How cells 'read' artificial ingredients tossed into genetic recipe

If the genome is the recipe of life, base pairs are the individual ingredients listed. These chemical structures form DNA, and every living organism on Earth has just four. The specific arrangements of these four base pairs -- A, T, C, G -- make us who and what we are.

So it was a big surprise when Scripps Research scientists revealed in 2014 that they could introduce two new, unnatural base pairs (they called them X and Y for short) into the genetic code of living bacteria in the lab. It was like two never-seen-before ingredients tossed into the recipe, hypothetically expanding the variety of dishes a cell can whip up.

Researchers immediately saw the potential applications: With more control and selection, they might be able to use cells as tiny kitchens to cook up new medicines and vaccines. But just because there are more letters in a genetic recipe doesn't mean the cell can read them, or knows what to do with them -- or that any of it works in the cells of organisms more complicated than bacteria.

In a study published June 17, 2021 in Nature Chemical Biology, a team led by researchers at Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences at University of California San Diego helped address these hurdles.

The team revealed that yeast cell machinery seamlessly "reads" the unnatural X and Y ingredients, the way it would A, C, T and G, and translates them into RNA, which could eventually be translated into proteins, the basis for just about every part of the cell. Unlike bacteria, yeast are eukaryotes, part of the same multicellular class of life as animals, plants and fungi. (A note about safety: These synthetic cells can't survive without special liquid food provided in the lab.)

"Now we can see exactly how eukaryotic cell machinery interacts with unnatural base pairs, but it's not perfect, there's room to improve in terms of selectivity and efficiency," said senior author Dong Wang, PhD, professor in the Skaggs School of Pharmacy. "It's our hope that this finding will have a profound impact in the field by enabling the design of more effective, next-generation unnatural base pairs."

Wang's lab has long studied RNA polymerase II, an essential enzyme found in every fungal, plant and animal cell. RNA Pol II reads the DNA recipe and helps convert the genetic code into messenger RNA. (That mRNA then carries that genetic recipe out of the nucleus and into the cytoplasm, where it's translated and used to assemble proteins as instructed.) In the past, the team has studied the structure of RNA Pol II and how it responds to normal genetic recipe hiccups such as DNA damage caused by radiation.

In their latest study, Wang's team revealed for the first time step-by-step what it looks like, structurally speaking, when eukaryotic RNA Pol II picks up and incorporates unnatural base pairs as it transcribes a piece of DNA. In doing so, they discovered, for example, that RNA Pol II is selective -- it can bind X or Y on one strand of a double-stranded DNA genome, but not the other.

"What we have now is a unique view of what is and what is not well recognized by RNA Pol II," said Wang, who is also professor at UC San Diego School of Medicine and Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry. "This knowledge is important for us to design new unnatural base pairs that can be used by host RNA polymerases."

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Co-authors of the study include: Juntaek Oh, Ji Shin, Wei Wang, Liang Xu, Jun Xu, Jenny Chong, UC San Diego; Ilona Christy Unarta, Xuhui Huang, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology; Aaron W. Feldman, Rebekah J. Karadeema, Ramanarayanan Krishnamurthy, Scripps Research; Floyd E. Romesberg, Synthorx.

This story has been published on: 2021-06-17. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
South Africa: Cele postpones Zandspruit feedback meeting

Due to a rise in COVID-19 infections in Gauteng, Police Minister Bheki Cele will today no longer engage in a feedback meeting with the residents of Zandspruit.

Cele was today due to engage the community on the improvement of service delivery by the police in the area.

The meeting was informed by the killing of eight youths on 17 May, in acts of vigilantism and criminality in Zandspruit.

Following the incident, the Minister met with community leadership structures to find out why some in this community took the law into their own hands.

The meeting revealed a trust deficit between residents and the police, brought about by numerous claims of rampant police corruption and overall substandard service delivery from the Honeydew police station, the Ministry said in a statement on Thursday.

As a way forward, Cele ordered a police task team to look at identified problems within the station and how service delivery can be improved.

The Ministry said Cele remains committed to returning to the area within a month in order to provide feedback to the residents on what has been done to enhance the stations performance and service delivery.

The Ministry of Police remains reassured that the South African Police Service in the province is hard at work on eradicating crime. It is encouraged about the progress made so far in arresting criminals through Operation Okae Molao, which targeted Zandspruit and surrounding areas, the police said.

The operation has seen over 350 suspects been arrested for various crimes including assault GBH, theft, fraud, possession of drugs and stolen goods, while another 204 illegal immigrants were also arrested and taken in for processing.  SAnews.gov.za

This story has been published on: 2021-06-18. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
South Africa: President Ramaphosa hails late Zambian leader Kenneth Kaunda

President Cyril Ramaphosa has described the passing of former Zambian President Kenneth Kaunda as a deep, sad loss.

KK, as he was affectionately known, passed away on Thursday at a military hospital in Lusaka after being admitted on Monday for an undisclosed illness.

The 97-year-old was also regarded as the countrys founding father after he became the nations first democratically elected President, after Zambia gained its independence in 1964.

We are united in our sadness with the Kaunda family, and the government and people of the Republic of Zambia.

President Kaunda dedicated his 97 long years to the liberation and service of the people of Zambia, said President Ramaphosa.

The President hailed KK for having devoted himself and the Zambian people, and supporting liberation movements around our region in their quest for independence and freedom.

Steadfast against the intimidation of the apartheid state, he offered Lusaka as the headquarters of the African National Congress (ANC) in exile. Under his leadership, Zambia provided refuge, care and support to liberation fighters who had been forced to flee the countries of their birth, he said.

Kaunda stood alongside the people of South Africa at the time of their greatest need and was unwavering in his desire for the achievement of their freedom.

It was in honour of this remarkable contribution that the South African government bestowed on President Kaunda the Order of the Companions of OR Tambo in 2002.

The Nelson Mandela Foundation has expressed sadness at Kaundas passing, saying the Zambian leader first met former President Nelson Mandela in 1962 during his travels through Africa to secure support for a nascent-armed struggle in South Africa.

He next saw him soon after his release from prison in February 1990, when he visited Lusaka at the start of another tour of the African continent. The two leaders then maintained a friendship which would endure until Madibas passing in 2013, it said.

In a statement on Thursday, the foundation said the 1990 visit to Lusaka was emblematic of the role Zambia played in South Africas liberation struggle under Kaundas leadership, as ANC headquarters were located in Lusaka for many years.

It said that Zambia paid a heavy price for its support, with the country suffering systematic destabilisation by the apartheid state.

We will not forget Kaundas contributions to the struggle against colonialism and apartheid, and the lessons his life holds for reflection on how democracy should be measured and how it can be deepened, said the foundation.  SAnews.gov.za

This story has been published on: 2021-06-18. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
South Africa: Sotyu highlights Importance of investing in land

Deputy Minister of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment, Makhotso Sotyu, has reiterated the urgency of investing in land, and enhancing partnerships to protect and restore natural ecosystems as part of the global recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic.

The pandemic is exacerbating economic, social and environmental problems such as poverty, poor health, lack of food security, biodiversity loss, water scarcity, reduced resilience to climate change and migration, amongst others.

Investing in healthy land as part of a green recovery is a smart economic decision, not just in terms of creating jobs and rebuilding livelihoods, but in terms of protecting economies against future crises caused by climate change and nature loss, the Deputy Minister Sotyu said.

Her remarks come as South Africa joined the international community on Thursday in marking the Desertification and Drought Day (DDD) under the theme: Restoration. Land. Recovery we build back better with healthy land.

South Africas landscape is composed of 91% of drylands making it susceptible to desertification, land degradation and drought.

It is for this reason that the government is committed to the rehabilitation, conservation and restoration of degraded landscapes by implementing the post economic recovery measures through the Presidential Stimulus Package.

Evidence suggest that a green stimulus package could offer growth potential for the economy through investment in green projects and programmes; employment creation and co-benefit effects, the Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment said.

These can be derived through restoration of degraded ecosystems and the conservation of the remaining intact ecosystems for the continued delivery of valuable services to livelihoods.

It is important to take into account that all ecosystems can be restored, rehabilitated or conserved. When it comes to the restoration of ecosystems, all actions and efforts at all levels matter. Degraded lands exacerbate drought, floods, water loss, extinctions, disease, conflicts and migration, while restoring them is a most cost-effective solution, Sotyu said.

Land restoration offers multiple pathways towards a green recovery and achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.

The department said tools to create healthier and more resilient societies and economies already exist, and include more responsible land governance, investments that protect and restore land, and coherent long-term policies and incentives.

As the foundation of all forms of life on earth, land supports the provision of ecosystem goods and services such as food, water, energy, resilience to climate, and reduce vulnerability to [the] spread of Zoonotic diseases. Despite all the benefits provided for by land, about 70% of global drylands are affected by desertification and land degradation.

However, the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) offers a new hope in the struggle against environmental problems, the department said. SAnews.gov.za

This story has been published on: 2021-06-18. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
South Africa: Call for integrated approach in dealing with illegal mining

North West Premier, Professor Tebogo Job Mokgoro, has called for strengthening the integrated approach towards combating illegal mining activities.

Mokgoro made the call during his visit to Matlosana Local Municipality following the discovery of 20 bodies of suspected illegal miners near Lawrence Parks mine ventilation shaft, which is no longer operational in Orkney, near Klerksdorp.

The Premier said the situation is unacceptable and calls for immediate action.

The situation calls for drastic, deliberate action that should happen almost immediately. I made it very clear that we have to strengthen our integrated approach towards dealing with illegal mining. Our efforts must be more sustainable and long lasting in terms of effectiveness.

We really believe that not sufficient role players have been taking part in operations. Going forward we will pull all resources together to combat, counter and eradicate this menace completely, Mokgoro said.

Before the inspection of the mine, the Premier, accompanied by Community Safety and Transport Management MEC Sello Lehari and Acting Provincial Commissioner General Dintletse Molefe, received a report on efforts by the South African Police Service, which include different operations geared towards dealing with illegal mining.

The reports painted a sophisticated operation by the heavily armed illegal miners in different Matlosana Municipality towns.

According to the report, over 50 people have been arrested in different operations, and gold material as well as firearms were seized. The suspects are still appearing in court.

Lehari said residents needs to work with the police to arrest those who are behind these operations which are problematic to the communities in the area.

Lehari said police are on high alert and investigation are on-going, with other police been deployed in the identified hotspots.

We are expecting more arrests soon. Residents must work with us and give us the necessary information. Thus far the information that came through is not enough.

We need to educate our people to work with the police and inform us because the perpetrators are part of our communities. Indeed an integrated will go a long way in dealing with the illegal miners, Lehari said.

The Premier said sustainable joint operations are expected to ensue in due course.  SAnews.gov.za

This story has been published on: 2021-06-18. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
South Africa: SA to participate in 8th Edition of Africa Public Service Day

Public Service and Administration Minister, Senzo Mchunu, will lead the South African delegation at the 8th annual Africa Public Service Day (APSD) conference to be held in Harare, Zimbabwe, from 21 to 23 June 2021.

During the three-day conference, the Minister will share developments in the countrys state of public service, development and governance practices.

This years APSD celebrations will be held at the Victoria Falls Conference Centre in Harare under the theme , Building the Africa we want through embracing an ethical culture that underpins purpose driven leadership in the context of a crisis.

The conference will see Ministers of some of the 55 African Union Member States responsible for Labour, Public and Civil Service, in their respective countries, converging to discuss the state of public service on the continent, governance issues, best practices and innovative ways on how to improve the effectiveness of the public service, amidst the COVID- 19 pandemic.

Discussions at the three-day conference will be phased along the following sub- themes:

- Celebrating the contribution of the public servant: a story of courage and resilience in the management of the COVID-19 Pandemic

- Embracing Cultural diversity as a lever to strengthen institutions for a responsive and ethical public administration

- Deploying technology to sustain and enhance service delivery in the face of this challenging COVID-19 pandemic climate

- Achieve inclusivity through harnessing Arts and culture, as instruments to inform markets and build demand side capacity for effective and efficient service delivery.

The APSD programme is also being observed in various countries as a week-long programme from 21- 25 June 2021, consisting of various activities, with the 3 day continental celebration being the kick-off event.

Locally, a programme comprising of a series of webinars will commence on 23 June, with a Dialogue on Youth Development in the Public Service, which will be preceded by a virtual showcasing and sharing of public service innovations unearthed in 2020 in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

This will be followed by a Dialogue on Frontline Service Delivery Monitoring, a webinar which seeks to create a platform for engagement, focusing on addressing the role of the public service and participatory governance and development of an efficient and effective developmental state.

The last event of the week will be a Master Class Webinar to be hosted by the National School of Government (NSG), where African public servants will be afforded an opportunity to critically reflect on their work and present urgent steps required to improve the effectiveness of the public service.

Information on these events will be shared on social media pages of the DPSA as well as the NSG.  SAnews.gov.za

This story has been published on: 2021-06-18. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
Hong Kong: 3 imported COVID-19 cases found

The Centre for Health Protection today said it is investigating three additional COVID-19 cases involving patients who arrived from Cyprus and Indonesia.

A total of 32 cases were reported in Hong Kong in the past 14 days, including three local cases, of which one is from an unknown source.

For information and health advice on COVID-19, visit the Governments dedicated webpage.

This story has been published on: 2021-06-18. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
Hong Kong: Bill for Open University gazetted

The Open University of Hong Kong (Amendment) Bill 2021 was gazetted today.

The bill seeks to amend the Open University of Hong Kong Ordinance to change the universitys title to Hong Kong Metropolitan University.

The Legislative Council Panel on Education was briefed on the legislative proposal on March 5 and indicated its support.

The bill will be introduced into the Legislative Council on June 23. If it is passed, the new title of the university will take effect on September 1.

This story has been published on: 2021-06-18. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
South Africa: Military health practitioners to assist Gauteng

Government has employed the help of the South African National Defence Force to fight the spread of COVID-19 in Gauteng, as the number of COVID-19 cases continues to peak.

After a conversation with the President and the Minister of Defence and Military Veterans, weve requested additional capacity to assist Gauteng, said Acting Health Minister, Mmamoloko Kubayi-Ngubane, on Friday.

Kubayi-Ngubane was updating media on the latest developments concerning the COVID-19 pandemic and the countrys vaccination rollout plan.

On Thursday, Gauteng recorded 7 502 new COVID-19 cases out of the 11 767 that were detected.

The Minister said government is concerned about the province, which is currently the country's epicentre.

In the meantime, the Minister said military personnel will also be involved in mass community testing, screening and contact tracing, and lending a hand at hospitals.

She announced that the military health service will deployed in Gauteng from today.

This will ensure that we can ease the burden of the healthcare workers in the province, where they are seriously under pressure, said Kubayi-Ngubane.

In addition, she said the closure of Charlotte Maxeke Johannesburg Academic Hospital continues to put undue pressure on the already strained healthcare system.

However, the department is working around the clock to bring the hospital into full functionality after the fire that gutted the facility in April.

The department has since issued a circular requesting that non-critical and non-urgent surgeries be postponed to pay attention to COVID-19 patients, while the province has managed to increase bed capacity to 4 000 from 3 000.

The Minister said South Africa has since surpassed the two million mark in terms of the number of people who have been vaccinated.

The higher the number of the people were able to vaccinate, the better we will manage the pandemic.

She has since called on people to not lower their guard but adhere to strict non-pharmaceutical protocols.  SAnews.gov.za

This story has been published on: 2021-06-18. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
South Africa: Over 100 houses allocated to District Six claimants

Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development Minister, Thoko Didiza, has announced that 108 housing units has been allocated to District Six claimants as part of Phase three of the District Six Redevelopment Project.

In a statement issued on Thursday, Didiza said a total of 139 claimants, who were dispossessed, have received their new homes in previous phases.

[On Friday] the Land Claims Commission will begin the administrative process of engaging with the 108 claimants who have been allocated dwellings. These claimants will be informed of the process and they will be able to view their allocated dwellings. They will also be given an opportunity to accept or reject the dwellings, Didiza said.

Didiza announced that the process of returning to District Six for the 108 claimants will take place from 24 June to 16 July 2021.

The Minister noted that a portion of the returning claimants are the originally dispossessed individuals, who applied for special needs, where applications were assessed by an Independent Selection Panel, followed by an appeal process.

The criteria included people who were originally dispossessed, age, those with ill health status and the most impoverished.

The Commission has received a total of 34 appeals and the process has been concluded. Other claimants to receive dwellings in this phase were selected from the official list in order of the date of lodgement. Since there are more than 1000 claimants who opted for dwellings, further redevelopment will be ensued, the Minister explained.

The houses in Phase 3 include a mix of apartments and houses that have been built along the original street network of District Six.

The homes have a minimum of three bedrooms and are designed to cater for family units, and allow for future expansion, to add more space by the users, if required.

Didiza said this was done to encourage as many of the originally dispossessed families to return to District Six, and to protect against gentrification.

The residential units are supported with public spaces, paved streets, and roads with street lighting and parking.

The roads comprise a series of low traffic streets linking to adjacent access routes, parking areas doubling up as play courts, with a mix of surface treatments, including permeable paving.

A new access route was constructed to link Hanover and Constitution Streets. Landscaping consists of trees and street furniture. The design has incorporated many of the original heritage elements of District Six to resonate with original character of this historic area, Didiza said.

The Minister said the construction of the remaining units will be carried out in two major build to be completed in August 2024, where all remaining claimants will be accommodated.  SAnews.gov.za

This story has been published on: 2021-06-18. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
Hong Kong: New bus franchises views sought

The Government invites members of the public to submit their views on the requirements of three new franchises for buses.

The current franchises of Citybuss Airport and North Lantau bus network and Long Win Bus Company will expire on May 1, 2023, and that of New World First Bus Services will expire on July 1, 2023.

The Government said today the three franchisees have indicated interests to apply for new 10-year franchises and it plans to engage them for discussion on the granting of new franchises upon expiry of the current ones.

According to the Public Bus Services Ordinance, the Chief Executive-in-Council may grant a company a franchise giving the right to operate a public bus service for a period not exceeding 10 years.

The ordinance also requires a franchisee to maintain a proper and efficient public bus service to the satisfaction of the Commissioner for Transport during the franchise period.

The Government noted the three companies have been providing proper and efficient bus services and have indicated that they are willing to continue to invest for further enhancement of the bus service.

The Government said it would endeavour to further enhance the quality of bus service and bus safety, noting that the operating environment of the bus industry in the foreseeable future is expected to be even more difficult owing to the rising operating costs and competition from other public transport modes.

The Legislative Councils Panel on Transport discussed the requirements of the new franchises for the three companies today.

Members of the public may put forth their views on the requirements of the three new franchises using an online form or by post to Bus & Railway Branch, Transport Department, 16/F, South Tower, West Kowloon Government Offices, 11 Hoi Ting Road, Yau Ma Tei, Kowloon, fax to 2802 2679 or email [email protected] on or before September 10.

This story has been published on: 2021-06-18. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
South Africa: Building a digital economy

The Department of Communications and Digital Technologies has embarked on a process to develop Data and Cloud Policy as one of the enablers of the digital economy.

Addressing the virtual colloquium on the Draft Data and Cloud Policy on Friday, Minister of Communication and Digital Technologies, Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams, emphasised the importance of building a digital economy, as it presents opportunities to create jobs.

The digital economy is driven by digitalisation, which is the use of digital technologies and digitised data to impact how work gets done, transform how customers and companies engage and interact, and create new (digital) revenue streams.

We believe data is the critical asset to set the digital economy in motion. We therefore did not decide to develop the Data and Cloud Policy to control and direct how it should be used, but rather as an enabler for social and economic development, Ndabeni-Abrahams said.

With skills development being a critical intervention to enable economic participation and inclusion, the policy reinforces the issue of skills and capacity development at different levels, including government to create a digitally transformed society through the implementation of National Digital and Future Skills Strategy published by the department in 2020.

As government, we also recognise the importance and availability of skills that exist outside State institutions, hence the policy proposal about the Data Advisory Council that will draw experts from government, private sector and academia, among others, to contribute towards certain aspects of data governance, including the development of standards relating to the management of data, the Minister said.

Ndabeni-Abrahams said the digital economy evolves at a faster pace and has the potential to render many innovations that are obsolete within a short period.

The policy asserts the role of the Department of Science and Innovation to lead South Africa Research and Development in collaboration with the department to accelerate inclusive economic growth, make the economy more competitive and improve peoples daily lives.

The policy further, propose the establishment of a dedicated research and development capacity, which is critical for the development of human capital to derive value from data and cloud and the establishment of world standard and reliable cyber-infrastructure, the Minister said.

She said the draft Data and Cloud Policy is also about reinforcing the acceleration of the rollout of digital infrastructure to reinforce a connected society.

It is also about the storage and, processing and digitisation of government data to create access for citizens, emerging businesses, government and even the private sector.

The government data referred to must be accessed data in useable form to innovate, develop digital products and services that improve the way we do business, interact with government and each other, support evidence-based policy-making and ultimately enhance service delivery by government, the Minister said.

Furthermore, it is about creating a feasible environment for data sharing and interoperability to strengthen cooperation and collaboration among government departments and state-owned enterprises to satisfy the unlimited needs of government and citizens.

The cooperation and collaboration is done through optimization of existing capacities and capabilities of other government and government institutions to create required capacity for data collection, storage and processing.

The draft policy also recognizes the need for data security and protection, hence its reinforcement of Cybersecurity protection of personal information, including the recommendation for review where necessary to support data protection and security and a data driven economy. It is about recognition of what already exists and implementing necessary enhancements to make it better, she said.

The Minister clarified the issue of data localisation by stating that government has a responsibility to the security and sovereignty of the Republic.

 As such, we unapologetically insist that Critical Information Infrastructure data (all ICT systems, data systems, databases, networks (including people, buildings, facilities and processes), that are fundamental to the effective operation of the Republic be stored within the borders of South Africa.

Kindly also note that there is no intention to force the private sector to store their data in the High-Performance Computing Data Processing Centre. We are clearly indicating that government data will be stored there, while we strengthen and preserve the confidentiality and security of the stored data in a manner that will encourage other parties to store their data there, the Minister said.  SAnews.gov.za

This story has been published on: 2021-06-18. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
South Africa: Suspects arrested for fraudulent vehicle registrations

Nine suspects are expected to appear in the Johannesburg Central Magistrates Court today for their involvement in registering stolen vehicles fraudulently in Gauteng.

The suspects, which were arrested on Thursday, are between the ages of 32 and 62-years-old.

The Hawks integrated team based in Cape Town that includes Serious Organised Crime Investigation, Serious Corruption Investigation and Road Traffic Management Cooperation (RTMC) made the arrests during a second leg of a project driven investigation.

The suspects were arrested from the three vehicle licensing departments where they worked as registration personnel in Roodepoort, Langlaagte and Krugersdorp (Mogale City) licencing departments.

This followed an in-depth investigation by the Hawks team, which identified several stolen vehicles, which had been fraudulently re-registered into the National Traffic Information System (Natis) as re-builds.

During the first leg of investigation eight syndicate members including their ring leaders, were dealt a major blow when they were arrested from February this year consecutively between Cape Town and Johannesburg.

It was further established that these employees from the department of transport allegedly aided the syndicate in ensuring that the stolen vehicles were re-registered.

The eighteenth suspect, a girlfriend to the Gauteng based ring leader was arrested on Wednesday for her alleged involvement in the syndicate.

She appeared in the Johannesburg Magistrate's Court yesterday and was released on R40 000.00 bail.

She is expected to appear in the same court again on the 23 July 2021.

All seventeen recovered vehicles that were sold to innocent and unsuspecting buyers and who purchased these vehicles from second-hand car-dealers, as well as on roadside car-sales through a gentlemens agreement, were seized and handed over to the rightful owners.

The National Head of the Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation, Lieutenant General Godfrey Lebeya lauded the elite investigating team for their exceptional skills.  SAnews.gov.za

This story has been published on: 2021-06-18. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
South Africa: Lesufi condemns shooting of Buyani Primary School principal

This story has been published on: 2021-06-18. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.

President Cyril Ramaphosa has expressed his deep sadness at the passing of Jabu Mabuza, describing him as an outstanding business leader. Mabuza, 63, passed away on Wednesday from complications associated with COVID-19. "The Presidents thoughts are with Mr Mabuzas family, friends, business associates, employees and members of his gl... See more
Sorghum, a close relative of corn, tested for disease resistance on Pennsylvania farms

With sorghum poised to become an important crop grown by Pennsylvania farmers, Penn State researchers, in a new study, tested more than 150 germplasm lines of the plant for resistance to a fungus likely to hamper its production.

Sorghum, a close relative to corn, is valuable for yielding human food, animal feed and biofuels. Perhaps its most notable attribute is that the grain it produces is gluten free. Drought resistant and needing a smaller amount of nutrients than corn to thrive, sorghum seems to be a crop that would do well in the Keystone State's climate in a warming world. But its susceptibility to fungal disease is problematic.

"In other locations where sorghum has been grown for a long time, it is attacked by a fungal pathogen that causes a disease called anthracnose leaf blight, which diminishes its yield," said study co-author Surinder Chopra, professor of maize genetics in the College of Agricultural Sciences. "We conducted a three-part experiment designed to evaluate the likelihood that anthracnose will be a problem with sorghum production in Pennsylvania, and what plants might resist the disease."

First, researchers carried out field surveys in 2011, 2012 and 2016 in six Pennsylvania locations to monitor the presence of the Colletotrichum fungus that causes anthracnose in commercial sorghum fields. They collected soil samples, plant samples and samples of the debris left by sorghum or corn, looking for the fungus at sites in Blair, Lancaster, Dauphin, Centre, Bedford and Lebanon counties.

Next, researchers grew 158 sorghum lines at Penn State's Russell E. Larson Agricultural Research Center at Rock Springs and tested them for vulnerability and resistance to the natural strains of anthracnose fungus. They obtained plant material for many of the sorghum lines from the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics, better known as ICRISAT, India.

Other sorghum lines came from varieties Chopra's research group has been breeding in plots at Rock Springs for years and are being tested for stress tolerance in another study. Still others came from sources such as the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Agricultural Research Service stations in Griffin, Georgia, Lincoln, Nebraska, and Lubbock, Texas; the Grain, Forage and Bioenergy Research Center, Texas A&M Agrilife Sorghum Breeding Program; and the National Plant Germplasm System.

Lastly, researchers conducted experiments in greenhouses on the University Park campus. They chose 35 sorghum lines that demonstrated resistance to the fungus in field trials and tested their responses after inoculating them with the pathogen. The team evaluated and scored those plants for the severity of anthracnose leaf blight that developed.

In findings recently published in Crop Science, Chopra and colleagues reported that the anthracnose leaf blight symptoms were observed on the older and senescent leaves in Pennsylvania. After evaluating, in field and greenhouse tests, the performance of the 158 experimental lines and commercial hybrids, the researchers noted that they discovered sources of resistance to anthracnose leaf blight.

"Many of those sorghum lines we tested had been improved in several states in the U.S. and in other parts of the world," Chopra said. "These should be useful in breeding programs targeted for Pennsylvania and for northeastern U.S. climatic conditions. Several lines received from ICRISAT showed the high level of resistance in the field."

The research was done in preparation for widespread cultivation of sorghum in Pennsylvania, at which time anthracnose leaf blight is expected to become a problem for farmers, Chopra explained.

"Our study is the first to investigate the frequency, diversity and distribution of Colletotrichum fungi species on sorghum in Pennsylvania, and the first to look for disease-tolerant strains that will grow best in the Northeast," he said. "Our findings will help develop better recommendations for sorghum growers so they can manage and proactively prevent the buildup of inoculum and resulting disease outbreaks."

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Also involved in the research were Iffa Gaffoor, former postdoctoral scholar in the Department of Plant Science at Penn State, advised by Chopra; German Sandoya, Everglades Research and Education Center/Horticultural Sciences Department, University of Florida; Katia Xavier, Lisa Vaillancourt and Etta Nuckles, Department of Plant Pathology, University of Kentucky; and Srinivasa R Pinnamaneni, Sorghum Breeding Program, ICRISAT, Patancheru, India.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture's National Institute of Food and Agriculture and the Fundacion Alfonso Martin Escudero for postdoctoral research provided funding for this work.

This story has been published on: 2021-06-18. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
New analysis discusses role of managed retreat as a climate change response

MIAMI--In a new analysis on managed retreat--the climate adaptation response of moving people and property out of harm's way--researchers explore what it would take for managed retreat to be supportive of people and their priorities. A key starting point is considering retreat alongside other responses like coastal armoring and not just as an option of last resort.

In a new paper in the journal Science, University of Miami (UM) Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science researcher Katharine Mach argues that managed retreat should be viewed as a proactive option that can support communities and livelihoods in the face of climate change.

"Managed retreat can be more effective in reducing risk--in ways that are socially equitable and economically efficient--if it is a proactive component of climate-driven transformations," said Mach, an associate professor in the Department of Environmental Science and Policy at UM Rosenstiel School. "It can be used to address climate risks, along with other types of responses like building seawalls or limiting new development in hazard-prone regions."

In the review paper, Mach and her colleague A.R. Siders from the University of Delaware reviewed the existing literature on the subject to argue that societies will be better prepared for intensifying climate change--such as more frequent and severe storms, flooding and sea-level-rise--if they consider the potential role of strategic and managed retreat.

"Communities, towns, cities and municipalities are making decisions now that affect the future," said Siders, a core faculty member in UD's Disaster Research Center and assistant professor in the Biden School of Public Policy and Administration and geography and spatial sciences. "If we're making these decisions now, we should also be considering all the options on the table right now, not just the ones that keep people in place."

Retreat is already happening in the U.S. and many parts of the world in the face of relatively moderate climate change and has happened throughout human history.

"Early conversations about managed retreat--and where, when, and why its use could be considered acceptable or not--substantially increase the likelihood that future climate retreat will promote societal goals," said Mach.

VIDEO: https:/ / www. youtube. com/ watch?v= irKluVmSk4o

In a related study in the Journal of Environmental Studies and Sciences, Mach and UM doctoral student Carolien Kraan conducted the first comprehensive overview of equity concerns that have been raised on voluntary property buyouts and provide policy options for addressing these concerns.

For example, they suggest that local governments involve residents in the buyout process from the start and provide homeowners with professional support to guide them through the process to reduce frustration.

"The article provides practitioners and researchers with a synthesis of policy options that are aimed at improving social justice outcomes in voluntary property buyout programs," said Kraan, a doctoral student at the UM Abess Center for Ecosystem Science and Policy.

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The review paper, titled "Reframing strategic, managed retreat for transformative climate adaptation," was published on June 18 in the journal Science.

The study, titled "Promoting equity in retreat through voluntary property buyout programs," was published May 11 in the Journal of Environmental Studies and Sciences. The authors include Jennifer Niemann from the UM Rosenstiel School, A. R. Siders from the University of Delaware and Miyuki Hino from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Funding for both studies was provided by the Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science and the Leonard and Jayne Abess Center for Ecosystem Science and Policy.

About the University of Miami's Rosenstiel School

The University of Miami is one of the largest private research institutions in the southeastern United States. The University's mission is to provide quality education, attract and retain outstanding students, support the faculty and their research, and build an endowment for University initiatives. Founded in the 1940's, the Rosenstiel School of Marine & Atmospheric Science has grown into one of the world's premier marine and atmospheric research institutions. Offering dynamic interdisciplinary academics, the Rosenstiel School is dedicated to helping communities to better understand the planet, participating in the establishment of environmental policies, and aiding in the improvement of society and quality of life. For more information, visit: http://www. rsmas. miami. edu and Twitter @UMiamiRSMAS

This story has been published on: 2021-06-18. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
Paderborn University hosts 'HEART'21'

The international IT symposium "Highly Efficient Accelerators and Reconfigurable Technologies" (HEART) will be held online this year, from June 21 to 23. The forum will explore the latest research findings on computer systems and methods in the context of hardware-accelerated high-performance computing (HPC). This time Paderborn is hosting the conference following Toronto and Nagasaki in previous years. The focus is on how to achieve the best computing performance and energy efficiency by using accelerators. Those who are interested have the opportunity to register at https:/ / events. uni-paderborn. de/ event/ 119/ registrations/ 81/ before the end of the symposium. Registered participants will also be able to access videos of most of presentations after the event. Presentations will be held in English.

Dr. Kosuke Tatsumura, chief research scientist at the Corporate Research and Development Center of the Toshiba Corporation, will give a keynote speech on "Large-scale combinatorial optimization in real-time systems by FPGA-based accelerators for simulated bifurcation." The subject is the optimization of real-time systems using FPGA-based accelerators. Professor Christian Plessl from Paderborn University, who is organizing the symposium, adds: "These freely programmable hardware building blocks are becoming more and more important. FPGAs - 'Field Programmable Gate Arrays' - are especially energy-efficient accelerators." The second keynote speech will be by Professor Torsten Hoefler from ETH Zurich. The researcher will talk about "Portable high-performance Python on CPUs, GPUs, and FPGAs." There will be a total of eight scientific presentations, a graduate forum, and a virtual poster session.

There will also be three special sessions on up-to-the-minute topics. Dr. Kentaro Sano and Dr. Tomohiro Ueno, both from RIKEN, Japan's largest research institution, are organizing a session on the challenges for infrastructure and system operations of FPGAs for HPC. The second session will address challenges for high performance computing that result from the growing user-hardware gap. This session is being organized by Professor Holger Froning from Heidelberg University and Dr. Felix Zahn from CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research. Mobile systems, edge computing and the Internet of Things are the focus of the third session, which will be led by Professor Smail Niar and Professor Ihsen Alouani, both from Universitye Polytechnique Hauts-de-France. Professor Marco Platzner, the program coordinator for the conference, explains, "These three special sessions will allow us to show that hardware-accelerated computing is a truly interdisciplinary topic, used everywhere from supercomputers to small computers in the Internet of Things (IoT)."

The symposium is being organized by the Paderborn Center for Parallel Computing (PC) at Paderborn University. Under its umbrella, scientists research the efficient use of supercomputers and operate high performance computer systems to serve university researchers throughout the entire Ostwestfalen-Lippe region. The high-performance computing center at Paderborn University is also part of the Association of National High-Performance Computing Centers (Verbund der Nationalen Hochleistungsrechenzentren, NHR). The event organization is supported by the Collaborative Research Center "On-the-Fly Computing," which is led by Paderborn University and funded by the German Research Foundation (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, DFG).

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More information and the full program can be found at https:/ / heart2021. uni-paderborn. de/ .

This story has been published on: 2021-06-18. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
Testing over the past week shows a 30 per cent positivity rate, pushing hospitals to the brink of collapse. The US embassy is placed under quarantine after it reports a major viral outbreak. Only 650,000 people have been vaccinated in a country of 38 million people.

Kabul (AsiaNews/Agencies)  Afghanistan is now in the frontline of the evolving COVID-19 pandemic in Asia, as the number of cases reaches a new high, putting great pressure on the countrys hospitals.

About 1,677 new cases of COVID-19 were reported in the last 24 hours but with only 4,711 people tested and a positivity rate holding at 30 per cent last week.

The official death toll is also rising with 101 on Wednesday and 87 on Thursday, for a total so far of 4,030.

With limited testing and a high positivity rate, many people believe that the real figures of the pandemic are underestimated.

The growing viral tide comes at a time of rising violence associated with the phased withdrawal of US and international troops.

The most serious situation is in Kabul, where local sources note that about 300 people are being hospitalised per day, most of them over the age of 40.

Afghanistan is at a crisis point in the battle to contain COVID-19, said Nilab Mobarez, acting President of the Afghan Red Crescent Society, in a statement released by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.

An outbreak has also been reported at the US Embassy in Kabul, the Afghan capital, which is coordinating the withdrawal of US troops set to be completed on 11 September. As a result, the entire legation and its staff has been placed under quarantine.

Meanwhile, Pakistan today decided to close its borders with Afghanistan by shutting down the Friendship Gate in the border town of Chaman.

The crossing is used by thousands of people who walk across every day. With the sudden decision to close, some have been stuck on the wrong side of the border.

The slow rollout of the vaccination campaign is also helping the virus to spread. Only 656,000 people have been vaccinated out of a population of 38 million, including 121,000 healthcare workers and 81,000 teachers.
by Silvina Premat

About 45 per cent of Chileans have been vaccinated, especially with Sinovac, but infections are at their highest since the outbreak of the pandemic. Of the 70 million doses administered in Brazil, 55 per cent are Chinese; yet the number of cases continues to rise. Peru is facing the same issue with Sinopharm. For CADAL researchers, suspicions about Chinese drugs are legitimate.

Buenos Aires (Asia News)  The number of people vaccinated against COVID-19 in Latin America is increasing at almost the same rate as the number of people infected. The case of Chile  the first country in the region to immunise 45 per cent of its population  is raising suspicions and questions about the effectiveness of Chinese vaccines in a continent where the pandemic has already claimed more than a million lives.

Chile began vaccinating on 3 February this year, relying mostly on CoronaVac, a vaccine made by Sinovac Biotech Ltd, a Chinese pharmaceutical company. However, nationwide infections and intensive care bed occupancy are currently at their highest level since the start of the pandemic.

Faced with doubts about the vaccines effectiveness, Chilean authorities released the results of a study that recorded the behaviour of 10.5 million people up to 14 days after receiving the second dose.

According to the study, CoronoVacs effectiveness in preventing symptomatic COVID-19 is 67 per cent; 85 per cent in cases that required hospitalisation, 89 per cent in cases that needed intensive care (ICU), and 80 per cent of cases prevented death. However, the effectiveness in preventing contagion is 54 per cent. Meanwhile, with one dose the efficacy is 16 per cent for symptomatic COVID-19, 35 per cent with hospitalisation and 40 per cent in death prevention.

We don't know if [the CoronaVac vaccine] protects against transmission, says their latest report (11 June) by ICOVID Chile, an initiative of the Universidad de Chile, the Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile and the Universidad de Concepcion, which analyses and reports on the COVID-19 situation in that country based on official data.

ICOVID Chile researchers warn that the effectiveness of the Sinovac vaccine against variants of the coronavirus reported in more than half of the latest cases in people under 50 years of age is unknown.

CoronaVac is also controversial in Brazil. The country of 200 million inhabitants has lost nearly half a million people to COVID-19. About 55 per cent of the 70 million doses administered so far come from the Sinovac vaccine whose effectiveness was criticised months ago by some Brazilian scientists.

However, the Brazilian Health Regulatory Agency (Anvisa) authorised its use, which found it effective in 50 per cent of overall cases and 100 per cent in moderate to severe cases of COVID-19. Still, President Jair Bolsonaro decided against it and on June 16 announced the purchase of 200 million doses of the American Pfizer.

The CoronaVac can be stored, it appears, for six months. Some people who received it have not developed antibodies. This vaccine has not been scientifically verified, said Bolsonaro, who is facing serious complaints about his government's handling of the pandemic.

The situation is also particularly serious in Peru where a political crisis has worsened the health situation. In one year the country has had two presidents and four health ministers. Out of a population of 32 million, Peru has reported more than 189,000 deaths related to COVID-19.

The vaccine from Chinas Sinopharm state laboratory accounts for about 35 per cent of those administered so far (about eight million) in a slow and uneven campaign. Some of Perus Amazonian and mountainous regions are not easily accessible and require special logistics to be reached. In total, 5 per cent of the Peruvian population has received two doses and 10 per cent one.

In addition to the vaccines from Sinopharm and Sinovac, several Latin American countries bought a vaccine from CanSino Biologics, a Chinese private laboratory, whose effectiveness is said to be 65 per cent effective in preventing symptomatic cases with a 90 per cent success rate against severe disease.

Politically, Chinas official discourse dismisses legitimate scientific suspicions aroused by its vaccines as an attempt at Western politicisation, say Juan Pablo Cardenal and Alfonso Canal, researchers with CADAL, the Centro para la Apertura y el Desarrollo de America Latina (Centre for Opening and Development in Latin America). However, The evidence that suspicions about Chinese vaccines are not a Western bias is the fact that the Russian vaccine, evaluated and approved like the others, has not been criticised.
by Vladimir Rozanskij

Evidence presented to the International Criminal Court. Uyghurs, who seek refuge in the former Soviet republic, are returned to the Chinese and end up in the Xinjiang concentration camps. The triangulation with Turkey. In exchange, the Tajiks obtain a loan to build a highway between the capital and the border with China.

Moscow (AsiaNews) - The lawyers of some Uyghur refugees yesterday presented a dossier to the International Criminal Court (CPI) in The Hague with evidence that shows how the Tajik government collaborates with China in the repression of the Turkish-speaking minority of Islamic faith.

Dushanbe returns many Uyghurs who seek refuge in Tajikistan to Beijing. Repatriated asylum seekers are arrested and sent to "correctional camps" in Xinjiang, where over one million Muslim citizens are reportedly detained for "re-education".

The complaint was published by Radio Azattyk, which reports that the lawyers have documented not only the Tajiks collaboration, but also of other countries such as Cambodia. China does not recognize the authority of the ICC, to which about 80 UN states refer. Beijing continues to argue that the camps mentioned are only centres for "vocational training", without any form of violence used against those who are in them.

According to Kyrgyz human rights activists, represented by lawyers at the ICC, the forced isolation of Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Kyrgyz and other Islamic minorities, such as the Chinese of the Hui ethnic group, is enacted. In this way, the Chinese government is implementing an aggressive policy of eradicating Islam from its own and surrounding territories.

Tajikistan and Cambodia are part of the ICC, and for this reason they have been denounced, as explained by Rodney Dixon, one of the lawyers of Uyghur refugees illegally repatriated to China. Tajikistan would be one of the states where the evidence of such violations would be more evident, allowing the presentation of a case with solid foundations. The denunciation was also joined by the government in exile of East Turkestan, a region that refers to part of the Tajik territory and Xinjiang, according to the ancient Persian denomination, also referred to in some ancient sources as Uiguristan, Mogulistan or Kashgarja.

The text of the complaint states that "the members of the China Social Security Office in Tajikistan entrust the local police with the task of carrying out roundups in the neighborhoods where the Uyghur refugees live and work".

They detain those who do not have all their documents in order, who are then forcibly repatriated to China in groups of 10 people at a time, "trying not to attract the attention of the international community".

According to the complaint, in the last 10 years the number of Uyghur refugees in Tajikistan has decreased from 3 thousand to about 100: most were deported between 2016 and 2018. Tajikistan has helped Chinese secret services organize the extradition of Uyghur refugees also from Turkey, providing the logistical bases for these operations.

The case of one woman, Zinettgul Tursun, repatriated in 2019 with her two young daughters from Turkish territory to China via Tajikistan is cited. Stopping in the Turkish city of Izmir, Tursun was boarded on the Istanbul-Dushanbe flight. Two Tajik passengers allegedly noticed the mother with her daughters, and then testified that they had seen her handed over to the Chinese police upon arrival at the Dushanbe airport.

In exchange, and perhaps also to encourage the transfer of unwanted people, the Chinese government has granted the government of Tajikistan a credit of 171 million euros for the reconstruction and modernization of the highway that connects Dushanbe to Chorug, a mountain city in the Pamir up to the Kulma pass (over 4 thousand meters high) on the border with China.

The project was announced on June 16 in the lower house of the national parliament by the Tajik Transport Minister, Azim Ibrohim. The work will be carried out by a Chinese company; the transport of materials through the new check point will not be subject to customs duties. The minister did not specify how many specialists or simple workers will come from China for the jobs, which will also go to several Tajik workers. The Dushanbe-Kulma route is essential for trade relations between China, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Afghanistan.
Shanghai (Gasgoo)- HYCET Technology Co.,Ltd. (HYCET), an automotive component manufacturer and a wholly-owned subsidiary of Great Wall Motor (GWM), saw its 10 millionth engine roll off the production line on June 17, becoming the first Chinese automotive engine maker that achieved the milestone.

Photo credit: Great Wall Motor



The significant product is a 1.5-liter turbocharged GDI (gasoline direct injection) engine code-named 4B15C. It can churn out up to 135kW and 275Nm of peak torque, and features a minimum fuel consumption rated at 218.2 g/kWh, according to GWM. It adopts a host of cutting-edge technologies such as continuously variable valve lift, variable-geometry turbocharger, thermal management module, and exhaust manifold integrated into cylinder head.

Li Jian, the director of HYCETs research institute said HYCET will continue the iterations and upgrades for its products to cover the mainstream emission range from 1.5L to 3.0L, and embraces the naturally aspirated and the turbocharged, the conventional and hybrid powertrains, as well as the high and the low power outputs.

Based on diversified car usage scenarios, HYCET is developing engines compatible with multiple kinds of powertrain architectures. Over the next three years, the company will roll out 23 engine models powered by gasoline, diesel, synthetic fuel and hydrogen, and riding on the platforms of EG, EB, EC, EN, EZ, and ED6.

It is worth noting that HYCET will launch its first HEV (hybrid electric vehicle)-dedicated engine with a thermal efficiency of 45% plus in 2023. Adopting HYCET's second-generation hybrid combustion engine, this engine can pump out 110kW and 240 Nm of torque.
Shanghai (Gasgoo)- In the 14th five-year plan period (2021-2025), China will work harder to strengthen traditional areas of weakness such as software and the core technologies and materials related to automotive chips, Guo Shougang, deputy director of the Equipment Industry Department I of China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, said on June 18 at the 2021 China Auto Forum.



Guo Shougang, deputy director of the Equipment Industry Department I of China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology; photo credit: 2021 China Auto Forum



Meanwhile, the country will also move faster on making breakthroughs in emerging industries like high-safety power battery, highly efficient electric drive system, basic computing platform, and operating system, according to Mr. Guo's speech.

Another mission Chinese auto industry assumes for the 2021-2025 period is to speed up its transition to electrification, connectivity, and intelligence. To achieve this goal, China will make greater efforts to construct the infrastructures for EV charging, battery swapping, hydrogen refueling, and LTE-V2X communications, make vehicles fully electrified in public service areas, improve relevant policies to further facilitate the use of NEVs (new energy vehicles), and boost the demonstration of ICV (intelligent-connected vehicle) testing, said Mr. Guo.

To provide a better environment for industrial development, China will deepen the reforms to streamline administration and delegate power, improve regulation, and upgrade services in car production field, orderly remove caps on contract manufacturing, and intensify the regulation on product safety, cybersecurity, and data safety, according to Guo.

He noted that Chinese auto industry is in an important period of strategic opportunities. China has reaped early-mover advantages in auto electrification, and its edge in information and communications technologies can greatly benefit the development of auto connectivity and intelligence. However, challenges have also changed due to the counter-current globalization, rising instabilities and uncertainties in industrial development, and fiercer market competition.

In the era of software defined vehicle, China should develop its own unified, open-source operating system for smart vehicles, as well as an independent and controllable industrial system for automotive-grade chips, Miao Wei, former minister of the MIIT, said at the forum.

Meanwhile, Mr. Miao also suggested that China should foster world-class companies for the development of semiconductors and integrated circuits. The firms from industries like transportation, electronic communications, Internet, and automobile should join hands to promote the strategic development of the 5G V2X-enabled intelligent-connected vehicles.
A taskforce of bright young students is offering local charities and non-profits free support over the coming year.

Satisfied customers of 180 Degrees Consulting Bristol include Bristol City Council, We The Curious science museum, Age UK Bristol and the Make A Wish Foundation.

Third sector organisations come to the University of Bristol society with an issue that needs solving and are allocated a team of six students.

The students use their diverse skills to research the organisation, the industry in which it works and the particular issue before coming up with a series of innovative solutions which they present to the organisations senior management.

180 Degrees Consulting Bristol also has dedicated graphic design and data analytics departments.

Since it launched a year and a half ago, the group has taken on 67 pro bono consultancy projects around the world.

Successful projects include finding new ways to increase footfall at Ashton Court Estate, developing a strategy to plant 20 million trees in Uganda and helping build a distribution facility for period pads in Beirut, Lebanon.

Kay Libby, Co-Chief Executive of Age UK Bristol, praised the students proactive, helpful and friendly approach, which has helped them with financial planning, fundraising, communications, virtual activities and social media.

She also spoke about the students on BBC Radio Bristol, saying: I would not hesitate to recommend their services to other voluntary organisations; they have made real and demonstrable improvements to the way that we work.

Gestures From the Heart, a Lebanese charity distributing food boxes and essential supplies to the elderly, said: After the Beirut blast everything was extremely bad and painful. We were lost and we lost hope, suddenly came a beautiful team of young, dynamic and extremely motivated people.

They were like a ray of hope that came at the right time. They were ready to help and make a difference in peoples lives without even knowing them. It was enough to get us back up on our feet and continue what we started.

The Bristol team also worked with then-High Sheriff of Bristol, Dr John Manley, on AskingBristol, which helps charities and community groups in Bristol ask for time, spaces, expertise, money and more from local individuals and organisations.

Dr Manley said: The quality and enthusiasm of the volunteers we received from 180 Degrees Consulting Bristol is extraordinary and they have proved to be an absolutely critical part of the team and its operation.

Each team of students is allocated a professional mentor from one of their corporate partners, which includes the likes of EY & Lancia Consult, who offers guidance throughout the project and helps develop the students skills.

180 Degrees Consulting is the worlds largest university-based consultancy with branches in more than 35 countries stretching from Cairo to California and Stockholm to Seoul.

The Bristol branch was named the Most Innovative Branch Worldwide 2020 at the Global Awards Ceremony last year, ranking first of 150 branches in their very first year of operation.

The branch was set-up by University of Bristol Economics and Finance student Jack Elliott.

He said: We launched the Bristol branch of 180 Degrees Consulting with the view of leveraging the talent at Bristol University to support charitable organisations driving social impact - and its been incredible to see the impact weve had already both in the local community and internationally.

Were looking to hear from any social impact organisation with problems that need solving or ambitions they want help making a reality. If youre interested in working with one of our strategy, data science or graphic design teams you can contact us directly at bristol@180dc.org.

The branch is also open to University of Bristol students looking to volunteer as management consultants this summer.

The branch will be working with Indian NGOs for the first time, following the impact of the second wave of COVID-19.

Apply to join 180 Degrees Bristol here: https://airtable.com/shrwg4mVm5WOV50PR
China-Africa solidarity, cooperation raise hope of overcoming COVID-19 globally

Xinhua) 16:25, June 17, 2021

Medical supplies donated by China are unloaded from a plane at Robert Mugabe International Airport in Harare, Zimbabwe, on May 11, 2020. (Xinhua/Zhang Yuliang)

"China has walked its talk with African countries and other developing countries around the world in an effort to manage this pandemic," said Cavince Adhere, a Kenya-based international relations scholar.

"Countries cannot act in compartments. They must be willing to shed off the tag of nationalism and begin to speak in a language that resonates with the cross-border challenges that we're facing today," he added.

NAIROBI, June 17 (Xinhua) -- Thursday marks the one-year anniversary of the Extraordinary China-Africa Summit on Solidarity against COVID-19, which has delivered an important message to the world that countries must stand together to rein in the devastating pandemic before it causes further harm.

Chinese President Xi Jinping, when addressing the summit on June 17, 2020, said that in the face of COVID-19, China and Africa have enhanced solidarity and strengthened friendship and mutual trust, reaffirming China's commitment to its longstanding friendship with Africa.

As the war against the coronavirus continues, especially when new waves of COVID-19 infections hit some parts of the world, the China-Africa solidarity throws light on the right way to fight a common enemy of mankind.

RUSH TO WHERE NEEDED

During the extraordinary summit last year, Xi said people and their lives must be put front and center, and that China and Africa should do whatever it takes to protect people's lives and health.

As the developing world is still facing a huge vaccination gap due to a dire shortage of vaccines, China has been trying its best to supply vaccines to where they are most urgently needed, having donated vaccines to more than 80 developing countries.

China has pledged to make COVID-19 vaccines a global public good. Currently, more than 30 African countries have received or will receive Chinese vaccines.

In Cameroon, Antoinette Fatimatu, a 38-year-old nurse who conducts COVID-19 tests at the Yaounde General Hospital, said the most difficult part of her job is to tell people they are positive for COVID-19. "I have seen people die within days after I test them positive. I need protection and can't wait to be vaccinated," her colleague Judith Maya told Xinhua.

China's Sinopharm vaccines are seen at an airport in Yaounde, Cameroon, April 11, 2021. (Photo by Jean Pierre Kepseu/Xinhua)

In April, Cameroon received its first batch of COVID-19 vaccines when 200,000 doses of China's Sinopharm vaccines arrived.

In Zimbabwe, 65-year-old Deborah Birch, who has an underlying condition, took her first jab of a Chinese vaccine in March. "I am confident that I have taken the Chinese vaccine," she said.

China also supports its own vaccine manufacturers in transferring technologies to other developing countries and carrying out joint production with them.

Last month, Egypt received from China the first batch of raw materials to locally manufacture the Sinovac vaccine with the target of producing 40 million doses within a year.

Airport staff members transport the first batch of Chinese Sinovac vaccine raw materials unloaded from a plane at the Cairo International Airport in Cairo, Egypt, May 21, 2021. (Xinhua/Sui Xiankai)

STANDING SHOULDER TO SHOULDER

China and Africa have stayed committed to fighting COVID-19 together. After the Chinese city of Wuhan reported its first infections, leaders of more than 50 African countries offered sympathies and provided support to China's anti-virus fight.

The goodwill and kind gesture by African countries have been returned with China's ensuing support.

In February, Equatorial Guinea became the first African country to receive Chinese vaccine aid.

In March, China agreed to expand and modernize the Juba Teaching Hospital so as to offer better medical services in South Sudan, a country that has suffered from years of conflict.

Members of the Chinese medical expert team communicate with local frontline health workers at a COVID-19 testing facility in Juba, South Sudan, Aug. 21, 2020. (Chinese Embassy in South Sudan/Handout via Xinhua)

At the Yaounde Gynaeco-Obstetric and Pediatric Hospital of Cameroon, Chinese medical team members have been helping with medical training for local staff.

"From the start of the pandemic until now, we feel the presence of the Chinese medical team alongside the Cameroonian team to effectively contain this pandemic," Nsom Mba Charles, deputy director-general of the hospital, told Xinhua.

Data showed that 46 Chinese medical teams in Africa have been mobilized for Africa's response efforts. China also sent 15 ad hoc medical expert teams to Africa and swiftly set up a cooperation mechanism for Chinese hospitals to pair up with 43 African hospitals.

Workers work on the construction site of the China-aided future headquarters of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, June 2, 2021. (Xinhua/Michael Tewelde)

In December 2020, construction of the Chinese-aided headquarters project for the Africa CDC commenced. Fantahun Hailemichael, project coordinator at the African Union, said the landmark project, presently progressing smoothly, is a generous gift to the 1.3 billion people in Africa.

"The Africa-China partnership is very strong and we hope it will last for a very long period of time. This will continue because it's based on trust and mutual interest. It can not be shaken by events or circumstances," Hailemichael said.

COMMUNITY OF HEALTH FOR ALL

During last year's summit, Xi called for building a China-Africa community of health for all and pledged that once the development and deployment of COVID-19 vaccine is completed in China, African countries will be among the first to benefit.

Last month, at the Global Health Summit, Xi said that confronted by a pandemic like COVID-19, we must champion the vision of building a global community of health for all and tide over this trying time through solidarity and cooperation.

To Cavince Adhere, a Kenya-based international relations scholar, China has demonstrated its tangible commitments to assist Africa, as China has really been offering the continent therapeutics, epidemic control information and vaccines.

A woman receives her first jab of Sinovac COVID-19 vaccine at Mbare Polyclinic in Harare, capital of Zimbabwe, April 14, 2021. (Xinhua/Tafara Mugwara)

"China has walked its talk with African countries and other developing countries around the world in an effort to manage this pandemic," Adhere said, noting that China is also the first country to assist Africa with local production of vaccines.

"I think the spirit of shared humanity that is being fronted by China is something that is very progressive and has seen a lot of valued acceptance and resonance around the world," Adhere said, adding, "Countries cannot act in compartments. They must be willing to shed off the tag of nationalism and begin to speak in a language that resonates with the cross-border challenges that we're facing today."

(Web editor: Shi Xi, Liang Jun)
Framing Chinese-U.S. competition as contest between systems undermines Washington's interests: media

Xinhua) 08:30, June 18, 2021

A cyclist rides by the Lincoln Memorial at the National Mall in Washington D.C., the United States, June 12, 2021. (Photo by Ting Shen/Xinhua)

NEW YORK, June 17 (Xinhua) -- The dangers of conceiving of U.S.-Chinese competition as a global contest between systems outweigh the benefits to Washington, an article published by Foreign Affair on Friday has said.

This good-versus-evil rhetoric, framed by U.S. President Joe Biden's administration, creates a permissive domestic environment for xenophobia, anti-Asian racism, and violence against anyone perceived as foreign, said the article titled "The Clash of Systems -- Washington Should Avoid Ideological Competition With Beijing."

According to the article, casting U.S.-Chinese competition as a contest between systems also undermines Washington's ability to engage productively with a wide range of governments in Asia and beyond.

The true sources of China's foreign policy influence are not ideological, said the article, noting that around the world, Beijing's "no strings attached" assistance has avoided ideological conditions.

Take China's behavior in Southeast Asia as an example, it reveals no favoritism toward political system with similar ideological foundations, it said.

The article added that over the last two decades, the Communist Party of China has built contacts with more than 400 political parties in over 160 countries.

(Web editor: Shi Xi, Liang Jun)
U.S.-China trade imbalance is improving: Forbes

Xinhua) 08:27, June 18, 2021

Containers of China COSCO Shipping Corporation Limited are seen at the Port of Long Beach in Los Angeles County, the United States, Feb. 27, 2019. (Xinhua/Li Ying)

That picture clearly shows a moderation in U.S. imports from China and an acceleration in U.S. exports to China, said Milton Ezrati, a senior economic strategist, noting that what is "clear in the figures is Beijing's compliance with the trade deal hammered out between it and Washington in 2019 and sealed just before the onset of the pandemic."

WASHINGTON, June 17 (Xinhua) -- America's trade with China has vastly moved away from its former state of imbalance, U.S. business magazine Forbes said in a recent article.

The pandemic obscured the picture of bilateral trade in 2020, but now that the impact of the virus is diminishing in both countries, "some statistical clarity has emerged," Milton Ezrati, a senior economic strategist who authored the article published Tuesday, said of trade data newly released by U.S. Commerce Department.

The Commerce Department says 2018 saw the worst bilateral trade deficit with China, when China sold America 419 billion U.S. dollars more in goods than the United States sold in China. "As of the first three months of 2021, that difference was running at a 284 billion dollar annual rate, sill a huge deficit but a correction -- if that is the right word -- of about a third," he said.

A man selects toys at a Walmart supercenter in New York, the United States, May 30, 2019. (Xinhua/Wang Ying)

That picture clearly shows a moderation in U.S. imports from China and an acceleration in U.S. exports to China, Ezrati said, noting that what is "clear in the figures is Beijing's compliance with the trade deal hammered out between it and Washington in 2019 and sealed just before the onset of the pandemic."

U.S. exports to China are growing. According to the text of that agreement, China effectively promised to buy more American products from a rather long list that the Commerce Department monitors monthly, Ezrati said, and the Asian country has delivered.

"On this score, the statistics speak loudly. Since the deal was signed, U.S. goods exports to China have risen at almost a 14.5 percent annual rate, far faster than the 0.6 percent yearly growth in all U.S. exports during this time and also faster than the 1.25 percent annual growth of U.S. exports to China during the three years prior to the deal," Ezrati added.

(Web editor: Shi Xi, Liang Jun)
China deals heavy blow to telecom, internet fraud

Xinhua) 08:42, June 18, 2021

Photo taken on June 3, 2021 shows a police officer sharing information on how to identify and prevent telecom and internet fraud with local residents at a community in Shijiazhuang City of north China's Hebei Province. (Xinhua/Yang Shiyao)

BEIJING, June 17 (Xinhua) -- The January to May period this year saw public security authorities across China uncover 114,000 telecommunications and internet fraud cases, dealing a heavy blow to such offenses.

The figure represented a 60.4 percent increase year on year, according to a Ministry of Public Security press conference on Thursday.

The number of captured criminal suspects in relation to the offenses was 154,000 during the period, up 146.5 percent year on year.

Also due to the persuasion of public security agencies, about 7.71 million individuals did not fall for fraud.

With the rapid growth of telecom and internet scams being curbed, around 84,600 such cases were newly registered in May nationwide, down 14.3 percent month on month, official data showed.

(Web editor: Shi Xi, Liang Jun)
China's top court specifies rules for online litigation

Xinhua) 08:44, June 18, 2021

File photo shows that a judge demonstrates a simulated online hearing at the Beijing Internet Court in Beijing. (Xinhua/Ju Huanzong)

BEIJING, June 17 (Xinhua) -- China's Supreme People's Court (SPC) on Thursday issued a set of rules for courts to handle online litigation, in an effort to promote and regulate digital litigation services.

The rules stipulate that online litigation has the same legal effect as that filed on paper, and provide that the litigation rights of the parties concerned are fully protected in the process.

The document lists five types of cases suitable for online litigation and stresses that such litigation should be conducted on a legal and consensual basis.

Liu Zheng, an SPC official, said online litigation is being promoted for the convenience of the public, reducing the cost of dispute resolution and ensuring judicial fairness.

China's courts have seen judicial services available online over the past few years. From Jan. 1, 2020 to May 31, 2021, the courts nationwide completed a total of 6.51 million mediations on the internet and held over 1.28 million virtual courts, according to Li Shaoping, SPC vice president.

The rules will be put into force on Aug. 1.

(Web editor: Shi Xi, Liang Jun)
Practices to form cliques, follow bloc politics will never succeed

08:53, June 18, 2021 By Zhong Sheng ( People's Daily

The Group of Seven (G7) recently wrapped up a summit and issued a joint communique in which it made irresponsible and false statements on issues related to Chinas Xinjiang, Hong Kong and Taiwan, viciously slandered China, and interfered in Chinas domestic affairs.

Such act runs counter to the purposes and principles of the UN Charter and the trend of the times of peace, development and win-win cooperation. It exposes the bad intentions of the United States and a few other countries to deliberately create antagonism and widen differences.

When the world is still challenged by the rampant COVID-19 pandemic, sluggish economic recovery and climate change, the United States and a few other countries have failed to deliver outstanding governance, and are trapped in an anti-China paranoia. The international society is very much disappointed by the G7 summit this time, and has expressed deep concerns and dissatisfaction over the practice of the United States and a few other countries.

Spanish newspaper Rebelion said in an article that the G7 was only working to maintain its hegemony and never cared about how the world could be made better. Former UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown even called the G7 summit an unforgiveable moral failure.

The United States and a few other countries did everything they could to slander China and build an image of unity during the G7 summit, but as American media said, few countries responded with passion. The reason is simple: lies are lies.

More and more far-sighted personages from the international community have realized that the implementation of the national security law in Hong Kong and measures to improve the special administrative regions electoral system are helpful for the long-term stability of the one country, two systems principle and have been supported by most of Hong Kong citizens. The Chinese governments Xinjiang policies are also supported by people of all ethnic groups in the autonomous region as the policies have further consolidated social stability, ethnic unity and peoples livelihood there. On Taiwan question, the one-China principle is a common aspiration of the international society, and any remarks and practices that support the Taiwan independence forces would never be allowed by international justice.

Russian President Vladimir Putin recently expressed his support for China on issues related to Xinjiang and Taiwan, which reflected the mainstream opinion of the international society.

The noises made by the G7 summit fully exposed the dangerous intentions of the United States and a few other countries to form cliques, follow bloc politics, and oppress other development modes guided by different ideologies.

There is only one system and one order in the world: the international system with the UN at the core and the international order based on international law. There is only one set of rules: the basic norms of international relations based on the purposes and principles of the UN Charter. At present, the international society faces an urgent need to reinforce solidarity and cooperation and practice genuine multilateralism under the banner of the UN.

The United States and a few other countries, being addicted to confrontation games, would only annoy the international society and be opposed by it. Their unilateral practices would only undermine international rules and orders.

In recent years, the necessity of existence of the G7 has been constantly questioned, due to a drop of its international presence, as well as its improper mentality on how it views the world. This point has been once again indicated by the G7 summit this time.

Volker Tschapke, honorary president of the Prussian Society, pointed out that from a global point of view, the G7 is a forum of the old times, and these countries cant solve the problems of the world on behalf of the global population.

Gulf News of the United Arab Emirates recently posted an article titled Why an Outdated G7 is No Longer Relevant. It stressed that good versus evil will not cut it in this age, adding that it will only make the G7 meeting another ceremonial photo-op event.

The polarization of the world and the democratization of international relations are an irresistible trend of the times. Todays world is no longer a place where a country, or a group of countries can decide everything. Any practice to form cliques or follow bloc politics runs counter to the trend of the times and will never succeed.

The United States and a few other countries shall find a remedy to their mental illness, get rid of Cold War mentality, abandon the attempt to recover their descending influence by establishing imaginary enemies, and do something that is really helpful for the international society.

(Zhong Sheng is a pen name often used by Peoples Daily to express its views on foreign policy.)

(Web editor: Hongyu, Liang Jun)
China to improve medical rehabilitation services capacity

Xinhua) 08:56, June 18, 2021

An elderly man undertakes rehabilitation training at the Tangshan Anxin Medical Pension Manor in Guye District of Tangshan City in north China's Hebei Province, March 24, 2021. (Xinhua/Mu Yu)

BEIJING, June 17 (Xinhua) -- Chinese authorities have issued a circular to improve the capacity of medical rehabilitation services, to provide comprehensive services for its people at all stages of life.

The document, jointly issued by the National Health Commission and seven other departments, sets the goal of establishing a professional medical rehabilitation team by 2022.

It also urges efforts to ensure eight rehabilitation physicians and 12 rehabilitation therapists for every 100,000 people by 2025.

The document also calls for strengthening the construction of rehabilitation hospitals and the departments of rehabilitation medicine at general hospitals, requiring at least one rehabilitation hospital at or above Grade II in every provincial capital and every prefecture-level city with a permanent population of more than 3 million.

(Web editor: Shi Xi, Liang Jun)
China's space station core module receives first group of residents

(Global Times) 08:58, June 18, 2021

As the three astronauts of the Shenzhou-12 manned spacecraft crewsuccessfully moved into the Tianhe space core module at 6:48 pm Thursday, following the epic rendezvous and docking with the orbiting destination in a rapid and automated fashion, Chinese people have entered its own space station for the first time in history.

It was a much shorter and more enjoyable ride for Chinese veteran astronaut Nie Haisheng when he embarked on his third space trip on Thursday morning. The Shenzhou-12 manned spacecraft, in which Nie and his two fellow crew members were traveling, pulled off the country's first-ever automated rapid rendezvous and docking for a manned spacecraft with the orbiting Tianhe space station core module at 3:54 pm on Thursday, just 6.5 hours after the former was launched Thursday morning on the Long March-2F Y12 carrier rocket from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in Northwest China's Gansu Province, the Global Times learned from the China Manned Space Agency (CMSA) on Thursday.

Three Shenzhou-12 astronauts, Tang Hongbo, Nie Haisheng and Liu Boming (from left) salute after entering the Tianhe core module on Thursday. Photo: Xinhua

As some may wonder why it took a few hours to enter the space station's core cabin after docking, Pang Zhihao, a Beijing-based senior space expert, told the Global Times that after Shenzhou-12's docking with the core cabin, a series of tests were conducted by the astronauts, including sealing and locking tests, leak detection, pressure balance, and air purification.

"The process takes about one to two hours each time, sometimes longer," Pang explained.

Based on the mission plan, the three new residents would conduct brief checks of their new home and rest after a long day of travel. On Friday, they are projected to open the door of Tianzhou-2 cargo craft and unbox their supplies that had arrived ahead.

The crew's smooth arrival marks yet another significant milestone in China's progress in the field of manned space travel, with the first linear complex, comprised of the Tianhe core cabin in the middle, and Shenzhou-12 manned ship and Tianzhou-2 cargo ship each at one end, now completed.

The Shenzhou-12 manned spacecraft and the Tianhe core module complete the rapid autonomous rendezvous and docking. Photo: Xinhua

The mission's launch was broadcast live on CCTV, the country's state broadcaster, and also livestreamed on China's social media platforms on Thursday morning, drawing hundreds of millions of views and soon topping the trending list on China's Twitter-like Sina Weibo.

Thrilled netizens, after five years of waiting since the last batch of astronauts visited space in 2016, brought the online community into a state of frenzy as they watched the three astronauts boarding the Shenzhou-12 spaceship.

Footage from the surveillance camera installed in the craft's cabin showed that the crew looked calm and relaxed, as Nie Haisheng, sitting in the middle with his legs crossed, waved at the camera with a big smile on his face.

Tang Hongbo, who had never traveled to space before, seemed more curious and playful. He played with a pen to test the weightless environment in space, and occasionally looked outside the window for his first glimpse of the vast universe.

Liu Boming, who had traveled with Shenzhou-7 into the space, was seen reading on paper materials most of the ride and he also gestured OK to the camera with ease.

The crewed spacecraft Shenzhou-12, atop a Long March-2F carrier rocket, is launched from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China's Gobi Desert, June 17, 2021. (Xinhua/Ju Zhenhua)

Emphasis on speed, safety

Compared with the previous Shenzhou series, the new model has greatly shortened the time of its space travel from launch to docking, reducing the duration from over 40 hours in the Shenzhou-11 mission in 2016 to the current 6.5 hours.

It took the US' SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule, which carried four astronauts to the International Space Station in late April, 23 hours to deliver humans to the orbiting lab after the launcher liftoff, which is nearly four times longer than that of China's Shenzhou-12.

The newly adopted autonomous rendezvous and docking capability, first used in the Tianzhou-2 mission in late May, helped the craft to realize a docking with the space station's core module in eight hour. Originally it took two days.

The success also shows that China has developed a highly advanced automation technology application in space and space tracking and monitoring capabilities, Wang Ya'nan, editor-in-chief of the Aerospace Knowledge magazine, told the Global Times on Thursday.

One of the key technological advances lies in the Guidance, Navigation &Control (GNC) subsystem of the Shenzhou-12 manned spacecraft, the core subsystem in charge of a series of operations from emergency rescue upon launch and altitude control during space flight, to the rendezvous and docking with the space station, the Global Times learned from state-owned space giant China Academy of Space Technology (CAST) on Wednesday.

The GNC system was first adopted onboard China's manned spaceship in 1999, and has been fully updated based on Shenzhou-11's technical status. It uses units that had been verified from previous launches, including those from the Tianzhou-1 cargo spacecraft, the new-generation manned spacecraft, and the Chang'e-5 spacecraft, while updating system functions to adapt to more complex situations in the space station construction phase, and greatly improving the Shenzhou-12 performance which shows fast, autonomous docking capability.

Developers have also prepared a backup plan that allows manual operations in case an error occurs during the spacecraft's autonomous docking with the core module. If the measurement or control functions for positioning the craft fails, the three astronauts aboard can observe their position through camera images and perform manual docking with the core module's cross target.

Making the safety of astronauts a priority, the Shenzhou-12 mission's research team has also developed a new emergency response system to ensure that the astronauts can be rescued both in space and at the launch site.

According to CAST, two Shenzhou vessels were transported to the launch site, which means that Shenzhou-12 has a backup that will stand by in the event of an emergency. The latter has the capability of being launched in eight and a half days to carry out space rescue work after the launch of the former.

A backup launch vehicle had also been transported to the launch site together with the Long March-2F Y12 carrier rocket, state rocket contractor China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology said, ensuring immediate rollouts of launchers in case crew members at the space station require immediate pickups.

Following docking, the Shenzhou-12 will berth and fly with the Tianhe core module for three months, marking another first in China's space history.

Unlike China's previous Shenzhou craft, which returned to Earth from an orbit of fixed altitude, Shenzhou-12 will be able to return from a range of orbital locations, a design that is aimed to enhance the craft's adaptability and reliability for its journey back to the Earth, and it would also mark a first in China's space industry.

Space time. Photo: GT

Largest space population

As observers pointed out, starting Thursday, there will be at least three Chinese astronauts working for a long period in space for the construction of China's space station and future operations after 2022, and this number of space personnel is no less than that from the US and Russia, both major players in the International Space Station, or from any other countries.

The International Space Station's crew is now made up of seven astronauts, three of whom are from the US, and two from Russia. As for the last two, one is from Japan and the other the Europe Space Agency.

The three Chinese astronauts have brought the total space population to 10, bringing the number of human beings in space to double digits for the first time.

The Thursday mission has brought China to a world-leading position in terms of in-orbit astronaut population, as the country plans to rotate its astronaut candidates on a routine basis that ensures long-term human stays with no less than three people onboard the space station, which is at the same level as the US and Russia.

The fact that Chinese astronauts are excluded from ISS cooperation has motivated China's manned space industry to pursue independent development, observers noted.

"China has obviously developed a highly mature training mechanism for professional astronauts, and has also built up a pool of spacemen and spacewomen who are available to execute space flight mission when their names are called China could compete with space powers like the US in those domains," said Wang, the magazine editor.

"It is an easy mathematical question. China plans to have three astronauts in orbit working and living for at least three months in its own space station and also to have another three as backup crew, and there will be rotations every few months It will be difficult for even the US to keep up," Wang explained.

Astronauts Nie Haisheng (R), Liu Boming (C) and Tang Hongbo wave during a see-off ceremony for Chinese astronauts of the Shenzhou-12 manned space mission at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China, June 17, 2021. (Xinhua/Li Gang)

China's progress in the manned space field should sound the alarm for the US, and prompt the latter to think twice about its current China policy, which is increasingly seeking the goal of containing and suppressing China's technological development and even of decoupling from China in the sector, Wu Xinbo, director of the Center for American Studies at Fudan University in Shanghai, told the Global Times on Thursday.

China has the capability and economic scale to build a relatively independent development system. US efforts to contain China could only slow but would never stop China's development, Wu noted.

"China is becoming the world's largest consumer market, which in return will provide an even stronger drive for technological development," he said.

The US could find a win-win situation not only in the space sector, but also in other domains if it works with China, or it will lose the vast Chinese market and also the opportunity for cooperation, Wu warned.

Once completed, China's space station will be able to operate in orbit for at least 10 years, a period that could be extended to 15 years under proper maintenance, making it the only operational space station when the ISS retires in 2024.

Also, many netizens recalled upon June 17, 1967, when China announced a successful H-bomb test and on the same date, hailing that China has and will always create its own path to development, regardless whatever exterior obstacles.

(Web editor: Guo Wenrui, Liang Jun)
Carbon emission manager, a new profession that helps enterprises consolidate green development

09:04, June 18, 2021 By Qiu Chaoyi ( People's Daily

Devices and cables at a 1,000-KV ultrahigh voltage transformer substation in Suzhou, east China's Jiangsu province are overhauled by technicians from the power transmission and distribution company under the State Grid Jiangsu Electric Power Co., Ltd., March 13, 2021. The substation is an important project of China's west-east electricity transmission, which is able to receive 16 billion KWh of electricity from outside Jiangsu, and reduce 6.7 million tonnes of coal consumption and 13.4 million tonnes of carbon dioxide emission in the province. (People's Daily Online/Shi Jun)

A slew of reform measures have been rolled out by China since the country proposed to peak carbon emission and achieve carbon neutrality.

A national carbon emission trading system is scheduled to be launched this year, under which enterprises would be allocated with carbon emission quota by relevant government departments according to certain standards. If enterprises' emission exceed the cap, they have to purchase extra quota; if they produce less carbon emission than their quota, then they can sell the surplus for profits.

Such a market mechanism would better encourage enterprises to cut carbon emission, and has also created a brand new profession - carbon emission manager.

Hu Yongfei is a carbon emission manager of the Longyuan (Beijing) Carbon Asset Management Technology Co., Ltd., a subordinate company of China Energy Investment Corporation, also known as China Energy. He recently went to a thermal power plant in east China's Jiangsu province to help the plant calculate its carbon emission.

"To calculate carbon emission, I need original records of coal quality test from their laboratory, purchasing, sales and inventory data from the fuel department, monthly production reports from the operation department, and purchasing invoices from the finance department," Hu told People's Daily, saying that carbon emission management is fiddly as he must understand how every production department is running. Many data have an influence over the emission, as well as a direct impact on the enterprise's profit, he added.

To become a qualified carbon emission manager, one has to be familiar with carbon emission and trade policies, and be specialized in engineering thermodynamics, as well as thermal energy and power engineering. Carbon emission managers must also work at least a year before they can independently fulfill their job duties.

To maintain a precise understanding of the thermal plant's carbon emission, Hu checked the operation of devices in a number of workshops. The step count on his mobile phone soon exceed 10,000. "Carbon emission management needs exercises, too," he said.

When data collected was put into a computer, Hu soon got the carbon emission intensity of the thermal plant. Normally the carbon emission intensity of a 1,000 MW ultra supercritical pure condensing unit stands at 0.8 tonne per GWh, and the intensity of the Jiangsu plant was lower than the figure, which meant that the plant could sell its extra emission quota on the market.

"Many enterprises are carrying out strict testing for coal elements, while some of them make light of this work, which might make their carbon emission intensity 30 percent higher than the standard," Hu said. He called for relevant enterprises to place high importance on carbon emission, or they will pay a very high price.

After the field trip to the power plant, Hu spent a week on a detailed report, raising science-based suggestions for the enterprise to adjust its strategies and further reduce its energy consumption.

"To pinpoint carbon emission data is a foundation for peaking carbon dioxide emission and achieving carbon neutrality. We will help consolidate this foundation and make the steps of green development more solid," Hu told People's Daily.

(Web editor: Hongyu, Liang Jun)
Chinese experience in desert control helps green the world

Xinhua) 09:29, June 18, 2021

-- Chinese researchers are dedicated to developing new techniques to combat desertification in China, which in the past 20 years has contributed to the world's largest greening areas. China also shared its experience in sand control with other countries.

-- For researchers, the ultimate goal of sand control is not to eliminate the deserts, but to improve the biodiversity of desert ecosystems and find a way for humans and deserts to live harmoniously.

YINCHUAN, June 17 (Xinhua) -- A strong wind blew over Zhongwei, a city near the Tengger Desert in northwest China's Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, one of the driest places in the country, covering everything with a thin layer of dust.

Zhao Yang, an associate fellow at Shapotou Desert Research and Experiment Station (SDRES) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), was working in a lab culturing a kind of cyanobacteria that is key to new desert-control technology.

The station was the birthplace of vast stretches of artificial straw-checkerboard, a technique to stop sand encroachment that was implemented in China over 60 years ago.

Today, Chinese researchers at SDRES are dedicated to developing new techniques to combat desertification in China, which in the past 20 years has contributed to the world's largest greening areas.

File photo taken on Sept. 7, 2020 shows desertification control workers making straw checkerboard barriers in the Tengger Desert along the construction site of the Qingtongxia-Zhongwei section of the Wuhai-Maqin highway in northwest China's Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region. (Xinhua/Feng Kaihua)

COMBATING DESERTIFICATION

Zhao is happy to see the progress taking place with the new desert-control technique.

According to Zhao, it naturally takes about 10 years to form a cyanobacteria crust on the surface of the sand that can prevent it from moving. However, by hybridizing a special bacterial strain extracted from the biological soil crust in the Tengger Desert with the cultured cyanobacteria, researchers at SDRES have successfully cut the crust formation time to only one year.

"The new technique has been implemented. The experimental field under my supervision alone is as large as 33.3 hectares, not to mention the fields supervised by my colleagues in other parts of China," said Zhao, who has been working at SDRES for 11 years.

Zhao's work is a microcosm of China's efforts to combat desertification, which dates back over 60 years ago.

When China's first railway through the Tengger Desert began operation in 1958, foreign experts who were invited to design the railway had predicted that it would be buried by sand in 30 years.

However, Chinese researchers' wisdom gave them a way out. Straw structures, which resemble checkerboards, proved to be the most convenient, environmentally friendly and cheap way of stopping sand encroachment. Within the checkerboards, the surface of the sand forms a hard crust over time which prevents the sand from moving.

With ample sand-control experience, Ningxia is building its first highway crossing the Tengger Desert, which is expected to be completed in 2021.

In recent years, China has pushed ahead with its greening efforts across the country. Official data showed that in 2020 alone, the country improved the ecology of 2.83 million hectares of grassland and carried out desertification prevention-and-control work on over 2.09 million hectares of land.

Aerial photo shows workers making grids to contain the moving sand dunes along Linhe-Ceke railway in north China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, April 14, 2021. (Xinhua/Liu Lei)

SHARING EXPERIENCE WITH THE WORLD

While making headway in combating desertification over the past decades, China shared its techniques and experience in sand control with other countries.

In 1977, China shared the anti-desertification technique used in Shapotou at the UN Conference on Desertification in Nairobi. Dry straw checkerboards have now been used in many parts of the world as an effective way to combat desertification.

"The Chinese experience can benefit the world," said Iraqi agricultural engineer Sarmad Kamil Ali, who was in China in 2013 to learn about sand control.

"The Chinese always surprise the world with creative methods to overcome the difficulties they face. They have different methods to fix the dunes, and I found out recently that they are using more advanced technologies in fixing the sand dunes," he said.

Since 2005, the research team from Xinjiang Institute of Ecology and Geography (XIEG) of the CAS has been exporting mature desertification control technologies to Central Asia and Africa.

Demonstration bases have been built in many countries, such as those for ecological restoration of shrub grassland in Ethiopia, desert plants breeding and mechanical desertification control in Mauritania, according to Zhang Yuanming, head of the XIEG.

Noam Weisbrod, director of the Jacob Blaustein Institutes for Desert Research at the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Israel, was impressed by the sand control efforts during his trip to China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region several years ago.

The impact of climate change is very similar in different drylands around the globe, Weisbrod told Xinhua in an interview. "I'm a great believer in international cooperation. There is a lot of room for Israel-China cooperation on these topics."

A researcher examines plants at Shapotou Desert Research and Experiment Station (SDRES) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) in northwest China's Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, June 16, 2021. (Xinhua/Lu Ying)

DESERT BIODIVERSITY

Despite China's achievements in desert control, researchers believe that the country's anti-desertification methods still need to withstand the test of time.

"We should not be complacent with what we have found in desert control," said the SDRES director Li Xinrong. "We need to do more theoretical research in the field."

For Li, the ultimate goal of sand control is not to eliminate the deserts, but to improve the biodiversity of desert ecosystems and find a way for humans and deserts to live harmoniously.

"Deserts are an indispensable part of nature and a valuable resource," said Li. "The Earth would not be a beautiful place without them."

(Web editor: Guo Wenrui, Liang Jun)
Israeli warplanes strike Hamas military posts in Gaza: sources

Xinhua) 09:41, June 18, 2021

GAZA, June 17 (Xinhua) -- Israeli warplanes struck on Thursday some military posts of the al-Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) that rules the Gaza Strip, Palestinian security sources said.

Israeli media reported that the Israeli airstrikes on Hamas military facilities came in response to the launching of dozens of incendiary balloons into southern Israel from Gaza for the third consecutive day.

The Palestinian sources and eyewitnesses said that several explosions were heard in the northern and southern Gaza Strip, following the Israeli fighter jets airstrikes on Hamas military posts.

The sources said that severe damage was caused to the military posts, but no injuries were reported.

The Israeli media reports said that the incendiary balloons launched from Gaza caused at least eight fires in Israeli communities close to the borders.

Launching incendiary balloons at Israel has been going on since Tuesday, in protest against the Israeli rightists' holding of a flag march in East Jerusalem.

On Tuesday night, Israeli fighter jets attacked Hamas military posts in the Gaza Strip, the first since the end of the May 10-21 fighting between Israel and the Hamas-led militants.

(Web editor: Guo Wenrui, Liang Jun)
Amid the pandemic, China's Luban Workshops boost vocational skills for African youth

Xinhua) 09:54, June 18, 2021

NAIROBI, June 17 (Xinhua) -- Peter Kariuki, a 23-year-old Kenyan university student majoring in science and telecommunications technology, has ambitions to be on the frontlines of the country's fourth industrial revolution.

Kariuki is enrolled at Machakos University, about 65 km southeast of the Kenyan capital of Nairobi, where a Luban Workshop launched in 2019 has raised the bar in vocational training.

A Luban Workshop provides technical and vocational training across a variety of fields to boost practical skills.

Though the COVID-19 pandemic has affected learning institutions worldwide, China has been working with African countries to establish more workshops.

China's Tianjin City Vocational College jointly built the workshop with Machakos University.

The workshop held a five-day training on cloud computing back in January. Nineteen trainees from Kenyan universities, including those from Machakos University, took part.

Kariuki said the training was a game changer in his quest to refine his technical skills and has paved the way for a promising career in the industry.

ADDITIONAL LEARNING SOURCE

"I have been taking a Huawei Certified ICT Associate (HCIA) routing and switching hardware (course) at Luban workshop for the last four months and have been able to gain hands-on skills on HCIA, R&S, AI Routing and Switching," Kariuki told Xinhua in a recent interview.

He said joining the program named after Lu Ban, an ancient Chinese woodcraft master, has improved his grasp of state-of-the-art networking technologies and their real-life applications, since the knowledge he learned in school has not adequately prepared him for a demanding career in network engineering.

"In HCIA routing and switching here at the Luban workshop, you get to learn a lot of skills, hands on skills unlike in class where we do a lot of theories," said Kariuki.

Kariuki said he is confident of establishing small- to medium-sized networking platforms in the near future with the skills acquired at the workshop.

Charles Mwaniki, dean of the school of engineering and technology at the institution, told Xinhua that training has enabled learners to have greater space to hone their technical skills.

"By introducing the Luban Workshop, the training has been more practical than before. We have more resources for students," said Mwaniki.

Philip Muchiri, head of the department of computing and information technology at the university, said his department has trained about 20 academic staff to teach students at the workshop.

"By the end of this year, we will have the first group of students graduating," said Mwaniki.

Owen Alikula, a 23-year-old university student majoring in information technology, said he never had the opportunity to interact with data centres until he joined Luban.

"It is a place that transforms young minds," Alikula said, adding that "Luban Workshop is the best additional learning source."

FULFILLING PLEDGE

Kenya is among a growing number of African countries where the launch of a Luban Workshop lines up with China's plans to boost capacity building including vocational training on the African continent.

The launch of the learning program in Nigeria's Abuja University in November 2020 was hailed as critical in meeting the rising demand for high-end technical skills in Africa's largest economy.

Adamu Adamu, Nigeria's education minister, said the Luban Workshop, whose target beneficiaries are local youth, will boost socio-economic progress in the country.

"This laudable initiative by the Chinese government is commendable due to the technical and professional training for the good and development of our nation," said Adamu.

China announced in September 2018 that 10 Luban Workshops would be established in Africa to provide vocational training for the continent's youth under the framework of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation.

Abdulrasheed Na'Allah, vice chancellor of the University of Abuja, said the program -- established with support from the Tianjin Sino-German University of Applied Sciences and Tianjin Railway Vocation and Technical College -- will enable Nigerians to acquire marketing skills.

Offered are courses on urban rail traffic management, urban train transit vehicles, railway bridges and tunnels, electronics and telecommunications.

SKILLS FOR GLOBAL MARKET

The April launch of the Luban Workshop at Ethiopian Technical University (ETU) based in the capital of Addis Ababa will pave the way for training in industrial sensor technology, mechatronics and robotics.

"It will make our graduates familiar with the 21st century skills and knowledge," said Teshale Berecha, president of ETU, adding that the facility will accommodate about 150 students and has the capacity to offer training to batches of students every year.

Habtamu Sisay, a student pursuing a post-graduate degree in automotive engineering at ETU, said studying at Luban will fulfill his dream of advancing mechatronics and robotics technologies in his country.

According to Sisay, the absence of well-equipped facilities hindered his quest for knowledge on emerging technologies like Artificial Intelligence that could fuel Ethiopia's industrial transformation.

He said a visit to the workshop made him appreciate the practical learning experience.

"With the Luban Workshop, we will be able to directly engage in practical classes with the help of modern machinery," said Sisay.

Chinese Ambassador to Ethiopia Zhao Zhiyuan said the workshop boosts cultural and educational opportunities between the two countries.

A workshop in eastern Uganda was launched in December 2020.

Elioda Tumwesigye, Uganda's former science and technology minister, praised China for establishing such a workshop that trains local youth on the application of modern technology in order to secure better jobs.

"After this particular training, and when students graduate, we are very sure that they are going to secure good jobs," Muchiri said, "because the demand is very high for cloud computing engineers."

(Web editor: Shi Xi, Hongyu)
China lists key tasks in medicine, healthcare reform for 2021

Xinhua) 10:01, June 18, 2021

BEIJING, June 17 (Xinhua) -- China will strive to balance medical resources and build up the public health system in 2021, according to the cabinet's new annual plan for further reforming the medicine and healthcare system.

Efforts must be made to accelerate the synergy of reforms relating to medical services, medical insurance and pharmaceuticals, said the document, which was published on the General Office of the State Council's website on Thursday.

The country will carry forward the bulk-buying mechanism to further slash medicine prices in 2021. Its tiered system of medical diagnosis and treatment will be refined and the development of healthcare consortiums will be accelerated, according to the document.

Disease prevention will be emphasized in the building up of China's public health system. The document called for efforts to boost the capabilities for early warning, risk evaluation and on-the-spot epidemiological investigation.

The State Council also made clear which authorities are responsible for each task within the reforms.

(Web editor: Shi Xi, Hongyu)
UN chief calls for debt relief extension for middle-income countries

Xinhua) 10:17, June 18, 2021

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres attends the joint hybrid press conference to launch the State of the Global Climate in 2020 Report at the UN headquarters in New York, on April 19, 2021. (Xinhua/Xie E)

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said that middle-income countries should have their debts suspended into 2022 to cope with the social and economic impact of COVID-19.

UNITED NATIONS, June 17 (Xinhua) -- United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Thursday called for debt relief extension for middle-income countries.

"Innovative instruments to allow debt restructuring and meaningful debt reduction can help middle-income countries expand their fiscal space to boost investment and steer a resilient and sustainable recovery from the (COVID-19) crisis," the secretary-general told the General Assembly high-level meeting on middle-income countries.

The top UN official underlined the need for financing to help middle-income countries, which account for more than half of the UN's 193 member states, recover in the wake of the global crisis.

He said that middle-income countries should have their debts suspended into 2022 to cope with the social and economic impact of COVID-19.

Many were already dealing with mounting debt before the pandemic, which has only further aggravated the situation.

"In small island states, for example, the collapse of tourism has greatly hindered their capacity to repay debts. And while the global response to the debt crisis is rightly attempting to support low-income countries, middle-income countries must not be left behind," he stated.

Diversity defines the world's middle-income countries, which were already home to some 62 percent of the world's poor prior to the pandemic.

The list includes India, which has a population of more than 1 billion, and Palau, an archipelago in the Pacific with less than 20,000 people.

A health worker takes a nasal swab sample of a woman to test with rapid antigen test for COVID-19 in Nagaon district of India's northeastern state of Assam, June 7, 2021. (Str/Xinhua)

Besides population size, these countries also vary in economic activity, geography and income levels per capita, which ranges from 1,000 to 12,000 U.S. dollars annually, meaning they often exceed per capita income thresholds for debt relief.

Guterres stressed the need for better mechanisms and international cooperation to address what he characterized as their mounting and unsustainable debt levels.

"Even if these countries manage to avoid default, they will see long-lasting limitations on critical government spending on a variety of development and climate objectives in the years to come," he warned.

He underlined the need for "a new debt mechanism" that includes debt swaps, buy-backs and cancellations.

"This is the moment to tackle long-standing weaknesses in the international debt architecture, from lack of agreed principles, to restructurings that provide too little relief, too late," said the UN chief.

This past March, the secretary-general convened world leaders for a meeting to bolster support for action to stave off the debt crisis in developing countries.

The UN chief was encouraged to see growing recognition around the need for new Special Drawing Rights, a type of foreign reserve asset developed by the International Monetary Fund. However, he said unused SDRs must be re-allocated to support vulnerable nations, including middle-income countries.

Last year, the G20 leading economies announced a debt service suspension initiative which allows the world's poorest countries to temporarily halt bilateral credit payments.

(Web editor: Guo Wenrui, Liang Jun)
What does it take to become an astronaut?

Xinhua) 10:31, June 18, 2021

China on Thursday launched the crewed spacecraft Shenzhou-12, which is expected to send three astronauts to its space station core module Tianhe for a three-month mission.

The three astronauts are expected to set a new record for China's manned space mission duration, exceeding the 33 days kept by the Shenzhou-11 crew in 2016.

Click the video to find out what it takes to become an astronaut.

(Web editor: Guo Wenrui, Liang Jun)
Chinese firm launches 110-mln-USD expansion project of Ethiopian dry port

Xinhua) 10:33, June 18, 2021

Representatives from Ethiopian government, World Bank and China Civil Engineering Construction Corporation attend the groundbreaking ceremony of Modjo dry port expansion project in Modjo, Ethiopia, on June 17, 2021. Chinese construction firm, China Civil Engineering Construction Corporation (CCECC), on Thursday launched the construction of a 110-million-U.S. dollar Modjo dry port expansion project in central Ethiopia. (Photo by Elias Gebreselassie/Xinhua)

ADDIS ABABA, June 17 (Xinhua) -- Chinese construction firm, China Civil Engineering Construction Corporation (CCECC), on Thursday launched the construction of a 110 million U.S. dollars Modjo dry port expansion project in central Ethiopia.

The Groundbreaking ceremony for the construction of Ethiopia's largest dry port was attended by senior Ethiopian government and World Bank officials.

Speaking at the ceremony, Dagmawit Moges, Ethiopia Minister of Transport, said the expansion of Modjo dry port will modernize landlocked Ethiopia's logistics sector.

The Modjo dry port is a key transportation and logistics facilitator between Ethiopia's hinterland and ports in neighboring Djibouti. The expansion project encompasses construction of six warehouses, several road and pavement works, multipurpose buildings and various operating facilities.

"In the logistics sector, the effect of undertaking successful work on quality, modernization and efficiency isn't limited to our country, but will also highlight the role of our trade and logistics in the region as well as globally," Moges said.

"Increasing our logistics capacity will make Ethiopia a prosperous and a preferable destination for investment inflow," Moges said.

Moges also detailed her country's long-term commitment to expand and modernize the logistics sector.

"In our new 10-year development plan of the sector, we plan construction of many road and rail projects," said Moges.

"This includes development of road expressways, development of corridor lines individually and in clusters as well as development of new dry ports," she said.

Ousmane Dione, the Ethiopian country director of the World Bank which finances the project, praised the expected benefits of the expansion project.

"This is a long awaited, but extremely important civil works for the advancement of Modjo as a colorful logistics hub of Ethiopia," Dione said.

"It is a transformative initiative which comprises comprehensive infrastructure enhancement of the port and associated facilities that are currently not available such as export consolidation, dry port storage and multi-model transfer platform to make import-export activities more seamless," he said.

Wu Jiuyi, Deputy General Manager of the CCECC Ethiopia Branch, expressed commitment to undertake a speedy, efficient construction of the project.

"Our company is one of the builders and currently an operator of the 752.7 km Addis Ababa-Djibouti railway. The Modjo dry port expansion will increase the capacity of the railway," Wu said.

"We will try our best to complete this project with quality and efficiency," he said.

The 752.7 km Addis Ababa-Djibouti railway, the first electrified transnational railway in East Africa, is contracted by two Chinese companies, China Railway Group and CCECC.

(Web editor: Shi Xi, Liang Jun)
Police operation unrelated to normal news coverage in Hong Kong: security chief

Xinhua) 10:44, June 18, 2021

Secretary for Security of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) government John Lee Ka-chiu attends a press conference in Hong Kong, south China, June 17, 2021. The Hong Kong police on Thursday morning arrested five directors of a company for suspected contravention of the national security law in Hong Kong. Local media reported that the suspects were executives of Next Digital Ltd. and Apple Daily, including Cheung Kim-hung and Chow Tat-kuen. The police said the four men and one woman aged between 47 and 63 were suspected of conspiracy to commit collusion with a foreign country or with external elements to endanger national security. They remained under custody. (Xinhua/Lui Siu Wai)

HONG KONG, June 17 (Xinhua) -- After the Hong Kong police arrested several people working for Apple Daily for endangering national security, Secretary for Security of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) government John Lee said the operation only targeted using newsrooms as a tool to endanger national security and reassured that normal news coverage will not be affected.

Lee made the remarks at a press briefing on Thursday after the police detained five people for conspiracy to commit collusion with a foreign country or with external elements to endanger national security.

The people under arrest were suspected of publishing dozens of articles on Apple Daily that requested foreign countries to impose sanctions or engage in hostile activities against HKSAR and China, Lee said.

Evidence showed that the newspaper continued to engage in such illegal activities after the national security law took effect, Li Kwai-wah, senior superintendent of the police's national security department, said at another press briefing.

Lee noted that the HKSAR government will act hard on any attempts to use news coverage as a shield to endanger national security.

The Security Bureau has frozen the offense-related property worth about 18 million Hong Kong dollars (2.32 million U.S. dollars) of three companies involved.

Freezing offense-related property is a globally recognized practice to prevent criminals from using their property to continue committing crimes, Lee said.

(Web editor: Shi Xi, Liang Jun)
Xenophobic targeting of US minorities unpalatable

China Daily) 11:31, June 18, 2021

Protesters take part in a rally to protest over the death of George Floyd on Foley Square in New York, the United States, May 29, 2020. (Xinhua/Wang Ying)

Dozens of cities in the United States have seen mass protests following the killings of some members of minorities, and the demonstrations continue unabated and have increased in intensity.

The protests are aimed at nudging US authorities to take concrete steps to stem the spiraling wave of hate crimes against minority groups. Asian Americans in particular have faced racial attacks, harassment and other discrimination against the backdrop of the raging COVID-19 global health crisis. In April, eight people, including six women of Asian descent, were gunned down in Atlanta.

The pandemic-inspired hatred of Asians, and Chinese in particular, was made worse by the remarks of former US president Donald Trump. Against the advice of the World Health Organization, Trump repeatedly referred to the novel coronavirus that causes COVID-19 as "Chinese flu". The discriminatory and antagonistic stance by the Trump administration against Chinese stoked xenophobic attacks directed at Chinese living in the US and in other places around the world.

In March alone, 6,603 reports of abuse or attacks against people of Asian descent were recorded by Stop AAPI Hate, a California-based nonprofit organization that tracks incidents of violence against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders.

In the bigger picture, another organization, the Anti-Defamation League, which says its mission is "to stop the defamation of the Jewish people and to secure justice and fair treatment to all", has said white supremacist propaganda disproportionately surged in 2020, with 5,125 cases of racist, anti-Semitic and other hateful messages spread through flyers, stickers, banners and posters.

The elderly have particularly come under increasing threat of physical assaults, compounding their already challenging experience amid the pandemic.

During such outbursts of negative energy targeting minority groups, innocent individualssome of whom have lived their entire lives in the USare subjected to disparaging and inhumane treatment, including physical assaults and killings.

Yet discrimination and maltreatment of minorities in the US do not start and end with Chinese or individuals of Asian descent. African Americans have for decades been subjected to unfair treatment by state and individual actors, in a practice stretching back to the epoch of slavery. African Americans have experienced relatively high infection and death rates from COVID-19 compared with other groups in the US. The black community also lags in vaccinations.

In a world of complex interdependence and unprecedented cross-border mobility, xenophobic attacks on one community could easily pose a risk to lives of people in other countries and regions. This is why it is important to cut the vice at the source in order to secure the broader welfare of every individual, regardless of their geographical origins.

US authorities should therefore undertake all practical and legal measures to protect the rights, safety and well-being of minority groups. Among other steps, President Joe Biden has signed a memorandum issuing guidance on how the Justice Department should respond to the escalating number of anti-Asian incidents. Biden has also banned the use of geographical names and labels when referring to COVID-19. These are certainly laudable steps, but more needs to be done.

In order to effectively address the root causes of the violence and bias against minority groups in the US, and indeed around the world, there should be targeted and sustained education on the dangers of ethnocentrism. A closer examination of the profiling reveals deeply held historical and racial prejudices that seek to place some races or nationalities above others. Unless this is reversed through systemic education, the symptoms will always outweigh the causes.

US authorities must take firm and decisive legal action against perpetrators of such xenophobic expressions, attacks and biases against minorities. All efforts should go toward making every person in the US safe from physical, mental and emotional abuse.

Instead of disparaging other societies' human rights records, the US should turn the torch inside and make peace with its own troubled record of keeping minorities safe.

(Web editor: Guo Wenrui, Liang Jun)
Canadas attempt to lead anti-China joint statement on Xinjiang doomed to fail: Chinese Mission Spokesperson

(Global Times) 13:12, June 18, 2021

People pay tribute to the murdered aboriginal children in Ottawa, Canada, on June 4.Photo: Xinhua

Out of political purposes, a small group of Western countries, Canada included, attempt to spread disinformation and lies to frame China at the Human Rights Council, said Chinese Mission spokesperson Liu Yuyin, noting that China will fight back resolutely any injustice and trespasses done to it.

It is learned that Canada will lead in making a Xinjiang-related joint statement at the interactive dialogue on the annual report of the High Commissioner for Human Rights at the 47th session of the Human Rights Council on June 21.

In response, Liu said that the attempt of Canada is nothing but a repeat of their usual trick of using human rights as a political tool, which is bound to be rejected by the international community and doomed to failure.

The spokesperson said that Xinjiang has made remarkable achievements in economic and social development and in the field of human rights. At present, Xinjiang enjoys social stability, peace and economic prosperity. People there are leading a safe and enjoyable life.

However, certain countries are simply not happy to see prosperity, stability and development in Xinjiang.

These countries all have embassies in China. How come that their ambassadors and diplomats have no idea of the truth in Xinjiang? Or they simply choose to be the man pretending to fall asleep, Liu said.

Liu noted that China has extended invitations on a number of occasions to these ambassadors to visit Xinjiang, but on each occasion, they declined with one excuse after another, and failed to make the trip to this date.

Why are they so scared to go? Obviously, what they really care is not facts and truth, but how to slander and frame China in every possible way under the pretext of Xinjiang-related issue. What they have done will not gain any support and wont go anywhere, said Liu.

Despite grave and shocking human rights violations within their own borders, countries including Canada have never taken any substantive actions to address the violations. For them, human rights is nothing but lip service or a tool to attack others, said Liu.

The recent discovery of the remains of over 200 indigenous children at a Canadian boarding school is yet another reminder of Canadas historical atrocities of killing the indigenous people and eradicating their culture. Over 150,000 indigenous children in Canada were forcibly taken away from their parents and sent to boarding schools, where at least 4,000 children died of unnatural causes. Until today, people of Asian and African descent in Canada are still suffering from systemic racial discrimination, and rights of migrants are wantonly offended.

We would like to once again warn these countries that Xinjiang, Tibet and Hong Kong are inalienable parts of China, and the Xinjiang, Tibet and Hong Kong related issues are purely Chinas internal affairs which brook no interference by any external forces, said Liu, noting that China is also a country that upholds principles and has its bottom line.

We stand firm and will never tolerate interference in Chinas internal affairs, vilification of China or infringement on Chinas interests. Canada and the countries concerned are advised to immediately halt their dangerous act, stop political manipulation of Xinjiang-related issues and stop provoking confrontation at the Human Rights Council. We will fight back resolutely any injustice and trespasses done to us, said Liu.

(Web editor: Guo Wenrui, Hongyu)
China welcomes U.S., Russia on continuing 'strategic stability' dialogue

CGTN) 13:14, June 18, 2021

China welcomes the consensus reached between the U.S. and Russia on continuing "strategic stability" dialogue, said Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian.

He made the remarks at Thursday's press conference after United States President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin agreeing to engage in a bilateral dialogue on "strategic stability" during their Wednesday meeting in Geneva.

A joint statement published on the Kremlin's website after the summit said Russia and the U.S. "will embark together on an integrated bilateral strategic stability dialogue in the near future that will be deliberate and robust."

"The recent extension of the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) exemplifies our commitment to nuclear arms control," it read.

As countries with the largest nuclear arsenals, the U.S. and Russia should earnestly fulfill their special and primary responsibilities in nuclear disarmament in accordance with UN General Assembly documents and international consensus, Zhao said.

This will help foster the eventual realization of general and complete nuclear disarmament and is the most effective way to maintain global strategic stability and promote international peace and security, he added.

Noting that "nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought", Zhao said China has been actively encouraging the nuclear-weapon states to jointly reaffirm this concept to reduce the risk of nuclear war.

China always supports discussions with all parties on a wide range of issues concerning strategic stability within the framework of the P5 mechanism and is ready to continue bilateral dialogue with all parties concerned on relevant issues on the basis of mutual respect and equality, he said.

China, France, Russia, the UK and the U.S., as the nuclear-weapon states designated by the Treaty on the Non-proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), formed the five nuclear-weapon states mechanism as a coordination mechanism during the review process of the NPT. The five states have maintained regular communication on important issues concerning strategy and security since 2009, jointly promoting the review process of the NPT.

(Web editor: Guo Wenrui, Liang Jun)
Brazil, Poland march towards men's VNL Final Four

Xinhua) 13:26, June 18, 2021

RIMINI, Italy, June 17 (Xinhua) -- Brazil and Poland marched towards the men's Volleyball National League semifinals after sweeping respective opponents here on Thursday.

Brazil eased past Australia 25-17, 25-22 and 25-12 for their 11th victory in 12 fixtures with Isac Santos and Mauricio Silva contributing 11 points apiece. With three matches remaining for each team in the 16-team round-robin preliminaries, Brazil led the standings with 32 points.

"This victory is very important for our team. We have a great group of players - if someone is needed, he enters the court and he tries to be perfect," said Silva. "Everyone was ready to play and give his best and it's our greatest strength. We have not only six players, but the entire group is very strong."

Poland beat Germany 25-22, 25-19 and 25-20 to improve to a 10-2 win-loss record. Bartosz led the Polish scoring with 16 points.

"Germany played today a really nice game. They served really well and we were a little bit surprised with their starting six that went out to the court, but we won so it's good for us. Now we have three days off and I hope we will use it well," said Piotr Nowakowski, who had seven points for Poland.

Slovenia rallied past Iran 14-25, 25-20, 25-19 and 32-30 for their ninth win in 12 matches. Poland and Slovenia stood second and third, followed by Russia, France and Serbia.

Also on Thursday, Argentina beat Serbia 3-0, Russia tamed Bulgaria 3-0, Canada overcame Japan 3-0, the United States twice rallied from one set down to beat the Netherlands 3-2 and Italy outlasted France 3-2.

The 16 teams will have three days off with the action to resume on Monday with the top four finishers from the preliminaries to qualify for the semifinals.

(Web editor: Hongyu, Bianji)
China introduces facilitation measures for shipping, freight companies

Xinhua) 14:46, June 18, 2021

Aerial photo shows a cargo ship docking at Meidong Dock of the Ningbo-Zhoushan port in Ningbo, east China's Zhejiang Province. (Xinhua/Huang Zongzhi)

BEIJING, June 18 (Xinhua) -- China's National Immigration Administration has rolled out 16 new measures for shipping and freight companies as part of efforts to further optimize the business environment at ports.

The measures are mainly aimed at streamlining administrative procedures for foreign cargo vessels, and Chinese freight vehicles and drivers frequently crossing land borders, the administration said Friday, pledging to offer international shipping vessels around-the-clock customs clearance support across Chinese ports.

The measures will save international vessels an average berthing time of 1.5 hours in Chinese ports, and reduce more than 10 percent of time spent in customs clearance for freight vehicles on land borders, the administration said.

(Web editor: Shi Xi, Hongyu)
Changes of China's countryside through lens of a British vlogger

Xinhua) 14:52, June 18, 2021

HOHHOT, June 18 (Xinhua) -- For many, China's glitzy metropolises like Beijing and Shanghai are the go-to places to feel the pulse of the fast-developing country. But to Curt McArdle, a British vlogger, the vast Chinese countryside is an even better location to keep up with the mind-blowing pace of development.

McArdle, 26, has lived in north China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region for five years, teaching English in a private institution in the regional capital Hohhot.

In his spare time, he likes filming his excursions to villages near Hohhot and has so far posted more than 10 such videos on YouTube.

McArdle said he was greatly impressed with the sea changes that have taken place in the villages during his trips over the years. In his eyes, the changes are most evident in infrastructures, such as roads, internet, public toilets and other amenities.

The old, bumpy village roads have mostly been paved, much to the delight of tourists who like to explore the villages on bicycles, McArdle said.

He added that Hohhot opened two metro lines in the last two years to link its downtown area with suburban villages, a move that is expected to further fuel the villages' development.

"Now you can easily spend a day in a village. You can use the public toilets and go to restaurants to buy food. That wasn't the case when I first went there," said McArdle, recalling that he used to fill his bag with all sorts of food before traveling to the villages.

"I can go to a tiny village in the middle of nowhere and pay for everything with WeChat. There's always 4G, so I can use the map on my phone to get back to the city," he said, adding that whenever he goes to a village, the local residents are more than glad to show him around their houses and inform him of the latest development in their village.

In some villages, vendors told him that they were able to sell local produce at higher prices thanks to the growing number of tourists brought in by the more convenient transport.

"The villagers are very proud of how their places have developed," he said.

McArdle attributed the great changes in Hohhot's countryside to China's efforts in poverty reduction and building a moderately prosperous society in all respects, known as "Xiaokang" in Chinese.

By 2020, China had lifted all of its nearly 100 million impoverished rural residents out of poverty, securing a decisive victory in poverty alleviation. Official data showed that the country's per capita disposable income exceeded 32,000 yuan (about 5,000 U.S. dollars) last year, more than double the level in 2010.

"I can't think of many changes on the planet that have been greater than that," McArdle said. "But when I read the numbers, it didn't surprise me because I think when China sets its mind to something, everybody gets behind it."

He said the rising incomes of the Chinese people, especially in the rural areas, have allowed them to pursue more colorful lives.

He recalled his visit to Gecilao Village in the suburb of Hohhot early this year, where he came across villagers singing, playing musical instruments, painting and practicing calligraphy in the local community center.

That would not have been possible if people still struggled to make ends meet and had little leisure time, he said.

As for his future plans, McArdle said he hoped to continue traveling and vlogging in China to show the real China to the world and become a part of China's development.

"Now that the vaccine is being rolled out and things are much safer in China, I really want to see more of the country," he said.

(Web editor: Shi Xi, Hongyu)
Palm oil options trading launched in China, open to overseas investors

Xinhua) 14:56, June 18, 2021

DALIAN, June 18 (Xinhua) -- China on Friday started the trading of palm oil options at the Dalian Commodity Exchange (DCE) and allowed overseas investors to participate, marking another step in the country's financial opening-up push.

The move made palm oil options the first yuan-denominated options contracts listed in China open to overseas investors, the DCE said.

China is a major importer and consumer of palm oil in the world, with its import and consumption volumes accounting for 15 percent and 10 percent of the world's total, respectively.

By launching palm oil options and including overseas investors in the trading, the country can provide risk management tools for market entities and contribute to the coordination of international supply and industrial chains, as well as ensure the quality development of its futures market, the DCE said.

China will also launch the trading of crude oil options on the Shanghai International Energy Exchange on June 21, according to an announcement made in May by the country's securities regulator.

In 2020, the total turnover of China's futures market rose 50.56 percent in 2020 from the previous year to 437.53 trillion yuan (about 67.9 trillion U.S. dollars), reaching a historic high, official data showed.

(Web editor: Shi Xi, Hongyu)
"Chinese miracle" proves success of socialism with Chinese characteristics, says Czech politician

Xinhua) 15:03, June 18, 2021

PRAGUE, June 18 (Xinhua) -- The "Chinese miracle" created by the Communist Party of China (CPC) in the past decades has proved that socialism with Chinese characteristics is the right path leading to the country's success in development, a Czech politician has said.

Behind the miracle is the CPC's dedication to people's needs, said Vojtech Filip, chairman of the Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia, in a recent interview with Xinhua.

"Also, the policies China adopted gave full play to the initiative of the CPC members and the Chinese people," said Filip, also the first deputy speaker of the Chamber of Deputies of the Czech Republic.

Speaking highly of China's achievements in the COVID-19 prevention and control, as well as in economic and social development, he said that the CPC has always adhered to the "people-centered" ruling philosophy, which is of great importance for governance, adding that his party shares a similar ideology of "with the people, for the people."

China, led by the CPC, has gained more and more support in the world, as the country is actively participating in the international affairs, safeguarding multilateralism, and promoting world peace and development, he said.

The China-proposed Belt and Road Initiative, in Filip's view, brought development opportunities to countries along the route and enhanced economic connections between them.

Commending the cooperation between China and the Central and Eastern European countries, including the Czech Republic, he said that the cooperative mechanism has not only promoted bilateral trade, but added impetus to their exchange and cooperation in science research and development.

Filip, as the chairman of his party since 2005, has visited China many times.

Expressing his warm congratulations on the CPC's centenary, Filip voiced confidence that China, under the leadership of the CPC, will continue to promote common development of the world.

(Web editor: Shi Xi, Hongyu)
The GMT publishing teams (including WorldTempus, GMT Magazine, and Skippers Magazine) have had a front-row seat at the event. Our offices are located on the rue des Vollandes in the Eaux-Vives district, right next to the venue of this historic meeting in the Villa de la Grange in the park of the same name. With helicopters, public transport disruptions, and a heavy military presence, no one could ignore what was going on in the neighbourhood.



As I am passionate about watches and politics (a strange combination, I admit) I planned to do my best to get a glimpse of the delegations as they passed by on Wednesday 16th June. The task wasnt as complicated as the authorities had led me to believe as it was easy enough to walk down to the lakeside (blocked for the event) during my lunch break. I was not alone as many of our neighbours were curiously checking out the situation too. Whether you like the two characters in question or not, it was very interesting to see these presidential processions with an incalculable number of vehicles pass by. I excitedly returned to the office after my lunch break, proudly sharing my joy at seeing the President of the United States in the back of his limousine!

Joe Biden in the back of the presidential limousine  Matthieu Moser

You may be wondering why this article is appearing on your favourite news site? Well, the answer is that the previous day, the WorldTempus team had started a bet on which watch the two presidents would wear for the summit. Many of you responded to our Instagram poll, much to our delight. Once the meeting had started and the worlds journalists were wondering what topics the presidents would be discussing and what the outcome would be, our team was busy analysing the photos from every single angle possible to try and detect which watches they were wearing.

The handshake between Joe Biden and Vladimir Putin  Brendan Smialowski

The first watch to reveal itself to us was that of Russian President Vladimir Putin. A lover of fine timepieces, he was wearing his watch on his right wrist, perfectly positioned for the photo of the historic handshake that would be published all over the world. Mr. Putin had chosen to wear his Blancpain Aqualung Grand Date for the summit. This classic model has frequently been spotted on the wrist of the Russian President.





Aqualung Grand Date  Blancpain

As for the watch worn by the American head of state, it was initially very difficult to see. A photograph taken in the villas library revealed a steel bracelet. Speculation was leaning towards one of the presidents two Omegas (Speedmaster and Seamaster) or his Rolex Datejust, which he wore at his inauguration earlier this year. One member of our editorial staff was wondering if he would wear his Speedmaster, the watch associated with the historic American landing on the moon, as a snub at getting there first. I was personally going against this hypothesis as the photo taken in the library showed a case with a crown, but no other pushers (unlike the Speedmaster).

Joe Biden in the library of the Villa La Grange  Alexander Zemlianichenko / AP

In any case, the speculation did finally come to an end just as the president was leaving Swiss soil. He stopped briefly on the tarmac of Geneva airport for a group photo, kneeling down to put us out of our misery with a flash of his Omega Seamaster.





Joe Biden on the tarmac of Geneva Airport with his Omega Seamaster with the aluminium bezel  Compte Instagram de Niccoloy

I will leave it to the international press and political journalists to report on the outcome of the diplomatic summit and give you their thoughts and analysis. The last thing I can say is that I am proud that, as a Swiss citizen, two world leaders chose Geneva, Switzerland for a meeting of this importance and both wore a Swiss watch on their wrist.




Reversal

The most amazing thing about the tourbillon is that even its opposite is still a tourbillon. Rather than chasing after every conceivable position of the balance-wheel in relation to the horizontal, some initiatives have sought to place it in a constant position. This is the idea behind Zeniths Tourbillon Zero Gravity, which though technically not a tourbillon, has a system of gimbals that constantly keep the balance-wheel flat, whatever the position of the watch  thus maintaining it in the most favourable regulating position. Cartier took the same approach for its Astroregulateur, in which the regulating organ is located on a rotor. It is thus in constant rotation, but not at an imposed rate; it all depends what the wearers wrist does. A rather less systematic option, the inclined tourbillon, achieves something close to the same result. Greubel Forsey calculated that a 24 angle would allow the balance-wheel to remain almost perfectly horizontal whenever the wearer was inactive, with their hands placed on their desk. Jaeger-LeCoultres thinking was along similar lines: its Spherotourbillon behaves like a moving Tower of Pisa, with the vertical axis of the tourbillon rotating while a second axis raises one side of the base, causing it to oscillate in a vertical plane at a constant angle of 20.

Traditionelle Tourbillon Chronograph  Vacheron Constantin

The Flip side

The tourbillon may have proved to be a quick way to the top for its practitioners, but as some have found out, this ladder to success can have several broken rungs. The fact is that with or without a tourbillon, producing any movement is about more than design; reliability is also crucial. Two examples reveal just how fragile a tourbillon can be. BNB Concept designed and delivered dozens of increasingly wild and wonderful calibres, but ended up going bankrupt due to vast numbers of returns and dissatisfied customers, exacerbated by the 2008 micro-crisis in watchmaking. Well before that, similar problems finished off STT, a movement manufacturer that had launched a range of very affordable mass-produced tourbillon calibres that sadly also proved to be very defective.

Tourbillon movement  Girard-Perregaux

The tourbillon thus embodies not only the successes of watchmakings new era, but its failures as well. Many manufacturers were in too much of a hurry, too eager for income, too inexperienced, or too unscrupulous, supplying ever-larger numbers of brands whilst ignoring the most elementary rules of quality and reliability. It took the industry a few years to get over this rather less welcome sign of the times.

Highlife Tourbillon Platinum  Frederique Constant

Fertilisation

The tourbillons tendency to be showcased, sometimes even shown off, mirrored another deep-seated trend in modern watchmaking; staging by design. This is clear when one looks at how brands have approached the design of tourbillon cages. From its origins as a mere structural component, the cage has become a means for the brand to express itself; a hallmark. Some already had their distinctive style: Girard-Perregaux, for instance, with the three lyres on its Tourbillon With Three Gold Bridges  a pioneer in the revival of this speciality, and the emblematic achievement of the generation of watchmakers trained in the 1990s. Vacheron Constantin lost no time in grasping how to use its Maltese cross logo on its tourbillons. Others went so far as to create cages structured in the form of their initials, as in Franck Mullers FM and Louis Vuittons LV.

Tambour Curve Flying Tourbillon Poincon de Geneve  Louis Vuitton

Another dimension involved work on the kinematics: more specifically, the trajectories followed by tourbillons. They were already spectacular in a central position, but one brand spent most of the decade spanning 2005 to 2015 pushing back boundaries, defying conventions, and investigating new layouts: Cartier, which found itself a new identity as a fine watchmaking specialist focusing on the creation of rotating regulating organs. The Astrotourbillon was thus housed at the end of the seconds hand, rotating once a minute around the rim of the dial. The Astromysterieux succeeded in combining the mysterious display, one of the brands historic watchmaking features, with the complication of the century, rotating in the middle of a central oculus, seemingly in mid-air. At the same time, the Le Locle International Chronometry Competition sealed the reputation of the tourbillons chronometric function. The first such prize-winner was the Master Tourbillon 978 by Jaeger-LeCoultre in 2009, followed in 2011 by Greubel Forseys Double Tourbillon 30 Technique. These rotating regulating organs thus demonstrated their performance  as well as passing the competitions impact tests, giving the lie to those who deemed them to be intrinsically fragile. Other brands have also created high-performance tourbillons, as evidenced by the Bulletins de Marche supplied by Chronometrie Ferdinand Berthoud. Amid all the upheaval generated by this complication, these exceptional pieces serve to remind us of the tourbillons original, half-forgotten vocation.

Fertility

Watchmaking always depends on technical fundamentals, but also uses them as a springboard towards new horizons. Tourbillons have tended to be deployed for aesthetic and symbolic purposes rather than for their precision. This loss of chronometric meaning has been one of the failings of the past two decades, focusing as they have on watchmaking showmanship at the expense of actual watchmaking. The high prices that tourbillons managed to command, sometimes without any actual technical foundation, opened a breach through which many brands poured, making the complication almost mundane. By around 2010, no fewer than 70 brands carried tourbillons. That said, the shift in focus away from tourbillons exceptional performance has been more than made up for by the accompanying brainpower they have harnessed, the resulting plethora of new ideas, and the subsequent emergence of historic talents. In turn, this fertility has helped the mechanical watch scale new heights of popularity among an ever-broader, more knowledgeable public. From the tiny seed of the tourbillon, an entire forest has grown.
China's unwavering efforts to deepen reform and opening-up are set to provide more business opportunities to foreign investors and contribute further to world economic recovery, according to experts and business leaders. Their comments came after the country's top economic planner announced on Thursday that China will further shorten the negative list for foreign investment this year, as part of ongoing efforts to continuously open its vast domestic market to global investors. Meng Wei, a spokeswoman for the National Development and Reform Commission, said the country is speeding up the formulation of the negative list for 2021, which will promote opening-up in the service sector in a bid to foster high-quality economic development. A negative list refers to special administrative measures for the access of foreign investment in certain industries or areas. "We will open more sectors of the economy on a larger scale and at a deeper level, to develop a new system promoting a higher-standard open economy," Meng said at a news conference in Beijing on Thursday. The country will continuously support the implementation of major foreign investment projects, especially in sectors such as advanced manufacturing and high-tech, and will encourage foreign investors to participate in the country's high-quality development of manufacturing, new infrastructure construction and innovation-driven growth, she said. To provide foreign investors with a fairer, more transparent and sound business environment, China will improve post-establishment national treatment for all foreign investors, treating domestic and foreign enterprises equally in accordance with the law in areas such as government procedure, certification and the setting of standards. Against the backdrop of a sharp decline in global cross-border direct investment, there has been significant growth in foreign investment in China. The nation's actual use of foreign investment grew 35.4 percent year-on-year to reach 481 billion yuan ($74.78 billion) in the first five months of this year, and had increased by 30.3 percent from the same period in 2019, according to the Ministry of Commerce. The number of newly established foreign-funded enterprises surged 48.6 percent year-on-year to 18,497, up by 12.4 percent from the same period in 2019. The country's successful reining in of COVID-19 has made it a safe haven for foreign investment and a growth engine for global economic recovery, according to experts. Zhang Fei, associate director of the Institute of Foreign Investment of the Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic Cooperation, attributed the growth in foreign investment in China to factors such as expanding foreign investors' access to more sectors and regions, as reflected in the shortening negative list, and the growing number of pilot programs in pilot free-trade zones, free trade ports and comprehensive pilot zones for the service industry. With COVID-19 largely under control, efforts by governments at different levels in the nation to support major foreign investment projects and facilitate foreign investors, the implementation of the Foreign Investment Law to protect the legitimate rights and interests of foreign investors, and the pursuit of a new dual-circulation development pattern that offers increasing opportunities for foreign-funded enterprises in China, also helped to attract foreign investment, according to Zhang. Leading executives of multinational companies have also expressed their long-term confidence in China, while speaking highly of the nation's contribution to the global economy. "China is a major engine for world economic growth. As an important part of the global industry and supply chains, China's market is continuously opening up to the rest of the world," said Leon Wang, executive vice-president of UK-based pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca and president of AstraZeneca China. "This plays a very big role in connecting global markets and sharing opportunities. It also makes China the No 1 destination for investment by many multinationals." Jiang Wei, president of Bayer Group's China branch, said as the world faces a huge public health crisis, open cooperation is particularly important to every country's success. "Bayer is very pleased to see how China continues to build a market-oriented and legitimate international business environment, and treats all types of companies equally," he said.


Editor's Note: Under the leadership of the Communist Party of China (CPC), China has worked with all other countries to build a community with a shared future for mankind, which has boosted confidence and added impetus for development of Asia and the world. For the celebration of the 100th funding anniversary of the CPC, we are launching the CPC in eyes of foreign military students series, viewing China and CPC from the perspective of foreign soldiers.

By Army Major Vicent Sibanda from the Republic of Zimbabwe

This year marks the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China (CPC). Since its establishment, the CPC has led and united with the Chinese people to blaze a new trail through numerous obstacles and hardships and made remarkable achievements. As a foreign military student ever studying at the PLA Army Logistics University , I've had my own insight into the CPC, a political party with courage to assume responsibility.

The year 2020 exposed the world to unprecedented challenges due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. In China, the CPC always put the people and their life first during the fight against the virus. By the end of 2020, China had not only succeeded in bringing the pandemic under control but also accomplished its goal of poverty elimination on schedule, lifting tens of millions of poor Chinese out of poverty.

A Chinese friend told me that he used to live a hard life in the countryside. To put an end to local poverty, the Party and the government issued multiple supportive policies. With the financial and technical assistance from the government, his family began to plant greenhouse vegetables several years ago, and the sale of vegetables has brought a continuous increase of income for his family and vastly improved their living standard.

This story impressed me deeply. China has the largest population in the world, and we can imagine how difficult it is to eliminate poverty and realize moderate prosperity in the whole country. Nowadays, what it has achieved satisfies its people and astonishes the world, setting an example for other countries to meet the United Nations 2030 Agendas Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

The CPC is a political party with courage to assume responsibility. Under its leadership, China always actively fulfills its international obligations and demonstrates its sense of responsibility as a major country. Especially during the COVID-19 pandemic, China helped many countries fight the virus while doing a great job at pandemic prevention and control at home, which is truly impressive.

In my home country Zimbabwe, China was the first country to provide us with personal protective equipment along with other supplies to combat the virus. It also sent medical expert teams to Zimbabwe to share their anti-virus experience and work side by side with our medical workers. In February this year, China provided precious COVID-19 vaccines to Zimbabwe to support our first phase of vaccination.

As far as I know, many other developing countries have also received aid from China. While China was sending much-needed vaccines to developing countries to help them control the epidemic, some Western countries, in sharp contrast, were selfishly hoarding the vaccines. Not long ago, the President of Zimbabwe was vaccinated with a Chinese vaccine, which has greatly eased public panic and boosted our confidence in defeating the virus.

As Guan Yingxiang, political commissar of the PLA Army Logistics University, told us, the CPC is not only working for the welfare of the Chinese people but also tries to make Chinas development achievements benefit the whole world, as manifested by the vision of building a community with a shared future for mankind. I believe the CPCs guideline and vision will empower China to keep pressing ahead toward a better future.

(This article is based on an interview by the PLA Daily with Major Vicent Sibanda assigned to the Army from the Republic of Zimbabwe, who had once studied at China's PLA Army Logistics University.)
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Illustration: Liu Rui/GT

US President Joe Biden tried his best to drive a wedge between China and Russia during a press conference after his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Biden said, "Russia is in a very, very difficult spot right now" and Russia "is being squeezed by China." He also said that Russia has "a multi-thousand-mile border with China. China is moving ahead seeking to be the most powerful economy in the world and the largest and the most powerful military in the world. You [Russia] are in a situation where your economy is struggling."

Biden may feel embarrassed to talk nonsense like this during the face-to-face meeting with Putin because if he did, Putin would very likely refute him immediately. Such kind of baseless provocation is a humiliation of the Russian people, treating one of the most powerful countries in the world as an idiot.

Which country is squeezing Russia strategically? What is the source of Russia's economic difficulties in recent years? A large number of facts are much too obvious. The US has caused waves of harms to Russia and Biden just wants to pass the blame to China. This is an illusion that is possible only under serious political autism and narcissism.

After the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the US carried out an incredibly brutal squeeze on Russia's strategic space. NATO expanded eastward to include all the former Warsaw Pact countries and advanced its position to the three Baltic states which were under the Soviet Union's influence. Russia's strategic space was almost dug up by NATO, and the US' policy to squeeze Russia was extreme. There has rarely been such a vicious unilateral pressure between major powers in history.

In the view of many outsiders, Russia has been restrained long enough. But when the US and the West wanted to cut off Ukraine, the "umbilical cord to Russia," Moscow chose to strike back.

Russia's economic difficulties are directly resulted from the joint sanctions imposed by the US and other Western countries. According to Russian statistics, the US alone has imposed more than 90 sanctions on Russia. Together with European sanctions, there are currently more than 400 Russian individuals and more than 500 entities on the Western blacklist. The trade volume between Russia and Europe in 2013 was about $410 billion but it dropped to $219 billion in 2020. The US and European sanctions have impacted Russia's energy and military industries and cut off Russia's previous financing channels. Besides, the US and Europe also weakened the ruble, leading to its sharp depreciation.

Due to the relatively big uncertainty in the Russian business environment, some Russia's capital continues to flow out while Western investors are hesitant to enter the Russian market.

The China-Russia land border is indeed long but it is an undisputed border that is highly peaceful. People from two sides of the border share active economic exchanges. China and Russia are strategic cooperative partners and their mutual trust has a solid political foundation. When facing provocative questions by US journalists, Putin responded clearly that Beijing is not a threat to Moscow and China is a friendly nation. He also said that more importantly, because of the nature and level of China-Russia relations, Russia is not "alarmed" by China's development.

Annual trade between the US and Russia is only more than $20 billion, while China-Russia trade is more than $100 billion. While the US imposed a high-tech blockade on Russia, China-Russia high-tech cooperation has become increasingly active. The two countries recently released a road map for an international lunar research station. Last month, leaders from the two countries launched the China-Russia nuclear energy cooperation project via video link. China imported 83.57 million tons of crude oil from Russia in 2020 and the two countries mutually supported each other in energy security.

There are too many facts that reveal the US' threats and pressure against Russia. Biden's accusation of China "squeezing" Russia is nothing but false. Face-to-face communication between Russian and US leaders helps the two sides manage their differences, and China welcomes this. But hopefully, Biden and his administration will not expect too much from it and the stupid idea of blasting China-Russia relations. The China-Russia comprehensive strategic partnership has gone through tests and became an irreplaceable common strategic resource of the two countries. On the one hand, Putin recognized the constructiveness of the meeting with Biden but on the other, he also said he had no illusions about relations with the US: "There are no illusions and there cannot be any."
By Gou Ziyi

The US President Joe Biden and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson signed The New Atlantic Charter on June 10, announcing their intention to intensify cooperation in such areas as trade, technology and intelligence. After Biden took office, he has been working hard to resume the alliance politics, but despite Washingtons efforts to mend and deepen its bilateral relationship with the UK, their conflicts and divergences remain uncleared.

The New Atlantic Charter is named after the agreement, The Atlantic Charter, signed between President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Prime Minister Winston Churchill in 1941 during WWII, which was an important document in the world anti-Fascist War as it envisioned a democratic world after the war.

The New Atlantic Charter is signed in a completely different time than 1941. In the new charter, the US and the UK proposed to, based on common values, cooperate in eight areas, including promoting democracy, maintaining international order, strengthening innovative edge in science and technology, reaffirming collective security, building a fair trade system, and tackling climate change. They also vowed to jointly cope with challenges in COVID-19 pandemic, cyberattacks, climate change and biodiversity.

Both sides hope to maintain and consolidate bilateral relations by signing the new document, which, however, isnt likely to be able to make their divergences go away.

For one thing, the two countries never see eye to eye on The Good Friday Agreement. Britain has had constant arguments with European countries about the border between Northern Ireland and Ireland, and Biden has insisted that Britain should abide by the agreementand stick to the Brexit deal. On June 3, 2021, Yael Lempert, Americas most senior diplomat in Britain, publicly criticized Britain on the issue and launched a diplomatic note. Americas National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan stressed that The Good Friday Agreement is the cornerstone for peace in Northern Ireland and the US doesnt support any action that may endanger or damage the agreement. Even the signing of The New Atlantic Charter wont resolve the issue at root.

For another, the two countries are not on the same page regarding their international position. After Biden came in office, he has kept emphasizing that America is back, Europe should follow, but Britain views its relationship with the US as alliance rather than a dependence. Before Bidens visit to the UK, he published an article reiterating the special relationship between the two countries, with which Johnson was displeased because that, he said, would make his country look weak.

Moreover, the two countries are passing the buck to each other on fighting COVID-19 and shouldering international responsibilities. The New Atlantic Charter claims to cope with the many challenges brought about by the pandemic, but the reality is that both the US and the UK refuse to fulfill their due obligations and responsibilities. On June 11, leaders of the G7 Group proposed to share COVID-19 vaccines and build a fairer world economic system, and the member states committed to providing at least one billion doses of vaccines, including 500 million doses from the US and 100 million from the UK, but both of them refused to take any concrete action.

The New Atlantic Charter indicates that Washington and London will stand together on future global governance and the building of international order, but it cannot clear away the many conflicts and problems existing between the two countries, and the US-UK relationship is bound to encounter new difficulties and challenges.
BEIJING, June 18 -- After the successful launch of Shenzhou12 crewed spacecraft on June 17, a promotional video for the manned space flight mission was released by China Manned Space (CMS) Agency.
By Chen Weihua

NATO leaders pose for a group photo during a summit at the organization's headquarters in Brussels on Monday. [Photo/Xinhua]

The just concluded NATO Summit in Brussels has sent a disturbing message on China, a message that could trigger an arms race and undermine world peace. While its rhetoric against China seems less harsh than against Russia, the fact that China featured prominently for the first time on its agenda and in its communique is disquieting.

Although NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said NATO does not see China as an adversary, he repeatedly exaggerated the challenges posed by China to the existing world order due to its growing international role and widening global influence.

Stoltenberg alleged that China's stated ambition and assertive behavior pose a systemic challenge to the rules-based international order, and expressed concern over China's rapidly expanding nuclear arsenal, sophisticated delivery system and "military cooperation" with Russia, especially in the Euro-Atlantic area.

Needless to say these allegations are groundless.

What's wrong in China pursuing military modernization as part of its overall national modernization? China's defense budget accounts for 1.3 percent of its GDP, compared with the 2 percent threshold for 30 NATO member states, and the monstrous US defense budget of 3.7 percent of GDP in 2020, which was higher than the combined budgets of the next 10 countries.

What's wrong in China modernizing its nuclear arsenal given its well-known minimum deterrence policy? China's 300 nuclear warheads are a fraction of the 6,000 massed up by the United States. Not to mention the US also maintains about 800 military bases around the world, many in China's neighborhood.

What's wrong in Chinese and Russian militaries sharing friendly relations given that they have never jointly invaded or bombed any sovereign nation? And if NATO member states can dispatch their military vessels to the South China Sea, why can't Chinese navy ships sail into the Atlantic?

May 7 marked the 22nd anniversary of the NATO bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade. Yet NATO's most nefarious acts in recent memory are its 20-year war in Afghanistan and regime change in Libya in 2011, condemning both countries to ruins. China has done nothing even remotely as destructive. Had China joined NATO in those atrocious missions, Stoltenberg probably wouldn't have accused it of not sharing Western values or of posing a challenge to the West.

The allegation that China presents "systemic challenges to the rules-based international order" couldn't be further from the truth. China has been a responsible member of the United Nations, as well as the World Trade Organization, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. Being the largest peacekeeping troop contributor among the five permanent UN Security Council members, China is committed to global peace and stability. And it doesn't export any ideology or political system. Instead, it adheres to a non-interventionist and basically a non-alignment policy.

The plain truth is that the US-led NATO is trying to create an anti-China miasma, in order to further increase its defense spending and boost its military prowess. Stoltenberg did exactly that when he tried to justify the NATO's 2030 Agenda.

By doing what NATO members have done, China could bolster its defense budget to 2 percent or even 3.7 percent on par with the US. Or, it could double its nuclear arsenal to 600 warheads, which even then would be just 10 percent of the US stockpile. In this sense, the NATO's agenda could trigger an arms race.

But despite the US' and now NATO's reckless warmongering, China has remained cool-headed. There has been no drastic increase in its military budget. By contrast, it has boosted investments in infrastructure such as high-speed railways.

It's no secret that many NATO members don't share the US' Cold War approach to China. So they shouldn't risk being hijacked by the US, especially because Europe knows full well the pain, suffering and destruction wars can cause.

The author is chief of China Daily EU Bureau based in Brussels.
Jordan calls for resuming peace talks to revive two-state solution

EditorWang Xinjuan Time2021-06-18 21:40:12

Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi (R) and visiting Luxembourgian Minister for Foreign and European Affairs Jean Asselborn attend a press conference in Amman, Jordan, on June 17, 2021. Jordan on Thursday underlined the necessity to resume effective peace negotiations for achieving the two-state solution regarding the Palestinian issue. Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi made the remarks at a meeting with his visiting Luxembourgian counterpart Jean Asselborn, where the two sides called for stopping all Israeli measures that undermine the two-state solution, such as building and expanding settlements. (Photo by Mohammad Abu Ghosh/Xinhua)

AMMAN, June 17 (Xinhua) -- Jordan on Thursday underlined the necessity to resume effective peace negotiations for achieving the two-state solution regarding the Palestinian issue.

Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi made the remarks at a meeting with his visiting Luxembourg counterpart Jean Asselborn, where the two sides called for stopping all Israeli measures that undermine the two-state solution, such as building and expanding settlements.

Safadi stressed the need to respect the legal and historical status quo in Jerusalem and its holy sites, vowing that Jordan will continue to work with all partners to protect the Islamic and Christian identity of the holy sites.

Noting that Jordan plays a key role in safeguarding the Islamic and Christian holy sites in Jerusalem, Asselborn affirmed that Luxembourg and the European Union will support the kingdom in continuing to play its crucial role in the region.

The two ministers also discussed ways to enhance bilateral relations and cooperation in various fields, according to a statement issued by the Jordanian Foreign Ministry.
Chinese ambassador to France Lu Shaye. Photo: Xinhua

Outspoken Chinese ambassador to France Lu Shaye has drawn attention recently for being the first Chinese diplomat to justify China's "self-defense" diplomacy amid foreign media's groundless speculation that making a "lovable" China would mean abandoning the so-called "wolf-warrior" diplomatic style. Analysts said Lus remarks signal the country is not reversing its self-defense diplomacy and that it will not give up in actively defending itself against the smear campaign of the West.

It is malicious for Western countries to call Chinese diplomats "wolf warriors" in order to portray an aggressive image of China in the global narrative battle, experts said. Amid the anti-China campaign led by the US, China has to respond to the slander and smears to earn respect and an equal position, which doesn't contradict Chinese leader's message of fostering an image of China that is trustworthy and respectable.

In an interview with French newspaper L'Opinion on Tuesday, Ambassador Lu talked about his idea of "wolf warrior diplomacy," saying that "wolf warrior" is a positive term in China which refers to warriors who fight for the country.

Since there are so many "mad dogs" attacking China, "I am honored to be awarded the title. We are fighters who stand in front of the motherland and fight for her, and we want to stand in the way of 'mad dogs' that attack China."

This is the second time Lu talked about "wolf warrior diplomacy" in public in two weeks, making him the first Chinese diplomat to publicly endorse China's current diplomacy after many foreign media, such as Deutsche Welle, misinterpreted Chinese President Xi Jinping's message on May 31 and claimed China was "abandoning" wolf warrior diplomacy.

When addressing the group study session of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee on May 31, Xi urged the creation of an image of China as "reliable, admirable and respectable."

Foreign media interpreted that China seeks to make "lovable" image globally.

"Saying that China will reverse from 'wolf warrior diplomacy' to building a lovable image is some Western media's wishful thinking, as the phrase 'wolf warriors' they made for China out of malicious purposes did not fit the fact - China has never taken the initiative to attack them," said Zheng Ruolin, a senior Chinese media professional and European studies expert based in France.

Lu also told L'Opinion that China has never been the one that made provocations, and it just defends itself to safeguard national interests, image and dignity.

"Why do media in the West accuse China's diplomacy as 'aggressive' or 'wolf warrior diplomacy?' China has never been an aggressor, yet in the past year, has been criticized on multiple fronts," Lu said. "Don't we have the right to fight back and defend ourselves? This is not fair!"

Instead of being aggressive, China's current diplomacy is more defensive and assertive, which doesn't contradict with being "reliable, admirable and respectable," analysts said.

Zheng noted that China has always been committed to being a "reliable, admirable and respectable" country, but it does not mean it will kneel and raise its hands when facing smears and attacks. "If we give an inch to those who groundlessly attack China, they will want a yard. Only a justified fight-back can help earn equality and respect."

In the face of the US and Western allies' rampant smears and attacks against China on topics like Xinjiang, Hong Kong, Tibet, Taiwan and origins of COVID-19, Chinese ambassadors, spokespersons of the Foreign Ministry and embassies have spoken out or released statements to refute rumors.

For example, since June 1, the majority of the releases published on the website of the Chinese Embassy to Canada are about refuting rumors as well as opposing the Canadian government's political farce on China topics. Soon after news on Budapest mayor's wrong remarks on China's human rights situation, the Chinese Embassy in Hungary on June 6 expressed opposition and dismissed the misinformation.

"Only by striking a blow to those who smear China can they feel the pain and rethink their moves that have poisoned bilateral ties. This is also the way to ensure that true information about China would not be blocked by the West," Li Haidong, professor at the Institute of International Relations of the China Foreign Affairs University, told the Global Times.

"We Chinese always say that we treat friends with delicious food and wine, and we treat jackals and wolves with guns," Li said, noting that building a lovable image in the majority of the people in the world should be China's main focus.

Lu also said although China was accused by the French media, it was also supported by the French people. And that the French people can access an alternative source of information on our publication, not just following the mainstream French media's distorted reports on China.

"China will continue to defend itself from untenable smears and attacks. It is China's right and also shows China's efforts to improve its image while living peacefully with other countries. But this should not be an excuse for certain countries to stigmatize it," Wang Wen, a professor and executive dean of the Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies at Renmin University of China, told the Global Times.
By Cheng Dong

BEIJING, June 18 -- The Taiwan air force published the PLA military aircraft dynamics on June 17, stating that one Y-8 stand-off jamming aircraft, two J-16 fighter jets, and four J-7 fighter jets entered the southwest airspace of Taiwan that morning.

As Taiwans "Central News Agency" reported, this is also the first appearance of the J-7 fighters, according to the public records of the Taiwans military, which has triggered many interpretations on the island.

Lin Ying-Yu, assistant professor at the Institute of Strategic and International Affairs of Taiwans Chung Cheng University, mentioned that the PLA sending transport aircraft formations to the South China Sea and conducting flight operations around the Taiwan Strait in recent days are to practice its strategic requirements of integrating air and space capabilities as well as coordinating offensive and defensive operations. It is possible that the PLA uses the BeiDou Navigation Satellite System (BDS) for positioning to test the mixed formation flights of new and old typed aircraft.

Chang Yen-ting, a retired Taiwan air force lieutenant general, said that judging from the formation on June 17, the PLA is conducting comprehensive training. Dispatching the third-generation fighters shows that the PLA is not afraid of the fourth-generation fighter jets of Taiwan, and has confidence in electronic warfare. The PLA will fight back with electronic warfare if Taiwan uses missiles.

He also mentioned that the PLA sent various types of aircraft to take turns in flights, rather than sending J-16 and other newer fighter jets. Such a combination sends signals to Taiwan on multiple layers and in multiple directions.

Statistics from Taiwans defense authority showed that there have been 28 PLA military planes flying over Taiwan on June 15, setting a record since it began to publish the statistics. The second most day was April 12, with 25 aircraft.

An article published on United Daily News on June 17 analyzed that in the foreseeable future, the activities of PLA aircraft and warships on the east and west sides of Taiwan will gradually get closer to the island, and the training of troops in the surrounding airspace will become normalcy. PLA will increase the deployment of various aircraft for drills and get familiar with the battlefield environment. At the same time, it will affect and test the reaction of Taiwan substantially. "This kind of low-cost but high-efficiency military action will often continue to be staged around the Taiwan Strait before the deadlock between the two sides of the strait is resolved, as long as our side cannot effectively stop it."

In response to the continuous flying-over actions of the PLA aircraft, Ma Xiaoguang, spokesperson for the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council, responded on June 16 that the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) authorities did not stop collaborating with external forces to provoke the Chinese mainland, challenge cross-strait relations, and undermine peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait during the pandemic. It is absolutely necessary for the mainland to curb the "Taiwan independence" secessionist forces, which is consistent with its sincere willingness to help Taiwan compatriots to control the pandemic, all for safeguarding the common interests of compatriots on both sides of the strait.
Japan unveiled plans Thursday to slowly ease the coronavirus state of emergency in Tokyo and several other prefectures in time for next month's opening ceremony of the Tokyo Olympics.

Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga announced that the government will switch to "quasi-emergency" measures once the state of emergency expires Sunday. The looser restrictions would remain in place until July 11, just 12 days before the start of the Olympic Games.

In addition to looser restrictions, the government is expected to announce a plan to allow up to 10,000 spectators to enter venues holding Olympic events.

The initial one-month state of emergency was first declared in April due to a surge in new COVID-19 infections in the Japanese capital and beyond, and was extended in late May. The surge prompted staunch public opposition against staging the Olympics, especially among a prominent group of medical professionals that urged Suga to call off the games.

The Tokyo Olympics are set to take place after a one-year postponement as the novel coronavirus pandemic began spreading across the globe. Foreign spectators have been banned from witnessing the event.
The U.S. House of Representatives approved a bill Thursday that would repeal the authorization of use of military force in Iraq that has been in effect since 2002.

Supporters of the measure say the repeal is necessary to restrict presidential war powers.

The 268-161 House vote came one day after Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer announced his support of the legislation, saying it would prevent acts of "military adventurism" like President Donald Trump's authorization of a 2020 aerial attack on a Baghdad airport.

Iranian commander Qasem Soleimani was killed in the attack.



"The Iraq War has been over for nearly a decade," Schumer said. "The authorization passed in 2002 is no longer necessary in 2021." Schumer said he planned a Senate vote on the repeal measure later this year, while the Senate Foreign Relations Committee said it would consider it at a meeting next week.



The White House said in a statement Monday it supported the legislation and emphasized that current military operations do not rely on the 2002 authorization.
The U.S.' new special representative for North Korea, Sung Kim, will be visiting South Korea this week to discuss ways to reengage the North in denuclearization talks.

The Unification Ministry on Thursday said Kim's visit is scheduled from this Saturday to next Wednesday.

Kim is slated to meet with Unification Minister Lee In-young and a Japanese Foreign Ministry official, Takehiro Funakoshi, will come to Seoul to join the meeting.
Given the frequency of side effects, many people who have had their first AstraZeneca shot are now thinking of getting their second jab with the Pfizer vaccine now mixing and matching is considered safe.

Koreans who book leftover vaccines through an app can already get their hands on some Johnson & Johnson supplies that were sent by the U.S. for Korean soldiers and reservists.

Johnson & Johnson and Moderna vaccines will become available here next month on top of Pfizer and AstraZeneca.

Health authorities on Thursday declined to say which of the four vaccines is the best. Clinical trials show that mRNA vaccines such as Pfizer and Moderna are 95 percent and 94.1 percent effective against coronavirus if administered three to four weeks apart, a much shorter interval than the 11 to 12 weeks considered safe for AstraZeneca.

But they create relatively strong side effects after a second shot. There were 145 reports of death after Pfizer shots as of June 10, about double the 77 reports of deaths after AstraZeneca injection and for a much smaller sample of the population.

AstraZeneca, an adenovirus vaccine, carries a small risk of thrombosis and is about 90 percent effective.

The Johnson & Johnson vaccine is only about 66 percent effective but requires only one shot.

"We've fixed a schedule for the supply of four kinds of vaccine doses for 10 million people in July. But we're still in the process of making a detailed weekly plan," a health official said.

Meanwhile in another setback for international vaccination efforts, Germany's CureVac has essentially proved a dud since it was only 47 percent effective in clinical trials.
E-commerce gaining ground as online buying habits deepen

From:ChinaDaily | 2021-06-18 09:32

Companies providing solutions to help build international business presence

Shopping habits have been shifting away from physical retail and toward online shopping for some time, and the COVID-19 crisis has accelerated this movement.

Data from the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development further shed light on this trend. While global trade in goods decreased 9 percent last year, e-commerce's share in global retail increased from 14 percent to 17 percent from 2019 to 2020.

As the pandemic halted work and disrupted supply chains in many regions, Chinaas the first major economy to resume the bulk of its productionhad an early start in normalizing business operations.

Consequently, digital retail is picking up steam in exporting Chinese goods overseas, where calls for easier and safer access to diversified merchandise are definitely on the rise.

To ride such a wave, AliExpress, the business-to-customer site of Alibaba Group, has unveiled a grand initiativeG100 Global Selling Planto help local brands extend their business presence abroad.

The site, connecting sellers with buyers from more than 200 economies, plans to nurture 100 of what it calls "super brands" by utilizing consumer data insights, sales channels and branding resources. The company also aims to incubate some 10,000 fledgling Chinese brands to gain an early foothold in overseas markets.

AliExpress General Manager Wang Mingqiang believes the time is ripe for Chinese suppliers to move beyond just "manufacturing" to actually creating brands, after the country's superior supply chains were proven resilient enough to weather storms such as the pandemic.

"For many Chinese companies, the best opportunity for consumer education beyond the home turf has essentially arrived," Wang said. "Those with genuine technological advantages and independent R&D capabilities that stay ahead of the curve will become the mainstay of cross-border retail exports."

Wang identified two driving forces needed to catapult Chinese online vendors to the forefront of global sales.

"For one, the pandemic has greatly accelerated e-commerce penetration in Western countries, making accessibility of foreign products easier. Second, as digital and social media savvy younger generations overseas become the backbone of shopping, they are more likely to embrace brands and products previously unheard of in their home countries," he said.

AliExpress has mapped out two approaches to bolster companies' overseas ambitions. For brands boasting robust supply chains and maintaining a fair level of brand awareness, AliExpress plans to devote more marketing resources and craft a country-specific strategy for brands to navigate a specific market.

At the same time, AliExpress will also provide local logistical support, including supply chain finance and after-sales services, so that companies can stay laser-focused on R&D and marketing.

Ugreen, a manufacturer of electronic devices, had a bumpy start when expanding overseas. While the category itself is rather standardized, sales data and customer insights are still needed for the company to better navigate unfamiliar markets.

"For instance, white phone chargers are normally popular in China. But would that color be widely accepted in Russia? Or Southeast Asia? That's the kind of question we hope the AliExpress tie-up can help us address," said Lei Jie, Ugreen's general manager of international marketing.

The second pillar targets brands that are still in their infancy but have exhibited huge growth potential. AliExpress offers a one-stop package for brands to expand abroad.

"After working with AliExpress for a trial period, we've seen gross profit grow 20 to 30 percent," said Zhu Huanyu, general manager of Shenzhen, Guangdong-based household supplier Insetlan. "I think it is critical to maximize brand value instead of just being labeled as an original equipment manufacturer."

Global e-commerce, according to an eMarketer study, is forecast to surpass $6 trillion by 2024 from $3.91 trillion in 2020.
Export firms going local amid ongoing dual-circulation drive

From:ChinaDaily | 2021-06-18 09:31

With COVID-19 dealing a heavy blow to global trade, some companies are starting to look in their own backyards, in a sense.

Business owners are sensing opportunities within China amid various global trade headwinds, and the government's dual-circulation development pattern encourages full exploitation of market potential and freer flow of goods across regions.

But the switch from exports to domestic sales is no easy feat. Limited domestic sales channels, lack of brand awareness and varying requirements and trade settlement methods between domestic and foreign trade are all substantial obstacles impeding its full pursuit.

1688.com, a B2B platform of Alibaba Group, is looking to lend a helping hand. The company plans to overhaul its digitalization plan dedicated to small and medium-sized factories and introduce a new model that allows them to conduct both wholesale and retail business at the same time.

During a conference with suppliers and partners in April, 1688.com announced plans to construct 700 logistics routes across the nation's core industrial zones, and build 100,000 "super factories" within three years.

"Reconstructing new trade and consumption patterns through digitalization is integral to promote the dual-circulation pattern," said 1688 General Manager Wang Hai. "For SMEs to take prompt action, we feel a responsibility to provide them with the necessary infrastructure and make things easier for them."

While lesser known outside of China, 1688.com is host to a huge number of Chinese wholesalers selling a variety of merchandise in the domestic market, and is a key part of the supply chain feeding retailers on Alibaba's Taobao and Tmall websites.

At the heart of the action plan is an effort to link street vendors directly with factories, effectively circumventing middlemen and saving time and costs.

Wang said the legion of small-scale merchants on the site has managed to gain the upper hand in price negotiations, while manufacturers are more willing to mass-produce as the economy of scale serves to trim costs, thus creating a win-win situation.

"Data analytics also kicks in, giving traders a sneak peek of current consumer trends so that they no longer need to operate their business purely based on intuition, and they can avoid stockpiling," Wang said.

As such the platform is linking factory data with consumers through Tetao, or the special edition of Taobao Marketplace featuring budget items, and aims to incubate 10,000 sought-after products with monthly sales volume of 100,000 yuan ($15,560).

Another upgrade comes on the logistics front: 1688 provides door-to-door delivery services and vows to build more than 100 local warehouses to reduce costs in the dispatch of goods.

In a similar vein, e-commerce site Pinduoduo has rolled out a string of training sessions, lecturing traditional exporters on how to adapt their outbound business to fit local needs.

"It takes a few years and a lot of money to train our employees to understand how marketing works for domestic consumers. Thus we decided to work with e-commerce platforms to make up for the expertise gap," said Ren Mingxing, founder of Shanghai Meidu Textile Production.

This is part of a Shanghai municipal government-orchestrated event to connect over 1,000 export-driven enterprises with leading e-commerce platforms where they manage to promote goods to the domestic market, according to the Shanghai Commission of Commerce.

Pinduoduo is looking to introduce over 1,000 such companies to open stores on the site, according to co-founder Da Da.

Discounts are also steep. For instance, a 20-inch suitcase made of recyclable materials, which was priced at 1,580 yuan, is being offered for just 299 yuan online, bringing benefits to customers and valuable cash flow to enterprises, said Yang Yanfeng, a partner at Shanghai Haichen International Trade Co Ltd.
Ambassadors give thumbs up to Yangpu waterfront

From:english.eastday.com | 2021-06-18 15:19

A delegation of ambassadors visited the waterfront of Yangpu on June 17, exploring how the old industrial site has gained a new lease on life through redevelopment.





The Huangpu River waterfront in Yangpu District is known as the birthplace of China's modern industries with the nation's first water plant, and the largest thermal power plant and soap factory in the Far East. It was once named by UNESCO as "the world's largest remaining riverside industrial belt".

Over recent years, the Shanghai government has revitalized the Yangpu waterfront by opening sidewalks stretching 45 kilometers on the banks of the Huangpu River between the Yangpu and Xupu bridges, with a dozen of China's earliest industrial heritages in the district preserved.

Selim Belortaja, the Albanian ambassador to China, said that what impressed him most is how the industrial and historical area has been transformed into a tourist attraction and has made peoples lives easier and more beautiful. It's a big challenge for the local government and the central government. He likes walking along the river on a sunny day in the evening.

In the City Construction Planning Exhibition Hall, the ambassadors watched a promotional video of the Yangpu waterfront. Maria Gustava, Mozambiques ambassador to China, was quite impressed by the governments philosophy of cities built by the people and for the people.





She said, It takes into consideration the whole aspect like the ecological, traditional and cultural aspects. And the most important thing is that it brings the young people from the university to participate in the construction of this area. They are building the city for themselves to enjoy it. So this is what I could see here, which is really a very good model for the building of the city of the future, because the young people from the university and the innovation is part of it.





(Maria Gustava, Mozambiques ambassador to China)

Story/ Wang Xiaoyang, Wu Qiong

Video/ Wang Pengchong

Translation/ Zheng Qian


Foreign envoys see how grassroots democracy works in Changning

By:Eastday | From:english.eastday.com | 2021-06-18 16:26

At a civic center in Changning District, a few residents are gathered at the Gubei Civic Chamber, discussing public affairs in their community. Among the faces, two of them are expats: one from the Philippines, the other Australia.

The way Chinese and foreign residents solve public affairs within the community in a democratic way impressed some foreign ambassadors and envoys who are visiting Shanghai these days.

How were you elected to represent the residents? asked Alain Wong Yen Cheong, ambassador of Mauritius to China, with curiosity. In response, the Filipino resident Michelle Teope-Shen explained that the Chamber is a platform open to each community resident, to ensure that the topics under discussion can be formed from the bottom to the top.

Located in the Ronghua Neighborhood Committee which covers the Gubei New Area, the Gubei Civic Center has three floors with a total area of 2,500 square meters, featuring four main functions: community affairs services, life services, cultural exchanges and community co-governance. To better meet the diverse needs of foreign residents in Gubei, the Center established a civic chamber formed by a panel of counselors.

According to Michelle Teope-Shen, the counselors, who are also residents of the community, have the right to score each proposal. But they will not make immediate decisions until they seek and consider other residents opinions.

Michelle has been a veteran of the Gubei Civic Chamber since 2014. In the beginning, the Chambers agenda was more about how to connect the Civic Center with the residents and improve their interaction. However, as time went by, the topics of the Chamber became more complicated and in-depth.

The Australian counselor is also very glad to participate in the process of public affairs. Considering it a very interesting and important process, she said she will encourage other public-conscious residents to join in the Chamber.

After learning the decision-making process of the Chamber, Gafar Ahmed, Ambassador of Sudan to China, was impressed by the long tradition of Chinas democratic decision-making at the community level, which dates back to the Han and Tang dynasties. As he said, though it is now operating in new buildings and new mechanisms, the tradition has been deeply rooted in the ideas of the Communist Party of China, becoming part of the Chinese culture and lifestyle.

Having living in China for three and a half years, Bahamas Ambassador to China, Sterling Quant, has been to many places across the country, and is thus no stranger to the practice of community governance in the Gubei Civic Center. As he said, what is being practiced here will be part of Chinas blueprint of promoting the model to all grassroots communities.

Story and Photos by Chen Jing

Translation: Wu Qiong
At dawn today, ISIS mercenaries launched an attack on sites and points of the Damascus government forces and its loyal groups in Fayda Ibn Muwayna area within Al-Mayadin desert in the eastern countryside of Deir Ezzor. As a result, clashes erupted, in which the Damascus government forces used missile-propelled grenades in an attempt to repel the attack.

According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, the clashes resulted in killing five elements of the Damascus government forces and their affiliated groups, in addition to killing two ISIS mercenaries.

While the Observatory documented the killing of 7 elements of the Damascus government forces, including an officer with the rank of brigadier, in a surprise attack by ISIS mercenaries in Sukhna desert, located in the easternmost countryside of Homs near the administrative border with Deir Ezzor.

D.H
Comal County health officials reported the county's 324th COVID-19 death on Friday morning as the number of active cases continued to hover in the low 200s.

Officials said the latest death was a New Braunfels man in his 80s who died on June 13.

The county added eight new cases of COVID to its totals, with three of those confirmed and the remaining five probable.

+13 New Braunfels gathers downtown to mourn deadly toll from COVID-19 Families gripped photos of loved ones lost to COVID, cried and hugged during a memorial cere

The number of active cases declined to 208 as the county had 16 COVID recoveries reported. Of those 208 cases, nine were reported hospitalized. At the start of the week the county reported 209 active cases with three hospitalized.

Comal County hospitals reported caring for 10 COVID-19 patients on Friday, with three in intensive care and none on ventilators. That's down three total patients from the start of the week.

The percentage of hospital beds being used by COVID-19 patients remained low on Friday, with only 2.27% reported across the 22-county area that includes both Comal and Guadalupe counties. That's down slightly from the 2.35% reported on Monday.

Both of Comal County's seven-day positivity rates were down from the start of the week, with the molecular rate at 3.5% on Friday from 4.29% on Monday while the antigen rate was at 4.17% on Friday down from 4.99% reported on Monday.

The county's public health department is continuing to administer vaccines by appointments, with the Moderna vaccine for those over 18 and Pfizer for those 12 and older. Those interested in receiving a vaccine can call 830-221-1150 to schedule an appointment.

According to the Texas Department of State Health Services, 57.22% of Comal County residents over the age of 12 have had at least one vaccine shot, while 48.29% are fully vaccinated.

Those numbers are slightly ahead of the statewide percentages which stand at 55.99% and 46.93% respectively.

The vaccination rate in neighboring Guadalupe County, which includes a portion of the city of New Braunfels, continues to lag behind, with 50.38% of eligible residents with at least one dose and 43.45% fully vaccinated.
New Braunfels, TX (78130)

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Considerable cloudiness. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 74F. Winds S at 5 to 10 mph.
Woburn, MA (01801)

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Cloudy with showers. Cooler. High 64F. Winds NE at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 70%..

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OSCAR BUZZ - Jane Curtain, Loretta Devine and Ann Margret in a scene from "Queen Bees" released by Gravitas Ventures. The film attempts to be senior citizen version of "Mean Girls".
Woburn, MA (01801)

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Steady light rain this morning. Showers continuing this afternoon. Cooler. High 64F. Winds NE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 70%..

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Overcast with rain showers at times. Low 58F. Winds NE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 40%.
A new Indiana law making it more complicated for Hoosier teachers to have union dues voluntarily deducted from their paychecks is the latest statute approved this year by the Republican-controlled General Assembly to be challenged in court.

Three central Indiana teachers unions have filed suit at the U.S. District Court in Indianapolis seeking an injunction to halt the enforcement of Senate Enrolled Act 251 before its key provisions take effect July 1.

Under the law, enacted by Republican Gov. Eric Holcomb, teachers who choose to join a union must annually submit a request to school administrators to have union dues withheld from their paychecks, and confirm that request in a separate email message.

Currently, dues authorization agreements permit the deduction of dues on a continuing basis until permission is revoked by the teacher.

WATCH NOW: Assistance available to help Hoosier renters pay landlord, utility costs

The new law also requires teachers to sign a form created by Republican Attorney General Todd Rokita, a Munster native, affirming they are aware they're not required to join or pay dues to a teachers union, and they can quit the union at any time.

The advisory, by law, must be printed in 14-point bold type.

In addition, schools are obligated to separately advise teachers, at least once a year, they are not required to join a union and the total yearly cost of union membership, as well as information on how to withdraw from a teachers union.

The lawsuit claims those provisions are unconstitutional for multiple reasons, including unlawfully impairing contracts, infringing on the right to free association, and compelling teachers to affirm an anti-union message dictated by the state.

The plaintiffs also argue it's improper for the General Assembly to impose on Hoosier teachers and their unions a far more burdensome process for assigning wages to a third party compared to any other employees or unions in the state.

"Placing a burden on teachers when they band together to financially support their exclusive representative while placing none on all employees who make wage assignments for individual purposes is clearly a restraint on the right of association," the unions said.

Moreover, they note the attorney general is not required to make the union dues deduction form and advisory available until July 1, while the law simultaneously expires all existing deduction authorizations the same day.

They said that will create an intentional union revenue gap until teachers obtain, fill out and submit the new form, and the verification process is completed  perhaps until August or September when teachers and school staff return to work.

"The teachers themselves have no control over the availability of school corporation staff to perform its obligations under (the law). Dues that would otherwise be checked off and remitted to plaintiff unions between July 1 and the beginning of the new school year will, therefore, not be timely paid," the unions said.

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"Plaintiffs rely on wages being appropriately deducted so that the exclusive representative, in return, may provide important services like enforcing the contract, interpreting the contract, negotiating the contract, providing representation as necessary in any grievance procedure, and liability insurance for its members."

Rokita is named as a defendant in the case, along with Holcomb-appointed Indiana Secretary of Education Katie Jenner, and Tammy Meyer, chairwoman of the Indiana Education Employment Relations Board.

The attorney general said the statute appropriately affirms Indiana's status as a "right-to-work" state, including the right of teachers to individually authorize a payroll deduction for union dues.

"I will always stand up to protect the individual liberties of hard-working Hoosiers  and that includes fighting to defend teachers' right to choose how they spend their hard-earned money," Rokita said.

A status conference held Thursday before Magistrate Judge Debra McVicker Lynch suggested she's likely to rule by June 30 on the unions' request for an injunction.

WATCH NOW: Riding Shotgun with NWI Cops  Patrolling Lowell with Cpl. Aaron Crawford

State Sen. Phil Boots, R-Crawfordsville, the sponsor of the measure in the Indiana Senate, said he believes the law provides needed transparency to teachers concerning their right to join a union, or not.

"It will simply require each teacher to verify their desire to be a member of a union and provide information on their dues structure. That requirement will not be a huge burden on any teacher. If a teacher wishes to be a member of a union, this law will not hinder their ability to do so," Boots said.

"This legislation was introduced after lawmakers heard from teachers who felt they were not given an appropriate amount of flexibility."

The new law was supported in the Senate by state Sen. Ed Charbonneau, R-Valparaiso. All Democratic Northwest Indiana senators, as well as state Sens. Mike Bohacek, R-Michiana Shores, and Rick Niemeyer, R-Lowell, were opposed.

In the House, state Reps. Mike Aylesworth, R-Hebron; Julie Olthoff, R-Crown Point; Hal Slager, R-Schererville; and Ed Soliday, R-Valparaiso, voted for the plan, while state Rep. Jim Pressel, R-Rolling Prairie, joined all Region Democratic representatives voting no.

Other new Indiana laws currently under review by state or federal courts include novel restrictions on abortion, changes to the membership of the Lake County Judicial Nominating Commission, and whether the Legislature can convene without the governor's consent during a statewide emergency.

Teachers unions lawsuit challenging Senate Enrolled Act 251

Meet the 2021 Northwest Indiana legislative delegation
Press Release

June 18, 2021 De Lima welcomes Senate panel's consideration of rental subsidy bill for informal settlers Opposition Senator Leila M. de Lima is elated over a Senate committee consideration of bills granting rental subsidy to informal settlers. De Lima made the statement after the Senate Committee on Urban Planning, Housing, and Resettlement panel has approved consideration of proposals for the three separate bills on rent subsidy for informal settlers, one of which was Senate Bill (SB) No. 1834 which she filed on September 22, 2020. "The need to uphold and protect people's right to housing cannot be any more pronounced than today. Housing in these troubled times, after all, has become the frontline defense against the coronavirus," she said. "The enactment of this measure is a step forward in ensuring that people's right to access adequate, secure, habitable, sustainable, resilient, and affordable housing is upheld," she added. With this new development, the Senate Urban Planning, Housing, and Resettlement Committee will form a technical working group to consolidate the measures which, aside from SB No. 1834, also include Senate Bill Nos. 1767 and 1227. These measures seek to provide monthly housing subsidy to informal settler families (ISFs) who are scheduled for relocation but were delayed due to calamities. In filing SB No. 1834, De Lima proposed to aid both lessors and tenants by extending lines of credit from government-accredited financial institutions, instituting a moratorium on evictions and establishing rental assistance centers. "Renters and lessors must not emerge from the pandemic overburdened with housing related debt as a result of financial and economic circumstances created by the COVID-19 crisis. This measure would provide a more stable and long-term solution to the plight being faced by both lessors and tenants," she said. "Malaki ang maitutulong nito upang mabawasan ang mga pasanin at alalahanin ng marami nating kababayan, na humarap at patuloy na humaharap ngayon sa mas mabibigat na problema sa pantustos sa pang-araw-araw na pangangailangan dahil sa pandemya," she added. The lady Senator from Bicol further said she hopes that her colleagues will support and help in the swift approval of the proposed measure. "I hope that my honorable colleagues will recognize the urgency of passing measures that will cushion or mitigate the worst effects of the pandemic and the economic crisis among our people," she said.
Press Release

June 18, 2021 Hontiveros seeks senate probe into police brutality on kids, teens, 'unabated' killings Senator Risa Hontiveros is set to file a senate resolution seeking an investigation, in aid of legislation, on the "unabated" killings during police operations, which have claimed the lives of thousands of Filipinos, including children and teenagers. The move comes as yet another teenager, 16-year-old Johndy Maglinte, was allegedly killed by police officers in an operation in Laguna. According to reports, Maglinte's family alleged he was shot while handcuffed and lying face down. "Johndy, at 16, is still a child according to our laws. Anong laban ng isang bata sa isang armadong institusyon? Bakit ba ang lalakas ng loob ng ilan sa mga pulis na mang-api at kumitil ng mga kabataang walang kalaban-laban? This is a serious human rights violation that needs to be investigated," the senator said. Hontiveros, who chairs the Senate Committee on Women, Children, Family Relations and Gender Equality believes Maglinte's death is no longer an isolated case as many other cases of police brutality have led to the death of helpless teenagers. In 2018, Kian delos Santos, Carl Arnaiz, and Reynaldo de Guzman, all teenagers, were killed during a so-called "One Time, Big Time" operation of the Caloocan City police. "Maglinte's death should never be considered an isolated case. These operations have been constantly posing a real danger to our youth: mula kay Kian delos Santos at sa kanyang mga kasamahan noong 2018, hanggang Kay Johndy ngayong 2021, at sa libu-libo pang mga kabataang pumanaw dahil sa kalabisan ng ating pulisya," she said. "This relentless, unabated slaughter of our people must stop. I will do all I can to make sure the perpetrators are brought to justice," she added. Hontiveros noted that government officials should stop defending their brutal policies and focus their resources on pursuing a public health approach to problematic drug use. "In the middle of a pandemic, no less, this administration continues to inflict nationwide emotional trauma on Filipinos. This should never be the status quo. Karumal-dumal na ang walang tigil na patayan at karahasan. Everyday, we will choose to take steps that will rectify this tremendous injustice towards Filipinos. The day of reckoning is fast approaching," Hontiveros concluded.
Press Release

June 18, 2021 Lacson: Funding for Minors' Vaccination Amply Covered by Existing Borrowings

More at: https://pinglacson.net/2021/06/18/lacson-funding-for-minors-vaccination-amply-covered-by-existing-borrowings/ The P57.3 billion in loans already secured by the government for the procurement of vaccines can cover the P25-billion requirement for the vaccination of minors, Sen. Panfilo M. Lacson said Friday. Lacson cited updated figures from the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) indicating only P30.462 billion may be needed to inoculate 68.2 million adult Filipinos this year. "Figures from the PSA as of March 28 this year shows the Philippines' midyear population will reach 110,198,654 by July 1. Of this, 62 percent or 68.323 million are adults. If we multiply this by P446 per dose, including logistical costs, we will need about P30.472 billion to inoculate our adult Filipinos. Thus the difference of P26.83 billion is more than enough to cover the P25-billion requirement to procure the vaccines for our minors," Lacson said. "Based on these figures, we may not need to look for an additional P25 billion since it is amply covered by the 'excess' in borrowings," he added. Lacson noted that even if the government were to inoculate 83.8 million adults based on the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF)'s figures, at P446 per dose including logistical requirements, it would only need P37.374 billion - still way below the P57.3 billion in borrowings. On the other hand, he pointed out vaccine czar Carlito Galvez Jr. had stated that we have 68 million free doses of vaccines, including 44 million from the COVAX facility and 24 million from two brands. "Every peso counts and must be accounted for, especially during these difficult times. That said, the IATF and DOF should further clarify the figures that they presented during last Tuesday's Committee of the Whole hearing," Lacson said. During the Senate Committee of the Whole hearing on the government's vaccination program last June 15, Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez III said that of the P88.6-billion budget to procure vaccines, P57.3 billion had been sourced through concessional loans from our multilateral partners. Also during the hearing, Lacson and Senate President Vicente C. Sotto III agreed that with more than enough funds to achieve herd immunity for this year, the government should focus more on ensuring the efficient rollout of the vaccines. Meanwhile, Lacson said the Senate will scrutinize agencies' requests for additional budgets against the pandemic, including an additional P66 billion being requested by the Department of Health for pandemic response. "First, they will have to account for P660.1 billion which, according to the Department of Budget and Management, has been released to the agencies concerned for the overall COVID-19 response over the last 15 months or so," he said. "During these times when the country is almost neck-deep in debt with an unprecedented P11 trillion in foreign and domestic borrowings, not to mention an alarmingly low revenue collection, every peso that comes from the treasury should count and made sure to be put to good use," he added. Lacson also said the government should all the more do a "good job" of promoting trust in the vaccination process and maximizing limited resources to do so, after Australia's commitment to provide P480.2 million to procure additional COVID-19 vaccine jabs. "We are very thankful to Australia for its gesture, which will go a long way for us Filipinos to 'get the jab done' and be vaccinated from COVID-19. But more importantly, this should be an added motivation for the government to 'get the job done' by maximizing the use of our limited resources to promote public trust in the vaccination process. This includes using our resources wisely by getting the most accurate facts and figures possible," he said. On Thursday, Australian ambassador to the Philippines Steven Robinson said Australia has an added commitment of AUD13.72 million (P480.2 million) for the Philippines to buy vaccines. He said this new commitment is in addition to Australia's support through the COVAX facility, to which Australia has contributed AUD130 million. He added the Philippines has received 5,025,870 doses from the COVAX facility. Also, the envoy said Australia's Vaccine Response Plan for the Philippines has provided AUD7.52 million in vaccine delivery support through UNICEF and WHO.
Tolentino asks NHA to allow reallocation of unoccupied gov't housing units

MANILA - Senator Francis "Tol" N. Tolentino has asked the National Housing Authority (NHA) to devise guidelines that would enable the government to reallocate completed but unoccupied government housing units to qualified beneficiaries, especially the homeless and urban poor.

Tolentino stressed that since government housing units are considered a public good, unoccupied housing structures should be reallocated to qualified beneficiaries if the original tenants failed to occupy the unit within three years.

"We consider these (government housing units) as a public good, and as a public good, they should benefit the general public," said Tolentino.

During the hearing of the Senate Committee on Urban Planning, Housing and Resettlement, which is chaired by Tolentino, NHA General Manager Marcelino P. Escalada Jr. revealed that a number of those who availed of "low-cost" housing units from the government did so as an investment, with some owners even renting out their properties for significantly more than the monthly amortization they are paying to the government.

Tolentino told the NHA to properly compensate the original awardees of housing units who have started paying amortizations once the agency reallocates their unoccupied units to other beneficiaries.

The senator stressed that allowing government housing units to remain unused deviates from their original purpose of benefitting the homeless, especially informal settlers and victims of natural and man-made disasters.

NHA General Manager Escalada welcomed Tolentino's proposal, and said that they are drafting a policy guidelines for the re-awarding of low-cost housing units that remain unoccupied within a specific time frame.
Home > 2021 > Khadijas Jail Time: A Prison Account from 1949 | Uma Chakravarti

(Extracted from her unpublished and unfinished memoir by Uma Chakravarti)

Khadija Ansari Gupta was born in 1932 in Firanghi Mahal, Lucknow which trained ulema and was famous in the Islamic world for its rationalist syllabi which was adopted in institutions as far as Egypt. Her father was a liberal, perhaps even radical student of Maulana Abdul Bari, who was known for his erudition. In the 1920s Bari sahib became a supporter of the Khilafat movement and drew the famous Ali brothers into the national movement led by Gandhiji. Leading Congress figures such as Sarojini Naidu were frequent visitors to the Firanghi Mahal and on my visit to the mohalla in March 2014 while making the film Ek Inquilab Aur Aaya I was casually shown places where Gandhiji stayed the night including where a goat was tethered so that Gandhiji could get his goats milk on call! Many people from Firanghi Mahal had gone to jail during the national movement including members of Khadijas family; Khadijas father too went to jail during that time.

Firanghi Mahal had many strands of political opinions including some who were drawn to communism. Khadijas elder brother became a communist during his student days and went to jail for his activities. Rashid Jahan and Hajra Begum, senior activists of the Communist Party were frequent visitors at Firanghi Mahal. A younger student activist whose "entire family" was communist, Bano Niazi, was an important influence on young Khadijas life as she too was drawn into the movement as a 16-year-old school-going student. According to Khadija, Bano gave her Kalpana Dutts memoir on the Chittagong armoury raid to read which had been translated into Urdu and that became the turning point in her life. As a student activist she wore mens clothes and joined others in sticking posters at night on the walls of Lucknow. She also hawked copies of the New Age in Hazratganj Chowk wearing a gharara. On one occasion a conservative member of Firanghi Mahal saw her selling the party paper and sent an anonymous man to buy out all the copies in her hand, a proposal that Khadija turned down sharply saying "nahi! Ek ek kar ke bechne se message badhta hai." She wasnt going to get off the street until her mission was complete!

Khadija was arrested in 1949 a day before the Communist Party had announced an All-India Workers strike for the 19th of February. Other women were arrested too but they were bailed out a couple of months later. Khadija was held under the Preventive Detention Act and stayed in jail for 11 months because she was regarded as particularly dangerous, suspected of being a courier for some of the leaders who were underground. Khadija herself believed that her extended family conspired to keep her in jail as that would take her off the streets as that was particularly embarrassing to them. She told me later that it wasnt a "bad" experience for her as the "asli jail" was the cloistered existence young women were expected to conform to at that time in the Firanghi Mahal. She had been one of the first girls to go to school from there. Ultimately Khadija went on to do a Ph. D in Sociology from Delhi University. She did fieldwork in a small town in UP pioneering a new trend in women doing fieldwork and wrote an essay on the subject. She taught sociology in Miranda House, Delhi University for many years producing many generations of young women who became sociologists in their own right. She retired from Miranda House in the early 1990s and went to live first in Goa, and then in Bangalore. Khadija is the protagonist of my film Ek Inquilab Aur Aaya, which is available for viewing on Youtube

Covid ended her spirited existence on May 8, 2021. She never gave up on life and on relationships. I last met her in December 2019 a few months before the Covid lockdown began. And Covid made sure that we were to never meet again as I never travelled to Bangalore after that.

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The most enjoyable periods of my life were the 10 months of jail confinement in the juvenile section of Central jail in Lucknow (as I was still underage for the regular jail as I was not yet a major). And the next was about two years I spent to build my nest with A (Aniruddha Gupta, Khadijas husband) and Guddu (her son) in Jhaluk Bari Teaching Staff quarter of Guwahati University in Assam after my marriage to A...

My Arrest, Imprisonment, and Life Inside Jail

I do not remember the exact date on which I was arrested but I do recall the exact time and the place from where I was picked up by the police. It was between 4-5 oclock in the evening; I was briskly proceeding towards Latoush Road to attend the meeting of grass root workers to allot the work to each one of us for the preparation of the D-Day-rail ka paheya jam karenge. The call was given by the Communist Party for All India Railway Strike on February 19, 1949, but the meeting was cancelled due to advance information about the Governments plan to arrest key persons from the meeting. But I had no information about it. As I was a few yards away from the office building I heard the screeching of a vehicle behind me. I looked back in panic and saw a uniformed person standing in front of me. He said: you are Miss Khadija Ansari?, and before I could utter a word, I heard him say you are under arrest. He opened the back door of the van and politely ushered me in. Two or three policemen joined me inside the van. The person who talked to me was perhaps the Officer as he went to sit at the front seat. I was stunned and dumfounded. It was a simple black out for me. I did not ask any question and sat quietly The van started and by the time it stopped it was nearing dusk. I was asked to get down and saw a very plump good-looking lady (later I came to know she was Mrs. Kaul, the woman in charge of female juvenile section of the Central Jail in Lucknow) accompanied by two uniformed middle-aged women. The elder of the two came forward to help me in getting down. She held one of my hands and gently led me to an iron gate which was locked: two gun-toting men were standing there. The plump lady whispered to them, and the gate was opened. I was led to a spacious office room and made to sit. After about an hour or so an officious looking man, in khaki uniform, came in and sat across the table. The woman gave him bundle of papers. After reading them he looked inquisitively at me. He said something to the lady in hushed voice got up from the chair and left the room.

It was almost dark outside. I was led by the two uniformed ladies, holding my two hands on either side, to a big open courtyard. I faintly remember the place and images around the place-it was a big squarish courtyard surrounded by very thick and high boundary walls. There were four or five longish rooms with iron bars. I was ushered into one smaller and barred room and the gate was closed behind me. There was no one beside me. For a second, I shivered as there was no light inside the barrack excepting a dim flicker from the lantern held by one of the two ladies outside the locked barred door. There were four concrete bed shaped platforms. The lady with lantern outside asked me to sit down. Perhaps she took pity on my teenaged-bewildered face and moved nearer to the place where I was standing inside the room.

After an hour or so the second lady holding a tray with food and a book came inside and asked me to eat. I was totally dazed and looked at her enquiringly. I dont remember the contents of the food, but I do recollect the size of the bookit appeared to me to be a fat one. The book was in English, and I had only a working knowledge of the language. As I turned the page in the dim light of lantern held by the lady, I could read only the name of the book and the authorDiscovery Of India by Jawaharlal Nehru, as these were written in bold letters. While nibbling food at the insistence of the lady I kept on turning the pages; I could vaguely remember to have read somewhere the excerpts in an Urdu booklet named Baap Ke Khat Beti Ke Naam / Letters from a Father to a Daughter written by Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru inside the prison. Since the book was in English, I could not comprehend much about the contents of the book. After partaking a bit of food perhaps I dozed off.

In the morning I was woken by the noise of a clicking iron door; perhaps it was late according to the rules of the jail as outside the barrack there were lots of noises of clicking vessels and calling out the (names) ---as if someone was taking the attendance in a classroomwith the slight change of calling numbers (of individual inmates) instead of names! Now, reflecting back, it seems that inmates of the prisons had no identity excepting that of having a qaidi / prisoner number, one....two ...three. This was during 1949, about six decades back! I have no idea about the present.

During those days, the rules and regulation and the maintenance of the political prisoners had not much changed from colonial times. Instead of cemented platform with scanty beddings meant for normal convicts and under trials, political prisoners from well-off or elite backgrounds were given a single iron cot with reasonably suitable beddings, and every morning a measured (prescribed in the jail manual) ration was given to individual inmate for cooking her meal in an allotted place in the barrack. Another inmate would come to clean the Indian style toilets which had no flush system. The barrack and the outer compound were cleaned by female inmates allotted for this purpose. There were two sets of wardresses who would always be with me for watch purposeslocking and unlocking barrack entrance etc. During the summer months, the bed would be brought outside the barrack and tied with an iron chain to huge thick trees planted in the compound. In the evenings I was allowed to walk around in the compound. I was allowed to play badminton and volley-ball games (the balls/shuttlecocks, two rackets and net was allotted to me as a political inmate by the Jail authorities). Since, no other inmate was with me at that time Mrs. Kaul would come to give me company. Perhaps my young age and bewildered look attracted her pity. In the morning around 10-11after completing her work in other compounds she would come to my compound with a Gita in her hand and loudly read out the scriptures which I did not comprehend one bit. In the evening she would visit me around 6 pm and make me play one or two rounds of volleyball or badminton.

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The Jail Staff

Looking back to the eleven months in jail under the Preventive Detention Act appear to be just unbelievable. While recollecting the details I go back to my lost dream land. I had noted each days activities in a note book provided by jail authoritiesthere were a number of blue colour lined exercise copies/books. I still remember the title I scribbled in Urdu on the cover Mera Roznamcha / My Diary/ My Daily Activities. Alas! Those notes were lost when our house was attacked during AssamiBengali riots in Guwahati University campus in Jhalukbari in 1960. Yet, I kept reflecting on those happy moments, the events, and the persons I interacted during my eleven months stay in jail. I vividly remember the name and faces of those who interacted with me and made a lasting impression on my mind.

Amongst those the first one was Mrs. Kaul, the caretaker of the women juvenile section of the Central Jail, Lucknow. She was the one who took me out of the police van along with two khaki clad female workers/the wardresses to keep watch and look after me in my compound. I am now forgetting their names, but I still remember their faces and appearances. The elder of the two was short, stocky and had a wrinkled but benign face. The other one was tall with a round face. Both used to be clad in Khaki lehnga, kurta and dupatta/scarf style covering on head and shoulders.

First let me describe Mrs Kaul. She was shortroly-polybut rosy in her complexion. Later on, I came to know about the sad story of her life. She was Kashmiri by origin. She was the daughter of a local well known skin specialist, Dr. Parshad. She was married to an army officer of her own caste and perhaps deserted by the husband for another woman. She was middle aged and was an employee of the jail. She had a small girl child about 3-4-years old whom she had adopted. The child was allowed to accompany her mother into the jail when there was a problem with the domestic help; so, at times she would accompany her mother into my compound.

Though Mrs, Kaul looked stern and officious outwardly, at heart she was very kind and affectionate as I found out later while interacting with her. From her I came to know a lot about the jail, its rules and regulations and the actual system of its operation. She also informed me about inmates of this juvenile section of the jail, especially the detailed background of the girls allotted to my barrack for daily chores. She was the one to chalk out the daily timetable for the individual girls and supervised the operations. In the evening she would invariably come and insist on my taking a walk or playing one or two rounds of badminton/volleyball with her. However, at times she looked very sad. She knew Ramayana and Mahabharata stories by heart and used to sing them loudly to me. At times she would drop in to see if the food was properly cooked for me by the girls.

Reflecting back, I now feel, that the days I spent in jail were the most enjoyable moments I ever had before I was married and left Firanghi Mahal.

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Mera Roznamcha

The following is part of the information I had recorded in my Mera Roznamcha which got destroyed in Jhalukbari during the riots in Assam in July 1960.

1) Balia the 17-year-old girl from Bihar village who was convicted for drowning a boy child of her agethe only son of a local rich zamindar of the same village while playing with him. At the time she was convicted and brought to jail she was less than 10 years of age; she came into the jail with a doll in her hand. In1947 while celebrating Independence Day all over India, most of the convicts in the various jails were freed on some sort of assurances from local gentry. But not Balia; she was not given remission as the zamindar of her village refused to give any such assurance.

2) Bitola, a girl from eastern Uttar Pradesh convicted for killing her husband with a gandasa (a sharp agricultural implement). Hers was a child marriage, and her husband was also of her age. During a child-like quarrel, she killed her husband in anger and was convicted for murder. She was stocky in built she might have killed in all innocence.

3) Majeedan was from western Uttar Pradesh. She had a 2-3 years-old child with her in her own barrack. She was accused of poisoning one of her own friends child out of jealousy. She was around 23-24years old and it seemed to me that she had a hard face.

4) Rampiyari was from Bareilly district of Uttar Pradesh. She was in her late 30s. She was an under trial from an urban area, a mother-in-law from a gold smiths family. She was being tried for poisoning her three daughters-in-law by mixing Dhatura (a deadly plant) in their food for greed of dowry. Her son and husband were also being tried and were behind bars.

While Majeeden and Bitola were allotted to me to cook and clean the place, Balia was a sort of an errand worker attached to Mrs. Kaul. It seemed Mrs. Kaul was fond of her and she too was attached to her. Apart from these, there were two watch and ward women officially called wardresses. As mentioned earlier, some where I had made detailed notes of each days activity in my Mera Roznamcha which got lost in the Guwahati riots. Now only the vague images flutter on (in my mind) from time to time.

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Memories of Resistance

The following are some of the important events associated with my life in jail. These continue to amuse me even at this fag end of my life.

I vividly remember the day when Hajra Apa and Dr Rashid Jahan were brought to the barracks led by a male official, perhaps by Mr Khan, the jailer. Both were our mentors when we were actively involved in the primary school teachers strike. I had seen and talked to Hajra Apa at the Communist Party office. She was the wife of Dr. Ahmad a very senior member of Communist Party of India. We had no opportunity to see him as he was under ground and Hajra apa was living in the party office along with other senior members of local unit of district Communist Part which was under the leadership of B.T. Ranadive. She was in charge of local unit of All India Womens Conference. She used to come to our house in Firanghi Mahal and would meet the young and middle-aged women of our family and try to expose them to the world OUTSIDE THE BOUNDARY of Firanghi Mahal.

Rashida apa was an eminent doctor in Lucknow. She was an important member of the All India Progressive Writers Association, a front organisation of the Communist Part, as were All India Womens Conference and the Indian Progressive Theatre AssociationIPTA.

I was a bit taken back to see them there! Today it looks so naive to write a personal/private note about myself, without much relevance to the present account. Yet, it is important to find out the possible biases in this accountto help those who might be interested in sing this account /or part of it for the research purposes.

Another important event in my jail life was the hunger strike for twelve days. The hunger strike call was given by the Communist Party and was meant for jail inmates against the arrest of an important labour leader Moulana Yusuf of Kanpur. It was the month of March 1949. The trade union wing of Communist Party had given the call for all an Indian Railway strike. While the big wigs of the Party had gone underground, the Party sympathisers, and grass root activists like me were being picked up one by one. This was the time when Dr Rashid Jahan and Hajra Apa (Hajra Begum) were rounded up and sent to Central Jail where I was lodged. I have no idea how the message reached us inside the jail. The three of us gave notices to the jail authorities (as per jail rules) that we would start our hunger strike from a given day. I was totally oblivious about the meaning and the processes involved in hunger strike except what I was tutored by my two mentors and what I observed on my own during the period of strike. Cooked food was put in front of us, as we were supposed to eat at regular timings. After some time, it was taken out at the usual time. The second or third day of the strike a few male jail officers started coming and talking to my mentors. After 4 or 5 days of strike I observed one doctor and a nurse along with Mrs. Kaul followed by a male jail officer started visiting us. We were medically checked every morning perhaps as a matter of routine.

On the 5th or the 6th day, a few more officers came in the barrack and had a long conversation with my mentors and left after whispering something to them. Early next morning I was taken to another cell and was asked to lie down on a cot. The doctor examined me and told me very gently that as I was not well, and that I urgently needed to take food. He tried his best to convince me about the urgency and he said: if you refuse, I have no option but to force the food through the nasal tube.

Amongst the couple of jail staff, I could spot the ADM, Bose Mullick, who had ordered the lathi charge on us in front of Hazratganj Police Chowki (who was then mimicking our slogan chanting, and at whom I had hurled my chappal which hit his face). Perhaps he had never forgiven me for that insult! In the jail, he shouted at the staff and asked them to hold me back on the bed, but somehow, I was able to disentangle my left foot from their tight grip and gave Bose Mullick a hard kick. Perhaps he would never forget this second insult and at an appropriate time he tried his best to convince As elder sister to keep her brother away from this extremely dangerous girl! At the time of our marriage, he happened to be the Registrar of Marriages and he made a barb at me saying "she is whispering (the vows) now; then she was shouting slogans at me!"

Being the youngest amongst the political prisoners, I was not being taken too seriously. Perhaps the prison authorities were a bit indulgent to me?

Looking back, I feel, perhaps, I was treated like a teenager who had in an absent-minded fashion strayed to the serious milieu of left politics. Alas, it was not true! I had the firm roots in national politics through my own observation during that period of 1943-47the active participation of my family in national politics, courtesy Gandhiji and other important members of the Congress party.

I must add some amusing event related to my hunger strike.

After five to six days of the hunger strike, Rashida Apa and Hajra Apa were released on the order passed by the Lucknow bench of the High Court against their detention argued by their lawyer Mr Dhawan; he may have been a party sympathizer, and he later became the governor of West Bengal.

My case, perhaps, was also argued by Mr. Dhawan but was lost on the prosecutors plea who argued that I could not be released as I had been engaged in subversive activities being a courier of the Communist Party of India. I did not have any clue at that time about anything beyond the romantic enthusiasm of being on my own to achieve the position of my icon Kalpanaji, Kalpana Joshi, nee Dutt) whom I had not met. I had only seen her photograph on the cover of a small bookletChatgaon- ke- Inqilabi (an Urdu translation) presented to me by my life-long mentorBano Niyazi (presently Dr Bano Gupta, an eminent lady doctor located in Delhi) on my first visit to her house in Kanpur. In fact, she was the one who made the greatest impact in shaping my life and she became a mother figure, though she was too young to take that position at that time. She must have been four to five years older than me. As I have already mentioned somewhere in this write up, I had not only been a precocious, but also difficult and restless child in the family. It was only after my mothers death that my father realised that fact and tried to help me out of my loneliness. Bano, without her knowing it, provided me tremendous emotional support to stand on my own. She was also the one who initiated me into politics. Even now at my ripe age I continue to be emotionally dependent on her she remains to be a mother figure in my inner (psyche)? She may have remained perhaps totally unaware of that then, and perhaps even now!

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Postscript

When Khadija was finally released 11 months after her imprisonment, she took a tonga to return home. A police constable was asked to tail her and so he rode behind the tonga. When Khadija asked him why he was tailing her he said that he had been deputed to do so. He followed her upto the boundary of Firanghi Mahal and then rode off.

The party in Lucknow had scattered. Khadija went on with her education and seems to have drifted away from political activities as she does not mention them in her memoir which ends abruptly with the description of her jail time.
Iran opens today Friday polling stations for 59 million of citizens to elect a successor to outgoing reformist President Hassan Rouhani who has led the Islamic Republic for eight years.

Polls opened at 7 am (0230 GMT) and will close at midnight with possibility of a two-hour further extension owing to health precautions and to avoid overcrowding.

59 million Iranian aged above 18 are eligible for the voting process. Country Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei cast his vote at a special polling station in Imam Khomeinis Hosseiniya in central Tehran at about seven and three minutes local time (02:33 GMT), reports say.

The guardian of the Iranian revolution called on Iranians to go out to vote at the time turnout according to reports, could be low, around 40 per cent. Anything the Iranian nation does today will build their future and determine their destiny for years to come, Khamenei remarked.

We repeatedly invite people to participate in the elections. The result of their presence primarily affects the people themselves. Of course, the peoples turnout will also help to gain major advantages for the country in the international arena, he added.

Five candidates including 60-year old head of the judiciary Hojjat al-Islam Raisi are contending for the president position. The Guardian Council, the body in charge of vetting candidacies, validated last month seven candidates for todays elections marking 13th presidential elections in the history of the Islamic Republic.

Three of the candidates threw in the towel in favor of Raisi and three others namely hard-line conservatives Mohsen Rezaei, a former commander of the Revolutionary Guards, Member of Parliament Amir Hossein Qazizadeh Hashemi and former governor of the Irans Central Bank, Abdel Nasser Hemmati.

Raisi, a conservative and believed close to Khamenei is tipped to win the vote He took part in 2017 elections and garnered 38 per cent votes in the elections won by Rouhani.
Security officers in the Central region are on high alert after claims that a cultic religion is recruiting young people into a marijuana-smoking lifestyle.

Christened the International Church of Cannabis, the religious organization with roots in Colorado, USA is said to have set base in several parts of the Central region, including Kiambu, Muranga, Kirinyaga, Nyandarua and Nyeri counties.

As reported by the Nation, Sub-county security committees have been mobilised to dismantle the cult that uses marijuana as a sacrament.

Central Region Commissioner Wilfred Nyagwanga attributed a sudden rise in marijuana peddling and smoking to the strange faith.

We will not allow any activity, whether camouflaged as a faith that is hell-bent to waste our youths. We have some Western cultures that are creeping into our society and we will apply our laws as they are and give no room to such infiltration of corrupt morals, he said.
Former journalist Makena Njeri says she is disappointed with the manner in which local media has covered the death of Kenyatta National Hospital (KNH) Pediatrician Lydia Wahura Kanyoro by apparent suicide.

The former BBC journalist reminded reporters to have a duty of care when covering sensitive stories and topics such as suicide.

A duty of care is a legal obligation (that we all have) to take reasonable steps to not cause foreseeable harm to another person. In journalism, the code of conduct stipulates that a journalist should ensure information disseminated is honestly conveyed, accurate and fair.

According to Makena Njeri, local print and radio media failed to observe this code while covering the tragic passing of Lydia Wahura.

Journalists in Kenya! Can we please go back to school and learn duty of care? I have seen this heartbreaking story written in such a bad light and also voiced on local radio in such a bad way! Do you understand duty of care?
Police in Laikipia county have opened a probe after a senior military officer was accused of defiling his daughter within the Nanyuki Barracks.

According to a police report seen by K24, the 10-year-old girl said her father, Mr Raphael Munayo, preyed on her days after her mother Ms Edna Mideva left the country for Dubai.

The Class four pupil told police that she was leaving from the bathroom when her father tricked her into his bedroom and raped her.

The father took her to his room and stripped her naked and defiled her in his bed without using any protection, a police report filed at Nanyuki station read in part.

The minor then took a bath after the ordeal, changed her clothes and told her sister about the incident in the evening.

The siblings then informed a neighbour known as Amina Aisha who escorted them to the station where they filed the report.

The girl was rushed to Nanyuki Teaching and Referral Hospital for medical treatment and was discharged on the same day pending laboratory results.

The two sisters were placed in safe custody pending further police action.
Highlights The helpline is manned by state police and is currently functioning in seven states and union territories.

The loss of defrauded money in online cheating cases can be stopped by chasing the money trail and stopping its further flow.

All major public and private sector banks are on board with the helpline and its reporting platform.

The Union Home Ministry has operationalised the national helpline 155260 and reporting platform for preventing financial loss due to cyber fraud. The helpline is currently functioning in seven states and union territories including Chhattisgarh, Delhi, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Telangana, Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh. The government has noted that the helpline will be rolled out in all states of India and is operated by the state police. The helpline which was soft-launched on April 2021 and has been made operational by the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C), with active support and cooperation from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), all major banks, payment banks, wallets and online merchants.





The Citizen Financial Cyber Fraud Reporting and Management System has been developed in-house to integrate law enforcement agencies and banks and financial intermediaries. According to the Centre, the helpline 155260 has been able to save more than Rs 1.85 crore of defrauded money from reaching the hands of fraudsters. Delhi and Rajasthan have saved Rs 58 lakh and Rs 53 lakh amount, respectively.

The facility empowers both the banks and the police by leveraging new-age technologies for sharing online fraud-related information and taking action in almost real-time. The loss of defrauded money in online cheating cases can be stopped by chasing the money trail and stopping its further flow before it is taken out of the digital ecosystem by the fraudster.



Once victims call on the helpline manned by the state police, a police operator notes down the fraud transaction details and basic personal information of the caller and submits them in the form of a ticket on the Citizen Financial Cyber Frauds Reporting and Management System. The ticket then gets escalated to the concerned banks, wallets, merchants, depending on whether these are the victim's bank or the bank or wallet in which the defrauded money has gone.

The victim will then receive an acknowledgement number of the complaint through SMS. They will also be directed to submit complete details of the fraud on the national cybercrime reporting portal (https://cybercrime.gov.in/) within 24 hours, using the acknowledgement number.



Once the ticket is generated, the concerned bank will be able to see the ticket on its dashboard on the reporting portal to check the details in its internal systems. If the defrauded money is still available, the bank will put it on hold, not allowing the fraudster to withdraw the money. If the defrauded money has moved out to another bank, the ticket will get escalated to the next bank to which the money has moved out. The process will be repeated until the money is saved from reaching the hands of the fraudsters.

Currently, the helpline and its reporting platform have all the major public and private sector banks onboard. These include State Bank of India, Punjab National Bank, Bank of Baroda, Bank of India, Union Bank, IndusInd, HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank, Axis Bank, Yes Bank, and Kotak Mahindra Bank. It also has all major online wallets and merchants such as PayTM, PhonePe, Mobikwik, Flipkart and Amazon linked to it.
Highlights Realme Narzo 30 5G and Narzo 30 4G smartphones are coming to India next week.

Realme has announced the June 24 launch date for the new products.

Realme will also launch the 32-inch smart TV and Buds Q2 earbuds.

Realme Narzo 30 5G, Narzo 30 4G, Buds Q2, and the 32-inch Smart TV are coming to India on June 24. Realme announced the launch date earlier this week for the upcoming event, and it looks like the company is going to be busy next week, even though that will not be for the GT 5G flagship phone. Realme GT 5G, however, is coming to India despite not having a particular date right now. While the launch of GT 5G seems a bit far, we have the new Narzo 30 smartphones and two new IoT products arriving, so let us talk about them.

The Narzo 30 series debuted in India earlier this year with two models, the Narzo 30 Pro and the Narzo 30A. But there were always three phones from the beginning, these two that debuted and the Narzo 30 that did not. Realme India and Europe CEO Madhav Sheth, however, confirmed that there is a Narzo 30 and that it would arrive soon. That is happening in India next week, but the Narzo 30 5G and Narzo 30 4G are already available to buy in some markets. The former is available in Europe while the 4G variant is selling in Malaysia. Here are the specifications of the Narzo 30 5G and Narzo 30 4G phones.

Realme Narzo 30 5G, Narzo 30 4G specifications

Specifications-wise, the Realme Narzo 30 5G and Narzo 30 4G are very similar except for the chipset and some other small specifications. The Realme Narzo 30 5G is powered by an octa-core MediaTek Dimensity 700 processor. The Narzo 30 4G, on the other hand, has the MediaTek Helio G95 chipset. Both phones come with a 6.5-inch Full-HD+ display with a 90Hz refresh rate and a maximum brightness of 600 nits. The phone has a side-mounted fingerprint sensor. There is a punch-hole on the top left that has a 16-megapixel selfie camera. The phone runs Android 11-based Realme UI 2.0.

The Realme Narzo 30 5G features a 48-megapixel main camera, along with a 2-megapixel macro camera, and a 2-megapixel black-and-white camera. You get features such as Nightscape mode and AI Beauty on the phone. The Narzo 30 5G comes with a 5000mAh battery inside with 18W fast charging, as opposed to the 30W fast charging on the 4G variant that has the same 5000mAh battery. There are Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, GPS, and a 3.5mm headphone jack among connectivity options on the Realme Narzo 30 5G.

Realme Buds Q2, Realme 32-inch Smart TV specifications

The Realme Buds Q2 arrived back in April in Pakistan, but the model coming to India looks like a rebranded Buds 2 Neo. That is because the design teased by the website is identical to that of the Buds 2 Neo. Plus, the Realme Buds Q2 for India will support active noise cancellation, while the original Buds Q2 earbuds just have environmental noise cancellation, which is an inferior form of noise cancellation. Design-wise, the Buds Q2 earbuds are going to look like last year's Buds Q. The price of the Buds Q2 is not available right now. The Realme 32-inch Smart TV is going to come with a Full-HD resolution and the Android TV operating system.
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The Washington Post

Opinion by Hamid Mir

June 15, 2021

For some elements in Pakistan, it is not enough that I have been taken off the air. They want to see me behind bars. Last month, I was banned from appearing on the talk show I have hosted for two decades, Capital Talk, on Geo News. I was also stopped from writing my column in Pakistans most popular Urdu-language newspaper, Jang. Now I face the prospect of sedition charges. The maximum punishment under the law is life imprisonment.

My apparent crime was a speech I gave at a protest in solidarity with journalist Asad Toor last month. On the night of May 25, three unidentified men entered Toors apartment, tied him up and tortured him. It was the latest in a series of attacks on journalists in Pakistans capital, Islamabad. We know about some of the attacks, but most have not been reported.

Toor paid a price for his decision to speak out against his assailants. Within moments, he was accused of faking his wounds to seek fame. Pakistans information minister, Fawad Chaudhry, claimed that journalists stage the attacks to seek political asylum abroad. These remarks angered the journalists standing with Toor. For me, it was personal. It reminded me of the attempts on my own life, and how, after being shot six times, I was also accused of making it all up.

In my speech, I said that if the attacks on journalists dont stop, we wont remain silent. I didnt name any individual or any organization, but my tone was harsh. I was quickly accused of maligning Pakistans top generals. A carefully coordinated campaign smeared me as a traitor on social media and, with suspicious haste, a flurry of complaints was filed against me around the country. Management of my TV channel informed me that I wouldnt be able to host my show. They took this action without any court order or showing any notice of cause. Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the International Commission of Jurists denounced the pressure brought on media owners to shut down critical voices.

Pakistani journalism organizations decided to defend me in the courts, but they asked me to explain my position because I had spoke on their platform. I clarified that I never named anyone in my speech and I respect the army as an institution, but that I cant remain silent on attacks against journalists. I even asked to be excused if my harsh tone caused any inconvenience to anyone, but reiterated my demand that attacks on journalists must come to an end.

In 2007, the then-military dictator, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, banned me for several months when he imposed a state of emergency. In 2012, a bomb was found under my car after I criticized the Talibans attack on Malala Yousafzai. I still carry two of the bullets inside my body from when I was nearly killed in 2014. After that, I faced allegations of blasphemy, but I was cleared by a court of law.

The attempt to charge me with sedition is part of a well-organized war on dissent in Pakistan. Journalists, human rights activists, politicians and academics have all been charged under the law. It is deliberately vague, and broad terms enable its abuse. You can be charged with sedition for merely liking a Facebook post, for drawing a cartoon or for making a speech. Two members of Parliament from the opposition are currently facing sedition charges. One, Mian Javed Latif, was recently released on bail. The other, Ali Wazir, has languished in a cell for the past six months.

The sedition law  124-A of the penal code  is a 19th-century British instrument of colonial repression. It was used to arrest the father of India, Mahatma Gandhi, who famously said it was designed to suppress the liberty of the citizen. The founder of my country, constitutional lawyer Muhammad Ali Jinnah, defended journalists accused of sedition in court  and won.

Ironically, the same governments that pride themselves on their patriotism today remain beholden to archaic British traditions. In India, the Modi government has wielded the sedition law to target academics, lawyers, activists and students. In Bangladesh, Sheikh Hasinas government has sought to silence journalists reporting on human rights violations and corruption. And in Pakistan, an attempt to finally rid us of the law was defeated last year by Prime Minister Imran Khans government in Parliament.

Alongside old draconian laws come new ones. The Pakistani government recently proposed a law to establish a body called the Pakistan Media Development Authority. It would have introduced media tribunals to decide what can and cannot be said or written, without notice or a hearing. Offenders would be punished by up to three years in prison and millions of rupees in fines. This law would enforce total silence in Pakistani media.

Journalists, lawyers and human rights activists all condemned the draft law with one voice. This new show of unity offers a ray of hope. If we all speak loudly and without fear, Im certain that we will be heard. This is how our forefathers resisted British rule, and its how well continue to resist the colonial mind-set that seeks to silence us today.

(Hamid Mir is a Pakistani journalist and author.)
Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Zhao Lijian's Regular Press Conference on June 18, 2021

2021/06/18

CCTV: The 47th session of the UN Human Rights Council will be held in Switzerland on June 21. It is understood that during the meeting, a small handful of countries, including the US, Canada and the UK, are set to make a joint statement on Xinjiang-related issues to smear and attack China on its human rights cause. What is China's comment on this?

Zhao Lijian: It seems they are bent on going down the wrong path and about to stage another political farce. Some individual countries like the US, Canada and the UK have been seeking to attack and smear China under the guise of human rights, making and spreading disinformation, and abusing the platform of the UN Human Rights Council. This obstructs international dialogue and cooperation on human rights, and tramples on the world human rights development cause.

The above-mentioned countries habitually use human rights issues as tools to practice blatant political manipulation. Their purpose is to deflect people's attention from their poor record of human rights by slinging mud at China, in an attempt to deceive people at home and in the world.

Facts speak for themselves. The Communist Party of China and the Chinese government, upholding the people-centered philosophy, regard the rights to subsistence and development as the basic human rights of paramount importance. The Chinese government's Xinjiang policy is open, aboveboard and fully endorsed by the Chinese people of all ethnic groups, as it lives up to people's aspiration, and stands the test of history. China's achievements in the human rights cause, including that in Xinjiang, are universally recognized, and no one can gainsay it.

Standing in stark contrast are these mud-slinging countries' own deplorable human rights record. Historically, these countries have slaughtered innocent lives through colonization and warfare, owing debts of blood to the people of the world. They have human rights issues like racism, gun violence, forced labor, child labor, and the list goes on and on. The remains of indigenous children found in residential schools in Canada, George Floyd's choking cry of "I cannot breathe", the innocent lives taken by gunfire, the hundreds of thousands of children forced into labor in the tobacco industry, and the ethnic minorities subject to discrimination and injustice in the UK are all questioning the conscience of the politicians in these countries and calling for justice. I wonder what gives these countries the confidence to brazenly accuse China based on false information while turning a blind eye to their own human rights problems.

The world will see the facts and come to a fair judgement. I believe that the majority of countries will see their true agenda and reject their political manipulation. If these countries think they can deceive the international community, jeopardize the prosperity, stability and sustainable development of Xinjiang and hamstring China's development by fabricating lies on Xinjiang, that will be like trying to hold back the tide with a broom. Failure will be their fate!

Reuters: The White House will consider arranging talks between Joe Biden and the Chinese leader, according to Biden's National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan. Can you confirm this?

Zhao Lijian: I noticed relevant reports. I don't have any further information to offer at the moment.

China Review News: China's Shenzhou-12 has successfully brought to the station three astronauts, which has attracted broad international attention and received warm congratulations from space authorities from many countries. Many deem the successful launch as another important step in China's space exploration and another proof of China's growing confidence and ability in the space field. Do you have a comment?

Zhao Lijian: Yesterday, the Shenzhou-12 manned spaceship, born from the wisdom and sweat of those dedicated to China's space endeavor, was launched amid enthusiastic aspirations of the Chinese people, and successfully conducted an autonomous rendezvous and docking with the space station core module Tianhe. Astronauts Nie Haisheng, Liu Boming and Tang Hongbo successively entered the Tianhe core module, marking the first time that Chinese astronauts have entered a space station of their own. The international community witnessed this historic moment together with China. Space agencies including Roscosmos, NASA and the European Space Agency have congratulated China in various ways. Netizens from all over the world also sent warm congratulations to China. We are deeply grateful for that.

Exploring the vast universe is the shared dream of all mankind, and China is no exception. As early as 1992, the Chinese government formulated a three-step development strategy for the manned space program. In the past 30 years, China's manned space program has made steady progress step by step, overcoming one difficulty after another and going from strength to strength. The entry of Chinese astronauts into Tianhe core module attests to China's achievements in scientific and technological innovation, marks a new stage in China's effort to build its own space station and symbolizes a new stride in China's space expedition. The construction and operation of China's space station will build up technology know-how and successful practices for humanity to advance deep space exploration. We will work with all countries and regions that are committed to the peaceful use of outer space to carry out international exchanges and cooperation, and make positive contributions to the exploration of the mysteries of the universe, the peaceful use of outer space and the building of a community with a shared future for mankind.

Reuters: The US Federal Communications Commission voted unanimously on Thursday to advance a plan to ban approvals for equipment in US telecoms from Chinese companies including Huawei and ZTE. Under the rules, the FCC could also revoke prior equipment authorizations issued by these Chinese companies. What's the ministry's response?

Zhao Lijian: I answered a similar question yesterday. China firmly opposes this. I want to stress that till this day, the US side is still abusing state power by citing national security as an excuse to crack down on Chinese companies without providing any proof. This typical and unveiled economic and technological bullying is a flagrant denial of market economy principles the US claims to champion. It also exposes how hypocritical the US is in touting the so-called fair competition.

We once again urge the US to stop the wrong practice of abusing national security and politicizing economic issues, and create a fair, just and non-discriminatory environment for the normal operation of Chinese companies in the US. China will continue to support relevant Chinese companies in upholding their legitimate rights and interests in accordance with law.

Xinhua News Agency: On June 17, Kenneth Kaunda, the first president of Zambia after the country's independence and known as Zambia's founding father, passed away aged 97. How do you comment on Mr. Kaunda?

Zhao Lijian: Mr. Kaunda was an internationally renowned veteran leader in Africa's independence movement, statesman and social activist. He had made historic contributions to Zambia's national independence and the liberation movements of southern Africa. He laid the foundation for China-Zambia relations, Mr. Kaunda had been committed to the friendship of the two countries, and set forth the innovative expression of "all-weather friendship", an accurate and expressive description of China-Zambia relations. Mr. Kaunda was also a good old friend of the Chinese people. Chairman Mao Zedong put forward the well-known Three Worlds Theory when meeting with Mr. Kaunda in 1974. We deeply mourn for Mr. Kaunda's passing and express our sincere sympathy to the government and people of Zambia and his beloved ones. We stand ready to work with Zambia for constant progress in our friendly cooperation with Zambia and the rest of Africa.

KBS: The ROK will exempt people who have received COVID-19 vaccine shots overseas from its quarantine measures starting July 1, including people inoculated with Chinese vaccines. Will China also give such quarantine exemptions for people who are vaccinated overseas? If so, can you brief us on the situation?

Zhao Lijian: The coronavirus is still spreading in many parts of the world with the emergence of many variants. China will take prevention and control measures through scientific analysis in light of the evolving situation.

Reuters: According to North Korean state media, Kim Jong Un said that the US should prepare for both dialogue and confrontation, but particularly confrontation. It appears to be his first comment on relations with the US. What's the Chinese side's feeling about this indication that North Korea is preparing for confrontation with the US?

Zhao Lijian: China's position on the Korean Peninsula situation and DPRK-US relations is consistent and clear. The situation on the Korean Peninsula is at a critical stage. All relevant sides should jointly safeguard stability and promote dialogue. The legitimate and reasonable concerns of the DPRK side should be taken seriously and accommodated. We encourage all sides to be actively committed to the two major goals of the establishment of a peace mechanism on the Peninsula and denuclearization of the Peninsula, and work out a feasible roadmap for that. We hope the DPRK and the US can meet each other halfway, earnestly accommodate each other's legitimate concerns on the basis of mutual respect and promote the political settlement of the Peninsula issue.

Global Times: A recent British media report shows that health inequality in the UK is made worse by COVID-19 and minority ethnic groups are more likely to report discrimination in medical care. Seperately, the UK jobless rate for minority ethnic groups went up during the COVID-19 outbreak according to a British think tank report. Some critics say this exposes the deep-seated problems of racism in the UK. Do you have any comment?

Zhao Lijian: I noted relevant reports. Racial issues have long beset the UK, which is known around the world. Report of the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination of the United Nations shows a sharp increase in recent years of systemic discrimination, violent provocations and hate crimes against minority groups in the UK. Since the onset of COVID-19, minority ethnic groups in the UK have been experiencing worsening situation in terms of medical care and employment. According to a report published by the Lancet, an authoritative medical journal, "ethnic minorities in the UK are at significantly greater risk of severe disease and death from COVID-19 than their white counterparts." A British think tank report shows that the UK jobless rate for young black people and Asian people rose to 35% and 24% respectively, nearly three times and twice the rate of young white people respectively.

Unexpectedly, instead of making reflections and taking concrete measures to protect the rights of minority groups, the UK tries to muddy the waters and gloss over the problems. In March, the UK released a report on racial issues in the country in which it says the review found no evidence of systemic or institutional racial discrimination. This self-deception and cover-up tactic have raised strong protest from minority groups in the UK and suspicion from all social sectors. The UN Working Group of Experts on People of African Descent and the Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance issued a statement to strongly condemn the UK report which distorts and falsifies historic facts and attempts to rationalize white supremacy by using the familiar arguments that have always justified racial hierarchy.

Apart from racial issues, the UK society is fraught with other human rights issues. It has a poor record of ignoring the life and health of its own people; and it has committed crimes such as killing innocent people in other countries. One-third of British families with children aged under five live below the poverty line. Many children suffer from hunger. The rights of refugees and immigrants are severely violated. The UK committed countless horrifying crimes all over the world during hundreds of years of colonial rule. The world's first concentration camp in South Africa carries with it the disgraceful brand of the British Empire. British forces killed innocent people and committed torture in places like Iraq and Afghanistan, but the culprits are sheltered by the government and remain unpunished by law.

The UK turns a blind eye to its own human rights issues while being obsessed with lecturing and making irresponsible remarks on other countries' human rights situation. This laid bare its hypocritical nature and double standards. The UK is in no position to interfere with and exert pressure on other countries under the pretext of human rights. It should reflect on its own poor record and earnestly redress its own problems, rather than fabricate accusations out of thin air to smear and attack others.

Reuters: The US on Thursday strongly condemned the arrest of five executives from the tabloid Apple Daily in Hong Kong. The State Department said "We strongly condemn the arrest of five senior executives from Apple Daily and its parent company and we call for their immediate release." What's the Chinese side's comment on this?

Zhao Lijian: You may have noticed that the HKSAR government, the Liaison Office of the Central People's Government in HKSAR and the Office for Safeguarding National Security of the Central People's Government in the HKSAR responded to the relevant issue already. China's Office of the Commissioner of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the HKSAR also refuted the false accusations of certain foreign officials and made clarifications. I would like to stress three points:

First, Hong Kong is a society with rule of law where everyone is equal before the law. No one has extrajudicial privileges and no organization is beyond the reach of law. No right or freedom, including that of press, can cross the line of national security. We firmly support the HKSAR government and police in fulfilling their duty in accordance with law and all efforts to safeguard national security and prosperity and stability in Hong Kong.

Second, the Law on Safeguarding National Security in the Hong Kong SAR focuses on cracking down on a handful of anti-China, destabilizing forces who seriously endanger national security. The law also protects the rights and freedoms enjoyed by the vast majority of Hong Kong residents in accordance with the law, including freedom of speech. Since the implementation of the national security Law, social stability has been restored in Hong Kong, the rule of law and justice have been upheld, and the lawful rights and freedoms of Hong Kong residents and foreign citizens in Hong Kong are better protected in a safer environment. This is an undeniable fact.

Third, Hong Kong is part of China. Hong Kong affairs fall entirely within China's internal affairs that no country, organization or individual has the right to interfere. We urge individual foreign politicians to set aside the arrogance and prejudice, abandon the double standards, earnestly respect law enforcement by the HKSAR, respect the aspiration of the Hong Kong citizens for stable social order and normal life, respect the fact that Hong Kong is a special administrative region of China, and respect international law and the basic norm in international relations of not interfering in the internal affairs of other countries.

Beijing Daily: According to a report from La Republica on June 17, President of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Italian Senate Vito Rosario Petrocelli said in an interview that he doesn't believe there is any "ethnic persecution" or "genocide" in Xinjiang, and finds it unfair to question a socialist model which is accepted by a billion people. He said there is no "ethnic cleansing", and he doesn't think millions of women are sterilized. He would like to bring a parliamentary delegation to Xinjiang, so that everyone can judge with their own eyes. What's your comment on this?

Zhao Lijian: I noted relevant reports and would like to commend President of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Italian Senate for his courage to speak up for objectivity, truth and justice.

Xinjiang enjoys social stability, economic development, ethnic solidarity and religious harmony. People of all ethnic groups in Xinjiang live a peaceful and happy life and enjoy unprecedented rights and dignity. This is a fact for all unbiased people to see. The slander and smear against Xinjiang by a small number of anti-China elements based on rumors and lies is like bubbles, which has been pricked by insightful people and are bursting in front of facts and truth.

More and more people have spoken up for justice on Xinjiang. The US independent website The Grayzone, Project Syndicate, the independent website Counterpunch, media in Australia, Brazil, Singapore and Sweden, the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post, and former mayor of Frogn municipality in Norway and French author Maxime Vivas have published articles or books, saying that the so-called accusations of "forced labor" and "genocide" are indefensible and revealing the US and other Western countries' double standard on counter-terrorism and geopolitical conspiracy of disrupting Xinjiang and containing China.

Last month, a total of 50 ambassadors and other senior diplomats from 49 countries in Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, and the African Union paid a visit to Xinjiang, and they sincerely praised Xinjiang for its leapfrog economic growth, social harmony and stability, peace and unity among different ethnic groups, freedom of religious belief and vigorous cultural development. They said they fully understand the efforts of the Chinese government in combating terrorism and de-radicalization in Xinjiang, and commended the important role played by the vocational education and training centers.

The facts and truth about Xinjiang are there for all to see, which cannot be easily covered up by the repeated rumors and farces of a handful of anti-China forces. China welcomes foreigners who uphold a fair and objective position to visit Xinjiang and see the real Xinjiang with their own eyes. We believe that in the face of facts, lies and disinformation concocted by anti-China forces will fall apart.

Bloomberg News: Just a follow-up on the question of Apple Daily. You said that only a handful of disrupters are targeted by the national security law. Is that what you think of the executives of Apple Daily? Are they disrupting the social stability of Hong Kong?

Zhao Lijian: I just gave a clear elaboration on our position. The case is based on clear facts and conclusive evidence. It is not about freedom of press.

Shenzhen TV: Japan's import and export with China in May registered the highest monthly figures since 1979, according to trade statistics released by the Japanese Ministry of Finance on June 16. China accounts for more than 20% of Japan's import and export, and is still growing in importance as a trade partner for Japan. What is your comment?

Zhao Lijian: China and Japan are highly complementary in economy and both make an important part of the East Asian and global industrial and supply chains. China is Japan's largest export destination, and Japan remains China's second largest trading partner. Despite the severe challenge of COVID-19, practical cooperation between China and Japan showed strong resilience and great potential last year. In 2020, the trade volume between China and Japan reached nearly $317.53 billion, up 0.8% year on year. In the first five months of this year, trade between China and Japan grew 23.5 percent year on year.

I noted that the White Paper on China's Economy and Japanese Enterprises 2021 released by the Japanese Chamber of Commerce and Industry in China pointed out that despite the epidemic, 63.5 percent of the surveyed Japanese enterprises in China reported profit last year, 92.8 percent of the respondents answered with "no such plan" as to whether they will "plan to adjust their production bases" due to the "coronavirus epidemic" and "changes in the trading environment", and 90.4 percent held a positive attitude on plans to further expand the scale of local procurement. This fully shows that the Chinese government's achievement in epidemic control and effort to improve business environment has been highly approved by foreign companies in China and the world remains upbeat about China's development.

Japan has been deeply involved in China's reform and opening up, which has greatly benefited the economy of both China and Japan. As the most dynamic and promising market in the world, China will continue to work hard to create a fairer, more stable, transparent and predictable investment and business environment for foreign investors. Recently, the Japanese government, in sync with the US economic suppression and containment against China, has implemented or is looking into policies to "decouple" the industrial chains and supply chains from China, creating obstacles to normal economic and trade cooperation between China and Japan and posing risks to the mutually beneficial cooperation between companies of the two countries. The Japanese government should proceed from safeguarding national interests and international order, respect the law of the market and free trade rules, heed the calls of companies, follow the trend of the times to provide a fair and just, transparent and non-discriminatory business environment. It should protect safe, reliable and stable global industrial and supply chains, reduce artificial non-market restrictions on and undue political interference with China-Japan economic and trade cooperation.
Two $50,000 Ohio Sires Stakes events for three-year-old pacing colts and geldings will be contested Saturday night (June 19) at Eldorado Scioto Downs. The co-featured events have been carded as races five and eight on the program, and both events feature first-leg winners.

Heading up the first division is Four Star Flash, a Brian Brown trainee that captured his May 3 contest at Miami Valley in 1:52. The son of Western Vintage and Keladi Blue Chip was bred by Marion Beachy and is owned by Hutchison Hrns, D. Wozniak, D. Van Dusen and Acadia Farms. A winner of $99,760, Four Star Flash has eight wins, one second-place finish and two third-place finishes in 15 career starts. This youngster is the second foal out of his dam, Keladi Blue Chip p, 3, 1:56.3f ($18,512).

Heart Of Chewbacca in the clear standout in the second division. The son of Bring On The Beach and Jts Chewbacca, conditioned by Ron Burke for Dennis Owens and Norman Rae Racing, captured his first OHSS event handily in 1:51.2. His last outing  a Scioto overnight  saw him pace to a career best clocking of 1:48.4 with Danny Noble at the lines. Bred by Spring Haven Farm, Heart Of Chewbacca has $276,348 in lifetime earnings from nine wins and three seconds in 12 starts. He is the second of four foals out of his dam, Jts Chewbacca p, 3, 1:53.1f ($32,220).

(Ohio Sires Stakes)
Schneider Electric released a research report to foster an understanding of how digitized and smart applications will be powered in the future. The report titled Digital Economy and Climate Impact predicts IT-sector-related electricity demand is expected to increase by nearly 50% by 2030. Yet, as the electricity system decarbonizes, emissions would not increase by more than 26% by that time. To help mitigate this rise in emissions, the Schneider Electric Sustainability Research Institute recommends continued efforts in achieving efficiencies on the IT and energy sides at both the component and system levels. Released at an exclusive media event presented virtually from Schneider Electrics Boston Hub, the report highlights how the rise of edge computing requires a specific focus as these systems are expected to be less efficient than hyperscale data centers from a PUE standpoint.

Pankaj Sharma, EVP, Secure Power, Schneider Electric, said, When the world locked down it also logged on and internet traffic soared. Its misleading to assume that digital activity will inevitably result in a deeply problematic increase in CO2 emissions. The analysis from the Schneider Electric Sustainability Institute puts to rest many of the worst-case scenario claims predicting IT-related electricity use will double every five years. That said, as an industry we must remain vigilant in finding new sources of sustainability gains while ensuring resiliency as digital keeps life moving forward.

Sharing his thoughts Mr. Venkatraman Swaminathan, VP & Country General Manager, India & SAARC, Secure Power Division, Schneider Electric added, The world has been experiencing an evolution in technological shift towards a sustainable model of operations. India is on a journey of transformation and businesses are embracing green energy supported by cutting-edge technology that aims at improving efficiency and business outcomes. At Schneider Electric, we believe in co-creating an ecosystem of growth and sustainability. Our endeavor is to innovate and build future ready solutions that can be leveraged by businesses to re-imagine their approach towards digital revolution and create a benchmark on the global map of energy efficiency.

In addition to releasing the research report, Schneider Electric also announced updates to its EcoStruxure IT data center infrastructure management software and Galaxy VL 3-phase uninterruptable power supply (UPS). All introductions are designed to advance the industry forward in meeting sustainability goals while increasing resiliency of IT and data center infrastructure.

EcoStruxure IT software updates reduce complexity in managing hybrid data center and edge IT environments

Increasing demands on digital consumption, which are explored in the new research report, create a more complex hybrid environment inclusive of enterprise, cloud and edge data centers. To address the unique management challenges of a hybrid IT environment, Schneider Electric has announced updates to its EcoStruxure IT software to increase efficiency and resiliency, including:

Increased remote management capabilities: New granular remote device configuration features enable users to change configurations on one or more devices  including the new Galaxy VL and APC Smart-UPS Ultra single-phase UPS units  from one centralized platform with EcoStruxure IT Expert. This update, combined with previously released software insights on device security health, enables the user to identify faulty devices or configurations and address them in a matter of clicks, keeping their hybrid IT environment secure.

New granular remote device configuration features enable users to change configurations on one or more devices  including the new Galaxy VL and APC Smart-UPS Ultra single-phase UPS units  from one centralized platform with EcoStruxure IT Expert. This update, combined with previously released software insights on device security health, enables the user to identify faulty devices or configurations and address them in a matter of clicks, keeping their hybrid IT environment secure. Improved environmental monitoring: Environmental monitoring systems ensure users have eyes and ears on data center and IT deployments from anywhere, anytime. With this update, users can push mass configurations remotely for NetBotz cameras 750 and 755 quickly and efficiently increasing security across the critical infrastructure.

Environmental monitoring systems ensure users have eyes and ears on data center and IT deployments from anywhere, anytime. With this update, users can push mass configurations remotely for NetBotz cameras 750 and 755 quickly and efficiently increasing security across the critical infrastructure. Enhanced remote capacity modeling and planning: With EcoStruxure IT Advisors new capabilities, users can remotely compare an unlimited number of racks and easily identify available capacity, view what assets are deployed and their dependencies.

Redesigned Galaxy Lithium-ion battery solution enables greater space savings, faster recharge and installation and enhanced safety

The newly released Galaxy VL, the most compact of its class, modular and scalable 3-phase UPS in the 200  500 kW range with efficiency levels up to 99 percent, now features redesigned Galaxy Lithium-ion battery cabinets, providing a sustainable, high-density and innovative energy storage solution for data centers, industrial processes, and critical infrastructure. The exclusive cabinets are compatible across the full Galaxy V Series.

A Green Premium offer, this UL9540A-compliant battery solution reduces battery footprint and weight by up to 70 percent, allowing more effective use of space. The new cabinets enable two to three times faster recharge than VRLA solutions as well as faster installation and enhanced system availability with patented redundant self-powered internal power supplies.

Lithium-ion batteries reduce total cost of ownership by doubling battery life, lowering installation and maintenance costs, plus reducing cooling needs, as they operate at higher temperatures than VRLA. The included real-time battery management system improves battery system visibility, predictability, and manageability. The modular, touch-safe design simplifies maintenance and increases operator safety.
NEC announced that it has been named as a key partner by Vodafone in the UK for supplying 5G massive MIMO radio units (RU) for the operators initiative to build one of the largest commercial Open Radio Access Networks (RAN) in the world.

Following Vodafones announcement of its plan to initially deploy Open RAN to 2,500 sites in the UK, starting this year, the operator will work with key vendors to extend 4G and 5G coverage in rural areas in the South West of England and most of Wales, later moving into urban areas.

NEC will be responsible for supplying its industry-leading massive MIMO 5G radio units that are compatible with the O-RAN Alliance 7-2x split. NEC will utilise its advanced technologies, commercial deployment experiences in Japan and its Open RAN Center of Excellence (CoE) in the UK to support Vodafones Open RAN deployment.

Open RAN is essential to accelerating innovation and increasing supply chain diversity, said Johan Wibergh, Chief Technology Officer, Vodafone. Vodafone is keen to work with our strategic partners such as NEC to create a more cost-effective, secure, energy efficient and customer-focused network of the future.

NEC is delighted to be awarded this project and we are excited to be working with Vodafone on this strategically important initiative, said Shigeru Okuya, Senior Vice President, NEC Corporation. We look forward to accelerating the development of Open RAN systems which in turn will improve innovation and help drive the UK digital economy.

NEC is also actively engaged in NeutrORAN, which demonstrates Open RAN ecosystem-based neutral host solutions. This is a part of the 5G testbed and trials program initiated by the UK Government in order to improve telecom supply chain diversification.

Vodafone is a leading telecommunications company in Europe and Africa. We are the largest mobile and fixed network operator in Europe and a leading global IoT connectivity provider. Our M-Pesa technology platform in Africa enables over 48m people to benefit from access to mobile payments and financial services. We operate mobile and fixed networks in 21 countries and partner with mobile networks in 49 more. As of 31 March 2021, we had over 300m mobile customers, more than 28m fixed broadband customers, over 22m TV customers and we connected more than 123m IoT devices.
Left: Under Sir James Mitchell as Prime Minister, Senator Ashelle Morgan would have been out of here. Right: Prime Minister Dr. Ralph Gonsalves warned Sir James about venturing into areas he should be avoiding.

He may have long departed the halls of government here, but former Prime Minister- Sir James Mitchell is still wont to comment on national issues and concerns.





His frankness, though, from time to time, has raised the ire of persons on both sides of the political boundary.





The most recent such occurrence followed his comments with respect to the allegations involving Deputy Speaker of the House and Government Senator, Ashelle Morgan, and the Assistant Director of Public Prosecutions, Karim Nelson, in the shooting of a 60-year-old male, Cornelius John.





Speaking on a recent episode of the OMG morning programme on BOOM FM, Sir James stated categorically that if he was still in office, he would have fired Senator Ashelle Morgan.





Sir James explained that as a senator appointed by government, Morgan held her position on the basis of the authority of the Prime Minister.





It was the Prime Minister, Sir James continued, "who informs the Governor General that you should be made a senator.





So, in the case of passing judgement on whether Senator Morgan should be dismissed, that judgement, according to Sir James, rests with the Prime Minister and not with the Speaker only.





Sir James went on to ask the speculate question: How much longer the Prime Minister was going to wait on the investigation which the Commissioner of Police said had been mounted by the Royal SVG Police Force? This investigation, Sir James assumed, was the grounds on which the Prime Minister sought justice in the matter.





But Sir James asked further, with a sense of satire, Is he (the Prime Minister) going to wait another two months or is he going to wait out the rest of the four years, or is there a feeling that this might be a storm in a teacup?





The flip side in the search of a resolution to the matter had to do with the Senator choosing to reign. However, Sir James repeated that action should be taken; the person should be fired.





And as expected, Sir James comments created quite some discussion and attracted some far-reaching reaction, not least from Prime Minister Dr. Ralph Gonsalves.





Addressing a press conference last Tuesday, Dr. Gonsalves countered Sir James stance with, "Then I saw Sir James say he would have fired Ashelle. Did he fire Carlyle? Did he fire PR? "Of course, Carlyle referred to Carlyle Dougan and PR to Parnel Campbell, who had both served the Mitchell/NDP Government as Attorneys General.





According to Dr. Gonsalves, "They resigned over certain things which they admitted, and they were not charged with any criminal offence. He said he fired persons. Way he fire them?





And as the Prime Minister seemed to become even more agitated, he blurted, "Look, Sir James, dont get me. . Look, I respect you. You held this office 16 years plus, but dont trespass in areas, please, dont try to rewrite history. I was involved in those issues with my friend PR and Carlyle, and I know what the facts are.





And addressing the issue at hand, the Prime Minister posited, ".. we will find out shortly what the DPP will do, and if she charges for whatever offenses, there would be a trial. If she doesnt charge, there is no trial. And I cant attempt in any way to influence this.




BRAGSA has made payment format changes so as to avoid large gathering of people (as pictured) in any one location. (Photo Credit: BRAGSA)

The Roads, Buildings and General Services Authority (BRAGSA) is scheduled, over the next two weeks, to pay out 3 million EC dollars to road workers.





In fact, the first payments to the six thousand persons who participated in the 7-day long road cleaning programme commenced on Wednesday, and BRAGSA Communications Officer- Rohan Cupid said payments will also be made this week in the Northern Grenadines and on the Windward side of mainland St. Vincent.





Payments for workers in Kingstown, the Southern Grenadines and the Leeward side of mainland St. Vincent will be made on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of next week.





Cupid further advised that in an effort to limit the number of persons at the locations at any given time, the payment format was changed with gangs being paid on Wednesday and Thursday, and Jobbers on Friday.





Gang leaders are therefore being asked to contact the District Officers for further information.





The Communications Officer has cautioned that COVID-19 protocols will be enforced and has urged persons to adhere to the protocols, which includes hand-sanitizing, social distancing and the wearing of masks.




The area on the bow of the Odesia where the men roasted the fish.

Bernard Butters Dublin, one of three fishermen from Rose Place, Kingstown who went missing for eleven days before being rescused is a devout Christian. His wife also shares his faith.





He admitted to praying throughout the ordeal for the safe return of his crew and himself to their families, and said he encouraged his colleagues to also pray.





"I would make sure tell dem say dey prayers before they go sleep, and when dey wake up, I go ask them if them say them prayers. So every morning I would tell dem dont give up. I could feel the church praying for us, said Dublin on how he kept hope alive.





Dublin recalled that the stress of the ordeal took a toll on their mental stability.





About a week into their ordeal, one of the crew stopped walking and talking.





Dublin even began to lose his memory and began acting strangely. In his own words, he took to asking about a mystery crewman who was never on board.





"I start to ask Pharaoh (Webb) if Gus wasnt here with we last night? Way Gus go with the water? So Web tell me, Man, Cap, no, yo start to lose it man. And he start to cuss and a get on.





Dublin added, "I is a Christian. I start to rub he head and say man take it easy with yo captian na man, ah just lose it for a few minutes.





It could have been worse but faith pulled us through, Dublin summarised.
Bernard Butters Dublin, captain of the Odesia, commits to never leaving shore again without a communication device.

Angus King Pharaoh Webb, Lennox Grand Charge Phillips and Bernard Butters Dublin (Captain) set out on Tuesday 1st June on a regular fishing trip from Rose Place  their home community - onboard a 27-foot pirogue Odesia.





The following day was Dublins birthday so they were hoping to make a decent catch to celebrate the special occasion.





Engine trouble  request for help





Since his return home, Dublin willingly spoke to THE VINCENTIAN about their ordeal.





The men headed for the north east (Owia/Fancy) of mainland St. Vincent, he said, a regular course for fishermen.





"We go up good but when we coming back down, I find the engine start smoking, it wasnt pumping, so I said the impeller gone. When the impeller gone you cannot keep on the engine or it will mash up other things in the engine. So I take off the engine and we heist (hoist) the sail.





With that done, Dublin related that they tried making it to Fancy Head but the current was such that it turned the boat in the direction of St. Lucia.





By this time, they had recognized they had no means of communications. They would usually depend on Phillips and his cellphone but as fate would have it, he had left the phone home that day.





"We aint get no phone call, so we end up drifting towards St. Lucia side, Dublin said.





The next day (Wednesday), his birthday, Dublin recalled that they manage to reset a course for St. Vincent

"We started making out houses in Owia and Fancy but the more we get closer the current started hauling we back.





Late in the evening the men felt their ordeal had come to an end.





Dublin described what unfolded this way: "A white man in a HUD yacht come up to we and started asking us if we had engine problem. We say yes and ask him for a tug, but he say call Coast Guard and left we and go.

For the next three to four days, the boat drifted but the men were still able to see St. Vincent.





Bad weather batters hope





Dublin said that on the Friday, they decided to lower the sail and allow the boat to run freely.





"We end up go way down in the west and is around late Monday (7th) evening I see a Booby bird (seagull) come down. I say fellas dem bird dont dey far from land, so just heist (hoist) the sail for me and if alyo want go back to sleep alyo go back to sleep .





The captain said that he was able to manoeuvre the boat from out to sea to a distance from which he could make out small boats fishing in what he assumed was Barrouallie.





"We light flambeau, all thing, but we didnt get no help, the Captain said.





On Tuesday (8th) the Odesia reached close to Bequia before the current took it in the direction of Baliceaux. The crew was able to turn the boat around towards St. Vincent and as they sailed inwards, they could make out the Aygle International Airport in the distance.





Unfortunately, according to Dublin, the weather condition turned for the worst. "The place just get blockout and is win and water. So I say fellas we aint going make it, let we just take off everything and sleep it out.





Dublin admitted his decision might not have been a good one as the current began to take them westwards away from St. Vincent.





"When I wake up the next morning, to tell you the truth I didnt know where I was, he confessed.





By this time, the catch (of fish), on which they depended by roasting them, had decayed and had to be thrown overboard. They, however, caught three dolphins. "We corned two and roast one, Dublin recalled.





He, however, had a bad reaction to the fish and ended up vomiting much of what he had consumed the previous day.





The men had had to go without drinking water. But it rained one day, a welcomed occurrence, allowing for something of a shower and a few mouthfuls of water.





Things would turn for the better on the second Friday after what was a bout of mental instability on the part of the captain.





During an exchange with his crew, he related, he raised his head and recognized a boat coming towards them.

We quickly took down the sail and put up a piece a bamboo with a bag , Dublin related.





As the boat (which turned out to be a tug) came close, its crew inquired about the mens condition and said they had heard of the missing boat from St. Vincent.





Webb and Phillips were helped unto the tug but Dublin remained on the Odesia to remove the engine, bail it after which it was tied on to the barge that the tug was towing.





According to information from the SVG Coast Guard, the tug, with a predominant Vincentian crew and on a voyage from Curacao, to Martinique, made contact with the Odesia some 190 miles west of St.Vincent.





The tug cleared with their agents in Martinique before taking the men to St. Vincent, a trip that took a day.





The tug berthed at the Kingstown wharf from where the rescued men were taken to the Milton Cato Memorial Hospital.





Webb and Dublin were subsequently discharged but Phillip, who had underlying health conditions, was admitted for further examination and treatment.





Even though he disclosed that no one in authority has reached out to the them and that some of his bills have gone unpaid, Dublin said, "It feels real nice to see that you are back again and our family is here. It gives me real joy.





Dublin admits that he has learned from his experience and will remember to always have a communication device in his possession, when he goes fishing again.




Readers will recall that a young man once stole a bicycle from the Georgetown Police Station. Nuff said about the vigilance there.

Weeks have passed and there has been no information about the investigations into the missing guns and ammunition from the Georgetown Police Station.





The police issued a statement on June 4, that the Major Crimes Unit within the Royal St Vincent and the Grenadines Police Force (RSVGPF) had launched an investigation, on the orders of Commissioner of Police Colin John, after it had been discovered that the items had been missing from the armoury at the said facility.





But, according to Leader of the Opposition, Dr Godwin Friday the public still does not know how many guns were missing, or how many round of ammunition.





He raised the issue again while speaking at a press briefing on June 15, saying that information suggests that as many as four or five guns and as much as 1,000 rounds of ammunition had gone missing.





"We still do not know because the police have not told us, Friday said.





And instead of seeking to alleviate the concern, the opposition leader said that the police have since remained silent.





"We know that officers from the Georgetown station have been transferred elsewhere, is this the response by the Commissioner of Police?





In addition, Friday said the public needs to know: How many guns and ammunition are missing? When did the police find out they were missing and did they go missing all at once or over a period of time?





Given that the Georgetown Police Station was a large, modern building and that a police station is supposed to be a secure place, Friday contended that "it would have been very difficult, if not impossible for an intruder to enter and leave with those weapons and not be detected in the process.
Winsbert Harry, President of the NFO, called out the authorities for not doing enough for fisherfolk but also identified shortcomings on the part of fisherfolk themselves.

Winsbert Harry, President of the National Fisherfolk Organisation (NFO), said that the authorities need to do more to assist fisher folk in St. Vincent and the Grenadines.





Speaking on the heels of the safe return of three fishermen - Angus King Pharaoh Webb, Lennox Grand Charge Phillips and Bernard Butters Dublin  after they had gone missing (at sea) for some eleven day, Harry expressed how happy he was that the men were returned to their families, but also took the opportunity to vent his frustration with those in authority.





He accused them of speaking highly about the industry but not delivering.





Among the failure of the authorities, Harry pointed to the promise made last year that a number of VHF radios would be availed for use by fishermen. The Ministry of Agriculture, he said, had also committed to train the fishermen in the appropriate use of the radios.





Nothing has been forthcoming in this regard, Harry lamented, adding that an effort to have the NTRC support the NFO request for a waiver of duties on radios, also hit a brick wall.





Additionally, the matter of Identification Cards has been an ongoing challenge for some time.





According to the NFO president, all ID cards issued have expired since 2015 and there has been no response to request to have this matter addressed.





"Is more than when you have press conference and media briefing you are hearing about the fisher folks, but when coming to reality and the love for fisher folks is more disrespect than love, Harry noted.





Harry admitted, though, to some of the shortcomings of the organization he leads.





He referenced the failure to keep records as to when the fishermen leave and when they return.





"That is something the fishermen and national fisherfolks will have to look into, Harry stated.





And as it relates to safety at sea, the President advanced the position that it was time to "make certain things mandatory, like GPS, VHF radio and life jackets.





There is also a need to encourage fisherfolk to call into the signal station to say when they are leaving and their estimated time of return, Harry admitted.





It is the general practice of fishermen who operate out of Rose Place to leave on their fishing trips around 5pm. They would, in most cases, return around 5pm.





If it is that a fishing boat does not return by 7pm, as a first response, the NFO is alerted and contact is made with the families of the fishermen, the Coast Guard and radio and TV stations.
(L-R): St. Hill Insurance Managing Director, Roxann MacLeish, hands over cheque to Captain Ernest Gachelin of the Salvation Army.

St. Hill Insurance Company Limited has joined hands with the Salvation Army to assist with the provision of relief supplies to Vincentians affected by the La Soufriere disaster.





Towards this end, the company donated twelve thousand East Caribbean Dollars (XCD 12,000) on June 15th, 2021 to Captain Ernest Gachelin, Local Commander/ Administrative Head of the Salvation Army.





In handing over the cheque, Managing Director, Roxann MacLeish, said the donation "continues the efforts of the 38-year-old company to be an example of good corporate citizenship and nation-building.





In appreciation of the assistance, Captain Gachelin said that the funds will help them to continue providing some comfort to the many affected persons, an effort the organization began on April 11th.





He added that one of the Salvation Armys missions is helping people in need, without discrimination.




Intertek, a Total Quality Assurance provider to industries worldwide, along with Al Bayader International, a UAE-based leading manufacturer and supplier of comprehensive food packaging solutions and cleaning materials, have celebrated World Environment Day.

In conjunction with the celebration, Intertek has awarded Al Bayader International, the globally recognised ISO 14001:2015, ISO 9001:2015 & ISO 45001:2018 certifications.

Intertek completed a series of rigorous audits across Al Bayaders processes to ascertain a robust integration of environment, quality, and health and safety management system requirements in the organisation, and accordingly granted ISO 14001:2015 (Environment), ISO 9001:2015 (Quality), and ISO 45001:2018 (Occupational Health and Safety) management system certifications. These new certifications provide Al Bayader International with a stronger foundation for its environmental performance, a value-added approach to remain agile in todays ever-changing environment, all while improving employee safety.

By adopting a continuous improvement model, the ISO 14001 certification helps Al Bayader International reiterate its commitment to environmental sustainability by strengthening its environmental management system.

Likewise, the ISO 9001 and ISO 45001 certifications demonstrate the organisations dedication to provide the best services to meet customers needs and maintain a safe and healthy workplace.

Nidal Haddad, Founder & Chief Executive Officer of Al Bayader International, said: Being awarded these certifications by Intertek re-affirms our commitment to the environment, sustainability, providing quality services and taking care of our employees safety. We are very proud of this new milestone, and our dynamic team was the differentiating factor that enabled us to meet this strategic initiative. Our foundation of a strong culture based on sustainability and customer care, has paved the way for us to achieve these certifications. We have embarked on a sustainability journey that has embraced good environmental practices, from producing renewable energy at our solar farm installed in the Dubai factory roof top, to treating our wastewater to irrigate 240 trees, we have also adopted advanced technologies to eliminate plastic waste and reduced our overall waste from going to landfills and oceans.

Samir Ahmed, Regional Director, Products & Marketing of Intertek for the Middle East, North Africa & Pakistan, commented: We congratulate the leadership team of Al Bayader International on achieving these ISO certifications which demonstrates their dedication to the environment, quality and safety. It is a pleasure to award these certifications on World Environment Day which highlights Al Bayaders path towards a more sustainable and safer future. With together with customers like Al Bayader International, Intertek is able to assist the world to build back ever better with quality and sustainability at their core. -- TradeArabia News Service
Chalhoub Group, a leading distributor and retailer of luxury brands in the Middle East, has revealed ambitious new targets to coincide with the release of its 2020 Sustainability Report, including a major set of new objectives for Saudi Arabia, which have been unveiled as part of a wider report into the Groups performance in the GCC.

A hybrid retailer bringing luxury experiences to the fingertips of its customers everywhere, the Chalhoub Groups latest sustainability report outlines ambitous new targets which will set its strategy in the kingdom over the next three years.

This includes specific areas of the business model that can be strengthened each year, which will be able to support the groups efforts to deliver meaningful impact in the kingdom and wider region, said the statement from the company.

A member of the UNGC Community and signatory of the Women's Empowerment Principles (WEPs), the Chalhoub Groups report underlines how sustainability has become integral to its strategy for the region and forms part of a policy that includes actionable targets for each independent objective.

The five pillars that have been identified are: leadership, people, partners, planet and impact, thus reaffirming the groups efforts to support the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UNSDGs).

A key priority for Chalhoub is to increase the number of Saudis working in back of house roles from 34% to 52% in the next three years, underscoring its commitment to nurturing local talent in line with the Kingdoms National Transformation Program, said the statement from the company.

The group will also aim to integrate a significant number of People of Determination into its workforce and ensure their spaces are friendly for people with different kinds of mobility and ability needs, the statement added.

Chalhoub pointed out that increasing the number of women employed in senior management roles from 20% to 50% by 2023 is another primary objective.

Affirming its commitment to the WEPs is part of the Groups ongoing strategy to create a working environment that is equal to all, remarked Group President Patrick Chalhoub.

"A female senior leadership programme will further extend the opportunities available to women who strive to reach the highest positions in the Group. These progressive practices are among the initiatives that have contributed to the Group being recognised as one of the Best 30 workplaces in the KSA for 2021 by the presitigious Great Place to Work," he added.

On the 2020 Sustainability Report, Chalhoub said: "It reflects the accomplishments of our teams dedicated to living our core values of respect, excellence, and entrepreneurial spirit. At Chalhoub Group, we set ourselves ambitious targets in line with the KSA Vision 2030, because it represents the understanding of a future that we share for this country: consistently aiming to be the best."

"Our Group owes its success to the talents and experiences of our diverse workforce of 114 nationalities; we believe our people are our greatest force in helping us to make a difference to the world around us, and we are very excited to work together to achieve these goals over the next three years," he added.

Florence Bulte, Chief Sustainability Officer, said: "While the pandemic was challenging, it provided time for new levels of learning and innovation. Across our group, the necessity to rapidly implement digital technologies has revealed just how important the relationship between efficiency and sustainability is."

"This, and our peoples dedication to the long-term vision of our group, has meant that we have continued to make progress on issues like diversity and inclusion, carbon emissions reduction and renewable energy integration," noted Bulte.

"Our sustainability vision is a critical priority for us as a Group, and we look forward to continuing this journey towards a future that puts sustainable economic growth at its heart," she added.-TradeArabia News Service
Aramco and an international investor consortium, including EIG and Mubadala, today announced the successful closing of the share sale and purchase agreement, in which the consortium has acquired a 49% stake in Aramco Oil Pipelines Company, a subsidiary of Aramco, for $12.4 billion.

The consortium consists of a broad cross-section of investors from North America, Asia and the Middle East. This long-term investment by the consortium underscores the compelling investment opportunity presented by Aramcos globally-significant pipeline assets, the Companys robust long-term outlook and the attractiveness of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to institutional investors, said an Aramco statement.

As part of the transaction, first announced in April 2021, Aramco Oil Pipelines Company and Aramco entered into a 25-year lease and leaseback agreement for Aramcos stabilised crude oil pipelines network. Aramco Oil Pipelines Company will receive a tariff payable by Aramco for stabilised crude oil flows, backed by minimum volume commitments. Aramco continues to hold a 51% majority stake in Aramco Oil Pipelines Company and retains full ownership and operational control of its stabilised crude oil pipeline network. The transaction does not impose any restrictions on Aramcos actual crude oil production volumes, which are subject to production decisions made by the Kingdom.

Aramco President & CEO, Amin H Nasser, said: We are pleased to conclude this transaction with the global consortium. The interest we have received from investors shows strong confidence in our operations and the long-term outlook for our business. It is a significant milestone that reflects the value of our assets and paves the way forward for our portfolio optimization strategy. We plan to continue to explore opportunities to capitalize on our industry-leading capabilities and attract the right type of investment to Saudi Arabia.

Abdulaziz M Al Gudaimi, Aramco Senior Vice President of Corporate Development, said: The interest we received for this deal is evidence of continued confidence in our Company from institutional investors and sets a new benchmark for infrastructure transactions globally. This transaction utilizes our world-class pipeline infrastructure to create additional value for our shareholders, reinforcing our Companys resilience and ability to adapt in a rapidly changing business environment.

R Blair Thomas, EIGs Chairman & CEO, said: We believe this is the marquee infrastructure transaction globally and we are pleased to see that so many leading international investors agree with us. - TradeArabia News Service
Help India!



On June 12, a massive fire destroyed a Rohingya refugee Camp in Okhlas Madanpur Khadar in New Delhi, displacing nearly 270 refugees. Although nobody among the refugees is certain about what started the fire, many refugees claim they were targetted.

Suchitra | TwoCircles.net

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NEW DELHI  In Okhlas Madanpur Khadar in New Delhi, what was once a slum settlement for Rohingya refugees, is now a pile of debris. A fire that broke out at the camp here at about 11.30 p.m. on June 12, destroyed over 50 temporary shanties and displaced nearly 270 refugees.

Although nobody is certain about what started the fire, many refugees claim that they were targeted.

Rohingya refugees that TwoCircles.net talked to said that that they used to stay in a camp in the nearby Kalindi Kunj neighbourhood until it was destroyed by fire in 2018.

Sufia, who was living at the camp with her husband and children since 2012, claimed that they lost Rs 50,000 as a result of the fire.

My husband had put in a lot to establish a shoe business, but it was all for nothing. Seeing all of this breaks my heart. They want us out of here, Sufia said.

Sufia, like many others, claims the firing incident was no accident.

We have been getting threats from some groups over the last two years. The government should help us. We cannot trust our government back home, she said, wiping away tears.

In 2018, a fire broke out in the dead of night at the Kalindi Kunj camp. During that incident, most residents lost all of their goods, notably crucial identity documents such as United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) issued refugee cards and immigration documents. They were resettled at the Madanpur Khadar camp, which is under the ownership of the Uttar Pradesh Irrigation Board but was administered by the Delhi Government.

Residents told TwoCircles.net that they have been receiving threats.

For the last few days, we have been getting these threats. We have been threatened previously, but it had become more widespread in recent days. This is what happened before the 2018 fire too, Minara, a community activist remarked.

After Delhi Police had picked up and detained some of our brethren from the camp in April amid the pandemic, we were fearful of eventual deportation, and now we have lost everything we builtagain, Sufia said.

Minara said that the Delhi government had informed her that temporary camps would be set up at the same location after the ground was levelled with a JCB roller.

The refugees have been relocated to the Kalindi Kunj campsite, which was destroyed by fire in 2018.

The Delhi government has set up tents for us here now, said Ali Johar.

Johar, a community organiser, told TwoCircles.net that the fire was not an isolated event, but rather part of a campaign to frighten and remove refugees.

The Uttar Pradesh government is all ready to regain its land from Rohingyas in Kalindi Kunj neighbourhood of Delhi, The Organiser, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sanghs mouthpiece, reported on March 26.

Over the last year, the UP Police has arrested 11 Rohingya refugees amid the pandemic.

The 2018 fire event is still under investigation. This was all temporary, Johar sighs, adding, Members of the UP Irrigation Board have been harassing the refugees since they moved to the Madanpur Khadar camp.

Left without any shelter and uncertainty about the future, the affected Rohingya refugees want a ray of hope to rebuild their lives.

Mohd Noor Qasim, who lost all of his savings in the fire, is unclear if he would be able to reconstruct his life. I lost everything in the last fire, but I got a new job, Qasim said.

Qasim added that he has little hope for the future and is afraid that he cant provide for his children as well as he wanted.

Suchitra is an independent journalist working on social justice, focusing primarily on gender justice. She tweets at @Suchitrawrites.
McCracken County Fair at Carson Park

PADUCAH - The South Paducah Kiwanis Club's McCracken County Fair returns to Carson Park Tuesday, June 22 through Saturday, June 26.The rides, food and fun are back, with the carnival open nightly at 5:30. Tickets and armbands will be available as usual.One lingering effect of the pandemic this year is that there will not be nightly activities in the grandstands, except for harness racing on Tuesday at 7 pm.Admission to the fair is $3 per person and parking onsite at the fairgrounds is $2 per vehicle. All money raised during the fair benefits the local charities that South Paducah Kiwanis Club members support.Nearly two dozen local charities receive annual donations from the club. This also includes a massive shoe donation to students in the local preschools and head start programs. We try to get new shoes to every student in need during the holidays explains South Paducah Kiwanis member Mark Ryan. It's humbling to see kids get excited over a new pair of shoes.Thanks to donations from South Paducah Kiwanis Club, thousands of children have received a new shoes over the years through this program.
by Nirmala Carvalho

The 84-year-old Jesuit arrested in October on terrorism charges for his commitment to the tribals. In addition to Parkinson's, he contracted Covid-19 in prison and needed intensive care. On "temporary release" for treatement, but the Indian security agency continues to oppose his release on bail.

Mumbai (AsiaNews) - The conditions of Fr. Stan Swamy, the 84-year-old Indian Jesuit arrested in October on suspicion of terrorism, is still critical and requires intensive care treatment. As a result, the High Court of Mumbai yesterday extended the "temporary release" until 5 July by virtue of which the religious has been hospitalized at the Holy Family hospital in Bandra since May 28.

Today the permission that the judges had granted to the religious would have expired. The Jesuit has been repeatedly denied release on bail, despite his age and the fact that he suffers from an advanced form of Parkinson's. It was ascertained in hospital - as suspected - the Jesuit also contracted Covid-19 in the Taloja prison, on the far outskirts of Mumbai, where he had been detained since October.

Fr. Swamy is a lifelong advocate for tribal rights in Ranchi. He is accused along with 15 other activists of organizing the violence that broke out on January 1, 2018 during the demonstrations of the Bhima Khoregaon-Elga Parishad, a protest of the dalit (outcasts ed).

India's National Security Agency (NIA) claims he has links to the Maoist guerrillas, an accusation that the elderly Jesuit has always rejected. Swamy spent his entire life in Jharkhand defending the rights of the adivasi, the tribal peoples which has resulted in his earning many enemies among those who aim to seize the lands of these communities.

In the months he spent in prison, the priest witnessed a serious deterioration in his health conditions: "Eight months ago - he said himself on May 21 last during a dramatic video-conference hearing in front of the judges - I could eat on my own, I was able to write, to walk, to bathe myself. All these things are disappearing one after another. Taloja prison has brought me to a condition where I am unable to write or walk alone. Someone has to feed me.

At the time the Jesuit had refused hospitalization, asking instead for bail, saying that he now only wanted to "die" among his people in Jharkhand. But the worsening of his conditions and the proximity of his Jesuit community made him accept the transfer to the Holy Family hospital.

Yesterday the judges ordered a new hearing to examine his situation for July 3. The request for release presented by his lawyers is still pending before the court. But the NIA again presented a negative opinion, claiming to have found elements that prove Fr Swamys links with the Maoist guerrillas. The Jesuit denounces the proof as having been fabricated, stating that he has never seen those materials before.
The US Chief of Defense says there is no short or medium term danger of a Chinese attack on the island. In March, the head of the US forces in the Indo-Pacific said that China could attempt to retake the island within six years. Biden rumoured ready to meet Xi Jinping.

Washington (AsiaNews / Agencies) - China does not currently have the military capabilities of the intention to invade Taiwan, according to General Mark Milley. Speaking yesterday in a congressional hearing, the US Chief of Staff was said reunification with the island remains a primary interest of the Chinese leadership; however, Beijing is aware that it does not yet have sufficient military potential to occupy the entire Taiwanese territory.

Milley argues that in the short and medium term there is no danger of invasion. His words clash with those spoken in March by Admiral Phil Davidson, at the time at the head of the US Indo-Pacific Command. Davidson said the Chinese could try to take back the island within the next six years.

Beijing considers Taiwan a "rebel province", and has never ruled out reconquering it with the use of force. In reality, the island has been independent of China since 1949; at the time, Chiang Kai-shek's nationalists found refuge there after losing the civil war on the mainland against the communists, making it the heir to the Republic of China founded in 1912.

But the Pentagon does not seem overly worried about the intensification of Chinese air operations in the skies of Taiwan.

Yesterday, seven military aircraft from Beijing, including some fighter jets, breached the southwestern sector of the Taipei aerial identification zone. On June 15, the Taiwanese authorities had identified 28: the largest raid since last September, when the People's Liberation Army began multiplying its air sorties in the Taiwan Strait.

Beijing said its air missions near Taiwan are a response to interference from foreign countries that conspire with Tsai Ing-wen's government for the independence of the island

Under the Taiwan Relations Act, the United States is committed to defending the island. Adopted in 1979 after the formal diplomatic recognition of Communist China, the provision does not specify the actual nature of Washingtons commitment: a "strategic ambiguity" that produces continuing tensions with Beijing.

Republicans and Democrats in Congress are taking further steps to bolster US support for Taipei. Meanwhile, Jake Sullivan, Joe Biden's national security adviser, said yesterday that the White House is considering organizing a meeting between the president and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping. The summit could take place by phone, or on the side-lines of the G20 meeting in Italy in October.
The total number of refugees now stands at 82 million and will soon reach 100 million. Syria tops the list, with 6.8 million people fleeing war and violence with a total of 13.5 million displaced. Turkey is the country that hosts the most. Between 2018 and 2020, at least one million children were born as refugees.

Damascus (AsiaNews)  The number of people in the world forced to leave their homes has risen in the last year to a record 82 million despite the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and the reduction in worldwide travel, this according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).

The total number of refugees has more than doubled in the last decade, resulting in more than 1 per cent of the world's total population being displaced, far from home and not always by choice.

According to a report by the UN refugee agency, the global pandemic has caused a significant drop in asylum applications and has generally put a brake on migration.

However, the 11.2 million people displaced last year was still more than in 2019. Many were forced to flee because of persecution, conflict, violence and human rights violations.

The vast majority are internally displaced persons, not least because of travel restrictions and border closures have made it in nearly impossible to cross international borders.

As a result, only 250,000 refugees were able to return to their countries of origin and only 34,000 were able to be resettled in third countries, the UNHCR said in its Global Trends Report.

The UNHCR said it was only a matter of time before the number of displaced people worldwide tops 100 million.

About 80 per cent of refugees come from only 10 countries, 67 per cent if only the top five nations in the world are considered.

Syrians fleeing war and violence top the list with 6.8 million, whilst a total 13.5 million Syrians (more than half the population) have been displaced since the conflict began in spring 2011. Venezuelans follow with four million.

Turkey, on the other hand, hosted the largest number of refugees in 2020: 3.7 million.

The displaced population also includes a growing number of children, deprived of the right to study and grow up. UNHCR estimates that between 2018 and 2020 at least one million children were born as refugees.

The UN agency expects conflicts to intensify this year, as restrictions imposed to contain the global coronavirus pandemic are eased.

The food emergency, ongoing conflicts, and extreme weather phenomena, including global warming, will further reduce food stocks and cause crises.

For experts, South Sudan, the Central African Republic and Syria are still at risk of famine.

Finally, as a result of the pandemic, the number of people in extreme poverty in the world is expected to reach between 119 and 124 million.

More than half of displaced people  some 48 million  are internally displaced.
It was a difficult negotiation, but this is an amazing project in an amazing community in Baltimore, Bramble said. Our goal is to hit the re-set button with the community and figure out how to get the remainder of this project off the ground.
After a trip to visit family that began in November 2019, they had planned to return in April 2020. At the end of March, however, South Africa closed its borders because of COVID-19 and the airline that they had flown in on ceased operating. Repatriation flights would cost around $4,000 per person. They also were concerned about the safety of flying during a pandemic.
This may sound simplistic, but its the way I read the Gospel, he said. Jesus went after all kinds of people, people that were broken and hurt and sad and lost and grieving. I think the church has to do the same. The church is for all of us who are, lets face it, messed up in our own ways. It should say, Come in, well figure it out together. All are welcome.
Although the county provides a large share of the operating expenses, only a portion of the expense of employing paid fire and EMS personnel are provided. The remaining cost of paid staffing is covered by EMS billing from ambulance transports and fundraising activities. In addition, no funds are provided for capital expenses such as fire stations or emergency response vehicles, including ambulances, fire engines, ladder trucks, rescue squads, or support vehicles. These expenses are covered using funds that volunteers must raise through their fundraising efforts.
Why are we not arranging to provide sanctuary to the Afghans acting as interpreters and in other key roles supporting our troops (We must look out for our allies in Afghanistan, June 7)? The United States has at least 18,000 people waiting for sanctuary with a nine month lead time. Getting these invaluable military supporters out by September 11, 2021 is impossible unless immediate action is taken.
While I was not surprised to see that Rep. Andy Harris voted against honoring U.S. Capitol police, citing the word insurrection as inaccurate, I have to wonder why, in May, he voted against the January 6 commission (Maryland Rep. Harris says he voted against honoring Jan. 6 officers because bill says there was an insurrection, June 16).
Those bad actors do operate, they do follow social media, and ... places we may not have thought they would be operating in, she said. We can be still more forthcoming in that, but its still a strategy to make sure were not giving up too much...We just need to find a forum where you can share some of that so you can inform constituents.
Though community walks are something Scott often does (one was held Wednesday in Northwest Baltimore), the Democrat said he felt it was important to talk with residents in the Mondawmin area following Mondays shooting outside a Dunkin Donuts that left one man dead.
Vallarta Living



Fun Online Spanish Classes with Andrea Mottura



Through FUN videos of her singing adventures with Bohemia Viva, BohemiaViva's Andrea Mottura will teach you how to speak Spanish like a person (not a text book). One-on-One and group online classes are available. Puerto Vallarta, Jalisco, Mexico - Learning a new language is a great way to engage with the world in a more meaningful way. Especially when you learn through songs and lyrics. BohemiaViva's Andrea Mottura invites you to have fun learning to speak Spanish through her online courses.



Best known as half of the fiery Argentine musical duo, BohemiaViva, Andrea is also a highly trained translator and interpreter with several language certifications, including: Degree in Scientific, Technical, and Literary Translation; Bilingual Assessor granted by the Argentine Ministry of Education; Teaching English Online - Cambridge Assessment; ATC Language School Teacher Training; Teaching Language Online Authorized by Arizona State University.



After years of traveling and performing all over the world (including Puerto Vallarta, Mexico), with Luis Lujan (the other half of the BohemiaViva duo), the pandemic began, so Andrea had to pause her singing career and return to her passion of teaching Spanish.



But she hasn't given up on her music. Infusing BohemiaViva's songs and lyrics into the Spanish lessons that she teaches, Andrea communicates the passion and beauty of the Spanish language in creative ways.



Using FUN videos of her singing adventures with BohemiaViva, Andrea teaches Spanish spoken in Mexico, which is universally understood, focusing on conversation, including colloquial expressions and some slang, with a non-threatening approach to grammar.



Language is a powerful force and a transforming experience that connects us with each other and our surroundings. Andrea can't wait to help you open some doors you've never imagined, that will bring you into a whole new world of communicating and understanding the Spanish language.



Andrea considers being bilingual one of the greatest gifts of her life. It has opened up many opportunities in her life, both personally and professionally, and she wants to be able to share that gift with YOU through her online Spanish courses that will guide you closer to the rich and endless culture of the Hispanic world.



Her online courses are taught in either one-on-one private classes, or as part of a small group class. Either way, Beginner, Advanced Beginner, Intermediate and Advanced classes are available, and Andrea can help you figure out the level that's right for you through a free consultation.



For more information about Andrea Mottura's private and group language classes, and to schedule your free consultation, go to



Puerto Vallarta entertainment writer Debbie White contributed to this article. - Learning a new language is a great way to engage with the world in a more meaningful way. Especially when you learn through songs and lyrics. BohemiaViva's Andrea Mottura invites you to have fun learning to speak Spanish through her online courses.Best known as half of the fiery Argentine musical duo, BohemiaViva, Andrea is also a highly trained translator and interpreter with several language certifications, including: Degree in Scientific, Technical, and Literary Translation; Bilingual Assessor granted by the Argentine Ministry of Education; Teaching English Online - Cambridge Assessment; ATC Language School Teacher Training; Teaching Language Online Authorized by Arizona State University.After years of traveling and performing all over the world (including Puerto Vallarta, Mexico), with Luis Lujan (the other half of the BohemiaViva duo), the pandemic began, so Andrea had to pause her singing career and return to her passion of teaching Spanish.But she hasn't given up on her music. Infusing BohemiaViva's songs and lyrics into the Spanish lessons that she teaches, Andrea communicates the passion and beauty of the Spanish language in creative ways.Using FUN videos of her singing adventures with BohemiaViva, Andrea teaches Spanish spoken in Mexico, which is universally understood, focusing on conversation, including colloquial expressions and some slang, with a non-threatening approach to grammar.Language is a powerful force and a transforming experience that connects us with each other and our surroundings. Andrea can't wait to help you open some doors you've never imagined, that will bring you into a whole new world of communicating and understanding the Spanish language.Andrea considers being bilingual one of the greatest gifts of her life. It has opened up many opportunities in her life, both personally and professionally, and she wants to be able to share that gift with YOU through her online Spanish courses that will guide you closer to the rich and endless culture of the Hispanic world.Her online courses are taught in either one-on-one private classes, or as part of a small group class. Either way, Beginner, Advanced Beginner, Intermediate and Advanced classes are available, and Andrea can help you figure out the level that's right for you through a free consultation.For more information about Andrea Mottura's private and group language classes, and to schedule your free consultation, go to andreamottura.com. New Beginner Classes start Thursday, July 1st, so visit her website TODAY!



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News Around the Republic of Mexico



Mexico Recovers Archaeological Pieces from Germany



The Mexican Culture Ministry tweeted details of the items recovered: "Among the cultural assets there are bowls, vessels, stamps and an Olmec-style anthropomorphic mask."



"Two German citizens approached our embassy in Berlin to express their interest in returning archaeological pieces that were in the possession of their families," said the Mexican foreign minister's legal consultant, Alejandro Celorio.



The Mexican Culture Ministry tweeted details of the items recovered: "Among the cultural assets there are bowls, vessels, stamps and an Olmec-style anthropomorphic mask."



The mask, made of rock and from the period 1200-600 B.C., was just one of the objects dating back centuries. Others included anthropomorphic clay figures and a three-legged Mayan clay pot from the period 1000-1521 A.D.



Sensitive issue



Diego Prieto, director of Mexico's National Institute of Anthropology and History, highlighted the "growing sensitivity" in the global community about the need to respect cultural heritage and return artifacts.



The recovered pieces were handed over to embassy officials in May of this year.



Twenty-eight of the objects were in the city of Monheim am Rhein in western Germany and the remaining six in Recklinghausen, some 70 kilometers (43 miles) away.



Original article Mexico has recovered 34 pre-Columbian artifacts that were voluntarily returned by two German private collectors, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said on Wednesday."Two German citizens approached our embassy in Berlin to express their interest in returning archaeological pieces that were in the possession of their families," said the Mexican foreign minister's legal consultant, Alejandro Celorio.The Mexican Culture Ministry tweeted details of the items recovered: "Among the cultural assets there are bowls, vessels, stamps and an Olmec-style anthropomorphic mask."The mask, made of rock and from the period 1200-600 B.C., was just one of the objects dating back centuries. Others included anthropomorphic clay figures and a three-legged Mayan clay pot from the period 1000-1521 A.D.Diego Prieto, director of Mexico's National Institute of Anthropology and History, highlighted the "growing sensitivity" in the global community about the need to respect cultural heritage and return artifacts.The recovered pieces were handed over to embassy officials in May of this year.Twenty-eight of the objects were in the city of Monheim am Rhein in western Germany and the remaining six in Recklinghausen, some 70 kilometers (43 miles) away.



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Destinations



Jalisco's Cabo Corrientes is Poised for a Luxe Influx



Cabo Corrientes is the defining end point of Banderas Bay west of Puerto Vallarta with about 75 kilometers of beautiful and rarely visited beaches, like Mayto, with its small hotel, campground and palapa-covered restaurant.



Over the years I've heard rumors and rumblings of the breadth of luxury slated to unfold in this part of the state. But for the longest time development has been kept relatively at bay - until now. The time, it seems, has come for the next wave of luxury to sweep into Mexico, and it's homing in on the southern coast of the Bay of Banderas.



Cabo Corrientes is the rounded peninsula that makes up the southern tip of the Bay of Banderas. It's home to unspoiled beaches, thick forest, rocky cliffs, small villages and not a whole lot else.



To give you a sense, for my 30th birthday we took a motorcycle trip out to a small beach community called Mayto. The motorcycle slipped and skidded along a sandy road that led to the stunning 7-mile beach. The beach had absolutely nothing save for one small hotel, a campground and a palapa-covered restaurant. It was probably the best birthday I've ever had.



But new developments, which include a highway, an airport and a boutique hotel, are going to create a new pocket of luxury that is sure to enthrall travelers looking for that next "it" spot in Mexico. I'm telling you: This is it.



According to state of Jalisco's tourism secretary, German Ralis, the anticipated highway connecting Puerto Vallarta with the Costalegre is about 9 miles from completion.



"The way is about 200 kilometers," said Ralis. "Fourteen kilometers are left to be renewed. It connects Puerto Vallarta to the south of Costalegre. It will make the travel time faster to Cabo Corrientes."



To get to Cabo Corrientes from Puerto Vallarta at present is a long, snaking drive along the coastal Highway 200 and then a veer off at the town of El Tuito through the national forest toward the coast, where Mayto and other rugged beaches lay waiting. Beautiful it most certainly is. Time efficient, at present, it is not. But it will be. Ralis anticipates the highway, which is a federal project, to be part of the next federal budget.



But Mayto is also expecting a private tarmac as early as next year, which will cater to private jets. And on top of that, a boutique hotel is expected to open on the crescent of beach. This hotel will cater to the boho-chic crowd (think Tulum or Sayulita vibes). While not many details on the hotel have been announced, it will be themed around the zodiac signs. The lack of light pollution in the area means this is one of the best spots in Mexico to see the stars - I can attest to that. The project should open next year.



Of course, further south along the coast, along the Costalegre, there have been pockets of luxury for decades, from the international artistic community at Careyes to the luxury accommodations at Cuixmala.



But the Four Seasons will open its Tamarindo property in the fall of this year. And a bigger airport, which has been talked about for years, is finally set to open in this part of the state, likely at the end of 2021 or beginning of 2022, predicted Ralis.



When you have something as beautiful as this part of Mexico, it's tough to keep it a secret for long. And as much as I treasured keeping this spot for myself, it will be exciting to see what happens next.



Original article It's always bittersweet when I hear about new developments springing up in Mexico - especially in the spots that I consider to be the secrets I keep for myself. I've known that Jalisco's wild, rugged Cabo Corrientes coast was always too beautiful and too special to stay secret for long.Over the years I've heard rumors and rumblings of the breadth of luxury slated to unfold in this part of the state. But for the longest time development has been kept relatively at bay - until now. The time, it seems, has come for the next wave of luxury to sweep into Mexico, and it's homing in on the southern coast of the Bay of Banderas.Cabo Corrientes is the rounded peninsula that makes up the southern tip of the Bay of Banderas. It's home to unspoiled beaches, thick forest, rocky cliffs, small villages and not a whole lot else.To give you a sense, for my 30th birthday we took a motorcycle trip out to a small beach community called Mayto. The motorcycle slipped and skidded along a sandy road that led to the stunning 7-mile beach. The beach had absolutely nothing save for one small hotel, a campground and a palapa-covered restaurant. It was probably the best birthday I've ever had.But new developments, which include a highway, an airport and a boutique hotel, are going to create a new pocket of luxury that is sure to enthrall travelers looking for that next "it" spot in Mexico. I'm telling you: This is it.According to state of Jalisco's tourism secretary, German Ralis, the anticipated highway connecting Puerto Vallarta with the Costalegre is about 9 miles from completion."The way is about 200 kilometers," said Ralis. "Fourteen kilometers are left to be renewed. It connects Puerto Vallarta to the south of Costalegre. It will make the travel time faster to Cabo Corrientes."To get to Cabo Corrientes from Puerto Vallarta at present is a long, snaking drive along the coastal Highway 200 and then a veer off at the town of El Tuito through the national forest toward the coast, where Mayto and other rugged beaches lay waiting. Beautiful it most certainly is. Time efficient, at present, it is not. But it will be. Ralis anticipates the highway, which is a federal project, to be part of the next federal budget.But Mayto is also expecting a private tarmac as early as next year, which will cater to private jets. And on top of that, a boutique hotel is expected to open on the crescent of beach. This hotel will cater to the boho-chic crowd (think Tulum or Sayulita vibes). While not many details on the hotel have been announced, it will be themed around the zodiac signs. The lack of light pollution in the area means this is one of the best spots in Mexico to see the stars - I can attest to that. The project should open next year.Of course, further south along the coast, along the Costalegre, there have been pockets of luxury for decades, from the international artistic community at Careyes to the luxury accommodations at Cuixmala.But the Four Seasons will open its Tamarindo property in the fall of this year. And a bigger airport, which has been talked about for years, is finally set to open in this part of the state, likely at the end of 2021 or beginning of 2022, predicted Ralis.When you have something as beautiful as this part of Mexico, it's tough to keep it a secret for long. And as much as I treasured keeping this spot for myself, it will be exciting to see what happens next.



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Celebrate Take Your Dog To Work Day in Puerto Vallarta



Friday, June 25 is Take Your Dog to Work Day, so stop by Ryan Donner and Associates real estate office to experience the joys of pets in the workplace and support two Puerto Vallarta animal rescue organizations. Puerto Vallarta, Jalisco, Mexico - Dogs have been man's best friend far back into pre-history when they became domesticated by choosing to live and work alongside mankind. From the very beginning, they worked alongside us, hunting and tracking and even keeping us safe at night by growling and barking when danger reared its ugly head.



In modern times, this relationship has been forgotten, and the poor pooch is now left to sit at home while we go about our daily business. But wouldn't you agree that leaving our four-legged fur babies behind as we head to the office the hardest part of the day?



Take Your Dog to Work Day was created by Pet Sitters International (PSI) and first celebrated in 1999. PSI created the day to encourage businesses to allow dogs in the workplace for one Friday each year to help people understand the human-animal bond, to educate others on the importance of saving these amazing critters from life on the streets, and to promote their adoptions from local shelters and rescue groups.



June 25, 2021, will mark the 23rd annual Take Your Dog To Work Day in the United States, but if you are here in Puerto Vallarta, you can celebrate the day at the Ryan Donner and Associates Real Estate office.



From 9:00 am until 6:00 pm, Ryan and his team will be accepting donations at their office, located at Insurgentes 108-1 on the south side of downtown Puerto Vallarta, for two local animal rescue organizations: the



Donation options are as follows:



Toys for dogs to benefit SPCA de PV

Old or used towels to benefit SPCA de PV

Dog Food to benefit The Sula Society

Jackets and Sweaters (all sizes) for dogs in the Flight Angels Program



But that's not all! From 4:00 pm to 6:00 pm volunteers from the SPCA de PV will be at the Ryan Donner and Associates office to provide information on:



How to adopt a pet in Mexico and, if you've already found your fur baby in Puerto Vallarta, help you start the adoption process on the 'spot.'



The Flight Angels program that looks for travelers to Canada and the United States to transport pets adopted in Puerto Vallarta to their new fur-ever homes in British Columbia, Alberta or Seattle.



Other ways you can help this non-profit association.



So take the time on Friday, June 25 to stop by Ryan Donner and Associates real estate office to experience the joys of pets in the workplace and support our local animal rescue organizations. Pets are welcome, so bring your puppy to play with other pets, while you learn more about these two noble causes.





Whether you are looking to buy or sell property in Puerto Vallarta or the greater Banderas Bay area, Ryan Donner & Associates is your Mexico real estate expert. Part of the company's philosophy is to provide their clients with all the information that they need to invest in the best deal possible. For more information, call 322-111-1162 or visit ryandonner.com.



Click HERE to learn more about Ryan Donner & Associates - Dogs have been man's best friend far back into pre-history when they became domesticated by choosing to live and work alongside mankind. From the very beginning, they worked alongside us, hunting and tracking and even keeping us safe at night by growling and barking when danger reared its ugly head.In modern times, this relationship has been forgotten, and the poor pooch is now left to sit at home while we go about our daily business. But wouldn't you agree that leaving our four-legged fur babies behind as we head to the office the hardest part of the day?Take Your Dog to Work Day was created by Pet Sitters International (PSI) and first celebrated in 1999. PSI created the day to encourage businesses to allow dogs in the workplace for one Friday each year to help people understand the human-animal bond, to educate others on the importance of saving these amazing critters from life on the streets, and to promote their adoptions from local shelters and rescue groups.June 25, 2021, will mark the 23rd annual Take Your Dog To Work Day in the United States, but if you are here in Puerto Vallarta, you can celebrate the day at the Ryan Donner and Associates Real Estate office.From 9:00 am until 6:00 pm, Ryan and his team will be accepting donations at their office, located at Insurgentes 108-1 on the south side of downtown Puerto Vallarta, for two local animal rescue organizations: the SPCA de PV and The Sula Society. Donation options are as follows:Toys for dogs to benefit SPCA de PVOld or used towels to benefit SPCA de PVDog Food to benefit The Sula SocietyJackets and Sweaters (all sizes) for dogs in the Flight Angels ProgramBut that's not all! From 4:00 pm to 6:00 pm volunteers from the SPCA de PV will be at the Ryan Donner and Associates office to provide information on:How to adopt a pet in Mexico and, if you've already found your fur baby in Puerto Vallarta, help you start the adoption process on the 'spot.'The Flight Angels program that looks for travelers to Canada and the United States to transport pets adopted in Puerto Vallarta to their new fur-ever homes in British Columbia, Alberta or Seattle.Other ways you can help this non-profit association.So take the time on Friday, June 25 to stop by Ryan Donner and Associates real estate office to experience the joys of pets in the workplace and support our local animal rescue organizations. Pets are welcome, so bring your puppy to play with other pets, while you learn more about these two noble causes.
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Summary

Chapter 1 opens with Helene on a British military plane called the Liberator. The only people on the plane are an RAF pilot, a dispatcher, and her partner on this mission, Hubert. They are flying above France and are nearly at their drop zone. Helene reflects that she is finally in the same country as her husband, Henri. She is hungover and nervous to jump out of the plane. The Germans fire at them and the whole plane shakes. Helene vomits. They reach their drop zone and Hubert jumps out of the plane. Helene takes her time applying lipstick before jumping. Her parachute gets snagged on a tree and she dangles from it, waiting to be found. An attractive, young French soldier comes and cuts her down.

Chapter 2 is a flashback to eight years...
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Comment Policy Calaveras Enterprise does not actively monitor comments. However, staff does read through to assess reader interest. When abusive or foul language is used or directed toward other commenters, those comments will be deleted. If a commenter continues to use such language, that person will be blocked from commenting. We wish to foster a community of communication and a sharing of ideas, and we truly value readers' input.
Handing over ceremony of vaccine refrigerators in Yaounde Archives

UK-based manufacturer of WHO-approveded PQS vaccine refrigerators, Dulas Solar Ltd, has donated off-grid solar vaccine refrigerators to the government and the Cameroon Baptist Convention (CBC) to boost the countrys immunization coverage and especially improve COVID-19 vaccination in remote areas.

Dulas solar vaccine refrigerators come in different shapes and sizes and run at a stable +5 C (generally 2-8C) with a freeze-free guarantee. They are equipped with a unique phase-change material built into the wall lining of the refrigerators that fluctuate between a liquid and a solid at +5 degrees thus guaranteeing the walls never go below freezing; the importance of that is to enable a secure cold chain for the more remote regions.

These equipment will ensure preparedness for immunization programs including Covid-19 vaccination in remote areas of Cameroon and help in the countrys fight against Covid-9. The two Dulas VC50SDD refrigerators can contain vaccines that could vaccinate up to 3400 people with two doses of the Oxford Astrazeneca vaccine.

The vaccine refrigerators were handed to the Ministry of Public Health and the CBC Health Services in Yaounde last May 31, 2021.

Dr. Judith Seunge, a senior official in the Ministry of Public Health chaired the symbolic handover event at the premises of the Expanded Program on Immunization in Yaounde on behalf of the Minister of Public Health in the presence of the Deputy British High Commissioner to Cameroon, Nigel Holmes, CBC, and W.H.O representatives and Dulas Solars local partner, Hero Technologies.

Hero Technologies CEO, Dr. Ndambi B. Ndaya said the initiative follows a visit to Cameroon in December 2019 of Catherine McLennan, International Sales Manager for Dulas Solar.

Dr. Ndambi said the company and her partners are very interested in looking into the numerous energy problems at every level in Cameroon. He said they offer a wide range of locally adapted renewable energy solutions on a small and large scale, from conception through design, supply of materials, installation, and maintenance.

"This gift is a demonstration of how adapted our solutions can be, and we hope the beneficiaries enjoy unmatched reliability and comfort as they use them," Dr. Ndambi said.

Dulas local partners, Hero Technologies gave a thrilling live demonstration of the functioning equipment to the guests at the ceremony. The unique internationally accessible, remote monitoring vaccine guard technology of Dulas captured the curiosity of many people present at the event, as Dr. Divine Bondfleet, Director of Procurement at Hero Technologies walked them through it.

The Deputy British High Commissioner to Cameroon in a tweet after the ceremony said: Im enthusiastic about prospects for adoption of British vaccine cold chain technology from WHO certified manufacturer Dulas Solar to boost Cameroons immunization coverage. Solar-powered fridges offered to MINSANTE and CBC Health Board yesterday are a valuable contribution.

The CBC installed its own refrigerator at the Ndu Baptist Health Center in the North West region while that of the government was installed at the Abong-Mbang district hospital in the East region. Dulas and its trusted local partners - Hero Technologies, ensured seamless movement of the equipment from the UK and to the said localities as well as the installations.

Prof Tih Pius, Director of Health Services at CBC explained that they chose Ndu because it is becoming a strategic distribution hub and itself serves over 85,000 people in the town.
Military harvest from "Operation Kumbo Clean" Archives

Security officials in Cameroons North-West region say they neutralized three separatist fighters who passed for generals. The trio was among many other armed fighters killed during a 32-day military maneuver code-named Operation Clean Kumbo.

General Thunder, General Abakwa, and General Spider were neutralized as state forces swept through separatist camps in Bui Division in Cameroons North West Region.

Operation Clean Kumbo was led by the Commander of the 51st Motorised Infantry Brigade, Colonel Matiang Charles Alain who had a 300-man troop at his disposal.

On Tuesday, June 15, 2021, Colonel Matiang presented a report of the 32-day operation to Brigadier General Nka Valere, Commander of the 5th Joint Military Region, and Lanyuy Harry, Senior Divisional Officer, SDO, of Bui Division.

Regretting that they lost four valiant soldiers in Operation Clean Kumbo, Colonel Matiang said his troops dislodged several separatist hideouts, killing many armed fighters and injuring others who are on the run, including notorious Amba General No Pity.

10 motorbikes, five AK47 riffles, dane guns, charms, gallons of contraband fuel as well as equipment used in manufacturing improvised explosive devices among other items were retrieved from the hideouts of separatists.

The Commander of the 5th Joint military region, Brigadier General Nka Valere saluted the defense and security forces for successfully completing phase one of Operation Clean Kumbo.

With some of the armed fighters like General No Pity still on the run, the Commander of the 5th Joint military region called on the troops to stay on alert. He reminded them of the need to remain professional as they fight to weed out separatist fighters in the North West Region.

SDO Lanyuy Harry requested that more vehicles and security personnel be sent to Bui for the protection of the people and their property as the poor state of roads has rendered the existing vehicles bad.

He regretted that economic operators who had started investing in the division had fled after the armed groups made life difficult for them.

We had institutions of higher learning in addition to the hospital facilities here; that is the Banso Baptist Hospital and Shishong Cardiac Centre. These are jewels we have. This is in addition to the agricultural prowess of the Division. Visitors were trooping here every day, either for education, healthcare, or for purchases. Our humble appeal is for the fighters in the bushes to drop their arms and join the DDR centers. Their place is in this republic, The Guardian Post quotes the SDO as saying.

The operation to clean Kumbo took the security forces to Verkovi, Mbiame, Ibal, and parts of Nwa in the Donga Mantung division.

During this first phase of the operation, four soldiers were said to have fallen on the battlefront while others injured are being treated in hospitals.

It should be recalled that last month, the convoy of North West Governor came under serious attack with improvised explosives planted along the way. Gunshots also erupted at St. Augustine College as Bishop Nkuo celebrated the 40th anniversary of his Priestly ordination.
This is bigger than just CRASC, anyone can use it and I think it is an important step for anyone to take, this one simple thing could make so many feel more included, said Hummer, who may try to win an appointed CRASC position after her term as education secretary ends Wednesday. Shes also considering running for the Anne Arundel County Board of Education student member role next year.
When Mr. Brown was attacked in January 2008 while waiting for a bus at 5 a.m. near his home on Cameron Road in Govans, he reported to work in the newsroom with his coat splashed with blood. It was only after the intervention of an editor that he agreed to go to the hospital and be examined.
Its important for us even more so this year to get [the letter of intent] in because there are significant shortages with automobile manufacturers, Doug Brown, deputy director of the department of public works, said. We can start to get those vehicles in.  Were working with the Sheriffs Office to roll out the older vehicles that might have damage.
It is not fair for some of our citizens to have three members in the Maryland General Assembly and others to have one, she said. If you live in one of those districts with only one representative, do you actually have the same level of support you would if you didnt?
A construction worker, identified by police as Antonio Oneil Payton, 33, of Temple Hills, was attempting to cross the Express Toll Lane to set up signs in a work zone when he was struck by a tractor-trailer, a preliminary investigation found, according to state police.
Kimberly Ross-Holmes works on her laptop at her home in Evanston, Friday, April 23, 2021. The Chicago suburb will become the first to pay reparations in the form of housing grants. She said she is glad that Juneteenth will be a federal holiday, but hopes that the federal government takes up more issues that affect the everyday lives of Black people. (Shafkat Anowar/AP)
Speaking of retreads, former Attorney General Doug Gansler has emerged to make a second run for governor. Comically, Gansler thinks his past scandals will be of no interest to voters based on anecdotal discussions with people already supporting him. As if his own baggage wasnt enough, Gansler is taking advice from Len Foxwell, a political consultant with plenty of his own personal and professional baggage.
It was ratified by a narrow margin made possible by a dispensation allowing soldiers serving in the Army to vote from the field rather than at their home county courthouse. The new constitution took effect in November, more than three months before Congress passed the 13th Amendment, abolishing slavery across the nation.
Leahy read into the record the names and addresses of a handful of residents who submitted written testimony that criticized the vote-by-mail plan. Some of the testimony echoed claims made by former President Donald Trump that voting by mail would lead to fraud. Despite numerous lawsuits filed by Trumps lawyer alleging fraud took place, none have been proven or held up in court. President Joe Biden was certified as the winner of the 2020 election. Hogan did not support Trumps claims.
Over a month after the BSF recovered arms and ammunition dropped by a Pakistani drone in Jammu, another Pakistani drone was noticed in Dera Baba Nanak of Punjab's Gurdaspur district on Friday, said BSF sources.

According to sources, the drone was noticed by BSF troops at around 4:30 am today.

BSF fired upon the drone near BOP Aabad after which the Pakistani drone went back, they said.

They further stated that a search operation has been launched in the area.

"Today around 4:30 am, a Pakistani drone was noticed in Dera Baba Nanak area by BSF troops. BSF fired upon the drone near BOP Aabad After which the Pakistani drone went back. BSF has started search operation in the area," BSF sources said.

This comes after the Border Security Force (BSF) on May 14, recovered an AK-47 rifle, a 9-mm pistol with a magazine and 15 rounds dropped by a Pakistani drone in the Samba sector of Jammu.

"On specific information of BSF regarding the crossing of arms/ammunition through drone from Samba border area. As per input, BSF troops carried out a search operation in the general area of the Samba sector on May 14. At about 11.30 am, BSF troops recovered a wrapped item with a yellow colour polythene bag in a field. After taking all precautionary measures, troops opened the wrapped packet and found an AK-47, a pistol, a magazine, 15 rounds of 9 mm, a wooden frame (used to attach the payload with drone) and the wrapping material. The site was around 250 metre from the international border inside the Indian Territory," read a BSF statement.

Earlier on April 24, BSF troops in Arnia sector of Jammu district in Jammu and Kashmir had foiled a drone intrusion bid by Pakistan on the International Border by firing upon two drones/UAVs that they observed entering from Pakistan side and compelled them to retreat.

An official statement issued by the BSF had said, "Today alert BSF troops in Arnia Sector foiled drone intrusion bid by Pakistan on International Border. During the early morning hours today, two drones/UAV were observed entering from Pakistan side and immediately fired upon by vigilant BSF troops which compelled it to retreat back to Pakistan territory."

The BSF had stated that the drone intrusion bid foiled by BSF Jammu troops was indicative of alertness and swift retaliatory action by BSF on a drone intrusion from the Pakistan side.

(ANI)

Also Read: Indian Coast Guard on alert after oil spill from Haldia-bound Portuguese ship: Ministry of Defence
B: 20210618 17:36:41  :B:

:B:

Stock Code: 000553 (200553) Stock Abbreviation: ADAMA A(B) Announcement No. 2021-26







ADAMA Ltd.



Announcement on the Completion of Cancelling

Repurchased Shares and Share Capital Change







The Company and all members of the Companys Board of Directors confirm that all

information disclosed herein is true, accurate and complete, with no false or

misleading statement or material omission.















I. Repurchase Plan and Approvals



The 26th Meeting of the 8th Session of the Board of Directors held on August 19, 2020

and the 3rd Interim Shareholders Meeting in 2020 held on September 7, 2020 of

ADAMA Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as the Company) approved the Repurchase

Plan for Part of the Companys Domestically Listed Foreign Shares (B share).



In order to protect the Companys value and shareholders interests, the Company

decided to use its own funds to repurchase (and cancel) a portion of its B-Shares

through centralized price bidding transactions and/or any other method/s permitted by

the applicable laws and regulations. The Company will spend no more than RMB

132,562 thousand to repurchase B-shares at the price of no more than 5.70 HKD/share.

The upper limit of the number of shares to be repurchased is 26,000,000 shares, and

the lower limit is 13,000,000 shares. The repurchasing period will not exceed three

months following the date of the Companys shareholders approval of the repurchase

plan.



IIImplementation of Share Repurchase



From September 16, 2020, the first day the Company started repurchase, to December

6, 2020, when the repurchase period expired, the Company repurchased 14,309,536





shares of B-Shares by means of a centralized price bidding transaction through a

special securities repurchase account for B-Shares, which accounts for 0.61% of the

Companys total share capital. The highest transaction price is 5.22 HKD/share, the

lowest transaction price is 4.27 HKD/share, the average transaction price is 4.87

HKD/share, and the total payment amount is HKD 69,747,208 (including transaction

fees).



On May 21 2021, 2020 Annual General Meeting of the Company approved Proposal

on the Cancellation of the Repurchased Shares and the Subsequent Decrease of the

Registered Capital of the Company. According to the resolution, the Company will

cancel the 14,309,536 B shares repurchased in 2020 and change the Companys

registered capital from RMB 2,344,121,302 to RMB 2,329,811,766. Besides, the

General Meeting approved the Proposal on Revisions to the Articles of Association of

the Company. Based on the above Proposal on the Cancellation of the Repurchased

B-Shares and the Subsequent Decrease of the Registered Capital of the Company, the

Company revised the articles in the Company's Articles of Association related to the

total registered capital and the total number of shares.



III. Cancellation of Repurchased Shares and Share Capital Change after

Cancellation



On June 17, 2021, the Company completed cancellation of above 14,309,536 B shares

at the Shenzhen Branch of China Securities Depository and Clearing Co., Ltd, within

the time limit required by relevant regulations and laws.



After the cancellation is completed, the total share capital of the Company decreased

from 2,344,121,302 shares to 2,329,811,766 shares. Specific change is as follows,



Item



Before the repurchase and

the cancellation



After the repurchase and

the cancellation



Number of

shares



Proportion

%



Number of

shares



Proportion



%



I. Restricted Shares



4,500



0.0002



4,500



0.0002



IncludingShares

held by domestic

natural person



4,500



0.0002



4,500



0.0002



II. Shares not

subject to Trading

Restriction



2,344,116,802



99.9998



2,329,807,266



99.9998









IncludingRMB

Ordinary Shares



2,177,067,461



92.8735



2,177,067,461



93.4439



Domestically

Listed Foreign

Shares



167,049,341



7.1263



152,739,805



6.5559



III. Total Shares



2,344,121,302



100.0000



2,329,811,766



100.0000











The Companys share capital structure after the cancellation still meets listing

requirement.



IV. Follow-up Steps



The Company will make change to registered capital and ICA registration changes

accordingly in line with relevant regulations.



It is hereby announced.







Board of Directors of ADAMA Ltd.



June 19, 2021









 Stock Code: 000553 (200553) Stock Abbreviation: ADAMA A(B) Announcement No. 2021-26ADAMA Ltd.Announcement on the Completion of CancellingRepurchased Shares and Share Capital ChangeThe Company and all members of the Companys Board of Directors confirm that allinformation disclosed herein is true, accurate and complete, with no false ormisleading statement or material omission.I. Repurchase Plan and ApprovalsThe 26th Meeting of the 8th Session of the Board of Directors held on August 19, 2020and the 3rd Interim Shareholders Meeting in 2020 held on September 7, 2020 ofADAMA Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as the Company) approved the RepurchasePlan for Part of the Companys Domestically Listed Foreign Shares (B share).In order to protect the Companys value and shareholders interests, the Companydecided to use its own funds to repurchase (and cancel) a portion of its B-Sharesthrough centralized price bidding transactions and/or any other method/s permitted bythe applicable laws and regulations. The Company will spend no more than RMB132,562 thousand to repurchase B-shares at the price of no more than 5.70 HKD/share.The upper limit of the number of shares to be repurchased is 26,000,000 shares, andthe lower limit is 13,000,000 shares. The repurchasing period will not exceed threemonths following the date of the Companys shareholders approval of the repurchaseplan.IIImplementation of Share RepurchaseFrom September 16, 2020, the first day the Company started repurchase, to December6, 2020, when the repurchase period expired, the Company repurchased 14,309,536shares of B-Shares by means of a centralized price bidding transaction through aspecial securities repurchase account for B-Shares, which accounts for 0.61% of theCompanys total share capital. The highest transaction price is 5.22 HKD/share, thelowest transaction price is 4.27 HKD/share, the average transaction price is 4.87HKD/share, and the total payment amount is HKD 69,747,208 (including transactionfees).On May 21 2021, 2020 Annual General Meeting of the Company approved Proposalon the Cancellation of the Repurchased Shares and the Subsequent Decrease of theRegistered Capital of the Company. According to the resolution, the Company willcancel the 14,309,536 B shares repurchased in 2020 and change the Companysregistered capital from RMB 2,344,121,302 to RMB 2,329,811,766. Besides, theGeneral Meeting approved the Proposal on Revisions to the Articles of Association ofthe Company. Based on the above Proposal on the Cancellation of the RepurchasedB-Shares and the Subsequent Decrease of the Registered Capital of the Company, theCompany revised the articles in the Company's Articles of Association related to thetotal registered capital and the total number of shares.III. Cancellation of Repurchased Shares and Share Capital Change afterCancellationOn June 17, 2021, the Company completed cancellation of above 14,309,536 B sharesat the Shenzhen Branch of China Securities Depository and Clearing Co., Ltd, withinthe time limit required by relevant regulations and laws.After the cancellation is completed, the total share capital of the Company decreasedfrom 2,344,121,302 shares to 2,329,811,766 shares. Specific change is as follows,ItemBefore the repurchase andthe cancellationAfter the repurchase andthe cancellationNumber ofsharesProportion%Number ofsharesProportion%I. Restricted Shares4,5000.00024,5000.0002IncludingSharesheld by domesticnatural person4,5000.00024,5000.0002II. Shares notsubject to TradingRestriction2,344,116,80299.99982,329,807,26699.9998IncludingRMBOrdinary Shares2,177,067,46192.87352,177,067,46193.4439DomesticallyListed ForeignShares167,049,3417.1263152,739,8056.5559III. Total Shares2,344,121,302100.00002,329,811,766100.0000The Companys share capital structure after the cancellation still meets listingrequirement.IV. Follow-up StepsThe Company will make change to registered capital and ICA registration changesaccordingly in line with relevant regulations.It is hereby announced.Board of Directors of ADAMA Ltd.June 19, 2021
Juneteenth commemorates June 19, 1865, when Union troops arrived in Galveston, Texas, to deliver the message that the Civil War was over and the last remaining slaves were freed. Approved by Congress and signed into law this week, Friday became the first official Juneteenth federal holiday, since this years date falls on a Saturday.
Not all businesses have had the same hiring luck, even when it comes to teen workers. Like other establishments in the service industry, Aztec Daves Food Truck has been short-staffed for some time. Although business is as busy as ever, owner Ramon Torres has only been able to add two people in the past month despite actively looking for workers for more than five months.
I used to associate subtitles with foreign films only, and to think of closed captions as aids for the hearing-impaired and tools for use when you needed to keep the sound off. There even seemed to be something a little fuddy-duddy about turning on the captions for Hamilton, as though it marked me as a tragically unhip older person who cant understand the rap music kids listen to these days.
On Aug. 21 and 22 from noon to 1 p.m. each day, the Blue Angels will perform their renowned flight demonstrations over the lakefront. But as the city and nation continue recovering from the pandemic, jump teams, parachuters and stunt planes that frequented the show in the past  like the Army Golden Knights and Navy Leap Frogs  are not slated to make an appearance.
On Friday, it was announced that Teigen would be stepping away from Safely, the cleaning brand she developed with Kris Jenner. An Instagram story posted to the brands account reads: Chrissy will be stepping away from Safely to take much needed time to focus on herself and be with her family. We fully support her decision and are thankful for her contributions. The brand will continue to move forward and focus on our important mission of bringing high quality, hard-working cleaning products to all American households.
In a statement, the army said soldiers fired at the woman in Hizmeh, just north of Jerusalem, after she exited the car and pulled out a knife. The statement did not say how close the woman was to the soldiers, and the army did not release any photos or video of the incident.
I am concerned about the security situation across a band of Africa, from the Sahel region in the west to the Horn of Africa, Townsend told reporters. He noted deadly attacks by al-Qaida- and Islamic State-linked jihadis and al-Shabab. All of them are on the march, he said.
The chairman of the USCCB doctrine committee, Bishop Kevin Rhoades of Fort Wayne-South Bend, Indiana, said no decisions have been made on the final contents of the proposed document. He said bishops who are not on the committee would have chances to offer input, and the final draft would be subject to amendments before it is put up to a vote.
The attacker shot the man in the neck and then escaped in a waiting Honda SUV, possibly a silver CRV, driven by a third attacker, police said. The SUV drove off north on State Street after the attack. Police didnt say whether there was an exchange of words or if the man who was shot resisted his attackers.
Kelly also testified that LaPorta, who was shot on the back left side of his head, used his left hand to shoot himself, something the board also didnt believe. LaPortas uncle testified that he taught his nephew how to shoot a gun with his right hand when he was 10 or 11. The uncle testified how he went hunting with LaPorta hundreds of times since he was a kid and has never seen his nephew fire a gun during hunting trips with his left hand, the board noted.
Despite these potential key touch points for the public sector to connect young people to social services, right now were failing to provide them with supports. The most striking way to see how the current system is failing young people is to see what happens to them a year after their arrest for carjacking. In the subsequent 12 months, those young people were 77 times more likely to be murdered than the average Chicago resident (and 940 times as likely to be murdered than in other rich cities around the world, such as London). The rate at which these young people are murdered on the streets of Chicago exceeds even the death rate among active U.S. combat soldiers during Operation Iraqi Freedom.
He also had an assistant directors role in the Office of Budget and Management for the City of Chicago before joining the Chicago Public Schools. While working at CPS, he became aware of the racial achievement gap, leading him to found TBSP in 1996. He wrote a Chicago Tribune commentary piece in 2013 that laid out some of his ideas about how poor Black and Latino students need greater help in closing the academic gap.
In a statement, Hastings, of Frankfort, said the decision to drop his candidacy came after thoughtful reflection and with a heavy heart. He announced his candidacy March 3 and had the endorsement of the Chicago Regional Council of Carpenters.
Thats despite Pritzker today saying he will sign the legislation if it reaches his desk. After the House passed the bill in a 70-41 vote yesterday, a motion to reconsider put it on hold, giving Lightfoot a chance to have what she said were real negotiations for the first time in months with lawmakers. House Speaker Emanuel Chris Welch said the hold would last for a couple of weeks.
Ishbia assembled the 3.3-acre lakefront parcel by swapping land with the Winnetka Park District. The arrangement allowed the park district to realize its goal of connecting two lakefront parks, Elder Lane Park and Centennial Park, by giving up a 71-foot-wide, 0.7-acre swath of green space at Centennial Parks south end that Ishbia is taking title of. The land swap also involved Ishbia paying $6.2 million for a house and 0.64-acre lakefront lot that lies between the two parks and then deeding that house and land to the district.
We were looking at space across the street pre-pandemic and Im glad we didnt pull the trigger, Aleman said. The [new] space is great, but its a little challenging the way its cut up over there. Were going to make the flow a lot better here. It will be heavily weighted on the food. We are a family-owned taqueria. The liquor will serve will compliment the food.
Police were called just after 1 p.m. June 11 to the bank branch in unincorporated Calumet Township. Surveillance video showed two men in all black, who approached the bank from a wooded area to the southeast, according to authorities. Castellana was shot in the face outside the bank and dropped to the ground, authorities said.
President of Jinzhong College of Information Ji Yu (L) and Dean of the Taiko Science Fiction Academy Zhang Ran inaugurate the Taiko Science Fiction Academy in Jinzhong city of China's Shanxi province, June 16, 2021. [Photo by Xu Xiaoxuan/China.org.cn]

"Most science fiction deals with the future, but an important branch of science fiction focuses on history. If time were to start over, history might evolve in a different direction, stimulating extensive imagination for historical science fiction," said China's sci-fi mogul and Hugo Award winner Liu Cixin at a forum marking the launching ceremony of the Taiko Science Fiction Academy on Wednesday.

Located in Jinzhong city of China's Shanxi province, the Taiko Science Fiction Academy, under the Jinzhong College of Information, has been established to explore the sci-fi elements in Shanxi's history and culture and encourage the combination of history and science fiction.

More than 40 renowned sci-fi practitioners in China and over 600 faculty members and students of Jinzhong College of Information attended the ceremony. Based on Shanxi's abundant historical heritages, such as the Pingyao Ancient Town and Yungang Grottoes, as well as its merchant culture and folk customs, the Taiko Science Fiction Academy will set up creative workshops, devise a comprehensive sci-fi curriculum system, and conduct a variety of club activities to develop Jinzhong into a capital of historical science fiction.

Ji Yu, president of Jinzhong College of Information explained the prospects of the Taiko Science Fiction Academy whose guideline features "History Plus Science Fiction" model, while inaugurating the academy with its dean Zhang Ran. First, the academy will pool science fiction talents and strengthen teaching and research in this regard. Second, a platform will be built to promote sci-fi communication and cooperation. Third, the academy will aim to aid and facilitate the science fiction industry.

A historical sci-fi project, "Taihang Universe" (named after the Taihang Mountains running across Shanxi) was also launched on the same day. According to Zhang Ran, dean of the academy and a sci-fi writer, the project serves as a structure and a platform where anyone is welcome to contribute their sci-fi projects, with the preconditions of respecting historical facts and figures and digging into the cultural heritage.

Forums and roundtables on sci-fi and live action role-playing (LARP) games; book signings; a sci-fi scripts, poster and peripheral products exhibition; and a cosplay fashion show were also held to offer sci-fi indulgence for the participants.




Young Kashgar artist paints hometown with mixed interpretation of old and new

Umber, ocher yellow and sienna are the dominant colors of the Ancient City of Kashgar, a rammed-earth building complex in the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region that can trace its origins back 2,000 years.



However, green, red, blue, orange and other vibrant colors are typical of the 25-year-old painter Mamattursunjan Mamtimin's palette when he portrays the intersecting alleyways and mazelike blocks of the ancient city.

"I used to follow the figurative style of many other local painters, who tend to use earth tones when drawing ancient city views. But now I've changed my ideas. It's time for the young generation to make some changes and be more expressive in creating artworks," said Mamattursunjan.

The young painter grew up in Xinjiang's Kashgar prefecture and went to Xinjiang Normal University in Urumqi, the regional capital, to study art in 2016.

During his university years, he traveled to Beijing, Shanghai, Xi'an in Shaanxi province, Jiuquan in Gansu province and other cities, where he visited museums and galleries and conducted exchanges with arts teachers and students.

He was then inspired by his travels to use bold colors and compositions, interpreting his hometown with a touch of modernity and vitality.

What has changed in recent years is not just Mamattursunjan's ideas of painting, but the ancient city where he often hung around during his childhood.

A total of 7 billion yuan ($1.1 billion) was invested in 2010, mainly by national, regional and city governments, to renovate the ancient city, upgrading its basic infrastructure and reinforcing time-honored buildings while maintaining the traditional Uygur architectural style.

Five years later, the scenic spot of the Ancient City of Kashgar, which covers 4.25 square kilometers, was designated a national 5A tourism attraction.

Mamattursunjan  who started to follow his primary school art teachers by sketching views of the ancient city's streets and lanes at the age of 10  has witnessed how the surroundings have been freshened up by the renovation and is willing to embrace the changes.

After graduating from the Art Institute of Xinjiang Normal University last year, he decided to go back to Kashgar, and with classmate Abduqeyum Abdukeram, who grew up in Kashgar's Shule county, he opened an art studio there.

"We've heard that the Ancient City of Kashgar had plans to create an Oil Painting Street lined with art studios, galleries and workshops. Therefore, we chose to locate our studio on the street," said Mamattursunjan.

Oil Painting Street boasts more than 40 art studios, galleries and workshops, giving local artists exposure to large groups of tourists who could also be potential customers.

"Sometimes, we can sell four paintings in a single week," said Abduqeyum.

Kashgar received more than 6.1 million domestic tourists during the first five months of this year, up 50.2 percent year-on-year, and revenue generated by its tourism industry during the period reached nearly 4.6 billion yuan, a year-on-year growth of 30.1 percent.

The booming tourism industry in the Ancient City of Kashgar has also enabled Mamattursunjan and Abduqeyum to network with visitors from home and abroad and conduct exchanges with people from different cultural backgrounds.

"Oil Painting Street has attracted domestic and foreign tourists, some of whom are also adept at painting. We benefit a lot by talking to them," Mamattursunjan said, adding that early in May, a Ukrainian visitor who came to tour the ancient city purchased several of his paintings.

He also noticed that an increasing number of young people, who once wanted to migrate to fashionable cities outside Xinjiang, have become more willing to stay.

"The ancient city is becoming more attractive for us young people," he said. "We've got night houses, cafes and many other fancy shops here. It's a harmonious mix of ancient culture and modern elements."
The 8th annual Global Film Industry Value Chain Development Forum was held during the 24th Shanghai International Film Festival. The forum invited film executives to discuss and explore the development trends and prospects of the film industry in the era of media convergence.

Film executives discuss the future of the Chinese film industry at the 8th annual Global Film Industry Value Chain Development Forum June 13, 2021. This year's theme is "Development Trends and Prospects of the Film Industry in the Convergence Media Era". [Photo courtesy of MPA]

Charles H. Rivkin, chairman and CEO of the Motion Picture Association (MPA) noted that although the global film industry has been hit by the COVID-19 pandemic over the past year, the efforts of filmmakers and rapid recovery of the film markets, with China being the best example, have boosted the confidence of the world's film industry.

But just due to the pandemic, many foreign filmmakers, executives and experts could not come to Shanghai's film festival, so that they spoke via video links during the forum. "Avengers: Endgame" director Joe Russo was the one to join the forum online, and said he believed that artificial intelligence (AI) technologies such as virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR) and virtual productions, will become the main direction of film shooting in the future, especially for science fiction films or blockbusters which require magnificent visual effects.

Gordon Cheng, CEO of Cameron Pace Group Asia & China, briefed the forum attendees about the new 3D technologies developed and to be used in James Cameron's much-anticipated "Avatar 2." He said China's film technology market is booming, and he hoped to explore and develop more advanced technologies with China's top universities as well as top film and technology companies, so that more future Chinese film and television works, especially in the field of science fiction, can use the China's own intelligent technologies.

Sun Zheyi, president of Sunac Culture, pointed out that AI shortens the animated film creation cycle, and technologies such as VR, AR and especially mixed reality (MR) can promote the strengthening of the relationship between virtual and real film sets. "The Sacrifice", released last year which used virtual production and many other new technologies, played an important role in promoting the industrialization of the domestic film industry. However, he suggested that compared with other industries, China's film and television industry still needs to be strengthened in terms of innovation.

In response to the ever-shortening cinema window period during the pandemic and the relationship between streaming media and theater chains, IMAX CEO Richard Gelfond believed as the film industry has a history of more than 100 years, with one year "interrupted" by the pandemic, nothing will really change anything forever. He said in the future, small films could opt for online release but the big blockbusters will still choose to release in theaters first, which will give films longer-term value. The robust recovery of the Chinese film market proved that audiences will return to theaters to enjoy the theatrical experience as soon as they are able to.

Li Jie, president of Alibaba Pictures, thought the internet is a very good way to supplement the distribution of theatrical releases. "For film companies, two teams should be established in the future: a theatrical release team and an online film team, which are two forms of the industry." He added, "China has a large audience, and has both theater distribution systems and online distribution systems that can digest a larger volume of content. Therefore, in the future, China may have a model that is rare in the world. There is a lot of room for industry practitioners to explore."

William Feng, vice president for Asia Pacific and head of Greater China of the MPA, said the association has always promoted cooperation between China and America in terms of filmmaking, and promoted Chinese films overseas. Previously the MPA and its member companies hosted Sino-foreign co-production forums, screening events and filmmaker exchange programs through which excellent Chinese filmmakers were invited to study and have exchanges in the United States every year.

He revealed there are new cooperation and exchange plans to not just support high-end talent exchanges in filmmaking, but also extend to other fields for more cooperation in the film industry, which will help China's film industrialization and Chinese culture to go global.
You are here: Business

China's Ministry of Commerce (MOC) said Thursday that it would enrich its policy toolbox to alleviate the pressure of commodity price spikes on foreign trade companies.

Import diversification has been promoted, and stable channels of commodity trade established, with joint efforts from the ministry and other authorities, MOC spokesperson Gao Feng told a regular news briefing.

Looking ahead, the ministry will enhance the policy effects of export credit insurance and credit support, closely monitor commodity prices, and help enterprises reduce costs and expand markets, Gao said.
China on Friday started the trading of palm oil options at the Dalian Commodity Exchange (DCE) and allowed overseas investors to participate, marking another step in the country's financial opening-up push.

The move made palm oil options the first yuan-denominated options contracts listed in China open to overseas investors, the DCE said.

China is a major importer and consumer of palm oil in the world, with its import and consumption volumes accounting for 15 percent and 10 percent of the world's total, respectively.

By launching palm oil options and including overseas investors in the trading, the country can provide risk management tools for market entities and contribute to the coordination of international supply and industrial chains, as well as ensure the quality development of its futures market, the DCE said.

China will also launch the trading of crude oil options on the Shanghai International Energy Exchange on June 21, according to an announcement made in May by the country's securities regulator.

In 2020, the total turnover of China's futures market rose 50.56 percent from the previous year to 437.53 trillion yuan (about 67.9 trillion U.S. dollars), reaching a historic high, official data showed.
China's famous herd of wandering elephants is showing increasing daily movement as it lingers in a particular spot of southwest China's Yunnan Province, with its activities now starting earlier in the day, authorities said on Thursday.

The herd is still roaming within Shijie Township in the city of Yuxi and travelled 7.4 km southwest between 6 p.m. on Wednesday and 6 p.m. on Thursday, according to the headquarters in charge of monitoring their migration.

A male elephant, which strayed 12 days ago, is about 18.8 km away from the herd now. All 15 elephants are safe and sound.

The headquarters is working to establish a regular mechanism for ensuring the safety of the herd and people, while coordinating the allocation of relevant designated funds.

The herd traveled about 500 km from their forest home in the Xishuangbanna Dai Autonomous Prefecture before reaching Kunming, the provincial capital, late on June 2.

For over a month, authorities have sent police to escort the herd, evacuated roads to facilitate their passage, and used food to distract them from entering densely populated areas.

Asian elephants are primarily found in Yunnan and are under A-level state protection in China. Thanks to enhanced protection efforts, the wild elephant population in the province has grown to about 300, up from 193 in the 1980s.
 Flash

China on Thursday vowed to continuously enhance mutual political support with Vietnam and inject new impetus into the socialist drive of the two countries and their bilateral ties in the new era.



The remarks came as Li Zhanshu, chairman of the National People's Congress (NPC) Standing Committee, held talks with Vietnam's National Assembly chairman Vuong Dinh Hue via video link.

Noting the important consensus reached this year between leaders of the two countries as well as the Communist Party of China (CPC) and the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV), Li said China is ready to work with Vietnam to forge a community with a shared future of strategic significance between China and Vietnam.

As this year marks the centenary of the CPC, Li said China is willing to draw wisdom from the splendid history of friendly exchanges and cooperation between the two parties, to inject new impetus into the socialist drive of the respective countries, as well as ties between the two countries and the two parties in the new era.

China and Vietnam, both socialist countries led by communist parties, are faced with multiple common tasks, Li said.

He urged the two sides to continuously enhance mutual political support, improve synergy between the Belt and Road Initiative and the "Two Corridors and One Economic Circle" plan, jointly ensure COVID-19 prevention and control works are carried out well, and properly manage maritime disputes.

He also emphasized for the two countries as well as the CPC and the CPV, it is imperative to promote consensus, enhance cooperation and make concerted efforts pertaining to following the socialist path, guarding against the "Color Revolution," and effectively responding to hegemonic behavior of suppressing and containing the development of socialist countries, among others.

Li said that the NPC is ready to promote friendly cooperation between legislative bodies, and enhance coordination in areas related to anti-interference, anti-sanctions and anti-containment so as to defend international fairness and justice and the common interests of developing countries.

Hue expressed the willingness to advance the effective progress of bilateral ties and pledged to strengthen communication and cooperation with the NPC.
You are here: World

 Flash

Two people were shot dead on Thursday in Germany's western town of Espelkamp, according to local police.





One was shot before a house and the other shot on the nearby street, according to the initial report.





The police have cordoned off the area.





The suspect is still on the run and supposedly carries a weapon, local media reported.
 Flash

French Prime Minister Jean Castex on Wednesday announced that people could stop wearing face masks outdoors starting from Thursday and the night-time curfew will also be lifted starting Sunday as the country's COVID-19 indicators continue to drop.





"The health situation in our country is improving faster than we expected," Castex told a press conference after a cabinet meeting. "We are going to lift the general obligation to wear a mask outdoors."





Masks will still be required in busy public spaces where barrier gestures cannot be respected, such as on public transport, in stadiums and other crowded places, the prime minister said.





The curfew, in force since October 2020, will end on Sunday, ten days earlier than previously planned, said Castex.





However, "if we are to face in the coming weeks an epidemic situation, we will not hesitate to take new measures to act quickly," he added.





France is now "below the threshold of 5,000 (new) cases per day" and "no department reports worrying (epidemic) dynamics," according to Castex.





The number of hospitalized and critically-ill patients -- key indicators to evaluate the health system's ability to cope with the health crisis -- has been falling for the sixth straight week.





As of Tuesday, 12,008 COVID-19 patients were hospitalized, including 1,952 in intensive care units, down from 6,000 reported at the end of April.





"We are living a happy return to a normal life. We are on the right track. Let's stay mobilized," said Castex.





Calling vaccination "the best bulwark against the epidemic resurgence," he pledged that 40 million people would have received at least one COVID-19 dose and 35 million citizens should have completed their inoculation by the end of August.





Some 30.76 million people, or 58.6 percent of the adult population, have already received one vaccine dose. Some 14.75 million people have received two shots, representing 28.1 percent of the adult population, according to the data from the Health Ministry.
When it comes to a godless government like Communist China, allegations of undermining countries' economies - through various propaganda and most recently, biological weapons - can no longer be dismissed as mere conspiracy theories.

Just last month, a Chinese professor with strong connections to the CCP triumphantly declared that China "defeated" the United States in a biological war in 2020. Such claim raised the possibility that the COVID-19 outbreak was a planned act.

As previously reported, Senior Researcher Chen Ping of the China Institute of Fudan University acknowledged in a video that was translated by New York-based blogger Jennifer Zeng that the Communist Party of China had won "the biology revolution."

"In 2020, China won the trade war, science and technology war, and especially the biological war," he said. "The achievement is unprecedented. This is an epoch-making historical record. So for the liberal, America-worshiping cult within China, their worship of the U.S. is actually unfounded. After this trade war and biological warfare, the U.S. was beaten back to its original shape."

Earlier this month, as proof of the Wuhan laboratory leaks continues to mount, former President Donald Trump described the COVID-19 as China's "single greatest attack on the world."

"Whether it's on purpose or not, it's the single greatest attack on the world--and not just us-- on the world in history," he said in a phone interview on Fox Business with Stuart Varney.

This is echoed by TruNews founder Rick Wiles when he said that the communist regime has "embarked on a plan to exterminate their enemies. This includes the United States of America, Australia, India, and the Philippines."

Wiles pointed out that these are the nations which are now under the most severe COVID assault, and he said that China is targeting them in a "multiple economic way" because they want the resources.

"This is the worst thing that has ever happened, I believe, in the history of the world - a biological attack on humanity," he added.

He further noted that CCP operatives had penetrated the federal, state, and municipal governments of the United States of America. Chinese propaganda, he claimed, is being promoted by American media outlets, while the world's major social media platform, Facebook, is enlisting the help of Chinese people to monitor and filter American social media postings.

"So, if a person in America ridicules the accusation that the Coronavirus is man-made in a Chinese laboratory, most likely move on. If that person were to choose any statements like that, you can be certain that that individual is either a CCP agent, or an apologist for the CCP," he said.

On Dr. Anthony Fauci, Wiles believes that he is complicit with the Chinese Communist Party and that he should be detained and questioned by the military.

"There is a medical mafia in this country," he declared.

On Communism, Wiles said it breeds godlessness and produces "madmen."

"Man is depraved and without God, man is totally depraved. And there's no depth of evil and wickedness that man cannot commit when man is without God."
Due to concerns about the potential risks masks bring to schoolchildren who wear them throughout the school day, a group of Florida parents submitted their children's face coverings to a laboratory for examination. Recently, it was found that face masks really capture a wide variety of bacteria, many of which are "dangerous pathogens," according to the researchers.

The Blaze reported that six face masks that had been used lately were submitted to the University of Florida for laboratory testing.

"We need to know what we are putting on the faces of our children each day. Masks provide a warm, moist environment for bacteria to grow," said Amanda Donoho, one of the concerned parents.

Testing performed by the University of Florida's Mass Spectrometry Research and Education Center revealed that five of the six masks tested housed a wide variety of germs, with three masks infected with "dangerous pathogenic and pneumonia-causing bacteria."

On the masks, the 11 "dangerous pathogens" are responsible for diseases like pneumonia, tuberculosis, meningitis and sepsis, food poisoning from E. coli, diphtheria, Lyme Disease, and UTI.

According to Rational Ground, half of the masks had been infected with one or more types of "pneumonia-causing bacteria." One-third of the samples tested positive for one or more types of the bacterium that causes meningitis while another one-third was found to contain microorganisms that were hazardous and antibiotic-resistant in nature.

There were also a number of less hazardous pathogens discovered, including pathogens that may cause a variety of symptoms such as fever, ulcers, acne, yeast infections, strep throat, periodontal disease, Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, and others.

The masks examined were new or freshly washed before being worn for five to eight hours by youngsters ranging in age from six to eleven. One of them was worn by a grownup.

Controls included a T-shirt worn by one of the youngsters at school and masks that had not been worn. The controls were determined to be free of pathogens.

The findings of Dr. Patrick Grant, a microbiologist at Florida Atlantic University, confirmed that unwashed face masks do accumulate harmful bacteria, whereas Dr. Rossana Rosa, an infectious disease specialist, said that there is no risk of pneumonia transmission because of accumulated infected particles on the facial mask.

But the risk of transmission that happens when students remove and reapply their face masks many times during the school day to eat and drink was not addressed. But given the result of the lab test, the buildup of dangerous bacteria should presumably enhance the likelihood of children becoming ill as a result of exposure.

What about mask mandates

According to WND, a separate study conducted by the University of Louisville indicated that state-mandated masks did not significantly reduce the spread of COVID-19.

"Masks may promote social cohesion as rallying symbols during a pandemic," the researchers said, "but risk compensation may also occur."

Some of the risks cited could be found here.

WND noted that despite the fact that Americans were complying with mask regulations, according to a research conducted in October by the CDC itself, the policies did not seem to have slowed or halted the spread of the coronavirus. Furthermore, it was discovered that wearing a mask had detrimental consequences.

Moreover, a "Mask Facts" page compiled by the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons show that the consensus before the coronavirus pandemic was that the efficacy of mask use by the public at large in reducing the transmission of a virus is dubious.

In a similar vein, according to a study conducted by Baruch Vainshelboim of Stanford University (SU) and published by the National Center for Biotechnology Information, the physical properties of facemasks are ineffective at blocking viral particles due to the difference in scales between them. Facemasks, on the other hand, may have long-term consequences if worn for a prolonged period of time such as the development of chronic illnesses, health deterioration, and early death.
Shane Idleman of Westside Christian Fellowship in California wrote an "Open Letter to Post-Pandemic Pastors" in which he posits a cutting question: "Was our silence because of true concern, or because of a lack of boldness via the filling of the Spirit?"

The California-based minister asserted that, if anything, the pandemic exposed what was truly going on within their hearts.

"I love pastors and understand that Covid was difficult to navigate, but I kept wondering: Where are the Isaiahs and Jeremiahs calling us to repentance? Where is the boldness of Paul, Peter, and John the Baptist? Why are the shepherds silent?" he wrote on Christian Headlines.

He said that the vast majority of pastors said nothing about the BLM Inc. riots, distorted statistics, and harsh tactics, but instead supported them in certain ways. Aside from that, he didn't see any emails urging people to engage in prayer and fasting, but instead, he saw hundreds of letters apologizing for their skin color and concentrating on unity.

In contrast, he mentioned Jesus' demonstration of zeal for his Father's house by driving out the moneychangers from the Temple.

"Today, how many pastors can truly say they are consumed with zeal for our Father's house? Apparently, not many. Many are like Samson, who "did not know that the LORD had departed from him" (Judges 16:20)," said Idleman.

Insurance liability vs. Spiritual liability

Idleman went on to say that although most pastors felt that they were doing the right thing by adhering to all of the political mandates, most pastors did not want to hear alternative viewpoints on issues such as vaccinations, masks, or obedience to government.

"Instead of allowing brokenness and humility to guide them, they choose pride and political correctness. As a result, they lacked boldness, fortitude, and spiritual strength. And that's exactly why most of them did not challenge governmental oppression. They did, however, lash out at Spirit-filled members and pastors who lovingly challenged them. Talk about a mixed message!" he pointed out.

Even though some believe that loving one's neighbor means submitting to the government, he believes that this must be aligned with loving a neighbor who is living in fear, loving the families entrapped in abuse or addiction, loving those trapped in sin, depression, or suicide, and loving all members who are dying spiritually as a result of pastoral cowardice.



He's also disappointed to see pastors who are more aligned with what the media regurgitates than with real science. He believes that those who believe that a vaccine would solve the nation's health problem are "gravely mistaken."

"I'm not anti-vaccine; I'm for what works," he clarified. "I'm for hearing both sides, researching RNA messengers, and looking at how the body works in fighting disease. Pastors, does it concern you that social media giants removed hundreds of videos from physicians asking hard questions? It appears not. Your silence speaks volumes."

For pastors who wish to absolve themselves of responsibility by asserting that "I'm just not political," Idleman quoted Pastor Rob McCoy as saying that their silence is complicity with the "Governor who continues to trample small businesses of California with shifting impossible metrics to reopen all while the state's homeless population and poverty rates now lead the entire nation."

"Politically, your church consentingly and silently waits downstream to collect the human heartache they help create by complying with this government malfeasance. You are political even if you choose to think you are not," added McCoy.

Several pastors, such as McCoy, are outspoken in their opposition to churches being fined and closed without due consideration while tyrannical politicians are given a free pass.
Scientists who support the Wuhan lab leak theory were reported to be in the danger of losing their careers due to "Fauci and his gang" silencing them.

LifeSite reported that Manipal University UNESCO Peace Chair Professor Madhave Das Nalapat disclosed in an interview with India's NewsX that "Doctor Fauci and his gang" are preventing critics and supporters of the "bunkum" origins theory of COVID-19 from speaking out.

Nalapat did not name who the scientists were but narrated in the interview that they are based in the United States and Japan.

"What is the most disgusting in this whole thing, is the cover-up. Any scientist who spoke up was strictly warned that 'Look here, you are going to have your career destroyed'," Nalapat said.

"Friends in the United States and Japan extensively briefed me that this theory [of the natural origin of COVID-19] is complete bunkum," he disclosed. "Then I asked them, 'What's wrong with you guys? Why are you silent?' But they said, 'If we speak out, Dr Fauci and his gang will destroy us, will destroy our reputations, will destroy our careers. We do not dare to speak out'."

Nalapat explained that National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Director Dr. Anthony Fauci is so influential that his statements against the Wuhan Institute of Virology leakage of COVID-19 and denial of his knowledge on the "gain-of-function" research done on it has forced those who disagree with it into silence. This is despite Fauci's published emails showing otherwise.

Fauci claimed during the event of Wall Street Journal Tech Health that he was not downplaying the Wuhan laboratory leakage as the source of COVID-19. What Fauci said, however, was that the idea of the Chinese "deliberately" engineering the virus to murder people seems is "farfetched."

"I still do think it is, at the same time as I'm keeping an open mind that it might be a lab leak," Fauci said. "The idea I think is quite farfetched that the Chinese deliberately engineered something so that they could kill themselves as well as other people. I think that's a bit far out."

LifeSite said Nalapat's claims are echoed by Washington Post Columnist Josh Rogin who revealed a similar information in his guesting at the Megyn Kelly podcast. Rogin revealed that scientists have informed him they are prohibited from contradicting Fauci's statements.

"I often talk to scientists who say the same thing, who say, 'Listen, we really want to speak out about this, but we can't do it. Why can't we do it? Well, we get all of our funding from NIH, or NIAID," Rogin narrated, "which is run by Dr. Fauci for years and years and years.' So we can't say anything like, 'Oh, gain-of-function research might be dangerous, or it might have come from a lab, because we're going to lose our careers, we're going to lose our funding, we're not going to be able to do the work'."

Besides Rogin, LifeSite news pointed to former Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Robert Redfield who said during his interview with Vanity Fair that he actually received death threats upon speaking of the Wuhan lab leak theory.

"I was threatened and ostracized because I proposed another hypothesis. I expected it from politicians. I didn't expect it from science," Redfield exposed.
Texas government entities are prohibited from forcing churches and other places of worship to close, according to a bill signed by Governor Greg Abbott on June 15.

The state's Republican governor announced via Twitter that "the First Amendment right to freedom of religion shall never be infringed," reports the Washington Examiner.

The bill came as a result of the states imposed lockdowns in an attempt to curb the spread of the coronavirus in March 2020 by closing services considered "non-essential" including places of worship. By executive order, Abbott reopened places of worship later that month, declaring them to be "essential services" for the community.

As for the recent bill, Governor Abbott said that it was drafted to safeguard Texans' first amendment right to religious liberty. Under the Republican-backed Bill, HB 1239, any public official or federal agency in Texas is banned from "issu(ing) an order that includes places of worship," reports Nation World News.

According to Republican state Representative Scott Sanford, the legislator who introduced the bill, church closures were an unconstitutional restriction on religious liberty protected by the First Amendment. He also argued that houses of worship "provide essential spiritual, mental, and physical support in a time of crisis."

"Closing churches not only eliminated these critical ministries and services," he contended, "but violated their religious freedom, guaranteed by our laws and constitution."

Critics of the bill, like state Representative John Turner, have argued that it is both "too comprehensive and too broad" in its application.

"I just thought it was a broadly written bill that could be problematic if applied as written," he told Texas Tribune.

Disputing Turner's remarks, Republican legislators who backed the bill pointed out that "strip clubs and liquor stores" in Texas are still operating, despite the fact that religious services were forced to shut last year.

A review of the previous year

A number of pastors were arrested during the first wave of COVID-19 for conducting services in defiance of local COVID-19 stay-at-home orders at the peak of the first wave.

The orders were met with resistance from churches and synagogues. Earlier this year, the Supreme Court struck down orders from governors like Andrew Cuomo and Gavin Newsom's limitations on church attendance after churches filed lawsuits contesting the disparity between them and other establishments. In the Brooklyn case, the court determined that the regulations "cannot be viewed as neutral because they single out houses of worship for especially harsh treatment."

A similar hopeful piece of legislation

Recent reports indicate religious liberty is also winning in Florida. Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a bill mandating that public schools offer students in grades K-12 one minute of silence at the beginning of each school day.

According to the bill, "too few people can even experience a moment of quiet reflection before dipping their head into daily activities" and that young people "are particularly affected by the absence of an opportunity for a moment of quiet reflection." While the minute of silence is in effect, teachers are not permitted to offer recommendations regarding the nature of introspection.

A signing ceremony was held in which DeSantis said that "you [can't] just push God out of every institution and be successful. I'm sorry, our founding members did not believe it."
In a ruling issued on Thursday, Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett disproved Democrats' expectations that her confirmation would mark the end of Obamacare.

The Supreme Court ruled 7-2 to overturn lower court decisions in Texas and other Republican-led states that had knocked down the individual mandate component of the Affordable Care Act, reports Newsweek.

Barrett joined Justices Stephen Breyer, John Roberts, Clarence Thomas, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Brett Kavanaugh in the court's majority decision.

With that considered, it's worth remembering that Democratic Party officials have previously warned that justices like Brett M. Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett would ascend to the Supreme Court and overturn Roe v. Wade and Obamacare, as per the Washington Post.

However, both voted in favor of keeping Obamacare in place on Thursday. Their primary case against Justice Barrett during the campaign season was based on this premise.

They've said a mouthful

According to Fox News, Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer, D-New York, stated in a press release that "a vote by any Senator for Judge Amy Coney Barrett is a vote to strike down the Affordable Care Act and eliminate protections for millions of Americans with pre-existing conditions."

When pressed Thursday for response on his past comments, Schumer's office referred to a news release applauding the court's ruling but omitting any mention of Barrett or Schumer's previous claims against the judge.

But Schumer was hardly the only Democratic politician to blast Barrett.

In an interview last year, the Democratic Senate Whip Dick Durbin said that then candidate was on Trump's assignment to get rid of Obamacare.

"We just chatted for a minute, and I really wanted to try to understand her experience as a person when it came to health care because she is being sent on assignment to the Supreme Court by President Trump," he said. "And we know what that assignment is, eliminate the Affordable Care Act."

Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., referred to her on the first day of her confirmation hearings as "a judicial torpedo" who was out to derail Obama's Affordable Care Act (ACA).

"This Supreme Court nominee has signaled in the judicial equivalent of all caps that she believes the Affordable Care Act must go, and that the precedent protecting the ACA doesn't matter," said Whitehouse.

During Barrett's confirmation hearings, Sen. Mazie Hirono, D-Hawaii, said in an interview that Republicans "want her on that court to hear the Affordable Care Act case... so that she can strike it down."

Hirono also stated that Barrett's nomination "poses a clear and present danger, an immediate danger, to the healthcare of over 20 million Americans who have healthcare thanks to the Affordable Care Act."

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, a former Democratic presidential candidate and current senator from Massachusetts, said that Barrett will "work to gut" the Affordable Care Act. She also described Barrett as a "right-wing ideologue who does not represent the majority of Americans."

Barrett's nomination is also being "fast-tracked" according to Senator Bob Casey, D-Penn., who said in a speech on the Senate floor that the Obamacare case is the reason for this.

To provide more samples, Dan McLaughlin of the National Review went through some of the Democratic Party's claims in an article titled, "Justice Amy Coney Barrett Proves Democrats' Obamacare Doomsaying Wrong."

Fox also noted that none of the Senators' Offices, save Schumer, had responded to their request for comment.
Republican Governor of Texas Greg Abbott signed a bill on Wednesday that would almost immediately make abortions illegal if Roe v. Wade is overturned. The governor signed House Bill 1280 into law shortly after the U.S. Supreme Court decided to hear a case about a Mississippi abortion law that has grave implications on pro-choice legislations and abortion access. A decision is set to be made next year and the Texas House Bill 1280 is a preventive measure that would take effect 30 days after the court's ruling.

"A favorable ruling would make Texas one of the first states to end abortions," Texas House Bill 1280 author state Rep. Giovanni Capriglione took to Twitter to share, as per the Texas Tribune.

Doctors who would violate the trigger bill will be charged with $100,000 in fines, have their licenses revoked, or even face life in prison if they continue to perform abortions under the ban. The bill does not allow exceptions for women who are at risk of suicide or self-harm and those whose pregnancies were a result of rape or incest. The trigger bill also does not allow any exceptions for "severe or potentially lethal fetal abnormalities." The only exception is when a woman faces death or "substantial impairment of major bodily function" if the abortion is not performed.

In May, Gov. Abbott signed the heartbeat bill, a legislation that criminalizes abortions once a fetal heartbeat is detected and is set to go into effect on September 1 this year. Fetal heartbeats can be detected as early as the sixth week of pregnancy, which some pro-choice advocates argue is too early as most women are not even aware of their pregnancy at six weeks, USA Today reported.

According to MSN, Gov. Abbott signed the latest in his slew of anti-abortion bills on the very same day that President Joe Biden signed a new legislation that made Juneteenth, the 19th of June, an official federal holiday celebrating the emancipation of African American slaves in the country. The Republican governor has been taking major strides to preserve conservative values in the state, signing into law on Tuesday a bill that bans public schools from teaching critical race theory.

Dallas News reported that not only did Gov. Abbott sign a law that is described as "strong move to abolish critical race theory in Texas," but the governor said that "more must be done," which is why he ordered a special session during which critical race theory will be discussed. A $15 million annual increase in spending is expected to come with the passing of this bill, as it "requires additional civics training for teachers."

The governor also signed up to seven bills on gun laws, including the House Bill 1927, which allows Texans 21 years old and above to carry guns even without licensing and training requirements, KSAT reported. On Wednesday, the governor shared on Twitter that he passed a law that "prohibits any government agency or public official from issuing an order that closes places of worship."

Gov. Abbott declared, "The First Amendment right to freedom of religion shall never be infringed."
FOX News personality Sean Hannity and former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee are planning to send North Korean defector and author Yeonmi Park to go on tour to U.S. colleges to speak out against the critical race theory teachings of various educational institutions in the country.

Park recently made headlines when she blew the whistle on how professors in Columbia University, where she studied as a young woman, blamed today's problems on "white men."

"I couldn't believe why people were hating their own people that much," Park said during a conversation with Huckabee and Hannity, as reported by Newsweek. She likened America's classroom with that of North Korea's, where she fled from as a teen to China and then eventually to the U.S.

"I literally crossed the Gobi desert to be free and now I thought I live in a country where I can say what I believe and have my freedom to think," Park lamented. "However, now I have to constantly censor my speech, because in the name of a safe space."

Park shared that Columbia University censored its students on the topics that they "can't talk about," causing her to become "concerned if America is not free, I think there is no place else left that is free."

Hannity admitted that he wasn't really "shocked" to hear about wokeness at U.S. colleges that promote "cancel culture" and political correctness in this day and age. Huckabee, a former Republican presidential candidate and former Baptist pastor, suggested that Park should go on a bus tour across U.S. colleges to speak out against wokeness in American educational institutions. When asked if she would consider such an endeavor, the North Korean defector said she would.

Hannity warned her, however, that fighting wokeness at U.S. colleges will put her at risk for being protested and cancelled by students and staff. The host said, "Every conservative I know lives through that experience."

Park seemed up for the challenge. The North Korea defector admitted that her "used-to-be enemy" was Kim Jong Un, the communist country's leader who had her on his "killing list" for "many years" because she had been speaking out about the suffering of North Koreans under his regime. She shared that her "original family" were punished and now, "so many Marxists and Communists and Maoists, Leninists" have sent her death threats.

The 27 year old North Korean defector escaped the regime as a 13 year old and in 2016 transferred from a South Korean university to the Ivy League school of Columbia University. According to Insider, the 27 year old has often spoken out about North Korea and its regime and at times had commented on Asian and American politics. She is also the author of a memoir called "In Order to Live: A North Korean Girl's Journey to Freedom," which was released in 2015.

FOX West Texas reported Park was recently at Angelo State University, where the Texas Tech University Free Market Institute sponsored her appearance at an event where the activist spoke about her experiences as a North Korean defector.
MIT and Harvard genetic engineering scientist Alina Chan has come clean as to why she and several scientists downplayed the Wuhan lab leak theory surrounding the origins of COVID-19 in 2020. The postdoctoral associate at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard University is one of 18 scientists who penned a letter calling for a more in-depth investigation into the origins of COVID-19 that would consider both natural animal-to-human transference and the possibility of a virology laboratory accident.

Chan admitted in a conversation with NBC News that scientists were reluctant to back the Wuhan lab leak theory for fear that they would be accused of "supporting racist rhetoric about how the coronavirus emerged." Former President Donald Trump, who pushed for the Wuhan lab leak theory, called COVID-19 "Wuhan virus" to refer to the city where it first came from, or "kung flu," referring to how the virus came from the Chinese.

"At the time, it was scarier to be associated with Trump and to become a tool for racists, so people didn't want to publicly call for an investigation into lab origins," Chan, who co-signed the letter published in the Science journal, admitted. But now that Trump is no longer in office, there has been a political shift as to how the government is considering the possibility that the Wuhan lab leak theory is actually a credible one.

WND reported that in 2020, then President Trump was asked if he had seen "evidence" that gave him a "high degree of confidence" that the Wuhan lab leak theory is indeed true. He answered that he had personally seen evidence and accused the World Health Organization (WHO) of a cover up, calling them the "public relations agency for China."

Similarly, the Washington Post's Glenn Kessler outlined in May a timeline of how the Wuhan lab leak theory slowly gained credence this year. He claimed that the Trump administration's "messaging was often accompanied by anti-Chinese rhetoric that made it easier for skeptics to ignore its claims."

In the former president's defense, Trump used the words "Wuhan virus" to describe COVID-19 because Wuhan is exactly where the virus originated. The ex-POTUS' supporters argued that MERS was literally called that way because it was the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) caused by a virus that came from camels in the Middle East. The same goes for the West Nile virus and the Zika virus, named after the places they originated from.

Its also worth noting how a CCP-linked professor called COVID-19 the 2020 CCP Virus which allegedly allowed China to defeat America in a biological war.

Andrew Bremberg, the former U.S. ambassador to the WHO, admitted that former President Trump's language and push for the Wuhan lab leak caused other governments who could have helped campaign for an investigation into the Wuhan virology lab, decided to distance themselves from the Trump administration instead. But despite their comments against the former Head of State, the evidence pointing to the virus as having come from a laboratory in Wuhan can no longer be ignored.

Nicholas Wade, a former New York Times columnist and editor for the Science and Nature journals conducted a word breakthrough analysis in May, leading him to conclude that there is evidence that the Wuhan lab leak theory is credible. This also adds credence to President Trump's claims and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's announcements.

President Joe Biden has also ordered U.S. intelligence groups to bolster its investigation into the Wuhan lab leak theory, after his administration shot down a Trump-era investigation that yielded interesting findings. This also comes after he issued an order banning the use of "China virus" and "Wuhan virus" in federal communications.

Chan's confession comes after reports of mainstream media also admitting that they brushed off the Wuhan lab leak theory and chose to brand it a conspiracy simply because former President Trump and other Republicans are pushing for it.
UN human rights experts said that they have reliable evidence regarding "organ harvesting" targeting minorities in prison in China, including Falun Gong practitioners, Uyghurs, Tibetans, Muslims, and Christians.

According to a press release from the UN Human Rights' Office of the High Commissioner, detainees may be forced to submit to blood tests and organ exams like ultrasound and x-rays without their permission, whereas other inmates are not obliged to do so. The test findings are allegedly entered into a database of live organ sources.

"Forced organ harvesting in China appears to be targeting specific ethnic, linguistic or religious minorities held in detention, often without being explained the reasons for arrest or given arrest warrants, at different locations," said the experts. "We are deeply concerned by reports of discriminatory treatment of the prisoners or detainees based on their ethnicity and religion or belief.

"According to the allegations received, the most common organs removed from the prisoners are reportedly hearts, kidneys, livers, corneas and, less commonly, parts of livers. This form of trafficking with a medical nature allegedly involves health sector professionals, including surgeons, anaesthetists and other medical specialists," they added.

Also mentioned is the restriction on family members claiming the corpses of dead detainees and inmates.

The report noted that the experts have called on China to respond promptly to the accusations of "organ harvesting" and to enable independent monitoring by international human rights organizations.

ChinaAid, a non-profit Christian human rights group, endorses the United Nations' latest report on human rights abuses in China.

"While horrific, the human rights experts' findings are a crucial step in pushing back against the Chinese Communist Party's campaign against religious minorities," they affirmed in a post in their website.

"There is substantial, credible, and a growing body of unrefuted evidence that the Communist Party of China has authorized and sanctioned - and continues to carry out-a systematic program of organ harvesting with a horrific and cruel loss of human life," they added.

As much as ChinaAid welcomes the UN report as a step forward, they are still concerned because the world "remains idle" despite ongoing evidence of the horrific practice of forced organ harvesting from religious prisoners in China.

The Chinese Communist Party's crimes against humanity, it said, must be "outrightly condemned" in the strongest terms possible by the international community. They must also collaborate to put a stop to the barbaric organ trafficking system.

Having said that, they have a message to the United Nations which they hope will be heard.

"We urge the United Nations to move beyond dialogue with China and into a full scale investigation to include unrestricted visits by the Special Rapporteur on trafficking in persons, especially women and children, the Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief, and the Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment."

In May 2019, during the Taiwan International Religious Freedom Forum, ChinaAid coordinated the signing of the #NoMoreOrganHarvesting Declaration by over 70 prominent activists, politicians, and religious leaders from across the globe. The declaration states: "On grounds of conscience and basic humanity, I solemnly pledge that I will not receive or accept, directly or indirectly, any organ transplant from China."
On Tuesday, June 15, Southern Baptist theologian Albert Mohler addressed the topic of religious liberty as part of the "Baptists Thinking Biblically: A Conversation on Religious Liberty" event.

On the late-night stage at Music City Center in Nashville, the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary president was joined by Andrew Walker, associate professor of Christian ethics and apologetics at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and associate dean of the Southern Baptist School of Theology.

Baptist Press published highlights from the theological discourse. Some of the more notable ones are as follows:

Baptists, according to Mohler, are tempted to do two things in the name of religious liberty.

"Number one is ... to argue for religious liberty for the right people and not for the wrong people without recognizing that unless religious liberty is within constitutional bounds for all, then you have a de facto state-sanctioned church," he explained.

"The other thing I think Baptists mess up is that when we become dominant in a culture, we tend to lapse into cultural Christianity, and then we discover that there's really no confession or conversion here. That's one of the reasons why people in the South are so surprised [about what] is going on with social transformation because they thought all these people were Christians. Well, it turns out, no, they actually weren't," he added.

According to Mohler, such individuals simply behaved in the manner as Christians because society indicated that was how they were meant to act, and now that society has told them not to act in that capacity, they have stopped.

Mohler then questioned Walker about the value of religious liberty "if no one wants to live according to the Scriptures."

Christians, according to Walker, will have a chance to persuade their neighbors to respect God by appealing to the order of things and the laws of nature.

"We've got to be able to have those arguments at our disposal to bring them into the public square to say to the world, 'We're not the weird ones for believing that males and females are biological categories that are fixed and unalterable,'" he said.

Religious liberty, according to Walker, is fundamentally about the freedom to preach the Gospel without being hindered by any obstacles.

He also made reference to the events in book of Jeremiah to illustrate that looking out for the general well-being of a city does not necessarily imply working out social transformation in order to achieve a certain form of "utopia." Rather, it means "slow, plodding work of forming families, getting rooted in your communities."

Religious liberty, according to Walker, is fundamentally about the freedom to preach the Gospel without being hindered by any obstacles.

"It's the ability to receive the Gospel with as few hindrances as possible, and it's about the ability to live out the aspects of the Gospel in the shape of our obedience," he said.

Mohler also tackled the concept of religious liberty.

He stated that throughout history of Western civilization, religious freedom sprang from a culture dedicated to humanity's perception of the image of God, and from a "conversionist faith" that, while veiled during the Middle Ages, nevertheless distinguished between those who professed the faith and those who did not.

The "freedom to reject belief in God" was not included in the original definition of religious liberty, according to Mohler, "because that wasn't even an intellectual choice." Specifically, it signified the freedom "not to be coerced - especially after the Reformation - into a particular confession, be it Catholic or Protestant."

The idea that evangelicals would be living in a different society next year if the Equality Act becomes law was also brought up by Mohler.

As Mohler puts it: "I don't think the average evangelical understands that their Christian school could basically be put out of existence. You can say, 'Well, that would never happen with the Supreme Court.' Well, let's put it this way: That means that nothing is stopping the absolute denial of religious liberty except some majority of justices on the Supreme Court, we hope."

Walker reacted to this by stating that if conservatives and Christians rely on the U.S. Supreme Court as a last resort, they are placing their faith in a "false hope." He said that by the time a case reaches that stage, all other options have been exhausted due to the degradation of the culture.
Following Pastor Ed Litton's election as new president of the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC), people are eager to know about his life and views on controversial issues.

The Christian Post outlined six things that described Litton, as well as his position on certain arguments, including racism, sexual abuse and women's role in the church.

First, the pastor declared that he has conservative leanings on politics and theology. He believes in the "inerrancy, infallibility and sufficiency of God's Word." He stands with the Biblical definition of marriage which is between a man and a woman. Litton also identifies himself as "pro-life."

He is "extremely conservative" politically but does not discuss about it in his preaching, believing that he is only called to help church members become "good citizens" and inspire them according to the Scriptures. He also shared his willingness to collaborate with politicians, honoring and treating them with kindness.

"My job is to represent Jesus Christ wherever I go," Litton added.

Next is on the role of women in the church. The pastor claimed that he is complementarian, affirming the SBC's statement of faith that the pastoral ministry is only "limited to men" in accordance with the Bible.

On the question about preaching with his wife about marriage, Litton pointed out that the convention extends local church pastors with freedom to decide according to their convictions. He explained that in inviting his wife to preach with him, she was under his authority.

On ordaining women ministers, the SBC president said that they will "have to work out" on this issue.

Third is his commitment on racial reconciliation. Litton is a member of Pledge Group, an organization in Mobile, Alabama that addresses racial division in the city.

However, he said that though Critical Race Theory is a "reality in the culture," it is "not a tool."

"We have a higher tool, and a higher tool is the Gospel. The Gospel is a tool we look at to say that we seek justice, and we're under command to seek justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with our God," Litton added.

The pastor shared that the minority groups in the SBC are growing in number, as opposed to the decline of the Caucasians.

"Asian American groups, Hispanic Americans, African Americans, they are growing at a rate of 232%, while our Anglo congregations are in decline," he said.

He is grateful to the people of color for helping the church reach out the lost in the country.

"So we are grateful for them. They make up a significant number of who we are. So yes, the first thing I say is, we want you here. We love you here. We can't reach every man, woman, boy and girl in this nation without you here," Litton stated.

Fourth is his view on sexual abuse allegations in SBC churches. The pastor hopes that the whole truth about it will be revealed, adding that the convention has to work hard to ensure that the churches are "safe places for people to be protected ... and not victimized."

"I think we have to find a mechanism and a way to help train our people, get more churches involved in wanting to create a safe environment," he continued.

"Learning and listening [are] very important," he pointed out.

Fifth, the SBC president is committed in uniting the people of the convention, hoping to "build bridges and not walls."

He considers pastoring a local church as the "highest honor" of his life, but he also has a "deep burden" for the people in the congregation.

"And I want to do whatever I can to help us pull this together. I'm not Superman. I have no magic. I know this person, and His name is Jesus. And they know Him too. And so I think we can find that common ground," he further stated.

Lastly, the pastor and his wife, Kathy, both suffered the tragedy of losing their spouses.

Litton's first wife, Tammy, died of a car crash in 2007. Kathy's first husband, Pastor Rick Ferguson, was also killed in an automobile accident in 2009.

He said that the sense of pain and suffering has changed him and Kathy for the better. He and his wife "loves" telling people that "there is a God who loves [them]."

"He doesn't go distant in the most painful things in life. He actually does the opposite. The Bible says it this way: He draws near to the brokenhearted, and those that are crushed in spirit," Litton declared.


Space News space history and artifacts articles Messages space history discussion forums Sightings worldwide astronaut appearances Resources selected space history documents





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US Postal Service releases 'Sun Science' stamps with NASA imagery



June 18, 2021  The Sun has risen on a new set of postage stamps.



The United States Postal Service (USPS) on Friday (June 18) released "Sun Science," a collection of 10 stamps celebrating the study of heliophysics using the imagery from a NASA probe.



"The U.S. Postal Service illuminates the light and warmth of our nearest star by highlighting these stunning images of the Sun on stamps," the USPS wrote, describing the new Forever-denomination stamps. "These 10 images come from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory, a spacecraft launched in February 2010 to keep a constant watch on the Sun."



A ceremony scheduled for Friday morning at the main post office in Greenbelt, Maryland, was set to mark the official first day of issue for the Sun Science stamps. Thomas Marshall, general counsel and executive vice president of the USPS and Dennis Andrucyk, director of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center were scheduled to preside over the event.



Alex Young, associate director for science in NASA's heliophysics science division and Yaireska Collado-Vega, director of the Moon to Mars space weather analysis office at the Goddard Space Flight Center were also scheduled to deliver remarks.



(The ceremony was relocated from the Goddard Space Flight Center due to observance of the Juneteenth federal holiday and the NASA facility being closed.)



Designed by USPS art director Antonio Alcala, each of the 10 stamps feature a single image of the Sun set against a black background. Each depicts the Sun in bold colors, which are based on the different wavelengths that reveal or highlight specific features of its activity. The images display common events on the Sun, such as solar flares, sunspots and coronal loops.



"The Sun is the only star that humans are able to observe in great detail, making it a vital source of information about the universe," the USPS explains on its website. "The Solar Dynamics Observatory lets us see the sun in wavelengths of ultraviolet light that would otherwise be invisible to our eyes. Each black-and-white image is colorized to the bright hues seen here."



The Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) was NASA's first mission dedicated to its "Living With a Star" program, which focuses on increasing our understanding of the causes of solar variability and its impacts on Earth. Launched into an inclined geosynchronous orbit in 2010, SDO has been able to make continuous observations of the Sun while transmitting its data to a dedicated ground station in New Mexico.



The 15-foot by 6.5-foot (4.5 by 2-meter) spacecraft is outfitted with equipment and instruments to capture images of the Sun in visible, ultraviolet and extreme ultraviolet light. SDO has gathered hundreds of millions of images during its more than a decade-long tenure, helping scientists to learn about how our star works and how its constantly churning magnetic fields produce the solar activity that we see.



The Sun Science stamps are now available at U.S. post offices nationwide and through the USPS website. The stamps are sold in panes of 20, with two of each design on each sheet.



The online shop also has several related products aimed at stamp collectors and enthusiasts.



Two different "first day cover" sets are available (a "cover" is a stamped envelope postmarked for a significant date; a "first day cover" is a cover postmarked for the day the stamp affixed to the envelope was issued). One set features a black ink pictorial postmark, which is styled after solar radiation. The second set features a digital color postmark, which "evokes two vivid and fiery suns, surrounded by floating hoops that suggest our nearest star's outline," according to the USPS.



Both sets include 10 first day covers, each dated for June 18, 2021 and Greenbelt, Maryland. They retail for $9.90 and $17, respectively.



Also offered for sale is a set of the 10 "Sun Science" postage stamps mounted with an enlargement of one of the stamps showing sunspots. The 13-inch by 16-inch (33 by 41 cm) presentation is showcased in a black frame and sells for $40.



In total, the USPS printed 30 million of the "Sun Science" postage stamps with a foil finish. The Forever stamps are priced at $11 per sheet.



The U.S. Postal Service has released "Sun Science," a set of 10 postage stamps featuring imagery from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) of our nearest star. (USPS/NASA)







The U.S. Postal Service is offering first day covers postmarked for the Sun Science stamps' release on June 18, 2021. (USPS)



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Global Reclosable Films Marketis accounted for $107.45 million in 2017 and is expected to reach $250.01 million by 2026 growing at a CAGR of 9.8% from 2017 to 2026. Some of the factors such as growing demand for reclosable films due to its re-closability feature and rise in utilization of flexible lidding are fueling the market growth. However, legislative regulations are negatively impacting the market growth. The usage of a reclosable lidding films as a promotional medium acting as an opportunity for the market growth.



Amongst Packaging Type, Trays segment is driven by due to the ease in opening and reclosing. For tray-sealing, the trays are equipped with two opening points that are positioned diagonally opposite each other. This makes it irrelevant in which way the trays are placed on the in-feed conveyor, thus preventing costly errors due to rotation of the trays. It is Easy-to-grip peel corner for effortless removal of top film is of the major benefit for this segment. By geography, the North America region is dominating the market during the forecast period due to the demand for reclosable films in the food industry.

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Some of the key players in Reclosable Films market include Winpak Ltd., Termoplast srl, TCL Packaging Ltd, Sudpack Verpackungen GmbH + Co. KG, Stratex Group Limited, Sealed Air Corporation, Schur Flexibles Holding GesmbH, Plastopil Hazorea Company Ltd, Parkside Flexibles (Europe) Limited, Mitsui Chemicals, Inc., Korozo Ambalaj Sanayi Ve Ticaret AS, Industria Termoplastica Pavese SpA, HFM Packaging, Ltd, Folian GmbH, DowDuPont Inc., Coveris Holdings S.A., Buergofol GmbH, Berry Global Group, Inc., Bemis Company, Inc. and AS Estiko Plastar.



Thicknesses Covered:

 Up to 100 Micron

 Above 200 Micron

 100 to 200 Micron



Peel Strengths Covered:

 Medium Peel Films

 Easy Peel Films



Material Types Covered:

 Polyethylene Terephthalate (PET)

 Pressure Sensitive Adhesive (PSA)

 Polypropylene (PP)

 Polyethylene (PE)

 Other Material Types



Packaging Types Covered:

 Trays

 Pouches & Bags

 Cups

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End Users Covered:

 Industrial

 Personal Care & Home Care

 Pharmaceutical

 Food & Beverages

 Other End Users



Regions Covered:

North America US Canada Mexico

Europe Germany UK Italy France Spain Rest of Europe

Asia Pacific Japan China India Australia New Zealand South Korea Rest of Asia Pacific

South America Argentina Brazil Chile Rest of South America

Middle East & Africa Saudi Arabia UAE Qatar South Africa Rest of Middle East & Africa



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IoT applications have unleased the consumer fantasy in an unprecedented fashion in the last few years. The Analytics of Things Market is characterized by the emergence of new wireless technologies, sensors, and mobile devices which are driving IoT evolutions. However, the real business value of the IoT technology, lies in analytics. Advanced analytics can provide meaningful insights, that can transform consumer experiences, help in the development of innovative products & services, optimize operations, and enable cost savings on assets. The datasets extracted from sensors can be correlated with other data, such as social data, to yield a strong understanding of the operations or a person or a group of individuals.

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Product analysis

IoT Analytics Platform can enable a wide range of analytics, from real-time to machine learning and cognitive to edge. Automated machine learning can be added to the quick and simple real-time monitoring for identification of anomalous behaviour. Predictive analytics can be utilised using advanced statistical modelling and historical data. For contextual insights, cognitive analytics can be applied to the unstructured data sources. The insights would consist of detailed graphs, and visualization dashboards. The platform is built with the ability to scale up to handle high data velocity and volumes. With advancements in processing and analytics, analytics can be performed at the edge of the network to overcome challenges related to connectivity, security, bandwidth, and latency.

Market analysis

The Analytics of Things Market has become highly relevant for few industries such as manufacturing, logistics, and utilities. Analytics is being applied to power grid systems for continuous monitoring, proactive management of power supply, and preventive maintenance. Most of the manufacturing plants, and fleets in logistics, already have internet enabled sensors and the application of analytics is highly relevant in these sectors. Majority of the new business processes and systems are likely to incorporate at least some elements of the IoT and analytics. Large enterprises who have prioritised low cost solutions are likely to deploy AoT solutions on cloud.

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Technology analysis

The value of Analytics of Things Market lies in real time business analytics. In IoT, with several million events often streaming into a system in real-time, real-time analytics becomes even more of a challenge. Lack of real-time advanced algorithms poses a challenge in real-time analytics. However, the challenges are being addressed as several IoT vendors are investing in improving the efficiency of their IoT systems. Descriptive analytics is a mature market, and the vendors are now focusing on predictive and prescriptive analytics. Both the types are likely to attract a lot of consumers due to their promises of improvement in operational efficiency, and cost reductions.

Key players

Most of the IoT vendors in the Analytics of Things Market have offerings for IoT analytics as well. The major vendors in the IoT market are Microsoft, Cisco, SAP, Intel, IBM, Google, AGT International, Accenture, Capgemini, and TIBCO Software.

Competitive analysis

Almost the entire Analytics of Things Market is ruled by the key IT players. Intel, Cisco, IBM, Microsoft, Google, and HP are some major players in the AoT market. The vendors are proactively investing in the development of IoT technologies. For instance, Microsoft has invested on processing features in Microsoft Streaming Analytics to enable better extraction of information from sensors in real-time. IBM has invested in enterprise application infrastructure and databases for connected devices. The increased investments have also generated a demand for data scientists and data science courses. The Federal and Central governments of several countries are also assisting in the development of the AoT ecosystem and are promoting the use of IoT and related technologies.

Regional analysis

With its assurance of cost reduction and improved operational efficiency, IoT and analytics is gaining popularity across all regions. North America leads the Analytics of Things Market due to the rising adoption of IoT solutions, a well-developed ecosystem, and the presence of major IoT players in the market. The market is yet to harness its complete potential as few of the organizations are still sceptical about the technology. European organizations and governments are investing on innovation and ecosystem development. Asia Pacific is a developing region, and the Asian economies are likely to invest in AoT as a move towards a digitized economy. Heavy and sustained investment in IoT technologies from countries such as India, China, South Korea, Singapore, and several Western European countries, have positioned them fit to lead the next digital wave of computing and industrialization. Middle East & Africa would increasingly invest on IoT and Analytics in line with its growing economy and dominant oil and gas industry. Latin America Analytics of Things Market would see increased investments by IoT vendors during the next 5 years.

Benefits

IoT analytics platform enables an organization to transform their business operations and boost their revenues. With the help of AoT, one can be warned of any potential problems associated with an equipment. Strengths and weaknesses of various processes can be analysed by turning tools and systems into smart devices. One can track the fuel and energy consumption in the processes, and cut down the expenses. Data gathered with respect to preferences and purchasing habits of customers can be used in developing personalized shopping experience. One can assess the product quality as well with IoT Analytics.

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Overview of the Global Varicose Vein Treatment Market

Infoholics market research report predicts that the global varicose vein treatment market will grow at a CAGR of ~6.0% during the forecast period 20192025. The treatment methods for varicose veins have transformed over the time due to recent alertness of cosmetic contemplations & the way they can disturb the superiority of life along with the advancements of innovative treatments & ambulatory care services. Varicose veins worry over 40 million individuals in the US, with about 50% of varicose vein patients having a family history.

Increasing prevalence of varicose veins and growing geriatric population are among the major factors driving the growth of the market. However, the high cost of treatment procedure and lack of skilled professionals are hampering the growth of the market.

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The majority of the revenue is generated from the leading players in the market with dominant sales from Syneron, AngioDynamics, biolitec AG, Energist Group, Medtronic Plc, and Sciton Inc.

According to the analysis, North America accounted for the largest share of the global varicose vein treatment market in 2018. The Asia Pacific region is expected to witness the fastest growth rate due to large patient pool, increase in the number of surgeries, and rising healthcare expenditure.

By Type:

Endovenous Ablation

Sclerotherapy

Surgical Ligation & Stripping

Sclerotherapy held the largest share in the global varicose vein treatment market in 2018. The market is likely to shift toward the non-invasive treatment technique during the forecast period 20192025.

By End-user:

Hospitals

Ambulatory Surgical Centers

Physicians Office

The hospitals segment holds a significant share among other end-users in the market and is also the fastest-growing segment during the forecast period 20192025.

By Region:

North America

Europe

Asia Pacific

Rest of the World

North America dominated the global varicose vein treatment market in 2018. The significant share of the North American region comes from the US, owing to the accessibility to good quality healthcare and excellent reimbursement facilities.

Varicose Vein Treatment Market Research Competitive Analysis  Surgical procedures for varicose veins are likely to experience significant changes in the foreseeable future; non-invasive alternatives have mainly overtaken surgery. In the recent past, the preference for non-invasive surgery has accelerated due to the possibility of infections involved with invasive surgery. High-intensity focused ultrasound is one of the latest treatment options for varicose veins and venous reflux disease. This innovative technology has been used for non-invasive tissue ablation in other therapeutic instances, and hence, there is a strong possibility of it being effective in veins.

Key Vendors:

Syneron

AngioDynamics

biolitec AG

Energist Group

Medtronic Plc

Sciton Inc.

Key Competitive Facts

The market is shifting toward less invasive procedures for the treatment of varicose veins.

The varicose vein treatment cost is high and the reimbursement scenario is very inconsistent.

Benefits  The report provides complete details about the sub-segments of the varicose vein treatment market. Through this report, the key stakeholders can know about the major trends, drivers, investments, vertical players initiatives, and government initiatives toward the disease management in the upcoming years along with details of the existing pure-play companies and new players entering the market. Moreover, the report provides details about the major challenges that are going to impact the market growth. Additionally, the report gives complete details about the key business opportunities to key stakeholders in order to expand their business and capture the revenue in specific verticals, and to analyze before investing or expanding the business in this market.

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Key Takeaways:

Understanding the potential market opportunity with precise market size and forecast data.

A detailed market analysis focusing on the growth of the industry.

Factors influencing the growth of the varicose vein treatment market.

In-depth competitive analysis of dominant and pure-play vendors.

Prediction analysis of the varicose vein treatment market in both developed and developing regions.

Key insights related to major segments of the varicose vein treatment market.

Latest market trend analysis impacting the buying behavior of the consumers.

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Overview of the Global Cystic Fibrosis Drugs Market

Infoholics market research report predicts that the Global Cystic Fibrosis Drugs Market will grow at a CAGR of more than 10% during the forecast period 20192025. The market has witnessed steady growth in the past few years and is sustaining due to rising prevalence of cystic fibrosis diseases, advancements in screening and treatments technology, and high prevalence of tobacco smoking.

Initiatives from government and other organizations, promising pipeline for the treatment of cystic fibrosis, and market expansion opportunities in emerging nations are providing scope for the growth of the cystic fibrosis drugs market. However, complex drug development process and expensive treatment options is restraining the growth of cystic fibrosis market.

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The majority of the revenue is generated from the leading players in the market with dominating sales from AbbVie, F. Hoffmann-La Roche, Gilead Sciences, Vertex Pharmaceuticals, Novartis, Advanced Inhalation Therapies (AIT) Ltd., Alcresta Therapeutics Inc., Allergan, AstraZeneca, Merck & Co. Inc., and Teva Pharmaceutical Industries.

According to market analysis, North America accounted for the largest share of the global cystic fibrosis drugs market in 2018. The Asia Pacific region is expected to increase due to large patient pool and more prevalence of respiratory diseases in this region.

By Drug Class:

CFTR Modulators

Mucolytics

Bronchodilators

Pancreatic Enzyme Supplements

Others

Recent information published by Proteostasis in March 2019 for its proprietary triple combination drug PTI-NC-733 (PTI-428/PTI-801/PTI-808) expressed concerns as to whether Proteostasis would contest Vertex\s grip on the CFTR modulator place.

By Route of Administration:

Oral

Inhalation

Intravenous

Among the various route of administrations, oral administration holds the majority share in the cystic fibrosis market in 2018.

By Regions:

North America

Europe

APAC

RoW

North America dominates the global cystic fibrosis drugs market in 2018 closely followed by Europe. Ireland has the most cystic fibrosis prevalence worldwide  around 1 out of 19 individuals in Ireland carry one copy of a mutated gene that can cause cystic fibrosis.

Cystic Fibrosis Drugs Market Research Competitive Analysis  Current cystic fibrosis medications are not appropriate for all patients and has restricted impact on this life-threatening disease. But these hurdles can be overcome by new developments of various therapeutic approaches. The development of small molecules for the treatment of cystic fibrosis has made important advancement in the previous decade. However, one of the major issues is that the success in the treatment options has been observed in only certain mutation classes among the 2000 mutations identified. Thus, many patients do not have any treatment.

Key Vendors:

AbbVie

Hoffmann-La Roche

Gilead Science, Inc.

Vertex Pharmaceuticals

Novartis

Key Competitive Facts

The firms Vertex Pharmaceuticals and CRISPR Therapeutics entered into a partnership in 2015 to target cystic fibrosis using CRISPR/Cas9. However, this technique for gene editing remains unproven in human lives and study is still in very early stage in its application in cystic fibrosis.

Restoration of CFTR function, mucociliary clearance, anti-inflammation, and anti-infective agents are the therapeutic approaches that are used in the development of effective drugs for CF.

Benefits  The report provides complete details about the sub-segments of the cystic fibrosis drugs market. Through this report, the key stakeholders can know about the major trends, drivers, investments, vertical players initiatives, and government initiatives toward the disease management in the upcoming years along with details of the existing pure-play companies and new players entering the market. Moreover, the report provides details about the major challenges that are going to impact the market growth. Additionally, the report gives complete details about the key business opportunities to key stakeholders in order to expand their business and capture the revenue in specific verticals and to analyze before investing or expanding the business in this market.

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Key Takeaways:

Understanding the potential market opportunity with precise market size and forecast data.

A detailed market analysis focusing on the growth of the cystic fibrosis drugs

Factors influencing the growth of the cystic fibrosis drugs

In-depth competitive analysis of dominant and pure-play vendors.

Prediction analysis of the cystic fibrosis drugs market in both developed and developing regions.

Key insights related to major segments of the cystic fibrosis drugs

Latest market trend analysis impacting the buying behavior of the consumers

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This market research report includes a detailed segmentation of the global retail analytics market by organization size (SMEs and Large Enterprises), by deployment (On-premise and Cloud-based), by application (Pricing, Merchandising, Customer Engagement, Inventory, and Others), by business process (Accounting and Finance, Marketing, Sales, and Others), and by geography (North America, Europe, APAC, and RoW). The market research report identifies SAP, Fujitsu, IBM, Happiest Minds, and Capgemini as the major vendors operating in the global retail analytics market.

Overview of the Global Retail Analytics Market

According to Infoholic Research, the global retail analytics market will grow at a rate of over 18% during the forecast period 20192025 and will be valued more than $9.5 billion by 2025. The market for retail analytics is predominantly driven by the rising adoption of IoT, Wi-Fi, and RFID tags as well as the increasing adoption of advanced technologies such as cloud-based analytics for decision-making. For instance, Sephora, a French beauty product retailers have deployed video analytics technology to monitor customer behavior in real-time.

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The company is installing AXIS cameras in its stores to count customers and their movement pattern within the space.

According to the retail analytics market analysis, North America accounted for the largest share of the global retail analytics market in 2018. With the presence of the highest number of technology innovators and increasing adoption of retail analytics by the retail corporations to enhance customers buying experience, this region is expected to dominate the market during the forecast period. The Asia Pacific region is expected to witness the fastest growth rate due to rising adoption of retail analytics solutions for reforming the retail landscape during the forecast period.

Retail Analytics Market Competitive Analysis and Key Vendors

The report covers and analyzes the global retail analytics market. Major vendors across different verticals are increasingly developing products and investments in this market, and as a result, the retail analytics market is expected to grow at a good pace in the coming years. The key players in the retail analytics market are adopting various organic as well as inorganic growth strategies such as mergers & acquisitions, collaborations & partnerships, joint ventures, and few other strategies to gain a competitive advantage in the market.

Few of the Key Vendors in the Retail Analytics Market

 SAP

 Mindtree

 Happiest Minds

 Capillary Technologies

 BRIDGEi2i

 IBM

 Oracle

 MicroStrategy

 Zebra Technologies

 Fujitsu

These companies are providing retail analytics solutions across functions. There are numerous other vendors that have been studied based on the portfolio, geographical presence, marketing & distribution channels, revenue generation, and significant investments in R&D for analysis of the entire ecosystem.

Retail Analytics Market Segmentation By Deployment

 On-premises

 Cloud-based

On the basis of deployment mode, the global retail analytics market is segmented to on-premises and cloud-based. Cloud-based subsegment is expected to grow significantly owing to low-cost availability and user-friendly deployment mode.

Retail Analytics Market Segmentation By Organization Size

 SMEs

 Large Enterprises

On the basis of organization size, the global retail analytics market is segmented to SMEs and Large Enterprises. SMEs segment is expected to grow at a significant rate due to low-cost availability and user-friendly cloud-based deployment.

Retail Analytics Market Segmentation By Application

 Pricing

 Merchandising

 Customer Engagement

 Inventory

 Others

Based on application, the market is segmented into Pricing, Merchandising, Customer Engagement, Inventory, and Others. Customer Engagement and Merchandising are expected to contribute significantly during the forecast period 20192025 predominately due to the growing adoption of AI and analytics to gain customer insights.

Retail Analytics Market Segmentation By Business Process

 Finance

 Marketing

 Sales

 Others

On the basis of the business process, the market is segmented into Finance, Marketing, Sales, and Others. The others segment includes store and supply chain.

Retail Analytics Market Research Benefits

The report provides an in-depth analysis of the retail analytics market. Retail analytics enable retailers to understand customer demand time through open management of products and resources in real-time. The technology helps in optimizing inventory management and identification of buying pattern. However, the high cost of deployment, as well as the inability of workforce to understand the behavior of customers, will create a challenging environment for the retail analytics market growth.

The growing adoption of new-age technologies such as AI and their integration with various software solutions is rapidly being adopted among brick and mortar retailers for an omnichannel retail approach. This adoption is resulting in enhanced customer retail experience as well as predicting customer demand in real-time. Sephora, a beauty retailer, introduced the omnichannel expansion of its new brick and mortar connected boutique in the US, facilitated with mobile-enabled experiences such as browsing products on retail iPad stations and providing customized digital makeover suggestions over emails to customers.

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Retailers across the globe will increasingly adopt retail analytics and shift towards new-age retailing techniques from traditional brick and mortar models. Rapid embracement of technological advances such as AI, cloud, and others are driving the demand for retail analytics. Additionally, business expansion by retailers is also boosting the adoption of retail analytics solutions.

Currently, several retail analytics players are offering several solutions that are being used across retail players globally. The report discusses the market in terms of deployment, application, business process, organization size, and regions. Further, the report provides details about the major challenges and drivers impacting the market growth.

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Overview of the Data Center Colocation Market

Infoholics market research report predicts that the global data center colocation market will grow at a CAGR of more than 13% during the forecast period 20192025. The market trends for data center colocation are primarily driven by the increasing demand from organizations to reduce the cost associated in the services of hosting servers and storages. The colocation vendor simply provides the power, cooling, and suitable environment for storing the hardware equipment of clients. The colocation providers also focus on providing proper bandwidth for high-speed data for multiple clients.

Enormous data are generated through sensors and mobile applications these days. Globally, organizations are facing scalability issues in data centers and considering moving their hardware equipment to a third-party rather than moving to cloud. Several colocation vendors are focusing on expanding their services in Middle East Africa and Latin America.

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According to our analysis of data center colocation market, North America accounts for the largest market share in 2019. With presence of numerous tier I companies in North America, the data center colocation is expected to rapidly increase in the US and Canada. Several enterprises in this region are proactively looking for areas to reduce the costs in hosting servers and data storages. Asia Pacific is anticipated to grow substantially due to the market potential in China, India, & Australia and investments in outsourcing of IT infrastructure. The data center colocation market is growing with an increase in colocation vendors who are expanding its services and providing low-cost alternative to hosting on-premises IT equipment. The Asia Pacific region is anticipated to grow at a high CAGR owing to the presence of many growing large & emerging enterprises increasing its customer base. The significant adoption of data center colocation is expected to be witnessed in BFSI and IT & Telecom. The colocation vendors are focusing on emerging markets such as Latin America and Middle East Africa. One of the important features that data center colocation provide is expertise in hosting scalable hardware equipment for multiple clients.

Data Center Colocation Competitive Analysis and Key Vendors

The report covers and analyzes the data center colocation market. The organizations maintain a rental relationship with the colocation vendors where colocation vendors offers space storing electronic equipment. The key players in the market are adopting various organic growth strategies, i.e., expansion in new markets. The data center colocation help in bringing easy alternative to hosting on-premises infrastructure. It is typically helpful for large enterprises which doesnt prefer to move to cloud but are looking for scalable solution for IT infrastructure.

Some of the Key Vendors in the Data Center Colocation Market:

Equinix

Digital Realty Trust

China Telecom

Century Link

China Unicom

Verizon

NTT Communications

BT

Interxion

CtrlS

These companies are striving in the market sphere by leveraging latest infrastructure empowering power and cooling, and energy management. The colocation vendors are focusing on the uptime of servers.

These vendors have been studied based on the portfolio, geographical presence, marketing & distribution channels, revenue generation, and significant investments in R&D for analysis of the entire ecosystem.

Data Center Colocation Segmentation By Tier

Tier I & Tier II Data Center

Tier III Data Center

Tier IV Data Center

The Tier IV segment is expected to grow at a highest CAGR during the forecast period 20192025.

Data Center Colocation Segmentation By Industry

BFSI

IT & ITeS

Government & Defense

Healthcare

Retail & Ecommerce

Manufacturing

Others

The IT & ITeS segment is estimated to hold the largest market share in 2019 and this trend is likely to continue during the forecast period 20192025.

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Benefits

The report provides an in-depth analysis of the data center colocation market. Though there are several risks in control over data, they also have advantage to maintain and repair quickly by the colocation vendors. While the GDPR is focusing European organizations to implement data center equipment in the European region, the Europe market is growing substantially. Also, tier IV data centers are growing owing to more number of enterprises looking to outsource their data center hosting and along with hyperconverged infrastructure, the establishment of tier IV data centers are increasing. The report discusses the market size in terms of tier, industry, and region. Furthermore, the report provides details about the major challenges impacting the market growth

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Overview of the Global In-store Analytics Market

According to Infoholic Research, the global in-store analytics market will grow at a rate of over 21% during the forecast period 20192025 and will be valued more than $3 billion by 2025. The market for in-store analytics is driven by the increasing adoption of advanced technologies such as cloud-based analytics for decision-making. For instance, in April 2019, Walmart, an American retail corporation deployed AI technology to monitor retail stores in real-time. The company is digitizing its stores with an objective to enhance the customers buying experience.

According to the global in-store analytics market analysis, North America accounted for the largest share of the global in-store analytics market in 2018. With the presence of the highest number of technology innovators and increasing adoption of in-store analytics by the retail corporations to enhance customers buying experience this region is expected to dominate the market during the forecast period. The Asia Pacific region is expected to witness the fastest growth rate due to rising adoption of in-store analytics solutions for reforming the retail landscape during the forecast period.

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In-store Analytics Market Research Competitive Analysis and Key Vendors

The report covers and analyzes the global in-store analytics market. Major vendors across different verticals are increasingly developing products and investments in this market, and as a result the in-store analytics market is expected to grow at a good pace in the coming years. The key players in the in-store analytics market are adopting various organic as well as inorganic growth strategies such as mergers & acquisitions, collaborations & partnerships, joint ventures, and few other strategies to gain a competitive advantage in the market.

Few of the Key Vendors in the In-store Analytics Market

SAP

Mindtree

Happiest Minds

Capillary Technologies

Celect

Capgemini

RetailNext

Sisense

Thinkinside

These companies are providing in-store analytics solutions across areas. There are numerous other vendors that have been studied based on the portfolio, geographical presence, marketing & distribution channels, revenue generation, and significant investments in R&D for analysis of the entire ecosystem.

In-store Analytics Market Segmentation By Deployment

On-premises

Cloud-based

On the basis of deployment mode, the global in-store analytics market is segmented to on-premises and cloud-based. Cloud-based subsegment is expected to grow significantly owing to low-cost availability and user-friendly deployment mode.

In-store Analytics Market Segmentation By Application

Customer Management

Competitive Intelligence

Merchandising

Operations

Sales and Marketing

Others

Based on application, the market is segmented into Customer Management, Competitive Intelligence, Merchandising, Operations, Sales and Marketing, and Others. Customer Management and Merchandising are expected to contribute significantly during the forecast period 20192025 predominately due to the growing adoption of AI and analytics to gain customer insights.

In-store Analytics Market Segmentation By Component

Solutions

Services

On the basis of component, the market is segmented into solutions and services. The solutions segment in the in-store analytics market will register strong growth since these solutions are enabling retail stores to effectively identify customer preferences and build a strategy based on insights.

In-store Analytics Market Research Benefits

The report provides an in-depth analysis of the in-store analytics market. In-store analytics provides retailers an opportunity to understand customer demand in real-time through open management of products and resources. The technology enhances data sharing and analyzing capabilities resulting in the growth of in-store analytics market across the globe. The growing adoption of new-age technologies such as AI and their integration with various software solutions is rapidly being adopted among brick and mortar retailers for an omnichannel retail approach. This adoption is resulting in enhanced customer in-store experience as well as predicting customer demand in real-time. Sephora, a beauty retailer introduced the omnichannel expansion of its new bricks-and-mortar connected boutique in the US facilitated with mobile-enabled experiences such as browsing products on in-store iPad stations and providing customized digital makeover suggestions over emails to customers.

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Europe will witness significant growth in the in-store analytics market during the forecast period. Retailers across the region are shifting towards advanced concepts of retail from brick and mortar. Rapid embracement of technological advances such as AI, cloud, and others are driving the demand for in-store analytics. Additionally, business expansion by retailers is also boosting the adoption of in-store analytics solutions. Amazon is planning to expand its grocery store business in the UK by bringing a cashier-less shopping experience.

Currently, several in-store analytics players are offering several solutions that are being used across retail players globally. The report discusses the market in terms of deployment, application, component, and regions. Further, the report provides details about the major challenges and drivers impacting market growth.

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Human hair wigs can be an expensive financial investment. This is due to the great demand for 100 percent European real human brazilian hair, as well as the fact that reputable, ethical manufacturers can expect to pay a premium for permanent quality, outstanding human hair. A good human hair wig, on the other hand, can endure from 12 to 24 months if properly cared for (artificial wigs have a shorter life span). This means that human hair wigs are appropriate for people who have long-term hair loss or hair loss that affects the entire scalp, such as alopecia totalis.





Made to order for a far better fit





Real hair ranges, as opposed to ready-to-wear artificial wigs, can be adjusted to your unique head dimension. A cast of your scalp and head is usually taken before developing your human hair wig. This is then transformed into a custom wig base, and the hair is added accordingly. The benefit is that your wig is highly safe as well as secure; you may live an active life without worrying about the product accidentally dislocating. Again, if you are experiencing long-term hair loss, a custom-made real hair wig might actually assist you enjoy a regular, happy, and also full existence  without the concern and anxiety of wig security.





Practical Appearance as a result of one-of-a-kind functions





A human hair wig is, without a doubt, the closest you can come to your own hair. As you might expect, 100% real hair wigs behave similarly to your own hair - they absorb moisture, colors can be added or removed (and, of course, colors can fade in the sunlight!). Aside from appearing great, many personalized genuine brazilian hair extension wigs include functionalities that ready-to-wear artificial wigs do not have. Human hair, for example, can be 'attracted through.' Hair is threaded between two layers of a thin, gauze-like foundation material, so there is no visible join between the base and the hair. Simply said, hair appears to be growing from a scalp, which is an extremely practical effect. When selecting a human hair wig, look for additional specific characteristics such as shoelace fronts (which provide a completely undetectable front hairline) and monofilament tops (where hair is separately tied forward so that it removes much more properly).





Convenience design





Contrary to popular assumption, bespoke human hair wigs are not usually available in a certain cut style. They are typically sold uncut,' and the consumer choose their favorite style, which should only be cut by a competent wig specialist. Because your hair is completely natural, your styling options are similar to your natural hair. You can use warmed devices (in accordance with provider specifications), and you may also be allowed to swim if you shampoo and condition your wig afterwards. However, caution should be exercised  while the hair feels like your own, keep in mind that individual strands cannot be replaced. As a result, be cautious when brushing, decorating, sunbathing, or venturing out in windy weather! Natural fibers, such as silk scarves and hoods, are ideal for protecting actual hair.





Restore Your Confidence





It goes without saying that human hair is typically the most similar to your original Brazilian hair due to its realistic appearance and added protection. This could imply that the wig goes unnoticed, which increases the wearer's self-confidence and self-esteem. Many people who wear these wigs have never looked back.
The report "Agricultural Adjuvants Market by Function (Activator and Utility), Application (Herbicides, Insecticides, and Fungicides), Formulation (Suspension Concentrates and Emulsifiable Concentrates), Adoption Stage, Crop Type, and Region - Global Forecast 2026", is estimated to be valued at USD 3.1 billion in 2020 and is projected to reach a value of USD 4.4 billion by 2026, growing at a CAGR of 6.1% during the forecast period. Factors such as the rising demand for improved crop varieties is driving the growth of the agricultural adjuvants market.

COVID-19 Impact on the Global Agricultural Adjuvants Market

The FAO has acknowledged that the spread of COVID- 19 pandemic is subsiding in a few countries and regions of the world. Still, it is also resurging or spreading quickly in some other countries such as Korea, Brazil, and India. This outbreak has affected significant elements of both food supply and demand. Border closures, quarantines, market supply chains, and trade disruptions have restricted peoples access to sufficient and nutritious sources of food, especially in countries hit hard by the virus. However, as the governments on a global level shut down borders and economies for restricting the spread of the coronavirus, the businesses observed major impacts on their international trades. Many markets are focusing on fulfilling their requirements for fertilizers, pesticides, and adjuvants by domestic companies. This is, however, causing an imbalance between the demand and supply quantities. However, some regions are completely dependent on imports and are facing tough situations. Adjuvants are majorly dependent on raw materials such as vegetable oils and petroleum for their production. Gradually the rise in the prices of these commodities has resulted in higher adjuvant prices. All these factors hampered the potential growth of the market at the beginning of 2020.

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Driver: Increased demand for green adjuvant, with an increasing focus on health and consumption of organically produced food during the Coronavirus outbreak.

In recent years, companies have been developing eco-friendly bio-based adjuvants such as methylated seed oil (MSO), modified vegetable oils, and organo-modified siloxanes. These biologically derived adjuvants are considered environment-friendly due to their high level of safety and biodegradability. In the time of the COVID outbreak, the world population is showing a trend towards higher demand for organically produced foods. There is a lot of concern rising for hygienic, healthy, and nutritious food in the markets, with people concerned about health amid the virus outbreak. Thus the demand for green and organic adjuvants is seen to remain stable in the pandemic times to increase to organic farm produce.

Restraint: Stringent regulations to manufacture adjuvants

Adjuvants produced from petrochemicals undergo various chemical processes that release toxic wastes and gases. Various regulations are imposed by government agencies such as the United States Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA) and the EUs Registration, Evaluation, Authorization, and Restriction of Chemicals (REACH) to address them. These agencies map and monitor the toxicity emission levels within permissible levels. Stringent environmental regulations across all countries have increased the cost of developing new products and resulted in their delayed launch. This has been a strong barrier for new market players to utilize the opportunities to enter this market

Asia Pacific is projected to grow at the highest CAGR% during the forecast period

The market for agricultural adjuvants in the Asia Pacific region is projected to grow at the highest CAGR from 2020 to 2026, owing to the increasing investments by key players in countries such as China, India, and Thailand, and also the rising adoption of adjuvant technology by the crop growers for insecticide applications. Due to these factors, the market in the Asia Pacific region is projected to record the highest growth from 2020 to 2026.

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This report includes a study on the marketing and development strategies, along with a study on the product portfolios of the leading companies operating in the agricultural adjuvants market. It includes the profiles of leading companies such as this market include Miller Chemical and Fertilizer, LLC (US), Precision Laboratories (US), CHS Inc (US), WinField United (US), Kalo Inc. (US), Nouryon (Netherlands), Corteva (US), Evonik Industries (Germany), Nufarm (Australia), Croda International (UK), Solvay (Belgium), BASF (Germany), Huntsman Corporation (US), Clariant (US), Helena Agri-Enterprises (US), Stepan Company (US), Wilbur-Ellis Company (US), Brandt (US), Plant Health Technologies (US), Innvictis Crop Care (US), Interagro (UK), Lamberti S.P.A (US), Drexel Chemical Company (US), GarrCo Products Inc. (US), and Loveland Products Inc. (US).
Market Research Future Published a Half Cooked Research Global Sulfuric Acid Market Research Report - Forecast to 2022 - Market Analysis, Scope, Stake, Progress, Trends and Forecast up to 2022.

Sulfuric Acid Market  Market Overview

Sulfuric acid is a mineral acid and is one of the largest volume industrial chemical produced across the globe. Fertilizer production, especially phosphate fertilizer from wet-process sulphuric acid, is the major end use market fort sulfuric acid. The major application area of sulphuric acid covers fertilizers, chemical manufacturing, refinery, textile, pulp & paper manufacturing, metal processing and others.

Agricultural economies holds the greater importance in this market, as fertilizer production considered as a key focused area for the consumption of sulpfuric acid. Increasing demand for fertilizer to attain the higher agriculture yield had a significant impact on this market over the past few years and set its uplifted usage in the coming years. China, alone acquired almost half of the global market in terms of sulphuric acid production resulting into domination of Asia Pacific over the global market. In addition to this, fertilizer consumption of India represents massive number on account of presence of large agriculture base and is driving the demand for sulphuric acid. Apart from the, automotive industry expected to provide higher gains to key industry players in this market during the forecast period. This is due to use of sulfuric acid in the automotive batteries which has triggered automotive application of sulfuric acid. However, volatility in the raw material prices and growing consumption of phosphate based fertilizer limited the growth scope of this market.

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Sulfuric Acid Market- Competitive Landscape

Global Sulfuric Acid market is highly concentrated as well fairly competitive in nature. The key industry participants operating in this market are Agrium, Akzo Nobel, Bayer, BP, Chevron, Cytec Industries, Dupont, Evonik Industries, Honeywell and Solvay. The major companies in this market are seen adopting collective market strategies to such as mergers, acquisition and joint-ventures in order to consolidate their product portfolio and to strengthen their market presence. Several production capacity expansion has also witnessed across the various developed markets to strengthen market penetration into emerging markets and exploit untapped markets. The overall effect of market competition observed in global sulphuric acid market is observed as high and is expected to get even higher due consistent increase in the production activities.

Industry/ Innovation/ Related News:

May 18, 2017- Yidu Xingfa Chemical and DuPont tied in an agreement for an engineering and technology license for a 3,600 Mtpd MECS MAX3 sulfuric acid plant. The collective effort has taken to build one of the largest sulfuric acid plant in China in order to cater the ongoing demand. Xingfa is expanding its existing site, located in the Hubei province near Yichang city, with the aim of roughly doubling the phosphate fertilizer capacity. The new MECS MAX3 sulfuric acid plant will process 1.2 MMtpy of sulfuric acid, as well as support the production of an additional 400,000 tonnes/yr of phosphoric acid, 400,000 tonnes/yr DAP and 35,000 tonnes/yr of potassium phosphate monobasic. The overall expansion activity expected gain market effectiveness while bridging the demand supply gap of sulfuric acid.

October 10, 2017- Indian Farmers Fertiliser Cooperative Ltd and Jordanian Phosphate Mines Company has formed joint venture to build largest sulfuric acid plant in India. The agreement has undertaken by investing overall amount of USD 860 million. The plant will come as a huge relief to Indias agricultural sector requirements in view of meagre availability of phosphates in India. Phosphoric acid produced at the plant will be exported to the Kandla port in Gujarat from Jordans Aqaba port, which is close to the location of the plant.

November, 2017- Leading chemical industry player BASF has launched new sulfuric acid catalyst. BASF has introduced the new sulphuric acid catalyst O4115 Quattro into the market. The new, cesium-based catalyst is unique due to its geometrical shape  a combination of four strands  leading to a 30 percent greater catalytic surface area compared to conventional sulphuric acid catalysts. The newly launched catalyst has 30 % greater catalytic surface area and helps to improve performance during the sulfuric acid production.

August 31, 2016- Jacobs Engineering Group Inc, Acquires BAYQIK Sulfuric Acid Converter Technology from Bayer AG. The company has acquired patented technology from Bayer AG, under the term of agreement the overall technology shift includes transfer of relevant Bayer technical, commercial and market information to Jacobs Engineering Group Inc. BAYQIK technology enables more efficient conversion of process gas with high sulphur dioxide concentrations. Therefore, it altogether expected to provide growth offerings in the Jacobs Engineering Group Inc. growth offering.

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Market Research Future Published a Half-Cooked Research Report on Refractories Market Research Report.

Market Insights

Market Research Future has recently made public its report on the global refractories market which divulges various crucial market figures. The global refractories market is due to grow at a CAGR of 4.02%during the forecast period 2016 to 2022. Used extensively for linings in furnaces, reactors and other processing units due to its heat-resistant composition, the market is expected to move forward with steady and moderate growth.

The demand for refractories material is consistent due to its ability to resist extremely high temperatures without resulting in physical or chemical changes. Refractories have been witnessing rising applications in emerging markets due to its extensive use in manufacturing and in the construction industry. These emerging markets are key in the progress of the market and are also among the largest produces of refractories. Additionally, the growing demand for infrastructure has resulted in high demand for glass, metals, and cement in the construction sector.

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Market Segmentation

MRFR's analysis of the market divides it into various segments in an effort to magnify every relevant market factor. Segmentation has been performed on the basis of type, form, application, and region. By type, the market is segmented into high alumina, magnesite, silica brick, fireclay, and others. Based on form, the market is divided into unshaped and shaped.

By application, the market is categorized into steel, cement, glass, non-ferrous, and others. The steel sector is the largest consumer of refractories. Globally used due to its lightweight, and heat resistant nature, refractories are highly suitable for use in the steel industry.

The global refractories market is segmented into North America, Europe, Asia Pacific and the Rest of the World.

Key Players

The competitive landscape of the global market is covered expensively in MRFRs report, and includes key market players such as Shinagawa Refractories Co. Ltd, Saint-Gobain S.A, RHI AG, Magnesita Refratarios S.A., Harbisonwalker International (HWI) Inc, Coorstek Incorporated, Krosaki Harima Corporation, Corning Incorporated, Vesuvius PLC, and Morgan Advanced Materials PLC

Latest Industry News

RHI Magnesita has announced its decision to merge its Indian operations under Orient Refractories The move comes in recognition of the potential the region represents.

HarbisonWalker International has opened its refractories plant in Ohio, U.S.A after its announcement of the project in 2017. The UD 30 Mn investment has resulted in a technologically advanced refractories plant which will provide the latest in refractories.

Regional Analysis

The Asia Pacific region accounts for the most significant market share and is followed by Europe and North America. The presence of a massive, ever-growing population in the region has driven the construction sector considerably with an increased demand for housing, and infrastructure in rapidly urbanizing countries. The region is one of the largest producers of refractories which is likely to assist in the APAC remaining in its leading position beyond the forecast period.

Led by the US, North America is another significant region in the global refractories market. The U.S is the largest consumer of refractories and the demand for steel and cement in construction activities drive the market in the region.

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The spread of the coronavirus has compelled all countries to examine the possibilities provided by modern technology to tackle the pandemic. Scientists and developers are focusing on utilizing technology to save lives, particularly during the pandemic. The silent transmission of coronavirus  caused by asymptomatic persons has been a serious worry in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic. Using mHealth technology such as mobile applications and wearable sensors to monitor COVID-19 patients and suspected cases, which can help to reduce the pandemics impact, is a good strategy to minimize the pandemics impact.

Understanding mHealth 

mHealth, when bifurcated stands for mobile health. In laymans terms, mHealth is the process of providing health care and medication with the help of mobile technologies such as computers, mobile phones, and tablets. The mHealth technology performs activities including collecting vital signs, providing information to physicians, and allowing remote examinations with the help of tablets, mobile phones, and other portable devices.

Mobile health technology is extremely helpful especially in rural places where physicians and nurses may not be available to offer care to the patients. Doctors and nurses operating in these remote locations rely on mHealth for up-to-date medical information, as well as sharing the information with the relevant authorities nearby. Mobile health technology also allows medical students and residents working in distant regions to receive faster training and instruction during health emergencies.

Besides, the COVID-19 pandemic has jolted everyone to an extent that people are overcautious towards their wellbeing. The fear of infection has driven the use of apps and wearables as a way to make people feel safer. With the ever-evolving technology, wearables can now provide reliable input on blood pressure, body temperature, and health signs, which is ultimately restoring peoples sense of relief while also assisting them in tracking their health.

Lets take you through some examples of mHealth apps which have been imperative during the COVID-19 pandemic.

It is believed that the inclusion of key components in mHealth might assist in diagnosis or symptom reporting that can be extremely crucial for infection management. Furthermore, the integration of essential epidemiological data and geographic information on transmittable diseases in a region would allow for case tracking, which can be utilized as an effective tool to prevent infection transmission. These types of mHealth apps can be more successful in delivering health-related information since data can be transmitted quickly and dynamically. During the first global wave of COVID-19 in the first quarter of 2020. Scientists and app developers came together to prevent the spread of coronavirus and developed several apps that were available universally to be accessible via smartphones.

A few of these apps are listed below:

Application Name Features Apple COVID-19 The app has up-to-date information from trusted sources about the coronavirus disease that is impacting people across the world. It is a simple screening tool to determine what you should do if you are concerned about COVID-19. HEALTHLYNKED COVID-19 Tracker It is a Covid-19 tracker app that allows users to self-report symptoms, if they test positive for the virus, alert contacts so that they can seek medical care to prevent spread. Aarogya Setu The app was developed by the Government of India to track COVID-19 at the personal and country level. The app also includes the initiatives and updates from the countrys health department regarding the pandemic. Coronavirus Australia The app was launched by the Australian government to advise and keep its nationals up to date with official information. Canada COVID-19 The app was designed to keep the local population informed about COVID-19 in Canada. It also provides timely updates and important news and alerts from Canadas Ministry of Health.

The above mentioned are a few of the most notable apps which were launched during the first global wave of coronavirus. There have been thousands of apps launched including self-monitoring apps that can notify the user of their health status during the pandemic. Moreover, a report by Grand View Research states that the Covid-19 pandemic has led to the increased utilization of mHealth applications across the globe. The upsurge in remote patient monitoring, patient data analysis, and diagnosis is the major factor boosting the adoption of these applications.

How mHealth is helping Health Workers, tackling COVID-19

The pandemic has posed enormous hurdles to countries with poor healthcare systems since many healthcare systems throughout the world are cracking under the weight of COVID-19. Hence, it becomes imperative to leverage technology to help our health care workers.



Lets discuss through some points how mHealth is proving vital for health care workers during COVID-19:

The primary purpose for mHealth in assisting health care workers is in recording and logging cases, as well as providing contact tracing, all this when they are supervised and outfitted with suitable personal protective equipment.

Another role that mHealth plays is providing education, training, and supervision to health care workers. With the ever-changing information related to the COVID-19 due to virus mutations, the healthcare workers are required to be updated with the changing symptoms and advisories provided by the government.

How mHealth is assisting in the fight against COVID-19?

Practicing Social Distancing while treating the patients affected with coronavirus:

Key global authorities is advocating to reduce physical contact between healthcare workers and patients. It is advised to adopt telehealth services unless it is really important. This would help in reducing the transmission rate of COVID-19.

Crowdsourced Health Information App:

The app developers along with health professionals are developing coronavirus tracing applications that run on crowdsourced information. People from all over the world enter their information  travel routes, the likelihood of becoming infected, and so on  so that healthcare experts can track hotspots and carriers.

The rising use of healthcare gadgets:

The impact of COVID-19 on the mHealth sector has been impactful. The healthcare gadget market saw a steep rise during the rise of cases globally. People started using applications and wearing masks because they were afraid of being sick. They became aware of their body temperature and health indicators. They began to rely on apps for health screening and awareness. Many companies introduced several healthcare gadgets to reduce anxiety while making consumers aware of their health.

The use of AI in medical apps to track and diagnose COVID-19 outbreak:

AI can use demographics, travel, and infection data to estimate where an illness might spread and how quickly it will spread. This information is used by healthcare institutions and governments to act rapidly to contain the spread. Significant mHealth advancements, along with the help of AI and ML apps to screen people and estimate infection risks, have made AI a crucial contribution to recognizing, tracking, and diagnosing epidemics.

What will happen to mHealth in the Post-Covid-19 Era?

Medical communications, such as the treatment of several non-communicable illnesses or the provision of primary care, will be remembered in the post-COVID-19 era. With the adoption of digital health as the new normal during the COVID-19, the world has witnessed a tremendous influence on the global digital health business.

New technologies such as AI, IoT, 5G, video conferencing, and others will strengthen the post-pandemic era to let us all connect with healthcare professionals from across the world in whole new ways. All of this is already happening in real-time in this worldwide epidemic, and at an unimaginable speed.

The adoption of precision health, both in customized and predictive health settings, would be another important change that we will observe in the post-COVID-19 era. We will see how digital technology is being used to enable people to manage their own lives.

Furthermore, in the future, we will realize that the new world of medical infrastructure is extremely different from the one we are currently accustomed to. It would necessitate us to being open to adapt the change.

Finally, one thing is for sure. The mHealth sector is growing at a significant pace, and the change and growth in the mHealth world is going to bring a lot of positive changes to the healthcare sector.
According to a new report published by Polaris Market Research the essential oil market is anticipated to reach USD 16,172.2 million by 2026. In 2017, the orange essential oil segment dominated the global market, in terms of revenue. Europe is expected to be the leading contributor to the global market revenue during the forecast period.

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A significant increase in disposable income, changing lifestyles, and initiatives by market players to promote healthy lifestyles drive the growth of this market. Other driving factors include increasing incidences of stress and anxiety, growing inclination towards use of natural and organic products, and increasing awareness regarding physical and mental health. The use of essential oils in various applications such as food and beverages, healthcare, pharmaceutical, cosmetics, and aromatherapy further propel the market growth. Increasing demand in developing nations is expected provide numerous growth opportunities to the market players during the forecast period.

There has been a shift towards e-commerce and consumers are increasingly purchasing essential oils through online platforms. The variety of choices available coupled with ease of purchase offered by online platforms encourages consumers to buy essential oils online, supplementing the growth of the market.

Improvement in lifestyle due to rise in income level, especially in the developing countries of Asia-Pacific fuels the demand for essential oils market. Factors such as increase in per capita income and changes in consumer behavior towards physical and mental health are expected to accelerate the adoption of essential oils in the coming years.

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Europe generated the highest revenue in the market in 2017, and is expected to lead the global market throughout the forecast period. The high geriatric population in the region coupled with high disposable income drives the market growth. The high demand of essential oils in food & beverages and cosmetic products support the market growth in the region. Asia-Pacific is expected to grow at the highest CAGR during the forecast period owing to increasing disposable incomes in developing countries of this region, rising awareness about benefits of essential oils, and rising demand of essential oils from healthcare sector in this region.

The different types of essential oils in the market include lemon, lime, orange, corn mint, eucalyptus, peppermint, citronella, clove leaf, and others. In 2017, the orange essential oil segment accounted for the highest market share. The increasing demand for orange essential oil is owing to properties such as anti-inflammatory, antidepressant, and antispasmodic. Use of orange essential oil has a calming effect on mind and body, and is used in various cosmetics products. It is also used in various foods and beverages to enhance flavor.

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The well-known companies profiled in the report include Doterra International LLC., Rocky Mountain Oils, LLC, Naturals Together, Robertet SA, Now Health Group, Inc., Biolandes SAS, Falcon Essential Oils, Ungerer Limited, The Lebermuth Company, Flavex Naturextrakte GmbH, Farotti Srl, and E. I. Du Pont De Nemours and Company among others. These companies launch new products and collaborate with other market leaders to innovate and launch new products to meet the increasing needs and requirements of consumers.

Essential Oil Market Size and Forecast, 2017-2026 by Product Type Lemon Lime Orange Corn mint Eucalyptus Peppermint Citronella Clove leaf Others

Essential Oil Market Size and Forecast, 2017-2026 by Distribution Channel Offline Stores Online Platforms

Essential Oil Market Size and Forecast, 2017-2026 by Application Healthcare and Pharmaceutical Cleaning Food and Beverages Spa and Wellness Others

Essential Oil Market Size and Forecast, 2017-2026 by Region North America U.S. Canada Mexico Europe Germany UK France Italy Rest of Europe Asia-Pacific China India Japan Rest of Asia-Pacific Latin America Brazil Middle East & Africa



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San Francisco, 18 June 2021: The Report South East Asia Telehealth Market Size, Share & Trends Analysis Report By Service Type (Remote Patient Monitoring, Real-time Interactions), By Delivery Mode, By Application, By Type, By End Use, And Segment Forecasts, 2021 - 2028

The South East Asia telehealth market size is expected to reach USD 916.2 million by 2028 and is expected to expand at a CAGR of 17.6% over the forecast period, according to a new report by Grand View Research, Inc. Constant evolution of smartphones has made accessing telehealth and teleconsultation services more convenient and is expected to contribute to the growing demand. The growing number of users and technologically advanced smartphones are enabling users tracks their fitness, monitor health, initiate conversations with healthcare professionals, and book appointments.

For instance, several apps such as Doctor Anywhere, Doctor on Call, and ClicknCare have been introduced to help patients book appointments, track their consultations and medical prescriptions, and store their healthcare information over course of the treatment. Furthermore, teleconsultation and telemedicine are widely being adopted across the region since it enables the communication between patients and caregivers in remote locations.

The ongoing Covid-19 pandemic has burdened global healthcare systems and is anticipated to drive the demand for telehealth services. Owing to lockdowns and movement restrictions, patients shifted their focus to telemedicine amidst the fear of contracting the virus by visiting the healthcare facility. Moreover, insurance companies are collaborating with market players to provide free consultation to their customers. For instance, Cigna Singapore and AIG partnered with Doctor Anywhere for providing Covid-19 Medical Advisory Clinic as a free service to policyholders across Vietnam, Singapore, and Thailand.

The demand for teleconsultation will continue to grow to post the pandemic owing to the increasing adoption of digital technologies, growing government support, advancements in digital infrastructure, and increasing public and private investments. Several key players like MyDoc, Haldoc, Alodokter, and Doctor Raksa have witnessed a surge in revenue generation and growth in daily users since the inception of the pandemic.

Based on the service type, the real-time interactions segment accounted for the highest revenue share in 2020 owing to the rising preference of telemedicine services by patients and healthcare providers to follow the Covid-19 protocol of social distancing without compromising the quality of care. Moreover, these services enable real-time interactions with patients in remote locations at an affordable price. On the other hand, the remote patient monitoring segment is anticipated to register the fastest growth during the forecast period owing to the increasing disease burden, rising healthcare costs, and geriatric population in this region. Moreover, technological advancements in video conferencing systems and the development of digital infrastructure are excepted to positively influence segment growth. Lastly, the growing demand for personalized and specialty care is expected to propel the adoption of these services.

In 2020, the web-based delivery mode segment accounted for the highest revenue share owing to the availability of the large number of web-based telehealth platforms and growing usage rates of web-based platforms by patients and healthcare personnel. Moreover, web-based data can be accessed and analyzed in real-time from remote locations and thereby, reduces operational hassles. On the other hand, the cloud-based delivery mode segment is anticipated to register the fastest-growing during the forecast period owing to numerous benefits such as high bandwidth, easy accessibility, easy data recovery and storage, and better data privacy and security. Due to these benefits, the cloud-based delivery mode is witnessing a surge in its adoption rate and is expected to rapidly grow over the forthcoming years.

Based on the application, the diagnosis segment accounted for the highest revenue share in 2020 owing to increasing penetration of the internet, increasing number of smartphone users, and rising adoption of telehealth services. Growing awareness levels of the benefits of telemedicine among patients, providers, and payers are driving the segment. On the other hand, the prevention application segment is expected to exhibit the fastest growth during the forecast period owing to growing awareness about the importance of health and fitness to avoid chronic ailments is supporting the segment growth. Healthcare systems sustainability is threatened with the increasing prevalence of chronic diseases, rising healthcare costs, and shortage of personnel, which is boosting the demand for telehealth services for the prevention application segment. Furthermore, the shift towards value-based care is strengthening the demand for better patient outcomes at a more sustainable cost is driving the adoption of telemedicine services for earlier disease prevention.

In 2020, the tele-hospital type segment accounted for the highest revenue share owing to the rising adoption of digital healthcare technologies, increased healthcare IT expenditure, and growing government initiatives towards telehealth services. Moreover, the growing geriatric population increased health consciousness, and rising demand for affordable and accessible healthcare is contributing to the segment growth. On the other hand, the tele-home type segment is anticipated to register the fastest-growing during the forecast period owing to its various advantages such as affordability, efficiency, and delivery of quality care. Moreover, the increasing number of internet-enabled device users is enhancing the accessibility of these services the increasing adoption of cloud computing solutions. In addition, increased usage of internet and web-based services and its enhanced accessibility from the most remote locations are contributing to the growing delivery segment.

Based on end-use, the providers segment accounted for the largest revenue share in 2020 owing to the rising adoption of telemedicine platforms by healthcare providers to reduce the burden on healthcare facilities and resources. Moreover, the growing middle class is demanding quality care, which is expected to contribute to the growing segment. On the other hand, the patient end-use segment is anticipated to be the fastest-growing segment during the forecast period owing to the increasing number of active users and website visits on the telemedicine platform. Moreover, telehealth services have enabled communication channels between the healthcare provider and patients residing in remote locations.

In 2020, Indonesia dominated the market. This can be attributed to the rise in the adoption of telehealth services and favorable government policies and initiatives. Key players such as Haldoc and Alodokter witnessed a surge in their telemedicine services throughout the Covid-19 pandemic. The shortage of healthcare personnel in Indonesia is contributing to the growth of the market in Indonesia. On the other hand, Malaysia is expected to be the fastest-growing region during the forecast period owing to the increasing deployment of telemedicine services, growing prevalence of chronic diseases, rising healthcare costs, and shortage of healthcare personnel.

Access Research Report of South East Asia Telehealth Market @ https://www.grandviewresearch.com/industry-analysis/south-east-asia-telehealth-market

South East Asia Telehealth Market Report Highlights

The market is anticipated to witness significant growth by 2028, owing to the increasing adoption of digital healthcare technologies and penetration of internet-powered smartphones and devices

The real-time interactions service type segment dominated the market in 2020, owing to increased accessibility and analysis of real-time data from patients in remote locations

The web-based delivery mode segment dominated in 2020, owing to the growing number of web-based platform users in the patient and provider community

The diagnosis application segment dominated the market in 2020, owing to increasing penetration of the internet and favorable government initiatives and support

The tele-hospital type segment dominated the market in 2020 owing to the rising adoption of digital healthcare technologies and the development of healthcare IT infrastructure

The provider segment dominated the market in 2020 owing to the widespread adoption of telehealth services to reduce the burden on healthcare facilities

Indonesia dominated the market in 2020 owing to the rapid adoption of telemedicine service and government support

List of Key Players of South East Asia Telehealth Market

Halodoc

Doc2Us

GrabHealth (Grab)

MyDoc Pte Ltd

Doctor Anywhere Pte Ltd.

TeleMe

Good Doctor Technology (GDT)

DoctorOnCall

Alodokter

ClicknCare

Access Press Release of South East Asia Telehealth Market @ https://www.grandviewresearch.com/press-release/south-east-asia-telehealth-market-analysis
Fashion brand optimizes products, people and process in partnership with Centric Software

CAMPBELL, Calif., June 17, 2021  Shanghai Yuanfan Fashion Womens Clothing Co., Ltd. (Yuanfan) has selected Centric Softwares Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) solution for emerging enterprises, Centric SMB. Centric Software provides the most innovative enterprise solutions to plan, design, develop, source and sell products such as apparel, footwear, sporting goods, furniture, home decor, cosmetics, food & beverage and luxury to achieve strategic and operational digital transformation goals.

Established in 2000, Yuanfan is engaged in R&D, manufacturing, marketing, logistics and staff wellbeing. Yuanfan has established a sales network of nearly 300 points of sale across China, and currently operates two modern production bases in Zhejiang Province.

Yuanfan regards structure and standardization of product information as key goals. We recognize that many leading apparel companies have achieved digitalized product development and production with the successful implementation of Centric PLM, says Mr. Liu, Chairman of the Board at Yuanfan. Centric Softwares extensive experience, customer portfolio, engagement in the global apparel industry and knowledge of industry best practices compelled Yuanfan to choose Centric as a partner.

Yuanfan selected Centric SMB, the SaaS PLM solution for emerging brands, to lay a solid foundation for development by improving efficiency and standardizing internal processes with an eye to innovation and full-spectrum future plans.

Online collaboration is the trend of the future, says Mr. Xiong Weixian, Assistant to the General Manager at Yuanfan. The entire apparel industry shows an increasingly higher demand for quick decision making based on up-to-date, accurate, shared information. Agility and working pro-actively are necessities. The implementation of Centric PLM is an opportunity to optimize our end-to-end product development chain.

Centric SMB will enable Yuanfan to address critical pain points by streamlining R&D and work tasks, tracking progress and structuring product categories for quick response. Yuanfan also expects to reduce communication costs, enhance managerial control, boost visibility to give employees a greater sense of their role in the organization and consolidate data to empower digital decision-making.

We are delighted that Yuanfan has selected Centric SMB to power their digital transformation, says Chris Groves, President and CEO of Centric Software. We look forward to working closely with Yuanfan to actively optimize the products, processes and people that are driving their future success.

Learn more about Centric SMB

Request a Demo

Yuanfan (www.chinayuanfan.com)

Established in Shanghai's Pudong in 2000, Shanghai Yuanfan Fashion Women's Clothing Co., Ltd. is a modern women's clothing company engaged in R&D, manufacturing, marketing, logistics and staff wellbeing. After years of efficient development, the company has established an expansive market sales network comprised of nearly 300 brand stores (counters) in numerous large and medium-sized cities across the country.

Yuanfan Fashion introduced advanced foreign manufacturing equipment in 2009 and currently operates two modern production bases in Zhejiang Province. The company has more than 500 employees, including a team of designers that boast a flair for fashion, stay abreast of the latest international trends and possess the capacity to introduce more than 2,000 designs to the market every year.

Inspired by nature, humanities, art and everything that is poetic in life, the YUAN FAN brand blends these elements into an overall design style that is simplistic and bright. The diverse use of colors and the neat and simple contours combine into a visual expression that is serene and elegant but also bright and cheerful. The intricate workmanship and exquisite details reflect YUAN FAN's tireless pursuit of quality. Fully aware that urban women are actively seeking an inner sense of satisfaction, YUAN FAN presents pure immanence in a direct manner to create a modern impression of neat, sweet, and elegant urban women, and embody the fashion, grace and refinement of professional women.

Centric Software (www.centricsoftware.com)

From its headquarters in Silicon Valley, Centric Software provides a Product Concept to Consumer Digital Transformation Platform for fashion, retail, footwear, luxury, outdoor and consumer goods including cosmetics, beauty and food and beverage. Centrics flagship Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) platform, Centric PLMTM, delivers enterprise-class merchandise planning, product development, sourcing, quality and product portfolio optimization innovations specifically for fast-moving consumer industries. Centric SMB focuses on core tools and industry best practices for emerging brands. Centric Visual Innovation Platform (CVIP) offers highly visual digital board experiences for collaboration and decision-making. Centric Software pioneered mobility, introducing the first mobile apps for PLM, and is widely known for connectivity to dozens of other enterprise systems including ERP, DAM, PIM, e-com, planning and more as well as creative tools such as Adobe Illustrator and a host of 3D CAD connectors. Centrics innovations are 100% market-driven with the highest user adoption rate and fastest time to value in the industry. All Centric innovations shorten time to market, boost product innovation and reduce costs.

Centric Software is majority-owned by Dassault Systemes (Euronext Paris: #13065, DSY.PA), the world leader in 3D design software, 3D digital mock-up and PLM solutions.

Centric Software has received multiple industry awards and recognition, including being named by Red Herring to its Top 100 Global list in 2013, 2015 and 2016. Centric also received various excellence awards from Frost & Sullivan in 2012, 2016, 2018 and 2021.

Centric Software is a registered trademark of Centric Software Inc. All other brands and product names may be trademarks of their respective owners.

Media Contacts:

Centric Software

Americas: Jennifer Forsythe, jforsythe@centricsoftware.com

EMEA: Kristen Salaun-Batby, ksalaun-batby@centricsoftware.com

APAC: Lily Dong, lily.dong@centricsoftware.com
The Orthopedic Veterinary Implants Market is estimated to run through a CAGR of 9% between 2026, reaching US$ US$ 3,500 Million. Online services have made a beeline to almost every industry vertical. The healthcare vertical is at the forefront herein. With e-prescriptions and door-to-door delivery of medicines taking over, 100% digital adoption is not far. Its, in fact, not just a need but a necessity herein. It wont be incorrect to state that the Out-Patient Department would be the Online Patient Department in the future. This would simplify the surgical processes as well, as the healthcare practitioners would be able to prioritize the course of treatment.

A recent report by Grey2K USA suggests that more than 14,000 injuries were reported at Greyhound racing in the U.S. between 2008 and 2016. These injuries mainly included broken legs, crushed skulls, seizures, paralysis, and broken backs. According to the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA), the percent of dogs and cats owned by households is 36.5% and 30.4%, respectively.

While this clearly depicts the increasing need for medical services and treatment for pets, the demand for orthopedic veterinary implants is set to see remarkable rise in the near future. Increasing focus on pet health insurance is also identified as an important factor driving the market for orthopedic veterinary implants. The global orthopedic veterinary implants market will exhibit a robust CAGR of over 8% during the forecast period (2019  2029).

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Company Profiles

Vet Implants

scil animal care company GmbH

KYON Pharma, Inc.

Everost Inc.

BioMedtrix, LLC

Integra LifeSciences

RITA LEIBINGER MEDICAL GmbH & Co. KG

B. Braun Melsungen AG

DePuy Synthes (Sub. Johnson & Johnson Services, Inc.)

Intrauma S.p.A.

Surgical Holdings

Ortho Max Manufacturing Company Pvt. Ltd. Novartis AG

Key Takeaways - Orthopedic Veterinary Implants Market Study

Accounting for over a fourth of market value shares, tibial plateau levelling osteotomy (TPLO) implants will remain the most preferred product type owing to their ability to stabilize the stifle joint after rupture of cranial cruciate ligament.

Trauma fixations with the application of intramedullary nails, bone plates, and bone screws are extensively used for the treatment of bone fractures.

Increased availability of veterinary practitioners, rise in surgical procedures, and heightened number of injuries in pets are factors expected to increase the number of visits to pet clinics and hospitals.

North America is expected to be significant revenue generator in the orthopedic veterinary implants market owing to increase in number of surgical procedures arising from obesity-related diseases such as arthritis and sports-related dislocation of hips and bones.

Significant product launches are boosting the orthopedic veterinary implants market growth. For instance, in October 2019 , Veterinary Orthopedic Implants launched HyProtect antimicrobial coated implants.



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Innovative product specifications and rise in pet care expenditure for surgical procedures are significantly favoring market growth and is expected to provide lucrative opportunities to manufacturers during the forecast period.

Strategic Partnerships - Winning Imperative for Market Participants

Manufacturers in emerging countries are focusing on strategic collaboration or alliance with regional players as well as local distributors to increase their footprint. For example, BioMedtrix collaborated with Laboratorios Macrimasa-Vet in January 2019 for distribution of its TPLO Curve, Universal Hip (including Micro & Nano Hip), I-Loc IM Fixator in Spain.

In March 2016, DePuy Synthes (part of the Johnson & Johnson) entered into an exclusive strategic alliance with Value Stream Partners, LLC to design, develop and implement programs for hip and knee replacements.

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Know More About the Report

Persistence Market Research offers a unique perspective and actionable insights on orthopedic veterinary implants in its latest study, presenting historical demand assessment from 2014  2018 and projections from 2019  2029.

The global orthopedic veterinary implants market is segmented in detail to cover every aspect of the market and present a complete market intelligence approach to the reader.

The study provides compelling insights on orthopedic veterinary implants market on basis of product type (total knee replacement, total hip replacement, trauma fixations, tibial tuberosity advancement implants, tibial plateau leveling osteotomy implants, advanced locking plate system, total elbow replacement), End User (veterinary hospitals, veterinary clinics) and across five major regions.

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Cordova was alone when she was shot. Neighbors said Cordovas adult son lives with her on the first floor, but Boisvert said police do not believe the intended target lived with her or even in another apartment in the home.
Restaurants that are owned by women, veterans and members of underserved communities were given preference and the funds were quickly exhausted. After three legal challenges objecting to the preferences, the grants have been frozen. The Small Business Administration reports that nationwide, 2,965 restaurateurs who were told they would get money have been put on hold.
Before the Broad, she was managing director, exhibitions and programming at the Global Cultural Asset Management Group in New York. Before that she worked at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation in New York for more than 12 years.
While African Americans today are still fighting for equality and justice, those colors symbolize the continuous commitment of people to do better  and to live up to the American ideal of liberty and justice for all, said Don Allan, president and chief financial officer.
Much of the public will have no interest in the details that legislators and Gov. Ned Lamonts aides tussled over in the dark this year. What they know is that marijuana will soon be legal. That news will awaken the entrepreneurial instincts in people who do not have the resources to win one of those state licenses. They will grow their own.
I would quote the good Senate chair of Appropriations, Carney said. This came directly from the governors office. I truly think that this is a mistake. Because the board provides needed transparency and oversight. She said she thinks it wasnt a question of money for the governor but of not wanting the oversight. And those are very discouraging words from a member of the governors party.
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Sen. Adam Ebbin, one of the lead sponsors, said people need to understand the laws limits for now. Possession of up to one ounce (28.3 grams) with no intent to distribute will become legal for adults, 21 and older. Adults will also be allowed to grow up to four marijuana plants per household. But not much else will change.
As devastating as the diagnosis was, Dean said it gave her a purpose. She found comfort and company in the rare-disease community and joined with them to lobby for research funding and for expanding disability services. And she threw herself into her sons round-the-clock care, determined to find ways to give him normal childhood experiences.
I think its important that we represent our culture, she said. Its very important for people to know that Africans did not lose their culture through the transatlantic slave trade. People think they were in the bottom of those ships, and they lost everything, and they really didnt.
People tend to get less sick than at other stages of the pandemic, likely due to higher levels of vaccination, she said. And there are fewer hospitalizations and deaths. One thing she looks at is the attack rate of the virus within an outbreak facility, or the percentage of the exposed population that ends up contracting the illness. Colon said she used to see attack rates of up to 75-80%.
Nearly 20 years ago Meyers initiated research on the Bray School, established in Williamsburg in 1760 to provide religious education to Black children. Several years ago he believed the school building had survived and was on the colleges campus. Last year dendrochronology by Colonial Williamsburg dated timbers in the structure to the winter of 1759-60 and spring of 1760.
A decision on the new location of the Bray School will be made in the not too distant future, Hurst said. Were looking at a location that would be prominently located, not in some obscure place. We also want the building to be close to W&M so it can be used for educational purposes in the focus of Black history here and in this country.  We want to convey the (Bray School) story as best we can.
The cars made their way down from Matthew Whaley Elementary to the intersection of Duke of Gloucester Street and N. Botetourt Street. Many graduates sat atop their cars sunroof and waved to the crowd, while others could be seen driving with friends and family. The seniors decorated their cars with Class of 2021 signs along with their future colleges, inside jokes and song lyrics in Jamestown Highs colors, green and white.
While most people were breaking their heads trying to find out how to pass time during the lockdown, actor Naresh Vijay Krishna had it sorted out. The versatile actor spoke to us about how he transformed this lockdown into one of his most productive periods in life. He indulged in farming activities at his five acres of farm, named Amuktamalyada, near Chilkuru on the Hyderabad outskirts.

Naresh showing a ripe mango from his farm

I planted around five thousand plants around my farm so far, says Naresh, adding that he recently even created a rainwater harvesting system on his own in his farm. Naresh tells us that the rainwater harvesting system was inspired by the tanks around Anantapur.

Lack of rains over the last few years (except for last year) in Hyderabad dented farming. Both Osman Sagar and Himayath Sagar rivers did not fill up, explains the actor, who himself is an expert in water harvesting. As a result, there was a water shortage and some of the mango trees were dying. I decided then to go for rainwater harvest pit.

Rainwater harvest system in his farm

To accommodate more water, Naresh has also expanded his water storage capacity. In fact, says the actor, as a result of the effective water harvesting, the size of the mangoes has increased this year. Today, his farm has 700 mango trees, Manilkara zapota, gooseberry, blueberry, dragon fruits, etc.

Choosing farming organically

Naresh reveals that he was introduced to farming in Chennai by his mother, late actress-producer-director Vijaya Nirmala, when he was ten years old.

I used to spend every summer in Chennai working on agriculture; it was my mother who motivated me to become a farmer, reiterates Naresh, who has been working on organic farming for more than a decade.

Naresh showing his farm to Prakash Raj and Rajendra Prasad

However, the actor feels theres a lot more to be done to revive farming in the city landscape. With the growing population farming, water and land are not proportionately increasing. Ecology survives when birds and other creatures can simultaneously live in nature, adds Naresh.

He believes farming shaped his personality, and contributed to making him a better person. No wonder then that he wants to bring back farming and inspire people through his efforts. I am 58, but do I look like that? he questions with a smile, adding that he wants to set an example with his farming efforts through which he realised he derives a lot of peace.

Birds sanctuary at the farm

Land is available and is just laying idle. If people can pick up a small piece of land and give it a shot, farming can come back. Farm houses are not meant for having weekend parties but to bring back what is lost in nature. As an actor, my schedule is completely different. Waking up to greenery, birds chirps, etc., makes me feel energised.

In the right space

The actor, who considers the lockdown to have been a golden time for him, predicts cooperative farming is the future of farming. The actor, who claims to be sleeping and waking up in his farm, shares more about his farming experiences.

Once you get used to organic farming, you wont leave it. But you have to find the ways and means to farm, he adds. Naresh had been doing organic fruit farming, with the intent to attract birds. So far hes spotted around 18 new bird species in his farm. The actor believes farming is something thats added to even his acting. He reveals that apart from understanding nature better, farming helps in creating engaging conversations with co-stars on film sets.

Naresh's farmland at Chilukuru

I realise I am energised when I go to shoot. My on-the-sets conversations and the pep talk on farming inspire my fellow actors, he says, adding that from what COVID has taught everyone, humanity has to somehow return to nature.
Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani is a committed real estate investor with a particular interest in English real estate.

He is famous for privatizing world-famous landmarks in the British capital such as the renowned Harrods store, owned through the Qatari sovereign wealth fund (also known as the Qatar investment authority) or the Shard skyscraper, the United Kingdom's tallest building facing the iconic tower bridge and Tower of London.

The Al Thani family ruling over Qatar also owns the Victory Park Olympic village built for the 2012 Olympic games in London and 20% of Londons Heathrow airport.

Recently, the house ofThani and the former Emir, Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani have made multiple deals with the well-known investment company Solomartel, investing millions of dollars in Solomartel funds.

Solomartel is the largest online real estate-focused investment fund proposing real estate investments all over the world. The organization has successfully completed many real estate funds in the recent years with various types of investment real estate, accessible to both private and corporate investors of various profiles.

The former Emir of Qatar made an investment of $210 million in multiple Solomartel funds with real estate in the United States, India, Morocco, Malaysia, Panama and Turkey. Most investments were made in funds containing real estate infrastructure located in the United states including the iconic Solomartel real estate fund operating properties in the states of Florida, Georgia and Alabama dubbed by many as America's most profitable publicly available real estate investment of the year 2020.

Other major investments were made in funds with Turkish and Moroccan real estate, one of the Turkish funds included an exclusive, newly built multiapartment complex overlooking the Bosphorus strait located in the economic capital of Turkey, Istanbul.

Most of the investment real estate in the United States and Turkey was residential whilst the real estate in Malaysia, Morocco and Panama consisted mainly of large, centrally located commercial properties such as shopping centers.

Qatar is ruled by the Al-Thani family and the throne is currently occupied by the Emir,Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani, appointed as Emir in 2013.

The Al -Thani family moved from Eshaige in the district of Najd and settled to the south-east of the Qatar peninsula in the 1720s. In the 19th century, the family moved to Doha where they assumed responsibility for the cycle of the foundation of the Emirate of Qatar.

The discovery of oil and gas are the main causes of the states financial prosperity, which enriched the state of Qatar and its citizens as well as the reigning Al-Thani dynasty currently worth $335 billion.

Hamad bin Khalifa is known for being an avid investor, it was under his reign that the sovereign wealth fund of Qatar was established in 2005 to strengthen the country's economy and reducing the states dependance on petroleum exports by diversifying into new asset classes

Important sums of money were invested to boost Qatarseconomic, foreign and industrial status. This includes the initiation of international forums to promote the guideline of exchange and comprehension among countries and people groups, like the Doha Forum on Democracy, Development and Free Trade, the US- Islamic World Forum, and the Doha Interfaith Conference.

Multiple prominent figures and companies in Gulf countries and in the broader world have invested in real estate through Solomartel including Indian real estate billionaires Kushal Pal Singh, ChandruRaheja, Jitendra Virwani, the Bank of Baroda, and the sovereign wealth fund of Saudi Arabia.

Despite having signed many investment deals withhigh-net-worthindividuals and large corporations, Solomartel proposes investments for anyone located almost anywhere in the world, from the very wealthy to the middle class and poorer investors, almost anyone can invest as the minimum investment is as low as 200$ on some funds.
Visakhapatnam: Former central minister and TDP politburo member P. Ashok Gajapati Raju on Thursday alleged that the officials of Mansas (Maharaja Alak Narayana Society of Arts and Science) and Simhachalam temple violated protocol when he visited the temple after assuming the charge of Mansas at Vizianagaram. The High Court reinstated him as the trustee chairperson of both the trusts setting aside the appointment of his niece P. Sanchaita Gajapati Raju by the state government.

After taking charge at Mansas, Raju said executive officer (EO) D. Venkateswara Rao and correspondent of the trust K.V.L. Rao were not present, which was a basic violation of the protocol. The government purposefully offended me. The officials rejected my donation for making the idols and did not invite me for the consecration of Lord Rama idols at Ramateertham, he said.

Raju asked the EO to explain the activities at the trust over the last one year as also all details on permissions given for sand extraction in Kotipalli in East Godavari district. He directed the disbursement of salaries to the Mansas and provide the details and bills regarding various purchases and procurements which exceeded `5 lakh during the last one year.

Raju was also sore that Simhachalam temple EO M.V. Suryakala and the commissioner of endowments, Padala Arjuna Rao, did not bother to call on him though it was part of the protocol.

The temple priests did not tie the headgear as was the custom in respect of important dignitaries, particularly hereditary trustees and chairman.

Due to the virus scare, the priests avoided tying headgear and EO and Commissioner were busy discussing land issues for which a meeting was held for over hours, said an official of the temple.
The Dust Bowl Brewing Company plans to open a taproom in this historic brick building at 9676 Railroad St. in Old Town.
Northbound traffic congestion on Interstate 5 is shown to the right during the morning of June 14. Many drivers used that freeway as an alternative route during the closure of Highway 99.
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Members of the EGUSD Parent Coalition announce their recall campaign against Elk Grove Unified School District Trustee Nancy Chaires Espinoza on June 15.
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Sterling, VA (20165)

Today

Rain or showers ending. Mainly cloudy. High 79F. Winds NW at 10 to 15 mph..

Tonight

Mostly clear. Slight chance of a shower throughout the evening. Low 59F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph.
Sterling, VA (20165)

Today

Rain or showers ending. Mainly cloudy. High 79F. Winds NW at 10 to 15 mph..

Tonight

Mainly clear. Slight chance of a shower throughout the evening. Low 58F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph.
Sterling, VA (20165)

Today

Rain or showers ending. Cloudy skies. High 79F. Winds NW at 10 to 15 mph..

Tonight

Mainly clear. Slight chance of a shower throughout the evening. Low 59F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that 6 civilians, including a woman and two children were injured as a result of missile shelling carried out by the Damascus government forces, targeting Bazabour village, south of Ariha city in the southern countryside of Idlib.

Earlier in the day, the Damascus government forces carried out missile strikes with more than 100 rockets, targeting separate areas of the so-called "De-escalation" area, as the shelling targeted the areas of Al-Ziyarah, Zayzoun and Al-Ankawi of Sahl Al-Ghab of Hama countryside, and separate areas of Jabal Al-Zawiya south of Idlib, in addition to areas in the western countryside of Aleppo, but no information was received about casualties.

D.H
In order to satisfy the controllable rotation of precision equipment, one is to point accurately, the other is to repeat positioning, and the third is to stop and stop. Therefore, zero clearance or negative clearance is very important for slewing bearings. For crossed roller bearings or self-weights such as over 200kgs, zero clearance is sufficient. Negative clearance generally investigates the starting torque.

In the actual machining process, when machining precision products with zero or negative clearance, considering heat treatment deformation, stable deformation and grinding method, at least three times the price must be paid to ensure that the clearance is stable and controllable and the performance test is outstanding. Wuxi Spark Bearing Co., Ltd is a complete, one-stop 15125 bearing supplier and manufacturer.

Ways to extend bearing life

The 15125 bearing are important parts of machinery and equipment. To ensure that the bearings exert their ideal performance, correct installation and operation and reasonable maintenance are very important. To extend the service life of the 15125 bearing , three aspects need to be done.

lubricating

Choose a suitable lubrication system and high-quality lubricants. The lubricating oil film separates the oil film surfaces that are in contact with each other due to the load bearing and provides the necessary protection against corrosion and wear. Therefore, for all rotating or reciprocating parts, especially bearings and gears, if normal operation is required, the lubricating oil film is indispensable lack.

Reasonably adjust the bearing

During assembly or installation 15125 bearing , if the internal clearance of the bearing is too large or too small, or in some cases, the preload is too high, which may cause early damage and shorten the life of the bearing. In addition to causing downtime and expensive maintenance, improper bearing assembly and installation may also have more negative effects, such as affecting the operation of other parts and shortening their service life.

Do the inspection after the bearing is installed

Whether the 15125 bearing is installed correctly or not has a direct impact on its life and the accuracy of the main engine. If it is installed improperly, the bearing will not only have vibration, high noise, low accuracy, and large temperature rise, but also the danger of being stuck and burned; on the contrary, if it is installed properly, it will not only ensure accuracy, but also greatly extend its life. Therefore, after the 15125 bearing is installed, it must be inspected. Wuxi Spark Bearing Co., Ltd is a complete, one-stop 15125 bearing supplier and manufacturer.

The market demand for 15125 bearing ?

The global bearing market value in 2020 is 123.34 billion U.S. dollars and is expected to reach 153.62 billion U.S. dollars by 2027, and the compound annual growth rate will also increase steadily.

A bearing is a mechanical element that supports relative movement and helps reduce friction caused between moving parts. Bearings are widely used in various industries such as automobiles, wind turbines, construction machinery, mining machinery, agricultural equipment, and machine tools. It is used in automobiles to ensure smooth driving of automobiles, electric vehicles (EV) and other types of vehicles (such as light commercial vehicles and heavy vehicles such as trucks). Due to the increasing utilization of bearing 15125 bearing in various end-use industries, rolling mills and electric vehicles, the global 15125 bearing market has become more and more important. The development of technology has improved the overall efficiency of bearing products in the field and extended the product shelf life. Wuxi Spark Bearing Co., Ltd is a complete, one-stop 15125 bearing supplier and manufacturer.

The market trend of 15125 bearing ?

The cost of raw materials is still the biggest concern for manufacturers. Raw materials account for approximately 60-62% of bearing manufacturers revenue. The price of raw materials for bearings fluctuates continuously according to market economic conditions. Such fluctuations in raw material prices are becoming a real challenge for companies to maintain competitiveness and ensure sustainable profits. As high-grade steel and alloy steel are the main raw materials used to manufacture 15125 bearing , bearing prices are highly correlated with global steel price trends. Therefore, fluctuations in the price of raw materials have brought challenges for bearing manufacturers to compare prices and quality to manufacture bearings. In addition, the bearings require regular maintenance to avoid failures and extend their service life, which further increases maintenance costs. Therefore, factors such as raw material price fluctuations and regular maintenance costs are expected to hinder the growth of the bearing market. Wuxi Spark Bearing Co., Ltd is a complete, one-stop 15125 bearing supplier and manufacturer.

How to contact WSBC bearing ?
DETROIT, June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Christopher Rivers, CEO of Visionz Group LLC, announced that starting this July 2021 the company will be providing workforce development and other services for parolees in tandem with Health Management Systems of America (HMSA).

Since its inception Visionz Group has been at the forefront of soft skills research and curriculum development for youth and young adults. Its robust and interactive College, Career and Life Skills Readiness curriculum has been used by youth groups, colleges, churches, corporations and more to improve the soft or "life" skills of their participants.

The Visionz evidenced based, culturally responsive programming was recently introduced into the juvenile detention and prison systems for adult inmates, to help them to re-integrate into their local communities and reduce the risks of recidivism. Under this new contract with HMSA, Visionz Group will be assisting ex-offenders in the state of Michigan by implementing Employment Readiness Workshops, Job Search Assistance Programs, and Vocational/Occupational Assessments. Studies have shown that teaching evidence-based life skills to offenders who are at-risk will reduce recidivism by 40%. By helping these offenders strengthen their job readiness and life skills, the program aims to build their assets and thereby reduce the likelihood of future delinquent behavior.

Health Management Systems of America (HMSA) provides Employee Assistance Programs (EAP) and Work/Life and Wellness services to managers, employees, and the families of over 2,000 companies nationwide. The company has grown from a regional provider of behavioral health services to a nationally recognized leader providing best-in-class behavioral health management, training and organizational development services. HMSA works with Fortune 500 corporations, government agencies, top universities, and hospital systems. Dennis Rice, President of HMSA said, "We are proud of the services that we provide to returning citizens and the quality partnerships like Visionz that we have forged in the community."

Visionz Group has developed the winning formula for accelerating positive change in the Juvenile Justice system and detention centers. To broaden its program helping youth and adults in the justice system, Visionz recently introduced its "Let It Go, So You Can Grow" curriculum that provides Social and Emotional Learning centered in Anger Management, Conflict Resolution and Growth Mindset  Grit, Resiliency and Ethics. "We are actively working on expanding our programming in Michigan and also introducing it into other state systems such as Georgia, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, and Texas" said Chris Rivers. "Having grown up in the Detroit area, I am very excited to see these programs created by Visionz being implemented to help people become successful learners and earners as they progress through life. We look forward to seeing this curriculum becoming a model of consistency throughout the country."

To learn more about Visionz Group and its emerging educational technology platform check out the Visionz Automated Learning Series titled "First Impressions" by clicking the link below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Chxd53degjI

About Visionz Group

Visionz Group provides young people and adults with the critical life skills they need to succeed and excel in life through cutting-edge tools, a nurturing learning environment, climate, and culture. Learn more at: www.visionzgroup.com

Media Contact: Preston Howell, Visionz Group, LLC - (800) 617-0093 phowell@visionzgroup.com

View original content:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/visionz-group-and-hmsa-form-partnership-to-help-ex-offenders-in-michigan-prepare-for-the-workforce-301315085.html

SOURCE Visionz Group, LLC
MichiganVotes.org is a free, non-partisan website created by the Mackinac Center for Public Policy to provide concise, non-partisan, plain-English descriptions of every bill and vote in the Michigan House and Senate. This report was released Friday, June 11.

Senate Bill 458: Require governor notify legislature when traveling out of state

To require that when leaving the state and on return, the governor must notify the lieutenant governor, and require this person to notify legislative leaders in writing within 12 hours.

Passed 20 to 16 in the Senate

Sen. Ruth Johnson (R-Dist. 14) YES

Sen. Jim Runestad (R-Dist. 15) YES

Sen. Lana Theis (R-Dist. 22) YES

Sen. Jim Ananich (D-Dist. 27) NO

Sen. Ken Horn (R-Dist. 32) YES

Senate Bill 458: Irwin legislative leader domestic terrorist amendment

To add an exception to SB 458, waiving the governor has left the state reporting requirement for a legislative leader believed to present a security risk to this state because of his or her affiliations with a domestic terrorist organization. This was proposed by Sen. Jeff Irwin, D-Ann Arbor.

Failed 16 to 20 in the Senate

Sen. Ruth Johnson (R-Dist. 14) NO

Sen. Jim Runestad (R-Dist. 15) NO

Sen. Lana Theis (R-Dist. 22) NO

Sen. Jim Ananich (D-Dist. 27) YES

Sen. Ken Horn (R-Dist. 32) NO

Senate Bill 429: Establish sand and gravel mining regulatory regime, fees

To impose a state permit mandate on aggregates mining (sand and gravel), which are needed for road repair and reconstruction projects. The bill would preempt locally imposed restrictions and permit requirements (with exceptions), and authorize a $5,000 permit application fee.

Passed 19 to 17 in the Senate

Sen. Ruth Johnson (R-Dist. 14) NO

Sen. Jim Runestad (R-Dist. 15) NO

Sen. Lana Theis (R-Dist. 22) NO

Sen. Jim Ananich (D-Dist. 27) YES

Sen. Ken Horn (R-Dist. 32) YES

House Bill 4823: Shift more online gambling tax revenue to horse race industry

To remove a cap on the amount of state online gambling tax revenue that can be given to the horse race industry and tracks. Fiscal agency analysts note this could cause a modest reduction in revenue for schools.

Passed 88 to 21 in the House

Rep. Bob Bezotte (R-Dist. 47) YES

Rep. Mike Mueller (R-Dist. 51) YES

House Bill 4667: Ban government vaccination passport

To prohibit the state or local governments from producing or issuing a COVID-19 vaccine passport, subject to a $1,000 penalty per violation. The bill would also ban governments from providing an incentive to a person to require or use a vaccination passport.

Passed 62 to 47 in the House

Rep. Bob Bezotte (R-Dist. 47) YES

Rep. Mike Mueller (R-Dist. 51) YES

House Bill 4631: Reduce a limit on government civil asset forfeiture takings

To create an exception to a 2019 law that prohibited government civil asset forfeitures, which are takings of property that may be associated with a suspected drug-related crime, unless the individual is actually convicted or accepts a plea bargain. That only applies to police seizures of property worth $50,000 or more, and the bill would lower this to $20,000 for property seized by public airport authority police.

Passed 77 to 33 in the House

Rep. Bob Bezotte (R-Dist. 47) YES

Rep. Mike Mueller (R-Dist. 51) YES




Financial Services Commission Chairman Eun Sung-soo / Korea Times file




NH Investment & Securities CEO Chung Young-chae. Korea Times file
Lawmakers of the ruling Democratic Party discuss whether to reduce real estate-related taxes on high-end homeowners at the National Assembly in Seoul, Friday. / Yonhap



The ruling Democratic Party (DP) on Friday adopted a set of policies aimed at reducing real estate-related taxes on high-end homeowners amid spiking house prices.



During a plenary party meeting earlier in the day, the DP won its lawmakers' endorsement through online voting for its plan to push for the tax cuts, according to party officials.



The DP has been under pressure to address growing public discontent over the overheated real estate market after runaway house prices drove up tax burdens on home owners while raising costs for home lenders.



The housing market issue has been widely blamed for the DP's crushing defeats in the Seoul and Busan mayoral elections in April.



Under the new policies, the lowest limit for levying the Gross Real Estate Tax, a special tax imposed on owners of multiple or high-end houses, will be raised to some 1.1 billion won ($973,020) from current 900 million won. The tax cut will benefit owners of a single home only.



According to party officials, the portion of homeowners to be levied with the Gross Real Estate Tax under the new policies will be reduced to top 2 percent of the total.



Under the decisions, the benefit of the Real Estate Transfer Tax exemption will also be extended to homes worth up to 1.2 billion won, from the current standard at 900 million won, the DP also noted.



"The (internal) controversies over the two real estate issues have been settled. The decisions will be pushed for through the DP's bills (on revising related laws)," Rep. Koh Yong-jin, the party's chief spokesman, said.



The ruling party can pass a bill without difficulty as it commands a parliamentary majority with 174 out of 300 seats.

The decisions mark the latest in a series of real estate-related tax cuts the ruling party has introduced as it seeks to win back voters' support following its election defeats as well as ahead of next year's presidential election.



In another major decision last month, the DP also extended the benefit of the 0.05-percentage-point property tax cut, currently available for houses worth 600 million won or less, to houses worth up to 900 million won.



The package of new policies faced backlash from some hardline members who denounced them as "tax cuts for the rich."

(Yonhap)


The best-selling books section of Kyobo Books in central Seoul / Korea Times file









By Kang Hyun-kyung







The most-read articles and top 10 best-selling books at bookstores compiled by media outlets have one thing in common: readers here don't seem to find well-researched, insightful works to be fascinating.







This week's best-seller list from Kyobo Books, the nation's largest bookstore, reaffirmed this trend. Former Justice Minister Cho Kuk's memoir, "Cho Kuk's Time: Pains, Truth and Untold Thoughts" published by Hangil Books, topped the list, while several books that teach people how to get rich or profit from property speculation also made it on the list.







Yet, this week's best-sellers delivered some positive news for the literary industry.







Star novelist Jeong You-jeong returned with a new crime thriller tentatively titled in English as "The Complete Happiness."







Jeong's new novel has been on the best-selling books list since late May when the publisher began to take pre-orders from readers before its official release in June.







Word of "The Complete Happiness" spread among readers in May when the author appeared on tvN's hit reality show, "You Quiz on the Block," prior to its official release. She talked about the thorough preparation and extensive research she does before writing stories.







Her promotion on TV helped her book draw attention from readers. Her past work, "The Good Son," which captivated Western readers since its English translation earned critical acclaim, also made the top 10 best-selling books list.







Jeong's two works simultaneously making it onto the best-seller list is considered to be an encouraging sign for Korean novelists who are grappling with sluggish book sales.







Despite such encouraging signs, Kyobo Books' top 10 list in general, like other online and offline bookstores' best-seller lists, does not seem to coincide with common perceptions of what ideally should be the most worthwhile works everyone should read. Rather, the lists show a particular formula ensuring the commercial success of publications.







Books that provide information on how to grow rich or become masters of property speculation have an easier time to make the bestseller list.







Another genre of books that show great popularity are the politically-motivated publications that pit voters with opposing views against each other, such as "Cho Kuk's Time."







"Cho Kuk's Time" is a memoir by the former justice minister who is on trial after being accused of abuse of power and other charges.







According to the publisher, the author tells his side of the story about what happened after he was hand-picked by President Moon Jae-in to serve as justice minister in August 2019. The book also offers Cho's account of how he became a member of Moon's inner circle and was appointed first to serve as senior presidential secretary for civil affairs before being nominated for justice minister. The book also discusses Cho's ideas about "reforming" the prosecution.







The controversial former justice minister's memoir became an instant best seller as soon as it went on sale at online and offline bookstores, creating a stir among the public. Readers' reactions were poles apart. His supporters loved it, while his opponents were left scratching their heads trying to guess Cho's motive behind publishing such an "unconvincing" memoir at this time.







"Cho Kuk's Time"  and similar books which have the potential to divide the nation  sell better simply because the writers have an unspecified number of die-hard fans who would support him no matter what he does. His book successfully rallied support from them, although the same book raised the eyebrows of many Koreans on the other side of the political fence.







Cho's memoir becoming a best-seller reminds readers of the publication of a book last year, called "The Unprecedented Nation: How Democracy Comes to an End," coauthored by five progressive intellectuals. The book critical of the former justice minister stormed into the best-selling books list as soon as it was released in August last year. Among progressive circles, the five authors were treated like enemies from within.







The dominance of politically-divisive books or money-making playbooks in the best-seller list has become a source of concern for those in literary circles.







Writing stories necessitates authors to go through a painful process. Part of the reason why authors of great works are lauded is because they successfully endured such a painful period to create their insightful works that resonate with readers across various walks of life.







If publications that are seen to have skipped such toils or bypassed the rite of passage find commercial success easily, I'm afraid full-time literary creators who solely rely on income from their book sales would be discouraged as their hard work is not rewarded. They would wonder if they still should sit up late at night continuously writing and rewriting their drafts to create innovative, inspirational and incredible works.


North Korean leader Kim Jong-un / AP-Yonhap



North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has said his country needs to prepare for "both dialogue and confrontation" with the United States under President Joe Biden, state media reported Friday.



At a plenary meeting of the central committee of the ruling Workers' Party of Korea on Thursday, Kim outlined his strategy for relations with Washington, and the "policy tendency of the newly emerged US administration", the Korean Central News Agency said.



Kim "stressed the need to get prepared for both dialogue and confrontation, especially to get fully prepared for confrontation in order to protect the dignity of our state" and reliably guarantee a "peaceful environment", KCNA reported.



The North Korean leader "called for sharply and promptly reacting to and coping with the fast-changing situation and concentrating efforts on taking stable control of the situation on the Korean peninsula", the agency said.



Pyongyang had already accused Biden of pursuing a "hostile policy" and saying it was a "big blunder" for the veteran Democrat to say he would deal with the threat posed by the North's nuclear program "through diplomacy as well as stern deterrence".



In 2019, the North said Biden should be "beaten to death with a stick".





A visitor views the North Korea side from the Unification Observation Post in Paju, South Korea, near the border with North Korea, June 17. AP-Yonhap




By Kim Rahn







South Korea's state-run institute dealing with nuclear-related technology was the target of an attack by a group of North Korean hackers, main opposition People Power Party lawmaker Ha Tae-keung said Friday.







According to the lawmaker, 13 unauthorized IP addresses accessed the intranet system of the Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute, May 14.







IssueMakersLab, a Seoul-based group of malware analysts, tracked the IP addresses and found some of them were linked to the server of "kimsuky," which is believed to be a state-backed North Korean hacking group, Ha said.







The cyber espionage group has been detected in previous hacking attacks targeting South Korean government organizations and is believed to have attempted to gain access to the cyber networks of global companies developing COVID-19 vaccines last year.







Ha also said some of the IP addresses used the email ID of Moon Chung-in, former foreign and security affairs adviser to President Moon Jae-in. The former adviser's email addresses were hacked in 2018.







"If the state's key technologies on nuclear energy have been leaked to North Korea, it could be the country's biggest security breach, almost the same level as a hacking attack by the North into the defense ministry in 2016," the lawmaker said in a press briefing at the National Assembly.







He said the institute initially told him there was no hacking incident, claiming it attempted to cover up the case.







In response to Ha's claim, the institute admitted to the hacking attack, but said an investigation is taking place to see if North Korea was really behind it, what information the hackers tried to access, and whether the hackers really stole any information from the institute.







The National Intelligence Service also said it is investigating the case with relevant government organizations.


North Korean leader Kim Jong-un presides over a session of the plenary meeting of the eighth Central Committee of North Korea's ruling Workers' Party of Korea in Pyongyang, Thursday, in this photo released by the Korean Central News Agency. Yonhap



North Korean leader stresses 'both dialogue and confrontation' with US



By Kwon Mee-yoo



North Korean leader Kim Jong-un emphasized stable control of the situation on the Korean Peninsula, Friday, and said the isolated state should be ready for "both dialogue and confrontation," in an apparent conciliatory gesture toward South Korea and the United States.



It is rare for the bellicose North to mention dialogue, and considering the remarks were made a day before U.S. special representative for North Korea Sung Kim's visit to Seoul, attention is now on whether stalled denuclearization talks will get a makeover.



According to the North's official Korean Central News Agency, during a ruling Workers' Party of Korea meeting Thursday, Kim said the country has "made a detailed analysis of the policy tendency of the newly emerged U.S. administration toward North Korea and clarified appropriate strategic and tactical counteraction and the direction of activities to be maintained in relations with the U.S. in the days ahead."



This is the first time that Kim has commented on the U.S.'s North Korea policy after President Joe Biden took office in January. The Biden administration finished reviewing its policy toward the North and said it would pursue a "calibrated, practical approach" on the way to the complete denuclearization of the peninsula.









During a five-day visit to Seoul, Sung Kim is scheduled to have bilateral and trilateral meetings with his South Korean counterpart, Noh Kyu-duk, and Japan's North Korea point man, Takehiro Funakoshi.



The fact that Kim's message was not antagonistic toward the U.S. has prompted Pyongyang watchers to believe it signals North Korea's willingness to hold talks.



Lim Eul-chul, a professor at the Institute for Far Eastern Studies at Kyungnam University, said that Kim sending a message to Washington was a sign of change as Pyongyang has not responded to U.S. calls for talks. He also said that Kim's emphasis on full preparation for confrontation may be designed to keep his people on a heightened state of alert.



"Though North Korea is hinting at the possibility of talks with the U.S., it is also preparing for confrontation, as the U.S. maintains its hostile policy against Pyongyang and the situation hasn't changed enough to resume conversations," Lim said.





Officials raise their hands in favor of a policy during a plenary meeting of the eighth Central Committee of North Korea's Workers' Party in Pyongyang, Thursday, in this photo released by the Korean Central News Agency. Yonhap


South Korea plans to offer more than $4 million in humanitarian aid this year for Venezuelan refugees and migrants, the foreign ministry said Friday.





Ham Sang-wook, deputy foreign minister for multilateral and global affairs, unveiled the plan during Thursday's virtual International Donors' Conference in Solidarity with Venezuelan Refugees and Migrants hosted by Canada.





"Our government plans to continue to participate in the joint efforts by the international community to address the humanitarian crisis facing Venezuelan refugees and migrants," the ministry said in a press release.





Since 2015, more than 5.6 million Venezuelan people are known to have left their homes due to social insecurity, violence and a lack of access to food, medicine and other essential items inside their home country. (Yonhap)










The government will consider requesting an investigation into how a map of Pyongyang was included in a video clip introducing Seoul at last month's global climate change summit, a foreign ministry official said Friday.







The decision followed more than a week of the foreign ministry's internal probe into the clip played during the opening ceremony of the virtual Partnering for Green Growth and the Global Goals (P4G) summit on May 30.







The internal inquiry found that a subcontractor in charge of creating the video mistakenly incorporated the map of the North Korean capital in the clip, and that the map went unnoticed despite three rehearsals.







The official said that the ministry could request a probe by the state auditors, police or other investigation authorities, as it remains still unclear whether the Pyongyang map was mistakenly or intentionally included in the clip.







The ministry's probe was initiated after Foreign Minister Chung Eui-yong expressed regrets over the "mistake" and called for a "concrete" examination into how it happened during a press conference on June 1. (Yonhap)


Smoke billows from a fire at a logistics center of e-commerce giant Coupang in Icheon, Gyeonggi Province, June 17. Yonhap



A fire at a distribution center run by Coupang, a South Korean e-commerce giant, continued to burn late Thursday after the blaze erupted and engulfed the building in flames, as firefighters struggled to put it out, officials said.



The fire broke out at 5:20 a.m. due to a spark from a power outlet in one of the basements of the four-story, 127,178-square meter Deokpyeong Logistics Center in Icheon, about 80 kilometers south of Seoul, authorities said.



Firefighters had brought the blaze under control about 2 hours into the firefighting work, but the fire suddenly began to rise again from the inside, prompting the fire crew to evacuate.



A 52-year-old firefighter has not made his way out. Four others escaped, with one being sent to hospital with dehydration.





Yonhap



"We believe that there were a lot of flammable materials near the fireman and they suddenly fell down, causing flames and smoke," an official said.



On-site responders are trying to rescue the trapped firefighter





Yonhap
Smoke billows from a fire at a logistics center of e-commerce giant Coupang in Icheon, Gyeonggi Province, June 18. Yonhap



A fire at a Coupang Inc. distribution center continued to burn Friday, more than a day after it broke out, with one firefighter trapped inside, officials said.



The fire began in the basement of the e-commerce giant's four-story building in Icheon, about 80 kilometers south of Seoul, around 5:20 a.m. Thursday. Authorities said it appeared to have been caused by a spark from a power outlet.



A 52-year-old firefighter who entered the basement Thursday morning to look for people left behind has yet to emerge from the building.



"We will resume our search as soon as it becomes possible to enter the building," a fire official said. "We don't know for now when the flames will die down."



The fire has spread from the basement to the entire building and begun to reveal its frame.



Firefighters said they are using water cannons to put out the fire from outside instead of entering the building out of concern it could soon collapse. The second floor has already begun to buckle.





Yonhap
Public officials encourage people to wear mask and keep the distance at Haeundae Beach in Busan in this July 5, 2020 photo. Yonhap



By Bahk Eun-ji



Busan Metropolitan Government said Friday it has sent a letter to six foreignes-related organizations, including the U.S. Consulate in the port city, to seek their help in encouraging foreign nationals to abide by COVID-19 quarantine guidelines especially around local beaches.



The city government's move came in response to earlier quarantine rule violations on Haeundae Beach, May 29, when around 2,000 foreign nationals including U.S. service members here held parties there to celebrate U.S. Memorial Day with many of them not wearing face masks and violating social distancing rules.



In the letter, the city government conveyed concerns from local citizens about quarantine rule violations. It introduced specific details of the administrative order related to the prevention of virus transmissions at famous tourist locations in Busan such as Haeundae and Gwangalli beaches and Millak Waterside Park, and asked the organizations to encourage residents or tourists from their countries to abide by the quarantine regulations.






Statues of three boys urinating into the lake stand at Songdo Central Park, Incheon. Yonhap



By Bahk Eun-ji



A controversy has arisen over three statues of boys urinating in the middle of a large park in Songdo, Incheon, with some residents and visitors calling the pieces showing the boys' genitalia inappropriate as a public artwork.



According to the Incheon Free Economic Zone Authority, Friday, two complaints have been filed with the Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission, asking for the removal of the statues installed in Songdo Central Park.



The statues, which are also fountains, depict three boys with their pants down urinating toward the lake. Installing it in 2011, artist Kim Young-gul said he created them based on his childhood memory that children wandering around mud flats in Songdo to catch clams used to urinate in the middle of mud flats when they couldn't go to a bathroom.



However, those who filed the complaints said it is unpleasant and uncomfortable to see the statues exposing their private parts, saying they don't understand why visitors to the park need to watch such statues of boys urinating.



Early this month, a members of an online community in Songdo, All That Songdo, wrote a similar complaint and said her son attending elementary school began to feel embarrassed about the statues, and she saw many couples on dates around the area startled when they saw them.





Statues of three boys urinating into the lake at Songdo Central Park, Incheon / Yonhap
Lee Jun-seok, the new chairman of the conservative main opposition People Power Party, rides a "Ttareungyi" bike, which is part of a bicycle-sharing service run by the Seoul Metropolitan Government, to get to the National Assembly from a nearby subway station, June 13, two days after being elected head of the party. He said he has often used the bike-sharing system, and he has not yet hired a driver, even though a vehicle has been provided for him by the party. Yonhap



By Jung Da-min



The political parties here are in a fierce competition to appeal to young voters in their 20s and 30s, with less than nine months left ahead of the next presidential election slated for March next year. The practice of politicians seeking to appeal to the younger generations has often been observed in past election campaigns, but policy competition to win young voters' support has recently intensified, especially after the April 7 by-elections and the dramatic rise of 36-year-old politician Lee Jun-seok, who became the youngest-ever chairman of the main opposition People Power Party (PPP), June 11.



After the ruling Democratic Party of Korea's (DPK) crushing defeat by the PPP in the by-elections, in which the opposition took the mayoral posts in the country's two largest cities, Seoul and Busan, many political watchers noted that negative sentiment has grown toward the ruling DPK among people in their 20s and 30s, many of whom voted for candidates from the conservative PPP.



Political watchers also noted that voters in their 20s and 30s, who used to be considered as supporters of the country's liberal bloc, have now become swing voters. The liberal ruling bloc has been losing support from them over its policy failures, especially regarding job creation and real estate market stabilization. In addition, corruption and land speculation scandals involving high-profile government officials and ruling party members have deteriorated positive public sentiment toward the ruling bloc.





Oh Se-hoon, center, the then-candidate of the main opposition People Power Party in the Seoul mayoral by-election and now Seoul mayor, joins hands with young supporters during a campaign held near Sinchon Station in Seodaemun District, in this April 6 photo. Yonhap



Against this background, many politicians have engaged in proposing policies targeting young people, such as promises to improve rewards and service conditions for young men on mandatory military service, to provide affordable housing for young people, and to subsidize start-ups led by young entrepreneurs.



Rep. Ha Tae-keung, a three-term lawmaker of the PPP who declared last week his bid for the party's primary to pick its presidential candidate, is among many politicians who have been promoting their policy promises to young voters.



Ha has been proposing bills related to controversial issues after listening to young voters' opinions. One such issue was an attempt by the Incheon International Airport Corp. to rehire subcontracted workers as regular workers, which raised a fairness controversy last year, especially among young jobseekers.





Rep. Ha Tae-keung, a three-term lawmaker of the main opposition People Power Party, declares his bid for the party's primary to pick its presidential candidate, in a live press conference on Facebook, Tuesday. From Ha Tae-keung's Facebook



Saying new regular workers at public organizations and companies have to undergo fierce competition when trying to get a job, Ha proposed a bill aimed at preventing non-regular workers at such organizations from having their status changed to that of regular workers without undergoing equivalent processes as those externally applying for such positions.



Declaring his bid for the party primary to be the main opposition party's presidential candidate, through a live press conference on social media, Ha said, "The public is clearly calling for the times to change." The 53-year-old three-term lawmaker is relatively young among other potential presidential contenders in the opposition bloc.



On the DPK's side, two-term lawmaker Rep. Park Yong-jin, 50, is a relatively young potential presidential hopeful. Park has been appealing to young voters with policy promises for them, while also sending the message of the need for a generational shift in politics. Park has pledged to introduce a volunteer military system to realize an "equal" military service system between men and women.





Rep. Park Yong-jin, a two-term lawmaker of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea who declared his bid for the party's primary to pick its presidential candidate in early May, speaks during a press conference at the National Assembly in Seoul, June 10. Yonhap



Young people have expressed mixed responses over the young politician's election as the new main opposition leader and the political circle's growing attention to the younger generation.



"Seeing Lee Jun-seok becoming the new main opposition leader and receiving congratulatory messages from President Moon Jae-in and other ruling party members who are much older than him, I felt it was like a young politician representing the new generation has beaten established politicians representing the old generation," said Lee Seok-hee, a 30-year-old man from Hanam, Gyeonggi Province.



"I also expect that Lee would bring a change in the country's politics by presenting a new picture for the conservative bloc, as he has pledged to prioritize capabilities and qualifications when choosing figures to represent the party."



But some others also say although they see the political circle's growing attention to the young generation as a positive change, it is not that they agree with all the proposals brought up by Lee Jun-seok or other politicians.



"Considering that the political circle seemed to be a league of politicians in their 50s, 36-year-old Lee's rise as the main conservative opposition party leader seems to be a signal of political change. But I think we need to be careful not to think that young people share the same ideas as Lee," said Jeon, a 28-year-old man.



Before becoming the PPP leader, Lee issued messages supporting young men and commented on some controversial gender-related issues such as the matter of conscripting women, or a quota system for women in the civil service sector which he said was unfair to men. But his outspoken and controversial comments on gender issues brought criticism not just among avid political watchers but also young women in general.



Rep. Jang Hye-young, a 34-year-old lawmaker of the minor liberal opposition Justice Party, which has long been promoting the rights of social minorities and the marginalized including women, said that Lee often distorted feminism when making such outspoken comments on gender-related issues and he needs to be more careful when commenting on feminism as he now has greater responsibility as the party leader.





Rep. Jang Hye-young of the liberal minor opposition Justice Party speaks during a press conference at the National Assembly in Seoul, Tuesday, calling for the establishment of a law banning all kinds of discrimination based on gender, disability, age, country of origin or other reason. Yonhap




President Moon Jae-in returned to South Korea on Friday following a weeklong visit to Britain, Austria and Spain.







He joined a Group of Seven (G-7) summit in the British county of Cornwall, which marked the first major multilateral summit to take place in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic.







Attending plenary sessions on heath, open societies and climate as a guest, Moon demonstrated Seoul's commitment to playing a bigger role in addressing pending global issues.







He then made state visits to Austria and Spain, during which South Korea agreed to lift the level of bilateral relations with the countries to a "strategic partnership."







Moon's summit diplomacy this time has served as an opportunity to confirm South Korea's enhanced international stature and improve relations with European countries, according to Cheong Wa Dae. (Joint Press Corps-Yonhap)


Rep. Song Young-gil, the chairman of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea / Yonhap



The Democratic Party of Korea will push to stamp out fake news by legislating a new law that obliges media to pay punitive damages for the spread of malicious disinformation and misinformation, officials said Friday.



The new law the ruling party aims to pass through the National Assembly by the end of this month calls for the payment of compensation three to five times the calculated amount of damage caused by false information in news, they said.



The imposition of extraordinary financial penalties was proposed as part of a new relief system for damage from fake and manipulated information unveiled by the party's special committee on media reform in a session Thursday.



In case it is difficult to calculate the amount of damage, the committee suggested that it be estimated to be between 30 million won ($26,500) and 50 million won. It means that a maximum compensation of 250 million won would be possible even in the case of failure to calculate the amount of damage from fake news.



Aware of criticism that the new law may weaken the media's monitoring function, however, the committee said that the punitive liability will be recognized only when malicious intent against public officials in political service or executives and employees of large corporations is confirmed.



Moreover, the media will be exempted from liability if they have made sufficient efforts to verify the authenticity of their news. The committee also suggested that any request for correction of information be disclosed in the concerned media article in order to prevent the spread of false information.



In a related reform plan, the ruling party will push to limit the news editorial rights of internet portal sites by allowing readers to personally exercise their own rights to choose media, reporters and news articles.



The party will also discuss with portal operators the removing or scaling down of the amount of news articles recommended by their own artificial intelligence algorithms.



"The rights to recommend CEO candidates for public broadcasters will be returned to the people. The editorial rights for portal news will also be returned to the people," said Rep. Song Young-gil, the chairman of the ruling party, in the committee meeting.



"The media environment reform plan is not intended to block the media's function of criticism. All ordinary people, as well as opposition parties, can be victims." (Yonhap)


By Kim Bo-eun





LG Electronics' headquarters in Yeouido, Seoul / Yonhap
An employee works at an assembly line of GM Korea's Bupyeong plant in Incheon, Korea, in this file photo. Reuters-Yonhap





By Kim Yoo-chul







Senior management officials at General Motors (GM) headquarters warned labor representatives of GM Korea several times that repeated factory closures due to labor disputes will force the Korean unit to encounter a very difficult situation in terms of receiving new electric vehicle (EV) production orders.







The exact words GM executives used in their direct encounter at the automaker's U.S. headquarters with the GM Korea labor delegation remain unknown. However, the central point GM officials delivered is that such repeated strikes will leave them with no choice but to stop investing further or allocating new EV orders to the Korean unit.







During the meeting, Doneen McDowell, head of labor relations at GM, told the Korean unionists that the U.S. automaker's factories in 40 different countries are competing to win more EV orders, sources familiar with the issue, said Friday.







Three GM Korea labor representatives, including GM Korea labor chief Kim Seong-gap, and GM Korea CEO Kaher Kazem recently returned home from a week-long visit to GM headquarters and its plant in Mexico.







McDowell's remarks came in response to questions about the possibility of GM Korea receiving a sizable amount of EV orders amid its moves to realign output volume based on targeted regions.







Also, GM's Executive Vice President of Global Manufacturing Gerald Johnson, who also attended the face-to-face meeting with GM Korea's labor delegation, reportedly said the U.S. automaker is searching for reliable evidence that would justify the head office's decision for long-term investments in the Korean affiliate. Johnson also told them GM headquarters is keeping an eye on the possible co-existence between labor and management, said the sources.







Johnson also delved into specific ways that unionized workers in factories in the United States and Mexico interact with management, serving as models for co-existence in handling conflicts of interest. GM's Mexico plant, which has been competing with GM Korea to receive EV production orders, hasn't seen a single labor strike over the last 26 years.







Michael Perez, executive director of global manufacturing strategy and planning at GM, was said to have raised issues of higher labor cost and labor unrest seen in GM Korea as one of the core factors prompting headquarters raise questions over the predictability and stability of the Korean affiliate. The exact words Johnson and Perez said were also unavailable.







Regarding such reactions and assessment by GM executives, labor representatives who attended the meeting repeatedly asked them to make a swift decision on more EV production volume being allocated to Korea.







It's no surprise to see such warnings delivered by GM executives to GM Korea labor representatives as the U.S. automaker recently warned that persistent labor unrest could force it to exit Korea. GM operates three plants in Korea  two in Bupyeong and one in Changwon  which are capable of producing a total of 630,000 vehicles a year. The automaker employs around 12,000 people in the country.







In this 2019 file photo, GM Korea's plant in Bupyeong is in a state of suspended operations as labor union members downed tools to demand a wage increase. Yonhap





GM Korea said strikes by its unionized workers and other types of labor action have resulted in more than 15,000 vehicles worth of lost output, rendering the Korean unit unable to turn a profit in the near future. Unionized workers at GM Korea were asking management to increase their base salary, pay performance bonuses and to guarantee job security.







GM Korea reported 316.9 billion won operating losses last year, increasing the cumulative size of losses to some 5 trillion won. In 2019, it reported an operating loss of 332 billion won.







Because of tepid production rates and poor sales, GM agreed on a massive rescue package worth some $7 billion, including $750 million from the state-run Korea Development Bank (KDB) back in 2018. Under the specific terms of the "binding deal," GM isn't in a position to exit its investment here for 10 years.


Police officers gather in the lobby of the Apple Daily headquarters in Hong Kong, June 17. AP-Yonhap



Five hundred Hong Kong police officers sifted through reporters' computers and notebooks at pro-democracy tabloid Apple Daily on Thursday, the first case in which authorities have cited media articles as potentially violating the national security law.



Around dawn, police arrested five executives of the newspaper, and officers were later seen sitting at computers in the newsroom after entering with a warrant to seize journalistic materials, including from reporters' phones and laptops.



The raid is the latest blow to media tycoon Jimmy Lai, the tabloid's owner and a staunch Beijing critic, whose assets have been frozen under the security law and who is serving prison sentences for taking part in illegal assemblies.



The raid drew condemnation from the United States and Europe.



The European Union and Britain said it showed China was using the national security law to crack down on dissent and silence the media rather than deal with public security.



U.S. State Department spokesman Ned Price said the United States was "deeply concerned by Hong Kong authorities' selective use of the national security law to arbitrarily target independent media organizations."



"The charges of 'collusion with a foreign country or with external elements to endanger national security' appear to be entirely politically motivated," he added.



In comments raising further alarm over media freedoms in Hong Kong, the territory's Security Secretary John Lee described the newsroom as a "crime scene" and said the operation was aimed at those who use reporting as a "tool to endanger" national security.



He did not elaborate on the dozens of articles at which police said they were taking aim, but said the five were arrested for a conspiracy to make "use of journalistic work" to incite foreign forces to impose sanctions on Hong Kong and China.



"Normal journalists are different from these people. Don't collude with them," he told reporters. "Do your journalistic work as freely as you like in accordance with the law, provided you do not conspire or have any intention to break ... the national security law."



Senior superintendent Li Kwai-wah said the tabloid's reports dated back to 2019, without saying when the most recent were published. The legislation is not retrospective but prosecutors can use actions from before its implementation as evidence.



Police have also frozen HK$18 million ($2.32 million) of assets owned by three companies linked to Apple Daily and said that the raid was not aimed at the media industry as a whole.



In a letter to readers, Apple Daily said it was the victim of a "targeted attack by the regime," but its staff "will continue to stick to their posts loyally and fight to the end."



It said police seized 38 computers used by reporters.



It was the second time national security police have raided the Apple Daily headquarters; 200 officers went in last year to arrest Lai on suspicion of colluding with foreign forces.



Lai has been in detention since December, denied bail under the security law and serving several sentences for taking part in unauthorized rallies, including during the global financial hub's mass pro-democracy protests in 2019.



The security law was Beijing's first major move to set China's most restive city on an authoritarian path. It punishes anything Beijing deems as subversion, secessionism, terrorism and collusion with foreign forces with up to life in prison.



The five arrested were editor-in-chief Ryan Law, chief executive officer Cheung Kim-hung, Chief Operating Officer Chow Tat-kuen, Deputy Chief Editor Chan Puiman and Chief Executive Editor Cheung Chi-wai.



"This is a blatant attack on the editorial side of Apple Daily," Mark Simon, an adviser to Lai who is outside Hong Kong, told Reuters. "They're arresting the top editorial folks."



Asked how long he thinks the newspaper can survive, Simon said: "They decide, not us," referring to authorities.





Police officers take away boxes of documents at the Apple Daily headquarters in Hong Kong, June 17. AP-Yonhap




Indian police said Thursday they have launched an investigation after a newborn baby was found alive and well in a wooden box floating on the Ganges River.







The inside of the box was lined with red cloth and contained images of Hindu gods as well as a horoscope giving the date and time of the girl's birth and name, Ganga  the Hindi word for the holy river.







The child, thought to be around a month old, was recovered earlier this week in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh by a man in a boat in bushes at the river's edge.







"It is difficult to ascertain how long she had been floating in the river.







The boatman heard a sound coming from the box and that's how he found the baby," local police official O.P. Singh told AFP.







"The baby is fine and is currently receiving medical attention. The government will take care of everything," Singh said. "We are trying to figure out where she came from." (AFP)


In this May 11, 2021, file photo, Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, speaks during hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington. The United States is devoting more than $3 billion to advance development of antiviral pills for COVID-19, Fauci said Thursday. AP-Yonhap



The United States is devoting $3.2 billion to advance development of antiviral pills for COVID-19 and other dangerous viruses that could turn into pandemics.



Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation's top infectious disease expert, announced the investment Thursday at a White House briefing as part of a new ''antiviral program for pandemics'' to develop drugs to address symptoms caused by potentially dangerous viruses like the coronavirus.



The pills for COVID-19, which would be used to minimize symptoms after infection, are in development and could begin arriving by year's end, pending the completion of clinical trials. The funding will speed those clinical trials and provide additional support to private sector research, development and manufacturing.



Fauci said the new program would invest in ''accelerating things that are already in progress'' for COVID-19 but also would work to innovate new therapies for other viruses.



''There are few treatments that exist for many of the viruses that have pandemic potential,'' he said.



But he added, ''vaccines clearly remain the centerpiece of our arsenal.''



The U.S. has approved one antiviral drug, remdesivir, against COVID-19 and allowed emergency use of three antibody combinations that help the immune system fight the virus. But all the drugs have to be infused at hospitals or medical clinics, and demand has been low due to these logistical hurdles.



The U.S. government has been trying to raise awareness of the treatments, connecting people who test positive for COVID-19 with information about nearby providers.



Health experts, including Fauci, have increasingly called for simpler pill-based drugs that patients could take themselves. Some drugmakers are testing such medications, but initial results aren't expected for several more months.



The currently available drugs have mostly been shown to help patients avoid hospitalization or shorten their recovery time by several days.



Under President Donald Trump, the U.S. poured more than $19 billion into rapidly developing multiple vaccines. But less than half that amount went toward developing new treatments. That shortfall has become increasingly concerning as the vaccination campaign slows and experts emphasize the need to manage the disease in millions of Americans who may never get inoculated.



The biggest need is for a convenient pill that can help keep patients with early symptoms of COVID-19 from developing severe disease and needing hospitalization.



Several companies, including Pfizer, Roche and AstraZeneca, are testing antivirals in pill form.



Until this week, the only medicines shown to boost survival were steroids given to patients sick enough to need extra oxygen and intensive care. But on Wednesday, U.K. researchers reported that one of the antibody combinations successfully reduced deaths in a large study of hospitalized COVID-19 patients.



News of the Biden administration's plans for the antiviral pills was first reported by The New York Times. (AP)


A reflection of the U.S. flag is seen on the signs of the WeChat and TikTok apps in this illustration picture taken Sept. 19, 2020. Reuters-Yonhap



U.S. President Joe Biden's executive order aimed at safeguarding Americans' sensitive data would force some Chinese apps to take tougher measures to protect private information if they want to remain in the U.S. market, according to people familiar with the matter.



The goal is to keep foreign adversaries like China and Russia from gaining access to large amounts of personal and proprietary business information.



The U.S. Department of Commerce may issue subpoenas to collect information about certain smartphone, tablet and desktop computer software applications. Then the agency may either negotiate conditions for their use in the United States or ban the apps, according to people familiar with the matter.



Biden's June 9 order replaced President Donald Trump's 2020 bans against the popular Chinese applications WeChat, owned by Tencent Holdings, and ByteDance's TikTok. U.S. courts halted those bans.



U.S. officials share many of the concerns Trump cited in his order banning TikTok, according to one person familiar with the matter. Notably, they fear that China could track the locations of U.S. government employees, build dossiers of personal information for blackmail and conduct corporate espionage.



The new order could end up capturing more apps than the final Trump orders because of a stronger legal framework. Reuters is the first to report details on how the Biden administration plans to implement the order, including seeking support from other countries.



U.S. officials have begun speaking with allies about adopting a similar approach, one source said. The hope is that partner countries will agree on apps that should be banned.



U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo will decide which apps to target for U.S. action, but they must meet certain criteria. For instance, they must be owned, controlled or managed by a person or entity that supports the military or intelligence activities of a foreign adversary such as China or Russia.



WeChat, TikTok may be reviewed



If Raimondo decides an app poses an unacceptable risk, she "has the discretion to notify the parties" directly or publish the information in the government's official daily publication, the Federal Register, a Commerce Department spokesman said.



Companies will then have 30 days to object or propose measures to secure data better, the Commerce spokesman said.



Apps from China are most likely to find themselves in the Commerce Department's crosshairs given escalating tensions between Washington and Beijing, the Chinese government's ability to exert control over companies and the number of Chinese apps used by Americans.



WeChat, TikTok and eight other apps targeted by the Trump administration in its last months are eligible for review by Biden's team, one source said.



The Trump targets also included Ant Group's Alipay mobile payment app, WeChat Pay, Tencent Holdings Ltd's QQ Wallet, Tencent QQ, CamScanner, SHAREit, VMate published by Alibaba Group subsidiary UCWeb and Beijing Kingsoft Office Software's WPS Office.



Some of the apps named by Trump have serious data protection issues, while it's unclear why others pose a heightened risk to national security, according to another person familiar with the matter.



The order will apply to business apps, including those used in banking and telecommunications, as well as consumer, the first source said.



Meanwhile apps linked to other adversaries like Iran or Venezuela are already blocked under broader sanctions. (Reuters)


In this Feb. 17 file photo, a view shows a Huawei logo at Huawei Technologies France headquarters in Boulogne-Billancourt, France. The U.S. FCC voted unanimously to advance a plan to ban approvals for equipment in U.S. telecommunications networks from Chinese companies deemed national security threats like Huawei and ZTE. Reuters-Yonhap



The U.S. Federal Communications Commission voted unanimously on Thursday to advance a plan to ban approvals for equipment in U.S. telecommunications networks from Chinese companies deemed national security threats like Huawei and ZTE.



Under proposed rules that won initial approval, the FCC could also revoke prior equipment authorizations issued to Chinese companies.



A Huawei spokesperson, in an email, called the FCC revision "misguided and unnecessarily punitive."



Acting FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel said the new measures would "exclude untrustworthy equipment from our communications networks... We have left open opportunities for (Huawei and other Chinese equipment) use in the United States through our equipment authorization process. So here we propose to close that door."



FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr said the FCC has approved more than 3,000 applications from Huawei since 2018.



The FCC action would prohibit all future authorizations for communications equipment deemed to pose an unacceptable risk to national security.



In March, the FCC designated five Chinese companies as posing a threat to national security under a 2019 law aimed at protecting U.S. communications networks.



A group of U.S. lawmakers including Democratic Senator Ed Markey and Republican Senator Marco Rubio praised the FCC action saying it mirrors the goals of bipartisan legislation. They said the FCC voted "to put national security first by keeping compromised Chinese equipment out of U.S. telecommunications networks."



The affected companies included the previously designated Huawei and ZTE, as well as Hytera Communications, Hangzhou Hikvision Digital Technology and Zhejiang Dahua Technology.



Huawei said "blocking the purchase of equipment, based on a 'predictive judgment,' related to country of origin or brand is without merit, discriminatory and will do nothing to protect the integrity of U.S. communications networks or supply chains."



In August 2020, the U.S. government barred federal agencies from buying goods or services from any of the five Chinese companies.



In 2019, the United States placed Huawei, Hikvision and other firms on its economic blacklist.



Last year, the FCC designated Huawei and ZTE as national security threats to communications networks  a declaration that barred U.S. firms from tapping an $8.3 billion government fund to purchase equipment from the companies.



The FCC in December finalized rules requiring carriers with ZTE or Huawei equipment to "rip and replace" that equipment. It proposed a reimbursement program for that effort, and U.S. lawmakers in December approved $1.9 billion to fund it.



Rosenworcel said the FCC will vote in July to finalize the rules overseeing the reimbursement fund. (Reuters)


In this Sept. 14, 2020, file photo, Paul Rusesabagina, center, whose story inspired the film "Hotel Rwanda" for saving people from genocide, appears at the Kicukiro Primary Court in the capital Kigali, Rwanda. Rwandan prosecutors on Thursday requested a life sentence for the man, while his family asserts that he faces mistreatment and an unfair trial. AP-Yonhap



Rwandan prosecutors on Thursday requested a life sentence for the man who inspired the film ''Hotel Rwanda'' as he faces terrorism charges, while his family asserts that he faces mistreatment and an unfair trial.



Paul Rusesabagina, once praised for saving hundreds of ethnic Tutsis from Rwanda's 1994 genocide as a hotel manager, faces charges related to attacks by an armed group inside Rwanda in 2018 and 2019. The nine charges include the formation of an irregular armed group, membership in a terrorist group and financing terrorism. Prosecutors seek to link him to activities that killed at least nine people.



Rusesabagina, a Belgian citizen and U.S. resident, has denied the charges, arguing his case is politically motivated in response to his criticism of Rwanda's longtime President Paul Kagame.



Rusesabagina alleges that he was abducted last year while visiting Dubai and taken to Rwanda, where he was charged. But a court ruled that he was not kidnapped when he was tricked into boarding a chartered flight. Rwanda's government has asserted that Rusesabagina was going to Burundi to coordinate with armed groups based there and in neighboring Congo.



''My father Paul Rusesabagina is a political prisoner. He is accused of invented charges, and zero evidence against him has been presented in the Rwandan kangaroo court,'' daughter Carina Kanimba tweeted after the prosecution sought the life sentence.



The family also has said Rusesabagina was being denied access to food and water, but Rwanda's prison authority has denied it.



The case has received global attention. This month the Lantos Foundation for Human Rights and Justice said it had filed a formal submission in the U.S. recommending sanctions against Rwandan Justice Minister Johnston Busingye and the head of the Rwanda Investigation Bureau, Col. Jeannot Ruhunga, for their role in Rusesabagina's detention.



Rusesabagina stopped appearing in court in March, saying he doesn't expect justice after his request to postpone the trial to prepare his defense was rejected. His attorney, Felix Rudakemwa, has asserted that Rusesabagina's legal papers were confiscated by prison authorities. (AP)


After enlisting in the military, fans have become worried about SHINee Taemin's weight loss.

SHINee Taemin Worries Fans with Alleged Weight Loss upon Enlisting in the Military

On June 15 KST, the Korea Army Training Center shared photos that feature their new recruits who enlisted for their mandatory military enlistment, and among these recruits is SHINee's very own Taemin!

YOU MIGHT BE INTERESTED IN: SHINee's Taemin Loves His Haters and His Reason Has Fans Heartbroken

In the shared photos, the new recruits and SHINee Taemin can be seen a black shirt and shorts, along with socks and sandals as they sit down in a row.

While sitting down and posing for the camera, SHINee Taemin and the recruits were each holding up a syllable that, if read together, spells out as "To our parents, we love you."

After the photos were shared, many fans, the Shawols, were delighted to sneak a peek at Taemin during his enlistment.

However, numerous fans also shared their worries for the idol. It is known in the industry and among fans that SHINee Taemin is naturally skinny, so seeing Taemin lose more weight while he is at the training center made fans worry more.

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT: SHINee Taemin Sheds Tears as He Thanks Fans for Supporting Him for 13 Years

Meanwhile, Taemin officially enlisted for his mandatory military service on May 31, 2021, and is the final member of SHINee to do so following Onew in 2018, Key in 2019, and Minho 2019, who were all discharged in 2020. Taemin will be doing basic training, and following that, he will serve the remainder of his military service as part of the military band. He is expected to be discharged sometime in November 2022.

What are your thoughts on Taemin's photos in the training center?

YOU MIGHT BE INTERESTED IN: These Female K-Pop Idols Deserve to Make Their Solo Debut

Taemin's Recent Activities Prior to Enlistment

Taemin announced his enlistment date during a V-Live he held on April 19. Just a few weeks before his enlistment on May 31, Taemin released his third Korean mini-album "Advice" on May 18, which consists of five tracks, his title track "Advice," "Light," "If I Could Tell You" which features Girls' Generation's Taeyeon, "Strings," and "Sad Kids."

The album's title track, "Advice," is an R&B song that uses piano flourishes and a choir arrangement over its trap beat. Taemin also performed the song on several Korean music shows such as "Show! Music Core," "M! Countdown," and "Inkigayo," where he was praised for his androgynous aesthetic, and charismatic and versatile performances.

In addition, "Advice" took over both domestic and international charts - taking the No.1 spot.

For more K-Pop news and updates, always keep your tabs open here on KpopStarz.

KpopStarz owns this article.

Written by Robyn Joan


The Graduate School at Emporia State University invites applications for the position of Associate Director of Graduate Recruiting and Marketing. The anticipated start date is July 26. Responsibilities The Associate Director works under the supervision of the Dean of the Graduate School and Distance Education and serves as the primary liaison between the Graduate School and ESU Marketing & Media Relations. Responsibilities include: MARKETING: manage marketing campaigns for the Graduate School, working closely with academic deans and Marketing and Media Relations.

Track and analyze available data (through Google and TargetX) to ensure budgeted advertising resources are efficiently and effectively used.

Proactively work with each graduate program to identify communication and marketing opportunities.

Facilitate the design and production of publications and promotional materials for the Graduate School, including viewbooks, digital and print messaging, and other materials as appropriate.

Attend ESU Marketing meetings.

COMMUNICATIONS AND PUBLIC RELATIONS: coordinate communications between the Graduate School and internal and external audiences through a variety of formats (e.g., website, social media, newsletters, videos)

Coordinate production of regular internal communications with students, faculty/staff, administration, the ESU Foundation, and other internal university audiences.

Work with Marketing and Media Relations to assist in the creation of website content, presentations, videos, etc. for use by the Graduate School.

Assist the Dean and Department Chairs with various aspects of public relations. For example, student relations, donor/alumni relations, community relations and corporate relations.

EVENT PLANNING: help plan, coordinate, promote and provide appropriate follow-up on events across the Graduate School

Secure locations, plan logistics and catering for events.

Consult with ESU Marketing & Media to arrange photo/video shoots and press releases.

Examples of events will include but are not limited to:

Graduate Student Orientation

Capitol Graduate Research Summit

Research and Creativity Day

Student Recruitment Fairs

Minimum Qualifications Bachelors degree in Marketing, Communication, or related professional experience.

Excellent communication (oral and written) and interpersonal communication skills.

Strong analytical and critical thinking skills.

Ability to work both independently with minimal supervision and collaboratively with a team.

Skilled in social and digital media management.

A commitment to the mission of the Graduate School.

Preferred Qualifications Experience in public relations, event planning, marketing, and/or communications.

Graphic design skills (training and/or experience)

Application Interested applicants should submit a resume that includes three professional references, a cover letter detailing training and experience to fulfill responsibilities listed above, and copies of transcripts by uploading them at https://bit.ly/3iJwRsS. A pre-employment background check is required. Emporia State University is an equal opportunity and affirmative action employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, race, color, national origin, ethnicity, religion, gender, sex, gender identity, gender expression, marital status, parental status, sexual orientation, genetic information, status as an individual with a disability, status as a protected veteran, or any other factors which cannot be considered by law.

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Search Fund Accelerator, an innovative investment group, is seeking Research Analysis Clerks to begin ASAP. What we do: Search Fund Accelerator, SFA for short, provides support to entrepreneurs. Our highly vetted entrepreneurs, or Searchers as we refer to them, are a diverse group of people and have experience in a wide range of industries. Our Research Analysis Clerks are an integral part of the support we provide to our Searchers. This is a full time position, 40 hours per week. What youd do: Assist our Searchers by identifying leads. Leads are identified by comparing company websites to predetermined criteria that well provide.

Extract data from company websites per guidelines.

Manage electronic files, resources, and data. What you should have: A Bachelors or Associate's degree or international equivalent

Experience with data entry and Microsoft office programs preferred

Research skills and attention to detail

A friendly personality and a sense of humor

Excitement to work in a small team, startup environment

Fluency in English, both oral and written form

Prior authorization to work in the US, we are not able to offer sponsorship for international applicants at this time Culture and Benefits: Our comfortable offices are collaborative and relaxed. Our small teams mean that your hard work is not only noticed, its appreciated! Research Analysis Clerks are compensated at the prevailing hourly minimum wage for Boston ($13.50) and the company pays for 100% of the employees health plan. This means that if you work for Search Fund Accelerator, the company pays 100% of the costs of your medical insurance. We believe that we have a responsibility to protect and care for our most valuable assets, and we want our employees to be taken care of completely. We are open to discussing the possibility of working from home. Apply today!

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JOIN OUR OUTSTANDING TEAM! At Marquis Hope Village, we offer residents the highest level of post hospital rehabilitation, long term care, assisted living and memory care services. We are seeking passionate individuals to work with us in the following departments:

- Caregivers/Medication Technicians

- CNAs - Certified Nursing Assistants

Starting pay at $18/hr

- RNs- Registered Nurses

- LPNs- Licensed Practical Nurses

- & Enrolling students into our FREE Nursing Assistant Training Course Full-Time & Part-Time Positions Available! Marquis is a workplace where employee choices are honored, contributions are encouraged and celebrated, high standards are the expectation as we champion each client's journey. For us community is about connection. Employees connect us to causes they care about and can request matching funds for charitable donations. We also love to connect our clients with others through service. Developing tomorrow's leaders from within our organization is a top priority. You can expect clear pathways to guide your planning and a strong commitment to continuing education. APPLY HERE:

https://bit.ly/3iBIdPH

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Requisition Number 2100097S Classification Title Technology Support Tech Position Job Title PC Support College/Division DACC Dona Ana CC Department 941220-DACC Computer Supp Position Number 749964 Internal or External Search External - Open to all applicants Reports To Position Title Mgr, PC Systems Target Hourly/Salary Rate 15.20 Pay Base Hourly Recruitment Summary Dona Ana Community College (DACC) is a comprehensive, learning-centered community college dedicated to a diverse population of learners in support of student success, workforce and economic development and lifelong learning. Established in 1973 at the request of the Gadsden, Hatch and Las Cruces school boards, DACC continues to meet the educational needs of county residents by providing instruction leading to associate degrees and technical certificates as well as community and adult education opportunities. As the second largest community college in the state, DACC offers accessible and affordable higher education opportunities to more than 18,000 students annually with eight learning sites county-wide. As part of New Mexico State University, DACC is accredited by the Higher Learning Commission of the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools. Job Duties and Responsibilities The PC Support Technician provides IT technical support to DACC faculty and staff to include the deployment, installation, troubleshooting and repair of windows and MAC OS desktops, mobile devices, printers, and other technology related equipment. This position is responsible for responding to user IT related questions, software deployments, and installation of PCs, printers, and other peripherals in our network environment. This position will be working in an enterprise environment for image deployment, software deployment, email, antivirus, and mobile device management. The technician will be working closely with IT administrative staff to identify, troubleshoot and resolve network, telephone, and other systems issues. Classification Summary Under direct supervision, provides routine end user support, simple problem analysis and resolution, general technical assistance, and training for information systems. Classification Standard Duties Answers user inquiries regarding computer software or hardware operation to resolve problems. Confers with staff, end users, and management to establish specifications for new systems and obtain vendor quotes. Maintains records of work order transactions, problems and remedial actions taken, or installation activities. Performs network configuration on end user equipment according to established practices and standards. Reads technical manuals, confer with users, troubleshoot, or conduct computer diagnostics to investigate and resolve problems or to provide technical assistance and support. Refers major hardware or software problems or defective products to vendors or technicians for service. Sets up, install and repair hardware, software, or peripheral end user equipment, following design or installation specifications ensuring proper installation of cables, operating systems, and appropriate software. Typically configures end user equipment to attach to central authentication systems like active directory. Typically identifies, refers, and reports problems with systems software or network for resolution by central IT. Knowledge Knowledge of current technological developments/trends in area of expertise. Knowledge of customer service standards and procedures. Skills Strong problem-solving and communication skills. Abilities Ability to determine computer problems and to coordinate hardware and/or software solutions. Ability to communicate technical guidance and instruction to users on the use of PC and/or mainframe applications and systems. Ability to analyze and resolve computer problems. Ability to perform preventive maintenance on computer hardware and software. Ability to write technical instructions in the use of programs and/or program modifications. Ability to document work in progress. Required Education High School diploma or GED certificate. Required Experience Two (2) years of related experience. Equivalency Completion of a post-secondary degree or certificate may substitute for years of experience. Standard Work Schedule Standard (M-F, 8-5) Physical Work Location State NM-New Mexico Physical Work Location County, if in New Mexico DA-Dona Ana Work Site Espina Campus Bargaining Unit Eligible Posting Announcement Statement This is a bargaining unit position with American Federation of State, County & Municipal Employees (AFSCME). Posting Date 03/01/2021 Closing Date 06/24/2021 Special Instructions to Applicants The electronic application is the official document that will be used to qualify applicants. Paper/email documents will not be accepted. Required documents must be attached to this application. This requisition will be filling (2) two vacancies for Position 749964 and 749948. Environment Work is normally performed in a typical interior/office work environment. Physical Effort No or very limited physical effort required. Lifting Requirements Requires handling of average-weight objects up to 25 pounds or standing and/or walking for more than four (4) hours per day. Risk No or very limited exposure to physical risk. Click Apply Now to view the job posting and apply on our website.

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Accounting Assistant

Ferrum College is accepting applications for an Accounting Assistant. The Accounting Assistant performs a variety of accounting tasks to include general accounting and internal auditing functions and acts as backup for other Business Office staff.

Primary responsibilities include:

 Prepare journal entries and post all entries to administrative software finance module.

 Reconcile various general ledger accounts, including cash accounts and other asset and liability accounts.

 Review accounts payable invoices and other requests for payment for accuracy and appropriate approval and assist with accounts payable check processing.

 Manage college purchasing card program.

 Perform testing of donor pledges to ensure only firm unconditional commitments are recorded.

 Post miscellaneous accounts receivable charges and generate statements when required.

 Reconcile vendor statements to invoices and payments posted on a monthly basis. Contact vendors and request invoices that have not been received.

 Notifies payees of unclaimed checks and completes Unclaimed Property Report for Commonwealth of Virginia and any other states as required.

 Maintain College fixed asset records.

 Audits petty cash funds.

 Assist with annual financial audit to include preparation of schedules.

 Prepares 1099-MISC and 1099-NEC forms for vendors.

Required minimum qualifications:

 Associate's Degree in Accounting or related field.

 Two years of experience in an accounting environment.

 Excellent written and verbal communication skills.

 Experience with Microsoft Office products including Excel and Word.

 Organized, flexible and able to prioritize while maintaining a keen attention to detail.

This institution is an equal opportunity provider and employer.

Preferred qualifications:

 Bachelor's Degree in Accounting or Business Administration.

 Three years of experience in college fund accounting.

 Additional experience with Colleague Administrative Software.

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Salary $33.11 - $50.56 Hourly Location (Sequoia Plaza) *ART Bus Accessible*, VA Job Type Part-Time Department Department of Human Services Job Number 6322-21E-DHS-EM Closing 7/1/2021 11:59 PM Eastern Position Information Please note: This position will work primarily at the Northern Virginia Mental Health Institute, 3302 Gallows Rd; Falls, Church, VA.



The Behavioral Healthcare Division is recruiting for the position of part time Behavioral Health Specialist (Adult Case Manager) to provide services and referrals to adults with serious mental illness, many whom are also dually diagnosed with co-occurring substance use disorders. This individual will act as a Discharge Planner and will be responsible for functioning as a liaison to Northern Virginia's local state psychiatric hospital, the Northern Virginia Mental Health Institute. The Discharge Planner will coordinate activities for clients in transition from the hospital to the community, including linkages to housing, medications, financial entitlements, and follow-up mental health care. Services are provided with an emphasis on trauma informed care and recovery principles while working in collaboration with other team members, community agencies, professionals, and family members. The population served is ethnically and culturally diverse.



To learn more about the Department of Human Services and the Behavioral Healthcare Division, please visit DHS.



Responsibilities include: Assessment of clients presenting symptoms to identify service needs;

Participating in weekly discharge planning activities;

Case coordination of clients in the hospital;

Communicating with a variety of mental health and social service professionals;

Documenting treatment plans and progress to ensure compliance with clinical, funding, and program licensing regulations and standards;

Facilitating discharge of individuals at the state hospital to community placements; and

Ensuring treatment linkage off all individuals who transition from the state hospital to the community. The employee works both independently and as part of an interdisciplinary team within the Behavioral Healthcare Division.



Arlington County DHS is committed to delivering client services in an effective, equitable, respectful, and trauma-informed manner. Our staff is dedicated to ensuring our clients are approached, engaged and cared for in ways that demonstrate competency, sensitivity and awareness of factors which impact the client experience including but not limited to: cultural identity, gender, racial, and ethnic diversity, religious/spiritual ascription, physical capability, cognitive and literacy levels, sexual orientation, and linguistic needs.

Selection Criteria Minimums: Completion of the requirements for a Bachelor's degree from an accredited college or university in a clinical discipline such as Counseling, Social Work, Psychology, or other directly related clinical discipline;

Two years of post-bachelor's degree experience providing behavioral health services in the legal or court systems to adults with a serious mental illness or co-occurring disorder; and

Meets the criteria of and register with the State as a Qualified Mental Health Professional-(QMHP-A) within 60 days of hire (ref: (see application details) QMHP_FAQs.pdf ). Substitution : A Master's degree may substitute for the experience requirement.



Desirables: Preference may be given to candidates with one or more of the following: A Master's degree from an accredited college or university in a clinical discipline such as Counseling, Social Work, Psychology, or other directly related clinical discipline;

Coordinating activities for clients in transition from a psychiatric hospital to the community; and/or

Providing case management services to adults with serious mental illness, substance use or co-occurring disorders.

Special Requirements An online application is required.



The applicant must possess, or obtain by the time of appointment, a valid motor vehicle operator's license from the applicant's place of residence or the applicant must have the ability and willingness to use alternative methods of transportation to perform assigned duties and responsibilities at locations other than the primary worksite. If the applicant possesses or acquires a license, the applicant must authorize Arlington County to obtain, or the applicant must provide a copy of the applicant's official state/district driving record. Any offer of employment may be contingent upon a favorable review of the applicant's driving record.



A pre-employment criminal records check will be conducted. It may include checks of the following: criminal record, driving record, education, professional licensure, and credit history. You may be required to sign a release authorizing the County to obtain your background information.



Must complete pre-hire federal background check and State of Virginia Central Registry check.

Additional Information Work Hours: 20 hours/week. Flexible schedule between Monday through Friday 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.



Your responses to the supplemental questionnaire are considered part of the selection process and are required for this position. Please do not give "see resume" as a response to the questions. Incomplete applications will not be considered. Arlington County Government employee benefits depend on whether a position is permanent, the number of hours worked, and the number of months the position is scheduled.



Specific information on benefits and conditions of employment can be found on the Arlington County Human Resources Department website: (see application details)



Permanent, Full-Time Appointments

All jobs are permanent, full-time appointments unless otherwise stated in the announcement. The following benefits are available:



Paid Leave : Vacation leave is earned at the rate of four hours biweekly. Leave accrual increases every three years until eight hours of leave are earned biweekly for twelve or more years of service. Sick leave is earned at the rate of four hours biweekly. There are eleven paid holidays each year.



Health and Dental Insurance : Three group health insurance plans are offered - a network open access plan, a point-of-service plan, and a health maintenance organization. A group dental insurance plan is also offered. The County pays a significant portion of the premium for these plans for employees and their dependents. A discount vision plan is provided for eye care needs.



Life Insurance : A group term policy of basic life insurance is provided at no cost to employees. The benefit is one times annual salary. Additional life insurance is available with rates based on the employee's age and smoker/non-smoker status.



Retirement : The County offers three vehicles to help you prepare for retirement: a defined benefit plan, a defined contribution plan (401(a)), and a deferred compensation plan (457). The defined benefit plan provides a monthly retirement benefit based on your final average salary and years of service with the County. You contribute a portion of your salary on a pre-tax basis to this plan. General employees contribute 4% of pay; uniformed public safety employees contribute 7.5% of pay. Employees become vested in the plan at five years of service. The County also contributes to this plan.



For general employees, the County also contributes 4.2% of pay to a defined contribution plan (401(a)) . The County also matches your 457 contribution, up to $20 per pay period, in this plan. The 457 deferred compensation plan allows you to set aside money on either a pre-tax (457b) or post-tax (457 Roth) basis up to the IRS annual limit. New employees are automatically enrolled with a pre-tax contribution equal to 2% of your base pay.



Other Benefits: The County also offers health, dependent care, and parking flexible spending accounts; long-term care insurance; tuition assistance; transit and walk/bike to work subsidies; a college savings plan; wellness programs; training opportunities; and a variety of other employee benefits.



Permanent, Part-Time Appointments:

Part time employees who work ten or more hours per week receive paid leave and benefits in proportion to the number of hours worked per week.



Limited Term Appointments:

Benefits are the same as permanent appointments except that the employees do not achieve permanent status.



Temporary Regular Appointments:

Temporary regular employees who work 30 hours or more per week are eligible for health, dental, and basic life insurance as described above. They are also eligible for vacation, sick leave, and paid holidays.



Temporary Seasonal and Occasional Appointments:

Temporary employees who work on a seasonal basis or variable hours receive sick leave, but do not normally receive other paid leave or benefits. Exceptions are noted in individual announcements.


Magnolia, AR (71754)

Today

Thunderstorms - a few could contain very heavy rain, especially this afternoon. High around 85F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 90%..

Tonight

A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible early. Clear to partly cloudy. Low 64F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph.
Le ministre du Travail a pris part aux debats le 17 juin 2021 sur The Appropriation (2021-2022) Bill 2021, apres avoir repondu a une Private Notice Question sur Betamax

Mr Speaker Sir,

Let me start by saying that the title Better Together and philosophy of this budget are in line with the spirit with which late Sir Anerood Jugnauth who has made this country what it is today. Credit goes to him and may his soul rest in peace.

Since the beginning of the budgetary debate, every member who has intervened before me took time to elaborate on the difficulties which we have been experiencing since last year. The pandemic has caused unprecedented disruptions to both supply and demand in the world and Mauritius has not been spared.

Measures announced last Friday by my colleague, the Minister of Finance, Economic Planning and Development, are meant to achieve Recovery, Revival and Resilience.

Mr Speaker Sir,

According to ILO, it is estimated that around 114 Million jobs were lost in 2020 alone and it is projected that in 2021, there would be a continued loss in employment corresponding to 90 Million full time jobs.

Unfortunately, Mauritius has known the same fate. For 2 years running our economy has suffered from severe contraction which have impacted on the labour market leading to an increase in the unemployment rate from 6.7% in 2019 to 9.2% in 2020. The validity of these figures have been accepted by international institutions such as, World Bank and IMF.

Mr Speaker Sir,

The figures compiled at the level of my Ministry show that last year, in 2020, 8439 people lost their jobs for economic reasons, related to Covid. A further 9166 had been dismissed for non-ecomonic reasons. So, for the year 2020, 17,605 redundancies were registered at the Ministry of Labour.

Allow me, Mr Speaker, to clarify some points regarding the figures of unemployment raised by some members of the opposition in this august assembly since the very beginning of the debate.

I listened attentively to the explanations of The Hon leader of the opposition and Hon. Shakeel Mohamed who said that this government is skewing the numbers. It seems that these honourable members are obsessed with the figure of 100,000 unemployed!

This number is like a stain they want to put on the back of the government.

I would like to reiterate here, that the figure of 100,000 unemployed was given by the Minister of Finance, Dr Renganaden Padayachy, last year when he was asked about the possible consequences of the economic crisis due to Covid on employment.

He replied that  potentially we could end up with 100,000 unemployed  . I am minded to say that he, like other ecomonic observers, was forecasting the worst scenario.

Under the given circumstances we simply could not sleep on our laurels and do nothing about it, we had to act. In the last budget we introduced bold measures specifically to avoid the worst. In reality, this government did everything that was required under the circumstances to protect as many jobs as possible.

Amongst others, non-conventional measures such as the Wage Assistance Scheme & Self Employed Assistance Scheme were introduced to relieve workers from the dread of being laid off. Like it or not people in the tourism sector have been paid their salary up to an amount of Rs 25,000.

This is exceptional and I cant recall of any other African country which has done the same. And we are not stopping here, we shall continue to pay the salary of workers in the tourism sector till the end of the September 2021. Today we can take pride in having successfully kept the mass unemployment at bay thus avoiding a social crisis.

Mr Speaker Sir,

The House will recall that for a continuous period during the Labour led government, recruitment in the public sector was almost freezed. Instead of substantive and pensionable positions, people were unfortunately being offered merely temporary jobs as a result of poor policy making.

I take pride to say that this government, since assuming office, has given prominence to the filling of vacancies in the public service through the permanent recruitment of persons at all levels. It is now announced the Government will recruit a significant number of persons in the public sector soon.

Now I come to this figure of 100,000 unemployed as mentioned by some member of the opposition.

As announced, the number of unemployed is 52,200 which is equivalent to 9.2% which Statistics Mauritius computed in its yearly household survey. According to Members on the other side of the House, the figure of 52,200 should have been added to the figure of 42,000 falling in the category of  potential in employment  in order to obtain the real figure of unemployment which, according to them, should have been oscillated around their magic figure of 100,000 unemployed.

Mr Speaker Sir,

According to ILO, unemployment is defined as someone who is available for work and actively looking for job as compared to potential labour force which refer to a person in unemployment and who is not actively looking for a job.

Mr Speaker Sir,

Logic would dictate that had it been the case as showcased by the opposition, Statistics Mauritius would have taken into account this particular fact and it goes without saying that the unemployment rate would have been estimated much above 9.2%.

The wrong interpretation of the official stats by a former minister of Finance and former minister of Labour is wrong in principal and it tantamounts to casting doubt on the integrity of the office of Statistics Mauritius which compute unemployment rate according to international standard taking into consideration, for example, indicators on international labour organisations conventions.

Actually, I would say that they have been astounded by the fact that we have been able to contain the unemployment rate and thus preventing a social crisis although the economic indicators are in the red.

Mr Speaker Sir,

Having said so, Unemployment remains a major concern for us and new policies and ideas are becoming necessary. Hence, to be in line with those needs, we introduced in 2017 the National Employment Act, which made provisions for the setting up of the National Employment Department (NED).

Mr Speaker Sir,

I must admit that there has been a delay in the implementation of this project due to the fact that capacity building of the staff by Pole Emploi was ongoing and the restructuring exercise was in the process of being completed.

That new department will have as main objective to collect and analyse data on any employment related matters in order to address the needs of the labour market, including skills mismatch, under-employment, unemployment and future employment prospects and to anticipate future needs and expectations of job seekers and employers.

The NED will also provide for a modern e-platform posting of vacancies by employers as well as registration and placement of jobseekers. Among other new service delivery, there will be counselling, meeting with employers, close follow-up to empower jobseekers to join the labour market. Here, I would like to thank the cooperation of the French Government and Pole Emploi for their technical support.

The National Employment Act also provides for the setting up of a National Employment Advisory Committee. The main functions of the Committee will be to advise on employment policies and strategies, employment opportunities, both local and overseas, training and placement schemes and most importantly linkages between the education and training systems and the workplace.

Mr Speaker Sir,

As you are aware, the COVID-19 pandemic has caused a massive economic and social shock due to business interruptions and shutdowns thus questioning our livelihoods, training and skills development ecosystem.

As such, this pandemic has put to the fore the importance of the skills strategy that is also structurally responsive to external shocks, as well as being flexible enough to accommodate dynamic demands and growing unemployment.

The strategy will attempt to address the existing structural challenges in our skills development eco system. My Ministry is finalising the National Skills Development Strategy 2021-2025 which will provide a basis to bring about changes across the system. This strategy has been developed with the technical assistance of the AFD (Agence Francaise de Developpement) to provide an overarching strategic framework to further promote skills development, bearing in mind the current and upcoming challenges. An action plan has been developed to enact the strategy with the collaboration of key stakeholders such as the Ministry of Education and other institutions. The strategy articulates around three main clusters namely:

Improving skills system effectiveness;

Tackling skills imbalances; and

Strengthening the Educational and training system to prepare and empower young people for the future.

My Ministry has been nimble to act prompt and within the Economic Recovery Programme. Realising the urgency to tackle job losses and reskilling, the Government is reinforcing investment in the NTRS (National Training & Re-skilling Scheme). To improve the efficacy of the scheme, MITD has been given added responsibility to implement targeted sectors of the NTRS where it has training capabilities.

We have started implementing the National Training and Reskilling Scheme (NTRS) targeting some 6,000 unemployed persons to be trained in fields including construction, manufacturing, logistics, ICT/BPO, agro-industry, renewable energy and circular economy for a duration of up to 6 months as announced previously. Participants will be eligible to a training stipend of Rs 10,575.

Under this scheme, 25 projects have already been approved for training of more than 2000 unemployed people. The projects span across sectors such as ICT/BPO, Agro-Industry, Construction, Health Care, Manufacturing and Renewable Energy & Circular Economy.

Mr Speaker Sir,

Many employers are having economic difficulties to sustain their workforce and as such, they can benefit from the employability schemes of my Ministry. We will facilitate the participation of employers by integrating the employability schemes on a single platform for exchanges of information.

Due to the effects of the Covid-19, the number of private employers who are facing financial constraints and willing to benefit from the Youth Employment Programme (YEP) has tremendously increased.

Since the launching of YEP in January 2013 up to May 2021, some 23,981 youths have been placed out of 39,738 registered. And today, 95% of those who have completed their one-years placement have been employed due to the employability skills acquired during their placement. The extension for another year, as announced in the budget speech, for some 2,250 trainees will be a boost up for the programme.

As you are aware, the unemployment rate among women is high. Study shows that women have been employed in traditional sectors like agriculture, textile and services. Statistics have shown that during the years, there has been a drop in women employment in those sectors. There are other sectors where women can be employed and also be an entrepreneur in fields like hairdressing and beautician amongst others. Through, the Back to Work Programme, my Ministry is providing tailor-made courses for these women so that they can meet demands in the programme. Here, I welcome the increase of the monthly stipend from Rs 6,000 to Rs 10,575, as this will give them an opportunity to have a stipend which is equal to the minimum wage.

Since the introduction of this programme, some 300 employers have participated in it and 1,325 women have been placed in productive employment. The aim is now to attract more women to be trained and placed in employment in order to curd down the rate of unemployment amongst women.

Mr Speaker Sir,

There is also a need to promote labour migration. In this context, my Ministry will set up a labour migration unit to look for overseas employment prospects.

Monsieur le President,

Au paragraphe 91 du Budget, il est question dun nouveau pilier economique base sur lenergie verte. Que ce soit avec leolien, la biomasse, wave energy ou le solaire, cette nouvelle industrie a un fort potentiel et necessitera de la main duvre.

Pour garantir que Maurice beneficie de la transition vers une economie verte, un ensemble doffres de formation techniques doit etre mis en place. Jinvite le CEB a collaborer avec le HRDC pour mener a bien cette initiative.

Le MITD appuiera aussi cet effort en proposant deux nouveaux programmes de formation a savoir :

Technicien en electricite avec cours en energie durable

Technicien en energie solaire.

Ces cours prepareront les stagiaires a travailler sur des projets defficacite energetique et denergie renouvelable.

Mr Speaker Sir,

Budget 2021/22 has announced additional measures to complement the ongoing schemes and programmes to curb the skills mismatch issues, such as the setting up of the digital skills academy. The HRDC being under the aegis of my Ministry, will be a major collaborator to jointly implement this programme. This will dovetail and complement existing initiatives in the digitalisation momentum.

Furthermore, a National Apprenticeship Programme shall be launched for the training of 750 apprentices who will get a monthly stipend of Rs5000 plus a travelling allowance of Rs1000.

My Ministry is also reinvigorating the importance of Technical and Vocational Education Training (TVET) in the skills development landscape of Mauritius. We have mounted vocational courses from low skills up to vocational masters to curb the issue of skills mismatch.

Similarly, in line of the strategy of my Ministry to reform TVET, the role of MITD has been heightened to provide training in specific areas and to complement skills development initiatives provided by Polytechnic Mauritius and ITET.

The MITD will be given a different impetus. It will streamline and consolidate its training centres, with synergies across trade area and training programmes that aim to develop a multi-skilled workforce to meet the needs of the industry. Clustering of training centres into regional ones would result into economies of scale and resource sharing. Furthermore, the MITD is establishing training schools to cater for the weakest profile of students in the school system. These schools will not aim to cover academic subjects too extensively, but will incorporate basic technical and life skills modules to help weaker students access semi-skilled jobs in the economy.

The MITD is working in close collaboration with the business sector to ensure training is aligned with industry needs. The MITD will continue to play an important part in the skills development of school leavers and unemployed for enhancing their employability in the reskilling and upskilling of those who are not fully employed because of the economic crisis.

TVET is an essential instrument for reducing youth unemployment and also for addressing the issue of poverty by empowering the socially and economically disadvantaged population. In order to widen access and enhance the employability of down trodden one, exceptional measures have been announced. The beneficiaries of SRM will be exempted from examination fees if they are pursuing studies to acquire specific skills at the MITD.

Mr Speaker Sir,

The HRDC is also implementing the National Skills Development Programme (NSDP) and the Graduate Training for Employment Scheme (GTES) to train unemployed youth and graduates to better develop and match their skills with the demand of enterprises. These programmes comprise two essential components namely demand-led training and industrial placement. Projects are mounted in such a manner to favour and support prospective employment, as they are demand-led. These programmes are also contributing to job creation, which is crucial in our current environment. Since its inception, more than 8000 youths have been trained, with more than 5000 of them having meaningful employment. The flexibility of such instruments, also make them amenable to support new economic pillars enunciated in the Budget.

Mr Speaker Sir,

The requisites of a rapidly changing world-of-work as a consequence of frenetic digital industrialization, increased automation, coupled to the foreseeable occurrences of shocks, for e.g. Covid pandemic, impact of climate change, amongst others, needed to be tackled by Government.

We, as a responsible Government, are investing into human capital and human capital formation. We are strategically doing so at a structural level through the systematic implementation of the NSDS 2021-2025, and at the operational level through the implementation of the skills development measures enunciated in the Budget Speech and the strengthening of existing ones.

Such an approach will help us address current issues that are subsequent to the pandemic, as well as more medium- to longer-term ones that are fundamental to our economic recovery and subsequent economic growth.

Right now, we should all be engaged, focused, driven while being nimble and flexible to adapt to forthcoming hazards.

Mr Speaker Sir

I now come to the measures announced to further protect our workers in line with the philosophy of this Government.

We are maximising efforts to reinforce the protection of foreign workers in Mauritius. Unfortunately, there are unscrupulous persons who employ foreign workers without a valid work permit.

The number of foreign workers who are today missing because they are presumably working illegally elsewhere is estimated to be around 2000.

We have come up, after long-standing consultations with all partners from private and public sectors, with a set of reforms, including the legislative amendments being recommended over here, to overturn this situation.

I am therefore reconciling the increase in penalties with the provision of a special humanitarian permit for workers who may have been victims of ill-treatment by their employers in Mauritius. This permit is the first of its kind in Mauritius and will be our best ally in our fight against human trafficking and the ill treatment of workers.

Monsieur le President,

En tant que Ministre du Travail, je suis bien place pour dire que cest ce gouvernement qui a le plus accompli en termes de protection des travailleurs.

Rehausser le niveau de vie de nos concitoyens demeure la priorite gouvernementale.

Larsenal legal mis en place depuis 2019 pour proteger les emplois a ete renforci en 2020. Cette annee-ci, nous avons etendu linterdiction de licencier jusqua la fin de Decembre 2021. Un regulation a ete prepare en ce sens et publie le Samedi 12 Juin 2021. Il entrera en vigueur le 01 Juillet 2021.

Mr Speaker Sir,

Government also made some major amendments to Workers Rights Act (WRA) so as to harness new measures made necessary or inevitable in the wake of the Covid-19.

Allow me to elaborate on their significance here

From the main amendments brought under the Covid-19 (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2020, we had:

The concept of work from home introduced by way of Regulations in September 2020 provided an opportunity to ensure business continuity and protecting employment.

Mr Speaker Sir,

the main amendments to be brought to the Workers Rights Act through the Finance (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2021 which aim at addressing practical hurdles in the proper enforcement of the existing provisions of the Workers Rights Act and further protecting the rights of workers.

Mr Speaker Sir,

The Workers Rights Act introduced the provision of compromise agreement with a view to protecting workers drawing a salary at a rate not exceeding Rs 600,000 in a year, against abuse by unscrupulous employers. An agreement which is not vetted by the Ministry is deemed to be null and void. However, there have been several cases of employers circumventing this provision by resorting to an agreement defined as a transaction under the Civil Code. Currently workers are made to sign an agreement unfavorable to them and the Ministry has no jurisdiction to vet such transactions made.

To prevent such abuse, a provision is being made in the Act so that Article 2044 and 2052 of the Civil Code shall not apply to a worker drawing up to Rs 600,000 a year.

With a view to safeguarding the rights of workers regarding the recovery of unpaid remuneration, the scope for the application for a protective order would be extended to the following situations, namely where workers are not paid their dues following an order of the Redundancy Board or a judgement of the Industrial Court, and in cases whereby they do not receive a gratuity on retirement payable under the Portable Retirement Gratuity Fund.

It has also been observed that in the recent past, workers of companies going in insolvency without an order from the Supreme Court were being penalized as they were not entitled to payment of unpaid remuneration up to an amount of Rs 50,000 as guaranteed by the Wage Guarantee Fund Account (WGFA). The proposed amendment will enable workers to obtain their dues under the WGFA once a company is considered to be insolvent.

Moreover, in some cases, laid off workers are not entitled to the transition unemployment benefit since they cannot make their application within the prescribed period of 60 days, although they showed good cause that they were sick or have sustained injury.

With a view to addressing this anomaly, provision would be made for the entitlement of the transition unemployment benefit to this category of workers.

(v) Enquiry has revealed that some employers are making an abuse of the Workfare Programme Fund by regularly laying off their workers and re-engaging them on new terms. Thus, the Workfare Programme Fund is being used to pay the wages of the workers during the period they have been laid off. A new provision is therefore being introduced whereby in these cases, employers would be required to refund the amount of transition unemployment benefit paid to these workers to the Workfare Programme Fund.

(vi) It has been brought to the attention of the Ministry that some employers are not complying with the new provision of the Workers Rights Act regarding the requirement to submit information or document related to a charge against a worker appearing before a disciplinary committee, and minutes of proceedings of the disciplinary committee. It is to be noted that this provision was introduced to ensure that workers are provided with necessary information to defend themselves.

Provisions are therefore being made so that non-compliance shall constitute an offence and on conviction, employers would be liable to a fine of Rs 25,000 or a term of imprisonment of 2 years.

(vii) Following the tragic incident at Champ de Mars on 15 May 2021, which caused the death of a Mauritian jockey, I have received representations from a group of jockeys, in respect to their conditions of employment more particularly regarding the non-payment of retirement gratuity upon retirement.

It is to be noted that this category of workers is not classified as workers on standard employment contract or as atypical workers since they are required to pay an insurance premium.

The government has not remained silent to their legitimate qualms; hence, provision would be made for them to be entitled to a payment of a gratuity under the Portable Retirement Gratuity Fund.

Mr Speaker Sir,

Up to last Friday, 361,182 people have had their first dose of vaccine. While 218,474 Mauritians already had their two doses. Without all the controversy fuelled by the opposition, we would have vaccinated many more people. But the government is doing the necessary to achieve its goal that is vaccinate as many persons as possible so that all economic activities can restart normally.

To this end, it is also of pivotal importance to ensure that employees work in a safe environment.

Hence the Occupational Safety and Health Division (OSHD) of my ministry has been and is still playing an active role in the prevention of Covid-19 infections at workplaces by carrying out regular inspections and investigations into complaints for non-compliance with sanitary protocol under specific regulations. The OSH Division is also conducting national sensitization on the pandemic.

Mr Speaker Sir,

I will now go through some measures concerning the Ministry of Commerce.

The minimum shelf space for locally manufactured products in supermarkets will be increased from 10% to 40%. This measure is expected to boost local production by providing an incentive through higher visibility for local products.

Yesterday, Honourable Sik Yuen presented to this House a list of products whose prices have known an increase recently Concerning increasing prices of commodities, he should know that pricing of most goods in Mauritius are determined and influenced by market forces though there is also price control on a selected number of products in accordance with the Consumer Protection (Price and Supplies Control) Act.

Monsieur le President,

Cest un fait que lappreciation du dollar et dautres devises etrangeres vis-a-vis de la roupie se traduit par une augmentation du prix des produits, notamment ceux importes. Cela aussi, lHonorable Sik Yuen doit bien le savoir, il lui suffit de demander aux distributeurs qui fournissent des produits au Sik Yuen Supermarket a Curepipe.

Mais imaginez ce quaurait ete la situation si le gouvernement navait pris aucune mesure pour introduire le controle des prix dun certain nombre de produits de base ? Que ce soit durant la premiere vague ou la deuxieme vague du Covid, ce gouvernement est intervenu pour sassurer, dune part, que le pays etait approvisionne et dautre part, quil ny avait pas dabus en termes de prix.

Mr Speaker Sir,

The price of twenty-six products are controlled under this mechanism like rice, white and brown flour, gas cylinders, potatoes, onions, basmati rice, canned sardines, face-masks, hand Sanitisers, infant milk powder, Pilchards, sanitary pads and pulses.

Monsieur le President,

La Consumer Affairs Unit sassure que les commercants travaillent selon les termes prescrits. Les officiers de mon ministere sont sur le terrain et, de Juillet 2020 au 4 Juin 2021, pas moins de 16,388 visites ont ete effectuees dans divers commerces. Pres de 1300 contraventions ont ete dressees pour non-affichage de prix et pour prix abusifs durant la meme periode.

Face a la demagogie de nos adversaires, je tiens a rappeler que dans le Budget presente lannee derniere, le Gouvernement avait deja prevu Rs 2 milliards de subsides pour maintenir le prix au detail du riz et de la farine a leur niveau actuel, et le prix de la bonbonne de 12 kg de gaz menager a ete reduit de Rs 210 a Rs 180. Nous avons cette annee introduit un subside sur le sac de 25 kg de farine. Une famille fera des economies dorenavant grace a cette mesure.

Dans la lignee du New Normal et face a une augmentation des prix des produits que nous importons, il est souhaitable que le Mauricien revoie aussi sa maniere de consommer. Voyons un peu ce qui se passe ailleurs et inspirons-nous de ces pratiques. Beaucoup de familles ont cree leur propre petit potager.

Et a Maurice, rappelons-nous de lepoque quand des milliers de familles elevaient des poules qui leur assuraient de la viande et des ufs.

Mon collegue Manish Gobin en tant que ministre de lAgriculture na de cesse de militer dans cette direction et cest une initiative fort louable.

Mr. Speaker Sir,

Members of the House, as well as the general public, are well aware that the State Trading Corporation (STC) has gone through some extremely turbulent times over the past year or so. I do not intend here to go back into the causes of this situation. I am informed that the National Audit Committee has recently completed its audit exercise at the Corporation and will soon be providing its findings to the Management.

The recent judgement of the Privy Council in favour of Betamax has further increased the challenges faced by the Corporation. However, as I stated earlier during the PNQ session, the STC will honour its obligations towards Betamax although we are still of the opinion that the contract was tailor-made to favour the latter.

Mr Speaker Sir

In these challenging times I have instructed the management and Board to take all necessary steps to strengthen the resilience of the corporation in the face of the immediate emergency while it strengthens its capabilities and organization flexibility to measure up to the forthcoming emerging internal and international environment which will certainly have an impact on the scope of its future role as the trading arm of the Government. We are all aware of the huge disruptions which have marked global trade in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic and as many authorities on the matter seem to agree, these will most likely have a permanent impact in shaping the new normal post Covid global trade scenario.

We have already witnessed the immediate impact of this situation and how it has negatively affected the movement of ships and cargo in our region. In what they describe as a rationalization of the routes served by them, the major shipping lines are more and more reticent to visit the ports of Small Island Developing States such as Mauritius and are inclined to consolidate and focus on a regional strategy. On the other hand, there is also a rising expectation that the post-Covid era may witness a fundamental change in global trade patterns as countries decide to procure goods and services from source geographically closer to them. In such a context, there will be huge potential for substantial increases in South-South trade.

Mr Speaker Sir

One of the most under rated achievements of this government over the past year or so has been the unprecedented success of our economic diplomacy leading to the ratification of the Comprehensive Economic Cooperation and Partnership Agreement (CECPA) with India coupled with the Free Trade Agreement with China. Add to this the fact that the African Continental Free Trade Agreement of which Mauritius is a party has come into force as from the 1st of January this year and we have a perfect cocktail of opportunities as opposed to the storm of challenges that I have mentioned earlier.

To come back to the STC, Mr Speaker Sir, this is the wider context in which the corporation will be called upon to constantly adjust its mission and objectives as well as its day-to-day operations to continue to serve the nation by contributing to consumer welfare, by ensuring the continuous supply of necessities to the population and creating the conditions for greater competition among economic operators.

In conclusion to this chapter concerning the STC, allow me, Mr Speaker, to share the conviction which has motivated me since I have been entrusted the portfolio of Minister for Commerce and Consumer Protection, and I sincerely hope that beyond sheer cynicism and political partisanship, my honourable colleagues will agree that: ce qui est mauvais pour la STC est mauvais pour le pays et ce qui est bon pour la STC est bon pour notre pays.

Monsieur le President,

En conclusion, je dirai que le Premier ministre Pravind Jugnauth et le Ministre des Finances ont agi avec promptitude quand le besoin sest fait sentir.

La croissance que nous esperons tous pour que notre economie decolle a nouveau sera possible que si nous faisons force commune. LIle Maurice doit se remettre au travail.

Ensam Tou Possib ce nest plus seulement un slogan de campagne, cest une necessite et cest dans cet esprit-la que nous remettrons ce pays sur les rails.

Let us all join hands together, and make it happen.

Merci.
There are also more low-skilled jobs now requiring only a high school diploma that pay $20 an hour and include benefits. Its not a mystery why someone wouldnt want to landscape all day in the heat for $10 an hour or work at the diner for $2.83 per hour plus the tips on a $12 breakfast.
Of the four candidates, Tuerk raised and spent the least amount of money over the final two weeks of the primary, but the most overall. He brought in $2,600 and spent $27,609 in May. In total, he raised more than $126,000 and spent more than $119,000  about $57.50 per vote.
But Spotlight PA reported June 9 that at least one document was still live and accessible online to anyone with the link, and contained the names of people who were potentially infected with the coronavirus, along with their dates of birth, phone numbers, counties of residence, and notes related to their test status or other personal information.
Weintraub said there was a large amount of blood throughout the Audi and it was unclear whether the victim was killed in the car or if it was used to transport the body. Police found a large knife with a wooden handle, believed to be the murder weapon, on the floor of the Audi as well, according to Weintraub.
History lessons arent always bright and cheery. Much of history, in fact, is cringeworthy. That doesnt mean learning about it should be optional to those who find it uncomfortable.
Since the start of the pandemic, families and communities have become acutely aware of the vital role that the public schools play in the lives of children and their families. Not only did they educate and provide safe environments for students, they provided meals, technology and health services, and connected families in need to community support agencies.
Instead of fixing the wage gap, the gender gap or anything that has to do with infrastructure, they pound their chests and scream how Dems wont work with them and arent being bipartisan (while they turn around and also say they wont compromise with Dems and block every bill a Dem writes).
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Sayre, PA (18840)

Today

Scattered thunderstorms during the morning becoming more widespread this afternoon. High 72F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 70%..

Tonight

Thunderstorms this evening followed by occasional showers overnight. Low 57F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 70%.
Air pollution is now identified as one of the world's biggest killers, yet the relative contribution of different kinds of emissions has until now been hard to calculate.

Air pollution-related Deaths in China and India

However, after putting together data from numerous atmospheric chemistry models and satellite-derived emissions evaluation, scientists have now come to a conclusion that 1.05 million deaths were due to fossil fuel combustion in 2017, with coal responsible for over half of this figure.

Given that the highest number of air pollution-related deaths happened in China and India, the study authors calculate that getting rid of coal and oil and natural gas combustion in both countries could reduce the universal death rate from fossil fuel emissions by 20 percent.

Presenting their discoveries in the journal Nature Communications, the scientists note that "approximately 1 million deaths could be prevented by the global elimination of fossil-fuel combustion, with 20% of this burden linked with the use of fossil-fuel in China and India alone."

Also Read: Decline in Earth's Oxygen Caused by Fossil Fuels, Experts Suggest

PM2.5

The study authors made use of updated emissions datasets in order to calculate the level of microscopic particles referred to as PM2.5 in 204 countries all over the world.

Measuring below 2.5 micrometers, these particles have the ability to make their way into the lungs and cardiovascular system of humans, bringing about respiratory and heart illnesses.

Overall, the team discovered that the burning of fossil fuels was responsible for 27.3 percent of all deaths that are PM2.5-related in 2017, while the use of solid biofuels, like wood and charcoal, added another 20 percent.

Researchers wrote: "The use of solid biofuel was a major source of emissions from the residential sector and was the dominant contributing combustible fuel in 78 countries, mostly all around the tropics."

Normally used for heating and cooking in residential settings, biofuel combustion was found to be responsible for up to 40 percent of the PM2.5 disease burden in countries like Nepal, Guatemala, and Rwanda.

Health Impact of PM2.5

Universally, residential emissions caused 740,000 deaths in 2017, while air pollution produced by the industrial and energy sectors led to 450,000 and 390,000 deaths, respectively. Agriculture and transport, meanwhile, both contributed approximately eight percent of global PM2.5 deaths.

To carry out their research, the study authors merged their enhanced global emissions data with the Global Burden of Disease, thereby achieving an unprecedented level of detail on the health impact of PM2.5 in various places all over the world.

Study author Randall Martin explained in a statement: "PM2.5 is the leading environmental risk factor for mortality in the world. Our primary objective is to understand its sources." Doing so will enable researchers and policymakers to develop targeted mitigation approaches for the reduction of air pollution across various regions, thereby providing a roadmap to a more healthy environment and minimal deaths.

Related Article: New Study: Pollution from Combustion of Fossil Fuel is More Dangerous Than Previously Imagined

For more news, updates about fossil fuel combustion and similar topics don't forget to follow Nature World News!
AccuWeather meteorologists will be keeping an eye on portions of the Midwest for severe thunderstorms in the coming days, as the threat from Thursday will move farther south and east on Friday.

Multiple Thunderstorms Impacts Western Lowa

On Wednesday evening, multiple thunderstorms impacted western Iowa with intense winds. Sadly, a much larger region will be in danger into Thursday night, and wind may not be the only hazard. After a calm midday, Thursday evening will become stormy for the area as afternoon thunderstorms in Iowa, central Wisconsin and southern Minnesota and slice southeastward.

As the storms form initially, large hail will be the major threat. Also, isolated tornadoes are not out of the question. Later into the evening and overnight, two different rounds of thunderstorms may move across southern Wisconsin and northern Iowa. Milwaukee and Davenport, Iowa are just two places that are at risk of severe weather.

Once the storm clusters develop and become organized, the major hazard will move to the heavy rain and high winds, particularly for regions that are dealt over one thunderstorm. AccuWeather Meteorologist Rob Richards said: "The major risks will be flooding downpours and damaging wind gusts for this part of the country." Any heavy rain could bring about ponding on roadways.

Also Read: Extreme Weather Leaves Thousands Without Power, Homes Damaged in Northeast Coas

Effects of Thunderstorms

Motorists along interstates 35, 39, 80 and 90 will need to reduce their speed and allow extra time to prevent hydroplaning. The storms will continue moving east late Thursday night, with Springfield, Illinois and Chicago; and South Bend, Indiana, at risk for very intense winds. The winds may be powerful enough to bring about power outages and even minor property damage.

Richards cautioned, "Some of the most powerful thunderstorms could produce wind gusts as high as an AccuWeather Local StormMaxTM of 90 mph." With the storms coming overnight in many places, residents will need to have the means to get alerted if a warning is issued for their location.

The storms are anticipated to weaken gradually as they keep moving farther eastward into Michigan and Ohio by Friday morning. However, the threat will not stop there.

Widespread Severe Weather

Richards stated that on Friday a cold front will march south and east, bringing about severe thunderstorms to form across the Ohio River Valley and into western Pennsylvania Indianapolis, Cleveland and Pittsburgh are a few areas that may have to cope with severe weather to end the week.

The storms will progress during the mid-afternoon hours and by evening it'll dive southward toward the Ohio River. Flooding, damaging winds, hail, and isolated tornadoes could take place as far south as northern Kentucky before the storms reduce later at night.

Isolated thunderstorms may affect some parts of the Northeast Saturday. While serious downpours and locally gusty winds are likely to occur, widespread severe weather is not anticipated.

Related Article: Full Spectrum of Extreme Weather Expected at North-Central U.S, Meteorologists Warn

For more news, updates about severe weather and similar topics don't forget to follow Nature World News!
The Chinese government has admitted damage to fuel rods at a nuclear power plant in the south of the country, but said there have been no radioactivity leak.

US Government Assesses a Reported Leak at the Facility

China's Ministry of Ecology and Environment said the problem was "common" with no need for worry. The acknowledgment comes after CNN reported that the United State government was assessing a reported leak at the facility. The French energy firm which assists in operating the plant in Guangdong province reported a "performance issue" earlier.

On Monday, an EDF spokesperson said a problem with fuel rods had brought about the build-up of gases, which had to be discharged into the atmosphere. In its report, CNN said the company had given warning to the US government that the nuclear regulator of China had raised limits on permissible levels of radiation outside the plant to prevent shutting it down.

But China's environment ministry said this report was not true in a Wednesday statement. The statement - its first formal confirmation of the incident - said while the regulator, the National Nuclear Safety Administration (NNSA), had made a review of the use of noble gases in a reactor, this had "nothing to do with radiation detection outside the nuclear plant."

Also Read: Radioactive Wild Boars Take Over Japanese Towns After Fukushima Nuclear Disaster

Noble Gases

Noble gases - also referred to as inert gases - are a group of stable chemical elements whose reactivity are very low. They are usually used in situations where researchers do not want chemical reactions, for example in nuclear reactors or lighting.

A boost in radiation levels was noticed in Taishan's Unit 1 reactor, but this was within the parameters for secure operations, the ministry said. The ministry said the increase was brought about by destruction to the cladding of a little number of fuel rods. Sealed metal tubes which carry nuclear materials used to fuel the nuclear reactor are called Fuel rods.

The ministry said of the 60,000 fuel rods in the reactor, the destroyed ones was responsible for "less than 0.01 percent. "Its statement said "fuel-rod damage during the nuclear power plants operation can be prevented" and "a common occurrence"

Taishan Plant

The Taishan plant supplies power for the Guangzhou and Shenzhen regions, both primary manufacturing hubs.

China has dozens of nuclear plants and has put in billions of dollars to develop its atomic energy sector. China is one of the biggest nuclear power users and is producing more reactors at a time when few other governments plan new facilities due to the cost of solar, wind and other options is plunging.

Chinese leaders see nuclear power as a means to curb air pollution and make a demand for imports of gas and oil, which they consider as a security risk.

Related Article: Brewing Heat: Nuclear Reactions Are Flaring in the Deeps of Chernobyl

For more news, updates about radiation leaks and similar topics don't forget to follow Nature World News!


As an intense and record-breaking heat wave keeps roasting the American West, the highest temperature happened on Wednesday at the lowest point in North America - Death Valley.

Death Valley

According to the National Weather Service, high temperatures in Death Valley, California, pushed to 125 degrees by Wednesday evening, with an AccuWeather RealFeel Temperature of 130.

Death Valley is the record-holder for the highest air temperature that has been recorded on Earth, a scorching 134 degrees Fahrenheit in 1913. 125 degrees high temperature came just within 9 degrees of that world record. Newsweek reported that California Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a State of Emergency in California on Thursday because of the extreme heat.

On Thursday, record-high temperatures were recorded in Death Valley, California; Barstow, California; Las Vegas; Kingman, Arizona; Needles, California; and Bishop, California. Each region topped its past record high temperature for June 17 and Palm Springs, California broke its record for any day in June.

Death Valley recorded its highest temperature of the heat wave as yet, getting to a scorching reaching 128 degrees.

Also Read: Experts Warn of Blistering Heat Wave to Envelope the Southeast

The Hottest Locations in the Lower 48

Death Valley is surely living up to its name as AccuWeather forecasters cautions that "most outdoor activity is likely life-threatening" in such severe heat, which will persist through the week. Bill Wadell, AccuWeather National Reporter, is in Death Valley and giving reports from there on the network.

By Wednesday 9 a.m. the temperature had reach 106 there and kept going. After 1 p.m., the mercury had increased to 121. The NWS marked Death Valley and Stovepipe Wells, California by 5 p.m., local time, as the hottest areas in the Lower 48 on Wednesday, both at 125 degrees F.

On the other state end, in northern California, one of the coldest temperatures of the day in the Lower 48 was recorded close to Old Station. Both that area and a station close to Sand Creek Station and Foster Flat in Oregon recorded low temperatures 25 degrees F - a difference of 100 degree.

Heat Watches and Warnings

But Death Valley is barely the only region experiencing searing heat, and many others have inputted new marks in the weather history books, and there could be falling of some more records, according to AccuWeather meteorologists. Forecasters say this present heat wave won't only be remembered for its severity, but for its duration also.

Dozens of record highs have fallen already from Arizona and California to Utah to Montana and Idaho, and there is a possibility of more tumbling while heading into the weekend as temperatures remain well above 100 F and 110.

The expansive nature of too many heat watches and warnings over some parts of the country accustomed to extreme heat is a testament to the extremity of this particular heat wave. Most of these alerts last into the weekend.

Related Article: Record-Breaking Heat Wave: California Residents Brace for Triple-Digit Temperature

For more news, updates about heat waves and similar topics don't forget to follow Nature World News!
PASTOR Panganayi Makarichi aligned to the breakaway AFM faction led by Cossam Chiangwa has been dragged to court for refusing to return the churchs motor vehicle.

According to an application for vindicatory relief, Makarichi has been illegally possessing an Isuzu KB300 double cab since the initial split sometime in 2018.

The documents also claim Makarichi has already vacated the churchs mission house in the capital following a recent Supreme Court ruling that stripped rights to assets to all aligned to reverend Cossam Chiangwas faction.

This is an application to this Honourable Court for a vindicatory relief compelling Makarichi to surrender to AFM in Zimbabwe its motor vehicle an Isuzu KB300 double cab truck registration number AEC 4083 following the termination of his employment with the church sometime in December 2018.

Makarichi is in possession of the above mentioned vehicle since the split of the church in 2018 up to date.

He was enjoying the use of the said motor vehicle due to the just ended litigation in the Apostolic Faith Mission in Zimbabwe under case SC 67/21, reads an affidavit deposed by the churchs secretary general Briton Tembo.

Tembo went on to claim that Makarichi had no standing to continue withholding the motor vehicle.

Furthermore, Makarichi has no basis to continue holding on to the motor vehicle which belongs to AFM in Zimbabwe.

Makarichi has already vacated the church mission house meaning he is aware that he should hand over all the possessions of AFM back, he said.

He said the church is incurring unnecessary litigation charges due to Makarichis continued possession of the said vehicle.

Due to Makarichis illegal possession of the motor vehicle, AFM has been unnecessarily forced to incur litigation expenses. Thus AFM prays that Makarichi be ordered to pay costs on a scale of legal practitioner-client scale, reads the papers.

Makarichi is yet to respond to the application. H Metro
ZIMBABWE was prejudiced of millions of United States dollars as a result of irregular procurement transactions around Covid-19 materials, with sharp scrutiny centred on tenders awarded to Young Health Care and Eqstra Holdings.

This has compelled the Auditor-General Mildred Chiri to institute an investigation into the murky deals following widespread reports that public procurement entities failed to submit relevant documentation to authorities.

The Zimbabwe Independent, in collaboration with the Voluntary Media Council of Zimbabwe (VMCZ), looked into how Covid-19 resources were utilised by central government and local authorities.

Official information from the Procurement Regulatory Authority (Praz) shows that Parliament and the Auditor-General were in possession of a report around Covid-19 procurement. The report cannot be released now due to parliamentary reporting procedures.

However, Harare City Council is involved in an opaque transaction where Eqstra Holdings, failed to deliver 10 000 Tyvek Covid-19 protective overalls worth ZW$51 520 000 (US$606 117) after it was unprocedurally awarded a tender.

Irregularities in the tender are contained in an audit report by the citys internal audit department. The matter is now a subject of investigation by the Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Commission (Zacc).

According to the audit report, council audit manager Archibald Nyamurova noted that prices for the equipment were inflated.

Suspended Harare Town Clerk Hosiah Chisango ordered the audit after learning that Eqstra was cherry-picked to supply the Tyvek coveralls under order number 0105212.

The initial purchase order (0105212) for Eqstra to supply council with 15 000 Tyvek suits at a price of ZW$2 997 (US$37) per unit at a total value of ZW$44 650 000 (US$525 294) was way cheaper, despite having more units.

The audit report reads: Council was deprived of its right to receive ZW$25 760 000

(US$303 000) worth of stock as result of the 5 000 units which were not delivered to council.

Eqstra was awarded an order by council to supply 15 000 suits, however, the company only supplied council with 10 000 Tyvek suits at a price of $5 152 (US$60) per unit.

In US dollar terms, a benefit of US$1 030 400 was forfeited as a result of the non-delivery.

The audit report reads: Council engaged Eqstra Hardware and Electrical who had no capacity to deliver the 15 000 Tyvek suits on the initial contract. After council authorised a reduction of the 15 000 units to 10 000 units, Eqstra Hardware and Electrical took four months to deliver the 10 000-unit consignment.

However, the company had indicated on its first bid that the 15 000 units were immediately available.

The report further says council was prejudiced of US$862 000 because of the authorised but unjustified price variation.

However, though the internal audit document was generated within the structures of council, Eqstra Hardware and Electrical, through its lawyers have dismissed its contents.

The owners (shareholders) of Eqstra Trading Private Limited hereinafter called Eqstra Trading namely Gretwin Chitauro and Samuel Kunyarimwe have never been blacklisted for any allegations by any State or private institution.

Only the Procurement Regulatory Authority of Zimbabwe (Praz) can blacklist companies or individuals from dealing with State institutions, Wintertons Legal Practitioners, representing Eqstra Trading, said.

Subsequently, Praz ordered suppliers to submit all procurement records for Covid-19 emergency procurements in electronic and/or scanned form in line with the Public Procurement and Disposal of Public Assets Act (PPDPA).

Information obtained by the Independent shows that while the PPDPA set the procurement record adequacy level standard at 100%, an assessment of Covid-19 emergency procurements indicated an overall record adequacy level of 44% with local authorities, at 41% with ministries, at 35% with parastatals.

Excessive and fraudulent procurement of Covid19 drugs and other issues also sucked in the government in the Drax procurement scandal.

The Independent has established that internal control weaknesses in the procurement and vendor management processes have been identified.

There are now fears that the figures reported by procurement entities (PEs) are way below the actual Covid-19 expenditure for the year 2020 as the total procurement values have been derived from a 51% PE submission effort.

This implies that the scandals in relation to Covid-19 procurement could actually be deeper than what is in the public domain as Praz is battling high levels of non-compliance by PEs with 49% of PEs having failed to declare any Covid-19 emergency procurements as of the end of 2020.

This is coming as the authority is also battling inefficiency in procurement processes with non-professional people flooding the entities.

A Praz strategy document shows that there were non-professional people in practice with 50% of procurement professionals still requiring capacity building while the sector has no code of ethics and a procurement professional council.

Twenty-five percent still need sensitisation, 60% of PEs still to apply for authorisation to conduct procurement and there are over 45% control overrides which affect effectiveness and 50% of the practitioners require capacitation on the law, while 100% require licensing, read the document.

Praz acting chief executive officer Clever Ruswa admitted the challenges in the Covid-19 procurement, as well as gross understatement of Covid-19 procurement figures by the PEs. However, he could not give figures saying they were still under investigation by Parliament and the Auditor-Generals Office.

Some of the non-companies that emerged from Praz monitoring and evaluation procurement reviews were as follows: As of end of 2020, 176 PEs (51%) although some having delayed submitting reports citing various reasons, complied with the directive to report on the Covid-19 procurements. 169 PEs, (49%) did not declare any Covid-19 emergency procurements. Given that the Covid-19 emergency procurements were subject to the framework arrangements centrally coordinated by the Ministry of Health and Child Care, the review process sought to assess the level to which the PPDPA Act, Circular guidelines, framework agreements and catalogues were adhered to, he said.

Based on the review of the 176 PE submissions, the following was observed: Submission effort of Covid-19 Emergency Procurements returns by PE Category and by Industry was at 51%. Given that the total procurement values have been derived from a 51% PE submission effort, there is a high possibility that the figures reported by PEs are way below the actual Covid-19 expenditure for this period.

Relating to Young Health Care, details show that Health and Childcare deputy minister John Mangwiro allegedly played a part in the unprocedural awarding of a US$6 million tender to the entity, triggering investigations by Zacc.

In December 2020, Mangwiro, was summoned by Zacc. A warned and cautioned statement was recorded over the Young Health Care tender.

Mangwiro was facing charges of interfering in the bidding process for the supply of Covid-19-related materials by Young Health Care to the National Pharmaceutical Company (Natpharm).

Based on the Ministry of Finance and Economic Development submission, the government provided a total budget of ZW$3,7 billion (US$43,5 million) across various ministries and departments although, the actual disbursements at September 2020 to PEs against this budget is reported as a total of ZW$2,3 billion (US$27 million).

Delays and non-submission of returns and procurement entities levels imply a significant and urgent need for the PPDPA compliance, monitoring and evaluation regulations to be gazetted to enforce compliance by procuring entities and suppliers to the PPDPA.

Red flags have also been raised around the irregular procurement deals which revealed a range of irregularities relating to price variations, fraudulent payments and duplicate payments. Other irregularities also include substandard goods and services under deliveries, inefficiencies, wastage of financial resources and high cost of procurement processes.

Transparency International Zimbabwe (TIZ) executive director Muchaneta Mundopa in a report titled Illicit Financing in the Health Sector in Zimbabwe said authorities should be accountable by publishing notices of contract awards on the Praz website within 30 days of the contract award, as required by Section 68 of the PPDPA.

Parliament can also follow up with Praz on its recommendation that Praz only registers reputable companies and only engage reputable pre-registered suppliers for single-source public procurement contracts, unless they are unable to provide the supplies, she said. Zimbabwe Independent
The Government has declared three days of national mourning- starting today- in honour of the founding President of Zambia, Dr Kenneth Kaunda who died yesterday.

In a statement, President Emmerson Mnangagwa said during the three days, the countrys flags will be at half-mast throughout the country.

Following the demise of our Regions last surviving Elder Statesman, leader of the Frontline States in the struggle against Colonialism, and founding President of the Sister Republic of Zambia, Government of Zimbabwe has decided to declare three days of National Mourning in honor of the dear departed

For the duration of these three days of mourning which start today, Friday 18 June 2021, flags will fly at half-mast throughout the country, reads the statement.

The President further urged all religious organisations to pray for the late Dr Kaunda and Father Emmanuel Ribeiro who also passed away on Thursday. Sunday Mail
A man acquired a birth certificate at the Lupane registry using a fake letter purportedly penned by a local village head in yet another example of corrupt activities at the key government office in Matabeleland North.

Investigations by CITE revealed that one *Mondli Mpunzis corrupt acquisition of the birth certificate using falsified information could be a tip of the iceberg as employees at the registry claimed that corruption had become institutionalised.

They blamed former provincial registrar Willard Sayenda for the chaos, claiming that he allowed corruption to fester during his tenure amid allegations that he benefited personally from the underhand dealings at the office.

In Mpunzis case, the village head who purportedly signed the letter confirming that he was born under his jurisdiction says he does not know the applicant.

The village head is not the one who wrote the confirmation letter but was written by an official working under Sayenda, reads a report by the Lupane registry into the saga, which was obtained by CITE.

A headmaster at Elihlo Primary School is said to be the one who wrote the school letter for Mpunzi (to obtain the birth certificate) yet he never attended school at that same institution that is 70 km away from Makhovula area where these people reside.

Mpunzis birth certificate was acquired at the provincial office instead of the district office as per government regulations.

This was despite the fact that in Lupane, the provincial and district registry offices are housed in the same building.

Lupane registry officials told investigators the provincial office failed to direct the applicant to the district office to cover up a corrupt deal.

The name on Mpunzis health card was tampered with and it is clear that a certain name was erased to insert the applicants name, added the report in CITEs possession.

The sex of the applicant on the health card was also altered including the date of birth, the mothers name on the health card was erased and substituted with the name of the applicants mother.

The handwriting that completed the birth registration forms is the same that endorsed the physical address in the health card.

The analysis further shows the health card was initially issued in 2017, even the vaccination dates show 2007 and 2008 whilst the applicants birth year is listed as 2011.

Further analysis of Mpunzis health card revealed that the applicants mother was single, but the registration forms say the applicants parents were customarily married.

The declarant did not declare this registration since the ID number used does not belong to her and it was registered in 1982 when the declarant was only 12 years old and not due for ID registration, the report added.

Therefore, there was no witness for this registration. The official could have just used the ID number and used a false name as the declarant and unfortunately, Sayenda did not bother to request for the copy of the declarants ID and the declarant herself as required by the Births and Deaths Registration Act.

Those familiar with the case told CITE that Mpunzis birth certificate must be cancelled because it was fake.

Mpunzis case is one of many alleged corrupt deals by Sayenda and other senior registry officials in Lupane that are now being exposed following the tops officials departure. Sayenda was reportedly moved to head the Umguza district registry under a cloud.

Some of the whistleblowers claim that they were victims of the former provincial registrars bullying.

They said they were allegedly transferred to other stations without due processes after they questioned alleged corruption in the issuance of passports and IDs.

Lupane province was allocated 90 emergency passports per day but workers were only allowed to book 70 people and the other 20 were allegedly Sayendas friends who would not join the queue like other citizens, claimed one of the employees.

When we queried the system, Sayenda transferred us yet he had no power to do that. Sayenda refused to comment on the allegations, which he said were not true.

That is not correct, I cannot comment, he said. Timothy Mumba, Human Resources Director at the Registrar Generals office in Harare, also refused to comment. Sorry I cannot respond to any of these issues, Mumba said.

They need clearance from the head of ministry, who happens to be the disciplinary authority. No matter what evidence is available, our spokesperson is the head of ministry. The HR director was accused of protecting Sayenda by the disgruntled workers.

Sayenda tendered his resignation in January 2021, but he withdrew it in April, one of the workers alleged.

He was then transferred from Lupane to head a district office in Umguza registry allegedly at the behest of Mumba

He is sitting comfortably, enjoying a company car and other benefits. Mumba is aware of this because workers wrote affidavits and sent them to him in September 2020, but he is protecting Sayenda, workers claimed.

Tawanda Mazango, Lupane Youth Development Trust Programmes Director, said locals were concerned about the alleged corrupt activities at the local registry office.

We did our investigation and we discovered corrupt activities as locals were not benefiting from these passports, failing to access them yet applicants would come from far places to collect passports, Mazango said.

Zimbabwe has a huge backlog of passport applications, which has been attributed to lack of foreign currency to buy consumables to produce the travel document.

Observers say the shortage of passports is fuelling corruption as registry officials solicit for kick-backs from desperate citizens seeking to jump the queue to get the document.

Zimbabweans also struggle to acquire birth certificates and IDs due to bottlenecks at the Registrar Generals office and they end up paying bribes to get a service. Cites.org.zw
Noting that they didnt have to deal with many of the tangible concerns so many others did during the pandemic, such as food insecurity, Leone said that quarantine was, in some ways, an easier transition for the pair.
The providers also say the city should be more flexible about penalizing providers for enrollment drops. City Pre-K and 3-K funding is normally based on student enrollment, and preschool numbers cratered during the pandemic, with new applications dropping 7% this year compared to last year, according to Chalkbeat.
The city Education Department, which will celebrate Juneteenth as an official holiday for the first time next year, curated curriculum resources for teachers to use this year in lessons about the holiday, calling it part of a broader education of the practice, impact, and legacy of slavery that speaks to Black history in this country.
I never knew how much I hurt them until I was in jail, she said. I dont expect her to accept my apology, but I hope maybe she will find it in her heart someday. I am very, very sorry.
Their votes will be divided between two candidates, the flier said. That means that Mr. [Finkelstein] needs to get only 34% of the votes to win, and he has a good chance to do that. We only now seek to get out the masses of votes for Charles Finkelstein and thereby assure that we will have a good friend (in the) court house.
These apparently are the men who have all the answers as to whats wrong with the face of the New York City Fire Department, he wrote in one editorial. Simply stated, it is too white. It is not black enough ... If you are a black firefighter in this department and you have an opinion, then speak up, brother. If you are a female firefighter, then you may speak up as well.
Many of the Victims attempted suicide and were hospitalized after those attempts. The defendant was often present prior to the Victims attempts and discussed the Victims vulnerability to suicide with both the Victims and other individuals. The defendant was also present after the suicide attempts, including by inserting himself into their treatment, Assistant U.S. Attorney Mollie Bracewell wrote.
Deuras was released to parole in 2018, after he was sentenced to 8-to-16 years in prison for a 2013 robbery. Hes served two other stints in state prison  for a 1993 robbery and a 2000 burglary.
The 23-year-old resident was moving his clothes from one closet to another inside his Jamaica Estates house near the corner of Edgerton Blvd. and Henley Road around 11:50 p.m. Wednesday when he found the bone wedged behind a shelf.
On Tuesday, Florea, 40, requested that he be released on $100,000 bail so he could live with his mother. The application noted hed be 13.3 miles away from the Queens apartment he shared with his wife, his defense attorney said.
His name was added to the states sex offender registery after he was convicted of assaulting, choking and sexually abusing a 22-year-old woman in 2015.
Jose Garcia-Cruz, 36, who was operating the bike, and Kristina Walker, 25, his passenger, were heading north on Rogers Ave. near Bergen St. in Crown Heights around 10 a.m. when they tried to pass the Mack truck, cops said.
Police followed up by saying their investigation had determined that a driver entering the freeway at Seven Mile Road was shot at by someone in a light-colored four-door automobile. Two children in the car, ages 2 and 9, were reportedly struck. The younger child was fatally wounded. The 9-year-old was listed in serious condition.
Spc. Raul Hernandez Perez, a signals intelligence analyst assigned to the 500th Military Intelligence Brigade, also pleaded not guilty on Thursday in military court to disobeying a non-commissioned officers order that he have no contact with his wife, Selena Roth, the Honolulu Star-Advertiser reported. The couple were going through a divorce initiated by the 23-year-old soldier, who wanted to get back together with a high school sweetheart in Florida.
Its just hard to imagine somebody can be so sick as to do this, intentionally kill people like that, Randy said. I mean, we see it in the world. We see it on the news. But you dont think its going to happen in your small community, to your family.
The newlyweds were exiting the well-known park just as the wind caught the gate, Fox13-KSTU in Salt Lake City reported. It had been left open for nearly two weeks, which is against federal policy, before it sliced through the side of their rented car, fatally striking 25-year-old Nakajjigo in the head and neck, the lawsuit said.
During a burglary investigation in Vienna, in upstate Oneida County, on Wednesday, cops said they came across a black van with a U-Haul logo on its windshield. Authorities said the vans catalytic converter, which reduces toxic emissions, had been removed. That auto part contains precious metals that can be stripped and resold.
According to the Sugarland, Texas, gas and oil industry worker, he had an opportunity to get vaccinated in January and took a pass. Later that month, he contracted the deadly virus. On Feb. 2, Garza fell while trying to walk and was rushed to a hospital, where he was hooked up to a machine that pumped and oxygenated his blood. He said it took three weeks before his lungs were already shot.
The eyes of the whole country are on us. If we dont act courageously, clearly and convincingly on this core Catholic value, how can we expect to be taken seriously on another matter? he asked.
Scardina, an attorney herself, tried to order the cake on the same day that the U.S. Supreme Court announced that they would hear Philips case. She claimed that her attempt at ordering the cake was not a set up, but instead wanted to challenge the veracity of previous comments made by Phillips about serving the LGBT community.
Of course they spoke to us previous to entering the courtroom about having no outbursts, but it was really hard to sustain all of that, older sister Mayra Guillen said. Seeing this person for the first time ever, it brings back a lot. ... It was really hard to maintain your cool.
I dont think parents understand the amount of seriousness these desk toys have, his mom told CNN. We as parents want to get that out there to other parents and even kids who are thinking it will be a fun challenge, nothing will happen. You can die from it, you can have lifelong issues from it, because look where we are.
However, since the disruptions happened during a time in the U.S. when few planes take off off, airline representatives told the Associated Press there was little to no effect on flights.
This settlement is not in any way an admission of guilt to any actions of the deputies, Coats said in a statement. Although I was not the sheriff at the time of the incidents, I still support the men that were involved and I believe they acted appropriately.
Search-and-rescue teams in Danville, N.C., have recovered the bodies of three individuals who went missing while going tubing near a dam. Two others have yet to be found.
Layla Malon was a student in Westports public schools. The towns schools superintendent said the district has begun to mobilize all of our resources to provide the necessary support to our students and faculty.
Its a variant that is more easily transmissible, potentially deadlier, and particularly dangerous for young people, he said. The good news is we have the solution. The science and the data are clear: The best way to protect yourself against these variants are to get fully vaccinated.
I said we want to do this, but we have to negotiate the specifics, he said Friday on WNYC. It will be a school holiday, unquestionably. It is Saturday this year so it doesnt play out as a school holiday, but going forward on weekdays, it will be a school holiday. Thats done. Weve got more work to do to bring the other pieces together. I think well get there.
Youre right. What does that require then? It requires a mayor that understands how to go after those abusive cops. It requires a mayor whos bold enough to say were going to make you use your cameras anytime you interact with the public, Adams said. Someone that understands the system of policing  no ones running for mayor that understands that. Theyre going to run rings around these cats, brother.
Following the early Wednesday strikes, Hamas did not fire any rockets. It remains to be seen if these continued strikes will draw more of a response and inflame an incredibly delicate situation. No deaths or injuries have been reported after either set of airstrikes or from the balloon fires. However, the IDF said it was preparing for a variety of scenarios including a resumption of hostilities.
Yang has buckled for the yeshivas, too. Hes also never voted for mayor, and has a kiddie-pool-shallow understanding of far too many of the citys biggest problems. Spitballing, he suggested putting a casino on Governors Island, which is barred by a federal deed restriction. He suggested creating domestic violence shelters, which already exist. When pitching municipal takeover of the MTA, he failed to demonstrate even the foggiest understanding of how the authority works. His billion-dollar Universal Basic Income proposal, to offer cash relief to a half-million New Yorkers, is a sketch at best with funding streams TBD.
What can one say to Shimon and Tzivia? All one can do is listen. But before parting, I shared with them that as a rabbi, I have learned that there is little one can do to remove the pain of death. Death, I shared, could be compared to a person who enters a dark room for the first time, and trips over the furniture. Each time he enters the room, he learns more and more where the furniture stands. In time, he becomes familiar with the room, and despite the darkness, knows how to get around.
I dont think that we would have gotten the cast that we had if the pandemic wasnt happening because no one had anything to do, Spaeny, 22, tells The News. So everyone was so excited to do something with themselves. And everybodys comfortability was different. For example, the Fred Armisen scene, he wanted to do it on his balcony. So we had all these fun obstacles that lent itself to the scene and that challenged you to be creative.
Please be patient with our staff. Sadly, due to government handouts no one wants to work anymore. Therefore, we are short staffed. So please be kind and patient with staff that wants to work and earn an income and not sit home and get a handout from the government. We are working hard to rebuild our team to serve you better.
Thank you for supporting our journalism. This article is available exclusively for our subscribers, who help fund our work at the Orlando Sentinel.
State data dashboards have been an integral component of the U.S. response to the COVID-19 pandemic, writes Beth Blauer, executive director of the Centers for Civic Impact at Johns Hopkins, in a plea to continue the daily reports. Due in large part to these efforts, test positivity rates are now dramatically decreasing across the country. ... Now that we are finally winning the battle against COVID-19, we cannot stop fighting. This virus is not going away.
Little by little, Burris said hes feeling better. He can only take small sips of liquid and is consuming few calories. While hes taking time off from work, as recommended by his doctor, Burris hopes to resume shorter versions of Coffee Talk next week.
A robust and successful clinical practice program is a key component of any college of medicine, Sarubbi wrote in a statement emailed on Wednesday to the Orlando Sentinel. As an emerging college, we continue to build our faculty practice to ensure we provide the best care for our patients and fulfill our mission to the community while enhancing the clinics financial performance by increasing revenues and reducing expenses.
That may change soon. With a request for proposals issued Friday, utility executives have called on developers to craft a new vision for the striking Lake Ivanhoe building and then arrange for its purchase. The location is prominent along a corridor that has been sprouting retail businesses, restaurants and residential high rises like Steelhouse Orlando on Orange Avenue at Colonial Drive, and the Yard at Ivanhoe near Virginia Drive.
Plumes of toxic oceanic bacteria known as red tide continued to move up the western Florida coast, strewing thousands of dead fish on beaches while state officials tried to reassure Floridians and potential tourists Thursday that the outbreak was being taken seriously but isnt as bad as it would seem.
Of the 19 puppies on which the complaint was based, six died from contagious illnesses or a genetic or hereditary disorder soon after sale; six were determined to be unfit for purchase by licensed veterinarians; five had congenital or hereditary disorders; and three were not the breed the store had represented or the breed quality the customer desired.
He said he was pursuing legal action against the Sentinel and the people and groups that repeatedly said this to law enforcement despite having no evidence  something I am confident of because no evidence exists  in an attempt to get me investigated for the crime for which Joel was charged and pled guilty to.
Let the party begin! That ruling prompted roofing companies to knock on doors to show homeowners damage and offer whats called assignment of benefit contracts. In other words, the roofing companies and their lawyers would fight with insurance companies for payment on behalf of the homeowner. It was quite the deal for homeowners. Sometimes, according to the Insurance Information Institute, roofers would even offer the customer a $500 gift card to sign on. Now theres an incentive that should scream something is wrong.
As Democrats, weve been in the minority for so long, I think for many its created almost a Stockholm Syndrome-like effect or a battered wife effect, Farmer said. I think, for some of our Democratic members in Tallahassee, that frustration over being in the minority has led them to behavior that has them throwing votes to Republicans, sometimes on controversial issues, in the hopes that they can pass a bill or get a little appropriation done here and there. So you kind of have to compromise your principles just to have personal success. The problem with that is then were not really a Democratic caucus. Were the Republican jayvee [junior varsity] caucus.
The Sentinel points to worst-case scenario language posted on one clerks website indicating it may take up to two weeks to produce certain records. The Sentinel fails to explain that this is not common, nor is it indicative of my office which explained to the Supreme Court of Florida that we complete online requests in as few as 16 minutes  far less than it takes to drive to one of our offices and return home.
As a retired police officer with 25 years of service, I thought that I had heard just about everything. But today I hear that several Florida sheriffs will be sending deputies to Texas and Arizona to help out on the border (DeSantis to send Fla. officers to Mexico border, June 17). I guess Florida has no crime. How about the person that gets raped or murdered, while the deputy that could have prevented that crime was protecting the citizens of Texas? Florida law enforcement needs to stay in Florida. This is purely a political move by the governor that the citizens of Florida will suffer for.
But the rifts in the Republican Party following the tumultuous Trump era couldnt entirely be papered over, with former Vice President Mike Pence being greeted with some boos and getting heckled as a traitor from at least one woman toward the back of the room. She was quickly removed by security.
If somebody is going to defraud the people of our state I have an obligation, a sworn obligation to defend the people of our state, Fried said. My job is to hold everybody accountable regardless of the mission of that organization and regardless of where the money is going to go.
After filing to run in Florida Senate District 9 last June, Iannotti did no campaigning and little fundraising, according to state campaign finance records. She also spent several weeks in Sweden before the election, when other campaigns were in full swing, her social media accounts show. She repeatedly declined interviews from the press and sent a statement in September asking for privacy.
Its test vehicle Neptune One took off from the Space Coast Spaceport in Brevard County at 5:23 a.m. achieving an altitude of 108,409 feet, or more than 20.5 miles, while crossing the state from east to west and splashing down in the Gulf of Mexico during a 6 hour, 39 minute flight.
All of Orlandos theme parks still have bag checks at their entrances, but security procedures have changed. At Disney World parks (and at Disney Springs), most visitors no longer have bags individually checked. Instead, people walk between two upright poles of the metal detectors. Heres the key: Go through one at a time but keep walking. Dont stop and wait for the rest of your travel party. That backs up the line and makes the wait longer and more frustrating. To paraphrase Dory, just keep walking.
Disney Wish will take over the short three- and four-night Bahamas visits currently assigned to Disney Dream while Fantasy will do six-, seven- and eight-night Eastern and Western Caribbean voyages. Disney Dream, which is leaving Port Canaveral for the first time when it migrates to Miami, will juggle four- and five-night Bahamas voyages while also doing some five-night Caribbean cruises to either Grand Cayman or Cozumel, Mexico. All three Florida-based ships will make stops at Disneys private Bahamas island Castaway Cay.
Those who can prove they have been vaccinated at least 14 days ahead of sailing do not need to take the tests. For the unvaccinated, though, they must take an RT-PCT test when checking in at the terminal and then take an onboard antigen test required within 24 hours of disembarkation. Thats on top of a test that needs to be taken by an RT-PCR test guests 16 years and older need to take within three days of sailing.
The system has a slightly diminished 80% chance of developing into a tropical storm within the next 48 hours, and the chances remain the same through the next five days. The system will approach the north-central Gulf Coast early Saturday and turn northeast after landfall.
The licence agreement involving the iNKT cell therapy platform will add substantially to the companys existing exposure to the oncology market.

The company also intends to raise a minimum of $3 million through a placement to sophisticated investors.

( ) (FRA:E4N) has signed a global, exclusive licence agreement with Imperial College London for a novel invariant Natural Killer T (iNKT) cell therapy platform.

The iNKT cell therapy platform is in the preclinical stages and can be used in conjunction with chimeric antigen receptors (CARs) to treat various blood cancers, with the CAR-iNKT cells expected to be suitable for off-the-shelf dosing - as one healthy donor can supply cells to treat many patients.

In addition to the licence, the company anticipates raising a minimum of $3 million via an institutional placement to be conducted through Baker Young to support the initial development of the iNKT cell therapy - including hiring key personnel and initiating the manufacturing of critical components to produce the product.

Only ASX-listed CAR-iNKT company

SUDA CEO and managing director Dr Michael Baker said: Cell therapies have transformed the way we think about cancer treatment.

The iNKT cell therapy platform provides an opportunity to target several cancers using a product that we expect to have superior activity and to be more cost-effective, which should allow the therapy to reach more individuals.

SUDA will be the only ASX-listed CAR-iNKT cell therapy company that is working on this cellular platform and we look forward to progressing the technology into clinical trials.

Innovative therapies for cancer patients

Imperial College London director of industry partnerships and commercialisation, medicine, Stephanie Morris said: Imperial College London is delighted to license this technology to SUDA Pharmaceuticals.

We are impressed with the ability of their executive team to push and bring therapies to market expeditiously.

At Imperial, our mission is to deliver world-class, transformative scientific research for societal impact.

We believe SUDA has the vision to offer innovative therapies to cancer patients.

Off-the-shelf advantage

The technology developed at Imperial by Professor Anastasios Karadimitris focuses on a specific immune cell type, iNKT cells, and his research group was the first to demonstrate that they are protective against graft versus host disease (GVHD).

This provides a critical advantage that the iNKT cell platform may be used off-the-shelf, meaning that the cells can be isolated from a healthy donor, modified to enhance their activity against cancer and stored frozen, ready to be administered to cancer patients as needed.

The natural properties of iNKT cells are expected to reduce the complexity of delivering the cell therapy to cancer patients and help to reduce the costs of such an important treatment modality.

This has the potential to solve one of the industrys significant challenges: manufacturing the therapeutic from each individuals own cells

CAR-iNKT cells

iNKT cells can be further modified to arm them with a CAR, and CAR-iNKT cells have two ways to recognise, attach to, and destroy cancer cells making them dual targeting.

In preclinical studies, CAR-iNKT cells have shown superior activity relative to conventional cell therapies in eradicating cancer cells and extending tumour-free survival.

CAR19-iNKT cells are being developed for the treatment of CD19 expressing cancers, including non-Hodgkins lymphoma.

The technology platform has long patent life, expected to expire in 2038 and has entered national phase in Europe, China, Canada, Australia and the US.

Licence agreement terms

The terms of the licensing agreement are non-dilutive for SUDA shareholders with no immediate material financial impact on the company as a result of signing the agreement.

The licensing payments include an upfront fee, annual maintenance fees and for the first oncology product developed, there are industry standard, non-dilutionary development milestones for initiating Phase 1, Phase 2 and Phase 3 clinical trials and for receipt of regulatory approval of the product in major territories.

The licence also includes commercial milestones based on achieving sales targets and a single digit royalty on future sales and sublicensing fees.

The licence agreement will expire upon the last to expire patent (or any other relevant patent extension term) or 10 years from commercial launch, whichever is longer, with no associated termination fees.

In addition to the licence agreement, SUDA soon also expects to enter into a collaborative research agreement with Imperial College London, facilitating further research to expand the platform and develop additional intellectual property.
Around 12% of shareholders at the meeting on Friday afternoon voted to oust co-founder Carol Kane as an executive director

boohoo Group PLC ( ) saw sparks fly at its AGM on Friday afternoon after 12% of shareholders voted to remove co-founder Carol Kane as an executive director amid ongoing fallout from a supply chain scandal last year.

Glass Lewis, which advises institutional investors, had pushed investors to oust Kane and also raised concerns about company chair and co-founder Mahmud Kamani even though he wont face re-election this year.

However, despite the sizeable rebellion, Kane was defended by boohoo's chief executive John Lyttle.

Carol plays an integral role in establishing the identities that sit behind each of the brands on our multi-brand platform, and as a co-founder of the Group her drive, enthusiasm and unwavering support for our Agenda for Change will be crucial in delivering change for the benefit of all stakeholders, Lyttle said.

The rebellion is likely an indication that many investors are still worried about progress in the company's ESG agenda and fears that top executives may not be doing enough to draw a line under last summers scandal.

The firm, which is the second-largest on the AIM market with a market cap of around 4bn, appointed former high court judge Sir Brian Leveson to review its supply chains, which in turn has revealed a clear lack of oversight, dismal monitoring and poor governance at the company.

However, some activists have pointed out that investor commitment to ESG may not be as solid as it seems.

That investors did not have questions to pose [at the Boohoo AGM] after a scandal-ridden year where the company finally admitted to serious labour rights abuses in their supply chain speak volumes about their commitment to ESG, said Thulsi Narayanasamy, Senior Labour Rights Lead at the Business and Human Rights Resource Centre.

The only question posed related to the companys controversial purchasing practices that ultimately drive the illegally low wage levels in Leicester and the response was characteristically flimsy. If I have heard that workers are still being paid below minimum wage in their supply chain right now, why havent they? We are left unconvinced by the progress made to ensure decent labour practices in their supply chain, Narayanasamy added.

Shares in boohoo dropped 2% to 325.1p in late afternoon trading.

--Updates share price and AGM details, adds comment--
The FTSE 100 headed lower into the weekend as UK retail sales disappointed while Tesco also underwhelmed. Londons blue-chip index was down 16 at 7.137 in early trade.

Retail sales dropped by 1.4% in May after a 9.2% surge in April. The ONS said people eating out again as lockdown restrictions were eased knocked food sales by 5.7%.

( ) numbers echoed the stats, with a small rise in quarterly sales compared to last year when revenue was boosted by a huge surge in demand during the first Coronavirus (COVID-19) lockdown. Trading benefited from increased at-home consumption during March but slowed in April and May as restrictions eased.

Tesla ( ) is facing a probe in the US after auto safety regulators opened 30 investigations into crashes involving the suspected use of its assisted driving system. The incidents have caused ten deaths since 2016, Reuters reported.

Among the small caps, ( ) said a study using the companys liquid biopsy system has helped increase the understanding of non-small cell lung cancer and how it mutates, a breakthrough that may offer a new method of guiding precision treatment. A team from the University of Athens deployed the Parsortix system to isolate circulating tumour cells (CTC) from blood samples.

( ) provided an upbeat assessment of the secondary reservoir targets in the Saffron-2 appraisal well as it drills down to the wells main target. Third-party petrophysical analysis of log data has indicated some 165 feet of net oil bearing reservoir sands.
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HSBC has been exiting its retail banking operations outside its core areas of Asia and the UK.

France was sub-scale and non-core to its ambitions going forward

PLC ( ) said it would book a US$3bn loss after it agreed on the sale of its French retail bank business to My Money, a group owned by private equity group Cerberus.

The UK bank said the businesses being sold comprise a network of 244 retail branches, which serve 800,000 customers, and had assets of 7.1bn.

Noel Quinn, s chief executive added: "The signing of an MOU for the potential sale of our French retail banking business represents a significant step in progressing the actions we announced during our strategic update earlier this year.

It will enable us to dramatically simplify our business in Continental Europe and allow us to accelerate the transformation of our European wholesale banking franchise.

We are committed to remaining as a leading international wholesale bank in Continental Europe, capitalising on our global network and serving our multinational customers both inbound and outbound."

HSBC has been exiting its retail banking operations outside its core areas of Asia and the UK.

Last month, the bank confirmed it was pulling out of US retail banking after initially entering the market in the 1980s and said its retail strategy going forward would be to focus on high net worths and businesses in Asia.

HSBC added it expected to complete its French disposal in the first half of 2023, with an estimated loss on the sale of US$2.3bn plus an additional US$700mln goodwill impairment.

Going forward, the European operation would connect trade and capital flows between the west and the east, supporting delivery of our growth ambitions in the Group's distinctive Asian and Middle Eastern businesses, it said.

Paris would remain the hub for HSBC in Continental Europe, it added.

HSBC shares shed 2% to 431p.
The pharma giant said a judge at the Court of First Instance in Brussels had ruled it had to supply 80.2mln doses by September 27, lower than the 120mln deamdned by the European Commission

PLC ( ) has won a legal battle against the European Unions executive branch after the bloc attempted to force the pharma giant to deliver millions of doses of its coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccine or face large fines.

On Friday, the FTSE 100 company said the EUs Court of First Instance in Brussels had ruled that the European Commission (EC) has no exclusivity or right of priority over all other contracting parties while also acknowledging that the difficulties experienced by AstraZeneca during the unprecedented situation of the pandemic had had a substantial impact on the delay.

The EC initially requested a total of 300mln by the end of September, however, production problems forced AstraZeneca to cut its supply forecast to 100mln. The EC then requested the judge raise this target to 120mln, with a penalty of 10 per dose per day for any shortfalls in delivery which could have run into billions in fines for the company.

However, AstraZeneca said the judge had only ordered it to deliver up to 80.2mln doses by September 27, 70mln of which it has already delivered, and that it now expected to fulfil the requirement ahead of schedule.

We are pleased with the Courts order. AstraZeneca has fully complied with its agreement with the European Commission and we will continue to focus on the urgent task of supplying an effective vaccine, which we are delivering at no profit to help protect people in Europe and around the world from the deadliest pandemic in a generation, AstraZenecas general counsel Jeffrey Pott said in a statement.

However, the EC also appeared to have claimed the ruling as a victory, with Commission president Ursula von der Leyen saying the courts decision confirms the position of the Commission: AstraZeneca did not live up to the commitments it made in the contract.

It is good to see that an independent judge confirms this. This shows that our European vaccination campaign not only delivers for our citizens day by day. It also demonstrates that it was founded on a sound legal basis, she added.

Shares in AstraZeneca were flat at 8,378p in late afternoon trading.
Now that an extensive exploration campaign at Cardinia is complete, Kin can embark on a suite of drilling programs to explore mineralisation at its regional targets.

Regional exploration is set to kick off at a suite of gold and nickel sulphide targets outside Kin Mining's Cardinia Gold Project.

Kin Mining NL (ASX:KIN) is turning its focus to regional exploration targets after a major fourth phase drilling campaign at its wholly-owned Cardinia Gold Project.

Four prospects will undergo follow-up exploration following completion of Kin's phase four drilling program at the 1.23-million-ounce gold play in Western Australia.

The Mount Flora and Axford prospects will each undergo further reverse circulation (RC) or aircore (AC) drilling, while work at the Randwick and Murrin prospects will entail auger and soil geochemistry programs.

Additionally, the explorer has planned a reverse circulation and diamond drilling campaign at the highly prospective Mt Fouracre nickel target, 60 kilometres northwest of Leonora.

Ultimately, Kin hopes to test a range of exploration targets outside its wider tenement package in the hopes it could lead to more discoveries beyond Cardinias borders.

Mount Flora

Earlier this year, Kin completed a 269-hole, 10,116-metre AC exploration campaign at the Mount Flora prospect.

A particular highlight from the program included a 22-metre hit, intersecting 8.96 g/t gold from 24 metres.

Now, Kin has identified mineralisation in three different zones across the prospect. It will conduct RC drilling over the high-grade AC intersections next month.

Axford

The ASX-listed gold explorer also has plans to follow up strong aircore results from the Axford prospect, which is located in the Iron King Project.

The gold play, which contains the historically mined Iron King open pit, produced around 20,000 tonnes at 9 g/t gold for 5,600 gold ounces.

An 11,425-metre AC campaign was executed over the Axford prospect in late 2020, returning a suite of strong intersections.

Kin will follow up with further AC lines to infill at the prospect, with an initial RC program slated for the September quarter.

Randwick

To date, Kin has identified several gold targets within the Randwick tenement group.

Targets have been identified based on historical workings because only limited modern exploration has taken place so far.

The ASX-lister will embark on a systematic exploration campaign at the tenements in the coming quarter, starting with an auger and soil geochemical program.

Murrin

As with the Randwick prospect, Kin has identified a suite of gold targets based on historical exploration.

With only a limited modern campaign conducted to date, the explorer intends to commence work with an auger and soil geochemical program.

Broadly speaking, the upcoming exploration program will evaluate the Murrin prospects prospectivity for follow-up drilling campaigns.

Mt Fouracre

In tandem with exploration at the four regional gold targets, Kin has also turned its focus to the Mt Fouracre Project, a nickel sulphide target to the northeast of the Iron King Project.

The project boasts a suite of historical work, which Kin reviewed with a moving-loop electromagnetics survey.

Promisingly, the program identified a strongly conductive target, positioned just below the base of the projects Mt Clifford ultramafic unit on the tenements western side.

Now, the explorer has planned an initial RC and diamond drilling program to test the source of the conductive anomaly mid next month, once a diamond rig returns to the Cardinia gold project.
The company believes that the appointments of Frank Bierlein and Richard Willson as non-executive directors will ensure board skills are aligned with the strategic direction of the company.

The Fountain Head and Hayes Creek projects in the Northern Territory are being advanced towards development.

( ) has strengthened its board with the appointment of Frank Bierlein and Richard Willson as non-executive directors of the company effective today.

The appointments follow an ongoing review of the companys board structure in consultation with its major shareholder to ensure board skills are aligned with the strategic direction of the company.

Increasing skills and experience

PNX chairman Graham Ascough said: On behalf of my fellow directors and management, I welcome Frank and Richard to the board.

The company has taken this opportunity to increase the skills and experience on the board as we advance the Fountain Head and Hayes Creek projects towards development.

Given the wealth of experience and knowledge that Frank and Richard have in both exploration and financing, respectively, I am confident that they will make a significant contribution to the future success of the company.

Frank Bierleins experience

Dr Bierlein is a geologist with 30 years of experience as a consultant, researcher, lecturer and industry professional.

He has held exploration and generative geology management positions with QMSD Mining Co Ltd, Qatar Mining, Afmeco Australia and Areva NC, and consulted for Newmont Gold, Resolute Mining, Goldfields International, Freeport-McMoRan and the International Atomic Energy Agency.

The new PNX director was engaged as a non-executive director of Gold Australia Pty Ltd from 2015 to 2019 and chaired the advisory board of a Luxemburg-based private equity fund between 2014 and 2021.

He has worked in all six continents spanning multiple commodities and has published and co-authored more than 130 articles in peer-reviewed scientific journals.

Bierlein, a PhD (Geology) from the University of Melbourne, is a fellow of the Australian Institute of Geoscientists, and also a member of the Society of Economic Geologists and the Society of Geology Applied to Mineral Deposits.

About Richard Willson

Willson is an experienced, non-executive director, company secretary and CFO with more than 20 years experience with publicly listed and private companies.

A Bachelor of Accounting from the University of South Australia, Wilson, is a fellow of CPA Australia and the Australian Institute of Company Directors.

He is a non-executive director of Limited ( ), AusTin Mining Limited ( ), ( ), 8IP Emerging Companies Limited (ASX:8EC), Unity Housing Company Ltd and Variety SA; and company secretary of several ASX listed companies.

Willson is the chairman of the audit committee of Titomic, AusTin Mining, 8IP Emerging and Unity Housing and is also the chairman of the remuneration & nomination committee of Titomic.
( ) is focused on exploration and development of its range of projects across Tasmania, the Northern Territory, Western Australia and New South Wales.

The companys portfolio includes:

The Rock Lodge (gold-silver-copper-zinc) and Turondale (gold-copper-silver-lead) projects in New South Wales;

The Edwards Creek (copper - pictured above), Bruce Gold and Box Hole (lead-zinc) projects in the Northern Territory;

The Nelson Bay River Iron Ore Project (NBR) in Tasmania; and

The Fraser Dundas, Golden Chimney and Ulysses South gold projects in Western Australia.

Shree Minerals director and company secretary Sanjay Loyalka said: What sets us apart from our peers is that we have both a development project, which has near-term production and cash flow opportunity in a commodity which is doing very well, and weve got a suite of exploration projects which we believe that, while at the early stage, have got a lot of potential.

Weve got a diversified basket of development and exploration projects and we have the technical skills within the company to progress them.

Rock Lodge a priority

Loyalka said, while exploration licences were granted earlier for the Northern Territory projects, the companys Rock Lodge Project in NSW is the priority.

He said: Our main focus this year will be our New South Wales projects as well as our Northern Territory projects.

In New South Wales, weve got two licences, one got granted earlier this year and one has just been granted.

We have started some preliminary work and in the next week or so our field geologists will head out to decide the priorities.

In our mind, the Rock Lodge Project in New South Wales is our most exciting project - based on historical test work we have seen.

Previous drill results at Rock Lodge include up to 5.36 g/t gold, 55.6 g/t silver, 0.12% bismuth, 0.8% copper and 1.46% zinc.

Turondale Project plans

At the Turondale Project, the company continues to compile previous exploration data, geological mapping and geophysical surveys to identify new targets, with the aim of undertaking geochemical stream-sediment sampling, soil sampling and geological mapping, followed by drilling.

Highly anomalous gold, copper, silver and lead values were reported near historic workings with stream sediment and soil values up to 2.55 g/t gold  which the company considers very encouraging.

Shree Minerals project locations.

Edwards Creek exploration

The company recently discovered new copper occurrences during its first site visit to the Edwards Creek Project in the Northern Territory (pictured above), with 16 rock chip samples taken and submitted to the laboratory for analysis of gold, copper and multi-elements.

Shree will now engage a geophysical consultant to conduct remodelling of airborne electromagnetic data at Edwards Creek to assist with the targeting of further drilling.

Additional geological mapping, rock chip sampling and detailed soil sampling is planned around the new copper occurrences.

If the soil sampling is successful, the program may be extended to cover additional areas, particularly the north and east limb of the folded prospective horizon that contains undrilled lead-zinc occurrences.

Arunta Joint Venture

Edwards Creek forms part of the Arunta Joint Venture between Shree Minerals and Territory Lithium Pty Ltd covering an area of around 380 square kilometres in the highly prospective Arunta Region.

Loyalka said: Were starting exploration in the Northern Territory with the Bruce Gold Project and the Edwards Creek Copper Project [and the Box Hole Project].

Two of those exploration licences were only granted recently and one was there earlier, so we took the opportunity in late May for our exploration geologists to go and do field reconnaissance and mapping at Edwards Creek and Box Hole projects.

RC drilling at Bruce Gold

The company is gearing up for a reverse circulation (RC) drilling campaign at the Bruce Gold Project after identifying priority drill target that run along a gossanous quartz vein spanning more than 1.5 kilometres in length.

Promisingly, historical sampling along the vein, conducted by the Northern Territory Geological Survey, has returned as much as 53 g/t gold.

Shree undertook a site visit at the gold asset last month to conduct additional quartz vein mapping and take a closer look at the projects namesake Bruce prospect.

In the coming weeks, the company will start planning its exploration program and seek approvals for an RC campaign.

Nelson Bay River development

Earlier this month, the company received comments from the Tasmanian Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on its draft development proposal and environment management plan (DPEMP) for the Nelson Bay River Iron Ore Project (NBR) which was submitted in January.

The company will now work with its technical consultants and the EPA to update the draft DPEMP with requested additional details and clarifications on the proposed mining operation and the management measures.

With the improvement in the iron ore price since mid-2018, the company has been actively working to re-permit the NBR and the strategy has been to recommence the production of Direct Shipping Ore (DSO) resources from the existing open pit.

Loyalka said: We have this project in iron ore in Tasmania where we are going through a re-permitting process and once thats complete, well look at restarting that iron ore mine.

Western Australian projects

At the Fraser Dundas Project, the company intends to infill historical 1 kilometre spaced soil sample traverses to refine and prioritise targets with auger work planned  after which anomalous gold in soil geochemistry will then be tested by RAB and RC drilling.

Loyalka said: The Fraser Dundas Project is still under applications.

At Ulysses, the licence has been granted but we will complete some test-work first.

Shree intends to use IP geophysics at Golden Chimney and Ulysses South to locate the pyrite altered mafic sequence and generate targets and then complete reconnaissance aircore drilling in the vicinity of historical holes.
s ( ) is set to capitalise on its partnership with ( ) (OTCMKTS:CNGGF) (FRA:CVJ) to complete pivotal clinical trials for its EMD-003 CBD medicine targeting mental health and to seek accelerated registration of a unique, low-dose, CBD-only capsule with the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA).

Successful registration as a Schedule 3 medicine would result in an over-the-counter (OTC), pharmacist-only CBD medicine.

The company will lead the EMD-003 drug development program using Cann Groups proprietary Gelpell microsphere technology to register a unique capsule form.

Partnership accelerates drug development

Emyria managing director and CEO Dr Michael Winlo said: This partnership greatly accelerates Emyrias EMD-003 drug development program by combining Emyrias unique clinical data and drug development expertise with Cann Groups best-in-class CBD delivery technology.

Cann Groups CBD has already completed robust stability testing as well as Phase 1 clinical trials as required by the TGA.

This allows us to move straight to pivotal clinical outcomes trials saving significant time and money.

Advantages of collaboration

The collaboration capitalises on a number of registration milestones already met:

Real-world clinical data collected with over 400 prescriptions already written for target dose form;

Pivotal trial protocols developed for target indication;

Phase 1 trials already completed for 10mg and 100mg doses of the capsule; and

Gelpell has been shown to have 3.5 times the bioavailability of oils (at 100mg) and has large-scale, GMP manufacturing opportunities.

EMD-004 for IBS

Current drug registration programs also include the EMD-004 CBD +/- THC for irritable bowel syndrome (IBS).

The company recently filed a new IP after extensive analysis of its proprietary clinical data collected with consenting patients, who obtained relief from their IBS condition while being treated at Emyrias wholly-owned, nationwide clinical subsidiary - Emerald Clinics.

There are currently no approved drug treatments for IBS, which affects around 11% of the population globally and is a significant unmet need often associated with greater levels of anxiety and lower quality of life measures.

The companys patents cover unique dose strengths and formulations, believed to be most effective in treating a range of IBS-related symptoms including:

CBD-only formulations, which could support a Schedule 3, OTC registration program in Australia; and

CBD and THC containing formulations that could support higher schedule applications and international registrations including US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

A large observational study involving IBS patients is currently underway across Emerald Clinics.

Psychedelic-assisted therapy program

The company is also progressing its EMDMA-001 MDMA psychedelic-assisted therapy program with partner Mind Medicine Australia, targeting sufferers of treatment-resistant post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

Pending ethics approval, Emyria will sponsor a major, independently monitored, clinical trial targeting treatment-resistant PTSD with evidence-based MDMA-assisted therapy.

A key priority of this first program is to help evaluate the long-term safety, efficacy and cost benefits of MDMA-assisted psychotherapy.

Such evidence is needed, along with fit-for-purpose clinical infrastructure and trained therapists, to deliver psychedelic-assisted care in a safe, standardised and scalable way.

Pending successful ethics review and the finalisation of all logistics, EMDMA-001 will begin with a Phase II, open-label clinical trial of MDMA-assisted psychotherapy at Emyrias fit-for-purpose clinic in Melbourne before expanding to other sites.

Emyrias pipeline and global registration plans.

Milestones for the year ahead

To progress EMD-003 in the next 12 months, the company plans to:

Commence pivotal registration clinical trials - Contingent on a successful ethics committee review in June 2021;

Complete trial and commence analysis - Contingent on recruitment success, which is expected four-eight months after commencement;

Prepare product dossier and clinical evidence package to submit to TGA for registration - expected six-eight months after submission;

Entry on Australian Register of Therapeutic Goods (ARTG) as a Schedule 3 medication;

Finalise commercialisation agreements and commence sales as an OTC Schedule 3 medicine; and

Commence international registration activities.

In parallel, Emyria will commence psychedelic-assisted therapy trials, registration trials for EMD-004 and launch registration programs for the US FDA and the European Medicines Agency (EMA).
Teslas self-automated driving system, known as Autopilot, has increasingly come under the spotlight after a number of recent accidents

( ) is facing a probe in the US after auto safety regulators opened 30 investigations into crashes involving the suspected use of its assisted driving system.

The incidents have caused ten deaths since 2016, Reuters reported.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) published a list with details of crashes under review by its Special Crash Investigations.

The NHTSA has ruled out Tesla's Autopilot in three crashes and published reports on two so far.

Teslas self-automated driving system, known as Autopilot, has increasingly come under the spotlight after a number of recent accidents and ahead of the launch of a full driverless option.

Tesla previously said that the driver-assist system, called Autopilot, is not an autonomous-driving program, and drivers must be ready to take control of the vehicle at any time.

Elon Musk, Teslas chief executive, said in January that full self-driving software will be hugely profitable for the company and that he was "highly confident" the car will be able to drive itself and that by the end of this year it would be more reliable than people.

It was reported in April that a Model S electric vehicle crashed into a tree and burst into flames in Texas, resulting in the death of two men inside, with local police saying no-one was found to be in the driver's seat.

Constable Mark Herman of Harris County Precinct 4 told reporters that one of the two people in the car was sitting in the front passenger seat and the other in a back seat.

Elon Musk tweeted that: Data logs recovered so far show Autopilot was not enabled and that the car owner did not purchase FSD, the Full Self-Driving computer that the company says is capable of delivering intelligent performance and control to enable a new level of safety and autonomy.

He added: Moreover, standard Autopilot would require lane lines to turn on, which this street did not have.

Shares were flat at US$616.59 in after-hours trading.
The identity-centric cybersecurity solution provider picked up a purchase order with a California state taxation agency worth $210,000

Plurilock will provide the state tax agency with annual subscriptions of Commonlook Office and portable document format software

Plurilock Security Inc ( ) (OTCQB:PLCKF), an identity-centric cybersecurity solution provider, revealed that it has secured a purchase order with a California state taxation agency worth $210,000.

The Victoria, British Columbia-based company went through a competitive process by responding to the request for a proposal. Ultimately, the company said the team's proven track record of providing quality products and customer service helped it to secure the new order.

According to the purchase order, Plurilock will provide the state tax agency with annual subscriptions of Commonlook Office and portable document format (PDF) software.

The contract win is the latest in the companys ongoing effort to rapidly expand within the government and healthcare verticals in North America.

On Tuesday, Plurilock received an order from a California state healthcare agency worth $400,000 as it adds to growing contracts from state agencies. Under the order, which it secured as an authorized vendor in the NASPO ValuePoint program, Plurilock will provide the US state agency with Broadcom licenses and maintenance support.

The company said healthcare organizations continue to be significant targets for cyber-attacks, with recent data showing a 55% increase in 2020.

Plurilock offers cybersecurity solutions paired with AI-driven, cloud-friendly security technologies that deliver persistent identity assurance.

Contact the author Uttara Choudhury at uttara@proactiveinvestors.com

Follow her on Twitter: @UttaraProactive
The automated packaging system will be installed in its food manufacturing facility in BC and is expected to be fully operational within six to eight weeks

The packaging line immediately increases the range of products and services the company can offer retail and foodservice clients

Naturally Splendid Enterprises Ltd ( ) (OTCPINK:NSPDF) (FRA:50N) announced it has purchased a state-of-the-art, automated packaging system capable of packaging a wide variety of food products in multiple formats.

The company said the packaging line will be installed in its 20,000 square foot, Safe Quality Food (SQF) certified food manufacturing facility in Pitt Meadows, British Columbia and is expected to be fully operational within six to eight weeks.

Adding this packaging line immediately increases the range of products and services we can offer retail and foodservice clients, Naturally Splendid Enterprises CEO Craig Goodwin said in a statement.

The strategy to leverage the resources of our existing facility and experienced production team by adding additional equipment specific to the production of NATERA Plant Based Foods, is being executed. The manufacturing lines to produce the plant-based product lines have been specified, and we will begin the systematic process of ordering, installing, and commissioning these lines once the definitive agreement with Flexitarian Foods is completed, Goodwin added.

This facility will be capable of manufacturing a wide range of plant-based alternatives for beef, chicken, pork, fish and shellfish once completed. We look forward to providing timely updates as these initiatives develop.

Naturally Splendid noted the packaging system will also be utilized for packaging existing products manufactured at the facility, including the companys plant-based bars and bites.

The company previously reported that it signed a letter of intent to be the exclusive Canadian manufacturer of plant-based, meat-replacement products for Flexitarian Foods, a division of Australia's largest plant-based food manufacturer.

As well, Naturally Splendid announced its board of directors has approved the settlement of $255,225.11 in debt by issuing 3,646,071 company shares, at a price of $0.07 per share, to certain creditors, including some Naturally Splendid directors and officers. The shares are subject to a hold period of four months plus one day from the date of issuance.

Founded in 2010, Naturally Splendid has established numerous healthy, functional foods under recognized brands such as NATERA Sport, NATERA Hemp Foods, CHII, Elevate Me and Woods Wild Bar, and most recently NATERA Plant Based Foods, a line of plant-based meat alternatives.

Contact Sean at sean@proactiveinvestors.com
"It is essential as a scientist that you evolve your opinion and your recommendations based on the data as it evolves. ... And that's the reason why I say people who then criticize me about that are actually criticizing science. That's the way science works. You work with the data you have at the time."

Dr. Anthony Fauci
Govt imposes stock limit on traders/importers of all pulses except moong till Oct 31 to prevent hoarding, check price rise.
Putin vetoes bill on mass media responsibility for fake news

11:57 18/06/2021

MOSCOW, June 18 (RAPSI)  President Vladimir Putin has set a veto on a bill on the responsibility of mass media for distributing fake information approved by Russias State Duma and Federation Council, according to the database of the parliaments lower house.

The draft law is sent for reconsideration.

The initiative which was not enacted by the President into law prohibits mass media from disseminating online false information posing a threat to human lives and health, citizens property, a threat of mass disruptions of public order or security, obstructiveness of functioning or breakdown of critical infrastructure, transport and social infrastructure of credit organizations, power engineering, industry and communications facilities.

The document envisages fines of up to 1.5 million rubles (over $20,000) for breaching the provisions.
Restaurants for persons vaccinated against COVID-19 to appear in Moscow

 nseri.com

13:13 18/06/2021

MOSCOW, June 18 (RAPSI)  Starting June 19, in Moscow there are to be opened restaurants that only persons who have been vaccinated against the coronavirus will be able to visit, according to Moscow Mayor Sergey Sobyanin.

A day before, the mayor said, he had a meeting with Moscow restaurateurs. It was discussed how cafes and restaurants are to organize their work in the current very difficult epidemiological situation. During the meeting, restaurateurs suggested organizing COVID free food service outlets. This experiment is to start on June 19, initially in just one or two dozens restaurants, Sobyanin noted.

Guests of such restaurants will need a QR code confirming vaccination, which is to be download from the website of state services, according to the official website of the Moscow mayor.

This Wednesday, Moscow chief state sanitary officer Elena Andreyeva issued an ordinance introducing compulsory vaccination against COVID-19 for service workers.

According to the decree, at least 60% of employees must be vaccinated with the first component of the vaccine in service enterprises by July 15, and the same number of employees must receive the second dose of vaccination no later than August 15. A little less than a month is allotted to launch a unified information system about vaccinated service workers - it will start working on July 1. The Moscow health department, in turn, must determine the city's need for vaccines against the virus.
Discrediting of State Duma elections coordinated from USA, EU, Ukraine - senators

 RAPSI

15:06 18/06/2021

MOSCOW, June 18 (RAPSI)  Actions aimed to discredit the elections to the State Duma of the Russian Federation is coordinated with direct participation of the US Department of State, according to a press release published by the working group under the Federation Council commission on monitoring attempts of external interference in elections.

Head of the monitoring group of the Federation Council Commission on Protecting State Sovereignty and Preventing Interference in the Domestic Affairs of the Russian Federation, First Deputy Chair of the Federation Council Committee on Foreign Affairs Vladimir Dzhabarov presented an interim report on attempts to interfere in the Russian parliamentary elections from abroad.

Foreign centers, primarily American ones, and those of the EU countries, NATO and Ukraine, had began active, large-scale and systematic work to discredit the Russian parliamentary elections even before the official announcement that these elections were to be held. At the same time, apparently, the ultimate goal of this work is in the maximum degree to discredit the entire electoral system of Russia for the presidential election campaign of 2024, Dzhabarov said; at the same time he emphasized the fact that because such centers realize that it is impossible to influence the true expression of the will of Russian citizens in reality, those aim to cause distrust of the very results of the Russian elections.

According to reports, concrete destructive work with respect to the September 2021 elections was started this spring and is coordinated by the US Department of State, the senator stressed.

The work to discredit the elections to the State Duma of the Russian Federation is carried out on a systemic basis and is coordinated directly from Washington with the direct participation of the US State Department, the press release reads.

Within the framework of destructive actions aimed at the discrediting the elections in Russia, it is planned to actively use direct henchmen of the West and their accomplices both abroad and inside Russia. In particular, it is planned to nominate numerous candidates for State Duma deputies from among persons who obviously do not have legal grounds to be registered, or whose purpose is not to obtain candidate status, but, on the contrary, to receive a refusal in registration, the authors of the press release write.

Thus, the main task of these persons is to create conditions for stir up scandals and create news suitable for anti-Russian propaganda.

Moreover, utilizing modern information and computer technologies, including AI technologies, it is planned to fabricate video materials based on recordings from webcams at polling stations, the report reads.

According to the monitoring data, today there is every reason to believe that in the near future, using Russian-speaking persons residing abroad, imitation of anti-Russian protest actions will be carried out for their subsequent use by pro-Western media, social networks and respecitve NGOs in order to discredit the electoral system of Russia.

These and similar actions will receive coordinated assistance and support from politicians, diplomats, unscrupulous foreign observers and various experts to substantiate the previously made conclusion about the non-recognition of the results of the Russian elections to the State Duma.

The way this work is to be performed by external forces can be exemplified by recently observed developments in neighboring Belarus, the report reads.

The Commission will do its utmost to further identify and expose such illegal attempts. It is expected that the information collected by the monitoring group will be used by the Central Election Commission and the Civic Chamber of Russia, the press release emphasizes.
A Place for All Conservatives to Speak Their Mind.
Espanola, NM (87532)

Today

Mostly sunny early with isolated thunderstorms developing this afternoon. High 84F. Winds SSW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 30%..

Tonight

A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible early. Cloudy skies this evening will become partly cloudy after midnight. Low 62F. Winds SSW at 10 to 15 mph.
The Allahabad High Court has dismissed the protection plea of a live-in couple, noting that the woman was already married and in a live-in relationship with another man.

"We fail to understand how such a petition can be allowed since it would be permitting illegality in the society," the high court observed while imposing a fine of Rs 5,000 on the couple.

Petitioner number one, Geeta, from Aligarh is a major and is in a live-in relationship with petitioner number two, who is a major man.

In a writ petition filed before the high court, they sought direction in the nature of mandamus commanding the respondents - Geeta's husband and other family members - not to interfere and disturb their 'peaceful live-in relation' by adopting coercive measures.

While rejecting their plea on Tuesday, a division bench comprising Justice Kaushal Jayendra Thaker and Justice Dinesh Pathak also dismissed the writ petition.

The bench observed, "Can we grant protection to the people who want to commit what can be said to be an act which is against the mandate of the Hindu Marriage Act. The Article 21 of the Constitution of India may permit a person to have own liberty but the liberty has to be within the ambit of law which applies to them."

The Article 21 of the Constitution provides protection of life and personal liberty. It guarantees that no person shall be deprived of his life or personal liberty except according to procedure established by law.

The court, while further noting that the woman is the legally wedded wife of one of the respondents in the case, remarked, "She has for whatever reasons decided to go away from her husband, can we permit them to live in relation under the guise of protection of life and liberty."

Significantly, the court also observed that whether her husband had committed an act which can be said to be an offence under Section 377 (unnatural offences) of Indian Penal Code (IPC) for which she has never complained of, all these are disputed questions of facts. There is no FIR.

The court directed that the fine imposed on the petitioners shall be deposited by them with the Uttar Pradesh State Legal Services Authority.
Congress General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra has spoken to Sachin Pilot, party leader Ajay Maken said this on Friday dispelling rumours that 'no leader was engaging with Pilot'.

Sources have said that party interim President Sonia Gandhi 'is likely to intervene' to resolve the deadlock between the Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot and Pilot.

Ajay Maken Congress General Secretary In-charge of Rajasthan said, "Priyanka Gandhiji and I have spoken to Sachin Pilotji. As he is senior leader of the party and asset, so it's impossible if he seeks appointment he will be denied, K.C. Venugopal has also spoken to him."

The MLAs and the Pilot camp in particular have been pressurizing the Congress leadership for cabinet expansion and appointments in board and corporations in Rajasthan. They allege all this is being stalled by the Chief Minister's camp.

Pilot was in Delhi last week and even toured Uttarakhand to meet his supporters where he attacked the BJP.

Maken had said last week, "Vacant positions in the cabinet, boards and commissions would be filled soon and we are in talks with all."

He said that all other pending issues will also be taken up.

When asked if senior party leader Sachin Pilot is angry, the former Union Minister said, "I am speaking to Pilotji on a regular basis. If he would have been angry, he would not be speaking to me."

Pilot has raked up the issue of non-resolution of commitments made to him.

"It has now been 10 months. I was given to understand that there would be swift action by the committee, but now half of the term is done, and those issues haven't been resolved. It is unfortunate that so many of the party workers who worked and gave their all for getting us the mandate are not being heard," Pilot had said.
Puchong, Malaysia -- (SBWIRE) -- 06/18/2021 -- When it comes to a perfectly built ceiling fan with the lights having the best modern designs that appeal for the finest lifestyle options, then it is for sure that Ecoluxe happens to be the best choice there. Coming from Malaysia, these decorative ceiling fans are the best choices that one can have. The demand of the modern ceiling fans has increased to a great extent in the recent years with the house owners looking for the ceiling fans that are all covering. It is here that the demand of these fans has reached sky high.



These fans have the range from the vintage and minimal ones to the modern and sleek models. The designs that Ecoluxe has for the ceiling fans are perfect for making the look of the room or the outdoor spaces perfect. The best designed units are there with the fans for keeping the space airy and cool. The manufacturing company has the purpose of providing the best quality that proves its worth over the time. The fans are made keeping in mind about the aesthetic features and performances. The well designed fans are the perfect picks for any kind of house. They have a very low noise even when they have a high performance. Their blades happen to be properly positioned in a way that produces maximum efficiency and airflow.



Along with the best price and perfect services in terms of airflow there are also options for free shipping as well. Across Malaysia, the company has access to any destination, and no matter wherever the booking is, they are sent at the doorstep. Therefore, it is not a matter of surprise that the fan has garnered so much appreciation from all.



About the Ecoluxe

Ecoluxe by Millenium Electrical & Lighting Sdn Bhd. It is a ceiling fan manufacturing company that has earned a wide reputation of manufacturing the best quality fans with the best looks and performance.



For more information, Please visit https://ecoluxe.my/



Contact Detail:



Millenium Electrical & Lighting Sdn Bhd

Ecoluxe

No.5 Jalan TPP 12, Taman Perindustrian Putra,

47130 Puchong, Selangor Darul Ehsan

Phone No: +6019-266 1998

Country: Malaysia

E-mail : sales@ecoluxe.my

Website Url: https://ecoluxe.my/
Kington, UK -- (SBWIRE) -- 06/18/2021 -- The .TLG file is one of several files that QuickBooks creates every time the company file is opened in a new place. The information in the TLG file is contained for error recovery.



As transactions are entered, the TLG file increases. Because the transaction log file is only reset under specific circumstances, it may grow in size and become larger than the QuickBooks company file itself. Large transaction log files can have an adverse effect on overall QuickBooks performance.



This log file can also be used together with a QuickBooks backup file (.qbb) to recover data from a damaged company file. "In most cases, the TLG may not really be a priority, but it is very important to maintain the log in case your company file is erased." John Rocha, E-Tech's Technical Services Manager said.



The transaction log file is reset every time a complete is made or a company file is restored. "The transaction log is only reset under these circumstances, which is why it tends to grow large in size, sometimes even larger than the QuickBooks company file itself. A very large transaction log file will have an adverse effect on QuickBooks' performance," Rocha said.



On the other hand, if QuickBooks loses connection to the company file, the TLG file automatically corrects the data file as much as possible.This is a highly useful method to use when your file becomes irreparable due to data corruption.



The actual working data file is a QBW file and is the most important QuickBooks data file you have on your system. If the .QBW file is missing or deleted, or if you find that it was accidentally moved to the recycle bin, E-Tech offers a service that can do a full recovery by restoring the .TLG file into an older backup.



For more information on this service, visit https://quickbooksrecovery.co.uk/quickbooks-file-data-services/quickbooks-tlg-data-recovery-service/



About E-Tech

E-Tech is the leading service provider of QuickBooks File Repair, Data Recovery, QuickBooks Conversion and QuickBooks SDK programming in the UK and Ireland. In their 20 years plus of experience with Intuit QuickBooks, they have assisted over 1000 satisfied customers with their requirements. E-Tech UK covers US, UK, Canadian, Australian versions which include Reckon Accounts, and New Zealand versions of QuickBooks through PC and Mac platforms.



For media inquiries regarding E-Tech, individuals are encouraged to contact Media Relations Director, Melanie Ann via email at Melanie@e-tech.ca.



To learn more about the company, visit: https://quickbooksrecovery.co.uk/.



Media Contact



Melanie Ann

E-Tech

61 Bridge St.

Kington HR5 3DJ

Melanie@e-tech.ca

www.quickbooksrecovery.co.uk
The sweat bee Megalopta genalis, a Neotropical nocturnal bee species that navigates under the forest canopy at light intensities 10 times dimmer than starlight, is able to learn dorsal landmarks to find its nest during homing, the first flying insect known with this capacity.

Megalopta genalis is a species in the family Halictidae (commonly referred to as sweat bees), the second-largest family of bees. The term sweat bee refers to their attraction to human sweat and perspiration.

First described in 1916, Megalopta genalis is native to Central and South America.

The special compound eyes of this species are 30 times more sensitive to light and concentrate photons of light in a way day-flying honeybee eyes cannot.

Megalopta genalis is a facultatively eusocial tropical bee that nests in hollowed-out wooden sticks entangled in the understory of the forest, said University of Lunds Dr. Eric Warrant and colleagues.

Typically, each bee forages during roughly 70 min windows bordered by astronomical twilight, once during dusk and once during dawn.

Due to the dense foliage in the rainforest, the light intensity during these twilight periods is typically around that of a starlit night under an open sky.

The researchers carried out several experiments at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institutes research station on Barro Colorado Island in Panama.

They first set up a special bee motel. Imagine the entrances to five rooms: each entrance is an identical, circular gray disc. The door is a tiny round opening at the center of the disc  the end of a stick nest.

In the first experiment, they asked if the bees could find their way home using a single landmark.

The scientists placed a black bar above the entrance to one of the nests. After the bees left to look for pollen, they changed the order of the nests, but the real nest was still marked by the black bar above the entrance. When the bees returned, they chose the right nest.

Next, the authors made it a bit more complicated by building a sort of awning  like the roof of a carport  above each nest entrance.

Over the four empty nests they placed an awning with a pattern of black and white bars, and over the occupied nest, a different pattern.

Again, when the bees went out, the team changed the position of the nest, and again, they found the right nest when they came back.

But the researchers still had not ruled out the possibility that the bees were using another clue, like smell, to find their own nest.

So they left the nest in the same place, but put the bees learned pattern over an empty nest and the bees chose the empty nest, showing that they were using the pattern as a guide, not smell or some other signal from the nest.

The teams final experiment was the most elegant: this time two nests shared a common awning, a design of dark circles on a light background made to represent the patterns of light and dark in real forest canopies.

The entrance to an empty nest was located under one end of the awning, and the entrance to the occupied nest under the opposite end. This time, when the bees left, the team flipped the awning around so that the pattern was reversed.

The bees chose the wrong nest more than 80% of the time, showing once and for all that they were navigating based on the pattern above.

Our results suggest that the local foliage patterns created by the canopy against the brighter sky could potentially provide the bee with reliable landmark information for navigation during foraging and homing at night, the scientists said.

The findings were published in the journal Current Biology.

_____

Sandra Chaib et al. Dorsal landmark navigation in a Neotropical nocturnal bee. Current Biology, published online June 10, 2021; doi: 10.1016/j.cub.2021.05.029
A new species of the giant rhinoceros genus Paraceratherium has been identified from the fossilized remains found in Gansu Province, northwestern China.

The newly-identified rhino species lived during the Oligocene epoch, around 26.5 million years ago.

Named Paraceratherium linxiaense, it belongs to Paraceratherium, a small genus of extinct hornless rhinos.

The giant rhino has been considered as one of the largest land mammals that ever lived, said Professor Tao Deng from the Chinese Academy of Sciences Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology and colleagues.

Its skull and legs are longer than all reported land mammals, but the metapodials (long bones of the hand and feet) are not massive in outline.

Its body size was suitable for open woodlands under humid or arid climatic conditions.

Except for some remains found in Eastern Europe, Anatolia, and Caucasus, giant rhinos lived mainly in Asia, especially in China, Mongolia, Kazakhstan, and Pakistan.

All forms of the giant rhino, including six genera, have been recorded from northwest to southwest China through the Middle Eocene to the Late Oligocene.

The genus Paraceratherium was the most widely distributed form of the giant rhino, but aside from East and Central Asia, many records from East Europe and West Asia comprise fragmentary specimens, they added.

Only Paraceratherium bugtiense, known from the southwestern corner of the Tibetan Plateau, has ample records and undoubtable taxa identity and is key to the origin and dispersal history of Paraceratherium.

The fossilized remains of Paraceratherium linxiaense  a complete skull and mandible with the associated atlas, and an axis and two thoracic vertebrae of another individual  were recovered from the Jiaozigou Formation of the Linxia Basin in Gansu Province, China, located at the northeastern border of the Tibetan Plateau.

The analysis of the specimens shows that Paraceratherium linxiaense is the highly derived species of its genus.

We found that all six members of the Paraceratherium genus are sister species to Aralotherium and form a monophyletic clade in which Paraceratherium grangeri is the most primitive, succeeded by Paraceratherium huangheense and Paraceratherium asiaticum, the paleontologists said.

We were able to determine that, in the Early Oligocene, Paraceratherium asiaticum dispersed westward to Kazakhstan and its descendant lineage expanded to South Asia as Paraceratherium bugtiense.

In the Late Oligocene, Paraceratherium returned northward, crossing the Tibetan area to produce Paraceratherium lepidium to the west in Kazakhstan and Paraceratherium linxiaense to the east in the Linxia Basin.

Late Oligocene tropical conditions allowed the giant rhino to return northward to Central Asia, implying that the Tibetan region was still not uplifted as a high-elevation plateau, Professor Deng said.

During the Oligocene, the giant rhino could obviously disperse freely from the Mongolian Plateau to South Asia along the eastern coast of the Tethys Ocean and perhaps through Tibet.

The topographical possibility that the giant rhino crossed the Tibetan area to reach the Indian-Pakistani subcontinent in the Oligocene can also be supported by other evidence.

Up to the Late Oligocene, the evolution and migration from Paraceratherium bugtiense to Paraceratherium linxiaense and Paraceratherium lepidum show that the Tibetan Plateau was not yet a barrier to the movement of the largest land mammal.

The study was published in the June 17, 2021 edition of the journal Communications Biology.

_____

T. Deng et al. 2021. An Oligocene giant rhino provides insights into Paraceratherium evolution. Commun Biol 4, 639; doi: 10.1038/s42003-021-02170-6
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Berlin (Germany), June 17, 2021 (SPS) - In the midst of Morocco's aggression against neighboring countries and the European Union to gain support in their policies contrary to international legality, the Secretary of State for Global Spain, Manuel Muniz has warned that the position of his countries, with legal and historical responsibility in the process of decolonization of Western Sahara, "has not changed and will not change.

According to the EFE news agency, the Secretary of State has clarified in a meeting with journalists, held in Berlin, that Spain's position is "perfectly framed in the Security Council resolutions" and in "the international consensus." he has defended that it is the same position that "has remained unchanged for decades."

"We support from the beginning what the United Nations Security Council has requested, which is that a dialogue be carried out between the Saharawi and Moroccan sides on the status of the region and that it be mediated by the (United Nations Mission for the referendum in Western Sahara) MINURSO , says Manuel Muniz in statements collected by EFE
Lake Charles, LA (70615)

Today

Mostly cloudy early, then thunderstorms developing this afternoon. High around 90F. Winds WSW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 80%..

Tonight

Scattered thunderstorms this evening becoming more widespread overnight. Low 74F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 80%.
Hospitals across the U.S. have reported a rise in lung transplants for severe coronavirus cases, the Cleveland Clinic, one of the countrys top-ranked medical centers, said last week. The grueling surgery may be the only solution for patients who experience a life-threatening constellation of lung damage inflicted by the virus, a hyper-inflammatory immune response to it, and the bodys failure to properly repair the injury.
Even as the death toll for COVID has topped 600,000, states such as Tennessee and North Carolina have given millions of doses back to the federal government, and Oklahoma has refused its weekly allotment, the Associated Press reported. Florida officials wont say whether the state has stopped placing orders for new doses in recent weeks because of its large inventory, or whether health officials have returned vials to the federal stockpile. State and federal health officials did not respond to requests for information regarding Floridas vaccine inventory.
We sat by the Ninja Turtles and he took a 10-second pause, he said. Tears started rushing down his face. When he saw Alf, he told me how he grew up in a single-family home with just his mother and the one thing they had time to do together was watch Alf. When the world is feeling and going bananas, sometimes seeing that one thing of value to you makes you forget about everything.
The home at 160 Marine Way was built in 1939. The current owner, who bought the property in 1993, is only the second owner of the property, which then consisted of two small cottages on three lots. In 1996, the owner added a 600-square-foot second-story master bedroom and bath and an open air "widows walk" on the top. The exterior walls of the existing two cottages were used to support and create the addition of the second floor, which is set back behind the original roofline, therefore, blending the two structures by the "bridge" upstairs. (Delray Preservation Trust/Courtesy)
A trooper, who was not identified other than being a woman, was heading east on Davie Boulevard to help another trooper when a driver attempting to make a left turn struck the right side of the troopers car, Florida Highway Patrol Lieutenant Yanko Reyes said.
With the current legislation that was just signed, we no longer have access to 100% of these funds  we being the citizens of Florida. So that is why now is the time for us to do this, said Mike McGraw, vice president of Florida Realtors. We have continued to go to Tallahassee and ask for full funding, and with this legislation we are now going to go and ask for full funding through the citizens through a ballot initiative.
Under the process, the agency is required to appoint a committee of interested persons and to publicly post the list of representatives. Anyone who is not invited to serve on the committee who feels like their interests arent represented has 30 days to apply to participate. The committee must be chaired by a neutral party, and its meetings must be publicly noticed.
If all of that doesnt matter, lets not forget the Sun Sentinels last endorsed candidate for governor fell into a drug-induced depression because he lost. Can you just imagine how depressed he would have been running Florida during Covid-19? Then again, he could have just called Nikki to ask her fiance to deliver a bag of marijuana to cope, and used taxpayer money to pay for it.
Some hatreds run too deep to be solved by the pen. After Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor and King of Spain, annexed the Duchy of Milan in 1535, it provided Francis I of France with the perfect pretext for launching another war against his perpetual adversary. This bellicose rivalry arose originally in 1519, when the German princes elected Charles over Francis as emperor, and over the next 25 years it would contribute to the eruption of four Italian Wars waged between the two monarchs.

The third of these, fought between 1536 and 1538, exacerbated this animosity and saw Francis secure an unexpected alliance with the Ottoman Empire in the hope of finally defeating his archenemy. They planned a joint attack by land and sea on Genoa, but when the Franco-Turkish fleet arrived there in August 1536, the Spanish forces had already reinforced the city's defences. And a raid on Corfu the following year by Hayreddin Barbarossa, better known as Red Beard, aided the legendary corsair more than the French as he enslaved nearly the entire rural population of the island.

With the war in a deadlock, Carlos and Francis sat down on 18 June 1538 to sign the Truce of Nice and put an end to the fighting.

History has its fair share both of children who became kings and of kings who never ceased to be children. Due to their intense mutual disdain, Carlos and Francis refused to sit in the same room as each other during the peace negotiations, forcing Pope Paul III to relay messages between them.

They eventually reached an agreement destined not to last: just four years later, Francis, who acquired the nickname of 'knight king' because of his personal vendetta against Charles, allied with Suleiman the Magnificent again and declared war against the Holy Roman Empire. This time, England's Henry VIII sided with Charles against the Franco-Turkish forces.

This fourth Italian War between Charles and Francis would end in 1546 with another treaty, followed by Francis' death a year later. However, the blood feud would continue with his son, Henry II, who commenced what would become known as the Last Italian War (1551-1559), eager to see Charles fall from his throne once and for all.
The Guardia Civil have arrested a 29-year-old man in Coin for allegedly sexually abusing a seven-year-old girl. The arrest took place this Monday, after the child's relatives handed in a video recorded the day to the police.

According to several sources consulted by SUR, the video was recorded on Sunday by neighbours of the girl, who had noticed the strange behaviour of the arrested man. When the images reached the hands of the minor's family, there was a great commotion and several people allegedly attacked the now detained man, according to the same sources.

The young man suffered injuries of varying degrees, but none of them serious.

Initially, both the child and the suspect were taken to the Guard Civil station while officers, together with the Local Police tried to calm the situation among residents in the area.

The girl was transferred to a hospital in Malaga to be examined, while the man was released after giving a statement to the police, although he was arrested the next day by the Guardia Civil and sent to prison, while investigations continue, by a judge.

Several relatives of the detained man have since, allegedly, been victims of various attacks, insults and threats that have been reported to the police.

Sources have told SUR that the arrested person has a recognised mental disability, a condition that is, apparently, not noticeable.
A firefighter has died and three more have been injured while extinguishing a fire in a car workshop in Vilanova i la Geltru (Barcelona) this Thursday (17 June).

The three injured firefighters were treated by ambulance crews because "they showed symptoms of heatstroke," according to a statement from the regional government.

The fire brigade were alerted to the blaze at 1.54pm, and 20 firefighters travelled to the scene. The fire was declared controlled at 3.27pm and extinguished at 3.49pm.

Some vehicles on the ground floor of the workshop, located on the town's Masia Nova street, were badly damaged.

The regional Minister of the Interior, Joan Ignasi Elena, visited the scene with the mayor of Vilanova i la Geltru, Olga Arnau, and the general director of the fire brigade, Joan Delort.
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Beijing, June 17(UNI) Around 500 policemen on Thursday raided the offices of pro-democracy paper Apple Daily in Hong Kong, accusing that the paper's reports breached national security law.

According to reports police arrested the editor-in-chief and four other executives from their homes, and also froze HK$18m ($2.3m; 1.64m) of assets owned by three companies Apple Daily Limited, Apple Daily Printing Limited and AD internet Limited all linked to Apple Daily, the BBC reported.

The paper's owner and well known media tychoon Jimmy Lai, is already in jail on a string of charges.

Apple Daily is known to be critical of the mainland Chinese leadership.

According to the police since 2019, Apple Daily has been publishing articles calling on countries to impose sanctions on Hong Kong and mainland China.

The paper broadcasted live footage of the raid on its Facebook account.

Photos published online by Apple Daily showed police going through reporters' computers.

The police separately visited the homes of editor-in-chief Ryan Law, parent company Next Digital's CEO Cheung Kim-hung, COO Chow Tat-kuen, Apple Daily publisher Chan Pui-man and Director Cheung Chi-wai, and arrested them.

UNI XC ACL1542
New Delhi, Jun 18 (UNI) A Portuguese flag container ship MV Devon, on passage from Colombo to West Bengal, developed an underwater crack in the fuel tank containing about 120 KL of very low sulphur fuel oil on June 16, a Defence Ministry release said on Friday.

Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre Colombo informed the Indian Coast Guard (ICG) regarding the mid-sea oil spill about 450 kms South East of Chennai, the release said.

As per the Ministry, the crack resulted in spillage of about 10 KL of oil into the sea before preventive action was taken and remaining oil in tank was transferred to another tank by the ships crew.

The vessel is carrying 10,795 tonnes of general cargo in 382 containers and manned by 17 crew. The ship is continuing its voyage to Haldia and likely to reach on June 18, 2021.

The ICG is in continuous contact with MV Devon and the master has reported that the vessel is stable. ICG Pollution response team at Chennai has been alerted and kept on standby. In addition, ICG ships & aircraft deployed at sea are also put on alert in pollution response configuration, the release added.

UNI SB GK 1057
New Delhi, June 18 (UNI) The Supreme Court on Friday refused to direct the medical universities to call off or postpone the final year Post Graduate exams in a plea filed by a group of 29 doctors Post-Graduate Medical residents.

A vacation bench of Justices Indira Banerjee and MR Shah said examination dates are to be announced by various varsities and it cannot pass any general order to all the universities not to conduct or postpone the final year postgraduate medical examination.

The Apex court noted that the National Medical Council (NMC) had advised the universities in the country to take the Covid situation into consideration while announcing the dates for final-year examination.

'We have interfered where it was possible like postponing by one month the INI CET examination conducted by AIIMS, New Delhi, where we have found that there was no justification in fixing the date for the examination without giving appropriate time to students to prepare, the bench was quoted as saying by Live Law.

Senior advocate Sanjay Hegde, appearing for 29 doctors, sought that NMC be directed to issue directions to all the varsities to give reasonable time to students for preparing for the examination as the examinee-doctors have been engaged in Covid duty.

On Hegde's plea, the bench said,'We don't know what could be the reasonable time for preparing for the examination. How can the court decide the reasonable time? Everyone may have their reasonable time. Let the university decide on the basis of the advisory of NMC as per the pandemic situation prevailing in their area.'

UNI SV JW1653
UW Professor Contributes to Study of How Animals Adapt Habitats to Climate Change

Michael Dillon (left), an associate professor in the University of Wyoming Department of Zoology and Physiology, and Arthur Woods (right), a professor of biological sciences at the University of Montana, were part of a research group that examined how animals ability to respond to climate change likely depends on how well they modify their habitats, such as nests and burrows. Here, Dillon bends over to examine a plant and measure microclimates at the UW-National Park Service Research Station in Grand Teton National Park. Their work, titled Extended Phenotypes: Buffers or Amplifiers of Climate Change?, was published in the June 16 issue of Trends in Ecology and Evolution. (Sylvain Pincebourde Photo)

Birds build nests to keep eggs and baby nestlings warm during cool weather, but also make adjustments in nest insulation in such a way the little ones can keep cool in very hot conditions. Mammals, such as rabbits or groundhogs, sleep or hibernate in underground burrows that provide stable, moderate temperatures and avoid above-ground conditions that often are far more extreme outside the burrow.

Michael Dillon, an associate professor in the University of Wyoming Department of Zoology and Physiology, was part of a research group that examined how animals ability to respond to climate change likely depends on how well they modify their habitats, such as nests and burrows.

So, how are these animals doing? Are they succeeding, struggling, or are their efforts a mixed bag in adapting their habitats to climate change?

One of the key reasons that we wrote this paper is that we dont know the answer to this very important question!, Dillon says. We hope the paper will encourage scientists to begin answering this question.

Dillon is a co-author of a paper, titled Extended Phenotypes: Buffers or Amplifiers of Climate Change?, that was published June 16 in Trends in Ecology & Evolution. The journal publishes commissioned, peer-reviewed articles in all areas of ecology and evolutionary science.

The lead author of the paper is Arthur Woods, a professor of biological sciences at the University of Montana. Other contributors to the paper were from the University of Tours in Tours, France; and Stellenbosch University in Stellenbosch, South Africa.

The study investigated extended phenotypes, which are modifications that organisms -- birds, insects and mammals -- make to their habitats.

An extended phenotype can range from simply a hole in the ground occupied by an animal to leaves rolled into cavities by insects, to nests of all shapes and sizes built by birds and mammals, to termite mounds and bee colonies, Dillon says.

Extended phenotypes are important because they filter climate into local sets of conditions immediately around the organism. This is what biologists call the microclimate.

Because extended phenotypes are constructed structures, they often are modified in response to local climate variation and, potentially, in response to climate change. This process is called plasticity of the extended phenotype.

One example might be a bird nest that is well insulated to protect eggs or young birds from cold. As climates warm, if the bird does not adjust insulation in the nest, it may, in fact, cause the young to overheat, Dillon explains.

In another prime example, termites build mounds that capture wind and solar energy to drive airflow through the colony, which stabilizes temperature, relative humidity and oxygen levels experienced by the colony.

However, the idea of microclimates is broader than constructed habitats. Microclimates typically differ substantially from nearby climates, which means that the climate in an area may provide little information about what animals experience in their microhabitats.

As an analogy, although a weather station might tell the public that the temperature in Laramie is 90 degrees Fahrenheit, simply by moving from the south to the north side of a building, one can experience microclimates that are strikingly different and often not captured by the weather data, Dillon says.

The same is true of animals of many different sizes. For example, a moose can move from an open sagebrush landscape to a shaded river corridor to cool off; a snake can move from its underground hole to a sunny rock to warm up; and a tiny insect shuttling between the top and bottom of a leaf can experience temperature differences of more than 20 degrees Fahrenheit.

So, animals use microclimates, both by simply moving but also by building structures, such as nests, burrows, mounds and mines, Dillon says.

Across the globe, rising levels of carbon dioxide in the Earths atmosphere are causing temperatures to rise and precipitation patterns to shift. For biologists, a key problem is to understand current effects of climate change on species, and to predict future effects, including how species ranges may shift and what the relative risks of extinction are for different animal species groups.

The research team favors a renewed effort to understand how extended phenotypes mediate how organisms experience climate change.

We need a much better understanding of the basic biophysical principles by which extended phenotypes alter local conditions, says Sylvain Pincebourde, an ecologist in the Insect Biology Research Institute at the University of Tours and one of the papers co-authors.

Another key challenge is to understand how much plasticity there is in extended phenotypes, and how much and how rapidly they can evolve.

At this point, we pretty much have no idea, Dillon says. Can structures that buffer temperature variability keep up with the pace of climate change?
UWs Seth Peterson Ties for Top Calf Roping Time of Entire CNFR

UWs Seth Peterson, of Minot, N.D., gets his rope on a calf during Thursdays College National Finals Rodeo in Casper. The senior stopped the clock in 7.7 seconds, tying for the fastest time of the week. (Morgan Tyree/Northwest College Photo)

It came out of nowhere, and Seth Peterson says it even shocked him.

The University of Wyoming Cowboy knew he lost his chance to gain a short go bid in tie down roping at the College National Finals Rodeo (CNFR) when he failed to get his rope on his second calf. So, it came down to a one-rope rodeo for the Minot, N.D., senior Thursday night.

And, when he successfully tied up his calf, the roar of the partisan Wyoming crowd in the Ford Wyoming Center in Casper told the story: Peterson stopped the clock at 7.7 seconds, tying for the best time of the entire weeklong rodeo. What could have been if he had tied his second calf? But Peterson didnt dwell on that -- he was left grinning on his final rope of his UW career.

I was a little mad at myself in the second round for not tying my calf and not doing my job, Peterson said. So, I came out tonight knowing that I drew a good calf. I knew I was going to do my job, I stayed within myself, and it worked out. My horse gave me the best shot I could, and it was awesome.

Peterson knew he was out of the average and had the mindset that he was going out with one last shot.

I was going for all or nothing out there. I was going for first to last -- it was a one-head rodeo for me, he said. Ive had a few better than 7.7, but nothing like this on such a big stage as here.

If his third-round time holds up, it will add major points to the Cowboys team total.

Peterson was the only UW Cowboy competing during Thursdays performance. He still has a chance to gain a finals bid in steer wrestling. His combined time of 19.2 seconds on two head gives him the opportunity to continue his stellar UW career that saw him win his second all-around title in the Central Rocky Mountain Region (CRMR) this past season.

His third bulldogging run is tonight (Friday).

As jubilant as Peterson was, Faith Hoffman suffered a major blow in her attempt to reach Saturdays short go in breakaway roping. Entering Thursday night, the Kiowa, Colo., senior was sitting fifth in the average at 5.5 seconds on two runs. All she needed was a third tie.

It didnt happen.

Hoffman was good coming out of the box and threw a nice rope, but her calf ran right through the loop for a no-time. That ended the CRMR all-around champions career for the UW Cowgirl. She also slipped down in her second event -- goat tying -- to 14th in the average, eliminating her from short go contention.

Only the top 12 times/marks earn automatic bids to Saturday nights finals.

Karson Bradley gave herself a chance for a short go bid Thursday night when she stopped the clock in 14.52 seconds in barrel racing. The Big Piney juniors three-run time of 33.28 seconds left her fourth in the average, with just one section of barrel racers left tonight.

This would be Bradleys second CNFR short go qualification.

The Cowgirls dropped two places in the interim team standing to sixth place with 145 points. Montana State University continues to lead with 355 points. The UW men moved up to 14th place with 185 points, while Western Oklahoma State College leads the pack with 565.


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Halls Sophie Garner-MacKinnon has been named the 2020-21 Gatorade Connecticut Softball Player of the Year, according to a release from Gatorade. Garner-MacKinnon is the first Gatorade Connecticut Softball Player of the Year to be chosen from Hall High School.
WKCTC Adult Ed Program Virtually Honors GED Grads

PADUCAH - In 2020-2021, 60 students received their GED from West Kentucky Community and Technical College's Skills U, the adult education program at the college. Recipients will be honored during a virtual GED graduation that is set to premiere on the college's Facebook page and YouTube channel June 30 at 6 pm."The country is beginning to move forward from the COVID-19 pandemic. WKCTC is closely monitoring the daily changes, while continuing to follow the guidelines of the CDC and the Kentucky Community and Technical College System for the safety of our students, faculty, staff and community as we too move forward," said WKCTC President Anton Reece. "These students have proven hard work and dedication pay off. We are proud of them, and we join their family and friends in celebrating this joyous occasion!"Ashley Vance began the journey to her GED at WKCTC in 2016. She said being a mother of two young children, working fulltime and focusing on school was no easy task, but the team at WKCTC Skills U helped her achieve far more than she dreamed possible."I was a nervous wreck and confused to say the least when trying to understand what my next step should be. Tammy (Maines, Skills U director) helped me fill out my Free Application for Federal Student Aid; she scheduled my classes; and she helped prepare me for my college entrance exams. She held my hand and never left my side while I adjusted to college life as a 30-year-old, said the Paducah resident.Vance, who enrolled at WKCTC in fall 2020, just one week after she received her GED, is thriving. Studying to earn an associate in applied science degree and a diploma in combination welding, she earned a welding certificate in her first semester. She has earned recognition on the Dean's List twice, serves as the current Student Government Association vice president and is a member of the Phi Theta Kappa Honor Society."I had never dreamed I would have come this far. I am a living example that no matter your age, financial situation, or what stage of life you're in, it is never too late to start your path towards a better life by getting an education."Maines said she applauds the GED recipients for their hard work, determination and perseverance, especially during the pandemic. "The world is at their fingertips, and they are now one step closer to the next goals they have set for yourselves. I am so proud of them."
Adam Butterbaugh (center) presents a gift basket to Keith and Tina Moszczenski of St. Louis. They were received Thursday as the 1000th Boat to visit the Paducah transient boat dock since its opening in 2017. PHOTO:City of Paducah

1000th Boat Visits Paducah's Transient Dock

By West Kentucky Star Staff

PADUCAH - On Thursday, Keith and Tina Moszczenski, from St. Louis, were greeted and welcomed as the 1000th boat to visit Paducahs transient boat dock.Adam Butterbaugh from Paducah Parks and Recreation presented the visitors with a basket of gifts and thanked them for visiting Paducah.Since the 340-foot dock opened on the Ohio River in 2017, it has received four straight Boaters' Choice Awards from the website Marinas.com .
Baptist Health to Offer Safe Sitter Classes

By West Kentucky Star Staff

PADUCAH - Baptist Health Paducah is offering Safe Sitter babysitting classes next month for boys and girls who are in sixth through eighth grade.The class includes safety skills to prevent unsafe situations, childcare skills with tips to manage behavioral issues, and life and business skills, such as how to discuss fees and how to greet employers.Registered nurses, who are Certified Safe Sitter instructors, will teach the class with fun games and role playing exercises.The one-day classes will take place at the hospital from 8 am until noon July 13, and noon to 4 pm on July 26 and 27. Class size is limited, so pre-registration is required. The fee is $30. For more information and to register, phone 270-575-8444 or email Rhonda.Brooks@bhsi.com.
Brasher Named McCracken County Library Director

By West Kentucky Star Staff

PADUCAH - The McCracken County Public Library Board of Trustees has selected their new Director of the library. Justin Brasher has been chosen after a nationwide search for a new director began in March.Brasher has a masters degree in Library and Information Studies from Florida State University, and he also earned a masters degree in Business Administration from West Texas A&M. He is a member of the American Library Association and the Texas Library Association.Board President Rachel Norton stated that Justin will bring a fresh perspective that will enhance the librarys existing strategies.Nortain said, He has a drive for innovation and development and enjoys technology, research, and business, recognizing the value that those areas can bring to a community.Board member Melony Smith added, Justin showed an unbridled desire to be adventurous in his leadership, which will allow our staff to continue to develop their innovative and visionary programs.Brasher is currently the Community Programming Manager for the Pasadena Public Library system, in southeast Houston. His first day at the McCracken County Public Library will be August 4.
West End Pursuit Suspect's Case Moves Forward

By West Kentucky Star Staff

PADUCAH - A man arrested Sunday after a vehicle and foot pursuit was in court Thursday.The McCracken District Court Clerk says 38-year-old Jonathan White had a preliminary hearing, and his case was transferred from District Court to Circuit Court. His arraignment is set for July 15.White was arrested by Kentucky State Police just before midnight on June 13 on Paducah's west end. Police say they tried to pull over the vehicle driven by White, but it fled the scene before crashing. White and 26-year-old Damareon Prather reportedly fled the scene on foot, but White was quickly caught by troopers. Prather was later arrested by Paducah Police as he hid under a local resident's porch.White faces charges of DUI with aggravating circumstances, fleeing or evading police in a vehicle and on foot, possession of a handgun by a convicted felon, trafficking in a controlled substance 1st degree 1st offense, and multiple traffic offenses.
McGuire Appears in Court on Theft-Related Charge

By West Kentucky Star Staff

PADUCAH - A McCracken County man charged with receiving stolen property was in court Thursday.According to the McCracken Circuit Court Clerk, 36-year-old Jonathon McGuire appeared for an arraignment, which was continued to July 8.McGuire was arrested on March 24 after a dealership on Paducah's southside reported a vehicle had been stolen. State troopers located the vehicle a short time later, leading to the arrest of 36-year-old Joseph Owen.The investigation led deputies to search a storage unit rented by McGuire. During a search, they reportedly found several items that had been reported stolen, including a gun.Detectives eventually found more stolen items, including a cargo trailer and commercial grade inflatables at a home in Carlisle County, which led to the arrest of 30-year-old Brandy Grooms. She told officers the items had been brought there by someone she knows.McGuire faces two counts of receiving stolen property over $500.
Paducah Pair Arraigned for Child Endangerment

By West Kentucky Star Staff

PADUCAH - A Reidland couple charged after their 3-year-old child was found in a neighbors yard was in court Thursday.Twenty-eight-year-old Bradley Vallely and 40-year-old Tabitha Craig were arraigned on charges of possession of methamphetamine, possession of ecstasy, possession of marijuana, possession of a hallucinogen, possession of a legend drug, and drug paraphernalia.Vallely was also arraigned on a charge of first-degree wanton endangerment. Craig was additionally arraigned on a charge of second-degree wanton endangerment and driving on a suspended license.A pretrial conference was scheduled for August 25.McCracken County deputies responded to Epperson Road on May 14 after a man said a child was on his property. The man believed the child had come from a nearby home, but he had not made contact with anyone there.Detectives entered the nearby home and found Vallely asleep. He claimed Craig had left the home but hadn't told him the child was still there.A search of the home reportedly uncovered meth, ecstasy pills, marijuana, psychedelic mushrooms, other pills, and drug paraphernalia.
World War II B-25 Bomber Visits Paducah Today

By West Kentucky Star Staff

PADUCAH - A historic World War II plane will be flying the skies over Paducah today.The B-25 Bomber, "Show Me," which is part of the Missouri Wing of the Commemorative Air Force, will arrive at Barkley Regional Airport around noon as part of a five-city barnstorming tour over the Father's Day weekend.Anyone may tour the aircraft at no charge today between 1-7 pm, with interruptions at 3 pm, 5 pm, and 7 pm for flights that are booked for veterans to experience flying in the historic plane. Those flights are already fully booked in partnership with Honor Flight Bluegrass.Those visiting the airport should park at Midwest Aviation, 200 Hardy Roberts Drive adjacent to the airport.Other stops on the tour include Somerset and Morehead on Saturday, and Frankfort and Leitchfield on Sunday.In service as a trainer from January 1945, the B-25J was put into storage in 1958. It was sold to a private owner in 1959. Damaged by a wind storm in 1969, the plane didn't fly again until 1975.It became part of the Missouri Wing of the Commemorative Air Force in 1982 and was officially renamed "Show Me."See more on the plane at the link below.On the Net:
4000-Mile Bike Racers In Area This Weekend

By West Kentucky Star Staff

MARION, KY - One by one, an elite group of bicyclists are starting to make their way through southern Illinois and western Kentucky this weekend.The leaders have each ridden 3,000 miles so far, but they still have more than a thousand miles to go in the annual Trans-America Bike Race.Forty-two entrants pedaled out of Astoria, Oregon on the Pacific coast on June 6. Fourteen of them have dropped out, some undoubtedly while trying to climb the Rocky Mountains and cross the Great Divide. The remaining riders were stretched from Idaho to Illinois as of Friday.The race leader is 54-year-old Kraig Pauli of Oregon. At sunrise on Friday, Pauli crossed the Mississippi River from Missouri to Chester, Illinois. By lunch he coasted into Murphysboro, with his sights on gobbling up the rest of southern Illinois mileage through the Shawnee National Forest, past Goreville, Eddyville, Golconda, and Shawneetown.On Friday evening, the Cave-In-Rock ferry deposited Pauli into Crittenden County for his next leg through Marion into the Pennyrile, and ultimately to Yorktown, Virginia.The second-place rider, Evan Deutsch, was about 80 miles behind Pauli, wrapping up his final miles in Missouri. Behind them, it's another 330 miles back to a foursome who are just about to finish crossing Kansas.Another unique aspect of this race is that the riders are "self supported." That is, they're making the whole trip with whatever they can carry on the bike, instead of having a support crew and supplies following in a van. Without the entourage or any hoopla surrounding the event, it's hard to spot the individual riders as they make their way along mostly back roads.However, thanks to satellite technology, you can track the riders' progress at their official race website, linked below.The course follows the Transamerica Trail, which is the oldest bicycle trail in the country. It was charted in 1973, and completed in time for use in 1976 and America's bicentennial. Casual riders of the trail give themselves about three months to complete the journey; race competitors cover the entire course from ocean to ocean in about 16 days.On the Net:
This undated photo provided by the Christian County (Ky.) Detention Center shows Christian R. Martin. Martin, a pilot for an American Airlines subsidiary was arrested Saturday, May 11, 2019 in the 2015 shooting deaths of three people in Kentucky, the state attorney general announced. (Christian County, Kentucky, Detention Center via AP) PHOTO:Christian County, Kentucky, Detention Center via AP

Airline Pilot Guilty Of Killing Three Neighbors

By The Associated Press





ELIZABETHTOWN - A jury in Kentucky convicted a former commercial airline pilot of killing three of his neighbors.Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron announced that 53-year-old Christian R. Martin was found guilty on Wednesday of murder, arson, attempted arson, burglary and tampering with physical evidence.Martin was arrested two years ago at the Louisville airport in the 2015 slayings. Police said Calvin Phillips was found shot to death in his cellar. The bodies of Pamela Phillips and Edward Dansereau were found in a cornfield in her burned car.Cameron's office brought the case to trial after his predecessor, now Gov. Andy Beshear, appointed a special prosecutor.
Unsafe Graves County Bridge Ordered Closed

By West Kentucky Star Staff

GRAVES COUNTY - The Kentucky Transportation Cabinet has closed a portion of Beech Grove Road in Graves County and barricaded the Mayfield Creek Bridge after it was determined to be unsafe.The bridge is located halfway between Antioch Church Road and Barnetts Chapel Road.Kentucky Transportation Cabinet certified bridge inspectors and consultants have been evaluating timber pile structures statewide. In a recent inspection of the Mayfield Creek Bridge they found all timber piles in one of the piers had sustained additional damage from overweight vehicles crossing the structure.Engineers will further evaluate the bridge to determine if it can be repaired or should be replaced.
Catholic Bishops May Rebuke Biden, Others

By The Associated Press

WASHINGTON - U.S. Catholic bishops overwhelmingly approved the drafting of a teaching document that many of them hope will rebuke Catholic politicians, including President Joe Biden, for receiving Communion despite their support for abortion rights.The decision, vehemently opposed by a minority of bishops, came despite appeals from the Vatican for a more cautious and collegial approach to the divisive issue. And it raises questions of how closely the bishops will be able to cooperate with the Biden administration on issues such as immigration and racial injustice.The result of the vote  168 in favor and 55 against  was announced Friday near the end of a three-day meeting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops that was held virtually. The bishops had cast their votes privately on Thursday after several hours of impassioned debate.Supporters of the measure said a strong rebuke of Biden is needed because of his recent actions protecting and expanding abortion access, while opponents warned that such action would portray the bishops as a partisan force during a time of bitter political divisions across the country.As a result of the vote, the USCCBs doctrine committee will draft a statement on the meaning of Communion in the life of the church that will be submitted for consideration at a future meeting, probably an in-person gathering in November. To be formally adopted, the document would need support of two-thirds of the bishops.One section of the document is intended to include a specific admonition to Catholic politicians and other public figures who disobey church teaching on abortion and other core doctrinal issues.Bishop Donald Hying of Madison, Wisconsin, said during Thursdays debate that he speaks with many people who are confused by a Catholic president who advances the most radical pro-abortion agenda in history, and action from the bishops conference is needed.Theyre looking for direction, Hying said.Bishop Robert McElroy of San Diego countered that the USCCB would suffer destructive consequences from a document targeting Catholic politicians.It would be impossible to prevent the weaponization of the Eucharist, McElroy said. He warned that the initiative would weaken the bishops ability to speak on issues such as poverty, racism and the environment.Biden, who attends Mass regularly, says he personally opposes abortion but doesnt think he should impose that position on Americans who feel otherwise. Hes taken several executive actions during his presidency that were hailed by abortion-rights advocates.Neither Biden nor the White House press office had any immediate comment on the bishops' vote.The chairman of the USCCB doctrine committee, Bishop Kevin Rhoades of Fort Wayne-South Bend, Indiana, said no decisions have been made on the final contents of the proposed document. He said bishops who are not on the committee will have chances to offer input, and the final draft will be subject to amendments before it is put up to a vote.Rhoades also said the document would not mention Biden or other individuals by name and would offer guidelines rather than imposing a mandatory national policy.That would leave decisions about Communion for specific churchgoers up to individual bishops and archbishops. Cardinal Wilton Gregory, the archbishop of Washington, has made clear that Biden is welcome to receive Communion at churches in the archdiocese.Gregory was one of nearly 70 bishops who signed a letter to USCCB president and Los Angeles Archbishop Jose Gomez urging him to delay the Communion discussion until the bishops convene in person, but that request was not granted.The choice before us at this moment," Gregory said during Thursday's debate, "is either we pursue a path of strengthening unity among ourselves or settle for creating a document that will not bring unity but may very well further damage it.The USCCB has identified the fight against abortion as its preeminent priority. But the bishops collective stance is at odds with the views of many Catholics in the U.S.In recent polls by the Pew Research Center, about 56% of U.S. Catholics surveyed said abortion should be legal in most or all cases, and 67% said Biden should be allowed to receive Communion during Mass.On the latter issue, Pew found a sharp partisan divide: 55% of Catholics who identify with the Republican Party said Bidens abortion stance should disqualify him from Communion, compared with 11% of Catholics who lean Democratic.David Campbell, a political science professor at the University of Notre Dame, said the bishops' vote reflects the fact that the same fault lines dividing all American voters also divide American Catholics  and Catholic leaders.The more attention the bishops focus on the Communion question, the more the church will be perceived as being in the political fray, which risks driving some Catholics away, Campbell said via email.
Gov. J.B. Pritzker speaks as Illinois Department of Public Health Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike listens during a press conference at the James R. Thompson Center in the Loop, Thursday afternoon, March 18, 2021, where Pritzker gave an update on COVID-19 vaccine supply and reopening plans in Illinois. PHOTO:(Pat Nabong /Chicago Sun-Times via AP)

Illinois Joins Other States With Vaccine Lottery

By The Associated Press

CHICAGO - Illinois has joined the group of states offering millions of dollars in cash prizes and scholarships to encourage residents to get vaccinated.Gov. J.B. Pritzker announced Thursday the state will offer $7 million in cash prizes and $3 million in scholarships through a new lottery open to all residents who have received at least one COVID-19 vaccine dose. Prizes will range from $100,000 to $1 million, and children can win a college savings plan worth $150,000.Names in Illinois vaccination database will be automatically eligible for the lottery. Participants will be required to have a shot by July 1. Weekly drawings will begin July 8.
Court Ruling Could Favor Sunrise Children Services

By The Associated Press/West Kentucky Star Staff

FRANKFORT - After a U.S. Supreme Court ruling on a similar case, Republicans have turned up the pressure on Kentuckys Democratic governor to renew a contract with Sunrise Children's Services, a Baptist-affiliated foster care agency.The state's GOP attorney general, state office holders and lawmakers reacted to the ruling Thursday, saying it should settle the Kentucky dispute between religious beliefs and gay rights.The Supreme Court ruled unanimously that the city of Philadelphia wrongly limited its relationship with a Catholic foster care agency based on its policy, which says its religious views prevent it from working with same-sex couples as foster parents.The Kentucky standoff revolves around a clause in a new contract with the state that bans discrimination based on sexual orientation, which Sunrise Childrens Services is refusing to sign. An exemption to that clause has been included in the contract with Sunrise every year since the 1970s, until now.Gov. Andy Beshear was noncommittal Thursday about the future contract status with Sunrise. Beshear acknowledged that at least some of the initial language in the ruling suggests it might resolve the Kentucky dispute. Sunrises attorney, John Sheller, says the high court ruling applies fully to the Kentucky dispute.Sheller said Thursday that if Kentucky fails to follow the Supreme Court ruling, they would be inviting litigation, and the state would surely lose. His statement says the facts and the law are identical in both cases.Attorney General Daniel Cameron, Agriculture Commissioner Ryan Quarles, State Treasurer Allison Ball, House Speaker David Osborne, and Speaker Pro Tem David Meade all issued statements urging the governor to abide by the federal ruling.Sunrise is the largest private residential childcare provider in Kentucky, serving over 1,000 children and families. They have facilitated more than 500 adoptions of Kentucky children and have worked with the commonwealth through 14 gubernatorial administrations.
Sign-ups Growing for Kentucky Vaccine Prizes

By The Associated Press

FRANKFORT - Gov. Andy Beshear says the number of Kentuckians vying for lucrative prizes tied to getting the COVID-19 vaccine continues to grow.Beshear said Thursday more than 414,000 Kentucky adults have entered drawings for $1 million prizes. Another 23,000 youngsters are entered for college scholarships.Three Kentucky adults will win $1 million prizes, and 15 students ages 12 to 17 will be awarded full-ride scholarships to a Kentucky public university, college, technical, or trade school.The offer is available to Kentucky residents already vaccinated and those who get the vaccine before the drawings. Drawings will be July 1, July 29, and Aug. 26.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-16 13:48:23|Editor: huaxia

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Agricultural machines are displayed at Fieldays, the biggest agribusiness event in New Zealand, at Mystery Creek of Hamilton, New Zealand, June 17, 2021. This year's Fieldays opened to the public on Wednesday since the last physical Fieldays was held in 2019. Fieldays is a renowned platform for launching cutting edge agricultural technology. With over 1,000 exhibitors, the latest innovations, health check-ups, advice on agricultural careers and education, competitions, food and beverage options, the four-day event based on a 114-hectare site at Mystery Creek of Hamilton drew people from New Zealand and even abroad - both as exhibitors and visitors. (Xinhua/Guo Lei)

HAMILTON, New Zealand, June 16 (Xinhua) -- This year's Fieldays, the biggest agribusiness event in New Zealand, opened to the public on Wednesday since the last physical Fieldays was held in 2019.

Fieldays is a renowned platform for launching cutting edge agricultural technology. With over 1,000 exhibitors, the latest innovations, health check-ups, advice on agricultural careers and education, competitions, food and beverage options, the four-day event based on a 114-hectare site at Mystery Creek of Hamilton drew people from New Zealand and even abroad - both as exhibitors and visitors.

Peter Nation, Chief Executive of the New Zealand National Fieldays Society, said, "We are honored to be in a position to host an in-person event while many countries across the world cannot."

"Two years without a physical event, having to go through what COVID-19 dealt last year, and then all the work we've had to do to put this event back together," he said.

Fieldays Online, launched during COVID-19 in 2020, also made a return. Last year it had 90,455 visitors and viewers from more than 75 countries and regions.

Nation expected sales at the event to be high, as farmers should have some extra cash flow due to high dairy payout indications and strength in most agricultural sectors.

"After the challenging year-and-a-half we have had facing the effects of COVID-19, it will be fantastic for our exhibitors to generate cash flow and grow their business at Fieldays. In turn, this will boost the earnings of the primary sector."

The Tractor and Machinery Association had also seen strong sales this year, indicating that New Zealand primary industry was in a good shape, according to Nation. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-17 15:55:13|Editor: huaxia

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Medical supplies donated by China are unloaded from a plane at Robert Mugabe International Airport in Harare, Zimbabwe, on May 11, 2020. (Xinhua/Zhang Yuliang)

"China has walked its talk with African countries and other developing countries around the world in an effort to manage this pandemic," said Cavince Adhere, a Kenya-based international relations scholar.

"Countries cannot act in compartments. They must be willing to shed off the tag of nationalism and begin to speak in a language that resonates with the cross-border challenges that we're facing today," he added.

by Xinhua writers Zhu Shaobin, Qiao Benxiao, and Wang Ping

NAIROBI, June 17 (Xinhua) -- Thursday marks the one-year anniversary of the Extraordinary China-Africa Summit on Solidarity against COVID-19, which has delivered an important message to the world that countries must stand together to rein in the devastating pandemic before it causes further harm.

Chinese President Xi Jinping, when addressing the summit on June 17, 2020, said that in the face of COVID-19, China and Africa have enhanced solidarity and strengthened friendship and mutual trust, reaffirming China's commitment to its longstanding friendship with Africa.

As the war against the coronavirus continues, especially when new waves of COVID-19 infections hit some parts of the world, the China-Africa solidarity throws light on the right way to fight a common enemy of mankind.





RUSH TO WHERE NEEDED

During the extraordinary summit last year, Xi said people and their lives must be put front and center, and that China and Africa should do whatever it takes to protect people's lives and health.

As the developing world is still facing a huge vaccination gap due to a dire shortage of vaccines, China has been trying its best to supply vaccines to where they are most urgently needed, having donated vaccines to more than 80 developing countries.

China has pledged to make COVID-19 vaccines a global public good. Currently, more than 30 African countries have received or will receive Chinese vaccines.

In Cameroon, Antoinette Fatimatu, a 38-year-old nurse who conducts COVID-19 tests at the Yaounde General Hospital, said the most difficult part of her job is to tell people they are positive for COVID-19. "I have seen people die within days after I test them positive. I need protection and can't wait to be vaccinated," her colleague Judith Maya told Xinhua.

China's Sinopharm vaccines are seen at an airport in Yaounde, Cameroon, April 11, 2021. (Photo by Jean Pierre Kepseu/Xinhua)

In April, Cameroon received its first batch of COVID-19 vaccines when 200,000 doses of China's Sinopharm vaccines arrived.

In Zimbabwe, 65-year-old Deborah Birch, who has an underlying condition, took her first jab of a Chinese vaccine in March. "I am confident that I have taken the Chinese vaccine," she said.

China also supports its own vaccine manufacturers in transferring technologies to other developing countries and carrying out joint production with them.

Last month, Egypt received from China the first batch of raw materials to locally manufacture the Sinovac vaccine with the target of producing 40 million doses within a year.

Airport staff members transport the first batch of Chinese Sinovac vaccine raw materials unloaded from a plane at the Cairo International Airport in Cairo, Egypt, May 21, 2021. (Xinhua/Sui Xiankai)

STANDING SHOULDER TO SHOULDER

China and Africa have stayed committed to fighting COVID-19 together. After the Chinese city of Wuhan reported its first infections, leaders of more than 50 African countries offered sympathies and provided support to China's anti-virus fight.

The goodwill and kind gesture by African countries have been returned with China's ensuing support.

In February, Equatorial Guinea became the first African country to receive Chinese vaccine aid.

In March, China agreed to expand and modernize the Juba Teaching Hospital so as to offer better medical services in South Sudan, a country that has suffered from years of conflict.

Members of the Chinese medical expert team communicate with local frontline health workers at a COVID-19 testing facility in Juba, South Sudan, Aug. 21, 2020. (Chinese Embassy in South Sudan/Handout via Xinhua)

At the Yaounde Gynaeco-Obstetric and Pediatric Hospital of Cameroon, Chinese medical team members have been helping with medical training for local staff.

"From the start of the pandemic until now, we feel the presence of the Chinese medical team alongside the Cameroonian team to effectively contain this pandemic," Nsom Mba Charles, deputy director-general of the hospital, told Xinhua.

Data showed that 46 Chinese medical teams in Africa have been mobilized for Africa's response efforts. China also sent 15 ad hoc medical expert teams to Africa and swiftly set up a cooperation mechanism for Chinese hospitals to pair up with 43 African hospitals.

Workers work on the construction site of the China-aided future headquarters of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, June 2, 2021. (Xinhua/Michael Tewelde)

In December 2020, construction of the Chinese-aided headquarters project for the Africa CDC commenced. Fantahun Hailemichael, project coordinator at the African Union, said the landmark project, presently progressing smoothly, is a generous gift to the 1.3 billion people in Africa.

"The Africa-China partnership is very strong and we hope it will last for a very long period of time. This will continue because it's based on trust and mutual interest. It can not be shaken by events or circumstances," Hailemichael said.





COMMUNITY OF HEALTH FOR ALL

During last year's summit, Xi called for building a China-Africa community of health for all and pledged that once the development and deployment of COVID-19 vaccine is completed in China, African countries will be among the first to benefit.

Last month, at the Global Health Summit, Xi said that confronted by a pandemic like COVID-19, we must champion the vision of building a global community of health for all and tide over this trying time through solidarity and cooperation.

To Cavince Adhere, a Kenya-based international relations scholar, China has demonstrated its tangible commitments to assist Africa, as China has really been offering the continent therapeutics, epidemic control information and vaccines.

A woman receives her first jab of Sinovac COVID-19 vaccine at Mbare Polyclinic in Harare, capital of Zimbabwe, April 14, 2021. (Xinhua/Tafara Mugwara)

"China has walked its talk with African countries and other developing countries around the world in an effort to manage this pandemic," Adhere said, noting that China is also the first country to assist Africa with local production of vaccines.

"I think the spirit of shared humanity that is being fronted by China is something that is very progressive and has seen a lot of valued acceptance and resonance around the world," Adhere said, adding, "Countries cannot act in compartments. They must be willing to shed off the tag of nationalism and begin to speak in a language that resonates with the cross-border challenges that we're facing today." Enditem

(Xinhua reporters Feng Yiwei, Li Hualing, Zhang Yuliang, and Zhang Gaiping contributed to the story.)
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-17 17:51:04|Editor: huaxia

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Photo taken on June 15, 2021 shows cherries growing in a tree in Gilgit city in Pakistan's northern Gilgit-Baltistan region. According to Pakistan's Ministry of Planning, Development and Special Initiatives, cherry is grown at over 2,500 hectares of land in Pakistan with Gilgit-Baltistan and the southwestern Balochistan province being the two major cherry producing areas of the country, and Pakistan's collective yield of cherry in 2016 was over 6,000 tons. (Photo by Miraj/Xinhua)

by Misbah Saba Malik

ISLAMABAD, June 17 (Xinhua) -- Soaked in summer sun, scarlet cherries glow softly in trees standing tall at the foothills of the Himalayas and Karakoram mountain ranges in Pakistan's northern Gilgit-Baltistan region, a land with ample varieties of fruits including sweet cherries, tangy apricots and juicy pears during this part of the year.

Nourished by fresh glacial water, and ripened in golden sunbeams coupled with gentle breeze whirling to and fro in the lap of world's highest peaks, the cherries can relish the taste buds, and experts believe that the cherries will also bloom the lives of people in the area if they reach in high-end Chinese and other markets of the world.

According to Pakistan's Ministry of Planning, Development and Special Initiatives, cherry is grown at over 2,500 hectares of land in Pakistan with Gilgit-Baltistan and the southwestern Balochistan province being the two major cherry producing areas of the country, and Pakistan's collective yield of cherry in 2016 was over 6,000 tons.

Pakistan is currently not so competitive in terms of cherry production and processing as compared to some countries in the world, but the situation could get better if farmers in the cherry-growing areas are given proper guidance, knowledge and technology to meet the demands of international markets, experts say.

Pakistani cherry has not been so far able to reach any international market, except being sold in a few markets in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), because local farmers do not know the process and procedures to register their products in the international markets. And due to lack of knowledge, it is hard for them to get international certifications to have an access to foreign high-end trading hubs.

Zulfiqar Ali Ghazi, 47, grows cherries in Gilgit and also exports the fruit to the UAE after collecting it from locals.

Ghazi, who has been associated with the cherry production and distribution business for more than one and a half decade, said in a conversation with Xinhua that currently there are 19 varieties of cherries in the Gilgit-Baltistan region, and only a few of them are suitable for export.

The government gave away many cherry plants to farmers this year to enhance the fruit production in the area and to support locals, he said, adding that it is the right time to focus on growing the varieties which are being demanded in international markets.

"The government should work on getting the international certificates to approve exports of cherries and help us develop a cold chain to preserve the cherries whose current shelf life is seven to 10 days. Pakistani cherries have a huge potential, but they need urgent concentration and support to make their mark in international markets," he said.

Talking to Xinhua, Federal Minister for National Food Security and Research Syed Fakhar Imam said that the cherry fruit has not made any significant entry into the international market despite having potential and the government is devising plans to uplift the agricultural sector which will eventually benefit all farmers including the cherry producers.

"Distinctive flavor of our fruits will have an impact on high-end markets, and to achieve that target, we must have a system to regulate the standard and quality of cherries to meet the requirements of international markets, eventually leading to a greater international demand for it," he said.

Pakistan's cherry production is small due to which it is not eyeing so many foreign markets except China which is a big consumer market for cherries, the minister said, adding that the cooperation between the two countries in agriculture under the second phase of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor will also encourage Chinese investors to invest in the country.

"Many Chinese have shown interest in investing in Pakistan and if they invest in cherry growing areas in the form of corporate farming, value addition and food processing, it will not only give benefit to the investors, but will also be a win-win situation for local public too."

Cherry prices stand high in the Chinese market, and once Pakistani cherries enter the country, it will give a big profit margin to local farmers and others around them to increase planting, the minister added.

Worth of fruits grows manifold after drying them, brewing juices from them or making jam and jelly to enhance their value addition.

Chinese are experts in food processing and their support in the form of joint ventures with local traders, and in corporate farming will help uplift the lives of local people greatly, Yasar Saleem Khan, a provincial team manager at the Pakistan office of the Center for Agriculture and Bioscience International, told Xinhua.

He also stressed on the renovation of old low-density and low-yield orchards with modern varieties, applying improved management practices to enhance yields and improve quality.

"The renovation process of the value chain and processing infrastructure will not only improve productivity of the fruit and reduce post-harvest losses, but also enhance quality of cherry for domestic and international consumption, enabling local farmers to get higher profits. These need to be initiated by the government and executed in collaboration with, and participation of the private sector including joint ventures with Chinese, farmers, traders and their groups and associations," he said. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-17 21:49:35|Editor: huaxia

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Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis (R) and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen attend the presentation event of the Recovery and Resilience Plan dubbed "Greece 2.0" in Athens, Greece, on June 17, 2021. The economic recovery plan of Greece has been endorsed by the European Union (EU), according to an official announcement on Thursday. Greece will receive 30.5 billion euros (36.4 billion U.S. dollars) from 2021 to 2026 (17.8 billion euros in grants and 12.7 billion euros in loans), according to the Recovery and Resilience Plan dubbed "Greece 2.0". (Menelaos Mirilas/Pool via Xinhua)

ATHENS, June 17 (Xinhua) -- The economic recovery plan of Greece has been endorsed by the European Union (EU), according to an official announcement on Thursday.

Greece will receive 30.5 billion euros (36.4 billion U.S. dollars) from 2021 to 2026 (17.8 billion euros in grants and 12.7 billion euros in loans), according to the Recovery and Resilience Plan dubbed "Greece 2.0".

The fund will be invested in such fields as green and digital transition, healthcare, and job creation, according to the plan.

"There is no doubt it (the plan) will deeply transform Greek economy which will embrace the twin green and digital transition," said Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission (EC), during her visit to Athens.

She said that all EU-member states will emerge stronger and more resilient. "The recovery is underway, and we can start to look to the future with hope and with confidence," she said.

Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said that this was a historic moment for Europe and the dawn of a new era. (1 euro= 1.19 U.S. dollars) Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-17 23:54:26|Editor: huaxia

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Aerial photo taken on April 10, 2019 shows a nonferrous metal company in Fangchenggang City, south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. (Xinhua/Zhou Hua)

BEIJING, June 17 (Xinhua) -- China will further release its state reserves of copper, aluminum and zinc to ensure stable prices of commodities and ease cost pressure on firms, the country's top economic planner said Thursday.

The National Development and Reform Commission will work with other departments to release the nonferrous metal reserves in multiple batches as needed in light of market price changes, said Meng Wei, a spokesperson with the commission.

The National Food and Strategic Reserves Administration on Wednesday announced that it would release national reserves of copper, aluminum and zinc via public bidding.

The release will be open to nonferrous metal processing and manufacturing enterprises, and small and medium-sized enterprises will be favored in participating in the bidding, Meng said.

The commission has taken various measures to rein in market speculation and correct the overly high commodity prices, Meng said, adding that price declines have been seen in commodities including iron ore, steel and copper.

Chinese authorities recently unveiled a slew of measures to ensure a solid market supply of staple goods together with price stability.

The NDRC, together with five other government bodies, has jointly released a guideline on fostering the price-control mechanism for important goods related to people's livelihoods. A work plan has also been released to improve the mechanism for adjusting pork reserves.

The top economic planner has also rolled out new rules to manage price indexes for important goods and services, to take effect on Aug. 1 this year.

The policy mix on price stability focuses on both the long-term mechanism and urgent problems, which is conducive to ensuring the stable supply and prices of bulk commodities and preventing price hikes from affecting people's livelihoods, Meng said.

Going forward, efforts should be made to closely monitor the market and price changes, maintain the balance between supply and demand, and strengthen the supervision of futures and spot markets, Meng added. 
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-17 23:54:57|Editor: huaxia

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People wearing face masks talk on a street in London, Britain, on June 17, 2021. Britain has reported another 11,007 coronavirus cases in the latest 24-hour period, bringing the total number of coronavirus cases in the country to 4,600,623, according to official figures released Thursday. (Photo by Ray Tang/Xinhua)

LONDON, June 17 (Xinhua) -- Britain has reported another 11,007 coronavirus cases in the latest 24-hour period, bringing the total number of coronavirus cases in the country to 4,600,623, according to official figures released Thursday.

The country also recorded another 19 coronavirus-related deaths, bringing the total number of coronavirus-related deaths in Britain to 127,945. These figures only include the deaths of people who died within 28 days of their first positive test.

Despite the success of the vaccination rollout, the report shows the prevalence of COVID-19 infections was rising rapidly during late May and early June, coinciding with the Delta variant (first identified in India) becoming the dominant variant in England, according to the latest results of the REACT-1 study published Thursday by the Imperial College London and Ipsos MORI.

The prevalence of COVID-19 infections is the highest in five to 12 and 18 to 24 year olds, rising from 0.16 percent to 0.35 percent and from 0.10 percent to 0.36 percent respectively, according to the study.

"These findings highlight the stark context in which we took the difficult decision to delay step four of the roadmap out of lockdown," said British Health and Social Care Secretary Matt Hancock in a statement.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced Monday a four-week delay to the final step of England's roadmap out of COVID-19 restrictions until July 19, amid a surge in cases of the Delta variant.

"We all must hold our nerve that little bit longer as our vaccine rollout continues and I urge everyone to keep observing hands, face, space and fresh air, and make sure you receive both doses of the vaccine for the best possible protection," said Hancock.

New data published this week by Public Health England shows the AstraZeneca vaccine is 92 percent effective against hospitalization from the Delta variant after two doses, and the Pfizer vaccine is 96 percent effective against hospitalisation after two doses.

Both vaccines are being widely used in Britain's vaccination program.

To bring life back to normal, countries such as Britain, China, Russia, the United States as well as the European Union have been racing against time to roll out coronavirus vaccines. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 01:54:18|Editor: huaxia

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Photo taken on June 17, 2021 shows the U.S. Capitol building in Washington, D.C., the United States. The U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday voted to repeal the 2002 authorization for the Iraq War, an effort to curb presidential war powers. (Xinhua/Liu Jie)

WASHINGTON, June 17 (Xinhua) -- The U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday voted to repeal the 2002 authorization for the Iraq War, an effort to curb presidential war powers.

The Democratic-led House revoked the 2002 authorization for the use of military force (AUMF) in a vote of 268 to 161, with 49 Republicans joining 219 Democrats.

"After nearly 20 years of fighting for this, we're finally one step closer to ending forever wars," tweeted by Congresswoman Barbara Lee, the sponsor of the repeal bill.

The 2002 authorization allows military action to defend the national security of the United States "against the continuing threat posed by Iraq." It was repeatedly used by following U.S. presidents to justify military action against terrorist threats.

The Donald Trump administration cited the 2002 AUMF as a legal justification for launching drone strikes that killed Iranian general Qassem Soleimani in Baghdad in January 2020.

The House voted to repeal the 2002 AUMF after the strike, but the effort went nowhere in the Senate, which was then controlled by Republicans.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer on Wednesday voiced support to revoke the authorization and said he would put a similar measure on the Senate floor.

U.S. media reported that the momentum is building for full congressional repeal of the 2002 authorization.

The White House said in a statement earlier this week that the administration supports the move.

"The President is committed to working with the Congress to ensure that outdated authorizations for the use of military force are replaced with a narrow and specific framework appropriate to ensure that we can continue to protect Americans from terrorist threats," it added. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 03:10:39|Editor: huaxia

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A UN General Assembly high-level meeting on middle-income countries is held at the UN headquarters in New York, on June 17, 2021. Guterres on Thursday called for debt relief extension for middle-income countries. (Eskinder Debebe/UN Photo/Handout via Xinhua)

UNITED NATIONS, June 17 (Xinhua) -- United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Thursday called for debt relief extension for middle-income countries.

"Innovative instruments to allow debt restructuring and meaningful debt reduction can help middle-income countries expand their fiscal space to boost investment and steer a resilient and sustainable recovery from the (COVID-19) crisis," the secretary-general told the General Assembly high-level meeting on middle-income countries.

The top UN official underlined the need for financing to help middle-income countries, which account for more than half of the UN's 193 member states, recover in the wake of the global crisis.

He said that middle-income countries should have their debts suspended into 2022 to cope with the social and economic impact of COVID-19.

Many were already dealing with mounting debt before the pandemic, which has only further aggravated the situation.

"In small island states, for example, the collapse of tourism has greatly hindered their capacity to repay debts. And while the global response to the debt crisis is rightly attempting to support low-income countries, middle-income countries must not be left behind," he stated.

Diversity defines the world's middle-income countries, which were already home to some 62 percent of the world's poor prior to the pandemic.

The list includes India, which has a population of more than 1 billion, and Palau, an archipelago in the Pacific with less than 20,000 people.

Besides population size, these countries also vary in economic activity, geography and income levels per capita, which ranges from 1,000 to 12,000 U.S. dollars annually, meaning they often exceed per capita income thresholds for debt relief.

Guterres stressed the need for better mechanisms and international cooperation to address what he characterized as their mounting and unsustainable debt levels.

"Even if these countries manage to avoid default, they will see long-lasting limitations on critical government spending on a variety of development and climate objectives in the years to come," he warned.

He underlined the need for "a new debt mechanism" that includes debt swaps, buy-backs and cancellations.

"This is the moment to tackle long-standing weaknesses in the international debt architecture, from lack of agreed principles, to restructurings that provide too little relief, too late," said the UN chief.

This past March, the secretary-general convened world leaders for a meeting to bolster support for action to stave off the debt crisis in developing countries.

The UN chief was encouraged to see growing recognition around the need for new Special Drawing Rights, a type of foreign reserve asset developed by the International Monetary Fund. However, he said unused SDRs must be re-allocated to support vulnerable nations, including middle-income countries.

Last year, the G20 leading economies announced a debt service suspension initiative which allows the world's poorest countries to temporarily halt bilateral credit payments. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 03:27:39|Editor: huaxia

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UNITED NATIONS, June 17 (Xinhua) -- Access and security challenges stem the scaling up of increased aid for victims of hostilities in northern Ethiopia, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said on Thursday.

"Under the latest response plan for northern Ethiopia, since May 1, more than 2.3 million people out of the targeted 5.2 million have been reached with food aid," the humanitarian office said.

More than 350,000 people face catastrophic food insecurity or famine conditions at Integrated Food Security Phase Classification level 5. More than 1.8 million people affected by the conflict are at emergency level 4 in northernmost Tigray and the adjacent regions of Amhara to the south and Afar to the east, OCHA said.

Security and access conditions in Tigray remain complex and highly fluid, with active hostilities impeding people's access to aid and the movement of aid workers, the office said.

Further complicating living conditions is the lack of protection for civilians, the humanitarians said.

"More than 500 cases of gender-based violence, including rape, have been reported in May," OCHA said. "This includes about 70 reported cases against girls under 18."

"It is expected that the actual number of cases is significantly higher given underreporting due to fear of stigmatization, retaliation, limited access to trusted service providers, and widespread impunity for perpetrators," the office said

The United Nations continues to call for safe, unimpeded and sustained access to civilians. More funding is also urgently needed. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 03:48:37|Editor: huaxia

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Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi (R) and visiting Luxembourgian Minister for Foreign and European Affairs Jean Asselborn attend a press conference in Amman, Jordan, on June 17, 2021. Jordan on Thursday underlined the necessity to resume effective peace negotiations for achieving the two-state solution regarding the Palestinian issue. Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi made the remarks at a meeting with his visiting Luxembourgian counterpart Jean Asselborn, where the two sides called for stopping all Israeli measures that undermine the two-state solution, such as building and expanding settlements. (Photo by Mohammad Abu Ghosh/Xinhua)

AMMAN, June 17 (Xinhua) -- Jordan on Thursday underlined the necessity to resume effective peace negotiations for achieving the two-state solution regarding the Palestinian issue.

Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi made the remarks at a meeting with his visiting Luxembourg counterpart Jean Asselborn, where the two sides called for stopping all Israeli measures that undermine the two-state solution, such as building and expanding settlements.

Safadi stressed the need to respect the legal and historical status quo in Jerusalem and its holy sites, vowing that Jordan will continue to work with all partners to protect the Islamic and Christian identity of the holy sites.

Noting that Jordan plays a key role in safeguarding the Islamic and Christian holy sites in Jerusalem, Asselborn affirmed that Luxembourg and the European Union will support the kingdom in continuing to play its crucial role in the region.

The two ministers also discussed ways to enhance bilateral relations and cooperation in various fields, according to a statement issued by the Jordanian Foreign Ministry. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 04:49:52|Editor: huaxia

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BRUSSELS, June 17 (Xinhua) -- The European Medicines Agency (EMA) said on Thursday it may not enforce a 50 percent efficacy threshold for COVID-19 vaccines and will still analyze the entirety of the evidence before making a decision on market authorization.

EMA's head of Biological Health Threats and Vaccines Strategy, Marco Cavaleri, said that although EMA and other regulators were asking for studies that prove that efficacy is at least 50 percent, EMA "always felt [it] difficult to define upfront a threshold."

"We will consider the benefits and the risks demonstrated by the vaccine and come up with a decision on whether the vaccine can be approved or not," he said in reply to questions.

"In other words, we will need to look at the data and only then can we understand that what has been proven in terms of efficacy and safety could be sufficient for a market authorization," he added.

He made the remarks after Germany's CureVac said on Wednesday that the company's COVID-19 vaccine was shown to be just 47 percent effective in an interim analysis of its late-stage trial. The European Union (EU) has secured up to 405 million doses of the CureVac vaccine.

"We know that variants could impact somehow the performance of the vaccines. The vaccines we have approved so far are holding quite well against the majority of the variants that are circulating right now," Cavaleri said.

Earlier on Thursday, the European Commission called for patience and caution while awaiting the results of EMA's final assessment.

"The information that is about the efficacy rate seems to point to some preliminary, or not complete or final results. Of course, it will be important for us to have the final set of complete results regarding efficacy before taking any steps or proceeding in our discussions with the company," declared Dana Spinant, deputy chief spokesperson of the European Commission.

The results of this preliminary analysis have been communicated to EMA, which has been conducting a rolling review of the Curevac vaccine since February.

If the vaccine is cleared, it will be granted a conditional marketing authorization, and EU member states will be able to purchase doses. In case of not getting the green light, the EU's contract with CureVac could be terminated, according to Stefan De Keersmaecker, the European Commission's spokesperson for health.

Currently, four COVID-19 vaccines have been greenlighted by EMA, namely BioNTech/Pfizer, Moderna, AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson. CureVac is under rolling review, along with China's Sinovac, Russia's Sputnik V and the U.S.' Novavax. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 09:19:33|Editor: huaxia

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BEIJING, June 18 (Xinhua) -- The Chinese mainland on Thursday reported one new locally transmitted COVID-19 case in Guangdong Province, the National Health Commission said in its daily report on Friday.

Also newly reported were 22 imported cases, of which eight were reported in Guangdong, five in Fujian, three each in Shanghai and Zhejiang, two in Yunnan, and one in Tianjin.

One new suspected case arriving from outside the mainland was reported in Shanghai and no new deaths related to COVID-19 were reported Thursday. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 09:47:55|Editor: huaxia

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MACAO, June 18 (Xinhua) -- China's Macao Special Administrative Region (SAR) reported one new imported COVID-19 case on Friday, bringing the SAR's total number of confirmed cases to 53, according to the Novel Coronavirus Response and Coordination Center of Macao.

The patient, a 59-year-old male visitor from China's Taiwan, arrived in Macao Thursday on a flight, the center said. The man said he had not been infected with the virus before, nor had he been vaccinated against it.

He has shown no symptoms yet, the center said. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 10:59:31|Editor: huaxia

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BEIJING, June 18 (Xinhua) -- The Chinese mainland on Thursday reported one new locally transmitted COVID-19 case in Guangdong Province, the National Health Commission said in its daily report on Friday.

Also newly reported were 22 imported cases, of which eight were reported in Guangdong, five in Fujian, three each in Shanghai and Zhejiang, two in Yunnan, and one in Tianjin.

One new suspected case arriving from outside the mainland was reported in Shanghai and no new deaths related to COVID-19 were reported Thursday.

A total of 6,351 imported cases had been reported on the mainland by the end of Thursday. Among them, 5,998 had been discharged from hospitals following recovery, and 353 remained hospitalized. No deaths had been reported among the imported cases.

The total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases on the mainland reached 91,534 by Thursday, including 501 patients still receiving treatment, 18 of whom were in severe condition.

A total of 86,397 patients had been discharged from hospitals following recovery on the mainland, and 4,636 had died as a result of the virus.

There was one suspected COVID-19 case on the mainland on Thursday.

A total of 25 asymptomatic cases were newly reported, all from outside the mainland. There were a total of 436 asymptomatic cases, of whom 415 were from abroad, under medical observation by Thursday.

By the end of Thursday, 11,881 confirmed COVID-19 cases, including 210 deaths, had been reported in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (SAR), while 52 cases had been reported in the Macao SAR, and 13,584 cases, including 497 deaths, had been reported in Taiwan.

A total of 11,603 COVID-19 patients in the Hong Kong SAR had been discharged from hospitals following recovery, while 51 had been discharged in the Macao SAR, and 1,133 had been discharged in Taiwan. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 11:48:47|Editor: huaxia

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RIMINI, Italy, June 17 (Xinhua) -- Brazil and Poland marched towards the men's Volleyball National League semifinals after sweeping respective opponents here on Thursday.

Brazil eased past Australia 25-17, 25-22 and 25-12 for their 11th victory in 12 fixtures with Isac Santos and Mauricio Silva contributing 11 points apiece. With three matches remaining for each team in the 16-team round-robin preliminaries, Brazil led the standings with 32 points.

"This victory is very important for our team. We have a great group of players - if someone is needed, he enters the court and he tries to be perfect," said Silva. "Everyone was ready to play and give his best and it's our greatest strength. We have not only six players, but the entire group is very strong."

Poland beat Germany 25-22, 25-19 and 25-20 to improve to a 10-2 win-loss record. Bartosz led the Polish scoring with 16 points.

"Germany played today a really nice game. They served really well and we were a little bit surprised with their starting six that went out to the court, but we won so it's good for us. Now we have three days off and I hope we will use it well," said Piotr Nowakowski, who had seven points for Poland.

Slovenia rallied past Iran 14-25, 25-20, 25-19 and 32-30 for their ninth win in 12 matches. Poland and Slovenia stood second and third, followed by Russia, France and Serbia.

Also on Thursday, Argentina beat Serbia 3-0, Russia tamed Bulgaria 3-0, Canada overcame Japan 3-0, the United States twice rallied from one set down to beat the Netherlands 3-2 and Italy outlasted France 3-2.

The 16 teams will have three days off with the action to resume on Monday with the top four finishers from the preliminaries to qualify for the semifinals. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 13:46:15|Editor: huaxia

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Dmitry Rogozin, director general of Russia's state space corporation Roscosmos, speaks during an interview with Xinhua in St. Petersburg, Russia, June 15, 2021. TO GO WITH "Interview: Russia ready to foster cooperation with China in space, says Roscosmos head" (Xinhua/Yuan Xinfang)

ST. PETERSBURG, June 17 (Xinhua) -- Given China's rapid development and its strong ties and common interests with Russia, it is only too right to foster cooperation between the two countries in the space sector, said Dmitry Rogozin, director general of Russia's state space corporation Roscosmos.

China, a prospering country with a rapidly growing GDP and an ability to capitalize on scientific research, is Russia's good partner and good neighbor, Rogozin told Xinhua in an interview Tuesday during the Global Space Exploration Conference 2021 held here this week.

There are many cases of mutual support, where Russia and China collaborated on space projects and shared knowledge and equipment, Rogozin explained. And that shows that both countries are able to foster productive and balanced cooperation based on intellectual and technological expertise.

"We have a mutual understanding or coinciding positions on most issues of international politics, so why not cooperate together in space? I think this is the right thing to do," he said.

On the global development of the space industry, Rogozin pointed out how countries are gaining confidence, technology, and talent resource, "while China and Russia are certainly very interesting partners in this regard."

Rogozin further talked about the importance of collaborating on deep space exploration.

"In deep space, considering that the distance to the moon is farther than to the International Space Station, mutual support is extremely important. We never know what can happen, and how would we help our astronauts and recover lost equipment," he said.

On the memorandum of understanding signed by the two countries this year on the construction of the International Lunar Research Station, Rogozin emphasized the symbolic significance of this cooperation, especially as it was initiated during the year marking the 60th anniversary of Yuri Gagarin's flight into space.

"We will continue supporting each other, developing together, and the project on the creation of the International Lunar Research Station, which was introduced by Russia and China and is open to all participants on an equal basis, is indeed a very good initiative," Rogozin said.

"I hope that the Europeans and maybe even the Americans will later agree to join this project; this will certainly remove the last existing barriers with regard to space activity and exploration," he added. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 14:13:23|Editor: huaxia

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LOS ANGELES, June 17 (Xinhua) -- One person was killed and 12 others wounded in a series of shootings in several places in the Phoenix metropolitan area in U.S. state of Arizona on Thursday afternoon, and the suspect has been arrested by the police.

According to Peoria Police Department, which led the investigation, the shootings happened at eight locations throughout the West Valley cities in the Phoenix metropolitan area and lasted more than one and a half hours.

Four of the 13 victims in the incidents were struck by a bullet and nine other victims were injured but not physically shot, Brandon Sheffert, a spokesperson for Peoria Police Department said in a briefing.

He said that the suspect was found during a traffic stop in the city of Surprise, where the suspect surrendered to policemen without incident.

So far, police was still investigating the suspect's motive.

A spokesperson for Banner Health told local ABC15 news channel Thursday afternoon that they received a total of nine patients at three of their hospitals related to the shootings, which they referred to as a drive-by shooting incident.

Both Peoria and Surprise are major suburbs of Phoenix. The two cities are 15 km apart.

Arizona Governor Doug Ducey expressed his support for Peoria officials.

"We are maintaining close contact with Peoria officials today following the shootings & we will continue to monitor the situation closely. Arizona's prayers are with those injured, & our condolences go to the loved ones of the individual whose life was taken by this tragic act," the governor tweeted. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 16:42:36|Editor: huaxia

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ULAN BATOR, June 18 (Xinhua) -- Mongolia has registered 2,746 new COVID-19 cases in the past 24 hours after 11,476 tests had been conducted across the country, the health ministry said Friday.

This is the ninth straight day of record new infections, bringing the national tally to 88,516, the ministry said.

Seven of the latest confirmed cases were imported from abroad, and the remaining ones were local infections.

Meanwhile, 2,505 more patients have recovered from the disease, taking the total to 61,725, and another 11 patients have from the disease, bringing the total death toll to 425.

Over 1,684,200 Mongolians have so far been fully vaccinated since the country launched a national vaccination campaign in late February, according to the ministry. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 18:27:49|Editor: huaxia

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LUSAKA, June 18 (Xinhua) -- China has joined African countries in sending messages of condolences following the death of Kenneth Kaunda, Zambia's first president.

Messages of condolences from all over the world have continued pouring in in honor of Kaunda, the last surviving member of African leaders who fought for the liberation of the African continent from colonial oppression.

Kaunda, 97, died on Thursday. A 21-day mourning period has been declared by the government. He led Zambia from 1964 to 1991.

In a statement, the Chinese Embassy in Zambia said it learned with deep sorrow the passing away of Kaunda whom it described as an "old friend of the Chinese."

"Dr. Kaunda was a founder of China-Zambia, China-Africa friendship and made remarkable contributions to China-Zambia, China-Africa relations," the statement said.

It added that the friendship between China and Zambia established by Kaunda and the older generation is all-weather in nature and has an important status and wide-ranging influence.

United Kingdom (UK) Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab also sent his government's condolences on the passing away of Kaunda.

In a release, he said Kaunda was a defining figure in Zambia's independence movement and laid the successful foundation of the southern African nation through his leadership, vision and "One Zambia, One Nation" mantra.

African Union (AU) Chairperson Moussa Faki-Mahamat said in a statement that Kaunda's death was an indescribable loss not only to Zambia but the entire African continent.

During the commemoration of this year's Africa Day, the AU awarded Kaunda a distinguished award for the role he played and the immense contribution he made to the liberation of Africa and its people.

The United Nations (UN) in Zambia described Kaunda as a significant figure in the history of Africa who not only fought for the liberation of the continent but also supported the fight against HIV/AIDS at a time when few were willing to speak out publicly.

"The United Nations notes Dr. Kaunda's contributions to the liberation struggle in Africa that led to political independence in many countries, and his generous support to thousands of refugees escaping conflict in their own lands," UN Resident Coordinator Coumba Mar Gadio said in a statement.

She said Kaunda's support for the fight against HIV/AIDS was demonstrated when he served as ambassador for the Brothers for Life campaign to encourage more men to be tested for HIV.

In 2018 he was presented with a UNAIDS leadership award for his remarkable contributions, she added.

The governments of Botswana and South Africa have since declared seven and 10 days of national mourning respectively in honor of Kaunda.

Botswana President Mokgweetsi Eric Keabetswe Masisi, in his message of condolences, said it was during Kaunda's tenure that relations between the two countries blossomed.

He described Kaunda as an iconic statesman of the highest credentials and lauded his selfless dedication to the interest of his own people as well as the wellbeing of neighbors.

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said his country will forever cherish the role Kaunda played not only in the liberation of Africa but South Africa in particular.

"Under his leadership, Zambia provided refuge, care and support to liberation fighters who had been forced to flee the countries of their birth," he said in a release. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 19:02:42|Editor: huaxia

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HONG KONG, June 18 (Xinhua) -- The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) government said on Friday that it will continue to support the development of local traditional culture after two intangible cultural heritage (ICH) items from Hong Kong were made national ICH items.

Tin Hau Festival in Hong Kong and the Hong Kong cheongsam making technique have been successfully inscribed onto the Fifth National List of ICH announced earlier by the State Council, the HKSAR government said.

The Tin Hau belief has a long history in Hong Kong. Every year, on the 23rd day of the third lunar month, the birthday of Tin Hau is celebrated in various districts, with some organizations staging Cantonese opera performances and holding parades along waterways or on land.

The origin of the cheongsam dates back to decades ago. After World War II, many tailors moved from Shanghai to Hong Kong. As a consequence, the craftsmanship of the Hong Kong cheongsam was enriched and Western sewing skills were taken up, resulting in the uniqueness of the Hong Kong cheongsam making technique.

These two ICH items are in the categories of "social practices, rituals and festive events" and "traditional craftsmanship" defined by the Convention for the Safeguarding of the ICH promulgated by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, according to the HKSAR government.

The HKSAR government said it will continue its commitment to preserving and promoting local ICH and will also encourage the participation of the community in supporting the transmission and development of Hong Kong's traditional culture.

Apart from the above ones, 10 ICH items from Hong Kong have been inscribed onto the National List of ICH, including Cantonese Opera, herbal tea, Cheung Chau Jiao Festival, the Tai Hang Fire Dragon Dance, Tai O Dragon Boat Water Parade.

In 2009, Cantonese opera was inscribed onto the UNESCO's Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, making it a world ICH item. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 19:04:47|Editor: huaxia

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BEIJING, June 18 (Xinhua) -- Xi Jinping, general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, on Friday stressed bearing in mind the course of the Party's struggles, shouldering historic mission and drawing strength from the Party's history to forge ahead.

Xi, also Chinese president and chairman of the Central Military Commission, made the remarks when visiting an exhibition on the CPC history. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 19:20:35|Editor: huaxia

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"I'm envious of their spacious home," says Yang Liwei, China's first astronaut entering the space, when he congratulates the astronauts of Shenzhou-12 spaceship entering the country's space station core module Tianhe.

The spaceship, atop a Long March-2F carrier rocket, was launched from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China's Gobi Desert on Thursday.

The three astronauts aboard the Shenzhou-12 spaceship will dedicate to four major tasks in the in-orbit construction of the station in the following three months.

Produced by Xinhua Global Service
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 19:24:55|Editor: huaxia

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PRAGUE, June 18 (Xinhua) -- The "Chinese miracle" created by the Communist Party of China (CPC) in the past decades has proved that socialism with Chinese characteristics is the right path leading to the country's success in development, a Czech politician has said.



Behind the miracle is the CPC's dedication to people's needs, said Vojtech Filip, chairman of the Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia, in a recent interview with Xinhua.

"Also, the policies China adopted gave full play to the initiative of the CPC members and the Chinese people," said Filip, also the first deputy speaker of the Chamber of Deputies of the Czech Republic.

Speaking highly of China's achievements in the COVID-19 prevention and control, as well as in economic and social development, he said that the CPC has always adhered to the "people-centered" ruling philosophy, which is of great importance for governance, adding that his party shares a similar ideology of "with the people, for the people."

China, led by the CPC, has gained more and more support in the world, as the country is actively participating in the international affairs, safeguarding multilateralism, and promoting world peace and development, he said.

The China-proposed Belt and Road Initiative, in Filip's view, brought development opportunities to countries along the route and enhanced economic connections between them.

Commending the cooperation between China and the Central and Eastern European countries, including the Czech Republic, he said that the cooperative mechanism has not only promoted bilateral trade, but added impetus to their exchange and cooperation in science research and development.

Filip, as the chairman of his party since 2005, has visited China many times.

Expressing his warm congratulations on the CPC's centenary, Filip voiced confidence that China, under the leadership of the CPC, will continue to promote common development of the world. (Video reporters: Yang Xiaohong, Li Xiaopeng; Video editor: Peng Ying, Ding Yi, Jiang Hanzhang)




Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 19:29:03|Editor: huaxia

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TAIPEI, June 18 (Xinhua) -- Taiwan on Friday reported 188 COVID-19 cases, including 187 local infections, as well as 21 deaths from the disease, according to the island's disease monitoring agency.

Of the locally transmitted infections reported on Friday, 83 were men, and 104 were women, aged from under five to over 90. They showed symptoms between May 29 and June 17.

The 21 deaths were 12 men and nine women, aged from in their 50s to in their 90s. They passed away between June 10 and June 16.

On the same day, Taiwan reported one imported COVID-19 case from India.

The total number of confirmed cases on the island has risen to 13,771, of which over 11,000 are infections reported since May 19, when the island raised its COVID-19 alert to level three.

To date, 518 people in Taiwan have died from COVID-19, including 504 since May 19. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 19:33:25|Editor: huaxia

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An ambulance driver is seen at the Wisma Atlet COVID-19 emergency hospital in Jakarta, Indonesia, June 16, 2021. (Xinhua/Veri Sanovri)

-- Indonesia reports highest number of daily cases since late January;

-- Thailand to further ease restaurant dine-in restrictions despite high case tally;

-- Cambodia's infection rates continue to rise as 799 new cases confirmed;

-- India reports 62,480 new COVID-19 cases.

HONG KONG, June 18 (Xinhua) -- The following are the latest developments of the COVID-19 pandemic in Asia-Pacific countries on Friday:

JAKARTA -- Indonesia recorded 12,990 newly-confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the past 24 hours, marking the highest daily spike since late January and bringing the total tally to 1,963,266, the Health Ministry said.

The COVID-19 related death toll added by 290 to 54,043, the ministry reported.

A woman gets vaccinated at a vaccination site in Bangkok, Thailand, June 7, 2021. (Xinhua/Rachen Sageamsak)

BANGKOK -- Thailand announced to further ease restrictions on restaurant dine-in services in the capital Bangkok and three other provinces as the government struggled to strike a balance between pandemic containment and easing economic pains from the third wave of outbreak.

A medical worker administers a dose of China's Sinopharm COVID-19 vaccine in Kabul, capital of Afghanistan, June 17, 2021. (Xinhua/Rahmatullah Alizadah)

KABUL -- Afghanistan's Public Health Ministry reported 1,677 new confirmed cases of COVID-19, raising the total tally to 100,521, including 32,614 active cases.

The pandemic has so far claimed 4,030 lives in Afghanistan since February last year, including 87 deaths in the past 24 hours, the ministry said in a statement.

Afghanistan inaugurated its fourth fully-equipped COVID-19 hospital in capital Kabul amid reports of rising new cases, the Afghan Public Health Ministry announced.

Local needy residents carry food and other necessary items distributed by a non-governmental organization after the government eased COVID-19 restrictions in Jampuijala, India's northeastern state of Tripura, June 16, 2021. (Str/Xinhua)

NEW DELHI -- India's COVID-19 tally rose to 29,762,793, with 62,480 new cases recorded in the past 24 hours, said the health ministry. Besides, 1,587 COVID-19 patients died during the period, taking the death toll to 383,490.

India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched a customized crash course program for COVID-19 frontline workers amid the ongoing second wave of the pandemic in the South Asian country.

Students wearing personal protective equipment are seen in a classroom during a limited face-to-face class at National University in Manila, the Philippines on June 8, 2021. (Xinhua/Rouelle Umali)

MANILA -- The Philippines' Department of Health (DOH) reported 6,833 new COVID-19 infections, bringing the total number of confirmed cases in the Southeast Asian country to 1,346,276.

The death toll climbed to 23,385 after 110 more patients died from the viral disease, the DOH said.

Aerial photo taken on April 19, 2021 shows a flight carrying the first batch of passengers from Australia after the opening of quarantine-free travel arriving in Wellington, New Zealand. (Photo by Mark Tantrum/Xinhua)

WELLINGTON -- New Zealand reported one confirmed case of COVID-19 in managed isolation and no new cases in the community.

Two kids play in a closed kindergarten during a lockdown in the ancient town of Luang Prabang, Laos, June 1, 2021. (Photo by Kaikeo Saiyasane/Xinhua)

VIENTIANE -- Everyone entering Laos must comply with all of the standard COVID-19 prevention and control measures, even if they have had two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine, Lao health authorities said.

A health worker pumps China's Sinovac COVID-19 vaccine with a syringe at a vaccination site in Phnom Penh, Cambodia on June 1, 2021. (Photo by Phearum/Xinhua)

PHNOM PENH -- Cambodia registered 799 new COVID-19 cases, bringing the national case tally to 41,581, the Ministry of Health (MoH) said in a statement.

The new infections included 702 local cases and 97 imported cases, the MoH said.

Health workers conduct an investigation to trace chains of infection to curb the spread of COVID-19 in Suva, Fiji, May 26, 2021. (FIJI SUN/Handout via Xinhua)

SUVA -- Fiji recorded 115 new COVID-19 cases in the last 24 hours and one death was under investigation, according to Ministry of Health Permanent Secretary James Fong.

A health worker shows a vial of locally produced Chinese CanSino COVID-19 vaccine in Islamabad, capital of Pakistan on June 1, 2021. (Xinhua/Ahmad Kamal)

ISLAMABAD -- Pakistan reported 1,043 new COVID-19 cases on Thursday, the National Command and Operation Center (NCOC) said as the country's number of overall cases rose to 946,227.

A woman wearing a mask sits in a cafe in Seoul, South Korea, June 1, 2021. (Xinhua/Wang Jingqiang)

SEOUL -- South Korea reported 507 more cases of COVID-19 as of midnight Thursday compared to 24 hours ago, raising the total number of infections to 150,238. The daily caseload was down from 540 in the prior day, staying above 500 for three days. The daily average caseload for the past week was 483.

Photo taken on Sept. 5, 2020 shows students taking their first class of the new school year in a secondary school in the Vietnamese capital city of Hanoi. (VNA/Handout via Xinhua)

HANOI -- Vietnam reported 515 new COVID-19 infections on Thursday, the highest daily increase since the pandemic hit the country last year, according to its Ministry of Health.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 19:40:19|Editor: huaxia

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Representatives from the Ethiopian government, World Bank and China Civil Engineering Construction Corporation attend the groundbreaking ceremony of Modjo dry port expansion project in Modjo, Ethiopia, on June 17, 2021. (Xinhua/Elias Gebreselassie)

China Civil Engineering Construction Corporation (CCECC) has started construction of a 110-million-U.S.-dollar Modjo dry port expansion project in central Ethiopia.

ADDIS ABABA, June 18 (Xinhua) -- Chinese construction firm, China Civil Engineering Construction Corporation (CCECC), on Thursday launched the construction of a 110 million U.S. dollars Modjo dry port expansion project in central Ethiopia.

The Groundbreaking ceremony for the construction of Ethiopia's largest dry port was attended by senior Ethiopian government and World Bank officials.

Speaking at the ceremony, Dagmawit Moges, Ethiopia Minister of Transport, said the expansion of Modjo dry port will modernize landlocked Ethiopia's logistics sector.

The Modjo dry port is a key transportation and logistics facilitator between Ethiopia's hinterland and ports in neighboring Djibouti. The expansion project encompasses construction of six warehouses, several road and pavement works, multipurpose buildings and various operating facilities.

"In the logistics sector, the effect of undertaking successful work on quality, modernization and efficiency isn't limited to our country, but will also highlight the role of our trade and logistics in the region as well as globally," Moges said.

"Increasing our logistics capacity will make Ethiopia a prosperous and a preferable destination for investment inflow," Moges said.

Moges also detailed her country's long-term commitment to expand and modernize the logistics sector.

"In our new 10-year development plan of the sector, we plan construction of many road and rail projects," said Moges.

"This includes development of road expressways, development of corridor lines individually and in clusters as well as development of new dry ports," she said.

Ousmane Dione, the Ethiopian country director of the World Bank which finances the project, praised the expected benefits of the expansion project.

"This is a long awaited, but extremely important civil works for the advancement of Modjo as a colorful logistics hub of Ethiopia," Dione said.

"It is a transformative initiative which comprises comprehensive infrastructure enhancement of the port and associated facilities that are currently not available such as export consolidation, dry port storage and multi-model transfer platform to make import-export activities more seamless," he said.

Wu Jiuyi, Deputy General Manager of the CCECC Ethiopia Branch, expressed commitment to undertake a speedy, efficient construction of the project.

"Our company is one of the builders and currently an operator of the 752.7 km Addis Ababa-Djibouti railway. The Modjo dry port expansion will increase the capacity of the railway," Wu said.

"We will try our best to complete this project with quality and efficiency," he said.

The 752.7 km Addis Ababa-Djibouti railway, the first electrified transnational railway in East Africa, is contracted by two Chinese companies, China Railway Group and CCECC. 
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 20:00:41|Editor: huaxia

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by Liu Zongya, Dana Halawi

BEIRUT, June 18 (Xinhua) -- The recent Group 7 (G7) and NATO summits have laid bare the hypocrisy of Washington, which once again revealed the U.S. obsession with aggression and dominance, Lebanese experts have said.

Adnan Bourji, director of the Lebanese National Center for Studies, said Thursday that the G7 summit statement "is illogical and unbelievable."

In a written interview with Xinhua, he noted the United States has occupied Iraq, deployed its forces in Syria, and openly supported Israel in the long-running Israel-Palestine conflict, adding that the United States continues to violate international resolutions and wantonly point fingers at other countries' human rights records.

This is ironic, he said, adding that global affairs observers would not buy the U.S. accusations against other countries in the statement, given what the United States has done around the world.

Washington "calls for non-interference in internal affairs, but do they start implementing these views by withdrawing their forces from Syria?" he said. "The United States talks about world peace, so why didn't they mention Palestine in one word?"

"The era of flashy and deceptive slogans" is over, Bourji said, urging the G7 countries to match their promises with actions and stop interfering in the internal affairs of other countries.

Mahmoud Raya, editor-in-chief of the news website China in Arab Eyes, also believes that the U.S. approach in global relations does not suit the world anymore.

The United States should cooperate with other countries instead of taking a confrontational approach, and it will become weak if it keeps its way of doing things on the global stage, Raya told Xinhua on Thursday.

He said that while Washington tries to cast Beijing in negative light, China's global efforts and various development initiatives are gaining increasing support.

The Belt and Road Initiative, which has attracted participation of more than 100 countries, aims to bring benefits to everyone with trade facilitated and development boosted, he said. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 20:31:17|Editor: huaxia

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BEIJING, June 18 (Xinhua) -- China expresses its deep condolences over the passing of Kenneth Kaunda, former president of the Republic of Zambia, a Foreign Ministry spokesperson said on Friday.

Kenneth Kaunda, the first president of Zambia after the country gained independence, died on Thursday, aged 97.

Spokesperson Zhao Lijian told a news briefing that Mr. Kaunda was a globally renowned leader, statesman and social activist of the elder generation of African independence movements. He made historic contributions to Zambia's independence and the liberation movements in southern Africa.

"We extend deep condolences on Mr. Kaunda's passing, and sincere sympathy to the government and people of Zambia, as well as Mr. Kaunda's family," Zhao said.

Mr. Kaunda was the founder of China-Zambia relations and was long committed to the bilateral friendship. He was an old and good friend of the Chinese people, Zhao said.

China stands ready to work with Zambia to push forward China-Zambia and China-Africa friendly cooperation, he added. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 20:51:29|Editor: huaxia

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LUSAKA, June 18 (Xinhua) -- Zambian Vice-President Inonge Wina has commended Chinese investors for the establishment of a multifacility economic zone in Chibombo district, a town in the central part of the country.

The Zambian vice-president said Thursday the establishment of the economic zone by Jiangxi United Industrial Investment Limited would go a long way in boosting the manufacturing industry in the district and in the creation of jobs.

In remarks delivered when she toured the multifacility economic zone, the Zambian vice-president also said the project was a testimony to the growing cooperation between the two countries.

While thanking the investors for their commitment to doing the project since the groundbreaking ceremony in 2019, the vice president said the project was a true actualization of the government's industrialization agenda and the investment will also trigger investment in other sectors in the district as such as housing development, apart from creating jobs.

"The government is impressed with the speed of the project and its focus in creating manufacturing plants," she said.

The Zambian Cabinet last year formally approved the establishment of the multifacility economic zone, which covers around 600 hectares of land. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 21:34:05|Editor: huaxia

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ADDIS ABABA, June 18 (Xinhua) -- The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) has commended Ethiopia for its efforts and inclusive policies for education of refugee children and the youth.

The Agency for Refugee and Returnee Affairs (ARRA), an Ethiopian governmental organization, and UNHCR together with humanitarian partners on Friday marked the World Refugee Day, with a call for greater inclusion of refugees in education.

Global displacement figures have hit a historic high of more than 82 million people, according to the report on UNHCR's Global Trends in Forced Displacement released Friday. Girls and boys under the age of 18 account for 42 percent of all forcibly displaced people.

As the third largest refugee hosting country on the African continent, Ethiopia hosts nearly 800,000 refugees of whom 52 percent are school-aged children, and nearly half of them are still waiting for a chance to go to school.

In Ethiopia, where 55 percent of refugee children are in school, according to UNHCR.

UNHCR's Representative Ann Encontre has commended the efforts and inclusive policies of the Ethiopian Government which have resulted in "remarkable progress in increasing the enrolment of refugee children and the youth over the last few years."

"Nevertheless, too many refugee children are still out of school, and COVID-19 has only exacerbated the situation," the representative said, "We all need to come together to do more to ensure that even more refugee children get the chance of realizing their potential."

Schools have reopened following extended closure due to COVID-19 restrictions.

Meeting the necessary COVID-19 precautionary measures, however, remains a challenge as most schools are congested and have limited handwashing facilities and other amenities, said UNHCR in its statement.

Ethiopia's progressive refugee law grants refugees access to education and allows qualified refugees to obtain work permits.

At the Global Refugee Forum in 2019, the Ethiopian government pledged to provide quality and accredited skills training to 20,000 refugee and host community youth on an equitable basis, taking into account the labor market demand and linkages with existing and new commitments in expanding socio-economic opportunities.

"Ethiopia is doing its part in ensuring refugees have access to primary, secondary and tertiary education as well as to include them in the national education system," said Tesfahun Gobezay, director general of ARRA. "However, lack of resources is limiting the government's ability to make good on its promises."

With a call for responsibility and burden-sharing in line with the key principles of the Global Compact on Refugees (GCR), the director general assured his government's commitment to continuing with "enduring generosity which demonstrates an exemplary level of solidarity to brothers and sisters who happen to be refugees in Ethiopia."

The World Refugee Day is observed every year on June 20. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 22:04:06|Editor: huaxia

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BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN, June 18 (Xinhua) -- Brunei reported one new confirmed COVID-19 case on Friday, bringing the national tally to 252.

According to Brunei's Ministry of Health, the case is a 29-year-old man who arrived in the country from Indonesia via Singapore on Tuesday. He has no symptoms of infection.

Investigation and contact tracing have found 12 close contacts who arrived together with the patient and were all quarantined upon arrival.

The new case is being treated and monitored at the National Isolation Center with five other active cases, who are all in stable condition.

With the detection of the new case, a total of 111 imported cases have been confirmed since the last local infection case on May 6 last year. Brunei has recorded 408 days without local COVID-19 infection cases.

There have been three deaths and 243 recovered patients reported from COVID-19 so far in Brunei. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 22:18:41|Editor: huaxia

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BEIJING, June 18 (Xinhua) -- Xi Jinping, general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, on Friday stressed bearing in mind the course of the Party's struggles, shouldering the historic mission and drawing strength from the Party's history to forge ahead.

Xi, also Chinese president and chairman of the Central Military Commission, made the remarks when visiting an exhibition on CPC history.

Themed "staying true to the founding mission," the exhibition debuted on Friday at the newly inaugurated Museum of the CPC in Beijing ahead of the CPC centenary.

"The Party's history is the most vivid and convincing textbook," Xi stressed.

The past 100 years have seen the CPC unswervingly fulfilling its original aspiration and founding mission, working hard to lay a foundation for its great cause, and making glorious achievements and charting a course for the future, Xi noted.

Xi said it is necessary to study and review the Party's history, carry forward its valuable experience, bear in mind the course of its struggles, shoulder the historic mission, and draw strength from its history to forge ahead.

Efforts should be made to educate and guide Party members and officials to stay true to the original aspiration and founding mission of the Party, Xi noted.

It is necessary for them to strengthen their awareness of the need to maintain political integrity, think in big-picture terms, follow the leadership core, and keep in alignment with the central Party leadership, and remain confident in the path, theory, system and culture of socialism with Chinese characteristics, as well as always closely follow the CPC Central Committee in terms of their thinking, political orientation and actions, he added.

Xi called on Party members to carry forward the fine traditions and play their exemplary role in uniting and leading the Chinese people, based on the new development stage, to follow the new development philosophy and formulate a new development paradigm, to effectively perform their work in promoting reform, development and stability, and to pool strength to fully build a modern socialist China and realize the Chinese Dream of national rejuvenation.

Xi was joined by other leaders including Li Keqiang, Li Zhanshu, Wang Yang, Wang Huning, Zhao Leji, Han Zheng and Wang Qishan during the visit.

Led by Xi, the leaders reviewed the Party admission oath. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-19 00:02:42|Editor: huaxia

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BEIJING, June 18 (Xinhua) -- Three Chinese astronauts aboard the Shenzhou-12 spaceship entered China's space station core module Tianhe on Thursday, embarking on the country's first crewed mission during the construction of the station, a space trip that has won congratulations from space agencies and scholars across the world.

"Roscosmos sends sincere congratulations to China on the successful launch of three taikonauts on the Shenzhou-12 crewed spacecraft to the new Chinese Tianhe space station" core module, said Russia's state space corporation in a statement released Thursday on its official website.

"China has made another confident step forward," Roscosmos said, adding that Russia and China will become "lasting and reliable partners" in long-term exploration of the outer space.

"Congratulations to the China National Space Administration (CNSA) on the launch of three 'taikonauts' on their Shenzhou-12 mission to the Tianhe (Heavenly Harmony) space station," the European Space Agency tweeted.

NASA Administrator Bill Nelson also extended his congratulations to China on the latest mission. "I look forward to the scientific discoveries to come," according to his Thursday statement on the U.S. agency's website.

The Brazilian Space Agency tweeted it congratulates the CNSA on "the successful launch of the first crewed mission to the new Chinese Space Station."

"We wish many achievements to China in this challenging space initiative," the agency noted.

The crew's planned three-month stay in the station will offer scientists more insights into the living, work and health conditions of an astronaut in microgravity, which in turn "will be useful for future moon missions or Mars missions or further afield," said Paul Francis, an astrophysicist at the Australian National University.

The Chinese mission may serve as a boost to international space exploration and cooperation, said Francis in an interview with Xinhua, after the launch.

Pablo Hollar, an Argentine expert in aerospace engineering, told Xinhua that China once again sending three astronauts to the outer space is an achievement that attracts worldwide attention.

The Shenzhou-12 spaceship, with vastly improved functions compared with the previous Shenzhou series, undertook the country's first round-trip mission to the space station, illustrating the great progress of China's scientific research, said Hollar, who also leads the Aerospace Division of VENG, a company held by Argentina's National Commission for Space Activities. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-19 00:36:14|Editor: huaxia

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United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres addresses an informal plenary meeting of the UN General Assembly to commemorate United Nations Day at the UN headquarters in New York, on Oct. 26, 2020. (Eskinder Debebe/UN Photo/Handout via Xinhua)

BEIJING, June 18 (Xinhua) -- Chinese President Xi Jinping on Friday sent congratulatory messages to Antonio Guterres and Portuguese President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa over Guterres' re-election as United Nations secretary-general.

In his messages, Xi said that as the most universal, representative and authoritative inter-governmental international organization, the UN plays an important role in international affairs.

China expects Guterres to continue to fulfill his obligations laid out in the UN Charter, uphold an objective and just position, firmly preserve multilateralism and make greater contributions to world peace and common development. 
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-19 00:39:01|Editor: huaxia

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BEIJING, June 18 (Xinhua) -- A mainland spokesperson on Friday condemned Taiwan's Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) authority for not caring the people's health in the island amid the COVID-19 epidemic but acting as a "pawn" for anti-China forces in the United States.

The DPP is preoccupied with the urgency to collude with external forces to seek "Taiwan independence" in disregard of the health of Taiwan people amid the COVID-19 epidemic, said Ma Xiaoguang, spokesperson of the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council.

The DPP authority does not feel ashamed of giving away the interests of the Chinese nation in order to seek "Taiwan independence," and is pushing Taiwan people into an abyss, Ma said.

"Their political attempts will end up in failure," he said, reiterating there is only one China in the world and Taiwan is part of it.

Ma urged the U.S. government to act on the one-China principle and the three China-U.S. joint communiques and stop sending wrong signals to secessionist forces on the island. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-19 01:55:28|Editor: huaxia

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UNITED NATIONS, June 18 (Xinhua) -- The United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) on Friday appointed Antonio Guterres as the UN secretary-general for a second term of five years beginning Jan. 1, 2022.

President of the 75th UNGA session Volkan Bozkir has officially announced the appointment.

Speaking to reporters after the appointment, Guterres said that he will take on the responsibility of serving a second term as secretary-general "with profound gratitude and a deep commitment to work together to advance the UN Charter at a time of great peril and promise."

Noting that the pandemic "has revealed our shared vulnerability, our inter-connectedness and the absolute need for collective action," the secretary-general said that "our biggest challenge - and at the same time our greatest opportunity - is to use this crisis as a chance to turn things around, to pivot to a world that learns its lessons, recovers fairer, greener and more sustainably, and forges ahead with much more effective global cooperation to address global concerns."

Guterres recalled that the "driving theme" in the vision statement which lays out the details for his second term is "prevention," noting that means the "prevention in all its aspects - from conflict, climate change, pandemics to poverty and inequality."

Talking about his 10 "inter-related imperatives for action," the secretary-general said that the first starts with "mounting a massive and enduring response to the COVID-19 pandemic and its consequences."

"Our single most immediate test will be effectively overcoming COVID-19 and equipping the world to prevent and be better prepared for future pandemics and other existential threats," he said.

"The virus is spreading faster than vaccines," said the secretary-general, adding that "we need an all-out effort to ensure vaccines for everyone everywhere - and we need it now."

Talking about other points of "imperatives for action," he said that efforts will be made to "leave no stone unturned in the search for peace and security," make peace with nature and press for climate action, and "turbocharge" the Decade of Action to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals and a more equitable world.

"The struggle against inequality is at the core of a new globalization that is fairer, more inclusive, sustainable and human-centric. We will advance our efforts to integrate work within the UN system that straddles across peace and security, sustainable development and humanitarian action, firmly underpinned by human rights," he said.

Other action plans will include the protection of human rights, taking gender equality "to the next level," advancing multilateralism and our common agenda, embarking on a "United Nations 2.0."

On "United Nations 2.0," the top UN official said that "we will strive for a more integrated, cohesive and joined up UN that also actively brings in outside networks."

Referring to his last point for action, Guterres said that "underpinning all our efforts, is the focus on people - bettering the lives of individuals, families and communities. Reaffirming the dignity and worth of the human person. Rekindling a strong commitment to shared and enduring values." Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-19 02:50:18|Editor: huaxia

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Xi Jinping and other Communist Party of China (CPC) and state leaders Li Keqiang, Li Zhanshu, Wang Yang, Wang Huning, Zhao Leji, Han Zheng and Wang Qishan visit an exhibition on CPC history themed "staying true to the founding mission" at the Museum of the CPC in Beijing, capital of China, June 18, 2021. (Xinhua/Ju Peng)

-- "The Party's history is the most vivid and convincing textbook," Xi stressed.



-- Xi said it is necessary to study and review the Party's history, carry forward its valuable experience, bear in mind the course of its struggles, shoulder the historic mission, and draw strength from its history to forge ahead.

-- Themed "staying true to the founding mission," the exhibition debuted on Friday at the newly inaugurated Museum of the CPC in Beijing ahead of the CPC centenary.

BEIJING, June 18 (Xinhua) -- Xi Jinping, general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, on Friday stressed bearing in mind the course of the Party's struggles, shouldering the historic mission and drawing strength from the Party's history to forge ahead.

Xi, also Chinese president and chairman of the Central Military Commission, made the remarks when visiting an exhibition on CPC history.

Themed "staying true to the founding mission," the exhibition debuted on Friday at the newly inaugurated Museum of the CPC in Beijing ahead of the CPC centenary.

Xi Jinping and other Communist Party of China (CPC) and state leaders Li Keqiang, Li Zhanshu, Wang Yang, Wang Huning, Zhao Leji, Han Zheng and Wang Qishan visit an exhibition on CPC history themed "staying true to the founding mission" at the Museum of the CPC in Beijing, capital of China, June 18, 2021. (Xinhua/Ju Peng)

"The Party's history is the most vivid and convincing textbook," Xi stressed.

The past 100 years have seen the CPC unswervingly fulfilling its original aspiration and founding mission, working hard to lay a foundation for its great cause, and making glorious achievements and charting a course for the future, Xi noted.

Xi said it is necessary to study and review the Party's history, carry forward its valuable experience, bear in mind the course of its struggles, shoulder the historic mission, and draw strength from its history to forge ahead.

Efforts should be made to educate and guide Party members and officials to stay true to the original aspiration and founding mission of the Party, Xi noted.

It is necessary for them to strengthen their awareness of the need to maintain political integrity, think in big-picture terms, follow the leadership core, and keep in alignment with the central Party leadership, and remain confident in the path, theory, system and culture of socialism with Chinese characteristics, as well as always closely follow the CPC Central Committee in terms of their thinking, political orientation and actions, he added.

Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, visits an exhibition on CPC history themed "staying true to the founding mission" at the Museum of the CPC in Beijing, capital of China, June 18, 2021. Xi is joined by other CPC and state leaders Li Keqiang, Li Zhanshu, Wang Yang, Wang Huning, Zhao Leji, Han Zheng and Wang Qishan during the visit. (Xinhua/Li Xueren)

Xi called on Party members to carry forward the fine traditions and play their exemplary role in uniting and leading the Chinese people, based on the new development stage, to follow the new development philosophy and formulate a new development paradigm, to effectively perform their work in promoting reform, development and stability, and to pool strength to fully build a modern socialist China and realize the Chinese Dream of national rejuvenation.

Xi was joined by other leaders including Li Keqiang, Li Zhanshu, Wang Yang, Wang Huning, Zhao Leji, Han Zheng and Wang Qishan during the visit.

Led by Xi, the leaders reviewed the Party admission oath.

Xi Jinping leads other Communist Party of China (CPC) and state leaders Li Keqiang, Li Zhanshu, Wang Yang, Wang Huning, Zhao Leji, Han Zheng and Wang Qishan to review the Party admission oath after visiting an exhibition on CPC history themed "staying true to the founding mission" at the Museum of the CPC in Beijing, capital of China, June 18, 2021. (Xinhua/Ju Peng)

The exhibition features four parts, namely the founding of the CPC and the victory of the New Democratic Revolution; the founding of the People's Republic of China (PRC) and the socialist revolution and development; the reform and opening-up, and the start of socialism with Chinese characteristics; and carrying forward socialism with Chinese characteristics into a new era, building a moderately prosperous society in all respects, and embarking on a new journey toward fully building a modern socialist country.

More than 2,600 pictures and more than 3,500 pieces or sets of exhibits reflect the extraordinary 100-year journey the CPC has traveled.

Xi and other leaders immersed themselves in the exhibits, files, photos and videos displayed, and learned about them in detail.

Xi Jinping and other Communist Party of China (CPC) and state leaders Li Keqiang, Li Zhanshu, Wang Yang, Wang Huning, Zhao Leji, Han Zheng and Wang Qishan visit an exhibition on CPC history themed "staying true to the founding mission" at the Museum of the CPC in Beijing, capital of China, June 18, 2021. (Xinhua/Ju Peng)

Among the items are the manuscript of Karl Marx's notes from Brussels, and restoration scenes of the first CPC National Congress and the famous Zunyi Meeting during the epic Long March (1934-1936).

Also on display are boards showing the establishment of revolutionary bases, footage from the founding ceremony of the PRC, and weapons used during the War to Resist U.S. Aggression and Aid Korea (1950-1953).

The exhibition also features data charts relating to poverty alleviation and models of the Huoshenshan and Leishenshan hospitals built in Wuhan to fight the COVID-19 epidemic in 2020.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-19 02:59:58|Editor: huaxia

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by Ronald Ssekandi

KAMPALA, June 18 (Xinhua) -- As the world is set to commemorate World Refugee Day on June 20, hundreds of refugees continue to flock into Uganda amid a devastating COVID-19 pandemic.

Uganda Red Cross Society (URCS), a humanitarian agency, said Friday that in the last one week, more than 1,200 Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) refugees have crossed into Uganda fleeing fighting back home.

"Majority are crossing through the porous border points of Bundibugyo district (in western Uganda)," said Irene Nakasiita, the communications officer of URCS.

Nakasiita believed the greatest threat is the COVID-19 pandemic, when a transit center has been opened to host them.

"There is a challenge, we are not sure whether these refugees that are coming in are vaccinated, there is no one who is screening them for COVID-19 and yet they are many," Nakasiita said. "We are sensitizing them, we have put hand washing facilities but majority of them have no masks and it is even hard to ask them to social distance considering the situation."

She said there is need for humanitarian support to prevent the refugees from contracting COVID-19.

Uganda is going through the second wave of the pandemic with more than 1,000 daily new cases reported, according to the Ministry of Health.

While the recent flight of Congolese refugees into Uganda may seem urgent, overall, the pandemic has had a negative impact on the refugee community in Uganda, according to a recent United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)/World Bank survey.

Uganda hosts the largest refugee population in Africa, with some 1.4 million people mainly from neighboring South Sudan, DRC and Rwanda, according to UNHCR figures.

The survey conducted in February and March 2021 and published on June 17 revealed that the pandemic has had a devastating toll on the living conditions of refugees in Uganda, noting that there is need for strengthened support to refugee communities.

The survey showed that refugees in Uganda were faring far worse than their host community on key dimensions to welfare, such as employment, food security and mental health. The report indicated that there is an alarming increase in the number of suicides among refugees, linked to the pandemic's disastrous socio-economic impact.

"While the pandemic has affected all communities, refugees have been hit particularly hard. With a second COVID-19 wave in full swing in Uganda, I am very concerned that the living conditions of refugees may not only deteriorate but become untenable," said UNHCR Representative to Uganda Joel Boutroue.

Food insecurity among refugees, measured as the share of households that have run out of food, was much higher than among their host communities (64 versus 9 percent), according to the survey.

Refugees were forced to reduce the amount and frequency of meals eaten in a day, the report added.

Despite the grim situation, the government, UNHCR and partners continue to provide protection and humanitarian assistance to refugees in Uganda.

"To respond to the pandemic, refugee response partners have redoubled efforts to ensure continuity of life-saving services and mitigate the impact of COVID-19," the survey published on June 17 said.

"I applaud Uganda's inclusive approach to refugees and call on the international community to pay closer attention to the gaps in basic needs of an already vulnerable population," said Boutroue. "More resources are needed to meet not only the basic needs of refugees, including food and access to water, but also to provide better support for livelihoods, education and mental health." Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-19 03:57:38|Editor: huaxia

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BEIRUT, June 18 (Xinhua) -- The UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) and the Lebanese authorities have opened an investigation into an Israeli claim that it has thwarted an attempt to smuggle weapons from Lebanon to Israel, a Lebanese security source told Xinhua on Friday.

The Israeli army informed the UNIFIL that it arrested a suspect who tried to pick a bag containing 12 pistols left in a spot in the Lebanese border town of Khiyam facing the Israeli settlement of Motella, the source said on condition of anonymity.

According to the source, an Israeli infantry force, backed by armored vehicles, carried out on Friday a wide combing operation along the border fence separating Lebanon and Israel around the perimeter of Motella, while the Lebanese army, in coordination with UNIFIL, monitored the Israeli force until it withdrew from the border fence.

The border line between Lebanon and Israel extends about 120 km and witnesses occasional tension between the two countries' armies. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 04:03:44|Editor: huaxia

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LUSAKA, June 17 (Xinhua) -- Zambia's first President Kenneth Kaunda has died at the age of 97, the Zambian government announced on Thursday.

Secretary to the Cabinet Simon Miti said on Thursday that Kaunda died at a military hospital, where he had been admitted since Monday, in Lusaka, the country's capital.

Miti did not disclose the cause of his death. Kaunda's office said earlier this week that preliminary tests had indicated that he had pneumonia.

Zambian President Edgar Lungu has announced a 21-day mourning period for the former president.

Miti said on state-broadcaster, the Zambia National Broadcasting Corporation, that the government will provide a detailed program on the funeral arrangement in line with the COVID-19 pandemic.

Lungu said he learnt of Kaunda's passing this afternoon with great sadness.

"On behalf of the entire nation and on my own behalf I pray that the entire Kaunda family is comforted as we mourn our First President and true African icon," Lungu wrote on his Facebook page on Thursday.

Kaunda, born in 1924, led Zambia's independence struggle and served as the first president of the country from 1964 to 1991.

Since his retirement from politics, Kaunda had dedicated his time to the fight against HIV/AIDS through his foundation, the Kenneth Kaunda Children of Africa Foundation.

Kaunda was a recipient of the 2018 UNAIDS Leadership Award, which is given to high-level personalities who have made outstanding contributions to the AIDS response in the course of their professional and personal life.

During the commemoration of this year's Africa Day, the African Union honored him with a special award for the role he played and the immense contribution he made to the liberation of Africa and its people, according to Zambia's Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 10:26:09|Editor: huaxia

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ADDIS ABABA, June 18 (Xinhua) -- Chairperson of the African Union (AU) Commission Moussa Faki Muhamat on Thursday expressed his deep condolences on the passing of Zambia's first President Kenneth Kaunda.

"It is with an indescribable sense of loss that the Chairperson of the African Union Commission, Moussa Faki Mahamat learnt of the passing of Kenneth Kaunda, the first president of the Republic of Zambia and one of the Founding Fathers of the Organization of African Unity (OAU)," said an AU statement on Thursday.

During the commemoration of this year's African Day, the AU honored Kaunda, who was 97 years old, with a special award for the role he played in and the immense contribution he made to the liberation of Africa and its people.

"Africa has lost one of its finest sons," the chairperson said.

Muhamat said Kaunda's championing of the Frontline States to defeat Apartheid and white minority rule in Southern Africa laid the foundation for regional integration today.

Zambian President Edgar Lungu has announced a 21-day mourning period for the former president.

"On behalf of the entire nation and on my own behalf I pray that the entire Kaunda family is comforted as we mourn our First President and true African icon," Lungu wrote on his Facebook page on Thursday.

Born in 1924, Kaunda led Zambia's independence struggle and served as the first president of the country from 1964 to 1991. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 12:44:38|Editor: huaxia

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GABORONE, June 17 (Xinhua) -- Botswanan President Mokgweetsi Masisi on Thursday declared a seven-day mourning period in the country in honor of Dr. Kenneth Kaunda, Zambia's first President.

All flags must fly at half-mast during the mourning period, according to a decree made by Masisi.

"Dr. Kaunda was an iconic statesman of the highest credentials and selfless dedication to the interests of his own country as well as the wellbeing of neighbors and humankind at large," said Masisi in his message of condolences.

Describing the late Dr. Kaunda as "charismatic," Masisi said the demise of the former Zambian leader is a loss to his "compatriots and to all peace loving people in Botswana and elsewhere."

Dr. Kaunda, who ruled the copper mining nation from 1964 until 1991, died at age of 97. He was at the forefront of the Zambia struggle for independence from British rule and one of the pioneer leaders of a new Africa. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 18:16:57|Editor: huaxia

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MOGADISHU, June 18 (Xinhua) -- The Somali National Army (SNA), backed by regional forces, on Thursday killed 30 Shabab militants and injured 24 others in an operation in the country's southern Middle Shabelle region, an official confirmed on Friday.

SNA spokesman Ali Hashi said the operation was conducted in the Jalable area where the militants were planning attacks against government forces.

"The militants attempted to resist the army, but our forces managed to kill 30 of them and injured 24 others," Hashi told SNA radio.

He noted those killed in the operation included Jama Dhere, a senior leader of al-Shabab in the Middle Shabelle region.

The latest operation comes amid sustained efforts by the Somali army against al-Shabab in the southern and central regions where militants still control swathes of rural areas, conducting ambushes and planting landmines.

Meanwhile, Chief of Defense Forces Odowaa Yusuf Rageh confirmed that four government soldiers were injured on Friday morning in a suicide car bomb attack outside a military base in Biyo Adde, also in the Middle Shabelle region.

Odowaa said the suicide bomber, who was in an explosive-laden vehicle, was shot dead before he could reach the army base.

Al-Shabab, which has been fighting to topple the internationally-backed government, claimed responsibility for the latest attack, saying its forces killed 10 soldiers and injured a military commander in the bombing. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 18:19:32|Editor: huaxia

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WINDHOEK, June 18 (Xinhua) -- Namibian President Hage Geingob on Thursday joined the world in mourning the late Zambian founding President Kenneth Kaunda, who died after being admitted to the hospital earlier this week.

In a statement, Geingob said Africa has lost a "giant" who was selfless in liberating the rest of the southern African region and was instrumental in the creation of the African Union, which was called the Organization of African Unity then.

"Kenneth Kaunda, KK as we affectionately called him, was generous, affable and above all resolute in his commitment to freedom for southern Africa. We have lost him. However, Africans, and Namibians in particular shall be eternally grateful for his stellar contributions to our freedom," Geingob said.

Geingob also extended his sympathy to the Zambian people.

"On behalf of the people and the government of the Republic of Namibia, I extend condolences to his children, the family and the fraternal people of the Republic of Zambia. Rest In Peace, KK," he said. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 18:54:11|Editor: huaxia

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HARARE, June 18 (Xinhua) -- Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa has extended localized COVID-19 lockdown measures to three more districts following surges in infections in those localities.

In a press statement on Thursday night, Mnangagwa said Makonde, Hurungwe and Kariba districts in Mashonaland West Province would be isolated and a 6:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m. curfew imposed, while access to and from the areas would be banned, except for essential services.

He said two senior government officials had died in Karoi, in Hurungwe District, earlier during the day and there was need to contain the pandemic from spreading.

"COVID-19 cases continue to increase in the above-mentioned districts," Mnangagwa said, noting that on Monday, June 14, Mashonaland Wes had 38 new cases, on Tuesday the figure went up to 115 and on Wednesday there were 105 new cases.

He said Karoi had 10 tobacco auction floors and this had resulted in the town drawing growers from as far as Gokwe, of Midlands Province, and Chegutu, of Mashonaland West, and other people from Harare, the capital.

Mnangagwa said the town is a business hub and has the potential to spread the disease to other parts of the country.

He also ordered that all auction floors should open between 8:00 a.m. and 3:00 p.m. and that each employee should have a negative PCR or rapid antigen COVID-19 test not older than 10 days.

The Grain Marketing Board depots, which collect grains from farmers, will also operate between 8:00 a.m. and 3:00 p.m.

"We lost two senior government employees today in Karoi. In Chinhoyi tests on 15 people found all 15 COVID-19 positive cases. There is a serious outbreak in Zambia and this exposes Kariba to COVID-19 from across the border," Mnangagwa said.

He ordered that commuter transport vehicles should carry half their capacity in order to promote social distancing and trucks will only stop and park in designated places for enforcement purposes.

Only 25 percent of office employees will be allowed at their stations, except for those in essential services.

Mnangagwa said the Ministry of Health and Child Care and security forces would ensure that the measures are adhered to, including observing other protocols such as wearing of face masks, social distancing and hand sanitizing.

A localized lockdown was imposed in Kwekwe after the Delta variant, which was first reported in India, was detected in the district.

On Thursday, Zimbabwe reported 371 new cases from tests conducted during the previous 24 hours.

The country has so far reported 40,927 total confirmed cases, 1,647 deaths and 37,109 recoveries. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 19:13:48|Editor: huaxia

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Rescuers work at the explosion site of a liquefied petroleum gas tanker on Mobolaji Bank Anthony Way in the Ikeja area of Lagos, Nigeria, June 18, 2021. A liquefied gas tanker exploded on Thursday night in Lagos, Nigeria's economic hub, killing at least three people and injuring 13 others. (Photo by Emma Houston/Xinhua)

LAGOS, June 18 (Xinhua) -- A liquefied gas tanker exploded on Thursday night in Lagos, Nigeria's economic hub, killing at least three people and injuring 13 others.

Ibrahim Farinloye, a zonal coordinator for the National Emergency Management Agency told Xinhua on Friday that a liquefied petroleum gas tanker exploded while in motion at about 10:32 p.m. local time (2132 GMT) on Thursday on Mobolaji Bank Anthony Way in the Ikeja area of the state.

Farinloye said the huge fire resulting from the explosion engulfed a nearby building which houses different commercial outfits, and three bodies were recovered later from the building.

"The initial search and rescue activities also revealed that 13 people sustained various degrees of burns," Farinloye said, adding the fire was put out after concerted efforts from the state fire service and emergency management agency.

He added that about 25 vehicles were damaged in the accident, and search and rescue efforts are still underway. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 19:54:07|Editor: huaxia

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LILONGWE, June 18 (Xinhua) -- Malawi has run out of COVID-19 vaccine doses amid a sharp rise in confirmed cases of the pandemic.

A consignment of 900,000 doses the country was expecting at the end of May through the COVAX vaccine-sharing facility is yet to arrive, the Ministry of Health and Population Services said in a statement Thursday, blaming the delay on recent worsening of the pandemic in India, a major manufacturer of vaccines.

Malawi "is experiencing stockouts of the vaccine in many vaccination sites due to the delay in the arrival of the next consignment of the vaccines in the country," the statement said. "The Ministry is working tirelessly with other partners, both bilateral and multilateral, to make the COVID-19 vaccine available in the country at the earliest time possible as we await the next consignment from the COVAX facility."

In the initial vaccination phase supported by COVAX, the Malawi government plans to cover 3.8 million people, or 20 percent of the country's population, including frontline health workers, social workers, the elderly and those with underlying health conditions such as diabetes, high blood pressure, and heart problems.

Malawi received its first consignment of 360,000 doses from the COVAX facility in March, followed by 102,000 doses from the African Union, and 50,000 doses from the Indian government.

As of Thursday, 378,694 and 27,473 people had received the first dose and second dose of AstraZeneca vaccine respectively, meaning that 406,167 doses have been administered in the country so far.

As of Thursday, Malawi had recorded 34,702 confirmed COVID-19 cases and 1,164 deaths, according to an update on the pandemic by health minister Khumbidze Kandodo Chiponda.

Nearly 20,000 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine were destroyed in May after the shots had reached their expiry dates. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 20:09:23|Editor: huaxia

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KAMPALA, June 18 (Xinhua) -- Uganda on Friday began the distribution of the third batch of the COVID-19 AstraZeneca vaccines it received from the global COVAX facility to address the nationwide stockouts, a health spokesperson said.

Sheila Nduhukire, spokesperson for the National Medical Stores, Uganda's central distribution hub for all public health facilities, told Xinhua by telephone that vaccines are being dispatched, with the main focus on the most hit COVID-19 districts across the country.

The country on Wednesday received 175,200 new COVID-19 vaccines with support from United Nations Children's Fund and French Embassy under the World Health Organization (WHO) COVAX initiative.

"Yes distribution is starting today. Focus is on the virus epicenter districts of Kampala, Wakiso, Mukono, Lira and Mbale," said Nduhukire.

Uganda had run out of vaccines for its vaccination campaign targeting priority groups, with several hospitals and vaccination centers across the country reporting stockouts.

Uganda received 864,000 doses of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine via the COVAX facility and 100,000 doses from the Indian government in March.

At least 688,000 more doses are expected from the COVAX facility in early August and 300,000 doses of China's Sinovac COVID-19 vaccines next month, according to the ministry of health.

The government continues to grapple with the surge in the number of COVID-19 cases and deaths since the second wave of the pandemic.

As of Thursday, a total of 812,118 people had been vaccinated against COVID-19 in the east African country, according to the ministry of health.

The country requires at least 45 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines to get its population vaccinated and extra doses to cater for the refugee population in the country, according to the government statistics. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 22:11:02|Editor: huaxia

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LUSAKA, June 18 (Xinhua) -- The Zambian government said on Friday that it has secured funds to procure 3 million doses of Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccines as it tries to ramp up its vaccination program.

Kennedy Malama, Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Health in charge of Technical Services said the vaccines will be acquired under the African Vaccine Acquisition Trust (AVAT).

He said in a statement on the COVID-19 update situation that the government has further submitted all the requirements under the COVAX Facility for the 108,000 AstraZeneca vaccine which will be arriving in the country next week.

Zambia has approved five COVID-19 vaccines, among them China's Sinopharm, to be administered to citizens as preventive measures against the pandemic.

Meanwhile, the country has continued to record increased COVID-19 cases and deaths.

According to health ministry figures, the country recorded 2,913 new cases in the last 24 hours, bringing the cumulative cases to 125,157.

The new cases were picked from 12,703 tests done during the period, representing 23 percent positivity while 29 people died, bringing the total deaths to 1,554.

A total of 1,999 patients were discharged from hospital, bringing total recoveries to 103,884.

The country's active cases stand at 19,719 out of whom 18,855 were under community management while 864 were in various isolation facilities. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 23:31:39|Editor: huaxia

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WINDHOEK, June 18 (Xinhua) -- Namibia President Hage Geingob on Friday declared seven days of mourning in honor of the late Zambian Founding President Kenneth Kaunda.

In a statement Geingob confirmed that all flags will be flown at half between June 19 and 25 in honor of the revered statesman who is credited for playing a pivotal role in liberating most southern African countries.

According to Geingob, Namibians will join the region and Zambians in honoring Kaunda who he described as a selfless and gallant son of the soil for his selfless contribution to Namibia's independence.

Kaunda hosted most of the liberation movements during the liberation struggle against colonial settlers allowing them to launch their military attacks and strategies from Zambia.

Geingob added that Kaunda will be remembered as a selfless leader who put the aspirations of others ahead of his and his country in his quest to liberate the continent. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-19 00:42:49|Editor: huaxia

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NAIROBI, June 18 (Xinhua) -- Many African countries have declared national mourning in honor of the late Zambian founding president Kenneth Kaunda who passed away on Thursday at the age of 97.

Namibia President Hage Geingob on Friday declared seven days of national mourning in honor of Kaunda. In a statement, Geingob said that all flags will be flown at half between June 19 and 25 in honor of the revered statesman who is credited for playing a pivotal role in liberating most southern African countries.

According to Geingob, Namibians will join the region and Zambians in honoring Kaunda who he described as a selfless and gallant son of the soil for his selfless contribution to Namibia's independence.

Geingob said Kaunda will be remembered as a selfless leader who put the aspirations of others ahead of his and his country in his quest to liberate the continent.

The Council of Ministers of Mozambique on Friday also decreed a six-day national mourning observance to honor Kenneth Kaunda.

Speaking to the press after the session of the council in Maputo, the Deputy Minister of State Administration and Public Service and the session's spokesman Inocencio Impissa said the high prestige that Kaunda has earned at the continental and world level was obtained in the struggle for racial equality and the progress of Africa, in the promotion of dialogue and peace between the peoples, and will leave an important legacy for future generations.

In his message of condolences issued earlier on Friday, Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi lamented the death of Kaunda, saying that he will be remembered as a great leader for his crucial role in Zambia's independence movement and contribution to the common efforts in defense of the independence, peace, and security in Africa.

In Uganda, President Yoweri Museveni has hailed the fallen ex-Zambian leader for his contribution to the liberation of several southern African countries.

"He fought for Zambia's independence and he made a big contribution to the freedom struggle of the liberation of the subcontinent of Southern Africa," Museveni said in a Twitter message.

Tanzanian President Samia Suluhu Hassan on Friday also announced seven-day national mourning following the death of Kaunda. Hassan said that the national flag will fly at half-mast during the seven-day mourning period, according to a statement issued by the Directorate of Presidential Communications.

The statement said President Hassan has sent a condolence message to Zambian President Edgar Lungu, the family of the former Zambian leader, and the people of Zambia for losing their heroic leader.

The governments of Botswana and South Africa also declared seven and 10 days of national mourning respectively in honor of Kaunda.

Botswana President Mokgweetsi Eric Keabetswe Masisi, in his message of condolences, said it was during Kaunda's tenure that relations between the two countries blossomed. He described Kaunda as an iconic statesman of the highest credentials and lauded his selfless dedication to the interest of his own people as well as the wellbeing of neighbors.

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said his country will forever cherish the role Kaunda played not only in the liberation of Africa but South Africa in particular.

"Under his leadership, Zambia provided refuge, care and support to liberation fighters who had been forced to flee the countries of their birth," he said in a release.

Zambian President Edgar Lungu on Friday visited the funeral home of Kaunda in Lusaka, the country's capital, and said Kaunda's death should enable the country to be united and embrace the "One Zambia, One Nation" mantra he espoused.

He said the life led by Kaunda should shape the country's destiny, especially in the current trying times the country was facing.

"Dr. Kaunda epitomizes the very existence of our country and of us as a nation. No one can speak about Zambia without recognizing the foundational role that he played in our statehood," he said.

A 21-day mourning period has been declared by the Zambian government. Kaunda led Zambia from 1964 to 1991. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-19 04:02:44|Editor: huaxia

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RABAT, June 18 (Xinhua) -- The World Bank approved a 450-million-U.S.-dollar loan to support Morocco's reforms for social and economic resilience amid the COVID-19 pandemic, a statement by the World Bank office in Rabat said Friday.

The loan aims to expand the availability of financial services and digital infrastructure for individuals and small and medium-sized businesses, said the statement.

"The COVID-19 crisis has disproportionately affected the most vulnerable, including women, youth, informal workers and smaller enterprises," the World Bank Maghreb Country Director Jesko Hentschel was quoted as saying in the statement.

"The improved financial and digital access is critical to reducing their social exclusion during the crisis, maintaining access to basic services and promoting digital entrepreneurship," he added.

Strengthening digital infrastructure and access to it is a priority in Morocco's new development model, the statement noted. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 08:31:04|Editor: huaxia

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ISLAMABAD, June 18 (Xinhua) -- A soldier was killed when terrorists attacked military troops deployed at security duties near an airport in Turbat area of Pakistan's southwest Balochistan province, an army statement said.

Other details of the attack on Thursday as well as identities or affiliations of the terrorists were not shared in the statement issued by the military's media wing Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR).

A large-scale operation by paramilitary troops Frontier Corps (FC) has been launched in the area to hunt the terrorists, the statement added.

"Such cowardly acts by inimical elements, backed by anti-state forces cannot sabotage the hard-earned peace and prosperity in Balochistan. Security forces are determined to neutralize their nefarious designs even at the cost of blood and lives," the ISPR said.

This is the second attack on security forces in the province recently. On Monday, four FC soldiers were killed in the explosion of an improvised explosive device in the provincial capital of Quetta.

Located along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, Balochistan province had been facing serious security challenges from terrorists based within the province and across the border in the past, but the situation came under control after the military's intelligence-based operations in the area.

However, a spike in terrorist attacks in the province has been witnessed over the last few months with frequent attacks targeting security forces and civilians. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 14:53:24|Editor: huaxia

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VIENTIANE, June 18 (Xinhua) -- Everyone entering Laos must comply with all of the standard COVID-19 prevention and control measures, even if they have had two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine, Lao health authorities said Friday.

Vaccinated travelers still need to spend 14 days in quarantine upon arrival in Laos, local daily Vientiane Times on Friday quoted Director General of the Department of Hygiene and Health Promotion under the Lao Ministry of Health, Phonepaseuth Ounaphome, as saying.

"We have not introduced a special policy to shorten the quarantine period," Phonepaseuth said.

Lao authorities have asked the World Health Organization (WHO) in Laos to provide guidance in this regard, he added.

The WHO has not recommended any reduction in the quarantine period so Lao authorities are continuing to comply with WHO's current recommendations, he added.

However, people who had received two doses of a vaccine would benefit from a special policy on domestic travel, in line with the government's COVID-19 prevention and control measures.

Under these rules, passenger transport by air and road between Lao capital Vientiane and the provinces is only permitted for people who have had two vaccinations at least one month prior to travel. These individuals will also not need to spend 14 days in quarantine.

Phonepaseuth said the use of vaccination certificates would result in several benefits after the lockdown is lifted and that travel and other activities may require the presentation of vaccination certificates in order to be approved.

Lao authorities are now speeding up the vaccination program, hoping to immunize 50 percent of the population by the end of 2021.

As of Friday, the total number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Laos is 2,047 with three deaths.

A total of 1,931 COVID-19 patients have recovered and been discharged from hospitals.

Laos reported its first two confirmed cases of COVID-19 on March 24 last year. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 15:52:56|Editor: huaxia

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TOKYO, June 18 (Xinhua) -- Tokyo authorities may be planning to ease bans on serving alcohol after the state of emergency in the capital is lifted, local media said on Friday.

According to the Asahi Shimbun newspaper, citing local government sources, the authorities in the capital are planning to permit the ordering of alcohol between 5 p.m. and 7 p.m. by "solitary drinkers" but the 8 p.m. limit for bars and restaurants to close their doors will remain.

The newspaper indicated the "solitary drinkers" will each be allowed to spend 90 minutes at a particular venue serving alcohol between the designated times.

On Thursday, the Japanese government approved the lifting of the COVID-19 state of emergency for nine prefectures from Monday.

Tokyo, Osaka, Kyoto, and Hyogo have been under a virus state of emergency since April 25.

The measures, which were originally supposed to be lifted on May 11, have been extended twice and expanded to include Aichi, Fukuoka, Hokkaido, Okayama, Hiroshima and Okinawa prefectures.

The state of emergency is currently set to end for all prefectures except Okinawa on June 20.

Okinawa will remain under the current state of emergency until July 11. Japan's southernmost prefecture has seen its healthcare facilities struggling under a surge of COVID-19 patients.

But rather than lifting all virus measures completely, the government will introduce a quasi-state of emergency until July 11 for Tokyo and eight other prefectures.

"The thing we have to be most careful about is preventing a big rebound," Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga told a press briefing in the matter after finalizing the decision at a coronavirus task force meeting earlier in the day.

Okayama and Hiroshima prefectures, meanwhile, due to seeing the virus rate and burden on medical facilities drop, will be exempt from further emergency virus measures.

In contrast to the fully-fledged state of emergency which banned alcohol, under the quasi-state of emergency, serving alcohol will be allowed until 7 p.m. provided antiviral measures are followed.

Restaurants will, however, continue to be requested to shut at 8 p.m., with governors having the power to institute tougher restriction as they deem fit.

But with around one month to go until the summer Olympics, the biggest quadrennial sporting event in the world, is set to begin in Tokyo, concerns remain that infections could rebound.

Shigeru Omi, the government's top COVID-19 adviser, in a press conference with Suga warned people to keep their guards up as to date only one in six people have received at least one vaccination shot amid the country's slow inoculation rollout.

"People will get a sense of security after getting vaccinated, but it's too early to begin letting our guard down. Keep your masks on," Omi said in the press conference with Suga.

Chiba, Kanagawa and Saitama, currently under a quasi-state of emergency, will see it extended until July 11, while Gifu and Mie will have all restrictions lifted at the end of the weekend, under the latest plan.

Despite nationwide COVID-19 cases dropping from their daily peak at more than 7,000 in early to mid-May during the fourth wave of infections, with cases in the capital also down notably, the highly transmissible Delta strain of the virus could cause infections to rebound as the Olympics are under way, experts here have warned. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 16:38:14|Editor: huaxia

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ISLAMABAD, June 18 (Xinhua) -- The cooperation between Pakistan and China in the agricultural sector will give boom to that field of Pakistan, Federal Minister for National Food Security and Research Syed Fakhar Imam said on Friday.

Speaking at an online conference for promotion of Pakistan's chilli contract farming project, the minister said that China possesses advanced experience in the agricultural sector as compared to Pakistan, and his country can learn from China by adopting farming techniques and introducing them in the country.

The conference was organized by the China-Pakistan Agricultural and Industrial Cooperation Information Platform which was jointly launched by the two countries in January, 2021 to organize business forums, business delegations and other activities to promote exchanges and cooperation in the field of agriculture and industry, and advance business-to-business cooperation between the two countries.

"Value addition, marketing and public-private partnership are some of the areas which can be worked on by the businessmen of both countries for the benefit of both of the countries," Imam said, adding that the bilateral cooperation will enhance agricultural output and improve their quality, enabling Pakistani commodities to reach international markets.

On the occasion, Chinese Ambassador to Pakistan Nong Rong said that Chinese companies have successfully planted chillies on almost 100-acre of land in Pakistan's eastern Punjab province through cooperation with their Pakistani partners and both sides plan to expand the planting scale and set up chilli-processing factory in the future to improve the livelihoods of local farmers.

The agricultural cooperation between the two countries have a great potential and China will encourage more Chinese companies to bring advanced techniques, good-quality seeds and machinery to Pakistan to promote the development of the country's agricultural sector, he said.

The cooperation in agriculture and industry has become a focus of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) and the progress in the agricultural cooperation will facilitate the high-quality development of CPEC, the Chinese envoy added.

Addressing the conference, Asim Saleem Bajwa, Chairman of Pakistan's CPEC Authority, said that the country is working on industrial development in the second phase of CPEC, and agricultural cooperation is also expected to increase at the same pace.

He said that cultivation of chillies in cooperation by Pakistani and Chinese companies is a vivid and practical demonstration of the agricultural cooperation between the two countries, adding that Chinese investors can also pay attention to the livestock sector of Pakistan.

During the conference, the Pakistan-China Condiments Industry Alliance was launched to promote bilateral cooperation in the field of condiments. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 22:40:29|Editor: huaxia

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NEW DELHI, June 18 (Xinhua) -- High court in the Indian capital New Delhi said Friday that breaches of COVID-19 protocol in the city's markets will only hasten a third wave, officials said.

The court's remarks came as it took note of the COVID-19 violations in markets of the country's capital following the massive easing of restrictions earlier this week.

The court asked authorities to educate shopkeepers and take strict measures against COVID-19 violators.

With crowds of shoppers in markets and restaurants and resumption of business amid phased relaxations in New Delhi, doctors have also cautioned that the city could face a "worse than second wave situation" if people do not adhere to safety norms.

The court said that if flouting of COVID-19 norms continues, "we will be in great trouble."

"We have paid a huge price in the second wave. We don't know if there is any household which has not suffered in the second wave, closely or remotely," the court said.

It said the memory of the second wave of COVID-19 was still fresh with so many people.

"Such breach will only hasten the third wave, which is likely to come and this cannot be permitted," the court said.

Shops, malls, restaurants, and public traffic in Delhi reopened on Monday as COVID-19 cases in the city saw a steady drop in the past few weeks.

On Friday morning, the federal health ministry said Delhi recorded 158 new COVID-19 cases and 10 deaths. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-19 00:23:35|Editor: huaxia

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DHAKA, June 18 (Xinhua) -- The Asian Development Bank (ADB) Friday approved a 250 million U.S. dollars policy-based loan to the government of Bangladesh to help finance reforms aimed at improving the inclusiveness and responsiveness of the country's social development and resilience program.

The Strengthening Social Resilience Program will include institutional and policy reforms to address cross-sector issues of social development in Bangladesh, said the Manila-based lender in a statement received here Friday.

"Enhancing social protection support is critical to cushioning the effects of the pandemic," said ADB Senior Social Sector Specialist for South Asia Hiroko Uchimura-Shiroishi.

He said, "ADB supports the government's intention to leverage the COVID-19 pandemic as an opportunity to strengthen its social protection programs as an essential means of building the resilience of the poor and supporting an inclusive recovery."

According to the statement, Bangladesh has made remarkable progress in reducing poverty over the past two decades. The poverty incidence declined from 48.9 percent in 2000 to 20.5 percent in 2019, it added. Enditem
China's industrial output up 8.8 pct in May China's value-added industrial output, an important economic indicator, went up 8.8 percent year on year in May as production demand continued to recover.

China's power use rises 12.5 pct in May China's electricity consumption, a key barometer of economic activity, expanded 12.5 percent year on year in May as the country's economy continued to recover steadily.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 10:48:21|Editor: huaxia

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WASHINGTON, June 17 (Xinhua) -- U.S. President Joe Biden and his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, agreed earlier this week that Turkey would play a leading role in securing Kabul airport, but the two sides remain divided over the issue of S-400 air defense systems, National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said on Thursday.

Biden on Monday had his first face-to-face meeting with Erdogan after taking office on the sidelines of the NATO summit.

Sullivan told reporters in a phone briefing that the two leaders had a detailed discussion of a potential Turkish mission to protect the airport following the withdrawal of NATO forces from Afghanistan.

"The clear commitment from the leaders was established that Turkey would play a lead role in securing Hamid Karzai International Airport, and we are now working through how to execute against that," he added.

Sullivan said Biden committed to providing the support that Turkey needed to fulfill that task.

The two leaders made no progress on the issue of Turkey's acquisition of Russian S-400 air defense system, Sullivan noted.

"On the S-400, they discussed it. There was not a resolution of the issue," he said. "There was a commitment to continue the dialogue on the S-400, and the two teams will be following up on that coming out of the meeting."

Russia and Turkey finalized the S-400 air defense system deal worth about 2.5 billion U.S. dollars in 2017, and the delivery was completed in 2019. Turkey is the first NATO member to purchase such a system from Russia.

In response, the United States suspended Turkey's involvement in the F-35 fighter jet program and imposed a series of sanctions against Ankara. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 14:52:22|Editor: huaxia

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PRAGUE, June 18 (Xinhua) -- The "Chinese miracle" created by the Communist Party of China (CPC) in the past decades has proved that socialism with Chinese characteristics is the right path leading to the country's success in development, a Czech politician has said.

Behind the miracle is the CPC's dedication to people's needs, said Vojtech Filip, chairman of the Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia, in a recent interview with Xinhua.

"Also, the policies China adopted gave full play to the initiative of the CPC members and the Chinese people," said Filip, also the first deputy speaker of the Chamber of Deputies of the Czech Republic.

Speaking highly of China's achievements in the COVID-19 prevention and control, as well as in economic and social development, he said that the CPC has always adhered to the "people-centered" ruling philosophy, which is of great importance for governance, adding that his party shares a similar ideology of "with the people, for the people."

China, led by the CPC, has gained more and more support in the world, as the country is actively participating in the international affairs, safeguarding multilateralism, and promoting world peace and development, he said.

The China-proposed Belt and Road Initiative, in Filip's view, brought development opportunities to countries along the route and enhanced economic connections between them.

Commending the cooperation between China and the Central and Eastern European countries, including the Czech Republic, he said that the cooperative mechanism has not only promoted bilateral trade, but added impetus to their exchange and cooperation in science research and development.

Filip, as the chairman of his party since 2005, has visited China many times.

Expressing his warm congratulations on the CPC's centenary, Filip voiced confidence that China, under the leadership of the CPC, will continue to promote common development of the world. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 20:03:49|Editor: huaxia

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BRUSSELS, June 18 (Xinhua) -- The European Union on Friday decided to gradually ease COVID-19 entry restrictions for travelers from the United States and some other countries and regions as the epidemiological situations there are improving.

The United States, Albania, Lebanon, North Macedonia, Serbia, and China's Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan were added to a so-called "white list" of countries and regions from which non-essential travel is allowed, the 27-nation bloc announced in a press release.

Australia, Israel, Japan, New Zealand, Rwanda, Singapore, the Republic of Korea and Thailand are already on the list.

At the outset of the pandemic, all EU member states apart from Ireland prohibited non-essential travel, except for in a few circumstances. Non-EU states Norway, Liechtenstein, Switzerland and Iceland also took part in the entry ban.

The change means that people from those countries and regions should have an easier time entering the EU. However, it will still be up to individual member states to decide whether to impose additional requirements, such as a negative COVID-19 test or a mandatory quarantine period.

There is no clear indication so far that a reciprocal U.S. decision easing entry for EU travelers is imminent.

Brussels said earlier this month that it was engaged in negotiations with third countries, such as Britain and the United States, on the mutual recognition of vaccine certificates.

European Commissioner for Justice Didier Reynders said that since the U.S. does not intend to issue a federal vaccination "passport," "we have to think about other kinds of proof for vaccination or recovery or tests, but it must be possible to solve the issue." Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 22:10:30|Editor: huaxia

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MADRID, June 18 (Xinhua) --Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said on Friday that the government is considering easing compulsory mask-wearing, and facemasks will no longer be obligatory outdoors from June 26.

He said that the government is going to bring up the proposal next Thursday at the cabinet meeting.

"This will be the last weekend with facemasks outside, because from June 26 we will no longer have to wear them in open spaces outside," he told a business conference in Barcelona.

Spain has had strict rules regarding facemask use for just over a year, with everyone aged six and over being obliged to wear them (unless they are doing exercise), even at places where a two-meter safe social distance can be observed.

Sanchez's announcement comes as the vaccination campaign continues to have a positive effect in Spain.

According to data from the Ministry of Health on Thursday, 13,641,091 people, or 28.7 percent of the population, have received both doses of vaccine, while 22,365,106, or 47.1 percent, have received at least one dose. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-19 05:24:45|Editor: huaxia

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VALLETTA, June 18 (Xinhua) -- The number of migrants arriving in Malta by boat dropped by one-third in 2020, the country's statistics office said on Friday.

The National Statistics Office said that the number of migrants arriving in Malta dropped by 33 percent to 2,281 from the previous year's number of 3,405.

The office said that almost 85 percent of the people brought to shore were citizens of African countries while the remaining were citizens of Asian countries.

Malta ranked second after Cyprus for the number of asylum applications per million resident population across European Union (EU) member states.

The National Statistics Office said that 273 migrants were relocated from Malta to another EU country in 2020, a decrease of 55.9 percent compared to the previous year. The majority of relocations were split between Germany and France. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 06:31:10|Editor: huaxia

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People line up outside a COVID-19 vaccination clinic in New Westminster, British Columbia, Canada, on June 18, 2021. Canada's National Advisory Committee on Immunization (NACI) recommends Canadians who received a first shot of AstraZeneca vaccine should get Pfizer or Moderna vaccine for their second shot. On June 1, NACI said AstraZeneca recipients could choose whether to get a second dose of the same vaccine, or an mRNA vaccine. But in new guidance released Thursday, NACI said Pfizer or Moderna are now "preferred" as the second dose. (Photo by Liang Sen/Xinhua)

OTTAWA, June 17 (Xinhua) -- Canada's National Advisory Committee on Immunization (NACI) recommends Canadians who received a first shot of AstraZeneca vaccine should get Pfizer or Moderna vaccine for their second shot.

On June 1, NACI said AstraZeneca recipients could choose whether to get a second dose of the same vaccine, or an mRNA vaccine. But in new guidance released Thursday, NACI said Pfizer or Moderna are now "preferred" as the second dose.

"An mRNA vaccine is now preferred as the second dose for individuals who received a first dose of the AstraZeneca/COVISHIELD vaccine, based on emerging evidence of a potentially better immune response from this mixed vaccine schedule," NACI said in a statement Thursday afternoon.

The new recommendation is based on growing evidence that a second dose of an mRNA vaccine produces a stronger immune response, and because of the low but serious risk of vaccine-induced blood clots associated with getting AstraZeneca.

It doesn't mean people can't still choose AstraZeneca if they want, or if they are allergic to the mRNA vaccines.

"People who received two doses of AstraZeneca/COVISHIELD vaccine can rest assured that the vaccine provides good protection against infection and very good protection against severe disease and hospitalization," NACI said in the statement.

As of June 5, 2.1 million Canadians had received one dose of AstraZeneca, and 15,186 people got two doses.

NACI said Canadians can easily shift to an mRNA-based immunization campaign because Canada is poised to receive a flood of shots from Pfizer and Moderna in the coming weeks, with 14 million more doses set to arrive this month.

NACI also said evidence emerging from studies in Germany suggests mixing one dose of AstraZeneca with a second dose of a Pfizer vaccine can actually produce "a potentially better immune response, including against variants of concern" than two doses of AstraZeneca alone.

"Evidence continues to suggest a first dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine followed by a second dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech mRNA vaccine has a good safety profile," NACI said.

NACI also recommends that mRNA recipients receive a second shot of whatever product they received first. The second shot should match the first unless "the same product is not readily available, or the product used for the first dose is unknown."

It added the two mRNA products can be considered interchangeable. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 06:46:42|Editor: huaxia

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WASHINGTON, June 17 (Xinhua) -- U.S. President Joe Biden on Thursday signed into law a bill making Juneteenth a federal holiday commemorating the end of slavery in the nation.

"Great nations don't ignore their most painful moments ... they embrace them. Great nations don't walk away, they come to terms with the mistakes they've made. In remembering those moments, we begin to heal and grow stronger," Biden said at a signing ceremony in the White House East Room.

Flanked by Vice President Kamala Harris, members of the Congressional Black Caucus and other lawmakers, Biden added, "The truth is, it's simply not enough to commemorate Juneteenth. After all, the emancipation of enslaved Black Americans didn't mark the end of America's work to deliver on the promise of equality, it only marked the beginning. To honor the true meaning of Juneteenth, we have to continue towards that promise because we have not gotten there yet."

The bill was passed in the Senate with unanimous consent on Tuesday, and the House approved it Wednesday in an overwhelming 415-14 vote. The signing came after Biden just returned from his first presidential trip overseas to Europe, and two days before this year's Juneteenth.

With the president signing off on the bill, the Juneteenth National Independence Day becomes the 11th federal holiday in the United States, and the first new one since Martin Luther King Jr Day was designated a federal holiday in 1983. Since this year's Juneteenth falls on Saturday, most federal employees get a day off on Friday.

Celebrated on June 19, the holiday marks the day in 1865 when Union Major General Gordon Granger issued General Order No. 3 in Galveston, Texas, emancipating the remaining enslaved people in the state. For enslaved Americans in Texas, freedom came two and a half years after President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation.

Biden in his remarks while signing the bill also spoke of efforts by some Republican-led states to make it harder for people to vote. The promise of freedom, the president said, is "not going to be fulfilled so long as the sacred right to vote remains under attack."

Senate Republicans, led by minority leader Mitch McConnell, vowed Thursday to block the advancement of the voting rights legislation known as For the People Act, a Democratic legislative priority. Republican opposition will all but guarantee a Senate filibuster -- the 60-vote supermajority rule that gives a united minority an effective veto power.

"I've taken a look at all the new state laws - none of them are designed to suppress the vote," McConnell said Thursday. "There is no rational basis for the federal government to take over all of American elections."

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is sending the bill to the Senate floor Tuesday. All eyes are on Democratic senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia, who has withheld his support for the bill, and is a wild card in the Democratic conference who could make unanimity among the 50 members on the issue unachievable.

Emerging from a huddling with Democratic senators Thursday, Manchin suggested that he would join with them to at least start debating the bill next week. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 07:16:55|Editor: huaxia

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LOS ANGELES, June 17 (Xinhua) -- Nine people were reportedly shot in several places in the Phoenix metropolitan area in U.S. state of Arizona on Thursday afternoon, and the suspect has been arrested by the police. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-06-18 15:03:04|Editor: huaxia

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OTTAWA, June 17 (Xinhua) -- Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau nominated Mahmud Jamal as the next member of the Supreme Court of Canada on Thursday.

"I know that Justice Jamal, with his exceptional legal and academic experience and dedication to serving others, will be a valuable asset to our country's highest court," Trudeau said in a statement.

Jamal is the first person of color to be nominated to Canada's top court. He taught constitutional law at McGill University and administrative law at Osgoode Hall Law School.

Jamal will replace Justice Rosalie Abella, currently the longest-serving Supreme Court justice, who will retire from the court on July 1 at the age of 75.

He was born in Nairobi, Kenya in 1967. In 1969, his family moved to Britain. In 1981, his family settled in Edmonton, Canada where he attended high school.

Jamal said he was raised at school as a Christian, and at home as a Muslim.

"Like many others, I experienced discrimination as a fact of daily life. As a child and youth, I was taunted and harassed because of my name, religion, or the color of my skin," he said.

Jamal said he is the first person in his family to attend university. He spent a year at the London School of Economics before getting his economics degree from the University of Toronto. He then went to McGill to study its common law and Quebec civil law before getting his graduate law degree from Yale Law School.

Jamal, fluent in English and French, was appointed to the Court of Appeal for Ontario in 2019 and appeared in 35 appeals before the Supreme Court of Canada on civil, constitutional, criminal, and regulatory issues. Enditem
Titular del @MininterPeru: a la fecha ya hemos superado las seis millones de dosis de la vacuna contra la #COVID?19 aplicadas en todo el pais. Asimismo, mas de dos millones de personas ya han sido completamente inmunizadas. #PongoElHombro pic.twitter.com/Q67S6jkwBf
Presidente @FSagasti: Ayer se presento en mesa de partes de las comandancias generales de FF.AA. cartas con una sola firma y una lista de nombres, dirigida a Comandantes Generales y al jefe del Comando Conjunto FF.AA., pidiendo que actuen en contra de la Constitucion y las leyes. pic.twitter.com/j3qGbWKbxr
YEREVAN, JUNE 18, ARMENPRESS. The electoral campaign for the June 20 snap parliamentary elections officially launched in Armenia on June 7.

The campaign will last until June 18.

25 political forces  21 parties and 4 alliances, are participating in the elections.

ARMENPRESS presents the schedule of the visits of the political forces on the 12th day of the campaign.

I have the Honor alliance

-Press conference at their headquarters (12:00)

Bright Armenia party

-Arabkir administrative district, Yerevan (11:00)

Armenian National Congress party

-Meeting with voters at Ani Grand hotel (17:00)

-Press conference (13:00)

Armenia alliance led by 2nd President of Armenia Robert Kocharyan

-Meeting at Yerevans Republic Square (19:00)

Our Home Is Armenia party

-Meeting near the St. Gregory the Illuminator Church (11:00)

Fair Armenia party

-Press conference (12:00)

Free Fatherland alliance

-Press conference (11:00)

National-Democratic Axis party

-Press conference
YEREVAN, JUNE 18, ARMENPRESS. Prosecutor General of Armenia Artur Davtyan, head of the department of international legal cooperation at his Office Yeghiazar Avagyan and advisor to the Prosecutor General Artur Baghdasaryan will depart for St. Petersburg, Russia, on July 5 to participate in the conference of Heads of Prosecutors Offices of European States, e-gov.am reported.

Artur Davtyan and his delegation will be in St. Petersburg until July 9.

The conference will be held on the topic Role of the Prosecutor's Office in Protection of Individual Rights and Public Interest in light of Requirements of the European Convention on Human Rights.

Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan
YEREVAN, JUNE 18, ARMENPRESS. Armenias delegation led by Deputy Chairman of the State Revenue Committee Ashot Muradyan met with deputy head of the Customs Service of Iran Ibrahim Naghdi at the Norduz border checkpoint and his delegation, the Armenian SRC told Armenpress.

A number of issues relating to easier and smooth implementation of processes at Meghri and Norduz checkpoints aimed at promoting the trade turnover between the two countries were on the meeting agenda. They also discussed creation of mechanisms and platforms for quickly and effectively solving the problems arising between the two countries.

During the meeting issues relating to the launch of electronic data exchange system relating to international transportation of goods between Armenia and Iran were discussed.

The Armenian and Iranian partners agreed to boost the partnership between the respective structures of the countries, which would positively affect revealing customs rules violations and more quickly solving the problems.

The sides agreed also to hold regular high-level meetings to give solutions to the ongoing problems relating to the customs service field.

Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan
YEREVAN, JUNE 18, ARMENPRESS. 2nd President of Armenia Robert Kocharyan, who is leading the electoral list of the Armenia alliance for the upcoming snap parliamentary elections, has addressed the Armenian people ahead of the snap polls.

Dear people, the campaign of the early elections has been completed. Within the past month together with my supporters we have toured Armenia. I havent visited you for 13 years, I want to thank you for the hospitality and warm welcome. These days I have shaken hands with thousands of people, have looked at their eyes. I do not hide, I was trying to understand whether you have changed during these years. And I must state with great joy that you have not changed, have remained hardworking, talented, clearly talking and differentiating between good and bad.

In other words, I am very happy that we are together again. And now briefly about the elections.

June 20 is a crucial day. We are choosing between dignified peace and humiliated disgrace. We are choosing between normal life and hopeless poverty.

I am sure you will not be deceived anymore. You will reject lie, illiteracy and filth.

I call on you, lets again develop our home, our Armenia together. Lets establish lasting peace, restore our dignity, heal the wounds, he said, assuring that everything will be well.

The snap parliamentary elections in Armenia will be held on June 20.

Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan
YEREVAN, JUNE 18, ARMENPRESS. Member of the European Parliament Loucas Fourlas has called for stopping the sham trial of the Armenian prisoners of war in Baku, Azerbaijan.

Stop the sham trial of the Armenian prisoners of war being held captive by Azerbaijan. I call on the European Commission to make a substantial contribution to the release of the POWs, the MEP said on Twitter.

The trial of 14 Armenian POWs started in Baku, Azerbaijan, on June 16. Fake criminal cases have been filed against the Armenian POWs illegally held in Azerbaijan.

On June 14 Azerbaijani court sentenced Lebanese-Armenian Vigen Euljekian, who has been captured by the Azerbaijani forces near Shushi after the signing of the trilateral statement on ceasefire, to 20 years in prison. He will spend 5 years in jail and the rest in a correctional facility.

Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan
YEREVAN, JUNE 18, ARMENPRESS. The General Staff of the Armenian Armed Forces condemns attempts of engaging servicemen into the ongoing political processes in the country.

Commenting on the video spread on social networks where servicemen of N military unit announce that they support the Armenia alliance for the June 20 snap parliamentary elections, Colonel Samvel Asatryan told ARMENPRESS: Soldier is obliged to fulfill the order of the commander in any case, and in this particular case, in our opinion, an order has been simply fulfilled, regardless of whether the thought voiced in the video reflects their desire or not. Engaging servicemen into political processes is condemnable, and the guilty ones will be punished by law. The details will be clear after an internal investigation, he said.

Armenia will hold snap parliamentary elections on June 20.

Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan
YEREVAN, JUNE 18, ARMENPRESS. Edmon Marukyan, who is leading the Bright Armenia partys electoral list for the June 20 snap parliamentary elections, has addressed the Armenian people ahead of the snap polls.

The Armenian history shows that when our ruling houses have fought against one another leaving aside the external threats, the enemy, by using this situation, has attacked our statehood, our kingdom, and both the kingdom and the ruling houses fell.

Centuries later the Armenian people gained statehood, and 30 years after that today the Armenian people are again divided by groups hating one another, fighting against each other, and the enemy is again taking advantage of the Armenian peoples internal division and weakness. And the Armenian people again are fighting against one another without any lessons learnt from the history  hatred, violence propaganda, which, in fact, has reached its peak.

On June 20 there is an opportunity to put end to the countrys division, the hatred, violence propaganda and this irreconcilable environment, by learning lessons from the history.

Dear compatriots,

Go to a polling station on June 20, take the ballot N9 and state that you support solidarity, unity and reconciliation within the country, and we will form the government of national consent which will get out the country of this difficult situation towards the development path.

God bless us all.

Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan
YEREVAN, JUNE 18, ARMENPRESS. Russia keeps a close eye on the information that Turkey may create a military base in Azerbaijan, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Friday, reports TASS.

Beyond any doubt, this is an issue of our close attention, the Russian presidential spokesman said, commenting on the information. We are interacting with the Turkish Republic in stabilizing the situation in the South Caucasus, the Kremlin spokesman added.

Turkeys President Recep Tayyip Erdogan earlier said he did not rule out that a Turkish military base could be created on Azerbaijani territory under the declaration recently signed with Azerbaijan.
YEREVAN, 18 JUNE, ARMENPRESS. The Central Bank of Armenia informs Armenpress that today, 18 June, USD exchange rate down by 0.38 drams to 513.73 drams. EUR exchange rate down by 2.20 drams to 612.16 drams. Russian Ruble exchange rate up by 0.03 drams to 7.12 drams. GBP exchange rate down by 4.28 drams to 713.98 drams.

The Central Bank has set the following prices for precious metals.

Gold price down by 1,377.94 drams to 29378.43 drams. Silver price down by 18.76 drams to 439.26 drams. Platinum price down by 905.93 drams to 18069.38 drams.
YEREVAN, JUNE 18, ARMENPRESS. The Foreign Ministry of Armenia strongly condemns prosecution carried out by Azerbaijan against the Armenian prisoners of war and captured civilians on false charges.

As ARMENPRESS was informed from the press service of the MFA Armenia, the statement runs as follows,

'' According to international law prisoners of war cannot be prosecuted for their participation in the military actions. At the same time, amid the policy of widespread hatred against Armenians in Azerbaijan and the state-sponsored racism, it is obvious that the ongoing trials cannot be fair and transparent.

In addition, the hostage taking and kidnapping of civilians are further gross violations of numerous norms of international law.

Another indication of war crimes and crimes against humanity is concealing the true number of the Armenian POWs and captured civilians and places of their detention by Azerbaijan.

Azerbaijan continues to blatantly violate a number of fundamental documents it has adhered to, including the European Convention on Human Rights, the UN Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the UN Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment or Punishment and, particularly, the Third Geneva Convention.

Thus, we strongly condemn the illegal decision of the Baku Court, announced on June 14, sentencing civilian Vicken Euljekjian, citizen of Armenia and Lebanon, to 20 years of imprisonment. He was kidnapped by the Azerbaijani armed forces the day after the signing of the Novermber 9, 2020, trilateral statement, while the court decision was based on forced confessions obtained through torture.

Equally deplorable is the initiation of trumped-up criminal proceedings and criminal prosecution against the servicemen captured as a result of military operation by Azerbaijan towards Hin Tagher and Khtsaberd villages of the Hadrut Region of Artsakh which were under the control of the Armenian forces - in violation of the first provision of the November 9 trilateral statement.

The video coverage of the conversation between the Presidents of Turkey Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev on June 15, within the framework of the visit to the city of Shushi of the Republic of Artsakh, which is currently under the Azerbaijani occupation, proves that in the post-war period the issue of prisoners of war is used by Azerbaijan for political purposes as an instrument of pressure against Armenia, which is also a blatant violation of the November 9 trilateral statement. This fact once again attests to Azerbaijan's consistent policy of non-compliance with its own commitments.

We call on our international partners, as well as human rights watchdogs to strongly condemn the gross violations of international law by Azerbaijan and demand the termination of false criminal cases and the immediate repatriation of Armenian prisoners of war''.
YEREVAN, JUNE 18, ARMENPRESS. The Special Investigation Service (SIS) has initiated a criminal case over the recording attributed to Armen Charchyan, director of Izmirlian medical center, ARMENPRESS was informed from the press service of the SIS.

In the recording that has gone viral, the person naming himself Armen Charchyan urges and demands his employees to participate in the elections. I can say that I am the 20th number of Armenia Alliance, which is a very good ranking and can give great opportunities. Being member of the Armenia Alliance, I have the technical opportunity to check the lists and see who has gone to the elections, and who has not, he said.
The U.S. Army is on its way to fielding command posts that are more mobile, scalable and survivable during close combat missions. Kathryn Bailey and Karen Danfelt, PEO C3T Public Affairs, report.

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The 2nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division at Joint Base Lewis-McChord conducts a validation exercise (VALEX) of prototype command post equipment in support of PEO C3Ts Command Post Integrated Infrastructure (CPI2) program. During the VALEX, held in April-May, 2021, the unit establishes and tests their tactics, techniques and procedures to ensure they can use the equipment properly based on their mission. The CPI2 program addresses the challenges posed by contemporary and future land conflict such as physical signatures, mobility and standardization. (Picture source: U.S. Army)

As one of the U.S. Army's top priorities for network modernization, the Command Post Integrated Infrastructure (CPI2) program addresses the challenges posed by contemporary and future land conflicts such as physical signatures, mobility and standardization. Command post designs for this effort are integrating approved commercial and government off-the-shelf systems, as well as government programs of record that support command post operational needs.

Under development in two increments, termed Inc 0 and Inc 1, the CPI2 program recently achieved its Milestone B decision authority under Inc 1, allowing the program to move forward into the engineering and manufacturing phase. Once developed and assessed, Inc 1 will field widely across the service.

Meeting this milestone for Inc 1 means that our initial prototype efforts under Inc 0 have informed the Armys needs for advanced command post capabilities and we are ready to develop a long-term solution, said Lt. Col. Jeremy Rogers, CPI2 product manager, part of Project Manager Interoperability, Integration and Services (I2S), under Program Executive Office for Command, Control, Communications-Tactical (PEO C3T).

CPI2 Inc 1 expands the Inc 0 product lines with an additional mix of military vehicle platforms, including a variety of armored vehicles, Joint Light Tactical Vehicles and Medium Tactical Vehicles. The effort also consists of the Command Post Support Vehicle, which serves as a communications node for brigade and above, assorted shelter systems and supporting intelligent power capabilities. Each component provides capabilities that allow commanders to synchronize the close fight, increasing survivability through a mobile command post infrastructure, while being at the critical decision point on the battlefield, Rogers said.



Soldiers with the 2nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division work inside a Mission Command Platform during Command Post Integrated Infrastructure (CPI2) training exercises at Yakima Training Center, Joint Base Lewis-McChord, in April-May, 2021. (Picture source: U.S. Army)

The path from prototype to Milestone B began with a DEVCOM C5ISR Prototype Integration Facility (PIF)-developed Inc 0 CPI2 platform, followed by two more CPI2 platforms developed by the programs awarded industry partners to provide opportunities to gather Soldier feedback for the Inc 1 design. The government and industry teams who developed Inc 0 prototypes have been extremely valuable partners with their ability to innovate and give us options for the units to evaluate, Rogers said.

In preparation for the engineering and manufacturing phase of the Inc 1 program, the Army has issued a Request for Information (RFI) from the industry for input and suggestions for the upcoming CPI2 contract. The contract is expected to cover production, integration, fielding, training and sustainment of the systems, with an award planned for FY24. Responses to the RFI are due on June 16.

Achieving Inc 1 status does not negate the need for Inc 0, which is ongoing and currently executing multiple phases of prototyping, integration and unit experimentation to inform Inc 1 by incorporating Soldier touchpoints with three units: 2nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division at Joint Base Lewis McChord, Washington; 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne Division-Air Assault at Fort Campbell, Kentucky; and 4th Infantry Division at Fort Carson, Colorado. These Soldier touchpoints are a critical part of the Armys DevOps process, feeding the product development team with valuable feedback and lessons learned that continue to inform the Inc 1 effort, Rogers said.

Operational assessments with two of the units this summer and fall will allow developers to gather feedback on the design across five brigade combat teams. Following the Inc 1 contract award and platform production, the Army will field the first unit equipped with Inc 1 platforms in FY25. The CPI2 program will ultimately field the modernized command post Inc 0 and Inc 1 capabilities to 92 units, with one system available for training activities.
Chilean author Isabel Allende fired up in the 'solitude' of lockdown Chilean writer Allende poses for portrait in Sausalito, California

By Lucila Sigal

(Reuters) - Isabel Allende has been busy during the pandemic. The 78-year-old Chilean author, feminist and national treasure says the tranquility helped her publish a book, write another, and start a third, even as she has also run a foundation to help women and had a television series made about her life.

"As a writer, the pandemic has been an opportunity to have time, silence and solitude, which are three things that you never get," Allende said with a laugh in a Zoom interview with Reuters from her California home, where she is on an "eternal honeymoon" with her new husband and their two dogs.

"Normally you have to fight for those things with a knife between your teeth."

Allende is one of the most widely-read living writers in the Spanish language. Some 25 books, including "The House of the Spirits" and "City of the Beasts," have been translated in over 40 languages. Last year, she published an essay on feminism, the "The Soul of a Woman."

The author says her journey into feminism began at a young age, after her father left and she watched her mother struggling with three young children. New women's movements such as Ni Una Menos in Latin America and @MeToo were reenergizing the cause, she said.

"This new wave has come with a tremendous force from women on the street, but also inviting other groups," she said, referring to movements for LGBTQ+ rights and Black Lives Matter.

The first 50 years of Allende's life have recently been dramatized for a television miniseries, "Isabel," showing on Amazon Prime's platform. She provided photos and videos for the production.

The series deals with Allende's childhood, her work as a journalist in Chile, and her exile to Venezuela after the 1973 military coup of Augusto Pinochet, who overthrew democratically elected Salvador Allende, a relative of Isabel. It also covers the death of her daughter Paula at age 29 from a rare illness.

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"The first scene in which Paula appears in the hospital spun me around and I could not continue to see her," Allende said. She had to skip over that part before she could watch.

END OF CAPITALISM?

The author has lived for some three decades in the United States, and is a strong critic of the immigration policy of former President Donald Trump. She hopes President Joe Biden can change things, although believes that he will face tough obstacles.

"I think part of it is going to change. At the very least, they are not going to separate the children from the parents and put them in cages," she said.

Her homeland Chile is also going through a sharp political shift, with angry protests in 2019 leading to the start of a process to redraft the Pinochet-era constitution, which had helped underpin market-driven economic growth but is also blamed for widespread inequality.

Allende believes the reform drive won't revolutionize Chile's politics, but could create a more progressive society.

"I believe the strongest reforms people wanted will not be possible. What is possible will be the inclusion of all groups, for example, indigenous groups and especially women," Allende said. "It is not about ending capitalism, as some people think."

Allende has sold more than 75 million books worldwide and plans to publish her latest novel, "Violeta," early next year. She said her style of working was disciplined and punctual and that she spends much of her days happily writing her books.

"As long as I have a book, a book project, I'm fine, I don't need anything because I live in that fictional world, which for me is real," she said.

(Reporting by Lucila Sigal in Buenos Aires; Editing by Adam Jourdan and Rosalba O'Brien)
RBA governor Philip Lowe is concerned businesses will continue to buy into the "narrative" around the importance of cost control. (Images: Getty).

Employment has fallen to 5.1 per cent - a pre-pandemic low, and the GDP has also returned to strengths last seen in early 2020.

But wages remain stubbornly, frustratingly low. And the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) is paying close attention.

In a speech on Thursday, RBA governor Philip Lowe said businesses laser-like focus on costs could be hamstringing the broader economic recovery.

Most businesses feel they are operating in a very competitive marketplace and that they have little ability to raise prices. As a result, there is understandably a laser-like focus on costs: if profits can't be increased by expanding or by raising prices, then it has to be achieved by lowering costs, Lowe said.

This has become the predominant mindset of many businesses. This mindset can be helpful in making businesses more efficient, but it also has the effect of making wages and prices less responsive to economic conditions.

His speech came after the Fair Work Commission on Wednesday decided to increase the official minimum wage by 2.5 per cent. While well below the 3.5 per cent unions had hoped for, it was significantly higher than the business lobbys proposed 1.1 per cent.

The new minimum wage is $20.33 an hour, an increase of 49 cents.

Lowe noted that even in areas where businesses are struggling to find workers, theres a reluctance to increase wages.

Business stinginess is a product of the resources boom, when the exchange rate appreciated significantly.

When one Australian dollar was worth more than one US dollar, many Australian businesses felt that their Australian dollar cost structure was simply too high, Lowe said.

You might recall that through this period many businesses were saying that Australian costs, including labour costs, were leaving them uncompetitive.

Years later, businesses are still buying into the narrative about the importance of cost control.

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This experience has left a lasting imprint on many businesses and it has reinforced the narrative about the importance of cost control.

Businesses struggling to find staff are now questioning whether to increase wages or find another way to plug the gap.

Many firms are choosing this second option, relying on non-wage strategies to retain and attract staff. Some are also adopting a wait and ration approach: Wait until labour market conditions ease, perhaps when the borders reopen, and until then, ration output.

The problem is that as businesses adopt this wait and see approach, the broader economy remains somewhat stuck.

The RBA believes the best way to deliver significant and durable economic growth is through low unemployment coupled with faster wages growth, Lowe added. But wage growth remain[s] subdued, despite recovering employment.
Around 250,000 people were killed in Liberia's two civil wars

Alieu Kosiah has been found guilty of war crimes in a Swiss court, becoming the first Liberian to be convicted over the country's civil war.

He was sentenced to 20 years for crimes including murder and rape.

Around 250,000 people were killed in Liberia's two conflicts between 1989 and 2003, and many thousands more fled.

Switzerland recognises the principle of universal justice, meaning suspects accused of high-profile crimes elsewhere can be tried in its courts.

The trial was the first under a 2011 Swiss law that allows prosecution for war crimes committed anywhere in the world. It also marked the first time war crimes charges have been heard by a Swiss civilian court.

Kosiah, 46, was a former rebel commander, who fled to Switzerland before being arrested there in 2014.

The 20-year sentence includes the six years he has already served in detention.

He was detained after a civil rights group, Civitas Maxima, presented the Swiss attorney general with evidence of his involvement in war crimes, including the deliberate killing of civilians, sexual violence, abuse of corpses and acts of cannibalism.

The court in the southern Swiss city of Bellinzona found him guilty of 21 out of the 25 charges that he originally faced. These included:

ordering the killing of 13 civilians and two unarmed soldiers

murdering four civilians

raping a civilian

repeated orders to loot

using a child soldier in armed hostilities

The crimes took place while he was fighting with Alhaji Kromah's United Liberation Movement of Liberia for Democracy rebel group against Charles Taylor's troops in the remote Lofa County in the 1990s.

Liberia endured two bouts of brutal fighting from 1989 to 1997, after which Taylor became president, and 1999 to 2003.

Before Kosiah's guilty verdict, no Liberian had ever been convicted of crimes committed during the conflict. Taylor was, however, convicted in 2012 of committing war crimes in neighbouring Sierra Leone.

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He is serving his 50-year sentence in a prison in the UK.

His son "Chuckie" Taylor was sentenced to 97 years in prison in a US federal court in 2009 for torturing and killing people while he was the head of Liberia's anti-terrorist services.

Ex-warlord Mohammed "Jungle Jabbah" Jabateh has been jailed for 30 years in the US for lying about his past as a leader of a force that carried out multiple murders and acts of cannibalism.

And Sierra Leonean Gibril Ealoghima Massaquoi is currently on trial in Finland for alleged crimes committed in Liberia.

Liberia has failed to hold war crimes trials because of a lack of a political will, says BBC Liberia reporter Jonathan Paye-Layleh.

A post-war truth commission did name people who could be prosecuted, but as some have held key government positions a special court has never been established.

Liberia's civil war:

Charles Taylor led the rebellion in 1989 and went on to be president
Notorious Sydney underworld figure Bilal Hamze has died after "being shot down in a hail of bullets" in the heart of Sydney's CBD last night.

The 34-year-old is the cousin of Brothers for Life founder and Goulburn Supermax inmate Bassam Hamzy, Sydney media reports.

Police were called to Bridge Street, near Circular Quay, just before 10.30pm Thursday, following reports a man had been shot.

Detectives said Hamze had been leaving a nearby establishment when he was killed. They declined to say if he was alone or with people.

Notorious Sydney underworld figure Bilal Hamze has died after 'being shot down in a hail of bullets' in the heart of Sydney's CBD last night. Source: AAP

Detective Superintendent Robert Critchlow, Criminal Groups Squad Commander, has called the incident a "brutal execution-style murder".

Hamze was treated at the scene for multiple gunshot wounds before being taken to St Vincent's Hospital where he died a short time later.

The shooter is believed to have fled in a black Audi, which was later found burnt out in Northwood on Sydney's lower north shore.

The execution-style shooting appears to be the result of an ongoing feud between Sydney's Hamze and Alameddine crime families.

Detective Superintendent Danny Doherty, Homicide Squad Commander, said in a police presser on Friday that it shows underworld violence is escalating.

He said considering a gun was fired multiple times in Sydney's CBD, it is lucky no one else was killed or injured.

Detectives from the NSW Police State Crime Command's Homicide Squad have established Strike Force Englorie to investigate the death.

Police work at the scene of a fatal shooting on Bridge Street in the CBD. Source: AAP

Shooting could be linked to police operation

Det. Supt. Doherty said it is possible that the fatal shooting is linked to a police operation between the Australian Federal Police and the FBI revealed earlier this month.

The operation targeted criminal organisations with a phone app that criminals across Australia and the world used to talk about murder plots, drugs and importation methods.

It led to more than 200 arrests within the country over three years.

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"Once you disrupt organised for networks, there's always going to be some irritation. And this may have been be a result of that, Im not saying if it is or not, but also you got a look at those things," Det. Supt. Doherty said.

Det Supt. Critchlow warned that there is now "a substantial risk of reprisals" and urged those who may be thinking of doing so, to please not react with further violence.

He also said police will be "kicking down doors and tipping people over" to solve the case, adding that one person unrelated to the case but connected to criminal organisations has been arrested.

The shooter is believed to have fled in a black Audi, which was later found burnt out in Northwood on Sydney's lower north shore. Source: AAP

Hamze's mum's home targeted twice

In March 2013, Bilal Hamze's mother Maha Hamze was shot in the legs through the door of her home in Auburn in western Sydney. She survived.

The shooting was sparked by a debt recovery fee feud between her son and another man.

Her home was shot up again in October last year.

On the same day, Bilal Hamze's cousin Mejid Hamzy was shot dead at his Condell Park home.

With AAP

Do you have a story tip? Email: newsroomau@yahoonews.com.

You can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter and download the Yahoo News app from the App Store or Google Play.
Australia is responding to a request from the Fijian government for a medical assistance team to fight a current COVID-19 outbreak.

A multidisciplinary team from Australia and New Zealand will deploy to Fiji, initially for a month, to provide immediate support with health system management, infection prevention and assessment of the country's priority health needs.

Australia has sent 1.3 tonnes of personal protective equipment and medical supplies including 500 thermal guns for health screening teams and testing equipment since April.

The health security of our near neighbours is a critical priority for Australia, said a statement from Foreign Affairs Minister Marise Payne, Health Minister Greg Hunt and International Development Minister Zed Seselja.
Montenegro's parliament has adopted a resolution on the 1995 Srebrenica genocide and dismissed the pro-Serb justice minister over his denial of the massacre.

The move may threaten the stability of the bickering ruling coalition.

In the resolution, the 81-seat parliament condemned the Srebrenica genocide when about 8000 Muslim men and boys were executed by Bosnian Serb forces.

It also banned public denial of the atrocity.

However, the pro-Serb Democratic Front (DF), the dominant pro-Serb party which supported Prime Minister Zdravko Krivokapic's Cabinet - which is comprised of pro-Western parties as well as those who favour close ties with Serbia - voted against the resolution, potentially harming the government's stability.

In April, Krivokapic launched a procedure to dismiss Justice Minister Vladimir Leposavic, who has no party affiliation, over his denial of the Srebrenica genocide.

Leposavic, a pro-Serb politician, said the Srebrenica genocide was not "unequivocally established" as fact.

The DF remained staunchly opposed to Leposavic's dismissal and he refused to quit.

"By proposing the sacking of the minister, I risked being ... labelled as an enemy and a traitor only because of justice and truth," Krivokapic told deputies.

The genocide resolution is in line with Montenegro's pledge to protect human and minority rights as part of its push to join the European Union.

Krivokapic and his allies came to power last August after narrowly winning a parliamentary election, ousting an alliance led by the Democratic Party of Socialists (DPS) loyal to the long-serving President Milo Djukanovic.

The DF also asked for Krivokapic's resignation and a new coalition agreement, but it was not immediately clear whether the crisis would lead to the collapse of the government or a cabinet reshuffle.

In Bosnia, where rival ethnic groups could not agree to pass a similar resolution on the Srebrenica genocide, Sefik Dzaferovic, a Muslim Bosniak member of the country's tripartite presidency, hailed Montenegro's move as an "enormous contribution to strengthening peace and trust".
Police say they have found the weapon used in the alleged murder of a young Queensland mother at a coastal town in northern Tasmania.

Gabrielle Marshall's body was found at a friend's home in Ulverstone in the early hours of Tuesday.

Colin William Drake, 35, has been charged with murdering the 23-year-old and has appeared in court once but is yet to enter a plea.

Tasmania Police released a statement on Friday saying the alleged murder weapon had been recovered.

"No further details are able to be provided as the matter is now before the courts," it said.

Ms Marshall had only been in Tasmania for a few weeks and was trying to turn her life around, her brother has said.

Drake, who has been remanded in custody, is expected to appear in Devonport Magistrates Court via video link on July 15.

Ms Marshall's family has started an online fundraising campaign to help cover the cost of her funeral.
Govt-and-politics

AUBURN

Auburn council approves city-run ambulance service

Kevin Rivoli, The Citizen A TLC ambulance responds to Auburn Correctional Facility in 2019.

AUBURN  The Auburn City Council has authorized creating a new city-run ambulance service.

In a 4-1 vote along party lines at Thursday's meeting, the Democratically controlled council approved a resolution to establish a city ambulance department, a move that will terminate Auburn's longtime relationship with TLC Emergency Medical Services, the current provider, later this year.

The only no vote came from Timothy Locastro, the sole Republican on the council. The vote allows the city manager to establish the EMS service, including acquiring the needed equipment and hiring the necessary personnel. Auburn's new ambulance program is anticipated to begin Nov. 1.

Auburn City Council to vote Thursday on launching new city-run ambulance service The Auburn City Council is scheduled to vote this week on whether to create a new 25-person city ambulance department that would take over service now provided by a private company.

No financial details for the new ambulance department were included in the resolution, although City Manager Jeff Dygert said during a proposal presentation in May the estimated startup cost was estimated to be around $1 million. He also said at the time he was concerned with TLC's availability and transparency.

At the first public to be heard portion of the meeting Thursday, Cayuga County Legislator Tim Lattimore said he had concerns with launching a city-run operation. Lattimore, a Republican and former Auburn mayor who is running for a city council seat this fall, said his lawyer has filed a Freedom of Information Law request with the city seeking all documentation on "complaints and problems" regarding TLC's services, as stated in the resolution authorizing the new service. The request also asks for all "budgets, forecasts or plans" regarding what it will cost the city to operate its own ambulance service.

Lattimore said that having TLC handle ambulance work in Auburn has been "a no-cost situation" for the city.

"I would hope that you would postpone this decision for at least 20 days until the information gets back to us, the public," he said to the council, noting that such information can reveal the severity of complaints.

Dr. Adam Duckett, Cayuga County coroner and chief medical officer of East Hill Medical Center in Auburn, also spoke and supported the city's ambulance endeavor.

"It opens (the city) up to collaborations, working with other organizations in the community to bring federal taxpayer dollars to the community to help offset startup costs, and actually redefine how we deliver care," he said.

Before the vote, Mayor Mike Quill asked Dygert if taxpayer funds would be used for the new service. Dygert replied it would be funded by service fees and "there will not be a tax that is used to maintain" the service.

Councilor Jimmy Giannettino asked Dygert if the city has any current concerns on TLC's operations. Dygert said there been various times since the beginning of the year that TLC has "been unable to meet the needs within the city," and mutual aid help had to be called. He said that happened 19 times in January, 28 in February, 27 in March, 36 calls in April and 61 in May.

Later, Dygert said the city received an opinion from the New York Conference of Mayors saying Auburn can't have a multi-year contract with an ambulance service, which it had previously done with TLC.

Councilor Debby McCormick expressed support for the city-run coverage, saying the COVID-19 pandemic reinforced the need for the change and the collaborations the city could start with this could prompt changes to how health care is handled in the city.

"This is a very critical and important road that we're going to take, and I wholeheartedly support it," she said.

Quill, Giannettino and Councilor Terry Cuddy all expressed support for the change.

Locastro said he wasn't against the idea of changing the ambulance service, but believes TLC does "a great job." He said he would need to see an independent study on the proposal before he would support it.

"If it looks good, I'll support it. But as of right now, until I get that study, I'm not going to support it," he said.

The city's relationship with TLC goes back to 2006. TLC has been contracted to run Auburn's ambulance coverage via a certificate of need the city got from the state not long before TLC was brought on. The contract between the two entities had been extended multiple times since mid-2018.

The city issued a request for service proposals from additional providers in late 2019. Dygert gave a presentation on the city-controlled ambulance concept in February 2020, noting at the time officials hadn't yet looked at provider proposals that were turned in. The city-run ambulance proposition was then sidelined due to COVID-19 until Dygert brought it back up in May 2021.

Under that updated plan, Dygert said, Auburn's ambulance service would have 25 employees, including full-time paramedics and EMTs, with wages and benefits meant to attract and retain workers.

TLC questions Auburn's city-run ambulance service proposal The company contracted to provide ambulance coverage in Auburn has responded to the city's latest proposal to create and run its own service, and it's asking Auburn officials to have an independent expert analyze the plan.

Lon Fricano, TLC's director of operations, emailed council members earlier this month arguing against the city ambulance proposal. He defended TLC's quality of service and said cost structures are too high for city-operated ambulance coverage to not incur taxpayer subsidy.

Despite the disagreement, both sides committed to an orderly and safe transition. At Thursday's meeting, the council also approved a resolution extending the city's present short-term contract with TLC  currently set to expire at the end of June  through Oct. 31. Locastro was again the sole no vote.
Q. If you could visit any place in the world, where would that be?

A. Because we are curious canines, my shelter friends and I always want to visit the places where our ancestors came from. There are conflicting opinions on where pit bulls originated from. Some put us in Greece during the first century A.D., where we worked as herding and working guard dogs. Others put us in England during the 10th century. So my ideal first trip would be to start in Greece and work my way over to England. Nothing strenuous, just a leisurely tour of the islands.

Q. Is there something special you would like our readers to know about you?

A. Well, there is! In case you hadn't noticed I am named after Athena, the Greek goddess of battle strategy and wisdom. I have some of the same attributes as she did. I like to think that wisdom is one of them  as in I have the wisdom to behave myself, LOL! In mythology, Athena was always accompanied by her pet owl and Nike, the goddess of victory. I have a very cool name and I try to live up to it.

Q. How would you describe yourself?
A 250-pound 4-year-old who stands nearly 6 feet tall is the newest resident of the Rosamond Gifford Zoo in Syracuse.

The zoo this week introduced Bjorn, an Andean bear who was born at the Queens Zoo in 2016 and had lived at Smithsonians National Zoo and the St. Louis Zoo.

Andean bears are also known as Spectacled bears because they are black with tan markings around their eyes that can resemble eyeglasses. They are listed as vulnerable in their native Andes Mountains due to habitat loss and poaching.

Zoo Director Ted Fox said in a news release that the zoo is thrilled to welcome Bjorn to reside in its Andean Bear Exhibit, which has been unused since the second of its elderly Andean bear brothers passed away in July 2020.

We lost Kahless and Morath in 2019 and 2020 at the ripe old ages of 25 and 26, and people have really missed seeing this amazing species exploring our complex bear exhibit, Fox said. We know our community will be so happy to have Bjorn here. He is a young, active bear who should be with us for quite some time.
Later, Dygert said the city received an opinion from the New York Conference of Mayors saying Auburn can't have a multi-year contract with an ambulance service, which it had previously done with TLC.

Councilor Debby McCormick expressed support for the city-run coverage, saying the COVID-19 pandemic reinforced the need for the change and the collaborations the city could start with this could prompt changes to how health care is handled in the city.

"This is a very critical and important road that we're going to take, and I wholeheartedly support it," she said.

Quill, Giannettino and Councilor Terry Cuddy all expressed support for the change.

Locastro said he wasn't against the idea of changing the ambulance service, but believes TLC does "a great job." He said he would need to see an independent study on the proposal before he would support it.

"If it looks good, I'll support it. But as of right now, until I get that study, I'm not going to support it," he said.
A handful of New York's 27 mass COVID-19 vaccination sites will close next week as the state shifts its focus to areas with low vaccination rates.

Beginning Monday, the mass vaccination sites at Corning Community College, SUNY Oneonta, SUNY Potsdam and York College in Queens will close. It's part of a "downscaling" by the state, according to Gov. Andrew Cuomo. More sites will close based on demand.

One reason for the shutdown of some clinics is the statewide vaccination rate reached the 70% milestone. Cuomo announced this week that many COVID-19 restrictions would be lifted after hitting that target.

As of Friday, the state Department of Health reported that 70.6% of adults age 18 and older have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine in New York. Nearly 63% of adults are fully vaccinated.

New York opened the mass vaccination sites to serve eligible populations, such as essential workers and older residents. Now that anyone age 12 and older are eligible for the vaccine, the clinics have administered shots to a larger group. The sites offer the Pfizer vaccine, which is the only vaccine approved for children ages 12-17.
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U.S. Catholic bishops overwhelmingly approved the drafting of a teaching document that many of them hope will rebuke Catholic politicians, including President Joe Biden, for receiving Communion despite their support for abortion rights.

The decision, vehemently opposed by a minority of bishops, came despite appeals from the Vatican for a more cautious and collegial approach to the divisive issue. And it raises questions of how closely the bishops will be able to cooperate with the Biden administration on issues such as immigration and racial injustice.

The result of the vote  168 in favor and 55 against  was announced Friday near the end of a three-day meeting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops that was held virtually. The bishops had cast their votes privately on Thursday after several hours of impassioned debate.

Supporters of the measure said a strong rebuke of Biden is needed because of his recent actions protecting and expanding abortion access, while opponents warned that such action would portray the bishops as a partisan force during a time of bitter political divisions across the country.
HIT: The completion of an extensive project in the town of Sterling is designed to prevent flooding problems that have taken place in the past.

The $2.7 million project is part of New York's Resiliency and Economic Development Initiative to address the effects of Lake Ontario flooding in shoreline communities. A 1.8-mile stormwater collection system and bioretention basins for rainwater have been constructed along West Bay Road to alleviate flooding, prevent road closures and protect the roadway from damage.

MISS: While it's possible that innocent misunderstandings are to blame, students and families connected to Casey Park Elementary School in Auburn are being asked to be extra careful and report any suspicious activity following two reports of students being approached by strangers.
I would be remiss if I did not chime in one more time about the renaming of the high school, partly because I initially encouraged the board to make the change at once if a majority vote so ordered. But the bizarre process that was set up, intentional or otherwise, caused more problems than it hoped to solve.

From many subsequent letters to The Citizen, I have learned that the systemic racism I described in my first column is denied by many of the more vocal citizens who see a threat to Auburns racial identity. Here is what I say to them.

Consider embracing the name Auburn Harriet Tubman High School. It carries the name of the city and points to 50 years of tradition. I taught there for 40 years with many wonderful educators and staff members and know of the schools many achievements. Generations are rightly proud of the high school. So keep the name Auburn as part of its title.
Amara Raja Batteries on Monday said it has decided to invest in green technologies, including lithium-ion batteries, to capitalise on fast-evolving trends in the energy and mobility sectors.

The company's board has decided to expand its lead-acid batteries business and set up a new 'Energy SBU' encompassing lithium cell and battery pack, EV chargers, energy storage systems, advanced home energy solutions and related products and services, the company said in a statement.

The vital role played by lead-acid technology across a variety of applications provide significant growth opportunities in both domestic and international markets, it added.

On the other hand, the emergence of lithium as an alternative energy storage technology opens up new and exciting growth opportunities, the company noted.

"After a careful review of the global business opportunities, the company board has decided to future-proof our business by repositioning the firm as an energy and mobility player. The board believes that the company has to invest in a portfolio of businesses to maintain its technological and business leadership," Amara Raja Batteries Vice-Chairman Jayadev Galla said.

Meanwhile, the company said that its Founder Chairman Ramachandra Galla, who steered the company for 36 years, has expressed his decision not to seek reappointment.

He will continue as Director and Chairman till the conclusion of the Annual General Meeting (AGM) in August and thereafter Vice-Chairman Jayadev Galla would assume the role of Chairman, the company said.

The company's board has also appointed S Vijayanand as President  New Energy (business vertical).

Amara Raja is one of the largest manufacturers of lead-acid batteries for both industrial and automotive applications in the country.

It produces automotive batteries under the brands Amaron and Powerzone and supplies to various original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) like Ashok Leyland, Ford India, Honda, Hyundai, Mahindra & Mahindra, Maruti Suzuki, and Tata Motors.
Advocates would like to see more of that funding to be steered to bike-specific improvements like protected bike lanes.

However, because the measure was approved by the Flagstaff electorate, the extent of legally reallocating funds is unclear. City staff appear to be looking into the matter more.

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In addition to the reallocation of funds, Heinsius said the petition is urging the city to implement faster solutions that are easily attainable.

That includes lowering the speed limit to 25 mph on the street where the accident occurred, Butler Avenue, as well as Lone Tree Road. Petitioners would like to see those changes made no later than August 2022.

The petition also calls for the city to install protected bike lanes on Beaver Street, San Francisco Street, Butler Avenue and Fourth Street by December 2022. On larger thoroughfares, such as West Route 66 and Milton Avenue, the petition asks for those changes to be made by December 2023

Heinsius, who owns Cosmic Cycles located downtown, said there is a narrative among residents that it is unsafe to bicycle around town.

That point was emphasized by other cyclists who spoke at the meeting, some recounting a history of dangerous encounters with cars while riding their bicycle in the city.
A multi-agency search and rescue operation was able to successfully recover an injured canyoneer at the Horsetank Wash in the Fossil Creek Wilderness area over the weekend.

Authorities said a 56-year-old male from Phoenix fell more than 60 feet as he began a cliff-side rappel. The man sustained multiple injuries, including a compound arm fracture.

The nature of the injury coupled with the location of the incident resulted in an operation that would encompass a search and rescue helicopter and multiple search and rescue teams from surrounding areas.

An Arizona Department of Public Safety Air Rescue helicopter responded from Flagstaff with a Coconino County Sheriffs Office Search and Rescue Air Rescue Specialist onboard, authorities said.

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The rescue also saw a Gila County Sheriffs Office Search and Rescue Coordinator in the vicinity respond to assist with the rescue, as well as members of Coconino County Sheriffs Office Search and Rescue.

Authorities said the terrain was incredibly difficult. A CCSO Mountain Rescue Team responded from Flagstaff to assist with a potential technical rope rescue in the event an air rescue was not feasible.
Khamenei cast the first vote from Tehran, urging the public to "go ahead, choose and vote.

Raisi, wearing a black turban that identifies him in Shiite tradition as a direct descendant of Islams Prophet Muhammad, voted from a mosque in southern Tehran. The cleric acknowledged in comments afterward that some may be so upset that they dont want to vote.

"I beg everyone, the lovely youths, and all Iranian men and women speaking in any accent or language from any region and with any political views, to go and vote and cast their ballots, Raisi said.

But few appeared to heed the call. There are more than 59 million eligible voters in Iran, a nation of over 80 million people. However, the state-linked Iranian Student Polling Agency has estimated a turnout will be just 44%, which would be the lowest since the revolution. Officials gave no turnout figures Friday, though results could come Saturday.

Fears about a low turnout have some warning Iran may be turning away from being an Islamic Republic  a government with elected civilian leadership overseen by a supreme leader from its Shiite clergy  to a country more tightly governed by its supreme leader, who already has final say on all matters of state and oversees its defense and atomic program.
NOFS astronomer Anthony Hewitt took the requested Pluto images on April 13 and May 12, 1978, capturing them on photographic glass plates. They were then sent to Christy in Washington, D.C. and on June 22 he began examining these and other Pluto plates from 1965, 1970 and 1971. Christy used a high-precision measuring machine called Starscan that magnified an image 30 times and projected it onto a three-foot screen.

Many of the plates seemed to be of poor quality because Pluto appeared asymmetrical, with a bulge in the north-south orientation. What really got Christy scratching his head was the fact that the background stars didnt exhibit the same lopsidedness. Elongation of all the bodiesPluto and the starswould have been easily explained as defective images, but with only Pluto being distorted, the answer had to be something else.

In the foreword to the book Out of the Darkness: The Planet Pluto by Clyde Tombaugh and Patrick Moore, Christy wrote, The elongation was fainter than the core of Plutos image, which made it appear unlike any image caused by motion of Pluto in its orbit. I thought about the possibility of a flare of some sort being emitted by Pluto, but at the instant I realized that the 12 May elongation was north of Pluto and that the 13 April elongation was to the south, the concept -- moon -- jumped into my thoughts.
These winners of PX3 bring us joy through their lenses and immense talent for capturing breathtaking photos.





Bronze in Nature/Trees

"Coming to Dresden, I noticed trees against the background of oilseed called rapethey looked like leaves from afar."

By Dominika Koszowska
US President Joe Biden's eight-day trip to Europe has prompted a flood of optimism rhetoric, and many officials chanted that America is finally waving goodbye to those hostile policies and mercurial behaviors during the presidency of Donald Trump.



For Europe, it is reasonable to regard it as a new beginning for the trans-Atlantic relationship. However, after intensive interactions in Britain's coastal county Cornwall and Brussels, European officials probably found that Trump's influence is hard to be wiped out, and their relations are difficult to get back where they were.



The rifts and mistrust between the trans-Atlantic partners concerning a series of issues, from trade to regional and global affairs, still remain hard to fix in a long time.



Trade tensions continue to cast a shadow on their ties. Over four months since Biden took office, Washington has yet to abolish the aluminium and steel tariffs the former government slapped on Europe in the name of "national security," as upholders of the trade barrier are still politically lucrative for Biden.



The longstanding battle between their aircraft manufacturing giants Airbus and Boeing over government subsidies was temporarily concluded with only a five-year truce, and many experts in the industry sighed because the vague terms will lead the two sides to cross swords again.



It is not difficult to understand Europe was somehow disappointed as they had expected Biden would end the trade war swiftly, but it now turns out to be yet another thorny issue.



From the Group of Seven Summit to the EU-US Summit, Biden has tried to mend Washington's relations with its European allies, and persuade them to forge a united front to compete with China and Russia. But some European countries, with concerns over their own interests, are less interested in joining the US-led alliance.



Just as Friedrich Merz, a politician of Germany's Christian Democratic Union party, has warned, Biden's policies would not deviate too much from Trump's. A sober approach for Europe might be to pick up the catchphrase "strategic autonomy" again, especially after Biden's victory.



The recent published Munich Security Report noted Europe must rethink and adjust its strategic and security reliance on the United States, as Washington has shifted its focus eastwards, and it needs to tackle some problems without the safe refuge of its old-time ally.



In other words, siding with the United States might not help, particularly in a time when solving problems need global actors beyond the West.



Sadly, many European politicians and media have been dwelling on the past and are keen on confrontation with China and Russia, following US Cold-War mentality.



In his new book titled The Hypocritical Superpower, Michael Lueders, a well-known German writer, reveals why European voices are prone to promote a trans-Atlantic alliance rather than a pragmatic attitude with China and Russia.

The Western media reports are somehow filtered by interest groups in the United States and used a certain framing that it is between "we western allies the good guys" against China and Russia "the evil ones," Lueders explained.

"Under Joe Biden many things will change, but 'America First' will still continue," Lueders wrote at the end of his book, and that is why Europe should step outside of the shadow of Washington.




BEAVER CITY  As a sex trafficking trial in Furnas County District Court concluded a second day of testimony on Thursday, a pair of witnesses described seeing the Oxford man who faces multiple charges in the case with a young girl on different occasions in 2019.

Greg Yost of Beaver City testified that he saw a young woman driving around Beaver City with William J. Billy Quinn, 57, of Oxford approximately 15-20 times in 2019.

Another witness, Amanda Becker of Beaver City, stated during her testimony that in the afternoon of Sept. 4, 2019, she pulled into her familys farm to check her cattles water when she saw a white Ford pickup parked near the barn with a man standing outside the pickup and a young girl inside the vehicle. Becker called her husband about the incident, and he reported the vehicle to the Furnas County Sheriffs Office for trespassing. Becker identified the man as Billy Quinn.

During defense attorney questioning Thursday morning, the alleged victim in the case admitted that she made false sexual allegations against a man in 2017.

The girl said the man had sexually assaulted her sister. Although her sister didnt report the incident to police, the girl wanted the man to get into trouble, so she told authorities he sexually assaulted her.
Ricketts had defended the grant funding as wise, saying that ethanol is a cleaner-burning fuel and that its increased use would help air quality and the states economy.

But conservationists said the grants for ethanol pumps seemed to be more about economic development than helping the environment.

A grant subcommittee of the trust had recommended funding 77 grants in 2020, but the ethanol grant was not among them, ranking 78th. The five grants that were defunded were ranked near the top, ranging from No. 7 to No. 36. While some board members said they have the discretion to alter the recommendations, critics  including some former members of the Trust Board  said such a switch was unprecedented.

The lawsuit alleged that giving money for the ethanol pumps violated two requirements of the trust: that grants do not primarily benefit a private interest and that grants shouldnt be given to projects that could be funded without the trust money.

Confer said a portion of the lawsuit, which alleges that the Trust Board violated open meeting laws at a November meeting, should go forward. He said his clients also want the state to pay its legal expenses. That will be argued at a court hearing scheduled for Wednesday in Lincoln.
Wyomings first two lease sales of 2021 have already been canceled. If Doughtys preliminary injunction stands, quarterly auctions are expected to resume this fall.

At present, its unclear how many leases will be available for purchase. Many drillers expect the BLM to offer just a handful of leases at the next sale, a sharp decline from the hundreds auctioned in past quarters.

A separate lawsuit over the executive action remains underway in Wyoming. Unlike the Louisiana lawsuit, the Wyoming case asks that the first and second quarterly lease sales of 2021 be held retroactively to make up for the states lost revenue.

The Petroleum Association of Wyoming is one of the parties suing over the executive order in Wyoming. That suit alleges that the Biden administration violated federal law by halting oil and gas lease sales.

The Mineral Leasing Act is pretty clear that the [Department of Interior] is required to hold quarterly lease sales, said PAW president Pete Obermuller. By not having any sale at all, and having no justification for that, it seems to us as a pretty clear violation of the Mineral Leasing Act.
Active wildfires burning in southeastern Montana have torched more than 30,000 acres over the past several days, and the weather through the weekend has the potential to either assist or hinder the effort to contain them.

While certain areas within Carbon County remain under pre-evacuation warnings, officials have lifted the evacuation orders in residential areas threatened by the Robertson Draw fire just south of Red Lodge.

The Robertson Draw fire, currently the largest in the region at nearly 25,000 acres, has destroyed eight homes and 13 outbuildings. Although the fire isnt at all contained, evacuation orders were lifted for property owners in the North and South Grove Creek, Gold Creek, Ruby Creek and Robertson Draw east to Highway 72 have been lifted for property owners, according to an announcement Thursday night. U.S. Forest Service lands south of Point of Rocks in the Rock Creek Drainage remain closed to the public.

Some of the 214 personnel assigned to the blaze spent Friday assisting evacuated residents back into their homes, according to the latest update from the fire's incident command team.
"I really don't know much about them," said Hertz, a Polson Republican.

Crabtree's group is now looking to recruit citizen support, riding the conflict between the judiciary and Republican lawmakers. The group emailed Missoula City Council members a week ago inviting them to a June 26 event to rally for the cause. The invitation mentions an "overwhelming amount of calls" the group has received regarding allegations of judicial misconduct, as well as the ongoing investigation of the judiciary by GOP legislators. It also mentions an excessively high number of wrongful convictions in Montana compared to the rest of the country, the same claim Mercer disputed during the Legislature two months ago.

Claims about wrongful convictions

The Montana State Council on Judicial Accountability has repeatedly claimed Montana ranks ninth in the U.S. for wrongful convictions, although it does not specify if that's per-capita or not. Peterson, the group's spokesperson, did not respond to a follow-up question asking about the group's source on wrongful conviction rates. At the National Registry of Exonerations, the source from which Crabtree's group claims to secure its figures, O'Brien said ninth is an inaccurate figure. The only wrongful convictions that come to light are those that result in exonerations, O'Brien said.
Gen. Quinn has a long history of serving our nations military, and has demonstrated a strong commitment to providing veterans with the quality services and respect they deserve," Democratic U.S Sen. Jon Tester said in a press release. "As head of the National Cemetery Administration, he is tasked with overseeing state cemeteries, addressing the special memorialization and burial needs of rural and tribal veterans, and ensuring all veterans have a final resting place that honors their service. Gen. Quinn is well qualified to take on this role, and I look forward to working with him to ensure VA has the resources it needs to preserve the legacy of our nations heroes.
"Officer Fanone did stop by our office and meet with our chief but there was no altercation," said Fones on Thursday.

Two men came into our office, unannounced, one dressed in plainclothes and one in uniform including a firearm, Fones said. Our chief politely asked if they were on duty and for their names as well as badge number, since we had individuals that had now entered our office, unannounced with a firearm and dressed as an officer. They stated they were not on duty, refused to give their badge number, and only Officer Fanone provided a name and email address. Our chief suggested that they would make time to meet with them soon. Our office intends to follow up on that promise if they reach out. Our chief provided them with business cards, shook hands, and they left.

Asking a person to identify themselves, especially one with a firearm, isnt an altercation. We ask anyone not on staff who enters our offices who they are, this is a standard safety protocol in every Hill office Ive entered, Fones said.

The medals vote, which took place June 15, was the second time the House had voted on the issue this spring. Lawmakers voted on the medals in March, at which point Rosendale voted to award the medals.
The Second Amendment is the Bill of Rights cornerstone.

It guarantees our God-given right to defend ourselves, our families, our property, and our freedom. President Joe Bidens nomination of David Chipman to head the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) is an attack on that right and on the hundreds of thousands of law-abiding gun owners in Montana  and the U.S. Senate must vote against his confirmation.

Our state has one of the highest rates of gun ownership in the nation. Far beyond a hobby or even passion, firearms are a part of our heritage and everyday life. We use them to hunt, protect livestock, and provide peace of mind when law enforcement may be miles away. Mr. Chipman has a long history of involvement with and lobbying for organizations whose mission is to diminish the Second Amendment.

For the last five years, he has been a senior policy adviser for Giffords. In an attempt at the U.S. Supreme Court to defend Washington, D.C.s complete ban on the possession of handguns, this organization argued that nothing in the Second Amendment restrains the authority of states or their political subdivisions when enacting firearm regulations. This dangerous position would allow politicians to run roughshod over the rights of their citizens.
Montana Territory was born in a spasm of violence. In 1863, when Bannack was the territorys first gold mining town, Henry Plummer, the sheriff later hanged by vigilantes, got into a heated argument in the saloon. Reputed to be the best shot in the territory, Plummer rose and at point blank range emptied his pistol. Three bullets hit the man he was aiming for, two grazed bystanders, and one was lodged in the beam above the bar.

According to the territorys first newspaper editor Thomas Dimsdale, shooting, dueling, and outrage were daily occurrences in Virginia City and Bannack. Granville Stuart, as close to a founding father as the territory produced, remarked that in 1860s Virginia City it became the custom to go armed all the time. Yet the territorys first legislature passed a law banning the carrying of concealed deadly weapons anywhere within the limits of any town in the territory. Such laws were not unique to Montana. Most states banned concealed weapons in the nineteenth century, considering them the weapons of assassins and thieves, not appropriate for an honest man.
The number of homicides in North Dakota reached an all-time high in 2020, according to the annual crime report released June 9 by North Dakota Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem.

Its the second consecutive year the statistic has set a new mark. The reasons aren't clear, though Stenehjem said it doesn't appear the pandemic was a factor.

The state had 32 homicides in 2020 -- up from 26 in 2019 -- which is the highest number since the state started compiling statistics in 1978 and probably the most serious weve ever had in the history of the state of North Dakota, Stenehjem said.

Twelve of the homicides were the result of domestic violence and many of the rest were the result of drug deals gone bad, Stenehjem said. Firearms were involved in 15 of the deaths. Four of the victims were minors.

Homicide numbers have trended up in the past few years but could drop back to or near average -- about 12 -- this year. As of a week ago there were four homicides in the state, and in the last week three more deaths have occurred that could be charged as murders. If that pace continued, the annual total would be about 14.
The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe is asking a federal judge to keep open its lawsuit against the Dakota Access Pipeline while an environmental study is underway, and it wants the line's operator to file monthly updates on the review.

Dakota Access and a federal agency say the case should be dismissed, and they argue they should not have to file regular updates with the court.

U.S. District Court Judge James Boasberg had asked the parties involved in the case to tell him the steps they planned to take after he declined to shut down the pipeline, and they all did so Friday by filing documents with the court. He ruled in May against Standing Rock's request for an injunction that would have required oil to stop flowing through the line during the review process, concluding that the tribe had not demonstrated a "likelihood of irreparable injury" from the line's continued operation.

Standing Rock and other Sioux tribes fighting the pipeline have not indicated whether they plan to appeal.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is conducting the court-ordered review of the pipeline's Missouri River crossing. It expects to wrap up the process in March 2022. Boasberg revoked a key permit known as an easement for the line's river crossing last year, and the review will determine whether the Corps reissues it.
CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta highlights Dr. Lakiea Bailey, a scientist with sickle cell disease who is working to find a cure.

Lakiea Bailey has tried to hide the pain and breathlessness she feels from her disease for most of her life.

As a child, she missed weeks out of every school year because of sickle cell -- a painful, genetic disease that's believed to impact 100,000 Americans.

Patients' red blood cells are "sickle" shaped and can clump together to impede blood flow to the rest of the body, causing serious problems, including strokes and organ failure.

As a studious young woman yearning to be normal, she hid her condition from her professors when she went off to college. But she says it only made her life harder.

When the condition flares up, an event known as a sickle cell crisis, "you cannot move, you can barely breathe without intense full-body pain in some cases, or it might simply be two arms, one leg, a foot," the 42-year-old told CNN.

Bailey has endured hundreds of surgical procedures, blood transfusions and hospitalizations over her lifetime. She remembers, as a child, fearing the night because that's when her sickle cell crises most often hit.

"I thought there was something about the hours between 2 and 5 a.m. that was just dangerous," she said.
But the $1 billion project has struggled to attract investors, and Meridians request to Environmental Quality this month marks the second time it has asked for an extension on the construction permit. Environmental Quality granted the first extension in December 2019 for 18 months.

Meridian is confident that it will meet -- in fact, has met -- the applicable deadline for commencement of construction under the Permit to Construct, the company said in a statement to the Tribune this week. It did not elaborate on what it has done to meet the deadline.

Stroh expects state officials will get a better feel for their next steps during a meeting expected to occur in mid-July between the company and Environmental Quality. Its too early to say what will happen if Meridian cannot meet the new deadline, he said.

Its possible the state will not issue any more extensions. The company would then have to restart the application process with the state if it still plans to pursue the project.

If they have a lot of good reasons why three months are not enough, maybe we would be more lenient to allow more time, Stroh said.

The refinery is slated to be built west of Belfield in Billings County.
This is done by whipping up hysteria in the base about something, anything, that threatens to bring about fuller inclusion of more people and an expansion of rights.

This attack on critical race theory is no different from the rush during the Obama administration by states to ban Shariah law in state courts, even though there was absolutely no threat that Shariah law would be recognized or used in those courts. This is simply an extension of the Barack Obama-is-a-secret-Muslim conspiracy and the backlash to his presence in the White House.

In fact, in the Republican primaries to pick a challenger to Obama in his reelection bid, Republican candidates were falling all over themselves to condemn Shariah law. However, in the 2016 primaries, the anti-Shariah law crusade died down. In its place, Trump vowed to ban Muslims from entering the country.

The freak-out about critical race theory is also not dissimilar from the ongoing attack on trans people, particularly people who were assigned male at birth. First came the introduction of a wave of bathroom bills that made it a crime to use a bathroom designated for a sex different from the sex you were assigned at birth. Most of these bills failed.
"We collectively thought we were doing the right thing at the time, but now sometimes harsh reality comes and bites you places, and there seems to be some teeth marks on parts of our body, so it's time to reassess."

-- Sen. Ray Holmberg, R-Grand Forks, announcing a study of a new law limiting the state Emergency Commission's spending approval authority between biennial sessions of the Legislature.

q q q

"It's a horse race."

-- State Mineral Resources Director Lynn Helms, on New Mexico threatening North Dakota's status of being the nation's second-biggest oil producer.

q q q

It hurt. We had to budget all over again. You just bought what you had to buy. Its our faith that keeps us going.

-- June Benedict, one of many people who had their work hours cut due to the coronavirus pandemic.

q q q
https://www.un.org/en/observances/sustainable-gastronomy-day

"The UN General Assembly adopted on 21 December 2016 its resolution A/RES/71/246 and designated 18 June as an international observance, Sustainable Gastronomy Day.

The decision acknowledges gastronomy as a cultural expression related to the natural and cultural diversity of the world. As the COVID-19 pandemic is still unfolding across the globe, sustainable gastronomy - celebrating seasonal ingredients and producers, preserving wildlife as well as our culinary traditions - is today more relevant than ever."
In this article:

HECTOR RETAMAL/AFP via Getty Images

Chinese-language anti-communist media and Twitter are abuzz this week with rumors that a vice minister of State Security, Dong Jingwei defected in mid-February, flying from Hong Kong to the United States with his daughter, Dong Yang.

Dong Jingwei supposedly gave the U.S. information about the Wuhan Institute of Virology that changed the stance of the Biden administration concerning the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Dong is, or was, a longtime official in Chinas Ministry of State Security (MSS), also known as the Guoanbu. His publicly available background indicates that he was responsible for the Ministrys counterintelligence efforts in China, i.e., spy-catching, since being promoted to vice minister in April 2018. If the stories are true, Dong would be the highest-level defector in the history of the Peoples Republic of China.

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Dongs defection was raised by Chinese officials last March at the Sino-American summit in Alaska, according to Dr. Han Lianchao, a former Chinese foreign ministry official before defecting after the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre. In a Wednesday tweet, Han, citing an unnamed source, alleged that Chinas foreign minister Wang Yi and Communist Party foreign affairs boss Yang Jiechi demanded that the Americans return Dong, and U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken refused.

Former Pentagon, State Department, and CIA expert Nicholas Eftimiades, author of Chinese Espionage: Operations and Tactics, called the report exactly what it is, a rumor. It happens all the time in the information warfare between Beijing and anti-communist overseas Chinese. But he called Dr. Han, a pro-democracy activist with the Washington, D.C.-based Citizen Power Initiative for China group, a straight shooter, not known to exaggerate in any way or form trusted for his integrity.

Mollie Saltskog, a senior intelligence analyst with The Soufan Group who earned a masters degree in global affairs from Tsinghua University in Beijing, also urged caution, saying the rumors of defections surface regularly. While significant and certainly useful for our intelligence efforts, she added, one high-level defection will not drastically change our understanding or approach to China. In short, if true, this is potentially significant but not a game changer.

The State Department did not respond to a request for comment by press time. It typically does not comment on defectors. A half dozen experts on Chinese intelligence queried by SpyTalk said they had no information to share on Dongs alleged defection.

Chinese-language press stories also claim that Dongs daughter Yang defected with him from Hong Kong on or about Feb. 10. She is allegedly the former spouse of a senior Alibaba executive, Jiang Fan, who heads TMall, Chinas big Amazon-like business.

Jon Stewart Goes All-In on COVID-19 Wuhan Lab Leak Theory

Without naming Dong, the pro-Trump web site Red State reported June 4 on a high-level defection from China, saying the Defense Intelligence Agency had received information from him that Beijing is covering up biological warfare research at the Wuhan lab, and advanced its story to question the integrity of Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

Sources say the level of confidence in the defectors information is what has led to a sudden crisis of confidence in Dr. Anthony Fauci, adding that U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) personnel detailed to DIA have corroborated very technical details of information provided by the defector, it said.

According to the authoritative Paris-based newsletter Intelligence Online, Dong is close to Chinese President Xi Jinping. He previously headed the Guoanbu in the region of Hebei, which has produced many of Xi's securocrats, the publication reported in 2018. Back in 2010, IO reported that Dong carried out orders from superiors in Beijing to arrest four Japanese employees of the Fujita Corporation who were filming in a forbidden military zone. The move was seen at the time as a power play by State Security against then-President Hu Jintao.

Meanwhile, the Chinese State Councils official web page listing the top personnel in the Ministry of State Security no longer lists any vice ministers working under MSS minister Chen Wenqing. Under personnel developments, it notes the corruption investigation against another former vice minister, Ma Jian, who was sentenced to life in prison in 2018. The vice minister section is blank.

Co-published with SpyTalk, where Jeff Stein leads an all-star team of veteran investigative reporters, writers, and subject-matter experts who will take you behind the scenes of the national security state. Subscribe to get full access to the newsletter and website.

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https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9699221/Has-Chinese-official-defected-Rumors-swirl-diplomat-told-DC-Wuhan-lab.html

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/chinese-defectors-identity-confirmed-was-top-counterintelligence-official-redstate

https://www.yahoo.com/news/rumours-swirl-chinas-top-spycatcher-191833291.html?.tsrc=fp_deeplink

https://redstate.com/jenvanlaar/2021/06/17/breaking-chinese-defector-confirmed-as-top-counterintelligence-official-n398374

https://twitter.com/SolomonYue/status/1406298864592715780

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If you look at three of the highest-paying segments of the regions economy  manufacturing, financial activities and construction  those fields, spanning more than 110,000 jobs, are down by only 1% from May 2019.

But there still are things holding the recovery back.

The continued closing of the Canadian border is the biggest one. It keeps Canadian shoppers out of the regions malls. It makes it harder for businesses to move goods and services across the border.

Those restrictions eventually will be lifted. But no one can be sure that local stores can count on Canadian shoppers to return in the same numbers as before the pandemic, said Fred Floss, a SUNY - Buffalo State economist.

After all, they have learned, just as Americans have, to shop online more than ever during the pandemic. But there is a bright spot: the Canadian dollar, now worth about 81 cents American, buys a little more here than it did a year ago, when it was worth around 73 cents.

Thats a huge part of tourism and shopping, Glass said.
WASHINGTON (AP)  The Supreme Court ruled on Thursday that the city of Philadelphia violated the Constitution by limiting its relationship with a Catholic foster care agency over the group's refusal to certify same-sex couples as foster parents.

The justices came down unanimously against Philadelphia and for Catholic Social Services.

"The refusal of Philadelphia to contract with CSS for the provision of foster care services unless it agrees to certify same-sex couples as foster parents cannot survive strict scrutiny, and violates the First Amendment," Chief Justice John Roberts wrote.

Catholic Social Services is affiliated with the Archdiocese of Philadelphia. The agency has said that its Catholic beliefs prevent it from certifying same-sex couples as foster parents.

Philadelphia learned in 2018 from a newspaper reporter that the agency would not work with same-sex couples. The city has said it requires that the two dozen-plus foster care agencies it works with not to discriminate as part of their contracts. The city asked the Catholic agency to change its policy, but the group declined. As a result, Philadelphia stopped referring additional children to the agency.
There was a strange climate of suspicion, he said, and an intense fear that Zaga and her children might still be sent back to Turkey. But at this point, representatives of the U.N. refugee agency had been informed and were present.

UNHCR Representative in Greece Mireille Girard said the organization received a telephone message on April 21 about migrants arriving on Samos and sought confirmation from authorities, but got no response. A few days later, the agency was informed a family believed to have been with the group had remained on Samos and was applying for asylum.

These elements are concerning. They are indications of a pushback from Samos island on 21 April and need to be formally investigated, Girard said.

In the meantime, Zagas family has received asylum. She says she fled her home in the Nablus region of the West Bank for several reasons, but mainly to escape an abusive husband who assaulted her eldest son. She hopes to eventually reach Belgium, where her sister lives.

I want to see my children happy, to see them going to school, eating healthy food, sleeping well and to live normally just like other children. To have safety and security, to have a school and home, she said.
As consumers emerge and spend within their communities, there are new opportunities to support minority-owned businesses. According to the New York Small Business Development Center, roughly 30% of small businesses in our state are minority-owned. When you consider that 48% of small business revenues are recirculated back into their neighborhoods, the impact of those businesses is substantial.

Unfortunately, these businesses have taken the biggest hit from the pandemic. As a study by Kinsey & Co. states, part of the reason lies in the fact that minority-owned businesses are more likely to be concentrated in the industries most affected by the pandemic  namely front-line, service industries. Even before the pandemic, many were undercapitalized from systemic social and economic injustices that have long created barriers to growth and financial stability.

The good news is that more consumers are sustaining the call for economic and racial equity by supporting minority-owned businesses. Supporting these businesses creates jobs, supports families, attracts other businesses and investments and strengthens the community.
When then President Donald Trump had to postpone a political rally last year because it was scheduled on June 19, he commented that nobody had ever heard of Juneteenth until the controversy over his rally.

He only exaggerated slightly. The holiday thats also known as Emancipation Day has been celebrated by African Americans since the late 1800s, though it is largely unknown in many parts of the country. Thankfully, that is changing.

Juneteenth marks the day in 1865 that slaves in Galveston, Texas, were first told that they were free. They had not heard of the Emancipation Proclamation issued in September 1862 by President Abraham Lincoln.

President Biden signed a bill on Thursday that makes Juneteenth a federal holiday. Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo did the same last October, making June 19 a state holiday in New York.

Why should we take notice across the country of a day that was originally celebrated only in Texas? Because the end of slavery in the U.S.  which eventually came when Congress ratified the 13th Amendment on Dec. 6, 1865  brought independence to a segment of our population that had been held in bondage.
As someone who has paid a nonsensical fine for driving 27 miles per hour at 11 a.m. on Delaware Avenue, near Canisius High School, I applaud the end of this money grabbing scheme by the City of Buffalo, and more particularly, its mayor, Byron W. Brown.

Understand, I have been a Brown fan for a long time. But in this case, he was wrong, and he knows it. What else can explain his failure to veto the Common Councils action terminating the speed zone cameras? Was it really about the safety of the kids or something else? What are the facts?

What I find puzzling is that through all the conversations about the cameras, we have yet to hear that a single accident or injury to a student has been avoided by the cameras. Why is that? If even a single child had been spared an injury, shouldnt we hear about it?

Motor vehicle accidents involving students in school zones are a matter of public record. They are reported and investigated. The mayor and other city officials would have access to these data.

The conclusion is there were no such injuries to begin with, so there was no problem to be solved. So, why the cameras and the fines? A money grab, plain and simple.

Dennis McCoy

Snyder
Representative image

Washington [US], June 18 (ANI): Universal school lunch programs make students healthier, and increase their lifetime income by 3 per cent, according to a unique study from Lund University in Sweden.

The findings of the study were published in the journal 'The Review of Economic Studies'.

Health disparities arise early in life and play a major role in economic outcomes among adults. Yet there are few studies on the long-term effects of school-based nutrition policies aimed at counteracting them.

Researchers from Lund University and Stockholm University can now show that universal school lunch programs have significant long-term benefits for students' education, general health and income.

"Today, we take school lunches for granted in Sweden. But the fact is, it was a very conscious investment when Sweden introduced free lunches in the 1940s. These cooked meals were meticulously planned in terms of nutrition. This begs the question: did it affect students' well-being in the long-term? We wanted to find out", said Petter Lundborg, professor of economics at Lund University.

Sweden, Finland and Estonia have been serving free school meals for a long time, unlike the neighboring countries Norway and Denmark, where pupils bring their own lunch. In other countries, such as the US and the UK, poorer students are offered school meals, while others pay.

In the new study, the researchers examine the Swedish school lunch program that was introduced gradually in different municipalities from the mid-1940s. The program offered nutritious school lunches to all Swedish primary school students, free of charge.

The researchers focused on the introduction of school lunches between 1959 and 1969. They discovered that the initiative had a positive impact on the height of the students, their health as young adults, the level of education they attained, and their lifetime income.

"Our study shows that universal efforts that provide children with nutritious meals can be seen as a long-term investment. In other words: ensuring that children eat well, also pays off later in life in terms of health, education and income", said Dan-Olof Rooth, professor of economics at the Institute for Social Research (SOFI) at Stockholm University.

Story continues

The study shows, among other things, that both boys and girls who took part in the school meal program throughout their schooling grew taller than those who did not have access to the program. Pupils who received school meals during the entire nine years of compulsory school became almost 1 cm taller and went to university more often compared with pupils without access to the program. However, most importantly, the students had a three percent higher lifetime income.

"We also noted some interesting differences in the effects, where children from poor households benefited the most, even if children from all households benefit to a certain extent. Students from poor families had a six percent higher lifetime income, and students from other households had about a two percent higher lifetime income. The reform thus benefited all students, from both poor and rich families", said Petter Lundborg.

The results are related: the students ate nutritious food at school, they became taller and more educated, which to a large extent can explain why they had a better income throughout life. However, the researchers found no long-term effects on mortality, morbidity or sick leave.

The effects of school meal programs can also be caused by factors that have nothing to do with nutrition. Therefore, the researchers also collected data on school absenteeism from municipal archives in Sweden. The researchers' analysis shows that the introduction of the school lunch program did not lead to any changes in school attendance, which was high even before school meals were introduced.

"A reasonable interpretation of our results is that the students became more receptive to what they were being taught when they ate a nutritious lunch. This is in line with a previous study, which found that test results among eleven-year-olds increased during the first year after the introduction of nutritious school meals in connection with the Jamie Oliver campaign in the UK", said Dan-Olof Rooth.

Petter Lundborg and Dan-Olof Rooth - who conducted the study together with Dr. Jesper Alex-Petersen - believe that their results are relevant to many western countries today, even though the Swedish school lunch program was introduced during the 1950s and 1960s. Sweden was a rich country, where school children did not lack food, but where parents lacked knowledge about healthy eating habits. The reform made school food nutritious and the same for everyone.

"It is important for many countries even today, because school meals and their nutritional content is a recurring issue. Our results show significant long-term economic benefits of school meals. You get a lot of 'bang for your buck' - it is extremely well-invested money", concluded Petter Lundborg.

The researchers used newly collected historical data on the gradual implementation of the program across municipalities in Sweden between the years 1959 and 1969. During this period, 265 municipalities introduced the program, with a roughly equal number of municipalities each year.

These historical data were linked to administrative records that cover the population of primary school pupils, i.e., about 1.5 million pupils born 1942-1965.

Using a difference-in-differences design, they estimated the impact of the school lunch reform on a broad range of outcomes taken from income and education registers, the military enlistment register, the medical birth register, and hospitalisation and mortality registers. (ANI)
What Sen. Manchin is putting forward are some basic building blocks that we need to ensure that democracy is accessible," Abrams told CNN.

Still, in a narrowly divided Senate where Democrats must count on Vice President Kamala Harris to cast tie-breaking votes, any compromise will likely be for naught unless changes are made to Senate filibuster rules, which Manchin and others oppose. For now, it takes 60 votes to overcome a filibuster and advance legislation.

Over a dozen Senate Republicans took turns at the microphone during a Thursday news conference to denounce the bill, which they view as a federal overreach into state and local elections.

McConnell predicted all Republicans would remain in lockstep opposition regardless of what changes are made. Sen. Roy Blunt, the No. 4 ranking Senate Republican, noted the endorsement by Abrams, who is a lighting rod for GOP criticism.

I actually think when Stacey Abrams immediately endorsed Sen. Machins proposal it became the Stacey Abrams (bill), not the Joe Manchin (bill), he told reporters Thursday.
"The GOP tax cut is eating our seed corn," Johnson said. "It's blowing the biggest opportunity that we have  our once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to invest in our state, in our kids and in their precious futures."

The GOP proposal also includes adding $200 million to the state's budget stabilization fund, a rainy day fund to be tapped in times of emergency, bringing the fund to an estimated $2.1 billion.

"That will make sure that we have money in our savings account that, whatever pandemic or recession comes in the future, were ready to meet that," LeMahieu said.

The Republican-authored budget now heads to the state Senate and Assembly, where it is expected to be taken up later this month. If passed by both chambers, the budget heads to Evers, who has partial veto power, which he used in 2019 to make more than 70 partial vetoes, including one to boost K-12 spending by $87 million. A finalized budget is due by July 1.

Education spending

Fiscal bureau director Bob Lang said the Republican budget meets federal guidelines to secure $2.3 billion in coronavirus stimulus funding. Federal guidelines required the state to spend more than the $128 million increase to schools approved by the committee last month.
A provision in state law that allows blood samples to be taken without a warrant from incapacitated drivers being investigated for drunken driving is unconstitutional, the state Supreme Court said Friday.

But ruling on the facts of the case that led to the decision, the court said in a unanimous decision that blood drawn from a Madison woman who was unconscious following a fatal crash was permitted because the officer who ordered the blood sample taken without a warrant was operating under the law as it stood at the time, calling it a "good faith" exception.

The court's ruling came in the case of Dawn Prado, now 54, who was charged in 2015 with homicide by drunken driving for a December 2014 crash in Fitchburg that killed another driver. The case has languished since 2016, when a Dane County judge threw out the results of a blood sample taken from Prado, ruling that a police officer should have obtained a search warrant to get the sample.

Since then, the Prado case has awaited appellate court rulings in other cases that appeared to be on point, but none directly answered the questions posed in her case.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, June 17)  The Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) has announced a leaner top management team come July as it seeks a fresh start in the aftermath of a multimillion-peso equity market scandal.

The PSE is left with just 14 nominees for its supposed 15-man board of directors after incumbent director Eusebio Tanco withdrew on Wednesday his candidacy for another term.

"My understanding from the NOMELEC [Nominations and Election Committee] chairman is that the committee decided to go ahead with the election with one less director. So we will have 14 directors instead of 15," PSE president and CEO Ramon Monzon told CNN Philippines Thursday.

Tanco, a longtime PSE director and chairman of brokerage company Ventures Securities, Inc. came under pressure after his brokerage firm got entangled in a financial fraud involving at least 700 million worth of shares siphoned off from stock market investors.

The PSE is set to hold its annual stockholders meeting on July 2 when it elects its new board members. With this, reopening the nomination period to fill the vacant slot was not a viable option for the stock exchange.

"It's not a question of nominating. If we will have to do that, we will have to open the nomination period...it's going to take too long," the PSE's top official said.

EQ Trades and reforms

Corporate regulator Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) earlier this week revoked the licenses of Tanco's Ventures Securities, Inc. and another brokerage firm, R and L Investments, Inc. after a rogue clerk was found to have fraudulently transferred shares from R and L Investments to Ventures Securities via so-called EQ trades - essentially electronically transferring shareholdings from one broker to another.

Tanco's Ventures Securities has appealed the SEC decision saying the PSE's investigation unit, the Capital Markets Integrity Corporation (CMIC), did not flag the brokerage of anomalies during the CMIC's regular audit.

CMIC, in a separate statement on Thursday, hit back at Ventures Securities, while the SEC junked the broker's appeal.

"[I]n CMIC's audit of TPs [trading participants], trading-related documents for a particular period may not arouse suspicion by themselves, but if similar documents for prior periods are correlated to each other, the suspicion of fraud may be supported by extending the examination procedures for the relevant prior periods or years," the CMIC statement read.

Millions of pesos in fines have also been imposed on the two brokerages and their officials, except for Tanco.

The PSE board shakeup is an attempt to restart on a clean slate and rebuild investor confidence shaken by the latest stock fraud.

"Even CMIC, they review their audit procedures, their audit coverage. It's stronger. On the PSE side, what we're doing now is we have been pushing for a lot of rules revisions. And a lot of these rules revisions are in the interest of investor protection whether backdoor listing or IPO listing," Monzon said.

Still, EQ trades will not be part of the reforms as the system is not within the PSE's ambit.

"EQ trades are with the Philippine Depository & Trust Corporation and the brokers," Monzon explained.

"EQ trades are not within the control of PSE. In fact that was one of the reasons why PSE was pursuing the acquisition of PDS because we felt like in all other exchanges in region and worldwide that the depository and the exchange are one and the same thing so the risk management and risk controls can be put in place," he added.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, June 17)  President Rodrigo Duterte downplayed the report of outgoing International Criminal Court Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda on the country's drug war, the Palace said Thursday.

"Immediately his reaction was: Eh bakit ganito ito? Bakit puro Rappler, ABS-CBN ang sini-cite ng prosecutor?" Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque said during his regular virtual brefing.

[Translation: Why is it like this? Why is the prosecutor only citing Rappler and ABS-CBN?]

Bensouda sought permission before the pre-trial chamber to conduct an investigation into the Philippines' war on drugs from November 1, 2011 to March 16, 2019.

Roque said they were appeased after seeing Bensouda's decision, which also cited reports from the Philippine Daily Inquirer, because "in law, all these newspaper accounts are mear hearsay."

The three news organizations have drawn the chief executive's ire earlier into his term.

"He shrugged off the opinion after checking the media sources kasi [because] all lawyers know that will not stand in court," added Roque, reiterating no proceedings can start on the basis of hearsay evidence.

Roque also said his "emotional outburst" during a briefing with the Philippine National Police earlier this week was "uncalled for" if this is the kind of evidence the prosecution will use, but he noted he hadn't seen Bensouda's opinion yet at the time.

"It's no big deal," he said. "We will allow and let the Department of Justice do its job, because that is really the obligation of the Philippine state to investigate, prosecute and punish if need be."

Roque earlier said the President will not cooperate with the ICC probe until the end of his term, reiterating the country is not a member of the international court anymore. Duterte pulled the Philippines out of its jurisdiction in March 2019 after a case was filed against him for the campaign against illegal drugs.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, June 18)  The Philippines' Health Department said Friday it is awaiting further developments on a report that health workers in Indonesia caught the COVID-19 virus despite being vaccinated with Sinovac.

Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire was referring to a Reuters story on more than 350 health workers who caught the virus in Indonesia's Kudus district, where cases of the highly transmissible Delta variant which first emerged in India were also previously detected.

The report said most of the workers were asymptomatic and in isolation, but "dozens were in hospital with high fevers and falling oxygen saturation levels."

READ: Hundreds of vaccinated Indonesian health workers get Covid-19, dozens in hospital

Like the Philippines, Indonesia has largely relied on the Chinese vaccine manufacturer amid global shortage, with most of its health workers getting Sinovac doses.

Vergeire said more details still need to be provided in the article to dispel possible worries among Filipinos.

"Looking at that article, we need to be very cautious kasi matatakot ang mga tao. Kasi iyong article na yan hindi naman niya sinabi kung ang mga bakunado ay fully vaccinated or (they) just received one dose," she told CNN Philippines' The Source.

[Translation: Looking at that article, we need to be very cautious because people might get scared. That article does not state whether the workers were fully vaccinated or they just received one dose.]

The report said Kudus has about 5,000 healthcare workers. Citing the Indonesian Medical Association, it said almost all of them received Sinovac.

"If for example they have 5,000 healthcare workers, and the infections were just at 300, maliit po na porsyento yan. At makikita natin na lets say 3% (ang na-infect), 97% pa rin naging epektibo ang bakuna," Vergeire said.

[Translation: If for example they have 5,000 healthcare workers, and the infections were just at 300, that's still a small percentage of infection. If for example, 3% of the group got infected, there's still a 97% chance that the vaccine was effective.]

The Reuters story actually said "more than 350 doctors and medical workers" in Kudus, which has about 5,000 healthcare workers, caught COVID-19 despite being vaccinated with Sinovac. Those numbers implied a 7% infection rate, a CNN Philippines computation shows.

Vergeire also noted that Sinovac has yet to release its study on its effectiveness against the Delta variant.

Sought for his comment on the issue, vaccine czar Carlito Galvez Jr. said the data should be validated first.

"Let's wait for the analysis of the vaccine expert panel, i-hold muna yung comment considering it came from a newspaper," Galvez said.

[Translation: Let's wait for the analysis of the vaccine experts panel, and hold the comment first considering it came from a newspaper.]

Galvez also shrugged off worries that the news may again dampen Filipinos' vaccine confidence in China's Sinovac.

Early this month, the World Health Organization approved Sinovac for emergency use after it showed that it prevented symptomatic disease in 51% of those who got the shot and prevented severe COVID-19 and hospitalization in 100% of the studied population.

However, it noted that the company must continue to "generate data to enable full licensure and WHO prequalification of the vaccine."

This Philippines now has 9 million Sinovac doses out of over 12 million vaccine supply being administered to health workers, senior citizens, persons with comorbidities, essential workers, and indigent citizens.

Also on Friday, Vergeire said in a media forum that less than one percent of people who received COVID-19 vaccines in the country as of June 6 had suspected side effects, most of them mild.

The government previously reminded the public that the best vaccine is still the one that is available, in a bid to overcome brand preference in the country.
(CNN)  Satya Nadella is now even more powerful at Microsoft.

The tech giant's CEO was named chairman of the board Wednesday, elevating his current role atop one of the world's most valuable companies.

Nadella, who has served as chief executive since 2014, has helped transform the PC maker into a leader in cloud computing in recent years, resulting in blockbuster earnings and a market cap of close to $2 trillion.

Microsoft said in a statement that Nadella had been "unanimously elected" to replace John Thompson in the position.

The news comes as the company grapples with the aftermath of a probe involving its co-founder.

Last month, news emerged of an affair between Bill Gates and an employee in 2000. Gates' representatives have acknowledged the relationship, which reportedly took place while he was chairman of the board.

Microsoft's board has said that it launched an investigation into the matter two years ago. Gates left the board in early 2020, though a spokesperson for the billionaire has said that the decision was unrelated to the probe.

The allegations came just under two weeks after the announcement of Gates' divorce from his wife of 27 years, Melinda French Gates.

Since then, Microsoft has faced intense scrutiny over its workplace culture.

On Wednesday, an activist investor urged the tech giant to do more to combat sexual harassment following the allegations, saying it should examine "the culture set by top leadership."

In a shareholder resolution, impact investment firm Arjuna Capital called on Microsoft to release an annual transparency report detailing its sexual harassment policies and investigations into alleged incidents across the company.

Microsoft declined to comment on the resolution.

Nadella has personally addressed the allegations against Gates, saying in an interview with CNBC last month that "the Microsoft of 2021 is very different from the Microsoft of 2000."

"To me and to everyone at Microsoft, our focus on our culture, our diversity, our inclusion, in particular, the everyday experience of our people is super important," he added.

 Rishi Iyengar contributed to this report.

This story was first published on CNN.com, "Microsoft names CEO Satya Nadella as chairman."
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, June 17)  Luzon residents may still encounter rotating brownouts because of limited supply, the Department of Energy said Thursday.

Latest projections show supply may fall short of projected demand beginning next week, followed by two consecutive weeks of yellow alert or thin power reserves.

Mahaba-haba po yung ating potential na yellow alerts at meron po tayong mga specific weeks ng potential red alerts Meron pa rin tayong power plants na magco-conduct ng kanilang PMS (preventive maintenance schedule) during the summer season, Energy Director Mario Marasigan told the Senate energy committee.

Kapag sumobra sa dalawa ang naka-outage, definitely may problema tayo sa supply, he added.

[Translation: We will experience a longer period of potential yellow alerts and specific weeks of potential red alerts Its because there are still some power plants that will conduct their PMS (preventive maintenance schedule) during the summer season. When there are more than two plants on outage, definitely we will have supply problems.]

The Luzon grid has an available capacity of 17,266 megawatts (MW) against a peak demand of over 11,000 MW on early afternoons. However, supply dwindles once generation facilities go on emergency shutdown.

Undersecretary Emmanuel Juaneza said the agency is in talks with a number of generating companies over maintenance activities beyond June to preserve supply. Two other power plants will go offline between now and early August, while another facility will go on full operation yet in August.

As a result, the grid will see a shortfall on July 12-18 and July 25-August 1. In between, the grid will remain on yellow alert  a trend to last until early September.

RELATED: PCC probing possible collusion as power plant shutdowns led to rotating brownouts

Procurement of electricity reserves is also a crucial step, along with putting up transmission lines to tap excess energy supply in Mindanao.

To guarantee the consumer the best price and continued better service, we announce that all ancillary services required by the grid shall henceforth be sourced and procured by way of public bidding and we will do this under whatever format or framework prescribed to us, National Grid Corporation of the Philippines spokesperson Cynthia Alabanza told lawmakers.

However, the Energy Regulatory Commission pointed out that the DOE has not yet released rules for the open bidding of power reserves. Existing guidelines only apply to baseload supply.

Tuwing may hearing tayo, may lumalabas na hindi pa pala nila nagagawa, napag-uusapan ito. At the end of the day, 'yung scenario na magba-brownout tayo is there [Whenever we hold hearings, we find out that the agencies have not acted or even discussed these issues. At the end of the day, the brownout scenario is there], Senator Nancy Binay said.

READ: Investments in more power plants long-term solution to power supply woes  NGCP

Energy Undersecretary Wimpy Fuentebella said forward contracting of power supply, along with faster action on pending power generation contracts, should help avert future red alert incidents.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, June 18)  More Filipino healthcare workers can now work abroad as the country's pandemic task force has increased the ceiling on those who can be deployed.

Malacanang on Friday announced the annual cap will be increased to 6,500 from 5,000. Healthcare workers under Mission Critical Skills with perfected contracts as of May 31 will be part of the adjusted ceiling.

The cap excludes government-to-government deployment.

A temporary ban on the deployment of nurses and other healthcare workers overseas was imposed two weeks ago after the 5,000 limit was reached.

Late last year, the Inter-Agency Task Force said the cap was needed given the "national demand" for healthcare workers amid the coronavirus pandemic.

A nurses group welcomed the development.

"Kasi meron pa namang mga exemption... kailangan din ng Pilipinas ng mga nurses so sa tingin ko sapat na 'yan," Philippine Nurses Association President Melbert Reyes told CNN Philippines' News.PH.

[Translation: Because there are still exemptions... and the Philippines also needs nurses, so I think that is enough.]

Reyes said nurses who have remained in the country still face the same issues such as lack of job security and low salary.

"Masaya tayo na nandito sila at nagsisilbi pero nakakalungkot na hindi sila binibigyan ng pagpapahalaga," he added.

[Translation: We are happy they are here and they are serving the public but it's sad that they are not given importance.]
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, June 18)  As government officials continue to debate on the use of face shield in the middle of the pandemic, the Health Department stressed that the protective gear still reduces the risk of COVID-19 infection, especially in enclosed spaces.

Health Spokesperson and Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire told CNN Philippines' The Source on Friday that based on studies, face shields, when coupled with face masks, provide up to 90% protection from the virus.

"We need to get back to the objective of why we have mandated this face shield from the very start. This has proven to be effective because it covers your whole face, your eyes, your nose and your mouth and it prevents the droplets from landing on your face," Vergeire said.

The Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Disease is appealing to President Rodrigo Duterte to maintain the mandatory use of face shields, at least for indoor spaces like hospitals, schools, workplaces, commercial establishments (such as but not limited to food establishments, malls and public markets), public transport terminals, and places of worship.

On Wednesday, Senate President Vicente Sotto III said the President had agreed that face shields should be used only inside hospitals, but this was prior to the IATF meeting that discussed the issue. There is still no written order revising previous guidelines on the protective gear.

READ: IATF to recommend use of face shields inside hospitals, other enclosed spaces

"Ito na ang pinaglalaban natin ngayon na dahil merong pronouncement ang World Health Organization (This is what we continue to insist, because of the WHO pronouncement) that [COVID-19] can be airborne in enclosed spaces, all the more that we need face shields in enclosed spaces because it adds to the protection," Vergeire added.

Vaccine czar Carlito Galvez shared the same view.

"May added value siya kasi unang una hindi natin mahawakan yung ating mga mata dahil andoon ang face shield," he told reporters.

[Translation: It has added value. Because first of all, we would refrain from touching our eyes since we are wearing a face shield.]

"Nakikita natin na nung sinimulan natin sa mass transport 'yan sinimulan natin sa mga work building at workplace, nakita natin talagang may gamit din siya," he added.

[Translation: When we started requiring it in mass transport, work buildings, and workplaces, we found it useful.]

Disinfect face shields after use

Vergeire also explained the importance of cleaning face shields after every use or leaving them under the sun or outdoors for airing to reduce the risk of transmission.

"Araw araw yan pag ginagamit natin, kailangan niliinis rin po natin iyan ng disinfectant natin tapos ibibilad sa araw o 'di kaya let it stay outside your house para mahanginan," Vergeire said. "Hindi pwedeng nagamit nang hindi nalilinis."

[Translation: When you use it everyday, you should clean it with a disinfectant and sun dry it or let it stay outside where the air keeps flowing. You cannot use it without cleaning it beforehand.]

She stressed that people can remove their face shields when they are not in a crowded place outdoors and when a one-meter physical distancing is being observed. But it must still be worn immediately after eating in restaurants and other public places that require direct interaction.

Vergeire added the public must not compare the Philippines' progress in vaccination and pandemic response with other countries, since there are still a lot of months to go before much of the country's population can be given COVID-19 shots.

Duterte has yet to give his final order on wearing of face shields. Its use was made mandatory in December 2020.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, June 18)  Senator Panfilo M. Lacson sees no need for the Philippine government to raise new funds and add them to the country's debt burden just to immunize Filipino minors against COVID-19.

Lacson said on Friday that out of the 57.3-billion loans incurred by the government for its pandemic response, there is an "excess" that could be used for vaccinating minors.

Citing figures from the Philippine Statistics Authority, the lawmaker said the government may only need to shell out 30.462 billion to vaccinate 68.2 million adult Filipinos this 2021.

"Figures from the PSA as of March 28 this year shows the Philippines' midyear population will reach 110,198,654 by July 1. Of this, 62% or 68.323 million are adults. If we multiply this by 446 per dose, including logistical costs, we will need about 30.472 billion to inoculate our adult Filipinos," he was quoted as saying in the statement.

"Thus the difference of 26.83 billion is more than enough to cover the P25-billion requirement to procure the vaccines for our minors," Lacson said.

Last Tuesday, Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez III said the Philippines may need at least 20 billion to vaccinate about 15 million minors aged 12-15.

READ: Funds to vaccinate minors may come from budget for vaccine-hesitant adults DOF Chief

The budget, the finance secretary said, may get from funds allocated for adults who refuse to receive coronavirus shots.

He also assured President Rodrigo Duterte that the government has "enough reserves to cover that amount of money".
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, June 18)  Residents of Marikina and Antipolo are expected to have an easier commute starting next week as the LRT-2 East extension becomes fully operational on June 23.

Light Railway Transit Authority spokesperson Hernando Cabrera on Friday confirmed the opening of the train stations in Emerald Station in Marikina City and Masinag Station at the Masinag Junction in Antipolo City after several delays due to the pandemic.

Antipolo Mayor Andrea Ynares said there will be a soft opening on June 22, then it will be fully accessible to the public the next day.

The fare from Recto to Marikina or Antipolo station will cost P30 for single journey tickets.

With the LRT-2 East extension, travel time from Recto, Manila to Masinag, Antipolo is estimated at 40 minutes.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, June 18)  The COVID-19 situation in Metro Manila remains "fragile," with some cities reporting a slight uptick in cases, Health Spokesperson Maria Rosario Vergeire bared Friday.

"Very fragile ang sitwasyon natin sa NCR (Our situation in the National Capital Region is very fragile)," Vergeire told CNN Philippines' The Source.

"Kahit nakikita natin na bumababa na, nakapagdecongest na tayo ng ospital, pero ang ibang mga lugar sa Pilipinas ay tumataas, ganoon din po, madali din po tayong pwedeng bumalik sa pagtaas kung hindi po natin mamamanage ng maayos," she added.

[Translation: Even if we see cases declining, even if we have decongested our hospitals, there are still other areas in the Philippines that have experienced a surge, and this can happen to us too, we can quickly return to that surge if we don't manage this well.]

Vergeire said 11 out of 17 Metro Manila cities and municipality have reported an increase in the average daily attack rate over the past days. They are also monitoring three cities that have shown a "moderately high" ICU utilization rate.

"We are seeing an increase in cases in some of the cities like Pasay, Malabon and Paranaque, pero syempre pinag-aaralan," she said. "Hindi naman po siya nagiging stable na tuluy-tuloy na pagtaas pero nakakakita po kasi kami ng uptick."

[Translation: We are seeing an increase in cases in some of the cities like Pasay, Malabon and Paranaque, but of course, we are studying this. They are not showing a stable increase but we are seeing an uptick.]

Vergeire said a small city like San Juan which has limited capacity, and Makati City which only has three major hospitals, usually seek assistance from nearby cities that are part of their networks when in need of additional hospital facilities.

"There are really hospitals in Metro Manila that are nearing that maximum capacity for ICU beds for COVID. Pero hindi po yan ang kalahatan. Hindi po iyan ang totality. Kasi ngayon ang totality natin sa ICU utilization is just at 47%," she clarified, noting that some cities really have a smaller capacity ranging from two to seven beds.

[Translation: This is not the totality. Because right now, our total ICU utilization is just at 47%.]

On Friday, OCTA Research Group reported that Metro Manila averaged 758 new COVID-19 cases per day over the past seven days, with a positivity rate of 7%, hospital bed occupancy of 35%, and ICU bed occupancy of 46%.

Cities with an ADAR of below 5 and fall under the "moderate-low risk" category are Malabon, Navotas, Caloocan, Marikina, Manila, and Quezon City. Pateros, Navotas, Malabon, and San Juan had recorded less than 20 new cases per day.

In terms of healthcare utilization rate, Pateros recorded an above 70% hospital bed utilization, while Paranaque and San Juan had higher than 70% ICU bed allocation, according to OCTA.

On Wednesday, Health Undersecretary and treatment czar Leopoldo Vega said Makati and Muntinlupa, and Rizal province are still under the "high risk" level in terms of bed occupancy in intensive care units for COVID-19 patients, indicating that 70 to 85% of the ICU beds are occupied.

READ: ICU capacity in 3 areas in NCR Plus at high risk  treatment czar

Vega urged hospitals to tap the services of the One Hospital Command Center, which finds facilities that have vacant beds for COVID-19 patients. He noted that the overall occupancy in the National Capital Region falls under 50% or "low risk" category.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, June 18) The delivery of the first batch of Moderna's COVID-19 vaccines has been pushed back due to logistical issues.

Instead of June 21, Vaccine czar Carlito Galvez Jr. said the arrival of 250,000 doses in the country has been moved to June 25.

"Normally 'yung nagiging problema natin is 'yung transpo pati 'yung logistical challenges," Galvez told a media briefing on Friday. "It's only four days delayed and normal naman 'yan sa lahat ng vaccines natin, nagkakaroon ng mga delays na hindi natin maiiwasan."

[Translation: Normally, the problems we encounter are transportation and logistical challenges. It's only four days delayed and that's normal for all of our vaccines, we encounter and we can't avoid delays.]

This would be the first shipment of the US-made vaccine brand in the country. From this batch, 100,000 doses will be given to the private sector, while 150,000 will be for the government.

Galvez added that one million more Moderna doses are expected to arrive in July, while two million will be shipped by September.

The Philippines in March signed a tripartite agreement with the American company for 20 million doses of its vaccine  with 13 million shots secured by the government while the remaining seven million were ordered by the private sector.

More vaccine supply deals are also being finalized, according to Galvez.

"I'd like to announce also na (that) more or less 'yung (the) remaining supply agreements, 'yung sa (for) Pfizer, also with J&J and even Novavax, we'll be closing it siguro (maybe) within the week or next week," he said.

CNN Philippines correspondent Melissa Lopez contributed to this report.
Uh-oh! It could be you, or it could be us, but there's no page here.
(CNN)  Even Queen Elizabeth II wanted to know: What would President Joe Biden say to Vladimir Putin?

"We had a long talk," Biden said of his tea with the monarch, who he was surprised to discover resembled his mother.

Traveling across Europe for the past week, Biden found his reputation as a foreign policy wiseman preceded him -- even at Windsor Castle, whose occupant has met her share of world leaders.

It was evident at nearly every stop along the way that after five months focused almost exclusively on pressing domestic concerns, Biden was at last in his comfort zone. He carried himself with a seasoned air of confidence that new presidents seldom possess, a fluidity on the world stage that was among his biggest calling cards in his race for the White House.

"I know we make foreign policy out to be this great, great skill, and somehow it's sort of like a secret code," Biden said. "All foreign policy is an extension of personal relationships. It's the way human nature functions."

Yet his premise will be tested in the coming months of his presidency as the Biden doctrine comes into sharper view and the relationship he's crafting with Putin and other world leaders develops. His decision to open a dialogue with his Russian adversary will be subjected to considerable scrutiny, the outcome of which will help shape his presidency.

Biden ran for president on a promise to repair frayed alliances and a pledge to restore the United States to its standing in the world. He made clear that his optimism was not born out of naivete -- bristling at the notion of his confidence when it came to changing Putin's conduct -- but rather at the prospect of what can be achieved through democracy and diplomacy.

"This is not a kumbaya moment," Biden said, reflecting on his talks with Putin. "But it's clearly not in anybody's interest -- your country's or mine -- for us to be in a situation where it's a new cold war."

In his element

For the last week, as he jetted from the rocky outcroppings of coastal England to the glass hallways of NATO to the Swiss manor house where he met Putin, Biden slipped comfortably into a club of world leaders he's long sought to join.

He was helped at most stops -- perhaps not with Putin -- by the deeply negative experience Europe had with his predecessor, who would leave almost anyone looking favorable by comparison to the leaders Biden met with overseas.

Yet even compared to his former boss, Barack Obama, Biden seemed to relish the hours of summit talks and pull-asides that most presidents eventually come to dread. The conversations with his European counterparts, where he was at the center of attention, seemed to hold far more appeal than the ones awaiting him back home with a divided Congress that has complicated his agenda.

He was nearly three hours late to a press conference in Brussels, swarmed by almost a dozen NATO heads-of-state eager to make his acquaintance. He held individual conversations with each of them.

"We have gotten a lot of business done on this trip," Biden said, with an air of satisfaction at the early bonds he formed on the first international trip of his presidency.

The results of that particular brand of diplomacy were easier to detect during Biden's stops at the G7 and NATO -- where western leaders were eager to welcome him to their ranks -- than with Putin, with whom he said he ran out of things to talk about after two hours.

The Russian president did have some blandly nice things to say about Biden afterward.

"President Biden is an experienced statesman," Putin said through a translator at his hour-long press conference following their summit. "And in this, he is very different from President Trump."

In reality, Biden's meeting with Putin may have amounted to the least consequential encounter on his agenda in Europe this week. The ultimate outcome evolves more around the decisions that Putin chooses to make, but it will test whether Biden can do what eluded his four predecessors in the Oval Office and stabilize relations with Russia.

"We're going to be able to look back, look ahead, and three to six months and say, 'Did the things we agree to sit down and work out, did it work?'" Biden said. "That's going to be the test. I am not sitting here saying because the president and I agreed we would do these things that all of a sudden it's going to work."

A heightened focus on China

At his earlier sessions, Biden forced China onto the agenda, even when his European interlocutors seemed resistant. Steering the conversation toward the rising threat of China may well be the most tangible outcome of the past week. While Russia presents a major threat to the United States, it is still China that Biden and his aides believe is a more serious adversary.

In heated talks at the G7, Biden grew forceful in his demands that the world's democracies speak out against human rights abuses. He got pushback from some of the group, including the German chancellor and Italian prime minister, whose countries and economies are more intertwined with Beijing.

But eventually they signed onto a joint statement that called out China's forced labor practices and agreed to an infrastructure initiative meant to rival Beijing's Belt and Road, though without any specific financial commitments.

At NATO, China was mentioned in the final communique for the first time as the defense alliance grows increasingly wary that its military prowess could be challenged.

In theory, Biden's thematic frame for his trip -- democracy versus autocracy -- could apply to Russia and China alike. But in reality, few US officials believe Putin's stewardship of Russia provides an appealing alternative to democracy. The country no longer ranks in the world's top 10 economies. Instead, relatively cheap ways of rattling the west -- like election meddling and cyberwar -- are causing relations with the United States to devolve to new lows.

It is China they are watching with bigger concern, as power becomes more centralized, human rights are ignored and military provocations grow.

"As I've told (Chinese President) Xi Jinping myself, I'm not looking for conflict," Biden said of his Chinese counterpart, whose name came up during nearly every stop on his European tour. "Where we can cooperate, we'll cooperate. Where we disagree, I'm going to state it frankly."

Xi's presence hangs over Biden's trip

It is telling that in his meeting with the Queen, the other leader she asked Biden about was Xi -- who was not on his formal agenda at all this week.

That is likely to change the next time Biden goes abroad, which currently is expected in November for the Group of 20 summit in Rome (he could, in theory, add other trips before then). China is a member of the larger group, presenting an opportunity for Biden to meet Xi face-to-face.

Of all the world leaders Biden has encountered over the years -- including those he encountered in Europe this week -- Xi is the one he has spent most time with. When both were vice president of their respective nations, Biden was dispatched to get the temperature of a man widely expected to eventually run the country.

Biden is fond of recalling the thousands of miles they traveled together in those days. At the time, few in Washington expected Biden would also be in charge by the end of the decade.

Now that he is, Biden is bringing to bear the four decades he's spent near -- but not quite at -- the center of American foreign relations, going on obscure congressional delegation trips or being sent by Obama to engage in unpleasant diplomacy.

But he's also bringing a politician's innate sense of appearances and optics, mindful that even repeating a message like "America is back" over and over -- as he did this week -- can sometimes be convincing enough.

As he departed Europe on Wednesday evening, Biden found he had more to say even after holding a lengthy press conference by his standards. Walking to reporters waiting by Air Force One, Biden initially offered an apology to CNN's Kaitlan Collins, who he chastised for a question about Putin.

But he did not apologize for approaching the world pragmatically and openly. Instead, he described an approach rooted in offering his time and attention to leaders who, like him, are politicians at heart.

"I found it matters to almost every world leader -- no matter where they're from -- how they're perceived, their standing in the world," Biden said before boarding his plane for Washington. "It matters to them."

This story was first published on CNN.com 'Biden finds his comfort zone on the world stage in first international trip as president'
(CNN)  Editor's note: CNN is launching the Meanwhile in China newsletter on June 21, a three-times-a-week update exploring what you need to know about the country's rise and how it impacts the world. Sign up here.

Within days, China will reach a staggering 1 billion doses in its COVID-19 vaccination drive -- a scale and speed unrivaled by any other country in the world.

As of Wednesday, China had administered more than 945 million doses -- three times the number delivered in the United States, and almost 40% of the 2.5 billion shots given globally.

The number is all the more remarkable given its rollout had a slow start. China only reached its first million doses on March 27 -- two weeks behind the US. But the pace picked up significantly in May, with more than 500 million shots given over the past month, according to data from China's National Health Commission.

On Tuesday alone, it administered more than 20 million doses. At that rate, it is likely to exceed 1 billion doses this weekend.

Vaccinating a country of 1.4 billion people against COVID-19 is a massive undertaking. Due to China's successful containment of the coronavirus, many residents initially saw little urgency in getting vaccinated. A history of safety scandals involving domestic vaccines also contributed to public hesitancy.

But several recent local outbreaks, including in the northern Anhui and Liaoning provinces and Guangdong in the south, have fueled fears of infection, prompting a rush to get vaccinated in affected regions.

For those still reluctant, China has a powerful tool in its arsenal: a top-down, one-party system that is all-encompassing in reach and forceful in action, and a sprawling bureaucracy that can be swiftly mobilized.

The top-down approach has been touted by officials as a strength of the Chinese system that helped curb the virus -- and has again been deployed to accelerate inoculations.

The all-out campaign to "vaccinate all who can be vaccinated" is being carried out across the country, in major cities and tiny villages alike, with government workers descending on neighborhoods to convince people to get vaccinated. In state-owned companies, meanwhile, employees are urged by their bosses to take the shots, while vaccination sites offer benefits, ranging from shopping vouchers to free groceries and ice cream.

Governments around the world have tried both carrot and stick-type approaches to encourage people to get vaccinated. But in China, punitive measures can sometimes take a darker turn.

Some residential compounds have warned residents they will be barred from reentering unless they are vaccinated, according to residents' posts on social media. One shopping mall in Shanghai put up a sign at its entrance, requiring customers to show their vaccination certificate for entry. A city park in northern Hebei province turned away unvaccinated visitors and guided them to nearby inoculation sites.

As the number of vaccinations exploded, some local governments even suspended the inoculation of the first dose this month, in order to make sure there were enough for people to get their second does in time.

China's National Health Commission does not offer a breakdown on how many people have been fully vaccinated. But the distribution is uneven. By the first week of June, the major cities of Beijing and Shanghai had fully inoculated nearly 70% and 50% of their residents respectively. But the rate in Guangdong and Shandong provinces remained below 20%, according to Reuters.

Zhong Nanshan, a top epidemiologist and government adviser, said China is aiming to fully vaccinate 40% of its population by the end of the month, and double that percentage by the end of the year.

Due to its huge population, China's doses per 100 people is still behind countries such as the US and Britain. But if its inoculation drive can keep up the current pace, it will be catching up fast.

A huge backlog at China's ports could spoil your holiday shopping this year

Get your Christmas shopping done earlier this year -- like, really early.

A coronavirus outbreak in southern China has clogged ports critical to global trade and caused a shipping backlog that could take months to clear.

That's because authorities in the province of Guangdong -- home to some of the world's busiest container ports -- were forced to lock down communities and suspend trade so they could bring the outbreak under control.

While the number of cases has abated, major ports are still operating below capacity, creating a domino effect of delays across the entire region. And that's particularly bad news when you're home to Shenzhen and Guangzhou, the fourth- and fifth-largest comprehensive container ports in the world.

The upshot: The pain from this backlog could soon be felt by retailers and consumers, leading to a shortage of goods and price increases all the way through the end of the year.

The clog "is adding extra disruption on an already stressed out global supply chain, including the significant seaborne leg of it," Peter Sand, chief shipping analyst for the shipowners association Bimco, told CNN Business.

He warned that people "may not find all they were looking for on the shelves when shopping for Christmas presents later in the year."

Read more about the latest threat in the ongoing supply chain crisis on CNN Business.

This story was first published on CNN.com, "China's about to administer its billionth coronavirus shot. Yes, you read that right."
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Ricketts said he was honored to be at Behlen. As someone who is a part of a family business, he understood the difficulties that it could present.

"How you keep a company continuing to be able to provide a high level of service, continuing the Partners-In-Progress and continuing to serve the community here in Columbus," Ricketts said. "At the end of the day, it's about people. That's one of the keys to leadership of the Raimondo family and at Behlen Mfg."

Ricketts noted the company's involvement in the community, specifically an apprenticeship program with Columbus High School that allows high schoolers the chance to learn about manufacturing and enter the workforce out of high school.

He also mentioned the donation of 3D printers to Columbus High and lauded Behlen's role during the COVID-19 pandemic.

"When some of the local folks were being furloughed from their companies, Behlen stood up to offer them temporary employment to help them get through a rough patch," Ricketts said. "That's what Nebraskans do. They help out their neighbors."

After his remarks, Ricketts signed a proclamation declaring June 16 as Behlen Manufacturing Day.

Phil Raimondo was grateful for the turnout from the community given the hot temperatures.
Throughout the years, Madeline and her 15-year-old sister Lillian have raised around $75,000 through Lemon Smiles.

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Madeline said shes been amazed to see the growth of the lemonade stand, noting she's had to buy more supplies each year.

Its really impressive to see, Madeline said, adding Preister has been in remission for a few years after battling cancer.

She also said she's been thrilled to see the amount of support for the cause.

In that first year the stand ended up earning around $100, but Madeline said it was an amazing experience to witness.

It was really small but it was really special to see, Madeline said.

As Lillian has gotten older, she has helped take over the lemon stand as Madeline has recently started college.

Its really incredible to see everybody helping out with it, Lillian said. Northwestern Mutual has been a huge supporter of us throughout the years. Its great to see everybody excited about it and ready to do it this year.

Northwestern Mutual-Columbus likes to give back to the community as the financial institutions biggest philanthropic endeavor is childhood cancer, Karges said.
College

top story

Cumberland County

Central Penn College asks county to backstop loan for nonprofit conversion

Jason Malmont, The Sentinel Fedrizzi-Williams

Central Penn College is asking the county to backstop debt that it plans to issue to convert the institution to a nonprofit, an arrangement that some county officials believe to be excessively risky.

The college presented the arrangement at Mondays county commissioners meeting, with the commissioners agreeing to advertise an authorizing ordinance, although this does not obligate them to actually vote the policy into law if not found prudent.

Central Penn College expects to issue between $16 million and $16.5 million in bonds through the Cumberland County Industrial Development Authority to finance the restructuring of the college, which is a for-profit entity under an Employee Stock Ownership Plan, into a nonprofit.

The industrial development authority, as a state-authorized finance agency, often issues bonds at favorable rates on behalf of entities that present a public good, although those entities retain liability for the repayments.

But the Central Penn College proposal goes a step further: If the college is unable to meet its repayment obligations, funds will be drawn out of a debt reserve account, which the county would be responsible for back-filling.

Obviously the county accepts a degree of risk in the transaction, Commissioner Gary Eichelberger said.

In voting for the ordinance advertisement, Commissioner Jean Foschi said the county was not agreeing to accept the risk yet, and would not do so until a risk assessment, currently underway, is completed.

COVID and colleges: Cumberland County's colleges and universities deal with economic impact of virus Like other schools, Dickinson College lost revenue in the spring when it sent students home due to the pandemic, and the college continues to see the loss of room and board revenue through the fall, Dickinson College President Margee Ensign said.

In light of Mondays vote, county Controller Al Whitcomb sent a memo to the commissioners saying he was surprised that they had agreed to advertise the matter at all.

What is to prevent other private and nonprofit organizations from queuing up at the courthouse doors seeking similar debt backstops using Cumberland County taxpayer monies? How would such requests be equitably responded to? Whitcomb wrote, according to a draft of the memo shared with The Sentinel.

Central Penn College announced in 2016 that it intended to become a nonprofit. The major benefit would be financial stability outside of tuition charges, college President Linda Fedrizzi-Williams said.

The main thing it does for us is open new opportunities for resources outside tuition, Fedrizzi-Williams said Monday.

She said the college has recently introduced additional certificate programs and flexible courses aimed at educating working students and families.

These are working-class people putting themselves through school, Fedrizzi-Williams said of her student base.

The lions share of the bond issuance would go toward buying out outstanding shares of the ESOP ownership structure, according to Andrew Giorgione, solicitor for the CCIDA. Currently, paying out ESOP values costs the college $1 million to $2 million per year, Fedrizzi-Williams said.

The bond issue would also include $1 million to create a debt reserve, which would cover any shortfall in debt obligations that Central Penn College is unable to meet. The county would be responsible for reimbursing the reserve, if it is tapped into, to create sufficient financial assurance for the colleges lenders.

If were in a position where the debt reserve is being hit, thats not a good thing, Giorgione said; the intention is obviously for that to not happen.

But if county taxpayers were to have to pick up the tab, Whitcomb wrote, the tangible public benefit is not at all obvious.

Most importantly, how is this fair and just to Cumberland County taxpayers whose taxes are being promised, under the arrangement as presented, to Central Penn Colleges lender should they default? Whitcomb wrote.

Central Penn College has around 1,000 students with a base annual tuition of around $24,000, Fedrizzi-Williams said.

The colleges graduation rate on the most common federal measure  first-time students enrolled full-time who completed a degree within 150% of the normal course time  was 47% for students who began in 2014, according to U.S. Department of Education Data.
The Hamilton Restaurant has seen 15 U.S. presidents, economic depression, World War II and the rise, fall and rebuilding of downtown Carlisle as it served generations of the towns residents.

On Thursday, the children of the past and present owners of the iconic restaurant unveiled a new marker celebrating its most famous offering  the Hot-Chee Dog.

The unveiling was held on the 83rd anniversary of the restaurants founding by Charlie and Mary Kollas.

I am surprised and my father would be so humbled, said Helen Kollas, Charlies daughter, as she thanked the crowd for their support. He came here to the United States at the age of 15 with 50 cents in his pocket.

Speaking for his father, Tommy Mazias who is in Greece for the first time since the onset of the pandemic, John Mazias offered his gratitude on behalf of the Mazias family.

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Without you guys, this is not possible. For all the years that hes been here, hes enjoyed conversations and everything, he said.

Destination Carlisle received a grant from the William G. Pomeroy Foundations Legends & Lore program to fund the marker.
Dear Editor:

The current move to pass a constitutional carry (unrestricted open or concealed gun carrying) bill is ludicrous, especially in the light of the more than 260 mass shootings so far this year. This does not include the innumerable daily individual shootings.

The NRA says the solution to gun violence is more guns. This is the same as saying the solution to all the heroin deaths is more heroin. The 2nd amendment calls for a well regulated militia. If you want to use military grade weapons (i.e. AR 15s, AK 47s) then join the army where you can train with them properly. Any potentially dangerous tool requires training and sometimes licensing.

To drive a car, we have to take test on the rules of the road and then take a driving exam to show proficiency with the vehicle. To use a chain saw on an Appalachian Trail crew, you have to take a safety course where you learn to properly and safely operate it. Should a gun be any different? Shouldn't we learn what the norms of behavior with a gun should be; how to properly hold, operate, shoot, clean and store a gun in a safe manner.
The St. Francois County Fair is back this year with the carnival and all.

I'm just glad to have a fair, St. Francois County Fair Board of Directors member Donnie Davis said. 2020 was really rough, not only on the St. Francis County Fair Board, but it was rough for everybody. Everything was canceled.

This is the 147th year for the county fair. In the beginning, the fair was off of Route D, north of town, Davis said. Then it moved to Wilson-Rozier Park before moving to the current fairgrounds at 1450 Woodlawn Drive.

The county fair has been part of St. Francois County for almost 150 years, Davis said. It's good for the community to get out and come and see. If you're not a livestock person  there's a lot of people that don't know much about livestock  come and see it and look and see what the kids are doing. Your kids in school, their friends are probably in 4H.

Davis is especially excited about the return of the carnival.

Without a carnival, it's kind of hard to have a fair, he added.
Customs Director Tarosa signing the instrument while the Director of DLA and OIC look on
Healy said she had met with Northam Chief of Staff Clark Mercer and Secretary of Finance Aubrey Layne about potential uses of the federal aid to provide more support for workers.

She said the money also could help the VEC keep up with changing information technology as it completes the long-delayed modernization of its antiquated IT system. The 12-year-old project is scheduled to be completed by Oct. 1.

Hudson is a vocal critic of the states approach to modernizing IT networks, which she said focuses too much on big-ticket purchases of expensive equipment and too little on skilled employees who update system equipment and software on an ongoing basis.

I would rather see Virginia spend $500,000 on planning for the creation of a modern digital services team than spend $15 million on the grand promise of a big new system, she said.

Layne already has said he would recommend allocating more than $1 billion in federal aid to replenish the Virginia Unemployment Trust Fund and shield employers from a potential fourfold increase in payroll taxes.

He said in an interview that he is looking for more details about the administrations request for money for other work force initiatives, which Healy said she expects to provide next week.

I havent seen a plan, he said.
DKU checked both of those boxes for me, she added. It was a last-minute decision. But it felt like I was in the right place at the right time.

She believes all students should try to push themselves out of their comfort zone and that the few years after high school provide the perfect time to experiment.

I really hope opportunities like mine continue to gain more traction so that other students can find whats right for them, she said.

For her first semester, Trask will be a student at Dukes flagship campus in Durham, N.C., allowing her to acclimate to college life before leaving for China.

Because of visa restrictions, I would either be doing my first semester online or on a different campus abroad, she said. I decided to go with the Duke route. Im super excited to be there for a semester, though.

Trask has been taking Korean language lessons since ninth grade (a skill she put to good use while studying abroad) but has yet to learn much Mandarin (Standard Chinese). She plans to hunker down this summer and try to build a foundation in the language.

As far as picking a major, Trask is aiming for a subject that pairs well with her desire to travel and absorb other cultures.
On Friday, Senior U.S. District Judge Norman K. Moon issued a memorandum opinion that said the trial will remain in Charlottesville. The reasons for this decision were multitude, Moon wrote.

Upon consideration of the parties arguments and submissions  and noting the parties pragmatic concessions limiting the number of parties and attorneys at trial and other steps reducing the footprint of the trial  the Court finds Charlottesville remains the proper and appropriate venue for trial, Moon wrote.

Among the reasons for keeping the trial in Charlottesville, Moon wrote that he could not conclude that it would be proper to hold the trial in either Lynchburg or Roanoke because the action was not filed in either division and it does not appear any defendant has resided in either division, and in any event, not all defendants reside in Virginia.

Moon also wrote that the plaintiffs deference should be given higher weight, further supporting the venue remaining in Charlottesville.
Students in the virtual program will be required to have their cameras on and will participate in more synchronous time than compared with the past school year.

The expectation is that they will be logged in all day for mostly synchronous instruction, said Summerlyn Thompson, principal of Johnson Elementary, during the presentation at the June 10 meeting.

Henderson said Buford students wont have the same access to electives as those attending in person.

When they go virtual, they are giving up something, he said. Well do what we can to meet their needs.

Charlottesville High School will not have an entirely virtual option. Students can supplement their course load with classes through Virtual Virginia and with select classes at the school that will be offered virtually.

CHS Principal Eric Irizarry said that with the complexities of scheduling classes, it would be difficult to piece together a full-time virtual schedule that allows students to graduate on time.

The lack of virtual options concerned JeSaun Johnson, the student representative on the board and a freshman at CHS.
Numbers are lower in some surrounding localities, including Louisa County, where 56.7% are vaccinated, according to district numbers.

UVa Medical Center officials say they have an average of nine adult patients being treated for COVID-19 in the hospital each day. Although vaccination clinics are contracting in favor of more focused and targeted efforts, officials worry the number of hospitalizations could increase because of the growing dominance of the COVID Delta variant.

The variant, which first surfaced in India, is increasing in prevalence across the state and country.

Its been found in more than 60 countries around the world, said Dr. Costi Sifri, director of hospital epidemiology at UVa. Compared to the Alpha variant, which was called the U.K. variant, its 50% more transmissible and the Alpha variant was 50% more transmissible than the original virus.

Sifri said the Delta variant is likely a significant driver in the devastating surge of COVID cases seen in India and is causing the recent surge in the Great Britain. In the last month or so, it has been found in about 10% of cases across the country.
Yes. I will do my part to conserve household energy usage, even if I'm uncomfortable in my home.

No. It is too hot to conserve household energy usage.

I already conserve, even before ERCOT requested it.

Maybe, depending on the reason ERCOT provides and whether or not I am home during that time.

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West Bengal: Life in a pandemic: Bengal faces major shortage of hilsa fish ahead of auspicious

June 18,2021 | Source: News 18

Kolkata is facing a major shortage of the citys favorite fish- Hilsa while the demand continues to rise unabated ahead of the auspicious Jamai Shahsti festival. Every year before the occasion the markets are filled with supplies of these fishes, but this year a massive shortage has been reported. The decreased supply has been attributed to low pressure and the ban which was imposed on fishing in the sea. However, Bengals only hope is to get Hilsa from Odisha and some scattered supply from Myanmar. Hilsa fishing is stopped before the onset of the monsoon across the country. This rule is observed for 50 days for the breeding of this fish. Fishermen were able to go to sea with trawlers from June 15 and that is why there has been a huge shortage of fish before Jamai Sasthi. Cyclone Yaas, which lashed the coastal districts of the State on May 26, has dealt a severe blow to fishermen in East Midnapore and South 24-Parganas as only 40 per cent of trawlers could venture out to catch the prized Hilsa on Tuesday, the first day of government-permitted fishing this season.



Sources estimate at least 30 per cent of trawlers will not be able to set sail this year owing to the disruption of lives and livelihoods of fishermen after the recent cyclone amid the pandemic. The Hilsa that is being sold in the market now is not the famous Padma hilsa. The availability of the fish is also hit due to the ban by the Bangladesh government on the export of hilsa to India. Keeping in mind the demand in West Bengal, the Bangladesh government had last year allowed the export of 500 metric tonnes of hilsa during this time. But now, some fish have come to the markets from Myanmar. The Secretary of the Howrah Wholesale Market Organisation said 150 metric tonnes of Hilsa had been imported from Myanmar so far. The fish came from the Irrawaddy River there. He said that there is no such difference between Padma Hilsa and Irrawaddy Hilsa. The only difference is that the fish had to be covered in ice from Myanmar by ship due to the long distance. In comparison, Padma Hilsa is available fresh. As soon as the market opened on Tuesday, the price of Hilsa rose to Rs 1,100 per kg. Prices in the retail market are expected to rise from Rs 1,200 to Rs 1,500. It is learned that about 1,800 trawlers went to the deep sea from Digha in search of fish on Monday night. But due to continuous lockdown and low pressure, many trawlers are not able to start their journey from Sundarbans.



Celebration of Jamai Sashti



Jamai Shashti is a day devoted to the son-in-law of a family. This festival is predominantly celebrated in West Bengal and is regarded as an auspicious occasion, where a grand feast is also organised.
According to court documents and a press release from Asphaug, here is a look at the complicated scheme of Lloyd and Schort.

In October 2020, federal agents initiated an investigation into Lloyd based on information suggesting he had fraudulently applied for PPP loans and EIDL at multiple financial institutions. Beginning in April 2020, Lloyd began submitting loan applications using numerous business names and personally identifiable information of relatives and business associates without their consent.

Lloyd submitted false documentation to justify the loan amounts requested, including an IRS Form 944 listing the 2019 wages purportedly paid by entities controlled by Lloyd. Total wages allegedly paid by these entities ranged from $3 million to more than $4.7 million.

In total, Lloyd submitted nine PPP loan applications, six of which were accepted, resulting in a payout of more than $3.4 million. Lloyd also applied for numerous EIDLs, of which one was accepted, resulting in an additional $160,000 in payments to Lloyd. Upon receipt of the funds, Lloyd purchased real estate and invested in securities. Lloyd transferred more than $1.8 million of the above-described PPP loan funds to his brokerage account. Securities Lloyd purchased using the fraudulently acquired funds substantially increased in value.
The team's use of force during protests and police declared-riots has led to multiple civil lawsuits in state and federal court, sanctions from a judge and now an indictment.

From May 29 through Nov. 15, during the height of the social justice protests in Portland, Portland police used force more than 6,000 times, according to a U.S. Department of Justice report.

Budworth marked the first Rapid Response Team officer to face criminal prosecution stemming from force used during a protest. The police union has called the prosecution politically driven, and said Budworths baton push to a womans head was accidental.

Also this week, authorities said a Portland Police Bureau detective is under review by the Oregon Department of Justice for possible criminal charges related to use of force at last years racial justice protests.

I have confidence that the (Portland Police) Bureau will continue their mission to maintain public safety," Multnomah County District Attorney Mike Schmidt said Thursday. In the meantime, my office will continue to focus on the fair and just prosecution of criminal matters."

Sara Cline is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local news. Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

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Exceptional women: City honors influential Black women

Jeff Woo/DRC From left to right, Lifelong Denton residents Alma Clark, Dorothy Minter, Betty Kimble and Ruby Cole, have been honored in the newly relocated mural, Foundation of Our History.

The crowd burst into spontaneous applause when Betty Kimble, Ruby Cole, Dorothy Minter and Alma Clark approached the mural of their likenesses.

Foundation of Our History, which depicts Kimble, Cole, Minter, Clark and the late Alice Alexander, was first painted on the exterior of Willies Fantastic Sales. When the businesss owner sold the building, the consignment shop and junk hauling operation owner Willie Hudspeth and city officials discussed having it repainted.

Thursday evening, city leaders and locals gathered at the repainted mural under the Union Pacific railroad bridge at Robertson Street and Bell Avenue. The intersection is an entrance to Southeast Denton, the neighborhood where the citys Black residents settled after they were forcibly expelled from Quakertown, a thriving and middle-class Black neighborhood, in the 1920s.

Clark, Kimble, Cole, Minter and Alexander all bridged the eras of racial segregation and desegregation in Denton.

Minter was a special education administrator for the Denton school district, and Alexander was among Denton teachers who made the transition from segregated to desegregated schools. Denton ISD renamed a school for Alexander.

After having run East McKinney Mini Market with her husband, Cole retired a successful businesswoman. Clark and Kimble were both community activists who spearheaded massive changes for Southeast Denton and beyond.

A different time

The four women have all lived in Denton for decades. Minter, 88, has lived in Denton for 66 years. Kimble is a Denton native, and Cole was born in Denton County and moved to the city of Denton as a child. Clark moved to Denton in 1962.

All the women recall how segregation touched their lives. In school, they used discarded books from white schools. Book covers swung in tatters and pages were missing. The districts Black school had an ill equipped science room, and Cole still remembers a fetus preserved in formaldehyde on a table.

We werent allowed in the library, Minter said. So we had to use whatever books were given to us.

There was a bookmobile, though, and Kimble said she and her peers flocked to the mobile library to check out as many books as they could.

In a way, we werent really deprived, Kimble said. We had good teachers, good nurses and doctors. School was over at the end of the school day. The teachers would come to our homes to see how we were doing, to help us where we needed it.

The women learned to lend a helping hand early in their lives. Clark, 93, grew up in Lampasas and attended school in a one-room schoolhouse.

I was a decent reader, Clark said. There were students several grades ahead of me who werent good readers. The students who were good readers would sit with them and teach them and help them. For me, we had hand-me-down books from working in white peoples homes. Good books, too.

As teens and young women, they experienced the well-known indignities of segregation  having to enter businesses using side or back doors, and using separate public accommodations.

At the courthouse here in Denton, we could use the bathroom, but you were only allowed to use one particular stall, Minter said. There was always someone in there working to make sure you used the right one.

There were also practices that many arent familiar with.

Youd go into a dress shop and they wouldnt let you try on any of the dresses, Clark said. Theyd measure your shoulders to tell you what size dress you could buy, but you couldnt try them on. Same with the hats. But you understood about the hats of course, because of the oil in your hair. But the dresses, that didnt make sense.

Kimble said Dentons Black residents found ways to thrive in the face of legal and cultural limitations.

We succeeded in spite of those things, Minter said. In spite of all of that, we made a way for ourselves and our community.

Creating community

As they grew up, married and had families, the women found ways to challenge a status quo poisoned by white supremacy. Minter worked in special education for the school district and advocated for students who were left behind or overlooked. Cole and her husband built their business selling groceries and a particular kind of neighborhood welcome.

We sold these cookies, pretty big cookies for 5 cents, Cole recalled. You know, there were some children who didnt have the money, and we gave them cookies anyway. They would come to the store with their friends. I couldnt imagine giving one child a cookie and not their friend.

Southeast Denton shoppers would stop in for necessities and to share news. Cole said the Mini Market was its own kind of community center.

I remember a lady telling me she couldnt drive down McKinney Street with her little boy in his seat, because hed kick his legs and holler Lets go see Johnny! I want to see Johnny! Cole said. Johnny was her husband and business partner.

The women said a longtime local university professor, Roosevelt Washington, told them he was troubled by Black students who werent quite ready for college coursework. Clark and her church friends found out by word of mouth which students from their neighborhood needed tutoring, and they organized tutoring for them.

Minter worked with students who were far behind their grade level, using her special education training to benefit them.

You feel really proud when you see a young person succeed. I worked with a young lady who was really struggling. She was reading on a third grade level. I took her back to the first grade level and we worked together. She graduated high school and went to college, Minter said. Sometimes, what a young person needs is for someone to stand up for them and their parents.

Clark and Kimble worked with the Denton Christian Womens Interracial Fellowship to pave the roads in Southeast Denton.

We walked all of these streets, the muddy streets, Clark said. We walked all of these streets, and I wore galoshes. I still have those galoshes.

Clark also worked to bring city services to the neighborhood.

I was so shocked that in 1962 the men had a burn bin for trash, Clark said.

Kimble recalls venturing to the Holiday Inn dining room with the late mayor Euline Brock, when they worked with the Fellowship to desegregate dining rooms and restaurants.

I was so nervous, Kimble said. But they were very kind to us, and they did serve us.

Cole, Clark, Kimble and Minter all worked on a campaign to clean up the neighborhood and Fred Moore Park, which in the late 1970s was littered with trash and broken glass. They worked with a beloved police chief and the interracial fellowship to clean up parts of their neighborhood each Saturday.

The attorney, L.A. Nelson, really helped us, and his wife [the late Martha Len Nelson] and her mother would come and set out food for us all as we cleaned.

The efforts to improve the neighborhood eventually led to Denton winning a national award for community policing. They were about to board a plane to New Orleans to accept their award when the airline reminded the police that they couldnt board with their firearms unless they were traveling with someone theyd apprehended.

I told the chief to go ahead and put the cuffs on me, Cole said.

Humbled and honored

The women said they were surprised to learn that local educator Margaret Neale and longtime Denton businessman and activist Willie Hudspeth had lobbied to put them on a mural. Minter admitted that it took her a few months to go see the first mural when it was completed. Kimble had forgotten about it when it was first painted in 2019.

People kept telling me I saw your picture over on Willies place. And I was like Picture? What picture? Kimble said.

All the women said they were most pleased to see Alice Alexanders image on the mural. Cole said that when she was growing up, Alexander was every neighborhood childs first grade teacher.

She was such a kind woman, Cole said. She used to pick me and my brother up and take us to her house on the weekends. Wed stay all weekend.

She was the kindest woman all of us knew, Clark said.

She was like a mother to so many, Minter said.

Minter said the women dont consider themselves exemplary.

All these ladies are good friends, she said. They are good to their families, good to the community and theyre all Christian women.

Ive helped people all my life because I love doing it, Kimble said. Its who I am. Who we all are, I think.

When the women walked toward the bridge on Thursday, each lifted a hand and bowed their head to the applauding crowd. They sat together and listened to Mayor Gerard Hudspeth, Police Chief Frank Dixon and Willie Hudspeth list their unsung commitment to their community.

Rev. Cedric Chambers, pastor of Mt. Calvary Baptist Church, said he learned that the four women and Alexander had paid a debt past repayment for their city.

When I listened to these women talk abut the things theyve lived through, I thought they reminded me of redwood trees, Chambers said. You see, the things that burn up other trees make a redwood tree stronger. When a redwood tree catches on fire, something happens. They release seeds to the ground.

These women have been through the fire, Chambers said. The fire didnt destroy them. They released their seeds down to the ground. You are the people who have caught those seeds. They are the redwood trees, and the fire didnt burn them up.

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Denton, TX (76205)

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Thunderstorms - some may contain locally heavy rain, especially during the morning hours. High 89F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall possibly over one inch..

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The incredible reach of social media is causing issues for governments and social media companies alike as they struggle with conflicts between free speech and the perceived interests of the state. The latest example in a growing number comes from Vietnam.

Vietnam has this week introduced what it calls national guidelines on social media behaviour. However, these arent just attempts to moderate speech that promotes violence or hate. According to Reuters, Vietnam is encouraging people to post positive content about the country. In addition state employees must report conflicting information, whatever that may be, to their superiors.

The code prohibits posts which violate the law and affect the interests of the state, and applies to state organisations, social media companies and all their users in Vietnam. It also discourages anonymous posting and insists that social media providers remove content from their platforms when asked to.

But is the code a law or a recommendation? Its not clear. However, Vietnam is a one-party Communist state with a strong grip on the media, where news outlets and journalists risk sanctions for broaching sensitive topics and for criticising the government.

Facebook has already been threatened with closure in the country if it does not do more to censor local political content. This could be tricky for Facebook, at least in financial terms, as Vietnam generates a healthy sum for the social media giant, estimated at close to $1 billion.

Tension between social media groups and governments has been noticeable in a number of countries of late. As we reported recently, Twitter is having a tough time in Nigeria where it removed messages posted by President Muhammadu Buhari that threatened secessionists with punishment. It now faces the threat of having to register a local unit and obtain a licence. Authorities in India and Mexico have also been threatening to do more to manage Twitters output.
Swedish multinational telecommunications company and mobile network operator Telia Estonia said it now runs 5G services in more than 50 areas across Estonia.

According to a company release, the main focus in developing and expanding the 5G network has been on larger cities such as Tallinn, Tartu, and Parnu. At the same time, new 5G base stations are increasingly emerging in other regions of Estonia.

Andre Visse, Telia's Estonian Chief Technology Officer said: "To date, thousands of customers have used our 5G network, and we anticipate a significant increase in the number of users shortly, as 5G support was activated on all iPhone 12 series phones at the beginning of June. There are almost 20,000 users of these models among our customers."

"Our goal is to bring 5G coverage to more than 100 locations by the end of the year. At the same time, we are looking forward to the country moving forward with the auction of the 3.6 GHz frequency band as soon as possible, which would enable us to offer our customers an even higher quality, faster and better 5G user experience,  he added.

Andre pointed out that in addition to the three biggest cities in Estonia, Telia has also established 5G base stations in the North Estonian county town of Rakvere, various locations on the Viimsi Peninsula, and in the small towns of Saha and Loo. The company is planning to further expand its 5G coverage in June through nearly 20 new locations.

To use Telia's 5G network, the customer needs to own a 5G-compatible smartphone as well as to have purchased a private or business customer mobile package containing a certain volume of data.
Moscow, ID (83843)

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Moscow, ID (83843)

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Plenty of sunshine. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. High around 90F. Winds WNW at 10 to 15 mph..

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Johns Chapel AME Church invites the public to share in the upcoming Vacation Bible School Kickoff and church picnic on Sunday, June 27. Sunday School will begin at 9 a.m. followed by worship service at the citys Westside Park on West College Street. Vacation Bible School will be held from June 28 through July 2 from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. for ages 4-17 years of age at the church and virtually for adults. This years theme for the week is Ive Got This! With Jesus! All COVID-19 health directives will be in place. Everyone is invited to attend. Please register on the churchs website at johnschapelamec.org . For more information, contact LauReen McDaniel, VBS Ddirector, at 334-470-1816 or Pastor Willie White Jr. at 334-701-5853.

Wiregrass Men of Valor will host the first Golf Classic tournament on Monday, June 28 at the Enterprise Country Club. Check in begins at 10:30 a.m. and a shotgun tipoff is scheduled for noon. The event will feature an 18-hole, four-person modified scramble, unlimited non-alcoholic beverages and the opportunity to compete in contests, including a $25,000 hole-in-one competition. Door prizes will be available after the tournament during dinner. All proceeds from this tournament will be utilized to support the not-for profit ministry and will help cover expenses to continue hosting the monthly Armor Up events at the New Brockton Farm Center. These events, held on the second Tuesday of every month at 6:30 p.m., feature a free steak dinner to all attendees as well a guest speaker.
Poet and author Maya Angelou, Americas first woman in space and a revered Cherokee Nation leader are among female trailblazers whose likenesses will appear on the U.S. quarter.

The new four-year American Women Quarters Program celebrates women's accomplishments and contributions to the United States' development and history, according to the U.S. Mint.

Under the program, the mint will issue up to five new designs each year from 2022 to 2025. Honorees will be from a variety of fields and from ethnically, racially and geographically diverse backgrounds, the mint says.

Those chosen for the first year are:

 Angelou, celebrated poet and memoirist

 Wilma Mankiller, the Cherokee Nation's first female principal chief

 Adelina Otero-Warren, a leader in New Mexicos suffrage movement

 Sally Ride, the first U.S. woman in space

 Anna May Wong, the first Chinese American Hollywood film star
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (AP)  A Justice Department lawsuit challenging sanitation and safety concerns in Alabama's men's prisons is too vague and should not be allowed to go forward, the state said in asking a court to dismiss part of the case.

The federal government has not specified which prisons are troubled by problems like broken locks, insufficient or faulty surveillance cameras and flooding caused by poor plumbing, the state argued in documents filed Wednesday, so the Department of Corrections can't defend itself.

Even if the Justice Department spelled out specific problems, there's no evidence they are a pattern in the state prison system, the state argued. And, it said, allegations about inadequate staffing are covered in other litigation and should not be included in the lawsuit, which claims Alabama prisons are so bad they violate the rights of inmates.

The state has acknowledged problems with its prisons for years while denying they were so bad that conditions are unconstitutional.

The government sued the state in December after warning in 2019 and again in 2020 about conditions in state prisons, which are designed to hold 12,388 people but were overcrowded with 16,810 prisoners in April, according to a state report. The population dropped by about 3,700 during the pandemic.
Juneteenth is about celebrating freedom for all people, according to organizers of Dothans inaugural Juneteenth parade.

Juneteenth commemorates June 19, 1865, when Union soldiers brought the news of freedom to enslaved Black people in Galveston, Texas  two months after the Confederacy surrendered and more than two years after the Emancipation Proclamation freed slaves in Southern states. Its been celebrated by African Americans since then and mostly overlooked by others.

But Juneteenth is now the 12th federal holiday  to be known as Juneteenth National Independence Day  with passage of a bill by Congress signed into law by President Joe Biden on Thursday.

The Tri-State Expo, a local event started in 2018 to highlight African American businesses, organized Dothans Juneteenth Celebration and Parade set for Saturday. The event will feature a combination of outdoor and indoor activities from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. and a stage play at 6 p.m.

Leah McKay, a spokesperson for the Dothan Juneteenth event, said its important to remember the different aspects of the countrys history and commemorate a time of liberation and freedom. Its exciting, she said, to be celebrating this part of history and emphasized that its an event for everyone.
Associated Press Georgia Daybook for Friday, Jun. 18.

The daybook is for planning purposes only and is not intended for publication or broadcast. You should verify any event you plan to cover.

Please keep the AP in mind when news develops. The Georgia bureau is reachable at 404-522-8971. Send daybook items to apatlanta@ap.org or georgia@applanner.com.

To see your Daybooks and events for Georgia and other States up to 12 months ahead, speak to your bureau or sales rep about access to AP Planner, or visit http://applanner.com.

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Johnathan Hanh Nguyen, chairman of both IPPG and IPP Air Cargo. Photo by VnExpress/Xuan Ngoc.

IPP Air Cargo, Vietnams first cargo airline, would fly to 16 local destinations and a number of foreign ones, and break even in three years, its chairman told VnExpress.

To be established next year by retail company Imex Pan Pacific Group (IPPG), which distributes over 100 global luxury brands in Vietnam, it would carry goods from Noi Bai airport in Hanoi and Tan Son Nhat in HCMC to the other local airports, Johnathan Hanh Nguyen, chairman of both IPPG and IPP Air Cargo, said.

International cargo airlines are permitted to fly goods only into Noi Bai and Tan Son Nhat.

IPP Air Cargo plans to build logistics hubs at two airports and also in Da Nang, Cam Ranh and Can Tho, and another hub at the under-construction Long Thanh international airport in the southern province of Dong Nai.

"IPP Air Cargo has investment of $100 million, but the cost of building the six logistics hubs and 16 warehouses will be many times higher," Nguyen said.

"We will build not only warehouses and shelves, but also modern conveyor and smart management systems (to facilitate customs clearance and goods delivery)."

IPP Air Cargo will use large aircraft to fly goods such as fresh fruits and frozen seafood from Vietnam to foreign countries, and collaborate with foreign partners to transport goods, including high-value items, from overseas to Vietnam.

"Foreign cargo airlines are eager to see IPP Air Cargo operate because, according to international aviation agreements, more outgoing flights (from Vietnam) will result in more incoming flights (into Vietnam)," Nguyen said.

"When IPP Air Cargo enters the market, foreign cargo airlines ... cargo output will increase some 50 percent thanks to a larger number of flights."

Starting with five aircraft in the first year, the carrier plans to expand its fleet to seven in the second and 10 in the third.

"The airline targets becoming operational as soon as possible," Nguyen, who used to be financial inspector at Boeing Subcontractors and Indochina chief representative for Philippines Airlines, said.

He is also chairman of Southern Airports Services Joint Stock Company, better known as SASCO, a service provider at Tan Son Nhat International Airport, and the Cam Ranh International Airport in the central province of Khanh Hoa.
With livelihoods hit by the Covid-19 pandemic, Vietnamese workers in Singapore grab any opportunity they get and support each other while waiting to return home.

It was a Sunday morning in June when Nguyen Trong Hung, 32, arrived at Singapores Changi Airport and started his 12-hour shift by cleaning the airport.

"This job helps me earn around $1,400 per month, less than my salary before this pandemic, but I cannot be demanding amid this ordeal," he says. He used to work as a cook at a Chinese restaurant before Covid took away his livelihood.

"After a month of tough measures to contain a coronavirus outbreak my friends earn next to nothing. We have no choice but to try and wait this out."

He is among many Vietnamese in Singapore who have tried to overcome the fallout of the pandemic, which resurfaced in mid-May after an outbreak at the airport, forcing the government to ban eating in restaurants and gatherings of more than two people.

People wearing face masks cross a road amid the coronavirus disease outbreak in Singapore May 14, 2021. Photo by Reuters//Caroline Chia.

After losing jobs and incomes in the last few months, people have grabbed any job they can to survive.

Due to the tough containment measures, eateries have seen a significant drop in the number of customers, causing the many Vietnamese workers in the industry to struggle for a living.

Nguyen Thi Trang, a dishwasher at a restaurant in Bukit Batok, says: "Last year the government supported restaurants amid the Covid-19 social restrictions, so I was not worried. But this year, we get no support. After getting hit by the pandemic for a year, it is really difficult."

With no diners allowed, Trangs employer has told her to work only two days a week until July, and so the 31-year-old woman has earned almost nothing in the last few weeks.

Hoping to earn a little bit of money, she cooks Vietnamese food and sells it on Facebook.

"I earn less than $2 from each order, but at least it makes me feel I am not useless."

Hung says the cost of living in Singapore is high, and so Vietnamese workers losing their incomes have to grab whatever opportunities they get to survive.

"Besides, if we do not have a job, we will be considered illegal workers. So people must look for a job if they do not want to be expelled."

Hoang Quoc Anh wears a face mask in office, where staff are banned from gathering. Photo courtesy of Hoang Quoc Anh.

No sweat

Knowing that foreign workers are not allowed to stay in Singapore if they do not have a job, Vietnamese have tried to help each other find employment.

Tran Phuong Trinh, 42, a head hunter, says: "I used to charge Vietnamese workers $3,200 for a job and paperwork, but now I charge them $700. Those without money can pay me later as long as they can stay here legally."

On Facebook groups of Vietnamese living in Singapore, members provide updates on the Covid situation in Singapore to their online friends and exhort each other to strictly follow prevention measures.

Le Hoang Anh, an IT worker, says: "The rules are strict in Singapore. So I am always aware of the need to follow Covid-19 prevention measures."

He says it took him weeks to get used to carrying masks and keeping a distance from people.

Many people have to deal with loneliness.

Hoang Quoc Anh, an account manager at Google, says social restrictions have affected many foreigners who do not live with their families unlike him.

"But I have tried to get used to it and get rid of stress by working out at home and in public parks." He admits he is lucky not to lose his livelihood to coronavirus.

As of Friday morning Singapore has had a total of 62,339 Covid cases and 34 deaths.

The country started to allow gatherings of up to five on June 14, and eased more restrictions in two stages following a steady drop in the number of cases.

If the situation remains under control, a further relaxation, including permitting dining in at eateries, is on the cards on June 21.

"Even as we progressively resume more activities, I urge everyone to remain vigilant," Trade and Industry Minister Gan Kim Yong, who co-chairs the task force tackling the pandemic, has said.

Many Vietnamese expats are yearning for home after not seeing their loved ones for years.

Trang says, crestfallen: "I hope the pandemic will be over soon so that I can see my husband and children. I have missed their birthdays, their first day at school and many other family events."

Vietnam closed its borders in March last year, and only allows in foreign diplomats, specialists and investors. Special flights are operated to repatriate Vietnamese, but their numbers are limited. Around 75,000 were brought home last year.

Trang, who used to work as a saleswoman, said her contract ended in early 2021, and she had planned to return to Ho Chi Minh City. But, unable to travel, she asked the company in vain for an extension. She quickly found a job at a restaurant as a dishwasher.

Living in a rented house with a Vietnamese friend and chatting online with her family in Vietnam every day, she has twice sent a request to the Vietnamese embassy to be repatriated, but has not received a response.

"At least I can stay here legally with a job; that is a blessing."

She has bought gifts for her family, and is ready to leave for home as soon as the embassy notifies her.
I graduated in 82.  Right at the peak of when we were graduating mining engineers, like a thousand a year, that was the trough of the mining industry where nobody could get a job. 

There were seven of us that graduated, and two of us got job offers.  I got an offer to go down to New Mexico  Mount Taylor. It was somebody that I had worked with through college and got to know.

He offered me a job at Mount Taylor as a grunt electrician, on one condition. He said if you tell anybody here youre a graduate engineer, Ill fire you.

Mining Minds: How do you think that experience helped you throughout your career?

Arnold: I think its the only reason Ive been successful. Im well into my 60s now, and Im not about to get on a jackleg. But the bottom line is, being able to know what a miner goes through every day.  Ive had a pretty successful career, and a pretty successful career in management, and I really do owe it all to what I learned from those miners. 

After nearly five years working as an hourly miner, Arnold and his wife moved to South Africa.
Getting out of the big city on a rotation to Elko made an impression on Hardy when he was in medical school. He said it helped shape his career choice to pursue family medicine in Boulder City.

[I] met and trained with doctors who had a sense of reality, a sense of what was important, a sense of how to take care of family members, how to deal with family and patients, how to help them with resources they have and know resources they needed to get and needed to have in addition to what they already have, Hardy said. It was a snapshot of reality of what it is like to be a real doctor and take care of real patients who have real problems and not be intimidated by it but recognize that the physician has something to add in partnership with patients.

Hardy as a senator and a dean at the college shares the hope with NGM and Premise Health that doctors will settle in Nevada. It means not only better health care for members of the community including the NGM workforce, and more stability for the well-being of Nevada as a state.

I am thrilled with our opportunity that our students will have to see not just Northern Nevada but Elko particularly and everything about the state, Hardy said. So one of my goals, obviously as a state senator, is to make sure I get students to become doctors and come back or stay in Nevada, and this is a wonderful opportunity for Touro University students to be able to see Nevada and say, Thats where I want to live; thats where I want to be. 

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On Thursday afternoon, US President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris signed a bill into law to make 19 June - known as 'Juneteenth' - a federal holiday commemorating the end of the legal enslavement of Black Americans.

Juneteenth vote sees 14 Republicans against

The bill, which was passed overwhelmingly by the US House of Representatives on Wednesday after a unanimous vote in the Senate, marks the day in 1865 when a Union general informed a group of enslaved people in Texas that they had been made free two years earlier by President Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation during the Civil War.

"Juneteenth marks both a long hard night of slavery subjugation and a promise of a brighter morning to come," Biden said. He said the day is a reminder of the "terrible toll that slavery took on the country and continues to take."

Biden said "great nations don't ignore their most painful moments...they embrace them." He spoke in a room filled with about 80 members of Congress, local elected officials, community leaders and activists such as Opal Lee, who campaigned to make Juneteenth a holiday.

Not everyone was in favor, however, with 14 House Representatives voting against the Juneteenth bill. They were: Rep. Andy Biggs of Arizona, Rep. Mo Brooks of Alabama, Rep. Andrew Clyde of Georgia, Rep. Scott DesJarlais of Tennessee, Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona, Rep. Ronny Jackson of Texas, Rep. Doug LaMalfa of California, Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky, Rep. Tom McClintock of California, Rep. Ralph Norman of South Carolina, Rep. Mike Rogers of Alabama, Rep. Matt Rosendale of Montana, Rep. Chip Roy of Texas, Rep. Tom Tiffany of Wisconsin

Biden and his fellow Democrats are under pressure to respond to a slew of Republican-backed state bills that civil rights activists say aim to suppress voting by minorities, and to meaningfully address the disproportionate killing of Black men by police.

"It's important to commemorate emancipation and to encourage everyday Americans to reckon with the history of slavery ... but there is always a danger with these sort of things so they can be performative," said Matthew Delmont, a professor of history at Dartmouth College who specializes in African-American history and civil rights.

Designating Juneteenth a federal holiday will be a "failure" if it just acknowledges the date without spurring action on issues such as police brutality, voting rights, and the racial wealth gap, Delmont said.

Juneteenth becomes 11th federal holiday

The law comes a year after the United States was rocked by protests against racism and policing following the murder of George Floyd, an African-American man, by a Minneapolis police officer.

Juneteenth will be the eleventh federally recognized holiday, joining a list that includes Christmas, New Year's Day, Thanksgiving and Independence Day, as well as days honoring presidents and slain civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.

Inauguration day, when the US president is sworn in, is also a federal holiday every four years.

Federal employees will start taking the holiday off this year, observing it on Friday since Juneteenth falls on Saturday, the US Office of Personnel Management said on Twitter.
Medical supplies donated by China are unloaded from a plane at Robert Mugabe International Airport in Harare, Zimbabwe, on May 11, 2020. (Xinhua/Zhang Yuliang)

"China has walked its talk with African countries and other developing countries around the world in an effort to manage this pandemic," said Cavince Adhere, a Kenya-based international relations scholar.

"Countries cannot act in compartments. They must be willing to shed off the tag of nationalism and begin to speak in a language that resonates with the cross-border challenges that we're facing today," he added.

NAIROBI, June 17 (Xinhua) -- Thursday marks the one-year anniversary of the Extraordinary China-Africa Summit on Solidarity against COVID-19, which has delivered an important message to the world that countries must stand together to rein in the devastating pandemic before it causes further harm.

Chinese President Xi Jinping, when addressing the summit on June 17, 2020, said that in the face of COVID-19, China and Africa have enhanced solidarity and strengthened friendship and mutual trust, reaffirming China's commitment to its longstanding friendship with Africa.

As the war against the coronavirus continues, especially when new waves of COVID-19 infections hit some parts of the world, the China-Africa solidarity throws light on the right way to fight a common enemy of mankind.

RUSH TO WHERE NEEDED

During the extraordinary summit last year, Xi said people and their lives must be put front and center, and that China and Africa should do whatever it takes to protect people's lives and health.

As the developing world is still facing a huge vaccination gap due to a dire shortage of vaccines, China has been trying its best to supply vaccines to where they are most urgently needed, having donated vaccines to more than 80 developing countries.

China has pledged to make COVID-19 vaccines a global public good. Currently, more than 30 African countries have received or will receive Chinese vaccines.

In Cameroon, Antoinette Fatimatu, a 38-year-old nurse who conducts COVID-19 tests at the Yaounde General Hospital, said the most difficult part of her job is to tell people they are positive for COVID-19. "I have seen people die within days after I test them positive. I need protection and can't wait to be vaccinated," her colleague Judith Maya told Xinhua.

China's Sinopharm vaccines are seen at an airport in Yaounde, Cameroon, April 11, 2021. (Photo by Jean Pierre Kepseu/Xinhua)

In April, Cameroon received its first batch of COVID-19 vaccines when 200,000 doses of China's Sinopharm vaccines arrived.

In Zimbabwe, 65-year-old Deborah Birch, who has an underlying condition, took her first jab of a Chinese vaccine in March. "I am confident that I have taken the Chinese vaccine," she said.

China also supports its own vaccine manufacturers in transferring technologies to other developing countries and carrying out joint production with them.

Last month, Egypt received from China the first batch of raw materials to locally manufacture the Sinovac vaccine with the target of producing 40 million doses within a year.

Airport staff members transport the first batch of Chinese Sinovac vaccine raw materials unloaded from a plane at the Cairo International Airport in Cairo, Egypt, May 21, 2021. (Xinhua/Sui Xiankai)

STANDING SHOULDER TO SHOULDER

China and Africa have stayed committed to fighting COVID-19 together. After the Chinese city of Wuhan reported its first infections, leaders of more than 50 African countries offered sympathies and provided support to China's anti-virus fight.

The goodwill and kind gesture by African countries have been returned with China's ensuing support.

In February, Equatorial Guinea became the first African country to receive Chinese vaccine aid.

In March, China agreed to expand and modernize the Juba Teaching Hospital so as to offer better medical services in South Sudan, a country that has suffered from years of conflict.

Members of the Chinese medical expert team communicate with local frontline health workers at a COVID-19 testing facility in Juba, South Sudan, Aug. 21, 2020. (Chinese Embassy in South Sudan/Handout via Xinhua)

At the Yaounde Gynaeco-Obstetric and Pediatric Hospital of Cameroon, Chinese medical team members have been helping with medical training for local staff.

"From the start of the pandemic until now, we feel the presence of the Chinese medical team alongside the Cameroonian team to effectively contain this pandemic," Nsom Mba Charles, deputy director-general of the hospital, told Xinhua.

Data showed that 46 Chinese medical teams in Africa have been mobilized for Africa's response efforts. China also sent 15 ad hoc medical expert teams to Africa and swiftly set up a cooperation mechanism for Chinese hospitals to pair up with 43 African hospitals.

Workers work on the construction site of the China-aided future headquarters of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, June 2, 2021. (Xinhua/Michael Tewelde)

In December 2020, construction of the Chinese-aided headquarters project for the Africa CDC commenced. Fantahun Hailemichael, project coordinator at the African Union, said the landmark project, presently progressing smoothly, is a generous gift to the 1.3 billion people in Africa.

"The Africa-China partnership is very strong and we hope it will last for a very long period of time. This will continue because it's based on trust and mutual interest. It can not be shaken by events or circumstances," Hailemichael said.

COMMUNITY OF HEALTH FOR ALL

During last year's summit, Xi called for building a China-Africa community of health for all and pledged that once the development and deployment of COVID-19 vaccine is completed in China, African countries will be among the first to benefit.

Last month, at the Global Health Summit, Xi said that confronted by a pandemic like COVID-19, we must champion the vision of building a global community of health for all and tide over this trying time through solidarity and cooperation.

To Cavince Adhere, a Kenya-based international relations scholar, China has demonstrated its tangible commitments to assist Africa, as China has really been offering the continent therapeutics, epidemic control information and vaccines.

A woman receives her first jab of Sinovac COVID-19 vaccine at Mbare Polyclinic in Harare, capital of Zimbabwe, April 14, 2021. (Xinhua/Tafara Mugwara)

"China has walked its talk with African countries and other developing countries around the world in an effort to manage this pandemic," Adhere said, noting that China is also the first country to assist Africa with local production of vaccines.

"I think the spirit of shared humanity that is being fronted by China is something that is very progressive and has seen a lot of valued acceptance and resonance around the world," Adhere said, adding, "Countries cannot act in compartments. They must be willing to shed off the tag of nationalism and begin to speak in a language that resonates with the cross-border challenges that we're facing today."




The Ministry of Energy is orienting representatives of the "green" energy industry to hold full-fledged "green" auctions next year, having previously announced the revision of quotas for participation in them for various types of renewable energy generation, Andriy Konechenkov, the chairman of the board of the Ukrainian Wind Energy Association (UWEA), has said.

"The signal from the Ministry of Energy is to conduct "green" auctions next year, finally regulating this process at the normative level. This year, they plan to hold a so-called demonstration auction for small capacity to work out the procedure," he said in a comment to the Energy Reform online portal based on the results of a meeting in the Energy Ministry with the industry representatives on June 16.

At the same time, according to him, the ministry also announced its intention in the coming days to revise and present new quotas for participation in auctions for wind farms and bio thermal power plants.

"More capacities for wind and bioenergy, less for solar, plus the issue of the obligation for solar plants to install storage systems along with generating capacities is being considered," he said.

At the same time, according to Konechenkov, the Ministry of Energy approves the independent entry of renewable energy generation to the market and announced its intention to contribute to this, but believes that it is too early to make forecasts when this may happen.

A representative of Ukrenergo also confirmed the intention to issue "green" bonds to pay off past debts by autumn, the head of the UWEA noted.

"Representatives of the industry asked the minister to facilitate the withdrawal of resource bill No. 5600, which, among other things, provides for the excise tax on green electricity," Konechenkov said.

Another participant in the meeting from RES generation noted in the commentary that he expected specific schedules and dates for all the announced events from the ministry, but his expectations were not met.

"We did not agree on anything specific. There was no roadmap, no schedules, no specific dates. And the fact that all the terms of "green" auctions have already passed, and they are not even announced for this year, speaks of a certain sabotage of this process on the part of the ministry," the representative of the industry said.

According to him, nothing prevents from holding these auctions this year  it is necessary to approve quotas.
Restrictions on entry from India to Ukraine have been lifted in accordance with the Cabinet of Ministers Resolution No. 611, said Yuriy Lysiuk, Deputy Director of the Department, Head of the Border Control Organization Department of the State Border Protection Department of the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine.

"[India] is a rather big direction. Many citizens - both our citizens and foreigners - traveled to India, through India. And in connection with the [COVID-19] outbreak, there were certain restrictions. Therefore, these restrictions are also removed by this decree, and travelers can left for India, go to India for rest, work, study, treatment, etc.," Lysiuk said during an online broadcast on the State Border Guard Service's Facebook page on Thursday.

He recalled that on Wednesday the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine adopted Resolution No. 611, which amends the Resolution of the Cabinet of Ministers No. 1236, and it entered into force on Thursday.

"Everything has changed significantly for the citizens of Ukraine, because citizens of Ukraine can enter and leave without any problems, certificates, tests, etc. They just take their passport. This applies to citizens of Ukraine and foreigners with permanent residence permits," Lysiuk explained.

According to the deputy director of the department, nothing has changed in the rules for entering Ukraine for foreigners.

"They go, as they did before, to Ukraine, with compulsory insurance, a PCR test or express test done 72 hours before crossing checkpoints and a certificate or vaccination certificate, which replaces the PCR test," he said.
Ukraine will not abandon the Minsk Agreements, Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council (NSDC) Oleksiy Danilov has said.

"We do not denounce them [the Minsk Agreements]. We need to work with the Minsk Agreements. There are no others. But you need to understand that to implement them as they are [...] [impossible]. With the presence of Russian tanks, generals and officers on our Ukrainian territory, holding elections is nonsense, it is impossible," Danilov said on the air of the Right to Power (Pravo na Vladu) program on the 1+1 TV channel on Thursday.

He noted that Ukraine is in favor of ending the war and starting negotiations.

"To avoid killing our guys. We are in favor of sitting down and negotiating," the NSDC secretary said.
Kyivavtodor cooperates with law enforcement officers, who conduct searches in the office premises of the municipal corporation on Thursday, the press service of the Kyiv City State Administration reports.

Law enforcement officers search and seize documents for evidence of tax evasion by a number of utilities. It is reported that Kyivavtodor does not have any contractual relations with these enterprises.

Kyivavtodor says that none of the aforementioned enterprises were reflected in the corporation's tax reports. The corporation paid all taxes in full in due time, respectively, with tax returns and financial statements in accordance with the current legislation," the message says.

At the same time, the company assured that they would continue to cooperate with law enforcement officers and provide all the necessary requested documents.

As reported, the Kyiv City Prosecutor's Office, together with the State Fiscal Service in Kyiv, are conducting searches in the offices of the Kyivavtodor municipal corporation in the case of tax evasion during the reconstruction and repair of overpasses in the amount of more than UAH 30 million by the contractor and subcontractors who carried out work on the construction and reconstruction of bridges and overpasses in Kyiv, in particular, the overpass at the intersection of Komarova and Lesia Kurbasa Avenues over the Kyiv-Volynsky-Sviatoshyno railway in 2019-2020.
President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky has signed a decree raising the minimum wage for medical personnel.

"At least UAH 13,500 for paramedical personnel and at least UAH 20,000 for doctors," Zelensky said during a speech on the Medical Worker Day, which was broadcast by the President's Office on Facebook.

According to Zelensky, the President's Office, together with the government and parliament, "will do everything to ensure that such sums will be not just on paper, and that the overall healthcare budget will increase, as well as the rates of medical guarantee programs."

"The government is starting the process of drafting the budget for 2022. And I expect that it will be a clear signal to renew the prestige and important role of doctors in our Ukrainian society," Zelensky said.

He also asked the government to take into account an increase in the minimum wage for doctors when drafting the budget for next year.

In addition, Zelensky called on local authorities to prevent situations where "hospital heads receive UAH 100,000 per month, and doctors and nurses receive UAH 6,000 per month."
Counterintelligence officers, together with investigators of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), have prevented the leaking of the latest inventions of the domestic military-industrial complex outside the country.

"Offenders who tried to sell classified design documents in the field of military shipbuilding to representatives of one of the Asian countries were exposed. Information with limited access was estimated at $2 million. It was established that several former and current employees of one of the domestic defense enterprises were involved in illegal activities," the SBU press center reports.

During the special operation, the SBU officers exposed the offenders during the transfer of $250,000 for part of the defense information.

During searches at the place of residence of the participants in the illegal fraud, documents and computer equipment with evidence of illegal activity were seized.

Now the issue of informing the offenders on suspicion and the choice of a preventive measure is being resolved. In the framework of criminal proceedings under Part 1 of Article 111 (high treason) of the Criminal Code of Ukraine, investigative actions are ongoing.
UNHCR Global Trends reveals that the number of people forcibly displaced in the world has risen to a record 82.4 million

June 18, 2021. Kyiv, Ukraine. Today, the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) has published its annual UNHCR Global Trends report on forced displacement in the world and is organising over 30 events around Ukraine to highlight the courage, resilience and contributions refugees, asylum-seekers and internally displaced persons bring to their new communities, on the occasion of World Refugee Day 2021.

Despite movement restrictions imposed by the pandemic, the number of people displaced due to conflicts, persecution and human rights violations rose to 82.4 million people in 2020, according to UNHCRs annual Global Trends report released today in Geneva. This is a further four per cent increase on top of the record-high 79.5 million displaced at the end of 2019. Girls and boys under the age of 18 account for 42 per cent of all forcibly displaced people.

The report shows that by the end of 2020, there were 20.7 million refugees under UNHCRs mandate, 5.7 million Palestine refugees and 3.9 million Venezuelans displaced abroad. Another 48 million people were internally displaced (IDPs) within their own countries. A further 4.1 million were asylum-seekers.

Ukraine is home to over 700,000 of the persons internally displaced in the world and to around 5,000 of the refugees and asylum seekers.

The report also finds that the vast majority of refugees  73% - are hosted in countries neighbouring to their own, and that 76% of the worlds refugees are living in a protracted refugee situation [one in which 25,000 refugees of the same nationality have been in exile for at least 5 years].

"The number of forcibly displaced persons in the world today is overwhelming  its around twice the population of Ukraine. And behind every digit is an individual girl or boy, woman or man who has been forced to leave their home and community behind, gather whatever belongings they can carry, and find protection in a new community. The strength and capacities of the many millions of people who go through this experience and who adapt to their new communities and build a life there impresses me every day. What I also hear every time I speak with someone who is seeking asylum, or is a refugee or IDP, is that most of all, they want the possibility to get on with their life, to live a safe and independent everyday life again, and contribute to the society. They do not want to be dependent on aid. This is what we collectively need to support and enable, said Karolina Lindholm Billing, a newly appointed Head of the UN Refugee Agency in Ukraine at the opening of photo-exhibition for the World Refugee Day in Kyiv.

World Refugee Day is observed each year on 20 June as a day designated by the United Nations to highlight the courage, resilience and contributions of people who have been forced to flee their homes to escape conflict, persecution or serious human rights violations.

The theme this year is inclusion, in recognition of UNHCRs experience that when people who have been forced to flee their homes in search of safety are fully included as members of their new society and given equal access to rights and services, they have the greatest potential to contribute to the development of their communities and develop their own human capital.

UNHCR Ukraine, together with displaced persons themselves and partner organizations, is organising more than 30 events around the country on the theme of inclusion and the message that "Together we can do anything". Together we heal, learn and shine.

The various activities demonstrate the benefits of inclusion and of facilitating the integration of refugees and internally displaced persons, and show that no matter what a persons background is  a doctor, builder, athlete, handcraft master  all can contribute when given the opportunity.

ENDS

UNHCR Ukraine recently prepared a publication , reflecting on its engagement in addressing forced displacement in Ukraine over the last 25 years.

The full list of events for World Refugee Day in Ukraine can be found here .

The full text of the UNHCR Global Trends can be found here.

To see the video from the opening ceremony.

UNHCR 2020 Global Trends Report  key data:

82.4 million people forcibly displaced globally (79.5 million in 2019) - 4 per cent increase 26.4 million refugees (26.0 million in 2019) including: 20.7 million refugees under UNHCRs mandate (20.4 million in 2019) 5.7 million Palestine refugees under UNRWAs mandate (5.6 million in 2019) 48.0 million internally displaced people (45.7 million in 2019) 4.1 million asylum-seekers (4.1 million in 2019) 3.9 million Venezuelans displaced abroad (3.6 million in 2019)

2020 is the ninth year of uninterrupted rise in forced displacement worldwide. Today, one per cent of humanity is displaced and there are twice as many forcibly displaced people than in 2011 when the total was just under 40 million.

More than two thirds of all people who fled abroad came from just five countries: Syria (6.7 million), Venezuela (4.0 million), Afghanistan (2.6 million), South Sudan (2.2 million) and Myanmar (1.1 million).

Vast majority of worlds refugees - nearly nine in 10 refugees (86 per cent) - are hosted by countries neighbouring crises areas and low- and middle-income countries. The Least Developed Countries provided asylum to 27 per cent of the total.

For the seventh year in a row, Turkey hosted the largest refugee population worldwide (3.7 million refugees), followed by Colombia (1.7 million, including Venezuelans displaced abroad), Pakistan (1.4 million), Uganda (1.4 million) and Germany (1.2 million).

Pending asylum applications globally remained at 2019 levels (4.1 million), but States and UNHCR collectively registered some 1.3 million individual asylum applications, one million fewer than in 2019 (43 per cent less).

Additional information / supporting multimedia materials:

UNHCRs Global Trends report and an accompanying package of multimedia assets are available on our media page: https://www.unhcr.org/unhcr-global-trends-2020-media-page-60be2dd14. The report is subject to a worldwide embargo of no use before 0500 GMT on 18 June 2021.

Note:

UNHCRs Global Trends report is released in parallel with its annual Global Report, which reports on UNHCR programmes and activities to address the needs of all who are forced to flee, as well as the worlds known stateless populations.

For more details please contact Victoria Andrievska, Public Information Officer, UNHCR Ukraine: +380 50 413 8404, andrievs@unhcr.org
The U.S. Supreme Court is seen in Washington, U.S., (Photo : REUTERS/Carlos Barria/File Photo)

Politicians, doctors, hospitals and others with a stake in the expanded healthcare policy known as Obamacare reacted to a U.S. Supreme Court decision on Thursday rejecting a Republican challenge backed by former President Donald Trump:



PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN ON TWITTER:



"With millions of people relying on the Affordable Care Act for coverage, it remains, as ever, a BFD. And it's here to stay."



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BIDEN IN A STATEMENT:



"Today's U.S. Supreme Court decision is a major victory for all Americans benefiting from this groundbreaking and life-changing law...



"After more than a decade of attacks on the Affordable Care Act through the Congress and the courts, (with) today's decision - the third major challenge to the law that the U.S. Supreme Court has rejected - it is time (to) move forward and keep building on this landmark law."



RON KLAIN, WHITE HOUSE CHIEF OF STAFF, ON TWITTER RECALLING BIDEN'S 2010 COMMENT https://news.sky.com/video/joe-biden-tells-president-obamacare-is-a-bfd-10726202 AS VICE PRESIDENT TO PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA CAUGHT ON A MICROPHONE:



"It's still a BFD."



FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA:



"This ruling reaffirms what we have long known to be true: the Affordable Care Act is here to stay. The principle of universal coverage has been established, and 31 million people now have access to care through the law we passed - with millions more who can no longer be denied coverage or charged more because of a preexisting condition.



"Now we need to build on the Affordable Care Act and continue to strengthen and expand it. That's what President Biden has done through the American Rescue Plan, giving more families the peace of mind they deserve. And because he extended the special enrollment period until August 15th, anyone who needs coverage can go to healthcare.gov and sign up."



DEMOCRATIC U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES SPEAKER NANCY PELOSI:



"Today's Supreme Court ruling is a landmark victory for Democrats' work to defend protections for people with pre-existing conditions against Republicans' relentless efforts to dismantle them...



"We will never forget how Republican leaders embraced this monstrous suit to rip away millions of Americans' healthcare in the middle of a deadly pandemic."



TEXAS ATTORNEY GENERAL KEN PAXTON, WHOSE STATE CHALLENGED THE OBAMACARE LAW:



"I will continue to fight this law - in fact, I have only just begun."



ROBERT HENNEKE, A LAWYER AT THE TEXAS PUBLIC POLICY FOUNDATION WHICH REPRESENTED INDIVIDUAL CHALLENGERS WHO OBJECTED TO THE REQUIREMENT THEY OBTAIN HEALTH INSURANCE:



"For a third time, the court bailed out Congress to save the Affordable Care Act from legal consequences, each time creating more questions than answers."



U.S. SENATOR RICHARD BLUMENTHAL, MEMBER OF THE SENATE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE:



"This decisive decision will allow millions of Americans to sleep a little easier tonight. After all the absurd legal contortions in this challenge, today's decision should be no surprise but it is a profound relief...



"After this resounding legal defeat, Republicans should finally abandon their cruel and reckless attempt to undermine healthcare protections."



DEMOCRATIC SENATOR ELIZABETH WARREN:



"Despite every desperate right-wing attack to rip healthcare away from millions of Americans, the Affordable Care Act is constitutional and it's here to stay. Now let's get to work to improve it so every American can get the care they need."



VICE PRESIDENT KAMALA HARRIS SPOKESWOMAN SABRINA SINGH:



"The Affordable Care Act remains the law of the land and will continue to provide millions of Americans with healthcare."



NEW YORK ATTORNEY GENERAL LETITIA JAMES, A DEMOCRAT:



"For more than a decade, the Affordable Care Act has been the law of the land, providing health coverage and a multitude of protections to tens of millions of Americans across the nation, and today's decision solidifies those protections for generations to come."



AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION PRESIDENT GERALD HARMON:



"Today's decision by the U.S. Supreme Court is a victory for patients and for the gains in healthcare coverage achieved through the Affordable Care Act (ACA). The American Medical Association (AMA) is pleased that the high court rejected the challenge to the ACA, thereby upholding critical patient protections that are improving the lives and health of millions of Americans, particularly amid a global pandemic."



RICK POLLACK, PRESIDENT AND CEO, AMERICAN HOSPITAL ASSOCIATION:



"The more than 30 million Americans who secured health insurance under the Affordable Care Act can again breathe a sigh of relief. But our work is far from over. We need to redouble our efforts to close coverage gaps and make care affordable and accessible for everyone, all while continuing to fight COVID-19 and encouraging more Americans to get vaccinated. The AHA is eager to partner with Congress and the Biden administration to make sure all Americans can achieve their highest potential for health."



MATT EYLES, PRESIDENT AND CEO OF AHIP REPRESENTING HEALTH INSURANCE PROVIDERS:



"We believe the Supreme Court rightly concluded this case does not belong in court, as the challengers have not suffered any injury...



"After a year filled with unprecedented loss when reliable comprehensive health coverage has never been more important, this decision protects the stability of health coverage for people with pre-existing conditions, hardworking families, seniors, and other Americans who need it most."


Voting rights activists gather during a protest against Texas legislators who are advancing a slew of new voting restrictions in Austin, Texas (Photo : REUTERS/Mikala Compton/File Photo)

U.S. Senate Democrats scrambled to unite around a sweeping election reform bill they hope to begin debating next week, in the face of Republican opposition and moves by several states to pass laws placing new restrictions on voting.



Several Democrats expressed optimism over a compromise plan proposed by moderate Democratic Senator Joe Manchin, details of which were released on Wednesday.



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"I am encouraged by these recent developments," Senator Raphael Warnock of Georgia told reporters. Georgia is one of a half-dozen U.S. states that passed tough new controls on voting procedures https://www.reuters.com/world/us/republicans-erect-voting-barriers-across-number-politically-crucial-us-states-2021-06-15 this year.



Warnock said Manchin's ideas were "very significant" because they could unite the 48 Senate Democrats and two independents, boosting chances for passing a bill.



It was not yet clear whether any Republicans would climb aboard, however. Under normal Senate rules, 60 votes are needed in the 100-member chamber to pass any measure.



A crucial test vote will be held on Tuesday on whatever bill Democrats agree upon in the next few days, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer told reporters.



Democrats hope to get at least all of their 50 caucus members to vote yes on opening debate. That, however, would be 10 short of the senators needed to clear a first hurdle.



But 50 would demonstrate Democratic unity on one of their highest legislative priorities and could even encourage more in their party to join a move to scrap or alter the Senate's rule requiring the 60-vote threshold to advance bills.



Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell on Thursday rejected the idea of compromise, saying "states, not the federal government, should decide how to run their own elections."



Democrats argue that they also support state-run elections, but with minimum federal standards.



Republican-controlled state legislatures say new restrictions on voting are needed to improve election security following former President Donald Trump's repeated claims that his election defeat was the result of widespread fraud.



Although multiple courts, state election officials and Trump's own administration have rejected the claims as untrue and Trump has not produced any evidence, a sizable number of Republican voters believe him anyway, polls show.



Democrat Amy Klobuchar, who chairs a Senate committee overseeing election procedures in the United States, called Manchin's compromise "a good faith effort."



She stopped short of embracing it and instead said, "We'll continue to work through his ideas."



But she noted that Manchin's plan contains key elements in a bill that has been pushed by Democratic leaders, including making "dark money" campaign contributions public and requiring that states give voters at least two weeks to cast their ballots in presidential and congressional elections.



Republican Senator Mike Lee said he believed the voting rights bill would hurt his party's electoral chances: "This bill isn't about strengthening democracy. This bill is about strengthening Democrats."



The issue is urgent for Democrats, who hold razor-thin majorities in both houses of Congress after the 2020 elections. History and a once-a-decade redistricting process, based on the 2020 U.S. Census, favor Republicans' chances of recapturing control of Congress in the 2022 midterm elections.



"If we don't get this bill passed, our democratic system is on the line. Voting is fundamental," said Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren.



'UNDER ASSAULT'



The flurry of state initiatives restricting voting is playing out in presidential election swing states, including Pennsylvania, Florida and Arizona.



"We've been tracking voting legislation for well over a decade and we have not seen a push this aggressive and intense before," said Wendy Weiser, an elections expert at the non-partisan Brennan Center for Justice. "Voting rights are under assault."



Senate Democrats' drive for passage of the For the People bill approved by the House of Representatives in March hit a wall with Manchin's opposition.



That sweeping measure would block many of the restrictions imposed by new state laws and require states to turn over the task of redrawing congressional districts to independent commissions.



Democrats' backup plan could be an expanded version of another bill, named after the late civil rights leader and congressman John Lewis, that would omit some of the larger bill's more sweeping changes, such as having commissions redraw congressional districts.


The U.S. Supreme Court building in Washington, U.S. (Photo : REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst/File Photo)

The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday rejected a Republican bid backed by former President Donald Trump's administration to invalidate Obamacare, preserving the landmark healthcare law for the third time since its 2010 enactment.



The 7-2 ruling declared that Texas and other challengers had no legal standing to file their lawsuit seeking to nullify a law, formally called the Affordable Care Act, that has enabled millions of Americans to obtain medical coverage either through public programs or private insurers. The decision was authored by liberal Justice Stephen Breyer.



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The justices did not decide broader legal questions raised in the case about whether a key Obamacare provision was unconstitutional and, if so, whether the rest of the statute should be struck down. The provision, called the "individual mandate," originally required Americans to obtain health insurance or pay a financial penalty.



"Today's U.S. Supreme Court decision is a major victory for all Americans benefiting from this groundbreaking and life-changing law," said Democratic President Joe Biden, whose administration opposed the lawsuit.



With three major challenges to Obamacare now having been resolved by the justices, Biden added, "it is time to move forward and keeping building on this landmark law." Biden also encouraged more Americans to use Obamacare to obtain coverage.



Polling data has shown that Obamacare has become increasing popular among Americans, including Republicans.



Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, a Republican who led the challenge, vowed to continue to fight Obamacare. The individual mandate, Paxton wrote on Twitter, "was unconstitutional when it was enacted and it is still unconstitutional."



The law was the signature domestic policy achievement of Democratic former President Barack Obama, who Biden served with as vice president.



"This ruling reaffirms what we have long known to be true: the Affordable Care Act is here to stay," Obama said.



Breyer wrote that none of the challengers, including Texas and 17 other states and the individual plaintiffs, could trace a legal injury to the individual mandate, partly because a Republican-backed tax law signed by Trump in 2017 had wiped out the financial penalty.



"Unsurprisingly, the states have not demonstrated that an unenforceable mandate will cause their residents to enroll in valuable benefits programs that they would otherwise forgo," Breyer wrote.



Twenty states including Democratic-governed California and New York and the Democratic-led House of Representatives intervened in the case to try to preserve Obamacare after Trump had refused to defend the law.



Conservative Justices Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch dissented from the ruling. Alito called the decision an example of "judicial inventiveness" and labeled the individual mandate "clearly unconstitutional."



Republicans fiercely opposed Obamacare when it was proposed, failed to repeal it when they controlled both chambers of Congress and have been unsuccessful in getting courts to invalidate the law, including in 2012 and 2015 Supreme Court decisions.



Biden's administration in February urged the Supreme Court to uphold Obamacare, reversing the position taken by the government under Trump, who left office in January.



Justice Amy Coney Barrett, a Trump appointee whose 2020 confirmation hearing included questions from Democrats over whether she would vote to invalidate Obamacare, joined the majority in the ruling.



'RELENTLESS EFFORTS'



If Obamacare had been struck down, up to 20 million Americans stood to lose medical insurance and insurers again could have refused to cover people with pre-existing medical conditions. Obamacare expanded the Medicaid state-federal healthcare program and created marketplaces for private insurance.



House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat, called the ruling a "victory for Democrats' work to defend protections for people with pre-existing conditions against Republicans' relentless efforts to dismantle them."



Biden has pledged to expand healthcare access and buttress Obamacare. He and other Democrats had criticized Republican efforts against Obamacare at a time when the United States was grappling with a deadly coronavirus pandemic.



Despite the Supreme Court's 6-3 conservative majority, the Republican Obamacare challengers came away disappointed in a ruling in which all three liberal justices were joined by four of the six conservative justices. Opposition to Obamacare seems to have receded as a political issue for many Republicans as their party has emphasized other matters such as immigration, voting restrictions and hot-button "culture war" issues.



The Supreme Court previously upheld Obamacare by deeming the financial penalty under the individual mandate a tax permissible under the U.S. Constitution's language empowering Congress to levy taxes. The penalty's elimination in 2017 meant the individual mandate could no longer be interpreted as a tax provision and was therefore unlawful, the Republican challengers argued.



A federal judge in Texas in 2018 ruled that Obamacare, as structured following the 2017 change, violated the Constitution and was invalid in its entirety. The New Orleans-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed that the individual mandate was unconstitutional but did not rule that the entire law should be stricken.


An Intel Tiger Lake chip is displayed at an Intel news conference during the 2020 CES in Las Vegas, Nevada, U.S (Photo : REUTERS/Steve Marcus/File Photo)

A bipartisan group of U.S. senators on Thursday proposed a 25% tax credit for investments in semiconductor manufacturing as Congress works to increase U.S. chip production.



The proposal sponsored by Senate Finance Committee Chairman Ron Wyden and the top Republican on the panel, Senator Mike Crapo, along with Senators Mark Warner, Debbie Stabenow, John Cornyn and Steve Daines, would provide "reasonable, targeted incentives for domestic semiconductor manufacturing," they said in a statement.



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The group did not immediately provide a cost estimate for the measure, which is on top of recent proposed semiconductor funding. Last week, the Senate approved $52 billion for production and research on semiconductors and telecommunications equipment. That included $2 billion dedicated to chips used by automakers, which have seen massive shortages and made significant production cuts. The House of Representatives must still act on the measure.



Supporters of funding note the U.S. share of semiconductors and microelectronics production has fallen to 12% from 37% in 1990.



The senators said up to 70% of the cost difference for producing semiconductors overseas results from foreign subsidies.



"The United States can't allow foreign governments to continue to lure companies' manufacturing overseas, increasing risks to our economy and costing American workers good-paying jobs," Wyden said.



U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said last month the funding could result in seven to 10 new U.S. semiconductor plants.



Raimondo anticipates government funding would generate "$150 billion-plus" in investment in chip production and research - including contributions from state and federal governments and private-sector firms.



The tax credit could benefit Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) <2330.TW>, which is building a $12 billion semiconductor factory in Arizona, and Dutch chipmaker NXP Semiconductors NV as well as U.S. firms such as Intel Corp and Micron Technology Inc.



The Semiconductor Industry Association praised the proposal, saying it said would "strengthen domestic chip production and research, which are critical to U.S. job creation, national defense, infrastructure, and semiconductor supply chains."


Low probability of China trying to seize Taiwan in near term - top U.S. general

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley looks on during a Senate Appropriations Committee hearing in Washington, U.S (Photo : Caroline Brehman/Pool via Reuters)

The top U.S. general said on Thursday there was a low probability that China would try to take over Taiwan militarily in the near-term as Beijing has some way to go to develop the capabilities needed.



While there has been increasing concern in Taiwan and among some U.S. lawmakers about Chinese military activity near the island, like flying jets in Taiwan's air defense identification zone (ADIZ), U.S. military officials have told Reuters that such moves are not overly concerning.



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Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley told lawmakers that while Taiwan was still a core national interest of China, "There's little intent right now, or motivation, to do it militarily."



"There's no reason to do it militarily, and they know that. So, I think the probability is probably low, in the immediate, near-term future," Milley said during a Congressional hearing.



"My assessment in terms of capability, I think China has a ways to go to develop the actual, no-kidding capability to conduct military operations to seize through military means the entire island of Taiwan, if they wanted to do that," he added.



The United States is Taiwan's strongest international backer and main source of arms, which angers China.



Beijing says the democratically ruled island is part of "one China" and routinely denounces foreign involvement as an interference in its internal affairs.



Democratic and Republican members of the U.S. House of Representatives will introduce legislation this week seeking to boost U.S. support for Taiwan, part of an effort in Congress to take a hard line in dealings with China.



NATO leaders, encouraged by U.S. President Joe Biden, warned at a summit on Monday that China presents "systemic challenges," taking a more forceful stance towards Beijing.



Earlier this week, twenty-eight Chinese air force aircraft, including fighters and nuclear-capable bombers, entered Taiwan's ADIZ, the largest reported incursion to date.



Like most countries, the United States has no formal diplomatic ties with Taiwan.


Former U.S. President Donald Trump speaks at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Orlando, Florida, (Photo : REUTERS/Octavio Jones/File Photo)

A U.S. House of Representatives committee on Thursday requested documents from the Justice Department related to the Trump administration's seizure of phone records from lawmakers, journalists and the then-White House counsel as part of its investigations into leaks of classified information.



The House Democrats, led by Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler, sent a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland requesting a wide range of documents before July 1.



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The documents included any communications between the Justice Department and former President Donald Trump or White House staff relating to the opening of the leaks investigations.



The letter represented the first major public step in an investigation that Nadler announced on Monday.



"The Committee is now engaged in an investigation of the Trump Administration's surveillance of Members of Congress, the news media, and others," Nadler said in a statement on Thursday. "We must determine if the Department sought these sensitive records for improper political purposes."



The department's internal watchdog, Inspector General Michael Horowitz, last week said his office was also launching a review into whether "improper considerations" drove the leaks investigations.



The New York Times reported last week that under Trump the Justice Department subpoenaed Apple Inc for data on Adam Schiff and Eric Swalwell, both House Democrats from California.



Apple also told Donald McGahn, who served as White House counsel under Trump, that the department had subpoenaed information about him in 2018 and barred the company from telling him, the Times reported.



The Justice Department has also acknowledged seizing phone records for journalists from the New York Times, Washington Post and CNN.



Garland met on Monday with officials from those three news organizations to discuss the department's policies.



The Justice Department said on June 5 it would no longer secretly obtain reporters' records during leak investigations, a major policy shift that abandoned a practice decried by press freedom groups.


Richard Li, Hong Kong businessman and younger son of tycoon Li Ka-shing, waves as he arrives to vote during the election (Photo : REUTERS/Bobby Yip/File Photo)

Hong Kong tycoon Richard Li's insurer FWD said it has lodged an application to regulators for an initial public offering (IPO) in the United States.



The company did not disclose the size of the IPO, but the deal could raise between $2 and $3 billion, people familiar with the matter said.



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A fundraising of that size would value FWD at $13 billion to $15 billion, they added.



FWD declined to comment on the potential size of the deal.



The number of American Depositary Shares (ADS) and price range have yet to be determined, a statement from the company said.



"The IPO is expected to take place after the SEC (U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission) completes its review process, subject to market conditions," it added.



The IPO filing comes under FWD holding company PCGI Intermediate.



Richard Li is the son of Hong Kong's richest man Li Ka-Shing. Billionaire Li laid the foundation for FWD in 2012 with the acquisition of ING's Hong Kong, Macau and Thailand units for $2.1 billion and has continued this bolt-on approach since.



The company's major acquisitions included its $3 billion purchase of Siam Commercial Bank's life insurance unit in Thailand in 2019, just days after agreeing to buy the Hong Kong operations of U.S. insurer MetLife Inc.



FWD is the insurance business of Li's investment arm Pacific Century Group.



FWD has businesses across 10 Asian markets led by Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan and Macau, according to its website.



The company has $62.6 billion in assets and 9.8 million customers, a factsheet on its website states which also says FWD's minor shareholders include Swiss Re, GIC Ventures, RBJ Capital and Hopu Investments.


A sign is seen at the entrance to the Google retail store in the Chelsea neighborhood of New York City, U.S., (Photo : REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton)

Alphabet unit Google could face its biggest regulatory threat, with EU antitrust regulators set to open a formal investigation into its lucrative digital advertising business before the end of the year, said people familiar with the matter.



It would mark a new front by the EU competition enforcer against Google. It has in the last decade fined the company more than 8 billion euros ($9.8 billion) for blocking rivals in online shopping, Android smartphones and online advertising.



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An EU probe would focus on Google's position vis-a-vis advertisers, publishers, intermediaries and rivals, one of the people said, indicating deeper scrutiny than the French antitrust agency's case concluded last week.



Google made $147 billion in revenue from online ads last year, more than any other company in the world. Ads on its properties, including search, YouTube and Gmail, accounted for the bulk of sales and profits.



About 16% of revenue came from its display or network business, in which other media companies use Google technology to sell ads on their website and apps.



Both units are under fire. The U.S. Justice Department, joined by some states, sued Google last year for abusing its dominance in search ads. A group of states led by Texas in a later lawsuit focused on anti-competitive behaviour on the network side of the house.



France last week settled with Google for $268 million and various commitments over similar allegations related to the network business, and the unit also must work closely with Britain's competition regulator on upcoming software changes as part of a settlement reached days later.



The Commission declined to comment. Google did not immediately respond to a request for comment.


U.S. bishops vote to draft Communion statement that may rebuke Biden for abortion views

President-elect Joe Biden, his wife Jill Biden, Vice President-elect Kamala Harris and her husband Doug Emhoff attend a church service (Photo : REUTERS/Tom Brenner/File Photo)

A divided conference of U.S. Roman Catholic bishops announced on Friday that they had voted to draft a statement on Holy Communion that may admonish Catholic politicians, including President Joe Biden, who support abortion rights.



The 168-55 decision to draft a teaching document on the Eucharist, a holy sacrament in the Roman Catholic faith, came after two hours of debate at the virtual assembly of the United States Catholic Bishops' Conference on Thursday, in which the bishops weighed the merits of reaffirming church teachings against the possibility of sowing partisan division.



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The debate this week laid bare some of the cultural and political rifts that have rocked the church in the last several years. U.S. Catholic Church membership has dropped nearly 20% in the past two decades, according to a Gallup poll published in March, as sexual abuse scandals involving predatory priests have come to light and members have become increasingly divided on social issues.



The bishops in favor of drafting the document insisted on Thursday that it would not call out any individual politician by name, but the topic of Biden's social views came up repeatedly in the discussion. Biden, the second Catholic to serve as U.S. president, has alarmed many bishops by supporting same-sex marriage and abortion rights, views they say are antithetical to church doctrine.



A White House spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.



Some bishops advocating for drafting the document argued they had an obligation to clarify the church's teachings for all Catholics in light of inconsistencies in the faith and actions of public officials like Biden.



"Almost daily I speak with people, Catholics...who are confused by the fact that we have a president who professes devout Catholicism and yet advances the most radical pro-abortion agenda in our history," said Bishop Donald Hying of Madison, Wisconsin, who supported drafting the document.



Opponents said they feared writing the document could sow further partisan division within the church, and that the bishops should take more time to discuss the issue before moving forward.



A Vatican official, Cardinal Luis Ladaria, wrote to the conference in May urging caution on the debate over politicians' abortion views and Communion, saying it could become a "source of discord," Catholic News Service reported.



Bishop Robert McElroy of San Diego argued against the drafting of the document, saying the move would run counter to the bishops' goal of uniting Catholics through the sacrament.



"The Eucharist...will inevitably become a tool in the vicious partisan turmoil that roils our nation. It will be impossible to prevent the weaponization of the Eucharist in partisan battles," he said.



Exit polls from the 2020 presidential election showed the Catholic vote nearly split between Biden and Republican former President Donald Trump.



The conference's Committee on Doctrine is now expected to draft the document ahead of a November meeting when the bishops will review an amendable draft.



In 2004, the conference published a statement that said individual bishops could decide whether to deny Communion to Catholic politicians who supported abortion rights.


Former U.S. President Donald Trump speaks at the North Carolina GOP convention dinner in Greenville, North Carolina, U.S. (Photo : REUTERS/Jonathan Drake)

Donald Trump and Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives remain in talks to resolve disputes concerning congressional subpoenas of the former U.S. president's financial records from Deutsche Bank AG, their lawyers said on Friday.



Deutsche Bank, long Trump's main bank, has taken no position on the subpoenas and said it would comply with the law.



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A joint status report filed in Manhattan federal court did not say whether Trump and the Democrats, who control the House, still believed they were "close to an agreement," as they had been when filing a similar report on May 17.



The lawyers said all parties, including Deutsche Bank, are addressing matters concerning "the scope, logistics, and other factors implicated by the proposed terms of any such resolution to determine the best procedure to move this case forward." They asked a judge for another 30 days to continue talks.



Lawyers for Trump and the Democrats did not immediately respond to requests for comment.



Two House committees had in 2019 subpoenaed Deutsche Bank for years of banking records concerning Trump, his adult children and his businesses.



The House Financial Services Committee was examining possible money laundering in U.S. property transactions, while the House Intelligence Committee was probing whether Trump's dealmaking left him vulnerable to foreign government influence.



Trump opposed the subpoenas, citing the powers he then had as president. Unlike several recent presidents, he declined to make his tax records public.



Last July, the U.S. Supreme Court said Trump did not have an absolute right to block Congress from seeing his records, but said a lower court failed to adequately consider whether lawmakers' demands were overbroad or too intrusive.



The 2019 subpoenas have expired but an agreement on Deutsche Bank's records would eliminate a need for new subpoenas.



Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance has eight years of Trump's tax returns for a criminal probe into the former president and his businesses, after the Supreme Court separately rejected Trump's effort to keep Vance from seeing them.


U.S. companies rush to change their calendars for new Juneteenth holiday

Norma Ewing of Seattle holds a sign as people gather at Judkins Park for Juneteenth, which commemorates the end of slavery in Texas, (Photo : REUTERS/Lindsey Wasson)

U.S. companies scrambled to put in place policies that would allow employees to take a day off after President Joe Biden signed a bill late on Thursday to recognize June 19, or "Juneteenth", as a federal holiday.



Juneteenth has been a holiday in some U.S. states, but the move has pressured more companies to declare the day a holiday. With Juneteenth, the first new federal holiday created in nearly four decades, falling on a weekend, some companies, including JPMorgan Chase & Co and Bank of America Corp, have allowed U.S. employees a floating day off.



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Many U.S. companies had observed Juneteenth last year, when the United States was rocked by protests against racism and policing following the murder of George Floyd, an African-American man, by a Minneapolis police officer.



More than 800 companies said they would offer employees a paid day off for Juneteenth as of Friday morning, said Hella Creative, which started an online signature campaign for firms recognizing the holiday.



Retailer Target Corp said the day would remain an annual company holiday moving forward, while it would be a paid holiday at Yelp. Nike said it would close all U.S. operations, like it did in 2020.



Coffee chain Starbucks Corp said its stores would remain open, but hourly workers would be paid at 1.5 times their regular rate and salaried staff will receive a holiday in lieu.


Arab foreign ministers on Tuesday backed calls for the United Nations Security Council to intervene in a lingering dispute between Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia over a massive dam Addis Ababa is building on Nile River's main tributary.

The move, announced at a meeting in Qatar, was the latest push by Cairo and Khartoum to reach an agreement on the filling of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam.

Arab League Secretary-General Ahmed Aboul Gheit said the Arab countries will press for the Security Council to hold an urgent session on the decade-long dispute.

Aboul Gheit spoke at a joint news conference with Qatar's Foreign Minister Mohammad bin Abdulrahman Al Thani in Doha, following the meeting of Arab ministers.

The three nations had been close to reaching a U.S.-brokered accord last year, but Ethiopia walked out of a signing meeting in Washington, accusing former President Donald Trump's administration of siding with Egypt.

Cairo and Khartoum have repeatedly called for the U.S., the European Union, and the U.N. to join the talks as mediators, along with the African Union. Addis Ababa has rejected the idea.

The agreement would spell out how the dam is operated and filled, based on international law and norms governing cross-border rivers.

The dam is now 80% complete and is expected to reach full generating capacity in 2023, making it Africa's largest hydroelectric power plant and the world's seventh-largest, according to reports in Ethiopia's state media.

The dispute now centers on how quickly Ethiopia should fill and replenish the reservoir and how much water it releases downstream in case of a multi-year drought. The latest round of African Union-brokered negotiations in April failed to make progress.

Tuesday's development came amid diplomatic and political pressure by Egypt and Sudan on Ethiopia ahead its planned second phase of filling the dam. They argue that Ethiopia's plan to add 13.5 billion cubic meters of water in 2021 to the dam's reservoir is a threat to them.

``There is a united Arab position,'' Al Thani, the Qatari foreign minister, said. ``Water security is about survival for mankind, and for the peoples of Sudan and Egypt.''

A final communique of the meeting called on the U.N. Security Council to take ``necessary measures'' to launch an ``active negotiating process'' aiming at reaching a deal within a specific timeframe.

Egypt and Sudan said they had sent letters to the Security Council this month, explaining their positions on the dam. Both warned about dire repercussions to peace and stability of the Horn of Africa without a deal.

They accused Ethiopia of failing to help reach a ``fair, balanced and legally binding'' agreement in previous talks overseen by the African Union.

There was no immediate comment from Addis Ababa. Ethiopia has maintained that the dam, which it has fully financed, will help pull millions of its nearly 110 million citizens out of poverty and make the country a major power exporter.

Doha's hosting of the meeting marks a new beginning for the Egypt-Qatar ties and Qatar's reemergence on the regional diplomatic stage after years of relative isolation. Egypt, along with other Gulf countries, was party to a boycott of Qatar that was based largely on its ties to Turkey and Iran.

A January declaration put an end to the diplomatic crisis that began in 2017 with a rift between Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain on one side and Qatar on the other.

The four countries had jointly boycotted Qatar and hoped an embargo and media blitz would pressure it to end its close relations with Turkey and Iran. Egypt and the UAE have viewed the support by Qatar and Turkey of Islamist groups like the Muslim Brotherhood as a security threat. Saudi Arabia and Bahrain were primarily concerned about Qatar's ties with Iran.

The countries accused Qatar of cozying up to Iran and financing extremist groups in the region, though Doha denied the charges. Qatar-based satellite news network Al Jazeera was at the center of the dispute. The four nations demanded its closure, among other measures, which Qatar rejected.

Al-Thani and Aboul Gheit also said ministers discussed the Israel-Palestinian conflict and discussed steps to stop what Al-Thani described as ``Israeli violations'' in Jerusalem.

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Russias Deputy Minister of Culture Olga Yarilova visited the Pyramids Plateau on Friday along with a Russian delegation as part of the Year of Humanitarian Exchange between Egypt and Russia 2021/2022.

Yarilova and her delegation went on a tour organized by the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities, starting with a tour of the Great Pyramid from inside, then moving to the panorama area and Sphinx.

During the tour, Yarilov expressed her admiration of the Giza pyramids and ancient Egyptian civilization.

The launch of the year-long exchange will take place at the Cairo Opera House, on Friday 18 June that will include a performance by the Beryozka (Berezka) Dance Ensemble.

The internationally renowned ensemble is one of the oldest Russian dance troupes, founded by Russian choreographer and dancer Nadezhda Nadezhdina in 1948 in the Soviet Union.

Over 20 artistic events will follow throughout the year including seminars, book fairs, art and traditional crafts exhibitions, discussions on the effects of Russian literature on Egyptian literature, as well as a series of exchange between Russian and Egyptian artists. Closing the year, in May 2022, a showcase of Egyptian art will take place in Moscow, Russia.

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Sudanese Foreign Minister Mariam Al-Sadiq said on Friday that Ethiopia stabbed Sudan in the back" with the first filling of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) in July 2020.

In a lecture held at Qatars Doha Institute for Graduate Studies on Friday, Al-Sadiq said that Ethiopia wanted to use its power over water sources to pressure Sudan.

She added that Khartoum wont give up its national sovereignty, nor its water security.

The statements of the Sudanese foreign minister come as Ethiopia gears up for the second filing of the GERD in July despite Egypt and Sudans complete rejection of the filling absent a legally binding agreement on the dams operation.

The second filling will collect around 18.4 billion cubic metres of Blue Nile water, up from the 4.9 billion cubic metres withheld during the first filling last year.

Sudan fears the GERD will put the operation of its Roseires dam and the lives of its citizens  approximately 20 million people  at a very high risk if an agreement regulating its operation and filling is not reached before the second filling.

During the lecture attended by diplomats and reporters in the Qatari capital, the Sudanese foreign minister criticised the populist and out-dated polices that Ethiopia has tried to promote, pitting Africans against Arabs.

Regarding the Declaration of Principles signed in 2015 between Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia, Mariam Al-Sadiq stated that the declaration can be built upon given good intentions, but it also has gaps that can be exploited by parties with bad intentions, giving no further details about the specific gaps in the agreement.

The foreign minister also called on the United Nations Security Council to launch negotiations between Sudan, Ethiopia and Egypt within a certain time frame in order to reach a legally binding agreement on the filing and operations policies of the dam.

She added that Sudan has legal, political and diplomatic options to make Ethiopia sign a legally binding agreement, without revealing those options.

In previous statements, Sudanese officials said that they would pursue international legal action against the companies participating in construction of the dam.

Despite her criticism of Ethiopia, the Sudanese foreign minister reiterated that the solution to the GERD issue must focus on cooperation and must involve an agreement between Sudan, Egypt and Ethiopia that doesnt force its will on the others.

The GERD should be a factor of stability and cooperation as Sudan owns vast fertilised land, Egypt owns technology and Ethiopia has manpower, She said.

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France on Friday accused Russia of proceeding with a "seizure of power" in the Central African Republic, acknowledging that the CAR's cooperation with Russian "mercenaries" had prompted Paris to scale down its military support.

The French military earlier this month suspended budgetary aid and military cooperation with the CAR, accusing its government of being "complicit" in an anti-French disinformation campaign backed by Russia.

The CAR has become a key area in the controversy over the role in Africa of the Wagner mercenary group which is allegedly run by the shadowy businessman Yevgeny Prigozhin, a close confidant of President Vladimir Putin.

"In the Central African Republic, there is a form of a seizure of power, and in particular of military power, by Russian mercenaries," Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian told BFM TV.

"We are fighting this and it has led us to take measures to withdraw a certain number of our military personnel."

He said Russian personnel were surrounding CAR President Faustin Archange Touadera and exploiting the wealth of the country.

One of the world's poorest countries, the CAR has been chronically unstable since it gained independence from France in 1960.

In 2013, France launched a three-year military operation to halt sectarian violence after the then president, Francois Bozize, was ousted by predominantly Muslim rebel groups.

The CAR's closer relationship with Moscow dates back to 2018, when Russia sent "instructors" to help train its beleaguered armed forces and supplied small arms, gaining exemption from a UN weapons embargo.

Last December, under a bilateral cooperation agreement, the Kremlin sent several hundred personnel to shore up Touadera, who was threatened by a rebel offensive.

Russians also provide the president's personal protection and his powerful national security advisor, Valery Zakharov, is a Russian.

On May 30, in an interview with France's Journal du Dimanche newspaper, French President Emmanuel Macron said "anti-French talk has provided legitimacy to predatory Russian mercenaries at the apex of the state.

"Touadera... today is a hostage of the Wagner group," he said.

In July 2018, three Russian journalists researching Wagner's operations in CAR for an investigative media outlet -- Orkhan Dzhemal, Alexander Rastorguyev and Kirill Radchenko -- were killed in an ambush.

Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the exiled former oligarch and Kremlin critic, was funding their project and an investigation he backed linked their killing to Prigozhin.

But Russian investigators dismissed that report, insisting the trio died in a robbery.

Prigozhin, who has been sanctioned by both the EU and US, has dismissed accusations of a link to Wagner and denied any role in conflicts in Africa.

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Ethiopia will vote Monday in an election billed as its freest yet, but that is proceeding under the shadow of war and famine in the north, and serious doubts over fairness

The vote is the cornerstone of a promised democratic revival in Africa's second-most populous nation, and is supposed to represent a clean break with the repression that tarnished past elections.

Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, the Nobel Peace Prize winner who freed political prisoners and welcomed back exiles, is seeking a popular mandate after three years of great change, but also violent turmoil, under his rule.

The young leader rose to power on the back of anti-government unrest and was praised for his democratic agenda, including a commitment to hold Ethiopia's most competitive elections yet.

The election was twice delayed -- once for the coronavirus pandemic, and again to allow electoral officials more time to prepare -- but Abiy is urging voters to turn out for a "historic day" on June 21.

In Addis Ababa, opposition and ruling party banners line the streets, and political movements of all shades held colourful rallies on the final day of campaigning on Wednesday, something of a rarer scene in elections past.

"Back then, you would never be able to do this," said Ayenew Yehualaw at a noisy opposition parade in the capital's main square, where a small number of police watched at a distance.

- Delayed vote-

But outside the capital, the picture is far less rosy in the large and diverse Horn of Africa nation of 110 million.

For millions of Ethiopians, the election is nationwide in name only, with voting not going ahead on June 21 in close to one-fifth of the country's 547 constituencies.

Some areas were deemed too insecure to hold a vote, plagued by armed insurgencies and ethnic violence that has worsened under Abiy, as regions push for greater freedoms.

In other cases, the electoral board was not ready, with printing errors on ballot papers, and other logistical setbacks, making a timely election across the board impossible.

A second batch of voting will take place on September 6 to accommodate many of the constituencies not taking part Monday.

But there is no election date set for war-torn Tigray, the northernmost region, where UN agencies say 350,000 people face famine conditions, and atrocities have been documented.

Tigray represents 38 seats in the national parliament, but its political fate is of less global concern than the immediate plight of its six million inhabitants.

Desperate hunger stalks the region seven months after Abiy sent troops into Tigray promising a swift campaign to oust its dissident ruling party.

Abiy was once feted in the west and across the continent, but his reputation as a reformist and peacemaker has suffered, even if his administration remains defiant in the face of international criticism.

"The prime minister need not be a darling of the west, east, south or north," his spokeswoman, Billene Seyoum, said this week.

"It is sufficient that he stands for the people of Ethiopia and the development of the nation. And on June 21, the people of Ethiopia will decide."

- Credibility concerns-

Even in areas where the vote is proceeding, some opposition parties are boycotting in protest over the jailing of their leaders, and other concerns over the fairness of the process.

William Davison, senior analyst at the International Crisis Group, said even an incomplete vote could allow Abiy and his ruling Prosperity Party to win a comfortable majority and form a government.

"Yet in that scenario there would still be massive doubts about the credibility of the process in the eyes of many Ethiopians, as well as international observers," he said.

For those able and willing to vote, credibility appears less of a concern. Bethel Woldemichael, a 37-year-old in Addis Ababa, said she and her friends and family would be turning out to vote.

"I hope the election is peaceful, and is not rigged, and everything goes smoothly in the country on June 21," the retail worker said.

The polls will be closely watched by western allies such as the United States, which has voiced grave concern about the exclusion of such large numbers of voters from the process.

The European Union said in May it would not send observers to the polls, citing a failure to reach an agreement with the government on basic issues like communications and the observers' independence.

The elections will choose national and regional parliamentarians. The national MPs elect the prime minister, who is head of government, as well as the president -- a largely ceremonial role.

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Nigerian troops have rescued two teachers and five students after clashing with gunmen who raided a college in a northwestern state and abducted an unknown number of people, the army said on Friday.

Gunmen stormed the Federal Government College in Kebbi State on Thursday, killing a policeman and snatching students and teachers, in the third kidnap attack on a school in less than three weeks in Nigeria.

Troops in pursuit clashed early on Friday with the gunmen who had split into two groups on the run, the army said in a statement.

Security forces "have so far, rescued two teachers and five students after a fierce exchange of fire with the criminals," it said.

It said one female student had been found dead from exhaustion.

Troops also recovered 800 cattle stolen by the same gang.

Police have so far not confirmed the number of missing students and teachers taken from the school.

Heavily armed criminal gangs, known locally as bandits, have long terrorised central and northwestern Nigeria, raiding and looting villages, stealing cattle and kidnapping for ransom.

But since December they have increasingly targeted schools, arriving on motorbikes, abducting students or schoolchildren and herding them into forest hideouts to negotiate ransom payments.

At the end of May, gunmen seized 136 children from an Islamic seminary in central Nigeria's Niger state. They are still being held.

Nearly 900 children and students have already been kidnapped by gunmen for ransom since December, though many have since been freed.

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Iran elects a new president Friday, with the ultraconservative cleric Ebrahim Raisi widely expected to take over from moderate Hassan Rouhani who has served two terms

Here are landmark events in the history of the country, once known as Persia, since the 1979 revolution that overthrew the US-backed monarchy and established an Islamic republic.

- 1979 Islamic republic-

After months of protests, on January 16, 1979, the US-backed shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, leaves the country.

Revolutionary leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini makes a triumphant return from exile in Paris on February 1.

Ten days later, the shah's government falls. Public radio hails "the end of 2,500 years of despotism".

An Islamic republic is proclaimed on April 1.

- US hostage crisis-

Radical students take 52 Americans hostage at the US embassy in Tehran on November 4, 1979, to protest the ex-shah's admission to hospital in the United States.

Washington severs diplomatic relations in 1980. The hostages are only freed on January 21, 1981, after 444 days in captivity.

1980-88: -Iran-Iraq war-

Iraq attacks Iran on September 22 after Iraqi president Saddam Hussein tears up a 1975 treaty on the strategic Shatt al-Arab waterway.

This triggers a gruelling eight-year war that is estimated to have cost hundreds of thousands of lives on both sides.

It ends on August 20, 1988 with a UN-brokered ceasefire.

- 1989: Khamenei takes over-

Khomeini dies on June 3, 1989. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, president since 1981, becomes supreme leader.

Moderate conservative Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani is elected president.

Re-elected in 1993, he orchestrates a relative opening up of the government and post-war reconstruction.

Rafsanjani's reformist successor, Mohammad Khatami, runs up against conservative opposition during his two terms from 1997 to 2005.

In 1999, the government faces the biggest protests since 1979, pitting pro-Khatami students against the police.

- 2002: 'Axis of evil' -

US president George W. Bush names Iran as part of an anti-American "axis of evil" with Iraq and North Korea, accusing it of supporting terrorism.

- 2005: Ahmadinejad era-

Populist Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is elected president in June.

During his tenure, Iran resumes uranium enrichment. That alarms the West, which suspects Tehran of wanting to produce a nuclear weapon, something Iran has consistently denied.

A crackdown on nationwide protests against Ahmadinejad's disputed re-election in 2009 hobbles the reformist movement.

- 2015: Nuclear deal-

The election of moderate cleric Rouhani as president in 2013 marks a warming of relations with Washington and the rest of the world.

Iran reaches a deal on its nuclear programme with world powers, including the United States, on July 14, 2015 after 21 months of negotiations.

It gives Tehran relief from crippling economic sanctions in exchange for limits on its atomic activities.

- 2016: Saudi standoff-

In January Iran's regional rival Saudi Arabia and its allies cut or scale back relations, after the Sunni kingdom's execution of prominent Shiite cleric Nimr al-Nimr which prompted demonstrators to ransack the Saudi embassy in Tehran and its consulate in Mashhad.

- 2018: US quits nuclear deal-

US president Donald Trump on May 8 abandons the nuclear deal and begins reimposing unilateral sanctions on Iran.

A year later Tehran begins gradually stepping back from its own commitments.

- 2020: Top commander killed-

On January 3, a US drone strike kills top Iranian commander Qasem Soleimani in Iraq, heightening fears of a direct confrontation after a string of incidents involving Gulf shipping.

Five days later, Iran launches a volley of missiles at US troops stationed in Iraq, but the standoff later eases.

- 2021: Gulf, Israel tensions-

The Revolutionary Guards in January seize a South Korean-flagged tanker in the Gulf amid a dispute over billions in frozen oil funds, the latest in a series of incidents there. The ship is released in April.

The same month, Iran claims Israel is behind an explosion at its Natanz uranium enrichment plant.

In a surprise move in May, the conservative-dominated Guardian Council disqualifies key establishment figure Ali Larijani from the June 18 presidential election.

It approves a field of candidates dominated by ultraconservatives, with judiciary chief Raisi seen as favourite.

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An Iraqi anti-graft police officer was shot dead outside his home Friday, a police official told AFP, in the second such murder in the country's south over the last month.

"Armed assailants this morning shot dead Mohammed al-Shemussi, a captain in the anti-corruption section, in front of his home," said Majed Hamid, a police captain in Amara, the capital of Missan province.

The perpetrators "fled in a taxi", he added.

Shemussi was in charge of applying the mandates of the integrity commission, the federal government's anti-corruption body.

Corruption in Iraq has deprived the public purse of some $450 billion of revenues since 2003, according to a 2019 parliamentary report.

In May, another Iraqi officer specialising in corruption issues was killed in Missan.

He was killed "the day after a police search at the homes of corruption suspects," another police source told AFP.

The home of the Missan tax authority's chief was among those searched, the source said.

Such positions are routinely allocated on the basis of political allegiance in Iraq.

The two killings are part of a wave of attacks against anti-corruption personnel in the rural province, sometimes involving bombs, including one against a judge, the source added.

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Israel is to provide around one million doses of Covid-19 vaccine to the Palestinian Authority in a swap as their expiry date looms, the Israeli prime minister's office said

Israel is to provide around one million doses of Covid-19 vaccine to the Palestinian Authority in a swap as their expiry date looms, the Israeli prime minister's office said Friday.

"Israel has signed an agreement with the Palestinian Authority, and will supply approximately one million doses of Pfizer vaccine that is about to expire," Prime Minister Naftali Bennett's office said, in a joint statement with the defence and health ministries.

Israel "will receive in return the doses that Pfizer is to send to the Palestinian Authority," the statement added.

The Palestinian Authority, based in the occupied West Bank, did not immediately comment on the deal.

"Israel will receive the same amount of doses of Pfizer in September/October 2021, on behalf of what is destined for the Palestinian Authority," the Israeli statement added.

"This agreement was made possible after noting that the stock of vaccines that Israel has in its possession meets its current needs."

Israel launched a sweeping vaccination campaign after obtaining millions of doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine.

More than 55 percent of Israel's population -- some 5.1 million people -- have received both doses of the vaccine.

On the Palestinian side, just over 260,000 people have received their two doses in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, according to the Palestinian health ministry.

From Wednesday to Thursday, 170 new Covid-19 cases were recorded in the West Bank and Gaza, bringing the total since the start of the pandemic to more than 312,000, 3,540 of them.

In Israel, 25 new cases were recorded from Thursday to Friday, bringing the total number of cases to 840,000, with more than 6,420 deaths.

The deal comes amid high tensions between Israel and the Palestinians, with violations of a fragile ceasefire between Israel and Gaza's Hamas rulers that went into effect on May 21, ending 11 days of Israeli assault.

Late Thursday, Israeli fighter jets carried out air strikes on Gaza for a second time since the ceasefire. The military said they were in retaliation for three days of incendiary ballons launched from the Palestinian enclave.

In Gaza, the coronavirus response has been hobbled by last month's fighting, which devastated infrastructure and reduced entire tower blocks to piles of smoking rubble.

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US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will head back to Europe next week days after President Joe Biden's first trip, further cultivating ties with allies France, Germany and Italy and taking up hotspots including Libya.

The State Department announced Friday that the top US diplomat will spend a week in Europe that will include talks with two of the continent's key leaders, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron.

Blinken will begin his visit in Berlin with participation Wednesday in an international conference on Libya, which is inching toward stability after a decade of war with elections planned for December 24.

Both Germany and France had rocky ties with Biden's mercurial predecessor Donald Trump, who berated Europeans on trade, defense and immigration policy.

The trip by Blinken -- a fluent French speaker who grew up partly in Paris -- will be the first to France by a senior member of the Biden administration.

Blinken will seek progress on another major global issue in Rome as he joins Italy in leading a conference of the US-led coalition against the Islamic State group, which has branched out in Africa as well as Afghanistan after being decimated in Syria.

In the historic southern Italian city of Matera, Blinken will participate in a meeting of foreign ministers of the Group of 20 major economies -- which includes two of the main US nemeses, China and Russia, potentially offering the opportunity for meetings.

Blinken at the G20 will "reinforce the US commitment to multilateralism and discuss continued cooperation in combatting the Covid-19 pandemic, addressing the climate crisis and building back better with our global partners, with a focus on Africa," State Department spokesman Ned Price said in a statement.

Biden visited Britain, Belgium and Switzerland on his maiden presidential trip in a bid to show greater transatlantic unity in the face of a rising China after Trump's chaotic presidency.

Biden, who took part in Group of Seven and NATO summits, proposed a Western-backed alternative to China's prolific infrastructure spending and resolved a long-running row between the United States and European Union on aviation.

Biden also used the trip to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin and his administration has said it is open to meetings with China, which the United States has identified as a pre-eminent rival on the world stage.

Blinken met senior Chinese officials in March in Alaska in a visibly tense meeting.

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Italy is reintroducing a five-day quarantine on arrivals from Britain after a spike in coronavirus cases there, Health Minister Roberto Speranza announced on Friday.

"I have signed a new order that... introduces a five day quarantine with a requirement to take a test for those coming from Britain," he wrote on Facebook.

Britain on Thursday recorded 11,007 new daily coronavirus cases, with the emergence of the Delta variant pushing the figure above 10,000 for the first time since late February.

Speranza's order also extends an existing ban on arrivals from India, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.

He said it would also allow entry for those arriving from the European Union, the United States, Canada and Japan who meet the requirements of the so-called Green Certificate issued by the EU.

That digital Covid certificate, which comes into force on July 1, will demonstrate whether a bearer has been vaccinated against Covid-19, has been recently tested or has acquired immunity from previously contracting the disease and recovering.

Currently those arriving from the United States, Japan and Canada must show a negative coronavirus test and quarantine for 10 days on arrival unless they come on one of a limited number of "Covid-free" flights.

Italy has been one of the European countries hardest hit by the coronavirus pandemic, but infection rates have fallen sharply in recent weeks and restrictions in much of the country have been lifted.

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Egyptian short film Kan Lak Maaya (Our Old Story) was screened on Thursday at the Ismailia Culture Palace, during the 22nd edition of the Ismailia Film Festival for Documentaries and Shorts, where a special tribute event was held to celebrate the films main actress, Safia El Emari.

During the seminar  attended by tens of filmmakers, critics and fans  the popular actress thanked the organisers at the culture ministry and the National Cinema Center for the return of such an important festival.

I hope we produce more films that positively represent Egyptian women, commented Safia El Emari speaking about how the film touches viewers.

Directed and written by Rogina Bsali, the 36-minute film was produced in 2020 by the National Cinema Centre. Our Old Story is a love story between Sheriff and Lila, who return to each other after many years of being separated, and decide to get married. Unfortunately, a sudden incident disturbs their plans.

Safia El Emari, who collaborated with great directors like Youssef Shahin and Kamal El-Sheikh, has made a pleasing appearance in the short film, said critic Tarek El-Shennawi, who ran the seminar, speaking highly about the career of the popular star.

El Emari focused on the humane sides of the character. Her performance took the film away from the melodrama, El-Shennawi added.

Under the presidency of critic Essam Zakareya, the festival is running until 22 June, with showings at various halls in Ismailia Cultural Palace and Misr Library among other venues.

The festival features 10 feature documentaries, 14 short documentaries, 16 short fiction films and 15 short animation films.

All events are taking place under strict precautions to avoid the spread of COVID-19. The global pandemic had previously forced successive delays of the festival.

For more arts and culture news and updates, follow Ahram Online Arts and Culture on Twitter at @AhramOnlineArts and on Facebook at Ahram Online: Arts & Culture

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I will line them up against the walls. They will be laid down on the asphalt of the main square in Avshar, a village in Armenias Ararat province where acting Armenian prime minister Nikol Pashinyan was holding an election rally. I will personally do that to anyone acting against the peoples will, he said this week.

Let them lie down to learn how to stand up if that makes things easier for them, he added.

Due to the ongoing political crisis in Armenia following the Nagorno-Karabakh War in 2020, the parliamentary elections scheduled for December 2023 have been moved to this Sunday, 20 June 2021.

Four political alliances and 23 parties have submitted documents to the Armenian Electoral Commission to register for the elections. By 10 June, four alliances and 21 parties were scheduled to participate, several of them founded in 2021 following Armenias defeat in the war. The official election campaign period started on 7 June and continues until 18 June.

The race has seen a comeback by three of Armenias former presidents, two as candidates and one as a supporter. The first president of independent Armenia, Levon Ter Petrosyan (in power from 1991 to 1998), heads the Armenian National Congress Party (ANC). Armenias second president, Robert Kocharyan (1998-2008), who also served as the first president of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic from 1994 to 1997 and is Karabakh-born, leads the Armenian Revolutionary Federation Party (ARF) in the Armenia Alliance.

Serj Sargsyan, 67, who served as third president from 2008 to 2018, supports the Im Honoured Alliances leader and candidate Artur Vanetsyan. Sargsyan, also Karabakh-born, was ousted by the Velvet Revolution that brought 46-year-old acting Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan to power. Since then, Pashinyan is the leader of the My Step Alliance formed by the Civil Contract Party.

There is an interesting but negative paradox in Armenian politics. Although there are 26 political parties and alliances competing in the elections, most are not true political parties in the classical sense, director of the Regional Studies Centre (RSC), an independent think tank in Yerevan, Richard Giragosian told Al-Ahram Weekly.

The overwhelming majority of these parties consist of artificial structures created by strong personalities and not traditional parties or political groups united by ideology or any coherent policy platform. In the 2018 elections, there were significantly fewer groups, with only 11 parties or alliances running.

During his campaign rallies, Pashinyan has made sure to gather enough supporters around him to avoid any surprises, including chants like Pashinyan traitor, which since the war between Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenia ended have become common. Pashinyan has a significant number of supporters, although the parliament rejected his candidacy last month.

Giragosian said the contest was about personalities more than policy alternatives. This polarisation and fragmentation means that most of the parties will not be able to pass the threshold to win seats in the new parliament. It is this that gives a further advantage to the incumbent Pashinyan government, he told the Weekly.

During one of his campaign rallies, Pashinyan held a hammer while giving a speech, waving it in a threatening way. I see the non-violent and popular revolution of steel gaining momentum every day in Armenia. We will show everyone their worth with a mandate of steel. We will be coming for you after the elections with this steel mandate, he said.

As demonstrated by his vicious and vindictive political discourse, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has exceeded all normal limits and surpassed all natural expectations by his impulsive and reckless rhetoric invoking threats and aggressive speeches, Giragosian said.

Armenia has been in a political crisis since Pashinyan signed a Russian-brokered ceasefire in November last year, described as shameful, to end the war with Azerbaijan over the Nagorno-Karabakh Armenian enclave. He was widely held responsible for Armenias defeat in the war.

Pashinyans main opponent, Robert Kocharyan, 66, is confident of the possibility of the return of the village of Hadrut to Armenia through negotiations, but not so confident about the return of Shushi, he said during a rally in Dilijan.

Hadrut is one of the Karabakh villages destroyed by Azerbaijan, including the destruction of Armenian cultural heritage. The village was taken under Azeri control after the war ended.

Giragosian said that the return of Kocharyan to power would also be a threat to democracy and reform in Armenia.

Although the former president needed a political vehicle of his own, his ARF Dashnak partners are actually a drain on his position and do not offer him support. As they secured a mere 3.9 per cent of the vote in the 2018 elections, Kocharyan is saving them from oblivion and political irrelevance, he thinks.

But as strong a threat as Kocharyan and his team may seem, their prospects are not good. Kocharyan is not only divisive, dangerous and destructive, but he has also never won a free-and-fair election on his own. He came to power by force, and many voters would prefer to see him remain as he is now: a former, and never a future, president.

Schoolchildren across the country have been brought to Pashinyans rallies. The 168.am local news agency interviewed the principal of one school whose pupils had been obliged to attend. She refused to look at the camera while answering questions, only saying that the children wished to accompany us. As soon as the gathering ends, they will go back to their classrooms.

She also refused to accept that the gathering was a political rally, even when the interviewer pointed out that as long as Pashinyan is around, it is his campaign rally.

A 10 June opinion poll released by Gallup has showed that the Armenia Alliance (Kocharyan and the ARF Party) is in the lead in the campaigns, with 24.1 per cent of the vote against Pashinyans Civil Contract at 23.8 per cent.

Meanwhile, there are still some 200 Armenian POWs in Azerbaijan. Last week, the Azeris released 15 of them in exchange for minefield maps provided by Armenia. The parties involved in the process included Georgia, the US, the EU Council and the Swedish chairmanship of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).

It is said that Pashinyan chose this timing of the deal to boost his position in the coming elections, with many asking why he did not negotiate the release of a larger number of POWs.

Pashinyans victory in the upcoming elections would be the best option for Azerbaijan to achieve its objectives, as he signed the humiliating agreement that ended the war between the two countries in November and is capable of dealing with the Azeri leaders in Baku.

A Kocharyan victory could jeopardise Azeri plans and renew military operations between the two countries.

Although the coming elections are widely expected to repeat the 2018 achievement of a truly free-and-fair contest, the political discourse of personal hatred and anger undermines democracy in Armenia. But although the post-war politics remain poisonous and polarised, these elections do offer a way to overcome the political stalemate and will provide a rare degree of legitimacy to whoever wins, Giragosian said.

He believes the campaign rallies are based on a confrontation of personalities rather than any real competition of policies. Like the opening rounds in the campaigns, the elections are also likely to remain defined by such distressing and destructive discourse, with a poverty of ideas, he concluded.

Voting around the country starts at 8 am on Sunday and ends at 8 pm the same evening.

*A version of this article appears in print in the 17 June, 2021 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly

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Iran is currently focusing on the Iraqi elections, the culmination of a tumultuous interim period that has brought grassroots uprisings and intense friction between the government and pro-Iranian militias in Iraq.

The latter reached a peak with the detention of Qasim Muslih, a commander of the Hashd Al-Shaabi, or Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF), on charges of killing political activists. The charges were subsequently dismissed due to lack of evidence, but his arrest triggered demonstrations and unrest among PMF militias, raising the spectre of an open clash between them and government forces.

At one point, Iraqi Defence Minister Jumaa Inad added fuel to the fire when he dismissed the part the PMF had played in the fight against the Islamic State (IS) terror group. Whoever believes that counterterrorism operations against IS would not have been completed without the PMF is wrong, he said, adding that the army could defeat terrorism on its own.

This was a direct affront to the prestige of the PMF, which claims it was responsible for the victory over IS in Iraq.

The intervention of prominent Shia leaders, such as Ammar Al-Hakim, prevented the situation from spiralling out of control, helping to restore calm and reaffirming the preeminence of the state.

However, the sudden visit to Iraq by Ismail Qaani, commander of the Al-Quds Force of the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), ostensibly as a peacemaker in the flare-up between the PMF and the Iraqi army, sparked suspicions that Iran was trying to form underground pro-Iranian militias because Tehran would no longer openly be able to rely on PMF contingents, even if they would continue to serve a logistics role.

According to Iraqi sources, the influence of the rapprochement between Iran and the US could be felt in the restoration of calm between the PMF and the Iraqi army. They believe that progress in the Vienna talks on the Iranian nuclear programme will have a positive impact on other regional issues and point to the visit by a delegation from the sultan of Oman to the Yemeni capital Sanaa timed to coincide with the visit by UN Envoy to Yemen Martin Griffiths.

Such developments are indicative of a significant shift in Iranian policy towards the regional questions in which Iran is directly or indirectly involved.

Since 9 April, Saudi and Iranian intelligence officials have held a series of talks on regional issues. According to Iraqi President Barham Salih, in a discussion hosted by the Beirut Institute think tank, the officials have made progress on the Yemeni question.

He did not go into the substance of the talks or how many rounds have been held, but he stressed that they were ongoing and important. On 10 May, Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh issued positive remarks on the talks in a press conference.

He said the participants were discussing bilateral and regional issues but gave no indication of progress, saying, lets wait and see. At the end of May, Saudi Crown-Prince Mohamed Bin Salman made the most encouraging remarks so far. He said that he was optimistic about the prospects for forging excellent relations with Iran.

Still, not everything may be progressing smoothly. An Iraqi political source close to the Iraqi president told Al-Ahram Weekly that the Iranian Foreign Ministry had approached Iraq in the hope that it would help advance the rapprochement with Riyadh. However, he suspected that the IRGC, which oversees Iranian affairs in Iraq, may not share the same outlook.

He added that although Baghdad has hosted two rounds of the Saudi-Iranian talks Qaani had not addressed the issue directly during his visit to Iraq. He made it clear that his focus was on restoring calm to the domestic front in Iraq.

On the other hand, according to Iraqi sources Qaani did mention matters related to the Iraqi elections. Of particular concern was the electoral alliance forged between Iraqi Shia leader Muqtada Al-Sadr and Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) leader Masoud Barzani against the backdrop of the tensions between the latter and Tehran after 2018.

This discord increased with the referendum on Iraqi Kurdistans independence. Sadr had been a key peacemaker between Barzani and Iraqi governments since the period in power of former Iraqi prime minister Nouri Al-Maliki. However, Tehran wants to avert a change in the electoral map in which the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) Party, the KDPs main rival, has a stab at placing one of its own in the presidents seat in Baghdad.

If the Iraqi experience says anything, it is that domestic politics are difficult to predict and always bring surprises. Seething tensions may erupt, as occurred between the PMF and the army, or there could be political assassinations and consequent confusion.

What we can say is that this is the first test of the grassroots movement in the political process and that the secularist political parties taking part in the elections are perhaps too idealistic in their ambitions to end the political hegemony of the Islamist parties with all their power, influence, money and indoctrinated supporters.

The secularist forces have strength to draw on among the educated and urban middle classes, but ultimately the militias will do what they can to prevent them from gaining ground in the political arena because of the threat their modernist discourse poses to the extremist religious-affiliated parties and their militias.

For the moment at least, it appears that Iraq has averted a political crisis that might have severely shaken its fragile stability largely due to the fact that the main players are investing their energies into the campaigns and electoral politics.

But the instruments of violence still abound, and there lurks the possibility that a militia will opt for a recourse to armed force, especially given the lack of clarity surrounding the nature of the agreement struck between the government and the PMF and the extent to which all sides will remain committed to it.

Another thing that the Iraqi experience tells us is that contradictions can coexist without going too far in opposite directions, as can be seen in the run-up to the elections. The situation is fraught, but a certain balance has been struck between Tehran, the PMF and the government, each side factoring in the difficult challenges they faced during the interim phase.

*A version of this article appears in print in the 17 June, 2021 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly

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Nigeria troops rescue some students after school kidnapping: Army



AFP, , Friday 18 Jun 2021



Troops in pursuit clashed early on Friday with the gunmen who had split into two groups on the run, the army said in a statement



Nigerian troops have rescued two teachers and five students after clashing with gunmen who raided a college in a northwestern state and abducted an unknown number of people, the army said on Friday.



Gunmen stormed the Federal Government College in Kebbi State on Thursday, killing a policeman and snatching students and teachers, in the third kidnap attack on a school in less than three weeks in Nigeria.



Troops in pursuit clashed early on Friday with the gunmen who had split into two groups on the run, the army said in a statement.



Security forces "have so far, rescued two teachers and five students after a fierce exchange of fire with the criminals," it said.



It said one female student had been found dead from exhaustion.



Troops also recovered 800 cattle stolen by the same gang.



Police have so far not confirmed the number of missing students and teachers taken from the school.



Heavily armed criminal gangs, known locally as bandits, have long terrorised central and northwestern Nigeria, raiding and looting villages, stealing cattle and kidnapping for ransom.



But since December they have increasingly targeted schools, arriving on motorbikes, abducting students or schoolchildren and herding them into forest hideouts to negotiate ransom payments.



At the end of May, gunmen seized 136 children from an Islamic seminary in central Nigeria's Niger state. They are still being held.



Nearly 900 children and students have already been kidnapped by gunmen for ransom since December, though many have since been freed.



https://english.ahram.org.eg/News/414554.aspx
KYODO NEWS - Jun 17, 2021 - 21:26 | World, All

Hong Kong police on Thursday arrested five executives of the media group that runs the outspoken Apple Daily newspaper for allegedly violating the national security law, including the group's CEO, local media reported.

The police also raided the building housing the group's headquarters as well as the newspaper's office, according to the reports.

Jimmy Lai, the founder of the parent media group Next Digital Ltd., has already been indicted under the same law. The media mogul is charged with conspiring with foreign forces, a crime punishable by life imprisonment.

The five arrested Thursday were group CEO Cheung Kim-hung, chief operating officer Royston Chow, editor-in-chief Ryan Law, deputy editor Chan Pui-man and chief executive editor Cheung Chi-wai, according to the newspaper.

The police did not identify those arrested by name but confirmed five directors of a company, four male and one female, were taken into custody for "collusion with a foreign country or with external elements to endanger security" in violation of the national security law.

Steve Li of the police's national security department told reporters they found over 30 articles requested foreign countries and institutions impose sanctions on Hong Kong and mainland China.

"We have very strong evidence that the questionable articles play a very crucial part in the conspiracy," Li said.

This is the second time a search has been conducted at the media building since August when Lai and other executives were arrested for collusion with foreign forces and fraud. Two of the five arrested Thursday were among those arrested then but were later released on bail.

Security Secretary John Lee also signed an order to freeze assets worth HK$18 million ($2.32 million) from three of the group's companies responsible for printing and internet content.

"This is the conspiracy" in which the suspects try to make use of journalistic work to collude with a foreign country or external elements to take hostile activities against Hong Kong and China, Lee told reporters.

"I do not envisage any professional journalist would be conspiring to do any act to endanger national security," Lee said, urging journalists to "work as freely as you like in accordance with the law, provided you do not conspire or have any intention to break any Hong Kong law."

Meanwhile, Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council, which handles Taiwan's relations with China, said in a statement that the Hong Kong government's action "is unimaginable in a democracy" and that it would only drive its people further away and is detrimental to its own image and that of the Communist Party of China.

Apple Daily said in an open letter that the daily will not budge in the face of political persecution.

"The law enforcement has labeled journalistic materials that were gathered openly as evidence of a crime."

Police have confiscated 38 computers used by journalists containing a considerable amount of news materials, the newspaper said.

The Next Media staff union condemned the police action as a blatant violation of press freedom.

"Actions by (police) today fully reflect how their power has expanded under the National Security Law," the union said in a statement posted on their Facebook page.

"This would spread fear among journalists that even publishing articles could breach national security law," Hong Kong Journalists Association chairman Chris Yeung said. "Self-censorship will worsen when the media cannot protect the news sources."

Lai, whose $64 million worth of assets in the company have been frozen by authorities while the criminal investigation continues, is currently serving time in prison for taking part in unauthorized assemblies in 2019. He is due to face trial on the collusion and fraud charges.

Stock trading of Next Digital was halted Thursday.

Related coverage:

Fresh ruling extends H.K. media mogul's jail term to 20 months

H.K. freezes media mogul Lai's assets over national security law

Hong Kong media mogul Lai faces 14-month jail term over 2019 rallies
KYODO NEWS - Jun 17, 2021 - 14:32 | All, Japan, Coronavirus

Japan's state-run mass COVID-19 inoculation centers started administering vaccine to people aged 18 or older Thursday, extending vaccinations beyond those aged 65 or over as many slots at the centers remain vacant.

The move came two days after the Defense Ministry, which runs the centers in Tokyo and Osaka, decided to remove age restrictions so as not to waste vaccine at the facilities where slots remained largely vacant for the period through June 27.

As of 10 a.m. Thursday, around 90 percent of the 70,000 slots at the Tokyo center between next Monday and June 27 were filled. At the Osaka center, however, around 20,000 of the 35,000 slots for the same period were still unfilled.

The centers, which can inoculate up to 10,000 people per day in Tokyo and 5,000 in Osaka, administer U.S. pharmaceutical company Moderna Inc.'s two-dose vaccine, which is recommended for people aged 18 or older.

A vaccination coupon sent by a local municipality is required to make a reservation via the Defense Ministry's website, the Line messaging app service or a phone call.

"I was anxious about getting infected as face-to-face classes have resumed at my university. We take tests and submit reports around this time, so I'm slightly relieved after receiving a shot," said Ryoto Matsuda, a 21-year-old university student at the Tokyo center.

Ryuji Shimada, a 44-year-old employee at a Tokyo wholesale food company, said he had set an alarm for midnight Tuesday to make a reservation for a shot immediately after the start of the booking period.

"Since we're involved in the delivery of food items, I tried to get a shot early so our clients are relieved," he said. "We face a tough situation as sales have dropped and there is no compensation. I am waiting for the day when people can go out and dine like before."

Daisuke Kuroda, 50, who came to the Osaka center with his wife Kumiko, 47, from Himeji, Hyogo Prefecture, said, "We'd like to go to many places without wearing masks."

The centers were set up last month to accelerate Japan's vaccine rollout by supplementing the efforts of local municipalities. The country's vaccination rate lags far behind other developed countries.

The centers initially targeted people aged 65 or older living in seven prefectures in the Tokyo metropolitan and Kansai areas but the scope was later expanded to accept younger people nationwide.

Slots from June 28 onward, however, are mostly reserved for elderly people to receive second doses of the vaccine, with hardly any slots available for new reservations.

Meanwhile, Taro Kono, the minister in charge of the country's vaccination efforts, said Thursday the government may achieve this week its target of administering 1 million shots per day. He made the comments in an online meeting with Akio Mimura, chairman of the Japan Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
By Keita Nakamura, KYODO NEWS - Jun 18, 2021 - 18:56 | Others

Japan's government plans to encourage firms to let their employees choose to work four days a week instead of five, aiming to improve the balance between work and life for people who have family care responsibilities or need more time off to acquire new skills.

The government included the promotion of an optional four-day workweek in its annual economic policy guideline finalized Friday by Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga's Cabinet.

Experts are divided, however, on whether the new initiative, intended to address challenges posed by the country's labor shortage, will be widely accepted, with labor and management both voicing concerns about possible unwanted outcomes.

For employers, while people working four days a week may become more motivated, this may not improve their productivity enough to compensate for the lost workday. Employees, meanwhile, fear pay cuts.

Among expected advantages are helping people with family-care responsibilities avoid the need to quit their jobs, promotion of recurrent education, and helping more people take on side jobs, the government said.

The coronavirus pandemic has helped the idea of a four-day workweek gain traction as the health crisis causes people to spend more time at home.

In late April, the ruling Liberal Democratic Party recommended that the government take policy measures to facilitate adoption of the system.

The LDP said working fewer days is expected to promote "diversified working styles" and prompt workers with new skills to move to growing industries such as IT.

At a key economic and fiscal policy panel meeting in mid-April where the promotion of a four-day workweek was discussed, Suga said his government would consider expanding support for people willing to enhance their careers through recurrent education without leaving their jobs.

Among major economies, Australian, Canadian, Italian and U.S. employees work longer hours than Japanese, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development's survey. But Japan's labor market remains rigid, with productivity showing limited improvement as people take fewer holidays compared to other developed countries and labor mobility stays low.

According to a survey conducted on over 4,000 firms by the labor ministry last year, 8.3 percent of them were giving their employees more days off than under a five-day workweek.

Internet and e-commerce service giant Yahoo Japan Corp. started allowing its employees who need more time off for caregiving to take three days off a week in April 2017.

"It has been favorably received in general, with some employees saying that it became easier to match their days off with their children's activities," a Yahoo Japan spokesman said.

Meanwhile, Hisashi Yamada, vice chairman of think tank Japan Research Institute, said he does not expect a four-day workweek to rapidly spread in Japan even with the government pushing it because it would complicate personnel management and evaluation.

"Let's say, if employees take second jobs, it would be difficult for managers to know how long they work in total and to evaluate equally those who take two days off a week and those who take three. From the employees' standpoint, they would not want to see their income from their main jobs decrease," said Yamada, who is well versed in labor economics issues.

At Yahoo Japan and many other firms offering an option of fewer workdays, extra holidays are unpaid. The Yahoo Japan spokesman said just about 100 of some 7,000 employees at the company had applied for the four-day workweek as of April. Those who want more days off for such purposes as acquiring new skills and taking side jobs are not eligible for the program, he said.

Japan Research's Yamada said he believes some small- and medium-sized businesses cannot afford to give such extra days off, and some businesses might try to cut labor costs by applying a four-day workweek even to employees who want to work more days.

"It will be important for the government to draw up a framework guaranteeing a worker's right to choose whether to take three days off a week," he said.

Takuya Hoshino, an economist at the Dai-ichi Life Research Institute, says simply introducing a four-day workweek may not necessarily encourage employees to use their time off in a way that benefits their careers or contributes to the economy.

"It's important for companies to make it clear what they intend in adopting such a system" and provide necessary support to employees to that end, he said.

Related coverage:

FEATURE: 4-day workweek gaining traction as business responds to pandemic

Skymark Airlines to introduce 4-day workweek for office employees

How the coronavirus is changing working styles in Japan
KYODO NEWS - Jun 18, 2021 - 22:32 | All, Japan

Former Japanese Justice Minister Katsuyuki Kawai was sentenced Friday to three years in prison and a forfeiture of 1.3 million yen ($12,000) in a high-profile case over buying votes for his wife in the 2019 upper house election.

Dismissing Kawai's claim of partial innocence, the Tokyo District Court ruled that he handed out a total of 28.7 million yen to 100 local assembly members and supporters in his wife Anri's constituency in Hiroshima Prefecture, western Japan.

"It is an extremely malicious crime that significantly undermined a fair election, the foundation of democracy," Presiding Judge Yasuaki Takahashi said.

Prosecutors had sought a four-year prison term and the forfeiture of 1.5 million yen during the 58-year-old former House of Representatives lawmaker's trial.

The defense appealed the ruling, having sought a suspended sentence on the grounds that Kawai had admitted to most of the charges and resigned as a lawmaker.

His bail granted in March was revoked after Kawai was convicted and again remanded in custody at the Tokyo Detention House. The defense requested his release on bail again Friday, but it was rejected.

The ruling did not touch on the unusually large sum of 150 million yen that the Liberal Democratic Party headquarters provided to Anri Kawai's camp ahead of the 2019 House of Councillors election.

Katsuyuki Kawai has denied that the money was used for buying votes. His wife won a seat in the July 2019 election, but she resigned as an upper house member in February this year.

Anri Kawai's campaign was supported by then Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga, now prime minister, and other senior LDP lawmakers.

According to the ruling, the former justice minister gave about 29 million yen to 100 local politicians and supporters to secure votes for his wife in the upper house election.

Kawai asserted his innocence at the beginning of the trial last August but reversed course and pleaded guilty later, telling a court hearing in March, "I cannot deny that I desired to get my wife elected."

He admitted that the cash he gave out to 90 individuals was for vote buying and resigned as a lawmaker.

The LDP headquarters had approved Anri Kawai as an additional candidate in the Hiroshima constituency with the aim of winning two seats, but the prefectural party chapter did not back the move.

The prosecution cited the difficult situation as a motive for Kawai's actions.

In January this year, the Tokyo court sentenced Anri Kawai to 16 months in prison, suspended for five years, for conspiring with her husband and handing out 1.6 million yen in total to four Hiroshima prefectural assembly members between March and May in 2019.

Related coverage:

4-yr jail term sought for ex-justice minister over vote buying

Japan's ex-justice minister resigns, pleads guilty to vote buying
KYODO NEWS - Jun 19, 2021 - 03:50 | All, Japan

A 40-year-old male customer at an internet cafe near Tokyo was arrested Friday night after holding a female worker hostage for more than 32 hours in a small room, police said.

The worker in her 20s was released with no visible injuries. Police officers broke the door's lock with special tools and stormed into the room after confirming the man had fallen asleep.

The suspect, identified as Kazutaka Hayashi, barricaded the 3-square-meter soundproof room but made no demands for money in exchange for the woman's release, according to investigative sources. He entered the cafe at around 10 a.m. Thursday.

Hayashi was arrested on site at around 10:40 p.m. Friday on suspicion of holding the woman unlawfully. He admitted to the charge, according to the police.

While threatening to hurt the woman with a knife, Hayashi warned police not to approach the room. The police suspect he tampered with the lock from inside the room, as the door could not be opened even with a master key.

Police said they received a report from the cafe in Saitama city at around 4:10 p.m. Thursday that the woman had gone to the male customer's room at 2:20 p.m. after being called by him, but had not returned.

While holed up in the room, the man exchanged words with police officers through the intercom. When police gave food and drinks to the two shortly before noon on Friday, the woman spoke through the intercom to police.

However, there had been no response from the man since shortly after 8 p.m. on Friday.

The internet cafe, with its 64 small private rooms in which customers can use the internet, occupies the sixth and seventh floors of a building on a shopping street near JR Omiya Station. The incident took place in a room on the seventh floor.

The room in which Hayashi is accused of keeping the woman had a personal computer, chair and television. The operator of the establishment touts the small rooms as a quiet and private environment suitable for work or taking a nap.

One senior police official described the standoff as unprecedented, in that it "occurred in such a closed, small space."

Due to the cafe's emphasis on privacy with customers spread out in individual rooms, it took more than an hour and a half after the woman left to attend to the suspect before her disappearance was noticed.

With the victim trapped for a long period of time with the suspect in a closed room, many people posted messages online worrying about her safety as well as questioning the practice of internet cafes allowing customers to have locked private rooms.
New Delhi:

In what can be termed a case of criminal negligence on part of the authorities and local administration, a 13-year-old victim of gang rape could not get medical attention for two days after she was violated.



The girl was gang-raped on Saturday by two minors who have been detained in connection with the case, police said on Monday.



Senior Sub Inspector of Sahibabad Jitender Singh said the medical examination of the victim could not be conducted even after two days due to non-availability of doctors at the government hospital.



The girl was playing with two boys who live in her neighbourhood when they coaxed her to accompany them to an isolated place and took turns to rape her, said her father in an FIR.



A case has been registered under section 376 of the IPC and the POCSO Act.
New Delhi:

Five years after then Congress President Sonia Gandhi laid its foundation stone, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday arrived in Rajasthans Barmer to launch 'work commencement' of the Pachpadra Oil refinery.

Rajasthan CM Vasundhara Raje and Union Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan will also be present during the 'work commencement' of the oil refinery.

The refinery has become the latest issue of confrontation between BJP and Congress with both parties alleging each other of deceiving the youth of Rajasthan by stalling the project for five years.

Former Rajasthan CM Ashok Gehlot under whose tenure the foundation stone of the refinery was laid, hit back at the BJP and said Rajasthan CM Vasundhara Raje stalled the project for four years.

Gehlot tweeted, CM kept trying to mislead ppl of state by repeatedly questioning state's share 26% in this project wd claims that wen land is ours, oil is ours & water is ours, then why only 26%? I ask her why state share in #Refinery has not been increased from 26% in new MOU?

However, amid the allegations of delay, Prime Minister Narendra Modi will inaugurate the commencement of work for the Rajasthan Refinery at Pachpadra in Barmer.

Here are the live updates:

# The way in which Vasundhara Ji tackled drought crisis during both her terms and helped people is praiseworthy. It is in contrast to the opposition in the state, whose poor drought management in Rajasthan is widely known: PM Modi

The way in which Vasundhara Ji tackled drought crisis during both her terms, and helped people is praiseworthy. It is in contrast to the opposition in the state, whose poor drought management in Rajasthan is widely known: PM Modi  ANI (@ANI) January 16, 2018

# Congress and drought are twin brothers. Congress brings drought where ever it goes.

# Meanwhile, Congress has taken a dig at Modi for launching Rajasthan refinery.

    4                        https://t.co/ImYfEEYV3P  Congress (@INCIndia) January 16, 2018

# This is a time for 'Sankalp se Siddhi.' We must focus on our aims and work towards achieving them by 2022, when we mark 75 years of freedom: PM Modi

This is a time for 'Sankalp se Siddhi.' We must focus on our aims and work towards achieving them by 2022, when we mark 75 years of freedom: PM Modi pic.twitter.com/vNiLL7kZY4  ANI (@ANI) January 16, 2018

# I am elated to be in Rajasthan that too for a project that will bring happiness and prosperity to the lives of many: PM Modi at inauguration of project commencement of oil refinery in Barmer

The way in which Vasundhara Ji tackled drought crisis during both her terms, and helped people is praiseworthy. It is in contrast to the opposition in the state, whose poor drought management in Rajasthan is widely known: PM Modi  ANI (@ANI) January 16, 2018

I am elated to be in Rajasthan that too for a project that will bring happiness and prosperity to the lives of many: PM Modi at inauguration of project commencement of oil refinery in Barmer pic.twitter.com/cdBwvJQYtD  ANI (@ANI) January 16, 2018

# PM Narendra Modi in #Rajasthan's Barmer; at the inauguration of the project commencement of an oil refinery.

PM Narendra Modi in #Rajasthan's Barmer; at inauguration of the project commencement of an oil refinery pic.twitter.com/NOvbEyDUQb  ANI (@ANI) January 16, 2018

# Former Rajasthan CM Ashok Gehlot has launched a spree of attacks on BJP government and CM Vasundhara Raje on twitter.

CM kept trying to mislead ppl of state by repeatedly questioning state's share 26% in this project wd claims that wen land is ours,oil is ours & water is ours, then why only 26%? I ask her why state share in #Refinery has not been increased from 26% in new MOU? #RefineryRajasthan  Ashok Gehlot (@ashokgehlot51) January 16, 2018

Still waiting for an appropriate answer as to why CM Smt. Vasundhara Raje stalled the ambitious #Refinery project for more than 4 years that would have changed the fate & face of our state. #RefineryRajasthan  Ashok Gehlot (@ashokgehlot51) January 16, 2018

Still waiting for an appropriate answer as to why CM Smt. Vasundhara Raje stalled the ambitious #Refinery project for more than 4 years that would have changed the fate & face of our state. #RefineryRajasthan  Ashok Gehlot (@ashokgehlot51) January 16, 2018

# PM Narendra Modi arrives in #Rajasthan's Barmer; he will inaugurate the project commencement of oil refinery in Pachpadra today

PM Narendra Modi arrives in #Rajasthan's Barmer; he will inaugurate the project commencement of oil refinery in Pachpadra today pic.twitter.com/39rXT9QSja  ANI (@ANI) January 16, 2018

# The Rajasthan refinery will be the first in the state, which is blessed with immense oil and gas reserves. This refinery will benefit Rajasthan, especially the industrious youth of the state: PM Modi twitted on Monday.

# PM Modi on Monday twitted: Looking forward to visiting Rajasthan tomorrow. Will attend a programme to mark the commencement of work for the Rajasthan Refinery at Pachpadra, in Barmer and will also address a public meeting.

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New Delhi:

Congress on Tuesday took a dig at Prime Minister Narendra Modi who inaugurated project commencement of Rajasthans first oil refinery at Pachpadra in Barmer, five years after Sonia Gandhi laid its foundation stone in 2013.

Taking pot shots at Modis refinery commencement launch, Congress tweeted, Modi government is about to complete 4 years in power, but still it has to inaugurate works done by Congress party to get clicked.

It was noted that in 2013, then Congress President Sonia Gandhi along with then Rajasthan CM Ashok Gehlot had led the foundation stone of the Barmer oil refinery.

However, a few months later, the BJP led by Vasundhara Raje succeeded the Ashok Gehlot led Congress government in Rajasthan and the work of Pachpadra oil refinery went into cold storage.

The BJP alleged that Gehlot government fooled people of Rajasthan by announcing a refinery on paper without any statutory clearances while no work was done on the ground.

Highlights of PM Modis event to launch project commencement of Rajasthan oil refinery

In 2013 Congress mocked the aspirations & emotions of the youth of Rajasthan by announcing a Refinery only on Paper without any statutory clearances, Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said.

Congress party hitting back at the BJP accused Rajasthan CM Vasundhara Raje of misleading people of Rajasthan and demanded an apology for stalling Congresss project.

Former CM Ashok Gehlot said, CM kept trying to mislead ppl of the state by repeatedly questioning state's share 26% in this project wd claims that when land is ours, oil is ours & water is ours, then why only 26%? I ask her why state share in #Refinery has not been increased from 26% in new MOU?

State's public & youth were not deceived by us but by the BJP govt that stalled all of Congress' important projects, including the #Refinery, The CM should tender an apology to the public for this, Gehlot said.

PM Modi while launching the work commencement of the oil refinery attacked Congress and said the party is a twin brother of drought and it brings drought, where ever it goes.

He said, I am elated to be in Rajasthan that too for a project that will bring happiness and prosperity to the lives of many.

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Mumbai:

The owner of the Mojos Bistro pub Yug Tulli, who had been evading arrest in the Kamala Mills compound fire case, surrendered before the Mumbai Police, officials said on Tuesday.

We have arrested Yug Tulli, after he surrendered himself before police today morning at N M Joshi Marg Police Station, S Jaykumar, Additional Commissioner of Police ( Central ) told PTI.

He will be produced before a court today, said Jaykumar.

After the arrest of Tulliwho had been evading arrest since last two weeksall the owners of the Mojos Bistro and 1 Above have been arrested, another official said.

On Sunday, Tulli was spotted at the Hyderabad Airport with his wife but disappeared before the police could arrest him, he said.

The deadly fire, which had engulfed Mojos Bistro and the adjacent 1 Above pub, at the Kamala Mills compound on December 29 last year had claimed 14 lives.

Tulli, a Nagpur based businessman, and his partner Yug Pathak, the son of former Pune Police Commissioner K K Pathak, were booked under sections of culpable homicide not amounting to murder.

The action was taken on the basis of the Mumbai Fire Brigades report which had said the fire possibly started at Mojos Bistro due to the flying embers of a hookah and spread to 1 Above, he said.

Initially this offence was registered against the three owners of the 1 Above pub, managers, and staff, he said

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Mumbai:

Two days after Special CBI Judge BH Loyas son claimed that he is convinced that his father died a natural death, Maharashtra Police on Tuesday said that there was no foul play in his death.

Nagpur Joint Commissioner of Police Shivaji Bodkhe said, Judge B H Loya died due to a heart attack.

After our thorough investigation we have found that Loya died a natural death. Postmortem and forensic report confirm his death due to heart attack, added the joint commissioner.

The officer added that postmortem and medical reports did not find anything unusual or any poisonous substance in his body.

Also read: CBI Judge Loya died natural death, family convinced about it, says son



The Nagpur Police investigated the matter after a report of accidental death was filed in Loyas case.

Judge Loya died on December 1, 2014. His death raised a massive political storm since he was hearing the Sohrabuddin Shaikh fake encounter case, in which BJP chief Amit Shah is one of the accused.

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New Delhi:

After Rajasthan and Gujarat, Haryana became the third BJP ruled state to ban Sanjay Leela Bhansalis upcoming period drama Padmavat. The movie has been mired in controversies since inception.

The order came a day after Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar said they will take a call on Padmavat after a private screening.

Haryana Health Minister Anil Vij on Tuesday took to micro-blogging site Twiiter to make the announcement.

Imposing a ban on Deepika Padukone-starrer Vij wrote, Film Padmavati/Padmavat banned in Haryana.

Talking about their latest decision Vij told media that the decision has been taken in view of the safety and security of the state."

The issue has been raised in the last cabinet meeting and Vij advised a ban on the Rs. 190-crore costume drama.

In this movie, they have distorted all the historical facts... today again, I have raised this issue, now that the Censor Board cleared this movie, he added.

Film Padmavati/Padmavat banned in Haryana

 ANIL VIJ MINISTER HARYANA (@anilvijminister) January 16, 2018

Earlier, Rajasthan banned 'Padmaavat' following huge protests by Karni Sena and other Rajput groups all over the country.

Also Read: Deepika Padukone-starrer Padmaavat's re-released trailer will give you goosebumps!

Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje had also written to Union broadcasting minister Smriti Irani urging a ban on the film. Gujarat too, has imposed a ban on Deepika, Shahid, Ranveer-starrer even after necessary cuts and changes, suggested by the Censor Board of the Film Certification.

However, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath has not yet cleared the air regarding release of 'Padmaavat' in the state.

Based on 16th century Sufi poet Malik Muhammad Jayasis epic poem 'Padmavat', the movie faced resistance due to misinformation campaigns and rumour-mongering.

Starring Deepika Padukone as Rani Padmavati, Shahid Kapoor as Maharawal Ratan Singh & Ranveer Singh as Alauddin Khilji, the Sanjay Leela Bhansali directorial is slated to release nationwide on January 25.

Also Read: Akshay Kumar not WORRIED about PadMan-Padmaavat clash

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New Delhi:

The four senior Supreme Court judges  Justices J Chelameswar, Ranjan Gogoi, Madan B Lokur and Kurian Joseph  who had publicly criticised the Chief Justice of India (CJI) last week met Dipak Misra on Tuesday in his chamber in a bid to resolve the rift.

According to sources, the meeting was called by CJI Deepak Mishra in his Supreme Court chamber and more meeting will be held between him and the dissenting judges.

It is yet not known what issues were discussed in the meeting between the CJI and four judges.

Attorney General K K Venugopal, earlier in the day had expressed doubts over whether the crisis has been resolved and hoped it would soon be settled.

I hope things will be fully settled within 2-3 days, said Venugopal.

On Friday, the four judges held a press conference and levelled serious charges against Chief Justice Dipak Misra. They had said that CJI Misra was ignoring rules and assigning important cases to select benches with no rationale.

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New Delhi:

The Indian Railway Recuritment Board (RRB) will soon release official notification inviting aspirants to fill nearly 50,000 vacancies for the post of Assistant Station Master.



Once the notification is released, interested and eligible aspirants can apply on the official website i.e indianrailways.gov.in.

According to reports,the application process will start from January and will continue till February.

VACANCY DETAILS:

Total posts: 50,000 (approximately)

NAME OF THE POST:

Assistant Station Master (ASM)

ELIGIBILITY CRITERIA:

EDUCATIONAL QUALIFICATION:

All the interested, eligible candidates must possess a Bachelor's degree or equivalent from the recognised university or institute.

For more details on eligibility, candidates need to wait for the official notification to release.

Also Read: ICAI CA CPT Final Results 2017 at icaiexam.icai.org

AGE LIMIT:

Candidates should be between 18 and 32 years for RRB ASM Recruitment 2018.

However, there is age relaxation for the reserved categories as per the government norms.

PAY SCALE:

Selected candidates will be paid between Rs 5,200 to 20,200 per month.

Selection process:

Candidates will be selected on the basis of marks obtained in Prelims exam, Mains examination and personal interview round.

How to apply:

All the candidates need to apply through online application mode only.

Also Read: Jind rape and murder case: Suspected accused found dead in Kurukshetra

About Indian Railways

One of the world's largest railway networks, the Indian Railways, was first introduced in the year 1853. It has always been an integral part of lives across the country.

Railways were first introduced to India in the year 1853 from Bombay to Thane.

By the year 1951, the different systems of the railways were nationalised as one unit, which became the Indian Railways. In the year 2003, the Indian Railways was featured in the Guinness Book of World Records for offering the steepest rise in altitude in the space of 96 kilometres.

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New Delhi:

A proposal worth Rs 3,547 crore to procure assault rifles and carbines was cleared on Tuesday by the Defence Acquisition Council (DAC), which also announced simplified norms to give a boost to Make in India programme.

Under the proposal, which was cleared at the DAC meeting chaired by Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, 72,000 assault rifles and 93,895 carbines will be procured on the fast track basis, a defence ministry release said.

The procurement is to enable the defence forces to meet their immediate requirement for the troops deployed on the borders and is expected to address the shortage of small arms for the armed forces, the ministry said.

Tenders will soon be floated to set the ball rolling for the procurement process, sources said, adding the procurement could also be done at the government to government (G to G) level.

To encourage participation of private sector in defence design and production and to give a boost to Make in India programme, the DAC introduced significant changes in the Make II category of the Defence Procurement Procedure, it said.

The DAC also simplified the procedure to make it industry friendly, with minimal government control.

Also Read: Pakistan Army Chief in Sri Lanka, to discuss matters of professional interests with counterpart

The revised procedure will now allow the defence ministry to accept proposals from the industry and also allow start-ups to develop equipment for the Indian Armed Forces.

The minimum qualification criteria to participate in Make II projects has also been relaxed by removing conditions related to credit rating and reducing financial net worth criteria.

According to the earlier Make II procedure, only two vendors were shortlisted to develop prototype equipment.

Now, all vendors meeting the relaxed eligibility criteria will be allowed to participate in the prototype development process. The vendor will not be required to submit Detailed Project Report, the statement said.

After accord of approval of the Make II project by the council, all clearances will be accorded at Service HQ (SHQ) level, it added.

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New Delhi:

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will join Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on a visit to Gujarat on Wednesday.



Both the Prime Ministers will pay homage to Mahatma Gandhi at Sabarmati Ashram in Ahmedabad.



Later, they will visit the Center of Excellence in Vadrad and inaugurate a Center of Excellence for date palms in Bhuj via video conference and inaugurate the iCreate Center at Deo Dholera Village in Ahmedabad.



They will visit a startup exhibition and interact with innovators and startup CEOs. The two Prime Ministers will dedicate a mobile water desalination van to Suigam Taluka of Banaskantha district through a video link and address a gathering.



The two Premiers will also visit the Centre of Excellence for Vegetables at Vadrad in Banaskantha district. They will be briefed on work plan of the Centre. They will inaugurate the Centre of Excellence for Date Palms at Kukama, Bhuj District through a video link.



The two Prime Ministers will also interact with farmers.



Prime Minister Netanyahu will later depart for Mumbai.

#WATCH PM Modi and Israel PM Netanyahu's roadshow in Ahmedabad https://t.co/eAE0jWc46u  ANI (@ANI) January 17, 2018

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Kolkata:

Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) chairman Mukesh Ambani on Tuesday said his company will invest Rs 5,000 crore in West Bengal in businesses such as petroleum and retail.

The investment will be made over the next three years and also promote electronic industry by manufacturing mobile phones and set top boxes, Ambani said at the two-day Bengal Global Business Summit which began here.

Also Read | Reliance Jio Sachet packs: Cheapest 4G prepaid plans under Rs 100

He said RIL has already pumped in Rs 15,000 crore in the telecom business in the state although it had earlier committed to invest Rs 4,500 crore.

Also Read: Jio 'Surprise cashback' offer doles out benefits up to Rs 3,300 for Prime subscribers

This was made possible due to conducive business environment in the state under Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, Ambani said.

The business summit is being attended by a host of prominent industrialists including L N Mittal of Arcelor Mittal, Sajjan Jindal of JSW Steel, Kishor Biyani of Future group, Uday Kotak, the head of Kotak group and Sanjiv Goenka, chairman of RP-Sanjiv Goenka group.

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Gurugram: A case of shooting and killing of an innocent 4-year-old boy in Pataudi area of Haryana's cyber city Gurugram has come to light. In fact, four armed youths on 2 motorcycles in Khalilpur village of Pataudi late last night fatally attacked a family, first shot 4-year-old innocent grand man playing in the courtyard of the house, then shot Praveen, the father of the deceased grand, sitting a short distance from the house, and fled the spot.

According to ACP Crime, the duo was admitted to the trauma centre in Rewari, where 4-year-old Grand died, while Praveen's condition is also said to be critical. According to ACP crime, just a few hours after the incident, the police arrested the four named youths involved in the incident and revealed the case. Initial inquiries are said to be related to the purchase of illicit liquor.

Praveen and Naveen alias Kanchi, Harish alias Baman, Paramjit alias Susu and Yemen alias Bhaiyya had enmity over this. The controversy escalated to such an end that the 4-year-old innocent was shot while the child's father is facing a serious condition in the hospital. ACP crime, the police are trying to trace them.

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WHO said on Wednesday that a new variant of covid has been found in 29 countries. The variant, lambda, is said to have been found for the first time in South America. WHO said in weekly updates that the Lambda variant, first found in Peru, was responsible for the growing cases of covid in South America.

Officials said Peru has seen more impact of lambda variants. In Peru, 81 per cent of covid cases have been linked to the same variant since April 2021. In Chile, 32 per cent of the sequences submitted in the last 60 days have been found to be the variant. Other countries like Argentina and Ecuador have also registered several cases of the variant.

Mutet contains Lambda variant: WHO said the Lambda variant is mute which is going to increase the transition capacity. At the same time, antibodies are not going to affect this form of infection. The organisation said more studies are needed to better understand the Lambda variant. It has been revealed that any form of virus is said to be alarming when scientists believe that it is more contagious and can make it seriously ill. Tests, treatments and vaccines identifying worrying variants can also be less effective against it.

However, WHO fear that this form of infection may not spread around the world. The delta variant also raised world concerns recently. Britain has claimed that the cases in its country doubled in 11 days and delta variants are being attributed. Britain has reported the highest number of 8,125 covid-19 cases in the last 24 hours since the end of February and Public Health England (PHE) has learnt that the delta format (B1) first identified in India. 617 2) Cases have increased from about 30,000 to 42,323 in a week.

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New Delhi: Dr Kenneth David Kaunda, the first President of Zambia and founder of modern Zambia, passed away on Thursday at the age of 97. Expressing grief over his death, President Ram Nath Kovind today said that the contribution of dedicated Gandhian and stalwart African leader Kaunda will never go in vain.

Saddened to hear about the demise of Dr. Kenneth Kaunda, 1st President & founding father of modern Zambia. I was privileged to meet him in 2018. A towering Pan-African leader & a committed Gandhian, his contribution will never go dim. Deepest condolences to the people of Zambia. pic.twitter.com/OQhW6IYCpX ? President of India (@rashtrapatibhvn) June 18, 2021

Rashtrapati Bhavan quoted Kovind as saying, "Saddened by the information about the death of Dr. Kenneth David Kaunda, the first President of Zambia and founder of modern Zambia. My deepest condolences to the people of Zambia." The President said that he had the opportunity to meet Dr. Kaunda in 2018. PM Narendra Modi also tweeted his condolences on the incident. He wrote, "Deeply saddened to hear of the death of Dr. Kenneth David Kaunda. He was a respected international leader and excellent politician. I extend my condolences to his family and the people of Zambia."

Dr. Kaunda was admitted to the hospital on Monday where he was undergoing treatment for Pneumonia. Kaunda was the leader of the movement that led to the end of british colonial rule in the South African country of Zambia. He became Zambia's first democratically elected president in 1964.

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Zambia's first president Kenneth Kaunda, dies aged 97
New Delhi: Interim Congress President Sonia Gandhi and former National President Rahul Gandhi on Friday condoled the death of The First President of Zambia and founder of modern Zambia, Dr Kenneth David Kaunda, saying he was a true friend of India and will continue to inspire generations to come.

Sonia Gandhi in her condolence message said that Kaunda was a stalwart personality who led the struggle against colonialism. As a politician, he groomed Zambia. He will always be remembered for his true friends and non-aligned movement of India. He said his special relationship with India and the Congress party will always be cherished. He said that in this hour of grief, India and the Congress Party extend deep condolences to the family and friends of Awam and Kaunda of Zambia.

It?s sad to hear of the demise of Dr Kenneth David Kaunda.



A champion of African freedom, he will continue to be a source of inspiration for generations to come.



My condolences to his family, friends and the people of Zambia. pic.twitter.com/SxqBpO8w36 ? Rahul Gandhi (@RahulGandhi) June 17, 2021

Rahul Gandhi tweeted that he was saddened to hear of the death of Dr. Kenneth David Kaunda. He was a champion of African independence and will continue to inspire generations to come. My condolences to his family and to the people of Zambia. Dr. Kaunda passed away on Thursday at the age of 97.

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Kathmandu, June 18

Ireland and Denmark, two members of the European Union, have provided various medical machines and tools including ventilators and BiPAP machines to Nepal to support Nepal in its fight against the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic.

The EU Delegation to Nepal says Ireland and Denmark are among 12 EU member states responding to Nepals appeal for assistance to deal with the pandemic threat that has had a terrible toll on the Nepali population in the past months.

Representative of the Honorary Consul to Ireland, Madalasha Shrestha, and the Honorary Consul to Denmark, Hari Dharel, joined by the EU Ambassador to Nepal, Nona Deprez, handed over the equipment to Health Minister Sher Bahadur Tamang at the Tribhuvan International Airport on Friday morning.

It is important that we stand with the people of Nepal in their moment of need. The Irish Aid programme, managed in my department, is supporting the delivery costs of the donation, which has come from the Health Service and others, including the Nepal Ireland Society, Irish Foreign Minister Simon Coveney has been quoted in the statement.

Likewise, the Danish Ambassador to Nepal, Freddy Svane, said, As foreign contributions are coming into Nepal for the relief of the Covid-19 crisis, it is a great pleasure to see the delivery of medical equipment provided by the Danish government arriving in Kathmandu today.

Representative of the Honorary Consul to Ireland, Madalasha Shrestha, and the Honorary Consul to Denmark, Hari Dharel, joined by the EU Ambassador to Nepal, Nona Deprez, handed over the equipment to Health Minister Sher Bahadur Tamang at the Tribhuvan International Airport this morning.

Details of the medical equipment and supplies provided by Ireland:

Oxygen concentrators: 72

BPAP air flow machines: 12

Ventilators: 44

Pulse oximeters: 400

Respiratory monitors: 50

Defibrillators: 50

Thermometers: 100

Oxygen regulators: 728

Air regulators: 398

Protective coveralls: 99,750

Face shields: 201,600

Surgical masks: 1,008,000

Details of the medical equipment and supplies provided by Denmark:
Since the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic entered Nepal through India, the government of Nepal imposed the lockdown in different places of the country. Currently, all districts of the country except two are on lockdown.

While the entire country and nearly all people are struggling to escape from this pandemic, a new report has come out which has once again exposed a terrible status of sexual violence against women. The Womens Rehabilitation Centre (WOREC) released a report stating 200 cases of sexual violence have been reported in the country in a month during the lockdown. Due to poor economic and social conditions of the survivors, the culprits threats of murder, the survivors fear of social humiliation as well, we need to understand that the number is only recorded by WOREC and there must be higher incidents of sexual harassments in the society that are still concealed. The report indicates terrible social abuses against women and it also reveals that sexual violence against women has increased alarmingly during this period.

The pandemic suffocation has directly or indirectly increased criminal activities in society. They are the results of less social awareness, frail implementation of law and order, and excessive practice of political power. Recently, a gang rape incident against a 19-year-old girl in Bedkot of Kanchanpur, an acid attack on wife by a man in Rautahat, brutal beatings of the newlyweds on the pretext of not bringing gas and gas stove as dowry are some representative incidents of sexual and gender-based violence against women. These all suggest the risk of such violence, which has already been a chronic disease of the Nepali society, increases during critical times such as the pandemic, and hence it needs additional attention.

Insufficient and weak law and order

Representational image

Last week, at Gurbhakot in Surkhet, three local youth forced Raute girls to get engaged in sexual activities against their will under the influence of alcohol. They took a video of the incident and uploaded it on YouTube. National Human Rights Commission Nepal (NHRC) has requested the concerned to save their lives as the Rautes have their own law and order.

In 2019, a boy attacked with acid Muskan Khatun when she was 15 years old and the reason was her refusing a relationship proposal by him. This incident became a nationwide priority and the government was forced to introduce a law for stern punishment against perpetrators. At present, Khatun is a human rights activist active in rescuing and helping other acid attack survivors.

On the one hand, women have been victims of gender-based violence, and on the other, they have been victims of mental illness due to a lack of treatment on time and the kind of violence leads them to suicide. We neither hear the news of stern punishment to criminals nor proper rehabilitation of survivors. Rather, during the pandemic, mental health and psychosocial support may be inaccessible as health service providers are preoccupied due to Covid-19 cases. Recent data released by Nepal police, hence, show that at least 5,673 people committed suicide during this fiscal years 10 months. It happens because of anxiety, feeling of despair, joblessness, helplessness and loneliness.

Politicisation of crime

Mostly, men are involved in many incidents of gender-based violence and domestic violence against women. However, legal action against them, sometimes, is compromised under their political power. Sometimes, courts also come under political pressure and it sentences light punishment to some people. For example, the Sunsari District Courts decision to acquit controversial religious leader Krishna Giri aka Siddhababa of the rape charge is an instance of political pressure in court. The culprits of Nirmala Pants murder have not been identified yet and there is a public complaint that the incident has a political smell due to the poor investigation of the police in the initial phase. The government had ordered Nepal Police to find out facts in the case and the police also formed a committee to look into this, but the probe was marred by various flaws on the investigators part. Therefore, the concrete result is still empty.

Recovery and remedies

Photo: Pixabay

In the context of Nepal, women are getting empowered, but social abuses, sexual assaults and gender-based violence have not been decreased significantly. Almost every newspaper publishes news about rape, social abuses, domestic violence, murder, child marriage, and so on almost every day. The causes of all these are a lack of education, joblessness, insufficient laws and order, patriarchal thoughts, womens weak willpower for change, and political influence on the judiciary.

Education is the light that makes life brighter, but education alone is not enough. So, life-supportive education is todays necessity, especially for women who are dependent on their family for life. They can sustain their life independently so that nearly half of the women domestic violence can be reduced.

Similarly, it is necessary to take stern judicial action against the family who demands dowry by formulating required laws. The evil practice of child marriage and dowry highly exists in the Madhesi community of Nepal, and it has further promoted domestic and sexual violence. Recently, a 22-year-old woman in Banke reportedly lost her life for her failure to receive a motorcycle in dowry from her parents. Likewise, in the Madhesi community, there is still the panchayat system that sometimes bars cases of sexual violence from reaching the police and court.

It is thus essential to ensure the effective implementation of laws about discrimination against women and sexual assaults. No matter what programmes are being carried out by various organisations in the name of women empowerment nationwide, empowering women at the grassroots to oppose acts of violence is necessary.

Finally, it is every single individuals duty to build an egalitarian family, society, village and nation as well.
FCW Insider: June 18, 2021

The passage of a law to commemorate Juneteenth as a federal holiday earlier this week will give many federal employees an unexpected day off on Friday.

The new survey data from an information sharing and analysis center was published on the same day a news outlet reported a water treatment facility in California was easily breached by an individual who possessed a former employee's credentials.

Three senators are aiming to pass new legislation that expands DOJ's power to go after botnets and stiffen penalties for cyberattacks on critical infrastructure by adding it to the upcoming infrastructure bill.

Quick Hits

*** The General Services Administration made awards on Thursday to 426 vendors to the small business contract 8(a) STARS III, which focuses on small business information technology contracting. The contract, now in its fourth iteration, has a ceiling value of $50 billion. GSA expects to name more vendors to STARS III later this year. Get more on this story from Washington Technology.

*** Chris Inglis was confirmed to take on the post of National Cyber Director on a voice vote in the Senate on Thursday.

*** We're saying goodbye to our cybersecurity reporter Justin Katz, who is returning to the defense beat to cover the Navy and Marine Corps for Breaking Defense. We wish Justin well and we're also looking for a new reporter to take on the government cybersecurity beat at FCW.
CALGARY, AB, June 18, 2021 /CNW/ - Big Rock Brewery Inc. (TSX: BR) ("Big Rock" or the "Corporation") is pleased to announce the closing of the sale of its Etobicoke assets and assignment of its related lease obligations to a private counterparty for total cash consideration of $2.1 million, net of transaction costs.

Big Rock Brewery Inc. logo (CNW Group/Big Rock Brewery Inc.)

As previously announced, the cash proceeds will be used to make full repayment of the Corporation's equipment lease liabilities associated with the Etobicoke assets, in addition to increasing the Corporation's 2021 capital budget related to its information technology and digital transformation initiatives.

The Corporation will continue to meet market demand in Ontario through utilization of its brewing assets at its Toronto Liberty Commons location.

Forward-Looking Information

Certain statements contained in this news release constitute forward-looking statements. These statements relate to future events or Big Rock's future performance. All statements, other than statements of historical fact, may be forward-looking statements. Forward-looking information are not facts, but only predictions and generally can be identified by the use of statements that include words or phrases such as, "anticipate", "believe", "continue", "could", "estimate", "expect", "intend", "likely" "may", "project", "predict", "propose", "potential", "might", "plan", "seek", "should", "targeting", "will", and similar expressions. These statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results or events to differ materially from those anticipated in such forward-looking statements. Big Rock believes that the expectations reflected in those forward-looking statements are reasonable but no assurance can be given that these expectations will prove to be correct and such forward-looking statements included in this news release should not be unduly relied upon by readers, as actual results may vary materially from such forward-looking statements. These statements speak only as of the date of this news release and are expressly qualified, in their entirety, by this cautionary statement. In particular, this news release contains forward-looking statements pertaining to Big Rock's ability to meet market demand in Ontario.

Story continues

With respect to the forward-looking statements listed above and contained in this news release, management has made assumptions regarding, among other things, the market demand in Ontario.

Some of the risks which could affect future results and could cause results to differ materially from those expressed in the forward-looking information and statements contained herein include the risk factors set out in the Corporation's annual information form and also include, but are not limited to, that Big Rock's brewing assets at its Toronto Liberty Commons location will not be able to meet market demand in Ontario.

Readers are cautioned that the foregoing list of assumptions and risk factors is not exhaustive. The forward-looking information and statements contained herein are expressly qualified in their entirety by this cautionary statement. The forward-looking information and statements included in this news release are made as of the date hereof and Big Rock does not undertake any obligation to publicly update such forward-looking information and statements to reflect new information, subsequent events or otherwise unless so required by applicable securities laws.

About Big Rock Brewery Inc.

In 1985, Ed McNally founded Big Rock to contest the time's beer trends. Three bold, European-inspired offerings  Bitter, Porter and Traditional Ale  forged an industry at a time heavy on easy drinking lagers and light on flavour. Today, our extensive portfolio of signature beers, ongoing seasonal offerings, six ciders (Rock Creek Cider series), custom-crafted private label products and other notable, licensed alcoholic beverages keeps us at the forefront of the craft beer revolution and still proudly contesting the beer and alcoholic beverage trends of today. Big Rock has brewing operations in Calgary, Alberta, Vancouver, British Columbia, and Toronto, Ontario. Big Rock trades on the TSX under the symbol "BR". For more information on Big Rock visit www.bigrockbeer.com.

SOURCE Big Rock Brewery Inc.

Cision

View original content to download multimedia: http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/June2021/18/c0780.html
Bitcoin Well Q1 2021 Revenue

Bitcoin Well Q1 2021 Revenue

Bitcoin Well Q1 2021 Revenue

EDMONTON, Alberta, June 18, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Bitcoin Well Inc. (the Company, Bitcoin Well or BTCW) is very pleased to announce record financial and operating results for the three months ended March 31, 2021, which reflect explosive growth quarter-over-quarter and year-over-year. Bitcoin Well demonstrated the benefits of our differentiated non-custodial business model and financial performance, driven primarily by transaction volume rather than currency value. The interim Financial Statements and Notes, as well as Managements Discussion and Analysis (MD&A) for the three months ended March 31, 2021 and 2020 have been filed on SEDAR.



The magnitude of growth realized by Bitcoin Well across the organization during the first quarter of 2021 was unprecedented in our history. In addition to announcing a $7.0 million brokered private placement, we continued to successfully expand our ATM count and grow our proprietary software business while making progress toward being a publicly-traded company. Subsequent to the quarter end, we added two new board members who each bring extensive, hands-on experience as an officer or director of a public company. All of our recent measures are designed to position Bitcoin Well as a successful and engaged issuer within the public markets.

Q1 2021 Overview

Q1 ended

Mar 31, 2021

Q1 ended

Mar 31, 2020

Revenue ($000s) $ 27,525 $ 6,221 Gross Profit ($000s) $ 2,303 $ 492 Gross Profit Margin (%) 8 % 8 % Adjusted EBITDA1 ($000s) $ 828 $ (12 ) Adjusted EBITDA1 Margin (%) 3.0 % (0.2 )% ATM Count 124 42

1 Non-IFRS measure. See Advisories  "Non-IFRS measures".

I am incredibly proud to share our teams meaningful progress and stellar financial results in the first quarter of 2021 with significant growth in revenue, Adjusted EBITDA1 and margins, said Adam OBrien, Founder and CEO of Bitcoin Well. While we continued to rapidly expand operations and generate returns, our team is demonstrating the tremendous scalability of our business. Bitcoin Well also achieved numerous strategic milestones in the period, including the unveiling of exciting plans for a new, cutting-edge headquarters in downtown Edmonton, and made continued progress on our public listing. This is only the beginning of our journey to raise awareness for Bitcoin Well and help to educate the world on financial sovereignty.

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Record Q1 2021 Highlights

Revenue increased by over 342% to $27.5 million in Q1 2021 compared to $6.2 million for the same period in 2020. The growth is due largely to an increase in active ATMs, higher per machine revenue, rising bitcoin and other cryptocurrency prices and an increase in our OTC sales.

Gross profit in Q1 2021 grew approximately 368% year-over-year to $2.3 million, representing a gross profit margin of 8%.

Adjusted EBITDA 2 totaled $828,365 in Q1 2021, an increase of over $840,000 from Q1 2020.

A total of 38 new ATMs were added to our portfolio through the three months which contributed to a total of 124 machines installed across Canada as at March 31, 2021. Currently, Bitcoin Well has over 140 ATMs installed across Canada.

Our average revenue generated per machine in Q1 2021 was over $83,000 with an average transaction size per machine of just under $1,100 (2020 - $113,940 per machine, and an average transaction size of $582). This decrease was largely due to access to certain machines being limited due to COVID 19 related restrictions.

Cash balances at March 31, 2021 totaled $5.2 million, an increase from $4.1 million at December 31, 2020.

Bitcoin Well recorded net operating income of $462,326 for Q1 2021, which includes $97,571 in going-public transaction costs, and $268,469 in depreciation and accretion, compared to a loss of $144,013 in Q1 2020.



Recent Events

Further enhanced the skillset, expertise and diversity of background of our Board of Directors with the appointment of Michele D. McCarthy and Alice Reimer, announced May 18, 2021. Michele and Alice collectively have decades of experience navigating the capital markets and strategy execution, and have served as board members for high-growth public companies, which will prove invaluable for Bitcoin Well as we embark on life as a public company.

On June 8, we completed a private placement raising gross proceeds of $7.0 million.

On June 11, we completed our previously announced arms length qualifying transaction (the Transaction) and having received conditional approval for the Transaction from the TSXV, our common shares are expected to commence trading on the TSXV under the ticker symbol BTCW during the week of June 21, 2021.

On June 15, we announced the opening of our Calgary over-the-counter (OTC) office which will provide best-in-class service by appointment for individuals seeking to transact in larger bitcoin denominations and will offer a comfortable setting for those interested in learning about the benefits of bitcoin as a means of securing financial sovereignty.

As a result of requirements under IFRS relating to revaluation of digital assets and changes in the unrealized value of the Companys Use of Coin Agreements, significant swings in net income (loss) may be reported period to period which are not indicative of the underlying operational performance of the business. These fluctuations resulted in the Company reporting a net loss of $4.4 million for the three months ended March 31, 2021, but positive total comprehensive income of $2.5 million. As a result, we present Adjusted EBITDA as the most meaningful metric to assess the health and performance of the underlying operations, as it excludes the noise caused by the revaluations and represents true performance of the business. Adjusted EBITDA increased significantly in Q1 2021 to $0.8 million, driven by the significant increase in revenue over the past year.

The plan we have developed for 2021 is expected to leverage the skills and expertise of our growing all-star team and expanding ATM network. Bitcoin Well will continue to enhance our service offerings to support our growth trajectory. We believe the Company is poised to drive further expansion of our business, revenue and customer base, while benefiting from the macro-level industry discussions around bitcoin and its role in aiding individuals to achieve financial sovereignty.

Corporate Update

The Companys Chief Financial Officer, Mandy Johnston, MBA, CPA (US), CMA (US), CSCA is taking a temporary leave, effective immediately, with an expected return to her post later this year. During her absence, the Companys Board of Directors has appointed Jason Vandenberg as interim CFO to support Bitcoin Well.

Jason brings over 20 years of experience across diverse financial leadership positions and has an established record of leading multiple companies through substantial growth, both organically and through the acquisition and integration of over 40 businesses. Jason is the Senior Vice President and Co-Founder of Camilla Advisory Group Inc., a management consulting firm in Edmonton, Alberta. Prior to, Jason held the role of CFO for nine years at ENTREC Corporation, a leader in crane and heavy haul transportation services in Canada and the United States, and was CFO at Eveready Inc., an international industrial services company. Jason is a Chartered Accountant and holds a Bachelor of Commerce, with Distinction, from the University of Alberta.

"Mandy has played an integral role in our efforts to become the world's first publicly traded Bitcoin ATM company and we appreciate her continued support with this process from afar, as she takes a necessary leave to focus on her health. We look forward to welcoming her back later this year," said Adam O'Brien, Bitcoin Well CEO. "In the interim, we are pleased to welcome Jason to the organization. His vast accounting experience and knowledge within the financial disclosure process will be an asset to Bitcoin Well as we embark on life as a public company."

Benefits of Our Non-Custodial Model

One of the many advantages of Bitcoin Well is that our business model is non-custodial, which means that at no time during a transaction are we holding client funds on their behalf. True to our credo that Bitcoin ATMs offer the fastest and safest ways to buy, sell and use bitcoin, the time lapse between when a customer deposits funds into our ATMs until they receive their bitcoin delivered to their wallet is typically less than 30 minutes. This sets Bitcoin Well apart from crypto-asset trading platforms (CTPs), which are custodial platforms (such as cryptocurrency exchanges) that facilitate trades in security tokens, or crypto contracts, and are very different from Bitcoin Well.

At the end of March, 2021, Canadian securities regulators issued guidance that represents a landmark change in the regulatory landscape for CTPs and which will have a material impact on those businesses in Canada. Since we are non-custodial, these new regulations do not apply to Bitcoin Well and in fact, help to demonstrate the value of our trusted, convenient and high-integrity business model. Effective June 1, 2021, new compliance obligations will be required for all entities dealing in cryptocurrencies which is expected to become overly burdensome for smaller companies and increase acquisition opportunities for Bitcoin Well. Since we are already registered with the Canadian Governments Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre (FINTRAC), Bitcoin Well has established extremely rigorous compliance protocols and practices which protect the Company as well as our clients.

About Bitcoin Well

Bitcoin Well offers convenient, secure and reliable ways to buy and sell bitcoin through a trusted Bitcoin ATM network and suite of web-based transaction services. BTCW is Adjusted EBITDA positive and positioned to become the first publicly traded Bitcoin ATM company, with an enterprising consolidation strategy to deliver accretive and cost-effective expansion in North America and globally. As leaders of the longest-running, founder-led Bitcoin ATM company, management of Bitcoin Well brings deep operational capabilities that span the entire value chain along with access to proprietary, cutting-edge software development that supports further expansion. Follow us on LinkedIn , Twitter , YouTube , Facebook and Instagram to keep up to date with our business.

Contact Information

For investor information, please contact:

Bitcoin Well

10142 82 Avenue NW

Edmonton, AB T6E 1Z4

bitcoinwell.com

Adam OBrien, President & CEO

Jason Vandenberg, Interim CFO

Tel: 1 888 711 3866

IR@bitcoinwell.com

For media queries and further information, please contact:

Karen Smola, Director of Marketing

Tel: 587-735-1570

k.smola@bitcoinwell.com

Reader Advisory / Forward-Looking Statements

Statements in this press release regarding Bitcoin Well which are not historical facts are forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties, such as the timing of expansion plans and activities, the timing of commencement of trading of Bitcoin Wells common shares on the TSXV, as well as various business objectives. Such information can generally be identified by the use of forwarding-looking wording such as may, expect, estimate, anticipate, intend, believe and continue or the negative thereof or similar variations. Since forward-looking statements address future events and conditions, by their very nature, they involve inherent risks and uncertainties such as the risk that the closing may not occur for any reason. Actual results in each case could differ materially from those currently anticipated in such statements due to factors such as: (i) adverse market conditions and (ii) the need for additional financing. Except as required by law, Bitcoin Well does not intend to update any changes to such statements.

Investors are cautioned that, except as disclosed in the filing statement prepared in connection with the Transaction, any information released or received with respect to the Transaction may not be accurate or complete and should not be relied upon.

Non-IFRS Measures

The Company uses certain terms in this news release and within the MD&A, such as adjusted EBITDA, which do not have a standardized or prescribed meaning under International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS), and, accordingly these measurements may not be comparable with the calculation of similar measurements used by other companies. For a reconciliation of each non-IFRS measure to its nearest IFRS measure, please refer to the "Non-GAAP Measures and Selected Financial Information sections in the MD&A for applicable definitions, calculations, rationale for use and reconciliations to the most directly comparable measure under IFRS. Non-IFRS measures are provided as supplementary information by which readers may wish to consider the Company's performance but should not be relied upon for comparative or investment purposes.

The TSXV has not approved nor disapproved the contents of this press release.

1 Non-IFRS measure. See Advisories  "Non-IFRS measures".

2 Non-IFRS measure. See Advisories  "Non-IFRS measures".

A chart accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/f720011e-cf43-4a13-aed8-40ade71262b0




China has continued its crackdown on crypto mining and is telling more than half of the worlds bitcoin miners to hit the bricks.

Texas has become a popular destination for the flood of crypto miners who are fleeing China in the wake of increased regulations from government officials. China is concerned that bitcoin mining is having a negative effect on energy-rich regions of the country due to the massive power required for mining operations.

China moving toward a national ban on crypto mining

According to CNBC, while the global distribution of mining power numbers for 2021 hasnt yet been tabulated, estimates show that up to 75% of the worlds bitcoin mining is done in China. The mining is concentrated in four main provinces: Inner Mongolia, Sichuan, Yunnan, and Xinjiang. Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia make use of the coal plants in the area while Sichuan and Yunnan utilize the regions hydropower resources. Crypto mining in those regions along with Qinghai has already been asked by the government to cease operations.

To nobodys surprise, these bans have already caused a lot of problems. One of those issues is the drop in global hash rate which puts a value on the bitcoin networks global computing power. Earlier in 2021, Chinas average monthly share of the global has rate was 65% according to the Cambridge Center for Alternative Finance. The report shows that Xinjiang alone made up for 36% of global consumption. While bitcoin has proven resilient to these hash rate drops thus far, the bans continue to come.

Another issue that everyone saw coming was the possibility that some miners would ignore the requests and continue to mine illegally. This has been a particularly persistent issue in Yunaan and the local authorities have threatened to cut power to those who continue to operate outside the law.

The Chinese bans are the result of government promises to become carbon-neutral by 2060.

Bitcoin miners finding a new home in Texas

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For those law-abiding Chinese miners who wish to continue operating, a change of venue is required. Texas has become the go-to spot for these displaced mining operations with companies like Bitman, Blockcap, Argo Blockchain, and Great American Mining rumored to be just a few migrating to the Lone Star State. CNBC estimated that more than 50% of Chnas total hash rate could eventually wind up in Texas.

According to Didar Bekbauov, the founder of Kazakh mine provider Xive, the exodus is already underway and it could be a huge game-changer for Texas. Texas not only has the cheapest electricity in the U.S. but some of the cheapest in the globe. He goes on to state that setting up a mining company is easy and just requires some capital. If you have $30 million, $40 million, you can be a premier miner in the United States.

Other advantages Texas provides are an expanding infrastructure based around renewable energy and politicians who support cryptocurrency. Some of those politicians, such as Governor Greg Abbott, have even gone on record supporting bitcoin mining. He believes it could be a valuable industry for the U.S.
Holiday Shows U.S. Government Can Be Fast When It Wants to Close

(Bloomberg) -- The mail is coming, but the Pentagon is closed and parents in Washington D.C. were left with no daycare as the nation adapted to a sudden holiday.

Across the federal government, agencies struggled to determine who would and wouldnt be working on Friday and employees had to adjust to an unexpected three-day weekend as President Joe Biden signed legislation making Juneteenth the first new federal holiday in nearly four decades -- one day before the holiday was to take effect.

The Office of Personnel Management that oversees the civilian workforce of more than 2 million people tweeted Thursday morning that most federal workers would have Friday off with pay. Thats because June 19 -- the formal date commemorating the end of slavery in the U.S. -- falls on Saturday. The U.S. Postal Service said it wont be able to adjust on such short notice and so mail service will continue as normal.

For many federal workers, though, it was like having a snow day in June. Schools and daycares were closed and everybody had to resubmit their time cards in a hurry, said Bruce Walker, a senior adviser at the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board.

The federal agency, which investigates major industrial accidents, stands ready to deploy if needed, but most of its 33 employees will be enjoying a day off, Walker said in a telephone interview on Thursday.

He will be one of them. He plans to spend his new-found free time catching up on a bunch of reading I need to do for work.

Daycare facilities housed in federal buildings or schools that were closed for the holiday abruptly shut, sending parents in Washington who dont work for the government racing to make alternative arrangements.

It isnt easy turning a ship as big as the federal government. Two of the biggest federal operations -- the Postal Service and the Pentagon -- didnt announce until late Thursday how they planned to proceed.

The Defense Department said in a statement on Thursday night that, as on any other holiday, most of its personnel, military and civilian, would get the day off. The Postal Service said it is continuing operations as normal, and will discuss future recognition of this significant new holiday with unions and management associations.

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We are part of the nations critical infrastructure and our customers are relying on us to deliver our essential services, the agency said in a statement. Closing down our operations without providing appropriate time would lead to operational disruptions and be a disservice to our customers and those who rely upon us.

The State Department said that its headquarters, as well as embassies overseas, would close. The announcement came at the very last minute for workers posted in Asia and the Pacific, some of which are more than 12 hours ahead of Washington time.

While the United Nations normally follows the American holiday calendar, the last-minute designation conflicted with a key vote in the General Assembly, which approved a second five-year term for Secretary-General Antonio Guterres Friday morning. The U.S. mission to the UN is officially closed, though diplomats will continue to handle essential operations.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission closed even though financial markets remain open. The Federal Reserve Board announced at the close of business Thursday that its offices in Washington would be closed.

With no official word from the Administrative Office of the Courts, it was left to individual district courts to decide whether to remain open. Federal courts in New Jersey closed, while those in Atlanta remain open, according to announcements on their respective websites. The Supreme Court announced after 6 p.m. Washington time that it would be closed.

Agencies including the Federal Communications Commission, International Trade Commission and Patent and Trademark Office extended deadlines to file documents and fees -- those due on Friday were extended to Monday.

Interior Event Still On

The holiday came too late for some top administration officials and their aides. For instance, Interior Secretary Deb Haaland is still set to hold a media event at Acadia National Park in Maine and meet with tribal leaders and elected officials on Friday.

Employees from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration were scheduled to take part in a six-hour meeting being held by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.

But late Thursday it was called off.

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Ford has two electric vehicles in the pipeline  the E-Transit cargo van and F-150 Lighting Pro aimed at commercial customers. Now, the automaker is rounding out its future EV commercial business with the acquisition of battery management and fleet monitoring software startup Electriphi.

Terms of the acquisition weren't disclosed. Ford is betting that the software developed by the three-year-old San Francisco startup will help it capture more than $1 billion in revenue just from charging by 2030.

Electriphi, along with its 30-person team, will be folded into the newly minted Ford Pro business unit, which is focused on providing services to commercial customers of its electric Transit van and F-150 Lightning Pro pickup truck. Ford will start shipping E-Transit to customers later this year. The F-150 Lightning Pro, a commercial variant of the all-electric Lightning pickup truck, is expected to come to market in spring 2022.

Ford Pro has financial ambitions beyond charging. The business unit said it expects to generate $45 billion in revenue from hardware and adjacent and new services by 2025 -- up from $27 billion in 2019.

"As commercial customers add electric vehicles to their fleets, they want depot charging options to make sure they're powered up and ready to go to work every day," said Ford Pro CEO Ted Cannis. "With Electriphi's existing advanced technology IP in the Ford Pro electric vehicles and services portfolio, we will enhance the experience for commercial customers and be a single-source solution for fleet-depot charging."

Electriphi launched in 2018 when it became obvious that upcoming state and federal mandates would drive heavy duty vehicles and mid-sized commercial fleets towards electrification, co-founder and CEO Muffi Ghadiali told TechCrunch in a recent interview. The company has focused on segments deploying commercial electric vehicles in the U.S. and internationally, a list that includes school buses and transit buses.

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"If you just think about what's going to happen in the next 10 years  it's a massive transformation in mobility for energy and software," Ghadiali said. "The stakes are incredibly high and time is running out." He noted fleet operators are nervous about that upcoming mandates that will require moving to zero-emissions vehicles by the end of the decade. "To turn over your entire fleet in 10 years, you have to start now; they're going, 'I have to make sure that my fleet operations don't skip a heartbeat, while this transition is happening.'"

Ford first approached Electriphi in early 2021. The startup had raised just $4.2 million at a valuation of about $11 million prior to the deal with autoomaker.

While Ford's focus is building out the software for its E-Transit and Lightning Pro, it is possible that it will also continue to serve Electriphi's customer base.

"Interestingly, as it turns out, the underlying Ford platform is used across many different vehicle types as well as school buses," Ghadiali said. "So it's hard to say which segments we won't still be in because they are you know they are very relevant to what we do. Of course, our focus will be the large volume that the Ford is going to ship in the next year."
FUSIONWRX Inc, a Flottman Company Promotes Chelsea Vaal To Senior Designer and Marketing Manager

Picture Two: Flottman Company Inc. - FUSIONWRX Inc, a Flottman Company and part of the Flottman Companys Family of Businesses  859.331.6636 | www.FUSIONWRX.com

Picture Two: Flottman Company Inc. - FUSIONWRX Inc, a Flottman Company and part of the Flottman Companys Family of Businesses  859.331.6636 | www.FUSIONWRX.com

Picture One: Chelsea Vaal, Graduate of the University of Louisville, Promoted to Senior Designer and Marketing Manager for FUSIONWRX Inc, a Flottman Company.

Picture One: Chelsea Vaal, Graduate of the University of Louisville, Promoted to Senior Designer and Marketing Manager for FUSIONWRX Inc, a Flottman Company.

Crestview Hills, Kentucky - Cincinnati, Ohio, June 18, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- FUSIONWRX Inc. a rapidly growing digital marketing agency providing marketing, design, geofencing, social media, pay-per-click advertising, website creation and content development recently announced the promotion of Chelsea Vaal to Senior Designer and Marketing Manager. In this new role, Vaal will continue to work one-on-one with the current client base, while advancing her digital expertise and graphic design capabilities.

In her previous role with FUSIONWRX and Flottman Company, Vaal oversaw the pay-per-click program, social media placements, design and client relations. Through Vaals work ethic, determination and desire to help others succeed, FUSIONWRX has more than doubled their clientele base, increased revenue and most impressively have achieved a 95% retention rate.

We are really excited to promote Chelsea Vaal to this newly created position, shared Sue Flottman Steller, President and Co-Owner of Flottman Company and FUSIONWRX, Chelsea has been a key component to the growth of FUSIONWRX. She has personified digital marketing for many of our clients, by being their liaison to success.

Vaal joined FUSIONWRX and Flottman Company three years ago as a Marketing Coordinator and instantly outgrew her role by accumulating more and more responsibilities. Prior to her move to FUSIONWRX she worked with SouthComm Publishing as an Advertising Coordinator.

Vaal holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Communication Art and Design from the University of Louisville and is certified in both Social Media Management and Google Ads.

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###

About FUSIONWRX Inc, a Flottman Company: www.FUSIONWRX.com

FUSIONWRX Inc, a Flottman Company is an integrated digital and traditional marketing agency, serving clients in the food service, financial, educational and service industries. FUSIONWRX supplies clients with a multitude of media outlets to connect with their target audience, like digital ads, directory listings, print materials and social media communications. Growth in the fields of content management, geofencing and out-of-home media have diversified FUSIONWRXs service portfolio, adding to their product offerings. FUSIONWRX has experience working with companies of all sizes, including family and private businesses to leading Fortune 500 companies. FUSIONWRX are part of the 100-year-old Flottman Company Inc.s family of businesses which is are a third generation, family business and women owned. They are a three time recipient of the Print Solutions PEAK Award for Top Marketing, Cross-Media Campaign. Clutch, a global marketing research company, ranked FUSIONWRX amongst the top digital, public relations, web design and strategic marketing business-to-business firms in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Attachments

CONTACT: Ed McMasters FUSIONWRX, a Flottman Company 859.331.6636 x221 ed@FUSIONWRX.com




* Euro zone periphery govt bond yields http://tmsnrt.rs/2ii2Bqr

By Stefano Rebaudo

MILAN, June 18 (Reuters) - German bond yields edged lower on Friday, tracking moves in U.S. borrowing costs, and analysts expect the adverse reaction of euro zone bond prices to a hawkish policy meeting of the Federal Reserve this week to prove short-lived.

The U.S. curve flattened after an initial spike in yields on Thursday, as some investors appeared to have been caught flat-footed by the Fed comments. Investors who had been betting on yield curve steepening after the Fed statements scrambled to cover those trades.

The U.S. 10-year government bond yield was down 1.5 basis points at 1.5% in early London trade.

"The eurozone government market will be in a wait-and-see mode today, with an eye on U.S. Treasury yields," said Andrea Ponti, co-head of fixed income portfolio management at Kairos Partners.

"But after yesterday's bond selloff, the focus is shifting to the ECB's ultra-dovish stance, with investors not forecasting any bond-buying tapering discussion before the fall," he added.

Germany's 10-year government bond yield fell 1 basis point to 0.2%.

According to Unicredit analysts, "after a turbulent week, we expect the next several days to see a modest increase in U.S. real rates, to which EGB yields should remain rather immune."

Periphery bond prices continued to underperform core bonds as they have benefited most from the ultra-accommodative monetary policy to avoid the pandemic's adverse economic impact.

Italy's 10-year government bond yield rose 0.5 basis point to 0.835%.

"Markets still seem to be getting to terms with the new Fed reality. Curve dynamics, in particular, stand out with 10-30y U.S. Treasuries switching from aggressive bear-flattening after the FOMC to bull-flattening during yesterday's recovery," Commerzbank told clients.

Besides, the "capitulation of 10y TIPS break-evens to the lowest level since end-March amid steady real yields is leaving inflation expectations as Powell's major victim," they said, adding that they seem "misguided in the current situation."

According to Deutsche Bank economist George Saravelos, this notable drop in inflation expectations "is telling us that the market is taking an extremely pessimistic view on real neutral rates". (Reporting by Stefano Rebaudo, editing by Gareth Jones)
TAMPA, Fla., June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Insurance claim attorney David Murray announced the formation of his new law firm, Murray + Murray. He is leaving Danahy & Murray to open a new trial law firm focused explicitly on insurance claim litigation across Florida. Murray + Murray will be specializing in insurance claim representation for homeowners, businesses, condominiums, and hotels.

David C. Murray, Esquire -- Murray + Murray, LLC -- (813) 567-5600 -- dmurray@murraylawgroup.com -- www.murraylawgroup.com

To pursue his new venture, Murray left his position as Managing Partner at Danahy & Murray, a firm he founded in 2004. For 16 years, he led Danahy & Murray toward success in the field of insurance claim litigation.

Attorneys Kimberly Murray and Kimberly Armistead will be joining Murray + Murray, in addition to Ocie Murray, Jr., who will serve as "of counsel." Danahy & Murray's former management team and a group of paralegals will also be joining the new firm.

The new firm will allow Murray to take his insurance litigation practice to provide his clients with specialized, high-quality, client-focused legal representation. "It was a bold move, but I believe the team is right, and now is the time to refocus my practice with the right people," he explained.

Murray holds positions with the Florida Justice Association, and has worked with the Florida Association of Public Insurance Adjusters and the Florida Policyholder Cooperative. He is a frequent speaker on insurance issues related to first-party insurance claims.

Murray is consistently recognized by the Florida Super Lawyers publication as a "Super Lawyer" for his work in insurance litigation. He is also a member of the Million Dollar Advocates Forum and was awarded an "AV" Preeminent Rating by Martindale-Hubbell, signifying that he has been determined to have the highest level of skills, integrity, and ethical standards in the area of insurance coverage.

Murray + Murray welcomes Florida homeowners, businesses, condominiums, and hotels with insurance-related issues to contact them for highly skilled and experienced legal representation.

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About Murray + Murray

Murray + Murray is a Florida insurance litigation law firm that holds your insurance company accountable when it violates the duties owed to you as the policyholder. Our firm specializes in handling insurance claims for homeowners, businesses, condominiums, and hotels in first-party insurance disputes and bad faith claims. For more information, please visit: https://murraylawgroup.com/ .

Contact:

Murray + Murray

109 N Brush St # 350

Tampa, FL 33602

(813) 567-5600

https://www.murraylawgroup.com/

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SOURCE Murray + Murray
NEW YORK, June 18, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The law firm of Kirby McInerney LLP announces that a class action lawsuit has been filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York on behalf of those who acquired Aterian, Inc. f/k/a Mohawk Group Holdings, Inc. (Aterian or the Company) (NASDAQ: ATER) securities from December 1, 2020 through May 3, 2021, inclusive (the Class Period). Investors have until July 12, 2021 to apply to the Court to be appointed as lead plaintiff in the lawsuit.



On May 4, 2021, Culper Research published a report titled Aterian (ATER): Bought from Felons & Fraudsters, Sold to You, alleging that Aterian has ties to convicted criminals and is promoting what we believe is an overhyped AI narrative and a string of garbage acquisitions to mask the failure of its already ill-conceived core business. Culper also alleges that [o]ver 25% of Aterian shares now belong to two felons and two alleged scam artists, all of whom will be free to dump their stock by August. The report alleged that the Company has been largely unsuccessful in convincing other Amazon sellers to pay for its AIMEE AI platform, and at least 5 former employees and a former customer have expressed doubts regarding AIMEEs legitimacy. On this news, Aterians stock price declined by $3.04 per share, or approximately 14.7%, from $20.66 per share to close at $17.62 per share on May 4, 2021, thereby injuring investors.

The lawsuit alleges that throughout the Class Period, Defendants made materially false and/or misleading statements, as well as failed to disclose material adverse facts about the Companys business, operations, and prospects. Specifically, Defendants failed to disclose to investors that: (1) the Companys organic growth is plummeting; (2) the Companys recent, self-lauded acquisitions were overpayments for flawed assets from questionable sources; (3) Aterians purported artificial intelligence software is a flawed product that lacks customer interest; (4) Aterian uses rebate programs and paid or artificial reviews to pump up their product offerings; and (5) as a result, Defendants' statements about its business, operations, and prospects, were materially false and misleading and/or lacked a reasonable basis at all relevant times.

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If you purchased or otherwise acquired Aterian securities, have information, or would like to learn more about these claims, please contact Thomas W. Elrod of Kirby McInerney LLP at 212-371-6600, by email at investigations@kmllp.com , or by filling out this contact form, to discuss your rights or interests with respect to these matters without any cost to you.

Kirby McInerney LLP is a New York-based plaintiffs law firm concentrating in securities, antitrust, whistleblower, and consumer litigation. The firms efforts on behalf of shareholders in securities litigation have resulted in recoveries totaling billions of dollars. Additional information about the firm can be found at Kirby McInerney LLPs website: http://www.kmllp.com .

This press release may be considered Attorney Advertising in some jurisdictions under the applicable law and ethical rules.

Contacts

Kirby McInerney LLP

Thomas W. Elrod, Esq.

212-371-6600

https://www.kmllp.com

investigations@kmllp.com




Reuters

BEIJING/TAIPEI (Reuters) -Chinese President Xi Jinping pledged on Thursday to complete "reunification" with self-ruled Taiwan and vowed to "smash" any attempts at formal independence, drawing a stern rebuke from Taipei, which lambasted the Communist Party as a dictatorship. China, which considers democratically-ruled Taiwan its own territory, has stepped up efforts under Xi to assert its sovereignty claims, including regular flights by fighter jets and bombers close to the island. "Solving the Taiwan question and realising the complete reunification of the motherland are the unswerving historical tasks of the Chinese Communist Party and the common aspiration of all Chinese people," Xi said in a speech on the 100th birthday of the ruling Communist Party.
Middlefield Canadian Income PCC Net Asset Value

Middlefield Canadian Income PCC

Middlefield Canadian Income - GBP PC

(a protected cell company incorporated in Jersey with registration number 93546)

Legal Entity Identifier: 2138007ENW3JEJXC8658

Net Asset Value

As at the close of business on 17 June 2021 the estimated unaudited Net Asset Value per share was 126.40 pence (including accrued income).

Investments in the Companys portfolio have been valued on a closing price basis.

Enquiries:

JTC Fund Solutions (Jersey) Limited

01534 700 000




OTTAWA, ON, June 18, 2021 /CNW/ - On Friday, June 18, 2021, the Honourable Bernadette Jordan, Minister of Fisheries, Oceans, and the Canadian Coast Guard, met with her provincial counterparts from Eastern Canada.

Minister Jordan highlighted Canada's commitment to a Blue Economy Strategy, and the value it will bring to Eastern provinces. The goal of the strategy is threefold: ensure long term health of our oceans, support Indigenous and coastal communities, and grow ocean economies. In addition, she raised the new $300 million investment in Small Craft Harbours from Budget 2021 that will help make harbours safer, create jobs, and increase efficiency across the region.

The ministers talked about the ongoing work with partners to develop Canada's first-ever Aquaculture Act. This unifying legislation will provide greater clarity for sustainable management of the sector as it continues to grow. Ministers acknowledged that most East Coast provinces are responsible for fish and seafood farming in their respective jurisdictions and will maintain their lead regulatory role moving forward.

Minister Jordan highlighted the need to continue walking down the path of reconciliation and stressed that all levels of government should work together to ensure Indigenous groups are participating in all facets of marine-related activity.

Minister Jordan spoke with Andre Lamontagne, Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food for Quebec; Margaret Johnson, Minister of Agriculture, Aquaculture and Fisheries for New Brunswick; Derrick Bragg, Minister of Fisheries, Forestry and Agriculture for Newfoundland and Labrador; Keith Colwell, Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries and Aquaculture for Nova Scotia; and Jamie Fox, Minister of Fisheries and Communities for Prince Edward Island.

Stay Connected

Follow Fisheries and Oceans Canada on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.

Follow the Canadian Coast Guard on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.

Subscribe to receive our news releases and more via RSS feeds. For more information or to subscribe, visit http://www.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/media/rss-eng.htm

SOURCE Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) Canada

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OTTAWA, ON, June 18, 2021 /CNW/ - The month of June is dedicated to recognizing and honouring the achievements, history and rich cultures of First Nations, Inuit and Metis. Together, we are building a stronger and more inclusive agriculture sector that advances meaningful relationships with Indigenous Peoples and reduces barriers for under-represented groups.

Today, the Minister of Indigenous Services, the Honourable Marc Miller, on behalf of the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food, the Honourable Marie-Claude Bibeau, announced investments of over $4 million in 16 projects that will help support Indigenous food systems initiatives, provide equitable access to healthy food, and increase participation of under-represented groups in the agriculture and agri-food sector.

Recipients include:

4-C Farms Limited Partnership, which received up to $954,000 to reintroduce grain farming as a viable business and career path and to finalize a business plan so that Cowessess First Nation can expand its farming operation to 2,000 acres;

Xaxli'p First Nation, which received up to $88,000 to prepare the community to engage in a number of agricultural activities by conducting a market study, a land capability assessment and an irrigation water source assessment; and

Bigstone Cree Nation, which will receive up to $131,000 to identify and plan agribusiness opportunities to participate and succeed in Alberta's growing agribusiness sector.

These projects, announced through the Indigenous Agriculture and Food Systems Initiative and the AgriDiversity Program, build on previous federal support of $2.1 million. This includes projects to support Indigenous agriculture and food initiatives undertaken by the Indian Agricultural Program of Ontario (IAPO), the Native Women's Association of Canada (NWAC), the Wikwemikong Development Commission, and the Northern Farm Training Institute (NFTI).

The Government of Canada is committed to ensuring Indigenous communities across the country have reliable access to healthy food. Today's announcement builds on existing initiatives, such as the Emergency Food Security Fund and the Nutrition North Canada Program, which strengthen food security, including in Indigenous communities.

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Quotes

"Our government is working to create a more inclusive agriculture sector that respects the values of Indigenous Peoples. These investments are intended to ensure that Indigenous Peoples have equal opportunities in the sector, the resources they need to be successful, and access to safe and affordable food."

- The Honourable Marie-Claude Bibeau, Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food

"Indigenous farmers, communities and agri-food entrepreneurs have a strong partner in the Government of Canada. We recognize all of you, as leaders, in building and growing opportunities  from farming, community gardens, traditional foods and agri-entrepreneurs. Indigenous Peoples were the first agricultural innovators and have a unique connection to the land that continues today. Today's announcement will help ensure that Indigenous Peoples can continue to contribute to and share in Canada's economic and agricultural success."

- The Honourable Marc Miller, Minister of Indigenous Services

"Our long term goal for 4C Farms is to build a fleet of grain farming equipment to enable our Nation owned farm to occupy Nation owned land. After Chief Kwiwizance (Cowessess) agreed to Treaty Four, Cowessess First Nation utilized the teachings and tools provided to support an agricultural existence. Overtime Cowessess members were great farmers then Canadian policy made it harder for Cowessess members to farm. Today, we want to revive agriculture and enable our community and its citizens to benefit from the vast amount of arable acres Cowessess First Nation owns. The assistance from AAFC has helped to support the reestablishment of agriculture on Cowessess First Nation."

- Chief Cadmus Delorme, 4C Farms Ltd

"The Xaxli'p Agriculture Community Readiness (ACR) project, funded by the Indigenous Agriculture and Food Systems Initiative through Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, will result in determining key agricultural opportunities for Xaxli'p on the sites of interest, and initial financial feasibility of these opportunities. This project is a steppingstone to business planning and infrastructure improvements."

- Lyle Leo, Economic Development Officer, Xaxli'p

"Bigstone Cree Nation is proud to accept the funding and support from Indigenous Agriculture and Food Systems Initiative (IAFI) which will assist the Nation in moving forward on the plans to initiate a bison operation, greenhouses and sustainable crops. We look forward to working with Agriculture and Agri Food Canada on various aspects of the agricultural sector which will incorporate our culture, traditional land use and knowledge in the success of our vision. We thank the Minister and everyone that joined this morning to announce and showcase as more Nations move closer toward self sustenance and true reconciliation."

- Troy Stuart  Land Manager Bigstone Cree Nation

Quick Facts

The Indigenous Agriculture and Food Systems Initiative (IAFSI) is a five-year (2018-2023) joint initiative with Indigenous Services Canada funded in part through the Strategic Partnerships Initiative (SPI), an innovative, horizontal initiative that fosters federal coordination to boost indigenous participation in economic growth. IAFSI funding supports Indigenous producers, communities, and organizations who are ready to launch agriculture and food systems projects and others who want to build their capacity to participate in the sector. Applications for IAFSI funding will be accepted until July 31, 2021, for projects to be completed on or before March 31, 2023.

The AgriDiversity Program, an initiative under the Canadian Agricultural Partnership, aims to help under-represented groups in Canadian agriculture, including Indigenous Peoples, youth, women and persons with disabilities, to fully participate in the sector by helping these groups address the key issues and barriers they often face for sector participation.

Budget 2021 committed an additional $140 million for the Emergency Food Security Fund and Local Food Infrastructure Fund to help emergency hunger relief organizations prevent hunger, strengthen food security in our communities, and provide nutritious food to all Canadians.

According to Statistics Canada, in 2016, 15,765 people in Canada's agricultural population identified as Indigenous (2.7% of the agricultural population). Indigenous agricultural operators, the majority of which are located in Western Canada, represented 5,160 (1.9%) of the 270,720 agricultural operators in Canada.

Budget 2021 proposes to provide $163.4 million over three years, starting in 2021-22, to expand the Nutrition North Canada program and enable the Minister of Northern Affairs to work directly with Indigenous partners, including in Inuit Nunangat, to address food insecurity.

Additional Links

Indigenous Agriculture and Food Systems Initiative

AgriDiversity

Government of Canada announces three projects under the Indigenous Agriculture and Food Systems Initiative

Agriculture in the North: Fostering skills growth and building capacity for Indigenous entrepreneurs

Follow us on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn

Web: Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada

Backgrounder: Government of Canada support for Indigenous food and agriculture initiatives

The Indigenous Agriculture and Food Systems Initiative (IAFSI) aims to increase and support economic development opportunities for Indigenous Peoples and communities in Canada. This initiative supports Indigenous communities and entrepreneurs who are ready to launch agriculture and food systems projects and others who want to build their capacity to participate in the Canadian agriculture and agri-food sector. IAFSI is part of the federal Strategic Partnerships Initiative, which provides a way for federal partners to coordinate their efforts, reduce administrative burden and pool resources in support of Indigenous communities.

The AgriDiversity Program, funded under the Canadian Agricultural Partnership, aims to help under-represented groups in Canadian agriculture, including youth, women, Indigenous Peoples, and persons with disabilities fully participate in the sector by helping these groups address the key issues and barriers they often face for sector participation.

The IAFSI recipients announced today are as follows:

Recipient Province Project Federal Support

(up to) 4-C FARMS Limited Partnership Saskatchewan Finalize a business plan Cowessess First Nation to expand its farm operation to 2,000 acres. $31,185 Confederacy of Mainland Mi'kmaq Nova Scotia Provide 13 Nova Scotia Mi'kmaq communities with the training and resources required to achieve food sovereignty and economic growth. $204,199 Cree Nation of Nemaska Quebec Implement an LED-based, smart, vertical farm that would grow fruits and vegetables for sale to the community and external markets. $720,854 Kwadacha First Nation British Columbia Provide the knowledge and skills necessary for two members of the community to operate their 10,800 square foot hydroponic greenhouse facility, independently. $254,019 Xaxli'p First Nation British Columbia Prepare the community to engage in a number of agricultural activities by conducting a market study, a land capability assessment and an irrigation water source assessment. $87,340 Saskatchewan Indian Institute of Technologies (SIIT) Saskatchewan Host a two-day summit that would bring together up to 200 First Nations leaders and other industry leaders to identify opportunities for Indigenous Peoples in the plant-based protein industry. $176,020 Tootinaowaziibeeng Treaty Reserve No.292 (TTR) Manitoba Conduct research and gather key data to determine the economic viability of a culturally-appropriate, sustainable bison operation within the community. $73,400 Doig River First Nation British Columbia Conduct a feasibility study to assess the viability of a hay farming operation. $16,898 Lytton First Nation British Columbia Provide food processing and preservation infrastructure, equipment, services and resources to local food producers and processors through a Food Hub. $1,041,831 Bigstone Cree Nation Alberta Identify and plan agribusiness opportunities to participate and succeed in Alberta's and Canada's growing agribusiness sector. $130,566 Kwikwasut'inuxw Haxwa'mis First Nation British Columbia Increase food security and economic opportunities for KHFN members living in the village of Gwa'Yas'Dums on Gilford Island. $126,619 4-C FARMS Limited Partnership Saskatchewan Reintroduce grain farming as a viable business and career path for the members of Cowessess First Nation. $922,728 Poundmaker Cree Nation Saskatchewan Develop a business plan to support their participation in agriculture that would help create a community garden and greenhouse. $15,000 Red Rock First Nation Ontario Conduct a feasibility study to determine the long term viability of developing a wild rice cultivation and processing operation. $19,925 Swan Lake First Nation Manitoba Establish a long-term business plan for an Integrated Grassfed Bison Enterprise, with particular focus on risk management and market opportunity analysis. $308,026

The AgriDiversity recipient announced today is as follows:

Recipient Name City Project description Federal Support Approved

(up to) Indigenous Works Organization Inc. Saskatchewan Identify gaps, challenges and opportunities for Indigenous people and organizations to increase their participation and innovation in the agriculture and agri-food sectors in Canada. $123,406

SOURCE Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada

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New Orleans, Louisiana--(Newsfile Corp. - June 17, 2021) - Kahn Swick & Foti, LLC ("KSF") and KSF partner, former Attorney General of Louisiana, Charles C. Foti, Jr., remind investors that they have until July 12, 2021 to file lead plaintiff applications in securities class action lawsuits against PureCycle Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ: PCT) f/k/a Roth CH Acquisition I Co. ("Roth") (NASDAQ: ROCH), if they purchased PureCycle and/or Roth securities between November 16, 2020 and May 5, 2021, inclusive (the "Class Period") and/or were holders of Roth securities entitled to participate in the March 16, 2021 shareholder vote on the merger with PureCycle. These actions are pending in the United States District Court for the Middle District of Florida.

What You May Do

If you purchased and/or held securities of PureCycle and/or Roth as above and would like to discuss your legal rights and how these cases might affect you and your right to recover for your economic loss, you may, without obligation or cost to you, contact KSF Managing Partner Lewis Kahn toll-free at 1-877-515-1850 or via email (lewis.kahn@ksfcounsel.com), or visit https://www.ksfcounsel.com/cases/nasdaqcm-pct/ to learn more. If you wish to serve as a lead plaintiff in the class action, you must petition the Court by July 12, 2021 .

About the Lawsuit

PureCycle and certain of its executives are charged with failing to disclose material information during the Class Period, violating federal securities laws.

On May 6, 2021, pre-market, Hindenburg Research reported a wide range of criticisms toward the Company related to its prior "going public" transaction with Roth and present position, concluding that the Company "represents the worst qualities of the SPAC boom; another quintessential example of how executives and SPAC sponsors enrich themselves while hoisting unproven technology and ridiculous financial projections onto the public markets, leaving retail investors to face the ultimate consequences."

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On this news, shares of PureCycle plummeted more than 40%, or approximately $10 per share, on very unusually high trading volume.

The first-filed case is Theodore v. PureCycle Technologies, Inc., et al., No. 21-cv-809.

About Kahn Swick & Foti, LLC

KSF, whose partners include former Louisiana Attorney General Charles C. Foti, Jr., is one of the nation's premier boutique securities litigation law firms. KSF serves a variety of clients - including public institutional investors, hedge funds, money managers and retail investors - in seeking to recover investment losses due to corporate fraud and malfeasance by publicly traded companies. KSF has offices in New York, California and Louisiana.

To learn more about KSF, you may visit www.ksfcounsel.com.

Contact:

Kahn Swick & Foti, LLC

Lewis Kahn, Managing Partner

lewis.kahn@ksfcounsel.com

1-877-515-1850

1100 Poydras St., Suite 3200

New Orleans, LA 70163

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/87984
The after-school tutoring market in China to witness 13.52% YOY growth in 2021.

NEW YORK, June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ --

Technavio has announced its latest market research report titled After-school Tutoring Market in China by End-user, Application, and Geography - Forecast and Analysis 2021-2025

Technavio has been monitoring the after-school tutoring market in China and it is poised to grow by USD 53.31 billion during 2021-2025, progressing at a CAGR of almost 14% during the forecast period. The report offers an up-to-date analysis regarding the current market scenario, latest trends and drivers, and the overall market environment.

Request a Free sample to understand the scope of the report

Frequently Asked Questions:

Based on segmentation by end-user, which is the leading segment in the market?

Based on the end-user, the market saw maximum growth in the primary school segment in 2020.

What are the major trends in the market?

The increased emphasis on test preparation is the major trend in the market.

At what rate is the market projected to grow?

The market is projected to grow at a CAGR of almost 14% during the forecast period.

Who are the top players in the market?

China Distance Education Holdings Ltd., ChineseHour, EF Education First Ltd., Koolearn Technology Holding Ltd., New Oriental Education and Technology Group Inc., TAL Education Group, The Unparalleled Insight, TiC, iTutorGroup, and ZhugeAacademy are the top players in the market.

What are the key market drivers and challenges?

The increasing focus on outcome-based education is one of the major drivers in the market. However, the availability of open educational resources might challenge growth.

Learn more about the global trends impacting the future of market research. Download a free sample here:

https://www.technavio.com/talk-to-us?report=IRTNTR70609

The market is fragmented, and the degree of fragmentation will accelerate during the forecast period. China Distance Education Holdings Ltd., ChineseHour, EF Education First Ltd., Koolearn Technology Holding Ltd., New Oriental Education and Technology Group Inc., TAL Education Group, The Unparalleled Insight, TiC, iTutorGroup, and ZhugeAacademy are some of the major market participants. Although the rising focus on outcome-based education will offer immense growth opportunities, the availability of open educational resources is likely to pose a challenge for the market vendors. In a bid to help players strengthen their market foothold, this after-school tutoring market in China forecast report provides a detailed analysis of the leading market vendors. The report also empowers industry honchos with information on the competitive landscape and insights into the different product offerings offered by various companies.

Story continues

Technavio's custom research reports offer detailed insights on the impact of COVID-19 at an industry level, a regional level, and subsequent supply chain operations. This customized report will also help clients keep up with new product launches in direct & indirect COVID-19 related markets, upcoming vaccines and pipeline analysis, and significant developments in vendor operations and government regulations.

After-school Tutoring Market in China 2021-2025: Segmentation

After-school Tutoring Market in China is segmented as below:

End-user

Application

Geography

After-school Tutoring Market in China 2021-2025: Scope

Technavio presents a detailed picture of the market by the way of study, synthesis, and summation of data from multiple sources. The after-school tutoring market in China report covers the following areas:

After-school Tutoring Market in China Size

After-school Tutoring Market in China Trends

After-school Tutoring Market in China Industry Analysis

This study identifies increased emphasis on test preparation as one of the prime reasons driving the After-school Tutoring Market in China growth during the next few years.

Related Reports on Consumer Discretionary Include:

Global Online Tutoring Market - Global online tutoring market is segmented by courses (STEM, language courses, and other courses) and geography (APAC, Europe, North America, South America, and MEA).

Request a Free Sample Report

Global K-12 Online Tutoring Market - Global K-12 online tutoring market is segmented by type (structured tutoring and on-demand tutoring), course type (assessments and subjects), and geography (North America, Europe, APAC, South America, and MEA).

Request a Free Sample Report

Technavio suggests three forecast scenarios (optimistic, probable, and pessimistic) considering the impact of COVID-19. Technavio's in-depth research has direct and indirect COVID-19 impacted market research reports.

Register for a free trial today and gain instant access to 17,000+ market research reports.

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After-school Tutoring Market in China 2021-2025: Key Highlights

CAGR of the market during the forecast period 2021-2025

Detailed information on factors that will assist after-school tutoring market in china growth during the next five years

Estimation of the after-school tutoring market in china size and its contribution to the parent market

Predictions on upcoming trends and changes in consumer behavior

The growth of the after-school tutoring market in china across APAC and North America

Analysis of the market's competitive landscape and detailed information on vendors

Comprehensive details of factors that will challenge the growth of after-school tutoring market in china vendors

Table of Contents:

Executive Summary

Market Landscape

Market ecosystem

Value chain analysis

Market Sizing

Market definition

Market segment analysis

Market size 2020

Market outlook: Forecast for 2020 - 2025

Five Forces Analysis

Five forces summary

Bargaining power of buyers

Bargaining power of suppliers

Threat of new entrants

Threat of substitutes

Threat of rivalry

Market condition

Market Segmentation by Application

Market segments

Comparison by Application

Subject specific - Market size and forecast 2020-2025

English - Market size and forecast 2020-2025

Market opportunity by Application

Market Segmentation by End-user

Market segments

Comparison by End-user

Primary school - Market size and forecast 2020-2025

Secondary school - Market size and forecast 2020-2025

Market opportunity by End-user

Customer landscape

Customer landscape

Market drivers

Market challenges

Market trends

Vendor Landscape

Vendor landscape

Landscape disruption

Competitive Scenario

Vendor Analysis

Vendors covered

Market positioning of vendors

China Distance Education Holdings Ltd.

ChineseHour

EF Education First Ltd.

Koolearn Technology Holding Ltd.

New Oriental Education and Technology Group Inc.

TAL Education Group

TiC

iTutorGroup

ZhugeAacademy

The Unparalleled Insight

Appendix

Scope of the report

Currency conversion rates for US$

Research methodology

List of abbreviations

About Us

Technavio is a leading global technology research and advisory company. Their research and analysis focuses on emerging market trends and provides actionable insights to help businesses identify market opportunities and develop effective strategies to optimize their market positions. With over 500 specialized analysts, Technavio's report library consists of more than 17,000 reports and counting, covering 800 technologies, spanning across 50 countries. Their client base consists of enterprises of all sizes, including more than 100 Fortune 500 companies. This growing client base relies on Technavio's comprehensive coverage, extensive research, and actionable market insights to identify opportunities in existing and potential markets and assess their competitive positions within changing market scenarios.

Contact

Technavio Research

Jesse Maida

Media & Marketing Executive

US: +1 844 364 1100

UK: +44 203 893 3200

Email: media@technavio.com

Report: www.technavio.com/report/after-school-tutoring-market-in-china-industry-analysis

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Public Reporting Companies Will Need to Disclose Human Capital Metrics Moving Forward

PHILADELPHIA, PA / ACCESSWIRE / June 18, 2021 / The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) recently recognized the importance of an organization's most valuable asset: its people. New disclosure requirements for public registrants are now designed to provide stakeholders insight into human capital - from the organization's operating model to talent planning, learning and innovation, employee experience, and work environments.

Valuation expert, Dave Bookbinder, Senior Director at CFGI, applauds the SEC for taking this groundbreaking step. Bookbinder has been a long-time advocate for the recognition of the impact of human capital assets on business performance and business valuation and says that the new disclosure requirements - while long overdue - are a good start. His hope is that every CEO who says that their people are their most valuable assets will mean it sincerely and understand it intellectually.

While the new disclosure requirements were designed around what investors might deem to be valuable investment considerations, it should not be ignored that these disclosure requirements were implemented during a global pandemic when it's never been clearer that people are an organization's most valuable asset.

"The connection between an engaged workforce and business valuation is demonstrated in a variety of empirical studies that track the stock prices of best workplaces' companies versus their peers," says Bookbinder. "By requiring companies to disclose certain people-related metrics, investors will be able to make better decisions about where they want to allocate their capital - and perhaps one day soon, human capital will appear on the balance sheet."

All companies, both public and private, on every continent, learned critical lessons during the COVID-19 pandemic. As a result, employees will likely benefit from these disclosure requirements as well. For instance, companies will be focused on highlighting and improving their programs around things like diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) and environmental, social, and governance (ESG) - each of which impacts the metrics around employee engagement and turnover. Concern for the health and safety of employees may have been forever changed, as has the where and how' employees work.

Story continues

Bookbinder thinks that these employee-centric considerations will also trickle down to private companies as well, as these companies observe the connection between human capital reporting and business valuation (stock prices) of their publicly traded counterparts. "The underpinnings of each disclosure item will be rigorous policies," he adds, "And procedures that formalize such programs which will serve to embed them into the fabric of the organization." Authoring The New ROI: Return on Individuals was Bookbinder's purposeful step in helping to measure the impact, and to shine a bright light on the subject.

These SEC regulations make it clear that human capital is the primary driver of an organization's value, which is a radically different perspective than corporate balance sheets in years gone by where an organization's people were largely overlooked. With this new age of transparency upon us, employees nationwide can hope to be regarded as the massive value-add that they have, in fact, been all along.

About The New ROI and CFGI

Founded in 2000 by former Big 4 professionals, CFGI is an established industry leader with the resources to successfully navigate today's complex accounting, reporting, tax, and compliance landscape. An assemblage of top-flight professionals with in-depth public accounting expertise, CFGI is able to fulfill a variety of client needs without the restrictions of auditor independence and helps clients with the valuation of businesses and intellectual property. Dave Bookbinder is an Accredited Senior Appraiser (ASA) in Business Valuation with the American Society of Appraisers, Senior Director at CFGI, (where he helps clients with the valuation of businesses and intellectual property), and holds the designation of CEIV (Certified in Entity and Intangible Valuations). He is also the author of a #1 best-selling book about the impact of human capital assets (people!) on the valuation of a business enterprise, titled The NEW ROI: Return On Individuals. For more information, visit newroi.com or cfgi.com.

CONTACT:

Dave Bookbinder

Phone: 267.253.9844

Email: davebookbinder@gmail.com

SOURCE: The New ROI







View source version on accesswire.com:

https://www.accesswire.com/652334/SEC-Acknowledges-Contribution-of-Human-Capital-On-Business-Value




NEW YORK, June 18, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) --



WeissLaw LLP is investigating possible breaches of fiduciary duty and other violations of law by the board of directors of CAI International, Inc. (CAI or the Company) (NYSE: CAI) in connection with the proposed acquisition of the Company by Mitsubishi HC Capital Inc. The transaction is structured as an all-cash tender offer pursuant to which the Companys shareholders will receive $56.00 for each share of CAI common stock that they own. The transaction is valued at approximately $2.9 billion.

If you own CAI shares and wish to discuss this investigation or have any questions concerning this notice or your rights or interests, visit our website:

https://www.weisslaw.co/news-and-cases/cai

Or please contact:

Joshua Rubin, Esq.

WeissLaw LLP

1500 Broadway, 16th Floor

New York, NY 10036

(212) 682-3025

(888) 593-4771

stockinfo@weisslawllp.com

WeissLaw LLP is investigating whether (i) CAIs board of directors acted in the best interests of Company shareholders in agreeing to the proposed transaction, (ii) the $56.00 offer price adequately compensates CAIs shareholders, and (iii) all information regarding the sales process and valuation of the transaction will be fully and fairly disclosed.

WeissLaw LLP has litigated hundreds of stockholder class and derivative actions for violations of corporate and fiduciary duties. We have recovered over a billion dollars for defrauded clients and obtained important corporate governance relief in many of these cases. If you have information or would like legal advice concerning possible corporate wrongdoing (including insider trading, waste of corporate assets, accounting fraud, or materially misleading information), consumer fraud (including false advertising, defective products, or other deceptive business practices), or anti-trust violations, please email us at stockinfo@weisslawllp.com.




The retail store Primark in Birmingham, Britain reopens its doors after a third lockdown imposed in early January due to the ongoing coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic

By Andy Bruce and William Schomberg

LONDON (Reuters) - British retail sales fell unexpectedly last month as a lifting of lockdown restrictions encouraged spending in restaurants rather than shops, according to official data.

Retail sales fell 1.4% between April and May, the Office for National Statistics said.

A Reuters poll of economists had pointed to an 1.6% month-on-month increase in retail sales volumes for May. Only three of 19 forecasts showed a fall.

Food stores suffered the biggest hit, with a 5.7% drop in sales. Separately on Friday supermarket chain Tesco, Britain's biggest retailer, reported a sharp slowdown in underlying UK sales growth in its first quarter.

"Anecdotal evidence suggests the easing of hospitality restrictions had an impact on sales as people returned to eating and drinking at locations such as restaurants and bars," the ONS said.

Most economists said the weak retail sales data was not necessarily suggestive of weaker consumer spending as the economy recovers from the COVID-19 pandemic, since hospitality businesses have reported booming trade.

But Samuel Tombs, at consultancy Pantheon Macroeconomics, said more recent payment card data suggested that the surge in consumer spending could be losing steam.

"Households' real disposable income looks set to fall in Q4, as the end of the furlough scheme reduces employment and inflation rises to match wage growth," he said.

The rapid advance of the "delta" variant of COVID-19, despite Britain's swift roll-out of vaccines, could also crimp household spending in the weeks ahead.

An end to lockdown in England that had been scheduled for Monday has been delayed for four weeks.

In annual terms, retail sales were 24.6% higher than May last year, short of the median expectation for a 29.0% increase.

Household good stores bucked the wider decline with month-on-month growth of 9.0%, which the ONS linked to spending on outdoor goods.

Story continues

Earlier this week, motoring and outdoor goods store Halfords said it had been doing a roaring trade in bicycles.

(This story fixes spelling in headline)

(Reporting by Andy Bruce; Editing by William Schomberg)
Virginia wont extend key pandemic-era eviction protections past the end of the month, Gov. Ralph Northams office said Thursday.

The decision came as two of the states foremost legal aid organizations urged Northam to keep certain safeguards in place using his executive authority.

In a letter sent Thursday, the Legal Aid Justice Center and the Virginia Poverty Law Center asked the governor to preserve the protections currently slated to cease when Virginias state of emergency expires June 30. Thousands of families could be at risk of losing their homes if the protections lapse and eviction filings and judgments return to pre-pandemic levels.

These protections were originally enabled for the benefit of tenants and landlords to assure housing stability during this crisis  a crisis that has not yet ended and will not immediately evaporate come July 1, the letter stated.

If Northam does not step in, Virginia will no longer require landlords to notify tenants about how to apply for rent relief through a state-run program, or apply or seek the money to cover delinquent balances tenants owe. A provision that forbids landlords for proceeding with an eviction for 45 days while waiting for a relief application to be approved would end, too.
The right to have a weapon for self-protection precedes the Constitution, a right so natural that the founders didnt bother to secure it by language any stronger than the slender reed of the Second Amendment.

The founders could not have imagined the killing efficiency of a modern assault rifle, any more than they could have imagined television, a Black president or a female vice president. For them, the right to bear arms implied muzzle-loading muskets.

Still, if the modern hypothetical home invader is much better armed than in colonial times, the modern hypothetical homeowner has a right to be better armed as well.

The unashamedly pro-gun Judge Benitez took a dubious path to the right conclusion. Like the judge, our society may be so infatuated with guns that his was the only possible finding.

But even a constitutional right can be limited. The courts have held that citizens cannot own machine guns or bazookas. Some of the carnage might be limited by more rigorous background checks, mandatory training and demonstrated proficiency.

Even Judge Benitezs ruling includes testimony (p. 30, p. 47) suggesting that the real culprit in mass shootings is large-capacity magazines. Reducing legal magazine size might help even the odds in the Great American Shoot-Out.

But in the meantime, our challenge is to find a way to live in a society drowning in guns, even as a hundred of us die every day by gunfire.

John M. Crisp, an op-ed columnist for Tribune News Service, lives in Georgetown, Texas. This commentary was distributed by the Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
Schoolboy prank after WWII sent a message

I was also a young boy in England during WWII like your correspondents friend [An English boy remembers GIs before D-Day, June 6]. Our family evacuated out of London to a seaside town on the south coast of England.

A few months later, France fell to the Germans, so that we were just across the English Channel from the enemy. For the whole war, we were not allowed to go on the beach or into the water!

Our elementary school was on the inland edge of town, so we could look at the nearby fields, which had become a fighter airfield, and watch planes taking off from our classrooms. I was 9 when D-Day came. We got used to the increasing number of U.S. Army men in the area, but we never went out of town, so we didnt realize just how big these forces were.

Then came D-Day. From early in the morning, there were hundreds of planes, all flying in the same direction and all with black and white stripes painted on their wings. Even to me, it was obvious what was going on. My father had volunteered to join the RAF and was away overseas for four years, but we never knew where he was.
Keene Memorial Library is looking to educate the Fremont community on its virtual resources during an upcoming fair.

The E-Resources Fair will take place from 2-4 p.m. Saturday, June 26 in the large meeting room at Keene Memorial Library. The fair will feature the librarys newest and most popular electronic resources.

Elisa Cruz, circulation manager at Keene Memorial Library, said the event will help expose the Fremont community to some of the hidden gems the library has to offer, such as its music database, testing database and e-book and audiobook library.

Its the first time that weve been able to get in on the calendar and actually promote it in such a way as this, Cruz said. I thought it would be kind of fun, especially since Im bilingual I thought we could get both Spanish and English speaking patrons in here so we can help them, she said.

Cruz said use of the librarys e-resources increased during the past year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, specifically among the librarys database of e-books and audiobooks.

Even so, she said the level of engagement could still grow.

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Johnson graduated from high school in 2003 and started attending college in California. After his graduation there, he made the choice to move to New Zealand.

It was the Recession, plus the job prospects just wanted to know your Microsoft Suite skills, he said. So I was like, This sounds terrible. Im just going to go.

In New Zealand, Johnson worked as a white water rafting guide before moving to Australia to work as a cattle rancher.

I was really on my own. I had to take care of myself. I had to make money to keep traveling all while still paying off student loans and I had some medical stuff I had to save for, he said. So it was teaching me to stand on my own two feet. It taught me how to keep cool and calm in stressful situations.

After two years out of the country, Johnson moved to New York City, where he enrolled in a drama classes and a writer for Inc. Magazine.

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So it was a very humbling experience, because I had no practical, real-world experience, but it also taught me that people look for transferable skills, not just transferable titles, he said. So even though it was my first time pursuing a corporate career and I had no experience, I could bring what I did know into play.
Sabine and Dexter Wang, visiting Hawaii from New Jersey for more than a month, were freaked out when a stranger walked into the Honolulu home where they were staying and acted oddly, Brower said.

He didnt get no permission. He didnt get any consent. He went in that house, Brower said.

Myeni told Sabine Wong something like I have I have video on you. You know why Im here, rummaged through the house and said he owned a cat there, Brower said.

He never mentioned the temple or being lost to the couple, Brower said.

Sabine Wang pretended make a phone call saying someone broke into the home, hoping that would be enough to get Myeni to leave, Brower said.

She then called 911 and told an operator about the man and and that he had no weapons in his hands, according to a recording of the call released by police.

In the doorbell video, Myeni is heard in the video outside the home saying repeatedly, Im sorry. He puts his shoes on and leaves, the footage shows.
The Biden administration has announced a strategy to combat the threat of domestic terrorism, a plan developed with the help of a new counterterrorism program headquartered at the University of Nebraska at Omaha.

The new strategy, released Tuesday, comes more than five months after a mob of insurgents loyal to then-President Donald Trump stormed the U.S. Capitol as Congress was voting to certify Joe Bidens presidential win.

Domestic terrorism  driven by hate, bigotry and other forms of extremism  is a stain on the soul of America, Biden said in a statement. It goes against everything our country strives for, and it poses a direct challenge to our national security, democracy and unity.

The announcement underscores a Justice Department decision to make combating domestic terrorism a top priority. The departments proposed 2022 budget includes $100 million to be used for analysts, investigators and prosecutors related to domestic terrorism.
Leo and his brother, Sandor, 21, watched their parents and grandmother being led to a nearby building for a shower.

They heard the shouting, cursing, yelling and crying of people in the building, while an orchestra nearby loudly played music to drown out the cries.

But Leo heard another sound coming from the building:

Some of the dying victims were singing, I believe in God.

I turned to my brother and said, Hell, what God? Leo said, adding, That was the first time and hopefully the last time I will ever question God.

Students listening to Leos talk sat motionless as he told how some Jews, who werent quite dead, were burned in the ovens of Auschwitzs crematory.

Leo was forced to work in six different labor camps and at one point attempted suicide.

Afterward, he was singled out for punishment. He worked a day without food and a Nazi beat him if he stopped to catch his breath.

That same Nazi later broke Leos leg, which healed in a bent position, leaving him disabled.
Dear reader,

Welcome to Gandhara's weekly newsletter. This briefing brings you the best of our reporting from Afghanistan and Pakistan.

If youre new to the newsletter or havent subscribed yet, you can do so here.

The Afghans who helped U.S. forces

Mustafa Sarwar and Frud Bezhan report on the plight of tens of thousands of Afghans who now face possible Taliban reprisals for having helped the U.S. and allied Western militaries that the hard-line group accuses of occupying Afghanistan during the past two decades.



With some 18,000 Afghans still awaiting a decision on their U.S. Special Immigrant Visa applications, others are facing similar holdups with the countries they served.



Many are getting desperate. The Taliban is growing stronger every day, Abdul Karim, who has worked for U.S. forces for more than five years, told us. That means our lives are becoming more perilous every day. Wasel, another interpreter, said they risked their lives to help the now departing foreign forces. Its their turn to help us, he said.

A Pashtun clan clamors for protection

Members of the Jani Khel Pashtun clan are refusing to bury their assassinated tribal leader and threaten to march on Islamabad if Pakistani authorities fail to rid their homeland of rival Taliban factions.



We will dig up the graves of the four teenagers [whom we buried in March] along with the corpse of Malik Naseeb Khan and march toward Islamabad, tribal leader Gul Alam said of their final desperate move years after the 60,000-strong community suffered deaths, destruction, and displacement.



We will march toward Islamabad with these five corpses, Alam said. We will keep on marching even if they shoot us or arrest us all. Their march might begin on June 20.

U.S. still committed to Afghanistan

In some hopeful news for Afghanistan this week, two senior American diplomats indicated Washingtons continued robust support for Afghanistan even after the expected U.S. military withdrawal completes next month.



The thrust of the U.S. policy in Afghanistan is to try to do all we can to improve the odds for the [Afghanistans] Islamic Republic, U.S. Charge d'Affaires to Afghanistan Ross Wilson told us. Our forces are leaving Afghanistan, but the United States is not leaving Afghanistan, said Zalmay Khalilzad, the U.S. special envoy for the country.

Turkeys maverick move

Ankara is eying a major security and diplomatic role in post-withdrawal Afghanistan as Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan called for continued U.S. support to secure Kabuls international airport after the withdrawal of other NATO troops.



There are signs that Erdogans offer will be accepted. During a major summit this week NATO leaders agreed to maintain funding for Kabuls civilian airport while Jake Sullivan, U.S. national-security adviser, hailed Ankaras promise.



The Taliban, however, staunchly opposes the proposal and is pushing for Turkey to withdraw its troops. Unlike next-door Syria, distant Afghanistan might prove a tougher challenge for bullish Erdogan.

Pakistans parliament brawl

Daud Khattak reports on Pakistanis response to witnessing their lawmakers hurl abuses, epithets, and heavy budget books at each other on the floor of the parliament this week.



The speaker banned seven government and opposition MPs from the building, but the move didnt garner much praise. The nasty episode was declared yet another attempt to undermine Pakistans fledgling democracy.



"What happened on June 15 was something pre-planned, Mohsin Dawar, an independent MP, told us. Those people were involved who are imposed on us by the invisible forces," he added. At the very least, the skirmish will prevent the government and opposition from cooperating on anything in the near future.

Drones, privacy, and surveillance

Radio Mashaal reports on the increasing opposition to Pakistani military quadcopters in parts of South Waziristan, where locals view their use as a means of violating their privacy rather than an effective instrument in identifying Taliban insurgents.



"We take this an insult to capture pictures of our houses where our women live," said Osman Maseed, a tribal leader. "Even in this hot weather, people sleep inside their rooms due to the hovering of the military drone cameras over our houses," he said. Many people in the mountainous region sleep outside during cool summer nights.

I hope you enjoyed this weeks newsletter, and I encourage you to forward it to colleagues who might find it useful.



If you havent subscribed yet, you can do so here. Until next week, I encourage you to visit our website and follow us on Twitter and Facebook.

Yours,

Abubakar Siddique

Twitter: @sid_abu



P.S.: You can always reach us at gandhara@rferl.org.
Hundreds of residents of Pakistans northwestern Bannu district have protested for a 18th consecutive day demanding the government to get rid of militants and restore security in the area.

The members of a Pashtun clan in western Pakistan -- Jani Khel -- launched the sit-in in protest of the killing of a tribal elder, Malik Naseeb Khan, who was shot dead late on May 30.

They refuse to bury the dead body and threaten to march on Pakistans capital, Islamabad, if their demands are not met.

Protest leader Gul Alam Wazir told RFE/RL on June 17 that the transport minister of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province, where Bannu is located, visited the protesters camp on June 17 and promised that the government will take practical steps within two days to fulfil their demands.

Khan was a leading member of the committee that negotiated an agreement with the government in March following a weeklong protest in which Bannu residents refused to bury the bodies of four slain teenagers.

If our demands are not met by Sunday (June 20), we will march toward Islamabad, Wazir told RFE/RL.

We will dig up the graves of the four teenagers along with the corpse of Malik Naseeb Khan and march toward Islamabad.

The region is rife with Taliban militants and other armed groups years after the Pakistani military claimed victory in the war on terrorism in the countrys northwest.

Requesting anonymity because he is not authorized to speak to the media, a senior security official told RFE/RL that security forces are waiting for an opportune time for launching an offensive against militants in the area, alluding to the intense summer heat when daytime temperature frequently surpass 45 degrees Celsius.

If such protests continue, our only option will be to launch a final offensive against the militants, the official said.
The Taliban has captured dozens of districts across Afghanistan in a lightning offensive since the start of the international military withdrawal on May 1.

Afghan security forces have retreated or been forced from at least 30 districts in rural areas, the most territory the internationally recognized Afghan government has lost to the militant group since it launched an insurgency after the U.S.-led invasion in 2001.

The Talibans considerable gains on the battlefield have fueled fears that it could topple the government and overrun the country's much-maligned security forces, which will lose crucial U.S. air support once all foreign troops depart by September.

Afghan officials claim government forces have retreated from some districts to prevent civilian casualties and vowed to retake them.

Officials also say the Taliban has failed to capture any provincial capitals or provinces despite major offensives across the country.



The seizures appear to stem from a combination of the Taliban pushing to consolidate its control in some rural areas in which it was already in a strong position and Afghan forces repositioning some of their forces to more defensible locations, says Jonathan Schroden, a security expert with the U.S.-based nonprofit research and analysis organization CNA.

Districts Fall

The militants have launched major offensives in rural areas in eastern, southern, northern, and western Afghanistan. There has also been a stark increase in deadly suicide bombings striking urban areas that have been blamed on the Islamist group.

In seven weeks, Taliban fighters have seized three districts in Uruzgan, a longtime stronghold in the south; Sar-e Pul, a Taliban stronghold in the countrys north; Ghor, a remote and unstable province in the central highlands; and Ghazni, a strategic province straddling the main highway linking Kabul with Kandahar, the nations second-largest city.

The insurgents have also captured two districts in Maidan Wardak, which is only 40 kilometers from Kabul and considered a gateway to the capital. Several key highways to the countrys central and southern provinces also go through the province.

The Taliban has captured at least 32 districts since May 1, according to the Long War Journal (LWJ), a project run by the Foundation for Defense Of Democracies, a Washington-based think tank, which tracks militant groups.

Afghanistans Tolo News estimates that the Taliban has seized control of at least 30 districts since the foreign pullout began.

According to the LWJ, the Taliban controls around 26 percent of Afghanistans 398 districts, more than the government, which commands only 23 percent. The rest of the districts are contested.

The LWJs living map, based mostly on media reports, is the only publicly available source that tracks district control in Afghanistan. NATO no longer assesses territorial control, and the Afghan government has classified its own data.

The Afghan government controls Kabul, provincial capitals, and major population centers. The Taliban -- which controls more territory than at any other time since 2001 -- commands large swaths of the countryside.

Risky Retreats

In some cases, the Taliban has seized districts after fierce clashes with Afghan forces, who have complained about overdue salaries, shortages of ammunition, and delays in sending air and ground reinforcements.

In other cases, the militants have seized control of districts without firing a shot. In a growing trend, the Taliban, with the help of local elders, has negotiated the surrender of hundreds of Afghan soldiers and national police officers.

Such actions have allowed the militants to stock up on weapons, ammunition, and equipment. It has also been a propaganda coup for the Taliban, which has boasted of an impending victory in its recent statements.



The Interior Ministry on June 13 announced that it had arrested an unspecified number of local elders who had mediated surrenders, saying that cooperation with terrorists was unacceptable.



And in other cases, Afghan forces have deliberately retreated from districts where they had only a marginal presence and withdrawn to other positions, mostly nearer to provincial capitals and major cities.



From a strategic military perspective, the repositioning of forces seeks to put Afghan forces into the best posture for defending the bulk of the country's population and political centers, says Schroden.



But from a strategic political perspective, he says, there are several risks.



First, it risks perceptions of increasing Taliban momentum and the inevitability of Taliban military takeover, which creates increased risk of side-switching by local armed forces and key political actors, as well as hedging by international actors, says Schroden.

And second, there is the risk of the Taliban using those perceptions to increase pressure on the government both internally and externally to make concessions at the negotiating table.

It is unclear if the militant group is attempting a forcible takeover of Afghanistan or just trying to boost its leverage in deadlocked peace talks aimed at striking a permanent cease-fire and power-sharing arrangement.

Intra-Afghan talks that began in September have made little progress, hampered by deep mistrust, militant violence, and a huge gulf between the Taliban and Afghan representatives on key issues. In a further blow, the insurgents last month backed out of a high-level international peace conference that was to have been hosted by Turkey.



In the wake of President Joe Biden's April decision to pull out the remaining 3,500 U.S. troops in Afghanistan without setting any conditions, the Taliban immediately intensified attacks on provincial capitals, district centers, and large government military bases.

Observers say the military exit will severely weaken Afghanistans security forces, which have relied heavily on U.S. air support, intelligence, and logistics to keep the Taliban at bay.

The United States has pledged to continue funding the 273,000-strong Afghan National Army and Afghan National Police. Washington has also said Afghan forces will receive military backing from U.S. bases and ships located hundreds of miles away, dubbed "over the horizon support.

But it is unclear if U.S. drones and war planes will aid Afghan forces fighting the Taliban or focus on counterterrorism missions against Al-Qaeda and Islamic State (IS) militants in Afghanistan.

Attritional Warfare

Observers say the Taliban is adopting similar tactics to the former mujahedin, the U.S.-backed Islamist guerrilla fighters who battled Soviet and Afghan communist forces in the 1980s.



The Soviets departed in 1989, following a devastating, nearly decade-long occupation. But with military and financial assistance from Moscow, the leftist government of Afghan President Mohammad Najibullah survived for three years and collapsed only after the breakup of the Soviet Union and the end of its support.



Tamim Asey, the head of the Institute of War and Peace Studies, a Kabul-based think tank, says the mujahedin used attritional warfare augmented by a military chokepoint strategy, the same tactics the Taliban has employed.



The strategy centers around capturing key strategic districts and provinces, making highways insecure, isolating major cities, and targeting the power and transit infrastructure leading to these major urban centers, says Asey, a former Afghan deputy defense minister.



In addition, [it relies on] carrying out targeted killings and assassination campaigns inside the isolated cities to undermine government legitimacy and erode public trust.



Taliban forces are estimated to have surrounded 16 of Afghanistans 34 provincial capitals.



The militants have captured several strategic districts near Kabul and other major cities. They have also waged a brutal yearlong campaign of targeted killings against government workers, journalists, and activists in major urban areas. There has also been an uptick in deadly suicide bombings striking urban areas that have been blamed on the Islamist group.



The greatest tragedy of our time is that the Afghan government hasnt learnt anything from the modern military history of Afghanistan and is responding with the same futile regular warfare counteroffensive tactics which led to the collapse of the last communist ruler of Afghanistan and has been a recipe for military disaster, says Asey.
Colorado Springs, CO (80903)

Today

Mixed clouds and sun this morning. Scattered thunderstorms developing this afternoon. High 74F. Winds SSE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 50%..

Tonight

A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible early. Some passing clouds. Low 57F. Winds SE at 5 to 10 mph.
Is your school principal denying that her school makes use of Critical Race Theory when you call to complain about it? If so, its likely that shes either misinformed, or just spreading disinformation. Here below is how to tell the difference.

There is a need for a checklist because as more and more Americans reject CRT indoctrination in schools, workplaces, or even the military, educators, HR personnel and others are feeling the need to engage in a little, uh, CYA. Sophists among academics, the Twitterati, and the political world, are rising to support this disinformation, too.

Frankly, the purveyors of CRT and related theories are shocked that Americans from all walks of life are speaking up against CRT. They thought they could take over classrooms, offices, the military  the whole country, really  without meeting any resistance.

Instead, parents are speaking out  from Loudoun County, Va., where I spoke to 300 loud parents meeting at the county government building on Saturday, to Douglas County, Colo., where school district authorities were astounded at the vehemence of the opposition.

Public comment went on for two hours as parents shellacked the board for its flirtation with Critical Race Theory, reports the Denver Gazette about the first in-person board meeting of the Douglas County School District since the pandemic.

So how can you tell if a teacher, principal, or school board official tells you that, no, theres no CRT here (as a lone heckler briefly interrupted my remarks in Loudoun County to inform me)? Here is a list (by no means exhaustive) of five key CRT principles. If your school or office does anything that includes these ideas, you can confidently call Bovine Manure when they deny its CRT.

The first and most important bedrock principle of critical race theory is that racism is not an individual, conscious decision to be a racist or act on that belief. No, its systemic. Racism, according to CRTs purveyors, is written into Americas laws, institutions, and capitalist system. What masquerades as American culture is actually the norms and practices of white people.

Critical race theory, writes one of its main architects, Angela Harris, takes the position that racism pervades our institutions, our beliefs and our everyday practices.

A second principle follows from the first: behaviors and beliefs are inherent in identity categories, and thus the members of these categories must not adopt American culture  which, in their telling, is merely a conspiracy to perpetuate white supremacy. Members of minority groups must never assimilate to standard practices or norms, even those that appear neutral on the surface.

[M]any Latinos naturally view information about time more generally and simply cannot see the judicial systems need for specificity and exactitude, writes Maria Ontiveros, a professor at the University of San Francisco, in her book Critical Race Feminism.

A third bedrock principle is that white people receive unearned privilege at birth, while other Americans are denied it. This whiteness premium has prevented the union of the working class.

Segregation, wrote the man widely recognized as the Godfather of CRT, Derrick Bell, represented an economic-political compromise between the elite and working-class whites [that] gave to the poor the sense of superiority, while retaining the substance for the rich.

A fourth principle is that meritocracy is myth. Since whites have rigged the system, all the ways we use to measure merit or success in education or work are far from objective. Hiring metrics and workplace benchmarks, and standardized tests for university admissions, must be eliminated.

On this we have, again, the authority of Bell, who wrote in Popular Democracy, a chapter in The Derrick Bell Reader: In short, merit serves as the phony pennant of color-blindness, used as justification for opposition to affirmative action.

The fifth and last tenet is that equity must replace equality. This may surprise those who think they amount to pretty much the same thing, but under CRT, the word equity has become corrupted, and has become the functional opposite of equality. Because the systemic racism that CRTs proponents see everywhere has produced disparities under a capitalist system that rewards the wrong criteria, government must step in and treat individual Americans unequally. Only in that manner, will outcomes be equal.

And on this, we have no less an authority than our Vice President Kamala Harris: Equitable treatment means we all end up in the same place.

Any curriculum or training program that does any of the above is classic CRT. Any functionary who denies it has simply not read her Derrick Bell  or may be lying to you.

Mike Gonzalez is a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundations Allison Center for Foreign Policy in Washington, D.C., and is the Angeles T. Arredondo E Pluribus Unum fellow.
Senate bill boosts penalties for cyber criminals

New legislation aims to create stricter penalties for cyberattacks against critical infrastructure and give the Justice Department more options for bringing charges against criminals in foreign countries.

The International Cybercrime Prevention Act is co-sponsored by Sens. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.). It essentially takes the existing legal statutes for racketeering, money laundering and forfeiture and "brings them to bear on cyber criminals," Whitehouse said.

The bill permits law enforcement to seize funds generated from the sale of spyware and to take equipment such as illegal intercept devices used in the commission of hacking campaigns, ransomware and other nefarious activity, according to a fact sheet provided by the lawmakers.

The bill would also make it easier for DOJ to go after botnets by expanding the list of reasons the federal government can seek injunctive relief. Under the current law, DOJ can only seek relief when a botnet is engaged in fraud or illegal wiretapping. The new bill would broaden that activity to include the destruction of data, denial of service attacks and certain violations in the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.

Asked about how the bill would deter foreign actors, most of whom reside in host countries that will often passively allow criminal activities such as ransomware attacks, Whitehouse cited DOJ charges brought under the Obama administration against Chinese military officials that acted as a "shot across the bow" warning to other countries.

During the June 16 meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, President Joe Biden gave the Russian leader a list of 16 critical infrastructure areas that should be considered off-limits to cyber intrusions. That list presumably maps to the list of 16 critical infrastructure areas designated by the Department of Homeland Security.

This article was first posted to FCW, a sibling site to GCN.
A jury in the wrongful death trial against a Buffalo Center long-term care facility handed the family of a woman who died there a $6 million award today.

The family of Darlene Weaver, a Timely Mission resident who died in June 2017, filed a lawsuit in Winnebago County District Court against the facility in November of that year, charging the facility with wrongful death, negligence, abuse and breach of contract.

In their suit, Weaver's family alleged the nursing home failed to timely transfer her to a higher level of care when her symptoms required it. Timely Mission also did not notify Weaver's doctor or her family of her change in condition and failed to monitor her appropriately to avoid injury, according to the suit.

In addition, the nursing home didn't have adequate staff to care for Weaver, the lawsuit states.

In its response, Timely Mission denied responsibility for Weaver's death.

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The jury's findings were based on several questions it was required to answer, including whether it believed Timely Mission was negligent (yes), and if yes, was the negligence a cause of damage to Darlene Weaver (yes).
Erasing the stigma

In August 2020, Norquist publicly announced the formation of a task force to study the matter. The goal, he said, was in part to remove the stigma of pilots talking about strange things they saw. Officials wanted to "start educating our pilots and get them to the point where they understand this is credible enough [that] we really need you to report this and you shouldn't be afraid that you're going to get grief from the department because you said this."

At that point, the former official said, the small task force working the issue understood that the data surrounding these encounters -- including radar and other technical information that theoretically couldn't be spoofed or attributed to pilot misperception -- pointed to a real event.

"You sort of had to get the ritual joke out of the way," Norquist said. "But everyone who dealt with it, when they saw the information understood, it is sufficiently credible [and] we need to find out why."

Erasing the stigma surrounding a serious discussion of UFOs was also the goal for lawmakers in 2020 when they passed legislation requiring the Pentagon and intelligence community to provide more information about these UFO encounters, details that have, until recently, largely remained shrouded in secrecy.
About me:

Goals of MBA for me in no particular order:

Booth:

INSEAD:

Other facts to consider:

Tl;dr:

I've never been more torn in making a decision in my life! I was lucky enough to get into a few schools and have since narrowed it down to Booth and INSEAD. Both are great programs and I'm so grateful to have been accepted into each. I recognize that I can't go wrong with either choice, but for some reason that isn't helping me make a decision. I would be extremely grateful for any thoughts or musings on my situation - hopefully you guys can help me come to some sort of decision here since I only have a week left to make up my mind!-29 F, US citizen / caucasian-Ivy undergrad, engineering degree-7 years work experience in tech - analytics and internal strategy-Studied abroad in Shanghai in undergrad. No work experience abroad but have done a lot of international work projects/trips-I am SO ready to travel-Use it to pivot abroad. Spend 2-4 years abroad (preferably somewhere in Asia or an emerging market) and return to the US to settle down in my mid 30s-Learn as much as possible. Round out my business acumen-Explore different areas like VC/PE, also interested in international expansion/international strategy roles-Make a solid group of friends and build a network that will benefit me 10/20/30 years down the road(already have a deposit, deadline to defer is 7/1)PROs:-Much stronger network in US. I plan to ultimately settle down in the US so this will be useful in the decades to come-2 year program, so it gives me more time to explore different classes and try new things-Classes are 3 months vs INSEAD's 2 months, so they go deeper and theoretically I would be learning more-I've been admitted since December so I've already had time to meet my classmates and I feel like I'm part of the community already-I could do a 3 month study abroad wherever during my second yearCONs:-I'm 29 - already above the average age. Worried I'll feel like my classmates are babies since I think so much personal/professional growth happens from 26-28-Chicago is smack in the middle of the US, so international travel becomes that much more cumbersome-From the small group of Booth alumni currently working broad that I spoke to, most were either international students to begin with or they were US citizens who ended up in London (I would be fine in London, but it definitely doesn't excite me)-I would be doing nontraditional recruiting since 99.9% of on campus options are US-based-Study abroad is only 3 months(need to pay $13k deposit by Friday 6/25)PROs:-Gets me abroad asap (it's been a life goal of mine to work abroad)-Higher likelihood of me finding a job abroad (see cons for potential counterpoint)-Average age is 29 so my classmates will have more experience coming into school-Would begin in January so I would have an internship opportunity-More international travelingCONs:-I've read so many posts that say INSEAD is for consultants to get the MBA stamp and then return to their prior company, or that INSEAD is where the rich international students go to goof off for a year before returning to their home country/family business, so as a result, the focus on academics is lacking-I ultimately want to settle down in the US, so if I go to INSEAD and work abroad for a year or two after, the INSEAD brand likely won't help much when I'm returning to the US and looking for a job. But perhaps I could rely on my undergrad brand for this? It seems silly to pay so much for a brand name that has short term benefits (getting me abroad) but not much in terms of long term re: US networking...-INSEAD career services told me that only 50 US citizens in the last 5 years have found job sponsorship in Singapore/Australia after graduation, which equates to 10 per year or 5 per class. This is somewhat alarming since ~50 students in each class are American-The INSEAD alumni I've spoken to who immediately returned to the US after graduation told me that their INSEAD degree/network didn't help at all in the job search and they had to rely on other networks. Again - red flag since this is going to cost $$$$$$ and I want the value to last longer than the few years I'm abroad for-I received a scholarship at Booth so both schools come out to approx the same amount for tuition + living expenses. Wish I could pick one based on $ alone-There is a SMALL chance that an international role could open up at my current company, but I likely wouldn't know this until after the INSEAD deadline comes and goes. If I could make this work, I would jump at this role and defer INSEAD or Booth for a year. Likely INSEAD because then I'd be extremely old by Booth standards, but there's no way I'd know if I got the job by the INSEAD deadline next Friday-Do I really want to be early 30s and trying to uproot what is supposed to be the beginning of a stable career trajectory to try to go abroad? 30s is generally the time people want to settle down and I'd be completely uprooting my lifeMy brain is telling me Booth, but my heart is telling me INSEAD. I always make decisions with my brain, but maybe it's time to do things differently? Or is a ~$150k purchase a silly time to start doing things differently? I can't seem to give up the idea of INSEAD even though I know it might be a poor choice longer term since my goal is to return to the US, but I don't want to always wonder "what if" and watch the opportunities to go abroad pass me by.THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU
Exam registration problems [ #permalink

Hi everyone. On the 9th on June I registered for an exam in Italy (thats where I live), but after inserting my credit card number and waiting for the page to load the following screen, I got kicked out of the page due to inactivity. My bank sent me a message saying that the payment succeded, but i didnt receive any news from GMAT about the exam, and the registration doesnt appear in my account. The exam I tried to register to is on the 23rd of June. Do I have to wait some more or should I do something?



Posted from my mobile device
The districts positivity  a measure of the positive results against the overall tests given  is down to 3.5%, one of the lowest levels recorded. Thats a slight bump since Sunday when the figure was at 3.1%. Virginias positivity rate is at a record-low of 1.5%.

Even with lower local infection figures, five new hospitalizations have been recorded during the past seven days, data from the Virginia Health Department show.

Vaccinations

Theres little local movement in the vaccination picture, although the state health department has added a new calculation to the already dizzying array of percentages.

Of adult residents, 44% in Danville and 41% in Pittsylvania County are considered fully vaccinated. Danville has 53% of residents with at least one shot of a COVID-19 vaccine, compared to 48% in the county.

The shots are administered in either a two-dose process for the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines or a one-shot Johnson & Johnson version. Pfizer is the only vaccine available to children as young as 12. About 13% of the 10-19 age group in the local health district have had at least one shot as of Friday.
The four who were rescued, who were not wearing life jackets at the time they were found, were being treated at a local hospital Thursday night for injuries not considered life-threatening, Cates said.

Workers at the Duke facility had alerted authorities around 3:30 p.m. on Thursday after they noticed the four people appeared to be stranded on the river near the dam. Cates declined to speculate on the ages of the rafters or whether they were intoxicated. He did not provide names of the rescued or missing individuals.

"This incident actually occurred near dark last night,'' Cates said, explaining the four rescued rafters provided authorities with some details. "These people were floating the river, they go over the dam which is near the Duke Energy plant,'' Cates said.

Dan Riverkeeper Steven Pulliam of Stoneville said on Friday that he wonders if recent rains created mud that obscured the portage area along the river where boaters and tubers can exit and walk around the dam's powerful currents.

"The portage/trail to exit pre-dam is a good ways before the dam on the right,'' Pulliam said. "It's possible that recent rains covered some of the steps with mud, making it hard to see, especially if you're not looking for it.''
The latest storm was expected to make landfall late Friday or early Saturday, imperiling Fathers Day weekend commerce in tourism areas already suffering economic losses caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

Of course, with weather like this, you know you cant run, but weekends, holidays, thats when tourists are coming down here, said Louisiana swamp tour boat captain Darrin Coulon. He canceled tours Friday and hoped for better weather Saturday and Sunday as he secured his boats in Crown Point.

Worries were similar for Austin Sumrall, the owner and chef at the White Pillars Restaurant and Lounge in Biloxi, Mississippi. He had 170 reservations on his books for Sunday, but was concerned that some patrons would cancel. We saw, especially last year, the rug can get jerked out from under you pretty quickly," he said.

A tropical storm warning extended from Morgan City, Louisiana, to the Okaloosa-Walton County line in the Florida Panhandle. Coastal surge flooding was possible and flash flood watches extended along the coast from southeast Louisiana into the Florida Panhandle and well inland into Mississippi, Alabama and into parts of central and northern Georgia.

I hope it just gets in and gets out, said Greg Paddie, manager of Tacky Jacks, a restaurant at Alabamas Orange Beach.
In the 1964 presidential campaign, Republican candidate Barry Goldwater had a slogan: In your heart you know hes right.

That was aimed at deflecting the stereotype about Goldwater and Republicans in general that they were an uncaring lot. It is a smear that still works to some extent for modern Democrats.

In his return to political campaigning last Saturday, former president Donald Trump channeled Goldwater when he claimed vindication for many of the positions he took during last years presidential campaign and in the four years of his administration.

Speaking to a gathering of North Carolina Republicans in Greenville, Trump touted his accomplishments, including tax cuts and regulation reductions. He also criticized what he said were President Bidens insane executive orders.

He might have added Middle East peace deals, including the Abraham Accords. He said President Biden is working to reverse all of his achievements and mentioned rising gas prices as a consequence that can be felt by nearly every American.
EDEN  The bodies of three people were recovered late Thursday from the Dan River, where their raft went over a dam the night before.

Water rescue teams in two boats and air crews worked Thursday evening in a search for five missing rafters who traveled over the dam near Duke Energy's Dan River Steam Station here late Wednesday night, authorities said.

By 6 p.m., the State Highway Patrol had dispatched a helicopter equipped with forward-looking infrared cameras to help with the search through the night. The technology is designed to enhance night vision and detect heat sources in such searches.

Authorities confirmed about 9:30 p.m. that three bodies had been found and were believed to be those of some of the missing rafters. Two people remained missing late Thursday.

Earlier Thursday afternoon, emergency workers rescued four people who said they had traveled the Dan River as a group of nine with the five missing people on Wednesday. The group used three rafts for their trek, said Rockingham County Emergency Services Director Rodney Cates.

The four who were rescued, who were not wearing life jackets at the time they were found, were being treated at a local hospital Thursday night for injuries not considered life-threatening, Cates said.

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GREENSBORO  There will be new principals at 12 schools and four new administrators this fall after the Guilford County Board of Education approved the appointments on Thursday.

Most of the names will sound familiar, as many are already working for the district or are returning here for the 2021-22 school year.

Here's a look at the appointments approved Thursday, according to a district news release:

 Dominick Robinson, chief student services officer. He currently works for the Texas Education Agency as director of the School, Family and Community Engagement Initiatives division. He also worked as a senior manager of early childhood enrollment and access for the Louisiana Department of Education.

 Angela Draper, principal at Falkener Elementary, will be a school support officer.

 Michael Hettenbach, principal at Southwest High, will be a school support officer.

 Melissa Nixon, former Title I director for the district who most recently worked to monitor federal programs for the N.C. Department of Public Instruction, will rejoin the district as the senior executive director of federal and special programs.
GREENSBORO  College textbooks can cost a bundle, but most N.C. A&T students won't have to worry about price when they buy their books.

The university announced Thursday that it will cover the cost of textbooks for all of its undergraduate students for the next two academic years. A&T said its program will save students on average about $1,000 annually.

A&T will use federal COVID-19 relief funds to pay for printed and digital textbooks. The university estimates the program will cost about $13 million.

"This program will help alleviate financial pressures often associated with pursuing higher education for many students, especially first-generation students and those with limited financial resources," A&T Provost Beryl McEwen said in a statement. "Our undergraduates will begin the academic year with an added layer of confidence and be able to focus on their studies without the worry of textbook costs."

A&T said students will get an email in August before the semester begins asking them to select their course materials. Students can either pick up their books at the campus bookstore or have them delivered digitally on the university's Blackboard learning software platform.
ASHEBORO  The Zoo is seeking help from the public in naming six American red wolf pups born in April, the North Carolina Zoo said in a news release.

The red wolf litter is the first to be born in the wolves public habitat in two decades. Typically, litters are born in the red wolf breeding area, the Zoo said.

The pups were born as a part of the Zoos red wolf breeding program. There were three litters with a total of 12 pups born within three days from April 28 to April 30, but for now, the public is only voting on names for the six pups born to parents Flint and Sassy.

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The names to choose from, chosen by the Zoos red wolf keepers, are all based on rivers in the southeastern U.S. where critically endangered red wolves used to range, the Zoo said.

People are invited to pick out their favorite six names from the list: Catawba, Edisto, Haw, Harper, Warrior, Eno, Fisher, Pearl, Waccamaw and Swannanoa.

Voting is open online through 4 p.m. June 28. People can also access the poll through the Zoos website.
The four who were rescued, who were not wearing life jackets at the time they were found, were being treated at a local hospital Thursday night for injuries not considered life-threatening, Cates said.

Workers at the Duke facility had alerted authorities around 3:30 p.m. on Thursday after they noticed the four people appeared to be stranded on the river near the dam. Cates declined to speculate on the ages of the rafters or whether they were intoxicated. He did not provide names of the rescued or missing individuals.

"This incident actually occurred near dark last night,'' Cates said, explaining the four rescued rafters provided authorities with some details. "These people were floating the river, they go over the dam which is near the Duke Energy plant,'' Cates said.

Dan Riverkeeper Steven Pulliam of Stoneville said on Friday that he wonders if recent rains created mud that obscured the portage area along the river where boaters and tubers can exit and walk around the dam's powerful currents.

"The portage/trail to exit pre-dam is a good ways before the dam on the right,'' Pulliam said. "It's possible that recent rains covered some of the steps with mud, making it hard to see, especially if you're not looking for it.''

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Last week, the Latta Plantation outside Charlotte sparked nationwide outrage when it promoted a $25 event on Juneteenth featuring white refugees where the overseer is now out of a job.

That event has since been canceled and Mecklenburg County officials closed Latta Plantation until further notice.

In contrast, Stagville Plantation outside Durham is holding emancipation tours on the property that once housed nearly 1,000 slaves, where the work to educate visitors about their lives goes on year-round.

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Raleighs Pope House Museum tells the story of Dr. Thomas Manassa Pope, the only Black man to run for mayor in the Jim Crow era.

For Ernest Dollar, director of Raleighs City and Pope House museums, the holiday remains a balancing act between celebrating emancipation and educating the state about its darkest chapters.

We also need to consider what freedom meant and how that was endangered for the next 100 years, Dollar said. Lastly, we might ask ourselves this week, why has it taken 156 years to collectively celebrate the end of human bondage in America?

Juneteenth stands for June 19, 1865  the day enslaved people in Galveston, Texas, learned that the Civil War had ended and their freedom was ensured.
More than that, the DWI courtrooms basic organization is drastically different.

Ordinarily, defendants are expected to arrive at the start of their court session, not knowing exactly when  or if  their case will be called.

Under the new system, each defendant is assigned a specific time to arrive in court. For trials, no more than one defendant is in the courtroom at any given time. And even in pleas, which get processed quickly, no more than a small handful of defendants are assigned to the same time slot.

The setup cuts down on crowds and unnecessary waiting. And although the new system is still in its trial period for the next 10 weeks, Osman thinks theres a chance it could wind up as a permanent solution.

We think there are now some opportunities to change and improve our processes to make them more efficient, he said.

****

On a recent June morning, Osmans court runs fairly smoothly.

The first trial of the day, a case from August 2019, ends in a guilty verdict. So does the second trial  this one from April 2018. Both defendants lose their licenses for 30 days and are told to perform 24 hours of community service.
From May to early June, the latest data available, cases of the delta variant increased nationwide from 2.8% to 9.5%, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In the four weeks before June 22, the latest available data, just 0.7% of cases in North Carolina were the delta variant, but state health officials expect that rate to increase in the coming weeks.
Hannah-Jones, who is a Black woman, is set to join the faculty in July as the Knight Chair in Race and Investigative Journalism. The Board of Trustees has not offered Hannah-Jones tenure for that position, which previous Knight Chairs have received. She is best known for her Pulitzer Prize-winning work on The 1619 Project, which aims to reframe the countrys history by putting slavery and Black Americans at the center of it.

The issue has caused national outrage among professional journalists, scholars and UNC-CH faculty who have defended Hannah-Jones and demanded she get tenure. Critics have pointed to race and politics as the reasons behind the boards decisions, particularly surrounding The 1619 Project.

And at least one top faculty recruit withdrew her candidacy because of the situation.

Hannah-Jones attorneys threatened a federal lawsuit in May, saying UNC-CH unlawfully discriminated against Hannah-Jones based on the content of her journalism and scholarship and because of her race. No lawsuit has been filed yet, but university lawyers are talking with her legal team.

Especially over the last year and a half, this is exactly what weve been trying to describe to everyone, Field said. This very situation is the definition of systemic racism.
The morning bell rang at Republican High (Home of the Fightin Pachyderms) as students shuffled in. Gretchen Niedermeyer dry swallowed a couple of preemptive aspirins and reminded herself as she did every morning that she was just 16 months and  a glance at the calendar  seven days from her pension.

Good morning, class, she said. As you know, oral reports on African American history are due this morning. She ignored a chorus of groans. Tommy, you go first.

Tommy Weissmuller stood. My report is on slavery, he said. Slavery is when they made the Black people work really hard. Like, they even had to work on weekends. And the Founding Fathers were surprised when they heard about this. They thought it was unfair, so they had a war with the South to make them stop. Then the South realized the Founding Fathers were right and together, they ended slavery. The end.

Mrs. Niedermeyer willed herself to stop grinding her teeth and marked a B+ in her grade book. In the old days, shed have given him an F. But that was before 2021, when Republicans banned critical race theory, The 1619 Project, museums, history books, Spike Lee movies, Spike Lee, dreadlocks, Black Panther comic books and anything else that made white people uncomfortable.
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Those interviewed said Harrington would often speak poorly about other employees, calling into question their work, in what the report describes as "an attempt to turn them against each other."

The report says he also cast doubt on other law enforcement agencies and city employees, "causing his staff to be cautious in trusting or working with these individuals," the report states.

Harrington had everything go through him, the report states. Employees were not communicating with others, facilitating the isolation.

Harrington also reportedly engaged in questionable surveillance of his employees. He installed cameras in the department that he could monitor remotely and installed GPS devices in each patrol car set up to alert him when the vehicles engaged in various actions.

"(Department employees) noted he would often make comments about the things they had done in the office, which he would only have been aware of if he was watching them on video," the Crosby report states.

In December 2019, the department hired a part-time administrative support specialist. That part-time employee was laid off three months later for reasons related to the COVID-19 pandemic with no apparent involvement of human resource staff.
When my sisters and I were little girls in the '70s, my mother often brought us from our familys home in Crane to the library in Sidney for story hour. My siblings and I have fond memories of exploring the stacks at the Red Lodge Carnegie Library and of summer workshops at the communitys cultural center. Family outings and school field trips always included stops at museums and historical sites throughout the eastern outposts of the state.

As I look back, I appreciate how humanities institutions in our state shaped and supported my experiences as a young person growing up in rural Montana, helping me explore new perspectives while I was learning to value my Montana heritage.

Like many of my high school and college friends, my siblings and I eventually left Montana for educational and career opportunities. After many years away, I returned to the Treasure State mid-pandemic to join the team at Humanities Montana, the states council for the National Endowment for the Humanities. When I accepted the position of executive director, what compelled me most was our mission to support Montanas cultural institutions  the places that had been so important to me as I made sense of my life as a young Montanan. But what I returned to during the pandemic was a cultural infrastructure in distress.
DECATUR  A healthy meal can change a childs life.

Cheryl Poffenbarger brought her grandsons to St. Pauls Lutheran Church, at 1 Bachrach Court, on Friday afternoon to help package rice meals for other children living in impoverished countries.

We heard they were short on help, so I thought this would be a great thing for them to participate in, she said.

Morgan Usherwood, 10, and Trace Usherwood, 8, have had a busy summer so far, but were willing to help their grandmother and the church. It sounds like fun, Morgan said. And one of my friends from school is here.

Poffenbarger and her grandsons were part of a group of volunteers packing perishable meals for Feed My Starving Children, a nonprofit, Christian organization that works toward eradicating hunger among children in poor countries. Their MannaPack meals are filled with vitamins, dried vegetables, rice and soy powder. The bags are packed and shipped to FMSC partners in 70 countries who distribute the meals.

That meal is in that format because rice is a universal grain that almost every culture knows how to cook, said Andrea Gerhard, coordinator for volunteer registration for the Decatur Community MobilePack event. Those meals (MannaPack) are packaged with all those essential nutrients and everything that is needed, not only to help battle malnutrition, but also to help reverse it.

Decatur community volunteers began the annual event of filling the FMSC bags in 2013 through the partnership of St. Pauls Lutheran Church, Archer Daniels Midland Co. and Tabernacle Baptist Church. However, the first event came to St. Pauls in 2011 through the efforts of the pastors daughter Bethany Roscoe. She wanted to do one for her birthday, Gerhard said. It was kids helping kids.

The church has been the central location for FMSC. According to Gerhard, more than 1.5 million meals have been packed in Decatur since the first event. Meals packaged in Decatur have been sent to such places as Nicaragua, Dominican Republic and Haiti.

The COVID pandemic delayed the annual event last year, but didnt stop food from being distributed. The Decatur group was scheduled to meet in September 2020. They were able to delay their meeting time until this weekend.

After all of the volunteer sites were shut down around the country, the organization was able to machine pack the meals. Normally these meals are all packed by hand, Gerhard said. But they were getting more and more requests for food, especially because of the pandemic.

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Although the agency utilized the efficiency of machines, volunteer hands are preferred, according to Gerhard.

Machine packing costs are a little bit higher. This is more cost effective, she said. Plus, we get to connect with someone across the globe, all the way from here.

In a normal year, nearly 200 volunteers would fill bags during each two-hour session in St. Pauls warehouse area. But in COVID times, we have a maximum of 80 people per session, Gerhard said.

The filling, labeling and packaging stations have been redesigned to accommodate social distancing. Extra safety precautions have also been implemented to prevent handling of the food.

The cost of the Decatur event is approximately $40,000 each year, all covered by donations. And people are still donating, Gerhard said. Were in a good spot.

Volunteers are easily recruited because of the reputation the event has made. Over the years, people have become more aware, Gerhard said. They look forward to it.

The Decatur site has made an impression on the FMSC organization. This weekends event is a training location for others associated with the agency. We have a great setup to be able to do this, Gerhard said. It doesnt hurt that we have a loading dock and the spaces that work really well for that.

Nora Beswick, FMSC event supervisor, travelled from Schaumburg to assist the Decatur volunteers. But we currently have teams here from all of our locations, one in Minnesota, one in Arizona, one in Texas, and one in Pennsylvania, she said.

According to Beswick, Decatur is one of the favorite mobile packing sites.

Its really nice to come back to a community like this where everyone is really invested and really involved, she said.

FROM THE ARCHIVES: 25 photos of Decatur churches through the years

Contact Donnette Beckett at (217) 421-6983. Follow her on Twitter: @donnettebHR

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DECATUR  The significance of the action taken Thursday to immediately make Juneteenth a federal holiday isnt lost on Jeanelle Norman.

It's excellent that it has become a national holiday, said Norman, president of the Decatur branch of the NAACP. Its certainly a joyous occasion for African Americans since we dont have that many national holidays named in honor of something like that, with the whole emphasis on what the holiday represents.

Norman said she is grateful for Evelyn Hood, director of the African-American Cultural and Genealogical Society and Museum, for her efforts over the years to organize the annual Juneteenth celebration in Decatur, and that she hopes the designation as a national holiday will mean schools will teach the history of Juneteenth and its significance, as well.

President Joe Biden on Thursday signed legislation that was passed by Congress to set aside Juneteenth, or June 19, as a federal holiday. I hope this is the beginning of a change in the way we deal with one another, he said.

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It commemorates the day in 1865 that Union troops arrived in Galveston, Texas, and informed the last enslaved Black Americans that the Civil War had ended and they were free.

The bill was sponsored by Sen. Edward Markey, D-Mass., and had 60 co-sponsors. Bipartisan support emerged as lawmakers struggle to overcome divisions that are still simmering following the police killing last year of George Floyd in Minnesota.

Gov. J.B Pritzker also signed a bill this week to make Juneteenth a state holiday in Illinois, beginning next year. But state offices now will be closed Friday because Biden signed the federal legislation, Pritzker said Thursday.

Im pleased to see the federal government join Illinois in recognizing Juneteenth as an official holiday, offering all Americans a day to reflect on the national shame of slavery and the work we must do to dismantle systemic racism," Pritzker said in a statement. Most importantly, let us stand shoulder-to-shoulder with Black Americans who will celebrate Juneteenth as a milestone in their fight for every ounce of the freedom that is their God-given right  and continue with them in that fight.

The Chicago Tribune and Associated Press contributed to this report.

Contact Valerie Wells at (217) 421-7982. Follow her on Twitter: @modgirlreporter

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Standing in front of a West Side exhibit honoring Martin Luther King Jr., Mayor Lori Lightfoot on Thursday followed the lead of several other cities around the country and declared systemic racism a public health crisis.

When we think about racism, many of us think about its visible and audible forms, Lightfoot said. But the reality is, the insidious nature of systemic racism has other impacts that are every bit as deep and harmful but are often ones we cant see, like impacts on the psyche and other impacts on our bodies that are just as, if not more, deadly.

Racism tells people theyre lesser and puts a cap on their humanity, effectively destroying their perception of themselves and leaving people with depression, anxiety and anger, Lightfoot said. The life expectancy gap between white and Black residents in Chicago is more than nine years, she added.

Ladies and gentlemen, it is literally killing us, Lightfoot said.

Lightfoot made the declaration two years into her first term as the citys first Black female mayor, and after the COVID-19 pandemic underscored Chicagos racial health disparities.

Milwaukee County in Wisconsin in 2019 was among the first governmental entities to say racism was a public health crisis, and similar measures have been taken in cities including Denver, Columbus, Ohio, and Boston.

While the mayors announcement was largely symbolic, the city said it would spend $9 million from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on programs in six regions of the city to boost community wellness.

Since taking office in 2019, Lightfoot has sometimes favored ceremonial events or incremental actions that focus attention on broad issues, saying its important to discuss big problems even if solutions arent readily available.

In February 2020, for instance, Lightfoot hosted a so-called poverty summit aimed at bringing attention to deeply entrenched poverty in Chicago. Some community activists slammed Lightfoots efforts to address poverty as incomplete and largely symbolic and said she left out key groups from her summit.

Still, the mayors comments about racisms effect on public health come as her administration faces significant criticism over issues of race and equity.

Although Lightfoot campaigned on a platform of police accountability, for instance, shes also been criticized for watering down a civilian oversight plan she once championed and for failing to fully comply with court-ordered reforms of the department. In Chicago, its most often Black and brown residents who are killed by police or have other negative interactions with law enforcement, a reality Lightfoot has often acknowledged.

Black and Latino people account for more than 9 out of 10 arrests and uses of force by police, a disparity just as pronounced as it was under her predecessor, Rahm Emanuel, a Tribune investigation found.

In recent weeks, Lightfoot has also delayed a decision about issuing a permit for a scrap shredding operation to move from the edges of Lincoln Park to the predominantly Latino and Black 10th Ward, but has faced criticism for not stopping the plan.

Activists have complained about the proposal to move General Iron equipment to the Southeast Side and were recently joined by Michael Regan, the new U.S. Environmental Protection Agency administrator, who raised concerns about locating another polluter in a heavily industrialized neighborhood where people already breathe some of the citys dirtiest air.

City officials also are facing scrutiny from U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. In response to a petition from community groups, HUD launched a civil rights investigation last year focusing on city ordinances that protect industries in certain parts of Chicago without consideration of the health and well-being of people who live nearby.

Still, the mayor has earned praise for how she handled some issues around race, like vaccine distribution. The citys earliest distribution of vaccines disproportionately went to white people, but the administration worked to ensure Black and brown residents got their doses.

Aldermen on Wednesday also advanced a Lightfoot administration proposal to direct about $30 million in federal COVID-19 funds toward programs designed to address health disparities in underserved Chicago neighborhoods.

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Its 2021, the pandemic is ongoing, although more and more people are now totally vaccinated. Many people are still flocking to the internet and social media in search of connection.

For some, it is an oasis. For others, a nightmare.

Woke folks are aware of #StopAsianHate, #BlackLivesMatter and #MeToo. These are hashtags meant to draw attention to the oppression of people based on race and gender.

As a lesbian of African descent, I have felt the weight of hate. Despite the ray of hope created by the guilty verdicts against Derek Chauvin for killing George Floyd, I am forever reminded of how far we have yet to go.

Most of what I personally see on social media is not specifically directed at me but comes rather in the form of posts that deny the existence of homophobia in general, allow for misgendering or deadnaming, spread misinformation and misquote famous folks under the umbrella of straight pride and are tainted with fear and hatred.

Personally, I dont want the triggers. I have never seen the entire video of Chauvin as he kills George Floyd; likewise, I do not dwell on online hate and harassment against anyone.

I am, however, grateful that others are examining online hate and harassment. For instance, the advocacy group GLAAD in May released its first Social Media Safety Index. (To read the report, search GLAAD and Social Media Safety Index.)

The reports sad conclusion is that the big five players in social media  Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram and TikTok  are not safe for LGBTQ+ folks and are riddled with online hate and harassment.

GLAAD utilized surveys conducted by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) in its Online Hate and Harassment Report: The American Experience 2021.

The ADL surveyed 2,251 folks and found that 64% of LGBTQ+ folks experienced online hate and harassment. It was the highest percentage for any demographic category. The next highest were Muslims (46%), Jews (35%), Blacks (33%), Asian Americans and Latinx (both 31%).

The GLAAD report called on social media platforms to act immediately to improve social media safety for LGBTQ+ people and for other historically marginalized groups. The safety of LGBTQ+ people on social media platforms is an urgent public safety issue.

There are individual recommendations for each platform regarding disinformation/misinformation. These include third-party fact-checking, improving the process of user reporting, bringing transparency to the system of enforcement, using qualified human moderators and diversifying the workplace, to name a few.

Of course, monetization is a key factor in whether and how the online media platforms address the issues of online hate and harassment.

Tech companies show an incredible ability to adapt their algorithms to boost engagement and profits, the report quotes Ina Fried of Axios as saying. They need to devote similar energy to creating algorithms that minimize hate and harassment  for their sake and for societys.

Heres to eliminating all hate speech and harassment, on and off line. We are not safe until all of us are safe.

Kiki Monifa of Oakland, California, is editor-in-chief of BlackHistoryEveryday.com.

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Books will be exchanged monthly, but facilities also will receive some free books to keep, she said.

The coordinator has designed reading tree posters to help monitor the childrens progress.

Each child places a sticker on their reading tree when they engage in reading or have someone read to them. The goal is for each participant to fill up the tree with stickers by the conclusion of the outreach program on July 9. Morrell-Lamie will bring each participating facility a gift basket of items, including books, crayons, sidewalk chalk, jump ropes and bubbles.

But thats not all. The outreach coordinator will deliver frozen treats to children and employees at each participating facility.

Well be turning the transit van into an ice cream truck for the occasion, she said with a laugh.

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All employees at the facilities will be entered in a drawing for a free Kindle.

If you see me driving the transit van, be sure to honk and wave, she said.

2021 Tails and Tales Summer Reading Challenge
Church Hill Rescue Squad Capt. Tim Coup said ground search efforts covered about a 1-mile radius of the home, and he expected it to be a 2-mile radius by the end of Thursday. Several law enforcement and medical helicopters and law enforcement drones have also been used to search by air.

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Were also experiencing very dense canopy cover and very dense ground cover, Coup said.

He noted that cellphone companies have provided signal boosts to help with the search.

Homes in the area are not close to each other, and authorities said some may be at least 1 mile apart. Local residents have been asked to search any place on their properties where someone might be able to hide.

Earhart said authorities are still only using professionals to search for Summer and are not yet asking for local volunteers. The community has helped with social media shares and donations.

The amount of resources that all the agencies involved from the local to federal level have committed to the search efforts in locating Summer safely is unbelievable, the Hawkins County Rescue Squad said on Facebook. The community support, prayers and donation of food, drinks and supplies that have (been) brought to the Command Post is also unbelievable and very much appreciated.
The centers, including 33 that include offices for the Virginia Employment Commission, are scheduled to reopen to the public on July 1.

Healy said she had met with Northam chief of staff Clark Mercer and Finance Secretary Aubrey Layne about potential uses of the federal aid to provide more support for workers.

She said the money also could help VEC keep up with changing information technology as it completes the long-delayed modernization of its antiquated IT system. The 12-year-old project is scheduled to be completed by Oct. 1.

Hudson is a vocal critic of the states approach to modernizing IT networks, which she said focuses too much on big-ticket purchases of expensive equipment and too little on skilled employees who update system equipment and software on an ongoing basis.

I would rather see Virginia spend $500,000 on planning for the creation of a modern digital services team than spend $15 million on the grand promise of a big new system, she said.

Layne already has said he would recommend allocating more than $1 billion in federal aid to replenish the Virginia Unemployment Trust Fund and shield employers from a potential fourfold increase in payroll taxes.
Carter said he became disheartened at times by the constant debate in the community and the description of those opposing the monument as agitators who need to move out of the county if they dont like looking at the statue. Carter said he was also dismayed that Gladding said there is no systemic racism in Tappahannocka statement Gladding stands by.

It was definitely frustrating, Carter said. Three-hundred and sixty-nine days is how long it took and we maintained the course. Weve been respectful. Weve been unbiased.

It was a difficult journey. ... Weve had to be subjected to people in a public forum using the N-word with no one stopping them. Weve had to sit back and have decorum while the same wasnt afforded to us.

Carter started a website called Essexmonument.com to explain why he and others believe the memorial should be removed. He also led a push to raise $10,000 from more than 130 donors to provide to the town for the removal of the monument.

Gladding said Town Council isnt sure how those funds will be used. Carter said one donor suggested using the money to assist with the contextualization of the plaque.
BLOUNTVILLE, Tenn.  The Sullivan County Commission passed a resolution Thursday to push for a summit about a regional development hub that some local government officials have considered creating for Northeast Tennessee.

The summits goal, its sponsors said, is simple: Figure out what regional hub even means, and what impacts it could have on Sullivan County and its various cities.

I dont want us to get ... in head first on something that none of us in here particularly know anything about, said Commissioner Hershel Glover, who represents Bluff City and was the resolutions primary sponsor, at the commissions Thursday meeting. And thats what this [proposed summit] is: Its a fact-finding meeting.

The regional hub initiative was started about two years ago, according to Mayor Richard Venable, who told the commission that he has been working on it with seven other mayors from the region. (The initiative is not to be confused with NETWORKS Sullivan Partnership or the Northeast Tennessee Regional Economic Partnership [NETREP], two other regional development projects.)
HICKORY  A new grant announced by the state of North Carolina will help assist recent high school graduates in covering tuition and fees at Catawba Valley Community College.

The North Carolina Longleaf Commitment Grant covers tuition and fees for eligible 2021 North Carolina high school graduates to attend any one of the 58 N.C. community colleges, including Catawba Valley Community College, for up to two years.

In order to be eligible for the Longleaf Commitment Grant, students must be a graduate from a North Carolina high school in 2021, be a North Carolina resident for tuition purposes, be a first-time college student (Career & College Promise (CCP) and early/middle college high school students are eligible), enroll in a curriculum program during the 2021-22 academic year, enroll in at least six credit hours per semester.

Eligible grant recipients must also complete the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) for 2021-22, have an Expected Family Contribution (EFC) of $0 to $15,000, renew FAFSA for the 2022-23 academic year and meet the satisfactory academic progress requirements of the college.
The information below has been supplied by dairy marketers and other industry organizations. It has not been edited, verified or endorsed by Hoards Dairyman

Aaron Augustian knew when he decided to no-till four years ago he was taking a gamble on his farm. Fast forward to today and he isnt deterred by the naysayers but has the confidence to talk with other farmers about why no-till is increasing his profit margins and saving time.

You must be confident in what you are doing, Augustian said in his no-till corn field. You just put your blinders on and earplugs in and dont worry about what your neighbors are saying. You need to let the crop show the results. Everyone is chasing bushels per acre and at the end of the day it is more about margin per acre. We are all learning together and are only going to get better at this.

Augustian was one of nearly two dozen farmers at a Peninsula Pride Farms Conservation Conversation, held on May 25, who discussed the advantages of no-till conservation practices and learning from failures. Peninsula Pride Farms is a farmer-led watershed conservation group in Kewaunee and southern Door counties in northeastern Wisconsin.

Augustian, whose farm is less than 2 miles from Lake Michigan, decided to start no-tilling his land four years ago because of his proximity to the lake. He has noticed there is better water infiltration and when there are heavy rains, he has almost no runoff.

The soil structure is improving slowly, Augustian said. We are noticing that when it rains we have more infiltration of rainwater that stays on the soil. Along with manure application, it seems to stick to the soil better with the growing cover crop out here.



Augustian started with 25 percent of his acres under no-till practices before advancing to more acres. He is now at 95 percent doing no-till and planting corn into green. He hasnt no-till planted soybeans yet but is preparing to do so next year.

Nick Guilette from AgSource Laboratories was among several experts who provided insights at the gathering.

No-till offers some flexibility when it comes to rotation planting, Guilette said. When we start talking about soil health benefits, we notice a lot of things: better infiltration, better soil structure, and fewer passes over the field leads to fuel savings. There are several benefits that come quickly when a farm decides to practice no-tilling.

Increasing bushels per acre isnt the ultimate goal when implementing a no-till conservation strategy, Guilette said .

Yield is one thing, but margin per acre is also important, he said. There is fuel savings, and Aarons field didnt have to get tilled twice or even three times. There was a no-till pass and maybe a little bit more money was used on the herbicide program. There is some scouting that needs to occur to see if weeds are under control or potentially if there are army or cut worms. It will take a little bit more boots-on-the-ground scouting, but that is a savings per acre.

Augustian talked about the fall of 2019 when, despite record rains, his no-till fields carried his equipment and had very little ruts.



Guilette emphasized that point.

Whats the topsoil worth? If you ask 10 different people you will get 10 different answers, he said. Its worth something and its worth a lot. I will venture to say I doubt we had any erosion out here. Its not even a consideration. If we get a 3-inch rain and this was conventionally tilled, I dont know what would happen.
Dr. Asif Iqbal at the launch of AfCFTA

New Delhi [India], June 18 (ANI/SRV Media): The AfCFTA (African Continental Free Trade Area) was launched in New Delhi at the Ghana Embassy with a lot of active commitment from Indian companies to enter Africa and take advantage of the AfCFTA.

AfCFTA is the biggest free trade agreement in the World since the World Trade Organization was created in the 1990s. When implemented, the AfCFTA is on a mission to increase intra-African trade by 52.3 percent.

Higher trade levels can facilitate economic growth for Indian companies and transform domestic economies. The Indian office of AfCFTA in New Delhi will support the African efforts in elevating the potential impact it will create on India-Africa trade and bilateral investments.

"The vision of Indian leadership of Atmanirbhar Bharat and the African "collective self-reliance" has long been an integral component attempted by African leaders and policymakers, to find Indo Africa-driven solutions to African problems in trade and commerce," said Varun Jain, the Chairman of the India Africa Trade Council (IATC) committee for AfCFTA. The event was held at the Embassy of Ghana in New Delhi in the presence of Ambassador of Ethiopia, HE Dr. Tizita Mulugeta, High Commissioner of Botswana, HE Gilbert Shimane Mangole, President of the Indian Economic Trade Organization, Dr. Asif Iqbal, CDA of Ghana Embassy and other African diplomats in the launch of the AfCFTA.

Indian trade will help all the African countries who have embraced the notion of "regionalism" and "regional integration" as part of their broader aspirations towards continental integration with this Agreement. Over the years, various pan-African organizations have been working towards deepening economic, social, and political integration in Africa. The AfCFTA is an attempt by the African governments to "unlock Africa's tremendous potential" to deliver prosperity to all Africans, and Indian companies can play a huge role especially post COVID-19 recovery. By 2030, the African market size is expected to reach 1.7 billion people, with a combined and cumulative consumer and business spending of US$6.7 trillion.

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The AfCFTA aims to expand intra-African trade through better harmonization and coordination of trade liberalization and facilitation regimes and instruments across subregions (RECs) and at the continental level.

As part of the agreement, countries have committed to removing tariffs on 90 percent of goods with the remaining 10 percent of items to be phased at a later stage.

"An increase in Indo-African trade will drive the structural transformation of economies from low productivity and labor-intensive activities to higher productivity and skills intensive industrial and service activities where India with its rich human potential can contribute to a great extent," said Dr. Asif Iqbal who also returned from Zimbabwe after a successful Indian business delegation.

At present, manufacturing represents only about 10 percent of the total GDP in Africa, on average, lagging behind other developing nations. Given the AfCFTA's enormous market size of 1.2 billion people and over $3.4 trillion of cumulative GDP", if implemented properly, the AfCFTA could reduce this gap by increasing growth in the manufacturing sector and its value-added products.

The Chairman Varun Jain will lead a big business delegation to the African Nations post Covid19 to enlarge the potential of benefits to help India Africa Trade relationships and strengthen the commitment of the vision and mission of the Government of India.

This story is provided by SRV Media. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/SRV Media)
Australia Spy Charged FILE - In this June 28, 2018, file photo, lawyer Bernard Collaery, left, addresses the media as lawmaker Andrew Wilkie, right, looks on in Parliament House in Canberra, Australia. A former Australian spy was released from court on Friday, June 18, 2021, with a three-month suspended prison sentence over his attempt to help East Timor prove that Australia spied on the fledgling nation during multi-billion dollar oil and gas negotiations. The former spy publicly known as Witness K and his lawyer Collaery had been charged in 2018 with conspiring to reveal secret information to the East Timorese government. (AP Photo/Rod McGuirk, File)

CANBERRA, Australia (AP)  A former Australian spy was released from court on Friday with a three-month suspended prison sentence over his attempt to help East Timor prove that Australia spied on the fledgling nation during multibillion-dollar oil and gas negotiations.

The former spy, publicly known as Witness K, and his lawyer, Bernard Collaery, had been charged in 2018 with conspiring to reveal secret information to the East Timorese government.

Former East Timor President and Prime Minister Jose Ramos-Horta is among leaders of the impoverished half-island nation of 1.5 million to urge Australia to drop the persecutions.

K pleaded guilty on Thursday at the beginning of a two-day sentencing hearing in the Australian Capital Territory Magistrates Court. The public and media were excluded when classified evidence was discussed.

Magistrate Glenn Theakston sentenced K to three months in prison fully suspended. K, who was hidden behind black screens in the courtroom throughout the hearing, must also pay a 1,000 Australian dollar ($840) security bond to be of good behavior for 12 months.

K had faced up to two years in prison. The maximum has been increased since his offense to 10 years as Australia tightens controls on secrecy.

The Australian government has refused to comment on allegations that K led an Australian Secret Intelligence Service operation that bugged government offices in the East Timorese capital, Dili, in 2004 during negotiations on the sharing of oil and gas revenue from the seabed that separates the two countries.

The government canceled Ks passport before he was to testify at the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague in 2014 in support of East Timors challenge to the validity of the 2006 treaty.

The East Timorese argued that the treaty was invalid because Australia had failed to negotiate in good faith by engaging in espionage.

There was no evidence heard in open court of a bugging operation, which media had reported was conducted under the guise of a foreign aid program.

Story continues

But K and Collaery had prepared for the East Timorese government two affidavits that identified K as a former ASIS member and details of ASIS functions.

Theakston noted that the case was unusual because Ks offense was committed in plain sight of Australian authorities.

That suggests to me it was brazen and indifferent or mistaken, Theakston said.

Theakston said it was open to him to find K had made a mistake rather than a deliberate breach based on a perception of justice.

The judge described K as an elderly man more than 70 years old who had had the threat of prison hanging over him for eight years.

The ASIS secrecy rules were strict and absolute for serving and former officers, Theakston said.

Defense lawyer Robert Richter said Mr. K had suffered from not being able to travel overseas with his wife because of the loss of his passport.

Richter blamed Ks post-traumatic stress disorder, clinical depression and anxiety for his offense. He argued for K to escape a conviction being recorded for reasons that will be made clear in closed court.

Collaery has pleaded not guilty and wants to fight the charge in an Australian Capital Territory Supreme Court trial without media or the public being excluded.

Collaery was allowed to sit in the public gallery of K's hearing during the closed and open hearings. Collaery declined to comment on the sentence.

Richter told The Associated Press, I think its a fair outcome.

Prosecutor Richard Maidment declined to comment on the result.

Australia and East Timor agreed on a new maritime border treaty in 2018. A year later, the Australian prime minister arrived in Dili to formalize the agreement and was targeted by street protests demanding charges against K and Collaery be dropped.
Colombo, Jun 18 (PTI) Sri Lanka's zoological gardens authorities have sought assistance from India after a lion tested positive for the coronavirus at a zoo here.

The head of the National Zoological Gardens here said that they are in touch with India's Central Zoo Authority to treat an 11-year-old lion named 'Thor' who has tested positive.

'We are in regular touch with the Central Zoo Authority of India and following their instructions on taking preventive measures to prevent the staff and other animals in the zoo being infected. We continue to treat the lion while keeping him in isolation,' Director General Ishini Wickremesinghe said in a statement.

The lion was sent to the Colombo zoo from the Seoul city zoo in South Korea in 2013.

The lion had been experiencing respiratory difficulties, but an initial antigen test result was negative. After several other PCR tests, the lion was confirmed to be COVID-19 infected, she added.

In India, a 12-year-old Asiatic lion who was treated for COVID-19 succumbed on Wednesday in the safari area of the Arignar Anna Zoological Park near Vandalur in Chennai. This was the second tragedy that struck the zoo as it lost a nine-year-old lioness due to coronavirus on June 3 and in total, seven lions of the 14, were infected. PTI CORR PMS PMS
GREENSBORO  N.C. A&T has received $5 million from Google to help it prepare more minority students for careers in science and technology.

The grant, announced Thursday, will be used in numerous ways at A&T, according to a news release: scholarships, career preparation, mentorship programs, campus technology and curriculum.

The donation to A&T was one of 10 that Google announced Thursday.

The company awarded $50 million to 10 historically Black universities  $5 million to each  as part of its effort to increase diversity within the technology world and minority access to careers in high-tech fields. The donations are unrestricted, which means each university can choose how to spend the money.

A&T was the only North Carolina university to receive money from Google on Thursday. Other recipients are Howard University in Washington, D.C., Florida A&M University and Morgan State University in Baltimore.

The investments that Google is announcing today underscore their belief in our institutions, A&T Chancellor Harold Martin said in a statement.

A&T and Google have some history together.
Barber-Scotia was recently forgiven several million dollars in debt to the U.S. Department of Education. Thats a big step forward and the City of Concord is working with the college.

The PR statement above is pretty big talk that we have heard before.

Back in 2015 when Concord City Council voted to demolish dorm buildings on campus, then President David Olah said the college was developing a renewable energy program with Green Power Services Global. That program never happened and the dorms were torn down.

Chances are better now that Barber-Scotia can rise from the crumbling buildings, but not without outside help. Lets hope they are really willing to work with the city and community.

No. 5

A reader takes except to last weeks Ask the Pastor column. The column by Pastor Adrienne W. Greene answered a question about dream catchers. The headline was Dreamcatchers: harmless icons or the Devils decor?

Greene went to great lengths to explain why its the Devils decor and amounts to inviting dark and evil forces to your home.

Gary Sain of Concord sent this response:
The bill has two parts, said Moffitt, a primary sponsor of the H.B. 781. One, it would allow municipalities to install social districts. He pointed to the Streets at Southpoint in Durham as an example, where people would leave a restaurant and carry a cup of alcohol within a permitted area. The second aspect, Moffitt says, would allow bars and restaurants to, in effect, extend their premises, which the governor temporarily allowed in an executive order after the pandemic. H.B. 781 would make this permanent.

Local governments would have the option of opting in or out of the new rules, as they could with the so-called brunch bill a couple of years back.

House Bill 722, which would expand the size of growlers  essentially refillable containers for beer and cider, from two liters to four liters  has passed the House. It passed the first reading in the Senate but was referred to the Rules committee.
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP)  California on Friday started offering residents a digital record of their coronavirus vaccinations that they can use to access businesses or events that require proof they got the shots.

The states public health and technology departments said the new tool allows Californians access to their COVID-19 vaccination records from the states immunization registry and includes the same information as the paper cards issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

To access the information, Californians will enter into a state website their name, date of birth and email or phone associated with their vaccine records and they will be asked to create a four-digit PIN. The record will include a QR code that users can save to their mobile phones.

With nearly 20 million people fully vaccinated in California and proof of vaccination already required in some circumstances such as travel, state health officials felt there would be demand for the tool, though it remains optional, said Dr. Erica Pan, the state's epidemiologist.

The odds are someone is going to misplace their paper CDC card and a digital COVID-19 vaccine record provides a convenient backup, she told reporters.
The bill would cost ratepayers too much, fall short of clean energy goals, hamper job recruitment and weaken the Utilities Commission which exists to provide accountability for utility companies, Cooper said in a emailed statement. It takes some steps toward more renewable energy but not nearly enough and its clear they need to go back to the drawing board and negotiate with a broader spectrum of stakeholders in order to get a better plan.

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The measure would direct subsidiaries of Charlotte-based Duke Energy, the states dominant electric utility, to retire coal-fired plants at Marshall, Allen, Roxboro, Cliffside and Mayo plants  by the end of the decade. Marshall would transition to a plant powered by natural gas, while Allen would go to a combination of solar and battery power.

Many environmental advocates contend the bill would force the states energy resources to depend on fossil fuels longer than necessary when alternatives are becoming more plentiful and affordable.

The bill, while well intentioned, does far too little to transition our state away from coal and towards cleaner sources of power and at too great a cost, said Greg Andeck of Audubon North Carolina, addressing the House Energy and Public Utilities Committee. A North Carolina Chamber representative later expressed support for the measure.
A student passenger is in critical condition after she and other occupants of a driver's education vehicle were injured in a six-car collision in Newton on Wednesday afternoon.

All three occupants of the drivers education vehicle were transported from the scene at the intersection of West 7th Street and Northwest Boulevard.

The girl in critical condition, who was sitting in the backseat at the time of the crash, was taken to Brenner Childrens Hospital, according to a news release from the Newton Police Department.

The other student in the vehicle, who was the twin sister of the rear passenger, has been released from Catawba Valley Medical Center.

The names of the twins were not released.

Craig Meadows, 48, is the driving instructor involved in the crash. He was taken to Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center and was in serious condition as of Thursday afternoon.

Debra Young, a 50-year-old Newton resident, was treated for injuries at Catawba Valley Medical Center and then released.

Charges are pending against 29-year-old Hickory resident Wenfred Alan Hooper.
100 years ago,

June 18, 1921

MATTOON  The north road to Charleston, extending east from the present pavement in Mattoon to the Charleston city limits, is soon to be given a coat of oil. The spreading of oil, however, will not begin until after a heavy rain so as to get the ground thoroughly packed. The pavement will extend east from the present pavement to the foot of the hill at the Old Salem Church. The church is about three and a-half miles from where the present Mattoon pavement ends and is about three and a-half miles from the Charleston city limits... CHARLESTON  The Central Illinois Public Service Company was informed by the Charleston city clerk today that if it fails to meet its financial obligation to the city in the next three days, water service to the company will be shut off. City officials say the service company owes an average of $270 a month since Sept. 1, 1920, making a total of about $2,420. The company says the City of Charleston owes it in the sum of about $2,500 for light service and wishes to offset one bill against the other... HUMBOLDT  John Clark of Humboldt was robbed of $70 in cash by a gypsy queen this week. Clark buys and sells chickens for Frank Pollock of Arcola and had the $70 pinned on a chest pocket of his shirt. He was on the Egyptian Trail two miles south of Arcola when he met some gypsies who were traveling in an automobile. A woman in the party said she wanted to buy a chicken. Clark brought the chicken to the car and handed it to the woman seated in the car. The woman grabbed the bills off Clark's shirt just as the car sped away, leaving Clark standing in the road without the cash or the chicken.

50 years ago, 1971

MATTOON  "The Census Bureau stands by its total of 19,681." That was the word received yesterday by Mattoon officials from U.S. Rep. William L. Springer, R-Champaign. City officials had asked Springer to look into the reasons for a "loss" of 744 people in Mattoon's population from the preliminary to the final 1970 census figures. Springer said he was told the preliminary figure included some Mattoon Township residents who live outside the city limits and the Census Bureau figures the average family to be 3.1 people and Mattoon used a figure of 3.3 per residence... CHARLESTON  The Board of Governors of State Colleges and Universities has approved payment of $2,300 in architectural work done on a proposed memorial tower at Eastern Illinois University. The carillon bell tower project, favored by President Quincy Doudna, was abandoned a year ago after students object to the plan. Construction of the tower was to have been financed jointly by alumni contributions and reserve student fees. Doudna expressed hope that a donor could be found to finance the portion of the cost that alumni did not finance. The tower was to be located between Coleman Hall and the Applied Arts and Education Center.

25 years ago, 1996

MATTOON  Discussion on the future of the train depot in Mattoon is among the items on the Mattoon City Council agenda tonight. Amtrak plans to stop staffing the Mattoon train station, effective July 1. To keep the station open, the city must provide a caretaker to open and close the station when trains arrive and pay for utilities and upkeep. A private group is working on a long-term solution to utilize the station. The Mattoon train station was built by the Illinois Central Railroad in 1917... MATTOON  Gold Award contributors to the recent Mattoon United Way fund drive were recognized by the organization. This year's recipients include R.R. Donnelley, represented by Joyce Lindsay; Kraft, represented by Jim Cudahy; General Electric, represented by Frank Harmon; and Consolidated Communications, represented by Teresa Nelson and Charlene Homann. Kim Spencer and Clyde Self, both of the Mattoon United Way Board, made the presentations... CHARLESTON  Jill Taylor, a Charleston native, recently finished a monthlong performance as the lead character in a new play entitled "Women in Hats." The off-Broadway play was performed at the Looking Glass Theatre in New York City. Taylor has enjoyed many roles in theater, as well as some TV commercial work. She also spent a year as executive assistant to Barry Weissler, the producer of "Grease" on Broadway. She is a graduate of Charleston High School and Eastern Illinois University with a master's in fine arts from Indiana University. She is the daughter of Michael and Karen Bence of Charleston.

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MATTOON  The newest mural in downtown Mattoon has been taking shape on the west wall of the former Thrifty Drug Store building under watchful eyes on the project's own YouTube channel.

However, Mattoon Tourism & Arts Director Angelia Burgett said she also encourages community members to go check out the work on this colorful mural that will stretch approximately 100 feet wide along the wall and 50 feet tall at two points.

"Seeing it in person, especially with the size of the wall, is definitely worth the drive downtown," Burgett said, adding a dedication ceremony may be held there in the fall. The wall faces toward the train depot and is highly visible to motorists to the west at Broadway's intersection with 19th Street/U.S. Route 45.

Burgett said the new work is the final of three murals, for the time being, that the Mattoon Arts Council has created with funding from the Lumpkin Family Foundation. She said the new mural is the biggest of the three, which also consist of the 2009 mural in Progress Square and the 2011 mural at the Wolf Pocket Park at 19th and Western Avenue.

The arts council sought input on the design of the first mural from the community and for the second one from Mattoon schoolchildren. Burgett said ideas for the third mural were sought from local artists. She said the design is aimed at being joyful and uplifting, and at referencing the parks and other green space in Mattoon.

"It is about the beauty of living in a small town," Burgett said. She added that the mural will greet Eastern Illinois University families and other passengers using the Amtrak station. "This is going to be such a nice calling card for Mattoon, a welcome to the community."

For the new work, Burgett said the Arts Council and project co-coordinator Justin Grady once again worked with a professional artist, David Guinn, from the Mural Arts Philadelphia group as it has with the other two projects.

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Guinn's assistant and installer, Josh Smith, started placing the mural on the wall recently with the help of artist Peyton Morrow of Mattoon while using a power lift to reach all of the surface. Smith said the mural's canvas is a polyester material that they call "parachute cloth."

Smith said he and Guinn cut the material into 148 58-by-58-inch panels that they placed in a grid in a Philadelphia-area school gym. They then primed and painted each of these panels, which are now being affixed to the wall with an acrylic polymer in a manner similar to installing wallpaper.

Once all of the panels are on the wall, Smith said they will do touch-up work and then treat the surface with a UV protective coating. He said they hope to be done before July 4, depending on the weather and not having any "hiccups."

"The wall has a mind of its own because every wall is different. You have to be flexible with it," Smith said.

In the meantime, Smith said he has enjoyed getting to know Mattoon and visiting with those who stop by to see the mural. The work is hot, he said, but that's to be expected, and he has enjoyed working while the Lunch & Music concerts are being held every Friday across the street in Heritage Park.

"To be exposed to live music while you are installing a mural is definitely a bonus," Smith said.

The mural can be viewed on the Mattoon Arts Council's YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymwd7j7V1FY.

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This weekend, Americans will celebrate an unofficial holiday that many people had not heard of a year ago.

In this era of purposeful racial awareness, Juneteenth is the new it holiday for the socially woke.

While many African Americans have celebrated it for decades, the effort to make June 19 a federal holiday commemorating the end of slavery has gained steam. In the aftermath of the George Floyd murder and other criminal injustices, Illinois legislature has passed a measure making Juneteenth a holiday, joining several other states.

Theres certainly nothing wrong with embracing Black history, making amends for atrocities past and present, and honoring the accomplishments of African Americans. The problem is that its the wrong date. The last of the slaves were not freed on Juneteenth.

Juneteenth represents June 19, 1865  the date Union soldiers arrived in Texas to announce that the Civil War was over, and slavery had been abolished. That was 2 1/2 years after President Abraham Lincolns Emancipation Proclamation declared slaves held in Confederate states free and two months after his assassination.

Juneteenth does not represent the end of slavery in America, as it is often erroneously reported. It specifically notes the end of slavery in Texas. Slavery continued to thrive in several border states that were not affected by the Emancipation Proclamation. Delaware was the last to free its nearly 2,000 slaves on Dec. 6, 1865, six months after Texas.

Dec. 6 would be the most accurate date to celebrate the end of slavery. Thats when the 13th Amendment was ratified in 1865, officially abolishing slavery throughout the United States. Every state was then required by federal law to free its slaves.

There is no historical reason to make June 19 a federal holiday or even a state holiday anywhere other than in Texas. It does, however, allow for a good summer celebration. And its better than no commemoration at all.

Even before Juneteenth became a Texas holiday in 1979, Black Texans were celebrating it as if it were the Fourth of July. There are festivals, parades, barbecues with strawberry drinks and red velvet cake, symbolizing the resilience of the descendants of slaves.

Several other states also celebrate their own emancipation dates. In Kentucky and parts of Tennessee, for example, Aug. 8 is observed as the day slaves there were told of their freedom.

Theres nothing wrong with commemorating Juneteenth, but America needs to understand exactly what its celebrating. African American history has long been distorted. To fully understand race, we must first acknowledge the truth about the legacy of slavery.

Juneteenth points to the treachery of the dying Confederacy and its determination to sustain the institution of slavery by any means necessary. Rather than abide by the Emancipation Proclamation, slaveholders continued to hold some 250,000 Black people throughout Texas in captivity long after they should have been freed.

We cant let Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky, Missouri and West Virginia off the hook for their defiance either. Slavery was a lucrative business in states that bordered the Confederacy, though they never seceded from the Union. It took an act of Congress to force them to give it up.

Every American should embrace the idea of commemorating emancipation, which fundamentally changed the direction of America. The 13th Amendment ended one of the worst atrocities in this countrys history. It deserves a national celebration.

Much of Americas Black history has been covered up to make slavery seem less abominable. Disinformation campaigns have long been used to distort Black history and diminish the contributions of African Americans.

How could most Americans have known? This part of history is not taught in public schools. There is barely a mention in history books because America has never been interested in telling the true story of slavery. This country has, however, been steadfast in honoring Confederate heroes.

A bipartisan group of legislators in Washington is attempting to push through legislation to make Juneteenth a national holiday. Similar efforts have failed in the past, and likely will again.

The problem with using Juneteenth as a catchall African American holiday is that it doesnt allow the true story to be told of how far America went to preserve the institution of slavery. But it will have to do until America chooses to come terms with its past.

Dahleen Glanton is a columnist for the Chicago Tribune.

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Id been hearing since the end of May when the General Assembly adjourned for the summer that there were some problems with the state budget legislation which needed to be fixed. Some effective dates apparently werent drafted right. But, silly me, I failed to follow my own rules and didnt read the bill (SB2800) for myself.

The scope of the problem was worse than I thought, but the most pressing issue was the House did not have nearly enough votes to correct its massive mistakes when the chamber returned to Springfield on June 16. It became a major test of rookie House Speaker Chris Welchs influence.

The House and Senate got caught up in a heated dispute on the night of May 31 (the last scheduled day of session) over whether to fund legislative pay raises. The House wanted to follow the Illinois Constitutions clear mandate and fund them, but the Senate refused for political reasons.

So, at almost the last minute, the House cobbled together the state operating budget, including the pay raise appropriations, with the capital budget (which the Senate was supposed to handle) and rammed the bill out of the House and over to the Senate at around 11:30 p.m. The Senate passed the bill not long after midnight. But, apparently, when the House hastily combined the two bills, nobody checked the effective date language at the tail end of the legislation.

The budget bill has 178 different articles, and each appropriation is spelled out in individual sections of those articles. The end of the appropriations bill has a short paragraph listing the effective dates for the articles. But articles 45-128 were not given any effective dates  about 47 percent of all the articles in the appropriations bill. And since the Senate passed the bill after midnight, by law, the appropriations articles without an assigned effective date cant take effect until June 1 of 2022  only a month before the end of the coming fiscal year.

Oops.

The mistake means that the entire supplemental appropriation for the current fiscal year couldnt be spent until almost a year from now. And tons of other programs, from tourism, to natural resources, to corrections, to employment security, to human rights, to, well, you can pretty much name it, wouldnt legally have access to their appropriations until next June, either.

A plan was developed for Gov. J.B. Pritzker to issue an amendatory veto to insert the proper effective dates. Accepting an amendatory veto on a budget requires a three-fifths vote in both chambers (36 in the Senate and 71 in the House). No way could Democrats count on Republican help. Republican moneybags Ken Griffin is still said to be angry at legislative Republicans for cooperating on the 2019 capital and budget bills, so if they helped the Democrats correct their massive errors, well, that would be the final straw.

The Senate has a huge Democratic super-majority, and it also has a remote voting rule, so dealing with the issue was no big deal.

The House was another story, however. Five House Democrats out of 73 were saying they couldnt be in Springfield on Wednesday. Unlike the Senate, the House had no remote floor voting procedure, so it can only afford to lose two members before it fell below the 71-vote threshold required to accept the amendatory veto.

If House Speaker Welch couldnt get enough members to Springfield to fix this problem, the New York bond houses couldve conceivably dinged the states credit rating. The state is only a tick above junk bond status as it is.

Welchs chamber made the drafting mistakes, and it was on Welch to fix them and, hopefully, never, ever do anything like this again. Last-minute, late-night budget votes have been far too routine in Springfield. It really needs to stop.

In the end, Welch decided to temporarily change the rules to allow for remote floor voting. The Republicans vigorously spoke against it, but two of their own members voted remotely (and against the budget fix, of course).

All but one of Welchs members were either in Springfield or participated in remote voting.

Welch forced Rep. Carol Ammons (D-Urbana) to resign from her leadership position last month and she has since been unapologetic about the controversies which led to her ouster.

Ammons claims she wasnt aware of the remote voting opportunity, but Speaker Welch said he tried to reach out to her and she never returned his messages.

Again, this is all too important to leave to chance or the whims of a single member. This stuff needs to stop.

Rich Miller publishes Capitol Fax, a daily political newsletter, and CapitolFax.com.

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Cicadas emerge when the ground temperature reaches 64 degrees and a soaking rain has fallen. So the southernmost ones come out first and the emergence moves northward.

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A final thought from Cicada Safari, Pesticides are not effective at controlling periodical cicadas. They are not pests and do not need to be killed.

Q: What is the status of House Joint Resolution 172 on Term Limits for the U.S. Congress? It passed the N.C. House on March 17 of this year in a bipartisan vote and then went to the N.C. Senate. Has the Senate scheduled it for a vote? Is it being debated?

 J.D.

Answer: House Joint Resolution 172 asks Congress to hold a Convention of the States to create a constitutional amendment to enact term limits on members of Congress.

The resolution currently is not scheduled.

Sarah Holland, the principal clerk for the N.C. Senate said, HJR 172 was received from the House and referred to the Rules and Operations of the Senate committee on March 17, 2021. The Rules committee does not currently have it on their calendar for a hearing.

Thank you
Ohl said the vaccines have kept those breakthrough cases in the mild to moderate levels for infection.

Any combination of (cold or flu) symptoms, and you should still be tested for COVID ... even if you have been vaccinated because you can spread the virus to other people, Ohl said.

Delta variant

Dr. David Priest, a Novant Health Inc. infectious diseases expert, said Tuesday that the three COVID-19 vaccines are effective against the COVID-19 variants gaining traction nationally.

However, Priest cautioned that for those who have gotten just one dose, they may not be as protected against the delta variant.

Although the delta variant sweeping the United Kingdom currently comprises about 10% of new COVID-19 cases in the U.S., that total is doubling about every two weeks, Priest said.

It is expected to become the dominant variant in the United States in the coming weeks, Priest said. It appears to be more contagious and may cause more serious disease as well.

Ohl projects that by July 31 the delta variant could represent 85% to 90% of all new cases because the transmission gives the strain more of a foothold to get into the population.
But Winston-Salem City Manager Lee Garrity told the graduates and members of the police force that Winston-Salem was the only major North Carolina city that saw no violence during last summers unrest, and credited local police, city leaders and police Chief Catrina Thompson for achieving that result.

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We were the only city who kept the peace, through 40-plus days of protest, through very tired days for our law enforcement officers who worked every day, Garrity said. We kept the peace, and Im damn proud of what this community did all around.

Forsyth County District Court Judge Denise Hartsfield, giving the keynote address, told the new officers that they endured and succeeded through the worst period that American history has seen in a very long time, a period when there was heated debate, that sometimes seemed to be a race war, or sometimes a war against the men and women in black and blue.

Telling the group that she believes nothing happens by chance, she said there is something that tells me that you have made it  that you sit here today, about to graduate for such a time as this.

Your class was supposed to be here for now, she said, noting that they were there when there was no herd of people running to get the job.
N.C. 12 is in greater peril than it was before, Outten said. We have to address those issues now and not when a storm hits.

The state highway department and others have spent $72 million in the last 10 years restoring parts of N.C. 12, not counting bridge-building costs.

The groups plans over the next few months to prioritize the most vulnerable places, come up with the best solution to fix them and try to fund the projects.

You cant ask anybody for money if you dont have a plan, Outten said.

Including the effects of sea level rise could help land state and federal grants, he said. The group will seek different sources of money such as grants rather than only state highway funding.

Sea level rise must be taken into account, absolutely, said Dave Hallac, superintendent of the National Parks of Eastern North Carolina.

N.C. 12 on Hatteras Island gets a low rating for state funding because its a sparsely populated area with heavy traffic only in the summer, said Stirling Baker, division 1 engineer for the North Carolina Department of Transportation.
A 14-year-old boy swimming in Holmes Lake on Wednesday found a loaded gun, according to police.

Officer Erin Spilker said the boy was swimming near the boat ramps at about 5:30 p.m. Wednesday when he felt something underneath the water.

Spilker said the boy reached down, felt a handgun, and pulled it out of the lake before calling police. Responding officers said the gun was loaded.

The gun has not been reported missing, Spilker said, and police are investigating how it wound up in the lake. Spilker declined to identify what type of handgun it was.

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A 25-year-old Omaha man charged with killing a Lincoln man in his home has pleaded not guilty.

Deontae Rush waived his appearance at an arraignment next week, opting instead to file a written plea to first-degree murder during a robbery and use of a firearm to commit a felony. He hasn't yet been given a trial date.

Rush was arrested in Chicago in early March, 10 days after 33-year-old James Shekie was found dead from a gunshot wound in his home at 4255 N. 20th St.

Officers found Shekie's body March 1 after a neighbor called because Shekies door had been left open for three days.

He'd been dead for nearly a week.

On March 4, police arrested 25-year-old Marques L. Moten and his sister, 17-year-old Anna Feilen, for conspiracy to commit robbery after a search of her phone allegedly showed a Facebook Messenger conversation between them about a plan to rob Shekie of several pounds of marijuana.

Feilen had lived with Shekie before the shooting.

In court records, police allege the three suspects went to Shekie's home early Feb. 23 and that Rush, who was armed, forced his way into the trailer.
Zach Hammack Education reporter/Night content coordinator Zach Hammack, a 2018 UNL graduate, has always called Lincoln home. He previously worked as a copy editor at the Journal Star and was a reporting intern in 2017. Now, he covers students, teachers and schools as the newspapers K-12 reporter. Follow Zach Hammack Close Get email notifications on {{subject}} daily! Your notification has been saved. There was a problem saving your notification. {{description}} Email notifications are only sent once a day, and only if there are new matching items. Save Manage followed notifications Close Followed notifications Please log in to use this feature Log In Don't have an account? Sign Up Today

If you want to catch a glimpse of the future of farming, look no further than Brett Heinrich.

The recent Norris High School graduate, who grew up on a ranch south of Hickman where he helps his father raise cattle, wants to lead the next generation of farmers at a time when retaining young talent can be difficult.

Heinrich was one of two recipients of a scholarship from Champion Seed, an Iowa-based company that asked applicants to consider the current state of agriculture and its future. A panel of judges from the ag industry narrowed the list from a national pool of applicants.

Heinrich plans to study agribusiness and animal science at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln this fall.

"I've been in agriculture my whole life," he said. "Agribusiness stood out to me because it's a really solid major, and you can do a lot of things with it."

Some of the questions applicants answered included how to attract young people to farming at a time when many are resettling in cities.

Heinrich's answer? Start in the classroom.
Nebraska lags far behind other states in building a robust rail passenger system. The federal tax dollars Nebraska taxpayers send to Washington do not come back to our state. The money for rail passenger instead goes to other states with rail passenger projects in service, in planning or under construction.

A survey done by the Bureau of Sociological Research at UNL sent to a sampling of all Nebraska residents found that Nebraska residents want more and better passenger rail service in our state by a two-to-one margin.

The failure of the Transportation and Telecommunications Committee to advance these bills to the floor debate flies in the face of the results of the survey and support voiced at the committee hearings.

Not helping the situation is the fact that even though we have a Department of Transportation instead of a Department of Roads, the department still has a highways only mindset. The Statewide Rail Plan was last updated in 2009 and is outdated.

In order to receive grants from the Federal Railroad Administration, a state must have a current Statewide Rail Plan. The new head of Nebraska DOT, John Selmer, comes from the Iowa DOT, which has an active rail-planning section. This may herald a welcome change for Nebraska DOT.
The agreement with the state requires the group to continue current AltEn cleanup efforts until a long-term plan is developed and, after public review, approved by Nebraska Department of Environment and Energy.

Cleanup efforts so far have focused on drawing down the wastewater lagoons to safer levels, erecting berms to control storm water runoff from the more than 84,000 tons of pesticide-laden distillers grain left on the site and removing and properly disposing of that grain.

Two key questions about the cleanup and agreement remain. The most pressing is how far from the plant will the company-funded cleanup extend. The wastewater has run some four miles from the plant, and the extent of soil contamination has not been determined.

If the company cleanup is confined to only the plant grounds, the mitigation costs for the surrounding area will likely have to be borne by taxpayers. That question needs to be definitively answered by the NDEE as soon as possible.

The second question is, simply, how to prevent a similar disaster from happening again.

As it is selling off assets, it appears that the AltEn plant will not operate again anytime soon -- or ever. That provides localized prevention.

But the state, which, after legislative action this spring, prohibits the use of pesticide-treated seed in ethanol plants, must be vigilant in its enforcement of that ban and in monitoring the grains that are used at any of Nebraska's plants.

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Go to Culvers right now and you can still get ButterBurgers, crinkle cut fries and all the custard you desire, but you probably cant get one popular item: Buffalo chicken tenders.

Outside many Culvers, taped to doors and on speakers at the drive-thru menu, are signs that say the popular spicy item probably wont be on the menu again until the fall.

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Its the result of a limited supply of chicken nationwide. The scarcity is caused by more than just a couple factors, some pandemic-related, some not.

For one, there were significant die-offs of chickens in Texas in February during unprecedented, fatal ice storms that pushed temperatures in some places far below freezing and knocked out power grids that powered heating systems.

That reduced supply nationwide, since Texas has the sixth-most chickens of any U.S. state.

Buckets Pub, 2031 Lathrop Ave., Racine People gather to watch the NCAA men's basketball tournament at Buckets Pub on March 25, 2005.

On top of that, labor shortages  due to too-low wages or too-high unemployment benefits or people choosing not to work due to safety concerns related to COVID-19, depending on whom you ask  have led to some factories producing below expectations.

Prices are up 55% or 60%, said Chuck Brandt, owner of Buckets Pub, 2031 Lathrop Ave., a restaurant that has won several Best of Racine contests for its chicken wings.

One supplier, Brandt said, told him that an entire shift of workers at a chicken factory walked off, citing COVID-19 concerns, as an example of the wide-ranging supply chain disruptions.

Siblings Jake and Alisa Haman, who run the family-owned Culvers along Highway 20 near Interstate 94 in Yorkville and are on course to open their own co-owned Culvers at 4542 Douglas Ave., Caledonia, before the year is out, couldnt point to a clear reason why theyre out of stock of Buffalo chicken.

That comes from corporate and it happens with a range of different items, Jake Haman said. Its the distributors, whatever theyre going through.

Industry leaders have been careful to not call the lack of chicken a shortage. A spokesman for the National Chicken Council told USA Today last month that there is a very tight supply but short of a shortage.

Culvers is saying the same thing. According to Culvers corporate office, since all chicken is in short supply right now, the company decided to stop offering Buffalo chicken tenders while still keeping regular chicken tenders on the menu.

The nations supply of chickens is currently tight, but not to the point that it could be labeled a shortage. The tight supply chain includes all chicken, which means wings, tenders and breasts all are affected, which in turn is affecting restaurants and grocery stores alike, Eric Skrum, director of public relations and communications for Culvers, said in an email. There are a variety of factors contributing to the nationwide tightened supply, including increased product demand and heavy winter storms in chicken growing areas like Texas.

Culvers continuously monitors our supply chain to ensure we meet the expectations of our guests in delivering high-quality food made with the best ingredients. As part of our proactive approach to supply chain management, we have shifted our chicken tender supplies to meet the higher guest demand for our Regular Chicken Tenders.

Like Brandt, Alisa Haman said she could point the limited supply to either issues of labor shortages or distribution difficulties.

Since the pandemic, weve had this left and right, Jake Haman said, referring to all the shortages that have occurred in the past 16 months. Right now  (its) the Buffalo tenders, he continued. But, if you go to any restaurant right now  its just a shortage.

Added Brandt: Its a trickle-down effect.

Out of the coop, off of menus

Some restaurants across the U.S. are taking chicken items off the menu altogether while others are raising their prices. The owner of an upstate New York restaurant told Fox Business this week that chicken prices are up almost 100% while the cost of fryer oil is up more than 120%.

There are also a couple minor causes.

Over the past few years, theres been a widespread spike in demand for fried chicken sandwiches partially blamed on the boom of the Chick-fil-As restaurant chain (it went from 500 locations in the U.S. in 1993 to 1,000 in 2001, and now more than 2,600) leading to competitors such as Burger King and McDonalds offering their own imitator chicken sandwiches.

More recently, the wildly popular social media platform TikTok was used to launch a trend that caused demand for Nashville Hot Chicken sauce from KFC and other hot sauces to skyrocket, thus lowering supply of the common chicken accompaniment.

Diana Panuncial contributed to this report.

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Newly minted U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany, one of only 14 Republicans and the only member of the state's congressional delegation to vote against making Juneteenth a federal holiday, said he voted against commemorating the end of slavery because it "fuels separatism."

"Once again, House Democrats have used their majority to balkanize our country and fuel separatism by creating a race-based 'Independence Day,'" Tiffany, R-Minocqua, said in a statement. "There is only one Independence Day in America, just as there is only one National Anthem, one American flag and one America  under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."

"It is unfortunate," he continued, "that some have chosen to politicize the naming of this important historical event  one of many momentous milestones in Americas shared journey that began in 1776 to create a more perfect union  to turn Americans against one another and foment division based on skin color instead of uniting us."
Copperas Cove, TX (76522)

Today

Some sunshine with a thunderstorm or two possible this afternoon. High 91F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 30%..

Tonight

Scattered thunderstorms this evening becoming more widespread overnight. Low 73F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 60%.
Copperas Cove, TX (76522)

Today

Scattered clouds with the possibility of an isolated thunderstorm developing this afternoon. High near 90F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 30%..

Tonight

Scattered showers and thunderstorms. Low 74F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 60%.
1. Yes. Its a serious public health issue; unvaccinated workers put others at risk.

2. Yes. Some colleges and school districts are mandating it. Its a necessary step.

3. No. Employees should have the option of getting vaccinated or not. Its up to them.

4. No. Some people have serious side-effects. Geting jabbed should be optional.

5. Unsure. Getting people vaccinated is important, but so is having a choice.

Vote

View Results
Killeen, TX (76540)

Today

A mix of clouds and sun with a slight chance of thunderstorms this afternoon. High 92F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 30%..

Tonight

Scattered thunderstorms early, then mainly cloudy overnight with thunderstorms likely. Low 74F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 70%.
When the grave rubbing is complete, the pressure from the crayon reveals the image of the tombstone on the piece of paper, as well as its texture and letter impressions.

Many students were pleased with their results.

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I might later, at some point during the summer, go to my grandparents farm and do gravestone rubbings and in one of their fields, because there used to be a town there, said Zoey Sandmeier, 12. So there was a cemetery, and at least two of the gravestones were left, so I might try to do rubbing on those. I live here, and its interesting to know the history of where you live.

The students did grave rubbings of mayors, sheriffs, businessmen, philanthropists and artists. All were influential in the development of Kearney, starting as early as the 1870s.

Also sought out were the graves of children who died while in an area industrial school in the late 1800s.

After rolling up their large sheets of paper, the students will look through the archives for information about their persons life.

Until then, all they know about the people are important dates and their names.
Hey. Or should I say Hay..being its that time of year and all. Vern here, your unofficial mascot of Vernon County. Do you know how I unofficially earned this title? Me neither. Its an honor, of course, but Ive never heard of anybody just giving unofficial titles away, unless you do something...well, unofficially. I guess maybe going to the fairgrounds was pretty unofficial. I stopped by because I just had to know if it was happening this year. And after snooping around I am happy to announce that YES, the Vernon County Fair is INDEED happening THIS YEAR! Great. Another 27,000 more humans in Vernon County this September. Better get ready for that. Its OK, its a fun time for all that lasts five days. Did you know that the Vernon County Fair has been going on for 165 years? Well, not last year, because well (insert your go-to-year-long-pandemic-word here)
Culvers is saying the same thing. According to Culvers corporate office, since all chicken is in short supply right now, the company decided to stop offering Buffalo chicken tenders while still keeping regular chicken tenders on the menu.

The nations supply of chickens is currently tight, but not to the point that it could be labeled a shortage. The tight supply chain includes all chicken, which means wings, tenders and breasts all are affected, which in turn is affecting restaurants and grocery stores alike, Eric Skrum, director of public relations and communications for Culvers, said in an email. There are a variety of factors contributing to the nationwide tightened supply, including increased product demand and heavy winter storms in chicken growing areas like Texas.

Culvers continuously monitors our supply chain to ensure we meet the expectations of our guests in delivering high-quality food made with the best ingredients. As part of our proactive approach to supply chain management, we have shifted our chicken tender supplies to meet the higher guest demand for our Regular Chicken Tenders.

Like Brandt, Alisa Haman said she could point the limited supply to either issues of labor shortages or distribution difficulties.
The report used earlier Rand studies as well as data from Defense Department anonymous surveys in 2016 and 2018 that seek information about sexual assaults and harassment that may or may not have been formally reported. And it compared that to other military personnel and demographic data.

Soldiers assigned to the Washington, D.C. region, meanwhile, have some of the lowest risk totals, with the Pentagon showing the lowest of all installations listed. Among the bases with the lowest reported risk were Fort Belvoir, in northern Virginia, and Fort George G. Meade and the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, in Maryland.

According to the study, an estimated 8.4%  or about 1 in 12  of the roughly 5,883 Army women who served at Fort Hood were sexually assaulted, while at the Pentagon it was 1.8%, or about one in 50. The study noted, however, that the difference is not surprising considering that it's likely that women at the Pentagon are, on average, older, more senior-ranking and more highly educated. They also are more likely to be working with older and more senior-ranking men.

The report said that the data can be used to help the Army tailor prevention and other programs to better counter sexual assault in the ranks.
When restaurant dining rooms were closed at the beginning of the pandemic last spring, Trio Bar & Grill in West Hempfield Township set up tables in part of a parking lot out back.

Normally, such an expansion would require approval from the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board that includes paying a fee and waiting through a 30-day advertising period. But to help liquor license holders whose businesses had to shut down and then faced restrictions after Gov. Tom Wolf declared a disaster emergency in March 2020, the PLCB waived all fees and began automatically approving any such extension of licensed premises.

That was amazing. Because that was a time when only outdoor seating was allowed, said Tony Lyristis, owner of Trio Bar & Grill, which had 21 tables outside. People loved it, so we said well do it this year because we still fell under the emergency declaration. So we put new tables and chairs out there, new umbrellas, new lights.

But on Tuesday, the PLCB told all liquor license holders that the formal end of the states emergency declaration puts all of the pre-pandemic rules back in effect, meaning that outdoor areas like the one at Trio where alcohol is served are no longer considered licensed. The sudden shift is forcing restaurant owners struggling to recover from the pandemic into the uncomfortable position of technically breaking the law if they continue to operate the outdoor seating areas many customers continue to favor.

Its like were back at the beginning of the pandemic where businesses are having to face the idea of Do I lose business or do I lose money, lay off staff, do I have to make major changes with no notice so I can comply with the law? said Aaron Zeamer, a Lancaster attorney who represents clients in the food service and hospitality industry and is advising Trio.

Its just hard decisions after a year of having to make a whole lot of hard decisions about their businesses, he said.

No emergency, no emergency help

In a notice sent Tuesday to All Members of the Alcohol Industry in Pennsylvania, the PLCB explained that the state legislatures vote to end the state of emergency over Wolfs objections meant the expiration of all temporary measures that were put in place during the emergency. Those included expanded outdoor operation and the sale of mixed-drinks to go.

The legislature was able to end the emergency declaration because of a constitutional amendment approved by voters in May, and certified Tuesday, the day the PLCB sent out its notice.

Therefore, now that the vote on the constitutional amendment is certified, the emergency declarations that have been in effect since March 6, 2020, will no longer be valid, said the PLCB notice, which detailed the rules that would once again go into effect immediately.

As it now stands, liquor license holders who want to continue to use outdoor areas created last year will have to apply for an extension through the PLCBs normal process, which includes paying a $220 fee and waiting at least 30 days. Crucially, the PLCB notice doesnt make it clear if liquor license holders will be able to keep their outside areas while an application is pending since it says such decisions will be made on a case-by-case basis.

The challenge for some folks is theyre saying, Look, if I have to shut this down for the next 30 days, theres no point in keeping it going, Zeamer said. I cant be in this limbo. You have to either tell me I can continue to do this, or I cant.

Automatic outdoor extensions were granted to 1,843 liquor license holders statewide, including 66 in Lancaster County, according to PLCB spokesman Shawn Kelly. Kelly said the PLCB sent its notice about the changes this week because the law that created all the temporary provisions says they could only last as long as an emergency declaration. The PLCB is following the law, he said. As for granting allowances to operate a temporary outdoor area while an application is pending, Kelly said the PLCB can only make case-by-case determinations since it has limited discretion to grant temporary operating authority.

Navigating the rules

Several Lancaster County restaurant owners with outdoor areas established during the pandemic emergency rules did not respond to requests to comment. One said he would speak only if his name was not revealed because of concern about attracting attention to an outdoor area that may now be illegal.

Zeamer said he understands such reluctance, saying he even cautioned Lyristis about being too outspoken. You dont want to be in the cross hairs. Its hard enough without inviting additional scrutiny and attention on yourself, he said.

Nevertheless, Zeamer says Trios application for a new outdoor area is likely to ultimately be approved since it is connected to an existing patio. But hes not as clear on what Trio would be allowed to do in the interim.

I have to tell licensees that if you operate those areas after (June 15) you are subject to being cited by the liquor control enforcement bureau for serving alcohol in an area thats not licensed, he said. PLCB fines can be from $50 to $5,000, with fines for violations of serving alcohol outdoors rules starting around $200, although multiple fines could jeopardize the renewal of a liquor license.

This week Lyrsitis was struggling with whether he would maintain his outdoor seating while his application is pending. Over the course of several days, he went from vowing to stay open to deciding to remove tables before finally adopting a wait-and-see approach to a problem he never saw coming.

None of us were aware of this. (We thought) theres no way theyre going to yank it from under us. Im just shocked, actually, he said. The pandemic just didnt end.

On top of it all, Lyrsitis frets that giving up some parking spaces for a new outdoor seating area could impact the approval he got from the township for his restaurant capacity, which requires a certain amount of parking.

Its a Catch-22, he said.

Legislative fix?

The PLCB notice comes as a bill passed by the state House and pending in the Senate would extend the use of temporary outdoor areas until December 2022. The bill, HB 1154, would also permanently allow restaurants to sell mixed drinks to go.

But with the legislative session ending at the end of next week, advocates for the restaurant industry are pushing to expedite a vote.

Expanded premise outdoor seating continues to be a valuable tool to business operations but were running out of time, said John Longstreet, president and CEO of the Pennsylvania Restaurant & Lodging Association.

Complicating the possible legislative fix is the fact that the bill now includes an amendment to allow grocery and convenience stores to sell prepackaged mixed drinks, a measure Gov. Wolf has said would prompt him to use his veto power.

Zeamer says the stalled legislative fixes coupled with the immediate rule changes announced without any notice are creating unnecessary headaches and expense for an industry still trying to recover from the pandemic.

With a little bit of foresight and a little bit of cooperation in Harrisburg, I think this really could have been avoided, Zeamer said. And thats whats very frustrating.
An attorney advising Penn Medicine Lancaster General Health employees who oppose a new hospital policy mandating staff vaccinations for COVID-19 says workers who do not meet the deadline will be suspended and ultimately terminated.

Hospital officials have repeatedly declined to clarify the disciplinary steps management will take if staff flouts the policy.

Eric Winter, a Berks County lawyer advising LGH employees, said he learned of the possible suspensions and termination from workers. LG Health did not respond Thursday when asked about Winters claim.

In a May 19 memo to all employees, LG Health CEO John J. Herman said staff who remain unvaccinated and who do not have an approved exemption from vaccination (after the Sept. 1 deadline) will be subject to discipline or sanctions that may ultimately preclude their ability to continue to work for the health system.

WellSpan Health and UPMC have not yet followed suit with similar policies.

In the wake of a federal judge in Texas delivering a blow to vaccine legal challenges by tossing out a suit by Houston Methodist Hospital employees opposed to a similar policy, LNP | LancasterOnline asked officials at UPMC Lititz and WellSpan Ephrata Community Hospital whether this changes the calculus.

Officials with both health systems said they were not yet contemplating a mandate.

WellSpan Health is constantly evaluating the latest vaccine data and we will continue to encourage our team members to get their shot of hope and receive their COVID-19 vaccination, Madeline Riggs, a WellSpan spokesperson said in an email.

LNP | LancasterOnline also inquired as to whether full U.S. FDA approval for the Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccines  expected as early as the fall - would influence a decision to create a mandate.

Neither Riggs nor Marcocci addressed the Texas lawsuit.

UPMC awaits more data on the efficacy of the vaccines in preventing transmission of COVID-19 before requiring the COVID-19 vaccine for employees, Kendall Marcocci, a UPMC Lititz spokeswoman, said in an email.

Last week, U.S. District Judge Lynn Hughes upheld Houston Methodist Hospital's policy mandating employees be vaccinated against COVID-19.

Not guaranteed

Protecting patients is the stated goal for LG Healths controversial staff vaccination policy, which requires full vaccination by Sept. 1.

Winter said Wednesday that employees are being pressured to inform management of their vaccination plans by July 1.

Depending on the vaccine type and the length between the first and second dose, LG Health employees could have fewer than five weeks to comply.

Employees can seek an exemption for medical and religious reason. However, Herman warned in the May 19 memo that requests will be carefully evaluated and are not guaranteed.

The real concern that people have is that legitimate exemptions are going to be denied, Winter said.

Pennsylvania Informed Consent Advocates and FreePA  a group that organized in opposition to the Wolf administrations COVID-19 mitigation measures  collected more than 10,000 signatures to pressure Penn Medicine to rescind the policy.

The petition was submitted Wednesday, according to a post on FreePAs Facebook page.

Rescinding the mandate isn't likely. LG Health has consistently defended its policy.

Penn Medicine Lancaster General Health believes it is critical to take a lead in requiring employee vaccinations to protect our patients and staff, and to set an example to the broader community as we work together to end the COVID-19 pandemic, a hospital spokesperson said in an email to LNP | LancasterOnline.

Employees, Winter said, are hopeful the petition could prompt a course change, but short of that would pursue litigation.

The Texas ruling, Winter noted, is only binding within that court's jurisdiction.

Theyre not anti-vax, Winter said of LG Health employees opposed to the mandate. They want more time.
A Lancaster County farmer accused of repeatedly shirking food safety laws was found in contempt of court this week, when a federal judge ruled that hed violated an earlier court order by selling meat that was processed outside of a federally inspected slaughterhouse.

The Upper Leacock Township farms owner, Amos Miller, is now awaiting related civil penalties, which will be negotiated in the coming days, said Millers Texas-based attorney, Steven Lafuente.

It was rather expected, Lafuente said of the outcome.

On Thursday, Lafuente said his goal now is to negotiate for penalties  fines or other legal agreements  that are appropriate but wont put the lights out at Millers Organic Farm, the farmers poultry and livestock operation.

At the farm on Mill Creek School Road, Miller has shown a singular, historic willingness to flout democratically enacted federal food safety laws, prosecutors have said.

Thats a reference to past violations dating back to at least 2015.

The contempt of court ruling, which was handed down Wednesday by U.S. District Judge Edward G. Smith in Easton, stemmed from an inspection of the farm carried out by U.S. Department of Agriculture investigators last month.

In May, investigators visited the farm to check that the operation was in compliance with food safety laws and previous legal agreements, but found that it was not, according to prosecutors court filings.

Miller told investigators that he had stopped taking his poultry and livestock to be processed at a federally inspected slaughterhouse, prosecutors said. Instead, animals were being processed in-house at the farm, which does not have regulatory approval to operate as a slaughterhouse, they said.

The self-processing was a violation of an earlier legal agreement  a consent decree reached in 2020 after an earlier violation  that stipulated Miller would follow food safety laws, said prosecutors, who pointed out that the farmer also failed to maintain required animal-related records.

The judge agreed, issuing the Wednesday decision that Miller was in contempt.

Miller had argued that he had to slaughter his own animals because the federally inspected slaughterhouse couldnt keep up with his needs, Lafuente said. Miller also argued that certain products used at the slaughterhouse to process his animals dont meet the high standards of his customers, who demand untainted, all-natural products.

At least one of those customers is so passionate about those standards that she called out after Judge Smith issued his decision at the Wednesday hearing, Lafuente said.

It was very lively. I looked at it as a protest, he said, adding that the judge allowed the outburst and even spoke, back and forth, with the customer. She was very animated.

In part, its the attitudes of those loyal customers who have kept Miller from seeking to legitimize his operation through efforts like pursuing necessary slaughterhouse certifications, Lafuente said.

They want nothing to do with federal government regulation, the attorney said.

In addition to negotiating prospective penalties with prosecutors, Lafuente said Thursday that he hopes to work toward a deal related to 3,100 pounds of meat  beef, pork and chicken  that federal regulators hope to seize and condemn.

So far, federal officials have been very reasonable, he said.
Consuewella Dotson Africa, a longtime member of the Black organization MOVE and mother of two children killed in the 1985 bombing of the group's home in Philadelphia, has died at 67.

She died Wednesday at a hospital. A member of the MOVE family, Janine Africa, said Consuewella Africa had tested positive for the coronavirus when she went to the hospital around the beginning of the month, but had largely recovered when doctors said last week she was not getting enough oxygen.

Through the stress with everything that was happening, her body just could not fight to get the air in her lungs because she was too burnt out and tore down from the stress, Janine Africa told The Associated Press. So that is what caused her to die.

Africa's death follows painful revelations in the last few months about the treatment of the remains of her two daughters who were killed in the police bombing of the organization's home, where 11 members  including five children  were killed and more than 60 homes were burnt to the ground.

Her daughters, 14-year-old Katricia Tree and 12-year-old Zanetta Netta, died in the bombing while Consuewella Africa was in prison serving a 16-year-sentence for simple assault related to the city's 1978 attempt to evict the group during which a police officer was killed.

In April, MOVE learned that an anthropology professor at the University of Pennsylvania and Princeton University had been given remains by the city's medical examiner believed to be one of Consuewellas children, and he had used the remains in teaching lessons without the permission or knowledge of family members.

In May, the city notified the group that partial human remains from the bombing had been cremated and disposed of without notifying family members. A day later, following the resignation of the city's top health official, the city reversed themselves, saying the remains had been located.

Janine Africa said having to revisit the killing of her children and the targeting of the group took a toll on Consuewella.

Once again, another death at the hands of the city of Philadelphia because they just took everything out of her with this last thing here," Janine Africa said. "Because she was reliving 1985 all over again, thinking about the children all over again and it just really broke her heart.

In May, members of the organization marked the 36th anniversary of the bombing in West Philadelphia that destroyed a swath of the neighborhood and took their loved ones.

She was there and full of life and fire and fight and there was no way that we could see this coming, Janine Africa said.

Consuewella Africa held the title Minister of Confrontation for MOVE, which identifies as both a family and an organization.

She was a no nonsense straight forward person, but on the same hand, she was always making people laugh, always lively, always getting things going, getting people, having a good time, Janine Africa said.

Her biological brother, sister and husband were with her when she died and her surviving son joined by phone, Janine Africa said.

MOVE wrote in a June 16 post on their website that the remains of Tree Africa were sent by the University of Pennsylvania to a funeral home where the organization can pick them up.

We hope that we can put Tree and Consuewella together, they wrote.
When: Denver Borough Council meeting, June 7.

What happened: Borough Council approved an agreement with East Cocalico Township for Michael Hession to be the manager of both municipalities. The salary and benefits will total $205,000 and be shared equally by the municipalities, offering a savings to both.

How it works: Hession will split his time about 50% between the borough and township. The intention of this agreement is to allow Hession to devote his attention to either municipality as circumstances required, subject to the 50% understanding. The term of the agreement is one year with an automatic renewal and a 90-day review, Hession said.

Background: Hession has managed Denver Borough for the past 24 years. The East Cocalico manager position has been vacant for several months. The township and the borough border each other and cooperate in the coordination of police services, join purchasing agreements and land planning, as well as other aspects.

Quotable: Mr. Hession can correct me because quite frankly, at the end of the day hes the one responsible for it, but my belief is, and I think the believe of council, is that Mr. Hession is a responsible manager, probably one of the best in Lancaster County and maybe Pennsylvania, Denver Borough President Blake Daub said. I think he will manage his time accordingly. And if he has to bend time here, there, the other place, that will be what itll be. Well have to figure it out.
The state Attorney General's Office has charged a Manor Township man with defrauding a Medicaid program by claiming to be providing care for his 91-year-old mother-in-law 24 hours per day, seven days a week, while also working another full-time job or not visiting her at all.

Mikhail Bagdasarian, 72, was charged with several felony offenses for filing fraudulent time sheets for care he did not actually provide, according to an affidavit of probable cause filed Monday.

Bagdasarian is charged as a co-defendant with his sister-in-law Zhanna Sainz, the two having split $95,000 in fraudulent billings, prosecutors said.

Sainz, 57, lives in Harrisburg with her mother, who suffers from multiple health issues and has been allowed 24/7 paid care since November 2019. Bagdasarian was hired by his mother-in-law to be her personal care attendant under a Medicaid waiver program that allows recipients to hire a personal care attendant, rather than having to rely on a nursing home or rotating home-care operations.

Bagdasarian submitted false time sheet filings between January 2016 and April 2021, according to the affidavit. Between January 2016 and June 2019, Bagdasarian submitted time sheets for Medicaid payments while he was working 55 miles away from his mother-in-law's residence at his full-time job at in Quarryville. Police said they identified at least 750 occasions where dates he was at his Quarryville job overlapped with his time sheets, when he was supposed to be caring for his mother-in-law.

Later in the police investigation, detectives began surveilling Sainz's home. Of the 223 days of recorded video evidence between August 2020 and March 2021, Bagdasarian visited the home only approximately 23 times, police said, though he was getting paid for being there 24/7. His mother-in-law was seen left alone at home for more than six hours at a time on at least 110 days, according to the affidavit.

"Zhanna Sainz and Mikhail Bagdasarian not only tried to make a profit from a program for senior Pennsylvanians, they also neglected Sainz's elderly mother who needed their care and support," Attorney General Josh Shapiro said in a news release. "Medicaid provides essential funding so families can care for their loved ones  it is not a source of profit for bad actors."

Police said that in interviews, Bagdasarian claimed he is "normally" with his mother-in-law on a daily basis, providing 90% of her care, though he admitted he had been employed during part of the time he was supposed to be caring for her.

Legal representation for Bagdasarian could not immediately be determined.
How Many of the January 6 Unindicted Co-Conspirators Worked for the FBI?

June 17, 2021 (EIRNS)Revolver News published an astonishing article June 15, raising evidence pointing to the Jan. 6 storming of the Capitol having been planned and organized by people working for the FBI, in a way similar to the foiled kidnapping plot against Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer the previous summer. Considering the self-described shock and awe prosecutorial campaign waged against participants in the events of that day, enormous suspicion is warranted about the manyat least 20unindicted co-conspirators listed in the charging documents against those arrested for storming the Capitol, whose actions were at least as deserving of prosecution as those currently held without bail in solitary confinementand often were more provocative. (This is purely by means of comparison, and not meant to universally endorse the prosecutions that have taken place.)

Revolver News poses three questions: (1) Leading up to and including Jan. 6, to what extent were the three primary militia groups (Oath Keepers, Proud Boys, Three Percenters) infiltrated by agents or informants of federal agencies? (2) How many federal agents or informants were present at the Capitol during the siege, and how active a role did they play? (3) Among the unindicted co-conspirators referenced in charging documents related to Jan. 6, how many worked for the federal government?

Thinking back to the Global War on Terror, there were many cases (if not a majority of cases) of dangerous plots foiled by the FBI or similar agencies revealed to be, essentially, entrapment operations. FBI agents or human sources encouraged their marksnot infrequently individuals with mental problemsto pursue plans to attack, bomb, murder, etc. Weapons, planning, encouragement supplied by the FBI motivated their victims to take actions that then justified their arrest and the opportunity for the FBI to brag about another job well done keeping America safe.

More recently, look back to the ostensible plot to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer. Among the 14 individuals who allegedly plotted the kidnappingand the planned overthrow of the state governmentat least 5 are known to have been undercover agents or federal informants. During one van ride to scope out Whitmers vacation house, fully three of the five people in the van had a relationship to the federal government! Whats more, following the arrest of those plotters who werent federal agents or informants, the then-director of the Detroit FBI Field Office, Steven DAntuono, was given a promotion announced by FBI Director Christopher Wray: to be the head of the Washington Field Office.

The alleged mastermind of the Whitmer plot, Adam Fox, had been kicked out of his girlfriends house and was living temporarily in the basement of the vacuum-cleaner store owned by his friend and employer. It was from this storage space, accompanied by his two dogs, that the sinister Fox supposedly hatched a plan to shake Michigan, that would require the purchase of thousands of dollars in explosives and other supplies.

As a matter of fact, the plot was not initially designed to kidnap Whitmer; it was, according to the Justice Departments indictment, to storm the Capitol building in Lansing, Michigan!

All told, FBI operatives played numerous important leadership roles in the plot:

 The explosives expert, from whom the plotters were to purchase bombs, was an FBI agent.  The head of transportation for the militia outfit was an FBI agent.  The head of security for the militia was an FBI informant.  At least two FBI informants were active participants in the initial meeting to plan the storming of the Capitol in Lansing.

To summarize the precedent of Michigan, Revolver News writes:

Just months prior to the U.S. Capitol Siege on Jan. 6, the FBI thwarted a similar plot involving a siege at the Michigan State Capitol, whose plotters belong to one of the three main militia groups associated with Jan. 6. The FBI was able to thwart this on the basis of an astonishing infiltration rate of said groups involving undercover operatives and informants who had been working in such capacity, just in one tiny Michigan network, for more than seven months.

If the government foiled the Michigan Plot, why didnt they step in to stop the so-called siege on Jan. 6? Revolver asks.

Looking into the charging documents related to Jan. 6, there are numerous examples of unindicted co-conspirators reserving and paying for hotel rooms, encouraging illegal actions, participating in the storming of the Capitol, and even directing the activities of activist networks.

How many among PERSON ONE through PERSON TWENTY and people referred to only as an individual are more than they seem? Will Director Wray be asked: How many of the unindicted co-conspirators in Jan. 6 cases are now, or have been, undercover agents or confidential informants?
Global Times Editorializes, Its the U.S., Not China Squeezing Russia

June 17, 2021 (EIRNS)In a strongly-worded editorial today, Chinas semi-official Global Times minced no words in denouncing Joe Bidens assertion to reporters yesterday that Vladimir Putin feels squeezed by a China that Biden says is seeking world dominance while Russia struggles to remain relevant. Biden might have been embarrassed to make such remarks in front of Putin, because the Russian President would have immediately refuted them. But, Global Times warns, such a baseless provocation is a humiliation of the Russian people, treating one of the most powerful countries in the world as an idiot. Who is really squeezing Russia strategically? the editorial asks. Its not China but the U.S. which has caused waves of harm to Russia, and Biden just wants to pass the blame to China. This, it affirms, is serious political autism.

One need only look at the brutal treatment of Russia by the U.S. and its Western allies after the fall of the Soviet Union to understand real strategic squeezing, Global Times charges.

NATO expanded eastward, to incorporate former Warsaw Pact states and then the three Baltic states. Russias strategic space was almost dug up by NATO.... There has rarely been such a vicious unilateral pressure between major powers in history. Some Westerners thought that Russia had been fully restrained through this treatment, but when the West wanted to cut off Ukraine, the umbilical cord to Russia, Moscow fought back. GT recounts the enormous harm done to Russias economy by the array of U.S./U.K./EU sanctions, weakening its economy and its currency, fostering capital flight, attacking its energy sector.

Yes, the editorial adds, there is a long border between Russia and China, but it is a peaceful one, where there is important bilateral tradeworth $100 billion, compared with $20 billion with the U.S. Russia and China are strategic cooperative partners and their mutual trust has a solid political foundation. Global Times lists all the areas of bilateral cooperation, in space, nuclear energy, high tech and trade; it is completely false to say China is squeezing Russia, therefore. Its fine for the U.S. and Russia to meet face-to-face to manage their differences, but the China-Russia comprehensive strategic partnership has gone through tests and become an irreplaceable common strategic resource of the two countries. On the one hand, Putin recognized the constructiveness of the meeting with Biden, but on the other, he also said he had no illusions about relations with the U.S.: There are no illusions and there cannot be any.
EIR LEAD EDITORIAL FOR FRIDAY, JUNE 18, 2021

What Could Have Happened in Geneva, and What Must Happen in the World

June 17, 2021 (EIRNS)That even the relatively uneventful meeting between Presidents Biden and Putin in Geneva can accurately be hailed as a step forward, speaks to the absolutely terrible situation the world is in. Hu Xijin, the editor-in-chief of Global Times, expressed it in a tweet: The meeting itself sends a strong signal. Both want to end the worst period of U.S.-Russian relations post-Cold War. At the very least, achieve low-level stability in their bilateral ties and avoid new uncontrollable conflicts. And this is probably the only product of the meeting.

Our aspirations must be so much greater!

How can our efforts benefit from the powerful positive example of China (and Chinese-Russian collaboration) and in breaking through the censorial thought-control that has come to increasingly dominate both the legacy media and the social media of the trans-Atlantic world?

The Shenzhou-12 rocket has brought three astronauts to the Chinese Space Stations core module, Tianhe, in a happy step in Chinas continued development of its space capacityas the International Space Station reaches the end of its life. It appears that great dreams cannot be derailed by such petty (and short-sighted) actions as banning Chinese purchase of certain microchips or the 2011 Wolf Amendment banning NASA from collaborating with China on manned space projects.

As Bidenand the press hyenasharass Vladimir Putin about his grave assault on freedom, recent shocking revelations in the United States provide a potential flank to blast the burgeoning attempts at truly dictatorial control over media, communication, and thought.

Those revelations center on evidence of the involvement of the FBI and other federal agencies in the events of Jan. 6. Not only were plans to storm the Capitol well known to intelligencewhich could have increased security to counter thembut the plans appear to have been promoted by these federal agents! Revolver News has revealed, through analysis of charging documents, the existence of at least 20 unindicted co-conspiratorslikely FBI or other agents or sourcesintimately involved in the events of Jan. 6.

Put this in historical context. Just a few months earlier, a dozen people were accused of plotting to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmeramong the purported plotters were no fewer than five federal agents or sources, who, far from passively infiltrating a plot in process, actively advanced it! This is in keeping with the FBIs modus operandi, put into overdrive with the beginning of the Global War on Terror, of participating in (through undercover agents and sources) and driving supposedly heinous acts of terrorism deftly and heroically foiled by the upstanding men and women of the FBI itself.

Helga Zepp-LaRouche warned on Jan. 9 that the storming of the Capitol had to be seen in this context, writing: There is every reason to believe that the assault on the Capitol is a direct continuation of the 9/11 attacks, the real masterminds of which have never really been named. Lyndon LaRouche had presciently predicted this terrorist act nine months earlier, on Jan. 3, 2001, by predicting that the Bush Administration, which would take office three weeks later, would stage a Reichstag Fire incident due to its inability to deal with the coming financial meltdown, as a pretext to implement dictatorial measures. This is exactly what happened with the introduction of the Patriot Act.... In the same fashion, the riot at the Capitol is intended to provide the pretext to eliminate any dissent towards the policies of the neoliberal establishment....

The alarm bells must ring for all people who hold dear the constitutional state, freedom of expression, and civil rights. What this is about is total dictatorship over opinion and the elimination of any opposition to the policies of the transatlantic financial elite, Zepp-LaRouche warned. We are in acute danger of a new fascism!

The revelations around the events of Jan. 6 can be a powerful tool for exploding the press for dictatorial control over thought, and exposing the hungry minds of those in the trans-Atlantic to the much larger, and better world that exists beyond the bounds of approved discourse, in the domain of fruitful encounters with the truly amazing developments already taking place, and possible, around the world. Victories far greater for humanity than a civil discussion between the presidents of the two most powerfully nuclear armed nations lie in store!
Children Can Receive Free Lunches at Select Los Angeles Parks Through Aug. 9

Starting June 16, and through Aug. 9, children up to 18-years-old can receive a free lunch at select Los Angeles city parks.

The Summer Food Service Program aims to ensure that children in Los Angeles have access to nutritious lunches when school is not in session. The menu, which meets USDA nutrition standards and the citys Good Food Purchasing Policy, will include options like fresh deli sandwiches, salads, fresh fruit, vegetables and milk.

The program is funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and is administered by the California Department of Education.

ADVERTISEMENT

We are incredibly thankful for the Summer Food Service Program, which provides reliable and nutritious meals throughout the summer months, said Mike Shull, general manager of the Los Angeles Department of Recreation and Parks. We encourage children and teens to take advantage of this opportunity.

Meals will be provided to-go, and parents are allowed to pick-up meals for their children. Only one meal is available per child, and food will be provided on a first-come, first-served basis.

A list of participating parks is available at https://bit.ly/3vgX4BV. More information is available by visiting laparks.org/food program or calling 818-346-2700.
Hong Kong police raided a pro-democracy newspaper on Thursday and arrested five officials at the publication.

Hundreds of officers were involved in a search of computers and notebooks used by reporters at Apple Daily.

Hong Kong Security Secretary John Lee described the newspaper offices as a crime scene. He said the operation was aimed at individuals at the publication who use reporting as a tool to endanger national security.

Police said they were acting on evidence. They said stories published by the newspaper had been used to help persuade foreign forces to place sanctions on Hong Kong and China.

The raid was carried out under a national security law passed in June 2020 by the government in Beijing. Critics of the law say it seeks to silence dissent and crush freedoms promised to Hong Kong when it was passed to mainland China in 1997. Rights of the territorys citizens were to be guaranteed under its Basic Law for 50 years.

Apple Daily has long been one of the most outspoken defenders of Hong Kong's freedoms. It said in a statement that the police action left it speechless. But it promised to continue its reporting. The newspaper said 38 of its computers had been seized by police.

Among those arrested were Apple Dailys chief editor, Ryan Law, and Cheung Kim-hung, the chief executive of its publisher, Next Digital. An official said police also froze $2.3 million in assets belonging to three companies linked to Apple Daily.

The newspapers owner, Jimmy Lai, is currently serving a 20-month prison sentence after being found guilty of taking part in unapproved pro-democracy protests in 2019. His assets have also been frozen under the national security law.

The Chinese government's representative office in Hong Kong said in a statement that it supported the action. It noted that while the city's Basic Law guarantees the freedoms of speech and the press, those rights cannot conflict with the bottom line of national security.

Freedom of the press is not a shield for illegal activities, the office said.

The head of the Hong Kong Journalists Association, Chris Yeung, criticized the raid and arrests in an online news conference. The national security law, he warned, was being used as a weapon against media officials and reporters.

He added that the court order permitting police to raid Apple Daily had violated the reporters ability to protect their materials. He said that was an important part of press freedom.

Self-censorship will get worse if journalists are not sure whether they are able to protect their sources of information, said Yeung.

Im Bryan Lynn.

The Associated Press and Reuters reported on this story. Bryan Lynn adapted the reports for VOA Learning English. Mario Ritter, Jr. was the editor.

We want to hear from you. Write to us in the Comments section, and visit our Facebook page.

_____________________________________________________________

Words in This Story

sanction  n. a punishment for not obeying a rule or law

asset  n. something a person or company owns that has value

bottom line  n. the most important fact in a situation

shield  n. a person or thing used as protection

censorship  n. the system or practice of censoring books, movies, letters, etc.

source  n. where something comes from


The United States is spending $3.2 billion to develop drugs to fight COVID-19 and other viruses that could turn into pandemics.

Dr. Anthony Fauci is the nations top infectious disease expert. He announced the investment during a Thursday briefing at the White House. The investment is part of a new antiviral program for pandemics that will develop drugs to treat diseases caused by dangerous viruses like the coronavirus.

The investment will speed up human trials of several promising drugs to treat COVID-19. Some are already under development and could be ready by year's end. The money will also provide support for research, development and manufacturing.

Fauci said the new program would invest in accelerating things that are already in progress for COVID-19. He added it will also support new treatments for other viruses.

There are few treatments that exist for many of the viruses that have pandemic potential, said Fauci.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has already approved one antiviral drug, remdesivir, against COVID-19. But the World Health Organization recommended against its use in COVID-19 patients. The drug was originally developed for the Ebola virus.

The health agency has also permitted emergency use of three antibody treatments to help the body fight the virus.

All the currently available treatments must be performed at hospitals or medical centers. They have mostly been shown to help patients avoid hospitalization or shorten their recovery time by several days.

Health experts, including Fauci, have been calling for the development of a simple drug that patients could take themselves. Several companies, including Merck, Pfizer, and Roche, are now testing such a treatment.

News of the Biden administrations plans for the antiviral program for pandemics was first reported by The New York Times.

The news organization said Faucis support for the program came from his own experience fighting AIDS some thirty years ago. In the 1990s, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, under Fauci, conducted research that led to some of the first antiviral drugs for H.I.V., the virus that causes AIDS.

I'm Dan Friedell.

Hai Do wrote this story for Learning English with additional reporting from the Associated Press. Susan Shand was the editor.

______________________________________________________________

Words in This Story

accelerate - v. to move faster

potential - adj. capable of becoming real
MoneyTips

Graduation for the Class of 2021 is here. Some college graduates have studied physics and will pursue rocket science as a career. Others plan to become doctors, memorizing every bone in the body, while a few are walking encyclopedias when it comes to history. But how many of them can  and do  balance a checkbook?

According to the Pew Research Center, 52% of Americans between the ages of 18 and 29 still live with one or both of their parents. This could be attributed to the nation's student loan debt, which stands at an all-time high of $1.6 trillion, and the job market that keeps graduates in internships and minimum wage positions for years after college. That means many recent college grads have never paid their own rent, balanced a checkbook or created a budget, much less learned to live on one.

The good news in this grim statistic is that learning the basics of personal financial management isn't really all that difficult. Here are seven personal finance st...
When we arrived at our ten-year high school reunion, we saw tables of old people and wondered about them. Those old people celebrated 50 years since graduationand now they are us. Good grief! Our yearbooks are stored in the museum. What happened? The answer is: Life happened. One hundred forty-four of us graduated in 1971. Since graduation we survived and thrived. We survived big changes both in the world and in our personal lives. What a journey!

Some of us transitioned from a two-room country school to a huge 7th, 8th, and 9th grade building. We learned how to operate lockers, find the right classroom at the right time for the right class with the right books and supplies. Back in the day that was a big life change for young us. The War in Vietnam entered our living rooms on TV and heralded more big changes to come. Our parents, families, and friends as well as our Lexington teachers, administrators, board members and taxpayers contributed to our firm foundation so we might explore the world.
William Chen, Marco Del Negro, Shlok Goyal, and Alissa Johnson

Estimating the Model taking the Pandemic and the New Monetary Policy Framework into Account

How Do the Latest Forecasts Compare with the Ones from March?

This post presents an update of the economic forecasts generated by the Federal Reserve Bank of New Yorks dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) model. We describe very briefly our forecast and its change since March 2021 . As usual, we wish to remind our readers that the DSGE model forecast is not an official New York Fed forecast, but only an input to the Research staffs overall forecasting process. For more information about the model and variables discussed here, see our DSGE model Q & A The key drivers of the models forecast remain the responses of the economy and policy to the COVID-19 pandemic. The models parameters are different than those used to produce the March projection in that the model has now been re-estimated, incorporating data up to 2021:Q1. In addition to changing the posterior distribution of the parameters, the estimation exercise provided the opportunity to evaluate the different scenarios for modeling the dynamics of the economy during the pandemic that we considered over the past year. As a result of this work, we coalesced on one specification. This specification features several transitory demand and supply shocks starting in 2020:Q1: these shocks capture the very large but relatively short-lived macroeconomic effects of the virus ( the model description on the GitHub page describes the modeling of the pandemic in some detail). As we described in previous posts, the demand shocks are modelled as discount rate shocks that affect intertemporal consumption decisions, while the supply shocks affect both total factor productivity and labor supply. Starting in 2020:Q2, the COVID-19 shocks are also partly anticipated one quarter ahead, to capture the fact that the pandemic has been persistent and has been expected to be so since shortly after its inception, albeit with an uncertain duration. While for past forecasts the standard deviations of the pandemic shocks were drawn from a prior distribution, now they are estimated, thereby letting the data settle the relative importance of shortfalls in supply or demand in driving the decline in economic activity.In March, the models forecast consisted of two scenarios. In the first one, the importance of standard business cycle dynamics was forcibly limited during the pandemic period, while in the second scenario it was not. The first scenario, which had a weight of 70 percent based on the February 2021 Survey of Professional Forecasters (SPF) consensus density forecast, had stronger output and weaker inflation projections than the second one. Under the new model specification, the standard business cycle shocks still play a role during the pandemic. A key difference with the second scenario, however, is that their standard deviationsand therefore their relative importanceare allowed to differ from their counterparts during normal times and are also estimated.In the new model specification we continue to assume that starting in 2020:Q4 monetary policy follows the new average inflation targeting (AIT) reaction function, reflecting the changes in the FOMC monetary policy strategy announced last August . The parameters of the new rule are such that the policy rate lifts off the effective lower bound (ELB) in 2023, increasing very gradually thereafter. Upon its introduction, we assume that agents awareness of the new policy is only partial, and that it increases over time. More specifically, expectations are based on a convex combination of the old and new reaction functions, with the weight on the latter converging to 1 over six years. This modeling approach captures the fact that expectations are likely to adjust only gradually to the introduction of the new policy strategy , partly since agents cannot directly observe policymakers reaction to macroeconomic developments while the policy rate is stuck at the ELB. (Again, please see the model description on the GitHub page for more detail.)The June 2021 model forecast is reported in the table below, alongside the one from March, and depicted in the following charts. The forecast is based on quarterly macroeconomic data released through 2021:Q1, augmented for 2021:Q2 with the median forecasts for real GDP growth and core PCE inflation from the May SPF release, as well as the yields on 10-year Treasury securities and Baa corporate bonds based on 2021:Q2 averages up to June 1.The change in the forecast relative to March is determined by two factors. One is the new data released over the past three months, and the other is the change in the model parameters and the model specification. The new data on economic activity and inflation were upside surprises. The new posterior distribution, and especially the new model specification lead ceteris paribus to weaker output and stronger inflation forecasts relative to the 70/30 combination of the two scenarios, as the new specification is closer to the second scenario in terms of predictions. These changes result in output projections that are slightly stronger in the short run but weaker in the medium run, and much stronger inflation projections, relative to March. Specifically, the mean forecast for real GDP growth (Q4/Q4) is 5.4, 2.6, and 1.7 percent in 2021, 2022, and 2023, respectively, compared to 4.7, 4.9, and 3.5 percent in March. Core inflation is projected to reach 2.2 percent in 2021, well above the March forecast of 1.4 percent. The model interprets this increase as partly temporary and predicts core inflation to be 1.9 percent in 2022 and 2023. This forecast is stronger than what was predicted in March for 2022 (1.5 percent), but similar for 2023 and 2024 (1.9 and 2.0 percent, respectively). The uncertainty surrounding the projections for all variables remains sizable but is mechanically smaller than in March since the projection then involved the combination of two scenarios. The 68th percentiles for the core PCE inflation projections remain below 3 percent throughout the forecast horizon. Estimates of the real natural rate of interest and its future evolution are higher than in March, with the natural rate being about 0 percent at the end of 2021 and rising to 0.6 percent by the end of the forecast horizon.
Lewiston, ID (83501)

Today

Mostly sunny. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. High 101F. Winds NNW at 10 to 20 mph..

Tonight

Mainly clear. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 66F. W winds shifting to SE at 10 to 15 mph.
Hancock College students will officially be returning to campus in the fall after the Board of Trustees on June 15 lifted the campus state of emergency passed in March 2020.

The decision to resume classes fully in person has major implications both for students and faculty. Students now will be asked to transition back to in-person learning, while faculty no longer will have the choice between holding classes in person, in a hybrid model or fully online.

Before June 15, college officials were crafting a fall schedule based on the modality preferences of individual teachers, a system agreed upon in a May 15 memorandum between the Hancock Full-Time Faculty Association and college officials.

While logistics still will need to be worked out before the start of the fall semester on Aug. 16, college officials are confident with their decision.

"As members of the board, our priorities are ensuring our students are safe while continuing to give them access to a quality education. As with all the decisions the board has made during the pandemic, we relied on guidance from federal, state, county and local health officials to protect the health and safety of students, staff and faculty," board President Jeffery Hall said.

With the faculty memorandum now moot, Hancock history professor and full-time faculty association President Roger Hall is unsure of what comes next for teachers who may not be comfortable teaching in person.

"We will be meeting back with the district, I would assume, fairly soon so we can figure this out," Hall said. "I think there are going to be some people who aren't comfortable with that, and of course we have that other question of, 'Are the students comfortable with it?'"

Officials have not stated whether continued distance learning will be an option for students even when in-person classes resume. In addition, while vaccinated Californians are no longer required to wear masks or practice social distancing in most settings, officials anticipate further guidance about how this should look in the classroom.

"We await guidance on provisions for vaccinations and other protocols  primarily about masking  but we anticipate fall 2021 to look more like fall 2019," college spokeswoman Lauren Milbourne said.

Despite some lingering questions, many students have expressed a strong desire to come back to campus, noting the lack of community in the online learning environment.

While the majority of summer classes are being held online, small groups of students can be seen on campus studying in the academic resource center, purchasing supplies in the bookstore or just connecting with friends in the student center.

"I'm excited. I really didn't meet anyone in the first year, so it will be nice," Hancock student Wyhir Rendon said of the fall return to classes, while sitting with a group of other students on June 17.
Santa Barbara County offices reopened for in-person service June 16 following the governors decision to move beyond the Blueprint for a Safer Economy and eliminate the color-coded tiers.

Reopened county facilities include administrative offices in the Joseph Centeno Betteravia Administration Building at 511 E. Lakeside Parkway in Santa Maria, a county spokesman said.

Those entering county facilities will not be asked for proof of vaccination, and the county initially said face masks would still be required for those attending in-person meetings with county employees.

County employees, vendors and consultants also would have been required to wear masks, but on June 17 the California Occupational Safety and Health Standards Board voted to lift the mask requirements for employees who are fully vaccinated.

It's unclear how that ruling will affect the county's mask requirements or whether it will open up the Board of Supervisors and other public meetings.

Last week county officials said Board of Supervisors, Planning Commission and other board, commission and committee meetings would continue to be held in a virtual format with remote public participation due to limited seating capacity and physical distancing required under California Division of Occupational Safety and Health guidelines.

County officials also said the Board of Supervisors hearing chambers would tentatively remain closed to the public for the July 13 meeting.

For most services, residents are asked to call first to make appointments, the spokesman said.

Some offices will be open during regular pre-COVID hours, while others will be open for limited hours. A list of county departments, their hours and their requirements for reopening are available at www.countyofsb.org/reopen.sbc.

Policies will be evaluated continuously and updates will be provided when policies are changed, the spokesman said.

The Lompoc Veterans Memorial Building is open, as are county day-use parks, including restrooms.

Cachuma Lake and Jalama Beach are open for day-use and overnight camping. Group picnic and group camping sites are open along with special event and wedding venues.

The county has also ended its RISE, or Reopening in Safe Environment, program for businesses as they return to their normal pre-COVID operations, the spokesman said.

However, the Ready Santa Barbara County website at https://readysbc.org will remain up to date with resources to help local businesses recover from the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic and provide information on operating requirements.

For more information, visit www.countyofsb.org.
The Air Force revises Air Force Instruction 36-2903 to address differences in hair density and texture June 25, 2021. When hair is secured behind the head, the hair may extend six inches to the left and to the right and six inches protruding from the point where the hair is gathered. The 12-inch total width must allow for proper wear of headgear.
Subcommittee on Defense - Hearings to examine proposed budget estimates and justification for fiscal year 2022 for the Air Force and Space Force.
Email Thomas Elias at tdelias@aol.com. His book, "The Burzynski Breakthrough, The Most Promising Cancer Treatment and the Governments Campaign to Squelch It" is now available in a soft cover fourth edition. For more Elias columns, visit www.californiafocus.net
Miera interviews many of Morenos contemporaries, and its a delight to see Morgan Freeman light up while talking about his old Electric Company castmate, and see them goof around together in old clips. She also interviews Latinx celebrities like Eva Longoria, Lin-Manuel Miranda and Madison resident Karen Olivo about the effect Morenos career had on them.

Olivo says that as big as West Side Story was, what really inspired her was Morenos over-the-top turn as screen star Zelda Zanders in 1952s Singin in the Rain, because she was allowed to play the character, not an ethnic type. She was deciding that her story, and who she was, was more important than how they saw her, Olivo says of Moreno's evolution.

Moreno got some blowback this week while appearing on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, responding to the charge that the new film version of Mirandas In The Heights contains so few Afro-Latinx actors. Miranda apologized, but Moreno dismissed the criticism, saying, Cant you just wait a while and leave it alone?
However, the personal property tax won't actually be eliminated unless it is done in a separate bill. The Republican-led Legislature would approve that plan, but it's unclear whether the governor would sign it into law. Evers has the power to make some changes to the state budget with his line-item veto powers  but can only approve or reject other legislation.

"Theres a lot of assumption here," Erpenbach told Republicans during budget deliberations. "I would hope the small businesses  are not counting on this anytime soon, because we have to be honest with them. It just flat-out may not happen."

The motions passed Thursday also include a $72 million increase in aid to technical colleges and an additional $408 million for general school aid. They also remove a reduction in general school aid associated with some independent charter schools. Because spending caps remain in place, that funding would result in a decrease in property taxes. In total, the budget reduces property taxes by about $647 million.

The Republican tax measures are based on the idea that "taxpayers will do a better job, a more responsible job" than government would with the majority of the $4.4 billion more than expected that the state is projected to take in over a three-year period, said co-chair Rep. Mark Born, R-Beaver Dam.
The COVID pandemic disrupted everything, and put strain on people and businesses throughout the city in countless ways, and this federal support allows the city to alleviate some of that strain and help Madisonians recover from the pandemic, Rhodes-Conway said in a statement. With this funding, we can help secure a variety of types of shelter and housing for those who need it, help residents meet their basic needs, bring summer jobs back for our youth, and help businesses and business districts recover.
One of the things that is making this drought scene really bad is weve had so many wet years lately, so to swing into very dry years, its a shock to the system, Otkin said.

Whats different about this years drought, UW-Madisons Department of Agronomy professor and chair Christopher Kucharik, said is the dry spring. This means that crops arent finding stored soil moisture than they would in a typical year.

We entered the growing season running a pretty significant precipitation deficit, Kucharik said.

The oscillation between extremes year-to-year and, sometimes month-to-month creates hurdles for growers. Its hard to plan for, maintain a crop management system and to turn a profit.

Kucharik noted record-setting years of rainfall in 2013, 2016, 2018 and 2019, a drought in 2012 and the dry conditions of this year. Agriculture is resilient, he said, but it gets harder economically to withstand multiple years of extreme weather events.

Its going to be harder and harder for them to remain economically viable with the catastrophic droughts or floods that happen, Kucharik said.

Share your opinion on this topic by sending a letter to the editor to tctvoice@madison.com. Include your full name, hometown and phone number. Your name and town will be published. The phone number is for verification purposes only. Please keep your letter to 250 words or less.
The Washington Post this week ran an upbeat piece on the future of passenger rail in America.

Contrary to what the naysayers  like all too many of Wisconsin's Republican legislators  claim, the story noted that the future of passenger rail is bright. And now that Amtrak has an actual ally in the White House, its unveiling some ambitious plans to extend the reach of rail to more of America, building on the success it has had in the Northeast.

The quasi-public corporation aspires to connect major city centers in the American heartland, the South and portions of the West, where it says it can replicate the service model of the Northeast  its busiest and most lucrative corridor  into areas of the country with significant growth and little or no rail service, the paper noted

Its our responsibility to provide service in places where 50 years ago there may not have been a need for service, but today there is a crying need for service, Amtrak Chairman Tony Coscia said in an interview with the Post. As the nations national rail network, we should be providing it.
The possibility of violence, even more serious than what was witnessed in January, feels omnipresent, and includes bodily threats to Republican officials who dared reject Trumps election lies. Months after the election, the spouse of Georgias Republican secretary of state is still getting text-messaged death threats because her husband refused to help Trump steal the election.

Which brings me to this.

Any Republican willing to push back against the partys fealty to Trumpism has both my attention and my respect. That is true even if they came late to anti-Trumpism, or if I abhor their policy positions on social spending or guns or reproductive rights. Its because so much is at stake.

Easy for you to say, some among you might think. You are white and economically secure. Certainly the other critical work of advancing liberal causes should continue, especially around topics of racial justice, just without blowtorching Republicans who are also aligned against Trumpism.
SEOUL, South Korea (AP)  North Korean leader Kim Jong Un ordered his government to be prepared for both dialogue and confrontation with the Biden administration  but more for confrontation  state media reported Friday, days after the United States and others urged the North to abandon its nuclear program and return to talks.

Kims statement indicates hell likely push to strengthen his nuclear arsenal and increase pressure on Washington to give up what North Korea considers a hostile policy toward the North, though hell also prepare for talks to resume, some experts say.

During an ongoing ruling party meeting Thursday, Kim analyzed in detail the policy tendencies of the U.S. under President Joe Biden and clarified steps to be taken in relations with Washington, the Korean Central News Agency said. It did not specify the steps.

Kim stressed the need to get prepared for both dialogue and confrontation, especially to get fully prepared for confrontation in order to protect the dignity of our state" and ensure national security, it said.
But its something that defies the lessons of history, he said. Should this be the case, it will mean that (the) Taliban are opting for a military solution, which is not a solution to begin with, and it will not happen the way that they envisaged.

By Sept. 11 at the latest, around 2,300-3,500 remaining U.S. troops and roughly 7,000 allied NATO forces are scheduled to leave Afghanistan, ending nearly 20 years of military engagement. There are concerns that the Afghan government and its security forces may be ill-prepared for the withdrawal and that the country may descend into chaos.

The Taliban ruled Afghanistan until ousted by a U.S.-led coalition after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in America. In recent weeks Taliban fighters have overrun several districts in south and northern Afghanistan, convincing government security forces to surrender and seizing their weapons and military vehicles. The heaviest fighting has been in the northern Faryab province and in southern Helmand.

Asked about possible interference from neighbors after U.S. and NATO troops have left, Abdullah said regional countries have declared that they have an interest in a stable Afghanistan and that they should put those words into deeds.
A provision in state law that allows blood samples to be taken without a warrant from incapacitated drivers being investigated for drunken driving is unconstitutional, the state Supreme Court said Friday.

But ruling on the facts of the case that led to the decision, the court said in a unanimous decision that blood drawn from a Madison woman who was unconscious following a fatal crash was permitted because the officer who ordered the blood sample taken without a warrant was operating under the law as it stood at the time, calling it a good faith exception.

The courts ruling came in the case of Dawn Prado, now 54, who was charged in 2015 with homicide by drunken driving for a December 2014 crash in Fitchburg that killed another driver. The case has languished since 2016, when a Dane County judge threw out the results of a blood sample taken from Prado, ruling that a police officer should have obtained a search warrant to get the sample.

Since then, the Prado case has awaited appellate court rulings in other cases that appeared to be on point, but none directly answered the questions posed in her case.
A dog and a cat died as a fire destroyed a Janesville home on Thursday afternoon, the Janesville Fire Department reported.

The fire at the home at 1911 S. Crosby Ave. was reported at 4:40 p.m. and the first arriving units reported heavy smoke and flames coming from the roof. The fire was brought under control in about 15 minutes, Battalion Chief Chris Lukas said in a report.

No one was home at the time of the fire and there were no injuries reported, but a dog and cat inside of the home died, Lukas said.

The home is considered a total loss and the cause of the fire is under investigation, Lukas said.

The Janesville Fire Department was assisted by fire departments from the town of Beloit and Milton.

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Wisconsins land stewardship program would be extended for four years instead of the 10 that Evers wanted. The budget also would make $32 million per year available to acquire land, which is the amount available now but less than half of the $70 million Evers proposed.

Unemployment

The budget includes more money for vocational training for the disabled, and youth and adult apprentice programs with the goal of addressing the states worker shortage problem. However, Republicans rejected Evers call to spend $15 million to improve the system for administering unemployment payments. Republicans said Evers can use federal stimulus money for that.

Broadband

Broadband expansion would get $125 million, which is less than the roughly $200 million Evers proposed. The money would also be borrowed rather than paid with cash, as Evers proposed.

Body cameras

Funding to pay for body cameras for Wisconsin State Patrol officers and Department of Natural Resources wardens is included, but funding was rejected to equip state Capitol police officers with them.

Juvenile prisons
Wisconsin got a jump on its Juneteenth celebrations on Friday by raising a commemorative flag over the state Capitol and holding a ceremony organized by Black lawmakers and attended by Gov. Tony Evers and others.

Evers, a Democrat, last year ordered the raising of the Juneteenth flag for the first time in the states history. Although the holiday marking the end of slavery in the U.S. is technically Saturday, the flag was raised a day early and will fly until Monday, temporarily replacing a rainbow gay pride flag that is up in June. On Thursday, President Joe Biden signed legislation establishing Juneteenth, or June 19, as a federal holiday.

In a statement, Evers said the work toward equity and justice in Wisconsin is far from finished.

Wisconsin faces some of the most disparate outcomes for Black Wisconsinites, from inequities in housing and health care to education and child care, to the justice system and economic opportunity, Evers said. We must continue our work to create the state and the future we want for each other and for our kids.
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Were processing evidence to see if there is something we can use to identify the people who are responsible, Troumbley said.

Filer deals with the occasional graffiti, but the extent of the recent vandalism at the Filer Storage Company on Yakima Avenue is uncommon, Troumbley said. Depending on the cost of the damages the business incurred, those guilty of the graffiti could face either misdemeanor or felony charges.

Although it does happen, graffiti is not a significant issue in Twin Falls, Garner said. This recent proliferation of vandalism is especially unusual because it has happened in places with high amounts of traffic, such as Blue Lakes Boulevard and Second Avenue West.

In my experience, you might see graffiti in alleys, not busy commercial corridors, Garner said.

The department has increased the number of officers available between 4 a.m. and sunrise, when police believe the majority of this vandalism has taken place, Garner said. Because there is not much physical evidence left behind at scenes of graffiti, the department is focused on catching somebody in the act or on through tips from the community.
BOISE  Idaho Gov. Brad Little is taking the lead on offering paid time off to employees who get the COVID-19 vaccine.

This morning, I informed Idaho state employees were offering them a new benefit  four hours of paid leave if they have received or choose to receive the safe and effective COVID-19 vaccine! Little said Wednesday on Twitter. The new benefit comes at no additional cost to Idaho taxpayers.

With about 25,000 employees, the state is Idahos largest employer.

The announcement comes as Idahos coronavirus vaccination rates have settled down into a low, slow pace. Only about half of Idaho adults have been vaccinated so far. Public health officials are hoping to encourage Idahoans age 12 and over to get their shots before fall, when respiratory diseases typically begin to surge and children return to classrooms.

Little said the incentive would apply for any state employee who has already been vaccinated, or who chooses to get vaccinated before Aug. 31.

Idahos economy has remained strong throughout the pandemic and continues to outpace other states recoveries, Little said in a letter to the states workers. The COVID-19 vaccine is our best tool to protect jobs, strengthen our workforce, and save lives.
The move comes after the board did a double-twisting backflip in recent weeks when it first postponed, then rejected, then adopted, then rescinded rules that would have allowed workers to forgo masks only if every employee in a room was fully vaccinated against the coronavirus.

Fully vaccinated employees will not need to wear masks, except in locations like mass transit and classrooms, where they are required for everyone, or in the event of outbreaks.

Physical distancing also will end except for certain workers during major outbreaks. Vaccinated employees wont need to be tested or quarantine unless they show symptoms, even if they have close contact with an infected person.

Employers must document that workers who skip masks indoors are indeed fully vaccinated. But employers have the choice of requiring workers to show proof of vaccination or allowing employees to self-report their status, with the employer keeping a record of who does the latter.

They also could decide to require everyone to remain masked  vaccinated or not. And vaccinated employees will still be able to wear masks if they choose without facing retaliation.

Public comments to the board before the vote largely split along management and employee lines.
Telehealth services have been especially useful during the COVID-19 pandemic. According to the Idaho Department of Insurance, telemedicine visits went from 200 appointments per month to 28,000 visits in April 2020 alone. We can use lessons learned from the expansion of telehealth and other flexibilities to make sensible changes that can better enable Idahoans access to quality care going forward. Information on the impact of expanded telehealth on access, quality and cost help guide permanent policy changes for the better.

As Ranking Member of the U.S. Senate Finance Committee, I have expressed interest in permanently extending health care flexibilities adopted during the pandemic with President Bidens nominees for key health care positions who have come before the Committee. Republicans and Democrats often disagree on the best way to achieve shared health care goals. However, we have common ground on this issue. In May, the Committee held a hearing, planned jointly with Finance Committee Chairman Ron Wyden (D-Oregon), to discuss what we can learn from experiences with the health care flexibilities adopted during the pandemic to inform what changes should be made to improve health care access beyond the pandemic. We reviewed the waivers and flexibilities made available in the Medicare and Medicaid programs during the pandemic, with telehealth as a key topic. Health care providers, a health policy expert and the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO), which Congress tasked with monitoring the federal governments pandemic response, provided insight to guide our evaluation.
President Grant and many friends and associates had their financial lives destroyed by a Madoff type. Since then, we have had extensive regulation, regulators and laws to prevent financial crimes. However, bureaucrats have proven to be totally incompetent. They were warned for years about Madoff. Bureaucrats are protected by public unions to not allow firings, demotions or competence. Even FDR warned against public unions. We have even seen the IRS play politics without meaningful control.

Linda Brugger says shes all in for Social Justice. I detest the term social justice, its meaningless. It could mean redistribution of wealth, socialism, climate change fanaticism, race-based policies, the definition can mean nearly anything for people that simply dont know what theyre talking about but want to sound like good people. Equal justice is what I believe in. Not investigations of Trump looking for a crime, instead of investigating a crime looking for a violator. The political abuse of power without fear of repercussions is dangerous to our country and society. The billion plus dollars worth of rioting, killing, looting and destroying peoples lives has largely gone unpunished. While the capitol rioters will have the book thrown at them. The crimes by summer rioters were also federal when they attacked federal officers and federal buildings. Again, punishment will be all political, more like the USSR than the US. Biden continues with his actions and rhetoric to divide the country both politically and race wise. However, the public has rejected his agenda totally, even the Democrats are predicting the loss of the House and Senate by large margins. Bidens Vice President has already proven to be incompetent. Hiring by race and gender without ability or experience shows why his cabinet and VP are such failures. They are stuck with Harris, let them suffer.
Students will receive a $3,000 scholarship each year for up to four years of undergraduate study at a participating four-year North Carolina college or university. Recipients from rural and tobacco-dependent or economically distressed North Carolina counties are selected based on career and educational goals, a review of school and community service activities, academic performance, length of residence in the county and expressed intent to contribute to the states rural communities upon graduation from college.

The Golden LEAF Foundation established the Golden LEAF Scholarship Program to broaden educational opportunities and provide support to students from rural counties with the goal that after graduation recipients will return and contribute back to rural communities. The North Carolina State Education Assistance Authority (NCSEAA) administers the program and selects students for awards.

We are proud to award scholarships to hardworking and bright students with deep roots in their rural communities, said Scott T. Hamilton, Golden LEAF Foundation president and chief executive officer. These students were selected out of a pool of more than 1,500 applicants. We look forward to the future success of these scholarship recipients as they follow their education pursuits and develop into North Carolinas next generation of rural leaders.
To fully respond to all of these calls requires an adequate number of firefighters. The grant from FEMA helped the department hire needed employees to fill the gap of declining volunteers, but the department is still well below industry standards. FEMA states that 72% of the states firefighters are volunteers and that number is dropping by 11% to 12% annually, according to Presnell.

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Furthermore, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) require a minimum of four firefighters on the scene before firefighting inside a building can begin. There has to be two firefighters inside the structure and two outside to meet this minimal requirement.

To maintain a good rating with the state Department of Insurance, a department shall show through documentation that an average of 12 firefighters has responded to each of 20 structure fires. The National Fire Protection Association recommended engine and ladder companies to be staffed with four personnel on board each apparatus. Marion Fire Departments response is three apparatus with one person on board each at full shift staffing. This is well below industry standards, said Presnell.
The way Americans approached their daily lives suddenly changed after COVID-19 spread through the U.S. in early 2020. Following the advice of health officials and governments, people isolated in their homes  either alone or with families  to avoid exposure to the virus, which has sickened more than 33 million people and killed 600,000 people in the U.S.

During the height of the pandemic, restaurants, movie theaters and stores either closed or continued operating with limited occupancy; church services, schools and government meetings went virtual; and many employers made working from home an option or a requirement. Mask wearing in public became the norm in most places, with some states and cities making it mandatory.

The emergence of the vaccine has helped slow down rates of infection and death, allowing state and local economies to reopen and leading Americans to return to activities they once enjoyed.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advised last month that vaccinated Americans dont have to wear a mask in most scenarios, indoors or out. The latest CDC data shows 53% of all Americans  65% of those 18 and older  have received at least one dose of the vaccine.
Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain

An experimental artificial heart includes an autoregulation control mechanism, or Auto-Mode, that can adjust to the changing needs of patients treated for end-stage heart failure. Outcomes in the first series of patients managed with the new heart replacement pump in Auto-Mode are presented in the ASAIO Journal, official journal of the American Society for Artificial Internal Organs.

The study reports on the response to "pressure sensor-based autoregulation of blood flow" in ten patients for up to two years after implantation of the Carmat Total Artificial Heart (C TAH). "The C TAH Auto-Mode with built-in pressure sensors effectively produces appropriate physiological responses reflective of changing patients' daily needs and thus provides almost physiological heart replacement therapy," according to the new research. The lead author is Ivan Netuka, MD, of the Institute for Clinical and Experimental Medicine, Prague.

Auto-Mode may increase independence and quality of life in severe heart failure

Heart replacement pumps can restore cardiac output in patients with end-stage, biventricular heart failure (affecting both sides of the heart) whose only other option is heart transplantation. However, to enable patients to go home from the hospital and return to their usual activities, the pump should emulate normal heart function, with minimal need for adjustment.

To meet that goal, the C TAH incorporates an Auto-Mode that automatically adapts the pumping action of the right and left ventricles in response to pressure sensors located inside the device, based on parameters set by the physician. The goal is to mimic normal physiological responses to changing needsparticularly physical activity.

Dr. Netuka and colleagues analyzed the Auto-Mode's performance in the first 10 patients undergoing C TAH implantation in early European clinical experience. The patients were all men, average age 60 years. The C TAH was used as a bridge to heart transplantation in six patients and as a permanently implanted device in four.

In all patients, the artificial heart was successfully switched from manual control to Auto-Mode in the operating room. Auto-Mode led to "an immediate appropriate cardiac output response" to the targeted settings. Hemodynamic data recorded by the C TAH showed expected variations in pumping output of the left and right ventricles, in response to changes in pressures and heart rate. Heart rate averaged 78 to 128 beats per minute; blood pressure was normal as well.

Over almost five years of aggregate follow-up, medical teams made changes in the Auto-Mode settings just 20 times. Most adjustments were performed during the first 30 days after device placement. Only four were done after the patient went home from the hospital: a rate of about 1 change per 11 months.

"The reduced need for device management changes may contribute to greater autonomy for patients outside of the hospital environment and improvement in their quality of life," Dr. Netuka and coauthors write. They acknowledge that their study is an initial experience in a relatively small number of patients.

"Nevertheless," they add, "it represents a significant leap towards the next stage more physiological heart replacement therapy. The overall experience of more than four years of device performance represents a positive and promising outcome for the patients while requiring only minimal intervention from the clinicians." The researchers plan further refinements based on the preliminary results; future studies will provide data on response to exercise and hospital readmission rates. A US clinical trial of the C TAH is scheduled to begin soon.

More information: Ivan Netuka et al, First Clinical Experience With the Pressure SensorBased Autoregulation of Blood Flow in an Artificial Heart, ASAIO Journal (2021). Ivan Netuka et al, First Clinical Experience With the Pressure SensorBased Autoregulation of Blood Flow in an Artificial Heart,(2021). DOI: 10.1097/MAT.0000000000001485
Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, left, and Belgium's Prime Minister Alexander De Croo, right, sign a banner during a working visit to the Pfizer pharmaceutical company in Puurs, Belgium, Tuesday, June 15, 2021. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau paid a visit to the Belgian Pfizer factory on Tuesday to thank employees making the COVID-19 vaccine. Credit: Frederic Sierakowski, Pool via AP

Canada's National Advisory Committee on Immunization said Thursday people who got the AstraZeneca vaccine as their first dose should get Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna for their second shot.

On June 1, committee had said AstraZeneca recipients "could" get Pfizer or Moderna for their second shot if they wanted, but Thursday went further to say an mRNA vaccine was the "preferred" choice.

Since the advisory committee "first looked at mixed vaccine schedules, new evidence is starting to emerge suggesting immune responses are better when a first dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine is followed by an mRNA vaccine as a second dose, said its vice-chair Dr. Shelley Deeks, in the new guidance documents.

The committee also updated its previous recommendation that people at high risk of exposure to, or serious illness from, COVID-19, could opt to get AstraZeneca rather than waiting for Pfizer or Moderna. Now it says everyone should always get the mRNA vaccines first, unless they are allergic to them.

Deeks said the advice is based on the growing supply of Pfizer and Moderna, and the risk of vaccine-induced blood clots associated with AstraZeneca. But she is still trying to reassure people who got one or two doses of AstraZeneca's vaccine that they are nevertheless well protected.

"Anyone who has already received two doses of AstraZeneca/Covishield can rest assured that they are protected, particularly against severe illness," she said. "There is no need for a third dose at this time.

Dr. Theresa Tam, the chief public health officer of Canada, said the new evidence in favor of mixing different types of vaccines included four studies in Germany.

"It's really the immunogenicity, that immune response, after that mixed-dose schedule that's resulted in NACI updating this recommendation, because all the accumulated studies essentially suggest that immune response is a better response, said Tam at a news conference in Ottawa.

One of those studies from Germany's Saarland University, published early data Wednesday saying giving Pfizer as the second dose after AstraZeneca, or two doses of Pfizer only, generated far more antibodies and T cells as two doses of AstraZeneca.

Almost 25 million Canadians have now received at least one dose of vaccine, and almost 6 million are now fully vaccinated. As of June 5, 2.1 million people had received one dose of AstraZeneca, and 15,186 had received two doses.

There are no further shipments of AstraZeneca currently scheduled, but there are about 600,000 doses still left from previous deliveries.

There are 14 million doses of Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna being delivered this week and next, including a donation of 1 million doses of Moderna's COVID-19 vaccine from the United States that was to arrive in Canada Thursday night.

Explore further Canada extends shelf life of AstraZeneca jab by 1 month

 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
The emergence of variants of concern in late 2020 marked a shift in the COVID-19 pandemic. Credit: Shutterstock

The emergence of variants of concern in late 2020 hearkened a shift in the COVID-19 pandemic as "variants" entered the public lexicon. The acceleration of the Delta variant around the world is raising questions about its origin, transmissibility, hotspots and potential for vaccine resistance.

What is a variant?

Through genome sequencing, we can determine specific orders of individual genes and the nucleotides that make up strands of DNA and RNA. If we think of the virus as a book, it's as though all of the pages have been cut up into pieces. Sequencing allows us to determine all of the words and sentences in their proper order. Variants differ from one another based on mutations. So, two copies of the book would be "variants" if one or more of the cut-up pieces were different.

We should also appreciate that variants have been emerging throughout the pandemic with no effect on viral behaviors. However, the emergence of variants of concern, where mutations have resulted in altered virus characteristics (increased transmission and disease severity, reduced vaccine effectiveness, detection failure) have had deleterious health consequences.

Emergence and transmission of B.1.1.7 (Alpha), B.1.351 (Beta) and P.1 (Gamma) in Canada resulted in third waves of transmission leading to overwhelmed health-care systems and implementation of further restrictions. The World Health Organization introduced a new naming system, based on the Greek alphabet, for coronavirus variants in the spring 2021.

What is the Delta variant, where did it emerge?

The Delta variant is a variant of concern also known as B.1.167.2 and is one of three known sub-lineages of B.1.167. According to the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Delta variant was first detected in India in December 2020.

The World Health Organization introduced a new naming system, based on the Greek alphabet, for coronavirus variants in the spring 2021. Credit: Shutterstock

What makes this variant different from other variants of concern?

One of the defining features of the Delta variant has been enhanced transmissibility with increases estimated at 40-60 percent above the Alpha variant. Recent data from Scotland suggested that the risk of hospitalization doubled following infection with Delta (compared to Alpha), especially in those with five or more other health conditions. Increased risk of hospitalization was observed from data in England.

Epidemiological analysis, which looks at things like the distribution of infection and the severity of illness, can often provide rapid assessments of changes to virus characteristics. Studying specific mutations using structure-activity relationship analysis, which looks at how the chemical structure of the virus affects its biological activity, can also provide clues, although validation is often time-consuming.

Early structure-activity relationship analyses have focused on the relation of three mutations to Delta's behavior. Notably, a preprint study that has yet to be peer reviewed suggested that three mutations in the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein may make the variant more transmissible by making it easier for the spike protein to bind to the receptor in human cells (known as the ACE2 receptor).

If we return to the book analogy, that means that three of the cut-up pieces in the Delta version of the book are different from the original. Each of these three pieces may makes it easier for the virus to infect human cells.

What do we know about the epidemiology of the Delta variant and its hotspots?

Evidence suggests that Delta played a large role in the surge of COVID-19 cases observed in India in 2021. Since then, this variant has spread globally. As of June 14, the Delta variant has been detected in 74 countries, accounted for over 90 percent of new cases in the United Kingdom, and at least six percent of total cases in the U.S., with estimates as high as 10 percent.

The spike protein (foreground) enables the virus to enter and infect human cells. On the virus model in the background, the virus surface (blue) is covered with red spike proteins. Credit: NIH, CC BY

Much of what we know about the Delta variant is derived from Public Health England. The Delta variant was first detected in the U.K. near the end of March 2021, and linked to travel. As of June 9, the number of confirmed or probable cases was 42,323, with wide and heterogenous distribution across the U.K.

In Canada, Delta was first detected in early April in British Columbia. Although Alpha is the most dominant variant lineage detected in Canada, Delta's growth has accelerated across many provinces. Alberta data suggests that the number of cases is doubling every six to 12 days. Ontario has estimated that 40 percent of its new cases as of June 14, 2021 are due to Delta. Modeling results from B.C. suggest Delta will significantly contribute to overall trajectory by this August.

It is important to note that Delta's reported prevalence is an underestimate because a timely screening test has not yet been developed.

What do we know about Delta and vaccines?

Early analysis from the U.K. about vaccine effectiveness against the Delta variant has provided some optimism.

Data from Scotland indicated that vaccination with either AstraZeneca or Pfizer reduced hospitalizations and infections, though less than for the Alpha variant. However, evidence suggests that two-dose immunizations with AstraZeneca or Pfizer reduced hospitalizations by 92 percent and 96 percent, respectively. Protection from symptomatic disease was reduced by 17 percent for Delta compared to Alpha with only a single dose of vaccine. Modest reductions in effectiveness against symptomatic disease were noted following two vaccine doses.

The spread of the Delta variant has made getting people vaccinated with two doses a major public health policy goal, and these results support that. However, first doses appear to provide substantial protection from severe illness requiring hospitalization.

Explore further UK says Delta variant 60 percent more transmissible

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

The World Health Organization voiced alarm Friday at surging COVID-19 cases across Africa, with the spread of new more contagious variants even as vaccination rates remain dangerously low.

"It's a trajectory that is very, very concerning," WHO's emergencies chief Michael Ryan told reporters from the organisation's headquarters in Geneva.

According to WHO data, the number of new COVID-19 cases in Africa rose to over 116,500 in the week ending June 13, up from nearly 91,000 the previous week.

Ryan stressed that in terms of absolute numbers, the region did not necessarily look like it was in bad shape, accounting for just over five percent of new global cases and 2.2 percent of global deaths last week.

However, he warned, across the continent, the trajectory was pointing straight up, with over 100-percent increases in a range of countries, and over 50 percent in others.

"This is a phenomenon occurring across the continent," he said.

Africa has been hit less hard by the pandemic than most other regions, recording over 136.000 deaths from some 5.1 million cases so far.

WHO's regional director for Africa Matshidiso Moeti warned earlier this week that the continent was "in the midst of a full-blown third wave."

The WHO said "a lack of adherence to transmission prevention measures has fuelled the new surge that coincides with colder seasonal weather in southern Africa and as more contagious variants spread."

'Storm' potential

Ryan stressed though that regardless what was causing the rising case numbers, the continent had been left far more vulnerable than it needed to be due to inequitable access to vaccines.

"The brutal reality is that in an era of multiple variants with increased transmissibility and potentially increased impact, we have left vast swathes of the population and the vulnerable population in Africa unprotected by vaccines, in the context where health systems are already weak," he said.

"That's the reality. And this is the consequence of the current unfair distribution of vaccines," he said, warning that "the population that needs to be protected is not."

While people in many wealthy nations are enjoying a return to a sense of normalcy thanks to high vaccination rates, the shots remain scarce in less well-off parts of the world.

That is particularly true in Africa, where only about one percent of the population is fully vaccinated, according to the WHO.

While Africa so far as found itself less hard-hit by the pandemic than many other parts of the world, Ryan warned that the third wave there could prove more severe.

"To assume that the next wave in Africa is just going to be a small passing shower, and will not be a storm, I think is very, very premature," he said.

"I think we have to really take what's happening on the African continent, very, very seriously."

Explore further Virus cases surge in Africa as third wave gains pace: WHO

 2021 AFP
Credit: CC0 Public Domain

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is an inflammatory autoimmune disease that causes pain, swelling and stiffness in the joints. It can also cause fatigue, and the underlying inflammation may affect other body systems. Up to 10% of people with RA are affected by interstitial lung disease (ILD) during their lifetime, and ILD is one of the leading causes of death in patients with RA. Data presented at the 2021 EULAR congress report findings from a longitudinal study showing that people with MUC5B gene variant have a considerable lifetime risk of ILD, and that this gene variant contributes to increased morbidity. These findings have clinical implications for improving identification of people with RA who are at high risk for developing ILD.

The MUC5B gene codes for mucina protein that is normally found in mucus secretions, and which is part of the body's natural defence against infection. The promoter variant called rs3570595 0is a common variant in the MUC5B gene, with an allele frequency of 0.1 in the Finnish population. Overexpression of MUC5B in lungs influences the development of pulmonary fibrosis. The promoter variant rs35705950 in MUC5B is the strongest known genetic risk factor for rheumatoid arthritis-associated interstitial lung disease (RA-ILD). However, there are no large-scale data on the impact of the MUC5B promoter variant on the long-term incidence of RA-ILD.

Antti Palomakiand colleagues used FinnGena collection of epidemiological cohorts and hospital biobank samplesto describe the long-term risk of RA-ILD in people with RA carrying the MUC5B promoter variant compared to those without the variant. FinnGen is able to link people's genetic information with up to 46 years of follow-up data within nationwide registries.

Of 248,400 people, 5534 had been diagnosed with RA, and 178 of these (3.2%) had developed ILD. The MUC5B promoter was a strong predictor of developing ILD in people with RA, conferring a lifetime risk of ILD of 14.5% by age 80, compared to 5.2% in people with RA who did not carry the promoter variant. In the general population of people without RA, MUC5B promoter carriers and non-carriers had lifetime risks of developing ILD of 3.9% and 1.3%, respectively.

The authors found that the risk difference started to emerge at the age of 65. The risk was highest in men with RA who are MUC5B carriers. In this group,18.5% of carriers developed ILD, compared to 8.5% of non-carriers.

These findings have clinical implications for improving identification of people with RA who are at high risk for developing ILD.

Explore further Researchers find genetic association for interstitial lung disease

Provided by European Alliance of Associations for Rheumatology
Credit: University of Liverpool

New research has found that previous infection, whether it was symptomatic or asymptomatic, does not necessarily protect you long-term from COVID-19, particularly against new Variants of Concern.

The preprint study was led by University of Oxford, in collaboration with the Universities of Liverpool, Sheffield, Newcastle and Birmingham with support from the UK Coronavirus Immunology Consortium.

The "Protective Immunity from T cells to COVID-19 in Health workers" (PITCH) study examined how the immune system responds to COVID-19 in 78 healthcare workers who had experienced either symptomatic or asymptomatic disease (66 vs 12). An additional 8 patients who experienced severe disease were included for comparison.

Blood samples were taken monthly from 16 months post infection to examine different elements of the immune response. This included different types of antibodiessuch as Spike-specific and Nucleocapsid-specific antibodies which are produced to target different parts of the virus, alongside B cells, which manufacture antibodies and keep the body's memory of the disease, and several types of T cell.

The preprint report details a highly complex and variable immune response following COVID-19 infection. The University of Liverpool's Dr. Lance Turtle is a co-author on the study, which has been posted on Research Square.

The researchers used a new machine learning approachnicknamed SIMONto identify detailed patterns in the data and to see if initial disease severity and the early immune response could predict longer-term immunity.

They found an early immune signature, detectable one month post infection and linked to both cellular and antibody immunity, which predicted the strength of immune response measured at 6 months post infection. This is the first time that such a signature has been found and improves understanding of the development of lasting immunity. When serum samples (containing antibodies) obtained at 1 and 6 months post infection were tested, the majority of samples from people who produced a weak immune response signature failed to show any neutralizing antibodies against the Alpha variant, with none mounting a neutralizing antibody response against the Beta variant. This raises the possibility that the immune memory of these individuals does not provide sufficient protection to prevent reinfection by these variants.

While the majority of people who had symptomatic disease did have measurable immune responses at six months post infection, a significant minority (17/66; 26%) did not. The vast majority of people who experienced asymptomatic disease (11/12; 92%) did not exhibit a measurable immune response at six months post infection. This implies that people who have previously been infected with COVID-19 should not assume they are automatically protected against reinfection and highlights the importance of everyone getting their COVID vaccination when they are offered it.

Health Minister Lord Bethell said: "This powerful study addresses the mysteries of immunity and the lessons are crystal clear. You need two jabs to protect yourself and the ones you love. I call on anyone invited to get vaccinated to step forward and finish the job so we can all get out of this."

Key findings from the PITCH study:

Immune memory following COVID infection is measurable at 6 months but is highly variable between people.

Previous infection does not necessarily protect you long term from SARS-CoV-2, particularly variants of concern Alpha and Beta. Individuals who show little or no evidence of immune memory to COVID at 6 months post infection are not able to neutralize the variants of concerns.

We can use the immune response characteristics at one month post COVID infection to predict which people will have durable immune responses at six months.

People with COVID symptoms have variable immune responses that may decline over time and are not necessarily protected from SARS-CoV-2 variants.

People who experienced asymptomatic infection tend to have lower immune responses across the many immune parameters we have measured.

Understanding the strength and durability of the immune response to natural COVID infection remains highly relevant as it will help us reduce reinfections, better understand immune responses to vaccination and tackle new variants of concern. Further research will continue to deepen our understanding of the immune responses over the longer term and what it means for protection against COVID-19 in the real world.

This study reinforces how important it is that everyone gets their COVID vaccination when offered. COVID-19 vaccines generate higher immune responses than natural infection, underlining the need for everyone to get vaccinated for maximum protection against this disease and in particular against Variants of Concern.

Explore further Scientists find new way of predicting COVID-19 vaccine efficacy

More information: Adriana Tomic* et al, Divergent trajectories of antiviral memory after SARS-Cov-2 infection, medRxiv (2021). Adriana Tomic* et al, Divergent trajectories of antiviral memory after SARS-Cov-2 infection,(2021). DOI: 10.21203/rs.3.rs-612205/v1
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, right, and French President Emmanuel Macron give a joint statement to journalists, at the chancellery in Berlin, Germany, Friday June 18, 2021. Credit: Axel Schmidt/Pool via AP

The leaders of Germany and France called for vigilance Friday to prevent the spread of a coronavirus variant that this week prompted Britain to delay the planned relaxation of pandemic restrictions in England.

Chancellor Angela Merkel said that while Germany has very low numbers of new COVID-19 infections at present, the "aggressive" delta variant could lead to a rise in new cases.

"We can't pretend that corona is over," Merkel told reporters in Berlin.

"Even though there's a feeling on such a warm summer's evening that it's all over, one can see from the example of Lisbon that things can quickly change," she said. "That's why I think it's necessary to be careful, so that we have a summer with many freedoms but not yet all freedoms."

Portuguese authorities on Thursday banned travel in or out of the capital region over coming weekends in response to a spike in delta variant cases. Earlier this week, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson pushed back the date for lifting restrictions on social contacts by four weeks as the government reported thousands of newly confirmed cases, mostly with the delta variant.

Asked about travel related to the Euro2020 soccer tournament, Merkel said it was good to see thousands of fans at the recent Germany-France match in Munich again.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, left, and French President Emmanuel Macron prepare to give a joint statement to journalists, at the chancellery in Berlin, Germany, Friday June 18, 2021. Credit: Axel Schmidt/Pool via AP

"But when I see completely full stadiums in other European countries, then I'm a bit skeptical whether that's the right answer to the current situation," she saida reference to Hungary, where authorities have allowed games without limiting spectator numbers.

Merkel spoke ahead of a working dinner with French President Emmanuel Macron, the first time she has hosted a foreign leader in Germany since last year.

Macron said it was important to be vigilant about the new variant and the European Union would discuss at an upcoming summit how to better harmonize travel restrictions during the pandemicsomething the bloc has struggled to do more than a year after the start of the outbreak.

EU countries have administered at least one dose of vaccine to roughly half of their populations, while more than a third have received both shots. Britain, which left the bloc last year, has a higher vaccination rate.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, right, and French President Emmanuel Macron give a joint statement to journalists, at the chancellery in Berlin, Germany, Friday June 18, 2021. Credit: Axel Schmidt/Pool via AP

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, left, welcomes the President of France, Emmanuel Macron, right, for a meeting at the chancellery in Berlin, Germany, Friday, June 18, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Michael Sohn

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, right, welcomes the President of France, Emmanuel Macron, left, for a meeting at the chancellery in Berlin, Germany, Friday, June 18, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Michael Sohn

Aside from the pandemic, next week's EU summit will also address foreign policy issues such as the bloc's relationships with Russia and Turkey, and the future of its common defense and security policy.

Macron welcomed U.S. President Joe Biden's commitment to NATO.

"I think we succeeded in establishing the idea that European defense and EU strategic autonomy is not an alternative to the trans-Atlantic organization, but a solid component of it," Macron said of the recent meetings with Biden at the Group of Seven and NATO.

Merkel concurred. "We can all be glad that (Biden) has created a climate of cooperation again, in which everyone of course has their role to play," she said.

"But I see an absolute necessityand this is something I believe the United States expectsthat we act coherently, that we say which areas of work we can take on and which contribution we can make."

Explore further Germany hits vaccination milestone but wary of delta variant

 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

Bookings for the first dose of the Pfizer vaccine have been halted in Victoria this week, amid shortages of the vaccine.

Some Victorians who've had their first Pfizer dose already will need to wait six weeks to get their second.

Some people are wondering if it's OK to get their second Pfizer shot beyond the recommended three week gap between their first and second dose.

And yesterday, the federal government recommended the Pfizer vaccine as the preferred vaccine for people under 60. Previously, it was only recommended for people below 50. This will place even more pressure on our currently limited supply of Pfizer vaccine, and could lead to wait times being longer than three weeks for some.

The good news is, you can wait up to 12 weeks between your first and second dose of the Pfizer vaccine. In fact, some preliminary evidence suggests you might get even stronger immunity with a longer wait time.

The only downside is you're at risk from the virus the longer you wait for your second dose.

So the improved immunity conferred from waiting longer must be weighed against the risk of contracting COVID in the meantime.

You can wait longer than three weeks

The Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunization (ATAGI) recommends a minimum of three weeks between the first and second Pfizer dose. However it says this gap can be extended to up to six weeks.

The minimum time to establish immune memory following first exposure to a new vaccine is roughly three weeks. This is the minimum time, but waiting longer between the first and second jab is absolutely fine in terms of efficacy.

This makes sense based on what immunology experts understand about our immune response to vaccines.

By about two weeks after vaccination, adaptive immunity has kicked in. This involves immune cells called T and B cells working together to produce antibodies that target the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein, and are able to block infection.

At this stage, some of these become "memory" immune cells, and by about the third week they have established immune memory. This means these virus-recognizing cells are on hand to rapidly respond if we are exposed again.

If that exposure is via a second immunization, this will boost the immune response to the vaccine and increase immune memory, which in turn enhances protection against the virus.

The secondary immune response is faster and bigger because you have a pool of memory immune cells primed and ready to jump into action. The memory response is also faster, so by two weeks after the second jab, protection has significantly increased.

You're not fully protected against COVID until about seven to 14 days after the second Pfizer dose.

Waiting longer might be even better

Many vaccines confer improved protection with longer gaps between doses, and preliminary data suggests this seems to be the case with Pfizer too.

One pre-print study, yet to be peer reviewed, suggests waiting 11-12 weeks for the second Pfizer dose actually produces an even more potent antibody response in people over 80.

The levels of antibodies in people who waited 12 weeks for their second dose were 3.5 times higher than those whose gap was three weeks.

What are the risks of waiting?

We must remember the level of protection isn't the only consideration. The time it takes to get there is also important. Delaying the second dose increases the time it takes for you to achieve a high level of immunity, and therefore increases your susceptibility to infection, and risk of COVID.

One dose does provide some protection from severe COVID, but not enough, which means you can still become infected and transmit the virus to others. Preliminary data suggests one Pfizer dose provides only 33% protection against the Delta variant, while two doses confers 88% protection.

However, this risk must be weighed against the risk of contracting COVID in Australia currently. Community outbreaks are relatively contained, so the risk in between doses is not as high as it is during periods of rampant transmission.

In saying that, as we've seen from Victoria's recent lockdown and new cases in Sydney this week, COVID transmission is still smoldering in Australia and we must not let our guard down yet. In this context it's important everyone who can get vaccinated does, and as soon as possible.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
A new AP-NORC poll finds Americans are more likely now than they were in May 2020 to return to activities they were doing regularly before the pandemic, including going to restaurants, traveling and seeing live events.

Many Americans are relaxing precautions taken during the COVID-19 pandemic and resuming everyday activities, even as some worry that coronavirus-related restrictions were hastily lifted, a new poll shows.

The poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research finds that majorities of Americans who were regularly doing so before the pandemic say they are returning to bars or restaurants, traveling and attending events such as movies or sports.

Just 21% are very or extremely worried about a COVID-19 infection in their inner circlethe lowest level since the pandemic beganand only 25% are highly concerned that the lifted restrictions will lead to additional people being infected in their community.

Andrea Moran, a 36-year-old freelance writer and mother of two boys, said she feels both relief and joy at the chance to resume "doing the little things," such as having drinks on a restaurant patio with her husband.

"Honestly, I almost cried," Moran said. "It's such a feeling of having been through the wringer, and we're finally starting to come out of it."

Still, 34% of Americans think restrictions in their area have been lifted too quickly, while somewhat fewer27%say they were not lifted quickly enough. About 4 in 10 rate the pace of reopening about right.

In this June 15, 2021, file photo, people arrive at Universal Studios in Universal City, Calif. Many Americans are relaxing precautions taken during the COVID-19 pandemic and resuming everyday activities, even as some worry that coronavirus-related restrictions were hastily lifted, according to a new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. Credit: AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu, File

The way Americans approached their daily lives suddenly changed after COVID-19 spread through the U.S. in early 2020. Following the advice of health officials and governments, people isolated in their homeseither alone or with familiesto avoid exposure to the virus, which has sickened more than 33 million people and killed 600,000 people in the U.S.

During the height of the pandemic, restaurants, movie theaters and stores either closed or continued operating with limited occupancy; church services, schools and government meetings went virtual; and many employers made working from home an option or a requirement. Mask wearing in public became the norm in most places, with some states and cities making it mandatory.

The emergence of the vaccine has helped slow down rates of infection and death, allowing state and local economies to reopen and leading Americans to return to activities they once enjoyed.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advised last month that vaccinated Americans don't have to wear a mask in most scenarios, indoors or out. The latest CDC data shows 53% of all Americans65% of those 18 and olderhave received at least one dose of the vaccine.

According to the AP-NORC poll, American adults who have not yet rolled up their sleeves for the shot remain hesitant to do so. Just 7% of those who have not been vaccinated say they definitely will get a COVID-19 vaccine, and 15% say they probably will.

Forty-six percent of Americans who have not been vaccinated say they will definitely not get a vaccine, and 29% say they probably will not. Young adults, Americans without a college degree, white evangelicals, rural Americans and Republicans are most hesitant to get vaccinated.

In this June 4, 2021, file photo, people dine at the Q restaurant and bar after a reopening in Portland, Ore. Many Americans are relaxing precautions taken during the COVID-19 pandemic and resuming everyday activities, even as some worry that coronavirus-related restrictions were hastily lifted, according to a new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. Credit: AP Photo/Paula Bronstein

The poll finds many Americans are still wearing masks and taking precautions to avoid contact with other people, but the percentage of those doing so is down significantly from just a few months ago.

In late February, 65% said they were always wearing a mask around people outside their households. Now, just 37% say so, though 19% say they often wear one.

Forty percent of Americans say they are extremely or very likely to wear a mask when participating in indoor activities outside their homes, while just 28% say the same about outdoor activities.

Aaron Siever, 36, of New Market, Virginia, said he and his wife have consistently worn masks and taken other precautions, including getting vaccinated. But Siever said virus-related restrictions were not lifted quickly enough, lamenting that some precautions were politicized and caused an "inherent panic."

"I think with masks being worn and people getting vaccinated, I think we could have opened a little earlier," said Siever, who maintains the grounds of Civil War battlefields in Virginia. "We started focusing on the politics of reopening, rather than the health."

Now that most states have lifted restrictions, the poll finds about two-thirds of Americans who used to travel at least monthly say they will do so in the next few weeks. About three-quarters of frequent restaurant or bar-goers before the pandemic say they will now return. A year ago, only about half said they would travel or go to restaurants if they could.

In this June 5, 2021, file photo, crowds gather on L Street Beach in the South Boston neighborhood of Boston. Many Americans are relaxing precautions taken during the COVID-19 pandemic and resuming everyday activities, even as some worry that coronavirus-related restrictions were hastily lifted, according to a new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. Credit: AP Photo/Michael Dwyer

Likewise, more are returning to activities such as visiting friends and family, seeing movies or concerts, attending sporting events and shopping in-person for nonessential items.

In Cookeville, Tennessee, Moran said her family still regularly wears masks in public, especially when they are indoors or around a lot of people. Both she and her husband have been vaccinated. Moran said she has eaten at outdoor restaurants, but she is avoiding indoor dining.

"Even if the air conditioning circulation is good, I just don't feel comfortable right now going inside, where there's a lot of people in fairly close proximity who I don't know," Moran said.

Moran said her family avoided nonessential travel during the height of the pandemic, canceling a trip to see her brother in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. But last weekend, the family traveled for the first time in more than a yeara roughly 3 1/2-hour road trip to Asheville, North Carolina, to visit a childhood friend.

"I felt a little bit nervous just because being around people is such a surreal thing after so long," Moran said. "I was really excited and I was thrilled for my kids that they were able to get out and get back to some semblance of normality."

 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
Credit: CC0 Public Domain

Babies born prematurely may have significantly higher risk of stroke as young adultsand the earlier the birth, the greater the risk, suggests an extensive new study.

Although people born prematurely have been shown to have higher risk of high blood pressure and other disorders that can lead to stroke, little research has focused on stroke itself, said Dr. Casey Crump, the study's lead author. Earlier findings also were inconsistent, said Crump, a professor and vice chair for research in the department of family medicine and community health at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York.

So, in what he said is the largest study to look at stroke risk and preterm birth, Crump and his colleagues examined the records of more than 2.1 million people born in Sweden from 1973 to 1994 who lived to at least age 18. That group was reviewed for first-time stroke through 2015, when the oldest was 43 years old.

A full-term pregnancy lasts about 40 weeks. In the study, infants born early preterm (22 to 33 weeks) had a 42% higher risk of stroke in adulthood compared to full-term babies. Those born late preterm (34 to 36 weeks) had a 22% higher risk. Early-term birth (37-38 weeks) was not associated with increased risk.

"It was quite striking that these risks seem to emerge in adulthood," Crump said.

The study adjusted for factors such as sex, the parents' ages and the mother's weight. To filter out genetic or environmental factors in the children's families, the study did a separate comparison between the preterm infants and siblings who were born full-term.

Even after adjusting for those unmeasured factors within families, most of the risks remained, Crump said. "This suggests that preterm birth itself may have direct effects on later risk of stroke."

The study was published Thursday in the American Heart Association journal Stroke.

Dr. Lori Jordan, who co-wrote an editorial accompanying the study, called the findings important and said multiple mechanisms have been proposed for why preterm birth might raise stroke risk.

Blood vessel walls form during fetal development, and arterial stiffness caused by abnormal development of the inner lining of those walls "seems to be a unifying theme" in possible explanations, said Jordan, director of the Pediatric Stroke Program at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, Tennessee. Stiff arteries, she said, may lead to increased blood pressure and early atherosclerosis, which are both associated with increased stroke risk.

Crump emphasized the absolute risk of stroke for people born preterm was low. During the study, only 0.3% of people born early were diagnosed with stroke.

But many people could be affected.

About 1 in 10 births in the U.S. are preterm, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Advances in treatment mean there are more survivors than ever. "It's really the first time in history that we have very large numbers of people born prematurely who are surviving into adulthood," Crump said.

The study used records from Sweden, but Crump said the findings likely apply broadly. He said more research would be needed in diverse racial and ethnic groups.

Jordan said people born preterm should work with their primary care physicians to monitor for high blood pressure, diabetes, high cholesterol and other modifiable stroke risk factors. "If risk factors are found, they can be addressed, and this will hopefully reduce the chances of a stroke occurring."

Crump said doctors need to be aware of the potential risks faced by people who were born preterm. "We need to improve the identification of these patients in clinical settings by including birth history as part of medical history-taking and tracking this in electronic health records, which will help put patients' health in better context," he said.

Explore further Preterm deliveries may pose long-term stroke risk for mothers

More information: Casey Crump et al, Stroke Risks in Adult Survivors of Preterm Birth: National Cohort and Cosibling Study, Stroke (2021). Journal information: Stroke Casey Crump et al, Stroke Risks in Adult Survivors of Preterm Birth: National Cohort and Cosibling Study,(2021). DOI: 10.1161/STROKEAHA.120.033797
Credit: 123rf.com

To boost employees' creativity, managers should consider offering a set of rewards for them to choose from, according to a new study by management experts at Rice, Tulane University, the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and National Taiwan Normal University.

The study, co-authored by Jing Zhou, the Mary Gibbs Jones Professor of Management and Psychology at Rice's Jones Graduate School of Business, is the first to systematically examine the effects of reward choice in a field experiment, which was conducted in the context of an organizationwide suggestion program. An advance copy of the paper is published online in the Journal of Applied Psychology.

"Organizations spend a lot of resources and exert a great deal of effort in designing incentive schemes that reward the employees who exhibit creativity at work," Zhou said. "Our results showed that the effort may be a bit misplaced. Instead of discovering one reward type that is particularly effective at promoting creativity, what is more effective is to provide the employees with the opportunity to choose from several reward types, if they submit one or more ideas that are among the top 20% most creative ones."

Workers in the study were given a range of options: a financial reward for the individual employee or their team, a self-discretionary reward such as getting priority to select days off, or a donation the company made to a charity selected by the employee. Those choices had positive, significant effects on the number of creative ideas employees generated and the creativity level of those ideas, Zhou and her co-authors found.

The researchers arrived at their findings by conducting a quasi-experiment at a company in Taiwan over the course of several months. Then they conducted a second experimental study that included employees from 12 organizations in Taiwan to replicate the first study's results and compared the results with a control group.

The studies also found that rewards aimed at helping others, such as making a donation to a charity, might be especially powerful. But for less-creative employees, alternative rewards that benefit those in need might actually lower creativity and should be avoided, the authors said.

The researchers also found that the choice of rewards fostered creativity by raising the employees' belief in their ability to be creative. Alternative rewards also had a powerful impact on boosting the creativity of employees who earlier had scored high on an assessment of creative personality characteristics.

More information: Jing Zhou et al, Enhancing employee creativity: Effects of choice, rewards and personality., Journal of Applied Psychology (2021). Journal information: Journal of Applied Psychology Jing Zhou et al, Enhancing employee creativity: Effects of choice, rewards and personality.,(2021). DOI: 10.1037/apl0000900
Engineering grad student Jacob Sheffield won the Student Innovator of the Year Award for this windshield-wiper device he created for laparoscopes. Credit: Jaren Wilkey/BYU Photo

One of the coolest modern medical innovations is the laparoscope, a slender rod with a camera tip that allows doctors to see inside a body during surgery. Laparoscopes have made surgery easier for surgeons and patients, but the device does have a problematic drawback: it must be removed, cleaned, and reinserted multiple times during surgery.

BYU student Jacob Sheffield hopes to change that. The recent grad and now engineering graduate student has created a tiny origami-based device that serves as a miniature windshield wiper for laparoscope camera lenses. When installed, the device will eliminate the need to remove and reinsert laparoscopes every five or so minutes during surgery, allowing surgeons to focus on the patient without disruptions.

"It's like driving the car in the rain," Sheffield said. "If you can focus on driving and not on reaching out the window to wipe off the windshield with your hand, you can keep your focus on what's important."

His technology, developed with mentoring from BYU professor Larry Howell in the Compliant Mechanisms Research Lab and help from ME undergrad Amanda Lytle, is called LaparoVision. The disposable mechanism snaps on to existing laparoscopes and features a one-piece curved wiper that conforms to the cylindrical walls of the medical tool. The wiper, which is so small it can rest on the end of a finger, is actuated by a trigger outside of the body.

The innovative concept was impressive enough to earn Sheffield the title of 2021 Student Innovator of the Year at BYU. The BYU award provides kick starter money to help with the journey of taking a device to market, as well as connections to potential investors, mentors and business partners. (The Student Innovator of the Year Competition is one of several hosted by BYU to foster entrepreneurship at BYU. Sheffield also won the BYU student Entrepreneur of the Year competition four years ago for unrelated work.)

"It's extremely helpful to get that funding through BYU awards programs and the feedback you get from judges is invaluable," Sheffield said. "My advice for future applicants is even if you don't win or get money out of it, use the deadline of the competitions to drive progress for your idea."

Sheffield's idea actually came about when he was meeting with surgeons across the country on other medical technologies being tested in the CMR lab. The issue of laparoscope removal and cleaning kept popping up in their conversations. The tool is used in 5 million surgeries annually in the U.S. alone, and the device is removed in roughly 90% of those procedures.

According to many surgeons and studies, Sheffield said, every five to eight minutes the device has to be pulled out and the lens wiped clean. With operating rooms costing $62 a minute, those fairly regular removals prove costly and frustrating. But more importantly, withdrawing the scope during a critical time can also pose real risk to the patient.

"There is a high correlation in keeping the scope clean, maintaining surgical focus and ensuring timely and safe patient outcomes," Sheffield said. "But it's not just about improving efficiency during surgery; every time you lose vision it could be a critical part in the surgery where you make an incision and get blood on the lens and you can't see what's going on."

Sheffield is currently in discussions to license the technology and, thanks to the Founder's Launchpad program through the Rollins Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology, has now formed a startup (Bloom Surgical) to take the device to market. His current focus is on proving the technology is reliable and safe, and working to receive FDA clearance for the tool.

Explore further Mini wiper blade enables clear view through minimally invasive surgical scope
Colorized scanning electron micrograph of a cell (blue) heavily infected with SARS-CoV-2 virus particles (red), isolated from a patient sample. Image captured at the NIAID Integrated Research Facility (IRF) in Fort Detrick, Maryland. Credit: NIAID

In early January 2021, travelers returning to Tokyo, Japan, from Amazonas, Brazil, were screened for COVID-19 at the airport. A few days later, the National Institute of Infectious Disease of Japan announced that the travelers had returned with a new variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus.

That variant, known as gamma, or P.1, led to a deadly surge in COVID-19 cases in Brazil this spring, and has now spread across the world. More than 200 cases have been detected in Wisconsin. Whether current vaccines are as effective against the gamma variant remains unknown.

In a new study using variant virus recovered from one of the original travelers, researchers in the U.S. and Japan have found that vaccination with an mRNA vaccine induces antibody responses that would protect humans from infection with the gamma/P.1 variant. Hamsters previously infected with the virus strains first circulating in early 2020 were also protected from infection with the gamma variant nine months later.

The findings, the researchers say, suggest that previous SARS-CoV-2 infection and vaccines that are based on earlier strains of the virus still provide protection against infection with gamma. The study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on June 17, 2021.

"The animals were quite protected," says study lead Yoshihiro Kawaoka, a professor of virology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Veterinary Medicine and the University of Tokyo. "There may be people who get infected with this variant even though they are vaccinated or were previously infected, but they shouldn't get severe disease."

However, he says, "that is not consistent with what has been happening in Brazil," where there have been reports of people reinfected with the gamma variant after recovering from infection with an earlier strain. It's possible, Kawaoka says, that COVID-19 immunity lasts longer in hamsters than in humans, or that cases documented as reinfections are actually first infections.

Kawaoka's research team established the Syrian hamster model for COVID-19 last year, after demonstrating that hamsters are highly susceptible to the SARS-CoV-2 virus and develop disease similar to humans, like ground glass opacity in their lungs. They also develop lasting antibodies that protect against reinfection.

"Animal models are great because (they allow us to) test vaccines, test drugs, test monoclonal antibodies and even do pathogenesis (studies)," says Kawaoka.

In fact, his team studied the gamma variant in hamsters because, while previous studies suggested P.1 might bind better to cells and resist antibodies created by previous infections or vaccination, little is known about the variant's ability to replicate in the body, how much illness or pathogenesis it causes, or how well immune responses react to the virus.

The researchers infected hamsters with either the P.1/gamma variant isolated from the traveler, or with one of two earlier strains of the virus from human samplesone isolated from a patient in February 2020, and the other from a patient with a non-variant globally predominant strain. Each of the strains replicated similarly in the nose and lungs of hamsters and caused similar illness affecting the lungs.

Next, Kawaoka's team looked at whether antibodies in convalescent sera from 35 recovered COVID-19 patients or from people who'd received the Pfizer-BioNTech mRNA vaccine could neutralize each of the three viral strains.

Following a natural infection or vaccination, the body produces antibodies that learn to recognize the spike protein of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which is responsible for binding to cells. Should people encounter the virus again, antibodies recognize the spike protein and subsequently fight off or limit the extent of infection.

Earlier studies have shown that a spike protein mutationE484K, found in gamma variantscan change the spike protein's identity just enough that the variant can slip past these defenses. However, antibodies in the blood of vaccinated individuals reacted to all three strains, including gamma.

Antibodies in the blood of recovered COVID-19 patients were also effective at neutralizing each of the strains. However, of the 35 patients, one had been infected with gamma and the antibodies from this individual were less reactive to the non-variant strains.

The researchers say these findings suggest there are some important differences in the spike protein of gamma that might influence immunity, warranting further monitoring. Additionally, Kawaoka's group found that gamma, but not other strains of SARS-CoV-2, can infect and replicate in mice, suggesting that the spike protein interacts differently with cells than earlier strains.

The researchers also found that hamsters that had recovered from infection with either of the earlier strains of SARS-CoV-2 were protected against viral replication in their lungs if reinfected with either the same strain or the gamma variant, three weeks and nine months later.

However, gamma was recovered in the nasal passages of reinfected animals in both groups. The amount of virus in the nasal passages of reinfected animals was 1,000-fold lower than animals infected for the first time.

Finally, the researchers studied whether convalescent plasma from three patients infected with SARS-CoV-2 in early 2020 could protect against viral replication in the nose and lungs of hamsters. They found that convalescent plasma, but not plasma from patients who did not have COVID-19, limited virus replication in the lungs of hamsters infected with the prevailing non-variant strain and with gamma/P.1. Virus was found in their nasal passages.

Vaccination, Kawaoka says, is the best way to seek protection from SARS-CoV-2 and emerging variants, including the delta variant, also known as B.1.617.2. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently designated the delta version as a variant of concern due to evidence that it transmits more readily.

Peter Halfmann, research associate professor at UW-Madison and co-leader of the study, added that the gamma and delta variants are circulating in Madison and other parts of the U.S., highlighting the importance of vaccination.

"The difference between the original strain and (delta) and the original strain and (gamma) is similar," Kawaoka adds, noting: "The (delta) variant may become prevalent but it shouldn't be extremely concerning as long as you are vaccinated."

With SARS-CoV-2 changing as it spreads, some versions of the virus will disappear as new variants emerge, as happened with a European variant in early 2020 that quickly eclipsed the original virus first found in China.

"At least in the vast majority of the population, we don't have good immunity to SARS-CoV-2, so the selective pressure on the virus at the moment is transmissibility," Kawaoka says, explaining why new variants that successfully spread tend to be more transmissible than those that came before. "But it will change. We should expect to see the selective pressure become immunity."

This is why vaccines will likely need to be modified in the coming years, he explains, in order to protect against a virus that will evolve to evade the protections we devise so long as spread of the virus remains high, or if our immune systems don't maintain defenses for long enough to prevent reinfections.

"We don't know which one is going to be the case ... it's too early to say how long immunity to this virus lasts," he says. "Hamsters look different from humans, anyway. It's difficult to predict."

Peter Halfmann, a research associate professor at UW-Madison, and Masaki Imai in the Division of Virology at the University of Tokyo, co-led the study.

More information: Masaki Imai et al, Characterization of a new SARS-CoV-2 variant that emerged in Brazil, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2021). Journal information: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Masaki Imai et al, Characterization of a new SARS-CoV-2 variant that emerged in Brazil,(2021). DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2106535118
AT LEAST seven Philippine Airlines (PAL) flights between Manila and Hong Kong and the Middle East scheduled for June 6-8 were canceled, the ...
LaFoy has allegedly uncovered a long lost reel of MacLanes work that hes hyping up, and it is the Lost Ark at the end of this adventure, but the story is really about Beth navigating her own path.

What does she learn about becoming her own artist and her own individual journey by pursuing this, said Michael Legg, the Reps artistic director.

12 stops

The story unfolds in a walking loop of 12 stops. Like the Reps Plays on Tap short play series, they invite people to start and stop the whole experience at a brewery. After you start the Phantom Bride, youll see the Roxy Theater, the Boone & Crockett Club, the river trail, the Missoula Public Library and eventually end up at Conflux.

At each stop, a short portion of the story that Beth has hijacked is revealed, either through video, audio narration and links to websites. The app has a map with pins for each section and will unlock them when you get close. You dont know till you get to the next stop whether youll see Beths footage of LaFoy behaving badly, or her narration about moving past this project, or more information about MacLane.
Amermans son, Preston, sitting quietly next to his dad, said he felt the joy that was radiating from him as he spoke and talked to visitors about the camas plant.

It was pretty exciting to see my dad out there, Preston said. It really took a mental toll on him not being able to present in front of others and it was a real culture shock after he was forced to stay inside. I can see that hes been waiting for this day to come.

One of the main goals of Amermans presentations is to show people how to appreciate the landscape of Packer Meadow and to teach them how people have used the camas plant culturally for thousands of years.

Aesthetically people are moved by the meadow, but when people hear my talk, their appreciation of the space around them is changed when you add a human element, Amerman said.

Camas plants are considered a key staple of the Nez Perce and Salish people. The iconic bright blue color of the plant can be found in traditional clothing and other tribal artifacts and years back the cooked version of camas was also considered of high worth and was used for trading purposes with other tribes.
He also is a relative of Ashley Loring HeavyRunner, who went missing in 2017 from the Blackfeet Nation.

From his work in MMIP advocacy and activism, MacDonald said he found himself thinking about what was needed to directly support families.

There are so many different facets you can work with to address the crisis. We asked what would help families and what their immediate needs are, he said.

If MacDonald sees a missing persons case, hell find out who to contact and reach out to offer support and resources. MacDonald has been in contact with the families of Leo Wagner and Arden Pepion, who both went missing from the Blackfeet Reservation in recent months.

Now that theres this centralized resource, its been great to be able to direct families there, MacDonald said.

Helping families navigate the legal system, obtain records, file suits and find private investigators and local counsel are all things the fund can assist in accomplishing, MacDonald added.
DOVER, Del. (AP)  The Democrat-led state House voted along party lines Thursday to give final approval to a bill raising Delawares minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2025.

Democrats approved the measure after defeating half a dozen Republican amendments, including proposals to allow small businesses and nonprofits to pay 85% of the minimum wage and to require the controller generals office to submit annual reports regarding the fiscal impact of the wage increases on the state budget, and on the broader effects on the state economy.

Democrats also rejected a proposal by one of their own party members, Rep. Sheraea Moore of Middletown, to delay each of the annual wage increases for one year for businesses employing 20 or fewer workers.

The bill now goes to Democratic Gov. John Carney,, who is expected to sign it. The bill was one of the legislative priorities for several left-leaning progressives who were elected last year and were able to get veteran Democrats to sign on to their cause.

In the last 15 years, weve made 15 attempts to raise the minimum wage. Only three of them bore fractional (fruit), said Wilmington Democrat Rep. Gerald Brady, chief House sponsor of the bill.
Cerroni estimated if the fire were to spread into the horse range that there would be 130 to 140 horses most affected. The horses in all likelihood would be able to move to a lower elevation should the fire reach the range, but Cerroni said the concern from there would be that there might not be enough water at lower elevations to support them since the horses rely on ponds and existing snow along the range. "The rest of the mountain's pretty dry," she said. "There's very little water source down there for that many horses."

If the fire were to consume some of the upper meadows where the horses graze, that could also affect the animals.

She said the area between the horses and the fire could act as a decent buffer because it is traditionally among the last areas to dry out.

June is typically an active period for the horses in which they congregate on the mountain and foals are born. Cerroni and her husband also lead tours of the area, some of which she has started to cancel due to fire-related closures on the mountain. In a non-pandemic year some of those tours would come from international customers. This year Cerroni said she's booked tours for people from Georgia, New York, Maine, Washington, California, North Carolina, Minnesota and Wisconsin. Some of those people set up their tours last year.
ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast (AP)  Former President Laurent Gbagbo returned home to Ivory Coast on Thursday, a decade after his refusal to concede defeat in a presidential election sparked months of violence that left more than 3,000 people dead.

Gbagbo was extradited to the International Criminal Court at The Hague in 2011 and spent eight years awaiting trial on war crimes charges. A judge acquitted him in 2019, saying prosecutors had failed to prove their case.

The verdict was appealed but upheld in late March, clearing the way for Gbagbo to leave Belgium, where he had spent the past two years.

After coming down the steps to the runway, Gbagbo soon made his way to a vehicle that was then surrounded by crowds as it headed toward the city.

He later made a brief but emotional speech to his supporters at his former campaign headquarters in Cocody.

I am happy to return to Ivory Coast and to Africa, he said before adding: I know that I am Ivorian but in prison I knew that I belonged to Africa.
"Rep. Rosendale voted in favor of a bill to give gold medals to USCP in March, his office explained in response to the Missoulian Editorial Boards request for an explanation. Unfortunately, Nancy Pelosi is continuing to play politics with the events of that day and months later brought a bill to the floor with an unrelated act of violence at the Capitol perpetrated by an Islamic extremist  attempting to pin that act on protesters months prior.

The one playing politics here is Rep. Rosendale. The unrelated act of violence this statement refers to concerns Officer Billy Evans, an 18-year veteran of the Capitol Police force who died in the line of duty after he was fatally struck by a vehicle that rammed into a Capitol Complex barricade on April 2. The driver, 25-year-old Noah Green, was shot at the scene and later died.

The legislation was about honoring the U.S. Capitol Police who defend the seat of American government  not parsing the motives of the attackers.

Rosendales rationale for his opposition is badly contorted, and a poor reflection on Montana. Both bills, fortunately, passed with strong majorities.
Second Amendment rightsregardless of your stance to it and its importance to you as a Montanan and Americanare truly rights perceived to allow one to use violence. Regardless of if in self-defense or not, to use a firearm against another human is violence. And at times people say that the Second Amendment is a God-given right.

Of the seven major religions: Christianity (2.38 billion), Moslem (1.91 billion), Hinduism (1.25 billion), Buddhism (0.51 billion), Chinese (three main components, 0.39 billion), Sikhism (0.026 billion) and Judaism (0.015 billion) for a total of about 6,480,700,000 people in the world (83% of people); no doctrines call for aggressive violence.

Early Christianity called for pacifism. In Matthew, Jesus warned of taking up the sword. The early Christians were executed for not fighting in war. Islam and Sikhism (24% of people) teaches possible self-defense, while all others now have doctrine for non-violence.

When the possibility of violence is expressed, such as Laura Trump recently calling for firearms at the southern border, it seems antithetical to claim religious backing for such talk and any resulting stochastic violent acts. To claim of a God-approved violence is odd.

Erwin Curry,

Missoula

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Kadrmas was initially charged by prosecutors in January 2020 with two counts of criminal distribution of dangerous drugs at or near a school and two misdemeanor counts of endangering the welfare of a child.

According to prosecutors, Amy Kadrmas and her husband, Brad Kadrmas, were living in a fourth-floor apartment at Butte Central High School in 2019 with a 14-year-old boy and she provided marijuana to him and a 14-year-old friend. Brad Kadrmas was a math teacher at the school.

The misdemeanor charges, punishable by up to six months in jail, alleged she also encouraged the youths to use alcohol and cigarettes. She initially pleaded not guilty to all the charges and Vainio later sought to suppress evidence.

According to facts relayed by Judge Whelan, a school administrator gave police detectives access to the school and fourth floor on Nov. 28, 2019. They exited the elevator on the fourth floor, which has a hallway and doors leading to the apartment and a chapel.

They knocked on the apartment door at the end of the hallway, Amy Kadrmas answered and they told her they were investigating a matter. She agreed to accompany them to the police station for questions and when they returned, she let them back in the apartment and they retrieved evidence.
In almost every case, the answer is just leave it there and its going to be OK, Crowser said. Its tricky for folks to understand how long a period of time adults leave babies. Theyre off getting food or something, and thats natural for them. It could be several days, which is alarming for people.

In addition to deer calls, Crowser said she regularly fields alerts about lost ducklings, goslings and other birds that cant find a nest. The chances of a human successfully raising a wild baby without biology training are lousy.

However, there are occasions where human intervention is useful. Crowser occasionally gets a call about a fawn caught in a window well or entangled in a fence. As handling a baby in the presence of its agitated mother poses a safety risk for all involved, she said its a good idea to seek professional help.

And growing up wild isnt easy. Many of the turtle eggs Gomez has found in Milltown State Park nests have already been plundered, probably by birds or raccoons, he said. His students have also had a hard time finding eggs of the Sierra chorus frogs and long-toed salamanders theyre looking for. The only species doing well in their study is the Columbia spotted frog, for which theyve found several egg masses and tadpoles.
MUSCATINE  It isnt often that a small town high school is recognized in Washington D.C., but on June 17, Muscatine High School received just that.

Early Thursday afternoon, Rep. Marianette Miller-Meeks spoke on the floor of the House of Representatives about Iowas partnership with the ACTs College Application Campaign, which has been going on for over 15 years. The College Application Campaign focuses specifically on increasing the number of first-generation students, as well as students from low-income households, that apply to college throughout Iowa each year as a way to encourage the pursuit of higher education.

Despite an unusual previous year, Miller-Meeks was happy to report that the campaigns efforts still saw successful results in 2020.

I am proud to announce, in 2020, 176 Iowa schools participated in the College Application Campaign, and altogether, 504 students completed 1,578 college applications, she said. But this wasnt the only good news that she had.
Today is Wednesday, June 16, 2021. Let's get caught up.

These headlines are in the news this morning: President Biden, Russia's Putin sit down for long-anticipated, high-stakes summit in Geneva; Senate approves bill to make Juneteenth a federal holiday; and the US West is facing sweltering heat, risk of wildfires.

Read on for these stories, other top headlines, celebrity birthdays and more.

TOP STORIES

Biden and Putin open summit with a handshake

GENEVA  President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin are starting their diplomatic talks in Geneva.

The two were first greeted by the Swiss president before sitting down for a small meeting that includes just Biden, Putin, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, with a translator for each side. Theyll then move to larger talks, which will include more senior aides and are expected to last hours.
NEW ORLEANS (AP)  Citgo Petroleum Corp. of Houston has agreed to pay $19.7 million for environmental damage from a 2006 spill at a Louisiana refinery, the U.S. Department of Justice said Thursday.

The agreement settles both state and federal environmental claims from the 2.2-million-gallon (8.3- million-liter) spill at the Lake Charles refinery's wastewater treatment facility, a news release said.

State and federal trustees will work together on restoration projects using nearly $19.2 million, the statement said. It said the remaining $528,000 will cover remaining costs of the damage assessment.

Oil companies have a responsibility to protect our waters, people, wildlife and diverse habitats from oil spills, and those who violate that duty will be held accountable for the harms they cause, said Jean E. Williams, acting assistant attorney general for the departments Environment and Natural Resources Division.
The Iowa attorney general's office declined to comment immediately on the ruling.

The plaintiffs said in a statement that they were considering all of their options.

The fight for clean water in Iowa is far from over, they said. Until further action is taken, industrial agricultural runoff will continue to pollute the river unimpeded, and Iowans right to clean water will remain a right without a remedy.

Justices Brent Appel, Christopher McDonald and Dana Oxley would have allowed the environmental groups' case to proceed to trial.

Oxley said the court majority's dismissive characterization of the plaintiffs requested declaratory relief as too general rings hollow. She said if a court struck down the state's current voluntary pollution strategy for farmers, the state could impose mandatory regulations on farmers that would provide relief to the plaintiffs that meets constitutional standards.

The Raccoon River is a 31-mile tributary of the Des Moines River and is a primary source of drinking water for about 500,000 central Iowa customers of the Des Moines Water Works. The utility's nitrate removal system was one of the largest in the world when it was built in 1992.

Iowa is the nations leading pork producer, with about 24 million pigs on farms that discharge billions of gallons of liquid manure into the environment every year. The state also is the nation's leading producer of corn, which requires significant amounts of nitrogen fertilizer to thrive. Iowa also has one of the most elaborate farm field drainage systems, which often dumps excess fertilizer and manure into waterways.

Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

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AMES  Friederich Burson said he has benefited from the help offered by a nonprofit youth support services organization, and his hope is that a new state law will help others in similar need.

Burson, a 17-year-old from Sioux City, spoke Wednesday at a public ceremony as Gov. Kim Reynolds signed into law a package of tax provisions that includes a new method for funding mental health care services across the state.

Mental health care advocates and stakeholders were on hand to celebrate the new law.

This will ensure that others can succeed just like I have, Burson said during the ceremony at YSS in Ames.

Dozens were on hand to witness Reynolds sign into law Senate File 619, which includes a wide range of tax reforms.

Mental health care advocates celebrated the legislations provision that gradually shifts the funding for mental health care services from local property taxes to the states general fund.
The Department of Communications and Digital Technologies says it has received more than 17,000 submissions since extending the deadline for responses on its proposal to establish a mega state-owned cloud network.

This was revealed by communications minister Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams during her opening address on a virtual colloquium to discuss The National Data and Cloud Policy, which was published on 1 April for public comment.

The department says the policy seeks to strengthen the States capacity to deliver services to citizens, develop informed policies based on data analytics, and promote South Africas data sovereignty and data security.

Its main goal will be to consolidate the governments disparate network assets and cloud computing capabilities.

The strategy includes the merging of the existing networks of Sentech and Broadband Infraco to create the State Digital Infrastructure Company (SDIC), which will have access to the excess capacity of government-funded ICT infrastructure.

This would cover the telecommunications networks of Eskom, SANRAL, Transnet, PRASA, and SANREN.

It is also proposed that a High-Performance Computing and Data Processing Centre (HPCDPC) should be established, which will include cloud computing capacity, to consolidate existing public-funded data centres.

The minister thanked those who have taken part in the public consultation process, which included stakeholders in the communications sector and other community interest groups.

The Minister said that the submissions from the public raised a few glaring issues in the policy, including:

The government is just trying to create another state-owned company by establishing the HPCDC.

The government does not have the capacity to run the HPCDC.

The HPCDC is an attempt to compete with the private sector to provide cloud services, which is not sustainable due to the limitations of the fiscus.

The centralisation of government data in one place (at the HPCDC) presents a data security threat.

Regarding the SDIC, the role of connecting government and government institutions should be played by the private sector.

In addition, concerns were raised about data security under the Open Data Strategy, which the department said were likely based on the misguided belief that all data would be open, which would not be the case.

Respondents were also critical of the impact of the Critical Information Infrastructure data policy in terms of data localisation and cross-border data flows, which could be an impediment to investment as most of the infrastructure could be unnecessarily classified under the definition, prohibiting the free flow of information.

Under localisation, there is also concern about the obligation to keep a copy of the data transferred outside South African borders domestically, the department said.

The concern is that this could impose an unnecessary cost burden to many multinationals and might therefore also discourage investment.

Respondents also argued against the need to push for a change in competition law, because there have not been clearly identified competition issues that could be of concern.

The minister noted that 90% of the input came from Dear South Africa.

She said with regards to these responses, the department wished that participants could provide further details about their concerns, instead of simply indicating that they did not trust the government with their data.

It suffices to say that we do not intend, through this policy, to expropriate anyones data or spy on anyone, the minister said.

The minister also said there was no intention to force the private sector to store their data in the HPCDC.

We are clearly indicating that government data will be stored there, while we will strengthen and preserve the confidentiality and security of the stored data in a manner that will encourage other parties to store their data there, Ndabeni-Abrahams said.

However, the department was unapologetic in insisting that Critical Information Infrastructure data, including all ICT systems, data systems, databases, and networks that are fundamental to the effective operation of the Republic be stored within the borders of South Africa.

She added that the government recognised the importance and availability of skills that existed outside State institutions, which is why the policy proposal includes the creation of a Data Advisory Council.

This will draw experts from government, the private sector and academia, among others, to contribute towards certain aspects of data governance, including the development of standards relating to the management of data.
Rolls Royce will transition its airplane engines to synthetic fuels in a bid to reduce carbon emissions.

Samsung is addressing camera and overheating issues in its Galaxy S21 phones with a June update.

Nvidia will invest $100 million in a supercomputer aimed at solving problems related to healthcare and AI.

Windows 7 will no longer receive driver updates from Microsoft.

Microsoft is launching its fluid framework aimed at enabling cross-platform workflows and synchronization across Office 365.

Here is what is happening in the tech world today:

Airplane engines going green: Rolls Royce has announced that it will produce jet engines capable of running with 0% carbon emissions by 2030, according to The Guardian. The company is planning to use what is known as sustainable aviation fuels  synthetic fuels that are not made from oil sources. An Airbus A350 with Rolls Royce engines flew on 100% synthetic fuels in March 2021, and Rolls Royce hopes to gain regulatory approval to use synthetic fuels in all its current engine models by 2023. British Airways plans to begin transatlantic flights using synthetic fuels by 2022.

Samsung Galaxy S21 updates and fixes: Samsung has started releasing its June update aimed at the S21 series smartphones, as reported by Android Authority. The updates will address camera lag issues reported by users, as well as overheating issues and problems with the cameras portrait mode. Not all regions will have received the update yet. To see if the update is available for your device, you can navigate to Settings > Software update and tap on Download and install.

Nvidia invests $100 million in supercomputer: According to Reuters, Nvidia CEO Jenseng Huang stated that the $100 million is an initial investment in the project. The computer will be focused on solving healthcare and AI problems. Nvidia is also in a bid to acquire ARM, a UK-based chip company on whose architecture various chips worldwide are based, including Apples new M1 Macbooks. The deal is reportedly worth $40 billion and is facing regulatory headwinds.

Windows 7 will no longer receive driver updates: As reported by Bleeping Computer, Microsoft will stop releasing drivers for the Windows 7 operating system with immediate effect. However, third-party developers partnered with Microsoft will still be able to release driver updates for the operating system until its officially retired in 2023.

Big updates to Microsoft Office platforms: The US company is releasing its Fluid framework announced last year. This will enable an integrated work experience across the Microsoft 365 ecosystem. Instead of content being hosted separately on Microsofts platforms, collaborative documents and notes will be synchronized across Teams, Outlook and Onenote. This will allow instantaneous updates to the same document, regardless of the platform it is worked on. According to The Verge, the company plans to expand the framework to more of its applications in the future.

Now read: MultiChoice fights back against plan for DStv to collect TV Licence fees
Heritage Housing Partners wants to bring a mixed-income project with single-family homes, townhouses, and stacked flat units to Napa County's Old Sonoma Road site.

That's the latest turn in the county's quest to sell the 8.6-acre property. Prospective buyers have brought the Pasadena-based nonprofit group into the picture.

The result: a vision for both rental and for-sale homes, with at least 15% meeting state affordable housing standards. But it's only a bare-bones vision as described in an email submitted by the prospective buyers to the county, without details such as how many units and how they might look.

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Three historic buildings from the old county hospital would remain and be renovated. The possibility that the buildings might be torn down caused controversy in the past.

We look forward to working with Napa Landmarks to ensure that the project is sympathetic to and compatible with the historic elements of the site, Michael Williamson, an attorney involved with the proposed development, wrote to the county.

Heritage Housing Partners couldnt be reached for comment. But Napa County at the Napa Valley Registers request released the Williamson email.
Michael Rogerson, who has an Oakville house and is CEO of Rogerson Kratos digital electronics company, wants to base two water-dropping Black Hawk helicopters in Napa County to fight wildfires.

It's the latest citizen-organized push to bring more firefighting equipment to Napa County. The goal is to get water on wildfires as soon as possible and prevent them from erupting into the next Hennessey or Glass fire.

Rogerson and his company would provide the Black Hawks. Napa County and Cal Fire would have to agree on the deployment and operational details if they decide the offer is a good one.

Im not doing this because I want to be in the firefighting business, Rogerson said last Wednesday. Im doing this to help Napa County.

Napa County Fire Chief Geoff Belyea on Thursday said he can't yet comment on the offer.

Its just an idea," he said. "Theres really no formal proposal yet on the table."

All of this comes against the backdrop of the Atlas, Tubbs, Nuns, Hennessey, and Glass fires that burned much of the county over three years. Some residents have looked for new ways to extinguish fires quickly.
The charter for the state of California local Fairs which includes the Napa Expo Center is; California's Industries, Agriculture, and Diversity of People. This is the overriding guidance that is supposed to influence all of the different county fairs and Expo-Center events though-out the state of California. I would say that our local Expo Board of Directors has failed us in meeting these goals.

Here at the Napa Expo, we do have cattle, sheep, pigs, chickens and even rabbits to display and sell. This helps kids provide funding for their college education in many cases. It also teaches them how to run a little business, purchasing feed, tending the animals, and then selling them. All prices are based on the weight of the animal when they are sold. Which is one of the reasons the fair has been in early August dating back to the 1950s. This is simple, so the animals can be fattened up, and the kids get the maximum amount of money for their efforts when they are sold by the pound.

In comparison surrounding fairs, Sonoma Aug. 4-8, Mendocino Sept. 17-19, and Lake County, Sept. 2-5, puts their livestock auctions much later and the kids sell their animals at a much higher weight. Napa is known for have some of the highest prices per pound all over Northern California.
Sham trial continues in Baku, prosecutor demands sentencing 12 Armenian POWs to 2 years in prison

Armenia acting PM dismisses Vayots Dzor Province deputy governor

Armenian analyst: Armenia needs to understand what it can offer China through One Belt One Road project

Armenia Constitutional Court registers Zartonk party petition to invalidate snap parliamentary election results

Dollar still dropping in Armenia

Lawyer Aram Vardevanyan to represent Armenia bloc at Constitutional Court

Armenia acting Deputy PM visits construction sites in Yerevan

YouTube deletes video about hate speech against Armenians posted by Turkey President's spokesperson

Armenia acting justice minister receives Kazakhstan Ambassador

European Commissioner plans visits to Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia

Four new cases of coronavirus reported in Artsakh

IMF sharply raises its forecast for US economic growth to 7%

Fan Yong: We work to draw Chinese investors to Armenia

Body implementing proceedings completes case of Armenian doctor Armen Charchyan, sends it to court

Macron warns of American-style culture dangers

Armenia Shirak Province village veterinarian commits suicide

Facebook to start warning some users that they may have seen extremist content

July in Armenia will be as hot as in June, says chief meteorologist

China ambassador to Armenia: We are waiting with pain in our hearts for return of captives

Both Armenia and Azerbaijan are included in Belt and Road Initiative, says China ambassador to Yerevan

China envoy to Armenia refutes Azerbaijan media report

US worries China is building over 100 new ICBM silos

Armenia State Revenue Committee discovers 97kg heroin, Turkey citizen detained

Armenian captives 'trials' continue in Azerbaijan

Chief meteorologist: June heat in Armenia is absolute record-breaking in meteorological monitoring history

Ombudsman informs CoE Commissioner for Human Rights on urgency of Armenian captives return from Azerbaijan

Australia announces drastic reduction in number of people who will be allowed to enter country

Armenia Seismic Protection Department activities terminated

Outgoing MP attends OSCE Parliamentary Assembly session, speaks about Armenian POWs in Azerbaijan

118 new cases of COVID-19 confirmed in Armenia

Armenia bloc petition already at Constitutional Court

Seven villagers with symptoms of anthrax are hospitalized in Gyumri

Yerevan hosting international conference on 100th anniversary of Communist Party of China

Armenia President visits US ambassador

130 countries support introduction of global minimum tax for multinational corporations

New Zealand to ban most single-use plastics by 2025

Al Pacinos rental home in Beverly Hills to be demolished?

Newspaper: Armenia Investigative Committee dismissals have interesting backstory

Newspaper: Why Armenia ex-President Sargsyan calls 7 "I Have Honor" bloc MP candidates to him?

World Bank pledges $20bn in funding coronavirus vaccine purchases, deployment

Newspaper: Why is coronavirus-related reality in Armenia being kept secret?

Armenia Ombudsman calls on Artsakh-Armenians to remove or block phone numbers, personal data on social networks

Armenia acting minister: Two new electric trains to transport passengers to and from Yerevan and Gyumri soon

Body of 33-year-old man found hanged in Armenia's Lori Province

Karabakh State Minister: I also have questions regarding loss of Hin Tagher and Khtsaberd villages

Armenia Ambassador to Ukraine hands copies of credentials to Ukrainian MFA leadership

Erdogan defends Turkey's withdrawal from Istanbul Convention

Parliament of Morocco recognizes 'third sex'

11 apprehended during opening ceremony of Tbilisi Pride Week

Armenian analyst: Opposition could have won the elections, if it used the right technologies

Adam Schiff: We have been able to secure more than $52,000,000 in funding for Armenia and Artsakh

Court declares head of Armenia's Odzun village as victim under criminal case, there is no accused

Direct flights to and from Kazakhstan and Armenia restored

Karabakh emergency situations service: Remains of 2 more soldiers found in Hadrut, Varanda and Jrakan

Karabakh Security Council Secretary discusses issues related to water supply and power supply

Armenian analyst: Turkey wants to do everything possible to absorb Azerbaijani army, turn it into subdivision

'Armenia' bloc to apply to Constitutional Court with demand to annul results of elections in coming days

Catholicos Aram I meets with Pope Francis at Vatican

Independent MP sues Armenia Parliament Deputy Speaker Lena Nazaryan for calling her 'an idiot'

Digest: US House calls for at least $50m aid to Armenia, New Jersey recognizes Artsakh independence

Did China's Ambassador to Azerbaijan talk about the "Zangezur corridor"?

Armenia 3rd President sends congratulatory message to China's Jinping

FM: Armenian statehood will become geopolitically disabled without Artsakh

Armenia fuel company owner Barsegh Beglaryan says he won't plead guilty and didn't incite anyone

Armenia 1st Military Unit participants in recent Artsakh war are solemnly demobilized (PHOTOS)

Armenia Environment Ministry: 1,650 structures being dismantled in lakeside zone of Lake Sevan

Armenia acting PM's ex-chief of staff to serve as Member of Parliament

Karabakh President makes new appointment

Karabakh: Searches for remains of servicemen continue in southern direction not under Artsakh's control

Armenia ex-President Sargsyan on criminal charge against him: The accusation is completely false

Google to change rules for finding information on web

Azerbaijan declares impossibility of Armenia lawyers defending Armenian captives in Baku

Armenia Parliament approves several amendments to existing laws

Dollar holding steady in Armenia

Republican Party of Armenia vice-president summoned to Investigative Committee after returning from Brussels

Armenia acting PM attends meeting dedicated to 103rd anniversary of prosecutor's office

Karabakh State Minister: Artsakh is planning to build a few reservoirs

Karabakh State Minister: Artsakh should prepare for elections, but under one condition

Faction of Armenia acting PM's political party votes against the bill that it introduced

Armenia Special Investigation Service ex-chief's son, official Narek Shahinyan stabbed in Yerevan

Kuwait announces launch of its first own satellite on Falcon 9 launch vehicle

Total amount of US assistance to Armenia to increase by $12.94m

Armenia President sends congratulatory message to Canada PM

Armenia acting territorial administration and infrastructure minister on news about being appointed Deputy PM

Judicial farce against Armenian captives continues in Azerbaijan

Oil rises in price

Artsakh state minister believes Russian peacekeepers presence is not limited to 5 years

Additional opportunities created to organize protection of right to self-determination, says Karabakh state minister

Court hearing over case of Armenia 3rd President and company owner taking place

Artsakh state minister: Azerbaijan will no longer use Karmir Shuka-Shushi road soon

Armenia PM staff has new chief

Armenia becomes 2nd country after US to grant patent to computer programs

Armenia provides additional funding to Karabakh

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Artsakh welcomes the recognition of Artsakh by New Jersey

Armenia acting economy minister: Twice as many agricultural products already exported as in 2019, 2020

Three new cases of coronavirus reported in Artsakh

Pashinyan: Armenia economic growth forecast for 2021 has risen from 3.2% to 6%

Armenia acting premier makes new appointment

126 new cases of COVID-19 confirmed in Armenia

Armenian acting PM to Chinese President: Armenia is eager to further develop friendly relations with China
Our government hasnt considered, isnt considering and wont consider any logic of corridor. This is what acting Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan said during Civil Contract Partys rally held at Republic Square.

In the context of opening of communication links, the government rules out change of status of any sovereign territory of Armenia. Azerbaijans and Turkeys statements on having a corridor through the territory of Armenia is simply absurd. The government has clearly expressed its stance. The economic links in the region need to be unblocked, and countries will receive equal and adequate opportunities, as it is described in the statement signed on January 11, 2021 in Moscow. Armenia is disposed to move forward consistently in order to implement the provisions of the statement, and this will be a strategic achievement for not only Armenia and the whole region, paving the way for peace, stability and long-term development, Pashinyan said, adding that Azerbaijans aggressive statements and destructive position are impeding the efforts, particularly Azerbaijans ongoing aspirations for the territorial integrity of Armenia.

The next urgent issue in the security sector is the situation in the Sotk-Khoznavar sector of the Armenian-Azerbaijani border. We say that this situation needs to be solved through peaceful means. All of our international partners share our view, that is, Azerbaijans military formations need to exit the territory of Armenia. Moreover, Armenia is ready to accept the proposal of international partners to deploy Russian border guards along the length of the border and carry out activities for delimitation and demarcation of the Armenia-Azerbaijan border, Pashinyan said.

Touching upon the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, Pashinyan said the conflict remains unresolved. We are certain that the 44-day war and the context of self-determination of Armenians has been further reinforced within the logic of remedial secession, he added.

Touching upon the return of prisoners of war, Pashinyan said the following: The recent return of 15 Armenian prisoners of war instills hope that there will be a major change in the regional atmosphere soon. There is no doubt that all of our prisoners of war will be returned soon, but the important thing is that the humanitarian issues are solved as soon as possible, and Armenia expresses its willingness to move forward by taking such steps.
These forces have nothing to say about or do in the future of the country. Their optimistic promises and great programs are merely the veil to conceal their main intentions and deceive the people, and the real goal is to take power at any price and take revenge over adversaries by using tremendous administrative, financial, media and even criminal leverages at their disposal, overlooking clashes and the blatant threats of incitement of a civil war. This is what first President of Armenia Levon Ter-Petrosyan said in a message today.

Dear people, compatriots, our homeland is facing a fatal dilemma, that is, a choice between restoration of stability of statehood and deepening of crisis. The election campaign shows that, to date, the conflicting and extremist forces have chosen deepening of the crisis. These forces have nothing to say about or do in the future of the country. Their optimistic promises and great programs are merely the veil to conceal their main intentions and deceive the people, and the real goal is to take power at any price and take revenge over adversaries by using tremendous administrative, financial, media and even criminal leverages at their disposal, overlooking clashes and the blatant threats of incitement of a civil war.

Thus, everyone needs to understand that they lack awareness of state interest. This means that citizens who will vote for any one of those forces by will or coercively, in essence, they will participate in further deterioration of the current situation. People might ask what the way out of this situation is. There is only one way out, and that is the vote for the Armenian National Congress political party, and with this, citizens will see a principled and realistic political party in parliament that will be capable of restraining the dangerous aspirations and extreme actions of the conflicting camps.

During the election campaign, we fully played this role, and in the new parliament, we are ready to continue to play this role in order to keep the people from tragedies and tribulations in the future. I believe in the common sense of the people and their ability to make the right decision at crucial moments. This time, the people dont have the right to make a mistake.
The British government supported a London-listed mining company that stands to profit from the recent war between Armenia and Azerbaijan, openDemocracy reported.

The British embassy in Baku, Azerbaijans capital, offered to help Anglo Asian Mining after diplomats learned that the company was set to secure access to mining concessions in the disputed territory of Nagorno-Karabakh [(Artsakh)] and other adjacent districts.

The UKs ambassador to Azerbaijan, James Sharp, met with Anglo Asian at the height of the conflict, according to email correspondence released under Freedom of Information. After the meeting, Anglo Asian sent Sharp a follow-up email containing information about gold deposits in Nagorno-Karabakh and the surrounding territories.

Embassy officials later offered to discreetly raise issues and questions on Anglo Asians behalf at a meeting with Azerbaijans state-owned mining company.

The story of the friendly relationship between Anglo Asian and the embassy emerged from email correspondence released under Freedom of Information rules. The British government has heavily redacted the emails, refusing to disclose their full contents as they could not only harm the companys interests, but also harm the international relations of the UK and both Azerbaijan and Armenia and the interest of the UK in these countries.

The UK has been consistently clear that we support the OSCE Minsk Groups work to facilitate a lasting end to the conflict, the Foreign Office said in a statement to openDemocracy, referencing the international body that mediates between Armenia and Azerbaijan. Greater prosperity across the region is an important part of securing a sustainable solution to the conflict.

In November 2020, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights warned of possible war crimes in the conflict zone  and further reports have emerged of brutal treatment, including the extrajudicial execution of Armenian civilians and captured soldiers. Baku has also retained a number of Armenian prisoners of war since the conflict, and has subjected them to cruel and inhumane treatment.

The UK government has failed to front up to the truth that the pursuit of global trade and investment opportunities can clash with its obligation to protect human rights, said Tom Wills, corporate accountability and trade project manager at the Business and Human Rights Resource Centre.

In a statement to openDemocracy, Anglo Asian said: The British Embassy does not give us any support outside of the normal course of their embassy responsibilities.

On its website and in other promotional materials, Anglo Asian maintains that Azerbaijan is a politically stable democracy with a good human rights record.

Azerbaijans gold mining sector has been dogged by allegations of nepotism. In 2012, Azerbaijani investigative journalists revealed that their countrys government had awarded stakes in gold fields to a shell company ultimately owned by the daughters of President Ilham Aliyev.

As the crisis deepened, the British embassy in Baku resumed contact with Anglo Asian Mining, which had sought to calm investors nerves over the wars impact on its operations with a public announcement.

Prompted by the embassy, Anglo Asian sent officials an update on 14 October. In the email, much of which has been redacted, Anglo Asian sought a meeting with either an unnamed embassy official or Sharp, the ambassador.

Zangilan [(Kovsakan)] region is home to the Vejnaly goldfield, which Anglo Asian holds exclusive rights to explore and exploit, and which had been previously operated by a Swiss-Armenian businessman.

On 27 October, Anglo Asian issued an update to its investors on Azerbaijans liberation of Zangilan, adding that it was in talks with the Azerbaijani government over the future development of the site. Two days later, Sharp met with Anglo Asian for what the Foreign Office described as a catch-up over coffee.

Anglo Asian also told openDemocracy that it has carried out a short site visit to its Zangilan concession, but that it currently lacks access to its mines in Nagorno-Karabakh and Kalbajar [(Karvachar)].

On 10 November, Armenia and Azerbaijan eventually signed a Russian-brokered ceasefire.

As Azerbaijans commitment to the ceasefire came increasingly into question in the weeks after it was signed, grainy footage circulated on social media on 26 November apparently showing Azerbaijani troops amassed on a snow-covered mountain pass above Sotk gold mine.

On 28 November, two days after the Sotk footage emerged, Anglo Asian sent an update on its operations to the UK ambassador. The email has been heavily redacted.
Fan Yong, Ambassador of China to Armenia, spoke with Armenian News-NEWS.am about the potential for the development of Armenian-Chinese economic relations and the development of tourism.

How would you rate the development potential of Armenian-Chinese economic relations? In which spheres do you think Armenia and China should strengthen economic cooperation?

In recent years, thanks to the joint efforts of both countries  China and Armenia, the economic relations between the two countries have developed steadily and the cooperation has achieved remarkable results. The trade level between China and Armenia has increased from USD 389 million in 2016 to USD 995 million in 2020, this is an increase of nearly three times. Although affected by the epidemic in 2020, bilateral trade volume has bucked the trend and increased by 31.88%, indicating that the development of trade between the two countries has potential. The interest of Chinese companies in economic and trade cooperation with Armenia is actively increasing, investment and other economic cooperation projects in Armenia are increased year by year, including North-South highways, power station construction, mineral water factory, clothing factories, etc.

However, the development potential of Chinese-Armenian economic relations has not been fully realized yet.

In terms of trade, China welcomes Armenian commodities to explore the Chinese market and share China's development opportunities. It is highly recommended for Armenia to increase the promotion of its own products in China, actively organize enterprises to participate in various trade promotion activities in China, promote the export of Armenian superior products, and promote the development of trade between the two countries. In terms of investment, we recommend Armenia to continue improvement of its business environment, introduce preferential policies to attract foreign investment, maintain policy stability, and timely introduce and disclose project conditions. The Chinese Embassy in Armenia will actively promote investment.

Armenia has always wanted to attract more Chinese tourists, Yerevan may also become a transit point for European countries, direct flights between Armenia and China have not been opened for a long time. What do you think is the problem?

The Armenian government attaches great importance to the development of tourism and considers it as one of the priority areas of economic development. Chinese government is willing to actively deepen touristic cooperation with Armenia. In recent years, personnel exchanges between the two countries have become increasingly frequent. In 2018, the number of Chinese tourists visiting Armenia was 9,189, comparing to the same period was increased by 59.9%, in 2019 the number of Chinese tourists visiting Armenia reached to 15,550, making a significant year-on-year increase of 69.2%. At the beginning of 2020, the agreement on mutual exemption of visas for holders of ordinary passports between the two countries came into effect. Affected by the epidemic, the global aviation logistics and tourism industry will suffer a greater impact from 2020 to the first half of this year, and the number of tourists will drop sharply. We believe that in the post-epidemic era, the number of Chinese tourists visiting Armenia is expected to continue to recover and grow.

Regarding the opening of direct flights, we are willing to work with relevant Armenian authorities to continue to promote the opening of direct flights between the two countries. Of course, opening of the direct flights is not an easy task to complete, for airlines, the passenger flow is the key. In short, only a certain number of passenger flows can ensure that airlines do not lose money in their operations. At present, most of the international tourists visiting Armenia are from Russia, Georgia, Ukraine, Central Asia and other countries and regions of the former Soviet Union. For Chinese tourists, Armenia is still a niche country with few Chinese tourists considering Armenia as a direct tourist destination country. We recommend to increase the promotion of Chinese tourists. The exhibition is a good way of publicity. Every year, China hosts China International Fair for Trade in Services and China International Import Expos. Relevant Armenian departments are welcome to participate in the exhibition. At present, there is no shortage of direct flights between China and Europe. There are even multiple daily flights from major Chinese cities to central European cities. What if Armenia has sufficient policies or other attractions to stop international tourists from transiting? This question is worthy for the Armenian government and business friends to study.

Chinese aviation companies such as China Southern Airlines are actively researching concerning the opening of direct flights to Armenia, but this process has been affected in the context of the epidemic. After the epidemic eases, China hopes to discuss the details of cooperation with relevant departments in Armenia.

The integrity and security of Armenias borders worry us most. What is Chinese vision on that?

China respects the independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity of Armenia. Chinese side welcomes Russia, Armenia and Azerbaijans conclusion of the "Nagorno-Karabakh conflict" ceasefire tripartite agreement last year, and hopes that all parties concerned will earnestly abide by the ceasefire agreement and resolve conflicts and differences through political dialogue. China has noticed the recent tensions in the Armenian-Azerbaijani border area. Azerbaijan and Armenia are both friendly and cooperative partners of China. The two countries are neighbors. Friends can be chosen but neighbors cannot. China sincerely hopes that the two sides will resolve their conflicts through dialogue and consultation, work together to maintain regional peace and stability and peoples peace of life.

You met with the minister of Economy of Armenia. What development plans and prospects did you mainly discuss?

Recently, I had a working exchange with Mr. Kerobyan, Minister of Economy of Armenia. Mr. Minister showed out some project cooperation suggestions, including science and technology city, free industrial park, non-ferrous metal smelting, chemical plant transformation, agricultural land and effective use of water resources, etc., he also mentioned the issue of direct aviation between the two countries. Of course, the above-mentioned projects need to be supported by in-depth demonstration and more program details. China is pleased to see the two countries deepen practical and friendly cooperation and will encourage enterprises to actively study the possibility of investment and cooperation in Armenian projects.

In addition to lack of stability, what do you think Armenia lacks to attract Chinese investment (in Georgia, Chinese companies get huge tax incentives when investing in Georgia)?

At present, Armenia has listed attracting foreign investment as an important development direction. I think this is right. Formulating preferential policies for attracting foreign investment and maintaining policy stability and predictability are necessary to increase the confidence of foreign capital in operating in Armenia. Armenia is relatively closed and the logistics is not flexible. This is an important reason that affects the exchanges between China and Armenia and this is a problem that needs to be improved and resolved. Armenia has a creative nation, and companies often propose cooperation ideas to us. If we can formulate specific and operational business plans for these ideas, it will be very beneficial to attract foreign investment. China and Armenia are far apart, many Chinese people don't know much about Armenia. It is recommended to learn from Georgia's wine promotion and develop a special marketing plan for the Chinese market to expand the sales of Armenian products in China and attract Chinese tourists.

Armenias cooperation with the SCO is very weak, and it has not participated in One belt, one road initiative on a large scale like the Central Armenian countries. Does China have a regional development plan in Armenia like in Central Armenian countries?

One Belt, One Road initiative and the SCO are important platforms for China and Eurarmenian regions to carry out cooperation in various fields. At present, China and some countries have jointly formulated cooperation plans in certain areas. If Armenia is involved in One Belt, One Road and China is willing to conduct in-depth communication with Armenia regarding any ideas about cooperation in Central Asia under the framework of the "Shanghai Cooperation Organization".

I heard that you have practiced Chinese Kung Fu and are very interested in Chinese sports culture. The 24th Winter Olympics and Paralympics will be held in Beijing and Zhangjiakou, China in February next year. At present, less than 8 months left before the opening of the Beijing Winter Olympics, Beijing is confident to offer a wonderful, extraordinary and outstanding Olympic Games to the world. At 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics, the Armenian delegation achieved excellent results, and Beijing is a blessed place. Winter sports are not very popular in Armenia, but we sincerely welcome the Armenian delegation to participate in the competitions and make efforts to promote the Olympic spirit of "faster, higher and stronger"
Armenian News - NEWS.am presents the daily digest of Armenia-related top news as of 18.06.21:

 Today was the last day of the agitation campaign for the Armenian snap parliamentary elections.

Until the end of voting at the elections at 8 pm on Sunday, any campaigning for or against political forces claiming to enter the National Assembly of Armenia of the 8th convocation is prohibited in the country.

Large fines and other penalties were imposed for violating the ban on campaigning. Before the day of the elections, the voters have time to think and make a deliberate choice.

The two main rivals are the Armenia bloc - led by second president Robert Kocharyan - and Civil Contract Party - led by acting PM Nikol Pashinyan.

 Bodies of three more Armenian soldiers have been found in territories of Artsakh [Nagorno-Karabakh] seized by Azerbaijan.

Armenia will designate forensic medicine expert examination to identify the bodies.

Since the truce, the remains of a total of 1,579 servicemen have been found in the territories that are no longer under the control of Artsakh.

 The Prosecutor General's Office of Azerbaijan has announced a search for a group of Russian Armenian businessmen, led by chairman Ara Abrahamyan of the Union of Armenians of Russia.

According to Baku, they 'expose the aggressive nature of Armenia, which has turned terrorism into one of the main tools of its aggressive policy supporting terrorism at the state level.'

The Prosecutor General's Office states that all possible measures are being taken to bring the perpetrators of these and other similar crimes to justice in accordance with international law.

 The British government supported a London-listed mining company that stands to profit from the recent war between Armenia and Azerbaijan, openDemocracy reported.

The British embassy in Baku, Azerbaijans capital, offered to help Anglo Asian Mining after diplomats learned that the company was set to secure access to mining concessions in the disputed territory of Nagorno-Karabakh [(Artsakh)] and other adjacent districts.

The UKs ambassador to Azerbaijan, James Sharp, met with Anglo Asian at the height of the conflict, according to email correspondence released under Freedom of Information. After the meeting, Anglo Asian sent Sharp a follow-up email containing information about gold deposits in Nagorno-Karabakh and the surrounding territories.

Embassy officials later offered to discreetly raise issues and questions on Anglo Asians behalf at a meeting with Azerbaijans state-owned mining company.

 Russia is in close contact with Turkey, Armenia, and Azerbaijan to stabilize the situation in Nagorno-Karabakh [(Artsakh)], Dmitry Peskov, spokesman for the Russian president, told TASS.

https://news.am/eng/news/649621.html

Peskov also noted that Russia is closely following the information about the possibility of establishing a Turkish military base in Azerbaijan.

"Undoubtedly, this issue is at the center of our attention," he said.

 As of Friday morning, 86 new cases of the coronavirus were confirmed in Armenia, and the total number of these cases has reached 224,086 in the country.

Also, one more death from COVID-19 was registered, making the respective total 4,492 cases.

The number of people who have recovered over the past one day is 238, the total respective number so far is 215,893.
We strongly condemn the prosecution carried out by Azerbaijan against the Armenian prisoners of war and captured civilians on false charges. This is stated in the statement of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Armenia regarding the inadmissibility of the false charges against Armenian POWs and captured civilians.

According to international law prisoners of war cannot be prosecuted for their participation in the military actions. At the same time, amid the policy of widespread hatred against Armenians in Azerbaijan and the state-sponsored racism, it is obvious that the ongoing trials cannot be fair and transparent.

In addition, the hostage taking and kidnapping of civilians are further gross violations of numerous norms of international law.

Another indication of war crimes and crimes against humanity is concealing the true number of the Armenian POWs and captured civilians and places of their detention by Azerbaijan.

Azerbaijan continues to blatantly violate a number of fundamental documents it has adhered to, including the European Convention on Human Rights, the UN Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the UN Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment or Punishment and, particularly, the Third Geneva Convention.

Thus, we strongly condemn the illegal decision of the Baku Court, announced on June 14, sentencing civilian Vicken Euljekjian, citizen of Armenia and Lebanon, to 20 years of imprisonment. He was kidnapped by the Azerbaijani armed forces the day after the signing of the Novermber 9, 2020, trilateral statement, while the court decision was based on forced confessions obtained through torture.

Equally deplorable is the initiation of trumped-up criminal proceedings and criminal prosecution against the servicemen captured as a result of military operation by Azerbaijan towards Hin Tagher and Khtsaberd villages of the Hadrut Region of Artsakh which were under the control of the Armenian forces - in violation of the first provision of the November 9 trilateral statement.

The video coverage of the conversation between the Presidents of Turkey Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev on June 15, within the framework of the visit to the city of Shushi of the Republic of Artsakh, which is currently under the Azerbaijani occupation, proves that in the post-war period the issue of prisoners of war is used by Azerbaijan for political purposes as an instrument of pressure against Armenia, which is also a blatant violation of the November 9 trilateral statement. This fact once again attests to Azerbaijan's consistent policy of non-compliance with its own commitments.

We call on our international partners, as well as human rights watchdogs to strongly condemn the gross violations of international law by Azerbaijan and demand the termination of false criminal cases and the immediate repatriation of Armenian prisoners of war.
Story Highlights Majority of Ethiopians (55%) say they are confident in honesty of elections

Skepticism creeping up in recent years

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- After a series of delays, Ethiopians head to the ballot box on Monday to vote in the country's first national election since Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed took power in 2018.

In late 2020, just prior to the start of the Tigray conflict and after elections were delayed the first time because of the pandemic, more than half of Ethiopians (55%) expressed confidence in the honesty of elections. Ethiopians' trust in their elections has narrowed since Ahmed's ascendance and the limited political opening it created.

Line graph. A slim majority of Ethiopians expressed confidence in the honesty of their elections and 38% are not confident.

The election, twice postponed from its original August 2020 scheduled date, was once expected to be a potential turning point for a country that brought youthful leadership to power following years of unrest.

Shortly after taking office in April 2018, the country's 41-year-old prime minister made international headlines by welcoming back exiled political groups and quickly making peace with enemy Eritrea -- actions that won him both the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize and an 89% approval rating domestically in July 2018, with majority approval in every region. His current approval stands at 77%.

Monday's election takes place amid a much darker backdrop, as reports of political arrests increase and conflict rages on in the northern Tigray region over accusations of human rights abuses and potential famine. Still, despite these crises and the ruling Prosperity Party's structural advantages that limit opposition competition, there may be reason to believe that the conduct of these elections may be an improvement.

Civil society organizations are expected to play an enhanced role, and the National Election Board of Ethiopia has grown increasingly independent under the leadership of former political prisoner and exile, Birtukan Mideksa. Next week's parliamentary elections could mark a messy but important step on Ethiopia's political and democratic journey -- or a slide back toward authoritarianism and conflict.

To stay up to date with the latest Gallup News insights and updates, follow us on Twitter.

Learn more about how the Gallup World Poll works.
He joins LIVEKINDLY Collective from Tyson Foods, the world's second largest processor and marketer of chicken, beef and pork, where he held several leadership roles since 2006. His tenure spanned across international operations, corporate strategy and business development and included the Chief Operating Officer role for China and the Chief Executive Officer role for India. Sadiq most recently served as Senior Vice President, Global Sourcing and Business Optimization, driving the growth strategy for the international business. At LIVEKINDLY Collective, he will oversee global operations across the companys portfolio of innovative plant-based brands available to consumers in 40 countries.

Our business is built on purpose, and Malik brings not only his deep expertise, but his kindness and genuine passion for making the global food system sustainable, said Kees Kruythoff, CEO and Chairman of LIVEKINDLY Collective. Malik comes to the Collective with 15 years of global operational experience and leadership in the food industry, which will be critical as we expand our footprint internationally and accelerate our mission of making plant-based living the new norm.

I am excited and inspired by LIVEKINDLY Collectives mission and unique model, which brings together visionary founders, entrepreneurs and global leaders, said Malik Sadiq. We are at a crossroads, and the future is in our hands. Together, we have an enormous opportunity to lead the global consumer movement toward plant-based food and drive sustainable, meaningful change.

About LIVEKINDLY Collective

LIVEKINDLY Collective was founded by Blue Horizon Group on the belief that plant-based alternatives have the power to make the global food system sustainable. Its mission is to make plant-based living the new norm. As a collective of founders, entrepreneurs and business leaders from across the globe, LIVEKINDLY Collective is uniquely positioned to create impact with speed, at scale. Through its portfolio of brands, Oumph!, The Fry Family Food Co., LikeMeat, No Meat and The Dutch Weed Burger LIVEKINDLY Collective is providing consumers around the world with healthy, sustainable, delicious food options. Furthermore, the company is the voice of the plant-based movement, communicating informative, entertaining and inspiring content through its media and lifestyle platform, LIVEKINDLY, at www.livekindly.com and @livekindlyco on Instagram. LIVEKINDLY Collective has 500 employees and sells in more than 40 countries around the world. To learn more, visit www.thelivekindlyco.com.
There was cake. There was singing. There was a festive hat for the birthday boy.

And within a day of Sammy celebrating his 19th birthday in style, there was an adoption.

Sammy had a week to remember at the Cincinnati Animal CARE adoption center. Pictures of his birthday party this week helped the senior cat go viral, and then adoption requests poured in.

Happy birthday to this beautiful fella who would love a nice, quiet home to live out his golden years! the animal shelter wrote. The only rule for adopting Sammy though? You have to throw him a 20th birthday party on 6/15/22!

Pictures show the cat wearing a top hat and eating a birthday treat as streamers surrounded his crate. There was even a plush birthday cake toy near him as workers sang Happy Birthday.

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Sammy had only been with the animal rescue for a week, the shelter wrote in a Facebook comment. He was sent there when his owner had to go into assisted living and could no longer care for Sammy.

Many people commented on Facebook that they would love to rescue Sammy. But before the animal shelter posted Sammys birthday photos, there was already interest in adopting the 19-year-old cat.

The animal center said a woman who messaged about Sammy before he became internet famous was waiting at the center ready to adopt him.

He is going home with a fellow senior kitty and has already been spoiled with a new hat, the animal center wrote Wednesday.

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Many people thanked the animal rescue for caring for Sammy and also thanked his new family.

What an amazing day for handsome Sammy. Bless his new family for giving him such happiness, one woman wrote.

This is Amazing!! He had an amazing birthday and got to go home with his new mom, said another commenter.

Cincinnati Animal CARE said a room at the center that houses adult cats has been renamed Sammys Senior Center. Around 10 senior cats are available for adoption at the rescue center.

Mysterious cat scare empties Pennsylvania school - and leads to a heartfelt reunion

Story continues

Borderline tolerable cat seeking jerk owner, Ohio rescue says. She is not cute

Determined stray dog tries 5 times to steal a stuffed unicorn from NC Dollar General

Dog named Jake from State Farm may be worlds most unlucky pet, NC shelter reveals
EXCLUSIVE: Cheers erupted at Dulles International Airport outside Washington D.C. as an Afghan combat translator, his wife and four young children arrived at the baggage carousel after a harrowing three and a half year wait for a Special Immigrant Visa after risking his life working for the U.S. military and facing death threats from the Taliban as U.S. troops hasten their withdrawal.

"Although it was a long journey for us, the visa process took a long time, like three and a half years, but finally [we] made it," the man who asked not to be identified told Fox News. "I feel safe. You know, I feel really good because I survived from many threats."

Fearful the Taliban will target his family back in Afghanistan he asked that Fox News refer to him by a pseudonym: Sediq. He received his SIV visa on May 27  one of the few that the State Department has approved despite the 18,000 Afghans who have provided the documentation that they worked for the U.S. government and are still waiting. Visa approval has slowed to a trickle despite promises from State Department officials to expedite them.

DEFENSE SECRETARY LLOYD AUSTIN: AL QAEDA COULD REGROUP IN AFGHANISTAN IN 2 YEARS

Asked if he is worried about those left behind, Sediq answered, "Of course. Of course. We hope that they should not get forgotten and they should get fully supported and they should receive their visa like me, and they should come to the United States and start a better life."

And if they dont receive help from the U.S. government before U.S. troops leave this summer?

"The bad guys will find them and they will kill them," Sediq said before heading to the airport Marriott with his children who were handed American flags and flowers when they landed by U.S. military veterans from the American Legion, No One Left Behind and Keeping Our Promise, Rochester who waited for 3 hours to greet Sediq and his family with t-shirts saying "Welcome Home."

Story continues

Another group of 5 Afghans, who said they had worked for the CIA in Kunar Province, before receiving their Special Immigrant Visas (SIV) three years ago awaited a cousin, who also had worked for the U.S. government and was arriving from Kabul on the same flight as Sediq. They showed Fox News photos of them with one of their CIA bosses who had come to visit them at their new home in D.C. from West Virginia. They said they have started a new life in the U.S. and are driving for Uber to make ends meet.

When their cousin emerged Fox News asked him about his family members who were not able to join him due to last minute bureaucratic hurdles from the U.S. embassy.

US TROOP WITHDRAWAL FROM AFGHANISTAN BEGINS AS TALIBAN RAMPS UP DEADLY BOMBINGS

"They want to come all our family to here because to be safe," the Afghan SIV who asked that Fox News use only one name, Hekmatyar, to disguise his identity. "Right now in Afghanistan, my family and my kid, they are not coming outside. Somebody kidnap him and somebody kill him, they want to kill him."

And then there was Sam - an Iraqi translator who became the State Department's first Special Immigrant visa recipient in 2006 and now serves in the U.S. Air Force - he came to welcome Sediq and his family to America. He became a U.S. citizen in 2012 and now works at Andrews Air Force Base.

"I was in their shoes over 15 years ago. And I really appreciated the fact that I was welcomed by a lot of people and those who made me feel that this is my home now," Sam told Fox News.

He testified to Congress in 2007 about the dangers faced by those working with the U.S. military.

Sen. Ted Kennedy took up his case at the time and the Special Immigrant Visa program was born.

"I honestly believed I would be killed. I too have been targeted for my death," Sam told the Senate Judiciary Committee from behind a screen. "My name was listed on the doors of several mosques calling for my death. Suppose a friend of mine saw my name on the list and turned on me because they believed I was a traitor?" That is the fear shared by those who worked with the U.S. government in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"I've seen this scenario in Iraq and I would hate to see it happen again in Afghanistan," Sam said in an interview with Fox News.

"I've actually lost personal friends and colleagues who supported the Americans."

U.S. officials say there is no plan to evacuate these Afghan translators. Secretary of State Tony Blinken said this recently on CNN's "State of the Union": "Evacuation is the wrong word. We're determined to make good on our obligation to those who helped us, who put their lives on the line, put their families' lives on the line working with our military, working with our diplomats."

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But the U.S. Embassy visa section is closed for interviews due to a recent COVID outbreak, meaning Sediq may be one of the last Special Immigrant Visas stamped before the U.S. military pulls out completely, which could happen as early as July 4.

Lawmakers are demanding President Biden act or order an evacuation before it's too late.

Former Army Ranger Cong Jason Crow of Colorado served in Iraq and Afghanistan. He has joined forces with Rep. Michael Waltz, R-Fla., a former Green Beret who held a press conference in front of the Capitol Wednesday.

"We are here today to urge the Biden administration. To do the right thing and to evacuate those who stood by us at great personal risk," Crow said. Waltz added a direct challenge to Biden who famously said in 1975 that the U.S. did not have an obligation to evacuate those Vietnamese who worked with the U.S. military and government.

"I want to be clear, if he doesn't act and he doesn't get these people out, blood will be on his hands and on his administration's hands," Waltz said. "And I, for one, will very publicly and very loudly hold him accountable for that."

Crow added: "There is a moral imperative at play here. The American handshake has to mean something."

Rep. Peter Meijer, R-Mich., added from the House floor: "President Biden ended the remain in Mexico policy for economic migrants but insists on remain in Afghanistan policy for Afghans who risked their lives to help American forces. While they wait the Taliban are hunting them down. Dozens have already been killed while bureaucrats dither. We cannot abandon our Afghan allies to die."

18,000 Afghans who risked their lives for the U.S. government are awaiting their fate in Afghanistan as U.S. troops pack up and leave.
The Telegraph

A statue of Diana, Princess of Wales, unveiled by her two sons this afternoon, is based on the final period of her life as she "gained confidence" in her humanitarian role. A joint statement was issued on behalf of both the Duke of Cambridge and the Duke of Sussex at the short but poignant ceremony in the Sunken Garden at Kensington Palace, the princess's former home, on what would have been her 60th birthday. The statue was designed to reflect the late Princesss "warmth, elegance and energy" a
When former President Donald Trump nominated Justice Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court last fall, many Democrats warned she would sink Obamacare.

Barrett blew that prediction out of the water on Thursday when she voted with the courts 7-2 majority to uphold the Affordable Care Act. For people who had been watching one of the years biggest Supreme Court cases closely, her decision came as no surprise.

SUPREME COURT FINDS TEXAS HAS NO STANDING TO CHALLENGE OBAMACARE

There was nothing in Justice Barretts career as a judge or a scholar that suggested she would be remotely sympathetic to the arguments presented in this case, said Jonathan Adler, a law professor at Case Western Reserve University.

Barrett was never likely to be a pivotal vote in a case that was almost certain to fail from the start, Adler told the Washington Examiner. And, he said, given the fact Barrett has voted in a non-ideological manner throughout her career, there was little reason to believe she would change with the Obamacare case.

In her brief time on the court, Justice Barrett has shown herself to be a thoughtful, independent jurist who carefully considers the merits of the cases before her, Adler said, adding that anyone who painted her otherwise owes her an apology.

Barrett faced fierce opposition during her confirmation hearings for alleged zealotry on the Obamacare case, prompting protesters to gather on Capitol Hill to speak against her nomination. In Congress, many Democrats characterized Barrett as the possible decisive vote against former President Barack Obamas signature achievement.

Rhode Island Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse was one of the strongest voices against her. He argued Barrett would be a judicial torpedo to Obamacare. Then-presidential candidate Joe Biden was also a harsh critic, telling reporters on the campaign trail Barrett was dangerous because she wants to get rid of the Affordable Care Act.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi offered equally dire predictions.

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"If this nominee is confirmed, millions of families healthcare will be ripped away in the middle of a pandemic that has infected 7 million Americans and killed over 200,000 people in our country," she said before Barrett's confirmation hearings began.

But when the court actually heard arguments in the case, just days after the presidential election, nearly every justice, including Barrett, showed strong skepticism to the challenge raised by Texas and joined by 17 other states and the Trump administration.

At the time, many of the justices and attorneys involved in the case focused on whether the individual mandate, which Congress eliminated in 2017, was severable from the rest of the law. The challengers argued because the mandate no longer existed, the whole law became unconstitutional. The justices were unconvinced by that argument.

Barrett did not focus so much on severability as she did on the question of standing, which is how the case was eventually decided. Along with several other justices, she argued because the mandate was set at zero, it was hard to conceive how Texas could prove it was harmed by the act.

Justice Stephen Breyer made an argument along these lines in his majority opinion, which Barrett joined.

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Upholding Obamacare is not necessarily an outcome many Republicans desire, but the case revealed Barrett has integrity, according to Carrie Severino, president of Judicial Crisis Network. Any suggestion she would strike it down was a smear campaign, she added.

That was crazy talk, and the Left knew it, Severino said.

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Tags: News, Amy Coney Barrett, Obamacare, Supreme Court, Senate Democrats, Donald Trump, Nancy Pelosi, Joe Biden, Sheldon Whitehouse

Original Author: Nicholas Rowan

Original Location: How Amy Coney Barrett's vote on Obamacare case proved the Democrats wrong
The Guardian

The former president appeared to mount a typically Trumpian bid to focus attention away from the growing scandal at his company Donald Trump at the border on Wednesday. A report by the Brookings Institution thinktank in Washington argues that Trump is at serious risk of eventual criminal indictment in New York state. Photograph: Brandon Bell/Zuma/Rex/Shutterstock No one could accuse Donald Trump of lying low when the long arm of the law finally caught up with him. On Wednesday the former US pr
MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP)  Many Americans are relaxing precautions taken during the COVID-19 pandemic and resuming everyday activities, even as some worry that coronavirus-related restrictions were hastily lifted, a new poll shows.

The poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research finds that majorities of Americans who were regularly doing so before the pandemic say they are returning to bars or restaurants, traveling and attending events such as movies or sports.

Just 21% are very or extremely worried about a COVID-19 infection in their inner circle  the lowest level since the pandemic began  and only 25% are highly concerned that the lifted restrictions will lead to additional people being infected in their community.

Andrea Moran, a 36-year-old freelance writer and mother of two boys, said she feels both relief and joy at the chance to resume doing the little things, such as having drinks on a restaurant patio with her husband.

Honestly, I almost cried, Moran said. Its such a feeling of having been through the wringer, and were finally starting to come out of it.

Still, 34% of Americans think restrictions in their area have been lifted too quickly, while somewhat fewer  27%  say they were not lifted quickly enough. About 4 in 10 rate the pace of reopening about right.

The way Americans approached their daily lives suddenly changed after COVID-19 spread through the U.S. in early 2020. Following the advice of health officials and governments, people isolated in their homes  either alone or with families  to avoid exposure to the virus, which has sickened more than 33 million people and killed 600,000 people in the U.S.

During the height of the pandemic, restaurants, movie theaters and stores either closed or continued operating with limited occupancy; church services, schools and government meetings went virtual; and many employers made working from home an option or a requirement. Mask wearing in public became the norm in most places, with some states and cities making it mandatory.

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The emergence of the vaccine has helped slow down rates of infection and death, allowing state and local economies to reopen and leading Americans to return to activities they once enjoyed.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advised last month that vaccinated Americans dont have to wear a mask in most scenarios, indoors or out. The latest CDC data shows 53% of all Americans  65% of those 18 and older  have received at least one dose of the vaccine.

According to the AP-NORC poll, American adults who have not yet rolled up their sleeves for the shot remain hesitant to do so. Just 7% of those who have not been vaccinated say they definitely will get a COVID-19 vaccine, and 15% say they probably will.

Forty-six percent of Americans who have not been vaccinated say they will definitely not get a vaccine, and 29% say they probably will not. Young adults, Americans without a college degree, white evangelicals, rural Americans and Republicans are most hesitant to get vaccinated.

The poll finds many Americans are still wearing masks and taking precautions to avoid contact with other people, but the percentage of those doing so is down significantly from just a few months ago.

In late February, 65% said they were always wearing a mask around people outside their households. Now, just 37% say so, though 19% say they often wear one.

Forty percent of Americans say they are extremely or very likely to wear a mask when participating in indoor activities outside their homes, while just 28% say the same about outdoor activities.

Aaron Siever, 36, of New Market, Virginia, said he and his wife have consistently worn masks and taken other precautions, including getting vaccinated. But Siever said virus-related restrictions were not lifted quickly enough, lamenting that some precautions were politicized and caused an inherent panic.

I think with masks being worn and people getting vaccinated, I think we could have opened a little earlier, said Siever, who maintains the grounds of Civil War battlefields in Virginia. We started focusing on the politics of reopening, rather than the health.

Now that most states have lifted restrictions, the poll finds about two-thirds of Americans who used to travel at least monthly say they will do so in the next few weeks. About three-quarters of frequent restaurant or bar-goers before the pandemic say they will now return. A year ago, only about half said they would travel or go to restaurants if they could.

Likewise, more are returning to activities such as visiting friends and family, seeing movies or concerts, attending sporting events and shopping in-person for nonessential items.

In Cookeville, Tennessee, Moran said her family still regularly wears masks in public, especially when they are indoors or around a lot of people. Both she and her husband have been vaccinated. Moran said she has eaten at outdoor restaurants, but she is avoiding indoor dining.

Even if the air conditioning circulation is good, I just dont feel comfortable right now going inside, where theres a lot of people in fairly close proximity who I dont know, Moran said.

Moran said her family avoided nonessential travel during the height of the pandemic, canceling a trip to see her brother in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. But last weekend, the family traveled for the first time in more than a year  a roughly 3 1/2-hour road trip to Asheville, North Carolina, to visit a childhood friend.

I felt a little bit nervous just because being around people is such a surreal thing after so long, Moran said. I was really excited and I was thrilled for my kids that they were able to get out and get back to some semblance of normality.

___

Fingerhut reported from Washington.

___

The AP-NORC poll of 1,125 adults was conducted June 10-14 using a sample drawn from NORCs probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for all respondents is plus or minus 4.2 points.
Writer Janet Malcolm battles leaves the Federal Courthouse in San Francisco in 1993 after the libel trial brought by psychoanalyst Jeffrey Masson. (George Nikitin / Associated Press)

One fall night in 1992, I was slumped at the cash register of an East Village bookstore, reading The Journalist and the Murderer, a chronicle of seduction and betrayal by Janet Malcolm, the peerless journalist who died Wednesday.

The book, wisely shorn of a subtitle, has a distinctive cover  pale yellow with block letters. One of the shops patrons asked me what I thought of it, and we agreed: Its a marvel, both chilling and incendiary, and really nothing short of a book-length siege. Malcolm locks a vise on the reader from the first sentence  her pitiless assertion that journalism is morally indefensible. And youre immobilized till the end when she turns her gimlet eye on the stupidity of journalistic subjects.

Like the young Aztec men and women selected for sacrifice, who lived in delightful ease and luxury until the appointed day when their hearts were to be carved from their chests, journalistic subjects know all too well what awaits them when the days of wine and roses  the days of the interviews  are over. And still they say yes when a journalist calls, and still they are astonished when they see the flash of the knife.

The bookstore patron, Rob Boynton, a journalist himself, eventually asked why I was working the nightshift at a 24-hour bookstore that seemed to specialize in Conspiracy Magazine for men and manuals on how to find love for women. When I stammered something about money, he mentioned an opening for a fact-checker at the New Yorker.

I took the A-train from Brooklyn to midtown the next day, and to my surprise, got the job. The only hitch was a shortage of cubicles, so my boss installed me in the windowless office of one of the staff writers who rarely came in: Janet Malcolm.

During the two or three times that Malcolm popped into her office, always gracious, to grab a book by Hannah Arendt or Susan Sontag, I never told her the story. Yes, I was starstruck. But the serendipity would have been too cute for her, or so I imagined; she seemed to prefer her stories tart. Her great gift was dismantling sentimental or melodramatic fairy tales, and what would happen if she suspected I wasnt telling the whole truth about the bookstore night? Id almost certainly spill my guts or otherwise disclose embarrassing secrets.

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Shame is the fate of Malcolms interview subjects. In Malcolms 1997 book Psychoanalysis: The Impossible Profession, the pseudonymous Aaron Green drops his professional authority within minutes of meeting the writer and treats her to a florid display of neuroses. And while Jeffrey Masson in In the Freud Archives clearly considers himself the soul of charm, he comes across, in Malcolms observation, as a vain dilettante and world-historical jerk.

Unlike most contemporary journalists, who tend to see themselves as storytellers more than philosophers, Malcolm had a rigorous critical methodology and a vital theory of selfhood. Near the start of The Impossible Profession, her 1981 book, she introduces her conviction that the most precious and inviolate of entities  personal relations  is actually a messy jangle of misapprehensions, at best an uneasy truce between powerful solitary fantasy systems.

Philosophical consistency is not easy for journalists, especially for reporters who must get deep into particulars. But somehow Malcolm was, for the length of her career, true to her premise that relationships are determined largely by confusion and delusion. Her work was in exposing the misunderstandings and self-serving fantasies, to lay bare the richness of reality. In 1995, in an article about Bloomsbury called A House of Ones Own, she scoffs at the central piety of modernism  that history moves from from social backwardness to social progress  and shows passion less about human lives than about the workshop where biographical narratives are manufactured.

There were two narrative workshops she toured most scrupulously: the ones that created the trope of the long-suffering poet Sylvia Plath and the one that created Long Beach doctor Jeffrey MacDonald. In Malcolm's telling, Plath, who died of suicide in 1963, and MacDonald, who is in prison for murdering his family, are far more complex than their biographers pretend. In The Silent Woman (about Plath) and The Journalist and the Murderer (about MacDonald), she argues that feminine suffering and masculine psychopathy are inadequate to the task of describing anyone, really. They had been forced on Plath and MacDonald by their fans and detractors, who had their own motives, sometimes pathological, for razing nuance.

At one point, Malcolm called herself the fallen woman of journalism. Indeed, some quarters tried to cancel her, mostly for spilling trade secrets about how journalists, especially the bestselling writer Joe McGinniss , got their subjects to trust them, only to julienne them in print. Malcolm was sued for defamation by the psychoanalyst Masson, who didnt do much to reverse her portrait of him as a jerk when he acted with operatic indignation and then lost the case.

Ive kept in touch with Rob from the bookstore over the decades, and right after we met he published a piece called Whos Afraid of Janet Malcolm?  probably the best thing ever written about her. I emailed him the other day to fact-check this piece, as I had learned to do at the New Yorker in the job that sent me on a path to journalism. He corrected some errors in it and tested my memory on some of the richer details that I'd omitted from that first bookstore encounter. We had no reason to clear up anything, though, content with Malcolms implied blessing to leave the happy friendship a jangle of misapprehensions, at best an uneasy truce between powerful solitary fantasy systems.

Virginia Heffernan is a regular contributor to the Times Opinion section.





This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
CANBERRA, Australia (AP)  A former Australian spy was released from court on Friday with a three-month suspended prison sentence over his attempt to help East Timor prove that Australia spied on the fledgling nation during multibillion-dollar oil and gas negotiations.

The former spy, publicly known as Witness K, and his lawyer, Bernard Collaery, had been charged in 2018 with conspiring to reveal secret information to the East Timorese government.

Former East Timor President and Prime Minister Jose Ramos-Horta is among leaders of the impoverished half-island nation of 1.5 million to urge Australia to drop the persecutions.

K pleaded guilty on Thursday at the beginning of a two-day sentencing hearing in the Australian Capital Territory Magistrates Court. The public and media were excluded when classified evidence was discussed.

Magistrate Glenn Theakston sentenced K to three months in prison fully suspended. K, who was hidden behind black screens in the courtroom throughout the hearing, must also pay a 1,000 Australian dollar ($840) security bond to be of good behavior for 12 months.

K had faced up to two years in prison. The maximum has been increased since his offense to 10 years as Australia tightens controls on secrecy.

The Australian government has refused to comment on allegations that K led an Australian Secret Intelligence Service operation that bugged government offices in the East Timorese capital, Dili, in 2004 during negotiations on the sharing of oil and gas revenue from the seabed that separates the two countries.

The government canceled Ks passport before he was to testify at the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague in 2014 in support of East Timors challenge to the validity of the 2006 treaty.

The East Timorese argued that the treaty was invalid because Australia had failed to negotiate in good faith by engaging in espionage.

There was no evidence heard in open court of a bugging operation, which media had reported was conducted under the guise of a foreign aid program.

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But K and Collaery had prepared for the East Timorese government two affidavits that identified K as a former ASIS member and details of ASIS functions.

Theakston noted that the case was unusual because Ks offense was committed in plain sight of Australian authorities.

That suggests to me it was brazen and indifferent or mistaken, Theakston said.

Theakston said it was open to him to find K had made a mistake rather than a deliberate breach based on a perception of justice.

The judge described K as an elderly man more than 70 years old who had had the threat of prison hanging over him for eight years.

The ASIS secrecy rules were strict and absolute for serving and former officers, Theakston said.

Defense lawyer Robert Richter said Mr. K had suffered from not being able to travel overseas with his wife because of the loss of his passport.

Richter blamed Ks post-traumatic stress disorder, clinical depression and anxiety for his offense. He argued for K to escape a conviction being recorded for reasons that will be made clear in closed court.

Collaery has pleaded not guilty and wants to fight the charge in an Australian Capital Territory Supreme Court trial without media or the public being excluded.

Collaery was allowed to sit in the public gallery of K's hearing during the closed and open hearings. Collaery declined to comment on the sentence.

Richter told The Associated Press, I think its a fair outcome.

Prosecutor Richard Maidment declined to comment on the result.

Australia and East Timor agreed on a new maritime border treaty in 2018. A year later, the Australian prime minister arrived in Dili to formalize the agreement and was targeted by street protests demanding charges against K and Collaery be dropped.
VIENNA (Reuters) -Austria will provide a million doses of coronavirus vaccine to the countries of the Western Balkans in addition to the doses it is funnelling towards the region on behalf of the European Union, Chancellor Sebastian Kurz said on Friday.

Kurz made the announcement after a summit with his counterparts from countries of the former Yugoslavia that are not EU member states. An envoy from Albania also attended.

Austria, the rump of an empire that stretched across the Western Balkans until its collapse a century ago, maintains close ties with the region, supporting EU membership bids and working with its countries on issues like migration. Austria is funnelling 651,000 vaccine doses to the region from the EU.

"Beyond that, we also want to make a contribution bilaterally as the Republic of Austria and we have decided as a government that we will make a million vaccine doses available to the states of the Western Balkans," Kurz told a news conference after the summit.

The doses will be delivered between August and the end of the year, he added, without saying which countries would receive them or how they would be distributed among them. He also did not say which specific vaccines they would be.

The EU doses of BioNTech-Pfizer vaccine that Austria is administering were allocated in April according to which countries needed them most, with Bosnia awarded the biggest number, followed by Albania and North Macedonia.

(Reporting by Francois Murphy; Editing by Jon Boyle and Philippa Fletcher)
Plumes of toxic oceanic bacteria known as red tide moved up the western Florida coast, strewing thousands of dead fish on beaches while state officials tried to reassure Floridians and potential tourists Thursday that the outbreak is being taken seriously but isn't as bad as it might seem.

As Florida's economy emerges from the devastation of the coronavirus pandemic, images of beaches littered with dead fish could keep visitors from flocking to seaside communities this summer.

Gov. Ron DeSantis said the bloom of red tide spreading around parts of Southwest Florida and Tampa Bay is not like the one that devastated the region in 2018.

I think we see some localized (red tide) ... but this is a great place to be," DeSantis said Thursday. "Theres very few places in this country that are as nice as this Tampa Bay region.

"The hotels, the restaurants, the beaches are open, he added.

The governor spoke during a roundtable with scientists and state environmental officials at the Fish and Wildlife Research Institute in St. Petersburg to discuss efforts to better understand and combat red tide.

Red tide: What to know about the potentially harmful algae bloom

What is red tide?

Red tide, which scientists call a harmful algae bloom, is caused by naturally occurring algae called Karenia brevis or K. brevis. When K. brevis appears in large quantities  typically in the Gulf of Mexico  it can turn ocean water red, brown or green.

K. brevis contains harmful toxins that can affect the nervous systems of fish, birds and mammals.

How does red tide affect wildlife?

Red tide can have debilitating effects on marine life. If the microorganisms are concentrated at more than a 10,000-cell-per-liter rate, fish of all kinds can die.

Florida's last major issues with the microorganism lasted from October 2017 to February 2019. It killed fish, dolphins, turtles and manatees.

Is red tide harmful to humans?

Most people can safely swim in red tide, but it can cause skin irritation and burning eyes. Inhaling the red tide toxins can lead to coughing, sneezing and teary eyes, though those symptoms are typically temporary.

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People with chronic respiratory issues such as asthma are advised to avoid red tide.

Salvatore Cuccia, 21, waits as a front loader picks up a bag of dead fish June 17 in Dunedin, Fla. Pinellas County had small boats retrieving dead fish in Dunedin and around Clearwater Harbor. The fish kill is attributed to a red tide bloom.

Where is there red tide?

Karenia brevis  the scientific name for red tide  has been detected around Port Manatee, where 215 million gallons of nitrogen-laden wastewater was dumped from the former Piney Point phosphate industrial site. Blooms also have been detected off several Manatee and Pinellas County beaches. Numerous fish kills were reported from Charlotte up to Pinellas.

Environmental officials reiterated during the roundtable discussion Thursday that the added nitrogen from Piney Point, which has shown to fuel algae, didnt cause the blooms.

I dont think you can make a definitive cause-and-effect type of relationship at this point, said Thomas Frazer, dean of the University of South Florida College of Marine Science. But what I can say is that we all understand that an increase in nutrient delivery to our coastal waters can exacerbate these blooms for some time.

Glenn Compton, chairman of the environmental advocacy group ManaSota-88, argued that its too early to say for sure that the bloom is not a direct result of red tide.

What is Florida doing to stem the tide?

Florida has worked to improve communication on red tide with different agencies and the public, including the addition of an interactive map that allows beachgoers to check conditions.

Since 2019, the state has dedicated millions of dollars toward research while reactivating the long-dormant red tide task force.

The state established the Florida Red Tide Mitigation and Technology Development Initiative, a partnership between the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission and Mote Marine Laboratory and Aquarium. That effort works to develop technologies and approaches to control and mitigate blooms.

Over the next six years, both agencies will receive $18 million to develop technologies to detect red tide.

Contributing: Bobby Caina Calvan, Associated Press

This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Florida red tide outbreak: State welcomes tourists amid algae bloom
President Joe Biden's performance at the meeting with foreign leaders in Britain last week was a disgrace. Biden cut deals with Britain that sold out America's interests, and for doing so, he won the worshipful accolades of the Europeans, the Brits, and the Canadians. It's amazing how popular you are at a party when you pay everyone's bills. Except Biden isn't spending his own money, of course. He's spending ours.

It would be an understatement to say that the Euroland leaders weren't big fans of Donald Trump. Trump went to the G-7 meetings and told his international peers that there was a new sheriff in town and that his foremost mission was to put America first. He canceled bad trade deals in which other countries were cheating. Trump insisted that the Germans, the French, and the Italians paid more of the NATO bills for their own defense. He pulled America out of the Paris climate accord in part because almost none of the other nations were abiding by it.

What a difference a new president makes. The Euroland leaders of the G-7 are beside themselves with joy over Biden's "cooperative tone" and concessions at the meetings in Britain this weekend. A Reuters headline captured the euphoria of the foreign heads of state: "G7 Sources Praise Biden after 'Complete Chaos of Trump."

Is anyone surprised by the lovefest? "It's great to have a U.S. president who is part of the club," France's Emmanuel Macron said in a lengthy statement, saturating the new American president with praise.

Why wouldn't Canada, Russia, and the Europeans be celebrating? Biden gave away the store. Let me count the ways:

1) He reiterated his promise that America will jump off the climate change cliff first and dismantle U.S. energy production as a sign of his commitment to stopping global warming. Yes, that is Vladimir Putin smiling. This reaffirmation of the U.S. undermining our own energy security, after Beijing announced it has no interest in compromising its economic prosperity in the name of global warming. They have more significant and more immediate ambitions than to worry about the planet's temperature in 50 or 75 years.

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2) He agreed to a global tax that will harmonize U.S. taxes with those of the socialist European nations and fight against international tax competition, which has historically benefited the United States. America is supposed to be the low-tax country globally, and now, we are ratcheting up our taxes to the levels commonplace in Europe. When Trump cut our tax rates, more than $1 trillion, much of it from socialist Europe, flowed into the U.S., financing new jobs and new enterprises. Now, Biden wants a U.S. rate that matches that of Europe and exceeds that of China.

3) Biden agreed to a "tax on tech" that will allow the Europeans and other international competitors to the U.S. to extract tens of billions of tax dollars every year from iconic American tech leaders such as Amazon, Apple, Google, Microsoft, and Facebook. Meanwhile, as the Wall Street Journal has pointed out, the Europeans continue to lobby to ensure that their large companies are exempt from these international taxes. What kind of president sells his own nation's companies down the river?

Don't be surprised if the Biden administration tells the Germans, the French, and the Italians that they can forget about those Trump demands that Europe pay more for their own defense at future NATO meetings. Uncle Sam is happy to keep picking up the tab.

Trump promoted American values and relentlessly fought for American interests when meeting with G-7 leaders. He told the Europeans that if they want to get richer, they should be more like us. Now, we have a president who wants America to be more like them.

This isn't leadership. It is a first step in surrendering America's power, prosperity, and sovereignty.

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Tags: White House, Joe Biden, United Kingdom, Foreign Policy, Climate Change, NATO, Taxes, Economy, Donald Trump

Original Author: Stephen Moore

Original Location: Biden economic strategy: Put America last
President Joe Biden on Friday nominated ex-Rep. Xochitl Torres Small to a top administration post, tapping a fourth House Democrat, but this time, the nominee is a former member.

Biden nominated the New Mexico Democrat to serve in the Agriculture Department as undersecretary of rural development.

Torres Small lost her bid for a second term to Republican Yvette Herrell in the 2020 election.

PUTIN SUMMIT GIVES BIDEN ANOTHER CHANCE TO SAY HE'S NOT TRUMP

Torres Small is the fourth House Democrat nominated to serve in the Biden administration. House Democrats earlier in the year expressed concern that the administrations desire to fill positions with House Democrats was depleting their very narrow majority. House Democrats now hold a four-seat advantage over the GOP.

Earlier this year, New Mexico Rep. Deb Haaland was confirmed in March to lead the Interior Department. Democratic Rep. Melanie Stansbury won a June special election to fill the seat, which was left vacant for three months.

In addition to Haaland, former Democratic Reps. Cedric Richmond of Louisiana and Marcia Fudge of Ohio joined the Biden administration earlier this year. Richmond serves as senior adviser to Biden, and Fudge leads the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

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House Speaker Nancy Pelosi praised Torres Smalls nomination in a Friday tweet.

Thrilled to hear @POTUS has nominated @xochnm to serve as USDA U-S of Rural Development, the California Democrat tweeted. In her home of Las Cruces & in Congress, Xochitl has dedicated years to advancing opportunity & prosperity, esp for our rural communities, so that all can share in the American Dream.



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Tags: News, Congress, Nancy Pelosi, Joe Biden, Biden Administration, Agriculture, Nominations

Original Author: Susan Ferrechio

Original Location: Biden plucks ex-House Democrat for Agriculture post
According to the Defense Departments Office of Inspector General, the Taliban has increased its violence against Afghan citizens since the beginning of the year. Peace talks with the Afghan government have led to a U.S. vow to pull troops from the country by Sept. 11. While Afghanistan gets most of the attention in the region, we, at least, are proposing a plan to neutralize anti-West terror development there. Well support intelligence, counter narcotics aid and freezing funds and assets going to terrorism. It may be idealistic, but at least its an attempt to get us out while stabilizing the region.

But the administration has no such plan for Afghanistans neighbor, Pakistan. Even though it hosted Osama bin Laden, a WorldPublicOpinion.org poll conducted 10 years after the 9/11 attacks found that 72 percent of Pakistani citizens said they didnt know who was responsible for the attacks.

Like Afghanistan, Pakistan is a world-leading narcotics supplier, where terrorists get most of their money as drug cartels. Al Qaida set up headquarters in Pakistans tribal areas after U.S. forces arrived in 2001. In a May 6 appearance on Morning Joe, former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates argued that the United States has ignored Pakistan while overemphasizing Afghanistan.

By January 2002, you had an Afghan government that was recognized internationally. You had all the parties in Afghanistan participating, except for the Taliban, who were hiding in Pakistan, Gates said. In 2009, former Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari admitted during a meeting with former civil servants that Pakistan had trained terrorists to further its foreign-policy goals. Let us be truthful to ourselves and make a candid admission of the realities. The terrorists of today were the heroes of yesteryears until 9/11 occurred, and they began to haunt us as well. They were deliberately created and nurtured as a policy to achieve some short-term tactical objectives, Ali Zardari said.

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SEAL Team Six finally killed bin Laden in Abbottabad, Pakistan in 2011. Abbottabad is not some small Pakistani village hidden in the mountains just across the Afghan border. Its population is more than 200,000. Its military academy  its West Point  is less than two miles from bin Ladens headquarters and hiding place. Is anyone really supposed to believe the Pakistani government didnt know he was there, allowing his protection?

As we approach the 20-year anniversary of 9/11, there hasnt been a major al Qaida terrorist attack in the United States since then. While al Qaida leadership has changed, its goal hasnt. Drug money is the main source of funding for terror groups. According to the State Departments 2021 International Narcotics Control Strategy Report, Afghanistan is the main opium supplier in the world. Pakistan produces one-third as much, but is a transshipment point for chemicals and the opium used to make heroin.

The U.S. Embassy and Consulates in Pakistan website now states that, Since 2009, the U.S. government has committed over $5 billion in civilian assistance to Pakistan and over $1 billion in emergency humanitarian response. This commitment reflects our belief that if Pakistan is secure and peaceful and prosperous, thats not only good for Pakistan, its good for the region and its good for the world.

Not exactly. India and Pakistan, both nuclear powers, have hated each other for decades with jealousy over the territory of Kashmir and a desire for world recognition at the expense of the other.

While most of Donald Trumps presidency was a disaster, his administration was right to cut off $1.3 billion in security assistance funding to Pakistan in 2018. However, like many events that took place under Trump, the aid was restored after his personal relationship with Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan improved.

The Biden administration certainly hasnt been chummy with Pakistan so far. Biden held a climate-change summit with leaders in the region in April. Indian and Bengali leaders were invited. Pakistani leaders were snubbed. This doesnt seem to be an accident, either, as Climate Czar John Kerry also recently visited countries in the region. Pakistan wasnt one of them.

While the cold shoulder is warranted, there should be no more free lunch. Funding should be contingent on an end to safe harbor for terrorists and an end to a worldwide drug distribution to fund those terrorists.

While Pakistan claims to be a friend to the United States, it is an ally in name only.

Robert Weiner is the former spokesman for the Clinton White House National Drug Policy Office and the House Government Operations Committee. He was chief of staff for the House Aging Committee under Florida U.S. Rep. Claude Pepper. Ben Lasky is a senior policy analyst at Solutions for Change.

Weiner
Scotch Mario Tama/Getty Images

The U.S. and Britain agreed Thursday to a five-year suspension of 25 percent tariffs on certain goods imposed under former President Donald Trump as part of a long trade dispute over subsidies to Boeing and its European rival, Airbus. The Biden administration and the European Union resolved the aerospace dispute earlier this week, paving the way for the suspension of the 2019 retaliatory tariffs. For Britain, which was part of the EU in 2019 but isn't anymore, the highest-profile export hit in the trade war was single malt Scotch.

The 25 percent tariffs on Scotch led a 30 percent drop in exports to the U.S. in the 18 months through March 2021, the Scotch Whisky Association says. Thursday's deal "enables distillers to focus on recovering exports to our largest and most valuable export market," Karen Betts, the whisky association's CEO, tells The Associated Press.

While Scotch can flow more freely to the U.S. now, the same isn't true for bourbon in the U.K. American whiskeys still face a 25 percent tariff in Britain, under a different EU-U.S. trade dispute involving steel and aluminum. "We hope this positive momentum will also lead to the prompt and permanent removal of the EU and U.K.'s tariffs on American whiskeys," said Chris Swonger, chief executive of the Distilled Spirits Council of the United States.

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The White House denied reports President Joe Biden's administration froze military aid to Ukraine following the announcement of a summit this week with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

"The idea that we have held back security assistance to Ukraine is nonsense. Just last week  in the run-up to the U.S.-Russia Summit  we provided a $150 million package of security assistance, including lethal assistance," said press secretary Jen Psaki in a press release Friday.

The response from the White House came hours after Politico reported the Biden administration temporarily halted a military aid package to Ukraine that would have included lethal weapons to address aggressive Russian troop advancements along the Ukraine border earlier this year. The report cited four sources familiar with internal discussions on the matter who claimed the package would be worth up to $100 million.

BIDEN FREEZES MILITARY AID TO UKRAINE AFTER PUTIN SUMMIT AS LEADERS PLEA FOR HELP

Psaki said the administration had "now provided the entire amount appropriated by Congress through the Ukraine security assistance initiative."

The press secretary also restated Biden's comments two days before the summit in Geneva, in which he said the administration would maintain putting Ukraine "in the position to be able to continue to resist Russian physical aggression."

Ukraine has been battling Russian-backed separatists in the eastern Donbass region of its country, which provides vital land access to the Sea of Azov and the Crimean Peninsula. Russia annexed Crimea in 2014 and a protracted war in Ukraine still simmers seven years later.

"We have also prepared contingency funds in the event of a further Russian incursion into Ukraine," Psaki said.

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"As President Biden told President Putin directly, we will stand unwavering in support for Ukraines sovereignty and territorial integrity," the press secretary added.

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Original Author: Kaelan Deese

Original Location: Biden White House says report US held back Ukraine aid is 'nonsense'
MAIDUGURI/ABUJA (Reuters) - A senior cleric with Nigerian Islamist group Boko Haram confirmed the death of its leader and urged fighters to stay loyal in its fight against rival Islamic State militants, according to a video seen by Reuters on Friday.

Bakura Sahalaba, a cleric with the Lake Chad branch of Boko Haram, urged its men to fight on in the video, which appeared on social media after the rival Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) said Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau had died.

Three Boko Haram researchers verified its authenticity.

ISWAP had said Shekau, one of the world's most notorious extremists, had died around May 18 after fleeing a battle with ISWAP and detonating an explosive device before he could be captured.

The regional affiliate of Islamic State, ISWAP has sought to absorb Shekau's fighters and unify the groups which during Shekau's tenure fought one another for control of territory in northeast Nigeria and around Lake Chad.

"The Lake Chad branch of (Boko Haram) is clearly willing to keep fighting ISWAP until it can speak directly with (Islamic State) on next steps," said Jacob Zenn, editor of The Jamestown Foundation's Terrorism Monitor publication.

The two groups have waged a bloody conflict in Nigeria's northeast since their split in 2016, sparked in part by ideological disagreements over Shekau's wanton killing of Muslim civilians.

Vincent Foucher, a Boko Haram researcher at the French National Centre for Scientific Research, said the cleric's comment that his group believes in Islamic State is a sign that Boko Haram may be seeking a form of arbitration with them.

Nigerian security forces could also exploit a rift between the two insurgencies.

"That's an opening for security forces to step up attacks now that they're fighting each other and also perhaps an opportunity to divide the ranks, to say, 'Those of you who want to defect, defect and come to us'," said Bulama Bukarti, a senior analyst with the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change.

(Reporting By Maiduguri Newsroom and Paul Carsten; writing by Libby George; editing by Philippa Fletcher)
BRASILIA, Brazil (AP)  As Brazil hurtles toward an official COVID-19 death toll of 500,000  second-highest in the world  science is on trial inside the country and the truth is up for grabs.

With the milestone likely to be reached this weekend, Brazil's Senate is publicly investigating how the toll got so high, focusing on why President Jair Bolsonaro's far-right government ignored opportunities to buy vaccines for months while it relentlessly pushed hydroxychloroquine, the malaria drug that rigorous studies have shown to be ineffective in treating COVID-19.

The nationally televised hearings have contained enough scientific claims, counterclaims and outright falsehoods to keep fact-checkers busy.

The skepticism has extended to the death toll itself, with Bolsonaro arguing the official tally from his own Health Ministry is greatly exaggerated and some epidemiologists saying the real figure is significantly higher  perhaps hundreds of thousands higher.

Dr. Abdel Latif, who oversees an intensive care unit an hour from Sao Paulo, said the fear and desperation caused by the coronavirus have been compounded by misinformation and opinions from self-styled specialists and a lack of proper guidance from the government.

We need real humane public health policy, far from the political fight and based on science and evidence," he said.

Brazils reported death toll is second only to that of the U.S., where the number of lives lost has topped 600,000. Brazil's population of 213 million is two-thirds that of the U.S.

Over the past week, official data showed some 2,000 COVID-19 deaths per day in Brazil, representing one-fifth the global total and a jump public health experts warn may reflect the start of the country's third wave.

Bolsonaro has waged a 15-month campaign to downplay the viruss seriousness and keep the economy humming. He dismissed the scourge early on as a little flu and has scorned masks. He was not chastened by his own bout with COVID-19. And he kept touting hydroxychloroquine long after virtually all others, including President Donald Trump, ceased doing so.

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As recently as last Saturday, Bolsonaro received cheers upon telling a crowd of supporters that he took it when infected.

The next day, he declared, I was cured.

He pushed hydroxychloroquine so consistently that the first of his four health ministers during the pandemic was fired and the second resigned because they refused to endorse broad prescription of the medicine, they told the Senate investigating committee.

The World Health Organization stopped testing the drug in June 2020, saying the data showed it didn't reduce deaths among hospitalized patients. The same month, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration revoked emergency authorization for the drug amid mounting evidence it isn't effective and could cause serious side effects.

Nevertheless, the notion that medicines like hydroxychloroquine work against COVID-19 is one of the main things the fact-checking agency Aos Fatos has been forced to debunk continually for the past year, according to Tai Nalon, its executive director.

This didnt change, mostly because there is a lack of accountability of doctors and other medical authorities who propagate this sort of misinformation, and the government supports it, Nalon said. "Basically it takes only the president to make any fact-checking efforts not useless, but less effective.

In fact, the Senate hearings that began in April have turned into a forum for dueling testimony from doctors who are either pro- or anti-hydroxychloroquine, creating what some experts fear is a misimpression that the drugs usefulness is still an open question in the international scientific community.

A Health Ministry official who is a pediatrician told the Senate that there is a much anecdotal evidence of its effectiveness and that the ministry provided guidelines for its use without explicitly recommending it. Fact-checkers cried foul, saying the ministrys own records show it distributed millions of the pills nationwide for COVID-19 treatment.

A cancer specialist and immunologist who has been one of the drug's biggest champions  and is said to be an informal adviser to the president  also testified, decrying demonization of a drug she said has saved lives. But fact-checkers proved her wrong when she claimed Mexico is still prescribing it for COVID-19.

Still, the drug is celebrated across social media, including Facebook and WhatsApp. And other misinformation is circulating as well.

Bolsonaro told a throng of supporters on June 7 that the real number of COVID-19 deaths in 2020 was only about half the official death toll, citing a report from the national accounting tribunal  which promptly denied producing any such document.

The president backtracked but has publicly repeated his claim of mass fraud in the death toll at least twice since.

Epidemiologists at the University of Sao Paulo say the true number of dead is closer to 600,000, maybe 800,000. The senators investigating the government's handling of the crisis ultimately hope to quantify how many deaths could have been avoided.

Pedro Hallal, an epidemiologist who runs the nations largest COVID-19 testing program, has calculated that at least 95,000 lives would have been spared had the government not spurned vaccine purchase offers from Pfizer and a Sao Paulo institute that is bottling a Chinese-developed shot.

When the U.S. recorded a half-million COVID-19 deaths, President Joe Biden held a sunset moment of silence and a candle-lighting ceremony at the White House and ordered flags lowered for five days. Bolsonaros government plans no such observance.

The Health Ministry is instead trumpeting the 84 million doses administered so far. The number is mostly first shots; just 11% of Brazils population is fully vaccinated.

The Senate committee will name at least 10 people as formal targets of its investigation by next week, members told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity. That could lead to a recommendation of charges by prosecutors. The list includes the pediatrician and cancer specialist who testified, the current health minister and his predecessor.

For his part, Bolsonaro has said the investigation amounts to persecution.

Last week, microbiologist Natalia Pasternak, who presides over the Question of Science Institute, a nonprofit that promotes the use of scientific evidence in public policies, went before the committee and decried the government's denialism. She lamented that the myth of hydroxychloroquine won't seem to die.

In the sad case of Brazil, its a lie orchestrated by the federal government and the Health Ministry, she said. "And that lie kills.

___ Biller reported from Rio de Janeiro. AP videojournalist Tatiana Pollastri contributed from Valinhos, Sao Paulo.
The Scottish brewer will be subject to an independent review and an anonymous staff survey will be conducted to 'paint a comprehensive picture of the Brewdog culture at every level'. Photo: Andrew Boyers/Reuters

The chief executive of BrewDog has issued an apology and vowed to reform the company after accusations of culture of fear from more than 100 former staff members.

In a message on professional networking platform LinkedIn, James Watt said he was sorry for neglecting many important people elements of the business, and apologised to all of the signatories, the BrewDog team and any community members that were affected.

This week has been tough for everyone at BrewDog. I know the events from the last few days have caused a lot of pain for all of our team members and our community and I can only apologise for that, he said.

I am ultimately responsible for the culture of our business. The letter that ex-colleagues wrote to us is 100% my fault.

He added that the Scottish brewer would be subject to an independent review and that an anonymous staff survey will be conducted to paint a comprehensive picture of the Brewdog culture at every level.

The findings of the review will be shared both internally and externally before the end of the year, he said.

Earlier this week, former BrewDog workers posted an open letter to the company on Twitter, accusing the company of being a cult of personality and detailing an alleged toxic environment.

The letter, posted on Twitter on Wednesday, said being treated like a human being at the firm was sadly not always a given. It claimed employees were harassed, assaulted, belittled, insulted and gaslighted.

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Watt was called out by name: It is with you that the responsibility for this rotten culture lies.

Among other things, the letter alleged that BrewDog, which has been valued at about $2bn (1.4bn), has a toxic attitude towards junior staff that trickled down throughout the business from day one, until they were simply an intrinsic part of the company".

The single biggest shared experience of former staff is a residual feeling of fear. Fear to speak out about the atmosphere we were immersed in, and fear of repercussions even after we have left.

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Earlier this year, several publications said the company was under fire for allegedly firing female and LGBTQ employees.

The letter also said Mr Watt and co-founder Martin Dickie had exploited publicity, "both good and bad", to further their own business goals and chased "growth, at all costs".

Read more: BrewDog announces plans for a 'beer hotel' in Edinburgh

On Friday Watt said: I want to be very candid about some mistakes that I have made that have detrimentally impacted our culture.

Despite surviving COVID-19 due to a phenomenal effort from our amazing team I had to make some very hard decisions to ensure our survival and these decisions have taken a considerable human toll on our business and had a negative impact.

Additionally, some PR mistakes that I have made in our past have also had a detrimental impact on culture. I can promise that I will not make these mistakes again.

Watts confirmed that exit interviews will be sent to everyone in the next two weeks who's left the company in the last year.

He also promised a salary review from 1 July, which was postponed because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Watch: BrewDog accused of 'Me Too' behaviour
Jun. 18Business officials told a committee of state lawmakers Thursday that Kentucky is in dire need of workers to fill available jobs and companies have become creative in their need to find employees.

"There are 90,000 (job) openings on our website," Ashli Watts, president and CEO of the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce told members of the Interim Joint Committee on Tourism, Small Business and Information Technology on Thursday.

Statewide, Watts said, there are two open jobs for every available worker.

But numerous factors are keeping people out of the labor force, officials from the Chamber of Commerce and Kentucky Retail Federation told committee members. For example, some workers are hampered from returning by the lack of child care, while others are fearful of returning to retail after the COVID-19 pandemic, officials said.

Expanded federal unemployment benefits are also "part of the issue as well," Watts told lawmakers. She said the chamber is in support of the state ending the extra federal unemployment payments, which are currently scheduled to end in September.

Finding workers "is a very real problem," Watts said. "We hear about it every day."

Tod Griffin, president of the Kentucky Retail Federation, said experts predict retail sales will grow by 10% to 13% this year. Some of the measures adopted during the pandemic, such as reduced business hours and automation, will likely become permanent, he said.

But difficulty finding employees is constraining retail outlets, Griffin said. In a recent survey of Retail Federation members, "just about every one of them has positions to fill."

Some retail stores have begun offering health insurance and other benefits as incentives, Griffin said. When people who were offered retail jobs and declined them were asked why, a majority said the deciding factor was "the federal unemployment payment," he said.

Kentucky extended unemployment payments to up to 50 weeks in January. In addition, Kentucky participates in the Federal Pandemic Unemployment Assistance Program, which provides recipients with $300 a week in federal funds.

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Kevin Cranley, chairman of the Retail Foundation, said unemployment payments are keeping restaurants from operating.

"What I'm hearing ... is restaurants can't open because they can't find workers," Cranley said.

The Retail Federation supports Gov. Andy Beshear's idea to provide incentives for people who join the workforce.

Retail businesses "suffer from an inaccurate perception," Cranley said. "Sure, we have entry-level jobs ... but there are retailers like myself that support families, careers and a high standard of living."

While some lawmakers urged Beshear to cancel the extra federal unemployment payment, others said the payments had been vital for some residents.

Federal unemployment payments "have brought over $4 billion to this state" since the CARES Act was passed last year, said Sen. Reginald Thomas, a Lexington Democrat. "That money was spent on food, housing, clothing.

"I support the Governor and his position" to not end the federal payments, Thomas said.

Watts said the "workforce participation shortage" affects every member of the state chamber.

"There are 100,000 fewer people in the workforce today than there was last March when the pandemic hit," Watts said.

People who retired or switched careers during the pandemic have also created worker shortages, she said. Also, "We know some people are still concerned about their safety in coming back to work."

"We don't know the perfect solution," Watts said.

Hiring issues have affected more than retail businesses and restaurants. Karen Cecil, human resources director for Century Aluminum, said the company has had problems with applicants who don't show up for interviews or who have substance abuse issues.

"We do believe the enhanced unemployment benefits have hurt us a little bit," Cecil said, adding that some workers who received federal stimulus payments have opted to not work until their stimulus dollars run out.

While the work at Century Aluminum is high-paying, the working environment is tough, Cecil said, and about half of new workers quit after two months.

The lack of new employees has strained the company's workforce, she said.

"Not being able to hire as quickly as we need to is a big component."

When asked if OPD would consider hiring a "lateral" officer from another department who had sustained policy violations in his or her background, Winkler said, "We have had multiple laterals apply at OPD over the last 12 months that did not meet our standards, and we are not willing to compromise on certain issues we find in people's backgrounds, simply because we are short personnel."

James Mayse, 270-691-7303, jmayse@messenger-inquirer.com, Twitter: @JamesMayse

James Mayse, 270-691-7303, jmayse@messenger-inquirer.com, Twitter: @JamesMayse
Throughout high school and college, Jennifer Rocha would plant strawberries with her parents from 6 p.m. to 3 a.m. Then she'd sleep a few hours and get ready for school.

But she never complained or slacked off; she said she knew she was making her immigrant parents proud.

On June 13, Rocha graduated from the University of California, San Diego, and she wanted to honor her parents' hard work. So she coordinated a photo shoot in the strawberry fields they worked night after night.

"Through drops of sweat, tears, back aches, they were able to get their three daughters through college. They deserve all the recognition in the world and for them to be an inspiration to other immigrant parents in the same circumstance as they are that it is not impossible for their kids to chase their dreams," Rocha told USA TODAY.

Rain, cold or heat, her parents worked  a quality she adopted as she juggled college courses, studying and work. Rocha admitted some days were more difficult than others, especially when she'd sit in class with an aching back from a long night of work.

In her college career, when she felt like quitting Rocha said she'd think back to her work in the fields and what her degree would mean to her family.

"When I would come back to work in the fields it humbled me and was a reminder as to why I need to get that degree," Rocha said.

Rocha hopes her photos bring awareness to the farmworker community and the impact of their work. She said it's easy for Americans to pick up vegetables and fruits from the grocery store without appreciation for the workers who made it possible. .

"Farmworkers do not deserve to be paid minimum wage. They worked throughout the whole pandemic risking their health and risking the health of their families not knowing if they would come home with something," Rocha said.

Jennifer Rocha's photo shoot has gone viral for highlighting the work of her and her parents.

Rocha's senior photos quickly gained social media attention, with hundreds praising Rocha's pride in her heritage and farmworker family. If there was one message people took away from seeing her photos, Rocha hopes it's that anything is possible.

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"No matter if your parents work in domestic labor jobs where the pay is minimum wage, with hard work, sacrifice, discipline, and dedication it can be done," Rocha said.

Rocha plans to go into law enforcement to "care for the community how it deserves to be cared for."

Follow Gabriela Miranda on Twitter: @itsgabbymiranda

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: California graduate honors farmworker parents in senior photo shoot
Canadians who were planning to take trip to see a Broadway show in New York City might not be allowed to do so after COVID-19 vaccine rules to see Springsteen on Broadway were revealed.

"Guests will need to be fully vaccinated with an FDA-approved vaccine in order to attend Springsteen on Broadway and must show proof of vaccination at their time of entry into the theatre with their valid ticket," the information reads.

"'Fully vaccinated' means the performance date you are attending must be: at least 14 days after your second dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna COVID-19 vaccine, or at least 14 days after your single dose of Johnson & Johnsons Janssen COVID-19 vaccine."

Notably missing from these protocols, because it is not an FDA-authorized vaccine, is AstraZeneca.

"At the direction of New York State, Springsteen on Broadway and the St. James Theatre will only be accepting proof of FDA-approved COVID-19 vaccines (Pfizer, Moderna, Johnson & Johnson)," the rules read.

Fully vaccinated AstraZeneca recipients in Canada were caught off guard by this decision, expressing concern about what else they may or may not be able to do in the U.S. once non-essential travel resumes.

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This came just as the National Advisory Committee on Immunization (NACI) recommended that individuals who received a single dose of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine be given an mRNA vaccine, Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccine, for their second dose.

"An mRNA vaccine is now preferred as the second dose for individuals who received a first dose of the AstraZeneca/COVISHIELD vaccine, based on emerging evidence of a potentially better immune response from this mixed vaccine schedule and to mitigate the potential risk of VITT [vaccine-induced immune thrombotic thrombocytopenia] associated with viral vector vaccines," the recommendation from NACI reads.

On Friday morning, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said that he is aware of issues around different countries having a different list of approved vaccines and said the federal government is "engaged in discussions" with the U.S. and countries to "ensure that people who are protected from COVID-19 are able to travel."

"We hope to be able to resolve those issues in the coming weeks, in time for...loosened restrictions around travel," the prime minister said.
Chicago Blackhawks senior management allegedly decided against calling police after being informed of two players sexual assault allegations against a former video coach, according to a report by TSNs Rick Westhead, citing an unnamed source.

The attorney representing one of the players in a lawsuit against the Hawks said she was aware of the meeting. It wasnt news to me, attorney Susan E. Loggans told the Tribune on Friday.

The Hawks did not immediately respond to an emailed request for comment from the Tribune, and a team spokesman declined to comment to TSN, citing the ongoing lawsuit.

Loggans added that her client sought help from the NHL Players Association at the time and alleged that they rebuked him. They did nothing about it.

Jonathan Weatherdon, NHLPA senior director of communications, declined via email to comment on behalf of the union, as this matter is subject to pending litigation between the player and his former NHL organization.

Loggans client, a former member of the 2009-10 Stanley Cup championship team, sued the Hawks last month, alleging the team was negligent and refused to act when he brought sexual assault allegations against then-video coach Bradley Aldrich to their attention.

In the suit, the unnamed plaintiff alleges that Aldrich sent inappropriate text messages, turned on porn and masturbated in front of him and threatened him if plaintiff did not engage in sexual activity.

The plaintiff said he reported the May 2010 incidents to mental skills coach James Gary but Gary convinced him the encounters were his own fault and the Hawks opted not to take action against Aldrich, according to the complaint.

That same month, according to TSN, senior management held a meeting that included then-Blackhawks President John McDonough, general manager Stan Bowman, vice president of hockey operations Al MacIsaac and Gary. The report states that then-skills coach Paul Vincent told team executives two players had accused Aldrich of sexual assault and requested they contact the sex crimes division of the Chicago police, and that the request was denied.

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Loggans said she wasnt surprised to see new reports about how the team handled the allegations.

This is what happens in these cases, that people keep quiet and then when they see that its coming up they decide that they want to tell the truth, she said.

In a statement released last month after the lawsuit was filed, the Hawks said that the allegations lacked merit. Earlier this week, the Blackhawks filed a motion to dismiss the suit.

Loggans also represents a former Michigan high school hockey player, John Doe 2, in a second lawsuit against the Hawks. That suit contends that the team failed to investigate Aldrich when the first plaintiff, John Doe 1, and his teammate made sexual assault allegations and that the team also provided positive references about Aldrich to future employers.

Aldrich, who became an assistant coach at Houghton (Mich.) High School, pleaded guilty in December 2013 to having sexual contact with a student who later sued the Blackhawks as John Doe 2. Aldrich was sentenced to nine months in jail and five years of probation and was ordered to register as a sex offender.

John Doe 1 said in his suit that in July 2019 he recalled suppressed memories about Aldrich after learning of the Michigan conviction.

Its not about Aldrichs conduct, Loggans said. Its about the Blackhawks subjecting a young person to the influence of somebody in a control position, namely the video coach, and subjecting the players to a hostile and dangerous environment.

And they became aware of it and hushed it up so that it wouldnt interfere their playoff chances and the Stanley Cup.

In June 2010, the month after the allegations against Aldrich surfaced, the Hawks beat the Philadelphia Flyers in six games to win the first of three championships in a six-year span.

Loggans also said the players union took a hands-off approach to her clients original complaint.

He just reported it to them to see if they would assist him in trying to get the Blackhawks to do something, she said. He did contact the players association, and they didnt get involved.

According to her client, They said it was between them and the Blackhawks.

The Hawks motion this week to dismiss John Doe 1s lawsuit is based on arguments that the plaintiff didnt exhaust all administrative remedies under state law and that he allowed various statutes of limitations to lapse.

Attorney Mike Hughes, a partner with Smith Amundsen who works with employers in labor and employment cases, said the Blackhawks raised some pretty legitimate defenses.

None of my analysis goes to whether or not the underlying abuse alleged happened or whether or not the Blackhawks acted appropriately when those issues were raised to the team, Hughes added. What they have here are defenses based on civil procedure.

The Hawks said in their motion that the plaintiff first had to pursue his negligence claim under the Illinois Human Rights Act and Illinois Workers Compensation Act.

If you are sexually harassed by your employer, you cant just go into court and sue, Hughes said. You have to follow the parameters of the Illinois Human Rights Act. You have to file a charge of discrimination with the Illinois Department of Human Rights or the EEOC (U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission).

The John Doe suit alleges that while the assault and the teams negligence in handling his complaint occurred in 2010, the Hawks fraudulently concealed his report and he suppressed the memory of the episode until July 2019.

Loggans said she disagreed with the Hawks arguments.

He has a right to file a civil case regardless of what other remedies available to him, she said. There is no legal requirement that you have to do anything before filing a civil case.

Asked about the Hawks statute of limitations argument, she said: The Catholic Church waived in many cases because they recognize that if in fact a priest did sexually molest people, that they have a moral obligation to compensate them.

The Blackhawks are just trying to use legal maneuvers to get out of it because they dont want to accept responsibility for what happened.
Italy forward Federico Chiesa said Friday he expects a battling performance from Wales stars Gareth Bale and Aaron Ramsey as the Azzurri look to extend their 10-match winning streak without conceding a goal.

Roberto Mancini's side play Wales for top spot in Group A in Rome, after 3-0 wins over both Turkey and Switzerland put them through to the last 16.

Italy are unbeaten since September 2018 and on Sunday Mancini could match Italy's two-time World Cup-winning coach Vittorio Pozzo's record of 30 games unbeaten between 1935 and 1939.

"Wales is a team that will certainly fight. They have influential players at international level, above all Gareth Bale," said Chiesa, who was also wary of Juventus teammate Aaron Ramsey.

"Ramsey too. He's an above average player, very intelligent. Technically strong, I appreciated him both off and on the pitch at Juventus."

Wales have four points from their two games in Baku and another draw would ensure progress to the last 16, while a win would put them top of Group A.

"There is energy, electricity and the credit goes to Mancini," said Chiesa, speaking at the team's training base outside Florence.

"The fans are right to dream and we're with them. We are here to go all the way, to crown this great dream."

Chiesa has yet to start for Italy in the group stage.

"Obviously we always hope to play, but I accept the decisions of the coach and I am ready when he decides to utilise me," said the 23-year-old.

"We are all starters and the coach wants us to be ready at all times."

Chiesa hit top form at Juventus after joining on loan from Fiorentina last September, scoring 14 goals in 43 games for the Turin giants, including four in the Champions League.

However for the national side he has scored just once in 27 matches over three years.

"It's true, with Italy there is room for improvement, but by continuing on this path everything will come," he warned.

ea/mw
By Gopal Sharma

KATHMANDU (Reuters) - Landslides and flash floods triggered by heavy rain across Nepal this week killed 11 people including one Indian and two Chinese workers at a development project, while 25 people were missing elsewhere, officials said on Friday.

The bodies of the three workers were recovered near the town of Melamchi in Sindhupalchowk district, northeast of Kathmandu, which was hit by flash floods on Wednesday that also forced many people from their homes, district administrators said in a statement.

"The foreign nationals were working for a Chinese company that is building a drinking water project," district official Baburam Khanal told Reuters.

The Home Ministry said late on Thursday that 25 people were missing in floods in Sindhupalchowk, a mountainous district bordering the Tibet region of China, and other parts of the country.

The monsoon rains, which normally begin in June and last until September, kill hundreds of people in mostly mountainous Nepal every year.

Heavy rain since Tuesday have damaged roads, destroyed bridges, washed away fish farms and livestock, and wrecked homes.

Hundreds of people have been forced to move to community shelters, including schools, sheds and tents, authorities said.

Aid agencies said the crisis this year could add to the social and economic woes of a country hard hit by COVID-19. Nepal has been reporting among the highest coronavirus test positivity rates in the world.

"Those who have lost homes are sleeping in community centres," said John Jordan of the U.S.-based charity World Neighbors.

"This forced density raises risks for a community that has been recovering from COVID-19."

(Reporting by Gopal Sharma; Editing by Devjyot Ghoshal, Robert Birsel)
Bokharis idea

Regarding Outlawing aid for homeless people isnt the answer, Charlotte advocates say, (June 16):

Normally I agree with Charlotte City Councilman Tariq Bokhari. Hes a very smart guy with a lot of great forward-thinking ideas, but citing good Samaritans for helping the homeless is not one of them.

Im glad I live in a city where good-hearted people will directly share some spare change, a decent meal, an old coat or a blanket with someone in need.

Charlotte has an overburdened police force and clogged courts. They have more than enough to keep them busy.

Does Bokhari really think redirecting those resources to prosecute altruistic citizens is a great idea? Perhaps a reread of the parable of the Good Samaritan is in order.

Jim Van Meerten, Charlotte

Jim Van Meerten

Capitol Police

Twenty-one Republican members of Congress voted against giving the Capitol Police the Congressional Gold Medal for their bravery protecting Congress on Jan. 6.

For a long period of time that day, Capitol Police officers stood alone against the mob of thousands. In case you missed the videos, there were violent armed individuals seeking to harm to members of Congress. That same mob planned to hang the vice president of the United States.

There is also video of some of the naysayers in Congress helping barricade doors against the mob that day, apparently in fear for their lives.

Do Capitol Police deserve a medal? Why is this even a question?

Mary Ann Evanoff, Midland

Greenes apology

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene has apologized for comparing mandatory masks use to the Holocaust. (June 16) I will not shout bravo because I cannot comprehend how a politician who was born in this democracy, who attended primary and secondary school, and who is near middle-age had to go to Washington to become aware of the horror and mass extermination of the Holocaust. Who believes this apology? I certainly do not. Was Marjorie Taylor Green born yesterday?

Marita Lentz, Charlotte

Marita Lentz

Being American

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Those who are constantly apologizing for Americas faults should read Jay Ambroses June 17 Opinion column.

It said, ... a Gallup poll shows 158 million people around the world, including 40 million in Latin America, would like to come here. A fraction of that could destroy us...

The United States has its faults, but we should never apologize for our wonderful country. We have liberties to speak our minds, pursue our dreams, and live our lives as we see fit. I, for one, will never apologize for being an American, but instead will stand tall and forever be proud for having been born and raised in this great country.

Lets all celebrate this legacy on July 4.

Sheila W. Evans, Charlotte

Sheila Evans

Rep. Ted Budd

Regarding Endorsed by Trump, Budd seeks GOP voters attention, (June 14):

It was embarrassing to me as a resident of the state of NC for the NC GOP to invite twice-impeached President Donald Trump to speak at the N.C. Republicans state convention.

But it was the height of hypocrisy for wanna-be senator, Ted Budd, to say that he had been praying for Trumps endorsement. To pray for an endorsement from someone of Trumps character seems out-of-touch with that for which Jesus taught us to pray.

Gervase Hitch, Statesville

COVID variant

The newest variant of COVID-19 is more contagious than the original strain and it is expected to affect children and young adults at a higher rate.

The current COVID vaccines provide robust protection against this strain and are the best way to stop the virus.

Despite political differences, we should all agree that protecting children is the highest priority. As long as the virus circulates in the world, the more it will mutate.

Please, unless you have some medical reason not to, get vaccinated as soon as possible. Do it for the children.

Dianne Mason, Matthews
Twenty-seven miles off the coast of Virginia Beach, Virginia, stand two offshore wind turbines, each taller than the Washington Monument, generating power for up to 3,000 homes.

In five years, Dominion Energy hopes to be finishing construction of its own ocean skyline  complete with 180 turbines standing roughly 200 feet taller than the pilot project, three underwater power substations, and a deep-sea transmission line to bring that electricity to shore.

The Virginia-based utility expects the commercial project, now the largest proposed offshore wind project in the country, to generate 2.6 gigawatts of electricity. That is enough zero-carbon electricity to power 660,000 homes.

Dominion Energys offshore wind efforts are a microcosm of what is happening all up and down the eastern seaboard. States and power companies invest billions in putting turbines in the water and turning East Coast ports into offshore wind industry hubs.

For example, Dominion expects to spend roughly $8 billion on its commercial project, including constructing a U.S.-based turbine installation vessel.

The Biden administration is also eager to see the U.S. offshore wind industry blossom. In March, President Joe Biden set a goal for the United States to deploy 30 gigawatts of offshore wind power by 2030, making the industry's success a key piece of meeting his aggressive clean energy and climate targets.

Since then, the Biden administration has approved for construction of the first large-scale offshore wind project, the 800-megawatt Vineyard Wind off the coast of Massachusetts. The Interior Departments Bureau of Ocean Energy Management has also announced it would advance the first areas for offshore wind off the California coast, propose a new lease sale in the New York Bight between Long Island and New Jersey, and begin exploring opportunities for offshore wind in the Gulf of Mexico.

The Biden administrations next offshore wind milestone is likely to involve Dominions commercial project.

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Officials with the utility say they are imminently expecting BOEM to release a notice of intent for their project, which would offer the public a chance for input on the utilitys plans and start the environmental review necessary for final approval.

If all goes well, Dominion expects BOEM to issue a draft environmental impact statement in June 2022, finalize its review in June 2023, and approve the project a few months later, Scott Lawton, Dominions director of generation environmental business support, told reporters on a June 16 boat trip to the pilot turbines.

Once the utility has secured that approval, it aims to put the first steel in the water in 2024 and finish construction in 2026, said Kevin Carroll, Dominions operations and maintenance manager for the offshore wind project.

After more than two decades in the Coast Guard, Carroll, who joined Dominion, refers affectionately to the pilot turbines as his wind babies. He said Dominion is learning valuable lessons from the two 6 MW turbines to apply to its commercial project.

For example, the pilot turbines have performed even better than expected, Carroll said. The turbines have been available to generate power roughly 97% of the time since they began operating in October 2020.

Theyve also been more efficient at generating power. To date this year, the two turbines have achieved a 54% capacity factor, compared to the 35% Dominion had forecasted. Carroll cautioned that the utility still needs more data before it can make a definitive statement on the turbines efficiency.

And perhaps most importantly, Dominions pilot project, as the first one approved in federal waters, helped test the permitting process that BOEM will now undertake with the commercial project and other offshore wind ventures.

We learned from them. They learned from us. It was a very iterative and very transparent process going through with them, Lawton said of permitting for the pilot turbines. That was all for not only the benefit of this project  but for the industry as a whole.

Dominion officials say the most important thing the Biden administration can do, as it looks to help scale U.S. offshore wind, is to provide certainty to power companies and other developers on what to expect in the permitting process.

Many of the projects coming to fruition have been in the planning stages for years, so while tax incentives could help some developers, the bigger issue ahead is navigating the permitting process, said Ann Loomis, Dominions vice president of federal affairs.

For example, Dominion began planning its pilot turbines in the early 2010s, and it was working on its construction and operations plan for the commercial 180-turbine project as it was building the pilot project.

Every project has some unique features that will be analyzed extensively, but really understanding BOEMs expectations in moving through the permitting process really impacts the economic viability of each project, Loomis said in an interview.

Dominions project, however, wont necessarily see smooth sailing ahead.

For example, the utility is still working to assuage the concerns of commercial and recreational fishers in the area who are fearful that the project could reduce their catch.

Dominion must also be cognizant not to harm ocean species. The migration path of the North Atlantic right whale, one of the worlds most endangered whale species, cuts right along the Virginia coastline, meaning Dominion will have to develop its construction plans to minimize noise during that six-month period.

On land, Dominion is working to gain support from people in the towns where transmission lines could cut through to help bring power to homes and businesses.

All of those issues will come under scrutiny once BOEM releases the notice of intent for the commercial project.

Carroll, the operations and maintenance manager, said he isnt concerned but instead excited to hear what the public (including fellow ocean users, environmental groups, and locals) thinks about the commercial project.

We believe we have a really good plan, Carroll said. I think its going to be a great plan when we get that input from the public.

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Tags: News, Energy and Environment, Virginia, Wind Energy, Regulation, Interior, Joe Biden

Original Author: Abby Smith

Original Location: Coastal Virginia project set to be next Biden milestone for offshore wind
On the day after Fathers Day last year, Frances Hall wrote me a letter.

She was responding to a column in which I mentioned that my father had hoped Id be a boy and, given that I wasnt, had decided to raise me as one, meaning that he expected me to achieve in the world the way a man might.

Hall was writing, she explained, because back when she was born, in the 1920s, in tiny York, South Carolina, her father, too, had wanted a boy.

Since I was not, I set out to be the best girl I could be, she wrote, then summarized her nearly 93 years of living in a neatly lettered two-page card. My fathers wish helped me.

Her note was such a moving history of her life and of our country that I tacked it on my refrigerator, where it stayed until this week when, with Fathers Day approaching again, I felt inspired to find her number and call her.

And thats how it came to pass that on Thursday morning, we sat down on the black couches in the common room of her South Side high-rise. Shed been awake since 4:30 a.m. when her 95-year-old cousin had called.

Said she just wanted to hear my voice, Hall said, with a small laugh and the jangle of the eight bracelets she always wears, even when she sleeps.

Hall is Black, and in the racially segregated South of her childhood, her mother had been a maid and cook before staying home to tend house and family. Her father sold beauty products before he got the calling and became a minister. Because hed wanted a boy, he gave her the middle name James.

Hall, an only child, excelled in school. In 1944, she was one of the four graduates of her all-Black high school, which had no 12th grade.

In those days, she said, racial tensions were muted by the fact that people knew their place and stayed in it. But one incidence of racial violence sticks with her.

A schoolmate of mine was lynched, she said, presumably because he was dating a white woman. She got tired of him and called rape.

She recited this memory matter-of-factly, then looked out the window.

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At a state college for Black students, Hall met her husband, a saxophone player from Chicago who had been in the Navy. When they married, he persuaded her to come North. Only later would she realize that she was part of what was called the Great Migration, the mass journey of Black Southerners to the North, a place, she soon discovered, that fell short of its promise.

It was a great awakening, she said, when I found out that a whole lot of what was going on in the South was going on here as well.

She learned Black people couldnt try on clothes at Marshall Fields. That Black people had a hard time getting mortgages and were instead forced to buy houses on contract, a financial scheme that bilked Black Americans of billions of dollars.

And the Chicago crowds. People were everywhere. The stores were huge. She entered a Sears through one door then came out another and felt lost.

But she adapted. She became a teacher and wound up in Chicago Public Schools. With a masters in special education, she eventually became a manager of special education programs.

I had to supervise a lot of people, a lot of white people, she said, and she adapted to that complexity too. I just take people as people.

After her first marriage ended  her husbands peripatetic life as a sax payer and jitney driver caused problems  she remarried, this time to a Chicago police officer. At 35, she said, he was killed in the line of duty.

I guess Ive tried to block it out, she said, trying to reconstruct the details. She looked out the window again. Its so vague now. But its probably why I still dont sleep much.

In 1964, after his death, she moved into this high-rise, where she has lived ever since. She has a view of the lake and an easy drive in her red Chevy Cruze to the library, the stores, the doctors, her church, her bridge club.

Real bridge, she stipulated, the kind Omar Sharif played.

Thursday morning, shed made a special trip to Dunkin because she wanted to feed her guests. It was packed.

I was surprised by how many people are into doughnuts, she said. Again, a laugh and a jangle of the bracelets.

Most of Halls close friends have died  I try not to dwell on it  and the original residents of her building are long gone. Many of her neighbors now are students.

If I had to name five people, I couldnt, she said. People keep to themselves.

But she keeps busy, doing puzzles, playing bridge on the computer her grandson recently gave her, reading.

She calls herself a news junkie, and the news can make her sad. So much violence, still. So many fractured families. But when she looks at the century she has lived through, shes encouraged.

Many more doors are open, she said. She cited Chicagos Black mayor, the countrys Black vice president.

Those were things I would have thought impossible when I was growing up.

And in a country that didnt make it easy, she became the best girl she could be. Her father, who died three months shy of 100, lived long enough to know and be proud.
A South L.A. woman was told the limit on a credit card she's held for 36 years was reduced because she didn't use it enough during the pandemic. (Associated Press)

Credit card companies deserve, well, credit for helping cardholders survive the pandemic. Most of the leading card issuers were willing to be flexible on payments, and some even waived late fees.

But many card companies also quietly but aggressively turned the screws on customers.

Amid the worst economic conditions since the Great Depression, card issuers have protected themselves by slashing the credit limits of many customers, often without warning or explanation.

Nearly a third of all U.S. cardholders had their credit limit cut or their account closed during the first four months of the year, according to a recent survey by LendingTree.

That's about 62 million people  on top of the tens of millions who faced similar issues last year.

Along with reduced purchasing power, a lower limit means youll probably use a greater percentage of available credit each month. This can hurt your credit score.

Rosalind Goddard, 77, was among those to be notified out of the blue recently that she's no longer considered as creditworthy as she once was.

The South Los Angeles resident said that after 36 years as a Nordstrom cardholder and frequent patron of the Seattle company's department stores, her credit limit was cut overnight to $1,000 from $5,000.

"I've been with Nordstrom for a long, long time," Goddard told me. "This was very off-putting."

She said she promptly called Nordstrom to ask what had happened. Why, after all this time, after thousands of dollars in clothing and shoe purchases, was she suddenly being treated like a bad penny?

"They told me it was because I wasn't using my card enough," Goddard recalled.

"I asked what they expected me to be using it for in the midst of a pandemic, while we're all under lock and key. I wasn't interested in buying more clothes or shoes because I had no place to go."

The Nordstrom rep, Goddard said, "apologized profusely, but she had no explanation beyond saying that I wasn't using my card enough."

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Presumably the rep didn't want to admit the obvious: Nordstrom, like many card issuers, was placing its own financial interests ahead of those of a loyal customer during unusually tough times.

"This cuts their outstanding risk," said Linda Sherry, director of national priorities for the advocacy group Consumer Action.

She acknowledged that it's "fairly typical" for card issuers to reduce credit limits when borrowing subsides during normal times. But these haven't been normal times.

Many consumers living paycheck to paycheck have been forced to rely on their plastic to make ends meet. Others have relied on their credit cards as a rainy-day financial safety net during the pandemic.

"Cardholders legitimately ask, 'I am managing my credit limit responsibly and this is how they treat a long-term customer?'" Sherry observed.

According to LendingTree, more than 558,000 cardholders were hit with a credit-limit reduction or account closure every day from January to mid-April.

Lack of activity was the main reason given by card issuers for the moves, the survey found.

"Unfortunately, there's no foolproof way to keep an issuer from closing your card, but there is a simple way to improve your odds: Use the card more," said Matt Schulz, LendingTree's chief credit analyst.

"It's also important to understand that banks don't just close dormant accounts and slash credit limits during bad economic times. It can happen even in the best of times."

Schulz said people shouldn't hesitate, after an unexpected credit-limit cut, to contact their card issuer and request a higher level.

That's good advice, especially because the arbitrariness of many reductions suggests little if any thought is going into the decisions. With tens of millions of accounts involved, it's hard not to believe much of this process is automated.

You still have to wonder, though, why many card issuers are willing to alienate consumers at a time when they're desperate to have people start spending again.

Goddard's credit-limit reduction "seems shortsighted," Sherry said, "especially with the hit that high-end clothing retailers took during the pandemic."

Nordstrom, like most retailers not named Amazon, experienced heavy losses over the last year.

In the first quarter of 2021, the company posted a loss of $166 million but said it expects sales growth of more than 25% this year as the economy recovers.

That seems to validate Sherry's take: It's remarkably shortsighted to put the squeeze on a good customer just as you're hoping she and others will once again give their Nordstrom cards a workout.

And Goddard is the sort of customer Nordstrom should cherish.

"I really like what they have in the way of clothing and accessories," she told me when I asked why she's held on to her Nordstrom card since 1985.

"That's why I was really upset when this happened."

Goddard did precisely what all cardholders should do if notified of a sudden credit-limit reduction: She called the company.

She also responded prudently when the Nordstrom service rep said that to take a closer look, she'd have to inspect Goddard's credit file.

There are two types of credit inquiries, a "hard pull" and a "soft pull." A hard pull occurs when you apply for new credit. It can affect your credit score, possibly lowering it by a few points.

A soft pull is typically made during background checks or if a lender wants to inspect your credit file without your permission. Typically, this won't affect your score.

Goddard was taking no chances. "I said I didn't want them pulling my file."

Instead, she contacted me. And I contacted Nordstrom.

Within days, I'm pleased to report, Goddard received a call from a company exec letting her know her credit limit will be raised to $3,000. That's less than the $5,000 limit she previously enjoyed but considerably better than the $1,000 ceiling the company imposed.

"Lowering credit limits is a fairly standard practice for any credit card issuer," Nordstrom told me in a statement.

"We regularly review accounts, which may result in some accounts being identified as eligible for a credit line decrease. We consider a number of factors in that process, including a customers purchase history over a period of time."

I replied that in raising Goddard's limit to $3,000, wasn't Nordstrom admitting it went too far in dropping it to $1,000? The company had no answer.

But Goddard said the Nordstrom exec who called her "apologized for what happened and acknowledged that the matter hadn't been handled well."

The exec also confirmed that no hard pull was made on her credit file in raising the limit, and agreed to put that in writing.

"I'm very, very pleased," Goddard told me.

I conveyed to her that Nordstrom is expecting a huge increase in sales this year. Will she be contributing to that?

"Sure!" Goddard replied without hesitation. "I'm not an extravagant person, but I do like nice things."

As do many others. Which is why retailers should think twice before pushing customers around.

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
There are two iconic pieces of signage in Los Angeles. One is big and tall and says Hollywood, the other is small and red and says Trader Joes.

For Angelenos, both are simply a part of the landscape, like the rearing heads of Mexican fan palms or strands of brake lights on the 405. Just as we groan when visitors want a Hollywood sign selfie Oh, my God. Why? we gasp when they say they don't live near a Trader Joes Oh, my God. How?

Can it honestly be called life if there is no Spiced Cider or two-buck Chuck? No Reduced-Guilt Mac & Cheese, Chocolatey Coated Chocolate Chip Dunkers or Crisp Pasadena Salad With Chicken? Who would choose to live somewhere you cannot buy TJs peanut butter-filled pretzels or Tempting Trail Mix, which is basically just candy?

Its hard to think of any other market that holds so much sway over its customers, especially a chain with problematic parking and such a frankly bizarre inventory. How did a store that sells 15 kinds of dark chocolate and zero kinds of aluminum foil, a chain that proudly advertises popular items with limited availability, even come into being, never mind becoming wildly successful?

Founder Joe Coulombe will tell you exactly how in his posthumously published new memoir, Becoming Trader Joe.

In the early 2000s, decades after he had sold it to the German family that also owns Aldis, Coulombe wrote a how I did it history of Trader Joes, a chronicle of the clever end-runs, deep research and influences that powered the now-national chain. The tone is conversational, one man's view of the world through the wine, spirit and grocery business, filled with the type of puns, literary references and bold-faced pronouncements that mark the stores signage and its legendary promotional leaflet, the Fearless Flyer.

According to Patty Civalleri, who shepherded the book to publication, Coulombe did not imagine the book would ever be published; he wrote it simply to ensure there would be a record. In 2007, he gave it to original Trader Joes employee and longtime friend Leroy Watson, with instructions to do whatever he wanted with it.

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Watson knew the Trader Joes story almost as well as Coulombe, but he had no idea what to do with a book. Eleven years later, he approached Civalleri, a friend who has published several travel guides, and asked her advice. I read the book and fell in love, Civalleri says. Joes voice was in every sentence.

So at Watsons behest, and with Coulombes blessing, she edited the manuscript for grammar and flow, added some images and pitched it to her agent.

Coulombe died in the pre-pandemic days of 2020, which makes the publication of Becoming Trader Joe: How I Did Business My Way & Still Beat the Big Guys further proof of his energy and ingenuity: A year after his death, Coulombe is still telling us how its done.

Though clearly written for fellow entrepreneurs and business types  for all his folksiness, Coulombe had an MBA from Stanford  and published under HarperCollins Leadership imprint, Becoming Trader Joe is much more than a how-to guide. Moving from the 1960s to the 1990s, it is also a tour of Californias shifting economy and culture, guided by one of its most original thinkers.

As anyone who has ever enjoyed, say, TJs now-defunct Sir Isaac Newtons or the Bagel Spinoza might surmise, Coulombe drew inspiration from a breathtaking variety of sources. Ernest Hemingway, Buckminster Fuller, Barbara Tuchman, Jose Ortega y Gasset and the Whole Earth Catalog, not to mention the state Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control, all contributed in some way to a market that, in fighting the conformity of corporate brands, became one of the most famous brands of all.

Many Californians think they know the story of Trader Joes, or at least the important bits.

Coulombe, who remained personally involved in every aspect of the chain for years after he sold it, was always happy to discuss the two articles that revealed to him an emerging demographic: A 1965 Scientific American piece on how the GI Bill had dramatically increased the number of college graduates and a Wall Street Journal story from that same year announcing that the Boeing 747 would slash the cost of international travel.

Coulombe, trying to figure out how he could turn his struggling Pronto Markets around, decided that educated people who could now afford the trips they dreamed of might crave the type of products they associated with travel, also at prices they could afford.

In 1966, Coulombe writes, The op-ed pieces in the LA Times fretted about how we would spend all that leisure time since the thirty-five-hour workweek was now a sure thing so Trader Joes was conceived in an atmosphere of fun-leisure-party prosperity."

The name and Tiki bar motif came from sources as varied as Disneylands Jungle Cruise, the songs Yellow Bird and Beyond the Reef and, of course, Trader Vics, then at the zenith of its Beverly Hilton glory.

Trader Joes became what we know and love in three major phases, which Coulombe identifies as Good Time Charlie (a party supply-heavy store complete with girlie magazines), Whole Earth Harry (hitting it big with bran and Brie) and Mac the Knife (when changes in California milk and alcohol policies forced Coulombe to move more deeply into TJ-brand food).

If there is a better description of Los Angeles evolution over those years, I dont know one.

From the moment it begins at the Tail O the Cock on La Cienega Boulevard, Coulombes tale is a crazy-like-a-fox exploration of California culture through the lens of one wildly creative and well-read man always looking for a new way over, around or through. Entrepreneurs will no doubt find plenty of inspiration, but fans will find a fascinating origin story.

If nothing else, Trader Joes normalized previously outlier foods, from trail mix to frozen tacos. Did you know that for many years, TJs was one of the few markets offering extra-large eggs, almond butter, wild rice and real maple syrup? That it got into fruit and nuts, because the only local company that packaged bran insisted on shipping those as well? That Trader Joes was among the first grocery stores in the U.S. to accept credit cards and that in the early days, it had its own winery? In Cucamonga?

There were plenty of mistakes and misfires  Coulombes dream of building a store in one of Fullers geodesic domes didn't pan out. He had to walk back claims that a Trader Joes brand of dog food was based on a formula devised at UC Davis (though the store still sells the no-corn kibble). And, as evidenced by the recent controversy over culturally modified brands including Trader Jose and Trader Ming, not all of the linguistic whimsy has worked.

But two things never changed: Inexpensive wine and well-paid workers. Coulombe devotes several chapters to the importance of paying workers well  minimal turn-over, fewer worries about unionization  which, given the current conflicts over raising the minimum wage, feels just as relevant as it did more than half a century ago.

And then there is the food. It's hard to imagine a Whole Foods without the path cut by Trader Joe's. More important, though many may argue about the names or even the quality of some of its offerings, TJ's predicted  and helped create  the international and intercultural exploration that has redefined American cuisine.

For Civalleri, working on the book reminded her how big an imprint Trader Joes had on the culture of food. Back in the 60s and 70s, our culture was all about processed food, canned food, homogenized brands. Joe found room to do something different. And that changed everything.

Also, those peanut butter-filled pretzels.

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Many job advertisements for remote work are now coming with an asterisk: Coloradans need not apply.

Please Note: Job cannot be performed in the state of Colorado, reads an active online advertisement for a remote sales solution architect at Concentrix. Disclaimers like that are becoming more common now after a Colorado law requiring employers to disclose salary ranges went into effect earlier this year.

The goal of the Equal Pay for Equal Work Act, which was passed in 2019, was to crack down on sex-based wage discrimination. In addition to mandating businesses announce employment advancement opportunities, job openings, and the pay range for openings, it also authorizes fines between $500 and $10,000 per violation  a move that appears to be causing companies to try and get around it by seeking employees in only 49 states.

IBM intends this job to be performed entirely outside of Colorado, read another recent advertisement for a 13-month residency program. Work location is flexible if approved by the Company except that position may not be performed remotely from Colorado, blared a job posting by Johnson & Johnson.

BUSINESS TRAVEL STARTS TO RETURN, EXPECTED TO INCREASE IN COMING MONTHS

The Colorado Department of Labor and Employment reportedly opened an investigation into a complaint against a company whose remote work job posting disqualified Coloradan applicants, Scott Moss, the director of the departments division of labor standards and statistics, told the Washington Examiner without revealing which company was being investigated. He said on Friday that the investigation was nearing closure.

Colorado has offered guidance that stipulates employers need not include salary ranges for remote roles that will be performed entirely outside the Centennial State or for remote jobs posted by a company that doesnt have any employees in Colorado.

"So there's no reason, and its puzzling, for entirely out-of-state employers to limit their own talent pool by excluding Coloradans, just to avoid being covered by a law that already doesn't cover them," Moss said.

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However, salary information would have to be posted for remote roles if a company has any presence in the state. The law has caused a bit of confusion in the pandemic-era remote work landscape, but Moss said salary-posting compliance isn't hard.

He said in a statement that "it doesnt require totally rewriting job postings, only adding into job postings just one phrase or sentence with an expected pay range and only a general description of benefits. Thats probably why all employers weve found to be in violation promptly fixed their posting, and major employers we spot-checked before and after the law took effect did start posting pay information, without the prod of a complaint or investigation."

Some companies, such as alcohol delivery company Drizly, have gotten around the mandate by offering two separate job postings, one targeting remote workers in Colorado and another aiming to reach potential workers in all of the other states.

Doing so requires considerable additional time and effort, the company told Vice. However, we believe that this approach best allows us to avoid confusion for candidates outside of CO and ensure that Coloradans have the same opportunities as everyone else to learn about and apply for remote work positions at Drizly.

The law does give a bit of flexibility to employers about how to craft salary ranges. It stipulates that compensation ranges must extend from the lowest amount of money to the highest amount that the business in good faith thinks it could pay for that position. Employers are allowed to end up paying the individual who is hired outside of that set range as long as the estimate was done in good faith.

The new law has faced some legal headwinds. The Rocky Mountain Association of Recruiters filed a lawsuit against Moss of the Department of Labor and Employment, arguing that regulations associated with the law are a First Amendment violation. This week, though, a federal judge ruled against halting the enforcement of the act.

In response to the myriad remote work advertisements that single out Colorado, a website was created that catalogs the companies and job openings that seek workers from states other than Colorado. Openings from dozens of companies are featured on ColoradoExcluded.com.

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER

The Washington Examiner reached out to Johnson & Johnson, Concentrix, and IBM for comment but did not receive responses by the time of publication.

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Tags: News, Wages, Jobs, Colorado, Law, Business

Original Author: Zachary Halaschak

Original Location: Companies avoid hiring remote workers from Colorado after new law requires salary disclosures
Photograph: Stephen M Dowell/AP

Mike Pence, the former US vice-president, has been heckled as a traitor for his refusal to overturn last years election result during a speech to a gathering of religious conservatives.

Pence, who is widely seen as laying the groundwork for a White House run in 2024, had entered an auditorium in Orlando, Florida to a standing ovation on Friday. But a small group began shouted abuse including traitor! as he began a 28-minute speech. The dissenters were quickly escorted out by police.

Related: Republicans dig in and prepare to sink Democrats voting rights bill

Earlier, in a corridor outside the ballroom, an attendee named Rick Hurley, wearing a red Make America great again cap, also vented his frustration over Pences role in certifying Donald Trumps defeat on 6 January amid false claims of voter fraud.

We need to start fighting! Hurley shouted at anyone who would listen. We need to stop being so damned nice. What the hells going on? Why is Pence coming today? Donald Trump has his pen in his back still.

Before being taken aside by police, he also remarked: Im ready to fight. Im going to boo him off stage. Ill take the bullet. Ill walk to the front of the stage and look him in the eye and and say, What are you doing here?

In an interview, Hurley said he had been at the US Capitol on 6 January. I want to know why Pence is here today. he said. He stabbed Donald Trump in the back and took the coins like Judas.

But Ralph Reed, organiser of the Faith & Freedom Coalitions annual Road to Majority conference, was at pains to give Pence a warm welcome and honor him as stalwart of the Christian conservative movement.

And the ex-vice president, who earlier this month admitted that he and his former boss may never see eye to eye on the events of 6 January, when some Trump supporters called for him to be hanged, did not dwell on that disagreement during his remarks.

He instead told the gathering: Thank you for the privilege of serving as your vice-president with Donald Trump. It was the greatest honor of my life.

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Pence made only a passing reference to the deadly insurrection that implied an equivalence with racial justice protests and Joe Bidens policies: Weve all been through a lot over the past year: a global pandemic, civil unrest, a divisive election, a tragic day in our nations Capitol, and a new administration intent on transforming our country.

Since leaving office, Pence has bought a house in Indiana, announced plans for a podcast and signed a two-book deal for his memoir. Despite the anger of some Trump supporters, he is seen as a potential candidate for the Republican nomination for president in 2024.

His conference speech on Friday duly listed the Trump administrations achievements  from supreme court appointments to coronavirus vaccines  and took aim at Biden for rapidly unravelling its legacy with a tidal wave of leftwing policies.

Pence quipped: Democrats have been so busy advancing their liberal agenda, sometimes I feel like the left hand doesnt know what the far left hand is doing.

He went on to rail against an explosion of runaway spending, proposed tax increases, plans to cut military funding and the cancellation of construction on Trumps signature border wall.

Literally in five months, they turned the most secure border in the world into the worst border crisis in American history, Pence said to applause. You know, when I was vice-president, I visited our southern border. And yes, its past time for our current vice-president to go to the border, put our policies back into effect and end the Biden border crisis today.

He also threw out false assertions to go after culture war targets currently in vogue in conservative media including cancel culture and defund the police.

Among them was critical race theory which, developed by academics starting in the 1970s, examines how racism embedded in law and institutions creates an uneven playing field for people of color in America. Numerous Republican controlled states have moved to ban it from being taught in schools.

Pence crudely misrepresented the intellectual tool by stating: Instead of teaching all of our children to be proud of their country, critical race theory teaches children as young as kindergarten to be ashamed of their skin color. Critical race theory is racism, pure and simple  and it should be rejected by every American of every race.

The truth is its past time for America to discard the left wing reflex to see systemic racism across our nation. As my friend Senator Tim Scott says so well, America is not a racist country  America is the most just, noble and inclusive nation ever to exist on the face of the earth.

In another wildly contentious claim, Pence said: The United States military is the greatest force for good the world has ever known.

Pence closed a morning session that included Republican senators Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio and Rick Scott, all potential rivals for the 2024 nomination. Trump himself has not yet declared whether he will run or whether Pence would again be his running mate.
KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) - The Malaysian high court has granted AirAsia X Bhd a nine-month extension on a restraining order which prevents creditors from filing any legal proceedings against it, the airline said in a stock exchange filing.

The filing on Thursday said the extension runs nine months from the day of the announcement.

The court had granted a restraining order in March for three months, as the budget airline undergoes a restructuring of its 64.15 billion ringgit ($15.5 billion) debt.

Earlier this month, AirAsia X shareholders approved its debt restructuring, allowing it to pursue a scheme it viewed as key to survival which includes a rights issue and a share subscription for new investors to raise 500 million ringgit.

($1 = 4.1390 ringgit)

(Reporting by Liz Lee; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman)
Phillip Washington  Mayor Michael Hancock's new pick to lead Denver International Airport  is named in a search warrant seeking records of communications between him and other high-ranking officials, Axios has learned.

Why it matters: The previously undisclosed search warrant, obtained by Axios, is part of an ongoing review of criminal allegations against the Los Angeles Metro transit agency Washington led for the last six years.

The fact he is named directly contradicts statements the mayor's spokesperson made this week in staunch defense of Hancock's nominee.

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What they're saying: On Tuesday, Hancock spokesperson Mike Strott told the Denver Post that Washington is "not the subject of any criminal investigation  nor is he named in any criminal warrant."

On Thursday, confronted with the new information, Strott told Axios he was unaware Washington was named in the warrant, but issued a new statement that Hancock's office continues to "look forward to his confirmation as (DIA's) first African American CEO."

Washington won't be speaking to reporters until that process is complete, Strott said.

What's new: According to the search warrant, detectives sought "any letters, emails (including emails sent via personal accounts), recordings, memos, notes, messages or other communications" between Washington and 10 other officials between Jan. 1, 2014, and Nov. 15, 2020.

The warrant also lists a slew of documents related to LA Metro's connection to Peace Over Violence, a nonprofit the agency has hired to run a sexual harassment hotline since 2017.

The sheriff's office confirmed the warrant, signed by a judge, was served Feb. 18. In a statement, it said that the investigation involved records from the nonprofit and LA Metro but would not provide further details.

Context: The warrant came amid a Metro employee whistleblower's claims of corruption.

Story continues

The claims  and related media reports  suggest the transit agency awarded Peace Over Violence a bidless contract, approved by Washington, to run a hotline that was costing taxpayers about $8,000 per call.

Details: Among the nearly dozen other officials named after Washington in the search warrant is LA County Supervisor and Metro board member Sheila Kuehl, who wrote a letter to Denver council members this week defending Washington's merit.

Kuehl told Axios on Wednesday that Peace Over Violence was "probably the finest agency on domestic violence and sexual assault in our country."

The bottom line: The questions surrounding Washington  and the contradictory statements from the mayor's office  may complicate the confirmation process through the City Council, which now has new powers over mayoral decisions.

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This is our weekly briefing on how the pandemic is shaping schools and education policy, vetted, as always, by AEI Visiting Fellow John Bailey. Click here to see the full archive. Get this weekly roundup, as well as rolling daily updates, delivered straight to your inbox  sign up for The 74 Newsletter.

Survey Finds Parents Arent So Thrilled About Most K-12 COVID Recovery Solutions on the Table: Via USCs Understanding America Study and The 74

Roughly a quarter of parents say their school offers in-person tutoring (27 percent both during and after), and of that quarter of parents, 34 percent of their children participate during school, 29 percent after. Among those who dont currently have the opportunity, 30 percent of parents say they would enroll their child for during-school tutoring, 25 percent after-school.

In-person pod use is also low, with 17 percent of parents reporting their childs school offers pods. Of those, 38 percent of students are participating. If offered, 25 percent of parents say they would enroll their child in a pod.

Though most parents do not favor tutoring overall, remote tutoring scored high in the survey, with 82 percent of parents supporting or strongly supporting. This is consistent across subgroups.

Read more at The 74.

June 18, 2021  The Big Three

Teen Suicides: The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says suicide attempts among adolescent girls surged by more than 50 percent during the pandemic.

Visits to emergency rooms for suspected suicide attempts rose about 51 percent on average for girls aged 12 to 17 in the four weeks ending March 20, [2020,] compared with the same period in 2019.

Numbers for adults and adolescent boys were stable over that period.

According to the study: Importantly, although this report found increases in [emergency department] visits for suspected suicide attempts among adolescent females during 2020 and early 2021, this does not mean that suicide deaths have increased. (Read at The New York Times)

State ESSER Plans: The U.S. Education Department posted 28 plans describing how states plan to use American Rescue Plan Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief funds. Read the press release. Some highlights:

Story continues

Nine states detailed plans to prioritize vaccinations for educators and students.

Tennessee released a template for school districts to develop health and safety plans as they work to bring more students back to in-person instruction and developed a data dashboard on school operating status that it plans to continue to share publicly in the fall.

Kansas will reserve a portion of funds for an initiative that will offset the cost of admission for students to visit museums, zoos, historical sites, state parks and the Kansas state fair.

Oklahoma is using approximately $35 million for districts to hire school counselors, licensed mental health professionals and licensed recreational therapists to lower the student-to-counselor ratio.

23 states havent submitted plans yet.

FDA and CDC Meet to Discuss Rare Heart Issues With Adolescents and COVID Vaccines: The Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee met last week to weigh in on how many kids might need to be enrolled in clinical trials and how much safety data companies might need to provide.

They also discussed rare but higher-than-expected cases of a heart issue called myocarditis among adolescents and young adults who received their second shot of one of the mRNA COVID-19 vaccines.

Overall, among all age groups, there were 573 cases of myocarditis and pericarditis reported after people received their second dose of either mRNA vaccine, compared to 216 after the first dose, according to data presented by Tom Shimabukuro, an immunization safety expert at the CDC.

Among 16- to 17-year-olds, who had received 2.3 million doses, there had been 79 cases of myocarditis or pericarditis reported.  Based on baseline frequency of the myocarditis and pericarditis, there would have been an expected two to 19 cases in that group.

For 18- to 24-year-olds, who had received 9.8 million doses, there were 196 cases of myocarditis and pericarditis reported, compared to an expected eight to 83 cases.

The CDCs Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices will hold a meeting June 18 to further discuss this emerging issue.

Federal

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services: The Administration for Children and Families released guidance related to the $39 billion Child Care Development Block Grant funding included in the American Rescue Plan.

National Telecommunications and Information Administration:

Department of Commerces National Telecommunications and Information Administration released the final rule for the $268 million Connecting Minority Communities Pilot Program.

It also released an interactive digital divide map that links poverty, usage and broadband access by compiling data sets to show where high-poverty communities are located with relation to internet usage patterns and access to computers and related equipment.

City & State News

California: Los Angeles Unified School District and the teachers union reached a tentative agreement to fully reopen classrooms this fall.

Protocols include increased testing, daily symptom screening, cleaning and paid leave for those required to quarantine.

High-risk staff can request reasonable accommodations in the online program.

Students and staff will wear masks.

Connecticut: New Attendance Works report links remote learning to chronic absenteeism.

30 percent of ninth-graders missed at least a tenth of last school year.

For Black/African-American students across all learning modes, chronic absenteeism rates were highest for in-person 11th-graders and lowest for in-person sixth-graders. In contrast, for Hispanic/Latino students, rates were highest for ninth-grade remote students and lowest for sixth-grade in-person students.

New York: How a pandemic school year changed six New York families  and how it didnt. Some great before-and-after photos.

Ohio:

Sidney City Schools is introducing the Jacket Virtual Academy (JaVA), a virtual learning experience for students in grades K-12.

We dont want to lose students: Cleveland schools to offer remote classes in the fall.

Arizona: Good Morning America profiled a mom who beats odds, graduates from high school with 2-year-old with the help of ASU Prep Digital.

Pennsylvania: Survey by Pennsylvania Association of School Business Officials reveals district spending priorities for stimulus funds:

Purchasing educational technology for students to aid in regular classroom instruction: 87 percent

Addressing learning loss among students: 87 percent

Planning and implementing activities related to summer learning and supplemental after-school programs: 85 percent

See the full breakdown.

COVID-19 Research

Using Smart Thermometers to Predict the Next COVID-19 Wave: New York City will harness data from thousands of internet-connected smart thermometers to identify future outbreaks days or even weeks before case numbers start rising.

Kinsa will distribute for free up to 100,000 of its internet-connected thermometers through New York Citys elementary schools.

Novavax Vaccine: The two-shot regimen was 90 percent effective at preventing people from falling ill in a 30,000-person trial conducted when variants had begun to complicate the pandemic in the United States and Mexico.

Delta Variant: Doubles the risk of hospitalization compared with the previously dominant variant in Britain.

The BioNTech/Pfizer vaccine provided 79 percent protection against infection from the Delta variant, compared with 92 percent against the Alpha variant, at least two weeks after the second dose, the study found.

The Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine, meanwhile, offered 60 percent protection against the Delta variant, compared with 73 percent for the Alpha variant.

WHO official: Delta variant poised to take hold in Europe

Delta variant causes more than 90 percent of new COVID-19 cases in UK

Study on UK Secondary School Reopenings: Just like in primary schools, UK researchers found limited infection or transmission when secondary schools reopened fully from September to December.

One of the study authors: This is yet another study showing that schools are not filled with asymptomatic kids spreading #SARSCoV2 to others. If that was the case, antibody positivity rates would be much higher (especially in kids), as seen in care homes, hospitals, prisons, etc. (30 to 60 percent).

Catchup Needed on Routine Vaccinations: Children behind on their shots for preventable diseases like measles and whooping cough could pose a serious public health threat during the return to in-person schooling this fall.

Viewpoints

CDC Foundation:

Intentions and Views around COVID-19 Vaccination Among K-12 Populations

20 percent of parents are vaccine-hesitant, and 19 percent are undecided about getting vaccinated themselves.

Almost 50 percent of parents reported that they would be more comfortable with their child attending in-person school once teachers and staff are vaccinated.

Among parents of school-age children, the following characteristics were independently associated with being vaccine-hesitant: non-Hispanic Black or African American, under age 40, household income under $50,000.

Parents unwilling to have their child tested regularly for COVID-19 at school for in-person learning were eight times more likely to be vaccine-hesitant than those in favor of testing.

Knowing What Schools Did in the Pandemic is Crucial. So Is Preserving That Data, Via EdWeek:

So even as schools look forward to recovery, Brown University economics Professor Emily Oster is looking back, leading a project to capture all of the data states collected about school operations in 2020-21 and to present it in a consistent format that can inform researchers and policymakers well into the future.

Connecting the Heartland to Bridge the Digital Divide: Blog post from Heartland Forward  Were working with a wide range of partners  from state agencies to community organizations  to help us reach and connect with eligible families, including providing information to be distributed at schools, libraries, health care facilities, employment service centers and more.

Virtual Learning Fault Lines: Via Washington Post:

But in New Jersey, learning remotely will no longer be an option.All we want is the choice, said  a New Jersey mother of three who has joined with other parents to protest the state action.

The crosscurrents have created a new education fault line: School by computer is on the way out in some places and on the rise in others  driven by sharply differing views on the long-term value of virtual instruction and the best way to help the most vulnerable children and families in a moment when the stakes are high.

Long Shadows: The Black-White Gap in Multigenerational Poverty: Important new report from Brookings and AEI.

Three-generation poverty occurs among one in 100 whites but describes the experience of one in five Black adults. Black adults in their 30s are over 16 times more likely than whites are to have had both a parent and grandparent in poverty (defined as the bottom fifth of the income distribution).

Blacks are 41 percent more likely to be in third-generation poverty than whites are to be poor.

Read more here.

Virtual School Is an Appealing Option for Many Black, Latino and Asian Families: Via WGBH

More Than 8 in 10 Parents Plan to Send Their Children to In-Person School in the Fall: A national survey of more than 2,000 parents, conducted by RAND Corporation and commissioned by The Rockefeller Foundation. Read the full report.

Darnella Frazier: Received an honorary Pulitzer

This content is not available due to your privacy preferences. Update your settings here to see it.

And On a Lighter Note

Backyard Squirrel Maze 2.0: The Walnut Heist: Former NASA and Apple engineer Mark Rober is back, facing off against his greatest frenemies.

The contraption Rober designed and built alongside his friends took two months of meticulous planning, but the real fun comes in watching the squirrels completely dissect and destroy their best-laid plans

ICYMI @The74

Weekend Reads: In case you missed them, our top five stories of the week:

Juneteenth: A Year After Nationwide Protests, District Promises for Racial Equity  Juneteenth Gains Legal Popularity, but Misses Classroom Recognition (Read more)

Teacher Diversity: El-Mekki  Pandemic Learning Loss Is Rooted in the Racial Chasm Between Educators and Students of Color. Only Teacher Diversity and a Strong Black Teacher Pipeline Can Fix It (Read more)

COVID Recovery: States Submit Plans for Using Relief Funds for Recovery, But 23 States Still Working on Drafts (Read more)

Analysis: Tutoring, Summer School, Pods  Survey Finds Parents Arent So Thrilled About Most K-12 COVID Recovery Solutions on the Table (Read more)

Federal Policy: A School Discipline Double-Take: How Catherine Lhamon Could Turn Back the Clock With a Renewed Focus on Persistent Racial Disparities  and Ignite New Feuds (Read more)

Disclosure: John Bailey is an adviser to the Walton Family Foundation, which provides financial support to The 74.

Related: Sign up for The 74s newsletter
KAMPALA, Uganda (AP)  Ethiopians will vote Monday in a landmark election overshadowed by reports of famine in the countrys war-hit Tigray region and beset by logistical problems that mean some people wont be able to vote until September.

The election is the centerpiece of a reform drive by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, whose rise to power in 2018 seemed to signal a break with decades of authoritarian rule and led to his Nobel Peace Prize the following year. He has described the poll as the nations first attempt at free and fair elections.

Abiys ruling Prosperity Party, formed in 2019 by merging groups who made up the previous ruling coalition, is widely expected to cement its hold on power. The party that wins a majority of seats in the House of Peoples Representatives will form the next government.

We will secure Ethiopias unity, Abiy said ahead of his final campaign rally on Wednesday, repeating his vow of a free and fair election after past votes were marred by allegations of fraud.

But opposition groups have accused Ethiopias ruling party of harassment, manipulation and threats of violence that echo abuses of the past.

And Abiy is facing growing international criticism over the war in Ethiopias northern Tigray region. Thousands of civilians have been killed and more than 2 million people have been displaced since fighting broke out in November between Ethiopian forces, backed by ones from neighboring Eritrea, and those supporting the now-fugitive Tigray leaders.

Last week, humanitarian agencies warned that 350,000 people in Tigray are on the brink of famine, a crisis that several diplomats have described as manmade amid allegations of forced starvation. Ethiopias government has rejected the figure and says food aid has reached 5.2 million in the region of 6 million.

No date has been set for voting in Tigrays 38 constituencies, where military personnel who usually play a key role in transporting election materials across Africas second-most populous country are busy with the conflict.

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Meanwhile, voting has been postponed until September in 64 out of 547 constituencies throughout Ethiopia because of insecurity, defective ballot papers and opposition allegations of irregularities. Outbreaks of ethnic violence have also killed hundreds of people in the Amhara, Oromia and Benishangul-Gumuz regions in recent months.

Some prominent opposition parties are boycotting the election. Others say they have been prevented from campaigning in several parts of the country.

There have been gross violations, Yusef Ibrahim, vice president of the National Movement of Amhara, said earlier this month. He said his party had been effectively banned from campaigning in several regions, with some party members arrested and banners destroyed.

Neither officials with the Prosperity Party nor Abiys office responded to requests for comment on such allegations.

Ethiopia last year postponed the election, citing the COVID-19 pandemic, adding to the tensions with Tigrays former leaders. Recently the vote was delayed again by several weeks amid technical problems involving ballot papers and a lack of polling station officials.

Abiys Prosperity Party has registered 2,432 candidates in the election, which will see Ethiopians voting for both national and regional representatives. The next largest party, Ethiopian Citizens for Social Justice, is fielding 1,385 candidates. A total of 47 parties are contesting the election.

But on Sunday, five opposition parties released a joint statement saying that campaigning outside the capital, Addis Ababa, has been marred by serious problems, including killings, attempted killings and beatings of candidates.

Two prominent opposition parties, the Oromo Liberation Front and the Oromo Federalist Congress, are boycotting the vote. Its going to be a sham election, OFC chairman Merera Gudina said earlier this month.

That means the Prosperity Party will face little competition in Oromia, Ethiopias most populous state.

Several prominent OFC members remain behind bars after a wave of unrest last year sparked by the killing of a popular Oromo musician, and the OLFs leader is under house arrest. The leader of the Balderas Party for True Democracy, Eskinder Nega, was also detained and is contesting the election from prison.

Getnet Worku, secretary general of the newly established ENAT party, said earlier this month it is not standing candidates in several constituencies because the threat of violence is too high, asserting that armed militias organized by local officials frequently broke up rallies.

There are growing international concerns over whether the elections will be fair. The European Union has said it will not observe the vote after its requests to import communications equipment were denied.

In response, Ethiopia said external observers are neither essential nor necessary to certify the credibility of an election, although it has since welcomed observers deployed by the African Union.

Last week the U.S. State Department said it is gravely concerned about the environment under which these upcoming elections are to be held, citing detention of opposition politicians, harassment of independent media, partisan activities by local and regional governments, and the many interethnic and inter-communal conflicts across Ethiopia.

Abiys appointment as prime minister in 2018 was initially greeted by an outburst of optimism both at home and abroad. Shortly after taking office, he freed tens of thousands of political prisoners, allowed the return of exiled opposition groups and rolled back punitive laws that targeted civil society.

In 2019 he won the Nobel Peace Prize in part for those reforms and for making peace with Eritrea by ending a long-running border standoff.

But critics say Ethiopias political space has started to shrink again. The government denies the accusation.

Several prominent opposition figures accused of inciting unrest are behind bars. While opening a sugar factory earlier this month, Abiy accused traitors and outsiders of working to undermine Ethiopia.

This week his spokeswoman, Billene Seyoum, described the election as a chance for citizens to exercise their democratic rights and accused international media of mounting a character assassination of the prime minister.
Ethiopia will vote Monday in an election billed as its freest yet, but that is proceeding under the shadow of war and famine in the north, and serious doubts over fairness.

The vote is the cornerstone of a promised democratic revival in Africa's second-most populous nation, and is supposed to represent a clean break with the repression that tarnished past elections.

Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, the Nobel Peace Prize winner who freed political prisoners and welcomed back exiles, is seeking a popular mandate after three years of great change, but also violent turmoil, under his rule.

The young leader rose to power on the back of anti-government unrest and was praised for his democratic agenda, including a commitment to hold Ethiopia's most competitive elections yet.

The election was twice delayed -- once for the coronavirus pandemic, and again to allow electoral officials more time to prepare -- but Abiy is urging voters to turn out for a "historic day" on June 21.

In Addis Ababa, opposition and ruling party banners line the streets, and political movements of all shades held colourful rallies on the final day of campaigning on Wednesday, something of a rarer scene in elections past.

"Back then, you would never be able to do this," said Ayenew Yehualaw at a noisy opposition parade in the capital's main square, where a small number of police watched at a distance.

- Delayed vote -

But outside the capital, the picture is far less rosy in the large and diverse Horn of Africa nation of 110 million.

For millions of Ethiopians, the election is nationwide in name only, with voting not going ahead on June 21 in close to one-fifth of the country's 547 constituencies.

Some areas were deemed too insecure to hold a vote, plagued by armed insurgencies and ethnic violence that has worsened under Abiy, as regions push for greater freedoms.

In other cases, the electoral board was not ready, with printing errors on ballot papers, and other logistical setbacks, making a timely election across the board impossible.

Story continues

A second batch of voting will take place on September 6 to accommodate many of the constituencies not taking part Monday.

But there is no election date set for war-torn Tigray, the northernmost region, where UN agencies say 350,000 people face famine conditions, and atrocities have been documented.

Tigray represents 38 seats in the national parliament, but its political fate is of less global concern than the immediate plight of its six million inhabitants.

Desperate hunger stalks the region seven months after Abiy sent troops into Tigray promising a swift campaign to oust its dissident ruling party.

Abiy was once feted in the west and across the continent, but his reputation as a reformist and peacemaker has suffered, even if his administration remains defiant in the face of international criticism.

"The prime minister need not be a darling of the west, east, south or north," his spokeswoman, Billene Seyoum, said this week.

"It is sufficient that he stands for the people of Ethiopia and the development of the nation. And on June 21, the people of Ethiopia will decide."

- Credibility concerns -

Even in areas where the vote is proceeding, some opposition parties are boycotting in protest over the jailing of their leaders, and other concerns over the fairness of the process.

William Davison, senior analyst at the International Crisis Group, said even an incomplete vote could allow Abiy and his ruling Prosperity Party to win a comfortable majority and form a government.

"Yet in that scenario there would still be massive doubts about the credibility of the process in the eyes of many Ethiopians, as well as international observers," he said.

For those able and willing to vote, credibility appears less of a concern. Bethel Woldemichael, a 37-year-old in Addis Ababa, said she and her friends and family would be turning out to vote.

"I hope the election is peaceful, and is not rigged, and everything goes smoothly in the country on June 21," the retail worker said.

The polls will be closely watched by western allies such as the United States, which has voiced grave concern about the exclusion of such large numbers of voters from the process.

But closer to home, Egypt and Sudan will watch keenly too.

Both oppose the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, a colossal hydropower project on the Blue Nile, and source of national pride in Ethiopia, saying it threatens their own water supplies.

Abiy has vowed to fill the dam, angering Cairo and Khartoum.

The European Union said in May it would not send observers to the polls, citing a failure to reach an agreement with the government on basic issues like communications and the observers' independence.

The elections will choose national and regional parliamentarians. The national MPs elect the prime minister, who is head of government, as well as the president -- a largely ceremonial role.

np-md/spm
COLOMBO, Sri Lanka (AP)  A team of technical experts from European Union are helping Sri Lanka's government assess the environmental damage caused by the sinking of a container ship that was carrying chemicals and caught fire, the government said Friday.

The experts held discussions with top Sri Lankan officials and stakeholders on Friday, a day after the Singapore-flagged MV X-Press Pearl ship sank off the country's main port and nearly a month after the vessel caught fire.

The 12-day fire ravaged the vessel, destroyed most of its cargo and caused severe pollution in the ocean and along a long stretch of the island nations famed beaches.

The team include three experts sent by the European Union through the United Nations Environment Program at Sri Lanka's request. Sri Lanka said that expertise within the country wasn't sufficient to accurately calculate the damage caused to its marine environment and coastal areas and also on the countrys economy.

The experts will closely work with government agencies, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement, noting that Fridays meeting focused on how the experts could support the process with recommendations on future action to be taken by the key stakeholder agencies.

The fire broke out on the vessel on May 20 when it was anchored about 9.5 nautical miles (18 kilometers) northwest of Colombo and waiting to enter the port.

Authorities extinguished the fire last week, but the ship then began sinking and attempts to tow it into deeper waters failed when its stern rested on the seabed. The ship had remained partly submerged until Thursday.

The Sri Lankan navy believes the blaze was caused by its chemical cargo, which included 25 tons of nitric acid and other chemicals, most of which were destroyed in the fire. But debris including burned fiberglass and tons of plastic pellets have already polluted nearby beaches. There are concerns that a spill of remaining chemicals and oil from the ship could devastate marine life.

Story continues

The main concern has been about 300 tons of bunker oil used as fuel for the ship. But officials have been saying it could have burned off in the fire.

Both Sri Lankan authorities and the ship's operator, X-Press Feeders, have said so far there is no sign of an oil spill.

Sri Lanka has already submitted an interim claim of $40 million to X-Press Feeders to cover part of the cost of fighting the fire.
By Robin Emmott, Sabine Siebold and Francois Murphy

BRUSSELS/VIENNA (Reuters) -The European Union is set to ban new loans to Belarus after reaching a deal on Friday for economic sanctions on Minsk as punishment for forcing down a flight to arrest a journalist, the Austrian foreign ministry and three diplomats said.

Broad economic sanctions would be the EU's strongest response yet to the forced landing of a Ryanair flight in May by Belarusian authorities to arrest an exiled dissident, a move the bloc's leaders have called state piracy.

Restrictions on the Belarusian financial sector, if agreed by EU governments at a political level, will include: a ban on new loans, a ban on EU investors from trading securities or buying short-term bonds and a ban on EU banks from providing investment services. EU export credits will also end.

Friday's agreement overcame objections from Austria, whose Raiffeisen Bank International is a big player in Belarus through its Priorbank subsidiary.

EU leaders meet next Thursday for a scheduled summit. It was not yet clear if they will approve the deal agreed by expert officials.

"With this agreement the EU is sending a clear and targeted signal against the Belarusian regime's unbearable acts of repression," the Austrian foreign ministry said in a statement.

President Alexander Lukashenko, in power since 1994, has argued that the journalist pulled off the plane on May 23, Roman Protasevich, had been plotting a rebellion, and he has accused the West of waging a hybrid war against him.

The EU, NATO, Britain, Canada and the United States have expressed outrage that a flight between EU members Greece and Lithuania was pressed to land in Minsk and authorities then arrested the 26-year-old exiled dissident with his 23-year-old girlfriend.

POTASH, TOBACCO, OIL

EU experts tasked with drawing up sanctions agreed on a ban of exports from the bloc of any communications equipment that could be used for spying, and a tighter arms embargo to include hunting rifles.

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They also agreed restrictions on EU purchases from Belarus of tobacco products, as well as oil and oil-related products, and a ban on importing potash, a major Belarusian export.

There will be exemptions in the financial sanctions for humanitarian purposes, while private savings of Belarusian citizens will not be affected, one of the diplomats said.

Closely allied to Russia, which sees Belarus as a buffer country against NATO expansion, Lukashenko has been impervious to foreign pressure since disputed elections last August, which the opposition and the West say were rigged. Massive street protests have had little impact on his grip on power.

The EU has already imposed three rounds of sanctions on individuals, including Lukashenko, since last year, freezing their assets in the EU and banning travel. On Monday, foreign ministers will approve another round, with 78 people and eight entities to be blacklisted, diplomats said.

EU governments now want to hit sectors that are central to the Belarus economy, to inflict real punishment on Lukashenko.

Exports of potash - a potassium-rich salt used in fertilizer - are a major source of foreign currency for Belarus, and state firm Belaruskali says it produces 20% of the world's supply.

The EU statistics agency said the bloc imported 1.2 billion euros ($1.5 billion) worth of chemicals including potash from Belarus last year, as well as more than 1 billion euros worth of crude oil and related products such as fuel and lubricants.

Germany has said sanctions should continue until Belarus holds free elections and releases political prisoners.

(Reporting by Robin Emmott, Sabine Siebold and Francois MurphyEditing by Frances Kerry)
Reuters

WINNIPEG, Canada (Reuters) -Protesters have toppled statues of Queen Victoria and Queen Elizabeth II in the Canadian city of Winnipeg as anger grows over the discovery of the remains of hundreds of children in unmarked graves at former indigenous schools. The action took place on Canada Day on Thursday, when traditionally celebrations take place across the country. However, many cities scrapped events this year as the scandal over the indigenous children made Canadians confront their colonial history.
By Alex Lawler, Ahmad Ghaddar and Dmitry Zhdannikov

LONDON (Reuters) - OPEC officials heard from industry experts that U.S. oil output growth will likely remain limited in 2021 despite rising prices, OPEC sources said, giving it more power to manage the market in the short term before a potentially strong rise in shale output in 2022.

Officials from OPEC's Economic Commission Board (ECB) and external presenters attended a meeting on Tuesday focused on U.S. output, the sources said. OPEC heard from more forecasters on the outlook for 2021 and 2022 at a separate meeting on Thursday.

While there was general agreement on limited U.S. supply growth this year, an industry source said for 2022 forecasts ranged from growth of 500,000 bpd to 1.3 million bpd.

"The general sentiment regarding shale was it will come back as prices go up but not super fast," said a source at one of the companies that provided forecasts to OPEC.

U.S. shale oil output usually responds rapidly to price signals and U.S. crude has this week hit its highest since October 2018 at nearly $73 a barrel. But U.S. producers are still focusing on capital discipline and investor returns, rather than expanding supply, the ECB heard.

"Investment discipline and free cash flow for the investor," said one OPEC+ source on condition of anonymity, summarising one of the ECB meeting's talking points. The ECB advises OPEC ministers and does not set policy.

Two sources said a presentation made to the meeting forecast U.S. output would rise by a low rate of 200,000 barrels per day this year. A third source said this level of growth was the consensus for this year among most presentations.

The lack of a large shale rebound could make it easier for OPEC and its allies, known as OPEC+, to manage the market. OPEC+ is gradually unwinding record output curbs made last year as demand recovers, and meets to decide policy on July 1.

"It looks like the shale oil genie is going to stay in the bottle for now," said the source at one of the companies that provided forecasts. "OPEC and Saudi Arabia have a lot of power at this time."

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MORE SHALE IN 2022

At Thursday's technical meeting, OPEC+ considered forecasts from a range of organisations, including the International Energy Agency, Argus Media, the U.S. Energy Information Administration, Wood MacKenzie, IHS, Energy Intelligence and Energy Aspects, sources said.

One of the OPEC sources said the forecasts were not projections OPEC was adopting and a fourth OPEC source said, while it was clear that capital discipline remained a priority for U.S. producers, the production outlook was not clear.

OPEC itself has been forecasting a limited shale rebound this year, as have U.S. producers themselves.

The latest OPEC forecast is for U.S. crude production in 2021 to decline by 120,000 bpd to 11.2 million bpd, and for output of tight crude - another term for shale - to drop by 140,000 bpd to 7.15 million bpd.

The group keeps a close watch on the outlook for U.S. supply. OPEC producers were sent reeling by a 2014-2016 price slide and global glut caused partly by rising U.S. output. In 2014, U.S. production rose by 1.5 million bpd.

(Editing by Elaine Hardcastle)
Dr. Anthony Fauci acknowledged that he and a group of scientists had discussed the theory that the coronavirus leaked from a lab, and the possibility that it could have been genetically engineered, during a teleconference on February 1, 2020.

I remember it very well, Fauci told USA Today on Thursday. We decided on the call the situation really needed to be looked into carefully.

The existence of the teleconference was documented in a trove of Faucis emails released as part of a FOIA request by BuzzFeed. Kristian Andersen, a participant on the call and specialist in infectious disease genomics at the Scripps Research Translational Institute, told Fauci in an email on January 31 that some of the features of coronavirus (potentially) look engineered.

Andersen wrote that he, virologist Edward Holmes of the University of Sydney, and other scientists agreed that they all find the genome inconsistent with expectations from evolutionary theory, although those opinions could still change.

The teleconference was a very productive back-and-forth conversation where some on the call felt it could possibly be an engineered virus, Fauci said. I always had an open mind toward the lab-leak theory, even though I felt then, and still do, the most likely origin was in an animal host.

Fauci has publicly supported the theory that the coronavirus first jumped from an animal to a human, and dismissed the the lab-leak theory as the less-likely alternative.

If you look at the evolution of the virus in bats and whats out there now, [the scientific evidence] is very, very strongly leaning toward this could not have been artificially or deliberately manipulated  Everything about the stepwise evolution over time strongly indicates that [this virus] evolved in nature and then jumped species, he said in a May 2020 interview with National Geographic. He added that proponents of the lab-leak theory were advancing a circular argument.

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A researcher with ties to the Wuhan Institute of Virology thanked Fauci in April 2020 for supporting the natural-origin hypothesis.

On February 4, three days after the conference, Andersen said in a separate email that data conclusively show that coronavirus was not engineered. That email was intended for scientists who were drafting a letter on the pathogen to the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.

The main crackpot theories going around at the moment relate to this virus being somehow engineered with intent and that is demonstrably not the case, Andersen said in that email. Engineering can mean many things and could be done for either basic research or nefarious reasons, but the data conclusively show that neither was done

Andersen did not comment to USA Today on why his position seemed to change within three days.

Public debate on whether the coronavirus leaked from a lab was rekindled after the Wall Street Journal reported that three researchers at the Wuhan Institute of Virology were hospitalized in November 2019, before the first identified case of coronavirus on December 8 of that year. That report was based on a U.S. intelligence assessment, which claimed that researchers became sick with symptoms consistent with both Covid-19 and common seasonal illness.

Alina Chan, a postdoctoral associate at Harvard University and MIT, said some scientists felt they could not speak freely about the lab-leak theory at the start of the pandemic, for fear of being associated with former President Trump.

At the time, it was scarier to be associated with Trump and to become a tool for racists, so people didnt want to publicly call for an investigation into lab origins, Chan told NBC on Thursday.

More from National Review
Dr. Anthony Fauci is waiting for COVID-19 to be essentially crushed before returning to his longtime work studying infectious diseases at the National Institutes of Health, he said in an interview with McClatchy on Friday.

It aint over till its over, Fauci, President Joe Bidens chief medical adviser, said. Im not going to be taking my attention off COVID-19 until we have it essentially crushed  namely, were not worried about it at all as a public health threat. When that happens, I will go back and refocus my attention on HIV, malaria, tuberculosis, and all the other things my institute does.

Fauci, who is director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said, I believe, with all due modesty, weve done incredible things with regard to HIV, with regard to flu and now with regard to COVID-19 by being the main movers in the development of a vaccine.

He announced this week the investment of $3.2 billion in a new COVID-19 Antiviral Development Strategy, a whole-of-government effort aimed at developing next-generation treatments for COVID-19 as well as other, future threats.

It was a sign of his focus on the next phase of the coronavirus pandemic, ensuring that the virus is continually monitored for mutations that could disrupt or reverse progress.

Fauci is closely watching a new variant first identified in India, known as Delta, which he said was concerning for the millions of Americans who are not yet fully vaccinated.

If youre vaccinated, you dont need to worry so much, because the predominant vaccine in this country  the mRNAs  protect very well against it, Fauci said. Its likely J&J does the same thing though we dont have formal proof of that.

My concern is for the people who are not getting vaccinated, he continued. Because when you have the circulation of a variant thats more transmissible  and recently a Scottish study shows is more pathogenic and causes more severe disease  then I worry about people who are not vaccinated, because then theyre really at risk from this really troublesome variant.

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Scientists are running clinical trials to test whether booster shots should target specific variants, or whether they should target the original strain of the coronavirus that emerged from Wuhan, as the original vaccines did.

Fauci suggested that boosting against the original virus strain, known as the wild type, might ultimately be the best strategy to pursue, because the vaccines have proven effective against every variant of concern identified so far.

Youve got to ask yourself the question, what is going to be the strategy for the future? Should we be boosting, if we have to boost, against the original one, which has already shown to be really, really good at spilling over protection against the variants? Or should we be making variant-specific boosts?

To be honest with you, Im not really sure were going to need that, he said, regarding booster shots that would target specific mutations. It may be that just increasing the level of protection against the original virus will give you enough cross-protection against most variants.
Videos released under court order provide a chilling new look at the chaos at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, including body camera footage that shows a man charging at a police officer with a flagpole and tackling him to the ground.

Federal judges ordered the release of the videos after media organizations, including The Associated Press, went to court to request that the Department of Justice provide access. The videos are being presented as evidence in prosecutors cases against three men charged with assaulting police.

The new videos show a Marine Corps veteran and former New York City police officer wielding a flagpole as he attacks police, as well as rioters crushing another officer into a door as he screams in pain. Still another video shows a New Jersey man punching an officer in the head.

The release comes at a time when Republican lawmakers in Washington increasingly try to downplay the siege, portraying the breach of the Capitol as a mostly peaceful protest despite the shocking violence that unfolded.

Supporters of former President Donald Trump fought past police lines to storm the building and interrupt the certification of President Joe Bidens election win over Trump.

The Justice Department has brought hundreds of criminal cases against the rioters. This week, a man linked to the antigovernment Three Percenters extremist movement was indicted on a new charge that he brought a semi-automatic handgun with him to the Capitol.

Body camera video released in the case against former New York City policeman Thomas Webster shows the man holding a flagpole and shouting profanities at officers standing behind a metal barricade. Webster pushes the barricade and swings toward an officer with the flagpole. There's a violent scuffle, the officer manages to take the flagpole away from the man, and Webster appears to tackle the officer to the ground.

Other images in court documents show Webster pinning the officer to the ground and grabbing at his face.

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Webster's lawyer wrote in court documents seeking his release from jail while he awaits trial that his client got upset when he saw police using pepper spray on the crowd. The lawyer, James Monroe, wrote that as a former U.S. Marine and a member of law enforcement, defendant's moral instinct was to protect the innocent.

Monroe said the officer provoked Webster by reaching across the barrier and punching him. The lawyer says Webster never actually struck the officer with the flagpole.

Other footage released in the case against Patrick McCaughey III, a Connecticut man charged with assault, show police wearing helmets and face shields gathered in a Capitol doorway as the crowd pushes aggressively forward and shouts at them.

At one point, Daniel Hodges of Washington's Metropolitan Police Department gets pinned against a door and a rioter rips off his mask. The mob shouts heave ho" as it pushes forward. Hodges, whose mouth appears bloody, cries out as he's crushed between a riot shield and the door. McCaughey at one point points to Hodges and says he's hurt," seemingly trying to alert the other officers. Hodges has recovered from his injuries.

An email seeking comment was sent to an attorney for McCaughey.

Democrats used the video of Hodges, which had been previously obtained by some media outlets, in their impeachment case against Trump accusing him of inciting the insurrection. The House impeached him  the second of his presidency  a week after the riot for telling his supporters that morning to fight like hell to overturn his defeat. The Senate acquitted him weeks later.

Footage released in a third case shows a man identified as Scott Fairlamb and others yelling at police as the officers walk through the crowd outside the Capitol. Fairlamb then shoves an officer and punches at his head, hitting his face shield. An email seeking comment was sent to Fairlamb's attorney.

Court documents filed this week also show another man, Guy Reffitt of Texas, has been indicted on new charges that he brought a rifle and handgun to Washington and carried the handgun onto Capitol grounds. He was arrested in January and previously pleaded not guilty to charges including obstruction of an official proceeding.

Reffitt's wife told authorities he's a member of a Three Percenters group, according to court documents. Prosecutors say Reffitt led a group of rioters up the Capitol steps and was stopped only after officers used pepper balls, impact projectiles and pepper spray.

An email seeking comment was sent to Reffitt's attorney on Friday.

More than 480 people are facing federal charges in the riot. Four have pleaded guilty so far, including a member of the Oath Keepers extremist group who has agreed to cooperate with investigators.

A 49-year-old Indiana grandmother is expected next week to become the first Jan. 6 person to be sentenced. Anna Morgan Lloyd is pleading guilty to a misdemeanor charge for entering the Capitol. Prosecutors are asking for a sentence of probation with community service and $500 in restitution.

After the riot, Morgan Lloyd described it on Facebook as the "most exciting day of my life, according to prosecutors. She wrote in a letter to the judge filed in court that she didn't see any violence at the Capitol and was shocked when she returned to her hotel and saw the news coverage.

"At first it didnt dawn on me, but later I realized that if every person like me, who wasnt violent, was removed from that crowd, the ones who were violent may have lost the nerve to do what they did. For that I am sorry and take responsibility," she wrote.

The powerful video footage was made public as Senate Republicans have blocked a bipartisan inquiry into the insurrection and as an increasing number of House Republicans have defended the rioters and played down the violence of the day.

At a House Oversight and Reform hearing Tuesday, several Republicans questioned Democrats efforts to examine the attack and said they should instead be focused on issues like border security or COVID-19 restrictions.

Wisconsin Rep. Glenn Grothman grilled FBI Director Christopher Wray on whether some of those who were arrested for illegally entering the Capitol were in fact innocent. Arizona Rep. Paul Gosar repeated his arguments that a Trump supporter who was shot and killed by police while breaking into the House chamber, Ashli Babbitt, was executed.

At a hearing last month, GOP Rep. Andrew Clyde of Georgia said one video feed of the rioters looked like they were on a normal tourist visit.

Also Tuesday, 21 House Republicans voted against giving congressional medals of honor to Capitol Police and Metropolitan Police to thank them for their service that day. Dozens of those officers suffered injuries, including chemical burns, brain injuries and broken bones as the rioters overran them and broke into the building.

____

Associated Press reporter Mary Clare Jalonick contributed to this report from Washington.
Meet the Clark men from Sheffield - [L to R] Neville Snr, 86, Neville, Jnr, Lee, Danny, 21 and Archie 2. (Caters)

Fathers Day will be a busy celebration for one unique family who have five generations of first born males with 84 years between the oldest and youngest members.

From 86-year-old Neville, down to his two year old great, great grandson, Archie, the Clark men from Sheffield span an incredible five generations.

And all being first born sons isnt the only thing they have in common, with four of the men working as electricians - though Archie is a bit too young to join the family trade just yet

We are all really close, we live within a mile of each other and we go on holidays, to matches and the pub together, Archies dad, Danny, 21, says of the family's unique bond.

Read more: Teacher becomes one of the first men in the UK to become a single dad by choice via surrogacy

Neville, 86, is dad to two boys, Neville 64 and Kevin, 61.

Neville (jnr) is a dad of three boys, Lee, 45, Glenn, 40 and Jonathan 38.

Lee is a dad of two boys, Danny 21 and Dylan 17.

Father's Day is a busy celebration for one family who have five generations of first born males. L-R Neville Jnr, Neville Snr, Danny, Archie, and Lee. (Caters)

Finally, completing the fifth generation in a family of sons, Danny is dad to Archie, two.

When Danny found out aged 17 he was going to be a dad, he turned to the men in his life to guide him.

I was scared to be a dad at that age, but when I told my dad he was very supportive and they have all given me help and parenting advice," he explains.

My dad, granddad and great granddad have helped me all the way. You couldnt dream of a better family.

Watch: Matthew McConaughey opens up about fatherhood.

Danny originally qualified as a sports coach but later decided to follow in the footsteps of his dad, granddad and great granddad and trained as an electrician.

As well as the family trade, the Clark men all have a shared love of football and as soon as Archie was born made sure he was kitted out in a Sheffield Wednesday shirt.

Football is a huge passion in our family, we all support Sheffield Wednesday and go to matches together," Danny explains.

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My dad used to manage the football team I played in as a kid, and my granddad used to manage my dads team. Even my great granddad was a football manager  its in our blood."

Read more: Physical play with dads could help children control their emotions

Danny welcomed his first child Archie when he was 18. (Caters)

The Clark men are looking forward to being able to take Archie with them to matches once COVID restrictions allow, but in the mean time are spending time together as a family.

My dad is a big kid at heart, he loves to take an interest in a theme that Archie likes, they are best friends," Danny adds.

Parenting has changed over the years and they are all very hands on with Archie, they even helped with nappies.

My dad is so soft with him, the whole family adore him, he is spoilt rotten."

My great granddad, Neville, hasnt seen much of Archie because of lockdown but when he does spend time with him, his face lights up and he doesnt stop talking about him."

Read more: David Beckham, Barack Obama and Gordon Ramsay top hottest celebrity dads list

Danny says his great, great granddad Neville is very proud of the family he heads.

"I love to see them together, its amazing to think there is 84 years between them," he adds.

Its really nice to know that Archie will grow up surrounded by hard working male role models."

Additional reporting Caters.

Watch: Kevin Hart hopes 'Fatherhood' dispels black father stereotypes
For the third time in three months, the Florida Supreme Court dashed the hopes of Floridians who want to see expanded access to cannabis.

In a 5-2 ruling on Thursday, the states highest court found a ballot initiative to legalize marijuana to be misleading. The initiative, titled Regulate Marijuana in a Manner Similar to Alcohol to Establish Age, Licensing, and Other Restrictions, also would have allowed Floridians to grow cannabis at home. Had it reached the ballot, the initiative would have needed the approval of 60% of voters to become a part of the state Constitution.

Attorney General Ashley Moody asked the court to weigh in on the ballot language in September 2019. It took the court the better part of two years to issue its ruling.

Justices Charles Canady, Ricky Polston, Carlos Muniz, John Couriel and Jamie Grosshans concurred Thursday that Sensible Floridas ballot initiative misled voters because the 75-word summary of the proposed amendment was unclear on the word use.

The ballot summary said the amendment would regulate marijuana for limited use and growing by persons twenty-one years of age or older. Justices found that this could mean the initiatives backers were claiming to set guardrails on the amount of cannabis an individual could personally consume. But the justices wrote that the language of the constitutional amendment set no such limits.

The Sponsors inability to point to anything in the text of the measure that could credibly support the limited use language in the summary leaves no doubt that the summary is affirmatively misleading, the justices wrote.

In a statement, Moody spokesperson Lauren Cassidy thanked the court for its decision.

Floridians must fully understand what they are voting on when they go to the ballot box, Cassidy said.

A harmful legal delay

Tampa attorney Michael Minardi, who backed the initiative, said in an interview he was disappointed in the courts decision. However, he plans to press on. His group will redraft the proposal in the hope of getting a version of the amendment before voters in 2022.

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We have already rewritten some alternate versions, Minardi said. Its really a welcome thing just to finally have the opinion.

Minardi has also entered the race to represent Florida House District 59, which covers part of Hillsborough County. The attorney, who would face Democrat Andrew Learned in a potential general election, said if elected, he would educate the Republican Party about the economic benefits of expanded cannabis access in Florida.

Nicholas Warren, an attorney with the ACLU of Florida, said the long wait between Moodys request and the courts ruling was highly unusual  and harmful to the initiatives prospects.

The Florida Supreme Court is killing initiatives by parking them in legal limbo, Warren said.

Records show that even without the courts decision, the marijuana legalization effort had a ways to go before hitting the 2022 ballot. Sensible Florida, the group chaired by Minardi, had collected just 29,172 of the necessary 891,589 valid signatures to be placed on the ballot. The group had raised about $271,000.

Successful ballot initiatives often cost millions of dollars. Sensible Florida may have trouble raising the money it needs. A law passed by the Legislature earlier this year limits individual campaign contributions to groups backing or opposing ballot initiatives to $3,000  until the proposal is cleared for the ballot.

Minardi noted that the law is the subject of at least one legal challenge.

A string of cannabis setbacks

The courts ruling Thursday is the latest in a string of defeats for advocates of expanded cannabis access. In April, the court defeated a different, industry-backed marijuana legalization initiative, ruling that it, too, was misleading. And in May, justices found Floridas medical marijuana regulations to be constitutional  a blow to smaller businesses hoping to enter the heavily regulated industry.

Charlie Crist, the Democratic congressman who hopes to challenge Gov. Ron DeSantis in the 2022 governors race, blasted the courts decision on Twitter.

The Florida Supreme Court that @GovRonDeSantis packed with partisan judges just denied another ballot initiative to let Floridians vote on legalizing marijuana. This is wrong. Legalization should be up to the people of Florida, Crist tweeted.

When he was governor, Crist appointed Canady and Polston, who sided with the majority, to the Supreme Court. Crist also appointed Jorge Labarga, who dissented in this case.

The Florida Chamber of Commerce celebrated the courts ruling.

We applaud the Court for ... protecting voters from efforts to obscure the initiatives true purpose, unlimited marijuana for all, the chambers president and CEO, Mark Wilson, said in a statement.
A former Japanese justice minister received a three-year jail term on Friday for vote-buying in an attempt to get his wife elected to a national office, local media said.

Katsuyuki Kawai, 58, was found guilty of charges that he distributed 29 million yen ($260,000 at today's rates) to about 100 people in 2019, to help secure an upper house seat for his wife Anri, national broadcaster NHK said.

He was fined 1.3 million yen ($11,800) in addition to the jail term, local media added.

Officials at the Tokyo District Court could not immediately confirm the reports.

Katsuyuki, a close confidant of former prime minister Shinzo Abe, had reversed his earlier claims of innocence and broadly conceded the allegations against him.

Anri, who won her seat in the July 2019 election, has already been found guilty over her role in the scheme and received a suspended sentence of 16 months earlier this year.

Katsuyuki's sentence is not suspended, meaning he faces jail time. But the Yomiuri Shimbun daily reported that he appealed.

He was named justice minister by Abe in 2019 but left the office after only a few weeks as the scandal emerged.

The headquarters of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party reportedly provided 150 million yen to Anri's election campaign, an unusually large sum to boost campaign efforts.

hih/sah/axn
The past tenants of St. Paul's Midway Shopping Center have sued the property owners who evicted them a year ago.

The shopping center was damaged by looting and fires during the unrest that followed the killing of George Floyd in May 2020. In July, the tenants had their leases terminated and were forced to move out.

Now, owners of the Golden Gate Cafe, Sweet Cajun, Mimi's Beauty salon and Hung Tu  all of whom say their stores suffered little to no damage in the unrest  have sued RK Midway Shopping Center, Snelling Midway Redevelopment and RD Management in Ramsey County District Court. The plaintiffs allege breach of contracts, wrongful eviction and unlawful exclusion, and breach of duty of good faith.

On May 28-29 of last year, rioters set fire to the shopping center's Foot Locker. The adjacent tenants, GameStop, New York, New York and Great Clips, suffered some collateral damage from firefighters' efforts to put out the blaze. The remainder of the shopping center suffered little damage, according to the lawsuit.

The lawsuit alleges the property owners terminated the leases and excluded the businesses from the shopping center in an attempt to expedite at the business owners' expense development of United Village, a planned redevelopment of the area surrounding Allianz Field, which includes the shopping center.

The minority-owned businesses suffered severely when they were forcibly shuttered, the suit claims.

If not for the closure, the businesses named in the suit would have continued to operate, the owners say.

"We're open at a new location," said Thien Do, owner of Sweet Cajun, now at 712 University Av. "Come visit us."

The city of St. Paul recently ordered the vacant shopping center demolished. The developer has applied for a demolition permit, which is under review but has not been issued, according to an acting city spokesperson.

The business owners also are seeking an injunction prohibiting a premature demolition of the Midway Shopping Center.

Zoe Jackson  612-673-7112

Twitter: @zoemjack
Nine members of the Stafford High School Class of 1951 showed up in the big back room at Basils Restaurant on Wednesday for an anniversary lunch. If that doesnt seem like a lot, its actually over half of the 17 members of the class who are still around, and nearly a quarter of the entire class that roamed the Stafford High hallways 70 years ago.

The Class of 51 lived through World War II as grade schoolers; some remember having to blacken the windows of their houses for air raid drills. The war that happened during their high school years was the Korean one, which ended in 53. The Baby Boom, which swelled the populations of schools throughout the community, was a few years away.

Many of Wednesdays lunchers have stayed in the Stafford area all their lives. Some of the classmates have been getting together every month for years, until COVID-19 happened. Sometimes its been two of us, sometimes 12 or 13, says Gloria Parsons (nee Levesque), who takes the lead in organizing the events.

They havent exactly kept to the every five- or 10-year anniversary schedule. Even the member who traveled the farthest to be at Basils Wednesday  Joyce Sadlak (nee Woods), who now lives in Santa Maria, California  was at a reunion gathering two years ago.

Sadlak loves telling the story of cleaning up the gym to get ready for a prom. There was a May pole, and it fell down.

There are much larger classes at the school now, says Patricia Greika (nee Lusa), who introduces herself as the last charter member of the Stafford Historical Society. Greika says she was born here and never left. I have good memories of school. I played basketball. The rules were different then. Girls couldnt cross the center line. We didnt even have softball in those days.

The town was different, too. You could drive and never see a stop light, Greika says. The Central Vermont train came through town. You have to have a car now. There are no buses to Hartford.

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There was more of a small town feeling then. There were more shops  a fruit store, the five & dime store  and everything was on the main street. There were quite a few farms.

Gloria Mattarelli (nee Roche) says her parents both worked outside the house, but also had a dairy farm. My brothers milked the cows every morning before school.

After school, Stafford teens would head to Dekes, which sounds like a scene out of an Andy Hardy movie or an Archie comic book. They had a jukebox with the big band records on it. You could get a Coke and chips.

One of the soda jerks scooping ice cream at Dekes was the 1951 class president, Bill Taylor. How did he receive that lofty honor? Somebody pushed me into it, he says humbly, to which his classmate Alex Parrow adds, He was a pretty popular guy in class. Everybody loved and respected him. Taylor, who now lives Mattituck, New York, jokes that when he mentioned to a friend hed be attending his 70th high school reunion, the friend did the math and recommended, Eat dessert first.

Parrow, who now lives in Lebanon, remembers all the innovations of the time. All the telephones in town were party lines; you had to share with your neighbors. When I was 10 years old, someone told me that in the future, wed have phones where we could see the person we were talking to. Parrow also recalls We were one of the first homes in our neighborhood to have television.

We had a close-knit class, Parrow says. Some of the boys, at 16, had their own cars and would go riding up and down Main Street looking at the girls.

Besides the sports teams, the high school had lots of clubs, many of which havent lasted as long as their club members. There was the Movie Operators Club, the Library Monitors Club, the Commercial Club (for budding businesspeople). Another club, Future Homemakers of America, was a national phenomenon which had started just six years before the class of 51 graduated, and still exists today as Family, Career, and Community Leaders of America.

Connie Swatik (nee Calchera), who still lives in Stafford Springs, attended the anniversary with her sister Annie, who was in the class of 48.

We didnt move around then like they do now, says Swatik. I didnt even have to look for a job. A representative from Travelers visited the schools seniors to talk about working there. I worked there for 40 years. An article in the local paper soon after graduation was headlined Stafford High Students Have Secured Jobs, and begins Many of the 1951 graduates of Stafford High School have secured jobs, some for the summer while others will be permanent. Another article just a few months later noted that the fall finds the 40 graduates of Stafford High School already launched on careers. That industriousness fits well with the old school motto, Labor Omnia Vincit  Latin for Work conquers all.

Gloria Mattarelli (nee Roche), who now lives 20 miles away from Stafford, in Suffield, says high school was a beautiful experience. All the people were friendly. I never heard anybody say a bad word to us. You could walk home from the movies at 10 oclock at night. It was so peaceful and quiet.

I wish everybody couldve had a childhood like I had.

Christopher Arnott can be reached at carnott@courant.com.
By Yimou Lee and Ben Blanchard

TAIPEI (Reuters) -Taiwan will allow Terry Gou, the billionaire founder of Taiwan's Foxconn, and TSMC to negotiate on its behalf for COVID-19 vaccines, a government spokesman said on Friday, but warned there was no guarantee of success.

Taiwan is trying to speed up the arrival of the millions of vaccines it has on order as it deals with a rise in domestic cases, although infections remain comparatively low. Only around 6% of Taiwan's 23.5 million people have received at least one of the two-shot coronavirus vaccine regimen.

The government has come under pressure to allow private firms to buy vaccines, and said while it welcomes the idea and is willing to help, they have to provide proof from vaccine producers they have shots and are willing to sell them.

Speaking to reporters after Gou said he was seeking a meeting with President Tsai Ing-wen to discuss his plans to buy 5 million shots from Germany's BioNTech SE, Cabinet spokesman Lo Ping-cheng said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co Ltd (TSMC) wanted to donate an equal amount.

Lo said BioNTech had told Gou, who wants to make the purchase through his Yonglin Education Foundation, on Wednesday they will only sell vaccines to governments.

"A good method is for the government to, under this framework, authorise TSMC and the Yonglin Education Foundation to buy them and then donate to the government," he said.

He said the government was, with the help of the German government, continuing its own talks with BioNTech, adding there was no guarantee Gou or anyone else would succeed.

"Even if Mr. Gou can discuss this with the original manufacturer or an agent, can he get them to sell sufficient vaccines? Honestly, nobody knows."

TSMC said it "confirmed the initiative", but offered no other details. BioNTech declined to comment.

Presidential office spokesman Xavier Chang said Tsai had met Gou and TSMC Chairman Mark Liu on Friday to discuss their proposals in a "good and friendly" atmosphere.

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"We all hope that it is produced in the original factory with the original packaging and will be delivered directly to Taiwan," he said, referring to the BioNTech shots.

Gou's spokesperson Amanda Liu said after the meeting that a "consensus was reached on key issues", and quoted Gou as saying "It's a daunting mission and there's a long way to go and we will do our best!"

Taiwan's own deal with BioNTech fell through this year, with the government blaming it on pressure from Beijing.

China has denied the accusation, saying Taiwan is free to obtain the vaccines through Shanghai Fosun Pharmaceutical Group Co Ltd, which has a contract with BioNTech to sell the vaccines in China, Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan.

Taiwan has been dealing directly with BioNTech in Germany, saying it does not trust vaccines from China.

Shieh Jhy-wey, Taiwan's de facto ambassador in Berlin, said that Germany's Economy Ministry had appointed officials to talk directly with BioNTech, adding the company had told him they were willing to sell vaccines to Taiwan directly from Europe.

Germany's Economy Ministry declined to comment.

Japan donated 1.24 million AstraZeneca Plc shots to Taiwan this month and the United States has pledged 750,000 doses, although it has not given details, all on top of vaccines Taiwan has already ordered.

Another 240,000 Moderna Inc doses arrived in Taiwan later on Friday.

(Reporting by Ben Blanchard and Yimou Lee; Additional reporting by Beijing newsroom and Andreas Rinke in Berlin; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan, Christopher Cushing and Alexander Smith)
The departure of two members of the HFPA comes at a critical time for the embattled organization that has vowed to enact sweeping changes following a Times investigation. (Photo illustration by Nicole Vas / Los Angeles Times; photos by Al Seib / Los Angeles Times, Mark Wilson / Getty Images)

Calling the Hollywood Foreign Press Assn. toxic and its reform efforts window-dressing, two members of the group that votes on the Golden Globe Awards resigned in protest Thursday.

Insulation, silence, fear of retribution, self-dealing, corruption and verbal abuse are just a few ways to describe the current culture, wrote Diederik van Hoogstraten, a member from the Netherlands, and Wenting Xu of China in their letter of resignation, sent to the HFPAs leadership.

The duos departure comes at a critical time for the embattled organization that has vowed to enact sweeping changes following a Times investigation that brought to light allegations of financial and ethical improprieties and pointed out that not one of its 85 members is Black. The stories prompted a cascade of outrage in Hollywood culminating in NBCs decision last month to cancel the 2022 Golden Globes broadcast.

In July, HFPA members are scheduled to vote on a slate of amendments, codifying the groups new bylaws.

The members defection, however, raises questions about the HFPAs ability to successfully enact meaningful reforms.

In the four months since the HFPA pledged a major restructuring, the organization has struggled to contain mounting pressures and crisis.

In April, former eight-term President Phil Berk was expelled after he sent an email to the groups entire membership that referred to Black Lives Matter as a racist hate movement.

Then in May, Hollywoods biggest power players  including Netflix, Amazon Studios, Warner Bros. and HBO  cut ties with the HFPA, announcing that they would not work with the group until more meaningful changes were enacted.

The strongest rebuke yet, however, appears to be coming from within.

The majority of the membership resists transformative change, despite our lawyers and spokespersons suggesting otherwise publicly, the two said in their letter. Internal opposition to the status quo has been stifled, and critical voices such as ours have largely been ignored.

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Though the signatories said that they believe in the associations potential and support its philanthropic endeavors, after attempting to work for change, they did not see a positive way to remain as members of the 78-year-old organization. Staying inside the association is no longer tenable for us, they wrote.

In a statement, the HFPA board called this a crucial, historic and trying time for the organization.

Reiterating its commitment to transformational change, the board said: At a time when the overwhelming majority of our members have chosen to be a part of change, it is disappointing that some members have decided to try and splinter our organization and sow division and doubt.

To date, the HFPA has implemented a number of reforms, including establishing a hotline to report incidents or allegations anonymously. Last month, the group hired two outside law firms to independently investigate reports to the hotline. As well, members approved a new code of conduct and retained a new diversity, equity and inclusion consultant. The Cambridge, Mass., firm Leadership Lab International was brought on board.

But the resigning HFPA members, who occupy a small, reform-minded faction, said the steps have fallen short. They said their recommendations for inclusion in the new bylaws were either diluted or disregarded altogether.

The new bylaws written by the legal consultants of Ropes & Gray have been watered down significantly to meet the demands of the current Board and many change-averse members, they wrote.

For example, they cited the amendment that would expand the current board to 15 members with the addition of three outside directors. This power imbalance, they wrote, all but guarantees the current culture will continue to thrive.

The members also took issue with the proposed process for admitting new candidates. A major criticism of the HFPA is that it has functioned like a country club, favoring members who are not full-time reporters or work for obscure media outlets to the exclusion of serious journalists, while capping annual admission at five new members a year.

According to draft bylaws under review, portions of which were described to The Times, a new nine-person credentials committee would be established, comprising four HFPA members  one of whom will be the HFPAs president  and five outside journalism professionals. They would assess and determine the candidates for admission into the association. Initially, an oversight committee would pick the five outsiders; afterward, the board would select them.

The two HFPA members criticized the proposed bylaw changes, saying the leadership ignored recommendations that all members resign and reapply under strict requirements.

There is still significant resistance to welcoming a large and diverse class of new members. The new proposed bylaws do not contain clear guidance for quickly identifying and admitting qualified journalists, they wrote.

I think it became clear to all of us and also to Ropes & Gray that the group of people who believe in deep, transformative, profound reform was a very small minority, Van Hoogstraten, a former board director who has been with the HFPA for six years, told The Times.

Xu, who has been with the association for five years, said in an interview that the reform plan under consideration still favors the organization's current leadership, the same people in power, the same people who used to refuse to incorporate reforms and to welcome all members, the same people who were involved in lawsuits.

Though the HFPA has publicly stated it is committed to accountability and transparency, the resigning members say they are in short supply.

Internal transparency was never great to begin with, [and] has dramatically decreased since February, so members dont know the details about the financials anymore, they wrote in their letter. But payments for internal jobs have skyrocketed lately. Morally and fiscally this self-dealing and sense of entitlement is a scandal in and of itself. But the lack of transparency goes beyond just the financials: since February most decision-making has happened behind closed doors. Questions and criticisms from us as well as outside critics have been waved off or dealt with by hired consultants, lawyers and PR agents.

In their resignation letter, Van Hoogstraten and Xu also described a toxic environment that undermines professional journalism, calling the HFPA a place where bullying of members by members is left unquestioned and unpunished. The badgering of talent and publicists: ditto.

Xu said she received no reply from leadership to an email she sent in March, reviewed by The Times, in which she expressed the need for transparency, strong leadership, new members with serious journalism credentials and real top-down change.

In May, as the crisis intensified, Xu followed up with another email calling on board officers to step down.

Responding to Xu, Helen Hoehne, the groups vice president, called her criticisms a hate campaign, telling Xu in an email reviewed by The Times, I would welcome your input if you chose to direct your energy to working with us instead of against us.

Van Hoogstraten said the organization remains toxic.

"The way people talk to one another, the way people cut each other off, bullying each other, verbally abuse each other to interrupt each other, he said. "It is quite striking that that culture is effectively unchanged. I can't be a part of this anymore.

Though Xu and Van Hoogstraten said that they dont know how the situation will ultimately unfold, they believe the HFPA squandered numerous opportunities to make things right.

That window has closed and Hollywood is moving on," they wrote in their letter. After we leave we plan to build a transparent, professional and inclusive organization."

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Google may be working on expanding Androids Find My Device functionality to more closely match the capabilities of Apples Find My network. Conducting an API teardown of the latest Play services release, 9to5Google found evidence of an API called Spot. The outlet enabled the feature to get a Find My Device network toggle to show up within Androids settings menu.

As most Android users know, Googles mobile operating system already includes a Find My Device feature that allows your phone to use a WiFi or cellular connection to help you locate it if you misplaced it. Apples Find My Network ups the stakes by adding Bluetooth and ultra-wideband to the mix. Lost Apple and third-party devices can broadcast a short-range signal which nearby iOS devices then relay to Apples servers to help you find your lost item.

By the looks of things, Google plans to build out a similar network. If the company moves forward with the project, its not clear how extensive the resulting platform will be in practice. For example, will it work with devices from all Android and Wear OS manufacturers or just those made by Google? How youll interact with the network is also unclear. 9to5Google believes Google will release an accompanying Spot app, though the website wasnt able to determine the exact purpose of the software.

As with all APK teardowns, well point out theres no guarantee well see Spot materialize into something Google will release to the public. At the same time, it wouldnt be a stretch to see the company evolve Find My Device in this way. After all, it did something similar with Android Beam and the eventual release of Nearby Share. Either way, weve reached out to Google for comment, and well update this article when we hear back from the company.
HBO Max

It brings me no pleasure to report how much of my headspace is devoted to Jennifer Lopez and Ben Afflecks PR-heavy second go at a relationship.

And who am I to call it a relationship? Maybe theyre just testing the waters again after a traumatic time, seeking comfort in the comfortable. Maybe theyre just fucking. Maybe its all a stunt. The fact that I could write a damn Harvard thesis on all three hypotheses makes me hate myself.

But there is a vibe they are projecting, one that makes me laugh. Especially now, and especially after all this [gesticulates wildly with his arms as if he is summoning a tornado and/or landing an airplane at JFK], its fun escapism to relive the Bennifer of 20 years ago. Its the future nostalgia Dua Lipa was singing about back when we were all dancing on our dining chairs working from home.

We talked a lot about escapism during the pandemic. Specifically in pop culture. Yes, binges of comfort TV like Friends or The Office spiked. Schitts Creek won every award available. Ted Lasso took the few that it didnt. But culturally there seemed to be a desire for another kind of comfort, one that this Bennifer fuckery is providing: Celebrities who are famous as hell performing their aspirational sex lives for us.

Would you like to go through an extremely public breakup and then bang Ben Affleck?

Were you spiraling during a pandemic to the point of basically becoming a Dunkin Donuts spokesperson, and then Jennifer Lopez literally texts, hey, u up?

Bennifers Back? J. Lo and Ben Afflecks Pandemic Stunts Have Been a Blessing

I dont know a more iconic form of escapism than to pretend this is how your life would work out. But I am a TV critic and I do know a show that gives you familiar vibes. Friends, watch Starstruck on HBO Max.

This series is the perfect companion to what appears to be Horny Celeb Summer. (Did you see that Angelina Jolie recently visited her ex Jonny Lee Miller?) That is because this is a series about a horny celeb.

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What makes Starstruck work so well is that it doesnt attempt to reinvent the format, but also kind of does exactly that. Its a romantic-comedy series (the British kind, so a blissfully bingeable six episodes running less than 30 minutes each), and it owns that. But it is also, as apparently every recently single A-list movie star is, about sex. Are you envious of Bennifer? Watch vicariously through Starstruck.

I dont remember the last time I thought a rom-com was this good. And maybe the reason why is because it is almost exactly Notting Hill. But actually relatable.

Drunk on New Years Eve, Jessie (Rose Matafeo) sleeps with Tom (Nikesh Patel). When she wakes up she realizes hes a mega-famous movie star. He realizes he really likes this magnetic mess of a human.

You can basically fill in the plot from that introduction. But theres still something so satisfying about the series.

It doesnt portray the relationship as fantasy. What if you were just a girl standing in front of a boy asking him to love her? Thats the kind of shit we get whisked away for. Starstruck meets you where you are: An emotional disaster, a professional flop, an OK body, but determined to work it out anyway.

Neither Tom nor Jessie understands why they click so well. But the connection is so undeniable that fate keeps causing them to meet. (Fate, feel free to send Nikesh Patel my way.)

Theres a distinctly older Gen Z/younger millennial vibe to the series, owed to Matafeo being the creator and writer. Her constant anxiety about turning 28 and feeling old aged me about a decade. But hers is also a very particular and relatable balancing act, one that I havent seen on TV before. She knows what she deserves and wants, both in a relationship and with sex. But shes also formed from a dialogue with rom-com ideas about what love should be, and that haunts her.

There are no easy answers. Thats part of the fun. But most of the fun is just that: how fun it is. Jessie is one of those protagonists whose messiness is probably a little heightened for TV, but in the pursuit of acing the relatability test. You immediately understand why one of the most famous people in the world would be beguiled by her. By being herself, shes beguiling.

Texts Reveal How the Church of Scientology Shadowed Leah Remini and Jennifer Lopez

If the narrative is familiar, why it stands outespecially in this #HotVaxSummeris that they have sex. Immediately. Its a curious thing about rom-coms. For all the escapism and fantasy, the sex part of a relationship and an attraction is just skipped over, or assumed.

Starstruck asks, what if Notting Hill was dirty? What if rom-coms actually acknowledged the sex? What if the characters talked about when one went down on the other instead of being demure in bedsheets?

The fun thing about being obsessed with the J.Lo and Ben Affleck journey is that its so not my journey. But maybe this is? Maybe Nikesh Patel (who, after also starring in Hulus Four Weddings and a Funeral reboot, is demanding to be the next Hugh Grant) is going to see me very drunk at a bar and find me irresistible.

The thing I like about this idea of #HotVaxSummer and the world opening again is not just the idea of possibility, but the validation of it. Im a jaded, depressed, deeply broken cynic who would never abide by that kind of optimism. But the glimmer of hope is there. May we all be Starstruck.

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When bears started charging toward Fina Kiefer, she called her husband for help.

The 55-year-old told him multiple bears were charging her on the Pioneer Ridge hiking trail in Alaska, and she had to use bear spray to deter them.

Then she vanished.

Shortly after requesting assistance, the hiker stopped responding to phone calls and text messages, the Alaska Department of Public Safety said in a news release. Alaska State Troopers responded to the trailhead and conducted a hasty search of the first section of the trail with no results.

Officials began a search Tuesday about 1:30 a.m. Once the morning came, they sent out an aerial search and rescue team, along with volunteers to search the ground.

They searched all day and into the night Tuesday with no sign of Kiefer, the department of public safety said.

No evidence of the missing hiker has been discovered, officials said at the end of the day Tuesday. Search efforts are ending for the day due to deteriorating weather in the area.

The search continued the next day. Around 5:30 p.m., a search volunteer who was driving on Knik River Road spotted Kiefer walking out of the woods.

She was about a mile from the trailhead, officials said. Kiefer was injured and taken to the hospital for medical care. The severity and nature of her injuries were not revealed.

Master Sgt. Evan Budd, superintendent of the Alaska Rescue Coordination Center, told the Anchorage Daily News that Kiefer had waterproof matches and started a fire overnight.

Being prepared for the unexpected is critical in the Alaskan outdoors, Budd told the news outlet. What you plan as a day hike can quickly turn into a multi-day ordeal.

Even bears like cracking open cold ones. Bear trashes Colorado car with beer inside

Watch what happens when a hungry black bear and grizzly meet in Glacier National Park

National Park Service once again tells tourists to not push their friends into bears
A man lost his left arm and his granddaughter was burned when a bomb detonated in a Port Hadlock backyard, police said.

Multiple people heard loud explosions Tuesday and told police they saw smoke and large flames coming from the home, the Jefferson County Sheriffs Office said.

While responding to the scene, deputies received an additional caller who reported a man with a chest injury and fully amputated left arm, officials said Wednesday in a statement on Facebook.

A Port Hadlock, Washington, man lost his left arm and a 6-year-old had burns on her head when a bomb detonated, the Jefferson County Sheriffs Office said.

Officials found a small building behind the house fully enveloped in flames and the man bleeding from his wounds. They also found the mans 6-year-old granddaughter with burns on her head, the sheriffs office said.

The man was flown by helicopter to a medical facility for treatment, officials said. They did not say what happened to the girl.

Detectives said they found evidence that someone was making explosives, including pipe bombs, in the outbuilding.

Charges are forthcoming in the incident, according to the sheriffs office.

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A state audit of English Language Learner programs in the Wilder School District last year found multiple issues with the program  which is also the subject of a federal civil rights complaint.

The State Department of Education is required to regularly audit federal programs at all Idaho school districts. During a routine review of the Wilder School District in the spring of 2020  before COVID-19 shut down schools  the SDE found issues in 18 of 23 areas of the ELL program, far more citations than in other districts audited that year.

The audit results raise some of the same concerns parents later voiced in a January 2021 complaint to the U.S. Department of Education, including an allegation that Wilder was providing no meaningful ELL instruction to Wilder English Language Learners, which make up 33% of the districts 500 students. The district is predominantly Latino.

The state auditors did not find evidence of materials or resources used to provide core English language instruction, audit documents say. There was no evidence of ELL courses offered to Wilder middle or high School students, state ELL coordinator and Wilder reviewer Maria Puga wrote in an email to reporters. And instead of approved English Language acquisition materials, Wilder students were learning from Rosetta Stone and other reading-specific programs.

These materials are useful as intervention or supplemental tools, but cannot replace a core language instructional education program, Puga said in an email Thursday.

And while Wilder said it was using an English Language model called SIOP to teach EL youth, reviewers did not find evidence this was used consistently district-wide, or that teachers had been trained on the model in the two years prior.

The review process meant to fix these problems lasted a year. The district closed the audit in March 2021 by submitting documents that addressed the states concerns.

But essentially, Wilders ELL students spent at least two school years  and a pandemic  learning in a program that did not meet federal standards.

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Wilder officials dispute claims of subpar ELL instruction

Wilder officials contend that the audit findings were mostly surface level, the result of clerical issues or policies that werent specific enough to satisfy the SDE, not the result of fundamental issues with the districts ELL programs.

But correspondence between the SDE and the district shows that the state sent Wilders plans back for revision until district documents met federal guidelines. For example, in February of 2021, Puga informed the district that its ELL program description still needs additional work to develop a core language instructional education program. Wilder federal programs director and elementary principal John Carlisle says that the district was providing this instruction, but the program descriptions simply werent explicit enough for the state.

The district satisfied many of the requirements when it turned in a comprehensive English Language Learner plan in the spring of 2021. Carlisle maintains that the plan doesnt significantly change the districts practices  it just provides better documentation of what the district was already doing.

The district did begin new SIOP trainings after the state review. Puga said Wilder also added two new EL courses for middle and high school students.

This was a new development, Puga said.

A parent advocacy group in Wilder has for years claimed the district is failing to properly educate children through Superintendent Jeff Dillons personalized learning and iPad program. They summarized their concerns in the January complaint to the department of education, which alleged the district was discriminating against English Language Learners.

Dillon refuted the federal complaint, saying the district and its board of trustees disagree entirely with the claims.

Referencing this state audit, he said, All of our federal programs, including the ELL program  have continually been found in compliance. Yet state officials were still working with the district to remedy problems in the ELL program at the time.

The U.S. Department of Education has not announced whether its going to investigate the complaint that families submitted against the school district in January. Erik Johnson, a lawyer representing the complainants through Idaho Legal Aid, said a federal investigator had been talking with families this spring. The federal agency refused to update reporters on the investigation process, or even confirm it received the complaint.

If the feds open an official case against the district, it will be added to an online database, a U.S. Department of Education spokesman said.

Wilder was not listed as a district under investigation as of late May, the last time the database was updated.

State found more problems than usual in Wilders ELL program

The SDE audits school districts once every six years to check if programs for student groups like English Language Learners, migrant students, homeless students and low-income students are in compliance with state and federal law.

A team of federal programs auditors visited the Wilder School District in March of 2020, in the week before schools across the state shut down. After looking through documents, visiting classrooms and interviewing students and parents, auditors documented at least 18 issue findings in Wilders ELL programs alone. The average number of ELL findings in other districts was seven, SDE Federal Programs Director Karen Seay said.

The district also had numerous findings related to its migrant education program, its program for serving homeless students, and the Title I-A program for low-income youth.

The number of findings, especially programmatic findings, was concerning, Seay said about Wilders audit.

State auditors found that Wilders written process for identifying, assessing and placement of eligible students into the ELL program didnt meet the minimum requirements. They also found recordkeeping issues, like ELL screening tests and exit forms missing from some students files.

The state and school district both say that some of the findings were due to organizational issues. Carlisle said that the state lost some of the districts documentation, and that Wilder staff struggled to use an online portal that the state uses for document submission. Puga said that Wilder did eventually prove that it was in compliance with some benchmarks that the state marked as issues, but the proof wasnt submitted properly at the time of the audit, which the district had months to prepare for.

A lot of times, with the state, they want to have the documentation of: How did this get done? Carlisle said. And sometimes when youre working with students in a classroom, what documentation is done? Did you take a picture of that student while you were working with them? Did you have the student sign a document that says yes, I was able to learn how to say the letter R?

Puga said the Wilder staff was responsive to the federal programs audit, and worked with the state to address its concerns. She noted that the district was in transition during the ELL audit: Carlisle had just taken over the federal programs mantle from predecessor Tom Farley, and the districts ELL program manager, Lynette Rivera, was also relatively new to the job.

With Lynette and John, like, once they saw this and started, they worked really hard to try and get to that baseline and be where they needed to be in order to not have these indicators or these findings anymore, Puga said. Ive personally been impressed with both.

The SDE could withhold funding from a district if its federal programs are not in compliance, Seay said, but that would only happen as a last resort, if a district had egregious issues and no apparent sense of urgency to change. Shes not aware of the SDE ever formally withholding funds, but it has on occasion held up reimbursements to districts with finance-related federal programs issues.

Wilder officials frustrated by the lengthy audit process

While Wilders in-person audit lasted only two days, the process of correcting the 18 citations dragged out for a full year.

After the initial audit, Wilder sent documents to the state attempting to correct the issue findings. That was in May of 2020.

Dillon, the superintendent, said they didnt hear back from the state until 2021.

On Feb. 1, 2021, Dillon received an email that the state wasnt yet satisfied with Wilders federal programs, and the district had more work to do. The news came just days after parents filed the U.S. Department of Education complaint against the district.

Seay said its not unusual for a district with many findings to take a year to finish its federal programs audit, but that the SDEs process was also delayed by COVID-19 and shifting responsibilities when the coordinator of the federal programs audits went on maternity leave.

Dillon said the district got lost in the COVID shuffle.

If theres something we havent been doing, or theres something you need for us to put in place, or were missing a policy, let us know, Dillon said. When you wait a year, its like wow, what a missed opportunity, or it could be, where we could be doing something better that we hadnt thought about before.

Seay said its likely that auditors will return to Wilder next year to make sure that the district is in compliance. As of early June, state auditors hadnt scheduled a return visit.
By Saurabh Sharma and Sankalp Phartiyal

LUCKNOW, India (Reuters) -Police in India have summoned Twitter's top official in the country to answer allegations that the U.S. firm failed to stop the spread of a video that allegedly incited "hate and enmity" between Hindu and Muslim communities.

An official police notice, seen by Reuters, showed a case had been registered in Ghaziabad in northern Uttar Pradesh state over a video of a few men, apparently Hindu, beating an elderly man believed to be a Muslim and cutting his beard.

The police report names Twitter Inc, its local unit and seven others for their alleged roles in disseminating a video that was deemed insulting to religious beliefs and causing public mischief in a state with a long, bloody history of communal violence.

The controversy comes just as India's federal government is locking horns with Twitter over non-compliance with new IT rules, which have raised doubts whether the platform would continue to enjoy protection against legal liability for user-generated content. The new rules became effective in late May.

In a notice dated Thursday, Ghaziabad police wrote to Twitter India head Manish Maheshwari to appear before officials within seven days of the receipt of the summons.

"Some people used their Twitter handles to spread hatred and enmity in the society and Twitter did not take cognisance," said the notice, which was reviewed by Reuters.

"Writings and works which promoted enmity and affected harmony between different communities in the country and the state were encouraged and such anti-society messages were allowed to go viral."

Twitter declined to comment, and Maheshwari did not respond to a request for comment.

IT minister Ravi Shankar Prasad lashed out at Twitter this week for the Ghaziabad incident, saying its failure to act was "perplexing."

NO SAFE HARBOUR

Prasad has said Twitter has not complied with a new set of government rules that required them to appoint new compliance officers by May 26.

Story continues

The rules state that in case of non-compliance, protection that companies enjoy related to any liability against user generated content "shall not be applicable" and companies "shall be liable for punishment under any law."

"The moment Twitter was non-complaint, the safe harbour protection was automatically not available," said Shlok Chandra, a New Delhi-based lawyer who represents the federal government in various cases. "The position is very clear."

Some free speech activists and lawyers, however, disagree.

"The Central Government neither has the power to bestow, nor the power to "withdraw" the exemption from liability...The determination of the question whether Twitter is entitled to seek exemption from liability is solely within the domain of the Courts," Delhi-based Ira Law firm said in a LinkedIn post this month.

Three special rapporteurs appointed by a top United Nations human rights body last week urged India to review the new IT rules, saying their broadened scope did not conform with international human rights norms and could threaten digital rights.

To comply with India's new IT rules, companies such as Twitter needed to appoint a chief compliance officer, a nodal officer and a resident grievance officer. But LinkedIn job postings show all three positions were currently open at Twitter.

The social media giant has however retained an interim chief compliance officer, it said this week, adding that it was making all efforts to adhere to the new IT rules.

(Reporting by Saurabh Sharma in LUCKNOW and Sankalp Phartiyal in NEW DELHI; Editing by Aditya Kalra, Raju Gopalakrishnan & Simon Cameron-Moore)
Gaza City. Mohammed Abed/AFP via Getty Images

For the second time this week, Israeli airstrikes hit Hamas facilities in Gaza, with military compounds and a launch site targeted late Thursday night.

In a statement, the Israel Defense Forces said the airstrikes were in response to incendiary balloons being launched from Gaza into Israel, where they started at least eight fires. On Wednesday, Israeli airstrikes hit Hamas compounds where militants met to plan attacks, the IDF said. Those airstrikes were also in retaliation for incendiary balloons being sent into Israel.

Last month, Israel and Hamas agreed to a cease-fire, following nearly two weeks of violence that left hundreds dead in Gaza and a dozen dead in Israel. For years, Hamas has launched incendiary balloons into Israel, and this is the first time Israel has responded with airstrikes, CNN reports. Israel Katz, Israel's former finance minister, tweeted that after last month's conflict between Israel and Hamas, his government "decided to change the rules. For every attack in Israel, targeted assassinations and widespread attacks on Hamas targets will be carried out."

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The new Israeli government agreed on Friday to transfer 1.2 million doses of Pfizer COVID vaccines to the Palestinian Authority. In return, Israel will receive the Pfizer vaccine shipment that the Palestinians were expected to get in October.

Why it matters: It's the first major decision by the new Israeli government on the Palestinian issue. Negotiations on the deal began during Netanyahus term but were expedited by the new government, Israeli health officials say.

Stay on top of the latest market trends and economic insights with Axios Markets. Subscribe for free

Driving the news: The vaccines Israel will transfer to the Palestinian Authority are doses that will expire soon, and which Israel doesnt need anymore because the majority of the population has already been vaccinated.

Israeli officials say this will allow the Palestinians to get the vaccines they urgently need three months ahead of time. Israel will get the shipment the Palestinians ordered from Pfizer that was supposed to arrive in the West Bank in October.

As part of the agreement, the vaccines will be transferred to the Palestinian Authority, who will distribute them in the West Bank. No vaccines will be transferred to Hamas-controlled Gaza at the moment.

A first shipment of more than 100,000 doses will be transferred to the Palestinian Authority on Friday, and the rest next week.

Behind the scenes: The talks on the vaccine deal started several weeks ago between senior officials in the Israeli Ministry of Health and the Palestinian governments COVID czar.

When the new Israeli government assumed office on Monday, the issue came up in the first meeting between the director general of the Ministry of Health and the new minister in charge, Nitzan Horowitz.

Israeli officials told me Horowitz urged his ministry staff to expedite the deal and called Prime Minister Naftali Bennett to receive his approval. Bennett called Horowitz back after three hours and asked for the opinion of the Israeli Ministry of Defense and National Security Council.

The Ministry of Defense and National Security Council supported the deal and Bennett gave the go ahead. An Israeli official told me opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu also gave a green-light for the negotiations when he was still prime minister, but that the process was slow.

One of the main issues was that the agreement between Pfizer and Israel didnt allow the transfer of vaccines to a third party. It took several days to get Pfizers approval, which came on Friday.

Horowitz spoke on the phone on Friday with his Palestinian counterpart Mai Al-Kila and told him that COVID-19 doesnt recognize any borders or distinguish between peoples, according to a statement from his office.

"This deal is a mutual interest of both parties and I hope it will allow more cooperation between Israel and the Palestinians in other fields," Horowitz said.

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ROME (AP)  Starting Monday, Italy is requiring people who arrive from Britain to do five days of quarantine as well as take a COVID-19 swab test.

Italian Health Minister Roberto Speranza on Friday said he signed that order as concern builds about a soaring increase of coronavirus cases in Britain involving the delta variant. That variant is responsible for over 90% of the new infections in the U.K. So far, it has been detected in relatively few infections in Italy.

The new requirement could have consequences for the Euro 2020 soccer competition, since England's national team is likely to play in Rome if it advances from the group stage.

Under the ordinance, Italy will allow people to enter from the United States, Canada and Japan if they meet the prerequisites for the European Union Green Certificate. Those requirements include full vaccination, documented recovery from COVID-19 or a negative swab test performed within 48 hours of arrival in Italy.

U.S. travelers who flew into Italy on COVID-tested flights, which require a negative swab test within 48 hours before boarding, could already enter Italy as tourists. Alitalia and at least two U.S. airlines have been operating those flights, which also require a swab test for passengers when they disembark in Italy.

Tourism, especially by U.S. visitors, is an important part of Italy's economy, and the sector is eagerly awaiting Americans' return.

___

Follow all AP stories on the pandemic at https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-pandemic.
TOKYO (Reuters) - Harvard University's endowment fund thanked a Japanese government adviser for advice, the industry minister said on Friday, in response to a probe that found a government adviser was involved in putting pressure on the fund.

The comments from Hiroshi Kajiyama come as the industry ministry has been under scrutiny about the pressure put on foreign shareholders of Toshiba Corp, and the role of a former adviser, Hiromichi Mizuno.

Kajiyama said Harvard thanked Mizuno for his advice. (This story corrects to clarify Hiroshi Kajiyama said Harvard fund thanked adviser, not government)

(Reporting by Ritsuko Shimizu; Editing by David Dolan)
Jordan is racing against time to save a tiny rare fish from extinction as falling water levels partly triggered by global warming threaten to dry up its last habitat.

The Dead Sea toothcarp -- scientific name Aphanius dispar richardsoni -- has been on the red list of the International Union for Conversation of Nature since 2014.

The IUCN warns that the "exploitation of spring waters and climate change" are major threats facing the four-centimetre-long, silver-coloured fish.

"This fish is threatened with extinction at the global level. It is endemic here and does not exist elsewhere," said Ibrahim Mahasneh, the manager of the fish's last home, the Fifa Nature Reserve.

Lying some 140 kilometres (85 miles) southwest of Amman in the Jordan Rift Valley and 60 kilometres south of the Dead Sea, the area is the lowest wet reserve on Earth.

Established in 2011, the nature park consists of some 20 square kilometres. It is located some 426 metres (1,400 feet) below sea level and is managed by an independent body, the Royal Scientific Society (RSS).

Even though the Hashemite kingdom is primarily desert, this area of wetlands is criss-crossed by streams and is home to a variety of plant and wildlife species including birds.

"We have a plan to save and breed this fish... to create a natural habitat for it to breed and at the same time to mitigate the existing threat," added Mahasneh.

"The reserve is the last home for this endangered species of fish," said environmental researcher Abdallah Oshoush who works in the reserve.

- 'Precious treasures' -

The male fish also has a streak of blue along its sides, while the female has incomplete black stripes.

It is not known how many still remain, but "monitoring programs have warned of a clear decline in the presence of this fish in recent years," Oshoush said.

Among the environmental threats causing numbers to drop is the "lowering water level due to low rainfall and the change in its environment, as well as the presence of other fish that feed on it and its eggs."

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Researchers are now preparing to open an artificial pond just for the toothcarp so they can grow safely and their eggs are not devoured by predators. Each season, a female produces around 1,000 eggs.

The aim is then to release the young fish back into the natural environment.

"In Jordan live two unique species of fish that do not exist anywhere else in the world. These are our precious treasures and they must be preserved for our ecosystem," said RSS spokesperson Salem Nafaa.

Two decades ago the RSS, which was established in 1970, succeeded in saving the endangered Aphanuis Sirhani fish in its only habitat in the Azraq reserve, about 110 kilometres (65 miles) east of Amman.

It got its scientific name from the Wadi Sirhan, which extends from the Arabian Peninsula to Azraq, but is commonly known in English as the Azraq killifish.

Only about six centimetres long, it is also silver but the female is spotted while the male has black stripes.

- Predators, birds -

"In the year 2000, there were no more than 500 Azraq killifish in the oasis, which means it was on the verge of extinction," said Nashat Hmaidan, the director of the RSS Biodiversity Monitoring Center.

"It was declining sharply, and it reached just 0.02 percent of the number of fish in the oasis," he said, blaming other predatory fish and migratory birds as well as a fall in water levels.

The RSS studied the fish's life cycle and determined it needed shallow water to lay eggs, and should be isolated from other species for the best chance of survival.

"We collected 20 fish over two years and put them in a concrete pond designated for breeding."

After the first fish were released back into the waters the team saw its presence had increased from 0.02 percent to nearly 50 percent. It "was a great success," he added.

Twenty years on, the Azraq killifish accounts for almost 70 percent of the fish in the waters. But he cautioned the goal now is that the numbers should "never drop below 50 percent".

msh/jkb
Photo credit: ANGELA WEISS - Getty Images

Im looking forward to the long weekend! So, were off tomorrow. Im so happy we have this Friday off! And the list drags on of recent comments Ive had to navigate in the virtual workplace. The day off being referenced is Juneteenth, and unlike July 4th, I havent received any questions about my plans or if Im doing anything fun for the holiday. People are more inclined to wish me a Happy St. Patricks Day, which isnt an American holiday or a day in which we have off. Juneteenths simplification to the long weekend is yet another example of a typical microaggression I, and many others like me, face while being Black in corporate America.

Ive found myself having to remind people that we werent just off this Friday, June 18, for the sake of summer fun; we were off, as many companies now are, for a brand-new federal holiday commemorating the end of slavery in the United States. At the same time, Ive watched some of my white coworkers and friends, many of whom didnt know what Juneteenth was prior to last year, now champion the holiday. But if you too are off this Juneteenth, what are you doing to reconcile with the fact that this day of celebration for many is now just another day of rest for you?

Admittedly, I had never celebrated Juneteenth prior to 2020. Ive chalked it up to never receiving a full education about the holiday, or even Black America at large, in the same way, schools teach about July 4th Independence Day. I never had the time off to engage in celebration and simply didnt fully grasp what my grandmother always talked about when she explained that Juneteenth was our actual day of freedom. I often feel like that one TikTok trend , where you recount a particularly cringeworthy moment while Sad Song by Gia Giudice plays in the background. I hear the lyrics, Waking up in the morning / Thinking about so many things / I just wish things would get better, as I recount all the Fourth of Julys Ive spent dressing in red, white, and blue celebrating the day of someone elses liberation, at a time when Black people were still enslaved.

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Photo credit: NurPhoto - Getty Images

When people consider white supremacy and the spaces it occupies, the imagery quickly points to burning crosses on lawns or men in pointy white hoods. While thats part of its long history, white supremacy is also more mundane, more nuanced. Its the everyday systems and interactions that have made it so, until last year, Juneteenth was never acknowledged on a national level. Its spending centuries only celebrating white freedom, while slavery persisted for nearly a century after the Declaration of Independence, aiding in the erasure of Black history. Its rarely teaching about Juneteenth in schools, and thereby ignoring the full truth about Black peoples enslavement in this country.

But how did Juneteenth even breakthrough into the broader, national conversation? Last summer was, for many, an awakening. Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, and George Floyd were killed within just months of each other. Even in a country where Black death and Black pain are so routine, this onslaught felt particularly devastating. The pandemic ensured that people were in their homes and glued to the internet, with little choice but to sit, watch, read, and grapple with what was happeningand has been happeningoutside their doors. No one could ignore it. All eyes were forcibly peeled on these tragedies.

For the first time, so many of my counterparts were having to process this trauma, in the same way, I have done since I was a child. At just nine years old, I learned about Amadou Diallo, a Black immigrant from Guinea, who four police officers fatally shot after confusing him for a rape suspect in a year-old case. The officers were acquitted of all charges. It was then that I was truly able to comprehend the racial injustices that exist in this country, specifically around Black interactions with the police. For years, I have sat with this knowledge, the same kind that white people in 2020 seemed to be just learning.

Photo credit: Andrew Lichtenstein - Getty Images

In response to this widespread focus on Black lives mattering, people were keen to take to social media to post about how they were listening and educating themselves, vowing to do the kind of work that must persist over a lifetime. One way came in June 2020, when people commandeered a call from Jamila Thomas and Brianna Agyemang, two Black music executives, to pause the music industrys daily business for a day of reflection. Instead, an overwhelming number of people took it upon themselves to post a black square on social media that day, as a low-effort way to signal they were not racist.

Then came Juneteenth, when companies were eager to give their employees off after years of ignoring the holiday. But overall as brands, and individuals, began to make grandiose commitments, the reality of the work quickly set in. I noticed fatigue after the first week, says Danielle Prescod, one half of 2BG (2 Black Girls) Consulting, an agency she founded alongside Chrissy Rutherford after both women went viral for calling out brands and influencers performative allyshipor deafening silencelast year. Since then, Rutherford and Prescod have used 2BG to formalize their antiracism training and challenge brands and influencers to do more beyond posting a black box. (They also donate a portion of their profits to Black organizations.) If black squares went up on June 2, by June 7, they were like, Is it fixed? Were done. Its time for summer vacation. I would certainly say by July, [the urgency] was over. If you really think about it, there was a lot of chatter around Juneteenth. Chrissy and I even had clients where we had to tell them, You cannot have a Juneteenth celebration, then say something about freedom and independence on July 4.

Everyones number one fear is getting called out, Rutherford adds. So they feel like they've made this pledge on June 2, theyve made it through the fire and now they just have to keep their heads down, post a couple of Black people here and there and all will be fine. And now that no one is really looking at us, we can go back to doing whatever is easiest for us.

Photo credit: Denver Post - Getty Images

Now here we are, nearly a full year later after white Americas collective discovery that racism still exists in our country. Black squares have been posted. There have been commitments to listen and learn. We have Juneteenth recognized as a federal holiday. But which of these actions translates into material improvements for Black people? As Congresswoman Cori Bush said on Twitter, its Juneteenth and so much moreits reparations, an end to police violence, an end to housing inequality, and a widespread, robust truth-telling about white supremacy.

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So on your day off, I challenge you to commit to true action. I challenge you to listen and learn and then do. If youre observing Juneteenth as someone whos white, how are you using your time, voice, and resources to ensure that Black people experience real freedom and justice in the same way you do? Do you want to raise the bar or keep it on the floor? Before you share your excitement for another day off to your Black colleague or friend whos waiting to see the Emmett Till Antilynching Act get passed or the effects of redlining to be addressed, think about what this day actually does for the Black people you know. While we absolutely will take the day to remember, ask yourself what have you done to be a part of the celebration.



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Are you tired of dealing with a perpetual loop of Zoom meetings and Wi-Fi connectivity issues?

Well, you can step outside this weekend and enjoy South Floridas sunny 90-degree weather while donning those immaculate red, black and green outfits (or listen to a few podcast episodes, more on that later)  thanks to a new bill signed by President Joe Biden.

Miami lawmaker Rep. Frederica Wilson on Thursday witnessed President Biden sign the bill that made Juneteenth the first federal holiday to be nationally recognized since Martin Luther King Jr. Day in 1983.

Since many companies across the country now are giving its staffers paid time off June 18 and 19, what are your plans? Weve got you covered and theres a ton of options this year.

Heres your guide to how you can get involved and celebrate Juneteenth to commemorate its 156th anniversary.

WHAT IS JUNETEENTH?

But first: what is this new federal holiday and how did it come to be celebrated?

June 19, also known as Juneteenth or Emancipation Day, marks the day when enslaved people in Galveston, Texas, learned from Union soldiers they were free two years after President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863  setting more than three million enslaved people free. The African Americans, who were enslaved, celebrated with food, music and prayer.

A year later on the same day, similar celebrations including gathering with family and dancing, began in Texas and continued as the activities spread to African Americans outside of the state. However, Juneteenth wasnt recognized as a state holiday until 1980. North Miami Beach became the first city in Miami-Dade County to declare it a municipal, paid holiday on April 8.

WHAT DOES THIS MEAN AFTER THE PANDEMIC AND SOCIAL JUSTICE MOVEMENTS OF THAT REELING SUMMER?

The Association of African American Museums (AAAM) is thrilled that Juneteenth is a federal holiday but its Executive Director feels education doesnt end with the holidays new status.

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Our AAAM members have been serving their respective communities virtually and in person for several decades, its refreshing to see that the emancipation of enslaved people throughout the United States is being celebrated in a way that can bring people together on a national level, Executive Director Vedet Coleman-Robinson wrote in an email.

Coleman-Robinson added that members of AAAM serve in communities challenged by a double pandemic, which refers to the COVID-19 pandemic and the social injustice and racism they encountered last summer. AAAMs museums continued to face adversity and stand strong while offering solace to those hit hard by trauma, officials said. So, Coleman-Robinson noted that Juneteenth being recognized like this is just the beginning and we are poised to support and serve.

No matter the adversity, [we] will continue to be the beacons of hope in our respective communities and will continue to make certain that African American history and culture is preserved, interpreted, and protected for the entire nation, she wrote.

Gale Nelson, president and CEO of Big Brothers Big Sisters of Miami believes a lot has changed since last summer but this holiday is a launching pad for more social justice progress.

We learn from history, and then do something about it now. We cannot get stuck in a time warp, he said.

In fact, Nelson is airing his Game of Life podcast series at 9 a.m. Friday on YouTube to honor Juneteenth. He emphasized that these conversations intend to take a middle-grounded approach and are inspiring, factual and educational.

Instead of debating with people who dont think it should be a holiday, Nelson feels that its about using history to learn and take action to support each other now.

Its not about us versus them. Its let us celebrate diversity and recognize that theres much more to be gained than to take this adversarial position about a real historical fact that impacts people of color, even to this day, he added.

On June 25 at 4 p.m., the BBBS is hosting a Bigs in Blue match event with the Miami Dade Police Department that pairs children with 20 officers as honorary participants. It will be held at the Miami nonprofits headquarters 550 NW 42nd Ave. and is invitation-only.

Not only have we made advances we have clearly moved the needle, he said. We have folks investing... We need to make sure that this is not just a moment, but a consistent sustainable movement, so that our kids will not only see but be a part of the solution.

HOW CAN I CELEBRATE AND LEARN ABOUT THE HOLIDAY? HERE ARE SOME EVENTS GOING ON THIS WEEKEND

Perez Art Museum Miami (PAMM) is kicking off the holiday weekend today at 7 p.m. with a free outdoor event that will last until midnight at PAMMs East Portico. Juneteenth Weekend Kickoff with Afropunk includes live art and music with DJ LaNegra Fabulosa and DJ Kumi. A screening of AFROPUNK BLACK SPRING will follow the DJs music on the waterfront terrace. Register for no charge here. For more information on museum hours and admission, which is discounted at $10, visit this website.

Bulldozing Barriers: Reflections of Juneteenth and Diversity in Miami is on Friday from 6 to 9 p.m. at Hampton Art Lovers Gallery at 249 Northwest 9th Street. The Miami Coalition of Christians and Jews (MCCJ), a nonprofit organization promoting equality and diversity, is hosting this panel discussion about racial fears, progress and inclusivity to encourage continuous self-development and respect not just for the black community, but for all cultures. This is part of a series called Can We Talk, Can We Really Talk? All races, religions and cultures are welcome to attend and can buy tickets here for $35 per person. After the discussion, attendees can come to Hampton Art Lovers, which is a nonprofit art gallery celebrating Black art, to view a One Way exhibit.

Some of the panelists are:

 Marilyn Holifield, Partner, Holland & Knight and MCCJ Silver Medallion winner

 Saif Ishoof, Vice President for FIU Engagement and MCCJ Silver Medallion winner

 Matthew Beatty, COO Carrie Meek Foundation

 Pamela Fuertes, Executive Director, Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses Program at Miami Dade College

 Deborah Koch, Executive Director at American Red Cross of Greater Miami

 Kathryn Mikesell, Founder, Fountainhead Residency

 Esther Park, Vice President of Programming Oolite Arts

 Matt Anderson, Executive Director, MCCJ (Moderator)
Jun. 18The search for the next president of Kansas State University is underway.

During its meeting Thursday, the Kansas Board of Regents approved a closed committee search for the next K-State president and nominated Carl Ice as the committee chairman. Current Regents board member Mark Hutton also will serve on the committee.

Regents director of government relations Matt Casey said the rest of the search committee has yet to be named. He said he anticipates the committee to gather in the next couple of weeks to begin the search process and formulate a timeline for finding suitable candidates to replace President Richard Myers, who is retiring at the end of 2021.

"One of our top priorities and responsibilities as a board is finding and hiring CEOs for our state universities," Casey said. "There's a lot of time and effort that goes into it, but it's an exciting process, too."

In a closed committee search, the candidates' names won't be released publicly.

The Regents, a nine-member board appointed by the governor, oversees the appointment of presidents to state universities. Casey said the search committee is a "good representation" of people across the state and its universities, and the group will begin to receive input and suggestions for presidential candidates once established.

Gov. Laura Kelly recently nominated Ice, the former CEO of BNSF Railway, for consideration to the Board of Regents. Ice and his wife, Mary, are K-State alums and longtime supporters of the university, having donated millions of dollars to the institution over the years.

However, Kelly advocated for K-State alumnus and retired U.S. Sen. Pat Roberts to chair the search committee in a recent letter to Regents President and CEO Blake Flanders.

"If he were up for it, I would recommend Pat to be the university president," Kelly said.

(That letter can be found on Page A6 in Saturday's Mercury.)

The Regents congratulated Myers on his retirement during its meeting. Myers, who is the university's 14th president, announced his retirement last month.

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"We'll be sad to see President Myers leave," Casey said. "What an incredible individual; he's done a great job for us and for the state, and he will be missed for sure."

Myers, 79, is also a KSU Foundation professor of military history and leadership. He initially served as interim president before taking the role on a permanent basis. Last year, Myers told The Mercury that the love of being on the campus where he attended college drove his decision to serve as K-State's leader.

"After 40 years in the military and 10 years of doing lots of other things, I never thought I would be back at K-State as president," he said.

A native of Merriam, Kansas, Myers retired as a four-star general in the Air Force. He served as the 15th chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff from 2001 to 2005 and was the principal military adviser to the U.S. president, secretary of defense, and the National Security Council. In 2006, K-State named the military science building Gen. Richard B. Myers Hall in honor of his service.

In other business, the Regents passed two measures relating to the KSU Polytechnic Campus in Salina. The board approved a request from the university to amend the fiscal year 2023 capital improvement plan to include a statement for construction of a new residence hall for Polytechnic Campus students.

The 100-bed residence hall will cost an estimated $7.7 million to build  or about $77,000 per bed. The facility will be three stories and is intended for freshman students, with lounges, group study rooms and kitchenettes on each floor. University officials gave no timeline for construction. Myers said a lack of available housing in the Salina community, along with a 122% increase in new freshman enrollment over the past few years, necessitates the building of a new residence hall.

The board also approved a measure naming the welcome center at the Polytechnic Campus after former dean and CEO Dennis Kuhlman. Kuhlman died after contracting COVID-19 last December at age 72. He served as leader of the Salina campus from 1997 until his retirement in 2012.
Joe Kibbe checked his email Friday morning to find a note from a Boise Pride Festival volunteer  about 25-30 LGBTQ pride flags that lined Harrison Boulevard had been removed. Kibbe, vice president of the Boise Pride Festival, said he was flooded with emotions: anger, sadness and frustration.

Hours later, Kay Jewelers arrived at Kibbes home with a surprise: a black titanium ring. His boyfriend, whom Kibbe says hes known for over 10 years, proposed to him while they pursued a long-distance relationship. And Kibbe said yes.

Boise Pride Festival Vice President Joe Kibbe wears his engagement ring by a pride flag along Harrison Blvd. in Boise on Friday June 18, 2021. On Friday Kibbe was engaged to his boyfriend, but he also found out that over 20 LGBTQ pride flags his organization had displayed for pride month had been stolen.

For Kibbe, the engagement brought mixed emotions. Having just been confronted with the stolen LGBTQ pride flags, Kibbe said he envisioned an easier future with his loved one outside of Idaho.

Its hard. And you have to ask yourself at some point, is it worth it? said Kibbe, who has been a resident of Idaho since the 1980s.

Boise police arrest suspect over stolen pride flags

A witness first reported stolen rainbow-colored pride flags to the Boise Police Department at about 7:45 p.m. Thursday. More flags were stolen later that night, Kibbe said.

Boise police responded to a report of a theft in progress on Harrison Boulevard at about 2:15 a.m. Friday, spokesperson Haley Williams said. The person who reported the crime wished to proceed with a citizens arrest.

Police arrested an 18-year-old suspect, who was taken to the Ada County Jail and charged with misdemeanor petit theft. Boise police valued the flags at a total of about $400.

The flags were very personal to Kibbe. He recalled having helped organize the project the first time five years ago. And he wondered whether the theft of the flags signaled a step backward for LGBTQ rights in Idaho, he said.

The flags were placed along Harrison Boulevard a couple weeks ago for LGBTQ Pride Month.

We have never had one flag tampered with in the five years that weve had this display, Kibbe said. So it was quite a shock when a volunteer reached back out and said that the flags had been stolen.

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Very heartwarming response

Boise Pride Festival members began gathering donations shortly after the theft. A neighborhood association got involved. And community members organized a pride flag rally at 6 p.m. Friday, beginning at the southern end of Harrison Boulevard at McCauley Park.

Kibbe said the outpouring of community support gave him hope, and reminded him of the meaning of the pride festival.

That has been very heartwarming to see that level of engagement come out of this terrible incident, Kibbe said. Pride is not about a flag display. Pride is about being connected with your community, being loved and supported, and being included.

Boise Mayor Lauren McLean issued a statement over the stolen flags on social media, thanking Boise Pride Festival for its efforts to replace them and promising that those responsible will be held accountable.

Im so saddened to hear that the pride flags lining Harrison Blvd. were stolen last night, McLean wrote. Boise is a welcoming and loving place for all  and my heart goes out to those who have ever been made to feel otherwise.
The AV Club

A man who calls himself Mr. Tiger has decided to give up on big city life and build himself a new home in the country. Mr. Tiger is not like ordinary people who might be content to find a property out in farmland, however. He is named for a mighty beast and like that mighty beast, he wanted to spend his downtime hanging out in a neat cave.
Associated Press

Honolulu police officers' use of deadly force was justified and no charges will be filed against them in a shooting that killed a Black man because an investigation found that he entered a home uninvited and physically attacked the officers, the city's prosecuting attorney said Wednesday. The April 14 shooting death of Lindani Myeni, 29, has drawn international attention, including from civil rights activist the Rev. Al Sharpton, at a time when police violence in other parts of the U.S. have prompted protests over racial injustice. Honolulu Prosecuting Attorney Steve Alm said his office's investigation refutes those who said the shooting shows that despite Hawaii's multicultural diversity, police are racist.
In the back of a ramen restaurant in the Little River neighborhood, a swanky hidden speakeasy is about to be born.

OK, so its not much of a secret anymore since we just told you about it. But Kojin at Kura, which opens next week in the back of Hachidori Ramen Bar, will specialize in sake and have its own pop-up kitchen serving a Washoku (traditional) dining experience.

ChatChowTVs Gio Gutierrez is curating the drinks menu, which will also include wine, beer and specialty cocktails. Man cannot live on sake alone. On the food end, resident chef Pedro Mederos will serve small plates that range from hot dishes to raw bites. The pop-up kitchen will be available for private tastings and chef collaborations, too.

Miami native Mederos opened the E&P Dmplngs pop-up last December and says its success motivated him to want to showcase more elements of Japanese cuisine.

Inside Kojin at Kura in Miamis Little River neighborhood.

Our goal is to make unfamiliar cuisines comfortable and fun for everyone, he said in a press release.

We want the experience of coming into Kojin to be unlike anything else you can find in Miami. Guests will witness the preparation of their meal firsthand, and see the care and attention to detail that goes into each dish. We want to form a bond with each guest on a personal level.

If you want to try Kojin, though, you dont want to wait too long. The pop-up is just a summer Miami fling and only plans to remain open through mid-September.

Kojin at Kura

Where: Hachidori Ramen Bar, 8222 NE Second Ave., Miami

Opens: June 22

Hours: Noon-10 p.m. Tuesday-Thursday; noon-midnight Friday and Saturday.

Reservations: Required after 5 p.m.; DM @Kojin_Miami on Instagram
Michigan will lift all indoor capacity restrictions and mask requirements next week, 10 days sooner than planned amid vaccinations and plummeting COVID-19 infections, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer announced Thursday.

Today is a day that we have all been looking forward to, as we can safely get back to normal day-to-day activities and put this pandemic behind us, Whitmer said in a news release.

Just months ago, the state was considered the worst COVID-19 hot spot in the nation. At mid-April, it was at a record-high for childhood hospitalizations  an alarming virus situation that researchers blamed on the U.K. variant when it first turned up in the state.

Now, Michigan's seven-day case rate has dropped to 18.4 per 100,000 people, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That's a 96.7% drop from 551.8 per 100,000 people on April 14.

Same with New York City. After restrictions opened up Tuesday in the state, the New York Yankees will resume 100% capacity at Yankee Stadium starting with Friday nights series opener against the Oakland Athletics.

And California regulators approved revised pandemic rules that end mask requirements for fully vaccinated workers, thus giving them the same freedoms as when they are off the job, freedoms granted this week.

But rates of COVID-19 vaccinations are continuing to slow across the United States, data from the CDC shows.

In the past week, only six states reported administering first doses at a pace of at least a quarter of their peak rate. Another six states reported administering first doses at a pace less than a tenth of their peak rate.

Also in the news:

The European Union on Friday added the U.S. to a list of countries for which travel restrictions should be gradually lifted. The list would apply to all American tourists, regardless of vaccination status, but leaves it up to member states to decide if they'll allow visitors or if they need a vaccination or negative COVID-19 test.

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Ohio will end its COVID-19 emergency declaration Friday, Gov. Mike DeWine said Thursday. Ohioans continue to die from COVID-19, DeWine said, but cases and hospitalizations have continued to decline. Most of the state's health orders, however, ended June 2.

The U.S. Open tennis tournament will allow 100% spectator capacity throughout its entire two weeks in 2021. This comes a year after spectators were banned from the Grand Slam event in New York because of the coronavirus pandemic.

The U.K. has recorded more than 10,000 daily coronavirus infections for the first time in nearly four months, likely the result of the spread of the more contagious delta variant. The variant accounts for around 95% of all new cases in the U.K..

Today's numbers: The U.S. has more than 33.5 million confirmed coronavirus cases and at least 601,200 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University data. The global totals: More than 177.5 million cases and more than 3.84 million deaths. More than 147.7 million Americans have been fully vaccinated  44.5% of the population, according to the CDC.

What we're reading: As the Delta variant of COVID-19 tore through India last month, there was a lot of concern, but few answers about what would happen when it arrived in the United States. Read the full story.

Keep refreshing this page for the latest updates. Want more? Sign up for our Coronavirus Watch newsletter for updates to your inbox and join our Facebook group.

CDC regulation on Florida cruises might be invalid, judge says

It's possible that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's restrictions on Florida cruises could be invalidated, according to a Friday court ruling.

For now, Florida has been granted a preliminary injunction that could render restrictions on cruising to and from the state imposed by the CDC as optional guidance starting next month.

"This order finds that Florida is highly likely to prevail on the merits of the claim that CDCs conditional sailing order and the implementing orders exceed the authority delegated to CDC," the conclusion of the 124-page ruling issued by Judge Steven Merryday on Friday.

Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis called the ruling a win for Florida in a statement Friday.

"Today, we are securing this victory for Florida families, for the cruise industry, and for every state that wants to preserve its rights in the face of unprecedented federal overreach," DeSantis said.

 Morgan Hines

Joe Biden touts 300M vaccine doses administered in US

President Joe Biden announced Friday the U.S. has administered 300 million COVID-19 shots in 150 days, a milestone moment in the campaign to overcome the coronavirus pandemic.

What we're seeing is a truly American accomplishment, 65% of American adults have gotten at least one shot, including 87% of our seniors. Just five months ago we were at only 5% of adult Americans," Biden said during remarks on the COVID-19 pandemic at the White House.

As of Friday morning, the CDC listed about 315 million shots had been administered across the U.S. Biden also touted closing the racial gap in vaccinations.

"More than 58% of shots administered by federally run vaccination sites have gone to people of color. Across the nation people of color have accounted for more than half of all vaccinations in the last month," Biden said.

"The more we close the racial gap in vaccination rates, the more lives we'll save," the president added.

 Mabinty Quarshie and Rick Rouan

COVID-19 surge in Afghanistan hits US embassy, prompting lockdown

A dangerous surge in COVID-19 cases in Afghanistan has gripped the U.S. embassy in Kabul, forcing an immediate lockdown and the creation of temporary, on-site COVID-19 wards to care for oxygen-dependent patients, according to an internal memo.

"COVID-19 is surging in the Mission. 114 of our colleagues now have COVID and are in isolation; one has died, and several have been medevaced," reads the notice from Shane Pierce, an employee in the embassy's health unit. His memo says that intensive care units at a U.S. military hospital "are at full capacity," prompting the need to set up temporary on-site units for staff who need oxygen.

Ned Price, the State Department's chief spokesman, noted the surge in cases coincides with "an intense third wave of COIVD-19 cases" across Afghanistan. Infection rates have surged in Afghanistan by 2,400% over the past month, according to the International Federation of Red Cross. Read more.

 Deirdre Shesgreen

As COVID-19 crisis ebbs, some seeking 9/11-style commission

With more than 600,000 Americans dead of COVID-19 and questions still raging about the origin of the virus and the government's response, a push is underway on Capitol Hill and beyond for a full-blown investigation of the crisis by a national commission like the one that looked into 9/11.

It is unclear whether such a probe will ever happen, though a privately sponsored team of public health experts is already laying the groundwork for one.

Many worry that politics will get in the way of any inquiry, as happened when Republicans came out against a commission to investigate the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol by President Donald Trump supporters. Others fear that a desire by many to simply move on will thwart a review.

I think we need to get into the weeds, to look at the details to see what happened, said Sabila Khan of Jersey City, New Jersey, whose father, Shafqat Rasul Khan, died of COVID-19. If this happens again, our loved ones died in vain.

Contributing: The Associated Press.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Judge rules against CDC cruise rules; Joe Biden touts 300M COVID shots
Michigan police are hunting for a shooter who fired into the side of a moving vehicle on a freeway in Detroit late Thursday, killing a 2-year-old boy and leaving a 9-year-old boy in critical condition.

A preliminary investigation revealed that a driver had entered south I-75 from Seven Mile Road in Detroit around 9:45 p.m. when "a light-colored four-door passenger car pulled up next to them" and someone inside began shooting, Michigan State Police (MSP) Metro Detroit said.

The driver whose vehicle was fired upon pulled over at McNichols Road and noticed both of their children were shot. The 2-year-old was transported to an area hospital where he was pronounced dead. The 9-year-old was transported to the hospital and was listed in serious condition Friday morning.

No license plate was obtained for the suspects vehicle, state police said. Metro South Post and Special Investigation detectives responded to the scene of the shooting and troopers shut down the freeway after the incident.

Anyone with information is asked to call 734-287-5000 or CrimeStoppers at 1-800-SpeakUp or leave a tip on the MSP mobile app.

CALIFORNIA MAN WHO ALLEGEDLY SHOT AND KILLED 6-YEAR-OLD GOT INTO ANOTHER ROAD RAGE INCIDENT THE NEXT WEEK: DA

State investigators have not determined a motive.

"Before we get started, let me just say this is the worst day of this familys life. I cannot fathom what they must be going through  absolutely horrible," Detroit Interim Police Chief James White told reporters late Thursday. He said police are seeking a silver Chrysler 300 with no license plate.

Because the shooting happened on the freeway, the Michigan State Police have jurisdiction, but White said "the Detroit Police Department homicide section are here to support and assist in this investigation and help get this monster off the street."

Its unclear if the shooting was connected to another that happened over an hour later across town.

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State investigators say the motive also remains "undetermined" for a second shooting that happened at approximately 11:05 p.m. on southbound M-39 near Plymouth. The preliminary investigation indicates that a driver of a passenger car was moving south on the Southfield Freeway near Schoolcraft in Detroit when an "unknown vehicle pulled alongside and began shooting," MSP said.

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The driver of the vehicle fired upon sustained a gunshot wound through the shoulder, and the rear seat passenger sustained a gunshot wound to the knee, police said. Both victims went to St. Marys Hospital in Livonia. Members of the Detroit Police Department accompanied the victims at the hospital and troopers later arrived to gather more information about the incident.
LONDON (Reuters) - Hochschild Mining said on Friday that 27 workers were killed while 13 more injured in a road accident in Peru involving a bus operated by one of the precious metals miner's contractors.

The bus was transporting workers from Hochschild's Pallancata operation to the city of Arequipa in the south of Peru, the London-listed miner said. Thirteen more were injured in the incident.

"We are all devastated by this news and we have already started a thorough investigation," said Chief Executive Officer Ignacio Bustamante.

One employee died at Hochschild's Pallancata mine last year after rocks fell but no fatalities were registered in 2019, according to the miner's annual report.

Safety issues are a major concern among miners who are under rising pressure from investors and governments to reduce the amount of deaths in and around operations.

Members of the International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM) recorded 44 deaths in 2020, compared with 287 in 2019, when the collapse of a mining dam in Brazil killed 270 people, a report said earlier this month.

(Reporting by Zandi Shabalala; Editing by Aurora Ellis)
The blue and red lights flashed in her rearview mirror as a Black woman was stopped by a Minneapolis officer.

In the back seat, her children grabbed their phones, ready to capture what they assumed would be a negative interaction with the police. Instead, the officer, who had pulled the driver over for a broken headlight, surprised her, handing over a voucher for a free repair  not a ticket.

"There's no other program like it and it is such a logical solution," said Don Samuels, recapping the woman's story. Samuels, a former Minneapolis City Council member, leads MicroGrants, a Minneapolis nonprofit that started the program Lights On! in 2017.

"It's totally upending the dynamics of a traffic stop," he said.

From Duluth to Rochester, a growing number of law enforcement agencies in Minnesota are signing on to the program, giving officers the option to hand out the free repair vouchers when they pull over a motorist for burned-out headlights or taillights.

This year, the program, which is funded by donations, has rapidly expanded to more than 100 agencies in Minnesota  covering nearly 90% of communities in the state  and has attracted national attention, partnering with departments in Kansas, New York, Tennessee and Iowa.

"There's an urgency in law enforcement for this program," Shakopee Police Chief Jeff Tate said, noting that his 50 officers have participated for a few years. "An overwhelming amount of officers want to do the right thing. This is a tool to bridge the gap."

Since 2017, more than 4,000 light bulbs have been fixed through the program, often helping low-income Minnesotans and communities of color who are disproportionately pulled over by police. In Minneapolis, nearly half of the voucher recipients are Black.

The program takes on fresh urgency in Minnesota amid increasing tensions between police and communities, especially after the murder of George Floyd last year and the police killing last April of Daunte Wright, who was shot by a Brooklyn Center officer. While neither Floyd nor Wright were stopped for broken lights, Samuels said the program is a simple way to ease relationships.

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Recipients, who can redeem the vouchers at nearly 150 local auto shops, often show up with tears in their eyes, grateful for the unexpected help, Samuels said. The program is funded by donations, including from the Chicago-based Joyce Foundation and Minnesota Vikings. The average cost of a repair is $53.

"It's pretty significant," said Eden Prairie Sgt. Tom Lowery of the repair voucher, which the west metro Police Department started handing out earlier this year. "It just helps build relationships."

In southern Minnesota, the Fillmore County Sheriff's Office this year became the 100th agency in the state to join the program. In Minneapolis, the Police Department changed its policy in January 2020 to only hand out the vouchers, no longer ticketing motorists for broken headlights or turn signals unless the equipment violation resulted in a crash or harmed someone else.

"It's a no-brainer," Tate said. "You don't get a lot of win-win scenarios in law enforcement. This is one of them."

While police may already give out mostly warnings for equipment violations like burned out lights, Tate said motorists are even more grateful to receive a voucher to help pay for the repair. He watched a body camera video of one of his officers approaching a driver, a young person of color with a burned out brake light. When the officer gave the man the voucher, his shoulders sunk down in relief as he fist bumped the cop.

"It's changing the conversation and tone of a traffic stop," Tate said. "This is a big deal for cops. Contrary to popular belief, they don't want to write a ticket."

In Minnesota, the program is free for departments, but outside Minnesota, MicroGrants funds half the costs  estimated at about $20,000 a year for a large city  while the city pays half.

The nonprofit was inspired to create the program after Philando Castile was shot and killed in a 2016 traffic stop by a St. Anthony police officer after being pulled over for a broken taillight. The officer, Jeronimo Yanez, who said he shot Castile because he thought he was reaching for a gun, was the first Minnesota police officer in modern history to be charged with the shooting death of a civilian, but he was later acquitted.

In Minneapolis, a 2018 Hennepin County report found that Black drivers are disproportionately pulled over for minor infractions, making up more than half of the motorists pulled over for equipment violations such as a broken taillight. This is despite the fact African Americans make up 19% of the city's population.

MicroGrants plans to keep expanding Lights On to more police departments across the U.S., trying to make a difference one voucher at a time.

"Traffic stops are inequitable," Samuels said. "It really presents an opportunity that is unique and very, very effective."

Kelly Smith  612-673-4141
A 63-year-old southwest Missouri man pleaded guilty Thursday to threatening to assault U.S. Rep. Emanuel Cleaver and another member of Congress, according to court documents.

Kenneth R. Hubert of Marionville pleaded guilty in federal court in Springfield to two counts of threatening to assault a United States Official.

The threats aimed at Cleaver came the day after a violent mob breached the U.S. Capitol with the intent to stop the certification of President Joe Bidens electoral victory. Hubert did not participate in the Jan. 6 insurrection.

In his signed plea agreement, Hurbert admitted that he left a voicemail at Cleavers office in Independence on Jan. 7 in which he called the representative a racial slur and said Cleaver was dumb as a rock.

How about a noose around his neck? Hurbert admitted in the plea agreement to saying.

When FBI agents contacted him on Jan. 19, Hurbert said he left the voicemail because he was upset about a statement Cleaver had made in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Hubert also admitted that on May 6, 2019 he called the Washington D.C. office of Rep. Steve Cohen of Tennessee and told a staff member that he has a noose with the Congressmans name on it and planned to put a noose around his neck and drag him behind his pickup truck.

Three days later, when contacted by the FBI, Hubert said he made the call because he was offended by a comment Cohen previously made about then-President Donald Trump.

In the plea agreement, Hubert admits that he threatened the two congressmen and that the threats were done with the intent to retaliate against them on account of the performance of their official duties. Hubert further admitted that the threats were true threats.

At a detention hearing in March, it was revealed that while Hubert had no criminal convictions on his record, he has shown criminal-like conduct dating back to 2014, when he left derogatory voicemails with a federal judge in Montana.

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In 2016, Hurbert was investigated for calls he made to the Council on American-Islamic Relations in St. Louis, according to prosecutors.

Pack up your tents and go back to your f------ Arab country, thats if you want to stay alive, Hubert allegedly told the civil rights and advocacy group.

When he was questioned about his voicemail to Cleaver, Hubert allegedly told FBI agents he was also previously investigated by the U.S. Secret Service for saying President Barack Obama needed to be hanged from a light post.
Missouri police arrested a naked man Thursday morning after he allegedly broke into several houses and assaulted a homeowner.

Moberly police responded to a 2:24 a.m. call of a break-in and saw JAngelo Robinson, 35, fleeing from someone, whom police later determined was one of Robinsons victims, according to a report.

Robinson resisted arrest and did not comply with police, Fox 22 KQFX reported.

Police determined that Robinson had broken into three separate houses, causing property damage and assaulting one of the homeowners. A child was present during the break-in at one of the residences.

DRIVER CHARGED IN DEADLY CRASH REPORTEDLY WAS HAVING SEX

Robinson is charged with two counts of first-degree burglary, third-degree assault and endangering the welfare of a child; the last charge was dropped when a warrant was issued Friday, KOMU News reported.

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The suspect is being held at the Randolph County Justice Center on a $50,000 cash-only bond.
This stock image shows baby's feet in a crib. Fabian Strauch/picture alliance via Getty Images

MIT Professor Troy Littleton put a crib in his office to support a new mom graduate student.

It's a Band-Aid for the US's unaffordable childcare and inadequate parental leave, the student said.

Working moms have largely carried the burden of childcare and homeschooling, leading to burnout.

Visit Insider's homepage for more stories.

Eleven-month-old Katie Cunningham already has a robust resume: The baby frequents an MIT lab, where she's occasionally watched by experienced scientists while her mom, a biology graduate student, conducts research.

The setup isn't an early childhood STEM program; it's a creative childcare solution conceived by Cunningham's professor, Troy Littleton.

The neuroscience professor wanted one of his students, Karen Cunningham, to be able to come into the lab like the rest of the team once everyone was vaccinated. But doing so was tricky for Karen, who delivered Katie in July 2020 and didn't have any childcare options during the pandemic, she told The Washington Post.

While she and her husband, a middle-school teacher, were mostly able to juggle responsibilities, Littleton's idea to put a crib in the lab eased their burden.

"Childcare in any profession is a challenge, but in science, it can even be more challenging," Littleton, a father of an adult son, told the Post. "Experiments don't always fit a 9-to-5 schedule. It just made sense for Karen to bring Katie in."

So along with support from Karen's labmates, the professor bought a travel crib to keep in his lab. It was the team's gift to the new mom who they weren't able to celebrate with a baby shower.

When Littleton posted a picture on Twitter of his new office furniture in May - one of about 70 he's posted in his life, he told the Post - it went viral, accumulating over 117,000 likes.

"My favorite new equipment purchase for the lab - a travel crib to go in my office so my graduate student can bring her 9-month old little girl to work when necessary and I get to play with her while her mom gets some work done," he wrote. "Win-win!!"

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Commenters praised the professor for supporting working parents in the US, where the childcare is "unaffordable" and the parental leave "inadequate," Karen said.

"I want this in every single work environment," one Twitter user wrote. "Enough with daycare and pre-school. I WANT TO BRING MY FUTURE CHILDREN TO WORK WITH ME. Let them learn what I do. Let them interact with older generations. Let us all be a community."

Littleton was surprised the tweet garnered so much attention, and followed up to put the spotlight back on Karen. "I wish people were able to spot the real hero here," he Tweeted. "It's the graduate student mom, not me. She's amazing to do all she has to with her daughter and still keep up her thesis project research."

The pandemic has hit working moms especially hard

A recent Insider poll found that 41.1% of women reported feeling "very" or "extremely" burnt out, compared to 30% of men.

When looking at moms in particular, a survey out of the New York Times, NPR, and Morning Consult found that 80% of moms said they managed homeschooling responsibilities. Three-quarters of parents didn't get any breaks from employers other than more flexible hours.

"We are all really struggling now, and parents have really been put in an impossible situation," scientist Gretchen Goldman previously told Insider. "Support systems have been ripped out, and we're expected to do our jobs as if nothing is different."

Read the original article on Insider
WINDHOEK, Namibia (AP) 

A prominent Namibian traditional leader, Vekuii Rukoro, the paramount chief of the OvaHererero people who led international legal battles to bring Germany to pay reparations for its genocide in the southern African country, has died of COVID-19.

Rukoro died early Friday, secretary-general of the Ovaherero/OvaMbanderu and Nama Council, Mutjinde Katjiua, told The Associated Press.

Rukoro, who was elected Paramount Chief of the OvaHerero in 2014, represented both ethnic groups in the international legal cases.

Rukoro and other traditional chiefs have accepted Germanys offer of compensation but said it should be improved through further negotiations, while some other traditional leaders have rejected it.

Last month the German government apologized for the colonial-era massacres and agreed to pay 1.1 billion euros ($1.3 billion) to Namibia over a 30-year period.

In what is now acknowledged to be the first genocide of the 20th century, the mass killings of the OvaHerero and Nama people were perpetrated by German colonial forces between 1904 and 1908.

Namibia is currently experiencing a surge of COVID-19. The country's 7-day rolling average of daily new cases has more than doubled over the past two weeks from 17.31 new cases per 100,000 people on June 3 to 49.13 new cases per 100,000 people on June 17, according to Johns Hopkins University.

Namibia, a country of 2.5 million people, has a cumulative total of just over 70,000 confirmed cases, including 112 deaths, according to the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The current surge has brought the government to restrict movement into and out of the capital, Windhoek, as well as restrict public gatherings to 10 people.

Six tourists from South Africa recently died of COVID-19 while on a bus tour of Namibia in which 37 of the 40 people on the tour became ill with the disease.
WASHINGTON  The Navy submitted an update to Congress to its annual long-range shipbuilding plans, one that takes a step back from the much-talked-about standard of a 355-ship fleet and instead lays out priorities for a future distributed naval force.

The new document lays out a manned fleet as low as 321 manned ships and potentially as large as 372 manned ships.

A fleet of 321 manned ships would be a departure from past modeling, wargaming and analysis that pointed to a fleet of 355 or more manned ships to counter threats from China and Russia in a future fight. The lower number, though, is more in line with current fiscal constraints and industry capacity. Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Mike Gilday said this week that, based on the top-line that we have, that we can afford a Navy of about 300 ships  and theres not much hope that Navy shipbuilding budgets will increase drastically in the next few years.

Those 321 to 372 manned ships would be supplemented by a yet-to-be-determined number of unmanned surface and underwater vessels  between 77 and 140, according to the document. It notes that new types of platforms, such as unmanned vessels, bring great potential, but also have greater developmental risk. This is represented by a wider objective range. As prototyping and experimentation retire technical and [concept of operations] uncertainty and risk, along with a clearer understanding of the associated costs, we expect that the objective force ranges will narrow.

As a result, the Navys total fleet could range from 398 manned and unmanned ships to 512. The document, obtained by Defense News June 17, states the Navy will release a more detailed long-range plan with the FY23 budget request next year.

In the interim, the Department will continue to build on ongoing analysis, experimentation, testing, prototyping, and the analytic results from force structure assessments, future fleet architectures, and intelligence updates to refine required capabilities and characterize the technical and operational risk of an objective battle force in military competition. This work will inform the content and transition pace to the future force and be reflected in the FY2023 shipbuilding plan.

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Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin in a June 17 hearing called 355 ships a good goal to shoot for but said he was working to field the right mix of capabilities. Size matters, but capabilities also matter.

The Navy is required to submit a 30-year shipbuilding plan to Congress each year along with its budget request, but the document is often skipped in the first year of a new presidential administration. The outgoing Trump administration submitted a document in December 2020 that was labeled a fiscal 2022 long-range ship plan, and it laid out a fleet that would grow to 347 manned ships by the end of the decade and above 400 manned ships by 2050. The Biden administration has accompanied its FY22 budget request with a shorter document that includes more themes and priorities than actual long-range shipbuilding and ship inventory projections.

The document maintains the Navys focus on undersea warfare, which leadership has repeatedly said is an advantage the Navy needs to protect and expand. Still, it notes that the Navy and industry wouldnt dramatically expand the size of the attack submarine fleet before the late 2030s, when the Columbia-class ballistic missile submarine procurement ends.

Maintaining the undersea advantage is a priority for the Navy. As the Navys most survivable strike platforms, SSNs and SSBNs are key to both deterrence and winning conflict against a rival power. To meet the demand for additional submarines, industrial base capacity must be expanded. The plan beyond the Future Year Defense Program (FYDP) reflects an increase in SSN production that is fully realized with the conclusion of the Columbia class procurement and delivery. We continue to evaluate the industrial base capacity increase required for more consistent delivery of two SSNs per year during Columbia serial production and subsequent potential increases to SSN procurement.

The document maintains the services commitment to fielding small surface combatants in greater numbers, freeing up a smaller fleet of large surface combatants to conduct only the most complex missions with their larger sensors and weapons. It also continues support for nuclear-powered aircraft carriers but notes that new capability concepts like a light aircraft carrier continue to be studied and analyzed to fully illuminate their potential to execute key mission elements in a more distributed manner and to inform the best mix of a future force.

And it acknowledges that the Marine Corps Force Design 2030 effort that is overhauling the Fleet Marine Force has implications for shipbuilding as well. This approach requires a new mix of amphibious warships (LHA/LPD) and includes the Light Amphibious Warship (LAW), which is an enabler of [Marine Littoral Regiment] mobility and sustainability. The overall number of amphibious warships grows to support the more distributed expeditionary force design, with LAWs complementing a smaller number of traditional amphibious warships.

Generally, it notes, the concepts of Distributed Maritime Operations (DMO) and Littoral Operations in a Contested Environment (LOCE) / Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations (EABO) require a balanced and different mix of traditional battle force ships and new amphibious and logistic ships. This will result in greater combat power than previous force structures in addition to new and key roles played by uncrewed platforms. These concepts and capabilities are being analyzed, tested, experimented, and exercised to better define a future objective battle force.

The document also outlines sealift and auxiliary ship gaps the service faces.

The Navy is short two oceanographic survey ships  and plans to buy two in FY22  and one cable repair ship.

On organic strategic sealift, the Navy has a shortfall of roll-on/roll-off (RORO) cargo vehicle ships, with just 35 in the inventory today compared to a requirement for 53.

The document states the Navys FY22 spending request continues Navys commitment to surge sealift requirements through procurement of used vessels to replace aging surge sealift capacity and conversion/upgrade of all newly-procured used RORO vessels to be performed in U.S. shipyards in a profile closely aligned to the procurement schedule. The recapitalization plan also includes adjustments to the existing fleet with service life extension of the ten most viable platforms, retirement of the seven least-ready roll-on/roll-off vessels, retirement of four special mission ships, continued investment in platform maintenance, and consolidation of the Surge Sealift and Ready Reserve Force.

The Navy is seeking $369 million to buy five used RORO ships.

The document also lays out planned ship decommissionings in FY22, which has already been a point of contention between the Navy and lawmakers.

The service would decommission seven cruisers  five that were already planned to age out of the fleet, and two more that are partway through a modernization program thats growing more costly and more timely; four Littoral Combat Ships, two of which Congress said no to decommissioning in FY21; an amphibious dock landing ship, two attack submarines and a fleet tug.

Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle criticized the Navy in a June 15 hearing with the full House Armed Services Committee and a June 17 HASC Seapower and Projection Forces Subcommittee hearing, arguing the Navy should have released a full five-year plan and a 30-year shipbuilding plan with its FY22 budget request in accordance with the law. The Navy released its plan on the evening of June 17, hours after the subcommittee hearing, but it didnt sit well with all lawmakers.

The law requires a 30-year shipbuilding plan and a future years defense plan (FYDP). Neither has been provided by the Pentagon. If the Navy does not give Congress a plan, we cant tell where they are going  we have to make assumptions. If we assume that next years budget will also fail to enable the force structure that we need, we will be forced to make broad cuts to other programs to fund the force structure that the Navy cannot articulate themselves. When the Navy provides ranges of ships needed it is clear that they do not have a strategy that defines actual requirements, otherwise it would be a discrete and defensible number, said Rep. Elaine Luria, D-Va., who sits on the subcommittee and serves as vice chair of the full committee.
For the third summer in a row, visitors to Ocracoke Island will have the option of taking a passenger-only ferry from Hatteras Island that delivers them to Silver Lake Harbor in the village.

And for the third year in a row, the N.C. Department of Transportation will be leasing a boat for its Ocracoke Express service, while the one it ordered several years ago remains unfinished.

NCDOT is leasing the M/V Marthas Vineyard Express, a catamaran-style passenger ferry owned by Seastreak Marine of New Jersey. Gov. Roy Cooper signed a bill into law this week that provides $700,000 to lease and operate the boat from Monday, June 21, until Aug. 15, or until the state-owned ferry is ready.

The Ocracoke Express is being built in Hubert, near Swansboro, and is now in the water for testing, said NCDOT spokesman Jamie Kritzer.

Thats part of the process the builder goes through before turning it over to the Ferry Division, Kritzer wrote in an email Friday. Until that happens we wont know when it will be ready for service.

The state expected its passenger ferry would be finished in April 2018. When it became clear the boat would not be ready for the 2019 season, the state leased the M/V Marthas Vineyard Express to take its place.

NCDOT and US Workboats, the company that won the contract to build the ferry, blamed each other for the delays in construction.

In a Wake County courtroom in late 2019, the companys lawyers accused the state of trying to apply a higher standard of welding than was specified in the contract. An attorney for the state countered that the company was trying to avoid some of the testing required to determine the welds were safe and that some of the tests performed at that point had uncovered significant problems.

Kritzer said another company, Waterline Systems, has taken over construction of the ferry.

The Ocracoke Express was conceived as an alternative to the car ferries that run between Hatteras and Ocracoke islands, after shoaling in Hatteras Inlet reduced the number of runs those boats could make each day. The car ferries are free, but theres often a wait on busy summer days.

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The passenger ferry enjoys support in the General Assembly. Last year, when NCDOT scrapped plans to operate the service because of the COVID-19 pandemic, lawmakers reversed the decision, providing $1.1 million to lease and operate the boat even as they cut half a billion dollars in transportation spending elsewhere.

The passenger ferry will make three round trips a day, leaving from Hatteras at 9:30 a.m. and 1 and 4:30 p.m. The crossing takes 65 minutes, about the same as the car ferry, which lands on the north end of the island.

Tickets are $5 each way, and an additional $1 per bicycle. Children 3 and under are free. Reservations can be made online at www.ncferry.org or by calling 800-293-3779. Riders who ask at the terminal or make a reservation by phone can buy one ticket and get one free until the end of June.

The federal government still requires passengers to wear face coverings inside ferries and enclosed terminals, to help prevent the spread of the coronavirus.
When Carla Mason called her parents in Kansas City last year, their labored breaths rattled through her phone speakers.

Though both of them have since recovered from COVID-19, remembering the way they sounded was enough to convince Mason, who lives on Elgywood Lane in north Charlotte, to get vaccinated in May.

But just next door to Mason, Mary and George Aikens refuse to get their shots. They say they think the vaccine is more dangerous than the virus.

Some neighborhoods in Mecklenburg County are nearly fully vaccinated, while others, like Masons, lag far behind, with most residents still unvaccinated, an Observer analysis of state data shows.

The gap in vaccination rates across Mecklenburg County persists despite widespread efforts from doctors, county officials and hospital systems to encourage vaccinations. And the disparity is especially apparent between predominantly white neighborhoods and predominantly Black and Latino neighborhoods.

The Observer interviewed a dozen people recently in neighborhoods where the low vaccination rate is especially stark, in two predominantly Black neighborhoods in west Charlotte and two predominantly Hispanic north Charlotte neighborhoods.

Charlotte residents gave many different reasons for not getting the vaccine: Some didnt have transportation to where the shots were being offered, while others said they didnt trust the science behind the vaccine.

Theyre not putting that in my body, west Charlotte resident Jayne Cook  who has gotten COVID-19 twice  told the Observer. Hell no.

The west Charlotte neighborhoods, both on the northeast side of Freedom Drive, report roughly 35% of people age 12 and older have gotten vaccinated as of June 11. Meanwhile, in the north Charlotte neighborhoods, bordered by Reagan Drive, Tom Hunter Road, North Tryon Street and Elgywood Lane, state numbers show 24% have gotten the vaccine.

On the other side of town, many neighborhoods with predominantly white residents in south Mecklenburg County are more than 70% vaccinated. In fact, in one Dilworth neighborhood, about 97% of residents 12 and older are vaccinated. Just 1% of that neighborhoods residents are African American and 4% are Latino, according to state estimates.

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Novant Health has hosted a number of mobile vaccination clinics in under-vaccinated areas of Charlotte, including an event at Lowe's in Northlake.

Transportation and access

Marquis Miller lives in west Charlotte near the Bette Rae Thomas Recreation Center on Tuckaseegee Road. He plans to get the vaccine, but hasnt yet because he doesnt have a car.

If I had a car, I would drive to Bojangles arena or Freedom Drive, he said. But Miller recently heard about a vaccine clinic within walking distance that hell go to soon.

Still, there was a lot he didnt know a lot about the vaccine. Is it a shot or a swab? What is it? Miller asked. (The vaccine is administered as a shot in one or two doses.)

I dont know too much about it, he said. But Im sure itd be definitely a step in the right direction if everybody gets it.

For West Charlotte resident Marquis Miller, the main barrier to getting vaccinated is transportation.

Finding the time

Hidden Valley resident Blanca Rosas issue with getting the vaccine isnt transportation  its finding the time to go get it.

After weeks of repeatedly calling clinics and vaccine sites, Rosa finally got an appointment. But now shes not certain if she can make it.

I need to make sure I have the time off, said Rosa, who works as a receptionist at a dental office. Also, I have to coordinate with my husband, in case he has a reaction.

They hope to get their vaccines separately, so one of them can be available at all times to take care of the other and their children. Theyre planning from experience  Rosa and her husband caught mild cases of COVID-19 simultaneously last year.

As soon as everybody gets the vaccine, the better its going to be for everybody, she said.

Blanca Rosa, a resident of Charlottes Hidden Valley community, said it took calling vaccine sites and healthcare providers repeatedly to get an appointment for her shot.

I dont believe in it

Cook, who lives in Millers neighborhood, has no plans to get the COVID-19 vaccine.

I dont believe in it, Cook said. Ive never had a flu shot either  To me, its a bunch of conspiracy.

She hasnt been wearing a mask either.

Cook has had COVID-19 twice, she said. Upper respiratory illnesses run in her family and she gets bronchitis often. The first time she had the coronavirus, in early 2020, she was so sick that she told her doctor: I feel like Im going to die.

Still, she refuses to get the shot. If youre going to get sick, youre going to get sick, Cook said.

The COVID-19 vaccines have been proven to be more than 90% effective in preventing deaths and hospitalization from the coronavirus.

Lately, North Carolina has followed the lead of other states by offering vaccine incentives, like $25 gift cards for people getting their first shot or driving others to get the shot. And Gov. Cooper said last week the state will hold a series of million-dollar drawings for vaccine recipients.

But Cook said such incentives havent convinced her to get a shot. Theres nothing that would convince her to get the vaccine, she said.

West Charlotte resident Jayne Cook said despite getting COVID twice, nothing could convince her to get vaccinated.

George and Mary Aikens, who live in Hidden Valley, will be hard to convince, too. They said they have not gotten the vaccine because they dont trust the science behind it.

I was afraid of the ingredients, Mary said. I watched a doctor on YouTube talk about some of the stuff in it things that are not safe for humans.

All of the COVID-19 vaccines, which have been authorized for emergency use by the FDA, have gone through testing and been shown to be safe for humans.

To protect herself, Mary Aikens has been taking melatonin at night, which she heard can stave off the virus. Preliminary research shows that melatonin might offer some protection against the virus, but that hasnt been proven.

George Aikens remembers the surge of polio cases in the United States in the 1950s.

As a child, his mother chose not to get him vaccinated, and one of his friends who did get the polio vaccine still caught the illness. That was proof enough for him.

When theres more data, we might change our mind, he said.

Jayne Cook said it makes sense that south Charlotte neighborhoods are more vaccinated.

A lot of people over here (in west Charlotte) are going to take a stand, referring to her decision not to get the vaccine. Were not sheep. Those people in south Charlotte dont even own guns.

Wait and see

LaQuandra Rouse, a longtime employee of Atrium Health, was part of one of the first groups who became eligible to get vaccinated in Mecklenburg County back in February. She lives right off Reagan Drive in north Charlotte.

But the career healthcare worker still waited. She wanted to consider all of the options and do her research.

Shes a manager at Atrium. But at the height of the pandemic, the former nurse was asked to temporarily return to working in that capacity. So she decided the benefits outweighed the risks  Rouse didnt want to be the reason anyone got sick.

I just try to encourage everyone to... do whatever we can do to help ourselves and help everyone around us, especially our loved ones, she said. I think it is worth a try.

LaQuandra Rouse is a longtime healthcare worker at Charlottes Atrium Health. Still, it took her some time to decide to get vaccinated.

Jackie Davis has lived in west Charlotte for 20 years. She got both doses of the Pfizer vaccine in April.

Her sister had COVID-19 in November. She was in the hospital for nine days before recovering. Even now, she still reports side effects from the virus, Davis said. It still takes a toll on her, she said.

Thats one reason Davis got the COVID-19 vaccine. Her sister is also vaccinated, but most of Davis friends and family  including her 15-year-old son  are unvaccinated, taking a wait-and-see approach.

But Davis is staying away from people who arent vaccinated. I told them: If I have a cookout, yall cant come unless you show me you have a vaccination card, she said.

Davis friends and family arent the only ones with a wait-and-see attitude.

Carla Masons adult children are also waiting to get vaccinated, despite their mothers opinion. Mason is leaving the decision up to them.

Im giving them the options. They want to see how it works on everyone else, she said. Im trying.

Proven safe

Local doctors have heard that a big chunk of people are waiting to see how others react to the shot until they decide on vaccination, Atrium Health infectious disease expert Dr. Katie Passaretti told the Observer. But she said now is the time to get the vaccine.

What I would say is: Youve waited and youve seen, Passaretti said.

Novant Health infectious disease expert Dr. David Priest echoed those concerns.

Theres been a lot of time, and millions upon millions of people have gotten the vaccine, Priest said. Its proven to be incredibly effective and incredibly safe.

Novant Health hosted a mobile vaccination cinic at Lowe's at Northlake to boost COVID-19 vaccination rates in underserved areas.

Local vaccination rates

In Mecklenburg County, 47% of residents have gotten at least one COVID-19 vaccine as of June 11, according to state Department of Health and Human Services data.

Statewide, 44% of residents have gotten at least one vaccine as of then, according to state numbers.

And 54% of North Carolina residents age 18 and older have gotten at least one vaccine  a rate that still trails the countrys goal of vaccinated 70% of U.S. adults by July 4.

Were making progress, but there are still a lot of people who are unvaccinated, Gov. Cooper said in Charlotte this month.

But North Carolina  along with many other states  is seeing a plateau in vaccinations, he said. Most people who wanted to get the COVID-19 vaccine have already gotten the shot. Cooper is encouraging people who still havent gotten the shot to talk to their doctors, to talk to people they trust about the vaccine.

And local doctors are trying to make it easier than ever to get a COVID-19 shot.

Both of Charlottes major hospital systems, Atrium Health and Novant Health, are partnering with local churches and stores to offer vaccines in under-served communities.

Were going to where people are, Atrium Health Senior Vice President Kinneil Coltman told the Observer. Because we know that our community is nowhere near herd immunity.

For Mason in north Charlotte, hearing her neighbors are some of the least vaccinated Mecklenburg County residents isnt surprising  because shes been listening, she said.

I think they have to educate themselves and have to understand.

We have a lot of vaccines. When polio (vaccines) came out, a lot were skeptical.  Now, our kids get vaccinated, Mason said. For me, I knew what I needed.

Database editor Gavin Off contributed to this report.
A gunman shot an alleged gang member in broad daylight in New York City  while two children who were completely uninvolved were mere inches away, according to police, sources and shocking video.

The 24-year-old man was standing on the sidewalk on Sheridan Avenue near East 172nd Street in the Bronx at about 6:44 p.m. Thursday when a gunman approached and began shooting at him, the New York Police Department ( NYPD ) said. But two children, ages 10 and 5, became entangled with the victim as he tried to escape his attacker, startling police video shows.

Police sources told Fox News the children were not with the victim at the time and were completely uninvolved with either party.

NYC'S GREENWICH VILLAGE TAKEN OVER BY CRIME, ANARCHY

The victim is seen falling into the kids. Then, despite the presence of children, the gunman continues firing shots toward the visibly shaken children, who grabbed onto each other through the terrifying ordeal, video shows.

NYPD SEEKS MAN ACCUSED OF DISTURBING ENCOUNTER WITH 10-YEAR-OLD GIRL IN HER BEDROOM

Police said two men were involved in the attack, and both fled the scene on a moped.

Meanwhile, the victim  whom sources identified as having known gang affiliations  suffered gunshot wounds to the back and both legs and was taken to an area hospital.

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Miraculously, neither child was physically injured, police said.

Police said both attackers are still on the loose. They ask anyone with information to call 800-577-TIPS.
An octopus on a coral reef in the Red Sea (Getty Images/iStockphoto)

Octopuses and fish team up to pursue prey, but they may not always get along, research suggests.

The tentacled cephalopods, it seems, can get a little salty and randomly punch their hunting partners  sometimes out of spite.

This bullish behaviour has been caught on camera by researchers observing interactions between octopuses and several fish species in the Red Sea.

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Footage captured by Eduardo Sampaio, a researcher at the University of Lisbon in Portugal, shows several octopuses lashing out at fish as they happily swim alongside.

Octopuses and fishes are known to hunt together, taking advantage of the others morphology and hunting strategy, Mr Sampaio said.

Since multiple partners join, this creates a complex network where investment and pay-off can be unbalanced, giving rise to partner control mechanisms.

The punching can sometimes serve a purpose by displacing the fish to a degree where it loses the immediate opportunity to catch prey.

Essentially, octopuses want to get to the food before the fish has a chance to.

But there are times when the explanation for the blow remains unclear and could just be a display of spiteful behaviour.

We found different contexts where these punches (or directed explosive arm movements, if you want to get technical about it) occur, including situations where immediate benefits are attainable, but most interestingly in other contexts where they are not! Mr Sampaio said.

The research has been published in the journal Ecology.

[This article was originally published in December 2020]

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Two Mooresville police officers who fatally shot Chris Craven last summer after they say he pulled a gun  an account disputed by the dead mans wife  will not face criminal charges, a special prosecutor announced Friday.

In a statement, Randolph County District Attorney Andy Gregson said officers Alexander Arndt and Christopher Novelli reasonably feared for their lives when they fired dozens of shots with high-powered rifles at Craven during an Aug. 2 confrontation outside his Mooresville home.

Chris Craven

It is clear from all of the evidence that at the time Officers Arndt and Novelli fired their duty rifles they were presented with an imminent threat of death or serious bodily injury from the actions of Mr. Craven, Gregson said in summarizing the findings of a State Bureau of Investigation report.

It is also clear from the evidence that the officers application of deadly force was reasonable and necessary in response to this threat.

According to Cravens autopsy and an accompanying medical examiners report, the 38-year-old parts department employee for Rick Hendricks NASCAR racing team was hit with at least 15 .223-caliber bullets.

Police say Craven, who grew up two doors down from where he died, was wearing a holster. Gregson said in his statement that a 9mm pistol, which Craven had legally purchased in 2016, was found on some stairs near his body.

Under North Carolina and federal law, police are legally entitled to use deadly force if they reasonably perceive a imminent threat of death or serious injury to themselves, other officers or the public at large.

The language, along with other factors, makes prosecution of police exceedingly rare. On average, law enforcement officers kill about 1,000 people a year. According to Philip Stinson, a criminal justice professor at Bowling Green State University and a former cop, only 131 officers have been arrested on charges of murder or manslaughter for on-duty shootings since 2005. Fewer than half that number have been convicted at trial, often for a lesser charge, he says.

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Amy Craven told the Observer earlier this month that, on the night he died, her husband was having a mental health crisis exacerbated by the pandemic. He was following police commands when he was shot, she said.

My husband did not pull a gun and he was complying with orders, Amy Craven said in a post on May 21 on the Mooresville Police Departments Facebook page. Chris was shot with his hands in the air.

She declined comment Friday.

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The familys attorney, Alex Heroy of Charlotte, told the Observer earlier this month that bodycam video released to the family shows police were 20-25 feet from Craven when the fusillade began, sending bullets slamming into the exterior walls of the home in which Amy Craven and two of the couples children were housed.

At least one of the bullets reached the interior of the home and slammed into a fire extinguisher, which exploded, Heroy said.

As silence surrounds a fatal police shooting, a family and small NC town seek answers

Gregson, in his statement, said police were responding to a highly volatile and dangerous situation for them and the occupants of Mr. Cravens home.

They were informed that Mr. Craven had committed a domestic assault. The officers had information that two adult females and two children were in the home. They were informed that Mr. Craven was suicidal and acting irrationally.

Craven, according to Gregson, can be heard on the 911 call threatening to kill himself, and the small children can be heard begging him not to and telling Craven that they love him.

According to Gregson, bodycam video shows Arndt and Novelli ordering Craven to put his hands up and to get on the ground.

Craven, according to Gregson, continued to walk. He raised his hands briefly in response to the police commands, then put them down to his sides.

Both involved officers stated that they then saw Craven reach into his waistband with his right hand and pull out a pistol, Gregson said.

A change in prosecutors

Gregson took over the investigation earlier this month after Iredell County District Attorney Sarah Kirkman unexpectedly recused herself from the case.

The veteran Iredell prosecutor stepped aside after Cravens family complained about a Facebook photograph posted by her office in May that showed the prosecutor posing at a community event with Mooresville police officers  including Novelli and Arndt. Kirkland was wearing a Back the Blue T-shirt at the time.

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Kirkman told the Observer after her recusal that she handed off the Craven investigation to Gregson to avoid even the appearance of any conflict.

Gregson, the top prosecutor in adjoining Randolph County, is a former High Point police attorney and military prosecutor who took over the case about two weeks ago.

His decision upholding the legality of the officers actions is almost certain to add fuel to a community debate in Mooresville over Cravens death  a debate reflecting Americas ongoing examination of the use of deadly force by police, the ability of officers to handle a mental health crisis, even the objectivity of prosecutors in cases involving cops.

Up to now, the police account has dominated the narrative surrounding Cravens death. Bucking a nationwide trend toward greater transparency in cases of officer-involved shootings, no police video has been released to the public in the 10-plus months since the shooting. Under North Carolina law, only a judge can order the videos release.

Gregsons report is the first time Arndt and Novelli have been publicly identified as Cravens shooters. The Observer previously reported that the officers names appeared on a March petition by Cravens family for bodycam video.
Police chief Lee Graf addressing a press conference in Ohio on Wednesday, 16 June 2021. He was responding to the reports of a police officer running over a gun-wound victim (Screengrab/NBC News)

A police officer in Ohio has been placed on leave after her dashcam video showed her patrol car driving over a shooting victim lying on a street, authorities said. The man died soon after.

The incident occurred on the night of 13 June, when Springfield police officer Amanda Rosales was responding to a 911 call about a shooting on West Liberty Avenue.

According to the video from inside of the cruise, Ms Rosales was driving the car when she struck an already bleeding Eric Cole, reported NBC News.

Cole, a Black man, was flown to a hospital but was pronounced dead shortly afterwards, police chief Lee Graf said at a news conference on Wednesday. The cause of death, however, is unclear at the moment and Montgomery County Coroners Office is working to determine it.

Even though police have called it an accident, Coles family has asked why they were not immediately informed about Ms Rosaless vehicle running him over.

The lead officer was trying to catch addresses on the house. Eric was lying in the street, police chief Lee Graf said during a tense media briefing attended by Coles relatives. This was an accident. It doesnt mean its OK. It was an accident. This was not an intentional act on the part of the officer. I am sure of that.

The dashcam video released to several media outlets shows Cole lying in a street in a white shirt and blue shorts. His shirt was covered in blood when the police car arriving at the scene struck him.

Ohio State Highway Patrol is investigating the vehicle-pedestrian accident while Springfield Police Division is probing the shooting incident, reported the USA Today.

Ms Rosales has been placed on administrative leave.

Coles mother, Regina Wilson, however, was unconvinced by the explanation offered by the police, and asked why were they not told that [Rosales] ran over my son.

I want the officer held accountable just like if they get the suspect, they will hold him accountable, Ms Wilson was quoted as saying by NBC affiliate WDTN.
A Mexican judge on Thursday sentenced one of the murderers of acclaimed journalist and AFP contributor Javier Valdez to 32 years and three months in prison for the killing, which sparked international condemnation.

The 50-year-old was a prominent chronicler of Mexico's deadly drug wars and known for writing articles critical of powerful gangs such as notorious kingpin Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman's Sinaloa cartel.

A judge handed down the sentence against Juan Francisco Picos Berrueta for his role as co-perpetrator and organizer of the May 2017 murder in the northern state of Sinaloa, the prosecutor's office said.

Valdez's widow Griselda Triana welcomed the ruling, but noted that the alleged mastermind of the killing has yet to be prosecuted for it.

"This is an important sentence because it sets a precedent," she told AFP.

"The murder was clearly due to his work as a journalist and now everyone will know that there are heavy punishments for people who violate freedom of expression," she added.

Picos Berrueta, known as "El Quillo," was convicted last week and faced up to 50 years in prison after he refused to plead guilty in exchange for a shorter term.

Last year, one of his relatives, Heriberto Picos Barraza, was sentenced to 14 years and eight months in prison after confessing to involvement in the Valdez murder.

He had served as a driver for Picos Berrueta and another suspect, Luis Ildefonso Sanchez, who was killed before he could be arrested.

In that trial, it was revealed that the trio had links to the kingpin Guzman, who is serving life behind bars in the United States.

- Alleged mastermind -

The prosecution alleged the assassination was ordered by Damaso Lopez Serrano, the son of a former top "El Chapo" lieutenant, who was said to have been furious at having been criticized in an article.

Lopez Serrano, who is imprisoned in the United States for drug trafficking, has denied involvement.

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Valdez, who was shot in Culiacan, the capital of Sinaloa, was an AFP contributor for a decade, a correspondent for the daily La Jornada and a co-founder of the Riodoce weekly newspaper.

One of his final pieces was about internal struggles within the Sinaloa cartel following Guzman's capture in January 2016, before the drug lord was extradited to the US.

Thursday's sentencing came just hours after gunmen killed another journalist -- Gustavo Sanchez, in Mexico's southern state of Oaxaca. It was the second such confirmed murder this year.

The body of another journalist, Enrique Garcia, was found the same day in the central State of Mexico, although media watchdog Reporters Without Borders said it was not immediately clear if he was killed because of his work.

The group regularly ranks Mexico alongside war-torn Syria and Afghanistan as the world's most dangerous countries for news media workers.

More than 100 reporters have been murdered since 2000 in Mexico, where investigating political corruption or powerful drug cartels can have deadly repercussions.

Only a fraction of those crimes have resulted in convictions.

Valdez, who was gunned down in broad daylight outside his newspaper's offices, was a winner of the prestigious International Press Freedom Award.

The Breach-Valdez Prize for journalism and human rights is awarded in honor of him and fellow journalist Miroslava Breach, who was also murdered in 2017.

It is sponsored by AFP and the United Nations, along with several other organizations.

jg-dr/dw
JERUSALEM (AP)  Palestinians protested after Friday prayers at the Al-Aqsa mosque compound in Jerusalem and briefly clashed with Israeli police, leaving three demonstrators wounded.

A series of far more violent clashes at the site in April and May helped ignite last month's 11-day Gaza war. The site is the third holiest in Islam and the holiest for Jews, who refer to it as the Temple Mount because it was the location of the biblical temples.

It has frequently been the scene of Israeli-Palestinian violence. This time, the police refrained from entering the compound and appeared to act with more restraint, possibly on the orders of Israel's newly sworn-in government. The Red Crescent emergency service said two Palestinians were wounded by rubber bullets and a third by a stone that was thrown.

Young Palestinians could be seen throwing stones at police stationed at an entrance to the compound, who fired stun grenades and rubber-coated bullets.

Hundreds demonstrated after Friday prayers in response to a rally held by Jewish ultranationalists on Tuesday in which dozens had chanted Death to Arabs and May your village burn. The Palestinians protested against insulting Islam's Prophet Muhammad, after online video showed some of the participants in the Tuesday march denigrating him.

Tensions have remained high since an informal cease-fire halted the Gaza war on May 21. Tuesday's rally was held to celebrate Israel's capture of east Jerusalem, including the Old City and its holy sites, during the 1967 war. Police forcibly cleared Palestinians from the route of the march and provided security as many in the crowd made racist chants.

In Gaza, meanwhile, activists mobilized by the territory's militant Hamas rulers have sent incendiary balloons across the frontier into Israel, setting fields and farmland ablaze. Israel launched airstrikes on Wednesday and Thursday, targeting what it said were Hamas facilities.

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There were no casualties from the strikes, but the violence risked unraveling the truce brokered by Egyptian mediators, who have been meeting with both Israel and Hamas to solidify it.

Israel swore in a new government last weekend, ending Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's 12 years in power. It relies on a fragile coalition of parties from across Israel's political spectrum, and is expected to try and sideline the Palestinian issue as much as possible.

Israel captured the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem in the 1967 war, territories the Palestinians want for a future state. The peace process ground to a halt more than a decade ago.
After a week of scorching heat that brought record-challenging temperatures across much of western and central Europe, severe thunderstorms will be a threat into Sunday night across far eastern France and southern and western Germany.

While many will be thankful the sizzling heat has subsided across western Europe, the storm system that is responsible for bringing relief from the heat sparked dangerous thunderstorms across France and southern Belgium on Saturday.

Strong-to-severe thunderstorms rolled through Reims, France on Saturday night causing damage to around 40 homes, several trees and flooding also happened.

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As storms ripped through parts of Spain on Thursday, one city was blanketed with a large accumulation of hail that made the streets look like a winter wonderland. There was so much hail that residents needed snow shovels to help clear it.

Later Sunday night and during the early hours of Monday, the threat for damaging thunderstorms is expected to lessen across far eastern France and into southern and western Germany.

Youths dive in the Canal de l'Ourcq Wednesday, June 16, 2021, in Paris. Temperatures rose up to 33 degrees Celsius (91 degrees Fahrenheit) in the French capital. (AP Photo/Benjamin Girette)

The threat for severe thunderstorms comes amid a record-challenging heat wave that gripped western Europe earlier this week and will continue to bake parts of eastern Europe through early this week.

As an area of high pressure remains across eastern parts of the continent it will cause temperatures to climb about 10-20 degrees Fahrenheit (5-11 degrees Celsius) above normal.

"This heat wave will likely be record setting for locations that reach 90 F (32 C) since it is happening so early in the month. Previous heat waves have been recorded during late June," stated AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Tyler Roys.

In Warsaw, afternoon temperatures are forecast to trend higher through early this week and may reach 90 F (32 C), almost 20 degrees F (11 degrees C) above normal for mid-June.

Story continues

Berlin may even set a record number of days above 90 degrees F (32 degrees C). After topping that benchmark on Thursday afternoon, temperatures are forecast to return to that level or higher through at least Sunday. Normal highs are in the low 70s F (22-23 C) this time of year.

The heat even extends into Scandinavia and northwestern Russia where high temperatures can exceed 86 F (30 C) for several days into early this week.

"If temperatures get as [high] as expected, records will be falling, especially near St. Petersburg," said Roys.

The heat wave could also threaten the highest temperature ever recorded during June in Finland, according to Mika Rantanen, a researcher at the Finnish Meteorological Institute. The current record stands at 92.8 F (33.8 C).

AccuWeather RealFeel Temperatures will range from 95-105 F (35-41 C) across the regions impacted by the heat.

Persistent heat and a lack of air conditioning across the region can increase the risk for heat-related illnesses, especially for those that are sensitive to the heat or do not have access to air conditioning.

High temperatures and dry conditions across the region can lead to an increased fire risk, especially in areas that have been dry in recent weeks. Heat will also put a strain on power grids where businesses and homes run air conditioners to try to keep cool.

Temperatures across eastern Europe are expected to gradually trend lower during the middle and latter parts of this week.

Keep checking back on AccuWeather.com and stay tuned to the AccuWeather Network on DirecTV, Frontier, Spectrum, FuboTV, Philo, and Verizon Fios.
(Bloomberg) -- PayPal Holdings Inc. jumped after warning merchants it will raise prices for some of its new products.

The company plans to charge 3.49% of a transactions value plus 49 cents for merchants that use its proprietary services, PayPal said Friday in a statement. For instance, retailers will have to pay more to accept Venmo payments or use a product that lets consumers split their purchases into four installments.

We are making changes to our published rates in the United States to better align our pricing with the value that our products and services provide, the company said in the statement. The changes will go into effect Aug. 2.

PayPal climbed 1.9% to $283.38 at 4:15 p.m. in New York, the highest since February and the third-best performer in the 74-company S&P 500 Information Technology Index.

PayPal has long charged one flat rate for its services -- 2.9% of a transactions price plus a 30-cent fee. With the changes, the firm is betting merchants will pay more to use some of the proprietary products it spent years developing beyond just processing credit- and debit-card payments.

PayPal has become more than just a button or payment processor to be a full commerce platform capable of driving growth for businesses, the company said in the statement. Consumers are nearly three times more likely to complete their purchase when PayPal is available at checkout.

Square, Stripe

Part of the changes will allow PayPal to take aim at the likes of Square Inc. and Stripe by lowering prices for both in-store and online credit- and debit-card purchases.

For in-store transactions, PayPal will lower its fee to 2.29% of the transactions price plus 9 cents. For online payments, rates will fall to 2.59% of the transactions price plus a 49-cent fee.

PayPals moves come after Visa Inc. and Mastercard Inc. postponed plans of their own to boost the fees U.S. merchants pay when consumers use credit cards online. The networks said in March they wouldnt implement those changes until April 2022.

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WASHINGTON  Former Vice President Mike Pence was heckled Friday with calls of traitor as he delivered remarks at a conservative policy conference in Kissimmee, Florida.

At first, Pence was greeted by cheers when he appeared on stage at the Faith and Freedom Coalition event, which was billed as charting a policy course toward a conservative majority. But as he began speaking, he was briefly interrupted by a woman who shouted traitor several times before she was escorted out. Pence ignored the outburst and continued with his speech.

Its unclear who the woman was or what her motivation was for heckling Pence. As she started, others in the audience also appeared to yell "no!" repeatedly as Pence spoke over the cacophony.

During the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol by a mob of President Donald Trump's supporters, some in the crowd were heard chanting Hang Mike Pence, who was in the building overseeing the counting of electoral votes solidifying Bidens presidential victory. Trump had been urging Pence to try to overturn the results of the election, but the vice president said he did not believe he had the authority to do so, causing a highly public rift between the two that worsened in the aftermath of the riot.

Though Pence on Friday touted what he saw as the accomplishments of the Trump presidency, he has also made clear recently that he may never see eye to eye with the former president about Jan. 6. At a GOP event in early June, Pence called it a dark day in the history of the United States Capitol.

"You know, President Trump and I have spoken many times since we left office. And I don't know if we'll ever see eye to eye on that day, he said.

The former vice president delivered his usual stump speech Friday, outlining what he said are the promises he and Trump fulfilled over the last four years and attacking the job President Joe Biden has done so far.

After 140 days, the Biden administration and Washington Democrats pushing open borders, higher taxes, runaway spending, defunding the police, abortion on demand, censoring free speech, canceling our most cherished liberties  the time has come for every American dedicated to faith and freedom to stand up and be heard and turn back the agenda of the radical left, he said.

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Pence slammed the Democratic Party, which he claimed was responsible for setting off a violent crime wave that's wreaking havoc on families all across the country, and took a swipe at the Black Lives Matter movement.

Black lives are not endangered by police. Black lives are saved by police, Pence said. "We don't need to defund the police, we need to defend the police, and put the lives of law-abiding citizens.

Pence did not address the numerous deaths of Black people in police custody, including George Floyd in Minneapolis, which sparked protests for racial justice and police reforms last summer in cities across the country.
File A sales assistant shows organic flower soil at the biannual gardeners market at the Botanical Gardens on April 5, 2014 in Berlin (Getty Images)

Oregon has become the third state in the US to legalise a new end-of-life process of human composting or natural organic reduction of the human body.

Governor of Oregon Kate Brown signed the House Bill 2574 into law this week, which will allow burial by composting bodies apart from limited options of burial or cremation  both of which are adding to the environmental crisis.

In the US alone, cremation adds up to 1.7 billion of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere every year.

Representative Pam Marsh of Jackson County, who co-sponsored the bill, said this will give the opportunity to people to make decisions they feel good about. She said people have shown interest in the alternative end-of-life process.

What becomes of our bodies afterlife is going to be a question for all of us, or at least for the people we leave behind. Its not easy to think about death, but it can be really comforting to have the opportunity to make decisions we feel good about. HB 2574 ensures we have another safe, proven choice for those who want it, she said.

The state has followed the footsteps of Washington, that first legalised human composting in 2019, and Colorado that also followed suit last month.

The law that will come into effect from 1 July also clarifies rules surrounding alkaline hydrolysis, an existing burial process in the state, also referred to as aqua cremation.

The natural reduction of the human body to organic compost is done by placing the body in an eight feet by four feet steel container filled with wood chips and other plant material. After the microbes and bacteria break it down for 30 days, the remains are then stored in separate containers for another few weeks, reported Gizmodo.

One body and the additional organic material used in the process can produce up to 200 gallons of compost. The families can take the human soil home or donate it to conservation lands.

The companies conducting human composting hailed the move as they believe it is a green burial and an environmentally friendly burial that decreases carbon footprint.

Story continues

Walt Patrick of Herland Forest Natural Burial Cemetery told KGW8 said it will help protect forests from being clear-cut and developed while calling those turned into compost as guardians of the forest. He said it is less expensive than a regular burial.

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A Volkswagen Tiguan driven by a shooter in Phoenix on Thursday (Peoria Police Department )

A suspect has been arrested in Phoenix, Airzona, following a series of drive-by shootings that killed at least one and injured 13 others, according to police.

In the space of an hour and a half, a shooter drove around an area 20 miles northwest of downtown Phoenix and randomly fired at passersby on Thursday.

The areas affected were Glendale, Peoria, and Surprise, in a region known as West Valley.

Officers from the Peoria Police Department (PPD) were first called to West Valley at about 11.30 pm, in what was thought to be the first shooting. A man was found deceased in his vehicle.

A witness and a victim of the first shooting described a white Volkswagen Tiguan to officers, allegedly driven by the shooter, who was police believe was responsible for at least eight shooting incidents on Thursday.

Further reports of shootings were also received by the Surprise Police Department (SPD), Maricopa County Sherriffs Office (MCSO) and the public safety department.

At about 12.42pm, the suspect was arrested by an SPD officer after the Volkswagen was seen by a Surprise firefighter. A weapon was located in his vehicle.

In an announcement, the PPD said 13 people were injured, at least four were injured from gunfire and the others sustained other injuries.

Sadly, an adult victim was found deceased in a vehicle. All additional victims are adults and are expected to make a full recovery.

An investigation is ongoing and police say there is no need for the public to fear further incidents from the suspect, who remains in custody.
LARGO  Pinellas County is planning to add early voting sites in the Countryside and Tyrone/Lealman areas, following a record high of early, in-person voting during the 2020 presidential election, Supervisor of Elections Julie Marcus announced at a county commission meeting Friday.

The elections office also is considering relocating the early voting site at the St. Petersburg College Allstate Center on 34th Street South to another nearby location, Marcus said. The sites will open for the November 2022 election, supervisor of elections spokesperson Dustin Chase told the Tampa Bay Times. The two areas for the new sites have a high portion of citizens who vote early, he said.

The addition of two sites follows years of community members advocating for additional in-person early voting sites, with the request gaining the support of local physicians, pastors of historically Black churches and the editorial board of the Tampa Bay Times.

Pinellas County had five in-person early voting sites in the 2020 general election, while Hillsborough County had 26 and Pasco County had 14.

For years, Pinellas County has resisted calls to add more early voting sites, as it emphasized the use of mail-in ballots. At the commission meeting Friday, Marcus noted that 52 percent of the countys voters have a mail ballot request in their files. Former Pinellas Supervisor of Elections Deborah Clark aggressively advocated for voting by mail; in 2016, when local pastors of historically Black churches asked for additional sites, she said the countys citizens preferred to vote by mail.

However, data over time prompted the county to consider adding two new in-person early voting sites, Marcus said.

We have seen an increase in the number of voters voting prior to Election Day, reaching record numbers in 2020, she said at Fridays meeting. With our continued efforts to ensure voters are educated about their voting options, we expect this trend to continue.

Story continues

The popularity of voting ahead of Election Day rose during the pandemic. Voting patterns were affected by concerns about the coronavirus as well as unfounded claims by former President Donald Trump and others about widespread problems with mail-in voting. (Trump himself has voted by mail in Florida.)

Marcus told county commissioners there were several factors that would go into determining the location of new voting sites, including compliance with state criteria, accessibility, proximity to mass transit and the flow of entrances and exits. In 2022, 91 percent of the countys voters will be within 5 miles of an early voting site, she said. All voters will be within 3 miles of a mail ballot drop box, she added.

The elections office budget includes costs for the new voting sites, as well as for its current 25 mail ballot drop-off locations and three additional classified positions, Marcus said.

Marcus also announced Friday that, beginning with the August St. Petersburg primary election, her office will begin using a new system to audit its election results: the ClearAudit software created by the Boston-based Clear Ballot Group. That technology, which is already in use by some Florida counties, including Hillsborough, is separate from a countys vote tabulation system; all ballots are run through the ClearAudit software to be tallied to see if vote totals match.

Marcus also talked to commissioners about the redistricting process, which will take place after the fall elections at the state, school board and county levels. After receiving the new district lines, the elections office will be responsible for redrawing precincts, getting them approved by the county board and mailing voter cards and ballots.

I am going to do everything I can to make sure that we maintain the continuity of our precincts and our polling places everywhere we can, Marcus told commissioners.

Linsey Grove, president of the League of Women Voters of the St. Petersburg Area, said she was glad to hear about the new early voting sites, especially in light of the passage of Senate Bill 90, which places restrictions on voting by mail.

Of course, were happy to see that shes adding a couple more early voting sites, Grove said. We hope that the supervisor of elections considers adding even more on top of that.
Indian police have summoned Twitter's top local executive over a viral video on the site of a Muslim man being assaulted, with authorities accusing the US social media giant of stoking sectarian tensions.

The order comes as a battle rages between foreign tech giants and the Indian government over new rules on removing and identifying the authors of online material deemed illegal or inflammatory.

According to a notice served to Twitter on Thursday, managing director Manish Maheshwari must report to a police station and make a statement within a week.

The platform "let content go viral that promoted enmity between various communities in the state and country", Uttar Pradesh police said in the notice, seen by AFP.

Twitter declined to comment and the video was still available on the site Friday.

Last month Indian police visited Twitter's offices after the firm labelled tweets by the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party's national spokesman as "manipulated media".

The US company later accused authorities of "intimidation".

- Nationalist chant -

The video causing the furore shows an elderly Muslim man forcibly having his beard shaved off.

Twitter users shared the footage and news reports that said the man was forced to chant "Jai Shri Ram" ("Hail Lord Ram"), a rallying cry for Hindu nationalists.

Police have said the incident was not a hate crime but a personal dispute and that the man was assaulted by both Hindu and Muslim men.

Earlier this week they filed a case against Twitter, three journalists, three members of the opposition Congress party and the investigative news website The Wire.

The preliminary charges include promoting enmity among communities, being party to a "criminal conspiracy" and spreading fake news.

All six of those named are from India's minority Muslim community.

Reporters Without Borders, echoing local rights groups, called on police to withdraw the "absurd" case, calling it "judicial harassment".

Story continues

- 'First originator' -

According to the Indian government, all large social media platforms have complied with new IT regulations that came into force last month -- except Twitter.

These rules demand that firms give details about the "first originator" of posts deemed to undermine India's sovereignty, state security or public order.

Social media companies and privacy activists fear the vagueness of the rules means they could be forced to identify the authors of posts critical of the government.

The tech companies also have to appoint a chief compliance officer for the rules and a "grievance redressal officer", both based in India.

Twitter on Wednesday insisted it was "making every effort to comply with the new guidelines" and was in close touch with the government.

WhatsApp is challenging the new rules in court. It fears it will be forced to break encryption, a cornerstone of its service that prevents anyone other than the sender and receiver from reading messages.

In its court filing, the Facebook-owned company said the rules infringed upon the "fundamental rights to privacy and free speech of the hundreds of millions of citizens using WhatsApp" in India.

ash/stu/axn
Boris Johnson has rejected the "bizarre" suggesting that he is neglecting southern voters, following the Conservatives' historic defeat in Chesham and Amersham overnight.

Lib Dem Sarah Green overturned a 16,00 majority to become the country's newest MP, in a move that party leader Sir Ed Davey said was "sending a shockwave through British politics".

Tory MPs claimed the upset had been provoked by Mr Johnson's focus on Red Wall seats at the expense of those in the South.

"Boris goes down like a bucket of cold sick with traditional One Nation Tories", one former minister told The Telegraph. "The party is only speaking to white working class voters in the Red Wall and turning off our own voters. This was entirely predictable".

Another added: "The Government's subliminal anti-South, anti-London [position] need to change... London needs levelling up as well."

A third added: "This has huge implications for Tory seats south of the Severn/Humber. Planning reforms are clearly going to have to have a rethink."

But the Prime Minister stressed that "particular circumstances" had been to blame and insisted that levelling up was an "agenda for the whole country".

It was a "bit bizarre" to suggest he had an anti-South bias, the former London Mayor added. "I won London twice... and just last month we had gains in Basildon and Maidstone and Basingstoke - all over the place."

Story continues

Follow the latest updates below.

02:49 PM

Theresa Villiers: Chesham and Amersham must force planning rethink

Despite an excellent candidate, there was a massive swing against the Conservatives in the Chesham and Amersham by-election, writes Theresa Villiers.

We need to reflect on what caused that dramatic result. I urge ministers to use this as an opportunity to rethink their approach to planning reform. Their Planning for the Future white paper proposes big changes, including removal of local decision-making in areas designated for growth. Moreover, whilst the infamous algorithm for calculating housing targets was abandoned for most areas following pressure from Conservative backbench MPs, current targets remain very high, especially in the south east. There is consensus on the need for new homes, but these need to be delivered in partnership with local communities rather than forced on them.

Read the rest of the former Cabinet minister's appeal to Boris Johnson here.

02:45 PM

Sausage wars herald a banger bonanza for Northern Ireland

Northern Ireland could be transformed into a post-Brexit banger-producing powerhouse even if Brussels and Britain fight a sausage trade war, experts predict.

The provinces pork producers are perfectly placed to profit from a banger boom sparked by the UK-EU sausage crisis, politicians, officials and industry insiders told The Telegraph.

Despite the tensions around the implementation of the Brexit treaty, that should bring unique business opportunities because Northern Ireland can serve both markets.

Its possible were entering the Belle Epoque of Northern Irish sausages, an EU official told The Telegraph, as he suggested a golden age of exports and foreign investment.

Read more here.

02:39 PM

Andrew Lloyd Webber backs down on threat to defy Government rules

Andrew Lloyd Webber has said he will not defy Government rules about opening Cinderella at full capacity, despite his previous threat to risk arrest to do so.

The Cats composer said his new show would open on June 25 "sadly at the Government's arbitrary 50 per cent capacity".

Legal advice suggested that opening at full capacity would make it "very likely that every member of my cast, crew and orchestra, the front and backstage staff, plus our loyal audience members, could be individually fined hundreds of pounds, which I couldn't possibly risk," he added.

"If it were just me, I would happily risk arrest and fines to make a stand and lead the live music and theatre industry back to the full capacities we so desperately need.

"I could not look my young cast and crew in the eyes to tell them we were delaying or closing down. So, I have made the decision to personally bear the losses until we fully open on - or hopefully before - July 19."

02:33 PM

Andrew Lloyd Webber rejects 'unequal' pilot scheme for new Cinderella show

Andrew Lloyd Webber has said his new show Cinderella will not participate in the Government's pilot schemes, as Prime Minister Boris Johnson indicated earlier this week.

He said in a statement: "I have made it crystal clear that I would only be able to participate if others were involved and the rest of the industry - theatre and music - were treated equally. This has not been confirmed to me.

"It has become clear that, while sporting events like Wimbledon had obviously been working with the Government for some time on this pilot, and were even able to start selling tickets yesterday, the theatre industry and its audiences is, once again, an afterthought and undervalued."

02:29 PM

'People here are furious': The view from Chesham and Amersham

Dodging the rain in Chesham town centre - a place not used to heavy political squalls, save for occasional council rows over local planning applications - Roger Phelps, 79 and his wife Sarah, 72, echoed the deep anger at what they considered the Tories betrayal over HS2.

The twin concerns of the rail link and planning reforms - with an underlay of Brexit and general disappointment in Boris Johnson - is what has fuelled the historic defeat today.

They could have stopped it. They could have voted against it after the last election, but they pressed ahead with it, said Mr Phelps, a retired company director and, back in his younger days, a former secretary of the Young Conservatives. On top of that the release of restrictions on building on the green belt has really frightened people.

We speak with more locals about why they have abandoned the Tories here.

02:15 PM

Sir Keir Starmers election strategy 'in tatters' after Labours worst ever by-election defeat

Sir Keir Starmers election strategy is in tatters after Labours worst ever by-election defeat saw it take just 1.6 per cent of the vote, MPs have said.

Labours candidate, Natasa Pantelic, secured just 622 votes in Chesham and Amershams by-election on Thursday, losing her deposit and falling more than 6,500 votes short of the partys 2019 performance.

Party insiders fought to insulate their leader from the loss, stressing that the campaign was fought on local issues like planning and HS2, rather than national politics.

But others said it was "just ridiculous" to blame the result on HS2.

There is a political realignment taking place," said one MP. "Until the party wakes up to that, it will continue to find excuses.

Read more here.

02:10 PM

Tory HQ was outgunned by Liberal Democrat ground war

Lib Dems: They came, they saw and they conquered - PA

In the leafy Buckinghamshire market town of Amersham, the only evidence of Thursday nights successful Liberal Democrat assault on the electorate is a few pieces of torn orange poster paper on the front of the partys now abandoned HQ, writes Camilla Tominey.

They came, they saw and they conquered - leaving the Conservatives who had occupied the Chesham and Amersham constituency since 1974 completely shellshocked.

A brief visit to the Chilterns constituency on Friday morning revealed the aftermath of a battle that appears to have caught the Tories completely unawares.

According to one well-placed source, they thought they had the seat "in the bag" until only very recently, when the Lib Dems relentless ground campaign suddenly appeared to be landing significant gains.

Read her survey of the scene here.

01:49 PM

AstraZeneca 'did not live up to commitments', claims European Commission

A court ruling today confirms that "AstraZeneca did not live up to its commitments", European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen has said.

The drugs giant has been ordered to deliver 80.2m doses of its Covid vaccine by September - something which it says can be done with ease. It is far less than the original 300m doses under contract and still falls well short of the 120m the EU was seeking (see 1:54pm for more).

The Brussels boss has claimed it as a victory for the EU. "This decision confirms the position of the Commission: AstraZeneca did not live up to the commitments it made in the contract," she said. "It is good to see that an independent judge confirms this.

"This shows that our European vaccination campaign not only delivers for our citizens day by day. It also demonstrates, that it was founded on a sound legal basis."

01:39 PM

Vaccine total ticks up by nearly 400,000

The number of people vaccinated against Covid has nudged up again, as the Government looks to maximise the additional month to protect as many people as possible.

A further 393,315 vaccines were given yesterday, taking the total carried out since the programme launched on December 8 to an eye-watering 61,606,582, according to NHS England data.

That includes 35,507,916 first doses, a rise of 217,157 on the previous day, and 26,098,666 second doses, an increase of 176,158.

That suggests four in five adults in England have now received their first dose of a Covid-19 vaccine.

01:25 PM

Have your say: How significant is the Chesham and Amersham by-election?

Ministers are trying to play it down. The Liberal Democrats are trying to play it up. Labour appear to have gone off the grid in hope no one will notice they were even taking part.

But just how significant is the Chesham and Amersham by-election?

Undoubtedly there were local issues at stake, with long held hated of HS2 clashing with residual Brexit scepticism.

But many Tory backbenchers are angrily pointing to the fact that this by-election result presages more pain to come in the Southern Blue Wall.

Who is right? Have your say in the poll below.

01:17 PM

Watch: Chesham and Amersham by-election defeat shows PM may be paying price for Red Wall focus

Planning reforms, HS2 and a focus on the Red Wall to the exclusion of the South - these are the key factors that have led to the Tories' historic defeat in Chesham and Amersham last night, according to political editor Ben Riley-Smith.

Watch the video below for his analysis on the situation, and just how damaging it could be for Boris Johnson.

01:11 PM

Southern Tories fed up with 'endless talk about levelling up', says polling guru

Middle class voters in London and the South are unsure about the direction the Tory party is taking under Boris Johnson, polling guru Sir John Curtice has said.

In comments that back up what Conservative MPs have spent much of today telling The Telegraph, the University of Strathclyde professor said Blue Wall voters had had enough of "Tories talking endlessly about levelling up".

He told GB News traditional Tory voters were "wondering what really is in it for us?

"And given the opportunity of a by-election to say 'Hang on we are not quite sure about this' - they have taken it!"

He added: "We are now looking at a Liberal Democrat Party that above all seems willing to pick up the seats of middle-class voters, some of them traditional Conservative voters.

"They are no longer quite sure about the direction of the Conservative party under Boris Johnson."

12:54 PM

AstraZeneca and EU both claim victory as court rules on vaccine row

Both AstraZeneca and the European Commission are claiming victory after a Belgian court ordered the drugs company to deliver 80.2 million doses of its Covid-19 vaccine to EU members by September 27.

The pharma giant had said it would make its best effort to deliver to the 27-nation bloc 300 million doses by the end of June, but production problems led the pharmaceutical company to revise down its target to 100 million vaccines.

That led to a bitter dispute, in which the EU launched legal action to get at least 120 million doses by the end of June.

In a statement, AstraZeneca said it would "substantially exceed" the amount mandated by the court as it has already supplied 70m. However the EU claimed it was a win for their argument.

12:48 PM

Allister Heath: Beware, Boris. This is only the start of a southern revolt

What is the point of voting Tory if you are a prosperous, shire-dwelling Southern voter, asks Allister Heath? Youve dutifully ticked the right box for years now, even under Tony Blair, but why bother remaining loyal any longer?

The only message you hear from the Government is that it believes in levelling up the North. That sounds sensible, as far as it goes.

But you dont live there, and as you watch your tax bill, and that of your business, shoot up, it feels awfully like the real agenda is to tear down Southern tall poppies: Neil Kinnock-style class warfare, dressed up in Tory garb. Even HS2, which you hate, wont use and are paying for, is entirely designed to buy votes in the Midlands.

Read the rest of Allister's analysis here.

12:44 PM

Watch: Sir Ed Davey smashes 'blue wall' as he heralds Chesham victory

Lib Dem leader Sir Ed Davey smashed a blue wall made of plastic bricks with an orange hammer, as he told supporters: "This election sends a message to the whole country".

The Chesham and Amersham result was "sending a shockwave through British politics," he added.

"This is a great result, a huge swing to us. There are many Conservatives across the country who are now worried."

"People have been talking about a red wall, well after Chesham and Amersham and Sarah Green's victory they'll be talking about a blue wall," he added.

Watch below.

12:38 PM

England's R-rate remains stable

England's R-rate has remained between 1.2 and 1.4 this week, official estimates show.

The figure - which is on a lag of a couple of weeks - had been expected to rise slightly means that, on average, every 10 people infected will infect between 12 and 14 other people.

The growth rate has also stayed stable, meaning the number of new infections is growing by between three and six per cent every day.

The South West and North West have the highest rates, of up to 1.5, while the East of England and the North East have the lowest rates, of up to 1.3.

12:34 PM

Taoiseach calls for 'calm heads' amid Northern Ireland turbulence

Irish Taoiseach Micheal Martin has called for "calm heads" to prevail in Northern Ireland amid a "very turbulent" 24 hours.

DUP leader Edwin Poots resigned last night, just 20 days after replacing Arlene Foster , after he nominated one of his former advisers as the new head of the Stormont executive against the wishes of his party.

Thursday nights chaos now threatens to unleash further instability, with several DUP insiders speculating that the power-sharing agreement could still collapse again in the coming days.

Speaking in Dublin on Friday, Mr Martin said: "I think it is very important that we all work collectively on the island towards maintaining stability and calm heads and staying focused on what is important to the people within Northern Ireland.... like the health services, Covid-19 and indeed the broader economic issues.

Stressing the need to safeguard the Good Friday Agreement, he added: "We will work constructively with the new leader. It's been a very difficult time for the outgoing leader Edwin Poots but I think it's important that we maintain relationships."

12:23 PM

Boris Johnson dodges questions about international VIPs for Euros

Boris Johnson has declined to confirm whether he will be allowing thousands of fans into the country for the Euro 2020 semi-finals and final next month.

Wembley Stadium in London is hosting several international matches in June and July, including the final on July 11, but Uefa has reportedly threatened to pull the game if VIPs are not allowed to leapfrog travel restrictions.

Tory Andrew Bridgen has branded the move "a kick in the teeth" given the country will still be under restrictions and "when double vaccinated Brits can't go on holiday".

When asked about this at Kirklees College in Dewsbury, West Yorkshire, Mr Johnson said: "We'll do what we have to do to keep the country safe from Covid - that's obviously going to be our priority, and we'll be talking to Uefa about what they want and see if we can make some sensible accommodations.

"But the priority obviously has to be public health."

12:12 PM

Boris Johnson 'very confident' that July 19 will see end of lockdown

Boris Johnson speaking the day after losing Chesham and Amersham - AFP

Boris Johnson has said he is "very confident" that the remaining coronavirus restrictions in England will be lifted on July 19.

Speaking at Kirklees College in Dewsbury, West Yorkshire, Mr Johnson said: "I'm very confident that we'll be able to go through with step four of the road map on the timetable that I've set out with treating July 19, as I've said, as a terminus date.

"I think that's certainly what the data continues to indicate."

12:08 PM

Wales pauses roadmap for four weeks

The Welsh Government will pause further easing of coronavirus restrictions for four weeks to allow for more people to be vaccinated, First Minister Mark Drakeford has said.

Mr Drakeford said this would help Wales, which has the lowest Covid-19 rates in the UK, "manage the impact of this new wave of infections".

"A four-week delay could help to reduce the peak number of daily hospital admissions by up to half," Mr Drakeford said.

"This is at a time when the NHS is very busy in Wales supporting all our healthcare needs, not just treating coronavirus."

Mr Drakeford said he was looking to "find ways for the future which mean that face coverings do not have to be worn in every classroom, every day".

11:57 AM

Lifelong Tories reveal why they left party behind for Lib Dems

It used to be said that if you put a donkey on the ballot paper in Chesham and Amersham and stuck a blue rosette on its hind quarters it would still win.

Not any more. For the first time since the formation of the constituency in 1974 the Conservatives lost their grip on the seat.

In a result sending shockwaves through Westminster the Liberal Democrats overturned the Tories 16,000 majority to win by 8,028 votes in the two previously true blue Chiltern towns.

And it didnt take long to establish the reason for this political earthquake.

It was HS2 wot lost it.

Read more here.

11:47 AM

Boris Johnson backs 'Hopeless' Matt Hancock over Dominic Cummings

Boris Johnson has backed Health Secretary Matt Hancock despite criticising him as "hopeless" in messages revealed earlier this week by Dominic Cummings.

Speaking in Kirklees, West Yorkshire, Mr Johnson said: "I have complete confidence in Matt and indeed all of the Government who have been dealing with Covid-19 during the pandemic."

His response was more emphatic than Mr Hancock's own defence from a couple of days ago - watch below.

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11:45 AM

Boris Johnson admits Chesham and Amersham result was 'disappointing'

Boris Johnson looked more downbeat than he did after last month's Hartlepool victory - AFP

Boris Johnson described the Chesham and Amersham by-election result as "disappointing", adding: "We are getting on with delivering our agenda for the whole country."

"I want to thank Peter Fleet - an outstanding local candidate," the Prime Minister told reporters.

11:37 AM

Boris Johnson rejects 'bizarre' suggestion he is neglecting Southern voters

Boris Johnson has insisted he is not neglecting voters in the South, amid widespread criticism that he has turned his back on traditional voters to woo those in the Red Wall.

The Prime Minister said there were "particular circumstances" which had led to the upset in Chesham and Amersham, noting that there had been some "wilful misunderstanding" of his planning reforms.

He insisted levelling up was an "agenda for the whole country", adding: "That is what One Nation Cconservatism is about - uniting and levelling up across the country."

Mr Johnson stressed it was a "bit bizarre" to suggest he had an anti-South bias, noting: "I won London twice... and just last month we had gains in Basildon and Maidstone"

11:30 AM

Lobby latest: Boris Johnson not a gaffe machine, says No 10

Downing Street said it did not accept Dominic Cummings's description Boris Johnson as a "gaffe machine" (see 11:55am).

Asked about the way Mr Cummings had characterised his former boss, a spokesman for the Prime Minister told a Westminster briefing: "Of course that is not a characterisation that we would accept.

"But I'm not going to get into specific allegations."

11:23 AM

Boris Johnson urged to make planning U-turn or risk electoral 'suicide'

"The problem with political suicides is you live to regret them," one Conservative MP tells Christopher Hope in the wake of the Tories' disastrous defeat in the Chesham and Amersham by-election.

Tory MPs are clear about the prime cause of the disaster: Boris Johnson's plans to overhaul the planning system in England and fierce local opposition to the HS2 rail link.

HS2 electoral defeats in Tory seats that snake along the HS2 route along the M40 corridor are now being priced in by Conservative strategists among communities divided in two by a new rail line which offers them little benefit as trains whizz past between London and the Midlands.

But of deeper concern are Mr Johnson's reforms to the planning system which critics say allow "developers to build the wrong buildings in the wrong places.

"That is a theme that is running through a lot of constituencies right now - particularly in the south and in London."

Read more here.

11:08 AM

Have your say: How significant is the Chesham and Amersham by-election?

Ministers are trying to play it down. The Liberal Democrats are trying to play it up. Labour appear to have gone off the grid in hope no one will notice they were even taking part.

But just how significant is the Chesham and Amersham by-election?

Undoubtedly there were local issues at stake, with long held hated of HS2 clashing with residual Brexit scepticism.

But many Tory backbenchers are angrily pointing to the fact that this by-election result presages more pain to come in the Southern Blue Wall.

Who is right? Have your say in the poll below.

10:55 AM

Boris Johnson 'a gaffe machine', says Dominic Cummings

Dominic Cummings has been responding to the Chesham and Amersham by-election with a characteristically lengthy series of tweets bemoaning the fact that "pundits" did not see the by-election upset coming.

Alongside his criticism of lobby journalists, Boris Johnson's former right hand man also lays into the Prime Minister, who he calls a "gaffe machine clueless about policy & government".

This is apparently the reason why Mr Johnson was not put up for an interview with Andrew Neill during the 2019 election.

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10:42 AM

The biggest by-election swings in recent years and what they meant

The Conservative Party's loss to the Liberal Democrats in Chesham and Amersham is their largest defeat at a by-election since its 2014 losses in UKIP-voting constituencies.

A fierce campaign centred on the Tories planning reforms and the construction of the HS2 rail line saw voters swing to Sir Ed Daveys party by 25 points on Thursday, giving the Liberal Democrats 56.7 per cent of the vote.

The party is claiming to have punched a hole in the Blue Wall - a band of southern Tory-voting constituencies with large majorities. Sir Ed said the win had "sent a shockwave through British politics".

The result is one of the biggest swings in recent memory - but the UK has a history of producing dramatic results at by-elections.

Read more here.

10:33 AM

Analysis: PM may be paying price for Red Wall focus

That sound you hear this morning after the stunning Liberal Democrat victory in Chesham and Amersham is Boris Johnsons new Conservative coalition bursting at the seams, writes Ben Riley-Smith.

The Prime Ministers much-hailed success in expanding the Tories appeal into working class communities in the North East and Midlands was critical to winning his vast majority in 2019.

But the counter-argument was always this: that in taking the Red Wall seats off Labour, the partys brand was now so stretched that at some point it would be untenable.

In Chesham, the critics have the first real proof of exactly that.

Read the rest of Ben's analysis here.

10:21 AM

Former frontrunner Howard Beckett withdraws from Unite race

Howard Beckett has withdrawn from the Unite general secretary election and will support Steve Turner, he announced.

Although at one point the frontrunner to replace Len McClusky, he derailed his own campaign after suggesting Priti Patel "should be deported", after which he was suspended from the Labour party.

He also lost a 1.3 million legal battle in a libel case against former Redcar MP Anna Turley.

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10:13 AM

Camilla Tominey: Why these middle class libertarians voted Lib Dem

Before Sir Ed Davey starts measuring for new curtains at No 10, it is worth considering the local issues at stake in Chesham and Amersham, writes Camilla Tominey.

HS2 is basically a swear word in that part of leafy Buckinghamshire and residents have become much more opposed during the pandemic, when the shift to home working has made the multi-billion pound rail project seem like even more of a white elephant.

Another major factor has been the Governments plan to build all over the constituency simply because it happens to be at the end of the Metropolitan line. People move there to escape the urbanisation of London, not to see it replicated on their doorstep.

Brexit has also played a part. Chesham and Amersham voted 55 per cent in favour of Remain, so the Lib Dems are natural bedfellows. Boris Johnson, who isnt universally popular in this part of the Home Counties, should take note.

With the Labour vote having collapsed, it is only to be expected that these middle class libertarians will vote yellow  especially when the Prime Minister has spent the last 15 months eroding their civil rights.

10:06 AM

How the Lib Dems targeted planning to win Chesham and Amersham

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09:51 AM

How loyal will Red Wall voters be in the long term?

One problem posed by the Chesham and Amersham by-election result is - to what extent are the Tories going to become reliant on Red Wall seats?

If this is, as some backbenchers fear, the thin end of the wedge, that leaves the party open to a longer-term problem of loyalty.

Many voters are tribal, and are likely to vote the same way election after election. So a strategy built on the backs of winning in the Red Wall does not have the strong foundations that can withstand political storms should they come.

"We appeal to white working class Labour and Ukip voters, not true-blue shire voters," says one senior Tory. "How loyal will they be in the long term...?

09:41 AM

Chesham and Amersham voters think Boris Johnson is a 'charlatan', says Dominic Grieve

Voters in Chesham and Amersham turned against the Conservative Party because they believe Boris Johnson is a "charlatan", Dominic Grieve has said.

The former attorney general, who lost the whip during the height of the Brexit wars in 2019, told the BBC the by-election result was not just "because of HS2 or greenbelt issues, though doubtless they played a part".

It was because the seat has "a pretty sophisticated electorate who know what a fraudulent prospectus is... they have a very low opinion of the Prime Minister and they consider him to be a charlatan."

That was a "widespread view among a certain section of the electorate that has consistently voted Conservative all their lives, and it is the fundamental problem the Conservative party has got", he added.

09:33 AM

FT's chief political correspondent literally eats his hat

The FT's chief political correspondent Jim Pickard has literally eaten (some of) his hat, after boldly proclaiming that he would do so if the Liberal Democrats won in Chesham and Amersham.

He gives the hat just one of 10 for flavour, but adds: "I like to think I have kept my word".

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09:26 AM

Sir Ed Davey smashes actual blue wall

Smashing: Sir Ed Davey claims the by-election was historic - PA

Sir Ed Davey has smashed through a wall of blue bricks to demonstrate the implication of Liberal Democrats' by-election win in Chesham and Amersham overnight.

The party leader took a mallet to the wall, before saying: "The geography of British politics was redrawn yesterday".

That seems like an overstatement at this stage - but it's fair to say that it has got Tory MPs nervous about what is around the corner if the party doesn't attempt to reconnect with some of its more traditional supporters.

09:23 AM

Tory MPs are worried about Chesham win, claims Sir Ed Davey

The Liberal Democrats' win in Chesham and Amersham is "sending a shockwave through British politics", Sir Ed Davey has said, noting there are several Tory MPs "who are now worried".

Speaking at a victory press conference, the leader thanked campaigners for their work, and said voters were "sending a message to the whole country".

There has been lots of discuss about the Red Wall, he adds. Now that conversation will turn to the Blue Wall.

09:12 AM

Tom Harris: Keir Starmer, not Boris Johnson, should be worried by Chesham

The remarkable result in Chesham and Amersham is undoubtedly causing many a Conservative strategist to have a fitful sleep, writes Tom Harris.

But the other noteworthy aspect of Chesham and Amersham is the impact on Labour. Yes, its vote plunged in the by-election, which is hardly surprising given that the Lib Dems were allowed to portray themselves as the main challenger to the incumbent party. This isnt the first time that has happened and it wont be the last.

No, the significance for, and threat to Labour raised by Chesham and Amersham is that in less than two weeks voters in Batley and Spen will go to the polls to elect a new MP.

If the Lib Dems can win in "safe" Tory seats, then the prospect of Labour not even being able to hold on to one of its own secure seats is truly ominous for Keir Starmer.

Read more from Tom here.

08:59 AM

Number crunching the Chesham and Amersham by-election

Just how massive an upset was the Chesham and Amersham by-election?

The Buckinghamshire seat has been Tory since it was created in 1974.

The contest was triggered by the death of former Cabinet minister Dame Cheryl Gillan, who took the seat with a majority of 16,233 in the 2019 general election - some 55 per cent of the vote.

But last night Sarah Green took 56.7 per cent of the vote to secure a majority of 8,028 over the second-placed Tories.

08:45 AM

Pressure builds on Robert 'Generic' Jenrick over planning reforms

It's not just Boris Johnson who is coming in for a kicking today, in the wake of the Chesham and Amersham by-election.

Robert Jenrick, the Housing and Communities Secretary, is also under fire for his role in pushing the planning reforms, which many blame the result on.

Although Christopher Pincher is the minister directly responsible - and the one who has been fielding much of the complaints from angry Tories (including last year's successful push to scrap the hated algorithm), backbenchers are now pushing for the PM to sack "Generic", as so many colleagues disdainfully call him.

08:34 AM

Chopper's Politics: Ireland will follow the UK, says Brexiteer peer Kate Hoey

Ireland will follow Britain out of the European Union, a senior Brexiteer peer has claimed saying it was the "logical thing to happen".

Baroness Hoey - who as Kate Hoey was one of the few Eurosceptic Labour MPs before she quit the Commons at the 2019 general election - forecast that Ireland will leave the EU "in the relatively short term".

Speaking to today's Chopper's Politics podcast, Lady Hoey said: "While sort of 15 years ago everyone said we could never leave the EU, I believe that in the relatively short term, the Republic of Ireland will probably decide to leave.

"There's a big debate starting there. And I think that is the logical thing to happen, that the Republic of Ireland leaves the European Union, now they're a contributor."

08:12 AM

Have your say: Did you vote in Chesham and Amersham?

Did you vote Liberal Democrat in the Chesham and Amersham by-election after previously voting Conservative? We want to hear from you if so.

Please fill out the form below to help us understand exactly what is going on in the Buckinghamshire seat.

08:09 AM

Little loyalty: Knives are sharpened for Boris Johnson

While Tory MPs recognise that Chesham and Amersham is only a by-election, the knives are being sharpened already.

Boris Johnson is coming in for particular criticism (see 8:16am, 8:22am and 8:41am for more). with MPs noting that he has little support among both backbenchers and his own Cabinet.

"They support him while he helps them to win. It is a very flimsy structure and easy to knock down," notes one former minister.

He is not at risk, yet, the MP adds. "But he doesn't have the credit in the bank that Thatcher had. The new intake is still v v loyal, but little loyalty elsewhere."

08:02 AM

Chesham and Amersham defeat sends 'complicated message', minister insists

Policing minister Kit Malthouse has insisted there was a "complicated message" after the humiliating defeat for the Conservatives in the Chesham and Amersham by-election.

The Tory MP told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "We will have to tease out what the issues are and not least because don't forget just a few weeks previously we had some fantastic results in local government across that area.

"I'm an MP not very far away and we had a broadly clean sweep in county and borough elections in my part of the world, so I think there's a complicated message there."

He also claimed that the Liberal Democrats had a different message "nationally to the local one" on HS2.

07:48 AM

Watch: Defeated Tory candidate promises to 'rebuild trust' in Chesham

Peter Fleet, the defeated Conservative candidate for Chesham and Amersham, has said the party must "start to rebuild that trust and understanding" among constituents.

"That work actually starts in the morning."

But he warned that Liberal Democrat winner Sarah Green now had to make good on her election pledges, noting she had "promised so much" to voters.

Watch below.

07:41 AM

Chesham and Amersham could prompt July reshuffle

The Chesham and Amersham upset could bring forward a reshuffle, Tory MPs believe, as Boris Johnson looks to reset his grip on the party - and his appeal to traditional voters.

The long-rumoured reshuffle has been kicked into the long grass month after month, with the Prime Minister thought to be dodging the difficult decisions that are likely to make him new enemies.

"Despite the popularity in the Red Wall, the PM is not very popular with his own MPs - new intake excepted - and he is right to be worried about having more disgruntled ex-ministers on the backbenches," one explains. "He is PM because of plotting and disloyalty after all."

But with the historic defeat in a Tory stronghold - and the lingering issues with ministers such as George Eustice, Gavin Williamson and Matt Hancock - the word in Westminster is that it could now take place as early as July.

07:30 AM

Chesham and Amersham voters freed up because 'there is no danger of Corbyn'

The argument that Jeremy Corbyn's departure has emboldened centrist Conservative voters to test alternatives appears to be holding some weight (see 7:55am).

"They were saying that on the doorsteps," says one Tory MP who helped campaign in Chesham and Amersham.

"There is no danger of getting brother Corbyn as PM, so this is a 'free' vote."

07:22 AM

Boris Johnson 'only speaking to white working class voters', says Tory MP

Chesham and Amersham was lost because "Boris goes down like a bucket of cold sick with traditional One Nation Tories", says a former Cabinet minister.

"Hope you're not having breakfast," the MP adds.

"The party is only speaking to white working class voters in the Red Wall and turning off our own voters. This was entirely predictable".

07:16 AM

Can Boris Johnson 'appeal anywhere other than the Red Wall', Tory MP wonders

The situation in Chesham and Amersham was "a car crash", one former minister has said.

"People who have voted Conservative all their lives saying they were going to use this as a chance to send Boris a message.

"Cabinet needs to think about planning reforms and how to make their s--- Brexit deal work, whether the PM is capable of appealing anywhere other than the Red Wall [and] how to stem the unrest in the South East."

07:12 AM

Chesham and Amersham hurt by Government's 'subliminal anti-South' message, says Tory MP

Tories might be claiming that the Lib Dems "flooded" Chesham and Amersham - but it's clear many of them also went to the Buckinghamshire seat in a desperate bid to stop it from turning yellow.

Their take on the situation on the ground is bleak: "There were two factors, the less important one is this was a protest," says one Tory MP. "Lots of anti-HS2 and planning reform.

"More important is the Government's subliminal anti-South, anti-London [messages, which] need to change... London needs levelling up as well."

07:05 AM

Policing minister insists 'there is no red or blue' wall

Kit Malthouse has insisted the Blue Wall is not at stake, saying "we are a One Nation party - there is no red or blue, we believe there is one nation".

The policing minister said Boris Johnson had policies that were attractive to voters in "Liverpool and Warrington and Darlington as well as Andover in my constituency".

But pressed about the planning reforms, he told Radio 4's Today programme that "we should be building beautiful houses [but] planning is something that should be done with them rather than to them".

07:00 AM

Vote breakdown: How Chesham and Amersham looks

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06:58 AM

Government won't make office working compulsory, says Kit Malthouse

The policing minister has insisted the Government will not make it "compulsory" to return to the office, and that the question of working from home should be left to businesses and their staff to navigate.

Kit Malthouse confirmed there will be a consultation on more flexible working, but not until later this year.

"This is a situation for employers and employees to discuss and negotiate themselves," he told Sky News.

"I know there has been some media about this over the last two or three days, we don't have any intention to make it compulsory to return to the office.

"Our manifesto at the last election did contain a pledge to consult on more flexible working to allow people to work from home should they wish to, and we will be doing that later on this year."

06:55 AM

Chesham and Amersham: Is the 'Blue Wall crumbling' assessment fair?

The Liberal Democrats are heralding their victory in Chesham and Amersham as proof that "the Tory Blue Wall is beginning to crumble."

But is that a fair assessment?

It's certainly true that there are some nervous Tories this morning, with those in traditionally safe seats having seen their majorities erode in the 2019 election, which saw several centrist voters drop out rather than back Bexit and Boris Johnson.

The likes of Dominic Raab, whose majority in Esher and Walton was cut from 20,000 to just 2,743 after a similar assault from the Lib Dems, is likely to be among them.

Some will point to the fact that since 2019 Brexit has "got done", which removes a particularly contentious issue for some of those voters.

But the other big change is the departure of Jeremy Corbyn, which means the perceived risk of voting for Tory alternatives is also diminished.

06:47 AM

Minister attempts to brush off Chesham and Amersham upset

Policing minister Kit Malthouse branded the Chesham and Amersham by-election result "very disappointing" and said that there would have to be a "fairly significant post-match analysis" on what went wrong for the Tories.

"It's obviously very disappointing, can't pretend anything otherwise," he told Sky News.

"Really sad for our fantastic candidate Peter Fleet. I was there myself just a couple of days ago, knocking on doors for him.

"We'll obviously have to have a fairly significant post-match analysis and understand what has actually gone on.

"Traditionally, it's always tough for governments, whatever 11 years in, mid-term, to win a by-election, but there are lessons there for everybody and no doubt they will become clear in the days to come."

06:34 AM

Ed Davey: Leader hails 'best ever by-election victory' saying Tories could lose 'dozens' of seats

Sir Ed Davey said the historic win in Chesham and Amersham was the party's "best ever by-election victory" and that the Conservatives would lose "dozens" of seats in the South if this pattern was mimicked across the country.

The Lib Dem leader told BBC Breakfast: "I think this will send a shockwave through British politics.

"Liberal Democrats have had good wins in the past but this is our best ever by-election victory and it if was repeated across the South, literally dozens of Conservative seats would fall to the Liberal Democrats.

"People talked about the red wall in the North, but forgotten about the blue wall in the South, and that's going to come tumbling down if this result is mimicked across this country."

06:32 AM

What does the result mean for Labour?

It's not good news for Labour, who had finished second in the constituency in 2015 and 2017.

Here's a take from their MP Rupa Huq.

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06:29 AM

Lib Dem a 'viable alternative' to voters, says MP

Alistair Carmichael, Lib Dem MP, suggested that his party can offer a 'viable alternative' to voters.

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06:24 AM

Are Tories in danger in the south?

Sir Ed Davey told the BBC's Radio 4 Today programme that the Conservative party is in danger of losing seats in the south.

And Boris Johnson will be forced to confront some difficult political choices as he assesses the Tory drubbing in Chesham and Amersham.

The Liberal Democrats claim the result has sent a "shockwave through British politics" by showing that seats in the "Blue Wall" of Tory seats in southern England are vulnerable.

The warning signs were there in the local elections in May - although Conservative eyes may instead have been tempted to look north, where further inroads were being made into previously safe Labour territory.

The party lost councillors in places including Tunbridge Wells, Surrey and Oxfordshire, as well as the West of England mayoralty.

06:16 AM

Tobias Ellwood: 'We must finesse our post-Brexit messaging'

Here is the latest from the Conservative Bournemouth MP.

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06:12 AM

How did the Tories lose their stronghold seat?

The scale of the defeat will ring alarm bells in Conservative Campaign Headquarters (CCHQ).

Major issues in the campaign included the HS2 rail line, which cuts through the constituency, and the Government's proposed planning reforms which have sparked fears about building in the countryside around the seat in the Chilterns.

06:12 AM

The historic by-election, in pictures

Sarah Green of the Liberal Democrats after being declared winner in the Chesham and Amersham by-election at Chesham Leisure Centre in Chesham, Buckinghamshire - Yui Mok/PA

Conservative candidate Peter Fleet (left), who was defeated by Sarah Green of the Liberal Democrats - Yui Mok/PA

Sarah Green makes her acceptance speech - Getty

06:08 AM

The first time Chesham and Amersham has been anything other than blue

Since its inception in 1974, the seat in Buckinghamshire has been held by the Conservatives.

But in the early hours of the morning the tide changed.

For more detail on the historic smash-and-grab, click here.

06:05 AM

Tory source: 'By-elections are always difficult for governing party'

A Tory source said: "By-elections are always difficult for the governing party, particularly 11 years into government, but there is no getting away from the fact this is a very disappointing result.

"The work of regaining the support of the people of Chesham and Amersham starts now."

06:04 AM

Defeated Tory candidate says he looks forward to rebuilding trust

Defeated Tory candidate Peter Fleet said: "It's clear that that on this occasion the constituents here in Chesham and Amersham have chosen a different candidate to represent them, to serve as their Member of Parliament.

"I look forward to how we can start to rebuild that trust and understanding amongst all those people in Chesham and Amersham and as far as the Conservative Party is concerned that work actually starts in the morning."

06:03 AM

Ed Davey: 'Tory Blue Wall is beginning to crumble'

Liberal Democrats leader Ed Davey said his party secured a huge swing of 25 points to win Chesham and Amersham, claiming: "The Tory Blue Wall is beginning to crumble."

He said: "This is a huge victory for the Liberal Democrats. The people of Chesham and Amersham have sent a shockwave through British politics.

"We were told it was impossible for any party to beat the Tories here in Buckinghamshire. We were told this seat was too safe and the Tories too strong. This Liberal Democrat win has proved them utterly wrong.

"Across the south, the Tory Blue Wall is beginning to crumble. Here and in great swathes of the country, only the Liberal Democrats can beat the Conservatives and breach their Blue Wall.

"Sarah Green will be a great local champion for the people of Chesham and Amersham, and the Liberal Democrats will be a strong voice for everyone who feels let down and taken for granted by this dreadful Tory Government.

"This amazing win will strengthen our fight to safeguard our precious natural environment and build a fairer, greener, more caring country."

06:00 AM

Acceptance speech: 'This Conservative Party has taken people across our country for granted for far too long'

In her acceptance speech, new Liberal Democrat MP Sarah Green said: "Tonight the voice of Chesham and Amersham is unmistakable. Together we have said 'Enough is enough, we will be heard and this Government will listen'.

"This campaign has shown that no matter where you live, or how supposedly safe a constituency may appear to be, if you want a Liberal Democrat member of Parliament, you can have a Liberal Democrat Member of Parliament.

"If you wish to reject Conservative mismanagement and vote for a voice that will represent you and stand up for your rights then it is the Liberal Democrats who will continue to fight your corner."

She added: "This Conservative Party has taken people across our country for granted for far too long.

"We will continue the work of holding this Government to account for letting Covid rip through the care homes. We will speak up for the three million people excluded from financial support throughout the pandemic and we will challenge Boris Johnson to be far more ambitious in tackling climate change, supporting our frontline workers and backing our small businesses."

05:59 AM

'Work starts now to show Conservatives can deliver on people's priorities and regain support'

Co-chairman of the Conservatives Amanda Milling, Cannock Chase MP, tweeted: "For decades Cheryl stood proud for the people of Chesham and Amersham. I'm deeply disappointed David Fleet can't carry on that legacy The people of C&A have spoken.

"Work starts now to show how it's Conservatives that can deliver on the people's priorities and regain their support."

05:58 AM

'This is huge', declares Lib Dem MP

Orkney and Shetland Liberal Democrat MP Alistair Carmichael tweeted: "A fantastic result tonight for our new MP Sarah Green - a testament to her dedication and that of the many Lib Dem volunteers and staff who met Chesham and Amersham voters and gave them a voice after they felt left behind by Boris Johnson's Conservatives. This is huge."

05:57 AM

Chesham and Amersham results

The result came in at just before 2am on Friday.

Here is the breakdown.

Sarah Green (LD) 21,517 (56.69%)

David Fleet (C) 13,489 (35.54%)

Carolyne Culver (Green) 1,480 (3.90%)

Natasa Pantelic (Lab) 622 (1.64%)

Alex Wilson (Reform) 414 (1.09%)

Carla Gregory (Breakthrough) 197 (0.52%)

Adrian Oliver (FA) 134 (0.35%)

Brendan Donnelly (Rejoin) 101 (0.27)
By Crispian Balmer

ROME (Reuters) - Prime Minister Mario Draghi urged Italians on Friday to get fully vaccinated against coronavirus, acknowledging that a government decision to ban AstraZeneca doses for people aged over 60 had created confusion.

"It is fundamental that people get vaccinated," Draghi told a hastily called news conference, signalling a U-turn on the block on AstraZeneca. "The worst thing you could do is not get vaccinated, or just get one vaccine shot," he said.

The government abruptly restricted the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine last week following the death of a teenager who had developed blood clots after receiving a first dose.

Italy's medicine agency AIFA said on Monday that those aged under 60 who had received a first dose of AstraZeneca could be given a different vaccine when they got their second dose.

However, officials have said the vaccination campaign saw a slight dip in numbers over the past week, with some people cancelling appointments, apparently worried about mixing shots.

Draghi, who is 73, said he himself would be getting a different type of vaccine next week after tests showed that he had developed a low number of antibodies when he had received an initial AstraZeneca shot in March.

"Mixing doses is safe," he said, but health authorities would be flexible.

"If someone is under 60 years old ... and has been offered a different jab, but does not want it for whatever reason, this person is free to take the second dose of AstraZeneca so long as they have a doctor's approval and informed consent," he said.

As of Thursday night, 25.3% of Italians were fully vaccinated with a further 26.3% awaiting their second jab.

Draghi said the challenge was to track down all those aged 50 and over who had not yet received any vaccination. "These are the people who get ill, get seriously ill and need to be vaccinated."

Italy has suffered the second highest number of COVID deaths in Europe after Britain, but infection rates have fallen sharply in recent weeks and the government said on Friday that almost all restrictions within the country would be lifted by Monday.

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Although wearing face masks outdoors remains compulsory, Draghi said he would seek medical advice at the weekend on when this could be lifted.

Despite the recent drop in both cases and deaths, there is concern over the highly contagious Delta variant, first identified in India and now spreading fast in Britain.

Looking to limit exposure to the variant, the health ministry said on Friday it would reinstate mandatory quarantine and testing for everyone arriving from Britain from Monday.

(Reporting by Crispian Balmer; Editing by Giles Elgood)
Prince of Wales NHS staff ambulance workers - Steve Reigate-WPA Pool/Getty Images

The Prince of Wales has condemned the unacceptable violence and personal abuse faced by NHS frontline staff.

The Prince asked to speak to some of the paramedics and ambulance crew on the receiving end of the attacks during a visit to Chelsea and Westminster Hospital in London.

To me its unreal, unacceptable, he said. Why attack the people who are trying to look after you?

NHS England data shows that 3,569 ambulance staff reported being assaulted in 2020/21 - a 32 per cent rise from five years previously.

Antony Tiernan, of the London Ambulance Service, said there had been 529 violent incidents involving staff and volunteers between April 2020 and January this year.

Those attacks include kicking, punching, head-butting, biting and spitting and there have also been 31 assaults with weapons, he said.

In addition, there have been 834 incidents of verbal abuse and threats.

Prince's disbelief at rising violence

The Prince expressed shock after speaking to the NHS workers, saying: You cant believe it, can you?

When I think of what it has been like for so long, and how many people have been lucky enough to have wonderful paramedics and ambulance staff coming to their rescue.

But now you find the situation rising  violence, attacks, verbal attacks, racial abuse and everything else.

Matt Hancock Prince of Wales NHS workers - Steve Reigate-WPA Pool/Getty Images

The heir to the throne was joined by Matt Hancock, the Health Secretary, at the hospital, where he thanked staff for their service during the Covid-19 crisis and learnt how his Princes Trust had helped young people find employment within the NHS.

He personally asked to speak to six paramedics and ambulance crew after learning about the statistics on abuse.

A Clarence House spokesperson said: The Prince of Wales was shocked to hear that those who have done so much for all of us in this pandemic are the victims of abuse and violence from a small minority. NHS frontline staff and volunteers deserve our support, thanks and respect for the important work that they do.

Earlier this month, it was announced that paramedics in England were to be fitted with body cameras in a bid to prevent thousands of attacks each year. As NHS workers risked their lives to help the country during the coronavirus pandemic, they were being attacked when attending emergency call-outs.
Hikers discovered a pair of red Nike shoes and a human foot in a Maryland national park, which led rangers to find the rest of the womans remains nearby on Saturday, the FBI said.

Hikers found the foot in a remote part of the woods, away from established paths of Catoctin Mountain Park, FBI spokeswoman Joy Jiras told The Frederick News-Post. Rangers found the rest of the womans body, except for a missing hand and foot, fewer than 100 yards away, according to the news outlet.

The FBI said officials dont know how long the body was in the park, but the agency is investigating.

Its sad. Its disheartening, Richard Ruggieri, a supervisory special agent in the FBIs Baltimore office, told The Washington Post. This person has a story to tell. First, we need to figure out who it is to tell the story.

The woman had dark hair that was worn in long braids, the FBI said.

She was wearing a black tracksuit, wrist guard, and red Nike shoes, the FBI said in a news release. She was also found with a Puma handbag and a set of keys containing an El Salvador keychain.

Who to call

The FBI is asking that anyone who could help identify the woman or who has information about a person who disappeared in the past six months contact the tip line at 800-CALL-FBI.

Discovery of body ends search for missing 38-year-old at Joshua Tree, rangers say

Dad told in-laws he was taking son for a hike. Both found dead on Appalachian Trail

Tourists find dying woman who plunged 80 feet from canyon in Utahs Zion National Park
ROME (AP)  Armed with a search warrant, Italys police wildlife unit entered the house of a suspected cactus trafficker, finding over 1,000 rare cacti poached from Chile's Atacama Desert in a locked room.

This February 2020 discovery became one of the largest known cactus busts and the catalyst for an international effort among cacti experts, police, conservationists and governments to return the plants to their native countries.

What Lt. Col Simone Cecchini and his team found in Senigallia, a town on central Italy's Adriatic coast, were hundreds of Copiapoa cinerea and Eriosyce cacti that had been uprooted from the desert. They also found the suspected traffickers passport, computer and other documents that helped them reconstruct his operation.

The suspect, an Italian in his 40s, had made seven trips to Chile, from where he sent boxes of cacti to Romania and Greece. They then were brought to Italy and sold to clients, mostly in Asia.

I never imagined there could be a market like this. I never thought a cacti could be sent by post to Japan for 1,200 euros ($1,430)," Cecchini said.

He reached out to Andrea Cattabriga, president of the Association for Biodiversity and Conservation, and asked him to examine the specimens to confirm they had plundered from the Chilean desert, which is considered the driest non-polar desert in the world. The region, west of the Andes Mountains, has been used by scientists as a site to simulate Mars expeditions.

In a small town on the outskirts of Bologna, Cattabriga has several greenhouses where he legally grows a wide variety of rare cacti from certified seeds. He then tries to recreate their natural habitat and uses cotton swabs for pollination. This has given him the ability to distinguish between those grown in greenhouses and others pulled out of the desert.

Cattabriga immediately contacted the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), which keeps a red list of endangered species around the globe. According to the IUCN, about one-third of 1,478 cacti species are classified as threatened.

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Yet while there's international concern about the risk of extinction for rhinos, tigers or pandas, few people are aware or concerned about the possibility of a cactus species becoming extinct.

I think part of it is because plants are everywhere. So we take them for granted, said Barbara Goettsch, co-chair of the IUCN's cactus and succulent plants group. In the specific case of cacti, these are more threatened with extinctions than birds or mammals.

Cacti have become increasingly popular both as collectors items and as decorative house plants. In recent years, demand has been growing in China, Japan and Thailand.

Cattabriga and Cecchini decided the size of the seizure required an historic action: plants had to be returned to Chile.

When a stolen work of art is recovered, it is returned, said Cattabriga. It had to be the same for these cacti.

But sending them back was easier said than done. Shortly after the seizure, Italy went into lockdown due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The confiscated cacti were moved to a greenhouse at the Botanical Garden at the University of Milan. Then they launched a year-long effort to cut through red tape and find the funds for the transfer.

In Chile, Pablo Guerrero of the Botanical Department at the University of Concepcion began organizing with the Chiles National Forestry Corporation (CONAF) to receive the plants.

Finally, over a year after the cacti were discovered, the recovery plan fell into place. Cattabriga joined officers from Cecchinis wildlife team wrapping up 844 plants to be sent back to Chile. Of those confiscated from the suspected trafficker, 107 had died.

On April 18, 2021, the plants arrived at the airport in Santiago and were taken to a special quarantine center on the outskirts of the Chilean capital. They will remain there until August.

Their future is still uncertain. Politicians are pushing for them to be returned to the Atacama Desert. But Guerrero is concerned that the plants may not survive that direct planting. He is pushing for a special botanical garden in the Coquimbo region where their natural habitat can be reproduced.

Meanwhile, the suspected trafficker and an accomplice have been charged and will face trial in Ancona, Italy. He declined to speak to The Associated Press. Cecchini also said people who collaborated with the suspect have been put into a Europol database and will be monitored.

Most people in Chile do not think we have species poaching. They think poaching is about rhinoceros or elephants very far away. They are not aware that it is right here with our cacti, said Guerrero.
Republicans and Democrats in Congress, including most of South Floridas representatives, are introducing new legislation in response to an ongoing crackdown on political dissent in Nicaragua by leftist President Daniel Ortega.

On Thursday, Miami Republican Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar introduced a bill that would require the Biden administration to re-examine an existing free trade agreement between the U.S. and Nicaragua after Ortega arrested political opponents ahead of elections scheduled for November.

Salazar, who previously worked as a journalist in Nicaragua and once interviewed Ortega, introduced the bill with New Jersey Democratic Rep. Tom Malinowski, who served as former President Barack Obamas assistant Secretary of State for democracy, human rights and labor. Miami Republicans Mario Diaz-Balart and Carlos Gimenez also signed onto the legislation along with Florida Democratic Reps. Stephanie Murphy and Charlie Crist, who is running for governor.

The bill, if passed, would require the United States Trade Representative to review Nicaraguas compliance with the Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement, a pact signed into law in 2005.

Under Daniel Ortega, Nicaragua has become a land of oppression, Salazar said in a statement. Ortegas thugs are jailing political opponents and violently silencing dissenting voices. Ive introduced the Nicaragua Free Trade Review Act because trade with the United States is a privilege, not a right. We must show Ortegas regime that they cannot continue repressing the Nicaraguan people while reaping the economic benefits of free trade with the United States. America should not be in the business of trading with dictators.

Malinowski said theres no reason the United States should reward [Ortegas] regime with preferential access to the U.S. market unless he releases political opponents from prison and commits to democratic reforms.

Last week, the Biden administration sanctioned four people, including Ortegas daughter, after the Treasury Department accused them of aiding Ortegas ongoing crackdown on free and fair elections. Camila Ortega has managed a family-run TV channel since 2011 which the U.S. said spreads pro-Ortega propaganda while using state funds and tax loopholes to sideline independent news outlets.

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Early this month, Ortega placed Cristiana Chamorro, the leading opposition candidate in the November presidential elections, under house arrest just hours after she officially announced her run for the presidency. Two other potential candidates, Felix Maradiaga, an academic and political activist, and Juan Sebastian Chamorro, an economist, were also arrested in recent weeks.

The arrests effectively prevent opponents from campaigning against Ortega ahead of the elections. The U.S. has said it will not recognize the election results if Ortega continues to repress political opponents ahead of the vote.

In March and April, the House and Senate introduced the Reinforcing Nicaraguas Adherence to Conditions for Electoral Reform Act, a bill that requires targeted sanctions to advance elections in Nicaragua, coordinates U.S. sanctions with Canadian and European diplomats, requires classified and unclassified reports on Ortegas corruption and Russian involvement in Nicaragua and supports independent media in the country.

The bill, originally introduced by Florida Republican Sen. Marco Rubio and New Jersey Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez, is scheduled for consideration in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on June 22.

As the regime plans to hold elections, we must ensure the U.S. and our allies are creating new initiatives to address Ortegas corruption, human rights abuses, and the ongoing repression of members of the independent press, Rubio said in a statement.

Salazar, Gimenez, Diaz-Balart, and South Florida Democratic Reps. Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Ted Deutch also signed onto the bill.

On Monday, Menendez and Rubio sent a joint letter to Secretary of State Antony Blinken, urging the Biden administration to use their legislation, which has yet to become law, as a guide as it considers further action against Ortega.

The Biden administrations announcement of new targeted sanctions against Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillos daughter and three of the regimes financial and political operators mark an important response, but additional steps are needed, Menendez and Rubio wrote. This authoritarian power grab poses direct challenges to U.S. national security, regional stability, and raises deep concern among Nicaraguan-Americans in the United States. The situation must be met with a coordinated response from the international community.
Ronald J. Ostrow, a soft-spoken but tenacious reporter who helped vault The Times into the first rank of Washington journalism during the Watergate scandal and won respect from leading Democrats and Republicans alike, died Monday at his home in Chevy Chase, Md. He was 89 and had Parkinsons disease.

During more than three decades covering the Justice Department and federal law enforcement agencies, Ostrow won the confidence of major officials  and minor figures too  thanks to his relentless accuracy, fairness and persistence.

He never pulled his punches, U.S. Atty. Gen. Merrick Garland, who dealt with Ostrow as a mid-level Justice Department official during the Clinton administration, recalled in an email. He was always knowledgeable, always prepared, always fair. He was tough as a journalist, kind as a person.  When the authors of the Bill of Rights drafted the First Amendment to protect freedom of the press, they had reporters like Ron Ostrow in mind.

He was a true professional of the old school, former Atty. Gen. William Barr, who served in the Trump administration, said in a text message. His reporting was fair and insightful.

He got stories from the FBI and Justice that nobody else had, William H. Webster, a former FBI and CIA director, told The Times in 2000. You could trust him.  If somebody got hit by Ron, it was because they deserved it.

Ostrow was born in San Francisco in 1931, the son of a glove salesman and a homemaker. He graduated from UC Berkeley and after two years in the Army, worked at the Wall Street Journal and Business Week before joining The Times as a business reporter in Los Angeles in 1966.

He was a Nieman Fellow at Harvard University in 1964-65 and joined The Times' Washington Bureau in 1966.

Along with reporters Jack Nelson and Robert L. Jackson, Ostrow led the papers coverage of Watergate, the scandal that grew out of the 1972 burglary of Democratic National Committee headquarters by agents ofPresident Nixons presidential campaign.

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In an important break in the story, Ostrow learned from a source that former FBI agent Alfred Baldwin was a key participant in the plot. Nelson tracked Baldwin down and persuaded him to submit to an on-the-record interview. Baldwin told him that former Atty. Gen. John N. Mitchell, then chairman of the Nixon campaign, knew about the burglary  the first time a knowledgeable, named source had made that allegation.

"The story [was] perhaps the most important Watergate story so far, because it was so tangible, it had an eyewitness, and it brought Watergate to the very door of the White House," author David Halberstam wrote in The Powers That Be, his 1979 book about media organizations.

Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, who won fame for their Watergate reporting, agreed. The Times interview with Baldwin had been the most vivid piece of journalism in the whole Watergate saga, definitively portraying the difference between a third-rate burglary attempt and the brand of political gang warfare practiced by the Presidents men, they wrote in their 1974 book, All the Presidents Men.

In another exclusive, Ostrow reported in 1974 that the Watergate grand jury had voted to name Nixon, who was still in the White House, as an unindicted co-conspirator in the plot.

Over the rest of his 33 years in The Times Washington Bureau, Ostrow reported on the civil rights movement, FBI misconduct, President Reagans Iran-Contra scandal, the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing and many other major stories.

He co-authored two books: The FBI and the Berrigans, with Jack Nelson (1972) and Taking Care of the Law, with former Atty. Gen. Griffin Bell (1982). Ostrow retired in 2000 after 38 years at The Times.

Former Washington Bureau Chief David Lauter, who worked with him in the 1980s and 1990s, recalled an example of Ostrows gift for making sources from 1987:

We were chasing reports that [then-President] Reagan was considering 9th Circuit Judge Anthony Kennedy for the Supreme Court, Lauter wrote. Ostrow telephoned his sources at the Justice Department in search of confirmation.

The phone at Rons desk rang. I heard him say uh huh, uh huh. OK, thanks. He put the phone down, looked over to me and said, Its Kennedy. We can go with it.

Years later, Lauter asked Ostrow who the source had been. The answer: It was an official Ostrow had befriended years earlier as a parking attendant at the Justice Department.

That guy had risen through the ranks and was now in charge, Lauter recalled. The man called Ostrow to tell him a visitor had been ushered into the building via the attorney generals private elevator  and that the sign-in sheet bore the name Anthony Kennedy.

Thats sourcing, Lauter wrote.

Survivors include Ostrows wife of 40 years, Alyce Kelly Ostrow; two stepdaughters, Kalin Hyman and Alison Auerbach; a stepbrother, Lewis Lovell; and four grandchildren. His 14-year-old daughter, Kathryn, died of cystic fibrosis in 1977.





This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
SHANGHAI, CHINA - JUNE 17: Visitors stand inside the Memorial of the First National Congress of the Communist Party of China, as Chinese President Xi Jinping is seen on the screen in the back, on June 17, 2021 in Shanghai, China. The memorial, built where the first congress of the party was started before being interrupted by authorities in 1921, is considered, together with Nanhu Red Boat in Jiaxing, the physical birthplace of the CPC and it is one of the key sites of the so called "Red Tourism". - Andrea Verdelli/Getty Images

Rumours abounded on Friday night that China's top spycatcher had defected to the US, amid a growing focus in Washington on the theory that Covid-19 escaped from a Wuhan laboratory.

Dong Jingwei, vice minister of state security, was reported to have flown from Hong Kong to the US in February with his daughter. There was no confirmation of the rumoured development from either the US or China.

Dr Han Lianchao, a former Chinese foreign ministry official who is now a pro-democracy activist in the US, claimed Dong had defected.

Dr Han, of the Citizen Power Initiative for China in Washington, claimed the situation was discussed by senior Chinese and US officials when they met in Alaska in May.

Nicholas Eftimiades, a former CIA and Pentagon expert on China, told the SpyTalk newsletter, which first reported the alleged development, that Dr Han was "trusted for his integrity".

However, he said the suspected defection was exactly what it is, a rumour". He said such rumours about Chinese officials defecting "happen all the time and were not necessarily correct.

If Dong has indeed defected, he would be the most high-profile Chinese official ever to do so. The 57-year-old assumed responsibility for counter intelligence three years ago as China's top spycatcher.

Despite the official silence from China, the social media account of its top law enforcement agency, the Central Political and Legal Affairs Commission, claimed Dong had spoken at a counter-espionage seminar on Friday, cautioning spies to watch out for "insiders" who collude with "anti-China" forces and for people who bankroll their activities behind the scene.

The agency did not say where the alleged seminar had taken place, according to the South China Morning Post.

The rumour came as Washington continues to struggle to find the truth about the origins of Covid-19. Last month, President Joe Biden ordered the US intelligence community to deliver in 90 days a report on how it started.

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Mr Biden said US officials had already "coalesced around two likely scenarios": that it passed from animals to humans, or was a laboratory accident at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

We've been looking for needles in haystacks

One former senior US government official, who worked on an investigation into the Wuhan laboratory theory under Donald Trump's administration, told The Telegraph the only way to prove it would be to encourage defectors.

He said: "If you offer $5 million and citizenship there'll be plenty of people wanting to defect. We've been sitting on our ass for a year and a half looking for needles in haystacks.

"We need human intelligence. We need to hear from Chinese people who were direct witnesses. Then you're off to the races." He added: "We have a lot of reason to be suspicious it was a lab leak. We should be treating this like a potential crime scene.

"I've never seen a bigger whitewash. China's approach has been systematic cover-up and denial. If this had started in a lab in Oxford you can bet the UK government would be responsive to us."

The former official added: "People get executed for [messing up] in China. So it is possible the Wuhan people covered it up from their own government."

This week, Shi Zhengli, the Wuhan coronavirus researcher known as China's bat woman, gave a brief interview to the New York Times, in which she vehemently denied the outbreak started at the lab.

She said: "How on Earth can I offer up evidence for something where there is no evidence? I dont know how the world has come to this, constantly pouring filth on an innocent scientist. Im sure that I did nothing wrong."

Any defection would be embarrassing for the Chinese Communist Party ahead of its centenary on July 1. Propaganda has been ramping up and large boards with a red-emblazoned "100" have been hung above shops and along busy streets.

The Chinese Communist Party has more than 91 million members.

Next month's anniversary celebrations will see the release of a blockbuster film about the party's founding. Key party members will also receive a special medal at a ceremony in Beijing.
They name themselves after a Turkish soap opera, count former Taliban insurgents among their ranks and dress like their enemies, but the shadowy "Sangorians" militiamen are among the fiercest forces on the Afghan battlefield.

They were established in 2015 by Abdul Jabar Qahraman, a high-ranking politician and military commander who was assassinated three years later by a Taliban bomb.

Local media reports say the covert group has received training from the country's spy agency as well as foreign forces.

And the Jamestown Foundation -- a US-based conservative think-tank -- says it was established specifically to infiltrate and disrupt the Taliban.

"We are fighting all day and night," militia member Ahmad Jan told AFP recently, pointing towards insurgent positions not far from his outpost on the outskirts of Laskhar Gah, the capital of southern Helmand province.

"We don't get rest even for two hours. This has become our life," he said, dressed in traditional garments and sporting a beard.

Afghanistan has a long history of local militias fighting for and against authorities in Kabul -- frequently switching sides and allegiances depending on the tide of politics.

Government forces have been on the back foot for months as the Taliban step up operations ahead of the US withdrawal scheduled to finish by September 11.

Enter the Sangorians, who took their name from a popular Turkish television serial about undercover operatives, and whom local media reports say the Taliban particularly loathe as many of the militiamen were former insurgents.

- 'No quarter given' -

Clashes between the Taliban and defectors are known to be "vicious with no quarter given", the Jamestown Foundation said.

"Consequently, the Taliban uses extreme violence to deal with Sangorian members. Captured Sangorian fighters are tortured brutally and killed by the Taliban," it said.

The foundation estimated the Sangorian strength at between 500 to 1,000 fighters.

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For some militiamen, after losing relatives and comrades in battles with the Taliban, the fighting is personal.

"I lost my son, brother and three cousins," said Ezatullah Mama, a Sangorian commander leading a band of 25 militiamen in the area.

He said about five years ago the Taliban broke through some areas of Lashkar Gah -- including his neighbourhood -- and in the ensuing fighting he lost his family members.

"We started fighting the Taliban. I had to fight the Taliban," said Mama, who like other Sangorians vowed to defend the city from the Taliban, who they consider outsiders.

Helmand provincial council chief Ataullah Afghan acknowledged the support of the Sangorians and the role they play in keeping the Taliban at bay.

"We are asking the government to get more people to be part of the Sangorians in order to defend the province," he said.

str-emh-jds/fox/ds/gle
The Post and Courier in Charleston filed a lawsuit Thursday against the police agencies investigating the murders of Paul and Maggie Murdaugh, alleging that they violated the Freedom of Information Act by refusing to release police reports and 911 calls.

The newspaper sued the S.C. Law Enforcement Division and the Colleton County Sheriffs Office over the investigation into the June 7 murders.

Paul Murdaugh, 22, and his mother, Maggie, 52, were found dead of multiple gunshot wounds at their Colleton County home. Colleton County deputies responded to the scene after a 911 call from Alec Murdaugh, Pauls father and Maggies husband, where he said he found them dead.

The investigation was turned over to SLED, but the Sheriffs Office continued to assist. Since then, the agencies have released little to no information, leaving rumors and gossip to fill the void.

By law, South Carolina police agencies are required to provide reports that disclose the nature, substance, and/or location of any crime or alleged crime.

Many circumvent this rule by providing bare-bones descriptions of what happened. The Island Packet and Beaufort Gazette asked the Colleton County Sheriffs Office on June 9 for an incident report and received a one-line report.

Asked for a supplement report, the agency told the Beaufort County newspapers that it couldnt release anything else due to an active investigation.

The Charleston newspapers lawsuit, filed by Edward Fenno of Fenno Law Firm LLC in Mount Pleasant, contends that a Post and Courier reporter went to the Sheriffs Office and was also denied access to documents or information beyond the one-line incident report.

The reporter was told the report must come from SLED. When a different reporter went to SLEDs offices, that reporter was also turned away.

The states Freedom of Information Act maintains that incident and supplement reports are public information.

SLED has also denied requests by the Post and Courier, the Island Packet, and the Beaufort Gazette newspapers to review 911 calls associated with the incident.

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While SLED and the Sheriffs Office has said there is no danger to the public, no names of suspects have been released. Theres been no arrests and no information about any motives.

If the Murdaughs were murdered, the public may be in danger from the killer or killers, the lawsuit states.

Jay Bender, a South Carolina Press Association attorney who often deals with S.C. open records law, said the decision by SLED and the Colleton County Sheriffs Office to keep silent is a mistake.

Police are handicapping themselves, Bender said by phone Thursday. There might be information the public has that might be helpful to law enforcement agencies.

Tommy Crosby, a spokesperson for SLED, said Thursday afternoon that the agency could not comment on the lawsuit.

We are aware of pending litigation, he said, and it would be inappropriate to comment as a lawsuit has been filed.
A Pennsylvania school district has been sued by Christian parents over classroom discussions involving Black Lives Matter and systemic racism.

The lawsuit, filed Monday in federal court by Maureen and Christopher Brophy, states lessons that involve systematic racism, white fragility, religion, white privilege, Black Lives Matter and police brutality are unacceptable and will not be tolerated.

The parents seek an undisclosed amount of damages from the East Penn School District because they feel their children were discriminated against after they complained to administration about the teachings.

(The) parents explained that these topics are anti-Christian and therefore, discriminate directly against their religion, according to the lawsuit.

The parents children attend Emmaus High School and were introduced to the book White Fragility in the fall, according to the lawsuit. The book, written by Robin DiAngelo, explores the counterproductive reactions white people have when their assumptions about race are challenged.

Maureen Brophy said in an email to school administration she did not deem the book acceptable because of the Black Lives Matter organizations hostility towards Christianity. A month later, the parents sent another letter to an administrator to say they did not feel videos shown in class regarding police brutality and the Breonna Taylor case were the best examples to use to demonstrate advocacy.

A request by the parents to exempt their children from the topics was denied in February by the schools superintendent, according to the lawsuit. The superintendent then banned the parents from communicating with their childrens teachers.

The parents felt degraded, victimized, embarrassed, and emotionally distressed by the superintendents actions, the lawsuit states.

Because the parents voiced the religious discrimination, they say the school retaliated by discriminating against the children over their disabilities. The parents say the children were not able to receive various educational opportunity or benefits.

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The retaliatory discrimination was severe, pervasive, and objectively offensive, the lawsuit alleges.

In response to the allegations, East Penn School District Solicitor Marc S. Fisher said, Anybody can file a lawsuit by paying the filing fee. Being successful is something completely different, Lehigh Valley Live reported.

Rev. Gregory Edwards, senior pastor of Resurrected Life Community Church in Allentown, told The Morning Call that true Christians should not take offense to the schools teachings.

The only Christians offended by teaching subjects or topics that will dismantle the sin of racism and the scourge of white supremacy from public schools or any other institutions or systems are those who have weaponized their faith in order to protect an idolatrous worldview of whiteness, privilege and white supremacy, Edwards told the publication.

Critical Race Theory

The lawsuit comes on the heels of nationwide discussions involving Critical Race Theory. The American Bar Association defines the theory as instruction that explores and critiques how the social construction of race and institutionalized racism perpetuate a racial caste system that relegates people of color to the bottom tiers.

The theory has turned political and efforts to ban its teachings have led to school board meetings being swarmed, lawsuits and federal complaints, NBC News reported.

The term has turned into a catchall term for discussions of race, The New York Times reported, and more than 20 states now are seeking to restrict these type of lessons.

Nearly 100 national organizations signed onto a statement authored this week stating their firm opposition to such legislation. The statement was authored by The American Association of University Professors, the American Historical Association, the Association of American Colleges & Universities, and PEN America.

These bills risk infringing on the right of faculty to teach and of students to learn, the statement reads. The clear goal of these efforts is to suppress teaching and learning about the role of racism in the history of the United States.
Ecological reconstruction of giant rhinos and their accompanying fauna in the Linxia Basin during the Oligocene (CHEN Yu)

In north-western China, scientists have discovered fossil evidence of a new species of giant rhinoceros, taller than a giraffe that lived 26.5 million years ago, making it one of the largest mammals to have ever roamed the planet.

According to the study, published in the journal Communications Biology, the rhino Paraceratherium linxiaense weighed 21 tonnes  the equivalent of four large African elephants  and could reach close to 7m to graze treetop leaves.

The scientists, including those from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, say the findings offer important clues about the distribution of this long extinct mammal across the Asian continent, shedding more light on the evolutionary lineage of modern-day rhinos.

In the research, the scientists analysed completely preserved skull and jawbone fossils recovered from the Linxia Basin in Gansu Province, China, among deposits pertaining to the Late Oligocene period 34 to 23 million years ago.

They also found associated fossilised body parts of the rhino, including the atlas bone that connects the skull to the spine, as well as three vertebrae from another individual in the site at the northeastern border of the Tibetan Plateau.

Based on the analysis, the researchers found that the fossil remains belonged to an entirely new species different from other known giant rhinos.

Deeper assessment of the atlas bone and the axis bone, the second vertabra going down from the top of the spine, revealed clues that the rhino possessed a long and flexible neck.

The scientists also found evidence from genetic analysis of the samples that Paraceratherium linxiaense was related to another giant rhino species from western Pakistan, indicating that the genus was widespread across Asia, including in the Indian subcontinent.

During this prehistoric time period, the researchers believe the giant rhino could disperse freely from the Mongolian Plateau to South Asia along the eastern coast of the Tethys Ocean  a prehistoric sea that has now become incorporated into mountain ranges that stretch from northern Turkey through northern Iran, Afghanistan, Tibet and Indochina due to tectonic plate movement.

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The Tibetan region likely hosted some areas with low elevation, possibly under 2,000m during Oligocene, and the lineage of giant rhinos could have dispersed freely along the eastern coast of the Tethys Ocean and perhaps through some lowlands of this region, the scientists wrote in the study.

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WASHINGTON  As lawmakers negotiate a bill to hold cops more accountable for violence in the line of duty, they're debating whether to soften what some say is a hard-to-reach federal standard that, if achieved, would be a major change in how officers are prosecuted.

The debate is about a provision of federal law known as Section 242, which serves as a backstop for state and local prosecutions of police. Federal charges are rare and can take years to pursue, but are often weighed in high-profile cases of police violence.

Federal prosecutors filed charges against former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin in May, after he was convicted in April of murdering George Floyd. But federal charges were considered  and not pursued  in many other cases, such as the high-profile deaths of Eric Garner and Tamir Rice.

A year of nationwide racial justice protests spurred Congress to debate the policing overhaul, after the deaths of unarmed Black suspects at the hands of police. But the proposed remedies are contentious. Congressional Democrats and civil rights groups argue cops must be held more accountable by making it easier to file criminal charges under Section 242 and pursue civil lawsuits. But police organizations oppose the changes as a threat to their own safety in making split-second decisions in a high-pressure job.

More on civil lawsuits: Qualified immunity divides lawmakers in police reform talks. What is that legal defense?

More than 1,000 civilians are killed each year by police and the number of federal prosecutions against officers averaged 41 each year during the last two decades, according to an analysis of federal statistics by the Transaction Record Analysis Center at Syracuse University.

The reason that they have filed charges so rarely is that the standard of proof is incredibly arduous, said Hernandez Stroud, counsel at the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University. You have to show that the defendant was acting for the express purpose of violating a persons civil rights. By lowering that standard of intent, the hope is that prosecutors will more easily be able to pursue charges under the statute.

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Stroud said the federal law serves as another way to punish police when state prosecutions come up short.

In some instances, a state may fail to initiate a case or to secure a conviction," Stroud said. "In cases like that, its very necessary to have in place an operable federal backstop to vindicate federal civil rights."

Section 242 at the heart of the debate

Section 242 of Chapter 18 of the U.S. Code requires one of the toughest burdens of proof in criminal law to convict officers.

The provision allows the Justice Department to charge officers who willfully deprive a suspect of civil rights, which aren't specified. The provision is vague enough that a Georgia sheriff once challenged it all the way to the Supreme Court, which yielded what legal experts say is "not a model of clarity." In another case, the high court provided guidance that prosecutors must prove the officer intended to act unreasonably in what can be a split-second decision.

The House voted in March as part of the policing overhaul to ease the standard from acting "willfully" to reckless conduct, which aims to punish conduct without knowing what the officer was thinking.

"The public wants to see police brutality, excessive force, end. They want to stop seeing the videotapes," said Rep. Karen Bass, D-Calif., who authored the legislation and acknowledged that changing Section 242 is contentious. "Accountability is absolutely key in the bill."

She's negotiating to keep the change with Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., who didnt include a comparable provision in his policing legislation last year. He has argued that the overhaul shouldn't demonize police officers and that there is a "chasm" of differences between the bills.

The devil in the details of the actual body of the pieces of legislation are complicated and there are very big differences," Scott said.

Another negotiator, Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., said lawmakers had "a really robust conversation" about Section 242 while meeting May 25 with Floyd's relatives on the anniversary of his death.

Negotiators hope to reach a compromise during June or July.

WASHINGTON, DC - MAY 18: (L-R) Rep. Karen Bass (D-CA) and Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) speak briefly to reporters as they exit the office of Rep. James Clyburn (D-SC) following a meeting about police reform legislation on Capitol Hill May 18, 2021 in Washington, DC. President Joe Biden has called for Congress to pass a police reform bill by the May 25th anniversary of the killing of George Floyd by Minneapolis Police officer Derek Chauvin. Lawmakers are still discussing key provisions in the bill, including qualified immunity laws for law enforcement officers. (Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

'Pretty difficult' to prove charges against police

Federal criminal prosecutions against police officers are rare. In the seven months before Floyds death, criminal charges were filed in 27 cases, according to TRAC. Prosecutions averaged 41 cases per year from 1990 to 2019, according to TRAC.

"Its pretty difficult to prove these cases," said Philip Stinson, a criminal-justice professor at Bowling Green State University who analyzes charges against police. "I dont know that moving the bar is going to change anything."

In one recent case, a federal jury convicted Brett Palkowitsch, a former officer with the St. Paul Police Department, in November 2019 for his response to a 911 call about a street fight involving a man with a gun.

Palkowitsch had kicked the suspect hard enough to break seven of his ribs and collapse both his lungs, while the suspect writhed in pain on the ground as a police dog mauled his leg, according to the Justice Department.

But the suspect, Frank Baker, a 52-year-old grandfather who lived in the neighborhood, hadnt been involved in a fight and had no gun when police approached him while he sat in his car, chatting on a cellphone, according to the department.

Palkowitsch was sentenced June 2 to six years in prison. He has appealed the sentence.

More: Derek Chauvin may face longer sentence after judge rules on aggravating factors in George Floyd's death

The Justice Department charged Chauvin the day after a state court convicted him of second-degree murder for kneeling on Floyds neck and causing his death. The department also charged three former officers who were with Chauvin  Tou Thao, Alexander Kueng and Thomas Lane  in the same indictment with depriving Floyd of his civil rights.

Chauvin was charged with causing Floyd's death by unreasonable force. Thou and Kueng are charged with failing to intervene and stop Chauvin's use of unreasonable force. And all four where charged with "deliberate indifference to Floyd's serious medical needs."

Thou, Kueng and Lane's trials on state charges of aiding and abetting second-degree murder are pending and all have pleaded not guilty. Their arraignments on the federal charges are scheduled for Sept. 14.

Courts divided over 'poorly defined' terms

The statute that has become known as Section 242 was added to the federal code after the Civil War. But a 1989 Supreme Court decision called Graham vs. Connor, a shoplifting case where officers were accused of using excessive force in arresting the suspect, set the modern rules for prosecuting police.

Then-Chief Justice William Rehnquist wrote that excessive force cases can't be precisely defined, but that it must be judged "from the perspective of a reasonable officer on the scene, rather than with 20/20 hindsight." He noted that officers often make "split-second judgments  in circumstances that are tense, uncertain and rapidly evolving."

"The question is whether the officer's actions are 'objectively reasonable' in light of the facts and circumstances confronting them, without regard to their underlying intent or motivation," Rehnquist wrote.

Lower courts have been divided on how to interpret that guidance. Jeffrey Fagan, a professor at Columbia Law School who studies policing, said terms in the law are poorly defined, leaving elastic interpretations.

Acting "willfully" is a different standard than "premeditated" or "deliberative" terms used in state courts. In Pennsylvania, premeditation can mean drawing a gun and shooting, while in California, time has to elapse to qualify as premeditation, Fagan said.

Another question is which civil rights are being deprived. Is it the right to life and liberty, or to freedom from state coercion? Fagan asked.

Its kind of open-ended and poorly defined, and it creates a space where police officers can justify just about any act," Fagan said. "Thats the problem with it. Thats exactly why its up for reform now in the Congress."

The high court's split-second framework for making decisions allows officers to justify their hasty response to a perceived threat. Police wield force at a higher rate against Black suspects, but claims of police bias remain contentious, according to an article by Fagan and Alexis Campbell in the Boston University Law Review in 2020.

After reviewing 3,933 cases when police officers killed civilians from 2015 to 2018, the study found Black suspects were twice as likely to be killed as white suspects, even when there are no other circumstances during the encounter that would make use of deadly force reasonable."

Theres a controversy among people who try to do some analyses of the characteristics of the cases where police officers kill civilians as to whether or not its racially tinged," Fagan said. "Bias is hard to prove."

Gianna Floyd, the daughter of George Floyd, walks into the West Wing at the White House, Tuesday, May 25, 2021, in Washington. Members of the Floyd family were meeting with President Joe Biden.

Prosecuting police officers is rare

Investigations under Section 242 take years and often dont result in charges, such as in the cases of Eric Garner and Tamir Rice.

Garner died after a struggle with police, who were arresting him for suspicion of selling untaxed cigarettes in July 2014 in Staten Island, New York. A video showed the officer hold Garner in a chokehold for about seven seconds before the two men fell to the ground, but prosecutors said the hold wasnt obviously intentional during the struggle.

After a New York grand jury declined to indict officers in the case, then-Attorney General Eric Holder opened a federal investigation in December 2014. But then-U.S. Attorney Richard Donoghue closed the case without charges in July 2019 by saying prosecutors couldn't prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Officer Daniel Pantaleo acted willfully.

Mr. Garners death was a terrible tragedy, Donoghue said. But having thoroughly investigated the surrounding circumstances, the department has concluded that the available evidence would not support federal civil rights charges against any officer.

More: George Floyd. Trayvon Martin. Sandra Bland. For many Black Americans, these deaths and others have caused lasting trauma

Rice was 12 when he was shot and killed by Cleveland police Nov. 22, 2014. Police were called to a recreation center for a 911 report of a guy with a pistol. Rice had been seen brandishing a toy gun that the Justice Department said was virtually indistinguishable from a real .45 Colt semi-automatic pistol.

The department called Rices death tragic when closing the investigation in December 2020. But the department said it couldn't charge Officer Timothy Loehmann because grainy videotape didnt contradict that the officer perceived Rice was reaching for a gun when officers arrived.

This high legal standard  one of the highest standards of intent imposed by law  requires proof that the officer acted with the specific intent to do something the law forbids, the department said in a statement. It is not enough to show that the officer made a mistake, acted negligently, acted by accident or mistake, or even exercised bad judgment.

In this Dec. 1, 2014 file photo, Tomiko Shine holds up a poster of Tamir Rice during a protest in Washington. The 12-year-old black boy was fatally shot by a white Cleveland police officer near a gazebo in a recreational area in November 2014. Officers were responding to a report of a man waving a gun. The boy had a pellet gun tucked in his waistband and was shot right after their cruiser skidded to a stop, just feet away.

Police groups oppose changes

Police organizations and their supporters in Congress have opposed changing the standard for prosecuting officers.

The Fraternal Order of Police said in a statement Saturday that it wouldn't yield on changes in protections for officers against civil lawsuits and wouldn't agree to changes in the "objectively reasonable" standard for charging police criminally. Police officers are protected from most civil lawsuits under a doctrine called qualified immunity, which lawmakers are considering changing, perhaps by allowing lawsuits against police departments.

The National Association of Police Organizations raised significant concerns about the House legislation dealing with qualified immunity and Section 242.

Combined, these two provisions take away all good faith legal protections for officers while making it easier to prosecute them criminally for good faith mistakes on the job, not just criminal acts, William Johnson, the groups executive director, told House leaders in a letter Feb. 25.

Scott has repeatedly said he wouldn't agree to changes to Section 242, which could discourage police from responding to emergencies.

"If you don't protect the officers, you don't have anybody coming into the community and that's terrible," Scott said.

Christopher Brown, a lawyer who has represented victims of police violence at The Brown Firm in Virginia, said an important aspect of the House bill passed earlier this year would place the cases in the hands of an independent prosecutor appointed by the state attorney.

The real difficulty is the relationships between the prosecutors and the officers being investigated when these things come up, Brown said.

More: Investigation faults overall police treatment in the fatal arrest of Elijah McClain

Colorado Gov. Jared Polis appointed state Attorney General Phil Weiser as a special prosecutor to investigate and potentially prosecute the Aurora police involved in the death of Elijah McClain. The Justice Department is also investigating.

McClain, 23, had been walking home from a convenience store in August 2019 when police were called for a suspicious man in a ski mask. McClain died several days after police struggled with him and placed him in a "carotid hold," which restricts blood to the brain. Police signed legislation in June 2020 prohibiting police from using carotid holds.

"Elijah McClain should be alive today, and we owe it to his family to take this step and elevate the pursuit of justice in his name to a statewide concern," Polis said in appointing Weiser.

Bass said she understood there was pushback from police and that some departments are having trouble recruiting. But she said all police are getting tarnished by misconduct such as Chauvin kneeling on Floyds neck for more than 9 minutes.

There has to be a way to hold the individual officer accountable and the department accountable," Bass said. "If an officer steals, the officer should be prosecuted. If an officer commits a crime with an underaged  you know, girl or boy  the officer should be prosecuted. If the officer sexually assaults or harasses somebody under the color of law, he should be prosecuted. Do you have a problem with that? Does anybody have a problem with that? As far as I understand, those are crimes anyway."

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: What is Section 242? Congress debates how to criminally charge police
Rhode Island Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse admitted to what has been plainly clear for some time: Democrats attack the Supreme Court in order to try to influence its decisions. And hes not going to give it up anytime soon.

Whitehouse, a rambling conspiracy theorist, asked now-Justice Amy Coney Barrett no questions during her confirmation hearing last year. Instead, he ranted about dark money while taking the same line of attack that every other Democrat did: Barrett was going to gut the Affordable Care Act, making her and Republicans evil people who were going to steal healthcare from Americans during a pandemic.

It was always a dubious line of attack, and of course now the Supreme Court did not do it at all. Barrett was among the 7-2 majority in the case Whitehouse had been referring to, which held that the plaintiffs didnt have the standing to sue. Conservatives had said from the beginning that this lawsuit was a longshot and the court wasnt likely to go along with it. No matter, though  not for Sheldon Whitehouse, at least. He took credit on behalf of the Democratic Party for intimidating the court into protecting Obamacare.

Whitehouse said he didnt regret his hysterics not for a minute, and that the Supreme Court might have killed the law if not for Democrats' political crusading to corrupt a judicial decision.

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Trying to intimidate the Supreme Court and influence its decisions has become a new calling card for the Democratic Party. Democrats have increasingly backed the idea of packing the Supreme Court in order to prevent their unconstitutional agenda from being struck down by justices who actually take their jobs seriously.

Whitehouse was also among the Democrats who threatened the Supreme Court in 2019, warning that, The Supreme Court is not well. And the people know it. Perhaps the court can heal itself before the public demands it be restructured in order to reduce the influence of politics. That's a very un-subtle threat.

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And who can forget now Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, apparently physically threatening justices by name last year over the issue of abortion? I want to tell you Gorsuch, I want to tell you Kavanaugh: You have released the whirlwind, and you will pay the price, Schumer said. You won't know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions.

Whitehouse seems to think this tactic works (and perhaps it does, at least with Chief Justice John Roberts). Democrats clearly are going to continue to try and intimidate justices going forward, as their agenda becomes more and more radical and continues to run up against the Constitution itself.

Washington Examiner Videos

Tags: Beltway Confidential, Sheldon Whitehouse, Democrats, Supreme Court, Obamacare, Amy Coney Barrett, Chuck Schumer

Original Author: Zachary Faria

Original Location: Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse admits Democrats are trying to intimidate Supreme Court justices
The Senate on Thursday confirmed Chris Inglis to be President Joe Bidens national cyber director, installing the former NSA deputy director as Bidens top cyber adviser at a time when many lawmakers are pressing the White House for a muscular response to a series of high-profile hacks.

As head of the new Office of the National Cyber Director inside the White House, Inglis will coordinate federal agencies disparate work on cyber issues and oversee the development of the U.S. digital defense strategy.

The Senate confirmed Inglis on a voice vote one day after the Homeland Security Committee unanimously approved his nomination.

The recent ransomware attacks on Colonial Pipeline and the meat processing giant JBS, both attributed to Russian cybercrime gangs, as well as the SolarWinds espionage campaign that intelligence agencies linked to Moscow, thrust cybersecurity into the spotlight on Capitol Hill and prompted renewed scrutiny of the challenges facing the federal government, including its limited understanding of attacks on private companies.

Washington is slowly responding to the crisis. In mid-May, Biden signed an executive order intended to close federal security gaps and increase oversight of the contractors that often serve as backdoors into agency networks. Two weeks later, the TSA issued a security directive requiring pipeline operators to report cyberattacks. A bipartisan group of senators is now planning legislation to require a wide range of businesses to report breaches.

Inglis new White House office was one of several policy reforms recommended by the congressional chartered Cyberspace Solarium Commission and incorporated into the fiscal 2021 defense policy bill. Lawmakers envisioned the office as analogous to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative in terms of elevating the importance of cyber issues within the White House.

But Congress did not define Inglis exact portfolio or authorities, and it remains unclear how he will work with Anne Neuberger, Bidens deputy national security adviser for cyber and emerging technology. During the presidential transition, Biden aides bristled at Congress creation of a new Senate-confirmed White House position and argued unsuccessfully that cyber coordination should remain the domain of the National Security Council.

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But many on the Hill wanted more continuity and stability in the White Houses approach to cyber issues. The Obama administration had created a cyber coordinator position inside the NSC, but the Trump administration had eliminated that role, calling it unnecessary. That move generated a fierce backlash and led to the Solarium Commission developing the contours of the national cyber director office.

Inglis, who served on the Solarium Commission, became an early frontrunner for the position. An Air Force veteran who spent nearly 30 years at the NSA, including serving as its deputy director from 2006 to 2014, Inglis developed strong relationships with key lawmakers and earned bipartisan respect on Capitol Hill.

He has a quiet but persuasive leadership style, Sen. Angus King (I-Maine), a Solarium Commission co-chair, said during Inglis confirmation hearing. All of us have been in meetings where theres one person, when they begin to speak, you lean over and say, Now, what are they going to say? Because this is going to be important. Thats Chris Inglis.

Inglis supporters have described him as well-prepared to face his biggest challenges. While he will not control the military operations of U.S. Cyber Command or the spying activities of the NSA from his White House post, he is deeply familiar with how both organizations work, having helped oversee the launch of Cyber Command, which is run by the same official who heads the NSA.

And while Inglis military background created some controversy when his name first surfaced as a candidate for cyber director  a role that will now be his first civilian government assignment  his six and a half years as a partner at the private equity firm Paladin Capital Group offered him a front-row seat to the growing cyber threats facing U.S. businesses. That experience could serve him well as he seeks to streamline how the federal government helps the private sector combat hackers.

With his mandate largely undefined, Inglis will have a unique opportunity to shape the role of the cyber director. But in the short term, he will have to contend with a more prosaic problem: Congress still has not funded his office, despite authorizing him to hire 75 employees.

In a press call with reporters ahead of Inglis confirmation hearing, King said he hoped to tuck funding for the office into a supplemental funding bill being planned for this summer.

I suspect that they can certainly find a way to pay his salary, King told reporters, but whether or not theyre going to be able to develop a staff, I think that's certainly the next step.
NBC

Now that President Joe Biden is back from his big summit with Vladimir Putin, Seth Meyers used his final A Closer Look segment of the week on Thursday to dig into the blatant, if not shocking, hypocrisy that Fox News has displayed in its coverage.

The very same people who approve of Donald Trumps friendly attitude towards Putin are claiming Biden wasnt tough enough, the Late Night host said, noting that even Putin was willing to admit that he was dealing with a more experienced statesman in Biden.

And yet, this will shock you, Fox News had a very different takeaway, Meyers continued, cutting to a montage of host Sean Hannity claiming that Biden was afraid to stand next to Putin during a joint press conference and contributor Lara Trump calling his performance embarrassing.

Colbert Mocks Grandpa Biden for Snapping at CNN Reporter Kaitlan Collins

Then there was KT McFarland, Trumps former deputy national security adviser, who complained that Biden looked tired next to Putin, who is a killer, who does have the wind at his back.

Am I supposed to be on Team Killer? Meyers asked in response. Also, this idea that Biden somehow comes off as tired just because he doesnt use his press conferences to rant and rave for hours about insane bullshit is so stupid. I mean, Trumps the one who constantly looked exhausted and drained of energy because he spent all his time screaming at reporters and pulling all-nighters to hate-watch cable news.

As for Foxs complaints that Biden didnt hold a joint press conference with Putin, Meyers reminded them that Trump did stand next to Putin in 2018 and agreed with everything he said. Trump was basically Putins Ed McMahon, he said, imagining the former president responding to claims that Russia didnt interfere in the 2016 election with, Ha, ha, ha, ha, very good!

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A growing number of states  including four that are canceling pandemic unemployment programs early  are offering jobless workers up to $2,000 when they get a job.

It's the latest effort by governors to combat concerns over labor shortages, but some experts say it may not work.

Montana, Arizona, Oklahoma, and New Hampshire are offering the return-to-work bonuses as an alternative to the unemployment programs that they're eliminating later this month and in early July. The federal programs expire September 6. Colorado and Connecticut which are not opting out of the programs  also have announced such initiatives.

Arizona  which plans to cancel the unemployment programs on July 10  is providing the biggest one-time bonus of $2,000 for those who get a full-time position and complete 10 weeks of work. The bonus is $1,000 for workers who accept a part-time offer.

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In Arizona, were going to use federal money to encourage people to workinstead of paying people not to work, Governor Ducey said in a statement in May, announcing the cutoff of the federal programs and the bonus initiative.

Arizona's bonus is still smaller than the $2,700 in benefits workers would get if the extra $300 in weekly benefits did not prematurely end.

The return-to-work bonus varies by state and can be different for full-time and part-time workers. Requirements also differ.

For instance, Montana and Oklahoma are both offering a one-time payment of $1,200, while Colorado is providing $1,600 to workers who began their jobs in May and $1,200 to the ones who start work in June.

Connecticut and New Hampshire both will pay $1,000 to unemployed workers taking jobs, but New Hampshire's payment for part-time workers is only $500. Part-time workers in Connecticut get the full $1,000.

The weeks workers need to be on the job before receiving the bonus ranges between four and 10 weeks, depending on the state. In Oklahoma, only the first 20,000 workers to take a job get the bonus. And in New Hampshire, only workers paid $25 or less qualify for the bonus.

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People walk by a Help Wanted sign in the Queens borough of New York City on June 04, 2021 in New York City. (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

'Don't fix the systemic issues'

More states may start paying bonuses this summer. North Carolina and New York have recently introduced legislation for return-to-work bonuses. Neither plans to opt out of the federal jobless programs early.

Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear said he plans to unveil a similar incentive for jobless workers who accept jobs, while also keeping the unemployment programs in place.

Read more: Can your employer force you to get vaccinated? Sometimes.

In the 25 states that have eliminated or plan to eliminate those federal jobless benefits, more than 4 million workers will see their benefits slashed by at least $1,200 a month in June or early July, losing a total of $22.1 billion in benefits, according to estimates by the Century Foundation.

In the four states canceling the benefits but also offering bonuses, the return-to-work incentives are lower than the money workers would have received if the jobless programs continued until their expiration. Additionally, the one-time payment is insufficient to address the issues keeping workers out of the workforce or to fill gaps in the states' unemployment programs, according to Jenna Gerry, senior staff attorney at the National Employment Project.

"Return-to-work bonuses don't magically make affordable, quality childcare available, they don't clear the health conditions of individuals and their families or quicken the return of industries that have all but disappeared during the pandemic," she told Yahoo Money. "They don't fix the systemic issues that are keeping people from returning to jobs."

Yahoo Money sister site Cashay has a weekly newsletter.

Denitsa is a writer for Yahoo Finance and Cashay, a new personal finance website. Follow her on Twitter @denitsa_tsekova

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New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu is being urged to veto a provision in the proposed state budget that would ban abortions after 24 weeks of pregnancy.

The measure, which has passed the GOP-controlled Legislature as part of a two year, $13.5 billion spending package, would prohibit doctors from performing abortions after the 24th week  the beginning of the third trimester  including in cases of fetal health, rape or incest. The measure provides exceptions if the mothers life is at risk.

Health care providers who perform the procedure after 24 weeks would face felony charges, punishable by up to seven years in jail and fines from $10,000 to $100,000.

Critics say the move, if approved, would jeopardize women's reproductive health services and result in an exodus of physicians who would fear being labeled as criminals.

Earlier this week, a group of more than 200 health care professionals wrote to Sununu urging him to veto the budget plan over the abortion ban.

"New Hampshire already struggles to retain medical professionals and we are deeply concerned that these criminal penalties will undermine the states efforts to recruit and retain clinicians," they wrote.

Sununu has signaled his support for the measure, recently telling the New Hampshire Today radio show that he "wouldn't necessarily veto" the budget over the abortion ban.

"Im a pro-choice governor, but like most citizens of the state of New Hampshire, I do not think that we should be doing late-term or, you know, these at-the-very-last-minute type abortions, Sununu said.

Sununu, who campaigned on a pledge not to make abortions more restrictive in New Hampshire, said he remains pro-choice but argued late-term procedures were different.

"I think fundamentally, again, most people agree that, you know, those types of late-term abortions are not appropriate," he told the radio show's host Chris Ryan.

Last year, Sununu vetoed a bill approved by the then-Democratic-controlled Legislature that would have required all commercial health care plans that cover maternity services to insure abortions. At the time, Sununu said the proposal ran afoul of a federal law banning discrimination against health plans that dont reimburse for abortion services.

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Women's groups argue that the measure would make abortions more restrictive and would rollback years of efforts to expand access to reproductive services.

"If Gov. Sununu signs this budget, he will be rolling back Granite Staters reproductive freedom by becoming the first governor in New Hampshire history to ban abortion and criminalize doctors," said Kayla Montgomery, a spokeswoman for Planned Parenthood Action Fund of New Hampshire.

Democrats have accused Sununu of waffling on the issue and ripped Republican lawmakers for tacking the controversial issue onto the budget.

"Republicans have turned doctors into criminals for providing abortions, even when it is in the best interest of the health of the mother or even the fetus," Sen. Tom Sherman, D-Rye, said a statement. "This will have a chilling effect not only on women's health in New Hampshire, but also on the already fragile system of healthcare for women."

But Republican lawmakers who supported the measure argue that New Hampshire should join 43 other states in restricting abortions at or before 24 weeks.

I personally believe 24 weeks is a modest goal for us to reach on a very divisive issue, Sen. Harold French, R-Franklin, said during a recent committee hearing on the amendment.

A recent poll by the University of New Hampshire Survey Center found 48% of Granite Staters support a ban after 24 weeks and 40% oppose a ban.

Washington Examiner Videos

Tags: States, News, Abortion, Budget, New Hampshire

Original Author: Christian Wade, The Center Square

Original Location: Sununu urged to veto abortion ban provision in New Hampshire budget
The Supreme Court saved the health care system from imploding Thursday by dismissing a Republican challenge to the Affordable Care Act. But it also saved the GOP itself from another round of intraparty chaos.

Why it matters: Most GOP lawmakers privately admit (and some will even say publicly) they don't want to deal with health care again. The issue generally isn't a good one for them with voters  as they learned the hard way after they failed to repeal the ACA in 2017.

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Now they're happy instead to make Democrats own problems with the health care system and brand their ideas to improve it as "radical."

The big picture: Years on from their 2017 failure, Republicans haven't gotten any closer to rallying around any alternative health care proposal.

Along the way, they've also lost both chambers of Congress  and the White House.

Between the lines: If the Supreme Court had made the opposite ruling, and the ACA had been killed or mortally wounded in court, it would've created chaos not only for the public but within the party.

Heading toward the 2022 midterms, Republicans would be on the hook for any fallout, while having little sway over what Congress did to fix it.

"The prospect of having to do a 60-vote bill, with Democrats in the majority and Joe Biden in the White House, to save millions of people from being uninsured right before the midterms, would shred any chance of taking back the majority in either chamber," a senior Republican Senate aide told Axios.

What they're saying: Asked whether the SCOTUS ruling signals the end of his party's effort to repeal and replace the ACA, Sen. Mike Braun (R-Ind.) said: "It ought to be."

He added: "Forget about repealing it. That waters under the bridge anyway, and all you get with that is, the other side will say youre against covering pre-existing conditions."

"The reality is no, we don't have the power to repeal Obamacare in this current construct," Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) also told Axios.

"We can still talk about how it doesn't work, we can make political arguments its failing the public and it needs to change, and we can come up with alternatives, politically. But I dont see the court doing much more."

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Republican lawmakers Thursday reissued their calls for the Cabinet for Health and Family Services to renew a foster care contract with a Baptist-affiliated foster care agency after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the City of Philadelphia couldnt block a Catholic agency from receiving a contract over their refusal to work with same-sex couples.

The Supreme Courts ruling  the latest in the legal struggle over where non-discrimination protections for LGBT people end and firmly-held religious beliefs begin  has the potential to impact a long-standing contract dispute between the state and Sunrise Childrens Services, a foster care and adoption agency affiliated with the Kentucky Baptist Convention.

For months, the two have feuded over whether a provision barring discrimination based on sexual orientation needs to be included in the contract, with Sunrise arguing that such a provision would infringe on its religious belief that homosexuality is a sin.

Gov. Andy Beshear said Thursday that his administration would review the Supreme Court decision to see if it resolved the conflict and that the administration is still waiting on guidance from the administration of President Joe Biden on the issue.

We will follow federal law, Beshear said during a press conference Thursday. And if that means this case resolves it, it resolves it.

Dale Suttles, the president of Sunrise, said they look forward to renewed conversations with the Beshear administration.

We are thankful for the Supreme Courts resounding 9-0 decision for Fulton today but are ready to move forward as many children and families are in need, Suttles said.

Whether the case will resolve the conflict is uncertain. The Supreme Court issued a unanimous ruling that hinged on the fact that there is a provision in Philadelphias contract that allowed for exceptions from its policies from other agencies. But it also clearly stated that Philadelphia had violated the first amendment.

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The refusal of Philadelphia to contract with CSS for the provision of foster care services unless it agrees to certify same-sex couples as foster parents cannot survive strict scrutiny, and violates the First Amendment, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote.

LGBT rights groups pointed to the narrow ruling over Philadelphias exception clause as a sign that the case might not have larger implications on other governments. Chris Hartman, with Kentuckys Fairness Campaign, said if Philadelphia had applied its non-discrimination requirement without exception, the case would have been ruled differently.

If Kentuckys Cabinet for Health and Family Services is applying its non-discrimination requirements without exception, todays Supreme Court ruling changes nothing, Hartman said. We believe Kentucky still has every right to refuse to make exceptions for discrimination in state-funded foster and adoption care, and they should.

Republicans, however, pointed to the ruling as a sign that Beshears administration should renew their contract with Sunrise. Several high profile Kentucky Republicans, including Agriculture Commissioner Ryan Quarles, Attorney General Daniel Cameron and House Speaker David Osborne put out statements urging a contract.

Quarles called the ruling a victory for religious freedom. Cameron said he would continue to fight to make sure constitutional rights are upheld for Kentuckians and faith-based organizations across the Commonwealth. Osborne, in a joint statement with Speaker Pro Tem David Meade, called on Beshear to set aside the political rhetoric and to make Kentuckys children his priority.

When asked whether they believed that foster children should not be placed with LGBT couples spokespeople for Cameron, Quarles, Osborne and Meade did not say. Instead, they insisted that the issue was about religious freedom, not whether LGBT people can be foster parents.

That isnt the issue here, said Sean Southard, the spokesman for Quarles. The issue is whether or not the Commonwealth of Kentucky can force Sunrise Childrens Services to violate its religious beliefs.

While Beshear said federal law will guide the contract dispute, when asked directly whether he was concerned about LGBT children who may be placed by Sunrise Childrens services, Beshear said hes concerned that any organization would preclude LGBT couples from serving as foster parents.

He also said he is concerned about LGBT youth, who have higher rates of suicide could be placed in an unfriendly environment.

It concerns me that they would go to a place, and I dont know that this happens at Sunrise, but any place that tells them that who they are is wrong, Beshear said. Because I do not believe they are sinful, I believe they are children of God, just like anyone else on this earth.

Republicans spar with Beshear on disputed adoption contract over discrimination clause.
By Emma Farge

GENEVA (Reuters) -A Liberian rebel commander was sentenced in Switzerland to 20 years in jail on Friday for rape, killings and an act of cannibalism, in one of the first ever convictions over the West African country's civil war.

The case was also Switzerland's first war crimes trial in a civilian court. It involved 46-year-old Alieu Kosiah who went by the nom de guerre "bluff boy" in the rebel faction ULIMO that fought former President Charles Taylor's army in the 1990s.

Kosiah faced 25 charges including one where he was accused of eating slices of a man's heart. He was convicted of that and all but four of the other counts, documents from the Swiss Federal Court showed.

He was arrested in 2014 in Switzerland, where he had been living as a permanent resident. A 2011 Swiss law allows prosecution for serious crimes committed anywhere, under the principle of universal jurisdiction.

A plaintiff in the case who testified that Kosiah ordered his brother's murder urged other Liberians to come forward as witnesses and secure more convictions.

"If you set an example, the other guys will be afraid," he said in a statement via the NGO Civitas Maxima that represented him. He asked not to be named in media reports for fear of reprisals.

Liberia has ignored pressure to prosecute crimes from its back-to-back wars between 1989-2003, in which thousands of child soldiers became bound up in power tussles exacerbated by ethnic rivalry.

Human Rights Watch called Friday's sentencing a "landmark".

"Switzerlands efforts on this case should help mobilize wider accountability in Liberia as this shows that these crimes can be prosecuted. I see this as an opportunity," the group's Elise Keppler said.

DEPORTATION, COMPENSATION

Activists in the Liberian capital Monrovia celebrated the verdict. "This will serve as a deterrent for others around the world. I think justice has taken its course," said Dan Sayeh, a civil society campaigner.

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Kosiah had denied all the charges and told the court he was a minor when first recruited into the conflict.

His lawyer Dmitri Gianoli said in an email to Reuters that Kosiah was "very disappointed" by the court's decision, saying it had succumbed to media and political pressure. "Mr. Alieu Kosiah will pursue his fight for justice to be served."

Kosiah was cleared on Friday of attempted murder of a civilian, accessory to the murder of a civilian, an order to loot and recruitment of a child soldier.

The court said that the 20-year sentence was the maximum it was allowed to give under Swiss law.

"No mitigating circumstances were taken into account in the sentencing. A deportation from Switzerland was also ordered for a period of 15 years," it said. Kosiah was also ordered to pay compensation to seven plaintiffs, it added.

A court spokesman later clarified that he would not be expelled before his sentence was served. The roughly 6-1/2 years that Kosiah has already served in pre-trial detention will count towards the sentence, the court papers showed.

Charles Taylor was sentenced for war crimes in 2012, but only for acts in neighbouring Sierra Leone. His son, Chuckie, was sentenced for torture in Liberia by a U.S. court in 2009.

(Additional reporting by Alphonso Toweh in MonroviaEditing by Alex Richardson and Andrew Heavens)
BRYAN, Texas (AP)  A Texas man has been indicted on a charges of murder and assault for allegedly opening fire at a cabinet-making company where he worked, killing one man and wounding five other employees.

A Brazos County grand jury handed up the murder charge against Larry Bollin on Thursday, along with five counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, said Jessica Escue, a spokeswoman for the local district attorney's office.

The charges stem from an April shooting at Kent Moore Cabinets in Bryan, about 100 miles (160 kilometers) northwest of Houston.

Bollin, 27, is accused shooting his colleagues, fleeing and then shooting and wounding a state trooper in a neighboring county as authorities searched for him. He was being held Friday in a Brazos County jail on a $3.2 million bond.

Bollin's attorney, Craig Greaves, declined to comment on the indictment. He previously said harassments from his clients colleagues may have motivated the shooting.

Bollin is also charged with attempted capital murder in Grimes County for the shooting of the state trooper.
(Bloomberg) -- Via Transportation Inc., which competes with Uber Technologies Inc. in some cities, is planning to go public in the U.S., according to people with knowledge of the matter.

The company is working with Goldman Sachs Group Inc. on the planned initial public offering, the people said, asking not to be identified discussing private information. A listing could happen in six months to a year, the people said.

The company, founded in 2012, also considered a merger with a special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC, but decided to pursue an IPO instead, the people said.

A Via spokesperson declined to comment. A representative for Goldman Sachs didnt immediately respond to requests for comment.

Vias business overlaps with ride-hailing companies like Uber and Lyft Inc. Via serves cities including New York, Chicago and Washington in the U.S. as well as Amsterdam and Berlin. Some of those operations however have been suspended due to Covid-19 and may not restart. Vias software is used by more than 500 cities and transit agencies, one of the people said. The companys software arm accounts for more than 70% of its revenue, another person said.

The company expects to be valued at a premium to its last funding round, one of the people said.

Via had a valuation of $2.93 billion after a $60 million funding round in March, according to data provider PitchBook. The companys investors include Daimler, Shell Ventures, Pitango Venture Capital and Hearst Ventures, according to PitchBook. Exor NV is also a backer.

Via announced in March that it had acquired Remix, a mapping platform for transportation planning and decision-making.

The global market for so-called transit tech software is expected to grow to about $60 billion in 2025, up from $20 billion last year, according to a report by Boston Consulting Group on Vias website.

(Updates with some operation suspension in fifth paragraph.)

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Bogdan Vechirko was charged with driving his semi-trailer truck into a crowd of protesters (Hennepin County Sheriff)

The driver who sped his semi-trailer truck toward a crowd of George Floyd protesters in Minneapolis last year may see all his charges dropped, thanks to a deal his lawyers reached with prosecutors.

Bogdan Vechirko, 36, had been charged with felony threats of violence and criminal vehicular operation over the incident. But on Friday, his attorneys reached a deal for both those charges to be dropped, as long as Mr Vechirko pays restitution, attends three sentencing circles, and doesnt break any laws for the next year.

The deal, termed continuance without prosecution, may come as a shock to anyone who witnessed the horrifying incident. On 31 May, 2020, thousands of people gathered on the Interstate 35W bridge to protest the police killing of Mr Floyd, which had happened just days earlier. As the protesters marched, Mr Vechirkos 18-wheeler came barreling down the bridge , sending demonstrators leaping out of the way.

It was one of the most dangerous things Ive ever seen, John Harrington, commissioner of the Minnesota Department of Public Safety, told WCCO at the time.

Miraculously, no one was killed. Prosecutors said at least one protester suffered abrasions as she jumped out of the trucks way, but mentioned no other injuries.

Even as he agreed to the continuance deal, the judge overseeing the case admitted how dangerous Mr Vechirkos driving had been.

I dont think anybody looking at that would have taken any bet that no one would be seriously injured, Judge William Koch said on Friday .

Mr Vechirko told investigators that he was in kind of a hurry and was trying to scare protesters out of the way.

His lawyer, Mark Solheim, told the court that his clients driving actually saved lives.

The social media videos make clear that Mr Vechirko was faced with a terrifying situation, yet still made efforts to safely remove himself and his tanker from the situation without catastrophic injuries or death, Mr Solheim said.

One of the protesters who narrowly avoided Mr Vechirkos truck, Bennett Hartz, didnt see it that way. Mr Hartz told the court that he still suffers from nightmares and post-traumatic stress due to the incident, and called it a miracle that no one was killed.

Story continues

Under the continuance deal, Mr Vechirko only needs to attend one more sentencing circle, as hes already gone to two. Officials have not specified how much he must pay in restitution.

Read More

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Crews removing barriers, memorials at George Floyd Square
Republican congressman Ronny Jackson says President Biden should take a mental health test (REUTERS)

Republican congressman Ronny Jackson has started a petition for President Biden to take a cognitive test, demanding that the president prove hes mentally fit for the job.

In an interview with The Hill , Rep Jackson said the president doesnt know whats going on, where hes at. Hes very confused all the time.

The Texas representative offered no specific evidence that Mr Biden is cognitively impaired, though he has not yet unveiled his petition. He says he began gathering signatures this week from his fellow Republicans in Congress, and will send the letter to the White House in the next day or two.

Rep Jackson is no stranger to controversy. Before he was elected to Congress in 2020, he was the presidential physician for Barack Obama and Donald Trump , and delivered an unusually glowing report on Mr Trumps health in 2018.

He has incredibly good genes, and its just the way God made him, he said at the time.

As part of his report, Dr Jackson said Mr Trump got a perfect score on a mental health assessment.

Ive found no reason whatsoever to think the President has any issues whatsoever with his thought processes, he told reporters.

The comments stand in stark contrast with his assessment of Mr Biden, who he says should take the same cognitive test as Mr Trump.

My point is that President Trump had to submit to that, even when I was his physician. I mean, the precedents already been set, Rep Jackson told The Hill . We did it and President Trump did it. And Biden, in his position, and his medical team, need to follow the lead now.

Doubts about Mr Bidens mental health have become a right-wing talking point over the past two years. Conspiracy theories have proliferated online that the presidents team is hiding his ailments, and that the president as we see him is computer animated or a hologram . (Such theories have been repeatedly and thoroughly debunked .)

To counter the health concerns, if not the hologram theories, Mr Bidens team released a medical summary in 2019 calling him a healthy, vigorous, 77-year-old male, who is fit to successfully execute the duties of the Presidency. The White House says it will release another assessment later this year.

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Meanwhile, one unexpected source has testified to Mr Bidens sharpness: Vladimir Putin .

I want to say that the image of President Biden that our press and even the American press paints has nothing in common with reality, Mr Putin said after meeting with the president in Geneva. Biden is a professional, and you have to be very careful in working with him to make sure you dont miss anything. He doesnt miss anything, I can assure you.

Meanwhile, Rep Jackson has had his own credibility issues. The Department of Defense released a report in March that accused him of abusing alcohol and sleeping pills on the job, and of making sexual and denigrating comments about a female subordinate. One witness said they saw him driving drunk. Another said he pounded on the hotel room door of the female subordinate, telling her I need you.

Rep Jackson has fiercely denied the charges.

Democrats are using this report to repeat and rehash untrue attacks on my integrity, he said in March. Im proud of the work environment I fostered under three different presidents of both parties; I take my professional responsibility with respect to prescription drug practices seriously; and I flat out reject any allegation that I consumed alcohol while on duty.

Read More

Ronny Jackson: Top White House doctor used to drink, take Ambien and make sexual comments at work, report claims

Ronny Jackson: White House doctor withdraws Veterans' Affairs candidacy after 'drunk driving' allegation

Ronny Jackson: Trump suggests his own Veterans Affairs nominee should withdraw

Putin heaps praise on Biden following Geneva summit: He doesn't miss anything, I can assure you'
The former White House doctor who gave a glowing report in 2018 about then-President Donald Trumps cognitive abilities is calling on President Joe Biden to take the same test.

U.S. Rep. Ronny Jackson, R-Texas, led a group of 14 Republicans who sent Biden a letter on Thursday urging him to take a cognitive test and make the results public.

The freshman Congressman served as White House physician under former presidents George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Trump. In 2018, he gave Trump a clean bill of health after an annual physical and cognitive test that came amid questions about Trumps mental fitness to serve.

At the time, Jackson said it was the first instance he knew of a cognitive test being administered to a sitting president, saying Trump was mentally very sharp.

We believe that, regardless of gender, age, or political party, all presidents should follow the precedent set by former President Trump to document and demonstrate sound mental abilities, Jackson and his Republican colleagues wrote in their June 17 letter to Biden.

President Joe Biden, pictured here during the final debate of the 2020 campaign, bristled at questions about his mental fitness during the presidential campaign.

The Trump campaign made Bidens mental fitness a major piece of its 2020 campaign. In campaign ads and rallies, Trump sought to paint Biden as mentally unfit to serve. His mental fitness has been a regular target for misinformation spreading online.

Biden, 78, is the oldest president in American history.

Fact check: Video of Biden discussing Jesus, the American Revolution and airports is missing context

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Biden has bristled at questions about his mental capabilities. Bidens doctor released a medical report in December 2019 in which he described Biden as healthy, vigorous and fit to successfully execute the duties of the presidency, according to The Associated Press. NBC News reported the report did not mention "mental deficiencies."

Biden is set to have a physical later this year, and the White House pledged in May to release the results to the public, according to The Washington Post.

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Jackson said in a prepared statement that it is past time that Biden submit to a cognitive test.

The American people deserve to have absolute confidence in their president, he said in the statement. They deserve to know that he or she can perform the duties demanded of the office, and they deserve to have full transparency on the mental state of their highest elected leader.

Jackson claimed Biden has shown "clear mental impairment."

Jackson was elected last year in Texas 13th Congressional district. Trump nominated Jackson, a Navy rear admiral, to serve as secretary of the Department of Veterans Affairs in 2018, but he withdrew from consideration amid allegations of misconduct, including drinking on the job and contributing to a hostile work environment.

The other 13 Republicans who signed the letter are:

U.S. Rep. Bob Gibbs, of Ohio

U.S. Rep. Jeff Duncan, of South Carolina

U.S. Rep. Andy Harris, of Maryland

U.S. Rep. Brian Babin, of Texas

U.S. Rep. Jody Hice, of Georgia

U.S. Rep. Claudia Tenney, of New York

U.S. Rep. W. Gregory Steube, of Florida

U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany, of Wisconsin

U.S. Rep. Kat Cammack, of Florida

U.S. Rep. Jerry Carl, of Alabama

U.S. Rep. Pat Fallon, of Texas

U.S. Rep. Diana Harsbarger, of Tennessee

U.S. Rep. Beth Van Duyne, of Texas

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Joe Biden urged to take mental cognition test by 14 House Republicans
ISTANBUL (AP)  A Turkish police officer has been sentenced to nearly 17 years in prison for the murder of a teenager who was hit in the head with a tear-gas canister in 2013.

Police officer Fatih Dalgali was on trial for causing the death of Berkin Elvan, a 14-year-old injured in the head by a high-velocity gas canister in Istanbul in 2013 as the Gezi Park anti-government protests were taking place nearby. Dalgali rejects the accusations.

Elvan was in a coma for 269 days. His death in March 2014 at age 15 led to a flare-up in protests. Elvans family said he was out buying bread, not protesting.

But Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who was then prime minister, claimed Elvan was among the terrorists at the protests with his face concealed and argued police had no way of knowing his age.

A court in Istanbul convicted Dalgali of possible intent of murder, sentencing him to 16 years and 8 months in prison, and barred him from leaving the country, according to official Anadolu news agency. The court did not seek his immediate arrest. His conviction may be approved or overturned by a higher court.
Twitter faces deepening trouble in India.

The firm's top official in the country has been summoned by police.

That is over allegations that Twitter failed to stop the spread of a video that allegedly incited enmity and hatred between Hindu and Muslim communities.

In the video a group of men, apparently Hindu, are shown beating a man believed to be Muslim.

Now a police case has been registered in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh.

The controversy comes as Twitter locks horns with India's government over its non-compliance with new IT rules.

That has raised doubts over whether the platform will continue to enjoy protection against liability for user-generated content.

Twitter hasn't commented on the police summons.

Earlier this week India's IT minister said it was "perplexing" why the firm hadn't acted to block the video.
U.S. Catholic bishops overwhelmingly approved the drafting of a teaching document that many of them hope will rebuke Catholic politicians, including President Joe Biden, for receiving Communion despite their support for abortion rights.

The result of the vote  168 in favor and 55 against  was announced Friday near the end of a three-day meeting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops that was held virtually.

The bishops had cast their votes privately on Thursday after nearly three hours of impassioned debate.

Supporters of the measure said a strong rebuke of Biden was needed because of his recent actions protecting and expanding abortion access, while opponents warned that such action would portray the bishops as a partisan force during a time of bitter political divisions across the country.

As a result of the vote, the USCCBs doctrine committee will draft a statement on the meaning of Communion in the life of the church that will be submitted for consideration at a future meeting, probably an in-person gathering in November.

Image: Joe Biden (Carolyn Kaster / AP file)

One section of the document is intended to include a specific admonition to Catholic politicians and other public figures who disobey church teaching on abortion and other core doctrinal issues.

Bishop Donald Hying of Madison, Wisconsin, said during Thursdays debate that he speaks with many people who are confused by a Catholic president who advances the most radical pro-abortion agenda in history, and action from the bishops conference is needed.

Theyre looking for direction, Hying said.

Bishop Robert McElroy of San Diego countered that the USCCB would suffer destructive consequences from a document targeting Catholic politicians.

It would be impossible to prevent the weaponization of the Eucharist, McElroy said.

Biden, who attends Mass regularly, says he personally opposes abortion but doesnt think he should impose that position on Americans who feel otherwise. Hes taken several executive actions during his presidency that were hailed by abortion-rights advocates.

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The chairman of the USCCB doctrine committee, Bishop Kevin Rhoades of Fort Wayne-South Bend, Indiana, said no decisions have been made on the final contents of the proposed document. He said bishops who are not on the committee will have chances to offer input, and the final draft will be subject to amendments before it is put up to a vote.

Rhoades also said the document would not mention Biden or other individuals by name and would offer guidelines rather than imposing a mandatory national policy.

That would leave decisions about Communion for specific churchgoers up to individual bishops and archbishops. Cardinal Wilton Gregory, the archbishop of Washington, has made clear that Biden is welcome to receive Communion at churches in the archdiocese.
The British criminal justice system has "failed" rape and sexual assault victims, a report released Friday said, prompting officials to apologize and vow "lasting improvements" to the way rape cases are investigated in the country.

By the numbers: The report  which only covered cases with adult victims, but acknowledged that minors are also victims  revealed that prosecutions and convictions for adult rape have fallen by 59% and 47% respectively since 2015-2016, with the number of reported rapes almost doubling since then, from around 24,000 to approximately 43,000 in 2019-2020.

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The government estimated that less than 20% of rape victims report their assaults to the police, adding that there's likely around 128,000 victims every year.

The state of play: The British government said that the reasons for the decline in cases reaching the court are "complex and wide-ranging, including an increase in personal digital data being requested, delays in the investigative processes, strained relationships between different parts of the criminal justice system, a lack of specialist resources and inconsistent support to victims."

The government released some recommendations to better prosecute and investigate sexual assault cases, including focusing more on the subject's behavior.

Officials said that victims often "do not feel believed" and added that by focusing on the subject, they could "help ensure decision-making is based on evidence, rather than subjective judgments of victim credibility."

Between the lines: The sexual assault and killing of 33-year-old Sarah Everard has spurred a cascade of concerns and worries over women's safety in Britain and how rape and sexual assault cases are handled.

A British police officer pleaded guilty for Everard's kidnapping and rape earlier this month.

What they're saying: "Victims of rape are being failed. Thousands of victims have gone without justice. But this isnt just about numbers  every instance involves a real person who has suffered a truly terrible crime," Justice Secretary Robert Buckland, Home Secretary Priti Patel and Attorney General Michael Ellis wrote in the report.

"Too many victims of rape and sexual violence have been denied the justice they deserve as a result of systemic failings," Buckland said in a statement. "We are deeply sorry for this and will not rest until real improvements are made."

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LONDON (AP)  In a surprising result, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson's Conservative Party has been easily defeated in a special election for a seat that it has held for decades.

The Liberal Democrats, which was in a coalition government with the Conservatives between 2010 and 2015 before seeing its electoral fortunes wane dramatically, won Thursday's election in Chesham and Amersham, 35 miles (57 kilometers) northwest of London.

Sarah Green, the Liberal Democrat candidate, picked up around 57% of the vote and won a seat the Conservatives have held since it was created in 1974. She added around 30 percentage points to the party's result from the 2019 general election.

This Conservative Party has taken people across the country for granted for far too long, Green said Friday.

Her party leader, Ed Davey, said the result sent a shockwave through British politics by showing that the blue wall of Conservative seats in southern England could be vulnerable.

There are many Conservatives across the country who are now worried, said Davey, who celebrated by smashing a blue wall made up of cardboard boxes with an orange mallet.

Chesham and Amersham are quiet, leafy, prosperous towns that are synonymous with traditional Conservative territory, in much the same way that the post-industrial towns in northern England have identified with the opposition Labour Party.

The Conservatives have made big inroads into Labour's red wall in recent years, winning a swathe of seats on a combination of factors, notably Johnsons insistence that he would ensure that Britain leaves the European Union after years of parliamentary haggling. Having secured that, Johnson has managed to capture more support in Labour's traditional heartland by promising to level up Britain through big infrastructure spending and other initiatives.

However, there are concerns among some Conservative supporters that the growing focus on northern seats has alienated the party's more traditional  and potentially more liberal  southern supporters. In the 2016 Brexit referendum, 55% of voters in Chesham and Amersham voted to remain in the EU, in sharp contrast to many of the constituencies the Conservatives have recently turned blue.

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Johnson denied that he was neglecting the party's traditional base and said there were particular circumstances at play in Chesham and Amersham.

We believe in uniting and leveling up within regions and across the country, he said.

The reasons for the Conservatives' heavy defeat varied, though national issues such as the government's handling of the coronavirus pandemic and its pro-Brexit stance clearly played a role.

"In remain-voting, middle-class seats in the south of England, the Conservative coalition has been weakened to some degree in the wake of Brexit, and the Liberal Democrats are the party that in many instances are best-placed to profit from that, and that's what they've managed to do in Chesham and Amersham," polling expert John Curtice told the BBC.

Local issues were also at play. Voters consistently voiced concerns about a high-speed rail line that will cut through the region and link London to the big cities in the north of England, such as Birmingham and Manchester, as well as Glasgow and Edinburgh in Scotland. Planning reforms proposed by the government also have sparked fears about more buildings in the countryside.

The defeated candidate, Peter Fleet, acknowledged the Conservatives had to rebuild trust and understanding with voters.

Despite the election's outcome, Johnson can still rely on a big majority of around 80 seats in the the 650-member House of Commons.
LONDON (Reuters) - British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Friday he was very confident that he would be able to lift remaining coronavirus restrictions on his new target date of July 19, based on the most recent data.

"I am very confident that we'll be able to go through with step four of the roadmap on the timetable that I've set out with treating July 19, as I've said, as a terminus date," he told broadcasters.

"I think that's certainly what the data continues to indicate."

(Reporting by Alistair Smout; Writing by William Schomberg)
`Retired four-star Adm. Jim Stavridis has a hot property on his hands.

Stavridis is the co-author of a critically acclaimed bestseller, 2034: A Novel of the Next World War, a scarily plausible imagining of how the United States and China could be drawn into a war and how badly it could turn out for both sides.

With a cast of complex, finely drawn characters and true-to-life depictions of current and future military capabilities, its just the sort of made-for-Hollywood technothriller that seems destined for a big or small screen near you.

The book had been out only a few months, when sure enough, Stavridis's phone rang.

I was called by the CEO of one of the largest studios in the country on a Friday who said, I'm reading the book. I love it. The only question in my mind is whether we're going to do a movie or we're going to do a miniseries. Who's your agent? he said.

As Stavridis recounted last month on the podcast Chatter on Books, he spent the weekend scrambling to get an agent with experience negotiating movie rights and called the CEO back on Monday.

But by then, something had changed.

Bad news, said the CEO. I read to the end of the book, and you know, I just can't sell this in China.

Stavridis may yet see his work of cautionary fiction, written in the spirit of classic Cold War novels such as On the Beach or Fail-Safe, turned into a movie or streaming series. Still, for now, the unseen hand of Chinese censorship has killed the project without lifting a finger.

Chinese box office revenues are expected to reach $15.5 billion next year, eclipsing the U.S. box office total, which before the pandemic was approximately $11.4 billion, according to PEN America, an advocacy group for literary and artistic freedom.

Consequently, the massive Chinese market is so keenly desired by U.S. media moguls that any hint Beijing might be offended is enough for producers to self-edit their scripts or scrap projects altogether.

Story continues

The word most often used to describe this obeisance to China is kowtow, which, unironically, comes from the historical Chinese custom of bowing down in worship or submission.

It's not right, says Stavridis. China should not get a vote on whether or not we produce artistic content, let alone works of nonfiction, let alone drive our ships through the high seas in the South China Sea. We gotta be careful we don't get canceled by China.

Examples of China effectively expunging any unpleasant truth from major motion pictures are rife, including removing Taiwanese and Japanese flags from Tom Cruise's iconic leather bomber jacket in the Top Gun sequel to Sony Pictures cutting a scene in the James Bond movie Skyfall in which a Chinese security guard is killed and Paramount Studios demanding dialogue Brad Pitts zombie movie World War Z be changed so that the fictional zombie virus did not originate in China.

But fear by studios that theyll be blacklisted if any of their movies dont depict a sanitized picture of China that comports with the image promoted in the ruling partys propaganda means that most censorship happens, as in the case of Stavridiss novel, in the pitch phase.

I want to write a movie about the concentration camps in China. ... No one would buy the pitch, said writer-director Judd Apatow in an interview with MSNBC last year.

Instead of us doing business with China, and China becoming freer, what has happened is a place like China has bought our silence with their money, said Apatow, one of the few Hollywood directors willing to criticize Beijing. As a result of that, we never wake up our country or the world through art or satire.

Actor Richard Gere says hes been blacklisted due to his longtime activism on behalf of Tibet and because of his role in Red Corner, which depicted Chinas police state and judicial system in an unflattering light.

Red Corner and the Brad Pitt movie Seven Years in Tibet, both made in 1997, are movies that a major studio could not make today.

The Chinese have an amazing influence over Hollywood, says Chris Fenton, a longtime Hollywood executive whose memoir, Feeding the Dragon: Inside the Trillion Dollar Dilemma Facing Hollywood, the NBA, and American Business, details his realization, over time, what a devils bargain it was for him to play by the Chinese Communist Party's rules.

Quite frankly, myself and other cogs and wheels of the machine of the capitalism  werent really thinking about how what we were doing was detrimental to America, said Fenton in a 2020 interview with Voice of America. We just were doing a job. We were trying to get access to a market.

Fenton said he began to grasp the insidiousness of Chinas grip over Americas global conglomerates when he witnessed the backlash following a 2019 tweet by Daryl Morey, at the time the general manager of the NBAs Houston Rockets, in support of Hong Kong.

That resulted in China demanding Morey to be fired and, for a time, a blackout of Rockets games in China.

The NBA called the deleted tweet regrettable, and some of NBA's major business partners lashed out at Morey, who was forced to apologize as a sop to China.

Hes now the president of basketball operations of the Philadelphia 76ers.

That was a real wake-up call to me, Fenton told VOA. It was a wake-up call to the American public about how companies were engaging with China that wasnt really part of being a patriotic American.

Just last month, actor and professional wrestler John Cena had to apologize on Chinese social media for the crime of referring to Taiwan as a country while promoting the latest installment in the Fast & Furious franchise.

But its not just sports and entertainment that are now under Beijings thumb  its also Americas and the worlds most valuable and profitable company.

A recent New York Times investigation uncovered the extent Apple has capitulated to Chinas demands to store its citizens' private data in China and has purged its app store of tens of thousands of apps to appease Chinese authorities.

What we found is that Apple is also becoming a tool of the Chinese governments vast censorship operation, said New York Times reporter Jack Nicas on the podcast, The Daily.

Over the past several years, Apple has begun to build this sophisticated system inside of its company that is designed to take down apps proactively before the Chinese government even asks, Nicas said.

Apple has created, essentially, a blacklist of terms that are banned in China. And these are things like independence for Tibet and Taiwan, the Chinese spiritual movement Falun Gong, the Dalai Lama, and the names of certain Chinese dissidents.

The banned apps include those from foreign news outlets, gay dating apps, apps that circumvent the governments internet restrictions, and apps that helped pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong organize.

It essentially means that Apple, one of the most technologically advanced and richest companies in the world, is bringing to bear its technology and its resources to help the Chinese government censor the internet for Chinese citizens, said Nicas.

Apple gave the New York Times a statement, which essentially said it had no choice if it wanted to continue to business in China, which makes the majority of Apples iPhones and is the No. 2 market for Apple products after the U.S.

These decisions are not always easy, and we may not agree with the laws that shape them, the statement read, but our priority remains creating the best user experience without violating the rules we are obligated to follow.

So far, the coronavirus pandemic is the defining event of the 2020s, and maybe someday, Hollywood will make a movie or limited series exploring how the plague ended up killing more than 1 out of every 500 Americans.

But unless movie producers grow a spine, you can bet the based on a true story plotline wont include any reference that Beijing silenced scientists and covered up its role, much less any suggestion that the virus could have escaped from a lab in China.

Jamie McIntyre is the Washington Examiners senior writer on defense and national security. His morning newsletter, Jamie McIntyres Daily on Defense, is free and available by email subscription at dailyondefense.com.

Washington Examiner Videos

Tags: News, National Security, Foreign Policy, China, Movies, Media, Books, Hollywood, Apple, Censorship

Original Author: Jamie McIntyre

Original Location: In the war of 2034, China has won the first battle without firing a shot
Jun. 18During the Thursday board meeting, the Washington Community Schools Board approved several new hires.

Halliw Browning, Marleigh Burris and Kaitlin Dant were hired as elementary teachers while Kim Conder will serve as an elementary art teacher. Rhiannon Fry will be the dean at Lena Dunn Elementary and Rebecca Titone will work with Kinder Camp students as a non-certified staff member.

After accepting the resignation of band director Brandon Hagen, they board also approved the hiring of Branden Burris for the position. Washington High School will also have a new math teacher in Jeanette Socks and Tamara Delisle will teach social studies at the junior high. Rachel Knepp will supervise the weight room.

Resignations were also accepted for Lacey Higgins, Olivia Pride, Zach Waggoner and Paige Roher.

Since the Daviess County schools have worked together to craft a back to school plan, Washington's will look much like the policy Barr-Reeve recently released.

"Masks will be optional except on the buses," said Washington Community Schools Superintendent Dr. Dan Roach, adding the plan is subject to change. 'We must follow the federal guidelines from the CDC on buses so the masks must be worn."

The board also approved bringing back early release days on Wednesdays to help provide teachers with professional development opportunities.

Roach said work is going on at several of the WCS facilities. The central office and Veale Elementary will have new roofing installed, all parking lots will be milled and paved and all classrooms will receive Viewsonic Smartboards that will replace the TVs and projector screens. Lena Dunn will have its playground moved to the back, UVC lighting will be installed in the buildings and security cameras will be upgraded among other projects.

Assistant Superintendent Kevin Frank also announced that Washington High School's Project Lead the Way programs have allowed the high school to be recognized as a distinguished school for the upcoming school year.

A special school board meeting will be held Wednesday at noon at the corporation office. The next regular board meeting is set for July 15 at 7 p.m.
GROS ISLET, St. Lucia (AP)  Dean Elgar showed the qualities South Africa recognized in raising him to the captaincy, making 77 to lead the Proteas fightback against the West Indies on Friday on the first day of the second test.

Elgars late partnership of 79 with Quinton de Kock, his predecessor as captain, solidified South Africas recovery from 37-3 in a damp morning session after it was sent in to bat.

De Kock followed up his match-defining 141 not out in the first test with an unbeaten 58 which had South Africa 218-5 when stumps were drawn in bad light, just before the rain returned. Wiaan Mulder was 2 not out.

Elgar survived the torrid start to the South African innings when the ball swung and was beaten twice by Kemar Roach in the short period between the delayed start of play and a fleeting rain break.

His first scoring shot was a boundary and he went on to his first half-century as captain from 147 balls. He was bowled by Kyle Mayers who brought a ball back from outside the left-handers off stump just before the arrival of the second new ball.

De Kock brought up his 22nd test half-century from 89 balls in an assertive innings which helped break the early domination of the West Indies fast bowlers.

Shannon Gabriel earlier took two early wickets on his return to the West Indies to put South Africa under pressure. The veteran fast bowler struck in his first over  the second of the day  and again to break a crucial partnership just before tea to leave the Proteas 125-4 heading to the final session.

West Indies won the toss and opted to bowl in St. Lucia as it looks to draw the series. The home team lost the first test by an innings but used damp early morning conditions to its advantage.

Elgar put on an 87-run stand with Kyle Verreynne (27) but Gabriel ended that just before the tea break when Verreynne was caught down the leg side and failed with a review.

Gabriel, who missed the first test, ended the day with 2-47 and fellow pacers Kemar Roach, Jayden Seales and Mayers had one wicket each, although the West Indies bowlers had to work hard in the second and third sessions as the skies cleared.

Story continues

They were dominant in the first session as Aiden Markram (0), Keegan Petersen (7) and Rassie van der Dussen (4) all departed for the Proteas, with the ball swinging and seaming around.

Rain delayed the toss and also caused a short delay during that first session at Daren Sammy National Cricket Stadium.

Markram flashed at a wide delivery from Gabriel to be caught at backward point, Petersen edged to the slips off Seales, and Van der Dussen left a delivery from Roach which jagged back and into his stumps.

West Indies made two changes after the first test loss, with Gabriel and Kieran Powell in for Rahkeem Cornwall and Nkrumah Bonner. Gabriel immediately boosted the home teams pace attack, while batsman Powell had already replaced Bonner in the first test as a concussion substitute.

South Africa kept with its winning lineup, meaning no recall for batsman and limited-overs captain Temba Bavuma.

Cricket West Indies said a small number of fans would be allowed into the stadium for this test, although they had to be fully vaccinated to attend. A maximum of 400 spectators per day would be allowed, CWI said, the first fans to attend an international cricket game in the Caribbean since the start of the coronavirus pandemic.

The tickets will be free but fans must present vaccination documents to gain entry. The stands were still largely empty around the ground.

___

More AP sports: https://apnews.com/apf-sports and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports
Jun. 18The Higher Order of Kentucky Colonels has awarded $240,000 in grants to nonprofits in Western Kentucky, several of which are Owensboro organizations.

A total of 275 organizations across Kentucky have benefitted from $2.1 million in HOKC grants this year. Thirty-nine were in Western Kentucky and seven were in Owensboro.

Local organizations that benefited from Kentucky Colonel grants include the Community Dental Clinic, Hospice and Palliative Care of Western Kentucky, Imagination Library, St Benedict's Shelter, the YMCA, the Owensboro Symphony and the RiverPark Center.

Grant administrator Eric Patterson said the HOKC, a nonprofit organization, awards grants to a variety of organizations.

"We support all different types of organizations, so there are not too many requirements. They have to have been in existence for at least five years. We're looking for organizations who are apolitical and also organizations who do not have any sort of religious requirements in order to receive services," he said.

The organization must also be a nonprofit to receive grant money from the HOKC.

The Kentucky Colonels, according to Executive Director Sherry Crowse, has been around since the early 1800s.

The organization focuses on philanthropic values by giving to organizations that touch the lives of residents in their communities.

"All of those dollars, that $2.1 million ... were given to us by Kentucky Colonels," she said. "They contribute to us so that we can make a difference in the commonwealth. All the grants that we've given out ... those nonprofits will have touched 3.7 million Kentuckians, and ... there are only 4.4 million Kentuckians right now."

Crowse said the HOKC gives to a variety of nonprofits, ranging from homeless shelters to animal shelters.

She said the organizations that receive grant funds from HOKC contribute to the commonwealth in meaningful ways.

"It's just this wide range of nonprofits that really affect the community, and those in Owensboro are outstanding nonprofits," she said.

To learn more about the HOKC, visit KYColonels.org.

Christie Netherton, cnetherton@messenger-inquirer.com, 270-691-7360
A woman died after she fell more than 200 feet off a cliff in Wyoming during a hike with her husband, authorities said.

The Sheridan County Sheriffs Office said they received a report Tuesday morning of a woman who fell off Steamboat Point. Calli Austs husband called 911 and told officers he didnt know where his wife was located due to poor phone service.

Bighorn National Forest public affairs officer Sara Kirol told The Sheridan Press that Steamboat Point is an abandoned fire lookout with pipe railing.

It is not a safe barrier, but merely a remnant of the lookout tower, Kirol said.

Cliff edges are unstable and there are a lot of loose rocks on the top of these high places, she continued. Standing or sitting near or on the edge of cliff faces is very risky, no matter the location.

Authorities said they arrived at the scene and found Austs body at the southwest side of the cliff and it was recovered.

Aust and her husband were on a hike to see the sunrise from Steamboat Point and her death is considered accidental, authorities said.
The Chinese government is considering the possibility of lifting family planning restrictions by 2025 amid stagnating population and economic growth, sources tell the Wall Street Journal.

Why it matters: The move reflects "increased urgency in Beijing as economic growth slows and Chinas population mix skews older," the Journal writes.

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The big picture: The once-a-decade Chinese census, released in May, revealed that China's population grew at its slowest pace in over half a century. The annual average growth rate was 0.53% since 2010, compared to a 0.57% rate from the prior decade, BBC reports.

The country recorded a fertility rate of 1.3 children per woman, "the fourth consecutive year the number of new births declined," the South China Morning Post notes.

China last month announced it was relaxing restrictions by allowing couples to have three children, up from two. The country had imposed a one-child policy in 1979 to slow population growth.

Details: A source told the Journal that they expect the country will start eliminating birth restrictions in regions, particularly in the Northeast, where birthrates are low, before enacting any nationwide changes.

Between the lines: "Ending birth restrictions is not enough to reverse the trend of negative population growth in our province," researchers in the Jilin province wrote in a report released in February.

"It is also necessary to introduce policies to encourage childbirth based on real-world conditions."

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It would allow for an increase in density, Mitchell said, noting the added units would not be extended-stay.

In response to a commissioners question of higher density bringing impacts to neighbors, Mitchell said: The impacts are really unknown until we get the site plan with these types of uses.

During the hearing, several neighbors, including some who said they live on Hunters Creek Road, which is directly next to the development, raised concerns about allowing higher-density development there.

Speakers addressed noise issues, lack of privacy and heavy traffic. One Hunters Creek Road resident said rains caused mud and debris from the construction site to come into his yard, adding he has encountered a lot of problems with the project and he would not have built his home there if he was told a three-story apartment building was coming.

Another resident who lives nearby said, We had no idea we would be seeing these monstrosities when we drive in our neighborhood, referring to the multi-story buildings in the development.

The developer recently submitted to the county a voluntary proffer that states the project will have a maximum of 300 dwelling units on the property.
With just seven teachers and nine employees total, the program is limited in its course offerings, Smith said, so students must be ready for the courses they offer. Smith said thats a major limiting factor when it comes to applications and acceptance in the program.

If you havent taken and done well in the prerequisite math course in 10th grade, you cant apply, Smith said. So the question is: In that course, what does the diversity look like?

Smith said he helped develop the divisions Promoting Excellence Through Accelerated Learning (PETAL) program over a decade ago when he was a supervisor in Lynchburg City and it started as a mindset shift of looking at students of color and students from underrepresented groups as at promise, rather than at risk, and accelerating them, and encouraged the division to continue doing that. He added the more students who are encouraged to take challenging, accelerated courses early in their secondary educations, the more likely theyll be eligible to apply and attend the governors school.

Smith said the program already has eliminated transportation and financial barriers that could have contributed to the lack of diversity. The five school divisions pay for students to attend the program and provide bus transportation to all students who need it.
He said the Lynchburg chapter of the Military Order of Purple Heart will donate $1,000 to the Nelson County museums fundraiser in honor of all of the pilots and crew members who died or were wounded in Vietnam.

During his time with the Marine Corps, Bozeman said he was a door gunner on a helicopter similar to this one, manning an M60 belt-fed machine gun out of the back.

Like van Opstal, he hopes displays like these will help present and future generations know how we served, he said.

We always want to make sure history doesnt evaporate, Bozeman said.

Looking out across the plaza, he pointed out Henry Wyatt, another Vietnam veteran who piloted Huey helicopters in 67 and 68.

Wyatt said he was surprised he had made it that far into the morning without climbing onto the roof of the chopper to inspect the rotor head.

They might get upset if I did, he said, laughing.

He gestured at the assembled crowd, and then to the helicopter.

It should remind everyone how tenuous our position is in this world today, he said. We are supporting peace, love and people all over the world.

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Former Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., who went on to become the U.S. attorney general, also opposed her, she said. Nevertheless, she won Senate confirmation in a 66-32 vote.

It was a huge hurdle to overcome, but thankfully with a lot of support from a lot of people, I was still able to get confirmed. I am very grateful to those who supported me for what was a very emotional time, said Demeo.

Asked what advice each of the three would have for LGBTQ+ lawyers who may be interested in becoming judges, Hughes said there is no way to plan for becoming a federal judge. He said you need the right experience and a sponsor.

Hughes said, If you really want to become a judge, you need to become a good lawyer and a respected lawyer in your community because somebody from that community at some point is going to support you and promote you to be a judge.

Demeo had some simple advice that Hughes and Oetken agreed with: My main advice is to be your authentic self because if you can do that, however hard it is, I think youll be more successful in your career.

I feel that my coming out in the work place, I was able to thrive more and be a better employee and be a more successful attorney  so, I guess its more career advice than good advice on how to get on the bench, she said.
Its a homecoming of sorts for Schrier, too, though. The Virginia Tech graduate lived in Roanoke for six months as Miss Virginia, before taking the larger crown. She is staying at the Hotel Roanoke with her mother, whose life in the corporate world included many Hotel Roanoke stays in the 1980s.

Schrier herself stayed there in 2015 when, as a new student in Blacksburg, she and a friend came down to Roanoke to take in the Miss Virginia pageant.

Mom used to travel here for work, and now Im here as Miss America, and I have a portrait of myself hanging in the lobby, Schrier said. So its very nostalgic for the two of us and kind of full circle. So its been wonderful to be back.

She said she was looking forward to meeting the pageants other Miss Americas, particularly Barker, another Virginia Tech alum. Barker is beloved in the Hokie community, as well as in her hometown, Galax, Schrier noted. She marveled during a trip she took to Galax High School.

They have a Kylene Barker shrine, at her high school, Schrier said. I was like, how funny is that? I think thats a testament to how much Virginia loves our Miss Virginias and our Miss Americas.
Fireworks lit up the night sky over New York to celebrate the reaching of a vaccination milestone, which triggers the easing of many of the st
Police in Tokyo have arrested a 49-year-old man for sexually assaulting and strangling a woman he met on a social networking site. The suspect also possessed a knife at the time and used it to threaten his victim.

According to police, Dai Fukushima, a temp worker from Tokyos Hachioji City, is accused of assaulting a woman in her 20s, who is from Osaka Prefecture, at around 9 p.m. in a car on May 27 at a parking lot in Sayama City, Saitama Prefecture, Sankei Shimbun reported. While seated inside the rental car, Fukushima allegedly threatened to stab the woman with a knife. He then groped and sexually assaulted her before attempting to strangle her to death.

The woman was able to get out of the car and sought help from a passerby. Police said she is recovering in hospital.

Fukushima, who lives with three family members, has partially denied the charge, saying he did not intend to kill the woman.
Carlos Ghosn, the auto-executive-turned-fugitive who plotted a brazen escape from Osaka in December 2019 following his arrest by Japanese authorities on charges of financial misconduct, has denounced what he calls Japans darker side  its legal system.

Ever since the French-Lebanese-Brazilian former chairman of Japanese car giant Nissan was arrested at Tokyo International Airport on Nov. 19, 2018, before launching a daring escape a year later hidden inside a luggage box on a private jet, the world has watched Ghosns capers with rapt attention.

Speaking exclusively to Arab News, the 67-year-old Ghosn, now on Interpols most-wanted list, again asserted his innocence and accused a powerful business cabal of being in league with Japanese prosecutors in discrediting him.

When you go to Japan, you have the impression you are in a mature democracy where your rights are going to be respected, where youre going to be dealt with with fairness. There is nothing more wrong than that, Ghosn told Arab News.

Prosecutors win in 99.4 percent of the cases, which means as long as they turn their eyes on you and for any reason they decide to pursue you on any matter, you have zero chance of getting out.

Ghosn has denied accusations of underreporting his compensation and misusing company funds to support a lavish lifestyle. The former auto executive insists that he was the victim of a corporate coup linked to a decline in Nissans financial performance as the Japanese automaker resisted losing autonomy to its French partner Renault.

That is why Ghosn says he had to jump his $14 million bail and flee rather than face charges in what he claims to be an unfair trial.

Whenever you have a coalition between executives in a company, the Tokyo prosecutor, and Hideki Makihara, the minister of industry in Japan, there is no more place for justice. Its over. Its a killer coalition where you have zero chance of prevailing.

Ghosn likened his treatment to the 2011 Olympus scandal and others at Toshiba, Takata and Fukushima, where he claims the same hidden hands have wrangled their favored results.
Chad Taylor, owner of Taylor Excavating and partner in D&D Construction, has been a sponsor of Wheels of Courage for six years.

Over the years I have witnessed firsthand friends and loved ones who have struggled with this terrible disease, he said. I cant imagine how it feels to be in that position. Whenever I have the chance to help someone who is going through a cancer diagnosis, Im going to.

Taylor and his wife Mandi not only sponsor Wheels of Courage but also volunteer and show their cars each year.

Its a fun event to be a part of, he said. In addition to raising money to help patients fighting cancer, we are also bring awareness to the community. To do that, we promote the event each week at the Thursday night car show as well as participate in other community events.

For hundreds of Methodist Jennie Edmundson Hospital patients in genuine need each year, coping with serious illness and mounting medical bills at the same time can be overwhelming. Funds raised during the Wheels of Courage Car Show help relieve some of the financial burden by assisting patients with everyday living expenses such as groceries, rent, and transportation.
P.E.O. Chapter FK

Chapter FK delegate, Peggy Tye, attending the 128th annual Convention of Iowa State Chapter P.E.O. Sisterhood on June 5. The theme was Radiate All Light Possible and Sue Aanes, Chapter EV, New London, presided over 550 delegates and visitors for the first ever virtual convention.

Attendees viewed workshops and heard from recipients of P.E.O.s six philanthropies and the Iowa P.E.O. Project Fund, Inc. The convention concluded with the instillation of the 2021-2022 executive board officers headed by president Carol Goldsmith, CB, Ida Grove; vice president, Carrie Wilkinson, OP, Cedar Rapids; organizer, Christin Smith, HL, Dubuque; treasurer, Lisa Reindl, OV, Cedar Falls; and secretary, Pam Schulz, KK, Cedar Rapids.

P.E.O. is a philanthropic organization where women celebrate the advancement of women; educate women through scholarships, grants, awards, loans and stewardship of Cottey College; and motivate each other to achieve their highest aspirations. There are approximately 6,000 chapters in the United States and Canada with nearly 250,000 members. Iowa is the second largest state chapter with 363 chapters and nearly 15,000 members.
Epworth United Methodist Church, 2447 Ave. B, would like to wish everyone a happy Fathers Day! The church is handicap accessible and membership is not necessary to participate. The church is now open for worship at 9:25 a.m. on Sundays and we will maintain social distancing. Masks are not required but are available for those who need or want one, and we have plenty of hand sanitizer. We will meet in the church sanctuary. If you are sick, please do not join us. The scripture for this coming Sunday is 2 Corinthians 6:1-13 and Mark 4:35-41. If you decide not to attend at this time, you can join us in worship at home through Facebook Live. There is Bible study on Thursdays at 9 a.m. We are in prayer for all those affected by this virus. Prayer requests can be made at epworthumccb.org/about-us/our-values/. Office hours are 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Monday through Friday. The office phone number is 712-323-3124. You can check us out at Facebook.com/pages/Epworth.
The Council Bluffs Fire Department has earned a Class 1 fire-protection services rating from the Insurance Services Office, the first time the department has earned the highest-possible rating.

According to the city, the ISO administers the Public Protection Classification program, which assesses a communitys fire-protection efforts. The agency collects and analyzes information on municipal fire-protection efforts in communities throughout the United States and then assigns a score from 1 to 10. ISOs rating system evaluates four primary categories of fire suppression  fire department, emergency communications, water supply and community risk reduction. The standards are set by the National Fire Protection Association.

Departments are evaluated on a point system, with 90 earning a Class 1 designation.

We had one of our personnel study the classification process. draw up a blueprint of what changes would need to be made to achieve the rating, Fire Chief Justin James said. Its judged on a fire departments capability in conjunction with 911 and Water Works. Water Works and 911 topped out, the points had to come from us.

James said much of the work was pure classification, making sure the ratings agency knew about the processes, training and equipment in use by the department.
WATERLOO  The Iowa Supreme Court has upheld part of the City of Waterloos ban the box ordinance, which was designed to prohibit employers from considering criminal records early in the hiring process.

The high court also struck down portions of the ordinance, passed as a way to provide people with criminal histories a chance at obtaining employment.

The City Council adopted Ordinance No. 5522, also known as the fair chance initiative, in November 2019.

Before it went into effect, the Iowa Association of Business and Industry took the city to court, arguing that the measure went against a 2017 state law that bars cities from adopting rules that exceed or conflict with the requirements of federal or state law relating to ... hiring practices ... or other terms or conditions of employment."

A district court judge sided with the city in an April 2020 ruling, and the IABA appealed the decision.

In a ruling handed down Friday, the Iowa Supreme Court upheld parts of the ordinance while striking down others.
Previously, absentee ballots returned by mail were considered timely if they were postmarked by the day before the election and delivered to elections officials by the Monday following the election. As such, voters could mail their ballots any time until the day before the election and trust they would be counted.

Smith called the change a common-sense reform that provides a defined deadline on receipt of absentee ballots.

Democratic state lawmakers argue more than 6,500 absentee ballots cast in Iowas 2020 general election arrived after Election Day, but could be counted because a postmark or barcode confirmed the voter mailed them on time. Had the new deadline been in place, they argue several thousand Iowans would have had their votes tossed.

Houser said that while few ballots come in after Election Day, the change in law will make things easier for his staff.

Theres more burden on the voters. Theyre going to have to pay attention, theyre going to have to pay attention to the new rules, he said. If they want an absentee ballot, theyre going to have to send that ballot back as soon as it comes in the mail. If you get a ballot in the mail dont lay it on your kitchen table, put a bunch of other stuff on top of it and forget about it.
NORFOLK  There needs to be further discussions about the major changes proposed for Johnson Park. At the open house that was held June 15, at the Norfolk library, it was stated that stakeholders (who are they?) are making the changes, but I dont believe they understand the impact they ar
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The Telegraphs coverage of last falls election campaign on renewing North Plattes Quality Growth Fund netted a top Nebraska Press Association award Thursday.

The newspaper received the 2021 Omaha World-Herald Community Service Award for Nebraska dailies as the statewide organization announced its annual Better Newspaper Contest winners.

Telegraph Digital Editor Susan Szuch, who joined the paper in 2018, was named co-runner-up in the NPAs Outstanding Young Journalist competition.

Staffers in various Telegraph departments also won or shared 15 awards in individual contest categories, including two first-place awards.

The NPA awards are normally given during the groups annual convention, usually held in April. Both the 2020 and 2021 awards were announced online due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Winners of the Community Service Award illustrate the impact and effectiveness newspapers have in their communities, the NPA said in a press release.

The World-Herald chose award winners in the daily category and four weekly categories based on circulation. Winning entries displayed initiative, editorial leadership and the extra effort expended to accomplish a meaningful goal or project, the press release said.
The White House said its whole-of-government approach to the vaccination effort has put the virus in retreat, which in turn has brought COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations and deaths to their lowest levels in more than a year. But Biden noted in his remarks that some communities in states with lower vaccination rates are seeing cases and hospitalizations increase.

The administration is in the middle of a monthlong blitz to combat vaccine hesitancy and the lack of urgency some people feel to get the shots, particularly in the South and Midwest.

CDC Director Rochelle Walensky said Friday that she expects the delta variant of the coronavirus will become the dominant strain in the U.S. That strain has become dominant in Britain after it was first detected in India.

During an appearance on ABCs Good Morning America, she told Americans who get their shots that youll be protected against this delta variant.

As part of the administration's vaccination push, Vice President Kamala Harris traveled to Atlanta on Friday to tour a pop-up COVID-19 vaccination site at Ebenezer Baptist Church, where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was a pastor until his assassination in 1968. The current senior pastor is U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock.
Children at a Juneteenth parade in Denver, 1998. Photo: John Leyba/Denver Post via Getty Images

When Gordon Grangers second stroke killed him in 1876, the 54-year-old Union Army officer had earned a reputation as a Civil War hero whose bosses couldnt stand him. Ulysses S. Grant thought he was impudent and abrasive. William Tecumseh Sherman was annoyed that he always seemed to be sick and taking time off, including a two-year absence when he was supposed to be overseeing the District of New Mexico, where he would eventually die. His last breath was almost a mercy. Hed gone blind in one eye, had acute retinitis, and regularly coughed up blood because of various lung ailments inflamed by the dry desert air. He mightve rested easier knowing how hed be memorialized in the days and weeks after his death: not as the guy who regularly pissed off his superiors, but as the officer who led reinforcements to rescue George H. Thomass troops during the Battle of Chickamauga in 1863, the Civil Wars second-bloodiest battle, preventing one of the Unions costliest defeats from becoming a catastrophic one.

It might seem strange to modern eyes to read his New York Times obituary from that year and find no mention that Granger was also the guy who told Texas the slaves had been freed. His proclamation at Galveston on June 19, 1865, inspired Juneteenth, the holiday that marks what many consider to be true Emancipation Day  when the last slave state fell and its Black residents learned they could leave their masters plantations, more than two years after President Lincoln had decreed it so. The announcement turned Granger into a Black history mainstay for the next 150 years, but the fact that it didnt warrant mention in his obituary was consistent with Juneteenths contested place in American public life. It remains, to this day, a holiday marked by conditionality and deferral.

This dynamic lives on in ways that Granger couldnt have foreseen. When protests and rioting gripped the country last summer in the wake of George Floyds murder in Minneapolis, corporate entities glommed on to Juneteenth as a concession to shifting market forces, which were suddenly pressuring them to perform solidarity with Black struggle. Its mix of low risk and low cost has made it an appealing virtue signal.

Several companies embraced it to gloss over their poor treatment of their own workers. Amazon has spent years punishing its distribution center employees for trying to organize. Most recently, the retail behemoth thwarted a unionization effort at its warehouse in Bessemer, Alabama, where the workforce is about 85 percent Black, through a mix of intimidation and aggressive propaganda. But Jeff Bezos was quick to encourage managers to cancel their meetings last Juneteenth and take time to reflect. At a warehouse in Chicago, workers were offered chicken and waffles to mark the occasion. Wheres the solidarity in that? read a post on an online forum for local Amazon workers. We demand a paid holiday, not some damn chicken.

In California last year, Uber spearheaded a $200 million campaign to pass a ballot measure, Proposition 22, that would ensure it didnt have to categorize its drivers as employees with the attendant rights and benefits. The company did, however, give its employees a paid day off last Juneteenth, to much fanfare  the drivers were not included.

This may look like irony inconsistent with the spirit of the holiday, but Juneteenth was always more accurately understood as a celebration of freedoms potential rather than its fulfillment. Grangers 1865 pronouncement came with a warning that hinted at this pretty clearly  not just to the slavers who might defy his orders, but to the formerly enslaved. The freedmen are advised to remain quietly at their present homes and work for wages, read Grangers General Order No. 3. [They] will not be supported in idleness either there or elsewhere. Black emancipation was already being envisioned as a new form of wage labor benefiting ex-slavers  a reflection not only of misgivings about the problems Black mobility might introduce, but of concerns about white backlash.

These concerns were well-founded. French forces had recently invaded Mexico and installed an emperor. Grangers boss, Philip Sheridan, feared the new monarchs army allying with Confederate fugitives and prolonging the fighting. Rebels whod learned of their armys defeat had already thrown much of the state into chaos, rioting and looting across Texas. Even at the end of the war, as occupying federal troops were struggling to impose a fragile calm, white anger and Confederate assaults of wandering freedmen held the very real threat of more bloodshed. Granger knew that Black freedom, momentous though it was, didnt really mean Black freedom.

This ambivalence was baked into Juneteenth. Historian Randolph B. Campbell writes that one slave watched angry whites whip 100 Black celebrants in the city of Crockett when they heard the news. Another reported leaping in the air to express his excitement, and his master responded by firing a pistol several times between his feet. Jump again, the master said, and I will shoot you between the eyes. The next 12 years would bring more setbacks, like Reconstruction going down in flames and the onset of the lynching era, which lasted until the 1950s and saw some its most brutal manifestations in East Texas. Juneteenth celebrations continued, despite this violence, as celebrants clung stubbornly to the unfulfilled promise of Grangers pronouncement. They spread beyond Texas, too. As Black people fled terrorism and economic deprivation in the South, many brought Juneteenth with them, a thin slice of liberty where little could be found otherwise.

By 1976, newspapers were publishing stories about the resurrection of dormant Juneteenth traditions. Commemoration had fallen off in many places, reports said, because of cultural shifts brought on by the civil-rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s. It seemed that many Black people had taken the push for integration, and its marginal gains, as evidence that it was prudent to avoid any displays that highlighted their differences from white Americans rather than their similarities. So to rescue Juneteenth from obscurity, boosters started to reframe it as something all Americans could be proud of and celebrate together. The goal was to ease the holidays mainstream embrace  to forestall backlash and reassure skeptics that it wasnt an indictment of them or the traditions they held dear. Everybody is invited to participate in Juneteenth activities, Henry Masters, a local booster, told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram at the time. One of the things that makes America a Democracy prototype is its openness and spiritual commitment to ethnic pluralism.

This framing worked, and helped usher in decades of growing popularity. Texas adopted Juneteenth as a state holiday in 1979. By 2019, it was officially recognized by 46 other states and the District of Columbia. Many activists and officials have been pushing for it to become a federal holiday, and they, too, have succeeded: This week, Congress voted to make it so.

There remains a hint of sourness to it all. The process of mainstreaming a once renegade and often neglected holiday was bound to be sporadic and riddled with contradictions. It hasnt been lost on observers that Congress passed a Juneteenth bill without much trouble, but hasnt done anything meaningful to curb police power, which is what most of last years demonstrators were actually asking for, let alone tried to pass ambitious legislation, like reparations, to address historical injustices. Gordon Granger couldnt have known, on his deathbed in Santa Fe, the debt that embattled 21st-century PR departments and politicians would owe him after he was gone. But he probably wouldnt be surprised that they, too, would be offering a degraded substitute for what people really needed.
Washington, PA (15301)

Today

Mostly cloudy this morning. A few showers developing during the afternoon. High around 70F. Winds NW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 30%..

Tonight

A few clouds. Slight chance of a shower throughout the evening. Low near 55F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph.
Oil companies operating in the Gulf Coast have started evacuating employees from platforms there ahead of a tropical storm that is brewing in the Gulf.

"A tropical or subtropical depression is expected to form in the western Gulf of Mexico, and no matter how well organized this system becomes, it poses a threat of flooding rain along a part of the northern U.S. Gulf Coast heading into Father's Day weekend," the Weather Channel said in an update. "This system could also contribute to coastal flooding, dangerous rip currents and gusty winds."

Reuters meanwhile reports that Occidental Petroleum and Chevron Corp were among the companies evacuating staff from platforms. BP and Shell arefor nowmonitoring the situation.

"We will continue to closely monitor the storm and we remain focused on the safety of our workforce, the integrity of our facilities and the protection of the environment," Reuters quoted a Chevron spokesperson as saying.

"All of our facilities have plans to prepare for weather-related events and are implementing those procedures," Occidental said.

Last month, an American Petroleum Institute official said, as quoted by Reuters, that the offshore oil and gas industry was already preparing for this year's hurricane season, which was forecast to feature above-average storm activity.

Last year's season had as many as 30 named storms, several of which battered the offshore oil and gas sector, at one point causing the shutdown of as much as 90 percent of production capacity as well as refining capacity on the Gulf Coast.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has forecast three to five major hurricanes for this year's hurricane season as well as six to 10 hurricanes with winds of over 74 mph. The authority has also forecast between 13 and 20 tropical storms this season. The numbers are higher than the previous averages because the NOAA changed the 30-yer period it uses as a reference point from 1981-2010 to 1991-2020.

By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com

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Despite $70 oil, U.S. shale producers are not expected to significantly raise crude production this year as they continue to be focused on disciplined capital expenditures and returning more cash to investors, OPEC sources told Reuters at the end of policy meetings of the organization.

OPECs economic and technical think-tank, the Economic Commission Board, met this week to take stock of the situation on the global oil market and the global economy. The board was also expected to review topics such as investment, expectations about recovery, and short- and long-term prospects of crude oil production.

One of the meetings, attended by external industry experts, focused on U.S. shale and the prospects of supply out of the United States, sources at OPEC told Reuters. The general view was that the shale patch will not be rushing into accelerating activity and production rates despite the high oil pricessomething it has regularly done in the past, contributing to market oversupply and lower oil prices.

For 2022, the views range from production growth of between 500,000 barrels per day (bpd) and 1.3 million bpd.

U.S. production has been hovering at around 11 million bpd in recent months, down by 2 million bpd from the record highs early in 2020, before the pandemic slammed demand and crashed oil prices.

The first-quarter earnings and conference calls of U.S. producers highlighted a previously unheard-of restraint from public shale firms. Listed producers generated record cash flows, but they are not reinvesting most of those back to drilling. Instead, shale operators are now channeling cash flow toward reducing debts and rewarding shareholders.

According to Reuters sources, the investment discipline was one of the highlights of the meetings this week.

The U.S. shale restraint makes OPECs job of managing oil supply to the market much easier, if forecasts of limited U.S. growth this year pan out.

OPEC and Saudi Arabia have a lot of power at this time, a source at one of the companies which provided forecasts to OPEC told Reuters.

By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com

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China is looking to put soaring coal prices under control by starting an investigation into the market and coal prices to prevent speculation and hoarding of supply.

Chinese state planner, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), and the state market regulator have announced a probe into the coal prices in the worlds largest energy consumer, according to a statement from NDRC carried by Reuters.

The Chinese authorities will check abnormal trading and speculation, as well as crack down on hoarding and driving up prices, the statement reads.

The surging price of coal is affecting the downstream sector and the real economy, according to the Chinese state planning body.

Coal prices in China have surged in recent weeks as thermal coal power plants are hoarding supply ahead of the expected peak in summer demand.

Chinas coal market has been distorted since the Chinese authorities banned coal imports from Australia as part of the dispute between the two countries, which has affected coal supply into China. Australia used to be Chinas second-largest thermal coal supplier before the geopolitical rift at the end of last year.

Physical prices for coal of the 5,500 kilocalorie/kilogram grade hit a record high in May and have been sitting there since.

During the winter, China had to resort to restricting electricity use due to severely limited coal imports from Australia.

At the end of last year and early this year, factories in some areas in China were working only part-time, and residents in several provinces were asked to save electricity despite the swift industrial recovery from the pandemic.

At the same time, coal use for electricity in China is rising. Chinas coal-fired power generation increased last year as growing electricity demand outpaced the installations of new clean power capacity, making China the only G-20 country with rising coal generation, climate and energy think tank Ember said in its Global Electricity Review 2021 earlier this year.

By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com

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Nuclear power is an indispensable part of the Biden administration's plan to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 52 percent over the next ten years, Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said at the annual general meeting of the American Nuclear Society.

"President Biden is absolutely committed to getting this country powered by clean energy, using every single clean energy tool available," Secretary Granholm said, as quoted by World Nuclear News, adding that "Carbon-free nuclear power is an absolutely critical part of our decarbonisation equation."

Nuclear power has a very low carbon footprint, but a bad rap has kept it outside the emissions-cutting spotlight. There have been calls from the industry to include nuclear power in energy transition plans as experts argued that these plans will fail without nuclear. Still, acceptance of this fact has been slow in coming for politicians, which makes Granholm's statement a rare glimmer of hope for the nuclear industry.

Nuclear power in the U.S. has been increasingly going out of favor not just because of reputational problems but because of the abundance of cheap natural gas, which has compromised the competitiveness of many nuclear plants and has led to canceled plans for more capacity. This may change now with the Biden administration's ambitious climate agenda.

The first step, Secretary Granholm said, is to preserve the existing nuclear capacity of the country, which generates a fifth of the total U.S. power output.

"DOE already works across the nuclear sector, which includes some of you. We work with you and we work with you on projects to reduce the operating costs and increase revenues from the nuclear fleet, and with this budget we've put USD175 million into these modernization efforts," she said.

"A lot of it is going into developing and deploying new and improved fuels to enhance performance and to reduce costs. And we're going to keep doing everything that we can to encourage our partners in the states to keep their reactors online."

At the same time, the administration is looking into new nuclear power technology and has earmarked some $700 million for tapping their "huge potential".

By Charles Kennedy for Oilprice.com

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The heat again cooked automotive and industrial emissions in Omahas air into a pollutant known as ozone, prompting the fourth consecutive day with an air quality alert for the metro area. Ozone pollution exacerbates respiratory problems, and multiple cities across the country issued ozone alerts.

The heat also brought out scammers trying to fleece people via their electric bills. The Omaha Public Power District reported that some customers were getting calls threatening to cut off their power if they didnt provide money to the caller, who was masquerading as an OPPD employee. The utility does not make such phone calls, a spokeswoman said.

Forecasters say the long-term outlook favors a hotter than normal summer, something that wouldnt surprise Pollack. He said conditions are ripe for unusually hot weather to continue resurfacing this summer, in spite of periodic cool spells.

Its still possible for us to have a decent summer, he said. Its not that it couldnt happen, but its going against the grain at this time.

Starting Friday, temperatures should drop off noticeably. Highs in the mid-90s are forecast through Sunday in Omaha, according to the National Weather Service. On Monday, the high could be 30 degrees lower than Thursdays 105 degrees, peaking in the mid-70s.
His other ads, one in English and one in Spanish, attempt to tie the recall to extremist Republicans by showing images of people storming the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6. The English ad calls the recall an assault on democracy" while the Spanish one references comments by the recall's lead proponent about microchipping immigrants. That organizer, Orrin Heatlie, later said the comment, made on Facebook, was hyperbole and is not something he supports.

Sonja Diaz, founding director of the Latino Policy & Politics Initiative at the University of California, Los Angeles, said Newsom's positive ad presents messaging that will resonate with families and young people who have been hard hit by the pandemic by highlighting the cash payments, help for businesses and an expansion of preschool.

This is something that I think is really targeted to talk to the policy choices that are going to help younger Californians," she said.

Meanwhile, Faulconer dropped his first campaign ad on Monday, also in Spanish. It paints Newsom in a negative light, highlighting the closure of most schools during the pandemic, the state's struggles to contain homelessness, and the expansion of good behavior credits that could lead to earlier release for tens of thousands of people in prison.
His focus was on economic development this session, he said.

Wayne plans to continue to push for the state holiday. There wont be any significant change if it comes to fruition at this point, he said, but it matters to him.

I think its great, Wayne said of the news that Juneteenth is now a federal holiday.

To him, it makes perfect sense that there was such broad support for the holiday because its significance is so complex that it touches everybody.

Wayne said Juneteenth is multifaceted: It honors the African American soldiers who fought for a country that didnt care for them. Its a reminder that the battle for equality is ongoing and that having laws on the books doesnt mean that theyll be fully implemented. It reminds him of the individuals ability to change and provides hope that the country can keep striving to be a more perfect union.

It reminds us that, you know, just because there was an Emancipation Proclamation, there still has to be work that has to be done, he said.

Often, the holiday is referred to as a celebration of the end of slavery.
Carter said the tuition freeze was made possible by a fiscally conservative approach during the pandemic as well as more support from state taxpayers over the next two years.

NU campuses have gone through their processes to identify $43 million in potential cuts, which include shuttering academic programs and cutting positions in order to achieve savings and reinvest funds to other priorities.

It didnt change us dramatically, Carter said, but it accelerated us in a few places.

At the same time, the Legislature also granted NUs modest request for a 2.5% boost to its state appropriations, which increases state taxpayer support by nearly $15.6 million this year.

Total state support of NU will increase to roughly $628.5 million next year under the plan to be considered by regents.

NU is also anticipating increased revenue from enrollment in the coming year, including a 9.6% growth of nonresident and international students, who pay more in tuition costs, as well as 0.6% growth in resident student tuition revenue.

Carters proposed budget also continues the Nebraska Promise program, which covered the full tuition costs for 1,000 in-state students from families whose household income was $60,000 or less.
TAN-TAN, Morocco (AP)  A senior U.S. general warned Friday that the wildfire of terrorism is sweeping across a band of Africa and needs the world's attention. He spoke at the close of large-scale U.S.-led war games with American, African and European troops.

The African Lion war games, which lasted nearly two weeks, stretched across Morocco, a key U.S, ally, with smaller parts held in Tunisia and Senegal. The annual drills were skipped last year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Gen. Stephen J. Townsend, head of the U.S. Africa Command, praised the work accomplished in joint operations, and painted a dark picture of threats besetting parts of Africa.

I am concerned about the security situation across a band of Africa," from the Sahel region in the west to the Horn of Africa, Townsend told reporters. He noted deadly attacks by al-Qaida- and Islamic State-linked jihadis and al-Shabab. All of them are on the march, he said.

African neighbors are helping governments deal with the threat, but, he added, all of that does not seem to be sufficient enough to stop what I call ... (the) wildfire of terrorism thats sweeping that region.

African Lion saw more than 7,000 troops from seven countries and NATO carry out air, land and sea exercises together.
Racism, redlining and lack of opportunities in Omaha forced a generation of young people, including myself, to flee to other cities, mostly west and north, to seek better opportunities and a better life. This took a tremendous toll on North Omaha and its potential  a brain drain of some of our most talented African Americans and their financial potential.

While the escape was comprehensive, many returned home to North Omaha during holidays of summer. That evolved into a tradition that is known as Native Omaha Days in July for celebrations with friends and families. This wonderful display of African American culture often includes family and class reunions. This year the Days begin in the last week of July, centered at 24th and Lake.

Down the road in December, African Americans celebrate Kwanzaa, an annual seven-day celebration Dec. 26-Jan. 1, that focuses on unity, creativity, faith and giving, and celebrates our culture.

Each summer, my organization, Black Votes Matter, conducts an annual six-day, all-expenses-paid tour for Omaha high school youth. We visit Memphis; Jackson, Mississippi; Birmingham, Tuskegee, Selma and Montgomery, Alabama; and Atlanta to teach and expose our youth to both their history and their culture, and hope that they learn and respect it, and then return home to become leaders, stay here and prosper.
Vodafone Ghanas mobile financial services, Vodafone Cash has partnered with global cross-border payments company WorldRemit to enable its customers to receive international money transfers straight to their mobile money accounts without any charges.



The service allows Vodafone Cash customers to seamlessly receive international money transfers from their family and friends in the UK, Canada, Australia, the USA, and others. This partnership between two global brands eliminates the stress, risks, long queues and other challenges associated with visiting agents to access remittances from overseas.



WorldRemit users can send money from over 50 countries, including the UK and the USA, to more than 130 destinations. Depending on their location, customers can choose from multiple payout methods including bank deposits, mobile wallets, cash pick up and mobile airtime top-up.



Speaking at the launch, Martison Obeng-Agyei, Head of Vodafone Cash at Vodafone Ghana, said: Our partnership with WorldRemit is part of measures to curtail financial barriers by using technology and innovation. The stress joining long queues to receive money from family and friends abroad can now be avoided by using Vodafone Cash. We have over the years provided a robust mobile money platform that allows our subscribers to simply and securely make transactions through Vodafone Cash. We are very proud to be at the forefront of innovative technologies and partnerships which make our customers' lives easier.



Country Director for Ghana at WorldRemit, Gbenga Okejimi, expressed his enthusiasm in collaborating with Vodafone Cash.



He said: Were delighted to broaden our partnership with such a reputable brand and payout network as Vodafone to offer a reliable payout service. Ensuring our customers are able to transfer money to family and friends back home conveniently, safely and as quickly as possible is why we exist. Were confident that this partnership in Ghana will give our customers more flexibility and options to receive support from their loved ones abroad.



Source: Peacefmonline.com/Ghana









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An entourage led by the Western North Regional Minister, Hon. Richard Ebbah Obeng has finally commenced the distribution of study desks for schools in the Western North region under the 1School Child 1Study Desk initiative.



In the first quarter of 2021, the Regional Minister outdoors the 1School Child 1Study Desk initiative to combat the desk deficits in schools across the entire Western North region as another way of improving teaching and learning in the region.



At the launch of the initiative, the Western North region was reported to have had over 66,000 desks deficits, thereby impeding the quality and performance of education and students respectively.



At a gathering in the Bia West district, the Regional Minister handed over the first batch of 100 chairs and study desks to the Adjoafua English and Arabic Primary School to supplement the over 4,000 desk deficits in the Bia West district.



Present at the event were the Western North Regional Coordinating Director, Mr Francis Kwarteng Amoako, the DCE of Bia West District, Hon. John Koah, MCE for Sefwi Wiawso, Hon. Louis Owusu-Agyepong, Bia West District Education Director, Mr Thomas Kwoffie, and Bia West Police Commander Supt. Kwaw Teye.



Speaking at the gathering, the Regional Minister emphasized that the desks shall be fairly and equally distributed across the various districts such that no child in any school shall be in need of a desk.







Hon. Richard Ebbah Obeng further added that the gathering was to inform the masses of the commencement of the distribution and that going forward, there will be no such gathering as desks will be distributed to the various districts and further disbursed to the various schools. He then entreated all stakeholders including the students to ensure they keep the desks well so others can also make use of them once they are out of school.



On a request from the chiefs of the community regarding the Adjoafua Senior High School, the Regional Minister emphasized that his dream is to make the region work and so, he and the other stakeholders will do well to discuss plans on projecting the Adjoafua Senior High School and other Senior High Schools in the region to gain an unending reputation.



The District Chief Executive (DCE) of Bia West received the desks and expressed his profound gratitude to the Minister for such an initiative, promising that the Bia West District Assembly will continue to work hand-in-hand and support the Regional Coordinating Council and the Regional Minister in achieving every objective they have set before them.



Hon. John Koah further appreciated the Regional Minister on his promise to commit to the revamping and reviving of the Senior High School in the community to make it one that shall be boasted of across the country.



The Education Director, Mr Thomas Kwoffie also added that they are deeply grateful for the donations and will plead that more should come, stressing that there are a lot more facilities needed in the district including bungalows for teachers.



On protecting what they have received, Mr Thomas Kwoffie emphasized that school authorities will be charged to monitor and ensure the desks are always maintained and kept in a good condition.

Source: Peacefmonline.com/Ghana









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Mr Alban Bagbin, Speaker of Parliament, has advised management of GIMPA to partner with internet service providers to develop on line programmes for effective and efficient teaching and learning.



He said sensitivity to the needs of GIMPA's stakeholders in these times of COVID-19 was important in leveraging the internet to boost the sustainability of higher education in the country.



The Speaker of Parliament said this in Accra at the GIMPA at 60 Alumni lecture on the theme, " The Sustainability of Higher Education in Post-Pandemic Times: A Celebration of GIMPA".



He commended GIMPA for adapting quickly to the changing demands of teaching and learning in the context of COVID-19 Pandemic, using appropriate technology, providing the institute with a sustainable delivery of education.



"GIMPA is not just another institution of learning; rather, it is one that seeks to promote the development of managerial and leadership skills and competences for persons employed in the public and private sectors and non-governmental organizations," he said.



The Speaker of Parliament said todays students appeared ready to accept online and a mixed approach to learning and urged GIMPA to redefine its relationship with technology to meet the needs of stakeholders.



He urged the Institute to collaborate with competitors, to build an ecosystem rather than sets of transactions and find the synergy for diversification and sustainability.



This, Mr Bagbin noted, would require a reassessment of business models and how GIMPA generated value.



"GIMPA must continue to explore technological options for the different aspects of teaching and learning- for the preparation of lecture notes, giving and submission of assignments, sharing of lecture notes".



The World Economic Forum in 2025, shows that higher education will be a hybrid of in-person and online learning, and the Speaker of Parliament viewed that, that is the way it should be.



He suggested that GIMPA must place a greater focus on its purpose and who it intended to serve because the economic sustainability of institutions of higher learning remained a challenged due to a decline in international students and a low return on investments.



The 2020 QS Global International Student Survey demonstrates that international students are open to virtual learning, with 58 per cent of students declaring some level of interest in completing their courses online.



However, challenges such as the strength of internet connection in local areas and the schedule time of lectures, he believed, should be looked at.



He said the role of institutions of higher education in strengthening and informing education policy and practice at every level was central to reimagining education to address the challenges of COVID-19.



Mr Bagbin said institutions which continue to invest in online learning in post-COVID-19 era would have access to a greater variety of student markets and could position themselves as innovation leaders.

Source: GNA









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Vice President Dr Mahamudu Bawumia and Mr James Duddridge, UK Minister for Africa, have virtually co-chaired the fifth UK-Ghana Business Council (UKGBC).



A statement issued by the British High Commission in Accra, copied to the Ghana News Agency, said the meeting built UKGBC 2020, which supported more than 223m of investment in Ghanas infrastructure.



It said the UK Government announced a new programme of support for Ghana Revenue Authority and noted that the meeting reflected on the achievements of the UK-Ghana partnership over the past year, including support for the security sector following the recent visit of Madam Priti Patel, the UK Home Secretary.



The statement said since the last meeting of the UKGBC, the UK-Ghana economic partnership had supported more than 223m of investment in infrastructure across the country, the biggest UK investment into infrastructure in Ghana in a generation.



"This investment has significantly developed the countrys critical infrastructure, combining UK support and expertise with Ghanaian skills and entrepreneurship to build roads, bridges, hospitals, water infrastructure, airports and the expansion of Kumasi market," it stated.



The statement said Council members discussed the progression of key projects that had grown out of the work of the UKGBC, such as supporting work to create jobs and build a sustainable industry in the auto, garments and pharma sectors through the UKs 12m JET programme and the ongoing the construction of the Tema to Afloa road.



It said the 80.3m projects, supported by UKEF, would improve transport links across the country and ultimately West Africa whilst creating skilled jobs for Ghanaians.



The statement said Mr Iain Walker, the outgoing British High Commissioner to Ghana; Emma Wade-Smith, the UK's Trade Commissioner for Africa; Sir Graham Wrigley, Chairman of the CDC Group and Louis Taylor, Chief Executive Officer of UK Export Finance also attended the Council.



Ghana's side included Mr Alan Kyerematen, Minister of Trade and Industry; Mr Dominic Nitiwul, Minister of Defence; Mr

Joseph Osei Owusu, the Minister of Public Enterprises and Mr Yaw Osafo Maafo, the Senior Adviser to the President.



It said delegates welcomed the signing of the UK-Ghana Trade Partnership Agreement, recognising it as the foundation for a strengthened trading relationship securing tariff-free access for products sold in British shops as well as supporting jobs in Ghana and helping both nations to build back better from COVID-19.



Speaking after the meeting, Mr Walker said: Todays fifth UK-Ghana Business Council UK recognised the long and enduring partnership between our nations and the real progress we have made since the Council was established in 2018.



Together, the UK and Ghana have worked to encourage economic diversification, seen new investment in manufacturing and improved tax policy and signed a Trade Partnership Agreement that will support Ghanas own priorities in trade and investment, and ensure that our mutual partnership strengthens.



The statement said during the meeting, the UK Government announced a new support programme for the Ministry of Finance and Ghana Revenue Authority to increase tax revenue and strengthen the countrys tax policy and administration.



Mr Duddridge reiterated the UKs full support of the African Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA) and again welcomed Ghanas successful hosting of the AfCFTA Secretariat.



The statement said both Council Chairs acknowledged the challenges and opportunities ahead as both Ghana and the UK continued the fight against climate change and collaborate to build a cleaner, greener future.



Established in 2018, the UKGBC functions as a high-level forum to promote bilateral relations and strategic partnerships between the Ghanaian private sector and UK counterparts.



The aim is to promote trade and investment for the mutual benefit of each nation and enhance economic growth.



The UK-Ghana Trade Partnership Agreement will provide Ghana with tariff free access to the UK and restore the terms of trade that applied until 31 December 2020.



Total UK trade with Ghana was 1.2 billion in 2019.



The Agreement restores Ghanas duty free, quota free access to the UK.



It will allow the UK to further deepen its relationship with Ghana and pursue common interests.



BHM Construction International is said to be a civil engineering company specialising in airports and roads.



The Tema to Afloa road  border with Togo major upgrade will be their first project in Ghana.



UKEF is the UK governments export credit agency and a government department, working alongside the Department for International Trade as an integral part of its strategy and operations.



Working with more than 100 private credit insurers and lenders to help UK companies access export finance -a particular class of loans, insurance policies or bank guarantees that enable international trade to take place as easily and securely as possible.



Held in Glasgow, Scotland in November 2021, the COP26 summit will bring parties together to accelerate action towards the goals of the Paris Agreement and the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.

Source: graphiconline.com









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The Public Interest and Accountability Committee (PIAC) has said the lack of long-term plan to inform how revenue from petroleum activities are spent has led to the financing of small projects which do not make big impacts.

Such small projects, including toilets and classroom blocks, do not also serve as catalysts to drive a larger economy, a phenomenon known as spreading thin.



The absence of such a plan had also led to the selection of the 2020 to 2022 priority areas for the annual budget funding amount (ABFA) disbursement without parliamentary approval, PIAC said.



Regional forum



At a Regional Public Forum on the Management of Petroleum Revenue in Tamale last Wednesday, the Chairman of PIAC, Professor Kwame Adom-Frimpong, said the findings of the 2020 report showed that surface rental payments remained in arrears to the tune of $2.11 million for last year, representing a 34.71 per cent increase over the 2019 arrears of $1.56 million, adding that non-payment of that stream of income denied the Petroleum Holding Fund (PHF) of the necessary inflow.



"Contrary to the Petroleum Revenue Management Act (PRMA), an unutilised amount of GH827.60 million from the 2017 to 2019 was spent to partially meet the shortfall in Annual Budget Funding Amount (ABFA) receipts caused by the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and its associated effects on the crude oil price globally," he added.



Petroleum revenue



The PIAC 2020 annual report revealed that revenue accrued from the petroleum sector reduced by over $286.39 million as compared to revenue accrued in 2019.



According to the chairman of the committee, the petroleum sector witnessed the drastic decrease in revenue as a result of the effects the COVID-19 pandemic exposed the country to.



Prof. Adom-Frimpong, indicated that the petroleum sector accrued a total revenue of $925,035,879.84 in 2019, while it accrued $ 638,643,030.56 in 2020, showing a significant decrease.



According to him, the revenue streamed from sources such as the Royalty, Carried and Participating Interest (CAPI), Corporate Income Tax (CIT), Surface Rental, Petroleum Holding Fund (PHF), and others.



On the distribution of the PHF, the chairman of the committee said 43 per cent went to the Annual Budget Funding Amount (ABFA), 31 per cent to the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC), 18 per cent to the Ghana Stabilisation Fund (GSF) and eight per cent to the Ghana Heritage Fund (GHF).



Recommendations



The committee recommended that the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) should as a matter of urgency initiate actions to recover Surface Rental Arrears with the appropriate interest as provided for by the FRMA.



The Ministry of Finance was also tasked to ensure that priority areas selected were presented to Parliament for approval before implantation as required by Section 25(5) of the FRMA.



"The ABFA should not be used to serve the purpose of filling expenditure gaps in times of revenue shortfall in the budget as this is the purpose of the GSF under the FRMA," the chairman said.



The PIAC further recommended that there was the need for a long-term national development plan to guide the spending of petroleum revenues, instead of resorting to the fall-back position of ministerial in selecting of the priority areas.



Also that the necessary gas infrastructure needed to be put in place by the government to ensure that the make-up gas from the Sankofa-Gye Nyame (SGN) was taken and utilised.



Benefits



The Northern Regional Minister, Alhaji Shani Alhassan Shaibu, indicated that the Northern Region had benefitted enormously from the 2020 Petroleum sector revenue.



According to the regional minister, some projects that were funded with the petroleum sector revenue included the construction of 12 community mechanised solar power water systems in communities such as Tolon, Zabzugu, Yendi, Mion and Yagaba.



Alhaji Shaibu added that road infrastructure, including the upgrading of the Tolon-Kumbungu road, upgrading of 62.4 kilometres Tamale-Salaga road and the rehabilitation of some selected roads in the Tamale Metropolis were funded from the petroleum revenue.



"The construction of a 12-seater water closet with mechanised boreholes in Tolon, Kumbungu and Zabzugu was funded by the petroleum sector," the minister added.

Source: graphiconline.com









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NPP Ashanti Regional Secretary, Sam Pyne has called on Ghanaians to assist the Ghana Police Service in fighting crimes.



In recent times, crimes have been happening in regular succession and this has become a serious matter of concern to the citizenry.



On Monday, June 14, 2021, a Police officer was shot dead in broad daylight by armed robbers who attacked a bullion van he was escorting in a vicinity at Jamestown, Accra.



The robbers also injured the driver of the van and killed a trader while two women on board escaped unhurt.



Another bullion van on the Kasoa road was attacked yesterday.



Days ago, there was another report of armed robbers' attack at a forex bureau in Osu, Accra.



Speaking on Peace FM's 'Kokrokoo' programme, Sam Pyne expressed worry over the recent spate of criminal activities in the nation.



He believed winning the fight against corruption is the responsibility of all and sundry, opining the Police cannot solely fight against crime.



He advised the citizens to provide intel on criminals so as to nip crime in the bud.



"Fighting crime, the Police are not God . . . We have to provide an intel to the security agencies to work with. We know those who engage in such things . . . It will be difficult for the security agencies if you don't give them the intel . . . It is difficult to read the mind of a criminal before he commits the crime. So, when people talk about prevention, it's the duty of all of us," he said.





Source: Ameyaw Adu Gyamfi/Peacefmonline.com/Ghana









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Former PNC General Secretary, Atik Mohammed has expressed confidence in the Inspector-General of Police (IGP), James Oppong-Boanuh.



Atik Mohammed strongly believed the IGP is rather doing a better job, contrary to claims that he isn't up to task in combating crimes.



A Policeman, Emmanuel Osei, on Monday, June 14, 2021, met his untimely death when robbers riding a number of motorbikes ambused a bullion van he was escorting at Jamestown.



Responding to the questions on Police investigations into the incident, the IGP said, We are doing what we can to protect the people of Ghana. There is no society in the world where there is no crime. Even in the USA, UK and Sweden, where they, more or less have everything, they still have crime. The only place that doesnt have crime is heaven and we are not in Heaven."



"So, if any so-called security analyst is saying that we are not on top of our game and that's why these things are happening, he does not know what he is talking about," he added after visiting the family of the deceased Police officer.



The IGP has come under intense criticisms following his statements with some critics calling for his resignation.



But to Atik Mohammed, "this particular IGP, I have a lot of faith in him. Look, we had all kinds of crimes going on and it was very disturbing but upon assuming office, he was able to stem some of these crimes. But these bullion attacks and murders going on, it will not be fair to say, because these are happening, so it means he is incompetent or not doing anything. No! He's effectively doing his part but crimes are sophisticated. So, we have to rally behind him''.



He noted that the fight against crimes isn't the sole responsibility of the IGP but each and every Ghanaian.



He stressed, "In fighting crime, you always need the support of the citizens. Intelligence is what you use to fight crime".



He made these submissions during Peace FM's morning show ''Kokrokoo''.





Source: Ameyaw Adu Gyamfi/Peacefmonline.com/Ghana









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Gregory Afoko, one of the two persons standing trial for the murder of the New Patriotic Partys Upper East Regional Chairman Adams Mahama has through his lawyers denied knowing one Robert Atule, a Prosecution Witness in the ongoing trial.



The witness, who is the States sixth witness, said he is a friend to Afoko and like brothers in the Bolgatanga Estate where they both lived until the incident of May 20 that led to the death of the late Mahama.



While being led by the Chief State Attorney Marina Appiah Opare to give his Evidence-in-Chief, the witness said, he met with Afoko a day before the incident who had expressed to him (witness) the grudge between his elderly brother Paul Afoko, the National Chairman of the NPP then and the Regional Chairman.



The witness said, acting as a senior brother to Afoko, he asked him to come over to his office to calm him down if he had in mind of doing something untoward, but the witness said Afoko never came as agreed.



Under cross-examination from Lawyer Stephen Sowah Charway, holding brief for Osafo Buabeng, put it to the witness that, he does not know Afoko anywhere, but the witness disagreed saying I know him and we know ourselves.



Counsel further put it to the witness that, his testimony to the court about meeting Afoko somewhere on May 19, 2015, a day before the alleged acid incident was never true and it was an after taught.



But, the witness said If he is saying so, I cant say yes or no. But, I know that I know him and I met him.



To this end, counsel ended his cross-examination of the six witnesses who were subsequently discharged by the court for the next witness to be called on June 24.



Deteriorating health



Meanwhile, the Lawyer for Afoko has concurred with the states request to the court to remand the accused persons to the Nsawam Prison custody.



The accused persons have been in the custody of the National Investigations Bureau.



According to counsel, his client, who has had surgery on his arm is having his health deteriorated at the NIB custody and wants his client transferred to the Nsawam Prisons where he can have enough ventilation and move freely.



According to him, considering he is almost held in low ventilation at NIB custody, we believe sending him to Nsawam to enjoy some fresh air and walk around will benefit him, and prayed the court accordingly.



Even though counsel for the second accused person Andrew Kudzo Vortia preferred his client to be in NIB custody for easy accessibility, the court said bo5th accused persons should be moved from the NIB custody to Nsawam.



The case has been adjourned to June 24.







Source: kasapafmonline.com









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A bullion van was attacked by armed robbers at Gomoa Okyereko on the Kasoa  Winneba road Thursday afternoon.

This incident comes barely four days after a similar incident at Adedenkpo, near James Town in Accra, resulted in the death of a police officer, Constable Emmanuel Osei and a hawker, Afua Badu.

According to Adom Fm reporter, Kofi Adjei, the robbers shot at the front passenger seat, where a police escort was sitting, shattering the window in the process.



He said, the police escort, subsequently ordered the driver to speed off while he called for reinforcement.



The Winneba Police Patrol team dispatched to Mpata Junction rushed to the scene and started a gun battle with the robbers, but they fled the scene.



All passengers in the bullion van escaped unhurt. The money in the van remained intact.

Ghana has recently recorded a surge in daylight robberies.



Apart from the James Town incident, another policeman was killed while on escort duty on the Adansi Fomena road in the Ashanti Region.



The armed men, numbering about 10, allegedly shot Lance Corporal Martin Babah during an attack on the bullion van he was escorting.







Source: myjoyonline.com









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Customs officials at the Tema Port have intercepted three assault rifles concealed in consolidated cargo declared as containing personal effects and vehicles.



The rifles, made up of a 10-millimetre Aero Survival Rifle, fitted with binoculars, an HK 416 semi-automatic rifle and a 4 x 32 premium scope crossbolts dead silent rifle, were detected yesterday during a physical examination on the consignment which arrived from the United States of America in a container numbered MEDU4810912.



The container had on board four vehicles and personal effects loaded in blue barrels, one of which was found to be holding the weapons.



Arrest



According to customs officials, an agent, Mr Bernard Adjei Kwarteng, who processed the container for clearing, was assisting them in investigations.



A seizure notice has been placed on the weapons and conveyed to the State Warehouse facility at the port.



No permits



A Principal Revenue Officer of the Ghana Revenue Authority in charge of the Golden Jubilee Car Park at the Tema Port, Mr Cyril Ekahe, told the Daily Graphic that the importation of the weapons contravened customs regulations which required importers of weapons to secure the necessary permits before bringing them into the country.



He said the diligence of the examination officer led to the detection of the weapons, since the container scanners were usually not able to vividly determine nor isolate items in containers arriving at the ports.



"The scan images are not able to determine nor isolate items in the container and if the physical examination had not been done, we wouldn't have detected the weapons because the container was also meant for door-to-door delivery, Mr Ekahe said.



A report on the incident, he indicated, had been submitted to the Tema Sector Commander for the necessary action.











Source: graphiconline.com









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PRINCE CHARLES Dedjoe, the businessman arrested for allegedly murdering his wife, has been granted bail by an Accra High Court. The accused person through his lawyer Nkrabea Effah Dartey had been pushing at the High Court to grant him bail after he was remanded into police custody by the Madina Magistrate Court when he appeared before it for committal.



A General Jurisdiction division of the Accra High Court presided over by Justice Ernest Yao Gaewu granted the accused person bail in the sum of GH200,000 with two sureties yesterday.



Mr. Dedjoe, as part of the bail condition, was ordered by the court to be reporting to the police once every two weeks pending the trial.

He will appear before Madina District Court on June 18 for the committal proceedings.



Whilst in custody, the accused tried to prevent the family of his late wife from going ahead to organise a burial ceremony for the deceased, but the court dismissed his application.



Murder



Mr. Dedjoe, Chief Executive Officer of Chadeco Group Of Companies Limited, was arrested on Independence Day after his father-in-law reported the alleged murder of his daughter to the East Legon Police, Accra.

The 43-year-old woman, Lillian, according to polices initial information, died after reportedly slipping and falling off the stairs at their East Legon home.

However, the father of the deceased, according to the police, later accused the suspect of assaulting his daughter, leading to her death.

The couple was married for some years, a union blessed with two children.

The relationship however, reportedly, turned sour, leading to the wife suffering alleged assaults from the man.







Source: Daily Guide









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Three of the four young men recently seen in a viral Video brandishing guns have been arrested by the police in the Ashanti Region.

The police have asked the public to help provide information on their criminal activities.



A fourth person in the video is being looked for by the police.



They are currently in police custody pending further investigation. The Deputy Ashanti Regional Police Commander, DCOP David Agyeman Adjem said the police is appealing to the public to provide any information of criminal activities against them.



Already, the young men, one of whom has been identified as Obour has been explaining on social media that they are not criminals.



Obour said the video doing the rounds on social media was recorded a long time ago and that it happened in Wa in the Upper West Region.



According to him, they were engaged in small scale mining (galamsey) and were involved in an altercation with a rival group and after overpowering the rival group, they brandished the guns on social media.



more to follow...







Source: graphiconline.com









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The Minority Leader of Parliament, Haruna Iddrisu has been chastised by the Deputy General Secretary of the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP), Nana Obiri Boahene for blaming President Akufo-Addo for the recent attacks on the Police officers in the country.



The Minority Leader, Haruna Iddrisu in a press conference on Tuesday, June 15, 2021, has blamed the President for the recent attacks on Police officers in the country.



A 25-year old Police officer named Emmanuel Osei was shot dead by armed robbers when they attacked a bullion van at Jamestown on Monday, June 14.



The Police officer and a trader were killed on the spot by the robbers while the driver survived by gunshot wounds.



Commenting on Okay FMs 'Ade Akye Abia' Morning Show, the Deputy Chief Scribe of the ruling NPP admonished the Minority in Parliament for politicizing crime issues in the country as the same bravado and impunity took place under former President Mahama administration.



 . . at your time, the same exhibition of bravado and impunity took place. The killing of people in broad daylight did not start from the era of Nana Addo and it will not stop there. So if you get Hon Haruna Iddrisu saying that all the criminal activities going on indicate that Nana Addo has failed, it is sad," he slammed.



We should not introduce politics into such a serious issue. Hon. Haruna Iddrisu is a senior lawyer and you have been a responsible and respectable character in the Parliament of Ghana. We dont talk like that and when we are engaging in the dramatization of politics, leave it to the small boys in politics, he added.



He further cautioned the Minority Leader of Parliament to be mindful of his utterances as Ghanaians listen with rapt attention whenever he speaks to issues in this country.



He, however, added that the Inspector General of Police has done no wrong in this recent attacks on the Police officers to warrant his dismissal from office as the Minority in Parliament and some section of Ghanaians are demanding.



He was of the view that, we can do better in this country and if we compare this country to other African countries in terms of crime rate, Ghana is far ahead of others.



Watch video below





Source: Daniel Adu Darko/Peacefmonline.com









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Minority in Parliament is accusing government of running away from accountability. This comes after Finance Minister, on Thursday, failed to show up in Parliament to provide answers on how much President Akufo-Addos latest foreign trips cost the taxpayer.



Ken Ofori-Atta was billed to appear to answer questions on the issue, but he has requested for more time. Ranking Member on Parliaments Foreign Affairs Committee Samuel Okudjeto Ablakwa says the delay tactics appear to be efforts to conceal the truth.



Now weve brought them to a more appropriate forum where they are constitutional bound to be accountable and there are all of these delayed tactics.



The President had earlier being accused by the Minority of ostentatious spending even as the country goes through economic hardship.



Per their calculations, President Akufo-Addo spent 345,000, i.e. 2,828,432.80 at the current exchange rate in flight cost during his nine-day visit to France, Belgium, South Africa, and back to the country.



Speaking after the failure to appear, Mr Okudzeto Ablakwa indicated that this is a pinnacle of luxury adding that this is about protecting the public purse.



It must strike you as very strange because really what do they have to hide. Its as though something is happening behind the scenes and they need time to complete whatever they are doing, he stressed.



Mr Okudzeto Ablakwa further argued that these are not the tenets of accountability of good governance, if you have nothing to hide if you dont need to buy time to do something untoward you just respond.



But Majority Chief Whip in Parliament Frank Annor Dompreh says the Minister of Finance has nothing to hide.



If a member has a question regardless whether the question has been advertised for in the other paper or not, you have the responsibility to follow up at the Speakers secretariat especially where your leader has told you that the question has been deferred because answers are not ready.



He added that in his view, it is preemptive and quite unnecessary for a member to hold a press conference and begin to read meaning to words as if the minister was afraid to come and answer the questions not knowing the minister was in the house today he answered a similar question.







Source: myjoyonline,com









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Former US President, Donald Trump has reacted to Joe Biden's summit with Russian president Vladmir Putin in Geneva.



Trump joined Fox News "Hannity" on Thursday, June 17, for an exclusive and wide-ranging interview, hours after President Biden held a closed-door summit with Russian leader Vladimir Putin in Geneva, Switzerland.



Trump told host Sean Hannity he is upset that Biden didn't score any wins during the summit, while in claiming Putin and Russia came out tops.



Trump highlighted the fact Biden stood by his decision to assent to the NordStream II pipeline's completion while canceling a Canadian-American pipeline project.



He said Russia will receive an undue windfall from oil sales to Germany while Chancellor Angela Merkel continues to underpay her country's own dues to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), which balance will instead continue to be subsidized by the United States.



"We gave a very big stage to Russia, and we got nothing. We gave up something that was unbelievably valuable. I stopped the pipeline, NordStream II, and the pipeline was stopped, and it was given back [to Germany and Russia] and nothing was gotten for it," Trump said.





"I think it was a good day for Russia. I don't think we got anything out of it."



Hannity went on to point out Biden's near-simultaneous canceling of the North American pipeline and approval of the North Sea connection killed as many as 10,000 U.S. jobs "with the stroke of a pen"





With reports also circulating about Biden's 51-year-old son Hunter's purportedly lucrative business deals in Russia and Ukraine, Hannity asked Trump what would happen if his own son Donald Jr. was being scrutinized for business dealings in Russia/Ukraine while he as the president made policy decisions that benefitted Moscow.



"Well, you just have to read the news," replied Trump.





"For five years, from the day I came down the escalator, we have been under investigation, and it turned out to be all full stuff. It was a terrible thing with the Russia, Russia, Russia, which actually made it difficult to deal with Russia," he said.



"It was a phony deal created by [California Rep. Adam] Schiff and [Hillary] Clinton and all of these people. It was a disgrace, an absolute disgrace that it should happen, and it really was dangerous and very bad for our country."



Trump added that Hunter Biden was reportedly paid $183,000 per month for being a member of the board of a Ukrainian energy company.



"But he admits that he knows nothing about energy. The whole thing is just terrible. The money from Russia, $3.5 million from the wife of the former mayor of Moscow," he said.





When asked about whether Biden is showing signs of frailty as of late, with host Sean Hannity pointing to public statements where the 78-year-old Delaware Democrat appears to lose his train of thought, Trump said the current President's age should not be a problem.





"[H]is age is not the problem," said Trump, who himself turned 75 this week.



Trump said his good friend and Home Depot co-founder Bernard Marcus is 92 and still at "100 percent."



"Look, I hope [Biden] has no problems. I want him to do well. I want him to go out and do well. I think the election was unbelievably unfair, but I want this guy to go out and do well for our country."









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Ghanaian MP, Kennedy Agyapong, has flown his kids to Dubai for some sweet birthday chilling. The Member of Parliament for Assin Central is having the time of his life celebrating his birthday.



Kennedy turned 61 years of age June 16th 2021. By his own admission, he has 22 children. About 17 of the kids are female  and he flew 16 of them to Dubai with him alongside his wife for his birthday enjoyment.



All Agyapongs daughters made the trip with the exception of his prodigal daughter Anell, who is in the United States graduating from college. A video of the first class chilling the family is enjoying in Dubai has hit the web.



The video shows Ken and his daughters seated at a dinner table with the old man being celebrated by everyone. Other scenes show Ken and his wife having a tender moment during the party. At a point even the posh cars the family used to transport themselves to the venue was shown and it was fantastic.



check out the video below















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An aerial view of an Aboriginal stone arrangement in the Channel Country of Central Australia. Such arrangements may be associated with initiation ceremonies and exchange of marriage partners, as well as trade. The main structure is around 30 metres long. Credit: Mithaka Aboriginal Corporation

Bruce Pascoe's Dark Emu is in the news again, with the publication of a new book critiquing Pascoe's arguments. Dark Emu builds on an earlier, less known work by archaeologist Rupert Gerritsen, who argued a number of regions across Australia should be considered centers of Aboriginal agriculture.

Historians Billy Griffiths and Lynette Russell, and now anthropologist Peter Sutton and archaeologist Keryn Walshe, have argued Pascoe has fallen into a trap of privileging the language of agriculture above hunter-gatherer socioeconomic systems.

We have been working in a landscape that provides an important test of the Dark Emu hypothesis. In partnership with the Mithaka Aboriginal Corporation, who occupy the Channel Country in Central Australia, we have begun investigating Aboriginal settlement sites, pit dwelling huts (known as gunyahs) and quarries.

Our landscape study, published in the journal Antiquity, has found over 140 quarry sites, where rock was excavated to produce seed grinding stones. We have also developed a method to locate traces of long-lost village sites.

Were First Australians farmers or hunter-gatherers? Contemporary archaeological research suggests it's not such a simple dichotomy. Understanding the Mithaka food production system may well tell us whether such terms are a good fit for defining socio-economic networks in Aboriginal Australia.

An extraordinary landscape

The Channel Country spreads across the Lake Eyre Basin, found in parts of Queensland, Northern Territory and South Australia. It is the world's last unregulated desert channel system (meaning there has been no intensive irrigation or damming) and one of Australia's richest beef cattle areas. The meandering channels are fed infrequently by monsoonal rains from the north, which transform large sections of the desert into a lush, green landscape.

In 2017, Mithaka Elder George Gorringe led a small expedition to an ancient clay-pan (an old lake bed) where one of us had recorded a burial site some years before. But the plan dramatically changed when monsoonal rains in the tropics flooded the land, diverting the expedition from north to the south.

The location of Mithaka country within the trade network of Pituri. Pituri leaves (some of which are from the Mulligan river region) are a narcotic and highly valued. This map shows the direction of trade and market centres and also the location of other important items of exchange. Credit: Nathan Wright

The extensive flood plains turned green as life-giving water irrigated native grasses and other plant species. George led the expedition to a series of sites he knew about from his father, Bill Gorringe, and from his previous work on numerous stations and as a council road works foreman. They included massive sandstone quarry sites, stone arrangements and the remains of Aboriginal pit dwelling huts (gunyahs): excavated structures with branches constructed over the top.

This largely intact archaeological landscape has the largest seed grinding quarry sites in the country. Archaeologist Mike Smith has discussed the importance of seed grinding implements for the economy of this region. Grinding stones were used to process native grasses and produce a form of bread. Axes scattered across the area also indicate trade with the Kalkadoon people from the Mount Isa quarries in the north.

It became clear from this first trip that this extraordinary landscape had enormous potential to investigate questions relating to Aboriginal trade and exchange, settlements systems and food production.

Reconstructing the past

When Europeans first stumbled across this landscape in the 1870s, as historian Ray Kerkhove discovered in the archives, they observed "civilized blacks" living in villages and maintaining intensive fishing industries. In 1871, for example, a sub inspector of the Queensland Native Police, James Gilmour, came across a "village" of 103 huts at the southern end of Thunderpurty lagoon while looking for evidence of the missing explorer Ludwig Leichardt.

History also records practices in the region including cultivation associated with ceremony, and fish trap and storage systems equating to aquaculture.

This landscape was very different to other areas in arid Australia well documented by historians and modern anthropologists. Unlike the more marginal desert environments in the center, Channel Country could support large numbers of cattle. This indicated it was also able to support larger populations of Aboriginal people.

Higher population numbers and the economic value of Channel Country to European pastoralists resulted in significant conflict, devastating the traditional Mithaka economic system. Archaeology thus plays a prominent role in reconstructing the past here.

A gunyah, believed to be from the 19th century, on the floodplains. Credit: Nathan Wright

Some cultural stories from Mithaka country were documented from the early 1900s by amateur ethnographer Alice Duncan Kemp, who lived on Mooraberrie Station until the late 1920s. An innovative researcher, trusted and respected by senior Aboriginal informants, Alice provides an important account of the complexity of the Mithaka social system, tying it into the landscape.

We have started to document this through cultural mapping, with the Duncan Kemp family. The Mithaka have designed a framework to help guide researchers in ethically telling the story of their landscape.

We are now using drones to record in 3D enormous quarries, which appear to be on an industrial scale. Archaeologist Doug William's excavations, supported by the work of dating expert Justine Kemp, show quarrying at one site may have begun more than 2,000 years ago.

If this is the case, the transcontinental trade system referred to by pioneering Australian archaeologist John Mulvaney as the "Chain of Connection" (extending from the Gulf of Carpentaria to the Flinders Ranges) may be at least twice as old as previously thought.

Could this trade system have played a role in the development of more intensified quarrying activity and more sedentary settlement systems? We are working on understanding the relationship between the archaeology and this remarkable social and economic network.

Seasonal or permanent village sites?

We have investigated eroding burial sites to see if the remains of the Mithaka ancestors themselves can provide clues to the past.

Limited analysis so far provides evidence of bio-mechanical stress to the upper limbs, likely a result of intense seed grinding. By studying geochemical signatures (isotopes) in human teeth we hope to establish if people maintained a large foraging range or were more sedentary, living in more restricted clan boundaries.

Josh Gorringe, a trained helicopter pilot, operates a small quadcopter drone over quarry sites at Glengyle. A range of fixed wing and smaller drones have enabled documentation of the cultural landscape. Credit: Michael Westaway

We have built a background isotopic map to help us understand people's mobility in the past. When people live in a landscape they ingest its isotope signature. Investigating the mobility of the Mithaka populations through isotopes will be an important test of whether documented village sites were seasonal or permanent.

One logical place to start an investigation of past food production systems is to look where people once lived. Early historic accounts record large village sites, so we have developed a methodology to find these places.

Geoarchaeologist Kelsey Lowe has used a magnetometer, designed to detect magnetic anomalies beneath the earth surface, to search for signs of ancient houses (gunyahs). By investigating standing gunyahs, dating back to the 19th century, we have detected distinct magnetic signatures for these dwellings.

Fish and plants

Archaeobotanists Nathan Wright and Andrew Fairbairn are carefully sifting through deposits to identify wood charcoal and evidence of plant use. Expertise in recovering not only ancient seeds and plant remains, but importantly, burnt plant remains in ancient fireplaces will play a key role in telling the past economic story.

Zooarchaeologist Tiina Manne has begun a study of recovered animal bones, which also include the inner ears (otoliths) of fish (yellowbelly). These may provide insights into past aquaculture systems hinted at in the historical record.

We have started to document fish traps in the landscape. And geoarchaeologist Mike Morley has taken molds of excavation pits to analyze microscopic evidence of hut floors and the areas in front of the gunyahs.

Botanist Jen Silcock is working with Mithaka Elders to understand more about plant use. Important food and medicinal plants such as native millet, sorghum and different species of desert shrubs will be investigated by plant geneticist Robert Henry. He will see if we can find evidence of people deliberately moving plants and identify traits of domestication within the genomes of important species.

Kelsey Lowe identifies a series of magnetic anomalies during her geophysical survey of the Ten Mile quarry site. Credit: Michael Westaway

Palynologist Patrick Moss has taken cores from lake sediments to recover ancient pollen sequences associated with known village site locations. He will examine how the environment changes over time and whether he can detect any shifts in pollen, which may represent more intensified use of plants.

Historian Tom Griffiths, meanwhile, has begun to investigate the history of conflict in the landscape, as Europeans and Native Police raged a war with the traditional owners of Mithaka country in the late 1800s.

This is important to understand because elsewhere in the country, archaeologists have suggested the development of village settlements may have been a response to colonial violence, rather than representing a traditional settlement system.

New, important stories

For one of us (Michael), the ideas generated through Gerritsen's research and Pascoe's popularized account have inspired and stimulated a different way of thinking about Aboriginal food production systems, and how we might investigate an archaeological record for Aboriginal village settlements.

And for the other (Josh), Dark Emu provides a different account of the Aboriginal past, written by an Aboriginal person outside of the academy, which challenges us to think differently about how we might define Aboriginal people. Josh believes it is up to archaeologists now to test Pascoe's hypothesis.

Hidden in the Mithaka landscape is a cultural narrative with great power to tell new and important stories. Multidisciplinary research involving traditional owner knowledge, even when fragmented by the ravages of past conflict and displacement, can re-energize landscapes.

It can provide a context for a richer, more nuanced and more comprehensive understanding of ancient Australia, creating a space for cultural learning, education and respect.

Explore further New insights into survival of ancient Western Desert peoples

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Credit: CC0 Public Domain

John Schaubroeck, a professor of management at the University of Missouri, believes hiring refugees can boost the economies of host countries. In fact, research has shown that assimilation is easier for refugees who work, making it more likely that they will contribute to their new communities.

But a new study by Schaubroeck found refugees benefit most from a workplace that values diversity and avoids stigmatizing people new to the community.

"The idea is that if you are in a favorable work environment, you will feel less 'othered." However, there are factors that can amplify or mitigate that effect," Schaubroeck said.

While most previous research shows that refugees being employed increases their productivity and assimilation into society, Schaubroeck wanted to understand what about these work environments made refugees feel more included.

"It's not just about being employed," Schaubroeck said. "It's the extent to which one perceives one really belongs in that organization that really matters. Do they see themselves as real members? Our findings suggest that's the first step to feeling like a member of the society in which they have relocated."

Schaubroeck's findings also suggest that when people are different from others, as with refugees, believing one's leaders and the organization overall strive to treat all members fairly and respectfully goes a long way in making refugee employees feel included.

Schaubroeck said it all comes back to diversity.

"While there's not much the organization can do about an internal belief of stigma in a society, our research showed that having a favorable diversity climateat all levelsrenders that belief much less relevant," he said.

The researchers sampled 389 Syrian refugees in 88 different organizations. The refugees were asked to take 30 minutes off from their jobs to complete a survey. They were given three questionnaires over two months to measure their insider status and what prompted these feelings. The researchers only talked with refugees who were employed.

Refugees are becoming increasingly relevant in the U.S. as the number of refugees in the country are skyrocketing. For instance, in May 2021, the U.S. saw its number of accepted refugees more than triple from the months prior, admitting 915 refugees compared to only 272 in February.

The nation has steadily increased its refugee acceptance since the beginning of the year, and the government has promised to increase the admittance even more as the year moves on. Schaubroeck believes these findings can help businesses adjust their environment to be more accommodating to refugees and help them learn to contribute to their host society. He said this improved quality of employment will not only benefit the refugees, but the communities they settle in as well.

"'I' Am Affirmed, but Are "We'? Social Identity Processes Influencing Refugees' Work Initiative and Community Embeddedness" is published in the Academy of Management.

More information: John M. Schaubroeck et al, "I" Am Affirmed, but Are "We"? Social Identity Processes Influencing Refugees' Work Initiative and Community Embeddedness, Academy of Management Journal (2021). Journal information: Academy of Management Journal John M. Schaubroeck et al, "I" Am Affirmed, but Are "We"? Social Identity Processes Influencing Refugees' Work Initiative and Community Embeddedness,(2021). DOI: 10.5465/amj.2020.0033
Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain

The colonies of social insects are complex systems that are entirely self-organized. Scientists who looked at the demographic, genetic and morphological structure of ant colonies were able to show how this self-organization works in practice. The study was supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) and is the subject of a paper published in PLOS Biology.

Colonies of clonal raider ants (Ooceraea biroi) were used as model organisms in this study. This Asian predatory ant is interesting for researchers because they can easily control the age, genetic and morphological makeup of colonies.

In their study, they have shown that the organization in a homogeneous colony is modified when different individuals are introduced. "Individuals of different sizes increased the division of labor in the colony, while genetically different individuals reduced it," explains Yuko Ulrich, the study's first author and former researcher at the University of Lausanne. "In fact, each source of heterogeneity generates a distinct pattern of behavioral organization in the colony," she says.

Who will do the dishes?

The results have surprised scientists because they go against some current theories on social groups. "It is thought that individuals act according to their tolerance threshold to stimuli," says Yuko Ulrich. To illustrate this model, the scientist proposes a comparison with humans: "In a family, some individuals react much more quickly than others to a pile of dirty dishes. They will therefore find themselves doing the dishes more often: a division of labor is taking place."

To explain the results of their ant study, the researchers had to expand this theoretical model. It now takes into account not only the stimulus tolerance but also the efficiency of each individual in performing a task and the overall workload of the colony.

This model still needs to be tested, but it is already opening up possibilities, explains Yuko Ulrich. It could provide a better understanding of other complex biological systems in which large numbers of heterogeneous individuals interact; this in turn could be used to generate more accurate predictions of collective outcomes.

Automatic tracking of individuals

The scientists carried out their tests on 120 colonies of ants, homogeneous or heterogeneous, which they raised in transparent Petri dishes. In order to observe the behavior of each ant, they developed an automatic tracking system. "This is the first time such a system has been implemented on this scale in an ant study. Without this type of software, tracking would have been impossible," explains Yuko Ulrich. Each experiment lasted about a month. About 7000 images were taken for each colony.

In order to be identified by the software, each ant was marked with a unique color combination. Based on the spatial distribution of each individual, the software calculated an index of the division of labor in each colony. It does not specify what each individual does, but it gives clues to their role. "If an ant often stays near the nest, we can assume that it is caring for the larvae. An ant that moves around a lot is more likely to be in charge of foraging," explains the scientist.

Explore further How army ants' iconic mass raids evolved

More information: Yuko Ulrich et al, Response thresholds alone cannot explain empirical patterns of division of labor in social insects, PLOS Biology (2021). Journal information: PLoS Biology Yuko Ulrich et al, Response thresholds alone cannot explain empirical patterns of division of labor in social insects,(2021). DOI: 10.1371/journal.pbio.3001269
Male elephant seals dwarf their female counterparts. Credit: Sean Lema/Shutterstock

Charles Darwin was a careful scientist. In the middle of the 19th century, while he was collecting evidence for his theory that species evolve by natural selection, he noticed it didn't explain the fancy tails of male peacocks, the antlers paraded by male deer, or why some the males of some species are far larger then their female counterparts.

For these quirks, Darwin proposed a secondary theory: the sexual selection of traits that increase an animal's chance of securing a mate and reproducing. He carefully distinguished between weapons such as horns, spurs, fangs and sheer size that are used to subdue competing rivals, and ornaments that are aimed at charming the opposite sex.

Darwin thought that sexually selected traits could be explained by uneven sex ratioswhen there are more males than females in a population, or vice versa. He reasoned that a male with fewer available females would have to work harder to secure one of them as a mate, and that this competition would drive sexual selection.

In a new study, my colleagues and I have confirmed a link between sexual selection and sex ratios, as Darwin suspected. But surprisingly, our findings suggest Darwin got things the wrong way round. We found that sexual selection is most pronounced not when potential mates are scarce, but when they're abundantand this means looking again at the selection pressures at play in animal populations that feature uneven sex ratios.

Since Darwin's time, we've learned a lot about uneven sex ratios, which are common in wild animal populations. For instance, in many butterflies and mammals, including humans, the number of adult females exceeds the number of adult males.

This skew is most extreme among marsupials. In Australian antechinus, for instance, all males abruptly die after the mating season, so there are times when no adult males are alive and the entire adult population is made up of pregnant females.

In contrast, many birds parade more males than females in their populations. In some plovers, for example, the males outnumber females by six to one.

So why do many birds species have more males, while mammals often have more females? The short answer is that we don't know. But there are smoking guns.

Lions dont appear to fancy their chances against a herd of female buffalo. Credit: Seyms Brugger/Shutterstock

Explaining uneven sex ratios

Some uneven sex ratios can be partially explained by lifespan differences. Female mammals, including humans, usually outlive their male counterparts by a wide margin. In humans, females live on average about 5% longer than males. In African lions and killer whales, the female lifespan is longer by up to 50%.

Predator preferences could also play a part. African lions kill approximately seven times more male than female buffalo, because male buffalo tend to roam alone, whereas females are protected within herds. In contrast, cheetahs kill many more female Thompson's gazelles than males, presumably because they can outrun female gazelles easierespecially the pregnant ones.

Finally, males and females often suffer differently from parasites and diseases. The COVID-19 pandemic is a striking example of this: the number of infected men and women is similar in most countries, but male patients have higher odds of death compared to female ones.

Sex ratios and sexual selection

Despite our growing knowledge of uneven sex ratios, Darwin's insight linking sex ratios with sexual selection has received little attention from scientists. Our study sought to address this, pulling together these two strands of evolutionary theory in order to revisit Darwin's argument.

We looked in particular at the evolution of large males in different species, which are often several times larger than their female counterparts. We see this in male baboons, elephant seals and migratory birds, for example.

Sometimes, females are larger than malesas with some species of bird, such as the African jacana. The scientific term for when one sex in a species is larger than the other is "sexual size dimorphism".

The female African jacana, on the left, is larger than the male. Credit: Bernard DUPONT/flickr, CC BY-SA

It's clear how sexual selection can sometimes create size dimorphism. Knocking out an enemy requires muscular power, while fight endurance requires stamina. So being bigger often means dominating rivals, thereby winning the evolutionary lottery of reproduction.

Analyzing 462 different species of reptiles, mammals and birds, our study found a tight association between sexual size dimorphism and sex ratios, vindicating Darwin's conjectures.

But the trend was the opposite to the one Darwin predicted with his limited evidence. It turns out the most intense sexual selectionindicated by larger males relative to femalesoccurred in species where there were plenty of females for males to choose from, rather than a scarcity of females as Darwin suggested.

Implications for sexual selection

This in no way invalidates Darwin's theories of natural selection and sexual selection. Our finding simply shows that a different mechanism to the one Darwin proposed is driving mating competition for animals living in sex-skewed populations.

Darwin's assumption was based on the idea that the most intense competition for mates should occur when there's a shortage of mating partners. But more recent theories suggest this logic may not be correct, and that sexual selection is actually a system in which the winner takes all.

That means that when there are many potential partners in the population, a top malein our study, the largest and heaviestenjoys a disproportionately high payout, fertilizing a large number of females at the expense of smaller males, who may not reproduce at all.

We need further studies to help us understand how males and females seek out new partners in male-skewed and female-skewed populations, and in what circumstances ornaments, armaments and sheer size are particularly useful. Such studies could provide us with unprecedented new insights into how nature works, building on Darwin's original theory of sexual selection.

Explore further Experiments show natural selection opposes sexual selection

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Consequences of hot and dry summers on beech forests are obvious when looking at their crowns: Almost half of the trees are damaged in many places in Hesse. Credit: Markus Pfenninger

Which trees will survive dry, very hot summers and which will suffer severe damage? Regarding European beech trees, this question may now be answered by genome analyses. A team led by Prof. Dr. Markus Pfenninger, LOEWE Center for Translational Biodiversity Genomics and Senckenberg Biodiversity and Climate Research Center, has studied damaged and healthy beech trees in Hesse, Germany and identified areas in their genome that are responsible for drought resistance. Based on these DNA sections, it is possible to predict for each individual tree how it resists longer periods of drought. Using targeted DNA tests, resistant specimens could now be selected for forestry in order to help beech forests adapting to climate change. The study was published in the journal "eLife."

Anyone who wanders through German forests in summer will see brown, parched leaves and dead branches again and again. The long dry periods in 2018 and 2019 have left their mark. This was also observed by Prof. Dr. Markus Pfenninger, who conducts research at the LOEWE Center for Translational Biodiversity Genomics and the Senckenberg Biodiversity and Climate Research Center and teaches at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz. Something caught his eye in particular: "In beech forests, not all trees are equally damaged. Completely healthy trees are standing right next to severely damaged ones." Such pairs can be found all over the state of Hesse central in Germany. But how can that be?

The answer can be found in the DNA of the trees, as a study by Pfenninger and colleagues on around 200 tree pairs shows. The genome of European beeches, i.e. their entire genetic information in form of DNA, comprises 542 million items. Some of these items are identical in all beeches. Others, however, differ from tree to tree. This is precisely the case in healthy and severely damaged beech trees, as the genome analysis shows: around 100 DNA sections are decisive for drought resistance. In healthy trees, these sections contain, among others, genes that are known from other plants and enable a reaction to drought stress.

"The individual genetic equipment determines whether a beech tree is able to survive longer periods of drought or not," says Pfenninger. Dr. Barbara Feldmeyer, molecular ecologist at Senckenberg Biodiversity and Climate Research Center, explains: "Now that we can classify individual trees, foresters can choose particularly resistant trees, for example for reforestation. Hence, we can help beech forests to sustainably adapt to climatic changes."

In order to achieve this, the researchers have developed a test to detect drought resistance in the genome of beech treeseven in their seeds. Researchers from Justus Liebig University Giessen, Johann Wolfgang Goethe University Frankfurt, TU Darmstadt and Hochschule Geisenheim University were also involved in the study.

The European beech (Fagus sylvatica) is widespread in Europe and the most common deciduous tree in Germany's forests. In Hesse, beeches are found on about one third of the state's forest area. Beeches grow at locations differing in environmental conditions and play an increasingly important role in sustainable forestry. They also provide a habitat for several thousand species, such as wood-dwelling beetles and larvae or woodpeckers nesting in tree cavities.

For the study, the researchers examined beech trees throughout Hesse in 2019 and 2020from Taunus to Rhine-Main area and Odenwald to Westerwald and northern Hesse. At each of the approximately 200 locations, they selected one tree appearing healthy and one neighboring tree with severely withered or missing leaves for the analysis. The distance between these tree pairs was five meters on average. DNA was extracted from green leaves in the laboratory. Based on the genome data, the test with molecular markers for genes relevant for drought resistance was developed. The test was validated on about 90 beech trees with a success rate of 99 percent.

"Our study provides a scientific basis for the sustainable management of beech forests that supports the natural selection of resistant trees," says Pfenninger. "Now the findings should be integrated into practice, for example in monitoring of natural forests or in selective logging and reforestation. Thereby, we can help to preserve a unique ecosystem that is already affected by climate change. There will be another heat wavesooner or later."

Explore further Droughts across Europe affect British trees most

More information: Markus Pfenninger et al, Genomic basis for drought resistance in European beech forests threatened by climate change, eLife (2021). Journal information: eLife Markus Pfenninger et al, Genomic basis for drought resistance in European beech forests threatened by climate change,(2021). DOI: 10.7554/eLife.65532
Credit: CC0 Public Domain

Researchers from Colorado State University, Amazon, and Dartmouth College published a new paper in the Journal of Marketing that examines the role of physical stores for selling "deep" products.

The study, forthcoming in the Journal of Marketing, is titled "How Physical Stores Enhance Customer Value: The Importance of Product Inspection Depth" and is authored by Jonathan Zhang, Chunwei Chang, and Scott Neslin.

While some traditional offline retailers are struggling and are closing stores (e.g., Macy's, Walgreens), online retailers are opening them (e.g., Amazon, Warby Parker). This conflicting trend raises the question, what is the physical store's role in today's multichannel environment?

The research team posits that products differ in the inspection depth"deep" or "shallow"customers require to purchase them. Deep products require ample inspection in order for the customer to make an informed decision. We propose that physical stores provide the physical engagement opportunity customers need to purchase deep products.

To test this thesis, the researchers conducted three studies. The first used transaction data from a national multichannel outdoor-product retailer. Two lab experiments demonstrated the same effect.

The large-scale transactional data involving 50,000 customers show that by using a "deep products in-store" promotional strategy to migrate new customers from a "low-value state" to a "high-value state," average spending per trip increases by 40%, long-term sales increases by 20%, and profitability increases by 22%.

The lab experiments show that:

By onboarding new customers to purchase a "deep product in-store" as their first purchase from a new retailer, their re-patronage intention for this retailer increases by 12% compared to all other product/channel combinations.

By directing new customers to purchase a "deep product in-store" as their first purchase from a new retailer, they are more likely to: 1) buy deep products in the future online, indicating that they generalize trust across channels; and 2) buy adjacent categories online, indicating that they generalize trust across categories.

The last decade has witnessed a marked increase in the opening of physical stores by online retailers, despite myriad changes in the retailing environment. This attests that these findings are not ephemeral. Zhang says "The general lesson of our research is for retailers to create a concrete, tangible, and multi-sensory experience for customers buying products that require this physical engagement. This sets the stage for favorable experiential learning and increased customer value." Retailers can do this in numerous ways:

First, when retailers find that a customer is buying deep products online but their spending is decreasing in value, they can provide a promotion for deep products in-store. This can increase customer value.

Second, retailers need to enhance physical engagement for deep products through merchandising and training sales personnel to walk customers through the engagemente.g., by helping customers try and use deep products in-store.

Third, retailers cannot infer product inspection depth solely from predefined product categories because there is much variation in inspection depth within a particular category. Rather, management should infer inspection depth using the proposed measures, or expert, independent judges.

Fourth, retailers should use a deep/offline onboarding strategy for new customers. That is, they should use acquisition channels that encourage the first purchase to be deep/offline.

Zhang adds that "We also discuss related issues such as using stores versus showrooms; fielding full or limited staff; selling private label goods; designing loyalty and buy online, pickup in-store (BOPIS) programs; and leveraging technology to create physical engagement in online settings."

Explore further Augmented reality in retail and its impact on sales

More information: Jonathan Z. Zhang et al, EXPRESS: How Physical Stores Enhance Customer Value: The Importance of Product Inspection Depth, Journal of Marketing (2021). Journal information: Journal of Marketing Jonathan Z. Zhang et al, EXPRESS: How Physical Stores Enhance Customer Value: The Importance of Product Inspection Depth,(2021). DOI: 10.1177/00222429211012106
In this Oct. 14, 2015, file photo, a riverboat glides through Lake Mead on the Colorado River at Hoover Dam near Boulder City, Nev. Despite drought, cities in the U.S. West expect their populations to grow considerably in the coming decades. From Phoenix to Boise, officials are working to ensure they have the resources, infrastructure and housing supply to meet growth projections. In certain parts of the region, their efforts are constrained by the fact that sprawling metro areas are surrounded by land owned by the federal government. U.S. Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto wants to remedy the issue in Las Vegas by strengthening protections for some public lands while approving the sale of others to commercial and residential developers. Credit: AP Photo/Jae C. Hong, File

Record-breaking heat and historic drought in the U.S. West are doing little to discourage cities from planning to welcome millions of new residents in the decades ahead.

From Phoenix to Boise, officials are preparing for a future both with more people and less water, seeking to balance growth and conservation. Development is constrained by the fact that 46% of the 11-state Western region is federal land, managed by agencies like the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management that are tasked with maintaining it for future generations.

That's led officials in states like Nevada and Utah to lobby the federal government to approve land transfers to allow developers to build homes and businesses on what had been public land. Supporters in the two states have won over environmentalists in the past with provisions that allocate proceeds to conservation projects, preserve other federal lands and prevent road construction, logging or energy exploration.

A small group of opponents is arguing that routinely approving these kinds of "swaps" to facilitate growth isn't sustainable, particularly in areas that rely on a shrinking water supply.

For the seven states that depend on the Colorado RiverArizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah and Wyominga regional drought is so severe that less water is flowing to Lake Mead and Lake Powell, the two manmade reservoirs where river water is stored.

If the level of Lake Mead keeps dropping through the summer as projected, the federal government will likely issue its first-ever official shortage declaration, which will prompt cuts in the share of water Arizona and Nevada receive.

In this Feb. 9, 2005, file photo, shows the suburbs of Las Vegas from atop the Stratosphere tower looking west down Sahara Ave., towards the Spring Mountains. Despite drought, cities in the U.S. West expect their populations to grow considerably in the coming decades. From Phoenix to Boise, officials are working to ensure they have the resources, infrastructure and housing supply to meet growth projections. In certain parts of the region, their efforts are constrained by the fact that sprawling metro areas are surrounded by land owned by the federal government. U.S. Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto wants to remedy the issue in Las Vegas by strengthening protections for some public lands while approving the sale of others to commercial and residential developers. Credit: AP Photo/Joe Cavaretta, File

The predicament is playing out in the Las Vegas area, where environmental groups, local officials and homebuilders united behind a proposal from U.S. Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto that was heard in the Senate this week.

The Nevada Democrat is pushing what she calls the largest conservation bill in state history to designate more than 3,125 square miles (8,094 square kilometers) of land for additional protectionsroughly the size of Delaware and Rhode Island combinedand 48 square miles (124 square kilometers) for commercial and residential development, which is about the size of San Francisco.

Some conservationists support the proposal because it would add federal land to the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area for recreation and reclassify some undeveloped parts of Clark County, where Las Vegas is located, and the Desert National Wildlife Refuge as Bureau of Land Management "wilderness areas," which carry stronger protections than national parks.

Jocelyn Torres, field director for the Conservation Lands Foundation, said at the Senate hearing Wednesday that the protections would restore lands to more efficiently capture carbon, which would help mitigate rising temperatures.

"Our public lands present our best chance to address climate change, our biodiversity crisis and invest in our local communities and economy," she said.

The effort mirrors land management pushes made over the past decade in Washington and Emery counties in Utah to designate wilderness and sell other parcels to developers to meet growth projections. The U.S. Census Bureau reported that St. George, in Washington County, was the nation's fifth-fastest growing metro area last year.

In this 2012 photo from a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service motion-activated camera, a golden eagle confronts a desert bighorn sheep at Desert National Wildlife Refuge in Nevada. Despite drought, cities in the U.S. West expect their populations to grow considerably in the coming decades. From Phoenix to Boise, officials are working to ensure they have the resources, infrastructure and housing supply to meet growth projections. In certain parts of the region, their efforts are constrained by the fact that sprawling metro areas are surrounded by land owned by the federal government. U.S. Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto wants to remedy the issue in Las Vegas by strengthening protections for some public lands while approving the sale of others to commercial and residential developers. Credit: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service via AP, File

In both regions, affordable housing is among officials' top concerns. Soaring home prices in California have added to a flow of people leaving for nearby states like Nevada, Arizona and Colorado, where open land, lower tax rates and jobs are attracting new residents.

The fast-growing Las Vegas area lacks the housing supply to meet projected population growth. A 2019 University of Nevada, Las Vegas, study that Cortez Masto's legislation references projected the population in Clark County would increase 35%, to 3.1 million residents, by 2060. That spike will be difficult to accommodate without building in existing communities or public lands.

"Due to this federal ownership, our options for planning and development are very constrained and require constant coordination with federal agencies," Clark County Air Quality Department Director Marcie Henson said.

Growth may stretch an already limited water supply. Water officials support the proposal, which allocates funding to maintaining the channels used to recycle wastewater through Lake Mead. The region has enacted some of the U.S. West's most aggressive conservation measures, including an outright ban on decorative grass in certain places, to prepare for growth.

Last year, water officials projected a worst-case scenario in which consumption patterns and climate change could force them to find other supplies as soon as 2056. Critics say the projections are concerning.

"This legislation doesn't have an identified, sustainable supply of water going out 50 years in the future," said Kyle Roerink, executive director of the Nevada-based conservation group Great Basin Water Network. "When you couple that with everything that we're reading about at Lake Mead and the Colorado River, it's very precarious to be putting forward a bill that invites another 825,000 people to the Mojave Desert."

In this Oct. 11, 2016 photo, a gypsum mine owned by developer Jim Rhodes, who wants to develop housing on the site, is seen in the foreground while the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area is seen in the distance. Despite drought, cities in the U.S. West expect their populations to grow considerably in the coming decades. From Phoenix to Boise, officials are working to ensure they have the resources, infrastructure and housing supply to meet growth projections. In certain parts of the region, their efforts are constrained by the fact that sprawling metro areas are surrounded by land owned by the federal government. U.S. Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto wants to remedy the issue in Las Vegas by strengthening protections for some public lands while approving the sale of others to commercial and residential developers. Credit: L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Sun via AP, File

Southern Nevada Water Authority General Manager John Entsminger said in a statement that the proposal "helps secure the water resources and facilities that SNWA needs to provide reliable and safe water to our customers for decades to come."

When Cortez Masto's proposal was introduced, there was little mention of how water factors into plans for future growth or if the conservation components of the bill could have any impact.

Roerink said the plan's funding allocations for water infrastructure need to be accompanied by additional "serious, realistic modeling" of the Colorado River.

"When an entity says, 'Let's go and build some homes in this region,' there's an implication that water's going to be there in perpetuity," he said.

Explore further US West prepares for possible 1st water shortage declaration

 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
Credit: CC0 Public Domain

New statistics published on infants in care proceedings reveal that the number of cases has continued to grow in England and Wales in recent years. The research, carried out by the Family Justice Data Partnership based at Lancaster University and Swansea University, for Nuffield Family Justice Observatory, also shows that in the majority of cases involving newborn babies, parents are given very little formal notice that care proceedings have been issued and the case is to be heard in court, which may result in the baby being removed from their care.

The research found that in England the number of newborn babies in care proceedings increased by 20 percent between 2012/13 and 2019/20, rising from 2,425 to 2,914 per year. And in Wales by 40 percent (rising from 145 to 203 babies per year).

When a local authority issues care proceedings under s.31 of the Children Act 1989, a request can also be made for an urgent hearing. In the last year, more than four out of every five cases in England, and three quarters of cases in Wales, were heard with less than seven days' formal notice. One in every six mothers faced care proceedings issued and heard on the same day.

Urgent hearings can be particularly traumatic immediately after birth, and can compromise parents' Article 6 rights under the Human Rights Act 1998, because the notice period means that it is very difficult for parents to effectively instruct a solicitor. Short-notice care proceedings also mean that the social worker representing the child has very little time to examine the case and advise the court on the best interests of the child. Growing concerns about urgent care proceedings featured centrally in the recent report of the President of the Family Division's Public Law Working Group, which called for compilation of reliable data about urgent applications. Since the implementation of the 1989 Children Act, there has been no systematic review of how cases of care proceedings are managed at birth. This research aims to prompt a national conversation about this critical issue.

The new research also found that London differs very significantly from both Wales and many regions of England, particularly, the North West, North East, and Yorkshire and the Humber. It has the lowest numbers of newborn babies in care proceedings, less than a third of the numbers in the North East of England, and less than half of the numbers in the North West of England or in Wales.

In London less than one in ten hearings are heard on the same day, and there are almost as few in the South East. While in the North East, the proportion of same-day newborn cases has doubled in the region over the period (to 41% in 2019/20)by far the highest rate across England and Wales. In Yorkshire and the Humber, although the proportion of same-day hearings is lower than in the North East, at 27 percent in 2019/20, it is growing and higher than the national average of 18.5 percent. A number of interrelated factors are likely to be at play, including levels of poverty, the availability of services to support vulnerable mothers and babies, and hospital discharge policies.

Karen Broadhurst, Professor of Social Work at Lancaster University and principal investigator on the research project, said: "Deprivation twinned with a lack of services is a perfect storm when it comes to keeping families together. Earlier research has suggested that the greater availability of preventative services in London, such as mother and baby placements and the quality of legal advocacy, had resulted in fewer infant cases being issued at birth, than in the North of England or Wales.

"The greater use of short-notice hearings in England and Wales requires further analysisI see the statistics as a first step in working collaboratively with professionals and family members alike to understand this trend and to consider whether there are alternatives to issuing care proceedings so soon after birth."

Lisa Harker, director of Nuffield Family Justice Observatory, said: "The separation of a mother and baby is deeply traumatic for all involved and has lifelong implications. Although in some cases urgent action following the birth of a new baby can be necessary where there is an immediate safeguarding need, there is widespread concern that the volume of these cases is increasing.

"Not only does it seem that chances are being missed to work with vulnerable mothers much earlier to give them the best chance of staying together as a family, but when that is not possible, the process is often not being managed in a sensitive or humane way."

A new report by the Family Justice Data Partnership team, led by Professor Karen Broadhurst, has been published today by the Nuffield Family Justice Observatory. The research (which follows on from previous work by the team in England and Wales) reveals that the number of cases has continued to grow in recent years. Statistics also show that in the majority of cases involving newborn babies parents are given very little formal notice that care proceedings have been issued and the case is to be heard in court, which may result in the baby being removed from their care.

The research found that in England the number of newborn babies in care proceedings increased by 20 percent between 2012/13 and 2019/20, rising from 2,425 to 2,914 per year. And in Wales by 40 percent (rising from 145 to 203 babies per year).

When a local authority issues care proceedings under s.31 of the Children Act 1989, a request can also be made for an urgent hearing. In the last year, more than four out of every five cases in England, and three quarters of cases in Wales, were heard with less than seven days' formal notice. One in every six mothers faced care proceedings issued and heard on the same day.

Urgent hearings can be particularly traumatic immediately after birth, and can compromise parents' Article 6 rights under the Human Rights Act 1998, because the notice period means that it is very difficult for parents to effectively instruct a solicitor. Short-notice care proceedings also mean that the social worker representing the child has very little time to examine the case and advise the court on the best interests of the child. Growing concerns about urgent care proceedings featured centrally in the recent report of the President of the Family Division's Public Law Working Group, which called for compilation of reliable data about urgent applications. Since the implementation of the 1989 Children Act, there has been no systematic review of how cases of care proceedings are managed at birth. This research aims to prompt a national conversation about this critical issue.

The new research also found that London differs very significantly from both Wales and many regions of England, particularly, the North West, North East, and Yorkshire and the Humber. It has the lowest numbers of newborn babies in care proceedings, less than a third of the numbers in the North East of England, and less than half of the numbers in the North West of England or in Wales. In London less than one in ten hearings are heard on the same day, and there are almost as few in the South East. While in the North East, the proportion of same-day newborn cases has doubled in the region over the period (to 41% in 2019/20)by far the highest rate across England and Wales. In Yorkshire and the Humber, although the proportion of same-day hearings is lower than in the North East, at 27 percent in 2019/20, it is growing and higher than the national average of 18.5 percent. A number of interrelated factors are likely to be at play, including levels of poverty, the availability of services to support vulnerable mothers and babies, and hospital discharge policies.

Explore further Building a picture of fathers in the family justice system in England

More information: The report is available online: The report is available online: www.cfj-lancaster.org.uk/files  rt_notice_report.pdf
Credit: CC0 Public Domain

Many employees have come to prefer working from home after being forced to do so more than a year ago when the pandemic started. By some estimates, at least one-quarter of employees will still be working remotely multiple days a week at the end of 2021.

For those whose jobs allow it, being untethered from the office might mean moving farther away from itby a few miles or a few hundred.

The National Bureau of Economic Research recently published a white paper by Jan Brueckner, UCI Distinguished Professor of economics, and his colleagues Matthew Kahn and Gary Lin at Johns Hopkins University considering the possible effects that ongoing remote work may have on housing markets, especially in the more densely populated and pricey urban areas. Brueckner shares his insights here.

You suggest that as more people have the opportunity to work from home, we'll see people move either farther into suburbia or to entirely different, less expensive cities. Why?

If workers can keep their well-paying jobs and move to a cheaper city, their incomes will go further. However, such a move might entail a sacrifice of amenities (good weather, etc.) that would need to be considered. For those workers who remain in their original city, the reduction in commuting costs due to working from home (going to the office only once a week, say) makes the suburbswhere housing is cheaper on a per-square-foot basismore attractive than before. As a result, working from home may lead to greater suburbanization.

What cities might we expect to be most affected by these shifts?

We would expect to see impacts in expensive cities with large shares of white-collar jobs that pay well and allow working from home. Such cities would include New York, San Francisco, Boston and Seattle. We expect people to move out of these citieseither into outlying suburban areas or to entirely different cities or even states.

So  it could become affordable to live in San Francisco again?

Possibly.

On the flip side, where do you expect to see people flock to?

We've heard in the media about migration from California to Austin, Texas, which is relatively cheap and offers less of an amenity sacrifice compared to coastal locations. The same is true for Boise, Idaho, which is in the news a lot. Migration data a few years hence will give a more complete picture.

Is this going to mean more gentrification in some cities?

In one sense, it's exactly the reverse. The prediction is that many well-paid residents will be leaving the country's premier cities, allowing more room for the less affluent. Gentrification may increase in the receiving cities as immigrants arrive, but gentrification pressure is lower in many of these places and thus less of a concern for poorer central city residents.

You mention that "the economy still has a long way to go before reaching the new predicted equilibrium." What kind of time horizon do you envision?

If our predictions are correct, we'd expect these changes to be complete within a decade. There are a number of caveats, however. Our predictions assume that CEOs will tolerate remote work from another city and not penalize those who do it. The Wall Street Journal, however, recently ran a story that casts doubt on this assumption. The issue partly hinges on whether remote workers can maintain their productivity, a concern discounted by some media reports saying that workers feel more productive remotely. A further question involves integration of new employees into an organization that relies on remote work. New employees may have trouble forging bonds and creating a rapport with their colleagues.

As we approach this new equilibrium, what are some other changes we can expect to see?

Intercity relocation will depress house prices and rents in cities that lose population while raising them in the receiving cities. Intracity relocation will push prices up in the suburbs. These changes will, in turn, affect property tax revenues across and within cities.

Explore further Research explores human migration changes during the COVID-19 pandemic

More information: Learn more by visiting: Learn more by visiting: brilliantfuture.uci.edu/uci-sc  l-of-social-sciences

Provided by University of California
Llobregat Delta, in Barcelona. (Author: ICTA-UAB)

A new study undertaken by researchers at the Institute of Environmental Science and Technology of the Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona (ICTA-UAB) supports protestors' concerns about damage to the Llobregat Delta in Barcelona Airport expansion plans.

The research, carried out in 2019, found that the well-maintained and unique natural environment of the Llobregat Delta is important or very important to 100 percent residents and 98.8 percent of visitors who responded to the survey.

The recently published article in Environmental Science and Policy found that the greatest frustrations that residents and visitors expressed related to the expansion of the airport and urban areas. Participants surveyed expressed concern about future airport expansion plans, and expressed their desire that these plans be modified.

"What is remarkable about the results is the amount of agreement among residents and visitors about the importance of the natural values of the Llobregat Delta. Even though the airport is nearby, people value being able to be able to access a protected natural area so close to Barcelona", explains Dr. Sonia Graham, the researcher leading the project. Dr. Graham recalls that, "during the interviews, a Barcelona resident told researchers that they would not like the airport to grow larger, and to have an impact on the area. They stated that the impact on the beach area by a possible expansion would be quite a hard blow, horrific". The wetlands, birdwatching huts and walking paths are highly valued ecosystem services and infrastructure that enable residents and visitors to experience and appreciate this unique area.

Llobregat Delta, in Barcelona. Credit: ICTA-UAB

Beatrice Meo, the lead author of the article, explains that not only are people concerned about the expansion of the airport, they are also worried about the impacts of climate change. "About 90 percent of residents and visitors are very or fairly concerned about the impacts of climate change on the Llobregat Delta. More than 60 percent of respondents believe we are already feeling the effects of climate change now", she says.

The work took place between March and June 2019. It involved in-depth interviews and a survey of residents and visitors to the Llobregat Delta. The interviews and survey collected data on what residents and visitors value about the natural environment, and how concerned they are about the impacts of climate change on the delta.

Explore further Delta reports another loss but sees jump in leisure travel

More information: Beatrice Meo et al, The resident and visitor gaze: A comparison of coastal social values at risk due to sea-level rise, Environmental Science & Policy (2021). Beatrice Meo et al, The resident and visitor gaze: A comparison of coastal social values at risk due to sea-level rise,(2021). DOI: 10.1016/j.envsci.2021.05.017
Can we always distinguish between what's natural and what's artificial? And does that distinction even make sense? Credit: David Padilla

Is natural always good and artificial always bad? We talked to psychologist Angela Bearth and biotechnologist Sven Panke about science, skepticism, misunderstandings and how language influences the way we think.

Ms. Bearth, based on your research in the Consumer Behavior Group, why do you think people get so emotionally worked up about techniques they see as artificial, such as genetically modified plants or vaccines?

Angela Bearth: The term "artificial" has negative connotations and is often associated with risk. Most people won't automatically know how an mRNA-based vaccine works, for example. That's the kind of situation where we tend to rely on so-called heuristicsmental shortcuts or simplified rules of thumb that help us make quick decisions of the type "if it's artificial, it must be bad".

Mr. Panke, your area of specialization is synthetic biology, which sounds pretty artificial

Sven Panke: That term was coined by an MIT and Berkeley working group, and we've never been very happy with it! As science branding goes, I would say it hits all the wrong notes, at least in Europe. But, yes, at its core, synthetic biology is about creating genetic circuits that do something useful in a cell. It always involves some kind of manipulation of a biological systemand, of course, that's another word with negative connotations.

So language influences our attitudes towards these things?

Bearth: This is one of the biggest challenges and something I'm also looking at in my work. If I ask you how dangerous you think biotechnology is, then I've already implied that it might be dangerous. A better approach is to start with a broad focus and talk about bigger issues before actually asking for people's opinions.

Coronavirus and the mRNA-based vaccine are the big issues right now. Mr. Panke, you're in charge of a new EU consortium that is examining the therapeutic benefits of mRNA. What are you aiming to achieve?

Panke: We want to find out if we can leave the realm of chemistry that nature has laid out for us. What possibilities might we unearth by working at a cellular level to manipulate molecules that exist in the same form just about everywhere? Might that enable us to develop new drugs, for example?

People have always striven to stretch the bounds of possibility. Is what's happening in research today really any different?

Panke: When we look at nature, we see how certain types of molecules appear again and again in virtually the same form, such as DNA. You could argue that just suggesting we try something different is already pushing back the boundaries.

So perhaps some skepticism is justified?

Bearth: Skepticism isn't a bad thing per se. It's actually good to instinctively take a precautionary approach. When we are unsure, we try to protect ourselves on an individual level. But it becomes problematic when decisions on a societal level are based purely on feelings and not on science.

Does public skepticism affect you, Mr. Panke?

Panke: Absolutely! I couldn't do things that would upset or alienate everyone around me. That's not in my personality. Obviously we're very open to new things at ETH. But that's balanced by a raft of government regulations that give me the framework for my research. I can move within that framework without having to constantly worry that I might be about to do something wrong.

Ms. Bearth, as well as being a researcher at ETH, you're also Vice President of the Forum for Genetic Research at SCNAT. What's your experience of the interaction between science, policymakers and the general public?

Bearth: For the most part, I find it very constructive. We're witnessing a new generation that grew up with climate activism and sees plenty of opportunities in new technologies. CRISPR has a better image than traditional genetic research. In addition, the research community is becoming more aware of the issue and is investing more in science communication.

Panke: Those of us working in synthetic biology have certainly tried to engage in dialogue early on, but overall I have a very different impression of the current situation. It seems to me that society has lost a huge amount of trust in scientists since the 1980s. There's a crisis of confidence, and our efforts to remedy this with better information aren't working. People don't believe us any more because we've messed things up too many times in the past.

Bearth: I don't think that's the case. Hardly any studies point to a steady decline in people's trust in science. In reality, the level of trust is pretty much stable, and in some areas it's even increasing. If there is the opposite impression, it might be because people who have lost trust in science are very vocal. Ultimately, they are a minority, but they are well organized. For example, the anti-vaccine movement is a powerful campaigning force. Their message can certainly undermine trust but mostly just makes people feel a little unsettled.

Panke: But what about genetic engineering in plant breeding? Researchers working in that field have tried so hard to get information out to the public, but my feeling is that none of their efforts have ever really got anywhere. Why is that?

Bearth: I agree that information is probably not the only solution. We can't all become experts in everything, but people do need to have some basic understanding of the issues. We recently did a study on potato blight where we offered people various solutions. Interestingly, the approach people were most enthusiastic about was gene transfer, which is gene technology. And that was true whether or not we used the term gene technology. People tend to generalize about consumers being against genetic engineering, but I don't think it's as simple as that.

One of the arguments that's often used to support genetic engineering and CRISPR is that we're doing the same thing that nature does, only faster and in a more targeted way. Is that a fair point?

Bearth: Obviously those technologies can produce mutations that might also occur in nature. The difference is that genetic engineering involves a specific person with a specific intention, who can then be held responsible for it. This is where consumers might judge differently, whereas a scientist wouldn't necessarily take that issue into account. Basic researchers don't put a big emphasis on which company uses a technology or who profits, but public opinion takes all those kinds of things into consideration.

Can we always distinguish between what's natural and what's artificial? And does that distinction even make sense?

Panke: It absolutely makes sense, because we're talking about social codes that are clearly important. Society uses the terms natural and artificial to contrast and compare certain things. As a scientist, I don't have sole power to define those words, and I wouldn't even want to. Instead, I need to focus on what society feels about what I do.

Bearth: I would largely agree with that, but I do think there's a problem when these terms lead to uninformed decisions, especially on a political or societal level. I've done a lot of research into toxicology, and it's a great example of how people misunderstand basic concepts. Many people think that the word "chemical" refers to something in a test tube, but not to the air we breathe or the water we drink. And that of course can quickly lead to all sorts of misunderstandings.

Mr. Panke, does it bother you that scientists and lay people interpret the terms differently?

Panke: No, quite the opposite! Scientists like me and the insights we offer are just part of a broader toolkit. We try to use the means we have at our disposal to help build the society of the future, but we shouldn't see our contribution as some kind of absolute.

Explore further The irrational consumer: Decision making based on feelings rather than facts
Credit: CC0 Public Domain

University of Delaware disaster researcher A.R. Siders said it's time to put all the options on the table when it comes to discussing climate change adaptation.

Managed retreatthe purposeful movement of people, buildings and other assets from areas vulnerable to hazardshas often been considered a last resort. But Siders said it can be a powerful tool for expanding the range of possible solutions to cope with rising sea levels, flooding and other climate change effects when used proactively or in combination with other measures.

Siders, a core faculty member in UD's Disaster Research Center, and Katharine J. Mach, associate professor at the University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science, provide a prospective roadmap for reconceptualizing the future using managed retreat in a new paper published online in Science on June 17, 2021.

"Climate change is affecting people all over the world, and everyone is trying to figure out what to do about it. One potential strategy, moving away from hazards, could be very effective, but it often gets overlooked," said Siders, assistant professor in the Joseph R. Biden, Jr. School of Public Policy and Administration and the Department of Geography and Spatial Sciences. "We are looking at the different ways society can dream bigger when planning for climate change and how community values and priorities play a role in that."

Managed retreat is the purposeful movement of people, buildings and infrastructure away from areas vulnerable to flooding, sea level rise or other climate change hazards. Used strategically, it can open the door to new possibilities. Credit: Mach, Siders.

Retreat does not mean defeat

Managed retreat has been happening for decades all over the United States at a very small scale with state and/or federal support. Siders pointed to Hurricanes Harvey and Florence as weather events that caused homeowners near the Gulf of Mexico to seek government support for relocation. Locally, towns such as Bowers Beach, near the Delaware coast, have used buyouts to remove homes and families from flood-prone areas, an idea that Southbridge in Wilmington is also exploring.

People often oppose the idea of leaving their homes, but Siders said thinking seriously about managed retreat sooner and in context with other available tools can reinforce decisions by prompting difficult conversations. Even if communities decide to stay in place, identifying the things community members value can help them decide what they want to maintain and what they purposely want to change.

"If the only tools you think about are beach nourishment and building walls, you're limiting what you can do, but if you start adding in the whole toolkit and combining the options in different ways, you can create a much wider range of futures," she said.

In the paper, Siders and Mach argue that long-term adaptation will involve retreat. Even traditionally accepted visions of the future, like building flood walls and elevating threatened structures, will involve small-scale retreat to make space for levees and drainage. Larger-scale retreat may be needed for more ambitious transformations, such as building floating neighborhoods or cities, turning roads into canals in an effort to live with the water, or building more dense, more compact cities on higher ground.

Some, but not all these futures currently exist.

New research from the University of Delaware's A.R. Siders and Katharine Mach, from the University of Miami, found that managed retreat can't be seen as a last resort -- it must be paired with existing (flood walls) or future (floating cities) measures to be effective. Credit: Jeffrey C. Chase/ University of Delaware

In the Netherlands, the municipality of Rotterdam has installed floating homes in Nassau harbor that move with the tides, providing a sustainable waterfront view for homeowners while making room for public-friendly green space along the water. In New York City, one idea under consideration is building into the East River to accommodate a floodwall. Both cities are using combination strategies that leverage more than one adaptation tool.

Adaptation decisions don't have to be either/or decisions. However, it is important to remember that these efforts take time, so planning should begin now.

"Communities, towns, and cities are making decisions now that affect the future," said Siders. "Locally, Delaware is building faster inside the floodplain than outside of it. We are making plans for beach nourishment and where to build seawalls. We're making these decisions now, so we should be considering all the options on the table now, not just the ones that keep people in place."

According to Siders, the paper is a conversation starter for researchers, policymakers, communities and residents that are invested in helping communities thrive amid changing climate. These discussions, she said, shouldn't focus solely on where we need to move from, but also where we should avoid building, where new building should be encouraged, and how we should build differently.

"Managed retreat can be more effective in reducing risk, in ways that are socially equitable and economically efficient, if it is a proactive component of climate-driven transformations," said Mach. "It can be used to address climate risks, along with other types of responses like building seawalls or limiting new development in hazard-prone regions."

Globally, Siders said the U.S. is in a privileged position, in terms of the available space, money and resources, relative to other countries facing more complicated futures. The Republic of Kiribati, a chain of islands in the central Pacific Ocean, for example, is expected to be under water in the future. Some of its islands already are uninhabitable.

The Kiribati government has bought land in Fiji for relocation and is developing programs with Australia and New Zealand to provide skilled workforce training so the Kiribati people can migrate with dignity when the time comes. Challenges remain, though, since not everyone is on board with moving.

In a recent special issue of the Journal of Environmental Studies and Sciences, edited and introduced by Siders and Idowu (Jola) Ajibade at Portland State University, researchers examined the social justice implications of managed retreat in examples from several countries, including the U.S., Marshall Islands, New Zealand, Peru, Sweden, Taiwan, Austria and England. The scientists explored how retreat affects groups of people and, in the U.S., specifically considered how retreat affects marginalized populations.

So, how can society do better? According to Siders, it starts with longer-term thinking.

"It's hard to make good decisions about climate change if we are thinking 5-10 years out," said Siders. "We are building infrastructure that lasts 50-100 years; our planning scale should be equally long."

Siders will give a keynote address and research presentation on the topic at a virtual managed retreat conference at Columbia University, June 22-25, 2021.

Explore further The case for retreat in the battle against climate change
How much do traditional practices contribute to the protection of local biodiversity? Why and how are sacred groves locally valued and protected, and how can this be promoted and harnessed for environmental protection? Working together with the University of Kurdistan, researchers at the University of Gottingen and the University of Kassel have examined the backgrounds of this form of local environmental protection in Iran. Credit: Zahed Shakeri

How much do traditional practices contribute to the protection of local biodiversity? Why and how are sacred groves locally valued and protected, and how can this be promoted and harnessed for environmental protection? Working together with the University of Kurdistan, researchers of the University of Gottingen and the University of Kassel have examined the backgrounds of this form of local environmental protection in Baneh County, Iran.

"Around the world, local communities are voluntarily protecting certain parts of their surroundings due to religious reasonsbe it in Ethiopia, Morocco, Italy, China or India," reports Professor Tobias Plieninger, head of the section Social-ecological Interactions in Agricultural Systems at the universities of Kassel and Gottingen. Sacred natural sites are places where traditional myths and stories meet local ecological knowledge and environmental protection. Beyond state-based protection programs, these form a network of informal nature reserves.

In the contested border areas between Iran and Iraq, state-run environmental protection programs are often failing, while natural resources are under a lot of pressure. Even in such areas of conflict, patches of highly biodiverse woodlands still exist thanks to informal conservation traditionsin the form of decades-old sacred natural sites, some of which are known as the 'sacred groves."

In the Middle East, sacred groves are quite common, but there has been very little research into these biocultural hotspots. They usually belong to a Mosque and serve as village cemeteries, the use of which is strictly regulated. Even though they usually cover only a small area1 hectare on averagethey are comparatively rich in biodiversity, provide numerous ecosystem services and are of great cultural and spiritual importance to local communities.

Local people regard them as the abodes of their ancestors. Dr. Zahed Shakeri, who accompanied the project as a post-doc researcher and grew up in the region himself, reports on the numerous myths and legends that surround these sites and demand a careful maintenance as well as respectful behavior. "Our research group developed a fascination for the botanical treasures of these sites," Plieninger tells. In a vegetation study, they found out that the taxonomic diversity in sacred groves is much higher than in neighboring cultivated lands. The vegetation composition, too, is fundamentally different here.

"The 22 sacred groves examined comprised 20% of the flora of the whole region. Moreover, they host multiple rare and endangered plants, and represent complex niches for threatened animals," Shakeri reports. "Due to this taxonomic diversity, sacred groves can serve as an important complement to formally protected areas in the region, and as baselines in their reconstruction." Today, due to changes in customary rights, population growth and the loss of traditional faiths, the number and condition of such sacred natural sites are decreasing around the world. Thus, local people's perceptions regarding sacred groves as well as the reasons for their relatively good condition in the region were also subject of this research.

On the basis of interviews with 205 residents from 25 villages, the research group identified people's key motivations for the protectionof the areas: In particular spiritual values, the preservation of cultural and spiritual heritage as well as of local biodiversity played a role. Furthermore, the importance of taboos became clear, which particularly prohibit the use of natural resources (for instance forest clearance, hunting and livestock grazing) and road construction, but also regulate the general behavior within these sites.

Even though these social values and taboos are considered relatively stable in the province of Kurdistan, the interviewees repeatedly referred to the threatened situation of the groves in the region. Especially elderly and rural people, women and people with traditional lifestyles were regarded as the holders of these values and taboos. "Protection programs could support these groups to defend and revive their customs. At the same time, young and urban people with modern lifestyles represent an important target group for awareness-raising," Shakeri summarizes.

The example of sacred groves demonstrates that social dynamics and especially cultural values deserve greater attention in environmental protection: "Such a biocultural approach to conservation that considers different worldviews and knowledge systems, could translate social taboos and the related land-use practices into socially acceptable and environmentally effective conservation outcomes," Plieninger concludes.

Explore further Conservation through religion? Scientists confirm that sacred natural sites confer biodiversity advantage

More information: Zahed Shakeri et al, Spiritual values shape taxonomic diversity, vegetation composition, and conservation status in woodlands of the Northern Zagros, Iran, Ecology and Society (2021). Journal information: Ecology and Society Zahed Shakeri et al, Spiritual values shape taxonomic diversity, vegetation composition, and conservation status in woodlands of the Northern Zagros, Iran,(2021). DOI: 10.5751/ES-12290-260130
A schematic illustration of the FlyPol spectropolarimeter. Image credit: Lucas Patty.

It could be a milestone on the path to detecting life on other planets: Scientists under the leadership of the University of Bern and of the National Center of Competence in Research (NCCR) PlanetS detect a key molecular property of all living organisms from a helicopter flying several kilometers above ground. The measurement technology could also open up opportunities for remote sensing of the Earth.

Left hands and right hands are almost perfect mirror images of each other. But whatever way they are twisted and turned, they cannot be superimposed onto each other. This is why the left glove simply won't fit the right hand as well as it fits the left. In science, this property is referred to as chirality.

Just like hands are chiral, molecules can be chiral, too. In fact, most molecules in the cells of living organisms, such as DNA, are chiral. Unlike hands, however, that usually come in pairs of left and right, the molecules of life almost exclusively occur in either their "left-handed" or their "right-handed" version. They are homochiral, as researchers say. Why that is, is still not clear. But this molecular homochirality is a characteristic property of life, a so-called biosignature.

As part of the MERMOZ project (see info box), an international team led by the University of Bern and the National Center of Competence in Research NCCR PlanetS, has now succeeded in detecting this signature from a distance of 2 kilometers and at a velocity of 70 kph. Jonas Kuhn, MERMOZ project manager of the University of Bern and co-author of the study that has just been published in the journal Astronomy and Astrophysics, says: "The significant advance is that these measurements have been performed in a platform that was moving, vibrating and that we still detected these biosignatures in a matter of seconds."

An instrument that recognizes living matter

"When light is reflected by biological matter, a part of the light's electromagnetic waves will travel in either clockwise or counterclockwise spirals. This phenomenon is called circular polarization and is caused by the biological matter's homochirality. Similar spirals of light are not produced by abiotic non-living nature," says the first author of the study Lucas Patty, who is a MERMOZ postdoctoral researcher at the University of Bern and member of the NCCR PlanetS,

The spectropolarimeter instrument FlyPol aboard the helicopter, with which the team carried out the experiment. Image Credit: Jonas Kuhn

Measuring this circular polarization, however, is challenging. The signal is quite faint and typically makes up less than one percent of the light that is reflected. To measure it, the team developed a dedicated device called a spectropolarimeter. It consists of a camera equipped with special lenses and receivers capable of separating the circular polarization from the rest of the light.

Yet even with this elaborate device, the new results would have been impossible until recently. "Just 4 years ago, we could detect the signal only from a very close distance, around 20 cm, and needed to

observe the same spot for several minutes to do so," as Lucas Patty recalls. But the upgrades to the instrument he and his colleagues made, allow a much faster and stable detection, and the strength of the signature in circular polarization persists even with distance. This rendered the instrument fit for the first ever aerial circular polarization measurements.

Useful measurements on earth and in space

Using this upgraded instrument, dubbed FlyPol, they demonstrated that within mere seconds of measurements they could differentiate between grass fields, forests and urban areas from a fast moving helicopter. The measurements readily show living matter exhibiting the characteristic polarization signals, while roads, for example, do not show any significant circular polarization signals. With the current setup, they are even capable of detecting signals coming from algae in lakes.

After their successful tests, the scientists now look to go even further. "The next step we hope to take, is to perform similar detections from the International Space Station (ISS), looking down at the Earth. That will allow us to assess the detectability of planetary-scale biosignatures. This step will be decisive to enable the search for life in and beyond our Solar System using polarization," says MERMOZ principal investigator and co-author Brice-Olivier Demory, professor of astrophysics at the University of Bern and member of the NCCR PlanetS says.

The sensitive observation of these circular polarization signals is not only important for future life detection missions. Lucas Patty explains: "Because the signal directly relates to the molecular composition of life and thus its functioning, it can also offer valuable complementary information in Earth remote sensing." It can for instance provide information about deforestation or plant disease. It might even be possible to implement circular polarization in the monitoring of toxic algal blooms, of coral reefs and the effects of acidification thereon.

Explore further Highly sensitive detection of circularly polarized light without a filter
Credit: Robert A. MacArthur/Kevin L. Campbell

New research by University of Liverpool scientists and international collaborators has revealed how the world's smallest diving mammalthe water shrewevolved to survive for long periods underwater without breathing.

"Water shrews are perhaps the most unlikely of all underwater foragers. Their low body oxygen stores coupled with the highest rates of oxygen use and loss of body heat among mammals provide formidable challenges to spending any time underwater," explains Liverpool researcher Dr. Michael Berenbrink.

The team's new study, published in the journal eLife, sampled DNA from 71 different shrew and mole species all belonging to a large group of related, insect-eating mammals called Eulipotyphla.

In contrast to previous studies that relied on morphological similarities and a fragmentary fossil record, the researchers used a novel comparative molecular approach to map the evolution of the oxygen-binding protein myoglobin and reconstruct the origins of diving lifestyles within the group.

Their analysis showed that the there have been three independent transitions to underwater foraging among shrews and two further independent transitions in the related desmans and star-nosed mole.

Dr. Berenbrink, who was a co-lead author on the study, said: "Our research resolves the century-old controversy about the evolutionary origins of this unlikely specialized lifestyle among shrews and slightly larger moles in one of the most diverse and species-rich order of mammals.

"It is an example of the value of long-term, low cost international research collaboration, that utilizes museum collections and field work to build up comprehensive data sets over many years. I am particularly proud of co-author and Liverpool Zoology graduate Hannah Czolacz, whose undergraduate project work contributed to this research."

Explore further Researchers discover the Sulawesi hairy-tailed shrew

More information: Kai He et al, Myoglobin primary structure reveals multiple convergent transitions to semi-aquatic life in the world's smallest mammalian divers, eLife (2021). Journal information: eLife Kai He et al, Myoglobin primary structure reveals multiple convergent transitions to semi-aquatic life in the world's smallest mammalian divers,(2021). DOI: 10.7554/eLife.66797
The picture shows Sentinel-1As solar array before and after the impact of a millimetre-size particle on the second panel. The damaged area has a diameter of about 40 cm, which is consistent on this structure with the impact of a fragment of less than 5 millimetres in size. Credit: ESA

There's a problem brewing overhead. Invisible to the naked eye and relatively unheard of, it threatens our future in spacespace debris.

A new "Space Sustainability Rating' is currently in development that will shed light on the problem, scoring space operators on the sustainability of their missions, increasing the transparency of their contributions to protecting the space environment and encouraging and recognizing responsible behavior.

The global initiative, launched by the World Economic Forum, is the first of its kind. In a situation in which no single government or authority has the power to set and enforce strict rules of behavior for all space-faring organizations, this project promises to be a game changer.

Much like the energy efficiency and nutrition labels now common on household items, food products and consumer goods, the Space Sustainability Rating will make clear what individual companies and organizations are doing to sustain and improve the health of the near-Earth environment.

Sustainability rating enters next phase

The SSR initiative has been developed over the past two years by the Forum, ESA and a joint team led by the Space Enabled Research Group at the MIT Media Lab, with collaboration from BryceTech and the University of Texas at Austin.

For the crucial next step, the Space Center (eSpace) at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne (EPFL) has been selected to lead and operate the Space Sustainability Rating in preparation for its roll out.

"The Forum is very glad to support such an innovative approach to the global challenge of space debris," says Nikolai Khlystov, Community Lead for Mobility and Space at the World Economic Forum.

"Incentivising better behavior by enabling actors to compete on sustainability will create a 'race to the top' and eSpace at EPFL is a great organization to take the SSR to the next level."

Satellites in orbit share near-Earth space with millions of fast-moving and dangerous debris objects. From tiny fragments millimetres in size to entire satellites no longer working, no longer controlled, roaming the space highways, each debris piece travels many kilometres per second. Any impact with one of these objects threatens to atleast impair the functioning of a working spacecraft, or at worst destroy it altogether, creating ever more debris. In this infographic from ESA and the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA), find out about the scale of the debris problem: how much of it is up there, what scales are we talking about, and what are our satellites are up against? Credit: ESA / UNOOSA

ESA measures the impact

The SSR rating system will score the sustainability of spaceflight operators based on factors ranging from data sharing, choice of orbit, measures taken to avoid collisions and plans to de-orbit satellites at end of mission to how easily their satellites can be detected and identified from the ground. There will be 'bonus marks' for adding optional elements, such as grappling fixtures, that could be used for the possible future active removal of debris.

"The SSR aims to influence behavior by all spaceflight actors, especially commercial entities, and help bring into common usage the sustainable practices that we desperately require," said Holger Krag, Head of ESA's Space Safety Program.

"To achieve this, the SSR rating includes a peer-reviewed assessment of the short- and long-term risks that any mission presents to other operators and for our orbital environment in general."

Powered by ESA expertise

ESA's Space Debris Office, located at the Agency's ESOC mission control center in Darmstadt, Germany, has for years studied the debris environment, becoming a world-leading authority on this issue of global concern.

The Agency's role in the development of the Space Sustainability Rating includes helping to define the 'rating architecture," i.e. the criteria on which space missions should be judged, and providing expert analysis, data and technical know-how developed over many years.

One particularly important component of the SSR is the new methodology for quantifying the space debris risk associated with a mission. It takes into account the additional burden the new mission poses to the operations of existing ones and its potential impact on the long-term evolution of the space debris environment.

Once the rating system has entered operation, ESA will support EPFL in evaluating this potential impact for new space missions. The Agency will also take a seat on the Space Sustainability Rating Advisory Board, as well as continuing to assist in many other ways.

Credit: ESA - European Space Agency

Rewarding good behavior

Satellites have become the backbone of our modern economies, providing navigation services, telecommunications, weather forecasting, climate monitoring and television broadcasts among many other critical services. Humankind's reliance on space infrastructure is set to increase sharply with the launch of large constellations of small satellites designed to boost global internet access among other important services.

There are currently close to 4,000 active satellites in orbit, including the inhabited outposts of the International Space Station and the Tiangong Space Station, currently under construction.

Exponential growth

As many more organizations from many more countries prepare to launch new missions, this number is set to grow exponentially. This will inevitably increase the risk of collisions and raises questions about the capacity of economically vital near-Earth orbits to safely and sustainably accommodate so many craft.

By voluntarily joining the new SSR system, spacecraft operators, launch service providers and satellite manufacturers will be able to secure one of four levels of certification that they can advertise widely to demonstrate their mission's commitment to sustainability.

Boosting transparency and doing right

This will increase transparencywithout disclosing any mission-sensitive or proprietary commercial informationand is expected to incentivise good behavior by other stakeholders in addressing the problem of space debris. A favorable score for a particular rated operator might, for example, result in lower insurance costs or improved funding conditions from financial backers.

Ghosts of historic space endeavorsold satellites and rocket bodieslitter Earth orbits. While missions are being developed to remove some of these objects, it's vital that we don't repeat the mistakes of the past. The Space Sustainability Rating will play an important part in wider measures to ensure the responsible use of space, and its sustainable future for all.

About the Space Sustainability Rating

Over the two-year development period of the SSR, numerous operators within the space industry have been engaged in the evolution of the rating system and there is already widespread interest in this new tool. Several companies, including Airbus, Astroscale, AXA XL, elseco, Lockheed Martin, Planet, SpaceX and Voyager Space Holdings, have actively supported the SSR concept and expressed interest in participating once it is publicly launched. More information via the World Economic Forum website.

Explore further Space Sustainability Rating aims to address growing amount of space debris orbiting earth
Visibility map. The RockOn launch may be seen from southern Delaware to the Chesapeake Bay-Bridge Tunnel. Credit: NASA

After being developed via a virtual learning experience, more than 70 experiments built by university students across the United States are ready for flight on NASA suborbital flight vehicles.

The launch of a NASA Terrier-Improved Orion suborbital sounding rocket carrying some of the students' experiments will be conducted at 8 a.m. EDT, Thursday, June 24, from NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia. The rocket launch is expected to be seen from the eastern shore of Virginia and Maryland and southern Delaware.

"One of the great attributes of the NASA suborbital flight vehicles is the ability to support educational flight activities," said Giovanni Rosanova, chief of the NASA Sounding Rockets Program Office at Wallops. "Despite the challenges that dealing with COVID 19 presented, everyone came together to make this launch happen this year after having to postpone the project in 2020."

Live coverage of the mission is scheduled to begin at 7:40 a.m. on the Wallops YouTube site. Launch updates also are available via the Wallops Facebook and Twitter profiles. The Wallops NASA Visitor Center will not be open for launch viewing.

"Typically, students from across the country descend upon Wallops days before launch to learn about rocketry and building experiments for spaceflight through the week-long RockOn! workshop," said Chris Koehler, director of the Colorado Space Grant Consortium. "This year to maintain social distancing due to COVID-19, the workshop was conducted virtually."

"Conducting the workshop virtually presented many challenges. However, everyone involved stepped up to the plate to make this a successful program," Koehler said.

A Terrier-Improved Orion with a RockOn/RockSat-C payload on the launch pad from a previous flight. Credit: NASA

This year, RockOn! had 102 participants. Colorado Space Grant sent the participants the materials needed to participate in the workshop and build their experiments. The participants then shipped their experiments to Colorado for checkout and integration. A team from Colorado then delivered the experiments to Wallops for the launch.

During past in-person workshops, participants have worked in groups of three to build experiments. Koehler said, "One big advantage of the virtual process is that participants worked in small teams or individually at their own pace."

The virtual process enabled more experiments to be successfully developed than in previous years, resulting in more flight-ready projects than could be accommodated on the rocket. Therefore, 34 of the experiments will fly on the High-Altitude Student Platform through the Louisiana Space Consortium on a NASA scientific balloon in Fall 2021 from Ft. Sumner, New Mexico.

The 36-foot long two-stage rocket will carry 32 experiments (measuring acceleration, humidity, pressure, temperature and radiation counts) from the RockOn! Program, 8experiments in the RockSat-C program and more than 60small cubes with experiments developed by middle school and high school students as part of the Cubes in Space program, a partnership between idoodlelearning inc., Wallops and the Colorado Space Grant Consortium.

Conducted with the Colorado and Virginia Space Grant Consortia, RockOn! is in its thirteenth year and RockSat-C its twelfth year.

Participants in RockOn! receive instruction on the basics required to develop a scientific payload for flight on a suborbital rocket. After learning the basics in RockOn!, students may then participate in RockSat-C, where during the school year they design and build a more complicated experiment for rocket flight.

The sounding rocket will fly the student experiments to nearly 73-miles altitude. The experiments will land via parachute in the Atlantic Ocean where they will be recovered by boat.

Explore further Rocket carrying student experiments launched from Wallops
One in three people with vision impairment did not gain quality employment despite earning qualifications in line with the general population. Credit: Mikhail Nilov from Pexels

A Longitudinal Transition Study just published by the Vision Impairment Center for Teaching and Research (VICTAR) at the University of Birmingham and Thomas Pocklington Trust (TPT) shows one in three people with vision impairment did not gain quality employment despite earning qualifications in line with the general population.

The study tracked 82 participants from England over a period of 11 years (from age 14 to 25) to improve understanding on why this population is vulnerable to becoming long term NEET (not in education, employment or training).

Many of the young people spoke positively about their experiences in school and achieved average or above average GCSE qualifications. But then faced a range of barriers when entering Further Education, Higher Education and ultimately the employment market.

Rachel Hewett, Birmingham Fellow at the Vision Impairment Center for Teaching and Research School of Education, University of Birmingham said: "The research identified key challenges once the young people transitioned into Further Education (FE). Many young people found adjustments were not put in place in time and they had a lack of access to specialist support.

"Careers guidance often focused on keeping the young person in education, with limited support for transitioning into employment. This led to some of the participants 'churning' in the system."

Many barriers were observed once the participants moved into Higher Education, such as an inaccessible application process for UCAS and Disabled Students' Allowance (DSA), and inaccessible virtual learning environments and a failure from institutions to make reasonable adjustments. This led to some of the cohort withdrawing from their courses, repeating modules or entire academic years, or leaving with a degree classification which they feel did not reflect their ability.

Several of the participants wished to pursue apprenticeships but were unable to identify suitable opportunities or access specialist support to help them consider alternative options.

Tara Chattaway, Head of Education at TPT said: "It is evident that young people with vision impairment are not getting the support at transition periods in their lives. The lack of support, accessibility and inclusion can impact on the quality of education the young person receives and on then on their employment opportunities. We are calling on Government to bridge this gap and to ensure that the Skills and Post-16 Education Bill and their response to the impending SEND review truly supports the aspirations and learning needs of vision impaired students."

At the end of the study 66% of the remaining participants were in some form of employment, 17% remained NEET, including seven young people who by the age of 25 had never experienced paid employment. Of particular concern is the lack of support available to help young people with vision impairment access employment once they become NEET, with several of the young people being actively discouraged by Jobcentre Plus staff to search for employment, in favor of long-term benefits.

The research did identify factors that drive positive outcomes for young people with vision impairment. They include:

Self-advocacy skills and a good understanding of their vision impairment and the adjustments they require.

A well developed and broad range of skills for accessing information.

Mobility and orientation skills, including skills for getting around in unfamiliar environments.

Tara added: "At TPT we understand the importance vision impaired students having the right access to materials, assistive technology and independence skills in order to thrive in education and to transition into employment. More must be done."

Explore further Students with vision impairment face a cliff edge when entering the workforce

More information: Lost in Transition? The post-school experiences of young people with vision impairment: Lost in Transition? The post-school experiences of young people with vision impairment: www.pocklington-trust.org.uk/w  ion-final-report.pdf
Sri Lankan navy personnel remove debris washed ashore from the MV X-Press Pearl ship in Colombo.

More dead turtles washed up on Sri Lankan beaches Friday, underscoring the environmental blight caused by a container ship fire off the country's coast.

The Singapore-registered MV X-Press Pearl was carrying hundreds of tonnes of chemicals and plastics when it caught fire last month, before burning for two weeks. Since June 2 its wreckage has been partially submerged off the capital Colombo.

Wildlife officials said the carcass of an olive ridley turtlea species listed as threatened by the International Union for Conservation of Naturewas found at the tourist resort area of Bentara, 80 kilometres (50 miles) south of Colombo.

Another was seen on a beach in Induruwa, just south of Bentara, raising to 15 the number found in the southern tourist resort belt, an official said.

"We see a clear link with the ship and the turtle deaths," the senior wildlife official on the island's south told AFP, declining to be named.

He said the disaster struck during the height of the turtles' mating season.

It is not unusual for some turtles to suffocate and die during the mating season, but deaths this year were "10 to 20 times more compared to last year", he said.

Local media reports have said more than 50 turtles and eight dolphins have been found dead across the island since the ship caught fire on May 20.

A Sri Lankan fishing boat operates against the backdrop of the MV X-Press Pearl, which lies partially submerged in shallow seas off Colombo.

Wildlife officials remove the carcass of a sea turtle washed ashore at Galle Face beach in Colombo last week.

As the fire spread, two explosions dumped several containers into the Indian Ocean, along with plastic pellets which blanketed nearby beaches.

The country's top environment official, Anil Jasinghe, on Thursday linked the deaths to the X-Press Pearl, but said he was still waiting for final autopsy reports.

About 1,200 tonnes of plastic pellets and other debris scooped from beaches are being stored in 45 shipping containers, officials said.

Sri Lanka is seeking $40 million in damages from the ship's operator, X-Press Feeders.

Environmentalists are suing the government and X-Press Feeders for allegedly failing to prevent what they have called Sri Lanka's worst marine environmental disaster, while Sri Lankan police have launched a criminal probe against the ship's captain, chief engineer and chief officer.

 2021 AFP
Panel A shows that male inventors have invented more for men than for women, which in turn has resulted in a sizeable gap in the sex focus of invention shown in Panel C since more men get to invent. However, Panel B shows that, after four decades of progress, the rise in femalefocused and -invented patents has shrunk and sometimes reversed that gap. Credit: Koning et al., Science (2021)

A trio of researchers from Harvard University, Universidad de Navarra and McGill University has found evidence that suggests fewer women receiving biomedical patents means that fewer inventions for devices or drugs to treat women are being developed. In their paper published in the journal Science, Rembrand Koning, Sampsa Samila and John-Paul Ferguson describe their study of patents awarded to inventors and what they found. Fiona Murray, with MIT, has published a commentary in the same journal issue outlining the work by the researchers in this new effort and describes how their findings fit in with those of other researchers who have looked into the issue of gender bias in the sciences.

Prior research has shown that women are underrepresented in scienceboth as students and as people who work in science fields. As a result, fewer women are working on efforts to develop medical devices or drugs to treat medical conditions. In this new effort, the researchers suggest this bias has led to harm to women, both in and out of the science community. They suggest the lack of women working on developing biomedical applications has led to fewer developments that address female-specific problems, as women are more likely to develop applications to address women's problems than are men.

The work involved obtaining access to U.S. biomedical patent information for the years 1976 to 2010 and then applying machine learning to the data. In so doing, they were able to see gender patterns. They found, for example, that inventor teams receiving biomedical patents that had equal numbers of male and female researchers grew from 6.3% of all those granted in 1976, to 16.2% in 2010. But they also found that teams made up mostly of women were 18% more likely to hold patents for applications that would help women. This indicates that if more teams had had more female members, more products geared toward resolving female problems would have been developedthey estimate the number of applications not developed due to this bias came to approximately 6,500 over the past 50 years.

Regression analyses show that patents with more women are more likely to be female-focused both within and across research areas. The same pattern holds for potentially patentable research. These patterns suggest that many promising female-focused medical treatments have yet to be commercialized because few women get to patent and invent. Credit: Koning et al., Science (2021)

Explore further Women listed as inventors in third of global patent filings: UN

More information: Rembrand Koning et al, Who do we invent for? Patents by women focus more on women's health, but few women get to invent, Science (2021). Rembrand Koning et al, Who do we invent for? Patents by women focus more on women's health, but few women get to invent,(2021). DOI: 10.1126/science.aba6990 Fiona Murray, Mothers of invention, Science (2021). DOI: 10.1126/science.abh3178 Journal information: Science

 2021 Science X Network
Dying clams on Hood Canal, Rocky Bay, 2019. Credit: King et al, Harmful Algae, 2021

Back in the summers of 2018 and 2019, the shellfish industry in Washington state was rocked by mass mortalities of its crops.

"It was oysters, clams, cocklesall bivalve species in some bays were impacted," said Teri King, aquaculture and marine water quality specialist at Washington Sea Grant based at the University of Washington. "They were dying, and nobody knew why."

Now, King and partners from NOAA National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science, NOAA Northwest Fisheries Science Center, Northwest Indian College and AquaTechnics Inc. think that they have finally sleuthed out the culprit: high concentrations of yessotoxinss, which are produced by blooms of certain phytoplankton. The researchers' findings were published last month in the open-access journal Harmful Algae.

Because yessotoxins are not a threat to human health, their presence in Washington has not been closely monitored. The researchers dug through data that had been collected by the NOAA Northwest Fisheries Science Center and NOAA National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science for different purposes, coupled it with current observations from the SoundToxins phytoplankton monitoring program, and discovered that these algae species, Protoceratium reticulatum and Akashiwo sanguinea, are correlated with shellfish mortality events stretching as far back as the 1930s.

The algae species Protoceratium reticulatum, seen under a microscope. Credit: Teri King/Washington Sea Grant

In 2018 and 2019, with SoundToxins partners' eyes on the water, and reports of dying shellfish from the Washington Department of Fish & Wildlife and the shellfish industry, the research team was able to collect shellfish and water samples for analysis. This set the table to help answer the mystery of what was causing summer mortality in Washington state shellfish.

These findings have significant implications for shellfish growers in the region.

"We are working towards being able to help growers count the cells of yessotoxin-producing organisms in the water and correlate it to an action level," King explained. "SoundToxins has been conducting similar work for the Washington Department of Health for three 'human health' marine biotoxins since 2006. Adding the 'shellfish killing' plankton species to the real-time mapping capability of the SoundToxins partnership would allow for shellfish producers and natural resource managers to make informed decisions, such as harvesting their product early or otherwise strategizing to save as much crop as possible."

Clams on Rocky Bay watershed, Case Inlet, July 2019. Credit: Teri King/Washington Sea Grant

King said this research is also a demonstration of the value of partnerships between shellfish producers, plankton monitors, Native tribes, agencies and researchers.

"We were a team of oceanographers, biologists and chemists working together to answer these questions," King said. "People are able to think differently when you have different people at the table."

Sometimes, it's even the key to solving the longstanding mysteries that have been taking place right in your backyard.

Explore further Algae blooms harmful to aquaculture: UN global assessment

More information: Teri L. King et al, Hiding in plain sight: Shellfish-killing phytoplankton in Washington State, Harmful Algae (2021). Teri L. King et al, Hiding in plain sight: Shellfish-killing phytoplankton in Washington State,(2021). DOI: 10.1016/j.hal.2021.102032
New York will begin scaling back its mass vaccination sites beginning next week, Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced on Friday.

The news comes just days after the state lifted most of its remaining COVID-19 restrictions after reaching its goal of administering at least one dose of the vaccines to 70% of adults in the state.

Our network of mass vaccination sites administered the biggest throughput of vaccinations in a short period of time, and thanks to their success we hit the milestones we needed to hit to get back to life as we know it, Cuomo said in a statement.

The state will now focus its efforts on vaccinating individuals in communities with low vaccination rates, Cuomo said.

On Monday, the state will close its mass vaccination sites in Corning, Oneonta, Potsdam and York College in New York City.

Its unclear when the vaccine site at Aviation Mall in Queensbury will close.

Locally, vaccination efforts continue to progress.

Warren County, on Friday, announced 60% of residents have been fully inoculated against the virus, the equivalent to 38,688 residents.
ARGYLE  A Salem man was injured when his plane crashed at Argyle Airport on Thursday morning.

The accident happened just after 11 a.m. at the private airport off Route 40.

Washington County Sheriffs deputies responded to the scene and found a fixed-wing, single-engine Cessna plane that had crashed.

The plane had heavy front end damage.

David L. Klingebiel, 80, of Bunker Hill Road, was the only occupant in the plane.

He was removed from the plane and transported by LifeNet helicopter to Albany Medical Center with head, chest and leg injuries, police said.

The light plane landed on its roof, according to police radio transmissions.

Police turned over the scene to the Federal Aviation Administration. The cause of the crash is under investigation.

The Fort Edward and Argyle fire departments, Argyle EMS and the Washington County Department of Public Safety also responded to the crash scene.

The airport has seen a few crashes over the years.
ALBANY  Operators of an Albany hospital agreed to stop levying hefty fines on nurses recruited from the Philippines and other countries if they left their jobs within three years and to return $90,000 to seven former nurses, New York Attorney General Letitia James announced Thursday.

The legal agreement ends contractual repayment fees for international nurse recruits at Albany Medical Center, which obligated them to pay up to $20,000 if they resigned or were fired before the end of their three-year employment commitment.

Nurses who didnt comply faced the threat of legal action or being reported to immigration authorities, according to court papers.

The attorney generals office argued the contract provision under permanent visa arrangements violated the federal Trafficking Victims Protection Act.

By forcing its employees to choose between paying outrageous sums to leave their jobs, or facing immigration authorities, Albany Med violated their rights as workers and as individuals, James said in a prepared release.

Albany Med Health System disputed the AGs findings. They agreed to remove the provision from employment contracts and to repay the seven nurses solely to avoid litigation costs, according to court papers.
NEW YORK  New York City municipal workers are not getting a paid Juneteenth holiday this year, despite a pledge last year from Mayor Bill de Blasio to make it one and as it becomes one for federal workers.

Juneteenth, on June 19th, marks the day in 1865, two months after the end of the Civil War and more than two years after the Emancipation Proclamation, that enslaved Black people in Texas were told by Union soldiers that they had been freed.

Its profile has risen in the wake of national conversations on racism and inequality, and last year, de Blasio said it would be an official city holiday starting this year.

But to make it one, the city would need to have labor negotiations with the unions representing city workers. As of Thursday, there have been discussions but no negotiations, according to the city.

President Joe Biden on Thursday signed legislation making Juneteenth a federal holiday.
Yes, I gave her flaws and vanities and, perhaps most significantly, strong opinions. I had her take sides. I was influenced by this thing that was in the air called deconstruction," she added. "The idea I took from it was precisely the idea that there is no such thing as a dispassionate observer, that every narrative is inflected by the narrators bias.

She was open about her feelings. In a New Yorker piece on the magazine Artforum, she interviewed the historian and Artforum contributor Rosalind Krauss and turned her subjects precisely furnished apartment into a most discerning character, writing: No one can leave this loft without feeling a little rebuked: ones own house suddenly seems cluttered, inchoate, banal.

In the book Iphigenia in Forest Hills, Malcolms account of a murder trial in New York City, she meets with the defense attorney after the verdict and agrees with his lament that the press had taken the prosecutions side.

Journalism is an enterprise of reassurance, she wrote. We do not wring our hands or rend our clothes over the senseless crimes and disasters that give us our subject. We explain and blame. We are connoisseurs of certainty. Hey, we got the killer. Dont worry. You can go to the playground. Nothing is going to happen.

Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

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Saunders-Hastings said Canadas decision to focus on more widespread, but weaker immunity means it will be several more months before the disparity is resolved.

A consequence of that is that our rates of double vaccination are quite low and were likely not going to see a surge until August or September, he noted.

That is not welcome news in North Countrys border communities from Plattsburgh to Sackets Harbor, where vital economic and family links have been severed for 16 months.

John Momot owns Blue Haven Campground in Ellenburg, just a few miles from the Canadian border in Clinton County. Canadians make up a huge part of his customer base.

Sixty-five percent of our seasonal guests come from Canada, he said at an event organized by the North Country Chamber of Commerce in Plattsburgh.

More than 4 million Canadians live less than an hour away in the Montreal metro area. They normally make regular trips across the border to visit lakes and mountains in New York, Vermont, and across New England.

However, without any visitors coming south businesses like restaurants, campgrounds and boat marinas have seen huge declines in customers.
Three members of a Belleplain family were arrested after police seized shotguns, rifles and drugs from their home Tuesday, Cape May County Prosecutor Jeffrey H. Sutherland said Thursday.

The investigation of Jared Weygand, 26, David Weygand, 67, and Carol Cramer-Weygand, 57, began when several packages containing about 500 pills of MDMA, or ecstasy, were delivered to their Chestnut Street home via U.S. mail, Sutherland said in a news release.

On Tuesday, the State Police TEAMS Unit executed a search warrant at the home, and the occupants were seen trying to destroy the evidence, Sutherland said. The three were arrested, and police recovered MDMA pills, a distribution amount of oxycodone, four shotguns, three rifles, a handgun and about $20,000 in cash.

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Jared Weygand was charged with possession with intent to distribute MDMA, possession of MDMA, conspiracy to distribute MDMA, conspiracy to possess MDMA and hindering.

David Weygard was charged with possession of oxycodone, possession of MDMA, possession with intent to distribute, possession with intent to distribute MDMA, possession of a firearm in the course of a drug offense, eight counts of unlawful possession of a weapon and money laundering.
MARGATE  City Commission on Thursday joined the growing list of communities in New Jersey saying no thanks to legalized marijuana.

The board voted 3-0 Thursday on two ordinances. One banned all cannabis businesses from setting up shop in town, and the other made it illegal to use cannabis products in public.

We are the official cannabis labor union, and we are asking you to table this ordinance and not ban good jobs, said Hugh Giordano, of Blackwood, representing the United Food and Commercial Workers union in Egg Harbor Township, which he said has 15,000 members in South Jersey.

Cannabis creates good union jobs, Giordano said, for those who study botany, horticulture, chemistry and pharmacy. It will attract young, educated people to live and work here.

Under the New Jersey Cannabis Regulatory, Enforcement Assistance and Marketplace Modernization Act, towns have until Aug. 21  180 days from the adoption of the state law  to create any local enforcement structure. Towns that do not act by then will be governed by the states law.

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While New Jersey has surpassed the governors goal, the percentage of the states roughly 9 million people who are vaccinated stands at about 54%.

The swell in vaccinated residents has led New Jersey to relax nearly all of the measures Murphy put in place beginning in March 2020. Just two weeks ago, he ended the public health emergency except for about a dozen executive orders. The number of new cases, hospitalizations and the rate of spread have been dropping for months.

The state is almost completely reopened for fully vaccinated individuals, with the only mask mandates being in places like state buildings, medical centers and long-term care buildings. Those exceptions will remain in place as the state continues to vaccinate more.

At the moment, no, Murphy said when asked by media whether the state will set additional goals for itself. Were just gonna keep the hammer down. Were gonna continue to plow ahead. I fully expect that well cross 5 million. I dont know know when, but that will not be that far in the future.

New Jersey was an early COVID hot spot last year, with 23,678 people succumbing to the disease. Now, Murphy says the outbreak is almost entirely among those who have not been vaccinated.
Theyd like to remove it in a whole section, but its been coming apart at the joints of the pipe and they are bringing it out in sections, he said.

He said the Army Corps was not concerned about any environmental impact from the operation and was confident all of the pipe would ultimately be located and removed, possibly as soon as this week. The remaining pipe sections that come apart isnt tiny pieces or anything like that, he said. Its pretty massive 100-foot sections that just come apart at the pipe joints.

On Thursday, directly across from the Troy Avenue beach, between a stand-up paddle boarder and a lifeguard boat bobbing in the waves, spurts of ocean water and sand could be seen rising up near the barge like a geyser. One of several tugboats carted off what appeared to be seven sections of pipe.

Winner, coincidentally a former Navy scuba diver and submarine sailor, said hed been staring at the barge for a week while on vacation from Central Pennsylvania. He said it reminded him of an operation to recover the Squalus submarine after it sunk off the coast of New Hampshire in the 1930s, which involved divers and fire hoses.

+8 South Jersey young people are increasingly applying to law school VENTNOR  The law has been an integral part of Vanessa Calixtos relatively short life.

Weve been watching, he said. I see a burst of water bubbling up every once in awhile.
Two pit bulls from Millville are among 21 heroic hounds in the running to become the countrys top dog in the 2021 American Humane Hero Dog Awards.

According to the contests news release, the American Humane Hero Dog Awards honor the best of our best friends and bring attention to the life-saving power of the human-animal bond.

K-9 Hansel, a 4-year-old fire department arson dog, and Cole, a 4-year-old deaf therapy dog, were chosen to advance as semifinalists in the 11th annual awards program sponsored by the Lois Pope LIFE Foundation and to be televised as a two-hour special on Hallmark Channel this fall.

Hansel is entered in the law enforcement category. He was only 7 weeks old when he was seized from an alleged dog-fighting ring in Ontario, Canada. He never fought. He and 20 other pit bulls were slated for euthanasia, but after a 2-year-long battle with the Ontario courts, Hansel was transferred to the Dogs Playing for Life shelter in Florida. He was accepted into the Throw Away Dogs project as a potential working dog candidate for the program.

The Millville Fire Department was looking for an accelerant detection K-9, and Hansel was a perfect fit, said Millville Fire Marshal Tyler Van Leer, who has been Hansels handler for just over a year.
Minnesota has recognized the third Saturday in June as Juneteenth since 1996, but the statute only obligates the governor to issue a proclamation each year honoring the observance. That's a common situation in the U.S., where the holiday is sometimes called Emancipation Day.

Calls by Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, a Democrat, to make it an official state holiday have failed to gain traction so far in the Minnesota Legislature, the only one in the nation where Democrats control one chamber and Republicans control the other.

Hawaii is one of only three states left that has not marked the holiday at all. A bill recognizing Juneteenth was signed Wednesday, a day ahead of the federal legislation. It did not create a paid state holiday, however.

South Dakota does not officially recognize the holiday, but Gov. Kristi Noem has issued a proclamation celebrating it. The governor does not have the power to make it an official state holiday  that must be done through the Legislature. A bill to recognize it as a working holiday fell a handful of votes short of passing this year.

It was defeated by an unusual coalition of Democrats who felt the day should be recognized as a full-fledged holiday, rather than a working holiday, and conservative lawmakers who opposed recognizing the holiday at all.
Two teenage brothers from New Jersey murdered a man then drove to a rural stretch of Pennsylvanias upper Bucks County in the middle of the night to dump his body in the woods, prosecutors said Thursday.

The crime might have gone undetected, authorities said, if Joshua and Anthony Gamble had not turned on their hazard lights after parking two cars on the side of Pumping Station Road in Richland Township around midnight Wednesday. A passing Pennsylvania state trooper, thinking a driver was in distress, stopped to assist.

Instead, he found blood stains and a bloodied knife in one of the cars, and one of the teens hiding in the grass nearby. The body of a man with multiple stab wounds on his neck, head and arms was a few hundred yards away, according to Bucks County District Attorney Matthew Weintraub.

Authorities had not publicly identified the victim as of Thursday afternoon. Both Joshua Gamble, 17, and Anthony Gamble, 19, remained in custody awaiting their arraignments, Weintraub said at an afternoon news conference. They will be charged with murder, conspiracy, possession of an instrument of a crime and tampering with evidence.

The younger Gamble will be prosecuted as an adult, Weintraub said.
Not that Democratic administrations have been much more effective when it comes to stopping Big Tech companies from buying up potential competitors  witness how the Obama administration green-lit Facebooks purchases of Instagram and WhatsApp.

For my money, the most important of the five bills is the Augmenting Compatibility and Competition by Enabling Service Switching Act because it could open the door to a flood of innovation in the fields now dominated by Big Tech companies. As Cory Doctorow has argued, the main barrier to competing with Facebook and other dominant social media companies isnt their scale, its the inability to stay linked to the friends youve assembled on those networks when you move to a different service. The bill would require Big Tech platforms to enable users to securely transfer their data to competing platforms.

Referring to Facebook as FB in a post last week about European regulations, Doctorow wrote, With low switching costs, much of FBs monopoly protection evaporates. Lots of people hate FB, and FB knows it. Youre on FB because your friends are there. Your friends are there because youre there. Youve taken each other hostage, and FB benefits. With low switching costs, you could leave FB  but not your friends. The kill zone disappears. All we need is interoperability.
As America rightly commemorates Juneteenth, June 19, 1865, when Union General Gordon Granger freed the Confederacys last enslaved African Americans, we should understand that slavery is part of American history but does not define America history. Freedom does.

Unlike the Declaration of Independence, the U.S. Constitution, the reconstruction of Europe and Japan after World War II, and our nations indispensable role in defeating the twin evils of fascism and communism, there is nothing uniquely American about racial oppression or slavery. For this reason, educators should never define America by its slavery.

To modern Americans it seems obvious that, as President Lincoln wrote during the Civil War, if slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong.

Notwithstanding Lincolns heartfelt words, globally, across cultures and in every major religious tradition, until recently most people considered slavery normal. It is instead slaverys abolition which is relatively recent, largely imposed on the rest of the world by the West.

As an example, consider the remarkable irony that slavery emerged as an issue in the most recent presidential elections in America and Mauritania, two countries with little else in common.
A look at what's next after "Obamacare" victory; tropical system takes aim at Gulf; 1 dead, 12 injured in drive-by shootings near Phoenix. Plus, the weekend weather and more.
"We are slowly working through this stash at our walk-in and pop-up clinics and we still have a good amount of vaccine in the freezer with expiration dates many months away."

Thoreson outlined how the Scott County Health Department coordinates with the Iowa health officials.

"There is not a lot of unused vaccine at this time. We have been in continuous conversations with partners that receive vaccine from us to ensure that we are requesting the appropriate amount of vaccine from the Iowa Department of Public Health," Thoreson said. "We, along with our partners, have worked very hard to find a balance between supply on hand and demand for vaccine. We have recently been hosting pop-up vaccination events and have ensured we have enough vaccine on hand to make these possible."

Like Hill, Thoreson said the public health emphasis is placed on vaccinating everyone who wants the jab  regardless if it means some vaccine may go unused.
CAMBRIDGE, Ill.  A Colona resident has sued the city of Colona over a fall on Feb. 4.

Vanderginst Law PC of Chicago filed the two-count lawsuit Thursday in Henry County Circuit Court on behalf of Peggy Hill of Colona.

According to the suit, Hill suffered severe and permanent injuries both internally and externally and will be hindered from attending to her usual duties and affairs. The suit also alleges she suffered great pain and anguish and will continue to suffer in the future, and that she already has expended large sums of money for medical care and will have to do so in the future.

The suit claims Hill entered the north door of City Hall that day and city employees were specifically instructing members of the public to leave the building by the south doors. That caused her to have to walk around the building to get back to her vehicle. The suit states she slipped on ice on the public parking area at or near the northeast corner of the building.

A count of negligence claims the city carelessly and negligently caused and permitted said premises to become and remain in a dangerous condition, and further, the city directed persons in such a way as to cause them to be directly exposed to the hazardous conditions on the premises.
"We don't have to get rid of everything," she said. "But, I do think that shifting the narrative (around safety), being community led, listening to the ideas of the community and looking at it through the lens, once again, of people, we can change things for the better."

Such as focusing resources on trauma-informed crisis intervention teams that work with community activists to disarm and deescalate conflicts, and connecting individuals to services that address the underlying problem, according to her campaign website at www.athena4mayor.com.

Gilbraith has led the charge locally pushing for equity in policing and to address issues of implicit bias, systemic racism, police brutality and a range of reform issues to address "bad police practices."

"I am not against policing," Gilbraith said, adding she does not support "defund the police." "I agree this is an emergency. We really need to take a closer look at how our structures that are already in place are affecting the community here. And, why certain people become violent. Are there things that we are missing," that require a closer look at addressing issues related to education, mental health, homelessness and poverty?
A good Friday to all. It was a dazzling display of lightning early this morning from Ma Nature as the Quad-City region received some much needed rain that will help perk up lawns and flowers.

More rain could come on Father's Day. Here's how the National Weather Service sees the weekend shaping up.

1. Rain chances return this afternoon, evening

There's a 30% chance of showers and thunderstorms after 3 p.m. Skies will be partly sunny with a high near 92 degrees. West winds could gust as high as 20 mph.

Tonight there is a 50% chance of showers and thunderstorms. Skies will be mostly cloudy with a low around 67 degrees. New rainfall amounts of less than a tenth of an inch are possible with higher amounts in thunderstorms.

Saturday: It will be sunny with a high near 90 degrees and a low around 67 degrees.

Sunday: There's a 50% chance of showers and thunderstorms. Skies will be partly sunny with a high near 91 degrees. New rainfall amounts between a tenth and quarter of an inch are possible with higher amounts in thunderstorms.

Sunday night: Showers and thunderstorms are likely before 1 a.m. Skies will be mostly cloudy with a low around 65 degrees. The chance of precipitation is 70%.
NEW YORK (AP)  A rabid dog imported into the United States this month has sparked a public health investigation across several states.

Health officials say a dog brought to the U.S. from Azerbaijan that ended up with a family in Chester County, Pennsylvania began acting strangely. It later tested positive for rabies and was euthanized. At least 12 people were exposed to the animal.

The dog was one of 34 animals  33 dogs and one cat  imported by an animal rescue organization from Azerbaijan to O'Hare International Airport in Chicago on June 10.

The animals were not in the main cabin of the plane or main terminal of the airport. Travelers through OHare are not considered to be at risk, but health officials are checking to see if other animals in the shipment are infected and are still tracking down the pets' new owners.

Rabies no longer regularly spreads among dogs in the U.S., but imported animals are considered a risk for new outbreaks.

Federal agencies are working with health officials in Pennsylvania, Illinois, Indiana, New Jersey, and New York on the investigation.
Chicagos police disciplinary panel voted to fire a veteran patrolman Thursday after finding the officer shot a close friend with his service weapon and then lied about it for years.

The decision by the Chicago Police Board marks another chapter in the citys long and troubled history with the case.

After arguing for nearly a decade that Michael LaPorta shot himself in a botched suicide attempt, the citys Law Department now says Officer Patrick Kelly pulled the trigger. City officials have not offered a detailed explanation about why they changed their position or offered LaPorta an apology for their past arguments. Law Department attorneys who defend Chicago cops in lawsuits are generally different than those who push to fire cops.

In an 8-0 vote, the Police Board ruled Kelly should be terminated for firing the bullet that pierced LaPortas skull, ricocheted around his brain and left him with catastrophic injuries that require round-the-clock care. Kelly repeatedly has said that LaPorta pulled the trigger and shot himself in the back of the head.

During his testimony before the Police Board earlier this year, Kelly also denied he was drunk the night LaPorta was shot.
They also passed legislation aimed at clearing up a backlog of applications for Firearm Owners Identification cards as well as legislation providing for a first-ever elected Chicago school board, an issue that had divided legislative Democrats and Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot.

But the one issue that continued to elude lawmakers was the issue that ostensibly brought them back to Springfield for the two-day session to begin with, passage of an energy overhaul bill.

One of the key sticking points that remains to be resolved is how the new legislation would treat coal and natural gas-fired power plants. Pritzker has said his goal is to phase out coal plants entirely by 2035, although he recently said he is willing to extend that if existing coal plants can somehow capture and sequester their carbon emissions. He also wants to phase out natural gas-fired plants by 2045 by gradually lowering caps on allowable emissions.

As negotiations over those issues continue, however, energy giant Exelon, which operates six nuclear power plants in Illinois, has threatened to shut down at least two of them because they are currently unprofitable.

Rep. Robyn Gabel, D-Evanston, who has been part of a legislative negotiating team on the energy bill, said Wednesday that she is not overly concerned about Exelons threat.
DES MOINES -- Child care should be considered infrastructure and belongs in the federal infrastructure funding package being crafted in Congress: that was the message U.S. Labor Secretary Marty Walsh and Congresswoman Cindy Axne conveyed during an event Friday at a child care center.

Walsh and Axne heard from central Iowa child care stakeholders during a roundtable discussion at Oakridge Neighborhood in Des Moines.

President Joe Biden proposed a $1.7 trillion infrastructure bill that included $200 billion for child care.

A bipartisan group of U.S. Senators developed a counter proposal that came in just shy of $1 trillion.

We are fighting tooth and nail to keep (funding for child care programs) in the bill, because it should be in there, Axne told the group. We are actively engaged in making sure that this comes to fruition.

Advocates say many low-income families cannot afford child care, and the cost is keeping many Americans out of the workforce as they find it more affordable to not work than to pay for expensive child care.
Juneteenth is now a federal holiday.It marks the day enslaved Black people in Texas learned they were free after the Civil War.President Biden signed the bill into law at a ceremony attended by activists and members of Congress. He and Vice President Kamala Harris spoke about the importance 

Illinois announced Thursday that it is joining the growing number of states that will have a vaccination lottery to incentivize vaccinations.

Gov. JB Pritzker said at a press conference in Chicago that the "All In For The Win" campaign would allow vaccinated residents to win more than $10 million, with $7 million in cash prizes for adults and $3 million in scholarships for children. The Illinois State Lottery will begin drawing winners on July 8 and will continue throughout the summer. Those vaccinated before July 1 will be entered into each drawing.

Statewide drawings will be held in conjunction with region-specific drawings, divided by the 11 regions in the Restore Illinois reopening plan, in order to have winners come from all parts of the state. Pritzker said that the lottery was both a way to thank people who had received their vaccine and an incentive for those who had not gotten their shot to get it.

"It's our way of saying to those who haven't been vaccinated, 'Please join us,'" Pritzker said. "Vaccines are incredibly effective and they keep you protected, but they also make your community safer. It's great that your grandma or grandpa has been vaccinated, but you can make them even safer by getting vaccinated, too."
WATERLOO  A Waterloo man has been arrested after he allegedly squeezed off shots from a pistol when he was attacked by a woman with bear spray while he was buying toilet paper.

The woman wielding the bear spray has also been arrested.

It happened Wednesday night outside the Family Dollar, 611 Broadway St., according to police.

No injuries were reported, but one of the bullets struck a van and the window of the Kwik Star convenience store a block away.

According to court records, Tyler Everett Williams, 23, was involved in an ongoing argument with Kynesha Corrien Harrington, 26, and her boyfriend. Around 7:45 p.m., Williams went to the Family Dollar to purchase toilet paper, and when he emerged from the store, the Harrington ran up to him in the parking lot and began dousing him and his vehicle with a large container of OC bear spray. She then ran to a van.

Williams pulled his handgun from his vehicles cup holder and fired two shots at the fleeing van, according to court records.

Williams, who has a permit to carry weapons, remained on the scene and waited for police to arrive, according to officers.
An abandoned gypsum mine in Blackhawk may extend farther than known mapped areas indicate to the northeast, east and southeast sides, a geophysical study shows.

Based on the information obtained in this research, there is also the possibility that the mine extends below the interstate, the study states.

Mohammad Sadeghi, a professor of geological engineering at Montana Technical University who has done multiple studies on gypsum, conducted the study on the abandoned gypsum mine below the Hideaway Hills neighborhood in Blackhawk.

A collapse on April 27, 2020, on East Daisy Drive within the subdivision exposed the mine. More than 40 people from 15 homes were forced to evacuate.

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According to a release from the Fitzgerald Law Firm, which hired Sadeghi, the interstate find is in agreement with possibilities left open by the state Department of Transportation study that was conducted in 2020.
Summers in full swing and while many people are out swimming, boating, camping, hiking and enjoying the Black Hills, Vitalant Blood Donation urges the public to find time to give blood.

We have less than a two-day supply of critical O type blood. Nationwide, there is a critical need for blood, said Tori Robbins, communications manager for Vitalant in western South Dakota, Montana and Wyoming.

Vitalant  formerly United Blood Services  prefers to maintain a four-day supply of each type of blood at all times. For the Black Hills, where tourist season has begun and will only get busier as the Sturgis motorcycle rally approaches, the blood shortage could be especially dire. Typically during the summer, donors give several thousand fewer donations each month compared to the rest of the year, according to Vitalant.

In South Dakota alone, we serve 23 hospitals, Robbins said. Blood recipients rely on donated blood. Blood has to be donated to be transfused, so donating is the best way to take care of those patients in the hospital who are in need.

Because the entire nation is facing a blood shortage, this is a long process to get the blood supply back up and to get it maintained as well, she said.
A team of South Dakota Mines students helped design a structural fire station in Pine Ridge.

Mines students William Smith, Zachary Darling, Ellie Burczek, Cody MacLake, Chase Storgaard, Jason Maiden, Joseph Updike and Tyler Jensen worked with tribal and federal officials to help research and design the new station. It is the first time the Oglala Sioux Tribe has had a fire station dedicated to protecting structures located on their reservation.

Oglala Sioux tribal officials reached out to the senior design team as part of a memorandum of understanding between the university and the Tribe that helps connect experts at Mines with tribal needs. The project was funded through a technical assistance grant from USDA Rural Development that seeks to help improve infrastructure in rural communities.

The teams at Mines met with tribal officials to determine their needs and to verify the long response times for fire emergencies on the Pine Ridge Reservation. Students then toured fire stations in the area and interviewed fire officials to garner ideas for the new design.
What does Rapid City have in common with Minot, Fort Bragg, Anchorage, Great Falls, Biloxi, Bangor and La Crosse?

These cities and 42 others were identified as the Most Patriotic Cities in America by Insurify. One city from each state was selected, and each is home to the greatest share of active service members and veterans than any other cities in their respective states.

"These are the cities that have demonstrated exceptional support for members of their community in the armed forces," according to Insurify.

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The research team at Insurify, an auto and home insurance comparison site, searched their database of more than four million insurance applications to select the most patriotic city in each state based on the number of military members living there. When applying for car insurance, drivers disclosed whether they or any driver on their policy are active service members or a veteran.
Even before Rory and Kristen Maynard had completed construction on a five-bedroom home in the Shirt Tail Gulch development in Deadwood, their neighbors had filed for an injunction to stop the work.

Robert and Sharlene Wilson argued that the Maynards were violating the subdivision's covenants that only allow for construction of homes for residential purposes.

Thursday morning, the South Dakota Supreme Court affirmed on a 3-2 vote a lower court's ruling that making a profit for renting the home 90-120 nights a year doesn't mean the home isn't used for "residential purposes."

The courts opinion was authored by Chief Justice Steven Jensen, with Retired Chief Justice Gilbertson and Retired Justice Konenkamp (sitting in lieu of Justice Salter who was disqualified) concurring. Justice Kern filed a dissenting opinion. Justice DeVaney signed the dissent.

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Construction on the home began in 2016. The Wilsons first sent a letter with concerns about the construction in October of that year. In May of 2017, a circuit court ruling found that the Wilsons would not suffer irreparable harm and denied an injunction against the Maynards' plan to rent the property.
Also misunderstood by some was HB 1067 to modify identification requirements for a marriage license and provide certain name change provisions. Erroneously deemed by a couple of people a politically motivated slap in the face of women's rights, the bill was formulated over months of coordination with the Register of Deeds across South Dakota. This bill did two things- streamlined proof of identification and reduced risk of fraud by allowing for surname change only. During committee and immediately following that committee hearing, we discussed how the bill could be modified next year to accommodate some of the concerns expressed (for example, changing a maiden name to a middle name). That change is a straightforward amendment for next year as long as it is supported. While better not to have to fix a bill after it becomes law, it shouldn't be too difficult to adjust in this circumstance.

After some of these other hard hitters, let's talk about little old SB 73. This bill streamlined the process for auto auctions to sell government-owned and non-government owned vehicles on the same day by having them marked, separated, and held at different times, rather than the current law, which requires auctions on separate days. Cut red tape, help an entity be more efficient. This one passed, no-fuss, no muss.
Moums background includes over a decade of documentary filmmaking for aid work, medical and missionary work overseas. When all international travel was canceled due to COVID-19, Moum had to reinvent his business for local production. He started working with nonprofits.

Every nonprofit has a good story, they just dont know how to tell it themselves or visually represent themselves, the story is always key for me, he said. Doing a full feature has been freeing and a wonderful thing because the story is just raw creativity. We can decide to make this beautiful story where the visuals alone can tell a story but then you have beautiful acting and dialog that furthers it into another realm.

Their new family-friendly film, Treasure State, is named after Montana and designed to have the feeling of a treasure hunt.

Its about an old mobster who is running from his troubles and hidden out in Montana and trouble finds him, Moum said. Theres a girl and a guy who have to go find his treasure that he left out for them. We want to film here because we see how the story fits here.

The script is written, casting is next and filming is scheduled for this fall. Currently, the trio at Watershed Films is searching for investors, a casting director, a lighting director and other key roles.
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP)  A federal judge on Friday said he won't allow an Arkansas man arrested after he was photographed sitting at a desk in House Speaker Nancy Pelosis office during the Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol riot to travel for a classic-car swap meet.

U.S. District Judge Christopher R. Cooper rejected the request by Richard Barnett to loosen the restrictions on how far he can travel while he's awaiting trial.

Barnett is allowed to travel only up to 50 miles (80 kilometers) from his residence while he is on home detention awaiting trial. Barnett's attorney said the Gravette, Arkansas, man needed to be able to travel to make a living buying and selling classic cars.

Petit Jean Mountain, where the car show is being held, is 200 miles (320 kilometers) from Gravette.

The Court is not persuaded that the defendant cannot pursue gainful employment within a 50-mile radius of his home as permitted by the current conditions," Cooper's order said.
The pandemic has become a split-screen for Raja, a health care worker who was stationed in COVID-19 units and then came home to call his family on the other side of the world to share the most up-to-date information on how to protect themselves.

With Pakistan cutting down the number of flights coming in, and his most recent plane ride canceled a few weeks ago, thats the closest he can get to being there for them  one year since his dad died last May.

Raja suspects his father contracted the virus, but COVID-19 tests were so scarce at the time that theyll never know for sure what killed him.

People did not want to get tested, either, because it was hard for them to go through the process. At one point, they were saying that people who are positive were quarantined as a family. ... They would take the whole family, he said. That part of the world, they dont have much resources. No family can sit on the side and do that.

His brothers continue sending him daily messages asking about the different vaccines and what their options are, whether certain activities are safe and how to verify information. Raja spends his days combing through the internet, hoping to find the resources they need in a country he doesnt live in. Working full time in a hospital doesnt make the ability to answer easy.
Parke was a small child at the time; her mother, Sherry Whittaker Parke, was Jean Woodfins sister.

Nici, who was shot in the head in front of the downtown Richmond Marriott and nearly died, posted news of Woodfins parole denial on a website she set up to gather support to block his release. Nici has led the effort to keep Woodfin behind bars.

Just notified this morning! Kenneth Wayne Woodfin has been DENIED PAROLE, Nici wrote. Do not have information as to whether only for 1 year or for 3 years as requested yet. On behalf of the all of the victims, their families, and friends  We want to personally thank everyone for your continued support to keep Woodfin incarcerated to ensure the safety of the victims, victims families, and the public.

Unlike previous years, Nici and others worried that the board, which is the subject of an ongoing scandal related to how it has released other convicted killers, would grant Woodfin his freedom this time around. He first became eligible for parole in 1999.

His latest parole hearing was conducted on June 11.
They say its inclusion on the register will help preserve its history and protect the site as state officials are planning a rail expansion and highway-widening projects in the area.

As part of the DC2RVA high-speed rail project between Richmond and Washington, the state is considering plans to construct new rails that historians and preservationists say would disturb the burial grounds.

State officials previously determined that the project would not harm the cemetery site, but McQueen and others objected, saying that they had not done enough historical research.

Earlier this year, state and federal officials reopened a historical evaluation process to determine whether the project may harm the site.

McQueen said the team is aiming to complete the application within the next few weeks so that state officials can begin reviewing it by September.

Meanwhile, Richmond officials are preparing their own plans to memorialize the site after recently reacquiring an acre of the original burial site for $145,000 in a tax auction.

The city sold the property in the 1960s to Sun Oil Co. without acknowledging the history of the site, according to Smith.

Langan did not provide a timeline for the installation of the new historical marker, but estimated that it would take a few months.
Rogers says we are seeing restrictions on voting rights today at loggerheads with the freedom that was achieved on Juneteenth.

Then again, the pushback against the advances of Black people is as American as fireworks on the Fourth of July.

Rogers, for example, explained that Reconstruction did not begin immediately after the Civil War.

As Rogers explains, the restoration of the rights of Southern states to do everything but enslave freed those states to enact Black codes and vagrancy laws, putting shackles on people in different ways to recreate slavery and make it more difficult for people who had now earned their own freedom to actually be able to enact that freedom.

It was only until two years later, in 1867, that Reconstruction, and the federal occupation of the South, launched a period of unprecedented Black progress. That success was cut off at the knees when the federal government decided that Southern appeasement mattered more than Black lives and abandoned the South, launching a reign of terror.

Today, as we strive to more greatly enact our freedom, Black lives and national unity feel precarious.
NEWARK, New Jersey (WABC) -- The city of Newark is paying tribute to George Floyd with a new statue in front of City Hall.

Mayor Ras Baraka, actor and filmmaker Leon Pickney and artist Stanley Watts unveiled the 700-pound bronze statue on Wednesday afternoon.

The statue was commissioned by Pickney, sculpted by Watts, and donated this week to the City of Newark

Floyd's murder at the hands of a Minneapolis police officer last year fueled a global movement for racial justice.

"Hopefully when people walk by and they see it, and they participate, hopefully it inspires them to become active in the struggles that are happening right here in Newark and right here in New Jersey," Baraka said.

The statue will remain outside City Hall for at least one year.

The ceremony also honored Juneteenth.
NEW ORLEANS (AP)  A federal appeals court refused Friday to hear Chinese tech giant Huawei's request to throw out a rule used to bar rural phone carriers on national security grounds from using government funds to purchase its equipment.

The 5th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the Federal Communications Commission was fully within its power and competence to issue the rule barring Universal Service Fund subsidies recipients from buying equipment or services from companies deemed national security risks.

The three-judge panel also dismissed a claim by Huawei Technologies Ltd that the FCC lacked the expertise to designate the company's equipment as a security risk to U.S. telecommunications infrastructure.

Assessing security risks to telecom networks falls in the FCCs wheelhouse, the judges wrote in a 60-page opinion, rejecting any suggestion it was some sort of junior-varsity agency on national security matters.

Huawei did not immediately offer a response to the ruling.

The Trump administration imposed a series of sanctions on Huawei, claiming it could not be trusted not to spy for Beijing because Chinese law so compels it. Huawei says it is employee- not government-owned and denies it might facilitate Chinese spying.
But once the VEC determines they were not eligible for traditional unemployment benefits, they get the bill to repay the money. In Cogars case, the agency determined she wasnt eligible for traditional benefits because she had left the newspaper job voluntarily because of the commute.

Why did they not determine my eligibility before sending the benefits out? Cogar asked. If they were trying to get the money out, I can appreciate that, but I dont think you can come back a year later and say, We goofed!

Ideally, Healy said, people who were self-employed would be evaluated for eligibility under the federal PUA program before they are considered for traditional unemployment benefits, which are tied to employers that pay into the state unemployment trust fund through payroll taxes.

Benefits under PUA dont come from the state trust fund, but instead are paid with federal money that Virginia received through the trio of federal relief packages.

Healy and the VEC say Cogars best option is to qualify for PUA benefits before they expire on Sept. 6 so she could use them to pay her debt. The agency said it would help her apply for the federal benefits.
The political class, which Harp knew intimately, having worked it assiduously since landing at the state Capitol two decades earlier as a newly minted lawyer, was outraged.

The Democrats who controlled the legislature viewed the dismissal as a partisan affront. Even Republicans were alarmed, believing it sent the wrong signal to a state work force long defined by stability.

A side gig in the attorney generals office as counsel to the Judicial Inquiry and Review Commission quickly became full time. And for the next 20 years, until his retirement in 1997, Harp would investigate complaints about judges, quietly telling some to straighten up and others to get out.

The commission, to the annoyance of the public and the press, operated in legally protected secrecy. And Harp was known to bristle when reporters  because it was their job  pried into the commissions proceedings, which  because it was his job  he cloaked in mystery.

Mabry joined VDOT when it wasnt as much led as ruled by the legendary Douglas Fugate, who believed there was little that a lot of asphalt couldnt fix. Fugate also transformed the department into a graduate program, of sorts, for Virginia Military Institute (VMI). As an alumnus, Fugate favored those with VMI degrees  Mabry, among them.
Carter said he became disheartened at times by the constant debate in the community and the description of those opposing the monument as agitators who need to move out of the county if they dont like looking at the statue. Carter said he was also dismayed that Gladding said there is no systemic racism in Tappahannock  a statement Gladding stands by.

It was definitely frustrating  369 days is how long it took, and we maintained the course," Carter said. "Weve been respectful. Weve been unbiased.

It was a difficult journey. ... Weve had to be subjected to people in a public forum using the N-word with no one stopping them. Weve had to sit back and have decorum while the same wasnt afforded to us.

Carter started a website called EssexMonument.com to explain why he and others believe the memorial should be removed. He also led a push to raise $10,000 from more than 130 donors to provide to the town for the removal of the monument.

Gladding said Town Council isnt sure how those funds will be used. Carter said one donor suggested using the money to assist with the contextualization of the plaque.
Over the past 18 months, the other significant tie that binds all Virginia colleges and universities  like all citizens, businesses and organizations  has been our struggle with the global pandemics enormous interruption to our operations, revenues and missions.

We lead institutions located in very different regions of Virginia. Our students are diverse. Many are first in their families to attend college, and many come from low- to moderate-income households. We have seen firsthand the pandemics hardships on those we educate.

We advocate for additional significant federal and state funding support for all Virginia two- and four-year public and private nonprofit colleges and universities, and we do so particularly regarding the governor and General Assemblys ongoing deliberations on ARPA funds.

All Virginia colleges and universities were fortunate to receive previous federal pandemic-related recovery funds  from both the federal government directly and via the commonwealth as well.
Earlier this week, the U.S. Senate endorsed the holiday under a unanimous consent agreement. On Wednesday, the U.S. House of Representatives voted 415-14 to make Juneteenth the nations 12th federal holiday. Were glad that all of Virginias congressional members supported it. President Joe Biden signed the measure into law on Thursday.

Juneteenth is an opportunity to reflect on our nations sordid history with slavery, acknowledge and commemorate the progress that has been made, and renew our commitment to advancing equity and justice for all, U.S. Rep. A. Donald McEachin, D-4th, said in a statement.

U.S. Rep. Robert C. Bobby Scott, D-3rd, the dean of Virginias congressional delegation, said 49 states and Washington, D.C., now celebrate Juneteenth as a state or ceremonial holiday.

The legacy of Juneteenth is a reminder of the way that justice and equality for Black people has too often been delayed in America, he said in a statement. The past year has also been a stark reminder of all the work that is left to do to fulfill the founding promises of our nation.

Juneteenth will be the first new federal holiday since the creation of Martin Luther King Jr. Day in 1983  another equally important observance.
Virginia just added its first blueway state park. Clinch River State Park in Southwest Virginia celebrated its official opening this week, becoming the commonwealths 41st state park. As a blueway, the park is based on a river instead of a land mass. It consists of 696 acres, situated across several small anchor properties and connected by multiple canoe-kayak access points along a 100-mile scenic stretch of the Clinch River. According to the office of Gov. Ralph Northam, who attended Wednesdays opening, the Clinch River is among the most productive and biodiverse waterways in the Northern Hemisphere, sustaining more than 48 vulnerable animal species, including 29 varieties of rare freshwater mussels and 19 species of fish. Rare plants, mammals and birds also thrive along the rivers edge. The properties run through Tazewell, Russell, Wise and Scott counties and offer a network of trails, camping sites and historical sites  including remnants of an 18th-century French settlement. After studies that began in 2005, much research and multiple land acquisitions, six tracts of land have been brought together to form Clinch River State Park, Clyde Cristman, director of the state Department of Conservation and Recreation, said in a statement. A very unique park is the outcome of that work, and we look forward to seeing how it will continue to develop and serve the people and visitors of the region. We look forward to exploring.
Standard Chartered Malaysia has rolled out the DuitNow Request feature on its mobile banking app, allowing customers to send payment requests to another person by keying in their mobile or MyKad number. It is the first bank in the country to adopt the latest DuitNow service.

According to Standard Chartered, the person requesting for payment (payee) can submit a request by tapping on the DuitNow Request tile  which can be found on the login page of the mobile app or in the Transfer & Payment tab. From there, go ahead and input the payers information, as well as the amount that they wish to collect. Once the request is submitted, they will receive a confirmation SMS, containing the reference number of their transaction and transaction details.

Meanwhile, on the payers end, they will need to approve the DuitNow Requests that are sent to them. This can be done by heading to the Inward Request section, found in the DuitNow Request tab. Payers can approve the requests by making the necessary payments, and they are also allowed to edit selected details if need be.

Standard Chartered further emphasised that the DuitNow Request service is free, and that no additional registrations are required. Customers will only need to download the Standard Charterd mobile banking app to use it. Note as well that each payee is only allowed to send out 20 active requests at any one time. Meanwhile, payers who are approving their DuitNow Requests will be limited by their daily DuitNow Mobile limit.

The head of consumer, private, and business banking of Standard Chartered Malaysia, Lai Pei Si said that the DuitNow Request feature will provide a more seamless payment and collection process for the banks customers. It will also contribute to the governments push for the people and public sector agencies to adopt cashless transactions.

With digital payments recording exponential growth, services such as DuitNow Request will be crucial in enabling real-time payments and high-volume transactions. Weve witnessed an 87% year-on-year growth in digital payments and found that four out of every five Malaysians expect the nation to go fully cashless, said Lai.

(Image: The Star)

Standard Chartered also said that it expects the DuitNow Request feature to be adopted by more financial institutions soon; at present, only two institutions have enabled support for the DuitNow Request feature: Standard Chartered and Standard Chartered Saadiq. The widespread usage of the feature will allow for a better ease of reconciliation for users, whereas payers will be notified of successful transactions in real time.

For context, DuitNow is an umbrella service that aims to simplify the process of transferring funds by utilising details that are easy to remember. Instead of using your bank account number to transfer money  which you often dont remember  DuitNow lets you use your mobile or MyKad number instead. Under DuitNow, there are several features that cater to various banking needs, such as DuitNow Transfer and DuitNow QR. DuitNow Request is the latest to be launched.

To find out more about Standard Chartereds adoption of DuitNow Request, head on over to the banks website. Alternatively, you can check out the FAQ for the feature here.

(Source: The Edge Markets)

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(Image: Malay Mail/Choo Choy May)

A global survey by recruitment solutions provider, Employment Hero, has found that a majority of the Malaysian workforce is more concerned about their financial security than their personal health. This was revealed in a report titled The Impact of Covid-19 On Business Owners and Employees, which polled more than 1,000 Malaysian participants.

According to the report, 71% of Malaysian employees said that they were worried about their financial health. Meanwhile, 66% and 62% of them were concerned about their physical and mental health, respectively, amidst the current workforce landscape that has been affected by Covid-19. Following the onslaught of the pandemic since the end of 2019, many employers had been forced to implement work-from-home arrangements.

Employment Heros report also found that although Malaysian employees were less worried about their mental health compared to financial security, their concern for mental health still ranked the highest among other countries that participated in the survey. For comparison, 50% of the workforce in Singapore said that they were worried about their mental health, whereas 49% of the participants from United Kingdom said the same. New Zealand and Australia both reported 46%.

(Image: The Malaysian Reserve)

The report further revealed a mismatch between the rising demand for mental health support among employees and the help that is being provided by employers. While 74% of Malaysian employers said that they are supportive of their employees mental health, only 56% of employees agreed. Correspondingly, 59% of employers believed that they have the resources to track mental health issues at work, but only 48% of employees agreed.

Aside from that, 70% of Malaysian employees said that a healthy work-life balance is crucial for them to maintain better mental health. This is in addition to other initiatives, such as more company-provided counselling services (57%) and health and wellness benefits (55%).

(Image: Focus Malaysia)

Data from the survey also noted that 64% of employees said that they felt stressed after being forced to work remotely due to the pandemic. Meanwhile, 59% of employees who have been working from home even before the pandemic reported similar anxieties.

The chief executive officer and co-founder of Employment Hero, Ben Thompson said that the survey essentially points to a need to prioritise work-life balance, mental health, and overall employee wellness initiatives among employers. With remote working here to stay globally and maybe in the future, companies must take action and set proper procedures and communication channels to safeguard the wellbeing of their employees, he said.

(Source: The Malaysian Reserve)

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We need to add employees, we need to add inventory, Fortier said. We need to transition from a schedule where we showed one or two movies a week to 16 screenings a day. Well transition from using primarily one or two screens to using all four screens.

During the days the Grandin is closed to the public, the theater will continue its private rental program, Fortier said.

These plans are going forward without a long-hoped-for Shuttered Venue Operators Grant in hand  though it could still come through. The U.S. Small Business Administrations SVOG program was created to offer federal aid in the form of grants to movie theaters, performing arts venues, museums and other cultural institutions and businesses that had to shut down or drastically reduce operations because of COVID-19.

The SVOG program has been afflicted with glitches and delays  including data errors that classified some applicants as deceased  and very few grants have been awarded, despite tremendous pressure from arts organizations and lawmakers to streamline the process.

I think the last I checked, out of 14,000 applications, they may have looked at somewhere between 500 and 600, Fortier said. Right now, its just a waiting game. However, the thing about grants is, its unpredictable revenue.
Charles Bates, the owner of Chucks Pups in Boones Mill, said Thursday that though Fracker works for him as a narcotics dog handler, the dog his company uses is not Dorka, but a German shepherd that Bates owns, named Hawkeye.

Bates said he has been working for four years to offer a service in which parents concerned that their child might be hiding drugs in the house could hire the use of a narcotics dog. I had a drug dog, a narcotics dog thats been fully trained, were all ready to go, and I didnt have a handler, which is why he brought Fracker in, he said.

Bates expressed sympathy for Frackers predicament following his dismissal from his law enforcement job. Because of this crap that the town put him under, he had nothing, he lost his livelihood. Were taking about a 30-year- old guy with a family, Bates said.

Responding to a Virginia Freedom of Information Act request, Rocky Mount officials provided The Roanoke Times with documents that show Dorka was sold for $5,000 on March 9 to Rocky Mount Police Sgt. Josh Mason, the former head of the departments narcotics dog units. Mason has since left the department.

Josh bought her, followed all the right channels and had the right paperwork completed, then purchased her from the town and gifted her to my family, Fracker wrote.
But for now, I think the pandemic in some ways has heightened peoples sense of vulnerability and its washed away our distinctions, Hayter said. Of course, hes quick to add, that feeling is not unanimous in this age of polarization. Some people cant even be compelled to wear a mask for their own well-being and that of others, much less acknowledge police brutality or white supremacy.

The optimist in me feels permanent change in the air; the realist wonders if this energy is sustainable.

But young people appear to be hyper-attuned to the brokenness that is the United States today. It wasnt working for many of them even before the pandemic and the deaths of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor at the hands of police, and jogger Ahmaud Arbery by vigilantes.

I think theres a deep-seated, broad-based unrest, especially with younger people, who in some ways recognize that their future has been leveraged, Hayter said, adding that theyve lost faith in the boomer generations ability to negotiate our way out of these messes.

But Hayter, who served on Stoneys Monument Avenue Commission, says you cannot make the Lost Cause narrative go away simply by tucking away symbols of white supremacy. They must be part of a teachable moment if America is to deal with its legacy of racism.
Why is the price of cars going up so much?

Why are so many tech jobs going to so few metro areas?

Why cant Congress get anything done on a bipartisan basis?

All good questions and they all overlap  with Sen. Mark Warner, D-Virginia, standing in the center of trying to fix all three.

Theres sometimes a difference between big news and important news. The big news out of Washington last week had to do with whatever Democrats and Republicans were arguing about on any given day.

The important news was that the U.S. Senate passed  and sent to the House  something called the Innovation and Competition Act. The bill didnt get much attention because there werent many people arguing about it; the measure passed by a wide and bipartisan margin.

A decade or more from now, this bill might turn out to be more important than anything else Congress did last week, or maybe lots of weeks.

The answer to the first question we posed deals with computer chips. They are the brains that make computers run  and cars these days are essentially computers on wheels.
US president Joe Biden and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin may have left Geneva with a sense of a job well done. The summit between two countries, beset by mutual distrust, passed without major disagreement and a significant list of areas of co-operation was agreed.

But fleshing out the details and making tangible progress will be far harder, Russia is cautioning.

This is a challenge for higher diplomatic mathematics, Russias deputy foreign minister Sergei Ryabkov remarked. In this matter, of course it is important to show not only political will, but also a creative approach.

Putin and Biden agreed at Wednesdays summit to restart talks on arms control, establish bilateral discussions on cyber security and explore the potential of exchanging citizens held in each others prisons. Both sides have failed to make progress in these areas in the past.

There is no complete match, Ryabkov said in an interview published by the foreign ministry on Thursday. If this were so, then by and large it would mean that all agreements have already been reached.

On the contrary, we have the impression that the American approach contains very different constants than ours. Combining these approaches, these two formulas, will be a daunting task, he said with reference to arms control talks, adding that added consultations could begin within weeks.

The US withdrew from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty  which banned land-based missiles with a range between 500-5,500km  under president Donald Trump and has resisted talks on a replacement deal that does not include China.

Washington has meanwhile accused Russia of ordering, supporting or abetting cyber attacks on US companies, government departments and infrastructure. Moscow rejects those claims and says it is also a constant victim of hacking attempts.

And while Putin and Biden affirmed there would be continued dialogue between their militaries in Syria, they are still in direct opposition over Moscows support for Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko and the ongoing conflict in Ukraine.

Biden said the test would be whether talks progressed over the next three to six months, but injected his own note of scepticism about the task ahead to reporters after the summit: When did I say I was confident?

Their separate press conferences allowed both leaders to proffer professional compliments to each other while reiterating longstanding complaints.

Biden condemned Russias treatment of opposition activist Alexei Navalny and warned of devastating consequences for Moscow if he were to die in jail, and also criticised the harassment of foreign media outlets by the Kremlin.

Putin, speaking before, compared Navalnys incarceration to those prosecuted for taking part in the January riot at the US Capitol, and cited the US detention facility at Guantanamo Bay to accuse Biden of hypocrisy on human rights.

But the overall attitude from both suggested the talks had at least paused the spiralling descent of relations between the two countries to a post cold war nadir.

We warned against having any excessive expectations for this summit from the beginning. But we can say now, first and foremost, based on the opinion of the president himself, that it can be described as rather positive, Putins spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Thursday morning.

The two leaders had the chance to directly present their stances and to understand more or less clearly where interaction is possible and where there can be no interaction for now due to categorical disagreements.

In a step that should help both sides turn the presidential agreements into tangible outcomes, ambassadors from each country are expected to return to their posts in the next few days, after months of absence following decisions to return them home for consultations.

But Peskov cautioned against rapid progress. There were no concrete agreements made on cyber security, he said, and no deadline for a possible prisoner exchange.

There are framework discussions at the state level, and then very, very difficult work will begin, he said, referring to exchanging prisoners. You need to sit down and talk at the working level. Indeed, it is the same for all the other issues.

A senior Biden administration official, saying the aim of the summit was to inject stability and predictability into the relationship, also kept expectations low.

[W]ere not flipping a light switch, the official told reporters after the summit. This is going to be an ongoing process and the ultimate test is whether there are practical results.
Ivo MOLINAS

Translation by Janet MITRANI

The supernatural events which we call miracle in the codes of Judaism are especially mentioned a lot in the Torah. From the many miracles that had been realized while leaving Egypt, to the eight-day burning of the menorah with only enough oil for one day during the battle between the Maccabees and Hellenes, countless miraculous events constitute the most important foundation of Judaism's existence.

For, the miracles have become a part of Jews' intention to show the power of their God to all the world, and the weakness of Jews' existence without Him has been tried to be explained.

However, Baruch Spinoza who had read the Torah line by line and made a comprehensive holy book analysis, had claimed that the events called miracle were in fact natural events that could not be explained by the human mind, and that in a universe where everything was predetermined, any event to be unnatural would not be possible due to the nature of the issue.

Since Spinoza argued "God is nature, nature is God" where he had intertwined nature with God, to him miracle would mean breaking of the law of nature (or God), and it would be an unacceptable proposal.

As for today, when we interpret the positive developments that suddenly appear amidst most desperate moments as miracle, we do not know if we should see these developments as a natural manifestation of the law of nature or God as Spinoza had claimed. Or else is the realization of an event or act that is hard to grasp by the human mind, not a miracle but a reality that the mind has difficulty in explaining with its limited perception and analysis capacity?



Is forming a government with the support of an Islamist Arab party in Israel, after the mini war that was fought just 45 days ago in the country and where many people had lost their lives, a miracle, or is it a striking gift of common sense to the world political history, that can set a precedent?

Yes, it seems that the fact that this week in Israel, a country of an over polarized society, as a result of the agreement of eight dissimilar parties that turned out to be anti-Netanyahu, a government like no other on the world political scene has been established only 45 days after the war and got a vote of confidence albeit by one vote difference, should be a hopeful development in the name of humanity.

It will be a first in the history of politics that such a fragile structure of the new Israeli government, which is founded by the signatures of a far-right, a television programmer, a Russian immigrant, a general, a gay, a feminist, a center-right, a socialist, and an Islamist, should govern the country without being damaged.

Maybe the Jewish history, which is enclosed with miracles, is facing a new 'miracle', despite Spinoza's argument.

Even though the image of these eight people coming together to govern a country, under normal circumstances, would be unbelievable, if we evaluate with a Spinozist approach, what lies behind the miracle is, the Netanyahu opposition they have in common; the unique motivation of getting rid of him, most probably.

One might think that Bibi Netanyahu, who has been the prime minister for twelve years, has not deserved an end like this. The fact that in Israel, the terms for being prime minister are endless, makes the political leader see himself as 'indispensable', as he stays in power more. And more and more, the leader, in his subconscious, assumes the illusion 'these people need me'. This kind of mentality also causes the leaders in democratic countries to be immersed in Machiavellian policies in order not to lose elections thus power, and to pursue political polarization.

It must be accepted that Netanyahu had developed successful policies domestically and abroad, in line with his, in his own words, 'staying alive' doctrine, he had planned in his mind as a highly self-confident leader. His country is in a more advanced and better shape in many areas, compared to 12 years ago, when he had assumed his position.

The thought "Be rich, be advanced, then everyone will be with you except a few enemies" is what's behind this doctrine.

While he did not even create a spark of peace with the Palestinians, he made a mark in history, making a radical paradigm change with the Abraham Accords he signed with some of the Arab countries. His establishing diplomatic, commercial, and political relations with some Latin, African, and Asian countries, China and Russia, as never before, was registered as another one of his successes. Despite Obama's objection, his historic speech concerning Iran's nuclear threat in the US Congress with his perfect English, has been instrumental in awakening the whole world.

He had only one goal: Keeping Israel alive in the safest and most advanced position in a world where jungle laws apply, using its wealth, sophistication and the relationships he had made with his charisma.

However, there were mistakes and negativities that every political project might cause. His attempts to provoke the Palestinians even further, instead of making peace with them, his labeling whomever opposed him within the country, as 'leftist' and even 'traitor' with a typical archaic approach, almost nearing hate speech, his constantly compromising greatly with the religious parties, his not seeking even the slightest solution to the extreme polarization of the society, his defining the prosecutors who have investigated him, then the judges, and even some of his right-wing friends as conspiring enemies, were his actions that had prepared his end.

Also, the fact that the growing wealth in the country not being distributed fairly causing the middle class to melt away, thus making the housing prices unreachable for this class, and some daily life problems that negatively affected the public, were other failures that caused Bibi's achievements to fade away.

Let's say that eight dissimilar, acting on the presumption that domestic economic and political discontent, polarization, and dissociation is endangering the country's security, have as a result jointly signed and placed Netanyahu into the opposition, for the time being, pioneering a substantial change. Let's just say, because it's hard to believe this fragile structure can create a sustainable partnership.

However, without making the mistake of trying to guess the future using the dynamics of the past, it is useful to preserve hope, in the name of tranquility and maybe even peace.

Let's wish that new miracles shall take over the region or based on Spinoza's approach, that common sense, which is derived from the law of nature, shall realize what is said to be impossible, and what is defined as miracle.

Just like the eight dissimilar is trying the similar...

Voice over by: Janet Mitrani
" " The Mississippi River at Kaskaskia, Illinois (pictured here in 2019) experienced a 100-year flood in 1993. Scott Olson/Getty Images

A 100-year flood, like a 100-year storm, is one so severe it has only a 1 percent chance of hitting in any given year.

Unfortunately, many people believe that if they experienced a 100-year flood this year, they will not see another one like it for 99 years.

It just doesn't work that way. In reality, the chance of being flooded next year, and the year after that, is the same as it was when the house flooded the first time  1 percent.

One percent is the same as a 1-in-100 chance. Hence, the shorthand: 100-year flood. The Federal Emergency Management Agency uses that measure when it drawsflood plain maps  the maps that show which areas are most likely to be flooded and that insurers use when they set rates.

Because of the confusion, many flood plain managers want to do away with the term "100-year flood," but that creates another problem. People generally do not have a good sense of risk as expressed as a probability, especially when that probability appears small. Look no farther than COVID-19, where about half the U.S. population was not concerned about a 1 percent chance of dying from infection while hundreds of people in the country were dying from it every day.

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Why Knowing Flood Risk Matters

A better way to understand the risk is to think about a home with a 30-year mortgage.

What's the minimum risk of a home being flooded over 30 years if it's in a 100-year flood plain? At least 26 percent, since we're looking over a longer period and there's not a guarantee of seeing a 100-year storm. Given that homes tend to be the biggest investment most Americans make, that probability may cause people to think about buying flood insurance.

In some cases, the risks are even higher. Since some homes sit lower than their neighbors, risk in a 100-year flood plain isn't consistent across the entire area. A homebuyer might consider their choice more carefully if the property actually has a 50 percent chance of flooding over 30 years. At some point, we'll have better tools to easily assign risk home by home.

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Why Are There So Many 100-year Floods Now?

With climate change, the flood risk can grow over time with stronger storms and heavier rainfall.

For example, an update of rainfall statistics for the Austin, Texas, area led an expansion of the 100-year flood plain to cover more of what had been considered 500-year flood plain. A 500-year flood plain suggests a 0.2 percent chance of flooding, meaning thousands of people faced far greater risk than they realized.

Flood plain statistics can be confusing, and that confusion can be deadly. Developing better tools to estimate flood risk and finding better ways to talk about that risk can better inform people of the actual risks.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. You can find the original article here.

Robert Maceis the executive director and chief water policy officer at The Meadows Center for Water and the Environment and a professor of practice in the department of geography at Texas State University. Robert has over 30 years of experience in hydrology, hydrogeology, stakeholder processes, and water policy, mostly in Texas.
* Indonesia shares track worst day since May 19 * Bank of Japan keeps monetary policy steady * Graphic: World FX rates https://tmsnrt.rs/2RBWI5E * Asian stock markets: https://tmsnrt.rs/2zpUAr4 By Shashwat Awasthi June 18 (Reuters) - Indonesian stocks slid nearly 2% and the rupiah weakened on Friday as surging COVID-19 cases sapped risk appetite and squashed hopes that the central bank's accommodative stance would allow equity markets to recover. South Korea's won fell for the fifth consecutive day in its worst week since March 2020, while other regional currencies were mixed, as investors further digested the U.S. Federal Reserve's hawkish signals this week. Jakarta's equity index shed as much as 1.9% and was set for its first weekly drop in four after Indonesia on Thursday reported its biggest daily rise in coronavirus cases since late-January. Yields on Indonesia's 10-year benchmark bonds climbed 8.5 basis points to a two-month high. "New COVID-19 infections are rising rapidly again... Hospital occupancy rates have surpassed 75% in the capital, Jakarta, raising the prospect that restrictions will need to be tightened," said Gareth Leather, senior Asia economist at Capital Economics. The rupiah weakened for the fifth straight session and was on track to lose 1% this week as Bank Indonesia's dovish stance and the Fed's indication of raising rates earlier than expected heaped pressure on the currency. Further complicating matters was news that hundreds of doctors and medical workers in Indonesia had been infected despite being inoculated, while analysts have also highlighted the slow pace of vaccinations. The U.S. Fed's sudden turn on Wednesday prompted Morgan Stanley analysts to recommend cashing out of long positions in many Asian currencies, including the rupiah and the Malaysian ringgit, as their appeal for carry trade was dented. "The most important reason why we have been recommending carry trades in Asia was a patient/dovish Fed... Now the conditions have changed materially on the back of a hawkish surprise from the Fed," they said in a note. Riskier currencies, such as those of emerging markets, thrive on U.S. interest rates remaining low because they benefit from the interest rate differential that increases their appeal for carry trade. Philippine shares continued to unwind some of the more than 11% gain accumulated in recent weeks and fell half a percent. HIGHLIGHTS ** Top losers on the Jakarta stock index include Prima Globalindo Logistik down 8.5%, MegaPower Makmur and Bank IBK Indonesia down 7%. ** In the Philippines, top losers are BDO Unibank down 2.8%, LT Group down 2.7%, and SM Prime Holdings down 2.6%. Asia stock indexes and currencies at 0615 GMT COUNTRY FX RIC FX DAILY % FX YTD % INDEX STOCKS DAILY % STOCKS YTD % Japan +0.11 -6.21 -0.06 5.67 China +0.07 +1.30 -0.12 1.39 India -0.10 -1.47 -0.75 11.38 Indonesia -0.07 -2.23 -1.82 -0.35 Malaysia -0.10 -2.95 0.13 -3.34 Philippines +0.14 -0.72 -0.53 -4.04 S.Korea -0.12 -4.03 0.26 13.92 Singapore +0.08 -1.52 -0.20 10.13 Taiwan -0.08 +2.51 -0.41 17.55 Thailand +0.10 -4.49 -0.75 10.77 (Reporting by Shashwat Awasthi in Bengaluru; Editing by Sujata Rao and Shailesh Kuber)
People waiting for a coronavirus vaccine in Sitra, Bahrain. The country currently has one of the world's highest infection rates. (Reuters)

It has one of the highest coronavirus vaccination rates in the world. But the situation in Bahrain also serves as a reminder that high jab numbers offer no guarantee against massive infection surges.

Bahrain, according to Oxford Universitys Our World in Data website, is the country with the sixth-highest rate of vaccines administered at 101.83 doses per 100 people, with more than 55% of all people have received at least one dose.

As of Monday, however, it also had the second-highest seven-day infection rate globally, at 1,653 cases per one million people. Only the Maldives  1,865 per million  has a higher rate.

The surge in cases, which is Bahrains worst during the entire pandemic, highlights the point that COVID-19 will continue to quickly spread among people who have yet to receive a vaccine.

Bahrains health ministry said on 20 May that its upswing in cases was due to large gatherings at home during the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan and Eid holidays, as well as increased testing.

Watch: Boris Johnson admits road map could be delayed because of Indian variant (from Thursday)

As cases continued to increase last week, the island nation imposed a partial lockdown on Thursday, with shopping centres, restaurants, cafes and hairdressers orders to close for two weeks.

The problems in Bahrain demonstrate the dilemma facing ministers and scientific advisers in England as they mull over whether to end lockdown on 21 June.

Read more:

England urged to 'push on' with end of lockdown by senior government COVID adviser

Why Brits are being told to stop talking about the 'Indian' variant

Like Bahrain, England has a high vaccination rate but there are concerns the Indian variant, renamed the 'delta' variant by the World Health Organization, could spark a third wave.

Meanwhile, Bahrain is among the countries likely to be added to the UK's travel ban "red list" due to its infection surge. The list will be updated later this week.

Watch: UK vaccines in numbers
Here's what you need to know to Get Up to Speed and On with Your Day .(You can also get "5 Things You Need to Know Today" delivered to your inbox daily. Sign up here .)

1. Affordable Care Act

The Supreme Court has dismissed a challenge to the Affordable Care Act brought on by Republican-led states. The justices decided that the opponents in this case, who urged justices to dismiss the entire 2010 law, weren't actually harmed by ACA provisions because Congress has reduced the penalty for failing to buy health insurance to zero. This was the third major challenge to the landmark healthcare reform law, and while the decision has preserved the ACA for now, there will undoubtedly be more Republican challenges. One such lawsuit is currently brewing in Texas, in which a group of individuals and businesses are arguing that an ACA provision requiring insurers to offer certain free preventative services is unlawful. About 31 million Americans have health coverage through the Affordable Care Act.
JUNEAU, Alaska (AP)  Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy labeled as defective the state spending package passed by lawmakers this week and said he was prepared to call them into another special session next week if they do not act before the current special session expires Friday.

He said notices warning of possible layoffs were sent to state employees, with the new fiscal year two weeks away. He pinpointed as a main concern a failed effective date vote, which he said raises constitutional issues.

The House and Senate this week passed a state spending package, but the House failed to get the two-thirds support for a procedural effective date vote. Attorneys for the Legislature and the state Department of Law have offered differing views on what that could mean.

Megan Wallace, director of Legislative Legal Services, said the spending package includes a section that makes all the provisions retroactive to their intended effective dates.
WASHINGTON (AP)  The head of the Environmental Protection Agency said Thursday he has fully reinstated one of two key advisory boards he dismantled earlier this year in a push for scientific integrity at the agency.

The new seven-member Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee features four scientists who have served on the panel previously  including two who were on the board when it was dismantled in March. The five women and two men on the panel include three people of color, making it the most diverse panel since the committee was established more than 40 years ago.

From the very beginning of my tenure, I have committed to ensuring that science is restored as the backbone of everything EPA does to protect people and the environment from pollution, EPA Administrator Michael Regan said in a statement. The new advisory panel will provide credible, independent expertise to EPAs reviews of air quality standards that is grounded in scientific evidence,'' he said.

Regan has said that advisers appointed under the Trump administration were overly friendly to business, adding that his March 31 reset of the clean-air panel and the Science Advisory Board would return EPA to its practice of relying on advice from a balanced group of experts.
If I had a different party affiliation, I may have turned a blind eye, she said.

DeSantis' office did not immediately respond Friday to a call and email seeking comment. As Fried is elected independently, DeSantis has no control over her actions.

Powell did not return a phone message left at her Dallas law office or respond to an email. Defending the Republic did not respond to a message sent through its website.

Trump and his allies filed more than 50 lawsuits in multiple states over the election and lost at every turn. Powell and Rudy Giuliani were among the lawyers behind the cases claiming a conspiracy by Democrats, despite Republican state leaders, and Trumps own attorney general and other administration officials, publicly stating there was no major election fraud. Powell appeared with Giuliani at a press conference and made multiple media appearances.

But after Powell threatened to blow up Georgia with a biblical court filing, the Trump legal team distanced itself from her, saying she was not working on their behalf but she continues to be one of his most vociferous supporters.

She is being sued by Dominion Voting Systems after she alleged it helped rig the election for Biden by manufacturing machines that could flip votes from Trump to Biden.

The Denver-based company claims Powell has raided Defending the Republics coffers to pay for personal legal expenses, citing her own remarks from a radio interview.

Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

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MADISON, Wis. (AP)  The Wisconsin Legislature's budget-writing committee completed its work Thursday on the state's next two-year spending plan, paving the way for the Senate and Assembly to vote on it later this month.

Here are some highlights of the budget as currently written by the Republican-controlled Joint Finance Committee:

TAX CUTS

Bolstered by rosier revenue projections, Republicans inserted $3.3 billion in income and property tax cuts into the budget. The provisions include $2.7 billion in cuts for people who earn between $24,000 and $2654,000 annually and nearly $650 million in local property tax cuts for schools and technical colleges. The budget would backfill that lost revenue with state aid. Residents would see a property tax bill but schools would come out even.

K-12 SCHOOLS:
Where you are, we will go. Donde tu estas, iremos nosotros, Becerra said.

He asked Latino communities to identify trusted leaders to operate as vaccine ambassadors" to convince those who are still hesitant. He reminded the public that the vaccine is free, noting that some may not believe there are no gimmicks attached to receiving the shot.

However, recent data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows that Latino populations have received a higher proportion of administered vaccine doses in the last two weeks, narrowing the disparity, the Department of Health and Human Services said.

Becerra also met faculty and students at the Metropolitan State University of Denver to hear about the effects of a grant his agency gave for behavioral health workforce training.

Becerra said the U.S. is so far behind on behavioral health services but that the pandemic has opened the door for the federal government to invest in mental health and substance abuse disorders.

I think, to some degree, that taboo aspect of talking about it has dissipated, Becerra told The Associated Press. I think COVID really forced people to recognize that there are people who are really suffering from stress and beyond.
KAMPALA, Uganda  Uganda is tightening its lockdown measures to try and stem a surge in coronavirus infections in the East African country that is seeing an array of variants.
Shoreline Junior High posted an apology on its Facebook page. But the page was later hidden or deleted.

We are deeply saddened by the mistake that was made that omitted a student photo out of the yearbook, the post said. Apologies have been made to the family, and we sincerely apologize to all others impacted by this error. We are continuing to look at what has occurred, and to improve our practice.

Davis School District in Davis County, just north of Salt Lake City, put out a similar statement.

We are continuing to look at what has occurred and why it occurred, the statement said. We will continue to look at our processes to ensure this does not happen again.

Poll said her family initially called the school and was told there was nothing they could do, The Tribune reported. She said Wednesday the school contacted the family again and are working to make the situation right.

Disability Law Center of Utah attorney Nate Crippes said Wednesday that this type of exclusion happens often in schools across the state, and that the center receives about 4,000 annual complaints. Crippes said all districts can work to improve by adding more accommodations and being more inclusive.

Arnold will be in ninth grade at Shoreline Junior High next year, Poll said, adding that her sister has not yet decided if she will continue being the cheer manager.

For copyright information, check with the distributor of this item, The Salt Lake Tribune.

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"Instead of furthering an important discussion about anti-racial profiling measures and modernizing our public safety departments, Gov. Reynolds took a giant step backwards," said Rep. Ross Wilburn, an Ames legislator who also is chair of the Iowa Democratic Party. "One year ago, the governor signed legislation that banned most chokeholds and made a promise to Iowans that this is not the end of our work, its just the beginning. We now know that statement was a lie. Instead, she ignored the call to unify."

Wilburn said Thursday's action broke a promise and broke the trust of Iowans who were "more than willing" to work in a transformative, bipartisan way for change that would have a lasting, positive effect on Iowa.

Thede and Rep. Ruth Ann Gaines, D-Des Moines, said they detected a "change in tone" among legislative Republicans this past session on a number of issues that dealt with diversity training, critical race theory education, voting rights and other bills that sent a "veiled, negative, dire" tone and message to young Iowans and people outside the state that "we don't want to grow, we want to maintain status quo."

"That was the big message of this session: We dont see a need for diversity, we dont see a need for collaboration. It is our way or the highway," said Gaines.
On June 7, the MacArthur Foundation bestowed its Creative Placemaking award to the 75th Street Boardwalk, a project on Chicagos South Side. Even in a year of constant improvisation, this project stood out: Its lime-green promenade, replete with picnic tables and play areas, was built from the plywood that boarded up the citys storefronts during the unrest that followed the murder of George Floyd. From the material that defined the city at its most tense and guarded moment, when the drawbridges were lifted over the Chicago River like a medieval moat, had come an architectural invitation. At the heart of the citys Black South Side, the symbol of that painful summer had been built into a place for people to gather.

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Five days later, with the Chicago Police Department warding off traffic as hundreds of Black Chicagoans partied along the street after dark, a pair of gunmen opened fire, wounding nine and killing a 29-year-old mom, Kimfier Miles.

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The success of the boardwalk was a sirens call, Nedra Sims Fears told me. Fears is the director of the Greater Chatham Initiative, the local group that took the lead on redesigning the street. Small afternoon block festivals had evolved into thousand-strong impromptu pop-up parties organized on social media. Now, she says, she is hearing a depressing message from some neighbors: People are coming to the boardwalk, so we need to take the boardwalk down.

In some ways, what happened on 75th Street tells a larger story. The past year has provoked a sea change in American public space, and not just in physical terms. Social norms also changed, as police relaxed their supervision of outdoor hangouts. Open container citations dropped; public pot smoking became commonplace; fireworks were launched in such numbers that neighbors suspected a CIA psy-op. At various points, the line between outdoor dining and full-fledged street party blurred.

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None of that happened evenly: Gatherings of Black Americans, whether in protest or in revelry, have still been met with aggressive policing. Several festive Black gatherings over the past year have been met by militarized cops, notably this March in Miami Beach, when police used pepper balls to disperse spring breakers. The dynamic was also in play in New Yorks Washington Square Park this month, where police have aggressively chased away crowds that are conspicuously younger and more diverse than the parks wealthy surroundings.

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In Chicago, its not just that 75th Street is exceptionally lively in contrast to nearby struggling commercial strips. Its vitality is the flipside of larger retail flight on the citys South Side, which tens of thousands of Black residents have left for the suburbs and the South in the past few decades. The businesses on 75th Street dont just draw from the neighboring blocks, as they did during the areas heyday in the 1960s and 70s, but from neighborhoods much further afield. Black (and some white) families come from miles around for delicacies like Lems Barbecue and Brown Sugar Bakery. They are regional attractions.

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Last summer, in an effort to help the strip recover from the lockdowns, Chicago City Planning Commissioner Maurice Cox coordinated an effort to make 75th Street a more fun place to hang out. This was a good fit: Cox came to Chicago from Detroit with a mandate from Mayor Lori Lightfoot to enhance public space and encourage investment on the citys South and West Sides. When I spoke to him last summer for a story, he said the goal was for people gathering to do outdoor activities to have a safe space on the street to signal to everyone, Hey Chicago, were back open.

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It worked. The phalanx of parklets, with their chairs and windowbox plants, turned a fast-moving thoroughfare into a neighborhood social space. These installations, designed by the Chicago landscape architect Ernie Wong, of Site Design, were a place to have a slice of cake or a rum and coke, a spot youd run into old friends or even the local alderman, who frequents the blocks 60-year-old bar. Together with the exercise bikes down the block, wheeled from the studio onto the sidewalk for evening classes, the boardwalk gave this stretch of sidewalk that uncanny, joyful feeling of a block turned inside-out. On a handful of sunny Saturdays, it was something more: An afternoon activity festival, with bands, dancing, games, and arts and crafts. The project also won a Charter Award from the Congress for New Urbanism.

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On the first weekend in June, the boardwalk was a real party: Hundreds and hundreds of young people showed up after sunset and turned the whole road into a jam-packed plaza. They had 75th St last night looking like Vegas. No shooting, no fighting, wrote the popular Instagram account Chicago Media Takeout. I have no complaints, lets normalize black outings with no violence, the Chicago rapper Donny Konz chimed in.

The Chicago police largely stood by and let the party go on. The police are trying to be friendly, because theyve been accused of so much, said Jaidah Wilson Turnbow, who runs Frances Cocktail Lounge and spoke with the police before last weekend. Theyre trying to keep down negative actions towards people of color. Theyre not breaking the law; theyre not fighting.

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Derrick Rowe, an ex-cop who runs the deli across the street, said the vibe had him fondly thinking back to when he was a kid. He and his friends didnt have social media to get the word out, but theyd still go down to Stony Island Avenue on their motorcycles to hang out. The first couple of nights, it was nice! he said of the late-night parties on 75th Street. My experience, I was happy to see all these people and no violence, I was like, Great, this is perfect! After the hardship of 2020, the South Side deserved a bit of Bourbon Street in 2021.

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Then, last weekend, things were going much the same when two men with guns opened fire on a group of revelers on the sidewalk. So far there is no known motive, and no arrests have been made.

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Now, 75th Street finds itself in the familiar bind of a Black neighborhood in an American city in 2021, stuck between unwinding after a brutal year and bracing against the rising toll of gun violence. Its a sad reminder that even as America strives to relax the police grip on public conduct, guns are so common that the possibility of violence is as much a fixture of our public spaces as seats, lights, and music. Thats not a problem thats limited to the South Side of Chicago, but it is one that weighs on people there. Everyone was confident that it was chill last week, and maybe we can go out and kick it this time. And maybe this is the summer that we can really chill, the victims cousin, Takita Miles told the Chicago Sun-Times. But it wasnt like that.

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This week, Lori Lightfoot was on 75th Street decrying the violence. It seems unlikely the organizers of pop-up parties on the South Side will urge people to come back to 75th Street this weekend. But it would be a real loss if neighbors end up turning against the boardwalk because it proved to be so popular.

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Nedra Sims Fears thinks its unlikely that the boardwalk is going anywhere. The violence was an aberration, she observed. The shooting is not proof that the South Side is too dangerous to have its own Bourbon Street. Instead, she said, it shows how badly South Siders want something like that, the freeform party that comes with music and dancing on a summer street at night. That energy deserves an outlet, even if this little commercial strip in a residential neighborhood isnt the perfect solution. We wanted to activate the space, she reflected, but not at 2 a.m. in the morning. It remains to be seen what will happen with the 75th Street crowds. But wouldnt it be nice if there was someplace just like it, to go and party in peace?
Documentarian Rachel Boyntons Civil War (or, Who Do We Think We Are) is the latest well-meaning attempt to get to the bottom of our great national disagreement over the meaning of the events of 186165. Watching it, I realized how completely done I am with the last decade of polite liberal discourse about the Civil War, Reconstruction, and slavery. I say this as a frequent participant: I am just not sure what all this talking has done.

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This is a film about storytelling, the movie, which is now streaming on Peacock, beginsan observation that lost its punch long ago. OK! Put aside the fact that all history is, to varying degrees, about storytellinghow could it not be?and grant the idea that the history of the Civil War has some particular claim to narrative indeterminacy. Now what the hell do we do when some people in our country want to tell a self-pitying, wrongheaded story, one that shows the deep lack of empathy in their hearts? One that displays the same racist lack of fellow feeling that their ancestors once used to justify separating parents from children? Thats what I want to know.

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Maybe its because the utter imbalance between the two sides is so obvious to everyone now, after the past decade or so of heightened public conversation about Black history, that this documentary feels so unsatisfying. For a film about storytelling, this movie has curiously little narrative drive. Instead, there are a lot of characters who appear for short amounts of time to deliver declarations about the history in question. Heartbreakingly earnest Black students! Recalcitrant white Sons of Confederate Veterans! Charismatic Black historians of slavery! (Kellie Carter Jackson is particularly magnetic.) White farmers who, bafflingly, blame the federal government for the recent loss of their land! Black protesters! Boomer Massachusetts liberals at an all-white evening discussion group about the history of Reconstruction! Mississippi legislators defending their heritage flag! Yale historian David Blight, giving one of his typically wonderful lectures! The gang is, literally, all here.

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History classes are the only places in the country where diverse collections of people talk about race day after day, in a systematic way.

Thats fine. But some of these people are right, and some of them are just wrong. To her credit, Boynton gets some of the white interviewees to say things that had me infuriated. Theres a lot of talk about reparations for slaves, the farmer says. When Abraham Lincoln emancipated the slaves, my great-great-grandfather, he didnt get paid for them! But I dont need to know that story exists. Ive seen this kind of weak-headed apologia over and over on the internet. When the documentary lands on a group of Black Lives Matter activists who sing at a white counterprotester, Get the fuck out of New Orleans/ Get the fuck out of New Orleansor a Black protester who, when asked by Boynton about Southern pride, quickly says, Fuck the South. Fuck Southern prideI cheered. The time for hearing them out is long over and done.

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Besides the moments where Black students talk about elders in their family who dont want to discuss slaveryan interesting counterpoint to the official white liberal line that we must talk about those times, in order to exorcise the poisonthe brief glimpses of history classrooms were where I wanted more of this documentary, not less. History classes are the only places in the country where diverse collections of people talk about race day after day, in a systematic way: not while segregated into interest groups, as with the Sons of Confederate Veterans or any number of liberal anti-racist book clubs; not as momentary attempt at enrichment, as you might do with a day at a historical site or museum. History classrooms are, as one teacher in the film says in describing a difficult discussion with a student, where the juice is. The recent run of anti-CRT laws passed by GOP-led state legislatures further proves that this is true. Why are they so scared, one might ask? They know.

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One particular episodean eighth grade class at Boston Latin School, a public magnet school in Massachusetts that has a diverse student populationhad a flow to it that the rest of the film sorely lacked. The instructor, an older white woman, apparently a teaching veteran, with the command of the classroom that this status brings with it, is working on a lesson about the lead-up to the Civil War with a crowded classroom. One student in the class, a young man with a ghost of a mustache, keeps speaking up. First, on the causes of the war: I notice there seems to be a common idea that the Civil War was totally about slavery. Im gonna disagree with that, he says. The South did want to leave the Union because of slavery, but the issue of the Civil War was keeping the South in the Union. So slavery wasnt the total issue.

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Later, as they talk about Reconstruction and Jim Crow, he gets more and more frustrated, twisting in his chair as the kids sitting around him laugh embarrassedly: Here he goes again. I just think talking about this is really not helpful, he says. What it does is it puts people in an unproductive mindset, it makes white people feel guilty, and it makes Black people feel like victims. Quickly, a Black classmate jumps in: If youre treated differently because of something you cant change, why wouldnt you be a victim? You dont have to talk about something for it to be a certain way.

Behind the scenes, talking to this contrarian student and his teacher, Boynton draws out how the teacher is trying so hard not to squash this child, as she puts it. Hes bringing some sincere and rigorousthe word he used was logicto this problem of Black peoples status in American society, she says. But he doesnt have an answer when I say, Whats the reason, if its not systemic racism? 

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This rich episode takes up only a small fraction of the screen time of the documentary. What happened to this student, after the filmmaker was gone? Did the teacher, and his fellow students, ever convince him to look again at his beliefs? Or did he dig in? Let any future filmmakers looking to explore the American conversation about the Civil War take note: The big-picture ground has been covered. A teaching workforce thats almost 80 percent white is working through this history with diverse groups of students every day. In every classroom, every year, theres a story. Get thee to the schools, and bring your cameras with you.
This article discusses the ending of Pixars Luca.

When director Enrico Casarosa says he didnt intend to make Luca a gay romance, I believe him. The first trailers for the movieabout two boys, one more worldly than the other, growing closer while sharing swims and bike rides in the Italian countrysideinvited some inevitable jokes about it being a kiddie Call Me by Your Name. And these jokes were only further encouraged by the fact that the new Pixar movie shares a name with that Oscar-winning queer romances director, Luca Guadagnino. But Casarosa has insisted that the movies central relationship is purely platonic. I was really keen to talk about a friendship before girlfriends and boyfriends come in to complicate things, he said at a press event. According to him, this coming-of-age story takes place in a pre-puberty world. The Call Me by Your Name-esque elements, he says, were based instead on his own experiences growing up with a childhood friend in Genoa. The name Luca, meanwhile, is surely another coincidence, since Luca is a very common Italian name.

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OK, but isnt it still a little bit gay? Even beyond the superficial similarities to Call Me By Your Name, it seems, at the very least, open to interpretation. Theres no doubt that Luca offers an allegory about identity, passing, and the way people fear others who are not like them. In this case, the two boys true identity just happens to be their hidden natures as sea monsters. The titular character, a young sea monster, disobeys his parents and ventures above the surface, where he forms a close relationship with fellow sea monster Alberto. They have their share of moments that could be easily interpreted as puppy love, such as when theyre stargazing with their arms around each other, and their secret time together is liberating for them. Its also forbidden. When Lucas mother finds out about it, she doesnt understand, and shes afraid for him. She threatens to send him further into the depthsaway from land, but also from Albertos influence.

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The two boys run away together to the nearby town, where they are again misunderstood and must hide their identities from the hostile townspeople. Luca wants to attend school, but, as Alberto reminds him, there will always be a risk of ostracizationeven violenceif the others find out what he really is. Alberto is also jealous of Lucas burgeoning relationship with a local girl, Giulia. And when Alberto comes out, so to speak, as his true self, he is stung by Lucas choice to throw him under the bus and remain closeted. The movies climax arrives when Luca finally decides to stand with Alberto and reveal his own identity. This in turn sparks defenses from their allies (including Giulia), and sets off a domino effect in which other members of the provincial town, including a pair of older women, announce that they, too, are sea monsters.

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As an allegory for the closet, its a messy one, to be sure, and the experience of hiding parts of your identity has never been exclusive to the LGBTQ community. In the eyes of some viewers, the movie may come across an allegory not about sexuality but about race, or gender identity, or immigration status, or simply feeling out of place.

Still, there have been so many similar discussions about queer identity in Disney movies that you can almost predict the discourse ahead of time: Theyre gay! But why do they have to be gay? Isnt it healthy to have a movie with two boys showing affection for each other without making it romantic? But why cant they be gay? Its the same loop that played out with movies like Frozen and Brave. (Why does a girl not wanting an arranged marriage mean she has to be a lesbian? Why shouldnt she be a lesbian? Repeat ad infinitum.)

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Disneys track record here doesnt help matters. For both live-action and animated movies, the studio has overhyped what have become known as exclusively gay moments, tiny morsels of representation that are either so subtle you hardly notice them (a kiss between two women in the background of a Star Wars movie) or so plot-irrelevant that they can be easily chopped or overlooked by international censors (heres looking at you, Endgames unnamed Grieving Man). Pixar at least seems to have learned a lesson about making too much of these moments: In Onward, an extremely minor character mentions having a girlfriend, but the character is still just thatextremely minoreven if the filmmakers were smart enough not to herald this development by tooting their own horns. Meanwhile, while Disney has congratulated itself and claimed to blaze new trails, plenty of other animation studios have been miles ahead of them: Laikas ParaNorman, for example, featured an openly gay character way back in 2012.

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Ironically, the Disney movie that gave us the term exclusively gay moment in the first place took a different tack: The live-action Beauty and the Beasts LeFou is more in the spirit of the studios long-standing tradition of strongly queer-coded, if not explicitly gay, villains. Fans have since picked up on homoerotic undertones in Raya and the Last Dragon and the live-action Mulan, but these movies remain rainbow Rorschach tests, with audiences having to read between the lines or project their own meanings to find queer representation.

Luca seems firmly in this last tradition. How gay is it? Whatever the directors stated intent, the answer seems to be: as gay as you want it to be. Are these two boys crushes? Are they friends? Can the movie be an allegory for coming out either way? All you can do is squint until something takes shape.

For more of Slates coverage of Luca, check out Dana Stevens and Karen Hans spoiler-filled discussion of the movie on the Spoiler Specials podcast.
Last week, Sarah Jessica Parker posted a photo on Instagram of her flanked by Cynthia Nixon and Kristin Davis, confirming two things: The long-discussed Sex and the City revival, And Just Like That, is really and truly happeningthe three had just read through the first episodesand, tragically, it is really and truly happening without Kim Cattrall. Due to a longstanding rift between Cattrall and Parker (and others associated with the show), the franchises beloved fourth lead character will be absent from the new series.

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Ive always been of the opinion that to do a new series, especially after that second movie, was ill-advised, but to do one without Cattrall was sacrilegious. Thats why I was delighted when a photo of Kim Cattrall in a very provocative ensemble crossed my Twitter feed this week:

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In this photo, Cattrall appeared to be wearing not a revenge dress, but something even better: a revenge NASA suit. Could it be? For one brief shining moment, I was elated by the thought that Cattrall had arranged so that while Carrie and co. were at brunch, she would be in space. Now here was a power move befitting Samantha Jones. Finally, a cosmopolitan-drinking cosmonaut! I pictured Samantha flirting with Jeff Bezos on the moon, and a thousand jokes about phallic rocket ships danced through my mind.

But my glee was short-lived, because, I am very saddened to tell you, Kim Cattrall is not going to space. I dont like it any more than youI dont want to live in a world where Bezos gets to go to space whenever he wants but Kim Cattrall cantbut it would be irresponsible to spread misinformation.

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What happened was this: Earlier this week, NASA tweeted that when its Artemis I mission flies around the Moon later this year, there wont be any astronauts aboard. But there will be a very important passenger: a manikin. Then, a Star Trek fan account quote-tweeted NASA, writing, Breaking news! @KimCattrall has been chosen to fly aboard @NASAs #Artemis I mission which flies around the moon later this year. Congrats Kim, wishing you good vibrations!

Breaking news! @KimCattrall has been chosen to fly aboard @NASA's #Artemis I mission which flies around the moon later this year. Congrats Kim, wishing you good vibrations!  https://t.co/cjpj8bAOby  startrekeire (@startrekeire) June 15, 2021

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If youre wondering why a Star Trek fan account would be interested in Kim Cattrall, its because prior to her Sex and the City career, Cattrall played a Vulcan named Valeris in a 1991 Star Trek movie. And if youre still wondering how the tweet makes any sense at all, its because before that, Cattrall starred in an extremely 80s comedy called Mannequin, where she played a department-store mannequin who came to life and fell in love with Andrew McCarthy.

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I knew both of these thingsCattrall hive!though not that there was a word, manikin, that meant something similar but slightly different than mannequin. So why was I so easily fooled, and by a Star Trek fan account? In my defense, Cattrall herself replied to that tweet with the aforementioned photo of herself in the spacesuit, and that got retweeted a bunch of times. And how are you going to argue with a photo of Kim Cattrall in a spacesuit?

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It was only upon further investigation that I realized that it was just a joke: Cattrall did a bunch of other winking tweets about it on her Twitter feed, and the hall monitors at NASA replied to one puncturing the fantasy. Sigh. Whatever, do I really have to apologize that I was so entranced, nay, inspired by the thought of Kim Cattrall in space? This is Cynthia Nixon losing the New York governors race all over again.

One final mystery remains: How did Kim Cattrall have a photo of her in a NASA suit just lying around? Here, a glimmer of hope: Im guessing its from 2013, when Cattrall visited the U.S. Space and Rocket Center to attend Space Camp! Yes, really. It turns out Cattrall is qualified to go into space. It just hasnt happened yet. But it still could. And I think that would be just fabulous.
If youve eaten at a restaurant during the pandemic, whether indoors or out, youve probably seen this happen: A server approaches a table of diners to check on their meals or deliver the check. The server is masked, because local laws require her to be. The diners arent, because as long as theyre seated at their table and eating, theyre allowed to keep their masks off.

This imbalance has always been a flaw of COVID-era restaurant reopening schemes, one of the many ways the pandemic has magnified existing class- and race-based inequities for workers in service industries. But while those one-sided mask mandates were hard to avoid in places that allowed restaurants to reopen in 2020 and early 2021diners have to remove their masks to eat and drink, while servers do notthey have become far less defensible as vaccination rates have risen and COVID case numbers have dropped. Its been over a month since the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued its guidance that vaccinated people could forgo masks in most indoor and outdoor spaces. Why are so many vaccinated service industry workers still forced to wear them?

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In the weeks since that CDC recommendation came down, many states and cities have rolled back their legal mask mandates. Private businesses in those jurisdictions still have the power to require mask use, and while some do, others have made masks optional. Many of those businesses have made requests for unvaccinated patrons to remain masked, but because of the substantial overlap between anti-vaxxers and anti-maskers, its hard to imagine theyre heeded.

These codified double standards are not just indefensible from an equity standpoint. They are wholly unsupported by public health guidelines.

At CVS, Whole Foods, and Target, most fully vaccinated customers and employees can go without masks. But some executives and small-business owners are taking another route: a two-tier system that requires stringent COVID precautions for employees and lax ones for customers. People who work at the TJX family of stores, which includes the lower-price retailers HomeGoods, Marshalls, and TJ Maxx, must wear masks for the entirety of their shifts, vaccinated or not. And the patrons theyll assist? We ask non-vaccinated customers to please continue to wear face coverings while in store, the retailers websites say.

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Several other major companies have issued similar masking guidelines in recent weeks. Wegmans announced on May 19 that fully vaccinated customers were no longer required to wear masks in the store, while fully vaccinated employees must continue to wear them until July 4. Disney World has totally different policies for its visitors (who can go maskless) and workers (who can only remove their masks if they work outside in a distanced location). All Gap employees must remain masked up, too, even as the company is simply recommending that unvaccinated shoppers continue to cover their faces.

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These codified double standards are not just indefensible from an equity standpoint. They are wholly unsupported by public health guidelines. Really, the exact opposite of the two-tier policies these companies have adopted would be a lot more consistent with current public health recommendations. The CDC says its OK for vaccinated people to be indoors together. It would be much easier for employers to verify a workers vaccination status than a customersand most of the companies Ive mentioned offer employees paid time off for vaccination and potential side effectsso it would make more sense to allow verified vaccinated retail workers to go unmasked while requiring all customers to mask up.

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The same applies to food service. Chipotle allows fully vaccinated customers, but not employees, to go maskless, and Starbucks workers must wear multi-ply facial coverings (or double mask) while patrons do not. True, it may take a while before it arouses no concern to see an unmasked stranger breathing on our food. But remember that epidemiologists and food-safety authorities have not identified food as a vector for coronavirus transmission. And even if you could catch the virus from eating a burrito bowl covered in spike proteins, a vaccinated worker in a community with low infection rates is highly unlikely to be spewing them. The greater hypothetical risk at a fully unmasked Chipotle would be a workers droplets and aerosols floating over the burrito bar and into a customers face. But if an institution has already decided to accept the risk of the droplets and aerosols that unvaccinated customers produce, as Chipotle has, there is no reason to hold vaccinated employees to a different standard.

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Its not just corporations that are saddling employees with the burden of fully masked shifts while customers breathe freely. The disparate treatment also persists in independent businesses, where mask mandates for staff can seem particularly absurd. Last month, I dined outdoors at a small restaurant with a group of fully vaccinated friends. Every time our server approached, some of my friends rushed to refasten their masks. Dont worry about that, our server said. Im vaccinated, so youre fine without them. She, on the other hand, was forced to wear hers, even while walking between the well-spaced tables on the wide-open patio. A colleague recently visited an auto mechanic whose outdoor crew was fully masked while they changed tires in the sweltering heat. Indeed, observed Jacob Bernstein in a May New York Times report on the current state of luxury living in the Hamptons, when one spots a person wearing a mask outdoors, chances are high that the person is attending to the rich.

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Its possible that some of these workers want to continue wearing masks for their own protection. Obviously, no one should be forced to remove a mask that makes them feel safe, even though an individuals mask principally protects other people from the breath of the person wearing it. Workers who are immunocompromised or just exceedingly cautious might want to stay masked until case rates are lower and vaccination rates are higher wherever they live and work. (Immunocompromised workers should already be granted the types of accommodations that must be made for any employee with a disability.) While United Food and Commercial Workers, a union that represents 1.3 million grocery and retail employees, has registered concern about the rollback of store mask mandates, a statement from the union president focused on the risk of customers with unknown vaccination histories going unmasked and workers being asked to be the vaccination police. But instead of reinstating customer mask mandates in response to worker concerns, the companies whove eliminated them have simply made masks optional for all customers, using an honor system to free employees from enforcement duty. (The burden of policing anti-masker customers was so great that some Starbucks workers told Business Insider that they were glad to see customer mask mandates gone.)

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What about the safety of immunocompromised customers, children, and others who arent yet eligible for vaccines? The burden of their protection should not be foisted solely upon workers, especially when stores are already creating uncontrolled risk by allowing customers to choose whether to wear masks at all.

Besides, the fact is fully vaccinated people are very unlikely to become infected with COVID-19. If they do, they are much less likely than unvaccinated people to transmit it to others. And if they still somehow contract the virus and have the ability infect others, its usually with a drastically reduced viral load. Forcing low-paid workers to wear masks in a place where unvaccinated, unmasked customers roam does more to falsely inflate a companys image as COVID-conscious than it does to reduce the actual risk of in-store COVID transmission.

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You might argue that retail and food service workers, by virtue of their public-facing duties, are at a greater risk of contracting the coronavirus, and then spreading it, than many of their customers, so they should be wearing masks for everyones sake. But theres no fair or reasonable way to make a blanket assumption about the risk level of an entire class of people. You could also argue that any transmission-prevention measure is a good one: The more masks, the better, and managers have a lot more power over what their workers wear than they do their customers. But how much extra risk reduction would a mask on an already-vaccinated employee offer in a store filled with unmasked patrons? Not enough to justify the disparate treatment. Consider it this way: What better way to convince front-line workers to get vaccinated than with the promise of an end to workdays spent breathing their own recycled breath?
U.S. Catholic bishops were largely in agreement that they should move forward with a plan that could ultimately lead to denying Communion to public figures who support abortion rights. That could end up in a stunning public rebuke of President Joe Biden and goes against the wishes of the Vatican. Despite all the controversy, the vote wasnt close. In a 168-55 vote, bishops agreed to draft a teaching document on the meaning of the Eucharist in the church. The document will be presented for approval in November and would require a two-thirds majority vote for approval.

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Even though the actual potential rebuke is still a long way away, the vote itself was still astounding considering it comes from leaders of the presidents faith and targets a leader who has regularly attended Mass his whole life. Biden is the second Catholic president in the countrys history and the most religiously observant one since Jimmy Carter. The vote was also particularly striking considering many conservative Catholics turned a blind eye to the sexual improprieties of former President Donald J. Trump because they supported his political agenda, notes the New York Times.

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Asked about the possibility that bishops would approve a document that would prevent him from receiving Communion, Biden refused to comment in detail. Thats a private matter, and I dont think thats going to happen, he said. Biden has said he is personally against abortion but wont impose his views on all Americans.

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By approving the document, the bishops went against the direct appeals from the Vatican that had called for a less divisive stance on the issue. Pope Francis has worked closely with Biden in the past, particularly during President Barack Obamas administration on the efforts to normalize relations with Cuba and climate change.

All the controversy led to heated debate at the annual spring meeting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops that was held virtually. Bishops on each side of the debate accused the other of threatening the churchs reputation. Our credibility is on the line.  The eyes of the whole country are on us. If we dont act courageously, clearly and convincingly on this core Catholic value, how can we expect to be taken seriously on another matter? asked San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone, who expressed support for the document. But San Diego Archbishop Robert McElroy warned that if they choose to go down that path theyll turn Communion into a tool in vicious partisan turmoil.
This summers spate of state-level bills aimed at censoring the content of history teaching in public school classroomsbills that have made much of the supposed double threat of critical race theory and the New York Times 1619 Projectmight seem somewhat random. But in fact, conservative attacks like these on humanities curricula that discuss race and racism in the United States follow a long-established pattern.

First, right-wing fears are always more about a vague idea of the content of such curricula than about classroom realities. (In Indiana, suburban parents have been angered by the supposed presence of critical race theory, or CRTtypically a graduate-level elective offered to law studentsin their schools, despite the fact that their schools do not teach it.) Second, because activists on the right view the schools as the grease that makes slopes slippery, they tend to use school curricula to talk about a host of related social issues. (Anti-CRT activists lump together everything they dont like, from Marxism to Black Lives Matter to progressive education, and call it CRT.) And third, these battles have always been waged over the stories that get told about the American past, present, and future. In that sense, the angry right wing is correct: The stakes couldnt be higher.

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Earlier battles over curriculum provided the template for todays anti-CRT, anti1619 Project political campaigns. In the late 1930s, for instance, activists in right-leaning patriotic groups such as the Daughters of the American Revolution and the American Legion warned their fellow Americans about a subversive set of textbooks. The fact that the textbooks written by Columbia professor Harold Rugg were widely popular and had been used for years in schools across America did not matter. The books, conservatives warned, represented an attempt by radical and communistic textbook writers to turn American children against America.

In reality, the books intended no such thing. Their lead author, Harold Rugg, an engineer turned professor of pedagogy whose intellectual roots lay in the Progressive education movement of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, took pains to categorically deny his participation in any communist or socialist movement. His vision of a good education, Rugg explained, consisted of young people confronting social conditions and issues squarely and digging to the very roots of our changing culture. Rugg hoped his books would lead students to think critically about the most difficult questions in American history, including racism and inequality. In his teachers guides, Rugg encouraged teachers always to ask students, What do you think?

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Rugg published a series of historical textbooks that encouraged students to confront the countrys chronic problems of racism and class conflictproblems that loomed large in the collective consciousness during the Depression years, a time of great national stress. In Culture and Education in America (1931), Rugg denounced the exploitative tradition in American society. In a middle school textbook, Citizenship and Civic Affairs, he taught American children about the question of equality and classes in America. It was a harsh fact of American society and history, according to the book, that some people did not receive a fair reward for their hard work, while others got rich without much work at all. Embedded in those lessons was an idea that terrified conservatives of the 1930s. American children, they feared, would hear that U.S. history was not only a story of greatness but a story of struggle.

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However, once the anti-Rugg campaign gained momentum among right-wing parents, what the books actually said mattered less than opponents stories about them. In Binghamton, New York, for instance, the school superintendent had read the books and liked them. As he told the press in 1940, its the kind of book I want my children to have. To say it is subversive is absurd. But the books reputation eclipsed all chances for reasonable debate. As one opponent declared, I havent read the books, butI have heard of the author, and no good about him. To avoid controversy, the superintendent pulled them from the districts schools. Elsewhere, school boards did more than just pull the books from their shelves. In towns from New Jersey to Wisconsin, panicked patriots lit bonfires of the books. Perhaps even worse, as historian Charles Dorn has found, other textbook writers censored themselves in order to avoid Ruggs fate. The anti-Rugg crusaders, even if they did not know much about the actual Rugg textbooks, narrowed the curriculum and steered children away from any topic that might cause similar outrage.

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The pattern of conservative backlash against progressive educations approach to teaching social issues was well-established by the 1950s. Self-described patriotic groups like the American Legion and National Council for American Education warned of unpatriotic teachers and professors and wrung their hands about the problem of making loyal Americans out of the boys and girls. In a number of cases, these pressure groups managed to get textbooks deemed subversive pulled from schools. These groups were among many right-wing organizations that campaigned to purify American history textbooks of supposedly subversive ideas. Concepts identified as offensive included describing segregation as a problem or, in the words of one Florida legislator, touting the superiority of the Negro race.

In the wake of Brown v. Board of Education, conservative groups predictably raged against school integration. But they also campaigned against curricula that would, in their view, upend white privilege and pride. The California far-right publication American Nationalist was typical when it warned against racially egalitarian ideas polluting white childrens minds. One of its pamphlets, which featured a photograph of a young white girl dancing with a Black classmate in Chicago, countered arguments, common among midcentury liberals, that childrens supposedly natural lack of hierarchical consciousness around race meant that teachers and curricula had the power to intervene to encourage a new way of thinking in the next generation. This youthful absence of prejudice, the writers argued, proved nothing. It is true, of course, the pamphlet explained, that young children normally display no race consciousness until so taught by their parents, but it is also true that they have no sense of honesty, modesty, or even hygiene.

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By the 1970s, backlash against supposedly progressive curriculums had ossified into predictable outcries about unpatriotic content, which often meant targeting material that dignified Black voices. Even if conservative complaints were rote, their activism was literally explosive. In Kanawha County, West Virginia, in 1974, white parents reacted with violent rage to false rumors about the contents of popular textbooks. In this case, a new series of English language arts textbooks had been approved by the state. One school board member, Alice Moore, warned that the books were full of anti-Christian, anti-American, anti-white propaganda and indoctrination.

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These warnings stoked a fire that had been smoldering for decades. For weeks at the start of the 197475 school year, outraged parents boycotted the schools and their dirty books. Protesters shot and vandalized school buses. They threw firebombs into empty school buildings. They exploded a dynamite bomb at the school district headquarters. Their fury, once again, was only loosely connected to reality. In this case, protesters had circulated flyers at the picket lines, warning that the books were sexually graphic. Opponents also objected to the inclusion of excerpts of work by Black authors such as Eldridge Cleaver and George Jackson. By doing so, the textbooksone conservative parent told a school board meetingreduced the English language to the language of the ghetto.

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Outraged white parents took to the streets to defend their children from exposure to such words and ideas. The supposed excerpts about sex were nowhere to be found in the actual textbooks under review. Still, protest leaders such as Alice Moore defended their opposition to Black authors. They were tiredas Moore saidof being called racist merely for insist[ing] on the traditional teaching of English. When it came to conservative outrage, the actual content of the books did not matter. As one boycott leader explained, You dont have to read the textbooks. If youve read anything that the radicals have been putting out in the last few years, that was what was in the textbooks.

In addition to the immediate violence and destruction of the boycott, the Kanawha County campaign led to familiar long-term damage. Teachers censored themselves. As one teacher remembered, she and her colleagues were terrified by all the chaos. Another teacher remembered checking with her principal before she taught a lesson in biology class about the asexual reproduction of mollusks. She did not want to be accused of warping young minds about sex. Teachers stopped teaching books such as 1984 and Brave New World, on the off chance that someone might find them too controversial.

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Todays backlash against the alleged teaching of critical race theory in Americas schools, like these earlier flare-ups over humanities curricula, holds the same potential to curb honest reckonings with the American past and present. As with prior reactionary movements, opponents of CRT maintain that American history is not meant to be merely another set of facts for children to learn. Instead, history must be a well of inspiration, a pure source of greatness from the past. From this perspective, CRT is any dangerous drop of doubt that will contaminate comforting white fantasies about Americas past, present, and future.

Classes in subjects that include the history of race and racism might be banned or canceled, due to the chilling effect of the backlash; some schools have already gone there. Even worse, teachers and students may resort to a stultifying self-censorship, avoiding topics that are vitally important precisely because they help students understand the true contours of Americas troubled history. Its impossible to face history if teachers are always looking over their shoulders. And for those cynically leading the charge against CRT, thats precisely the point.
North Koreas Kim Jong Un had been pretty silent about relations with Washington since President Joe Biden took office. Now he has spoken and called on his government to get ready for both diplomacy and confrontation with the United States. Kim did emphasize the confrontation side of the equation during a detailed analysis of Bidens North Korea policy, state-controlled Korean Central News Agency said. Kim stressed the need to get prepared for both dialogue and confrontation, especially to get fully prepared for confrontation in order to protect the dignity of our state and its interests for independent development and to reliably guarantee the peaceful environment and the security of our state, KCNA said.

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Despite the focus on confrontation, Kims apparent willingness to dialogue as well marks a possible opening to resume nuclear talks with Washington that have been at a standstill since 2019. By sending out both messages, North Korea is sticking to a kind of wait-and-see strategy with regard to the new US administration. But behind the ambiguity of Kims message is also a signal that North Korea is willing to return to talks, writes the BBCs Nari Kim.

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Bidens administration had made an effort to reach out to Pyongyang to understand whether nuclear negotiations could resume but did not receive a clear answer. Then in April, the White House said it reached a clear understanding of how efforts to negotiate with North Korea had failed recently. At the time the White House said Biden was ready to explore diplomacy with North Korea. Kim spoke at a meeting of the ruling Workers Party shortly before Bidens new special envoy on North Korea, Sung Kim, is set to meet with South Korean and Japanese officials to discuss North Korea.

Kim opening the door to dialogue also comes amid a warning from the totalitarian leader about a looming food shortage, which analysts had said could make North Korea more willing to relaunch stalled negotiations. It isnt clear exactly how bad the situation is in North Korea yet but analysts say Its unlikely that the country is close to reaching a famine like it suffered in the 1990s. Still, analysts the situation could at the very least push North Korea to try to seek a short-term agreement with the United States.
Welcome to this weeks edition of the Surge. You know, weve been in the market for a tagline, and we came up with it this week: Theres no happiness in life, only a mirage of it on the horizon. Eh? You say Vladimir Putin already used it? Hes hacked our brains.





The United States Senate is at Seersucker Thursday levels of back to normal, and the work is stacking up. A bipartisan infrastructure deal may actually be coming togetherand its making progressives worried about whether that may be all that comes together. Voting rights and election reform are heading to the floor next week, and Joe Manchin is finally on the move. Congress approved a new federal holiday this week for the first time in 38 years, and that new federal holiday is observed today! Is that great newsor the latest trick in the critical race theory trick book? A grown woman had to go to the Holocaust Museum to learn that the Holocaust was not comparable to wearing a cloth mask, and Congress might finally repeal the presidents authority to send troops to attack anyone in Iraq whos jaywalking.





But lets start with the figure whos working the most to make order out of chaos.
The theory that COVID-19 escaped from a lab has never been more popular. There are many questions about the degree to which it is plausible and which alleged evidence is more conspiratorial. Regardless of how likely you think the lab escape theory is, however, theres something most pundits miss. That is: What should we be asking foras a matter of policy and politicseven if it is a lab escape?

Truth is, its rare that proponents of the lab escape theory really have a plan. As biosecurity experts, were interested in the answer to the lab escape question. If the theory is validated (and theres a chance, but its very slim), the coronavirus would be the first potential lab release leading to a global outbreak in more than 40 years. But as one of us has argued, even if true, that doesnt necessarily change what we should be doing to protect against pandemics of all stripes. More fundamentally: There is no strong international legal basis on which to investigate the activities of biological laboratoriesand we cant create one overnight.

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But it didnt have to be this way. And the reason why theres so little ability for us to know the safety of laboratories ahead of time, much less after a possible laboratory release, is a story of political failures over decades, leading up to the present confusion.

Despite the rapid expansion of biological technologies and the ability to create novel pathogens, the world has very little formal capability to investigate a pandemic disease that might have emerged from a lab in a way that would satisfy proponents of the lab release theory. If a nation suspected COVID were a biological weapons attack, it could invoke Article V of the Biological Weapons Convention and ask for a consultation among countries to determine the status of the claim. It could then use Article VI to bring a claim of a biological attack to the U.N. Security Council, though China, as a permanent member, could veto a decision to investigate such a claim.

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Neither of these mechanisms, though, would give us the background information to nail down some of the claims proponents of the lab escape make: what diseases were studied at the lab in question, how often, and so on. To do that we would arguably need a verification mechanism to routinely inspect high containment labs, know their contents, and ensure they were operating appropriately. That mechanism nearly existed, but was sidelined by the U.S. in 2001.

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The reasons why depend on who you ask. For some, it was a cynical move by the U.S. For othersincluding the U.S.it was a recognition that the life sciences are so ubiquitous and diverse that, unlike nuclear weapons, it would be impossible to enforce, or at least too costly to both states and the labs inspected. The argument says that because developing a biological attack requires only a small amount of an agent (which unlike uranium or plutonium can be grown into larger amounts), a verification mechanism like we have with nuclear materials isnt the right framework for biology. But no alternative mechanism has arisen since, and at least one group of commentators has noted that in rejecting the verification protocol as it did, the U.S. effectively killed any favorable multilateral consideration of any ideas, however meritable, that it might bring forward at some subsequent date.

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What were left with is the International Health Regulations (2005), negotiated after SARS to detect and mitigate outbreaks that might become epidemics or pandemics and other events of international public health concern. Earlier versions of the International Health Regulations focused on a specific list of diseases that particularly concerned the international community; by 1969, that was limited to, cholera, plague, and yellow fever. Efforts to reform the IHR had been underway in the late 20th and very early 21st centuries, but not until the rapid global spread of SARS did the international community come together to update the treaty framework. While addressing emerging diseases and unexpected outbreaks was a central focus of the negotiations, discussions were complicated by the recent failure of Biological Weapons Convention verification efforts and fears that the International Health Regulations would be used as a stand-in mechanism for security issues.

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These suspicions were not unfounded: During the negotiations, the U.S., European Union, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and Nicaragua pushed to include chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear incidents in the treaty as events. Other countries were concerned that the inclusion of chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear events in the IHR would allow too much overlap with other nonproliferation treaties, including the Biological Weapons Convention, leading to the eventual creation of the catch-all definition in the International Health Regulations decision annex: [a]ny event of potential international public health concern, including those of unknown causes or sources and those involving other events or diseases than those listed 

Unlike the Biological Weapons Convention, which would not have covered a laboratory release, this catch-all category would cover an accidental release. It could have allowed the WHO to investigate the possibility of a lab release if stronger measures were also included in the IHR 2005.

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But there were two major sticking points in the updating of the International Health Regulations: reporting by nongovernment sources and WHO inspection. Early drafts of the updated International Health Regulations allowed the WHO to verify rumors of public health risks, a recognition of the success of the Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network encouraging collaboration in outbreak reporting. This language caused significant debate about both what would qualify and where such rumors might originate. Some countries wanted any nongovernment source reported by name, which would likely have discouraged reporting in the first place. Others worried rumors was so broad as to allow the treaty to become a political tool. This language was eventually softened to the current version of Article 10, which allows WHO to request verification from a State Party of reports from sources other than notifications or consultations of events which may constitute a public health emergency of international concern allegedly occurring in the States territory.

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Verification of public health events through WHO was also controversial, particularly once the definition of event was made flexible enough to cover chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear incidents. Original drafts of the updated International Health Regulations 2005 would have allowed on-the-spot studies by a team sent by WHO. In the early 2000s, many countries were wary that investigations through the International Health Regulations might be an attempt to create an alternative to the failed Biological Weapons Convention verification protocol. The U.S. in particular objected strongly to the article and refused to move forward without softened language. Several countries were concerned about the power to inspect laboratories, investigate within national borders, and investigate outbreaks without the collaboration of the national government. Given discussions in the House Committee on Foreign Affairs hearing on June 7, the concern may have been prescient. In the end, the language was softened to allow only voluntary investigations in collaboration with the state, a process we saw play out in the investigation of the origins of COVID. Clearly, this investigative process was not enough for proponents of the lab leak theory. But because of the history of the International Health Regulations, its all we have.

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In the end, the International Health Regulations of 2005 do allow reporting of a lab release and collaborative, voluntary investigation of one. But the conflict over Biological Weapon Convention verification and concerns around sovereignty means there is no stronger mechanism to verify the origins of COVID. Although the International Health Regulations do require reporting and information sharing, there is no mechanism to force them if a state decides not to participate.

Its a profound irony, then, that American calls for verification and transparency lack teeth precisely because of the U.S. tanked two verification mechanisms. But this lack of capability, in some ways, also lets proponents of the lab release theory off the hook. They want transparency, true. But theres not really anything anyone can do, short of cooperationwhich proponents seem not to wantto make this case any clearer.

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What we need in this case is not to divorce science from politics. Rather, we desperately need better politics. The lab release debate has been largely directed by scientists, journalists, and politicians, whose knowledge of the failures of previous attempts to better secure the life sciences at an international level is limited. We may never settle the question of a lab release definitively. But we need a better international system to understand and respond to biological threats anyway.

What the lab release debate needs is a series of proposals about what we do next. What it needs is a plan. That plan doesnt need to, and shouldnt, wait for the results of an investigation. And thats because the work to prevent the misuse and accidental harm of the life sciences stalled years ago at the international level. Getting that started again is vitally important.

Future Tense is a partnership of Slate, New America, and Arizona State University that examines emerging technologies, public policy, and society.
ARCHIVED - Spain to receive 19 billion euros this year following EU approval of recovery plan



EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen presented her Covid Digital certificate as she entered Spain

On Wednesday (June 16) European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen met with Spanish President Pedro Sanchez as part of a round of visits to member states.

She brought with her the formal approval of the Spanish Covid recovery plan, highlighting in her official presentation that it allocates 68 per cent of the funds to reforms and programmes relating to energy transition and digital transformation.

Brussels has approved the recovery plan the Spanish government submitted at the end of April, bringing the country one step closer to receiving a nine billion euro advance payment from the European crisis fund.

However, the initial payment still depends on the document being given the green light by the EUs Economy and Finance ministries, which is expected to happen in mid-July.

Moreover, the European authorities think another 10-billion-euro payment could be approved at the end of the year, meaning Spain will have received 19 billion by the end of 2021. Unlike the initial advance payment, the second will depend on whether the country has reached a series of goals and milestones agreed by Spain and Brussels. Specifically, the EU authorities will have to validate some 50 targets in order to approve it. Many of these goals have already been met, as they can include measures adopted since February 2020. There are still some pending issues though, EU sources have pointed out, such as reducing the temporary nature of the public sector, the entry into force of the climate law and the deployment of electric car charging points.

Although Spain was eligible to receive some 140 billion euros from the EUs 800-billion recovery fund, for the time being, the government has only requested the 69.5 billion euros available in non-refundable transfers. The remaining amount would have been in the form of loans.

The country must meet a total of 416 goals and milestones to unlock six-monthly payments between the end of 2021 and June 2025. The biggest single instalment, amounting to some 12 billion euros, is scheduled for June 2022, and the government must meet a range of targets to obtain it, most of which are related to labour market reform.

Spains plan, the Commission said in a statement, includes a broad range of mutually reinforcing reforms and investments that contribute to fully addressing or significantly reducing the economic and social challenges highlighted in the country-specific recommendations. Moreover, it includes details of how the national authorities intend to prevent, detect and correct conflicts of interest, corruption or fraudulent use of the EU funds.

EC President Ursula von der Leyen said that the plan will profoundly transform Spains economy, making it greener, more digital and resilient. The Commission has backed the plan because it is ambitious, forward-looking and will help build a better future for citizens in Spain, she said.

"This is a unique opportunity not only to strengthen the country's recovery from the pandemic but also to build an economy that is more socially just, more sustainable and more dynamic," added EU Economy Commissioner Paolo Gentiloni.

Image2: Fernando Calvo/Pool Moncloa


Support for pro-Western orientation in Slovakia rises. So does support for Vladimir Putin

Public approval of the Kremlin leader has increased by 14 percent in Slovakia.

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Slovakia holds the distinction of being the only country in the region to record rising support for a pro-Western orientation, including EU and NATO membership, since 2017.

This stems from the Globsec Trends 2021 report conducted based on polls from March 2021 on a representative sample of the population in ten countries: Austria, Bulgaria, Czechia, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania and Slovakia.

The only country with a clear trend in any direction is Slovakia, with support for EU membership gradually rising from 66 percent in 2018 to 78 percent in 2021, the Globsec report reads.

(Source: Globsec Trends 2021)

With few exceptions, long-term data indicates that geopolitical preferences - Western or Eastern - are rather stable among the researched countries. Two patterns are discernible from the longitudinal data in Hungary and Slovakia. Whereas preferences for a Western orientation have increased slightly in Slovakia since 2017, there has, conversely, been a slight decline in Western dispositions in Hungary.

8. Jun 2021 at 10:57 | Compiled by Spectator staff
Interior minister survives ousting attempt

The session, initiated by the opposition, lasted two days.

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Roman Mikulec (OLaNO) will continue serving as the interior minister.

The opposition failed to remove him from the post, as its proposal was supported by only 53 out of 135 MPs present. To recall him from the post, the majority of votes of all members of the parliament, i.e. 76 votes, was needed.

The discussion in the parliament started on the morning of June 15, but the MPs voted only on the evening of June 16. Most opposition MPs from Smer, the far-right Kotlebovci  Peoples Party Our Slovakia (LSNS) and non-affiliated MPs around Peter Pellegrini and Stefan Kuffa supported the proposal to remove Mikulec, the SITA newswire reported.

He is the second minister to face an ousting attempt recently. Before him, the opposition tried to recall Justice Minister Maria Kolikova (Za Ludi), who survived the vote in May.

Mikulec criticised for failing to manage his ministry

Interior minister may face no-confidence vote. His colleague criticised him, too Read more

The special session was initiated by Smer, which claimed that the recent media reports only confirm that the minister is failing to manage his own department.

The party has accused Mikulec of interference in police investigations. The latest developments include the arrest and charging of the now-former head of the police inspectorate earlier this month, the body whose main task is to deal with wrongdoing by police officers, followed by a June 10 raid by the police inspectorate against the National Criminal Agency (NAKA).

Smer also mentioned what it called universal witnesses, i.e. detained people who started collaborating with the police whose testimonies are allegedly coordinated.

No violations of coalition agreement

Smer chair accuses the coalition of having "a system of snitches" Read more

Though Mikulec had the support of the entire cabinet and several media reports called his ousting improbable, there were some coalition MPs who criticised the minister.

Before the actual vote, two Sme Rodina MPs, Peter Pcolinsky and Adriana Pcolinska, the brother and wife of the detained former director of the Slovak Information Service (SIS) intelligence agency, Vladimir Pcolinsky, were said to be given a free hand in their vote.

If the two had supported the Smer-initiated proposal, it would have in fact meant a violation of the coalition agreement, which in most cases bans the common vote of coalition MPs with the opposition. This did not happen, as PM Eduard Heger (OLaNO) said.

Still, the two MPs left the assembly hall before the vote, the TASR newswire reported.

17. Jun 2021 at 12:02 | Compiled by Spectator staff
A rarity in Culpeper got the thumbs-up Thursday: a state historical marker that will honor United States Colored Troops, who entered Central Virginia via the county as the Unions Overland Campaign began in 1864.

The Virginia Board of Historic Resources voted unanimously to approve the marker, among others discussed Thursday afternoon, as its members met virtually. As OKd by the board, the silver-and-black cast-metal sign will read:

U.S. Colored Troops in the Overland Campaign: On 5 May 1864, thousands of United States Colored Troops entered Culpeper County at Kellys Ford, six miles southeast of here, marking the first time Black troops served alongside the Army of the Potomac. These men, including some who had escaped slavery in Culpeper and nearby counties, served in the 19th, 23rd, 27th, 30th, 39th, and 43rd USCT and the 30th Connecticut Colored Infantry, which made up the 4th Division of IX Corps. After a brief stay in Culpeper County, the troops marched south across the Rapidan River to join Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grants Overland Campaign. While in Culpeper, at least three Black soldiers were captured by Confederates and summarily executed along the roadside.

Virginia historians greeted news of the historical marker enthusiastically.
One of the programs core goals is to support early childhood teachers, who are often women of color. These teachers provide an essential service in educating and caring for young children, yet are paid less than K12 teachers and even many service jobs, McGill said.

One of the challenges of hiring is that people are seeing signs in McDonalds for $15-an-hour jobs and were not paying that, unfortunately, and the responsibilities of this job are so great, McGill said. And we cant ask parents to pay more.

Teachers at facilities that are part of the PDG program and work for at least 30 hours per week with children up to age 5 are eligible for a stipend of $1,500, and McGill said the stipend has been helpful for her staff.

Northam said she and her husbands administration have worked to raise the profile of early childhood educators, beginning by moving oversight of child care and preschool facilities from the Department of Social Services to the Department of Education.

This workforce needs to be recognized as so much more than babysitters, she said.

Northam said the pandemic made clear how crucial child care is to a functioning economy.
Youre going to get the context of whats going on in the United States in the 1840s to about 20 years up until the Civil War, understanding whats going on on the Great North Platte River Valley, and how that goes for the whole Platte River area. So yeah, everything is going to be in context, Reddish said. Nothing just happens in a vacuum. There is always a cause and effect.

Reddish said that this tour would help people see the Oregon Trail come to life and give a realistic visual of the stories Nebraskans learn and read about in fourth grade. Its not exactly what you might have seen in the movies or on TV.

Whatever images that you still think of that Hollywood produced, no, she said. You pretty much walked. The only time youre riding in the wagon is maybe if youre sick, but even then its not going to be a great feeling.  The Hollywood image of sitting in the wagon  probably not.

Reddish said the tour is a bit of an experiment right now to see if something like this would be successful for the area, but Sandoz said she couldn't believe it wasnt being done already.
Bond pushes these two actors to their limits, asking them to get out of their comfort zone by dancing, doing stunts and making every single movement precise and comically meaningful.

Working with our director, James Bond, hes very specific, so you have to get even the littlest movements right. So, its just a lot of repetition, and you got to stick with it, Doremus said. But at the end of the day, its completely worth it. Its completely worth it to get everything as picture perfect as we can to just make everybody laugh. (We) look a little ridiculous along the way, but thats the fun in it.

Both students are grateful for the opportunity to perform and work with industry professionals through Theatre West. Grady, who plans to attend Lindenwood University in the fall, said hes grown so much because of this experience.

Im getting so much experience and a lot of work, Grady said.  Id never expected anything like this. I mean, Francesca (Mintowt-Czyz) has opened up the door for so many opportunities, (as well as) Patrick Newell with Theatre West. Its just surreal. I love it. Im so thankful for it.

For Doremus, it might actually solidify his career path.
Wayne plans to continue to push for the state holiday. There wont be any significant change if it comes to fruition at this point, he said, but it matters to him.

I think its great, Wayne said of the news that Juneteenth is now a federal holiday.

To him, it makes perfect sense that there was such broad support for the holiday because its significance is so complex that it touches everybody.

Wayne said Juneteenth is multifaceted: It honors the African American soldiers who fought for a country that didnt care for them. Its a reminder that the battle for equality is ongoing and that having laws on the books doesnt mean that theyll be fully implemented. It reminds him of the individuals ability to change and provides hope that the country can keep striving to be a more perfect union.

It reminds us that, you know, just because there was an Emancipation Proclamation, there still has to be work that has to be done, he said.

Often, the holiday is referred to as a celebration of the end of slavery.
Since President Joseph R. Biden, Jr. was sworn into office in January, our country has seen a dramatic shift in national policy and how the federal government treats states. From tax hikes to new regulations, the Biden-Harris Administration has charted a more liberal course than the Trump Administration. Over the last couple of weeks, Ive been traveling the state highlighting the threat that President Bidens 30 x 30 plan poses to Nebraska, but that isnt the only issue of concern at the federal level. There are several different issues on the horizon that could affect Nebraskas ag economy. Ill briefly highlight a few of them here.

Meat Processing Investigation: The meat processing industry has been consolidating for years. This has left producers with very limited options when marketing their cattle. In light of this, there have been questions about pricing in the industry. While processors are making about $900 a head, I am concerned that high prices paid on the boxed beef side have not always translated into higher prices paid to producers. Over the last several years, the producers share of profits has declined, while the price of fresh beef has jumped. In May 2020, President Trump tasked the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) to investigate the business practices of our nations four largest meat processors. At that time, the DOJs anti-trust division began looking into allegations of anti-competitive practices in the beef industry. Last month, I joined five other Governors in sending a letter to DOJ seeking an update on its investigation. It has now been over a year since DOJ began its probe. Both livestock producers and consumers deserve to know the status of the investigation. The DOJ also needs to prioritize its work to ensure fairness for producers and consumers and to restore trust within the cattle industry. You can read the full letter at www.Governor.Nebraska.gov.
In January 1995, I made a list of 18 attributes that described the type of man I wanted to marry. The list included wants children, high family ties  loves his mother, secure in themselves and social.

Three years later, I married such a man. A man who more than met the criteria, Jimmy Cushman.

Jackie Gingrich Cushman Jackie Gingrich Cushman writes a weekly human-interest column for Creators Syndicate that focuses on current events and political issues.

I first knew that we would marry when he was helping me hang curtains in my house. Standing in front of a window, wearing jeans, hammer in hand, he was staring up, determining the next steps. In a flash, I knew that we would one day be married. Less than two years later, we were.

We have been blessed by God with two wonderful children, Maggie and Robert. It was only after we had had children that I realized how incredibly important he was, not only to me, but to our children. He is irreplaceable.

Maggie was born in respiratory distress and was whisked from the delivery room for breathing treatments. Jimmy followed her every step of the way to make sure that she was safe and being looked after.

My favorite picture from the hospital shows Jimmy seated in a chair. His head is bowed; he is sleeping, holding Maggie in his arms.
A lawsuit from Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton's Office accuses Marlon and LaShonda Moore of scamming African Americans out of tens of millions of dollars through a pyramid scheme created during the COVID-19 pandemic.
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On the morning of June 19, 1865, some 2,000 federal troops arrived in Galveston and told the more than 250,000 enslaved people that they were free.

Hayes explained that early freedom celebrations also served as rallies to give voting instructions to the newly freed slaves.

Hayes shared that in 1866, 51 Black men voted for the first time in Smyth County. She said, Freedom gave them that right. I enjoy the same right because they stepped into history and claimed their freedom. So today, I celebrate emancipation every time I vote. No one has the right to take that from me.

Hayes believes that Juneteenth slipped from the national story as people tried to move forward. The pain of slavery caused us [African Americans] to try and forget that part of our history. We as a people wanted to blend in to mainstream America. Slowly we have been taught about our fight and gifts to the history of the world and this nation.

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William Fields, Mount Pleasants director, believes thats an important reason to continue Juneteenth celebrations. He said, We need to open peoples eyes to the see the truth.

Fields, a Chilhowie resident, hopes that adults and children who want to learn will take part in Saturdays activities.
From the beginning, the Commission has claimed that it launched the emergency legal procedure, which started at the Brussels Court of First Instance last month, simply to secure the vaccine doses that EU member countries were promised.

It accused AstraZeneca of acting in bad faith by providing shots to other countries, notably Britain, and argued that the company should have used its production sites in the U.K. to help fill the EUs order.

But AstraZeneca argued that the challenges of producing and delivering the vaccine could not have been foreseen during a once-in-a-century pandemic, and that its U.K. sites were primarily meant to be used to service its contract with the British government.

In its 67-page ruling though, the court suggested that the company might not have used all the means at its disposal, including the Oxford Biomedica and Halix sites in the U.K., to meet its EU supply schedule. This could be perceived as not making a best reasonable effort to fulfil its contract.

In its statement, AstraZeneca said that it now looks forward to renewed collaboration with the European Commission to help combat the pandemic in Europe.

While its deliveries will continue this year, the Commission has already decided not to renew its contract with the company.

Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
Tazewell, Va.  With her hand on her grandfathers Bible, Shanna Plaster took the oath of office as the Northwestern District Supervisor June 24.

The Bible came from her grandfather Edgell, who was one of 19,000 Americans killed in the four week siege of Bastogne near the end of World War II. Her father was less than a year old when his father was killed and the Bible has remained in the family over the years.

Plaster, became just the third woman elected to a supervisors post in the county history said she hopes to be a role model for girls and boys in the program she works with.

My day job is for a nonprofit group called communities in schools. I try to give students a hope for the future. I want to try to make sure each child has a future and a future in Tazewell County, she said.

Plaster takes office immediately after being elected June 15 to fill the time remaining on the term of Travis Hackworth. Hackworth was elected to the state senate in March and resigned his seat on the board with nearly three years left on his term.

Plaster, who ran unopposed for the seat said jobs will be her number one priority and the need for jobs was the main concern she heard from voters while campaigning. She expressed love for the county and a hope she could help make it a better place for people to live and work.

She has been attending board meetings unofficially since starting her campaign and said she felt comfortable and ready to vote on the budget June 29 and other issues moving forward.
Brennen Kauffman joined The Daily News staff Thursday as a local government and politics reporter.

The experienced journalist previously worked as an education reporter at the Post Register in Idaho Falls, Idaho where he also helped to cover city governments and a range of other stories.

Ive always enjoyed writing and helping to tell stories about other people, Kauffman said. I look forward to bringing my skills to The Daily News and doing what I can to cover local issues.

The Daily News Interim Editor Todd Krysiak said Kauffmans experience will serve the Longview community well.

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Were really excited about the talents and data journalism skills Brennen can bring to our newsroom, he said.

Kauffman grew up in Centennial, Colo. He attended Miami University in Ohio where he earned bachelors degrees in journalism and analytics.

During college he interned for the Journal-News, where he covered his college town, and for an independent news website in the disputed eastern European nation of Kosovo.

Kauffman said the scenic locations around Longview were a major draw when he accepted the job at The Daily News.
As the state and local COVID-19 vaccination rate slows, health officials are concerned more transmissible variants and a false sense of security may cause cases to increase among unvaccinated people.

About 67.8% of Washington residents 16 and older had initiated vaccination as of Tuesday, including 174,450 people who had received vaccination through the Department of Defense or Veterans Affairs.

Gov. Jay Inslee has said the state will fully reopen at the end of June or when 70% of state residents age 16 and older have one vaccine dose, whichever comes first.

Between 140,000 to 170,000 residents need to initiate vaccination to reach that goal, said Secretary of State Umair Shah Wednesday during a Department of Health briefing. When the state reaches 70% of those 16 and older initiating vaccination, more than 2 million residents will still be unvaccinated.

"We are absolutely, in the field of public health, concerned that people think were completely done with the pandemic when we hit a goal," Shah said. "We are really concerned that folks are going to think we're at 70% and therefore you don't have to worry about anything and that may make vaccinations drop off. ... We want the message to continue to be get vaccinated."
Looming evictions

As of Wednesday, 927 local residents were on Lower Columbia CAPs waiting list to receive rental assistance  a likely indicator they are struggling to pay.

I would assume all of them are behind on rent, Executive Director Ilona Kerby said.

Housing plan updates aim to direct federal funds for Longview and Kelso residents Longview and Kelso officials are reviewing a plan to provide housing for people living on low or moderate incomes in order to receive federal 

The nonprofits waitlist has been going up faster over the last few weeks, said Kerby, as the moratorium lift looms.

Lower Columbia CAP covers rent for those in need who qualify for federal pandemic relief funds and low-income energy assistance, Kerby said.

As the Cullen Rentals property manager for eight Longview rental units, Yvonne Andrews receives a check directly from Lower Columbia CAP to pay rent for one tenant, who has been struggling, she said.

Another tenant has not paid rent since the eviction moratorium began, Andrews said, and will not answer the door or respond to letters to set up a repayment plan.

At the end of the month, Andrews fears the eviction process may start for that tenant, as well as many others.

Theres going to be a lot of evictions if people havent been able to pay all year long, she said.
Householder reiterated his innocence in a House floor speech before the vote and predicted again he would be acquitted of accusations that he orchestrated a $60 million bribery scheme meant to approve legislation to prop up two nuclear power plants and then kill a ballot issue trying to overturn the law.

Householder and four associates were arrested in July in an investigation connected to the nuclear bailout legislation, House Bill 6, which contained a $1 billion ratepayer-funded rescue that would have added a new fee to every electricity bill in the state and directed over $150 million a year through 2026 to the plants near Cleveland and Toledo.

Householder faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted.
Chinas decision to anoint a chip czar is the latest step to advance its semiconductor industry. It wont be a magic solution for all the challenges the nation faces in catching up to the US, Taiwan, and South Korea.

Vice Premier Liu He is an obvious and worthy choice to spearhead the development of future semiconductor technologies. Hes headed Chinas technology reform since at least 2018 while his position within leader Xi Jinpings inner circle  he has been chief negotiator in US-China trade talks  ensures his recommendations get heard.

Liu is not an engineer. The Harvard-educated career bureaucrat is more of an expert in economics and industrial policy. These arent terrible skills to have, but it means the 69-year old will have to rely on experts when it comes to decisions in his remit: semiconductor materials, equipment and processes. Having acute judgment as to where he should guide financial and human resources will make all the difference.

Beijings track record on chips, so far, doesnt inspire confidence. Having set a goal in 2015 of sourcing 70% of its needs locally by 2025, the nation has managed to raise it from 10% to a mere 16%, and likely will struggle to hit 20% by that deadline. Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp., the nations flagbearer in manufacturing, is still around six years behind global leaders Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC) and Samsung Electronics Corp. And those rivals arent sitting still. TSMC is set to invest $100 billion over the next three years to extend its outright dominance, while Samsung and Intel Corp. have announced bold spending plans to keep up.

SMIC can barely squeeze a dime out of its $9 billion worth of property and equipment. In fact, over the past three years, it made as much money from interest as it did from producing chips.

Since 2014, China has invested a total of $51 billion into two separate national funds to help its domestic semiconductor players catch-up to overseas rivals. But instead of building towering chip giants, these policies have dug great money pits, including Tsinghua Unigroup Co., the commercial arm of the famous university of the same name and alma mater of Xi himself. The company has been burning through cash and sits on piles of debt to the point that bondholders ought to feel happy to recover 31% of their money.

The poor financial performance of SMIC and Unigroup indicates theres a very thin local market for the technology and factories China has sunk all its money into. Beijing may try to push, prod, or compel the nations leading companies to buy from these also-rans. Thats worked to some extent to encourage sectors such as autos or aerospace. But Huawei Technologies Co., Lenovo Group Ltd., Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., and their ilk are more likely to be held back by buying the current range of Chinese chips, which are far from state of the art. And that kind of consumption isnt likely to spur the semiconductor industry to advance into world-beater status.

Thats not to say Lius plight is hopeless. Rather than merely catch-up, his chip strategy will be to explore areas rivals have yet to master in the hope that China can colonize these technologies before anyone has a foothold. Its the kind of moonshot approach that the Peoples Republic already practices. China last week released the first images taken on Mars as part of its Tianwen-1 interplanetary mission. That success, according to Beijing-based consultancy Trivium, validates the focus on pursuing leapfrog development: focusing on next-generation technologies where no country has a clear advantage.

Beijing is right to trumpet this success in space, and the results ought to boost morale within its struggling chip sector. Theres no evidence yet that this leapfrog strategy can translate into semiconductors. But with a vice-premier at the microchip helm, China is leaving itself no more excuses to fail.
Credit: American Public Power Association

New research from North Carolina State University and North Carolina Central University finds that when a power system combines energy storage and solar power generation, the end result is greater than the sum of its parts in terms of the system's ability to handle peak energy demand. This is encouraging news for renewable energy.

"Electric utilities are tasked with ensuring they can reliably meet consumer energy demands," says Joseph DeCarolis, co-author of a paper on the work and a professor of civil, construction and environmental engineering at NC State. "Quantifying the reliability benefits of different generation sources informs where investments will be made."

A power source's reliability benefit is how much power a given source can be relied on to produce during times of peak demand.

"Our work here suggests that solar power can offer greater benefits to reliability than sustainable energy skeptics suggest," says Jeremiah Johnson, corresponding author of the paper and an associate professor of civil, construction and environmental engineering at NC State. "Investing in both solar power and energy storage systems can unlock reliability value that neither technology would provide on its own."

For this study, the researchers looked at the power system in North and South Carolina to assess issues related to renewable energy and reliability. With data on power demand and the mix of power generation sources, the researchers built computational models to assess how much power a system could expect from different sources during periods of peak energy demand. The models allowed researchers to vary the size of solar farms in the system and the amount of energy storage in the system to determine how those changes might affect the overall reliability benefits during periods of peak demand.

"When a system combines solar and energy storage, that combination can be relied upon to provide up to 40 percent more power during peak demand than if you just added the output from each source," Johnson says.

"Basically, we found that solar power generation reduces the peak load that would need to be met with stored energy, and reduces the duration of that peak demand. In effect, there is a symbiotic relationship between these technologies."

The paper, "The Symbiotic Relationship of Solar Power and Energy Storage in Providing Capacity Value," appears in the journal Renewable Energy.

Explore further Benefits of renewable energy vary from place to place

More information: Daniel Sodano et al, The symbiotic relationship of solar power and energy storage in providing capacity value, Renewable Energy (2021). Journal information: Renewable Energy Daniel Sodano et al, The symbiotic relationship of solar power and energy storage in providing capacity value,(2021). DOI: 10.1016/j.renene.2021.05.122
The solvent-assisted microstructure increased electrode energy density to 300 Wh/kg compared to the dry-mixed microstructure at just under 180 Wh/kg by substantially improving the utilization rate of active material. Credit: University of Houston

Only 2% of vehicles are electrified to date, but that is projected to reach 30% in 2030. A key toward improving the commercialization of electric vehicles (EVs) is to heighten their gravimetric energy densitymeasured in watt hours per kilogramusing safer, easily recyclable materials that are abundant. Lithium-metal in anodes are considered the "holy grail" for improving energy density in EV batteries compared to incumbent options like graphite at 240 Wh/kg in the race to reach more competitive energy density at 500 Wh/kg.

Yan Yao, Cullen Professor of electrical and computer engineering at the Cullen College of Engineering at the University of Houston, and UH post doctorate Jibo Zhang are taking on this challenge with Rice University colleagues. In a paper published June 17 in Joule, Zhang, Yao and team demonstrate a two-fold improvement in energy density for organic-based, solid state lithium batteries by using a solvent-assisted process to alter the electrode microstructure. Zhaoyang Chen, Fang Hao, Yanliang Liang of UH, Qing Ai, Tanguy Terlier, Hua Guo and Jun Lou of Rice University co-authored the paper.

"We are developing low-cost, earth-abundant, cobalt-free organic-based cathode materials for a solid-state battery that will no longer require scarce transition metals found in mines," said Yao. "This research is a step forward in increasing EV battery energy density using this more sustainable alternative." Yao is also Principal Investigator with the Texas Center for Superconductivity at UH (TcSUH).

Any battery includes an anode, also known as negative electrode, and a cathode, also known as positive electrode, that are separated in a battery by a porous membrane. Lithium ions flow through an ionic conductoran electrolyte, which allows for the charging and discharging of electrons that generates electricity for, say, a vehicle.

Electrolytes are usually liquid, but that is not necessarythey can also be solid, a relatively new concept. This novelty, combined with a lithium-metal anode, can prevent short-circuiting, improve energy density and enable faster charging.

Cathodes typically determine the capacity and voltage of a battery and are subsequently the most expensive part of batteries due to usage of scarce materials like cobaltset to reach a 65,000-ton deficit in 2030. Cobalt-based cathodes are almost exclusively used in solid-state batteries due to their excellent performance; only recently have organic compound-based lithium batteries (OBEM-Li) emerged as a more abundant, cleaner alternative that is more easily recycled.

"There is major concern surrounding the supply chain of lithium-ion batteries in the United States," said Yao. "In this work, we show the possibility of building high energy-density lithium batteries by replacing transition metal-based cathodes with organic materials obtained from either an oil refinery or biorefinery, both of which the U.S. has the largest capacity in the world."

Cobalt-based cathodes generate 800 Wh/kg of material-level specific energy, or voltage multiplied by capacity, as do OBEM-Li batteries, which was first demonstrated by the team in their earlier publication, but previous OBEM-Li batteries were limited to low mass fraction of active materials due to non-ideal cathode microstructure. This capped total energy density.

Yao and Zhang uncovered how to improve electrode-level energy density in OBEM-Li batteries by optimizing the cathode microstructure for improved ion transport within the cathode. To do this the microstructure was altered using a familiar solventethanol. The organic cathode used was pyrene-4,5,9,10-tetraone, or PTO.

"Cobalt-based cathodes are often favored because the microstructure is naturally ideal but forming the ideal microstructure in an organic-based solid-state battery is more challenging," said Zhang.

On an electrode level, the solvent-assisted microstructure increased energy density to 300 Wh/kg compared to the dry-mixed microstructure at just under 180 Wh/kg by improving the utilization rate of active material significantly. Previously, the amount of active materials could be increased but the utilization percentage was still low, near 50%. With Zhang's contribution, that utilization rate improved to 98% and resulted in higher energy density.

"Initially I was examining the chemical properties of PTO, which I knew would oxidize the sulfide electrolyte," Zhang said. "This led to a discussion on how we might be able to take advantage of this reaction. Together with colleagues at Rice university, we investigated the chemical composition, spatial distribution and electrochemical reversibility of the cathode-solid electrolyte interphase, which can provide us hints as to why the battery could cycle so well without capacity decay," Zhang said.

Over the last ten years, the cost of EV batteries declined to nearly 10% of their original cost, making them commercially viable. So, a lot can happen in a decade. This research is a pivotable step in the process toward more sustainable EVs and a springboard for the next decade of research. At this rate, perhaps just as literally as euphemistically, the future looks much greener on the other side.

More information: Jibo Zhang et al, Microstructure engineering of solid-state composite cathode via solvent-assisted processing, Joule (2021). Journal information: Joule Jibo Zhang et al, Microstructure engineering of solid-state composite cathode via solvent-assisted processing,(2021). DOI: 10.1016/j.joule.2021.05.017
FILE - In this March 14, 2021, file photo, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., speaks during a news conference in New York. Gillibrand is on the brink of success in her years-long campaign to get sexual assault cases removed from the military chain of command. But getting over the finish line may depend on whether she can overcome wariness about broader changes she's seeking to the military justice system.
The VB 10,000 crane vessel completed its cut of Section 3 from the shipwrecked Golden Ray in the St. Simons Sound at around daybreak Thursday, ending an eight-week ordeal stymied by dense steel brackets and a massive internal fire.
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MORENO: Yes. But I have to say that after I saw the documentary for the very first time  my daughter and I saw it together  I left the screening room saying, "Wow, that's quite a life I've led!" (Laughs) But you don't think that way about yourself. Very likely, if you had something like this done about you, you would also say the same thing about yourself.

AP: In watching what has and hasn't changed in that time, what stands out to you? You were there when Martin Luther King Jr. gave his "I Have a Dream" speech.

MORENO: I feel extremely fortunate that I'm still around to see the sea changes that are taking place. I'll be 90 in December and I don't think I'm going to see the women's movement really progress more because I won't be around. But I've seen it change. I've seen a change in such meaningful ways and I'm grateful for that. What still concerns me mightily and profoundly is that Hispanics haven't gotten their hold on our profession, I don't know what the hell is wrong. I don't know what is not working right. The Black community has done incredibly and I have nothing but the deepest admiration for the Black professional community. They've done it and I think we can take some lessons from them. But where is our "Moonlight"? Why are we not advancing?

AP: Do you have any answers?
Brazos Valley residents will have a variety of local opportunities to commemorate Juneteenth, the Texas-based annual celebration of the announcement of the end of slavery in the United States.

On Thursday, President Joe Biden signed legislation declaring Juneteenth a federal holiday after the bill passed the Senate unanimously and the House passed it 415-14. The Texas A&M University System will shut down today in observance of Juneteenth, System Chancellor John Sharp announced Thursday afternoon. Blinn College District Chancellor Mary Hensley announced late Thursday all Blinn campuses would be closed today and Saturday.

Local Juneteenth festivities kicked off Thursday evening with a gospel musical festival at Neal Recreation Center in Bryan.

On Saturday at 10 a.m., the annual Juneteenth Parade will kick off in Bryan at Kemp Elementary and end at Sadie Thomas Park. Kenya Ford-Roquemore, secretary of the Brazos Valley African American Heritage and Cultural Society, said parade entries are still welcome and that a variety of groups will participate throughout the event.

Beginning at about 6:30 p.m. Saturday, a Juneteenth blues festival will be held at the Palace Theater in Downtown Bryan. Ford-Roquemore said the musical group Hard 2 Find will perform.
Texas A&M Universitys diversity, equity and inclusion efforts will now be overseen by senior professor Frank Ashley, who said multiple positions he has held in his three decades at the school have prepared him well for this new task.

Ashley, senior associate dean for academic affairs at The Bush School of Government & Public Service, has had 10 different titles over his years at A&M, including working in the admissions office and serving as vice chancellor for diversity and recruitment for the A&M System.

Being selected for the new role is an honor, Ashley said.

Its nice when people think that you can make a difference, he explained, so I hope I can make a difference.

In January, the Texas A&M System Board of Regents approved a four-year, $24.75 million plan to address diversity. The action plan was a direct response to needs identified in a report by the 45-member Commission on Diversity, Equity and Inclusion that former President Michael K. Young initiated last year. The action plan outlines several goals, including increasing the number of scholarship recipients and fellowship participants for certain programs and efforts aimed to increase diversity in the schools faculty and student populations.
Iranians were voting Friday on who should be the country's next president amid tensions with the West over its tattered nuclear deal with world powers.

While the race is wide open due to President Hassan Rouhani being term limited from running again, authorities barred his allies and nearly every reformist from entering the race.

That has analysts believing hard-line judiciary chief Ebrahim Raisi is the clear front-runner. The only competitor who represents a stand-in for Rouhani's administration, the former Central Bank chief Abdolnasser Hemmati, has argued others in the race serve as proxies for Raisi and allow the cleric to avoid criticizing him directly.

Heres a look at the candidates competing.

EBRAHIM RAISI

Raisi, 60, is a hard-line cleric close to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei who has vowed to combat poverty and corruption.

In 2016, Khamenei appointed Raisi as head of the Imam Reza charity foundation, which manages a vast conglomerate of businesses and endowments in Iran. Khamenei called Raisi a trustworthy and highly experienced person, causing many to wonder if he might also be a possible successor to the supreme leader himself.
American Civil Liberties Union of Iowa Executive Director Mark Stringer said the law is clearly an effort to shut down public criticism of abuses by law enforcement. He said it gives police less accountability by putting into law broad immunity from many state law claims brought in lawsuits by those alleging harm by police.

Reynolds signed the bill in front of about 150 officers from local and state agencies, Iowa Law Enforcement Academy students and lawmakers.

Like so many Iowans I was raised to be grateful to the heroes who patrol our streets at great personal risk and sacrifice and tragically this fundamental and wholesome part of Americas culture is now under vicious attack, she said. She told the law enforcement officers that your governor, your legislature and your state stand behind you.

Reynolds characterized racial unrest protests which occurred across the country last year after the killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer as lawless.

Last summer when lawless mobs across the country coopted peaceful protests to riot and loot, Iowa experienced its share of unrest. The Back the Blue Act responds by making rioting a felony so if you riot, if you loot if you attack our law officers then you will be punished the fullest extent of the law, she said.
Its 2021, the pandemic is ongoing, although more and more people are now totally vaccinated. Many people are still flocking to the internet and social media in search of connection.

For some, it is an oasis. For others, a nightmare.

Woke folks are aware of #StopAsianHate, #BlackLivesMatter and #MeToo. These are hashtags meant to draw attention to the oppression of people based on race and gender.

As a lesbian of African descent, I have felt the weight of hate. Despite the ray of hope created by the guilty verdicts against Derek Chauvin for killing George Floyd, I am forever reminded of how far we have yet to go.

Most of what I personally see on social media is not specifically directed at me but comes rather in the form of posts that deny the existence of homophobia in general, allow for misgendering or deadnaming, spread misinformation and misquote famous folks under the umbrella of straight pride and are tainted with fear and hatred.

Personally, I dont want the triggers. I have never seen the entire video of Chauvin as he kills George Floyd; likewise, I do not dwell on online hate and harassment against anyone.
The original church building was located in the heart of Boones Mill near the corner of what is now U.S. 220 and Bethlehem Road. Over the years as traffic to and from Roanoke increased, the church became noisy and crowded. The building was sold to the Masons, and in 1993, a new church was constructed along Grassy Hill Road.

The most senior member at the centennial celebration was Gelene Amos who is 94 years young. Amos grew up across the street from the old church and began attending when she was eight. Until fairly recently, she served as the churchs organist for several decades.

Church elder George Carlson, 88, and his wife Betty have been members of BMCC for 51 years. George feels there are a couple of reasons the church has reached its 101st anniversary. I think God has really looked out for us and we are not just a church that does things inside the building. We reach out to the community a lot.

Bernard feels the church has achieved such longevity by being a beacon in the community and by shining light on Gods name.

Elaine Austin is pastor of BMCC. She described the Centennial Celebration Sunday as a powerful, awesome day. Austin feels her church has reached the milestone of 100 years because the congregation seems to put missions first and is so welcoming to newcomers, despite the family connections spanning so many years.
Gills Creek District representative Lorie Smith said the project was already $2.5 million above what the county originally budgeted. Escalating construction costs would also likely increase that even more, she said.

Smith also questioned if the project would take away from other priorities the county planned to fund in the near future. This project, in my humble opinion, we cant afford it, she said.

Blackwater District representative Ronald Mitchell, a longtime volunteer firefighter in the county, was the most vocal opponent of the current proposal of the Glade Hill station. He said the project had increased in size and scope far above what the departments volunteers originally asked for.

Mitchell said the site of the proposed station on Turtle Hill Road is also not the best location due to issues with the small size of the property and site distance of oncoming traffic on Virginia 40. The new building also may not be able to fit all the departments fire and rescue vehicles, he said.

County staff were asked to keep their mouth shut on how bad of a location this was, Mitchell said. What kind of leaders are we up here on this board when we ask staff to keep their mouth shut when they are here to give us guidance. That really upsets me.
Lane also sketched out the history of state funding for school construction, which is highly instructive. Nearly three decades ago, the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission researched this and found that the state was active in school construction in the early 1900s.

That changed in the 1930s when Harry Byrd was governor. He was a transportation governor who instituted state funding for roads. The trade-off: The state would get out of the school construction business.

Historical irony: Today affluent and ethnically diverse Northern Virginia benefits from the roads-over-schools policies of the segregationist Byrd.

One difference between then and now: Then there was lots of federal money available for school construction. In 1938, the federal government paid 45% of the costs of local school construction  a byproduct of the New Deals Works Progress Administration.

Today federal funding for construction amounts to less than 1%. Instead, the burden is almost entirely on local governments  i.e., local taxpayers, but the cost of building a new school is often beyond the means of many localities that might gently be described as economically distressed.
A second video combines exterior shots of the Vernon C. Bain prison barge on the East River with three months of intercepted radio recordings between guards discussing the apparent use of force against inmates. The crowded prison  set up as a temporary facility almost three decades ago  saw high death rates from COVID-19 last year.

Poitras and Vegezzi said they were surprised that the prison's continued existence and the conditions there haven't been taken up by local politicians, given that most of the inmates are local residents awaiting trial for minor crimes.

As a New Yorker I hope that it's difficult to look at this prison ship and know that you are complicit in it, Poitras said, admitting: We are interested in getting this shut down.
KEARNEY  Christine Wilson had just two horses when she began her business in 2003, but her affinity for horses goes back earlier in her life.

I started riding when I was 9 in Germany. I came over here and bought my first horse in 1994, Wilson said.

Today the number has grown to 10 horses. Christines Horseback Riding business also owns a pony mule, two Shetland ponies, five cats and several chickens  plenty of animals for children to love.

Did we mention that customers at Wilsons business northwest of Kearney also can learn horseback riding either Western or English style?

The lessons take place at her Hidden Hills Arena at 8215 Hidden Hills Road northwest of Kearney. In addition, some services that she provides can take place outside the arena.

We do lessons for all ages and trail rides, Wilson said. Were also contracted with the state to do trail rides at Fort Kearny Historical Park.

On Thursday, Wilson will celebrate her ownership of Christines Horseback Riding and Hidden Hills Arena with a ribbon cutting 4-6 p.m. at the arena.

We will have free pony rides, unicorn photos and Sno Cones, Wilson said.
This goal is especially radical given that the President has no constitutional authority to take action to conserve 30% of the land and water. This has raised a lot of questions about what the President intends to do. So far, he has not defined what he even means by conservation. Aside from vague platitudes, he has not revealed how he intends to implement his plan.

Heres what we do know, the governors column said. 30 x 30 will not only have major consequences for private property rights, but also for the states tax base and economy. Unlike states in the western part of the country where there are already significant amounts of federally owned lands, 97% of land in Nebraska is privately owned. Federally owned land is not taxed, and restrictions will reduce our ability to develop it for agriculture, infrastructure, or businesses. If 30% of land in Nebraska is set aside for conservation, it will shift the property tax burden onto fewer farmers, ranchers, homeowners and business owners. Right now, the federal government pays about $2.50 per acre on average in lieu of taxes on land it holds with conservation easements. Even if a land trust holds the conservation easement, the lands potential taxable value is still greatly reduced. This leaves fewer taxpayers to pay for schools, roads, bridges, and other services.
For the experiment, Morner placed a large glass jar beneath each pan so that water poured over the samples would run down through the tubing and into the jar. The water added to each pan of soil represented rainfall, allowing Morner to measure the amount of erosion on each soil sample by how much sediment ended up in each collection jar.

The experiment showed that the conventionally tilled bare soil had the greatest amount of soil sediment end up in the collection jar with the water runoff. The no-till soil had somewhat less soil in its collection jar. The no-till soil with rye cover crop had very little soil run off into its collection jar, showing that these practices are useful for prevention of erosion. The practice is also an important method for keeping inputs, including nitrogen-based fertilizer, on the field instead of in surface and ground water where it can pose a risk to human and animal health.

While there were no ribbons given at the science fair held in April, Morner said his rainfall simulator experiment was well received.

People really liked it, he said, noting that it was popular with the other ag producers in the crowd that attended the event, as well as with students and teachers.
Paris, TX (75460)

Today

Mostly cloudy early with scattered thunderstorms developing this afternoon. High 86F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 50%..

Tonight

A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible early. A few clouds. Low 67F. Winds ENE at 5 to 10 mph.
Whether or not to teach critical race theory in the classroom

Resume debate over the voting bill

H.B. 20, which would have made it harder to bail out on bond without cash

Fixing the state's electrical grid

Expanding healthcare

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The Affordable Care Act remains the law of the land," President Joe Biden said, using the statute's more formal name, after the court ruled that Texas and other GOP-led states had no right to bring their lawsuit to federal court.

Its not as sacred or popular as Medicare or Medicaid, but it's here to stay," said Drew Altman, president of the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation. And its moved from an ideological whipping boy to a set of popular benefits that the public values.

Highlighting the GOP's shifting health care focus, in interviews and written statements Thursday, more than a dozen Republican lawmakers called for controlling medical costs and other changes, but none suggested another run at repeal. Congressional Republicans hadn't even filed a legal brief supporting the latest Supreme Court challenge.

Just practically speaking, you need 60 votes in a Republican Senate, a Republican president, right? And we've tried that and were unable to accomplish it," said Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., a leading voice on health care in the GOP.

Polling shows the risks in trying to demolish Obama's law. A Kaiser poll showed Americans about evenly divided on the law in December 2016, just after Trump was elected on a pledge to kill it. By February 2020, 54% had a favorable view while 39% disapproved.
The worst thing we can do to victims of sexual assault is to move a bill through that cant be implemented effectively or on time, creates too large a workload for too few qualified military judge advocates, imperils prosecutions, leads to convictions being overturned on appeal, or results in neglected cases because the necessary attention cannot be devoted to them, he said.

Reed, a Rhode Island Democrat, said Pentagon estimates indicate the broader bill would require more senior qualified lawyers than the department has, and will take 180 days to implement. He also has repeatedly objected to Gillibrands efforts to get unanimous approval to move her bill separately to the full Senate for a vote, saying it should be included in the overall defense bill.

Asked about cost, Gillibrand said it will be very little because the prosecutors already are in place and they already take the cases to court.

The Pentagon, however, believes it won't be that simple, and that if lawyers are pulled out of the chain of command to handle major crimes, others will be needed to deal with other cases and duties, such as desertion, military discipline or legal policy reviews.
CHICAGO (AP)  A mass shooting that left four people dead and four others wounded at a house on Chicago's South Side was believed to have been carried out by two people who shot all but one of the victims in the head, according to a police report.

Police received a call about shots fired from people on the second floor of the house at about 5:45 a.m., and when they arrived they found four people dead in various rooms, according to a report based on preliminary information.

All had been shot in the head, as had three of the victims who survived, and the other surviving victim was shot in the back. According to the report, several .45-caliber and 9 mm shells were found throughout the house.
"In this bill, they're going to retrain our workers. Our schools, our taxing districts, they're going to send millions down here and help us all out with that," Meier said. "But let's talk about some broken promises. Let's see what southern Illinois gets. ... Why should we believe any promise they make to us? It's not going to happen."

Two metro-east Democrats also opposed the legislation. A group of 52 lawmakers sent a letter to Gov. J.B. Pritzker decrying the proposed closure of coal-fired power plants. State Rep. LaToya Greenwood, D-East St. Louis, and state Sen. Chris Belt, D-Swansea, both signed despite recent criticism from environmental activists for not supporting legislation that would close Prairie State.

"If legislation is enacted to close these plants in 2035, before the end of their useful lives, there will be devastating consequences," the letter said. "Thousands of employees will lose their jobs, stifling economic activity in areas of the state where jobs can often be hard to come by."

At a recent protest outside Belt's office in East St. Louis, Rev. J. Kevin James of Macedonia Baptist Church recognized the senator's achievements as a member of the Illinois Legislative Black Caucus, but called on him to support closing Prairie State.
Although sausage is a fairly straightforward ingredient to prepare, a little TLC and some basic know-how can elevate your recipes from standard to stellar. Corrie Cook, narration director for Goose the Market and Smoking Goose in Indianapolis, offers cooking tips thatll have you turning out chef-level sausage dishes in no time.

Boiling/poaching

Perhaps the easiest way to prepare sausage links, poaching only requires a pot, liquid and heat. Cook recommends, as with any fresh meat, allowing the sausages to reach room temperature before cooking. Place the sausages in a pot or skillet with enough water to come halfway up the sides of the sausages. Cook over low heat until the sausages are cooked to temperature, turning them halfway through cooking, which should take anywhere from 15 to 30 minutes, depending their size. Cook says you want to cook them gently and avoid boiling water, which could cause the casings to burst and the sausages to become tough. From there, you can go straight to the plate, but Cook recommends a quick sear on the grill or stovetop for added flavor.

You can also layer on flavor by experimenting with different poaching liquids, Cook says. Try stock, beer, cider or wine mixed with water.

Even easier, throw everything in a slow cooker and let it do the work for you.

Grilling

The trick to grilling fresh sausages is to start slow and low, turning frequently, until the sausage is browned on all sides. Or, you can always poach the sausages on a stovetop and finish them on the grill.

You want to grill gently over indirect heat at first, Cook explains. Once the sausage is cooked, you can move it to the hotter section of the grill to get a quick sear that caramelizes the surface and adds that snap that makes a bite so satisfying.

For ready-to-eat sausage links that are already fully cooked, Cook advises letting them come to room temperature and then searing them quickly over high heat.

Broiling

Cook describes broiling as grilling in reverse, with the heat source coming from the top instead of the bottom, but the cooking process is basically the same.

Poach the sausages first and finish them in the broiler, or let the sausage come to room temp and broil on the rack furthest from the heat, turning often, she instructs. The juices on the pan will caramelize quickly; take advantage of that deliciously reduced flavor by adding a little wine, beer or water and using a wooden spoon to scrape up the browned bits. Reduce and serve as a sauce for the sausages or side dishes.

Pan-frying

As with grilling, throwing a fresh sausage straight into a screaming-hot pan may cause the casings to burst which releases the fat and juices from the sausage and can make them turn dry. The sausage will also lose its shape and seep out of its casing. Cook recommends adding a little liquid to the pan and cooking over low to medium heat instead.

You can use water, or again, layer on more flavor with stock, beer, cider, wine or even a spirit like bourbon or tequila cut with water, she says. Once the sausages are cooked, you can remove them from the liquid and reduce it down to make a sauce or glaze.

Smoking

Smokers add a whole new dimension of flavor to sausage based on the variety of wood youre using.

Fruit woods like apple are lighter and sweeter; hardwoods like hickory are stronger and richer, Cook says. Depending on the type of protein and the thickness of the sausages, youre generally looking to smoke between 200 and 250 degrees F for anywhere from one to three hours.

Baking

Sausages lend themselves nicely to quick sheet-pan dinners that are easy to prepare with minimal clean up. Just add your favorite vegetables to sausages on a sheet pan (potatoes, peppers, onions, Brussels sprouts, mushrooms and carrots all work nicely), toss with a little olive oil, salt and pepper, then bake until everything is cooked through, stirring occasionally.

If youre short on time, cut the sausages into halves or quarters and the vegetables into smaller pieces so theyll cook more quickly and evenly, Cook notes.

Ready to eat

Although many consumers prefer them served hot, ready-to-eat sausages dont require any cooking at all and can simply be sliced for snacking or a charcuterie board. When it comes to accompaniments, the skys the limit.

Smoking Gooses sausage flavors, for example, are prime for creative condiment pairings like fruit preserves, tangy mostardas, flavored mustards or sweet and spicy nuts, Cook offers. You can also skewer sausage segments for Bloody Mary garnishes, or chop them to add to egg dishes.

For food safety, the USDA recommends cooking fresh or raw sausages made with ground beef, pork, lamb or veal to an internal temperature of 160 degrees F, and ground turkey or chicken sausages to 165 degrees F. You can store sausages in the refrigerator or freezer. Make sure to use up any cooked leftovers within three to four days.

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Turnblad also said a local food share group called the ACE Basin Growers reached out to him last year about his blueberries and a relationship ended up blossoming as a result.

Our wholesalers were still buying, but the quantities were limited and the price was not great, Turnblad said. We were looking for other alternatives.

I am a fan of the program, he said. I like the local market opportunity and they provide a healthy alternative that people need. It was an important part of our marketing, no doubt."

South Carolina Farm Bureau President Harry Ott said, We can always count on farmers to tend the land and livestock and to keep putting seeds in the ground, and they truly went above and beyond when the rest of the state and nation came to a screeching halt amid the global pandemic.

They continued to provide safe and wholesome food all while many completely changed their business models to account for challenges no one couldve expected.

He said, At South Carolina Farm Bureau, we are proud to work alongside these men and women and support them in their efforts of growing food, fuel and fiber to keep the world running.
Pete Henley, 71, was setting up tables Thursday for a Juneteenth celebration at the Old Central Cultural Center, a Galveston building that once was a segregated Black school. He said the Juneteenth holiday will help promote understanding and unity.

All holidays have significance, no matter what the occasion or what its about, but by it being a federal holiday, it speaks volumes to what the country thinks about that specific day, said Henley, who studied at the school before it was integrated and is president of the cultural center.

He said his family traces its roots back to enslaved men and women in the Texas city who were among the last to receive word of the Emancipation Proclamation.

As a country, we really need to be striving toward togetherness more than anything, Henley said. If we just learn to love each other, it would be so great.

Holmes-Ross recalled first learning about Juneteenth in church in Evanston, a Lake Michigan suburb just outside Chicago. Over the years, she said she made sure her three children commemorated the day with community events including food, dancing and spoken word performances.

She said it was about more than a day off for her family and expressed hope that it would be for others, too.
I understand that those are very complex issues, but I also understand their perspective, Davis said about the team's decision. If you put a human being through what they went through, that takes a toll.

While protests have significantly decreased in the city, there are still small protests by self-described anarchists in contained areas of Portland.

Davis said in the event theres a declared riot in the coming days, there will still be a police response from other officers within the bureau with as close to adequate resources as we can get."

Portland Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty, who has led efforts to defund the police and proposed disbanding the team last fall, said that the resignations are yet another example of a rogue paramilitary organization that is unaccountable to the elected officials and residents of Portland.

Earlier this week, for the first time in Portlands history, an officer from PPBs Rapid Response Team was charged with a misdemeanor for assaulting a photojournalist during a protest last summer, Hardesty said. Ironically, we now see some PPB officers engaging in the act they showed so much disdain for last summer by staging their own protest.
With the release of Dr. Anthony Faucis emails detailing his communications early in the COVID-19 pandemic, many Americans are now facing hard truths. The emails show that Fauci was warned by scientists, at the earliest stages of the pandemic, of solid evidence that COVID-19 showed signs of human engineering.

The emails include communications about quieting public disclosure that the source of the virus might be a Wuhan lab leak. Faucis public stance, until forced to change, was that the virus almost certainly originated naturally from animal transmission to humans. Likely the Wuhan wet market, as hard as that appeared to believe.

The mainstream media helped push this narrative by calling the engineered COVID-19 lab leak theory a dangerous fringe conspiracy. Social media censored any publication of the lab leak theory. We also learned through the emails that Fauci knew of the potential positive effects of hydroxychloroquine. Unfortunately, he kept this quiet and allowed the narrative of hydroxychloroquine being too dangerous to use. Similar issues with masks. Over many decades, Americans have come to put more faith in government experts to the exclusion all else. Its time we get away from what President Dwight Eisenhower warned about over 60 years ago, putting our ultimate faith in a Scientifictechnological Elite over God and reason. Let me explain.
I resent that the people peddling all of this nonsense claim to speak for the Black community when I know they do not.

As a Christian, I look beyond individual differences and see the potential for good in everyone. If I cant love my brothers and sisters whom I can see, how can I claim to love a God I cant? Based on the ideology of critical race theory, I would have to hate God too.

So as far as Juneteenth goes, I am happy to have the 4th of July  Independence Day  instead. The Declaration of Independence and our Constitution are unrivaled among other nations. And I say that, knowing full well that Blacks didnt get their freedom until several generations after 1776.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. also understood this, and he remained hopeful. His belief in America radiated throughout his I Have a Dream message  his goal that one day people would not be judged by their skin color but by their character, and that all would receive the promises of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Dr. King strongly believed in America, and he was confident that it would someday live up to its full potential. He never saw any reason to give up on the American experiment or harbor bitterness and hatred. And he applied the fight for freedom and equality to all of Gods children despite superficial differences.
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Police discuss their investigation after a shooting at the Herbal Choices Cannabis store in North Bend on Friday. One person died at the scene and a second person died in a linked incident about a mile away.
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Iron Elk poker run June 26-27

The 9th annual Iron Elk Motorcycle Poker Run is June 26-27. Registration starts at 8 a.m., at the Casper Elks Lodge and get your first card. Cost is $40 per hand per person. This will be a overnight Poker Run to Black Hawk, Colorado. Join your Elk friends for a fun day of riding and enjoyment. Details at the lodge, for more information and RSVP by email at Elkslodge1353@gmail.com, or call Casper Elks Lodge at 237-2432 or Kris at 259-7455 or Ron at 315-7842. Open to the public and any vehicles.

Art on the Go brings art to you

Art on the Go is a new informal group of local artists who have banded together to present Pop-Up Art Shows sure to add an exciting element to special events or celebrations held by Casper groups and businesses. Art on the Go will also provide short-term art installations for any indoors spaces open to the public. We provide these delightful shows to the hosting organization free of charge and feature for-sale, original art by Wyoming artists. To see examples of what we can offer, please visit Oil City Beer Company or the Tate Pumphouse. For more information or to schedule a show, please contact Carol Chapman at hecoly@aol.com.

Free food for seniors
For more events and information, and a link to attend online, go to uucasper.org or visit UU Casper on Facebook.

Patio talk discusses Utes

Patio talks at the National Historic Trails Interpretive Center are informal, usually outdoor learning experiences. The public is always welcome. At 1 p.m., inside, historian Tom Rea will discuss the flight of the Utes across Wyoming in 1906.

Casper Humane Society takes garage sale donations

The Casper Humane Society will be holding the Summer Super Garage Sale June 25 to 27 at 2401 E. Yellowstone Highway (the former Wyoming Rents building).

Donated items will be accepted Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., Sundays from noon to 3 p.m., and weekdays 5:30 to 6:30 p.m., through Wednesday, June 23 at 2401 E. Yellowstone Highway (across the street from the Whites Mountain Kia). For more information, or to arrange a drop off outside of these hours, please call the shelter at 265-5439.

No computers and/or monitors, keyboards, televisions, house paint, desks, video tapes, or adult clothes, please. All other items will be gratefully accepted.
Laramie County Health Officer Dr. Stan Hartman added that there were two ways to get to herd immunity: a majority of people getting vaccinated, or a whole bunch of people getting sick.

It looks like, in Laramie County, were opting for a mixed model, Hartman said at the meeting.

Bindschadler mentioned hed recently spoken with a CRMC employee, who said two of the hospitals ICU nurses  two people who had cared for the most serious COVID patients  did not want to get vaccinated.

And we just look at that and we shrug our shoulders and we think, What the heck? Theres nothing you can do, he said. You can offer it to them, and if they take it, they take it, and if they dont, its on them.

In an interview, Emmons said she still wakes up in the middle of the night wondering what the health department could be doing differently in motivating people in the county to get vaccinated. Even so, the comments from her fellow health officials reflected a reality check for her.

At what point do we say weve done everything we can and the patient is no longer listening or willing to do what needs to be done to be safe? And its hard, because I obviously take this incredibly seriously, she said.
A wildfire that destroyed a home on the edge of Pine Haven was likely unintentionally human caused, authorities said.

That cause was determined by eliminating other possible reasons for the blaze, explained Melanie Wilmer, a spokeswoman for the firefighting effort.

What this means is that there is no evidence of a lightning strike or arson, she wrote in an email to the Star-Tribune. There are no tracks of any kind, nothing malicious or foul play indicated at the point of origin. Scenarios like this usually are a spark from a blade on a rock, ash from a cigarette/campfires, etc.

All natural causes such as lightning, reflections, etc. have an indicator, this fire did not so therefore the only remaining cause is human caused, she added.

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The fire ignited Wednesday afternoon in northeast Wyoming. Along with the home, it destroyed an outbuilding and two campers. It temporarily closed roads and prompted evacuations.

The blaze was contained Thursday after charring 103 acres. Mop-up operations were expected to continue through Sunday.

No injuries were reported.
MACAO, China (AP)  The tiny Chinese autonomous region of Macao has joined its larger neighbor Hong Kong in closing its representative office in Taiwan as China seeks to intensify the diplomatic isolation of the self-governing island democracy.

Macao gave no reason for the closure, which was announced Wednesday and takes effect from Saturday. As with Hong Kong, Macao is setting up a telephone hotline to provide service for any of its residents in Taiwan.

The closure comes a month after Hong Kong, another semi-autonomous Chinese territory, shut its office in Taipei, accusing Taiwans government of having grossly interfered in Hong Kong's internal affairs.

Taiwans government had voiced support for pro-democracy protests that roiled Hong Kong in 2019 and extended assistance to asylum seekers from Hong Kong fleeing a hash crackdown backed by Beijing.

Relations between Taiwan and Beijing have deteriorated in recent years as China ratchets up diplomatic, military and economic pressure on the island and also tightens its control over Hong Kong, a former British colony that was promised it could maintain many of its freedoms when it was handed to Chinese control in 1997.
(Unlike Biden, Putin knows that in 2021 whoever has the oil and gas still calls the shots  and no one is going to take away that geopolitical weapon with windmills and Parisian climate treaties.)

For good measure, Biden  trying to get tough?  gave Putin a list of 16 places in America that are off limits to cyberattacks by Russians in or out of the government.

Hello? Does that mean everything else is OK to attack, Putin might ask? To his credit, Biden didnt send Putin the 16 URLs.

After the so-called summit, Biden made things worse by letting Putin hold a press conference by himself where he trashed America  and no one could challenge him.

Then, as Biden was leaving his own solo press conference, he got mad at a CNN reporter who had the nerve to ask him why he was so confident that killer Putin would change his behavior and turn into the Russian equivalent of Old Joe Biden.

Will someone please tell me what good came out of Bidens un-summit for America?

Apparently, our president doesnt know that when you go into a negotiation with a foreign adversary you dont give them everything they want beforehand.
AT 32 years old, Zwede Hewitt is building out an app that he is confident is going to take the world by storm.

The name of the app is LUHU, which stands for Let Us Help U and Hewitt describes it as social marketplace.

It is a place where people can do social networking, but it combines that with the ability to shop. So the concept is essentially social networking meets e-commerce, says Hewitt.
THE oldest pottery known to man dates back thousands of years ago. Just as it was back then, the pottery that exists today is not only functional but is also a form of artistic expression and a window into different cultures and customs. For instance, historians and archaeologists are able to learn more about the ways and customs of Amerindians and past civilisations by examining remnants of pottery that have been discovered.
The Prime Minister has an open mind on the selection of a police commissioner.

Asked yesterday whether as head of the Cabinet, his Government was prepared to approve a nomination coming to the Parliament for the continuation of Gary Griffith as Commissioner of Police, Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley said: We in the Cabinet keep an open mind on matters of national interest like that. The Cabinet has a duty to keep an open mind. The authority (Police Service Commission) advises us and we will look at the advice with an open mind as you would have seen us doing before.
Because of my previous association with the Tobago House of Assembly (THA), several persons have been asking why am I not commenting on the two self-government bills for Tobago.
In the good old days of not long ago, tricked out motorcycles with gleaming chrome and leather saddlebags lined the front of the Bashful Bandit, Tucsons storied, rough-around-the-edges biker bar on East Speedway at North Dodge Boulevard.

For more than 40 years, the bar, with its memorial wall devoted to longtime customers, bras hanging from a ceiling pipe and reputation for a bar fight or two, was Tucsons unofficial biker headquarters, a watering hole and gathering spot for those who rode on weekends and those who rode for life.

But all that ended on Sunday, June 13, when the Bandit closed for good.

In the fall, Toby Kyte, who bought the bar this week, will open a barbecue restaurant that will incorporate the Bashful Bandit name in some form, he said.

But before he begins a $250,000-plus buildout of the space that will include keeping the wraparound wooden bar and stools, creating an outdoor kitchen, enlarging the restrooms and repaving the parking lot, Kyte is opening the Bandit for one last hurrah on Friday, June 18.

The bar will open at 11 a.m. for a final last call and to give customers who have photos or other memorabilia on the memorial wall a chance to take it home; other memorabilia from the license plates, posters and blowup dolls, are not included, Kyte said. The bar will remain open until 9 p.m.

Kyte said he plans to maintain the buildings character and historic place in Tucson when he begins an extensive buildout that he said could take six months.

It wouldnt be the same block without the Bandit there, said Kyte, whose family owns Bisbee Breakfast Club and whose father owned and ran 40 Pizza Hut restaurants throughout the state for 65 years before selling them last year. The Bandit can have a new life; maybe it will last another 80 years.

The Bashful Bandit was the third bar to occupy the 2,875-square-foot building that Bertha Lester built at 3686 E. Speedway in 1947. Lester, who had inherited her husbands Rio Rita Bar when he died in 1941, moved the bar from East Speedway and North Tucson Boulevard after her lease ran up in mid-1947.

According to divorce documents from her second husband, Lester bought the land at Speedway and North Dodge Boulevard and built the building, which she opened as the Rio Rita on Christmas Eve 1947. She sold the bar in the summer of 1948 and it remained the Rio Rita until 1977, when Sherrys Retreat took over for two years.

The Bashful Bandit opened in 1980 and attracted a mix of folks from its midtown neighborhood, including bikers and some college students from the nearby University of Arizona. Kyte, a Tucson native, recalled his first time at the bar when he was home for the summer after his freshman year at NAU. He was underage and his buddies had dared him to go in to the Bandit and order a beer.

I think if you go into any bar that might look a little rough, if you go by yourself and sit at the bar, no one will bother you, he said.

That was in the early 1990s and the Bandit had established its reputation after attracting more than its share of trouble. Police were called out for fights and other public nuisance complaints and at least one murder: On July 11, 1981, James T. Big Jim Nolan, a member of the Outlaws motorcycle gang, shot and killed a fellow bar patron in the Bandits parking lot. Apparently Nolan and the victim, John McQuillen, had argued because Nolan kept playing the same song on the jukebox, according to Star archives.

Nolan was ultimately acquitted at trial.

Those are the kinds of stories that have cemented the Bashful Bandits reputation and, over the years, kept many people from wandering into the bar. But Kyte said he hopes his plans to open a barbecue restaurant will change that narrative.

My favorite thing about barbecue is how it brings folks together, he said, outlining plans to create an outdoor kitchen and dining room where customers could watch pit masters at work. If you think about the outdoor barbecue, I think the best burger Ive had was on the outdoor grill, taken right off the grill. Barbecue is a communal experience.

Kyte said he wants to maintain little bits of the Bandits aesthetic, including the L-shaped wooden bar complete with the names that have been carved into it over the years. But he also wants to create a new, more approachable space, with dining inside and on the patio, which will be enlarged with the outdoor kitchen.

I know how important the Bandit is to everybody, and it is to me, Kyte said. I want this to be a place thats approachable for everybody. Its going to be a different place. It will feel different, it will look different. It will change a bunch.

Contact reporter Cathalena E. Burch at cburch@tucson.com. On Twitter @Starburch

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This study tells us there is a lot more to be done to help Americans feel confident about their careers, said Eylers. As we emerge from the global pandemic, University of Phoenix remains steadfast in our commitment to providing a rigorous education and to be constantly innovating to meet the needs of all students. Our research is designed to remove barriers and provide students, alumni, and the community support throughout their career journey.

To read the COVID-19 Issue of Phoenix Scholar, visit: Scholar-4.1-1.pdf (phoenix.edu).

About the College of Doctoral Studies
PHOENIX  Unable to advance his proposed $1.9 billion permanent tax cut at the Capitol, Gov. Doug Ducey is now going public  or at least to business interests  trying to build pressure.

Some of the numbers he is using in that sales pitch, however, are not quite accurate.

Duceys office created a website Thursday where individuals can sign up to show support for the plan, which lacks the necessary legislative votes. There already was a handful of names on the site as of early afternoon.

The Republican governor also is taking his case directly to business owners. At a telephone town hall Thursday afternoon, Ducey, along with the two main legislative proponents of the tax-cut proposal, appealed to people who, based on the questions they were asking, already support the plan.

It could be the business owners that have the most to gain.

First, the proposal would collapse all tax brackets into a single rate of 2.5%. That isnt much of a break for couples earning up to $53,000, who now are in the 2.59% tax bracket.

But earnings above $318,000 a year, now taxed at 4.5%, would be subject to the 2.5% rate.
But Karamargin said the distinction Ducey is making between the shots for MMR and for COVID is not political.

Those vaccines are part of a schedule of vaccines that have gone through the full FDA approval process, he said of what the governor is allowing the universities to continue to require. The COVID vaccines have not.

But Karamargin was careful with his wording.

This is not to say they are unsafe, he said of the COVID vaccines. We believe they are safe.

It would be a surprise if the governor or his spokesman argued otherwise, and not just because both have received the vaccine.

Dr. Cara Christ, the state health director, has also affirmed that the vaccines are safe. More to the point, she said that Emergency Use Authorization designation was largely meaningless.

These vaccines have been through the exact same clinical trials as all of the other vaccines, Christ said. The Emergency Use process, she said, simply cuts down on the bureaucratic requirements.

Karamargin, however, said Duceys actions in eliminating any requirement for students to be vaccinated against COVID remain valid because they fall under a different category.
He must fulfill his commitment to sharing 80 million COVID-19 vaccine doses with the world by the end of this month, while devising plans to meet his pledge to share a further 500 million over the next year. White House COVID coordinator Jeff Zients said Thursday that the administration would be unveiling the recipients of those 80 million doses in the coming days, as the U.S. works through the diplomatic and logistical hurdles to ship vaccines abroad as quickly as possible.

Having secured an agreement with the European Union to end a 16-year dispute over commercial airliners, Biden said he is now looking to bring about a de-escalation in a host of other trade tensions with the bloc as he tries to develop a more united front to counter Chinas trade practices. Hes tasked U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai to step up negotiations.

And after sitting down with Putin, Biden said the next six months would determine whether a constructive partnership could be formed in areas of mutual interest, from nuclear arms control and safeguarding critical infrastructure from cyberattacks to a potential exchange of imprisoned citizens. Progress on any of those fronts would be ironed out in the months ahead, Biden added.

The president was very clear yesterday that the proof of the pudding is in the eating, national security adviser Jake Sullivan said Thursday. It is the start of the story, and how the story ends will unfold here over the course, as he said, of the next six months to a year.

Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
BRUNSWICK, Ga. (AP)  The coastal Georgia county where Ahmaud Arberys slaying raised an outcry over racial injustice has hired its first full-time Black police chief.

Glynn County commissioners voted Thursday for Jacques Battiste to lead an embattled department that some Georgia lawmakers tried unsuccessfully to abolish last year.

A former FBI agent now serving as a deputy constable in New Orleans, Battiste was chosen after a search conducted by the Georgia Association of Chiefs of Police with assistance from the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives.

"I promise you I will bring my best game every day, Battiste told residents during a community forum earlier in the week.

Battiste's hiring comes after a turbulent year for the Glynn County Police Department. The agency was widely criticized for making no arrests after Arbery, a 25-year-old Black man, was chased and fatally shot by three white men who spotted him running in their neighborhood on Feb. 23, 2020. Charges came more than two months later after the Georgia Bureau of Investigation took over.
Calls by Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, a Democrat, to make it an official state holiday have failed to gain traction so far in the Legislature, the only one in the nation where Democrats control one chamber and Republicans control the other.

Hawaii had been one of only three states left not to recognize the holiday at all. A bill marking Juneteenth was signed there Wednesday and in a second holdout state, North Dakota, in April. Neither created a paid state holiday, however.

South Dakota still does not officially recognize the holiday, but Gov. Kristi Noem has issued a proclamation celebrating it. The governor does not have the power to make it an official state holiday  that must be done through the Legislature. A bill to recognize it as a working holiday fell a handful of votes short of passing this year.

It was defeated by an unusual coalition of Democrats who felt the day should be recognized as a full-fledged holiday, rather than a working holiday, and conservative lawmakers who opposed recognizing the holiday at all.

Vaney Hariri, a Black business owner who organized a march after Floyds death, said that vote showed the entrenched attitude of many lawmakers who would turn down a day off rather than celebrate your freedom from pain and captivity.
NEW YORK (AP)  Prosecutors asked a judge Friday to limit what jurors can hear of the psychological history of victims in a forced labor case, saying they were manipulated by a man who posed as a mental health expert and was sometimes there before or after many of them attempted suicide.

The request came in the case against Lawrence Ray, 61, who was arrested in February 2020.

Ray has pleaded not guilty to charges that he forced vulnerable college students into prostitution or unpaid labor over the span of a decade starting in 2010, when he moved into his daughters residence at Sarah Lawrence College.

Prosecutors say he befriended her classmates and became a patriarchal figure who exerted a manipulative influence over their lives.

Ray used physical, sexual and psychological abuse to extort nearly $1 million from victims, including five students, prosecutors said. One victim was forced into prostitution, the government has said.

A message seeking comment was sent to Ray's attorneys.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP)  A southwest Missouri man has admitted that he threatened U.S. Reps. Emanuel Cleaver II of Missouri and Steve Cohen of Tennessee because he was upset by comments they made.

Kenneth R. Hubert, 63, of Marionville, Missouri, pleaded guilty Thursday to two counts of threatening to assault a U.S. official, according to court documents.

Hubert acknowledged that he left a voicemail at Cleaver's office in Independence, Missouri, on Jan. 7. After calling Cleaver, who is Black, a racial slur, he said, How about a noose around his neck?, according to the documents.

Hubert told FBI agents who contacted him on Jan. 19 that he was upset over a statement Cleaver made in the U.S. House of Representatives, The Kansas City Star reported.

Cleaver has said previously that he didn't know Hubert and was unaware of the call until Cohen told him about the investigation.
Missouris new law would subject law enforcement agencies with officers who knowingly enforce federal gun laws to a fine of about $50,000 per violating officer.

Boynton said Missouris law conflicts with federal firearms laws and regulation and that federal law would supersede the states new statute. He said federal agents and the U.S. attorneys offices in the state would continue to enforce all federal firearms laws and regulations. He asked that Parson and Schmitt clarify the law and how it would work in a response by Friday.

Schmitt is running for U.S. Senate.

Republican lawmakers who pushed Missouris new law said they were motivated by the potential for more restrictive gun laws under Democratic President Joe Biden.

Republican Sen. Eric Burlison, of Battlefield, helped pass the bill and said he's not aware of any federal gun laws currently enforced that are not also illegal under state law. But he said the legislation, HB 85, will prevent local law enforcement from enforcing any wild ideas later enacted under Biden.

If this administration wants to go down a path of enforcing unconstitutional gun grabs, then our law enforcement officers, through HB 85, will not be lifting a finger to help them," Burlison said.
House Minority Leader Reginald Bolding, D-Laveen, said he was glad that this $100 million package was approved with support from both sides of the aisle.

We must do what we are doing today to react to this emergency, he said. But Bolding said the action cant stop here, saying it has to serve as a wake-up call.

Climate change is real, he said, saying it poses a near-term and long-term threat to Arizonas public health, safety and prosperity.

We must also do everything in our power to mitigate the crisis for future generations, Bolding continued. And we must do that together.

Ducey, in signing the measure into law, acknowledged the comments but was noncommittal.

Now, theres always going to be more work to be done, he said. All the leaders that came to the podium touched on that.

The governor left the ceremony without taking questions.

Ducey has a mixed record on the issue of climate change.

In 2015, After being briefed by experts, Ducey said he is convinced the climate is changing.
State Sen. Jane Nelson, chair of the state Senate Finance Committee, said in the press conference that the $250 million in state money  that Abbott referred to as a down payment  was being allocated as authorized under emergency orders. She did not clarify where the public money came from originally, but in a letter released later by Abbott's office the governor said said it would come from the Texas Department of Criminal Justice's budget.

The state also has set up a webpage and post office box so anyone can donate money for Abbott's wall.

Large numbers of migrants have been showing up at the U.S. border with Mexico, with many turning themselves over to U.S. Border Patrol agents in seeking legal asylum status. But the numbers of families and children traveling without their parents crossing into the U.S. have dropped sharply since March and April, while the encounters with single adults have remained high.

Abbott, who is up for reelection next year and has hasn't ruled out a run for president in 2024, has taken increased action over immigration since Biden took office, including sending more state police and national guardsmen to the border to arrest people entering the country illegally or cartels trafficking illegal drugs. On Wednesday Abbott said jails are looking for additional bed space to house the rising number of people being arrested.
Steves gravestone is not a gift from me. Its a gift from all of those people, whether you bought a ticket from his memorial concert or you gave to the fundraiser, or you bought a T-shirt. Or maybe you shared his music. Even if you just offered positive thoughts and lifted the family up in prayer, you contributed to this memorial. So my thanks goes to Tulsa and the fans because they are the ones that put the money behind it. Its their memorial. If you ever cared about Steve and his music, you guys are the ones who did it.

In a Tulsa World story after Steves death, Paul Benjaman said Steve became pretty much everybodys mentor no matter what style they were doing. If you were doing stuff like him, he was the No. 1 guy and the reason you lived here.

Continuing, Benjaman said, He was the most important musical figure in my lifetime. He was the sun that everybody revolved around. He was Tulsa music for us.

A Tulsa native and Nathan Hale High School alum, Steve Pryor began playing locally in the early 1970s with his own band and with others, including the Mighty Kingsnakes, The Neighbors and Old Dog Band. He shared stages with artists such as Muddy Waters, B.B. King, Paul Butterfield, Robert Cray and Russell. In the early 90s, he landed a record deal with Zoo/BMG and toured with the Fabulous Thunderbirds.
A Tulsa attorney made his first court appearance Friday after being charged with first-degree rape in connection with reports that he sexually assaulted several women.

Jeffrey Price Krigel has been out of custody on a $200,000 bond since being arrested the afternoon of June 11 on the rape charge, which alleges that he raped a woman while she was unconscious and therefore unable to legally consent on April 29.

Krigel, 34, is a private attorney in Tulsa who primarily handles criminal defense misdemeanor cases and has been licensed to practice in the state since 2012. He appeared in a Tulsa County courtroom before 9 a.m. Friday with his attorney, Shannon McMurray, to enter a not guilty plea.

Because of Krigels familiarity with Tulsa County prosecutors through his work, the Wagoner County District Attorneys Office was assigned to handle the case. Krigel was once a licensed legal intern for the Tulsa County District Attorneys Office and has worked as an intern for the Tulsa County Public Defenders Office, according to his personal website biography.
One of the major reasons they hired him was because he did believe in the environment and that things should reflect nature and be a part of nature, Busby said. He visualized the inside and outside, how that all related to the surrounding environment, and brought that to bear in his work.

Fords style is reflected in everything from the color of bricks used to construct the building  inspired by Oklahomas red dirt, Busby said  to the common areas parquet floor and large windows to welcome natural light.

Holland Hall, which was established downtown in the 1920s and has moved several times over the past century, will celebrate its 100th anniversary in conjunction with the buildings addition to the register, Holland Hall Head of School J.P. Culley said. A ceremony will be held when the historic place plaque is installed near the start of the next school year.

The Walter Academic Buildings nomination was never guaranteed, Busby said. The idea of applying to the register was first voiced in fall 2019, and when the Board of Trustees decided to move forward with the application, it contacted Tulsa architect and Holland Hall alumnus Marty Newman.
In a move that just makes a lot of sense, Tulsa Mayor G.T. Bynum on Thursday announced the citys plan to rename two well-known parks near downtown.

The proposal would rename Centennial Park, which is wedged between the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 577 and American Legion Post 1 near Sixth Street and Peoria Avenue, to Veterans Park, making way for the current Veterans Park at 21st Street and Boulder Avenue to be transformed into a park honoring the lands rich Native American history.

At that location, Dream Keepers Park would be almost catty-corner to Creek Nation Council Oak Park at 18th Street and Cheyenne Avenue, which memorializes the settling point of the Lochapoka clan of the Muscogee Nation after they were forced out of Alabama in 1836.

The history of the Muscogee Nation and the history of Tulsa are one and the same, Muscogee Second Chief Del Beaver said, speaking on behalf of Principal Chief David Hill at the press conference. Theres been greater recognition of that fact recently, Beaver said, and the move to rename the park is one more act of such.
Oklahoma prosecutors meet in two closely related but separate groups, the Oklahoma District Attorneys Council and the Oklahoma District Attorneys Association. The council functions as a state agency that provides advisory and administrative support. The association, which budgeted $48,000 in fiscal year 2020 to lobby the Legislature, operates as a nonprofit advocacy organization.

Carissa Byrne Hessick, director and lead researcher for the Prosecutor and Politics Project, said prosecutors should have a voice in the legislative process. But in most states, Hessick said district attorneys havent been transparent about their lobbying efforts and that the public is unaware of their political activity.

If theres going to be someone out there whos making really consequential decisions, and the check on their power is elections, its important for voters to have access to information that lets us know how that power is being used, Hessick said. And for the most part thats incredibly difficult to find.

Researchers used media reports and records from legislative hearings to determine whether prosecutors were lobbying a bill. What was most difficult to quantify was lobbying that happens behind closed doors, Hessick said.
That changed at a church service when their daughter introduced them to the pastor as her dads.

She did that without a hesitation or hiccup, Gray said. Our kids were blown away that we would even think that would be a problem. As much as we thought itd be an issue, weve never faced anything that way. People have been very open and accepting.

After that, the dads never hid their relationship.

When you enter into anything like this with a co-parent, you make sure your morals, values and beliefs line up and have a similar vision, Oellien said. Our family is very large and very diverse. Its truly surprising how accepting everyone is of our situation.

We try to be a voice and show who we are to allow other people to see different aspects of family.

Gay fathers arent much different from any other parents, especially when it comes to the enjoyment of talking about their kids.

They have straight As and have never been in an ounce of trouble, Gray said. Weve matured through this. There is something about having a family and the responsibility that comes along with that and wanting to be at your best for them.
Readers of Liu Cixins Three-Body Problem trilogy are familiar with the theory that extraterrestrials are quite rationally hiding their locations, to avoid being destroyed by more powerful extraterrestrials. Another idea, proposed by the economist Robin Hanson and his collaborators, is that any grabby civilizations out there have expanded so rapidly that we cant detect the signs. Why not? Because their rapid expansions came after the signals we can observe departed their distant galaxies billions of years ago: If they were where we could see them, they would be here now instead of us. (A thought that for Hanson helps explain why, if more advanced civilizations exist, we shouldnt be trying quite so hard to contact them.) A third possibility is that more advanced aliens exist, and theyre neither hiding nor grabby but instead have found a path of technological evolution that doesnt leave the sorts of signals were capable of searching for.
The Affordable Care Act  Obamacare  has survived another legal fight.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled Thursday that those challenging the federal health coverage law in the latest case had no standing to bring their claims.

The high courts ruling isnt entirely satisfying to anyone involved because it didnt address the questions raised about the laws legality, only whether two individuals and more than a dozen states led by Texas had any right to take those issues to court. They dont, the court ruled on a 7-2 vote that included conservative and liberal justices.

This is the third time that Obamacares opponents have brought increasingly creative and desperate challenges to the health care law before the high court and the third time they have been turned back. Although the justices involved have changed over the years and the court has clearly become more conservative, the common thread of the high courts public discussions seems to be that the Supreme Court shouldnt be used to make essentially political decisions about health care coverage law.

As Chief Justice John Roberts bluntly said during oral arguments on the Texas case, thats not our job.
A further 240,000 COVID-19 vaccine doses from Moderna Inc will arrive in Taiwan on Friday afternoon, Deputy Minister of the Interior Chen Tsung-yen said, boosting the islands slow vaccination programme.

Only around 5% of Taiwan's 23.5 million people have received at least one shot so far, with orders delayed by global shortages as the island deals with a spike in domestic infections.

Taiwan has already received and has started administering 150,000 Moderna shots, and has around 5 million on order.

Half of Taiwans 20 million dose order is with AstraZeneca Plc which have been slow to arrive, but this month the island received an additional 1.24 million AstraZeneca doses donated by Japan.
Police in Da Nang on Thursday indicted four company directors and issued a warrant for a search of their workplaces and places of residence due to their involvement in a case of organizing illegal entry into Vietnam.

The indictment decision and search warrant were imposed on Vo Tan Cuong, director of Kuvarose Company Limited, Tran Thanh Son, director of Stad Advertising Services Co. Ltd., Do Van Hoat, director of An Nhien Informatics Co. Ltd., and Nguyen Trung Thu, director of Tour-Media Co. Ltd.

Motivated by self-interest, these four directors signed endorsement papers to help a number of South Korean citizens make entry into Vietnam under the guise of experts, although their companies had no need to employ foreign workers, according to police.

They were also well aware that those South Koreans were not experts, who are included in Vietnams list of priority for entry during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Son even attempted to legalize records to conceal his violation when he acknowledged that local authorities were stepping up their measures against the rampant issue.

Police then ordered the arrest of Son and Cuong while banning Hoat and Thu from leaving their residences.

Da Nang authorities have continued calling on companies organizing or abetting the illegal entry of foreigners into Vietnam to admit their wrongdoings before functional forces to receive the leniency of the law.

Vietnam began denying entry to foreign nationals in March 2020 and currently only allows arrivals who are investors, experts, skilled workers, and business managers.

They are required to present certificates proving their negative test results for COVID-19 within three days before their flights and comply with Vietnams coronavirus quarantine regulations upon arrival.

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Health authorities recorded almost 150 locally-transmitted coronavirus infections in Ho Chi Minh City on Friday, as Vietnam has been struggling with the fourth transmission wave  and the worst so far  since late April.

One hundred and forty-nine cases were detected in the community, the municipal Center for Disease Control (HCDC) said in a report.

This is the biggest-ever daily case increase the city has reported since the virus first emerged in the country early last year.

The patients were related to about 20 transmission chains, with a dozen cases showing no clear source of infection.

The southern economic hub has found 1,346 community cases since April 27, when the fourth virus wave broke out in Vietnam.

The pathogen is silently spreading in the community so everyone should adhere to social distancing rules, reinstated on May 31, and limit unnecessary interactions, the HCDC said.

Those finding that they are at risk of infection should immediately contact local medical providers for help, it added.

The Ministry of Health documented 259 local COVID-19 cases nationwide on Friday, including 149 in Ho Chi Minh City, 76 in Bac Giang Province, 16 in Bac Ninh Province, 12 in Binh Duong Province, three in Ha Tinh Province, two in Hoa Binh Province, and one in Lao Cai Province.

A total of 232 cases were logged in quarantined or isolated areas, the ministry noted, adding 80 recoveries were recorded the same day.

Vietnam has registered 9,173 domestic infections in this wave, 1,840 of which has been found since Monday.

Bac Giang is leading with 5,083 patients, followed by Bac Ninh with 1,470 and Ho Chi Minh City.

By comparison, Vietnam confirmed 106 community cases in the first wave from January 23 to April 16, 2020, 554 in the second from July 25 to December 1, 2020, and 910 in the third from January 28 to March 25, 2021.

The Southeast Asian nation has reported an aggregate of 12,414 patients, including 10,742 local and 1,672 imported cases.

The number of recovered patients stands at 4,733 while 62 have died, most having suffered critical underlying conditions.

Nearly two million AstraZeneca vaccine shots had been administered and almost 90,000 people had been fully inoculated by Thursday, according to the health ministry's data.

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A mass coronavirus inoculation drive with over 800,000 AstraZeneca vaccine doses will be carried out in Ho Chi Minh City on Saturday at around 1,000 vaccination points, a high-ranking health official has said.

Deputy Minister of Health Nguyen Truong Son made the statement on Thursday when he joined the municipal Pasteur Institute to inspect the storage of 836,000 doses of AstraZeneca vaccine jabs having been allocated by the central government to the city.

These doses, developed by British-Swedish firm AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford, are among nearly one million shots of the vaccine the Japanese government donated to Vietnam on Wednesday.

This allocation reflected a priority the government and the National Vaccine Steering Board has given to the nine-million-strong city to help it expand the immunization coverage and thereby drive back the increasing COVID-19 spread, which has so far affected the entire southern city, Deputy Minister Son said.

The vaccine doses underwent required tests lasting for 48 hours at the Vaccine Testing Institute for safety certification before use, the deputy minister said.

This supplied photo shows the AstraZeneca vaccine shipment upon its arrival at Noi Bai International Airport in Hanoi on June 16, 2021.

The vaccination drive is expected to start on Saturday at 1,000 points of inoculation citywide and will last for five or seven days, making it the largest-ever mass COVID-19 immunization in the city.

The inoculation will be intended for priority subjects designated by the government and others including essential service providers, teachers, health workers, people working at administrative agencies, people over 65 years old, and workers at industrial parks and export processing zones.

Each point will vaccinate 200 people per day, which means a total of 200,000 people can receive injections per day.

City authorities have drawn up a plan to mobilize all possible health workers and facilities for the mass inoculation, the deputy minister said, adding that lists of vaccination must be made available within Friday.

It is a principle that this mass immunization is conducted quickly but must ensure absolute safety for vaccinated people, Son requested.

Ho Chi Minh City health authorities recently reported that around 11,000 locals have been vaccinated since June 3, bringing the total number of inoculated people to about 84,000 since the city began its immunization program on March 8.

Nationwide, nearly two million vaccine shots had been administered and 90,000 people had received the full two doses by Thursday, according to the health ministry's data.

The ministry confirmed 121 new coronavirus cases at noon on Friday, including 119 domestic and two imported cases, of which 59 were detected Ho Chi Minh City.

The new cases have taken the Southeast Asian countrys tally of patients to 12,352, including 62 deaths, since early 2020.

Since April 27, when the pandemics fourth wave appeared in Vietnam, the country has documented 9,114 domestic infections.

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The headquarters of a district-level peoples committee in Ho Chi Minh City has stopped operating after a civil servant tested positive for COVID-19.

The Ho Chi Minh City Center for Disease Control confirmed on Thursday that an officer of the Peoples Committee in District 7 had contracted the novel coronavirus.

Local authorities have tracked 51 people who came into contact with this case.

The headquarters of the District 7 administration has halted all operations, and multiple public servants and officials are temporarily quarantined at the venue.

Other staff members who have been working from home are required to fill out health declaration forms and undergo temporary self-quarantine.

The districts medical center has begun collecting samples from all workers at the headquarters for COVID-19 testing.

People are banned from entering the headquarters of the Peoples Committee in District 7, Ho Chi Minh City, June 17, 2021. Photo: Nhat Thinh / Tuoi Tre

Preliminary epidemiological investigation showed that the officer lives with five other family members at their house in District 7.

Two of the family members went to a local hospital for a health check-up on Tuesday, and their rapid-result tests came back positive for the novel coronavirus.

Health workers then retested the two individuals and other members in the family on Wednesday.

The results of the entire family returned positive.

Vietnam has documented 12,424 COVID-19 cases as of Friday afternoon, with 4,653 recoveries and 61 deaths, according to the Ministry of Health.

The country has recorded 9,114 local infections in 40 provinces and cities since April 27, including 1,316 cases in Ho Chi Minh City.

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A fruit vendor who parks her cart just outside a massive facility owned by a company which employs tens of thousands of workers in Binh Tan District, Ho Chi Minh City tested positive for COVID-19 on Wednesday, medical authorities told Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper on Thursday.

The womans fruit stall is located near the back gate of PouYuen Vietnam Company Limited on Street No. 49 in Tan Tao Ward, Binh Tan District.

PouYuen, a Taiwanese firm, employs about 56,000 workers.

The womans husband and child also tested positive for the virus.

Authorities tested the woman and her child for COVID-19 after the pair were admitted to Gia An 115 Hospital in the same district following a traffic accident.

The results of their rapid and real-time RT-PCR tests returned positive for the novel coronavirus.

Her husbands COVID-19 test result also showed that he had caught the pathogen.

Authorities and medical forces have approached people [living and operating street-vending businesses] at the market area near the back gate of PouYuen Company and collected 500 samples for COVID-19 tests so far," said a representative of the medical station of Tan Tao Ward.

"The results are still pending.

Vietnam has documented 12,231 COVID-19 cases as of Friday morning, with 4,653 recoveries and 61 deaths, according to the Ministry of Health.

Tay Ninh Province reported one virus-related death on Thursday but the health ministry has yet to record it.

The country has logged 8,995 local infections in 40 out of its 63 provinces and cities since the fourth wave erupted on April 27, including 1,257 cases in Ho Chi Minh City.

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Vietnamese police seized a total of 270 kilograms of ketamine, including 90 kilograms concealed in pig innards, from a Taiwanese-led transnational drug trafficking ring which had been using GPS tracking to monitor their transport operations.

The seizure was reported at a meeting hosted by the Ministry of Public Security's Drug Crime Investigation Police Department in Hanoi on Thursday to review the departments performance during the first half of 2021.

The ring was led by a group of Taiwanese nationals who had been living in Ho Chi Minh City, said Major General Nguyen Van Vien, director of the department.

The department was tipped off about the crime ring by Taiwanese law enforcement who said that several Vietnamese in Cambodia had been colluding with a syndicate in Vietnam to traffic drugs from there to Ho Chi Minh City before shipping them out of the country by road and air, the major general said.

On May 19, a police team pulled over a car transporting 10 kilograms of ketamine stashed inside boxes of instant noodles in the citys Binh Tan District.

Officers then arrested two Taiwanese nationals who had been preparing to receive the shipment for delivery to a third country.

The two Taiwanese told police that another Taiwanese national, Huang Yen Sheng, had hired them to transport the drugs.

In this supplied photo, drugs were found hidden in pig organs at a factory in Hanoi.

Working off testimony from those in custody, authorities raided a warehouse belonging to a transport company in Binh Chanh District, where they discovered 150 kilograms of drugs hidden in five electric motors, each weighing one ton, which were being prepared for transport to Hanoi.

Meanwhile, during a search of a 300-square-meter factory that Huang had been renting in Hanois Thuong Tin District, police found dozens of kilograms of drugs stashed inside pig organs awaiting delivery to China.

Members of the drug ring had portioned out 90 kilograms of ketamine and concealed them in the abdomens of 900 pigs.

They then fixed a positioning device onto the shipment in order to monitor it during transport.

Another search of an apartment rented by Huang in Hanois Long Bien District led to the discovery of five positioning systems intended to monitor drugs during the transport process.

Police have so far arrested five members of the ring and discovered that it had successfully delivered 270 kilograms of ketamine hidden in three outbound shipments since the beginning of the year.

As the rings masterminds are now in China and Cambodia, Vietnamese police are coordinating with counterparts in those countries to continue their investigations, Major General Vien said.

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HANOI -- Vietnam on Thursday called on the World Health Organization to speed up the COVAX vaccine drive as the countrys new daily infections hit a record high.

Vietnam successfully contained outbreaks for most of last year, but a new outbreak that has infected 8,914 people since late April, or 75% of the total cases, has prompted calls for Vietnams government to accelerate its vaccination programme.

WHO should speed up vaccine delivery through the international COVAX scheme, Vu Duc Dam, head of the countrys COVID-19 task force, said during a meeting with WHOs regional director for the Western Pacific, Takeshi Kasai.

Dam also urged the WHO to accelerate the transfer of vaccine manufacturing technology so Vietnam can become one of the vaccine production hubs in the region.

The WHO said last month it was reviewing a proposal by an unidentified vaccine manufacturer in Vietnam to become an mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccine technology hub in the Southeast Asian country.

The country of about 98 million people has received nearly 4 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine, most of which came from the COVAX programme.

Vietnams domestic inoculations started in March. At least 1.77 million people in Vietnam have had one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, while 72,325 have been fully vaccinated, according to official data.

In a separate meeting on Thursday, Dam asked Vietnamese health authorities to speed up testing and inoculations, and tighten control inside quarantine facilities to minimize cross-infection.
Confined to a quarantine center after coming into direct contact with a COVID-19 patient, an art teacher has spent his time giving a facelift to the walls of the facility in the north-central Vietnamese province of Ha Tinh.

The photos of Le Duy Loi, an art teacher at Nguyen Tuan Thien Middle School in Ha Tinhs Huong Son District, painting the walls of Son Trung Kindergarten in the same district went viral on social media platforms recently.

Loi has been placed in centralized monitoring at Son Trung Kindergarten, which has been requisitioned for quarantine purposes, since June 12 as a direct contact of a virus infection case.

The intuition of an art teacher, coupled with a lot of time to spare at the quarantine center, prompted Loi to create beautiful murals on the walls, of which the previous paint layer had mostly worn off.

After receiving the approval of local authorities, the teacher asked his family members to supply him with drawing tools and paint.

He painted whenever he was not busy with other quarantine duties.

Many other people being quarantined at the kindergarten also lent him a helping hand.

A wall is turned into a mural thanks to Le Duy Loi. Photo: Binh An / Tuoi Tre

Lois murals depict lovely, cheerful, and encouraging activities for children.

Its also a way for everyone to relax and create a sense of comfort to forget the concerns over the ongoing pandemic, Loi said.

Nguyen Truong Giang, head of the Huong Khe District Bureau of Education and Training, hailed Lois initiative, which did not only give a facelift to Son Trung Kindergarten but also helped quarantined people reduce stress.

Ha Tinh has recorded 73 local COVID-19 cases as of Friday afternoon since the fourth wave erupted in Vietnam on April 27.

Nationwide, 9,114 local infections have been detected in 40 out of the country's 63 provinces and cities ever since.

The overall caseload has reached 12,424 infections, with 4,653 recoveries and 62 deaths, according to the Ministry of Health.

Tay Ninh Province reported one virus-related death on Thursday but the health ministry has yet to count it in the tally.

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Three months after Nines own computer systems were hacked, 60 Minutes reports on cyber criminals.

At War

The world is at war. Every minute of every day, governments, institutions and companies, many in Australia, fight for survival in combat against cyber criminals. The enemy is not only evil, but also extremely clever in attempting to extort money from often unsuspecting organisations. Stealth is one of the hackers most potent weapons, enabling maximum mayhem and catastrophic damage. Three months ago, Nine, Australias largest locally owned broadcasting and publishing company, was attacked. On 60 Minutes, Tara Brown reports from the frontline of this extraordinary cyber battle: a sinister infiltration that led to an incredible fightback which tested the best technical minds in the country.

Reporter: Tara Brown

Producer: Garry McNab

The Life of Brain

At first it sounds so unbelievable its laugh-out-loud funny, but this story is certainly no joke. Foreign Accent Syndrome is an extremely rare and baffling condition that affects the way people speak. One moment theyre completely normal, the next theyre talking as if they were born and raised in another country. Sarah Abo meets two Australian women who unexpectedly started speaking in accents that suggested theyd spent all their lives in Ireland. For years, FAS has left experts scratching their heads, but that could finally be changing with a Sydney neuroscientist trying to unlock the secrets of this strange syndrome by using state of the art technology to map whats going on inside the brain. Its very welcome news for those who are struggling to recognise the sound of their own voice.

Reporter: Sarah Abo

Producers: Madeleine Apps, Sheree Gibson

9pm Sunday on Nine.
July is a big baking month for Lifestyle Food with UK contest The Great Celebrity Bake Off set to screen with Tim Minchin, Teri Hatcher & Alan Carr appearing in various episodes.

This is a 2018 series which aired in Britain as The Great Stand Up to Cancer Bake Off.

Stepping into the tent to kick off The Great Celebrity Bake Off are comedian Harry Hill, Spandau Ballets Martin Kemp, actress and writer Roisin Conaty and veteran broadcaster Bill Turnbull. In each episode Sandi Toksvig and Noel Fielding are joined by four different celebrities including Australias own Tim Minchin, actress Teri Hatcher, English comedian Alan Carr and television and radio star Melanie Sykes. Theyre all aiming to impress judges Paul Hollywood and Prue Leith with their baking skills. Over 5 episodes Paul and Prue set 15 exciting new baking challenges: pushing the celebrities to their baking limits. But only one celebrity per episode will be awarded the coveted star baker apron. On your marks, get set, bake.

Monday July 5 at 8.30pm on Lifestyle Food.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2MlaAZcmr5c

Back in 2008 The Fugly Awards rolled out a bit of brown carpet opposite Crown Casino for an awards ceremony like no other.

Organiser Anthony Dever flew from Brisbane to stood behind a milk crate podium and award non existent trophies to empty chairs with the words Kyle Sandilands, Jackie O, Anna Coren and Gladiators.

The anti-Logies, as they were known, were an online hit, honouring the worst in Aussie telly. Attracting 12,000 votes in their first year and 25,000 in their second, they frequently attracted media attention for their sheer bravado. Flying in the face of 50 years of television respectability, one man hit a nerve with his snarky sense of fun.

It was always just a silly, off the cuff thought that friends and family suggested I actually do, Dever told TV Tonight at the time. I put the website up online and it just took off. Everyone voted enthusiastically for what they thought was the worst on the telly.

Despite some stars accepting their gongs (Adam Hills, The Chaser) thee was never any recognition from TV Week.

Dever once said, There were a couple of years where I was trying to bait them. Even last year with our logo design. In the second and third years I was even sending media releases directly to the editor just trying to get a rise.

But there was never any sort of bite back which was a little disappointing.

After 7 years, The Fugly Awards concluded, managing to outlast some of the glorious shows it once recognised.
If you are sick with COVID-19 or suspect you are infected with the virus that causes COVID-19, follow the steps below to help prevent the disease from spreading to people in your home and community.
Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the faith God has distributed to each of you. (Romans 12:3)
Irish premier Micheal Martin has urged those at the centre of the political crisis in Northern Ireland to remain calm, as the province emerges from a very turbulent 24 hours.

Mr Martin said it was important everyone worked collectively to maintain stability in Northern Ireland.

Edwin Poots announced he was quitting as leader of the DUP on Thursday, just weeks after taking up the role.

The DUP is now searching for a new leader, after party members rebelled against Mr Poots decision to nominate Paul Givan as Northern Ireland First Minister.

Speaking in Dublin, Mr Martin said it had been a difficult period for Northern Ireland.

It has been a very turbulent 24 hours, he said.

I think it is very important that we all work collectively on the island towards maintaining stability and calm heads and staying focused on what is important to the people within Northern Ireland, he added.

That is a Government that can work on fundamental pressing issues, like the health services, Covid-19 and indeed the broader economic issues.

The Government will work with all parties and the British Government to protect the institutions, the Good Friday Agreement and work to ensure the continuation of the Assembly and the Executive.

Edwin Poots resigned three weeks after being ratified as DUP leader (Brian Lawless/PA)

Its been a very difficult period but its important we stay focused on the issues. We will work with the new leadership  that is a matter for the DUP  and whoever emerges as their leader.

We will work constructively with the new leader. Its been a very difficult time for the outgoing leader Edwin Poots but I think its important that we maintain relationships.

The vast majority of DUP MLAs and MPs voted against Mr Poots decision to proceed with reconstituting the Stormont Executive, amid party anger at a UK Government pledge to grant Sinn Fein a key concession on Irish language laws.

The UK Government committed to passing the stalled laws in the autumn if they were not moved at the Stormont Assembly in the interim.

Story continues

Mr Martin said the implementation of the Irish Language Act should not be the cause of division.

The Irish Language Act has been agreed on a number of occasions by a number of parties at different times and its been on the agenda for some time, he added.

The Irish Language Act and its implementation should not be the cause of division so I dont think the British Government made a mistake. I think they were working in good faith.

(Secretary of State) Brandon Lewis had a view on this for some time, given a year ago it was signed up to by the parties, and he was of the view that we needed to press on if it was not delivered in the Assembly.

Irelands Foreign Affairs Minister Simon Coveney said the region faced potentially a very tense summer (Niall Carson/PA)

All parties have agreed to the Irish Language Act.

Language is something that should unite, it shouldnt be the cause of political division.

Earlier, Irelands Foreign Affairs Minister said the last thing Northern Ireland needed was for its largest party to be divided.

Simon Coveney said the DUP should be given space to respond to the challenges it was facing.

Mr Coveney told RTEs Morning Ireland programme: Were back to square one, if you like, where the party has to find a way of electing a new leader that can unite the DUP, or at least attempts to.

And thats important for politics in Northern Ireland.

He added that, with the region facing potentially a very tense summer, what was needed was stability and some predictability in Northern Ireland politics.

Mr Coveney also said it was hard to tell whether Paul Givan would quit as Stormonts First Minister following Mr Poots resignation.

DUP members were angry at Edwin Poots nomination of Paul Givan, pictured, as First Minister (Liam McBurney/PA)

The DUP is remaining very tight-lipped in terms of their approach to the First Minister, and, of course, electing a new leader. Whether that will be by contest, or whether theyll rally behind one name now, is hard to know, he said.

Well have to wait and see what happens in relation to Paul Givan as First Minister.

As of now, he is the First Minister in Northern Ireland. Hes been selected and elected yesterday into that position.

But so much has changed in those 24 hours that you have to say theres a lot of uncertainty.

The Fine Gael TD said an election in Northern Ireland at this time would be too divisive and that all parties should work towards stabilising the political situation.

Whats needed now is stability and political leadership as opposed to an election at a time of real polarisation and tension across Northern Ireland within communities and society, the minister said.

I think we have enough challenges right now, without a very divisive, polarising election in Northern Ireland, but that is what could happen if political leadership cant find a way of stabilising things in Northern Ireland.
By Karolina Tagaris

RITSONA, Greece (Reuters) - With walled camps and tougher border controls, Greece is hardening its approach ahead of summer when migrant arrivals pick up, defying criticism from aid groups and saying it has little choice given a lack of support from the rest of Europe.

The squalid conditions facing many asylum-seekers were laid bare last year when a fire devastated the sprawling Moria camp on Lesbos, and Greece has denied repeated accusations that its coast guard vessels have pushed back migrant boats as they entered Greek waters from Turkey.

Migration Minister Notis Mitarachi says the government is taking a tougher approach "so we don't send the wrong message of incentivizing people to come" to Greece.

"Our policy is strict but fair," Mitarachi told Reuters.

Greece was the frontline of Europe's migration crisis in 2015, when a million refugees from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan landed. The numbers have slowed sharply since, but Greece says it is still left shouldering much of the burden.

Outside Athens in the camp of Ritsona, signs of the stricter policy are visible. Concrete-fenced, it resembles a small walled town, with makeshift grocery stores, a butcher and a cafe blasting Arabic music.

For many asylum-seekers, it feels like a prison.

"Before, we were in an invisible jail. Now it (is) a visible jail," said Liban, who fled Somalia in 2018 when drought and ongoing conflict left half the population without food, water or shelter. He asked that his full name not be used because his asylum application was pending.

In addition to fencing off camps, Greece launched an EU-wide tender in June to build two closed-type facilities on the islands of Samos and Lesbos, where the former occupants of Moria are housed on an abandoned army firing range.

Athens says the measures will make camps safer but aid groups say containment policies hurt people already traumatized by war and conflict. The Council of Europe's Human Rights Commissioner has urged Greece to reconsider.

Story continues

'OBSESSION WITH DETERRENCE'

Medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres said a "policy-driven humanitarian crisis" was unfolding on the five islands near Turkey, where it treated more than 1,300 people, a third of them children, for mental health issues.

"This obsession with deterrence and the obsession of control and at the same time, zero investment in integration, is only causing pain and nothing else," MSF's Greece director Christina Psarra said.

Greece has been pushing EU countries for support over a proposed overhaul of EU migration rules. While EU funds are easing some of the burden, there is a lack of solidarity, Mitarachi said.

"We still feel we are alone - Greece, Italy, Spain, Malta and Cyprus, the five Mediterranean countries - in tackling the pressures from migration."

For Amir, a 17 year-old Afghan who has learned Greek since arriving in Ritsona 18 months ago and wants to become a doctor, the price feels high.

"We feel we have been separated with the walls they have built," he said.

Greece says its policies are bearing fruit. In the months through May, there were more returns than arrivals and flows were down 68%, the migration ministry said. The number of people in camps was down 71% since last May.

But with instability in Syria, conflict in Somalia and the Taliban gaining strength as international forces prepare to leave Afghanistan, the drivers of migration remain strong.

In June, Greece issued a decision designating Turkey a "safe country" for asylum-seekers from those countries, making it harder for their asylum requests to be approved.

Mitarachi said Greece granted asylum to qualified applicants but "we don't want to be the gateway to Europe for the smuggling networks".

(Editing by Emelia Sithole-Matarise)
The UK exported more food and drink to outside the EU than into it in the first few months after Brexit as exports to the bloc nosedived.

Sales to non-EU countries made up 55% of all UK food and drink exports in the first three months of 2021 compared to less than 40% a year earlier, according to data from the Food and Drink Federation.

However, this is not thanks to any major boom in exports to non-EU countries, which only rose by 0.3%, the group said.

It means that overall exports of food and drink sunk to 3.7 billion from 5.1 billion a year earlier.

Food exports have been hit hard (Peter Byrne/PA)

The loss of 2 billion of exports to the EU is a disaster for our industry, and is a very clear indication of the scale of losses that UK manufacturers face in the longer-term due to new trade barriers with the EU, said the federations head of international trade Dominic Goudie.

Some of the drop will be down to EU importers having stockpiled goods from the UK ahead of Brexit, the Food and Drink Exporters Associations John Whitehead said.

Yet, he said, significant business has been lost as a direct result of the additional bureaucracy, customs delays and costs of trading with the EU.

He added: Experienced FDEA members are continuing to battle against inconsistent interpretations of regulations across the EU and having to weigh up whether the time and cost involved is sustainable. We fully support the FDF in pressing Government to boost support for exporters.

The hardest hit sector was dairy exporters. Milk and cream exports to the EU dropped more than 90% while cheese exports fell by two-thirds.

Across the three months food and drink exports to Ireland dropped by nearly 71%, while to Portugal they dropped 72% and to Spain by 63%.

Next to this exports to East Asia have risen. To China they grew by 28%, by 19% to South Korea and by 6.2% to Japan.
Rosemary beach in California has an incredible vibe. (Getty Images)

After more than a year of stringent restrictions between the US and the UK, transatlantic travel could soon be back on the cards.

President Joe Biden and Prime Minister Boris Johnson met ahead of the G7 summit last week and agreed to work towards reopening a travel corridor between the US and the UK.

According to the secretary of state for transport Grant Shapps, the two governments are looking to set up a joint task force, in the hope of reopening a travel route between the countries, which could be welcome news to holidaymakers who have missed hopping across the pond.

Before the outbreak of COVID-19, the UK-US air corridor was one of the busiest in the world.

More than five million people from the UK visited the US every year, with 4.5 million trips made in the reverse direction.

As it stands at the moment, most US travellers are required to quarantine for 10 days upon landing in the UK, and the US continues to prohibit UK travellers to enter as part of its wider international travel ban.

Read more: Dog dangers of summer: How to keep your pet safe all season

But the thought of a potential lifting of restrictions has had many dreaming of trips to the US.

To whet your appetite we've asked the travel experts for their pick of some of the best bucket-list spots to visit when you can...

Live like a cowboy in Fort Worth

Live like a cowboy in Fort Worth. (Getty Images)

According to Tom Bourlet, travel blogger at www.spaghettitraveller.com most US tourism is focused on the coastlines.

"Whether its a scenic trip across California in the west, or embracing the magic of New York in the east, however, there are a number of incredible places to visit in the middle of the USA."

Bourlet says Fort Worth offers the chance to live out a childhood dream and live like a real cowboy. You can stay on a ranch, learn to ride a horse and do a cattle drive, watch a rodeo and finish with a steak in the evening.

Explore Northern California

Take in an incredible sunset at the Ghost Town of Bodie. (Getty Images)

If youre looking to visit the states once travel resumes, Nicky Kelvin, head of The Points Guy UK recommends exploring Northern California for some exciting but often overlooked destinations.

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"There is so much to discover including the ghost town of Bodie, as well as Lake Tahoe," he says. "You could spend weeks exploring the area and still not see it all, making it the perfect place to revisit time and time again."

Embrace all the live music in Nashville

Take in the music at Nashville, Tennessee. (Getty Images)

The home of The Kings of Leon, Taylor Swift, Dolly Parton, Willie Nelson and Dave Pomeroy, Nashville has a strong connection with music, with people travelling from across the country to play in Nashville bars such as The Bluebird Cafe.

"Nicknamed the Music City, every bar seems to have open mic nights, 7 days a week," says Bourlet.

"Most importantly, Nashville isnt a dry state like its neighbour Tennessee, the home of Jack Daniels, meaning you can enjoy an incredibly cheap glass of JD and coke."

Read more: 8 things you need to know before taking your first camping trip

Watch 1.5 million bats fly out from Congress Avenue Bridge

Crowds gather around the water to watch the bats by the Congress Avenue Bridge at sunset. (Getty Images)

Every day around sunset in Austin, approximately 1 million free-tail bats fly out from under the Congress Avenue Bridge, taking around 45 minutes.

"This spectacle normally gathers a decent sized audience, with people debating the best spot to watch the marvel, with many on the walkway to the east side of the bridge, while others get on a kayak to see it up close," explains Bourlet.

Take in the Great Smoky Mountains

Check out the view at the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.(Getty Images)

Located across Tennessee and North Carolina, the Great Smoky Mountains is the most popular national park in the US and its no surprise why.

"Here you can go tubing, hiking and also just enjoy the scenic views all year round," Kelvin explains. "Its also located near to the iconic Dollywood if youre after some theme park fun."

Red Bud Isle

The scenery is incredible at Red Bud Isle in Austin. (Getty Images)

According to travel blogger Bourlet, Austins strapline is Keep Austin Weird.

"The closest resemblance we have in the UK is probably Brighton, with the cosmopolitan city embracing creativity in every possible aspect," he says.

One of the supposed big sights to see in Austin is the springs, with Barton Springs often labelled as the best, but Bourlet says he was disappointed after visiting himself due to overcrowding and rubbish-strewn water.

Watch: World's best beaches.

Instead he suggests visiting "hidden gem" Red Bud Isle.

"Often labelled as an off leash dog park, this 13 acre space is far from just that," he explains. "People jumping off cliffs into the water, paddle boarders floating by and clear water with turtles swimming past, this is a breathtakingly beautiful spot in the USA that hasnt made many travel guides yet."

Yosemite National Park

Yosemite National Park, California is a must-do in the US. (Getty Images)

"The USA is spoilt for national parks, with arguably the most famous being Yellow Stone, but I would also love to highlight Yosemite National Park for anyone visiting the West coast," Bourlet says.

The park is 1,200 square miles with a huge number of stunning waterfalls, cascading water off the edges to the rocks below, with Yosemite Falls the highest in the whole country.

"This is a great scenic route for a walk or a bike ride, while its also amazing for wildlife fans, with plenty of coyotes, raccoons, bobcats and even bears!

"If you stay the night camping then you can look up at the clear skies without air pollution to see a star filled sky," he adds.

Read more: The UK's best nudist beaches revealed

The beach at Dry Tortugas National Park

Dry Tortugas National Park is one of the most isolated coastal fortifications in the US. (Getty Images)

According to Travel and Leisure Dry Tortugas National Park is actually one of the country's least-visited national parks. Situated 70 miles off the shore of Key West, the beach here is only accessible by boat or plane, but the difficult journey is worth the trouble with crystal clear, blue waters and white sands greeting you on arrival at the island park.

Kelvin also recommends Floridas Rosemary Beach for its white sand beaches and great atmosphere.

Admire the Grand Canyon

Incredible views at the Grand Canyon National Park, Arizona. (Getty Images)

The Grand Canyon is a natural wonder like no other in the world. "If you have the budget, you can take a helicopter ride from Vegas over to the Grand Canyon, down to the bottom, to then try white water rafting, before getting a helicopter back to Vegas," Bourlet says.

"But if you dont want to spend that much, taking a trek down the Grand Canyon is an unbelievable experience, but make sure to pack plenty of water as the heat can be quite intense.

"If youre feeling really brave, you can walk on the Grand Canyon Skywalk at Eagle Point, but I wasnt courageous enough."

Have a beach day at Hanalei Bay, Hawaii

The beach at Hanalei Bay, Hawaii is a must-visit according to travel experts. (Getty)

For those after something more tropical, Kelvin says he can't recommend Hawaii enough. "Hanalei Bay, located on the northern side of the island of Kauai, is home to some of the best beaches in the US," he says.

Take a trip to Las Vegas

Las Vegas should be on your US bucket-list, according to travel experts. (Getty Images)

According to Bourlet there's a lot more to Las Vegas than gambling. "Many people who havent visited Las Vegas have the impression that this bizarre place is purely a holiday resort built for gambling, which is an obvious aspect, but there is so much more," he says. "There are a number of incredible shows that you should book, including Cirque du Soleil, David Copperfield and the Blue Man Group.

"If you want a free spectacle, then you can enjoy sunset by watching the water show at the Bellagio hotel, taking place every 30 minutes.

"Las Vegas is also home to a number of Michelin star restaurants, meaning you can try some of the most incredible culinary creations in the world," he adds.

North Fork, Suffolk County

Avoid the crowds by heading to the coast at North Fork, Suffolk County, Long Island, New York. (Getty Images)

Avoid the crowds at Long Island by heading to North Fork in Suffolk County. According to Travel and Leisure you can bike, kayak, or just have a peaceful picnic without battling for space. While the beach itself is small it will feel spacious in comparison to other more popular city beach spots.

Watch: UK and US taskforce try to thrash out the return of transatlantic travel.
In April, the U.S. Navys top admiral revealed that it would deploy hypersonic weapons on its advanced Zumwalt-class destroyers by 2025. This is sooner than the previous plans for hypersonic weapon deployment on the Virginia-class attack submarines, set for 2028, and is more enduring than plans to put the weapons on the navys aging guided missile submarines in 2025 as an interim capability before they are retired at the end of the decade. As The Diplomat writes, the U.S. Navys hypersonic weapon, called the Conventional Prompt Strike (CPS) weapon, is a so-called boost-glide weapon. After being lofted  the boost  to altitude by a 34.5-inch diameter rocket, its warhead then maneuvers unpowered  the glide  to its target at speeds exceeding five times the speed of sound.

However, how the Zumwalts would accommodate hypersonic weapons was unclear until the navys 2022 budget was released at the end of May. The vertical launch cells on the U.S. Navys Arleigh Burke destroyers and the three huge Zumwalt-class destroyers are 25 inches- and 28 inches-wide respectively, too small for the Conventional Prompt Strike weapons 34.5-inch-diameter booster rocket. To put hypersonic weapons on the Zumwalt class, huge new launch tubes need to be installed.

The budget provides new details about those launchers. To fit new launchers, the Zumwalts two Advanced Gun System mounts, located on the ships forward section, will be removed. An Advanced Payload Module will be installed in their place that will carry and launch up to 12 CPS weapons.

The loss of the ships Advanced Gun Systems (AGS)  long-range precision naval cannons  is not really a loss. The AGS was originally designed to fire guided 6-inch artillery shells more than 60 nautical miles in support of marines operating ashore. However, when the Zumwalt class was cut from a planned 30 ships to only three, the economics of scale for producing the AGSs unique ammunition became skewed and the cost-per-round skyrocketed to nearly $1 million, nearly the same as a Tomahawk cruise missile, which has a larger warhead and a range of nearly 1,000 miles. Given the extraordinary cost, the navy decided to cancel any additional ammunition buys for the AGS five years ago, and since the guns cannot fire any of the other precision artillery shells already in production, the guns had become dead weight.

Replacing the Zumwalts unusable guns with hypersonic weapons will give the ships a strategic-level capability without sacrificing any of its existing 80 vertical launchers, which are still needed for air-defense and anti-ship missiles. According to the Navys budget justification, the hypersonic weapon modification provides a flexible, surface combatant launched long-range strike capability through the ships remaining service life. When combined with the low observable characteristics of the Zumwalt platform, the funds provide a compelling strike capability from a platform designed to complicate an adversaries targeting problem.

The funding documents also reveal that the Zumwalts CPS launch system will be the same as found on the Ohio- and Virginia-class submarines. This, combined with the ships capacity to carry up to 12 hypersonic weapons, suggests that the Advanced Payload Module the U.S. Navy will install on the Zumwalts is a version of the Virginia Payload Module.

The Virginia Payload Module is a 70-foot-long midsection being added to later Virginia-class attack submarine hulls. The new sections house four large-diameter launch tubes similar to what the navys Ohio-class ballistic missile submarines use to launch Trident nuclear missiles. Each tube can carry up to seven Tomahawk cruise missiles or other ordnance. The modified Virginias are meant to replace the conventional missile launch capacity of the navys aging guided missile submarines, which were converted from the four oldest Ohio-class submarines to carry 154 Tomahawk cruise missiles instead of nuclear weapons.

The Virginia Payload Tubes that will carry the Navys hypersonic weapon in 2028 are 87 inches in diameter, which can accommodate three 34.5-inch-wide booster rockets (with some additional space left for the weapons launch cannister). Each Virginia Payload Module has four launch tubes, and each tube appears capable of accommodating three hypersonic weapons, providing for a maximum loadout of 12 hypersonic weapons. Thus the Advanced Payload Module that will be installed on the three Zumwalt destroyers in place of their two now-useless cannons is likely a Virginia Payload Module of four large-diameter launch tubes that will be loaded with three CPS weapons each.

Just as the Virginia Payload Tubes can accommodate a number of different weapons, the Zumwalts will also presumably be capable of carrying a mix of hypersonic weapons and large numbers of other new advanced land-attack and anti-ship missiles.

The budget also reveals a goal of producing 24 CPS weapons per year to accommodate both the U.S. Armys ground-launched hypersonic weapon units (planned to be ready in 2023) and the Zumwalt destroyers ahead of deployment on the Virginia submarines nearer the end of the decade.
With parliamentary elections in Armenia approaching on June 20, its neighbors in Azerbaijan are watching particularly closely. The outcome of the vote will determine the immediate future of the conflict between Yerevan and Baku, which is far from over after the end of fighting last year that saw Azerbaijan regain many of its territories in and around Nagorno-Karabakh. As Euriasianet writes, key issues that remain to be resolved include the final status of Nagorno-Karabakh, the demarcation of borders between the two countries, and the re-establishment of transportation connections, as stipulated in the November 10 ceasefire statement.

From Bakus perspective, what matters is not only the result of the Armenian elections but also the process leading up to it. Armenian society is badly polarized, with the incumbent prime minister, Nikol Pashinyan, and his main rival, former president Robert Kocharyan, exchanging threats and insults and engaging in populist and irredentist rhetoric. There appears to be a real risk of confrontation spilling into the streets.

Armenian polarization benefits Azerbaijan in two major ways. First, an erosion of state institutions  exemplified by mass resignations at the foreign ministry  means there is no capacity to devote energy and political capital to the fate of Karabakh.

Second, Armenia will be seen as a failing state while contrasting with Baku's functioning institutions. This implies that Baku's stability is preferable to the chaos and defeat that democracy brought to Armenia.

It also vindicates the Azerbaijani regimes skepticism about Western values and closer ties with Europe. Although Armenia after 2018 made some strides in liberalization following Western models and signed a cooperation agreement with the European Union, in its hour of need the EU didnt rush to its defense.

Azerbaijans president Ilham Aliyev understood that the key to his diplomatic and military success lies in cultivating his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, formally a treaty ally of Armenia. Aliyev and Putin get each other. Conversely, as a populist leader who came to power via a revolution, Pashinyan has never truly belonged to the club.

Azerbaijan is interested in establishing a land corridor to its exclave of Nakhichevan through Armenian territory. This is a project in which Azerbaijans main allies, Turkey, has a particular stake as it would open direct land access to the Turkic republics further east in Central Asia.

For that strategy to develop, Baku needs a government in Armenia capable of delivering on the trilateral statement, in particular the creation of the Nakhchivan transport route. The idea is deeply unpopular in Armenia as it is seen as threatening Armenian sovereignty. A collapse of Armenian statehood, however, would render that agreement unimplementable.

That would put Azerbaijan in a quandary. Kocharyans victory could likewise jeopardize Azerbaijans plans and introduce a further element of uncertainty. Running as the anti-Pashinyan, he is openly critical about the trilateral statement and has denounced the provision of the land corridor as unacceptable. He would be less hesitant to use force to evict Azerbaijani soldiers than Pashinyan. Also unlike Pashinyan, Kocharyan always has had good chemistry with Putin and has declared that his foreign policy would be unambiguously pro-Russian. It remains to be seen whether Moscow will respond to these overtures by tilting towards Armenia.

Given the alternatives  prolonged instability or Kocharyans restoration  Pashinyans victory in the upcoming elections is probably the best option for Baku to achieve its objectives. With renewed domestic legitimacy, but externally weak and dependent, he may be the only one capable of delivering on the agreement he himself signed.
Azerbaijan has put on the international wanted list the heads of Armenian companies illegally transporting weapons to Karabakh in the past 20 years, the Prosecutor-General's Office reported on June 18.

On April 28, 2021, the Prosecutor-General's Office opened a criminal case under the relevant articles of the Criminal Code, and the Prosecutor-General's Office investigation department was instructed to investigate the case, the report added.

It noted that the investigation had been carried out on the basis of information published in a number of media outlets and social networking platforms about the illegal transportation of weapons and military equipment to Armenia and from there to Azerbaijan's Nagorno-Karabakh region.

It was established that the head of the Tashir group of companies, Samvel Karapetyan, also known in Armenia as a "grey businessman" and Royalsys Engineering owner David Galustyan, KOMEX Director-General Ara Abrahamyan and others smuggled illegally-acquired large-calibre military firearms, ammunition, explosives and devices into Armenia and from there into Azerbaijan's Armenian-occupied Nagorno-Karabakh region and adjacent seven districts during 2001-2021, the report added.

In violation of the requirements of the Customs Convention on International Carriage of Goods and the Treaty on the Limitation of Conventional Arms in Europe, the people in question organized the smuggling by passenger planes, the Armenian Air Force's Il-76 TD cargo plane and the Ilyushin-76TD cargo plane purchased by Ara Abrahamyan, who also heads the Union of Armenians of Russia.

The smuggled weapons, ammunition, explosives ad military equipment were aimed for the Armenian armed forces, the Prosecutor-General's Office said.

"Samvel Karapetyan, David Galustyan and Ara Abrahamyan were prosecuted under Articles 100.1, 218.1, 228.3, 279.1 and 206.4 of the Criminal Code, a measure of restraint in the form of arrest was chosen against them, and all of them were put on the international wanted list," the law-enforcement agency added.

The Prosecutor-General's Office sent a request for legal assistance to the relevant state authorities of foreign countries in connection with the aforementioned criminal case.

It stated that all possible measures are being taken to bring to justice those responsible for these and other similar crimes in accordance with international law.

The Prosecutor-General's Office earlier stated that under President Ilham Aliyev's instructions those responsible for war crimes and crimes against humanity will be identified and brought to justice regardless of the time of the crime.
Georgia will receive 100,000 Covid-19 vaccines from Estonia, announces Estonian Foreign Ministry.

An official statement of the ministry reads that in addition to Georgia, Estonia will also support to Eastern neighbour Moldova by donating another 100,000 doses Covid-19 vaccines.

Georgia started coronavirus vaccination in mid-March when the country received 43,200 doses of AstraZeneca vaccine.

The country is currently using Sinovac, Sinopharm, AstraZeneca, and Pfizer vaccines for certain groups of individuals, Agenda.ge reported.
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan highlighted Turkey's importance for the European Union, as he said the country's integration is vital for the bloc to become a center of power, Daily Sabah reports.

"It is not possible for the EU to reach its goal of being a center of attraction and power without Turkey," Erdogan told the Southeast European Cooperation Process (SEECP) summit in Antalya on Thursday.

"Ankara expects EU to immediately rid itself of strategic blindness, advance accession process with positive agenda," Erdogan said.

He continued by noting that countries in the Southeast Europe region do not have the "luxury" to sit and watch what is happening regarding irregular migration.

Erdogan also warned against increasing racism, Islamophobia, anti-immigrant sentiment on a global scale, gradually turning into a national security problem.
The Putin-Biden summit has been widely aired and much discussed across state media platforms in the West. Some experts believe that it was the Russian leader who needed the summit most, others that Biden, and others note the mutual benefit of the meeting for both great powers. The Chinese accused the American of trying to sow discord between Russia and China.

The National Interest writes that the summit was mutually beneficial. There are no winners here; both Moscow and Washington have gained benefits.

"Start with the optics. For President Joe Biden, it was an opportunity to show that he could hold his own on the world stage; for President Vladimir Putin, that Russia matters. Both won by showing up and eschewing any drama. Putin was early. Biden didnt take any gratuitous swipes. It was all business for both leaders," the article reads.

Former U.S. President Donald Trump has accused Joe Biden of giving a "very big stage to Russia" after the two leaders came face-to-face for talks in Geneva. "We did not get anything," he told Fox News in a wide-ranging interview. "We gave a very big stage to Russia, and we got nothing."

The Washington Post, on the contrary, pays tribute to the U.S. leader, who did not give in to Putin and warned Moscow against rash steps.

"Biden comes back to the United States with increased stature and unity among allies. He achieved what he came to do in Geneva: reasserting American values and conveying to Russia the risks of its reckless aggression. The point here was not to attain capitulation. Im not confident Putin will change his conduct, Biden said bluntly. But he did eradicate any misconception that the last four years were anything more than a nightmarish aberration and reestablished the United States democratic bona fides," the article reads.



"US President Joe Biden tried his best to drive a wedge between China and Russia during a press conference after his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Biden said, "Russia is in a very, very difficult spot right now" and Russia "is being squeezed by China...Biden just wants to pass the blame to China. This is an illusion that is possible only under serious political autism and narcissism," Global Times writes.
The Kremlin on Friday blamed a fresh surge in COVID-19 infections on nihilism among the population, Russias low vaccination rate and virus mutations, as Moscow reported a record number of infections.

President Vladimir Putins spokesman Dmitry Peskov said a mass inoculation campaign had clearly not been as effective as desired and said that Putin was closely monitoring the situation.
Armenian Prime Nikol Pashinyan on Thursday urged voters to hand him a new mandate as around 20,000 supporters packed a central square in the capital Yerevan ahead of snap polls.

"The moment of truth has arrived," declared Pashinyan, who turned up at the rally in the capital's Republic Square with his wife and children. "On June 20 we will come to the polls to stage a steel revolution," he added as the crowd cheered and chanted "Nikol!"

During an aggressive campaign that sparked warnings from the country's rights ombudsman, he has urged voters to give him a "steel mandate" and brandished a hammer.

On Sunday, the small South Caucasus country holds early parliamentary polls called by Pashinyan in an attempt to diffuse a political crisis after a disastrous war with Azerbaijan last year, AFP reported.
The Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry held bilateral consultations between Azerbaijan and Russia on the issues related to the Caspian Sea on June 17, 2021.

At the consultations, the Azerbaijani side was represented by the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Special Representative of the President of Azerbaijan for Border and Caspian Sea Issues Khalaf Khalafov, and the Russian side was represented by the Ambassador-at-Large of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Special Representative of the President of Russia for the delimitation and demarcation of the state border of Russian with the CIS member states, Mikhail Petrakov.

During the meeting, issues on the implementation of the Convention on the Legal Status of the Caspian Sea, measures related to the preparation for the next Caspian summit at the level of heads of state, as well as draft agreements between the Caspian states on cooperation in this area, which are currently at the stage of the agreement, were discussed.

At the meeting, a wide exchange of views took place on the issues of the agenda and the holding of the next meeting of the high-level working group on the Caspian Sea.
U.S. President Joe Biden and Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan agreed in a meeting this week that Turkey would take a lead role in securing Kabul airport as the United States withdraws troops from Afghanistan, U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said on Thursday.

However, the two leaders were not able to resolve the long-standing issue of Turkey's purchase of Russian S-400 defense systems, Sullivan said, a bitter dispute that strained ties between the NATO allies. He added that dialogue on the issue would continue, Reuters reported.

Sullivan told reporters that Biden and Erdogan, in their meeting on Monday at the NATO summit, discussed the Afghanistan issue. Erdogan sought certain forms of U.S. support to secure the airport and Biden committed to providing that support, Sullivan said.
The delegation of Uzbekistan led by Foreign Minister Abdulaziz Kamilov will visit Antalya on June 18-19 to attend Diplomacy forum held by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Turkey.

The delegation will hold several bilateral meetings on the sidelines of the Forum, AKIpress reported.

The Antalya Diplomacy Forum will open on June 18 to discuss the situation in South Caucasus. Representatives of Armenia were invited for the event, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said.

More than 40 heads of state, government, Foreign Ministers, academia, experts, media representatives will partake in the Forum.
Starting June 18, the national airline Uzbekistan Airways will reduce the number of flights from Tashkent to Delhi. This was reported by the press service of the airline.

The corresponding decision was made due to worsening situation with the COVID-19 pandemic in India.
Indiana Funds Commercialization Award Supports Promising Technology Based on Work of PVM Faculty Member Riyi Shi

Technology from Neuro Vigor draws on the work of Dr. Riyi Shi, the Purdue Mari Hulman George Endowed Professor of Applied Neuroscience in the College of Veterinary Medicines Department of Basic Medical Sciences. (Purdue University photo)

Technology related to the research of Purdue Veterinary Medicine neuroscientist Riyi Shi has received major new support as a means of providing new options for patients with neurological disease and pain.

Neuro Vigor, a Purdue University-affiliated startup, won a $100,000 Early Commercialization Award from the Indiana Spinal Cord and Brain Injury Research Fund. The companys proprietary drugs offer new disease-modifying therapies to reduce patient suffering in neuro-degenerative conditions. This is the first time the research fund has provided support to an early commercialization company.

This award is a significant show of support for our company and technologies, said Mark Van Fleet, CEO of Neuro Vigor. Our initial target is neuropathic pain in spinal cord injury, a largely unmet medical challenge, but our solution has exciting potential for several other devastating neurological diseases, including Multiple Sclerosis and Parkinsons.

Neuro Vigors technology is largely based on the work of Dr. Shi, who holds a joint appointment as Purdues Mari Hulman George Endowed Professor of Applied Neuroscience and professor of biomedical engineering and serves as director of the Center for Paralysis Research in the College of Veterinary Medicine. It is an incredible honor to be recognized for our efforts to bring meaningful research out of the lab and into the clinic, said Dr. Shi, who is chief scientist for Neuro Vigor. These advances benefit not only Purdue and the scientific arena, but most importantly patients.

Dr. Henry Feuer, neurosurgeon and chairman of the funds board, said, This creation of an early commercialization opportunity as part of our annual funding mechanism recognizes the contributions that established or startup companies could provide. This award, using rigid National Institutes of Health criteria, will enable Neuro Vigor to bring together top scientists and collaborators in order to develop a novel therapeutic strategy to reduce the consequences from neuropathic pain, with fewer side effects.

The Neuro Vigor team worked with the Purdue Foundry, an entrepreneurship and commercialization hub. The research project will involve collaboration with scientists from the University of Western Australia.

This is a very dedicated team advancing technology to impact an exceptionally important unmet medical need, said Wade Lange, vice president and chief entrepreneurial officer at the Purdue Foundry. Its yet another great example of the success of the Purdue entrepreneurial ecosystem, where researchers pair with entrepreneurs to start companies and move inventions to the marketplace.

Dr. Shi also works with the Purdue Research Foundation Office of Technology Commercialization to patent his discoveries. This office operates as one of the most comprehensive technology transfer programs among leading research universities in the U.S.

Click here to view a complete news release.

Writer(s): Chris Adam, Purdue Research Foundation | pvmnews@purdue.edu
Food and beverage outlets in HCM City have switched to takeaway and delivery services during the two-week social distancing that began on Monday last week.

The online food delivery market has seen robust growth since the COVID-19 outbreak began, and this is likely to continue through this year given Vietnamese consumers cautiousness, Peter Christou, commercial director of Kantar Worldpanel Vietnam, said.

Drivers collect delivery orders in Tan Phu District, HCM City.  VNS Photo Diep Phan

There was rapid adoption of online food delivery by consumers, food and beverage businesses and delivery services, and Christou noted that early signs indicate this habit would stick since the spending remained consistent even when restrictions were eased and out-of-home spending recovered as restaurants reopened.

Food and beverage outlets in HCM City have switched to takeaway and delivery services during the two-week social distancing that began on Monday last week.

Coffee chains such as The Coffee House, Trung Nguyen, and Cheese Coffee, and fast food chains Lotteria and KFC have their own online ordering app now and also use food delivery partners like Grab, Now and Baemin.

Truong Ham Liem, marketing director of Lotteria Vietnam, said online sales have doubled during social distancing, and account for 40 per cent of total revenues, with the remaining being through delivery partners and from takeaways.

There has been a reduction in the number of online orders, but the value of each order has increased as customers now tend to order in groups, he said.

Hoang Van Loc, owner of a milk tea shop in Binh Tan District, told Viet Nam News: "Our revenue has fallen by 50 per cent these days, so we have to offer discounts and find new customers by promoting sales on social networks to keep the business going.

Many restaurants are also tying up with ordering platforms.

Nguyen Hanh, owner of an eatery in District 10, said: We have been selling our products on Now and GrabFood for nearly two years, and they have increased our number of orders sharply. We used to have our own delivery service but only for orders over VND200,000 (US$8.71) within five kilometres.

Now, with these platforms, customers from anywhere in the city can have a taste of our noodles, costing around VND50,000 ($2.18) a bowl, delivered to them at a reasonable fee.

We can also buy discount coupons, which are partly supported by the platforms, for customers to use or pay to feature on their banners to attract more customers.

Hoang Anh, who started selling food on Baemin since the COVID outbreak began last year, said: Ordering platforms have made tracking orders much easier and improved our revenues. Commissions are rather high but manageable. So we will continue to use the apps in the post-pandemic future.

Forty-three per cent of HCM Citys population ordered food online at least once a week in 2020, and 34 per cent in Hanoi, according to Kantar.

Thuy Huong, who orders food through delivery apps two to four times a week, started last year.

She told Vietnam News: Their convenience has made me stay. I no longer have to worry about long queues or the weather when I am hungry.

Lan Ngoc, a final-year student at the HCM City University of Law, said: I have been using delivery apps at least once a week since 2019. The apps allow me to compare the menus and prices of various restaurants, which could be troublesome in the past. They also offer plenty of promotions and choices of foods.

Competitive market

Realising its vast potential, investors have started to cash in on this market segment. Recently Loship announced investment by Skype co-founder Jaan Tallinn through his investment vehicle, MetaPlanet Holdings.

The online food delivery market would remain competitive for at least the next two or three years, Loship CEO Nguyen Hoang Trung told Vietnam Investment Review.

Vietnam has many favourable conditions for food delivery, including a vast market, substantial user base, high internet and mobile penetration rates, and more, and so attracts many players, he pointed out.

Simplified e-banking systems and improved food-service logistics coupled with changing customer lifestyles are also propelling the growth of the food delivery market.

The pandemic has necessitated the act of home delivery, which drives growth even further.

GrabFood saw the number of merchant partners grow three-fold between the first and third quarters of 2020, while the average order value was up 26 per cent.

GoBiz, a special application for GoFood (Gojek) partners, has helped reduce the time it takes for food to travel between restaurant and customer by up to 50 per cent and the number of its completed orders has increased by 300 per cent.

Other players in the market have also stepped up their game. Baemin recently launched in Da Nang, marking its expansion into the central region. Foodys Now is diversifying its delivery services from food and medicines to flowers to compete with other rivals.

A survey by Q&Me found that GrabFood and Now are the most popular delivery apps, with Baemin and GoFood close behind and the former growing at the fastest rate.

The competition will be fiercer than ever and the winners will be those who embrace partnerships and deliver excellent customer experiences, Christou said, pointing out that the biggest challenge for online food delivery platforms is attracting investors to achieve expansion.

The value of Vietnams digital economy, including e-commerce and food delivery, grew by 16 per cent to $14 billion in 2020, according to the eConomy SEA 2020 report.

Digitising and personalising the service experience has become a matter of survival for providers, according to financial consultancy firm Deloitte.

Convenience, speed and competitive prices are the top factors in consumer choice decisions.

Source: Vietnam News

Rapid growth of online delivery services The sudden, unexpected and virulent spread of the Covid-19 pandemic brought about a change in perception and planning in consumer sales behavior, and many well established businesses made a strong shift towards online delivery servicing.
National flag carrier Vietnam Airlines has received a Foreign Air Operator Certificate (FAOC) issued by the Transport Canada, allowing it to operate flights to the North American country.

The FAOC took effect on June 11 with unlimited time and number of flights.

Accordingly, the carrier could operate flights carrying passengers and cargo between Vietnam and all airports in Canada. The earliest flight is scheduled to take off on June 30.

Vietnam Airlines is the first carrier in Vietnam to receive Canadian authorities' permit to run flights to the country.

The carrier is building a plan to conduct flights between the two nations, with Toronto and Vancouver as its major destinations.

With a total distance of over 20,000km and two-way flight time of over 30 hours, the airliner will use wide-body aircraft Boeing 787 and Airbus A350 for the service.

Earlier, it received the FAOC for the first time which was valid from July 13 to October 13, 2020 and extended till November 15, 2020./.

Source: VNA
The fourth wave of COVID-19 has changed the routines of many people working in industrial parks (IPs) in northern Vietnam.

A worker of Samsung Company in Yen Phong IP, Bac Ninh Province, is vaccinated against COVID-19.  Photo laodong.vn

As IPs play an important part in the countrys exports and local economic development, the re-emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic could cause disruptions to production and business activities, causing tens of thousands of workers to work alternate shifts or take temporary leave, said experts.

To deal with the situation, Bac Ninh Province, which is home to 1,120 companies including big names such as Samsung, Canon, Foxconn and Microsoft, as well as about 450,000 workers in 10 industrial parks and 26 industrial clusters, started the first ever production-residence-combined model in the country to deal with the ongoing outbreaks in the IPs.

Vu Ninh, who worked as a manager at Samsungs vendor at the Yen Phong IP told Viet Nam News: I was vaccinated against COVID-19 on June 2 and feel thankful and safe for that.

Ninh said: Now, everything is served at the factory. Instead of going back and forth between Hanoi and Bac Ninh every day like usual, we are working, eating and staying at the factory all the time.

Other IPs in Bac Ninh Province are following similar models.

Nguyen Thi Khai, a worker at Bujeon Vietnam Electronics Company in Que Vo IP, said: "I feel peace of mind while I keep my job and income and am protected.

Nguyen Thi Thu, a worker at Yen Phong IP, said: We get VND100,000 per day and extra each month to call home.

Co-operate to protect the IPs

While Bac Ninh Province People's Committee set up teams to inspect, supervise and guide enterprises to implement the work-stay model, local enterprises were also working hard to make sure their staff stay safe.

Bujeon Vietnam Electronics rearranged an equipment line, temporarily suspending an expansion project to take advantage of the space for accommodation.

Song Yu Hoon, director of the companys Administration and Human Resources Department, said: We always ensure the best conditions for workers' accommodation as they need to be safe to maintain stable production.

Choi Joo Ho, general director of Samsung Vietnam, said: In a short time, equipment has been installed for workers to stay at the factories and at 51 schools in Yen Phong district.

To ensure peace of mind for tens of thousands of employees, the company provides free accommodation, as well as three meals and a snack a day.

Bui Hoang Mai, Head of the Provincial IP Management Board, told local media: The policy of the province has received the consent of enterprises as it is the most practical solution to fulfil the "dual goal" of both economic development and fighting the COVID-19 pandemic.

Other IPs to be protected

There are 3.8 million people working in 369 industrial zones and border areas nationwide, while some 600,000 people work at industrial clusters.

Hanoi, HCM City and Bac Giang Province also suffered from the fourth wave of COVID-19. In the top ten exporting localities, valued at US$213 billion, the top four accounted for 51.2 per cent of the volume. HCM City and Hanoi accounted for 40 per cent of the country's GDP.

In the fourth wave of the virus since April 29 to June 16 afternoon, Bac Giang reported 4,590 cases, Bac Ninh followed with 1,432, while HCM City and Hanoi reported 1,015 and 464 cases, respectively.

With more positive cases reported, HCM Citys factories implemented measures to deal with the pandemic and ensure production.

Head of Viet Thang Jean Co. with thousands of workers and vice president of the HCM City Textile, Embroidery and Knitting Association, Pham Van Viet, said: The textile and garment industry is labour-intensive and works on a chain, so if a worker is isolated for 14-21 days, the enterprise's production plan and the production chain are interrupted.

Viet said: "We are very worried because if we cancel orders, we have to compensate customers, while thousands of workers have to quit or lose their jobs.

As in Bac Ninh, the citys businesses have prepared plans for on-site production and accommodation. On June 11, the management board of the citys Hi-Tech Park organised an online scenario when workers stay and work in the factories.

Economist Ngo Tri Long said that the fourth wave poses other problems. The first priority was to fight the pandemic, but at the same time keep production chains intact.

In the planning and development strategy of IPs, it is necessary to prepare and respond to the pandemic and limit the spread of the disease. The construction of concentrated accommodation and catering for workers in a closed chain in industrial parks and factories will be a long-term solution. Thus, it is easy for us to stamp out the pandemic, not to spread it in the community.

Long said it was necessary to urgently trace, localise and stamp out new infection clusters, especially outbreaks that have spread to industrial parks and export processing zones, adding that foreign experts working in the IPs need to undergo mandatory isolation.

Economist Nguyen Tri Hieu told Viet Nam News: The local economy has spent the first five months relatively optimistic. Exports grew over the same period last year, foreign trade maintained growth, jobs were restored, and GDP continued to grow. However, from now until the end of the year the situation will be very unpredictable.

He added: We still have strength in exports. Many markets around the world are being strongly affected by the pandemic, but there is a lot of demand for goods, especially agricultural products. However, the pandemic must be controlled and the production must be maintained.

Source: Vietnam News
This is a great irrelevance, because these infrastructural facilities are small in scale, but extremely numerous in number, and spread evenly across villages in the country, which are only understood by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development.

Many bridges were swept away in the rain and floods last year and have yet to be rebuilt. The reason is not because a lack of investment but because they have to wait for the participation of other ministries than the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development.

The repair or rebuilding of these bridges is not under the management of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development. Because of this paradox, many problems have arisen. For example, businesses specializing in grass-growing, cow-raising and dairy processing are under the management of two ministries, one being agriculture and the other industry.

The Ministry of Construction manages the construction sector, but how can it manage traffic and industrial construction If it performs all of these works. The Ministry of Construction needs to be merged with many ministries, not only with the Ministry of Transport. While the management function of the Ministry of Construction has little practical value, urban construction has been downgraded.

Before the Doi Moi era, Vietnam's urbanization was only around 20%. The rate increased to 30%, then 40% in recent years, and will reach 50% or 60% in the near future. So why there is no Ministry of Urban Development but the Ministry of Construction performs multidisciplinary construction management?

For our country, in terms of space, land, and population, two components have been planned: rural and urban. If rural development already has a management ministry, why should not urban development be assigned to a powerful and specialized ministry. It could be the Ministry of Construction.

Other "multidisciplinary construction" has been managed by many ministries, for example, construction of traffic projects managed by the Ministry of Transport, industrial construction under the management of the Ministry of Industry and Trade...
Nguyen Thuy Dan won a scholarship from Columbia University in the US to pursue a doctorate in East Asian languages and cultures, with research on the formation and development of Vietnamese thoughts in medieval and modern times.

Dan, born in 1994 in the US, is especially good at ancient literature written in Han-Nom (Chinese-Nom characters. Nom is native Vietnamese derived from Chinese script).

However, Dan was not taught Han-Nom literature at high school or university before in the US. He learned it on his own.

Dan was born in Sacramento, California. Dan learned Vietnamese from his parents so that he could read books to his grandmother. His grandmother, born in 1920, was illiterate, and needed her grandsons help.

When Dan turned 13, his parents brought him to Vietnam where he traveled to many places in the northern, central and southern regions. He went to his mothers village of Nam Dinh and his fathers village of Nghe An  Ha Tinh.

He then wanted to study the Nom script. However, as he could not find a teacher, his parents bought a Nom script dictionary for him. Dan returned to the US with the dictionary and began learning Nom script by himself for three years.

At the age of 16, he returned to Vietnam once again and became a teacher of English in the outlying Cu Chi district in HCM City. During that time, Dan continued learning Vietnamese.

One day, he heard a 15-year-old girl reading a poem of Ba Huyen Thanh Quan (Ba Huyen Thanh Quan, 1805-1848, was a Vietnamese famous woman poet). He felt so moved that he decided to write poetry.

Nguyen Thuy Dan won a scholarship from Columbia University in the US to pursue a doctorate in East Asian languages and cultures, with research on the formation and development of Vietnamese thoughts in medieval and modern times.

The years at high school and the shock he got after the death of the grandmother when he was 18 years old caused Dan to become even more enthusiastic about learning Han-Nom ancient literature.

This was because the grandmother told him that many members of the great family were very good at sages words. She had devoted her life to her children and grandchildren, and he wanted to make her happy knowing that there was another person in the family who understood Confucianism.

He spent many months learning Chinese characters in a house in northern California. After high school, Dan studied at thecUniversity of Houston. He obtainedca bachelors degrees in English Literature and Musical Performance (Piano, Clavecin and Church Organ).

He spent a lot of time on Han-Nom studies as well.

After finishing higher education, he returned to California, beginning in-depth research on religion, western and oriental philosophy. He conducted research on Nguyen Duc Dat, a Confucian during the reign of King Tu Duc.

Dan returned to Hanoi for three months to study at the Institute of Han Nom Studies on a scholarship. In 2019, Dan was granted a PhD scholarship at Columbia University, which that year had launched a new major in Vietnamese studies.

When I graduated from college, I worked as a performing musician. I had had no intention of continuing to study at a higher level until a friend told me one day that Columbia University had the right major for me. And I applied and got a full scholarship from the school, he said.

The two majors he followed at university did not have a relation with his current major. But his basic knowledge, experience, in-depth research and translations apparently impressed the school.

Nguyen Thi Bich Hau

Vietnamese students design 'cooling vest' for frontline health workers The vest uses a phone's backup battery, so it can work for more than eight hours. In addition, users can add "coolant" by adding ice into the included water jug without taking off their vests.
"We are confident that we can control the Covid outbreak, so we have not imposed a lockdown on the entire province," said Bac Giang Chair Le Anh Duong.

When the outbreak in Bac Giang reached its peak, you asked Quang Ninh to send medical workers to the province to help fight the pandemic. Was Bac Giang afraid of public opinion?

On May 14, the pandemic broke out in Quang Chau IZ with the complicated hotbed Hosiden. We found that the situation was very serious, which was beyond the provinces capability.

After asking for Deputy PM Vu Duc Dams opinion, we decided to ask Quang Ninh to send its elite force to help us fight the pandemic.

On the same day, Quang Ninh sent 200 medical workers from the Vietnam-Sweden Friendship Hospital. These are elite frontline doctors, with a lot of experience from pandemic fighting campaigns.

Hai Duong, Yen Bai and Thai Nguyen also sent volunteers to Bac Giang to help us.

Now, looking back at the decision, I still find it a right and wise decision. To date, the reinforced doctors still serve the major force in tracing infections and taking samples for testing.

Multi-purposes targeted

Were you personally afraid of possible negative public opinion about the Covid fighting capability?

At that moment, fighting the pandemic must be a top priority, above the ego. The optimal task then was obtaining resources as soon as possible to stamp out the pandemic. The resources here are human resources and experience of many localities.

The Quang Ninh provincial Party Committee Secretary shared a lot of lessons and experience with us. The benefits of the whole province must be put above my ego. I thought so and I did so.

At some moments, Bac Giang was nearly going to announce the lockdown for the entire province. Why wasnt the decision released?

In fact, this was just a suggestion by some people. However, Bac Giang was confident that it could control the outbreak, so it did not decide to impose lockdown.

First, when considering the situation, we believed that Covid only broke out in IZs and spread to workers residential quarters, while there was a low possibility of spreading into the community. We could see the path of the virus and knew where it would go.

Second, we have to fight the pandemic while ensuring the implementation of other tasks. If we had announced a lockdown, this would have meant declaring death to the litchi growing area, which was about to harvest.

We not only have a VND7 trillion litchi growing area, but also have 17 million fowl that need to be sold, and more than 1 million pigs which cannot be kept in farms forever. And we have pineapple, watermelon, vegetables and fruits. If we had imposed lockdown, the VND7 trillion litchi growing area would have been lost.

"We are confident that we can control the Covid outbreak, so we have not imposed a lockdown on the entire province," Le Anh Duong, Chair of Bac Giang People's Committee

Our decision on not imposing lockdown has helped protect the litchi growing areas of Tan Yen and Luc Ngan amid the pandemic. As of June 9, we had sold 70,000 tons of litchis, including 50,000 tons of early litchis. The litchi price was still the same as 2020. Around 35 percent of litchis was exported, while 65 percent was consumed domestically.

As such, Bac Giang both can fight the pandemic and protect farmers benefits. If we had only set one target of fighting the pandemic and making light of other tasks, we might have stamped out the pandemic more quickly, but socio-economic consequences will last a long time, and the peoples confidence in the Party and government would have been shaken.

Gathering forces for recovery

Bac Giang is entering a new period of launching a general offensive to extinguish the pandemic. Which new solutions will you have?

The general offensive of Bac Giang has the time limit of 14 days. We will basically control the outbreak after June 21. This is a big political commitment and a goal which is not easy to reach. We have some solutions.

First, as the outbreak has shrunk to Viet Yen IZ, we will deal with it this way:

The areas where many workers stay will be locked so that it cannot be spread to the community, while all workers in the areas will leave the areas for concentrated quarantine places.

As for the other hamlets, which are less risky, we will organize regular testing, once every two days. Those workers who are really safe (who have 5-6 negative results, live in safe places and dont contact F0) will be certified as meeting requirements to go to work. Quarantine areas will be applied in production facilities to reduce the worker density in residential quarters.

As such, we will localize the pandemic step by step, from hamlet to every alley, and from every alley to every house.

Second, we will carry out community screening of the entire Viet Yen District and delicate areas in other districts to ensure safety. If we find hotbeds, we will able to stamp them out immediately, with no little fires left in the community.

Third, we attack the outbreak in concentrated quarantine zones. The pandemic is now mostly seen in the zones. We will conduct classification and screening.

Fourth, re-organizing production in IZs. The production must be safe and workers must clean (i.e screened many times, tightly controlled, avoid social communications and quarantined in production facilities so that they can have income).

Regarding social security, we will design a new boarding model for workers.

Previously, one guesthouse had workers from many different companies and workers rented rooms directly from landlords. But from now on, landlords with signed contracts with companies, and each guesthouse will become a dormitory for one company. One guesthouse will serve one company. This will help ease pressure on the government.

We are also accelerating vaccinations. We have asked the Government to provide more vaccines.

Social distancing will be lifted in areas which have become safe and the new normal will be restored. Meanwhile, control will be tightened in three districts of Viet Yen, Hiep Hoa and Yen Dung.

We are building concentrated collection centers with 1,800 beds. You may ask why we want to build such centers to treat Covid-19, if the outbreak is nearly over.

But we will accelerate the project. All Covid-19 patients will be gathered there so that medical centers in districts can operate well. People have abstained from having medical examinations for a long time.

Kien Trung

How Bac Giang authorities persuade foreign firms to halt their operations Bac Giang province has been gathering strength to fight the Covid-19 outbreak for one month, vowing to stamp out the outbreak by the end of June.
Party General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong, State President Nguyen Xuan Phuc and Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh were appointed to the Standing Board of the Central Military Commission in the 2020-25 period on Thursday.

Party General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong chairs the first meeting of the Central Military Commission in the 2020-25 period on Thursday.  VNA/VNS Photo

Three other officials appointed to the board are Senior Lieutenant General Phan Van Giang, Politburo member, deputy general secretary of the Central Military Commission and Minister of National Defence; General Luong Cuong, Politburo member, chairman of the General Department of Politics of the Vietnam People's Army; Senior Lieutenant General Nguyen Tan Cuong, Politburo member, chief of the General Staff of the Vietnam Peoples Army, deputy minister of national defence.

The Central Military Commission held their first meeting of the 2020-25 period on Thursday to assign tasks in the first half of this year and discuss missions for the second half.

Twenty-five officials were appointed to the Central Military Commission in the 2020-25 period.

Party General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong, Secretary of the Central Military Commission, said during the 2015-20 period, the commission always set an example of solidarity, took determination to make changes, had a lot of innovations and directed the entire army to successfully implement Resolution of the 10th Armys Party Committee Congress as well as major military and defence objectives and policies proposed by the 12th Party Congress.

The commission gave consultations to the Party and State on military and national defence, promptly and effectively handled situations, firmly protected the independence, sovereignty, unity and territorial integrity of the Fatherland, he said.

The defence industry has made progress. Vietnam can master the manufacturing of technology and produce a number of modern weapons and pieces of equipment, he said.

Regarding defence external affairs, Trong said positive outcomes in this field contributed to protecting the country from the early days. Field hospitals in South Sudan operate effectively and become trusted addresses of UN officials and employees in the area and local people.

On behalf of the Poliburo, Secretariat of the Party Central Committee and the Central Military Commission, the Party chief thanked the commissions officials of the 2015-20 period who have been relieved from duty for their contributions.

He urged newly-appointed members of the commission to uphold responsibility and solidarity, and have practical, sharp thinking, stay absolutely loyal to the Fatherland, the Party, the State and the people.

They must build a clean, strong, exemplary and typical Armys Party Committee, taking the lead to successfully perform assigned tasks, Trong said.

Source: Vietnam News

Vietnam sets up more maritime militias The militia squadrons are tasked with reconnaissance and maritime exploitation
New Zealands Ambassador to Vietnam Tredene Dobson wore unique Ao Dai during a ceremony to present her credentials to Vietnamese State President Nguyen Xuan Phuc on June 16.

New Zealands Ambassador to Vietnam Tredene Dobson (left) wears an unique Ao Dai when she presents her credentials to Vietnamese State President Nguyen Xuan Phuc, Hanoi, June 16, 2021.

In an interviewed with the VGP, she said that wearing also comes as an early celebration of the 46th anniversary of the bilateral diplomatic relations between New Zealand and Vietnam (June 19, 1975  June 19, 2021).

This was extra special for Ambassador Dobson because she was able to wear the Ao Dai, painted with a design by New Zealand and Vietnamese artists.

The Ambassador commissioned the design around the theme of connectivity, bringing the culture and history of Vietnam and Maori, the ingedineous people of New Zealand, together.

The five peaks of her mountain, Mount Manaia in Te Tai Tokerau (in the far north of New Zealand, the Ambassadors hometown) also connects New Zealand and Vietnam through the beautiful lotus flower, the national flower of Vietnam.

The Ambassador is also wearing a korowai  a traditional Maori cloak which was woven by traditional Ngapuhi weavers.

Wearing this beautiful piece of art  this collaboration between two amazing young female artists, one in New Zealand and one in Vietnam  it just makes me feel incredibly proud. It is a privilege to serve as New Zealands Ambassador to Vietnam, and wearing my Ao Dai with its stunning Maori design and korowai today  genuinely connects me to these two incredible countries said Ambassador Dobson.

The Ao Dai has for long been an icon of Vietnamese culture, praised for highlighting the graceful beauty of local women.

Source: VGP
The top legislators of Vietnam and China on June 17 shared their view on the significance of the bilateral comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership in the foreign policy of each country.

Chairman of the Vietnamese National Assembly (NA) Vuong Dinh Hue and Chairman of the National People's Congress (NPC) Standing Committee of China Li Zhanshu held online talks on June 17. (Photo: VNA)

During their online talks, Chairman of the Vietnamese National Assembly (NA) Vuong Dinh Hue and Chairman of the National People's Congress (NPC) Standing Committee of China Li Zhanshu spoke highly of achievements in cooperation between the two legislative bodies, Parties and countries over the past time.



They compared notes on measures to strengthen the Vietnam-China relations in such areas as politics, economy-trade-investment, land border management, and the maintenance of peace and stability in the East Sea.



Hue informed Li about Vietnams successful organisation of the 13th National Party Congress and the elections of deputies to the 15th NA and all-level Peoples Councils for the 2021-2026 tenure, as well as the countrys socio-economic development and the fight against COVID-19.



He congratulated the Chinese side on the 100th anniversary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) (July 1), and achievements the country has recorded in COVID-19 containment, economic recovery and eradication of absolute poverty.



Hue suggested the two sides step up meetings at all levels, and invited Li to visit Vietnam, saying he wants to work together with the Chinese leader to instruct competent agencies to implement the cooperative agreement between the Vietnamese NA and the National People's Congress of China.



The two sides should enhance friendly exchanges between peoples, especially young generations, and intensify the communication work to raise public awareness of the friendship between the two Parties and countries, he said.



Hue suggested the two countries enhance economic and political trust at the same time and make efforts to handle pending projects, and called on China to increase its import of Vietnamese goods.



He also called for Chinas continued support to Vietnam in the pandemic combat, including the vaccine strategy.



Regarding the East Sea issue, Hue said the two sides should make joint efforts to maintain peace and stability, satisfactorily settle sea-related issues, respect legal and legitimate interests of each other in the spirit of common perceptions at the high level, notably the Vietnam-China agreement on basic principles guiding the settlement of sea-related issues, and in line with international law, including the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (1982 UNCLOS).

Chairman of the National People's Congress (NPC) Standing Committee of China Li Zhanshu. (Photo: VNA)

For his part, Li congratulated Vietnam on the successful organisation of the two above-said political events, and achievements in socio-economic development and COVID-19 containment.



He expressed his hope that under the leadership of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV), headed by General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong, Vietnam will grow further in the time ahead.



The CPC, the National People's Congress and people of China attach importance to the friendly neighbourliness and comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership with Vietnam, he affirmed.



He shared Hues view on the need to boost all-level exchanges and meetings, and invited the Vietnamese top legislator to visit China.



Li expressed his willingness to work together with the Vietnamese legislature in realising the cooperative agreement between the two legislative bodies.



China will continue to assist Vietnam in the pandemic fight, including vaccine cooperation, he said, adding that China takes into account Vietnams suggestions in economic, trade and investment collaboration.



Li suggested the two sides observe high-level common perceptions in maintaining maritime peace and stability, and implementing the Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the East Sea (DOC), soon reaching a Code of Conduct in the East Sea (COC).

Source: VNA
At Noi Bai Airport in Hanoi, passengers who are returning from HCM City are separated in a particular zone, and some of them are randomly tested for Covid-19.

Health workers take samples from passengers at Noi Bai Airport for rapid testing of Covid-19. Photo: Hanoi Department of Health

Director of the Hanoi Department of Health Tran Thi Nhi Ha said that this measure was being applied because the epidemic situation in some areas has become complicated, particularly in Ho Chi Minh City.

This will be implemented for seven to 10 days at the airport, with about 1,000 passengers to be tested. On June 16, the first day, 97 random samples were taken and all gave negative results.

In addition to testing passengers at the airport, Hanoi will organize covid-19 tests in industrial zones and industrial clusters.

The quick screening is expected to help the city decide suitable prevention and control measures regarding people arriving from pandemic-hit areas as well as take prompt actions when detecting COVID-19 cases. Apart from the airport, similar tests are also underway at local industrial clusters.

According to the Director of the Hanoi Department of Health, Hanoi is taking timely response measures in the prevention and control of the Covid-19 epidemic. The citys strategy in disease prevention and control in the coming time is to proactively detect, prevent, investigate, and promptly trace and vaccinate.

Vietnam logged 81 locally-transmitted cases of COVID-19 in the past 12 hours to 6am on June 18, raising the national count to 12,231, according to the Health Ministry.

Among the new infections, 60 were found in Ho Chi Minh City and 21 in Bac Giang. Of them, 76 were detected in quarantine or blocked areas.

So far, the country documented 10,564 domestic infections and 1,667 imported ones.

The number of cases since the fourth wave of the pandemic began on April 27 was 8,994.

The capital has logged a total 736 cases of COVID-19 so far.

Huong Quynh

Local engineer creates air-conditioned COVID-19 testing booth A mobile air-conditioned COVID-19 testing booth has been set up and put into use in the current COVID-19 hotspot of Bac Giang Province
Dak Nong Provincial Police Agency has reported that 112 Chinese are working illegally at wind power projects in Dak Song district in the Central Highlands province of Dak Nong.

Colonel Ho Quang Thang, Deputy Director of Dak Nong Provincial Police Agency.

Colonel Ho Quang Thang, Deputy Director of Dak Nong Provincial Police Agency, told a press conference held by the authorities of Dak Nong Province on June 17 that 112 Chinese people were working without work permits at three wind power projects located in Dak Song district. The foreigners got visas issued by the Immigration Department of the Ministry of Public Security under Vietnams regulations.

Among them, five hold visas valid for more than three months; 98 with visas valid for less than three months and 9 with visas valid for less than one month.

When entering Vietnam, they complied with all procedures for the prevention and control of the Covid-19 epidemic in accordance with the law.

The Chinese people are staying at motels in Nam Binh commune and Duc An town in Dak Song district.

Colonel Thang said that these foreign workers entered the country in accordance with regulations, and that local authorities had not detected any activities that violated Vietnamese law or national security.

Director of the Department of Labor, Invalids and Social Affairs of Dak Nong province Nguyen Cong Tu said that the Chinese workers had not been granted work permits. The local authorities have asked the employers to get work permits for these people.

Tu said that the employers promised to submit applications for work permits for these Chinese workers before June 21.

According to Dak Nong Department of Industry and Trade, the province has three wind power projects - Dak N'Drung 1, 2, and 3 - with a total capacity of 300 MW, and total investment of more than VND 10,000 billion, invested in by Dak N'Drung 1, 2, 3 Energy One Member Limited Liability Company.

Two foreigners fined for working without permission in Hai Duong



Vice Chairman of the Peoples Committee of northern Hai Duong province Luu Van Ban has signed decisions fining two foreigners 40 million VND (1,739 USD) in total for entering Vietnam, working or engaging in other activities without permission of Vietnamese competent authorities.



Specifically, the first one is Wang Shoucheng, who is a Chinese national born in 1970 and now living in Lam Son commune, Hai Duongs Thanh Mien district. Wang was granted a visa by the border guard station of Lang Son provinces Huu Nghi Border Gate with a temporary stay extension until June 23, 2021 to work at Kam Fung Vietnam International Company Limited in Quat Lam township in Nam Dinh provinces Giao Thuy district. However, on April 22, he quit this job and began working for Champion Product Vietnam Co., Ltd. in Lam Son commune one day later. Wang was fined 20 million VND for violating regulations at Point b, Clause 5, Article 17 of the Governments Decree 167 dated November 12, 2013 on penalties for administrative violations in the field of security, social order and safety, and prevention of social evils; fire prevention and fighting, and domestic violence prevention and control.



The other was also given the same charge. The Chinese national, Ye Zhaoxin, was born in 1996 and is now living in Lam Son commune as well. He had a temporary stay extension until June 18, 2021 to work at Sun Vigor Vietnam Smart Toy Joint Stock Company in Hai Phong citys Tien Lang district. However, on April 27, he also left his job and came to work at Champion Product Vietnam Co., Ltd.



With involvement with Wang Shouchen, Vu Van Buong, born in 1967, was fined 1.25 million VND for "letting foreigners stay overnight without declaring temporary residence, failing to instruct foreigners to declare temporary residence as prescribed or failing to comply with other regulations of competent agencies./. VNA

Trung Duong
Six plants with nearly 3,000 workers in industrial parks in Binh Tan, Binh Chanh and Cu Chi districts in HCM City have been locked down after several workers tested positive for coronavirus,

according to a source at the Management Board of HCM City Export Processing Zones - Industrial Parks.

Workers at industrial zones strictly comply with regulations on Covid-19 epidemic prevention.

According to this source, the factory of Trung Son Food Joint Stock Company in Tan Tao Industrial Park in Binh Tan District was locked down after two workers tested positive for coronavirus. More than 140 workers who had contact with patients were sent to concentrated quarantine zones, while nearly 800 workers will be isolated at the factory for 14 days.

A garment factory and a plant at Van Duc Food Company, both located in Vinh Loc A industrial zone in Binh Chanh district, with about 1,000 workers, have both been isolated. According to authorities, the infection case at the garment factory is related to the infection chain at a mechanical workshop in Hoc Mon district, which has had 51 cases so far. More than 1,000 workers at these two factories have been quarantined at a dormitory at Vietnam National University in Ho Chi Minh City.

In addition, a garment factory in Tan Phu Trung Industrial Park in Cu Chi district with 550 workers has been locked down since June 15.

Previously, on June 12, two factories in Tan Tao Industrial Park, Duy Tan Precision Mold Co., Ltd and Cloth & People Vina Co., Ltd. were locked down after three cases of Covid-19 infection were detected. The total number of workers at the two factories is nearly 500 people.

Ho Chi Minh City has conducted extensive Covid-19 testing for 23,000 workers at 121 companies in Vinh Loc industrial park. Health workers worked from the morning of June 15 through the morning of the next day to collect 23,000 samples to send to laboratories.

Ho Chi Minh City has 1.6 million workers, including more than 320,000 people working in 17 industrial parks, export processing zones and high-tech zones.

Ho Chi Minh City is set to begin its COVID-19 vaccination campaign on June 19, with priority groups to get injected with about 800,000 AstraZeneca vaccine doses donated by the Japanese Government.

The largest-ever vaccination campaign in HCM City is scheduled to last for about five to seven days, targeting the priority groups identified in the Governments Resolution No 21.

About 1,000 sites across the city have been ready for the vaccination, he noted, adding that local authorities will mobilise the entire medical workers, including those deployed from central establishments, for the drive.

Ho Van

Businesses seek sources to buy vaccines for their workers The electronics, textile and garment, footwear, wooden furniture and dairy sectors have proposed that the Government allow them to seek vaccine sources and pay for vaccinations at their enterprises so they can maintain production.
Deputy Prime Minister Vu Duc Dam has proposed the World Health Organization (WHO) accelerate the transfer of vaccine production technology to Vietnam to help the country become a regional vaccine production centre.

Deputy Prime Minister Vu Duc Dam has an online meeting on Thursday with Dr Takeshi Kasa, WHO regional director for the Western Pacific.  VNA/VNS Photo

Dam, who leads the National Steering Committee on COVID-19 Prevention and Control, had an online meeting yesterday with Dr Takeshi Kasa, WHO regional director for the Western Pacific, to discuss vaccine supply, Vietnams response to the outbreak and the countrys access to vaccines.

Deputy Minister Dam spoke highly of WHOs role in the fight against the pandemic and thanked the organisation for offering assistance to Vietnam over the past one and a half years since the pandemic broke out.

He said the Vietnamese Government has made efforts to accelerate the implementation of its vaccination strategy to achieve herd immunity soon and resume socio-economic activities as well as ensure public health and social security.

He proposed the WHO promote vaccine delivery under the COVAX Facility and transfer of vaccine production technology to Vietnam, aiming to help regional countries soon get access to vaccines.

Dr Kasa said he appreciated Vietnam's effective COVID-19 response measures, noting that drastic and focused direction from senior leaders along with communications on pandemic prevention and control measures have been effectively implemented with the engagement and strict observation of the entire community.

Vietnam has become a good example in the region for its response to COVID-19, he said.

He spoke highly of Vietnams precise and effective approach to vaccines. Vietnam has made stable investments in pandemic prevention and control, especially attracting the participation of the private sector and promoting public-private partnerships (PPPs) for technology transfer and vaccine production.

In the context of the pandemic, the WHO regional director for the Western Pacific recommended countries not to loosen preventive and control measures even if the majority of the population have been vaccinated.

He pledged to continue to support and stand with Vietnam in responding to the pandemic.

The representative said he would accelerate the transfer of vaccine supplies under the COVAX mechanism and vaccine production technology to Vietnam.

The two sides agreed to strengthen co-operation and exchange policies and safety regulations on vaccination to maximise the role of the WHO in supporting countries in combating the pandemic.

The WHO Regional Director for the Western Pacific thanked the Vietnamese Government for donating US$500,000 to the COVAX mechanism and successfully treating a WHO expert who contracted COVID-19.

Source: Vietnam News

PM orders accelerating work towards domestic vaccine production Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh has urged scientists and representatives of vaccine research and production units to step up research and technological transfer for the domestic production of vaccine against COVID-19 as early as possible.
However, are you really sure you want to? Trumpet vines are incredibly invasive, sending up root sprouts all over the yard.

The much more refined variety called Madame Galen trumpetcreeper would be a far better choice. It would be my only choice in an orange trumpet vine.

DEAR NEIL: As we continue to wait for our plants to recover from the freeze, we see this kind of growth on Texas mountain laurels (see photo).

Should we remove all of these shoots and let the plant push all of its energy to the tip growth, or should we let them develop?

Dear Reader: Let them develop. Theyre not going to be stealing that much away from the tips, and you probably want the plants to fill in anyway.

DEAR NEIL: Do you think the hedge in the attached photos can be salvaged? I would rather not have to replace all of it.

Dear Reader: I was not able to separate the photos in your PDF sheet. It appears to be Japanese boxwood, and it looks like the backside 80% has died.

Unfortunately, I think it would take a long time for these five or six plants to fill back in again. As little as these cost, you would be far better off replacing them.
SANTA ANA, Calif. (AP)  A Southern California man charged with killing a 6-year-old boy in a road rage incident last month told police he pulled out a gun and fired at a car on the freeway after he got angry with a driver who made a rude gesture, prosecutors said.

Orange County prosecutors wrote in a court document filed Wednesday that murder suspect Marcus Eriz, 24, told police on June 6 that he grabbed the loaded gun, rolled down the window and shot at the car driven by a woman who gestured toward him on a freeway while he was on his way to work on May 21.

The shot killed 6-year-old Aiden Leos while he sat in a booster seat in the back of his mother's car on his way to kindergarten, prosecutors have said.

Days later, a co-worker told Eriz that authorities were looking for a car similar to the one he used with his girlfriend, Wynne Lee, 23, who since has been charged with being an accessory after the fact, the court filing said.

Eriz then hid the car in a relative's garage and instead started using a red truck, shaved his beard and began pulling back his hair, prosecutors said in the document, while calling Eriz an extreme danger and asking the court to deny him bail.
GABORONE, Botswana (AP)  A huge diamond weighing more than 1,000 carats, which could be the third-largest mined in history, has been discovered in the southern African country of Botswana.

The high-quality gemstone weighing 1,098.3 carats was unearthed earlier this month in the Jwaneng mine owned by Debswana, the mining company jointly owned by the Botswanan government and the De Beers Group.

"With the recent introduction of a modern, state-of-the-art large diamond pilot plant, I have every hope that we will be able to recover more large diamonds," said Lynette Armstrong, Debswana's acting managing director.

"This by all standards is a great metallurgical achievement, to recover a diamond of this size intact through our conventional ore processing plant," she said.

The large diamond  73 millimeters long, 52 millimeters wide and 27 millimeters thick  is the largest gem-quality diamond found in Debswana's mines in the company's more than 50-year history, she said. Diamonds were discovered in Botswana in 1967, and Debswana was formed in 1969.

The most recent large diamond found at Jwaneng mine was a stone weighing 446 carats in 1993, Armstrong said.
But this week, everybody has had their eyes on ERCOT  the Electric Reliability Council of Texas  to watch a daily competition between the amount of electricity available and the amount of electricity demanded. Theyre rooting for available, too aware after February of the scary things that can happen when demand wins the race and Texans who need power cant get it.

Its a trust thing. At the beginning of February, its safe to assume that most Texans had no idea what ERCOT is, what it does or why its important. And because the states electric generators couldnt produce the power they were obligated to produce during that storm, forcing ERCOT to order blackouts, weve all got the fidgets.

What wasnt even entering our minds a few months ago is now front and center. Were not taking our electricity for granted at the moment. ERCOTs forecasts for this summer were that heat-related blackouts were possible. Now the prospect is real: The heat and the air conditioners and our memories of February are making it hard for the governor to direct our attention to his efforts to deal with an increase in migrants at the border.

He insisted Wednesday  emphatically and in a raised voice  that his call for a border wall isnt driven by politics, and that anyone who says otherwise doesnt know what theyre talking about.
As a New Yorker living in Manhattan on 9/11, I saw things on that day that will never leave my brain, from men jumping off of buildings to loved ones sobbing in the streets. But Ill never forget walking down Park Avenue just hours after the towers fell, and watching a man run up to a Sikh cab driver in a turban, bang on his window, and irrationally scream at him, YOU DID THIS!

I cried in that moment, and in many moments after, at seeing the worst of us come out amidst our fear and anger.

Ive thought of that moment a lot during the last year and a half, saddened by the inability and unwillingness among some to come together, put politics aside, harness our empathy and sense of community, and instead wage wars on each other. These wars have ravaged American communities as violently as the pandemic itself.

Republican lawmakers like Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene and others comparing mask-wearing and vaccination policies to the Holocaust, stoking conspiracy theories about mask ineffectiveness, claiming God doesnt want you to wear a mask, invoking AIDS to flout mask requirements  I could go on and on. The willful ignorance combined with deliberate fearmongering, gaslighting, profiteering and politicizing of the very real pain and anguish Americans suffered this year is inexcusable and horrific.
By having and supporting those ideas and ideals, making them holidays, we infringe on any and all that are not of the group of people that the holiday is shedding light on. We use segregation and separation for these holidays as a tool in divisive ethnic tactics making the supposed unity of our nation that much farther from reality.

Doug McDurham: By that reasoning, we should not celebrate the Fourth of July as Independence Day because it only granted freedom to people with white skin. Im white and I celebrate Juneteenth because it meant that the country I love was closer to living up to its promise of freedom and justice for all. While it holds special meaning to the descendants of people who were enslaved, it is not just a holiday for people who are Black.

Jeb Barr: As a white male complaining that times devoted to learning the history and culture of other ethnicities is infringing on him, you may have missed that this has been the everyday reality for minority groups in our country throughout our history. Celebrating diversity is not the opposite of unity. Its just recognizing that unity can be achieved by appreciating and celebrating our different cultures and contributions instead of trying to achieve unity through historical whitewashing.
CONTRACT AWARD

GSA reveals first block of STARS III awardees

New 8(a) small business IT contract

The General Services Administration has made an initial cut of 426 awards for the next iteration of its popular STARS vehicle for acquiring IT services and solutions from 8(a) small businesses.

GSA will make additional awards beyond this first block of STARS III as discussions with remaining bidders in the running will take place this summer, the agency said Thursday. Revised final proposals and evaluations of them are still to come as well. The contract vehicle is worth $50 billion over 15 years.

Click here to see the full list of group one awardees.

Some of the emerging technologies GSA is interested in for this version of its Streamlined Technology Acquisition Resource for Services vehicle include artificial intelligence, blockchain and robotic process automation.

Pending any possible protests, GSA plans to issue notices to proceed to the first group of awardees within the next 30 days that would at least open the contract for business to them.

Competitive range notices for STARS III first went out to those companies who cleared that bar in May.
COMMENTARY

Evolving digital platforms open more ways to win in GovCon

Over the past year of the COVID-19 pandemic, we witnessed a major shift in companies moving the majority of their marketing spend to digital platforms. For the commercial and B2C world, this increase was simply an additional boost to what was already trending as a growing dominant reliance on digital tools to reach consumers where they work, live and play  digital devices.

However, in the government technology and services marketplace, where the traditional marketing formula of in-person networking, conferences and job fairs had still remained a dominant form of audience engagement prior to the pandemic, the shift was dramatic for those who jumped into digital.

Yet, overall, we find that digital platforms today remained a generally untapped area for the government marketplace especially in the procurement of new business.

The challenge is most social channels have not segmented their markets or offerings to easily accommodate B2G audience segmentation. From the perspective of the social media platform owners, this makes sense, because as an industry, government marketing spend is perhaps one of the lowest in the world.

LinkedIn is the only platform that offers government industry segmentation and programs, which is why it is such a powerful tool for recruiting.

Even though most channels do not cater to the government industry specifically, they can still be very powerful and cost effective when used correctly. Especially for smaller to mid-size contractors, these channels offer opportunities to get in on the ground level before the marketplace becomes more expensive and digital landscape is more crowded.

As the professional and personal arenas blur, this places an ever-growing emphasis on a digital, interconnected business landscape. Both organic and paid digital media have become a standard for channel content and reach, whether to create awareness, educate an audience, or create a direct-action result. The most frequent digital tools are search engine marketing, social media marketing and programmatic marketing.

Within the government contracting market, in order to meet request for proposal requirements, procurement teams search for organizational information such as past performance or proof of capabilities to evaluate all bidders. This is where having an effective digital strategy becomes critical, starting with your company website and disseminating through the entirety of your digital communications.

We find the most effective B2G digital programs include these elements:

A focused, strategic message - Businesses need to focus on cultivating a consistent brand message throughout their online sites, from website to social media channels, Apps and more. This messaging is vital because, should it make a lasting impact, it will regularly bring your brand to the top of potential customers and employees minds.

Content aligned to SEO strategies - As you develop your site content, ensure best practices are implemented for search engine optimization with properly formatted pages, titles, headers, and meta descriptions, as well as a responsive framework and relevant keywords embedded in respective pages. Higher search result rankings for relevant keywords coupled with strategically developed content that speaks to your audiences needs establish credibility and, by extension, validate your offering.

An expanded digital footprint - Once your sites are built or updated, its critical to expand your organizations digital presence. Whether establishing new social channels or repurposing existing ones, its essential to plan out editorial calendars that lay out the specific content, the content schedule, and the strategy behind it. The primary goal is to leverage content that contains consistent brand messaging (which was created during the website phase) and link back to relevant pages on your website. This method creates initial engagement while providing further context to supplement the brevity of social media posts. By crafting relevant and engaging content paired with strategic calls to action on every post, you start conversations that make lasting impacts with users and help spread your message, outside your existing network of connections/followers.

Effective organic content - Along with website development and social media, organic content is among the most potent drivers of buy-in and new business available today. Organic content is original copy and images that individuals and organizations post on their social channels. The most important content needs to be less about selling, and more about informing, educating and inspiring. And also, btw, not all about you and your organization. Audiences are quick to dismiss and even disdain social channels that are purely about directly selling. Quality organic content is a must have, and these strategies also take time to reach their true potential. Search engines require backlinks and other forms of validation to ensure that content is relevant, a proof that is built through subsequent and repetitive searches.

Laser focused visibility - Social media accounts need time to grow engaged followings. This is where paid media management will bolster your organic efforts and offer a distinct advantage. Paid digital media can be in various forms, including funds that boost organic content to reach greater target audiences and posts written and funded to appear in social feeds only to specifically identified audiences on that channel.

Digital platforms can keep brands top of mind during the request for information or RFP stage of a contract. They can get your message in front of key influencers or decision-makers, or they can be used to create unparalleled awareness in a target geographic market where work will be done or when reaching the general public is needed.

As more services providers across the government industry start jumping into digital, we anticipate this state of the digital landscape will change. Early adopters will be the brands to beat in the upcoming GovCon decade.
Every single desk goes up and down, said Skovgard, so employees can work while sitting or standing. We wanted people to really like their work space.

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The fourth floor is empty but ready for future expansion.

When we started looking (for a new location), we were right on the edge of not having enough space, he noted. A trailer had been added at LSBs Kimball Avenue operations center in the fall of 2019 to make more space for its 65-70 staff members. Months later, people were working from home because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

But the growth of the company continued in the financial technology industry, mortgage refinancing and government guaranteed loans. Last year, we added 80 people to an organization that was already out of physical space, said Skovgard.

LSBX started in 2014 as the companys fintech division, which has accounted for much of the companys growth. It provides banking services for millions of people with accounts through mobile and online applications. Among LSBXs partners are Square Cash App, Qapital, M1 Finance and Acorns.

When you use their apps, we provide the banking, said Skovgard.
WATERLOO  The Iowa Supreme Court has upheld part of the City of Waterloos ban the box ordinance, which was designed to prohibit employers from considering criminal records early in the hiring process.

The high court also struck down portions of the ordinance, passed as a way to provide people with criminal histories a chance at obtaining employment.

Mayor Quentin Hart said the city was encouraged by the ruling.

Our communities are faced with hiring challenges and an overall labor shortage. This decision supports the many existing Waterloo businesses that have already taken steps to create more inclusive hiring practices and provide a framework for struggling employers to meet the employment needs. Hart said.

The City Council adopted Ordinance No. 5522, also known as the fair chance initiative, in November 2019.

Before it went into effect, the Iowa Association of Business and Industry took the city to court, arguing that the measure went against a 2017 state law that bars cities from adopting rules that exceed or conflict with the requirements of federal or state law relating to ... hiring practices ... or other terms or conditions of employment.
EVANSDALE  Residents in Evansdale, Gilbertville and Jesup are reporting an uptick in the number of butterflies flitting about, landing on plant life  and humans.

Iowa State Extension and Outreach of Black Hawk County has received phone calls and photographs of increased flying insect activity in those areas over the past week.

Residents there report seeing increased numbers of moths and butterflies in wooded neighborhoods and along gravel roads in rural areas. Through photos and in-person observation the ISU Extension has identified the hackberry emperor butterfly as the most frequent flyer in the area.

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Extension officials suspect the lack of rain has allowed more eggs and caterpillars that overwintered in dead leaves to emerge as butterflies.

While harmless, the hackberry emperor moth is seeking to water for drinking and may land on humans for salt.
WATERLOO  Scythian and Gaelic Storm are returning to the 2021 Iowa Irish Fest Aug. 6-8. The bands will join 20 bands and entertainers, including five groups traveling from Ireland to perform in Lincoln Park in downtown Waterloo.

Having these bands travel from Ireland is part of what makes Iowa Irish Fest one of the premiere events in the Midwest, Director Chad Shipman said in a news release. Despite everything thats happened in the last year, having these bands perform shows that the Fest is ready to knock your socks off this year.

Tickets are on sale now at IowaIrishFest.com.

The Screaming Orphans, Dublin City Ramblers and JigJam are among the groups from Ireland.

The high-energy Celtic folk-rock band Scythian hails from Washington, D.C. Theyve played for former United States presidents during their 1,300+ shows. Gaelic Storm began their career playing in pubs in Santa Monica, Calif., in the mid-1990s and performed in the movie Titanic. The band has topped the Billboard World Chart six times and regularly headline festivals around the country, including Iowa Irish Fest.
DENVER (AP)  U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra visited a mobile vaccine clinic near Denver on Friday to promote COVID-19 shots among underserved communities of color that have some of the nation's lowest vaccination rates.
Who's ready for hot vax summer? Go on, raise your hand. Then, make plans to get out of San Francisco to soak up some actually warm summer days by the pool...with Liholiho's fried chicken sando in hand.

On the edge of Woodside with views of deep green mountain ridges, the Rosewood Sand Hill resort is serving up tropical vibes with a new poolside dining concept helmed by SF chef Ravi Kapur and cocktails featuring Flor de Cana rum and The Bad Stuff Tequila.

The pool scene is set with cheerful yellow umbrellas, chaise lounges, low couches, and a new tin-roofed beach that functions as the bar. The service is extremely friendly, as it should be at any tropical resort. The food? Well, get ready for a taste of aloha that goes above and beyond your standard hotel hamburger.

Liholiho Yacht Club's Chef Ravi is spinning the food of his Hawaiian upbringing into an approachable yet thoughtful menu for the Rosewood's pool, where you may now have your choice of a fresh tuna poke bowl with furikake seasoning (Kapur's favorite) or a juicy burger topped with pineapple, kimchi, and bacon.

"As a native Hawaiian with Chinese and Indian roots, the flavors and ingredients I'm drawn to have always been influenced by my multi-ethnic heritage and upbringing," Kapur says. "The menu at Rosewood Sand Hill embraces these flavors while celebrating the fresh ingredients we're able to source from local farmers and purveyors."

While you're in vacation mode, you will most definitely want to try some libations from the refreshed cocktail menu crafted by Olivia Aguilar, the hotel's beverage manager. Go for the pina colada and set your out-of-office reply.

Photography by Sarah Chorey The pool at the Rosewood Sand Hill offers plenty sunny and shaded seating options.

// Rosewood Sand Hill, 2825 Sand Hill Rd. (Menlo Park), rosewoodhotels.com
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Vancouver, June 18, 2021 AEST (ABN Newswire) - In this segment of The Ellis Martin Report, Ellis speaks with Jonathan Weisblatt, CEO of Rockridge Resources ( CVE:ROCK )( OTCMKTS:RRRLF ) as the company intersects 2.34% Copper Equivalent at the Knife Lake Copper Project in Saskatchewan.To Listen to the interview, please visit:To view the Press Release, please visit:About Rockridge Resources Ltd

Rockridge Resources (CVE:ROCK) is a publicly traded mineral exploration company focused on the acquisition, exploration, and development of mineral resource properties in Canada and other mining-friendly jurisdictions. The Company's Raney Gold Project is a high-grade gold exploration project located in the same greenstone belt that hosts the world-class Timmins and Kirkland Lake lode gold mining camps. The Company's Knife Lake Project is in Saskatchewan, which is ranked as the #3 mining jurisdiction in the world by the Fraser Institute. The project hosts the Knife Lake deposit, which is a VMS, near-surface copper-cobalt-gold-silver-zinc deposit open along strike and at depth. Rockridge's goal is to maximize shareholder value through new mineral discoveries, committed long-term partnerships, and the advancement of exploration projects in geopolitically favourable jurisdictions.
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Vancouver, June 18, 2021 AEST (ABN Newswire) - Join Ellis Martin for a conversation with Jordan Trimble, the President and Chief Executive Officer of Skyharbour Resources ( CVE:SYH ) ( OTCMKTS:SYHBF ) a preeminent uranium and thorium exploration Company with projects located in the prolific Athabasca Basin of Saskatchewan, Canada which was ranked as the best mining jurisdiction to work in globally by the Fraser Institute in 2017.The Company has been acquiring top tier exploration projects at attractive valuations culminating in five uranium properties totaling approx. 200,000 hectares throughout the Basin. In July 2016, Skyharbour secured an option from Denison Mines ( TSE:DML ) to acquire a 100% interest in the Moore Uranium Project, now the flagship project, which hosts the high grade Maverick Zone. The Company is run by a strong management and geological team who are major shareholders with extensive capital markets experience as well as focused uranium exploration expertise in the Basin.In this segment Mr. Trimble discusses the expansion of its diamond drilling program at the Moore Uranium Project from 3500 meters to 5,000 meters, as well as growing interest in the sector from large generalist funds.To listen to the interview, please visit:To view the Press Release, please visit:About Skyharbour Resources Ltd.

Skyharbour Resources (CVE:SYH) (OTCMKTS:SYHBF) holds an extensive portfolio of uranium and thorium exploration projects in Canada's Athabasca Basin and is well positioned to benefit from improving uranium market fundamentals with six drill-ready projects. In July 2016, Skyharbour acquired an option from Denison Mines, a large strategic shareholder of the Company, to acquire 100% of the Moore Uranium Project which is located approximately 15 kilometres east of Denison's Wheeler River project and 39 kilometres south of Cameco's McArthur River uranium mine. Moore is an advanced stage uranium exploration project with high grade uranium mineralization at the Maverick Zone. Drill results have returned up to 6.0% U3O8 over 5.9 metres, including 20.8% U3O8 over 1.5 metres at a vertical depth of 265 metres. Skyharbour has signed option agreements with Orano Canada Inc. and Azincourt Energy whereby Orano and Azincourt can earn in up to 70% of specific segments of the Preston Project through a combined $9,800,000 in total exploration expenditures, as well as $1,700,000 in total cash payments and Azincourt shares. Preston is a large, geologically prospective property proximal to Fission Uranium's Triple R deposit as well as NexGen Energy's Arrow deposit. The Company also owns a 100% interest in the Falcon Point Uranium Project which hosts a high-grade surface showing with up to 68% U3O8 in grab samples from a massive pitchblende vein, the source of which has yet to be discovered. The Company's 100% owned Mann Lake Uranium project on the east side of the Basin is strategically located adjacent to the Mann Lake Joint Venture operated by Cameco, where high-grade uranium mineralization has been identified. Skyharbour's goal is to maximize shareholder value through new mineral discoveries, committed long-term partnerships, and the advancement of exploration projects in geopolitically favourable jurisdictions.
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Venue Plus continues In Case You Didnt Know, a weekly feature with fun tidbits about New Mexicans and their projects.

Cassidy Watt never backs down from a challenge.

The Santa Fe-based artist had plenty of downtime due to art shows being postponed last year. But that didnt stop him from moving forward.

Watt moved from Madrid to Santa Fe, where he has found another round of motivation for creating art.

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Many of the new pieces are on a much bigger scale.

Its been challenging, he says. Creating the new pieces has brought up some technical challenges. Ive thought about how to make an 8-foot totem. Ive been figuring out how to change the dimensions of something in a medium Ive been working with for so long.

One reason Watt is working with a bigger medium is that hes readying a show in August at Ventana Fine Art on Canyon Road.

He will be one of two artists featured in the show.

Its big news for me, he says. Im creating this body of work specifically for this show.

Watt is known for his manipulation of metals. His process begins with an experimental phase, as the medium  aluminum, copper, steel or brass  reveals its resistance or obeisance to various applications of patina, torch or hammer. The various results can be juxtaposed into a vertical totem form to create confrontations of reaction and resolution. As totems, this stacking of texture, colors and tone invokes the complexity of emotional language.

Before the pandemic, Watt was beginning to have success at outdoor art shows.

Hes excited about his work being shown at Ventana Fine Art in Santa Fe.

All of a sudden, people are able to see my work in person, he says. Its been an amazing year of change.

Watt is finding his bearings at his Santa Fe studio  which is bigger than the one he had in Madrid.

Because I have more space, I have to be creative in how I utilize it, he says.

During the pandemic, while Watt continued to create, he often wondered whether the art world would come back to life.

I started showing people what I had done, he says. Now, I have goals again. With being shown on Canyon Road, theres a new clientele that my art is reaching. Its been a pretty amazing experience.

While Watt continues to create his body of work, here are five things you probably didnt know about him:

1 In 2005, while working at a gallery in New York City, I attended Art Expo NY to scout for new artists for the gallery. There, I met an artist and gallery owner. After a long conversation, I was offered a gallery director position in his New Mexico gallery.

2 Almost immediately after, I moved from New York to the tiny, former ghost town of Madrid.

3 After a couple of years running Chumani Gallery, I  opened my own gallery, Metallo, which I ran for 13 years. It became best known for the annual mini-show, where artists were challenged to produce small works of 2D and 3D art.

4 Working and surrounding myself with art on a daily basis inspired me to create my own art. My artist journey began as a jeweler. I sold my jewelry for many years before transitioning into larger-scale metal work.

5 In 2018, I returned to Art Expo NY, 13 years after that initial visit, this time as an artist. I showcased my newest line of work, my remnant totems, and won the Spotlight Artist Award.
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Guitarists from New Mexico and around the world will come together to celebrate the stringed instrument during the 2021 New Mexico Classical Guitar Festival.

Internationally renowned guitarists Iliana Matos and Paul Galbraith will be the featured artists at the festival. Each of their concerts will take place online. The festival, from June 25 to 27, also will include a student showcase as well as in person youth and adult ensembles and workshops.

As a young girl living in the small province of Guantanamo, Cuba, Matos was drawn to music after following a group of children to a private music academy. She later learned to play several instruments, including guitar, piano, and tres, a stringed Cuban instrument. Matos began teaching guitar in her homeland and later in other countries, including Venezuela, Spain, and Canada, where she now lives.

We (learned) just by hearing chords on the guitar and the piano, Matos said. And it was very practical. You learn three chords, and lets learn a song with those three chords. And lets practice together and play together. And this is a really practical approach to learning music that I think is great. And Im very grateful. Im happy, I would say lucky, that I had that approach to the music from this perspective, because for me, music is all about performing.

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Matos, who has been teaching for about 30 years, will bring her talents to the 2021 New Mexico Classical Guitar Festival. She will perform an online concert and hold a master class on June 25. The one-hour program features classical songs as well as music by Cuban composers and songs from Latin America and Spain. Some compositions in Matos performance repertoire include the Spanish piece El Jardin de Lindaraja, music by Eduardo Morales-Caso, Divertimentos Tropicales by Eduardo Martin and Prelude, Fugue, and Allegro by J. Sebastian Bach.

Paul Galbraith was introduced to guitar at age 8 when his father bought him a guitar on an impulse.

I hadnt asked for one and dont have any memory of even hearing the guitar especially, Galbraith said in an email.

Thirty years later, Galbraith would develop a unique eight-string guitar with luthier David Rubio. Galbraith had been playing a David Rubio six-string for 10 years and would regularly visit the guitar maker in Cambridge in the United Kingdom, where Galbraith now resides.

Rubio named the eight-string instrument the Brahms guitar since Galbraith immediately played a long set of keyboard variations by Brahms (op. 21a) on it.

The guitar is not the only thing unique about Galbraiths performances. His posture when playing is similar to that of a cellist rather than a guitarist.

Id been searching for a solution to two issues: one involving the need to have equal freedom of movement in both arms; the other involving a better  more balanced and healthy  sitting posture, he said. I experimented over a three week Easter break, but came up with nothing, so I left it alone. Then out of the blue it came to me, and Ive been sitting in the same basic way ever since, though initially I sat on the floor, before I had a cello end-in fitted, as I have now. It allows me to shape phrases and spaces, principally between the notes, in a particular way, and to sit very comfortably.

2021 NM CLASSICAL GUITAR FESTIVAL

WHEN: Iliana Matos online concert at 6 p.m. June 25. Paul Galbraith online concert at 6 p.m. June 26. Student Showcase Concert at 1 p.m. June 27. In-person ensembles and workshops June 25-27. Visit guitarnewmexico.org/festival-schedule for ensemble and workshop times.

WHERE: Rehearsals and student showcase at Albuquerque Youth Symphony Music Facility, 4407 Menaul NE

HOW MUCH: $20 adults, $15 seniors, $10 students for online concerts. $100 adult ensemble; $100 youth ensemble at guitarnewmexico.org/register. Information, visit guitarnewmexico.org
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Every time you turn around, a celebrity comes out with a new tequila.

Native New Mexicans and restaurateurs Matthew Hechter and Chris Brandon wanted something better for their home state. They wanted to bring in a high-quality product made authentically that incorporates the rich culture of Mexico, where it is made, and not the glitz and glitter of Hollywood.

A lot of these really influential brands  theyre all using additives or they use diffusers, which is, like, a way of using acid to break down immature agave, said Hechter, CEO of Tepozan Tequila. So, you know, ultimately, for us, we just wanted no part of that. And we really just wanted to build something of quality. And we felt like that was much more of a long-term approach and just how we wanted to approach it. And so we partnered with the family  we have the namesake brand, which is Tepozan Tequila  at the Tepozan Distillery. Our master distiller, Carlos (Padilla), started his career as a farmer of agave. So hes been growing Grade A Highland, amazing, incredible agave for, like, 30 years now. And so a portion of what he grows is allocated to our distillery. And so we are, like, the true farm-to-bottle tequila, one of the few.

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The business partners headed to Mexico to understand how tequila is properly made.

They just grow it, they bake it in these horno ovens, and they use local yeast thats on the property to ferment the agave, said Brandon, co-CEO of Tepozan Tequila. So you know, really, its just everything thats in that bottle happens on the distillerys land or their property. Its right outside this town called San Julian, which is in the southern Los Altos area. Its kind of a very prestigious area to have tequila.

Tepozan Tequila currently offers a blanco, a reposado and an anejo. An extra anejo is in the works. The reposado is aged for four months, and the anejo is aged 14 months. Both are aged in Kentucky white oak bourbon barrels.

The unaged blanco has a lean and soft taste, with sweet grapefruit, white pepper, and star anise, with an electric midpalate. It finishes with hints of cilantro, poblano pepper and raw almond on the tongue. The reposado is round and generous with a spice oak, brown sugar and pineapple sage taste. The finish is plush and lasting with caramel, coriander and clove. The anejo is bold and smooth, with butterscotch, serrano pepper, marigold and smoked earth. It finishes with a lush and balanced nutty minerality with caramel and sweet piquant notes, according to the Tepozan website. Tepozan Tequila can be found at Los Poblanos Historic Inn & Organic Farm and Four Seasons Resort Rancho Encantado Santa Fe. It can be purchased at Jubilation Wine & Spirits and Total Wine. It will be available soon at Whole Foods Market, and plans to get it into more establishments and retailers around the state are in the works. It can also be purchased on the tequilas website at tequilatepozan.com.

Tepozan Tequila is additive-free.

I think a lot of our success were seeing has come from the fact that youre starting to see the consumers more and more are way more focused on what theyre putting into their body, Hechter said.

Hechter and Brandon met while attending high school in Las Cruces. Growing up close to the Mexican border resonated with them when they were creating Tepozan Tequila.

Chris and I feel like that is such a missing element in tequila and mezcal, really in the United States, which is the biggest consumer, even bigger than Mexico, of these goods, Hechter said. Theres very little attention paid to the culture around it or how it came about or why it exists or why is it so important to Mexican culture, even to this day and age. Tequila is actually the most highly regulated spirit in the world, which most people dont realize. And to me, what that speaks to is just how important the spirit is to Mexican identity in their culture, and how badly they want to make sure they protect it.
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As they finally begin to emerge from under the shadow of COVID-related restrictions, local restaurants are facing a new challenge: a shortage of workers that has forced many places to remain in tak eout-only mode.

At Krung Thai on Menaul, the ornately decorated dining room was blocked off by a row of tables when I entered on a recent Saturday night. A woman hurried back and forth from the kitchen, bringing orders out for two waiting Grubhub drivers. She told me that due to staff shortages, the place will run as takeout-only operation for now. In a couple of weeks, she said, the restaurant would be moving to a hybrid model where patrons have the option of eating inside after they pick up their order. Its similar to what Thai Vegan was doing when I ate there a few weeks ago.

You need to be agile to survive these days, and Krung Thai is nothing if not that, having lasted 18 years at its location in on Menaul NE near Wyoming.

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The building that houses Krung Thai is set back from the street behind a small parking lot. A wall of red tiles lines the facade, and the side wall wears a peeling coat of powder blue paint adorned with big red letters spelling out the restaurants name and contact information, including a website that appears to be defunct.

Krung Thai translates to Thai city.

The cuisine of Thailand bears the influences of its neighbors, and Krung Thais menu reflects that with Vietnamese dishes such as fried catfish in ginger sauce and Laotian specialties such as the ground meat salad called larb, also popular in Thailand. Prices are about the same as at the nearby Thai Tip on Wyoming and a little higher than those of Bangkok Bite across Menaul in the Hoffmantown Shopping Center.

Appetizers include a few exotic options such as garlic frog legs ($11.95) and Laos sausage ($10.95).

The soup menu reflects the pan-Asian theme with choices such as pho and hot and sour. The Thai coconut soup known as tom kha ($11.95) is the standout. The creamy broth is brightly colored with broccoli and red peppers and fragrant with lemon grass. Thai spices and the subtle presence of fish sauce help keep the sweetness at bay, while mushrooms and blocks of tofu make it filling enough for a meal.

Although its often thought of as having Thai origins, papaya salad ($10.95) actually comes from Laos. Krung Thai honors this history by offering versions in Laos or Thai style. The latter, slightly sweeter, is served as a big block of shredded green papaya under chopped cabbage and butter lettuce. Dried mini-shrimp provide an intense shot of brine. Aware that the food at Krung Thai has a reputation for heat, I requested my salad to be just a little spicy. Sweet and sour flavors registered initially, and then the heat from the chile peppers swept them away and lingered long after the bite.

Like the soups and salads, most of the entrees cost between $10 and $15 and are served in generous portions that will provide leftovers for all but the most prodigious eaters. The Pad Thai ($11.95) comes in a Styrofoam tray, most of which is given over to a slab of rice noodles tinged with sauce. Pepper flakes, crushed peanuts, limes and bean sprouts fill out the dish. The faintly sweet sauce, most of it absorbed by the noodles, was a bit listless, missing the sour notes you normally get from the tamarind paste.

Curries make a better choice here. Theres the usual assortment of red, green, yellow and massaman varieties. The spice level of the yellow curry ($11.95), gilded with turmeric, was just enough to cut the coconut milk-based sauce laden with potatoes, onions, bell peppers and flattened pieces of white chicken meat. Its Thai food at its best, fragrant, spicy and sweet, and it pairs exceptionally well with rice.

Speaking of rice, you get a large serving of the steamed variety with the curry, which in hindsight should have steered me away from the sticky rice-based desserts on the menu. Nevertheless, the lightly glazed fruit on the Mango Sweet Sticky Rice ($7.95) was a treat, even if the starch overwhelmed me.

Gluten-free options are restricted to the curries and the soups, the server told me. She was a friendly and efficient and brought the food out to our car a little over 10 minutes after I ordered.

Krung Thai is yet another high-quality Thai restaurant in the city. Even if you cant sit down and order a meal there, getting takeout is pretty easy, and you can eat for days on the leftovers.

KRUNG THAI

3 stars

LOCATION: 7923 Menaul NE, 292-9319

HOURS: 11 a.m.-9 p.m. Wednesdays-Thursdays; noon-9 p.m. Fridays; 11 a.m.-9 p.m. Saturdays; noon-9 p.m. Sundays; 11 a.m.-9 p.m. Mondays; closed Tuesdays

NO ALCOHOL
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WASHINGTON  President Joe Biden on Tuesday installed an energetic critic of Big Tech as a top federal regulator at a time when the industry is under intense pressure from Congress, regulators and state attorneys general.

The selection of legal scholar Lina Khan to head the Federal Trade Commission is seen as signaling a tough stance toward tech giants Facebook, Google, Amazon and Apple. Khan was sworn in as FTC chair just hours after the Senate confirmed her as one of five members of the commission on a 69-28 vote.

Khan has been a professor at Columbia University Law School and burst onto the antitrust scene with her massive scholarly work in 2017 as a Yale law student, Amazons Antitrust Paradox. She helped lay the foundation for a new way of looking at antitrust law beyond the impact of big-company market dominance on consumer prices. As counsel to a House Judiciary antitrust panel in 2019 and 2020, she played a key role in a sweeping bipartisan investigation of the market power of the tech giants.

At 32, she is believed to be the youngest chair in the history of the FTC, which polices competition and consumer protection in industry generally as well as digital privacy.

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Lina brings deep knowledge and expertise to this role and will be a fearless champion for consumers, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., who has called for tech industry breakups, said in a statement. Giant tech companies deserve the growing scrutiny they are facing, and consolidation is choking off competition across American industries. With Chair Khan at the helm, we have a huge opportunity to make big, structural change by reviving antitrust enforcement and fighting monopolies that threaten our economy, our society and our democracy.

Khan also was a legal adviser to Rohit Chopra, an FTC commissioner, and was previously legal director of the Open Markets Institute, an organization that advocates against corporate concentration.

It is a tremendous honor to have been selected by President Biden to lead the Federal Trade Commission, Khan said in a statement. I look forward to working with my colleagues to protect the public from corporate abuse.

Biden said as a presidential candidate that dismantling the big tech companies should be considered. He also has said he wants to see quickly crimped the social media companies long-held legal protections for speech on their platforms.

Biden in March appointed Tim Wu, also an academic expert on antitrust and industry critic, as a special assistant to the president for technology and competition policy within the National Economic Council. Wu, like Khan a Columbia law professor, has been a senior adviser to the FTC and a senior enforcement attorney in the New York attorney generals office.

The tech industry, once lionized by lawmakers and presidents as an engine of innovation and jobs, has seen its political fortunes eroded in recent years. Calls have been rising to break up the Silicon Valley giants.

Lawmakers of both parties champion stronger oversight of the tech industry, arguing that its massive market power is out of control, crushing smaller competitors and endangering consumers privacy. They say the companies hide behind a legal shield to allow false information to flourish on their social media networks or to entrench bias.

Last fall the Trump Justice Department, joined by states, filed a ground-breaking antitrust lawsuit against Google, accusing the search giant of abusing its market dominance to stifle competition. That was followed in December by another big antitrust suit against Facebook, brought by the FTC and an array of states.

Amazon and Apple are under scrutiny by antitrust enforcers at the Justice Department, now in Bidens purview, and the independent, bipartisan FTC. Twitter has joined Facebook and Google in facing frequent run-ins with lawmakers over its policies for moderating content on its platform.

A bipartisan group of House lawmakers, animated by the results of the Judiciary panel investigation of Facebook, Google, Amazon and Apple, proposed sweeping legislation Friday to rein in Big Tech, possibly forcing the giants to break up their businesses while making it harder for them to acquire others. Those kinds of mandated breakups through a legislative overhaul would be a radical step for Congress to take and could be a bridge too far for some Republican lawmakers.

Some Republican lawmakers have denounced the new school of antitrust thought, championed by Khan and Wu and gaining currency among Democrats, that looks beyond the impact of big-company market dominance on consumer prices to its broader effects on industries, employees and communities.

The school is called hipster antitrust by its detractors. With this approach, Democrats are seeking to use antitrust law not to promote competition but to advance social or environmental goals, the Republicans contend.
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Copyright  2021 Albuquerque Journal

LOS LUNAS  Leland Hust repeatedly told Rio Rancho police detectives in a recorded interview that he could not remember raping or strangling the 6-year-old girl he is accused of killing.

Hust, 24, wept and appeared distraught as he struggled to remember events surrounding the death of Ariana Jade Romeo in the video played for jurors Thursday in Husts trial.

Rio Rancho police interviewed Hust for about six hours on Oct. 5, 2018, the day he was arrested, about two months after Arianas killing.

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I cant remember what happened or what I did, Hust told detectives in the recording. I dont know how it happened. I am trying to remember so I can help.

Hust is charged with intentional child abuse resulting in death, and rape of a child younger than 13, both first-degree felonies. He faces an alternative count of first-degree murder during the commission of a felony.

Hust could be sentenced to life in prison if convicted on either charge.

Presiding 13th Judicial District Judge George P. Eichwald ordered a change of venue to Los Lunas because of extensive media coverage of the case.

Detectives at times accused Hust of lying or repressing his memory of Arianas killing. During the interview, then-Rio Rancho police detective Aaron Brown showed Hust a crime-scene photo of Ariana after her death.

Leland, you did this, Brown told Hust in the recording. You dont want to see this picture because you dont want to come to grips with what happened.

Husts attorney, Michael Rosenfield later questioned Brown about the comment.

Did you give up trying to find the truth at that point? Rosenfield asked.

Brown said the purpose of the interview was to gather information about Arianas killing.

Rosenfield said detectives used hardball interrogation techniques to coerce a confession, such as accusing Hust of lying, and suggesting to Hust that he had been sleepwalking when he killed Ariana, or that he had killed the girl accidentally or by mistake.

Brown responded that detectives were asking questions only in an attempt to learn the truth.

Brown also said detectives hadnt intended to question Hust for six hours. The interview continued because Hust wanted to talk and did not ask to leave, he said.

Ariana was found nearly naked and bleeding in a bedroom of a Rio Rancho home she and her mother shared with Hust and seven others.
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Copyright  2021 Albuquerque Journal

There is no more room at the inn.

The Animal Welfare Department is approaching capacity with nearly 800 pets at city shelters  and more than 800 in foster homes  and is waiving adoption fees in hopes of finding forever homes.

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The Empty the Shelter adoption drive is being held from Saturday through July 3 at the Westside Shelter, Eastside Shelter and Everyday Adoption Center in PetSmart at Eubank and Interstate 40.

Each adoption will come with a free nail trimming coupon and, for dogs, one free training class.

We really hope to see a huge interest in adopting from our shelters because all of these pets deserve loving families and forever homes, said Carolyn Ortega, Animal Welfare director.

She said AWD has about 785 pets in their shelters. At this time in 2019, the number was 789. Although Ortega said they have a capacity of 1,100 pets she said the current capacity puts a lot of strain and pressure on the shelter and pets.

We want to make sure we keep those numbers down and our adoptions rates higher, Ortega said. She said they have animals of all types and sizes available for adoption, including tons of puppies, kittens and more mellow older animals.

Ortega said  contrary to popular belief  there isnt a flood of pets being returned to shelters post-COVID, and the current capacity numbers match up with 2019.

She said the number of adoptions has remained the same over that time period but intakes went up by 13%, or 351 animals.

The increase has led AWD to place more than 816 pets in foster homes right now, up from 520 in 2019. She said, thankfully, they have also increased the number of foster homes for animals, from 403 in 2019 to 608.

Ortega said 75% of their fosters end up adopted and foster homes are more conducive to the pets growth, health and ability to show what theyre really like in a home environment.

Ortega said post-COVID they are seeing a troubling decrease in owners claiming strays that come into the shelter.

As a result, AWD is waiving its reclaim fee and encouraging owners to secure their yards and make sure their pets are microchipped.

She said the large number of pets has taken a toll on shelter staff as AWD battles a worker shortage.

Its not out of the ordinary for our staff to be overwhelmed during this time, its kind of the normal course of the year, Ortega said. The city currently has 22 vacancies  from animal handlers to field officers.

AWD is in the process of hiring 10 staff members and eight temps and Ortega said she hopes to have zero vacancies by 2022.

In the meantime, she said anyone interested in working with animals or who loves animals should apply at the citys website or volunteer.

We are always looking for good people that are very passionate about what we do, with the understanding that it can be very emotional, Ortega said.
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During our pandemic-borne podcast, EthicsNOW (www.ethicsnow.org), we asked guests what ethics meant to them. Collectively, guests spoke of honesty, integrity, keeping ones word, thinking of the other not just ourselves, doing the right thing, creating equitable opportunities. High school students who responded to our essay contest prompt in 2019, What does being ethical mean to you? chose to write about many of the same things.

All of the work New Mexico Ethics Watch undertakes has the same goal: to improve the ethical culture in New Mexico  encouraging public officials, citizens, our youth to value ethics, to practice and demonstrate identifiable ethical principles and actions. New Mexico and New Mexicans will be better for this practice.

A recent Albuquerque Journal editorial, Redistricting redux: Voters deserve a do-over, published Sunday, June 13th, highlighted how far from the ethical mark committee appointers fell with regard to appointments to the newly-created Citizens Redistricting Committee. How, in practice, the appointments, collectively, did not hold to a high bar reflecting integrity, keeping ones word, thinking of the other, doing the right thing and creating equitable opportunities. Although the editorial only mentioned the word ethics in the State Ethics Commissions title, the failure in practice can be called an ethical failure.

It is true that the Redistricting Act did not mandate coordination or networking between the appointing authorities  various lawmakers and the State Ethics Commission  but, as the Journal editorial points out, the Redistricting Act calls for appointments with due regard to the cultural and geographic diversity of the state.

As an appointing authority  particularly if youve voted on the legislation, but hopefully even if not  you are aware of what is essentially a pledge or a promise to appoint a culturally and geographically diverse group of citizens. But we did not get that with the appointed committee. Instead, we got a committee made up of six men and one woman, a committee with no Native American or African American members, a committee where six of the seven members live in Albuquerque, and the seventh in nearby Belen.

How is that equitable? How is that ethical? How is that representative of the state? Its not. And so, the Journal proposes a do-over. Might a tangent to ethical principles be the ability to admit when something has gone wrong and to take the care and consideration to try again for a better result?

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Cynics might say that the Citizens Redistricting Committee, with its lack of ability to impose map choices upon lawmakers, is just for show, has no power, was a compromise without teeth that lets lawmakers trumpet  or even whisper  their support for ethical, nonpartisan redistricting. Even if this is so, why dont we let our public officials know that it matters to us  New Mexicans, citizens, voters  and that we want to hold legislators to their word and have them act more ethically in appointing a diverse, representative committee? We can and we should.

As far as who goes and who stays in this do-over? While the appointment of retired Justice Edward Chavez to chair the committee is unassailable, lawmakers would do well to appoint people from outside central New Mexico, a Native American member and an African American member, reflecting our cultural and geographic diversity.

The particulars are up to the appointing authorities, but creating a more transparent selection process, like that undertaken by the State Ethics Commission, and using that process in a coordinated, second attempt at creating the Citizens Redistricting Committee will assist in building trust among the public  a public wary of politics and that is most likely tired of political business as usual.
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The Albuquerque Journal editorial of April 21 appropriately endorsed Albuquerque creating a safe harbor provision protecting domestic violence (DV) victims from being arrested on misdemeanor warrants or minor charges when they call for help. But the Editorial Board misplaces the nobleness of this provision by memorializing APDs response to the DV escort request by Dominic Medina, Albuquerque Police Chief Harold Medinas son, as the type of case the safe harbor provision seeks to address.

On March 15, a city councilor asked if the administration is able to clarify further for the public if Chief Medina is under investigation for allegedly interfering with the arrest of a family member on two outstanding warrants. Albuquerque CAO Sarita Nair blamed disgruntled former employees for false rumors to discredit Medina and cover up for their own shortcomings. Neither she nor the chief clarified if he was under investigation, leaving the interference claims raised in the councilors question unresolved and apparently not investigated by IA.

The chief asserted his son was a DV victim on Sept. 10, 2019. Dominic contacted the police requesting an escort to get personal property at the apartment he shared with his abuser. The APDs reporting officers report  Incident No. 192530515; Case No. 19008343 486  did not conclude that Dominic was the victim  the roommate accused Dominic as the aggressor  and the officers reported they were unable to determine a predominant aggressor.

The chief affirmed his sons abuser told the officers his son had an outstanding misdemeanor warrant for DWI at the time of the incident. The chief never said or explained why Dominic was not arrested on the warrants, T-4-DW-2017-000895-1  one even with a no-bond hold. The officers didnt arrest Dominic on outstanding warrants not of their own discretion but allegedly because they were directed not to, according to one of the officers who has since resigned from APD.

The chief assured the Council he was not present or involved with his sons DV encounter. Officers body camera videos confirm that his wife, Beatrice Medina, was present with their 29-year-old son at the NE substation and then at Dominics apartment.

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The officers were instructed to remove references to Medinas outstanding warrants from the original report, according to the officer who has since resigned. The final report has some serious anomalies; (1) the outstanding warrants are not in the report; (2) the assisting officer is not listed on the report as required in APD policy; (3) there is no disposition of the assisting officers camera video as logged into evidence; (5) the presence of Beatrice Medina is not disclosed; (5) the report was not approved for 23 days, not by the end of shift or the next day as required without documented approval.

Not a hint of substantive clarification of why officers did not report the roommates claim of an outstanding warrant for Dominic, the heart of the question. The City Council accepted the chiefs explanation unassumingly at face value without a single question  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDwtnCFxHU8.

Executive-level leadership with a commitment to transparency is a needed, essential element of successful cultural change and CASA counter-culture reformation. Im not sure APD has what it takes.
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To say the N.M. Department of Workforce Solutions needs some tweaking is like saying the Titantic needed some Flex Seal. And former DWS Cabinet Secretary Bill McCamley and the governor should have seen that iceberg coming.

Granted, Workforce Solutions found itself facing unprecedented challenges during the COVID-19 pandemic as tens of thousands of workers found themselves out of a job as businesses closed their doors or scaled back on Gov. Michelle Lujan Grishams orders, or without customers as people hunkered down under stay-at-home mandates.

And the department did pay out roughly $3.8 billion in jobless benefits during the pandemic  a total that includes federal stimulus plans. But thats about the extent of its wins.

The Legislative Finance Committee reports Workforce Solutions may have overpaid unemployment benefits by as much as $250 million (a total disputed by the agency), with more than half of that in fraudulent claims.

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First, many New Mexicans received overpayments due to state error. The governor hasnt said definitively the state wont seek to recover that money (presumably already spent by the recipients in many cases) but did say it is unfair to blame the recipient. Shes right about that. And how did people who never applied for benefits end up receiving debit cards from Workforce Solutions?

Then theres the outright fraud. We are horrified by it, and we want people held accountable, the governor said. Also the right response, but easier said than done as international criminal fraud schemes targeted states.

And then theres the phone problem.

Workforce Solutions says in March it received 1.5 million calls and answered only about 66,000 of them, or roughly 4.4%. Acting Secretary Ricky Serna said his department is now tracking unique phone numbers and either answered or reached out to about 40% of callers. An improvement, but not much consolation if youre in the 60% stuck on hold/disconnected/told to make yet another attempt to go online.

Some New Mexicans who have called the Journal reported calling more than 100 times a day to get a claim established or a question resolved with no human being answering the phone and no option to leave a voicemail or receive a callback. Serna says the department lacks manpower to use a callback system but it appears calls are decreasing. That may be thanks to the new system or folks going back to work.

Or to people just giving up. The term trainwreck is not an exaggeration.

Serna took over for McCamley, who resigned in April citing threats to himself and his family. Clearly, threats should be investigated and prosecuted. Frustration or desperation felt by those who lost their livelihoods does not justify a criminal reaction.

The governor acknowledged the frustration and anger many New Mexicans have felt while trying to obtain unemployment benefits, and said state residents deserve a government that recognizes its weaknesses. No argument there. And she is making the right move by asking Sen. Michael Padilla, an Albuquerque Democrat whose business helps call centers and who successfully stood up Albuquerques 311 system under then-Mayor Martin Chavez, to review the agencys call center operation and recommend possible changes. He is doing it on a volunteer basis and deserves a public thank you.

Also, the state is in the final stages of contracting with Abba Technologies of Albuquerque to do an outside review of department operations and systems to identify shortcomings. And, presumably, how to fix them.

Finally, the governor is on the right track with her stated intent to funnel federal stimulus money into the depleted state unemployment compensation fund rather than force businesses to pay higher rates in the coming year. I have zero interest, she said, in making it harder for businesses that are working diligently right now.

Better late than never, the governor has set an ambitious agenda to right the ship at Workforce Solutions. Thousands of New Mexicans frustrated by the agencys inability to do its job for more than a year are waiting for the results.

This editorial first appeared in the Albuquerque Journal. It was written by members of the editorial board and is unsigned as it represents the opinion of the newspaper rather than the writers.
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Copyright  2021 Albuquerque Journal

SANTA FE  For advocates of legislation allowing terminally ill New Mexicans to end their own lives with the help of prescribed medication, Friday has been a long time coming.

But, for critics, it marks the first step down a path theyd long tried to block.

A new aid-in-dying law, which drew emotional debate at the Roundhouse in recent years before finally winning approval this year, is one of nearly 70 new laws set to take effect Friday.

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In preparation for the bills effective date, a new nonprofit group has been created to give information to families with ailing loved ones, and raise awareness of the new law among hospitals, doctors and hospice care providers.

Barak Wolff, board chairman for End of Life Options New Mexico, said the law was carefully tailored to provide safeguards, including an opt-out provision for physicians with moral objections.

This isnt being foisted on anybody, Wolff said Thursday. It is a rigorous process to be qualified, as it should be.

He also said less than 0.5% of total deaths in other states with similar laws in place  including Oregon and Washington  stem from patients taking end-of-life medication.

It really is used by very few, ultimately, Wolff said, adding many who seek medication to end their lives dont ultimately end up taking it for various reasons.

Under New Mexicos new law, a doctor can issue a prescription for life-ending medication only after determining the patient seeking it has the mental capacity to make such a decision.

In addition, patients have to be able to self-administer the medicine and only those deemed likely to die within six months will be able to obtain it. There will also be a 48-hour waiting period to get the prescription filled, with narrow exceptions.

Until Friday, it had been illegal for New Mexico medical practitioners to issue prescriptions for medication that patients could take to end their own lives.

The law was originally named after Elizabeth Whitefield, a retired judge who died in 2018 of cancer after imploring legislators to pass such a measure.

However, the new law also drew emotional opposition, including from Archbishop John Wester and other top state Roman Catholic officials.

Sen. Gregg Schmedes, a Tijeras Republican and physician, expressed concern Thursday that the new law could open the door to euthanasia for sick people who want to avoid being a burden on their family.

He also said the law could allow doctors or insurance companies to broach the subject of aid-in-dying medication with patients, while also predicting it could be loosened in future years to expand the type of patients eligible to qualify.

I think this is something that is primarily going to be utilized by the secular community in cities, Schmedes told the Journal. Its a law for rich people who want to control the end of their lives.

But Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, who signed the bill in April, described it as a long overdue change that would allow terminally ill New Mexicans to avoid significant pain and suffering at the end of their lives.

New Mexicans deserve every single dignity we as a state and as a community can provide them, the Democratic governor said after signing the bill. Dignity in dying  making the clear-eyed choice to prevent suffering at the end of a terminal illness  is self-evidently a humane policy.

Meanwhile, the aid-in-dying legislation is one of at least 68 bills approved during this years 60-day legislative session that will take effect Friday.

Under the state Constitution, bills approved by the Legislature and signed by the governor take effect 90 days after a legislative session ends, unless they specify a different effective date.

Nearly 40 additional bills will take effect July 1, which is the start of the states new fiscal year.

At a glance

About 70 new laws passed this year by New Mexico lawmakers will take effect Friday. Here are some of the high-profile new laws:

 Repealing New Mexicos long-dormant abortion ban;

 Allowing collegiate student athletes to be paid for endorsement deals;

 Making it easier for New Mexicans over 75 years of age to opt out of jury duty;

 Establishing a new state office of broadband access and expansion; and

 Allowing state District Court judges to qualify for public campaign financing.
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Copyright  2021 Albuquerque Journal

The city of Albuquerque during the pandemic has filed liens against 10 hotels for unpaid lodgers tax, including at least four associated with one of the states most prominent hoteliers.

Jim Longs Hyatt Regency in Downtown, Hotel Chaco and Hotel Albuquerque in Old Town and Nativo Lodge in Northeast Albuquerque, had an estimated $336,000 in combined unpaid lodgers tax and hospitality fees as of April, according to liens filed with the Bernalillo County Clerk.

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As of last week, the city estimated there was $420,000 in unpaid lodgers tax and hospitality fee revenue throughout Albuquerque. It now has filed more than twice as many liens for the debt as it did all of last fiscal year, when it took that action against four hotels.

While city spokeswoman Sarah Wheeler said it is common practice to file liens after three months of unpaid lodgers taxes, she said officials considered the pandemic this year. COVID-19 hit the hospitality industry particularly hard as the virus and associated lockdowns caused travel to plummet.

Considering the extraordinary circumstances attributed to the pandemic, the City held off on filing liens for more than one year, and some hotels were more than 15 months delinquent, Wheeler wrote in response to emailed Journal questions.

In the case of the Hyatt, Wheeler said the city began alerting the hotel last June about unpaid taxes  including for the pre-pandemic month of February 2020. Last September, it offered to establish a payment plan with the Hyatt. It sent two additional notices before filing a lien, she said.

Hotels collect the 5% Albuquerque lodgers tax and 1% hospitality fee from their guests and are supposed to forward the money to the city on a monthly basis.

In February, Wheeler said the city sent certified delinquency letters to 26 properties  about 15% of local lodging establishments that collect and remit the tax.

By April, half of the 26 had paid in full or signed on for payment plans. Three more had closed. The city filed liens against the remaining 10.

The City has a responsibility to the taxpayers of Albuquerque to ensure that taxes are collected fairly. The taxes were already collected by hotels, and all hotels that owed have been given numerous opportunities to work with the city on payment  including payment plans, Wheeler wrote.

Wheeler would not identify the specific hotels, but a Journal search of county records found seven, including Longs four hotels.

Journal attempts to reach representatives at the three other properties were unsuccessful Monday.

Contacted by the Journal last Friday about the liens, Long  CEO of Heritage Hotels & Resorts  said the company had held off paying lodgers tax to study the legal issues associated with the tax as it was assessed during the pandemic. Long said he still does not believe the tax was collected correctly by cities during the pandemic, but the company has begun making the deferred lodgers tax payments on the hotels it operates.

However, he added that the company intends to bring up the need to reform the law with the New Mexico Legislature in the future.

Long also said he didnt believe the city used the lodgers tax in accordance with the law during the pandemic.

We just think the law is poorly written, and the vagueness in the law has allowed cities to not comply, Long said.

The city said on Friday  two months after filing the liens  it received a payment covering all the back lodgers tax owed on Hotel Albuquerque. By Monday, Hyatt, Hotel Chaco and Nativo Lodge were also paid up, according to the city.

While the Hyatt remains closed, Long said it is not due to the lodgers tax debt. He said he aims to reopen in September, depending on the return of large events to the Albuquerque Convention Center.

This is a hotel that relies on conventions, and it relies on business travel, Long said. And those are the two segments of the hospitality industry that will be the slowest to bounce back.

Lodgers tax is generally funneled back into the tourism industry. State law requires at least half of the revenue go toward marketing the city to tourists. Other uses include tourism-related facilities. Albuquerque, for example, issued $26.3 million in new bonds in 2019 to fund several projects, including a massive overhaul of Los Altos Park and a new indoor track for the convention center.

The city was to pay off those bonds and other similar debt with lodgers tax.

As the hotel business cratered during the pandemic, the citys general fund  which usually covers day-to-day expenses like police and animal shelter operations  picked up the slack.

The city budgeted $3.5 million from the general fund to help cover such debt this fiscal year, and Wheeler said the outstanding lodgers tax should not require additional subsidy from the general fund as the city expects hotels to eventually pay it.
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Copyright  2021 Albuquerque Journal

Albuquerque officials can continue planning the Gateway Center unfettered by ordinance-mandated bed limits after the City Council struck down a proposal that would have capped capacity at homeless shelters.

Councilor Pat Davis proposal that would have restricted overnight shelters to 10, 30 or 100 beds based on zoning  with the potential to double if certain conditions were met  failed on a 1-8 vote during a special City Council meeting Thursday.

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Davis proposed the limits as part of the councils annual update to the citys Integrated Development Ordinance.

There are currently no shelter capacity restrictions in the IDO, but the issue has garnered attention as the city plans its Gateway Center shelter and services hub in Davis Southeast Albuquerque district.

The city recently purchased the old Lovelace hospital on Gibson Boulevard for the project.

While the city has yet to reveal a complete operational plan, officials in Mayor Tim Kellers administration have indicated the site might accommodate 150 to 175 shelter beds.

Had Davis proposal passed, the city would have been restricted to 60 beds at the facility.

Davis said the limits would prevent shelters from warehousing people and from overwhelming individual neighborhoods.

It would help the city be sure with any new shelters were opening that they open with a capacity that can be maintained by a neighborhoods carrying capacity, he said.

But the proposal failed to garner any additional council support.

Councilor Diane Gibson said she found it problematic. It almost feels like we are trying to limit people (in one area) because of their condition, she said.

While the councils decision was lopsided, public comments were more evenly split.

Several people spoke in favor of the proposal, with some arguing that the neighborhoods around the Gateway Center already have a higher concentration of social services than other parts of Albuquerque.

How much is too much for one section to take while affluent neighborhoods escape their fair share? Raven Del Rio said.

But other speakers objected to the capacity restrictions, saying it could hamper efforts to address the growing number of people who are homeless.

For a successful response to homelessness, we do not want to see further complications and barriers to the development of shelters through added regulation, said Brie Sillery, who said she was representing the New Mexico Coalition to End Homelessness.

Kellers administration on Thursday praised the councils decision.

While so many of our neighbors struggle to find shelter and support, we should be focused on how we can provide compassionate care to those in need, not how quickly we should start turning people away, Albuquerque Family and Community Services Director Carol Pierce said in a written statement.
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DENVER  State officials have closed a residential treatment center in Watkins for troubled children after repeated complaints of licensing violations that include runaways, drugs being smuggled into the facility, lax supervision and repeated use of restraints.

The Colorado Sun reports that officials arrived at Ridge View Youth Services Center just after a high school graduation on Thursday and moved children to other foster care placements. The center offers an on-campus charter school and behavioral health treatment. The Department of Human Services ordered it to close by July 1.

The center, which was caring for fewer than 50 boys, will not have its license renewed because of repeated licensing violations, the department said in an email. Ridge View is a state Division of Youth Services center that serves boys with a criminal history.

Jerry Adamek, a center board member, said officials arrived without notice and that students were in class and therapy sessions. Adamek said the center had accepted new youth at the states request during the pandemic and that it will appeal the closure.

According to records obtained by The Sun through public information laws, Ridge Views license was placed on probationary status in 2018 and 2019. State officials identified 83 potential licensing violations in 2019.

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ALBUQUERQUE, N.M.  Authorities say a gunfight between Socorro County deputies and at least one person inside a truck Thursday night led to an explosion and left one man dead and two others seriously injured in Veguita.

New Mexico State Police spokesman Ray Wilson said no deputies were injured and 26-year-old Joseph Remalia, of Los Lunas, was charged with being a felon in possession of a firearm. He did not give the conditions of the two people, a man and a woman, that were injured.

Wilson said Socorro County deputies responded around 9 p.m. to 78 Pedro Place after a neighbor called 911 to report several people inside a pickup truck shooting guns at a vacant house.

He said the deputies were met with gunfire from at least one of the individuals before the deputies fired back. Wilson said during the shootout the truck was hit by bullets and there was an explosion.

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He said after the explosion one man took off into the desert and two men and two women were detained. Wilson said two of them were hospitalized, Remalia was arrested and the man who ran into the desert was found dead in a nearby arroyo.

He said the mans body was taken to the Office of the Medical Investigator in Albuquerque for identification and cause of death.

The identities of the individuals who were injured will not be released by State Police unless they are charged at a later date, Wilson said. This is a complex crime scene many details are still under investigation.

Socorro County Undersheriff Amanda Vega declined to answer any questions about the incident on Friday afternoon.
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SANTA FE  New Mexico is set to fully reopen on July 1  with the help of some rounding up to reach a 60% vaccine goal set by Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham.

The Democratic governor said Friday the states push to vaccinate residents against COVID-19 would continue, despite the long-awaited reopening.

Frankly, we need to be better than 60% fully vaccinated, Lujan Grisham said in a statement. The variants across the globe and in the U.S. present very serious risks to unvaccinated people, even young people.

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State health officials also said that expected vaccine data from Texas and the federal Indian Health Service would likely put New Mexico within the margin of error for the 60% fully vaccinated target, with Department of Health data showing 59.4% of eligible residents had completed their vaccine shots as of Friday.

The governor had set the goal of vaccinating 60% of adult residents by the end of Thursday  a target she said would allow the state to fully reopen July 1 since the vaccines can take two weeks to be fully effective.

However, reaching the goal has proven to be difficult, with vaccination rates in some New Mexico counties  many located in the states more conservative east side  still hovering below 40%.

In an attempt to reverse a slowdown in the vaccine administration rate, the Lujan Grisham administration in recent weeks announced incentives that included a $100 cash offer to those who complete their vaccine shots. The cash incentives ended Friday, with roughly $750,000 paid out, according to the Governors Office, but state health officials are planning more vaccine clinics, such as a Juneteenth event Saturday targeted at the states African American population.

In addition, New Mexico followed the lead of such other states as Ohio and Oregon, and launched a $10 million lottery sweepstakes for vaccinated individuals. Four initial winners of $250,000 were picked Friday, one from each region of New Mexico, though their names were not immediately released pending a confirmation of their vaccine status.

Meanwhile, the removal of mass gathering restrictions, restaurant capacity limits and a color-coded risk system for counties will come nearly 16 months  or 476 days to be exact  after Lujan Grisham first declared a public health emergency as the first cases of COVID-19 surfaced in New Mexico.

The restrictions currently in place for all 33 New Mexico counties include limiting restaurants to 75% of capacity indoors and on patios, and barring more than six patrons from sitting at the same table. The states public health order also bans public gatherings of more than 150 people.

The governors handling of the pandemic has drawn praise from some national health officials, but steady criticism from top New Mexico Republicans.

Sstate Senate GOP leaders issued a succinct statement after Fridays announcement. The statement said simply: Its about time.

Cases at lowest level since April 2020

While pandemic-related business restrictions will be eliminated July 1, top health officials have said they expect New Mexico to keep in place an emergency public health order of some kind, even after lifting the color-coded system.

Human Services Secretary David Scrase has said a face mask requirement for unvaccinated individuals may remain in place, per guidelines from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In addition, businesses, Native American tribes and other entities will be able to continue mandating masks for employees, customers and visitors at their discretion, according to the Governors Office.

And its not yet clear whether face coverings will still be required for students attending New Mexico public schools come this fall.

Currently, only children age 12 and over are eligible to get the COVID-19 vaccine, and 15.8% of state residents between the ages of 12 and 15 had competed their vaccine shots as of Friday, according to state DOH data.

We believe our level of immunity is in fact greater than 60%, including the immunity of those in our state who have had COVID-19 and have not been vaccinated, and those who have had a mild infection, as well, Scrase said Friday.

New COVID-19 cases in New Mexico recently dropped to their lowest level since April 2020.

The states death rate from the virus has also dropped significantly since its mid-December peak, though an additional six deaths were reported Friday, bringing the states death toll to 4,316 since the start of the pandemic.

Many of those who have died were elderly residents with underlying health conditions, though some younger New Mexicans also battled serious cases.

In all, there have been 204,698 confirmed COVID-19 cases in New Mexico  or nearly 10% of the states population  and more than 94% have fully recovered, according to state data, a number that could be even higher due to tracking gaps.

Putting health and safety first

More than 30 other states have already fully reopened by eliminating pandemic-related business restrictions and curfews, including New Mexicos neighboring states of Texas, Arizona, Oklahoma and Utah.

But Lujan Grisham has insisted that other states actions would not impact her administrations decision-making.

The pandemic has also raised questions about the governors legal authority to impose business restrictions and spend emergency dollars, but court challenges on such grounds have been unsuccessful to date.

And Lujan Grisham has staunchly defended her handling of the pandemic, specifically citing the states efforts to roll out COVID-19 testing and vaccines.

I know some will say this day is late in coming. I sure wish wed gotten here sooner, Lujan Grisham said Friday. I said all along: Vaccines are the way out, getting shots gets us there quicker.

We were always going to put health and safety first, the governor added. All along, we have taken the approach that will protect the most New Mexicans, knowing the unique health risks of our population, understanding and respecting how dangerous this virus is.
WENN/Doug Meszler Music

The rapper offers the house, where he and bandmates used to record their songs, up for rent to mark the 25th anniversary of his group's album 'Atliens'.

Jun 18, 2021

AceShowbiz - Rapper Big Boi is giving fans the chance to rent the Atlanta, Georgia home where OutKast recorded some of their biggest hits to celebrate the 25th anniversary of their album "Atliens".

The hip-hop star is offering three overnight stays at the pad known as The Dungeon via Airbnb, with the June and July (21) bookings available on a first come, first served basis once the application goes live on 25 June.

Successful devotees who live in the Atlanta area will also be given an added bonus - a ride to and from the home in an Escalade.

Once there, guests will be invited to take a tour of the famed basement, where OutKast and the Goodie Mob, both part of The Dungeon Family collective, created some of their earliest works, and even signed their names on the walls of the makeshift studio.

Other rooms are designed to pay homage to Atlanta venues which inspired the music of The Dungeon Family, while there is also a top-of-the-line studio filled with Yamaha audio equipment - a more recent addition to the property.

The home previously belonged to producer Rico Wade's mother, but Big Boi purchased it two years ago, and now he's teamed up with Airbnb bosses to offer up each of the overnight stays for just $25 (18).

As part of the deal, Airbnb officials will be making a donation to the Atlanta Public Schools Music Department to expand resources and increase access to music education for young students, reports TMZ.
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The WAG member, who also penned episodes of 'Wasteland', wrote back in September that 'if I didn't get better, I did not want to live like this,' before she took her own life after 13-month battle with the disease.

Jun 18, 2021

AceShowbiz - Hollywood writer Heidi Ferrer, who was known for her work on WB's "Dawson's Creek" and ABC's "Wasteland", has passed away at 50 years old. She died by suicide following a long battle with COVID-19.

Her husband, screenwriter, director and producer Nick Guthe, confirmed that Heidi took her own life on May 26 following an unremitting battle with long-haul COVID. In a Twitter post he uploaded shortly after his wife's passing, he shared a heartbreaking tribute along with a throwback photo of Heidi and the couple's then-toddler son.

"My beautiful angel, Heidi, passed over tonight after a 13 month battle with Long Haul Covid," Nick penned. "She was an amazing mother. She fought this insidious disease with the same ferocity she lived with. I love you forever and I'll see you down the road."

Heidi Ferrer's husband paid tribute to her in a heartbreaking tweet.

Heidi contracted the virus in April 2020, when the pandemic just started to hit the nation, and her health deteriorated steadily. She was bedridden a couple of months after she first fell ill and in constant physical pain, suffering from severe neurological tremors and severe fatigue.

Back in September, Heidi opened up in a blog post about COVID knocked her down. "In my darkest moments, I told my husband that if I didn't get better, I did not want to live like this. I wasn't suicidal, I just couldn't see any quality of life long term and there was no end in sight," she wrote.

More than a year after she contracted the virus, Heidi was bedridden again before her death. In her blog Girl to Mom, her husband Nick said, "The excruciating physical pain and inability to sleep from the pain led Heidi to the decision she would rather leave this world on her own terms before her condition worsened more."

He added, "Heidi loved hearing from all of you and she never would have made this decision if not for her intense suffering from Long Haul Covid." While he has "intentionally not shared that on social media" before, he noted that "the mental strain of Long Haul Covid sufferers is a public health crisis that must be addressed quickly."

Heidi is survived by her husband, 13-year-old son, mother and 2 sisters.
Movie

About the animal rights organization's request, senior vice president Lisa Lange says that their message to the studio is simple which is 'fish are our friends - not hors d'oeuvres.'

Jun 18, 2021

AceShowbiz - People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) bosses are urging Disney executives to splash out on vegan treats for the cast and crew of "The Little Mermaid (2022)" when it shoots in Sardinia this summer (2021).

They note that the film's star, Halle Bailey, is already vegan and that fish-free dishes benefit the planet.

"['The Little Mermaid'] Ariel would recoil with horror at the thought of eating her pelagic pals and the 1989 [animated] film even includes a scene in which Sebastian the crab escapes a ruthless chef," PETA senior vice president Lisa Lange tells WENN. "PETA's message to Disney is simple: Fish are our friends - not hors d'oeuvres."

In her letter to Disney production president Sean Bailey, PETA's senior manager of Animals in Film and Television Lauren Thomasson, writes, "Disney's 'The Little Mermaid' got it right in 1989 - fish are intelligent, emotionally complex, and playful, and they experience pain just like we do."

"I'm writing on behalf of the many Disney fans at PETA and animal advocates everywhere to ask that the live-action production be completely Flounder-friendly by providing only tasty, vegan, fish-free food for the cast and crew on set. Eating vegan is the easiest and most effective way each of us can protect animals and our planet - just ask cast members Halle Bailey, a vegan, and marine life enthusiast Javier Bardem."

The animal rights organisation bosses have also asked Disney chiefs to consider not using real marine life in the film, replacing them with computer generated creatures.
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Four years after the terror attack claimed the lives of 22 fans, experts claim in a 200-page report that 'more should have been done' by police and security officials to prevent it.

Jun 18, 2021

AceShowbiz - Security staff failed to prevent the bombing at Ariana Grande's 2017 Manchester Arena concert, investigators have ruled.

Four years after the terror attack claimed the lives of 22 fans as they left the venue, experts have started dishing out blame, insisting security teams missed multiple chances to prevent the tragedy.

Bomber Salman Abedi detonated a home-made explosive device in the foyer of the venue as concertgoers were leaving. More than 800 people were injured by the blast.

A 200-page report into the attack has now been published, and in it investigators state, "There were a number of missed opportunities to alter the course of what happened that night," adding, "More should have been done" by police and security officials to prevent the bombing.

The report, which has been in development for nine months, notes police chiefs should have identified Abedi as a potential threat on the night of the attack.

The leaders of the inquiry have also named arena operators SMG and security company Showsec as "principally responsible" for missed opportunities to prevent or minimize the "devastating impact of the attack."

John Saunders, who chaired the inquiry, also notes that a teenage security guard failed to take effective steps after a member of the public raised concerns to him about Abedi.

He also criticizes SMG's inadequate surveillance camera system, which gave Abedi the opportunity to hide from view for close to an hour before the bombing.

"It is implicit in the findings that I have made that both SMG and Showsec failed to take steps to improve security at the Arena that they should have taken," Saunders explains, also revealing that of the four British Transport Police officers on duty at the arena on the night of the blast, two had taken a two-hour meal break, driving miles away from the arena, despite the fact the national terror threat level in the U.K. was severe.
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In a video recorded by spectators during the tragic accident, the motorcycle stuntman can be seen riding his bike through a field before jumping off a ramp and smashing into a large dirt mound.

Jun 18, 2021

AceShowbiz - Alex Harvill has passed away in a tragic accident. The daredevil rider died on Thursday, June 16 at the age of 28 after crashing while practicing for an attempt at a world-record 351-foot motorcycle jump.

The tragedy happened at the Grant County International Airport in Moses Lake, Washington, according to the Grant County Coroner's Office. In the video recorded by spectators from a distance, the 28-year-old could be seen riding his bike through a field before jumping off a ramp.

The motorcycle stuntman was actually trying to break the Guinness World Record for the longest motorcycle ramp jump, which was previously set at 351 feet by Robbie Maddison in March 2008. During his jump, however, the late bike rider came up short of his destination and smashed into a large dirt mound. The crash sent him flying over the handlebars of his Suzuki 450 and flipping dozens of feet forward.

iFIBER One reported that the fatal practice jump was his first of the morning and was a 150-foot jump. Meanwhile, some eyewitnesses claimed that his helmet flew off of his head after the crash, as per KIMA-TV reports.

Alex was reportedly rushed to Samaritan Hospital in Moses Lake after first responders tried to treat him at the scene, before ultimately succumbing to his injuries. An autopsy is scheduled to be performed on Friday, June 18 to identify his cause of death, according to the Grant County Sheriff's Office via Facebook.

"We regret to report today at our first event of the airshow -- the Guinness World Record Jump Attempt, Alex Harvill was injured during his warm-up before the jump and has been taken to the hospital," the Moses Lake Airshow said in a statement on its Facebook page prior to his death. "We do not have more information at this time regarding the incident."

The airshow also vowed to donate proceeds from the jump towards medical expenses for Alex. "Our hearts are with Alex and his family. All proceeds from today's jump will be donated to Alex to contribute to his medical expenses," they declared.
Movie

Two members of the organization, Diederik van Hoogstraten of the Netherlands and Wenting Xu of China, cite 'corruption and verbal abuse' as part of the reasons of their resignation.

Jun 18, 2021

AceShowbiz - The Hollywood Foreign Press Association has fired back after two of its members resigned following months of controversy over its lack of diversity. After two Golden Globes voters decided to terminate their memberships with the embattled organization over alleged "corruption" and "bullying," the HFPA released a statement to dismiss the allegations.

"At a time when the overwhelming majority of our members have chosen to be a part of change, it is disappointing that some members have decided to try and splinter our organization and sow division and doubt," the HFPA said in the statement released on late Thursday, June 17, calling out the former members' decision. Claiming that the organization has resolved to change, it added, "While some may have their own agendas, the Board and membership of the HFPA share one, common goal - passing the transformational change our organization needs."

The statement went on to read, "The Hollywood Foreign Press Association is an organization with more than 75 years of history. The amount of change that we have accomplished thus far is only the beginning. This is a crucial time for our organization, and we stand ready to collaborate with our members and outside groups to make this change a reality. We are forever grateful to the members that have decided to stay the course during this historic and trying time to help make this new era a reality for the HFPA."

Earlier Thursday, L.A. Times reported that Diederik van Hoogstraten of the Netherlands and Wenting Xu of China sent a letter of resignation to the HFPA leadership. The two overseas journalists said in their letter that the HFPA is a place where "bullying of members by members is left unquestioned and unpunished. The badgering of talent and publicists: ditto."

Van Hoogstraten and Xu also called out the practice of doling out large fees to members for serving on committees. "Payments for internal jobs have skyrocketed lately. Morally and fiscally this self-dealing and sense of entitlement is a scandal in and of itself. But the lack of transparency goes beyond just the financials: since February most decision-making has happened behind closed doors," they wrote.

Alleging that the organization is reluctant to make transformative changes, they added, "The majority of the membership resists transformative change. Internal opposition to the status quo has been stifled, and critical voices such as ours have largely been ignored." They summarized the culture of the HFPA as one of "insulation, silence, fear of retribution, self dealing, corruption and verbal abuse."

The HFPA came under fire earlier this year after it was unveiled that none of its 87 members were black. In fact, the association had not had a new black member since Meher Tatna, its former president, in 2002. The reports prompted various celebrities, publicists and production houses, including Netflix, Amazon and WarnerMedia, to back away from the HFPA and the Globes. NBC also announced that it would not broadcast the 79th Golden Globe Awards ceremony in 2022.

In response to the criticism, the HFPA released a new timeline for its reforms, including the addition of 20 members this year, with a focus on adding black journalists to the group's ranks. The whole process is expected to be completed by the week of August 2.
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After his ultra-luxury 5-star private estate went up in flames, the 'Girls Gone Wild' creator explains that he is looking at about three or four months to 'open up again.'

Jun 18, 2021

AceShowbiz - Joe Francis has shared an update of the fire incident that severely damaged Casa Aramara, a private beachfront Mexican estate he owns. The "Girls Gone Wild: Girls on Girls, Vol. 2" director revealed that the authorities suspected the blaze was caused by arson from a neighbor.

"The house was being rented by a group of 20 people and the fire broke out around 10 P.M. Tuesday night," the 48-year-old told Fox News. The entrepreneur explained further, "The first thing we did was get our guests to safety. That was obviously the priority and then to save the physical property." He then revealed why the police are investigating, saying, "But what's happened here is arson that's what authorities think."

Explaining the extent of the damage, Joe said only the main house on the beach was really affected badly by the fire. "The other structures on the estate are fine. There's no damage at all. Only the front facade [of the main house] and the roof were damaged in the fire," he told the publication.

Joe added, "So we're looking at about three to four months to open up again, according to the contractor." During the conversation, he also shared that he already planned to shut down, rebuild and bring guests back as soon as possible. "We're stronger and we'll be better and we always have. So, you know, it's a challenge. But here we go," he noted.

His ultra-luxury 5-star private estate went up in flames on Tuesday, June 15. "A tragic inferno struck @CasaAramara last night. Fortunately no one was injured," Joe wrote alongside an Instagram video of the resort's main building in a blaze. "The most tragic part about the whole incident is it could've been avoided or minimalize dramatically."

In the caption, Joe claimed that the homeowners association of Punta Mita "refused to let in the firefighters in [the] security gates for 3 hours." He doubled down on the allegations, adding, "They were direct orders by a neighbor of Casa Aramara to let the house 'burn as much as possible.' "

Joe pointed out that the "damage is extensive" as a result, but "the other four buildings" on the 4,000-square-foot property were "completely untouched" by the fire. "The main structure should be fully repaired in the next 3 to 4 months," he penned. He then ended his note, "Thank you for all of your thoughts and prayers!"

Casa Aramara has been frequented by several A-list stars over the years. Besides the Kar-Jenners, a number of other A-lister stars have stayed at the expansive home, including Russell Wilson and Ciara, Hailey Baldwin, P. Diddy, Jennifer Aniston, Selena Gomez, Eva Longoria and Ashton Kutcher.
WENN/C.Smith Celebrity

Sharing one of his 13-month-old son Wyatt's milestones, the CNN anchor reveals his reaction was unlike what others would've expected as he wishes that Benjamin would've told him white lie.

Jun 18, 2021

AceShowbiz - Anderson Cooper makes it clear that he doesn't want to miss any milestone in Wyatt's life. In a new interview, the "Anderson Cooper 360" host revealed that his ex Benjamin Maisani left him "really pissed" with text about his son's first walk.

While appearing as a guest on "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert" on Wednesday, June 16, the 54-year-old dad told Stephen Colbert, "I got really pissed at Benjamin." On the reason why, he opened up, "I was going to Israel last week, it was my first work trip for '60 Minutes' and I was doing an interview and I get this text from Wyatt's other dad, Benjamin, and he said, 'He just walked!!' "

Rather than being overjoyed by his son's achievement, Anderson jokingly added, "My reaction was fury." He explained, "In my household when I grew up, you would lie about everything. He should have just lied." The so-called silver fox then quipped, "He should have lied and said, 'Oh no, he's not walking at all so when I got home and he walked, we'd be like, 'Oh my god! It's the first walk.' "

Of his 13-month-old son Wyatt's new milestones, Anderson joked that his son walks "like a drunken sailor," adding that while he's talking, it's not exactly in English. "He talks in a dialect of Hindu or Urdu, I'm not sure," the CNN anchor told host Stephen. He then praised his little boy, saying, "It's incredible. It's a really interesting dialect. He doesn't make any sense at this point, but he's really committed to it."

With Father's Day coming up this weekend, Anderson admitted that until his son's birth, he didn't truly have a connection to the holiday since his own dad passed away when he was 10. "The pain was so great for most of my life I didn't know Father's Day was this date," he shared.

"And yet, the interesting thing about having a child is it's made me sort of connect with my dad and my mom's past and my brother's past in a way that I never really anticipated," Anderson continued. He went on to say, "I feel like I'm in communion with them in some strange way. I remember things about my dad that I never remembered before because I'm experiencing them with Wyatt as a dad."
The Delta variant of Covid-19 is expected to become the dominant strain in the United States, and it's further reason why people need to ramp up the vaccination pace, said the director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In an interview with CNN on Friday, Dr. Rochelle Walensky said that the Delta variant's increased transmissibility could allow it overtake the Alpha variant, first identified in the United Kingdom, in the US in the coming months.

'The UK variant was more transmissible. That is now nearly 70% of the virus here,' she said. 'We know that the Delta variant is even more transmissible than the UK variant, and I anticipate that will be the predominant variant in the months ahead.'

Walensky reiterated that the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines offer good protection against the variant  after the second dose.

'After two doses  reminding you, get your second dose  after two doses, you are protected from that Delta variant,' she said. 'And studies are underway now to examine the Johnson & Johnson. We just don't have as much data with that vaccine.'

Another vaccine expert says that time is running out to get ahead of the potential strain of variants  as odds stack against the US reaching President Joe Biden's goal of 70% of adults at least partially vaccinated by July 4, especially as demand drops off.

'Vaccines are our only way out of this,' Dr. Paul Offit told CNN's Wolf Blitzer. 'Unless we vaccinate a significant percentage of the population before winter hits, you're going to see more spread and the creation of more variants, which will only make this task more difficult.'

Cases and infections have decreased, Offit said. But with hundreds of people dying and at least 10,000 people infected most days, the rates are still too high to prevent the summer lull from turning into a winter surge, he said.

13 states have fully vaccinated more than half of residents

More than 44% of the US population is fully vaccinated, or 148.5 million people, according to the latest data from the CDC.

At least 13 states have fully vaccinated more than half of their residents. Those states are Connecticut, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington.

While the pace of vaccinations across the country has slowed, more than 900,000 new people on average become fully vaccinated daily, according to the CDC data.

In California, health officials announced the launch of a new website where residents can access a digital version of their Covid-19 vaccination card and use as proof of immunization -- but they said the electronic record will not be mandated.

'While (the California Department of Public Health) recommends that vaccinated Californians keep their paper CDC card in a safe and secure place, we recognize that some people might prefer an electronic version,' California state epidemiologist Dr. Erica Pan said in a statement. 'And if one of the state's nearly 20 million vaccinated Californians misplaces their paper card, the Digital COVID-19 Vaccine Record provides a convenient backup.'

Variants should encourage people to get vaccinated, experts say

Experts have cautioned that the continued spread of the virus could lead to more numerous  and potentially more transmissible and dangerous  variants.

The US has already seen surges of the highly transmissible Alpha and Delta variants, while the spread of the Gamma variant is growing in several states.

To attain herd immunity, or the point at which the virus cannot easily spread within the community, experts have offered estimates of it requiring the inoculation through infection or vaccination of between 70 to 85% of the population. According to the CDC, only 53% of the population has received at least one dose of the vaccine.

And only 65% of adults have received at least one dose.

'You would have thought at the beginning of this, knowing that vaccines are our only way out of the pandemic, the hardest part would have been figuring out how to construct these vaccines,' said Offit, a key member of the Food and Drug Administration's Vaccines Advisory Committee. 'The hardest part is convincing people to get it, which is remarkable.'

Spreading variants shouldn't be a concern to those who are vaccinated, Dr. Anthony Fauci told NPR, but it should be an incentive to get vaccinated.

The CDC elevated the Delta variant to a variant of concern this week. Fauci said that 'the combination of more transmissibility and greater severity of disease, appropriately, prompted the CDC to elevate it to a variant of concern.'

When asked how concerned he was about the variant, Fauci said: 'I'm not concerned about the people who are vaccinated. Because the good news about all this, among the seriousness of the situation with regards to the variant, is that the vaccines work really quite well.'

People who are vaccinated are protected, 'which is another very good reason to encourage people strongly to get vaccinated because if you are not vaccinated, you are at risk of getting infected with a virus that now spreads more rapidly and gives more serious disease,' said the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

Vaccine protection could last a year or much longer

Experts and officials are pressing for people who are still hesitant to get the vaccines and help slow the spread.

'What do we do if a critical percentage of this population chooses not to get vaccinated and chooses to allow this virus to continue to spread, continue to hurt themselves and others and continue to create variants which become all the more contagious and all the more difficult to contain,' Offit said.

Protection offered by vaccines appears to be very strong, Offit said.

'Although immunity might fade for protection against mild disease or asymptomatic infection or low moderate disease, I think protection against critical disease will probably be relatively long-lasting, meaning for a few years,' he said. 'The so-called cellular immune response induced by these vaccines appears to be excellent.'

But experts can only rely on six months of data, since the vaccines are so new. And scientists still can't say for sure how long the protection will last.

Their durability will determine whether the population will need boosters, Fauci said.
CHICO, Calif.- California has dropped the workplace mask rule for vaccinated workers.

Action News Now spoke with employees at Broadway Heights in Chico to see how theyre adjusting.

For the first time in over a year, the restaurant looks just like it did before the pandemic. Employees said they are happy to see their customers smiling faces again and excited to not have to mask up anymore.

Its great to see their face, Im like oh thats what you look like, and its good that I can breathe easy and Im not dying under my mask and its also nice people can see my cheerful face again too, said employee Lesa Sheridan.

Sheridan said she feels comfortable interacting with customers without a mask.

RELATED: California drops workplace mask rule for vaccinated workers

I know people are getting vaccinated out there, some people are not, but I myself feel totally safe, she said.

Broadway Heights owner, Scott Schulman, said he lifted all restrictions at his restaurant Tuesday when the state reopened.

Were getting a constant barrage of things we should do we shouldnt do. Do it voluntarily, dont do it voluntarily. Who do you listen to? The governor, Cal OSHA, Butte County, so we just decided nothings mandatory its all voluntary, said Schulman.

He said they are still keeping their tables far apart.

Schulman tells Action News Now they are doing everything they can to stay safe and have been doing so since the pandemic started.

He said vaccinated employees are able to take their masks off and those who arent vaccinated are encouraged to wear one but not required.

Schulman adds that its a big challenge for him like many other businesses right now is hiring employees.
CHICO, Calif. - Councilmember Scott Huber said he resigned from his summer job due to persistent harassment to the company.

Huber said he would be away for a seasonal job at the Grizzly Country Wildlife Adventures as a Wildlife Guide in Jackson, Wyoming.

RELATED: Chico councilmembers summer plans make some concerned

On Wednesday, Huber said that he would not miss any council meetings and he checked with the city clerk before accepting the job in Jackson.

Johnathan Hunt, the owner of Grizzly Country Wildlife Adventures, said he was not aware Huber was a council member in Chico.

Hunt hired Huber because he thought Huber would be a good fit for his company because of his love for nature.

Since offering Huber the job, Hunt said his company has received negative reviews and scathing emails. He said his business is family owned and he has nine employees, as this has impacted his business and employees.

Hubers statement is below:

Due to the persistent harassment of my summer employer I have resigned from the company to save them from additional harm to their business. I have no additional comment. Thank you, Scott Huber.
REDDING, Calif. - A ribbon-cutting ceremony kicked off a big day for the Redding airport, its first flight from Redding to Seattle.

"The Redding community has been dying and begging for affordable convenient travel and this is our answer," said Ericka Jones, one of the first people first on board.

Jones thinks this new connection will boost the local economy.

"As more of our community uses these services the airport will only become more efficient," Jones explained. "They will increase their runaway, I think we will see bigger planes coming in."

Once passengers went through TSA checkpoints at the terminal, it was time to get on and buckle up.

RELATED: New Alaska Airlines flight touches down at the Redding Airport

The airport manager said at least 70 people hopped on board Alaska Airlines en route to Seattle Friday.

One of those people includes Alaska native Julie Bendle.

"It's wonderful because Sacramento is so far away. Now I'm like five minutes to the airport and hop out of the plane there hop from Seattle to Alaska," Bendle said.

After crews loaded the last bag, it was time for take-off.

A trip from Redding to Seattle costs $95 both ways.

The Redding Airport manager tells Action News Now if more airlines decide to come to Redding in the future, he might propose an airport expansion to the city council.
REDDING, Calif. - A new northern connection touched down at the Redding Airport on Thursday evening.

The new Alaska Airlines flight connects Seattle and Redding. The Redding Airport hopes it will lead to more people flying in and out of Redding instead of San Francisco or Sacramento.

Redding Airport said its already seeing a lot of people booking flights for Seattle.

People are excited about this new connection.

It will sure make it a whole lot easier to get here, said Jeremy Pollard of Redding.

There's not a whole lot between here and Sacramento and up to Seattle as well. There's a lot of empty space on I-5 and that'll make it a whole lot easier for people to get here.

The cost to fly Seattle is $95 both ways.

Reliability is something that folks want and reasonable prices, said Jim Wadleigh, the Redding Airport Manager. I know that Alaska [Airlines] offers both of those.

RELATED: Alaska Airlines will arrive in Redding Thursday

The new direct flight also expands options for both domestic and international travel. With three airlines now flying out of Redding, people will have an easier time flight to bigger cities, either for business or for pleasure.

My opinion is that it's a really good thing for Redding for flights up to Seattle, said James Whitman of Redding. I think there are a lot more people that will use it. It's also a good commute for people, like Microsoft and other tech industry people.

On Friday morning, the first Redding to Seattle flight will take off around 7:30 a.m.

Just last month, the Redding Airport launched services from Redding to Burbank through Avelo Airlines. United Airlines flies from Redding to Los Angeles and San Francisco.
5paisaCapital Limited (5paisa Capital), Indias only listed pure play discount broker, has hired Ankit Fitkariwala as Chief Business Officer &Head of Products. His main focus will be to further fortify the Companys digital presence and enhance overall process of customer acquisition.

Prior to joining 5paisa, Ankit Fitkariwala worked with Paytm Money as the Head of Investment Products. At Paytm, he was instrumental in building digital platform for investment products. He has over 10 years of experience in the financial services sector. Ankit has earlier worked with Jefferies, DBS Bank, Cisco Systems and Smartwiz (which he also co-founded). He completed his MBA from IIM Calcutta and B.E. from Jadavpur University.

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Commenting on the appointment, Mr. Prakarsh Gagdani, CEO, 5paisa, said, 5paisa has been growing at a rapid pace and we see huge opportunities in expanding our customer base and product offerings related to investments. We are in the process of strengthening our senior management team. Ankits addition to the team is in sync with these objectives and I am confident that together, we will achieve great heights.

Ankits experience of creating successful fintech products for retail investors bodes well for us. This is because majority of our existing and potential customers are first-time investors in the capital markets from smaller locations across India.

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5paisa.com has on-boarded more than 2 Lakh new customers during Q4FY21, taking the total number of registered customers to 13.5 Lakh. The 5paisa mobile app is used by over 7 Million investors and enjoys a rating of 4.0+ stars on Playstore.

5paisa Capital recently raised251 Crore from marquee investors including Ward Ferry, Fairfax and RIMCO. With the requisite growth capital, the Company is on track to be among the top three brokers in India.
To honor our parents, we don't need any particular day to celebrate. However, days like father's day & mother's day are commemorated to make them feel special and to show our love as well as gratitude towards them.

This day is celebrated worldwide to recognize the contribution and sacrifices that father's make for their child to bring a smile on their face and to acknowledge the importance of fatherhood as well as male parenting.

The first loving and caring man for every child is his/her life is their father and they deserve to know how much they mean to their family. Father's are said to be superheroes though they don't have a super power but they have always been supportive to their children, be it an arguement with mom or something else, we will always see them standing by our side no matter what!

From piggyback rides to being a superhero who always had our back, Dads make several silent sacrifices to make us who we are today.

No child can ever thank God enough to give them a special gift like their father..

To thank all the father's and to honor them with love and effection, Brands have come up with amazing campaigns and messages for the pillar of the family,

Louis Philippe, Indias leading premium menswear brand from Aditya Birla Fashion and Retail Ltd., has launched a simple, heartwarming, yet powerful campaign to commemorate the Fathers Day. The brand has released the campaign across its digital platform with an aim at celebrating the father-children bond. The campaign christened as #ThanksDad features young professionals thanking their fathers for all they did to raise them right.

Fathers are the superheroes who are always there for us no matter what the situation is. Mankind Pharmas Multivitamin and minerals brand Health OK has launched an emotional campaign titled #expressthetoughlove, focusing on the father-son relationship. The video highlights the modern-day relationship between a father and a son.

Mankind Pharmas pregnancy detection brand, Prega News has come up with a special message celebrating the spirit of Fatherhood featuring its brand ambassador Anushka Sharma. Fathers are the real superheroes for their kids, adapting to new roles and working selflessly for their childrens brighter future. It is a perfect day to acknowledge their contribution to our lives.

CARS24, India's leading e-commerce platform for pre-owned vehicles, has rolled out its latest heart-warming campaign- Kyuki Papa Sab Jaante Hain- through a poetic video to show some love to the big-man on Fathers Day. The video celebrates the man who doesnt wear a cape but is our eternally favourite superhero  the one we can always fall back upon!

VAIO has come up with a beautiful video fun Ad video that depicts teaching the first words to crucial business lessons. Dads are the invaluable force that pushes us to do better, live better, be better. Here's to your relentless dedication, unconditional love, exemplary persistence, and an undeniable presence responsible for who we are and what we aspire to be. #VAIOCelebratesFatherhood this Father's Day.

TVS Srichakra Limited, Indias leading 2 & 3-wheeler Tyre Company, has rolled out a social media campaign #TurnItAround to celebrate Fathers Day 2021. Taking a simple, contextual situation that children are experiencing right now, due to the second wave of the pandemic, the campaign talks about how Fathers are our everyday heroes who can turn around any situation.

Fathers are those members of the family who selflessly and relentlessly work day and night to keep their entire family happy. Therefore, celebrating the occasion of Fathers Day, the premium personal care brand, Bombay Shaving Company releases a heart-warming video that brings out how thoughtful gifts strengthen the relationship between a father & child.

CashKaro has collaborated with Indian Comedian & Laughter Sensation 'Kiku Sarda', along with his son Shaurya, for a fun Ad video that depicts a regular father-son relationship and banter.

Diaper brand Mamypoko pants has unveiled a new campaign on the occasion of Fathers Day. The video titled #PapasWhoKnow highlights the fact that in modern society dads are today equally trying to involve in raising the child.

Fathers are the real life heroes in their childrens lives, the inspiration behind their actions and one of the most influential figures in their upbringing. On Fathers Day this year, we at Philips want to celebrate this special bond between fathers and their children through the launch of our campaign #KhulKeBolo with TVF.

With Fathers Day arriving this June 20th, tring made the occasion highly memorable for one fabulous father. A recently released video, filled with warmth and emotion, captures the former 5-time world chess champion Viswanathan Anand sending his wishes to a father on behalf of his son and daughter.

Glenfiddich, the worlds most awarded single malt whisky celebrates the life and experiments of ingenious minds and innovative thinkers by virtue of its #FathersofInnovation campaign. Glenfiddich continues to re-define fatherhood by acknowledging innovators who blazed their own trail by giving birth to path-breaking ideas.

#FathersofInnovation manifests the true spirit of innovation in consonance with the Worlds Most Awarded Single Malt which in itself is a reflection of integrity, passion and pioneering spirit passed down through five generations.

Seizing the occasion of Fathers Day, Luminous Power Technologies launched a thoughtful campaign #DADHEROES, putting a spotlight on how the role of fathers has evolved over the period of time. The video showcases how modern-day dads have been breaking all the stereotypes.

Dhara, Indias leading edible oil brand has rolled out a digital film celebrating the occasion of Fathers Day, which urges consumers to legally adopt and support unaccompanied children in this pandemic. Showcasing the joy of parenthood, the digital film subtly conveys a fathers love for her adopted daughter encapsulating the emotional connect beautifully.

This Father's Day ForMen has launched a video campaign called "Undekha". This video brings out the pattern that an Indian family follows, where fathers seem to be missing out on doing their part. But if looked closely, they are always there, on the sidelines, quietly but steadily supporting their kids, and standing by them.

This Fathers Day, Bajaj Allianz Life celebrates #WFHDadMoments. #WFHDads who worked hard glued to Teams and yet managed to played harder with kids.

ACKO General Insurance, a purely digital insurance company, has released a campaign film on the occasion of Fathers Day. Conceived by Lowe Lintas Mumbai, the film is a light-hearted take on how the bond and care remains unchanged even though the roles change over the years.

Voltas, the No. 1 AC from the house of TATAs, announces the launch of its DVC campaign #MahaAdjustableDads. Voltas salutes all super cool dads who have kept their calm in pressing circumstances and have supported their children through all the phases of their life.

Voltas Beko, the partner of everyday happiness, also launched a DVC for Fathers Day which is an effort to embrace the caring and protective side of fathers and their contribution to their families. This campaign, Dad is Not a Superhero, is an initiative to demystify the larger-than-life tags given to fathers.

The pandemic has re-shaped our perspective around the responsibilities of fathers at home and the way they are adapting to a new lifestyle while simultaneously fulfilling the promise of protecting their family. Recognising the larger role played by Fathers towards the family as well as society, this Fathers Day, SBI Life Insurance, one of the most trusted private life insurers in the country, has released a heart-warming digital film.

Every dad has a unique way of showing their care, and we love them for it. This Fathers Day, we created some badges for them. #Nerolac #FathersDay #ColoursThatCare

Didnt take a bath, didnt get out of sweatpants for weeks but dad will always see your #beauty. Just like #AcneStar.

#HappyFathersDay #skincare

Papa ko roz achha khilao aur unhe khud ka dhyaan rakhna sikhao. Bhejo apne papa ke saath pictures comments mein aur unhe fathers day ki shubhkamnay do : Gas-O-Fast

You don't need a day to thank your father for all the sacrifices he made for you - be it your 3 am ice cream craving, giving you heating pads on your period, or simply going pad shopping/purchasing pads for you! RIO Pads

He has always been a hero, a friend and a shoulder to fall back on. This Fathers Day, dont let loss of bladder control be the reason to take his smile away. Manage Incontinence with Friends Adult Diapers.

Fathers have a tact to dispense sagely advice that goes beyond words to teach us a lesson, etched in our memory to serve us at the right opportunity. #SonyPicturesNetworks

This Fathers Day, Zee Cinema, in-line with its belief Jazba Hai Jenene Mein, Jab Cinema Hai Seene Mein, strums the heart strings of its audience through a heart-warming video with an appeal to vaccinate our loved ones.

On the occasion of Fathers Day, ICICI Lombard, one of Indias leading non-life insurance companies, launched a digital campaign encouraging fathers to take the pledge of safety, by wearing the helmet while riding a two wheeler at the behest of their loved ones. The campaign is an extension of the insurers sustained communication around its Ride to Safety initiative.

Sensibly overcoming the logistical challenges posed by the pandemic, Hotstuff Advertising Pvt. Ltd. has produced this skillfully edited video with music and animation for IDFC Mutual Funds on the occasion of Fathers Day.

Kahaani ek Hero ki, aapke favourite Hero ki!

Happy Fathers Day! #ZeeCinema

MX Player says Admit it, we all secretly love #dadjokes
#ThankYouForBeingDabangg campaign by Cartoon Network, a WarnerMedia kids channel, received more than 500 messages of gratitude from across the country, for the Indian police force. The unique social media campaign aimed to honour the relentless work of Indias supercops during the ongoing challenge of COVID-19. The campaign was launched alongside the channels latest Bollywood-inspired action-comedy Dabangg  The Animated Series on May 31.

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Supported by Momspresso, leading parenting platform, the initiative saw kids and parents share messages in the form of handwritten notes, drawings, and videos, on social media. Bollywood superstar Salman Khan who plays Dabanggs iconic Chulbul Pandey and movie producer and actor Arbaaz Khan also encouraged kids to participate through their social media posts. Notable kids academy ABCD Dance Factory shared their messages in their distinctive artistic style via Instagram Reels, set to the Dabangg  The Animated Series title track while prompting its students to follow suit. YouTube Kids sensations Aayu and Pihu also participated via their eponymous show, and encouraged their followers too, to join in the conversation.

Speaking on the campaign, Abhishek Dutta, South Asia Network Head for Cartoon Network and POGO, said, #ThankYouForBeingDabangg was launched to collectively pause and appreciate the constant endeavour of the police force during the COVID-19 pandemic. It was heartening to see responses pouring in from every corner of the country, in various ways and in multiple languages, like Hindi, English, Tamil, Telugu, Marathi and more. It brings us immense joy to have created this movement and saluting our fearless heroes.

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Speaking on the initiative, DCP S.Chaitanya  Mumbai Police, said, "We are truly grateful for the enormous amount of love we have received from kids across the country through the #ThankYouForBeingDabangg initiative. This was such a thoughtful initiative by Cartoon Network and the creative ways in which the kids thanked us was very touching. We promise to continue being Dabangg for all of you!

Talking about the show Dabangg- The Animated Series, Anish Mehta, CEO, Cosmos-Maya said, At Cosmos-Maya, we are thrilled to reimagine an iconic franchise that is well-aligned with our familiarity with novelty formula. It is an honour to work alongside industry doyens such as Salman Khan and Arbaaz Khan and a broadcast partner such as Cartoon Network for Dabangg  The Animated Series while marking our 10th year of original IP creation in India."

Co-presented by Chocoliebe Eclairs and Cue Learn along with associate sponsor BritanniaTiger Krunch, the animated version of Bollywoods sensational supercop franchise airs every day at 12 pm, only on Cartoon Network.
ACKO Insurance is one of Indias leading digital insurance policy providers with its entire operations offered through the digital platform. Founded in 2016 by Varun Dua and Ruchi Deepak, ACKOs entire process is designed to provide better customer experience.

ACKO executes primarily through a digital platform with no offline hassles  zero paperwork from purchase, claims to renewals. ACKOs innovative products and smart technology offerings make it stand out. The company uses a direct-to-consumer approach for distributing traditional products, allowing for favourable risk selection and exceptional underwriting. ACKO also offers innovative and bite-sized insurance products such as rider insurance, mobile and appliance protection, ticket cancellation, etc., in partnership with 18+ leading players in the internet ecosystem such as Ola, Oyo, redBus, Zomato, HDB Financial Services and Urban Company.

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In our latest column  MARKETING MINDS  Ashish Mishra, Executive Vice President - Marketing, ACKO, speaks about how they are simplifying the insurance process, the emphasis on offering an intuitive digital journey to the customers, using TV & traditional media to create large scale awareness for the brand and more.

As a digital insurance company what is the kind of differentiation you bring in your products to nudge your customers for auto insurance? Insurance is still a low involvement category, so how are you driving growth for your company?

The Traditional Insurance category has been designed in a way that it appears too complicated to customers. At ACKO, we have always focused on simplifying the whole insurance category. We are obsessed with customer satisfaction. And we make sure that we deliver the same standard or better than what our customers are used to getting from brands like Amazon. Its important to understand that the core of our business strategy rests on the usage of tech and data to be able to provide better products that are attractively priced to our customers. Thats where the true differentiation lies. This is core to how we go about doing things. I have been part of meetings where the teams are debating at length if we should add a new feature that will increase the customers journey by just one more step. So, we have focused on fixing all three aspects of the journey  buying an insurance policy, renewing your insurance and the claim process. The whole experience is delivered through an intuitive digital journey that makes the customer feel that they are making an informed decision and are not overwhelmed while making this decision delivering strong customer satisfaction in the process. No wonder our app is rated 4.5 stars and above.

What has been the audience profile for your auto insurance? What kind of communication strategy have you been using to raise awareness of Acko in the market?

As you would expect with any insurance player, our profile is fairly mass. The Demographic majority of our customers is between 25 and 45 years and live in more than 600 cities across India. What differentiates ACKO customers slightly is that they are typically App first, which means that they would like to order products and services through an app or a website rather than walk into a branch or speak to someone. They are also curious, love to try new technologies, or at least explore the market to see if they can get a great deal. We are still a relatively young brand. Hence, our communication strategy is focused on talking about the key benefits of an ACKO insurance, that is, Zero Commission insurance delivered through a seamless digital experience (a truly zero paperwork process) and our ability to process claims faster. In some cases, we are able to process the claim and send the money across to the customer on the same day, which is unheard of in this industry. Our current campaign with Arshad Warsi, which is doing really well, is focused on encouraging customers to download the app and discover the ACKO experience. As we are growing, our media has also started to go pan India. We are heavy on mass media as it is the fastest way to raise awareness. There is some interesting work happening in terms of tie-ups and sponsorships that will hopefully help bring the brand ACKO in pop culture. Watch this space.

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With the second pandemic wave there has been a deep slip in the sale of automobile brands. How has it impacted your performance overall for both new insurance and renewals? In the last one year have you seen any major shift in people buying insurance online, especially after the pandemic? If so, how has it helped your company to garner some market share?

We have noticed that given the pandemic, more customers are moving to digital to complete their insurance needs. And this has a reflection on our business too. Last two months have been the best in the history of ACKO in terms of business.

IPL 2021 was cancelled mid-way. You were associated with a few franchisee teams. Has it impacted you as IPL was a great platform to engage with your audience? How are you making up for this move?

There are very few properties like IPL that provide you with access to such a large audience. But, I believe it was the right thing to do to cancel it during the middle of the big second wave. It also forced us to quickly pivot our media from being focused on IPL to other genres across TV and OTT platforms. We are seeing great results coming out of this move.

Digital has transformed every sector. How much emphasis do you give to digital in your overall media strategy? Where does mass media stand for you in todays scenario?

For us, TV and traditional mass media will remain key in the near future. A large bulk of our media money will be allocated to them. I count Digital TV or OTT in the same bucket. Truly digital advertising (performance and display) will make up around 25% of our budget. This strategy is designed because the brand is in a growth phase and we are looking for large scale awareness.
The Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (MIB) has amended the Cable Television Network Rules, 1994 by providing a statutory mechanism for redressal of grievance/complaints of citizens relating to content broadcast by television channels. This will strengthen the grievance redressal structure by giving broadcasters legal recognition for their association and bodies.

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The self-regulating bodies of the broadcasters will be registered with the Government. At present there are over 900 television channels which have been granted permission by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting all of which are required to comply with the Programme and Advertising Code laid down under the Cable Television Network Rules.

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Continuing to rule the roost, Moneycontrol Pro cements its leadership position in the digital business and finance segment. As per the recently released Global Digital Subscription Snapshot of 2021 Q2 Update Report by FIPP in association with CeleraOne  Moneycontrol Pro is ranked in the Top 20 list of Global Digital News Subscription Services and top 3 Digital News Subscription Services in Asia. With this  the platform joins the league of the worlds leading news publishing platforms in the likes of The New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal amongst others.

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Since its launch in April 2019, Moneycontrol PRO has become the countrys fastest growing subscription-based product  owing to its best-in-class services, innovative offerings, and in-house expert led team of market pioneers. It offers comprehensive research on the industry, curated markets data, exclusive trading recommendations, independent equity analysis, and actionable investment ideas that help investors to stay on top of their stock market game. Throughout its journey, Moneycontrol PRO kept on expanding its offerings through transformative services and collaborations, best exemplified by the editorial content partnership with global publishers, monthly webinars, online summits, exclusive interviews with Indias top fund managers. Through a platform-agnostic approach it continues to provide its diverse &ever-growing subscriber base of 3 lac+ active users premium, relevant and exclusive content.

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Sharing his thoughts on the achievement, Manoj Nagpal, Business Head, B2C Revenue, Moneycontrol said, In our endeavor to serve our users with finest services adept with the latest technology  we have gained the trust of people from all over the world. This is very well testified by the global recognition showcased in the report. In the past year, we gained more subscribers as people started to pay more attention to their investments to increase their earnings to cope with the market uncertainties. Content has always been one of the key differentiators for us. The period saw us go beyond the ordinary and build a comprehensive catalogue of webinars, conversations, and associations. This certainly is an encouraging win for the entire Moneycontrol team for their undeterred hard-work and determination. We are now, even more motivated to continue and bring the best-in-class offerings for our subscribers.

Moneycontrol PRO's innovative offerings, services and deals have always been in line with users best interests, making it an undisputed leader in the business and finance segment. Every milestone PRO has witnessed is a testament to its increasing popularity.

Read the entire report here
In a bid to make the chore of doing laundry more efficient, Indias best selling detergent brand Surf Excel by Hindustan Unilever launched the Surf Excel 3 in 1 Smart Shots, a single use soluble liquid detergent capsule with a unique three chamber design, specially designed for fully automatic front and top load washing machines. The product contains smart technology for advanced stain removal, long-lasting fragrance and care for fabrics, held together in the three chambers.



With Surf Excel 3 in 1 Smart Shots, one can simplify the laundry process by just putting one Smart Shot into the empty drum of the washing machine before adding the laundry. Its highly concentrated formula will deliver superior cleanliness of the clothes and hyper convenience for the user. Also, the capsule is completely soluble in water, leaving no residue on the clothes or in the machine. Surf Excel Smart Shots is a revolutionary design in laundry management, easy to handle and store. The pre-packed detergent is a great way to prevent spills, wastage and overdosing. There is also no opportunity for the liquids to come into contact with the skin, if used as recommended.



Speaking on the launch of Surf Excel 3 in 1 Smart Shots, Prabha Narasimhan, Executive Director and VP, Home Care, Hindustan Unilever Ltd. said, Surf Excel 3 in 1 Smart Shots is a breakthrough in design required to match the evolving needs of hyper convenience for the consumers. With the Surf Excel 3 in 1 Smart Shots, we are delighted to give consumers a quick and upgraded laundry experience. We know that the Indian consumer is discerning and looking for ways to decrease the load of household chores with innovative and efficient products, and we have always strived to provide such solutions.
Zeotap, the leading Customer Data Platform, has launched a new integration with Google Customer Match, enabling marketers to leverage their first-party data to engage audiences at scale across Google Search, Shopping, Gmail, YouTube and Display.2 In doing so, the new integration provides an important solution to addressability when third-party cookies deprecate at the end of this year.

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By becoming a Customer Match partner, Zeotap allows marketers to upload their first-party data to Google Customer Match via a simple API integration, streamlining the matching process. The resulting segments can then be included or excluded from Google Ads campaigns and used to tailor bid strategies, ad creatives and landing pages. This precision targeting helps deliver 79% higher CTR and 67% higher CVR than non-audience traffic.

Florian Lichtwald, Managing Director and Chief Business Officer of Zeotap, said: For any marketer looking to drive strong returns on their campaigns, the benefits of Google Customer Match have long been clear - Zeotaps role is to make it easier than ever to get those results. With the deprecation of third-party cookies on the horizon, this will help marketers in the crucial act of leveraging their first-party data to get better results from paid channels.

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Zeotaps API integration allows for matching based on several different types of data, including email addresses and Mobile Device IDs. Used as part of Zeotaps Customer Intelligence Platform, the integration also identifies non-Gmail email addresses, which helps achieve higher match rates compared to other upload processes. The process is safe and secure, as Zeotap completes security and data hashing protections prior to uploading, and is ISO 27001 compliant.
Federal Department of Foreign Affairs

Bern, 18.06.2021 - On 17 June, Federal Councillor Ignazio Cassis met France's Minister of Europe and Foreign Affairs Jean-Yves Le Drian in Paris. Talks focused on SwissEU relations and relations between Switzerland and France. Various international issues of current concern were also discussed.

At his meeting with Jean-Yves Le Drian, head of the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs Ignazio Cassis expressed the Federal Council's wish to continue Switzerland's partnership with the EU on the basis of the bilateral agreements. To this end, Switzerland has proposed to the EU that a political dialogue be initiated with a view to identifying and exploring shared priorities for future cooperation. The Federal Council also wishes to continue cooperation in a number of well-established areas.

A range of international issues were also on the ministers' agenda for the working dinner, including the recent trip to sub-Saharan Africa by the Head of the FDFA and the situation in Mali. Federal Councillor Ignazio Cassis described the work undertaken by Switzerland in the Sahel region. The two ministers also discussed the situation in Libya, looking forward to their participation in the Berlin conference on Libya on 23 June.

Strong bilateral and cross-border relations

Mr Cassis' visit to Paris is a demonstration of Switzerland's commitment to strengthening bilateral relations with France. Switzerland and France enjoy extremely close economic, human and cultural ties. During the visit, both the quality of bilateral relations and the scope and intensity of cross-border cooperation were emphasised, particularly against the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic. Mr Cassis and Mr Le Drian also addressed employment law issues in relation to the Swiss sector of Basel-Mulhouse Airport as well as the question of the governance of the Rhone waters.

Address for enquiries

FDFA Communication

Federal Palace West Wing

CH-3003 Bern, Switzerland

Tel. Communication service: +41 58 462 31 53

Tel. Press service: +41 58 460 55 55

E-mail: kommunikation@eda.admin.ch

Twitter: @SwissMFA

Publisher

Federal Department of Foreign Affairs

https://www.eda.admin.ch/eda/en/home.html




The Federal Council

Bern, 18.06.2021 - Switzerlands first state report on the implementation of the Istanbul Convention presents the countrys efforts to prevent and combat violence against women and domestic violence. The Federal Council approved the report on 18 June. The summary of the current situation emphasises the fundamental importance of cooperation between the Confederation, cantons and communes, together with civil society, in order for prevention efforts to succeed.

Violence against women and domestic violence are common in Switzerland and cause significant distress. A woman dies every 2.5 weeks on average due to attacks of this kind, with an estimated 27,000 children also affected by domestic violence every year. These figures having been rising slowly for years, with registered domestic violence offences reaching a new high of 20,123 in 2020.

Switzerland ratified the Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence (the Istanbul Convention) on 1 April 2018. Joining this treaty obligates countries to make consistent progress in developing their measures on prevention, victim protection and prosecution practices with respect to these forms of violence.

Now Switzerland has published its first state report on the implementation of the Istanbul Convention. State reports are intended to provide the Council of Europe with regular insight into the progress that member states are making in implementing the Istanbul Convention. Switzerlands first state report thus presents a summary of all activities aimed at preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence.

The Istanbul Convention has created new momentum in Switzerland, as combating violence against women and domestic violence has become the focus of political debate. In the 20192023 legislature planning, the Federal Council decided to define combating gender-based violence as one of the central areas of action in the 2030 gender equality strategy. In addition, Parliament included a national action plan to implement the Istanbul Convention in the legislature planning. The Confederation and cantons approved a roadmap as part of their strategic dialogues on the topic of domestic violence. The roadmap sets out measures to combat domestic violence, including a central hotline for those affected. Numerous plans of action and measures to implement the Convention were approved at cantonal and communal level.

At national level, starting this year private and public organisations running projects to combat and prevent violence against women can receive financial assistance from the Confederation. The website www.opferhilfe-schweiz.ch, which went online in 2019, contributes to protection and support by providing information and assistance to victims of violence.

Generally, Swiss law is able to satisfy the requirements of the Convention. The Federal Act on Improving the Protection of Persons Affected by Violence has been in force since 1 July 2020. The provision on the electronic monitoring of contact prohibitions and exclusion orders under civil law will come into force on 1 January 2022. In addition, at the start of this year the Council of States Legal Affairs conducted consultations on the revision of the law on sex offences. The offence of rape is to be redefined in a gender-neutral way, and it will be made an offence to carry out sexual acts with a person against their will even if no violence or threats are involved. This particular amendment aims to improve the protection given to victims of sexual assault under the criminal law.

The state report clearly demonstrates that the implementation of the Istanbul Convention is a collective responsibility: one requiring various policy areas to join forces, working together with the cantons and communes in consultation with civil society. The Federal Council continues to give top priority to combating violence against women and domestic violence.

Switzerlands first state report will serve as the basis for monitoring by GREVIO (Group of experts on action against violence against women and domestic violence), an independent body. After reviewing the first state report, the group of experts will make an evaluation visit in March 2022 and draw up recommendations for Switzerland by the end of 2022 based on their findings.

Address for enquiries

Sina Liechti

Communication Officer

Federal Office for Gender Equality

Tel. +41 58 467 42 02

sina.liechti@ebg.admin.ch

Publisher

The Federal Council

https://www.admin.ch/gov/en/start.html



Federal Department of Home Affairs

http://www.edi.admin.ch



Federal Department of Justice and Police

http://www.ejpd.admin.ch



Federal Office of Justice

http://www.bj.admin.ch



Federal Office for Gender Equality

https://www.ebg.admin.ch/ebg/en/home.html




MILO, Iowa  Robby Dittmer owns a Porsche. In fact, he owns three of them. But the vehicles Dittmer owns are not race cars. They are tractors.

When you think of a Porsche, you definitely dont think of tractors, says Dittmer, a farmer who also works as an agronomist with Agriland Farm Service in Indianola. A lot of people dont believe me when I say we have Porsche tractors.

The story of the Porsche tractors is a bit complicated, as is the story of how Dittmer came to own three of them, but one thing that isnt complicated is the attraction.

They have style, Dittmer says. They dont have the power that American tractors of the same era had, but they look good. When you see the tractor with its bright red paint, it really pops.

Its hard to argue with the assessment. The three Porsche tractors Dittmer owns  a 1958 standard, a 1960 junior and a 1960 standard  are eye-catching. They sport chrome trim and stylish grills.

They also include some unusual features. One includes a seat on the fender for a spare rider. It also has a PTO shaft under the chassis pointed forward instead of backward, apparently to facilitate a mower or some other piece of machinery. There are hitches on the front, as well as the back.

There are design features such as unusual headlights. And they are small tractors featuring air-cooled diesel engines at a time when most tractor engines were water-cooled and most small tractors used regular gasoline.

The one-cylinder engine on the junior, a small tractor, only produces about 14 horsepower. The other tractors are perhaps double that. And Dittmer says it is clear that the German-made tractors were designed for a different type of agriculture, where they were used for pulling wagons or doing light fieldwork rather than for plowing or heavy tillage.
For area farmers, summer is an extremely busy season. There are weeds and water to manage, equipment to maintain and crops to harvest and store. All of these aspects are crucial to producing the regions premium grains, but they are all steps that have the potential for accidents to occur.

Before diving into the busy summer months, Austin Grazier, director of the Montana Agriculture Safety Program, recommends producers develop an overall safety plan, and before working with equipment and storing grain, going over that plan and safety guidelines with employees.

Just having a quick meeting with employees to discuss safety is crucial. They dont have to be long tedious meetings, just five minutes before the start of the day, Grazier said for example.

According to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), farming is considered the eighth most dangerous occupation in the U.S. A major component driving that statistic is the dangers associated with grain handling, specifically the threat of grain entrapment.

In 2020, there were 35 reported grain entrapment accidents in the United States. Of those entrapments, 20 of them resulted in death, according to a report published by Purdue University. The state with the most entrapments was Illinois (10) followed by North Dakota (5) and Minnesota (4). Overall entrapments were reported in 11 states and all of them involved males.

It is recommended to not hop into a grain bin unless you absolutely have to, Grazier stated.

Continuing, Grazier noted that if it is absolutely necessary to get into a bin, only allow authorized personal to do so, and most importantly, let others on the farm know someone is in the bin. Utilizing a lockout-tagout system to prevent equipment, like augers, from being turned on is also a highly recommended safety protocol.
Interest has increased dramatically in expanding dairy opportunities in Nebraska. Heres why:

Nebraska has significantly expanded its annual corn and soybean production over the last decade, and authors of a new study say that creates an opportunity to expand livestock production and processing across Nebraska. It will all have a subsequent economic impact on rural economies.

In turn, ideas are bubbling over about the chance to significantly expand the dairy cattle industry in Nebraska by bringing in a cluster of dairies along with a dairy processor for either fluid milk, cheese, butter or yogurt.

Coinciding with June Dairy Month, the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and several agencies released the study, The Economic Impact of Dairy Processing Expansion in Nebraska, which was discussed during a June 17 webinar.

The study compared three Nebraska communities  Grand Island, Norfolk and South Sioux City  which all have shovel-ready sites for any company interested in building in Nebraska. The study found a butter plant would have the largest impact, followed by cheese.

The impact trickles down to Nebraskas crop fields. The studys authors learned that, when considering additional feeds, corn would be the largest feed demand, followed by hay and soybean meal.

This will create pressure on local crop production to either switch crops to support dairies or put pressure on local cash prices, and possibly raise prices, said Elliott Dennis, assistant professor of livestock economics at UNL, who authored the study with UNL colleagues Eric Thompson, economics professor and director of the Bureau of Business Research, and Ellie Foral, an undergraduate research student.
"In 2017 there was a good amount of spring wheat cut for hay. This year, however, a few neighbors in the area dont feel the wheat will be tall enough to justify cutting. If they do, it will not amount to much." Crop Watcher Jeremy Stoecker shares a report:
Lake Charles Mayor Nic Hunter and six of the seven City Council members were sworn in for their new terms in office Thursday. Hunter, who is starting his second term as mayor, called on the community and local elected leaders to work together so that the city can rebound from a string of nat
Lake Charles Mayor Nic Hunter and six of the seven City Council members were sworn in for their new terms in office Thursday. Hunter, who is s Read more
The Law of the Bureaucrat is simple: The Bureaucrat is the smartest person in the room.

This Law has a huge impact on everyday life and, if fully understood, will make it clear that we must clean out all the Federal bureaucracies. Further, it demonstrates why Anthony Fauci felt free to pursue gain of function research in collaboration with the Wuhan Institute of Virology. And finally, it explains why he feels free to completely dismiss any criticism of his actions. Lets break it down.

Congress passes lots of laws. But Congress has no interest in actually dealing with the details. Congresspeople love to paint with a broad brush and say theyve helped you by passing a multi-thousand-page act with a wonderful-sounding title. How to implement it is too much trouble for such important people. Instead, they hand it off to a bureaucratic agency. Or, if they are [f]aced with a problem, be it real or imagined, that stirs voters, politicians propose new programs to solve the problem.

Congress (and this applies at many lower levels as well) simply isnt smart enough to give bureaucrats adequate direction. Formulating rules now often requires bureaucrats specializing in finance, economics, statistics, and numerous fields of science. Imagine Alexandria Airhead Cortez explaining to the CDC how it should control diseases. Of course, diseases cannot be controlled. Whatever doctors do simply helps your God-given mechanisms do the work. (ICYMI, I am a doctor.)

The Supreme Court has blessed this situation, codifying the Law of the Bureaucrat in Chevron and Auer, anointing them with the divine authority of the ultimate expert. This has created the Fourth Branch of Government, one that does not exist in the Constitution.

Fauci came into being not so much by his birthing person, but by Congresss doddering inaction which ultimately anointed him the Virus Czar at NIAID. Congress declared that the Federal Government should be involved in virus research, and then declared Fauci the smartest person in the room so Congresspeople wouldnt have to be bothered with any details. This gave him free rein to go anywhere and do anything he wanted.

By definition, a bureaucrat is infallible. This corollary of the Law became Faucis first hit parade. Early on he trotted out a theory that the AIDS virus could be airborne, causing a pandemic. UPI trumpeted his unsubstantiated speculation, as did the New York Times. Neonatal AIDS led to a huge scare and, again, Fauci was a hero. His amazing intellect would guide us. The fact that he hadnt read the paper with his name on it in the Journal of the American Medical Association was lost. HIV was actually transmitted by blood across the placenta, not in the air or by casual contact.

Two months later, Fauci reversed course, although never admitting his error. After all, as the smartest man in the room, he could not make possibly be mistaken! When you tracked down his public statements, most of them were couched in fuzzy language, making it hard to pin down what he had actually said. But he sounded so authoritative saying it.

Ebola gave him a second chance at the brass ring. Remdesivir, his pet project, looked promising, but ultimately failed to halt the disease. Excellent supportive care allowed a handful of victims to recover, while the deadly course of the disease in Africa killed its victims too quickly to allow it to spread. Then came COVID-19. But this story is a bit more complicated.

Remember that Fauci, as a Bureaucrat, is the smartest person in the room. He was hired to solve the problem of viral diseases. He is unable to make the mistakes we mortals make. But if by some unfortunate miracle, he actually found the secret cure for viral diseases, hed be out of a job. No bureaucrat can survive that.

Since bureaucrats can never actually solve the problem theyre handed, Fauci, with his buddy Peter Daszak, started engineering new viruses. There wasnt enough fun or glory in simply dealing with the existing bugs. We know this activity started as early as 2012, and Fauci was explicit in his emails that he might create a bug that would kill millions, but he really didnt care. He was too far above us, and science was too important.

The Patron Saint of Wuhan could not be thwarted. When gain of function research was officially halted in 2014, he looked for ways around it and, in December 2017, found it in a footnote to the rule. There was a national security exception, and science was obviously (to him, and no one else mattered) a national security issue. As the smartest man in the room, the decision was his to make.

Since Lord Fauci Is Science, our Dear Leaders word is the same as Gods. But there are pesky investigators out there who might discover his nefarious plot. Videos did get out but, fortunately, no one noticed their import. And the Regent of Remdesivir could not get his fingers dirty. Instead, he funneled money through Peter Daszak at the EcoHealth alliance, offshoring millions to the Wuhan Institute of Virology, where no prying American eyes would be allowed.

When the pandemic hit, Fauci was ready. He had multiple pronouncements on what we should and should not do. Since the virus was new, old drugs (think: HCQ) couldnt possibly be useful, so he actively worked against them, likely killing thousands. But as the smartest person in the room, he could not be questioned. If someone died, it was because his prescription hadnt been perfectly followed, not because he blocked an effective prescription. After all, no one could possibly be as smart as he is.

Masks, lockdowns, and the like were blithely recommended while extensive data showing those measures were uniformly harmful were ignored. When they caused great harm, the CDC, in lockstep with Fauci, commanded a moratorium on tenant evictions, creating new harm for landlords.

As the highest-paid employee in the Federal Government, there was little of pecuniary interest left for Fauci. But fame was a new currency, the ultimate aphrodisiac for a bureaucrat. COVID-19, when Fauci mismanaged it, was his ticket to a most exhilarating extended orgasm. The little people did not matter.

By now, I think it is very clear that establishing bureaucracies to fill in the blanks Congress leaves behind is an extremely bad thing. The Law of the Bureaucrat corrupts people who might start out as worthy into mavens of destruction, unaccountable to anyone because they are the smartest people in the room. Any failures in their arena are never theirs but fall on you because you did not perfectly follow their prescriptions. Flip flops on their part are simply you misunderstanding what they commanded in the beginning. And on.

But we can push Congress to pass the Write the Laws Act. Meanwhile, perhaps the Supreme Court will revisit Chevron and Auer. Justices Gorsuch and Kavanaugh have written that this is overdue.

Fauci is the quintessential bureaucrat. He plays a doctor on TV because that suits his objectives. And he is criminally responsible for millions of deaths worldwide. When will a State Attorney General grow the brass ones required to charge him with complicity in those murders?

Ted Noel MD writes and posts as DoctorTed and @VidZette.

IMAGE: A thank-you to Fauci as the teller of truth by Tyler Merbler. CC BY 2.0.

To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here.
The election of 2020 is going to lay bare the dereliction of the Supreme Court for all to see. The COVD-19 pandemic gave numerous state election officials an excuse to implement far-reaching changes to our election processes. Those changes obviously made our systems vulnerable to fraud. States implemented massive mail-in balloting at the same time they relaxed ballot security and voter identification. They even extended the voting periods -- to give the criminals more time to commit their fraud.

All these changes were unconstitutional. The Constitution clearly gives the various state legislatures the authority to define how their elections will be conducted -- not state election officials. Election officials are only empowered to conduct elections within the rules set forth by their respective legislatures -- except, apparently, during a pandemic. There must be a pandemic emanation hidden in a penumbra of the Constitution we didnt know about. Alarmed that the changes would invite fraud, various organizations filed lawsuits to stop the changes.

The Supreme Court declined to get involved. It ruled that the plaintiffs lacked standing because nobody had been harmed -- yet. Since the election hadnt happened, nobody was damaged, and there was no case to be heard. They were thinking like a civil court, not the defenders of the Constitution they are sworn to be. It was a cowardly way to stay out of the political controversy. Unfortunately, it also missed an opportunity to defend the Constitution, which was clearly under attack.

After all the ad-hoc changes had been allowed to stand, the election of 2020 saw an unprecedented number of irregularities -- too many to ignore. Election observers were banned from observing the election. Counting stopped in the middle of the night and then restarted after boxes of ballots were mysteriously found. There are reports of ballots being driven across state lines -- by the truckload. There were even precincts that counted more ballots than there were registered voters! A number of states filed lawsuits against the states in which these irregularities occurred.

Even though the Supreme Court is supposed to be the arbiter of cases between states, it again refused to get involved. They ruled that Texas couldnt sue Pennsylvania because Texans had their votes accurately counted and therefore were not harmed by Pennsylvania. Apparently having the wrong president crammed down the throats of Texans is not considered harm. Given the flood of illegal aliens President Asterisk has invited -- and the crime that has accompanied them -- would the justices consider Texas harmed now?

A number of other cases were dropped because the court considered them moot. The election had been certified and nothing was going to change that -- hence no need to look at the evidence. In the immortal words of Hillary Rodham Clinton, At this point what difference does it make?

The court seems to have three distinct voting blocs:

The oath keepers -- These are the justices that are willing to stand up and defend the Constitution even if it means theyll have to endure attacks. Justices Thomas, Alito, and Gorsuch make up this bloc. The jellyfish -- These are the justices that lack the spine to face controversy. Theyre more concerned about defending the court than the Constitution. Justices Roberts, Barrett, and Kavanaugh make up this bloc. The subversives -- These are the justices that have been using penumbras and emanations to rewrite the constitution in pursuit of social engineering. Justices Kagan, Sotomayor, and Breyer make up this bloc.

Its rumored that only three justices wanted to hear the 2020 election lawsuits. Does anyone doubt that it was those who comprise the oath keepers bloc?

Now, Chief Justice Roberts has placed his court in a trick-box. By choosing to stay out of the election controversy, John Roberts has bet the courts reputation that the mysteries of the election would remain mysteries. As wagers go, it was not a particularly smart one. The election involved millions of ballots, tens of thousands of election workers, and thousands of counties. If there was fraud, there is too much evidence, in too many hands, to stay hidden.

Tellingly, the Democrats are scrambling to keep the truth hidden, but its slowly coming out. State-sponsored forensic audits, as well as private investigations, are turning over the stones. Well likely know the truth by the end of this year. If it turns out that the election was stolen, the Supreme Court will be exposed as derelict, weak, and useless. It will all be because the jellyfish bloc doesnt understand the psychology of bullies.

The Supreme Court avoided involvement in the election because they wanted to stay out of the controversy -- they didnt want to be bullied by the Democrats or the media. There are other possible motives, but theyre even more disturbing. Cowing to bullies will not avoid conflict. Bullies prey on weakness. One has to either stand up to them eventually or accept servitude. Every kid on the playground has learned that lesson by the 8th grade. Apparently, John Roberts hasnt. Each time Chief Justice Roberts has acceded to the bullies, hes made the courts future challenge greater.

Ruling that last-minute ad-hoc election changes were unconstitutional would have been relatively straightforward -- but the court didnt. Hearing the election fraud evidence and adjudicating the result would have created a political crap-storm -- but it would have been the right thing to do. What will become of the courts reputation if it becomes obvious that the election was stolen and rather than stand up, it sat down?

An April poll by Rasmussen Reports found that 51% of the population believes that fraud affected the election outcome. Does Roberts grasp the significance of that number? Its the percentage of the population who believe the Supreme Court was derelict in defending the Constitution. If John Roberts wanted to defend the court, perhaps he should have considered the pursuit of the truth rather than avoidance of controversy.

A recent Ipsos poll found that 63% of the public thinks its time to impose term limits on Supreme Court Justices. The public isnt stupid. It recognizes that the Supreme Court needs to be taken to the woodshed. The next few months will say a lot about the Supreme Court. Will it correct course, or will it embrace servitude to the mob?

Image: Pixabay

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The people who bravely allied themselves with American efforts to lift Afghanistan out of medieval theocracy  estimated to be 170180,000 in number  are about to learn that trusting America was a bad bet. Many will be condemned to torture and death as the reward for their service. You can be certain that the lesson will not be lost on those elsewhere in the world contemplating allying themselves with American goals for their countries.

Former congressman Steve Israel writes in The Hill:

Someone needs to speak for those who spoke for our troops. I'm talking about the Afghan translators who provided critical support to U.S. and coalition forces during the two-decade war. These people took heroic risk in defying the Taliban, and if we withdraw our remaining forces without providing them refuge, that risk grows exponentially. Fatally. One former translator told the New York Times, "I get phone calls from the Taliban saying, 'We will kill you'  they know who I am and that I worked for the Americans." A U.S. official deployed in Afghanistan told the American Legion that his translator "has a bounty on his head. The Taliban has no remorse. They will torture, rape and kill his kids, his wife, his mom and dad, brothers and sisters  whoever they can find  in front of him. Then they will behead him."

Announcing our troop withdrawals put a bounty on all their heads. With enough time to plan ahead, the safe evacuation of these people and their families could have been arranged. Now, with time short, worries about loyalty have been touted:

I realize that applicants must be fully vetted (although they presumably were when they were hired in Afghanistan). The risk of fraudulent submissions is real. But this isn't an intractable ideological or partisan battle; it's a solvable bureaucratic one. The State Department has said it is "Committed to supporting those who have helped U.S. military and other government personnel perform their duties, often at great personal risk to themselves and their families." Which means, as it usually does, the problem requires resources  more people processing visas and accelerating the background checks on applicants and their families.

Those resources are not being applied. Michele Keleman reports for NPR:

The U.S. Embassy in Kabul says it is suffering from a major COVID-19 outbreak that has largely confined staff to their quarters and is disrupting many of its operations. Earlier this week, the embassy announced that it was suspending in-person visa interviews for Afghans who had worked for the U.S. military. In a note sent to staff, seen by NPR, the embassy says 114 people "have COVID and are in isolation; one has died, and several have been medevaced." The note goes on to say that military hospital ICU resources are at full capacity and that the embassy has been forced to "create temporary, on-compound COVID-19 wards to care for oxygen-dependent patients." Most of the cases involve individuals who are unvaccinated or not fully vaccinated.



U.S. embassy in Kabul celebrated U.S. Independence Day in 2009.

U.S. government photo, CC BY-ND 2.0.

A friend notes:

We apprehend 180,000 illegals crossing the Southern border each month, coddle them and allow many to stay, in addition to the tens of thousands of monthly getaways. Yet we can't more quickly vet and save the Afghan translators who helped us over the past 20 years. It's disgraceful.

It is a moral stain on America and on the Biden administration. It is also a crippling signal to future potential friends overseas that trusting Uncle Sam is a bad bet.

To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here.
Iranian society is getting increasingly violent. In the past few days, several women have been killed by their husbands in Iran's border cities. An increase in child murder, general murder and family crimes, suicide, and theft, and a decrease in psychological security in society, reflects the rising violence and seems to contribute to more violence.

Society does not move toward violence overnight, over a month, or even over several years. Violence is the result of many shortfalls in any society, bringing it to the brink of collapse. At one point, it manifests in the form of a volcanic eruption. The traces of violence are seen among the elderly in Iran (this couple, for example), the same people who were once a symbol of peace, tolerance, and experience. Nowadays, they are like moving bombs of violence on the streets, buses, and subways.

The recent pandemic has lowered the tolerance threshold for people all over the world. Iran's supreme leader issued a fatwa banning reputable vaccines from countries such as France, Britain, and the United States. This latest example of colossally mismanaging the virus has contributed to a more tense society in Iran. However, the pandemic is not the reason for a dysfunctional system; it is just another symptom.

Violence in Iran's society is directly related to the violence that Iran's security and law enforcement agencies perpetrate. The security forces impose all kinds of restrictions, limitations, brutalities, and hardship on society. The security forces kill the border porters and fuel carriers.

Another cause of anger in Iran is unbridled class differences. In Iran, a sentence from the Prophet of Islam is incredibly famous, and that is that society could carry on with infidelity but could not sustain poverty and oppression. These realities are all interwoven.

Iran is currently one of the world's most impoverished nations, with over 40% of Iran's citizens living in household poverty. Individuals cannot meet the basic needs of their families, including food, safe water, health, education, housing, and even air. In 2020, incomes below $1.90 per person per day will push people below the absolute poverty line.

This concept means that today, every person in Iran earning less than 80 tomans (Iran's new currency) per month lives below the absolute poverty line. Eighty percent of Iran's population is either below or just above that poverty line.

At present, the well-being of Iranian families has reached its lowest level in decades, and there are indications that this downward trend will continue in the future. Even the lifting of sanctions will not provide a way to return to the past.

Children as garbage collectors, women being the heads of households, and children working on the streets, in subways, in anonymous workshops and signs have become familiar scenes in the city. Their numbers are increasing every day.

In such a context, the children's rights are completely ignored. They are prone to many physical and psychological injuries. Perhaps the most obvious example is that most adults opted to stay home and safe at the beginning stages of the COVID-19 spread. Still, the working children continued to stand behind red lights and look for jobs and income on the deserted streets. These children could have been infected with the virus or injured  and they've been blamed.

We are facing a "social collapse." Social collapse can be low, medium, or high in any society. In present-day Iran, we have crossed the middle ground and are entering the critical sector.

The angry and aggravated people of Iran use every opportunity to express their hatred and disgust for the mullahs' governance. They have been burning campaign posters and propaganda banners of Ibrahim Raisi, Khamenei's preferred candidate, now considered the next president of Iran. It has reached the point that Raisi has asked the government forces to stop installing his banners. He cannot tolerate the level of dismay and hatred of the people for this regime.

Raisi is the man who played a key role in the 1988 massacre of political prisoners. The extraordinary societal hatred for Raisi appeared at a rally Ahvaz that the regime organized. The regime forced people from Khuzestan and neighboring provinces to attend (and paid some). The AP reported about supporters but neglected to report that when Raisi spoke to the people crammed into Takhti Stadium in Ahvaz, they shouted, "There is no water, there is no water."

The result of this anger and hatred is the unified boycott of Khamenei's engineered elections, which can be seen in the speech of Khamenei's prayer leader on June 11. Mullah Alam al-Huda, for example, interpreted the embargo, saying: "The other system has taken its life and is over." The source of this general embargo is universal anger, and protest erupts everywhere and at every opportunity.

Although Raisi avoids appearing at any gathering exposing him to public outrage or reporter's questions, the people have not forgotten that Raisi, Khamenei, and others committed massacres in 1988 and again in 2019. The daily violence reminds them how oppressive the regime is. This anger and hatred will flare up when Raisi, the Ayatollah of Executions, takes the regime's presidency. (His victory is foreordained.)

The Friday sermon of Qazvin said the organization of hypocrites (the name of the Iranian regime, gives its sworn opposition to the Mojahedin) is trying to discourage electoral participation in the run-up to the elections and finally start a civil war. Hojjatoleslam Khezri stated that the enemy is pursuing three strategies close to the elections: divisiveness and trying to discourage people's participation in the election, destroying the essential personalities of the revolution (Raisi), and initiating a civil war.

They are wrong. Any civil war won't be because of opposition tactics. It will, instead, naturally reflect the tens of thousands of daily executions, killings of young people in the 2019 uprising, and the 1988 massacre of political prisoners. The one who sows the wind reaps the storm.

Image: Ebrahim Raisi by Hossein Razaqnejad. CC BY 4.0.

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Yair Lapid, Israel's new foreign minister and architect of the Bennett government that unseated Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, indicated that he knows just how to curry favor with the Biden administration. He lambasted ex-P.M. Netanyahu after twelve successive years leading Israel (fifteen years in all as prime minister), as reported in The New York Times ("Israels New Coalition Takes First Steps, Including Mending Fences With U.S.").



Yair Lapid, speaking at the Brookings Institution in 2015.

Another Times article ("Shift in Israel Provides Biden a Chance for Better Ties"), on the felt need of the Bennett government  let's call it the Bennett-Lapid government  for mending fences to "repair" Israel's relations with U.S. Democrats and diaspora Jews, includes this remark made by Lapid, speaking to officials in Israel's foreign ministry:

"'The outgoing government took a terrible gamble, reckless and dangerous, to focus on the Republican Party and abandon Israel's bipartisan standing[.]'" The lead story in the Times, June 15, pressed the point that the Biden administration loathed Bibi Netanyahu and looks for "better ties" with the Bennett-Lapid government. (Where the "mending fences" article had Lapid accusing Netanyahu of being "reckless and dangerous," the lead in "better ties" had it "'careless and dangerous.'")

Does foreign minister Lapid think for a moment that Democrats who accuse Israel of being an apartheid state, who sympathize with Hamas's aggression against Israel, who raise the cry "disproportionate casualties" when Israel acts to defend against Hamas-fired rockets at Israeli civilians  does Yair Lapid think for a moment that these Democrats will embrace his new government, which includes four Israeli Arab members of the Knesset (Israel's Legislature)? Isn't it more likely that the totalitarian-minded Democrats would denounce the four Israeli Arabs in the Bennett-Lapid government as Uncle Abdullahs?

Hamas, two days after Israel's new government became a political fact, sent incendiary balloons over Israel to set southern areas of the country ablaze. Israel responded by sending fighter jets over Gaza to attack Hamas positions. Was Hamas testing the new government's resolve to retaliate? Was Hamas testing Biden's response to Israeli retaliation under Bennett? Or was Hamas testing the four Israeli Arab Knesset members to see if they would bring down the Bennett-Lapid government over Israeli airstrikes over Gaza?

These basic questions must certainly occur to Lapid, who, by assembling a government under Israel's 13th prime minister, must have lots of political savvy in his DNA.

Lapid is set to change places with Bennett and become Israel's 14th prime minister in 2023  if the Bennett-Lapid government lasts that long. In evaluating Lapid, this question is uppermost: does he seriously believe that it was Netanyahu who harmed Israel's ties to U.S. Democrats? Maybe it is the other way around: that the unraveling of Israel's ties to the Democrats was initiated by Obama in his rush to cozy up to Iran's supreme leader? To raise the question is to lead to an unavoidable conclusion.

Recall, too, that Obama's parting shot at Israel was to allow a U.N. Security Council anti-Israel resolution to be adopted, just before Obama left office. That incident prompted President-elect Trump to have Michael Flynn try to get Russia to oppose the resolution, an effort that resulted in media criticism of Mr. Trump and Lt. Gen. Flynn.

Yair Lapid should be asked: would he have backed Obama's attack on Trump and Flynn for trying to protect the Jewish state against yet more calumny from the United Nations?

It would be understandable if Lapid, at this point, echoed Biden administration hostility toward Netanyahu, to lull the John Kerrys and the Susan Rices in Biden's administration into believing he is just as anti-Netanyahu as they. (Perhaps he really is.) But if currying favor with the Obama crowd that are Biden's puppeteers signals a willingness of Bennett-Lapid to accept the diktat of the Biden administration, these will be long years indeed for Israel during Biden's tenure.

An American administration that is substantively hostile to Israel, whatever the political mindset of its government, is an American administration more likely to find Israelis rushing to reinstall Bibi Netanyahu as prime minister for a basic, existential, reason: the national security of Israel. That national security is not helped by a so-called "ally" that forces the Jewish state to fight Hamas aggression with one hand tied behind her back.

Article 30 of the Hamas Charter makes it clear that anyone  including Obama people in the Biden administration  who gives moral support to Hamas in its ambition to replace Israel with an Islamic state, is considered a jihadist just as much as the terrorist militant.

Men of letters, members of the intelligentsia, media people, preachers, teachers and educators and all different sectors in the Arab and Islamic world, are all called upon to play their role and to carry out their duty in view of the wickedness of Zionist invasion, of its penetration into many countries, and its control over material means and the media, with all the ramifications thereof in most countries of the world. Jihad means not only carrying arms and denigrating the enemies. Uttering positive words, writing good articles and useful books, and lending support and assistance, all that too is Jihad in the path of Allah, as long as intentions are sincere to make Allah's banner supreme. "Those who prepare for a raid in the path of Allah are considered as if they participated themselves in the raid. Those who successfully rear a raider in their home, are considered as if they participated themselves in the raid" (Told by Bukhari, Muslim, Abu Dawud and Tirmidhi).

It must be assumed that Mr. Lapid is fully knowledgeable on the Hamas anti-Israel credo.

Prime Minister Bennett should realize  along with Lapid  that Israel would be foolhardy to rely on support from a U.S. administration riddled with honorary jihadists. The political reality is this: at present, there is no bipartisan backing for a secure Israel.

Israel's best American friends are Republicans. As the late H. Ross Perot might have said: "It's as simple as that."

Photo credit: Ralph Alswang, CC-BY-NC-ND 2.0 license.

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Critical Race Theory opponents are the new Tea Party, a grassroots phenomenon all over the country, mobilizing both activists and people with a political background at all to oppose the teaching of race hatred. There is nothing quite as powerful in exciting passions in adults as threatening their children. And make no mistake: Critical Race Theory harms children deeply, teaching Blacks that they are victims and can't succeed on their own, and teaching non-Blacks that they are born evil.

If you spend two minutes and forty-seven seconds watching the following cell phone video of a Black medical professional denouncing the teaching of Critical Race Theory at a school board meeting, you will understand the panic that is starting to hit Democrats and their media apparat. The passion and the intelligence of this self-described holder of two medical degrees, a man who worked his way through college, "up from the streets," are inspiring. He told the mostly White crowd gathered there that he "gives orders" to people who look like them every day, so how can he be oppressed?



Twitter video screen grab.

"How do I have two medical degrees if I'm sitting here oppressed?"

Watch this parent absolutely obliterate Critical Race Theory at an Illinois school board meeting:



How do I have two medical degrees if Im sitting here oppressed? pic.twitter.com/gmCRJaphXt  Benny (@bennyjohnson) June 17, 2021

The best thing about opposition to CRT is the way that it unites Blacks and Whites affirming their equal status and respect. I can't claim to be an expert on Black public opinion, but there have to be many people as offended as the man above at the notion that they are helpless victims, incapable of competing on an equal footing.

The smarter Democrats are starting to have an "oh s---" moment, realizing what they have unleashed. William Jacobson of Legal Insurrection writes, "The best evidence that the resistance to CRT is gaining and posing a threat to Democrats is that the mainstream media is trying to marginalize and demonize the movement the way it attacked the Tea Party." He lists several recent attempts to smear opponents of CRT as tools of the right, racists, and the like.

It didn't work with the Tea Parties, and it won't work this time. Maybe this time around, the GOP will have the brains to capitalize on a ready-made activist constituency.

To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here.
We're always skeptical of polls, but this one confirms what I hear from the people I go to Mass with. This is from Catholic Vote:

CatholicVote released a poll Tuesday showing a strong majority of Mass-attending Catholics believe politicians who oppose Church teaching should not present themselves for Communion. The poll found that 83% of churchgoing Catholics believe politicians who oppose Catholic teachings "create confusion and disunity." 74% believe that "Catholic public officials who disagree with their Church on serious or grave matters" should "avoid creating confusion and disunity by not presenting themselves for communion...." The polling data comes just before the U.S. Bishops begin their June 16-18 Spring Assembly meeting, when they are slated to debate and vote on producing a teaching document about how to properly receive the Eucharist.

Confusion and disunity are an understatement. It confuses the heck out of young people who are caught between the culture and the Church's teachings.

As a Catholic, I've always felt that the Vatican should be very clear on the matter of abortion. This is a matter of life and death. We've terminated 50 million lives in the U.S. because of abortion. God only knows what the international number is!

Pope Francis has an opportunity to hit our depraved culture between the eyes. The pope should make it clear that Biden and Pelosi should confess and then publicly call for an end to abortion. If not, then they can search for another church!

It's time, and the parishioners agree.

PS: You can listen to my show (Canto Talk).

Image: PxHere.

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On Friday, June 18, 2021, a presidential election will take place in an Iran struggling with instability and confusion. According to the Iranian regime's officials, this election is expected to be one of the most stagnant and sluggish elections in the last four decades.

Over the past century, the Iranian people have experienced four major movements in search of democracy: the 1906 Constitutional Revolution, the Mossadegh National Movement in the early 1950s, the 1979 anti-monarchist revolution, and the resistance to the current regime since the 1980s. It's only the last of the four movements, though, that has seen unparalleled repression and dictatorship.

In 1988, the Ayatollah Khomenei regime brutally massacred an estimated 30,000 people for opposing the regime. It emerged in 2016 that Ayatollah Montazeri, who was to have been Khomenei's successor, addressed the perpetrators, one of whom was Ayatollah Khamenei's chosen presidential candidate, Ebrahim Raisi, saying: "In my view, the biggest crime in the Islamic Republic, for which history will condemn us, has been committed at your hands, and they'll write your names as criminals in history."

Iranians refused to elect Raisi in 2017. However, Khamenei is being forced to push him into office, to unify the Velayat-e-Faqih system (that is, the Islamic Revolution's form of government) and strengthen his faltering regime.

The impact of the election on JCPOA and Khamenei's project

To save his system, Khamenei blames the government and Rouhani for all the problems. The economic crisis, unemployment, and poverty have put society in an explosive state. In such circumstances, Khamenei seeks a way out of this crisis by establishing a unipolar regime totally aligned with him and a nuclear Iran, an ambitious idea he designed and planned long ago.

For the first step, Khamenei disrupted the International Atomic Agency (IAEA)'s oversight work. He created many obstacles to providing video information to IAEA, making it conditional on lifting sanctions and returning the United States to the JCPOA. Khamenei knows that the international community will not accept his terms. He is just buying time so he can consolidate his regime preparatory to obtaining a nuclear weapon.

On June 7, IAEA director-general Rafael Mariano Grossi stated:

Since my last report, Iran has provided no new information in relation to one location; has not answered any of the Agency's questions nor provided any information in relations to two other locations; and provided a written statement on a fourth location without any substantiating documentation.

Because Khamenei understands that the 2015 JCPOA is dead, he's got a 2021 JCPOA lined up. The regime's Resalat newspaper quoted an independent newspaper, saying, "The United States and its powerful European allies are working to include the issue of continuing talks to address the two issues of the ballistic missile program and the Islamic Republic's behavior in the region."

Therefore, Khamenei sees obtaining nuclear weapons as the secret to his regime's survival. That's why he wants Raisi as president: he knows that Raisi, considered one of the most brutal men in Iran, will help him achieve that goal by consolidating power and working with him to hide a sped-up nuclear program from the international community.

But Khamenei knows better than anyone else that he is sitting on a powder keg of Iranian anger. The expected low turnout in the Iranian elections will have far-reaching consequences for the Middle East.

The AP reported on June 16 that "for Raisi himself, the immediate danger may be coming from inside Iran itself. Anger over its ailing economy has seen nationwide protests erupt twice in recent years and spin out of control." Therefore, Khamenei wants to arm his regime against the uprising of the Iranian people and its organized resistance for justice and freedom in Iran.

Human rights groups fear a Raisi presidency because of his long history of brutality in Iran. Thus:

The rights group's [Amnesty International's] Iran researcher Raha Bahreini told AFP that Raisi should be "criminally investigated for the crimes against humanity of murder, enforced disappearance and torture", including by foreign countries under the principle of universal jurisdiction.

Now, in the inflamed and explosive atmosphere of Iranian society, Raisi's advertising banners have caused anger and hatred among the people. They're being torn and burned every day in the cities.

The Iranian people are no longer willing to go along peacefully with predetermined sham elections. They understand that Khamenei is propping up an unpopular regime by installing a brutal man in the presidency. They consider it their national and historical duty to boycott the elections and topple this regime.

Hassan Mahmoudi is a social analyst, researcher, independent observer, and commentator of Middle Eastern and Iranian politics. He tweets under @hassan_mahmou1.

Image: Burning an Ebrahim Raisi campaign poster. YouTube screen grab.

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In Philadelphia (as in most cities), the foster care system is dependent on private organizations certifying families that can take foster children. The City of Philadelphia tried to force Catholic Social Services (CSS) to certify homes with same-sex couples. When CSS said its faith prevented it from concluding that such homes could be in a child's best interest, Philadelphia "fired" it. CSS sued but lost at both the district and appellate court levels. In Fulton v. Philadelphia, though, a unanimous Supreme Court held that Philadelphia had violated CSS's First Amendment rights.

Nothing that CSS did deprived foster children of access to safe homes, including same-sex homes or homes with a member of the LGBT orientation:

CSS does not object to certifying gay or lesbian individuals as single foster parents or to placing gay and lesbian children. No same-sex couple has ever sought certification from CSS. If one did, CSS would direct the couple to one of the more than 20 other agencies in the City, all of which currently certify same-sex couples. For over 50 years, CSS successfully contracted with the City to provide foster care services while holding to these beliefs.

However, when a newspaper article revealed that CSS would not certify same-sex couples, the City Council "called for an investigation, saying that the City had 'laws in place to protect its people from discrimination that occurs under the guise of religious freedom.'" More formally, "The City later explained that the refusal of CSS to certify same-sex couples violated a non-discrimination provision in its contract with the City as well as the non-discrimination requirements of the citywide Fair Practices Ordinance."

CSS sued, alleging "that the referral freeze violated the Free Exercise and Free Speech Clauses of the First Amendment." Both the trial court and the appellate court ruled against CSS because they believed that the law was facially neutral and generally applicable under Employment Division, Department of Human Resources of Oregon v. Smith, 494 U.S. 872 (1990). Every certifying organization had to certify LGBT couples, so those that didn't couldn't complain.

The Court opened by saying the city's actions discriminated against CSS  but that is allowable up to a point:

The Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment, applicable to the States under the Fourteenth Amendment, provides that "Congress shall make no law . . . prohibiting the free exercise" of religion. As an initial matter, it is plain that the City's actions have burdened CSS's religious exercise by putting it to the choice of curtailing its mission or approving relationships inconsistent with its beliefs. ... Our task is to decide whether the burden the City has placed on the religious exercise of CSS is constitutionally permissible.

CSS, Justice Alito, and Justice Gorsuch wanted to overrule the Smith case (above) entirely. However, the Court didn't need to look that far afield. "This case falls outside Smith because the City has burdened the religious exercise of CSS through policies that do not meet the requirement of being neutral and generally applicable."

The Court zeroed in on Philadelphia having violated the "generally applicable" rule. "A law is not generally applicable if it 'invite[s]' the government to consider the particular reasons for a person's conduct by providing 'a mechanism for individualized exemptions.'" In other words, if an ostensibly general standard nevertheless allows the government to treat people differently on a case-by-case basis because of religious considerations, it fails to be generally applicable.

The Court's example was the case of a Seventh-Day Adventist who couldn't find a job that didn't require her to work on Saturdays. When she applied for unemployment, the State denied her because she had failed to accept available and suitable work. The mere fact that the state could make case-specific exemptions causing religious hardship showed that the law was not generally applicable.

A law also fails the general applicability test if it prohibits religious conduct while allowing the same behavior in a non-religious context. Thus, in Church of Lukumi Babalu Aye, Inc. v. Hialeah, the city forbade Santeria's animal sacrifice ostensibly because disposing of the animal carcasses posed a health risk. However, Hialeah did nothing to control how hunters were disposing of animal carcasses.

In CSS's case, the relevant municipal statute held that foster care providers could not reject a family based upon a couple's sexual orientation unless the commissioner, in his discretion, granted an exception. That exception  which the city swore would never apply to CSS  violated the general applicability rule.

The city made several more arguments that the Court batted down. On this one, CSS and religion were the clear winners. Not only is this a victory for religious rights and for the Constitution itself (as written), but the Court's unanimity may matter, given Jonathan Turley's suggestion that the Court is deliberately issuing unanimous decisions to push back against the Democrat plan to keep adding justices until there's an activist majority.

Image: United States Supreme Court by dbking. CC BY 2.0.

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Conservatives believe that the American military exists to defend the nation and that this works best with tight unit cohesion based on shared experiences and alliances. Obama believed that the military is a social justice experiment that requires welcoming open homosexuality and transgender troops. Trump was able to slow this trend, but he didn't realize how deep the rot was in the Pentagon. The moment he was out of office, Biden appointed Lloyd Austin as Pentagon chief, and the Obama social justice experiment morphed into full-blown racial Marxism. I could write volumes on this, but I'll content myself with a short intro and then turn the floor over to Tucker Carlson.

Obama did away with "don't ask, don't tell" in favor of having gays and lesbians serve openly. I have no idea whether that's worked to the military's benefit because there will never be an honest assessment. He also admitted transgender people, despite their profound emotional problems, and said the military would pay for their mutilating surgeries and hormones, used to achieve a poor imitation of being the opposite sex.

The most problematic thing Obama did was to purge traditional military officers from the Pentagon. I wrote about that at length here, before I came on board at American Thinker, so I won't belabor the point. Suffice it to say that if you held the conservative view of the military (a colorblind institution dedicated to America's defense), you were likely to be cashiered from your position in the Pentagon.

Through it all, and running into the Trump years, there was the constant, damaging pressure to put women on the front line. I deeply oppose this. In small numbers, women have been frontline fighters throughout history, and have acquitted themselves bravely, but that's always been because the home front and the frontline were one and the same. When serious armies facing serious challenges have experimented with women in battle, it's been a disaster  and that doesn't even count lowering standards to accommodate the fact that women are physically weaker than men.

With Biden in the White House Obama's efforts to alter the military to more closely resemble the average American college campus seem almost quaint. Under Lloyd Austin, the military has wholeheartedly embraced Critical Race Theory, which is simply Marxism in racial garb. This should terrify you because it's intended to render the military dysfunctional. A dysfunctional military in a dangerous world is the stuff of nightmares.

And now I'll stop writing and, instead, let you see Tucker Carlson's excellent summary, including his highlighting how appalling Ibrahim X. Kendi's book is  and it's recommended reading in the Navy  and how stupid Kendi himself is. Even worse than that, though, is seeing what passes for a high-ranking military officer in Biden's military. We must hope for the sake of the men and women (and transgender its) serving under Admiral Michael Gilday that he is not quite the racist fool he appears to be.

Both America and her military have shown tremendous resiliency over the centuries. It's to be hoped that both still have reserves enough to handle what the Biden White House is sending their way.

Image: Admiral Gilday. YouTube screen grab.

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In "Israeli Arabs asserting their Palestinian identity" (6/12/21), the Washington Post asserted its Palestinian bias. The front-page article starts off with the story of Mahmoud Abo Arisheh, who grew up in an Arab village in the northern part of Israel and "was sure of at least two things: He was Israeli, and he was not allowed to talk politics." Further, his parents told him, "Be careful, or the Shin Bet [Israel's version of the FBI] will get you." The article continues that Abo Arisheh grew up to become a lawyer, a poet, and a theater director in the trendy Israeli port city of Jaffa. The article states, "He attends protests and talks politics freely." So, in essence, his parents' warnings were markedly unfounded.

Interesting that the Post fails to mention that Arabs in Israel have greater voting rights and civil liberties than the citizens of any Arab country, not to mention that they are allowed to protest and speak out against their leaders. Abo Arisheh should attend protests and speak of politics freely in all the neighboring Arab countries and see how long his lifespan is.

The article further states that Israeli Arabs "have been arrested by the hundreds following some of the worst communal violence between Arabs and Jews in Israel's post-independence history." The violence has been almost entirely from the Arab side, where at least four synagogues were torched in the mixed city of Lod. Yes, torching synagogues will get you arrested in the State of Israel.

The article then quotes an Israeli Arab member of the Parliament, Sami Abu Shehadeh: "for a long time, a lot of the world did not know about our existence." That would be impossible, especially for anyone who travels. The Palestinians were the innovators of airplane hijacking in the 1970s. With that "contribution," travelers throughout the world are reminded of the Palestinian movement, in what amounts to an entire industry of airport security, not to mention the inconvenience. They are thought about thousands of times a day, but yes, many may not attribute that "contribution" to the Palestinians.

Abu Shehadeh understands that people can get confused about the Israelis and Palestinians, saying, "We became citizens in the state that was established on the ruins of our homeland." The Post omits the critical follow-up: that the Arabs started a war against the nascent Jewish state that caused the "ruins." Moreover, there was never a "homeland" country called Palestine. During the 400-year period before the Brits were put in charge of administrating the region called Palestine, the land had been part of the Ottoman Empire, not any Arab state. How can the Washington Post let such obvious propaganda be spouted in its paper? Is the Washington Post a newspaper or a mouthpiece for the Palestinian movement?

During the recent 11-day war between Hamas and Israel, Israeli Arabs rioted and destroyed many synagogues, attacked Jews, and destroyed property. The Washington Post called these "demonstrations." The Post identifies a fair number of grievances by the Arabs of Israel. Did the Post bother to ask them which other country in the region they would prefer to live in over Israel? Israel is not a perfect state, yet its recent new government has as part of their platform to improve living standards of the Arab population. Why not emphasize that and add other achievements and contributions that Arabs have made in Israel? Why not highlight the success stories of Israel's pluralistic democracy, such as Jewish and Arab doctors and nurses working side by side in Israel's hospitals? Why not mention the Arab members of the Supreme Court? Or is the goal of the Post to find only the negatives in the truly great rebirth of the Jewish nation, a rebirth that is unmatched in the history of civilization?

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Tucked away at a corner of Fort Detrick in Frederick, Maryland, dwarfed by buildings on three, sides stands a relic of Cold Wara humongous steel sphere 40 feet across with volume of 1 million liters. For most of its existence, the sphere remained hidden enclosed under a large wood and metal cube. But the timber has now disintegrated away revealing this extraordinary contraption with a sinister past.

Fort Detrick was the center of the US biological weapons program from 1943 to 1969. Much of the tests involving aerosols of infectious agents was conducted inside this steel sphere, lovingly referred to as the Eight Ball.

One-Million-Liter Test Sphere in Google Maps

The One-Million-Liter Test Sphere was like a cloud chamber used to test how aerosolized biological agents highly pathogenic to man and animals would suspend in the air and infiltrate the lungs in a controlled environment. Access ports along the perimeter of the sphere, fitted with biological safety cabinets allowed small tethered animals such as monkeys to be introduced into the chamber for live testing. Human volunteers could also breath in metered aerosols of infectious organisms through these ports. Such test allowed scientists to determine the lethal doses of biological agents. Scientists also tested the most effective method of dissemination of deadly agents, from bombs to sprays.

Containment of the infectious aerosol was insured by pre-testing for gas-tight integrity using a test gas of high detection sensitivity. Protection against system failures and human errors was provided by means of backup systems that were energized, either automatically or instantly by manual means upon-functioning of warning alarms. In addition to the gas-tight feature of the system, the entire complex was routinely rated on a slight negative pressure so that any leakage that should develop would only permit clean air to enter the system; contaminated air could not escape. The air process system used for achieving and maintaining controlled environments was displayed schematically, giving the operations supervisor continual surveillance over the status of the equipment. In testimony to the integrity of the Test Sphere facility with respect to agent containment, it is worthwhile noting that in 19 years of almost daily operations, its biological safety record was perfect. Not only was there never an escape of any of the lethally dangerous biologicals worked with in the Sphere, there were also no instances of occupational illness among operating personnel. These personnel worked in the area surrounding the sphere without benefit of or need for respiratory protection. United States Department of Interior, National Park Service

Photo: usarmywhitecoat.com

The Eight Ball wasnt always used for offensive purposes. The sphere was also used in the development of vaccines against other nations biological weapons. The Test Spheres best known use was during Operation Whitecoat, a program intended to test the effects of biological agents on humans through exposure.

More than 2,300 Army volunteers, often drawn from the ranks of conscientious objectors, inhaled lung full of air into which biological agents had been released, and researchers then monitored their reactions. Some subjects were given investigational vaccines for Q fever and tularemia, as well as for yellow fever, Rift Valley fever, hepatitis A, Yersinia pestis (plague), and Venezuelan equine encephalitis and other diseases, before being exposed to the agent to test the vaccines effectiveness.

Workers standing outside the 1-million-liter sphere, circa 1968. Photo: Wikimedia Commons

Photo: Wikimedia Commons

The test sphere has not been used since 1969, when the U.S. biological weapons program was discontinued. Five years later, a fire razed the structure that enclosed the sphere, but the sphere itself remained unhurt, although the fire did damage the control panels and exposure chambers at the base of the test sphere.

Because of its historical scientific significance, the Test Sphere is now on the National Register of Historic Places.

References:

# USArmy Whitecoat

# National Register of Historic Places Nomination Form

# Beth Perretta, Historic 1-Million-Liter Structure Stands as Reminder of Biological Warfare, Capital News Service

# Wikipedia




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Official: Dhanush and Sekhar Kammula joining hands:- National award-winning actor Dhanush has a bunch of projects in the pipeline. The actor is also rushed with several Hollywood offers and he is currently shooting for a Hollywood flick in USA. The actor also has a couple of Hindi movies along with his Tamil projects. There are speculations that Dhanush will make his Tollywood debut soon and the project got its official announcement today. Sensible director Sekhar Kammula impressed Dhanush with a script and the project is locked recently. The makers of the film made an official announcement today and the shoot of the film commences very soon.

The two Men who crossed the barriers to Celebrate Cinema



The National Award Winners @dhanushkraja & @sekharkammula collaborating for a Tamil-Telugu - Hindi Trilingual FILM



Proudly Produced by #NarayanDasNarang & #PuskurRamMohanRao under @SVCLLP Banner ! pic.twitter.com/GcBkGqzd1R  Sree Venkateswara Cinemas LLP (@SVCLLP) June 18, 2021

The details about the film other cast, crew members will be announced by the production house soon. The film will be shot simultaneously in Telugu, Tamil and Hindi languages. Narayan Das Narang and Puskur Ram Mohan Rao will jointly produce this prestigious project. Sri Venkateswara Cinemas LLP is the production house. Sekhar Kammula is currently finalizing the technicians for this pan-Indian project. He is done with the work for Naga Chaitanya and Sai Pallavi starter Love Story. The film is expected to hit the screens this year in August or September. The film is carrying huge expectations. Dhanush will join the sets of Sekhar Kammula's movie once he is done with the shoot of his current commitments.
As the mobile industry continues to deploy the fifth-generation (5G) networks globally, 5G smartphone shipments are growing as well. According to research firm Strategy Analytics, global 5G smartphone shipments grew six percent quarter-on-quarter (QoQ) to reach a record 136 million units in Q1 2021. The figure for the previous quarter, i.e. Q4 2020, comes in at 128 million.

Samsung saw the biggest growth in 5G smartphone shipments in the past quarter. The South Korean behemoth shipped 17 million devices equipped with the next-gen wireless connectivity, up a whopping 79 percent from 9.5 million units in the previous quarter. Its recent flagships, the Galaxy S21 series, have sold really well in South Korea, North America, and parts of Europe.

Emerging Chinese brand Vivo was the second-fastest-growing 5G smartphone vendor in Q1 2021, riding on the back of its iQOO U3 5G and U7 5G mid-rangers. Its shipments jumped 62 percent QoQ to reach 19.4 million units during the past quarter. China and Europe were the two markets where Vivos 5G smartphones sold the most.

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Vivos compatriots OPPO and Xiaomi also registered a healthy QoQ growth in 5G smartphone shipments in Q1 2021. Apple, meanwhile, saw its 5G smartphone shipments decline 23 percent QoQ during the same period. The Cupertino-based iPhone maker was still the largest 5G smartphone vendor for the first three months of the year though, having shipped 40.4 million phones with 5G connectivity. That high number is because all of the companys recent iPhones are 5G capable.

So, despite a QoQ decline in shipment volume, Apple captured a large chunk of the 5G smartphone market in Q1 2021. It held a 29.8 percent share in the market, distantly followed by OPPO with a 15.8 percent share. Vivo (14.3 percent), Samsung (12.5 percent), and Xiaomi (12.2 percent) are neck and neck against each other in this race.

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5G smartphone shipments will continue to rise throughout 2021 and beyond

The strong growth in 5G smartphone shipments in Q1 2021 was driven by increasing demand in China, United States, and Western Europe, where the next-gen wireless networks are more readily available than anywhere else. The firm expects this growth trend to gain pace rapidly in subsequent quarters. It is forecasting global 5G smartphone shipments to reach 624 million units this year. That would mark a staggering 132 percent year-on-year (YoY) shipment growth from 269 million units in the previous year.

The projected growth is in line with that of another research firm Canalys though. The firm recently said that about 610 million smartphone units sold this year could be 5G-ready. One-third of those phones are expected to cost less than $300.
Earlier this year Google officially added a search bar to the Stadia store on the web, but not the Android app. Mind you, this is a feature that many users thought Google would have added alongside the services launch back in 2019.

But to everyones surprise it wasnt added until much later. With the search bar now available in the Stadia Android app, narrowing down games you may be looking for will be a lot more efficient than before.

Having said that, there are some things to be aware of about the feature. Especially if you plan on using it often.

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The Search bar in Stadia for Android is an experimental feature

The first thing to make note of is that this is an experimental feature. That means Google is still working on it. And development of the feature is likely to continue until Google feels that its at a point where it can be rolled out as part of the normal features.

To activate this feature so you can use it, tap on your profile avatar that sits in the top right corner. Then scroll down to Experiments, which should have two features in there currently. There will be one for playing on this device which is only usable if your device isnt already supported, and one for the Filter Search.

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The Filter Search feature is the one you want to enable. Tap the toggle and then youll be able to use the search option inside the store part of the app.

There is one other caveat though. The search bar isnt a persistent thing that will be available throughout the entire store.

Youll only find the search bar inside pages

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To get to the search function, youll need to pick one of the pages. For example, the Summer Deals page. Once you tap on this page, you should see a search filter option at the top.

From there simply tap on the search filter and then enter any keywords you want to narrow down the results.

While this isnt a true search bar that works from the stores home page, its at least an option. And perhaps when the search function is no longer an experiment, Google will turn it into a search bar thats accessible from anywhere in the store.
OnePlus has confirmed that OxygenOS is not going away. As many of you know, OnePlus CEO announced that the company will further integrate with OPPO. He shared that information a couple of days ago.

Following the news, many users were worried that OxygenOS will cease to exist, and that ColorOS will take over. The OxygenOS 12 beta build did not inspire much hope either.

OxygenOS is not going away following OnePlus merger with OPPO

Well, you can rest easy, as OxygenOS is staying put. Pete Lau confirmed the information to MySmartPrice, as the site reached out for clarification. Pete Lau once again said that OnePlus will continue to operate as an independent brand, and will keep developing OxygenOS for its devices.

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This is applicable for all markets other than China, of course. In China, OnePlus is using an OS called HydrogenOS. That is also OnePlus operating system, but its different than OxygenOS.

That is basically everything that was shared by the source. Pete Lau just wanted everyone to be clear that OnePlus, and its software, are not going anywhere. The two companies will work closely together, but thats nothing new.

The two companies have been sharing resources for a long time

OPPO and OnePlus have been sharing resources for a long time now. After all, both companies are owned by the same company, BBK Electronics. The same goes for Vivo, actually, in case you didnt know.

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Theyve been inspiring each other for a long time now. This news only makes things official, in a way. Pete Lau said that this integration will allow OnePlus to get access to even more resources, though.

In his blog post, Pete Lau promised that such integration will help OnePlus provide faster updates, and also more stable ones at the same time. The company was already quite fast when it comes to updates, so this does sound quite promising.

Just to be clear, OnePlus as a brand is not going anywhere, nor will it cease to exist in any way.
Samsung is reportedly expanding on its Quick Share offering to include support for a more universal, cross-brand file sharing initiative dubbed MTA. Specifically, the company is said to be joining an initiative dubbed the Mutual Transmission Alliance (MTA). An endeavor first started by Xiaomi, Oppo, and Vivo.

For clarity, MTA is responsible for a more universal transfer protocol. And that works via a Bluetooth standard typically used for fast pairing. But, instead of pairing, its utilized to transfer files from images and documents to compressed packages and more. The connection itself is similar to Wi-Fi Direct and happens Peer-to-Peer at around 20Mbps.

What does MTA mean for Samsung Quick Share?

Now, Samsung Quick Share is, like MTA, meant for sharing files quickly over a non-internet connection. It works similarly to Apples AirDrop or Googles Nearby Share. And, in more recent news, it actually works cross-platform and even with other brands via Windows OS. But this marks the first time Samsung has worked to make this work with other mobile brands.

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In this case, the mobile brands participating include not only those brands above. But also ASUS, Black Shark, Hisense, MEIZU, OnePlus, Realme, and ZTE. And what this does for users on Samsung devices is fairly straightforward.

Essentially, with this expansion, Samsung devices can share wirelessly without an internet connection with those gadgets. Including files, images, videos, and other file types or information. And at a higher rate of speed than the current iteration of Googles Nearby Share.

When is this coming?

In terms of exactly when the expansion of Quick Share will take place, thats not yet known. And thats if reports are accurate and the company actually plans to join the alliance. The source for this information appears to be Chinas social media site Weibo. However, if accurate, Samsung may announce the change to Quick Share and its decision to join with MTA as early as its next event. Potentially at MWC 2021, which takes place between June 28 and July 1.
Samsung is preparing to launch a Fan Edition (FE) variant of the Galaxy S21 flagship later this year. While theres a lot of confusion around when this device might break cover, it continues to pop up on the internet pretty frequently. Most recently, a new variant of the phone has appeared on benchmarking platform Geekbench with model number SM-G990U. The U in the model number suggests its the US-bound Galaxy S21 FE.

The listing doesnt reveal anything that we dont already know. The phone gets Qualcomms Snapdragon 888 processor with 6GB of RAM and Android 11-based software. An earlier Geekbench entry revealed that the Galaxy S21 FE will also come in an 8GB RAM variant.

The upcoming affordable Galaxy flagship has also picked necessary certifications in some regions in the recent past. A 3C certification in China last week revealed that the phone will feature 5G connectivity and support 25W fast wired charging. It should also support wireless charging as well as reverse wireless charging. The handset will likely pack a 4,500mAh battery. It might not come with a charger in the box though.

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Other rumored specs include a 6.5-inch Super AMOLED punch-hole display with Full HD+ resolution and a 120Hz refresh rate. There could be a 12-megapixel triple-camera setup at the back while the front-facing camera will likely be a 32-megapixel sensor. An under-display fingerprint scanner, stereo speakers, Samsung Pay, Bluetooth 5.x, Wi-Fi 6, IP67/IP68 rating, and NFC are also expected to be part of the package.

Galaxy S21 FE will likely arrive a couple of months late

The Galaxy S21 FE was expected to be revealed alongside a bunch of other Galaxy devices including the Galaxy Z Fold 3 and Z Flip 3 foldables sometime in August. However, recent reports coming from South Korea suggest Samsung is delaying the launch of the new affordable flagship by around two months to give its upcoming foldables more time in the market. And while the company has yet to confirm any of these rumors, it seems very likely that the Galaxy S21 FE will arrive a little late than expected.

Nonetheless, we should get to hear more about this phone in the coming weeks. Samsung should also soon start teasing its upcoming devices on its social media handles. Apart from the Galaxy S21 FE, there are at least five more of them  Galaxy Z Fold 3, Galaxy Z Flip 3, Galaxy Watch 4, Galaxy Watch Active 4, and Galaxy Buds 2. So theres plenty to look forward to the next Galaxy Unpacked. We will make sure to keep you updated on all the latest developments around it.
Googles Waymo has now announced new funding to pay for more self-driving car technology and staff. In fact, according to recent reports, its received more than $2.5 billion in additional funding for the endeavor.

The funding, Waymo indicates, will pay to hire more staff and for R&D on its self-driving technology. With the ultimate goal of opening up its service for more paid riders.

Waymo has been around, so how does the funding help self-driving technology cars?

Now, Waymo has been in operation under Google parent Alphabet Inc. since 2009. And, in the interim, it has continued improving its technology and offered more rides in more places. The focus of those endeavors has been, of course, getting the service up to par to serve as a paid taxi service for riders.

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The most recent of its pushes on that front happened back in late 2020. Specifically, in Phoenix Arizona. But Google isnt operating in a vacuum either.

Setting aside the pitfalls and setbacks encountered by big competitors such as Uber and Cruise, the latter of which was recently approved to open up operations in San Francisco, Waymo could also face stiff competition from newcomers to the AI-driven space. Newcomers with long histories in the technology market, such as Huawei and others.

Waymo hasnt detailed exactly how the funding received in the latest investment round will be spent. But it will most likely go toward increasing testing and improving both the AI and the sensors the AI utilizes to drive safely.

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Why is this funding important now?

With business beginning to return to normal as more people are vaccinated against Covid-19, Waymo will need to step up its game to stay relevant in the self-driving industry. As the competition heats up and people begin to travel again. As noted above, one of its biggest competitors is Cruise. And that competitor recently received the go-ahead to begin driving in San Francisco  a big win against the Google-associated company.

While those rides havent started yet for Cruise, the approval does put it ahead of Waymo in the region. The company has yet to receive its permit from the California DMV and the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC). Cruise also matches Waymo in terms of funding. Last year, Waymo announced an initial funding round at around $2.25-billion. That was ultimately extended, giving the company approximately $3.25-billion.

The latest funding round puts Waymo just short of $6 billion. But Cruise also recently announced some help for its endeavors from GM. To the tune of around $5-billion.
A detailed and thorough look at the city's natural history museum and what it needs to thrive began on the front page of June 18, 1972.
Vanessa Henderson recieves her first COVID-19 vaccine from Samantha McKay with Quality of Life Health Services during an event in Hobson City on March 23, 2021.
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TUNIS - Solocoreografico, an international dance festival for solo choreographies, is debuting in Tunisia. The festival, founded in Italy in 2014 by Italian choreographer Raffaele Irace, will be held in Tunis on June 19 at 7 PM, thanks to the collaboration with the Cultural multidisciplinary center Studio ElHouma. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, this first edition in Tunis will take place as a film screening at the Studio ElHouma, with a limited public and streamed on Facebook live.



The year "2021 marks a particular moment in the history of this festival", Irace explained to ANSA. Starting this year, in fact, along with the editions of Turin and Frankfurt (the latest made in collaboration with Gallus Theater), which took place respectively from 2014 and 2018, two editions have been added: one in Oklahoma City as part of the Oklahoma International Dance Festival and the one in Tunis, in collaboration with the Studio ElHouma of Selma Boukef. Expanding its international network, the festival is widening its artistic offer, developing a wide context based on dialogue and the respect of diversity of human and artistic approaches inside which performers and the public can move at ease.



The first part of the evening in Tunis will be dedicated to Solocoreografico Film Night, the festival's video dance section.



In the second part, choreographies selected for the 2021 edition will be presented for the first time in Tunis: "Over the fence - Fragole" by Cristina Golin, danced by Rebecca Moriondo; "Free" by Charfeddine Traoriti; "Come era il passato" choreographed by Isabella Legato, performed by Ada Tenuti; "Entre ciel et terre" by Afiadegnigban Kossivi Senagbe; "Mormora" choreographed by Francesco Mangiapane, danced by Ylenia Ambrosino; "Bach" by Collin Connor, danced by Micah Bullard.



"We have reflected a lot about the opportunity or not of organizing this new edition in Tunis, during the pandemic", explained Irace, adding that "we have reached the conclusion that we always want, especially at this time, to support the artists of dance and we have decided to do it".



For this particular edition, we have decided to dedicate the framework of the festival to young choreographers and dancers who have confronted themselves with this difficult period. They continued to dance, creating and producing new works that we have the pleasure to show on Saturday, June 19 with the screening of a film at Studio ElHouma for the local public and online for a wider one". "It is important for organizers of Solocoreografico to maintain the atmosphere of the festival, the international dimension, cooperation and the idea behind it, even at times of social distancing. The connection with several international partners is still central for Solocoreografico which will continue collaborations today and in the future, hopefully without travel restrictions, that interrupt many artistic exchanges that we hope to make", concluded Irace.
BRUSSELS - In a preliminary draft of the conclusions of a summit of EU leaders to be held on June 24-25, under the chapter concerning Turkey is a space dedicated to refinancing the hosting of Syrian refugees in Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon. A proposal of the European Commission is expected on the issue. It should not be too far from the previous six billion of the EU-Turkey statement (2016) for the period 2021-2027. However, negotiations are ongoing. One of the issues under discussion is whether the entire sum should come from the European budget or from other entries.


BARCELONA - Italy and Spain are "stronger together", Premier Mario Draghi told Premier Pedro Sanchez at the Italo-Spanish dialogue forum in Barcelona Friday.



Draghi added that Madrid was a "strategic partner" and called for more unity to overcome north-south divisions and create a "more modern" EU with the help of Spain, France and Germany.



Draghi added that Italy's post-COVID Recovery Plan, the PNRR, will earmark 17 billion euros to regenerate cities and make them more sustainable, plus two billion to valorise the historical heritage of art cities.



The two leaders also said a common response from the European Council on migrants was urgent.
BELGRADE - Fresh political turbulence has been registered in Montenegro, where Parliament on Thursday night adopted a resolution banning the denial of Srebrenica's genocide, approving at the same time a measure to dismiss from office Justice Minister Vladimir Leposavic, who over the past few months has questioned the genocide carried out in the Bosnian city in July 1995 by the Bosnian-Serb forces of Ratko Mladic.



Srebrenica's resolution was approved also with the votes of the leading opposition party Dps of President Milo Djukanovic, which forced many to talk of a clear new majority and of a government crisis, a situation that would not reflect anymore the outcome of elections held on August 30 last year which sent Djukanovic's party to the opposition after 30 years in power.



Representatives of pro-Serbian forces are in particular on a war footing, supported by a massive Serbian component of Montenegro's population (about one-third). Andrija Mandic, leader of the democratic Front, a pro-Serbian formation that is part of the government coalition, has denounced the coup de main in Parliament, asking for the formation of a new executive or fresh elections. From the Parliament of Podgorica, said Mandic, came an attack to Serbia and the Serbian population that was even stronger and more hostile to the one made by the Tribunal of The Hague. In Belgrade, a lawmaker of the majority party Sns, the political force led by President Aleksandar Vucic, proposed to declare persona non grata in Serbia all lawmakers and members of Montenegro's government, including Premier Zdravko Krivokapic, who yesterday voted in favor of the resolution on Srebrenica. Belgrade's official position is that in Serbrenica a massacre was perpetrated by single people who were responsible, but that it wasn't a genocide, as claimed by the international judiciary.



The Croatian and Muslim component of Bosnia-Herzegovina had the opposite reaction. Sefik Dzaferovic, the Bosniak Muslim member of the Bosnian tripartite presidency, described the resolution as a contribution to the restoration of confidence and the strengthening of peace in the region. The Croatian member of the presidency Zeljko Komsic spoke about a decision worthy of a civil country, expressing the wish that the same will be done by Bosnia-Herzegovina and Serbia. In Bosnia-Herzegovina it is quite difficult to adopt unitary decisions due to the deep division between the two entities (Republika Srpska and the Croat-Muslim Federation) and the three populations (Bosnian Muslim, Serbians Orthodox and Croatian Catholic people) composing the Balkan country.




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One of the candidates in the election to succeed Len McCluskey as general secretary of Unite has withdrawn.

Howard Beckett, an assistant general secretary of the union, said he will now support Steve Turner.

His decision means there are now three candidates  Mr Turner, Sharon Graham and Gerard Coyne.

Mr Beckett and Mr Turner said in a joint statement: Both recognise the vision and strengths of their respective campaigns and Steve Turner recognises the key manifesto commitments and energy generated by Howards campaign.

They will both work to implement a blended manifesto, taking the best ideas from both candidates, when Steve Turner becomes general secretary.

Howard Beckett will campaign alongside Steve for the next two months to present a joint programme which includes greater support for workplace representatives, important new communications initiatives including Unite TV, upgraded education and training for members, an independent and progressive political voice, and a new structure for the union reflecting the diversity of our nations and regions.

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Voting among Unite members starts next month and the result will be announced in August.
An MP suspended by the Tories is facing trial accused of sexually assaulting a 15-year-old boy in 2008, it can be revealed.

Imran Ahmad Khan, the 47-year-old representing Wakefield in West Yorkshire, issued a denial in the strongest terms over the allegation he groped the teenager in Staffordshire.

Ahmad Khan helped Boris Johnson win a large Commons majority by taking the constituency in the so-called red wall that formed Labours heartlands in the Midlands and the North of England.

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The Conservatives said the whip had been suspended from Ahmad Khan, meaning he would sit as an independent in the Commons, after reporting restrictions preventing his identification were lifted on Friday.

The MP faces a single count of sexual assault against the then-teenager, who cannot be identified because he is an alleged victim of a sexual offence, in 2008.

Ahmad Khan, who is from Wakefield and was first elected in the 2019 general election, appeared at Westminster Magistrates Court on Thursday by video-link from his lawyers office.

Asked to indicate a plea to the charge, he responded: Not guilty.

In a subsequent statement, Ahmad Khan added: May I make it clear from the outset that the allegation, which is from over 13 years ago, is denied in the strongest terms.

This matter is deeply distressing to me and I, of course, take it extremely seriously.

Imran Ahmad Khan has been suspended by the Tories (UK Parliament/PA)

To be accused of doing something I did not do is shocking, destabilising and traumatic. I am innocent.

Those, like me, who are falsely accused of such actions are in the difficult position of having to endure damaging and painful speculation until the case is concluded.

I ask for privacy as I work to clear my name.

Ahmad Khan was granted unconditional bail ahead of his appearance at the Old Bailey on July 15.

He took the Wakefield constituency in the last general election from Mary Creagh, overturning the senior Labour MPs 2,000-vote majority in the seat she had held since 2005.

The loss of Ahmad Khan from the parliamentary party is unlikely to diminish the Prime Ministers power in the Commons significantly as he still holds a comfortable working majority of more than 80.

But Mr Johnson has faced significant rebellions to pass legislation for coronavirus restrictions, with the blushes of a defeat only being saved by Labour not opposing the measures.

A spokeswoman for the Tory whips office said: Imran Ahmad Khan has had the whip suspended. As there is an ongoing court case, we will not be commenting further.

Imran Ahmad Khan is due to appear at the Old Bailey next month (Daniel Leal-Olivas/PA)

It was understood that the suspension was issued when chief whip Mark Spencer was informed of the charges.

Ahmad Khan was said not to have been on the parliamentary estate since the charge was brought and was not expected to return while the case was ongoing.

The charge, which was read out in court, stated: In the county of Staffordshire you intentionally touched a boy aged 15 and that touching was sexual when he did not consent and you did not reasonably believe that he was consenting, contrary to Section 3 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003.

Chief magistrate Paul Goldspring said the case was not suitable for trial in the magistrates court and sent the case to the Old Bailey.

According to his website, the MP was born in Wakefield, where he attended the independent Silcoates School before going to university at the Pushkin Institute in Russia and graduating from Kings College London with a bachelors degree in war studies.

Before entering Parliament, he worked for the United Nations as a special assistant for political affairs in Mogadishu.

The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said it made the decision to charge after reviewing a file of evidence from Staffordshire Police.

Stressing the need for a fair trial, the CPSs Rosemary Ainslie said: It is extremely important that there should be no reporting, commentary or sharing of information online which could in any way prejudice these proceedings.
The Duchess of Cambridge has declared the time for action is now on the issue of early childhood development, describing it as the social equivalent of climate change.

Kate was speaking as she gathered a panel of experts at a leading London university to discuss the inaugural report of her new Royal Foundation Centre for Early Childhood.

She insisted she was not looking for a quick win with her early years work, but wanted to take a holistic approach to better prepare the next generation of parents.

And she hoped her new institution would make it more common to speak about emotions and feelings, enabling adults to better understand how affection affects their own behaviour.

Speaking during the roundtable discussion at the London School of Economics, Kate said she was really excited to launch the centre.

She added: So my hope today, through the report and through this new centre, to show that change really needs to happen, and the time for action is now.

Because I feel that this is the social equivalent of climate change, where we followed the science for many, many years.

And that is what we have to do with early childhood development if we want to build a happier, healthier world.

After meeting academics the duchess chatted to parents at Kensington Palace (Victoria Jones/PA)

The more we learn about early childhood and the first five years of life the greater imperative it is to act.

The centre will be based at Kensington Palace and marks the culmination of ten years of work by the duchess into the importance of the formative years of a childs life.

The Royal Foundation Centre for Early Childhood stems from research which shows the first five years of childhood fundamentally shape adulthood, with social challenges such as addiction, violence, family breakdown, homelessness and mental health having their roots in the earliest years of life.

Three key areas will be the focus of the new organisation  research, developing new solutions with public and private voluntary sectors, and campaigns to raise awareness.

Its website will showcase its major initiatives, highlight its research, and act as a platform for those who want to find out more about the impact of early childhood.

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The centres Big Change Starts Small inaugural report, written in collaboration with The Centre on the Developing Child at Harvard University and the London School of Economics, revealed that the cost of lost opportunity is 16.3 billion in England alone.

The duchess was joined for the discussion by leading academics, some from charities she formally supports, including representatives from Maternal Mental Health Alliance, Mind, Place2Be, the Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Future Men.

Paul Farmer, chief executive of the mental health charity Mind, said behind the statistics about the economic impact of not investing in the early years was the reality of lives lost and ruined.

He said: That, of course, is the greatest tragedy of all and I think its so important, when you start looking at the damage that has often happened, it all too often tracks back to whats been happening in peoples early years.

Dr Guddi Singh, a paediatric registrar at Guys and St Thomas NHS Foundation Trust, said: Parenting hasnt had the elevation that it needs in this country, and in fact in any western country. Its about tackling that as an issue.

Kate meets a group of people who have inspired her work in the early years development of children (Tolga Akmen/PA)

Later, at Kensington Palace, the duchess was reunited with people she has met over the last decade who have helped to shape her understanding of the importance of the early years.

Kate spoke with Julie Muir, who has met the duchess twice before, in 2015 and 2020, at womens prison, HMP Send.

Kate said about her work on early years development: This started in HMP and hearing your stories. It was these conversations that made me realise how important this was.

Julie Muir, 40, who was in prison as a young woman for drug-related offences but is now head of recovery and housing for the Forward Trust, which runs programmes in prisons surrounding addiction, spoke about the impact of the pandemic on families.

She said: I feel flattered to be part of the change in the duchess that has helped her refocus her energy on the early years.
EDEN, N.C. (AP)  Three people are dead and two remain missing after a group floating down a North Carolina river on inflatable tubes went over a dam, authorities said Thursday.

Rockingham County Emergency Services Director Rodney Cates told reporters that a group of nine people tubing on the Dan River went over the Duke Energy dam in Eden around sunset on Wednesday. A Duke Energy employee who saw some of the tubers called the situation in to 911 Thursday afternoon, Cates said.

Cates did not release the identities of the three people who died.

The Dan River in North Carolina is seen snaking through the forest below as I fly over. The Dan River flows 214 miles in North Carolina and Virginia. It rises in Patrick County, Virginia, and crosses the state border into Stokes County, North Carolina. It then flows into Rockingham County. From there it back into Virginia through only Pittsylvania County before reentering North Carolina near the border between Caswell County and Rockingham County. It flows into northern Caswell County and then back into southern Virginia (briefly Pittsylvania County, then into Halifax County) and finally into Kerr Reservoir on the Roanoke River.

Four other people were rescued and taken to a hospital for treatment of injuries that Cates said were not life-threatening. Two more remained missing Thursday night.

Boats and helicopters were used in the search in the county north of Greensboro along the Virginia state line.

Cates said it's not immediately clear why the tubers didn't contact authorities sooner, but he said it may have been because they didn't have phones with them.

He said it's not unusual for people to float the river on tubes or rafts in the area but most get out and walk around the dam, which is marked by signs. The dam is approximately 8 feet (2.5 meters) tall, he said.
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The U.S. Marine Corps Program Manager for Training Systems has awarded Saab the Force on Force Training Systems - Next (FoFTS-Next) Single Award Task Order Contract (SATOC). The contract has a potential value of USD 127.9 million. The FoFTS-Next SATOC will include U.S. Marine Corps Training Instrumentation Systems (MCTIS) equipment, logistics, and training exercise support.

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The Saab Live MCTIS Training System is a proven solution that will provide interoperability training to prepare our U.S. Marines for combat effectiveness across multi-domain operations," said Erik Smith, President and CEO of Saab in the U.S. (Picture source: Saab)

Through this framework agreement with future task orders exercised, Saab will provide a full turnkey live training capability to include equipment deliveries for individual Marine weapons and vehicles, as well as logistics and maintenance support and training exercise support at all major U.S. Marine Corps installations worldwide. "Ensuring the readiness of our Armed Forces is the foundation of all Saab training systems. The Saab Live MCTIS Training System is a proven solution that will provide interoperability training to prepare our U.S. Marines for combat effectiveness across multi-domain operations," said Erik Smith, President and CEO of Saab in the U.S.

The Saab next-generation Live MCTIS Training System will replace the U.S. Marine Corps' current Instrumentation and Tactical Engagement Simulation System (ITESS) equipment. Through innovative use of technology and well-proven training philosophy, Saab offers world-leading training solutions and capabilities enabling interoperability and true realism for land forces. Saab offers solutions for live training, live-fire training, virtual training, and training services.
Modi urged the people to remain cautious, stressing that the virus is 'still amongst us' and the possibility of it mutating is also there

Prime Minister Narendra Modi during the virtual launch of Customized Crash Course programme for Covid 19 Frontline workers, in New Delhi. (PTI)

New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday launched a customised crash course programme that aims to skill and upskill over one lakh "Covid warriors" across the country.

Speaking on the occasion, Modi urged the people to remain cautious, stressing that the virus is "still amongst us" and the possibility of it mutating is also there.

He also said the central government is committed to provide Covid vaccination free to everyone, starting June 21.

"In the second wave of coronavirus, we saw what kind of challenges the ever-changing form of this virus can bring before us," Modi said.

"We have to further enhance the preparedness of the country to meet the challenges ahead," Modi asserted.

With this goal in mind, a massive campaign to prepare about 1 lakh frontline "Corona warriors" is being started in the country, he said.

Modi also said work is underway on war footing to ready over 1,500 oxygen plants and efforts are on to reach every district.

The 'Customised Crash Course programme for COVID-19 Frontline workers' aims to skill and upskill over one lakh "Covid warriors" across the country, according to the PMO.

The training will be imparted to them in six customised job roles namely home care support, basic care support, advanced care support, emergency care support, sample collection support, and medical equipment support.

The course has been designed as a special programme under the central component of the Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana 3.0, with total financial outlay of Rs. 276 crore, the PMO said.

The programme will create skilled non-medical healthcare workers to fill the present and future needs of manpower in the health sector, it said.
Athens, TX (75751)

Today

Mostly cloudy early, then thunderstorms developing this afternoon. High near 85F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 70%..

Tonight

An isolated thunderstorm possible this evening, then occasional showers overnight. Low 72F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 70%.
SUV

Dodge will happily sell you the Durango Hellcat (no really, they've boosted the production), which puts the supercharged 6.2L HEMI in a three-row context. But, as mentioned in the intro, that hasn't stopped the aftermarket from wishing to convert the Ram TRX into an. For one, here's Texan specialist Hennessey Performance's take on the matter, with the conversion being ready to add a third row of seats to the party.However, the transformation portrayed in this rendering seems to hit the machine with a shrink ray.Now, before anybody drops the kind of evil laugh a criminal mastermind operating such a device would deliver, allow us to come up with a more reasonable description: the TRX loses its bed, as well as a part of its wheelbase, leaving just enough room between the wheels to still accommodate the factory doors.It's worth noting that digital label superrenderscars, who handled the stunt, decided to leave the rest of the vehicle untouched (i.e., no fancy custom wheels or off-roading accessories have been fitted to the vehicle).Of course, the new proportions aren't exactly the kind that inspire confidence when it comes to pushing the 702 hp monster hard, especially since lowering the machine appears to be out of the question. After all, such a move would completely defeat the purpose of the terrain tamer.Then again, this whole setup reminds us of a real-world contraption of the sort, namely the Suzuki Jimny. And we're specifically referring to how the aftermarket gave the tiny Japanese off-roader a Mercedes-AMG G 63 look in spite of the cheesiness of such a transformation, we have to admit it looks pretty convincing, bull bar and all.
EV

The Korean company revealed that at InterBattery 202, the largest battery industry exhibition in its home country. Sadly, SK Innovation did not disclose how energy-dense its nickel-rich cell is. Well try to learn that from the company itself.Regardless of how much it is, that makes Ford be ahead of Tesla when it comes to battery tech. Tesla said its 4680 cells would also be rich in nickel. Elon Musk even asked mining companies to increase their nickel production because his company would need a lot of the metal for its new batteries.The irony is that the company seemed much closer to delivering these supercells than anyone in the market after Tesla Battery Day . At the Q1 2021 earnings call on April 26, 2021, Musk said that he thought the 4680 were not quite yet at the point where we think the cells are reliable enough to be shipped in cars.He predicted that would happen 12  probably not more than 18 months away than that point, which implies they will only be available by May 2022 in the best-case scenario. The F-150 Lightning has been promised to spring 2022, which means Ford may start to sell its electric pickup truck earlier than Tesla will sell the Cybertruck . SK Innovation will produce the NCM9 cells in its battery plant in Georgia, U.S.Apart from the NCM9, SK Innovation also presented the NCM8, the cell that the Hyundai Ioniq 5 and the Kia EV6 use. The company also said it is working to create batteries that are safer, faster to charge, and live longer than the current ones.To make charging faster, SK Innovation will double the number of cathodes and anodes per cell. That will make electrons travel shorter distances. They will also have more resistant electrodes, which will make them last longer.Finally, SK Innovation bragged about how its batteries have never seen a fire case after more than 270 million deliveries to date. It was a subtle and polite way to tease LG Energy Solution, which has been involved with two significant recalls: for the Hyundai Kona Electric and the Chevrolet BoltAccording to SK Innovation, its separators are of exceptionally high quality, which prevents short circuits. They also prevent heat from propagating, which saves nearby cells if one of them has any issues. Finally, SK Innovation has the Z folding strategy, which wraps the anode and the cathode in zigzags. That reduces the risk of contact between them, which is what causes short circuits and fires.
This G-body coupe is capable of delivering 8s quarter-mile runs, as it recently demonstrated at the Lucas Oil Raceway in Indiana, where it attended an event dubbed Midwest Drags.All that stopwatch might is delivered courtesy of a Chevy small-block and while this part of the build is keeping things in the GM arena, we can hardly label it as a traditional contraption. That's because the V8 is aided by a pair of GT45 turbochargers that were grabbed from eBay.The engine, which sips on E85, is mated to a GM 4L80-E four-speed automatic, which, in another "plot twist", sends the power to the wheels via a Ford 8.8 rear end.The exterior of the Golden Bowtie machine has been left mostly stock, except for the LED headlights and a few bits that were required to make the most out of the said mechanical transformation.As such, if you get close enough to the car to be able to pick through the front grille, you'll notice the intercooler, while the side exhaust tips penetrating the front wings are not exactly subtle.Oh, and let's not overlook the skinny front wheels and the massive sidewalls of the rear tires, with this so-called drag pack allowing the Monte Carlo to make the most out of its newfound muscle.Now, if you head over to the 6:30 point of the video below (lens tip to Drag Racing and Car Stuff), you'll see the Chevy battling a Dodge Challenger SRT Demon , whose factory quarter-mile number sits at 9.65s.It looks like the Monte Carlo driver gives the Mopar guy the hit, not that this would be enough to close the gap between the two machines.Then again, you can't win them all, as the battle at the 1:10 timestamp shows, with this casting a heavily modded secong-generation Camaro in the role of the antagonist.
Born as a follow-up to the Daytona, the 1970 Plymouth Superbird not only had the well-known graphics and horn sound but also came to the NASCAR party with numerous engineering enhancements thanks to the lessons learned previously with the Charger sibling. But we didnt know that Plymouth also created Superbird clones.Or should we say almost identical twins? Just take a look at the video embedded below that comes courtesy of the good folks over at the Shift channel on YouTube or the gallery above. And believe us when we say that no one is seeing double. Instead, were presented with a couple of almost identical 1970 Plymouth Superbirds that were on site for a show apparition during an event held at the Thunder Valley Raceway Park in Noble, Oklahoma.According to the description, these old-school racers were there just for the beauty shots, but they ultimately decided to make a pass to please the crowd. Then, once we recovered from the shock of seeing these two rare examples still alive and well enough to go for a quarter-mile skirmish we also started looking at the jaw-dropping details.Yes, these two are both painted white and feature identical black tops and Road Runner graphics. But one can also see that were dealing with slightly different white-wall tire and wheel choices. All-black looks for the Superbird in the right lane and the classic silver for the sibling in the left lane. Also, just one of them did a burnout to get the right temperature for the rubber.As such, its easy to scent the winner even before the green light, though it was also a little surprising to see the left lane driver have the tiniest advantage off the mark thanks to a seemingly better launch. But the race was soon settled in favor of the other Superbird, as expected. Yes, the ETs arent the most impressive... but do they even matter in this particular case
Boston-based Regent (Regional Electric Ground Effect Nautical Transport) has only recently announced that its developing an all-electric, high-speed ferr y that can foil like a hydrofoil and fly close to the water surface, like a plane. Now, the France-based company Brittany Ferries has signed a letter of intent, with the purpose of bringing seagliders to sail between France and the UK, by 2028. Until then, smaller electric craft could become operational as soon as 2025.This innovative mode of transport could not only significantly reduce travel time, but also reduce CO2 emissions and become even greener with time, as more of the electricity is obtained from renewable sources. With a top speed of 180 mph (290 kph) and a battery range of 180 miles (290 km), the seaglider would be 6 times faster than a standard ferry and more efficient for long distance travel.For example, it would only take 40 minutes to get from Portsmouth (UK) to Cherbourg (France).Technically, this unusual craft is a wing-in-ground effect vehicle (WIG), based on the concept of ground effect. The high-pressure air that is trapped between the crafts wings and the water (or ground), when flying at low altitude, is what the seaglider rides on, when in open water.When it sets off from the port, it rises on foils (like a hydrofoil), and then it takes off in open water , like an aircraft. The wing-mounted propellers provide the thrust needed to sea-skim at a few meters above water, and the electric motors regulate the air flow during the ride.Although there are still technological and regulatory issues that need to be sorted out, seagliders are here to stay and in the next few years they could become a standard mode of transport.
SUV

Although not all of the designing process was transferred to the companys fans, the social media dwellers still had the chance to choose some key styling features in a series of online polls. Now Ford has vouched to start the production of the limited series and first deliveries should be expected before the end of the year.Calling it an innovative experiment in human-centered design, Ford has revealed the exact numbers for the winning specification, which came up on top of the alternate Puma ST 24K Edition nameplate for 59% of the responders. The companys social media fans cast almost 275k votes over just ten days, choosing about anything from the color combinations to the models badges.As such, the winning mix includes a black exterior paint (56% over grey), red brake calipers (74% over black), grey seatbelt stitching (87% over black), Puma ST scuff and pride plates, and more. Now, it just remains to be seen if what fans wanted will also translate into a sales success. It could since under the hood resides a 200-ps (197 hp) 1.5-liter EcoBoost mill thats capable of taking the little crossoverto 62 mph (100 kph) in 6.7 seconds.It also comes with the hard-to-find in the segment limited-slip differential, Sport/Track/Eco Drive Modes, those patented force vectoring springs, and the Ford Performance tuned suspension and steering for great driving characteristics. And, by the way, its interesting to note that Ford has also designed a concept with help from fans, the Team Fordzillas P1 prototype that was turned last year from a virtual vision to scale model reality in just seven weeks.
Richard Branson to be Astronaut 001 in Virgin Spaceflight on July 11

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3 Urban Utilities S-Poo-V Number 2 Shows How Human Waste Can Power An EV

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1 Electrified 2021 Hyundai Tucson N Line Launched in the UK, Priced at 34,900

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Hyundai Debuts Hydrogen Charging System at World's First Touring Race for EVs

Hyundai recently announced that its dedicated hydrogen fuel cell system sub-brand, HTWO, will make its motorsports debut, providing its fuel cell generators to the world's first all-electric touring car race (ETCR) series that will take place between June 18th-20th. 6 photos ICE are allowed to participate. During the event, automakers will have the opportunity to demonstrate their electric tech on the racetrack.



The Vallelunga opener will also hold the competitive debut of the Veloster N ETCR, Hyundai's first-ever electric car. Each PURE ETCR event will include short battle races with vehicles driving flat out. The fastest cars will advance to the final, and the winner will be crowned King or Queen of the Weekend.



Hyundai is not only fielding its own racing team, but it will also provide a green charging infrastructure to power all EVs using its sub-brand HTWO's patented fuel cell generator. The charging system has a power output of up to 160 kW and can charge in less than an hour two ETCR vehicles, each with a 65 kWh battery.



This generator is mobile, and it can also provide power in remote areas where electricity is unavailable. According to Hyundai, the ETCR will not only act as a high-performance vehicle testbed for the company's system, but it will also open up a new market potential for HTWO's power-generating technology. The brand hopes to utilize its



"Through the event, we hope to relay a message that hydrogen and electric energy solutions will coexist as the power sources of future mobility," says Saehoon Kim, Executive Vice President and Head of Fuel Cell Center, Hyundai Motor Group. Hyundai is ready for the inaugural season of PURE ETCR, which begins with the opening round at Vallelunga, Italy. Only vehicles withoutare allowed to participate. During the event, automakers will have the opportunity to demonstrate their electric tech on the racetrack.The Vallelunga opener will also hold the competitive debut of the Veloster N ETCR, Hyundai's first-ever electric car. Each PURE ETCR event will include short battle races with vehicles driving flat out. The fastest cars will advance to the final, and the winner will be crowned King or Queen of the Weekend.Hyundai is not only fielding its own racing team, but it will also provide a green charging infrastructure to power all EVs using its sub-brand HTWO's patented fuel cell generator. The charging system has a power output of up to 160and can charge in less than an hour two ETCR vehicles, each with a 65battery.This generator is mobile, and it can also provide power in remote areas where electricity is unavailable. According to Hyundai, the ETCR will not only act as a high-performance vehicle testbed for the company's system, but it will also open up a new market potential for HTWO's power-generating technology. The brand hopes to utilize its fuel cell system to power ships, trains, urban air mobility vehicles, and in a variety of other future mobility fields."Through the event, we hope to relay a message that hydrogen and electric energy solutions will coexist as the power sources of future mobility," says Saehoon Kim, Executive Vice President and Head of Fuel Cell Center, Hyundai Motor Group.

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It hates unions, something Germans have a tradition with. Why would any politician want to attract such a company? We talked to Jorg Steinbach about that, and the Tesla effect is a possible explanation.Steinbach is the minister for Economic Affairs, Labour, and Energy of the State of Brandenburg. In other words, hes the man who extended the red carpet for Tesla to install a factory in his state. We talked to him thanks to CLEW (Clean Energy Wire).This German journalism organization aims to incentivize news about the energy transition going around worldwide. The conversation happened at one of the sessions of the digital research tour The future of the European car industry: the challenge of industrial transformation. We are among the 15 selected journalists to cover that. Despite the name of the event, the challenge and its outcomes are global.Besides Steinbach, we also talked to Philip Barnstorf, the RBB journalist that correctly said Tesla made rough plans for its factory, hence the multiple delays. The company stated it would start its operations on July 1, 2021, and that will already not be the case. Tesla now talks about the end of the year, but that also does not seem feasible.If it were, Steinbach would see the production of the first car there as a personal reward.I am still confident that we will see a car there, even if not yet for mass production, in 2021. It would be like a Christmas gift to me.We reminded him about the issue with the 4680 cells . Apart from not being ready for production yet, Tesla asked for permission to have a 100 GWh battery factory at Giga Grunheide on June 3, 2021. It will take quite a while to start its operations. Tesla said Fremont could supply the 4680 cells, but exporting lithium-ion batteries is not easy: they are considered hazardous materials.Since the cars it plans to build in Germany will need these larger batteries, both situations make it almost impossible for any vehicle to be produced in Grunheide this year. Steinbach preferred to abstain from this discussion.I will not make any predictions about when that will happen. That is totally up to Tesla, but it would be good news if it could make a car there this year.We asked him whether it was Tesla who set a date to start operations in the factory or if Brandenburg had given the company any forecast of when that would be possible.They had to predict a date, and I learned that Tesla usually establishes these targets for the second half of the year. Apart from that, the teams inside the company compete with each other. Therefore, the German team had the personal ambition of getting the factory ready before Austin.Tesla is also building a factory in Texas, and it will probably begin its activities before Giga Grunheide. In Germany, plants can take more than four years to be completed. Yet, both Tesla and Elon Musk criticized the bureaucracy that they should know beforehand existed in the country. Steinbach did not feel it was an attack.It is not known that our permit process can start over if plans present significant changes. Musk has triggered this kind of discussion, even if not in the best way. We could remain slow and lose every race.After seeing the permit process restart twice, Tesla should already know thats how things are. Despite that, even the minister criticized the bureaucracy in the country.Germans love to plan, but it is expensive and time-consuming. We have competing areas of the law creating bottlenecks: theres environmental protection and animal protection. Ill give an example: Tesla cut the trees in the area to start building the factory. One of the trees was not cut because it had a hibernating bat. It slept for weeks.Steinbach stresses his point is not against nature but to set priorities and follow them.Dont get me wrong: I support the environment and animal protection, but we have to have priorities. If an area is set for industrial development, that should be the goal.The minister did not touch this subject, but it is bizarre that a protected area with a groundwater table was deemed appropriate for industrial development. Tesla faced many issues because of that, placing foundation piles in the terrain that ended up invading that table.According to Steinbach, journalists tend to see only the negative side of things.Theres the public perception about the factory, and theres the noise around it. We made a poll, and 85% of the residents around the plant area think it is a positive thing, 10% are against it, and 5% are neutral and want to see how things evolve there. Yet, we hear mostly about the 10% that are against it.For the minister, Tesla brought awareness to how much Brandenburg invests in clean energy generation. John Kerry, United States Special Presidential Envoy for Climate, recently visited Germany and praised Brandenburg for its environmental efforts. Steinbach credits that to the Tesla effect.Another one of these effects can be a disregard for unions. Tesla has avoided as much as possible having unions in its Fremont factory and is allegedly working in the same direction in Austin. In Germany, it already said it would not join the employers association, with which IG Metall establishes collective agreements. We asked Steinbach about that.I have to promote talks between Tesla and the unions. What the company has assured me is that it will comply with all labor laws, such as allowing a works council to form.The minister said Tesla would have no special treatment at all in the country.We do have a red carpet policy to invite investors and show we are a friendly environment for them. Despite that, they will have no preferences whatsoever when they are established here. Theyll be treated like everyone else.Thats something Musk disputed months ago. After calling the permit process in Germany irritating, the Tesla CEO said his company deserved fast-track privileges for spreading e-mobility. Well follow closely how things unfold there.
EV

As you already know, the wheel-tire combination plays a huge role in terms of driving range. Wider tires and larger diameters for the wheels may improve grip, traction, and therefore handling and launches, but we have to remember that higher rolling resistance defeats the purpose of an. Or - better said - most EVs because the Plaid isnt your regular eco-friendly car.There are three main purposes for the strip-slaying Plaid , starting with slightly larger profit margins for the Palo Alto-based automaker. Tesla has also had trouble selling the Model S in the past couple of years because of the Model 3 and Model Y, and the launch of the Plaid should bring in more customers to the full-size sedan. And finally, Tesla differs from legacy automakers who tried their hands at making EVs by integrating excitement.The closest rivals to the Plaid in a straight line come in the form of all-electric hypercars, especially the Rimac Nevera . The Croatian company quotes a 62-mph (100-kph) acceleration of merely 1.85 seconds, and the quarter-mile sprint is over in a whopping 8.6 seconds with the proper setup.Coincidence or not, you cant hit the claimed 1.99-second acceleration to 60 mph (97 kph) in the Plaid unless you have the proper wheel-tire combo, a VHT-covered strip, Cheetah Stance activated, and the first foot of rollout subtracted. In the real world, on plain old asphalt and without rollout, the most the Plaid can offer is 2.28 seconds according to MotorTrends testing.Thats still more than impressive for a five-seat luxobarge, especially one that weighs 4,766 pounds (2,162 kilograms) before any optional extras.
Lest we forget (Ne Obliviscarus) is HMS Argylls motto. Indeed, we should never forget to honor those who have served before and the ships that made history. With a 30-year long career, the Royal Navy s longest-serving Type 23 frigate is still one of the most powerful ships at sea, blending its extensive experience with the latest cutting-edge technology.HMS Argylls crew recently celebrated the frigates milestone birthday, with a proper ceremony and even a cake. And Argyll does deserve all the honors  commissioned in the spring of 1991, it has now accumulated over 685,000 nautical miles, which is the equivalent of 32 trips around the world.You might think that a warship that has been designed in the 80s couldnt keep up with the latest generation, but Argyll is actually one of the most technologically capable frigates today, after having been upgraded a few years ago.And it recently proved that, during NATOs Formidable Shield exercise, where it successfully tracked supersonic ballistic targets and helped develop operational tactics for the powerful Sea Ceptor missile system. In fact, through 2018 and 2019, it was deployed as the first Royal Navy warship equipped with the Sea Ceptor.Argyll was also the first Royal Navy ship to demonstrate the ability to control autonomous, unmanned Rigid Hulled Inflatable Boats (RIBs), through its combat system, in 2019. Not to mention the fact that its also a hero ship that helped rescue 27 sailors from the burning MV Grande America, in the Bay of Biscay (a gulf of the Atlantic Ocean), a couple of years ago.Two members of her crew were awarded a Queens Gallantry Medal and a Queens Commendation for Bravery, while HMS Argyll was named Hero Overseas Unit, in 2020.After having been deployed to the Asia-Pacific, Arabian Gulf, the U.S., West Africa and the Caribbean, throughout its extended career, HMS Argyll will take a maintenance break next year, before taking on future challenges.
Britain is not wasting any time when it comes to developing its space industry. Science Minister Amanda Solloway has just unveiled the National Space Propulsion Test Facility (NSPTF), one of only 3 in the world today and the countrys first. Funded by the UK Space Agency and located at the Westcott Space Cluster, in Aylesbury Vale Enterprise Zone, this pioneering testing lab will serve to test next-generation propulsion engines that power small satellites, in space.This is a huge step for UKs space strategy, for 2 main reasons. First of all, British companies no longer have to depend on overseas labs for testing bigger engines, which also meant higher costs. Now theyll be able to do that in the UK, so the process will become more affordable. Secondly, newer and more sustainable types of propellants (hydrogen peroxide and liquid oxygen) will be tested here, leading to an environmental-friendly rocket development.And its not all just for the national space industry. NSPTF is set to become an international hub for spacecraft propulsion development, where customers from all over the world would be able to test their rocket engines.Nammo UK is the one that designed and built this state-of-the-art rocket test facility, in partnership with the UK Space Agency, the European Space Agency and the Science and Technology Facilities Councils RAL space facility, where the latest technology will be used to create conditions that are similar to those in space.With its first spaceports currently under development, and a brand-new spacecraft engine testing facility, Britain looks to be right on schedule for the first rocket launch off its soil, in 2022.
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The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops overwhelmingly voted, 168-55, to draft a document that they hope will prevent President Biden and other Catholic politicians from receiving Communion if they advocate for abortion rights, the Associated Press reports.

Why it matters: Biden is the United States' second Catholic president and the country's most religiously observant leader since Jimmy Carter, per the New York Times. Enforcing the rule to deny Communion would be up to individual bishops.

Last month, Cardinal Luis Ladaria, the head of the Vatican's doctrine office, sent a letter to the conference imploring them to carefully deliberate before making the decision.

The cardinal advised that the bishops should seek unanimous approval, adding that it could become "a source of discord rather than unity within the episcopate and the larger church in the United States."

What they're saying: Thats a private matter, and I dont think thats going to happen," Biden told reporters on Friday, when asked about the vote.
The Palestinian Authority called off the COVID vaccine deal with the new Israeli government after determining the does were too close to their expiration date, Reuters reports.

The latest: Israel had agreed to transfer 1.2 million doses of Pfizer to the Palestinian Authority in exchange for the fresh Pfizer shipment Palestinians were expected to receive in October. But on Friday Palestinian officials said the doses from Israel were set to expire soon and did not meet the necessary standards.

What they're saying: "After the technical teams in the ministry of health examined the first batch of the Pfizer vaccines that were received this evening from Israel, it became clear that the 90,000 doses received do not conform to the specifications contained in the agreement," PA spokesman Ibrahim Melhem said during a joint press conference with PA Health Minister Mai al-Kaila, per Reuters.

"Accordingly Prime Minister Muhammad Shtayyeh instructed the minister of health to cancel the agreement with the Israeli side on exchanging the vaccine and returning the quantity that was received today to Israel."

Why it matters: Negotiations on the deal began during then-Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's term but were expedited by the new government, Israeli health officials say.

Israeli officials had said the agreement would allow the Palestinians to get the vaccines they urgently need three months ahead of time. Israel didnt need the vaccines anymore because the majority of the population has already been vaccinated.

As part of the agreement, the Palestinian Authority would've distributed the vaccines in the occupied West Bank, with a first shipment of more than 100,000 doses transferred on Friday and the rest next week.

Editor's note: This story has been updated.
In separate statements, they described Kocharian as an experienced and competent leader who can confront grave security challenges still facing the country after last years war in Nagorno-Karabakh.

I believe that in this situation we must support Armenias second President Robert Kocharian and all those forces that are fighting against the current authorities, read the statement released by Gasparian on Friday, the last day of campaigning for the snap elections.

Gasparian accused Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian of trying to scapegoat the Armenian military and dodge responsibility for Armenias defeat in the war in hopes of retaining power at any cost.

The general was fired as chief of the Armenian armys General Staff in early March after he and four dozen other high-ranking officers accused Pashinians government of misrule and demanded its resignation. The demand was hailed by Armenian opposition groups but rejected as a coup attempt by Pashinian.

Gasparian challenged his sacking in court. Pashinian has repeatedly attacked him during the election campaign.

Karapetian endorsed Kocharian on Monday. In a written statement, he said the ex-president can get the country out of the crisis, quickly restore our security system and make Armenia a predictable and trustworthy partner for foreign powers.

He will create an environment where our societys potential will be realized in full and we will have a national, modern, rational and efficient state, added the statement.

Kocharian and Karapetian met at the ex-presidents election campaign headquarters in Yerevan and dined at a restaurant in Gyumri in the following days. A short video released by Kocharians Hayastan (Armenia) alliance showed the two men strolling in downtown Gyumri late on Wednesday.

Hayastan is widely seen as the main opposition challenger of Pashinian and his Civil Contract Party. It was due to conclude its election campaign late on Friday with a rally at Yerevans central Republic Square.

Karapetian was appointed as prime minister in September 2016 by then President Serzh Sarkisian. The former business executive ceded that post to Sarkisian and was named first deputy prime minister in April 2018 after the latter engineered Armenias transition to a parliamentary system of government.

Karapetian became the countrys acting prime minister just one week later, after Sarkisian resigned amid Pashinian-led mass protests against his continued rule. But he too had to step down after the former Armenian parliament reluctantly elected Pashinian prime minister in May 2018.

Sarkisian now leads another opposition bloc running in the June 20 elections.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan did not rule out Turkeys permanent military presence in Azerbaijan after visiting on Tuesday the Nagorno-Karabakh town of Shushi (Shusha) captured by Azerbaijani forces during last years war.

In a joint declaration signed there, Erdogan and his Azerbaijani counterpart Ilham Aliyev pledged to further deepen military and other ties between their nations. Aliyev said the declaration calls for their mutual military assistance in the event of an armed conflict with third states.

Erdogan on Thursday did not exclude a Turkish military base in Azerbaijan. There may be development, expansion here later, he told Turkeys NTV channel.

Commenting on Erdogans statement, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said: The deployment of military infrastructure by the [NATO] alliance countries near our borders is cause for our special attention as well as a reason for us to take steps to ensure our security and interests.

Peskov also said Russia is in close contact with Turkey, Azerbaijan and Armenia on further stabilizing the situation in the South Caucasus after the Armenian-Azerbaijani war stopped by a Russian-brokered ceasefire in November. Regional players must not take actions containing any elements that could cause a rise in tensions, Russian news agencies quoted him as saying.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov was more dismissive of the talk of Turkish military presence in Azerbaijan. We have not discussed that issue and do not comment on rumors, he told a news conference on Friday.

Lavrovs remarks contrasted with concerns voiced by some Russian lawmakers and pundits. Gazeta.ru, a major Russian news website, said Moscows reaction to a possible Turkish military deployment in Azerbaijan would be very negative.

It quoted Alexander Sherin, the deputy chairman of a Russian parliament committee on defense, as saying that Azerbaijan can already be considered a de facto NATO member because its soldiers fought alongside Turkish troops against Russias ally Armenia during the Karabakh war. Its de jure membership [in NATO] is only a matter of time, claimed Sherin.

The Armenian Foreign Ministry has condemned Aliyevs and Erdogans visit to Shushi as a provocation against regional peace and security.

In a statement released on Thursday, the ministry accused Turkey and Azerbaijan of threatening Armenias territorial integrity after their joint aggression against Karabakh. It pointed to the Shushi declarations references to a corridor that should connect the Nakhichevan exclave with the rest of Azerbaijan via Armenias Syunik province.

Ankara lent Baku strong military and diplomatic support during the six-week Karabakh war. Yerevan says that Turkish military personnel participated in the hostilities on the Azerbaijani side along with thousands of mercenaries recruited in Syrias Turkish-controlled northern regions.

The truce accord led to the deployment of 2,000 Russian peacekeeping soldiers in Karabakh. Russia has also deployed soldiers along some sections of Armenias border with Azerbaijan.
Former President Robert Kocharians Hayastan (Armenia) alliance, widely seen as the main challenger of Prime Minister Nikol Pashinians Civil Contract party, held its last campaign rally, attended by thousands of supporters, in Yerevans central Republic Square.

The sprawling square was the scene of a large demonstration held by Civil Contract the previous night. Another major election contender, the opposition Prosperous Armenia Party (BHK) led by businessman Gagik Tsarukian, also concluded its campaign on Thursday evening with a rally held elsewhere in the city center.

Kocharian and his political allies again pledged to restore security in Armenia, end the countrys post-war political crisis and kick-start its economy as they addressed supporters demonstrating outside the prime ministers office.

These authorities are not capable of solving any of these problems because they themselves created and are still fuelling these problems. We are coming to put an end to all this, said the 66-year-old ex-president, who had ruled Armenia from 1998-2008.

Trust us. Allow us to assume responsibility for the countrys future and push country forward in all directions, he said in a speech repeatedly interrupted by Kocharian! chants from the crowd.

Kocharian again expressed confidence that his bloc will win most votes in the snap elections meant to end a serious political crisis resulting from Armenias defeat in the autumn war in Nagorno-Karabakh.

We started an election campaign and are now concluding a victorious campaign, he declared.

Pashinian predicted that his party will score a crushing victory in the polls when he addressed supporters on Thursday.

The 12-day campaign has been marked by bitter accusations and threats traded by Pashinian and Kocharian and another ex-president, Serzh Sarkisian, who is also challenging the incumbent. Sarkisian leads an opposition bloc called Pativ Unem.

Other, more moderate opposition contenders, notably the Bright Armenia Party (LHK), have sought to cast themselves as an alternative to the countrys current and former rulers.

Campaigning in Yerevans northern Arabkir district on Friday, LHK leader Edmon Marukian reiterated that he will try to form a government of national unity comprising all rival factions if his party again wins seats in the National Assembly.

We will do everything to make this agenda prevail, Marukian told reporters. This agenda reflects the peoples demand.

Meanwhile, former President Levon Ter-Petrosian, who leads the opposition Armenian National Congress (HAK), hit out at the rival extremist forces, in a clear reference to Pashinian on one side and the opposition forces led by Kocharian and Sarkisian on the other. He claimed that the political crisis will only deepen if one of them wins the elections.

These forces have nothing to say or to do about the countrys future, Ter-Petrosian said in a video appeal to Armenians.

A total of 26 parties and alliances are running for at least 101 seats in the Armenian parliament under the system of proportional representation. The parties need to win at least 5 percent of the vote in order to be represented in the legislature and potentially form a new government. The vote threshold for alliances is set at 7 percent.

The tense election campaign has also been marred by mutual accusations of foul play, arrests of opposition activists accused of bullying or bribing voters, and at least one reportedly violent incident.

On Friday, law-enforcement authorities detained Armen Charchian, the director of a Yerevan hospital running for the parliament on the Hayastan ticket, after a local non-governmental organization publicized a leaked audio recording of his meeting with hospital personnel.

Charchian can be heard telling them that they must participate in the June 20 elections. After the elections I will take voter lists and see who went to the polls and who didnt, he warns.

It was not clear if Charchian explicitly told his employees to vote for Hayastan.

A senior Hayastan figure condemned the prominent medics arrest and demanded his release at the start of Kocharians rally.

The Special Investigative Service (SIS) also announced the arrest of an unnamed election candidate of Pativ Unem accused of vote buying. The opposition bloc did not immediately react to it.

Five other individuals, all of them opposition candidates or supporters, were arrested earlier on charges of trying to hand out vote bribes.

Also taken into custody on Thursday was the director of a cultural center in the southeastern town of Goris run by a senior Hayastan member. He allegedly threatened to fire one of his employees who took part in Pashinians rally held there earlier this week. The Kocharian-led bloc demanded his immediate release.

Several Hayastan and Pativ Unem sympathizers holding senior positions in schools, provincial medical centers and other public institutions have claimed in recent days to have been fired for publicly showing support for Pashinians political foes. Law-enforcement authorities have not yet reacted to their allegations.

Hayastan also said that several of its activists in another southeastern town, Yeghegnadzor, were detained and beaten up by local police when Pashinian held a campaign rally there this week. Prosecutors instructed the SIS to look into these claims.
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Great Columbia Crossing is Back in October | N. Oregon Coast's Astoria

Published 06/13/21 at 4:50 AM PDT

By Oregon Coast Beach Connection staff

(Astoria, Oregon)  The race is on - or back on, that is.

Returning to the north Oregon coast is the Great Great Columbia Crossing 10K Run/Walk after going virtual last year due to the pandemic. October 10 is the date when thousands gather to walk or run across the expanse of the Astoria-Megler Bridge  so massive it has in recent years demanded actually closing the bridge down for a few hours.

2020's event went virtual, hosted by the Astoria-Warrenton Area Chamber of Commerce, shutting down the real thing because of COVID-19 and all its health uncertainties. There, participants ran their own distance wherever they lived and on their own schedule. The vibrant energy, of course, was not there.

The big race now returns to the elevated and scenic course that takes participants from the starting area in Washington across the Astoria-Megler Bridge into Astoria. The Great Columbia Crossing is the only occasion where pedestrians are allowed to cross the longest continuous truss bridge in North America.

Once more the event requires the entire bridge to shut down for the complete safety of runners and walkers. The 200-foot incline offers runners and walkers scenic views of the mouth of this famed Oregon coast river and all the marine activity below. After crossing the finish line, participants can head into the historic town of Astoria to fuel up with coastal fare as the morning fog starts to lift.

Look to www.greatcolumbiacrossing.com starting July 14 as registration begins. This time around, capacity will be limited to 2,000 participants to adhere to current health and safety guidelines.

Event planning during this pandemic is challenging and we appreciate your patience, said Chamber Event Coordinator Bayly Lay. Safety precautions and recommendations are still changing and evolving. Please know that we are doing everything we can to ensure that this remains a safe and responsible event for all. Registrants should be prepared to abide by any safety standards that may be required at the time of the event. We look forward to seeing everyone again this year.

Merchandise for participants commemorating the experience includes this years long-sleeve event t-shirt featuring original artwork designed for the event by Don Nisbett of Ilwaco, WA.

Event Basics

Sunday, Oct. 10, 2021 from 8:30 to 11 a.m.

Participants take shuttles from the Port of Astoria, OR or Port of Chinook, WA for transport to the starting line. The course map is available on the event website.

COST: Registration is $45 (includes electronic chip timing)

SPONSOR: The Great Columbia Crossing is hosted by the Astoria-Warrenton Area Chamber of Commerce. The presenting sponsor is the Columbia Memorial Hospital Cardiology Clinic, a CMH/OHSU Collaboration. Columbia Memorial Hospital, in collaboration with Oregon Health & Science University, provides comprehensive care for a range of heart health and heart disease prevention needs here in our community.

TRAVEL INFO and TRAFFIC ADVISORY:

During the event, the Astoria-Megler Bridge will be closed to vehicle traffic to add safety for participants, volunteers and others helping on the bridge. The closure will occur for approximately 2.5 hours during the event, from 8:30 to 11 a.m. The event works with local law enforcement agencies and may allow access to emergency vehicles during the event. Any participants remaining on the bridge portion of the course will be picked up shortly before 11 a.m. so that lanes can be reopened for vehicles. The communities around the bridge encourage non-event travelers to take a little more time that morning before checking out of their hotels, enjoy a leisurely breakfast, shopping and exploring before hitting the road to avoid the delay and congestion around the bridge. For more information about the region, and local lodging options, visit www.travelastoria.com

www.greatcolumbiacrossing.com

503-325-6311, 800-875-6807

events@oldoregon.com

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Oregon Coast Less Traveled in Cannon Beach

Published 06/14/21 at 2:40 AM PDT

By Oregon Coast Beach Connection staff

(Cannon Beach, Oregon) - An odd rule of thumb occurs when it comes to the Oregon coast, especially the really busy towns. Head to the extreme northern or southern edges, and youll usually find the lesser-traveled sands, the not-so-bustling beach. Its not always true, 100 percent of the time. But in Cannon Beachs case it definitely is. (Above: Crescent Beach as seen from above at Ecola State Park)

It's somewhat true in Lincoln City (head to Roads End or just north of Taft) and a guideline for Seaside as well (12 Ave. is devoid of souls as are areas closing in on The Cove). In this north Oregon coast town, however, it's harder to get away from the masses, but the means exists. It's just harder work.

At the far southern edges, even beyond the Tolovana Area, it's a section that's a tad difficult to find. And that's what makes it awesome sauce. Find where the streets begin to take on the names of other Oregon coast towns and you start encountering the secret spots hiding in plain sight. The final street (we'll let you find it on your own) is host to a sort of Mini-Me of Haystack Rock: a smaller sea stack with slightly similar shape. Around there tidepool life usually gathers.

The big secret is the nighttime here, especially in late summer. No lights on the beach mean near pitch-black conditions and perfect viewing for meteor showers in August. This spot is super for checking for the glowing sands phenomena (glowing phytoplankton). If you're extremely lucky you may get to see both shooting stars and the glowing sands  little fireballs above and below you. There's nothing like this experience.



Silver Point

Keep on walking south and you'll soon encounter Silver Point and the wacky rocky blob with the mysterious sea cave. Truly amazing stuff lurks on this hidden beach.

At the very northern end, near the southern face of the cliffs of Ecola State Park, there's more treasures. It takes some walking, but that's why you'll find less folks there.

These basalt headlands are perhaps half a mile from the nearest beach access, which lies at the end of a private neighborhood at the end of 5th St. You can, however, reach it by a much longer walk from the last access downtown - from the park.

On the other side of that basalt structure lays an even more hidden beach: Crescent Beach. There, you'll find a large half-moon of a beach, cut off from any access but a one mile-plus hike. Pristine sands surround you, with almost never a human being there. As if designed by Mother Nature to be a centerpiece, a few chunks of sandstone sit practically in the middle.

It's only accessible via a sizable hike from the road that takes you to Ecola State Park, which begins at the private neighborhood. You can't park here: you'll have to park a ways away from the trailhead and walk the road to the beginning of it all. You're looking at a good three-mile roundtrip, but it's worth it. MORE PHOTOS BELOW

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Cannon Beach Vacation Rentals. About 60 vacation homes to choose from: ocean view, oceanfront and very close to the beach, all in Cannon Beach or in Arch Cape. All are either oceanfront or very close. Homes sleep as many as 12. 164 Sunset. Cannon Beach, Oregon. 503-436-0940. 866-436-0940. www.visitcb.com



Beachcomber Vacation Homes . Numerous vacation rentals in the Cannon Beach area, including Falcon Cove and Arch Cape. Depending on the home, you may find amenities and luxuries such as a barbecue, claw foot tub, a ship's ladder. 115 Sunset Blvd. Cannon Beach, Oregon. 855-219-4758. 503-436-4500. Website







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Coos Bay's Santa Clara Shipwreck Among Deadliest on Oregon Coast

Published 06/14/21 at 2:40 PM PDT

By Oregon Coast Beach Connection staff

(Coos Bay, Oregon)  In the years between 1880 and 1930, shipwrecks  especially deadly ones  seemed a dime a dozen on the Oregon coast. Many of the worst and most prominent happened in the 1910s, and that includes one of the highest in fatalities of them all: the wreck of the Santa Clara at Coos Bay. (Photos courtesy Coos History Museum)

She started out around 1900 as the John S. Kimball, and was at the time the largest steam schooner on the Oregon and Washington coast. One more name change and after that she became the SS Santa Clara. Then, on November 2, 1915 she was on her way into Coos Bay (still called Marshfield then) from Portland.

That day proved exceptionally stormy, which may not have been a big deal except apparently the storm churned up a new shoal, or at least it was uncharted one. The Santa Clara struck it about 4:28 p.m. or so, and Captain August Lofstedt soon discovered the propeller wasn't taking him and the 60 souls aboard anywhere. Most of them were passengers.

The engineer informed him the ship was taking on water, and all deckhands had already gathered up top awaiting orders. The radio had stopped working, which kept authorities in the dark on what was going on. Lofstedt hesitated for a long time, and for good reason. It was truly dangerous out there. Finally, he gave the orders to get into lifeboats, but the first one capsized in the raging waters en route to shore, killing women and children.





Other boats dropped into the sea had to contend with impossible conditions, tossed about madly and sometimes losing people overboard. Those manning the oars were inexperienced, and boats actually bumped into each other trying to save those flung into the water. Some had to turn back and get back into the SS Santa Clara to await rescue. Most wrestled with the white monsters for hours before finally getting to the beach.

16 people had lost their lives on the southern Oregon coast that day.

Bodies washed up periodically over the next few days, sometimes with friends or relatives who were keeping watch witnessing their own loved ones come up onto the beach.

Meanwhile, fog and ferocious waters kept rescue crews away. By land, there were no real roads so physicians and other personnel took hours to get to the burned and injured on the beach.

The saga wasn't quite over. For the next few days looters attacked the ship, making off with the many goods onboard as well as parts of the vessel. Liquor was a favorite, with looters getting nicknamed pirates for that. Newspaper reports of the period talk about items from the ship being sold on the streets of Marshfield left and right, creating a momentary, small booming industry.

Meanwhile, the ship's owners had vacillated for a long time on hiring men to grab the valuables and merchandise, allowing raiders to drain it further. One group tried to dynamite part of the ship to get quicker access. Arsonists also set the wreckage ablaze at one point.

The SS Santa Clara was also carrying a lot of mail, which eventually allowed authorities to go after many of the thieves with the full might of the feds behind them.

Captain Lofstedt was found guilty of negligence for his part in the wreck.

In the end, the sea claimed the rest of the vessel and nothing is left along the shoreline of the Coos Bay area. Also see Coos Bay's Czarina Shipwreck a Heart-wrenching Oregon Coast Tale

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Cape Arago decades ago

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3 1 of 3 Kim Brent / The Enterprise Show More Show Less 2 of 3 Kim Brent / The Enterprise Show More Show Less 3 of 3





Four more hours of negotiations and as many union proposals still didnt lead to a deal to end the ExxonMobil Beaumont lockout.

USW District 13 Representative Richard Hoot Landry told The Enterprise on Thursday that the company reviewed each of the proposals and rejected them.
The First City Buildings history and architecture has made it a de facto welcome mat for Beaumonts downtown, something its new, local owner hopes to continue in a big way with future renovations.

The 125,000-square-foot building at 505 Orleans St. was sold at auction at the end of March after its local owners decided to pass it along to someone that could extend its legacy.

The auction was hosted in person and online, which would have made it easy for a number of real estate firms or investment companies to scoop up the property , but James Payne -- a local attorney with Provost Umphrey -- came out on top.

Related: First City Building heads to auction block

Payne, a Port Arthur native that now is one of the states notable lawyers, said he created his real estate business with intentions of building something to take care of his family. But its now turned into a chance to preserve one of the citys most valuable assets.

I believe in downtown development, and I see potential for growth here with the right opportunities, Payne said. I knew this building would be a good asset, but I think it can also help encourage growth.

Opened in 1962 as the First Security National Bank, the six-story building was one of the last major projects by renowned Beaumont architect Llewellyn William Pitts, who died in 1967.

Pitts and his legacy now are honored as the namesake of the lifetime achievement award for the Texas Society of Architects.

Related: 'Mission Walker' finds fountain of youth on the trail

Its modernist style is highlighted by a unique facade sculpted by Matchett Herring Coe, a sculptor from what is now part of Lumberton whose work is featured in museums across the country, as well as the Jefferson County Courthouse, Houston City Hall and the Houston Zoo.

Tom Bell, director of Beaumont Main Street, said the building was empty for a while after First National Bank left the space for what is now the CapitalOne Building on South Bowie Street.

The building eventually was bought and renovated for office rentals by Beaumont Preservation Partners, a group led by Ted Moor, Jr.

When Moors family decided to sell the building, about 85% of the 77,500 square feet of rentable space in the building was occupied. Current tenants include the civil engineering firm Chica and Associates, Dexter ATC Field Services and Beaumont Main Street, the nonprofit organization tasked with promoting downtown Beaumont.

The disclosed lowest accepted bid for the auction was set at $800,000, but real estate experts from Williams and Williams assumed that it would attract plenty of competing bids.

Top hits: Get Beaumont Enterprise stories sent directly to your inbox

The building was appraised at $1.5 million in 2020 by the Jefferson County Appraisal District.

After the auction, it is now valued at $5.4 million.

Payne said the plan now is to continue to invest in the building and take care of existing tenants, while securing new ones for the available space.

He said most of the rentable space likely will continue to be used for offices, but he also is interested in creating a mixed-use building that could host businesses and attract visitors to downtown Beaumont.

jacob.dick@beaumontenterprise.com

twitter.com/jd_journalism
From philanthropic foundations to education to the environment to his church, Arlen L. Edgars civic interests were as broad as his interest in the oil and gas industry.

The long-time Midlander, a Stephenville native, passed away Tuesday.

Arlen Edgar was a gentlemen. We were fortunate to benefit from his leadership and wisdom for 28 years. We grieve his passing and celebrate a life well-lived, Mark Palmer, executive director of the Abell-Hanger Foundation, where Edgar served as a trustee emeritus, told the Reporter-Telegram by email.

Edgar was inducted into the Petroleum Hall of Fame in 2019. Kathy Shannon, executive director of the Petroleum Museum, commented to the Reporter-Telegram by email, He will be greatly missed. Arlen was a wealth of information, from Midland history to the intricacies of the petroleum industry. We are honored to host the Arlen Edgar Distinguished Lecture series at the Museum, to recognize all his remarkable contributions to our community. Arlen was also a very deserving inductee of the Petroleum Hall of Fame. Yes, he will be greatly missed.

Among his many honors  including the Hearst Energy Award for Lifetime Achievement  was the Top Hand award from the Permian Basin Petroleum Association, presented in 2004.

I am greatly saddened to hear of the passing of our good friend Arlen, Ben Shepperd, president of the PBPA, told the Reporter-Telegram by email. Arlen was a kind, gracious man and a friend to everyone. A former PBPA Top Hand, Arlen made a tremendous impact on the Permian Basin oil and gas industry and everyone he met.

Edgar grew up in Stephenville on the fringes of fabled oilfields at Desdemona and Ranger. His nearness to those oilfields piqued his interest in the industry, he told the Reporter-Telegram when he was receiving the Hearst Energy Award for Lifetime Achievement.

After receiving an associates degree in engineering from Tarleton State College and a bachelors degree in petroleum engineering from the University of Texas at Austin, he began his oilfield career with Pan American Petroleum, moving from Pan Americans Odessa office to its Midland office to serve as junior and then intermediate engineer.

Ive often thought that if I hadnt gone into oil and gas, I would have gone into mining. I like the idea of getting something from the ground and creating value from it.

He left for Fort Worth after three years in Midland and joined Leibrock, Landreth, Campbell and Callaway, a consulting engineering firm he described as comprised of partners who were entrepreneurs and anxious to start a company in the energy chemicals field. He stayed there six years and also served as secretary and a director of Kanata Exploration, a Canadian production company and Offshore Exploration Co., which explored for oil and gas in south Louisiana.

In 1967 he joined Tipperary Land and Exploration when it was formed by Bob Landreth Sr., where he divided his time between the US and Australia. Tipperary was involved in cattle, shrimp farming and hard minerals and no oil, he recalled. After four years with Tipperary, he joined Western States Producing Co. as general manager of the San Antonio companys Midland office. He finished his oilfield career as an independent investor and consultant.
During a digital press conference hosted by Rep. Henry Cuellar on Wednesday, he discussed the latest update regarding the non-essential travel ban but said that there is still no definitive answer on when the federal government will lift the restriction.

However, Cuellar remained optimistic over a near-future reopening as he said he was told by White House officials and Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas that they were engaging with both Mexico and Canada on how to reopen the border.

That sentence is probably the most significant thing Ive heard from the administration ... that is important, said Cuellar, who highlighted that was the first time the White House had been in discussion with both countries on reopening.

Still, the congressman seemed a little less sure of the reopening compared to the last times Laredo officials spoke on the matter. On June 3 during the weekly COVID media briefing, Mayor Pete Saenz discussed a planned date of reopening of June 21. Cuellar also discussed that date a few days later, although he said it was unofficial. And on Wednesday, he instead provided a range of dates spanning all the way through July.

Im not going to say they are going to open on the 21st, Cuellar said. We are still trying to find out if they are going to do that, but we are hoping somewhere between the 21st and July 4 to hear some news.

Cuellar previously said that unless lightning strikes from the White House there would be an announcement on the border reopening during last October, although one never came. And COVID cases picked up tremendously in the ensuing months making the effort moot.

Both Cuellar and Saenz have been citing concerns about the June reopening date, stating that Title 42 could potentially being removed and there could be an influx of migrants arriving when that happens. And seeing as they had not received a plan from the federal government at that time, opening in June brought with it concerns.

However, the government has still not officially addressed any specific date for the bridges to be reopened or any plans for the removal of Title 42. It also seems that the early June discussions between U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris and Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador did not provide any tangible result regarding the reopening.

Cuellar also said that he invited Harris to visit the border. He sent a letter to her asking for them to come get a first-hand look at immigration concerns while stating that economic struggles continue due to the travel restrictions.

Additionally, Cuellar said that after a Tuesday evening discussion with Marcelo Ebrard  Mexicos Secretary of Foreign Relations  they discussed the flow of vaccines from the U.S. to Mexico. But Ebrard said that it would need additional doses for the border communities on the Mexican side.

Other subjects were also discussed Wednesday around Texas, including the current plan from Gov. Greg Abbott on the building of a border wall and the permitless open carry legislation.

According to Barbara Gervin-Hawkins, Texas representative for the 120th House District, the state allocated $1.3 billion toward border security in their budget, including a Texas-paid wall and the hiring of additional Border Patrol agents. But Cuellar said that he believes the state does not have the proper funding to build the wall and referenced the efforts of former President Donald Trump to build one and how much it cost the country.

Cuellar added that President Joe Biden will not be waiving any environmental laws to build the Texas fence, ultimately making it more difficult for Abbott to act on building it. Considering the recent declarations by Abbott to crowdsource the wall, Gervin-Hawkins and Cuellar agreed that the state should focus on addressing the Electric Reliability Council of Texas power issues that have affected Texans throughout the state.

Gervin-Hawkins said that during a discussion with ERCOT officials, she asked if it would be possible to connect with the national grid and if Texas energy would be better protected. She proposed that the national grid could be used as a backup, but added that ERCOT would be sending her a report weighing the pros and cons of the integration.

On Monday, ERCOT issued a reduce electrical service announcement to Texas residents as power plants were shut down due to high temperatures this week. This comes after the major winter storm which saw many in the state without power in February resulting in over 151 deaths, according to the Texas Department of State Health Services.

The permitless carry bill was also discussed and Gervin-Hawkins shared her concerns.

She said that despite supporting the second amendment and gun control, permitless carry would allow those without training or permit to brandish a gun in public. She is also concerned about the difficulties the bill would be responsible for in terms of tracing weapons or gun owners.

cocampo@lmtonline.com
GULFPORT, Miss. (AP)  Sentencing has been delayed for a former Mississippi mayor and his wife.

Mario King is a Democrat who was elected mayor of Moss Point in 2017. He resigned in February of this year, after he and his wife, Natasha King, each pleaded guilty to a federal conspiracy charge.
AP

BRYAN, Texas (AP)  A Texas man has been indicted on a charges of murder and assault for allegedly opening fire at a cabinet-making company where he worked, killing one man and wounding five other employees.

A Brazos County grand jury handed up the murder charge against Larry Bollin on Thursday, along with five counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, said Jessica Escue, a spokeswoman for the local district attorney's office.
MEXICO CITY (AP)  The Mexican resort of Cozumel on Wednesday welcomed the first arrival of a cruise ship carrying passengers since the coronavirus pandemic essentially collapsed the industry.

Officials in the Caribbean coast state of Quintana Roo welcomed Royal Caribbean's Adventure of the Seas as it arrived from Nassau in The Bahamas at the arrival at the worlds busiest stopover for cruise ships.

The cruise line requires all passengers 16 and over to be fully vaccinated. Those that arent have to get COVID-19 tests.

Gov. Carlos Joaquin said about 5% of passengers aboard the ship  about 150 youths or those with chronic health conditions  havent been vaccinated and would be subject to special rules. State and federal health officials were on hand to oversee the arrival.

The company proposed that the non-vaccinated group can only disembark on excursion packages with sanitary bubble protocols, not just to any place, Joaquin said. As you can see, these cruise ships have very strict conditions.

The cruise line touted the trip as a chance to venture into Maya history during a visit to Cozumel.

Quintana Roo is home to resorts like Cancun, Playa Del Carmen and Tulum. The state depends on tourism for 87% of its economic activity.

Alejandra Aguirre, the state health secretary, wrote of the cruise ship arrival, We are working together for an orderly revival of economic activity.

However, fate didnt appear to be smiling on the return of the cruise ships; Wednesdays weather started off fairly rainy, with significant amounts of sargasso seaweed at many of the states beaches.

Mexico has not instituted any testing requirement for incoming passengers, and anecdotal evidence suggests tourists are attracted to Mexicos Caribbean resorts in part because there has been no lockdown and health precautions are largely voluntary. Many visitors shed their masks when they reach their hotels or beach clubs.

The state has seen a recent upsurge in COPVID-19 cases, in part linked to increased travel around Easter week, and partial reductions at businesses like hotels and restaurants have been implemented to stem the upsurge.

Mexico has never enforced a strict, European-style lockdown.
Southeast Texas has seen some big housing developments over the years, but the one planned for the western edge of Lumberton is one of the largest and most ambitious the region has seen in a long, long time. If it is done right  and there is no reason to think that it wont  it could be a significant boost to not just Hardin County but the entire region.

Housing is one of the biggest needs for families in this area and the entire country. Housing prices have skyrocketed in recent years, and the surge in lumber prices caused by the pandemic has boosted them even higher. The homes in this new development will not be cheap, but they will add to the available supply of housing in the region, and overall that will help hold costs down.

And make no mistake about it, this is a big project  3,200 acres spread over the city of Lumberton and unincorporated areas. Many of the home sites will be big too; realtor Hershel Manley said, A lot of the lots you see are a quarter-acre with a 3,000-square-foot house, but these will probably be more like a third of on an acre with side entry and garages.

The project is so big that it could take several decades to be developed, but that time frame allows for good planning. All the governmental entities involved here  the city of Lumberton, Hardin County and the Lumberton Municipal Utility District  should make sure that everything is constructed to the highest standards. At a time when hurricanes and floods are foremost in the mind of all planners  and many average residents too  good drainage must be one of the highest priorities.

The goal in all new home or business construction in the region must be to move water efficiently in the right direction, always feeding into larger drainage systems that ultimately empty into the Gulf of Mexico. For something this big, that goal is even more important. Dumping excess water on your neighbor downstream is obviously not acceptable. This is a bit of a challenge for area governments because water flows across many city or county lines. Neighboring governments must work together well to tie all their drainage systems together efficiently.

Fortunately, Hardin County Judge Wayne McDaniel is aware of this issue, saying, The drainage (factor) is the most important one to address. I just need to see proof that there will be no added risk of flooding from the project.

Tuesdays public meeting was a good opportunity for local residents to learn about this project, and it should be followed by as many others as are needed. Communication is the best way to alleviate concerns and answer questions, on anything from a housing subdivision to a petrochemical plant. Developers who have nothing to hide will be open and thus boost public confidence.

Population growth has been a challenge in Southeast Texas for a long time, even though Lumberton and Hardin County have grown impressively in recent years from a smaller base. Proposals like this could add a lot of families to the region, which of course means more traffic for local businesses. As we emerge from the challenges of the pandemic, the state and national economy are poised for many months of solid expansion. A mammoth subdivision like this will complement that momentum nicely.
At a time when partisan bickering and racial tensions are uncomfortably high, the last thing the American people might expect is a bill making Juneteenth a national holiday not just passing the sharply divided Senate, but doing so unanimously. But that is exactly what happened this week, and this legislation is a reflection of all that is good in this country.

This bill probably wouldnt have happened if it had been for the persistent support of Texas Sen. John Cornyn. He has been pushing it in Washington for more than a year, first proposing it in the national trauma after the police killing of George Floyd. That effort did not succeed, but this year all the pieces of the puzzle came together.

This conservative Republican partnered with U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee of Houston, one of the most liberal Democrats in the House, to steer this bill through both chambers. That kind of bipartisanship is rare in Washington these days.

Democrats hold a slim majority in the U.S. House, and it is expected that this bill will pass by strong margins there  we hope with a lot of Republican support. The Senate was a trickier challenge, but Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., made a motion to pass the bill via unanimous consent, and no senator objected. Even Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, one of the most conservative members of the Senate who had previously opposed the bill, got on board. President Biden has indicated he will sign the bill into law if it reaches his desk, creating the 11th federal holiday.

Texans can be especially proud of this achievement because Juneteenth is part of this states history. It has been a state holiday for four decades, and over the years more and more other states began appreciating it too. Forty-six states and the District of Columbia now observe it as a state holiday.

Texans always knew there was something special about June 19, 1865, when Union Gen. Gordon Granger landed in Galveston and proclaimed that slavery had been ended by President Abraham Lincoln when he issued the Emancipation Proclamation on Jan. 1, 1863.

But the end of the Civil War was still two years away when Lincoln signed that historic document, and slavery continued in the Confederate states until they were taken by Union troops or formally surrendered.

Grangers proclamation freed the last remaining slaves because Texas was so isolated from the rest of the Confederacy. Even then, historians believe it took some time for the word to filter though all of Texas. Cornyn and Lee also authored a bill for a federal study of a National Emancipation Trail from Galveston to Houston, following the path of former slaves who learned of their freedom and went out to spread the news.

June 19  Juneteenth, as it has come to be known affectionately  was the final nail in the coffin of slavery. As such, it should be celebrated in Texas, and the rest of the nation. In fact, African Americans in Texas had been celebrating this holiday throughout the 19th and 20th centuries before it became an official state holiday.

Texans will once again celebrate Juneteenth this Saturday as a state holiday. But on that date in 2022, it should be a national holiday, and thats something all Americans can be proud of.
Bedford, PA (15522)

Today

A mix of clouds and sun. Slight chance of a rain shower. High 74F. Winds WNW at 10 to 20 mph..

Tonight

Some clouds. Slight chance of a shower throughout the evening. Low 57F. Winds NW at 10 to 15 mph.
Rohingya women wait in line with their children at an NGO-run health center on Bhashan Char Island, Bangladesh, June 13, 2021.

At least four Rohingya children and an adult died of diarrhea and thousands more have been afflicted in the last two weeks on a Bangladeshi island, refugees said on Thursday about the first outbreak of any disease at the site, which has been criticized for lacking adequate health facilities.

Dr. Masum Iftekhar, the chief health officer in Noakhali  a district that encompasses Bhashan Char Island where nearly 19,000 Rohingya refugees are confined  said he could confirm that one Rohingya died of diarrhea in a hospital but the cause of death of the other four had not yet been determined.

Iftekhar said about 1,000 Rohingya contracted diarrhea, while Mohammad Jobayer, a Rohingya leader living in Bhashan Char, said about 3,000 people there have suffered from it.

Five people, including four children, have died, Jobayer told BenarNews by telephone.

During the last two weeks, 2,000 to 3,000 people in Bhashan Char had diarrhea. Many people have been undergoing treatment at hospitals.

Iftekhar said about 600 Rohingya were admitted to a hospital suffering from diarrhea during the past two weeks.

Only one Rohingya died of diarrhea at a hospital. We have yet to ascertain whether diarrhea killed the other four persons, he told BenarNews.

Seventeen diarrhea patients were admitted to Bhashan Chars hospital in the previous 24 hours, he said on Thursday.

The media reports suggesting that up to 5,000 Rohingya in Bhashan Char had diarrhea during the last 15 days are not true. At best, 1,000 Rohingya took diarrhea treatment, Iftekhar said.

The diarrhea situation in Bhashan Char is under control.

Meanwhile, according to another refugee, many Rohingya who contracted diarrhea could not get treatment.

Many of the victims died before being taken to a hospital, Mohammad Nurul Islam told BenarNews. Many of them have been taking treatment at houses because the hospitals cannot accommodate them.

Bhashan Char has a 20-bed government hospital while NGOs operate six health centers there, Mohammad Atiqul Mamun, the island representative of the Refugee Relief and Repatriation Commissioners office, told BenarNews.

Since December 2020, Bangladeshs government has moved close to 19,000 Rohingya to the island and away from camps in mainland Coxs Bazar district, where some 1 million Rohingya refugees from Myanmar are sheltering.

The government, which built facilities and infrastructure on the Bay of Bengal island to accommodate a refugee population in order to ease crowding in the mainland camps, maintains that the Rohingya agreed to relocate off-shore and were not compelled to move.

Iftekhar, the district health officer, could not identify the cause of the outbreak on Bhashan Char but said it could be because of a lack of knowledge about hygiene.

We have adopted the necessary measures to contain the situation. We have provided the Rohingya all possible assistance  adequate quantity of water purifying tablets and oral saline, he said.

A campaign to create awareness about diarrhea among the Rohingya is under way.

Public health expert Mahbubur Rahman, a doctor based in Dhaka, said officials must test the water on Bhashan Char.

The first consideration, is whether there is any problem with the source of water. We need to examine the water the Rohingya use for cooking and observe if they use soap after using the toilet, Rahman told BenarNews

The authorities need to launch big awareness campaigns about personal health and hygiene among the Rohingya. A multimedia content in their language would help.

Bangladesh sees an uptick in diarrhea infections every year starting in the summer, which begins in mid-April, and running into the monsoon season, which begins in June.

Outbreaks of diarrhea have been reported in Noakhali district outside Bhashan Char since April where 21 people have died, Iftekhar said.

Similar outbreaks have been reported in Barishal and Bhola districts in south-central Bangladesh since April, killing 22 people so far, according to official estimates.

In June, at least 11 people died of diarrhea in Bandarban district, which borders Myanmar and also hosts Rohingya camps.

Between 2000 and 2016, Bangladesh reduced diarrhea deaths of children 5 and younger from 38,877 to 7,062, according to The Borgen Project, an American anti-poverty NGO.

On March 10, the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics told reporters that diarrhea killed 7,213 people in 2019 and 7,201 in 2020.
Handout from Indonesias Ministry of Maritime and Investment Affairs via AFP

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi (third from right) speaks with Luhut Pandjaitan, Indonesias coordinating minister for maritime affairs and investments, during a meeting in Parapat, Indonesia, Jan. 13, 2021.

Updated at 11:11 p.m. ET on 2021-06-18

Ties are growing between Indonesia and China, as Jakarta balances economic interests with concerns about Beijings expansive territorial claims and alleged human rights abuses, analysts say.

China is not the biggest investor in Indonesia, but its investments in Southeast Asias largest and most populous country have grown consistently, doubling to almost $4.8 billion in 2020 from $2.4 billion in 2017.

Everything seems to come from China nowadays  vaccines, investment  and Mr. Luhut has been at the forefront of this, Indonesian business tycoon Chairul Tanjung quipped to senior minister Luhut Pandjaitan during an online event in February.

Luhut, Indonesias coordinating minister for maritime affairs and investment, and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi have met twice since the start of the year.

Earlier this month, Luhut led an Indonesian delegation for talks with Wang in China, where they signed five agreements on cooperation in the infrastructure, maritime and investment sectors, details of which were not made public.

In January, Wang visited Luhuts hometown in North Sumatra.

China is funding projects in Indonesia as part of its ambitious One Belt, One Road (OBOR) worldwide infrastructure-building program. These include the $6 billion Jakarta-Bandung high-speed rail project, which is expected to be completed next year.

And this year, Indonesia approved Chinas proposal to conduct a study on the $400 million Lambakan Dam project in East Kalimantan, near the site of the future Indonesian capital in Penajam Paser Utara regency.

Luhut told businessman Chairul at the February event that these Chinese investments have no strings attached.

They are not dictating anything, said Luhut, who is widely regarded as President Joko Jokowi Widodos right-hand man.

Tepid response

But Indonesias enhanced relations with China carry substantial risks, said Aristyo Rizka Darmawan, a lecturer in international law at the University of Indonesia.

For instance, many observers have criticized Indonesia  the largest Muslim country in the world  for its tepid response to the alleged human rights violations in Xinjiang to the minority Uyghur Muslim ethnic group, Aristyo wrote in a recent article on the website of the ISEAS  Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore.

A Chinese Foreign Ministry statement about Luhuts visit in June said that Indonesia adheres to the principle of non-interference in other countries internal affairs and stood ready to help the Indonesian people and the international community have a better understanding of the development and progress of China's Xinjiang."

Western nations and rights groups accuse China of egregious abuses against the Muslim Uyghurs of Xinjiang, which China angrily denies.

Witnesses and experts testified about enforced disappearances, compulsory sterilization and forced contraception, organ harvesting, and torture by Chinese authorities in Xinjiang, at a tribunal in London this month investigating whether Chinas treatment of its ethnic Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslims constitutes genocide.

Indonesias foreign policy can be driven by economic interest and transactional considerations, Aristyo wrote. But Jakarta should mind the gap in its approach to China and also seek to balance its growing relationship with Beijing by pursuing deeper relations with other major powers with interests in the Indo-Pacific.

The limitations of pushing back

Meanwhile, Indonesia and China have had several spats over maritime rights in waters off Indonesias Natuna Islands, located in the southern reaches of the South China Sea.

In January 2020, Jakarta sent warships and fighter jets to the area after scores of Chinese fishing vessels escorted by the China Coast Guard entered Indonesias exclusive economic zone (EEZ).

Chinas incursions near the Natunas were serious in terms of vessel numbers and duration ... one of many to rattle Indonesias security establishment, Natalie Sambhie, executive director of Verve Research, an Australia-based independent think tank, told BenarNews.

Indonesia has also protested to China over what it called the slave-like treatment of its sailors working on Chinese fishing boats. At least 16 Indonesian sailors working on Chinese boats have died since late 2019, according to officials.

Indonesias stance in the Natuna Sea has been consistent  balancing concerns about sovereignty with the need for investment and COVID-19 relief, Sambhie said.

While these policymakers are well aware of the slow erosion to national confidence and even sovereign rights posed by Chinas incursions, they are also well aware of the present-day limitations of pushing back, she said.

Dewi Fortuna Anwar, a senior researcher on international politics at the Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI), said that the COVID-19 pandemic provided momentum for closer ties between Jakarta and Beijing.

Amid vaccine nationalism in several countries, China has been willing to share their vaccines. This goodwill gesture paved the way for trust, Dewi told BenarNews.

Indonesias stance also strikes an equilibrium between Indonesias interactions with other large powers like the U.S., India and Japan, Sambhie said.

She cited the fact that Indonesia accepted search-and-rescue support from Australia, India, Singapore and the United States after the KRI Nanggala-402 submarine sank in April, killing all 53 sailors on board.

Jakarta also accepted assistance from China, which sent three ships to support efforts to lift the wreckage of the submarine, albeit unsuccessfully, from waters off Bali a half-mile deep.

It benefits the country

Indonesia is as open to working with anyone as long as it benefits the country, said Rizal Sukma, a former Indonesian ambassador to Britain.

We are working with China in sectors where we think cooperation is essential for our national interests. Indonesia will work with any country when we need to and stand up to anyone whenever we must. That is our principle, Rizal told BenarNews.

If the U.S. is serious about building relationships with ASEAN countries, including Indonesia, naturally we are open to that as well, he said, referring to the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations.

Meanwhile, China is now in a position to invest in many countries, said Yose Rizal Damuri, head of the economics department at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) Indonesia.

Now that China is economically maturing, they can expand by doing what Japan did in the 70s, Yose told BenarNews.

In the last 10 years, they have invested more in natural resources, but now the direction is to build a production bases in countries. If Indonesia can tap this, we will benefit much.

Growing economic relations were not likely to cause Indonesia to become dependent on China, he added.

Our biggest investor is Singapore, and previously it was Japan. Have we become dependent on these two countries? Yose said.

Geopolitics can affect economic ties, but the opposite is unlikely.
Philippine police said Friday that they rescued the victim of an attempted kidnapping and apprehended five members of a gang suspected of targeting fellow Chinese nationals, along with a Filipino who served as their driver.

The six suspects were arrested in the Manila suburb of Paranaque city on Thursday, national police chief Gen. Guillermo Eleazar said. Witnesses had reported the abduction of a 23-year-old Chinese employee of an offshore casino operation shortly after noon Thursday outside a hotel in Manila, the chief said.

The commotion caught the attention of hotel security personnel who immediately reported the incident, Eleazar said. Immediately, duty personnel responded, resulting in the arrest of the suspects. The arrested suspects are now under the custody of Paranaque City Police Station for proper investigation and filing of appropriate charges.

We are also grateful for the immediate response of our community to rescue the victim and prevent him from possible harm at the hands of these kidnappers, he said.

About 150,000 Chinese nationals are employed in the Philippines offshore gaming industry, which has seen a boom since President Rodrigo Duterte took power in 2016.

Duterte has fostered friendly relations with Beijing, despite bilateral differences over contending territorial claims in the South China Sea, and welcomed Chinese investors as well as tourists and workers. Duterte in the past has resisted calls to put a freeze on the influx of Chinese nationals.

With the influx, gangs from mainland China have preyed on their countrymen working in the Philippine casino industry, police said.

In January, police in Manila apprehended eight suspected Chinese kidnappers, including its leader, over an alleged abduction of fellow nationals identified as Lyu Long and Liu Xue Xue who worked at a Chinese-owned electronics firm.

Their supervisor paid 400,000 Chinese renminbi (U.S. $62,000) in ransom for Lyu but his captors did not release the victim. The company then informed police about the abduction after receiving information that Lyu Long was killed and dumped in a deep ravine, Maj. Gen. Joel Napoleon Coronel, chief of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group, said at the time.

In July 2017, Philippine police arrested 43 foreigners  many of them Chinese nationals  who were suspected of kidnapping a Singaporean woman, who was gambling at a local casino, and holding her for ransom. Police rescued the woman during a raid on the suspects hideout in the Metropolitan Manila area.

Meanwhile on Friday, the Bureau of Immigration announced the arrest of 15 Chinese nationals caught working in warehouses in suburban Bacoor city, south of Manila, following raids on Wednesday.

Despite the pandemic, our intelligence teams are actively investigating reports of illegal aliens staying in our country, bureau Commissioner Jaime Morente said in a news release. We urge foreign nationals to legitimize their stay here in the country, lest they face expulsion and blacklisting.



The 15 are to undergo COVID-19 testing and quarantine before being detained at the bureaus facility in Taguig, Metro Manila, pending deportation.

Jeoffrey Maitem in Cotabato City, Philippines, contributed to this report.
Montasser Sabal greets supporters during his 2010 campaign for mayor in Talitay town in Maguindanao province, southern Philippines.

Philippine police said officers shot and killed a former mayor, who had been identified by President Rodrigo Duterte as a narco-politician, after he allegedly grabbed a policemans gun while being transported to Manila early Thursday.

The shooting occurred a few days after the International Criminal Courts outgoing chief prosecutor sought to open a full probe into extrajudicial killings carried out in the Duterte administrations war on illegal drugs.

Montasser Sabal, the former mayor of Talitay, a town in southern Maguindanao province, was captured in the seaside province of Batangas on Wednesday night along with his driver and two aides, according to national police chief Gen. Guillermo Eleazar.

The suspect grabbed his police escorts firearm while onboard the vehicle which resulted in a scuffle wherein he was able to shoot the police officer beside him, Police Maj. Gen. Albert Ignatius Ferro, director of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group, said in a report to Eleazar. Posing danger, the accompanying police officers prompted to use reasonable force that resulted in wounding the arrested person through the use of his firearm.

Police did not release information about the officer who was shot. Sabal was transported to the San Juan Medical Center where he was declared dead.

Since he died under police custody, it is part of the protocol for the Internal Affairs Service (IAS) to conduct a motu-proprio investigation, Eleazar said, referring to an investigation launched without any referrals. We will leave the investigation to our IAS.

Investigators are expected to determine whether Sabal was restrained properly during the transport.

Police identified those arrested as Sabals household staff: Norayda Nandang, 43, and Aika de Asis, 34; as well as his driver identified as Muhaliden Mukaram, 36.

Officers said they confiscated guns, two plastic sachets containing illegal drugs along with cash during a search of Sabals vehicle.

Eleazar said Sabal, a former police officer who served as mayor of Talitay from 2010 to 2013 and as vice mayor from 2013 to 2016, was facing drug charges. In addition, Sabal allegedly supplied firearms and explosive materials to pro-Islamic State militants in the south who bombed a night market in Dutertes hometown of Davao City that left at least 14 dead in 2016, according to the chief of national police.

He was also considered a narco-politician guilty of dishonesty and neglect of duty and that is why an order for his dismissal was issued and affirmed, by the Supreme Court, Eleazar said.

Sabals brother, Abdul Wahab Sabal, who also served as the towns mayor, was shot and killed by motorcyclists outside a downtown Manila hotel on Feb. 10, 2020.

Duterte released the names of 35 mayors, seven vice mayors, one provincial board member and three congressmen he alleged were involved in illegal drug trafficking. The Sabal brothers were among those on the list.

BIFF link

Eleazar described Sabals death as a big blow to the supply chain of firearms and explosives to Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF), a militant group blamed for attacks and bombings in the southern Mindanao region.

The BIFF is a faction that split from the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), the countrys largest former separatist group. The MILF controls an autonomous region in the south after signing a peace pact with the government.

Sabals death came three days after Fatou Bensouda, then the top prosecutor of The Hague-based International Criminal Court, asked the body to open a full investigation into Dutertes drug war, which has left thousands dead since 2016.

Duterte has said he would not cooperate with the ICC. Sen. Christopher Bong Go, the presidents former personal assistant and a key ally, has said Dutertes war on drugs would continue until he stepped down next year.

Bensoudas report said that many of the killings in the Philippines were carried out by police officers and pro-government vigilantes as an official state policy of the Philippine government.

In asking for the investigation, Bensouda said thousands could have been victims of extrajudicial killings from mid-2016, when Duterte took office, to March 2019. She left office the day after filing the request at the end of her nine-year term.

A new chief prosecutor for the ICC, Karim Khan, was sworn in on Wednesday. Bensouda said she expected Khan to carry on with the investigation.

Police and other government officials planned, ordered, and sometimes directly perpetrated extrajudicial killings. They paid police officers and vigilantes bounties for extrajudicial killings, the report said, adding that officials at the highest levels of government encouraged it.
A man holds a placard in Tagalog saying The death squad killed my father, as he and other Filipinos participate in a day of mourning in Manila for victims of extrajudicial killings, Aug. 20, 2019.

The Philippine human rights commission said Friday it would investigate the killings of a 16-year-old boy and his adult companion during a police counter-narcotics raid, the second reported fatal shooting of drug suspects by Filipino cops this week.

The teenager, Johndy Maglinte, and his adult friend, Antonio Dalit, allegedly died in a shootout with police during a drug-related arrest in Binan city, south of Manila on Wednesday, the Commission on Human Rights (CHR) said. It cited an initial police report on the incident.

[The Commission] is deeply concerned with the news on another death of a minor  this time involving a 16-year-old boy who allegedly fought back (nanlaban) when police officers were serving a warrant for a drug charge in Binan, Laguna, Jacqueline Ann de Guia, CHR spokeswoman, said in a statement.

We shall be conducting our own independent probe on this incident to pursue the truth behind the incident and, more importantly, in pursuit of justice should it be proven that a human rights violation was perpetrated by the police.

The deaths of Maglinte and Dalit marked the second fatal shooting by Philippine police during a counter-narcotics arrest in the same week that the outgoing prosecutor of the International Criminal Court called for a full investigation into thousands of alleged extrajudicial killings during the Duterte administrations war on drugs.

[W]e strongly urge the government to speed up their investigations on cases of alleged extrajudicial killings, especially those linked to the governments drug campaign. Notably, there was already an observation from the U.N. Human Rights Office on the widespread and systematic killing of thousands of alleged drug suspects and the persistent impunity in the country that urgently need to be addressed, de Guia said.

We hope that commitments to uphold human rights translate to delivering justice to the aggrieved and improvements on government programs and policies, including reviewing the conduct of state agents in implementing them.

The CHR is an independent body set up under the 1987 Philippine constitution to investigate alleged human rights violations.

An official report by the Philippine National Police said the two suspects in Binan city exchanged shots with the arresting officers who had properly identified themselves.

But according to the CHR, the boys live-in partner, who is also a minor, told local media that she witnessed the killings, and the two suspects were handcuffed and facing down into the mud when police shot them.

On Friday, National Police chief Gen. Guillermo Eleazar denied that his officers had strayed, and said he ordered an investigation into the allegation that police officers had summarily executed the two suspects.

First, he was not handcuffed as others claimed, Eleazar told local radio station Radyo5.

Eleazar, who vowed to clean up the national force when he became chief in early May, said officers would investigate if there were any disparities in the police report.

The killings in Binan city occurred a day before a former mayor in the southern Philippines, Montasser Sabal  whose name President Rodrigo Duterte had put on a list of suspected narco-politicians but without offering any proof  was shot and killed by police after his arrest.

While Sabal was being transported to Manila, police said he grabbed a policer officers gun, leading to a scuffle in which he was shot and later died.

This weeks killings by police underscore the need for international pressure to stop Dutertes bloody drug war, said Carlos Conde, a senior researcher for Human Rights Watch in the Philippines.

We have seen far too many children falling victim to horrific police evidence. This should compel the ICCs pre-trial chamber to formally open an investigation, Conde told BenarNews.

On Monday, Fatou Bensouda, the then-chief prosecutor for the ICC, which is based in The Hague, said there was a reasonable basis to believe that the Crime Against Humanity of murder was committed in the Philippines between July 2016 and March 2019, as she released a report and asked for a full ICC investigation into Dutertes drug war.

Information obtained by the prosecution suggests that state actors, primarily members of the Philippine security forces, killed thousands of suspected drug users and other civilians during official law enforcement operations, Bensouda said.

The next day, a spokesman for Duterte said the president would never, ever cooperate with an ICC investigation, and dismissed Bensoudas report as politically motivated.

In May 2019, the Philippines officially withdrew from The Hague-based ICC, saying the country was no longer bound by its rules.
Bennington, VT (05201)

Today

Showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm during the morning, then some lingering showers still possible this afternoon. High 66F. Winds E at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 90%..

Tonight

Considerable cloudiness with occasional rain showers. Low 56F. Winds E at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 60%.
Features Intern

Bellamy Richardson is a features intern at the Berkshire Eagle. She is a rising junior at Williams College and is the executive editor for features at the Williams Record. She can be reached at brichardson@berkshireeagle.com.
Behold the power ... of art that tempts you to say 'cheese' on rail trail
Reporter

Greta Jochem, a Report for America Corps member, joined the Eagle in 2021. Previously, she was a reporter at the Daily Hampshire Gazette. She is also a member of the investigations team. You can find her on Twitter @greta_h_jochem.
Scott Stafford has been a reporter, photographer, and editor at a variety of publications, including the Dallas Morning News and The Berkshire Eagle. Scott can be reached at sstafford@berkshireeagle.com, or at 413-496-6301 and on Twitter at @BE_SStafford.
GREAT BARRINGTON  Police say a town man was high from inhaling from a can of computer duster when he crashed his pickup truck into another vehicle, causing what the other driver says are lasting injuries.

There isnt enough evidence to prove it in court, pointing to the larger challenge of keeping drugged drivers off roads.

Prosecutors on April 1 dropped an operating-under-the-influence-of-a-drug charge against David Ruddy, 37, citing a lack of sufficient evidence, according to Berkshire District Attorneys Office public information officer Andrew McKeever. Police also had charged Ruddy with negligent driving in the Oct. 27, 2019, accident, for which he received six months probation, according to court records. At the time of the crash, he was on probation for a domestic assault.

Ruddy rear-ended an SUV driven by John Wiltshire, of Sheffield, as he waited at the light in front of the police station on Route 7. Station surveillance video shows Ruddys truck plowing into Wiltshires vehicle and pushing it approximately 50 feet forward, into the intersection.

Police say Ruddy made no effort to slow or stop; the force of the crash broke Wiltshires headrest and resulted in injuries that include brain damage that has led to memory and other problems, according to Wiltshire.

Responders took Ruddy to a hospital; the severity of his injuries was not made public.

After the crash, police say, a can of Staples Computer Duster fell out of Ruddys truck; inside, a bag with five more cans sat on the passenger seat.

Wiltshire, who said he is preparing a civil lawsuit against Ruddy, is frustrated by the dropped charge.

It made me angry, Wiltshire said. I might have had my children in the back seat, and they could have been killed.

Ruddy could not be reached for comment.

Without rapid, specific tests for marijuana and other drugs, or metrics akin to those for alcohol, it is hard to prove in court that a driver was stoned or under the influence.

An arrest cant be made on suspicion alone; an OUI drug charge typically wont stick unless intoxication is clear and obvious, said town Police Chief Paul Storti.

We can suspect it, but if we cant prove it, its just a waste of the courts time and energy, he added. Sometimes we win them and sometimes we dont.

There is one thing that can help, and even it isnt foolproof.

Storti said legalization of pot in the state prompted his department, under former Police Chief William Walsh, to send Officer Christopher Peebles to train as a Drug Recognition Expert officer. The training teaches a 12-step protocol that involves observations, blood pressure, pulse and pupil tests. It ends with blood and urine analysis.

Last year, the department also had written a proposal to the town to ask for some of the community impact fees from pot stores to pay for another officers training. Town officials declined, Storti said.

Yet, testimony from Drug Recognition Expert officers wont necessarily make a case airtight, since several studies have debunked the 12-step evaluation procedures as unscientific and unreliable.

In 2019, a Berkshire County judge considered those studies, in part, when she tossed testimony from the countys first DRE officer in an OUI drug case.

Other studies indicate reliability if a DRE is well-trained, and Gov. Charlie Baker, for instance has tried to boost the number of DRE officers statewide.

Others see a threat. The American Civil Liberties Union and defense attorneys raise concerns about convicting the innocent using a protocol with questionable reliability, even if all 12 steps are completed.

Any time an expert testifies in court, juries and judges tend to give that expert a lot of credence and authority, said Joseph Zlatnik, a Pittsfield attorney who represented the defendant in that 2019 Berkshire case in which the judge threw out the drug expert testimony.

Zlatnik explained that the final evaluation step involving blood and urine samples is most important, and that the DRE officer did not perform those with his client.

In the Ruddy case, Great Barrington Officer Samuel Stolzars report says he and another officer immediately were on the scene outside the police station. Stolzar said that Ruddys behavior was consistent with inhaling gas from canned dusters.

He formed the opinion based on a number of factors, including Ruddys short-lived disorientation, witnesses who said Ruddy was semiconscious and Ruddys quick return to coherence, since the high from huffing compressed air fumes  its a dangerous practice  is short-lived.
Reid Middle School now is among the Berkshire County schools that have achieved the Anti-Defamation Leagues No Place for Hate designation, reflecting months of work guided by eighth grade civics students, and aimed at fostering an inclusive and equitable environment in school.
PRIZES FOR SHOTS: Facing a surplus of COVID-19 vaccine doses, states are continuing to hop onto the trend of doling out prizes for residents to receive vaccinations, which are available for free. Louisiana is awarding $100,000 scholarships to nine winners aged 12 to 17, in addition to $100,000 prizes for four adults and a $1 million prize for an adult winner.
The author says he has joined the rarefied ranks of nonfungible token creators, a cohort that likely includes geeks in basements all over the Berkshires, as well as Joe Exotic  his given name is Joseph Maldonado-Passage  the disgraced ex-star of the Netflix series Tiger King who now sells NFT artwork from his jail cell.
Ralph Gardner Jr. is a journalist whose work has appeared in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times and The New Yorker. He can be reached at ralph@ralphgardner.com. The opinions expressed by columnists do not necessarily reflect the views of The Berkshire Eagle.
Megan Markle, the Duchess of Sussex has another descriptor to add to her name: bestselling author!

Markles first childrens book, The Bench, reached the #1 position on The New York Times Bestseller List one week after it was published on June 8. The picture book, which celebrates the special bond between fathers and sons, tops the bestsellers list on the week before Fathers Day.

Markle thanked her supporters in a statement posted on her and Prince Harrys Archewell website. While this poem began as a love letter to my husband and son, Im encouraged to see that its universal themes of love, representation and inclusivity are resonating with communities everywhere.

She continued: In many ways, pursuing a more compassionate and equitable world begins with these core values. Equally, to depict another side of masculinity  one grounded in connection, emotion, and softness  is to model a world that so many would like to see for their sons and daughters alike. Thank you for supporting me in this special project.

RELATED: Meghan Markle Announces Her First Childrens Book

Markle dedicated The Bench to her husband and their son, Archie Harrison. She explained that a fathers day post she wrote for Prince Harry was the inspiration behind the book in its announcement press release last month.

The book, illustrated by Caldecott award-winning artist Christian Robinson, features drawings of Harry and Archie feeding rescue chickens at their home in Montecito, Calif., which was seen on Oprah Winfrey's interview special with the royal couple. The book also includes an illustration of Meghan holding her newborn daughter, Lilibet Diana, in a sling.
The Chicago woman whose house was wrongly raided by police in 2019 is accusing Mayor Lori Lightfoot of breaking a promise after the city moved to dismiss her case.

Anjanette Young and her attorney have called out Lightfoot and the Chicago city law department for their lack of cooperation during the case. I stand here, approximately 846 days of living the trauma that was caused to me, by the city, by the Chicago Police Department, and I call it reckless," Young said.

Police broke down Youngs door with a battering ram while acting on erroneous information in search for a suspected felon in Feb. 2019. Released body cam footage showed that Young was undressed at the time, and police placed her in handcuffs while she repeatedly told them that they had the wrong house. Lightfoot publicly apologized to Young after the footage was released, amid backlash for reports that her administration tried to block both Young and CBS Chicago from publicly releasing the footage.

RELATED: Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot Apologizes For Police Invasion Of Womans Apartment, Cuffing Her While She Was Undressed

Young told Chicago station WLS that Lightfoot promised to make her whole at a meeting in December where Young personally accepted the mayors apology. "And yet here we are almost six months later, and she's threatening to dismiss this case, Young said.

WLS reported that in April 2020, the citys attorneys rejected Youngs settlement demand and counter-offered with zero dollars. In late May 2021, a mediator got involved in the case.

Keenan Saulter, Youngs attorney, said that the biggest number the city offered during mediation was less than half of the settlement amount for a previous case similar to Youngs. According to WLS, the previous case settled for $2.5 million.

Young said, "It's been a very challenging time for me. I am often in tears about a lot of things. Very disappointed or disgusted at the mayor.

RELATED: Chicago Woman Reveals Footage Of Botched Police Raid At Her Home As Cops Handcuff Her As She Stands Naked

Chicagos law department released a statement saying that they have no choice but to take the case to court after Saulter rejected offers at mediation.

We were hopeful that a robust discussion moderated by an experienced former federal judge would lead to a fair and judicious outcome - one that would have fairly addressed Ms. Young's traumatic experience, but also fair to the taxpayers, the statement read. Mr. Saulter chose to reject the City's offers and walked away from further settlement discussions.

In response, Saulter said that the city made a take it or leave it offer early during the scheduled mediation, and refused to negotiate further, walking away from the mediation while Youngs team had another proposal on the table. He also accused the city of Chicago and its legal department of disrespecting and attempting to bully himself and Young.

"Regardless of how long it takes us to get to trial, how long it takes us to get justice. We're going to demand and fight for justice," Saulter said.
Juneteenth marks both a long, hard night of slavery and subjugation and the promise of a brighter morning to come, he continued. This is a day, in my view, of profound weight and profound power. A day in which we remember the moral stain and terrible toll that slavery took on the country and continues to take.

President Biden signed the bill to make it federally recognized, which was passed in both the House and Senate with strong bipartisan support. He said it is a day that reflects what the Psalm tells us: weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.

Juneteenth is now a federal holiday, becoming the first created since Martin Luther King Jr. s birthday in 1983, and marking the culmination of a political push to make the day officially observed.

Saturday, June 19 marks 156 years since Black people in Galveston, Tex., were informed that they had been freed by the Emancipation Proclamation, which mandated the end of enslavement of Black people two years earlier. An enslaved population in the town did not realize this until U.S. Army Major Gen. Gordon Granger arrived there and read General Order No. 3, which declared federal enforcement of the policy signed by Abraham Lincoln, who had been assassinated two months earlier.

RELATED: Senate Passes Bill to Make Juneteenth A Federal Holiday

The day became a cultural celebration observed mainly by Black people in the southern and southwestern United States, and it became a state holiday in Texas in 1980. By this year, every state in the nation, with the exception of South Dakota at least recognized the day.

But the push to make Juneteenth a federal holiday was led by Opal Lee, a 94-year-old resident of Fort Worth, Tex., whose family was celebrating Juneteenth in 1939 when she was 12, but was terrorized by a white mob that attacked her home and burned it down.

But she refused to give up on the spirit of the holiday, becoming an activist to create awareness of the cultural celebration. In 2016, she even walked from Fort Worth to Washington D.C. to advocate for Juneteenth to become a federal holiday.

Ive got so many different feelings all gurgling up in here, Lee, who is called grandmother of Juneteenth told CBS Dallas-Fort Worth. I dont know what to call them all. I am so delighted to know that suddenly weve got a Juneteenth. Its not a Texas thing or a black thing. Its an American thing.

Bidens signing of the bill also marks a grim anniversary. On June 17, 2015, nine members of Mother Emanuel A.M.E. Church in Charleston, all Black, were gunned down by a young white man in a racist rampage. The president recognized the tragic shooting and said today is a reminder that our work to root out hate never ends, because hate never hides....and when you breathe oxygen onto that rock it comes out.

Thats why we must understand that Juneteenth represents not only the commemoration of the end of slavery...but the ongoing work we have to bring true equity and racial justice into American society, which we can do.

With Biden was Vice President Kamala Harris, who made brief remarks before the signing of the bill, explaining the importance of including Juneteenth among the nations roster of national holidays.

When we establish a national holiday, it makes an important statement, Harris said. These are days when we as a nation have decided to stop and take stock and often to acknowledge our history.
At one of its largest meetings in decades, the Southern Baptist Convention chose to elect a new president, and chose someone who has previously worked to bridge racial divides in the church and defeated an effort to make an issue of critical race theory.

According to CBS News, Ed Litton, a pastor from Alabama, won 52 percent of the vote in a runoff against Mike Stone, a far right Georgia pastor backed by a new group called the Conservative Baptist Network that had attempted to move the already-conservative denomination further right.

Litton, a white man, was nominated by Fred Luter, the sole Black pastor to serve as president of the United States largest Protestant denomination. Luter praised Littons commitment to racial reconciliation.

RELATED: Rev. Raphael Warnock Gives First Sermon Since Winning U.S. Senate Race, Condemns Violence At Capitol That Marred His Victory

Stone had campaigned for the presidency aggressively, speaking at churches nationwide and even appeared on Fox News on Tuesday prior to the vote.

"We're a family, and at times it seems like an incredibly dysfunctional family," Litton said after the results were announced, according to CBS News. "But we love each other."

Additionally, delegates rejected a proposal that would have explicitly denounced critical race theory, which has been a target of the religious and political right. Instead, they approved a consensus measure that rejects any view that sees racism as rooted in "anything other than sin."
Detroit City Council officially passed a resolution in an effort to support reparations for African Americans in the city, whose population is 78 percent Black.

According to the Detroit Free Press, President Pro Tem Marry Sheffields resolution passed on Tuesday (June 15) without objection. It aims to create a foundation to form a city task force or commission to design what reparations may look like for Detroit residents and how to make it happen.

Sheffield said there are numerous community-led initiatives for reparations.

"You have Proposal P. Then you have the petition-led initiative, which is trying to put the question on the ballot, Sheffield said, according to the newspaper. The ideas were kind of waiting to see is what happens with those so were not duplicating something that may be placed on the ballot. Today was important because it also shows councils support for the idea of reparations and supporting a process to explore it moving forward.

RELATED: Chicago Suburbs Black Residents Explain Why Reparations Are Owed To Them

The resolution also states that African Americans have been unjustly enslaved, incarcerated, denied housing in public and private markets, segregated denied mortgages, and more.

Attorney Todd Perkins is submitting a ballot initiative for the November election that seeks to amend a portion of the city charter that restricts power from the voters to enact city ordinances for the appropriation of money." This, according to Perkins, will sequester funds from marijuana revenue sales to be put in a reparations fund or committee.

They would then decide how these monies would be spent and for what purpose, Perkins said to the Free Press, adding hes received nearly 4,000 signatures. It creates a sense of understanding and acknowledgment that OK, you were actually wronged. Theres an acknowledgment that something went wrong.

RELATED: California To Study How Slavery Reparations Could Become Reality

Below are the highlights the city plans to address in the resolution:

 Right to water and sanitation

 Right to environmental health

 Right to safety

 Right to live free from discrimination, including people with disability, immigrants, LGBTQ, and others

 Right to recreation

 Right to access and mobility

 Right to housing

 Right to the fulfillment of basic needs

Additionally, the reparations initiative calls for Detroit City Council to establish a process to develop short-and-long-term recommendation to boost opportunities within the African American community and address the creation of generation wealth.

"There's a lot of systemic issues that African Americans face and this is a predominately Black city," Sheffield said. "I think it's important that we acknowledge it and we at least begin to have conversations on how to address the issue of reparations."
Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy speaks to reporters during a news conference in Juneau, Alaska, Thursday, June 17, 2021. Dunleavy said the budget lawmakers approved this week is "defective" and said he is prepared to call another special session if action is not taken before the current special session expires Friday.
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Spearfish, SD (57783)

Today

Sunny early then increasing clouds with some scattered thunderstorms this afternoon. High near 90F. Winds SSE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 50%..

Tonight

Scattered thunderstorms early, then becoming clear after midnight. Low 69F. Winds SSW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 50%.
It is something that is easy to say and nearly impossible to do: love your enemies. In this article, we hope we can help unpack the meaning of two critical passages that guide us in this area: Matthew 6:44 and Luke 6:27. We will seek to understand the presenting issues and context that brought about that statement from our Lord Jesus and discover the meaning for our lives. What are the real ways that believers can love their enemies?

What Does 'Love Your Enemies' Mean in Matthew 6:44

"You have heard that it was said, You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven." -Matthew 6:43-45

In this passage, Jesus is seated before a crowd and teaching the Word of God that is being fulfilled in His own person. John Donne (1572-1631), the poet-preacher of St. Pauls, London, wrote of Matthew 5: All the articles of our religion, all the canons of our church, all the injunctions of our princes, all the homilies of our fathers, all the body of divinity, is in these three chapters, in this one Sermon on the Mount.1 The Sermon on the Mount, on a hill north of Galilee, has been called a radical re-interpretation of the Old Testament Scriptures by Jesus. As the late Dr. John Stott wrote, In each antithesis (You have heard that it was said  but I say to you ) he rejected the easy-going tradition of the scribes, reaffirmed the authority of Old Testament Scripture, and drew out the full and exacting implications of Gods moral law.2 So, we can say that the presenting issues we observe in the text have to do with a misunderstanding of loving ones enemies. This remains a challenge for our generation, as well.

The other contextual factor that exists in Jesus statement in the sermon on the mount is pride, position, and power. These are people who are under the oppressive regime of the Roman empire. This humbling situation is magnified by the appointed Jewish governors and other public officials who are seen as turncoats. These, like Matthew, and Zacchaeus, were tax collectors. They and other unscrupulous figures who use their delegated authority from Rome to fleece their own people represent an existential threat to Israels identity. This undesirable state creates a culture of suspicion, intrigue, concealment, treachery, and sabotage casting a shadow on unity, and turning a nation into a divided people. How easily a unified people become Balkanized (broken into competing groups, divided) when pride and self-interests supersede love and a common heritage in God.

We are also concerned with Luke 6:27: But I say to you who hear, Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you.

The passage in Luke 6 refers to Jesus Sermon on the Plains. The Lord Jesus had descended the mount after a night of prayer. A crowd awaited. They wanted more teaching, more application for living, more understanding, and, thus, more hope. Jesus began to teach a message very similar to the Sermon on the Mount. Dr. Lukes Sermon on the Plains, is shorter than the Sermon on the Mount. According to David E. Holwerd in The Lectionary Commentary, Lukes sermon is much shorter (30 verses to Matthews 107), and it contains only four beatitudes compared to Matthews eight. Yet, both of these divine sermons have the same goal. As David Holwerda wrote of Luke 6:17-26: Thus both the beatitudes and the woes [of the Sermon on the Mount and the Sermon on the Plains] are intended to shape the lives of disciples who live in this world as citizens of Gods kingdom.

3 Lessons on Real Ways to Love Your Enemies

In both Matthew 5:44 and Luke 6:27, Jesus calls for believers to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us. We can learn how to apply Jesus command in our own lives by following the fullness of the teaching. In both passages, Jesus provides the theological necessity for loving our enemies, as well as the blessed consequence of obedience. These three components of our Saviors sermons provide practical ways that we can love and forgive our enemies.

Lesson 1: Remember the Concept of Enemy Is Not a Permanent State but a Temporary Position

There was nothing wrong with the Old Testament teaching of recognizing the enemies of God. But the casual, easy interpretation by the Pharisees and the Sadducees led the people of Israel to see all the Gentile nations as prominent and perennial enemies. Hatred of others is a useful tool used by ungodly authorities to create a unity based on rage, roots of bitterness, and the past sins of others. Jesus taught that we, who were enemies of God, are now called friends of God, through Jesus Christ. Moreover, those who persecute us today may, in Gods grace, become those who protect us tomorrow. Therefore, we are taught by Jesus in the same passages to pray for them. We must always remember Saint Paul; he was the persecutor of the believers  the enemy of the Saints  who became the great Apostle to the Gentiles. Always remember that life in the community of man is not divided into the 'Hatfields and McCoys.' We are in no permanent position of hatred and enmity with others. Because of the love of God in Christ and the transforming power of the gospel, many who curse God today will be preaching His Word tomorrow.

Lesson 2: We Must Realize That We, Too, Were Once Enemies of God

The Lord Jesus says that when we love our enemies, we prove that we are His children. Yet, His childrenthat is, you and Iare children by holy adoption. God adopted His enemies to be His sons and daughters. Think on what is, perhaps, the most famous verse in the Bible: John 3:16. Read beyond verse 16 to consume the fullness of the meaning:

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. (John 3:16-18)

God saves because we need saving! If we look upon those who oppose, hurt, or persecute us as irredeemable, unchangeable Creatures of the Black Lagoon that are undeserving of our love and our forgiveness, then we must quickly run to the cross! Meditate on the truth that is proclaimed throughout all of the Bible and personified in the person of our Lord: But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Rom. 5:8)

Benjamin Breckenridge Warfield (1851-1921) of old Princeton reminded us that the greatest truth of John 3:16 is that God pursues those who rebelled against Him that He might bless them. David was a type of this kind of searching love when he returned to Jerusalem. And David said, Is there still anyone left of the house of Saul, that I may show him kindness for Jonathans sake (2 Samuel 9:1)? We might hate the wicked ways of those around us as they represent an affront to Gods holiness. However, those living without Christ are not unreachable. Pray for them. Pray that God will help you to love them and forgive them as you remember how God loved and forgave you.

Lesson 3: We Love Our Enemies So That We Might Please the God Who Loved Us

Jesus emphasizes the reality of reward in loving others. Luke 6:35-36 states, But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, for he is kind to the ungrateful and the evil. Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful. The practical implication of this teaching is clear: There is great reward in loving our enemies and forgiving them for their sins against us.

Several years ago I wrote a book called Hit by Friendly Fire: What to do when other believers hurt you. The thesis of the book is simply is this: as Jesus forgave those who crucified Him, the cross of Christ was transformed from an instrument of shame to a sign of salvation. Such radical gospel transformation is, now, the operating hypothesis for the people of God. As Martyn Lloyd-Jones taught, we should not be surprised when unbelievers are converted to Christ. We should be surprised when they are not. The gospel is, like C.S. Lewis Aslan, on the move! When faced with the enemies of God, it is best to take those who have hurt us or even persecutors and leave them at the foot of the cross in prayer. To continue hating, resenting, or holding a grudge against another person is to remain on the cross. There is no transformation in such scenarios. There is only greater pain.

When we follow the rich, life-giving teaching of our Lord Jesus Christ, we become spirits set free, free from yesterdays pain, free from the ugliness of sin that stains and infects our relationships, free from the life-crippling burden of unforgiveness. To love as Christ loved us is to receive and share the reward of such love: new life.

There is no reason for you to remain on a painful cross of unlovingness, or in the shame-shrouded tomb of lifelessness. Christ loves you. He forgives you as you come to Him. You come down from the cross, out of the tomb, and are, like the Lord, renewed to eternal life. And that is not only how to love your enemies, but also why we must love them. There is no other alternative for one who knows such love in ones own life. This is why Paul writes, And now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love (1 Corinthians 13:13, NKJV).

Sources:

Further Reading

What Did Jesus Really Mean by 'Love Your Enemies'?

What Does it Mean to 'Love Your Enemies'?

Photo credit: GettyImages/Tinnakorn Jorruang / EyeEm

MICHAEL A. MILTON (Ph.D., University of Wales; MPA, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; MDIV, Knox Theological Seminary; Cert. in Higher Education Teaching, Harvard University) serves as the Provost and James Ragsdale Chair of Missions and Evangelism at Erskine College and Seminary. A Presbyterian minister (PCA, ARP), Milton has penned more than thirty books, hundreds of articles in journals, magazines, opinion columns, and newspapers. As president of the D. James Kennedy Institute and Faith for Living, Milton has served as a public theologian. His work has been cited on numerous national media outlets as he provides historic Christian insights into faith and life in a changing world. Dr. Milton's record of ministry includes seminary chancellor, president of three seminaries, senior minister of one of America's historic churches, founder of three congregations, and a Christian academy. A composer and artist, Mike and Mae Milton reside in the mountains of Western North Carolina. Learn more at michaelmilton.org/about. [from a press release by McCain& Associates.]

This article is part of our larger resource library of popular Bible verse phrases and quotes. We want to provide easy to read articles that answer your questions about the meaning, origin, and history of specific verses within Scripture's context. It is our hope that these will help you better understand the meaning and purpose of God's Word in relation to your life today.

Listen to our Daily Bible Verse Podcast Now!




OLYMPIA - On Thursday, June 17, Washington State Attorney General Bob Ferguson announced Google will pay $423,659.76 to Washingtons Public Disclosure Transparency Account for violating the states campaign finance disclosure law, which Washingtonians adopted by initiative in 1972.

Washingtons voter-approved Fair Campaign Practices Act requires political advertisers to retain records related to political ads because the public has a right to inspect the records, including the cost of the ad, the sponsor, and the person paying for the advertisement. Fergusons lawsuit followed Googles failure to retain and disclose state political ad records.

This is the second time Ferguson has taken legal action against Google for violating Washingtons voter-approved law on political advertising. In June 2018, the Attorney Generals Office filed a lawsuit against Google for similar conduct. Fergusons 2018 lawsuit resulted in Google paying a $200,000 judgment and an additional $17,000 to reimburse the states attorney fees. This case involves approximately one-third the amount of ad expenditures as the 2018 lawsuit. In this case, Google is paying double that judgment amount, in addition to attorney fees.

Google is one of the largest corporations in the world, and should be able to figure out how to follow our campaign finance laws, Ferguson said. Todays judgment is twice as high as the one Google paid in 2018. Repeat violators of Washingtons voter-approved campaign transparency laws will be held accountable.

The Public Disclosure Commission appreciates the Attorney Generals Office efforts to defend the publics right to know about political advertising, Commission Chair Fred Jarrett said. Our continued partnership in enforcing Washington states strong campaign finance laws ensures Washingtonians enjoy robust disclosure of political spending.

Google is not the only tech giant facing a lawsuit over repeat campaign finance violations from the Attorney Generals Office. In April 2020, Ferguson filed a lawsuit against Facebook for similar, repeat conduct. That lawsuit is scheduled to go to trial on December 6, 2021. In response to that lawsuit, Facebook is challenging the constitutionality of the commercial advertiser requirements of Washingtons voter-approved campaign finance law, which could put that law and the transparency it provides the public in jeopardy.
ASEAN had seen stronger Science, Technology and Innovation (STI) collaboration

Singapore Minister of State, Ministry of Trade and Industry Alvin Tan and Deputy Chief Executive (Research) of A*STAR Prof Andy Hor led the Singapore delegation at the 11th Informal ASEAN Ministerial Meeting on Science, Technology and Innovation (IAMMSTI-11), and the 79th ASEAN Committee on Science, Technology and Innovation (COSTI-79) and related meetings respectively.

Hosted by Thailand, both meetings took place from 15 to 17 June 2021. Meetings were held under the chairmanship of AMMSTI and COSTI to Thailand, with the former chaired by Thailands Minister of Higher Education, Science, Research and Innovation, Prof. Dr. Anek Laothamatas.

ASEAN Member States reaffirmed their commitment to regional cooperation on science and technology and discussed proposals for research collaboration to boost ASEANs capabilities in combating COVID-19 and future pandemics. The COSTI-79 and IAMMSTI-11 meetings were conducted in a hybrid format, onsite in Bangkok and attended virtually by ASEAN member states.

New COVID-19 Research Collaboration Proposals

Two COVID-19 research collaboration proposals, initiated by Singapore in 2020, during its chairmanship of COSTI, were officially endorsed at the COSTI-79 and IAMMSTI-11. Both proposals arose from the outcomes of the ASEAN COSTI Forum on COVID-19, initiated and organised by Singapore in October 2020. With the Forums broad themes of Prevention, Detection, and Therapeutics. Member states shared their collective national experience in dealing with the pandemic and brainstormed ideas for regional cooperation in science and technology which could strengthen ASEANs technological capabilities against COVID-19.

Singapore-Malaysia Collaboration: Stepping Up ASEANs Epidemic Preparedness with Genomic Surveillance

IAMMSTI-11 and COSTI-79 endorsed a proposal on adding analysis value to genomic surveillance, co-led by Singapore and Malaysia through Singapores Bioinformatics Institute (BII) and A*STAR Infectious Disease Labs (ID Labs), research institutes under the Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR), and Malaysias Institute for Biotechnology (NIBM). The R&D partnership aims to provide accurate and up-to-date genomic information on virus strains detected in the region, leveraging the Global Initiative on Sharing All Influenza Data (GISAI) platform  an international data initiative for sharing of virus genomes, including the coronavirus causing COVID-19, to enable rapid and open access to virus information. This proposed partnership leverages existing biotechnology and bioinformatics capabilities in ASEAN and builds on top of existing national genome sequencing efforts.

The Philippines-Singapore Collaboration: Tapping on ASEAN Research Networks to Investigate Immunity Against COVID-19 in Regional Populations.

The Philippines and Singapore are co-leading a regional study to assess the levels of immunity within ASEAN communities at different stages, including before vaccination and the longevity of immunity conferred through vaccination. The study will look into the effectiveness of seroconversion of vaccines, which refers to the development of specific antibodies in the blood serum as a result of a COVID-19 infection or vaccination. This research partnership also taps on the networks fostered through the ASEAN Diagnostics (Dx) Initiative, expanding on the list of priority diseases and pivoting to help meet the challenges of the current pandemic.

ASEAN members states that have confirmed participation in the proposal are Indonesias Eijkman Institute of Molecular Biology, Malaysias University of Malaya, Faculty of Medicine, Thailands King Chulalongkorn Memorial Hospital Bangkok and Vietnams Oxford University Clinical Research Unit.

This is the first multi-country regional study on the serology response to vaccination. With multiple vaccines being deployed, coupled with the evolving variants of concern (VOCs), this study will potentially offer impactful insights for the scientific community, public health practitioners, government policymakers and industry involved in COVID-19.

Image Caption: Zoom snapshot of the 11th Informal ASEAN Ministerial Meeting on Science, Technology and Innovation (IAMMSTI-11). Highlighted in yellow is Thailands Minister of Higher Education, Science, Research and Innovation, Prof. Dr. Anek Laothamatas, who chaired the IAMMSTI-11 meeting. Pictured above Prof. Dr. Anek Laothamatas is Mr Alvin Tan, Minister of State, Ministry of Trade and Industry, Singapore.
100-bed free hospital with ICU facilities, started by B'lore tech firm Globals with support from QNET, Presidency University, and Rotary Manyata

Asia's leading direct selling company, through its CSR arm, RYTHM Foundation has joined hands with a group of young entrepreneurs in Bengaluru to convert a non-operational hospital into a free COVID Care Health Centre through Project CoHeal.

The funding from QNET has helped transform the disused Rajiv Gandhi Medical Hospital building in R.T Nagar into a 100-bed COVID Care facility that provides free, round-the-clock care to those who need it the most.

Project CoHeal is the brainchild of the young entrepreneurs behind Bengaluru based technology firm Globals Inc who joined hands with the Rotary Club Manyata and Presidency University to launch this as a joint CSR initiative.

The support from QNET's Indian business facilitated by the company's CSR arm, the RYTHM Foundation has helped equip the hospital with Oxygen Concentrators, HFNC ICU Ventilators, and also covers the payroll for the doctors and nurses of the hospital for the next 6 months.

This 24-hour COVID care hospital has zero cash counters, assuring patients that treatment is 100% free. It is also in the process of incorporating a dedicated paediatric wing as well as building intensive care unit (ICU) capabilities. Other facilities in the hospital include a clinic, elevators for stretchers, oxygen flow meters, pharmacy, lobby, X-Ray, washroom, AC, parking zone, and doctor's lounge.
As people look for home exercise lessons and ways to boost immunity and mental health, yoga has gained a fresh wave of popularity

Much like everything else on the planet today, yoga too has gone virtual! In many countries including India, this will be the second year when the International Yoga Day celebrations will be held virtually. The usefulness of yoga for mental peace and managing stress has been acknowledged by global experts. It is one of the reasons why last month the US state of Alabama lifted a 30-year-old ban on teaching yoga in schools with riders. The Indian Missions overseas have made the most of the opportunity and organised camps to promote the practice and Indias soft power.

Interestingly, the Dutch Ministry of Defence is said to have introduced yoga for its armed forces some 15 years ago to help reduce stress and improve the physical and mental fitness of soldiers. With this years International Yoga Day being commemorated in the midst of a pandemic, the relevance of this centuries-old Indian healing practice has increased manifold. People across the world are looking for new ways to keep them physically and mentally fit as the pandemic continues to cause job losses and pay cuts. The uncertainty lurking over the world has given rise to a parallel epidemic of stress, anxiety and depression. Yoga, a wholesome practice of aligning the body and the mind, is also being looked upon by people as a mental health saviour in these circumstances.

Yoga in a time of surging demand for home workouts

The COVID-19 crisis that has dramatically changed the ways we work and live has also changed the way we exercise and stay fit. As gyms remain closed, open spaces and parks remain restricted, people are resorting to home workouts. Runners and cyclists are looking for indoor exercise options to burn calories and stay agile. A natural corollary has been a surge in demand for home workout equipment and accessories such as treadmills, exercise bikes, resistance bands, skipping ropes, dumbbells along with fitness apps and online fitness programmes.

As a form of exercise that can be easily practised even in a small enclosed space, yoga has found new converts during the pandemic. While there was no dearth of online yoga sessions and apps even before COVID-19 broke out, most people usually preferred to perform yoga in groups and under the physical supervision of a trained expert. However, virtual yoga has now become viable for many people as they stay at home. Yoga apps and online yoga lessons are witnessing surging popularity. Recent market research estimated that the global Yoga mat market is estimated to reach $17.32 billion by 2025, growing at a CAGR of 5.8 per cent from 2019 to 2025.

People who prefer to work out under the physical supervision of a guru, are now demanding personalised and customised yoga sessions suited for their individual needs. Many yoga and fitness apps have introduced solo yoga lessons to cater to such demands.

Yoga for immunity and lung health

Even though countries have vaccinated a section of their population, a strong immune system remains the only recourse for people against coronavirus. With its benefits for immunity and lung health, yoga has become an exercise of the first choice for many people. A study published in the Journal of Behavioral Medicine in 2018 suggested that yoga can help boost the immune system and decrease inflammation in the body. Along with relaxation, exercise and meditation, pranayama or breathing control is a major pillar of yogic practice. The regular practice of pranayama is known to increase chest wall expansion and lung functions.

With shifting consumer preferences, yoga experts and lesson providers are also reporting a rise in numbers of people seeking greater expertise in meditation and pranayama as ways to reduce stress and improve lung function to beat the coronavirus threat.

Yoga with family

The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted our lives in many ways. However, if we could draw one positive leaf out of this experience, it is the valuable time people have got to spend with their families. With people saving their travel hours and working from home, the additional time at home is a useful opportunity to make memories with your family -- yoga is more than physical activity.

In the words of one of its most famous practitioners, the late BKS Iyengar, Yoga cultivates the ways of maintaining a balanced attitude in day-to-day life and endows skill in the performance of ones actions.

Last year, the Ministry of AYUSH initiated a campaign 'Yoga at Home, Yoga with Family' to encourage people to adopt the practice and to stay healthy during the pandemic. This year, their video contest 'Be With Yoga, Be At Home' is likely to engage more people. By performing yoga together with your family, not only you get an opportunity to bond with your family but it also allows you to give your children a healthy practice that would stay on with them for their entire lives.

Kamal Narayan Omer, CEO, Integrated Health and Wellbeing (IHW) Council
The Golden Drum International Festival of Creativity, which aims to support young creatives to find inspiration, develop creative skills, gain industry insights and explore issues and ideas that will reshape the industry's future, has opened registrations for its Young Drummers and The Golden Drum competitions.

Challenge and awards

Competition jury

Aleksandr Dobrokotov; creative director, DADA Agency

Ana Savsek; head of content digital marketing department, Slovenian Tourist Board

Sergio Spaccavento; chief creative officer and partner, Conversion E3

Barbara Zmrzlikar; head of research, development, innovation and EU projects department, Slovenian Tourist Board.

SOUTH AFRICA South African Social Media Landscape Report 2021 event launch Ornico, in collaboration with World Wide Worx, is launching this much anticipated SA Social Media Landscape Report event live on YouTube on Wednesday, 30 June 2021...

The Golden Drum competition

Three days of Virtual Drumming

Michael Moynihan, senior vice president, global brand, marketing, insights and partnerships, The Lego Group

Damien Marchi; senior vice-president, CSR development at Vivendi

Fernando Machado; chief marketing officer at Activision Blizzard

Sietze Rademaker; director of sonic branding and new business at Amp.Amsterdam

Raja Rajamannar; chief marketing and communications officer and president, healthcare business at MasterCard

Eynat Guez; CEO and cofounder of Papaya Global

Carmela Soares; creative strategist at Facebook Creative Shop ANZ

For this years Young Drummers competition, the festival has again partnered with the Slovenian Tourist Board to challenge young creatives under 30 on the topic of Slovenia, the land of active holidays. Participants from all over the world can join the competition.This year, the competition aims to raise awareness of Slovenia as a green destination which offers unique and active outdoor experiences. Creative solutions will be primarily used on the Feel Slovenia social media channels targeting specific groups. Final works will be submitted as a short video or a series of short videos. The deadline for submissions is 1 September 2021 and the entry fee is 25.The author of the best video or video series will be awarded a 1,000 prize and will be given a chance to present themselves and the winning video on the virtual stage during the festivals program on 13 October 2021. The prize will be awarded at the live online Golden Drum Award Ceremony on 15 October 2021.Leading the jury will be Suvi Lahde, executive creative director at SEK. During her years in the creative industry, she has built and developed brands like Visit Finland, Finnair and Finnish Lapland. She has created strategies, concepts and campaigns for brands such as Coca-Cola Company, Valio and Paulig, working both in the home and global markets.She said, I am truly honoured to lead the Young Drummers competition jury this year. We are living in a world where were daily bombarded by messages of disasters, crises and problems with seemingly no solutions. But there is a way to craft a better future  creativity. It is said to become one of the most important skills of tomorrow. This year, together with my distinguished fellow jury members, we are looking for creative solutions that unblock yesterdays patterns of thinking and have a real impact beyond tomorrows short term business goals.Joining her in evaluating the videos will be:For more information about the Young Drummers competition, go here Golden Drum invites creatives from 38 countries to enter their best work into the main Golden Drum Competition until 13 August 2021.There is two-year eligibility for all entries. Golden Drum is also offering a quantity discount on entry fees and a 50% discount on the entry fee for the Covid-19 group. Moreover, Little Black Books partnership with The Golden Drum will see all Grand Prix winners entered directly, free of charge, into the relevant regional competition of The Immortal Awards.Golden Drum Competition is included as one of the eight regional shows on WARC rankings and Creative 100.As we emerge from the worst of the Covid-19 pandemic, it's time to press the restart button and start working towards a better future. How to restart the future, though? Will our lives go back to normal and what will the new normal look like for our industry?The most burning questions aims to be answered during three days of Virtual Drumming. From 13 to 15 October 2021, the organisers invite you to listen, learn and participate in a free, online, live Golden Drum programme featuring international speakers like:For more information on the Golden Drum competition, go here For more information on the speakers, go here
Where is it all happening? Online, of course. According to Statista there are now 38.13 million active internet users in the country.

Website myths that could be keeping your small business small Here are some of the common myths that could be standing in the way of small businesses getting online and reaching their full potential...

Thats why it is important to relook at how your SME is doing online and whether there is room for improvement. Below is a list of the top five most important online trends and what they can do for your business.Search engine optimisation (SEO) is not a new trend, however, it is important to realise that it isnt a once-off task either. In order to give customers exactly what they want, search engines are constantly improving algorithms. SEO is therefore a long-term, on-going project. Make sure your content is always updated, regularly add new and informative images, videos, blogs, FAQs, etc. to your website, and make sure you follow Googles E-A-T (expertise, authority, trustworthiness) principles when you do.What customers are saying about your business online, matters. In fact, it matters so much that three out of every four customers base their buying decisions on the reviews they have read about you online. You need to manage this. Ask customers to review you. Getting bad reviews? Zone in on the problem and fix it ASAP.In a digital age, convenience is perhaps one of the main things online-savvy customers come to expect. A growing number of people want easy access to answers they might have relating to your product. Social e-commerce is, therefore, becoming very popular because it is closing the gap between 'seeing' and 'buying'. Social e-commerce makes it more convenient for potential customers to learn about a product (price, availability, etc.) within fewer clicks, rather than sending them to your website instead.There is a good reason why word-of-mouth marketing will never die. This is because it works. People like to hear how great your products or services are from other people who have experienced it first-hand. If this person is a cousin  great, however, if this person is an influencer they admire and adore  even better. Do not just pick any influencer for your marketing; try and connect with a micro influencer whose core values are similar to that of your brand.Over the course of the past seven years online shopping via mobile devices has grown by 222% globally! So, when it comes to the user-experience of your website: think mobile first! Continue testing your website pages and making any adjustments until you can get the mobile vs desktop user-experience almost seamless. It may be a good idea to ask several people outside your organisation for honest and critical feedback regarding the useability of your website. Domains.co.za is a domain name registration and website hosting company based in Johannesburg, South Africa. We also offer a collection of value-added solutions aimed at getting small to medium-sized businesses online, safely and cost-effectively, whilst still maintaining a professional image.
Conversation Lab continues to entrench itself in the education sector with another significant win within the impressive AdvTech stable of brands. The full-service digital agency has been awarded the digital advertising business of disruptive new school brand, Evolve Online School. The new offering provides a completely personalised online learning experience.

Uyanda Manana, Conversation LAB SA MD

The agency already has a deep strategic partnership across a range of AdvTech tertiary and school brands including the IIEs Varsity College, Vega, Rosebank College, Abbotts Colleges, Crawford International and Trinityhouse. In addition, just last month, the agency took on further AdvTech accounts, including Elkanah House, Greenwood Bay College and Glenwood House schools.The Evolve Online School opened its virtual doors in January 2021, welcoming learners from Grade R to Grade 9. Applications and enrolments started last September, and soon exceeded expectations, as parents considering online school options are becoming more discerning in terms of the various offerings on the market.Germari Eksteen, brand and sales manager for Evolve Online School, said: We needed to hit the ground running and chose Conversation LAB as trusted AdvTech partners with deep category expertise and knowledge to guide us through launch and beyond. EdTech is moving at pace, and we couldnt be happier with breadth of offering Conversation LAB brings.Uyanda Manana, Conversation Lab SA MD added: AdvTech continues to lead in the private education space in Africa, based on their reputation for maintaining the highest quality academic excellence. During last years lockdowns, the group lost not a single academic day, and even attracted new enrolments as a result of their superior online offering. While the development of their online school has been some time in the making, the huge demand for academic excellence in the online space demonstrated the tremendous demand for a school such as Evolve, which offers an MIT-developed programme complemented with real-world engagement for students. We are very excited to partner with such a cutting-edge brand as Evolve Online School. Where others follow, AdvTech leads.
A 10-part anthology animated series, created by filmmakers from Zimbabwe, Uganda, South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya and Egypt, will premiere on Disney+ in late 2022.

Concept art from Kizazi Moto: Generation Fire  Disney

We are bringing the work of a visionary new generation of African filmmakers to Disney+. In addition to delivering thrilling animation for fans of all ages, this collection of 10 original films taps into the Afrofuturism phenomenon  which was turbo-charged by Marvels Black Panther and reflects Disneys ongoing commitment to partnering with leading global talent to tell the stories of the world from fresh and authentic points of view, commented Michael Paull, president, Disney+ and ESPN+, The Walt Disney Company.

Kizazi Moto: Generation Fire brings together a new wave of animation stars to take you on a wildly entertaining ride into Africas future. Inspired by the continents diverse histories and cultures, these action-packed sci-fi and fantasy stories present bold visions of advanced technology, aliens, spirits and monsters imagined from uniquely African perspectives.Oscar-winning director Peter Ramsey (Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse) will serve as executive producer for the anthology, with Tendayi Nyeke and Anthony Silverston as supervising producers. Triggerfish will be the lead studio for the anthology, working in collaboration with animation studios across the continent and globally.Kizazi Moto derives from the Swahili phrase kizazi cha moto  which literally translates as fire generation, capturing the passion, innovation and excitement this new cohort of African filmmakers is ready to bring to the world. Moto also means fire in several other African languages, from Rwandas Kinyarwanda to Shona, a Zimbabwean language, speaking to the pan-African spirit we hope this anthology embodies, commented Tendayi Nyeke, supervising producer, Triggerfish.Im really pleased to be part of a ground-breaking, fresh and exciting project thats aimed at exposing the world to a whole new wave of creativity and invention from a place that is just ready to explode onto the world animation scene. The films in the anthology kind of run the gamut when it comes to science fiction. There are stories that touch on other worlds, time travel and alien beings, but all of these genre conventions are seen through an African lens that makes them totally new. I cant wait for people to have their minds blown and say I want more, commented Peter Ramsey, executive producer.More than 70 leading directors and creators across the continent were invited to pitch their ideas, after a multi-year research phase that included input from Ghanian comic book blogger Kadi Tay, award-winning Congolese animation supervisor Sidney Kimbo-Kintombo (Avengers: Endgame) and Namibian-South African producer Bridget Pickering (Hotel Rwanda).The process was curated and produced by the team at Triggerfish, including supervising producer Tendayi Nyeke, head of development Anthony Silverston and Kevin Kriedemann, who proposed the initial idea for the anthology. At least 15 shortlisted projects were mentored by Academy Award-winning director Peter Ramsey and the creative teams from Triggerfish and Disney.The final 10 films are from Ahmed Teilab (Egypt), Simangaliso Panda Sibaya and Malcolm Wope (South Africa), Terence Maluleke and Isaac Mogajane (South Africa), Ngendo Mukii (Kenya), Shofela Coker (Nigeria), Nthato Mokgata and Terence Neale (South Africa), Pious Nyenyewa and Tafadzwa Hove (Zimbabwe), Tshepo Moche (South Africa), Raymond Malinga (Uganda) and Lesego Vorster (South Africa). Each film will be roughly 10 minutes long and together will comprise a feature-length anthology of original animation that will be released as a Disney+ Original across the globe.
Side effects observed in follow-up studies of health workers vaccinated with the Johnson & Johnson (J&J) shot in the Sisonke Study are similar to those in other parts of the world, and other vaccines.

Professor Glenda Gray. Image supplied

They may not protect you from infection but they do protect you or reduce your risk from severe disease.

The South African Medical Research Council (SAMRC) collaborated with J&J on the investigator-led collaborative Sisonke Study, which saw close to 500,000 healthcare workers receiving the single-dose vaccine.The lead investigator and SAMRC chief executive officer, Professor Glenda Gray, said the vaccines - whether it is a J&J or Pfizer - will reduce the risk of severe disease.According to the professor, they are following up on all the healthcare workers that had breakthrough infections  cases where fully vaccinated individuals test positive for coronavirus  and they are currently adjudicating them to see if their illness was mild or severe.However, most of the breakthrough infections have been mild and only a handful have been severe, she said.Most breakthrough infections have been due to the variant that is currently driving the third wave in the country. Researchers are also looking at boosters for the J&J vaccine, about six months after the first vaccination.In the meantime, Gray said sub-studies are being conducted with the single-dose vaccine, looking at HIV-infected healthcare workers; pregnant and lactating women, and healthcare workers with comorbidities to understand their immune response compared to other parts of the world.We still believe that healthcare workers must use the personal protective equipment. They must use masks, wash their hands and observe social distancing, said Gray.
After acquiring a Diploma in Public Relations in 2018, Keowin Knowlden immediately started working as an intern at Atmosphere Communications. This opportunity launched his PR career and after a mere two years in the industry he became an account manager at just 24-years-old. Knowlden has been part of a team who has won several awards, including a Loeries in 2018 and Prisms in 2019 and 2021...
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Even though the Manitoba legislature wont reconvene until the fall, the discourse surrounding Bill 64 is still heating up this summer, with Education Minister Cliff Cullen being at the centre of it.

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JOHN WOODS / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS On Monday, Education Minister Cliff Cullen dedicated an entire news conference to dispelling misconceptions about the Education Modernization Act. (File)

Even though the Manitoba legislature wont reconvene until the fall, the discourse surrounding Bill 64 is still heating up this summer, with Education Minister Cliff Cullen being at the centre of it.

On Monday, the Spruce Woods MLA dedicated an entire news conference to dispelling "misconceptions" about the Education Modernization Act, accusing members of the Manitoba NDP and its affiliates of perpetuating a misinformation campaign designed to "instil fear and anxiety in parents and educators."

This news conference came at a time when the province is hosting a variety of virtual meetings that are designed to gather the publics feedback on how to reshape Manitobas education system.

In order to clear the air about Bill 64, and the provinces push for education reform more broadly, Cullen decided to speak with the Sun over the phone on Thursday morning.

The following is a transcription of that conversation, which has been slightly edited for length and clarity.

The Brandon Sun: Do you believe that your government is striking the right tone by directly going after the opponents of Bill 64 in such a way, especially now that the province is hosting these virtual meetings with parents?

Cliff Cullen: We got into this because we are trying to be the most improved province in the country. And we have to have a conversation about education to achieve that. Thats why we embarked on the K-12 review.

(With) 75 recommendations coming out of that review  its not something that were going to leave sitting on the shelf and collect dust. We want to move forward with the recommendations in that report.

Clearly weve learned through our COVID experience that there can be a new way of doing business. And what weve done is weve combined the recommendations from the K-12 report and our COVID experience and put together a Better Education Starts Today strategy.

The message this week is we want Manitobans to be informed about what were trying to accomplish through the strategy and that Bill 64 really speaks to one pillar of the four pillars in the strategy.

Were trying to encourage Manitobans to do their homework and get educated on what were trying to accomplish, and that really is the best for students.

SUN: I think a lot of people feel like certain educators and parents already have done their homework and still have concerns about the legislation. Do you feel that it is a good rhetorical strategy to come out and tell these people that theyre wrong, even though they have done the legwork to read through the bill itself and come to the conclusion that they have concerns with it?

CC: What I said was, not everyone is not going to agree with our approach, the governance model.

We think its the right approach. We are listening to Manitobans. We are prepared to make amendments, and thats why were going through the listening exercise, quite frankly. Were going out of our way to engage.

Ive had 18 teacher discussions over the last month. We have a parental engagement team out in the field doing regional meetings. Were going to have our fourth town hall next week. Weve heard from literally thousands of Manitobans, and a lot of those Manitobans are saying "yeah, its time for change."

SUN: I dont think that people are objecting to the idea that change needs to happen. I think some people object to the amount of change you guys are instituting and the way youre instituting it.

CC: What were doing is really empowering the local community to provide advice to the school. Were empowering parents to do that, were empowering the community to do that and were providing direct advice to the school leadership through principals and vice-principals to make those decisions, and really empowering teachers as well.

Parents know their kids the best. Educators are trained in delivering education, and weve seen more and more money diverted away from the classroom. And we think that we need more resources for the front-line classes, and we think this is the model that can do that.

I get that change can be difficult, but we think this is a change for the better.

SUN: You mentioned the K-12 education review and how thats kind of the foundation of Bill 64 and the Better Education strategy more broadly. But why should parents believe that the new round of consultations that youre doing this summer are meaningful when your government ignored major recommendations in the K-12 education when constructing Bill 64? I think immediately of the recommendation that you should keep some school boards intact.

CC: The reality is, Kyle, that of 75 recommendations, 60 we agreed with, the other 15 we agreed with in principle. If you look at that one recommendation of the 75, it talks about elected officials as well.

The only thing we did slightly different was we have the French language division and an English language division. We just thought that the time had come to do it that way.

So when you say that were ignoring recommendations, I would strongly disagree with that.

If you look at the recommendations, a lot of those, the 15 that I talk about, are goals. Theyre lofty goals that cant be accomplished through legislation. Thats really why were engaging Manitobans. Were saying "OK, have a look at the legislation. Thats our short-term governance piece."

The bigger picture here is obtaining outcomes for students and teachers and leadership. And that is a journey. Thats a five-year journey and we want you to be part of this journey.

So its about reaching out on two fronts: on the legislation, but also trying to engage Manitobans and educators that to achieve our goals recommended there is going to take a lot of work.

The K to 12 report did not leave a roadmap on how to achieve these goals, and we are currently putting together that roadmap on how we are going to achieve these goals and provide that to Manitobans this fall.

SUN: In the spirit of looking ahead to the future, especially if Bill 64 comes to pass, I was curious about what the fate of different school divisions will be if the legislation passes in its current form? For example, for a smaller organization like the Turtle Mountain School Division, will it cease to exist? What will happen to the staff who are employed by some of these smaller rural school divisions?

CC: So, school boards themselves will disappear. We still need the staff to provide the administration. Were not centralizing a whole bunch of staff into an office in Winnipeg. Thats the misconception thats out there.

Weve learned through COVID that people can work remotely and they can work from home, those that arent in the classroom. So theres all kinds of opportunity for that to happen.

So we still need the administrative support, we still need that network of people involved in education, certainly outside of the classroom, to make sure the administration is done. We just dont need the bricks and mortar that we used to.

SUN: So am I to understand that all the administrative staff who are part of these divisions will still be employed, they will just be employed in different capacities within these new regions that are being proposed under Bill 64?

CC: Were currently having a look at what the structure of that system will look like. Thats currently underway. Clearly, we do have a duplication in services across 37 school divisions, so thats something that were looking at. Were looking at efficiencies and synergies in the system.

We have committed to taking the money that we can save on the administration side and moving that money to the front line, where we can provide additional education assistance and provide the clinical support and evaluate funding for special needs and those with mental health issues. Thats one of our goals as well.

SUN: Moving back to Mondays press conference, you were repeatedly asked to identify the groups who support Bill 64 and who are in favour of the changes that you guys are proposing? Would you be willing to expand on or identify those groups with me today?

CC: Let me say that were engaging thousands of Manitobans, parents and educators. A lot of them have indicated a willingness for change, to improve the system.

We look forward to that. We are continuing to work with the parents and teachers. Were engaging other stakeholders as well to explain what were trying to accomplish.

So far weve just had one coalition of union leadership that appear to be opposed to it.

SUN: In that respect, youve been quoted in the past as saying that the opponents of Bill 64 are a "vocal minority." In this sense, do you believe that the NDP is fabricating or inflating the amount of support theyve received through petition signatures or lawn signs that they say are being set up across the province?

CC: Im saying theyve been disingenuous in terms of providing false information to Manitobans. Thats why some Manitobans are making the decisions they are. The point of the news conference on Monday was to say to Manitobans "make sure that you understand the facts."

Thats why we put out our Facts versus Fiction information. Were simply asking Manitobans to make sure they appreciate the facts. Dont make decisions based on fiction.

SUN: Is there anything else you would like to add about the Bill 64 discourse and how you think it will continue to evolve over the summer as these Parent Engagement Task Force meetings move forward?

CC: Were going to continue to engage Manitobans. Were going to listen to Manitobans, get their ideas in terms of both the legislation and the (Better Education) strategy going forward. We look forward to continuing those discussions.

Were encouraging Manitobans to go to bettereducationmb. ca and make sure they fully understand the strategy and what were trying to accomplish.

 kdarbyson@brandonsun.com

 Twitter: @KyleDarbyson
By taking a leave of absence from the Rivers Police Service, Const. Jerra Green traded one line of public service for another.

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By taking a leave of absence from the Rivers Police Service, Const. Jerra Green traded one line of public service for another.

Since the beginning of last month, she has been stationed in northern Manitoba as part of a crew helping fight wildfires.

Rivers Police Service Const. Jerra Green has taken a leave of absence from the force for the summer to help fight wildfires in northern Manitoba and potentially beyond. (Submitted)

"Its kind of a bucket list thing, but also as a police officer we work very closely with the fire department and other emergency services  so its more background knowledge on it," she said by phone during a recent weekend break in Brandon.

Having previously done some wild land firefighting in South Africa, Green brought some knowledge with her appointment to the north, where shes stationed in Paint Lake.

"I like adventure and I like to do some exciting and adventurous type stuff, so the travel part of its huge for me," she said, adding it has been exciting to explore areas of Manitoba shed never seen before. Green said there is also potential to travel elsewhere in Canada and the United States, depending on where her crew is called to service.

Although she hasnt faced large flames thus far, she said others have and that theres still plenty of time within her appointment, which began May 3 and extends to the end of August, to battle some larger blazes.

"Im sure itll come with how dry it is at this point," she said. "Theres definitely been a lot of action for a lot of different crews."

She recently joined her crew in a deployment to Swan River, where she said there was a fairly large fire prior to rains beating it down.

The fire burned deep, so her crew was charged with "mopping," which includes some digging into the ground to make sure potential hot spots dont reignite something later on.

Green is part of a four- to five-person initial attack crew, meaning theyre among the first to tackle the scene of a fire.

Only a month into her northern adventure, Green said it has been well worth it and shes thankful leadership at Rivers Police Service awarded her the leave of absence required to strike an item from her bucket list.

"A lot of people kind of have their designated lake or spot they generally go to, but to see some of the untouched land up north is just out of this world, and I havent even seen a quarter of it," she said of the expansive landscape.

Everyone should strive to explore Manitoba when they get a chance, she said, as "there are a lot of beautiful places in Manitoba and Canada."

 tclarke@brandonsun.com

 Twitter: @TylerClarkeMB
Police are still searching for Eric Wildman, who is wanted by police in connection with a mans disappearance.

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Police are still searching for Eric Wildman, who is wanted by police in connection with a mans disappearance.

Wildman is considered armed and dangerous and police are advising the public not to approach him if seen. Instead, call 911 immediately.

Police are currently in the Whiteshell area searching for him. RCMP officers from across southern Manitoba are in the area, along with the RCMP emergency response team, police dogs, critical incident command, air services and major crime services.

Manitoba RCMP are also working with the Ontario Provincial Police to search for him.

Wildman is reportedly driving a 2020 Chevrolet Equinox with Manitoba licence plate KGE 368.

 The Brandon Sun

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The Branson Board of Aldermen on Thursday (now postponed to July 28) will consider an ordinance that would require face coverings in public spaces. The aldermen might approve it, disapprove it, or approve an amended version. Would you be in favor of some form of mandatory face covering ordinance in the city of Branson?

You voted:
Australias largest energy provider, AGL, has been hit with heavy penalties after one of its subsidiaries allegedly signed up customers to online contracts without their consent.

An investigation by the Victorian Essential Services Commission has alleged a sales agent for Click Energy fraudulently processed transfer requests for 20 customers between September 1 and September 25, 2020, resulting in 32 penalty notices totalling $640,000 being issued to the AGL-owned electricity and gas retailer.

A subsidiary of AGL has been hit with fresh penalties for allegedly fraudulently signing up new customers. Credit:Virginia Star

Commission chair Kate Symons said it was the second time Click Energy had attracted penalties for alleged fraudulent conduct by sales agents.

Retailers are responsible for the actions of their sales agents and we will not hesitate to act to stamp out energy retailers gaining customers by allegedly fraudulent means, Ms Symons said.
Getting a character from a book  or a line of their dialogue  as a tattoo is next-level fandom. Yet its not uncommon for readers of fantasy novelist Maria Lewis, whose latest, The Rose Daughter, is the seventh in the series.

Maria Lewis is a writer across many genres: fiction, screenwriting and comics. Credit:Luis Enrique Ascui

When the 32-year-old wrote about a character loving lemon meringue pie, fans presented her home-baked versions of the sweet throughout the ensuing publicity tour.

Each book features a different woman as the central character, each a different kind of monster. Dreckly, the lead in The Rose Daughter, is a 140-year-old sprite of Asian descent. Witches, banshees, werewolves all get a look-in. The world they inhabit is the same, so each novel stands alone but when read in sequence a much bigger picture is revealed. Lewis compares it to X Men, in which Wolverine has his own story, as do Storm and Rogue. But the world that they share and the mechanics is the same. Anyone can be the main character of their own story  it just depends on perspective.

In person, Lewis is funny, fast-talking and sassy, often slipping into an accent and even an occasional song. She knows many of the staff at our lunch venue Hero, Karen Martinis new place, where the celebrity chef is visible in the kitchen.
Whether the movie will get made was always an open question. There are so many factors involved in movie financing that projects can and do fall over at any stage. Ive spoken to directors over the years who have recounted with weary resignation, and not a little residual trauma, tales of finance falling through the week, or even the day, before shooting was due to begin; one even told me a big chunk of money fell through while he was shooting (luckily, replacement funds were found). Loading They Are Us would have been heading to Cannes with a reasonable chance of securing finance (depending on budget, of course), but with no guarantees. The market  which is to say the distribution companies and sales agents and individuals who might stump up the cash that would allow the project to move to the next stage, where it might seek access to government funding and tax offsets and gap finance and all the other moving parts that allow filmmaking to happen outside of Hollywood and Bollywood  would ultimately have determined whether or not the film was a good idea. Is this a compelling story, a compelling team, a salable commodity? Will we recoup our investment? Will we make a profit, or at the very least not lose a bundle? In a sense, the protests against They Are Us may have done the project a favour. They serve as market research of a sort and highlight some of the issues the film will need to address  not least the disavowal by Ardern herself  if it is to glide into the world with ease and goodwill rather than smash into a wall of resistance. They may prompt changes, though whether those changes make a flawed film better or a strong one worse we may never know. Mosque shooting survivor Farid Ahmed. Credit:AP

In the past week, the producers have attempted to wrest back control of the narrative (though one of them, Philippa Campbell, severed ties with the project on Monday, saying she had heard the strength of peoples views and concluded she did not wish to be involved with a project that is causing such distress). In a statement issued jointly with the Muslim Association of Canterbury, producer Ayman Jamal (whose idea the film apparently was) claimed the production had over a year ago  consulted with the local Muslim community of Christchurch, including the imams of the Al Noor Mosque and the Linwood Islamic Centre and over 20 victims of the March 15 attack. MAC spokesman Abdigani Ali  who had earlier claimed he had been blindsided by news of the project  said in the statement that the association acknowledges that the producers have contacted and spoken to both the imams  and some of the victims. However, he added, more consultation needs to be done. The association had, he added, agreed to work closely with the producers, who had made a commitment to work with our community in an appropriate, authentic and sensitive manner. Jamal also released some detail about the proposed movie, including that it covers events over a full week, from the Friday of the attack to the following Friday, and that it focuses not just on Ardern but also on the acts of heroism and sacrifice from others, including the worshippers who confronted the gunman at Masjid Al Noor and shielded their fellow worshippers, the unarmed worshipper, Abdul Aziz [Wahabzada], who chased the gunman away, and Farid Ahmed, who publicly forgave his wifes murderer. American actor Caleb Landry Jones plays a disturbed young man who becomes a mass murderer in Justin Kurzels Nitram. Credit:Ben Saunders

Still, the protests continue. The question now is can the project continue in the face of them? Last year, Justin Kurzel managed to shoot a feature film about the Port Arthur massacre almost entirely in secret. Never mind that 24 years had elapsed (compared to Christchurchs two), when this masthead broke the news that a film on the subject of Australias worst mass shooting was in production in Geelong, the response was just as fevered and negative as that which has greeted Niccols project. The big difference was, it was almost finished. Its become such a hot potato for obvious reasons, producer Nick Batzias said of his film, which he insists has an anti-violence message and does not show the shootings. But wed prefer to give people an opportunity to have an opinion about a finished film rather than just an idea. Niccol has had no such luck. And while Kurzels film Nitram will screen in competition at Cannes next month  the first Australian movie to be so honoured in a decade  it remains to be seen whether Niccol will even have the opportunity to make his. Email the author at kquinn@theage.com.au, or follow him on Facebook at karlquinnjournalist and on Twitter @karlkwin
In Europe, of course, Londons politics are more remembered than his wolves. Martin Eden made the list of Le Mondes 100 greatest novels of the 20th century. Italian TV adapted it for a five-part series in 1979, and there are two earlier film versions  both long ago.

In America, Jack London is remembered more for his white-fanged wolves and mad sea captains than his politics, but he was a lifelong socialist  one of the few that American readers would tolerate. He was also an autodidact, and his 1909 novel Martin Eden is something of a self-portrait, the story of a working-class man who becomes a successful writer through self-education, only to become disillusioned.

Luca Marinelli is mesmerising as Martin Eden.

Here, director Pietro Marcello turns it into an Italian saga worthy of high praise, if you dont mind that it takes a while to find its rhythm. Luca Marinelli plays Martin, a young man of rough manners and keen intelligence, who has been making his way in the world, largely as a deck-hand, since he was 11.

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In Naples, he saves a drunken aristocrat from a beating in a dockside fight. The young mans aristocratic family thank him profusely. Martin falls deeply for the daughter, Elena (Jessica Cressy), who has all the cultural training of her class: she paints, she plays piano, she knows the major works of literature. Martin determines to make himself worthy of her love. He gives up seafaring and hits the books, discovering a talent for story-telling that blossoms into a burning desire to become a writer. Elena keeps reminding him he needs also to make a living but he doesnt get the hint.

Pietro Marcello comes from documentary and is something of an auto-didact himself  so the film has a personal and idiosyncratic feel. He throws in clips from other films, without much context: we see footage of the Italian anarchist Errico Malatesta kissing a baby, perhaps in the 1920s, but nothing to tell us who this is, or why he features. It becomes clearer later that Marcello is building a kind of jigsaw of meaning, and a jolting rhythm may be part of his strategy. The director grew up in Naples and trained initially as a painter, which is obvious in his somewhat epic staging. He always operates the camera on his films. This one was shot in Super 16mm, which is a bit like writing a novel with a quill. It pays off here: the film has rich archaic colours and a couple of moments so beautiful youd think Caravaggio was his gaffer.
At the other end of the spectrum, some looked like theyd seen a ghost, like Id assembled every bully from their youth in one room, listed all their failings on a whiteboard in front of them, and then punched them in the guts for good measure. I feel blessed that my school life doesnt conjure such horrors.

Theres something about drinking cheap champagne with people who knew you before you were fully formed as a person that makes you assess your own lifes journey. Credit:iStock

Public opinion fell into three camps. A very few lit up at the thought, keen to see how life has treated those theyve lost touch with.

But now I have to decide if Ill go. And to help me make a decision I asked around, because school reunion invitations are like haemorrhoids: everyone gets one eventually.

Ive been invited to my high school reunion. The invitation came in the mail, rudely announcing that it has been 31 years since I finished school. THIRTY ONE! It was a bit of a shock. Envelopes that carry news like that should come with a warning.

But the huge majority find such an invitation confronting, and I can see why. Theres something about drinking cheap champagne with people who knew you before you were fully formed as a person that makes you assess your own lifes journey, and then compare it with those of your school chums. Which is a game no one wins.

Comparison is the thief of joy. Theodore Roosevelt apparently said that, and he was a US president, so you imagine hed hold up quite well in a comparison game. But hes right. Even though I am very happy in myself, with my haphazard career, average-looking family and shabby home, comparing my life with others takes the joy out of being me.

So okay, lets not do that. If were to stand in a cold school hall eating hot party pies, lets check in achievements and perceived failures at the door, together with What are you doing now? and Who is that and was she even in our year? And lets actually reunite with those six years of our lives, with the moments that planted the seeds that led to us growing into who we are now. Would that be a good time?

I find it very easy to transport myself back to the blue mascara of my youth. The scenes float through my mind like a badly edited movie.

Our end of year 12 assembly. One hundred girls singing Groove is in the hearrrrrrrrt at the top of our voices as we gyrated like pretend pole dancers, desperately trying to appear sexier and more mature than we felt. Cut to year 9, dancing in a dark under-age club, trying to be cool while my friends pashed boys in the shadows.
Former special forces soldier Ben Roberts-Smith has repeatedly denied inventing evidence in a tense day of cross-examination in his defamation trial during which he was also grilled about changing a key piece of evidence overnight.

Mr Roberts-Smith is suing The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald for defamation over a series of reports in 2018 that he says portray him as a war criminal and accuse him of an act of domestic violence against a woman with whom he was having an affair.

Ben Roberts-Smith arriving at the Federal Court in Sydney on Friday. Credit:Rhett Wyman

He denies all wrongdoing. The media outlets are seeking to rely on a defence of truth.

On Friday, the second day of his cross-examination by the media outlets barrister and the ninth day of the trial in the Federal Court in Sydney, Mr Roberts-Smith was asked about the killing of an Afghan man in a cornfield in 2012.
Missing fraudster Melissa Caddick, who misappropriated millions of dollars from her clients, used the services of a former bankrupt accountant who had been banned for ten years from managing a corporation as well as jailed for embezzling money from a superannuation fund.

Cyril John Pearson, 77, was sentenced to a five-year jail term in 1998 after he was found guilty of stealing money from a super fund as well as falsifying documents to cover his tracks.

Melissa Caddick and her one-time accountant Cyril John Pearson who is a former bankrupt and was jailed for fraud.

He was the first person in Australia to be prosecuted by the corporate regulator ASIC in relation to the misuse of superannuation funds.

His company, Corplan, was the administrator of the Beneflex Superannuation Fund which managed super funds for thousands of hospitality workers. Members lost $2.7 million in contributions, half of which was fraudulently used by Mr Pearson for his own benefit.
Owens has now begun the task of trying to prove the truth of the newspapers allegations, first put forward in June 2018 by investigative reporters Nick McKenzie and Chris Masters, who are also being sued by Roberts-Smith. Both were present in the courtroom this week, Masters from the beginning and McKenzie arriving on Thursday having just escaped Melbournes latest lockdown. One or other and sometimes both of Roberts-Smiths parents, Len and Sue, have also been regulars in the courtroom. Owens began on Thursday laying the groundwork for the media outlets defence much as a spider spins a web: methodically and purposively, his seemingly leisurely pace masking lethal intent. Lawyer Nicholas Owens has a big job ahead of him. Credit:Edwina Pickles Initially he probed Roberts-Smiths understanding of the international rules of warfare  reflected in Australias rules of engagement  which require protection to be given to combatants (or suspected combatants) whove been disarmed and rendered Persons Under Control (or PUCs in military jargon). Yes, Roberts-Smith said, he understood those rules. And yes, he agreed hed be complicit in a crime if he killed or assaulted a PUC, or stood by as another soldier ordered or committed such an action.

Owens then took him through the intricate detail of how Australian special forces handled villagers, women, children, fighting age males (or FAMs) and prisoners during their sweeps through Afghan settlements and compounds, before turning to several key events which lie at the heart of the newspapers published allegations. One, in 2012, centres on the death of a man described by Roberts-Smith as a Taliban spotter, whom he says he helped kill in a cornfield in the vicinity of a dry creek-bed near the village of Darwan. The media outlets say that individual was really a harmless farmer named Ali Jan, kicked down a cliff by Roberts-Smith who then either shot him or stood by as another soldier did so before their SAS patrol exited the area by helicopter. Crucial timing differences On Friday Roberts-Smith shifted uncomfortably in the witness box as he was asked to accept that a crucial time window hed first estimated as being around 10 minutes long was, in fact, much longer, perhaps up to one and half hours. He was challenged on why the supposed spotter hadnt already been flushed out by troops on each side of the creek bed, who were carrying out detailed searches of the area.

Then came a tussle with Owens over the meaning of the word cliff. Roberts-Smith agreed thered been very steep terrain near where hed been operating. But, he told the medias barrister, a cliff is a cliff and that is not a cliff to me. Loading After challenging nearly every detail of the incident as described by Roberts-Smith, Owens moved to the crunch: I want to put it to you that you have invented the story of the [spotter] in the cornfield. No Roberts-Smith replied. A second incident, also central to the media outlets defence, turns on the death of an insurgent with an artificial leg which occurred during an SAS search of a compound designated Whisky 108 in 2009. At the time, Roberts-Smith was second in command of a patrol dubbed Gothic 5. Roberts-Smith says he rounded a wall outside the compound in the course of the search operation and encountered the man carrying a weapon, at which point he opened fire and killed him. But the media outlets assert Roberts-Smith machine-gunned the man when hed already been rendered harmless.

On Friday morning, Roberts-Smith amended one key aspect of the evidence hed given the previous day on this incident, denying (when challenged by Owens) that hed spoken to anyone about it overnight. Owens put forcefully to the Victoria-Cross winner that his account of this incident was also concocted  a charge denied by the former soldier. Owens has been getting Roberts-Smith, step by step, to reconstruct his exact movements through these and four other contested events in a time frame between 2009 and 2012. Maps, diagrams, photos and satellite images have been repeatedly handed to the former soldier, with Owens asking him to mark his position at different stages of each operation. The meticulous scene-setting will no doubt play a central role when Nine (owner of the Age and the Herald) calls a number of former SAS colleagues of Roberts-Smiths to testify against him down the track. The witness list shows it will also call his former wife, Emma Roberts, and his former lover, a married woman identified only as Person 17 with whom he had an affair in late 2017 and early 2018. In another extraordinary development in this already extraordinary case, Andrew Hastie  a former SAS captain who served in Afghanistan and is now the assistant minister for defence  is listed as a likely witness for the media outlets while former minister for defence Brendan Nelson will give evidence for Roberts-Smith.

Nelson was one of the first to ring and commiserate with Roberts-Smith when the first articles appeared on a June weekend in mid-2018, the ex-soldier told the court this week. He was disgusted with what had been written. And he had identified that it was talking about me. This was a reference to the fact that the initial articles had not identified Roberts-Smith by name, but through the pseudonym Leonidas after a warrior of ancient Sparta. (The ex-soldier has a Spartan helmet tattooed across part of his chest). Roberts-Smith says this and other clues in the text made clear he was the subject of the allegations, and a subsequent article, in August of that year, did identify him by name. Ben Roberts-Smith and then director of the War Memorial, Dr Brendan Nelson. Credit:ADF Roberts-Smiths legal team have flagged they have up to 14 former and serving SAS soldiers who will support his version of events. The newspapers have up to 21 military witnesses listed. While this will make for riveting theatre for the rest of the country, it will be extremely uncomfortable for leaders of the ADF as soldier is pitched against soldier, and former comrade against former comrade.

Roberts-Smiths alleged misdeeds in Afghanistan are not the only aspects of his behaviour under scrutiny in this trial. McClintock took the tactical decision to get his clients version of a range of other events, which occurred after he left the army, on the record this week before they could be dredged up by Owens. Loading These include Roberts-Smiths decision to hire private investigator John McLeod to spy on his former lover as she visited an abortion clinic in early 2018 and his use of the same PI to try and find the home addresses of soldiers he thought were briefing against him. Owens in his opening address accused Roberts-Smith of using prepaid burner phones to secretly collaborate with former army colleagues in an attempt to undermine the integrity of the evidence against him. But Roberts-Smith says he was just trying to protect his privacy, fearful that calls with colleagues would be intercepted by the media. He was also trying to work out which of his one-time SAS comrades were trying to poison the well against him. He conceded comparing notes with other former soldiers, saying the kind of thing we would talk about is, for example, where we got dropped off, what our route was moving into position, who assaulted which areas of the compound  whether it was night or day. Just basically looking at what had been written, because most of it was wrong and false.
Chinese students are signing up to NSWs top two universities in increasing numbers despite border closures, with Sydney University defying dire predictions by growing overseas enrolments and attracting a boom in donations from philanthropists.

However, second-tier institutions and those dependent on the Indian and Nepalese student markets have lost overseas enrolments, leading to an overall drop of 7 per cent last year. As universities cut costs, 7 per cent of academic and general staff lost their jobs.

Universities also pocketed $46 million in JobKeeper subsidies through companies they owned, despite being ineligible themselves, with the University of NSW collecting $13 million, said a report from the NSW Auditor-General tabled in Parliament on Friday.

The University of Sydney posted a $100 million profit last year. Credit:Dominic Lorimer

Higher education leaders rushed to slash their budgets when the COVID-19 pandemic closed Australias borders in March last year and thousands of international students - a major source of revenue - could no longer travel. They expected the impact to be even worse this year.
But over time the rate has just steadily climbed. Its now more like one in 35,000 or 40,000, she said. Professor Macartney said while she wanted to provide assurance to anyone who had recently got an AstraZeneca vaccine that it was still a rare condition, it also becomes more apparent in the 50 to 59 age group that the cases had tended to be a bit more severe, with clots in both the brain and/or the abdominal blood vessels. Doctors are still strongly urging those who have received their first AstraZeneca to go back for their second dose. Chief Medical Officer Professor Paul Kelly said anyone who had a first dose of AstraZeneca without a problem should feel very confident to have their second dose, and they should keep that booking.

Data from Britain shows the rare clotting syndrome was far less common for second doses. Two Australian women, aged 48 and 52, have died from the clotting disorder after receiving the AstraZeneca shot and four million doses of the vaccine have been administered nationwide. A 52-year-old NSW woman died last week, with the Therapeutic Goods Administration saying she died from a clot in her brain. In April, 48-year-old Genene Norris, also from NSW, died from blood clots likely to be linked to the vaccine. However, the risk of thrombosis with thrombocytopenia is lower in older groups, with 1.4 cases in every 100,000 AstraZeneca vaccine doses reported for those in their 60s compared with a rate of 2.7 per 100,000 doses in the 50 to 59 age group.

Murdoch Childrens Research Institute vaccine uptake expert Margie Danchin is a non-voting member of ATAGI and said it would be unwise for people aged 60 or over to put off having a vaccine until later in the year as they waited for an alternative to AstraZeneca. The last thing we want to do is have a massive outbreak and people turn around and say you said wait and now people are dying from COVID disease, she said. That would be an absolute tragedy. Barry Clearwater has had the first shot. Credit:Simon Schluter Melbourne consultant engineer Barry Clearwater, 67, has already had one shot of the AstraZeneca vaccine and sees it as his duty to get his second jab when its due in August. I think we not only have a duty for ourselves  but also a duty to others, [so that others are] able to have an income, such as waiters, chefs and travel people, and we need to get going again, Mr Clearwater said.

Loading While federal health authorities have conceded Thursdays decision will temporarily slow the vaccine rollout as people in their 50s reschedule their first doses, Health Minister Greg Hunt said the call by ATAGI could actually increase uptake overall, as those in their 50s hesitant to get the AstraZeneca vaccine take up the Pfizer jab. What this will do is it will mean, for those potentially up to a million people who were AstraZeneca-hesitant within that age group, they will have access to Pfizer, Mr Hunt said. Asked how the change in clinical guidance would further slow down the vaccine rollout already beset with delays, Dr Blyth said increasing reliance on Pfizer vaccines would mean supply will again be challenged for the next few months. But he was hopeful constraints on supply would eased later in the year with tens of millions of doses of Pfizer and Moderna vaccines expected to arrive in Australia.

He said a number of mitigation strategies to increase vaccination uptake in Australia were being actively considered by the expert panel. This included the possibility of widely distributing first doses of the Pfizer vaccine, and delaying the second dose, a strategy that had been used overseas to increase partial protection and immunity quicker. Loading Replay Replay video Play video Play video All of those things need to be considered in light of this decision, and were looking hard at that at the moment, he said. Associate Professor Danchin said experts on the group agonised over the decision to change the preferred vaccine for those in their 50s, concerned about the impact it would have on public confidence.
Former Playboy editor Chuck Smeeton, 57, became a self-confessed feminist in training after meeting his partner, Dr Niki Vincent, 58, Victorias first Public Sector Gender Equality Commissioner, two years ago.

Dr Niki Vincent and Chuck Smeeton: Im pretty tough and not needy in the slightest, so its lovely that Chuck wants to take care of me. Credit:Joe Armao

NIKI: In 2019, I ended a relationship and thought, Im going to get back out there. The same day, I put a Tinder and Bumble profile together. I was South Australias Equal Opportunity Commissioner and worried about being recognised, so most of my pictures were of me hiking or paragliding. Chuck was a Tinder match. He works in the science field [for the non-profit Royal Institution of Australia] and his office was a two-minute walk from mine, on the same street in Adelaide. On our first date, we sneaked out to have a meeting about gender equality and science. I got back 45 minutes later than planned.

Both of us have had two marriages before and I never thought Id live with anybody again. It was surprising that we moved in together within months. I really liked how involved Chuck is with his children [a son, now 21, and a daughter, 19]. I have an 18-year-old foster daughter living with me, four children and nine grandchildren. I came from fairly poor circumstances, left home at 15, married at 18 and became a grandmother at 38, while Chuck became a father at 36. I squeezed in a whole generation while he was enjoying life!
The former Australian spy known as Witness K has been handed a three-month suspended sentence for conspiring to reveal classified information about an alleged Australian operation to bug East Timors cabinet rooms during sensitive oil and gas treaty negotiations.

In a sentencing hearing in the ACT Magistrates Court on Friday, magistrate Glenn Theakston chose not to jail the former spy, who was obscured from the view of the courtroom behind a wall of black panels.

Protesters supporting Witness Ks former lawyer Bernard Collaery in front of the Law Courts in 2019. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

Witness K pleaded guilty to the charges on Thursday. He is now subject to a 12-month good behaviour bond.

Mr Theakston said the offence was not trivial and that there were good reasons for the culture of secrecy engaged in by intelligence agencies, the Guardian Australia reported.
Human remains have been found at a Melbourne tip where police have been searching for the remains of missing mother Ju Zhang.

Officers on Tuesday began searching the landfill site in Wollert as part of their investigation into the suspicious disappearance of Ms Zhang, also known as Kelly, who was last seen at her home on Winchester Avenue in Epping on the evening of February 1.

Her boyfriend, Joon Seong Tan, 35, was charged with her murder on February 11. Police conducted several significant searches in an effort to locate her body.

A police spokeswoman confirmed that what appeared to be human remains were found on Friday about 2pm. They are yet to be formally identified.
Kershaw said the poisoned An0m app made up only five per cent of organised crime messages, meaning that all the Lego pieces would stretch from Melbourne to London, with 12 million or so left over to build giant dinosaurs. (The jigsaw, by the way, would be nine hectares  or 4 times the size of the MCG playing surface  enough space to snugly park 432 double-decker buses.)* Maybe I need to get a hobby. Intelligence is not evidence; it is more a tip that needs to be corroborated by investigators with incontestable facts. Thirteen double-decker buses at the Central Bus Garage in North Fitzroy, 1940. Credit:Melbourne & Metropolitan Tramways Board The beauty of the Ironside intercept is police have captured the golden thread  the crooks own words to be used in court. The crooks were so confident in the system that they used direct language to discuss criminal conspiracies. Juries love that stuff. Defence lawyers dont.

Police say they have mined only two per cent of the material, like prospectors who have picked up glittering nuggets without even breaking the surface. Much of this intelligence will not make sense on a national level but when it trickles down will provide keys to hundreds of local crimes. Ironside gives us a rare and sobering insight into organised crime and how police must respond  a model that has taken four decades for many in authority to accept. While cracking the encrypted code is a hi-tech solution, the method of intercepting crooks communications is not. Drug dealer Tony Mokbel and his senior team that ran a $400 million syndicate were nabbed after an informer managed to provide the key players with phones monitored by the Purana Taskforce.

The An0m material shows organised crime is multicultural, with Triads, Russian Mafia, bikies and Middle Eastern crime gangs all co-operating, because money speaks all languages. US court documents list 17 key figures in the distribution of the An0m device. The seven Australians listed are based in Colombia, Asia, Europe and Australia. So how did it work? When international police disabled Phantom Secure, a Canadian encrypted service that let crooks destroy messages remotely, the FBI recruited one of the systems former operatives, who was building An0m. In exchange for a reduced sentence and $US120,000 ($156,000) he gave the FBI control and built in a back door. Three international gangsters (two connected to Australia) became enthusiastic controllers, spreading it across the world.

The spread to 300 crime groups acted like dye in an MRI, highlighting the international flow of the app to nearly 100 countries. It was marketed as made by criminals for criminals, with users paying around $1700 for a six-month lease. With about 12,000 devices it was bringing in more than $40 million a year. The app, hidden under a calculator icon, was designed to be wiped remotely if a unit fell into police hands, concealing the users location  or so they thought. Experts from the AFP helped unscramble the encrypted messages and the intelligence fed down the line to state detectives, many of whom only recently learned the source. Prime Minister Scott Morrison and AFP Commissioner Reece Kershaw reveal the Ironside raids and arrests. Credit:Getty At the time police announced the breakthrough, Kershaw said it had resulted in 224 arrests, 525 charges, raids on six clandestine laboratories and thwarting 21 threats to kill. Police seized 104 firearms and weapons and almost $45 million in cash.

There have been nearly 1000 arrests in Australia, Austria, Canada, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Hungary, Lithuania, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Britain and the United States. Considering the FBI paid the informer just $120,000 and $45 million has been recovered, it was a better investment than Bitcoin. Thats all big-picture stuff, but what does it mean on the street? Plenty. It proves how international syndicate heads order subordinates around Australia to commit crimes on a no-questions-asked basis. Loading

One recent Friday night the Feds contacted Victoria with an urgent message. A shooting had been ordered by a bikie boss to be carried out at a Melbourne fight night. The planning was so detailed police moved in to seize two stolen cars to be used by the hit team, cloned numberplates and guns. Someone is walking around today unaware they are alive because cops unscrambled the encrypted message. The level of sophistication is astounding. Bikies are using number plate recognition cameras at key properties to identify law enforcement and rival gang vehicles. The gangs use drones to patrol and protect drug labs and safe houses. The bikie model is to have chapters in drug source countries, with many of the bosses living in countries without extradition deals with Australia.

A key promoter of An0m, the Facebook gangster Hakan Ayik, fled Sydney more than 10 years ago but remains a key influencer with the Comancheros. Facebook gangster Hakan Ayik. The real damage to the crime syndicates will not be the arrest of soldiers or even their generals but the doormen - the enablers who work in legitimate positions and open doors for the crooks. These lawyers, accountants, baggage handlers, officials and cargo controllers assist in the distribution of tonnes of drugs and the laundering of millions in funds. So far six police and one lawyer have been charged in the international raids. On the docks an agent who organises an illicit container to piggyback on legitimate imports is paid $600,000 and a controller who warns when a drug container has been diverted to be examined receives $50,000. Loading

When cops brag that they have seized a container of drugs but dont mention arrests, you know the syndicate has been tipped off and have cut their losses. If enablers are caught on An0m, their loss will be catastrophic to syndicates. Meatballs with meat cleavers can be replaced overnight, sleepers in positions of authority cant. Ironside acts as a template for future investigations, for without total, enthusiastic and committed co-operation between state, federal and international law enforcement, we are just kidding ourselves. The crooks are multinational, with 70 per cent of Australian organised crime assets held offshore. One division, one police force or one country cannot deal with crime that doesnt respect national boundaries. This is not a new thought but generations of blinkered, bent or blindingly stupid cops, more determined to protect their patch than do their job, have sabotaged collaboration. When Victoria Police had key information to solve the 1977 murder of Griffith anti-drugs campaigner Donald Mackay, the head of the NSW investigation, Joe Parrington, came to Melbourne for a visit.

When detectives tried to brief him, he put up his hand and said: I dont talk to monkeys, I talk to the organ grinder. They should have stuffed a banana in his ear and sent him back to Sydney. The best cop of his generation, or any generation for that matter, was Victorias chief commissioner Mick Miller, who in 1980 argued for a national intelligence scheme. He made sure the first director of the Australian Bureau of Criminal Intelligence was someone he could trust: Fred Silvester, my father. Time and again Fred briefed the commissioners on what was needed and time and again they knocked him back. He wanted accountants, lawyers, tax and money-laundering experts embedded in law enforcement, plus international agreements on intelligence sharing. The commissioners wanted schnitzel sandwiches for lunch. Little wonder they obstructed: One ended up in jail and another was lucky not to find himself in the same place.
One of the biggest schools in Melbournes west will cut back on enrolments next year despite skyrocketing demand, blaming changes to federal government funding it estimates will cost it almost $5 million a year.

Bacchus Marsh Grammar is one of Victorias fastest-growing schools, but will cut its prep enrolments by about a third in 2022 because it can no longer afford to invest in new facilities to cater for increased demand, principal Andrew Neal said.

Bacchus Marsh Grammar principal Andrew Neal says federal funding cuts have forced the school to reduce its student intake for 2022. Credit:Justin McManus

Mr Neal said looming changes to non-government school funding introduced by the Morrison government last year had forced it to reduce the number of prep classes it would offer next year from 12 to eight.

That means a significant number of families are not going to be able to get into the school of their choice, which is allegedly a primary concern of this [federal] government, Mr Neal said.
The West Gate Tunnel is facing a fifth legal challenge, putting even more pressure on one of the Andrews governments signature infrastructure projects which is already running at least two years late.

The states Environment Protection Authority is being sued by residents on Melbournes western fringes who say they were not consulted on a key decision to send some of the toll roads contaminated soil to a landfill in Bacchus Marsh.

Soil from the West Gate Tunnel project. Credit:Wayne Taylor

The legal bid comes as internal EPA audits obtained under Freedom of Information laws reveal the watchdog did not initially want to send the projects 3 million tonnes of contaminated rock and soil to landfill.

The EPA wanted to treat and reuse the waste that contains per- and polyfluoroalkyl chemicals  the potential carcinogens known as PFAS  but the state lacked viable options to do this.
It also held rallies in March calling for an end to the $41 million in staff cuts, as well as course cuts, faculty restructures and forced online learning. The guilds cry has been heard, with the university confirming semester two would return to full venue capacity, allowing for lectures and large group collaborative teaching sessions made up of debates, industry engagement, interview panels, immersive and interactive experiences. Our timetabling indicates over 90 per cent of student learning will be delivered face-to-face, a spokesperson said. Ms Naylor Zambrano believes they were instrumental in improving the student experience going forward, as any changes will be done as a pilot, as opposed to being [rushed through] across the entire university. The university said it appreciated the input.

There were many lessons learnt during the pandemic  and one of the key ones is the importance of hands-on learning and human experience, they said. We also understand the power of technology in education and will continue to use new and emerging technologies that improve our students learning experiences. Universities nationally have slashed tens of millions of dollars from their budgets and fast-tracked digital learning in the face of a collective foreign student income loss of $3 billion, with an $18 billion deficit forecast by 2024 as the enrolment pipeline dries up. While online learning has been necessary for students stuck overseas, some domestic students  particularly in the more expensive fields of arts, humanities and law  are paying up to $72,000 for an education that holds all the enthusiasm of a Zoom meeting. Murdoch law students who spoke to WAtoday on the provision of anonymity say they are struggling to maintain their studies.

I just havent had the motivation to be doing uni because Im not made to be in the environment, said a second-year law student. Loading I need to be accountable to someone other than myself, whereas if Im stuck online in my bedroom, if I dont show up, I just let myself down. Another agreed, saying it was hard to keep up with the material since it got released every week. Its hard to engage in that live material when youre behind and then you end up skipping them because, whats the point, I am not going to be able to understand? and its that snowball effect, they said.

Online tutorials run frequently and for 30 minutes, whereas two-hour campus time slots are infrequent, with no penalties for inattendance, so the drive in doesnt make it worth it for most. I havent even made any friends at uni at Murdoch, because I havent had a chance to, the first student said. Its quite an isolating experience. Curtin guilds survey also reflected the same level of dissatisfaction, but unlike the rallies and formal reports put before the Curtins decision-makers, Murdochs guild has remained silent. They have never really been a student body, theyve just been this corporate on campus who just get votes and get people to go to its places, said a third Murdoch law student.

The atomisation of students stuck at home has worked to the universitys benefit, with many bereft over who to turn to for help, or to voice their feelings or opposition over the status quo. I feel everything is you have to do it yourself, and no one is really there to help you and thats across the board, said the student. I follow more of the other unis groups than I do Murdoch because otherwise theres no real point. This fragmentation could become permanent, with the Curtin survey finding 84 per cent of respondents would spend less time on campus if there was an increase in online learning. Face-to-face mass lecture is all but dead

In an independent study commissioned by communication giants Cisco and Optus into the digitalisation of campuses, education leaders from 16 universities agreed future campuses would have fewer people. Loading The face-to-face mass lecture is all but dead; current technologies and new ways of engaging with content provide more varied opportunities for our students learning outcomes, said Darren McKee, Murdoch University chief operations officer, in the study. Education leaders, including seven from the Group of Eight, also believed future campuses needed to be more experimental, more porous to industry, automated and efficient, and promote health and wellbeing. Were going to start reimagining what the learning experience is from an immersion point of view, and bring the digital and learning world into an integrated, immersive and interactive solution, said Jason Cowie, Curtin University chief information officer, in the study.

The study promoted digital platforms over historic buildings and said space was one of universities largest fixed costs  and the most inflexible spaces were lecture theatres. It said the theatres were expected to be phased out by being leased or sold off to create opportunities for improved utilisation. Cisco and Optus on The Tipping Point for Digitisation of Education and Campuses study. Credit:Online We are now reviewing: what can we rationalise in terms of space, and who we can attract to campus, Mr McKee said. Incubators, commercial space, government agencies, more student job-ready industry connections.

Murdoch and Curtin universities have already welcomed Cisco-led networking academies on campus in 2020 and 2019, respectively. Loading Even before COVID-19 and transitioning to online lectures, Australian universities were seeing traditional lecture attendance decline significantly, with Murdochs 2019 space audit showing a considerable drop off by week four. But federal Education Minister Alan Tudge has called for universities to return to the previous face-to-face learning, where COVID rules allow. For Murdoch law students the sense of student community at the university has died, which was not the case five years ago when one student toured the campus in year 10 and found it a lot more vibrant, a lot more vivid.

Its a dying uni, they said. Ive known so many people who have gone through the early offers for the first year and then transferred across to Curtin  thats not just law, thats across everything. Id honestly be quite surprised if in five years time people still consider this a proper university because its not what I was sold two years back, it was not what I was sold in year 10. Official census data into universities student retention has yet to be released and Murdochs student surveys of units and teaching have not yet been made available for semester one. We do not accept the proposition that there is a drop off in student engagement, a Murdoch University spokesperson said.
A recent paper for Education International, titled Pandemic Privatisation in Higher Education: Edtech & University Reform, by University of Edinburghs Ben Williamson and University of Queenslands Anna Hogan, revealed a post-pandemic landscape that looks increasingly privatised, commercialised, digitalised and datafied. Among the options floated for higher education by Ernst & Young were the Champion University, where institutes are strategic national assets with hands-on government support; and the Commercial University, where universities are financially independent based on industry. Then there is the Disruptor University, based on deregulation and mass micro-credentials as technology continues to disrupt the workplace; and the Virtual University, which is modelled on meeting workplace needs and retraining people on shared digital platforms for a world of AI. We see the potential growth of a direct-to-student-consumer model of learning, where both public and private providers are consumed by a Netflix mentality, Dr Williamson and Dr Hogan wrote. They found the Big Tech companies were rolling out cloud infrastructure for long-term hybrid education that would provide data analytics into student performances, while the AI robot teacher was already being prepared.

Companies and HE institutions alike are asking such questions as how might we best bundle degrees, stream learning on demand, or offer micro-credentials for immediate workplace upskilling? Loading Murdoch announced in June last year a Cisco-founded Digital Futures Academy, which will provide micro-credentials and short courses that will offer industry-relevant learning experiences and certification. Initial courses will give students first-hand experience in the internet of things, followed by offerings in automation, artificial intelligence, robotics and blockchain technologies, vice chancellor Eeva Leinonen said in the press release. These courses, run in collaboration with Cisco, will ensure our students are ready for our technology-driven world.

While Curtin Universitys Cisco Centre for Networks, based within Curtins School of Electrical Engineering, Computing and Mathematical Sciences, will undertake important research to support industries looking for a simplified and more automated approach to managing their IT networks. Theyre not alone with eastern counterparts, La Trobe, Maquarie, University of Technology Sydney, Swinburne, among many nationally to install Cisco networking academies. As a global federation of teachers trade unions, Education International recommended stakeholders, including academic staff, students, and the unions that represent them, should work urgently and collectively to come up with alternatives to guide educations post-pandemic recovery. Education International members must continue to debate the appropriate intensity of privatisation and commercialisation in education, Dr Williamson and Dr Hogan found. It also suggested that unions held a critical role in advocating what the future of HE should be and the need to support the freedom of HE employees and their right to participate in the formulation and implementation of institutional policies around teaching and learning, and the extent to which these are privatised.

The student union movement, when joined with the workers union, has proven a powerful social force in the chapters of history, particularly when you look to Paris in 1968. But you neednt even look that far back. Seven years ago Australians voiced their opposition to the Americanisation of their higher education institutes, with university students clashing against a Liberal-led government bent on deregulating education and allowing universities to set their own fees. Student clashes at Melbourne University in protest over higher education reforms in 2014. Credit:Justin McManus We deserve a future too rang out as thousands took to the streets nationwide and, perhaps more memorably, hijacked ABCs Q&A show to heckle federal government ministers to protest the cost of a degree soaring to $100,000.

And the reforms were defeated, albeit narrowly. Loading But fast forward to 2020 and the neo-liberal thinking that doubled the cost of a three-year arts degree to $43,500 and made a five-year law degree $72,000, while simultaneously slashing annual funding for universities by $1883 per student, came about without the same fanfare. A joint protest by University of Western Australia and Curtin University guilds in July last year congregated on the steps of WA Parliament with more than 100 supporters but little to no media interest. Unsurprising as WA, and the whole nation, was in the grip of an global pandemic, where protests were considered a source of viral spread and issues over education didnt seize the public psyche.
Perth Racing will undergo an external review of its workplace culture after its managing director was sacked over allegations of serious misconduct last month.

Professor John Yovich was dismissed, effective immediately, on May 27 over allegations of inappropriate workplace conduct.

Professor John Yovich. Credit:Perth Racing

The board applauds the brave staff member who came forward with their credible account and evidence of what occurred, the Perth Racing board said in a statement at the time.

As a result of this evidence, the Perth Racing board has been made aware of serious cultural issues within the organisation and will now work to appoint an independent agency to conduct a full organisational review.
His linguistic gift was truly astonishing. When asked how he came to speak so many languages, he just shrugged his shoulders and said: You just pick it up. He graduated with first-class honours and was offered a PhD scholarship by the ANU. For his thesis he wanted to write something about the history of the Chinese language, including its lost predecessors. He was steered into a study of the mysterious Jurchen and their language, showing they were forebears of the Manchu, who came to impose Chinas last imperial dynasty, the Qing, which is now the subject of a wave of exploration in Chinese popular culture. On finishing his doctorate, which became the basis of a widely commended book on Jurchen, Kane was sought by the Department of Foreign Affairs for the embassy in Beijing. He arrived in 1976 as third secretary and was given the first six months to learn political Chinese and the meaning of slogans like Destroy the Gang of Four. He did a course in Chinese literature at Peking University and worked for a spell in a factory. After this immersion, Kane was at ease interpreting for his ambassador, Garry Woodard, and visiting Australian ministers at meetings with Chinese leaders. Danny Kane and an unknown calligrapher at the Summer Palace, Beijing. Credit:Zya/Julia Kane

People with whom he regularly chatted included the English interpreter to Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping. He was famed for once eliciting loud guffaws from Mao Zedongs notoriously stony-faced niece Wang Hairong as he regaled her with Chinese jokes at a formal dinner for visiting prime minister Malcolm Fraser and foreign affairs minister Andrew Peacock. Kane had succeeded spectacularly where Mr Peacock had failed when he bet members of the Fraser party that he could extract a smile from Wang. He was in his element during the exciting period of the Democracy Wall in late 1978, when newly returned leader Deng, for his own political purposes, allowed the release of pent-up pressures. Wrapped up against the winter in a Chinese overcoat and cap, Kane merged easily into the crowds, excitedly discussing the big character posters that called for democracy. Kane became the go-to source about the Democracy Wall for the small corps of foreign correspondents then in Beijing. He became more noticeable when he engaged in conversation with the movements leader, Wei Jingsheng. A Chinese official mentioned informally that these activities were being noted. Ambassador Woodard replied that Kane was acting with his full knowledge and approval, a defence that might not be possible today. It is hard to convey the volcanic energy and enthusiasms that went along with Dannys spectacular linguistic and cultural skills, says Woodard, now retired in Melbourne. Kanes heart was in scholarship and the company of fellow experts in the languages of the world. After his embassy posting ended in 1980, he returned to academia at Melbourne University, pursuing his hunch that the Jurchen were linked to an even older people, the Kitan, a nomadic people who lived across a vast area of what is now northern China, Mongolia and the Russian Far East from roughly the 4th to the 10th centuries AD.

Working from rubbings found in the late 19th century from a stone tablet at the tomb of Empress Wu Zetian (624-705 AD) which turned out to be parallel texts in Chinese and Kitan  a kind of Rosetta Stone - Danny Kane began to decipher the Kitan script. His work mediated between Chinese linguists who had deciphered some Kitan inscriptions, European historians who had little knowledge of Chinese historical linguistics, and Chinese historians who had limited knowledge of the Ural-Altaic languages of Chinas border regions; he integrated these perspectives with research published in Japanese, Russian, German and other European languages. Dannys reputation resulted in invitations to lecture all over the world, including at Leuven in Belgium, Leiden in the Netherlands and many Chinese universities. A peer had commented on his 2009 book on the Kitan language and script that Kanes book brings an end to one era of Kitan studies and starts a new one. In 1986, in a university cafe, he encountered Ye Xiaoqing, a brilliant Chinese historian who had emerged from years of forced rustication on a pig farm during the Cultural Revolution to astonish the academic world with a study of how Qing-era intellectuals had reacted to the West. They married and had a son, Ian, and went together to Beijing in the late 1990s when Kane was appointed cultural counsellor at the embassy, then took up positions at Macquarie University. When she died of cancer in 2010, Kane said at her burial that the conversation begun 24 years earlier was still going on inside his head. The conversation continued on frequent visits to her grave. Kane retired from his professorship at Macquarie in 2012, honoured by election as a Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities, but continued teaching for some years as a visiting scholar in several Chinese universities.
A disruptive woman It was Abbott who used to say that if Peta were Peter, she would be treated differently. A view he maintains, telling The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald, she was targeted by people who thought that attacking her was a means to chip away at me. But anyone who has seen Peta on Sky would know just how unfair that criticism was. And now the torrent of allegations about men misbehaving in Parliament and the treatment of women has prompted something of a rethink about the treatment of Credlin by a number of Liberal staffers who were privately critical of her as Abbotts chief of staff between 2013 and 2015. There is a growing view that her extraordinary authority in the prime ministers office and expletive-ridden rants would have passed unremarked if she had been a man. She was also one of the few willing to call out the toxic behaviour that has since been exposed in the corridors of the nations parliament. To some, Credlin was a woman who dared to disrupt.

Former Abbott government staffer and state director of the Victorian National Party Sally Branson believes many of Credlins detractors were people who felt intimidated by her and were also galled that a woman could wield so much influence. I find it difficult to reconcile within all the calls to enforce discipline in the House that there was little reflection on the criticism of Peta when she worked on this very issue during her tenure as chief of staff, she says. Credlin was Abbotts most influential and indispensable rock, and during that time we only had two women in cabinet. Long-serving Liberal MP Sharman Stone Some of the most damaging criticism was that she was above her station as a non-elected official  or perhaps as a woman  to be trying to rein in undisciplined behaviour. Branson, who admires Credlin, said she, too, had been the victim of a Credlin outburst during her stint in the prime ministers office, but admits: I was underprepared that day; I deserved it.

Brittany Higgins When former Liberal staffer Brittany Higgins alleged in February that she was raped by a colleague in the ministerial wing of Parliament House in 2019, Credlin had never met her. Higgins claims she did not feel supported by the government and says her initial reluctance to talk was prompted by a culture of silence in Parliament House. The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald can confirm that Higgins contacted Credlin in the weeks after her allegations were made public, hoping such a prominent Liberal figure could help bring change to Parliament House. Credlin offered to assist. Brittany Higgins, seen here at the March 4 Justice protest with Lisa Wilkinson (right), has made contact with Peta Credlin. Credit:Dominic Lorrimer Credlin wont be drawn on the rumours that she is privately advising Higgins  she declined to be interviewed for this article  but she has said she would be submitting years of evidence to a review being carried out by Sex Discrimination Commissioner Kate Jenkins into the workplace culture at Parliament House.

However, there remains a core group of female politicians and staff who accuse Credlin of failing to support Liberal women and for allowing the relentless gendered attacks on Julia Gillard. Long-serving Liberal MP Sharman Stone infamously accused Credlin of failing to support women by acting as Abbotts gatekeeper, his most influential and indispensable rock, and during that time we only had two women in cabinet and they sure as hell didnt have the finance portfolios. Political ambitions? Few political staffers have attracted such media attention as Credlin. Her frank advice to the government on policy and strategy broke through the noise of Canberra and senior ministers, even those that did not like her tone, listened. As one former Liberal minister put it: She is often the smartest person in the room, even if we didnt want to admit it.

That authority now has some conservative figures pushing her to enter state politics and take on Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews at next years election. The Peta for Premier push started in late 2020, when she publicly grilled Andrews over phone records that hadnt been released to the hotel quarantine inquiry. During the nine-minute exchange at a live press conference, Credlin methodically questioned the Premier over key events about hotel quarantine and pushed for the release of phone records of calls made to then chief commissioner of police Graham Ashton. Questioning Victorian premier Daniel Andrews during the second-wave COVID outbreak. Credit:Joe Armao Andrews agreed to provide the records if the inquiry asked, which it later did. Supporters of Andrews, and many progressives on Twitter, called for her to be banned from future press events as she was a former political staffer, at best a partisan commentator, but not a journalist. But her intervention struck a chord with some fed-up Liberal Party supporters who saw her as more effective at holding the government to account than any member of the state opposition. At that time several prominent donors were said to be willing to fund her political ambitions should she want to move into politics.

The push bubbled to the surface again in March when Victorian Liberal leader Michael OBrien was challenged for the leadership by shadow roads minister Brad Battin. Conservative commentators, many of them friends of Credlin, argued that OBrien was too reasonable to puncture Andrews dominance and what the Victorian Liberals needed was a strong female leader. Loading Conservative commentator Steve Price used his column in Melbournes Herald Sun to call for Credlin to replace OBrien. Credlins Sky News colleague Alan Jones later joined the chorus, telling viewers that the Victorian Liberals should not reinstate former leader Matthew Guy but instead roll little-known Liberal backbencher Gary Blackwood, who holds the western Gippsland seat of Narracan, and replace him with Credlin. No disrespect to him, but no one has heard of him, Jones said. If he is a true-blue Liberal, why not resign the seat and the Victorian administration invite Peta Credlin  unopposed  to be the candidate and pitchfork her straight into the leadership. There is little doubt Credlin is being encouraged to run for Parliament at some stage. When asked, she is unwilling to rule out a tilt in the future but it is difficult to find a serving politician, state or federal, who thinks she will do so any time soon.

Politically, Credlin is a true conservative. She favours lower taxes, limited government and free enterprise. She is socially conservative, too, using her media platform to argue legalising euthanasia was an excuse to defund proper palliative care and accusing the Andrews government of engaging in social engineering through its Safe Schools program. She has opposed strict lockdowns, saying the restrictions were driven by partisan politics of the nastiest kind. She was also forced to apologise on air last year after wrongly linking the South Sudanese community to Victorias second- wave COVID outbreak. Much of her internal support comes from the Liberal Partys conservative Right. Liberal insiders maintain that her years in Canberra, particularly her intimate knowledge of the Senate, means a seat in Federal Parliament would suit her more than any job on Spring Street. Federal Labor staffers who worked in Canberra in the Rudd and Gillard governments can see her potential and fear her return. But on Spring Street, Labor MPs seem unperturbed. They consider her too divisive for Victorian voters. History tells us that Victorian voters are different to those in the early 1990s that voted for a strong personality with similar politics like Jeff Kennett, said pollster and former Labor assistant state secretary Kosmos Samaras.

For now, Credlin seems content as a columnist and hosting her show, Credlin, which is the number one program in its timeslot across Foxtel. The Peta for Premier push is not the first time she has been touted as a future MP. She has previously been linked to the safe Melbourne seats of Menzies and Higgins, as well as the regional electorate of Mallee in north-west Victoria. It may be a long way from her luxury park-side apartment in East Melbourne, but Mallee takes in the small farming town of Wycheproof where Credlin was born. Hooked on politics Credlins father, Len, whose family had farmed in the area since the 1870s, left school at 12 but valued education. While Credlins mother voted Liberal, her father believed the way a man voted was a private matter, although Credlin has always suspected he supported the Democratic Labor Party.

Credlin, her parents and four siblings moved to the Bellarine Peninsula near Geelong when she was a teenager, where she attended Sacred Heart College. The strict Mercy nuns pushed her academically but it was a year-long exchange to northern California, when Ronald Reagan was in the White House, that ignited her love of politics. She gained entry to Melbourne University, where she studied law alongside OBrien. Unlike the future opposition leader, she steered clear of student politics and threw herself into her studies and social life at Newman College, waitressing to earn money. Senator Kay Patterson in 2006. Credit:Chris Lane Her political career began in heartbreak. After her graduation, Credlins father unexpectedly died when she was just 25. A gap year in Britain was put on hold as she decided to stay close to her mum, who also fell ill that year and nearly lost her life. Needing a job, she took a position as a speechwriter in the office of Victorian senator Kay Patterson. Within weeks, Credlin was asked to write a speech, which Patterson delivered verbatim. Hearing the words she had crafted being read out in the Senate chamber, Credlin was hooked.

Not only did Patterson give Credlin her career start, she helped her find romance. Patterson encouraged her to find a man that shared her love of politics. Eventually the senator took matters into her own hands, sticking an article on Credlins desk about Brian Loughnane, a bachelor who had been appointed director of the Victorian Liberal Party. Next year will be their 20th wedding anniversary. The couple were unable to have children and Credlin went public with her fertility treatment while working for Abbott. Friends believe not having children had a profound effect on her and goes some way to explaining her determination to fix some of the problems holding women back from careers in Parliament. Loading Despite her support for woman, though, Credlin does not support quotas, describing it as fools gold to think that more women alone would fix the toxic culture. Instead, she believes the Liberal Party should support women to run for safe seats She also wants changes to the employment rules for political staffers known as the MOP(S) Act. Credlin worked in many political offices, in the House of Representatives and in the Senate, for ministers, for opposition leaders and ultimately for the prime minister. She believes the fixation on her gender triggered criticism and abuse she never would have received if she was a man.
The National Archives will get a funding injection from the federal government to stop vulnerable parts of Australian history disintegrating, including war-time speeches by John Curtin and records of the Bounty mutineers.

The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald can reveal the government is close to finalising a package to help the National Archives immediately salvage documents, film and other at-risk materials while also safeguarding its long-term role.

Treasurer Josh Frydenberg drew on the National Archives resources during his High Court battle to prove his citizenship. The Archives holds the original certificate of exemption from the Immigration Act for his mother, Erika Strausz. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen/National Archives

Historians, writers and international experts have raised fears about the state of the Archives after The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald revealed in April the extent of problems facing the institution.

At risk of being lost forever are a series of radio addresses made by Curtin during World War II, surveillance films taken by ASIO, video of the 1998 Constitutional Convention and one of the few original documents recording Pitcairn Island and its Bounty descendants.
More than one-third of Australians believe a cut in overseas arrivals is the best way to handle growing pressure on the nations quarantine regime amid a political row over the need for dedicated facilities.

Only 7 per cent of voters back the idea of expanding the existing hotel quarantine system to allow more people to enter the country.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison has defended the hotel quarantine system against Labor attacks over breaches that have spread COVID-19 into the community. Credit:Fairfax Media

With more than 35,000 expatriate Australians waiting to return home, a new survey has found there is only minority support for increasing arrivals, even if it is done with more purpose-built facilities.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison has defended the hotel quarantine system against Labor attacks over breaches that have spread COVID-19 into the community, intensifying calls for more facilities like the Howard Springs camp near Darwin.
A fourth was knocked back when the requested information had already been deleted after a mandated 28 days, two more were still pending approval prior to the bill passing, and the last order, made on May 27, was technically deficient and not taken any further. A letter, tabled in the upper house during debate, dated March 12 from WA Health director general David Russell-Weisz to Mr Dawson stated police had requested information about patrons entering venues related to an assault that resulted in a laceration to a lip, a stabbing, a murder investigation, and a potential quarantine breach. The letter was written one day before the state election when Mr McGowan claimed the biggest election win in Australian history. Liberal MLC Nick Goiran told Parliament the letter tabled in the chamber showed there had been multiple discussions between Mr Dawson and Dr Russell-Weisz on or before March 12.

The day before the election ... the director general of health wrote to the commissioner of police and referenced his multiple conversations that they had had about this issue, he said. What we do not know is which Mark McGowan ministers were aware of those multiple conversations that took place between senior public servants about serious concerns about information that had been provided contrary to the assurance that had been provided by the Premier of WA. He assured Western Australians that their data would not be breached or provided in these circumstances. WA police did it anyway. The Department of Health had no choice but to comply with the lawful direction. Senior public servants knew about this and were having multiple discussions about this, including during the election campaign. Both Mr McGowan and Mr Quigley said they became aware of the issue in April. Parliamentary secretary to the Attorney General, Matthew Swinbourn, told parliament it would be disingenuous to suggest Dr Russell-Weisz was just sitting around doing nothing and then happened to come across the issue.

Loading There was an election at that time during which the government went into caretaker mode, which obviously changes a lot of the Westminster conventions. There were those issues to take into account, he said. The first issues relating to these matters arose in December and then there were internal workings within the health department. Advice was sought from the State Solicitors Office on these matters. It is not uncommon for departments and departmental heads to deal with matters before they raise them with their ministers. Dr Russell-Weisz received a response on March 19 from Mr Dawson and a briefing note was prepared on March 25 before being sighted by Mr Cooks office by at least March 31.

Creating a new protocol There were no senior police on hand during scrutiny of the new bill on Thursday but Mr Swinbourn told Parliament a policy was put in place some time in February by WA Police where an officer would need to go to a superintendent before seeking SafeWA data. Mr Dawsons response letter to Dr Russell-Weisz sought to reassure the director general. I have instructed my State Emergency Coordinators Directorate  to issue operational guidance to officers as to the process for considering SafeWA information for an investigation, it said.

I have required for a senior officer at the SECD to assess each request by an investigator to access stored information, prior to obtaining an order to produce [which has to be signed off by a justice of the peace] to ensure that this information is only accessed where it is defensible and required. This will ensure every request is justified and necessary and is specific to a serious crime. I envisage relatively low numbers of requests. Police Commissioner Chris Dawson claims exceptional circumstances warranted the data breach. Mr Dawson was unapologetic in interviews on Wednesday and told 6PR it was not his view there had been a breach of public trust. Police have a duty if any person is murdered ... the police have a duty to collect the best possible evidence and put it before the court, he said.

Mr Dawson pushed the case police had only accessed information on two occasions, with one being related to a murder, which was only in relation to a minuscule fraction of the more than 240 million SafeWA check-ins. He pointed to one instance of his discretion on the issue where he had knocked back investigators who wanted to access SafeWA data in a case where methamphetamine was being brought into a quarantine hotel. I overrode that and said, Look, in this instance, we should not do it, but at least in the case of a murder investigation we should, Mr Dawson said. Mr Dawson has maintained police acted within the law but Mr Goiran said in Parliament just because something was lawful it did not make it right or ethical. Mr Goiran also said there was an issue with Mr Dawson being the State Emergency Coordinator who signed off on directions under the rolling state of emergency, which had given government authorities extraordinary powers to manage the pandemic.

It is, at the very least, a massive conflict of interest when the commissioner of police signs off on a direction telling everyone to comply with contact registration, knowing that the Premier had given Western Australians an assurance that it would be used only for contact tracing, yet the commissioners own agency went and compelled the Department of Health to provide information within nine days, Mr Goiran said. Mr Dawson said he did not see a conflict between his duties as Police Commissioner and State Emergency Coordinator. A police spokeswoman said the roles were complimentary and bound by specific legislative requirements. Whats the damage? Police will be able to keep the data they have already gained  2439 check-ins related to Martins death and four with the stabbing.

Mr Swinbourn said there did not appear to have been any change in the apps user behaviour given 1.23 million people had checked in on Thursday, which was in line with the the daily average of 1.2 million from the previous week. Liberal MLC Tjorn Sibma told Parliament on Thursday night a threshold had been crossed. I think that trust has been significantly more undermined today as a consequence of the timeline in decision-making and the revelation that very, very senior public servants, in the course of an election campaign, knew about this problem, he said. Not only was it during the course of the election campaign, the date stamps on that correspondence coincide with the early voting passage of the election campaign.
Singapore: In a closed courtroom in Myanmars purpose-built 21st century capital Naypyitaw next week, Australian Sean Turnell is expected to face a judge for the first time since being arrested in the days after a coup in the country more than four months ago.

There has been no official announcement of the court date or charges against the economist and former adviser to overthrown civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

Sean Turnell with Aung San Suu Kyi.

I dont know about this matter, was all an official from Myanmars Ministry of Information would say on Friday before hanging up on The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.

The only reason Turnells impending court appearance next Wednesday has been made public is because it was flagged this month by the lawyer for Suu Kyi, whose own trial has started this week in Naypyitaw behind closed doors.
London: The work of childrens author Enid Blyton has been condemned as racist and xenophobic by a cultural foundation in the latest episode of Britains divisive culture wars.

The charity English Heritage, which brings the nations history to life with a scheme that sees blue plaques installed on buildings that were once lived or worked in by famous individuals, updated the information associated with Blytons iconic plaque, which is positioned on the front of the house she lived in between 1920-1924.

Enid Blyton in 1949 with her daughters. Credit:George Konig

Blytons work has been criticised during her lifetime and after for its racism, xenophobia and lack of literary merit, the website reads, citing a 1996 report from the Guardian that explores Blytons book The Little Black Doll, which sees the character of Sambo - itself an offensive term for African-Americans - only being accepted once its ugly black face is washed clean by the rain.

English Heritage said on Thursday that their website serves to provide readers with a full picture of those commemorated with a blue plaque, adding that it would also seek to address any uncomfortable aspects of ones life.
There is not a country that would sit around that table that would seek a concession on any of those 14 points as something they also would tolerate, Morrison said after the meeting. After a slow start at the G7, those bolshy remarks and Morrisons surprise decision to table the dossier were the first signs of what the Prime Minister might achieve from the trip. By the time he landed back in Australia on Friday morning, his warnings about the Indo-Pacific had achieved strong cut through. Australias plight is now on the radar of nations with less skin in the game. G7 leaders at the summit in Carbis Bay. Credit:AP The biggest backing came during a meeting between Morrison and Macron at the Elysee Palace. Frances historic interests in the Pacific mean Macron has a good ear for the tensions - he spoke about the geopolitical balance of the region at length during a Sydney visit in 2018 - but the forcefulness of his support for Australia this week took many observers by surprise. Speaking of threats and intimidation, Macron declared Australia was at the forefront of the dispute in the region and pledged to stand by Canberras side.

As a token of friendship and solidarity, and as we discussed together during the G7, we firmly reject any coercive economic measures taken against Australia in flagrant violation of international law, he said. French President Emmanuel Macron and Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison ahead of a working dinner in Paris. Credit:AP The speech raised eyebrows from those listening in, including assembled press who knew Macron had told an earlier summit in Brussels that he didnt think China was NATOs business. That same summit for the first time declared China poses systemic challenges to international order. But a transcript of what Macron actually said at NATO is telling. Of China, he said: It is much larger than just the military issue. It is economic. It is strategic. It is about values. It is technological. Macrons lines were so similar to what Morrison has been saying for many months now that the statement could have been uttered by the Prime Minister himself.

Asked by The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age whether a turning point had arrived in how countries view China, Morrison raised his eyebrows and said: I think there is a growing awareness of the Indo-Pacific, full stop. It is so much more a factor in both the considerations and assessments of governments - not just strategically but economically as well, but also of the business community. Loading Morrison was also buoyed by a public show of support from Johnson, who during a Downing Street meeting promised to stand shoulder to shoulder with our friends. But the British Prime Minister offered a note of caution by stressing nobody wanted to descend into a Cold War with China. Johnson had earlier grappled with other G7 leaders over how hard to criticise Beijing in the summit communique for its human rights abuses and treatment of Australia. We only know this because Draghi, the Italian Prime Minister, told Morrison so at the start of their bilateral meeting. The only difference in views on China, Draghi explained in a recording of what was probably intended as a private exchange, was the intensity of the message to send.

Italy stunned fellow G7 members when it signed up to Beijings controversial Belt and Road Initiative in 2019 but the newly installed Draghi is clearing the way for a policy shift. He has been cool on the partnership for several weeks now but emerged from the G7 session so alarmed he pledged to review Italys deal. Its an autocracy that does not adhere to multilateral rules and does not share the same vision of the world that the democracies have, he said. In the end, the G7 rebuked Beijing for human rights abuses, its assault on Hong Kong and non-market practices which undermine the fair and transparent operation of the global economy. It also included a reference to Taiwan for the first time, calling for peace across the Strait that separates China from its threatened island neighbour. China accused the bloc of rich countries of attempting to dictate world affairs and said that the era of international diplomacy was over. It called the United States, its superpower rival, sick, very sick for leading a coalition that had interfered in its internal affairs.

The statement was probably less than Morrison and an increasingly assertive Biden had hoped for but was a big step up from just two years ago in the French city of Biarritz when the rising superpower wasnt even mentioned by name in the G7 communique. Backed up by his razor-sharp national security advisor Michelle Chan, Morrison deployed a simple strategy to explain to Europe the problems in the Indo-Pacific: China may not be an immediate security threat to remote nations but its pattern of behaviour presents a real risk to the health of all economies. Loading He hammered this home during a speech at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development in Paris - the final engagement of his trip. After being welcomed by former finance minister Mathias Cormann, Morrison told ambassadors that anti-market behaviour was a threat to their financial prosperity. The global trading system and rules-based order is under serious strain and threat, he said. Meeting these challenges will require a degree of active cooperation not seen for many decades.
Bryan, OH (43506)

Today

Sunshine to start, then a few afternoon clouds. High near 75F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph..

Tonight

Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low around 55F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph.
Ryan Ramczyk can't really pinpoint whether he's a few blocks away, around the corner or just down the street. But the New Orleans Saints' star right tackle knows he's approaching being the player he wants to be.
To support the state during the COVID-19 pandemic, the contributed an amount of Rs 500 Crore to Odisha Chief Minister's Relief Fund, Odisha Chief Minister Office (CMO) said on Thursday.

In a statement, CMO said Odisha Agro Industries Corporation and Odisha Cashew Development Corporation paid also a dividend of Rs 3.76 Crore to State Government.

"Chief Minister Shri thanked all the three corporations for this support during the pandemic," the CMO said.

As per the statement, while the Agro Industries Corporation paid an amount of Rs 3,29,76,362 at 30 per cent of net profit for the year 2017-18, the Cashew Development Corporation paid a dividend of Rs 46,51,200 at 30 per cent of net profit for the year 2018-19.

It said the Agro Industries Corporation Chairman Debashis Mohanty and Cashew Development Corporation Chairman Amarendra Mohanty handed over the cheques to Chief Secretary Suresh Chandra Mohapatra for their respective corporations.

For the Odisha Mining Corporation, Chairman Surendra Kumar handed over a cheque of Rs 500 Crore to Chief secretary Suresh Chandra Mohapatra. Briefing on the activities of the Mining Corporation, Kumar said that OMC made a growth of 5.42 per cent during the last financial year despite the pandemic. The total mineral production last year was 17.12 million tons.

"In the last Financial Year, OMC achieved a sales revenue of Rs 5,592 Crore, which was 36.60 per cent higher than the previous year. OMC aims to achieve 1 billion dollar revenue by next year," CMO said.

It further said that "the Corporation is also supporting many welfare programmes of the state. It is funding 10 dedicated Covid hospitals in 8 districts of the 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.)
Hit by provisioning for outstanding amounts of inter-corporate deposits (ICDs) and write-off of capital advances on a land deal amounting to Rs 629.70 crore, battery maker, Industries India, posted a consolidated net loss of Rs 442.53 crore in the March quarter compared to a net profit of Rs 63.07 crore in the same period last year.

The stock, however, moved up 6.11 per cent and closed at Rs 333.35 on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE).

Revenue from operations was 21.67 per cent higher at Rs 272.63 crore as against Rs 224.08 crore in the corresponding quarter last year.

Revenue from operations in FY 2020-21 stood at Rs 1,248.99 crore compared to Rs 1221.09 crore in FY2019-20. Profit before exceptional items & tax stood at Rs 147.27 crore, an increase of 119 per cent. However, the company posted a net loss of Rs 311.52 crore compared to a profit of Rs 178.29 crore on account of the provisioning.

managing director, Amritanshu Khaitan, said, The company has achieved its highest-ever operating profit despite a challenging year due to Covid. We will continue to focus on operational efficiencies and generate the kind of profitability that we have seen in the last year.

The aim is to make the company a zero debt company in the next two years, he added. Eveready has a debt of around Rs 400 crore.

On the balance-sheet cleanup, Khaitan said that the board had taken a decision keeping accounting prudence in mind to create a provision for the outstanding on various group

Eveready had given ICDs to promoter group and paid for certain guarantees to banks/ other parties who had provided loans to these

From time to time, in earlier years, as well as in the current year under review, a portion of these deposits were repaid by the borrowing entities to the company on demand, it said.

However, deposits and recoverables amounting to, 489.29 crore and interest amounting to Rs 68.42 crore were outstanding as on March 31, 2021.

The borrower companies had been given time till February 28, 2021 for repayment of the outstanding. But on the expiry of the timeline, legal proceedings have been initiated for recovery of the outstanding amounts.

Also, an outstanding amount of Rs 72 crore advance was paid to a company consequent upon a memorandum of understanding (MoU) executed on September 26, 2018, for assignment of leasehold rights of a property.

But on the expiry of the timeline, the MoU was canceled and legal proceedings initiated for recovery of the amount due along with interest.

Eveready said that while it was putting in best efforts to recover the outstandings from the companies, it considered it prudent to make the exceptional adjustments, without prejudice to any of the legal rights and remedies to recover all the due amount.
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Andhra Pradesh reported 6,341 fresh cases of coronavirus, 8,486 recoveries and 57 deaths in 24 hours ending 9 am on Friday.

A health department bulletin said the number of active cases in the state dropped to 67,629.

The total positives touched 18,39,243, recoveries 17,59,390 and deaths 12,224 so far, it said.

East Godavari district continued to report the highest number of cases (1,247) in a day.

Chittoor added 919 and West Godavari 791 while the remaining 10 districts registered less than 500 new cases each.

Chittoor had the highest toll of 12 in 24 hours, Guntur eight, East Godavari six, Krishna, Prakasam and Srikakulam five each, Anantapuramu, SPS Nellore, Visakhapatnam and West Godavari three each, Kurnool and Vizianagaram two each.

Principal Secretary (Health) Anil Kumar Singhal told a press conference that the government has decided to once again undertake a communications campaign on the need for following Covid-Appropriate Behaviour despite the downtrend in cases.

"From Monday, the Covid curfew hours will be relaxed, but there will be a strict enforcement to ensure people do not show any slackness in wearing masks, maintaining physical distancing and sanitization," Anil said.

The number of Covid hospitals in the state has now come down to 400 from 625 during the peak period.

He said 50 per cent of ICU beds and over 65 per cent of oxygen beds in Covid hospitals were now vacant due to the significant reduction in the caseload.

The Principal Secretary said 198 persons so far succumbed to mucormycosis (black fungus) in the state.

In all 2,678 black fungus cases were reported so far, of which only 1,419 were active now.

(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.)
Plcs Covid-19 vaccine manufacturing partner in Southeast Asia has missed a delivery target in and shipments to other countries in the region have been delayed, the latest setback for a shot that was meant to be the backbone of the global inoculation effort.



was slated to receive and administer 6 million vaccine doses in June but health authorities this week said they would be distributing only about 3.5 million of those shots this month. Pledging to still give out 6 million doses as planned, officials appear to be making up the shortfall with millions of shots from Chinas Sinovac Biotech Ltd.

Shipments of shots made by Siam Bioscience -- AstraZenecas Bangkok-based partner, which has links to the Thai royal family -- to Malaysia and the Philippines have also been delayed, though both countries say they dont expect to be waiting for too long.

The situation comes on top of delivery problems at Indias Ltd., another partner, which has left developing countries from Nepal to Rwanda short of shots that were promised through the World Health Organization-backed Covax program. Siam Bioscience is AstraZenecas sole Covid vaccine partner in Southeast Asia, a region that is trailing on inoculation and where the virus continues to flare, including in where infections have surged over the past two months.

AstraZeneca declined to comment, while Siam BioScience didnt respond to requests for comment.

The Philippines now expects a batch of nearly 1.2 million AstraZeneca shots to be shipped from Thailand in mid-July rather than this month, though a government official said the initial delay will not derail the countrys vaccination push. In Malaysia, authorities say theyre working to resolve the issues around the delivery schedule, which the government stated in May would see 610,000 doses arrive from Thailand in June and another 410,000 in July.

AstraZeneca itself is also facing legal action from the European Union for a production shortfall, with the company only delivering 30 million doses to the bloc in the first quarter, compared with an original target of 120 million.

Seeking Alternatives



The Anglo-Swedish company, which partnered with the University of Oxford on the vaccine, received orders to supply as many as 3 billion doses worldwide before efficacy data came out last year, more than twice as many as any other first wave shot, data compiled by Bloomberg shows.

While not exclusive to AstraZeneca, the various delays -- particularly out of India, which has banned the export of Covid vaccines -- have left dozens of countries that were counting on the shot desperate to find doses elsewhere, and undermined the companys bid to supply the developing world.

Now, countries are turning to alternatives, particularly shots developed by Chinese companies Sinovac and Sinopharm that recently received approval from the WHO. While theyre less effective than the Messenger RNA vaccines made by Pfizer Inc., BioNTech SE and Moderna Inc., these shots are easier to store and transport.

Thailand, which aims to vaccinate 70% of its population by the end of this year, is also now allowing regional health authorities to extend the interval between Astrazeneca vaccine doses to 16 weeks, from 10 to 12 weeks previously, though officials say the move is to optimize the shots effectiveness and not for lack of supply.

The country has also ordered 20 million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine and is in talks for 5 million doses of the single-shot Johnson & Johnson vaccine as it continues to expect deliveries of the Astra shots from Siam Bioscience.

New to Vaccine-making



AstraZenecas vaccine is among the cheapest of the first round of Covid shots because the company said it wouldnt take a profit, selling it at cost.

But the lack of economic incentives could have constrained AstraZeneca and its manufacturing partners ability to get the supply chain in order, said Carlos Cordon, a professor of strategy and supply chain management at the Institute for Management Development in Lausanne, Switzerland.

The supply chain of the Astra vaccine is not an easy one and, logically, one would assume that there will be more than one source of supply to avoid bottlenecks, Cordon said. A little bit of an economic incentive would have certainly helped to make companies in the supply chain even eager to make higher production volumes.

AstraZenecas choice of Thai partner raised questions from the start. Unlike Indias Serum -- which was the worlds biggest vaccine maker before the pandemic -- and other Asia partners like South Koreas SK Bioscience Co., Siam Bioscience is new to the vaccine-making business.

The company was founded in 2009 as Thailands first domestic bio-pharmaceutical drugmaker by the father of the nations current King Maha Vajiralongkorn, to provide cheaper alternatives to imported drugs. It has also made Covid test kits.

Its set up by the Crown Property Bureau, an agency that managed assets for the palace no matter who sat on the throne. The company had been operating at a loss in the four years leading up to the year of pandemic, when it brought in a net profit of 35.8 million baht ($1.1 million), according to data published by the Department of Business Development.

In February, Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-Ocha said Siam Bioscience does not seek to profit from making the Astra vaccines.

Royal Links



Complicating matters is Thailands lese majeste law, which can see jail time of up to 15 years for defaming the royal family. Its sweeping mandate means that little is said publicly about Siam Bioscience, even as concerns over vaccine supplies grow.

In January, Thai officials said that Siam Bioscience would make 200 million doses each year. They havent spoken publicly again about the company in detail since.

When former prime-ministerial candidate Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit suggested that Siam Biosciences royal ties played a role in its appointment as AstraZenecas partner, the high-profile government critic was charged with royal defamation.

Prime Minister Prayuth apologized this week to the public for the delay, blaming supply and distribution issues without elaborating. Neither the Thai government nor Siam Bioscience responded to repeated requests for information on what is causing the supply shortfalls.

One Thai healthcare industry veteran, who asked not to be identified for fear of legal repercussions, likened the situation with Siam Bioscience to a bakery that just started making bread.

They still havent perfected their craft, he said. None of us really knows their production capacity because they havent publicized it and we cant criticize it. No one is willing to say. They cant say it, because its Siam Bioscience.

While noting that he has no insight into the relationship between AstraZeneca and Siam Bioscience, Nikolai Petrovsky, a professor at the College of Medicine and Public Health at Flinders University in South Australia, said it could be an example of how politics have factored in the choice of manufacturers for vaccines. Governments in some countries picked their best friends rather than the best vaccine makers when awarding contracts, he said.

While some western countries like the U.S. are starting to reopen amid consistent supplies of vaccines, many parts of Asia are lagging behind, particularly developing economies, raising the risk of resurgent outbreaks that could seed new virus strains.

Due to regulatory setbacks and the export ban -- imposed as India suffered a devastating second wave -- the Serum Institute has only delivered 30 million of the minimum 200 million doses of the AstraZeneca shot promised to Covax, an initiative designed to ensure equitable vaccine access between rich and poor nations.

These supply issues do highlight the need for additional regional vaccine manufacturing capability in the Asia Pacific region, Petrovsky said. Hopefully, governments will see the sense in investing in this increased capability even once the immediate threat of this pandemic has subsided.

--With assistance from Michelle Fay Cortez, Suzi Ring and Thomas Kutty Abraham.
India on Friday reported a net reduction of 28,084 in active cases to take its count to 798,656. Indias share of global active cases now stands at 6.86 per cent (one in 14). The country is second among the most affected countries by active cases. On Thursday, it added 62,480 cases to take its total caseload to 29,762,793. And, with 1,587 new fatalities, its Covid-19 reached 383,490, or 1.29 per cent of total confirmed infections.

With 3,259,003 more Covid-19 vaccine doses being administered on Thursday, Indias total count of vaccine shots so far reached 268,960,399. The count of recovered cases across India, meanwhile, reached 28,580,647  or 96.03 per cent of total caseload  with 88,977 new cured cases being reported on Friday.

With a daily increase of 62,480 in total cases, Indias tally of coronavirus cases has risen from 29,700,313, on Wednesday to 29,762,793 an increase of 0.2%. has reached 383,490, with 1,587 fatalities, an all-time high in daily spike.

Now the second-most-affected country by active cases, total cases and recovery, and third by death, India has added 487,970 cases in the past 7 days.

India now accounts for 6.86% of all active cases globally (one in every 14 active cases), and 9.86% of all deaths (one in every 10 deaths).

India has so far administered 268,960,399 vaccine doses. That is 903.38 per cent of its total caseload, and 19.3 per cent of its population.

Among Indian states, the top 5 in terms of number of vaccine shots administered are Maharashtra (31618559), Uttar Pradesh (29468714), Gujarat (25252281), Rajasthan (25038564), and West Bengal (22527823).

Among states with more than 10 million population, the top 5 in number of vaccine shots per one million population are Kerala (405284), Gujarat (395355), Delhi (394579), Uttarakhand (359383), and J&K (331588).

Backwards from here, the last 1 million cases for India have come in 13 days.

The count of active cases across India on Friday saw a net reduction of 28,084, compared with 38,692 on Thursday. States and UTs hat have seen the biggest daily net increase in active cases are Maharashtra (3304), West Bengal (921), Meghalaya (145), Mizoram (85), and Manipur (24).

With 88,977 new daily recoveries, Indias recovery rate stands at 96.03%, while fatality rate remained unchanged at 1.29%.

The Indian states and UTs with the worst case fatality rates at present are Punjab (2.66%), Uttarakhand (2.07%), and Maharashtra (1.95%). The rate in as many as 17 is higher than the national average.

Indias new daily closed cases stand at 90,564  1,587 deaths and 88,977 recoveries. The share of deaths in total closed cases stands at 1.72%.

Indias 5-day moving average of daily rate of addition to total cases stands at 0.2%.

Indias doubling time for total cases stands at 329.8 days, and for deaths at 167.1 days.

Overall, five states with the biggest 24-hour jump in total cases are Kerala (12469), Maharashtra (9830), Tamil Nadu (9118), Andhra Pradesh (6151), and Karnataka (5983).

Among states with more than 100,000 cases, the five with worst recovery rates at present are Karnataka (93.54%), Tamil Nadu (94.53%), Maharashtra (95.64%), and Kerala (95.65%).

India on Thursday conducted 1,929,476 coronavirus tests to take the total count of tests conducted so far in the country to 387,167,696. The test positivity rate recorded was 3.2%.

Five states with the highest test positivity rate (TPR)  percentage of tested people turning out to be positive for Covid-19 infection (by cumulative data for tests and cases  are Goa (18.62%), Maharashtra (15.3%), Dadra & Nagar Haveli-Daman & Diu (14.49%), Kerala (12.83%), and Sikkim (12.03%).

Five states with the highest TPR by daily numbers for tests and cases added  are Kerala (10.85%), Meghalaya (10.02%), Mizoram (10%), Goa (8.6%), and Manipur (8.41%).

Among states and UTs with more than 10 million population, five that have carried out the highest number of tests (per million population) are Delhi (1097967), J&K (687529), Kerala (605640), Karnataka (477346), and Uttarakhand (464092).

The five most affected states by total cases are Maharashtra (5944710), Karnataka (2790338), Kerala (2773943), Tamil Nadu (2397864), and Andhra Pradesh (1832902).

Maharashtra, the most affected state overall, has reported 9830 new cases to take its tally to 5944710.

Karnataka, the second-most-affected state, has reported 5983 cases to take its tally to 2790338.

Kerala, the third-most-affected state by total tally, has added 12469 cases to take its tally to 2773943.

Tamil Nadu has added 9118 cases to take its tally to 2397864.

Andhra Pradesh has seen its tally going up by 6151 to 1832902.

Uttar Pradesh has added 275 cases to take its tally to 1703733.

Delhi has added 158 cases to take its tally to 1431868.
A decision on further relaxing lockdown restrictions in the state after June 21 when the current curbs come to an end, will be taken on Saturday, Karnataka Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa said.

"The situation is improving. There is also a possibility of a third wave in the future, but despite that we will have to give some relaxations. We will discuss it at a meeting tomorrow evening, and take a decision," Yediyurappa told reporters on Friday.

According to official sources, the government may announce relaxations in 11 districts where lockdown measures have continued, while further relaxations in terms of movement of people and opening of businesses may be announced in the remaining 19 districts from June 21.

The government had last week issued fresh guidelines extending the COVID induced lockdown in 11 districts, which have a high positivity rate, till June 21, where citizens were allowed to buy essentials between 6 am and 10 am.

Some relaxations were announced in the remaining 19 districts from June 14, allowing essential shops to be open from 6 am to 2 pm, and movement of people till 7 pm.

It had also imposed COVID curfew (daily) from 7 pm to 5 am and weekend curfew from 7 pm on Friday to 5 am on Monday.

The 11 districts where strict lockdown measures have continued are Chikmagalur, Shivamogga, Davangere, Mysuru, Chamarajanagar, Hassan, Dakshina Kannada, Bengaluru Rural, Mandya, Belagavi and Kodagu.

The Karnataka government had initially announced 14 days 'close-down' from April 27, but subsequently imposed a complete lockdown from May 10 to May 24, as the COVID cases continued to spike.

Citing lockdown yielding results and experts' advice, it was further extended till June 7 and then again till June 14.

Meanwhile, the Chief Minister along with a few Ministers today held discussions with officials on precautionary measures to be taken in case of flood situation, due to monsoon rains in the state.

Yediyurappa said Maharashtra's irrigation minister will be visiting the state on Saturday and will hold discussions with him.

Release of excess water from dams in Maharashtra during heavy rains there usually causes flood-like situation in the bordering districts of the state.

Yediyurappa said he will also hold a meeting via video conference on Saturday with Deputy Commissioners of 20 districts regarding monsoon preparedness and preventive measures to be taken in case of floods there.

Noting that the state is receiving good rains and farmers are involved in sowing activities, he said measures have been taken to ensure availability of seeds and fertilisers without any shortage.

(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 Friday took cognisance of the violation of COVID-19 protocols in various markets in the national capital and observed that such breaches will only hasten the third wave which cannot be permitted at all.

The high court asked the Centre and Delhi government to take strict measures, sensitise shopkeepers and hold meetings with markets and vendors associations in this regard.

A vacation bench of Justices Navin Chawla and Asha Menon took note of certain photographs sent to one of the judges of the high court by an AIIMS doctor showing scant regard for COVID-19 protocols by street vendors in markets.

"We have paid a huge price in the second wave. We don't know if there is any household which has not suffered in the second wave, closely or remotely," the bench observed.

(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.)
Reading down of anti-terror law is an important issue and may have pan-India ramifications, the said on Friday and sought responses from three student activists granted bail by the Delhi High Court in north-east Delhi riots case.

The high court judgements will "not to be treated as precedent by any Court" to give similar reliefs, the apex court said while hearing Delhi Police appeal against the bail.

A vacation bench of Justices Hemant Gupta and V Ramasubramanian made it clear however that the bails granted to these student activists will not be affected for the time-being.

Taking note of Solicitor Generak Tushar Mehta's submission that the entire anti-terror law, UAPA, has been turned upside down by the Delhi High Court while granting bail to these activists, the bench said what is troubling it was that 100 pages of the verdict have been rendered while granting bail and judgement discussed the entire law.

The High Court had on June 15 granted bail to JNU students Natasha Narwal and Devangana Kalita and Jamia student Asif Iqbal Tanha saying that in an anxiety to suppress dissent the State has blurred the line between right to protest and terrorist activity and if such a mindset gains traction, it would be a "sad day for democracy".

The high court, in three separate judgments, set aside the trial court's orders denying bail to student activists and allowed their appeals by admitting them to regular bail on furnishing a personal bond of Rs 50,000 each along with two sureties of the like amount.

(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.)
Senior Congress leader on Friday said Prime Minister has "without doubt" lost the moral authority to rule for not standing with people in need of medical aid during the second wave of COVID-19 and for doing playing political one-upmanship in polls instead.

In an interview with PTI, the former union minister launched a hard-hitting attack on the prime minister saying the lack of a credible political alternative did not mean that he should stop discharging his duties believing that his political fortunes are secure.

Sibal also attacked the government for what he called its ineptness to strategise the COVID-19 vaccination, saying it borders on criminal negligence and its priorities in tackling the pandemic are "misplaced and faulty and lack sincerity".

He also said that the toolkit issue is nothing but an attempt to "deploy forgery" to divert public attention from his government's failures.

"A prime minister who should have stood with the people while they were languishing outside hospitals in need of medical aid during the pandemic, was busy playing political one-upmanship during Assembly elections in West Bengal, Assam etc, has, without doubt, lost the moral authority to rule.

"There may or may not be a credible alternative but does it mean that he should stop discharging his responsibilities believing that his political fortunes are secure," Sibal told PTI while blaming the prime minister for inaction in saving precious lives during the second wave of the pandemic.

Sibal said he agreed that at present "there is definitely a void in terms of a strong political alternative" and that is why he has suggested reforms in his own party so that the country has strong and credible opposition.

The senior Congress leader, who was one of the 23 leaders who had written to Sonia Gandhi suggesting the party's overhaul, said when the whole world was doing its best to tide over the pandemic and save precious human lives, our Prime Minister was busy addressing election rallies in West Bengal, Assam, Tamil Nadu and Kerala.

The COVID-19 protocols that the government under him had itself put in place were openly flouted, he alleged, saying, "I believe that is what defamed India".

He said it is so convenient for this government to pin blame on others for its "monumental failures" rather than to introspect and do the course correction in order to provide succour to those affected.

"The toolkit issue is nothing but an attempt to deploy forgery to divert public attention from the Modi government's failures in managing the pandemic," he said referring to the issue that has been marked as 'manipulative media' by Twitter leading to a tiff with the government.

Sibal also alleged multiple flip-flops in the government's vaccine policy and said India was hugely embarrassed within a short span of time from a vaccine supplier to a country that was gasping for oxygen.

He also blamed the government for doing nothing to ramp up medical infrastructure between the first and the second wave that cost the country heavily and many precious lives were lost for want of medical aid including oxygen, ICU beds and medicines.

The Congress leader also accused the government of doing nothing to ramp up vaccine production and said it was shocking that the first order for procurement of vaccine from foreign manufacturers was placed as late as January 2021.

"Our ineptness to strategise the COVID-19 vaccination drive borders on criminal negligence. Globally, mass immunization is key to managing the pandemic. The two pillars of immunising a large population quickly and efficiently are procurement and delivery. In India, we have struggled on both fronts," he said.

Sibal alleged that the people of this country know that the priorities of this government in tackling the COVID-19 pandemic were "misplaced, faulty and lacked sincerity and that it was completely clueless and unprepared to deal with the enormity of the challenge despite expert advice and warning".

He also accused the government of cleverly shifting the burden of procurement to state governments, after having failed to timely procure vaccines and said both the decentralised model for vaccination and the new liberalized pricing model were "deeply flawed".

"Public anger resulting from vaccine shortage was deflected by the government by blaming state governments," he said, adding the reality was that the states only wanted flexibility in vaccine distribution and not in vaccine procurement.

"People dying for as basic a medical aid as oxygen was a bigger embarrassment and that actually defamed the country," the former union minister said.

He said since the National Disaster Management Act, 2005 was in force, the Union Government is solely charged with the responsibility to deal with such disasters and it cannot wash its hands off by putting forward the oft-repeated rant of health being a state subject.

(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 Dominican court has ordered Indian fugitive businessman to be remanded at the Dominica State Prison despite a decline in his health, the local media reported.

According to Dominica News Online, a news outlet in the Carribean island, Magistrate Pearl Williams on Thursday ordered that Antiguan citizen and businessman who is wanted in India for alleged bank fraud, to be remanded at the Dominica State Prison.

Choksi, who pleaded not guilty to illegal entry into Dominica, was remanded into police custody at the Dominica China Friendship Hospital (DCFH) where he has been a patient since May 29.

On June 2, 2021, at Choksi's first court hearing where the charge was read to him, the acting Director of Public Prosecution (DPP), Sherma Dalyrample, made an application before the Chief Magistrate Candia Carrette George pursuant to Section 212 of the Magistrate code of procedure, to have him brought before a Magistrate every three days to be further remanded until he is discharged from the hospital.

This application came under review by Magistrate Williams on June 11, however, she reserved her ruling as a bail application for Choksi was being heard in the High Court on the same day.

On Thursday, the 62-year-old diamantaire was expected to appear before the court for reporting and further remand but his attorneys presented a medical report to the court which indicated that Choksi's health has deteriorated and as a result, he was unable to attend.

However, Magistrate Williams ordered Choksi to be remanded at the State Prison as she stated, based on the law, she does not have the jurisdiction to remand the accused to the hospital every three days.

Dissatisfied with her decision, three of Choksi's attorneys -- Julien Prevost, Zena Moore-Dyer and Gina Dyer-Munro, who were present at the court, objected claiming that their client is now in a bad state, and the decision to remand him to the state prison is appalling as bleeding in the head is one of his conditions.

The attorneys argued that there must be a certain level of "humanity" in how the court operates and everyone should be treated fairly.

Despite the heated argument in court, Magistrate Williams remained resolute in her decision and said her order will stand. She said arrangements will be made for the court to visit the hospital for Choksi to be remanded at the prison.

Attorneys for Choksi said they will go to the High court to prevent the order.

The Magistrate remanded Choksi until June 24, where he will appear before the court to be further remanded whilst his trial for illegal entry is expected to commence on June 25.

The matter of Habeas Corpus filed by Choksi's attorneys in the High Court has been adjourned sine die.

The 62-year-old diamantaire who gained citizenship in Antigua and Barbuda in 2017, is wanted by the Indian investigative agencies for allegedly cheating the Punjab Bank of Rs 13,500 crore, one of India's largest bank frauds in decades.

--IANS

aks/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.)
Union Home Minister is likely to visit his home state for two days on June 20 and 21, sources said on Thursday.

Though there has been no official communique about Shah's visit yet, but sources said the Home Minister is likely to inaugurate two flyovers near Gandhinagar on the Sarkhej-Gandhinagar highway (SG Road), one over the Vaishnodevi Circle and the other at Khoraj.

These two flyovers will greatly reduce the traffic on SG Road. Chief Minister Vijay Rupani and Deputy CM Nitin Patel are expected to be present during the opening ceremony.

Shah is also expected to be present at a vaccination centre at Bodakdev in Gandhinagar, which is his parliamentary constituency, to give boost to the ongoing vaccination drive.

Shah is also likely to participate in a sapling plantation programme in Thaltej.

--IANS

amc/arm

(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.)
Over 62,000 fresh cases reported

India reported 62,480 fresh infections on Friday, taking the cumulative caseload to 29.7 million, according to central health ministry data. The country saw 1,587 deaths due to the pandemic, taking the death toll to 383,490. The active caseload is at 798,656, while the total recoveries have surged to 28.5 million. As many as 268.9 million vaccine shots have been administered since the nationwide inoculation programme kicked off on January 16. Of these, 3.25 million were given on Thursday. Read more

Delhi's affluent were also hit hard by Covid, going by obituaries in newspapers

A report in ThePrint said the month of May saw a big jump in obituaries in two of Delhi's widely-circulated English daily newspapersTimes of India (TOI) and Hindustan Times. A total of 870 obituaries were published in the month this year, up from 204 in the same period last year. Given the steep costs of getting an obituary published in a widely-circulated newspaper, the rise in obituaries suggests the second wave of Covid took a grave toll on the affluent as well Its mostly people with business backgrounds who opt for obituaries, and a bulk of announcements come from corporate businesses for their noted employees, said an obituary coordinator with TOI. Read more

Bengals Covid infection rate is at 1.36, much higher than Indias 0.78

West Bengal's R valuein other words, the Covid reproduction rate which measures how fast the infection is spreadingsaw a spike in the past week and government officials have blamed the Delta variant, a report in ThePrint said.

Bengals R value, which was 0.4 on June 8, reached 1.36 on Thursday. This is much higher than the national R value which dropped to 0.78 in the last two weeksthe lowest it has been since the pandemic hit India last year. The Delta variant was identified in nearly 90 per cent of cases reported in the past fortnight, according to a top official in the state's health department. Read more

Exposure to the common cold virus can help fight Covid

Researchers from Yale University have found that exposure to the virus that is the most frequent cause of the common cold, the rhinovirus, can provide protection against the novel coronavirus, a report in The Indian Express said. The common respiratory virus jump-starts the activity of interferon-stimulated genes, the study said. These are molecules in the immune system whose early response can halt the replication of the within airway tissues infected with the cold. The research was published in the Journal of Experimental Medicine. Read more

Sputnik version to fight Delta strain to be launched soon

A version of Sputnik V vaccine, developed by Russia's Gamaleya Research Institute of Epidemiology and Microbiology, which can target the Delta variant is slated to be launched "soon", a report in The Indian Express said. This versionwhich will be provided as a booster shotwill be offered to other vaccine makers, according to the Russian Direct Investment Fund. Read more
A commentary on the website of medical journal 'Lancet' has recommended eight measures India needs to take to prevent a resurgence of Covid-19 infections. The commentary, authored by 21 experts, includes Biocon's Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, cardiac surgeon Dr Devi Shetty and microbiologist Gagandeep Kang.

The measures they suggested include decentralisation of essential health services, a transparent pricing policy and wider dissemination of clear and evidence-based information on the management of Covid-19, among others.

The eight points recommended by the experts:

1. The organisation of essential health services must be decentralised. A one-size-fits-all approach is untenable since the numbers of COVID-19 cases and health services differ substantially from district to district.

2. There must be a transparent national pricing policy and caps on the prices of all essential health serviceseg, ambulances, oxygen, essential medicines, and hospital care. Hospital care should not require any out-of-pocket expenditure and costs should be covered by existing health insurance schemes for all people, as has been done in some states. All local governments must be allocated their grants as recommended by the Fifteenth Finance Commission8 to ensure they have the resources to augment COVID-19-related health services in their jurisdictions.

3. Clear, evidence-based information on the management of COVID-19 must be more widely disseminated and implemented. This information should include suitably adapted international guidelines9 for home care and treatment, primary care, and district hospital care in local languages that incorporate local circumstances and clinical practice. The guidance must also emphasise what not to do,10 and ensure that only evidence-based therapeutics are used.

4. All available human resources across all sectors of the health system, including the private sector, must be marshalled for the COVID-19 response and adequately resourced, particularly with sufficient personal protective equipment, guidance on the use of clinical interventions, insurance, and mental health support.

5. Central systems to procure and distribute Covid-19 vaccines free of cost should be established in a departure from the current policy of decentralised procurement through state governments.15 Such an approach would optimise prices and minimise cross-state inequities that may result from differential fiscal and capacity contexts.

6. Community engagement and public participation must lie at the heart of India's COVID-19 response. Grassroots civil society has historically had a crucial role in people's participation in health care and other development activities, such as in strengthening the Covid-19 response in Mumbai.

7. There must be transparency in government data collection and modelling to enable districts to proactively prepare for the likely caseloads in the coming weeks. Health system personnel require data on age and sex disaggregated COVID-19 cases, hospitalisations, and mortality rates; community-level coverage of vaccination; and community-based tracking of the effectiveness of Covid-19 treatment protocols and long-term outcomes.

8. The profound suffering and risk to health caused by loss of livelihoods should be minimised by making provisions for cash transfers by the state to workers in India's vast informal economy who have lost their jobs, as is being done by some state governments. Formal sector employers must be required to retain all workers, irrespective of the status of contracts, through a government commitment to offer compensation to these companies when the economy revives.
Lt Governor Tamilisai Soundararajan on Friday said Puducherry did not have a shortage or lack of vaccines to cover all the eligible people in the fight against COVID-19.

Talking to reporters at Raj Nivas here after handing over medical equipment to the Health Department, she said when there were reports of people facing difficulty in getting the jabs for want of adequate stock of the vaccine in several parts, Puducherry had full stock to meet the requirements.

The Prime Minister had also promised that more stocks would be distributed to states and union territories including Puducherry from June 21, she said.

"Hence, there is no shortage of medicines here," she said and asked the people to come forward and get vaccinated against

A special vaccination festival was in progress in 100 centres since June 16.

"I would only appeal to the people to get innoculated as vaccination alone is the most powerful weapon to combat the coronavirus," she said.

Stating that the Puducherry Health department was "battle ready" in case a third wave of COVID occurred, she said, "We are particularly keen to ensure that necessary facilities including beds and drugs are ready for the children in case they contracted the virus."



"Special beds for children were also being readied in hospitals as the requirements (of children) would be different from the elderly people," she added.

Tamilisai Soundararajan said the Pradhan Mantri Health insurance scheme for those coming under the below poverty line category was also being implemented in Puducherry.

There was an estimated1.91 lakh people identified to be eligible for the health insurance scheme.

Already 70,000 people have enrolled themselves for the scheme, she added.

The Lt Governor earlier declared open a Covid Care Centre on the premises of the Pondicherry University in neighbouring Kalapet.

She also handed over relief materials to economically backward families.

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Canada's National Advisory Committee on Immunization said Thursday people who got the vaccine as their first dose should get Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna for their second shot.

On June 1, committee had said recipients could" get or Moderna for their second shot if they wanted, but Thursday went further to say an mRNA vaccine was the preferred" choice.

Since the advisory committee "first looked at mixed vaccine schedules, new evidence is starting to emerge suggesting immune responses are better when a first dose of the vaccine is followed by an mRNA vaccine as a second dose,? said its vice-chair Dr. Shelley Deeks, in the new guidance documents.

The committee also updated its previous recommendation that people at high risk of exposure to, or serious illness from, COVID-19, could opt to get AstraZeneca rather than waiting for or Moderna. Now it says everyone should always get the mRNA vaccines first, unless they are allergic to them.

Deeks said the advice is based on the growing supply of and Moderna, and the risk of vaccine-induced blood clots associated with AstraZeneca. But she is still trying to reassure people who got one or two doses of AstraZeneca's vaccine that they are nevertheless well protected.

Anyone who has already received two doses of AstraZeneca/Covishield can rest assured that they are protected, particularly against severe illness, she said. "There is no need for a third dose at this time.?



Dr. Theresa Tam, the chief public health officer of Canada, said the new evidence in favor of mixing different types of vaccines included four studies in Germany.

"It's really the immunogenicity, that immune response, after that mixed-dose schedule that's resulted in NACI updating this recommendation, because all the accumulated studies essentially suggest that immune response is a better response,? said Tam at a news conference in Ottawa.

One of those studies from Germany's Saarland University, published early data Wednesday saying giving Pfizer as the second dose after AstraZeneca, or two doses of Pfizer only, generated far more antibodies and T cells as two doses of AstraZeneca.

Almost 25 million Canadians have now received at least one dose of vaccine, and almost 6 million are now fully vaccinated. As of June 5, 2.1 million people had received one dose of AstraZeneca, and 15,186 had received two doses.

There are no further shipments of AstraZeneca currently scheduled, but there are about 600,000 doses still left from previous deliveries.

There are 14 million doses of Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna being delivered this week and next, including a donation of 1 million doses of Moderna's COVID-19 vaccine from the United States that was to arrive in Thursday night.

(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.)
Chief Minister on Thursday released a feature film made by the prisons department and claimed that the jail system in the state is better compared with other parts of the country.

It is the endeavour of his government to take concrete steps to maintain a healthy environment in the jails, he said, suggesting officials to make arrangements for the placement of the prisoners who complete their sentence to help them earn their livelihood.

This will make it easier to connect the prisoners with the mainstream, he said while addressing a virtual event.

In the programme, he released a feature film, Road to Reform, made by the prisons department.

He said good treatment to prisoners in the jails paves the way for improvement in their lives.

He appreciated the initiative of making the film, saying this will motivate the prisoners. DG (Prisons) Rajiv Dasot and other officials were also present on the occasion.

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The issue of reading down of anti-terror law UAPA is important and can have pan-India ramifications, the said on Friday, making it clear that the Delhi High Court verdicts granting bail to three student activists in northeast Delhi riots case will not be used as a precedent by courts in the country.

A vacation bench of Justice Hemant Gupta and Justice V Ramasubramanian termed as troubling that the high court has written over 100 pages discussing the entire anti-terror law UAPA while deciding the bail applications in the case and said it will require interpretation by the apex court.

The apex court agreed to hear the appeals filed by challenging the HC verdicts and issued notices to JNU students Natasha Narwal and Devangana Kalita and Jamia student Asif Iqbal Tanha seeking their responses.

While refusing to stay the high court verdicts granting bail to the three accused, the bench said these judgements will not be treated as a precedent by any party before any court.

In the meantime, the impugned judgment shall not be treated as a precedent and may not be relied upon by any of the parties in any of the proceedings. It is clarified that the release of the respondents (Narwal, Kalita and Tanha) on bail is not being interfered at this stage, the bench said in its order.

Issue notice, it said, adding, Let the counter affidavits be filed within four weeks. List in the week commencing July 19, 2021 on a non-miscellaneous day.





ALSO READ: HC extends activist Stan Swamy's stay at private hospital till July 5

The bench took note of Solicitor General Tushar Mehtas submission that the UAPA has been turned upside down by the high court in granting bail in the case.

We would like to issue notice and hear the other side, it added.

Mehta urged the apex court to stay the high court verdicts saying the findings arrived at in these judgements virtually record acquittal for these accused and other accused would also seek bail relying on them.

The way the Act has been interpreted, probably it will require interpretation by the That is why we are issuing notice, the bench said.

Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for the student activists, said there is no doubt that the apex court should consider the ramifications and interpretation of the UAPA so that there is a judgement on the issue from the top court.

We are dealing with bail applications, Sibal said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Amid a tussle between the Union government and over the new IT rules, members of a parliamentary panel on Friday strongly objected to India officials' observations that they abide by their policy and categorically told them that the rule of land is supreme.

According to sources, members of the Parliamentary Panel on Information Technology also asked why it should not be fined as it has been found "violating" rules of the country.

Earlier this month, the Centre issued a notice to Twitter giving it one last chance to "immediately" comply with the new IT rules and warned that failure to adhere to the norms will lead to the platform losing exemption from liability under the IT Act.

The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Information and Technology, chaired by Congress leader Shashi Tharoor, had last week summoned Twitter over issues related to misuse of the platform and protection of citizens' rights.





ALSO READ: Reading down UAPA may have pan-India ramifications: Supreme Court

Twitter India's public policy manager Shagufta Kamran and legal counsel Ayushi Kapoor deposed before the panel on Friday.

Members of the panel asked some tough and searching questions to Twitter India officials but there answers lacked clarity and were ambiguous, sources said.

They strongly objected to the observation of Twitter India officials that its policy is on par with the rule of land and categorically told them "rule of land is supreme, not your policy", sources said.



ALSO READ: Ghaziabad Police summons Twitter India MD Manish Maheshwari over video

"We appreciate opportunity to share our views before Standing Committee on IT. Twitter stands prepared to work with the Committee on important work of safeguarding citizens' rights online in line with our principles of transparency, freedom of expression, and privacy," said Twitter spokesperson.

Twitter and the Centre have been at loggerheads over several issues for the last few months.

The microblogging site had faced backlash when it briefly removed the 'blue tick' verification badge from the personal account of Vice-President M Venkaiah Naidu and of several senior RSS functionaries, including its chief Mohan Bhagwat.

Earlier, Delhi Police had sent a notice to Twitter, seeking an explanation of how it described an alleged "Congress toolkit" against the Central government as manipulated media.

The police reportedly had also questioned Twitter India MD Manish Maheshwari on May 31 and visited the Twitter India offices in Delhi and Gurgaon on May 24 over the toolkit 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.)
The UN refugee agency says war, violence, persecution and human rights violations caused nearly 3 million people to flee their homes last year, even though the COVID-19 crisis restricted movement worldwide as countries shut borders and ordered lockdowns.

In its latest Global Trends report released on Friday, UNHCR says the cumulative total of displaced people has risen to 82.4 million roughly the population of Germany. It marks the ninth straight annual increase in the number of people forcibly displaced.

Filippo Grandi, the high commissioner for refugees, said conflict and the impact of climate change in places such as Mozambique, Ethiopia's Tigray region and Africa's broad Sahel area were among the leading sources of new movements of and internally displaced people in 2020.

They added hundreds of thousands more people to the overall count, which has for years been dominated by the millions who have fled countries such as Syria and Afghanistan due to protracted wars or fighting.

This is telling, in a year in which we were all locked down, confined, blocked in our homes, in our communities, in our cities, said Grandi in an interview before the report's release. Almost 3 million people have had to actually leave all that behind because they had no other choice.

UNHCR, which has its headquarters in Geneva, said that 99 of the more than 160 countries that closed their borders because of COVID-19 didn't make exceptions for people seeking protection as or asylum-seekers.

Grandi acknowledged the possibility that many internally displaced people who couldn't leave their own countries will eventually want to flee abroad once borders start reopening, if the pandemic eases.

A good example is the United States where already we have seen a surge in people arriving in recent months, Grandi said, and referred to the U.S. provision called Title 42 that let U.S. authorities temporarily block people seeking asylum from entry for health reasons.

Title 42 will be lifted eventually and I think this is the right thing to do but this will have to be managed.

Asked about U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris' recent trip to Central America, where she told would-be migrants to the U.S. do not come, Grandi expressed hope that the remark was not reflective of overall U.S. policy.

"I think that messaging indeed, as it was reported, is stark, and maybe shows only one part of the picture now, Grandi said, adding that he had heard a more complex response from other officials in Washington when he was there recently.

Among recent hotspots, Grandi said hundreds of thousands of people were newly displaced in Mozambique and the Sahel last year, and up to 1 million in the Tigray conflict that started in October.

I'm worried that if the international community is not able to stop these conflicts, we will continue to see the rise in the numbers, he said.

The report said that at the end of last year there were 5.7 million Palestinians, 3.9 million Venezuelans and an additional 20.7 million from various other countries displaced abroad. Another 48 million people were internally displaced in their own countries. Some 4.1 million more sought asylum.

Turkey, a neighbor of Syria, has taken in the most refugees in absolute numbers 3.7 million a figure more that twice that of the No. 2 host country, Colombia, which borders Venezuela. Afghanistan's neighbor Pakistan was third.

UNHCR said now 1 per cent of all humanity is displaced, and there are twice as many forcibly displaced people than a decade ago. Some 42 per cent of them were aged under 18, and nearly 1 million babies were born as refugees between 2018 and 2020.

Many of them may remain refugees for years to come, it said.

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The Ghaziabad Police has sent a notice to the India Managing Director, asking him to join a probe in the case involving an assault on a Muslim man here, officials said Friday.

has been asked to appear at the Loni Border police station here within seven days to get his statement recorded in the case in which as FIR was lodged against the social media giant, a police official said.

The Ghaziabad Police Tuesday booked Twitter, news website The Wire, besides some journalists and Congress leaders over circulation of a video in which an elderly Muslim man says he was thrashed and asked to chant 'Jai Shri Ram' on June 5. The police claim the video was shared to cause communal unrest.

They have maintained the incident took place because the accused were unhappy over the 'tabeez' (amulets) sold to them by the man, Abdul Shamad Saifi.

The FIR names Inc, Communications India, news website The Wire, journalists Mohammed Zubair and Rana Ayyub, Congress leaders Salman Nizami, Maskoor Usmani, Shama Mohamed and writer Saba Naqvi.

(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 Uttar Pradesh Police on Thursday sent a legal notice to the Managing Director of India Manish Maheshwari regarding the viral video of the assault on an elderly man in Loni. The MD has been asked to record his statement after the microblogging site "let the anti-social messages go viral".

According to the legal notice, the managing director has been asked to come to the Police Station Loni Border and record the statement over the matter within seven days.

"Some people used their handle as a tool to spread hatred in the society and Communication India and Twitter Inc did not take any action against it. They let the anti-social messages go viral," the notice sent to the managing director read.

This comes after when Twitter has lost its status as an intermediary platform in India as it does not comply with new IT rules. According to the sources, Twitter is the only social media platform among the mainstream that has not adhered to the new laws.

Now, instead of being considered just a platform hosting content from various users, Twitter will be held directly editorially responsible for posts published on its platform.

The implication of this development is that if there is any charge against Twitter for alleged unlawful content it would be treated as a publisher - not an intermediary - and be liable for punishment under any law, including IT Act, as also the penal laws of the country, sources stated.

Earlier, a senior-level team of Delhi Police's Special Cell questioned the Twitter India managing director Manish Maheshwari at Bengaluru over the 'Congress toolkit case' matter on May 31.

The Delhi Police had earlier sent a notice to Twitter, seeking an explanation from the microblogging platform to explain the rationale and share all the information on how it described the toolkit as manipulated media.

The police had also visited the Twitter India offices in Lado Sarai, Delhi and Gurgaon on May 24 with the notice over the tagging some of the posts on an alleged Congress "toolkit" against the Central government, as "manipulated media".

The Uttar Pradesh Police had confirmed that there is no communal angle in the incident in Loni and arrested five accused of assaulting the 72-year-old man. The police also stated that action would also be taken against the complainant for providing wrong facts.

The on Tuesday filed FIR against nine entities, including Twitter India in connection with the Loni incident.

In the FIR, the Police had said, "There is no communal angle to the incident in Loni where a man was thrashed and his beard was chopped off. The following entities -- The Wire, Rana Ayyub, Mohammad Zubair, Dr Shama Mohammed, Saba Naqvi, Maskoor Usmani, Salman Nizami -- without checking the fact, started giving communal colour to the incident on Twitter and suddenly they started spreading messages to disrupt the peace and bring differences between the religious communities.

(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 on Thursday (local time) upheld the ObamaCare, or the Affordable Care Act (ACA) against the latest Republican challenge, allowing millions to keep their health insurance coverage amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

In a 7-2 decision, the nation's highest court ruled that the GOP challengers lacked standing to sue, in a decision that marks the third major challenge to ObamaCare, to be rebuffed by the Supreme Court in roughly a decade, thus preserving the landmark law and its key protections for millions of people with preexisting health conditions.

The case arose after 18 Republican states brought a legal challenge in 2018 aimed at striking down the ACA.

Led by Texas, the Grand Old Party (GOP) challengers focused on the tax penalty meant to induce the purchase of health insurance by most Americans. They argued that former President Trump's 2017 tax cut, which zeroed out the penalty, made that provision unconstitutional.

Without the tax penalty, they argued, effectively lost its constitutional footing, requiring its invalidation by the court.

But the justices did not even address those issues in their decision.

"We do not reach these questions of the Act's validity, however, for Texas and the other plaintiffs in this suit lack the standing necessary to raise them," Justice Stephen Breyer wrote for the majority.

However, the lower courts had largely sided with the Republican states but agreed to delay enforcement of the ruling while appeals played out. ObamaCare's defenders, comprising a coalition of 20 blue states and the Democratic-led House, appealed to the Supreme Court, as per The Hill.

The Justice Department under Trump backed the GOP states in urging the justices to strike down the law. But the Biden administration reversed course. The Biden administration recently announced that a record 31 million people were covered under the law.

Since the appointment of former US President Donald Trump in 2017, the Republican government had tried to strike down several times.

In 2017, a federal judge in Texas had struck down the Affordable Care Act, terming it "unconstitutional." The judge stated that its mandate requiring people to buy health insurance is unconstitutional and the rest of the law cannot stand without it, CNN reported. In July, the Senate had voted to repeal the Obamacare medical device tax and in the same year, Trump had vowed to repeal and replace Obamacare after the Republican tax cut bill is signed into law.

(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.)
CureVacs setback shows not all mRNA vaccines are equal

Having seen the successes of Pfizer and Moderna vaccines against coronavirus, there was widespread hope among scientists and experts in general about the revolutionary messenger-RNA technology. However, the Curevac vaccine's weak results (only about 47 per cent efficacy in interim analysis), based on the same mRNA tech, came as a shock to many. It also shows that not all mRNA vaccines can produce promising results. The German biotech firm made some crucial choices that set its candidate apart and experts say key differences between the vaccines probably played a major role in CureVacs disappointing show. One key element was dosage. CureVac executives said they probably werent using enough mRNA to elicit strong immunity. The low dosage was necessary because the company was using a different type of mRNA from the kind in rival shots, and higher amounts would have raised the risk of side effects. Read here

Let's look at the global statistics

Global infections: 177,438,001

Global deaths: 3,842,377

Vaccine doses administered: 2,489,796,449

Nations with most cases: US (33,508,905), India (29,762,793), Brazil (17,702,630), France (5,811,461), Turkey (5,354,153).

Source: John Hopkins Coronavirus Research Center

Expats in Singapore, Hong Kong watch with envy as world opens up

With the European Union and United States opening up, businesses and expatriates in Singapore and Hong Kong are starting to feel restless after seeing more than a year of restrictions. Tighter borders and quarantines, along with sustained local lockdowns, are taking a toll. For Singapore, the extended closure has diminished its stature as host for high-profile global events and a travel hub via one of the worlds top-rated airports, particularly after winning plaudits for its early handling of the virus. Hong Kong has the added pressure of Beijings tightening grip. A survey by the American Chamber of Commerce last month showed more than 40 per cent of its members might leave Hong Kong, highlighting concerns over a China-imposed national security law and the handling of the pandemic. Read here

The Maldives lured tourists back; now it needs nurses

As cases exploded last month, Maldives, an archipleageo of about 1,200 islands in the Indian ocean, found itself in no man's land. The result of the devastating outbreak is the strain it puts on health systems and frontline workers, as was the case across the world. Many countries had resorted to recruiting medical students to make up for the shortfall, in order to deal with the crisis. Maldives, cant easily call up masses of students because it has only one university with a school of medicine. And it cant rely solely on its citizens, because its health care system depends largely on foreign workers. The result is that the Maldives, which has otherwise tackled the pandemic with meticulous attention to detail, isnt sure how to staff its hospitals for the next crisis. Read here

Previous Covid infection may not offer long-term protection, study finds

Previous infection with does not necessarily protect against Covid in the longer term, especially when caused by new variants of concern, a study on healthcare workers suggests. Researchers at Oxford University found marked differences in the immune responses of medical staff who contracted Covid, with some appearing far better equipped than others to combat the disease six months later. Scientists, who conducted the study, said the findings reinforced the importance of everyone getting vaccinated regardless of whether they had been infected with the virus earlier in the pandemic. Read here
XLRI- Xavier School of Management, Jamshedpur has been ranked among the top 47 global spread across 21 countries in Positive Impact Rating (PIR) 2021.

The result of the second edition of the Positive Impact Rating 2021 was launched at the World Economic Forum in Lucerne-Burgenstock, Switzerland on Thursday.

"XLRI, Jamshedpur has reached the topmost level 5 (Pioneering Business Schools) among 47 participating located in four continents and 21 countries in the second edition of Positive Impact Rating 2021... XLRI is the only Business School in the world to have moved up from Level 3 (progressing schools) to the topmost Level 5(Pioneering Business Schools) within a year," a statement from XLRI said.

Antonio Haulte, Executive Director, UN Global Compact Switzerland, said business can be a force for good, and this is strengthened by students who are the next generation of business leaders.

The PIR supports to prioritise responsible management UN Global Compact and PRME principles strongly support these ambitions, he added.

The Positive Impact Rating is a rating by students and for students, measuring the positive impact of business schools and how business schools contribute to solving societal challenges by energising the school and its culture besides contributing as a lever of change for transformation in business schools.

Fr Paul Fernandes, Director, XLRI remarked, "For over seven decades, XLRI has steadfastly held on to its mission of proffering world-class and ethics-driven teaching while nurturing responsible global leaders for the greater common good and a sustainable future. The PIR rating inspires us to work more diligently towards attaining our Vision and Mission."



He said the millennial B-School students across the world have got a unique opportunity to evaluate their own business schools on how it is solving societal and sustainable challenges, and how they perceive their institution's positive impact on the community and society at large.

"This marks a paradigm shift towards fostering a collaborative ecosystem and making the process of management more meaningful and serve as a tool for continually improving the business schools, especially in a world that is still suffering as a consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic", he added.

"While traditional business school rankings in India and abroad have not shown significant engagement in integrating sustainability and social impact, the PIR has a clear focus on the social impact of business schools. The Covid-19 pandemic is an inflection point for B-Schools. Business schools have to re-orient and re-invent themselves to the new reality and step up their role as positive change agents in addition to their traditional role of supporting business and the economy," said Sunil Varughese, Chief Brand & Sustainability Officer at XLRI.

XLRI, Jamshedpur is a premier, private management institute in India founded in 1949 by Fr Quinn Enright, in the 'steel city' of Jamshedpur.

Over the last seven decades, the institute has grown into a top- ranking business management school of international repute with a wide portfolio of management programmes and research publications.

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The country's reserves surged by USD 3.074 billion to reach a record high of USD 608.081 billion in the week ended June 11, the latest data from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) showed on Friday.

The reserves had increased by USD 6.842 billion to USD 605.008 billion in the previous week ended June 4, 2021.

In the reporting week ended June 11, the rise in reserves was on account of an increase in foreign currency assets (FCA), a major component of the overall reserves, the RBI's weekly data showed.

FCA rose by USD 2.567 billion to USD 563.457 billion, as per the data.

Expressed in dollar terms, the foreign currency assets include the effect of appreciation or depreciation of non-US units like the euro, pound and yen held in the reserves.

After declining in the previous week, the gold reserves rose by USD 496 million to USD 38.101 billion in the reporting week, according to the data.

The special drawing rights (SDRs) with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) declined by USD 1 million to USD 1.512 billion.

The country's reserve position with the IMF increased by USD 11 million to USD 5.011 billion in the reporting week, the data showed.

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The (RBI) has given in-principle approval to Centrum Financial Services Ltd (CFSL) to set up a small bank (SFB), which will take over the beleaguered Punjab and Maharashtra Cooperative Bank (PMC Bank).

Jaspal Bindra-led Centrum Capital, the holding entity for CFSL, and its partner BharatPe, a payments system company, will infuse Rs 1,800 crore into the small bank.

It will get 120 days to commence operations. The amalgamation with is a separate process that would involve a notification of the scheme by the government, said Bindra, executive chairman, Centrum Capital.

Centrum Capital is a BSE-listed entity and its shares closed 8.3 per cent higher at Rs 50.25 per share on the stock exchange.

Bindra said in the first year the partners would put in Rs 900 crore, which will be used for starting the business and acquiring The second round of equity funding of Rs 900 crore will happen in the following year.





ALSO READ: Ray of hope for PMC depositors as Centrum roped in for revival

The in-principle approval has been given to Centrum in accordance with the offer it made in response to the expression of interest (EoI) to take over PMC Bank, the said in a statement.

The consortium of Centrum and BharatPe had expressed an interest in taking over According to reports, both Centrum and BharatPe will hold 50 per cent in the small bank and the assets and liabilities of the multistate cooperative bank will be transferred to it.



BharatPe is delighted at the opportunity to build a high-performing technology-led small finance bank serving the payment, investment, and credit needs of the under-served, said Ashneer Grover, chief executive officer and co-founder, BharatPe.

PMC Bank was placed under curbs in September 2019. Its administrator had floated an expression of interest on November 3, 2020, inviting investors for revival/reconstruction. Initially, four investors had shown an interest and three of them participated in further process.

In 2019-20, PMC Banks deposits stood at Rs 10,727.12 crore with advances at Rs 4,472.78 crore. The bank posted a net loss of Rs 6,835 crore with net worth at a negative Rs 5,850.61 crore.





ALSO READ: RBI has given us 120 days to operationalise SFB: Centrum's Jaspal Bindra

The had placed the bank under restrictions in 2019 following revelations of alleged irregularities in certain loan accounts.

On March 26, the had extended the spell of curbs for three months beginning from April 1, 2021, to June 30, 2021. Given the financial condition of PMC Bank, the process is complex and is likely to take some more time. The process of reconstruction will start as soon as the objectives are achieved to the best possible extent, the RBI said.

Meanwhile, Centrum Capital is planning to raise equity capital through a rights issue or a private placement (including but not limited to a qualified institutional placement).

It will also look at raising up to Rs 1,000 crore through non-convertible debentures (NCDs). The board of Centrum Capital is meeting on June 22 to consider proposals for equity share and debentures issuance.
is claiming victory in a court tussle with the European Union over allegations that the vaccine-maker was not producing shots fast enough.

said in a statement Friday that the EU's executive branch, the European Commission, had requested that the drug-maker deliver 120 million vaccine doses in total by the end of June 2021, but that a judge in Brussels ordered delivery of 80.2 million doses by 27 September 2021.

was seen as a key pillar of the 27-member EU's vaccine rollout. Its contract with the Commission foresaw an initial 300 million doses being distributed, with an option for another 100 million.

The judgement also acknowledged that the difficulties experienced by AstraZeneca in this unprecedented situation had a substantial impact on the delay, the company said.

AstraZeneca now looks forward to renewed collaboration with the European Commission to help combat the pandemic in Europe.
Concern for the future of Myanmars deposed leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, is mounting after her appearance in a purpose-built courtroom in the countrys capital Naypyidaw at the start of what is expected to be a seven-week trial. Since the coup on February 1, little has been seen of Aung San Suu Kyi, and her future appears uncertain after the initial court proceedings.

Initially charged with the illegal possession of walkie-talkies, charges against the pro-democracy leader have escalated dramatically. She now stands accused of various counts of corruption that, if she is found guilty, could result in what is effectively a life sentence.

On February 1, at what should have been the opening of the new parliament, the military detained alongside the leaders of her party, the National League for Democracy (NLD). The sparked outrage across the world  but curiously, the military claims the putsch was legal. Sections of the 2008 constitution allow the military to declare a state of emergency if there is an insurgency or an attempt at taking over power unlawfully and by force.

If the can be legal, questions must be raised over the fairness of Aung San Suu Kyis trial.

An independent judiciary?

Since 2008, has been struggling through a transition to democracy after more than 60 years of military rule. Landslide victories for the NLD in 2015, and again in 2020, were both assessed as free and fair. But the transition has been far from linear and one of the core causes for concern has remained the issue of rule of law, which should be providing checks and balances and enshrine citizen rights at the centre of the government.

Read more: Myanmar coup: how the military has held onto power for 60 years

But the 2008 constitution in has instead enshrined and protected the military, which remains in control of key departments and has a quota of reserved seats in all houses of parliament. As already noted, it also provides for the army to assume power legally in a sufficiently severe crisis. Crucially, the constitution leaves it for the military to be the judge of what constitutes a crisis.

The judiciary is nominally independent, but almost all of the lawyers, judges and court officials were trained under the military  and many have a military background. Corruption has remained a consistent feature at all levels of the court system. My PhD research shows that few citizens are able to access court services or progress court proceedings until the relevant bribes are paid. Meanwhile, courts are overwhelmed with the number of cases, prisoners and proceedings brought by the military.

Research suggests the law is seen as an undesirable profession in Myanmar and those that do pursue it are rarely able to effectively support their clients through the court for various reasons, including a lack of funding and arbitrary practices such as prisoner transfers and random changes of trial dates.

The judiciary remains highly reliant on the military, which will often outline the outcome of cases for the judges before the case is heard. It was nominally provided with independence in the 2008 constitution, but in practice, it is anything but. The murder Ko Ni is widely seen as an indication of what can happen to lawyers who defy the will of the military.

The trial of Aung San Suu Kyi

faces seven separate indictments, ranging from the initial charge of illegally importing walkie-talkies to the much more serious charges of breaking the Official Secrets Act and committing corruption using her rank for allegedly accepting over US$600,000 (430,000) and 11kg of gold in bribes, based on allegations by the detained former chief minister of Yangon.

It is these more recent charges that pose the greatest concerns, as they hold sentences of up to 14 and 15 years, respectively. The former leader turns 76 on June 19, so if found guilty on these counts she will be effectively sentenced to life in prison. Her lawyers claim such charges to be bogus and politically motivated and are aimed at keeping her out of and the public eye.

The pre-court proceedings  as well as the first week of the trial  suggest she is very unlikely to have a fair trial. Though she does have a legal team, she has only met with them three times since she was arrested. Public and media access has been restricted and the only attendees permitted are court officials, judges, prosecution and and her defence team. The police and security presence has been increased around Naypyidaw.

What is really concerning is the way charges against Aung San Suu Kyi have mounted over the past few weeks. It feels reminiscent of her period of incarceration between 1989 and 2012, when she was held in almost continual house arrest after her party won elections in 1990. Each time she was released, there would be a new reason to return her to detention in her Yangon home.

This suggests two things. First, that the regime has form for using the constitution to legally silence opposition. And, second, that while there may be nominal rule of law under Myanmars 2008 constitution, it exists as a tool for  rather than a limit on  the military.

Anna Plunkett, PhD Candidate, Department of War Studies, King's College London

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
US President Joe Bidens executive order aimed at safeguarding Americans sensitive data would force some Chinese apps to take tougher measures to protect private information if they want to remain in the countrys market, according to people familiar with the matter.

The goal is to keep foreign adversaries like China and Russia from gaining access to large amounts of personal and proprietary business information. The US Department of Commerce may issue subpoenas to collect information about certain smartphone, tablet and desktop computer software applications. Then the agency may negotiate conditions for their use in the United States or ban the apps, according to people familiar with the matter.

Bidens June 9 order replaced former President Donald Trump's 2020 bans against the popular Chinese applications WeChat, owned by Tencent Holdings, and ByteDances US courts halted those bans.

US officials share many of the concerns Trump cited in his order banning TikTok, according to one person familiar with the matter. Notably, they fear that China could track the locations of US government employees, build dossiers of personal information for blackmail and conduct corporate espionage.

While the new order does not name companies, it could end up capturing more apps than the Trump bans and hold up better if challenged in court. Reuters is the first to report details on how the Biden administration plans to implement the order, including seeking support from other countries.

US officials have begun speaking with allies about adopting a similar approach, one source said. The hope is that partner countries will agree on apps that should be banned.

US Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo will decide which apps to target for US action, but they must meet certain criteria.

For instance, they must be owned, controlled or managed by a person or entity that supports the military or intelligence activities of a foreign adversary, such as China or Russia.

If Raimondo decides an app poses an unacceptable risk, she has the discretion to notify the parties" directly or publish the information in the government's official daily publication, the Federal Register, a Commerce Department spokesman said. will then have 30 days to object or propose measures to secure data better.
The Delta variant of COVID-19, first identified in India, is becoming the globally dominant variant of the disease, the World Health Organization's chief scientist said on Friday.



Soumya Swaminathan also voiced disappointment in the failure of CureVac's vaccine candidate in a trial to meet the WHO's efficacy standard, in particular as highly transmissible variants boost the need for new, effective shots.



Britain has reported a steep rise in infections with the Delta variant, while Germany's top public health official predicted it would rapidly become the dominant variant there despite rising vaccination rates.



The Kremlin blamed a surge in COVID-19 cases on reluctance to have vaccinations and "nihilism" after record new infections in Moscow, mostly with the new Delta variant, fanned fears of a third wave.



"The Delta variant is well on its way to becoming the dominant variant globally because of its increased transmissibility," Swaminathan told a news conference.



variants were cited by CureVac when the German company this week reported its vaccine proved only 47% effective at preventing disease, shy of the WHO's 50% benchmark.



The company said it documented at least 13 variants circulating within its study population.



Given that similar mRNA vaccines from Pfizer and BioNTech and Moderna posted efficacy rates topping 90%, Swaminathan said the world had been expecting more from CureVac's candidate.



"Just because it's another mRNA vaccine, we cannot presume all mRNA vaccines are the same, because each one has a slightly different technology," Swaminathan said, adding the surprise failure underscored the value of robust clinical trials to test new products.



WHO officials said Africa remains an area of concern, even though it accounts for only around 5% of new global infections and 2% of deaths.



New cases in Namibia, Sierra Leone, Liberia and Rwanda have doubled in the last week, WHO emergencies programme head Mike Ryan said, while vaccine access remains miniscule.



"It's a trajectory that is very, very concerning," Ryan said. "The brutal reality is that in an era of multiple variants, with increased transmissibility, we have left vast swathes of the population, the vulnerable population of Africa, unprotected by vaccines."

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
The plan of which will "supercharge investment, reform and growth throughout the country" has been endorsed by the (EU).

Under the Recovery and Resilience Plan dubbed " 2.0", the country will receive 30.5 billion euros from 2021 to 2026 (17.8 billion euros in grants and 12.7 billion euros in loans), Xinhua news agency reported.

The fund will be invested in such fields as green and digital transition, healthcare, and job creation, according to the plan unveiled by Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission (EC), and Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis on Thursday.

"There is no doubt it (the plan) will deeply transform Greek which will embrace the twin green and digital transition," von der Leyen said.

She said that all EU-member states will emerge stronger and more resilient.

"The recovery is underway, and we can start to look to the future with hope and with confidence."

On his part, Prime Minister Mitsotakis said that this was a historic moment for Europe and the dawn of a new era.

"The EU Commission's green light for Greece's ambitious 30.5 billion euro recovery plan will supercharge investment, reform and growth throughout the country. A game changer for generations to come.

"Our national plan is based on the spirit of European checks but also on four key pillars: the green transition, digital transformation, employment and social cohesion, and private investment by upgrading the production model.

"The ' 2.0' Plan contains 175 investments, projects and reforms. Together with the NSRF funds and private investments, the total funds that can be mobilised will reach 100 billion euros.

"In a seven-year horizon, they will create an additional 200,000 jobs," he said in a statement.

--IANS

ksk/

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has signed a contract to drill 96 oil wells in the West Qurna-1 oil field located in the southern province of Basra to raise the production, according to a statement by the Ministry of Oil.

The state-run Basra Oil Company and the contractors for the West Qurna-1 oil field, ExxonMobil company and the US' Schlumberger International, signed the contract on Thursday, reports xinhua news agency.

Minister of Oil Ihsan Abdul-Jabbar Ismail said during the signing ceremony that the contract "will increase oil production in the Qurna-1 oil field by 200,000 barrels per day (bpd) in the coming five years".

Meanwhile, Deputy Minister of Oil Karim Hattab said the current production in West Qurna-1 is 380,000 bpd out of a production capacity exceeding 500,000 bpd.

The oil field also produces around 150 million cubic feet of associated gas on a daily basis, he added.

Iraq's West Qurna-1 oil field, which holds more than 20 billion barrels of expected recoverable reserves, is among the largest in the world.

Iraq's economy heavily relies on export, which accounts for more than 90 per cent of the country's revenues.

--IANS

ksk/

(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 state-owned company Aerospace Industries (IAI) announced it will manufacture and deliver 69 tactical mobile radar systems to the German Army in a deal valued at 36 million euros.

The systems are IAI's WatchGuard, the fifth generation of motion-detection tactical ground surveillance radars, Xinhua news agency quoted the company as saying on Thursday.

Employing both staring and electronic-steering search techniques, the systems are expected to replace the aging legacy systems in the German army, the IAI said.

Featuring a high update rate, IAI's radar enables a high probability of target detection and tracking to support complex missions.

A combination of staring and scanning allows adapting and optimizing the radar operation for any scenario.

With the all-weather and day-night capability, the systems are able to undertake long-term reconnaissance and surveillance in large areas while occupying a small force footprint.

The systems intend to supply comprehensive information acquisition to determine threat potential and operational conditions.

The systems will be delivered by the IAI through its subsidiary Elta Systems and its partner German electronic and IT systems company ESG.

--IANS

ksk/

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North Korean leader Kim Jong Un ordered his government to be prepared for both dialogue and confrontation with the Biden administration but more for confrontation, state media reported Friday, days after the United States and urged the North to abandon its nuclear programme and return to talks.

Kim's statement indicates he'll likely push to strength his nuclear arsenal and increase pressure on Washington to give up what considers a hostile U.S. policy, though he'll also prepare for talks to resume, some experts say.

During an ongoing ruling party meeting Thursday, Kim analysed in detail the policy tendencies of the U.S. under President and clarified unspecified steps to be taken in relations with Washington, the Korean Central News Agency said.

Kim stressed the need to get prepared for both dialogue and confrontation, especially to get fully prepared for confrontation in order to protect the dignity of our state and its interests for independent development and to reliably guarantee the peaceful environment and the security of our state.

In 2018-19, Kim held a series of summits with then-President Donald Trump to discuss his advancing nuclear arsenal. But their negotiations fell apart after Trump rejected Kim's calls for extensive sanctions relief in return for a partial surrender of his nuclear capability.

Biden's administration has worked to formulate a new approach on North Korea's nuclear program that it describes as calibrated and practical.

Details of his policy haven't been publicized, but U.S. officials have suggested Biden would seek a middle ground between Trump's direct meetings with Kim and former President Barack Obama's strategic patience to curb Kim's nuclear program.

Earlier this week, leaders of the Group of Seven wealthy nations issued a statement calling for the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula and the verifiable and irreversible abandonment North Korea's nuclear and missile programs.

They called on to engage and resume dialogue and respect human rights conditions.

Kim has recently threatened to enlarge his nuclear arsenal and build high-tech weapons targeting the U.S. mainland if Washington refused to abandon its hostile policy on North Korea.

In March, Kim's military performed its first short-range ballistic missile tests in a year. But North Korea still maintains a moratorium on long-range missile and nuclear tests in an indication that Kim still wants to keep prospects for diplomacy alive.

Kwak Gil Sup, head of One Korea Center, a website specializing in North Korea affairs, wrote on Facebook that Kim's statement suggested he's taking a two-track approach of bolstering military capability and preparing for talks. But he said Kim will more likely focus on boosting military strength and repeating his demand for the U.S. to withdraw its policy.

Kim said last week must stay on high alert "to fulfill its noble mission and duty of firmly defending the sovereignty and security of the country.

Analyst Cheong Seong-Chang at the private Sejong Institute in South Korea said North Korea will still likely return to talks but it won't accept a call for immediate, complete denuclearisation. He said North Korea may accede to a proposal to freeze its atomic program and partially reduce its nuclear arsenal in phased steps if the Biden administration relaxes sanctions and suspend its regular military drills with South Korea.

Kim called the ruling Workers' Party's Central Committee meeting taking place this week to review efforts to rebuild his economy, which has been severely crippled by pandemic border closings, mismanagement amid the U.S.-led sanctions, and storm damage to crops and infrastructure last year.

On Tuesday, Kim opened the meeting by warning of potential food shortages, urging officials to find ways to boost agricultural production because the country's food situation is now getting tense. He also urged the country to brace for extended COVID-19 restrictions, suggesting North Korea would extend its border closure and other steps despite the stress on its economy.

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Chinas decision to anoint a chip czar is the latest step to advance its It wont be a magic solution for all the challenges the nation faces in catching up to the U.S., Taiwan and South Korea.



Vice Premier Liu He is an obvious and worthy choice to spearhead the development of future semiconductor technologies. Hes headed Chinas technology reform since at least 2018 while his position within leader Xi Jinpings inner circle  he has been chief negotiator in U.S.- trade talks  ensures his recommendations get heard.

Liu is not an engineer. The Harvard-educated career bureaucrat is more of an expert in economics and industrial policy. These arent terrible skills to have, but it means the 69-year old will have to rely on experts when it comes to decisions in his remit: semiconductor materials, equipment and processes. Having acute judgment as to where he should guide financial and human resources will make all the difference.

Beijings track record on chips, so far, doesnt inspire confidence. Having set a goal in 2015 of sourcing 70% of its needs locally by 2025, the nation has managed to raise it from 10% to a mere 16%, and likely will struggle to hit 20% by that deadline. Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp., the nations flagbearer in manufacturing, is still around six years behind global leaders Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. and Samsung Electronics Corp. And those rivals arent sitting still. TSMC is set to invest $100 billion over the next three years to extend its outright dominance, while Samsung and Intel Corp. have announced bold spending plans to keep up.



Read More: China cuts taxes to spur semiconductor development after US sanctions

SMIC can barely squeeze a dime out of its $9 billion worth of property and equipment. In fact, over the past three years it made as much money from interest as it did from producing chips.

Since 2014, has invested a total of $51 billion into two separate national funds to help its domestic semiconductor players catch-up to overseas rivals. But instead of building towering chip giants, these policies have dug great money pits, including Tsinghua Unigroup Co., the commercial arm of the famous university of the same name and alma mater of Xi himself. The company has been burning through cash and sits on piles of debt to the point that bondholders ought to feel happy to recover 31% of their money.

The poor financial performance of SMIC and Unigroup indicate theres a very thin local market for the technology and factories has sunk all its money into. Beijing may try to push, prod or compel the nations leading companies to buy from these also-rans. Thats worked to some extent to encourage sectors such as autos or aerospace. But Huawei Technologies Co., Lenovo Group Ltd., Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. and their ilk are more likely to be held back by buying the current range of Chinese chips, which are far from state of the art. And that kind of consumption isnt likely to spur the to advance into world-beater status.

Thats not to say Lius plight is hopeless. Rather than merely catch-up, his chip strategy will be to explore areas rivals have yet to master in the hope that China can colonize these technologies before anyone has a foothold. Its the kind of moonshot approach that the Peoples Republic already practices. China last week released the first images taken on Mars as part of its Tianwen-1 interplanetary mission. That success, according to Beijing-based consultancy Trivium, validates the focus on pursuing leapfrog development: focusing on next-generation technologies where no country has a clear advantage.

Beijing is right to trumpet this success in space, and the results ought to boost morale within its struggling chip sector. Theres no evidence yet that that this leapfrog strategy can translate into semiconductors. But with a vice premier at the microchip helm, China is leaving itself no more excuses to fail.
Shares of companies controlled by Indian billionaire are set to record their biggest weekly losses ever. The six stocks cumulatively lost nearly 2 trillion Indian rupees ($26.98 billion) of value in four days through Thursday.

THE FUNDS

Indian newspaper Economic Times reported on Monday the accounts of three Mauritius-based funds, which are among the top foreign investors in companies, had been frozen by the National Securities Depository Ltd (NSDL).

The NSDL website showed accounts held by the three funds frozen as of May 31, among thousands of others, without citing a reason, according to a review by Reuters. The exact date of the freeze is unknown and the accounts remained frozen on Friday, according to the website.

DENIALS, CONTRADICTIONS

The firms, in identical statements issued to stock exchanges, rejected media reports, including in the Economic Times, as "blatantly erroneous."

The companies, which are in the businesses of operating airports and ports, power generation and transmission, coal and gas trading, said the accounts in which the funds hold Adani shares were not frozen.

NSDL and India's securities regulator SEBI did not respond to requests for comment from Reuters.

But a senior NSDL official, who declined to be identified, told Reuters on Monday the funds have multiple accounts and that the Adani shares were held in other accounts that were not frozen, adding that freeze was "not new".

The shares of the Adani companies however have continued to fall.

THE FUNDS

The three foreign funds - Albula Investment Fund, Cresta Fund and APMS Investment Fund - are all registered at the same address, according to the Mauritius financial regulator.

The funds cumulatively control 2.7% of all shares in the companies as on June 11, calculations based on an e-mail sent by Adani executive to NSDL and reviewed by Reuters showed.

A spokesman for the Adani Group did not immediately respond to questions on the shareholdings.

Two other Mauritius-based funds that are also investors in Adani companies - LTS Investment Fund and Asia Investment Corp - are also registered at the same address.

Reuters was unable to find a website for all five funds, and calls to the phone numbers provided to Mauritius regulators went unanswered.

The five funds deployed 94.4%-97.9% of their total capital in Adani companies' shares, data by Indian stocks analysis firm Trendlyne showed.

Reuters could not independently verify Trendlyne data.

Four of the six Adani stocks have a public shareholding of about 25% - the minimum level mandated by regulators for companies listed on Indian exchanges.

Indian stock exchange data shows most shares of Adani Group companies are held by trusts controlled by Adani. Foreign portfolio investors are the next largest shareholders, while retail and domestic investors typically control about 5%.

THE IMPACT

After falling 0.4-8.5% on Monday, the day of the Economic Times report, Adani group stocks fell between 7.7%-23% in the first four days this week, wiping out nearly a quarter of the gains in the year preceding this week.

The decline saw the firms' cumulative market capitalisation decline by over a sixth.

"I don't think the market is convinced with the quality of the clarification from the Adani group," Jimeet Modi, founder of Mumbai-based Samco Securities, told Reuters.

($1 = 74.0375 Indian rupees)

(Reporting by Sudarshan Varadhan in Chennai and Abhirup Roy in Mumbai; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)

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Shares of shuttered nosedived nearly 5 per cent on Friday after did not approve the carrier's financial results for the last two financial years.

The scrip of the airline, which has been undergoing insolvency resolution process for nearly two years, touched its lower price band of Rs 90.25 apiece on the BSE.

It declined nearly 5 per cent to end the day at Rs 90.30 apiece.

On the NSE also, similar trends were witnessed and the airline's shares dropped nearly 5 per cent to close at Rs 90.70 apiece.

On Friday, the 30-share BSE Sensex closed marginally higher.

of the company have rejected approval for its audited standalone financial statements for the financial years ended March 31, 2019 as well as March 31, 2020, according to regulatory filings.

The proposal to appoint Sharp and Tannan Associates, Chartered Accountants as statutory auditors has been cleared by the

Voting results of the company's annual general meeting held on June 15 was submitted to the stock exchanges on Thursday.

was not able to prepare its financial results on time as directors, CEO, CFO and various other top management personal had resigned before the resolution process began in June 2019.

The affairs of the shuttered airline is now being managed by insolvency resolution professional Ashish Chhawchharia.

Under the resolution process, Jalan Kalrock Consortium has emerged as the winning bidder for the airline and the National Company Law Tribunal's decision is awaited.

The airline suspended operations on April 17, 2019 due to financial distress. It had come a scheduled carrier in 1995.

It had started as an air taxi operator on May 5, 1993, with a fleet of four leased Boeing 737-300 aircraft. The airline, which got listed on domestic bourses in February 2005, operated its first international flight from Chennai to Colombo in March 2004.

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The offer received bids for 5.56 crore shares as against 1.44 crore shares on offer.

The initial public offer (IPO) of Krishna Institute of Medical Sciences received bids for 5.56 crore shares as against 1.44 crore shares on offer, according to the stock exchange data at 17:00 IST on Friday (18 June 2021). The issue was subscribed 3.86 times.

The issue opened for bidding on Wednesday, 16 June 2021, and it will close today, 18 June 2021. The price band for the IPO was set at Rs 815-825 per share.

The IPO comprised fresh issue of shares aggregating up to Rs 200 crore and an offer for sale of up to 2,35,60,538 equity shares from promoters and existing shareholders.

Ahead of the IPO, the company finalized allocation of 1,15,84,060 equity shares to anchor investors at Rs 825 per share aggregating to Rs 955.68 crore.

The company proposes to utilize the net proceeds of the fresh issue towards repayment/pre-payment, in full or part, of certain borrowings availed by the company and by subsidiaries viz KHKPL (KIMS Hospital Kurnool), SIMSPL (Saveera Institute of Medical Science) and KHEPL (KIMS Hospital Enterprises) amounting Rs 150 crore and balance towards general corporate purposes.

Total borrowing as on 31 March 2020, was at Rs 220.164 crore.

Krishna Institute of Medical Sciences (KIMS) is one of the largest corporate healthcare groups in Andhra Pradesh (AP) and Telangana in terms of number of patients treated and treatments offered. It provides multi-disciplinary integrated healthcare services, with a focus on primary, secondary & tertiary care in tier 2-3 cities and primary, secondary, tertiary, and quaternary healthcare in tier 1 cities.

The company operates 9 multi-specialty hospitals under the KIMS Hospitals brand, with an aggregate bed capacity of 3,064, including over 2,500 operational beds as of March 31, 2021, which is 2.2 times more beds than the second largest provider in AP and Telangana. It offers a comprehensive range of healthcare services across over 25 specialties and super specialties, including cardiac sciences, oncology, neurosciences, gastric sciences, orthopaedics, organ transplantation, renal sciences and mother & childcare.

The company reported a consolidated net profit of Rs 201.22 crore and total income of Rs 1329.94 crore in the twelve months ended on 31 March 2021.

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Nava Bharat Ventures fell 3.44% to Rs 110.75 after the company's consolidated net profit slipped 13.9% to Rs 159.4 crore on 14.9% decline in revenue to Rs 688.67 crore in Q4 FY21 over Q4 FY20.

Nava Bharat Ventures said its Q4 performance was marked by resurgence in Manganese Alloys both in domestic and export markets and improved merchant power rates through lEX affording the Company to register better PLFs in captive power plants in Telangana and Odisha and higher spreads.

The company said that shut down due to maintenance of one 150 MW unit at Maamba Collieries Limited, Zambia resulted in lower power generations. The coal mining business in Zambia received boost with 80% growth in revenue from external sales.

The company's consolidated profit before tax increased by nearly 10% to Rs 215.48 crore in Q4 FY21 from Rs 195.94 crore posted in Q4 FY20. EBITDA grew 7.7% to Rs 367.73 crore in Q4 FY21 as against Rs 341.37 crore in Q4 FY20. EBITDA margin improved to 53.4% in Q4 FY21 compared with 42.2% in Q4 FY20.

The company posted 3.8% rise in consolidated net profit to Rs 550.68 crore for the year ended March 2021 (FY21) as against 530.75 crore in the year ended March 2020 (FY20). Revenue declined 7.6% to Rs 2548.50 crore in FY21 over FY20.

Nava Bharat reduced its overall debt to Rs 3559.90 crore as of 31 March 2021 from 3644.10 crore on 31 March 2020.

Nava Bharat Ventures is a power focused company with interests in ferro alloys and healthcare.

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Vedanta Ltd is quoting at Rs 247.5, down 5.26% on the day as on 13:19 IST on the NSE. The stock jumped 135.15% in last one year as compared to a 52.16% rally in NIFTY and a 148.32% spurt in the Nifty Metal index.

Vedanta Ltd dropped for a fifth straight session today. The stock is quoting at Rs 247.5, down 5.26% on the day as on 13:19 IST on the NSE. The benchmark NIFTY is down around 0.66% on the day, quoting at 15587.55. The Sensex is at 52019.44, down 0.58%.Vedanta Ltd has lost around 12.45% in last one month.Meanwhile, Nifty Metal index of which Vedanta Ltd is a constituent, has eased around 5.44% in last one month and is currently quoting at 5095.1, down 2.64% on the day. The volume in the stock stood at 151.62 lakh shares today, compared to the daily average of 121.07 lakh shares in last one month.

The benchmark June futures contract for the stock is quoting at Rs 245.95, down 5.91% on the day. Vedanta Ltd jumped 135.15% in last one year as compared to a 52.16% rally in NIFTY and a 148.32% spurt in the Nifty Metal index.

The PE of the stock is 9.09 based on TTM earnings ending March 21.

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In 1982, the economist Mancur Olson set out to explain a paradox. West Germany and Japan endured widespread devastation during World War II, yet in the years after the war both countries experienced miraculous economic growth. Britain, on the other hand, emerged victorious from the war, with its institutions more intact, and yet it immediately entered a period of slow economic growth that left it lagging other European democracies. What happened?

In his book The Rise and Decline of Nations, Olson concluded that Germany and Japan enjoyed explosive growth precisely because their old arrangements had been disrupted. The devastation itself, and the forces of American occupation and reconstruction, dislodged the interest groups that had held back innovation. The old patterns that stifled experimentation were swept away. The disruption opened space for something new.

Something similar may be happening today. Covid-19 has disrupted daily American life in a way few emergencies have before. But it has also shaken things up and cleared the way for an economic boom and social revival.

Millions of endured grievous loss and anxiety during this pandemic, but many also used this time as a preparation period, so they could burst out of the gate when things opened up. After decades of slowing entrepreneurial dynamism, 4.4 million new businesses were started in 2020, by far a modern record. A report from Udemy, an online course provider, says that 38 per cent of workers took some additional training during 2020, up from only 14 per cent in 2019.

After decades in which consumption took preference over savings, socked away trillions of dollars in 2020, reducing their debt burdens to lows not seen since 1980 and putting themselves in a position to spend lavishly as things open up.

The biggest shifts, though, may be mental. People have been reminded that life is short. For over a year, many experienced daily routines that were slower paced, more rooted, more domestic. Millions of seem ready to change their lives to be more in touch with their values.

The economy has already taken off. Global economic growth is expected to be north of 6 per cent this year, and strong growth is expected to last at least through 2022. In late April, Tom Gimbel, who runs the recruiting and staffing firm LaSalle Network, told The Times: Its the best job market Ive seen in 25 years. We have 50 per cent more openings now than we did pre-Covid. Investors are pouring money into new ventures. During the first quarter of this year US start-ups raised $69 billion, 41 per cent more than the previous record, set in 2018.





Illustration by Binay Sinha

Already, this era of new creation seems to be rebalancing society in at least three ways:

First, power has begun shifting from employers to workers. In March, US manufacturing, for example, expanded at the fastest pace in nearly four decades. Companies are desperate for new workers. Between April 2020 and March 2021, the number of unemployed people per opening plummeted to 1.2 from 5.

Workers are in the drivers seat, for now, and they know it. The quit rate the number of workers who quit their jobs because they are confident they can get a better one  is at the highest in two decades. Employers are raising wages and benefits to try to lure workers back.

Second, there seems to be a rebalancing between cities and suburbs. Covid-19 accelerated trends that had been underway for a few years, with people moving out of big cities like New York and San Francisco to suburbs, and to rural places like Idaho and the Hudson Valley in New York. Many are moving to get work or because of economic distress, but others say they moved so they could have more space, lead slower-paced lives, be closer to family or interact more with their neighbours.

Finally, there seems to be a rebalancing between work and domestic life. Stanford economist Nicholas Bloom expects that even when the pandemic is over, the number of working days spent at home will increase to 20 per cent from 5 per cent in the prepandemic era.

While this has increased pressures on many women, millions of Americans who could work remotely found that they liked being home, dining every night with their kids, not hassling with the commute. We are apparently becoming a less work-obsessed and a more domestic society.

In 1910 the educator Henry Van Dyke wrote, The Spirit of America is best known in by one of its qualities  energy. That energy seemed to be fading away in recent years, as Americans came to move less and start new businesses less frequently. But the challenge of Covid-19 has summoned forth great dynamism, movement and innovation. Labour productivity rates have surged upward recently.

Americans are searching for ways to make more money while living more connected lives. Joel Kotkin, a professor of urban studies at Chapman University, points out that as the US population disperses, economic and cultural gaps between coastal cities and inland communities will most likely shrink. And, he says, as more and more immigrants settle in rural areas and small towns, their presence might reduce nativism and increase economic competitiveness.

People are shifting their personal lives to address common problems  loneliness and loss of community. Nobody knows where this national journey of discovery will take us, but the voyage has begun.
The BJP on Thursday decided to



hold demonstrations across next week in protest against the ruling "Trinamool Congress' violence" faced by its activists since assembly poll results were out on May 2, party sources said.

Protest demonstrations will be held in Kolkata on June 23 and in the districts on June 25.

Party sources said that the decision was made at a high-level meeting attended by central BJP leaders Shiv Prakash, Arvind Menon and Amit Malviya apart from state unit chief Dilip Ghosh.

Violence is being carried out against party supporters and their families forcing them to flee their homes and the administration is doing nothing to stop this, the BJP alleged.

"Thousands of our workers are still out of their homes. They are having a difficult time in the rains. The meeting took stock of the situation," Ghosh told reporters.

The MPs and MLAs of the party were asked to stay in their constituencies and take an active role in bringing back home BJP members and supporters who had fled.

The meeting also decided to observe International Yoga Day on June 21 at the state and district level following Covid-19 protocols and involve important personalities from different walks of life in the programmes, the sources said.

The meeting also dissected the reasons for the poll reverses by the party.

(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.)
BJP's in-charge Arun Singh on Thursday said that his conversations with party MLAs revolved around development works and did not veer towards change of leadership in the state "even once by mistake".

As Singh arrived in Bengaluru on Wednesday evening, some BJP leaders had described that his three-day stay in Bengaluru would be a "troubleshooting mission", while another section had claimed that "change of leadership in state" would be the primary agenda of a series of meetings to be held by him.

After a day-long meeting with party MLAs at the BJP state headquarters here, Singh told reporters he could hold discussions only with those leaders and MLAs who had sought a prior appointment.

"All these leaders spoke only about measures needed to be taken to strengthen the party in the state and discussion never veered towards change of leadership in the state," he said.

Ruling out the possibility of change of leadership in the state, he said that had he come here to discuss this issue, he would have met all MLAs instead of only those leaders who had sought an appointment.

"The very premise that I have come here to discuss change of leadership itself is a flawed one. There is no such reason to believe that anything needs to change here," he retorted.

He said that party MLAs were working hard at the grassroot level along with party workers during the pandemic and at the top, Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa and his ministers are working hard to find solutions to the issues that the pandemic is throwing on a day to day basis.

Singh said that there could be "one or two such leaders" who might be openly defying party discipline and making such statements but the BJP, being the biggest national party with crores of workers, their statements make no impact.

"BJP state unit President, Nalin Kumar Kateel will take care of those two or three leaders who are making such remarks... all of these leaders have come from other parties and they are not original BJP leaders," he said, in an indirect dig at Vijaypura MLA Basanagouda Patil Yatnal, Tourism Minister C.P. Yogeshwara and MLC, A.H. Vishwanath as these leaders have been openly criticising Yediyurappa and his son, B.Y. Vijayendra's "interference at all levels in the administration" for quite some time now.

"We are collecting enough evidence against these leaders who are trying to malign the image of our party before taking any concrete action," he said.

In response to a question, he said that he gathered more information about the strengths and weaknesses of opposition Congress and Janata Dal-S, "and how they were losing their workers at grassroot level". This would help the BJP in the 2023 elections, he said.

Nearly 40 MLAs, and 30 chairmen of state-run boards and corporations met Singh for one-on-one discussions.

--IANS

nbh/vd

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Prime Minister is likely to chair a meeting with all political parties from on June 24 as part of the Centre's initiatives to bolster political processes, including holding assembly elections, in the union territory, officials said here on Friday.

The meeting -- the first such exercise since the Centre announced the abrogation of Jammu and Kashmir's special status and its bifurcation into union territories in August 2019 -- is likely to be attended by Union Home Minister Amit Shah and other central leaders.

The central leadership has begun the process of inviting National Conference (NC) chief Farooq Abdullah, PDP chairperson Mehbooba Mufti, Altaf Bukhari of the Apni Party (JKAP), and People's Conference head Sajjad Lone for the discussion, the officials said.

Mehbooba told PTI Friday night that she had received a call from the Centre for a meeting on June 24. "I am yet to take a decision. I will discuss with my party members and take a final call," she said.

Both Abdullah and Mehbooba had served as chief minister of the erstwhile state of

Asked about the prospect of talks with the Centre, CPI(M) leader and spokesperson of the People's Alliance for Gupkar Declaration (PAGD) M Y Tarigami said there has been no word from New Delhi, but added that if it happens, it would be welcomed.

"We have never closed our doors for meaningful engagement with the Centre. Though I have no information about any dialogue, if it happens, it will be welcomed," Tarigami told PTI from Srinagar.

The PAGD is an alliance of some parties in Jammu and Kashmir, including the NC and the PDP, that was formed in the aftermath of the Centre's August 2019 decisions.

JKAP president Bukhari said, "I welcome, if and when, the talks take place. This vindicates our position of March 2020 when we had made it clear that dialogue is the only mechanism to restore democracy and statehood for Jammu and Kashmir."



"Better late than never as the solution to all our problems lies with New Delhi and nowhere else," he added.

The Jammu and Kashmir units of the BJP and the Congress are also likely to be part of these discussions, which are being seen as part of efforts to strengthen normal political processes in the union territory.

The officials said the delimitation commission under the leadership of Justice (retd) Ranjana Desai, which was set up immediately after the passage of the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Bill in Parliament, is likely to expedite its work and submit its report. The commission was set up in February 2020 and has been given an extension of one year in March this year.

Barring Bukhari, other leaders have served a spell of detention following the August 2019 decision of the Centre to abrogate special status of Jammu and Kashmir and bifurcate the erstwhile state into union territories -- Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh.

In the District development Council election last year, the PAGD surged way ahead of the BJP and its allies, including the JKAP, by bagging 110 seats out of 280 with the National Conference emerging stronger with 67 seats within the alliance. The BJP was the single largest party with 75 seats.

The political mainstream of the union territory, especially those having a strong base in Kashmir Valley, have been critical of successive administrations of the union territory for neglecting the demands of the people and raising questions on the development slogan raised post August 2019.

(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.)
Union Agriculture Minister on Friday said the government was ready to talk to the agitating farmers "even if they come at midnight", but not about their demand to repeal the three new laws which are the bone of contention.

Thousands of farmers are camping on Delhi's borders since last November, seeking withdrawal of the new agriculture laws.

The government is always ready to talk to any farmers' union, I will welcome them even if they come at midnight," the Union minister told reporters here.

The government is ready for talks anytime but not on the repeal of the laws," he said.

To a question about vaccination against COVID-19, Tomar said vaccines would be available in enough quantity in August.

On Congress leader Digvijaya Singh's reported statement that his party would reconsider the abrogation of provisions of Article 370 if it came to power, Tomar said the entire country is against the restoration of Article 370.

"Digvijaya Singh's statement would make the country free of Congress," he said, adding that there was no possibility of the opposition party coming to power, and even if it did, it can not restore the article's provisions which conferred a special status on Jammu and Kashmir.

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By Karen Freifeld

(Reuters) - President Joe Biden's executive order aimed at safeguarding Americans' sensitive data would force some Chinese apps to take tougher measures to protect private information if they want to remain in the U.S. market, according to people familiar with the matter.

The goal is to keep foreign adversaries like and Russia from gaining access to large amounts of personal and proprietary business information.

The U.S. Department of Commerce may issue subpoenas to collect information about certain smartphone, tablet and desktop computer software applications. Then the agency may negotiate conditions for their use in the United States or ban the apps, according to people familiar with the matter.

Biden's June 9 order replaced former President Donald Trump's 2020 bans against the popular Chinese applications WeChat, owned by Tencent Holdings Co, and ByteDance Ltd's TikTok. U.S. courts halted those bans.

U.S. officials share many of the concerns Trump cited in his order banning TikTok, according to one person familiar with the matter. Notably, they fear that could track the locations of U.S. government employees, build dossiers of personal information for blackmail and conduct corporate espionage.

While the new order does not name companies, it could end up capturing more apps than the Trump bans and hold up better if challenged in court. Reuters is the first to report details on how the Biden administration plans to implement the order, including seeking support from other countries.

U.S. officials have begun speaking with allies about adopting a similar approach, one source said. The hope is that partner countries will agree on apps that should be banned.

U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo will decide which apps to target for U.S. action, but they must meet certain criteria. For instance, they must be owned, controlled or managed by a person or entity that supports the military or intelligence activities of a foreign adversary such as or Russia.

WECHAT, TIKTOK MAY BE REVIEWED

If Raimondo decides an app poses an unacceptable risk, she "has the discretion to notify the parties" directly or publish the information in the government's official daily publication, the Federal Register, a Commerce Department spokesman said.

Companies will then have 30 days to object or propose measures to secure data better, the Commerce spokesman said.

The process stems from a May 2019 Trump executive order for reviewing information and communications technology from foreign adversaries.

Apps from China are most likely to find themselves in the Commerce Department's crosshairs given escalating tensions between Washington and Beijing, the Chinese government's ability to exert control over companies and the number of Chinese apps used by Americans.

WeChat, TikTok and eight other apps targeted by the Trump administration in its last months are eligible for review by Biden's team, one source said.

The Trump targets also included Ant Group's Alipay mobile payment app, WeChat Pay, Tencent Holdings Ltd's QQ Wallet, Tencent QQ, CamScanner, SHAREit, VMate published by Alibaba Group subsidiary UCWeb and Beijing Kingsoft Office Software's WPS Office.

Some of the apps named by Trump have serious data protection issues, while it's unclear why others pose a heightened risk to national security, according to another person familiar with the matter.

The order will apply to business apps, including those used in banking and telecommunications, as well as consumer apps, the first source said.

Apps linked to other adversaries such as Iran or Venezuela are already blocked under broader sanctions.

(Reporting by Karen Freifeld; Editing by Chris Sanders, Cynthia Osterman and Leslie Adler)

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As the South Korean tech giant exits the mobile business, it may soon start selling iPhones at its stores in the country, the media reported.

According to Business Korea, tech giants Apple and are still in the process of negotiations with some major pieces to work out, like will these Apple corners within the stores be operated by Apple employees or will LG employees from the mother-store help out, reports GSMArena.

A final decision has not been reached yet, according to an LG Electronics official.

However, "LG probably wants to close the deal by the end of July, which is when the last sales of LG phones will come to an end".

There are over 400 LG Best Shop locations around South Korea, so this could be a major expansion of Apple retail space in the country.

In April, the company announced that it will be withdrawing from the mobile business.

The South Korean company said in a regulatory filing that its mobile communications (MC) unit will no longer produce and sell handsets after July 31, citing a slump in business and fierce competition in the industry as the reasons behind the decision.

The announcement came two months after the company said its MC division is open to "all possibilities" for its future operations.

The company said its exit from the mobile business will lead to a decline in revenue in the short term but will eventually improve its financial status and management efficiency in the longer period.

--IANS

vc/

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Amid a tussle between the Union government and over the new IT rules, officials of the microblogging site on Friday deposed before a parliamentary panel chaired by Congress' Shashi Tharoor over preventing misuse of social media.

Earlier this month, the issued a notice to giving it one last chance to "immediately" comply with the new IT rules and warned that failure to adhere to the norms will lead to the platform losing exemption from liability under the IT Act.

The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Information and Technology, chaired by Tharoor, had last week summoned over issues related to misuse of the platform and protection of citizens' rights.

Twitter India's public policy manager Shagufta Kamran and legal counsel Ayushi Kapoor deposed before the panel on Friday.

Twitter and the have been at loggerheads over several issues for the last few months.

The microblogging site had faced backlash when it briefly removed the 'blue tick' verification badge from the personal account of Vice-President M Venkaiah Naidu and of several senior RSS functionaries, including its chief Mohan Bhagwat.

Earlier, Delhi Police had sent a notice to Twitter, seeking an explanation of how it described an alleged "Congress toolkit" against the Central government as manipulated media.

The police reportedly had also questioned Twitter India MD Manish Maheshwari on May 31 and visited the Twitter India offices in Delhi and Gurgaon on May 24 over the toolkit issue.

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New Delhi [India], June 18 (ANI/SRV Media): Recently after the announcement of the NFT marketplace for digital art, (http://artwally.com) Artwally.com is regarded as India's first Non-Fungible Token marketplace for physical art, artifacts, limited editions, and signed artworks of photography and art collection.

It is the brainchild of Art Connoisseur Asif Kamal. The marketplace will be offering affordable modern and contemporary art and artifacts of limited edition and signed prints from exquisite collections.

Artwally invites all potential artists to participate and contribute by archiving their work through distributed ledger technology called blockchain method and have NFT emerge from it. The collector will receive digital ownership rights directly transferred to his account as NFT, and the NFT will function as authenticity, as opposed to the traditional method of providing hard copy certificates for authenticity and provenance. The edition number will be registered on the blockchain, so no more editions can be printed and sold in the market, and this information will be registered on the blockchain as tamper-proof technology, which will help reduce the market of fake art and forgery in the art business in future.

Artwally is looking at a market size whose current worth is 64 Billion Dollars. They strongly believe in the modern era of digitization and artificial intelligence, and considering that NFT is undoubtedly the best thing to use in the overall art business, and as an art-house, they are working toward its implementation in a technology-driven art marketplace for artworks. They envision expanding access to contemporary art, support local artist communities, and democratize the process of procurement. Artwally hunts for hidden gems to perform on such platforms, which will help the market of art to grow massively and will also be able to promote the hidden gems in the art industry. The platform will help them build confidence as the NFT marketplace will give them maximum exposure and a chance to get their art picked by millionaires and billionaires of the crypto world.

By looking forward to the present era of digitization, digital currency holders can use their digital currency wallets to purchase physical art. Also, anyone who has previously purchased digital art will now be able to purchase physical art that will be delivered to their doorstep, hassle-free and following all Covid safety protocols.

Art Connoisseur Asif Kamal, Founder of Artwally and Founder Chairman of Alturaash Group, says, "People must understand the full concept of Non-Fungible Token; it is not only about digital art, but it is a complete ecosystem in and of itself. It has a lot to do with smart contracts, transparency, authenticity, and so on. Our NFT platform will provide opportunities to a lot of artists who do not have a lot of resources to reach and present their art to the right community. Hence, will make them feel confident by introducing them to true potential buyers. Finally, on behalf of the entire team of Artwally, I welcome both new and seasoned collectors to enjoy our carefully curated paintings, sculptures, and prints without the intimidation of traditional galleries or institutions."

Artwally assures the quality of sell products that are signed, numbered, and delivered with a certificate of authenticity, with each print signed by the artist himself/herself. They believe in the buyers to enjoy purchasing original works of art rather than posters. This window will help the art market grow significantly and will also be able to promote the art industry's hidden gems. The platform will help them gain confidence because the NFT marketplace will provide them with maximum exposure and the opportunity to have their art chosen by crypto millionaires and billionaires.

For more information, visit (http://artwally.com) Artwally

This story is provided by SRV Media. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/SRV Media)

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Hyderabad, Telangana [India], June 18 (ANI/PNN): MOURI Tech announced well-being services for its employees to deal with health challenges thrown by the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The company has enhanced its health policy package to offer immediate financial help to employees contracted or recovering from COVID. Now COVID-related medical treatments are covered under group employee insurance and all the 3,500+ employees are covered under the same.

To handle the global crisis, Company's Crisis Management Team (CMT) monitors and responds to the situation. The CMT will also keep a track of the employees who are still recovering and need any kind of support. With its focus on India operations, MOURI Tech's CMT has formed a National Emergency Response Team (ERT), a group of MOURI volunteers who assist its employees for various emergencies in medical, mental, and emotional situations.

Regular sessions will be organized for mental well-being and emotional wellness. This group works 24x7 across the nation to support employees who are working remotely. ERT Mobile App is also launched to track employees' health situation and to provide required assistance on a proactive basis. Currently, more than 200 employees are volunteering through ERT and have helped many employees and their families.

On this development Srini Sandaka, CTO- MOURI Tech, said, "Following to our 'Employee First. Customer Foremost' philosophy, we stand with our employees and their families and do utmost care in these tough times that the world is witnessing. Financial and emotional support for our people is our top priority, and our ERT team reflects empathy; that's one of our core values."

The company has already started a nationwide vaccination drive few days back for its 3500+ employees and their spouses across its offices in Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Vizag and Kolhapur. The company is also assisting employees who are residing in other cities. Keeping the severity of the situation in mind, the company has extended the 'Work from Anywhere' option till the end of this year. By doing so company encourages social measures and safety to its employees and their families. IT operations & governance models have been installed to support operations and ensure quality and timely delivery to its global clients.

Established in year 2005, MOURI Tech has evolved into a trusted global enterprise solution provider to its customers, helping them transform to an intelligent enterprise. Its customer base includes several fortune 500 companies and from various industries across the globe.

Headquartered in Dallas Texas USA, MOURI Tech has offices across five continents, with delivery COE and innovation centres in India. With a strong employee presence of 3500+ globally, and CMMI, ISO and PCI certified, MOURI Tech has wide range of IT services, solutions, and qualified/ patented products to cater to digital needs of the businesses of today and tomorrow.

Visit Website for More Details : (https://www.mouritech.com)

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Bengaluru (Karnataka) [India], June 18 (ANI/BusinessWire India): KLAY Preschools and Daycare, a leading provider of Early Childhood Care & Education, has announced the launch of Klaytopia today.

Klaytopia is a complete preschool experience that packs the established preschool's decade-rich experience in the form of a theme-based hands-on activity box, complete with virtual lessons and expert support.

With a razor-sharp focus on making children not only school-ready, but importantly life-ready, the program caters to families with children aged between 2 and 6 years of age (toddlers, PreK, K1, and K2 levels). Klaytopia is available at an introductory price of INR 1999 per month.

With schools being shut down for early years learners indefinitely, the pandemic has spurred the rise of alternate, innovative methods of learning. Against this backdrop, KLAY began its academic year with a live, interactive online program built from scratch. The preschool followed it up with a unique in-person, at-home care and learning solution to serve parents' unique needs. One year later, with the pandemic still disrupting the education sector, KLAY launches an opportunity for parents to be empowered to take control of their child's learning needs at their homes, through Klaytopia.

AK Srikanth, CEO, KLAY Preschools and Daycare said, "We've been hearing of how millions of children across the world are at the risk of missing out on their schooling altogether due to the pandemic. Klaytopia is a big leap forward for us as educators in our commitment to make our world-class curriculum accessible and inclusive.

A great deal of thought and care has gone into converting our deep-rooted understanding of how children learn and making that a transformational experience for the entire family. The last one year has been phenomenal for us as a team - we've worked day and night to create high-quality proprietary online content that has proven effective with 4500+ children last year. This year we already have 2000+ enrolments for our online program and expect to see 4X growth in enrolments compared to last year. We also provided the services of our teachers and caregivers in the homes of 1000 families, in the in-person format. Riding on this success and our experience of actually implementing hands-on learning in physical classrooms before the pandemic, we've created a program that goes beyond merely 'engaging' the child and promises to be an unforgettable learning experience. To top it all, our deep engagement with our parent community will continue to be integrated seamlessly into this solution."

Klaytopia is aligned to KLAY's renowned curriculum which has sparked the joy of learning with 50,000+ children so far. The preschool's pedagogy is based on the Theory of Multiple Intelligences proposed by Harvard psychologist Prof. Howard Gardner, where the child is allowed to learn the way they want to. The objective is to leverage upon and further develop the child's dominant areas of intelligence and prepare the child to be a curious, confident, independent, and empathetic individual.

Klaytopia involves a total of 30 hours of constructive engagement per month and includes:

Hands-on learning box

A theme-based monthly box that contains age-wise, child-appropriate hands-on activities - puzzles, manipulatives, board games, worksheets, etc. - which are reusable to achieve diverse learning outcomes.

High-quality online content

Access to video lessons, proprietary content, and an exhaustive repository of worksheets that align with the theme and learning objective of the month's box. The online content has been tried and tested in the last year and has helped achieve 100% of the learning outcomes that would otherwise be met in physical classrooms.

Comprehensive assessment mechanism

The same online platform comes with a robust and comprehensive assessment tool to evaluate the progress of the child's development.

Curriculum and socio-emotional support

Access to curriculum experts and a child psychologist & family counsellor - this includes fortnightly sessions with KLAY's early years experts to help parents navigate through the program and support them through their children's learning journey and developmental milestones.

Preschool certification

On completion of 12 months of the program, the child is issued a preschool certification based upon the learning outcomes achieved.

Commenting on the launch, Sandeep Aneja, Founder & Managing Partner, Kaizenvest said, "The Early Years Education space has been the most innovative and resilient in the Indian education sector during the pandemic. Established preschools like KLAY, especially, are at a unique advantage (versus EdTech players) as they are naturally inclined to prioritize education first and then technology next in a suitable manner, instead of the other way round. With the child at the core of everything that KLAY does, the brand has pivoted to a hybrid delivery mode keeping in mind the unique needs of diverse families. Klaytopia as an offering is a great example of this, and I am excited by the limitless possibilities with this new program."

Klaytopia is available for immediate purchase; visit (https://www.klayschools.com/klaytopia) for more information.

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.)
Kochi (Kerala) [India], June 18 (ANI/PNN): Riafy Technologies Private Limited has emerged as a global winner in the Build-An-Agent Contest hosted by Google this year. The award was for Riafy's AI assistant Esse, which they adapted for Federal Bank under the brand name Feddy.

Based in Kochi, Kerala, Riafy was announced as one of the second-place winners amongst 21 finalists. The award includes a cash prize amounting to USD 10,000, along with official recognition as one of Google's Developer Partners.

The Build-An-Agent Contest is a competition to create and launch innovative experiences on Google's Business Messages platform. It aims to recognize pivotal transformations in the digital space using Business Messages.

Riafy's AI assistant Esse, for which they received the honor, has leaped bounds ahead of existing technology in conversational AI. They have reimagined customer experience with conversational AI to create an optimized user experience. Esse uses a unique combination of machine learning, natural language processing, and Riafy's proprietary contextual smart search engine to deliver an intelligent AI experience. You can check out Esse on (https://esse-ai.com)

Riafy was founded in 2013 by six friends who had just graduated as engineers, with a vision to create unique technological solutions at lightning speed. With John Mathew (CEO), Neeraj Manoharan (COO), Sreenath K V (CTO), Benny Xavier (CIO), Joseph Babu (CMO), and Benoy Joseph (CFO) at the helm, the Riafy team has unlocked numerous incredible milestones in just over 8 years. Riafy has previously partnered with Google, Apple, Siemens, and Sony. Riafy was the first Indian developer to be featured at Google I/O consecutively for five years from 2015.

This story is provided by PNN. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/PNN)

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Benchmark equity indices slumped over 1 per cent in Friday's intra-day session but made a sharp V-shaped recovery to end the day little changed. Financials and metals exerted pressure on the bourses, even as gains in Reliance Industries, FMCG, and select private bank stocks tried to limit the losses.

The S&P BSE Sensex fell 722 points intra-day but recovered to close 21 points, or 0.04 per cent, higher at 52,344 levels. The broader Nifty50 index, meanwhile, bounced back from the day's low of 15,451 to end at 15,683 levels, down 8 points or 0.05 per cent.

The correction was deeper in the broader where the BSE MidCap and SmallCap indices closed 0.7 per cent and 0.89 per cent down, respectively.

Overall, the market breadth was heavily skewed towards bears with the Advance to Decline ratio standing at 1:2. ONGC, Coal India, Power Grid, JSW Steel, UPL, NTPC, M&M, SBI, and Nestle India were the top laggards among the large-cap stocks while Mahanagar Gas, Ashok Leyland, SAIL, Canara Bank, Max Financial Services, Graphite India, HEG, Hindustan Copper, Affle India, and Wockhardt Pharma cracked in the mid-, and small-cap segments.

Sectorally, the Nifty PSU Bank declined nearly 2 per cent while the Nifty Auto, Metal, and Realty indices slipped up to 1 per cent each. On the upside, the Nifty FMCG index ended 0.29 per cent higher.

Buzzing stocks



Shares of Vodafone Idea soared 10 per cent on report that the company may raise up to Rs 7,000 crore via QIP route. Reports further suggest the Department of Telecommunication may allow Vodafone Idea to raise funds supported by FDI.

Shares of SBI Cards and Payment Services, on the other hand, tanked 6 per cent to Rs 984 on the National Stock Exchange (NSE) in intra-day trade on Friday after around 64 million shares, representing 6.8 per cent of the total equity of the company, changed hands on the NSE and BSE. While the names of the buyers and sellers could not be ascertained immediately, reports said US-based private equity firm Carlyle planned to offload 5.1 per cent stake in SBI Cards and Payment Services. The stock eventually ended 4 per cent lower on the NSE.

Shares of Nazara Technologies also tanked 12 per cent to Rs 1,463.75 on the BSE in intra-day trade after foreign brokerage firm CLSA initiated coverage on the stock with a Sell rating and target price of Rs 1,095, citing hefty premium valuation. The stock was trading close to its 52-week low level of Rs 1,412.50 hit on April 12, 2021.

Lastly, shares of Adani Ports and Adani Enterprises snapped their four-day losing run as they surged 7 per cent and 9 per cent, respectively. Adani Power, Adani Green, and Adani Transmission, however, hit their 5 per cent lower circuit for the fifth straight day.

In the primary market, the initial public offer of Dodla Dairy garnered subscription of over 45 times on the final day while that of KIMS got oversubscribed by nearly 4 times till 4:15 PM.

Global markets



Stocks were stranded just below record highs on Friday, with investors left looking for direction after digesting the US Federal Reserves more hawkish stance.

In Asia, MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was flat after falling for four sessions. Chinese blue-chip shares were also little changed, along with Japans Nikkei.

In Europe, a slide in bank and energy stocks hit shares, with a hawkish policy outlook from the US Federal Reserve also casting a dampener. The pan-European STOXX 600 index was down 0.2 per cent while Germany's DAX index fell 0.3 per cent.
CA Rover Holding, a US-based private equity fund and an affiliate of PE (Private Equity) major Carlyle Group, is planning to offload a 5.1% stake in SBI Cards and Payment Services for around Rs 5,000 crore ($682 million).

The stake sale will be done through a block deal, The Economic Times reported.

A total of 48 million shares of the sole listed credit card issuer in India will be on offer and will range between Rs 1,002 to Rs 1,041.30 per share - which is up to a 4.7% discount to the last closing price of Rs 1,051.7 on the National Stock Exchange on Thursday.

Also Read: Carlyle Group, others float 'draft letter offer' for 26% stake in PNB Housing Finance

At the end of the March quarter, CA Rover Holdings held an 11.61% stake in SBI Cards and Payment Services.

The Carlyle arm has reportedly mandated Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley to execute the deal on Friday.

Also Read: SBI Cards raises Rs 500 crore by issuing bonds

This is the second block deal in SBI Cards and Payment Services in 2021. In March, Carlyle had offloaded a little over 4% stake in the credit card company for around Rs 3,800 crore via block deals to pare its stake to 11.61% from 15.86%.

Carlyle Group had acquired a 26% stake in SBI Cards and Payment Services from the GE Group in 2017 for Rs 2,000 crore, valuing the company at Rs 7,200 crore.
Around 3.5 lakh doctors of the Indian Medical Association (IMA) will participate in a nationwide protest on Friday demanding a central law dealing with violence against medicos. IMA national president Dr JA Jayalal said besides its members, a number of organisations such as the Association of Physicians of India, the Association of Surgeons of India, the Medical Students Network, Junior Doctor Network will participate in the protest.

In Bihar and central Kerala, doctors will close their clinics in the morning to press for the demand of a central law against violence against doctors. In the evening, public interaction has been arranged to form a coordination team in each branch of IMA to stop such violence from taking place.

"We are deeply hurt to see increasing physical violence on doctors and healthcare professionals. It's occurring day in and day out. The IMA is pressing for a central act against the violence," the IMA said in a statement.

The Health Services Personnel and Clinical Establishment (Prohibition of Violence and Damage to Property) Bill, 2019, which sought to impose a jail term up to 10 years for assaulting on-duty doctors and other healthcare professionals was dismissed by the Home Ministry saying the special law was not feasible as health is a state subject, it said.

"There are many central health laws such as the PCPNDT Act and the Clinical Establishment Act. Currently, 21 states have local laws, but what we need is a strong central law to protect doctors from violence," the doctors' body said. Listing plans for Friday's protest, the IMA said memorandums will be submitted to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, senior ministers including home minister Amit Shah. All branches of IMA would submit memoranda to local authorities.

"All the 1,700 branches are organizing events to mark the protest. Students' wings are very active on the event as they are the ones most concerned about how the issue is tackled and addressed," the IMA statement said. "We demand that the government enhances security features in every hospital and declare hospitals as protected zones," the statement said.

On the issue of Yoga guru Ramdev's recent controversial comments, the IMA said a number of police complaints have been filed across the country for his "malafide statements, which, in our opinion, is against the interest of the citizens of the country".

"Accordingly, we have urged the prime minister to take appropriate action against him. We respect Ayurveda as part of our culture and ancient science and we never go out and criticize it... Our job is to ensure that they (patients) get treated in the best way possible. We are not interested in controversies," it said.

Also read: HSBC provides Rs 15 crore grant to Mumbai's dabbawalas amid COVID-19 crisis

Also read: PM Modi to roll out crash course to upskill COVID-19 frontline workers today
The Centre has amended the Cable Television Network Rules to provide for a statutory mechanism for the redressal of complaints relating to content broadcast by the television channels. The Information and Broadcasting (I&B) Ministry notified the Cable Television Networks (Amendment) Rules, 2021 in an official gazette on Thursday.

The ministry said the rules have been amended to provide a transparent statutory mechanism that would benefit the citizens.

"The @MIB_India has by amending the Cable Television Network Rules, 1994, developed a statutory mechanism to redress citizens' grievances & complaints against programmes of TV Channels. The @MIB_India has also decided to recognize Statutory Bodies of TV channels under CTN Rules," Information and Broadcasting Minister Prakash Javadekar said in a tweet.

At present, there is an institutional mechanism by way of an Inter-Ministerial Committee to address grievances of citizens relating to the violation of the Programme and Advertising Codes under the rules. "Similarly, various broadcasters have also developed their internal self-regulatory mechanism for addressing grievances," the ministry said in a statement.

However, it said, a need was felt to lay down a statutory mechanism for strengthening the grievance redressal structure. Some broadcasters had also requested for giving legal recognition to their associations/bodies, it added.

"The Supreme Court in its order in WP(C) No.387 of 2000 in the matter of ''Common Cause Vs Union of India & Others'' while expressing satisfaction over the existing mechanism of grievance redressal set up by the Central Government, had advised to frame appropriate rules to formalise the complaint redressal mechanism," the ministry said.

The amended rules provide for "a statutory mechanism for redressal of the grievances/complaints of the citizens relating to content broadcast by television channels in accordance with the provisions of the Cable Television Network Act, 1995," it said. "At the same time, self-regulating bodies of broadcasters would be registered with the central government," it added.

At present, the ministry said, there are over 900 television channels that have been granted permission. All of these channels are required to comply with the Programme and Advertising Code laid down under the Cable Television Network Rules. The amendment to these rules is significant as it paves the way for a strong institutional system for redressing grievances while placing accountability and responsibility on the broadcasters and their self-regulating bodies, the ministry said.

Also read: Indian UHNIs may pump in up to $30 billion in tech startups by 2025
Funds parked by Indian individuals and firms in Swiss banks, including through India-based branches and other financial institutions, jumped to 2.55 billion Swiss francs (over Rs 20,700 crore) in 2020 on a sharp surge in holdings via securities and similar instruments, though customer deposits fell, annual data from Switzerland's central bank showed on Thursday.

The increase in aggregate funds of Indian clients with Swiss banks, from 899 million Swiss francs (Rs 6,625 crore) at the end of 2019, reverses a two-year declining trend and has taken the figure to the highest level in 13 years. It stood at a record high of nearly 6.5 billion Swiss francs in 2006, after which it has been mostly on a downward path, except for a few years including in 2011, 2013 and 2017, as per the Swiss National Bank (SNB) data.

The total amount of CHF 2,554.7 million (Rs 20,706 crore), described by the SNB as 'total liabilities' of Swiss banks or 'amounts due to' their Indian clients at the end of 2020, included CHF 503.9 million (over Rs 4,000 crore) in customer deposits, CHF 383 million (over Rs 3,100 crore) held via other banks, CHF 2 million (Rs 16.5 crore) through fiduciaries or trusts and the highest component of CHF 1,664.8 million (nearly Rs 13,500 crore) as 'other amounts due to customers' in form of bonds, securities and various other financial instruments.

While the funds classified as 'customer account deposits' have actually declined from CHF 550 million at the end of 2019 and those through fiduciaries also more than halved from CHF 7.4 million, the money held via other banks rose sharply from CHF 88 million in this period.

However, the biggest difference has been a surge in 'other amounts due to customers' from India, which rose over six times from CHF 253 million at 2019-end. All four components had declined during 2019. These are official figures reported by banks to the SNB and do not indicate the quantum of the much-debated alleged black money held by Indians in Switzerland.

These figures also do not include the money that Indians, NRIs or others might have in Swiss banks in names of third-country entities. According to the SNB, its data for 'total liabilities' of Swiss banks towards Indian clients takes into account all types of funds of Indian customers at Swiss banks, including deposits from individuals, banks and enterprises. This includes data for branches of Swiss banks in India, as also non-deposit liabilities.

On the other hand, the 'locational banking statistics' of the Bank for International Settlement (BIS), which have been described in the past by Indian and Swiss authorities as a more reliable measure for deposits by Indian individuals in Swiss banks, show an increase of nearly 39 per cent during 2020 in such funds to USD 125.9 million (Rs 932 crore).

This figure takes into account deposits as well as loans of Indian non-bank clients of Swiss-domiciled banks and had shown an increase of 7 per cent in 2019, after declining by 11 per cent in 2018 and by 44 per cent in 2017. It peaked at over $2.3 billion (over Rs 9,000 crore) at the end of 2007.

Swiss authorities have always maintained that assets held by Indian residents in Switzerland cannot be considered as 'black money' and they actively support India in its fight against tax fraud and evasion.

An automatic exchange of information in tax matters between Switzerland and India has been in force since 2018. Under this framework, detailed financial information on all Indian residents having accounts with Swiss financial institutions since 2018 was provided for the first time to Indian tax authorities in September 2019 and this is to be followed every year.

In addition to this, Switzerland has been actively sharing details about accounts of Indians suspected to have indulged in financial wrongdoings after submission of prima facie evidence. Such exchange of information has taken place in hundreds of cases so far. Overall, customer deposits in all Swiss banks rose in 2020 to nearly CHF 2 trillion, which included over CHF 600 billion of foreign customer deposits.

While the UK topped the charts for foreign clients' money in Swiss banks at CHF 377 billion, it was followed by the US (CHF 152 billion) at the second spot -- the only two countries with 100-billion-plus client funds. Others in the top 10 were West Indies, France, Hong Kong, Germany, Singapore, Luxembourg, Cayman Islands and Bahamas. India was placed at 51st place, ahead of countries like New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Hungary, Mauritius, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.

Among BRICS nations, India stood below China and Russia, but above South Africa and Brazil. Others placed above India included Netherlands, UAE, Japan, Australia, Italy, Saudi Arabia, Israel, Ireland, Turkey, Mexico, Austria, Greece, Egypt, Canada, Qatar, Belgium, Bermuda, Kuwait, South Korea, Portugal, Jordan, Thailand, Seychelles, Argentina, Indonesia, Malaysia and Gibraltar.

The countries for which Swiss banks reported a decline in amounts due to clients included the US and UK, while the money parked by individuals and enterprises from Bangladesh also declined during 2020. However, the amount almost doubled in the case of Pakistan to over CHF 642 million. Just like India, the issue of alleged black money in Swiss banks has been a political hot potato in the two neighbouring countries as well.

As per the SNB, there were 243 banks in Switzerland at the end of 2020.

Also read: Indian UHNIs may pump in up to $30 billion in tech startups by 2025
Funds held by Indian individuals and companies in Swiss banks jumped to 2.5 billion Swiss francs (Rs 20,700 crore) in 2020.

The money was parked through India-based branches and other financial institutions. The holdings via securities and similar instruments saw a steep rise, however, customer deposits dropped, annual data from Switzerland's central bank showed on Thursday, PTI reported.

The figure for 2020 is the highest in 13 years, reversing a two-year declining trend. At the end of 2019, the aggregate funds of Indian depositors with Swiss banks stood at 899 million Swiss francs, or Rs 6,625 crore, the report noted.

Also Read: India among top 3 nations getting Swiss info on bank accounts

The deposits hit a record high of around 6.5 billion Swiss francs in 2006, following which they have mostly been on a downward path, except for a few years including in 2011, 2013, and 2017, as per the Swiss National Bank (SNB) data.

The total amount of CHF (Swiss franc) 2,554.7 million (Rs 20,706 crore), described by the SNB as 'total liabilities' of Swiss banks or 'amounts due to' their Indian clients at the end of 2020, included CHF 503.9 million (over Rs 4,000 crore) in customer deposits, CHF 383 million (over Rs 3,100 crore) held via other banks, CHF 2 million ( Rs 16.5 crore) through fiduciaries or trusts and the highest component of CHF 1,664.8 million (nearly Rs 13,500 crore) as 'other amounts due to customers' in form of bonds, securities, and various other financial instruments.

While the funds classified as 'customer account deposits' have actually declined from CHF 550 million at the end of 2019 and those through fiduciaries also more than halved from CHF 7.4 million, the money held via other banks rose sharply from CHF 88 million in this period.

However, the biggest difference has been a surge in 'other amounts due to customers' from India, which rose over six times from CHF 253 million at 2019-end. All four components had declined during 2019.

These are official figures reported by banks to the SNB and do not indicate the quantum of the much-debated alleged black money held by Indians in Switzerland. These figures also do not include the money that Indians, NRIs, or others might have in Swiss banks in names of third-country entities.

According to the SNB, its data for 'total liabilities' of Swiss banks towards Indian clients takes into account all types of funds of Indian customers at Swiss banks, including deposits from individuals, banks, and enterprises. This includes data for branches of Swiss banks in India, as also non-deposit liabilities.

Also Read: India receives second list of Swiss bank account details under automatic information framework

On the other hand, the 'locational banking statistics' of the Bank for International Settlement (BIS), which have been described in the past by Indian and Swiss authorities as a more reliable measure for deposits by Indian individuals in Swiss banks, show an increase of nearly 39 per cent during 2020 in such funds to USD 125.9 million (Rs 932 crore).

This figure takes into account deposits as well as loans of Indian non-bank clients of Swiss-domiciled banks and had shown an increase of 7 per cent in 2019, after declining by 11 per cent in 2018 and by 44 per cent in 2017.

It peaked at over $2.3 billion (over Rs 9,000 crore) at the end of 2007.

Swiss authorities have always maintained that assets held by Indian residents in Switzerland cannot be considered as 'black money' and they actively support India in its fight against tax fraud and evasion.

An automatic exchange of information in tax matters between Switzerland and India has been in force since 2018. Under this framework, detailed financial information on all Indian residents having accounts with Swiss financial institutions since 2018 was provided for the first time to Indian tax authorities in September 2019 and this is to be followed every year.

In addition to this, Switzerland has been actively sharing details about accounts of Indians suspected of having indulged in financial wrongdoings after the submission of prima facie evidence.

Such exchange of information has taken place in hundreds of cases so far.

Overall, customer deposits in all Swiss banks rose in 2020 to nearly CHF 2 trillion, which included over CHF 600 billion of foreign customer deposits.

While the UK topped the charts for foreign clients' money in Swiss banks at CHF 377 billion, it was followed by the US (CHF 152 billion) at the second spot -- the only two countries with 100-billion-plus client funds.

Others in the top 10 were West Indies, France, Hong Kong, Germany, Singapore, Luxembourg, Cayman Islands, and Bahamas.

India was placed at 51st place, ahead of countries like New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Hungary, Mauritius, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka.

Among BRICS nations, India stood below China and Russia, but above South Africa and Brazil.

Others placed above India included Netherlands, UAE, Japan, Australia, Italy, Saudi Arabia, Israel, Ireland, Turkey, Mexico, Austria, Greece, Egypt, Canada, Qatar, Belgium, Bermuda, Kuwait, South Korea, Portugal, Jordan, Thailand, Seychelles, Argentina, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Gibraltar.

The countries for which Swiss banks reported a decline in amounts due to clients included the US and UK, while the money parked by individuals and enterprises from Bangladesh also declined during 2020.

However, the amount almost doubled in the case of Pakistan to over CHF 642 million.

Just like India, the issue of alleged black money in Swiss banks has been a political hot potato in the two neighbouring countries as well.

As per the SNB, there were 243 banks in Switzerland at the end of 2020.
All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS), the farmer and peasant front of Left party CPI-M, has alleged that the Central government's just approved "Deep Ocean Mission" is an attempt to commercialise the ecologically sensitive deep sea for the benefit of private corporate players.

The proposal of the Ministry of Earth Sciences, which got the clearance of the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on June 16, talks of spending Rs 4,077 crore in the next five years to explore deep ocean for resources and developing deep sea technologies for sustainable use of ocean resources. Since the technologies required for deep sea mining have strategic implications and are not commercially available, the proposal says the government will try to indigenise technologies by collaborating with leading institutes and private industries.

Criticising this, AIKS said that given the BJP government's "lack of transparency in arriving at such a crucial decision", it is forced to conclude that "the move is motivated to further the interest of the private corporate players which are working for newer ways to exploit nature by allowing mindless mining and related activities without paying any attention to existing grave concerns about its impact on the possible destruction of sea and coastal ecologies".

"It will have a harmful impact on the livelihood opportunities of millions of small fishermen dependent on the sea," said Hannan Mollah and Ashok Dhawale, general secretary and president respectively of AIKS, in a joint statement.

The Deep Ocean Mission consists of six major components, namely - development of technologies for deep sea mining and manned submersible, development of ocean climate change advisory services, technological innovations for exploration and conservation of deep-sea biodiversity, deep ocean survey and exploration, energy and freshwater harvesting, and establishment of an advanced marine station for ocean biology.

The government has also quoted the United Nations (UN) declaration of the decade, 2021-2030, as the Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development and India's unique maritime position to highlight the importance of the Deep Ocean Mission. AIKS said that by "quoting the UN declaration, without consulting any environmental body or the stakeholders, the Central Government is making a mockery of the concerns related to sustainability itself."

The organisation wants the "Mission" with corporate involvement to be scrapped.

Also read: Govt approves mission to explore ocean resources; to spend Rs 4,077 cr in 5 years
A parliamentary panel will examine the issue of safeguarding the rights of Indian citizens and preventing misuse of online news platforms today. The Standing Committee on Information Technology led by Congress MP Shashi Tharoor has called Twitter India representatives and officials of the IT ministry.

The panel will take into account their views on the subject. There will be special emphasis on the security of women in the digital space, stated a report in NDTV.

The Twitter officials have been summoned at a time when the microblogging site has clashed with the government over the new IT rules. The site has also been charged by the UP Police with inciting communal hate over posts on an elderly Muslim man in Ghaziabad.

Along with Twitter several journalists and Congress leaders have been named in the FIR that alleges that they provoked 'communal sentiments' by sharing the elderly man's allegations.

UP Police sent legal notices to Twitter India's head Manish Maheshwari, who has been summoned to the Loni Border Police Station. He has also been asked to record his statement within seven days.

Communications, Electronics & Information Technology Minister Ravi said the platform was given multiple opportunities to comply with the rules. He said that the microblogging site "has deliberately chosen the path of non-compliance".

"The culture of India varies like its large geography. In certain scenarios, with the amplification of social media, even a small spark can cause a fire, especially with the menace of fake news. This was one of the objectives of bringing the Intermediary Guidelines. It is astounding that Twitter which portrays itself as the flag bearer of free speech, chooses the path of deliberate defiance when it comes to the Intermediary Guidelines," the minister had said in a series of tweets.

Also read: Twitter stock slips 25% from 52-week high amid tussle over Indian IT rules
State Bank of India has warned its customers against KYC (know your customer) frauds. It said that the threat is very much real and has proliferated across the country. It also suggested ways to keep one's account safe from such frauds.

"KYC fraud is real, and it has proliferated across the country. The fraudster sends a text message pretending to be a bank/company representative to get your personal details," it said, urging customers who have been duped to report such cyber crimes.

The lender offered three basic safety tips:

1. Think before you click any link

2. Bank never sends links to update KYC

3. Don't share your mobile and confidential data with anyone

KYC fraud is real, and it has proliferated across the country. The fraudster sends a text message pretending to be a bank/company representative to get your personal details. Report such cybercrimes here: https://t.co/3Dh42ifaDJ#SBI #StateBankOfIndia #CyberCrimeAlert #StaySafe pic.twitter.com/VpODvKp1FD State Bank of India (@TheOfficialSBI) June 15, 2021

This alert comes as SBI recently decided to permit acceptance of documents for KYC update through mail or post due to the difficulties faced by customers amid local lockdowns.

The Reserve Bank of India had also asked banks and other regulated financial entities not to impose punitive restrictions against customers for failure to update KYC till December 31.

KYC or know your customer are measures taken by the banks to ensure that their customers are genuine. "Please refer to Section 38 of the Master Direction on KYC dated February 25, 2016, in terms of which Regulated Entities (REs) have to carry out periodic updation of KYC of existing customers. Keeping in view the current COVID-19 related restrictions in various parts of the country, REs are advised that in respect of the customer accounts where periodic updation of KYC is due and pending as on date, no restrictions on operations of such account shall be imposed till December 31, 2021, for this reason alone, unless warranted under instructions of any regulator/ enforcement agency/court of law, etc. Regulated entities are also advised to continue engaging with their customers for having their KYC updated in such cases," said an RBI notification dated May 5.

Also read: PE major Carlyle's arm eyes Rs 5,000 crore from 5.1% stake sale of SBI Cards

Also read: SBI launches 'Kavach' personal loan scheme of up to Rs 5 lakh for COVID patients
On June 11, the total market capitalisation of Adani Group was Rs 9,50,000 crore. The group's market cap ended at Rs 7,90,279 crore today, resulting in Rs 1,59,721 crore market cap loss this week.

The stocks of Adani Group were under tremendous selling pressure this week. Shares of Adani Transmission, Adani Total Gas, Adani Green and Adani Power ended in the red for the fifth straight day.

However, the flagship companies, Adani Enterprises, and Adani Ports saw renewed buying interest today. Adani Enterprises ended 8.76 per cent higher at Rs 1487.85 against the previous close of Rs 1367.95 and Adani Ports ended 7.39 per cent higher at Rs 694.60 on BSE.

Earlier this week, the investors went on a huge selling spree following reports that the National Securities Depository Ltd (NSDL) has frozen the accounts of three foreign funds that together own shares worth Rs 43,500 crore in four Adani Group companies.

The Economic Times had reported that the NSDL had frozen the accounts of three foreign funds due to insufficient disclosure on beneficial ownership. The reports of a freeze on these accounts had sent Adani group stocks plummeting to record levels.

The market cap of Adani Group fell more than 10 per cent or nearly Rs 1.03 lakh crore in the morning session on Monday. Investors in listed companies of the group, who enjoyed the dream run in 2020 and 2021, have incurred heavy losses since then.

The Adani Group termed the report as "blatantly erroneous" and that it was "done to deliberately mislead the investing community".

The stocks of Adani Group pared some losses after the clarification from NSDL but still witnessed continuous selling pressure.

The group also shot an email to the NSDL, asking the status of three foreign funds. It also provided the details of Demat accounts of the three funds mentioned in media reports, including APMS Investment Fund Ltd, Albula Investment Fund Ltd, and Cresta Fund Ltd.

Most of the funds are based out of Mauritius and a few of them are inactive too. They are registered at the same address in Port Louis and don't have websites.

Later, Rakesh Mehta, Vice President of National Securities Depository Ltd said that the accounts of three foreign funds that are among the biggest backers of the Adani group are "active" and not frozen.

"I don't think the market is convinced with the quality of the clarification from the Adani group," Jimeet Modi, founder of Mumbai-based Samco Securities, told Reuters.

Meanwhile, according to the Forbes Real-Time Billionaires list, Adani's net worth fell to $63.2 billion. At the beginning of the week, Adani's net worth was above $77 billion.

As a result of this bloodbath, Gautam Adani is no longer Asia's second-richest person and has lost more money than anyone in the world this week.

He has lost the dreamy title to Zhong Shanshan, who has again bagged the second spot behind Asia's richest man Mukesh Ambani, chairman of Reliance Industries Limited.

Shanshan who chairs bottled water company Nongfu Spring and controls Beijing Wantai Biological Pharmacy had menial jobs before becoming China's richest man.

Before he started his business of bottled water, Shanshan reportedly tried his hand in various ventures including growing mushrooms, founding a private newspaper, and selling curtains.

According to the data on Bloomberg, seven foreign funds own the majority of public shareholding in Adani Group. These funds are Vespera Fund, Elara India Opportunities, Albula Investment Fund, Cresta Fund, APMS Investment Fund, Asia Investment Corp, and LTS Investment Funds.

Albula Investment fund and APMS Investment fund have put more than 95% of their investments in Adani group firms. Cresta Fund too has parked in 97.7% of their investments in the Adani Transmission, Adani Enterprises, and Adani Total.

Asia Investment Corporation Ltd held a stake in three companies of Adani group, which accounted for 99% of its portfolio. Vespera Fund Ltd held a stake in four companies of the Group which accounted for over 98% of its portfolio.
18 Jun 2021, 11:10 AM

COVID-19 in India: Google to provide Rs 113 cr to build oxygen plants, train rural healthcare workers

Google's philanthropic arm Google.org announced on Thursday that it will provide Rs 109 crore ($15 million) to India to assist in the fight against coronavirus. The fund will be used to support procurement and installation of around 80 oxygen generation plants in healthcare facilities in high-need and rural locations. The funds will go to GiveIndia and PATH. The two organisations will oversee the oxygen programme and provide project management support.

Indian IT sector to add over 96,000 employees in FY21, to remain a net hirer: Nasscom

Information Technology industry body Nasscom stated on Thursday that the IT sector continues to be the net hirer of skilled talent in the country. It added the top five Indian IT firms are planning on hiring 96,000 employees in 2021-22. Nasscom's statement has come a day after Bank of America had stated the Indian software firms were going to cut 3 million jobs by 2022

Indians' funds in Swiss banks reach over Rs 20,000 crore

Funds parked by Indian individuals and firms in Swiss banks, including through India-based branches and other financial institutions, jumped to 2.55 billion Swiss francs (over Rs 20,700 crore) in 2020 on a sharp surge in holdings via securities and similar instruments. However, customer deposits fell, annual data from Switzerland's central bank showed on Thursday.

After Zoom, Microsoft tweaks Teams for hybrid work

Microsoft on Thursday said it will be tweaking the design of Teams over the course of the year to make its video conferencing tools stay relevant even in a hybrid work setup as the pandemic abates in various parts of the world. The tech giant's announcement comes a few weeks after rival Zoom also pegged itself as a must-have tool for the hybrid work model as a majority of workplaces are considering adopting a more flexible approach to work.

3rd COVID wave may hit Maharashtra in 2-4 weeks; Delta-plus may spike cases

A state-appointed task force has expressed concerns that a third wave of COVID-19 pandemic could hit Maharashtra as early as the next two to four weeks if the crowding seen in the last three days continues. Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray was informed that a highly virulent strain called 'Delta plus' could start the next wave in Maharashtra.

PM Modi's approval rating fell 20 points over last year, now at 66%, finds US firm

Prime Minister Narendra Modi's approval ratings have dipped to 66% from the previous 82% in August 2019 when the Centre announced the abrogation of Article 370 and bifurcation of Jammu and Kashmir, according to the Morning Consult, a global leader approval tracker. At 66%, PM Modi's approval continues to be ahead of other global leaders, according to the survey conducted by the American data intelligence firm.
Domestic air passenger traffic dropped significantly in May due to the second COVID-19 wave that severely impacted the aviation sector. According to the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) around 21.15 lakh domestic passengers travelled by air in May, which is 63 per cent lower than April when the sector had clocked 57.25 lakh passengers. The regulator said on Thursday that 78.22 lakh people travelled within the country by air in March.

IndiGo had the lions' share among all airlines. It carried 11.69 lakh passengers in May, accounting for 55.3 per cent of the domestic market. SpiceJet flew 1.99 lakh passengers that translates to 9.4 per cent share of the market.

Air India, GO FIRST (previously GoAir), Vistara and AirAsia India carried 4.29 lakh, 1.38 lakh, 97,000 and 64,000 passengers respectively.

The DGCA stated that occupancy rate of the six major Indian airlines was between 39.3 per cent and 64 per cent in May.

SpiceJet had the most occupancy at 64 per cent, followed by GO FIRST at 63.3 per cent, IndiGo at 51.2 per cent, AirAsia India at 44.4 per cent, Vistara at 40.9 per cent, and Air India at 39.3 per cent.

In May, IndiGo had the best on-time performance of 98.7 per cent at four metro airports -- Bengaluru, Delhi, Hyderabad and Mumbai, followed by Vistara and AirAsia India with 98.1 per cent and 97.4 per cent on-time performance.

As wave after wave continues to disrupt the sector, airlines have gone for cost-reducing measures including pay cuts, leave without pay and layoffs. Last year domestic passenger flights were banned for two months due to the pandemic.

Also read: COVID 2nd wave: Domestic air traffic down 67% in May, reaches June-July 2020 levels

Also read: IndiGo hopes to attain pre-COVID-19 traffic by Q2 of 2022: CEO
It was announced this week that biotech company, Horizon Therapeutics will establish a manufacturing facility in Waterford which will employ 90 people.

Founded in 2008, Horizon Therapeutics is an innovation-driven biotech company focused on researching, developing, and commercialising medicines that address critical needs of people impacted by rare, autoimmune and severe inflammatory diseases.

The new global biotech manufacturing operation will produce drug product for Horizons rare, autoimmune and severe inflammatory disease portfolio. The company is purchasing the existing drug product manufacturing facility operated at present by EirGen Pharma, an OPKO health company located on IDA Irelands business park in Waterford to facilitate its establishment there.

Some 40 of EirGens employees are transferring to Horizon as part of the process and are among the 90 people to be employed at the new facility. Horizons Irish operations, located in Connaught House, Dublin 4, has grown to more than 100 people. As well as its role as global headquarters, Horizons Irish operations incorporate several key functions including technical operations, finance, legal and R&D. The company is due to move shortly to a new location on St. Stephens Green in Dublin.

Speaking about the project yesterday, Horizons Chairman, President & CEO, Tim Walbert said, "Adding to our strong network of contract manufacturing organizations, this facility will also play an important role in our global expansion. We look forward to leveraging our existing technical operations expertise in Ireland, along with the expertise of the EirGen employees, to build a robust and effective manufacturing operation that will enable us to meet the unmet needs of people impacted by rare diseases around the world."

IDA Ireland CEO, Martin Shanahan added, "In addition to the jobs and economic benefits of this project to Waterford, the South East and Ireland, Horizon will add to the growing pharmaceutical cluster in the South East, which to date includes EirGen, MSD, Teva, and Sanofi. I wish Horizon every success with this new manufacturing facility in Waterford and wish EirGen Pharma continued success with its Irish operations in Waterford where they are a substantial and valued employer."

Source: www.businessworld.ie
Pictured is the Mesick water tower. The Mesick Village Council recently voted to apply for a grant from the MEDC to fund $1 million in water system upgrades.
In todays Caixin energy news wrap: Mining tragedy continues rattling China as all 13 miners trapped in a Shanxi mine were found dead; Chinas environmental authority denies radiation leak at Taishan nuclear plant; and a massive hydropower project in the upper reaches of the Yangtze River starts full operation.

China to release strategic commodity reserves

China plans to release some industrial metals from its national reserves to curb commodity prices in the first such move in a decade. The National Food and Strategic Reserves Administration said Wednesday that it would release copper, aluminum and zinc in batches to nonferrous processing and manufacturing companies via public auction. China has stepped up its campaign to rein in commodity prices and reduce speculation to ease the threat to its pandemic rebound from soaring raw material costs.

Thirteen people detained in fatal mining disaster in Shanxi

Police detained 13 suspects as investigations into a deadly incident in an iron ore mine in Shanxi got underway. All 13 miners who were trapped underground by flooding in the mine in Daixian county were found dead as of Thursday following six days of rescue efforts, state broadcaster CCTV reported. As of Wednesday evening, 11 of the 13 victims were identified through DNA testing.

China says theres no radiation leak at Taishan nuclear plant

Chinas Ministry of Environment and Ecology denied media reports of a possible leak at a nuclear power plant in southern Chinas Guangdong province, saying that nothing out of the ordinary has been detected. The ministry confirmed that radiation indicators in the vicinity of the Taishan nuclear plant remain at background level and that no leak of any kind has occurred, according to a statement issued Wednesday.

Giant Wudongde hydropower project in full operation

The last generating unit of the Wudongde hydropower station in Yunnan province was officially connected to the China Southern Power Grid Wednesday, marking full operation of the installation, China's fourth-largest and the world's seventh-largest hydropower project. Spanning the Jinsha River in the upper stretches of the Yangtze River, the project has a total installed capacity of 10.2 million kilowatts with 12 generating units.

Coal production rose 8.8% in first five months

Chinas raw coal production rose 0.6% in May from a year ago to 330 million tons, reversing a 1.8% decline in April, according to the National Bureau of Statistics. From January to May, China produced 1.62 billion tons of raw coal, an increase of 8.8% from the same period a year ago. The country imported 111.17 million tons of coal, down 25.2%.

CECEP to invest $23 million in distributed wind power project

CECEP Wind-Power Corp. (601016.SH) said it will invest 149 million yuan ($23.3 million) in the construction of a 20 megawatt distributed wind power project in Shanxi province. The company will invest at least 29.71 million yuan from its funds while borrowing the remainder from financial institutions.

Zijin Mining to begin trial production at Serbia copper and gold mine

Zijin Mining Group Co. Ltd. (601899.SH) said its wholly owned subsidiary Zijin Mining Doo obtained a permit from the Serbian Ministry of Mining and Energy to begin trial production in the upper zone of the Serbian Cukaru Peki copper and gold mine. The mine will process 3.3 million tons of ore and produce 91,000 tons of copper and 2.5 tons of gold annually.

Great Wall Motor ties up with TotalEnergies in NEV technology

Great Wall Motors Co. Ltd. set up partnership with French energy giant TotalEnergies SE to jointly develop new-energy vehicle technologies and expand international businesses. The parties will establish a joint technology R&D laboratory for new-energy vehicle fluids. TotalEnergies will continue to invest in the joint laboratory at Great Wall Motors Haval Research and Development Center. Meanwhile, Great Wall Motor will continue to recommend TotalEnergies supporting oil to its overseas subsidiaries and authorized dealers.

State Grid completes construction of power project in Ivory Coast

Chinese utility giant State Grid said construction of the Zagne Substation in eastern Africas Ivory Coast was completed. The project, built by Chinese companies led by State Grid, has started power transmission.

Contact editors Han Wei (weihan@caixin.com) and Bob Simison (bobsimison@caixin.com)

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Follow the Chinese markets in real time with Caixin Globals new stock database.
pictureA Chinese investor and his wife lost more than 50,000 yuan on stock purchase despite advance knowledge of a related acquisition. Photo: VCG

The fact that Ren Yiguo lost more than 50,000 yuan ($7,704) on a stock trade has not stopped securities regulators from slapping him and his wife with a 300,000 yuan fine for insider trading.

Ren, 51, was penalized for a nearly 2 million yuan purchase of Chifeng Jilong Gold Mining Co. Ltd. (Chifeng Gold) (600988.SH) shares that was made with his wifes brokerage account in March 2019, just before the company acquired another firm he held a stake in, according to an announcement (link in Chinese) released last week by the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC).

The regulator accused Ren of having advance knowledge of the acquisition. In January 2019, Shanghai-listed Chifeng Golds actual controller, surnamed Zhao, told Ren about his intention for the company to buy up all the shares of Jilin Han Feng Mining Technologies Co. Ltd., which Ren held a stake in at the time, according to the CSRCs office in the Inner Mongolia autonomous region. In March that year, shareholders of Jilin Han Feng, including Ren, agreed to transfer their stakes to Inner Mongolia-based Chifeng Gold.

It remains unclear what benefit Ren or his wife expected to gain from buying the Chifeng Gold shares at the time or why the shares were sold in April 2019.

After a thorough investigation, the regulators traced the source of the funds used to buy the Chifeng Gold shares back to Ren, who insisted that he had not tipped off his wife about the companys acquisition of Han Feng Mining, according to the CSRC.

Rens wife, Dong Hui, who lived with him in Chinas northeastern province of Jilin, corroborated his story, claiming that she knew nothing about her husbands work, the CSRC said. However, in early 2019, Ren transferred a large sum of money into his wifes account. The regulator said the timing of the trade was consistent with his knowledge of the inside information.

Contact editor Michael Bellart (michaelbellart@caixin.com)

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Construction of the new Workers Stadium began last year, with the aim of creating a world-class soccer venue and restoring the Beijing landmark to its original appearance from the 1950s. The home of the Beijing Guoan soccer team has hosted a number of key events over its history and has been renovated three times since the 1990s

Jul 02, 2021 07:44 PM
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Here you'll find our latest collection of Caledonian-Record reports on the coronavirus outbreak and local response, from the beginning of April. Our January, February and March stories are here: https://www.caledonianrecord.com/news/local/our-coronavirus-coverage/collection_5885178c-692e-11e
CAMEROUN :: Cameroon and the Anglophone problem: How to quench the erupting volcano?

Lawyers-protestToday Cameroon should be attracting and reassuring investors in view of its emergence slated for 2035. But the country is rather facing poignant emergencies such as rampant corruption, massive youth unemployment, daunting insecurity with attacks by Boko Haram, etc. And worse still, it is the Anglophone problem that can throw the country into disarray. It is up to the State authorities and the elites, without any distinction of political leanings, to understand this crisis and work out appropriate solutions in full responsibility. This can only be achieved through a serene and honest dialogue with the real representatives of the angry but not desperate Anglophone community, whose obvious wish is to be considered and listened to, and not insulted or ignored as it has so far been the case.

I - What exactly is the Anglophone problem?

Maybe the average Francophone cannot fully grasp the problem with Anglophones. Only the one wearing tight shoes can feel the pinch, but the powers that be should understand it and stop turning a blind eye to the issue. The Anglophone problem is a set of demands formulated in various ways and on many occasions by Anglophones in Cameroon. These are identity and language claims that actually question the form of the State. Indeed in 1961, the Anglophones formed a two-state federation with the Francophones, but today Anglophones are merely two administrative regions out of ten. Their grievances should be received and examined, accepted or rejected, just like in any normal democratic setup. But Anglophones cannot simply be contemptuously turned away or ignored, accused of identifying themselves in relation to a foreign language, told that the malaise is national and not just Anglophone, or be brutalized by the police. Such responses from the State exacerbate tensions in a country where the right to protest is guaranteed.

Anglophones are not just Cameroonians who speak English as their first official language, as opposed to those whose first official language is French. As Simo Bobda (2001) argues, being an Anglophone in Cameroon is a more ethnic, cultural and regional concept than a linguistic categorization. This definition excludes the Francophones who have long settled in the Anglophone area, even though they may possess economic assets or family ties there, as we analyzed in our book Fifty Years of Bilingualism in Cameroon - What Perspectives in Africa? (L'Harmattan, Paris, 2010). This approach also excludes Francophones with Anglo-Saxon education, and those who have studied in Anglophone schools in French-speaking Cameroon. In short, Anglophones in Cameroon do have a particular cultural identity, a limited geographical space and a specific sociopolitical history, even before being a linguistic community. With this clarification in mind, we can better and fully grasp the nature and the scope of the Anglophone problem, which is today causing riots and tensions in the South-West and in the North-West.

II - A brief historical flashback

When France and Great Britain took over from Germany in Cameroon from 1916, this created a Cameroonian Anglophone community living in 1/5 of the territory on the one hand, and a Francophone community living in 4/5 of the country on the other hand. The Anglophone minority was used to relative political and cultural autonomy during the British indirect rule colonization. But France applied a strict Jacobin type of centralism in the Francophone zone, coupled with linguistic and cultural assimilation, though Cameroon was not technically a French colony. One can therefore understand Anglophones' uneasiness within a highly centralized State, which the first Francophone president saw as the best way to achieve rapid development in peace and unity. After adopting French-English bilingualism based on biculturalism in 1961, reunited Cameroon became the meeting ground of French and English, two of the most prestigious languages in the world.

Indeed, the new political dispensation allowed the country to take advantage of the great heritage of French (a beautiful language of Latin origin spoken by more than 400 million people worldwide, full of refinement, enriched and defended since 1539 by generations of writers and scholars, and present in more than 70 countries and territories). In addition, the country would benefit from the prestige of English (an international language spoken by one billion people around the world, which is dominant in strategic sectors such as communication, diplomacy, business, etc.). But the blessing of adopting English in Cameroon has seemingly become a curse, or at least has contributed in giving rise to the Anglophone problem. Why? Just because in the course of its implementation since 1961, Cameroon's bilingualism has run into a number of difficulties: the law of the majority has conferred a de facto preponderance on French, despite all relevant constitutional provisions; the promotion of bilingualism has remained minimal or just academic, instead of being systematically implemented through specific laws and regulations in each sector like in South Africa; bilingualism has become lopsided as it is not always supported by strict biculturalism. In the end, Anglophones cannot culturally enrich or impact the governing system in Cameroon, hence their feeling of being assimilated by the Francophones. In that respect, in 1964 in the Cameroon cultural review Abbia, Bernard Fonlon in an article entitled We Should Make or Mar, had the following complaint to make: "After Reunification, we now drive our cars on the right, the franc has replaced the pound as our currency, the academic year has been aligned with that of the Francophones, the metric system has replaced the British measurement units, but in vain have I have looked for a single institution brought back from Anglophone Cameroon. Anglophones' cultural influence is virtually nil ".

Even when Anglophones are appointed to high positions in the administration, their cultural and linguistic specificities should be protected by relevant and binding laws and regulations. In his book entitled My Faith, a Cameroon to Refurbish (Veritas, Douala, 2010), Christian Cardinal Tumi writes: "The daily anguish of the Anglophone Prime Minister on certain issues, the repeated, chronic and open disregard for him from some members of the government just aggravate a situation which is already very embarrassing ". Official bilingualism cannot just be used to conceal or cover up the State's failures in other important aspects of national unity or harmony.

III  What are Anglophones' Worries?

The main threat to the Anglophone sociological entity in Cameroon came on May 20, 1972: Ahmadou Ahidjo organized a referendum to put an end to the federal system that had been in place since 1961. Under that dispensation, the Anglophones constituted a federated state and were able to manage their own local and regional affairs without any interference from the Francophones. But of what significance are the Soviet-like results of a popular consultation organized in a context of tyranny and single-party politics? Ahidjo's political maneuver was just a trick to neutralize and better assimilate the Anglophones, with the overt and covert complicity of France. In that connection Christian Cardinal Tumi, still in his book quoted above, writes (on page 33) that a French diplomat in Rome had told him that France's policy in Cameroon was "to wipe out the Anglo-saxon culture of the Anglophone minority in Cameroon ".

At any rate, since 1972 the Anglophones in Cameroon have been able to realize, with Ahidjo and even after him, the real meaning of the unitary State for them: adamant political marginalization, impossibility for them to head a number of key ministerial departments (Finance, Foreign Affairs, Territorial Administration, Education, Defense, etc.), Francophone administrative authorities in Anglophone areas, the absence of good roads linking the South-west to the North-West, the growing political divide between the two Anglophone regions, the dilution of the Anglophone cultural heritage, the non-respect of the Anglophone Prime Minister by some Francophone cabinet members, the publication of official texts mostly in French, etc. It was after realizing that huge trickery that John Ngu Foncha, who had led the Anglophones to the 1961 Reunification, opted to resign in 90s and demanded a return to federalism.

With the return to a multiparty system in the 90s, Anglophone group unity began to crumble. Political opposition between their two regions was exacerbated. After the All Anglophone Conference (AAC) and the meeting of Anglophone teachers and parents in Buea in 1993, the two Anglophone regions remained politically divided. Worse still, through their elites and traditional rulers, they engaged a fierce competition for the State favors. The contention intensified in the 1990s after Achidi Achu (from the North-West) and Mafany Musonge (from the South-West) were alternately appointed prime ministers, from 1992 to 1996 for the former, and from 19996 to 2004 for the latter. They both proclaimed that politic na njangi, just a way to say that politics is a game of interest in which the ruling party gives favors only to the constituencies that have given them their votes. That mercantilist and non-democratic conception of power politics, which gave rise to unspeakable backstage maneuvers for appointment positions, was detrimental to the values that characterized Anglophones: restraint, hard work, moral probity, transparency, honesty, selflessness and dedication. And not surprisingly many Anglophones were subsequently seen indulging in fraud, the rigging of elections, the corruption of traditional rulers, the embezzlements of public funds, etc.

Concerning the educational system, a serious threat to the Anglophone entity was the francophonization of technical and vocational education. Indeed, technical secondary schools in the English-speaking area have operated since 1972 like in the francophone zone, and their pupils had to write the same examinations such as the CAP, the technical Probatoire and the Bac, even after the GCE Board was created. Worse still, most technical education teachers were Francophones until the year 2009, when the first Higher Teachers' Training College for Technical Education was opened in Bambili in the North-West region. Moreover, since colonial times the Anglophones have always made it a point of honor to inculcate civic values to young children (good morality and citizenship, hard work, obedience, etc.). That was achieved through religion and moral education courses taught at all levels, in public schools as well as in secular and denominational institutions. These two subjects were officially disqualified in 1976 by presidential decree as criteria for admission to university or to employment in Cameroon. The Anglophones saw in that move a desire to radically francophonize their school subsystem.

Following the creation of Anglo-Saxon universities after the massive failures of Anglophone students in the bilingual national universities, the Anglophones noted that Francophone lecturers were appointed to teach or to manage those Anglo-Saxon institutions. This could be seen as real attack on the Anglophones' specific cultural identity. A similar threat was the migration to the Anglophone areas of thousands of Francophone students attracted by the high quality of the Anglophone subsystem. Indeed, many Francophone students and their parents had discovered, after the inception of the GCE Board in 1993 and the admission of Cameroon to the Commonwealth in 1995, that Anglophone certificates could open up more doors worldwide than Francophone diplomas. As a result, France was no longer the first destination for serious undergraduate or post-graduate studies: Cameroonian students preferred to study in the US, Canada, the RSA, India, etc. And to get better prepared for that, the Anglophone subsystem was the ready answer. These new linguistic Anglophones, expected to increase in number as time goes by, can gradually turn the original ethnic Anglophones into a minority among all English-speaking Cameroonians.

IV - The Responsibility of the State

Such are the hard facts, as seen through Anglophones' eyes. What should the State do at this point in time? The difficulties faced by Anglophones are of identity, socio-political and linguistic in nature, with many psychological implications. Therefore the first measure towards solving the Anglophone problem is human and communicational: finding credible mediators who can really build the bridges and destroy the walls, in order to (re)establish dialogue between the concerned parties. Then the second step should be technical and scientific. The 1996 Constitution, by establishing a decentralized unitary State, has visibly failed to create the desired level of harmony in Cameroon. The persistence of the Anglophone malaise is clear evidence of that failure. The country needs a strong national unity combined with a real regional autonomy. That is the system at work in the US, in South Africa, in Germany, and even in neighboring Nigeria. It is called federalism. It allows democratically elected officials placed at different levels of hierarchical responsibility - local, regional and federal - to manage the country according to the rule of law, and with due respect for objectivity, fairness and accountability. But Cameroonian experts and constitutionalists could also invent for their country a form of federalism that is even more adapted.

The government and the governed, to preserve the unity of the nation, must stop seeing anglophonization as a threat to some, and francophonization as death to others. Besides, the governed are sometimes ahead of the government: many Francophone families in Yaounde and Douala have anglophonized their children without getting the green light from the State. The future of Cameroon will be a judicious anglophonisation/francophonisation of a number of cultural elements that came to us either from France or from England. And if our national interest one day requires us to borrow some ways of doing things from Germany, China or Japan, shall we refuse that move just to keep our cherished Francophone or Anglophone identity? It is high time we changed our way of thinking, and started behaving as Cameroonians aware of building their future as Africans in a global context of rapid change.

Indeed, as discussed in my recent book Time for Africa's Emergence? With Focus on Cameroon (USA, 2016), in this era of globalization, Africa's emergence will rely more on our geography than on our history. It is therefore up to us to strike the right balance between our identity and our aspirations that is between our roots and our wings. But it should be noted that federalism in Cameroon would be a boon not only to Anglophone regions, but also to many other regions whose elites have been sending memoranda for years to the central government. These regionalist claims clearly express the thirst of all Cameroonians for a better distribution of national wealth, a better conduct of local affairs, and a better management of regional peculiarities. Obviously each and every region would like to be part of a well-managed country where all the citizens, in harmony with one another, can develop their full potential through hard work, in strict respect of their individual as well as collective rights?



Conclusion

Today the urgency for the State in Cameroon, conscious of its obligations before History, should be to appease Anglophones while correcting or redressing any institutional dysfunctions to preserve or perfect our national unity. The Anglophone problem (or any other similar set of grievances) is actually a thermometer that reveals high temperature, the urgent need to reform our institutions to enhance our living together. In that respect, and by way of example, the educational system is a great tool for a sound homogenization of the rising generations without sacrificing natural regional diversity, and not a nursery where short-sighted politicians can sow the seeds of future hatred and discord. More importantly, what the Anglophone regions are asking for (that is more freedom, autonomy, political initiative, better local government, etc.) is also good for other regions in the country. In the final analysis, the Anglophone problem is the manifestation of the discomfort of a community aspiring to better living conditions, but it also reveals a need that can be found all over the country. Obviously 22 million Cameroonians cannot be governed today with the same reflexes, methods and institutions as in 1972, when the country had only 6 million inhabitants.


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Few animation pitches open like this one does: with footage of terrorists. The scourge of Boko Haram in Nigeria is the subject of Animahs Journey, whose namesake protagonist, an 11-year-old girl, is forced to flee her village when the terrorist group attacks it. To cope with the trauma, she retreats into her imagination, where she pictures the gunmen as sinister wraiths.

The plot was engagingly narrated by director Wilson, with the aid of stills. The character designs consciously evoke those of Cartoon Saloon, including in its Taliban drama The Breadwinner. Animated family films about war and refugees are common in Europe, but the Boko Haram crisis is largely skated over  its a story thats not being widely told, as Wilson puts it.

Locked Down

Directors: Oyinkan Odunlami, Temidayo Odunlami

Format: series, 10 x 10min

Status: concept

Looking for: (co-)producers, distributors, financiers

Budget: 300,000 or $360,000

As the title suggests, this series addresses the pandemic, albeit through an outlandish comic sci-fi premise. Mysterious spores descend on the world and turn people into zombie goats, forcing human society underground. Locked Down centers on five adults and a goat stuck in a bunker while the apocalypse rages outside.

The creators, wife Oyinkan and husband Temidayo, conceived the show while locked down together, and hinted jokingly throughout the pitch that their relationship has been strained. The show is shot through with the kind of feverish dark humor that has marked many peoples experience of lockdown, and which wouldnt be out of place on, say, Adult Swim.

Artifacts

Director: Stanlee Ohikhuare

Producer: Mighty Jot Studios

Format: feature

Status: in development

Looking for: (co-)producers, broadcasters, distributors, financiers, sales agents

Budget: 500,000 or $600,000 (10% secured)

This project deserves a prize for kookiest concept. A 3d-printed faux-African artifact from Paris ends up in a Nigerian museum, where it tries to blend in among the exhibits, but eventually learns to celebrate its differences. There is scope for imaginative use of animation, texturing, or other visual devices to distinguish the fake artifact from the real ones, but the pitch didnt touch on this.

The story mirrors a contemporary reality: the presence of many stolen African antiquities in museums around the world. Ongoing campaigns for their repatriation informed the films storyline, as the pitch acknowledged. Cannily, it also noted the marketing potential of a film about a cast of figurines.
Animation festivals were mostly quiet last year due to the pandemic, and one of the casualties was the Los Angeles festival Animation is Film (AIF), which was forced to cancel its 2020 edition. But the festival announced this week that it will return to L.A. this fall for its fourth edition from October 22-24 at the TCL Chinese 6 Theatres in Hollywood.

What is Animation is Film? Launched in 2017, AIF brings new animated features from around the globe to Los Angeles, a city that, despite being a global animation production hub, lacks a major animation festival. The festivals goal is one we certainly agree with: it embraces the highest aspirations of the medium as an artistic cinematic art form on par with live action.

What happened at the last edition? The 2019 edition drew over 7,000 guests and included retrospectives, talks, and short film programs, in addition to its feature film line-up. The 2019 winners included I Lost My Body (which went on to be nominated for an Oscar), Maronas Fantastic Tale, Weathering With You, and The Swallows of Kabul.
Photo: The Canadian Press Finland's Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto

Ethiopias leaders in closed-door talks with a European Union special envoy earlier this year said they are going to wipe out the Tigrayans for 100 years, the envoy said this week, warning that such an aim looks for us like ethnic cleansing.

The remarks by Pekka Haavisto, Finland's foreign minister, describing his talks with Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and other ministers in February are some of the most critical yet of the Ethiopian government's conduct of the conflict in Ethiopias northern Tigray region. They came in a question-and-answer session Tuesday with a European Parliament committee.

Ethiopias foreign ministry dismissed Haavistos comments as ludicrous and a hallucination of sorts or a lapse in memory of some kind.

Haavistos special adviser, Otto Turtonen, told The Associated Press that the envoy has no further comment on this matter.

For months, Haavisto has served as the EU's special envoy on Ethiopia. In February he said he had two intensive days in substantive meetings with Abiy  the Nobel Peace Prize winner in 2019  and other key ministers about the growing humanitarian crisis in Tigray, where thousands of civilians have been killed and famine has begun in a region of some 6 million people. Ethiopian and allied forces from neighboring Eritrea have been accused of atrocities while pursuing fighters supporting Tigray's former leaders.

It is not clear from Haavistos remarks this week which Ethiopian officials made the comments about wiping out ethnic Tigrayans.

When I met the Ethiopian leadership in February they really used this kind of language, that they are going to destroy the Tigrayans, they are going to wipe out the Tigrayans for 100 years and so forth," the envoy said.

If you wipe out your national minority, well, what is it?" Haavisto added. "You cannot destroy all the people, you cannot destroy all the population in Tigray. And I think thats very obvious, that we have to react, because it looks for us like ethnic cleansing. It is a very, very serious act if this is true."

In comments shortly after those February meetings, Haavisto had warned that the crisis in Tigray appeared to be spiraling out of control.

The United Nations human rights office has said all sides in the conflict have been accused of abuses, but witnesses have largely blamed Ethiopian and Eritrean forces for forced starvation, mass expulsions, gang rapes and more.

Haavisto's remarks emerged as Ethiopia prepares to vote in a national election on Monday, the first major test at the polls for Abiy as he seeks to centralize power under his Prosperity Party.
Photo: The Canadian Press

The United Nations General Assembly elected Antonio Guterres to a second term as secretary-general on Friday, giving him another five years at the helm of the 193-member world organization.

Ambassadors in the assembly chamber burst into applause as Assembly President Volkan Bozkir announced Guterres re-election by acclamation.

Just before the announcement, Estonias UN ambassador Sven Jurgenson, the current Security Council president, read a resolution adopted by the 15-member council recommending Guterres for a second term.

Under the UN charter, the General Assembly elects the secretary-general on the recommendation of the Security Council.
Photo: Twitter

Iranians voted Friday in a presidential election dominated by a hard-line protege of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei after authorities disqualified nearly all of his strongest competition, leading to what appeared to be a low turnout fueled by apathy and calls for a boycott.

Opinion polling by state-linked organizations along with analysts indicated that judiciary chief Ebrahim Raisi  who is already under U.S. sanctions  was the front-runner in a field of just four candidates. Former Central Bank chief, Abdolnasser Hemmati, is running as the races moderate candidate but hasnt inspired the same support as outgoing President Hassan Rouhani, who is term-limited from seeking the office again.

By late afternoon, turnout appeared far lower than in Irans last presidential election in 2017. State television offered tight shots of polling places, several of which seemed to have only a handful of voters in the elections early hours.

Those passing by several polling places in Tehran said they similarly saw few voters. In addition to the disqualifications, voter apathy has also been fed by the devastated state of the economy and subdued campaigning amid a monthslong surge in coronavirus cases. In images on state TV, poll workers wore gloves and masks, and some wiped down ballot boxes with disinfectants.

If elected, Raisi would be the first serving Iranian president sanctioned by the U.S. government even before entering office over his involvement in the mass execution of political prisoners in 1988, as well as his time as the head of Irans internationally criticized judiciary  one of the worlds top executioners.

It also would put hard-liners firmly in control across the Iranian government as negotiations in Vienna continue to try to save a tattered deal meant to limit Iran's nuclear program at a time when Tehran is enriching uranium at its highest levels ever, though still remains short of weapons-grade levels. Tensions remain high with both the U.S. and Israel, which is believed to have carried out a series of attacks targeting Iranian nuclear sites as well as assassinating the scientist who created its military atomic program decades earlier.

Whoever wins will likely serve two four-year terms and thus may be at the helm at what could be one of the most crucial moments for the country in decades  the death of the 82-year-old Khamenei. Already, speculation has mounted that Raisi may be a contender for the position, along with Khameneis son, Mojtaba.

Polls opened at 7 a.m. local time for the vote, which has seen widespread public apathy after a panel overseen by Khamenei barred hundreds of candidates, including reformists and those aligned with Rouhani. Some, including former hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad who had been barred from this election, urged voters to boycott the poll.

Khamenei cast the first vote from Tehran, urging the public to take part.

Through the participation of the people the country and the Islamic ruling system will win great points in the international arena, but the ones who benefit first are the people themselves," Khamenei said. "Go ahead, choose and vote.

Raisi, wearing a black turban that identifies him in Shiite tradition as a direct descendant of Islams Prophet Muhammad, voted from a mosque in southern Tehran, waving to those gathered to cast their own ballots. The cleric acknowledged in comments afterward that some may be so upset that they dont want to vote.

"I beg everyone, the lovely youths, and all Iranian men and women speaking in any accent or language from any region and with any political views, to go and vote and cast their ballots, Raisi said.

But few appeared to heed the call. There are more than 59 million eligible voters in Iran, a nation home to over 80 million people. However, the state-linked Iranian Student Polling Agency has estimated a turnout will be just 44%, which would be the lowest ever since the countrys 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Fears about a low turnout have some warning Iran may be turning away from being an Islamic Republic  a government with elected civilian leadership overseen by a supreme leader from its Shiite clergy  to a country more tightly governed by its supreme leader, who already has final say on all matters of state and oversees its defence and atomic program.
Photo: Contributed

The hike up to Gold Creek Falls is well worn, appropriately marked, family friendly, and safe.



In fact, the word hike hardly seems appropriate. The path to the falls is only a little over two kilometres and on any given weekend in the summer, you will find it crowded with tourists and locals..

The route can be easily traversed in inclement weather, with minimal preparation, and with any manner of footwear (both Crocs and thong sandals have made this trek).



The falls are in Golden Ears Provincial Park, just outside Maple Ridge, British Columbia. Sitting in the shadow of the Alouette and Golden Ears twin mountain ranges, the park is home to old-growth hemlock forests, ancient western red cedars and Douglas firs.

Theres a large campground where the tops of the trees create a patchy canopy, and young kids can be seen running with abandon, hiding among the gnarled and ancient roots, and building makeshift forts and lean-tos with the soft moss and fallen branches that litter the forest floor.



We have camped here a number of times, and each time we do, we walk the well worn path to the falls. On our most recent visit, our family diverged from the crowded path at the midway point, following the river to the base of the falls.

We splashed in shallow water running over smooth river stones, and leapt across large boulders scattered near the base of the falls.

We baked in the scorching July sun, and then plunged ourselves into the icy pools of runoff some 30 feet from the falls. We would return to the rocks to dry off, clinging like starfish to their surfaces and absorbing their heat, our lips purple, skin pale and teeth chattering.



Then we ventured closer to the mouth of the falls themselves.



The immediate basin of the falls was above us, and partially obstructed from where we were swimming and sun tanning. I led the way with my children, scrambling up nearby boulders and edging my way around the largest rock surface, until the basin was in front of me.

Only as you turn that final corner do you realize how powerful the falls really are. The same large rocks that had obstructed our view had also obscured the sound of it. A deafening tumult of sound, the force of the water pummelling down endlessly into the basin.

The temperature drops immediately, the mist and spray from the falls suddenly everywhere, making each surface surrounding it slick. The torrent creates its own private windstorm, the wind surrounding and encircling you.



I became terrified. It was suddenly unnerving how near the edge I was, and how my eldest child was only a few feet behind me, beginning to turn the corner toward the basin herself.

We were entirely too close to something great and terrible. I yelled for her and her brother to turn around, but my voice was nearly inaudible in that storm.

I pointed back the way we came, and held their hands as we edged back away from the falls, and returned to our on-looking family at the edge of the river.



As we returned to the security of the on-looking path, somebody screamed. Continued screaming. A small white dog had been playing with her owner at the top of the falls when it ventured too far and got carried away by the current and pulled over the edge.

The owner of the dog continued to scream as she hastily scrambled down the ledge. I returned to the basin I had just left and found her staring wildly and screaming at the roiling surface.

I grabbed the largest stick I could find nearby, at least five feet in length, and began prodding the water. I dont know what I expected, but as I plunged the stick as deep as it could go, I met no resistance. I pushed the stick around the edge of the basin, and it was wider than I anticipated. There was a shelf of rock underneath and all around the edge of the pool.

The constant tumult had ebbed and eroded the smooth rock deeper than I could plumb, and wider than I could see from the surface.



We stayed at the edge of that basin for a long while, and eventually the screaming subsided, but we never found that dog. I dont know if they ever did.

A quick online search reveals multiple stories of those who underestimated their proximity to danger.

As I write this, four people have died in as many years. I discover a story of a woman who fell over the falls trying to rescue a friend who had also been swept up by the current.

I read a story of a 24-year-old male who was presumed dead after falling over the falls, search and rescue teams being unable to ever locate his body.



The falls are beautiful, but they are not safe.



I have a picture of my kids and me near the edge of the basin that day. The photo was taken by my wife from a distance, before any of this occurred. It is a stunning picture, but to this day it makes me shudder. The scene appears still and serene, completely devoid of the awesome terror of standing at the edge of such brutal force.

That day, and the picture of it reminds me how beautiful and terrible and fragile everything was, without my awareness. All at once together, and inseparable.



Its worth noting that you dont need to go down to the mouth of the falls to appreciate them. Most do not.

You can see the entirety of the falls from atop the high lookout at the end of the well-worn path.

You can hear the muted sound of it, a low roar that blends seamlessly with the chatter of the onlookers.

You might even feel some of the light spray.

The lookout is a fine place to take in the beauty of the falls, but it might be easy to forget how powerful they are, or how fragile you are, from such a distance.

That forgetting might be the greatest danger of all.

Perhaps, sometimes, we need to be uncomfortably close to see things as they really are.

To shock us, to wake us up.

To remind us that some things look safe and predictable, only from a distance. That things may appear simple at first glance, and intricately complex up close.

Perhaps when we draw near, quite a few things will reveal themselves as beautiful and terrible and fragile. And worth a closer, trembling look.
Photo: IHIT

Homicide investigators have taken over a Burnaby missing persons case.

Parminder Paul Rai, 33, was reported missing by his family on June 9, according to the Integrated Homicide Investigation Team.

He was last seen on June 4 at his home near University Crescent and Tower Road on Burnaby Mountain.

IHIT took over the case this week after a preliminary investigation by the Burnaby RCMP suggested an element of foul play, according to a news release Thursday.

"Rai is known to police for his connection to drug and gang activity," stated the release. "His disappearance is not believed to be random.

Rai is described as South Asian, 510 and about 185 pounds.

He drives a black 2011 Honda Accord with the B.C. licence plate number MB231R.

IHIT is urging anyone with information to contact IHIT at 1-877-551-IHIT (4448), [email protected] or Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-TIPS (8477).
Photo: The Canadian Press Chief councillor Marilyn Slett pauses for a moment during a news conference in Vancouver, Wednesday, Oct. 10, 2018. The B.C. government has signed a reconciliation agreement with the Heiltsuk Nation aimed at offering support for housing, language and economic development. THE CANADIAN PRESS Jonathan Hayward

The B.C. government has signed a reconciliation agreement with the Heiltsuk Nation aimed at offering support for housing, language and economic development.

The $22.3-million agreement also provides a foundation for the implementation of Heiltsuk rights, title and self-government under a 2019 deal with the provincial and federal governments.

Chief Coun. Marilyn Slett says the funding will go toward a language centre, tourism business opportunities, a business plan for a lumber mill and a long-term care facility for community elders.

Slett adds that the agreement will help close the socio-economic gap the band's members face.

Indigenous Relations Minister Murray Rankin says he believes more similar agreements will be signed in the future.

Hereditary chief Harvey Humchitt says the agreement is a culmination of years of work between the government and previous band chiefs and councillors.

The agreement is a step in the right direction but the journey to recognizing Heiltsuk's rights will continue, Slett said.

"As our chiefs have said, it's been a long road. But it's not over," she said.

Rankin said he's confident that the agreement will lead to further co-ordination between the nation and various levels of government.

"I honestly think we've done something for the history books," he said.

Jennifer Rice, a New Democrat who represents North Coast in the legislature, said she hopes the commitment will lead to improvements in the quality of life for Heiltsuk members.

"No amount of financial contribution can ever right the wrongs of the past, but I'm hopeful that this commitment will help the Heiltsuk achieve your goal of closing the socio-economic gaps created by settler colonialism," she said.
Buena Vista, CO (81211)

Today

Sunshine this morning. Scattered thunderstorms developing this afternoon. High near 75F. Winds S at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%..

Tonight

Scattered thunderstorms early, then becoming clear after midnight. Low around 50F. Winds WNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%.
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A fifth charge is filed against a former Yanceyville funeral home director; Pittsylvania planners field a request from a former farm; Our local Congressman tours the Mexican border; The city is gets ready for a big splash on the Fourth.
Calvary Chapel pastor Frank Ramseur on Thursday afternoon asked the County School Board not to use the Planned Parenthood sex education program.

Noting that Planned Parenthood was attempting to make a "re-emergence" in Chattanooga, he said the local schools should continue to use state programs that focus on abstinence instead.

Ann Roth, who was with him, said Planned Parenthood had hired a life educator in Chattanooga.

She said under current programs that teen pregnancies and teen birth rates had fallen sharply.

Board members made no comment.
Hearings for violations of the Chattanooga beer code were put on hold last year due to the difficulties caused by remote meetings of the beer board during the COVID pandemic. Beer Inspector Officer John Collins with the Chattanooga Police Department told the City Beer Board on Thursday that prior to the pandemic cases were brought to the board in a timely manor and now he is trying to get caught up. That is the reason some of the violations occurred over a year ago.

Five violations for serving beer to customers who were underage occurred at the Cheesecake Factory, 2084 Hamilton Place Blvd., from May 2020 through June 2021. They were all heard as one at the Beer Board meeting. All the violations stemmed from compliance checks made by the TABC (Tennessee Alcoholic Beverage Commission) which issues its own penalties after which the cases are referred to the Beer Board. Agent Travis Patten with the TABC told the board that the first violation, which occurred on May 28, 2020, and the second, which occurred on Aug. 18, 2020, were both for take-out orders. The third violation on Oct. 27, 2020, was a dine-in violation and the fourth and fifth, that took place on Jan. 22, 2021, were customers sitting at the bar. A fifth compliance check was made at the restaurant in 2020 where no violation was found.

Some of the servers involved in the illegal sales checked Id's and some did not and one server did not have a permit to sell alcohol, and one was a senior manager.

Attorney Brant Phillips, representing Cheesecake Factory, told the board that he was at the meeting to say Im sorry, and that both he and the company are embarrassed. There are 12 locations across Tennessee and this is the first time for a violation. We had a serious breakdown, he said. All servers involved were terminated and the manager was put through remedial training and placed on probation. The business agreed to a 30-day suspension, to pay a fine of $10,000 to the state and to a probation period of 180 days. And all front house staff at this location is going through remedial TABC training.

The Beer Board must mirror the 30-day suspension of the TABC suspension that will begin on Aug. 16 and will run concurrently with the TABC suspension.

Alex Thai Food & Sushi Bistro, 26 E. Main St., also had violations for serving minors on two occasions, the first on Nov. 18, 2020, and the second on April 30, 2021. Agent Patten told the board that at one of the compliance checks, the server had no permit to sell alcohol and at the second the underage sale took place even though the ID was checked. Both were at curbside to-go sales which has been allowed by executive order from the governor because of COVID. The penalties given by TABC were to suspend the license for five days and fines of $650 for the November offense and $5,150 for the second violation on April 30. The Beer Board has to give the same suspension as the TABC, which will be for five days beginning Monday, June 28.

Alan Golds, 1100 McCallie Ave., was at the board meeting for violation of overcrowding that happened Feb. 22, 2020. Officer Collins was conducting a bar check around 12:45 p.m. when he said the crowd appeared too large for the capacity given by the fire marshal, which was 201 individuals. The officer ordered a bar dump, which is to empty the building. A clicker was used to count people leaving, which registered 324. After the incident, he said he suggested the owner contact the fire marshal to increase capacity, which was later revised to the current 251. He also suggested hiring a private security officer for the front door and using two clickers, one for those entering and another for those leaving to get an accurate count.

Officer Collins has been back to the bar twice since that night and there was no overcrowding. Although the manager did take corrective action, attorney Foster recommended not looking at mitigation that was done to determine the penalty. The board voted to give a three-day suspension of the beer license or to pay a $500 fine. If the suspension is chosen, it will begin July 1.

Doc Holidays Bar and Grill, 742 Ashland Terrace, was at the Beer Board for the fourth time since November 2019 when it received a letter of reprimand for allowing a server to consume alcohol while at the place she worked. The same violation for an incident on December 2019 was dismissed and a 10-day suspension was given for an intoxicated employee on Feb. 9, 2020.

The case before the board on Thursday was because a customer called the police to report that Raulston Lamar Combs, the owner, was at the bar and was intoxicated. Patrol Officer Jacob Simpson was dispatched to the location for the fifth time. He told the board that this is an on-going problem. Three of those calls were specifically for Mr. Combs being intoxicated, and he said that every time he had done a bar check, he found the owner under the influence. His answer is always that I drink at home and then come to check on the bar.

"He always tells me that he is drinking ice water," said Officer Simpson, "and one time I smelled the glass when he left it, and it was not water." Officer Simpson is also trained to detect intoxication by observation to determine the condition of a person, he told the board. On all five calls he has made to the bar, he said the owner was under the influence.

He has not done a sobriety test before the owner leaves, however, because the man always leaves with a friend driving. But he has no way of knowing how he gets there. There were two charges on Thursday, an employee/owner drinking on the premise of where they work and being intoxicated on the premise.

Some discussion occurred about the officer arriving with a pre-conceived notion of what he expected to find. And there was stronger evidence and more documentation for the prior four cases than the one that the board was hearing for the March 25 incident. Officer Collins replied that Officer Simpson had been dispatched specifically because the owner was under the influence. He also has been trained with observational skills to determine a persons condition. Mr. Combs had also been given five warnings and the opportunity to conform to the laws.

The motion passed to issue a 10-day suspension of the beer license for Doc Holidays that will start on July 1.
General Motors is at wits end. GM needs to hire 450 part time workers immediately in Flint, Michigan and another 275 at the Fort Wayne, Ind., assembly plant. Add the fact the United Auto Workers, with its last president just sentenced to over two years in the slammer, is just as desperate for new members. GM is offering $16.67 an hour the first day, free medical care after 90 days, paid vacation after 120 days and a plump permanent job within 24 months.

But nobody is applying. The first hurdle is that the average unemployment check in Detroit is $16.05 an hour. There aint 50 suckers in Michigan or Indiana who are going to swap the sofa for back-breaking assembly line work for a net 62 cents an hour.

Thats right, a 10-hour shift will yield $6.20 more than unemployment for a full days work and taxes will swallow that whole. Those interested should call the UAW for more details.

But wait til you hear this! The UAW has just launched a fail-proof plan  the union has asked GM to lift all drug screening for new employees. In other words, nobody will fail a drug screening. Now thats fool-proof!

Eric Welter, the UAWs Shop Chairman for Local 598, explained this idea to the Detroit Free Press. "When you have a line of people waiting for a job, then it's OK to test (for marijuana). But, if you don't have enough candidates, testing for marijuana might turn people off from applying," he reasoned.

Welter says younger job hunters are particularly likely to skip an interview if they know they're going to be drug tested. (General Motors generally collects hair samples, which can reveal signs of pot use even if it was consumed several weeks before someone applied for a job.)

His better approach? You have to start treating people right, improving your compensation and doing something different to attract employees because youre competing with every major employer in the area. Nobody has workers," Welter told the newspaper. He recommends increasing the entry-level pay to over $17 an hour.

Are you kidding me? Thats just $10 bucks a day better than unemployment and you aint got to hold a front-bumper assembly while Darlene tightens the bolts. Secondly, Walmart and Amazon will meet that price for a skilled worker and a manager at McDonalds is a heckuva lot happier.

Finally, Michigan is one of 16 states where marijuana is legal. What do you reckon Darlene and her cohorts on the Local 598 Womens Select Bowling Team might share a doobie or two before the second-shift whistle? Brake lights dont work on the Silverado come down the line? No cares, my man  chill. Accidents, people falling those are union grievances. No problem Aunt Mary Jane will soothe your anxiety and let GM grabble internally.

Over a dozen UAW leaders, including the ridiculed former president Dennis Williams, are now in the hoosegow. Many union members are miffed by huge money loses, an insatiable pension plan about to topple, and corruption still rife in the lesser ranks. Man oh man! Roll me a blunt.

* * *

CHICAGO MAYOR DECLARES RACISM PUBLIC HEALTH CRISIS

Mayor Lori Lightfoot formally declared racism to be a public health crisis in Chicago on Thursday in a terse announcement at the MLK Exhibit Center and it was the most laughable moment in the United States.

Lightfoot, in my opinion, is the most repugnant elected official in America, is a blatant racist and just a month ago wrote to the Chicago media that she, as the first black woman and openly gay person elected to run that city, confirmed that on the occasion of the two-year anniversary of my inauguration as Mayor of this great City, I will be exclusively providing one-on-one interviews with journalists of color. Please!

"We can no longer allow racism to rob the residents of the opportunity to live and lead full, healthy and happy lives and we are working closely with the Chicago Department of Public Health and community organizations to address these inequities once and for all," Mayor Lightfoot wrote in mid-May. (A Lightfoot spokesperson later clarified that the protest only pertains to interviews about her anniversary in office.)

Yesterday the volatile firebrand was back on her high horse. This week her hysteria was borne by a Chicago Department of Public Health study that earlier this week showed black Chicagoans have a shorter life expectancy. The study revealed black lives are shorter in the city. On average in 2017 blacks in the city lived 71.4 years, while non-blacks lived 80.6 years.

The report listed the factors of the gap as chronic diseases, homicides, infant mortality, HIV, flu and other infections, and opioid overdoses. Put an emphasis on homicides

THIS JUST IN: The Chicago Jackass website revealed Thursday afternoon that 43 persons have been shot and killed within the Chicago city limits thus far in just the month of June and 258 Chicagoans have been shot in the last 17 days. For the year. 294 have been killed by gunfire and 1,704 people have been shot  thats one victim for every 2 hours 22 minutes since Jan. 1, 2021. The demographics: Of the dead this year there are 221 blacks, 36 Hispanics and 8 whites. (SOURCE: heyjackass.com)

royexum@aol.com
Graduates from Hamilton County Schools class of 2021 earned more than $116 million in scholarships and plan to attend 171 colleges and universities across the country.

In the midst of a global pandemic, the class of 2021 demonstrated resilience that deserves to be celebrated, said Dr. Bryan Johnson, superintendent of Hamilton County Schools. Our mission includes creating pathways to bright futures and Im excited to see what these graduates accomplish in the days ahead.



HCS graduates will attend a variety of two-year as well as four-year colleges and universities in over a dozen states, including two students who will attend Harvard University.



HCS students grades 9-12 earned 1,143 industry certifications and the class of 2021 earned 216 industry certifications.



The top 10 college and university choices for the class of 2021 include:



1. Chattanooga State Community College (includes Tennessee College of Applied Technology)

2. The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga

3. The University of Tennessee, Knoxville

4. Middle Tennessee State University

5. Tennessee Technological University

6. East Tennessee State University

7. Cleveland State Community College

8. Lee University

9. Tennessee State University

10. Lane College



Click here for a full list of colleges and universities the class of 2021 plans to attend.
A Red Bank duplex was damaged by fire early Friday morning.

A Red Bank resident called 911 reporting heavy smoke coming from a duplex. At 6:45 a.m., the Red Bank Fire Department responded to 449 Lullwater Road on a residential fire. Firefighters arrived on the scene reporting smoke showing on the front and back of the home.

A duplex resident from apartment B informed first responders no one was home at apartment A. Firefighters gained entry to apartment A to find fire in the living room area and contained it quickly.

No injuries reported but HCEMS was on the scene for any potential injuries to first responders.

Red Bank Fire Chief Brent Sylar reported the cause of the fire will be under investigation by the Red Bank Fire Department.

Apartment A had significant smoke/fire damage and firefighters saved apartment B and remains livable for the resident. Damages to apartment A are unknown at this time.
Following an unannounced inspection by the Tennessee Corrections Institute, the Bradley County Jail has received positive results with zero deficiencies found, including an official certification from the TCI Board of Control. This is the second consecutive year that the Bradley County Jail has made this accomplishment.The Tennessee Corrections Institutes jail inspection was based on the following categories: sanitation, hygiene, medical services, food services, inmate programs and activities, mail and visitation, supervision of inmates, security, maintenance, admission, records and release, physical plant, administration and management, personnel, discipline and classification.The states inspection was conducted on June 10, with no deficiencies found.The Tennessee Corrections Institute recently inspected the [Bradley County Jail], says William Wall, TCI executive director, in a letter to Sheriff Steve Lawson. The inspection revealed this facility meets all applicable minimum standards . . . You are to be congratulated for attaining this degree of professionalism in your organization.Inspectors also commented to the sheriff that the Bradley County Jail is one of the most clean and well kept correctional facilities they have inspected.I am very pleased to see our jail receive the results that it did from the TCI, and am especially proud of receiving the certification from the states Board of Control for the second year in a row, says Sheriff Lawson. I want to recognize and sincerely thank my corrections staff for their hard work in achieving this great milestone  You all are foundational to the success of our jails operations. Over the past three years, a great majority of my focus and energy as sheriff has been directed towards improving the condition and functionality of our jail little by little, day by day. I believe this certification speaks to that and the efforts of our jails leadership.The Bradley County Jails certification was received from the TCI Board of Control on June 10 following their review and approval.
A Tennessee Army National Guard medical flight crew responded to an emergency air evacuation mission after a camper was attacked and injured by a bear while sleeping in the Great Smoky Mountain National Park area Thursday.

Shortly before 7 a.m., the Tennessee Military Department and Tennessee Emergency Management Agency were notified of a camper in distress at a backcountry campsite 5.7 miles from the Maddron Bald Trailhead. Requiring immediate medical care, the Tennessee National Guard was alerted for a helicopter rescue.

A UH-60 Blackhawk helicopter from Detachment 1, Company C, 1-171st Aviation Regiment based in Knoxville assembled in under an hour and launched to the incident site, arriving at the campsite at approximately 8:45 a.m.

The flight crew consisted of Chief Warrant Officer 3 Andrew Redley, Pilot in Command, Capt. Philip Webster, Pilot, Sgt. Tim Allen, Crew Chief, and Sgt. 1st Class Tracy Banta, Critical Care Flight Paramedic.

Once the rescue aircraft arrived on scene, the flight crew began hoist operations. With the aircraft unable to land due to terrain, Sgt. Allen lowered Sgt. Banta to the patient via rescue hoist where he performed a medical assessment with the park rangers who were providing initial medical care, and ensured that the patient was stable enough for hoisting. Once complete, Sgt. Banta and the patient were lifted safely into the helicopter, which departed for the University of Tennessee Medical Center in Knoxville. The entire hoisting operation took 14 minutes to complete.

While onboard, the aircrew continued medical aid to the patient during the 20-minute flight to the hospital.

This is the third search and rescue mission by the Tennessee National Guard this year.
Tennessee American Water has named Doug Wagner as vice president of operations. Mr. Wagner will manage the teams responsible for the daily operations in the Chattanooga and Sequatchie Valley Districts. Mr. Wagner reports to Grant Evitts, president of Tennessee American Water.

Mr. Wagner began his career with American Water in 2002 and most recently held the position of senior manager for Missouri American Water in St. Louis. He also has served in leadership roles at Illinois American Water, where he was a senior superintendent of Operations, and at Virginia and Maryland American Water as a business performance supervisor.

We are excited to welcome Doug to Chattanooga, said Mr. Evitts. Dougs successful track record with environmental compliance, safety focus, implementing efficient processes, and emphasis on teamwork will continue our 130-plus years of quality water service in the Chattanooga community.

In his current role, Mr. Wagner will lead the production, water quality and field operations teams in their delivery of clean, safe, reliable water to 380,000 people in the region.

Mr. Wagner and his wife will relocate to Chattanooga with their two rescue dogs.




Whether you finished Dexter recently or you were one of the millions who tuned into the finale at the time it aired, its controversial ending still has people talking today. After eight long seasons, most viewers expected Dexter Morgan to either die or be held accountable for his crimes. But instead, he started a new life in Oregon as a lumberjack.

Almost a decade later, the series is making a comeback with a 10-episode limited series set to air in 2021. In the lead-up to the premiere, actor Michael C. Hall (Dexter Morgan) offered up some thoughts on the show, including on the series finale and whether his character is still a lumberjack.

Michael C. Hall on the red carpet at an event for the Showtime series Dexter | Getty Images

The Dexter series finale made the reboot possible

Though viewers widely panned the finale, if it wasnt for the way it ended, the show might not have been able to come back. Hall admitted such in an interview with The Telegraph, explaining, I do think that the way it ended is a part of what set the stage for us to return to it and find out what happened to him.

The revival was first announced in October 2020, with production underway at the time of this writing.

Were still in the midst of shooting it, but were far enough along that I have a sense of what its going to feel like, Hall went on. And I think for all of us involved in the project, theres some wistfulness over the fact that how mystifying the way it ended was, and a sense of responsibility and purpose that infuses our work this time around. A desire to kind of make things right.

RELATED: Dexter: The Alternate Ending Makes So Much More Sense to Viewers

The revival brings back some of his past tendencies

At some point over the years, Dexter left Oregon for a fictional remote town in New York, where hes working for a local shop. He goes by the name Jim Lindsay and has a totally different look than before, specifically a clean-shaven face and a neatly trimmed haircut.

Asked to confirm that Dexter has left the logging industry, Hall teased, He always was! Hes only chopping down the bad trees.

RELATED: Dexter Showrunner Hints at Why He Moved From Oregon to New York

With that, it seems that Dexter technically isnt a lumberjack anymore. But it looks like he decided to hold on to his ax. In one teaser clip for the revival, the camera focuses on an ax as Dexter says in a voiceover that hes back to his nature. Another trailer opens with a campfire burning in his wooded backyard before panning into his cabin, where a man can be seen struggling in the background.

Teasing whats to come, showrunner Clyde Phillips previously told TV Insider: Dexter always has what we call the dark passenger living inside him. He is more grounded than hes ever been, but that dark passenger is a voice he cannot deny. This is Dexter. People are going to die.
Fly Away is one of Lenny Kravitzs most famous classic rock songs. However, it almost left of its album. Heres why Kravitzs label initially hesitated to release the song  and what a young Zoe Kravitz thought of it.

Lenny Kravitz | Frank Micelotta/ImageDirect

What Lenny Kravitz thought when he started writing Fly Away

During an interview with Rolling Stone, Kravitz discussed fifteen of his songs which defined his life. He mentioned a mix of songs, from his biggest hits to more obscure album tracks. He cited Fly Away as one of these songs.

In the article, he discussed the creation of Fly Away. I cut that album in the Bahamas before I had my studio, he revealed. One day, the engineer brought in his guitar amp  it was a Park, very much like a Marshall. I plugged in a guitar and was playing with it and started the chords to Fly Away. I was like, Oh, wow. I think I have something. So started recording. It was just me there, nobody else. I played the drums, two guitars and the bass and I had this track.

Kravitz didnt initially see it as material for his album The album was done, so I wasnt even thinking about it, he said. I was like, Maybe this could be a B side or Ill finish it later. I would blast it in the car when Id drive Zoe to school; we would drive really fast down this road next to the beach. It was beautiful. We liked the way it sounded, but I still had no melody or words.

Lenny Kravitz | Frank Micelotta/ImageDirect

RELATED: The Hot Hit Song Madonna Wrote With Lenny Kravitz

Why Larry Kravitz almost didnt get to put the song on his album

Kravitz played Fly Away to a friend who felt the song was destined to be a massive hit. He encouraged Kravitz to put it on his album 5. However, Kravitz didnt think he could do so because he turned in the album.

Subsequently, he called up Virgin Records. He sent the song to the label anyway. They changed their minds and put the song on 5. Ultimately, Kravitz won the Grammy Award for Best Male Rock Performance for the song.

Lenny Kravitzs Fly Away

RELATED: Lenny Kravitzs Obsession with Lisa Bonet When They First Met Caused Him to End an Engagement

How the world reacted to Fly Away

Kravitz was able to put the song on the album. The album was a success, reaching No. 28 on the Billboard 200, remaining on the chart for 110 weeks. Fly Away reached No. 12 on the Billboard Hot 100, remaining on the chart for weeks. It charted higher than any other Kravitz song, with the exceptions of Again and It Aint Over til Its Over.

Fly Away has a legacy outside of its initial chart run. The track appeared in the trailer for Star Trek: Discovery Season 2. It also appeared in the cult classic romance Coyote Ugly. Despite some initial hesitation from his label, Kravitz was able to put Fly Away on 5 and it became a hit  and a small part of Star Trek history.

RELATED: Star Trek: Why William Shatner Doesnt Want to Play Captain Kirk Again
90 Day Fiance fans are accustomed to seeing an endless stream of spinoffs appearing on either TLC or discovery+ these days  now Love in Paradise: The Caribbean, A 90 Day Story, is joining the fray. The awkwardly named show will follow couples who fall in love while on vacation as they try to navigate their new relationships and make them last beyond a summer fling. As one might expect, there will be drama aplenty, and a new trailer shows a variety of uncomfortable moments just waiting to unfold on your television screen.

Love in Paradise cast revealed

Love in Paradise stars Aryanna and Sherlon | discovery+

RELATED: 90 Day Fiance: Ronald Smith Calls Tiffany Franco Emotionally Abusive, Couple Splits

The Love in Paradise cast has been revealed  the 90 Day Fiance spinoff will feature four couples as they navigate their new and potentially challenging relationships, premiering on July 18.

Couple Aryanna and Sherlon met in Jamaica. Aryanna is from Illinois, and Sherlon is a boat tour guide who works at a swingers resort. So already, its easy to imagine what sort of drama that might stir up. Aryanna returns to Jamaica, six months pregnant with Sherlons baby, in an attempt to get Sherlon to return with her.

Couple Mark and Key met in Panama 10 years ago, in Bocas del Toro. The two already have a complex history  Mark helped Key following an overdose, but the two havent been together in years. Now, Mark wants Key to commit to their relationship, as well as a move to California, but Key isnt sure that shes ready.

Steven and Martine met on a cruise ship, have been together and apart a few times since they first got together. Steven, a DJ, has cheated on Martine in the past, who says that if it happens again, theyre through.

Finally, theres Amber and Daniel  a duo sporting a hefty age gap and potential financial difficulties that might get in the way of making their K-1 visa happen.

The 90 Day Fiance spinoff trailer includes baby drama and commitment demands

Love in Paradise stars Mark and Key | discovery+

Naturally, any 90 Day Fiance spinoff is going to be chock full of drama, and Love in Paradise is no exception. The trailer for the show already hints at some major difficulties between the couples.

Were first introduced to Aryanna and Sherlon  Aryanna tells us about Sherlon working at a swingers club.

Crazy stuff goes on there. The flesh is a weakness, Sherlon says. Big hints at swingers drama to come, or just Sherlon having hangups about their lifestyle choices?

Amber and Daniel are next, with Amber mentioning she needs to figure out if Daniel is the one. Later, he calls her crazy, and she says she didnt even know who he truly was.

Then comes Mark and Key, with a clip highlighting differences in their views on how to pace their relationship. Later, Mark tells Key if she wont move to California with him, theyre through.

I let Key get away once, and Im not gonna let that happen to me again, he says.

I love you, but dont rush me, Key warns him.

Aryannas pregnancy drama takes a sharp turn in the trailer when friends or family, its unclear which, ask Sherlon a rudely pointed question.

Is this your first child, or do you have some more kids with some more tourists? one asks. Later, the trailer shows a clip of Aryanna crying and telling Sherlon she doesnt want to raise a child alone, and have one decision change her entire life.

Theres infidelity drama too

Love in Paradise stars Steven and Martine | discovery+

Next Steven and Martine are showcased, with Martine mentioning that Steven, as a DJ, often receives plenty of attention from women.

If a man wants to be with you, he will make it clear to you. Like diamond clear, Martine says while flashing her ring finger.

What? Youre on some bullsh*t, Steven replies. Martine later reveals that Steven has cheated on her before, following a clip in which he appears to be receiving late night messages from a woman.

Suffice it to say, the trailer is enticing for any fan of reality television relationship drama, but it remains to be seen if 90 Day Fiance fans have the stamina for yet another discovery+ exclusive spinoff.
An exhibit titled Sequoyahs Last Journey at Sequoyahs Cabin Museum in Sallisaw offers a look at Cherokee migration in pre-statehood Texas, as well as later attempts by individuals to discover the linguists resting place.
Last August, Doolittle Elementary School was vandalized.

An offensive racial epithet, written in graffiti, shook the community, especially coming in the wake of mass national protests that sprung up after the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minnesota Police Officer Derek Chauvin.

Yet Doolittle Principal, Amy OBrien, was determined to turn the horrible act into a positive experience for her community and students.

It was an awful thing that happened, and I wanted to really make that a learning experience for our community and use it as a way to teach acceptance and tolerance, OBrien explained.

To do so, Doolittle students have been working on a rainbow mural on the exact wall that was vandalized.

We started this project in May with the kids and they have all really taken to it, explained Art Teacher Tony Arru. I came up with the geometric design of the mural to really make it pop. My idea is to have cooler colors in the center and have it expand to warmer colors as the wings spread out.

Along with the mural, each grade has been participating in cultural diversity lessons that teach them about the importance of acceptance and cultural spaciousness.

At the start of each day cycle, (A, B, C, and D) the counseling department will be collaborating with me to share special developmental lessons on diversity, tolerance, and cultural awareness, O;Brien explained. The lessons will adhere to the CASEL competencies of self awareness and social awareness, with an emphasis on self-perception, self-confidence, perspective-taking, empathy, respect for others and appreciating diversity.

First and second grade students will read Same, Same But Different by Jenny Sue Kostecki-Shaw as part of the initiative. The book compares the differences in childhoods between a student in America versus a student in India, and contrasts their life experiences.

The third and fourth grade students will be watching a video that includes interviews with children from around the world, each one of whom discuss their customs and traditions.

Lastly, fifth and sixth grade students will be examining their own cultural backgrounds and watch a video from a reporter in Japan who challenges Amercians to view their culture through the eyes of someone who is not American.

The mural, which is called the Wings of Acceptance and Unity, is worked on every Friday by Arrus art classes, and he was hoping to have it completed by the end of the school year.

We have been working really hard on this, and we were nice enough to receive some local help for this mural from R. W. Hines with the materials for painting it, explained Arru.

R. W. Hine Ace Hardware helped supply Arru with the paint and necessary materials for the mural, reinforcing their dedication to the Cheshire community.

It was so nice that they did this for us, it was really sweet of them, Arru added.
Chickasha, OK (73018)

Today

Cloudy skies this morning followed by scattered showers and thunderstorms during the afternoon. High 82F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%..

Tonight

A few clouds. Low 68F. Winds ENE at 5 to 10 mph.
When Darrick Rizzo was 18, his girlfriend of three years told him she was pregnant. With the couple on the cusp of their college careers and unprepared to parent, his girlfriend chose to pursue adoption. Despite opposing the decision, Rizzo ultimately acquiesced, hoping to offer the best life possible for his son.

I was willing to do anything for my boy, even if that meant listening to his mom and choosing an open adoption, wrote Rizzo in his book, The Open Adoption: A Birth Fathers Journey.

Rizzo was committed to his role as a birth father and sent letters and gifts to his son. Years later, he learned his child had never received his correspondence. Despite a desire to be an involved birth father, his efforts were thwarted.

Whether or not they make the effort, the reality is that many birth fathers end up absent from the lives of their adopted children. And until recently, the relationship between adoptees and their birth fathers had not been given too much consideration in the context of the adoption conversation.

But as social media and family genealogy tracing allow more children to find and connect with their biological dads, Christians involved in adoption are thinking about the significance of such relationships.

Were starting to see a little more discussion around birth fathers, where historically theyve been left out of the picture, said Cam Lee, an adoptee and a Christian who now works as a therapist with adoptive families.

Most adoptions feature communication exclusively with birth mothers. Lee has noticed that adoptees on social media are speaking out more about their interest in their other parent too.

For Christians, these new conversations around birth fathers represent an opportunity to affirm their role and welcome them into the adoption story.

Paul Batura, the father of three boys through adoption, says its important to remember and uplift his sons biological dads. In a recent essay, he wrote a letter to them, extending his gratitude for their part in their existence. He also expressed a desire that they one day meet their sons, and that it will further affirm themand you as beloved and important.

Its a complicated reality, but nothing God didnt anticipate. As the adoptive son of Joseph, Jesus didnt have an earthly biological father, said Batura, who serves as vice president of communications for Focus on the Family. But we can know with certainty that it was Gods plan because God doesnt make mistakes.

Given that his sons birth fathers know his name, Batura said he published the essay hoping they might recognize themselves in it. We always try to honor them in our conversations and stories, he said.

But many birth fathers arent aware they have a child on the wayor in the world. Until a couple generations ago, out-of-wedlock pregnancy carried such an intense stigma that unwed mothers were usually silently ferried away until delivery and adoption were complete. Fathers were rarely part of the decision-making.



Back then, most adoptions were closed and identity records sealed. Prior to 1972, adoption didnt even require the consent of an unmarried father. Today, birth father rights vary from state to state, and at least 24 states have a putative father registry, which allows unmarried fathers to establish their potential paternity and attempt to maintain legal rights.

In addition to more legal protection for fathers, now 6070 percent of adoptions are open and 95 percent include at least some minimal type of contact between birth and adoptive families. This shift in adoption culture came after research showing that adoptees in open adoptions fare better personally and socially.

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Bringing birth fathers into the narrative could be life-changing for families. If adoptees knowing their birth mothers produces better personal results, having knowledge of and relationship with birth fathers offers even better results.

What we know is that when birth fathers are involved  its a better outcome, said Jennifer McCallum, foster care and adoption counseling supervisor for Buckner International, a Christian organization that facilitates open adoptions.

We tend to think of the expectant moms as the only one making a sacrifice or grieving, said McCallum. But we want birth fathers to be a part of the entire process.

Both parents can experience a sense of loss when their child is adopted. There isnt much research out there, but one study of 30 birth fathers found that they experience feelings similar to birth mothers: grief, distress, and pain, for example.

Birth fathers reported similar waves of emotion around birthdays, holidays, major life events and other major triggers, according to the National Council for Adoptions report.



Roger Matthews, 61, placed his son up for adoption over 40 years ago. He maintains it was the right decision for him and his girlfriend, both just 18 at the time, and one born out of their nascent Christian faith at the time.

Years later, Matthews met his adult son, and it was the beginning of a new family tree for them both. Matthewss son initially sought contact with his birth mother, who then connected the three of them. We now see them regularly, Matthews said in an email. I count them as part of our family.

Theodora Blanchfield, 38, was adopted as a newborn. As an adult, she met her birth mother first. That desire felt urgent at the time. But it wasnt long after that when she was compelled to find her birth father, too.

Growing up, I had envy of people who werent adopted, said Blanchfield. People who took knowing stuff about themselves for granted. Though she said meeting her father was somewhat anticlimactic, she was thankful for the opportunity.

Lee, the therapist who works with adoptive families, never met the birth father who died when he was a baby. But he has a living curiosity about him, including regular thoughts and dreams. Theres a longing to humanize him, he said.

He believes it would be beneficial to start incorporating birth fathers more into his work with families. Without the presence of a birth father in any way, he said, identity development can be harmed.

If we were able to have access to them in some kind of way, said Lee, theres a higher chance we could make sense of that story  and how we want to think or feel about it. (He did acknowledge that there are some situations when connecting with a birth father would be deemed unsafe.)

For those who dont know their birth fathers and never fully make sense of their backstories, God promises in the Bible to be a Father to the fatherless (Ps. 68:5). Its a comfort for the many children who grow up without their biological fathers around, whether because of adoption or other circumstances. My husband, who grew up without a father, experienced the fulfillment of that promise, which we wrote about in our book, Leaving Cloud 9.

Darrick Rizzo continued to reach out to his son, and once his son was a teenager, they were able to form a personal relationship. Both say they are better off now that the puzzle pieces of their lives have come back together.

More recognition for birth fathers, wrote Roger Matthews, might contradict the American worldview that views people merely as representatives of groups, rather than individuals formed by a Creator for relationship, marriage, and family. It may also help equalize the pressure and stigma that so often falls onto birth mothers alone.

On Fathers Day and beyond, advocates like Batura say thanking birth fathers publicly is appropriate, validating, and kind. There will always be brokenness in an adoption story, but even in adoption, Gods design for humanity and family can be sustained.

Ericka Andersen is a freelance writer in Indianapolis. She hosts the Worth Your Time podcast and is writing a book about women and church.
Our family is a bit raw this week. Packing your whole life into a U-Haul and leaving behind everything called home has a way of putting everyone on edge. We moved several times during my childhood, but this was my first time doing it as a father. I remember moving to South Florida in the third gradethe tears, the uncertainty, the upheaval. Its been hard to watch a familiar sorrow swell in the eyelids of my own kids.

As fathers, we dream of passing down wisdom, character, and faith, but so often we end up leaving our children an inheritance of pain, hurt, and unfulfilled longing. In his latest offering, Lament for a Father: The Journey to Understanding and Forgiveness, prolific author and longtime World magazine editor in chief Marvin Olasky reflects on this mixed blessing. Many people  have unresolved conflicts with dads, living or dead, he writes. So do I.

Olasky styles the book as an elegy for his own dad, a father simultaneously present and absent. Its a work so particularly about one father that it ends up being about every father.

Who is to blame?

Eight brief chapters piece together a mosaic of Eli Olasky, a son of immigrants who grew up in a Jewish ward of Malden, Massachusetts, just outside Boston. Using the present tense, the author narrates the life of a school principal with a Harvard degree who settles into a life of comic books, bridge, frequent job turnover, and disappointing his wife. Aloof and stoic, he shows a mysterious lack of ambition.

A sense of melancholy weighs heavily over the entire book. The discoveries the younger Olasky digs out of Harvard archives, newspaper clippings, and family photo albums give his prose the yellowed edges of a son who would rather have known his father in his own words. Chock full of details from a distinctly Jewish upbringing, Olaskys vignettes benefit from a pen sharpened by decades in magazine editing:

In 1957 we drive down US Route 1 to Hollywood, Florida, where my father will be the principal of a Hebrew school that students attend after public school lets out. One night we eat at a Howard Johnsons. The table looks a lot like the one we have at home, with the same laminate surface. My father orders a hamburger and a wedge of iceberg lettuce. No ketchup or mustard on the burger. No dressing on the non-salad salad. My mother orders beef burgundy.

I request a small wedge of lettuce and a childs hamburger. Since we eat only kosher meat at home, I ask the waitress if its kosher. She laughs and walks away. My father says it isnt. I ask, Why are we eating it? He says, Its not important.

Its funny what memories a sons mind latches onto when its starved for a father. The older Olasky was always dodging his sons probing queries with that same refrainIts not important.

The author unpacks his taciturn fathers past one dusty box at a time. He learns of the antisemitism he had to overcome to gain entrance to Harvard. He begins to comprehend his fathers love-hate relationship with his Jewish heritage after discovering the philosophies he encountered in college. He realizes that his detached father probably spent a lifetime coping with the horrific sights, smells, and sounds he brought home from concentration camps he saw during the Second World War. Like many of his generation, Olasky writes, my father never spoke of his World War II experience. Like many of my generation, I didnt ask.

Olasky dignifies every unfolding detail of his fathers life like a skilled mortician. He chronicles the slide of his parents into middle age. They fight a lot, particularly over his fathers underachievement, and his mother fends off fatalism with the interjection, Im not going to end up like my mother! Both hope their two boys will provide redemption for the familys shortcomings. With wistful hindsight, Olasky writes, That does not happen. His fathers career disintegrates into administrative temp jobs while the son completes graduate school: I dont know anything about that, but I dont ask.

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His tale concludes with the sentiment, Who should I blame? When fathers and sons have poor relationships, when families fall apart, who is at fault? The author warns, Scapegoating is an occupational hazard for writers of family history: Its easy to blame parents. Part of Olaskys recent journey as a son has been learning of all the sin, abuse, and trauma his parents suffered in their own lives:

Ive realized in the course of this research how self-centered I was, not only as a child but as an adult. Why did I have so little interest in seeing my parents not primarily as people to meet my needs (or not), but as individuals with their own struggles? I never really cared to find out about them.

In these sheepish confessions, Olasky reiterates the books main thrust: Fathers and sons are meant to know and to be known by one another. He gives sons this bit of advice: Persist in questioning while your father is still alive. Dont take no for a final answer.

As I was packing up our shed this past week before our move, my nine-year-old son unloaded a barrage of questions: Whats that called? Whats it for? Where does it go? I was hot, sweaty, and annoyed, so I began to respond with sarcastic non-answers meant to discourage further inquiry.

I read Olaskys exhortation later that afternoon, and I had to go find my little boy to apologize. I never want to hinder or discourage his searching heart. Those persistent questions are the outward expression of a little soul that longs to know his father.

A together misery

In Lament, the author realizes that his fathers reticence may have stemmed from a desire to shield his son from trauma, pain, or personal sin. As fathers, it can feel shameful to be so known. Our kids see us at our worst; they know our bald spots better than we do. Rather than leaning into this intimacy, we can recoil from embarrassment and push our kids away. However, in hiding our flaws from our children, we hide ourselves.

One quibble readers might have with Olasky is that his lament ends abruptly with almost no conclusion or application. At only 100 pages in length, another chapter easily could have been justified. Im sure readers would appreciate a few more reflections on what Olasky learned from unearthing his fathers pastand what he might have us learn.

But perhaps that is part of the point. Perhaps Olasky is resisting the trivialization of his fathers existence by boiling his life down to a few chirrupy lessons. The focus on the lost details of his fathers historyfacts recounted without much commentary or digestseem to be his way of saying, Eli Olasky has value not because of what he gave me or what he taught me but simply because he was my dad.

It is a human impulse to try to make sense of our bewildering tragedies by stringing together some greater purpose on our ownan artificial connecting of the dots to forge some cheap closure for ourselves. Olaskys Lament refuses to do so. His elegy remains unresolved. Leaning into the dissonance of human sorrow and divine sovereignty, the author will not let God off the hook. Mankind cannot redeem his sorrows. Only God canand he must.

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The Olaskys of Lament for a Father lived a story so oddly specific and yet so eerily familiar. We all have moments where we see devastation in our relationships and say, I wish it were not so. Is this not the throb of the Christian heart in a world not yet fully redeemed? Commiseration is the point of lament. A together misery . A shared sadness. Lament is an invitation: Be wretched with me. Our sorrows are not all the same, but they are a part of the same fallen world.

My son and I were driving the moving van this weekend, a sieve of fresh-picked blueberries between usthe last vestige of the home we were leaving behind. As the miles passed, I regaled him with tales from my childhood: places Id lived, friends Id left behind, hardships Id endured. Olaskys encouragement echoed in my mind: Even if it seems too late, its not.

Fathers, find a place, an activity, a time, where you feel comfortable sharing yourself with your children. Ask Marvin Olasky, or any son who has lost a father. They know in their bones that this is true: Our kids dont want a perfect dad; they just want Dad.

Chad Ashby is a graduate of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and Grove City College. He currently teaches literature, math, and theology at Greenville Classical Academy in Five Forks, South Carolina. He blogs at After+Math.
Image: Canva

Holidays and missions are two things Christians and churches celebrate. We stand proudly on Memorial Day as we remember the sacrifice of soldiers. We listen to sermons on gratitude and praise God for His blessings on Thanksgiving. We watch videos about the legacy and impact of Lottie Moon and praise God for the fruitfulness of those on the mission field.

By now, many of us have heard of the holiday Juneteenth, though many Christians still dont celebrate the day or recognize the fruitful mission work birthed out of the freedom of African American slaves. Though the liberation of the enslaved people is the only reason we need to celebrate Juneteenth, there is much to commemorate. I propose that we should also commemorate this day to recognize the missional fervor displayed by freed African Americans and the way they stewarded their freedom to continue a Christian legacy of fulfilling the Churchs mission.

What is Juneteenth?

In the midst of the Civil War, President Lincoln enacted the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, which declared enslaved people in the Confederate states as free. Tragically, cities like Galveston, Texas utilized legal barriers to withhold the news of freedom from enslaved people. However, on June 19, 1865, the day is known today as Juneteenth, two months after the ending of the Civil War on April 9th, General Gordon Grainger brought the news of freedom to the enslaved people in Galveston. For years, freed black men and women and black enslaved people fought vigorously for the liberation of black people, and finally, they were free. To be clear, many social, economic, and legal barriers would come during Reconstruction and eventually Jim Crow that suppressed the full freedom of African Americans but to the slave on Juneteenth, freedom seemed promising.

Nevertheless, one of the most remarkable things about Juneteenth is the missional zeal displayed by African Americans after they were liberated. Thus, Juneteenth demonstrates how important physical freedom is for missions.

Juneteenth, Missions and Church Growth

A revisionist history tends to speak of the growth of African American church and missions between the 1700s to the 1900s as a product of the Great Awakenings, Quakers, and the evangelism by slave masters. However, the liberation of enslaved people brought a significant growth in conversions, church planting and domestic and international missions among African Americans.

Missions

It is undeniable that African Americans were involved on the mission field prior to Juneteenth. Missionaries such as Lott Carey, who helped establish the Richmond African Baptist Missionary Society in 1815 and Daniel Coker who organized the first AME church in Sierra Leone in 1820 were prominent black missionaries before Juneteenth. However, Juneteenth enabled African Americans to act on their convictions to serve God by carrying out the Great Commission both domestically and internationally.[1] To enslaved people, Juneteenth removed barriers to the mission field and as a result they moved with fervor to proclaim the gospel of the God of liberation and justice.

The international mission work among black Americans increased dramatically after the Civil War, which ended 2 months before Juneteenth, with the number of free blacks between the ages 24 and 35 increasing from 86,000 to 665,000.[2] Many newly freed slaves were mobilized to take the Gospel to Africa and to black people throughout America, particularly in the South. Among those missionaries were black Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians, and Pentecostals.

Between 1880 to 1883 the Baptist Foreign Mission Convention laid the foundations for future missionary endeavors and the movement for African missions gained momentum.[3] From 1892 and 1900, the AME church planted a number of churches in South Africa. Similarly, by the beginning of the 20th century, the AMEZ church had developed within its church a widespread interest in missionary expansion in Africa.[4]

African American missionaries also traveled to places such as Canada and the Caribbean islands.[5] For example, the womens missionary organizations such as the Womans Parent Mite Missionary Society in South Bend, Indiana began their mission work in places such as Haiti, Jamaica, and Sierra Leone in 1898.[6] Missionaries like the reverend George Liele, a freed slave and missionary to Jamaica, and reverend Prince Williams, a freed slave from South Carolina and missionary to the Bahama Islands, both seized the opportunity to take the Gospel to the islands.

Church Planting and Growth

After Juneteenth African Americans utilized their freedom to establish religious independence and create churches for black men and women. Historian Joe M. Richardson explains the zeal among newly freed slaves claiming, long desiring religious freedom and repelled by discrimination in white churches, blacks after emancipation quickly began to renounce their old religious connections and form churches of their own.[7] As a result, black churches sprang up quickly and frequently. Historian Paul Harvey notes, After the war, independent churches and denominational organizations sprang up quickly in black communities, including thousands of small local congregations and major national organizations.[8] African American church membership grew from 2.6 million to 3.6 million between 1890 and 1906, most belonging to newly formed black churches.

By 1906, the National Baptist Convention, a nationwide organization of black Baptists that had been created in 1895, claimed more than two million attendants, which was 61 % of all black churchgoers.[9] Beginning in 1896, Charles Harrison Mason, a COGIC preacher, began drawing large crowds to his holiness services and eventually worked with Charles P. Jones, and W.S. Pleasant to create the COGIC denomination, which embodied an intense desire for the mission field.[10]

Why do we commemorate?

Enslaved people marched out of slavery with feet walking towards their people, mouths proclaiming the Gospel, hands committed to working towards physical liberation, and eyes towards the coming Kingdom. Convinced that their God was a God of liberation and eager to spread their Christian faith, African Americans spread the Gospel and caused significant growth in black churches in America and missionary work domestically and abroad. So, we commemorate Juneteenth because we rejoice in the liberation of black enslaved people and acknowledge the example set before us by African American Christians to steward our liberation to fulfill the Churchs mission.

[1] Vaughn J. Watson and Robert J. Stevens, eds., African American Experience: In World Mission: A Call Beyond Community (California: William Carey Library, 2002), 31.

[2] Vaughn J. Watson and Robert J. Stevens, eds., African American Experience: In World Mission: A Call Beyond Community (California: William Carey Library, 2002), 56.

[3] Ibid., 40.

[4] Ibid., 35.

[5] Ibid., 48.

6] Ibid., 32

[7] Joe M. Richardson, Christian Reconstruction: The American Missionary Association and Southern Blacks, 1861-1890 (Georgia: University of Georgia Press, 1986), 143.

[8] Paul Harvey, Through the Storm Through the Night: A History of African American Christianity (New York: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, 2011), 69.

[9] Ibid., 72.

[10] Anne H. Pinn and Anthony B. Pinn, Fortress Introduction to Black Church History (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2002), 113.
A diverse group of American evangelicals congratulated Naftali Bennett on becoming the new prime minister of Israel and successfully forming a coalition government, offering reassurance on to Israelis concerned about Christian support after Benjamin Netanyahus departure.

We pray that God grants you wisdom and strength as you make hard decisions that will affect the lives of millions, and we trust that He will answer those prayers, wrote more than 80 religious leaders, organized by the Philos Project, a group promoting positive Christian engagement with Israel and pluralism in the Middle East.

The letter expressed appreciation for Netanyahu and everything he did to strengthen Israel and its alliances over the past 12 years he served as prime minister. It also welcomed the change brought by Bennett, a religious Jew and former Netanyahu disciple who formed an alliance with multiple parties across the political spectrum to oust Netanyahu.

We want to thank you in advance for protecting our shared values as they apply to Israels citizens, whether Jews, Christians, Muslims, or Druze; for guarding the holy sites and welcoming religious pilgrims from around the world to discover the birthplace of their faith; for defending Israel from outside aggression; and for continuing to work toward peace with Israels neighbors, the letter said. In return, we pledge to deepen our friendship with your country and its wonderful people.

Some Israeli political commentators have worried about evangelical support for the new government. In the run-up to the election, former Israeli ambassador to the US Ron Dermer argued Israel should be very concerned about losing the support of American evangelicals.

Those fears seemed to be confirmed when Mike Evans, founder of the Jerusalem-based Friends of Zion Heritage Center and the Jerusalem Prayer Team, lambasted Bennett in an open letter.

The Jerusalem Prayer Teams Facebook page had 77 million followers before it was taken down in May, and Evans is regularly described in Israeli media as a prominent American evangelical leader and even the worlds largest evangelical leader.

Shame, shame, shame on you. Don't ever call yourself a defender of Zion. You're not, Evans wrote to Bennett in early June, while Bennett was negotiating to form a coalition government.

I will fight you every step of the way. You have lost the support of evangelicals 100 percent, Evans said. We gave you four years of miracles under Donald Trump. We evangelicals delivered it. You delivered nothing. What appreciation do you show us? You s right on our face.

Evans later apologized for using rude language, but repeated his opposition to Bennett and any other political figures who might attempt to replace Netanyahu.

Youre gonna wave a white flag of surrendernot a blue and white flaga white flag, because youre so blinded by your hatred, by your petty politics and your obsessions with power that you cant see the trees for the forest, he said.

Evans also reiterated his claim to represent American evangelicals, and referred to my 77 million evangelicals in his press conference.

Other American evangelicals with a record of strong support for Israel stepped in to say that not everyone felt the same as Evans.

While Evangelicals do highly respect and appreciate Netanyahu, their love for Israel is not tied to one man, wrote Joel Rosenberg, a Christian fiction author and founder of All Israel News. Christians of course know that at some point Netanyahu will move on, but they sincerely want to bless and strengthen Israel for the long haul regardless of who is in power.

Rosenberg is one of the dozens of leaders who signed the Philos Project letter.

It was also signed by Methodist, Pentecostal, Southern Baptist, and Missionary Baptist pastors; bishops in the Anglican Church in North America and the International Pentecostal Holiness Church; and representatives from the National Day of Prayer Task Force, the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, National Religious Broadcasters, Pastors Wives of America, and Promise Keepers.

Professors from The Kings College, Grove City College, Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, Dickerson-Green Theological Seminary, and Beeson Divinity School signed on, as did Tony Suarez and Johnnie Moore, who served as evangelical advisors to President Donald Trump.

Robert Nicholson, president of The Philos Project, said in a statement that the letter was designed to show broad support.

This list represents tens of millions of Christians from all over the denominational spectrum, he said, who differ on many things but agree on the importance of Christian friendship with Israel based on shared values that come from the Bible.
Historical awareness, spirit of reconciliation: Churches across US observe Juneteenth

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Churches across the United States are hosting events to celebrate Juneteenth, which celebrates the official end of slavery in the country after the American Civil War.

The holiday centers on the anniversary of June 19, 1865, when Union troops entered Galveston, Texas, and implemented the Emancipation Proclamation, which was issued in 1863.

Also known as Freedom Day, Jubilee Day or Liberation Day, Juneteenth holds an especial significance this year as, with strong bipartisan support, it became the first new federal holiday since Martin Luther King Jr. Day in 1983. On Thursday, President Joe Biden signed the bill making Juneteenth a national holiday.

Garfield Memorial Church of South Euclid, Ohio, which has celebrated the holiday before, will be hosting a communitywide event, partnering with city officials and others.

Chip Freed, lead pastor at Garfield Memorial Church, told The Christian Post that they will highlight black-owned businesses and vendors, have a tent for building bridges conversations, as well as family activities, various performances and a kickball with the cops sporting event.

We are a national teaching church in the Mosaix Global Network seeking to build more healthy multiethnic churches in an increasingly polarized society, Freed said.

We have 1,200 active members with no one ethnic group comprising more than 52% of our congregation. We highlight all cultural celebrations as we are able.

When asked by CP what he hopes people take away from the event, Freed responded that he wants to see a sense of historical awareness as well as a spirit of reconciliation.

Gail Bouffard of Manchester Church of Christ, located in Manchester, Connecticut, told CP that her congregation would be holding their first-ever Juneteenth observance on Saturday.

Our congregation here in Manchester has historically been predominantly a white one, but more recently that isn't the case. Observing Juneteenth is one of the ways that we hope will demonstrate our sincere desire to be unified in Christ, she explained. Our sister congregation, the Northside Church of Christ, has been co-planning this event with us, and it has been a time of learning and listening for us.

Bouffard also told CP that the churches were praying that they will provide an event that helps give both the history of and context for Juneteenth, through the lens of faith, while also providing us with one more avenue for expressing faithful unity in Christ.

Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church of Montclair, Virginia, will be hosting a virtual event known as the Juneteenth Poetry Jam, which will feature Kim Miller, the first African American Poet Laureate for Prince William County.

Before the pandemic, it was common for Bethel AME to observe Juneteenth by traveling to Petersburg, Virginia, to tour the many historic African American landmarks.

The Rev. D. Melynda Clarke, pastor of Bethel AME, explained in an emailed statement to CP that these tours would also include visiting Pocahontas Island, which prides itself as the oldest existing free black community in the nation.

We hope that the Juneteenth Poetry Jam will inspire all people to be knowledgeable regarding Black Freedom Day and join in celebrating our heritage, diversity, creativity and culture through poetry, Clarke said.

Embracing black heritage is a fundamental element of the African Methodist Episcopal Church. In this spirit, Bethel AME Church is proud to host an event to bring awareness to Juneteenth while demonstrating amazing black talents and creativity.

In Princeton, New Jersey, Mt. Pisgah African Methodist Episcopal Church and Princeton United Methodist Church will be holding their first-ever joint celebration of Juneteenth.

The two churches are planning to hold a cookout lunch at Community Park South Pavilions in Princeton, according to event co-chair Dana Dreibelbis.

Along with traditional goals of acknowledging and celebrating African American people and culture, we have a goal of specifically building interpersonal relationships via the fellowship, Dreibelbis said.

This includes the notion that race relations in the U.S. will improve, in part, to the extent to which we all get to know and respect others. Simply put, putting love your neighbor as yourself, into action. We want to build foundations for long-term, harmonious relationships."
HHS to investigate NIH grant program amid concerns over Wuhan lab funding

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A federal agency has opened an investigation into the U.S. National Institutes of Healths grant program for international research amid criticism over funding sent to the Wuhan Institute of Virology, the Chinese lab from which some claim the virus may have originated.

The U.S. Health and Human Services announced it would look into how NIH monitors grantees and subgrantees' use of grant funds.

"We share stakeholders concerns regarding compliance and oversight of NIH grant funds. We have been monitoring this issue for some time and consider it a high-priority matter that can pose a threat to the integrity of the NIH grant program," Tesia Williams, spokeswoman for Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General [OIG], said in a statement to The Hill.

"Based on our preliminary research and analysis, HHS-OIG has decided to conduct an extensive audit reviewing how NIH monitored selected grants and how the grantees and subgrantees used and managed federal funds between years 2014 through 2021, she continued.

Fox News reports that the new investigation coincides with a period of time in which NIH gave New York-based EcoHealth Alliance $3.75 million in grant funding to carry out studies on coronavirus in bats.

Fauci admitted before Congress that EcoHealth Alliance used a nearly $600,000 subgrant from NIH to fund research at Wuhan Institute of Virology on bat coronaviruses over five years, from 2014 to 2019. However, HHS documents obtained by the conservative activist group Judicial Watch suggest that $826,277 was provided by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases to the Chinese lab during that time.

Former President Trump terminated this contract in April 2020, arguing that he had seen evidence that the institute in Wuhan was responsible for the outbreak.

Many top Republicans and Trump blamed China for the start of the pandemic in 2020, claiming that it escaped from the premier lab for studying coronaviruses. Many dismissed the claim as a conspiracy theory. There are competing theories on how the virus originated.

Alina Chan, a Canadian scientist and postdoctoral associate at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard University, recently said she and her colleagues initially denied the possibility of the coronavirus originating from a lab leak because they did not want to be associated with Trump.

"At the time, it was scarier to be associated with Trump and to become a tool for racists, so people didn't want to publicly call for an investigation into lab origins," Chan told NBC News.

Chan is one of the 18 experts who signed a letter in May demanding an in-depth investigation into the virus' origins that looks into theories of natural origin and laboratory leak. However, she didn't want to call for this action at first to avoid being associated with Trump.

Harper Books announced on June 8 that Chan will co-author a book chronicling every twist and turn in uncovering COVID-19s origin.

Footage from the Wuhan Institute of Virology shows live bats were kept in cages, debunking a World Health Organization claim that such an allegation was a conspiracy, Sky News reported.

A WHO report released in March stated the coronavirus likely emerged from bats and is extremely unlikely to have emerged from a laboratory leak. The report argued the virus was more likely to have spread to another animal before being contracted by humans.

A popular theory has been that COVID-19 emerged from bats in a Wuhan, China wet market.

Fox News reported that experts and lawmakers have claimed that Wuhan Institute of Virology was participating in gain-of-function research, where animal viruses are manipulated to become transmissible and harmful for humans.

Funding gain-of-function research is prohibited by Senate Amendment 2003, which defines gain-of-function as any research project that may be reasonably anticipated to confer attributes to influenza, MERS, or SARS viruses such that the virus would have enhanced pathogenicity or transmissibility in mammals.

National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Director Anthony Fauci and NIH Director Francis Collins have denied allegations that grant money awarded to EcoHealth Alliance was used to fund gain-of-function research in Wuhan.

Republican Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., recently cited a Hudson Institute event regarding the COVID-19 origins and said evidence of a lab leak has been building for months." He pointed to the lax safety conditions at Wuhan Institute of Virology, similarities between research at the lab and features of the virus and patents for bat cages and other live-animal research tools filed by WIV.

More questions surrounding the lab leak hypothesis for the COVID-19 outbreak arose when State Department documents released during the final days of the Trump administration revealed three researchers from the lab were hospitalized after becoming sick with COVID-19 symptoms in November 2019, a month before the first confirmed case.

The Senate unanimously approved a bill, introduced by Sens. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., and Mike Braun, R-Ind., on May 24 to require the federal government to declassify all information on links between the Wuhan lab and COVID-19 following the Wall Street Journal article about the three sick researchers.

In a statement in late May, President Joe Biden said that the intelligence community has coalesced around two likely scenarios on the origin but has not reached a definitive conclusion on this question. He called on the intelligence community to redouble their efforts to collect and analyze information that could bring us closer to a definitive conclusion."
IRS denies tax-exempt status to Christian org accused of being too political; appeal filed

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A Christian group is appealing a decision from the Internal Revenue Service denying nonprofit exemption status due to the government believing that its endeavors are too political.

Christians Engaged filed an appeal Wednesday to a decision by the IRS denying the organization an exemption under Section 501(c)(3), which would allow the group to be legally considered a charitable organization and receive benefits like tax-deductible contributions.

The organization filed for the status in 2019 and received a notice of denial from IRS Exempt Organizations Director Stephen A. Martin on May 18.

The appeal argues that the IRS' argument is flawed in three ways, namely that it invented a nonexistent requirement that exempt organizations be neutral on public policy issues."

The appeal contends that the agency wrongly assumed that "Christians Engaged primarily serves private, nonexempt purposes rather than public, exempt purposes because he thinks its beliefs overlap with the Republican Partys policy positions."

First Liberty Institute, a conservative legal nonprofit that often handles religious freedom litigation, filed the appeal on behalf of Christians Engaged. The appeal argues that the IRS engaged in both viewpoint discrimination and religious discrimination.

Only a politicized IRS could see Americans who pray for their nation, vote in every election, and work to engage others in the political process as a threat, said First Liberty Counsel Lea Patterson in a statement.

The IRS violated its own regulations in denying tax exempt status because Christians Engaged teaches biblical values.

Last month, the IRS argued in a letter that the group was too political in its goals.

You engage in prohibited political campaign intervention, Martin wrote.

You are also not operated exclusively for one or more exempt purposes within the meaning of Section 501(c)(3), because you operate for a substantial non-exempt private purpose and for the private interests of the [Republican] party.

Martin further argued that the Christians Engaged is precluded from tax-exempt status because the group works to instruct people on what the Bible says about issues such as the sanctity of life, marriage and justice that "generally distinguish candidates and are associated with political party platforms."

However, First Liberty Institute argues that Christians Engaged "does not produce voter guides or otherwise suggest that recipients should vote for or against any particular candidate or candidates."

Martin informed Christians Engaged that it had a right to protest if you dont agree and gave the organization 30 days from May 18 to file an appeal.

Christians Engaged is led by conservative activist Bunni Pounds, who ran for Congress in 2018 but lost in the Republican primary. The organization's vice president is Trayce Bradford, who previously led the pro-family advocacy group Texas Eagle Forum.

In 2013 during the Obama administration, the IRS garnered national outrage when the agency admitted to having targeted conservative groups' tax-exempt applications that included the terms Tea Party or Patriot during the 2012 presidential election season.

Lois Lerner, then director of the IRS Exempt Organizations Division, offered an apology for these attacks, stating at the time that it was absolutely inappropriate and not the way we should do things.

Sometimes people do things because they don't understand the rules or don't think about it, added Lerner, who insisted that the targeting was not political because it involved "mistakes" and a lack of "good judgment" by low-level employees.
Pro-life group holds 'Face the Truth' tour to invoke 'sympathy for the victims of abortion'

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A pro-life group is holding a weeklong Face the Truth tour in the Chicago area, sharing pictures of preborn babies with the public in an attempt to invoke a sense of real sympathy for the victims of abortion.

The Pro-Life Action Leagues 22nd annual Face the Truth tour kicks off Friday and will last through June 26. With the exception of Sunday, pro-life activists will be stationed at 24 locations (three each day) throughout the city.

Participants will visit sites throughout the Chicago area, holding pictures of beautiful unborn babies along with signs showing the victims of abortion, the Pro-Life Action Leagues website states.

This years Face the Truth tour is held in memory of Pro-Life Action League founder Joseph Scheidler, who died on Jan. 18.

The goal of the Face the Truth tour is to make people care about these members of the human family who are so often overlooked, abandoned, ignored, whose humanity is denied, whose lives have no value before the law, Eric Scheidler, the president of the Pro-Life Action League, said in an interview with The Christian Post.

Scheidler expressed a desire to invoke a sense of real sympathy for the victims of abortion in  the hearts and minds of everyone who passes by our display.

He also shared the reasoning behind the groups decision to hold the Face the Truth tour at this time of year.

During the summer, theres much more foot traffic outside. Theres more regular traffic, people driving to summer events and  driving around  traveling from one part of the country to another.  People are more out and about during the summer months. Theres also greater visibility. We have more daylight hours, and were able to inspire volunteers to come out when the weathers good.

Its really the perfect conditions between the amount of traffic out in the public spaces  and the good climate for getting out into the public, and going outdoors and doing a display like this, he continued. So summers really the best time.

According to Scheidler, The main goal is to be reaching the general public, so we pick locations that have [a] high level of traffic, [and a] good level of visibility where people can actually see the signs as theyre passing by," Scheidler said.

While the Face the Truth tour has taken place in the Chicago area every year since 2000, Scheidler described this years tour as special because of its commemoration of his late father.

He was a huge advocate for showing the pictures of abortion, Scheidler recalled. He was in his 90s still going to the Face the Truth tour.

Scheidler explained to CP why his father was often considered the godfather of the pro-life movement: He raised up leaders all over the country. He pushed people to go farther, to make a bigger commitment. So he was in that sort of role of a Godfather who encourages, who gives people their marching orders, who they look up to and trust.

He wrote the pro-life activist manual 99 Ways to Stop Abortion," Scheidler said. "And he rose to international fame during the course of the NOW v. Scheidler lawsuit. In that case, the National Organization for Women sued him as a racketeer, using the racketeering laws that are designed to go after gangsters, organized crime.

He ultimately won that case in the United States Supreme Court in a unanimous ruling  and that is another reason that I think people really looked up to him, the pro-life activist added. He was also an imposing figure  tall and handsome and well-spoken, very talented guy, and very charismatic. So he was a figure that people trusted and admired and felt called to follow because of the example that he offered to people.

Scheidler predicted that dedicating this years Face the Truth tour to his father is going to really inspire people to get involved.

He expects about 300 people to participate in the tour, and some of those people will be with us for every stop, others will join us for just one or two stops, he added, noting that the country is really opening up after the COVID-19 lockdowns.

In addition to honoring the memory of Joseph Scheidler, this years Face the Truth tour comes after the Supreme Court announced that it will review a lower court decision striking down a Mississippi law banning abortion after 15 weeks gestation, a move that pro-lifers see as potentially setting the stage for the partial overturn of the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision establishing a right to abortion.

Eric Scheidler views this years Face the Truth tour as a perfect opportunity to rally public opinion in the pro-life movements favor.

Were especially excited to be taking to the streets with this display showing the reality of abortion  the violence and injustice of abortion right at this time. Because America is going to be paying very close attention to the abortion issue as the Supreme Court takes up this case. So we see a real opportunity to get out there and show the American people that they really should support the Mississippi law.

One of the pictures that will be on display is of a baby at 15 weeks gestation. Thats the perfect sort of message to share with people at a time when a 15-week abortion ban is before the U.S. Supreme Court," he stressed.

While Scheidler reported that the Pro-Life Action Leagues encounters with the public are rarely violent, during the Face the Truth tours, the pro-life activism does not come without its challenges.

Over the course of the two decades weve been doing the Face the Truth tours, we have had numerous challenging encounters with the public, he said. We get people swearing; we get people throwing things sometimes. Weve had knives thrown at us; weve had eggs thrown at us; weve had our signs thrown out onto the street. Weve  even had volunteers and staff members attacked physically by people over the course of the years. And weve had to call the police, and weve had arrests, and weve had people spat on.

Acknowledging that its a controversial thing to share pictures of aborted babies with the public, Scheidler maintained that its an urgent thing to do.

He pushed back against claims that the pictures the Pro-Life Action League shares at these events scare children.

In fact, the pictures that weve chosen to use, the display that ... we use, its really not very gory. These arent bloody, gory, violent pictures. They show the reality of abortion in a way adults can perceive, recognize what happened.

Scheidler contended that when people express concerns about the pictures of aborted babies impact on children, its really just kind of an excuse by those seeking to avoid being reminded about abortion. They want to use children as a shield, saying, Well, its bad for children, children shouldnt see them, when what they really mean is: I dont want to see them  I dont want to see those pictures.
SBC committee to consider disaffiliating Saddleback Church for ordaining women pastors

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A committee within the Southern Baptist Convention is set to consider whether a prominent megachurch led by bestselling author Rick Warren can continue in fellowship with the denomination after it ordained three women pastors last month.

At the annual meeting of the SBC this week in Nashville, a motion asking if the denomination should break fellowship with Saddleback Church in Orange County, California, was referred to the denomination's Credentials Committee.

The Credentials Committee is tasked with evaluating whether SBC-associated churches meet the denomination's standards of faith and practice.

The megachurch posted on social media that it ordained three female pastors on a "historic" Thursday night, which drew criticism from Baptist leaders who believe female ordination goes against SBC teachings and praise from supporters of women in ministry.

The motion was introduced by Pastor Shad Tibbs of Fellowship Baptist Church in Trout, Louisiana.

The church is led by Warren, the author of the mega-bestseller The Purpose Driven Life. The 67-year-old Warren recently announced that he is searching for his successor amid plans to retire.

During a press conference following his SBC presidential election victory, incoming SBC President Ed Litton was asked whether churches that ordain women should be "kicked out" of the denomination.

As a self-professed complementarian, Litton said: Thats something were going to have to work out.

The motion from the Louisiana pastor comes amid heightened tension in the denomination about what Scripture says about gender, particularly whether or not women are permitted to hold certain offices and preach in church.

The Baptist Faith and Message 2000 plainly states that the pastoral office is "limited to men as qualified by Scripture."

The issue has become one of the most visible divisions in the convention, especially after popular Bible teacher Beth Moore announced that she could no longer identify as a Southern Baptist and left the denomination.

Proponents of this view, sometimes called complementarians, often reference 1 Timothy 2:9-15, where the Apostle Paul speaks of not allowing women to teach or exercise authority over men.

Egalitarians, by contrast, assert that this particular scripture seeks to correct a specific problem in the church in Ephesus and that it is not a permanent nor universal restriction. They argue that the phrase in Greek is more accurately translated as "I am not now allowing" a woman to teach.

The national convention has yet to remove a church from fellowship for this reason. But some local and state conventions have done so.

Once reviewed by the Credentials Committee, a recommendation will be made to the Executive Committee.

Should the Executive Committee decide that a church is no longer in cooperation with the denomination, the decision will be made public. Should a church opt to appeal the decision, messengers at the denomination's annual meeting may decide whether to uphold the decision.

In early May, Saddleback ordained Liz Puffer, Cynthia Petty and Katie Edwards as pastors.

Days after the ordination of the three women, then-SBC President J.D. Greear said in a blog post that although he respected Saddleback's ministry and their heart for taking the Gospel around the world, he disagreed with the ordination. He called the move "disappointing."
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Everyone we met with at some point in the conversation said, This time it was different. As a delegation of two organizations, The Philos Project and Passages, that bring young, Christian leaders to Israel, we were curious about how the recent conflict had been felt on the ground. The three weeks of violence that started with a property dispute over four homes in the Sheik Jarrah neighborhood of Jerusalem spilled onto the Temple Mount where Israeli police and Muslim worshippers clashed. Then came the riots, the rockets from Gaza, and the attacks on Jews around the world. The sheer number of rockets alone, nearly 4300, should have been enough to say, This time was different. But that doesnt really get at the heart of the issue. This time coexistence was questioned. This time the veil separating anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism dropped. This time no one was safe.

Lod is not a tourist destination, but it is one of the oldest cities in the world. The city lies at a crossroad intersecting the ancient highway along the coast and the highway coming out of the mountains where Jerusalem sits. Given that its just outside the Ben Gurion Airport, most pass by on their way to somewhere else. Lod is also a mixed city. Jews and Arabs live side by side. Apartment buildings and grocery stores are full of Jews and Arabs.

In Lod, we met Tahael. Tahael is an orthodox Jewish woman who moved to Lod with her husband and two children so that her children could grow up in a mixed community. She was at an event for Jewish youth when the riots began. They barricaded doors and waited for the police to escort kids home. The local Imam is pretty radical and regularly called for men to embrace violence. This time they did. Jewish cars were targeted and burned. A Jewish apartment was ransacked and set on fire. Five synagogues were burned, some severely. Then came the rockets from Gaza. Riots ran the streets and rockets fell from the sky.

During the chaos, Tahael went with her family to the bomb shelter. She was there with her Arab neighbors. Just days earlier she spoke with her neighbors, helping each other carry groceries up the stairs. But in the bomb shelter, the Arab men of the apartment building are absent. Are they in the streets? At the riots? The pavers in front of the apartment building have been taken up and used as stones. I cant look at my neighbor anymore, Tahael said with pain in her eyes. This time it was different.

Also in Lod, we met Yoav. He is Jewish. His dad owned a computer repair shop, the last shop in a strip of repair shops. Next to Yoavs dads shop is Suhels shop. Suhel sells and repairs tires. He is Arab. The only Arab shop in the strip. During the riots in Lod, perhaps as retaliation to the attacks on Jews, old tires were stacked up against Suhels shop and set on fire. In a matter of minutes a lifetime of labor went up in smoke. Yoav is into live action role play (LARP) and built a studio in the back of his dads shop. It too was completely destroyed.

The next day as Suhel was trying to salvage anything he could in the shop, everything was covered in black soot. He tearfully struggled to understand how this could have happened. To help his neighbor, Yoav started a small fundraising campaign by reaching out to his fellow online LARPers. Donations from Jews and Arabs around the country began to pour in. His small campaign went viral. Two shops unintentionally modeling coexistence were destroyed. And yet, the nation rallied to support the rebuilding of both. This time it was different.

Ashkelon is another one of those ancient cities. In the Bible it is described as one of the capital cities of the Philistines. Today it is a thriving city on the edge of the Mediterranean and, until the last war, just outside the reach of Hamas rockets. It was in Ashkelon that we met Roz. Before COVID shut down the tour industry in Israel, Roz was a guide. Those who knew Roz before the recent conflict remarked, Roz is more serious now. The last war had taken its toll. He actually lives in one of the small farming villages right on the border with Gaza. His kids, like everyone else in the Gaza Envelope deal with PTSD minus the P. There is no post in the trauma there, always present. Roz talked about how he once took his kids to a playground in Jerusalem. They were reluctant to play on all the fun obstacles and slides. After a while he asked them why they were not playing, his kids, 5 and 7 years old, said, Its not safe. There is no [bomb] shelter.

Living so close to the border with Gaza, Roz is used to the rockets and mortars regularly launched at his village by one of the terrorist organizations that is ruling Gaza. The Iron Dome rocket interception system doesnt protect his village, but it does protect Sderot, Ashkelon, and the many Jewish and Arab towns and villages that dot the landscape of Southern Israel. However, 4300 rockets nearly overwhelmed the Iron Dome system. This time it was different.

Amal lives in a Bedouin town. The Bedouins are a nomadic Arab people who settled down mostly in the southern and northern parts of Israel. Many have integrated into Israeli society and serve in the IDF. As we sat in her familys ancestral home enjoying tea and sweets, Amal described her life. While most girls from her town were married off after 6th grade, Amal finished school. She overcame many obstacles to become a nurse and is one of the first in her town to get a drivers license. For many, Amal is a trailblazer for womens rights in Bedouin society. But she is also an advocate for coexistence.

Amal chose to send her daughter to a Jewish school so that she would learn the value of coexistence. Yet, it is not hard to imagine how the recent conflict fostered suspicion and threatens coexistence. Amals daughter, a 5th grader, was told by her teacher to go back to Gaza. When confronted, the school did not act. The matter is still unsettled and Amals daughter refuses to go to school. The pain and frustration of living in constant fear of rocket attacks is very real. So is the fact that Jews and Arabs both are under threat from Hamas.

The majority of the rockets launched out of Gaza are low-tech. Light poles are cut down and filled with explosives and a propulsion system are hurled at Israeli population centers. The deaths of Arabs, children, and even Gazan kids from these faulty rockets are worth it to Hamas if even one Jew dies or leaves Israel. The new high-tech rockets and anti-tank missiles used this time are made by Iran and smuggled into Gaza. These rockets can reach Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.

Amal described how one of the rockets landed near her home. This time it was different. Rockets reached her too. When asked how she felt about being targeted by Hamas she didnt answer. More likely, she couldnt. Hamas has long arms.

As we were meeting with individuals impacted by a month of violence that sought to destroy coexistence, a new government in Israel was being formed. A coalition that, for the first time, included an Islamist Arab Israeli political party. Unified in its opposition to the former Prime Minister Netanyahu, this government, nevertheless, is formed the very moment coexistence seems impossible.

In those first few days it seemed that the fabric that made Israel a model of pluralism was torn. Yet all along the way we heard stories of Jews and Arabs choosing coexistence. As the fabric of Israel was torn, there were those stitching it back together one meeting at a time. This time it was different, meaning Israel is at a crossroads. Down one path, Hamas wins and coexistence becomes a memory. Down the other path, coexistence wins and eventually Hamas becomes a memory. People of good will can support only one of those paths.

Luke Moon is Deputy Director of the Philos Project and regularly writes on Christian engagement in the Middle East. Follow him on twitter @lukemoon1
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Critics of the COVID lockdowns often argued that, in the end, the lockdowns would do more harm than good, not just financially but also medically. One reason was that patients needing treatment would be less inclined to visit a doctor or hospital, increasing their health risks. Critics also pointed to the psychological aspects of the lockdowns, leading to increased loneliness, depression, and even suicide.

What about forbidding Christians (and other people of faith) from gathering for worship, prayer, and ministry? What kind of impact did this have on the overall health and wellbeing of tens of millions of Americans (along with countless others worldwide)? Or, conversely, what positive role did faith play in the overall health and wellbeing of Americans during the lockdowns?

A new article posted in the Scientific American, by David H. Rosmarin, and titled Psychiatry Needs to Get Right with God, addressed these very questions.

According to Rosmarin, Spirituality has historically been dismissed by psychiatrists, but results from a pilot program at McLean Hospital in Massachusetts indicate that attention to it is a critical aspect of mental health care.

He noted that, In the past year, American mental health sank to the lowest point in history: Incidence of mental disorders increased by 50 percent, compared with before the pandemic. Alcohol and other substance abuse surged, and young adults were more than twice as likely to seriously consider suicide than they were in 2018. Yet the only group to see improvements in mental health during the past year were those who attended religious services at least weekly (virtually or in-person): 46% report excellent mental health today versus 42 percent one year ago.

It looks like churches and houses of worship were delivering essential services after all.

Unfortunately, Rosmarin explains, Since Sigmund Freuds characterization of religion as a mass-delusion nearly 100 years ago, mental health professionals and scientists have eschewed the spiritual realm. Current efforts to flatten the COVID-19 mental health curve have been almost entirely secular. The American Psychological Associations extensive set of consumer resources makes no mention of spirituality. And the Centers for Disease Control and Preventions only spiritual recommendation is to connect with your community- or faith-based organizations. Of more than 90,000 active projects presently funded by all 27 institutes and centers within the National Institutes of Health, fewer than 20 mention spirituality anywhere in the abstract, and only one project contains this term in its title.

He continues, This situation goes beyond separation of church and state. Health care professionals falsely disconnect common spiritual behaviors and experiences from science and clinical practice. As a result, we ignore potential spiritual solutions to our mental health crisis, even when our well-being is worse than ever before.

Of course, Gods Word, the Bible, was quite aware of these realities, demonstrating an understanding of the connection between body, mind, spirit, and emotions, to the point of offering what could be called psychosomatic observations.

When writing my doctoral dissertation on the primary Hebrew word for healing, the root raphah, I noted that the fundamental meaning of this root was to restore, make whole, out of which the other meanings (including physical healing) flowed. Put another way, the concept of healing was holistic. The results of that dissertation, in a much more expanded  and hopefully, more readable!  form were published in my 1985 volume, Israels Divine Healer. The book has been very useful in curing insomnia. Start reading it late at night, especially focusing on the 85,000 words of endnotes, and youll soon be out like a light.

In my studies, I also noted how some verses in the Book of Proverbs, a treasure trove of practical, divine wisdom, directly addressed the connection of internal and external health.

For example, Proverbs 3:7-8 exhorted, Do not be wise in your own eyes; fear the Lord and depart from evil. It will be healing to your fleshand tonic to your bones. So, humility and godly living would lead to physical health as well.

Proverbs 14:30 observed, A heart at peace gives life to the body, but envy rots the bones. As the Jewish commentator Malbim aptly noted, flesh and bones are only as healthy as the spirit they encase. Indeed.

Other verses state, What brightens the eye gladdens the heart; good news puts fat on the bones (15:30). And, A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones (17:22). And, A mans spirit sustains him in sickness, but a crushed spirit who can bear? (18:14).

Commenting on these verses (and others), popular Christian author Elmer Josephson wrote, Right attitudes encourage and refresh the soul and strengthen the moral spirit; actually, then the blood and the sympathetic nervous system are rejuvenated, which make for good cell construction and build healthy body tissues. Wrong relationships and attitudes depress the mind and fill the blood with alkaloid poison. The involuntary sympathetic nerve system actually causes a malformation of cell construction and tissue arrangement (See Gods Key to Health and Happiness).

Yet Josephson made these observations back in 1976, citing medical studies to back his claims. (Whether medical professionals would agree with every one of his points or not, the overall claims are certainly true.)

Its a shame that mental health professionals, along with other healthcare providers, have been so slow to recognize the important connection between spiritual health and mental health.

I say its high time for the wellbeing of those struggling that naturalistic biases and presuppositions be removed in the interest of truth and health. We are more than material beings, and that by divine design.
Baptist church ordains first known transgender pastor in denominations history

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An Indiana congregation affiliated with the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship has ordained who is believed to be the first confirmed transgender pastor in the denomination's history.

Laura Bethany Buchleiter, a trans-identified individual who identifies as female, was ordained at University Baptist Church of Bloomington in a ceremony held last month.

In an interview with The Christian Post on Tuesday, Buchleiter credited a meeting with the late progressive Christian writer Rachel Held Evans with helping to reignite a childhood interest in ordained ministry.

She introduced me to communities that were both faithful and affirming of LGBTQ people. I began to study with The Reformation Project. I attended conferences, helped to organize and then traveled on the first Free Mom Hugs Tour from Oklahoma to Stonewall Inn, explained Buchleiter.

I re-entered Baptist culture through Wilshire Baptist Church in Dallas, Texas, at a time when they were discerning their status as an open and affirming church. It was there the call to serve the Church was revived.

Buchleiter told CP that the ordination was not to a specific congregation" and will initially take on the role of interim pastor for four months at a United Church of Christ congregation in Green River, Wyoming.

Many, especially theological conservatives such a Texas Baptist megachurch pastor Robert Jeffress, have argued that transgender ideology is inherently incompatible with Christianity.

"It's not that confusing, said Jeffress in a 2016 sermon. In Matthew 19:4, God's Words are applicable. The Bible says, 'God made them from the beginning male and female,' not male, female and question mark. God has determined how many sexes there are  there are two, not three."

Gender identity confusion is an emotional disorder that should be treated professionally and compassionately. Gender identity confusion should not be exploited by social activists like those in the [President Barack] Obama administration who want to deny the God-given distinction between the sexes. This is a rebellion against God's plan.

In response, Buchleiter told CP that I believe that to accept the complex expressions of gender we have seen throughout human history is not an affront to God's sovereignty, but a testimony to God's immense creativity.

In my case, this was further demonstrated when I was diagnosed with an intersex condition, having been born with both male and some female organs, continued Buchleiter.

I either had to view my body as a mistake  or allow for the fact that God is truly the master creator  operating outside the boundaries of gender binaries.

Buchleiter also drew a parallel to Jesus acceptance of eunuchs, as explained in Matthew 19:12. However, the pastor also acknowledged that LGBTQ identity is not directly equivalent to the status of 'eunuch' in biblical times.

My calling into ordained ministry is not intended to cater to the comfort of all; neither does it require the affirmation of all, said Buchleiter.

University Baptist Church Pastor Annette Hill Briggs explained to CP that the ordination came after Buchleiter had two years of supervised ministry internship and graduated from seminary with a master of divinity degree.

[Buchleiter] has been a member of University Baptist Church for four years in total, said Briggs, adding that the pastor was ordained after "sufficient time and experience to ascertain, experience."

Briggs stressed that the church affirms Buchleiter's "obvious call of God to pastoral ministry" and a "giftedness for the work.

Briggs explained that the ordination was a popular decision, as it was unanimously approved by the church. As of June, no one had left the congregation in protest.

Ninety-nine percent of the response we have received locally and online has been joyfully supportive while a handful of strangers have been positively vitriolic toward me, our church, and Reverend Buchleiter, Briggs continued.

None have accepted my invitation to talk together about our differences, that we might witness to our Oneness in Christ, and kindly talk about our differences. Only one person who disagrees with us has reached out in a Christ-like manner.

In 1999, the church left the Southern Baptist Convention after it made Briggs its pastor despite the SBC stance against female ordination.

Now affiliated with the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, Briggs told CP that the denomination does not have an official stance on LGBT issues, and so there is no expectation of institutional pushback for the ordination.

"For Clarification: I'm not the first transgender person to be ordained in a Baptist church, I may be just the second - and the first in a CBF church," Buchleiter wrote on Facebook. "I'm very grateful for those who have gone before me, and am also very aware that we are all still pioneers in this space."
JD Greear urges Southern Baptists not to engage in Pharisee hypocrisy on sexual abuse, racism and CRT

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Outgoing Southern Baptist Convention President J.D. Greear warned the largest Protestant denomination in the United States against being Pharisee-like hypocrites on issues pertaining to sexual abuse, racism and how they handle critical race theory.

More than 15,000 Southern Baptists came to Nashville, Tennessee, for the SBCs annual meeting, held Tuesday and Wednesday at the Music City Center.

The annual meeting has garnered extensive attention from those outside of the SBC due to issues like the debate over critical race theory, traditional gender roles, and complementarian theology taking center stage.

At his final address as president of the SBC, given Tuesday afternoon, Greear focused his remarks on Matthew 23, in which Jesus warned His disciples against the hypocrisy, or leaven, of the Pharisees.

While speaking positively of the SBCs Conservative Resurgence, stating that the curse of liberalism is real, he added that Jesus warned that there is more than one way to lose the Gospel.

There was another, said Greear. A leaven Jesus warned about also, perhaps one even more deceptive than liberalism, He called it the leaven of the Pharisees.

What is most dangerous about this leaven is that it grows in the soil of orthodoxy.

Greear warned that Pharisee tendencies threaten the SBC, such as focusing on the more minute parts of the law while ignoring the weightier parts, and gave examples of how he believed that looked in the modern day.

Might look like any institution that creates unnecessary obstacles for victims of sexual abuse to seek justice by hiding behind legal smokescreens or [non-disclosure agreements], continued Greear.

It looks like a convention that polices itself rigorously on complementarian issues, but allows female abuse victims to be mistreated and maligned. It looks like an SBC that expends more energy decrying things like CRT than they have done lamenting the devastating consequences of years of racial bigotry and discrimination.

While Greear stressed that he is opposed to CRT, saying it stems from a belief system at odds with the Gospel, he added that denouncing it falls on deaf ears when we remain silent on the suffering of our neighbors.

We must make certain that our zeal to clarify what we think about CRT is accompanied by a pledge to fight with them against all forms of discrimination. To make clear that we stand with our brothers and sisters of color in their suffering, he said.

The outgoing president stressed the importance of racial minorities in the growth of SBC, getting a lengthy applause after he told them from the stage that we need you.

Greear went on to express concern that political calculus might be elevated to divine authority, declaring that whenever the church gets in bed with politics, the church gets pregnant. And the offspring does not look like our Father in Heaven.

His remarks were on the first day of the SBC's Annual Meeting, in which over 15,000 messengers attended to determine resolutions and hear reports for the Convention.

CRT proponents trace their origins to the 1970s, as civil rights activists at the time responded to what they viewed as a backlash to the civil rights movement of the 1960s.

According to University of Alabama professor Richard Delgado and his colleague Jean Stefancic, who co-wrote the book Critical Race Theory: An Introduction, CRT is defined as a movement comprised of activists and scholars interested in studying and transforming the relationship among race, racism, and power.

The movement considers many of the same issues that conventional civil rights and ethnic studies discourses take up, but places them in a broader perspective that includes economics, history, context, group- and self-interest, and even feelings and the unconscious, wrote Delgado and Stefancic.

Unlike traditional civil rights, which embraces incrementalism and step-by-step progress, critical race theory questions the very foundations of the liberal order, including equality theory, legal reasoning, Enlightenment rationalism, and neutral principles of constitutional law.

Critics of CRT have long warned of its ties to Marxist critical theory. Opponents have noted that the ideology uses Marxist tactics of class struggle to divide people among race, gender and ethnicity. Some have argued that the CRT wrongfully vilifies the United States and its history, as well as stoking its own racially-charged vitriol.

Last year, The Council of Seminary Presidents of the Southern Baptist Convention released a statement denouncing racism and CRT as both being incompatible with Baptist beliefs.

Albert Mohler of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary said in comments released with the statement that CRT has no rightful place within an SBC seminary.

Instructed by the Bible and motivated by the Gospel, we are called to stand together in opposing the sin of racism. We must make clear that racism has no rightful place within the SBC, our churches, or our entities, stated Mohler at the time.

We are not to be guided by secular ideologies, but by the Word of God alone and in the love of Christ. I believe that Southern Baptists are up to this task.
Ronnie Floyd calls on So. Baptists to focus on Great Commission 'Sending missionaries is the heart of the Southern Baptist Convention'

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NASHVILLE, Tenn.  As the Southern Baptist Convention grapples with a slew of hot-button issues, Ronnie Floyd, president of the SBC's Executive Committee, stressed to the thousands gathered at the annual meeting that sending missionaries out into the world is at the heart of the denomination.

Sending missionaries is the heart of the Southern Baptist Convention, Floyd, a past president of the SBC and former senior pastor of Cross Church in Northwest Arkansas told the more than 15,000 SBC messengers gathered on Tuesday.

Oh, that doesnt mean we dont have a heart for other things. But I'm telling you  doesnt matter whether you're a church, whether you're a convention, an association, a state convention, or you're a big ol commission like we are across America with all of these churches, listen, sending missionaries is what we are really about.

So I challenge you, pastors and laypeople today: Go back to your churches and begin to ask God to raise up people to go to the mission fields from your churches. The urgency is now.

The theme of the 2021 SBC Annual Meeting, chosen by SBC President J.D. Greear, is We are Great Commission Baptists.

The denomination is wrestling with issues including sexual abuse, race relations, and a particularly tense presidential election. Floyd himself is facing calls for his resignation. But on Tuesday, he focused his message on the denominations strategic goals ahead of 2025.

Vision 2025 is a call to reach every person for Jesus Christ in every town, every city, every state and every nation. This is the most urgent thing that we must do, he declared.

Floyd said that over the next few years, the denomination plans to: Increase full-time, fully funded missionaries by a net gain of 500; Add 5,000 new congregations, giving the denomination more than 50,000 congregations; increase the number of workers in the field; address the denominations decline in reaching, baptizing and discipling 12- to 17-year-olds, and increase annual giving through the cooperative program.

Oh, there are many things we can do, but what are the right things to do? he asked. What will fire our churches up?

Floyd said the eternal losses of the world fall on the Church, adding: It doesn't matter what our church size is or what our financial capacity is. Together, we can send 500 more missionaries overseas.

He stressed the importance of reaching teens with the Gospel.

If I dont get anything else right the next four, five years  we must get this right, he said.

This is not the church of tomorrow. Don't say that. This is the church of today. This is the church of today and tomorrow, and it all starts with reaching them for Jesus Christ. You cannot baptize those you do not reach. You cannot disciple those you do not reach. The order is clear: We must reach baptize and disciple, teenagers.

Floyd urged attendees to lend their support to Vision 2025 through prayer.

We cannot be content doing ministry without the power of God, he concluded. We need to do ministry with His power and His power. When we pray, God places His power upon our lives.
Southern Baptists affirm commitment to racial reconciliation without fight over critical race theory

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Southern Baptist messengers affirmed their commitment to racial reconciliation and the sufficiency of Scripture to address issues of race by adopting a resolution that avoided the contentious debate over critical race theory at the annual meeting of the Southern Baptist Convention in Nashville Tuesday.

Messengers affirmed their commitment to the issue with a resounding adoption of Resolution 2, which was one of 10 resolutions presented to them for adoption by the 2021 SBC Resolutions Committee. The resolution asked messengers to affirm the sufficiency of Scripture on race and racial reconciliation, condemn racism, and reject any theory or worldview that finds the ultimate identity of human beings in ethnicity or in any other group dynamic. It also asked them to reaffirm the SBCs 1995 Resolution on Racial Reconciliation.

Prior to the 2021 SBC annual convention, concerns were raised by some Southern Baptists, like Pastor Dwight McKissic Sr., that the denomination would rescind Resolution 9 On Critical Race Theory and Intersectionality, which was adopted with much dissent in the summer of 2019.

The resolution defined CRT as a set of analytical tools that can be useful in explaining how race has and continues to function in society. The use of the theory, which has been dismissed by critics as Marxist propaganda aimed at watering down the Gospel, and has been a lightning rod for debate and division in the denomination and evangelical circles in recent years.

Pastor Kevin Apperson of North Las Vegas Baptist Church, who criticized Resolution 2 for not having the courage to address critical race theory by name, voiced his opposition to the resolution by arguing that its language is insufficient, vague, nebulous, unclear, and ambiguous.

I, like many people, have flown a great distance to address an ideology which tells me that I am inherently guilty because of the melanin content of my skin. I am either, according to this theory, an ignorant oppressor or a conscious oppressor because of that melanin content. Two years ago, we approved critical race theory as a teaching tool, and now we need to address it by its name, and this resolution does not do so. Local school systems address it by critical race theory, governors call it critical race theory, state school systems call it critical race theory. If we do not have the courage to call a skunk a skunk, let's not say anything, Apperson said.

Reacting to the criticism, former SBC president James Merritt, who leads Cross Pointe Church in Duluth, Georgia, and also chaired the 2021 SBC Resolutions Committee, suggested messengers could make better use of their time than using it to fight over critical race theory.

So fellow messengers, lets just put it on the table. It is time to find out who we are and where we are headed. I'm going to say this bluntly and plainly. If some people were as passionate about the Gospel as critical race theory, we would win this world to Christ tomorrow, he said to cheers.

When I was a student at Stetson University my first semester, I read the New Testament through 27 times. I read the Bible through every year for probably the last 40 years. I found a lot about race. I found a lot about race. There is only one race, the human race. And we are all created in the image of God. I found a lot about racial reconciliation. We have been given the ministry of reconciliation, not just reconcile to man, but people to people, he continued.

I didn't find CRT in the Bible. Well, correction, I did find it. It stands for Christ returns triumphantly. We got a choice. My brothers and sisters, we are not the 2019 Resolutions Committee. We are the 2021 Resolutions Committee. And we decided we are not going to limit anything to just one theory. And by the way, the same state schools that are kind of up in arms and some of these people that are against critical race theory are teaching evolution to your kids every single day. What we have done in this resolution is say, you know what? Let's just settle this issue once and for all. Yesterday, today and forever, he said.

Merritt further suggested that messengers would be of better service to the Gospel if they focused on building bridges of understanding.

There is a world watching out there. This is exactly what they want. This is exactly what they want to put on the front pages of their paper. Well, as the country song goes, let's give them something to talk about. We can either build bridges and tear down walls, or we can put up walls and destroy bridges, he said.

Let me be plain. It doesn't take a lot of effort to blow up a bridge. One stick of dynamite [and] you will do it. But to build a bridge, it takes hard work. It takes sacrifice. And it takes a commitment to reach to the other side to the people who are not with us yet, but we are going to do everything we can to get them there, and I ask you to support this resolution, he said, as the resolution was adopted without any amendments.

.
Bible-engaged Americans more hopeful, despite suffering trauma and heartache: report

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The third chapter of American Bible Societys State of the Bible report released this week reveals that those who read Scripture have more hope than those who are less engaged, and shows how the Bible brings healing to people who are suffering.

The Hope for the Hurting chapter released on Wednesday shows how Scripture Engaged people over-index for hope though they experience stress at average levels.

Just because people are in the church, just because theyre deeply engaging in Scripture, that doesnt mean they get a pass on stress or trauma, John Farquhar Plake, director of ministry intelligence for American Bible Society, told The Chrisitan Post in an interview.

In fact, oftentimes they over-index for experiencing both stress and trauma in their lives, Plake said. Whats different and really hopeful for us is, we discovered that those same people who are experiencing really high levels of stress and trauma are also experiencing very high levels of hope, and they have a deep ability to forgive those who have hurt them [if they engage with Scripture]. And thats really different. It doesnt mean they have a different experience in life, but they experience life differently.

The findings from the report come from data collected by ABS in January through surveying over 3,300 Americans nationwide.

Scripture-engaged people, though they have average levels of stress, they have way above average levels of hope, Plake explained. I just think of Jesus talking to His disciples and saying, In this world, youll have trouble, but take heart, I have overcome the world. Theres a way that Gods Word and Gods presence gives us that allows us to live differently in the midst of the same circumstances, and that is really transformative.

Plake said that in the midst of stress, trauma and a national increase in stress over the last year, Americans are finding hope in Gods Word.

Americans are finding comfort in Scripture," Plake said in a statement. While being part of the Church doesnt mean hardships disappear, our study found that when Americans are rooted in Scripture, we are better able to forgive and to cope with trauma or stress. Were seeing in real-time how the Bible shows us that our story does not end with hurt and pain  we have hope beyond our suffering. As people consistently interact with truth found in the Bible, they see a way forward toward a brighter, more hopeful future.

The chapter also highlights the relationship between trauma and forgiveness.

Marlaina Centeno, a church partnership associate with the ABS' Trauma Healing Institute, said the Bible helps others understand how to suffer through observing Jesus.

American Bible Society recognizes the trauma indicated in the State of the Bible as a major barrier of full relationship with God and the Bible, she said.

We know that trauma separates people from God and from their communities, but the trauma healing program at American Bible Society, we know that healing is actually found in Scripture. So you have this tension of trauma separate from the Scripture, but also the Scripture brings healing, so how do we do that? Well, our trauma healing ministry incorporates the truth of the Bible in a very gentle way in a community setting with trained facilitators in the Bible.

Centeno explained how the Bible provides a model of how to deal with trauma and heartache.

Our trauma healing model has been globally proven, transforming community after community as hurting people from every walk of life encounter our own wounded Savior. So when we see Jesus as one who has gone through suffering and how He was able to overcome it, we have a model through the Bible, she added.

Plake said Chapter 3 deals with the hardships that people are experiencing, such as heightened stress and trauma, especially with the COVID-19 pandemic and social and political unrest. Next months chapter will focus more on the good news, he said.

I think maybe Chapter 3 is in some ways the bad news, [but] the good news is coming, he said.

ABS released its first two chapters of the State of the Bible report earlier this year and will release the remaining six chapters of the report between July and December.

The thing that I would just want to not miss in all of this is that a quarter of Americans are really experiencing very high levels of stress, and it can be difficult to understand that when were all in it together, he said.

I think pastors, church leaders, and people who care for others need to recognize theres a lot of stress and difficulty that people are enduring, and were not done with it yet. So we need to be looking for, how does the Bible equip us and how does Chrisitan community equip us to care for others and love them through their hurt to the point where they experience Gods hope and Gods healing, he added. I trust that this chapter will help point some of our colleagues to really good resources.
Democrats overwhelmingly support CRT, but most other Americans says its bad for the country: poll

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While critical race theory is unpopular with most Americans, it's supported by an overwhelming majority of Democrats, according to a new poll.

The Economist, in conjunction with YouGov, released a wide-ranging poll Wednesday that asked Americans for their opinions on a variety of issues. One question asked respondents, Do you have a favorable or unfavorable view of critical race theory? Only respondents who answered in the affirmative when asked if they knew what critical race theory was were asked the follow-up questions about their views on the ideology.

Christopher Rufo, a writer, filmmaker and researcher who has studied the issue extensively, defines critical race theory as an academic discipline that holds that the United States is a nation founded on white supremacy and oppression, and that these forces are still at the root of our society. According to Rufo, an outspoken opponent of critical race theory.

Critical race theorists believe that American institutions, such as the Constitution and legal system, preach freedom and equality, but are mere camoflauges for racial discrimination, According to Rufo, an outspoken opponent of the theory.

They believe that racism is a constant, universal condition: it simply becomes more subtle, sophisticated, and insidious over the course of history, he added. In simple terms, critical race theory reformulates the old Marxist dichotomy of oppressor and oppressed, replacing the class categories of bourgeoisie and proletariat with the identity categories of white and black. But the basic conclusion is the same: in order to liberate man, society must be fundamentally transformed through moral, economic, and political revolution.

The survey by The Economist, which did not provide an explicit definition of critical race theory, found that just 38% of Americans said they had a very or somewhat favorable opinion of critical race theory, with 25% saying they have a very favorable view of the ideology and 13% describing their view of critical race theory as somewhat favorable. Meanwhile, a majority of Americans (53%) have a very unfavorable view of critical race theory. The remaining 5% have a somewhat unfavorable view of critical race theory.

Additionally, the poll asked respondents if they believed teaching critical race theory was good for America or bad for America. A majority of Americans (55%) said they thought teaching critical race theory was bad for America while 37% expressed the opposite view. The remaining 8% concluded that it was neither good nor bad for America.

Democrats are the group with the most favorable view of critical race theory, with 86% expressing a somewhat or very favorable view of the ideology. A majority (58%) of Democrats have a very favorable view of critical race theory and an additional 28% hold a somewhat favorable view.

Similarly, 85% of Democrats believe that teaching critical race theory was good for America, compared to just 5% who said it was bad for America. Self-described liberals also demonstrated support for critical race theory, with 82% describing it as very or somewhat favorable and 89% believing that it is good for America.

In addition to Democrats and liberals, majorities of African Americans (68%) and those between the ages of 30 and 44 (52%) hold a favorable view of critical race theory. A larger majority of African Americans (75%) believe that teaching critical race theory is beneficial to the U.S., while 52% of Americans between the ages of 30 and 44 hold the same view.

A majority of Hispanics (53%) hold an unfavorable view of critical race theory, along with supermajorities of white men without college degrees (74%), white women without college degrees (71%), and white men with college degrees (65%). White women with college degrees were split on critical race theory, with 52% expressing an unfavorable view and 44% holding a favorable view.

Hispanics were divided on whether they believed teaching critical race theory was positive or negative for the country. Thirty-five percent of Hispanics believe that teaching critical race theory is good for America while 40% have the opposite opinion. Twenty-five percent of Hispanics told pollsters that teaching critical race theory was neither good nor bad for America.

Majorities of whites of all education levels maintained that teaching critical race theory was bad for America, with that view most predominant among whites without college degrees of both genders (70%), followed by college-educated white men (62%), and college-educated white women (51%).

Independents also hold overwhelmingly negative views of critical race theory, with 76% describing their opinion of the ideology as somewhat or very unfavorable. Meanwhile, 18% of independents think teaching critical race theory is good for America as opposed to 72% who feel otherwise.

Additionally, a majority of self-described moderates also expressed concern about critical race theory, with 54% holding an unfavorable view of the ideology and 52% believing that teaching it was bad for America. No groups were more opposed to critical race theory than Republicans and conservatives.

A whopping 91% of Republicans reported holding an unfavorable opinion of critical race theory, while 88% believed teaching it in schools was bad for America. Similarly, 91% of self-described conservatives hold an unfavorable view of critical race theory and 90% believed that teaching it in schools was bad for America.

As reflected in the results of the survey, conservatives have emerged as outspoken critics of critical race theory, with many states passing laws to ban the teaching of the ideology in their schools. States that have passed such legislation include Florida, Arkansas, Idaho and Oklahoma.

Critical race theory has been a frequent topic of discussion on American college campuses for years, but received heightened attention in politics and education following the death of George Floyd in police custody last year and the resulting unrest that ranged from peaceful protests to violent riots that led to the deaths of more than 20 people and over $2 billion in the destruction of property.

Over the past year, some have argued that there is a need for educators to address systemic racism and that led some schools to embrace controversial curriculum such as The 1619 Project. Many parents have shared their opposition to the inclusion of critical race theory in schools.

The Economist/YouGov survey questioned 1,500 adults between June 13-15 and had a margin of error of +/- 3 percentage points.
House Republicans prevent passage of pro-abortion, pro-LGBT bills in 'stunning' development

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UPDATE June 22 at 4 p.m. ET: In an email to The Christian Post, Stacey Daniels, the communications director for Rep. Lisa McClain, R-Mich., announced that Congresswoman McClain accidentally voted the incorrect way [on the Equal Access to Contraception for Veterans Act] and the Congressional Record has been updated to reflect that fact. The Congressional Record now features a quote from McClain, who said, Mr. Speaker, on Roll Call No. 160, I mistakenly voted yes when I intended to vote no. According to Daniels, When the vote comes back up this week, she will be voting no. McClains vote change means that 21 Republicans supported the legislation as opposed to 22.

Original article:

Congressional Republicans and conservative activists are celebrating stunning victories after GOP lawmakers successfully derailed pro-abortion and LGBT-related bills in the U.S. House of Representatives.

The House held votes on the Equal Access to Contraception for Veterans Act and the LGBTQ Business Equal Credit Enforcement and Investment Act Tuesday.

In both cases, lawmakers voted on whether to suspend the rules and pass the bills. According to the Congressional Research Service, when a bill or some other matter is considered under suspension, floor debate is limited, all floor amendments are prohibited, and a two-thirds vote is required for final passage.

While the CRS describes the suspension of the rules as a procedure that the House of Representatives often uses on the floor to act expeditiously on relatively noncontroversial legislation, opponents of the bills do not believe that they are noncontroversial.

According to the Congressional Budget Office, the Equal Access to Contraception for Veterans Act would eliminate copayments that the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) charges to veterans who receive contraceptive items from the Veterans Health Administration.

However, the conservative Christian activist organization Family Research Council warned that the Equal Access to Contraception for Veterans Act would have increased insurance coverage to 100 percent for all FDA-approved forms of contraception for veterans.

This includes emergency contraceptives like Plan B and Ella, which act as abortifacients by preventing implantation or ending the life of an embryo before implantation, wrote Family Research Council President Tony Perkins, a leading social conservative activist. American taxpayers should not be forced to pay for abortifacient drugs, but that is exactly what H.R. 239 mandates.

Ultimately, 240 members of Congress supported the Equal Access to Contraception for Veterans Act, leaving it far short of the two-thirds threshold needed for passage. Every House Democrat voted for the measure, along with 22 Republicans.

The LGBTQ Business Equal Credit Enforcement and Investment Act would amend the Equal Credit Opportunity Act to require the collection of small business loan data related to LGBTQ-owned businesses. As currently written, the Equal Credit Opportunity Act is designed to facilitate enforcement of fair lending laws and enable communities, governmental entities, and creditors to identify business and community development needs and opportunities of women-owned, minority-owned, and small businesses.

The LGBTQ Business Equal Credit Enforcement and Investment Act would insert the phrase LGBTQ-owned after every use of the term minority-owned in the existing law and expand the definition of sex in the document to include sexual orientation and gender identity.

In the roll call vote, the bill received the support of 247 lawmakers. Perkins lamented the alarming number of Republicans who voted for both bills.

Reps. Mike Bost, R-Ill.; Rodney Davis, R-Ill.; Brian Fitzpatrick, R-Penn.; Carlos Gimenez, R-Fla.; Tony Gonzales, R-Texas; Anthony Gonzalez, R-Ohio; John Katko, R-N.Y.; Young Kim, R-Calif.; Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill.; Nancy Mace, R-S.C.; Nicole Malliotakis, R-N.Y.; Mariannette Miller-Meeks, R-Iowa; Dan Newhouse, R-Wash.; Jay Obernolte, R-Calif.; Tom Reed, R-N.Y.; Maria Elvira Salazar, R-Fla.; Michelle Steel, R-Calif.; Fred Upton, R-Mich.; and Jeff Van Drew, R-N.J.; supported both bills.

Reps. Dan Crenshaw, R-Texas; Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif.; and Lisa McClain, R-Mich.; supported the Equal Access to Contraception for Veterans Act while opposing the LGBTQ Business Equal Credit Enforcement and Investment Act.

Reps. Ken Calvert, R-Calif.; Tom Cole, R-Okla.; Mario Diaz-Balart, R-Fla.; Tom Emmer, R-Minn.; Andrew Garbarino, R-N.Y.; Mike Garcia, R-Calif.; Ashley Hinson, R-Iowa; David Joyce, R-Ohio; Patrick McHenry, R-N.C.; Greg Murphy, R-N.C.; Peter Meijer, R-Mich.; and David Valadao, R-Calif.; supported the LGBTQ Business Equal Credit Enforcement and Investment Act while opposing the Equal Access to Contraception for Veterans Act.

In an interview with Breitbart News, Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Ariz., the chairman of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, described the defeat of both bills as a stunning development and a leverage point to try to restore the balance on Capitol Hill.

He predicted that if you start taking some of these down, It gives you leverage points so the Democrats come back to us and say alright, lets make a deal.

Its what our base wants us to do, he added. That it worked is good. Now we need to make it work on a regular basis, and if we do that, things are going to change up.

Biggs accused the Democrats of trying to "change all the rules and traditions of the House" to "force all of their agenda ... down our throats."

"Our position has always been that we have to fight on every issue," Biggs said. "Thats why we ask for roll call votes on the suspension votes because we want transparency for the American public ..."

In most cases, legislation can pass the House of Representatives with a simple majority. This has enabled Democrats, who have a narrow majority in the lower chamber, to pass progressive legislation with ease despite accumulating little to no Republican support.

Such legislation includes a bill to make Washington, D.C. a state, the Equality Act seeking to codify discrimination protections for the LGBT community into federal law and the For the People Act, which would increase federal oversight of the way states conduct federal elections.

Most legislation in the U.S. Senate requires 60 votes to pass. Since Democrats only have a narrow 50-50 majority in the upper chamber, with Vice President Kamala Harris casting the tie-breaking vote, Democrats need to secure the support of 10 Republicans to pass most legislation.

Additionally, one Senate Democrat, Joe Manchin of West Virginia, has announced his opposition to the For the People Act and the D.C. statehood bill as well as the elimination of the 60-vote rule, an idea that has been floated by Democrats seeking to pass progressive legislation approved by the House without Republican support. As a result of the makeup of the Senate and current Senate rules, the progressive legislation has failed to pass the upper chamber thus far in the 117th Congress.
June 17th  Victory for religious freedom at the Supreme Court

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Yesterday, June 17, 2021, is a day that should be celebrated and cherished by lovers of religious freedom and defenders of traditional religious values across this nation and beyond.

In a unanimous 9-0 decision, the US. Supreme Court ruled decidedly in favor of what had been traditional understandings of the religious free exercise clause of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution in Fulton v. City of Philadelphia.

There are several important aspects of this decision that are very encouraging to those who cherish religious freedom. First, the decision was unanimous (9-0). Given the fractious nature of this Court, particularly on issues involving the LGBTQ community, this fact alone signals a significant Court shift on this issue. Second, the fact that the unanimous opinion was written by the Courts Chief Justice, John Roberts, adds to the signaled significance of this opinion given the Chief Justices perceived reticence in recent years to take decisive and bold action on such contentious culture war issues.

Third, the decision amplifies the fact that elections have consequences. If Hillary Clinton had won the 2016 presidential election, Justices Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Barrett would not be Supreme Court Justices and a President Clinton would have appointed justices who would have ruled in a very different fashion and would have exercised a gravitational pull on the more liberal justices: Kagan, Breyer, and Sotomayor.

Instead, we have a unanimous decision affirming the free exercise of religious rights of Americans and refuting the drumbeat of articles in law school journals and other venues over the last two decades. The argument was that when LGBTQ rights conflict with traditional religious beliefs, religious free exercise rights must always give way as if every issue was, and is, a zero sum game where one side must win and the other side must lose.

Many of those defending exceptions that respect genuine religious convictions (including myself) have argued that this is not the case and that the rights of the LGBTQ community could be recognized while still respecting the religious convictions of their fellow citizens.

The Fulton decision proves the zero sum belief of complete winners and complete losers was fallacious.

John Roberts, the Chief Justice, writes in his unanimous opinion that the City has burdened the religious exercise of CSS through policies that do not meet the requirement of being neutral and generally applicable.

The Chief Justice then notes significantly that the decision prohibits no one from serving children, but rather simply ends a state discrimination against those with deeply held religious convictions. Roberts is arguing here that both the LGBTQ and Catholic Social Services (CSS) community can be accommodated and more needy children can be served. What a civilized and civil solution.

As the Chief Justice also noted, CSS seeks only an accommodation that will allow it to continue serving the children of Philadelphia in a manner consistent with its religious beliefs; it does not seek to impose those beliefs on anyone else.

One could only wish that the LGBTQ community were as tolerant and as accommodating of their fellow citizens as Catholic Social Services has demonstrated itself to be.

This is indeed a day and a decision to greatly encourage those who love and believe in freedom of conscience from government coercion in matters of religion.

How big a victory is it? Given the recent history of this issue, it was a huge, perhaps game-changing victory. If this signals a sea change in Supreme Court thinking, enabled and energized by the Trump Triumvirate (Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Barrett) of Justices, then it very well may signal a decision as significant as Brown v. Board of Education, 1954, (good) or Roe v. Wade, 1973, (bad).

At the very least, it signals that momentum has changed jerseys and the wind is at freedoms (and civilitys) back. I pray that is so.

*For those readers expecting the second part of my column on Critical Race Theory (CRT), I have postponed that column until next week in order to address this very important strategic victory at the Supreme Court for defenders of religious liberty and soul freedom.
Juneteenth becomes 12th federal holiday

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Juneteenth, the celebration of the anniversary of when slavery was officially abolished in the United States, has become a federal holiday through strong bipartisan support.

President Joe Biden signed the law on Thursday, making Juneteenth, which honors the date when Union troops read aloud the Emancipation Proclamation to slaves in Galveston, Texas, on June 19, 1865, the newest federal holiday.

In remarks made Thursday at the signing of the "Juneteenth National Independence Day Act," Biden said the holiday marks both the long, hard night of slavery and subjugation and a promise of a brighter morning to come.

You know, today, we consecrate Juneteenth for what it ought to be, what it must be: a national holiday, the president added, noting that it was the first new national holiday since the creation of Martin Luther King Holiday nearly four decades ago.

Im especially pleased that we showed the nation that we can come together as Democrats and Republicans to commemorate this day with the overwhelming bipartisan support of the Congress. I hope this is the beginning of a change in the way we deal with one another.

Biden added that with Juneteenth being a federal holiday, all Americans can feel the power of this day, and learn from our history, and celebrate progress, and grapple with the distance weve come but the distance we have to travel.

The truth is, its not  simply not enough just to commemorate Juneteenth. After all, the emancipation of enslaved black Americans didnt mark the end of Americas work to deliver on the promise of equality; it only marked the beginning, he continued. To honor the true meaning of Juneteenth, we have to continue toward that promise because weve not gotten there yet.

Also known as Freedom Day or Jubilee Day, Juneteenth is considered the longest-running celebration for an African American-centered holiday, having been first observed in 1866.

Texas made the observance a state holiday in 1980, with calls for it to be made into a federal holiday gaining strength over the past year.

When the Act to make Juneteenth into a holiday was brought before Congress, only 14 members of the House of Representatives  all Republicans  voted against the bill.

Rep. Ronny Jackson of Texas, one of the 14 who voted against the bill, explained to USA Today that he felt there were enough federal holidays right now and thus did not see the reason in doing it.

Rep. Matt Rosendale, R-Mont., released a statement in which he said that the Juneteenth Act was an effort by the Left to create a day out of whole cloth to celebrate identity politics as part of its larger efforts to make critical race theory the reigning ideology of our country.

Since I believe in treating everyone equally, regardless of race, and that we should be focused on what unites us rather than our differences, I will vote no, stated Rosendale.
What Christians need to know about minimum wage laws and white supremacy

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President Bidens proposal to raise the nations minimum wage to $15 per hour has been upstaged by his stimulus and infrastructure spending proposals, but the administration hasn't given up, and some well-meaning but historically and economically naive Christians are on board.

All the missiles from economics launched against a minimum wage because it harms poor minorities bounce off the minds of statists (socialists, progressives, fascist, liberals, etc.) like Hamas rockets hitting Israels Iron Dome. Facts dont move them. Consequences dont faze them. Socialists reject the most developed of the social sciences, economics. Self-righteousness demands a minimum wage because they have declared it to be the moral thing to do regardless of the damage it will inflict.

Honestly, is it as moral as socialists claim? After all, minimum wages became popular in the early 20th century as the less violent way to promote eugenics. American progressives taught eugenics to Germans before Hitler and he merely took the ideology to its logical, violent conclusion. Progressives in the US wanted a non-violent way to suppress undesirable races and a minimum wage offered its services.

In his review of Illiberal Reformers: Race, Eugenics, and American Economics in the Progressive Era, by Thomas C. Leonard, Art Carden wrote,

Leonard recounts the ways in which Progressive Era economists argued that minimum wages were good policy precisely because they reduced employment opportunities for those workers. Social scientists in the thrall of the eugenics movement enthusiastically endorsed policies that excluded unfit workers from the labor market lest those workers earnings enable them to continue polluting the gene pool. Foreigners and other nonCaucasians could underlive American workers because they were accustomed to lower standards of living. Nonwhite workers would thus win the race to the bottom, ultimately culminating in race suicide. In this view, Darwinian and competitive forces were dysgenic, meaning that unchecked reproduction among the fecund and swarthy would overwhelm the genetically superior, leading ultimately to the degradation of the human race."

In his review of the standard textbook on economics of the US Progressive Era, Principles of Economics, by Frank W. Taussig (1917), Jeffrey Tucker wrote that the purpose of a minimum wage would be to regulate the labor market to exclude workers whose productivity was too low:

Some people are simply unemployable, he [Taussig] says, for example those who are helpless from cases irremediable due to old age, infirmity, disabling accident and also those suffering from congenital feebleness of body and charters, alcoholism, dissolute living [] irretrievable criminals and tramps. This class, he opines, must be stamped out and should not be allowed to breed. Ideally, he says, we should proceed to chloroform them once for all but that might have a bad look. Instead, at least they can be segregated, shut up in refuges and asylums, and prevented from propagating their kind."

Tucker added that Princeton Universitys Royal Meeker, Woodrow Wilsons commissioner of labor, held the same ideology. It is much better to enact a minimum-wage law even if it deprives these unfortunates of work, Meeker argued in 1910.

Better that the state should support the inefficient wholly and prevent the multiplication of the breed than subsidize incompetence and unthrift, enabling them to bring forth more of their kind. If we are to maintain a race that is to be made up of capable, efficient and independent individuals and family groups, Seager continued, we must courageously cut off lines of heredity that have been proved to be undesirable by isolation or sterilization.

One of the most famous socialists of the early 20th century, Sidney Webb, summed up the consensus of the time in his 1912 article The Economic Theory of the Minimum Wage:

Legal Minimum Wage positively increases the productivity of the nations industry, by ensuring that the surplus of unemployed workmen shall be exclusively the least efficient workmen; or, to put it in another way, by ensuring that all the situations shall be filled by the most efficient operatives who are available.

Who were the unemployable workers that progressives wanted to freeze out of the job market? They targeted blacks, Chinese, Hispanics, Eastern Europeans, and Jews. Progressive/socialist eugenicists were white supremacists who feared that inferior humans would destroy all that whites had built. Eugenicists were also responsible for Jim Crow laws.

What changed? Hitler followed Taussigs advice but used a deadlier gas than chloroform. When Americans witnessed the concentration camps and gas chambers in Germany, any thought of oppressing minorities became repulsive. So socialists flipped the narrative and insisted that a minimum wage would benefit the same groups they had assaulted with it before the war. And theyre still pedaling that lie. Christians are required to care for the poor, not just to put on a political mask which pretends they do care, but actually advocates policies which were designed to harm them.
SBC encourages churches to 'permanently disqualify' pastors who commit sex abuse

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NASHVILLE  Messengers at the Southern Baptist Convention's annual meeting approved a resolution encouraging churches within the nation's largest Protestant denomination to "permanently" disqualify individuals who have committed sexual abuse from the pastorate.

That resolution is nonbinding and encourages all SBC affiliated churches to hold the standard that any person who engaged in sexual abuse in their life is permanently disqualified from holding the office of pastor.

Former Southern Baptist President James Merritt, who also serves as the chairman of the SBC Committee on Resolutions, told to reporters Wednesday that any pastor who commits sexual misconduct should be permanently disqualified from ever returning to church leadership. He warned that such behavior damages the credibility of the Body of Christ.

I just read yesterday about a pastor that had to resign [from a] church, Merritt, the senior pastor of Cross Pointe Church in Georgia, said.

He committed sexual abuse 40 years ago, and it came out. This will be hard for the outside world to understand, but the Scripture is very plain that a pastor has to be above reproach."

"Good, bad or indifferent, when someone commits sexual abuse, whether it's 20, 30 or 40 years ago, if it comes up, it's just going to be damaging," Merritt added. "It's going to put a lot of doubt and a lot of people's minds."

Merritt said hes of the firm belief that if a pastor is unfaithful to his wife, hes also permanently disqualified from ever being a pastor again.

I honestly believe that, he said. It's not an issue of forgiveness. If a Christian gets drunk and drives his car into a tree and loses his left arm, God will forgive him. But he still won't have a left arm.

Pastors who commit such offenses can return to the ministry in some fashion, he clarified, but never as a lead pastor.

We've got a big job ahead of us as pastors, I believe, to rebuild credibility and trust in the community, he continued.

Nathan Finn, the vice chair of the resolutions committee, agreed that allowing pastors who have committed sexual sin to return to the pulpit weakens the credibility of the entire office of pastor.

So I believe it's very important for Southern Baptists to speak unequivocally and in a way that everyone can understand us that we believe that sexual abuse is a disqualifying factor for anyone who would serve in church leadership where they were commended to vulnerable populations in the church, he stressed.

The issue of sexual abuse within the denomination was a hot topic at the SBCs annual meeting, which drew more than 21,000 people to Nashvilles Music City Center, including 15,726 messengers.



On Wednesday, SBC messengers overwhelmingly approved a motion to set up a task force to oversee an independent investigation into allegations that SBC Executive Committee leaders have mishandled allegations of abuse within SBC churches.

A leaked May 31 letter from former SBC ethicist Russell Moore to outgoing SBC President J.D. Greear alleged that leaders mishandled a crisis of sexual abuse in the denomination by intimidating whistleblowers into silence and exonerating churches with credible allegations of negligence toward sexual abuse victims.

The SBC Executive Committee subsequently announced that Guidepost Solutions would review such allegations.

Guidepost Solutions was also commissioned to "review and enhance training provided to SBC Executive Committee staff and its board of trustees" as it relates to sex abuse and the organizations "communications to cooperating churches and congregants in cooperating churches."

Wednesday's motion comes after the Executive Committee rejected a motion earlier in the week to expand the scope of the Guidepost Solutions' investigation by appointing an independent task force to oversee the inquiry instead of Executive Committee leaders.

Finn said the resolution served as a way to come alongside all the positive momentum that says our first instinct needs to be to care for those who have been abused more than protecting our own reputation.
Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer bans funding of gay 'conversion therapy' for youth

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Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer has signed an executive directive banning state and federal funding of sexual orientation therapy for youth who identify as LGBT. Critics say the directive is unnecessary because counseling for unwanted same-sex attraction has never received state or federal funding.

Known as Executive Directive No. 2021-3, the measure orders the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services to take actions necessary to prohibit the use of state and federal funds for the practice of conversion therapy on minors.

This includes without limitation funding related to Medicaid and the Childrens Health Insurance Program (CHIP), child welfare services, and juvenile justice programs, continued the Executive Directive signed on Monday.

All departments and autonomous agencies subject to supervision by the governor that regulate, provide, procure, or pay for medical or mental health services on behalf of Michigan residents must explore what further actions they can take to protect minors from the practice of conversion therapy as permitted by law.

On Tuesday, a spokesperson for the governor emailed a press release to The Christian Post in which Whitmer was quoted as saying that hate has no home in Michigan.

My administration is committed to addressing the systemic barriers faced by young LGBTQ+ Michiganders so that our state is a place where they are able to reach their full potential, Whitmer stated.

The actions we take today will serve as a starting point in protecting our LGBTQ+ youth from the damaging practice of conversion therapy and in ensuring that Michigan is a reflection of true inclusion.

According to the Michigan governments website, while similar to executive orders, executive directives differ in that they are not officially filed with the secretary of state.

Dan Jarvis, director of Research and Public Policy at the Michigan Family Forum, was critical of the executive directive, telling CP that he considered it pandering as it is a certainty that there are no state or federal dollars being spent on conversion or reparative therapy in Michigan.

Helping individuals explore why they have certain attractions and how they can manage those feelings is compassionate and laudable, said Jarvis. Stifling individuals, including licensed mental health professionals, as some lawmakers have called for, is a serious violation of a person's First Amendment rights.

Jarvis went on to tell CP that he believed there was a large segment of the population that struggle with same-sex attraction who are quietly suffering and wondering why they feel the way they do, and wishing that they did not feel that way.

Good public policy, and a Christ-like response, allows those individuals to freely seek out mental health professionals who can help them understand themselves and live out their faith, he concluded.
Convicted porn producer calls porn industry evil business, receives 20-year sentence

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A porn actor and producer who lied to and coerced young women to perform sex videos for San Diego-based websites GirlsDoPorn and GirlsDoToys received a 20-year sentence on Monday after pleading guilty to federal sex trafficking and conspiracy charges.

Ruben Andre Garcia admitted in December that he worked with the owners of porn sites GirlsDoPorn and GirlsDoToys to fraudulently coerce young women from the United States and Canada to film explicit videos.

Garcia and his co-defendants promised the girls he coerced that the videos would never be public and only sent to private customers outside the U.S. But the videos were posted to GirlsDoPorn, GirlsDoToys and PornHub, some of which received millions of views on some of the most heavily trafficked porn sites.

As many as 20 victims testified during a sentencing hearing, and some said that Garcia sexually assaulted them, according to The Times of San Diego.

Some victims told Judge Janis Sammartino that the videos continue to plague them by destroying family relationships and job prospects. Some women even attempted suicide after the videos release and still seek therapy.

Ive been doing this a very long time, and I can tell you I havent had a case like this, Sammartino said during the hearing, according to Courthouse News Service.

I spent most of my time this morning listening to people who were victims in this offense. You were treated in the poorest of ways, you were disregarded, treated as disposable commodities in someones quest for money. The only thing I can come up with is a greed motive."

Garcia offered a short apology and acknowledged the porn industry is an evil business. The hearing marked the first time that he addressed the accusations.

I would like to sincerely apologize to you  to the victims and the families  I was deceitful, Garcia was quoted as saying. I accept responsibility for my actions.

Garcia worked for the websites from 2013 to 2019 as a recruiter and adult film performer. The websites generated millions of dollars in revenue, and the films received millions of views.

The victims were forced into video shoots that lasted hours and often led to pain and bleeding. They were sometimes barricaded or trapped in a room and were sometimes threatened to force them to complete the hours-long filming.

Once women discovered their videos were posted, the website owners ignored their requests to remove the videos.

The National Center on Sexual Exploitation, a leading organization that seeks a world free from sexual abuse by exposing the links between all forms of sexual exploitation and the public health harms of pornography, is grateful that survivors have received a measure of justice through Garcias sentencing.

We hope that this sentence brings a measure of justice for those who were sex trafficked by Andre Garcia and GirlsDoPorn and who courageously fought for this legal victory, said NCOSE General Counsel Benjamin Bull in a statement. This reprehensible crime shows the horrible reality of the pornography industry, which is rife with abuse and coercion .

This legal victory also strikes at the heart of the pornography industrys claim that verified content is safe and has the consent of the performers, Bull continued. GirlsDoPorn content was promoted as a verified partner of Pornhub, but the harrowing testimony from these GirlsDoPorn survivors and their mounting legal victories prove that the pornography industry is not and cannot ever be safe. The pornography industry is a predatory and exploitative business.

Garcias co-defendants who worked for GirlsDoPorn have pleaded guilty and await their sentencing, according to The Times of San Diego.

Twenty-two survivors of GirlsDoPorns sexual abuse and exploitation were awarded $12.7 million in January 2020 as part of a civil lawsuit, NCOSE reported.

Over 40 GirlsDoPorn survivors have since filed a lawsuit against Pornhub for refusing to remove their coerced videos.

In a statement shared in December after Garcia admitted his guilt, FBI Special Agent in Charge Suzanne Turner said that the "The FBI is committed to investigating those who prey upon trusting women and girls, causing pain and humiliation for their own personal gain." She called Garcia's guilty plea a "small victory in the ongoing battle with those who commit sex trafficking.
Mom outraged at Illinois' sex ed bill, opposes kids being taught about masturbation, anal sex

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A furious Illinois mom lashed out during a recent school board meeting over controversial sex education standards that she claims sexually grooms young children by introducing sensitive and inappropriate topics.

Both chambers of the Illinois legislature recently passed S.B. 0818, a bill requiring schools that teach sex education to use the National Sex Education Standards (NSES).

The bill is awaiting a signature from Democratic Gov. J.B. Pritzker. Republicans strongly opposed the bill, and it passed by a partisan vote, according to WGEM.

Becky Swan, a mother and alumna of District 87 in Illinois, said the bill imposes a form of sexual harassment that begins with children as young as kindergarten and continues through the 12th grade.

Swan said this nationalized sex education destroys local control over curriculum, according to a video of the school board meeting released by a local news outlet.

Swan shared different elements of the sex education curriculum from the NSES guidelines that will "force" students to learn about masturbation, anal sex and transgender ideology before their teenage years, The Blaze reported.

You have a hard time hearing this from me, but this is for 10 years old and up, and this bill was passed for five-year-olds, she said as she addressed the school board and Superintendent Barry Reilly.

The curriculum expects students between sixth to eighth grade to define vaginal, anal and oral sex. Students at the end of second grade are expected to list medically accurate names for body parts, including the genitals.

At the end of fifth grade, the standards require students to explain common human sexual development and the role of hormones (e.g., romantic and sexual feelings, masturbation, mood swings, timing of pubertal onset)," as well as differentiate between sexual orientation and gender identity."

Swan showed the school board pictures from the book, It's Perfectly Normal: Changing Bodies, Growing Up, Sex, and Sexual Health, which she says is used as a part of sex education in some schools.

The book is written for children 10 years old and up and is one of the most banned books of the past two decades for its explicit content. According to NPR, the book includes full-color illustrations of naked people and sections on sexual orientation.

Swan passionately urged the school board to pass a resolution not to allow the curriculum in the district and to ask the governor to veto the legislation.

Meeting attendee Kara Brown rebutted Swans criticism and said the new sex education legislation would encourage conversations about sexual assault.

Other parents at the school board meeting addressed the board about critical race theory being taught in schools.

Sex education measures across the country have received pushback from concerned parents.

Parents of children at a $55,000-per-year elite private school in New York City were recently outraged by controversial sex education classes where masturbation and gender identity were taught to their first graders.

"Health and wellness" educator Justine Ang Fonte reportedly showed 6 and 7-year-old students a cartoon video where masturbation and gender identity were explained.

Kids have no less than five classes on gender identity  this is pure indoctrination, a mother of one of the private school students told The NY Post.

This person should absolutely not be teaching children," she said. "Ironically, she teaches kids about consent, yet she has never gotten consent from parents about the sexually explicit and age-inappropriate material about transgender to first-graders.

Fonte has resigned from the school in the wake of the outrage and will work on being an independent health educator, The New York Post reported.
Virginia school district to appeal order reinstating teacher opposed to transgender pronouns

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A public school district in Virginia that was ordered to reinstate a teacher punished for criticizing a proposed policy to require teachers to use trans-identified students' preferred pronouns says it will appeal the decision to the state's supreme court.

Last week, a judge told the Loudon County School Board to reinstate Byron Tanner Cross, a physical education teacher at Leesburg Elementary School placed on administrative leave.

In a statement last Friday, Loudoun County Public Schools said that it will file an appeal of the June 8 decision, claiming that Cross comments were harmful.

LCPS respectfully disagrees with the Circuit Courts decision to issue the injunction, and it is appealing this ruling to the Supreme Court of Virginia, stated LCPS.

Many students and parents at Leesburg Elementary have expressed fear, hurt and disappointment about coming to school. Addressing those concerns is paramount to the school divisions goal to provide a safe, welcoming and affirming learning environment for all students.

The school district went on to state that while they respect the rights of public school employees to free speech and free exercise of religion, those rights do not outweigh the rights of students to be educated in a supportive and nurturing environment.

In May, LCPS held a meeting to discuss a proposed policy that would require students and faculty alike to use the preferred pronouns of youths who identify as transgender or gender-expansive.

Cross attended the meeting and spoke out against the proposal, telling the school board that he was speaking out of love for those who suffer with gender dysphoria.

I love all of my students, but I will never lie to them regardless of the consequences. Im a teacher, but I serve God first and I will not affirm that a biological boy can be a girl and vice versa because its against my religion, stated Cross at the meeting.

Two days after the meeting, Cross was put on administrative leave with pay and prohibited from going onto any school properties unless given permission.

In response, Cross filed a complaint against LCPS and was represented by the Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative legal nonprofit that handles religious liberty cases and has won several U.S. Supreme Court cases in recent years.

ADF Senior Counsel Tyson Langhofer said in a statement that he believes public schools cannot suspend someone simply for respectfully providing their opinion at a public meeting.

The school district favors a certain set of beliefs on a hotly contested issue, and it wants to force Tanner to cry uncle and endorse them as well, stated Langhofer. Thats neither legal nor constitutional, and neither was the schools move to place Tanner on leave.

Last week, Judge James E. Plowman of the 20th Judicial Circuit of Virginia granted Cross' request for a temporary injunction against the board's decision to place the teacher on leave.

Plowman concluded that punishing Cross was extreme and an unconstitutional action since the views of the teacher, even if controversial, were nevertheless permissible.

The Court agrees with Plaintiffs analysis and concludes that Defendants actions to suspend the Plaintiff, as well as the additional restrictions placed upon him, adversely affected his constitutionally protected speech, wrote the judge.

Here, it was clear that the Plaintiff was speaking as a citizen, not in his official capacity. His speech was not conducted at his usual place of employment, occurred during non-working hours and at a forum where public comment was invited.
ICC complaint says China rounding up Uyghurs who fled to other countries: 'Never heard from again'

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A legal team acting on behalf of exiled Uyghur leaders has submitted new evidence to the International Criminal Court saying that ethnic Muslim minorities who fled China into neighboring countries have been seized, repatriated and have not been seen or heard from since.

The allegations come as part of the ongoing effort to convince the international body to open an investigation into actions taken by the Chinese government against ethnic Muslims in western China amid accusations of "genocide."

They claim that because Muslims who fled human rights abuses in China  which is not a party to ICC  were repatriated from countries that are parties to the ICC, the Hague-based court has jurisdiction to hold perpetrators accountable.

A "hefty dossier" of evidence was submitted to the ICC's Office of the Prosecutor last Thursday on behalf of the East Turkistan Government in Exile and the East Turkistan National Awakening Movement. The dossier outlines that most Muslim minorities who fled to Tajikistan have been repatriated back to China.

East Turkistan National Awakening Movement describes itself as an international movement striving for the restoration of East Turkistans independence as an open, pluralistic, Republic guaranteeing Human Rights and Freedoms for all.

What the East Turkistan National Awakening Movement refers to as East Turkistan is recognized by the rest of the world as the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in western China, home to Muslim religious minorities such as Uyghurs and Kazakhs. In Xinjing, communist authorities have been accused of "genocide" by international actors for detaining over 1 million ethnic minorities in concentration camps under the guise of guiding Muslims away from terrorist ideologies.

Last July, lawyers acting on behalf of the East Turkistan National Awakening Movement and the East Turkistan Government in Exile filed a complaint with the ICC, asking for an investigation into Chinese officials over their treatment of Uyghurs, which they characterized as genocide and crimes against humanity.

The ICC initially declined to take such action, but lawyers for the Uyghur activists are confident that the new evidence will convince the ICC to investigate the Chinese government.

Nikita Bernardi, who leads public outreach to convince the ICC to investigate Chinas actions against Uyghurs, hosted a webinar featuring the legal team and the leadership of the East Turkistan Government in Exile and the East Turkistan National Awakening Movement on Monday.

"This evidence was submitted in order to establish jurisdiction for the International Criminal Court over crimes which are being committed by Chinese authorities against Uyghurs," Bernardi said.

One member of the legal team, Rodney Dixon, alleged that at a minimum, "85% to 90% of the Uyghur population" in neighboring Tajikistan "has been targeted and moved out into China.

He spoke of a very sophisticated and cunning campaign to do this just below the radar, over time and patiently in order to achieve the goal of ensuring that there are no Uyghurs, essentially, left in Tajikistan and that theyre all in China, where they can be targeted, controlled and persecuted.

According to Dixon, there are approximately 100 Uyghurs left in Tajikistan who are heavily controlled by Chinese operatives in a toxic environment. That number is down from a few thousand over a decade ago.

After remarking that Our investigators have been on the ground for some time and still are, Dixon credited them for unearthing a shocking discovery that  we have made, and it simply cant now be overlooked.

The legal team conducted their investigations from January to May.

We were able to get persons on the ground in various countries, conducting interviews, recording interviews, taking photographs of what they were able to see as well, Dixon said. All of that material has been gathered and it is now available and submitted to the prosecutor.

From January to May, we conducted these investigations, and we were able to get a substantial body of evidence, which we have submitted to the prosecutor last week, addressing exactly the issues that she said we needed to, Dixon added. She said there were a number of questions that were not properly addressed because there wasnt sufficient evidence. Weve now given the prosecutor that evidence.

Dixon declined to go into detail about the evidence, citing concerns about confidentiality.

However, a copy of the filing obtained by The U.K. Times indicates that "Chinese Public Security Bureau operatives who are in Tajikistan" have directed raids to be carried out on "bazaars where the Uighurs work." Additionally, Chinese authorities are accused of directing "local Tajik police to detain all the Uighurs who do not have the correct paperwork.

"[A]n entire bazaar was raided and blocked off until all the Uighurs working there had been seized," the filing states. "The Uighurs then get deported by Chinese officials back to China in groups of about ten. The deportation groups are kept small to avoid attention.

The report further claims that Chinas consulate in Tajikistan exerts its complete control over the Uighurs paperwork and purposely delays the granting of visas, work permits and other documentation that the Uighurs need to live in Tajikistan.

Dixon contends that under the ICC procedure, the prosecutor would go to judges to request that an investigation is opened.

Dixon acknowledged that while its process can be slow, the ICC is the only body at the international level that can actually investigate and prosecute Chinese officials for what has happened.

He stressed that the ICC was set up to deal with these kinds of mass human rights violations, describing an investigation into actions taken against Uyghurs as a case like none other for the ICC to address.

Dixon expressed hope that that very important step will be taken very soon.

Dixon recalled that in previous cases, the ICC has determined that even when the main country involved in a complaint is not "signed up to the ICC," "that doesnt mean that the Court doesnt have jurisdiction."

"[T]he court can hear a case if an element of the crime that you are alleging takes place in an ICC state party territory," he explained. "In our case, its Tajikistan and Cambodia, which are both ICC state parties where we say that acts have occurred that are elements of crimes over which the court has jurisdiction.

Because they occur on the territory of the ICC state party, the prosecutor can therefore investigate as long as one element occurs there," he continued. "Then, the court has jurisdiction over that aspect but also the continuation of that crime into China as well."

Dixon said the purpose of the investigation is to decide whether you can bring charges against the actual people who have perpetrated these deeds.

What weve been able to find from our investigations is that Chinese authorities, Chinese operatives have in fact gone onto the territory of an ICC state party, thats Tajikistan in this case  and they have identified, targeted and rounded up Uyghur persons living there in order to deport them back to China," he said.

"And in the cases that weve looked at, those persons who have been  in that way detained and taken back by Chinese officials, they have never been heard from or seen again.

Noting that Chinese officials have exposed themselves to the ICCs jurisdiction by rounding up Uyghurs in the ICC state party of Tajikistan, Dixon stressed that actions taken by Chinese officials against Uyghurs are not just those acts isolated on their own." Instead, he said they are the very first acts within the overall plan of China to commit crimes against humanity and genocide."

The leadership of the East Turkistan Government in Exile also spoke during the webinar, attempting to put the Chinese governments actions in perspective.

President of East Turkistan Government in Exile Ghulam Yaghma argued that the Chinese governments actions constitute the most horrific crimes against  humanity and also genocide in the 21st century.

East Turkistan Government in Exile Prime Minister Salih Hudayar called on all governments around the world, especially governments that adhere to democracy, that adhere to human rights, that adhere to freedom, and especially those that are member states of the International Criminal Court to support our case, to support us in obtaining justice through the international law.

He also urged organizations and individuals who care about the world, who care about human rights, who care about justice, who care about ending atrocities to help us by supporting our case at the ICC both materially and morally and spiritually.
Coming to the market for the first time in more than 20 years, Homme qui chavire is a dramatic variation on the elongated figures created by the Swiss sculptor after the Second World War, and a poetic expression of the human condition

In the autumn of 1945, Alberto Giacometti (1901-1966) left his war-time refuge in Geneva and returned to Paris, where his future wife and favourite model, Annette, would join him.

Abandoning the Surrealist works that had made his name in the early 1930s, he had returned to figurative representation during the war, sculpting plaster heads and figures that were so small they fitted into matchboxes.

That would soon change, however.

In 1946, while watching a film in a cinema on the Boulevard Montparnasse, the artist realised that the way he saw people on the street was very different from the way they were portrayed in photography and film  and, as he later explained, I wanted to represent what I saw.

His figures were already getting thinner. Now they grew taller as well, soaring to life-size heights of up to two metres and beyond  resembling, as Giacometti said, not so much the human figure, but the shadow that is cast.

You dont feel your weight, he noted. I wanted  without having thought about it  to reproduce this lightness, by making the body so thin.
As major Bay Area tech companies like Reddit, Salesforce and Dropbox all announced variations of a permanent remote work program amid the COVID-19 pandemic, others were experimenting with different ways to shift their workforce.

In September 2020, Stripe offered its employees a unique proposition  move outside the Bay Area and receive a $20,000 bonus. But all attractive offers come with a catch, and this one was a 10% pay cut.
Pride Month is in full swing and after a year in lockdown, what better way to celebrate than to patronize a local LGBTQ-owned business?

While many companies recognize Pride with a new rainbow paint job on their logos, this year, let's celebrate by giving back to the businesses that work hard year-round to be inclusive and serve queer clients.

SOUL FOOD: Here's where you can get some of the best soul food in Houston

Here's a list of 11 LGBTQ-owned businesses around Houston, from fashion houses to dance studios and restaurants to yoga retreats.

Anthony Ferrell and Alan Lett, Owners

When it comes to high-quality customized shirts, no company does it better than AF Custom Shirts. Apart from excellent apparel, Ferrell and his husband Lett provide monthly training to small businesses with videos and seminars to help them learn how to use resources that are readily available to them.

Rosa Montereal, Owner

At one of the few trans-owned businesses in the Houston area, Montereal provides top-notch haircuts at an affordable price. She is a professional master stylist, creative colorist and amazing barber.

Christopher Barry, Owner

Buddys is more than just a gay bar in Houston. Buddys provides fantastic events every month that vary from fashion shows to steak nights, to its popular Karaoke nights.

Michael Dorsey and Chih Lin, Owners

Dumpling Dudez

Looking for a unique dumpling experience? Look no further than Dumpling Dudez. Where else can you get rainbow dumplings in the Houston area? Dorsey and his husband Lin, in their cooking classes, help people create lasting memories and delicious dumplings. This is part of the magic that happens when you attend a class with the Dumpling Dudez.

Juan Quintero, Owner

HortiProcess, dedicated to the specialty coffee and tropical fruit industry, highlights tradition and culture through the gastronomy of the tropics. For Pride Month, use the promotional code PRIDE for 35 percent off.

Antonio and Diego Chiarello, Owners

This Italian cafe features gorgeous pastries that remind us of the beauty Italy has to offer. Diego, an esteemed chef, shares his love of his culture and homeland at La Sicilia. This establishment captures the American essence of baked goods and merges them wonderfully with his specialties from Sicily.

Charles Armstrong, Owner

JRs Bar and Grill is one of the most talked about gay bars in Houston. Offering a safe space for the LGBTQ+ community, this establishment promotes local artists and DJs from the queer community. JRs continues to be a destination for a good time, Pride month or not.

Perfecto Ramirez, Owner

Owned and operated by Ramirez, Sky Dreams Dance Studio provides everyone an enjoyable experience. His dance choreography encourages kids and adults to understand the importance of being responsible, committed and hard-working. By motivating local kids and adults to understand the concept of teamwork, he not only teaches them how to dance but also builds confidence and allows them to explore different genres of music and cultures.

Tamika & Lenie Caston-Miller, Owners

Annie Mulligan, Houston Chronicle / Contributor

This wellness community creates a space where BIPOC and LGBTQ+ people can feel seen, heard and empowered. The facility allows members to reconnect with nature and each other through art and yoga. In addition, they offer free and dramatically discounted services for any paid workshop or event at TRH for those who need it most. All proceeds go back to funding scholarships and education programs for the community.

Krysten Mabry, Owner

Mabry works hard to create an environment where everyone can improve themselves through the practice of yoga. With classes focusing on fitness, mindfulness and recovery, what better way to spend a Monday night?

Julie Mabry, Owner

Godofredo A. Vasquez, Houston Chronicle / Staff photographer

One of the last lesbian bars in Texas, and one of the last 21 in the U.S., the Pearl Bar serves as a hangout for many. Now with a more inclusive vibe, non-stop parties and awesome drinks, it is an environment where everyone is appreciated and accepted.
Apparently, there are no tacos in San Diego, California. A chain of taquerias located in this area of the United States is in crisis, since it has not found this type of workforce, although it offers a salary of a thousand dollars per week, which is equivalent to just over 20 thousand Mexican pesos, as reported by Imagen TV .

The case went viral on social networks, where many people who live in Mexico have been interested in the position. A taquero's hours at this San Diego restaurant are 50 hours a week with a payout of $ 20 each.
Congressman August Pfluger, a San Angelo Republican who represents Midland in the House of Representatives, is leading fellow congressmen in urging the Biden administration to reverse its proposal to list the Lesser Prairie Chicken under the Endangered Species Act.

Pfluger and Rep. Bruce Westerman, ranking member on the House Natural Resources Committee, Rep. Yvette Herrell, Rep. Dan Newhouse, chairman of the Congressional Western Caucus, and Reps. Kevin Brady, Doug Lamborn, Lauren Boebert, Scott Perry, Markwayne Mullin, Tracey Mann, Randy Weber, Stephanie Bice, Ronny Jackson, Louie Gohmert, Cliff Bentz and Michael Cloud have sent a letter to the administration opposing the listing, citing harm to the oil and gas industry, production agriculture and the livelihoods of hundreds of thousands of workers and their communities.
Read SFGATE's latest story on the Willow Fire here.

Evacuation information: https://montereyco.maps.arcgis.com

Willow Fire map and updates: https://inciweb.nwcg.gov/incident/7549/

LATEST June 18, 8:50 pm. The Monterey County Sheriff's Office has upgraded the evacuation warning to an order for Zone WF-3a on Friday evening.

Zone WF-3a includes all areas of Arroyo Secco Roadd west of Woodtick Canyon, including Arroyo Seco Campground, Rocky Creek Road, and Camp Cawatre.

See the evacuation map here.

June 18, 4:30 p.m. The Willow Fire grew to approximately 750 acres Friday afternoon, according to the Los Padres National Forest.

The blaze emitted a massive pyrocumulus cloud that rose up to 14,000 feet above ground level, according to the National Weather Service.

"Any time we have a fire, these can develop," said Brooke Bingaman, a meteorologist with the weather service. "I think whats shocking is this is developing very quickly and that plume is going very high and we havent seen that since last year when we had our big lightning outbreak and a lot of fires."

So called "fire clouds" form over forest fires when an intense heating of the air triggers an upward motion, pushing smoke and water vapor to rapidly rise.

"What happens is when any moisture in the air rises, it wants to condense, but it cant condense on nothing, and so the smoke particulates act as something it can condense on," Bingaman explained.

The cloud was visible from the Salinas and Carmel valleys and many posted images in social media. One Twitter user said he spotted the cloud from Capitola near Santa Cruz.

There are 300 firefighters on the ground as well as air tankers and water-dropping helicopters battling the blaze.

Hot and dry weather conditions with temperatures over 100 degrees are creating difficult firefighting conditions. Winds out of the southwest are 5 mph to 10 mph with gusts up to 20 mph.

Find evacuation information here.

June 18, 1:30 p.m. Monterey County released a map of evacuation orders and warnings for the Willow Fire in Big Sur. Find it here.

June 18, 1 p.m. KSBW-TV broadcast an update on the Willow Fire in Big Sur with a weather forecast. Watch it here.

June 18, noon A wildfire burning in the Los Padres National Forest in Big Sur had grown to 200 acres as of Friday at noon, according to KSBW.

June 18, 11 a.m. A wildfire burning in California's Big Sur region Friday has triggered evacuations, growing to 180 acres with no containment as of Friday morning.

The Willow Fire sparked on Thursday, June 17, at 8:10 p.m. on Willow Creek in the Ventana Wilderness northwest of the Arroyo Seco Recreation Area close to the Tassajara Zen Center, according to an incident report from the Los Padres National Forest. It is burning north of the Dolan Fire that ravaged 128,050 acres in 2020.

The Montery County Office of Emergency Services issued an evacuation order Friday morning for Tassajara Road from the Tassajara Zen Center to China Camp Campground, in the Los Padres National Forest, including tributary forest routes.

The National Weather Service shared footage on Twitter from a PG&E webcam showing a smoke plume billowing above the mountains near Arroyo Seco Campground in Big Sur.

"Note the rapid expansion of the smoke plume in response to a wind shift that will continue to steer it towards the north thru the rest of today," the weather service said.

Smoke was visible in the Salinas and Carmel valleys Friday.

The wildfire started amid a sweltering heat wave gripping the West Coast, and temperatures in Big Sur on Thursday rose into the low 90s, which is unusual for the coast. Gradual cooling is expected Friday and through the weekend.

For updates, visit the Big Sur Fire Facebook page and the Montery County Office of Emergency Services Twitter page.

This is a developing story.
Amazon recently announced that they will no longer test most of their job seekers for cannabis. In the same blog post, they also announced their support of the MORE Act (Marijuana Opportunity Reinvestment and Expungement Act of 2021,) a bill that would legalize marijuana at the federal level.

Because we know that this issue is bigger than Amazon, our public policy team will be actively supporting The Marijuana Opportunity Reinvestment and Expungement Act of 2021 (MORE Act)federal legislation that would legalize marijuana at the federal level, expunge criminal records, and invest in impacted communities, Amazon stated on a company blog post. We hope that other employers will join us, and that policymakers will act swiftly to pass this law.

The company said some roles may still require a cannabis test, particularly those in line with Department of Transportation regulations. Amazon will still test workers for other drugs and conduct impairment checks on the job.

RELATED: What "Black-ish" got right about the racial stigma surrounding cannabis

The move to cease testing job seekers for cannabis use had become all but necessary for the international company. One in three Americans now live in a state where cannabis is legal, and those states are introducing laws barring employers from testing for cannabis, making company policies on the issue for multi-state operators increasingly complex. In March, a man in New York sued Amazon, claiming that they rescinded his job offer at an Amazon warehouse because he tested positive for THC. In New York, employers cannot legally test job applicants for cannabis.

Amazon is the second-largest private employer in the US, so the decision, combined with their public support of the MORE Act, is bound to have ripple effects.

According to Kimberly Harding, employment attorney at Nixon Peabody, other companies will likely to follow Amazons footsteps in ceasing to test job seekers for cannabis, if only for the reason that it will make company policies more consistent.

For nationwide employers like Amazon, the decision to stop testing for marijuana is becoming recommended course, Harding told GreenState. Theres such a hodgepodge of state laws on this subject now that companies may see eliminating it on a national level will make things simpler and more consistent. Its likely to become the path of least resistance.

RELATED: 1 in 3 Americans Now Live in State Where Cannabis Is Legalized

In a way, Amazon is pioneering cannabis acceptance in big business the same way Colorado pioneered legalizing recreational cannabis at the state level. They are not the first major company to ditch cannabis testing, but they may just be the most influential.

But with great power comes great responsibility. On one hand, the decision will open the labor market significantly for Amazon, at a time when the labor force is still suffering from the impact of COVID-19. This increase of the companys job candidate pool also gives Amazon the opportunity to diversify its workforce, a small step in the right direction for a company whose approach to racial issues has recently fallen under scrutiny.

On the other hand, theres a downside to being the guinea pig. Amazon is the largest company to stop cannabis testing in the US, and therefore risks the most if they fail to set clear parameters for employees using cannabis recreationally, says cannabis attorney Yvette McDowell.

Im afraid it could cause legal complications, as well as problems and confusion for employees, McDowell told GreenState. We dont have the knowledge of cannabis or the technology to say what qualifies as intoxication, and the amount of THC it takes for someone to be obviously high will be different for each employee. Forklift drivers may smoke before coming in because they dont think theyll be intoxicated, and then you open the floodgates for a lot of lawsuits. Were not ready for this, and I think companies who follow suit will do it at their own peril.

RELATED: Will Cannabis Become Legal in 2021? With Record Support and Biden, Its Possible

Whether a success or failure in the long run, the results of Amazons decision have been nothing but positive for cannabis enthusiasts so far. In the days following the announcement, cannabis stocks skyrocketed. A writer at Forbes called it the missing link for legalizing cannabis nationally.

While Harding is less certain on this front, she said its possible that Amazons support for the MORE Act will be what pushes it through.

What Amazons backing of the MORE Act has done is indicate that a big, familiar businesses is supporting this bill, Harding said. Amazon sells universally legitimate products that all legislators will recognize, and this shows its not just cannabis businesses who want this bill passed. That gives it a lot more credibility.

Elissa Esher is Assistant Editor at GreenState. Her work has also appeared in The Boston Guardian, Brooklyn Paper, Religion Unplugged, and Iridescent Women. Send inquiries and tips to elli.esher@hearst.com.

This article first appeared on GreenState, a cannabis lifestyle blog owned by Hearst.
BERLIN (AP)  German police appealed Friday for information about the possible owners of two 17th-century paintings discovered in a highway rest stop dumpster.

Police said a 64-year-old man found the oil paintings at the rest stop near Ohrenbach in central Germany last month.
Craving a new bite to eat in Houston this week?

We've got the hook-up on new restaurants and flavors coming to H-Town. From a new dessert shop to a familiar menu opening in Montrose.

UP IN FLAMES: Legendary Houston honky-tonk burns down in bizarre fire

Have a suggestion for this weekly list? Email me at jay.jordan@chron.com.

This menu has everything American, including burgers, chicken sandwiches and signature cocktails.

The restaurant will open its Montrose location (907 Westheimer) on June 23. This is the second location opening for the restaurant, which has its original spot off Shepherd Drive. The place is known for eats during the day and drinks after dark.

It's pet-friendly and has plenty of screens to catch any game.

The familiar dessert food truck specializing in cheesecakes is opening its first brick-and-mortar store in Willowbrook soon.

Bite-sized cheesecake master Kenneth Brooks came up with the idea for the perfect cheesecake recipe having a near-death heart attack in 2014. Since then, he's operated Masterpiece Desserts out of a food truck.

Starting June 26, customers can visit them in their first store front at 9111 Cypress Creek Parkway, Suite A.

New flavors at Common Bond

Courtesy Common Bond

Just in time for Pride Month and Father's Day, Houston bakery Common Bond has new treats.

For Father's Day weekend, the baker is offering a peanut butter and jelly entremet between June 17 and 20.

Starting June 18, Pride shortbread cookies will also be available. A rainbow Pride cake will also be available starting June 21. Both are available until June 28.

An opera cake entremet and a limoncello macaron will be available starting June 21. And a 32-ounce strawberry lemonade bottle will return June 20.
CRYSTAL LAKE TWP.  Most Benzie County residents and visitors want to protect the water quality of Crystal Lake and conserve the natural beauty, rural character and resources of the Crystal Lake Watershed.

The challenge is how best to do it.

A group of citizens have spent the last two years doing extensive research to better understand the most effective ways to keep this area "a special environment for generations to come."

The wide-ranging group consists of township planning and zoning officials, members of the Crystal Lake & Watershed Association and other volunteers representing a diversity of interests and professional backgrounds including engineering, real estate, landscape architecture and the biological sciences.

They have read publications, studies and model ordinances from regional conservation district experts, and conferred with the Michigan DNR, professional foresters, arborists and scientists from Michigan State University and the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy (EGLE), according to a news release.

In all the research weve seen, one thing is very clear, protection now is far better and a much less expensive option than mitigation," said Tom Kucera, a member of the group, in a news release. "Once water resources are degraded, its nearly impossible to reverse the damage. Protection now is really the only sustainable option.

The research also shows that land use by humans is the single largest factor affecting water quality and watershed health. In April 2019, EGLE stated, The number one threat to lake health is land use.

Land use quickly became a major focus of this group of volunteers.

Four overriding factors found to be essential to mitigating damage caused by human land use and thereby essential to protecting and maintaining a healthy watershed are:

 Preserving vegetative cover. Vegetative cover (all of the native growing things including trees, shrubs, grasses and perennial flowers) functions as a watershed filter, removing toxic pollutants (fertilizers, oil, pesticides) and nutrient-laden sediments from rain and storm water runoff before it enters a stream, lake or wetland. By slowing runoff, vegetation also helps replenish groundwater and prevent erosion.

 When vegetation is removed and replaced by impervious surfaces (buildings, driveways, decks and patios) or even with mowed lawns, the watersheds ability to perform functions critical to maintaining water quality is diminished.

 Steep slopes and ridgelines are particularly sensitive to development. The energy of storm runoff from denuded and impervious sites is more aggressive along steep slopes and ridgelines than on flatter sites.

 Shorelines act as the last line of defense against water degradation. Buffer zones, vegetated zones with no impervious surfaces, are essential along any lake shore, stream or ridgeline, where these buffer zones function as the final stage of runoff purification and groundwater recharge.

 Protecting forestland. Healthy forestland throughout the watershed is a strong indicator of water quality and the general health of the entire watershed. Forestlands are giant natural sponges that trap rainwater and snow melt, limiting erosion, filtering contaminants, recharging groundwater and protecting wetlands and stream headwaters. When forest cover falls below 90%, negative changes in the tributaries and ground waters that feed lake water become detectable. When forest cover falls below 60%, water quality is noticeably deteriorated.

 Treating the watershed as a whole, living and integrated system. Research has shown that watershed upland areas, open spaces, stream headwaters and woodlands need just as much protection as the more visible shoreline areas. All these elements combine to influence the water quality of Crystal Lake and the quality of the groundwater that supplies the well water we all depend on.

 Maintaining septic systems. Proper design, construction and maintenance of septic systems are critical to Crystal Lakes water quality. Old, poorly maintained septic systems are the number one polluters of Michigans inland lakes.

The group believes education and communications supported by appropriate and updated land use ordinances are the most effective ways to ensure that the beautiful lakes, streams and wetlands in Benzie County continue to thrive. They are planning a series of educational events to reach property owners and specific influencers such as architects, builders and real estate agents, in addition to proposing revisions to the current watershed overlay ordinance.

The current land use ordinance, the Crystal Lake Watershed Overlay District Ordinance (Article XXIV), was adopted in 1994 by Benzie County and is administered now by the townships of Benzonia, Lake, Crystal Lake and the Village of Beulah. An Overlay District is a geographical area subject to special zoning regulations because of that areas unique resources, character, or economic importance and the need to transcend typical political boundaries.

According to a news release, in 1994, Article XXIVs stated purpose was ... to protect the environmental quality of Crystal Lake, the Crystal Lake shoreline and the Crystal Lake watershed through appropriate land use and design regulations. The protection of the Crystal Lake Watershed is deemed a public purpose in order to preserve important environmental, historical, residential, recreational, cultural, scenic, and economic attributes of the region, and remains relevant today. However, in order to reach these goals, the group has found through extensive research, and observation of the continued and rapid escalation of development in the Crystal Lake watershed, that updating and restating the 1994 ordinance has become necessary.

The groups proposed updates to the overlay ordinance are under review by the Crystal Lake Township Planning Commission and will be discussed at a meeting at 7 p.m. on June 23. These proposed updates will also be presented at a public hearing at 7 p.m. on June 30 at Grow Benzie. The public is invited to attend and provide comments on the proposed updates at either meeting.

After considering public comments, the planning commission will deliberate recommending approval by the township board. If recommended, the updated ordinance will then be submitted to the Crystal Lake Township Board for adoption. A similar process will be followed with all other township boards in the Crystal Lake Watershed.

Interested people will be able to voice their opinions and give their own recommendations at any of the scheduled meetings. In the meantime, the current Crystal Lake Township Watershed Overlay (zoning ordinance article XXIV) and the proposed updates are available online at crystallaketwp.org.

PUBLIC MEETINGS

Crystal Lake Watershed Overlay District Ordinance update reviews will be held on the following dates:

June 23 at 7 p.m. at the Crystal Lake Township Planning Commission regular meeting.

June 30 at 7 p.m. during a public hearing at Grow Benzie.
Boots dont stomp on the Ranch Hill Saloons dance floor quite like they used to.

For two decades, Montgomery Countys only gay bar has fought off intolerance, including violence, to provide the areas LGBTQ folks with a place of refuge.

Within its timber-covered walls, patrons have found camaraderie, love and security in their identities. But on the eve of the bars 21st birthday and in the midst of a month celebrating strides made by the LGBTQ community, the saloons owner, Debbie Steele, fears it may be time for a final last call at the bar located at 24704 Interstate 45 in Spring.

On HoustonChronicle.com: 'Blood in the water': Squeezed by shutdowns, Houston's bar owners are on the rocks

The pandemics hobbling effects on the bar industry have battered business at Ranch Hill. Steele, 69, is finding younger generations no longer have the same urgency in seeking out a watering hole like hers. A void will be left in the north Houston suburbs if the bar shutters, Steele and customers agree.

Youre losing your heritage, said Steele, who identifies as lesbian. Youre kind of losing part of your life once we start disappearing.

Battling bigotry

For little more than 10 years, Steele hesitated to fly the rainbow flag of the LGBTQ rights movement outside Ranch Hill Saloon. Then by 2014, the debate on same-sex marriage began gaining traction in its favor.

I thought, Its time. We can now be who we are, she said about putting up the flags.

Her hesitation stemmed from fervent opposition to Ranch Hill from people off the street, other business owners and at least one local official.

For the first five years after opening in 2003 at its second and current location, Steele said bigots would wave the Confederate flag in the parking lot and yell anti-gay slurs inside the bar. In response, Steele took to carrying a bat on the property.

As recently as about eight years ago, a man stormed into the bar, announcing an intention to beat up gay patrons. He slugged a bouncer, shattering his nose and wounding his eye socket.

Steele carved out a space for Ranch Hill near the countys southern outskirts after enduring turmoil in Conroe. The bar was originally off Airport Road  back then the boondocks, as she remembers the area.

A pair of women launched Ranch Hill Saloon in July 2000 as a lesbian meeting place after taking over an existing straight bar. Steele volunteered at Ranch Hill before its opening, checking the plumbing, hauling beer and doing other odd jobs.

I had never felt like such a part of a family and a community, Steele said about the first couple of great years in Conroe, quickly acknowledging some in the then city of about 37,000 absolutely hated us.

MARK YOUR CALENDAR: Montgomery's Freedom Fest returns July 3

As Steele recalls it, the landlord made armed threats to the owners who consequently decided to walk away in early 2003. But Steele, who made her first million running a restaurant goods delivery company, felt compelled to salvage Ranch Hill and persuaded the owners to sell the bar to her.

She scurried to find a permanent home at a strip mall on Frazier Street. Though the new landlord was welcoming, she said business owners on the property authored a letter threatening to pull their lease if the gay bar opened there.

A radio station in town started inciting a backlash on Ranch Hill, leading to a fire codes official becoming involved and pressing for costly improvements at any new site Steele tried relocating to, she said.

Because of these challenges, in September 2018, Steele became the inaugural recipient of LGBTQ nonprofit The Woodlands Prides Debbie Steele Courage Award.

The example she has set is that, hey, dont let adversity, dont let the negativity of those that are vocal, that are opposing of whether its your political views or just being who you are, stand in the way of running your own business, said Ryan Elkins, COO of The Woodlands Pride.

Safe haven

Elkins, a 26-year-old software salesman, was a 2014 candidate for The Woodlands Township Board of Directors after growing up in the south Montgomery County city. Elkins decision to live as an openly gay man was prompted by the welcoming atmosphere he found when he visited Ranch Hill Saloon when he was 21.

I was comfortable with myself to come out and be open because I was able to be surrounded by those that were loving, accepting, Elkins said, adding others in the county share similar experiences with Steeles bar.

When Spring resident and longtime patron April Kelly-Milner, 45, was celebrating her birthday at Ranch Hill seven years ago, she found someone with her same first name and same birth month. Kelly-Milner and April Milner, 40, began a romance and were married in October.

People can go there and be who they are, Kelly-Milner said of the bars importance.

INTERACTIVE: Here is your fab, fierce guide for Pride events in and around Houston

As much as Ranch Hill Saloon and other gay bars have served as a safe haven for people who are LGBTQ, the mainstreaming of the community appears to Steele to have diminished the bar scenes relevance. Kelly-Milner admitted visiting the saloon is not the same as years ago, while Elkins mentioned he is no longer as drawn to the night life.

The number of gay bar listings across the country has dropped, according to an analysis by Greggor Mattson, a sociology professor at Oberlin College. Reviewing Damron Guide, a national travel guidebook published annually, Mattson found a 36.6 percentage decrease in gay bar listings between 2007 and 2019.

Steele said she has heard some popular gay bars in Houstons Montrose neighborhood have lost patronage in recent years.

Whatever cultural trends were hurting bars, COVID-19 furthered their pain. The pandemic has pushed Ranch Hill to the edge of permanent closure. State-ordered closings and capacity restrictions, along with recurring concerns of infection in mass crowds, led to Steele running behind on rent.

Since food-serving businesses enjoyed less limitations, Steele turned her corner office into a make-shift kitchen and cooked hamburgers for customers.

But the large crowds never returned. Some nights Ranch Hill has made as little as $25. Where the bar had always operated 365 days a year, the slowdown forced Steele to close on Mondays.

Steele had hopes the first Saturday of Pride month this year would boost earnings at Ranch Hill Saloon. She expressed disappointment in seeing the night raked in $790 compared to the $2,200 to $2,800 it used to generate on weekends.

One for the road

Late night June 5, a steady flow of around 25 people were present at Ranch Hill Saloon. Some played pool while others gathered at the bar top. A few watched a TV airing the Womens College World Series softball game between Florida State and Oklahoma State.

The dimly lit dance floor found a few couples tightly embracing as they swayed about to country western songs like Tennessee Whiskey by Chris Stapleton. In between, the DJ shuffled pop hits, including Lady Gagas power anthem Born This Way. As the night carried on, cumbia melodies by Selena blared across the bar.

This is a woman-built bar, Steele points out.

She personally installed recycled wood throughout and accented the interior with recovered old tin to fit the bars early honky-tonk roots. Steele knocked down a wall to expand the location to 2,250 square feet. She and a couple of other women constructed the patio deck.

Sparkling like a disco ball, a childs horse saddle bespeckled with broken mirror glass and rhinestones dangles above a corner of the saloons bar top. Crafted about 20 years ago by a former Ranch Hill DJs mother and her friends, Steele has been offered up to $16,000 for it.

I could use the money, Steele said, quickly adding, Once thats gone, that means were gone, so I cant do that yet.

jose.gonzalez@chron.com

twitter.com/jrgzztx
ANTALYA, Turkey (AP)  The Afghan governments chief peace envoy expressed fears on Friday that the Taliban will have no interest in a political settlement with the U.S.-supported administration in Kabul after the scheduled departure of American and NATO forces.

Abdullah Abdullah, head of Afghanistans National Reconciliation Council, said there were signs that the Taliban were seeking military advances ahead of the Sept. 11 troop withdrawal. He warned however that, if so, the extremist Islamic movement was making a big miscalculation.

In an interview with The Associated Press, Abdullah also said Afghanistans neighbors must refrain from interfering and instead seek cooperation with Kabul for the country's long-term stability.

(Withdrawal) will have an impact on the negotiation with the Taliban, Abdullah said. (They) may find themselves further emboldened and they may think  some of them at least  that with the withdrawal, they can take advantage of the situation militarily.

He added however that it will be a big miscalculation ... should they think that they can win militarily. There are no winners through the continuation of the war.

Abdullah said there are signs that the Taliban are trying to take over provincial districts in a bid to take advantage of that situation.

But its something that defies the lessons of history, he said. Should this be the case, it will mean that (the) Taliban are opting for a military solution, which is not a solution to begin with, and it will not happen the way that they envisaged.

By Sept. 11 at the latest, around 2,300-3,500 remaining U.S. troops and roughly 7,000 allied NATO forces are scheduled to leave Afghanistan, ending nearly 20 years of military engagement. There are concerns that the Afghan government and its security forces may be ill-prepared for the withdrawal and that the country may descend into chaos.

The Taliban ruled Afghanistan until ousted by a U.S.-led coalition after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in America. In recent weeks Taliban fighters have overrun several districts in south and northern Afghanistan, convincing government security forces to surrender and seizing their weapons and military vehicles. The heaviest fighting has been in the northern Faryab province and in southern Helmand.

Asked about possible interference from neighbors after U.S. and NATO troops have left, Abdullah said regional countries have declared that they have an interest in a stable Afghanistan and that they should put those words into deeds.

There were some countries which had concerns about the presence of NATO troops in Afghanistan, including the Islamic Republic of Iran," he said. Now, NATO troops are not going to be there.

He was speaking on the sidelines of an international forum in Antalya, on Turkeys Mediterranean coast, where he held separate meetings with the foreign ministers of Turkey, Iran, Qatar and Pakistan.

"I dont think that that they would like to see instability in Afghanistan or (a) return to the old days because we have too much (of a) common interest in the neighborhood as a whole, Abdullah said.

In a further warning to neighbors, Abdullah said millions of refugees had returned to Afghanistan as the country stabilized and added: Should the situation reverse, the consequences of this will also be reversed.

The peace negotiator said talks between the government and the Taliban, that were scheduled to take place in Turkey before the September troop withdrawal, were not completely off the table.

Turkeys position is that when both sides ... are ready for serious negotiations, we are ready to host it, he said, adding that the Taliban had at times put conditions to participate in the talks or engaged in delaying tactics.
Houston needs more sober queer spaces. Here's why. A writer calls for a space where quiet, sober, or non-drinking age queer people can hang out.

Patrick Beverley embarrassed himself with Chris Paul push in back Patrick Beverley, once a Rockets favorite, looked really small in the Western Conference finals.
Every year, Hollywood inevitably comes under criticism for its lack of racial diversity. But another lesser-known yet still pervasive problem also resurfaces: the lack of diversity in skin tone.

It happened again with In the Heights, a big-budget film based on the musical created by Lin-Manuel Miranda, which was called out this week for its dearth of dark-skinned, Black Latinos in leading roles.

Colorism  or discrimination against darker-skinned people within their same ethnic group  lurks deep among pretty much all communities with varying levels of melanin. But it doesn't get talked about, and that could be a setback for the racial justice efforts that intensified after the police killing of George Floyd last year.

Avoiding the conversation will hinder the battle for racial justice because the two are fully and inextricably linked, said Ellis P. Monk, Jr., a sociology professor at Harvard University who has been researching colorism for years.

Monk says the issue is prevalent in all communities of color and has been taboo in part because its uncomfortable to talk about internal strife while also fighting against broader discrimination based on race and ethnicity.

In a way, colorism and skin tone stratification is an even more difficult problem to fix because you could make the argument that everyone is involved in the system of colorism, Monk said. If we think about race and racial inequality without taking these skin tone differences seriously, then were actually missing how this system of racial inequality works.

Miranda, best known as the creator of the Broadway musical Hamilton and a longtime champion of including Latinos in the arts, recognized his own short-sightedness in addressing colorism and issued an apology.

I can hear the hurt and frustration, of feeling still unseen in the feedback, Miranda wrote. I hear that without sufficient dark-skinned Afro-Latino representation, the work feels extractive of the community we wanted so much to represent with pride and joy.

The legendary Rita Moreno likewise turned introspective on colorism after she faced backlash in her defense of Miranda when she implied that Latinos should be grateful they're being represented in any fashion. She has since apologized.

There is little data that tracks discrimination based on skin tone, and therefore it is hard to quantify just how pervasive colorism is. But the studies that do exist show that people with darker skin have higher incarceration rates, lower access to health care and education and live in poorer neighborhoods, several experts say.

Nayeli Chavez, a clinical psychologist and faculty at The Chicago School of Professional Psychology, has spent a decade looking into racial differences between ethnic groups.

We have been socialized from childhood to look down on darker skin, on indigenous features, Chavez said.

As a psychologist who has dedicated her career to helping people heal from racial trauma, Chavez sees how avoiding the topic of colorism is detrimental and says there is a false assumption in Latin America that because those places were colonized and its people are of mixed races, there is no racism.

The key to changing behavior is by teaching history accurately and admitting that those biases exist.

Racial justice begins with our own community. It literally begins in our own families, Chavez said. This is an area that theres so little about. We are barely like touching the tip of the iceberg.

Nancy Lopez, a professor of sociology at the University of New Mexico, said one way Latinos and other communities of color can begin to address colorism is by asking themselves a simple question: what is your street race?

Street race refers to the race someone assumes you are when youre walking down the street and they know nothing else about you. Take former President Barack Obama, who is half-white. Someone who saw him in the street would likely see him as Black  his street race.

Lopez, who also directs and co-founded the Institute for the Study of Race and Social Justice at UNM, said the concept of street race affects family dynamics, too. Two siblings from the same parents may have different skin tones and therefore different experiences in how theyre perceived and treated, Lopez said.

Reflecting on your street race is one way of practicing solidarity with those siblings, cousins, partners, relatives who may be racialized very differently than you, may be experiencing racializing in a very different way, she said.

While some may find calling attention to colorism divisive, Lopez says its the opposite. If communities dont talk about it, theyre not in total solidarity, she said.
BOSTON (AP)  A Charlestown man has pleaded guilty to illegal possession of a firearm by a convicted felon and dealing in firearms without a license, after selling more than 30 firearms to gang members and others barred from possessing guns.

Charles Barker, 45, entered his plea on Wednesday at the U.S. District Court in Boston, prosecutors said in a statement.
MONTPELIER, Vt. (AP)  A former school principal serving a five-year prison sentence for secretly recording teenage girls in his home will be able to appeal his sentence, the Vermont Supreme Court ruled Friday.

The high court reversed a decision by a lower court that had dismissed the request by Dean Stearns, the former principal in South Royalton, to reconsider the sentence imposed in January 2020.
COLUMBIA, Mo. (AP)  Missouri is clashing with the U.S. Department of Justice over a new law banning police from enforcing federal gun rules.

In a letter obtained by The Associated Press, Justice Department officials wrote that state lawmakers went too far with the law and noted that federal law trumps state law under the U.S. Constitutions Supremacy Clause.

In response, Gov. Mike Parson and Attorney General Eric Schmitt wrote a defiant letter stating that they still plan to enforce the new law.

Missouris new law would subject law enforcement agencies with officers who knowingly enforce federal gun laws to a fine of about $50,000 per violating officer.

The law also declares that any federal laws, executive orders or other federal regulations to track or take away firearms from law-abiding citizens will be considered void in Missouri.

WHY DID LAWMAKERS PASS THIS BILL?

Republican lawmakers who helped pass the bill said they were motivated by the potential for new gun restrictions under Democratic President Joe Biden. Biden so far has taken limited action on firearms aside from further regulating pistol-stabilizing braces and cracking down on ghost guns, homemade firearms that lack serial numbers used to trace them and are often purchased without a background check. Republican Sen. Eric Burlison, who was among the Missouri lawmakers leading the push for the bill, cited the regulations on stabilizing braces as one example of federal rules he hopes to preempt.

WHAT'S THE PRACTICAL IMPACT OF THE LAW?

Almost all federal gun laws are also enshrined in Missouri's state laws, meaning local police can continue to enforce those policies.

Theres very little circumstances, if any, where theres a difference between whats on the books on the federal level and whats illegal in Missouri, Burlison said. As we stand here today, it does not have an impact on law enforcement.

One of the few differences between current state and federal gun laws deals with people convicted of misdemeanor domestic violence crimes, who under federal law cannot own guns. Missouri affiliates of the group Everytown for Gun Safety have raised concerns that because Missouri doesn't have a matching rule against misdemeanor-level domestic abusers owning firearms, the new law could prevent local law enforcement from keeping guns from violent partners.

Brian Boynton, an acting assistant attorney general at the Justice Department, also asked Missouri officials in his letter to clarify whether the law will prevent local police from asking federal agents to trace a firearm from a crime scene or testify in front of federal grand juries on gun crimes. Schmitt and Parson did not address Boynton's questions in their Thursday response. On a more abstract level, Boynton said the measure threatens to immediately disrupt the working relationship between federal and state law enforcement officers."

HAS THE JUSTICE DEPARTMENT WARNED OTHER STATES?

Several states passed similar laws this year, including Arizona, Arkansas, Idaho, Montana, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas and West Virginia. Missouris law went further than most in its possible punishments for officers who do enforce federal gun laws, including a possible fine of about $50,000 per violating officer. So far, the Justice Department has only sent a letter to Missouri raising concerns about its law. But Everytown for Gun Safety has been pushing the federal government to send a warning to at least one other state, Arkansas.

___

Associated Press writers Michael Balsamo, in Washington, and Lindsay Whitehurst, in Salt Lake City, contributed to this report.
NEWTON, Mass. (AP)  A veteran Massachusetts firefighter has filed a lawsuit against the city of Newton alleging that he has been subjected to racist language on the job and has experienced a hostile work environment.

Newton firefighter Lee Gilliam, who is Black, alleges in the suit filed this week in Middlesex Superior Court that a racial imbalance in the department has fostered an environment in which white firefighters generally feel free to make insensitive and degrading comments concerning African Americans without consequence, according to court documents, The Boston Globe reported Thursday.
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP)  Florida's Democratic agriculture commissioner, whose office polices charities, alleged Friday that a group run by one of former President Donald Trump's most prominent election conspiracy adherents is illegally seeking donations in the state.

Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried said her office has filed an administrative complaint against attorney Sidney Powell's Defending the Republic group demanding that it obey state law or cease Florida operations. The group receives donations to support her discredited allegations that Trump actually won the November election over President Joe Biden.

A voting machine company that is suing Powell for defamation alleges that she siphons money from the charity to pay for her own legal defense.

When asking people in Florida for donations and you don't follow the law and if you misrepresent and deceive what you are doing, we will hold you accountable, no matter who you are, said Fried, Floridas only statewide elected Democrat. She is seeking her partys nomination to challenge Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, a close Trump ally, in next year's election.

The two have spent the last several months openly showing their disdain for each other, with Fried calling DeSantis an authoritarian whose far-right agenda is sowing seeds for a 2024 presidential run. He calls her a do-nothing who spends her time on social media seeking campaign donors in California and New York.

Fried and Rick Kimsey, her director of consumer services, said Defending the Republic has not registered with their agency as required by state law or filed financial disclosures that show how revenue is spent, even though its website told donors it had done both. The group could be fined $15,000 and receive a cease and desist order if it fails to comply within three weeks.

Fried and Kimsey said when their office contacted Defending the Republic after receiving a complaint about the website, its officials claimed it must be run by another similarly named group. But Fried and Kimsey said the investigation showed the domain name is owned by Powell. She is best known for saying in November that a lawsuit she filed would unleash a Kraken, a mythical sea creature, that would destroy Bidens claim on the White House. It went nowhere.

Fried denied that her action is politically motivated, but implied that a Republican agriculture commissioner might have ignored Defending the Republic's actions.

If I had a different party affiliation, I may have turned a blind eye, she said.

DeSantis' office did not immediately respond Friday to a call and email seeking comment. As Fried is elected independently, DeSantis has no control over her actions.

Powell did not return a phone message left at her Dallas law office or respond to an email. Defending the Republic did not respond to a message sent through its website.

Trump and his allies filed more than 50 lawsuits in multiple states over the election and lost at every turn. Powell and Rudy Giuliani were among the lawyers behind the cases claiming a conspiracy by Democrats, despite Republican state leaders, and Trumps own attorney general and other administration officials, publicly stating there was no major election fraud. Powell appeared with Giuliani at a press conference and made multiple media appearances.

But after Powell threatened to blow up Georgia with a biblical court filing, the Trump legal team distanced itself from her, saying she was not working on their behalf but she continues to be one of his most vociferous supporters.

She is being sued by Dominion Voting Systems after she alleged it helped rig the election for Biden by manufacturing machines that could flip votes from Trump to Biden.

The Denver-based company claims Powell has raided Defending the Republics coffers to pay for personal legal expenses, citing her own remarks from a radio interview.
NEW YORK (AP)  Prosecutors asked a judge Friday to limit what jurors can hear of the psychological history of victims in a forced labor case, saying they were manipulated by a man who posed as a mental health expert and was sometimes there before or after many of them attempted suicide.

The request came in the case against Lawrence Ray, 61, who was arrested in February 2020.

Ray has pleaded not guilty to charges that he forced vulnerable college students into prostitution or unpaid labor over the span of a decade starting in 2010, when he moved into his daughters residence at Sarah Lawrence College.

Prosecutors say he befriended her classmates and became a patriarchal figure who exerted a manipulative influence over their lives.

Ray used physical, sexual and psychological abuse to extort nearly $1 million from victims, including five students, prosecutors said. One victim was forced into prostitution, the government has said.

A message seeking comment was sent to Ray's attorneys.

In papers filed Friday in Manhattan federal court, prosecutors revealed more about their case, saying Ray knew his victims had a history of mental health issues and sought to build trust by presenting himself in the role of a mentor or therapist after describing his experience in medicine and mental health treatment.

They said he was present before or after some of them attempted suicide and were hospitalized and tried to insert himself into their treatment by making statements to their physicians and by interfering with the involvement of the victims family members as the victims tried to recover.

Prosecutors said Ray often acted as if he was diagnosing particular mental health conditions, such as borderline personality, before asserting control over their mental health treatment by receiving updates from the women about sessions with therapists or by participating in therapy sessions.

Prosecutors said they wanted to ensure that lawyers for Ray do not try to elicit information that victims shared with therapists and expose the victims to questions about information that is protected by privacy laws.
COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP)  South Carolina lawmakers have agreed to a compromise between the House and Senate versions of the state's more than $10 billion budget.

Members of a conference committee voted Thursday to approve the $10.7 billion spending plan for the upcoming year, The Post and Courier reported.

The spending plan includes money the state didnt use this budget year because lawmakers feared a more serious economic downturn in the COVID-19 pandemic.

The budget compromise will give state employees at 2.5% pay raise. Teachers will also receive an additional $1,000 in pay, and law enforcement officers will see a salary bump as well.

The budget is nearly $2 billion more than last year's budget, which lawmakers simply cut-and-pasted from the spending plan the year before due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Lawmakers will return next week so the full House and Senate can approve the deal and send it off to Gov. Henry McMaster, who will consider whether hell veto any part of the plan before the fiscal year starts July 1.

Other items in the budget deal include:

 $100 million for school construction in poor, rural areas that don't have enough money in local property taxes to pay for it

 $34 million to expand full-day pre-kindergarten for low-income 4-year-olds across the state

 $40 million for college and universities to encourage them not to raise tuition

 $200 million for improvements at the Port of Charleston

 A nurse and police officer in every South Carolina public school
(The Conversation is an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts.)

Eurie Dahn, The College of Saint Rose

(THE CONVERSATION) Using punctuation and capitalization as a form of protest doesnt exactly scream radicalism.

But in debates over racial justice, punctuation can carry a lot of weight.

During the Black Lives Matter protests of 2020, mainstream news organizations grappled with whether to capitalize the first letter of black when referring to Black people. Of course, writing Black was already common practice in activist circles. Eventually The Associated Press, The New York Times, USA Today and many other outlets declared that they, too, would capitalize that first letter.

It turns out the push to capitalize black is only the most recent way Black writers and activists have pushed back against entrenched power through ostensibly bland elements of writing.

As I discuss in my recent book, Jim Crow Networks: African American Periodical Cultures, Black activism in the media can take a variety of forms  some more subtle than others.

Seemingly unimportant elements of writing have long been adapted as tools of Black activism. Much like the recent drive to capitalize black, activists have deployed punctuation to question the legitimacy of confessions, criticize justifications made for lynchings and highlight the undervaluing of Black expertise and knowledge.

The power of punctuation

Punctuation was developed in the 3rd century B.C. to visually separate sentences and improve comprehension. But punctuation can do more than clarify. It can extend, contradict and play with meaning.

Think of the difference between ending a sentence with an exclamation point and with an ellipsis, or the way emoticons made of repurposed punctuation can be used to denote sarcasm or add playfulness and emotion.

This makes it a useful tool for activists who seek to upend dominant narratives.

Quotation marks convey suspicion

A push to capitalize has actually happened before.

In the 1920s, influential Black intellectual W.E.B. Du Bois wrote to The New York Times and Encyclopedia Britannica to argue that the word negro ought to have its first letter capitalized.

A decade later, to counter racism in the white press, the Black press used quotation marks when reporting on the case of a young man named Robert Nixon, who was convicted of murder.

In 1938, the white-owned Chicago Tribune notoriously described Nixon  who would serve as the basis for protagonist Bigger Thomas in Richard Wrights 1940 novel Native Son  as an animal whose physical characteristics suggest an earlier link in the species.

However, the citys influential Black newspaper, the Chicago Defender, covered the case differently, reporting Nixons claim that his confession was the result of police coercion. In a 1938 article, the Defender included a subheading that declared, Nixon Also Refutes Confession.

These simple quotation marks signaled doubt over the legitimacy of this confession, while teaching newspaper readers to be suspicious of so-called legal facts.

As sociologist Mary Pattillo notes in her book Black on the Block, the Defenders strategic use of quotation marks called into question official accounts of Nixon as a murderer. In doing so, the paper highlighted the unfair treatment of Black people by the media, police and court system.

The code of the question mark

Similarly, Black activists used question marks to criticize mainstream accounts of events during the Jim Crow era.

In her 1892 pamphlet Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases, anti-lynching activist Ida B. Wells used question marks in parentheses on four occasions to interrogate descriptions of crimes supposedly committed by Black Americans.

For example, she wrote, So great is Southern hate and prejudice, they legally(?) hung poor little thirteen year old Mildrey Brown at Columbia, S. C., Oct. 7th, on the circumstantial evidence that she poisoned a white infant.

She also quoted from one of her earlier newspaper editorials in which she discussed the lynchings of eight Black men by saying that, in each case, citizens broke(?) into the penitentiary and got their man. The question mark casts doubt on this break-in and suggests that the perpetrators were, in fact, aided and abetted by law enforcement in murdering these men.

These simple question marks subtly undermined a legal system that sought to cast the murders of a young girl and eight men as just responses. Wells indicted not only the legal system but also the white press, which was often an accomplice to racial violence.

[Over 106,000 readers rely on The Conversations newsletter to understand the world. Sign up today.]

Afrofuturist questions

The writer, editor and activist Pauline E. Hopkins similarly used question marks within parentheses in her early Afrofuturist novel Of One Blood.

The novel  which contains depictions of a leopard attack, a lost African city and a ghost  was serialized in the pages of the Colored American Magazine from 1902 to 1903. At one point, the protagonist, a Black doctor, brings a patient back to life. Yet the responses to this miracle display ambivalence:

The scientific journals of the next month contained wonderful and wondering (?) accounts of the now celebrated case,  re-animation after seeming death.

Much as Wells used the question mark to dismiss the official accounts of lynchings, Hopkins deploys it to undermine the scientific establishment and cast doubt on the journals for their stunned and disbelieving responses to the medical marvel.

For Hopkins, the question mark worked to demand respect for Black expertise and knowledge.

Punctuations possibilities

Punctuation activism can be an important companion to on-the-ground activism. It reveals languages capacity to transform the world. At the same time, it exposes languages often hidden role in maintaining structures of power.

Certainly, punctuation  like language overall  is typically used in less radical ways. But these examples of early 20th century Black writers, activists and journalists point to punctuations possibilities in questioning entrenched power structures and laying claim to alternative futures.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article here: https://theconversation.com/how-black-writers-and-journalists-have-wielded-punctuation-in-their-activism-161141.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP)  As Iranian state TV showed people streaming to cast their ballots Friday and news anchors praised them for coming out to vote, very different scenes played out on Tehrans streets, where many polling places appeared relatively empty.

Amid rising anger and apathy over a presidential vote tipped in favor of Ebrahim Raisi, the hard-line judiciary chief cultivated by Iran's supreme leader, the election atmosphere was distinctly subdued.

In past elections, long lines snaked out of polling stations. Cars and minibuses zigzagged through the capital's chaotic streets blaring campaign slogans. Banners too big to miss championed the various candidates and blanketed buildings.

But this year, the streets were calm, traffic was light and the typical zeal was absent even from state television, which offered only tight shots of people putting paper ballots into boxes. Few, if any, other voters could be seen in the background.

It is useless, said Ali Hosseini, a 36-year-old unemployed resident in southern Tehran, about the exercise of voting. Anyone who wins the election after some time says he cannot solve problem of the economy because of intervention by influential people. He then forgets his promises and we poor people again are disappointed.

Throngs of reporters packed Tehran's turquoise-domed Hosseinieh Ershad institute, photographing officials and ordinary Iranians casting ballots. The images of journalists pushing and jostling in the polling place were carried by local media and international broadcasters.

But that scene was at odds with what people saw at 16 different polling stations across Tehran, where lines were short and no more than eight voters at a time could be seen casting ballots. Some polls remained virtually deserted throughout the day  a stark contrast to ice cream shops and restaurants nearby. Of two dozen voters interviewed at various stations, more than half said they'd voted for Raisi. Listless poll workers listened to state radio, looked at their phones or chatted calmly.

While the government's turnout figures weren't expected until Saturday, the state-linked Iranian Student Polling Agency earlier this week estimated a turnout of just above 40%, which would be the lowest since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Signs of anxiety over turnout began to emerge at the highest levels of Iran's leadership days before polls opened. Fearing a boycott that might undermine the credibility of the theocratic system, officials across the political spectrum  from the powerful hard-line Revolutionary Guard to relatively moderate outgoing President Hassan Rouhani  urged people to vote. In an unprecedented televised speech on the final day of campaigning, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei warned sternly of foreign plots to keep voters home and described participation as a way to show defiance toward the West amid heightened tensions.

And yet, despite the official warnings and admonishment from the news media, many Iranians struggled to see the point in voting. The country's clerical vetting body allowed only Raisi and a few other low-profile candidates, mostly hard-liners, on the ballot. The main moderate contender, former Central Bank chief Abdolnasser Hemmati, lacks the support base required to rally the masses. All their campaigns dealt with similar generalities: helping the unemployed, improving the economy, boosting Iran's self-sufficiency.

None of the candidates are trustworthy, said Nasrin, a 31-year-old accountant in central Tehran who declined to give her last name for fear of reprisals.

In the last election in 2017, she voted for Rouhani, whose administration struck Tehran's 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, granting Iran sanctions relief in exchange for curbs on its nuclear program. But three years later, then-U.S. President Donald Trump withdrew America from the accord and returned crushing sanctions, triggering the collapse of the Iranian riyal and destroying Rouhani's forecasts of an economic boom.

I heard similar promises for a better life and more roles for women in past elections, but no change happened on the ground, Nasrin said.

Another passerby in a middle-class Tehran district, 23-year-old Rojin Ahmadi, offered a similarly grim view of the candidates.

None of them dared to offer a plan to show they would bring the country into normalcy, she said, adding that she wasn't voting.

Public frustration with the status quo has swelled under Iran's mounting crises: global isolation, unprecedented U.S. sanctions and the coronavirus pandemic, which has killed over 82,600 Iranians  the highest death toll in the Middle East. But faith in the power of voting to change anything also had suffered badly.

The elimination of Rouhani allies and prominent reformists startled even high-ranking officials. Analysts describe this election as the least competitive in the Islamic Republic's history. Demoralized critics have mounted boycott calls on social media. Former hard-line populist President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, barred from running a second time, seized on popular anger by repeating his decision to stay home for the vote. Rouhani, who is term limited, expressed regret over the disqualifications of reformists as he cast his ballot, hinting that a low turnout was a foregone conclusion.

I wish we didnt have so many problems and saw more turnout today, he lamented.

As the conflict over whether to vote played out, Raisi supporters did not need much convincing. The cleric appeals to some impoverished Iranians for his anti-corruption campaign and outspoken criticism of the West. The U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned him in 2019 over his involvement in the mass execution of political prisoners in 1988, at the end of the Iran-Iraq war, and his time as chief of Iran's internationally criticized judiciary.

He's clergy, said Niloufar Mohammadi, a 19-year-old law student, explaining why she voted for Raisi. Influential people listen to him.
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP)  A sharply divided Iowa Supreme Court on Friday stopped a lawsuit aimed at reducing the flow of fertilizer and hog farm waste into the state's river and streams, finding that limiting pollution from farms was a political matter and not one for the courts.

The 4-3 decision handed a significant defeat to environmental groups hoping to get the chance to prove that Iowa should scrap its voluntary farm pollution policy, order new mandatory limits on nitrogen and phosphorous pollution and stop construction of new hog barns.

It is the latest court rejection of an attempt to force the nation's leading corn and pork producing state to clean up farm pollutants from its major rivers that provide drinking water to hundreds of thousands of Iowans.

The lawsuit, which was brought by Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement and Food & Water Watch, contended that unregulated farm pollution is violating the rights of citizens to clean water in the Raccoon River for recreational and drinking water use.

It said a legal concept that precedes Iowa statehood  the public trust doctrine  should apply to this case and require the state to ensure that citizens have a useable Raccoon River untainted by excess pollution caused by farm runoff of fertilizer and animal manure.

A state judge ruled in 2019 that the environmental groups sufficiently demonstrated that they suffered injury because the river's untreated water is too polluted to enjoy recreationally or aesthetically. The state appealed the ruling and asked the court to dismiss the lawsuit.

Four of the court's conservative justices said the environmental groups didn't show that the state's actions had caused a concrete injury the courts could fix. They also said the public trust doctrine historically hasn't been used to solve a problem as complex as the environmental issues raised, and that the issues at the heart of the case were political questions that would fall to the Legislature to settle.

There is not enough here to demonstrate that a favorable outcome in this case is likely to redress the plaintiffs alleged reduced ability to kayak, swim, or enjoy views of the Raccoon River, or would save them money on drinking water. The plaintiffs claims must therefore be dismissed for lack of standing, Justice Edward Mansfield wrote for the majority.

He said the Des Moines Water Works would have better standing to sue, but he pointed out that the utility already did so and lost a 2017 federal court case that was also dismissed.

The utility filed a brief with the state Supreme Court saying it was pursuing the development of alternate sources of water but that its long-range plans involve the implementation of new treatment technologies that would cost customers tens of millions of dollars.

DMWWs decision to invest millions of dollars in treatment infrastructure to contend with nutrient pollution in the Des Moines and Raccoon Rivers should reveal the magnitude of the water quality problem in Iowa," the utility wrote.

The Iowa attorney general's office declined to comment immediately on the ruling.

The plaintiffs said in a statement that they were considering all of their options.

The fight for clean water in Iowa is far from over, they said. Until further action is taken, industrial agricultural runoff will continue to pollute the river unimpeded, and Iowans right to clean water will remain a right without a remedy.

Justices Brent Appel, Christopher McDonald and Dana Oxley would have allowed the environmental groups' case to proceed to trial.

Oxley said the court majority's dismissive characterization of the plaintiffs requested declaratory relief as too general rings hollow. She said if a court struck down the state's current voluntary pollution strategy for farmers, the state could impose mandatory regulations on farmers that would provide relief to the plaintiffs that meets constitutional standards.

The Raccoon River is a 31-mile tributary of the Des Moines River and is a primary source of drinking water for about 500,000 central Iowa customers of the Des Moines Water Works. The utility's nitrate removal system was one of the largest in the world when it was built in 1992.

Iowa is the nations leading pork producer, with about 24 million pigs on farms that discharge billions of gallons of liquid manure into the environment every year. The state also is the nation's leading producer of corn, which requires significant amounts of nitrogen fertilizer to thrive. Iowa also has one of the most elaborate farm field drainage systems, which often dumps excess fertilizer and manure into waterways.
IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP)  A divided Iowa Supreme Court on Friday banned police from searching peoples uncollected trash without a warrant, outlawing an investigative technique that had been used for decades.

The court ruled 4-3 that officers commit an unreasonable search and seizure under the Iowa Constitution when they look for evidence of crimes in trash left for collection outside homes.

The tactic amounts to an unconstitutional trespass on private property and violates citizens expectations of privacy, especially in cities that have ordinances barring residents from accessing others trash, Justice Christopher McDonald wrote for the majority.

We do not question the utility of warrantless trash grabs for the purposes of law enforcement, but the utility of warrantless activity is not the issue under our constitution, he wrote, adding that garbage contains intimate and private details of life.

The ruling overturned Iowa courts' long adherence to a 1988 U.S. Supreme Court decision that found the U.S. Constitutions Fourth Amendment does not prohibit the search of garbage outside ones home.

With Fridays ruling, Iowa joins a small number of other states that have limited trash searches by holding that their state constitutions provide greater protections than the U.S. Constitution against warrantless searches. They include Oregon, New Hampshire, Vermont, Washington, New Mexico and New Jersey, according to Friday's decision and news reports.

In a sign of the rulings impact, the court sent two cases of people convicted of drug crimes based partly on trash searches back to lower courts to determine whether the evidence should be thrown out.

Dissenting justices, including Chief Justice Susan Christensen, warned that the decision was out of step with the vast majority of states and outlawed a tactic used to gather evidence of drug manufacturing and dealing. They said people have no expectations of privacy when they put their trash on the curb.

The majoritys reasoning  that officers cant use investigative techniques that would be illegal for private citizens  is nonsensical and calls into question the legality of several other law enforcement practices, dissenting justices said.

Christensen said the reasoning would invite legal challenges against officers who make warrantless traffic stops, search private property and seize guns under emergency or other circumstances that have long been allowed by courts.

Unfortunately, our state law enforcement officials are now left with a guess-and-see approach to many actions previously considered lawful, undermining public safety in the process, Christensen wrote.

The ruling came in the case of a Clear Lake man whom a police officer was investigating on suspicion of dealing drugs. The officer twice rummaged through the man's trash in a public alley outside his home and found items that later tested positive for morphine and cocaine, and several pounds of poppy seeds.

The officer used that information to obtain a warrant to search the home, where police found a small amount of marijuana and Vyvanse, a prescription drug for which he did not have a prescription. The man was convicted of misdemeanors and sentenced to two days in jail.

The second case impacted Friday involved a Dixon man who was convicted of possession of marijuana with intent to deliver. His home was searched pursuant to a warrant after deputies rummaged his trash and found evidence of marijuana purchases from a dispensary in Colorado.

Dissenting Justice Thomas Waterman said trash searches can help shut down meth labs and other societal scourges. He said banning them in state investigations would lead to more federal drug prosecutions, which carry longer prison sentences.

Offenders facing federal time without parole likely wont view todays decision as advancing their civil liberties, he said.
MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) 

Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey announced that state offices will close Friday for Juneteenth, the new federal holiday commemorating the end of slavery in America.

Ivey issued the proclamation Thursday after President Joe Biden signed a bill making June 19 a federal holiday for Juneteenth Independence Day. Ivey said that after the federal bill became law that she authorized Friday as a holiday for state employees. June 19 falls on a Saturday this year.

The Republican governor is hopeful it will become a permanent state holiday, her office said. However, it is unclear if it will.

Leah Garner, Iveys communications director, said it was the governors decision to recognize the holiday. However, for it to be a recurring holiday, the Legislature would need to codify it. It is our hope they do so now that it is a federal holiday, Gardner said.

If they dont, Ivey would need to issue another memo for the next state observation, Gardner said.

State Auditor Jim Zeigler criticized Iveys decision to make it a state holiday for state workers, saying it's the Alabama Legislature's duty to declare state holidays.

June 19, 1865, is when Union soldiers brought the news of freedom to enslaved Black people in Galveston, Texas  two months after the Confederacy surrendered and some 2 1/2 years after President Abraham Lincolns Emancipation Proclamation.

The following year, the now-free people started celebrating Juneteenth in Galveston. The day became a celebration marking the end of slavery and was a holiday in many states, including Texas, before it became a federal holiday.

Its the first new federal holiday since Martin Luther King Jr. Day was created in 1983.

Alabama generally recognizes federal holidays as state holidays. Holidays that fall on a weekend are celebrated on Friday or Monday.

State offices, including drivers license offices, will be closed Friday. Ivey said employees who must work Friday should get a day off as soon as possible.

Alabama has three state holidays celebrating the Confederacy.

Confederate Memorial Day is marked on the fourth Monday in April. The state marks Jefferson Davis birthday in February. It also jointly celebrates Robert E. Lee Day with Martin Luther King, Jr. Day in January.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP)  A Kansas prosecutor accused of misleading juries in two cases has resigned from her positions in Bourbon and Allen counties, just weeks after a disciplinary panel recommended she be disbarred.

The Topeka Capital-Journal reported that Jacqie Spradling stepped down earlier this month as assistant county attorney in Allen County. She also is leaving her position as the county attorney in Bourbon County effective June 30.
A Laredo woman and her two children went missing after visiting family in Sabinas Hidalgo, Nuevo Leon, a town located about 78 miles south of Nuevo Laredo, Mexican authorities said.

Gladys Cristina Perez Sanchez, 39, along with Juan Carlos Gonzalez, 16, and Michelle Cristina Duran, 9, were last seen June 13 after departing from Sabinas Hidalgo, authorities said.

They were believed to have disappear along the Monterrey-Nuevo Laredo Highway. The family was in a yellow 2014 Chevrolet Sonic bearing Texas license plates NBX-4740.

Perez Sanchez is a custodian with the United Independent School District, a spokesperson said. She had been working for the district for three years.

People with knowledge of the whereabouts of the family are asked to call in Mexico 82 42 42 57 72 or 81 20 20 57 00.

Federal Bureau of Investigation officials said that pursuant to FBI policy, they could not confirm or deny the existence of an investigation.

The San Antonio FBI continues to encourage members of the public to contact the FBI if a U.S. citizen friend or relative goes missing in Mexico. Moreover, any threatening communications received in the United States, demanding ransom in exchange for the release of a kidnapped victim should also be reported. Concerns about missing U.S. citizens should also be reported to the nearest U.S. Embassy or Consulate, the FBI said.

If you are concerned about a U.S. citizen relative or friend who is traveling or living abroad, you may contact the nearest U.S. Embassy or Consulate, or call our Overseas Citizens Services office in Washington, D.C. at 1-888-407-4747 (from outside the United States and Canada, call 202-501-4444).
COLUMBIA, La. (AP)  The Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries is investigating a boating accident that killed a 69-year-old man, the agency said Friday.

Agents who had been searching for two days found the body of Clifford Jewell, of Columbia, on Thursday in the Boeuf River in Caldwell Parish, a news release said.
MADISON, Wis. (AP)  A man charged with killing a University of Wisconsin-Madison student in 2008 has been found competent to stand trial.

David Kahl appeared by video from the Oshkosh Correctional Institution Thursday and told a Dane County judge he agreed with the findings of a psychological exam that determined he was competent to assist in his defense.
DEWEY BEACH, Del. (AP)  A man serving time for Maryland arsons is accused of starting fires in two Delaware beach towns last year.

The Delaware Office of the State Fire Marshal announced Thursday that it has obtained warrants for Richard Lodeski of Wilmington for second-degree arson and criminal trespassing. An investigation involving federal and state officials linked Lodeski to a fire that destroyed the Lighthouse restaurant in Dewey Brach when it was under construction in April 2020 and a fire at a vacant Rehoboth Beach building in June 2020, officials said. Damage in those fires was estimated at just under $1 million.
HUNTINGTON, W.Va. (AP)  Marshall University's Board of Governors has approved a timeline for naming a new president.

The goal is to have a new president named by October, the university said in a news release Thursday.

Jerome Gilbert, who became Marshall's president in 2016, announced in April that he is stepping down next year.

It is the boards intent to conduct the most inclusive and transparent presidential search that has ever been done at Marshall University, board chairman Patrick Farrell said.

Marshall has set up a presidential search website to keep the university community informed.
PHOENIX (AP)  An Arizona teenager suspected of killing one person and injuring a dozen others during a 90-minute string of drive-by shootings in metropolitan Phoenix told police he believed people were after him because of his involvement in another shooting, according to court documents released Friday.

Ashin Tricarico, 19, is accused of opening fire on vehicles and pedestrians from a white SUV on Thursday in at least eight separate shootings in three cities that stoked fear throughout the region. Four people were shot, including a man whose pickup truck careened into a canal alongside a freeway.

A witness told police he saw the suspect drive up behind the truck and swerve into the lane beside it and then he heard a gunshot. Police later found the man's body inside the truck with a gunshot wound to the neck and his head, face and body covered in blood, the court documents state.

Police said Tricarico admitted to some of the shootings and declined to talk about others but denied firing at a woman or killing the man, whom police haven't identified. Tricarico told police he was involved in another shooting a month ago in Phoenix while he was a security guard and believed people have been following him because of it, according to the court documents.

Ashin thinks every vehicle and person he drives past is pointing a gun at him," police wrote.

Tricarico was working as a licensed, armed security guard at a restaurant in north Phoenix on May 5 when he shot a male customer outside who was reported intoxicated, causing a disturbance and charging at Tricarico. Phoenix police said in a statement Friday night.

Police said the man was taken to a hospital with a non-life-threatening injury, and Tricarico remained at the restaurant and cooperated with investigators. The case is still being investigated, and Tricarico told police he shot the man in self-defense. The gun he used was impounded and has remained in police custody.

Tricarico, who was arrested Thursday, appeared remotely for a court hearing Friday and was directed to contact a public defender. The Maricopa County Office of the Public Defender did not have a specific attorney assigned to Tricarico, whose next court hearing is scheduled for June 24. He faces charges of first-degree murder, shooting from a vehicle, aggravated assault and endangerment.

There was no immediate response to a message left at a number listed for a relative of Tricarico.

Documents police filed in Maricopa County Superior Court allege Tricarico fired at more than a dozen people, seemingly at random. In some cases, he pulled up beside vehicles and placed the barrel of an assault rifle through his window and fired multiple shots, police said.

A 3-year-old child was in one vehicle with her mother when the front windshield and driver's side door were hit, but wasn't harmed. The mother told police she heard three gunshots while driving and immediately felt pain in her arm, stomach and head. She was covered in blood and screaming oh my god, according to witness statements.

Others were injured as bullets hit or shattered glass. Authorities said the injured ranged in age from 19 to 56.

Police said Tricarico left his house in the city of Surprise with an AR-15 rifle and later bought four boxes of ammunition, filling two 30-round magazines. Matching shell casings were found at some of the shooting scenes, police said.

Richard Valencia, 34, said he spent Thursday afternoon in the hospital after being shot in the shoulder as he walked from a convenience store in Surprise. He told Phoenix news station KSAZ-TV that he fired back three times with his own weapon.

I dont even know the guy, he said. It was completely random.

Victims and witnesses were able to give authorities a description of the suspect's vehicle  a white Volkswagen SUV  and the license plate number. A local fire department spotted the vehicle and called police, who swarmed a shopping center that includes restaurants, a nail salon and a Walgreens.

Neil Betrue, a pastor in Surprise, was alone in his churchs office when he noticed a few police officers and heard a helicopter buzzing overhead. He peered out the door and saw even more officers surrounding the suspects car and started recording the commotion on his cellphone.

I did not know at the time it was a shooting spree happening, Betrue told The Associated Press on Friday. I just thought maybe there must have been a car chase or something.

As officers drew their weapons, the suspect, wearing a black jacket, black pants and white shoes, raised his hands in the air. He then was cuffed without incident, Betrue's video shows.

I'm just thankful that he didn't try to put the officers or any of the business or anyone else in harm's way here, Betrue said.

Police don't believe anyone else was involved in the attacks.

Tricarico also was accused of pointing an assault rifle at a man in the parking lot of a convenience store Wednesday evening as the two were sitting in their vehicles, according to the court documents. Tricarico later followed the man, who ducked when he heard a gunshot but wasn't harmed, police said. Tricarico, however, claimed not to have left his house that day.

Police said they won't release any further information until Monday, saying the investigation is complex.

The Phoenix metropolitan area has seen other deadly drive-by shootings.

In 2005 and 2006, the area was terrorized by a pair of serial shooters who drove around and shot at random targets, killing six people and wounding 19 others. After they were finally arrested, airport janitor Dale Hausner and his roommate Sam Dietman, a petty criminal, were given life sentences. Hausner killed himself in prison by overdosing in 2013.

A decade later, a similar string of drive-by shootings started. In 2015 and 2016, nine people were killed and two injured in what police called the Serial Street Shootings. Police in 2017 arrested Aaron Saucedo, then 23, alleging he randomly gunned down the people, often at night, while they were returning home from work or in their front yards. He has pleaded not guilty to numerous charges and is awaiting trial. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty.

___

Fonseca reported from Albuquerque, New Mexico. Associated Press writer Michelle L. Price in Las Vegas contributed to this report.
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP)  New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham said Friday that all remaining pandemic-related public health restrictions on commercial and day-to-day activity in the state will be lifted July 1, clearing the way for restaurants and other venues to operate without any capacity limits and for cities to plan in-person Fourth of July celebrations and other summer festivals.

The Democratic governor made the declaration as state health officials continued to crunch the vaccination numbers following a push that included a multimillion-dollar sweepstakes, other cash incentives and offers that included free child care for those who needed it in order to get their shot.

Lujan Grisham wanted at least 60% of residents 16 and older to be vaccinated two weeks ahead of the reopening. Her office said vaccinations stood at 59.4% on Thursday but that health officials were waiting for more federal data to come in that would push the state closer to its goal.

Still, the governor said in a statement that she had hoped the vaccination numbers would be higher by now.

The variants across the globe and in the U.S. present very serious risks to unvaccinated people, even young people," she said. We all, each of us, have the power to stop the serious illnesses and deaths: Get your shot. Its safe. It works. Its that simple.

She vowed that the state would continue its vaccination campaign, saying that inoculations were the way out of the pandemic.

The July 1 reopening will mean that all businesses across the state can once again operate at 100% of maximum capacity levels.

However, state officials said businesses will still be authorized to require masks, distancing or other health precautions against the spread of COVID-19.

I firmly believe limitless possibility awaits us on the other side of this crisis, Lujan Grisham said, and I am confident that continuing to work together for the betterment of all New Mexico workers and families, we will be a national model for recovery, growth and new opportunity.

Republican lawmakers have been critical of the governor's handling of the pandemic, as have parents who were concerned about their children losing a year of learning because of the challenges of virtual schooling and the inability to participate in extracurricular activities.

Only this week did the state ease mask restrictions for student athletes during competition. Those students who are unvaccinated are still required to wear masks.

Republican Sen. Cliff Pirtle of Roswell accused the governor of setting what he described as arbitrary goal posts. Pointing to other states that already have opened, Pirtle said the handling of the pandemic by state officials has been exhausting and infuriating for residents.

Theres no science or reason behind the continued shutdown, he said. If 60% of our population with immunity was the goal, we should have been open weeks ago given the amount of positive recovered cases in our state.

State health officials have reported more than 204,600 confirmed COVID-19 cases since the pandemic began last year. More than 4,300 deaths in the state have been linked to the virus.

The Health Department also announced Friday that the names of four people have been drawn as part of the state's vaccine sweepstakes. Each will win $250,000.

Their names have yet to be released as state officials were working to verify their vaccine status. They are from Albuquerque, Santa Fe, Las Cruces and Ruidoso.
LAGOS, Nigeria (AP)  Gunmen abducted scores of children from a school in northwest Nigeria, the second kidnapping from a school in the country's north within a week, officials said.

A policeman was shot dead in the attack Thursday at the Federal Government College in Birnin Yauri in Kebbi State, according to police spokesman Nafiu Abubakar.

About 70 children were abducted from the school, according to the Lagos-based Guardian newspaper which quoted an eyewitness and a staff member of the school.

Some students were taken away in two vans while others were put on motorcycles, said the report. The gunmen had used a van stolen from the police who were supposed to be protecting the school.

The Yauri incident is the seventh mass abduction from a school in Nigeria this year.

Five teachers and the vice-principal are also missing and most of the kidnapped students are female, said a student who had been abducted and was later released. He insisted on anonymity for his safety.

The gunmen released the student because he had a gunshot wound and was losing a lot of blood. He was shot through a window by the attackers who forced their way into a building where some students were hiding.

The Nigerian Army said Friday it had rescued two teachers and five of the students after a fierce exchange of fire with the criminals.

Military spokesman Brig. Gen. Onyema Nwachukwu said in a statement that troops in conjunction with elements of the Nigerian Air Force, who provided close air support, intercepted the gunmen early Friday and engaged them in a firefight leading to the successful rescue of the teachers and students.

The troops are still pursuing the kidnappers to rescue the remaining students, he said, adding that one female student had died of exhaustion.

In an earlier kidnapping, a student was shot dead on June 11 at the Nuhu Bamalli Polytechnic in Zaria by gunmen who abducted eight students and two lecturers.

Last month, 147 students and three teachers were abducted on May 30 from the Salihu Tanko Islamic School, Tegina, in neighboring Niger State. One person was shot dead during that incident.

The abductions are being carried out by armed groups who want ransoms. Many schools have been forced to close as authorities are unable to adequately protect them.

The spate of mass abductions from schools in Nigeria has grown significantly since 2014 when members of the Jihadist group Boko Haram abducted 276 female students from a school in Chibok in Borno State.
Eds: This story was supplied by The Conversation for AP customers. The Associated Press does not guarantee the content.

Morgan Marietta, University of Massachusetts Lowell

(THE CONVERSATION) It wasnt a dramatic expansion of religious rights  not yet. But the Supreme Courts ruling in favor of a Catholic adoption agency that had been excluded from Philadelphias foster programs for refusing to work with same-sex couples will be consequential. It suggests that when the broader question of whether religious groups have the right to discriminate does come before the justices, they will likely uphold religious liberty over gay rights.

The courts decision, delivered in a 9-0 ruling, emphasizes a pluralist approach: The Christian agency gets to participate in the adoption programs while adhering to its religious beliefs, and LGBTQ couples will continue to have access to other adoption agencies within the Philadelphia system.

The ruling is narrow, but it means that any unequal treatment of religious groups will be regarded as a violation of the First Amendment, even if it comes at the expense of the dignity of LGBTQ citizens.

Perhaps the most important aspect of the ruling is its unanimity in upholding a clear standard of neutral treatment for religious and secular groups. The city government claimed it was not violating this standard, but even the liberal justices agreed it was.

The citys contention that government funding or the citys contracting rules shifted the equation against religious rights was roundly rejected by the court.

The unanimous ruling was achieved by delaying another core question that some of the justices wanted to address: whether religious businesses or groups have the clear right to deny service to the LGBTQ community or whether states can insist that in the public square, such faith-based groups set aside discriminatory beliefs.

Nonetheless, as a scholar of the Supreme Court, I believe the decision of the nine justices will have broad ramifications for current government policies and future judicial rulings. By subordinating the dignity of same-sex couples to the religious rights of believers, the courts new decisive ruling will influence many interactions between religious organizations and LGBTQ citizens.

Harming the dignity of same-sex couples

The case in front of the Supreme Court addressed the city of Philadelphias refusal to continue to allow Catholic Social Services to participate in the citys adoption and foster programs because the religious charity would not serve same-sex couples.

The group claimed that its First Amendment right to free exercise of religion had been violated as a result.

The organization, along with Sharonell Fulton and Toni Simms-Busch  two Catholic women who wished to serve as foster parents through the agency  sued the city.

They were aided by the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, a nonprofit law firm behind several successful Supreme Court cases, including 2014s Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, which upheld the ability of religious businesses to refuse to pay for forms of contraception that violate their beliefs, and Little Sisters of the Poor v. Pennsylvania in 2021, which also protected religious exemptions to contraceptive coverage under the Affordable Care Act.

The city of Philadelphia argued that religious rights do not allow for harms to third parties, including to the dignity of the same-sex couples being told publicly that they are not acceptable.

As one constitutional law professor wrote in an amicus brief in favor of the city: The believers can believe whatever they like and organize their affairs through discriminatory purposes, to be sure, but not when the government is paying and not when the public is impacted.

But the justices seem to have agreed with the alternative framing offered by Lori Windham, the advocate for Fulton: Does the Free Exercise clause shrink every time the government expands its reach and begins to regulate work that has historically and traditionally been done by religious groups?

A surprising unanimity

All nine justices agreed with the core holding that Philadelphia could not exclude Catholic Social Services. There were no dissents from Justices Stephen Breyer, Elena Kagan or Sonia Sotomayor  the current liberal wing of the court.

But three of the conservative justices  Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch and Clarence Thomas  signed separateopinions agreeing with the outcome but arguing that the protections of religious rights should have been even stronger.

The ruling does not protect the ability of religious groups to discriminate or exclude under any circumstances. Rather, it prevents government authorities only from applying different standards to religious and secular organizations. Philadelphias policies did not apply a generally applicable rule, but instead allow exceptions at their discretion.

In coming to their decision, the justices cited previous decisions holding that if government allows exceptions for secular reasons, then the First Amendment demands that they also allow them for religious reasons. As Chief Justice John Roberts phrased it, The creation of a formal mechanism for granting exceptions renders a policy not generally applicable.

In presenting the case to the justices, Fultons attorney argued: In our pluralistic society, this Court has repeatedly said that there should be room for those with different views.

Roberts majority opinion appears to reflect that view: No same-sex couple has ever sought certification from CSS. If one did, CSS would direct the couple to one of the more than 20 other agencies in the City, all of which currently certify same-sex couples.

For this reason, CSS seeks only an accommodation that will allow it to continue serving the children of Philadelphia in a manner consistent with its religious beliefs; it does not seek to impose those beliefs on anyone else.

The expansion of religious rights

At a mere 15 pages, the ruling is what Justice Alito described as a wisp of a decision in his 77-page concurrence. He argued that the court should have decided more boldly in favor of expanded religious rights.

The Fulton decision follows a long string of other rulings that have tipped in favor of religious claimants. In recent years, the court has increasingly protected the freedom of religious groups in government programs, in commerce, in public displays and in public school programs.

The most recent ruling also suggests the limits of LGBTQ rights under the current court. There have been no major victories on this issue at the Supreme Court since the 2018 retirement of Justice Anthony Kennedy  the author of every major gay rights ruling in recent decades including Obergefell v. Hodges, which legalized same-sex marriage throughout the country in 2015. But Kennedy himself hinted at the limits to LGBTQ rights when they are in opposition to religious liberties, writing in the Obergefell decision that the First Amendment ensures that religious organizations and persons are given proper protection as they seek to teach the principles that are so fulfilling and so central to their lives and faiths.

Since the Obergefell case, most of the Supreme Court cases addressing LGBTQ rights have not been brought by an LGBTQ plaintiff. Instead, they have have been brought  and won  by religious groups.

[Explore the intersection of faith, politics, arts and culture. Sign up for This Week in Religion.]

The question to come

The Fulton case proved no exception to this winning streak for religious rights.

But what the ruling did not do is hand down a definitive answer to the question that these cases are moving toward: Should gay rights or religious rights yield when the two are in irreconcilable conflict? When the court answers that question, it will likely not be unanimous. But the current trajectory suggests that religious rights are more likely to prevail.

As Justice Gorsuch concluded in his concurring opinion, dodging the question today guarantees it will recur tomorrow.

The Conversation is an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts. The Conversation is wholly responsible for the content.
CINCINNATI (AP)  A shooting in a Cincinnati neighborhood left a teenage boy dead and three other people wounded, authorities said.

The shooting in the Walnut Hills area occurred around 11:30 p.m. Thursday, authorities said. City police responded to the scene after receiving several 911 calls about shots fired and soon found the four victims.

Ladarius Evans, 16, was pronounced dead a short time later. The three wounded victims  whose names were not released  were taken to a hospital for treatment of undisclosed injuries that were not considered life-threatening.

A possible motive for the shooting remains under investigation. No arrests have been made.

Authorities have not released further information about the shooting, including what type of weapon was used or how many people may have been involved.
TORONTO (AP)  Border restrictions on nonessential travel with the United States will be extended until July 21, officials said Friday, as Canada works to get a higher percentage of Canadians fully vaccinated.

Public Safety Minister Bill Blair said the move has been made in coordination with the U.S. There are growing calls in the U.S. to open the Canada-U.S. border for nonessential travel like tourism, but less than 20% of Canadians are fully vaccinated.

Were still seeing cases across the country and we want to get them down," Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said. "At the same time we also know we have to hit our targets of 75% vaccinated with the first dose and at least 20% vaccinated with the second dose before we can start loosening things up because even a fully vaccinated individual can pass on COVID-19 to someone who is not vaccinated."

Trudeau said they need to ensure communities to which fully vaccinated travelers return to are not at risk

Even though they are protected from hospitalization the people around them might not be, Trudeau said.

The ban on nonessential travel across the Canada-U.S. border was announced in March 2020 and has been extended every month since.

Even some provinces in Canada remain closed to each other. Ontario and Quebec only this week allowed nonessential travel between the two provinces. And Atlantic Canada will be closed to Canadians from elsewhere well into July.

The government expects to have enough vaccine delivered for 80% of eligible Canadians to be fully vaccinated by the end of July.

About 70% of eligible Canadians have had at least one dose of vaccine and second doses are ramping up this month and next. Canada delayed administering a second dose to get more people a level of protection with the first dose faster and as the country waited for more supply to arrive.

Canada only started getting U.S. manufactured vaccines in May as the U.S. didn't allow exports until then. Canada had largely been getting vaccines from Europe until then.

Blair noted the government plans to release details on Monday about fully vaccinated Canadians who return to the country. The Trudeau government has said it anticipates fully vaccinated Canadian citizens who test negative for COVID-19 will be exempt from two weeks of quarantine when returning to the country in early July.

Trudeau said the government plans to have Canadians upload proof of vaccination pictures to an app so border agents can verify someone is fully vaccinated when travelling this summer.

Two U.S. members of Congress who co-chair the Canada-U.S. Interparliamentary Group, criticized the extension. Western New York Democrat Brian Higgins and Michigan Republican Bill Huizenga decried the lack of transparency around the border talks between Canada and the U.S. as a disservice to residents on both sides of the border who are waiting to see loved ones and renew business ties.

Perrin Beatty, president of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, said the policy should be based on whether a traveler is vaccinated, not on nationality. He noted France now allows Canadians and Americans to visit, which makes it easier to travel abroad than within this country and to our closest neighbor. What the government is doing flies in the face of science, of economics and good public policy, Beatty said.
There are things to do during a traffic stop, and things not to do. Handing your open beer to a cop is one of them.

That's what happened to a man in McLennan County earlier this month when approached by game wardens. The game wardens were patrolling near Lake Waco when they were cut off by the driver of a pickup.

GONE FOREVER: Legendary Houston honky-tonk burns down in bizarre fire

The man then drove on the wrong side of the road before the wardens pulled him over, police said.

When wardens approached the truck, the man was having trouble turning down his music, they said. As he fumbled with the radio, he apparently handed one of the wardens an open beer so he could concentrate.

Wardens had other suspicions that the man was intoxicated after he stumbled out of the car and failed a field sobriety test. But passing the drink probably didn't help his case.

The man was eventually arrested.

Texas game wardens publish blotters of their activity, however unusual, every month or so. Here are their other reports:

Hes a Rescue

Texas Game Wardens and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Agents inspected some antique resale stores. These locations had alligator skulls, black bear mounts, waterfowl mounts, raptor mounts and migratory bird mounts for sale. During the inspection of one store, an individual entered with a pet possum. In order to possess, sell, or purchase a fur-bearer, a person must have a valid Fur-bearing Propagation Permit. The possum was confiscated and relocated to a licensed rehabber. Citations were issued and cases are pending.

Dude, Wheres My Car?

A Bexar County game warden was patrolling Calaveras Creek by boat because the banks are closed to the public when they saw a person trespassing then hide in the mesquite brush. The warden called for backup and two additional wardens and a K-9 officer arrived to assist. After an exhaustive search, they were still trying to locate the subject. One of the wardens continued navigating their vessel father north into the creek when they spotted someone walking on the other side. The subject was stopped and told he was trespassing. He said he didnt have any fish or fishing gear and was walking back to the roadway where his van was parked.

The subject said his friend brought him to the property but had already left and was waiting at the van. The warden exited the vessel and walked along the subjects path where they found an ice chest with six tilapia, one black bass and a cast net. The man said he left the ice chest on the trail because he got scared. The K-9 handler radioed the warden to let them know the other suspect and van were gone. The man said, How am I supposed to get home? He told the warden his phone, wallet and money were in the van and his friend was supposed to wait for him and take him home. The warden arrested the man for criminal trespass, had him board the vessel and transported him to the Bexar County Jail. Case pending with the District Attorneys office.

Gig Em

A Uvalde County game warden found an unaccompanied vehicle at a Nueces River crossing. Believing the occupants got into another vehicle and drove down the river, the warden drove to a hill overlooking the river a couple of miles away. There they saw four individuals walking down the river, three with gigs and spears and one with a fishing pole. The warden saw two of the individuals with snorkeling gear dive into the river with the gigs.

Another person in the group waved to the divers, who proceeded to dive and emerged with a catfish at the end of a gig. The warden drove down to the group and discovered a fishing pole but no other fishing, gigging or snorkeling equipment. After searching the area, the warden found the gigs and spears, which had been thrown in the water and concealed. The gigged catfish were nowhere to be seen. The warden interviewed the four individually and found none of them had a fishing license. After talking with each subject, one finally admitted to gigging a catfish and leaving it at their last fishing spot some distance away. The catfish was retrieved and seized along with three gigs and spears. Multiple citations were issued with civil restitution.

And Thats the Boat-tom Line

Three Bell County game wardens were patrolling Lake Belton checking crappie, white bass and tournament fishermen when they came across a vessel hull identification number that did not conform to the U.S. Coast Guard standards. The wardens ran the TX number and the vessel was flagged for a mandatory boat inspection. The man operating the vessel had purchased the boat several days ago from another person who didnt put the vessel in their name and failed to provide a title to the boat. The wardens contacted the current registered owner who said the boat had been stolen from Belton in 2009. A police report was never made. The vessel was seized and citations were issued to the subject who sold the vessel.

His Name is Mudd (Bugs)

A Jefferson County game warden followed up on information from a social media post where a subject was selling live crawfish. When the warden contacted the seller, he claimed to own a catering company that sold live crawfish to local restaurants and individuals. The sale of live crawfish for commercial and personal use would require a Texas Wholesale Fish Dealer License. The man claimed over the phone that he was properly licensed in Texas and Louisiana. After requesting an in-person meeting with the subject, the warden discovered that the subject did not possess any type of commercial license and his vehicle was not properly marked to transport aquatic products.

Dont be Shellfish

Two Jefferson County game wardens were patrolling the ship channel near Port Arthur when they saw a commercial truck about to be loaded with a pallet of shrimp at one of the local wholesale shrimp processing facilities. They stopped to inspect the vehicle and discovered it already had a cargo of 15 crates of fresh blue crab on board. The driver was acting very suspicious and claimed to have bought the crabs legally in Louisiana and transported them into Texas, which requires a Texas Wholesale Fish Dealer License. The driver could not produce a wholesale license or an aquatic product transportation invoice, or other documentation for where the crabs had originated. Wardens for the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries were contacted to assist with the investigation. They interviewed the dealer in Louisiana where the driver claimed the crabs had originated and discovered that the driver was being deceptive. Texas game wardens seized all 15 crates of crabs and sold them to the highest bidder as required by law. The driver was issued citations and given warnings.

Oh-Fish-ially in Trouble

Galveston County game wardens received a call about two individuals who were catching sheepshead fish with a net and keeping over their bag limit. The wardens saw two over-flowing coolers with fish. When the wardens asked how they caught all the fish, they said, "with the net." When inspecting the coolers, the wardens found two hidden bags also containing fish. The two individuals were in possession of 47 sheepshead (27 undersized), three speckled sea trout and one 28 red drum. Multiple citations were issued to each individual. Cases are pending.
Local activists are hosting a rally against Texas' "heartbeat bill" next week outside a Planned Parenthood location in San Antonio.

During the Texas Legislature session in May, lawmakers passed Senate Bill 8, which prohibits abortions as early as six weeks in Texas  before some women know they are pregnant.

The bill does not make an exception for survivors of rape or incest who become pregnant. It only allows an exception for a woman suffering from a medical emergency. The law takes effect in September.

"I was really shocked," Yajaira Montor, a 24-year-old nurse and member of Be The Change, Texas, tells MySA about the bill. "It made me realize that this is exactly why we need to vote. To know that women who are raped can't have an abortion once they hear the heartbeat in Texas is wrong, and it's what really pushed me to start this rally."

READ ALSO: San Antonio-area lake now 'fully infested' with zebra mussels, TPWD says

Be The Change, Texas plans on hosting its rally from 4 to 7 p.m. on Friday, June 25, on the sidewalk outside of the Planned Parenthood on 2140 Babcock Road. Montor says they decided to have it at the clinic to help bring awareness of the bill and why it needs to be overturned. She added it's also to show support to Planned Parenthood  a company where pro-lifers show up almost every day in front of its facilities.

"We want to share why abortion should be legal and why they are necessary," Montor says. "Women may choose to have an abortion if they are not financially stable, if the pregnancy was a result of rape, if they are in an abusive relationship and if they are in high-risk pregnancy, and many more reasons. We don't want to challenge those pro-life people but instead spread awareness on why legal abortions are needed."

As a nurse at a rehab facility in San Antonio, Montor says she respects and understands those who make decisions in their medical life based on their religion. However, she added, pushing a religion on others and making the choice for women who want an abortion is wrong.

"That's a women's choice," she says. "We all have different cultural beliefs, and that's OK. I think we should be able to be diverse in our community and not push one thing onto others."

For more information on the rally, visit bethechangetx on Instagram.
Florida, FL (34429)

Today

Partly to mostly cloudy skies with scattered thunderstorms during the morning. High 84F. Winds WSW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 40%..

Tonight

Scattered thunderstorms early, then mainly cloudy overnight with thunderstorms likely. Low 76F. Winds WSW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 80%.
A. Lower speeds need to be approved for human and manatee safety.

B. The current boating speeds are fine. They don't need to be changed.

C. Boaters should be able to go faster, above 25 mph, between Marker 2 and Marker 7.

Vote

View Results
Canadian government confirms it is extending restrictions by one month until July 21. It will announce a phased reopening plan on Monday.

Update: Canada extends travel restrictions yet again Canadian government confirms it is extending restrictions by one month until July 21. It will announce a phased reopening plan on Monday.

Update: Canada extends travel restrictions yet again Canadian government confirms it is extending restrictions by one month until July 21. It will announce a phased reopening plan on Monday.

Update: Canada extends travel restrictions yet again Canadian government confirms it is extending restrictions by one month until July 21. It will announce a phased reopening plan on Monday. Shelby Thevenot Aa Accessibility Font Style Serif

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The Canadian government has confirmed it is extending restrictions on non-essential travel from around the world and the United States until July 21.



CIC News Update:

Click here to read the latest CIC News story on international travel restrictions being extended until July 21

Click here to read about the Canada-U.S. border restrictions being extended by another month

Bill Blair, Canadas minister of public safety confirmed the news Friday morning via Twitter.

Bill Blair on Twitter: Our number one priority as we fight #COVID19 is keeping Canadians safe. In coordination with the U.S., we are extending restrictions on non-essential international travel and with the United States until July 21st, 2021. / Twitter Our number one priority as we fight #COVID19 is keeping Canadians safe. In coordination with the U.S., we are extending restrictions on non-essential international travel and with the United States until July 21st, 2021.

Blair also tweeted that more information will become available this Monday: As we have said, the government is planning measures for fully vaccinated Canadians, Permanent Residents, and others who are currently permitted to enter Canada and will provide further details on Monday, June 21.

The original article continues below:

All eyes are on the Canadian border as the current travel restrictions are set to expire this Monday, June 21. The question is, will they be extended again?

There has been much discussion, and hints leaked to the media, but officials have been tight-lipped so far.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has suggested the border would be re-opened in phases. Trudeau has maintained that Canada would not start easing restrictions until 75 per cent of Canadians have been vaccinated. About 60 per cent of Canadas total population has received at least one dose, and 8 per cent are fully vaccinated.

Discover if Youre Eligible for Canadian Immigration

Health Minister Patty Hajdu has also said the government could start scaling back mandatory quarantine as early as the first week of July. New arrivals to Canada could possibly get out of quarantine as soon as their COVID-19 test comes back negative. As it is now, travellers who come by plane have to stay in a hotel at their own expense. Once they receive a negative test result, they have to carry out the rest of the mandatory 14-day quarantine requirement at their final destination.

Hajdu suggested that the new measure would apply to Canadian citizens and permanent residents who have been fully vaccinated by one of the four vaccines approved in Canada: Pfizer, Moderna, Astra Zeneca, and Johnson & Johnson.

Vaccination documents will likely be uploaded through the ArriveCAN app.

There has been no official protocols released for children travellers who are not old enough to be vaccinated. At a press conference, Chief Public Health Officer Theresa Tam suggested that there may be different rules for people travelling with minors.

The first rule of thumb, if you like, is that of course kids cannot be separated from their parents We will make sure that those questions and answers are provided, Tam said at a press conference on June 11.

On June 17, Trudeau met with provincial leaders to discuss the border reopening. Details of the next phase of border restrictions will have to be released by Monday, whether or not they will be extended.

Canada-U.S. border reopening

The pressure to reopen the Canada-U.S. border has been strong on both sides, but Trudeau has been siding with science over public outcry. Politicians and business leaders in Canada and the U.S. have been pressuring the nations leaders to reopen the border, and restart the economy for sectors that have been hard-hit since the March 2020 closure.

June 22 will not likely be the beginning of the end Canada-U.S. border restrictions, as officials have hinted earlier this month. International Affairs Minister Dominic Leblac told reporters that reopening may begin in July. He also said there may be dates released with the new order that will signal what the phases of reopening will look like.

What we dont know

A phased border reopening could take many forms. It could be phased in terms of geography, as in tighter restrictions on entering areas of Canada with high case counts. Also, as we have seen with the ongoing flight ban on India and Pakistan, the government could choose to take measures to slow travel between certain countries. The government is currently watching the progression of the delta variant, which may become a factor in decisions relating to travel.

There may also be differences in how the government handles reopening travel between Canada and the U.S., and Canada and the rest of the world. The restrictions are already divided in this way, with one order pertaining to U.S. travellers, and the other to travellers from all other foreign countries. There are few differences, due to the important trade and political relationship between Canada and the U.S. Some of these differences, however, affect travellers.

For instance, approved permanent residents who got their confirmation documents after March 18, 2020, are not allowed to travel to Canada to complete the landing process, unless they are U.S. residents. In order to come to Canada and activate their documents from any other country, they need to fall under another exemption. This has caused thousands of people to be stuck in immigration limbo throughout the pandemic, waiting with only a promise that they will be able to come to Canada eventually. This brings us to the other thing we dont know  how will the phased-in approach affect people by immigration status?

Hajdu has hinted that the relaxed quarantine requirements would affect exempt travellers, such as Canadian citizens and permanent residents, and those who have vaccines that are approved in Canada. This could suggest the government is considering a phased-in approach based on the travellers vaccination history, and reason for entering the country.

Canada could continue to enforce restrictions on people based on whether or not they are considered essential travellers. The government has changed the parameters for essential travellers in the past. Notably, in fall 2020 when more international students and family members became exempt from restrictions.

By Monday, the feds will need to answer to what the phased-in approach will look like, how will testing and proof of vaccinations work, and what the new quarantine policies will be.

Discover if Youre Eligible for Canadian Immigration

 CIC News All Rights Reserved. Visit CanadaVisa.com to discover your Canadian immigration options.
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Nexstar Media Inc. is a company with a diversified portfolio of brands. Susan Parker is the Digital Division's Chief Strategy Officer/EVP of Strategy and Data.

FREMONT, CA: Nexstar Media Inc.'s Digital Division, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Nexstar Media Group, Inc. (NXST), promotes Susan Parker to Chief Strategy Officer/EVP Strategy & Datas Digital Division. She oversees all data and strategy functions for Nexstar Media Inc.'s Digital Division, translating Nexstar's audience insights into the digital realm. Ms. Parker, based in Connecticut, begins her new duties immediately and report to Karen Brophy, President of Nexstar Media Inc.'s Digital Division.

As the digital division continues to build out a unified data strategy, developing new products and leveraging data to personalize our ad technology products remain major areas of focus, says Ms. Brophy. Susan brings deep expertise and a proven track record leading data transformations, and along with her team, will be instrumental to our product innovation.

Ms. Parker joined Nexstar Media Inc. as SVP, Strategy and Business Intelligence in October 2019, leading a team of digital experts focused on creating data-driven advertising products, audience platform growth, and the use of analytics and reporting to inform all aspects of Nexstar's digital business. Before joining Nexstar Media Inc., she worked at Nielsen as the Vice President of Marketing Cloud Solutions, where she was responsible for technical operations. She previously worked at The New York Times as a Senior Director of Ad Operations and Yield and at Hearst as a Vice President of Digital Revenue and Analytics.

This is a time of tremendous change for our industry, says Ms. Parker. I look forward to leveraging Nexstars impressive scale to build advanced data capabilities that guide our decisions while also creating new products that anticipate audience and advertiser demands. I am thrilled to lead such a dynamic team, delivering cutting-edge capabilities and advertising products to our key stakeholders, local television stations, and premium clients.
New York City Council Member Bill Perkins filed petitions and will appear on the June 22 Democratic primary ballot, but thats just about the only sign of life from the 72-year-olds reelection campaign. He has no campaign website, he has no social media accounts, he has not appeared at any candidate forums, and he hasnt responded to inquiries from City & State or, apparently, other outlets. Perkins has reported spending a measly $4,180  less than all but one of his 12 competitors in the June 22 Democratic primary for City Council District 9 in Harlem.

And he might win anyway, thanks to name recognition and relationships built over his decades-long career in public service, dating back to when he was elected to the Council the first time in 1997.

According to some people who have worked with him, Perkins is dealing with serious health problems including apparent memory loss and cognitive decline that often leaves him disoriented, according to people who have worked with him. He was often a distant nonparticipant in proceedings and sometimes would speak in ways that were out of left field and off-topic, said a City Council member who serves with Perkins and asked for anonymity to discuss a colleagues health. There were times when he would be in the wrong meeting, and wasnt even aware of it.

With most City Council members term-limited, leading to wide open races to replace them, and other high-profile races, like mayor, sucking up most of the attention, Perkins campaign has endured very little scrutiny.

In 2019, the Daily News reported he was taken in for a psychological evaluation in 2019 after neighbors called the police on him for allegedly shouting and throwing things in his home. Perkins denied that he was given a psychiatric evaluation at the time, but told the News that he had been on a drug regimen to treat his colon cancer which the News reported, some close to him worry may have caused cognitive issues.

Some of his opponents expected he would not run for reelection this year, which he was eligible to do because he has only served one full four-year term in his current tenure on the Council. (He previously served from 1998 to 2005, before serving in the state Senate from 2007 to 2017.) So a huge lineup of Democrats filed to run, including longtime Democratic political club leaders like William Allen, and Cordell Cleare, Perkins former chief of staff. But The City reported in March that Perkins would be running after all, formally entering the race at the last possible minute.

Its sad. Hes sick. He has an illness.  Its episodic. Some days hes totally fine. And other days hes not fine at all, said another council member who asked for anonymity to discuss Perkins health. The colleague did note that winning Council members will have to run again in 2023, rather than the usual four-year terms, because of redistricting. He might win. Its only a two-year term. But for those two years, its not really fair to those voters, the Council member said, referring to Perkins Central Harlem constituents.

Thats a case being made by some of Perkins opponents, like Athena Moore, who has worked with Perkins office as the director of the northern Manhattan office for Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer. We know now that in terms of budget negotiations and land use decisions and policy decisions  all of which I sit at the table now, helping to make those decisions  hes not present, she told City & State. We know his staff is doing all that he can, but you need the member to actually be negotiating and setting policy and looking at the budget. And the community is definitely missing out when that leadership is not in place.

Moore, who previously took on Perkins in 2017, is considered one of the leading contenders in the crowded field, boasting endorsements from Hazel Dukes, president of the NAACPs New York conference, the Amsterdam News and Brooklyn Rep. Yvette Clarke. Allen, a former staffer at the Rev. Al Sharptons National Action Network, is also a serious contender, running with the support of mayoral candidate Andrew Yang and state Sen. Brad Hoylman. Poet and artist Kristin Richardson Jordan and Joshua Clennon are both running on more left-wing platforms than the rest of the field, having both taken Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Courage to Change pledge. Richardson Jordan has also reported raising the most money of any candidate in the field. But Cleare, who worked for Perkins and also ran in 2017, considers herself to be the real progressive choice in the district after earning endorsements from New York City Public Advocate Jumaane Williams and labor union 1199 SEIU.

Cleare said Perkins has been absent from the district and his responsibilities. City & State ranked Perkins as the worst council member in 2019 based on his poor attendance record, his lack of legislative activity and an unresponsive office. Theres been a really deafening silence coming from that office in the past few years. Its not the office that I remember, Cleare said.

And its not just Perkins opponents saying that. It is really the open secret in Harlem that his mental acuity is failing. And even just his activity in representing constituents is practically nonexistent. And it really is a disservice, said a Democratic strategist uninvolved in the race, who asked for anonymity so as to not reflect upon his clients. And what I hear a lot  why is the rest of the Harlem leadership silent on this issue? Why are they letting it happen? Do you really distrust the next generation this much?

Manhattan Democratic Party Chair Keith Wright, a Harlem power broker, disagreed. Nobody is letting it happen. (Perkins) is free to run. Mickey Mouse can run. I would fault the people that vote for him! However Wright has not personally endorsed in the race, and said that the county organization does not endorse in primaries. If I had the power to stop people from running, please let me know what the power is, he said.

However, many candidates and community leaders have been hesitant to publicly criticize Perkins, or make too much of an issue of his health. Were Harlemites. We talk shit about each other, but we wont do it in public. Thats rude, said one politically connected Harlem Democrat, who asked for anonymity to discuss a sensitive subject. That said? He shouldnt be running.

Perkins has not taken the opportunity to defend himself, or discuss the race at all. Contacted by City & State on his personal phone, Perkins on two separate occasions said that he was busy at the moment and asked to be called back. Perkins did not respond to subsequent calls or messages. Emails and calls to his Council office went unreturned, as did emails and calls to contact information associated with his 2021 campaign.

Despite it all, some Harlemites  like Malik Wright, a political operative with no relation to Keith Wright who considered a run for District 9 this year before dropping out  think Perkins could win. Especially in a big field, it just becomes very difficult to compete with an incumbent with a set of votes I think its not beatable,Wright said.

But Wright objects to the fact that Perkins is running at all, in light of his diminished activity. Its immoral. It really is, Wright said. He should be able to leave with his legacy.
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Early this year, Alexandria Neason wrote for CJR about the past and present of white supremacy in journalism. Americans have short memories, she observed. We dont like to be reminded of our many sins, so instead we prop up lofty narratives of progress and unity that obscure the violence enacted along the way. The press, she wrote, has played a key part in that. In 1898, newspapers in North Carolina were weaponized by white vigilantes as part of a coup that killed hundreds of Black people. These days, Neason continued, journalism has a different relationship with racism, but the modern manifestationsof language, of omission, of framingfollow centuries-old tactics, only papered over, smoothed out, and couched in industry norms.

In recent years, news organizations have put out apologies for past offenses: in 2004 the Jackson Sun, in Tennessee, acknowledged that it had ignored or downplayed local civil rights efforts in its pages; in 2011, the Waco Tribune-Herald, in Texas, apologized for its coverage of the 1916 lynching of a seventeen-year-old named Jesse Washington; in 2018, National Geographic audited its archives, and told readers that the magazine had depicted people of color in exoticized ways, often nude and as happy hunters, noble savagesevery type of cliche. Lately, many more outlets have released public statements of regret. But as Neason wrote, that should only be the start: Regret without restitution is maintaining the status quo. Or, as the Reverend William J. Barber II told her, I dont know if the language of media apology is even sufficient. For guidance, Neason turned to a project called Media 2070, which has invited people to imagine what reparations might look like for the news industry. Reparations are both a destination and a pathway, Alicia Bell, one of the organizers, saida means of realizing the reconciliation, the restoration, the repair that needs to happen within the media.

Neason noted, too, that journalisms attempts to redress structural inequities can feel maddeningly cyclical. Often, conversations aiming to assess a newsrooms performance come with an urge to self-congratulate, so as to soften the embarrassment of too-slow progress, she wrote. After decades of attempting reform, we need to wonder how sincere weve been, if we have been truly reckoning with anything at all.

Below, more from CJR on racism and the press:

In an issue of the magazine focused on disinformation, Neason asked: A police department exists to protect the public and to protect itself, but can it ever really do both? In speaking with the press about a crime in which an officer may have been at fault, police tend to prioritize brand management, she wrote . Victimswho more often than not are Blackhave long listened to police with skepticism, expecting misinformation about themselves and their communities. Journalists have struggled to tell the whole story.

Errin Haines published an essay in CJR about her life on the race beat. It has been crucial for me to seek out stories that help bear witness to and for my communityand then, in the newsroom, push past the comfort of some white gatekeepers, she wrote . So much of journalism is about the choices we make about who will be seen and heard; the race beat is recognition of the fact that images and voices have seldom told the stories of my community.

In the same issue, Jelani Cobb wrote about how, for the most part, American journalists look nothing like the demographics of the communities they cover. Fifty years after the Kerner Commission declared that a predominantly white press had failed to cover the story of racism in the United States, we still see chronic underrepresentation of racial and ethnic minorities in print and broadcast media.

For the recent Existential issue, Nehal El-Hadi interviewed Chris Gilliard and Marcus Gilroy-Ware about power structures embedded in digital journalism that perpetuate racial injustice and social inequality. If you look at Black Lives Matter in the summer, the technical possibilities for how that could have been dealt with journalistically were all there, Gilroy-Ware said. But editorially, time and time and time again, the stories that were written, the headlines that were writtenthe ways that the destruction of Black lives at the hands of police and the outpouring of anger in relation to that was handled in newsroomswas extremely problematic.

Other notable stories:

Has America ever needed a media watchdog more than now? Help us by joining CJR today

The Editors are the staffers of the Columbia Journalism Review.
Insurers Generali Ceska Pojistovna and Ceska Kooperativa of the VIG group have reached an agreement with CEZ to end cover of the plants, the companies said.

We are reducing our activities in insuring coal power plants, Generali said in a statement, adding it was aiming to rapidly de-carbonize its portfolio.

CEZ did not give details of its alternative solution.

The trend is clear, this is after mutual agreement, said CEZ spokesperson Ladislav Kriz.

We have already set up a new system of insuring our coal plants from the next year onward. We will secure these end-of-life sources until they are definitely decommissioned.

CEZ presented a strategy outlook last month planning to shut most of its coal capacity by 2030, cutting the proportion of coal in its production mix to 12.5% from 36%, and adding 6 gigawatts (GW) in renewable sources.

Coal has been in retreat in Europe and the United States as countries pledge to cut their carbon emissions.

On Sunday, the Group of Seven nations pledged to rapidly scale up technologies and policies that accelerate the transition away from coal, including ending new government support for coal power by the end of this year.
William Russell Allton was born in Dewey, Oklahoma on April 25, 1931 to Russell Frank and Alice Mae (Steffens) Allton. He attended school in Claremore and graduated with the class of 1948. On August 26, 1949 Bill married Jimmie Louise Reed and the couple made Tulsa home for the first 25 year
PayGo Energy is a venture-backed technology company based in Nairobi, Kenya. The company is an early innovator in Pay-as-you-go (PAYGO) smart meters for liquified petroleum gas (LPG) and supply chain software. After initially piloting a business-to-consumer (B2C) model, PayGo Energy pivoted to a business-to-business (B2B) model, supplying hardware and software to LPG distributors. Recently, the company formed strategic partnerships with Saisan, a Japanese conglomerate, and BBOXX, an off-grid energy company based in sub-Saharan Africa.

PayGo Energy CEO, Nick Quintong, recently spoke with Shrikant Avi, CCAs Venture Catalyst Senior Manager, about what these partnerships mean for the future of the company and their contribution to scaling up clean cooking solutions.

This interview is part of a series of conversations CCA is having with business leaders from markets around the world and across the clean cooking sector.

Shrikant Avi (Avi): Can you describe PayGo Energys products and services and what benefits they bring to customers?

Nick Quintong (Quintong): We build hardware and software solutions for downstream LPG distributors, with a focus on developing markets. We think our technology can solve two inter-related problems: (i) making clean cooking affordable and accessible for low-income households; and (ii) making the supply chain more efficient and expansive.

We have two core products. The Cylinder Smart Meter (CSM) is an Internet-of-Things device that attaches to most LPG cylinders, and accurately measures gas flow as customers use it for cooking. The CSM enables customers to purchase gas in any amount, using mobile money, and automatically shuts off when a customers credit reaches zero. By breaking down the cost of an LPG cylinder into smaller payments, were matching the way gas is sold to the way consumers in developing markets typically earn and spend their incomes.

Our other product is Tag & Trace, a software platform that digitizes LPG distribution and retail data. The platform is fully customizable, with a range of features including cylinder tracking, inventory management, customer relationship management, and payments. We see significant scope to eliminate waste in the LPG supply chain through digital applications, and it is our hope that, ultimately, those savings will be passed on to the consumer.

Avi: PayGo Energy recently partnered with the Japanese conglomerate Saisan. How did this come about?

Quintong: After initial discussions with Saisans leadership team, it was clear we had a shared vision for how we could work together to crack key challenges in expanding the addressable market for LPG. Also, the timing was right: we had been assessing a couple of key markets in Asia from a distance but had not yet found the right partner on the ground. Saisans LPG brand, Gas One, has operations throughout Asia and is an ideal downstream partner, so it all made a lot of sense.

Avi: What makes PayGo Energy attractive to a company like Saisan?

Quintong: LPG is a hyper-competitive industry. Companies like Saisan are constantly looking for opportunities to strengthen their position within operating markets and to expand into new geographies. PayGos technology is attractive because it creates opportunities to do both  Saisan can deploy our technology through existing operations to provide a better, more efficient service, and they can also use it as a tool to enter new markets.

In addition, while companies like Saisan have a broad footprint, they dont currently have a lot of data about their customers or even their own supply chain. We have information flowing from the distributor, to the retailer, down to the household, which were piecing together to create a complete view of their business, or virtual pipeline. Long term, we believe this increased flow of information will unlock a whole range of new opportunities, from efficiency gains, to new business models and product offerings. Weve just skimmed the surface of whats possible.

Avi: How will Saisans investment and broader partnership support PayGo Energys growth strategy?

Quintong: This was our first deal in Asia, and almost overnight we acquired a strong pipeline of potential partners in high-impact markets. Saisan is the perfect springboard for us in the region. They have deep institutional knowledge of the sector, established LPG distribution and retail infrastructure across multiple markets, and a willingness to test  and, if successful, to scale  new and innovative technologies.

Weve kicked off two pilots and were already seeing the benefit of the relationship. Without strong, local implementing partners, our model doesnt work.

Avi: PayGo Energy also recently entered into a strategic partnership with BBOXX, a next-generation utility. Why is this significant?

Quintong: BBOXX originally focused on manufacturing and distributing in-home solar systems and is now looking to leverage its retail network to add PAYGO LPG to their product line. Their ambitious plans to grow LPG in underdeveloped markets and to strengthen connections with households align well with the PayGo ethos.

The partnership with BBOXX is initially focused on the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). We believe the DRC is a high-potential market for PAYGO, with significant need (just four percent of the population has access to clean cooking facilities); high population density (six urban areas have populations of over 1 million people); and growing investment in the LPG supply chain (including from leading commodity trader Trafigura, which also has a partnership with BBOXX).

Avi: How critical is the pivot to a B2B partnership model to PayGo Energys future strategy?

Quintong: It is absolutely critical. If we cant reach sufficient scale, the economics wont work, and we wont achieve the impact were chasing. But were also a startup, meaning we need to be efficient in how we achieve that scale.

By partnering with companies that have an established operational footprint in our priority markets, we can rapidly deploy smart meters without investing in LPG distribution and retail infrastructure. It also means we can build a global footprint while still maintaining a lean, centralized team. That doesnt mean we hand over our hardware and say see you later  effective partner onboarding and support is super important  but it does enable us to focus on the technology and leave the rest to our partners.

Were not interested in scaling a traditional LPG business. We initially tried going down that path, but it was too operationally intensive and there are other folks out there who execute that model with a lower cost base. Our current business model enables us to focus on building great hardware and software and supporting our partners to execute to a really high level. So, for us, other LPG companies are potential partners, not competitors.
This weeks Torah portion recounts a violent story of the Israelites wanderings in the wilderness more than 3,000 years ago. A neighboring tribe called the Midianites leads the Jewish people to idol worship and immorality as a great plague erupts in the Israelite camp.
Beachwood, OH (44122)

Today

Cloudy this morning followed by isolated thunderstorms this afternoon. High 69F. Winds NNW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 30%..

Tonight

Clear to partly cloudy. Low 59F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph.
Israeli police deploy at a Palestinian protest at the Damascus Gate to the Old City of Jerusalem Thursday, June 17, 2021 against incendiary chants used by ultranationalist Israelis at their "Flags March" at the same site on Tuesday.
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Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, June 18)  The Bureau of Customs (BOC) simultaneously destroyed 21 smuggled motor vehicles, including luxury cars, with a total value of 58.55 million in Manila and Cagayan de Oro on Friday.

In a statement, the agency said the vehicles were shipped into the country by different consignees and seized on separate occasions from 2018 to 2020.

At Port Area in Manila, the BOC destroyed seven luxury cars: a brand-new McLaren 620R, a used Hyundai Genesis, a used Bentley 2007, one used Porsche 911 C2S, one used Mercedes-Benz, one unit of Lotus, and one Toyota Solara. The smuggled vehicles were brought in from the Manila International Container Port (MICP), Port of Manila, and Port of Subic.

Meanwhile, 14 knocked-down used Mitsubishi Jeeps seized by the Port of Cagayan de Oro were also destroyed at Diamond Logistic in Baloy, Brgy. Tablon.

This is the second condemnation activity by the BOC this year. The first one held on February 9 involved 17 smuggled units from MICP and the ports of Cebu and Manila.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, June 18)  The Commission on Human Rights (CHR) on Friday said it will investigate the recent killing of three members of the Lumad-Manobo tribe in Lianga, Surigao del Sur.

"Our CHR Regional Office in Caraga will dispatch an investigation team to look into the violent death of these indigenous peoples allegedly perpetrated by the military," the CHR said in a statement.

A 12-year-old girl was among those killed in what the military said was an encounter between government forces and communist rebels. The Armed Forces of the Philippines' Eastern Mindanao Command claimed the victims were members of the New People's Army.

However, human rights group Karapatan identified the three as farmers Willy Rodriguez and Lenie Rivas, and Angel Rivas - a Grade 6 student of the province's Lumad school Tribal Filipino Program.

"The perpetrators are mad killers, with clearly no respect to life and rights. They look at the Lumad people like hunted prey, lying to their teeth and falsely tagging the victims as members of the New People's Army," Karapatan secretary general Cristina Palabay said.

Meanwhile, the CHR urged the government to conduct its own investigation "to bring justice to the death of Willy Rodriguez, Lenie Rivas, and 12-year-old Angel Rivas."

"It also concerning that there are allegations the female victims were sexually assaulted as well," the agency added.

The CHR also extended its deepest sympathies to the families of the victims.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, June 18)  The COVID-19 task force is studying if it can further ease quarantine rules for fully vaccinated Filipinos returning from abroad, Vaccine czar Carlito Galvez, Jr. said Friday.

He said a technical working group is already looking into allowing all returning Filipinos - whether they were vaccinated here or in the country of origin - to spend the required seven-day quarantine in their homes.

"Ang gagawin natin is they will be having their home quarantine and inspected regularly by the LGU. Paiigtingin natin yung ating quarantine restrictions in terms of hindi talaga sila makakalabas sa 7 days," Galvez told reporters.

[Translation: What we'll do is they will having their home quarantine and inspected regularly by the LGU. We will intensify our quarantine restrictions in a sense that they really cannot step outside during those 7 days.]

A person is considered fully vaccinated two weeks after receiving their second dose of a vaccine.

Currently, only returning Filipinos who received two doses of COVID-19 vaccines in local vaccination sites may avail of the shortened quarantine period, which must be spent in accredited facilities.

However, Galvez said this plan will rely on the ability of agencies like the Department of Foreign Affairs and the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration to coordinate with manning agencies and foreign employers to validate their vaccination status.

Swab test requirement

Galvez, who heads the national task force against COVID-19, said swab tests should still be mandatory for returning travelers.

"Magiging uniform whether vaccinated here or abroad, meron silang same quarantine of 7 days after. Ang recommendation is they will also be subject to testing," he said.

Galvez added that countries like Israel - where mass vaccinations have been implemented - still requires swab tests for travelers. He said task force members will meet with Israeli medical experts on Sunday to discuss policy recommendations.

"Dapat you understand why the IATF is doing this. We don't want any single trace of the Delta variant coming here," he added, expressing concern with the surge in infections in areas like Indonesia and the United Kingdom.

Meanwhile, the Department of Health plans to recommend scrapping the testing requirement for returning Filipinos who have been vaccinated abroad once they find ways to verify their vaccination status or cards.

Current rules require inbound travelers to undergo testing on the seventh day of their return and go through facility-based quarantine for 10 days. They must complete their two-week quarantine in their respective homes.

But starting June 22, inbound travelers who have been vaccinated in the Philippines need not undergo COVID-19 testing while on facility-based quarantine, provided they do not develop flu-like symptoms. Their mandatory stay in quarantine centers will also be shortened to seven days.

The same relaxed rules are being considered for returning Filipinos who got their COVID-19 shots in other countries, Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said Friday.

"Ganyan din po ang ating pong nirerekomenda for those vaccinated abroad na mga Pilipino na babalik dito pero hindi pa ho natin yan nafa-finalize because we need means of verification of their vaccination status or vaccination cards," Vergeire said during a media forum.

[Translation: We are recommending the same policy for those who plan to go back here, but we have not finalized the recommendation because we need means of verification of their vaccination status or vaccination cards.]

The Department of Foreign Affairs is coordinating with different embassies on possible ways to validate the COVID-19 vaccination of Filipinos overseas, Vergeire said in a separate briefing. "Tinitingnan rin natin iyong risk classification ng isang bansa kung paano maisasama sa criteria na binubuo natin," she added.

[Translation: We are also checking if we could include the risk classification of a country in the criteria we are formulating.]

Such proposals will be discussed with the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases next week, Galvez said.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, June 18)  Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire says it is not yet an "appropriate" time to further shorten the quarantine period for vaccinated travelers entering the country.

Speaking to CNN Philippines' The Source on Friday, Vergeire said the Department of Health remains cautious about the highly transmissible Delta variant (B.1.617.2).

"For us in DOH we really do not see that it is appropriate at this time because of the increasing cases, because of the Indian variant actually. We are very, very cautious about the (Delta) variant that it will not enter our borders," said Vergeire, who is also DOH spokesperson.

READ: PH extends travel ban on India, 6 other countries until June 30

Senators have been calling for a lifting of the mandatory quarantine for incoming travelers, both Filipino and foreign, who are fully vaccinated, noting that this step would help boost the country's economy.

The Philippines has reported 13 cases so far of the "double mutant" Delta variant. Vergeire said they are hoping to maintain this figure, seeing how the variant worsened the situation in other countries that are still trying to recover from the pandemic.

"Hopefully, we can continue to do so because we can see that it is ravaging the other countries. UK, with almost 50% of their population vaccinated, is having another surge because of this (Delta) variant," she said.

Vergeire added: "At this time, I think even experts are saying it would not be appropriate for us to have a shortened quarantine period for our incoming travelers."

The Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases moved to June 22 the start of the seven-day quarantine protocol for all inbound travelers fully vaccinated in the Philippines.

This is in consideration of "the full rollout of the process of validation of vaccination certificates," Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque said in a statement on Friday. The policy was supposed to be implemented on June 16.

The current policy does not apply to foreign nationals or overseas Filipino workers who were vaccinated abroad. They still have to undergo a 10-day facility-based isolation and take an RT-PCR, or swab test, on the 7th day.

For inbound travelers who have been vaccinated in the Philippines, a swab test will only be done if they exhibit flu-like symptoms during their 7-day isolation in a quarantine facility, the Inter-Agency Task Force said.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, June 18) Senator Risa Hontiveros is set to file a resolution seeking an investigation into reported killings during police operations in the country, including those that involved children and teenagers.

The move comes after the death of a 16-year-old in Laguna, who according to reports was allegedly killed by police officers during an operation.

"Anong laban ng isang bata sa isang armadong institusyon? Bakit ba ang lalakas ng loob ng ilan sa mga pulis na mang-api at kumitil ng mga kabataang walang kalaban-laban? This is a serious human rights violation that needs to be investigated," the senator said in a statement on Friday.

[Translation: What can a child do against an armed institution? Why do some police officers have the courage to abuse and kill children who cannot fight?]

Hontiveros added that the teenager's death should not be considered an isolated case, citing how other police operations led to the demise of other minors including 17-year-old Kian delos Santos.

READ: 3 cops found guilty of murdering Kian delos Santos

"This relentless, unabated slaughter of our people must stop," Hontiveros added. "This should never be the status quo."
(CNN)  SpaceX received a warning from a district attorney in Texas this week, warning that the company could be violating several state laws by shutting down public beaches for extended periods of time and using unlicensed security guards to ward people off public roads.

The discrepancy centers on SpaceX's activities in South Texas, where the company has taken over large plots of land near Boca Chica Beach in order to build and test massive rocket prototypes of the rocket that CEO Elon Musk envisions will one day carry the first humans to Mars.

The frequent road closures and traffic jams SpaceX has brought to the area, as well as the explosive rocket testing mishaps that have littered the local beaches with shrapnel, have often rubbed local residents and environmental activists the wrong way. Now, the district attorney of Cameron County, which encompasses Boca Chica Beach, is warning SpaceX that its actions could make the company and, possibly, employees "subject to arrest and prosecution," according to a June 11 letter obtained by CNN Business.

The contents of the letter were first reported by local television station KRGV.

In the note, Cameron County district attorney Luis Saenz alleged that members of his staff, while investigating complaints from a resident about the behavior of SpaceX's private security personnel on June 9, encountered a man wearing a "tactical bulletproof vest" who "approached, stopped and detained" them for attempting to access a public roadway near SpaceX's manufacturing facilities.

Saenz's letter states that the county had not authorized a road closure at the time, and his staff later found out the security guard who detained them was not licensed by the Texas Department of Public Safety, as is required by state law.

"This conduct is unacceptable," the letter reads, adding that Saenz was further concerned by the fact that SpaceX responded to that incident and another, similar incident in early April by chocking up the incidents to an "overzealous security guard."

"While Space-X is a valued member of our community, this does not authorize Space-X, its employees, staff, agents, and/or contractors to disregard Texas Law," the letter states. "Also, be advised, if this conduct were to happen again, not only could the individual Space-X employee/contractor/agent be subject to arrest and prosecution, but as a Texas Business Entity...Space-X could be prosecuted as well."

SpaceX did not return requests for comment.

The letter also lays out complaints about the extent to which SpaceX has restricted access to Boca Chica Beach, which is one of the nearest beaches to the city of Brownsville and one of the last undeveloped stretches of coastline in the state. SpaceX is only authorized to close the beaches for up to 300 hours per year for rocket testing and launches, according to an agreement with the Federal Aviation Administration.

But just six months into 2021, the company has already shut down the beaches for about 385 hours, according to Saenz's letter.

SpaceX's actions could amount to a Class B misdemeanor (for "obstructing a highway or other passageway") and a third-degree felony (for "impersonating a public officer"), the letter states.

The letter  which is addressed to SpaceX's head of Starship operations, Shyamal Patel  also requests that SpaceX respond with legal justification for its action by June 14, though it's not clear if SpaceX has responded. Saenz's office did not respond to a request for comment on that matter.

Saenz's letter states that his office was tipped off to issues with SpaceX by Save RGV, a local environmental advocacy group.

Mary Angela Branch, a Save RGV advocate and resident of Port Isabel, the town adjacent to Boca Chica Beach, told CNN Business that she began gathering evidence of SpaceX's actions after hearing from a friend that SpaceX security guards were allegedly forbidding people from accessing public roads without authorization from the county.

"I don't know how they've gotten away with all of that," Branch told CNN Business. "It's scary."

This story was first published on CNN.com, "Texas authorities threaten SpaceX with legal action over beach closures, private security."
Saratoga Springs, NY (12866)

Today

Cloudy early, then off and on rain showers for the afternoon. High 66F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 70%..

Tonight

Overcast with rain showers at times. Low around 55F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 60%.
Columbia, SC (29201)

Today

Showers and a few thunderstorms likely. High 82F. Winds WSW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 90%..

Tonight

Variable clouds with showers and scattered thunderstorms. Storms more numerous this evening. Low 66F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 70%.
Penn States Jeffrey A. Conrad Center for Sexual and Gender Diversity is hosting its second Camp Crystal Queer summer program, which features in-person and virtual events for LGBTQ students.

The program is designed to include fun and engaging activities for students to attend throughout the months of June, July and August, including movie nights, hiking trips, stargazing and a weekly virtual book club.

Eric Duran, CSGDs programming coordinator, said the center didnt offer as many events during the summer months before 2020 due to the lower number of students who were living in the State College area during that time.

When CSGD moved its spring semester programming to a virtual format because of the coronavirus pandemic last year, the idea to create virtual summer programming for students came to fruition, Duran said.

It started with biweekly community check-ins via Zoom, then evolved into virtual campfire chats where attendees could share stories, Northeastern folklore and Penn State ghost stories. From there, virtual tours were also held, featuring downtown State College, The Arboretum at Penn State and Shavers Creek Environmental Center.

At the beginning, it was like, What do we do in a virtual world?, Duran said. The goal was to figure out how students could stay connected and have fun at home.

This year, Camp Crystal Queer looks a little different. With coronavirus restrictions loosening on campus and in Pennsylvania, CSGD was able to create a hybrid program of virtual events for students who are not in the area over the summer and in-person events for those who are.

Many of the same activities held last year were able to happen again  this time in person. Most recently, CSGD took attendees to Shavers Creek for a group day of hiking.

Upcoming in-person events will include lawn games at noon on June 22 and stargazing at 8:30 p.m. on June 28. Both will take place on the HUB-Robeson Center lawn.

Camp Crystal Queer also features several virtual options and CSGD resources for students to connect and become more familiar with the LGBTQ community at Penn State. Its book club is held at 5:30 p.m. every Tuesday, and a virtual campfire chat focused around Pride will be held from 2-3 p.m. on June 24.

Students are still able to register for Camp Crystal Queer events by using the link on the CSGD Instagram page.

Another feature of the program comes in the form of embroidered patches. Similar to those received by Boy Scouts of America and Girl Scouts of the USA for their merits and achievements, Camp Crystal Queer campers are able to recieve various patches for their participation in events and activites.

Offered as a virtual option last year, CSGD will now hand out physical patches to campers when the programming ends in mid-August, according to Duran.

With last years programming exclusively held virtually, CSGD has planned to continue offering students access to most of the inaugural years activities via a Camp Crystal Queer blog.

Duran said CSGD student staff members played a critical role in the evolution and planning for this years camp.

Sarabeth Bowmaster, a CSGD peer education intern, was tasked with maintaining various programming activities for Camp Crystal Queer, such as the pen pals program and the virtual book club.

Bowmaster (junior-womens, gender and sexuality studies and philosophy) said the engagement levels have been lower for in-person events  but the virtual options are booming.

Being able to connect with other LGBTQ students has been a highlight of Camp Crystal Queer, Bowmaster said, and she said she looks forward to participating in upcoming events.

For me at least, it's a great way to stay connected with the community and not feel so disengaged in the summer, Bowmaster said. Keeping that engagement up in the summer and letting it trickle into the school year and getting people involved before theyre weighed down by classes and work is super important.

Bowmaster said she believes having hybrid events that students are able to still participate in from home is another critical aspect of Camp Crystal Queer. She said as some students are not in entirely welcoming spaces when they return home, summer programs can be a great way for LGBTQ students to remain engaged with the community.

When the pandemic put a halt on in-person events and classes, Muggs Leone was not able to find the time during the fall and spring semesters to get involved with CSGD. Now, Leone (sophmore-pyschology) works as a student staff member and helps maintain various social media and programming for Camp Crystal Queer.

As someone whose entire college experience so far has been online, meeting people in person over the summer when I dont have to worry about classes... I think it's easier to get engaged over the summer, Leone said. I think [Camp Crystal Queer] is a great way for people with busy schedules, or [who] might not [be] located directly nearby, to get engaged and get connected.

With summer programming somewhat overlooked before 2020 due to the emphasis on fall semester planning, Duran said this is new territory for CSGD to explore. He said he hopes Camp Crystal Queer will continue to grow and offer more events for students to participate in.

In the previous years, we didnt really do so many because we would really focus on the fall, Duran said. With June being national Pride month, and even students being around in July and August, it is important for us to continue doing summer programs.

For more information, students can contact Duran at ejd5531@psu.edu. If students are looking for confidential support beyond the summer programming, they can reach out to lgbtqa@psu.edu for resources or help.
Plaintiff has presented evidence that he was treated differently than his white colleagues throughout his entire tenure at Heaton Middle School, concluded U.S. District Judge R. Brooke Jackson in a June 3 order. He argues that the mistreatment made it difficult for him to effectively do his job, which thereby contributed to the partially effective performance reviews.
In this week's Colorado Politicking, reporter Pat Poblete was joined by elections reporter Ernest Luning and courts reporter Michael Karlik to take a look at the upcoming campaigns, the latest in state courts and Gov. Jared Polis' bill signing bonanza from the week.

Luning discussed U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet's latest fundraiser.

"He talked about the high stakes of Democrats maintaining control of the Senate next year," Luning said, adding Bennet was using critical terms about the fragility of our democracy with references to former President Donald Trump, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and reigning in the fillibuster.

Luning also gave a scoop on who may be running for the high ticket against Bennet.

Shifting to a conversation on the latest in Colorado courts, Karlik explains the Title IX case in which the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals reinstated a case on a possibly "anti-male" investigation that found its accused guilty.

Meanwhile, "in a major win for civil liberties advocates," Karlik said the right to record police has now been established as a first amendment right, before Poblete gave a look at Gov. Jared Polis' flurry of bill signings from the week, mostly to do with the state stimulus but with other major legislation tucked in.

Find related reading below:

Michael Bennet tells donors Democrats have a 'moral responsibility' to keep Senate majority Sen. Michael Bennet, who is seeking a third full term, spoke to more than 70 donors during an hour-long Zoom teleconference dubbed the grassroots kick-off to his 2022 campaign.

TRAIL MIX | Next year's top-ticket GOP challengers remain a mystery Ernest Luning: "In conversations with political insiders lately, it's become nearly as common as remarking on the weather to ask if there's news about a Republican running for any number of top-ticket offices, and the answers are usually the same."

10th Circuit reinstates lawsuit alleging anti-male bias in DU sex assault investigation A student expelled from the University of Denver after a sexual assault investigation had his lawsuit against the school reinstated on Tuesday, after the federal appeals court based in Denver determined he had plausibly alleged an anti-male bias in the universitys investigation of the incident.

In a first for Colorado, federal judge rules First Amendment grants right to record police However, a Lakewood officer who allegedly blocked two men from recording a traffic stop may not be sued because at the time, no judicial decision had clearly established that right.

Polis signs state stimulus bills on energy, business, arts and events The governor signed into law more than a half dozen bills from the $800 million Colorado Comeback stimulus package in four separate ceremonies around the Denver metro area.

Polis continues stimulus bill signing spree with stops on the Front Range, Eastern Plains Gov. Jared Polis continued his flurry of Colorado Comeback bill signings with a whirlwind tour of the northern Front Range and Eastern Plains, where he put pen to paper on three bipartisan state stimulus measures with another three still on the days agenda.

Polis signs legislation seeking to drive down cost of health insurance, prescription drugs Saving people money on health care is really core to our goals and our needs as a state, Gov. Jared Polis said during the bill signing ceremony. It's more than just health care, it's the well-being of our communities. It's economic security for ourselves, our families, and our small businesses.

Polis signs six more state stimulus bills into law Gov. Jared Polis on Wednesday continued enshrining elements from the Colorado Comeback package into law, signing six state stimulus bills in ceremonies around the Denver metro area.

Governor signs $5.4 billion transportation bill backed by new fees It's been an uphill struggle with a lot of twists and turns, but from a perch overlooking Floyd Hill, Colorado's transportation future got a new, better financed outlook Thursday.
Colorado Politics is published both in print and online. Our website features subscriber-only news stories daily, designed for public policy arena professionals. Member subscribers also receive the weekly print edition of our award-winning newspaper, containing outstanding features and news stories, in their mailboxes every Saturday.
Robert L. Leighty, 93, passed in his sleep on Wednesday, June 23, 2021. He was born April 20, 1928, in Veedersburg, IN, to Hazel and Ivan Leighty. The family moved to Danville, IL when Bob was small. He attended Danville Schools before joining the Army and spending two years in the service. 
Editor's note: Cisco is a client of the author.

One of my favorite kinds of briefings is when a vendor brings in customers who talk about how they did the impossible. While these do promote a vendors wares, they also provide a wealth of knowledge about what worked, what didnt, and what folks would do differently. Given that we are likely to have a regular recurrence of pandemics n the years ahead, knowing what worked could be useful if we want to improve IT in the future.

Cisco had one of these events focused on lessons learned at the Canutillo Independent School District in Texas and at the St. Vrain Valley School District in Colorado. Heres some of what school officials found out as they tried to keep classes up and running during the COVID-19 pandemic over the past year.

The school/student disconnect

This lack of understanding between school officials and students in Texas was fascinating; they initially didnt understand how distressed some students were. Oscar Rico, the executive director of technology for the school district, described house lots with one meter, a hose to get water from, and multiple mobile homes using the same resource. Parents didnt know anything about technology, there was no broadband, and many families were unable to pay rent. In many cases, the PC sent out by the school was the most expensive system in the home, and parents were scared they might break it, so they avoided learning how to use it. Even simple things like logging in were beyond them.

It wasnt just students. Some of the teachers lived on farms that lacked adequate connectivity as well, making teaching far more complex.

Apple hardware wasnt a panacea

Its believed that Apple hardware can be used with zero-touch support, but that was not the case. Instead, the Texas school fielded up to 80 calls a day from among some 6,000 users  calls it was not set up to support. One takeaway: next time focus on early training for school personnel so everyone can pitch in on support calls as needed.

Vendor issues and hardware shortages

There wasnt much love for OEMs except for Cisco. According to Rico, most vendors laughed at what the school wanted to do and said it was trying to be an ISP. They saw the effort as a lousy investment, especially after the state seized the $30 million provided by the US Government, forcing school officials to get funding from the community with a bond issue. What made Cisco different? It came in willing to help. Officials discovered Ciscos expertise to be invaluable and, were they do to this again, said they would rely more on the companys advice to avoid mistakes made by decision-makers who didnt understand what they were doing.

Among those mistakes: not pushing for more hardware sooner. Shortages were an ongoing issue as the unnamed hardware services vendor that provisioned the PCs couldnt handle the load. That led to delays in equipping everyone as needed. The obvious lesson: make sure a vendor can handle the provisioning load needed for success.

Wi-Fi, mesh networks and distributed phone systems

In Colorado, one school had a unique problem: its students were spread over 411 square miles, many in areas not even covered by cellular towers. So officials set up regional outdoor Wi-Fi access points to provide those students with broadband access. And they did it in just 10 days.

That led to a different issue: the number of WebEx meetings quickly jumped from a few a day to thousands. In preparation for the next crisis, school officials are putting in place a large-scale wireless mesh network to reach all students while keeping network loading manageable.

With everyone suddenly working from home, telephone systems had to be switched so that inbound calls could go to receptionists working from home and then be forwarded to the homes of whomever the callers were trying to reach. This helped streamline the communications between parents and students and school officials.

Pop-up classes

Sometimes, solutions dont need to rely solely on technology. Students wanted in-person instruction and were feeling depressed and isolated, so Colorado officials set up occasional outdoor classes when the weather permitted. This allowed for needed facetime with students and was far safer than in-class sessions.

As a side note, according to Michelle Bourgeois, the CTO for the St. Vrain Valley School District, many teachers elected to keep working from home because they were more effective. That mirrors much of what has happened in the business world as employees who got used to remote working last year are eager to continue doing it this year and next.

Cybersecurity

Not surprisingly Colorado school officials were concerned about cybersecurity, fearing that a successful attack could have derailed the entire effort. As a result, they wound up using the Cisco Umbrella security software, which had little IT admin overhead and proved successful during the remote schooling pivot. The system covered both the network and PCs in the home.

Wrapping up

After hearing how these two school officials had maneuvered last year to keep schools up and running  one who had his state funding yank and the other who had students spread out over hundreds of miles  I was sorry the presentation wasnt public. Both deserved a standing ovation for the fantastic work they did.

As for the lessons learned, they generally apply to companies as well as school districts: pre-train staffers to deal with the new remote environment, picking vendors with experience, focus on solveing the problem rather than selling stuff, understand the issues facing students, and craft an equally unique solution. Anticipate shortages, choose service providers that can appropriately scale, prioritize security, and find a way to give students face -to-face time safely.

If everyone begins planning for the next pandemic now and learns these lessons, well have a far easier time shifting to home learning (and work from home) next time. And,rest assured.
100%

Website air-shots.ch uses latest and advanced technologies like: JQuery. It supports HTTPS and GZIP compression. The main html page has a size of 332101 bytes (324.32 kb uncompressed) and 34087 bytes (33.29 kb compressed).

This CoolSocial report was updated on 2021-01-23, you can refresh this analysis whenever you want.
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Website lowellsun.com uses latest and advanced technologies like: JQuery. It is very popular on the web, it's within the 1 million most visited websites of the world at position 168647 by Alexa. It supports HTTPS and GZIP compression. The main html page has a size of 242574 bytes (236.89 kb uncompressed) and 44350 bytes (43.31 kb compressed).

This CoolSocial report was updated on 2021-03-28, you can refresh this analysis whenever you want.
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Website useetv.com uses latest and advanced technologies like: Boostrap. It is very popular on the web, it's within the 1 million most visited websites of the world at position 51356 by Alexa. It supports HTTPS. The main html page has a size of 286948 bytes (280.22 kb uncompressed).

This CoolSocial report was updated on 2021-04-15, you can refresh this analysis whenever you want.
Corsicana, TX (75110)

Today

Partly cloudy with afternoon showers or thunderstorms. High 88F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 50%..

Tonight

Scattered thunderstorms this evening, then cloudy with rain likely late. Low 74F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 70%.
Fluorescent labeling was used to visualize calcium released from cellular stores as they signaled or moved from one cell to the next through gap junctions.

In vitro, calcium was shown to spread a given distance in 8 sec without treatment. With the MossCellTec Aloe ingredient, the same distance was traversed in 1 sec.

Based on the protonema formed during the early stages of Aloina aloides (aloe moss) development, a culture extract was derived for the reproducible, sustainable and scalable production of this resource.

Mosses absorb water directly from the air into their leaves. They can absorb up to 30x [their weight in water]." -Beata Hurst, Mibelle Biochemistry AG

Inspired by the meditative practice of forest bathing, Mibelle Biochemistry AG has tapped into the ancient water-retaining capabilities of Aloina aloides (aloe moss) to cultivate a sustainable skin care ingredient demonstrating novel activity: harmonizing skins moisture flow.

The ingredient, MossCellTec Aloe (INCI: Xylitol (and) Caprylyl Glycol (and) Ketoglutaric Acid (and) Water (Aqua)) was launched during the companys 30-year Cyber Celebration, held on June 17, 2021.

See related: Mibelle Biochemistry's MossCellTec No. 1

Forest Bathing and Moss Muse

Sharing the inspiration for MossCellTec Aloe was Beata Hurst, head of sales for Mibelle Biochemistry AG in South Africa, Canada and German-speaking regions. MossCellTec is a contemporary ingredient that fits with the current trend for forest bathing, she said, explaining that by 2050, two-thirds of the population will live in cities, placing a heavier emphasis on reconnecting with nature. Spending time in nature is a growing need, and this trend reflects that.

Hurst described forest bathing as more than a walk in the woods. It is taking in, with all your senses, the forest atmosphere. It is  a conscious and contemplative mindseta mobile meditation. She added is it a type of therapy in regions including Japan, where the practice was coined as Shinrin-yoku by the Japanese Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries. This practice also fits alongside the current market drivers for health, well-being and well-aging.

See related: I'm Outside Launches Forest Bathing in a Bottle

The woods and nature led to moss as a source for the MossCellTec Aloe ingredient. Mosses were among the first plants to grow on dry land some 470 million years ago, Hurst explained. Mosses absorb water directly from the air into their leaves. They can absorb up to 30x [their weight in water], she added, highlighting this water regulation function, tolerance for dry conditions and fast rehydration response once water becomes available.

Based on the protonema formed during the early stages of Aloina aloides (aloe moss) development, a culture extract was derived for the reproducible, sustainable and scalable production of this resource. The approach utilized requires only a small quantity of plant, no land is needed and no wastewater is produced. The material is cultivated in sterile bags that, once full, are harvested, filtered, cold-pressed and extracted again to form a concentrate. The method uses little amounts of plant material, said Hurst. And the ingredient is not dependent on seasons. It also produces the same quality [of ingredient], completely free of pollutants and pesticides.

Mechanism of Action: Harmonizing Skin Moisture

Following Hurst, Franziska Wandrey, Ph.D., head of research for Mibelle Biochemistry explained the ingredients mechanism of action. She started with some biology basics. Connexins are proteins that form a ring of six in the membrane of a cell [such as keratinocytes], and when two cell membranes come together and both of them have a connexin ring, they form a gap junction that is basically a channel that allows the transport of materials between those two cells. She added that this channel is important for water exchange as well as signaling molecules and ions to flow between cells to synchronize their response to the environment.

As cells age, they communicate less effectively through these gap junctions. This is where MossCellTec Aloe steps in: to improve cellular communication through the gap junctions. This is reflected by an even distribution of skin moisture, reduced wrinkles and increased skin elasticity. The company developed a novel in vitro assay to test these effects, in brief by culturing keratinocytes and adding adenosine triphosphate (ATP) to initiate signaling between cells. Fluorescent labeling was then used to visualize calcium released from cellular stores as they signaled or moved from one cell to the next through gap junctions.

These calcium waves can be measured in terms of speed and intensity, as well as in the presence or absence of the moss active. In vitro, calcium was shown to spread a given distance in 8 sec without treatment. With the MossCellTec Aloe ingredient, the same distance was traversed in 1 sec. Furthermore, cells were treated with glyoxal to artificially age them and in the presence of the active, the signaling intensity was significantly improved.

Next, in vivo, 43 subjects with signs of aging such as crows feet wrinkles were treated with a 2% MossCellTec Aloe cream or a placebo twice daily for 28 days. Parameters measured included elasticity, wrinkle volume/depth, skin hydration and hydration homogeneityacross 53 points on the face. Combined hydration mapping across subjects in each test group revealed a 14% improvement in hydration evenness after just 14 days and 20% improvement after 28 days. General skin hydration also was improved.

Hurst concluded the ingredient clearly demonstrates efficacy for moisturizing and balancing formulas, as well as holistic well-being concepts, healthy aging and spa/wellness formulas. She added, It [also] is based on fascinating story of moss and clever water management. Finally, he highlighted the new claim for harmonizing the moisture flow in skin, based on convincing efficacy, as well as the ingredients 100% natural and sustainable status, meeting the global well-being and healthy aging trends.
If the first Cold War was best encapsulated by the most powerful men on the planet passive aggressively bitching in a fake kitchen in front of a hollering crowd, the "new" Cold War would be better understood through the prism of a fake Italian fast-food company's ad campaign from the mid-nineties. If you want to know about recent history, don't peruse the state archives, look at a hoarder's VHS collection.

As Cold War tensions wound down, the "pizza war" had only just dawned. American pizzeria company Pizza Hut hired the services of advertising firm BBDO to keep up with the likes of Domino's Pizza and Little Caesars.

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In 1996, following the collapsed USSR, the distinguished former USSR leader Mikhail Gorbachev lost his presidential election bid, Russians preferring their drunk uncle to a Nobel Prize laureate. Gorbachev's storied career was dead. To his horror, Gorbachev's 4,000-ruble-a-month pension was rendered worthless, about $2.28 a month due to inflation. Gorbachev's earlier reforms allowed for more freedom of press, private enterprise, and an opening up of the nation to outsiders. Broke and having opened the door for fast food chains to make inroads, the man who was once the face of communism found no recourse but to whore himself in the name of Pizza Hut in 1997:
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Not that even meth was strong enough for what Hitler wanted his soldiers to achieve. In 1944, Nazi scientists developed a one-man submarine designed to launch surprise attacks on Allied ports. But getting there would require the single crewman to stay awake for days. So they also developed an extremely powerful cocaine chewing gum capable of keeping a sailor twitching with energy the whole way. Unsurprisingly, spending days doing cocaine in a tiny suicide submarine caused many of them to have massive mental breakdowns, veering wildly off course as they clawed at the metal walls. Even they had it better than the concentration camp prisoners who were ordered to test the gum by walking around a circular track until they collapsed near death from exhaustion.

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The really surprising thing is that there were any drugs left for the army after the Nazi top brass got through with them. Hermann Goering, in particular, was captured at the end of the war desperately dragging around a suitcase of 20,000 codeine pills, of which he popped 20 a day. Meanwhile, Hitler, who prided himself on his healthy lifestyle, was secretly completely dependent on a shady doctor named Theo Morell. Despite being named like a mushroom, Dr. Morell preferred a cocktail of steroids and opiates, as well as large doses of oxycodone. After an assassination attempt in 1944, doctors also started giving Hitler regular cocaine injections. Because this was a time when good medical advice was just going "losing a world war? Have you tried doing speedballs about it?" It's even been suggested that Hitler's erratic behavior in the final months of the war was down to withdrawals after the Allies bombed German drug factories.

Brazilian National Archives Curiously, when the Allies reached the bunker they found all the copper stripped out of the walls.

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As good friends, the Germans naturally shared their drugs with their allies, meaning that Finnish troops were also issued Pervitin at this time, although they were reportedly somewhat less enthusiastic about using it. Which brings us back to Aimo Koivunen, who found himself stranded in Lappland, out of food, out of options, and worst of all, out of meth.
Anna Mae Wilson-Welborn, 86, of Crossville, passed away at her home surrounded by her family on Monday, June 28, 2021. She was born July 11, 1934, in Spencer, TN, daughter of the late Floyd Stanton Dodson and Annie (Lawson) Dodson. Anna worked as a seamstress and was of the Baptist faith. Sh
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For many overdose victims, the gateway drug was OxyContin

In the past 25 years, Purdue Pharmas OxyContin has played a devastating role in the countrys epidemic of opioid addiction and overdoses, according to lawsuits and victims families.
ANSONIA - Now that Juneteenth is a federal holiday, organizers of Saturdays celebration at Gatison Park hope this will lead to increased city resources for future ceremonies.

Valley Save Our Youth and the MLK Committee will be hosting the event starting at 2 p.m.

According to Valley Save Our Youth, the event will have live music, food vendors, and guest speakers. Organizers said this year will focus on African American-owned small businesses, as opposed to last year which the organization said was more of a conversation with local police.

Iris Carotenuto, co-founder of Valley Save Our Youth, said that the holiday would be a great way for residents to get to know their neighbors and emphasized all residents are welcome.

We're going to hear some speakers, but we're also talking to people and residents and trying to bring our community together, Carotenuto said.

Juneteenth is a holiday that celebrates the emancipation of enslaved African Americans in Texas more than a month after the end of the Civil War. The Emancipation Proclamation freed African Americans in 1863. But many African Americans were still enslaved in areas controlled by the Confederacy up until and even after the very end of the war.

Maliqa Mosley-Williams, chairperson of the MLK Committee, said since President Joe Biden signed into law this week the acknowledgment of Juneteenth as a federal holiday, she hopes that this will lead to bigger celebrations going forward.

Im hoping now that Juneteenth is officially a federal holiday, that the city will begin to promote the continuation of these celebrations while helping to make them bigger and better each year, Mosley-Williams said.

Mayor David Cassetti said that the city is now taking steps to celebrate it next year.

I've already directed my CFO and my staff to prepare putting another holiday for our employees to have a day off on that day, which probably will be Monday of next year, Cassetti said.

He will also be in attendance tomorrow along with Fourth Ward alderwoman Diane Stroman.

Carotenuto said that she hopes it will also help African American-owned businesses in the area by raising their profiles at the event. She said the mood at the event will be joyful.

COVID, Carotenuto said, made for a limited ceremony last year.

This is more interaction and free from COVID. And we're going to eat and we're going to dance and we're going to laugh, she said.
BRIDGEPORT  A local man was wounded after reportedly being caught in a gang-related shooting involving his teenaged son, police said.

On Friday morning, police said they arrested one of the shooters, an alleged member of the Green Hollow Boyz gang.

Jadarius Jackson, 20, of Norman Street, was charged with first-degree assault, illegally firing a firearm, conspiracy to commit first-degree assault, risk of injury to a child, reckless endangerment, and possession of a firearm without a permit.

Jackson, who was arrested last December in New Haven on gun charges, was served with the new arrest warrant at the Golden Hill Street courthouse.

During Jacksons arraignment Friday afternoon, Assistant States Attorney Felicia Valentino urged Superior Court Judge Kevin Doyle to set a high bond.

Jacksons lawyer, Assistant Public Defender Mike Paris, argued that his client is already being held on a high bond for the New Haven case.

The judge agreed with the prosecutor and ordered Jackson held in lieu of $300,000 bond. He continued the case to July 20.

Shortly after noon on Nov. 4, 2020, police said a local man was walking along State Street with his three children when he heard gunshots and realized he had been shot in the left hand.

Police said witnesses told officers they had seen two men, wearing black hoodies, fleeing the scene after the shooting. The victim was taken to Bridgeport Hospital for the hand wound.

Police said surveillance video in the area showed two men in hoodies fleeing to a dark-colored Hyundai sedan. They said witnesses identified the owner of the car as a member of the Green Hollow Boyz, a gang operating out of the Greene Homes housing project.

Police said they checked video surveillance of the housing project and spotted Jackson walking from the car parked in a parking lot at the project. Police said they then checked surveillance video from Nov. 4, 2020 and saw Jackson and three other men get into the Hyundai. Other video surveillance tracked the car as it drove to the area of State Street, passing the shooting victim and his family before parking a short distance away, police said.

Video then showed two men in dark hoodies leave the Hyundai and fire guns in the direction of the victim and his family, police said. They then fled in the Hyundai.

Police said they subsequently arrested a juvenile male who they allege to have taken part in the shooting.

Police said the juvenile told them that the victims teenaged son had actually been the target. The juvenile told them the teen had previously made disparaging remarks about the cousin of the juvenile who had been murdered in January 2020, police said.

Police said they subsequently recovered a .40-caliber handgun from the juveniles home that had been used in the shooting.

Police said they are seeking two other men who were involved in the shooting.
U.S. Catholic bishops overwhelmingly approved the drafting of a teaching document that many of them hope will rebuke Catholic politicians, including President Joe Biden, for receiving Communion despite their support for abortion rights.

The decision, vehemently opposed by a minority of bishops, came despite appeals from the Vatican for a more cautious and collegial approach to the divisive issue. And it raises questions of how closely the bishops will be able to cooperate with the Biden administration on issues such as immigration and racial injustice.

The result of the vote  168 in favor and 55 against  was announced Friday near the end of a three-day meeting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops that was held virtually. The bishops had cast their votes privately on Thursday after several hours of impassioned debate.

Supporters of the measure said a strong rebuke of Biden is needed because of his recent actions protecting and expanding abortion access, while opponents warned that such action would portray the bishops as a partisan force during a time of bitter political divisions across the country.

As a result of the vote, the USCCBs doctrine committee will draft a statement on the meaning of Communion in the life of the church that will be submitted for consideration at a future meeting, probably an in-person gathering in November. To be formally adopted, the document would need support of two-thirds of the bishops.

One section of the document is intended to include a specific admonition to Catholic politicians and other public figures who disobey church teaching on abortion and other core doctrinal issues.

Bishop Donald Hying of Madison, Wisconsin, said during Thursdays debate that he speaks with many people who are confused by a Catholic president who advances the most radical pro-abortion agenda in history, and action from the bishops conference is needed.

Theyre looking for direction, Hying said.

Bishop Robert McElroy of San Diego countered that the USCCB would suffer destructive consequences from a document targeting Catholic politicians.

It would be impossible to prevent the weaponization of the Eucharist, McElroy said. He warned that the initiative would weaken the bishops ability to speak on issues such as poverty, racism and the environment.

Biden, who attends Mass regularly, says he personally opposes abortion but doesnt think he should impose that position on Americans who feel otherwise. Hes taken several executive actions during his presidency that were hailed by abortion-rights advocates.

During a White House event on the COVID-19 pandemic Friday, Biden was asked about the possibility that the bishops would approve a document suggesting that his abortion stance should disqualify him from receiving Communion.

Thats a private matter, and I dont think thats going to happen," the president said without elaborating.

The chairman of the USCCB doctrine committee, Bishop Kevin Rhoades of Fort Wayne-South Bend, Indiana, said no decisions have been made on the final contents of the proposed document. He said bishops who are not on the committee will have chances to offer input, and the final draft will be subject to amendments before it is put up to a vote.

Rhoades also said the document would not mention Biden or other individuals by name and would offer guidelines rather than imposing a mandatory national policy.

That would leave decisions about Communion for specific churchgoers up to individual bishops and archbishops. Cardinal Wilton Gregory, the archbishop of Washington, has made clear that Biden is welcome to receive Communion at churches in the archdiocese.

Gregory was one of nearly 70 bishops who signed a letter to USCCB president and Los Angeles Archbishop Jose Gomez urging him to delay the Communion discussion until the bishops convene in person, but that request was not granted.

The choice before us at this moment," Gregory said during Thursday's debate, "is either we pursue a path of strengthening unity among ourselves or settle for creating a document that will not bring unity but may very well further damage it.

The USCCB has identified the fight against abortion as its preeminent priority. But the bishops collective stance is at odds with the views of many Catholics in the U.S.

In recent polls by the Pew Research Center, about 56% of U.S. Catholics surveyed said abortion should be legal in most or all cases, and 67% said Biden should be allowed to receive Communion during Mass.

On the latter issue, Pew found a sharp partisan divide: 55% of Catholics who identify with the Republican Party said Bidens abortion stance should disqualify him from Communion, compared with 11% of Catholics who lean Democratic.

Sixty Catholic Democratic members of the House of Representatives issued a statement Friday urging the USCCB to drop any effort to exclude politicians from Communion over the abortion issue, and calling it contradictory.

No elected officials have been threatened with being denied the Eucharist as they support and have supported (other) policies contrary to the church teachings," the statement said, "including supporting the death penalty, separating migrant children from their parents, denying asylum to those seeking safety in the United States.

David Campbell, a political science professor at the University of Notre Dame, said the bishops' vote reflects the fact that the same fault lines dividing all American voters also divide American Catholics  and Catholic leaders.

The more attention the bishops focus on the Communion question, the more the church will be perceived as being in the political fray, which risks driving some Catholics away, Campbell said via email.

___

Associated Press religion coverage receives support from the Lilly Endowment through The Conversation U.S. The AP is solely responsible for this content.
Brian A. Pounds / Hearst Connecticut Media

In January, Sen. Martin Looney introduced a bill proposing an act concerning a three-tiered grants in lieu of taxes program. Proposed Bill 170, co-sponsored by Sen. Gary Winfield and Reps. Robyn Porter and Patricia Dillon of New Haven and supported by Rep. Toni Walker, co-chair of the Appropriations Committee, New Haven Mayor Justin Elicker, Hartford Mayor Luke Bronin, the chair of the Connecticut Conference of Municipalities, and many others, was only one paragraph in length. But if approved by the House of Representatives and the Senate and signed into law, it would remedy one of the glaring shortcomings in the states chronically underfunded PILOT (payments in lieu of taxes) program and dramatically improve the fiscal situation of New Haven and other cities in the state that are severely stressed in part because they have large amounts of tax-exempt property.

Under the existing PILOT program, the secretary of the Office of Policy Management determines each year the amount payable, as a state grant in lieu of taxes, to each municipality in which there is property owned by the state, colleges and hospitals. The existing legislation stipulates that the grant will provide a municipality 100 percent of the property taxes that would be paid, if there were no exemption, for a state correctional facility or juvenile detention center, 45 percent of the property taxes that would be paid for all other state-owned property as well as municipally owned airports, and 77 per cent of the property taxes that would be paid for property owned by colleges and hospitals. But the program has been significantly underfunded in recent years. As a result, Hartford, New Haven and indeed all municipalities typically receive only 20 to 30 percent of what they would receive if the program were fully funded.
There are many complex policy problems that the U.S. urgently needs to address, from tackling the existential threat of climate change to improving access to health care. But theres one overarching obstacle standing in the way: legislative gridlock, money in politics and special interests blocking meaningful reform.

That could change if our federal lawmakers pass the For The People Act, the most impactful anti-corruption and pro-voter legislation in 50 years. Among other worthy reforms, the bill would ban gerrymandering, improve voter access, and curb the influence of billionaires and Super PACs on our elections. The For The People Act has already passed the U.S. House of Representatives, and now needs to get through the Senate before President Biden can sign it into law.

According to many recent polls, The For The People Act has overwhelming bipartisan support among voters, despite all the partisan noise in Washington, D.C. This is true in both red states and blue states, and among Trump voters and Biden voters. When you consider the measures in the bill, its not hard to see why. We all want voting to be easy, accessible and secure; we want politicians to represent us, not just wealthy and powerful people and PACs; and we want our government to function.

So why hasnt it passed? Why are some legislators reluctant to carry out the will of the people?

Because the For The People Act threatens to upend the political system that has allowed dark money and special interests to pick and choose our countrys legislative agenda and secured politicians their seats in Congress.

Americans feel like the system is rigged against them. This level of distrust makes us vulnerable to conspiracy theories and suspicious of our leaders, science and facts. Our election system and the checks and balances to assure a peaceful transfer of power barely held, by a thread, just four months ago. As we grapple with tackling so many of the pressing issues of our day, it can be hard to prioritize esoteric and intractable-seeming causes like campaign finance reform and anti-corruption.

But prioritize it we must, for it is the broken political system that is making it impossible to advance on other issues. Imposing reform on our political process is not easy.

Direct democracy efforts around the country in the form of voter ballot initiatives can be powerful tools of reform. For example, in 2018 Florida voters passed an amendment to their state constitution restoring voting rights to those barred from voting due to a previous felony. Likewise, voters in Alaska, Oregon, Virginia and Colorado have used ballot initiatives to pass anti-gerrymandering, campaign finance, anti-corruption and embracing ranked-choice voting in recent years. Ballot measures are well suited to passing such laws which restrict the very politicians who stonewall them. However, ballot initiatives are also by their nature blunt force approaches  not well suited to solving complex public policy issues and therefore best used as a last resort when legislators wont do the will of the people.

Most Eastern states, including Connecticut, didnt benefit from the Progressive Era reform measures in the late 1800s that swept direct democracy measures into Western states constitutions. (Eastern states, concerned about the votes of immigrants in the Northern cities and freed slaves in the South, were less willing to institute measures that did the will of the masses.) So, we have to make our voices heard on why it is important to prioritize and pass the For The People Act, and shine the light on the real reasons why this bill is struggling to advance through Congress.

Connecticuts own senators, Chris Murphy and Richard Blumenthal, have already signaled they support the For The People Act. Thats great news, but we have to make it clear to them that this bill is a priority, and we cant afford to fail. Sen. Chris Murphy said it best when he called the For The People Act a down payment on better government. I hope Connecticut voters will join me in making our voices heard that this bill should be a priority, and that its something worth spending political capital on.

Aimee Hoben is a deputy general counsel at The Hartford and a volunteer with the nonprofit RepresentUs. The authors views are her own and should not be construed to represent the views of The Hartford.
Weather Alert

...The Flood Advisory continues for the following rivers in Illinois... Kankakee River near Wilmington affecting Will, Kankakee and Grundy Counties. PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS... A Flood Advisory means water levels near flood stage are imminent or may already be occurring. Water may overtop low stream banks in some areas. Persons in the advisory area should use caution and avoid flood waters. Turn around, don't drown when encountering flooded roads. Most flood deaths occur in vehicles. Additional information is available at www.weather.gov/Chicago and water.weather.gov The next statement is expected around 1145 PM CDT this evening. && ...The Flood Advisory is now in effect until early tomorrow afternoon... The Flood Advisory continues for the Kankakee River near Wilmington. * Until Saturday afternoon. * At 7:45 AM CDT Friday the stage was 5.1 feet. * Action stage is 5.0 feet. * Flood stage is 6.5 feet. * Forecast...The river is expected to fall to 3.3 feet Friday morning. * Impact...At 5.0 feet, Minor lowland flooding begins in areas immediately adjacent to the river. &&
Elizabeth City, NC (27909)

Today

Thunderstorms likely. Storms may contain strong gusty winds. High 79F. Winds SW at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%..

Tonight

Thunderstorms during the evening will give way to cloudy skies after midnight. Low around 65F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 60%.
Mr. Trevor Garrett Cobb, age 31, of Chatsworth, GA, passed away on Monday, June 28, 2021 at the Murray Medical Center. He was born May 17, 1990 in Dalton, GA. He was preceded in death by his grandparents, Ralph Wheat, Glenn and Dorothy Ann Cobb. He is survived by his son, Granger Atlas Cobb 
Michael Hein, shown at the Daily Freeman office in Kingston, N.Y., in January 2019, when he was Ulster County executive, issued a 'Ban the Box' order in 2014.
Diane Pineiro-Zucker has been a reporter at the Daily Freeman since April 2013. Pineiro-Zucker worked as a reporter in the Freemans Rhinebeck bureau in the early 1980s, left to become executive editor at Taconic Newspapers in Dutchess County.
Phyllis Ann Broughton, 92, of Ashland, passed away Tuesday, June 29, 2021 at the Hospice Care Center in Ashland. Mrs. Broughton was born March 11, 1929 in Westwood, a daughter of the late Roy Taylor and Lenora Ellington Cook. Her mother passed away at a young age and her mother's sister Lucy
Sunbury, PA (17801)

Today

Mixed clouds and sun this morning. Scattered thunderstorms developing this afternoon. High 76F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%..

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Partly cloudy skies this evening. Increasing clouds with periods of showers late. Low 56F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 40%.
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Life is getting better for students, young Dems say during forum
Diniers in West Chester will now be able to eat without worrying about noise.
As any sportsman will tell you, there are few more ill-tempered places than a losing dressing room.

Moans, groans, fruity language. Perhaps the odd boot hurled across in despair.

In extreme cases, some sensitive dear might be slumped in the corner having a good old blub.

There's a similar flavour to the Opposition benches in the Commons whenever that piping hot potato Brexit is discussed. Even now, those ardent Remainers are still moping around licking their sores, predicting plagues of locusts and all manner of biblical disruption.

Yesterday, International Trade Secretary Liz Truss came to the chamber to deliver a statement on the recent post-Brexit trade deal we've struck with Australia.

International Trade Secretary Liz Truss came to the chamber to deliver a statement on the recent post-Brexit trade deal we've struck with Australia

The Prime Minister signed the deal with his counterpart Scott Morrison this week, we are told, over a supper of Welsh lamb and lashings of Aussie plonk. (No wonder Boris seemed a bit off-colour at PMQs on Wednesday.)

Truss hailed the deal as 'truly historic'. It was a 'gold-standard agreement', she announced, which 'shows what the UK is capable of as a sovereign trading nation'.

She said this very, very sloooowly, as ever putting stress on all the wrong syllables.

Decent minister, Truss, but as a performer she's more wooden than one of Bjorn Borg's rackets. Responding for Labour was Emily Thornberry. Bruiser alert! Truss was 'talking nonsense' appar-ently. The deal was a stinker. 'Britain needs and deserves better,' Thornberry said, that tar-coated larynx of hers as husky as a saloon bar seducer's.

Particularly perplexing for Emily were some of the methods used by Australian farmers, whose meaty products would now pour into the country. These included trimming hens' beaks and branding poor cows with red hot irons.

Truss pointed out there was not a single trade deal her opponent supported

Thornbug's concern for animal welfare surprised me. Always seemed to me to have a touch of the Cruella de Vils about her.

Truss pointed out there was not a single trade deal her opponent supported. She just rubbished everything. 'The reality is that the Right Hon. Lady simply wants to stay in the EU,' she said.

Thornbug let out a high-pitched shriek of laughter, as if to say 'well of course I do, dahling' before returning to the more serious business of fiddling with her phone.

SNP corner was the usual cesspit of misery. Grumbleweed alley. They see the European Union as the land of milk and honey and thus loathe the idea of the UK flourishing outside of it.

Angus MacNeil (SNP, Na h-Eileanan an Iar) thought it a rotten deal that only suited the Aussies.

He reckoned so much celebrating would be going on in Canberra that they must be running out of the celebratory fizz. This at least prompted a few laughs.

Among the Scots Nats, Angus is a chink of sunshine in a sea of arch bores.

Some of his colleagues such as Philippa Whitford (SNP, Central Ayrshire) tried to frighten everyone with talk of Australia's low commitment to food standards.

Deeply serious creature, Dr Whitford. Not once have I ever seen her smile.

Others such as Brendan O'Hara (SNP, Argyll & Bute) fretted about 'cheap, inferior' Aussie meat flooding the market north of the border. (Do Scots actually know what's in haggis, I wonder?)

There was an acidic pop at Truss toward the end from John Cryer (Lab, Leyton and Wanstead) who reminded the House that she'd been a Remainer who then flip-flopped after the referendum.

This is true, of course. La Truss was also once a Lib Dem supporter who in her hot youth marched on Greenham Common and sang anti-Thatcher songs.

You have to admire her. She's had more reinventions than Madonna.

Later we had Business questions with Leader of the House Jacob Rees-Mogg, who was sporting a sharp new haircut.

Too sharp, perhaps. Note to the Moggy's barber: Perhaps a little less off the sides next time.

If he'd mown closer around the ears Jacob could have passed as an extra in the next series of Peaky Blinders.
CHRIS VAN TULLEKEN (pictured): Last autumn, my twin brother Xand and I were invited to Kensington Palace

Last autumn, my twin brother Xand and I were invited to Kensington Palace to meet Her Royal Highness the Duchess of Cambridge. We had been asked to launch the results of a survey about early years development.

Its a subject we knew the duchess has long been passionate about and today she is launching the Royal Foundation Centre for Early Childhood which will, I believe, transform the lives of generations of children.

Ill admit I was both flattered and curious: as qualified doctors and television personalities, it is not unusual for Xand and I to receive requests from people in the public eye to lend our voice to their campaign or deliver a piece of research.

Throughout our meeting, she not only underlined the critical lifelong impact of the early years on individuals, our economy and society at large  but her determination to change outcomes for people who, for whatever reason, do not get the start in life they deserve.

If youre reading this you may think you know the importance of early years development.

The duchess has long been passionate about early years development and today she is launching the Royal Foundation Centre for Early Childhood

Yet what the survey undertaken by the duchess lays bare is that most of us have very little idea about how vital those early years are to our future well-being.

Fewer than a quarter of people, for example, believed that the first five years is crucial to future happiness and health, while two-thirds were not aware of the staggering brain development that goes on between conception to the age of two.

This all despite the science, which shows us that by the age of two our brain is already 80 per cent of its adult weight, making the trillions of critical connections, which are informed by their earliest environment and experiences.

If you are lucky  like Xand and I were  those experiences are happy and positive, acting like nutrients for that developing brain. But sadly, that isnt the case for every child.

I write that with no judgment. As the father of two young children aged one and four, I know that becoming a parent is challenging, even in a position of privilege, as I am. I have a loving relationship and a regular salary yet I still find it hard.

The duchess, too, has been candid about the challenges of raising young children.

he Duchess of Cambridge has been candid about the challenges of raising young children

So we can only imagine what it is like for those who are struggling and unsupported, and whose problems have now been exacerbated by the coronavirus pandemic.

What is now all too clear are the staggering consequences of those problems and its toll on society  a toll for which we now have a clear statistic.

Some 16.13billion is what lack of investment in early childhood costs us in terms of the short and long-term mental and physical health problems that blight so many lives.

And this doesnt include social issues like addiction, homelessness and family breakdown.

Thats five times the annual spend in England on early education and childcare, and 44 times the annual expenditure on healthcare for mothers around birth.

Whatever side of the political fence you are sitting on, it is clear that this issue makes no economic sense whatsoever.

In many ways, this is the duchesss starting point  that investing in our children is an investment that ultimately benefits every single person in the UK today.

It will not be easy and it will not happen overnight, but her commitment to helping to transform our society for generations to come is something the duchess made very clear. She sees it as her lifetimes work.

And I, in turn, believe that the launch of her centre will be viewed, in time, as a milestone moment in this country.
Enid Blyton (pictured) gave us the Famous Five and the Secret Seven

God help us all, what have the idiotic warriors of wokery been up to now? Such was my immediate thought when I read yesterday's headlines, proclaiming that English Heritage, the blue plaque people, had 'cancelled' Enid Blyton on account of her racism, xenophobia, sexism and homophobia.

Like millions of my generation all over the world, I was brought up on the adventures of the Famous Five and the Secret Seven (Malory Towers, Blyton's tales of a girls' boarding school, was too sissy for my taste). To this day, the very cover illustrations of Blyton's books evoke the happiness of my 1950s childhood more vividly than any concrete memories of my life as I actually experienced it.

Never mind that we lived in central London for the first ten years of my existence. I was that boy in the shorts, rowing out to the mysterious wreck on Treasure Island. I was there in the cave at Smuggler's Top, eavesdropping on the villains with my fellow gang members.

Life for me in the 1950s, as I look back through my rose-tinted spectacles from this distance of six decades, was an endless series of happy holidays by the seaside, picnics in sun-dappled forests and fun, fun, fun.

Such was the captivating appeal of Blyton's books that their spirit has stayed with me ever since, supplanting some of the harsher realities of those post-war years when austerity really did mean austerity, even for a comparatively privileged middle-class boy like me.

Burned

But oh, no, say the woke warriors of the modern age. I should not have enjoyed Blyton's immensely popular stories for what they appeared to be  harmless, escapist adventures to fire a child's imagination and instil a habit of reading. Had I been properly educated, they say, I would have been alert to one or two thoroughly offensive characteristics of her work.

Some of today's self-appointed guardians of correct thinking are so shocked by Blyton's outdated attitudes that they have cleared school libraries of her books. Others say that no parent should ever allow a child to read anything she has written, while extremist enthusiasts for the cancel culture have argued that all her output should be burned and never reprinted.

TOM UTLEY: 'To this day, the very cover illustrations of Blyton's books evoke the happiness of my 1950s childhood more vividly than any concrete memories of my life as I actually experienced it.' Pictured: The Famous Five (left) and Malory Towers (right)

So my heart sank when I read yesterday's headlines suggesting that English Heritage, supposedly the custodians of the nation's past, had joined the massed ranks of pusillanimous institutions which have kowtowed to the statue-topplers, knee-takers and history re-writers of the Black Lives Matter movement. It was only when I read further that I began to change my mind.

Now, I know that what I have to say will enrage many readers who shared my childhood delight in reading Enid Blyton's stories and, like me, find most manifestations of wokery profoundly irritating.

Some, indeed, have declared that they will cancel their membership of English Heritage, just as so many stopped their subscriptions to the National Trust when it bowed to BLM by vilifying many of its most generous donors. Others say its public funding  169 million since its foundation, and counting  should be cut off.

But hang on. The more I think about the quango's behaviour, the more I wonder what all the fuss is about. After all, what has it actually done that so many believe to be so very wrong? One thing it has not done, I'm pleased to report, is pull down its blue plaque marking the house in Chessington, Greater London, where Blyton began her writing career when she lived there as a governess from 1920 to 1924. That would have been insufferably annoying  and quite impossible to justify.

Blue plaques, after all, do not imply approval of the people named on them, but merely mark the places where famous or otherwise influential people lived or worked. Saints and sinners alike are awarded them  and nobody should object to that.

No, all that English Heritage has done is add two paragraphs to its online notes about Blyton, which are intended for those who are interested to know more about the people named on their plaques, beyond the bald fact of where they lived.

Tom Utley asks: But what's so wrong with saying Blyton stoked controversy?

Offensively

Headed 'Racism in Blyton's Work', the addition begins: 'Blyton's work has been criticised during her lifetime and after for its racism, xenophobia and lack of literary merit.' All perfectly true. Her work has long been so attacked.

It goes on: 'A 1966 Guardian article noted the racism of The Little Black Doll (1966), in which the doll of the title, Sambo, is only accepted by its owner once his 'ugly black face' is washed 'clean' by the rain.'

True again. The Guardian did draw attention to that passage, which was quite obviously offensively racist  and not just by today's standards.

The website is also accurate in pointing out that in 1960, the publisher Macmillan refused to publish Blyton's story The Mystery That Never Was for what it called its 'faint but unattractive touch of old-fashioned xenophobia'. And it is right again when it records that in 2016, Blyton was rejected by the Royal Mint for commemoration on a 50p coin because, the advisory committee minutes record, she was 'a racist, sexist homophobe and not a very well-regarded writer'.

In conclusion of its potted biography, English Heritage notes, with equal truth: 'Others have argued that while these charges can't be dismissed, her work still played a vital role in encouraging a generation of children to read.'

I repeat: What's so wrong about this?

True, the quango's decision to add those paragraphs, written from a distinctly modern perspective, carries a strong whiff of Leftish kowtowing to BLM. It could also be argued that by devoting two out of a mere seven paragraphs of a potted biography to repeating attacks on Blyton, EH gives undue weight to the minus side.

Nor is there any mistaking the lofty sneer behind those two disparaging references to Blyton's literary merit. Come along, guys, she may not have been Shakespeare or Tolstoy. But her books have sold more than 600 million copies in 90 languages  with millions more flying off the shelves every year (though often in clunkily sanitised versions for today's market). She must have had something, do admit.

Queasy

As countless others like me can testify, what she had was magic. Though her plots may have been unsophisticated, and her characters less than subtly drawn, she had an extraordinary gift for keeping the young gripped. Whether the Left likes it or not, children throughout the world, of every colour and background, can't get enough of Blyton's thrilling but safe, idyllic middle-class world, in which virtue is always rewarded and the goodies never fail to triumph over the baddies.

All that said, however, much of what she wrote makes exceedingly queasy reading today. Her villains  among them 'gypsies' and 'tinkers'  tend to have swarthy skin and foreign accents. Her mothers do all the housework, while the fathers do the important jobs. That's not to mention the names of some of her characters  the imp called 'Chinky' or the black dolls in The Three Golliwogs, named 'Golly', 'Wolly' and the N-word.

I can't pretend to have noticed these offences against the feelings of minorities when I was reading the books in my childhood. Nor do I believe that any child today is seriously likely to be turned into a sexist, racist brute by reading them now.

Yet it's surely not unreasonable to argue that no potted biography of Enid Blyton would be complete without pointing out that some of her extraordinarily prolific writing raised serious disquiet during her lifetime, while her attitude to race leaves a particularly nasty taste today.

So, no, I will not join the chorus of the quango's critics, who say this is yet another example of 'political correctness gone mad'. The blue plaque is staying up. Blyton's huge popularity with children is acknowledged, along with her promotion of literacy, with no attempt made to airbrush her out of history.

All that has happened is that EH has offered a little more information about the woman behind the plaque, in keeping with its mission to 'retain and explain'. Isn't this a rare instance of political correctness gone moderately sensible, for a change?
At first I assumed it was a mistake. I had emailed my NHS Trust to change a hospital appointment and theyd emailed back with a date for next January. Seven months to wait for an appointment that would probably take 15 minutes? I phoned to query it.

The woman in the booking team gave an almost audible shrug. The only chance of an earlier appointment was if someone cancelled.

How would I know about it? Youll have to check, she said.

A study published in the British Journal of Anaesthesia showed there were 1.6 million fewer operations carried out in hospitals and England and Wales because of the pandemic last year

So I should phone every day or maybe every hour of every day just in case?

I could see the rest of my life ebbing away as I listened to a machine telling me to hold and, when I finally got through to a human, being told there had been no cancellation so Id have to phone again tomorrow. And then again into eternity . . .

Twenty-four hours later a report was published that put all this into context. Mine was an inconvenience  for others, this was a matter of life and death. Literally.

For the first time, we were presented with a real picture of what has been happening in our hospitals since Covid struck. Or, rather, what has not been happening.

In simple terms, normal service has been suspended.

A study published in the British Journal of Anaesthesia showed there were 1.6 million fewer operations carried out in hospitals and England and Wales because of the pandemic last year. Exact figures on surgical procedures are hard to come by, but thats roughly one in six.

Most will have been relatively minor procedures but many were life-changing. In some cases life-threatening.

This newspaper reported the tragic case yesterday of Adrian Rogers, who should have had surgery for his bowel cancer last April. The operation was delayed. The number of tumours in his body rose from six to 20. Mr Rogers said he felt he had been left high and dry. Four months ago he died. He was 46 years old.

The authors of the report predict that by the end of this year the number of cancelled or delayed surgical procedures will have reached 2.4 million.

Nobody can predict confidently how many more people will die as a result of that.

The co-author of the study, Tom Dobbs, put it bluntly: The interruption of surgical treatment will be felt by millions of patients for many years to come.

What we cannot know is how many more lives would have been lost to Covid if the NHS had handled the pandemic differently  perhaps giving less priority to Covid patients.

Its easy to speculate with the benefit of hindsight. Not so easy for the admissions nurse faced with a seriously ill Covid patient.

Yet we can all imagine how Mrs Rogers must have felt as millions of us stood on our doorsteps applauding the NHS while her husband was losing the battle for his life.

We can also speculate on how different things might have been had Mr Rogers been wealthy enough to go private.

We might instinctively disapprove of individual consultants taking private patients in their own time, but on what basis?

I can imagine sharp intakes of breath as I write. We pay for the NHS through our taxes. Why should we pay again?

We also pay a fortune for doctors to be trained. The minute they become consultants, they set up private practices and make us pay through the nose for what they should be doing free. Surely theyre just conning us, arent they?

Well, not in my experience theyre not.

The first time I went private was for my father. His sight had been terribly damaged when he was a child because of measles and never properly recovered.

In his early 80s he was effectively blind and I begged him to have an operation. He said he would  but only if I could find the surgeon who had operated on him years ago.

I managed to track him down, but he had retired from the NHS and was practising privately. After a consultation in Harley Street, he said he could operate but could not guarantee success. We agreed. The operation was performed at a private clinic and there was only a modest improvement to Dads sight.

The bill from the clinic came swiftly. But the bill from the surgeon never arrived.

I chased him up but he flatly refused to charge me, even though hed done two consultations and a pretty lengthy operation. It hadnt really worked, he said, so no charge.

My last foray into the private sector was when my knee gave out while I was running. I could barely walk, let alone run.

I went to see a brilliant surgeon privately who told me he only ever operated as a last resort. His treatment worked and he charged me a pittance.

But what if I had needed a new knee, I hear you say, and the bill was 8,000? Or a new hip at 12,000? Humphrys might be able to afford it. Most of us could not. Private medicine is a luxury for the rich. And thats true, but its not my point.

The former Chancellor Nigel Lawson famously said that the NHS is the closest thing the British have to a religion. Thats why politicians know theyre on to a vote-winner when they accuse governments of wanting to privatise the NHS.

Its a meaningless charge and its wrong. The highly respected Kings Fund has crunched the figures and concluded that the total spent by the NHS on private providers has remained relatively stable at 7.2 per cent.

We might instinctively disapprove of individual consultants taking private patients in their own time, but on what basis?

How could the NHS stop them  always assuming they complete their allotted hours in their hospitals? It would be like stopping teachers offering private tuition in their spare time. Most senior doctors work between 40 and 50 hours a week.

The reality is that the NHS is facing the biggest backlog of cases in its history.

The British Medical Association calculates that from April of last year to March of this year there were 3.37 million fewer elective procedures than there should have been, and more than 21 million fewer outpatient appointments. Most would have been relatively trivial but many meant important treatment being delayed, often with serious consequences.

This is a public health crisis and every doctor I have spoken to says it cannot be solved unless the NHS works more closely with the private sector.

For a start, its madness to have well-equipped operating theatres lying unused in private hospitals at weekends. There simply are not enough of them in NHS hospitals alone. And we must accept that doctors and nurses will have to be paid well to work in them.

Inevitably, though, we come up against our old friend bureaucracy. It is rampant in the NHS.

Until recently, many of our most senior doctors were refusing to work extra shifts. If they had done so, they would have been heavily penalised because of an impenetrable pension system. They would have lost more than they earned.

Another bureaucratic absurdity is the need for trained consultants to prove they are qualified to work in other health districts. Why? Isnt it one NHS?

As for our undervalued GPs, they are resigned to spending as much time filling in forms as seeing patients.

A GP friend had a formal complaint made against her when she suggested to a patient that she buy paracetamol rather than have a prescription for it. The pills would have cost her less than 1 at Boots. The cost to the NHS of the cheapest prescription is 10.

A small sum in itself but not when you multiply it by millions. And thats the problem with the NHS. Its too big and its too bureaucratic. It needs help.

I warned Gareth on penalties

So, Gareth, if you happen to be reading this and youre worried about the next big game in the Euros . . . you know how to contact me

Mixed feelings for me when Wales beat Turkey in the Euros this week.

Elation, of course, that Wales won convincingly, but Gareth Bale (right) missed a penalty and that made me very cross indeed. I remember specifically warning him not to kick the ball over the bar when I was training him as a youngster.

You didnt know I had trained the lad who was to become the richest and most successful player of his time?

To be honest, it was me and my late brother Rob, who lived next door to the Bale family in Cardiff. Gareths best friend was Robs son.

And when I say trained it was mostly just the four of us kicking a ball on the common opposite Robs house.

But who can say what effect that had on the young Bale?

So, Gareth, if you happen to be reading this and youre worried about the next big game in the Euros . . . you know how to contact me.
A Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor has gone viral for installing a crib in his lab for a graduate student who is also a new mom.

When grad student Karen Cunningham, 29, was coming back to school after having a baby, her biology lab professor Troy Littleton, 54, wanted to make things a bit easier for her  so he asked the nine other grad students to chip in on a crib where Karen could put her 10-month-old daughter Katie.

Last month, he shared a photo of the crib on Twitter, where it quickly went viral  and prompted a passionate discussion about resources for new moms.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology graduate student Karen Cunningham, 29, and her husband welcomed a baby girl named Katie last July

Troy Littleton, 54, who runs a biology lab, chipped in with Cunningham's fellow graduate students on a travel crib for the office

MIT actually offers on-campus daycare for parents, but it was shut down during the pandemic last year  which was an unwelcome surprise for Cunningham.

'It really was a little stressful to have the world shut down in the middle of our pregnancy, then give birth knowing we were going on this big adventure without all of the infrastructure we needed,' she told the Washington Post.

She and her husband, Steve, welcomed Katie into the world on July 6, and planned for Steve to be home with Katie while teaching classes online.

But sometimes, things come up  he has meetings, or she has a quick errand to run at the lab.

So Littleton enlisted Cunningham's fellow graduate students to go in on a travel crib together, and he surprised her with it when she came back.

'Usually in non-pandemic times we always have baby showers for expectant mothers and fathers where we give them gifts and we weren't able to do that with Karen because of the pandemic, so this was sort of the lab gift for Karen, 10 months later,' he told Good Morning America.

'Child care in any profession is a challenge, but in science, it can even be more challenging,' he added to the Washington Post. 'Experiments dont always fit a 9-to-5 schedule. It just made sense for Karen to bring Katie in.'

The school offers on-campus daycare, but it was closed during the pandemic

Cunningham's husband has been home with the baby, but when she returned to school, her professor had a surprise

Littleton said he was 'delighted' when Cunningham came into the lab for the first time with Katie, prompting him to share a photo on Twitter.

'My favorite new equipment purchase for the lab  a travel crib to go in my office so my graduate student can bring her 9-month old little girl to work when necessary and I get to play with her while her mom gets some work done. Win-win!!' he wrote.

His tweet went viral, earning over 117,000 likes, plus plenty of comments.

Many commenters applauded him, with one writing, 'It takes a village!' and another saying, 'This is amazing!'

Others, however, said that while the gesture was kind, the US should have parental leave laws and childcare systems in place that would render this kindness unnecessary.

Littleton told GMA that he didn't intent to 'create this large discussion about the challenges mothers face in the workplace' when he tweeted, but he is glad that it happened, 'because we need to be solving these issues, both in academia and on a broader level as well.'

Meanwhile, Cunningham is grateful to have the crib as 'backup' until Katie starts daycare in the fall.

Cunningham said it's 'great' and 'useful' as a backup plan, or when she is stopping by the lab for an errand

Littleton tweeted a photo of the crib, which earned praise on social media  but also prompted a discussion about parental leave and childcare in the US

'There's the solid, focused six to eight hours of work that you wouldn't want to bring a baby in for, but then there's the lab errands that you do here and there and that's when it's really useful,' she explained.

'I can put Katie down and just go do something quick and I can see her and talk to her and she can nap in there. It's great.'

But she agreed with those who said that parental leave and childcare need to be better handled in the US, noting that it often falls on women to make tough choices  and ends up pushing them out of certain career paths.

'What Troy has done is like a little warm spot in a mess of unaffordable child care and inadequate parental leave in our country, she added.

'I didnt know anyone whod had a baby in grad school,' she said. 'Having to make that choice is driving a lot of women out of science. I honestly felt like I was bushwhacking, but I really wanted a child.'

She continued: 'I think it's really easy to look at the systemic challenges facing parents and moms in our country  and kind of throw up your hands and be like, "Well it's huge. I can't fix that."

'But then these sort of local ways that people in positions of power can protect parents against the systemic things, like what Troy's been doing in creating a really supportive and inclusive lab, I think that does make a really big difference and it's great to have an example of that.'
There are always ideas percolating in Julia Donaldson's head, and right now she's mulling a story about legs. Most of the time, when she's staring out of the semi-basement window of the study where she creates her books, all she sees are legs; fat ones, thin ones, well-dressed and naked ones.

But when the primary school across the road finishes in the afternoons she also gets to see faces; dozens of them as the children jostle at her window to see the genius  the woman who wrote the stories they grew up reading  at work.

The smiling faces might be charming, but they can also be irritating, admits Julia, who has a child-like candour to go with her huge imagination.

'It makes it all a bit more difficult,' she sighs. 'If I stopped to wave at each of them it would only encourage them more and I'd never get any work done.'

Julia Donaldson, 72, (pictured) who is one of the world's bestselling authors, has fans including the Royal Family

Despite being one of the world's bestselling authors, with sales of 90 million books, sitting alone at her desk, thinking and writing, crossing things out and starting again, is still one of the things the 72-year-old loves doing most.

If you have a child or grandchild who grew up in the last 20 years, the chances are you'll have read at least one and probably several Julia Donaldson books to them. Her fans include everyone up to the Royal Family  Princes George and Louis and Princess Charlotte love Room On The Broom the most according to their father Prince William.

She has plenty of imitators but no rival when it comes to the runaway success of her constant inventiveness; from the clever mouse and stupid monster in The Gruffalo to the clumsy witch of Room On The Broom, the adventurous snail in The Snail And The Whale, blundering dragon Zog and her latest book about a woolly bear caterpillar who just wants to be like the others.

Parents know that when they pick up a Julia Donaldson book it will look at the world in a new way; it will be whimsical, poetic, expressive, perceptive, often moving and always have a clever ending.

It's little wonder that adaptations of her books are now a much-anticipated part of the annual BBC Christmas output.

Her readers are the most discerning of all. If a child doesn't like a book, they simply won't want to hear it again. This is why Julia shrugs off the many celebrities who have tried to knock her off her perch, the Duchess of Sussex being the latest to try her hand at a picture book.

'These books might get a lot of publicity because people are curious but editors will tell you that all the publicity in the world can't make people love something,' she says.

Julia and Axel posing with the Gruffalo

'Each book needs to be judged on its own merit but if it's not very good  some of these books really aren't  then it won't succeed.

'But I do think it makes a difference if the so-called celebrity is a writer anyway. David Walliams was best known for his comedy sketches, which he wrote and were very good, so it was quite natural for him to continue to write. His books have been very successful, others less so.'

Julia stumbled into writing picture books in a way you could imagine one of her characters tumbling into a different world.

Growing up she wanted to be an actress and in an alternate universe she'd be like her heroines Judi Dench or Helen Mirren. But she wrote her own story and it has several twists.

She grew up in an artistic house in Hampstead with her parents, sister, aunt and uncle and cat. Her father, a lecturer at the Maudsley Hospital, was crippled by polio but played the cello in string quartets while her mother sang with the local choir.

On holiday once Julia heard a woman change the lyrics to a Gilbert and Sullivan song into a satirical sketch and it became something she did at home.

'It worries me that because of Covid children haven't been allowed to sing at school,' says Julia, who still likes to write tunes for her stories.

'It's a shame that a whole generation has missed out on a year of singing songs at school. It was so important for me, and there may be children who have lost the confidence to sing.'

Julia said the Witch from Room On The Broom is the closest she has come to writing about herself. Pictured: Julia's creation

Julia's life has always been full of music. Fellow student Malcolm Donaldson, who was training to become a doctor, went busking with her in Paris and they later fell in love.

Turned down by drama school, she was making a living as a writer of ditties for children's programmes, as well as being a mother to three boys, when a publisher asked if she wanted to turn one of them, A Squash And A Squeeze, into a book.

SHE'S FINALLY MADE IT TO THE SCREEN Julia, who wanted to be an actress as a child, will make her first on-screen appearance in a TV adaptation of her work in the upcoming BBC series Princess Mirror-Belle. 'I have a cameo as a children's author  so it was a bit of a challenge!' she smiles. 'It was filmed in Scotland in a library I had actually visited, and I got to do some proper acting. I must say that now I've had a taste of it, it's not something I'd love to do. All the endless waiting around and different takes. 'I think that if you had told the teenage me that I would never play Lady Macbeth then I would have been a bit disappointed. But things happen in a roundabout way, don't they? You don't want the ending of something to ever be too predictable, do you?' Advertisement

Famously Axel Scheffler, the London-based German illustrator whose name will forever be entwined with Julia's, was the first person available to create the illustrations; if the two people who rejected the job had said yes, life might be very different for both of them and for parents around the world.

The book was mildly successful but it wasn't until six years later that they went on to have the big hit which was to change everything for her. She'd come up with the idea for The Gruffalo, loosely based on a Chinese folk tale, and sent it to publishers but no one was interested.

Julia was sure it could be a success so, unusually, approached Axel herself to do some illustrations. The book has now sold an amazing 13 million copies. And while both Julia and Axel work with others, it is their books together that retain the most magic.

She is estimated to be worth more than 30 million, although she frequently claims she isn't as rich as people think (and she's so careful with money she recycles wrapping paper).

Julia still acts, in a fashion. She and Malcolm, now a retired consultant paediatrician, Axel and whoever else they manage to rope in, often perform versions of the books in front of adoring children  she even has a room at their West Sussex home simply for the costumes and props.

This summer they're hoping to be at the Edinburgh Fringe festival alongside professional actors while her children and eight grandchildren also get in on the act. 'We're like the Von Trapp family,' she laughs.

Her Princess Mirror-Belle books, which have just been adapted for the BBC, were inspired by her eldest son Hamish, who died in 2003 aged just 25.

Like his mother, Hamish was incredibly creative and had two imaginary friends who would pop out of a mirrored lift. In Princess Mirror-Belle, a girl called Ellen discovers that the reflection in her bathroom mirror belongs to a princess called Belle.

But with Hamish's vivid imagination there was a darker side. Even as a young boy he appeared to be 'wired differently' and was excluded from school for being disruptive and aggressive.

Julia Donaldson with a sculpture of The Gruffalo in Buckinghamshire in June 2014

Aged 16 he had his first psychotic episode and a year later was diagnosed with a schizoaffective disorder. But he was frequently in trouble with the police, drinking and smoking cannabis. In 2003 he stepped in front of a train.

Julia, so ensconced in her world of dragons and mice, ducks and worms, has such an air of simple and untouched innocence that it's hard to reconcile with the tough times she's been through.

But, she says, there has been a relief in work. It allows her to compartmentalise; it's an escape, a genuine joy, as well as a job.

She doesn't write about herself  she says the closest she's come to that is with the Witch from Room On The Broom because she's similarly scatty and always losing things (on the day we chat over Zoom Malcolm keeps walking into her study bringing her things she's lost and he's just found), but if you look hard enough she is there.

She's there in the lost, storytelling fish Tiddler, in the heartbreaking story of Stick Man who can't find his way home, and there is more loss in The Paper Dolls, about a girl who has adventures with her paper dolls until a nasty boy tears them up.

Years later, with the girl now a mother, she re-creates the paper dolls for her own family.

'When I write about loss, I think I often do it subconsciously,' says Julia.

'The Paper Dolls is about bereavement, and it's sort of a bleak view, but there's this idea about handing things over to the next generation.

'There's this idea of a new beginning, but things are different. Picture books can often be frivolous but they can also be quite deep, that's what I love about them.

'I don't really like the ones that are really earnest, they can be pretty turgid. But some are seriously tear-jerking.

'Little kids do have to deal with the deaths of loved ones and I think the books that handle that best aren't saying, 'It's so sad, grandpa died' but instead show an adventure with grandpa and then the grandfather saying, 'You'll have to go back without me.'

'Picture books can be an amazing opportunity for parents and children to talk about really difficult subjects, they can be amazingly helpful.'

Julia's passion for storytelling is clear and she's enjoyed exploring her subject for the latest BBC Maestro course.

Subscribers have already had the chance to learn cookery tips from Marco Pierre White, songwriting from Gary Barlow and how to write TV scripts from Line Of Duty's Jed Mercurio. Now they could learn about children's stories from the best in the business.

Julia is enthused talking about the 27-lesson course she has created.

'I think there's a chance I may end up being eclipsed by the people who do the course,' she smiles.

'I'll be giving them lots of tips and setting exercises for them to do. Some of it is just about broadening their knowledge, other lessons are about words and rhyme.

'I think a lot of people have misunderstandings about how to get published. They think they should write a story and then get a neighbour who once won a prize for art at school to do the illustrations. But I'll be explaining how you never send things in with illustrations.

'I'll be talking about how rhyme for a book needs to be more like a song  with a verse and a chorus. Not every line has to rhyme, unless you're really, really good at it.'

Julia also talks about her writing process  starting with that percolation of ideas.

'A lot of the writing starts in my head. I don't ever sit down with a blank piece of paper and think, 'What am I going to write today?' I need not only the germ of an idea, but the whole. And that can be quite a slow process, like a seed germinating.

'It's only when I have the whole storyline in my head that I sit down. I talk about endings in the course  my editor has told me about how so many books she receives just fall flat at the end.

'You wouldn't have a joke without a punchline and only when I have the ending do I sit down to write the story.

'First, I'll grab my notebook and brainstorm. I'll write the story very roughly, put in a few rhymes and choice phrases. With Room On The Broom I had written down the phrase, 'And whoosh they were gone' and that went on to form my chorus. I'll pick out the best bits and throw the rest away.

'And that's when the blood, sweat and tears start as I try to hone down my verse and chorus and get the story just right. I like a structured story and a good ending line or a twist. A lot of time goes into writing those.'

She doesn't read aloud as she writes. The first person to recite the first draft is Malcolm. She's very keen to ensure each word is emphasised in the right way, and after that will often go back to her desk to fine tune.

Her office is full of the fruits of her labour, from versions of her books to two 'Nibbie' British Book Awards. The walls feature offcuts from Axel's work and the tablecloth was designed for an exhibition of her work.

But it's inside her head that the real work is going on. 'They say there are only seven basic stories but I think the key is to be as original as possible. Children don't want to be bored with the same thing, just as adults don't want to be.

'I don't think of myself as a rebel but there is a subversive side to my nature which comes out in my books. I like to surprise people.' And she always does.

Julia Donaldson's creative writing course, Writing Children's Picture Books, is available now on bbcmaestro.com. The Woolly Bear Caterpillar by Julia Donaldson and illustrated by Yuval Zommer (12.99, Macmillan Children's Books) is out on Thursday.
An 11-year-old boy from Montana spent months growing his hair out long enough to donate to charity.

Conor Rogers from Kalispell, Montana ultimately donated more than a foot of his blonde hair to Wigs For Kids, a nonprofit that makes custom-fitted wigs for children who have lost their hair due to illness.

The generous boy told local news station KRTV that it made him feel good to help other children in need.

Little helper: Conor Rogers from Kalispell, Montana grew his hair long and chopped of 12 inches to send to a nonprofit that makes wigs for sick children

Bright idea! He said he got the idea to donate his hair after his dad's friend did it

Conor said he was inspired to donate by a friend of his father's, who also donated his hair.

'I was just like, let's grow my hair and donate it,' he told KRTV.

While he didn't say how long it took him to grow out, hair grows about 1/2 inch per month on average  so 12 inches would take two years. And because that 12 inches would have to be uniform, it likely started at about chin length  meaning the actual growth time was several months longer.

Conor's mother, Meghan Sistok, said she is very proud of her son, particularly because he committed to sticking to his goal even after he came to like his long hair.

'He mentioned that he really likes his hair now, his sister gave him an out and said, "Well, you don't have to cut it," and even today he says, "No, I said I was going to do it and I'm going to do it,"' she said.

Color explained that helping children in need was worth it.

Sweet kid! He came to like his long hair but was committed to sharing it with the organization Wigs For Kids

'[It] feels good that like someone else that has cancer or a disorder that lost all of their hair, can they actually have hair and my hair, and it makes me feel very good,' he said

'[It] feels good that like someone else that has cancer or a disorder that lost all of their hair, can they actually have hair and my hair, and it makes me feel very good,' he said.

Wigs for Kids, an Ohio-based nonprofit operating for over 30 years, provides free hair replacement systems and support for children who have lost their hair due to chemotherapy, radiation therapy, Alopecia, Trichotillomania, burns, and other medical issues

They require a minimum of 12 inches , and hair cannot be highlighted, color-treated, or permed.

Earlier this year, the organization celebrated a four-year-old named Kate who donated her hair  following in her mother's footsteps.

And earlier this month, they spotlighted Jessica Vik, who had just donated hair for the ninth time.

'My hair is really thick and grows fast,' she said. 'I was inspired by my mother-in-law, who had cancer when her kids were little.

'She wore wigs on both stints, losing her hair due to chemo. So every couple years I get short hair, medium, and long hair This is a way I can give to those in need. I believe God has blessed me with such hair to share it with others,' she said.
An animal shelter in Ohio threw a birthday party for a 19-year-old cat who was surrendered into their care  and he got adopted the next day.

Cincinnati Animal CARE spoiled the birthday boy Sammy with a glittery cowboy hat that matched his collar and a cake on June 15, sharing photos of the bash on Facebook.

'Recently, the staff at Kitty City learned that today is senior Sammy's 19th birthday! Naturally, we threw him a birthday party!' the shelter captioned the heartwarming snapshots.

Heartwarming celebration: Cincinnati Animal CARE celebrated Sammy the cat's 19th birthday with a party on June 19

Birthday boy: The shelter shared photos from the party on Facebook, encouraging people to consider adopting the elderly cat

One birthday snap show Sammy curled up in a staffer's arms while decked out in his birthday hat and a blue gingham color. In another, the white cat is enjoying his many birthday treats.

'Happy birthday to this beautiful fella who would love a nice, quiet home to live out his golden years!' the shelter wrote. 'The only rule for adopting Sammy though? You have to throw him a 20th birthday party on 6/15/22!'

Cincinnati Animal CARE added in the comments that there was also singing on Sammy's birthday, which many appreciated.

More than 250 people commented on the post, with many wishing Sammy a happy birthday and praising the shelter for the work they do.

What a celebration: Sammy's cage was decorated, and he was even given a cake, among other birthday treats

'Happy belated Purrthday Sammy! I wish you many more sweet boy!' one person wrote, while another added: 'THAT IS SO AMAZING!!! I hope he finds a forever home with a great window to live his golden years.'

'Thank you for all you do for Sammy and all the animals there,' someone else shared. 'I pray for Sammy and all the animals there to find forever loving homes.'

After the party was over, Sammy ended up getting the best gift of all: a new home.

The shelter shared on Facebook that the beloved cat was adopted, and his story ended up inspiring the adoption of other senior cats like himself.

Looking good: The carefree cat even donned a glittery cowboy had during the celebration

Happy ending: Cincinnati Animal CARE announced after the bash that Sammy had been adopted, but his story inspired others to take home senior cats

Cincinnati Animal CARE spokesperson Ray Anderson told the HuffPost in an email on Tuesday that Sammy was 'in a loving home for many, many years,' but he ended up in the shelter after his owner went into assisted living.

Sammy's former owner was the one who told them his birthday.

Anderson said Sammy has a heart murmur and a small mass under his ear, but he is in 'pretty good shape' considering his age.

'Sammy is just amazingly sweet,' he added. '[He] likes to cuddle, likes to be held, likes to rest his head on you and was definitely soaking up all the attention [on his birthday].

'Hes a very agreeable cat, as Im sure you can tell with his spectacular hat he got to wear... Hes very observant and likes to just sit and watch whats going on.'
A woman claims she almost lost her nose and lip and has been left permanently scarred due to botched filler.

Horrified Leah Morton, 26, from Liverpool, was told by medics she was most likely going to lose the tip of her nose and the top of her lip after she developed necrosis.

The bank worker claims her nose turned white and ice-cold as the flesh began to die and rot away.

Time was crucial in saving Leah's nose and after going to A&E a few days after the procedure on April 29, Leah was eventually prescribed hyperbaric oxygen therapy to save as much of her nose as possible.

Horrified Leah Morton, 26, from Liverpool, claims she almost lost her nose and lip and has been left permanently scarred due to botched filler (pictured before)

Leah was told by medics she was most likely going to lose the tip of her nose and the top of her lip after she developed necrosis (pictured while in hospital after)

Leah says that she has had this treatment every day for the past 30 days, which has saved the shape of her nose, and down to her bottom lip, however the colour has not yet come back and her face is permanently scarred.

She has decided not to name the individual or clinic who injected the filler. Leah said she is speaking out about her experience because she wants to warn others about the dangers.

She added: 'I have had filler before in my lips, but I decided I wanted to get the treatment done to my nose because I have always hated the shape.

'So on April 29th, I went to the salon to have the procedure done. I wasn't told of any risks or repercussions, it was just injected straight into my nose.

'I went home and that evening I felt so much pain and pressure on my nose. I didn't sleep at all that night because it felt so uncomfortable and I was weirdly having nightmares that my nose was going to fall off.

Leah has had hyperbaric oxygen therapy every day for the past 30 days, which has saved the shape of her nose, and down to her bottom lip, however the colour has not yet come back and her face is permanently scarred (pictured now)

'The next day I checked my face in the mirror and the tip of my nose was pure white and ice cold to touch.

'I messaged the lady who did it for me the next day to see if this was normal and she told me she wasn't worried about it at all and it looked fine.

'But she said that if I was that worried I could go and see her friend whom she said was a nurse and she would dissolve it for me, as she was away. But she insisted I shouldn't be losing sleep over it.'

The next day Leah visited the practitioner, who was a friend of the woman who'd originally injected Leah's filler, to dissolve it in her nose because she felt sure something wasn't right.

Leah told how the procedure was excruciatingly sore, adding: 'I had never felt pain like it. I felt intense pressure up to my eyes and I was crying when she was massaging my nose to dissolve it.

Leah, pictured before, said she is speaking out about her experience because she wants to warn others about the dangers

The bank worker claims her nose turned white and ice-cold as the flesh began to die and rot away after having the filler (pictured)

'Once I had got home I was still in so much pain and there was so much pressure. It still felt blocked but I tried to get some rest because I thought that now it was dissolved it would be okay. I was so wrong.

'I woke up on Sunday morning and there were lots of little white blisters around my nose which I discovered was the start of necrosis. My nose had started to die.

Necrosis: the death of body tissue that cannot be reversed Necrosis is the death of body tissue and occurs when too little blood flows to it. It can be caused by a number of external sources including injury, infection, cancer, infarction, poisons and inflammation. Black necrotic tissue is formed when healthy tissue dies and becomes dehydrated, typically as a result of blood flow (and thus oxygen) being restricted or reduced in a part of the body. Necrosis cannot be reversed. When large areas of tissue die due to a lack of blood supply, the condition is called gangrene. Advertisement

'The white blisters were spreading by the minute and my mum and dad were desperate for me to go to A&E. I did some research on social media and I found a girl in Essex who had been through something similar.

'She told me my nose was dying and that I needed to get to a clinic in Birmingham, called the Consultant Clinic, straight away as they would be able to help me.

'I got on the motorway and I have never been more stressed. They dissolved my nose for me properly but told me that I needed to go to A&E for antibiotics and further treatments because they confirmed I had necrosis.

'A blood vessel in my nose had been blocked with the filler which had caused vascular occlusion.'

After arriving at the hospital Leah says she was told she just had a skin infection and that she could go home. However, medics from the Consultant Clinic insisted it was more serious, so Leah said she wasn't happy to go home because she feared she was going to lose her nose.

'Eventually medics agreed it was necrosis, and that they had never seen anything like this before,' she explained.

'They took a thermal image of my nose and the tip and down towards my lip was completely white, meaning no blood was getting to it. They said that they were really worried that I was going to lose the tip of my nose and my top lip if we didn't act fast.

'It felt like I was living through a nightmare. I was absolutely terrified. I am a young girl, I couldn't imagine losing my nose and lip.

After arriving at the hospital Leah says she was told she just had a skin infection and that she could go home. However, medics from the Consultant Clinic insisted it was more serious, so Leah said she wasn't happy to go home because she feared she was going to lose her nose

So far Leah has been able to keep the shape of the tip of her nose and her bottom lip, however the skin is damaged and uneven and she is not sure whether she will get any colour back

'I was then told that I needed hyperbaric oxygen therapy immediately in an attempt to save my nose as much as they could, and I have been having this treatment every day for 30 days since.

'I am currently on a break from it as it can cause blurred vision.

'I also haven't been able to go to work since any of this happened due to the treatment and my awful anxiety as a result of the ordeal.'

So far Leah has been able to keep the shape of the tip of her nose and her bottom lip, however the skin is damaged and uneven and she is not sure whether she will get any colour back.

As a result of her painful ordeal, Leah said her anxiety has been 'through the roof' and she's not been able to work

She added that while she is over the worst of it and is extremely lucky she didn't lose her nose, she is permanently scarred on her face.

Leah added: 'I'm usually a really confident girl, but I haven't wanted to leave my house at all for the past six weeks.

'My anxiety has been through the roof and I have been so stressed about everything. It has been unbearable. I would never get filler in my nose ever again. It is just not worth the risk.'

The salon was contacted for a right of reply.
Royal author Phil Dampier has slammed Prince Harry for 'running to his lawyers like a Hollywood star' after threatening BBC with legal action over reports he didn't ask the Queen about calling his daughter Lilibet.

Appearing on The Royal Beat, available on Royalty TV, the veteran royal correspondent branded the Duke of Sussex's threat of legal action against the BBC and other media outlets as 'absolutely extraordinary' - adding 'this is what worries me about him.'

'Whenever something critical appears he runs straight to his lawyer,' Phil Dampier explained. 'It's very LA. It's OK for Hollywood stars, but not to solve a family feud

'I think the BBC correctly reported what she had told her royal aide to say, which was she hadn't been asked in advance.'

Phil Dampier (pictured, right) appeared on The Royal Beat and discussed the plans for Princes William and Harry to reunite next month for the unveiling of a statue of their mother

Royal expert Phil Dampier claimed he doubts Meghan Markle will return to the UK. Pictured, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle are pictured during the Oprah Winfrey interview

Vanity Fair Royal Correspondent Katie Nicholl added: 'I think the fact that there was no Palace denial to the BBC story spoke volumes.'

At the time, senior Buckingham Palace sources told BBC royal correspondent Jonny Dymond that the Queen was 'never asked' her opinion on the couple's decision to name their new baby after her childhood nickname.

However, Harry hit back within 90 minutes of the BBC's report being published through a statement from his and Meghan's close friend Omid Scobie that insisted the Queen was the first person the Duke called after the birth of his daughter.

Mr Scobie, who wrote the bombshell Finding Freedom biography of the couple, also claimed the Sussexes would not have used the name Lilibet unless the Queen had supported the move.

Phil Dampier (pictured, second from left) discussed recent news coverage around whether Prince Harry requested permission from The Queen to call his daughter Lilibet was correctly reported and branded his reaction 'extraordinary' and more like behaviour of Hollywood star

Harry (second right) is surrounded by family at his mother's 1997 funeral. Pictured (from left): Prince Philip, Prince William, Earl Spencer, Prince Harry, Prince Charles

Sweet family nickname for Queen that inspired Harry and Meghan's name for their baby daughter Lilibet - the Queen's family nickname - was first used when Princess Elizabeth was just a toddler and unable to pronounce her own name properly. Her grandfather King George V would affectionately call her 'Lilibet' imitating her own attempts to say Elizabeth. The sweet nickname stuck and she became Lilibet to her family from then on. The Duke of Edinburgh also referred to his wife as Lilibet, writing to his mother in law after their wedding: 'Lilibet is the only 'thing' in the world which is absolutely real to me.' Harry and Meghan's new baby daughter - the Queen's 11th great-grandchild - will be known as Lili. A variation on Lily, the flower is often seen to symbolise purity, commitment, rebirth and fertility. Lili's middle name Diana honours Harry's later mother Diana, Princess of Wales. It is no surprise the couple chose to pay tribute to Diana, who died in a car crash in 1997 when Harry was just 12. Lili has been born almost a month before the princess would have celebrated her 60th birthday on July 1. Her cousin Princess Charlotte also has Diana as one of her middle names, as well as Elizabeth. She is Charlotte Elizabeth Diana. Harry and the Duke of Cambridge are due to unveil a statue of their mother at Kensington Palace on her birthday, but the arrangements have yet to be confirmed, amid a long-reported rift between the brothers. The Sussexes' tribute to the Queen is likely to be seen as an olive branch to the monarch and the rest of the family. Harry and Meghan plunged the Windsors into crisis with their Oprah Winfrey interview in March when they accused an unnamed royal of making a racist remark about their son Archie's skin tone before he was born. They also said the institution failed to help Meghan when she was suicidal. But during the televised interview with Winfrey, the Sussexes lauded the Queen. Harry spoke of his respect for his grandmother, while Meghan said: 'The Queen... has always been wonderful to me.' Advertisement

Harry, who together with wife Meghan announced they were expecting a girl during their interview with Oprah in March, took things a step further mere hours after his rebuttal of the report, threatening the BBC with legal action through law firm Schillings.

Notice of the legal action was followed by a carefully-worded statement that raised more questions than answers over whether the Queen did give permission or if the couple simply informed her of their intentions in a fait accompli.

The statement insisted that the BBC report was wholly wrong and read: 'The Duke spoke with his family in advance of the announcement, in fact his grandmother was the first family member he called.

'During that conversation, he shared their hope of naming their daughter Lilibet in her honour. Had she not been supportive, they would not have used the name.'

The BBC then amended its report though the article still says that the Queen was not asked about the name of the baby. Mr Dymond's tweets citing a Buckingham Palace source also still remain up.

The BBC report on the Palace's position and Harry's fiery reaction implies both parties believe they are telling the truth on the issue. It suggests that Harry and Meghan could have informed the Queen of Lilibet's name before taking Her Majesty's non-denial as consent.

On the other hand, the Palace briefings appear to hint that the Queen felt she was presented with the couple's decision and asked to rubber stamp it, rather than give permission.

During the Royal Beat, Phil Dampier also went on to discuss the plans for Prince William, 39, and Prince Harry, 35, to reunite next month for the unveiling of a statue of their late mother, the Princess of Wales - and say he believes Meghan Markle will 'never return to the UK.'

'I don't think William trusts Harry anymore and he is always worried that anything he says will end up in the press in two or three days' time,' he said. 'That's what he is worried about, and he needs to be cautious of what he can actually say to him.'

He added: 'My personal opinion is that Meghan will never come back to this country ever again. I might be completely wrong, but I don't think she will ever come back.'

Katie Nicholl added that The Queen is the one member of the Royal Family who may discuss how to resolve the difficult relationship between her two grandsons when they are in the UK next month.

'She is the only person who can talk to Harry in a certain way and make him see sense,' she continued.

Nicholl also spoke about the Earl and Countess of Wessex's higher profile in recent months.

'She [Sophie] has emerged as such an unsung star of The Royal Family and I think she and Edward are having a bit of a moment,' she explained. 'It is something of a royal renaissance.'

'They have worked quietly in the background for all of these years.'
Chocolate lovers are in for a treat next week after Cadbury confirmed the release of a new 'deliciously scrumptious' chocolate bar.

Cadbury Caramilk bars will be available in UK shops from Monday June 21 - after proving to be hugely popular in Australia, causing fans to hoard, ration and queue around the block to get their hands on one.

The new bar is made from a uniquely crafted golden blend of caramelised white chocolate which is sourced from 100% sustainable cocoa.

Cadbury Caramilk will cost 1.50 for a 90g bar and 0.69 for a smaller 37g bar.

Cadbury Caramilk bars will finally be widely available in UK shops from Monday, June 21 - after proving to be hugely popular in Australia

It is said to boast a unique combination of a melt-in-the-mouth golden caramel chocolate, combined with a smooth silky texture.

In Australia Caramilk chocolate causes shopping frenzies as soon as stores re-stock. Fans have even been known to flock to auction sites to get their hands on the bars.

Beatrice Berutti, Brand Manager at Mondelez, which owns Cadbury, said: 'We're excited to announce that Cadbury is launching its Cadbury Caramilk bar in the UK this summer.

'After we heard Aussie fan's reaction and their love for the Caramilk bar, we knew we had to add this popular classic to our range in a new and improved format.

Caramilk chocolate was previously only available in Australia where it still makes headlines and causes shopping frenzies as soon as stores re-stock (Australian packaging)

'I'd encourage everyone to keep their eyes peeled for the bars hitting the shelves, if it's anything like Australia, the bars will be loved by everyone!'

On the website, Cadbury says: 'Cadbury are launching in the UK Cadbury Caramilk Golden Caramel chocolate- a caramlised white chocolate.

'Enjoy the smooth golden blend of caramelised white chocolate.

'Caramilk is a Cadbury product enjoyed in other countries around the world and it's now time for the UK to taste this amazing bar.'
Princess Leonor of Spain followed in her mother's stylish footsteps as she arrived at an awards ceremony at Madrid's Zarzuela Palace alongside her family on Friday.

The teen, 15, who is the heir to the Spanish throne, joined her father King Felipe VI, 53, mother Queen Letizia, 48, and sister Princess Sofia, 14, to open the Order of Civil Merit ceremony.

Wearing a 222 blue dress from Spanish brand Vogana Collection, the royal, who will be studying in Wales from September, looked perfectly poised as she took her place next to her father during the function.

Princess Leonor's mother Queen Letizia donned a bespoke hot pink dress with nude heels, while her younger sister Princess Sofia wore a pastel-coloured summer dress with flat shoes.

Princess Leonor of Spain (pictured), 15, joined her parents King Felipe VI of Spain and Queen Letizia and sister Princess Sofia, 14, at the Order of Civil Merit ceremony at Madrid's Zarzuela Palace today

The future monarch of Spain cut a stylish figure next to her father, mother and sister at today's event in a 222 dress from Spanish brand Vogana Collection, pictured

Leonor, who will one day be Spain's monarch, looked ever the Queen-in-waiting in a knee-length blue dress which featured ruffled sleeves.

The royal paired it with nude slingback heels from Carolina Herrera the same as the ones her mother was wearing - while her shoulder-length blonde locks were styled straight, with a hair pin adding definition.

She also wore her Order of the Golden Fleece brooch pinned on her dress, which her father bestowed on her a day before her 10th birthday in 2016.

The natural beauty appeared fresh-faced with no makeup and adhered to Covid-19 guidelines by covering her face with a protective face mask.

The stylish family (pictured) stood to attention during the event at Zarzuela Palace today

Princess Leonor sat to the right of her father, while Queen Letizia and Princess Sofia, who both wore pink dresses, sat to his left side (pictured)

Queen Letizia donned a bespoke dress from Moises Nieto which she paired with the same Caroline Herrera slingback heels as daughter, Princess Leonor (pictured)

The Spanish royal family, pictured, put on a stylish display at today's function, with bespoke dresses and designer heels

Proud parents King Felipe VI and Queen Letizia could be seen exchanging conversation during the ceremony

Queen Letizia opted for a midi-length bespoke dress from Moises Nieto which was fitted at the waist and featured a boat neck collar.

The royal, whose brown locks were styled in a neat bun revealing a pair of red and green-drop earrings, also sported a ring on her left hand.

Meanwhile, her younger daughter Sofia opted for a straight dress in a lighter shade of pink, which featured a darker pink lining, and donned flat nude sandals from Carolina Herrera.

Surrounded by his daughters and his wife, King Felipe VI put on a dapper display in navy suit with a crisp white shirt and pink tie.

The ceremony, which takes place every year at the royal family's Zarzuela Palace, awards Spanish citizens with the Order of Merit in recognition of their outstanding contribution to society.

24 frontline workers were set to be awarded the honour for their work during the Covid-19 pandemic today.

Princess Leonor waited patiently for the ceremony to start. Queen Letizia and Princess Sofia wore matching dresses, pictured

Father-of-two King Felipe could be seen leaning over to speak to his wife during today's ceremony

King Felipe VI and Queen Letizia of Spain lead the way as their daughters Princess Leonor and Sofia followed close behind

King Felipe VI took his youngest daughter's hand while the royal family warmly applauded this year's ceremony attendees

Weating a bespoke designer dress and a dropped earrings, Letizia was a picture of style next to Felipe VI, who was wearing a matching tie

The reigning Spanish couple listened intently during today's ceremony, where citizens received the Order of merit in recognition of their personal commitment and social contributions
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The Duchess of Cambridge has declared 'the time for action is now' on the issue of early childhood development, describing it as the 'social equivalent of climate change'.

Kate Middleton, 39, was speaking as she gathered a panel of experts at The London School of Economics to discuss the inaugural report of her new Royal Foundation Centre for Early Childhood.

Arriving in a torrential downpour donning a chic LK Bennett pale blue dress and towering heels, Kate insisted she was not looking for a 'quick win' with her early years work, but wanted to take a 'holistic approach' to better prepare the next generation of parents.

Later the Duchess grinned as she arrived at Kensington Palace, carrying a colourful umbrella, to chat to parents in the cafe who have helped to shape her understanding of the importance of providing support for parents during the earliest years of children's lives.

Wearing her brunette tresses in loose, glossy waves, the mother-of-three sported her usual natural make-up look and two necklaces - a Spells of Love double strand beaded satellite gold chain, priced at 89, and an Astley Clarke pendant. She also wore her diamond and sapphire drop earrings which were a gift from Prince William and originally owned by his mother, the late Princess of Wales, as well as a Halcyon Days gold Maya Torque in Aquamarine bangle.

Kate said she hoped her new institution would make it 'more common to speak about emotions and feelings', enabling adults to better understand how affection affects their own behaviour. Speaking during the roundtable discussion at LSE, she stressed she was 'really excited' to launch the The Royal Foundation Centre for Early Childhood, which will drive focus on bringing to light the extraordinary impact of the early years in order to transform society for generations to come.

Kate grinned as she left Kensington Palace today, carrying a colourful umbrella, wearing her brunette tresses in loose, glossy waves as she headed to the London School of Economics

Kate arrived at the London School of Economics in towering heels, carrying an umbrella and a copy of the The Royal Foundation Centre for Early Childhood's inaugural report

The Duchess meets with a group of parents who have helped her understand the importance of providing support for parents during the earliest years of children's lives

The Duchess of Cambridge looked polished in a chic LK Bennett pale blue dress as she arrived at the London School of Economics today to kickstart her new early years initiative

Kate Middleton, 39, is launching The Royal Foundation Centre for Early Childhood, which will drive focus on bringing to light the extraordinary impact of the early years in order to transform society for generations to come

Poor Kate arrived during a torrential downpour but kept her composure as she clutched an umbrella and made her way inside

Kate spoke to parents at the Kensington Palace cafe who have helped to shape her understanding of the importance of providing support for parents during the earliest years of children's lives

Wearing her brunette tresses in loose, glossy waves, the Duchess sported her usual natural make-up look and two necklaces - a Spells of Love double strand beaded satellite gold chain, priced at 89, and an Astley Clarke pendant

She added: 'So my hope today, through the report and through this new centre, to show that change really needs to happen, and the time for action is now. Because I feel that this is the social equivalent of climate change, where we followed the science for many, many years. And that is what we have to do with early childhood development if we want to build a happier, heathier world. The more we learn about early childhood and the first five years of life the greater imperative it is to act.'

The establishment of the centre signals a lifetime commitment from the duchess to transforming society. The mother-of-three, who has championed the cause since she joined the Royal Family, stressed our first five years 'lay important foundations for our future selves' and ultimately 'shapes the adults and the parents we become' in a video released this morning.

The Royal Foundation Centre for Early Childhood will focus on three key areas of activity in the years to come, which include promoting and commissioning high-quality research to increase knowledge and share best practice. It will also work with people from across the private, public and voluntary sectors to collaborate on new solutions, and develop creative campaigns to raise awareness and inspire action - driving real, positive change on the early years.

Kate kicked off her engagement at LSE with a round table discussion on the centre's inaugural report, Big Change Starts Small, written in collaboration with the LSE and Harvard University, which brings together leading sector research in one place and underlines the critical lifelong impact of the early years on individuals, our economy and society at large. It also sets out recommendations on how all aspects of society can contribute positively and make a difference on this important issue.

The launch of the Centre comes one week after the Duchess was joined by the US First Lady Dr Jill Biden on a visit to Connor Downs Academy in Cornwall. The duo visited the school's Reception Class to hear how its pupils are supported through a bespoke Early Years Foundation Stage curriculum before hosting a roundtable on the importance of early childhood, attended by experts from the UK and the USA.

The Duchess of Cambridge arrives at a reception to meet parents of users of a Centre for Early Childhood in the grounds of Kensington Palace

For over a decade the Duchess has seen first-hand how some of today's hardest social challenges  from addiction and violence to family breakdown and homelessness, so often underpinned by poor mental health  have their roots in the earliest years of life (pictured today)

A smiling Duchess arriving at Kensington Palace in London for a reception for parents of users of a Centre for Early Childhood, on the day of the launch of the Royal Foundation Centre for Early Childhood

Kate beamed as she arrived at Kensington Palace in the rain, ready for a reception with parents who will benefit from her new initiative

In the Kensington Palace cafe, Kate met with parents who have helped to shape her understanding of the importance of providing support for parents during the earliest years of children's lives. Parents spoke to her about their experiences, while she explained what she hopes the centre will achieve for future generations

The Duchess of Cambridge hands her umbrella to her detective as she arrives at the London School of Economics in a torrential downpour

Kate kicked off her engagement at LSE with a round table discussion on the centre's inaugural report, Big Change Starts Small, which brings together leading sector research in one place and underlines the critical lifelong impact of the early years on individuals, our economy and society at large

For over a decade the Duchess has seen first-hand how some of today's hardest social challenges  from addiction and violence to family breakdown and homelessness, so often underpinned by poor mental health  have their roots in the earliest years of life.

In that time Kate also convened a steering group of experts to look at how cross-sector collaboration could bring about lasting change, and spent time listening to the public about their views on the importance of the early years. As a result, she is committed to elevating the importance of early childhood and continuing the conversation on this vital issue.

Sharing a video to the Kensington Palace Instagram page, entitled '10 years in the making', Kate said: 'My early years journey began by meeting people rebuilding their lives from addiction, homelessness and family breakdown. Listening to these experiences, I came to understand that poor mental health and a traumatic childhood shaped their lives.

'I wanted to do more to help prevent those social challenges by improving mental health [launching Heads Together]. But learning more only highlighted the need to start this earlier in life. Hearing from teachers and parents [in 2018] helped me understand the need to support children before school, which led me to the science of our early childhoods and the lifelong impact of our physical and mental wellbeing.

'And because my journey started by listening, I wanted to hear more about what the public thought. And this led me to today - the realisation that we need to change the way we think about early childhood. And that starts now.'

Writing in the foreword of the Big Change Starts Small report, Kate said: 'Our first five years lay important foundations for our future selves'

The Duchess looked engaged as she chatted to fellow mothers and fathers at the Kensington Palace cafe over tea today

The Duchess sported her usual natural make-up look and two necklaces - a Spells of Love double strand beaded satellite gold chain, priced at 89, and an Astley Clarke pendant

The Duchess (pictured chatting to parents at Kensington Palace) and the Foundation will aim to bring people together from all corners of the country and all parts of society to help improve early childhoods and ultimately lifelong outcomes

The launch of The Royal Foundation Centre for Early Childhood is a landmark step in Her Royal Highness' work and signals her lifelong commitment to improving outcomes across society.

Writing in the foreword of the Big Change Starts Small report, Kate said: 'Our first five years lay important foundations for our future selves. This period is when we first learn to manage our emotions and impulses, to care and to empathise, and thus ultimately to establish healthy relationships with ourselves and others.

'It is a time when our experience of the world around us, and the way that moulds our development, can have a lifelong impact on our future mental and physical wellbeing. Indeed, what shapes our childhood shapes the adults and the parents we become.'

The report, which has been written in collaboration with The Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University and the London School of Economics, also reveals that the cost of lost opportunity is 16.13 billion per year in England alone.

This is the cost to society of the remedial steps we take to address issues  from children in care to short and long term mental and physical health issues - that might have been avoided through action in early childhood.

Alongside the launch of the Centre and the publication of the report, the Duchess has launched a new website which will help to raise awareness of the importance of early childhood, laying out the scientific, economic and social opportunity for change.

It will also act as the home for the Centre's latest research, a showcase for its major initiatives and a platform those who want to delve deeper into early childhood, whether they're coming to this area for the first time or simply looking to further their understanding.

Kate wore her diamond and sapphire drop earrings which were a gift from Prince William and originally owned by his mother, the late Princess of Wales

Alongside the launch of the Centre and the publication of the report, the Duchess has launched a new website which will help to raise awareness of the importance of early childhood, laying out the scientific, economic and social opportunity for change

Chair of The Royal Foundation, Lord Hague said: 'The launch of the Centre for Early Childhood is a pivotal moment in The Duchess of Cambridge's work on this critical issue.

'Her Royal Highness and The Royal Foundation are determined to help bring about lasting change for future generations.

'The Duchess and the Foundation will aim to bring people together from all corners of the country and all parts of society to help improve early childhoods and ultimately lifelong outcomes.

'Over the coming years, the Centre will help to create better understanding of the relevant issues, making it clear why the experiences we have in our earliest years are so important - not just to us as individuals but to society at large.'
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Royal Ascot is one of the most glamorous occasions in the British social calendar and a whole host of society beauties certainly did not disappoint as they turned out in force on day four of the racing festival today.

Lady Eliza Manners, 22, looked very much the lady in red as she swapped Grade I-listed Belvoir Castle in Leicestershire for the beautiful surrounds of the famous Berkshire racecourse.

The outing comes after the young socialite - who is the daughter of David Manners, 11th Duke of Rutland, and his ex-wife Emma, Duchess of Rutland - kept a low profile at the 15,000 acre estate during lockdown, sharing snaps as she relaxed at home, rode horses through fields and enjoyed dinners and picnics with her family.

Eliza was also seen striking a pose next to Virginia Chadwyck-Healey, a former editor at British Vogue magazine, who was confirmed as Kate Middleton's new wardrobe adviser over in April 2019.

Virginia, known as Ginnie, who has been credited with imbuing the royal with a renewed sense of confidence in her sartorial choices, opted for a red and pink colour block ensemble and fancy fascinator as she kick-started the weekend with a day of fun-filled festivities.

Lady in red! Lady Eliza Manners put on a stylish display as she posed alongside Charles Barrons on day four of Ascot

The Queen's cousin Lady Tatiana Mountbatten, 31, who lives in Chelsea, brightened up an otherwise dreary day in a bold pink dress as she posed for a snap next to Alick Dru

Sabrina Percy and Isabel Getty put their best fashion foot forward as they arrived at the racing festival today

Blue beauties! Charlotte Hawkins (pictured, left) and Martha Ward (right) cut stylish figures during Royal Ascot 2021

Elsewhere, the Queen's cousin Lady Tatiana Mountbatten, 31, who lives in Chelsea and is the daughter of the 4th Marquess of Milford Haven and the 94-year-old monarch's second cousin, was also in attendance.

The horse rider, who trained under Olympian Charlotte Dujardin, brightened up an otherwise dreary day in a bold pink dress as she posed alongside Alick Dru for a snap.

Meanwhile, model and illustrator Sabrina Percy, who donned an intricately detailed jumpsuit, struck a pose next to Isabel Getty - who is the great-granddaughter of American oil tycoon, Jean Paul Getty, granddaughter of the Duty Free billionaire Robert Miller and counts Princess Olympia of Greece as her cousin.

Unprepared for the wet weather, revellers were decked out in a sea of bright and pastel-coloured summer dresses in silks and chiffon. But many refused to let the rain dampen their spirits and were seen getting into the party spirit early, with glasses of Pimms and mini bottles of Moet Champage flowing.

Typically stylish Isabel Getty and Pia Getty donned oversized hats as they took to the stands at Royal Ascot today

Isabel Getty - who is the great-granddaughter of American oil tycoon, Jean Paul Getty, granddaughter of the Duty Free billionaire Robert Miller and counts Princess Olympia of Greece as her cousin - was also in attendance

Virginia Chadwyck-Healey (pictured, left) and Eliza Manners (right) opted for bright shades of pink and red as rain swept over the Berkshire racecourse

Lady Eliza Manners wore her brown hair loose and wavy and opted for a bright red dress which featured belt detail, cinching her in at the waist

Sabrina Percy put on a model display in a black jumpsuit complete with embroidered jacket and playing card-inspired clutch bag

Sabrina Percy and Deborah Bayne put their best fashion foot forward as they arrived at the racecourse for a day of fun-filled festivities

Virginia Chadwyck-Healey and Oliver Chadwyck-Healey smile for the cameras at the famous Berkshire racecourse

Monochrome magic! fashion influencer Stephanie Waxberg opted for a monochrome ensemble as she attended a fun afternoon of racing

Kat Farmer, the British stay-at-home mum behind the blog Does My Bum Look 40 In This, clashed a cheerful orange dress with an oversized red hat

While some were forward thinking enough to come armed with an umbrella, others opted for practicality over style, donning giant ponchos and wellies in a bid to keep dry.

Eventually the rain eased, but it left behind big puddles which proved a difficult obstacle for guests wearing heels - forcing their male companions to give them a helping hand.

Elaborate headwear was the order of the day for many, with oversized hats and flamboyant fascinators adorned with feathers, flowers and frills spotted in the enclosure.

In total, 12,000 revellers have been granted tickets to each day of Royal Ascot as part of a list of pilot events taking place before the possible lifting of all lockdown restrictions next month.

Ray of sunshine! Racegoers put their best fashion foot forward despite the rain as they turned out for Royal Ascot

Summer is here! Florals and all-white ensembles were still on display despite the grey and rainy weather

Splash of colour: Women in yellow and floral dresses posed for photographs at Royal Ascot today

Their finest fashions! Racegoers Holly Ellis (left), Zara Julians (centre) and Alysen Miller looking resplendent at Royal Ascot

Cream of the crop! Victoria Walsh (left) and Paula McNeill (right) arrive at Royal Ascot for a day of fun despite the rain

Patterned perfection! Racegoers stepped out in a range of colours, cuts and styles, from vibrant prints to classic neutrals

Not raining on her parade! One reveller didn't let the wet weather dampen her spirits as she arrived in a bright pink three-piece suit complete with flamboyant fascinator and matching brolly

Flamboyant fascinators took centrestage on day four of Royal Ascot, while some perfectly matched their umbrellas to their ensembles

It's a washout! One female racegoer hoisted up her chiffon gown as she stepped over a puddle in her skyscraper heels on arrival on day four of the racing festival

Bright sparks: Despite the weather racegoers did not disappoint with their sartorial display of carnival brights - including this reveller who opted for a yellow two-piece suit

Stylish racegoers were all smiles as they took to the stands ahead of the first races this afternoon

On Monday Boris Johnson announced a four-week delay to 'Freedom Day' - but any disappointment looked far from the minds of racegoers as they kickstarted their weekend celebrations early.

Two world-class Group 1 races provide the highlights on the track for the fourth day of the racing festival with a supporting cast of three competitive handicaps and two more Group level contests.

Yesterday, Sophie Wessex jubilantly celebrated a win on the horses today as she joined fellow royals Princess Anne, Zara Tindall and Peter Phillips at Royal Ascot Ladies Day.

Zara Tindall was also in attendance, accompanied by close pals Dolly Maude and Chanelle McCoy, as was her mother, the Princess Royal, 70, who looked radiant in yellow - but it remains to be seen who will attend today.

Brushing off the bad weather! The Tootsie Rollers arrived in vintage-inspired ensembles for day for of Royal Ascot today

Sarah Soulsby (left) and Nazer Bullen (right) from London were determined to bring a bit of summer spirit despite the raint weather, opting for bright ensembles on day four of Royal Ascot

Thinking ahead! One racegoer had clearly planned for a rainy day at the races, slipping into a waterproof mac and shoes

Bright and dandy! The dreary racecourse was a sea of brightly coloured umbrellas and outfits on day four of Royal Ascot

While some revellers decided to embrace the wet weather with bare arms, others came prepared in macs and umbrellas

The rain left behind big puddles which proved a difficult obstacle for stylish guests wearing skyscraper heels

Flower power! While women braved cream and white dresses, men looked dapper in top hats and tails

Connect the dots! One reveller who put pon a stylish display in a polka dot dress and striking red hat posed with her umbrella

This reveller came well-prepared as she opted for a practical pair of wellies for the occasion along with a rain mac

Elaborate headwear was the order of the day for many, with oversized hats and flamboyant fascinators adorned with feathers, flowers and frills spotted in the enclosure

Perfect pout! Revellers were all smiles as they kick-started their weekend early and captured memorable moments on their phones

Royal blue! One reveller ensured she matched the colour of her poncho to her accessories as she arrived on day four of Royal Ascot

No wet feet here! These racegoers were prepared for the wet and rainy weather conditions, opting for practical footwear

While some revellers opted for plunging necklines and open toe shoes, others embraced practical trainers for the rainy weather conditions

A sea of colour! This glamorous reveller made a cheerful entrance to the racecourse in a brightly coloured fascinator and fascinator

Singing in the rain! These patterned pals didn't let the wet weather get them down as they took shelter under their umbrellas

Daring hemlines! Two women battled the elements as they arrived in chiffon dresses for a day of festivities as they kickstarted the weekend

Lady in red! One lady was spotted taking a big step over a puddle in open-toe heels as she kick-started the weekend early

Pretty in pastels! One optimistic racegoer donned a pale blue frock while a male reveller looked dapper in a top hat and tails

Looking all white! One racegoer braved the elements in heels and a white gown as she arrived at the Berkshire racecourse

Racegoers (pictured, left and right) smile and pose for photographs as they arrived for day four of Royal Ascot at Ascot Racecourse

Cream dreaming: This elegant lady does her best to protect her pristine ivory outfit from the showers

On Wednesday, Sophie was joined by senior royals including Princess Anne, Prince Charles, the Duchess of Cornwall and her husband Prince Edward.

One notable exception to the royal line-up was the Queen, 95, but Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall were spotted taking a keen interest in the races as her horse King's Lynn took part in the Kings Stand Stakes -finishing in seventh place.

The Queen missed Royal Ascot for only the second time in 69 years. Her Majesty's racing manager confirmed the monarch would not be attending on Wednesday but is hoping to make it later in the week depending on 'how things go'.

The Queen's racing manager John Warren told Radio 4: 'Obviously the Queen would love to attend, as you know she's fanatic about racing, watching racing and breeding horses, and has been going to Ascot all of her adult life. So, it's a shame to miss an event.

Hat's the ticket! One Royal Ascot reveller went all out in an oversized hat on day four of the racing festival

Taking cover! Elaborate headwear was the order of the day for many female reveallers, while men looked dapper in top hats and tails

Charlotte Hawkins and Mark Heyes (left) shielded from the heavy rain under an umbrella during day four of Royal Ascot at Ascot Racecourse

Royal blue! One prepared stylish reveller completed her white and navy ensemble with a glamorous umbrella

A right royal washout! But the rain did little to dampen spectators' spirits, as jovial guests laughed off the downpours

A brolly good show! The Tootsie Rollers arrived in their vintage-inspired ensembles during day four of Royal Ascot

The Tootsie Rollers were all smiles despite the miserable weather conditions during day four of Royal Ascot

While some were forward thinking enough to come armed with an umbrella, others opted for practicality over style, donning giant ponchos and boots in a bid to keep dry

'The plan at the moment is to see how it goes towards the latter part of the week and if the Queen's able to come because she's got runners, then, fingers crossed, it will happen.'

He added that the monarch was 'fanatic' about horse racing, and called her energy levels 'incredible' despite her age.

He said: 'It's remarkable. The Queen's energy levels are incredible. She's 95. She went down to the G7 this week, and trundled back on the train in the middle of the night and the energy will be raised higher again for a week like Ascot.'

However he said the experience would be different for the monarch, adding: 'In the past, she would have gone and looked at horses in the paddock, even though they weren't hers because she is so fascinated in the breed so she'd want go and look at the stallion prospects of the future.'

The weather may be miserable, but nothing dampened the atmosphere at

Two men looked smart in top hats and tails as they shared an umbrella on arrival at Berkshire racecourse

Glamorous in green! Many were forward thinking enough to come armed with an umbrella as rain swept across the Berkshire racecourse

Brollies at the ready! Staff members could be seen sheltering under umbrellas arriving at Royal Ascot today

Smartly dressed couples, who appeared to be headed for the Royal Enclosure, managed to keep smiling despite their formal outfits getting soaked

The area near the turnstiles was turned into a sea of umbrellas as thousands of rain-sodden guests began to arrive

The rain resulted in big puddles which proved a difficult obstacle for stylish guests wearing skyscraper heels

John continued: Every race that takes place every day of the week, the Queen will certainly read the Racing Post every morning, look at the breeding of all the winners the day before, and see that these stallions that she uses will be potential horses for her own mares.

'It's a deep fascination, a very broad escapism for all the other things that the Queen has to deal with in her life.'

The Queen has a number of runners at the Berkshire racecourse, with Mr Warren tipping Tactical in the Jersey Stakes on Saturday as a potential winner.

Last year  when Ascot was held behind closed doors  was the first time the Queen had missed it in her entire reign.
Meghan Markle has revealed her two dogs have been a source of comfort in a year when people have been 'forced apart'.

The Duchess of Sussex, 39, who lives in a $14million Montecito mansion with Prince Harry, 36, their children Archie, two, and newborn Lilibet, reflected on the importance of pets in a foreword for London-based animal welfare charity Mayhew, of which she is patron.

Meghan owns a beagle named Guy, who she adopted while living in Toronto as an actress, and adopted Pula the Labrador with Harry.

Introducing the Mayhew annual review, Meghan described the last 12 months as being a 'process of grief, growth and also of gratitude', adding that people had been 'forced apart'.

It came as it was revealed the Duchess of Sussex will give her first interview since the birth of her daughter Lilibet less than two weeks ago.

Meghan owns a beagle named Guy, who she adopted while living in Toronto as an actress, and adopted Pula the Labrador with Harry. Pictured, with Guy and old dog Bogart

Meghan will appear on US radio show NPR Weekend to discuss her children's book, The Bench.

The chat with Samantha Balaban will be the first time she has spoken since welcoming daughter Lilibet on June 6.

Her friend Omid Scobie tweeted: 'Fresh off the heels of her first childrens book becoming a certified #1 New York Times bestseller, Duchess Meghan will be giving her only interview about #TheBench to @samanthabalaban at the renowned @NPRWeekend show, this Sunday between 8am-10am Eastern.'

The news comes just a day after the Duchess' foreword was published as part of the Mayhew annual report.

She wrote: 'Over the last year, each of us have felt the profound effects of the global Covid-19 pandemic. Be it the loss of a loved one, the health challenges far too many faced, or the disproportionate life changes everyone has experienced, it has been an overwhelming process of grief, growth and also of gratitude.

'I have heard from so many of you about the impact of having a pet with you at home during the isolation of lockdown; you have mentioned the therapeutic effect of having your animal by your side and the solace and comfort you found in their company.'

She continued: 'When I reflect on 2020, I always come back to the importance of community and connection.

'We may have been forced apart, but we found new ways to be close and to support each other through this shared crisis. For many of us, this was made all the easier with our pets by our side...

Meghan, an advocate of adopting rescue dogs, chose animal welfare charity Mayhew as one of her first patronages in January 2019.

'As we collectively build to the future, my sincere hope is that we do so with ongoing support and appreciation for organizations like Mayhew, who continue their vital work in days of crisis and in days of calm.

'Their commitment to the cause of animal welfare is steadfast and their effect on our community wellbeing is self-evident.'

Meghan, an advocate of adopting rescue dogs, chose animal welfare charity Mayhew as one of her first patronages in January 2019.

In January last year she made a surprise visit to the charity's headquarters in one of her last official outings in the UK before she jetted back to Canada to be with Archie.

The charity was given the honour of unveiling the Sussexes' Christmas card in December. It featured an artistic rendering of Harry, Meghan, Archie, Guy and Pula

Meghan Markle has been 'in touch' with her patronage the Mayhew throughout the crisis, after agreeing to remain on as patron following Megxit.

The charity was given the honour of unveiling the Sussexes' Christmas card in December.

It featured an artistic rendering of Harry, Meghan, Archie, Guy and Pula.

Mayhew was founded in 1886 and today sees itself as an animal welfare social worker, keeping cats and dogs, whether family pets or companions for the homeless, safe and well alongside their owners, and supporting communities.

It has a pet refuge service, provides vet services to vulnerable owners and has a team of animal welfare officers who work with residents helping local communities.
A McDonald's in Louisville, Kentucky reportedly closed early on Saturday night when a fed-up manager quit.

The unidentified employee announced his resignation via a sign that he hung on the drive-thru speaker, which read in all caps: 'We are closed because I am quitting and I hate this job.'

The sign was still there Sunday morning when Twitter user @GreatApeDad arrived to place an order, and his photo of the dramatic note has since gone viral.

A McDonald's in Louisville, Kentucky reportedly closed early on Saturday night when a fed-up manager quit  and hung this sign on a drive-thru monitor

The sign was captured by Twitter user @GreatApeDad at a Louisville location on Sunday morning

The Twitter user's photo showed the hastily-made sign taped in the drive-thru lane  directly on top of an old sign apologizing for an unknown inconvenience.

Speaking to Today, @GreatApeDad said that his wife had sent him to pick up the chain's special new BTS meal when he came across the sign, which was was taped to a monitor that hadn't been working for weeks.

'I personally thought it was funny, so I took a picture, uploaded it to Twitter not thinking much of anything about it,' he said.

By the time he was there Sunday morning, the McDonald's was open and running.

An employee told him that the note had been left up from the night manager from the previous evening.

'I spoke with the staff at this McDonald's today. It turns out the sign was put there by a night shift manager who suddenly quit, and it was left up over night,' he tweeted.

The customer said that he could understand the ex-employee's frustration.

McDonald's said it will implement raises over the next few months at company-owned locations, with entry-level employees earning $11 to $17 an hour

'I used to work in the service industry myself,' he said. 'I think that people are just frustrated, especially the working class people who are there in the front line.

'Things that are in a boiling point where I can definitely see where someone on a Saturday night that doesn't want to be working the drive-thru  wants to just call it quits.'

Reports of worker shortages have surged this year, with a National Federation of Independent Business survey reporting that 40 per cent of small businesses said they had jobs they couldn't fill.

Meanwhile, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported in March that the US had 6.9 million unfilled jobs on the last day of January.

While some conservative politicians have blamed higher unemployment benefits  saying they discourage people from getting back to work  others point to how people's priorities have changed during the pandemic.

For lower-wage earners, in particular, there has been rising demand for raising the minimum wage.

Some companies have made the move to raise wages in light of the shift. According to CNBC, McDonald's will implement raises of 10 per cent, on average, over the next few months at company-owned locations. For entry-level employees, that means $11 to $17 an hour, and managers can expect$15 to $20 an hour.

On Twitter, commenters have applauded the manager for quitting, while others wonder why one person leaving would close the whole restaurant

On Twitter, commenters have applauded the manager for quitting, with some saying that McDonald's might not have run into the problem if they paid employees more.

'Gee, if only Corporations could end this mass-resignation by paying more for jobs, which would also bring in MORE employees and higher quality service and innovation,' wrote one.

Some found it odd that a single employee quitting would shut down the whole restaurant.

'Wait, did they seriously have a shift of ONE PERSON at an entire mcdonalds such that one person quitting mid-shift shut it all down? I'm willing to believe that, but my goodness, the sheer amount of neglectful staffing involved...! Whoever walked off from that c**p is great!' wrote one.

'"I"?? only one person working there rn? or it must be just a few ppl working,' tweeted another.
McDonald's Australia is selling Big Mac burgers for just 50 cents for one day only.

The fast food chain will launch a new range of never-before-seen promotions, menu items and unique collaborations from now until the end of August.

To kick off its 50-year anniversary, Maccas has slashed the price of the Big Mac, which normally cost $6.50, to just 50 cents across all restaurants nationally.

To redeem the offer, the first 500,000 customers can snap up the 50c Big Mac on Friday, June 18 via the MyMacca's app.

McDonald's Australia is selling Big Mac burgers for just 50 cents for one day only

To kick off its 50-year anniversary, Maccas has slashed the price of the Big Mac, which normally cost $6.50, to just 50 cents across all restaurants nationally

Over the past five decades, the fast food giant has sold more than 1.1 billion Big Macs to Aussie customers.

'We are extremely proud to be celebrating 50 years of providing great tasting food and supporting our customers, people and communities in Australia,' Andrew Gregory, chief executive officer, McDonald's Australia, said.

'We are firm believers in the quality and taste of Australian home grown produce and have always been and remain committed to our local suppliers and supporting more than 15,000 Aussie farmers annually.

'Many of our long-standing partnerships with Aussie suppliers and farmers have spanned multiple decades. Working together, we continue to find new ways to constantly improve the Macca's experience for our customers.'

Opening the doors to its first Australian restaurant in 1971, Macca's now boasts 1,009 restaurants nationwide, employing more than 100,000 people and serving two million Aussies every day

What Macca's in Australia once looked like in 1993: Over the past five decades, the fast food giant has sold more than 1.1 billion Big Macs to Aussie customers

To celebrate its 50th anniversary, the restaurant has shared vintage pictures of the chain

Today, Macca's is the largest employer of young people in the country, having created job opportunities for more than 1.5 million Australians throughout the past 50 years

Today, Macca's is the largest employer of young people in the country, having created job opportunities for more than 1.5 million Australians throughout the past 50 years.

Opening the doors to its first restaurant Down Under in 1971, Macca's now boasts 1,009 restaurants around the country, employing more than 100,000 people and serving two million Aussies every day.

'We're proud of our history and the positive difference our 245 franchisees continue to make by providing the best first job in Australia for young people,' Mr Gregory said.

'Our franchisees play a critical role in making Macca's one of the most trusted brands in Australia and we're looking forward to celebrating our 50th birthday with our people and customers.'
Canada's National Advisory Committee on Immunization said on Thursday that people who got the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine as their first dose should get the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna shot for their second.

Previously, the committee - which provides recommendations to the Public Health Agency of Canada has said AstraZeneca recipients 'could' get Pfizer or Moderna for their second shot if they wanted.

But in the most recent statement, members went a step further to say an mRNA vaccine was the 'preferred' choice for the 1.7 million people who have received at least one dose of the British-made vaccine.

The committee says the new recommendations are based on the growing supply of Pfizer and Moderna shots, and the risk of rare vaccine-induced blood clots associated with AstraZeneca.

But officials are still trying to reassure people who got one or two doses of AstraZeneca's vaccine that they are nevertheless well protected

Canada's National Advisory Committee said it is 'preferred' that people whose first dose was AstraZeneca get a second dose of Pfizer and Moderna

The new recommendations are due to the risk of rare vaccine-induced blood clots associated with AstraZeneca and applies tp the 1.7 million people who have gotten the British made vaccine (above(

In new guidance documents, vice-chair Dr. Shelley Deeks, said since the advisory committee 'first looked at mixed vaccine schedules, new evidence is starting to emerge suggesting immune responses are better when a first dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine is followed by an mRNA vaccine as a second dose.'

The committee also updated its previous recommendation that people at high risk of exposure to, or serious illness from, COVID-19, could opt to get AstraZeneca rather than waiting for Pfizer or Moderna.

Now it says everyone should always get the mRNA vaccines first, unless they are allergic to them.

'Anyone who has already received two doses of AstraZeneca/Covishield can rest assured that they are protected, particularly against severe illness,' she said.

'There is no need for a third dose at this time'

However, many residents have been left feeling frustrated, thinking that they have made a mistake.

Officials are trying to reassure residents who got one or two doses of AstraZeneca's vaccine that they are nevertheless well protected. Pictured: A medical worker prepares a dose of Oxford/AstraZeneca's COVID-19 vaccine, March 18

Gwenny Farrell, of White Rock, British Columbia, who got two doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine told the Canadian Press her confience was shaken by the new recommendation.

'I'm frustrated because now, after being told for months that the best vaccine is the first one that's in your arm, I'm being told I may have made a mistake,' Farrell, 55, said.

Meanwhile, Michael Slavitch, 54, whose first dose was an AstraZeneca vaccine made two separate appointments for his second dose because of mixed advice.

He told the Candian Press that he plans to cancel his AstraZeneca appointment and keep his appointment for an mRNA vaccine.

'I'm confused about what to do,' he said. 'Our government is responsible for cleaning up this mess.'

Dr Theresa Tam, the chief public health officer of Canada, said the new evidence in favor of mixing different types of vaccines included four studies in Germany.

'It's really the immunogenicity, that immune response, after that mixed-dose schedule that's resulted in NACI updating this recommendation, because all the accumulated studies essentially suggest that immune response is a better response,' said Tam at a news conference in Ottawa.

One of those studies from Germany's Saarland University, published early data Wednesday saying giving Pfizer as the second dose after AstraZeneca, or two doses of Pfizer only, generated far more antibodies and T cells as two doses of AstraZeneca.

Some Canadians who get AstraZeneca shots fear they have 'made a mistake' while others say they don't know if mixed doses will permit them to travel. About 25 million Canadians have received at least one dose

Almost 25 million Canadians have now received at least one dose of vaccine - more than 60 percent of the population and almost six million are now fully vaccinated.

As of June 5, 2.1 million people had received one dose of AstraZeneca, and 15,186 had received two doses.

There are no further shipments of AstraZeneca currently scheduled, but there are about 600,000 doses still left from previous deliveries.

There are 14 million doses of Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna being delivered this week and next, including a donation of one million doses of Modernas COVID-19 vaccine from the United States that was to arrive in Canada Thursday night.
Areas of New York City with greater white populations had more COVID-19 vaccination sites than those with higher black or Hispanic populations, a new study finds.

Researchers from the New York University Grossman School of Medicine looked at different districts in the borough of Brooklyn, and analyzed vaccine access along with racial demographics of each.

Districts with little to no white people about four vaccine sites compared to six sites in majority Caucasian areas - a 50 percent difference.

The teams sats the findings show that this left many minority communities ill equipped to deal with the pandemic and likely contributed to the current racial disparity in vaccine distribution in the city.

A new study found Brooklyn districts with little to no white people about four vaccine sites compared to six sites in majority Caucasian areas - a 50% difference (above)

One district with a large black and Hispanic population has zero vaccine sites within its boundaries (file image)

For the study, published in JAMA Network Open, the team gathered data on 18 community districts in Brooklyn.

They used the 2014 and 2018 American Community Survey results to estimate the racial makeup of each, and the city's online vaccine locater to find vaccine sites across the city's most populated borough.

The team found a clear trend in its data that districts that included more white people were more likely to have more options for vaccine sites.

Districts with a white population of less than 40 percent had a median number of four vaccine sites.

Those with a white population of 40 percent or more had a median of six vaccine sites each, a 50 percent increase.

For example, District 1 has among the largest white populations at 63 percent, a Hispanic population of about 20 percent a black population of only 4.5 percent.

The district has seven vaccination sites.

Meanwhile, District 7 with a 40 percent Hispanic population and a 24% white population had just two sites.

District 16 was the only district included in the study that did not have any vaccine sites at all.

The district has the lowest white population of any included in the study (2.6 percent), the second highest percentage of black people at 72.1 percent and among the highest percentage of Hispanics at 22.4 percent.

The most vaccine sites in a single district are the 10 in District 18.

The district has a large minority makeup, with 61.9 percent of the population being black, and only 22 percent of the population being white.

'The findings of this study suggest that there are substantial vaccination access deserts,' the authors wrote.

'With many preliminary barriers to vaccination uptake, including supply issues, scheduling multiple doses, and a delay for scheduling appointments, vaccine rollout has been slow.

'Furthermore, early COVID-19 vaccination efforts in NYC have been focused primarily in white, middle-to-upper class neighborhoods, with the greatest access occurring in these areas. '

The issue of vaccine sites not being as densely available in minority communities has become a nationwide trend.

Areas in Louisiana, Chicago among others have also been criticized for unequal distribution of vaccines.

The reason for these disparities is often chalked up to minority communities starting with less available resources to open these sites as white communities, making it easier to just build these sites in white areas.

Currently in New York City, more than 4.5 million of the cities 8 million residents have been vaccinated.

Black New Yorkers have disproportionately not received the vaccine, though, and the lack of access to the shots in their communities may be playing a role.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has postponed its meeting on heart inflammation among young people who have received either the Pfizer or Moderna COVID-19 vaccine due to the Juneteenth national holiday.

On its website, the agency said the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) will now be discussing the issue next week during a previously scheduled meeting.

'The June 18, 2021 COVID-19 meeting is being rescheduled due to the observation of the Juneteenth National Independence Day holiday,' a statement reads.

'The discussion will be rescheduled to be included as part of the June 23-25 ACIP meeting.'

The ACIP was set to discuss the 300 reports of the heart inflammation, known as myocarditis, in vaccinated males between ages 16 and 24.

It comes as one pediatrician who treated at least seven patients said that during initial examinations, it looked like the teen boys were having heart attacks.

The CDC has postponed its meeting on report of young men who've had heart inflammation after receiving Pfizer and Moderna vaccines due to Juneteenth. Pictured: Max Zito, age 13, is inoculated by Nurse Karen Pagliaro at Hartford Healthcares mass vaccination center at the Connecticut Convention Center in Hartford, Connecticut, May 13

One pediatrician in Oregon describes seven cases of heart inflammation in seven male patients between ages 14 and 19 who got the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines

Among the 300 known cases, it's unclear how many people have been hospitalized or have recovered.

Last week, it was reported that three were in intensive care, 15 were hospitalized, and 41 had ongoing symptoms. The remaining 167 had recovered.

This type of heart inflammation can be caused by a variety of infections, including a bout of COVID-19, as well as certain medications.

With more than 200 million young Americans who have received both doses of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, it means just 0.00015 percent of people who have been administered the shots have reported such an effect.

The ACIP is not expected to cast a vote on any issues regarding the vaccine rollout, but may issue an update on vaccine safety, the odds of myocarditis and a risk-benefit of analysis of vaccines in teens and young adults.

In a meeting before the National Vaccine Advisory Committee, which advises the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, on Thursday, Dr Judith Guzman-Cottrill of Oregon Health & Science University, discussed seven cases she treated separately, reported CNN.

The teenagers, between aged 14 and 19, all said they were experiencing chest pain and were admitted to the hospital to be monitored.

Guzman-Cottrill said initial tests run by clinicians looked like the boys were having acute myocardial infarctions, also known as heart attacks.

However, they were not having heart attacks. Instead, they were suffering from rare cases of myocarditis after being vaccinated against COVID-19.

Guzman-Cottrill documented her findings in the journal Pediatrics, published on June 1.

CDC director Dr Rochelle Walensky said on Friday (above) that, so far, 300 cases have been reported out of 200 million doses, which means the risk occurs in 0.00015% of people

The meeting will now be held between June 23 and 25 and members expected to to issue either an update on vaccine safety or risk-benefit of analysis of vaccines (file image)

The patients all recovered and were treated with various methods including aspirin, ibuprofen and steroids.

'Fortunately, none of our patients were critically ill and all of them responded very quickly to treatment,' Guzman-Cottrill said at the meeting.

She said she wonders if these events are occurring because young people are more likely to have reactogenicity, or adverse reactions, because their immune systems are more robust.

'I am wondering if myocarditis is actually an additional rare adverse event related to systemic reactogenicity and/or immunogenicity and these younger patients just tend to have more reactogenicity compared to older populations - and more severe reactogenicity,' she added.

In an appearance on Good Morning America, CDC director Dr Rochelle Walensky said the agency has been closely watching reports of heart inflammation, but said the risk of COVID-19 is higher than the risk of vaccine-related myocarditis.

'What I will say is over 200 million doses of vaccine have been given and really these events are really quite rare,' she said.

Walensky also encouraged parents, many of whom are still wary, to vaccinate their children.

'The really most important thing that you need to do is be comfortable as a parent with your choice in making this decision,' she said.

'If you make an informed decision, where you listen to the science around the vaccine, the safety of the vaccine, the overwhelming data we have n the safety vaccines, and how effective they are at preventing severe disease and sickness in your children, I think you'll come down the way I did and vaccinate your children.'
A key drug used to fight hard-to-treat brain tumors has been removed from Medicare in a decision that experts say will cause people to die.

Lomustine, which is sold under the brand name Gleostine, is being removed from the Medicaid drug rebate program, by its developer, NextSource Biotechnology. Ph

The drug is one of the key treatment for glioblastoma patients, who have tumors that grow very fast and spread very quickly.

It is the same cancer that led to the deaths of Senator John McCain (R-Arizona) and Beau Biden, President Joe Biden's eldest son.

Patients who need the drug will now need to purchase it themselves if their state does not dedicate Medicare dollars towards it.

NextSource Biotechnology purchased the drug in 2013, when it sold for a price of $50 per pill.

They have since raised the price by about 1,900 percent to as much as $1,000 per individual pill.

Glioblastoma is a brain cancer that leads to tumors on a persons brain. Picture: A brain scan showing a glioblastoma tumor

NextSource Biotechnology is removing Gleostine from the Medicaid rebate program after increasing the drug's price by 1,900%. Patients who need the drug may need to pay $1,000 per pill out of pocket to continue treatment

'There are lots of people right now who are not getting the drug,' DR Henry Friedman, a professor of neurosurgery at Duke University School of Medicine, told CBS MoneyWatch.

WHAT IS GLIOBLASTOMA? Glioblastomas are tumors that arise from astrocytes, the star-shaped cells that make up the supportive tissue of the brain. These tumors are usually highly malignant. They're grade IV tumors, which means they can grow fast and spread quickly. Almost one in five tumors that start in the brain are glioblastomas. Approximately 14,000 new cases are diagnosed every year. Signs and symptoms: Persistent headaches

Seizures

Vomiting

Changes in mood or personality

Trouble with concentrating

Trouble with speaking

Double or blurred vision Treatment options to slow and control tumor growth: 1) Surgery The goal is to remove as much of the tumor as possible. In high-risk areas of the brain, the surgeon may not be able to remove all of a tumor. 2) Radiation Radiation is used to kill as many leftover tumor cells as possible after surgery and slow growth of inoperable tumors. 3) Chemotherapy Temozolomide is the most common chemotherapy drug used for glioblastoma, although it can cause short-term side effects. Survival rates: One-year rate: 37.2 percent Five-year rate: 5.1 percent Ten-year rate: 2.6 percent Advertisement

'There are patients who can't afford the drug, and other drugs may not be as effective.'

He also noted that some patients will likely die because of this decision.

NextSource, which is based in Miami, posted a statement on its website explaining the reason for the price-hike.

One of the reasons NextSource lists for price increase is that it supplies bottles at low costs to the government for use in the Medicaid program, which it will no longer be a part of.

However, NextSource has not indicated if it will now lower prices in response.

The company notably took part in none of the research or development of the drug, which it purchased it in 2013, nearly 40 years after Gleostine was developed in 1976.

'It's all greed,' Friedman told CBS.

'Why do you take a drug for which you do no research and development and raise the price 1,400 percent? All they did was rebrand it, a drug that was out there forever,'

Research and development are often the most expensive part of selling a drug.

'Lomustine is one of only three FDA-approved chemotherapies for patients with glioblastoma and the one that most patients receive when their tumor progresses on first line temozolomide chemotherapy.' Dr Patrick Wen, director of the Center for Neuro-Oncology at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, told CBS.

Since the average age of a patient with the condition is 65 years old, the removal of the drug from Medicare will effect around half of people who develop glioblastoma.

The median age of diagnoses for the condition is 64 as well, and it occurs in 3.21 out of every 100,000 people per the American Association of Neurological Surgeons.

The highly-malignant tumors that come with the condition arise out of cells that make up supportive tissue in the brain.

Almost 20 percent of all brain tumors are glioblastomas.

'The only other treatment is avastin. Lomustine is also the standard-of-care treatment used in the control arm of most recurrent glioblastoma clinical trials, and not having easy access to this drug has an important impact on research to find better treatments for this devastating cancer,' Dr Wen continued.

Around 14,000 new cases of the condition are diagnosed every year, and more than half of patients diagnosed with the condition will die within the first year.

It is often treated using chemotherapy or brain surgery.
Many Americans to their pre-COVID-19 pandemic way of life, a new poll finds.

Conducted by the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, the survey asked more than 1,000 U.S. adults about what activities they had done in the last week.

Results showed that 85 percent had gone shopping at stores, 75 percent were eating at restaurants and even 50 percent had gone to a concert or movie.

This is an increase from last month, when 65 percent who had gone shopping, 50 percent had gone out to eat and 40 percent saw a film or live show.

The data comes as cases in America have fallen to their lowest since the early stages of the pandemic in March 2020.

Deaths are also at yearly lows, with the nation not recording more than 1,000 deaths in a single day for nearly three months.

A new AP-NORC poll finds Americans are more likely now than they were in May 2020 to return to activities they were doing regularly before the pandemic, including going to restaurants, traveling and seeing live events

Just 21 percent of people in the poll said they are very or extremely worried about a COVID-19 infection in their inner circle - the lowest level since the pandemic began.

Only 25 percent are highly concerned that the lifted restrictions will lead to additional people being infected in their community.

Still, 34 percent of Americans think restrictions in their area have been lifted too quickly.

While 27 percent say they were not lifted quickly enough. About 4 in 10 rate the pace of reopening about right.

The way Americans approached their daily lives suddenly changed after COVID-19 spread through the U.S. in early 2020.

Following the advice of health officials and governments, people isolated in their homes - either alone or with families - to avoid exposure to the virus, which has sickened more than 33 million people and killed 600,000 people in the U.S.

At its worst in winter 2020, the virus was infecting over 250,000 people every day and causing over 3,000 daily deaths.

During the height of the pandemic, restaurants, movie theaters and stores either closed or continued operating with limited occupancy.

Church services, schools and government meetings went virtual and many employers made working from home an option or a requirement.

Mask wearing in public became the norm in most places, with some states and cities making it mandatory.

The emergence of the vaccine has helped slow down rates of infection and death, allowing state and local economies to reopen and leading Americans to return to activities they once enjoyed.

Many states, many with a more Republican leaning government, reopened months ago.

But, even the more liberal leaning states are tilting towards a return to normal, like New York, which recently lifted all COVID-19 restrictions once the state reached 70 percent of its adult population vaccinated.

Aaron Siever, 36, of New Market, Virginia - a state with a Democratic governor - said he and his wife have consistently worn masks and taken other precautions, including getting vaccinated.

But Siever said virus-related restrictions were not lifted quickly enough, lamenting that some precautions were politicized and caused an 'inherent panic.'

'I think with masks being worn and people getting vaccinated, I think we could have opened a little earlier,' said Siever, who maintains the grounds of Civil War battlefields in Virginia.

'We started focusing on the politics of reopening, rather than the health.'

The vaccine has played a major role in the reduction of cases.

More than 60 percent of American adults have received at least one shot of a COVID-19 vaccine.

According to the AP-NORC poll, American adults who have not yet rolled up their sleeves for the shot remain hesitant to do so.

Just sevenpercent of those who have not been vaccinated say they definitely will get a COVID-19 vaccine, and 15 percent say they probably will.

Forty-six percent of Americans who have not been vaccinated say they will definitely not get a vaccine, and 29 percent say they probably will not.

Young adults, Americans without a college degree, white evangelicals, rural Americans and Republicans are most hesitant to get vaccinated.

The poll finds many Americans are still wearing masks and taking precautions to avoid contact with other people, but the percentage of those doing so is down significantly from just a few months ago.

In late February, 65 percent said they were always wearing a mask around people outside their households.

Now, just 37percent say so, though 19 percent say they often wear one.

People arrive at Universal Studios in Universal City, California. Many Americans are relaxing precautions taken during the COVID-19 pandemic and resuming everyday activities, even as some worry that coronavirus-related restrictions were hastily lifted, according to a new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research

Forty percent of Americans say they are extremely or very likely to wear a mask when participating in indoor activities outside their homes, while just 28 percent say the same about outdoor activities.

Now that most states have lifted restrictions, the poll finds about two-thirds of Americans who used to travel at least monthly say they will do so in the next few weeks.

About three-quarters of frequent restaurant or bar-goers before the pandemic say they will now return. A year ago, only about half said they would travel or go to restaurants if they could.

Likewise, more are returning to activities such as visiting friends and family, seeing movies or concerts, attending sporting events and shopping in-person for nonessential items.
MARILYN AND ME

by Lawrence Schiller (Taschen 50)

MARILYN AND ME by Lawrence Schiller (Taschen 50)

Marilyn was a photographers dream subject with her clothes on  and even more stunning with them off. This is the unsurprising conclusion of Lawrence Schiller who, in 1962, aged just 25, shot Marilyn Monroe for Paris Match Magazine.

His book, Marilyn And Me, offers a mesmerising glimpse of the star in her final months, when Monroe was filming Somethings Got To Give, her last film, in which she appeared nude in a swimming pool.

It didnt take me very long to find the one scene I was sure I wanted to shoot, recalls Schiller. I bet it didnt . . .
ACTRESS by Anne Enright (Vintage 8.99, 272 pp)

ACTRESS

by Anne Enright (Vintage 8.99, 272 pp)

When the author Norah FitzMaurice is approached by a PhD student who wants to write a thesis about her mother, a legendary Irish actress, Norah considers replying: I have written five novels since my mother died and they are still described as written by the daughter of Katherine ODell .

When she agrees to talk to the student, the encounter stirs up so many unresolved memories that Norahs husband says she should write her own book about her mother.

Notorious for the intensity of her performances as well as for shooting a colleague in the foot when the balance of her mind was disturbed  Katherine is an enigma even to Norah.

Anne Enrights brilliant novel is a darkly glittering account of the cost to both the mother and her daughter of Katherines complicated fame.

SUMMERWATER

SUMMERWATER by Sarah Moss (Picador 8.99, 208 pp)

by Sarah Moss (Picador 8.99, 208 pp)

In a group of holiday chalets on the edge of a Scottish loch, a disparate collection of families has assembled.

David and Mary have been staying there for years. When their children were young, they used to come with friends for holidays that seemed, at least in retrospect, idyllic.

But now they are old; Mary is frail and confused and David, a retired GP, feels both pity and irritation at her decline. Domestic conflict is seething in the other chalets, too.

Resentful teenagers, a young mother whose children are disturbed by her struggle with depression, a twentysomething couple with comically different sexual agendas, and a household whose noisy partying disturbs the damp lochside peace.

Beginning at dawn, Sarah Mosss atmospheric novel follows the interior lives of each household, with a haunting sense of foreboding that by nightfall will have exploded into tragedy.

SICILY 43

SICILY 43 by James Holland (Corgi 9.99, 784 pp)

by James Holland (Corgi 9.99, 784 pp)

Like a blockbuster novel, James Hollands account of the 1943 Allied invasion of Sicily begins with thumbnail portraits of the principal personalities involved  American, British, Canadian, German and Italian.

Operation Husky, a precursor to D-Day, was an extraordinary logistical challenge, involving elaborate plans to deceive the Axis powers, including Operation Mincemeat, in which details of a secret plan to invade Sardinia were placed on a body dressed as a Royal Marines officer and floated ashore in southern Spain.

Brilliantly blending historical fact with vivid personal testimony by participants (among them was a 21-year-old Naval 1st Lt called Philip Mountbatten), Holland makes a persuasive case for the conquest of Sicily as a turning-point in the war.
Tesco's sales growth almost came to a halt in the three months to the end of May as Britain's biggest grocer hit some tough comparisons with last year's pandemic-driven surge.

Sales at its UK supermarkets still inched higher, but just by 0.5 per cent to 10billion compared to the same period last year, when they went through the roof as Britons went crazy and stockpiled toilet paper and all sorts of food and drinks.

But when compared to the same period two years ago, sales were up 9.3 per cent - although growth gradually eased over the months as people started dining out more and hitting the pub again.

Little growth: Sales at Tesco's UK supermarkets still inched higher compared to the same period last year, when they went through the roof as Britons stockpiled

Sales growth 'peaked' in March at 14.6 per cent and 'moderated' in April and May as restrictions eased, the supermarket said.

Meanwhile, online sales growth continued unabated, with 1.3million orders a week being placed as the supermarket doubled the capacity of its delivery operations to keep up with a surge in demand during the pandemic.

Online sales rose by more than 22 per cent in the quarter compared to last year and are now up 81.6 per cent on pre-pandemic levels.

Analysts said Tesco's performance was 'impressive', considering the tough comparatives with last year.

'Tesco's first quarter 2021 figures were never going to live up to last year's comparable period, as the three months to May included the period where the nation went crazy stockpiling food and drink as the pandemic took its grip,' said Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell.

'These are impressive results against unprecedented growth from last year,' said Richard Lim, chief executive of Retail Economics.

'Despite last year's surge towards online, the retailer maintained growth in this channel, reflecting significant investment made to boost capacity and consumers' ongoing appetite for home deliveries,' he added.

Tesco's wholesale Booker business saw the strongest growth as the hospitality industry gradually reopened, with sales up 9.2 per cent to 1.77billion.

Booker's catering like-for-like sales jumped 68.1 per cent, although it was offset by a 4.3 per cent fall in its sales to other retailers - typically independent convenience stores.

In Ireland, Tesco failed to match the strong growth from last year, with sales falling 6.1 per cent to 641million.

The retailer's central Europe division also failed to keep up with the pace of growth, dropping 1.6 per cent to 940million, although both it and Tesco's Irish divisions remain ahead on a two-year basis - up 13 per cent and 1.5 per cent respectively.

Tough comparatives: Empty Tesco shelves last year, when sales went through the roof as Britons went crazy and stockpiled toilet paper and all sorts of food and drinks

Total sales were up 1 per cent to 13.4billion in the period, which AJ Bell's Mould said 'was not a disaster'.

'It implies that Tesco is holding its own against tough competition in the grocery space and no doubt retained lots of the customers it won in 2020 from having wider availability of online delivery slots than its peers,' he added.

Still, shares in the FTSE 100 company dropped 2.5 per cent to 225.40p in morning trading.

Clothes and other non-food sales helped drive some of the growth in the period, with Tesco remaining open throughout the recent lockdowns whilst fashion stores were unable to trade until April.

General merchandise, which includes all non-food products, was up 10.3 per cent and clothing up 52.1 per cent in the period compared to a year ago.

Analysts noted that perhaps this was because last year, people focused purely on food and drink, so the comparable figures were easy to beat.

Bosses said they were keen to continue pushing cheaper prices and have maintained their Aldi price match scheme on more than 500 lines.

Chief executive Ken Murphy said: 'We delivered a strong performance in the first quarter, even as we lapped the high demand of last year due to the pandemic.

'While the market outlook remains uncertain, I'm pleased with the strong start we've made to the year'.
East Asian food chain Itsu plans to open 100 new stores after striking an investment deal with a private equity firm.

The company, founded by Julian Metcalfe, has sold a minority stake to Bridgepoint Capital.

It is the second time Bridgepoint has backed one of Metcalfe's ventures, after previously investing in his Pret a Manger sandwich chain in 2008.

Thrilled: Itsu, founded by Julian Metcalfe, has sold a minority stake to Bridgepoint Capital

Pret was then valued at 364million but later sold for 1.5billion, handing investors a lucrative return.

Itsu did not disclose the financial terms of the deal.

But Bridgepoint is thought to have paid around 200million for a 30 per cent stake, potentially valuing the chain at more than 660million overall.

Following the deal, Itsu is now poised to open 100 stores over the next five years, creating 2,000 jobs.

Metcalfe, 61, said most of these would be in 'big towns' and other locations outside the UK's major cities, reflecting growing demand in these places from office staff who are increasingly working from home.

He told the Mail: 'We are thrilled to be teaming up with Bridgepoint again after our success together at Pret a Manger.

Amid all the horror and doom and gloom we have seen recently, this is a huge and very exciting deal for Itsu and everyone that works with us. I also think it's an incredible indicator of the way that people, during and after the pandemic, have realised that they have got to eat healthier and more nutritious food.

'That is what Bridgepoint is really investing in. So it is a very positive statement.'

Benoit Alteirac, partner of Bridgepoint, added: 'We see a global opportunity for Itsu. It combines affordable, convenient, and fresh food with an outstanding operational model coupled with deep-rooted brand values.

'Their time is now and their ambition, goals and purpose are so relevant in this post-pandemic era.'

The deal is the latest example of a private equity spending spree that has swept through Britain during the pandemic.

It will also be seen as a welcome sign of confidence in the casual dining industry, which has been pushed to the brink by repeated coronavirus lockdowns.

Coming back: The casual dining industry, which has been pushed to the brink by repeated coronavirus lockdowns

Itsu, which has dishes such as chicken with greens and brown rice on its menu, has 74 stores, including one in New York.

But many rely on lunchtime custom from office workers  and so business has been hit during the pandemic when people have been forced to stay at home.

Last year, it completed a company voluntary agreement  a type of insolvency procedure  to close two stores and slash rents on 53 more.

Metcalfe said he was confident workers would return to the office soon. But he said Itsu was also seeking to capitalise on strong trade it has seen recently in small cities and big towns.

'We are only charging 7 a head and in places like Brighton and Bristol that is proving very successful,' he said.

'We can really take on some of the big giants.'
The profits made by Britain's biggest children's home provider are a 'scandal', claim campaigners.

Caretech increased its profits by 140 per cent to 42.3million in the six months to March 31.

Furious: Critics said Caretech was making huge profit margins, of 28.4 per cent in its children's services division from fees paid by stricken councils

Furious critics said it was making huge profit margins, of 28.4 per cent in its children's services division from fees paid by stricken councils.

Campaigner Martin Barrow said: 'This is a scandal. Wealthy investors are cashing in on children and young people in care.'

The UK competition watchdog launched a probe into the sector amidst concerns over rising fees charged by private companies.

Caretech said profits 'increased because of continued investment', and that the profit figure was flattered by non-underlying accounting adjustments.
Hard-up elderly people are being urged to apply for pension credit to boost their income, as the number in poverty soars to 2.1million.

Black and Asian older people are most at risk of struggling to make ends meet in later life, while over-85s, renters, and single female pensioners are also among those more likely to have strained finances, according to the charity Age UK.

Pension credit boosts weekly income to at least 173.75 if you are single and to 265.30 for couples, but you can gain up to 12,000 a year on top via help for housing, heating, council tax, TV licences and other bills.

Pension credit: Hard-up elderly people are being urged to check their eligibility

Reasons for not claiming include lack of awareness, worry about filling in long forms, reluctance to disclose personal information, feeling others are worse off than you are, or being determined not to ask for help, says Age UK.

This means an estimated 920,000 pensioner households are missing out on pension credit payments worth up to 1.6billion a year, according to Government figures.

>>>How do you apply for pension credit? Find out below

Meanwhile, the number of pensioners in poverty has risen by 31 per cent from 1.6million in 2013-14 to 2.1million in 2019-2020.

Being poor is defined as living in a household on less than 60 per cent of median income after housing costs. In 2019-2020, the median income after housing costs for a couple was 476 per week or around 24,900 per year.

Median means the middle of the income range of UK workers, and this is used instead of the average because a small number of very high earners can skew the results.

Age UK explains that poverty is a relative measure, and as average household incomes were broadly increasing in the years up to 2019-20, there was an increase in the number of pensioners falling below the poverty line.

Some 33 per cent of Asian older people and 30 per cent of black older people in the UK live below the poverty line

That means the incomes of poorer older people have not kept pace with the overall rise in household incomes.

Government figures reveal that 33 per cent of Asian older people and 30 per cent of black older people in the UK live below the poverty line, compared with 16 per cent of white older people.

Caroline Abrahams, charity director at Age UK, says: 'The numbers of older people living in poverty have risen steadily in the last few years, so they now top two million.

'That's a lot of older people worried sick about how they'll cope if their heating or their cooker breaks down and needs replacing, more than the entire populations of Newcastle and Liverpool put together.

'It's sad to realise that the burden of poverty in old age is falling disproportionately on black and Asian older people in our society at the moment.

'For their sake and, indeed, for the sake of anyone forced to scrimp and save in their later years, we should do everything possible to raise their incomes, so they can enjoy the dignified and comfortable retirement they deserve.

'It's deeply frustrating that the money is available to top up the incomes of pensioners who live on the lowest incomes but that much of it goes begging every year because many never claim what is rightfully theirs.'

Former Pensions Minister Ros Altmann recently urged people meeting up with elderly relatives and friends after lockdown to help them apply for pension credit if you find out they are struggling financially.

She welcomed the Age UK campaign to promote increased take-up of pension credit, saying: 'Workers and businesses have rightly received Government furlough money to help them afford to live during the pandemic.

'However, pensioners have continued to miss out on money they are entitled to, because they do not claim pension credit.

How to apply for pension credit You can apply yourself by phone, online or by post, or a friend or family member can do this on behalf of an elderly person. You can call 0800 99 1234, claim online here, or find out how to apply by post here. Charities also have further useful information. Age UK offers help here and the Citizens Advice Bureau here.

'Pension credit take-up is lowest of all means-tested benefits  40 per cent do not claim.

'It is well-known that pensioners find form-filling off-putting, are often too proud to apply for help, or wrongly believe they are not eligible.

'They may not realise that they could have up to 10,000 in savings, but still be eligible for small amounts of pension credit and these can lead them to be entitled to many other valuable benefits, worth thousands of pounds a year.

'Great to see Age UK working on this to spread the word and I encourage everyone who knows older people to suggest they check their eligibility.'

Myron Jobson, from Interactive Investor, says official statistics on household wealth by ethnicity show that almost across the board, people of colour were worse off than their white counterparts, but one of the standout findings was the ethnicity pension disparity.

'The median private pension value was 80,000 for White British groups but less than 5,000 for Bangladeshi, Black African, Chinese and any other ethnic groups.

'The Office for National Statistics said that disparities in employment rates and earnings will contribute to the ethnicity pensions gap, but also points to a pensions knowledge gap and the likelihood of participating in available schemes being lower among some ethnic minority groups.'

Jobson says there is an ethnicity pension chasm  not gap  that needs to be addressed, akin to efforts rightly made to address gender inequalities.

'The first step is understanding the experiences and expectations that are unique to different communities.

'However, lack of research is an ongoing motif when it comes to exploring how attitudes and experiences among BAME [Black, Asian, and minority ethnic] communities might affect their access to, and use of, financial services.'

II is currently carrying out its latest Great British Retirement Survey, and Jobson says that last year it attracted over 12,000 respondents but there wasn't a big enough sample from BAME communities to draw many meaningful conclusions.

The survey is open until 30 June and you can take part here.
Convicted rapist and former actor Simon Monteiro - who once boasted of relationships with Mariah Carey and Barbara Hershey - is back behind bars after breaching supervision orders.

Monteiro appeared via video link at Gosford District Court for sentencing on Wednesday after pleading guilty to breaching many supervision orders which restricted his online activity and use of aliases.

He had been arrested in August last year after he was found with mobile phones and laptops he was not allowed to own under the supervision order, and admitting to opening What's App, Facebook and Gumtree accounts under false names and without notifying police.

Playboy rapist Simon Monteiro (second from left) pictured with Mariah Carey (third from left)

Judge Tanya Bright sentenced him on Wednesday to two years and eight months in jail, but he immediately vowed to appeal, sacked his barrister on the spot, interrupted the judge and stormed out of the video appearance.

During sentencing the court was told of the extensive and violent criminal history of Monteiro, whose original name was Simon Lowe.

He previously spent over ten years in jail for aggravated sexual assault on his then girlfriend in 2008.

Convicted rapist Simon Monteiro (right) formerly rubbed shoulders with Hollywood A-lister Barbara Hershey (left)

Just prior to his release last year, supervision orders were put in place which were designed to restrain his online activity and ownership of devices such as phones and computers.

The orders were based on psychological profiling which diagnosed Monteiro with narcissistic personality disorder and which found he was at a high risk of re-offending both violently and sexually toward an intimate partner.

Mug shot of rapist Simon Monteiro

The orders included the use of only one mobile phone and to provide Corrective Service officers with this number along with the serial number and IP address of any internet devices, email addresses, login details and passwords.

However the court heard that despite Monteiro telling his supervising officer he got rid of all of his devices and was just using a cheap Nokia phone, arresting police discovered an iPhone, a Huawei phone, a Macbook computer, and a HP laptop along with a number of hard drives.

Further release orders included Monteiro was not to use an alternative name or alias or use any form of social media or dating websites.

Simon Monteiro (pictured) is back behind bars until August 17, 2022 for breaching court conditions

Yet evidence presented showed Monteiro had four social media accounts on various apps, was using ten aliases including the name of Shaun White on Facebook, had six different email addresses and had searched the profile of a female Corrective Services officer up to 80 times.

Monteiro did not wait until his matter was finalised by the judge on Wednesday before storming out of the video suite.

Monteiro's case has been in the headlines for many years not only thanks to his formerly glamorous lifestyle and supposed ties to Hollywood A-listers, but in his complaints about prison conditions which included demands for a cell by the coast, a soft-bristled toothbrush and an orthopedic mattress.

Convicted rapist Simon Monteiro (pictured) in his glory days

Monteiro also reportedly threatened to rape a prison guard's wife while behind bars.

In October of 2017 Monteiro told the New South Wales state parole board it was 'in the public interest' he be released from prison despite the creation of a Change.org petition with over 46,000 signatures urging he should never be released.

The husband of murdered Melbourne woman Jill Meagher had made an impassioned statement about Monteiro to Change.org.

'My wife was murdered in Melbourne by a parolee just like this unrepentant creep. I spoke personally with the Adult Parole Board of Victoria at the time warning them of the egregious mistake of putting serial sex offenders like him back out to terrorise women.

'Let this man back out on the street and you will almost certainly see another headline like this one,' he wrote, citing a report that Ms Meagher's death was preventable had the offender been properly supervised.
Roger Stone has revealed emotional details of wife Nydia's desperate cancer battle in an exclusive DailyMail.com interview, saying: 'We are both devastated.'

He spoke after the couple filed a legal plea for a 90-day stay in a lawsuit being brought by the Department of Justice that claims they have failed to pay nearly $2million in taxes.

The pair say in the paperwork obtained by DailyMail.com that they cannot concentrate on the legal fight in Florida because of Nydia's Stage IV lymphoma, which has spread to her lungs.

Stone  pardoned by former President Donald Trump after being sentenced to 40 months as a result of the Mueller Investigation  cited the stress of the past two years as one possible reason for his stricken wife's illness.

The controversial political fixer revealed: 'This diagnosis had come out of nowhere. We have had a tumultuous couple of years being vilified, smeared, framed, gagged, banned, de-platformed and bankrupted by a fraudulent and politically motivated witch hunt. And then a Soviet-style show trial.'

In an exclusive interview with DailyMail.com, Roger Stone has revealed emotional details of his wife Nydia's cancer battle

Stone, who said his finances were wiped out after he was convicted of lying to Congress and witness tampering, has launched a video appeal for money to help fund Nydia's treatment

Stone continued: 'The point is that the stress is cumulative. And my poor wife was my rock throughout the entire thing. She is my soulmate, she is my life partner, she provides the balance in my life and tells me to chill out when I need to. We are both devastated by this.

Nydia is set for another visit to the University of Miami Cancer Center for a second opinion next Wednesday June 23

'Right now she needs tranquility and quiet. She needs peace and that's very hard to achieve.'

Former model and photographer Nydia, 74, was diagnosed at the beginning of the month with Stage III cancer. But that was later revised to the more serious Stage IV, delivering another blow to the couple.

'My wife is highly resilient though,' Stone, 68, told DailyMail.com. 'Nydia's in good spirits. She was initially in a lot of pain and had trouble breathing. She had very high fever because of pneumonia at the same time as her initial diagnosis.

'She was hospitalized for nine days, however she is now back home. I mean, she's very tough.'

Nydia is set for another visit to the University of Miami Cancer Center for a second opinion next Wednesday June 23.

'It's all consuming. We are overwhelmed with cancer advice right now,' Stone said as he revealed the couple is considering a homeopathic and holistic approach to fight the disease.

He added: 'We are firm believers in homeopathic and holistic treatment. We also don't reject all modern medicine, but a lot of it is very cookie cutter. We are trying to select the right course for her. We are optimistic.'

Stone, who said his finances were wiped out after he was convicted of lying to Congress and witness tampering, has launched a video appeal for money to help fund Nydia's treatment.

He said: 'Of course, we have not recovered financially. We lost everything. We lost our home. I had to sell my car, lost most of our insurance, lost our savings. We had a little fund put aside for the college education of our grandchildren generated from the sale of my five books.

'So just at a time when I'm trying to get back on my feet, my wife is diagnosed with what they now tells us is Stage IV lymphoma which has spread to her lungs. And it is overwhelming.'

Stone was pardoned by former President Donald Trump after being sentenced to 40 months as a result of the Mueller Investigation

Nydia Stone is seen dancing with Donald Trump at her wedding to Roger. They married in Las Vegas in 1992 in a ceremony attended by Trump and then fiancee Marla Maples

'This diagnosis had come out of nowhere,' Stone said. 'The point is that the stress is cumulative. And my poor wife was my rock throughout the entire thing'

Nydia was born in Washington DC after her Cuban parents moved there when her father was appointed military attache for the pre-revolution Havana government. They moved back to Cuba with their daughter, but the family became refugees in the United States after Fidel Castro seized power in 1959.

Stone, a long-time Trump ally, was working for the Ronald Reagan campaign when he met his second wife in 1980. They married in Las Vegas in 1992 in a ceremony attended by Trump and then fiancee Marla Maples.

The couple are accused in the DoJ lawsuit of failing to pay income tax by using their company Drake Ventures 'to shield their personal income from enforced collection and fund a lavish lifestyle'.

It alleges the Stones avoided paying $1,590,361 in taxes between 2007 and 2011 and snubbed the IRS of $407,036 in 2018.

And it added: 'Despite notice and demand for payment, Roger and Nydia Stone have failed and refused to pay the entire amount of the liabilities.'

But the couple, who are both defendants, have now asked the Southern District of Florida federal court in Fort Lauderdale for more time to fight the claim due to the cancer diagnosis.

Their lawyers wrote: 'The side effects of cancer treatment can be significant and greatly impair a person's ability to complete day-to-day tasks Mr Stone is likewise focused on his wife's health and care and this sudden change to their lives.

'Given that Ms Stone was principally involved in the family's finances and has information that may be relevant to his defense, her inaccessibility during this time directly affects his ability to prepare a defense.

'He is of course also impacted by his wife's treatment plan as he remains one of her primary caretakers.'

The legal team also outlined some of Nydia's treatment in their appeal for a delay. They said: 'Ms Stone was hospitalized shortly after her diagnosis, released, and hospitalized again while her doctors conducted various tests and determined what treatment options, if any, might be available.'

'Ms Stone was released from hospital again on June 10 and has started a course of treatment, but others may be necessary. Her short-term prognosis and health remain uncertain.

'Nydia Stone's recent diagnosis renders her and her husband, Defendant Roger Stone, unable to meaningfully participate in the case as they focus on the immediacy of Ms Stone's health.'

The couple's legal team added 'the court should exercise its discretion to grant a 90 day stay in this matter'. They added the stay was 'unopposed'.

The 90-day stay request is to give the Stones more time put their defence together.

Roger Stone said: 'It would delay by 90 days the date by which we must formally respond to the Government's complaint. At that point the normal trial schedule, whatever that is, would go forward.'

Stone continued: 'The request for the delay was filed roughly five days before the response due date, to give the Government time to give the judge time to consider.'

'It's all consuming. We are overwhelmed with cancer advice right now,' Stone said as he revealed the couple is considering a homeopathic and holistic approach to fight the disease

'She is my soulmate, she is my life partner, she provides the balance in my life and tells me to chill out when I need to. We are both devastated by this,' Stone said

Stone told DailyMail.com: 'My wife handles all of our family finances and our tax filings and our bill payments and all our financial records. I like to say, I make the money she spends the money. And therefore it really is impossible to proceed on the Government's case. And their case is a fraud.'

Nydia very publicly stood by her husband after he was seized in a dramatic swoop on their rented $9,500-a-month Fort Lauderdale mansion in January, 2019. He was found guilty of seven counts of lying to Congress, witness tampering and obstruction  part of the inquiry by Special Counsel Robert Mueller. Trump commuted his sentence days before he was due his jail term in July last year  and later pardoned him.

Stone branded the Department of Justice suit, filed in April, 'another political hit'.

It alleges Drake Ventures - owned 50/50 by the couple - was used to pay their personal expenses, 'evade their tax obligations and conceal their assets from collection by creditors'.

And it continued: 'The Stones caused numerous checks naming Roger Stone as payee to be deposited into Drake Ventures accounts. They also transferred funds from their personal bank accounts to Drake Ventures' accounts.

'The total of these check and wire transfers for the years 2018 and 2019 exceeds $1million. By depositing and transferring these funds into the Drake Ventures' accounts instead of their personal accounts, the Stones evaded and frustrated the IRS's collection efforts.

'The Stones also used Drake Ventures' accounts to pay some of their personal tax liabilities. The Stones paid over $500,000 of their personal tax liabilities from Drake Ventures' accounts during the years 2018 and 2019.'

The 'facts demonstrate that the Stones used Drake Ventures for an improper purpose and harm the United States'.

The couple filed a legal plea for a 90-day stay in a lawsuit being brought by the Department of Justice that claims they have failed to pay nearly $2million in taxes

The couple's lawyers hit back in their latest filing, saying: 'It is important to note that the Stones have not willfully shirked their tax obligations. This matter concerns the tax years 2007-2012 and 2018. All other tax years, the Stones have filed and paid as required.

'More importantly, the complaint itself acknowledges that the Stones timely filed their 2007-2012 and 2018 tax returns.

'However, finding themselves unable to pay their reported taxes at the end of the year, the Stones  as have many Americans  worked with the IRS on payment, initiating offers in compromise and requesting installment agreements.

'They have endeavored to honor these obligations. In 2018 and 2019, the Stones paid the IRS over $500,000 towards the liabilities underlying this suit.'

Stone told DailyMail.com: 'The DoJ imply that we have hidden income which is categorically false and easily disproven.

'No asset has been hidden from them. Everything has been properly declared. It is a civil action. They are not charging me with tax evasion, because there is no tax evasion. I made four years of payments without missing a payment, until the Mueller investigation literally bankrupted us.

'This is another deep state hit on me. The moment I fail to make payments they have the authority to take any asset I own. Today, right now. So the point of this lawsuit is what? It's politically motivated.'

All contributions can be made at StoneFamilyFund.com.
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Middle income families are lashing out against Joe Biden's punitive new tax plan that would claim a large chunk of the amount someone leaves to their kids when they die just because it has gone up in value over the course of their lifetime.

The harsh new tax - dubbed Biden's 'death tax' - is hidden in his American Families Plan and it's receiving ferocious backlash. It proposes that when someone dies, any asset they leave behind that has appreciated in value by more than $1million since the time they bought it should be taxed.

The tax rate would go as high as 40% - double what it is now - and it applies to how much the asset has appreciate. So someone who inherited a house their mother and father paid $250,000 for but that's now worth $2.5million would have to pay tax on the difference.

Currently, the only capital gains taxes people pay on inherited assets is what they pay when they sell it, and even then it is 23 percent.

The current law allows families with few cash assets to keep valuable property, stocks or businesses in the family, passing them down for generations without anyone being given a huge tax bill.

Previously, the only people who had to pay tax when they inherited money or assets were those who inherited $11.7million or more because they would be liable for an estate tax. That still has to be paid - so those heirs would pay a death tax twice.

But the proposed change to the capital gains widens the net drastically - a recent survey found there are at least 3million homes across America worth at least $1million.

Under Biden's plan, death tax wouldn't just be for the super wealthy but also people whose parents or grandparents worked their whole lives to make shrewd investments - and never thought they'd have to share the reward with Uncle Sam.

'WE WORKED OUR WHOLE LIVES TO BUILD A HOME WE COULD LEAVE TO OUR KIDS - NOW THEY MIGHT NOT BE ABLE TO AFFORD TO KEEP IT'

Judi Desiderio, 63, is the CEO of Town & Country Real Estate in Long Island. She and her husband bought a vacant lot of land in East Hampton, Long Island, in 2000 for $550,000.

They spent several years building the property and it's now worth an estimated $6million.

They plan to retire there and eventually leave the home to their two adult sons - aged 27 and 34 - but she now worries they'll have to sell it to be able to pay Biden's tax bill, if it becomes law.

'This affects homeowners all over New York and Long Island - it is not a high threshold,' she said.

She's also worried about how much the property will be worth by the children inherit it.

'We bought the lot in 2000 for just over $500,000 and we spent a lot of time and money building it. Now, it's worth around $6million.

Judi Desiderio, 63, is the CEO of Town & Country Real Estate in Long Island. She and her husband John bought a vacant lot of land in East Hampton, Long Island, in 2000 for $550,000. They plan to retire there and live out their days then leave it to their adult sons but they now worry they won't be able to afford the capital gains tax on it without selling it - which would ruin their dream of them raising their kids there

Judi Desiderio, 63, and her husband bought the vacant plot of land their home is now on in Long Island in 2000 for $550,000. Today, it's worth around $6million. They say they'll never leave - it's where they want to retire, and what they want to leave to their children. But she worries her kids wouldn't be able to afford the tax bill they received when they inherited the property, especially in strong markets where the value of homes is only going to keep going up over the next 30 years

'We dont intend on leaving there - we plan to retire and live out our life, we love it here. We have absolutely no intention of leaving.

'Our two sons will inherit it with their families but theyll have no choice but to sell it if by the time I drop dead, when that does happen  20 years from now, let's hope. And I cant imagine how much more its going to be [worth] by then.

'Its a money grab. Its punishing people and families that want to keep their family house in the family

'If they get slammed with the taxes  lets say in 20 years its worth $18 million... the government may look just at the $550,00 we paid for the lot and then the kids will have no alternative but to sell the house they grew up in to meet the tax.

'Its a money grab. Its punishing people and families that want to keep their family house in the family.

'Itll make it impossible for the next generation.

'When you look at land values anywhere on Long Island and New York  people bought apartments for a couple hundred thousand, now theyre worth millions.

'It's crazy to think that the next generation can pay that bill.

'It's just unfair, especially considering every penny earned to get to this point we've already paid taxes on,' she said.

'THIS DOESN'T JUST HIT THE BILL GATES OF THE WORLD... THIS WILL HIT US TOO'

Tom Hedger, 58, and his four brothers inherited their family's business when their father died in 2010.

His father had started it in 1939 and grown it to a company with around 100 employees.

They were hit hard in the recession and recovered in the years following his father's death.

The business changed hands in a year where estate tax - levied against estates worth more than $11.7million (which theirs was) was suspended.

Lisa and Tom Hedger with their kids. Tom says it's 'twisted' the government thinks it is 'privy' to the assets the family has spent a lifetime building, and that the estate tax alone would cripple their business

Had it been applied, he says it would have crippled them - as it would now.



Tom and Lisa Hedger's home in Maine which they bought to retire in for $800,000 in 2019 and which has already gained more than $400,000 in value

'The perception is, "Oh, you have a $40million business, you're OK". But thats not $40million in the bank.

'We didnt have the cash on hand to pay the estate tax.

'You basically would have been had to liquidate a huge amount of that.

'It was a horrible time.'

He is among many business owners who have long called for an end to the estate tax but now, they'd also be walloped with a capital gains bill under Biden's new plan.

Hedger and his wife live in Maine. They bought their home for around $800,000 in 2019.

Thanks to an influx of people moving from major cities to the area during the COVID-19 pandemic, their home has shot up in value.

They also have three Airbnb properties which they will use as their retirement business.

The Hedger family runs an Airbnb business now in Maine. They own three properties which combined, would be taxed under Biden's plan

They don't consider themselves to be extraordinarily wealthy but their children would be in for a huge bill on their property alone when they inherit it.

CURRENT LAW VS BIDEN'S PROPOSAL CURRENT LAW Do I pay capital gains tax on an asset I inherit? Yes How much do I pay and when do I pay it? 20% of the gain from when you inherited the asset to when you sell it. There's no capital gains tax if you keep it in the family BIDEN'S PROPOSAL Do I pay capital gains on an asset I inherit? Yes How much & when do I have to pay it? Up to 40% of the gain from when the owner acquired it to when you inherit it - when the person dies, regardless of whether you plan to sell it or not Advertisement

'It is insane - the concept that people are just sitting around with that amount of cash and the idea that somehow that money is more beneficial in the hands of the government.

'My brothers are stressing our tremendously, they'd hoped to pass the business on too to the third generation.

'Now it's like, what do you have to liquidate in order to be able to afford to pass it on to your family?

'It's a question of can you afford your own family's money?

He and his wife have resorted to expensive insurance policies which not everyone would be able to afford.

'We've been fortunate enough to put aside in insurance - I want to be able to secure some kind of future for my kids.

'I've worked all my life to build up what we have.

'It is twisted to me that the government thinks they're privy to this money and that somehow your success is a result of what they have done - it's disgusting.

'The idea they're going to take that cash and allocate it in a manner more effective that I could or that my children could.

'The threshold is so, so low. This is not just affecting the Bill Gates' of the world.

'In fact, they'd barely be affected. It's the small businesses.

'The families who have worked their whole lives.'

'WE'RE HAVING TO PLAN NOW FOR WHAT HAPPENS 20 YEARS DOWN THE LINE TO AVOID THIS'

Patricia and Vince Sadd, both in their mid 60s, moved to Florida for tax reasons after the company he worked for was bought out. They have 3 adult kids who they'd planned to leave their estate to - now they say they're restructuring it in light of Biden's proposal. Their assets are in their businesses, not in property

Patricia Sadd, a 64-year-old retired pharmacist, and her 67-year-old husband Vince moved from California to North Carolina and then to Florida, all for the sake of being savvy with taxes in their retirement, after the company he worked for was bought out.

They have three adult children, one grandchild, and a portfolio of property and business to leave to them when they die.

Under the old threshold of $11.7million, they wouldn't have been affected but now, they are restructuring their estate planning to get around Biden's burdensome proposal.

'Weve worked hard and have been as savvy as we can be.

'This new law would be going too far.

'You see the farmers, the average joes, someone whose property really has appreciated, what do they do to be able to afford the taxes?' Mrs. Sadd told DailyMail.com.

'I just think theyre going to have to come up on with some remedy  you cant lose a family asset because you cant afford to pay the taxes... imagine not being able to afford your own inheritance?'

She does not believe it'll pass because the $1million threshold would likely impact most of Congress.

'This will affect way too many people, they're going to have think of some kind of remedy for it,' she said.

The Sadds moved from California to North Carolina then to Florida to save on taxes. They say they've been savvy about it their whole lives, and now don't want to have to worry about capital gains for their kids with whatever they leave them

The wealthy - who have access to estate planners and are well versed in estate loopholes - are already planning ways to get around this, like gifting their estates to their kids before they die.

'What we have decided to do is, were only in our mid-60s, we have time. Were not 85. I think with the right trust in place and some gifting itll be OK. Were planning to do that.

'But you have to stay on top of that  theres different ways to start gifting, it just depends on your length of time.'

They have turned to estate planners Van Leeuwen & Company to help guide them through the process.

But not everyone has access to such strategies and across the board, many say they shouldn't need to defend themselves from such policies in the first place.

'OUR FARM LAND HAS BEEN IN THE FAMILY FOR 100 YEARS AND IT'S THE ONLY ASSET WE HAVE - BUT OUR KIDS WOULDN'T BE ABLE TO AFFORD TO KEEP IT UNDER BIDEN'S PLAN'

Farms, for example, have expensive equipment that would quickly put them in the threshold.

Another problem is establishing the value of the farm when it was first acquired.

Kalena Bruce, 35, lives on a ranch in Stockton, in southwest Missouri, with her husband and their daughter.

The farm has been in her family for over 100 years and was a homestead - it was given to one of her relatives after someone else in the family died in the war.

There's no way of telling how the government would decide what it was worth when the family acquired it but now, the 2,000 acres of farmland that she and her siblings own collectively could be worth between $5million and $6million.

Kalena Bruce, 35, lives on a ranch in Stockton, in southwest Missouri, with her husband and their daughter. The land has bee in their family for 100 years. The capital gains change would force their kids to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars when they inherit it. She's worried about how the government will determine the capital gain on a property that was acquired so long ago, that's now worth over $1million but is the entire family's only asset

There's no way of telling how the government would decide what it was worth when the family acquired it but now, the 2,000 acres of farmland that she and her siblings own is worth between $5million and $6million. Bruce is worried about how the government will decide what it's worth when they impose a capital gains tax if it comes into law

They'd pass it on as a collective, to her daughter and her daughters cousins.

But the kids would then be liable for a tax bill they'd only be able to pay by selling a huge chunk of the land.

'My husband and I are fifth generation and we ranch in southwest Missouri, Cattle, hay, and just have been doing that since we were basically born. We have land on both sides of our family that our family has been transferring through the generations for over 100 years.

'Our family has been working for this business for 100 years. If that gets taken away, it changes how we operate. It could put a lot of families out of business

'It's a really neat heritage and legacy and we're very proud of what we've built.

'Weve seen a lot of people move into our state and area, out of Californian and Arizona, the suburbs of Chicago and into our area because there is more opportunity so we were already worried about encroachment.

'People are moving in  those land prices go up and people want to buy our 100 acres and subdivide it. We need the stepped up basis tool in our toolbox.

'We have this farm thats wonderful, but what if my daughter inherits it in 50 years and theres a piece now in the city limits, she cant farm it and you cant fertilize it correctly, she needs the ability to sell it so it can be used but she couldnt have to sell more than what she needs to just to pay the taxes on that.

'Our family has been working for this business for 100 years. If that gets taken away, it changes how we operate. It could put a lot of families out of business,' Bruce told DailyMail.com.

She says that unlike in industries, farmers don't typically have any other type of asset to pass on beyond the land they live and work on.

'This would destroy farms. They own so much equipment, you have one of these combines that cost $200,000 and you have two or three, youre way past the $1million threshold,' David Williams of the Tax Payer Alliance told DailyMail.com

'Theres no 401k in farming- our retirement is the asset. What were leaving them is the land. It's what was passed down to us, we made it better, and were passing it down.

SPOOKED BY BIDEN'S PLANS, ESTATE PLANNERS ARE ADVISING ON HOW TO GET AROUND THEM Spooked by Biden's proposal and the fact that the current laws expire anyway in 2025 - opening the door for the threshold on estate tax to be lowered - money managers and estate planners are already thinking up ways to get around it. Take, for instance, a 70-year-old with an estate of $1.1million. If they gave away $15,000 a year to their single child for the ten years before they died, they wouldn't have to pay gift tax because they didn't exceed the annual exclusion of $15,000. If they managed it for ten years, their estate would be worth $950,000 when they die - less than Biden's threshold - nor would they have had to pay gift tax on the 10 years of $15,000 gifts they'd given to their kids. Equally, someone could gift $200,000 of their $1.1million estate - they'd be taxed 40% of that $200,000 gift ($80,000) rather than $440,000 - the rate of Biden's 40% death tax - when the parent died. Some are advising clients to take out life insurance policies so that there's a lump sum of cash left when they die for their kids to use on the tax. But as Caryn B. Keppler, partner at the legal firm Pierro, Connor & Strauss, LLC, points out, not everyone is insurable. 'This has been proposed many times and it has never become a law for various reasons. 'First of all, up until the last two decades, brokerage houses were not required to keep basis records so people had stocks, businesses etc. and nobody knew what they paid for it originally [making it impossible to determine what the capital gain is. 'The other reason is actually because it could be a drain on the middle class. 'I happen to live in Harlem. I look at some of these gorgeous brownstones that are on these beautiful blocks, purchased 50 or 60 years ago for next to nothing that are now selling for millions of dollars. 'The families who still own these may not have substantial cash without having to sell the property. People might be forced to buy life insurance to cover the capital gains. 'Youre talking about hitting a lot more families than you with do with the estate tax.' She said she's advising clients more on the likelihood of the estate tax threshold - currently $11.7million - being lowered. 'Keep I mind, that $11million is due to expire in 2025 and go back to $5million, which is what it was before the law was passed. It may even go as low as $3.5million.' Advertisement

'Theyd be forced to sell part of the far just to pay the tax on the transfer. That makes zero sense.'

Other farmers say this could decimate the industry.

'This would destroy farms. They own so much equipment, you have one of these combines that cost $200,000 and you have two or three, youre way past the $1million threshold,' David Williams of the Tax Payer Alliance told DailyMail.com.

Biden's plan wouldn't force family businesses to pay the gains - but only if they continue to operate the business.

If they want to sell it, they'd have to pay the gain - and determining that gain could become a nightmare.

Others are worried about how it would affect their stock inheritance.

Ginger Osteen's mother invested in a stock that now has a healthy capital gain. She wrote to DailyMail.com on Thursday, concerned about what would happen to her stock inheritance under Biden's plan.

'My mom has a stock that she has held for many years and there is a LOT of gains in it. Will I have to pay capital gains taxes on it or is that still exempt?' she said.

Others are worried about the duality of a federal estate tax and a state estate tax.

'For the most part, except for the ultra wealthy, inherited real estate has value far in excess of an heirs ability to pay a hefty capital gain tax upon inheritance.

'It is fairer to tax it upon sale, not upon inheritance, where at least the heirs can pay the tax out of the proceeds of the real estate sale.

'In addition, 40% is far too oppressive. Remember that many states also levy inheritance taxes upon the death of the decedent and those taxes are in the 5% range for direct descendants, more for siblings.

'Forty percent federal tax on top of state tax nearly halves an estate. That is far too burdensome,' Larry Klein, President of Klein Law & Mediations, told DailyMail.com.

Spooked by Biden's proposal and the fact that the current laws expire anyway in 2025 - opening the door for the threshold on estate tax to be lowered - money managers and estate planners are already thinking up ways to get around it.

Take, for instance, a 70-year-old with an estate of $1.1million.

If they gave away $15,000 a year to their single child for the ten years before they died, they wouldn't have to pay gift tax because they didn't exceed the annual exclusion of $15,000.

If they managed it for ten years, their estate would be worth $950,000 when they die - less than Biden's threshold - nor would they have had to pay gift tax on the 10 years of $15,000 gifts they'd given to their kids.

But they'd have had to have planned it meticulously for 10 years.

Or if someone gave their kids $200,000 of their $1.1million estate - they'd be taxed 40% of that $200,000 gift ($80,000) rather than $440,000 - the rate of Biden's 40% death tax - when the parent died.

Some are advising clients to take out life insurance policies so that there's a lump sum of cash left when they die for their kids to use on the tax.

But as Caryn B. Keppler, partner at the legal firm Pierro, Connor & Strauss, LLC, points out, not everyone is insurable.

'This has been proposed many times and it has never become a law for various reasons.

'First of all, up until the last two decades, brokerage houses were not required to keep basis records so people had stocks, businesses etc. and nobody knew what they paid for it originally [making it impossible to determine what the capital gain is.

'The other reason is actually because it could be a drain on the middle class.

'I happen to live in Harlem. I look at some of these gorgeous brownstones that are on these beautiful blocks, purchased 50 or 60 years ago for next to nothing that are now selling for millions of dollars.

'The families who still own these may not have substantial cash without having to sell the property. People might be forced to buy life insurance to cover the capital gains.

'Youre talking about hitting a lot more families than you with the estate tax.'

She said she's advising clients more on the likelihood of the estate tax threshold - currently $11.7million - being lowered.

'Keep I mind, that $11million is due to expire in 2025 and go back to $5million, which is what it was before the law was passed. It may even go as low as $3.5million.'
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A fascinating photo album showing one of the three towns which were merged in 1949 to form the Chinese city of Wuhan, where the coronavirus pandemic is believed to have begun, has gone on sale.

The images, which were taken in Hankow in the 1920s and 1930s, show the city when it was home to various 'concessions' of foreign control - including one belonging to what was then Great Britain.

Hankow was merged with the towns of Wuchang and Hanyang to form what is now Wuhan city, the capital of China's Hubei province.

Among the images in the album are those of Hankow's Customs House and Dazhimen train station, both of which are still standing in today's Wuhan.

Also seen are thousands of Western and Chinese revellers at a racecourse, as well as a shot of locals pulling rickshaws down a street adorned with Chinese-language signs and shop fronts.

The black and white images of Hankow belonged to a woman who was brought up in China in the early 20th century.

The collection is being sold by her family through Chorley's Auctioneers, in Cranham, Gloucestershire, on June 22 and is expected to fetch between 200 and 300 when it goes under the hammer.

Auctioneer Thomas Jennerfust said: 'This album gives us a glimpse of life in 1920s Hankow, a town which later merged with others to form modern day Wuhan.

'We see colonial buildings of the various foreign 'concessions', views of the Chinese City and racegoers crowding the racecourse and flooded streets, perhaps from the floods of 1931.'

It was in Wuhan where Covid-19 was first detected in December 2019, leading to Wuhan residents being the first people in the world to be subjected to a lockdown.

British intelligence officials now believe it is 'feasible' that the virus may have escaped from the city's Wuhan Institute of Virology, a Chinese research facility where research into bat-derived coronaviruses is conducted.

 Slide me  A fascinating photo album showing one of the three towns which were merged in 1949 to form the Chinese city of Wuhan, where the coronavirus pandemic is believed to have begun, has gone on sale. The images, which were taken in Hankow in the 1920s, show the city when it was home to various foreign 'concessions' - including ones belonging to the United Kingdom. Among the images in the album is one of Hankow's Customs House, which is still standing today

 Slide me  What was then Hankow's Dazhimen train station and is now Wuhan's rail hub is also seen in the stunning images. Hankow was merged with the towns of Wuchang and Hanyang to form what is now Wuhan city, the capital of China's Hubei province

The black and white images of Hankow belonged to a woman who was brought up in China in the early 20th century. The collection is being sold by her family through Chorley's Auctioneeers, in Cranham, Gloucestershire, on June 22 and is expected to fetch between 200 and 300 when it goes under the hammer. Pictured: What was then the headquarters of the Asiatic Petroleum Company - a joint venture between the Shell and Royal Dutch oil companies. The building is now The Lin Jiang Hotel

It was in Wuhan where Covid-19 was first detected in December 2019, leading to Wuhan residents being the first people in the world to be subjected to a lockdown. British intelligence officials now believe it is 'feasible' that the virus may have escaped from the city's Wuhan Institute of Virology, a Chinese research facility where research into bat-derived coronaviruses is conducted

 Slide me  Hankow's branch of the National City Bank of New York is also seen in the album. The City Bank of New York, which was founded in 1812, still exists today as global firm Citibank. Hankou became a base for foreign businesses when the 1858 treaties of Tianjin were signed between China, France and Great Britain

This image shows Hankow residents walking down a wide street. One man is seen carrying an object on his shoulders whilst he walks in front of what was then the French Banque de L'Indochine. France acquired its Concession in Hankow in 1896. Its bank financed its commercial interests in China in cities including Hong Kong and Shanghai

Also seen are thousands of Western and Chinese revellers who had gathered to watch horses and their riders compete at what was then Hankow Race Club. Whilst some Chinese people are visible, there are also many Westerners, highlighting how Hankow was then a hub of foreign trade. Concessions were granted to British, French, German, Japanese and Russian interests between 1861 and 1896

Traditional Chinese buildings are seen in this image of Hankow. The exact date of when the photograph was taken is unclear, but it dates from the 1920s. The buildings have since been replaced by modern structures. Hankow was merged with Hanyang and Wuchang by the then newly formed People's Republic of China in 1949

This stunning image shows the non-Western part of Hankow. Shop signs written in Mandarin are seen above dozens of residents, some of whom are pulling rickshaws. In 1911, the republican revolution which overthrew China's last imperial dynasty was accidentally sparked in Hankow. The catalyst for the revolt was the accidental detonation of a bomb in Hankow's Russian Concession. It blew up after a pro-republican revolutionary dropped a lit cigarette

Another image in the album shows a quiet street scene. Residents are seen walking past a building which is partially obscured by trees. One person is carrying a rolled up object. The accidental detonation of the bomb in Hankou led to the police being called. They in turn found documents implicating members of Wuchang's Garrison of Chinese soldiers as revolutionaries who were about to mutiny. The rebels were then faced with a choice of arrest and probable death or putting up a fight. The choice of the latter led to the anti-Qing rebellion, which eventually ended the 267-year-old Qing Dynasty

The woman who owned the photograph album which shows Hankow was born in 1911 and educated in the UK before moving to China with her family. Her father worked as a tea taster in Hankow. The woman lived with her parents in the city until neighbouring Japan invaded China in 1937. Pictured: Hankow waterfront as it was in the 1920s

In 1931, a series of floods hit many of China's cities, including Hankow. Estimates of the number of people who died range from 150,000 to more than two million. The above image shows the extent of the flooding in Hankow. Two people are seen in a boat daubed with the number 70. Behind them, a person is seen using a piece of wood balanced on their shoulders to carry items

A building flying what appears to be the Union Jack in Hankow is seen in the above image. Hankow was captured by revolutionary Kuomintang armies in December 1926 and the British concession in Hankow was occupied. It led to an agreement between Britain and China for the joint administration of the concession until 1929, when it formally came to an end

The Hankow (Wuhan) Bund - or waterfront - is one of the best-preserved from China's colonial era. At around 2.5miles (4km), it is twice the size of the more famous Shanghai Bund. It remains host to the buildings which were home to the five different foreign concessions. Pictured: The Bund as it looked in the 1920s

The Hankow Bund has not survived in its entirety - parts have been replaced by modern buildings. The German and Japanese parts of it have been almost entirely destroyed or covered over. More remains of the British, French and Russian concession areas. Pictured: A ground view of the Bund in the 1920s

This image shows a Chinese policeman standing in the street in Hankow in front of another concession building. Behind him, rickshaws are seen making journeys as other pedestrians also walk past
Two black college students who were dragged from their car by Atlanta cops and tased while caught in traffic during a Black Lives Matter protest last summer are suing the city, its police and the mayor over the incident.

Taniyah Pilgrim, 21, and Messiah Young, 23, filed a federal lawsuit Thursday accusing Atlanta police officers of assault and false arrest. They said one officer dangerously escalated the confrontation by falsely claiming the pair had a gun in the May 2020 incident.

The two students, who both attend historically black colleges in Atlanta, were driving home May 30 when they got stuck in traffic amid protests following the death of George Floyd while in police custody days earlier.

Police bodycam footage captured them being confronted by officers who shouted at them, fired tasers at them and dragged them from their car as they screamed and asked what they had done wrong.

The widely viewed footage sparked an uproar at a time when tensions between the black community and police were already fraught and several officers were charged over the incident.

The two black students Taniyah Pilgrim, 21, and Messiah Young, 23, are suing after they were dragged from their car by Atlanta cops during a BLM protest last summer. Messiah Young speaks during a news conference Thursday announcing the suit

Police bodycam footage captured Taniyah Pilgrim, 21, and Messiah Young, 23, being confronted by officers who shouted at them, fired tasers and dragged them from their car as they screamed and asked what they had done wrong on May 30 2020

Pilgrim and Young held a press conference Thursday with their attorneys announcing the suit which names the city, nine officers and Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms as defendants.

According to the suit, the police stormed their car, smashed their windows and physically assaulted them in the incident.

Atlanta police had no justification for pulling them from their car and hitting them with stun guns while they were stuck in traffic, it claims.

Mawuli Mel Davis, an attorney for Young, said the pair want 'accountability' for what happened.

'For these young people to have this video out and have to live with this for the rest of their lives is unthinkable, but we are here to hold the city and all those involved accountable,' said Davis.

'Accountability is what relieves pain and brings peace, and unfortunately there has been no accountability.'

Young and Pilgrim were heading home on May 30 during a curfew declared hours earlier by Bottoms when an officer instructed Young, who was driving, to leave the area, according to the suit.

Young - unaware of the curfew - moved forward a few yards to comply with the officer but was again stuck in traffic, the suit says.

He had been filming police confronting someone else on the side of the street, and the suit claims the officer retaliated by going after him and Pilgrim.

Officers are seen pointing a taser at the two students, who both attend historically black colleges in Atlanta, through a smashed window of the car

Pilgrim is seen in the passenger seat of Young's car screaming in terror as an officer aims and deploys a taser at her

Police swarmed the vehicle, and one officer repeatedly shouted that they had a gun, though he had no reason to believe that, according to the suit.

The suit claims another officer responded by pulling out and aiming his gun at Young and dragging him violently out of the vehicle and slamming him to the ground.

Young was punched repeatedly and suffered a deep laceration to his arm that required 13 stitches, according to his attorneys.

Another officer said concern about a gun led him to hit Pilgrim with a stun gun, according to the suit.

Pilgrim's attorney L. Chris Stewart pointed out that both students were unarmed at the time and there was no reason to think otherwise.

'There was no gun. There was no weapon,' he said.

'Yet he screamed multiple times from a distance, "He's got a gun,"' which could have gotten these kids killed.'

Attorneys played video of the encounter at a news conference.

Pilgrim (left) and Young at a press conference last June. The suit, filed Thursday, accuses Atlanta cops of assault, false arrest and says one cop dangerously escalated the confrontation by falsely claiming the pair had a gun

Young turned his head away from the screen, and Pilgrim dabbed tears from her eyes.

The two students spoke of the toll the incident had taken on their lives.

'Everyday, I'm reminded of something from that night,' said Young, who attends Morehouse College.

'A huge part of my life was diminished. Trying to move forward from this point is very irritating and very triggering.

'At a point, just seeing brutality continue, you would think there would be some type of reform or change at this point.'

Pilgrim, a student at Spelman College, said she still experiences anxiety and nightmares more than one year on from the encounter.

'It's like life took a total turn for something that we didn't ask to be involved with,' she said.

She added: 'Our lives are now at a standstill because of this when we should be able to be moving on as, you know, the officers are doing.'

Atlanta Police officers Ivory Streeter, Willie Sauls, Armon Jones (left to right top row) and Lonnie Hood, Mark Gardner and Roland Claud (left to right bottom row). The six officers were slapped with criminal charges over the incident

The mayor's office said it had not been served with the lawsuit and could not comment.

Six officers faced criminal charges days after the incident including aggravated assault, pointing or aiming a gun, simple battery and criminal damage to property over the incident.

They are: Officers Lonnie Hood, Roland Claud, Mark Gardner, Armond Jones, Willie Sauls and Ivory Streeter.

Bottoms and then-Police Chief Erika Shields fired two of the officers - Gardner and Streeter - when the footage went viral, saying they had used excessive force.

In February, they were reinstated to the force after a review board overturned their firings.

Atlanta's Civil Service Board determined that the city did not follow its own personnel procedures when terminating the officers because they had not been given proper notification or adequate opportunity to respond.

At least two other officers named in the suit are no longer with Atlanta police.

Shields also stepped down as police chief about two weeks after the May 30 incident.
The wife of a Cantor Fitzgerald executive accused of squatting at a $5million Hamptons home broke down in tears this week as she explained that the couple and their two children have nowhere else to go.

'I'm not squatting, I'm just trying to keep my kids with a roof over their heads,' Stephanie Pion told DailyMail.com outside the gated four-bed, three-bath property Thursday.

Stephanie and her husband Paul Pion, the chief administrative officer of the Manhattan finance firm, have remained at their $10,000-a-month Water Mill rental despite their two-year lease expiring on May 31.

In a lawsuit filed against the Pions last Friday, the owner of the Long Island property claimed the wealthy couple were exploiting New York's Covid-19 moratorium barring eviction and refusing to vacate the house.

The filing claims the Pions have another home in Manhattan and have been using 'shifty' means to stay at the rental - which has also allegedly been in a state of disarray.

But Stephanie, 39, has insisted 'there's no truth' to the allegations, claiming she's just trying to care for her two children, ages six and 11, while they search for a new place to live.

Stephanie Pion broke down in tears on Thursday as she addressed claims that she and her husband Paul Pion, the chief administrative officer of Cantor Fitzgerald, were squatting at a $5million Hamptons house

The mother-of-two, 39, tearfully explained she and her family have nowhere else to go, before dropping to her knees on the driveway and pleading for 'more time'

Stephanie and Paul have been renting out a property in Water Mill for the past two years for $10,000 a month, but a court document claims their lease ended on May 31. They are pictured in an Instagram post

'I have two kids,' she said tearfully before dropping to her knees on the driveway and pleaded for mercy. 'I'm just trying to take care of them. I've been trying to leave. I just need more time.'

In his filing, the owner of the home revealed he found a buyer for the house and expressed concerns that the Pions could jeopardize the $4,970,000 sale, which was scheduled to close on Tuesday.

But a person close to the family told DailyMail.com that the Pions' tenancy had been open-ended, and that the landlord failed to give them appropriate notice that their lease was being terminated which would allow for an orderly transition to leave the house.

'Realizing now that they didn't give proper notice, the owner is scrambling to blame someone and the purchaser is using bully tactics to force their hand,' the Pion family associate said.

The homeowner further claimed the couple had refused to allow potential buyers to tour the home and even once removed a lawn sign saying the property was 'IN CONTRACT.'

Earlier this week a source told the New York Post that the house looked like an episode of Hoarders, referring to the TV series that documents people who fill their homes from floor to ceiling with trash and belongings.

An appraiser who was eventually let into the house also allegedly described the place as a 'mess' and said 'the occupant was crazy.'

In photos obtained by DailyMail.com, however, the house did not appear to show such signs of damage or clutter.

The lawsuit against the couple claimed they had caused damage to the property and that the house was a 'mess'. However, photos obtained by DailyMail.com did not show such conditions

Stephanie claimed the house 'is a very clean house' and blamed the owners for failing to provide proper maintenance

The Pions say the house was built in the 90s and has not received proper upgrades or maintenance since

A source close to the Pions claimed the couple has spent tens of thousands of dollars of their own to maintain the properties systems 'which are old and in need of constant repair'

The property is valued at nearly $5million, and the homeowner has found a new buyer for it

In regards to the lawsuit, Stephanie said: 'I'm not allowed to comment because of the litigation,' but went on to deny the claims.

'There's no truth to what they say,' she added. 'I don't have a city apartment. I'm not a billionaire, or whatever they make me out to be.

'The house is a very clean house. But I'm a normal person. It's not a showhouse. It's a teardown.

'The house was built in the 90s and it hasn't been touched,' she continued. 'The landlord never did anything.'

The filing painted the Pions as an 'intolerable nuisance', hosting large parties, and causing damage to the home through 'unauthorized alterations, misuse and overuse of the household systems and lack of routine maintenance.'

But the family source told DailyMail.com: 'The house has been a money pit for the Pions as they have spent tens of thousands of dollars to maintain the property's systems which are old and in need of constant repair.'

The insider claimed the owner pocketed the years rent all upfront and therefore 'had all the leverage to tell the family to make the repairs themselves.'

Stephanie also confirmed reports that she and her husband were at one point considering buying the house in 2019, but explained, cryptically, that the deal never happened.

'He (the landlord) wanted to do it, an exchange, and I said, being a nice person, 'okay, no problem.' And then he didn't put a penny into it,' she said.

Homeowner Damian Krause has accused the couple of refusing to leave Water Mill house, but a source close to the Pions say they were not given adequate notice to vacate the property. Krause is pictured above with his wife Sharon in Water Mill, New York in 2012

The homeowner claims the Pions have become an 'intolerable nuisance', regularly hosting large parties and could potentially jeopardize the sale of the home

An ice cream truck was seen arriving at the home of Paul and Stephanie Pion on Thursday

The house, located on Flying Point Road, is surrounded by pine trees and not visible from the road.

It's located about a half mile from the beach and considered modest given the luxurious estates located just down the street.

One neighbor said he'd never met the Pion family but noted he has heard music blaring from their rental, particularly on weekends when he's seen as many as 10 to 15 cars parked in the driveway.

Aaron Appel, the buyer, told DailyMail.com that his purchase of the property is contingent on the home being vacated.

'I have a contract with the owner,' said Appel, who works in real estate. 'The owner has to deliver vacant possession of the house. That's for them to work out.'

'This is not my fight,' he added. 'This is their (the Pions) fight with the existing owner.'

The property owner, Damian Krause, did not respond to DailyMail.com's calls for comment.

The Pions, pictured in an Instagram photo, have denied claims that they have another residence in Manhattan

Last month, the New York State Legislature approved an extension of the moratorium for tenants who 'declare a financial or medical hardship' from the pandemic until August 31.

But the lawsuit argues that the ban on evictions 'has no bearing here since defendants have suffered no financial hardship from it.'

'I don't understand, they have money,' the insider told the New York Post. 'The owner filed a lawsuit but can't evict them because of COVID. That makes sense if you don't have money.'

Stephanie on Thursday denied that the couple owned another residence and were living at the rental like hoarders, claiming it's all part of the owners' scheme to force them out.

'I'm the total opposite of what they say,' she said. 'Honestly, I would give the shirt off my back to anyone. That's probably why I'm in this position.

'All I'm asking for is a little more time,' she cried. 'Because I need to find a place.'
A court in Myanmar extended the detention of American journalist Danny Fenster for another two weeks on Thursday, despite a demand from the U.S. State Department to be allowed to see him.

Online news and business magazine Frontier Myanmar, where Fenster is managing editor, said he faces a charge that carries a potential three-year prison term.

The charge, used frequently against dissidents and journalists, criminalizes 'any attempt to cause fear, spread false news, or agitate directly or indirectly a criminal offense against a government employee.'

The magazine said it did not know the reason for the charge.

Danny Fenster, 37, will be detained at least another two weeks after a court ruling in Myanmar on Thursday

Fenster has been detained in Insein prison (pictured) since May 24, when he was arrested boarding a flight to Detroit. A court inside the prison extended his detention on Thursday

Myanmar's military government has tried to silence independent news media by withdrawing the licenses they must obtain to publish or broadcast and by arresting journalists.

According to Myanmar's Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, about 90 journalists have been arrested since the army seized power in February and more than half of them are still detained.

The special court at Insein Prison in Yangon ordered Fenster's continued detention there for two weeks, scheduling his next hearing for July 1.

U.S. Embassy officials are demanding access to Fenster, who has not been seen since his arrest on May 24

Myanmar authorities have not allowed U.S. Embassy officials access to Fenster, State Department spokesman Ned Price told reporters in Washington.

He urged them to grant access under the Vienna Convention 'without delay and to ensure proper treatment of Danny.'

Price said the State Department was 'very gratified' by the release of another U.S. journalist, Nathan Maung, who had been arrested on a similar charge in March while working for a local news online news agency in Myanmar.

Maung was deported on Tuesday after the charge against him was dropped and his case dismissed, though a colleague at Kamayut Media who was arrested with him, Myanmar citizen Hanthar Nyein, remains imprisoned.

Price said Maung has met and spoken with senior State Department officials since his return.

Frontier said Fenster was represented by a lawyer in court Thursday but the magazine's representatives were not permitted to attend.

'We are still seeking information on the reason for Danny's arrest and continued detention,' Frontier said in its statement.

The State Department said it was 'very gratified' by the release of another U.S. journalist, Nathan Maung (left), who had been arrested on a similar charge in March

Parents Buddy (left) and Rose (center) and brother Bryan (right) of detained journalist Danny Fenster have campaigned for his release

Bryan is asking for the public's help in spreading the word about his brother's arrest in the hope that it will expedite his release

Fenster, 37, was detained at Yangon International Airport on May 24 as he was trying to board a flight to go to the Detroit area to see his family.

Bryan Fenster, Danny's brother, told the Detroit Free Press the family were 'just praying for his safety.

'We just hope he's healthy, that he's being looked after and that this mess is rectified as soon as possible.'

Bryan is asking for the public's help in spreading the word about his brother's arrest in the hope that it will expedite his release.

He said his brother has a 'passion for journalism and how the written word could spark change.'

'He's got a heart and passion for human rights and social justice, definitely a concerned world citizen.'

Two Myanmar journalists who were arrested more than a month ago were released on Thursday, the wife of one of them said.

Voice of Myanmar Editor-in-Chief Nay Myo Lin and reporter Shine Aung were arrested on April 27 when they obeyed an order to report themselves for questioning about articles judged to be anti-military.

Both returned to their homes after they were released when the cases against them were dropped, said Zarni Mann, who is Nay Myo Lins wife.

Voice of Myanmar, an online news service suspended operations following their arrests.

'We have said that journalism is not a crime. But not only Nay Myo Lin but also many other journalists have been prosecuted and detained in the prisons. I want all other detained journalists to be released, just like Nay Myo Lin,' said Zarni Mann.
A leader in the movement for the wealthy Atlanta suburb of Buckhead to secede from the city has blasted the mayor over rising crime in the area, saying a 'divorce' is inevitable.

'We filed our divorce papers at the city of Atlanta and our divorce is final,' said Bill White, the CEO of the Buckhead City Committee, in an interview with Fox News on Thursday.

White slammed Atlanta city leadership, including Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms, accusing her of ignoring soaring crime in Buckhead and presiding over a demoralized and underfunded police department.

It follows a shocking shooting in Buckhead on June 5, when father-of-three Andrew Worrell was struck twice by bullets while jogging at around 8.35am. He survived and has since been released from hospital to recover at home.

'They are just not paying attention to the crime. The leadership vacuum is substantial,' White said of Atlanta's elected officials.

'I don't like saying anything bad about Mayor Bottoms. I'm sure she is a nice human being ... but she has completely let our officers down,' he added.

'We filed our divorce papers at the city of Atlanta and our divorce is final,' said Bill White, the CEO of the Buckhead City Committee, which is leading the secession push

Mayor Bottoms is seen on Wednesday signing an order to make Atlanta's city-owned bathrooms all-gender. Critics say she isn't doing enough to address violent crime

Father-of-three Andrew Worrell was struck twice by bullets while jogging the morning of June 5. He survived and has since been released from hospital to recover at home

'They feel demoralized, underpaid, underrecognized and being told not to fight crime in the way they would like to,' added White.

'We love the Atlanta police department but we'll form Buckhead City with its own police department, with significantly greater presence on the streets.'

A spokesperson for Mayor Bottoms did not immediately respond to an inquiry from DailyMail.com on Thursday evening regarding rising crime rates in Buckhead.

Bottoms, who was on President Joe Biden's shortlist of potential VP picks, has remained active on other fronts this week, on Wednesday signing an order declaring all of Atlanta's city-owned bathroom 'all-gender'.

The crime spike in Buckhead so far this year has alarmed residents. Through last week, aggravated assaults were up 52 percent in the wealthy enclave, compared to a rise of 26 percent citywide, according to an analysis of police data by WXIA-TV.

Robberies citywide were up just 2 percent, but in Buckhead they are up 39 percent, while larceny from automobiles rose 40 percent in Buckhead and 27 percent citywide.

Residents of Buckhead anticipate a referendum next year will allow them to secede from Atlanta. The boundaries of their proposed new city are seen above

Citywide crime statistics (above) show crime rising across Atlanta, but rates are jumping even faster in Buckhead, where aggravated assaults were up 52 percent

BUCKHEAD, GEORGIA: ONE OF THE NATION'S WEALTHIEST ZIP CODES Buckhead is known as Atlanta's commercial and residential district, famed for its high-rise buildings and shopping centers, hotels and mansions. The neighborhood is a historically wealthy district and was once ranked the ninth richest zip code in the country with a median price of homes of $1,460,595, according to Forbes. American suburban luxury home in Buckhead, Atlanta Bloomberg named Buckhead the 20th richest zipcode in the nation in 2011, when the average household net worth there was $1,353,189. The average household income was $280,631. Because of this, Buckhead is often called the 'Beverly Hills of the East/South', in reference to the upscale city in California. Buckhead is also known to have a few notable residents, including Georgia Republican Kelly Loeffler. Loeffler was among the wealthiest members of Congress until she lost her seat in January. In 2009, she and her husband spent more than $10million on a European-style mansion named Descante in the Buckhead neighborhood. Advertisement

'The people of Buckhead have had enough,' said White. 'The criminals here feel emboldened.'

White estimated nearly 80 percent of his community will vote in favor of the separation from Atlanta in a referendum expected to reach the ballot next year.

Currently, a bill authorizing the referendum has been introduced in the Georgia House of Representatives, and the legislature will be able to vote on it in the 2022 session.

Atlanta officials have opposed the idea to separate the wealthy, largely white neighborhood from the rest of Atlanta, which is predominantly black, arguing it would siphon away much of the city's tax base and, in turn, its budget.

Buckhead's population is 73.5 percent white and 23.9 percent black. This compares to the wider Atlanta population which is 50.7 percent black and 38 percent white, according to census data.

Data analysis shows that Buckhead's population accounts for 20 percent of Atlanta's population, but more than 40 per cent of the city's assessed property value.

The tipping point for many Buckhead residents was the shooting attack on Worrell earlier this month.

Worrell was shot twice by a 'mentally ill' man who police say also opened fire on two other people and mowed down a neighbor with his car.

Atlanta police arrested and charged 22-year-old Gaelen Newsom with attempted murder, three counts of aggravated assault and two counts of possession of a firearm during a crime in connection with the weekend crime spree.

His wife Anne Worrell appeared on Fox News on Tuesday, telling host Tucker Carlson that she never imagined violent crime would 'really be knocking on my door'.

Asked if what happened to her husband felt like part of a bigger pattern, Anne agreed.

'It does. We've been saying for the past year 18 months that it just feels like it's creeping in closer and closer to the neighborhoods,' she said.

'I mean it's been in Buckhead but it just feels like it's getting closer and closer and I never imagined that it would really be knocking on my door like this but I think this is one reason why the citizens of Buckhead are very disturbed by this because we all feel violated.'

Andrew Wornell is pictured with a walker after having returned home from the hospital

Anne said she felt compelled to speak up on the issue of violence in Buckhead following Andrew's shooting.

'I do feel like since it's happened to us, we need to be the next voice and maybe this can be the catalyst for some change and some action in Atlanta and specifically Buckhead,' she said.

Gaelen Newsom, 22, was arrested and charged in Andrew's shooting

She said Andrew had been about halfway through his regular three-mile route when a car pulled up next to him.

'As the window came down he saw a gun and the guy just shot immediately and he was stunned and he shot him again and Andrew took off and ran up a little hill behind a tree and the guy took off and Andrew called 911'.

First responders found Andrew suffering from gunshot wounds to his leg and hip. He was taken to Grady Memorial Hospital.

Buckhead has seen several other high-profile instances of violence in recent months, including the fatal shooting of a 7-year-old girl in December.

Homicides were up 63 percent across Atlanta in the period running January 1 to May 23 compared to the same period last year, crime data show.

Last month, Mayor Bottoms ordered a new anti-violence advisory panel to convene and review the city's approach to curbing violent crime, as well as issue recommendations to city leaders.

Bottoms admitted in December she didn't know how to stop the alarming wave of violence and is 'open to suggestions.'
Public school kids in one state will have their start and finish times staggered as part of a push to modernise the traditional school day and reduce traffic congestion.

The overhaul planned by education authorities in New South Wales would mean principals can offer options to parents other than the standard 9am-3pm school day.

Alternatives would include a 7am-1pm day or extended after-school care.

Government officials hope they can ease pressure on Sydney's heavily-congested roads by staggering when students are picked up and dropped off from school.

School children in New South Wales will have their start and finish times staggered as part of a radical push to modernise the traditional school day. Pictured is a file image of a schoolgirl walking to school in NSW

The cost of Sydney's traffic congestion to the state economy is estimated to reach $13.1billion by 2031, according to the NSW Productivity Commission.

As well as splitting start times, schools will also be allowed to extend their daily hours of operation, The Sydney Morning Herald reported.

Merrylands East Public in the city's west already operates an 8am to 1.15pm school day.

The scheme would also give more flexibility for shift-working parents and allow them to fit the school day around their work times.

NSW Treasurer Dominic Perrottet said schools needed to adjust to the fact more women were participating in the workforce.

'This is an opportunity for us to rethink how our students learn and how we can make life easier for many working parents,' he said.

Parents could choose options including 7am-1pm day or extended after-school care as part of the flexible new school hours. File image pictured of children in uniform visiting the the Donald Bradman museum

NSW Education Minister Sarah Mitchell added the traditional school day was a '20th century concept' which needed to be made more flexible to fit modern-day needs.

'This project is an opportunity to identify measures which remove pressure from parents and carers and improve the educational outcomes for students by being flexible with school hours, and then see how they might be scaled to similar schools,' she said.

'The reality is that the traditional school day, like the 9 to 5 workday, is a 20th century concept which may not always be relevant for schools in the 21st century.'
The identical twin of a young woman who died in a horror car crash while her boyfriend was 'hooning' on a beach says her sister's death took 'a huge piece of my soul' away.

Madison Prentice, 22, gave a shattering statement at the sentencing hearing of Matthew Emerson, 31, who pleaded guilty to causing the death of Paige Prentice by dangerous driving in December, 2019.

Mr Emerson, with Paige beside him, was 'hooning' and 'snaking' for 300 metres on the sand at Long Beach, three hours south of Adelaide, at 70km an hour just before Christmas on December 22, 2019.

Madison Prentice told the District Court that the loss of her identical twin sister Paige (left) in a 2019 accident on Long Beach, South Australia, took 'a piece of her soul'. Prentice and Madison are pictured together in the above photo

Paige Prentice, 22, died four days after the accident in which her boyfriend Matthew Emerson, 31, was 'hooning' for 300 metres on the sand at Long Beach

Neither Paige, nor her boyfriend Mr Emerson, were wearing seatbelts.

Mr Emerson's car tyre dug into the sand and the vehicle rolled.

She died four days later from injuries sustained in the crash, The Advertiser reported.

'When you took her life, you took my essence too. You are selfish and you are reckless and that is all I have to say to you,' Madison Prentice said, reading from her victim statement while staring at a crying Mr Emerson in the District Court.

She detailed how Mr Emerson had robbed her of a life beside her twin, including plans to travel the world together.

Both Madison Prentice and Paige's father, Graham, spoke with brutal, heartbreaking honesty at his sentencing.

Mr Prentice said Paige had spoken only days before the accident that she wanted to be an organ donor - and that her organs had helped five people live.

He told the court a parent should 'never have to bury their child'.

'People say that time heals all wounds, but I think that's bulls***. Time just helps you move forward, moving slowly forward through grief. How can you recover from such a loss?'

Matthew Emerson (picture) pleaded guilty to causing death by dangerous driving over the December 22, 2019 accident

He said his family 'would never be the same' and also called Mr Emerson's (pictured) actions 'reckless'

He said his family 'would never be the same' and also called Mr Emerson's actions 'reckless'.

Mr Prentice added that he believed Paige would want Mr Emerson to 'get on with your life' and 'hold it together' but 'never forget her'.

Prosecutor Thi Thy Nguyen described Mr Emerson's driving that day as 'mild hooning'.

Judge Ian Press accepted Mr Emerson was 'remorseful' and that the fact he had just been given his driver's licence was a factor.

Mr Emerson's lawyer Ben Armstrong called his behaviour 'low level skylarking' and asked Judge Press to suspend any sentence.

Emerson read a tearful apology to the court and will be sentenced in July.
A Bondi woman has denied pouring hot tea onto her hardware tycoon neighbour and his dog.

Mayo Hardware director James Mayo, who owned Australia's most expensive apartment, applied for an restraining order against his neighbours over claims a hot liquid was poured on him and his dog from a fifth-floor balcony.

Mayo, 54, sold his four-bedroom penthouse overlooking Sydney's Bondi Beach in March for a record $20.5 million.

He has now privately applied for a restraining order over claims he and the dog were burned by the liquid poured on them while they were on the street below.

But in a twist to the bitter feud, neighbour Kim Lipping shut down Mayo's claims that he and the dog were burned by the liquid poured on them while they were on the street below.

The four-bedroom Bondi Beach penthouse went under the hammer for auction in March. Mr Mayo claims he and the dog were burned by the liquid poured on them as they were standing on the street

Mayo Hardware director James Mayo, who owned Australia's most expensive apartment, applied for an restraining order against his neighbours. Pictured with his wife Tottie Goldsmith

When asked outside court if she had poured hot tea on the multimillionaire, Mrs Lipping simply responded: 'no'.

'I really can't comment, I'm sorry. It's very stressful,' she told The Daily Telegraph.

Mr Mayo was set to apply for two apprehended domestic violence orders against Mrs Lipping and her husband Michael in court on Thursday, however the matter will instead be heard next month.

Lawyers for the Lippings suggested the dispute could be handled through free mediation in a Community Justice Centre rather than in court.

Magistrate Ross Hudson referred the matter to mediation. The trio will reappear in court on July 15.

Mr and Mrs Lipping have a social circle including NRL identities and are well-known in Bondi for their charitable work.

Mr Mayo is moving into a $36million mansion overlooking Sydney Harbour in the affluent suburb of Point Piper.

A spokesman said the application was not a police matter.

Mr Mayo is an accomplished yachtsman who won the Sydney to Hobart race as a teenage crew member.

He first put the four-bedroom penthouse under the hammer for $17 million on March 20.

The apartment was put on the market for $17 million and a couple paid more than $4 million over the asking price

The sale was four years after he bought the property in 2016 for $9.8 million

Panoramic views of the ocean and ritzy location of the penthouse drew in huge interest from vendors.

A couple, who have not been named, won the heated bidding war and paid more than $4 million over the asking price.

The open plan interior spans 304sqm and includes its own foyer at the entrance.

Though the panoramic views of the ocean and ritzy location of the penthouse drew in huge interest from vendors

Four en-suite bathrooms are attached to the bedrooms, granting residents excellent privacy.

The apartment has a dedicated media room and a spacious formal dining room, making it the perfect entertainer's suite.

The oversized terrace is pitched by the real estate agency as the perfect alfresco setting with sprawling views of Bondi Beach in the backdrop.
A photo of Scott Morrison touching down in Australia after a landmark trip to Singapore, Britain and France that secured a billion-dollar free trade deal with Britain has renewed debate about Covid-19 international travel rules.

The Prime Minister arrived in Canberra on Thursday night and went straight into two weeks of home quarantine at The Lodge, his official residence in the nation's capital.

Mr Morrison posted a picture of him being temperature tested on the runway after disembarking his RAAF special-purpose plane which took him to the G7 summit in Cornwall, England last weekend.

'Good to be back home in Australia', he wrote.

Mr Morrison posted a picture of him being temperature tested on the runway after disembarking his RAAF special-purpose plane at Canberra Airport on Thursday night

The photos of Morrison touching down in Australia after a whirlwind visit to Singapore and Europe has sparked debate over Covid-19 international travel rules

Poll Should Aussies be allowed to visit family overseas and home quarantine on return like the Prime Minister? Yes No Undecided Should Aussies be allowed to visit family overseas and home quarantine on return like the Prime Minister? Yes 203 votes

No 76 votes

Undecided 11 votes Now share your opinion





'I've just arrived back in Canberra after a very productive trip to Singapore, the UK and France, and will now undertake the required 14 days of quarantine.

'Also can't wait to see Jen and the girls once my quarantine is finished.'

But the post divided the PM's followers on Facebook.

Many congratulated him on signing a trade deal with the UK and 'securing the country's future', but others urged him to let Australians go overseas with home quarantine on return instead of expensive hotel quarantine.

'Can't wait to see my family overseas. Make a plan for opening borders,' wrote Sandie Smith.

'When can we do the same, go and quarantine at home when we come back. Or is this not for us?' wrote Fernando Estrada.

Since March 2020, foreigners cannot enter the country and Australians have been banned from leaving unless they get an exemption for purposes including business or travel in the national interest, which allowed Mr Morrison to depart.

But thousands of Aussies who have family overseas are demanding the government relaxes the rules to let them re-unite with their parents and siblings. Under current rules, only spouses and dependent children of a resident are allowed to enter.

Independent MP Zali Steggall and Greens Senator Nick McKim have tabled a petition in Parliament which has 66,000 signatures to change the definition of 'immediate family' to include parents.

Dozens urged Mr Morrison to let Australians go overseas to visit friends and family

Mr Morrison has insisted that his trip was necessary, telling Sky News: 'Well, this is essential. This has been essential.

'This has been the first time when these nations have been able to gather together in person for some time. There was never a more important occasion for Australia to be around this table.

'This all impacts on Australia's interests. It all impacts on our security. It impacts on our prosperity, and it impacts on our well-being, our health,' he said.

At the G7 summit with the US, UK, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, the European Union, South Korea, South Africa and India, Mr Morrison rallied allies to help protect the Indo-Pacific region from increasing Chinese aggression.

He then flew to London and agreed a trade deal with UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, which will allow Australian farmers to sell more products to the UK and let Britons live down under for three years without doing farm work.

The agreement will boost the Australian economy by $1.3billion (700million) and the UK economy by $915million (500million) each year.

The government aims to open the international border in July 2022 but will closely monitor rates of hospitalisation and death in nations that have been largely vaccinated against Covid-19 to decide if it can open sooner.

'Also can't wait to see Jen and the girls once my quarantine is finished,' Mr Morrison (pictured with Mrs Morrison) wrote

The post sparked a divided response as many supporters congratulated the Prime Minister on signing a trade deal with the UK

Last week an image of Mr Morrison standing outside an English pub sparked angry accusations of hypocrisy as Australians face yet another year of overseas travel bans.

The Jamaica Inn hotel in Cornwall posted a social media image of the Prime Minister visiting their drinking hole for a weekend lunch, during the three-day G7 summit at Carbis Bay, a one-hour drive away.

'Pleasure to have the Australian Prime Minister and his 20-plus personal team for lunch this weekend,' it said on Facebook.

'You never know what you might find at Jamaica Inn!'

The Launceston village hotel's Facebook page was inundated with messages protesting against Australia's ban on citizens travelling overseas or foreigners visiting Australia to see family and friends.

An image of Scott Morrison standing outside an English pub has sparked angry accusations of hypocrisy as Australians face yet another year of overseas travel bans

The Jamaica Inn hotel, in Cornwall, posted a social media image of the Australian Prime Minister visiting their drinking hole for a weekend lunch, during the three-day G7 summit at Carbis Bay, a one-hour drive away

Mr Morrison was accompanied by personal advisers, public servants from the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet and the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, along with Australian High Commission staff, based in London, during his pub visit on Sunday.

His office also confirmed an official photographer and a press secretary were part of the entourage to the UK.

Mr Morrison's entourage of 20 staff was significantly smaller than US President Joe Biden's 1,100 personnel.

'The Prime Minister is travelling with seven personal staff including his senior national security and international policy adviser, his senior defence adviser, a senior media adviser and photographer to manage travelling media and local media engagements, his executive officer and his director of programme and advancer,' a spokeswoman for the PM told Daily Mail Australia.

The Jamaica Inn hotel, in the Cornwall county village of Launceston, posted a social media image of the Australian Prime Minister visiting their drinking hole following the three-day G7 summit at Carbis Bay, a one-hour drive away

The Launceston village hotel's Facebook page has been inundated with messages protesting against Australia's ban on citizens travelling overseas or foreigners visiting Australia to see family and friends

Melbourne engineer Kim Bernadette suggested Mr Morrison could have joined the G7 by Zoom like his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi, whose country has recently battled a deadly Covid second wave.

'He could have participated as a guest via zoom, as the Indian PM did,' she tweeted.

'Double standards when Australians can't leave the country.

'It's tone deaf for Scott Morrison to be in the UK with an entourage of 20.

'Australia isn't a member of the G7.'

Mr Morrison's spokeswoman said meeting world leaders in person was better than over Zoom.

'The G7 and meetings in Singapore, the UK and France are a unique opportunity for the Prime Minister to ensure Australia is at the table with the world's largest democracies for vitally important security, health and economic talks,' she said.

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson invited Australia, India and South Korea to the June 11 to 13 G7 summit, even though they are not permanent members of the Group of Seven nations. Mr Johnson is pictured centre with his wife Carrie and Australian PM Scott Morrison at the G7 summit

With the PM and not ordinary people allowed to travel to and from Australia, an English grandmother lamented at how she was yet to meet her two-month old granddaughter in Victoria.

'We last hugged our daughter who lives outside Melbourne in August 2019,' she said.

'We now have a grand daughter born April this year. When will we get to meet her?

'How old will she be?'

A Facebook group, UK Mums in Australia, protested about the ban on permanent residents leaving Australia for social visits unrelated to work.

'I cannot begin to tell you how rage-inducing this happy snap is for our community and for everyone stuck here in Australia with family in the UK,' it said.

'The double standard of it all is astounding. Parents according to Scott Morrison (ScoMo) are not considered immediate family in Australia.

With the Australian government expecting to keep the travel ban in place until at least mid-2022, Melbourne engineer Kim Bernadette suggested Mr Morrison could have joined in by Zoom like his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi, whose country has recently battled a deadly Covid second wave

'We are separated from partners, children, parents and grandparents with no road map from the government when we can see them again.'

The social media pile-on, featuring an image of that English pub, spilled over into Mr Morrison's Facebook page.

On woman defended the Prime Minister, among a sea of hostile comments.

'All the left wing whingers are here,' she said.

In limited circumstances, Australia's Department of Home Affairs is allowing overseas travel for work-related purposes or for compassionate reasons like a funeral on the proviso Australians quarantine for 14 days when they arrive home, regardless if they have been vaccinated or not for Covid-19.

Social visits overseas, however, have been banned since the start of the Covid pandemic in March 2020.

Scott Morrison's visit to England yielding a free-trade deal with the UK. He is pictured with his UK counterpart Boris Johnson outside 10 Downing Street in London

An English grandmother lamented at how she was yet to meet her two-month old granddaughter in Australia

Mr Morrison on Sunday, Australian time, defended the overseas travel ban after being asked at a press conference about his English country pub visit.

'What they can do is that they can go to sporting games,' he said during a media conference at the St Illogan Church in the UK.

'They can go to work. They can live in an economy that is bigger today than before.

'That hasn't seen the terrible number of deaths that we've seen in other parts of the world.'

Asked when Australians would be able to travel overseas again, Mr Morrison said: 'When the medical advice suggests that we should.'

In April, 22,610 people flew into Australia for a short stay, up from 8,320 in March.

Of those short-term visitors, 16,320 came from New Zealand, a big increase from 2,060 the previous month.

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson invited Australia, India and South Korea to the June 11 to 13 G7 summit, even though they are not permanent members of the Group of Seven nations
Judd Feeney meeting SES crew member Kevin in their hi-vis gear (pictured)

A young boy fascinated with the SES has pitched in to help crews clean up debris after Victoria's wild storms - and has even got his own pint sized uniform.

Six-year-old Judd Feeney from Moonee Ponds has joined SES volunteers for some 'training' by clearing branches off roads and giving weather updates.

'This is Judd Feeney from SES. There's a branch, see? So don't go on Maribyrnong Reserve. Be safe. Thank you very much. Bye,' he advises in one clip.

The boy can be seen wearing hi-vis overalls with the SES logo on the back and his name printed on the chest as he then clears the branch off the road.

In another video he tells residents of Traralgon - two hours east of Melbourne - to beware of strong winds along with hippos and crocodiles in rising floodwaters.

'Please don't go through floodwater and take action now to protect your home,' he says.

Floods caused debris near the entrance of a gold mine in Walhalla, Victoria on June 10 (pictured)

The nine-year-old SES hopeful giving one of his weather updates telling the public to beware of hippos and crocs in the floodwaters (pictured)

His mother Nikki Fox said her son had been obsessed with the SES since one of their search and rescue operations caught his attention.

'A boy of a similar age got lost at Mount Disappointment recently for three days and he would wake up and watch it on the news and say he wanted to help,' Ms Fox told Daily Mail Australia.

'He's joined scouts and he stages fake rescues with his cousins and abseils off his bunk bed.'

He is also seen in a photograph in his bright orange SES t-shirt - which he wears every day - alongside VICSES volunteer Kevin in his gear and hard hat.

Judd Feeney (pictured) helps clear a fallen branch from Maribyrnong Reserve in Melbourne

Storm damage in Melbourne on June 10 after wild winds and heavy rain swept through the region (pictured)

Judd hopes to join the vertical rescue unit of Essendon SES unit as a volunteer when he turns 15.

Following wild weather last week, Melbourne residents have been told to steer clear of storm-ravaged regions as clean-up efforts continue.

Emergency Management Commissioner Andrew Crisp has cautioned them against a trip to the Dandenong Ranges and parts of Gippsland.

'My strong message to anyone that is not a local, that does not live up here, stay away,' he said on Thursday.

'You'll be getting in the way of all the great work trying to clear the roads.'

As well as road closures, many national parks have been shut after being deemed inaccessible or dangerous.

People observe the flood water in Traralgon (pictured) on June 10. Rising floodwaters prompted an evacuation warning for parts of the town in the Victorian region of Gippsland

The Dandenong and Yarra ranges national parks and 11 others to Victoria's east are among the long list off-limits to visitors.

Deputy state response controller Chris Hardman said Victorians must carefully plan their travel to ensure they didn't run into problems over the weekend and upcoming school holidays.

'If you're planning on camping these school holidays, ensure to never camp under trees as after heavy rainfall, they can become unstable,' he said.

The Victorian government also unveiled a new weekly payment of up to $1680 as some residents face another three weeks without power.
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have so far broadcast just 35 minutes of podcast content on Spotify as part of their 18million deal - as a royal expert says the streaming giant will be expecting 'something in return'.

The Duke, 36, and Duchess of Sussex, 39 - who are parents to two-year-old Archie - welcomed Lilibet 'Lili' Diana Mountbatten-Windsor earlier this month, on June 4 at 11.40am in Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital, California.

And before stepping back into their various business engagements the couple will 'both take some proper time off' to adjust to life as a family of four at their 11million mansion in Montecito, California, a source close to the couple told Vanity Fair.

Prince Harry's paternity leave means taking time out from his executive position at a Silicon Valley start-up that claims to be worth $1.7billion.

For the couple the time-off also means temporarily stepping back from their multi-million-pound deals with Netflix and Spotify - which Harry told Oprah Winfrey he was persuaded to sign when he was 'literally cut off financially' from the Royal Family.

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle during a visit to youth-orientated radio station, Reprezent FM, in Brixton, south London, 2018

The Sussexes were last heard on their Archewell Audio Spotify podcast for the 2020 Christmas special, and the platform had planned for 'a full-scale launch of shows' in 2021.

It is understood that the couple will be paid the full 18million fee after their duties have been met, The Sun reports.

Royal author Phil Dampier told The Sun: 'We're being told they're having up to five months off and people who are paying them a lot of money will expect something in return.'

Mr Dampier questioned whether the couple may 'have too much on their plate' after securing numerous deals and agreements before the birth of their daughter.

Harry & Meghan holiday special now available on Spotify - the 34 minute episode is the only content available so far, aside from a three minute trailer for the podcast

Prince Harry's paternity leave means taking time out from his executive position at a Silicon Valley start-up, BetterUp (pictured on their website)

Prince Harry is 'chief impact officer' at mental health services business BetterUp, where he helps promote an app used by corporate giants including Hilton, Facebook and oil firm Chevron to improve the wellbeing of their staff.

The company's chief executive Alexi Robichaux has declined to say how much the royal is being paid, although similar roles at other California firms would command six or seven-figure salaries.

Duke and Duchess of Sussex said in a joint statement after signing the deal with Spotify last year: 'What we love about podcasting is that it reminds all of us to take a moment and to really listen, to connect to one another without distraction.

'With the challenges of 2020, there has never been a more important time to do so, because when we hear each other, and hear each other's stories, we are reminded of how interconnected we all are.'

MailOnline has contacted Spotify and Archewell Audio for comment.
Alex Harvill died on Thursday after crashing while gearing up for an attempt at a world record 351-foot motorcycle jump

Daredevil Alex Harvill died on Thursday after crashing while gearing up for an attempt at a world record 351-foot motorcycle jump.

Harvill was at the Moses Lake Airshow in Washington, where spectators were recording his practice jumps ahead of the world record attempt.

iFIBER One reports that the fatal practice jump was his first of the morning and was a 150-foot jump.

In the video, Harvill can be seen riding his bike through a field before launching off a ramp.

During his jump, however, Harvill came up short and crashed into a dirt mound.

KIMA-TV reports that witnesses saw Harvill's helmet flying off of his head after the crash.

It then appears Harvill is tossed forward from the bike. Spectators watching the stunt could be heard groaning as the video comes to an end.

The Grant County Coroner said that Harvill, 28, was attempting a practice jump when the crash occurred, with the injuries ultimately resulting in his death.

WARNING: GRAPHIC VIDEO

Daredevil Alex Harvill lost his life after a practice motorcycle jump resulted in a deadly crash

When Harvill lands, he hits the a dirt mound with a high enough impact to go flying

Harvill was reportedly taken to Samaritan Hospital in Moses Lake after first responders tried to treat him at the scene, before ultimately succumbing to his injuries.

An autopsy is scheduled to be performed on Friday to determine Harvill's cause of death.

'Our deepest sympathies go out to Alexs family, friends and loved ones,' the Grant County Sheriff's Office said on Facebook.

After the crash, the airshow where the jump was taking place vowed on Facebook to donate proceeds from the jump towards medical expenses for Harvill.

Harvill was an experienced stuntman and daredevil with several records to his name

Harvill was seen on Instagram looking at the ramp where his fatal crash would occur

The Moses Lake Airshow, where the jump took place, commented before Harvill's death

There has been no further public comment since Harvill's death was confirmed around 4:30pm ET.

Harvill was listed as one of the featured events in the airshow at the Grant County International Airport, set to run from Thursday to Saturday.

The 28-year-old was an accomplished daredevil who hailed from Ephrata, Washington.

On May 12, 2012, he set a world record at Toes Motocross Park in Royal City, Washington, for ramp-to-dirt distance jump, which he clocked in at 425 feet.

A year later, he went for the world record for dirt-to-dirt distance jump.

Harvill leaped over 297 feet at Horn Rapids Motorsports Complex in Richland, Washington, on July 6, 2013. He still holds that Guinness World Record.

He also competed in a number of sports, including the Canadian MX National Series, AMA Motocross, AMA Supercross and Arenacross, in addition to doing stunt work.

A month before his fatal world record attempt, Harvill posted about his goal on his website.

In video, Harvill can be seen on Thursday riding up to the ramp for his jump

Once he hits the ramp, he starts flying through the sky, all seemingly to plan

As his jump is unfolding, however, it becomes clear that Harvill may land short of his target

Witnesses claim that Harvill lost his helmet after the crash took place on Thursday

'I will be attempting another world record jump at this years airshow here in Moses Lake Washington. This time it will be Guinness World Records official for the Ramp to Dirt Motorcycle Distance Jump attempt,' Harvill posted.

'The current Guinness record... is held by Robbie Maddison who has courageously pushed the sport in many ways over the years,' he continued.

That record was set by Maddison over 13 years ago, back in March 2008.

Ahead of his record jump attempt, Harvill told the Columbia Basin Herald that he had been riding since he was four years old.

He also spoke of the inspiration of Evel Knievel, saying, 'Its so awesome that I can follow in his footsteps and have some local ties to him and just live on the daredevil motorcycle legacy of pushing the limits.'

Harvill was listed as one of the featured events in the airshow at the Grant County International Airport, set to run from Thursday to Saturday (bike pictured)

Alex Harvill is survived by his wife, Jessica, pictured with him on Instagram

Jessica gave birth to their second child just one month ago

In 2017, Harvill suffered an injury after taking a jump too fast, resulting in a hard landing that sent him flying over the handlebars, shattering a heel.

'All the sudden I just saw I was going too far,' Harvill said. 'And at that point, theres nothing you can do.'

The accident forced him to reconsider his racing career, though he ultimately got back into it and was even winning races prior to Thursday's tragedy.

Just one month ago, Harvill took to Instagram to announce the birth of Watson Robert Harvill, his second child with wife Jessica.
Australians who bought Bitcoin this year at the height of the cryptocurrency frenzy can reduce their tax bill - but there are penalties for those who try to hide their gains.

Bitcoin surged to $80,000 in early April after American billionaire Elon Musk declared he would accept it as payment for his Tesla electric cars.

Little more than a month later, Bitcoin dived after Musk changed his mind, arguing cryptocurrencies were created by solving complex maths equations, with those computer functions using too many fossil fuels.

Australians who bought Bitcoin this year at the height of the cryptocurrency frenzy can reduce their tax bill - but there are penalties for those who try to hide their gains

Penalties for lying about cryptocurrency CARELESS: 25 per cent RECKLESS: 50 per cent DELIBERATE: 75 per cent REPEAT OFFENDER: 95 per cent Source: H&R Block analysis of Australian Taxation Office penalties for failing to declare capital gains Advertisement

China's Communist Party government also announced it would ban cryptocurrency transactions.

Since the start of May, Bitcoin has dived from $74,000 to $50,000, leaving investors exposed if they bought amid the hype rather than a year ago when Bitcoin was worth just $13,000.

Existing tax rules allow Australians who make a loss on investments, including shares, to claim that loss against their capital gains but not their taxable income.

H&R Block director of tax communications Mark Chapman said Australians could only claim that loss against the capital gains they made in 2020-21 from selling shares, property or cryptocurrency.

'If you don't have capital gains in the same year or you don't have enough capital gains to use up the loss, you have to carry it forward to later years and use it against the first available capital gain that arises,' he told Daily Mail Australia.

'You can't use the loss against wages/salaries, business profits, rent, or interest and dividends.'

Bitcoin surged to $80,000 in early April after American billionaire Elon Musk declared he would accept it as payment for his Tesla electric cars. Little more than a month later, Bitcoin dived after Musk changed his mind, arguing cryptocurrencies were created by solving complex maths equations, with those computer functions using too many fossil fuels

Contrary to popular belief, the Australian Taxation Office can trace cryptocurrency transactions.

Phone companies, known legally as Australian Data Service Providers, provide the tax office with cryptocurrency transactions.

Australians who carelessly forget to declare their cryptocurrency transactions face a 25 per cent penalty on the amount they hid from the tax authorities.

Existing tax rules allow Australians who make a loss on investments, including shares, to claim that loss against their capital gains but not their taxable income. H&R Block director of tax communications Mark Chapman said Australians could only claim that loss against the capital gains they made in 2020-21 from selling shares, property or cryptocurrency

Records of crypto transactions that should be kept Receipts of purchase or transfer of cryptocurrency Exchange records Records of agent, accountants and legal costs Digital wallet records and keys Software costs related to managing your tax affairs Source: H&R Block Advertisement

This rises to 50 per cent for reckless evasion to 75 per cent for a deliberate offence and 95 per cent for repeat offenders.

Mr Chapman said trying to be too clever with the tax office with cryptocurrency gains was ill advised.

'I'd have thought that gives some idea why it's a bad idea,' he said.

Australians who profit from cryptocurrency also need to be aware they have to pay not just capital gains tax, but also income tax if the ATO considers the gains to be business related.

'If you are acquiring the cryptocurrency to trade it, you might be deemed to be running a business of trading cryptocurrency, in which case you will pay income tax on the business profits,' Mr Chapman said.

Unlike the capital gains tax, Australians don't get a 50 per cent discount on their income tax as the proceeds from cryptocurrency move them into a higher tax bracket.

Cryptocurrency investors are advised to keep records and receipts of the date of transactions, which can be done via exchange-trading platforms instead of just peer-to-peer transactions.

These exchanges also provide an Australian dollar value of transactions.
Boris Johnson was last night facing an angry backlash over the Government's use of scientific data after it emerged he may have delayed lockdown based on outdated modelling.

Sir Iain Duncan Smith accused the Prime Minister of too often taking vital decisions for the nation based on modelling which turned out to be incorrect.

The former Tory leader said it was 'breathtaking' that the PM had been presented with models based on out-of-date data which forecast massive numbers could be hospitalised or die because of the Indian, or Delta, variant.

The models failed to take into account the latest information showing that vaccines were more effective than first thought in protecting against the variant.

Sir Iain Duncan Smith (right) accused the Prime Minister (left) of too often taking vital decisions for the nation based on modelling which turned out to be incorrect

The Prime Minister used modelling by Imperial College London which published a pessimistic scenario warning that Britain could experience a further 203,824 deaths by next June.

But MPs have been told the Imperial team based their calculations on old estimates of vaccine effectiveness. They worked on the basis that the Oxford/AstraZeneca jab would reduce hospitalisations by between 77 and 87 per cent after two doses.

But real-world data from Public Health England shows two doses of the Astra Zeneca vaccine is 92 per cent effective at preventing hospitalisation. The Pfizer jab is even more effective  with a 96 per cent reduction in the risk.

The crucial finding means all of the modelling considered by the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies and the Prime Minister over-estimated the likely number of deaths.

Readjusting the models could see Imperial's death estimates until next June fall from 203,824 until to 26,854  and Warwick University's would fall from 72,400 to 17,100  and perhaps even further to just over 6,000.

Professor Neil Ferguson, from Imperial College London, said of the modelling: 'They're not really predictions  they're scenarios deliberately looking at a wide range of uncertainty, asking how bad could things reasonably become?'

Conservative MP Huw Merriman pointed to data, published at the time of the roadmap in February, which has turned out to be far too pessimistic about the numbers ending up in hospital with Covid.

Sir Iain said it proved the Government needed to bring in other experts to more rigorously scrutinise the forecasts being presented to him by the Sage committee.

He said: 'The Government desperately needs to have a "red team" of people  economists, software experts and modellers, and other scientists  who come in and look at the data from a different perspective.' Sir Iain added: 'We seem to be only getting the information which allows the judgment to be made for delay.

'The more I hear about Imperial models, the more I get a picture of a shoebox held together by paper and string.'

Mr Merriman also highlighted the fact that there are far fewer Covid patients in hospital than the modelling used to inform the roadmap out of lockdown had forecast.

When the Government announced its dates in February, experts said it was possible there could be up to 15,000 in hospital by now. Official figures show there are only 1,227.

Yesterday members of Sage defended their projections. Professor Neil Ferguson, from Imperial College London, said of the modelling: 'They're not really predictions  they're scenarios deliberately looking at a wide range of uncertainty, asking how bad could things reasonably become?'

Professor Graham Medley, who chairs the modelling sub-committee of Sage, told the Royal Society of Medicine: 'The modelling is being misrepresented in a way, in the sense that people say, "Oh look, It didn't happen". That's partly because measures were put in place to prevent it happening.'
The View went off the rails Thursday morning, when co-hosts Whoopi Goldberg and Meghan McCain got into a verbal spat about President Joe Biden lashing out at a CNN reporter the day before.

McCain called Biden out for his bad behavior for snapping that Kaitlan Collins was 'in the wrong business' after she asked him if he could work with Russian President Vladimir Putin after their sit down. Biden later apologized but complained journalists never ask him a 'positive question.'

'Part of my problem,' McCain said on Thursday's show, 'is that just because Trump was so bad, it doesn't absolve Biden's bad behavior. What he did was 100 percent Trumpy.'

'If Trump had done that, we would be screaming at the top of our lungs in one way or another,' she said, adding that Biden usually gets a 'free-pass' from reporters, but 'it is in no one's best interest to treat him like it's state TV'.

Whoopi hit back that she's never heard Trump apologize to a reporter during his four years in office.

'With all due respect, I don't care,' McCain responded as the discussion began to heat up. 'I don't care if he is apologizing. He just embarrassed himself, and he looks like Trump.'

Whoopi fired back: 'I don't care that you don't care. Just hear what I'm saying.'

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The View co-hosts Whoopi Goldberg and Meghan McCain got into a heated argument on Thursday about President Joe Biden lashing out at a CNN reporter the day before

'Part of my problem,' McCain said on Thursday's show, 'is that just because Trump was so bad, it doesn't absolve Biden's bad behavior

McCain then yelled back: 'Well I don't care that you don't care, Whoopi, so we're even.'

'Well then, good, Meghan then you can be how you always are,' Goldberg spat back, to which McCain replied: 'You could be how you always are.'

The show cut to commercial break at that point, and when it returned the two co-hosts apologized to each other.

This isn't the first time the two have gotten into an argument though.

In 2019, amid a heated dispute between McCain and another co-host, Joy Behar, Goldberg told her to 'please stop talking.'

'Girl, please stop talking,' she said. 'Please stop talking now!'

'No problem, McCain replied. 'I wont talk the rest of the show.'

'Im OK with that,' Goldberg responded as the audience gasped. 'Im OK with that. If you are going to behave like this.'

And in May, Goldberg cut off McCain's comments about how she had condemned a rise in anti-Semitic acts before the rest of the panel slammed Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Green for comments she made comparing a mask mandate to the Holocaust.

Goldberg said they were going on a commercial break and the conversation would continue when they returned, but McCain asked: 'Why are you cutting me off?'

'I'm cutting you off because we have to go, Meghan,' Goldberg responded. 'Why do you think I'm cutting you off?'

Thursday's verbal spar came just one day after President Joe Biden ended a series of questions about his summit with Putin by yelling at Collins.

She had asked him why he was so confident Putin would change his behavior and agree to work with the United States after years of bad-blood between the two countries and Putin's past actions.

'I'm not confident I'll change his behavior,' Biden replied. 'Why do you do this all the time?'

'When did I say I was confident?' he continued. 'What I said was - let's get it straight. I said what will change their behavior is if the rest f the world reacts to them and it diminishes their standing in the world.'

'I'm not confident of anything,' the president said. 'I'm just stating the facts.'

'But given his past behavior has not changed, and in that press conference after sitting down with you for several hours, [Putin] denied any involvement in cyber attacks, he downplayed human rights abuses, he even refused to say Alexei Navalny's name.

'So how does that account to a constructive meeting?' the president asked, rhetorically. 'If you don't understand that, you're in the wrong business.'

He was soon criticized by other journalists, and before he boarded Air Force One later in the day, he reportedly apologized for his tone with Collins, and said he shouldn't have been a 'wise guy.'

The president confronted CNN reporter Kaitlan Collins after she asked him why he was so confident Vladimir Putin would be willing to work with the United States and told her that she misconstrued his words and if she didn't understand that she was 'in the wrong business'

President Joe Biden on Wednesday spoke to reporters on the tarmac of the airport in Geneva before boarding Air Force One for his flight home to Washington, DC

But he also claimed reporters only ask him negative questions.

'To be a good reporter you gotta be negative. You gotta have a negative view of life, ok, it seems to me - the way you all - you never ask a positive question,' Biden told one of the reporters on the tarmac at the airport in Geneva Wednesday before boarding Air Force One for a flight back home to Washington.

Biden made his complaint after being asked to provide 'concrete evidence' that 'suggests any movement has been made' with the Russian leader.

'Well find out,' the combative president said. 'We have an agreement to work on a major arms control agreement.

'I started working on arms control agreements all the way back during the Cold War. If we can do one during the Cold War, why couldnt we do one now?

'Well see. We will see whether or not it happens.'
A high-ranking Chinese spy chief is rumoured to have defected to the United States and given Washington evidence on the Wuhan lab which prompted Joe Biden's about-face on the coronavirus leak theory.

Dong Jingwei is believed to have fled to the US with his daughter Dong Yang on February 10, according to Spy Talk.

He made a name in China's secret service, known as Guoanbu, and was head of counter-intelligence, or spy-catching, after being promoted to the post of vice minister in April 2018.

If the reports are true, Dong is the highest-level defector in the history of the Peoples Republic of China.

It is claimed that he informed US officials about the Wuhan Institute of Virology, where Covid-19 may have emerged, causing Biden to look seriously at the lab leak theory - long-derided as an erroneous fascination of the Trump administration.

Dong has been pictured online, and though not all of the pictures match up, one that continues to crop up was posted by Dr Han Lianchao, a former Chinese foreign ministry official who defected after the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre.

Han, described by US officials as a 'straight-shooter,' claims that Beijing dispatched envoys to meet with US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken in March to discuss handing Dong back to them.

Dr Shi Zhengli (pictured) is known as 'Bat Woman' by her colleagues because of her pioneering virus-hunting expeditions to bat caves. She is also at the centre of theories which claim that Covid-19 leaked from the Wuhan Institute of Virology

Various photos purporting to show Dong Jingwei have appeared online. One that continues to crop up was this one posted by Dr Han Lianchao, a former Chinese foreign ministry official who defected after the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre

It is claimed that the Communist Party's top brass demanded Dong be returned to them at a highly-contentious meeting in Alaska

Han claims the Communist Party's top brass demanded Dong be returned to them at the highly-contentious meeting in Alaska.

Blinken refused, Han said.

'He worked closely with Zhang Yue, who's now serving 15 years imprisonment for corruption,' Han said.

'Zhang was a confidant of Ma Jian, former MSS executive vice minister, who is also in prison for corruption.'

Dong 'was last seen in public in September 2020,' Han claimed.

His photos have been deleted by the Chinese search engine Baidu, according to some Chinese language news reports abroad.

Han's claim was impossible to verify, but he was known as 'a straight shooter, not known to exaggerate in any way or form, trusted for his integrity,' according to Nicholas Eftimiades, a former Pentagon, State Department and CIA expert.

But Eftimiades, a Nonresident Senior Fellow with the Atlantic Council's Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security, warned that the report should be seen for 'exactly what it is, a rumor.'

He added that such rumors 'happen all the time'.

Mollie Saltskog, a senior intelligence analyst with The Soufan Group, agreed, saying that unconfirmed reports of defections surface regularly.

'While significant and certainly useful for our intelligence efforts, one high-level defection will not drastically change our understanding or approach to China,' she told Spy Talk.

'In short, if true, this is potentially significant but not a game-changer.'

The conservative website Red State reported that the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency had received information from him that Beijing is covering up biological warfare research at the Wuhan lab.

Dr Anthony Fauci, Biden's chief medical advisor and a current target of Republican fury, has defended investing U.S. funds in the Wuhan lab, insisting that their research into coronaviruses was essential and it would be 'a dereliction of duty' not to support their work.

Anthony Blinken, the Secretary of State (center right) is seen meeting his Chinese counterpart in Alaska on March 18. At the meeting, Dong's defection was raised, a Chinese dissident has alleged. China asked for Dong to be sent back: Blinken reportedly refused

Blinken, pictured with a face mask, refused to hand over Dong, a Chinese dissident reported. The State Department has not confirmed Dong's defection

Chinese Communist Party foreign affairs chief Yang Jiech is pictured at the March 18 meeting in Alaska. He is said to have demanded the return of Dong, who reportedly defected on February 10

Red State reported that Dong's defection pushed U.S. officials to question Fauci's approach.

'Sources say the level of confidence in the defector's information is what has led to a sudden crisis of confidence in Dr. Anthony Fauci, adding that U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) personnel detailed to DIA have corroborated very technical details of information provided by the defector,' it said.

Spy Talk also quoted the Paris-based newsletter Intelligence Online as reporting that Dong is 'close to' Xi Jinping, the Chinese president.

'He previously headed the Guoanbu (security ministry) in the region of Hebei, which has produced many of Xi's securocrats,' the publication reported in 2018.

Dong's defection, if it happened, may never be confirmed.

But it does come as the Biden administration, following scientific consensus, makes a notable shift in its thinking about the 'lab leak' theory.

Last year scientists were downplaying the theory, insisting that it was far more likely that the COVID-19 virus passed from animals to humans.

Now scientists believe that it may indeed be true.

On January 15 the State Department published a fact sheet about COVID-19, which said that 'circumstantial' evidence suggested a lab leak theory was possible.

Biden on May 26 ordered intelligence agencies to investigate the two competing ideas about the origins of the pandemic - evolved naturally and passed from animals to humans, or released from a laboratory. He gave them 90 days to report back.

ORIGINS OF COVID-19: THE THEORIES US state officials have given momentum to the idea that COVID-19 either leaked from a lab or was man-made by China as some kind of weapon against humanity. A Wuhan wet market was first thought to be the breeding ground of the virus, where the selling of live, wild animals would have given the perfect opportunity for it to naturally spread between species. It is thought the virus first developed in bats before passing on to a creature such as a pangolin that then came into contact with humans and transmitted the virus. Once it entered humans, the coronavirus is likely to have mutated to survive and then escalated out of control as a result of an unprepared population. There are also theories that the virus was genetically engineered by scientists, or that it has actually been around for years and even killed people in the past. Two high security laboratories in the city  the Wuhan Centre for Disease Control and the Wuhan Institute of Virology  have been the subject of many conspiracy theories. President Donald Trump claims he has seen evidence the virus, which he solely blames China for, came from Wuhan Institute of Virology  but he is not allowed to reveal it. The Institute has denied the claims from the early days of the outbreak. In April, Trump said: 'We are doing a very thorough examination of this horrible situation that happened.' Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, claimed in May there is 'enormous evidence' the coronavirus outbreak originated in a Chinese laboratory  but failed to provide any of the alleged evidence. Advertisement

The Wuhan laboratory in Hubei province is now at the center of speculation about the origins of COVID-19. Dong is said to have claimed that the virus escaped from the lab

Blinken has urged China to be more transparent about what they knew, when.

'What the government didn't do in the early days and still hasn't done is given us the transparency we need,' Blinken said on June 7, in an interview with Axios.

The White House has also accused China of obstructing investigations into the source of the pandemic.

The World Health Organization (WHO) sent a team to the Wuhan lab in late January, but the investigators were only allowed in for three hours, and were not granted access to all the documentation they required.

Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director general of the WHO, said their visit was inconclusive and upbraided China for being uncooperative.

Fauci, the nation's top public health expert, is now facing scrutiny over what he knew, when - and whether he was always straight with the public.

His critics, mainly Republicans, accuse him of downplaying the 'lab leak' theory because it was promoted heavily by Donald Trump.

The critics also argue that Fauci did not want to admit at the time that U.S. taxpayers' money was spent on the Wuhan lab.

He has since confirmed that $820,000 was given to the lab, over six years, to fund their research into coronaviruses.

Fauci justified the spending when quizzed on it before Congress last month, insisting that it was vital to understand coronaviruses coming from bats, and the bats were in China.

He said it would have been a dereliction of duty not to support the scientific research.

Fauci also insisted that the grants were not being used on 'gain of function' research, whereby viruses are made more transmissible or deadly, to understand their capabilities.

He said the scientific studies published thanks to U.S. funding bore no evidence of 'gain of function' research.

But he admitted that he had no way of knowing if the Wuhan lab was carrying out experiments in secret.

Scientists are seen working inside the Wuhan lab. The site is one of only three in the world - the others are in North Carolina and Texas - where 'gain of function' research is carried out on viruses, to make them more transmissible or deadly

Meanwhile, the former head of the Food and Drug Administration, Scott Gottlieb, has said Fauci told world leaders in the spring of 2020 that the coronavirus may have escaped from a lab in Wuhan, China.

U.S. researchers around that time still were considering whether the virus came from a lab break, and Fauci told the health leaders gathered that the newly identified strain of the coronavirus 'looked unusual,' according to Gottlieb.

The disclosure from the former FDA chief comes as an increasing number of mainstream scientists and media figures no longer are parroting the line from the Chinese Communist Party that the virus came from a bat.

Now, Gottlieb says Fauci last year at least considered that COVID-19 could have come from a lab - before closing ranks around the idea that it occurred naturally.

Former FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb said he was told Dr. Fauci had briefed world leaders on the possibility that the novel coronavirus leaked from a lab

Gottlieb, who served under Trump, said a former senior member of the Trump administration told him at the time of Fauci's 2020 talk.

Gottlieb said he'd recently reconfirmed with that person that Fauci had given the talk.

'I think early on, when they looked at the strain, they had suspicions,' Gottlieb recalled on CBS Face the Nation, speaking of U.S. scientists.

'And it takes time to do that analysis, and that dispelled some of those suspicions,' he added.

Additionally, Gottlieb said it was a mistake to only look at the virus from a scientific perspective: It also needs to be examined from a national security lens, he said.

'A scientific mindset looks at the virus and the virus' behavior and draws a conclusion,' he said.

'A national security assessment looks at that and then looks at the behavior of the Chinese government, the behavior of the lab, other evidence around the lab - including the infections we now know took place - and that changes the overall assessment,' he said.

While China has tried to insist the virus originated elsewhere, academics, politicians and the media have begun to contemplate the possibility it escaped from the WIV - raising suspicions that Chinese officials simply hid evidence of the early spread
A severe shortage of workers is threatening the supply of festive pigs in blankets.

The British Meat Processors Association (BMPA), the British Poultry Council and Tesco have demanded urgent action from ministers to protect food supplies as workers from Europe have been driven away by a combination of Brexit and Covid-19.

Chief executive of the BMPA, Nick Allen, said: 'If our guys can't supply the market, the retailers will probably look abroad.

'You actually start planning for Christmas at this time of year, and certainly things like pigs in blankets, you start making them now.'

A severe shortage of workers is threatening the supply of festive pigs in blankets

The British Poultry Council said the industry has seen a 10per cent drop in throughput in recent weeks because of a shortage of workers. Historically, some 60per cent of poultry meat workers - 22,800 - are EU nationals.

Its chief executive, Richard Griffiths, said: 'British food producers have shown phenomenal resilience and worked incredibly hard to feed the nation amidst the biggest crisis of our lifetime. Now is the time for the Government to support British businesses to ensure that quality British food never diminishes.

'We cannot run the risk of creating a two-tier food system where we import food produced to lower standards and only the affluent can afford high quality British produce.'

Chief executive of the BMPA, Nick Allen, said: 'If our guys can't supply the market, the retailers will probably look abroad. You actually start planning for Christmas at this time of year, and certainly things like pigs in blankets, you start making them now.'

Food industry leaders are calling on the Government to change visa rules to allow in tens of thousands of European nationals to support the food industry.

This includes attracting truckers to handle deliveries.

Tesco has told ministers its suppliers are wasting nearly 50 tonnes of food a week because of the worsening HGV driver shortage, according to The Grocer.

Britain's biggest supermarket told ministers earlier this week that some 48 tonnes of food across its supply chain in the last week alone had been binned.

The Federation of Wholesale Distributors said the situation is so bad that the government should put the Army on standby to help with food deliveries.
Brussels last night promised to consider a request from the UK to allow sausage sales to continue in Northern Ireland for another three months.

In a potential breakthrough in the 'sausage wars' row, the EU said it would assess the UK's call to extend a grace period on chilled meat sales until the end of September.

Under the terms of the Northern Ireland Protocol, British-made sausages and similar foods will be banned from being sold in the province at the end of this month.

In a potential breakthrough in the 'sausage wars' row, the EU said it would assess the UK's call to extend a grace period on chilled meat sales until the end of September

Britain has threatened to unilaterally extend the current grace period if a solution is not found, but Brussels has warned it would retaliate.

In a statement, the EU Commission said it was open to a solution on extending the grace period to September 30.

A No 10 spokesman said the extension would 'allow movements to continue while we seek to find a longer term solution with the EU'.

It came as the US also agreed to drop a 25 per cent tax on single malt Scotch whisky for five years following Brexit.

Commission vice-president Maros Sefcovic (pictured) will seek to arrange talks with Brexit minister Lord Frost

The EU Commission statement read: 'The Commission will now assess this request.

'The Commission has already indicated its openness to finding solutions in line with the Protocol.

'However, for that to happen, the UK must fully implement the Protocol, which is the solution found to protect the Good Friday (Belfast) Agreement, the functioning of the all-island economy, and the integrity of the EU's Single Market.

'There is no alternative to the Protocol.

'When looking for solutions, providing stability and predictability for the people of Northern Ireland will be of paramount importance.'

Commission vice-president Maros Sefcovic will seek to arrange talks with Brexit minister Lord Frost and his team to discuss the request, the statement added.

A Government spokesman said: 'There is no case whatsoever for preventing chilled meats from being sold in Northern Ireland - any ban would be contrary to the aims of the Protocol and the interests of the people of Northern Ireland.'
Tom Hawkins' wife has revealed things have become awkward in their household since their 18-month-old daughter Primrose developed an obsession with one of the AFL star's biggest rivals.

Emma Hawkins' Instagram post of Primrose - known in the family as 'Mimi' - showed her cuddling a plushie toy of Western Bulldogs star Marcus Bontempelli as Geelong's star forward watched on.

'Poor daddy. Things are getting a bit awks in the household with Mimi's Bont obsession in the lead up to Friday night's game,' she captioned the post, referring to Bontempelli's nickname.

Geelong Cats star Tom Hawkins watches on as daughter Primrose cradles her treasured plush doll of Marcus Bontempelli, one of Hawkins' fiercest rivals

Hawkins' wife Emma posted the adorable video of the 18-month-old cuddling the 'Bont' doll

The Bontempelli doll is Primrose's favourite along with a bunny and Bluey, said her father

The Marcus Bontempelli 'Bleacher Creature' plush doll, $30 for other AFL stars' daughters

Hawkins' Cats play Bontempelli's Bulldogs in a Round 14 clash on Friday night in Geelong.

Hawkins and wife Emma have two children Arabella, 3, and Primrose.

Earlier this month he posted an Instagram story which also showed Primrose playing with the Bontempelli doll and a soft bunny toy while watching television.

'Doing the hair can wait,' Hawkins wrote.

'As long as Mims got her three Bs in the morning - bunny. bluey. bont.'

Hawkins social media reveals his love of family life, filled with affectionate portraits of him with his wife and daughters.

Geelong Cats star Tom Hawkins pictured with Emma, his wife, and two children Arabella, 3, and Primrose, 18 months

Hawkins posted this picture when reunited with his family after six weeks apart during the AFL's enforced Covid 'bubble' in Queensland last year

He confessed last year to finding playing AFL 'tough' when he was separated from his family for nearly two months when the Cats entered the sport's Queensland Covid 'bubble' to play games.

His wife and daughters eventually came to Brisbane and did two weeks in quarantine in order to be reunited with the 32-year-old goalkicking whiz.

'Reunited at last! he wrote on the August 13, 2020 post. 'I'm lucky to have them here with me.'
Experts have warned that Covid testing in schools is hugely disruptive and should be scrapped after it emerged up to 60 per cent of positive tests turn out to be negative when checked.

More than 50 million lateral flow tests have been carried out in schools alone as part of the mandatory requirements of lockdown easing.

Many pupils and their social bubbles have been forced to self-isolate for 10 days after falsely testing positive.

Experts have warned that Covid testing in schools is hugely disruptive and should be scrapped after it emerged up to 60 per cent of positive tests turn out to be negative when checked

Analysis of Test and Trace data by The Telegraph shows that around a third of positive lateral flow tests come back negative when checked against the higher standard PCR tests.

In March, the figure rose to 60 per cent for a week, the data revealed.

Professor Sir Anthony Pollard, who led the Oxford vaccine programme, said the testing on such a huge scale was causing mass disruption.

He even said it could be worth vaccinating youngsters, an issue which ministers are still debating.

He said: 'If children are not severely affected, if they're not major drivers of transmission, the testing itself is picking up lots of cases, causing classes to be sent home and so on.

More than 50 million lateral flow tests have been carried out in schools alone as part of the mandatory requirements of lockdown easing

'We've got to get to a point where we're not impacting on education. And I think that impact on education could be a reason for vaccination.'

Experts on the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation are understood to have raised 'serious ethical concerns' about inoculating children because of the tiny risk they face of becoming seriously ill.

The group will release fresh guidance on the highly controversial topic of vaccinating children by the end of the week, according to the Telegraph.

It will urge No10 to hold off jabbing under-18s in the immediate future and wait for more safety data to come out of the US and Israel, where the plans are already in motion.

Cabinet minister Liz Truss said No10 would look 'very closely' at advice from the panel, which has helped steer Downing Street through the pandemic.

Meanwhile, one of the Government's senior scientific advisers warned of the ethical dilemma posed by vaccinating children  who face a one-in-a-million risk of dying from coronavirus.

SAGE's Professor Calum Semple, an expert in outbreak medicine at the University of Liverpool, said he is against vaccinating the 14million children in the UK.

Children's campaigners, who have raised opposition to any mandatory vaccination programme for school students, said they were 'very reasurred' by the news.

But experts are divided on the topic, with some insisting it would help deal with the Indian variant.

Pfizer's jab has already been approved for 12- to 15-year-olds by the UK's Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA).

But it hasn't yet been deployed in the UK because ministers haven't given the green light to expanding the roll-out. Professor Chris Whitty this week hinted that children could get vaccines to stop the virus disrupting their education.

Pfizer's jab is already being used on children in the US  but concerns are mounting that it may be linked to heart damage in young adults. Some 226 myocarditis and pericarditis cases have been reported in the US following Pfizer and Moderna shots, mostly in men with an average age of 24.

Moderna's vaccine is poised for approval in the same age group in the US and both companies, as well as Johnson & Johnson, have begun trials for under-12s.

UK parents have already hit out at plans to inoculate children, with 50,000 signing a petition against Covid vaccinations for youngsters.

Teaching unions, meanwhile, have offered tentative support for an under-18 jab roll-out, if it helps tackle disruption to schooling.

A Whitehall source told the Telegraph: 'Nobody is going to green light the mass vaccination of children at this stage.

'Scientists want to see more data from the US and elsewhere before taking a firm stand either way.

'The JCVI will want to weigh up the benefits against the risks before vaccinating children and it wants more data.'

And International Trade Secretary Ms Truss this morning concurred that the JCVI would not be recommending jabs for children.

She told BBC Breakfast: 'Of course the Government will look very closely at the JCVIs recommendations.

'It is my understanding that they are not recommending the vaccination of under-18s and we will be saying more in due course about that.'

Meanwhile, Professor Semple said he is 'veering on not vaccinating children' because of their low risk of severe disease.

Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Today programme today, he said he would prioritise vaccinating hard to reach vulnerable people in the UK and sending jabs abroad.

Professor Semple said: 'The first thing to remember here is that risk and severe disease in children  Im talking about admission to hospital, admission to intensive care and death  the risk of death is one in a million.

Experts on the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) are said to have raised 'serious ethical concerns' about vaccinating children - because of the low risk of youngsters becoming serious illness through Covid. It comes amid a kick-back from parents, with 50,000 people recently signing a petition against Covid vaccinations for youngsters. Pictured left: Health Secretary Matt Hancock. Pictured right: Campaigner Molly Kingsley from UsforThem

'And thats not a figure Im plucking from the air as a sort of average or guess. Thats a quantifiable risk.

'So were talking about vaccinating children here mainly to protect public health and reduce transmission and its accepted that teenagers who are biologically more like adults are more likely to transmit but the younger children really are not.

'The balance here is should the vaccine be pushed into the arms of hard to reach adults and should we spend efforts persuading hesitant adults to have a vaccine.

'And if we do have lots of vaccine left over, should we be sending it to countries in Europe and Africa and Asia where they havent got enough vaccine.'

He added that the spread of the Indian 'Delta' variant in schools should not be a cause for concern because it does not cause more serious illness in youngsters.

Professor Semple: 'Yes, the virus is spreading in schools because its got nowhere else to hide at the moment and thats confounding the challenge too.

'The Delta variant is more transmissible but its not causing greater disease in children per se.

'Its just that its not able to cause greater disease in the older adults because their vaccinated and the vaccines still pretty good.

'So Im veering on the not vaccinating children, only because of the ethical issues and the need to get the vaccine into older people.'

The Government should not roll-out its mass Covid vaccine programme for children until scientists get 'more data on the risks', top scientists will reportedly warn

Why children are less affected by Covid-19 Children are less at risk of developing severe Covid symptoms and dying from the disease due to a host of differences between the bodies and immune systems of youngsters and adults, a study shows. Australian researchers have identified several specific physiological differences which may explain why Covid-19 is rarely severe or fatal in children. These include strong, undamaged cells in their blood vessels which prevent inflammation and clotting; elevated levels of vitamin D; an immune system that is both fast acting and well-oiled; and fewer ACE2 receptors, which the coronavirus uses to infect cells. While Covid-19 causes well-documented respiratory problems in adults, particularly the vulnerable and elderly, other respiratory conditions also plague children. However, society's youngest are demonstrably less affected by coronavirus infection, making up only a tiny proportion of cases, hospital admissions and deaths. A recent study from the US looked at hospital admissions of children at seven different hospitals and found just just four per cent of children test positive for the virus. The research looked at tests of more than 135,000 children who went to hospital for various reasons before September 8. It revealed only 5,374 (4.0 per cent) of patients tested positive and, of this small percentage, only 359 (6.7 per cent) were hospitalised, with 99 in intensive care. Eight of the infected patients (0.15 per cent) later died. Six of the deaths were patients with 'complex preexisting comorbidities', the scientists say. But why this is the case has thus far remained a mystery, with scientists and doctors trying to get to the bottom of the mystery. Advertisement

Meanwhile, children's campaigners, UsforThem, today praised the news.

Co-founder Molly Kinsgley said: 'UsforThem are very reassured to see that JCVI are expected to recommend against a mass roll out of the Covid-19 vaccine to children in the immediate future.

'Whilst we recognise there may be a need for children with serious vulnerabilities to have the Covid-19 vaccine, we have always had serious concerns about the appropriateness of reliance on emergency use authorisation for a mass roll out to children given the lack of adequate, long term safety data.

'We are pleased to see that the JCVI have appeared to recognised the severity of the issues at stake and have, in our view, sensibly and rightly, followed the example set by the German STIKO in declining to recommend the vaccine for mass roll out in children at this stage.

'To suggest, as Chris Whitty did in the Q&A to the press conference earlier this week, that a benefit to children taking the vaccine would be to prevent school disruption is disingenuous.

'Once all adults have been vaccinated there should simply be no more school disruption and it would be unconscionable to suggest that education - which is a basic human right of children - is dependent on the willingness of the cohort or individual children to take a vaccine, and especially one for which there is no long term safety data.

'If what is being reported is correct it is a rare example of adults finally doing the right thing by children. We applaud the integrity shown by JCVI and hope that others in a position of responsibility for the health and welfare of children now follow suit.'

It comes after Professor Chris Whitty earlier this week hinted children could be given Covid jabs to stop the virus disrupting their education or increasing their future risk of physical or mental health problems.

England's Chief Medical Officer (CMO) told a Downing Street news conference that the 'wider question' was about whether such a programme would help limit Covid's disruption to schooling.

He said officials were still considering whether to vaccinate children but the 'big priority' was reaching over-18s in the summer.

Speaking at the Downing Street press conference earlier this week, he said: 'The key thing for children is safety.

'We know that the risks in terms of of physical disease to children, other than for some children with significant pre-existing problems of physical health, are much, much lower than for adults.

'So you wouldn't want to vaccinate unless the vaccine was very safe. Vaccines are now being licensed in some countries and we're accruing safety data on the safety of these vaccines in children.'

England's Chief Medical Officer (CMO) told a Downing Street news conference that the 'wider question' was about whether such a programme would help limit Covid's disruption to schooling

Scientists on the JCVI will reportedly recommend the Government looks to the US and Israel where children are already being vaccinated.

In the US, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommended that all children over 12 should get a Covid jab in May. Some 7.6million 12- to 18-year-olds have already had a first dose while 4.7million have had their second.

Meanwhile, Israel has recently started vaccinating children aged 12 to 15. France has also opened up vaccinations for children aged 12 and over.

If the UK Government does push on for a vaccine roll-out for children, it will most likely use the Pfizer vaccine.

The jab has already been deemed safe for use in those aged 12-15 by the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA).

A senior government source told the Telegraph: 'The Pfizer vaccine has been licensed for 12 to 15-year-olds by the MHRA, and a number of countries will be vaccinating children in those age groups.

'Ministers have not received advice, and no decisions have been taken.'

AstraZeneca's vaccine will almost certainly not be recommended for use in children, having already been advised against for under-40s by the JCVI because of its links to extremely rare blood clots in the brain.

The issue of vaccinating children is contentious, because studies show there is an extremely low risk of children becoming seriously ill through Covid.

The main benefit, it is thought, is to limit the spread of the virus in schools.

It comes as more than 50,000 people signed a petition against Covid vaccinations for youngsters

A study earlier this year revealed that those who do become infected three weeks after receiving one dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech or AstraZeneca vaccine were between 38 per and 49 per cent less likely to pass the virus on to their household contacts than those who were unvaccinated.

There is also data to suggest that teenagers are more likely to spread Covid  and this is one of the reasons behind potentially vaccinating children in the UK.

It comes as more than 50,000 people have now signed a petition against Covid vaccinations for youngsters.

The appeal to Parliament had raked in 54,895 as of Tuesday morning as it called on the government to avoid jabbing youngsters.

Retired paediatrician Dr Ros Jones created the page and called for officials to delay giving doses to under 18s until after 'Phase 3 trials are complete'.

She wrote: 'A risk vs benefit calculation does not support giving COVID-19 vaccines, which use novel technologies and are still in Phase 3 trials, to healthy children.

'Any rollout should not start until trials are complete and all findings are published and peer-reviewed on long-term safety data.

'Healthy children are at low risk from COVID-19 yet face known and unknown risks from COVID-19 vaccines.

'Rare, but serious, adverse events and deaths are being reported to monitoring systems around the world.

'Official guidance is updated as the side-effects become more apparent. Giving Covid-19 vaccines to healthy children to protect adults is unethical and unjustifiable.

'The Government has an ethical duty to act with caution and proportionality.'

The Government responded: 'The Government will continue to evaluate evidence and assess expert opinion before making a decision on routinely vaccinating children under 18 years old.'

Despite the backlash from parents, teachers' unions appear to be mostly in favour of jabbing children.

Joint General Secretary of the NEU Kevin Courtney said: 'The NEU would welcome the extension of vaccination to school students when and if that is approved - this would lead to children missing less in-person education.

'In the meantime we should continue to take all appropriate measures, including face coverings and better ventilation, to reduce the risks of transmission.'
New South Wales has recorded one new case of Covid-19 as Gladys Berejiklian makes masks mandatory on public transport for the next five days.

The state premier said the one additional local case was a man in his 50s who visited Myer at Bondi Junction's Westfield shopping centre in the city's eastern suburbs at the same time as an infected airport worker.

Chief Health Officer Dr Kerry Chant said the new case was in the same section of the department store at the same time as the limousine driver on Saturday afternoon.

She said the shopper may only have had 'very fleeting contact' with the driver who tested positive to the highly-contagious Delta strain of Covid-19 on Wednesday.

From 4pm on Friday until next Wednesday night, anyone using public transport in the Greater Sydney area must wear a mask - while face coverings are highly recommended in all other indoor venues.

Ms Berejiklian said unlike with previous outbreaks, residents in the Illawarra, Central Coast and Wollongong would not have to follow the same mask restrictions.

Health staff register a resident at a Covid-19 drive-through testing site on Bondi Beach on Wednesday. New South Wales has recorded one new case of Covid-19 - a shopper who was in close proximity to an infected airport worker at a Myer store in Bondi Junction in Sydney's east

Anyone using public transport in the Greater Sydney area must wear a mask for the next five days. Pictured are commuters at Town Hall station in Sydney

'When we are saying Greater Sydney we are sticking to the geographic definition,' she said.

'For the next five days we want everybody to wear masks on public transport to make sure that if the virus is circulating it doesn't spread.'

Dr Chant said Friday's new case visited venues across Sydney including Redfern and Newtown, Bondi Junction in the inner-city and east, and Campbelltown in the south-west while infectious between June 13 and June 15.

On Sunday he visited The Twisted Olive cafe between 12.20pm and 1.30pm and Adora Handmade Chocolates between 2pm and 3.30pm.

He then visited The Alkalizer cafe in Campbelltown on Tuesday between 9am and 10am and the Greenwood Grocer in North Sydney's Greenwood Plaza on the lower north shore from 5pm to 5.20pm.

Ms Berejiklian said there was no need at this stage in Sydney's outbreak - which has reached five cases - for the state government to ban large organised public events.

'Those events should proceed because all major events and all outdoor events have good Covid safety plans,' she said.

NSW Health is meanwhile looking at CCTV footage from inside the Myer store at Bondi Junction to find other shoppers who were in close proximity to the infected driver.

Ms Berejiklian said unlike with previous outbreaks, residents in the Illawarra, Central Coast and Wollongong would not have to follow the same mask restrictions as Sydney. She said health officials were 'sticking to the geographic definition' of Greater Sydney

NEW COVID-19 EXPOSURE SITES VISITED BY INFECTED MYER SHOPPER Redfern: The Twisted Olive, 684 Bourke Street, Sunday 13 June - 12.20pm to 1.30pm Newtown: Adora Handmade Chocolates, 2/325 King Street, Sunday 13 June - 2pm to 3.30pm Campbelltown: The Alkalizer, Campbelltown Council Building, 91 Queen Street, Tuesday 15 June -9am to 10am North Sydney: Greenwood Grocer, Greenwood Plaza Lower Level, 71/36 Blue Street, Tuesday 15 June - 5pm to 5.20pm Advertisement

Dr Chant said the new case reported on Friday and the airport worker checked into the department store at very similar times.

'That led us to ask for CCTV footage and it showed they are in the same section at the same time,' she said.

'We're looking at different angles to watch how they were moving around to see if there is a more direct exposure.'

The NSW premier said there was no need at this stage in Sydney's outbreak - which has now reached five cases - for the state government to ban large organised public events. Pictured are cars lining up for Covid-19 testing at Bondi on Thursday

Health authorities in NSW and Canberra meanwhile are on alert after an infected Sydney man in his 40s with low levels of the virus visited the ACT on June 14.

The man, from Baulkham Hills in Sydney's north-west, visited the National Gallery of Australia's Boticelli to Van Gogh exhibition and gift shop from 12pm to 1.45pm on Monday.

Anyone who visited the gallery at the same time has been told to get tested and immediately isolate until they receive a negative result.

Health authorities are urging anyone who went to the National Gallery of Australia's Boticelli to Van Gogh exhibition or gift shop from 12-1.45pm last Monday to get tested and immediately isolate

The same advice applies to anyone who visited Via Dolce Pasticceria, a popular Italian dessert and pizza eatery, on the same day from 2.45-3.15pm.

The alert for Canberra comes as Sydney's Covid exposure list continues to grow, with a popular bowling club and Harris Farm supermarket added on Tuesday night.

New South Wales has seen four new coronavirus cases in the last 48 hours, after a 40-day run without a single locally acquired infection.

Authorities are now scrambling to keep the lid on a potential outbreak, after a driver who transported international flight crew tested positive on Wednesday.

Anyone who visited Via Dolce Pasticceria, a popular Italian dessert and pizza eatery last Monday from 2.45-3.15pm is advised to get tested and immediately isolate

The Bondi man's wife has since also tested positive, as has a woman in her 70s who was at a Vaucluse cafe at the same time.

Dr Greg Kelly, from The Children's Hospital at Westmead in Sydney, blasted NSW Health over poor protocols that allowed the driver to contract the virus while working.

'This latest NSW leak 100% preventable. Australia, all that is standing between airborne #COVID-19 & frontline workers (and therefore you, grandma & the rest of us) is a flimsy surgical mask,' he wrote.

Testing queue swelled again on Thursday as yet more exposure sites were announced (pictured, the drive-through clinic in Bondi Beach)

'No airborne PPE, no smart workplace engineering, & no vaccine. THIS JUST ISN'T GOOD ENOUGH.

'People absolutely need to start losing jobs over this, and I dont mean poor cafe and gym owners, I mean people with responsibility for quarantine.'

A man in his 40s in Sydney's north-west, with no known links to other infections, has also tested positive - but authorities are still investigating whether he currently has the virus.

An infected case visited Northmead Bowling Club (pictured) on Sunday for six-and-a-half hours

Northmead Bowling Club was announced as an exposure site late on Thursday night, with anyone there from 3.30pm to 10pm on Sunday June 13 told to get tested and isolate immediately.

A further venue in the East Village Shopping Centre in Zetland has also been put on alert, with anyone who went to Lorna Jane in the centre on Monday between 11am and 1pm told to seek testing and isolate for two weeks, regardless of the result.

Bondi's The Health Emporium is also now on the list.
A heavily tattooed tradie has been accused of torturing a man with a blow torch because he tried to hit on his girlfriend.

Bowie Sheng Papa allegedly tortured the man in his Surfers Paradise apartment between March 8-12 this year.

He allegedly held a blow torch to the man's knees, forced him to walk on all fours and held a pillow over his face over the three-day-long ordeal.

Bowie Sheng Papa allegedly tortured the man in his Surfers Paradise unit between March 8-12 this year

Papa, who allegedly has links to the Finks bikie gang, is also accused of trying to coerce the man into handing over a number of his cars into his name

Papa, who allegedly has links to the Finks bikie gang, is also accused of trying to coerce the man into handing over a number of his cars into his name.

Defence solicitor Demi Quadrio tried to argue that his client hadn't actually held a blow torch to the alleged victims knees, saying photos of the injuries weren't consistent with the claim.

'I would expect to see significant burns on the knees,' she said, according to the Gold Coast Bulletin.

Ms Quadrio also claimed the alleged victim made Papa dinner over the three days, pointing to inconsistencies in his statement.

'It seems baffling to me that the complainant would make my client dinner when it is alleged my client has been assaulting him over a number of days. It seems strange behaviour,' she said.

Magistrate Kerry Magee granted Papa, who had been in custody since March, bail with several conditions.

Ms Magee described the charges as 'extremely serious' and noted that the complainant's initial statement was 'inconsistent with the CCTV footage which resulted in him significantly amending the factual sequence and factual scenario'.

Papa will be required to report to police every single day, as well as abide by a curfew and is forbidden from having any contact with the alleged victim.

The matter will return to court on June 29.
The Fair Work Ombudsman has launched Federal Court action against Woolworths for alleged underpayments to 70 managers totalling $1.17 million.

Woolworths is facing legal action for allegedly underpaying managers, with the workplace watchdog hunting more than $710,000 in outstanding back pay.

The Fair Work Ombudsman has launched Federal Court action against the supermarket giant over allegations it underpaid 70 salaried managers upwards of $1.1 million.

The regulator claims $713,395 has not been returned to the employees.

Woolworths is facing legal action after allegedly underpaying 70 employees by as much as $1.1million between March 2018 and 2019

Woolworths disclosed underpaying thousands of employees in 2019 with the back-pay bill later calculated to cost the company around $390 million.

The admission sparked an investigation which assessed the records of 70 managers' work between March 2018 and 2019.

The alleged underpayments range from $289 to $85,905 for the 70 managers over the one-year time frame.

The ombudsman alleges the most significant underpayments were Woolworths' failure to pay the correct overtime entitlements to the salaried managers.

It will also try to prove annual salaries did not cover weekend and public holiday rates, meal allowances and annual leave loading, given the hours employees worked.

Fair Work Ombudsman Sandra Parker said it would be alleged salaried managers were significantly underpaid.

"This court action highlights that large employers face serious consequences if they do not prioritise workplace law compliance among other aspects of their business," she said.

Woolworths employed about 19,000 salaried managers between June 2015 and September 2019.
The execution death of Bilal Hamze has sparked fears of a gangland war in Sydney's western suburbs, where Middle Eastern crime gangs have long run rampant.

Hamze, 34, was gunned down in the CBD on Thursday night after dining at ritzy sushi restaurant Kid Kyoto.

He was shot in the stomach and shoulder by an unknown person who police say was lying in wait for Hamze.

Hamze is the cousin of Bassam Hamzy, 41, who is serving more than 40 years for a spree of killings and gang-related crimes, and Mejid Hamzy who was shot dead in his Condell Park driveway in October 2020.

At the time of Mejid's killing, police said he may have been responsible for several assassinations including the 2016 death of Hamad 'The Executioner' Assaad, and that his murder was definitely part of a gang-related attack.

In the immediate aftermath of Mejid's death, police banned members of his crew, the Alameddine crew and others from certain parts of Sydney their rivals were known to haunt in an attempt to avoid an all-out gang war.

As NSW Police hunt Hamze's killer, Daily Mail Australia has taken a look at these two Middle Eastern crime crews, and others, who are wreaking havoc across the city.

Bilal Hamze, 34, was gunned down in the CBD on Thursday night after dining at ritzy sushi restaurant Kid Kyoto

The shooting murder of Mejid Hamzy (left), older brother of notorious criminal Bassam (right), has sparked fears of an all-out war between criminal clans fighting for control of Sydney's west

(L to R) Criminals Rachad Alameddine and his brother Jihad pose for a photo with their cousins Hamdi and Rafat. They are known for having control over the Merrylands area in west Sydney

Police believe Mejid Hamzy was responsible for the shooting death of Hamad Assaad, a close associate of Osman Haouchar (left) who is pictured with his wannabe standover man cousin Mohamad 'Butch' Haouchar (right)

In total 22 people were banned from certain areas in Sydney's west and east.

They include some members of the Hamzy crew being banned from entering Mount Druitt, Rooty HIll, Blacktown and Merrylands where the Alameddine gang frequents.

Similarly, the Alameddine associates are banned from going between Picnic Point in Blaxland, and Villawood and Strathfield.

Tensions in the city's south-west and western suburbs are at a long-time high.

In a separate recent shooting prominent gangster Samer Marcus was left fighting for life in hospital after being gunned down outside his parents' home.

Retired NSW detective turned Western Sydney University lecturer Michael Kennedy has seen generations of organised crime groups in Sydney.

He told Daily Mail Australia that despite the hard tactics of police, antagonising these groups is in his opinion not the best way to go about it.

'If you use the word "mafia" it gives the wrong idea, but it's essentially the same thing in that you have a close knit system,' Professor Kennedy said.

'You will often see that organised crime groups keep things in the family, because it brings a level of trust and unity, but also they don't want to share what they have.

'What we've seen since back in the day with these families is that they move out for a new life in Australia, and will do anything to avoid going back to where they're from.

'There's no great mystery that families who come here with nothing will do the hard yards and whatever it takes to get money, and many individuals end up in crime.'

Professor Kennedy, who spent years investigating organised crime, is critical of the recent heavy-handed response taken by NSW Police to large criminal enterprises.

Over recent years Strike Force Raptor against bikies and the middle-eastern crime squad has seen criminals riled up and retaliate.

'It shouldn't be any surprise that organised crime crews remain staunch and refuse to stand in the witness box and give each other up,' Professor Kennedy said.

'But what you've got to do is get these communities to trust you.

'Organised crime is not going anywhere, you can't regulate it, and so you need them to self-regulate.

'You don't give them a green light by any means, but you have an open dialogue so that you can go to them and say "this is a problem" and they will act.'

Pools of blood and ripped clothing lie on the ground outside the house of a friend where Mejid Hamzy stumbled to after being shot in the front yard of his own home on Monday, October 19

Blood stained shirts and other ripped clothing was taken away in evidence bags by NSW Police

A burnt out car, believed to have been the one used by the two gunmen, was found on a nearby suburban street

THE HAMZYS

Khaled and Lola Hamzy moved their family to Australia in the 1970s as civil war erupted in Lebanon.

The family name first came onto the radar of police in the mid-1990s, when Khaled was jailed for his role in a drug ring.

In 1999, his son Bassam shot dead a teenager during a night out in Sydney and was himself jailed for 21 years.

But while life behind bars is intended to be a deterrent for reoffending, it was where Hamzy thrived.

He set up the gang Brothers 4 Life, and with a bevvy of mobile phones hidden in his cell, ran a sophisticated drug and crime ring.

Bassam Hamzy is one of NSW's most notorious prisoners having been convicted of killing, drug and gang offences. He will call Goulburn Supermax, Australia's most secure prison home until at least 2042

Bassam's father Khaled (left) moved his family to Australia in the 1970s and was himself jailed in the mid-1990s on drugs charges. Bassam's cousin Mohammed 'Little Crazy' Hamzy (right) is currently serving time in jail for shooting two men in 2012. He was stabbed in prison last week

Bassam will not be eligible for parole until at least 2042.

A source close to Bassam told Daily Mail Australia he was 'shattered' at news of his brother's death, which came just months after the passing of his father.

His cousin Mahmoud, a fellow Brothers 4 Life member, was also shot dead in 2013 as he was caught in the middle of an attempt on another cousin, Mohammed 'Little Crazy' Hamzy.

Mohammed, again a Brothers 4 Life devotee, was stabbed in prison in late-October where he is serving time for shooting two men in 2013.

Prior to his assassination, Mejid Hamzy was more than happy to fly under the radar as he went about his business in the underworld.

He did a stint in jail in the late-2000s, but was last year cleared on drug trafficking charges.

A former associate of Mejid's said his death really could spark an underworld war.

'Whoever pulled this stunt is a madman for sure. He (Mejid) was one of the biggest names in Sydney,' they said.

'Bassam was big but Mejid is a different breed.

'This guy was well connected and loved by heaps of heavies. His crew won't take this lightly.'

Mahmoud Hamzy (pictured), a fellow Brothers 4 Life member, was also shot dead in 2013 in an attempt on another cousin, Mohammed 'Little Crazy' Hamzy

A former member of his brother Bassam's gang Brothers 4 Life, Mejid was connected to several underworld killings.

NSW Police had reportedly believed he was involved in the shooting death of Hamad Assaad, who was gunned down in his driveway in 2016.

The Hamzys believed Assaad had been paid by another notorious group to carry out a drive-by shooting on the family's matriarch Maha, that left her wheelchair bound.

They believed that person was a member of the Haouchar crime gang.

THE HAOUCHARS

In the aftermath of Hamad Assaad's death, a one-eyed man carried his coffin down the steps of Lakemba Mosque. His name was Osman Haouchar.

Haouchar lost his eye in a drive-by shooting at his family's Merrylands home in 2008.

He long blamed Michael Ibrahim, the younger brother of famed Kings Cross identity John.

Osman was interrogated after returning from the Turkey and Syria border in 2015, as it was a designated no-go zone.

He claimed he was there doing humanitarian work and has never been charged with a criminal offence.

Osman's brother Bilal (pictured) was caught on recordings vowing to kill Michael and his older brother Sam in 2013, once he got out of prison. He has since fled to Lebanon but he remains a suspect in a number of murders in Australia, however the countries have no extradition treaty

Osman Haouchar (left) carries the coffin at the funeral for murdered gangster Hamad Assaad. The one-eyed pallbearer was detained in 2015 after returning from Syria, where he claimed he was doing 'humanitarian work'

Osman's brother Bilal fled Australia for Lebanon in 2018, but remains a key person of interest over a spate of murders - however Australia and Lebanon have no extradition treaty.

Bilal's disdain for the glitzy rivals was so severe that John has been warned on a number of occasions about threats on his life.

In 2013 he was caught on recordings from behind bars vowing to kill Michael and his older brother Sam once he got out of prison.

Bilal had been serving time on a murder charge which was later downgraded to him being an accessory.

'You could say he is definitely a person of interest in a host of crimes, including murder,' a NSW Police source told The Daily Telegraph.

Bilal's angst towards the Ibrahims was echoed by his cousin Mohammad last year when he tried to stand over nightclub boss John Ibrahim.

Mohammad, better known as 'Butch', arrived at John's clifftop home and attempted to provoke a confrontation over money.

Ibrahim came out and spoke with the heavily-tattooed Haouchar and calmed the situtation, but police eventually arrested and charged the would be intruder.

Daily Mail Australia is in no way suggesting that John Ibrahim is involved in an underworld war or is part of any crime group.

In addition to the mentioned Ibrahim members, the Haouchars have also had a long running feud with some of the Hamzys.

Mohammad, better known as 'Butch', arrived at John Ibrahim's clifftop home and attempted to provoke a confrontation over money

The angst between the two came to a head in 2013 during the botched shooting on Maha Hamzy, the aunt of Mejid and Bassam.

A contract gunman and an associate of Osman Houchar, Assaad was believed to have been the trigger man.

THE ALAMEDDINES

Talal Alameddine is the most infamous in his family, despite having numerous criminals among his relatives

As part of their hunt for Mejid's killer, NSW Police are also investigating a brawl between members of the Hamzy crew and associates of another major group, the Alammedines, in the days before he died.

The street side brawl came a day before a series of shootings at homes linked to both a Hamzy and Alameddine relative.

At 2am that Saturday, the home of Maha Hamze was shot at in a drive-by attack.

The very next day, bullets were fired into the home of another Alameddine.

That family member has since been revealed to be Rafat Alameddine.

Daily Mail Australia is not suggesting that Rafat Alameddine was responsible for, or in any way involved, in the shooting.

NSW Police assistant commissioner Peter Thurtell claimed the ongoing gang wars on the streets of western Sydney are drug related.

'They are organised criminal groups targeting each other,' Asst Comm Thurtell said.

'The rationale behind targeting each other is obviously drug related.

'We will be targeting associates and known offenders. They can expect us to be in their face. They know we will come knocking on their door.'

The recent brawl followed a similar fight last year behind bars between the two most infamous people with Hamzy and Alameddine as a surname.

Talal Alameddine, who delivered the gun used to kill NSW Police accountant Curtis Cheng in 2015, took on Bassam Hamzy in an exercise yard at Goulburn's Supermax Prison.

CCTV footage of the brutal showed the two going head-to-head before Alameddine got the upper hand, leaving Hamzy battered and bruised.

While Talal's involvement in the murder of Mr Cheng has seen him become the most infamous member of the clan, he is not the only one to have landed himself in strife.

In recent years 26-year-old Talal's brother Rafat, 28, and cousins Bilal, 21, Jihad, 31, Rachad (sometimes 'Richad'), 28, and Hamdi Alameddine 27, have all faced serious criminal matters in court.

Supporters including Rachad Alameddine (front) leave court after Talal Alameddine was given a 13-year sentence in 2018 for supplying the gun used to kill police accountant Curtis Cheng

Bilal Alameddine (left) could face more than five years in jail when he is sentenced on gun and drug running charges on December 11. Jihad Alameddine (right) has pleaded guilty to a charges including drug possession, drug driving and possessing equipment for administering drugs

While Talal will be off the streets for at least the next decade, his five relatives have continued to develop into a prominent crime entourage in western Sydney.

Six male members of the Alameddine crew are already in jail or before the courts, facing charges related to guns, drugs, violence and organised crime.

They and their crew have established a stronghold around Merrylands - an area criminals have fought for control for years.

A source close to the Alameddines said: 'For years there were multiple families in that area, but most of the other ones were too focused on each other in the end.'

Another source described the current situation in Sydney as being 'on a knife's edge'.
The mayor of Chicago has declared racism to be a public health crisis, and allocated $10 million in COVID relief funding to combat it.

Lori Lightfoot announced on Thursday the new policy, aimed at reducing the glaring inequalities in the city's health.

Earlier this week the city health department released data that showed black residents on average live 71.4 years, while non-black Chicagoans can expect to live 80.6 years.

'When we think about racism, many of us think about its visible and audible forms,' Lightfoot said, standing in front of an exhibit honoring Martin Luther King Jr in the West Side of the city.

Lori Lightfoot, the mayor of Chicago, is seen on Thursday announcing $10 million in COVID-19 relief spending dedicated to the public health crisis of racism. She spoke after it emerged earlier in the week that black Chicagoans lived on average nine years less than non-black

'But the reality is, the insidious nature of systemic racism has other impacts that are every bit as deep and harmful but are often ones we can't see, like impacts on the psyche and other impacts on our bodies that are just as, if not more, deadly.'

She said that racism tells people they are not worthy.

'Ladies and gentlemen, it is literally killing us,' Lightfoot said.

The city will designate six Healthy Chicago Equity Zones, where the $9.6 million in CDC money will be spent on trying to improve wellness and public health.

Lightfoot is two years into her first term as the city's first black female mayor.

She spoke at a time when the COVID-19 pandemic has emphasized Chicago's racial health disparities.

Chicago is not the first city to make such a move.

Milwaukee County in Wisconsin in 2019 was among the first governmental entities to say racism was a public health crisis, and similar measures have been taken in cities including Denver; Columbus, Ohio; and Boston.

Chicago Public Health released a report earlier this week detailing disparities in health

The map shows the areas, in darkest blue, with the highest concentration of black residents. The diagonal shading shows the highest concentration of economic hardship - showing that the two often go hand-in-hand

Lightfoot is attempting to turn the page from a series of high-profile actions that her critics said made her unfit for office.

Earlier this week, she was attacked for sending a 'deranged' email to one of her female staffers, berating her for failing to scheduled enough 'office time'.

The condescending message was sent by Lightfoot to her then-scheduler Taylor Lewis on January 28, but was only obtained by the Chicago Tribune this week.

The paper was investigating reports of high staff turnover at City Hall when they uncovered the 'unhinged' email.

The message included sentences which Lightfoot repeated more than a dozen times - apparently in order to really get her point across.

ASSISTANT: The mayor's then-scheduler, Taylor Lewis, no longer works in the office, the Chicago Tribune reported

'Since my prior requests are routinely ignored, I am now resorting to this: I need office time everyday! I need office time everyday! I need office time everyday!' Lightfoot raged in the e-mail.

She repeated the same sentence a further 13 times, before writing: 'Not just once a week or some days, but everyday!'

Office time apparently refers, according to Lightfoot, to open time set aside for thinking on big-picture type issues that isn't clogged up with meetings or other obligations.

In the email, Lightfoot continued to patronizingly repeat each sentence she subsequently wrote.

She signed off her message by writing: 'Have I made myself clear?!' 13 times times in a row.

The message included sentences which Lightfoot repeated more than a dozen times in order to get her point across

As of June, Taylor Lewis no longer works for Lightfoot. Her official position with the city was listed as 'Director of Scheduling and Advance.' She was a member of the mayor's 'Diversity Cabinet.'

On Monday, Lightfoot attempted to explain away the email, saying it was 'born of frustration.'

'We got beyond that and solved the challenges that were at the heart of that email which was written five-plus months ago so I think we're in a better place,' she stated.

However, the Chicago Tribune reports that there have been grumblings coming from City Hall about Lightfoot being a difficult boss to work for.

According to reporter Gregory Pratt, City Hall is having difficulty hiring and retaining staff.

In one instance, Lightfoot reportedly ripped up documents and sent staff a photo of it to illustrate her message, saying: 'I have asked nicely, now I am done.'

And last month, Lightfoot again angered people by announcing that she would only grant one-on-one interviews to 'black and brown' reporters to mark her two-year anniversary in the role.

The temporary policy sparked anger from reporters of all colors, but Lightfoot doubled down on her decision, insisting it was part of her lifelong battle for diversity and inclusion.

'I have been struck since my first day on the campaign trail back in 2018 by the overwhelming whiteness and maleness of Chicago media outlets, editorial boards, the political press corps, and yes, the City Hall press corps specifically,' she wrote in an open letter.

She called it 'unacceptable' that reporters covering City Hall were mostly white.

'Many of them are smart and hard-working, savvy and skilled. But mostly white, nonetheless,' she wrote.

She lectured the Chicago media leadership to evolve and diversify, for fear that 'this arm of our democratic system is on life support.'

Lightfoot is now being sued by a white Daily Caller reporter for racism.
Podcast host Joe Rogan has slammed CNN host Brian Stelter, mocking his falling ratings and slamming his show Reliable Sources as 'terrible'.

On Thursday's episode of The Joe Rogan Experience, Rogan took issue with an unspecified CNN segment in which the hosts lamented that some YouTubers draw more viewers than cable networks.

'They were describing it as if they were entitled to viewers,' Rogan said. 'This is because the market has spoken and your show's f**ing terrible.'

'Brian Stelter's show keeps slipping and slipping and slipping in the ratings. Same with Don Lemon's. It's the same thing. Everybody knows they're not real. They're not real humans,' he continued.

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Podcast host Joe Rogan has slammed CNN host Brian Stelter, mocking his falling ratings and slamming his show Reliable Sources as 'terrible'

Stelter (left) took flack for his interview with White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki (right) last month, which critics called 'fawning' and 'sycophantic'

Reliable Sources, which airs weekly on Sundays, has suffered a disastrous ratings drop since interest from early this year, when interest peaked for all cable news amid the Capitol riot and Inauguration Day.

So far in June, Stelter's ratings are down 57 percent overall since January, and 67 percent in the key age demographic prized by advertisers; 25-54, according to Nielsen data reviewed by DailyMail.com.

Reliable Sources has also lost viewers compared to last year, dropping 10 percent overall and 26 percent in the demo from the same period in 2020.

On his podcast, Rogan berated Stelter for his exclusive interview with White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki earlier this month, which critics such as journalist Glenn Greenwald slammed as 'fawning.'

'How about Brian Stelter talking to the press secretary saying, 'What are we doing wrong? What are we doing wrong?' Like, hey motherf***er, you're supposed to be a journalist,' Rogan raged.

'They're obviously being told a certain amount of what to do,' said Rogan of Stelter and other cable news hosts.

'Maybe he'd be an interesting guy if he had his own f**in' podcast, if he could just rely on his own personality and be himself. I don't know. I can't imagine doing that gig. Any of those guys. That gig is a strange gig,' he said.

Reliable Sources has shed 57 percent of its viewers overall (left) since January, and 67 percent in the key age demographic prized by advertisers; 25-54 (right)

Rogan (left), who is also a UFC announcer, may have been provoked in part by a segment Stelter did last month mocking Rogan's 'overreaction' to 'woke cancel culture'

As pointed out by Mediaite, Rogan's rage may have been spurred in part by a segment Stelter did last month mocking Rogan's 'overreaction' to 'woke cancel culture.'

Stelter played clips of Rogan expressing fears that eventually 'straight white men' would be forbidden from speaking or going outside if woke culture took its course, remarks that Stelter sneered were 'crazy'.

Stelter continued: 'On one level it's just comical hearing this rich and famous guy express worries even though he's paid to talk for a living, he's going to be silenced in the future.'

A spokeswoman for Stelter did not immediately respond to a request for comment from DailyMail.com late on Thursday.

On Wednesday night, Stelter was spotted partying in Manhattan with Jeffrey Toobin, the CNN legal analyst who returned to the airwaves this week after a suspension over his lewd exposure over Zoom to colleagues at the New Yorker, which fired him last year.

Stelter (left in 2019) was spotted Wednesday partying in Manhattan with Jeffrey Toobin (right), the CNN legal analyst who returned to the airwaves this week after his Zoom exposure incident

The moment @brianstelter stepped away from his own book party to catch up on the news. pic.twitter.com/lAYI3HsiyO  Pat Kiernan (@patkiernan) June 16, 2021

'It's in the past, people have moved on,' a nonchalant Toobin remarked to a Politico reporter at Stelter's party.

Stelter hosted the exclusive gathering for the media elite to celebrate the release of the paperback of his book Hoax, which slams Donald Trump and CNN's rival Fox News.

According to Politico, Toobin was spotted mixing and mingling with Stelter's invited guests, who included such CNN personalities as Kate Bolduan, Poppy Harlow and Ana Cabrera, as well as Stelter's wife Jamie and her NY1 colleague Pat Kiernan.

In a toast, Stelter doubled down on the premise of his book, saying: 'We now know the ending to Fox and Trump, it's definitely not a hoax.'

According to Nielsen Bookscan data, the paperback edition of Hoax has sold 1,738 copies since its June 8 release.

The new edition was ranked #2,962 on Amazon's books list on Thursday night.
A young woman has been killed in a horrific crash involving a truck and a car after witnesses reported the smaller vehicle driving erratically.

The tragedy unfolded on the Warrego Highway at Bowenville in Queensland's Toowoomba region at about 8.30am on Friday.

The woman, 29, who was a passenger in the maroon Holden Commodore, died when the vehicle slammed into the semi-trailer head-on.

Queensland Ambulance Services and Life Flight Rescue team at the accident scene

The driver, a 35-year-old man, was airlifted to hospital where he is fighting for life with horrific injuries to his arms and legs.

The truck driver, also 35, is in a stable condition and was taken to the local Darby hospital for observation.

Brad David from Dalby police said the commodore had veered on to the wrong side of the road before impact.

The scene of the head-on collision at Dalby

'The road marking suggest it was on the wrong side of the road [for the commodore] and the truck driver has done his best to avoid it,' senior constable David said.

'But he has braked significantly prior to the impact.'

It is not known if alcohol or drugs played a role in the crash.

The Forensic Crash Unit is appealing for any witnesses to the crash, or anyone with dashcam footage of either vehicle before the crash, to contact police.
A primary school in Sydney's west had been forced to close on Friday when a number of its teachers were ordered to self-isolate after visiting locations identified as NSW Covid hotspots.

Yates Avenue Public School at Dundas Valley was closed as a precautionary measure, it's website informing families the school is currently 'non-operational'.

'Yates Avenue Public School will be closed for onsite teaching and learning today after a number of staff were advised by NSW Health to self-isolate and get Covid tested,' a NSW Education Department spokesperson said.

Yates Avenue Public School at Dundas Valley in Sydney's West was forced to close on Friday after some staff members were identified as having visited Covid-19 hotspots

'The closure is precautionary as a result of staff having visited locations associated with a confirmed case of Covid-19. Those staff who are self-isolating and are well, will be working from home.

'We are continuing to work closely with NSW Health to maintain educational continuity and will be updating parents based on this advice.'

'We would like to confirm that the school has no confirmed cases of Covid-19 and there is no action that any of our families need to do in relation to this,' wrote Principal David McSporran on the school's Facebook page.

The closure follows news New South Wales had recorded one new case of Covid-19 on Friday - a man in his 50s who visited a Myer at Bondi Junction in the city's eastern suburbs at the same time as an infected airport worker.

The case was added to the four other already notified in NSW, including a limousine driver who transported an international flight crew, his wife, another woman who attended an exposure site and a man who lives in Baulkham Hills, in the citys north west.

In response, Premier Gladys Berejiklian made masks mandatory on public transport for the next five days.

Around two dozen exposure sites had now been identified in the Sydney area, including locations at Bondi Junction, Redfern, Castle Hill and Zetland.
A 14-year-old boy said he spent more than 20 hours in a North Carolina river before he was rescued following a tubing accident involving nine family members, three of whom were killed after going over an eight-foot dam and two others who were still missing.

The teen was among four survivors who were plucked from the Dan River in Rockingham County on Thursday afternoon. Also rescued were the boy's uncle and two cousins.

Search continued into Friday evening for the two tubers who were still unaccounted for in the wake of Wednesday's deadly accident.

Rescue personnel were seen hauling rafts toward the water at a staging area in Eden, north of Greensboro near the Virginia state line. Boats and a helicopter were being used in the search.

The mother of the 14-year-old survivor told WGHP he was tired after being pulled from the water more than 20 hours into the harrowing ordeal.

The woman said her son was physically fine but mentally distraught. He was released from the hospital on Thursday night.

Three people have died and two are missing after a family of nine floated over the Duke Energy dam in Eden, North Carolina, on Wednesday evening. Rescuers are seen on the scene

Four people, including a 14-year-old boy, were rescued more than 20 hours after the accident. They were plucked from the water after Duke Energy workers spotted them 'hanging onto various items' around the eight-foot dam at about 3:30pm on Thursday

Rescue personnel stage along the Dan River in Eden, N.C., Friday, June 18, 2021. The search for two missing tubers continues after three others were found dead

A member of the rescue team is seen taking part in the search for the missing tubers in North Carolina near the border with Virginia

The group got into trouble when several of their round inflatable rafts came untied and some floated over the Duke Energy dam in Eden, North Carolina

The boy, who has not been named, was visiting his aunt and uncle when the accident happened at around 7.30pm Wednesday.

The 14-year-old was said to have tried to get to his other family members to help them, but could not do it.

Rockingham County Emergency Services Director Rodney Cates said the situation was called in to 911 by a Duke Energy employee who saw some of the tubers at the bottom of the dam around 3.15pm on Thursday.

The group got into trouble when their three round inflatable rafts, which had been lashed together, came untied. Each person was floating on their own tube when they went over the dam.

Cates said there are signs on the river that warn about the dam downstream.

'People usually get out before the dam,' Cates said.

Glenn Bozorth, who operated a water sports business on the Dan River for 25 years, told Greensboro News and Record that people often underestimate the force of the current at the base of dams.

'When the water goes over the dam, it creates a circular motion that pulls you under,' he said, 'it sucks you under and once you're drowned, you float downstream and get hung up somewhere or hung up under water.'

First responders indicated the survivors were caught in fast-moving water near the dam when they were found, according to recordings of scanner traffic on broadcastify.com.

First responders can be heard over public safety radio ordering boats and other swift water rescue equipment to the area shortly after the 911 call came in Thursday around 3:15 p.m.

'Were taking a call on the Dan River at the dam near the Duke Energy plant. Caller is advising five tubers  went over the dam,' one person says.

A rescuer says some of the tubers were stuck near the dam because of the pull of water flowing over it.

'Theyre on that side  at the abutment for the dam. And theyre all caught in the pull. If you can come over  we can probably pull them out pretty good, hopefully,' the rescuer can be heard saying.

Cates told reporters Friday that debris and rocks in the river can puncture tubes or rafts, so its important for people to wear life preservers. He said it wasnt clear if any of the nine were using life preservers.

'The current of the river makes it very hard to navigate, even for the most experienced swimmers. So we strongly encourage people to wear some type of personal floatation device in addition to the tube theyre in,' he said.

It is unclear at this time why the family of nine did not get out of their tubes before they reached the dam.

Rescuers launched a search effort in the county north of Greensboro along the Virginia state line on Thursday night.

Personnel from Pittsylvania County and Danville were also involved in the efforts and helped recover three bodies.

State Highway Patrol also helped, dispatching a helicopter equipped with forward-looking infrared cameras, technology designed to enhance night vision and detect heat sources, to aid the search.



Cates did not release the identities of the three people who died, but said: 'Though the outcome is tragic for these people that have been recovered, at least for their families, there's some closure. And our crews out here tonight have done an outstanding job'.

Four people were rescued around 9:30pm after they were seen by Duke Energy workers 'hanging onto various items' around the dam at 3:30pm. They were not wearing life jackets when they were rescued.

They were taken to a hospital for treatment of non life-threatening injuries. At least one, a 14-year-old boy, was later released.

Rescue teams launched a search effort in the county north of Greensboro along the Virginia state line on Thursday night (pictured, the Dan River in North Carolina)

Rescue teams launched a search effort in the county north of Greensboro along the Virginia state line on Thursday night

Rockingham County Emergency Services Director Rodney Cates said rescue teams were 'staying positive' about rescuing two people who are still missing

Cates said rescue teams were 'staying positive' about rescuing two people who are still missing.

'We're going to stay positive that we can do a rescue rather than a recovery,' he said

'We have done both an air and water search at this time. We've had an aircraft that has flown the river.

'They flew 6 miles into Virginia, they came back widened their perimeter and flew the ground area adjacent to the river,' Cates added.

He said it was not immediately clear why the tubers did not contact authorities sooner, but he said it may have been because they didn't have phones with them.

He said it's not unusual for people to float the river on tubes or rafts in the area but most get out and walk around the dam.

He added a warning for anyone tubing on the water, asking people to be careful as there is a 'pretty steep drop' from the dam.

'Know where you are, know your surroundings have your safety vest your life vest, the inner tube may not always stay inflated and if the inner tube is not inflated you need some type of floatation device to secure you as you are coming on down the river,' he said.
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A hydropower plant at California's drought-stricken Lake Oroville that powers up to 800,000 homes could be shut down for the first time since it opened 1967 as an unrelenting heat wave torching the Southwest continues to strain the region's electrical grid.

Lake Oroville, which is the state's second largest reservoir, dropped to around 700 feet above sea level. If it continues to fall to 640 feet, there won't enough water to operating the plant, California Energy Commission spokesperson Lindsay Buckley told CNN.

California Governor Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency on Thursday after temperatures across the state soared past 100 degrees Fahrenheit and reached nearly 130 degrees in Death Valley, where its own 1913 record for hottest air temperature ever reported on Earth could be broken.

California is looking to avoid the woes of last summer, when rolling power outages plagued residents for several days during a heatwave.

On Wednesday, the California Independent System Operator, the main power grid operator in the state, also issued an alert, asking for a five-hour voluntary electricity conversation effort on Thursday from 5pm to 10pm, peak usage times.

'It is necessary to take action to reduce the strain on the energy infrastructure and increase energy capacity,' the state of emergency proclamation reads.

 Slide me  A hydropower plant at California's drought-stricken Lake Oroville that powers up to 800,000 homes could be shut down for the first time since it opened 1967 as an unrelenting heat wave torching the Southwest continues to strain the region's electrical grid. The aerial photos above show the lake in June 2019 (left) and in June 2021 (right)

 Slide me  Lake Oroville in California and the surrounding agriculture is drying up at a rapid pace during the Southwest's unrelenting and prolonged heat wave. Pictured: Lake Oroville in July 2011 (left) and in June 2021 (right)

 Slide me  The lush, vibrant view of Lake Oroville in July 2011 is a stark contrast to the barren lake in June 2021

The Edward Hyatt Plant at Lake Oroville (pictured) has never before been shut down since it opened in 1967

The Edward Hyatt Plant at Lake Oroville (pictured) generates power for up to 800,000 homes in northern California

California Governor Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency on Thursday after temperatures across the state soared past 100 degrees Fahrenheit and reached nearly 130 degrees in Death Valley

A woman is seen next to a temperature display in Death Valley National Park in California

In Phoenix (pictured), temperatures reached as high as 118 degrees this week

The declaration will ease restrictions on backup generators and sources of carbon-powered electricity.

Fuel consumption and air-quality restrictions for utility companies will also be rolled back.

Many of the provisions in the state of emergency are set to expire on Saturday night, though some last into next week.

'The proclamation suspends certain permitting requirements, allowing the use of back-up power generation and freeing up additional energy capacity to help alleviate the heat-induced demands on the states energy grid,' the California governor's office said in a statement to Fox News.

The declaration comes as temperatures in the region have reached as high as 118 degrees Fahrenheit in Phoenix, Arizona.

A digital sign displays a temperature of 115 degrees Fahrenheit as a heat wave continues to bake the Southwest United States in Las Vegas, Nevada

Signage warns of extreme heat danger at the salt flats of Badwater Basin inside Death Valley National Park

Visitors take pictures at the salt flats of Badwater Basin inside Death Valley National Park

Gavin Newsom declared the state of emergency after temperatures across the state soared past 100 degrees Fahrenheit

Tourists on a road trip from Texas, take pictures with a thermometer displaying temperatures of 130 degrees Fahrenheit at Death Valley National Park

The National Weather Service has issued excessive heat warnings for much of the Southwest, including Arizona, southern Nevada, much of California and southern Utah.

Heat advisories were issued for parts of the Central Plains, including Kansas, Nebraska, Iowa and Missouri.

'It's a pretty big impact with respect to where the record heat is,' National Weather Service meteorologist Bob Oravec said from the Weather Prediction Center in College Park, Maryland.

A high-pressure system has been parked for three days over the Southwest, a region used to temperatures of around 100 degrees Fahrenheit between now and September.

'But now the temperatures in the last several days, especially today, are going anywhere from 10 to 20 degrees above average,' Oravec said.

On Wednesday, much of California was either under an excessive heat warning or watch

The record high temperatures in the heatwave continued to pester the southwest on Thursday

Salt Lake City, Utah, on Tuesday tied its all-time high temperature since record-keeping began in 1894, at 107 degrees Fahrenheit.

California's Death Valley National Park, typically one of the hottest spots in the world, recorded 129 degrees Fahrenheit on Wednesday.

'Up to a certain temperature it's OK, like maybe 120, but once it gets above that is when it really gets hard,' said Willo Alford, who runs a general store in Death Valley Village and has lived there most of her life.

The National Weather Service has said there could be 'dangerously hot, potentially life-threatening temperatures' in the San Joaquin Valley through Saturday.

Some regions in the state are beginning to open cooling centers for those struggling to combat the heat.

With air conditioners cranked up in homes and businesses, Texas and California urged consumers to conserve energy during peak times to avoid blackouts.

'The public's help is essential when extreme weather or other factors beyond our control put undue stress on the electric grid,' said Elliot Mainzer, chief executive of the California ISO, which operates the grid in most of California.

Some of the heat records that fell this week have lasted for multiple decades

The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), the state's grid operator, expects Thursday's demand to break the June record set on Monday.

Both states have previously imposed rotating or controlled outages to prevent more widespread collapses of their power systems - California during a heat wave in August 2020 and Texas during a brutal freeze in February 2021.

The National Weather Service has issued red flag warnings across the Southwest to warn of fire dangers and major blazes were burning across the region, although most of them were more than 50 percent contained as of Thursday afternoon.

'Mother Nature, please bring on a productive monsoon. Be gone: #heat wave #wildfires,' Monica Surfaro of Tuscan, Arizona, wrote on Twitter.

A cold front is expected to bring relief to the midsection of the country on Sunday as temperatures in the Southwest slowly moderate as well

A cold front is expected to bring relief to the midsection of the country on Sunday as temperatures in the Southwest slowly moderate as well.

'The heat wave, at least the record portions of the heat wave, looks like it will be coming to them this weekend,' Oravec said.

Last summer, California had to deal with several nights of rolling power outages for the first time in two decades due to a heatwave.

The provisions in the state of emergency declaration are aimed at preventing such issues from cropping up again.

To that end, the power grid operator in California is hoping residents will bump thermostats above 78 degrees.

They also want people to refrain from using washers, dishwashers and major appliances.

Dry land is visible, at a section that is normally under water, on the banks of Lake Oroville, which is the second largest reservoir in California

The heat wave has also taken a devastating toll on an already drought-ravaged region, drying up water supplies and torching vegetation

'Tens of thousands of households modestly adjusting their consumption can have a big aggregate impact.

According to the Washington Post, this is the first time the power grid operator has issued a 'Flex Alert' in 2021.

Notably, the alert comes before the summer has even officially started, suggesting hotter temperatures and more alerts could be on the horizon.

''Tens of thousands of households modestly adjusting their consumption can have a big aggregate impact,' said Jim Williams, an energy systems expert at the University of San Francisco.

Officials believe the electrical grid is better prepared than a year ago, when rolling blackouts plummeted hundreds of thousands into the dark for several nights.

'Tens of thousands of households modestly adjusting their consumption can have a big aggregate impact.

People gather at the beach to cool-off as a heatwave continues in Oceanside, California

This is the first time the power grid operator has issued a 'Flex Alert' in 2021

Officials believe rolling blackouts are less likely than they were a year ago, but they can't be ruled out.

The heat wave has also taken a devastating toll on an already drought-ravaged region, drying up water supplies and torching vegetation.

Amid the current heat wave Lake Mead, the reservoir formed by the Hoover Dam on the Colorado River in southern Nevada, has fallen to its lowest level since it was filled in the 1930s.

The lake's water level has now dropped 143 feet below its 2000 level, or 34.7 percent, when it was last considered full. What's left is a 'bathtub ring' of white minerals as tall as Lady Liberty along the lake's steep shoreline.

Aside from straining electrical grids, the severe temperature is drying up water supplies and vegetation, which creates a combustible concoction for wild fires, and affecting 40 to 50 million people in the region.

More than 20 large wildfires are already burning in Arizona, California and other parts of the West.

And approximately 89 percent of the western US is experiencing drought conditions, with more than half reported to be in 'extreme' and 'exceptional' drought, and this region is on track for its most severe drought in history.
A 'completely delusional' ice user who shot a police officer and security guard at a hospital's emergency department wants to resume nursing in the future.

Michael De Guzman, a registered nurse, is being detained at a forensic hospital after a NSW District Court judge found him not guilty in 2018 of 11 charges by reason of mental impairment.

They included shooting dog squad officer Sergeant Luke Warburton with intent to murder at Nepean Hospital, west of Sydney, in January 2016.

The police officer was shot with his own gun as he tried to take scissors from the hand of de Guzman, who had seconds earlier held a doctor hostage and made threats to kill.

A 'completely delusional' ice user who shot a police officer (pictured, sergeant Luke Warburton) and security guard at a hospital's emergency department wants to resume nursing in the future

The police officer was shot with his own gun as he tried to take scissors from the hand of de Guzman, who had seconds earlier held a doctor hostage and made threats to kill (pictured, police arriving at the scene following the shooting)

At the time of the shooting, de Guzman was convinced his wife had been taken to Saudi Arabia to join a Russian mafia-run prostitution ring and people in the hospital were involved.

The Health Care Complaints Commission subsequently took disciplinary proceedings against him in the NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal.

The tribunal on Friday cancelled his national nursing registration and banned him from seeking a re-instatement order for five years, the period sought by the HCCC.

'We are cognisant that the practitioner expresses a wish to be able to practise in the future and at a time sooner than proposed by the HCCC,' the tribunal said.

It upheld all three complaints against de Gruzman, which he admitted.

He was found to have engaged in improper or unethical conduct by purchasing and using methamphetamine between 2012 and 2016 when he was working as a nurse.

Secondly, he suffers a mental illness impairment, amphetamine use Disorder and schizophrenia, with significant potential for relapse.

Finally, he was found guilty of professional misconduct and not competent to practise.

The tribunal was told he was making good progress and not using substances while in custody, but will require ongoing rehabilitation and treatment in the hospital where he will likely stay for a number of years.

An expert referred to the fact de Guzman had been using ice on a daily basis while working as a nurse.

'The effect of the ice use on his mental state was ultimately catastrophic, led to police officers and medical personnel and health professionals being seriously injured and traumatised, and resulted in serious adverse publicity for the nursing profession.'

At the time of the shooting, de Guzman was convinced his wife had been taken to Saudi Arabia to join a Russian mafia-run prostitution ring and people in the hospital were involved

The expert said his conditions were in remission, that he is not currently symptomatic, and in the ordinary circumstances, subject to a considerable number of safeguards, he could practise.

'It is unlikely that he will be at the point where he could have his registration restored with conditions for many years,' he said.

'If and when(he) reaches this point, there will be significant recency of practice issues and at that point he will require significant retraining.'

The tribunal accepted the evidence, finding that by his illicit drug-taking, de Guzman potentially exposed patients to ill-treatment and negligent care.

'His actions on 12 January 2016, which we are cognisant did not occur in the practice of his profession or the purported practice of his profession, have had terrible and lasting consequences for those who suffered injury from his conduct.

'His actions on that day brought the reputation of the profession into disrepute and support a finding that he is not competent to practise.'
Queensland will shut its border to anyone coming from the eastern suburbs of New South Wales from today as the state battles a Covid cluster and issues a new exposure site alert.

Visitors from the Waverley area of Sydney - which includes the current Bondi Junction hotspots - will be blocked from freely entering the state from 1am on Saturday.

Mandatory hotel quarantine will be restarted for anyone from the affected area after the lockdown comes into effect.

And Queensland health Minister Yvette D'Ath said anyone coming into Queensland will now need a border pass to get in.

She added: 'We believe we need to act quickly to ensure we don't have any of that transmission coming into Queensland.'

Queensland will shut its border to anyone coming from the eastern suburbs of New South Wales from 1am on Saturday as the state battles a Covid cluster

NEW COVID-19 EXPOSURE SITES VISITED BY INFECTED MYER SHOPPER Redfern: The Twisted Olive, 684 Bourke Street, Sunday 13 June - 12.20pm to 1.30pm Newtown: Adora Handmade Chocolates, 2/325 King Street, Sunday 13 June - 2pm to 3.30pm Campbelltown: The Alkalizer, Campbelltown Council Building, 91 Queen Street, Tuesday 15 June -9am to 10am North Sydney: Greenwood Grocer, Greenwood Plaza Lower Level, 71/36 Blue Street, Tuesday 15 June - 5pm to 5.20pm Advertisement

The latest official update on the Queensland state government Covid-19 website adds: 'If you have been in a declared COVID-19 hotspot in the last 14 days, you will not be allowed to enter Queensland, unless you are a Queensland resident, except for a limited range of people who can enter for essential purposes.

'From 1am AEST Saturday 19 June 2021 you must complete a declaration to enter Queensland from anywhere in Australia or New Zealand that is not a declared COVID-19 hotspot.'

The lockout comes as New South Wales brought back mandatory masks on public transport in Sydney, as the cluster of the highly-infectious coronavirus Delta variant expanded to a fourth person.

NSW Health issued an updated alert on Friday evening urging anyone at Westfield Bondi Junction from 11am to 12pm on June 12, and 1pm to 2pm, and 4pm to 4.30pm on Sunday June 13 to get a Covid-19 test.

The alert also applies to people who were in the Westfield car park during those times.

Anyone who was in the gaming room of the Tea Gardens Hotel in Bondi Junction on June 13 from 5pm to 5.15pm is a close contact and must get tested immediately and self-isolate for 14 days no matter what the result.

'We don't want people panicking but at the same time we want everyone on high alert,' Premier Gladys Berejiklian said on Friday.

Anyone using public transport in the Greater Sydney area must wear a mask for the next five days. Pictured are commuters at Town Hall station in Sydney

Masks will be made mandatory in trains, buses and ferries from 4 pm local time on Friday for five days while officials urged residents to also wear them in all indoor venues including supermarkets and theatres.

Ms Berejiklian added: 'We feel the response we have outlined today is enough for the information we have today.

'We have room to move if the situation worsens or something unexpected happens.'

The latest Covid scare has now also spread to Canberra after a Sydney man with low levels of the virus reportedly visited the nation's capital while infected.

The man in his 40s from Baulkham Hills in Sydney's north-west visited the ACT on June 14.

Health authorities are urging anyone who went to the National Gallery of Australia's Boticelli to Van Gogh exhibition or gift shop from 12-1.45pm on Monday to get tested and immediately isolate.

The same advice applies to anyone who visited Via Dolce Pasticceria, a popular Italian dessert and pizza eatery, on the same day from 2.45-3.15pm.

The alert for Canberra comes as Sydney's Covid exposure list continues to grow, with a popular bowling club and Harris Farm supermarket added on Tuesday night.

Queensland health Minister Yvette D'Ath (pictured) said anyone coming into Queensland will now need a border pass to get in

New South Wales has seen four new coronavirus cases in the last 48 hours, after a 40-day run without a single locally acquired infection.

Authorities are now scrambling to keep the lid on a potential outbreak, after a driver who transported international flight crew tested positive on Wednesday.

The Bondi man's wife has since also tested positive, as has a woman in her 70s who was at a Vaucluse cafe at the same time.

New South Wales has seen four new coronavirus cases in the last 48 hours, after a 40-day run without a single locally acquired infection
Three teenagers have narrowly avoided causing a major traffic accident after they dashed across a four-lane freeway, forcing a truck driver to slam on his brakes.

Video shows the teenagers running across two lanes to the concrete median barrier - where they hesitate as cars speed past them before they sprint across the final two lanes.

A truck in the peak-hour rush slams on the brakes and grinds to a halt in front of the last teenager - a split second later and he would have collided with boy.

The short video was filmed by a pedestrian on an overpass of the Kwinana Freeway south of Perth and shared to Reddit on Thursday night.

'No way. How dumb are they?' a voice can be heard saying on the video.

The freeway dash is understood to have happened last Friday about 5.40pm.

On Thursday, WA Police appealed to the public for anyone that might have Dashcam footage of the incident as they believed the teenagers could be linked to burglary.

'Around 5.30pm the boys are believed to have committed a burglary on a house in Fyfe Circle, [which] runs adjacent to the Freeway,' a Facebook post by Fremantle police said.

'They were seen carrying a case that was stolen from the house when they ran across the Kwinana Freeway and across the railway line.

'This was reported to police by a witness travelling on the southbound carriageway of the Freeway.'

Anyone who might have information is asked to contact Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.
Unvaccinated cadets at West Point Military Academy are reportedly facing discrimination with tougher mask mandates and a shorter summer break than their vaccinated peers.

A majority of the students at the academy are vaccinated, according to FOX News, with just about three dozen unvaccinated cadets at the school of more than 4,500 students.

And many of the students who have not yet gotten a COVID shot said they already have immunity from contracting the virus, but are now facing stricter quarantines and tougher mask mandates.

West Point cadets were required to wear masks throughout the school year. They are pictured here marching at a wreathe-laying ceremony in May

Parents and students have said the push for them to get COVID vaccines began once the first doses were approved in January, and now, months later, students who are unvaccinated are facing increasing pressure and coercion to get the vaccine, even though the military academy does not have a vaccine mandate.

They say they are being treated as second-class citizens and have been called 'diseased' and 'dirty' and treated as outcasts.

The vaccinated cadets have allegedly been told not to socialize with their unvaccinated friends, and a spreadsheet has been circulating on campus listing cadets by their name and their vaccination status .

The school has said it may have been 'inadvertently disseminated,' and officials were looking into the manner.

The new limits, FOX reports, include a seven-day quarantine for unvaccinated cadets before the rest of the class has to return for summer training.

'It's like solitary confinement for a disease we don't have,' one cadet told FOX, with Elita Perusek, a mother of a son in his final year at the school, saying her son had declined to get the vaccine but had tested positive for antibodies.

'He was counseled before he left West Point by his tactical officer, who told him that because he chose to exercise his right to not take the vaccine that he would be called "susceptible status" and that he would have to submit to Restriction of Movement throughout the summer, which means that he would have to give up some of his leave.'

She said the students have already missed out on some leave this year out of COVID precautions.

On Sean Hannity's show on Thursday he spoke with parents of cadets who refused to get the vaccine about what their children are facing at the Military Academy

The previous Restrictions of Motion requirement for students returning from break allowed them to go out to the mess halls and engage in activities, but Perusek said under the new requirements her son has had to stay in his room for 23 hours a day and 'nobody in the chain of command' came to visit him.

Documents obtained by 'Hannity Tonight' also show that as recently as last week, cadets were cited with Negative Cadet Observation Reports for violating mask requirements and social distancing, when they were sitting unmasked on outdoor bleachers within six feet of each other.

The students were also reportedly warned further discipline would be forthcoming if they violated the rules again.

The school's guidelines for unvaccinated cadets say a mask should be worn in the barracks and in shared spaces - such as bathrooms and showers. They would not need to wear masks, the school said when 'performing personal hygiene.'

But, the guidelines say, masks should also be worn when cadets are swimming, unless social distancing is maintained, and the only time they should not be wearing masks is during physical training.

Mathias Sampson, a 20-year Army vet, said his daughter at West Point did not get the vaccine because she had concerns about the long-term effects on her fertility, but, he said, officials are still pushing for her to get the vaccine.

'It's certainly not about the science anymore,' Sampson said. 'As her father, I'm very worried for her, but more importantly, and why I'm on the show tonight, is that as an American I'm deeply concerned about what's going on in the military academies right now.'

He said his daughter has had COVID and currently has the antibodies, but 'West Point is putting a ridiculous amount of pressure on her to take the vaccine.'

The U.S, Military Academy's Public Affairs Office said vaccines are encouraged, but are not mandatory.

'Though they train together and are fully integrated in all activities, unvaccinated cadets are currently being housed separately from vaccinated cadets to minimize transmission risk and are provided with equal or better living conditions,' the office told Hannity's show.

'The academy's risk mitigating plan for summer military training was developed under the guidance of medical advisors, experience from last year's academy summer training experiences and is aligned with the measures used in other military training, exercises across the army.'

The school also pushed back against the idea that the school's COVID coordinator, Col. Laura Dawson attempted to coerce the cadets into getting the vaccine.

'Currently the Department of Defense is not mandating vaccines for US military members, and it remains optional but encouraged for West Point personnel,' the school said in a statement.

'Any harassment, abuse, threats or punitive measures targeting unvaccinated personnel is antithetical to West Point policy, ideals and Army values,' it continued. 'West Point takes every report of inappropriate behavior very seriously and takes immediate actions to address such reports in a timely manner.'
Tucker Carlson on Thursday night doubled down on his claim earlier this week that the Capitol rioters who were named as 'unindicted co-conspirators' in court documents were actually federal agents, orchestrating the attack.

Carlson told his viewers that the FBI had a long history of infiltrations and pushing people to commit crimes, and said he believed they had done it again.

'If that happened, and we believe it did happen, it would not be out of character for the FBI. It they've done things very much like that before,' he said.

'That is beyond dispute.'

The Fox News host said his questions had led to the media becoming 'hysterical when we mentioned it.'

Tucker Carlson on Thursday night revisited his claim, made on Tuesday, that the FBI had been 'organizing' the January 6 Capitol riot. Republicans are keen to downplay the role of Donald Trump, and shift the blame. They are also blocking an inquiry. Carlson said there remained questions as to the FBI's involvement

Rioters waving Trump flags are seen storming the U.S. Capitol on January 6. Carlson insists that many of them were actually FBI agents

The insurrectionists smashed their way into the Capitol, forcing members of Congress to run for their lives

He continued: 'You can't say that, they screamed, that's not allowed!

'The geniuses at Twitter weighed in to inform us that agents of the FBI were just FBI informants, so shut up. Hilarious.

'We won't shut up, and we shouldn't.

'It could not be more obvious at this point that the government is in fact hiding something, probably quite a few things.'

He added: 'Best to abandon theatrics and find out what they are hiding, that's our job.'

Carlson had on Tuesday night referenced a report in Revolver News, which looked into the indictments of the around 400 people charged over the January 6 unrest.

More than 2,000 criminal charges have been filed against 411 suspects, including hundreds of felonies such as assaulting officers and trespassing with a weapon.

Carlson noted that many of the indictments mentioned 'unidentified co-conspirators.'

'Without fail, the government has thrown the book at most people who were present and in the Capitol on January 6,' he said on Tuesday.

'There was a nationwide dragnet to find them. Many of them are still in solitary confinement tonight.

The rioters stormed the Capitol for the first time since 1814, breaking down doors and desecrating the building

Footage taken by those inside the Capitol showed the moment that Ashli Babbitt was killed as windows were smashed and doors broken down

'But strangely, some of the key people participating on January 6th have not been charged.

'Look at the documents, the government calls those people unindicted co-conspirators.

'What does that mean? It means that potentially with every single case they were FBI officers.

'Really, in the Capitol, on January 6th.'

On Thursday Carlson said that the FBI needed to answer three questions.

He asked how many of the MAGA rioters 'had a relationship with the FBI'.

He wanted to know why the FBI, if they knew of the plans, did not do more to stop the riot.

And thirdly, he wanted to know why 10,000 hours of footage from the Capitol had not been released.

Carlson has criticized Republicans who supported plans for a commission to investigate what happened, calling the proposed inquiry a 'farce' and 'a poisonous hoax'.

Carlson earlier in the week pointed to the case of Thomas Caldwell, a 66-year-old former naval officer who allegedly conspired with members of the Oath Keepers to storm the Capitol.

Caldwell's charging document says that he spent the night before the riot staying in the same hotel as 'person two'.

Thomas Caldwell, 66, is charged with his role in the riot and his part in an alleged Oath Keepers' plot. His charging documents mention 'person two' and 'person three', who Carlson said were FBI agents

Another individual, 'person three', led Caldwell to believe there would be a 'quick reaction force' participating in their storming of the Capitol.

'But wait, here's the interesting thing,' said Carlson.

'Person two and person three were organizers of the riot. The government knows who they are, but the government has not charged them.

'Why is that? You know why. They were almost certainly working for the FBI.

'So FBI operatives were organizing the attack on the Capitol on January 6th. According to government documents.'

Carlson said that there were more than 20 unindicted co-conspirators mentioned in the Oath Keeper indictments, 'all playing roles in the conspiracy who have not been charged for virtually the exact same activities.'

Carlson questioned the role played by the 'unindicted co-conspirators' in the insurrection

He concluded: 'So it turns out that this white supremacist insurrection was again, by the government's own admission in these documents, organized at least in part by government agents.'

The Fox News host pointed out that Merrick Garland, the Attorney General, had identified white supremacist groups as the biggest domestic terror threat currently confronting the United States.

But, he said, the FBI had a long history of tracking and infiltrating them.

Carlson noted that two people involved in the plot to kidnap and kill Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer last year were FBI agents, and said that a 2015 Islamist terrorist in Garland, Texas, had been texting with an FBI agent.

'So because of January 6th, says the chief law enforcement officer in the United States of America and other members of Joe Biden's cabinet, we must now use law enforcement and military force to arrest, imprison, and otherwise crush anyone who leads opposition to Joe Biden's government,' Carlson said.

'That is their position, for they said that out loud, they did today.

'We are living through the transformation of a formerly democratic republic and to something else.

'This is an authoritarian system.'

Carlson also questioned why more than 10,000 hours of footage from the Capitol riot were yet to be released, and why the member of the Capitol Police who shot and killed Ashli Babbitt had not been named.

'What could possibly be the reason for that?' Carlson asked.

'Even as they call for more openness.

'We could release those tapes today, but they are not. Why?

'We ought to be asking those questions urgently, because the Attorney General reminded us today a lot depends on the answers.'
Queensland schoolgirl Tiahleigh Palmer likely died as a result of choking or asphyxiation in a deliberate act by her foster father, a coroner has found.

Convicted sex offender Rick Thorburn told the inquest into Tiahleigh's death he accidentally suffocated his foster daughter, but this was rejected by Deputy State Coroner Jane Bentley.

'I find that Richard Thorburn deliberately killed Tiahleigh, he did so at the residence of the Thorburn family between 7.30 and 9.30pm on the 29th of October 2015,' she said, handing down her findings in Brisbane on Friday.

Tiahleigh Palmer was killed at the Thorburn residence between 7.30 and 9.30pm on the 29th of October 2015, the Deputy State Coroner Jane Bentley said

Ms Bentley said Tiahleigh was most likely choked or asphyxiated by Rick Thorburn

While the exact cause of death could not be conclusively determined, Ms Bentley said Tiahleigh was most likely choked or asphyxiated.

Thorburn sobbed while reading a one-page statement - he says was written about four years ago - in the Coroner's Court last week.

He said he had no recollection of being told by his wife on the day Tiahleigh died that his son had had sex with the 12-year-old.

Asked whether there may be a link between the circumstances of him killing Tiahleigh and finding out about the sexual relationship, he answered: "I don't know".

He also told the inquest he was "coerced into pleading guilty" earlier to multiple charges of sexual assault for offences unrelated to Tiahleigh.

Despite internal reviews and criminal trials, no one knows what happened to Tiahleigh in her final moments, a pre-inquest hearing was told last month.

"(Thorburn) has pleaded guilty to her murder but has never given an account, either on oath or otherwise, as to how he killed her," counsel assisting the coroner Kate McMahon said during the hearing.

In the hours before Tiahleigh died, she had been to a hip-hop dance class where she complained of stomach pains.

That same night, Thorburn's son Trent confessed to his mother Julene that he'd had sex with the schoolgirl and feared the stomach pains were a sign she was pregnant.

Thornburn and his wife feared a pregnancy could mean Trent would go to jail, according to earlier proceedings.

That night, Julene, Trent and brother Joshua went out, leaving Tiahleigh home alone with Rick Thorburn for two hours.

She was never seen alive again.

Trent Thorburn confessed to his mother Julene that he'd had sex with the schoolgirl and feared her stomach pains were a sign she was pregnant

Tiahleigh's body - naked except for underpants - was badly decomposed when found by three fishermen on the banks of the Pimpama River near the Gold Coast on November 5, 2015.

Members of the Thorburn family were convicted of being part of the crime - Rick Thorburn for the murder, Trent for incest, and Julene and Joshua for being part of an elaborate cover-up.

Rick Thorburn was sentenced to 20 years in jail.
Wally the walrus made a triumphant return to the UK coastline last night - by delighting locals in the Scilly Isles yesterday.

The walrus travelled 518 miles north from Spain to appear in the Bay of Porthcressa, on the island of St Mary's on July 17.

Residents raced down to the beach to catch a glimpse of the tugboat-dodging animal, who was seen trying to climb aboard yachts 35 miles off the Cornish coast.

And no wonder the walrus needed to rest his flippers, after the Arctic mammal brought delight to communities in Ireland, Pembrokeshire, Cornwall and France over the past few months in his 2,000 mile adventure from Greenland.

Wally the walrus made a triumphant return to the UK coastline last night - by delighting locals in the Scilly Isles

The walrus travelled 518 miles north from Spain to appear in the Bay of Porthcressa, on the island of St Mary's on July 17. Residents raced down to the beach to catch a glimpse of the tugboat-dodging animal, who was seen trying to climb aboard yachts 35 miles off the Cornish coast (pictured)

And no wonder the walrus needed to rest his flippers (pictured trying to climb on a yacht) , after the Arctic mammal brought delight to communities in Ireland, Pembrokeshire, Cornwall and France over the past few months in his 2,000 mile adventure from Greenland

A Scilly islander said the walrus was enjoying himself around moored boats on Thursday.

Local Will Lethbridge said: 'He seems pretty happy and healthy. The beach is full of people with binoculars and telescopes and it seems Wally the walrus is around the shoreline playing with some of the yachts.'

Wally was last spotted soaking up the rays off the coast of Spain less than a fortnight ago - as he continued his long-distance swim across Europe.

The Artic walrus traveled 230 miles through the Bay of Biscay to the River Nervion earlier this month.

Wally spotters in France, where he was seen previously, said: 'The walrus that appeared in La Rochelle last week is already in the Basque Country.

'The Bilbao superport tugboats located him swimming in the mouth of the Nervion in apparent good health.'

Pictures show Wally the Walrus sunbathing on the rocks in Les Sables d'Olonne, France

Wally became a local celebrity when he rocked up on the south Wales coast in Tenby this year.

He was first spotted in County Kerry, Ireland in March, before heading over to the UK after he was believed to have fallen asleep on a drifting iceberg in his Arctic homeland.

Six days after first appearing in Ireland in March, the RSPCA were called out to check on the creature - which was 'underweight' - at the bottom of a cliff near Broad Haven South beach in Pembrokeshire, Wales.

Wally was last spotted earlier this month near Padstow, 390 miles away from France

Wally cause quite a scene in Wales when he lounged on the RNLI's slipway

Wally posed a weighty problem for worried lifeboat chiefs in Tenby when their emergency crews were blocked by the giant on their slipway.

But after becoming a known figure in the area, animal welfare groups believe he left after becoming 'obviously disturbed' by day-trippers getting too close.

Irresponsible tourists tried to approach him using jet-skis, paddleboards and drones as he rested on a RNLI slipway in the town's harbour.

It became a concern for RNLI volunteers, who had to resort to shooing Wally off the slipway, using brooms and airhorns to try to move the animal.

Wally the Walrus travelled from Wales to Cornwall, and has now migrated further south

The RSPCA Cymru and Dyfed-Powys Police had to issue a plea to tourists to keep their distance from Wally, who is protected under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981.

Having spent months basking in the Welsh sunshine, he then travelled further south, popping up in Cornwall for a few days.

Then he migrated further south still, to Les Sables d'Olonne in western France, making it the town's first sighting of a Walrus in 50 years.

Photographs show Wally basking in the French sun on the rocks on May 27.

People in Tenby are hopeful that Wally will return to Wales after his time in France, because he has become a local celebrity, with many shops selling Wally the Walrus merchandise.

Experts believe that Wally may have initially dozed off on a block of ice and drifted across the ocean.

RSPCA animal rescue officer Ellie West described Wally's plight as 'sad' during Radio 4's Today programme back in March.

She said at the time: 'Whilst it is a very unusual sight [...] it is quite a sad occurrence because we have to remember that this walrus is a very, very long way from where he should be.

'We're talking about a wild animal that's still very mobile. He's very big, we're talking about much bigger than our normal seals. This one, although he's of a large size he is a bit underweight.'

Wally became an icon in Tenby, Wales, where shops are selling walrus merchandise
Border Patrol agents in Texas found 33 illegal immigrants crammed inside a U-Haul last week as temperatures reached 100-degrees.

The U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents made the discovery last Thursday outside of a McDonald's restaurant in the west Texas town of Van Horn, Fox News reported.

Many of those inside were 'close to perishing due to excessive heat,' border patrol agents announced late Tuesday, as the truck did not have any fresh air and temperatures hovered near 100-degrees.

More than 30 illegal immigrants were found crammed inside a U-Haul truck last week as temperatures reached 100-degrees. Many of them needed medical attention for heat-related illnesses, with at least a dozen brought to a hospital

Some were treated for dehydration, KVIA reports, while at least a dozen needed to be hospitalized. None of the undocumented immigrants died, the border patrol agents reported.

'Had our heroic agents not been able to free these trapped undocumented migrants, we could have seen 33 miserable deaths in this event,' Border Patrol's Big Bend Sector Chief Sean McGoffin told the local news station.

'Smugglers do to care what type of misery they put people through as they take their money.'

The discovery comes less than a week after agents found another U-Haul truck carrying 27 illegal immigrants into the country in Big Bend.

The truck was found outside of a McDonald's restaurant in the west Texas town of Van Horn

It comes one week after Border Patrol found 27 illegal immigrants were found in another truck

The temperature inside the truck was 106-degrees at that time, and none of the immigrants were wearing personal protective equipment.

Texas has been facing a lengthy heatwave, with temperatures reaching up to 127-degrees in parts of the desert southwest.

A spokesman for U-Haul told Fox that they would not comment on the matter.

'We tend to let law enforcement speak to any criminal activity where our equipment may be involved.'
An Australian mother and daughter have been told they can sue cruise ship company over the White Island volcano tragedy that killed their two family members.

Marie Browitt and daughter Stephanie, 24, were told in the federal court they can now sue Royal Caribbean Cruises in the United States over psychological and physical injuries suffered in the tragedy.

The cruise line argued in court it was not responsible for the injuries and deaths - including the loss of Krystal and Paul Browitt - resulting from the eruption, but lost its case, 9News reported.

Krystal Browitt, 21, died along with her father Paul in last year's White Island volcano eruption

Stephanie Browitt (right), 24, was touring the island with her 21-year-old sister Krystal and their father Paul (left) when it erupted off the coast of New Zealand on December 9, 2019

Stephanie (pictured) suffered third degree burns to 70 per cent of her body and lost a number of her fingers

'Paul, Stephanie and Krystal suffered horrific injuries from the molten ash and rock that spewed from the erupting volcano,' wrote federal court judge Angus Stewart in his ruling.

'Marie has suffered unbearable loss and psychological injury.'

Krystal Browitt, 21, and her dad Paul Browitt, died after the volcano exploded while they were standing on it.

Marie Browitt and her late daughter Krystal Browitt, who died in the White Island volcano eruption in 2019

Stephanie Browitt, who was also on the island, survived despite suffering third degree burns to 70 per cent of her body and losing some of her fingers.

She was in a coma for two months and spent six months in hospital.

Marie Browitt remained on board the Ovation of the Seas cruise ship and was uninjured.

In total 21 people died in the eruption.

Royal Caribbean argued the Browitts could only sue in a New South Wales court, because they booked their tickets with Flight Centre in NSW.

The federal court rejected that defence, opening the way for the grieving mum and daughter to sue in a Florida court.

The fatal explosion off the coast of Whakatane, New Zealand, claimed the lives of 22 of the 47 people on the island on December 9, 2019

Ms Browitt put her insecurities to the side in a brave attempt to share her experience with disfiguring injuries (pictured: her healing back in March 2020)

Royal Caribbean was also ordered to pay the Browitt's federal court costs.

The cruise giant is run from Miami, although it is registered to the African nation of Liberia.

The Melbourne family was enjoying the holiday of a lifetime on the Royal Caribbean ship Ovation of the Seas when the incident occurred.
A female prison guard detailed the 'risks' she was taking to be with her jailbird lover in a heartfelt letter in which she also confessed she loved his 'amazing blue eyes'.

Melissa Maree Goodwin, 26, has pleaded guilty to having an intimate relationship with prison inmate Corey London, 21.

Melissa Maree Goodwin, 26, has pleaded guilty to having an intimate relationship with prison inmate Corey London, 21

A handwritten letter penned by the suspended Corrective Services NSW officer in January last year offers a glimpse into their relationship, which began while she was working at the Metropolitan Remand Centre in the western Sydney suburb of Silverwater.

'I don't know if you truly understand the risks and consequences I am taking for you. I hope I am right this time,' Goodwin wrote in the letter tendered to Burwood Local Court, the Daily Telegraph reported.

'Firstly, I am writing in my purple uni pen as I know you like purple. I'll wait until you're out to do my nails purple so you can see them in real life.

'I see a lot of good in you especially in those amazing blue eyes you have, I love them.'

Goodwin wrote that while she believed convicted thief London was 'handsome' and had so much 'potential', the people he surrounded himself with had got him into trouble.

In a handwritten letter to London, Goodwin described how she loved his 'amazing blue eyes' (pictured is a mock up of the letter)

Goodwin even offered to pick up her lover when he was released from jail, saying she missed him 'heaps' and was 'counting down the days'.

'I know in there you need to be tough but you'll never need to be like that with me. You have a big heart like me, it gets us into trouble,' she wrote.

The former prison guard asked London to have his mum send her updates on his situation and told him to 'be careful' about what he told her.

Goodwin then told the inmate to 'stay positive' and focus on his life upon his release.

Goodwin has denied smuggling in contraband including chewing gum and lighters to London (pictured)

Goodwin even offered to pick up her lover when he was released from jail, saying she missed him 'heaps' and was 'counting down the days'

The 26-year-old has denied claims her relationship with London was sexual.

Goodwin is also fighting charges she smuggled contraband, including Extra chewing gum, White Ox tobacco and two lighters to London in prison.

She later pursued a relationship with ex-prisoner and Rebels bikie gang associate Caleb Valeri outside jail. Valeri was on bail at the time.

Goodwin was not charged over her relationship with Valeri.

London refused to testify about his relationship with Goodwin in court this week.

Goodwin will return to court for sentencing over a single charge of engaging in an intimate relationship with an inmate causing a safety risk.
Police say they have found the weapon used in the alleged murder of a young Queensland mother at a coastal town in northern Tasmania.

Gabrielle Marshall's body was found at a friend's home in Ulverstone in the early hours of Tuesday.

Colin William Drake, 35, has been charged with murdering the 23-year-old and has appeared in court once but is yet to enter a plea.

Gabrielle Marshall, 23, moved to the Apple Isle from Brisbane just three weeks ago, but was found dead in a friend's house after being allegedly stabbed to death

Tasmania Police released a statement on Friday saying the alleged murder weapon had been recovered.

'No further details are able to be provided as the matter is now before the courts,' it said.

Ms Marshall had only been in Tasmania for a few weeks and was trying to turn her life around, her brother has said.

Ms Marshall's family has started an online fundraising campaign to help cover the cost of her funeral

Drake, who has been remanded in custody, is expected to appear in Devonport Magistrates Court via video link on July 15.

Ms Marshall's family has started an online fundraising campaign to help cover the cost of her funeral.
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Gaps in England's Covid vaccine roll-out were laid bare today by MailOnline analysis which revealed parts of the country have still only managed to inoculate a fifth of over-25s.

Despite the drive lagging behind in inner-city regions home to thousands of students, some coastal neighbourhoods have already managed to fully vaccinate 85 per cent of all adults.

Ministers are racing to dish out jabs to millions more adults over the next four weeks to thwart the spread of the Indian variant, with Freedom Day delayed to give the NHS more crucial time in the fight against Covid.

NHS England's most up-to-date regional figures show 84 per cent of over-25s across the country have had their first jab, while 62 per cent have had both doses.

But MailOnline analysis of the same statistics has revealed uptake around the country varies massively, with seven areas having reached fewer than 30 per cent of eligible adults.

Selly Oak in southwest Birmingham has the lowest coverage in the country, with 1,395 of the 6,928 over-25s living in the postcode receiving their first jab  20 per cent of the age group.

For comparison, Morpeth South and West in Northumberland has vaccinated 94 per cent of its 5,271 eligible adult population.

Experts told MailOnline the huge gap in uptake is 'clearly concerning' and warned low vaccination rates may cause local outbreaks over the summer and beyond.

England's vaccine roll-out was extended to over-18s today, with the campaign now on the home-straight. Over-25s were able to start booking appointments last week.

Low rates are particularly concerning given the rampant spread of the Indian variant, which has almost doubled in size over the past week. Public Health England (PHE) today revealed it found another 33,000, last week taking the overall amount identified to 75,000.

With the mutant strain now in almost every corner of the country and restrictions eased, cases are growing. Britain recorded more than 11,000 Covid infections for the first time since February yesterday.

The spiralling cases have raised fears of a third wave this summer, with hospitalisations also spiking by 45 per cent in the space of a week. One dose offers less protection against the Indian variant than it did against the previously dominant Kent variant, meaning two doses are needed for adequate protection against serious illness.

Experts have always cautioned jabs are not perfect and hospitalisations will rise in line with infections, regardless of how successful the roll-out is.

For that reason, SAGE advisers warned the uptick in cases could trigger a third wave this summer that was even worse than the second, prompting minister to push back 'Freedom Day' from June 21 to July 19 in order to ensure more people are vaccinated.

MailOnline analysis has revealed uptake around the country varies massively, with seven areas having vaccinated less than 30 per cent of eligible adults

Second doses followed a similar pattern, with the lowest numbers seen in student areas across England. In Cathedral and Kelham in Sheffield, just eight per cent of people are fully vaccinated

England's vaccine roll-out was extended to over-18s today, with the campaign now on the home-straight. Over-25s were able to start booking appointments last week. Pictured: 18-year old Robyn Coatsworth receives her first Pfizer Covid-19 jab at Stithians Vaccination Centre today

The NHS figures show a gap between urban areas in the North West and West Midlands and more rural parts of the the North East and South Coast.

After Morpeth South and West, the neighbourhood of Felixstowe East in Suffolk had the highest first dose uptake rate in over-25s in the country (93 per cent).

Covid was only the 24th leading cause of death in England in May and made up fewer than 1% of all fatalities, official data shows Twenty-three diseases and conditions killed more people than Covid in England last month and the virus was responsible for fewer than 1 per cent of all fatalities, official figures show. The Office for National Statistics found that Covid deaths continued to fall significantly during the month, even though cases were beginning to rise because of the rapid spread of the Indian variant. Coronavirus claimed 355 lives in May, which was down almost 65 per cent on the toll in April, in another sign that the vaccines are providing huge protection even against the mutant strain. The continued decline in Covid deaths means the virus is now the 24th 'leading' cause of death, down from ninth last month. It had been the country's biggest killer for four consecutive months from November through February. In total there were 35,401 deaths from all causes registered in England last month, which was 10 per cent lower than normal and the second month in a row they have been below average. Covid was the leading cause in just 0.9 per cent of the fatalities, accounting for about one in 110. Heart disease was the biggest killer in May (3,780) followed by dementia (3,711), while flu and pneumonia are now killing three times as many patients (1,012) as Covid. The low Covid death numbers and other promising statistics have given even the Government's cautious scientific advisers confidence that England's new 'terminus date' on July 19 will go ahead. Imperial College London's Neil Ferguson - dubbed Professor Lockdown for his gloomy predictions which led to the initial lockdown last spring and prompted the most recent delay - said yesterday he believes deaths will remain at 'manageable levels' when the country unlocks next month. Downing Street is said to be so impressed by the protection the vaccines are providing that lockdown could end two weeks early if Covid data continues to improve. No10 has opened the door to ending restrictions on July 5, amid growing evidence that assumptions used by government scientists to justify delaying Freedom Day were too pessimistic. Advertisement

Although its older population  1,048 aged 80 or above compared to 206 people aged between 20 and 29  meant more people will have had time to get their first dose, the seaside town also ranked fourteenth in the country for uptake in 20- to 29-year-olds.

Selly Oak is a residential area in Birmingham with a large student population, which may go some way to explaining the low uptake numbers.

The National Immunisation population estimates come from where people are signed up to their GP and many students and former students remain on the books of GPs in areas they no longer live, meaning university towns have higher population figures than in reality  particularly in younger age groups.

But uptake is low across all age groups in the area, with just 14 per cent of 30- to 39-year-olds, 17 per cent of 40- to 44-year-olds and 34 per cent of 45- to 49-year-olds having had a jab.

The student areas of University and Little Woodhouse in Leeds, Cathedral and Kelham in Sheffield, Oxford Central, City Centre and Arthur's Hill in Newcastle, Devonshire Quarter in Sheffield and Leeds City Centre were all also in the ten worst areas for first dose uptake.

Tidenham and Woolaston in Gloucestershire, which had an uptake rate of 24 per cent, may have particularly low numbers because of its proximity to Wales. Residents who had their jab in Wales would not be registered on NHS England figures.

The MailOnline analysis of data up to June 13 looked at middle-super output areas, which are geographical wards home to around 10,000 people.

Second doses followed a similar pattern, with the lowest numbers also seen in student areas across England. In Cathedral and Kelham in Sheffield, just eight per cent of people are fully vaccinated.

Some 26 areas of England have fully vaccinated more than 80 per cent of their eligible residents. Yarmouth and Freshwater in the Isle of White had the highest rate at 85 per cent, thanks to its large elderly population.

Professor Azra Ghani, chair in Infectious Disease Epidemiology at Imperial College London, told MailOnline the divide in uptake could lead to severe outbreak over the coming winter.

She said: 'I have no doubt that there is significant variation in vaccine uptake across the UK as a whole, and this is clearly concerning because there will remain the potential for local outbreaks in these areas.

'It is important that efforts continue to work within local communities to talk to those that are hesitant about getting vaccinated and address their concerns to prevent the possibility of severe outbreaks occurring over the upcoming winter and putting further pressure on local health services.'

But she warned the uptake rates among young people may be premature because of the time lag between booking vaccination appointments and receiving a jab.

Professor Kevin McConway, emeritus professor in applied statistics at the Open University, also warned the uptake rates in student areas may not reflect reality because of the high number of people registered with GPs there despite no longer living in the postcode.

He said: 'Places where a lot of university students live will tend to have relatively young populations of people who arent students, just because of the kind of accommodation there, and because of people staying on and living there after they have left uni.

'So, even if the population denominators were correct, youd get lower than average uptake rates there simply because the people living there are younger than average.'

It comes as a Public Health England report today revealed the Indian 'Delta' variant now makes up 99 per cent of Covid cases in the UK.

The fast-spreading variant has now completely taken over in Britain and the number of cases linked back to the strain has doubled in a week.

The number of people admitted to hospital after catching the variant rose more than two-fold to 806 from 383 in the past week and Indian variant deaths increased from 42 to 73.

The new fast-spreading variant, which scientists think is around 60 per cent more transmissible than the Kent strain that was dominant over the winter, has triggered a surge in cases that led Boris Johnson abandon his plan to end lockdown on June 21, with researchers now scrambling to work out how dangerous it is.

Promising figures suggest two doses of vaccine work well against the strain, although one is not very effective, and the jabs rollout today opened up to everyone over the age of 18 in the UK.

PHE's report today showed that, since the variant was first discovered in April, the most cases have been found in Bolton in Greater Manchester, where 4,684 positive tests had been linked to the strain by June 14.

Other hard-hit areas were in the North of England or Midlands, too, with Manchester (3,102), Blackburn (2,762), Birmingham (1,948) and Leeds (1,642) filling out the five worst-affected places.

The UK Health Security Agency's Dr Jenny Harries said: 'Cases are rising rapidly across the country and the Delta variant is now dominant... It is encouraging to see that hospitalisations and deaths are not rising at the same rate.'
Neighbours heard two shots when a man in his 20s was gunned down in Balham in south London yesterday where semi-detached houses sell for around 1.6million.

Armed police were called at around 10.50pm to reports of a man suffering gunshot wounds on Bedford Hill - home to The Bedford, one of the best comedy clubs in the country where Ed Sheeran, U2 and The Clash have performed - in Wandsworth.

The London Ambulance Service attended and rushed the victim to hospital, but he was pronounced dead just over 45 minutes later.

Detectives have launched a murder investigation, said the Met Police. The victim's next of kin have been informed and a post-mortem will be held in due course.

Armed police officers were called at around 10.50pm last night to reports of a man suffering gunshot wounds on Bedford Hill in Wandsworth, London

Properties in the neighbourhood of Balham, where the shooting took place, have an overall average price of nearly 1million, according to Rightmove

No arrests have been made and enquiries into the circumstances remain ongoing, added the force.

A local, who did not wish to be named, said: 'I heard two pops that made my dog jump up.

'I came out and looked up the street, but didn't see anything. All I heard was two shots. The dog was very animated by the sound.'

She added: 'That's not the first time something has happened here - three or four years ago there was a drive-by shooting incident.

'And then two years ago there was an acid attack and stabbing.

'There's a lot of movement in and out and lots of noise issues. It's a housing association property. There's high turnover.

'At one point two summers ago they had an illegal nightclub there. The music was really loud. It is a source of deep disquiet and discomfort.

'Somebody last night said it was a halfway house. It's awful that someone's lost their life.'

Today forensics investigators, wearing blue boiler suits, were conducting a fingertip search at the scene.

A police officer pictured at the cordoned-off scene last night. No arrests have been made and enquiries into the circumstances remain ongoing, said the Met

Police officers and vehicles at the scene last night. London Ambulance Service attended and rushed the victim to hospital, but he was pronounced dead just over 45 minutes later

Forensic officers from the Met Police at the scene last night. In a statement released this morning, the force said: 'A murder investigation is underway following a shooting in Balham'

They were concentrating on the driveway of a residential address, believed by neighbours to be a halfway house run by a housing association.

The officers also appeared to be searching a vehicle parked on the driveway, while uniformed police stood guard at the edges of a cordon stretching around 200 yards along the road.

Properties in Balham, where the shooting took place, have an overall average price of nearly 1million, according to Rightmove.

Flats in the affluent area, that counts a number of celebrities and high-profile residents as neighbours, sell for around 615,000 with terraced properties going for 1.27million and semi-detached properties fetching 1.58million.

Boasting low council taxes, trendy pubs, comedy and literary festivals and 15-minute tube links to central London, the neighbourhood is a commonly sought after place to live in the capital city.

A policeman and forensic officer on Bedford Hill - home to one of the best comedy clubs in the country where Ed Sheeran, U2 and The Clash have performed - in Wandsworth last night

A forensic officer is seen wearing gloves and blue overalls alongside detectives and police officers at the scene in Wandsworth last night

A police officer is seen speaking with emergency service workers at the taped-off scene in Balham, south London, on Thursday night

In a statement released this morning, Scotland Yard said: 'A murder investigation is underway following a shooting in Balham.

'Police were called at approximately 22:50hrs on Thursday, 17 June to reports of a man suffering gunshot injuries in Bedford Hill, SW12.

'Officers and London Ambulance Service attended and the man, believed aged in his 20s, was taken to hospital for treatment.

'Despite the best efforts of the emergency services he was pronounced dead at 23:36hrs. Next of kin have been informed.

'A post-mortem examination will be scheduled in due course. Enquiries into the circumstances remain ongoing and there have been no arrests.'

Anyone with information is asked to call police on 101, tweet @MetCC quoting CAD8915/17June or get in touch anonymously via Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111.
Sean Hannity blasted Biden over the summit with Putin and asked why the president's staff are stopping him from answering questions during a segment on Thursday night.

The Fox News host claimed Biden's staff will only allow him to take questions from pre-selected reporters because 'he's not capable of giving a coherent answer' and said the president 'seems totally lost, dazed, and confused.'

Texas Republican Rep. Ronny Jackson, who served as Donald Trump's White House physician, on Thursday night called for Biden, 78, to take a cognitive test to prove that he was capable of leading the country.

It comes after Biden met with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Geneva on Wednesday - a meeting Hannity branded a 'trainwreck' because Biden failed to eke out a single concession or agreement from Putin.

Sean Hannity blasted Biden over the summit with Putin and asked why the president's staff are stopping him from answering questions during a segment on Thursday night

The Fox News commentator claimed Biden's staff will only allow him to take questions from pre-selected reporters because 'he's not capable of giving a coherent answer' (pictured, Biden holds a press conference after meeting Putin on Wednesday)

Biden extended his hand first. Putin accepted, and the two proceeded to shake hands and smile for the cameras. They ignored questions shouted by reporters covering the summit

Hannity claimed Biden's aides prevented him from answering questions 'because they hate cleaning up the mess that he makes.'

'Why are they controlling him? 'I'm going to get in trouble if I take another question. I can't take another question.' Why?', Hannity asked.

'Anyone with common sense knows what's going on here. Joe Biden gets agitated at the drop of a hat, he gets cranky without his warm milky and his sippy cup'.

Biden 'frequently forgets what he is saying midsentence. At times he seems totally lost, dazed, and confused.'

He added the U.S. needs a 'capable leader not a mumbling, bumbling idiot'.

Biden and Putin held a one-on-one meeting, following by expanded talks including the U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and other senior staff.

Hannity slammed Biden for his performance at the meeting, saying he failed to get a single concession or agreement from Putin.

'Putin basically gave Joe nothing, the United States nothing. He made not a single concession', he said.

The pair did go as far as making a joint statement that said the two countries will conduct a dialogue on strategic stability issues and reaffirmed that 'a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought'.

It comes after Biden met with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Geneva on Wednesday - a summit Hannity branded a 'trainwreck'

President Joe Biden (L) and Russia's President Vladimir Putin (R) met for talks at the Villa La Grange in Geneva, accompanied by key aides

Hannity slammed both leaders' post-summit press conferences - held separately, in a break with tradition.

Putin, Hannity said, 'mocked and trashed the U.S. at length' in his solo remarks to the press.

Putin described Biden as 'very different' from Donald Trump and turned any questions on human rights violations in Russia into attacks on violence in America in the press conference.

'President Biden is an experienced statesman. He is very different from President Trump,' he said.

But, he turned many of the questions into criticism of the United States, including the high levels of gun violence in America.

'You don't have time to open your mouth and you're shot dead,' he said, referring to mass shootings in the United States.

'Look at American streets. People are getting killed there,' he said. 'You can get a bullet in the neck.'

And, when asked about human rights violations in Russia, he argued in return the US had 'secret CIA prisons.'

Vladimir Putin said there was no hostility in his meeting with Joe Biden in his nearly one hour press conference after their summit

Putin took questions from Russian state media and American news outlets

The Russian leader also inspired several Bond villain comparisons after quoting Tolstoy while responding to a questions about growing trust and happiness between him and the U.S. president after their meeting.

The strongman said: 'There is no happiness in life, only a mirage of it on the horizon, so cherish that.'

Speaking to Hannity on Thursday night, Rep. Jackson described Biden's performance overseas this week with world leaders as 'embarrassing'.

'We can't sit on this any longer,' he said. 'He's not physically or cognitively fit to be our president right now.

'I know what the rigors of this job are, physically and cognitively - it's demanding. He's not inspiring confidence. It's sending the wrong message to our adversaries.'

Ronny Jackson, who served as Donald Trump's personal physician, on Thursday night told Sean Hannity he was deeply concerned about Joe Biden's mental state - declaring that he had been voicing concern for several years

Jackson said that Biden's behavior on his trip to the UK, Belgium and Switzerland had been 'embarrassing'

The congressman announced earlier on Thursday that he has sent Biden a letter urging him to take a cognitive test.

Jackson has been circulating the letter with House colleagues and has been able to get the signatures of 13 GOP lawmakers.

'Sorry I was such a wise guy': Biden apologizes after snapping at CNN reporter at Geneva press conference President Joe Biden has apologized after he snapped at a reporter during a press conference in Geneva on Wednesday following his meeting with Russian president Vladimir Putin. The apology came after Biden shouted at a CNN reporter who yelled out a question asking why he was so confident the Russian strongman would change his behavior, given his previous denials and his history. During the conference, Biden chewed out the press, and specifically CNN's Chief White House Correspondent Kaitlan Collins, shouting in the crowded auditorium: 'I'm not confident I'll change his behavior. What do you do all the time?' Biden walked up to the reporter, with his suit jacket off on an unusually hot day, and accused her of not knowing her business  gesticulating while holding his Ray-Ban sunglasses. 'When did I say I was confident? I said  What I said was  let's get it straight,' Biden intoned. 'I said what will change their behavior is if the rest of the world reacts to them and it diminishes their standing in the world. I'm not confident of anything. I'm just stating the facts.' Seeking to clean up the incident minutes after the tense exchange, a now-smiling Biden addressed traveling reporters under the wing of Air Force One and said: 'I owe my last questioner an apology. I shouldn't have been such a wise guy with the last answer I gave. 'Anyway, thanks for being here,' he added. Collins later said on air she was 'just doing my job' and that Biden didn't need to apologize. She called it 'completely unnecessary' and said 'he did not have to apologize, though I do appreciate that he did'. Advertisement

The letter cites the president's 'mental decline and forgetfulness', notes several of his 'gaffes', and urges the White House to publish the test results immediately.

'The American people deserve to have absolute confidence in their president,' it read.

'They deserve to know that he or she can perform the duties demanded of the office, and they deserve to have full transparency on the mental state of their highest elected leader.

'I would argue that the American people don't have that confidence in President Biden.'

Hannity later blasted Biden, saying the president 'gave a short, scripted speech' and claimed the remarks were 'probably written before the summit'.

He 'took a handful of questions from, as always, preselected reporters, and then got very cranky and lashed out at reporters', Hannity said.

Republicans have torn into President Biden's performance at his press conference on Wednesday and criticized hearing more about his 'favorite ice cream flavors' than his inability to ask questions.

Arizona Rep. Andy Biggs told DailyMail.com: 'The media has set such low standards for Biden that we hear more about his favorite ice cream flavors than the fact he is unable to coherently answer basic questions.'

Hannity also criticized the U.S. president for handing Putin a list of 16 key areas which Russia should not try to attack.

Terming the list a 'roadmap' to hurt the country, Hannity said 'how dumb is it to give a hostile act, an evil guy like Vladimir Putin, 16 specific things, a roadmap that would cripple the USA? That's pretty dumb.'

'What would stop Putin from going after the other 14 sectors?', Hannity went on. 'All cyberattacks against America and Americans, Joe, that already should be off-limits.'

He also said the president had failed to rebuke Putin over recent cyberattacks on a U.S. pipeline and meat processing facility, pointedly telling Biden 'you should have lectured him loudly.'

The Fox News host also lashed out at several media outlets for praising Biden's performance at the summit.

'They're trying so hard to keep the Biden protection program going,' he said.

'Although, we're starting to see cracks here and there. Even late night comics are starting to realise this guy's not really with us is he.'

Hannity singled out the New York Times and Washington Post, reading headlines that praised Biden for his diplomacy.

He said the 'fake news' had continued on networks around the country, showing snippets from segments on MSNBC, CNN, and ABC to apparently prove his point, before claiming the shows made him want to throw up.
Ms Jenkins was left in a coma for three weeks after suffering a fractured skull

Driver had been on phone and was found to have metabolite of cocaine in blood

A cocaine-snorting driver has avoided jail after running over a nursery nurse at 63mph in a 30mph zone while on her phone because her mental health would 'deteriorate' if she was locked up.

Clare Cassidy, 31, was speeding in her BMW 118D when she hit 29-year-old Yasmin Jenkins, who was out running in Stockport, Greater Manchester, with her boyfriend Philip Mott to raise money for the NHS on April 18 last year.

Ms Jenkins was thrown into the air by the force of the impact, which took place on Styal Road in Gatley, despite a desperate attempt by Mr Mott to save her.

Inquiries revealed Cassidy had been on her mobile phone at the wheel of her car in the moments before the accident and had failed to slow down at road junctions.

She was also found to have 186 micrograms (mg) of benzoylecgonine, a metabolite of cocaine, in 100 millilitres of blood. The legal limit is 50mg.

At Minshull Street Crown Court, Cassidy, of Didsbury, faced up to five years jail after she admitted causing serious injury by dangerous driving.

But she was handed a two-year sentence, suspended for 18 months, after claiming she had mental health issues which led to her being admitted to the Priory rehabilitation clinic.

Clare Cassidy (pictured above), 31, was speeding in her BMW 118D when she hit 29-year-old Yasmin Jenkins, who was out running in Stockport, Greater Manchester, with her boyfriend Philip Mott to raise money for the NHS on April 18 last year

Ms Jenkins was thrown into the air by the force of the impact, which took place in Gatley, despite a desperate attempt by Mr Mott to save her (pictured: Ms Jenkins and Mr Mott)

Ms Jenkins was left in a coma for three weeks after suffering multiple serious injuries including a fractured skull, bleed to the brain and fractured left ankle. She has been left struggling to walk and had to learn to write again.

In a statement, she told police: 'I am still struggling now and my throat hurts if I talk too much. I needed a drainage procedure by having a hole drilled into my skull and I had CT and MRI scans.

'It got to the point when I couldn't have any more due to too much exposure to radiation.

'I had DVT in my right leg vein. I had a left ankle fracture causing drop foot and severe nerve damage. It caused damage to my whole right side. I was unable to walk as before. I had blurred vision and loss of speech. There was damage from tubes down my throat, causing loss of voice.

'I was unable to eat or drink. I have cognitive problems. I will not fully recover from my injuries. Three parts of my brain have been damaged. I struggle to remember things.'

Ms Jenkins said she is not allowed to drive again, and has had to move in with her father and partner with her bed in the kitchen as she is unable to get upstairs.

The nursery nurse added that she cannot walk without a crutch, has to drink through a straw, was unable to speak for four weeks and is taking prescription medication for post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) brought on by the incident.

She continued: 'It's very upsetting to have to deal with it all. It's upsetting not to do what I want to do. In the past, I would go shopping and to the gym two to three times a week. I missed out on promotion and had a loss of earnings.'

Ms Jenkins added: 'It's put a strain on the relationship with my partner. I do not remember my accident, but I ask what happened since. I currently can't stay home without somebody being there.

'I am unable to consume alcohol. I used to love prosecco on a Saturday night. But now when my friends make plans, I don't want to go.

Ms Jenkins (pictured left and right, with Mr Mott) was left in a coma for three weeks after suffering multiple serious injuries including a fractured skull, bleed to the brain and fractured left ankle. She has been left struggling to walk and had to learn to write again

'Looking back, I am upset and distressed that this has happened to me. I have lost so much that I set out to do. I am unsure I will be able to go back to what I was doing and pursue what I was doing.

'Since the accident, I have been unable to return to work. I have heard it might take five years to recover. I can't get back this time of my life.'

Police compiled a report which showed Cassidy was travelling across junctions without slowing down while engaged in phone conversations at the wheel and not using hands-free Bluetooth equipment.

Investigators said Cassidy first saw Ms Jenkins when she was 80 metres away and had no chance of avoiding her due to her excessive speed.

Cassidy (pictured above) was handed a two-year sentence, suspended for 18 months

Prosecutor Helena Williams said: 'Mr Mott crossed the road and called towards Ms Jenkins to get her attention but she did not hear him because she was wearing headphones.

'Ms Jenkins then saw where he was and he waited for them to pass before crossing herself. Ms Jenkins was two feet away from the kerb side of the road. Mr Mott turned around to look over at her and was ten feet in front of her.

'He saw a black vehicle driving at speed but he wasn't unable to move fast enough to get to Miss Jenkins. The black BMW hit Ms Jenkins to her left buttocks and thigh and witnesses described seeing Miss Jenkins flying in the air.

'She landed on the pavement face down and there was something like a loud cracking noise. A piece of the car came off and hit Mr Mott.

'While Ms Jenkins was on the floor, there was blood coming from her nose.. She had grazes to her right leg and grazes on her head. Now out of the car, Ms Cassidy said: "I can't believe I hit her".

'Prior to the collision another driver saw the black BMW hurtling towards her travelling at speed.'

A consultant neurosurgeon said Ms Jenkins would require a long period of neurorehabilitation and the injuries she sustained were life-threatening.

In mitigation, defence counsel Oliver Jarvis said: 'She was driving too fast and if she hadn't been going at that speed, the accident wouldn't have happened.

At Minshull Crown Court (file photo, above), Cassidy was also banned from driving for three years and ordered to complete 120 hours of unpaid work

'She has a drug problem. She has been at The Priory since 2016 for a mental health issue but has addressed the problem and she is now drug-free.

'She is not seeking sympathy - there is no self-pity here. There is no danger to the public. She is deeply, deeply sorry for what she did that day.'

Sentencing, Recorder Robert Lazarus told Cassidy: 'The evidence is that you used cocaine two days prior to the collision.

'While clearly you are over the limit, there is no evidence before the court that benzoylecgonine in your blood had any direct effect on your driving.

'If the evidence concluded that you were not under the influence of drugs, the conclusion is that this was a deliberate and callous disregard for the safety of road users.

'If you had been driving at a safe and reasonable speed, no collision would have taken place. In other circumstances, your driving could quite easily have led to her death. It is really only luck from your perspective that she is still alive today.

'But you have a history of long-term mental health problems and I accept you are genuinely remorseful. I also note your mental health problems may deteriorate if sent to prison. '

Cassidy was also banned from driving for three years and ordered to complete 120 hours of unpaid work.
Hong Kong citizens have been queuing up to buy pro-democracy Apple Daily in support of press freedom.

It comes a day after police raided its offices and arrested senior staff under national security laws

Hong Kong police charged two executives from the pro-democracy Apple Daily newspaper on Friday using a powerful new security law, a day after the company's newsroom was raided over articles it had published.

In a short statement, police said a 47-year-old and a 59-year-old were charged with 'collusion with a foreign country or with external elements to endanger national security'.

Apple Daily said the two charged executives were chief editor Ryan Law and CEO Cheung Kim-hung.

Hong Kong citizens have been queuing up to buy pro-democracy Apple Daily in support of press freedom

A woman buys a copy of Apple Daily newspaper at a news stand in Hong Kong, China, June 18. The pro-democracy newspaper made print-run of 500,000 for 18 June 2021, a day after Hong Kong's national security police arrested five directors at the newspaper on suspicion of conspiracy to collude with foreign forces under the China-imposed legislation

A poodle stands next to copies of Apple Daily newspaper for sale at a news stand in Hong Kong on June 18. The pro-democracy newspaper made print-run of 500,000 for 18 June 2021, a day after Hong Kong's national security police arrested five directors at the newspaper on suspicion of conspiracy to collude with foreign forces under the China-imposed legislation

The raid on the paper's offices - along with the freezing of $2.3 million worth of its assets - marked the first time a sweeping national security law has been used against the media. It was the latest sign of a widening crackdown on civil liberties in the semi-autonomous city, which has long cherished freedoms that don't exist elsewhere in China.

In a display of support for press freedom, people across the city people bought multiple copies of Apply Daily, some handing them out to businesses to give to customers.

One woman even filled an entire Ikea bag with copies of the publication.

'A coffee shop in Central giving away free copies of #AppleDaily.

'They said someone left the copies there,' photographer Bertha Wang wrote on Twitter.

With anti-government protests silenced, most of the city's prominent pro-democracy activists in jail and many others fleeing abroad, people snapped up copies at newsstands and in convenience stores.

'There are lots of injustices in Hong Kong already. I think there are a lot of things we cannot do anymore,' said resident Lisa Cheung.

Defendant Tang Ying Bun, one of eight men accused of attacking pro-democracy protesters in Yuen Long in 2019, arrives outside the District Court in Hong Kong on June 18

A woman buys a copy of Apple Daily newspaper at a news stand in Hong Kong, China, June 18. The pro-democracy newspaper made print-run of 500,000 for 18 June 2021, a day after Hong Kong's national security police arrested five directors at the newspaper on suspicion of conspiracy to collude with foreign forces under the China-imposed legislation

'Buying a copy is all what we can do. When the law cannot protect Hong Kong people anymore, we are only left to do what we can.'

The front page of Friday's edition splashed images of the five editors and executives led away in handcuffs. Police also confiscated 44 hard drives worth of news material. A quote from Cheung, the arrested CEO of Next Digital, said 'Hang in there, everyone.'

Another resident, William Chan, said he bought a copy of the paper as a show of support.

'It was such a groundless arrest and suppressed freedom of the press,' he said.

The national security law was imposed after massive protests in 2019 challenged Beijing's rule by calling for broader democratic freedoms. It outlaws subversion, secession, terrorism and collusion with foreign countries. The maximum penalty for serious offenders is life imprisonment.

Security Minister John Lee had on Thursday warned other journalists to distance themselves from those under investigation at Apple Daily. He said those arrested had used journalistic work to endanger national security and that anyone who was 'in cahoots' with them would pay a hefty price.

The Chinese government's liaison office in Hong Kong said in a statement Thursday that it supported police action, noting that while the city's mini-constitution, the Basic Law, guarantees the freedoms of speech and press, those rights cannot undermine the 'bottom line of national security.'

'Freedom of the press is not a `shield' for illegal activities,' the liaison office said.

State Department spokesman Ned Price said that the U.S. strongly condemned the arrests and called for the immediate release of the five arrested. He also called for Hong Kong authorities to stop targeting independent and free media.

'We are deeply concerned by Hong Kong authorities' selective use of the national security law to arbitrarily target independent media organizations,' Price said, adding that the suspected foreign collusion charges appear to be politically motivated.

More than 500 officers conducted a dawn operation which authorities said was sparked by articles Apple Daily had published 'appealing for sanctions' against Hong Kong and China's leaders

Employees sit and wait at their computers as police swarm the Apple Daily headquarters at dawn on Thursday

'As we all know, exchanging views with foreigners in journalism should never be a crime,' he said.

British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said in a tweet that freedom of the press is one of the rights China had promised to protect for 50 years when Britain handed over Hong Kong in 1997.

'Today's raids & arrests at Apple Daily in Hong Kong demonstrate Beijing is using the National Security Law to target dissenting voices, not tackle public security,' Raab said.

European Union spokesperson Nabila Massrali said that the arrests 'further demonstrates how the National Security Law is being used to stifle media freedom and freedom of expression in Hong Kong.'

She said that media freedom and pluralism were fundamental to Hong Kong's success under the 'one country, two systems' framework.

Apple Daily has pledged to readers that it will continue its reporting, and on Thursday night invited members of the media to its printing presses to watch its Friday edition roll off the press in a show of commitment.

Its founder Jimmy Lai is currently serving a 20-month prison sentence on charges of playing a part in unauthorized protests in 2019. The paper's average daily circulation has been around 86,000 copies.
The funeral of a bikie gang member has produced stunning scenes as hundreds of outlaws shut down streets in Auckland while they performed mass burnouts during his farewell.

Head Hunters gangster Taranaki Fuimaono, 43, died while in police custody on June 12 in New Zealand's biggest city and members from a wide range of gangs turned out to lay him to rest on Friday.

Clouds of smoke filled the streets near St Joseph's Catholic Church as bikies burned rubber in his honour while police watched on.

Outlaws from rival groups such as the Hells Angels, Rebels, King Cobras and the infamous Mongrel Mob all arrived for the funeral procession clad in their gang colours - but despite the potential for trouble, police made no arrests.

Fuimaono, known as 'Ardie' was in custody on drug charges and is understood to have died due to a medical event, Stuff reported.

Head Hunters gang members are seen carrying the coffin of 43-year-old bikie Taranaki Fuimaono

Taranaki Fuimaono, 43, died while in police custody in Auckland, New Zealand

His coffin - painted in red and black - was carried on the shoulders of his fellow Head Hunters members, who all wore T-shirts with their fallen comrade's face on them.

A Samoan flag was also painted on the front of Fuimaono's coffin.

Police officers and detectives lingered around the funeral procession and closed nearby roads to protect the public.

Officers had announced they would be 'actively monitoring' the funeral proceedings due to the large gathering of bikies.

Bikies perform burnouts on Friday morning as they pay their final respects to a Head Hunters gang member

The road outside St Joseph's Church is hidden by a thick cloud of smoke as bikies burn rubber in honour of fallen gang member Taranaki Fuimaono

Pictures from the funeral service show Fuimaono as a young man. He died nearly a week ago

Three helicopters circled around the church and nearby the Head Hunters gang headquarters.

'Police will ensure that any unsafe or dangerous behaviour occurring during the event will be followed up by Police,' Inspector Jacqui Whittaker said.

A huge procession of motorcycles revved their engines along Great North Road in Grey Lynn as mourners waited for the funeral service to begin.

The 43-year-old's body was taken in a hearse to the Mangere Lawn Cemetery around 1.30pm for the burial where hundreds of bikies and family members waited in silence.

Close family members farewelled Fuimaono in a separate funeral service on Thursday night.

An investigation into the circumstances surrounding the 43-year-old's death is ongoing.

Members from various bikie gangs turned up to the funeral service on Friday morning in Auckland
Tories vented fury at DUP 'dinosaurs' today after the party went into meltdown with leader Edwin Poots resigning after just three weeks in charge.

The unionists faced complaints they are a 'recruiting sergeant' for a united Ireland after Mr Poots quit last night leaving powersharing hanging in the balance.

It means that Mr Poots becomes the shortest serving leader in DUP history. He was narrowly voted in as Arlene Foster's successor on May 14, following a revolt against the former First Minister by his supporters.

But a majority of the DUP's elected representatives turned on Mr Poots after he reached an agreement with Sinn Fein on Irish language legislation - a contentious issue for local unionists - to prevent the Stormont executive from collapsing.

Mr Poots, a creationist seen as a more hardline figure than Mrs Foster, then disregarded internal opposition to proceed with formally nominating ally Paul Givan as the new First Minister.

The disarray has raised fears that the fragile Northern Ireland Assembly could collapse, just 18 months after it returned following a three-year hiatus.

Sir Jeffrey Donaldson is favourite to take over from Mr Poots, but he is believed to have a tense relationship with Mr Givan.

Tories turned their fire on the DUP over crisis, with one senior MP telling MailOnline that Mr Poots's plans have 'gone to sh**' because his allies 'can't count'.

'The DUP don't have a strategy apart from how best to put people off voting unionist,' the MP said.

'They are the biggest recruiting sergeant for a border poll and they just won't learn their lessons.'

The MP said unionists were being weighed down by having to appease 'creationist luddites'.

'It is extraordinary for a party which houses so many creationists how many dinosaurs are in it as well,' they added.

DUP leader Edwin Poots leaves a party meeting in Belfast tonight before announcing he would stand down from the role following an internal party revolt against him

Edwin Poots, leader of the DUP, leaves the party headquarters in Belfast on June 17, 2021

Poots latest casualty in war for soul of the DUP The row that led to Edwin Poots quitting as DUP leader may seem baffling to those outside Northern Ireland, being sparked by a row over the teaching of the Irish language. But stripped down to its basic form it was just the latest battle in a war for the soul of the ultra-unionist outfit. Mr Poots was elected just three weeks ago after an internal coup by his supporters against Arlene Foster. Despite being seen as a hard-line thorn in Theresa May's side over Brexit, many in her own party saw her as too moderate on social issues, including the legalisation of gay marriage and abortions. They also wanted a far harder line on the implementation of the Brexit agreement. Post-Brexit trade rules have imposed customs and border checks on some goods moving between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK, angering Northern Ireland's British unionists who say the new checks amount to a border in the Irish Sea and weaken ties with the rest of the UK. Tensions over the new rules contributed to a week of street violence in Northern Irish cities in April that saw youths pelt police with bricks, fireworks and gasoline bombs. Mr Poots, a Christian creationist who believes the Earth is just 6,000 years old, represents a more traditional faction in a party rooted in the fundamentalist Free Presbyterian Church. Their defenestration of Mrs Foster lead to the first leadership election in the party's 50-year history. But Mr Poots' narrow margin of victory, 19-17 against MP Sir Jeffrey Donaldson, showed that all was not well. Former party leader Peter Robinson branded the manner of her removal, which was instigated by Mr Poots' supporters, as publicly humiliating, vindictive and needlessly nasty. That view was shared by a great number of DUP members - some of whom had their own issues with Mrs Foster's leadership, but who nevertheless believed she should have been treated with more respect. His downfall this week started with the late-night deal over Irish language teaching in Northern Ireland. Sinn Fein had made clear it would only renominate Ms O'Neill if the party secured a guarantee that stalled language legislation agreed in the 2020 deal to restore powersharing would finally be implemented. A refusal by Sinn Fein to nominate would have crashed the Executive and prompted a snap election. The legislation would enshrine protections for Irish speakers in Northern Ireland society, such as ensuring public bodies provide services in Irish. While the laws contain similar provisions for the Ulster Scots culture, in the political context the legislation has always been viewed as a top ticket item on the wish list of republicanism. Mr Poots said he would implement the legislation but did not assure Sinn Fein he would do it in the current Assembly mandate. In response, Sinn Fein bypassed the DUP and asked the UK Government to introduce the laws at Westminster instead. Senior DUP figures criticised the suggestion, characterising it as an interference with devolution. It therefore came as a shock to many DUP elected representatives when, in the early hours of Thursday morning, Northern Ireland Secretary Brandon Lewis not only agreed to Sinn Fein's request but also announced that Mr Poots was still happy to proceed with reconstituting the Executive on that basis. Of the back of this, with anger already growing, he then insisted on pressing ahead with the nomination of his close friend Paul Givan as Stormont First Minister, despite opposition from a majority of his election representatives who were deeply unhappy that it would be accompanied by a major win for Sinn Fein. A blistering internal meeting followed in a room in Stormont, with a mass uprising against Mr Poots's proposed course of action. Colleagues the party leader had appointed to senior roles only a week previously were openly opposing his decision. But he appeared unwilling to listen. And this flew directly in the face of his leadership pitch to listen to a range of voices within the DUP, and to involve as many party members as possible in policy formation and major decisions. A few minutes before the Assembly sat, Mr Poots and Mr Givan rose to their feet and walked out of the room while the meeting was still ongoing. Despite a significant majority of DUP MPs and MLAs set against the move, the two close political allies headed to the chamber and proceeded with the nomination process. But this rash decision was just more fuel for the fire and within hours, Mr Poots announced he would step down. Advertisement

The backbencher speculated that Ms Foster might do a 'Bobby in the shower' - a reference to the famous Dallas scene when a lead character died, only to reappear several episodes later in the bathroom with the whole thing having been a dream.

Mr Givan accepted the nomination and was confirmed as First Minister yesterday after Mr Poots pressed ahead at a special sitting of the Stormont Assembly.

He opted to proceed despite a morning of uncertainty which saw a significant majority of DUP Assembly members and MPs vote against Mr Poots at a stormy private meeting.

Senior DUP figures wanted him to hold off on the nomination because they are unhappy about the terms he has agreed to reconstitute the powersharing administration after Sinn Fein secured a key concession on Irish language laws.

In a quirk of the Stormont agreement, Mr Givan can only be removed as FM if he voluntarily resigns or Sinn Fein's Deputy First Minister Michelle O'Neill herself resigns.

After the meeting DUP MP Sammy Wilson warned Mr Poots will have to 'live with the consequence' of defying his MPs and MLAs.

But late last night, in a statement, Mr Poots said: 'I have asked the party chairman to commence an electoral process within the party to allow for a new leader of the Democratic Unionist Party to be elected.

'The party has asked me to remain in post until my successor is elected.

'This has been a difficult period for the party and the country and I have conveyed to the chairman my determination to do everything I can to ensure both unionism and Northern Ireland is able to move forward to a stronger place.'

He was formally ratified as leader on May 27, meaning he officially served just 21 days in the role.

His planned departure followed a dramatic 24 hours in Northern Irish politics.

A sizeable majority of MLAs and MPs voted against his decision to reconstitute the powersharing Executive with Sinn Fein in a bruising internal meeting just minutes before the process for nominating Stormont's leaders began in the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Sinn Fein had threatened not to fill the post of deputy because of a feud about protections for the Irish language. That would have mothballed the administration - under the power-sharing arrangements set up as part of Northern Ireland's peace accord, a government can't be formed unless both roles are filled.

The language issue cuts to the heart of tensions between Northern Ireland's mostly Catholic nationalists, who see themselves as Irish, and Protestants, who largely identify as British.

The Northern Ireland Assembly, in which the DUP is the largest party, has failed to pass a law ensuring protections for the Irish and Ulster Scots languages, despite the power-sharing parties agreeing last year to do so.

But after crisis talks with the two parties, the British government said early Thursday it would step in and pass the legislation in the UK Parliament if the Belfast assembly did not do it by September.

Sinn Fein welcomed the move, with party leader Mary Lou McDonald saying it had broken the 'logjam of DUP obstructionism.' Mr Poots accused Sinn Fein of creating instability, but agreed to nominate a first minister.

That provoked fury from many DUP colleagues.

Members were furious that Mr Poots pressed ahead with nominating his Lagan Valley constituency colleague Paul Givan as First Minister, after Sinn Fein secured a key concession from the UK Government to legislate for Irish language laws at Westminster.

A post-midnight announcement by the Government, committing to pass the stalled laws at Westminster in the autumn if they were not moved at the Stormont Assembly in the interim, was enough to convince Sinn Fein to drop its threat not to nominate a deputy First Minister as joint head of the devolved Executive.

The development came after a night of intensive talks involving Northern Ireland Secretary Brandon Lewis and DUP and Sinn Fein delegations in Belfast.

Many DUP politicians had warned against a Government intervention on such a sensitive devolved issue and they were enraged that Mr Poots was still prepared to enter a new coalition on that basis.

A meeting of DUP party officers got under way at party headquarters in Belfast, amid speculation Mr Poots could potentially face a vote of no confidence.

Mr Poots left the meeting after 8pm, saying only 'how are you' to gathered media before being driven off in a waiting car.

He declined to respond to media questions about his leadership and whether he faced a motion of no confidence during the meeting.

Following the announcement by Mr Poots, a Sinn Fein spokesperson said: 'Whoever leads the DUP is a matter for that party.

'Sinn Fein has worked for weeks to bring stability to the Executive - our priority is our response to the Covid-19 pandemic, the continued successful rollout of the vaccination programme and rebuilding our economy to sustain jobs and livelihoods.

'We have monumental challenges ahead that will require unity of purpose and urgency. They include tackling the totally unacceptable hospital waiting lists that have left people crucified, in pain and without hope.

'That is our focus and should remain the focus of all ministers in the Executive.'

DUP leader Edwin Poots during the nomination of Paul Givan as First Minister, in the Stormont Assembly in Parliament Buildings in Belfast

Young earth creationist and LGBT critic who represents DUP's traditional wing Edwin Poots is a creationist and farmer seen as a political hardliner - who was involved in ousting ex-First Minister Arlene Foster. The 55-year-old father-of-four's on LGBT rights have led to criticism - he has opposed gay men and women adopting children or giving blood in the past. He supported Christian bakers who in 2015 were found guilty of discrimination after refusing to make a cake for gay rights activists. But it is another part of his evangelical Christian beliefs that attract the most attention. He is a 'young earth creationist' who rejects the theory of evolution and believes the world was made by God around 4,000 BC. He has also criticised the theory of evolution and outspoken humanist scientist Richard Dawkins. Advertisement

The remaining DUP party officers left the meeting at their headquarters at 8.50pm, all departing together.

All of them, including senior party figures such as Sir Jeffrey Donaldson, Diane Dodds, Sammy Wilson and deputy leader Paul Bradley, refused to speak to the media as they left.

A statement confirming Mr Poots' intention to stand down was issued shortly after.

The Irish language legislation is one of several outstanding elements of the New Decade, New Approach (NDNA) deal that resurrected powersharing in Northern Ireland after a three-year impasse.

Since becoming the new DUP leader, Mr Poots has repeatedly said he is committed to implementing all of the NDNA agreement.

Sinn Fein has however demanded specific and immediate action on the Irish language aspect, insisting the legislation must be tabled at Stormont ahead of the summer recess if it is to become law before the end of the current Assembly mandate next spring.

The cultural elements of the NDNA, which include protections for Irish and Ulster Scots speakers, would be delivered in the form of amendments to the 1998 Northern Ireland Act.

With the law changes having already been drafted as part of the NDNA deal, the draft legislation can commence its journey through the Assembly once the Executive gives it the green light.

A former special adviser to Arlene Foster last night accused Edwin Poots of making 'monumental mistakes' in the 24 hours before his resignation.

Emma Little Pengelly, also a former DUP MP, said he had failed to demonstrate the necessary leadership.

She told BBC NI's The View: 'Edwin was clearly very, very keen to take the leadership, there were many in the party unhappy about the way that it was done.

'It was then over to him then to demonstrate why he felt it was necessary.

'What were the changes that he felt needed to happen?

'However, over the course of the last two weeks we haven't seen that - for example in terms of North South relations, the protocol and of course what has happened over the last 24 hours.'

She added: 'What has happened over the last 24 hours, last night and into today seem to have been monumental mistakes'.
An assisted dying campaigner who was left paralysed from the neck down after a car crash and was in pain every day has died in hospital aged 65.

Paul Lamb, from Leeds, West Yorkshire, who took on several legal challenges including one at the Supreme Court, died in hospital on Tuesday, announced Humanists UK.

Mr Lamb's carer Francesca Hepworth said she is 'shocked' by his death, which is believed to be from natural causes, but expressed relief that he is 'finally at peace' after suffering from chronic pain as a result of the car crash in 1990.

The former builder and greyhound racer was left with no function from the neck down aside from limited movement in his right arm and required 24-hour care.

Ms Hepworth said: 'Paul's death has been a shock to us all, but I'm glad he is finally at peace. For years, Paul grappled with his condition and faced increasing pain, discomfort, and distress.

Paul Lamb (pictured in 2013), from Leeds, who took on several legal challenges including one at the Supreme Court, died aged 65 in hospital on Tuesday, announced Humanists UK

'I know Paul was resolute in his belief that nobody should be forced to suffer, and determined to keep fighting to change the law on assisted dying.

'I only regret that he now won't be able to see such a choice realised, if the law were to change.

'I'm proud to have known him, and been able to call such a brave and courageous man my friend. I am going to miss him.'

Humanist UK's chief executive Andrew Copson said Mr Lamb will leave a 'fierce legacy of campaigning'.

He said: 'Paul Lamb was a tireless advocate for the right to die who dedicated his life to championing choice for those with terminal or incurable illnesses.

'He leaves behind a fierce legacy of campaigning, which we are determined to continue in his honour.'

Mr Lamb said the law in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, where assisting a suicide is a crime punishable by up to 14 years in prison, 'condemns me to a life of constant pain, and removes the small part of my life that I could still have some say over - how I want to die'.

He was the patron for Humanists UK and spearheaded a legal bid aimed at changing the law in 2014 at the Supreme Court.

The former builder and greyhound racer (pictured arriving at the Royal Courts of Justice on May 13, 2013) was left with no function from the neck down aside from limited movement in his right arm and required 24-hour care

Humanist UK's chief executive Andrew Copson said Mr Lamb (pictured in an undated handout file photo) will leave a 'fierce legacy of campaigning'

Mr Lamb took on the case from fellow activist Tony Nicklinson, who began the campaign at the High Court in 2012 and died days after losing this bid.

Along with Mr Nicklinson's widow Jane, Mr Lamb lost the case but secured an agreement from some judges at the UK's highest court that Parliament should be given the opportunity to reconsider the law.

MPs voted against the Assisted Dying Bill in 2015, though this would not have helped Mr Lamb (above, in London in 2013) as it only applied to the terminally ill

MPs voted against the Assisted Dying Bill in 2015, though this would not have helped Mr Lamb as it only applied to the terminally ill.

Following the Supreme Court ruling, Mr Lamb said: 'I cannot understand, in a civilised society like ours, why I should be forced to suffer when millions of people around the world already have the choice I asked for.

'Throughout my case, all I have been told is how sympathetic others are to my situation. But I have never wanted anyone to pity me.

'All I have ever wanted is for my choice to be respected and given equal validity under the law, like everyone else's.

'Instead this decision, if it is the final word on the matter, condemns me to a life of constant pain, and removes the small part of my life that I could still have some say over - how I want to die.'

In 2020, the Court of Appeal refused him permission to bring a fresh case, ruling that assisted dying was 'pre-eminently a matter for Parliament, and not the Courts'.

Mr Lamb said he was 'devastated' by this ruling which left him in a 'powerless position' and wrote to Justice Secretary Robert Buckland calling for an inquiry into assisted dying in November.

Mr Lamb took on the case from fellow activist Tony Nicklinson (file photo, above), who began the campaign at the High Court in 2012 and died days after losing this bid

In 2020, the Court of Appeal (file photo, above) refused Mr Lamb permission to bring a fresh case, ruling that assisted dying was 'pre-eminently a matter for Parliament, and not the Courts'

Trevor Moore, Chair of My Death, My Decision, which supported the campaigner's fresh case, said: The team at My Death, My Decision send their heartfelt condolences to Paul Lambs family and to everyone who knew and loved him.

'We are honoured to have had Paul as a much-valued patron who inspired so many people to support the campaign for a compassionate law on assisted dying. He will be greatly missed.

Paul faced considerable challenges with unrelenting courage, despite his evident suffering.

'Through it all, he remained committed to achieving a law that would allow an assisted death not only to the terminally ill, but also to those suffering incurably, as Paul did.

'We will carry forward his legacy by campaigning with renewed vigour for the law that Paul so tirelessly sought. That is why we continue to press for a public inquiry, now long overdue.
A teacher who was suspended after showing a cartoon of the Prophet Muhammad to pupils during an RE lesson has refused to return to work over fears for his life - despite being cleared of causing deliberate offence and told that he could have his job back.

He continues to remain in hiding with his family and has permanently left the housing association property they shared near Batley.

The family have been rehoused at a secret location with not even close relatives being informed about where it is.

The Batley Grammar School teacher sparked fury by allegedly showing pupils cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad in a RE lesson. Pictured: Protesters outside the school in March

Two other members of staff who were also suspended by officials at Batley Grammar School, West Yorkshire have refused to return to the classroom after being reinstated, citing similar concerns that they could be attacked.

It has resulted in the entire RE department, which was made up of the three teachers, being replaced by supply staff.

The teacher who kick-started the row and his two colleagues remain on full pay although it is not known how long this will continue for as their suspensions have been lifted.

They are being supported by the National Education Union (NEU), which is liaising with school officials in an attempt to resolve the stalemate.

A source close to the teacher, who was head of RE at Batley Grammar School, told MailOnline that he had not ruled out the possibility of legal action if he is unable to reach a settlement with the school so that he can move on with his career and personal life.

'On paper, he's got his job back but returning to the school is not a possibility,' the source said. 'An inquiry might have cleared him, but it doesn't mean a thing because he doesn't feel safe teaching there and genuinely fears that he could be killed.

The teacher, who is not being named, was head of Batley Grammar School's RE department but remains in hiding with his family following furious protests in March. Pictured: Protests outside Batley in March

'His two colleagues feel exactly the same. The matter needs to be resolved so that they can have a decent future but if we don't get to that point soon, legal action is not out of the question.'

The teacher's former home is currently undergoing repair work for new tenants.

A neighbour told MailOnline: 'A few weeks ago a removal van came and took all their stuff. I saw the teacher's sister and she told me that the family won't be coming back.

'The last contact I had with him was last month when he sent us Eid cards and presents through his sister.

'But I've not been able to speak with him or his partner because they've had to change their mobile phone numbers and they're not allowed to contact us.'

Batley Grammar School in West Yorkshire

The teacher was suspended in March for showing pupils a drawing taken from the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo during a religious studies classes at Batley grammar school, provoking complaints from parents and protests outside the school's gates.

A report published last month by the Batley Academy Trust, which runs the school, found that although it was not necessary for the teacher to use the material in question, they 'genuinely believed' using the image had educational purposes and did not mean to cause offence.

But it added: 'Nevertheless, the Trust recognises that using the image did cause deep offence to a number of students, parents and members of our school community.'

It ruled that the teacher's suspension and the suspension of his two colleague should be lifted and they should be allowed to return to the classroom.

The Trust refused to comment on the reasons why they have not yet resumed their teaching duties.

On March 24, the teacher was suspended and the school accompanied its unreserved apology with the announcement of an independent panel to investigate. Pictured: Protestors outside the school

In a statement, it said: 'The findings are clear, that the teaching staff involved did not use the resource with the intention of causing offence, and that the topics covered by the lesson could have been effectively addressed in other ways.

'In the light of those conclusions, the suspensions put in place while the investigation was underway will now be lifted.'

A spokesperson for the NEU said: 'Personal employment details of individual members are not something for the NEU to discuss publicly, and we believe that our members want, need and deserve privacy.

'We are continuing to support all our members at the school, and we have worked to ensure fairness and the best outcomes in the workplace for all going forward.'
Wolves were filmed chasing actors across a stage and even running through the audience during a live performance in China, sparking safety concerns.

The animals, who did not appear to be wearing any type of harness, are part of the show 'Tuoling Legend' or 'The Legend of Camel Bell' at a theatre in the northwestern city of Xi'an.

Footage shows the actors fleeing as wolves chase them.

Wolves were filmed chasing actors across a stage and even running through the audience during a live performance in China, speaking safety fears

Several of the animals leave the stage and run into the aisles between audience seats.

As part of the show, the wolves also act out fight scenes with the performers.

The clip shows one of the actors being pinned to the ground by a wolf.

The video was shared on China's social media platform, Weibo, quickly clocking up more than 433 million views.

'I would lose my mind if just sitting there,' one person commented.

The animals, who did not appear to be wearing any type of harness, are part of the show 'Tuoling Legend' or 'The Legend of Camel Bell' at a theatre in the northwestern city of Xi'an

According to the Huaxia Cultural Tourism, the wolves feature in one scene which recounts the history of the Silk Road, an ancient trade network, with the wolves representing the dangerous journey China's ancient camel troops would take to Central Asia.

The company who owns the theatre dismissed safety concerns, insisting that the wolves 'won't hurt people'.

'The wolves have been domesticated for three to four generations,' a representative of the Xi'an branch of Huaxia Cultural Tourism said, as quoted by CNN.

'They are legally raised and trained by professional trainers with certifications since 2018 and no accident happened in the past three years.'

The representative added that the theatre had taken safety precautions including erecting protection nets between the stage and seats so wolves could not reach audience members.

The actors also wore protective clothing so they would not be injured during fight scenes, the representative said.
Lib Dem leader Ed Davey channelled 80s children's television superstar Timmy Mallett today as he knocked down a symbolic Tory 'blue wall' with a tiny orange hammer.

He took part in the publicity stunt after his party's major upset in the Chesham and Amersham by-election saw them take the previously safe Conservative seat with a massive majority.

In an extraordinary result, the Lib Dems defied years of electoral woe to storm the ultra-safe seat - which has been held by the Conservatives since it was created in 1974.

Party leader Ed Davey said the 8,000-vote margin of victory showed that Boris Johnson's 'Blue Wall is beginning to crumble'.

And he decided to emulate this in physical form at a youth centre in Chesham, Bucks, this morning, as he went to congratulate the new MP Sarah Green.

He used a small orange mallet to take down a chest-high wall of blue bricks hastily set up at the indoor venue.

There was laughter as he help up the hammer and said it was an 'orange force', adding: 'Do you know what happens when a really strong and powerful orange force goes against a blue wall? Stand back - let me show you.'

He took part in the publicity stunt after his party's major upset in the Chesham and Amersham by-election saw them take the previously safe Conservative seat with a massive majority.

He used a small orange mallet to take down a chest-high wall of blue bricks hastily set up at the indoor venue.

Timmy Mallett was a popular children's presenter in the 1980s and early 1990s who carried a soft toy mallet that he would use to playfully hit children on the head with.

Timmy Mallett, now 65, was a popular children's presenter in the 1980s and early 1990s who carried a soft toy mallet that he would use to playfully hit children on the head with on programes including the Wide Awake Club and Wacaday'.

The stunt drew comparisons with one performed by Boris Johnson ahead of the 2019 election. On an election visit to JCB he drove through a fake brick wall in a digger emblazoned with the words 'get Brexit done'.

Ms Green won with a majority of 8,028 over Conservative David Fleet, gaining 21,517 votes - nearly 57 per cent of the total - to his 13,489, 35.5 per cent, on a turnout of just over 52 per cent.

Green candidate Carolyne Culver got 1,480 votes, with Labour's Natasa Pantelic receiving just 622.

In a crumb of comfort for Mr Johnson, Labour's 1.6 per cent share of the vote was its worst performance in any by-election since the Second World War.

The bombshell news will fuel fears that the Brexit-driven political realignment that allowed Mr Johnson to smash Labour's Red Wall is now loosening his grip on traditional Tory heartlands.

The stunt drew comparisons with one performed by Boris Johnson ahead of the 2019 election (pictured).

Chesham & Amersham, in Buckinghamshire on the outskirts of London, voted strongly for Remain at the 2016 referendum. Opposition to the overhaul of planning rules and HS2 are also thought to have been a major factor - with Lib Dem candidate Sarah Green against the rail project even though the national party supports it.

In a round of broadcast interviews this morning, policing minister Kit Malthouse said the defeat was 'obviously very disappointing' - while arguing governments typically perform badly in mid-term by-elections.

But Tory backbencher Bob Blackman told MailOnline that it was a wake-up call on how badly government planning reforms are viewed across the south, and pointed out that the late former MP Cheryl Gillan had been the 'foremost campaigner' against HS2.

'This is Tory heartland and very expensive housing. People were obviously annoyed about HS2. A lot of the countryside will be despoiled,' Mr Blackman said.

'A lot of us have been saying for quite some time, it's all very well to say we want to see more housing built... but they have got to listen to the advice we have given. Local plans should be made sacrosanct so local people have their say about what is going to be built where, and not have national targets that ride roughshod over local people.'

Mr Blackman added on the planning loosening: 'Across the South East it is the real threat.'

Thanet MP Roger Gale said: 'Planning policy has to change. But will Johnson and Jenrick now listen?'

Other MPs voiced concerns that Mr Johnson was losing more affluent 'bookshelf' Tories for Red Wall voters who 'go down the bookies'.

The loss appeared to surprise even Conservative MPs who have been spending a lot of time campaigning in the constituency. Lib Dem claims that they were on the cusp of victory had been dismissed as 'what they always say', with predictions that any challenge would be seen off once postal votes were counted.

Mr Davey said: 'People talked about the red wall in the North, but forgotten about the blue wall in the South, and that's going to come tumbling down if this result is mimicked across this country.'
Spain has announced it will scrap laws requiring people to wear facemasks in public places from June 26 as Covid cases fall across the country.

Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said lawmakers will vote on the new rules next Thursday, and that he expects them to be in force from Saturday.

'This weekend will be the last one with masks in outdoor spaces because the next weekend we will no longer wear them,' Sanchez told an event in Barcelona.

It will come as a relief to those lucky enough to make it out to Spain for their holidays, especially sunbathers who might have found themselves returning with some very odd tan lines otherwise.

Spain will drop rules which made facemasks mandatory in all public places from next week, the prime minister has said

Currently, Spain is welcoming all fully-vaccinated tourists including Britons without the need for a negative Covid test or quarantine.

Arrivals must have received their final dose of an EU-approved vaccine at least two weeks before departure, with all vaccines currently in use in the UK qualifying.

Non-vaccinated arrivals are being accepted, provided they show a negative PCR or antigen test taken 48 hours before departure.

Those who have evidence of a previous Covid infection are also being accepted, provided they were diagnosed at least 11 days prior to departure.

All travellers, regardless of vaccination status, also have to fill out a passenger information form before departure and present a digital QR code to be scanned before boarding the aircraft and on arrival.

But despite its falling infection rate, Spain remains on the UK's amber travel list meaning all Britons will have to quarantine for 10 days on arrival back home.

Travellers must also take two PCR tests purchased at a cost of 210 before departure, to be taken on or before day two of quarantine, and on day eight.

Breaking self-isolation could lead to a 10,000 fine, while those who do not take the day 2 and day 8 tests could be fined 2,000 and those who provide incorrect information on their passenger locator forms could be handed a 10,000 penalty or a 10-year jail sentence - or both.

Spain is trying to tempt back tourists including Britons by relaxing its Covid measures, but the country remains on the UK's travel 'amber' list

Masks have been required in public in some form or another in Spain since June last year, with the original rules stating they were needed only in places where 5ft social distancing was not possible.

That guidance was then updated on April 1 this year to state that masks were mandatory in all public spaces, whether or not social distancing was also in place.

At the time of that rule change, it the government was criticised for being heavy-handed and failing to take into account the latest information on how the virus spreads, and Spain's vaccination rate.

The latest rule change means masks will be unnecessary even in spaces where social distancing isn't possible.

Almost half Spain's population has so-far been vaccinated, including 90 per cent of those aged over 50 who are most at risk of serious infection.

The nationwide infection rate as measured over the preceding 14 days fell to 96.6 cases per 100,000 people on Thursday, down from over 150 cases a month ago.

Pressure on the health system has also eased significantly since the start of the year.

Spain's 17 regions are largely responsible for managing healthcare, but major policy shifts must be proposed by the central government, in a system that frequently generates tension between administrations.

Last week the government was forced to backtrack on a plan to gradually reopen nightclubs after widespread complaints from regional authorities who dismissed it as either too strict or too loose
Keir Starmer suffered more woe today after Labour suffered its worst ever by-election result in Chesham & Amersham.

The party's candidate Natasa Pantelic received just 622 votes - a paltry 1.6 per cent of the total cast - and lost her deposit in the extraordinary contest.

That compared to more than 7,000 votes in the constituency at the 2019 general election and 11,000 two years before that.

Labour MPs blamed an 'anti-Tory tactical squeeze' for the dire showing - believed to be the worst at a by-election since the party was formed in 1900.

But Corbynites insisted it was down to the 'centrist' agenda being pursued by Sir Keir.

The Lib Dems overturned a 16,000 Conservative majority to take the seat, sparking claims that Boris Johnson's 'Blue Wall' could be about to collapse - even as he tightens his grip on the so-called Red Wall.

Chesham & Amersham, in Buckinghamshire on the outskirts of London, voted strongly for Remain at the 2016 referendum. Opposition to the overhaul of planning rules and HS2 are also thought to have been a major factor - with Lib Dem candidate Sarah Green against the rail project even though the national party supports it.

Campaigners on the ground say Labour did not put much effort into the seat, possibly because they could see the Lib Dems were best placed to challenge.

The Lib Dems overturned a 16,000 Conservative majority to take Chesham & Amersham from the Tories this morning

Keir Starmer's party received just 622 votes - a paltry 1.6 per cent of the total cast - and lost its deposit in the extraordinary contest

Labour MPs blamed an 'anti-Tory tactical squeeze' for the dire showing - believed to be the worst at a by-election since it was formed in 1900

FULL CHESHAM AND AMERSHAM BY-ELECTION RESULTS Sarah Green (LD) 21,517 (56.69% share) David Fleet (C) 13,489 (35.54%) Carolyne Culver (Green) 1,480 (3.90%) Natasa Pantelic (Lab) 622 (1.64%) Alex Wilson (Reform) 414 (1.09%) Carla Gregory (Breakthrough) 197 (0.52%) Adrian Oliver (FA) 134 (0.35%) Brendan Donnelly (Rejoin) 101 (0.27%) Lib Dem majority 8,028 Turnout 37,954 (52.11%) Advertisement

In a round of broadcast interviews this morning, policing minister Kit Malthouse said the defeat was 'obviously very disappointing' - while arguing governments typically perform badly in mid-term by-elections.

But Tory backbencher Bob Blackman told MailOnline that it was a wake-up call on how badly government planning reforms are viewed across the south, and pointed out that the late former MP Cheryl Gillan had been the 'foremost campaigner' against HS2.

'This is Tory heartland and very expensive housing. People were obviously annoyed about HS2. A lot of the countryside will be despoiled,' Mr Blackman said.

'A lot of us have been saying for quite some time, it's all very well to say we want to see more housing built... but they have got to listen to the advice we have given. Local plans should be made sacrosanct so local people have their say about what is going to be built where, and not have national targets that ride roughshod over local people.'

Mr Blackman added on the planning loosening: 'Across the South East it is the real threat.'

Thanet MP Roger Gale said: 'Planning policy has to change. But will Johnson and Jenrick now listen?'

Other MPs voiced concerns that Mr Johnson was losing more affluent 'bookshelf' Tories for Red Wall voters who 'go down the bookies'.

The loss appeared to surprise even Conservative MPs who have been spending a lot of time campaigning in the constituency. Lib Dem claims that they were on the cusp of victory had been dismissed as 'what they always say', with predictions that any challenge would be seen off once postal votes were counted.

Mr Davey said: 'People talked about the red wall in the North, but forgotten about the blue wall in the South, and that's going to come tumbling down if this result is mimicked across this country.'

Liberal Democrat Sarah Green won with a majority of 8,028 over Conservative David Fleet, gaining 21,517 votes - nearly 57 per cent of the total - to his 13,489, 35.5 per cent, on a turnout of just over 52 per cent.

Green candidate Carolyne Culver got 1,480 votes, with Labour's Natasa Pantelic receiving just 622.

In a crumb of comfort for Mr Johnson, Labour's 1.6 per cent share of the vote was its worst performance in any by-election since the Second World War.

Thanet MP Roger Gale said: 'Planning policy has to change. But will Johnson and Jenrick now listen?'

Mr Davey said: 'This is a huge victory for the Liberal Democrats. The people of Chesham and Amersham have sent a shockwave through British politics.

'We were told it was impossible for any party to beat the Tories here in Buckinghamshire.

'We were told this seat was too safe and the Tories too strong. This Liberal Democrat win has proved them utterly wrong.

'Across the south, the Tory Blue Wall is beginning to crumble. Here and in great swathes of the country, only the Liberal Democrats can beat the Conservatives and breach their Blue Wall.

It is a rude awakening for the PM after he basked in the Tory success in seizing Hartlepool from Labour last month.

Conservatives have been bullish about the prospects of grabbing another Red Wall seat, Batley & Spen, from Keir Starmer's party in another by-election happening on July 1.

A Tory source said: 'By-elections are always difficult for the governing party, particularly 11 years into government, but there is no getting away from the fact this is a very disappointing result.

'The work of regaining the support of the people of Chesham and Amersham starts now.'

A senior Tory MP said waspishly: 'There may be a lesson that you don't launch a contentious free trade agreement 24 hours before a by-election.

'That might speak to a lack of political thinking and an arrogant we are not losing anything at the moment.'

They told MailOnline there is a risk that 'bookshelf' Tories are being abandoned in favour of voters who 'just go down the bookies'.

'There is an element of a more red in tooth and claw, working class Toryism, versus the leafy home counties 'gin and jag' Toryism.

'Are we losing the bookshelf voters, people with bookshelves with books on them, for the people who just go down to the bookies?

'That is the difficulty.'

The MP said the government needed to 'build a suite of policies that builds and sustains a broad church'.

'With the surprise that the Red Wall finally tumbled all of the thinking has gone into that. But don't bank Tory votes elsewhere. They need to be won, they need to be held, and they need to be convinced to stay. That is a challenge,' they said.

Polling guru Sir John Curtice told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: 'It has exposed a flank in more traditional middle-class constituencies in London and the south-east, some of whom have contained quite a lot of Remain voters.

'That area is hearing the Tories talking endlessly about levelling up and wondering what really is in it for us?'

'And given the opportunity of a by-election to say 'Hang on we are not quite sure about this' - they have taken it!'

It is the first time the seat, which was formed in 1974, has ever been lost by the Conservatives.

Dame Cheryl Gillan held a 16,000 majority from the 2019 General Election when she died in April.

The Tory Party co-chairman Amanda Milling tweeted: 'For decades Cheryl stood proud for the people of Chesham and Amersham.

'I'm deeply disappointed @pdfleet can't carry on that legacy The people of C&A have spoken.

'Work starts now to show how it's @Conservatives that can deliver on the people's priorities and regain their support.'

In her acceptance speech, the new MP Ms Green said: 'Tonight the voice of Chesham and Amersham is unmistakable.

'Together we have said 'Enough is enough, we will be heard and this Government will listen'.

'This campaign has shown that no matter where you live, or how supposedly safe a constituency may appear to be, if you want a Liberal Democrat member of Parliament, you can have a Liberal Democrat Member of Parliament.

'If you wish to reject Conservative mismanagement and vote for a voice that will represent you and stand up for your rights then it is the Liberal Democrats who will continue to fight your corner.'

She added: 'This Conservative Party has taken people across our country for granted for far too long.

'We will continue the work of holding this Government to account for letting Covid rip through the care homes.

'We will speak up for the three million people excluded from financial support throughout the pandemic and we will challenge Boris Johnson to be far more ambitious in tackling climate change, supporting our frontline workers and backing our small businesses.'

Defeated Tory candidate Peter Fleet said: 'Clearly this was a very disappointing result, not the result that I was expecting nor my team.'

He added: 'It's an absolutely extraordinary result which must take into account the fact that the Liberal Democrat party didn't just throw the kitchen sink at this constituency, I think it was the microwave, the table, the oven, the dishwasher, the dog, the cat and anything else that was lying around as well.

'And we should consider that when we reflect upon the extraordinary nature of the result.

'It's clear that that on this occasion the constituents here in Chesham and Amersham have chosen a different candidate to represent them, to serve as their Member of Parliament.

'I look forward to how we can start to rebuild that trust and understanding amongst all those people in Chesham and Amersham and as far as the Conservative Party is concerned that work actually starts in the morning.'

And Orkney and Shetland Liberal Democrat MP Alistair Carmichael tweeted: 'A fantastic result tonight for our new MP @SarahGreenLD - a testament to her dedication and that of the many @LibDems volunteers and staff who met Chesham and Amersham voters and gave them a voice after they felt left behind by Boris Johnson's Conservatives. This is huge.'

Chesham and Amersham, named after the market towns in the constituency, had had just two MPs in its history, Sir Ian Gilmour until 1992, and former Welsh secretary Dame Cheryl Gillan until her death in April.
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Fascinating photos of captured Tommies doing amateur dramatics dressed in drag during the First World War have emerged 103 years on.

Although the pastime of British PoWs putting on elaborate stage shows to keep up morale is commonly associated with the Second World War, these images show Tommies treading the boards over 20 years earlier.

One officer goes all out in a flapper dress, while others don frocks and make-up in the jovial previously unseen images.

The men took their performances so seriously that they spent up to six hours a day rehearsing.

The photos were taken by Second Lieutenant Clarence Pickard, a member of the Durham Light Infantry, who was captured in June 1918 after being shot in the hip on the battlefield.

He was detained for the remainder of the conflict at Schweidnitz PoW camp in eastern Germany, writing regularly to his sweetheart Gwen Johnson in Hartlepool, County Durham.

A British prisoner of war dressed as a flapper swoons in the arms of a comrade as they take part in dramatics to help boost morale at the Schweidnitz PoW camp in eastern Germany during the First World War

Captured British soldiers in drag take part in a stage production. The photos were taken by Second Lieutenant Clarence Pickard, a member of the Durham Light Infantry, who was captured in June 1918 after being shot in the hip on the battlefield.

Two soldiers dressed up as women taking part in amateur dramatics at the Schweidnitz PoW camp

The soldiers sit down for a photo. The conditions in First World War prisoner of war camps were generally far superior to those of the Second World War

Lt Pickard's mother was initially told that he had been killed in action, so receiving his first letter from captivity was an emotional shock for his loved ones.

The letters that followed gave an interesting account of day-to-day life in camp.

In one of them he writes: 'Never mind dearest, the day will soon come when we shall be joined together again.'

True to his word, they got married when he returned to Britain at the end of 1918.

His camp photos and love letters are being sold alongside his campaign medals by a distant relative with auctioneers Elstob & Elstob, of Ripon, North Yorkshire.

There are also three postcards Lt Pickard sent Gwen which have been partially censured.

The auctioneer said that World War One PoW camps were far more civilised and hospitable than the horrific conditions endured in Second World War.

Plays, which were advertised in camp newspapers, helped boost morale and alleviate the monotony of captive life.

Lt Pickard's camp photos and love letters are being sold alongside his campaign medals by a distant relative with auctioneers Elstob & Elstob, of Ripon, North Yorkshire. Lt Pickard's medal group consists of the British War and Victory medal, engraved '2 Lieut C.B Pickard'. The sale of the archive, which is valued at 150, takes place on Saturday.

David Elstob, director of Elstob & Elstob, said: 'Amateur dramatics was a popular morale-boosting feature at PoW camps during World War One, alongside sporting societies and musical groups.

'We can see from the photographs that the men put a lot of effort into producing their own costumes and sets, and it probably provided an important mental diversion to help lift the boredom of their incarceration.

'These camps were a very different to those we commonly associate with World War Two which had far worse conditions.'

Of the overall archive, he added: 'It is very exciting when lots have such a fascinating history and can give us such specific details of past lives.

'Thankfully, this soldier's story had a happy ending and his memory lives on in these intriguing artefacts.'

Lt Pickard's medal group consists of the British War and Victory medal, engraved '2 Lieut C.B Pickard'.

The sale of the archive, which is valued at 150, takes place on Saturday.
Questions are being asked over how Border Force will deal with policing double-jabbed Brits should amber list countries open up.

British holidaymakers who have received both doses of the Covid-19 vaccine could be given the green light to fly to nearly 170 countries from next month under new government plans.

The Home Office has insisted that it has already 'taken steps to reduce wait times for those entering the country' by upgrading e-gates and improving technology.

But critics have warned that there could be queues of up to seven hours as flight capacities increase and Border Force officials struggle to check travellers' evidence of vaccination.

British tourists at Portgual's Faro Airport as they were forced to interrupt their holidays in the Algarve to return home earlier this month

Those who are fully vaccinated will need provide evidence via the NHS app at border controls and then be able to enjoy trips to amber list nations without having to isolate for 10 days upon returning home.

Huge numbers of tourists had to scramble home from Portugal earlier this month in order to beat the quarantine deadline when it was dramatically taken off the green list.

Some 168 destinations are currently on the amber list, including popular holiday spots like Portugal, France, Spain, Italy, Greece and the United States.

Ministers are still discussing the plans at this early stage, but Boris Johnson could rubber-stamp them in time for millions of lockdown-weary Britons to jump on flights in July.

The idea would see travellers obliged to take several PCR tests on their return, but if they come back negative, they won't have to remain stuck in their homes like under current rules.

However it remains to be seen whether the Border Force will be able to cope with such a large number of travellers.

The under-fire agency was widely criticised over chaotic scenes at Heathrow earlier this year - when travel was heavily-restricted - when passengers had to queue for up to seven hours to get through passport control and at least one passenger collapsed.

Last month, one Border Force worker told the Guardian that the situation in airports was only set to worsen unless the government were able to ease the workload.

'Normally a Brit arriving at passport control would clear immigration in 30 seconds but the current requirements to manually check Covid-19 testing paperwork and quarantine requirements mean that each person is taking 15 minutes to process,' the worker, who wished to stay anonymous, said.

'Everyone is back at work including formally shielding staff  but the truth is that there simply isn't the capacity for staff to carry out the checks demanded by the government.

'Flights are currently running at around 15% of normal capacity. If they return to anywhere near their normal level, and the processes remain as they are, it's going to be a very frustrating summer of long, four- to six-hour waits,' he said.

Footage posted online in April shows a woman lying on the floor of Heathrow Airport being tended to by staff - as many more passengers wait to be cleared through the border

The agency insisted last week that it has taken steps to reduce wait times for those entering the country, including upgrading e-gates and improving technology at the border

However, it insisted last week that it has taken steps to reduce wait times for those entering the country, including upgrading e-gates and improving technology at the border.

The agency suggested widespread reports of the extent of the delays included 'misleading claims' that they were down to a lack of resource and inadequate staffing levels.

It claims that improvements to border technology means it has now more than halved the time it takes to check passenger locator forms to two minutes when scanning a passport. It could previously take up to six minutes.

Border Force also said it had upgraded e-gates at Terminals 2 and 5 at Heathrow and at Gatwick, while there are plans for even more, to speed up processing of passengers returning from green or amber list countries.

A Government spokesperson said: 'To protect the public and the UK's vaccine rollout, as international travel resumes the Government will maintain its enhanced borders regime, which include 100% checks and traffic light system for international travel.

'While we do this, wait times are likely to be longer and we will do all we can to smooth the process, including the roll-out of our e-Gate upgrade programme during the summer and deploying additional Border Force officers.

'Arrangements for queues and the management of returning passengers are the responsibility of the relevant airport, which we expect to be done in a COVID-secure way.'

Treasury Secretary Jesse Norman yesterday hinted proposals are in motion, saying: 'We don't want to get left behind by countries which may be adopting a two-jab approach if it can be done safely, carefully and securely.'

But a Whitehall source has now suggested the scheme is being accelerated, telling the Sun: 'I don't think we can wait for a long time if it is something that we want to do.'

The plans are not likely to affect existing rules on red list countries, such as India and Turkey, which require those returning to Britain to quarantine in hotels.

However, there are concerns about an age divide, with the vast majority of older travellers likely to have received both jabs, while younger holidaymakers may have only received one, or not even that, with 18-and-19-year-olds, for example, only invited to book a first dose this week.

'We don't want to see the oldies getting into fights with youths at the airport,' a source said.

So far, more than 42 million first doses have been administered while more than 30 million have received both jabs.

The plans are expected to be ready for discussion by the Cabinet's Covid operations committee ahead of a June 28 deadline by which ministers have pledged to review the traffic light system.

Officials are reportedly discussing how the move would affect those who cannot be vaccinated, whether under-18s should be exempt and whether it would apply to Britons or all arrivals.

Demand for air travel collapsed in March last year when the UK went into lockdown in response to the crisis, with the Government now under pressure to restart international travel by the battered tourism industry.

Bosses of the travel industry are furious that Portugal, which was originally on the green list, was suddenly put on the amber list within weeks.

They also believe that the Balearic and Greek Islands should have been included on the green list. The Balearic island, Majorca, for example, currently has a lower Covid rate than the UK.

It comes as Ryanair and bosses behind three major English airports prepare to take the Government to court over its travel traffic light system, which they say is bringing the industry to its knees.

The budget airline is set to be joined by Manchester Airports Group (MAG) - the operator of Manchester, East Midlands and Stansted airports - in launching a High Court challenge.

The legal bid will seek to force the Government to reveal how it decides which countries are placed on the green, amber and red travel lists.

Outspoken Ryanair chief Michael O'Leary yesterday blasted ministers as 'incompetent' in a scathing attack on the Government's transport policy.

Speaking to the Telegraph, who first revealed Ryanair's anticipated legal challenge, Mr O'Leary said: 'I've never come across a more incompetent f****** front bench of ministers.

'I have no faith in (Boris) Johnson's government on any of these issues, having completely mismanaged the original lockdowns last year and the reopening now.'

The Prime Minister's official spokesman insisted during the April disruption that Border Force had the 'right level' of staff despite complaints and chaotic scenes when the unnamed woman appeared unconscious on the floor of UK arrivals.

At the time, it was understood only a maximum of 20 of the 40 passport control desks at Heathrow Terminal 2 have been manned because of social distancing.

Staff have also been in small bubbles because of Covid-19, preventing groups being deployed when the border becomes busy.

Following the chaos in April, No 10 pushed the blame on passengers, saying people should only travel when 'absolutely necessary' and suggested not enough travellers were filling in their forms correctly or pre-booking tests.

The Prime Minister's official spokesman said: 'At this stage with where we are on our road map in this global pandemic, people should not be travelling unless absolutely necessary.

'The Border Force has staff there to check passengers are compliant with our border health measures and we continue to ask that passengers completed the necessary requirements to enter the UK in advance - things like purchasing testing packages'.

It was understood at the time the long delays are being caused by a perfect storm of problems with the Home Office, accused of using a 'rigid and inflexible' bubble system for staff.

This meant those not on the rota for passport control cannot be moved in to ease pressure at peak times, despite social distancing and regular sanitising.

Huge queues were being made worse because electronic-gates could not be used because the Government was yet to fully digitise the 'passenger locator forms', which travellers must fill in before heading to the UK.

Unions claimed Heathrow could use all passport control desks if they had installed screens surrounding each booth, rather than the front-facing ones they chose.

But they also blamed passengers for failing to fill in the right forms with birder staff they are seeing large numbers of people using fake Covid test certificates that are not properly checked by airlines.
A lifeboat crew has rescued 14 migrants who crossed the English Channel and brought them ashore near Dungeness power station today.

The boat was picked up by the RNLI at a remote beach on the Romney Marsh in Kent and brought into the harbour at around 7.30am. The group was then taken to Border Force officials for processing.

Pictures show people huddled in foil blankets and being escorted by officers after making the treacherous 21-mile journey across the world's busiest shipping lanes in rainy conditions.

It follows around 100 migrants being intercepted at Dover on Wednesday, according to eyewitness estimates, after it was revealed the number arriving in the UK since January has topped 5,000 - more than double the same period last year.

The group were picked up from Dungeness beach on the coast of Kent at around 7.30am and taken to Border Force and police officials for processing

A total of 14 migrants, pictured above, were rescued by a lifeboat crew after making the treacherous 21-mile journey across the world's busiest shipping lanes in rainy conditions

Five people are seen huddled in foil blankets, with some looking towards the camera, after being picked up from a beach on the coast of Kent this morning

One onlooker said: 'They looked incredibly cold and wet. They would've been at sea for several hours before they came ashore.

'I just can't believe they risked it in these conditions.'

It brings the number of migrants who have been detained by Border Force making the crossing so far this month to 1,508.

The arrivals from two days ago included toddlers who, if unaccompanied, will be relocated to other local authorities by the Home Office after Kent County Council said it could not accept anymore unaccompanied asylum seeking children.

An Immigration Enforcement officer was also seen carrying a baby no more than a year old in her arms as they escorted the migrants up the gangway at Dover Marina in Kent for processing.

And a total of 80 migrants were intercepted in three boats on Tuesday, taking the total to arrive this year to 5,087.

The first group was brought into Dover Marina around 8am on the back of Border Force cutter Hunter.

At least ten migrants - some huddled in blankets and carrying their possessions in rucksacks - were seen on board.

Three migrants are seen with an immigration enforcement official after crossing the English Channel and arriving near Dungeness this morning

Pictures show people huddled in foil blankets and being escorted by officers this morning after making the 21-mile journey

The group is seen with immigration enforcement and police officials on the coast of Kent today

People pictured huddled in foil blankets after the crossing today. It follows around 100 migrants being intercepted at Dover on Wednesday, according to eyewitness estimates

They disembarked and were escorted up the gangway for processing by Immigration Enforcement officers.

On Monday, 110 people were intercepted crossing the Dover Strait which took the total to 5,007 and surpassed the landmark figure.

Just 1,865 migrants were picked up by Border Force in the same period from January 1 to June 14 last year, which turned out to be a record year with 8,410 eventually making crossings last year.

Dover and Deal MP Natalie Elphicke called for 'more robust deterrents' to ensure migrants crossing the Channel by small boat know 'they have no chance of breaking into Britain in this way'.

Reacting to the news of more than 5,000 migrants arriving in 2021, she said on Tuesday: 'Small boats crossings have gone on for too long. It's time these crossings came to an end.

Home Office immigration enforcement and police vans pictured near Dungeness, on the coast of Kent, early this morning

People seen huddled in blankets and accompanied by a police officer today. It was revealed the number of migrants arriving in the UK since January has topped 5,000 - more than double the same period last year

Two migrants who were rescued by a lifeboat crew near Dungeness pictured this morning. A total of 80 migrants were also intercepted in three boats on Tuesday

'We should look at more robust deterrents that have been adopted elsewhere - notably in Australia, where a robust stance has saved lives and massively reduced illegal immigration activity.

'Everyone knows that these crossings will only come to an end when migrants know that they have no chance of breaking into Britain in this way, and the criminal gangs stop profiting from them.'

A Home Office spokesman said earlier this week: 'Criminal gangs are putting profits before people's lives through these dangerous and unnecessary crossings.

'Almost 5,000 people have been prevented from making the dangerous crossing so far this year and we are cracking down on the despicable criminal gangs behind people smuggling.

'Inaction is not an option whilst people are dying. The Government is bringing legislation forward through our New Plan for Immigration which will break the business model of these heinous people smuggling networks and save lives.'
Sir Ian McKellen insists Hamlet is bisexual, as he returns to play the young prince once more at the age of 82 in an age-blind interpretation of the Shakespeare play.

The theatre veteran first played the Prince of Denmark in the tragedy 50 years ago and will take on the part again in a production opening at the Theatre Royal Windsor next week.

It is thought Hamlet was meant to be around 30 years old, while speculation over the character's sexuality has long been rife.

Sir Ian McKellen insists Hamlet is bisexual, as he returns to play the young prince once more at the age of 82 in an age-blind interpretation of the Shakespeare play

The theatre veteran first played the Prince of Denmark in the tragedy 50 years ago and will take on the part again in a production opening at the Theatre Royal Windsor next week

The actor will lead the Theatre Royal Windsor's summer season company in Hamlet from June 21. Pictured: McKellen and the cast of Hamlet during their rehearsal

Could Hamlet be bisexual? Speculation over the character's sexuality has long been rife. Scholars have previously pointed out that while Hamlet is romantically involved with Ophelia, their relationship appears strained. The prince is cruel to her, and she becomes a lightning rod for his anger over Gertrude's marriage to Claudius, while others highlight the fact the pair simply share very little time on stage together. Hamlet also appears to have complex relationships with many of the male characters, including Rosencrantz who tells him in the play: 'You did love me once'. Similarly, he is extremely close to Horatio, telling him: 'Since my dear soul was mistress of her choice and could of men distinguish, her election hath seal'd thee for herselfgive me that man that is not passion's slave, and I will wear him in my heart's core, ay, in my heart of heart, as I do thee.' Meanwhile, the sexuality of Shakespeare himself has also been a topic of debate, despite his well-documented marriage to Anne Hathaway, with whom he had three children. Some scholars argue analysis of his sonnets suggests he is bisexual, as they are described as love poems addressed to a man, while also featuring puns relating to homosexuality. Advertisement

Scholars have previously pointed out that while Hamlet is romantically involved with Ophelia, their relationship appears strained.

The prince is cruel to her, and she becomes a lightning rod for his anger over Gertrude's marriage to Claudius, while others highlight the fact the pair simply share very little time on stage together.

Hamlet also appears to have complex relationships with many of the male characters, including Rosencrantz who tells him in the play: 'You did love me once'.

Similarly, he is extremely close to Horatio, telling him: 'Since my dear soul was mistress of her choice and could of men distinguish, her election hath seal'd thee for herselfgive me that man that is not passion's slave, and I will wear him in my heart's core, ay, in my heart of heart, as I do thee.'

Meanwhile, the sexuality of Shakespeare himself has also been a topic of debate, despite his well-documented marriage to Anne Hathaway, with whom he had three children.

Some scholars argue analysis of his sonnets suggests he is bisexual, as they are described as love poems addressed to a man, while also featuring puns relating to homosexuality.

Speaking about the upcoming performance, Sir Ian told BBC Radio 4's Front Row: 'When you come see me you won't see an old man pretending to be a young man, you'll see a man pretending to be a prince, pretending to be an intellectual, pretending to be a neurotic, pretending to love his mother, pretending to love girls and boys.

'You didn't know that was in Hamlet did you?

'It's there, Rosencrantz to Hamlet: 'You did love me once'.'

Discussing returning to the role in his 80s, Sir Ian said: 'I suppose I thought I might be playing Polonius, 'No we'd like you to play Hamlet', said Sean (Mathias, theatre director).

'There was a pause, I thought that sounds like a bit of a silly idea, and then I thought no if that's what you want to do, if you want to just say at the beginning of the show; 'Here is a group of actors - all sizes, shapes and ages, and colours and ethnicities, and experience - and we're going to tell the old familiar story, but perhaps not in the old familiar way', that seemed to me an adventure worth going on.'

Emmanuella Cole (left) and Francesca Annis (right) will star alongside McKellen in the production this summer

The production will see Jenny Seagrove (left) play Hamlet's mother Gertrude and Steven Berkoff (right) play Polonius

Alis Wyn Davies (left) and Ben Allen (right) will also star in Hamlet which will open to the public from June 21

The company also includes actors Asif Khan (left) and Nick Howard-Brown (right)

Joining the Lord of The Rings star will be Llinos Daniel (left) and Ashley D. Gayle (right)

Missy Malek will join the cast for the production which will see McKellen play the Prince of Denmark for ten weeks

Sir Ian came out during a BBC radio appearance in 1988 and said he could not recall if it was planned or a spontaneous decision.

He said: 'I can't tell you for certain, but I know I'd been thinking about it and discussing with friends who were open about their sexuality as to whether it would be an appropriate thing for me to do.

'People I talked to, principally Armistead Maupin, author of Tales Of The City, he said it would be important for me in my development as a person, but he said it would be important for other people.

'Well, that rather appealed to me, coming from a family of 'do-gooders'.

'I hadn't felt up to that time that I was disadvantaged by the laws of the land which made it illegal for me to make love, because I simply broke the law.

'But of course when I grew up and understood what the actual laws were - and this pernicious new little law (Section 28) that was being brought in, very mean spirited, inhibiting children to being introduced to the fact of homosexuality in society - it was only when I realised that there was grave injustice, that I realised it was a grave injustice against me and I took it personally, and once I'd taken it personally it became obvious not what I had to do, but wanted to do.'

Asked if it liberated him, he replied: 'Totally, oh yes.

'Once you are free as everyone else is, to choose to be your own person and express yourself in your own way - which when you're in the closet you can't and don't do - your life of course changes in every aspect for the better, particularly in relationships with other people.

'Is it any wonder that my acting got better? It did, almost overnight.

'Now my acting is not about disguise but about revelation.'

The full interview is on Front Row on June 18 from 7pm on Radio 4 and BBC Sounds.
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More evidence Britain's Covid outbreak is slowing down emerged today as a raft of official data showed the country's crisis is no longer growing uncontrollably.

The Department of Health reported 10,476 new infections in the past 24 hours, up by a third on last Friday. But the same data shows the speed at which infections are increasing every week has slowed, despite the spread of the highly infectious Indian variant.

Figures from the Office for National statistics also showed more than 100,000 people in England were estimated to have had Covid last week, the highest number since April. But the figure  based on random swab testing of tens of thousands of people across the country  nudged up by only eight per cent compared to a near-doubling at the start of June.

Meanwhile, SAGE said the R rate was flat after rising for five weeks in a row following the easing of restrictions, with SAGE saying it still stood between 1.2 and 1.4. The figure  which measures how quickly the virus is spreading  is usually a couple of weeks out of date and less reliable when case numbers are low, as they are now.

On the back of the promising data, Boris Johnson has said he is 'very confident' that restrictions will come to an end on July 19 but dismissed reports that the unlocking could be brought forward to July 5. The PM, during a visit to West Yorkshire today, remained adamant a four-week delay would make 'even more of a difference' than two. But ministers will review the coronavirus situation again early next month.

The encouraging data  which come after MailOnline yesterday uncovered separate figures that revealed the speed of growth was slowing  come despite a surge in the Indian 'Delta' variant, which has now completed its takeover in the UK and accounts for 99 per cent of cases, with confirmed infections surging by 80 per cent in a week.

However, there are still early warning signs that the spike in cases over the past month could turn deadly. The DOH's daily update showed the number of Covid hospital admissions occurring each day has spiked by more than a quarter in a week. There were also another 11 deaths from the virus recorded today, down on the 17 last Friday.

A Public Health England report today revealed the number of people admitted to hospital after catching the strain rose more than two-fold to 806 from 383 in the past week  but only one in 10 were fully jabbed, bolstering hopes that vaccines will keep the virus at bay. Deaths from the mutant strain increased from 42 to 73.

Although the strain is triggering local outbreaks, there are signs these can be controlled without lockdowns, with the early hotspots of Bolton and Blackburn managing to get cases under control with extra testing and contact tracing, and officials hoping other areas experiencing surges will follow suit.

Speaking about lockdown-easing plans in Kirklees today, the Prime Minister said: 'We are very confident that we'll be able to go through with step four of the roadmap on the timetable that Ive set out, with treating July the 19th, as Ive said, as a terminus date. I think thats certainly what the data continues to indicate.'

The average number of people testing positive each day (yellow bars) appears to have stopped accelerating as rapidly as it had in May and early June, with the rate of increase (red line) now showing that there are smaller increases each day, suggesting the outbreak is still growing but not as quickly as it was

Today's Office for National Statistics report estimated that 105,000 across the country would have tested positive last week but this figure nudged up by only eight per cent compared to a near-doubling the week before, when it hit 96,800

PHE's report today showed that, since the Delta variant was first discovered in April, the most cases have been found in Bolton in Greater Manchester, where 4,684 positive tests had been linked to the strain by June 14. Other hard-hit areas were in the North of England or Midlands, too, with Manchester (3,102), Blackburn (2,762), Birmingham (1,948) and Leeds (1,642) filling out the top five

The country's R rate, measuring the speed of the virus's spread, was today estimated to be between 1.2 and 1.4, remaining unchanged over the past week after rising for five weeks in a row, offering another sign of a slowdown. The figure is usually a couple of weeks out of date and less reliable when case numbers are low, as they are now. It is highest in the North West, where the Indian variant is most widespread

Boris Johnson, pictured on a visit to Kirklees in Yorkshire today, said that he was 'confident' lockdown restrictions could come to an end on July 19 but indicated an earlier easing was unlikely

Today's Office for National Statistics report estimated that 105,000 across the country would have tested positive for coronavirus last week but this figure had nudged up by only eight per cent compared to a near-doubling the fortnight before, when it hit 85,600.

It suggested 0.19 per cent of people - one in 520 - were carrying the virus and that it was more widespread in the North West, at 0.6 per cent, than in any other region. Cases were lowest in the East of England.

This chimes with PHE's report which showed that, since the Delta variant was first discovered in April, the most cases have been found in Bolton in Greater Manchester, where 4,684 positive tests had been linked to the strain by June 14.

Other hard-hit areas were in the North of England or Midlands, too, with Manchester (3,102), Blackburn (2,762), Birmingham (1,948) and Leeds (1,642) filling out the five worst-affected places.

The variant is least common in rural areas, mainly in the South West, with the lowest numbers of cases found in Torridge, Devon and North Devon, which both have fewer than five cases each, and West Devon (5), South Hams, also in Devon (6), and North Norfolk (6).

The ONS report also found infections are most common among teenagers and young adults, the ONS report shows, with 0.5 per cent of 16 to 24-year-olds testing positive in the survey - the highest of any age group.

The next highest rate was among 25 to 34-year-olds (0.4 per cent), and then positives dropped off to 0.2 per cent in school-age children and just 0.1 per cent - one in 1,000 people - in all over-35s.

Lower infection rates among older people show that vaccines are working at preventing infection as well as slashing the risk of serious illness or death.

Further hints that vaccines are working come in the slowing rate of increase - the eight per cent rise in cases last week continues a slowdown that saw a rise of only 13 per cent the week earlier which had followed a spike of 77 per cent.

The ONS report adds to growing evidence that this is the case, with the Covid Symptom Study finding the same trend and NHS Test & Trace figures beginning to show a similar pattern with the daily average starting to level off.

The UK Health Security Agency's boss Dr Jenny Harries said: 'Cases are rising rapidly across the country and the Delta variant is now dominant... It is encouraging to see that hospitalisations and deaths are not rising at the same rate.'

Graph left: A Public Health England report published today revealed the fast-spreading variant has now completely taken over in Britain and it makes up 99 per cent of cases. Graph right: Lab testing shows that the Delta variant (pink) has accounted for thousands of cases (specimens) in recent weeks and case numbers are soaring. It has dwarfed all other variants, shown in different colours. The Kent variant is not shown in the graph because it looks at only 'S gene positive' cases which are ones that the swab test works perfectly on. The virus's S gene on the Kent variant cannot be detected by swab-testing so it is classed as an 'S gene negative' variant. 'Unclassified' tests are strains that were not categorised as a specific variant, likely because they came in such small numbers compared to the Kent variant in January

Britain yesterday recorded its highest number of cases since February 19 in the second wave, with 11,007 positive tests, but there are signs outbreaks are coming under control in the northern areas hardest hit by the strain.

Most of the surge in Indian variant cases has been driven by young people - the graph shows there are significantly more cases among under-40s than middle-aged or older people, who have mostly been vaccinated. Dr Jenny Harries said: 'The increase is primarily in younger age groups, a large proportion of which were unvaccinated but are now being invited to receive the vaccine'

Just 84 out of 806 admissions were among people who had been given both vaccine doses. 135 happened after someone had protection from their first dose and 587 were among people who were unvaccinated, unknown or had had their first dose within the past three weeks meaning they were unlikely to have any immunity

England's coronavirus vaccine postcode lottery: Just a FIFTH of over-25s have had their first jab in parts of Birmingham Gaps in England's Covid vaccine roll-out were laid bare today by MailOnline analysis which revealed parts of the country have still only managed to inoculate a fifth of over-25s. Despite the drive lagging behind in inner-city regions home to thousands of students, some coastal neighbourhoods have already managed to fully vaccinate 85 per cent of all adults. Ministers are racing to dish out jabs to millions more adults over the next four weeks to thwart the spread of the Indian variant, with Freedom Day delayed to give the NHS more crucial time in the fight against Covid. NHS England's most up-to-date regional figures show 84 per cent of over-25s across the country have had their first jab, while 62 per cent have had both doses. But MailOnline analysis of the same statistics has revealed uptake around the country varies massively, with seven areas having reached fewer than 30 per cent of eligible adults. Selly Oak in southwest Birmingham has the lowest coverage in the country, with 1,395 of the 6,928 over-25s living in the postcode receiving their first jab  20 per cent of the age group. For comparison, Morpeth South and West in Northumberland has vaccinated 94 per cent of its 5,271 eligible adult population. Experts told MailOnline the huge gap in uptake is 'clearly concerning' and warned low vaccination rates may cause local outbreaks over the summer and beyond. England's vaccine roll-out was extended to over-18s today, with the campaign now on the home-straight. Over-25s were able to start booking appointments last week. Low rates are particularly concerning given the rampant spread of the Indian variant, which has almost doubled in size over the past week. Public Health England (PHE) today revealed it found another 33,000, last week taking the overall amount identified to 75,000. With the mutant strain now in almost every corner of the country and restrictions eased, cases are growing. Britain recorded more than 11,000 Covid infections for the first time since February yesterday. Advertisement

Dr Harries added: 'The increase is primarily in younger age groups, a large proportion of which were unvaccinated but are now being invited to receive the vaccine.

'It is encouraging to see that hospitalisations and deaths are not rising at the same rate but we will continue to monitor it closely.

'The vaccination programme and the care that we are all taking to follow the guidance are continuing to save lives. Please make sure that you come forward to receive both doses of the vaccine as soon as you are eligible. Dont drop your guard - practice "hands, face, space, fresh air" at all times.'

Despite concerns about the numbers of positive tests spiking, there are signs the outbreak is slowing down and that vaccines are protecting people well against the variant.

Only one in 10 people who were admitted to hospital with the new strain had been given both their jabs, showing that vaccines protect well because the majority of people becoming severely ill are unvaccinated.

Just 84 out of 806 admissions were among people who had been given both vaccine doses.

Some 135 happened after someone had protection from their first dose and 587 were among people who were unvaccinated, unknown or had had their first dose within the past three weeks meaning they were unlikely to have any immunity.

In an analysis of 60,624 of the 75,953 cases since February 1, PHE found that just 4,087 infections were among people who had been given both their vaccine doses - seven per cent, or one in every 14.

Official Department of Health infection data show that the average daily rate of increase in positive tests had halved in a week up to yesterday.

And in another sign the outbreak is losing speed, a symptom-tracking study estimated that 15,760 people are now getting sick each day  up only a third in a week after doubling a week earlier.

Professor Tim Spector, the King's College London epidemiologist who runs the Covid Symptom Study, said: 'The numbers this week seem to be slowing down, which is good news. Worrying areas with a high number of cases like Scotland and the North West are starting to level off.

'I'm predicting based on past experience that, although we may not have reached the peak quite yet, within two weeks we will see cases beginning to drop again.'

But he insisted the PM's decision to put 'Freedom Day' on hold until mid-July was 'probably necessary' as his study showed vaccines are doing a huge amount of heavy lifting and slashing case numbers.

Explaining that jabs could be protecting areas against bigger surges, Professor Spector said: 'Wales in particular has seen tangible benefits from a faster than average vaccination rate, where they previously had some of the highest rates in the country, we are now seeing clear protection against rises.

'Wales is now several weeks ahead of the rest of the UK in terms of vaccinations, so it looks like the rest of us will soon follow suit.'

MailOnline analysis has revealed uptake around the country varies massively, with seven areas having vaccinated less than 30 per cent of eligible adults

Second doses followed a similar pattern, with the lowest numbers seen in student areas across England. In Cathedral and Kelham in Sheffield, just eight per cent of people are fully vaccinated

WHERE HAVE THE MOST DELTA VARIANT CASES BEEN FOUND? Bolton  4,684 Manchester  3,102 Blackburn with Darwen  2,762 Birmingham  1,948 Leeds  1,642 Wigan  1,544 Salford  1,512 Stockport  1,242 Bradford  1,099 Bedford  1,094 Advertisement

WHERE HAVE THE FEWEST DELTA VARIANT CASES BEEN FOUND? North Devon  <5 Torridge (Devon)  <5 West Devon  5 East Devon  6 North Norfolk  6 South Hams (Devon)  6 Mid Devon  7 East Cambridgeshire  9 Ipswich  9 Bolsover (Derbyshire)  10 Advertisement

Most of the Indian 'Delta' variant cases have been found in the North West of England (dark blue) but they are spread across the country

The ONS said Covid was now the 24th 'leading' cause of death in England as of last month  down from ninth in April

Covid was only the 24th leading cause of death in England last month Twenty-three diseases and conditions killed more people than Covid in England last month and the virus was responsible for fewer than 1 per cent of all fatalities, official figures show. Despite the rapid rise in infections of the Indian variant in May, the Office for National Statistics found that Covid deaths continued to fall significantly during the month. Coronavirus claimed 355 lives in May, which was down almost 65 per cent on the toll in April, in another sign that the vaccines are providing huge protection even against the mutant strain. The continued decline in Covid deaths means the virus is now the 24th 'leading' cause of death, down from ninth last month. It had been the country's biggest killer for four consecutive months from November through February. In total there were 35,401 deaths from all causes registered in England last month, which was 10 per cent lower than normal and the second month in a row they have been below average. Covid was the leading cause in just 0.9 per cent of the fatalities, accounting for about one in 110. Heart disease was the biggest killer in May (3,780) followed by dementia (3,711), while flu and pneumonia are now killing three times as many patients (1,012) as Covid. Advertisement

One of the key reasons the Prime Minister decided not to go ahead with ending lockdown next week was because experts fear not enough people have been vaccinated to prevent a devastating third wave.

Just over half of adults have had two vaccine doses. Over three quarters  nearly 41million people  have had their first jab but studies show that a single shot doesn't offer good protection against the new Delta variant, with only around 33 per cent protection from infection.

'Boris Johnsons decision this week to delay the lifting of all restrictions in the UK, was a difficult but probably necessary one,' Professor Spector added. 'Its good to see decisions being made from the data, not dates.

'Life is better than it was, where we can go out and see friends and family, so having a few more weeks will give us the time and space to get more people vaccinated.

'We have already seen that being fully vaccinated dramatically reduces both the likelihood of contracting the virus, as well as severity of symptoms, so its crucial that everyone eligible for the vaccine gets the first or second jab as soon as possible.'

There had been early signs this week that cases were beginning to come under control in the areas first hit by the Delta variant, suggesting the strain can be controlled without lockdowns.

Covid cases appear to be flat or falling in the hardest-hit places, with the infection rate in Blackburn with Darwen, which took over from Bolton as the country's hotspot at the end of May, falling after appearing to peak on June 4 when there had been an average 143 cases per day over the previous week.

It remains the worst-affected place in the country but if the trend keeps up the change of fortunes could suggest that, as was seen in Bolton, simple surges in testing and vaccinations and tougher advice on travelling in or out of the area and social distancing could be enough to keep a lid on local outbreaks.

Ministers this week urged another 3.6million people in Birmingham, Liverpool, Warrington and parts of Cheshire to try to avoid travelling and be more careful about virus control measures in a bid to slow outbreaks there.

The other areas that were first to be hard hit by the strain when it emerged in April  Bedford and Burnley  also appear to have arrested the spread of Covid by scaling up local efforts to stamp it out and test and isolate everyone.

Those four areas, Bedford, Blackburn, Bolton and Burnley, were the first to see cases surge, the first to get extra help from the Government to control the virus, and now appear to be the first to see infections levelling off.

Blackburn's public health director, Dominic Harrison, said that cases appeared to have 'peaked' there after a massive spike.

On Twitter the local health chief said yesterday: 'Good news  increasingly strong signal that the [Blackburn with Darwen] case rate may have peaked on 7th June (at 667) & that the fall in daily case numbers will be sustained for at least 7 days. First sustained fall since initial Delta variant case on 7th April.

'Based on Blackburn and Bolton experience  other areas with Delta variant surge (with strong surge response) may get: 8 week rise in cases, increased but manageable hospitalisations with very low mortality. This may be what 'living with COVID 'looks like!'

Infections are still rising fast in many areas that have been added to the official hotspots, however, with cases going up in twice as many areas as they are flat or falling.
The heir of a prominent South Carolina legal dynasty has joined the survivors of a 2019 boat crash in volunteering his DNA sample as the investigation continues into the double murder of his wife and son.

The brothers of Richard Alex 'Alec' Murdaugh, 53, told Good Morning America the bereaved husband and father has offered a sample to investigators as he is 'willing to do anything' to help in the hunt for anyone responsible for shooting dead Paul, 22, and Margaret, 52, last Monday.

'I can tell you he was willing and still is willing to do anything that's asked of him,' said John Murdaugh. 'He wants this solved.'

Randy Murdaugh added that there is 'no possible way' his brother is involved in the murders and said he loved his family.

'My brother loved Maggie and loved Paul like nothing else on this Earth, just like he loves Buster [the couple's other son],' he said.

'So there's no possible way he could have anything to do with this, I can assure you.'

Margaret and Paul were shot multiple times and killed at their hunting lodge in Islandton, South Carolina, June 7.

Police said Alec called 911 at 10.07pm reporting that he had found their bodies when he returned to the family home. The time of death was between 9pm and 9.30pm.

Murdaugh was interviewed by investigating officers June 10. Sources close to him said he has a 'cast iron alibi' for the night of the killings and that he is merely co-operating with the investigation.

Paul was awaiting trial on charges in a 2019 boat crash that killed 19 year-old Mallory Beach, who was thrown from the vessel he was driving, allegedly while drunk.

Questions of a possible tie between the murders and the incident have swirled in the local community, while - now almost two weeks later - police have made no arrests, revealed no suspects, persons of interest or motives, and released very little information about the investigation.

Buster, Margaret 'Maggie', Paul and Richard Alex 'Alec' Murdaugh (left to right). Alec has joined the survivors of a 2019 boat crash in volunteering his DNA sample as the investigation continues into the double murder of his wife and son

Randy and John - the brothers of Alec - told Good Morning America he is 'willing to do anything' to help in the hunt for the person or persons responsible

Nearly two weeks since 22-year-old Paul Murdaugh and his mother Maggie were found murdered outside their family's lodge, no arrests have been made and no suspects have been named. @evapilgrim has more. https://t.co/L9HvqlVsTI pic.twitter.com/PCui5b4tpP  Good Morning America (@GMA) June 18, 2021

The four survivors of the fatal boating accident voluntarily gave DNA samples and statements to investigators, DailyMail.com learned Thursday.

They are Paul's ex-girlfriend Morgan Doughty, Beach's boyfriend Anthony Cook, his cousin Connor Cook and Connor's girlfriend, Beach's best friend, Miley Altman.

Beach's family also handed over DNA samples, which are still being processed, GMA reported.

State Law Enforcement Division spokesman Tommy Crosby confirmed that investigators also pulled digital and cell records  including those belonging to Alec Murdaugh  to pin down individuals' movements on and around the day of the murders. He described this as 'a usual investigative process.'

Paul's uncles Randy and John broke down in tears Thursday as they said they have no idea who could have been 'so sick' to carry out the brutal murders.

'It's hard to imagine somebody could be so sick as to do this, intentionally kill people like that,' said Randy.

'We see it in the world. We see it on the news. You don't think it's going to happen in your small community to your family.'

While the uncles insisted the two did not have any known enemies, they revealed that Paul Murdaugh received threats after he was accused of causing Beach's death.

'I don't really know of any enemies,' said Randy.

'We hear all this talk on social media in regard to Paul but I don't really know of anybody who would truly be an enemy or would truly want to harm them.'

John spoke of unspecified threats made to Paul, and said he'd initially dismissed them as harmless.

He did not share any further details on who had issued them, but said the family now wonders if they were wrong to discount their seriousness.

'I didn't think it was credible threats. If it was I would have tried to do something or notified someone,' he said.

'But I guess, maybe I made a mistake.'

They grew emotional as they pleaded for information on the murders, no matter how 'big or small' the details.

Randy and John (left and right) broke down in tears as they revealed Paul had been receiving threats prior to his death

Alec Murdaugh - a part-time prosecutor for the 14th Circuit solicitor's office - called 911 at 10.07pm on June 6 to say he had returned home and found their bodies outside the residence.

Officers arrived on the scene to find both Paul and Margaret Murdaugh dead from multiple gunshot wounds.

Paul had been awaiting trial on charges relating to Beach's death, after she was thrown from the boat he was driving. He had denied the allegations he faced.

DailyMail.com learned that allegations of obstruction of justice in the original criminal enquiry into the boat crash are also being investigated.

A police source told local newspaper The Island Packet that they believed Paul to have been the target of the murders, with his mom shot for being with him when the killer or killers struck. Two different guns were used in the shootings.

Questions around a possible tie between the incident and last week's killings continue to mount as the state attorney general is refusing to close the case into the boat crash despite the murder of the man accused of being culpable.

The Murdaugh family has dominated the county's legal system for decades, prosecuting nearly every criminal case in the southern part of the state.

Several family members have served as county elected prosecutors in the 14th Circuit solicitor's office going back almost a century.

But Randy and John denied that the family exercised its legal power to interfere in the boating case in any way and said they believe the perception of them as a 'dynasty' is all wrong.

Paul had been awaiting trial on charges relating to the 2019 boating death of Mallory Beach (pictured), who was thrown from the boat Paul was allegedly driving while drunk when he crashed it

'You see words like dynasty used and power and I don't know exactly how people use those words but we're just regular people and we're hurting just like they would be hurting if it happened to them,' said Randy.

The family members choked back tears as they revealed how, on the day of the murders, Alec had just taken their dying father Randolph Murdaugh III back to the hospital and gone to check on their mother.

He then returned to his own home to find the bodies of his son and wife, they said.

Law enforcement sources previously told local outlet The Island Packet that he told cops he had been out shooting that day when he returned to the grim scene.

John said he got a phone call from Alec Murdaugh that night and just 'knew something was wrong.'

'I got a call from Alec Monday night. As soon as I picked up the phone I knew something was wrong,' he said.

'Oh man, he just told me: 'Come as fast as you can. Paul and Maggie have been hurt.''

Randy described his brother as a 'very caring person' whose wife, Maggie, was 'the rock of the family.'

'His voice - the fear, he was just distraught,' Randy said of speaking to his brother.

He added that the horrific murders had changed them as 'a family'.

'I can't imagine horror that my brother is experiencing,' he said.

John told how one moment Alec is 'upright and strong, and making his way and then he just breaks down'.

The family said they were speaking out to urge anyone with information to come forward.

'The person that did this is out there and there's information however big or however small it is,' said Randy.

The Murdaugh family home where the two bodies were found. Colleton County Coroner Richard Harvey said they had each been shot multiple times, with their time of death placed at between 9pm and 9.30pm

The bodies were said to be found near a dog kennel on the family's property by Richard

This graphic shows the Murdaugh family tree

Three days after the murders, Paul's grandfather and Alec's father Randolph Murdaugh III died aged 81. His death is believed to have been the result of natural causes.

Now, 11 days after Paul and Margaret's murders, little is known about what happened.

Investigators were seen searching near a swamp close to the scene of the murders, reported GMA.

Police have made no arrests, revealed no suspects, persons of interest or possible motives, and little information has been released to the public.

They have ruled the deaths a double homicide but insisted there is no risk to the public. Cops have also appealed for anyone with information to come forward, and have refused to release audio of the 911 call made by Alec Murdaugh on the evening he found his wife and son dead.

Repeated requests for information from SLED were denied, citing an active investigation - even though South Carolina state law requires police to provide some records on cases in the days following an incident.

On Tuesday, SLED shared a press release about the investigation. It gave few details, other than confirming Alec made the 911 call at 10.07pm to report finding his wife and son's bodies.

The agency again ruled out releasing further information about the case saying it does not want to jeopardize the investigation.

'SLED is committed to conducting a professional and thorough criminal investigation to bring justice in the deaths of Paul and Maggie,' it said.

'SLED is further committed to transparency and will release any additional information, including additional information provided during the 911 call, at the appropriate time.

Paul (right) - the son of a powerful South Carolina legal family - is thought to have been the intended target of the shooting that also killed his mom Margaret (left)

Paul, Margaret, Alec and Buster. The Murdaugh family has ruled the county's legal system for decades, prosecuting nearly every criminal case in the southern part of the state

'However, we cannot and will not do anything that could jeopardize the integrity of this investigation or that would violate the due process afforded to all in our constitutional system of justice.'

Officials also finally set up a dedicated tip line for the case.

Prior to that press release, the only report released to date had been a one-line statement from Colleton County Sheriff's Office Tuesday.

It reads: 'On June 7, 2021 at approximately 2226 hours I responded to 4147 Moselle Rd in Colleton County in reference to two gunshot victims found by the caller.'

Colleton County Coroner Richard Harvey confirmed Monday the two victims had each been shot multiple times, with their time of death placed at between 9pm and 9.30pm.

The coroner said authorities would know more when the full autopsy is completed in about six weeks.

Harvey refused to answer any further questions about the case or confirm reports that two separate firearms were used in the slayings.

'That is all the information we are releasing at this time,' Harvey said Monday.

'They were both shot multiple times and SLED will take it from here,' he said.

A law enforcement source last week told The Island Packet Paul was shot in the head and upper body with a shotgun, while Margaret was shot with an assault rifle.

Alec and Margaret pictured together. Officials continue to remain tight-lipped about the double murders

The source said Paul was thought to have been the intended victim of the shooting while Margaret was likely in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Their bodies were found several yards apart from one another and shell casings were discovered at the scene, they said.

SLED was handed the case from Colleton County Sheriff's Office almost immediately due to the Murdaugh family ties to the 14th Circuit solicitor's office.

Rumors continue to swirl over the case given the silence from officials and Paul's charges over the boating death.

The South Carolina Attorney General's Office said Monday the charges had been dropped following Paul's death but that the investigation remains open.

'We had every intention of moving forward with Paul Murdaugh's prosecution,' spokesperson Robert Kittle told the Island Packet.

'While the charges against him will be dismissed, the case has not been closed because the investigation is not finished.'

The local paper had asked the office for the case files.

This has fueled speculation about why the investigation is still ongoing, with the attorney representing Paul saying he believes it suggests cops are probing a tie between the 2019 death and the double murder.

'I can understand that they would not want to open the investigative file to disclosure because there may be information related to the murder investigation,' said attorney Jim Griffin.

Paul was awaiting trial on three felony charges of facing one count of boating under the influence causing death and two counts of boating under the influence causing great bodily injury over the death of Mallory in 2019.

He had been indicted and released on a $50,000 bond.

Beach's mother, Renee, brought a wrongful death suit last year which is currently proceeding against the company that sold alcohol to Murdaugh, Alec Murdaugh, and Paul's older brother, Richard Alexander Jr, known as 'Buster,' whose ID Murdaugh used that day.

Mallory Beach (pictured). Questions around a possible tie between her boating death and last week's murders continue to mount as the state attorney general is refusing to close the case into the boat crash despite the death of the man accused of being culpable

Paul's attorney said the fact the 2019 case is not closed suggests a tie between the case and the murders

According to depositions filed as part of the lawsuit, he and Mallory were part of a group of six involved in the boat crash on February 23 2019.

The documents say Paul was 'highly intoxicated,' 'drunk' and 'belligerent' that night with all of the survivors testifying to him being drunk and there being arguments over his determination to drive his boat.

The six on board that night were under 21, all were ejected from the vessel and all but Beach made it to shore.

The group had gone by boat to an oyster roast on Paukie Island before they left to head back around midnight.

Witnesses at the party said they urged the group not to travel by boat as it was foggy and cold, and they had been drinking.

Paul was 'grossly intoxicated', got into an argument in a bar and insisted on driving the boat, according to testimony.

Anthony Cook, who was Mallory's boyfriend, said Paul was behaving erratically in the moments before the crash.

Altman recalled that the group repeatedly urged him to let someone else drive the boat.

'I yelled at him once and he just told me... he was like... shut the eff up and sit the eff down. Nobody else is driving my boat,' Altman said.

Cook said Paul started yelling at his girlfriend and slapped her, before stripping down into his underwear in the 40 degree weather.

'Paul for some reason acted like he was on drugs or something. He started taking his clothes off during one of the arguments, and it is 40 degrees outside,' Cook said in his testimony.

'I've seen him do it a few times when gets drinks. I don't know why he does that.'

Paul then allegedly pushed the boat full throttle and it took off.

'We went from a two-mile-per-hour idle to the bow of the boat sticking up in the air and I went to the back,' said Cook.

Cook pulled Beach down next to him and held onto her, he testified.

The boat crashed into bridge pilings that lead to Parris Island.

Cook said the next thing he knew he was 'waking up' in the water, grabbing at piles of weed and debris and fighting against the swift current and frigid temperatures.

All of the survivors testified to Murdaugh being drunk and there being arguments over his determination to drive his boat. Beach's boyfriend Anthony Cook offered to get an Uber but Murdaugh was insistent they would travel by boat despite the fog and the lack of any light on the vessel

We went from a two-mile-per-hour idle to the bow of the boat sticking up in the air and I went to the back,' Anthony Cook said as he described the accident

Corporal John Keener, an officer on the scene on the night of the crash, spoke about Murdaught being 'belligerent and stupid' and generally difficult

Both Cook and Altman told how Murdaugh, 'slapped, pushed and spat' on his girlfriend Doughty as the bitter arguing continued

Doughty told how she and Beach cowered in the boat with their arms 'intertwined,' as Murdaugh continued the journey that was doomed to end in such tragedy

All six were thrown from the boat with the five survivors quickly establishing that nobody could locate Beach.

It took dive teams nine days to find her body in the water.

In an emotional Facebook post barely a month after Beach's death Cook wrote how he would have to live the rest of his life, 'with the memory of getting thrown into the freezing pitch black water with the true love of my life in my arms.'

He wrote, 'I had to swim against that current for 15 minutes in a panic screaming her name begging her to answer me. I had to swim to shore without her to save my own life and live in regret of that forever. I'm reminded of that by every little thing all day everyday!'

Cook also testified that Paul would often get drunk and become a 'crazy' different person, earning him the nickname 'Timmy'.

'It's a different name because he turns into a completely - totally different person. So somebody will say, 'All right. Here comes Timmy. We got to go.''

Paul's then girlfriend, Morgan Doughty, also testified that he was 'an angry drunk,' who thought he was 'invincible.'

Paul pleaded not guilty and was due to stand trial.

Paul's ex-girlfriend Morgan Doughty (pictured together) has been cooperating. According to Doughty, Paul was, 'an angry drunk,' who thought he was 'invincible'

Anthony Cook posted a heartbreaking tribute to his girlfriend Mallory who he called 'the love of my life'

The day after the boating accident - and weeks before Paul was charged - the 14th Circuit solicitor's office told the attorney general about the conflict of interest.

The first two judges to whom the wrongful death civil lawsuit was assigned, recused themselves and it was eventually handed to a judge from another county.

The Beach family released a statement after the murders saying they hoped the killer would be brought to justice.

'The Beach Family extends its deepest and warmest sympathies to the Murdaugh family during this terrible time.

'Having suffered the devastating loss of their own daughter, the family prays that the Murdaughs can find some level of peace from this tragic loss.

'They would like the family and the community to know that their thoughts and continued prayers are with the Murdaughs.

Authorities are refusing to release almost any information about the investigation despite state rules. Colleton County Sheriff's Office released this one-line statement Tuesday

'It is their most sincere hope that someone will come forward and cooperate with authorities so that the perpetrator of these senseless crimes can be brought to justice.'

Paul's family connections are believed by some in the local community to have landed him with softer treatment from prosecutors.

There are now growing concerns the family's powerful role in the county's legal system could jeopardize the current murder investigation and the search for the killer or killers.

The sheriff's office handed the case to SLED last week due to the Murdaugh family ties to the 14th Circuit solicitor's office, according to The Post and Courier.

Alec works as a part time prosecutor for the office.

On Thursday, Randolph Murdaugh III - Paul's grandfather and Margaret's father-in-law, died aged 81 from an unspecified illness

Three generations of the family - Alec's father, grandfather and great-grandfather - ran the office nearly consecutively from 1920 through 2005.

It is now headed up by non-family member Duffie Stone.

However, the 14th Circuit solicitor's office is still involved with the investigation and has not handed off the case, reported The Post and Courier.

Funerals were held Friday for Paul and Margaret. Hundreds including public officials gathered for the service as they were laid to rest in Hampton Cemetery.

As well as dominating the 14th Circuit solicitor's office, Randolph Murdaugh also founded law firm Peters, Murdaugh, Parker, Eltzroth & Detrick in 1910.

The Murdaugh family's power has helped them accrue vast amounts of wealth in the county, including owning more than 1,700 acres of land including the hunting lodge where the double murders took place.

They have been struck by other tragedy in the past with Randolph Murdaugh I killed when a freight train hit his car back in 1940.


A former assistant principal in Alabama has admitted to filming his young daughter's friend naked in the shower after previously blaming his nine-year-old son for elicit videos found on his school-issued laptop.

Tim Clevenger, 54, pleaded guilty to two new counts each of production and possession of child pornography in a separate case with a different victim on Thursday in Blount County District Court.

In his plea Clevenger confessed for the first time that he was the one who secretly recorded his daughter's friend - who was 14 at the time - in the bathroom of his home back in 2013.

Investigators uncovered the video in 2015 when he was still working as an assistant principal at Locust Fork High School. At the time Clevenger claimed that his son had downloaded the child pornography onto his laptop.

In 2018 Clevenger was convicted on several charges of production and possession of child pornography related to the video of the 14-year-old girl. He is currently serving his sentence at the Alabama Department of Corrections.

Tim Clevenger, 54, (pictured) admitted that he was the one who secretly recorded his daughter's friend in the bathroom of his home back in 2013 after initially placing the blame on his young son

Clevenger worked as an assistant principal at Locust Fork High School for 11 years and had been in the Blount County Schools system for 18 years prior to his arrest in 2015.

The new charges Clevenger pleaded guilty to on Thursday stemmed from a video of a girl under the age of 16 that was discovered on a school owned laptop when he sent it to the district's central office for technical support.

Investigators said he recorded the girl through the blinds of his home while she was in the shower in December 2013, WBRC.com reported.

After a search warrant for additional electronic devices at his home and school was issued, video of the additional victim was found and he was arrested in 2017 for the second victim.

Prosecutors said Clevenger recorded both victims when they came over to visit his daughter, AL.com reported.

Clevenger worked as an assistant principal at Locust Fork High School (pictured) for 11 years and had been in the Blount County Schools system for 18 years prior to his arrest

Investigators said the videos were taken at night when the girls were unaware that he was outside watching them.

During his initial trial in 2018 Clevenger shifted the blame for the videos to his nine-year-old son, claiming he was the one who recorded the girls and downloaded the videos onto his computer, District Attorney Pamela L. Casey said.

The DA said evidence proved that downloads took place at 1.30am on Clevenger's school computer and that there was no physical way that the young boy could have been the one to download the child pornography.

'Today, for the first time, Tim Clevenger admitted that he perpetuated these horrific crimes against a young girl,' Casey said.

'In 2018, he refused to acknowledge his guilt in the trial related to the first victim and instead testified that his young son had snuck out of the house at night and took these videos and downloaded them onto this computer.'

'It takes a real piece of crap to blame their own child for committing such vile acts knowing that they had actually done it,' Casey added.

The second victim showed up in court on Thursday to hear Clevenger admit his guilt.

The D.A asked that his sentence for the second victim run consecutively with the first, but the judge decided to run them concurrently instead.
A Chicago police officer has been fired for allegedly shooting a friend in the head, leaving him with a brain injury, and then lying about it for a decade.

Patrolman Patrick Kelly learned of his termination after the Chicago Police Board voted Thursday to oust him from the force for the January 2010 shooting of Michael LaPorta and the coverup that followed.

Kelly told investigators that LaPorta, a close friend, shot himself with the officer's gun in a botched suicide attempt during a night of heavy drinking. The officer was off-duty at the time and denied being drunk.

Chicago Police Board has voted 8-0 to fire Patrolman Patrick Kelly (left) for the 2010 shooting of Michael LaPorta (right), leaving him with a traumatic brain injury and in a wheelchair

The shooting left LaPorta with a traumatic brain injury that has rendered him unable to walk or live independently.

Kelly was never criminally charged. Cook County prosecutors reviewed the case and determined a jury was unlikely to find the longtime patrolman guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.

He was stripped of his police powers after he refused to answer questions on the witness stand during the trial of a lawsuit that LaPorta had filed against him.

For years, Chicago city lawyers defended Kelly, but when the case was reviewed in 2017, investigators concluded that Kelly was the one who pulled the trigger and then blamed the shooting on LaPorta, reported CBS Chicago.

LaPorta, known as Mikey, spent two months in the hospital after the shooting, followed by two more months in a rehabilitation facility. The bullet from the shooting remains lodged in his head.

Also in 2017, a federal jury found the city repeatedly failed to identify Kelly as a problem before he shot LaPorta, and set the damages at $44.7million - the most ever awarded in Illinois in a police misconduct case.

But this past February, the 7th US Court of Appeals tossed the record-setting judgment against Chicago, ruling that the city cannot be held liable for the shooting because Kelly was off-duty and none of LaPorta's federal rights were violated.

Kelly claimed that LaPorta (pictured), a close friend, shot himself with officer's service weapon in a botched suicide attempt after night of drinking

Kelly remained employed by the Chicago Police Department and received his $87,000-a-year salary until he took disability leave in 2019.

On Thursday, Chicago's police disciplinary body voted 8-0 to fire Kelly, reported Chicago Tribune.

'[Kellys] actions in shooting of Michael LaPorta in the head were reckless, violent, and unjustified,' the Chicago Police Board wrote. 'The Board finds that returning [Kelly] to his position as a police officer, in which he would be armed and authorized to use deadly force, poses an unacceptable risk to the safety of the public.'

Kelly could appeal his firing to the Cook County Circuit Court.

LaPorta's attorney praised the firing as a 'small measure of justice' for his client and blamed the Chicago Police Department for keeping Kelly on the force for years, even as he racked up dozens of misconduct allegations and use of force reports.

A 2017 investigation by the Chicago Tribune uncovered that Kelly has been declared mentally unfit for duty twice during his career and arrested twice.

'After years and years of egregious and violent behavior, and police denials that Patrick Kelly was a danger to the community, it is no more than a relief that he is finally off the force,' said lawyer Antonio Romanucci.
An autistic student died after he was restrained by teachers at a Texas special needs school, a new report has revealed.

Xavier Hernandez, 21, passed away March 1, after being rushed to hospital from Boulevard Heights - a school for disabled students in Fort Worth.

Medical examiners have not yet determined Hernandez' cause of death, but his family believe there is no way he died from natural causes and want someone to be held 'financially or criminally' accountable.

'Someone is responsible for his death,' Hernandez' aunt, Ebonie Baltimore, told the Fort Worth Star Telegram on Thursday. 'We need to know what happened to him'.

Xavier Hernandez, 21, passed away March 1, after being restrained by employees at Boulevard Heights - a school set up for disabled students in Fort Worth

'Someone is responsible for his death,' Hernandez' aunt, Ebonie Baltimore, told Fort Worth Star Telegram on Thursday. The pair are pictured in an old social media snap

Hernandez arrived at Boulevard Heights around 8am on the day of his death, before dispatch records show the school called for an ambulance at 10.44am.

Due to the severity of Hernandez' autism, he was required to be in the presence of a school employee at all times, so his family insist that someone knows exactly what happened to him. But Baltimore alleges that the school has not been forthcoming with information.

A spokesperson confirmed to Fort Worth Star Telegram that a school employee restrained Hernandez sometime before the ambulance was called, but would not say whether that was directly linked to his subsequent death.

Disability Rights Texas are investigating reports that the restraints used in Hernandez' case were improper and unnecessary.

Texas state law mandates that schools notify a parent or guardian within 24 hours if they have had to restrain a student.

And while Boulevard Heights got in contact with the Hernandez family in this instance, the school is under fire for not reporting a separate restraining incident to another student's parents.

On May 7, a bystander captured video of fourth-grade student Toni Crenshaw being pinned down by six employees at the school

On May 7, a bystander captured video of fourth-grade student Toni Crenshaw being pinned down by six employees at the school.

The disturbing video - which was filmed just two months after Hernandez' death - shows Crenshaw shrieking for the teachers to get off her.

The girls' mom, Sandra Crosby, told Fort Worth Star Telegram that she only learned of what happened to her daughter after the video went viral on social media.

'It did something to my soul,' Crosby stated. 'I had a long talk with my baby and let her know it's never OK for this to happen.'

Crosby has now pulled her daughter out of Boulevard Heights saying she doesn't feel safe having her daughter enrolled there.

Meanwhile, Hernandez' family are awaiting the results of an autopsy which they believe will shed more light on what really happened at the school that day.

They told Fort Worth Star Telegram that they are unafraid to contact attorneys to pursue legal action against Boulevard Heights if necessary.
A property developer has launched an appeal against a 300,00 fine after he had a 176-year-old giant redwood tree cut down to make way for new homes.

Director Fiorenzo Sauro, 49 paid for the chopping down of 70 protected trees in Swansea, which included one of Britain's first ever giant redwoods.

The tree contractor who carried out the illegal felling was fined another 120,000 for the destruction caused in the ancient woodlands in Penllergaer.

A court previously heard that the 90ft redwood tree was estimated to be worth more than 66,000 but, in reality, it is 'irreplaceable.'

Planted in 1842, the tree was on British shores around 10 years before redwood seeds are credited with being brought to Britain from America.

Director Fiorenzo Sauro (pictured outside Swansea Magistrates' Court), 49, paid for the chopping down of 70 protected trees including one of Britain's first ever giant redwoods

The site has been earmarked for 80 new homes being built by Sauro and his company, Enzo Homes Ltd.

The tree was planted by John Dillwyn Llewelyn who imported trees from all over the world.

A judge ruled that the felling of the tree was deliberate despite Sauro insisting it was an accident.

He is now appealing against the fine, and has said the redwood was 'never meant to come down.'

An appeal hearing at Swansea Crown Court heard that Sauro has received abusive messages online following his conviction, and that there was 'no financial gain' to be received by chopping down the historic tree.

The 176-year-old redwood tree (pictured) was felled to make way for new homes in the area

'The whole matter had an effect on the company's reputation,' he said. 'We had abuse on social media, on email, by letters, we had threats.'

He told the court the trees had been marked with a silver tag to show contractors which ones should not be chopped down, and that trees which did not need to be preserved were marked with a red cross.

He returned to the site the following morning having been told there had been a 'balls up' which resulted in the tree being chopped down by contractor Arwyn Morgan.

The court heard that Morgan, 50, told Sauro that 'the tree had die back on it and it had to come down and it was not marked' when he arrived on site.

The redwood was just one of many trees felled in the area to make way for 80 new homes

The court heard that Morgan said the tree 'had die back on it and it had to come down'

'It was clear the tree protection plan showed the redwood was to be retained,' Sauro told the court.

'Anyone who saw the tree protection plan would know this was never meant to come down'.

Morgan was previously fined 120,000 after pleading guilty to contravening tree preservation regulations.

Enzo Homes were fined 120,000 and Sauro was fined 180,000.

The case, which is sitting in Swansea Civic Centre, continues.
The woman whose 911 call led to the fatal police shooting of South Africa Idol contestant and Zulu 'prince' Lindani Myeni has claimed she reported him because she feared he was going to attack her when he entered the Airbnb she was renting with her husband in Hawaii.

Myeni, a married black father-of-two from the Zulu Kingdom in South Africa, was unarmed when he was shot and killed by Honolulu Police officers on April 14 in the city's Nuuanu neighborhood. Police said he violently resisted arrest when they responded to reports of an intruder.

An attorney for the woman who made the 911 call - Shiying 'Sabine' Wang - shared her side of the story with the Honolulu Star-Advertiser on Friday after he filed a complaint with the FBI on behalf of Sabine and her husband Da Ju 'Dexter' Wang.

The attorney, Scot S. Brower, alleged that Myeni, who was said to have mistaken the home for a temple next door, had followed the Wangs in their car that night and ran up behind them while recording video of them on his phone as they entered the Airbnb.

Bowser said Sabine dialed 911 because she believed Myeni was at their residence to attack them amid a string of anti-Asian hate crimes plaguing the nation.

Shiying 'Sabine' Wang is seen calling 911 moments before police shot dead Lindani Myeni outside her Honolulu home on April 14. Sabine claims she made the call because she believed Myeni was going to attack her and her husband after he mistook their home for his Airbnb

Shiying and her husband (pictured) alleged that Myeni had been following and filming them before entering their residence for over six minutes

Police said Myeni (pictured) was staying down the road from the property, followed Sabine into her home, and exhibited 'odd' behavior before 'charging' at cops who arrived on the scene

According to Brower, footage released earlier this week by the an attorney for Myeni's family - which showed him repeatedly apologizing to the Wangs after entering the home - only captured part of the incident, excluding the nearly six minutes when he was inside.

During that time Brower said Myeni rummaged through two bedrooms and told the couple that he owned the home as well as the 10-year-old cat that lives there.

'This Myeni had said to Sabine when he first arrived that "I have video on you, you know why I am here,"' Brower said.

'They never recognized him before. He followed them to the house, and at some point Sabine turned around, he ducked in and tried to make it look like he was taking off his shoes. It is clear that when he ducked down it was evasive, and that's how my client Sabine recognized it.

'He didn't come into the house with any consent; he didn't come into the house with any permission. In the house he claimed he lived there, he claimed he owned the cat. The owner of the house owns the cat and has for 10 years. He walked down the hallways alone and was heard rummaging in the back rooms. My clients are very traumatized by this thing. Obviously, this is something that most human beings don't experience in their entire lifetime.'

Brower claimed that Myeni never conveyed to the couple that he was looking for the nearby ISKCON temple, a lodging adjacent to the Honolulu residence that the Wangs were renting.

'At no time during the entire encounter did he mention the temple. This charade that he was going to a temple is mistaken. A reasonable person that was lost or looking for something would have mentioned it,' he said.

Brower asserted that the Wangs had reason to fear for their lives as the US has seen a surge in hate crimes against Asians and Asian-Americans in recent months.

According to Brower, footage released earlier this week by the an attorney for Myeni's family - which showed him repeatedly apologizing to the Wangs after entering the home - only captured part of the incident, excluding the nearly six minutes when he was inside

Sabine's attorney said she believed Myeni was there to commit an Anti-Asian hate crime amidst growing assault rates on Asians and Asian-Americans across the US

Last month, DailyMail.com reported that a homeless man attacked a female Asian police officer in San Francisco, while an elderly Asian woman was sucker-punched in Queens, New York, leaving her with a fractured eye socket and broken nose and two black eyes.

In NYC alone, anti-Asian hate crimes have noticeably spiked, with 86 reports this year compared to just 19 the same time last year in 2020.

Reaction to Myeni's death has prompted the likes of Al Sharpton to condemn the Honolulu Police Department for the fatal shooting.

The doorbell camera footage released by Myeni's family attorney, James J. Bickerton, earlier this week showed him repeatedly apologizing to the couple who were staying there before police arrived and shot him dead.

It shows Myeni, 29, following the couple toward the porch of the home, taking off his shoes and entering the property after them. He appears to be calm.

He then quickly leaves after his presence appears to have confused the Airbnb occupants, repeatedly saying 'sorry'.

Seconds later, Shiying runs out and points Myeni out to police officers, who are responding to a 911 call about Myeni entering the property. Police bodycam footage previously released shows what happened next.

It shows Myeni ignoring commands to get on the ground outside the house he entered, a stun gun fired by police either malfunctioning or having no effect on Myeni.

It also shows that an officer fired several gunshots at the black man before identifying themselves as 'Police!'

Myeni was taken to hospital where he died. The exact time lapse between Myeni arriving at the Airbnb and the fatal shooting is not clear.

The footage released Tuesday has some lapses in time and is edited, merging parts of the doorcam, 911 call and bodycam.

Police had previously released short clips of body camera footage and the 911 call made by Shiying - but made no mention of the doorcam footage.

The family attorney claimed Honolulu Police reviewed the doorcam footage on the night Myeni was shot dead and went to court to block its release.

Bickerton said Myeni mistook the home for the ISKCON Hawaii Hare Krishna temple, which is next door to the Airbnb on Coelho Way. DailyMail.com has contacted the temple for comment; its leaders didn't immediately respond.

Myeni's wife has previously said her husband took off his shoes as a mark of respect - as she said is customary in the Zulu Kingdom.

Following the shooting, police initially said they had responded to a home invasion. They said Myeni's strange behavior frightened the occupants and that he violently attacked responding police officers, leaving one hospitalized with a concussion.

Lindani Myeni on a beach in Waimanalo, Hawaii with his wife and two children. Myeni, a married black father-of-two from the Zulu Kingdom in South Africa, was shot and killed by Honolulu Police officers back on April 14 in the Nuuanu neighborhood

The doorbell footage begins with the lights of two vehicles pulling up outside the Airbnb at 91 Coehlo Way at 8.07pm.

The captions on the footage say that the address is next door to a temple, which has a similar semi-circular driveway and columns.

The Wangs are then seen walking up to the front door of the property.

According to depositions in the lawsuit, Shiying and her husband were tourists from New Jersey staying in the multi-unit dwelling, the lawyers said.

Da Ju is ahead of his wife. Myeni is then seen walking up behind them. He is wearing a face mask and his umqhele, a traditional Zulu headband.

Dexter opens the door and enters followed by Sabine, who turns and watches as Myeni stops at the porch and bends to take off his shoes.

She pauses and watches him before following her husband inside the property.

Myeni slowly talks off his shoes and strolls in after them.

Voices are heard from inside the home, but they are unclear in the recording

Moments later, Myeni exits the property and stands, still wearing his mask, looking back inside.

Shiying is heard making a 911 call - although Myeni's lawyer says the first one heard of the tape is just pretend; she doesn't actually call 911 until a bit later.

'Hello, someone just break in, breaking into my house he's in front of our door,' she says, as Myeni stands outside.

The doorcam cuts out at this point, according to the lawyers. It is 8.09pm.

Shiying then actually called 911 and told an operator about the man: That call was recorded by 911 dispatch.

The 911 audio - which was previously released - captures Dexter in the background saying: 'We have no temple.'

The couple - Shiying 'Sabine' Wang and her husband Da Ju 'Dexter' Wang - are seen walking up to the front door of the property

Myeni is seen walking up behind them. He is wearing a face mask and his umqhele, a traditional Zulu headband

Myeni calmly stops at the porch and bends to take off his shoes before strolling in after them

Shiying is heard saying: 'Please leave.'

When asked who is in the property, she replies to say: 'He says Lindon from South Africa,' before adding that she does not know if the man knows the owner of the home they are renting as an Airbnb.

The operator asks if he has any weapons in his hands to which she replies, 'No.'

She also confirms he is not yelling at them.

The footage released by the attorney moves back to the doorcam at this stage.

At this point, Myeni is seen walking back out of the property and turning to ask: 'What's wrong?'

'Who are you?' shouts Shiying, sounding more hysterical.

Myeni then repeatedly says: 'I'm sorry.'

'I know you guys though. May I see your phone?' he adds.

Shiying is heard on the 911 call saying he tried to go outside.

Da Ju is heard saying: 'My wife is so afraid and I don't know what's going on. I don't know. He said his name is Lindon.'

The attorney said he was on the phone to the Airbnb owner James H. Hall. Hall didn't comment.

Myeni is then seen calmly walking out of the home. He puts his shoes back on and walks back in the direction of his car, again apologizing: 'Sorry.'

Da Ju calmly walks out to see where he has gone and tells Hall: 'He apologized and he just left.'

Voices are heard from inside the home but they are unclear. Moments later, Myeni exits the property and stands, still wearing his mask, looking back inside. Sabine is heard appearing to pretend to make a 911 call claiming 'someone just break in'

The occupants then call 911. Myeni is then seen calmly walking out of the home repeatedly apologizing

He puts his shoes back on and walks back in the direction of his car, again apologizing: 'Sorry'

Shiying is heard on the 911 call growing more hysterical saying: 'I am afraid to go outside.'

Da Ju says: 'He apologized for [inaudible] and just left.'

Shiying is heard sobbing and says: 'Yes I see, car is here. He's still in the community. I think the police officer can stop him.'

'I saw a car...' she says, with her voice becoming inaudible.

The operator asks Sabine if she remembers what his car looks like.

The video released by the family attorney shows the doorcam and the police bodycam footage side by side, giving different perspectives of the same moment and what happens next.

In the doorcam, Shiying runs out of the front door and points at Myeni in the distance saying 'that's him' as the officers arrived on the scene. Neither Myeni nor the officers are visible in this footage.

In the bodycam, Shiying's voice can be heard and the outline of a man - now known to be Myeni - is seen in front of the officer.

'Get on the ground now,' one officer is heard repeatedly saying.

'Who are you? Who are you?' Myeni asks.

Police bodycam footage previously released shows none of the officers identified themselves as police until they had already fired three gunshots at Myeni.

It was also pitch black outside at the time.

Myeni's family say he would not have known the people shining bright lights in his eyes in the darkness were police.

He likely mistook the house for a similar looking dwelling that houses a temple next door that's open to the public, the lawsuit said.

Lindani Myeni in his South Africa Idol audition. His wife has filed a lawsuit claiming he was racially discriminated against

The lawyers said they were still evaluating full, unredacted body camera footage for the period after the shooting.

A statement from the lawyers who released the video said Honolulu police 'tried to convince the public that this was a burglary and that Lindani Myeni was acting erratically; but the doorbell video we have now obtained from the owner shows that HPD knew all along these stories were untrue.'

The statement added: 'We have also compelled the City to turn over unredacted body cam footage in its original format, producing much better quality audio and images than the version that HPD played for the press on April 16, 2021.'

Police officials didn't immediately respond to a request for comment after the widow's lawyers released the video.

'Mr. Myeni's death is tragic,' Mayor Rick Blangiardi said in a statement. 'We await both sides making their arguments in court, consequently I have no further comment at this time.'

Officials previously released clips from two of the three bodycams worn by cops from the night of the incident; a third was not activated during the struggle.

The clips show three gunshots rang out before an officer says, 'police.'

Acting Deputy Chief Allan Nagata has acknowledged police did not initially identify themselves but said: 'They were in the fight for their lives. They were very brave. They didn't shoot or discharge the firearm right away. This was not a case of overreaction.'

Honolulu police body camera footage of the fatal shooting shows three gunshots rang out before an officer says 'police'

The officer yells repeatedly for Myeni to get on the ground. Shots ring out and then after a pause, an officer said, 'police'

'They didn't identify themselves, but hey, let's be honest. They're in uniform, right? They're coming there with the police cars. Although it is dark, it's pretty clear.'

Myeni had assaulted the officers, punching one of them until the officer briefly lost consciousness, Nagata said.

The first clip - which is badly lit - begins with a woman crying and telling an officer: 'That's him.'

Myeni, who did not have criminal history, is then seen in the driveway of the home. An officer tells him: 'Get on the ground now.'

After Myeni walks towards the cop a struggle ensues with the officer filming the altercation appearing to be knocked to the floor.

A second clip from a third officer on the scene shows Myeni engages in a struggle with the two other officers.

That third officer deploys his taser before a shot is fired. Three more then follow.

Towards the end of the video an officer then yells 'police.'

Police said the taser was ineffective in subduing Myeni, who then charged at the third officer and punched him.

Myeni then allegedly ran back at the first officer who fired a single gunshot at him.

The Airbnb on Coelho Way in the Nuuanu neighborhood where the married father-of-two from the Zulu Kingdom in South Africa was shot and killed by Honolulu Police officers on April 14

The shot did not stop the Myeni, who tackled the officer to the ground, straddling him and punching him repeatedly, police said.

At this point, the second cop fired three rounds at Myeni, who fell to the ground, police said.

'This all happened in less than one minute from officer one's arrival,' Ballard said.

Myeni was taken to The Queen's Medical Center in critical condition with multiple gunshot wounds where he later died from his injuries.

One cop was hospitalized with major facial injuries and concussion following the incident while the other two also sustained injuries.

Myeni's wife Lindsay Myeni filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the city and the three cops involved in his death, claiming wrongful death, negligence and assault and battery.

The suit claims both the renters of the home at 91 Coelho Way and the officers racially discriminated against Myeni because he was black, with the cops 'treating him as less than a human being.'

Myeni's American wife has also insisted he was not a violent person and has suggested his actions may have been the result of cultural differences after he moved to Hawaii in January.

Bickerton is trying to depose Shiying, her husband Da Ju and the owner of the home to question them over the incident.

Lindani Myeni with his wife and two children. The family says Myeni mistook the home for at the ISKCON Hawaii temple next door to the Airbnb on Coelho Way

'After Mr. Myeni arrived by car and removed his shoes upon entering the transient accommodations house on the Property, Mr. Myeni became aware that he was unwelcome and left the house peacefully,' the suit filed on April 22 claims.

'The response by the occupants of the Property was motivated by Mr. Myeni's race and constituted racial discrimination in public accommodation.'

The attorney said, as an Airbnb rental, discrimination by persons owning, operating or controlling the establishment on grounds of race is illegal.

Before Myeni's shooting, police had been called to numerous other incidents at the Airbnb including a vehicle break-in and the property was also subject to seven complaints from 2019 to 2020 of it being used as an illegal short-term rental.

The suit also claims the responding officers treated Myeni differently because of his race.

'This conduct towards Mr. Myeni, treating him as less than a human being regardless of whatever alleged 'crime' was being investigated and callously not deigning to explain themselves, their identity, or their purpose, was motivated by racial discrimination towards people of Mr. Myeni's African descent,' it reads.

Honolulu Police Chief Susan Ballard has denied race was a factor in Myeni's death previously saying it was 'nothing to do with race' but insisted that the officers' lives were 'in jeopardy.'

'I think what we need to remember is it had nothing to do with race. It had to do with behavior and the fact that this person seriously injured the officers and their lives were in jeopardy,' Ballard said.

The family's suit also claims the officers tried to take Myeni 'by surprise' as they did not announce they were law enforcement officers.

Myeni pictured with his wife. The family filed a suit on April 22 against the cops and the city

Myeni's family has cast doubts on the police's version of events, with his American wife Lindsay (pictured together) saying he was not a violent person

Myeni (pictured with his wife). They also claim cops treated 'him as less than a human being' due to being black

'Unbeknown to Mr. Myeni, the police decided to treat this non-violent and peaceful entry into, and departure from, a place of public accommodation, as a crime in progress, and arrived at the scene without lights, sirens or other indicators of their presence in an apparent attempt to take the 'perpetrator' by surprise,' the suit reads.

'As there was no moon present in the sky at the time and this was a residential street in Nuuanu, it was dark.

'As Mr. Myeni stood still, unarmed, on the side of the driveway just a few feet off the street, one of the Officers, while hysterical screams of 'that's him' emanated from a person standing in the doorway of the house on the Property, suddenly shone the flashlight directly in Mr. Myeni's eyes and held a pistol in the flashlight beam pointed at Mr. Myeni.'

It continues: 'At the same time, without ever announcing that he was an officer or using the word 'police,' or stating his purpose, that officer shouted several times in a rough, aggressive, disrespectful, and threatening manner 'get on the ground.'

The family also claim the Honolulu Police Department has also refused to hand over Myeni's cellphone to either them or to prosecutors probing the man's death.

'What are they hiding?,' Bickerton said to the Star-Advertiser.

The lawyer said the family wants to both retrieve personal family photos and try to use the call and map history on the phone to piece together the night's events.

Lindsay Myeni, who was born in the US but met her husband while she was on missionary work in South Africa, previously told Hawaii News Now she does not know what led him to visit the home.

However, she dismissed the claims it was a burglary, describing him as the 'most gentle person' and suggesting different cultural norms may have meant his actions were misunderstood by the residents.

The shooting happened three months after Lindani and Lindsay Myeni moved to Hawaii, where she grew up.

The couple believed Hawaii's diversity would make it the safest U.S. state to raise their two black children, she said.

Lindsay suggested his actions may have been the result of cultural differences after he moved to Hawaii in January. Lindsay said in the Zulu Kingdom it is customary to go into 'anyone's home' and taking off his shoes was a mark of respect

Myeni is from the Zulu Kingdom where it is customary for people to visit 'anyone's house', she said.

'In Zulu culture you can go to anyone's house. You can knock on anyone's door. It doesn't matter if it's 8 o'clock it's not a big deal. Neighbor are neighbors,' she told Hawaii News Now.

Lindsay added that the fact he took off his shoes shows he believed he was showing the homeowners respect.

'It says he took off his shoes. I'm sure he did that as a sign of respect,' she told the outlet.

Lindsay said her husband had been on his way home to the house they shared with their two children just down the street from the now-crime scene.

He had been at the Pali Lookout earlier that day and seemed his usual self, she said, adding she had spoken to him less than 20 minutes before the incident unfolded.

'He was on his way home. So for whatever reason, he stopped to talk to this neighbor - that literally is down the street from us,' she said.

'I don't know why he stopped at those people's house,' she said, adding that they didn't know each other.

She insisted he 'wouldn't burglarize' saying: 'We have money. We have everything we need. We're not looking for anything. He wanted to talk to them for some reason.'

Lindsay told the outlet she could not understand what had happened as he is the 'most gentle person... and the best father.'

She added: 'We've got two babies under 2. I've got to go to sleep every night without him.'

Myeni appeared on Idols (South Africa) in 2013 and was the nephew of a rural king's village in the Zulu Kingdom, meaning he has the rank of a prince.

His death came one week after Honolulu Police officers shot and killed 16-year-old Iremamber Sykap (pictured) during a car chase on April 5

He also used to play rugby for KZN club in Durban.

Myeni and his wife met six years ago when she was on a Christian mission in the country.

They lived in South Africa for three years before moving to the US and then relocating to Hawaii in January.

Myeni was supposed to have his green card interview the following week after his death, his wife said.

'We dated, got engaged and got married before he ever came to America,' Lindsay told Hawaii News Now.

'He never wanted to come to America. It was never anything he was interested in. He loves his people. He is from the Zulu tribe. They speak Zulu.'

Myeni's death came one week after Honolulu Police officers also shot and killed 16-year-old Iremamber Sykap during a car chase on April 5.

Sykap died from multiple gunshot wounds following a police chase that started on the East side of O'ahu and ended near Kalakaua Avenue.

Six people were in the car, with two of them shot by officers in the incident.

Sykap was taken to a hospital where he died while the other person shot - a 14-year-old boy - survived.

Police said the car was involved in an armed robbery just 20 minutes prior to the shooting.

Both males killed in the officer-involved shootings are thought to have been unarmed at the time.

These officer-involved shootings come as the nation is reeling from multiple other police killings of predominantly black men across the US.
A repulsive phone call made by child murderer Rick Thorburn after killing his foster daughter has been revealed at an inquest into the schoolgirl's tragic death.

Thorburn and his wife Julene complained journalists were 'out to get them' in a chilling recorded phone call made from a Queensland prison on June 1.

During the call the pair expressed a desire to 'live their lives' without being hassled following the murder of their 12-year-old foster daughter Tiahleigh Palmer in late October 2015.

Coroner Jane Bentley ruled Thorburn strangled Tiahleigh when he found out his son Trent had previously had sex with the minor.

Tiahleigh Palmer was killed between 7.30 and 9.30pm on the 29th of October 2015, the Deputy State Coroner Jane Bentley said

Ms Bentley said Tiahleigh Palmer was most likely choked or asphyxiated by Rick Thorburn (pictured)

The court heard Thorburn deliberately avoided passing on details of the murder to police and possibly sexually abused Tiahleigh himself.

The call shows the married couple felt they were the ones being victimised.

'When we go into the courtroom, if they want anything out of me they can tell a heap of people to f... off otherwise they'll get nothing,' Mr Thorburn told his wife on the phone from behind bars.

'I will go to my grave with what I've got. If the Coroners Court don't like that, well that's their f...ing problem, not mine.'

Mrs Thorburn replied: 'We would all talk a lot happier and as ourselves without them there. But everything we say and do, they are going to twist to put in the news  and that's what makes it very restrictive. So it makes us very reserved to speak at all.'

Her husband responded by promising to say he 'could not remember' what happened on the night he murdered Tiahleigh when in court.

'That's what I'll say  just say the words, `I can't recall' and what have they got then?

'F... all. Just leave it up to me to say everything. I can say and do what I want but you, you can't, you know,' he told his wife.

Mrs Thorburn then stated: 'That's it  we've got to live our lives without them (media) hassling us... anything we say and do they are going to twist and make us look disgusting aren't they?'

To which an unremorseful Mr Thorburn replied: 'That's right - that's what the f...wits do.'

Earlier, the coroner found schoolgirl Tiahleigh Palmer likely died as a result of choking or asphyxiation in a deliberate act by her foster father.

Convicted sex offender Thorburn told the inquest into Tiahleigh's death he 'accidentally' suffocated his foster daughter, but this was rejected by Deputy State Coroner Jane Bentley.

'I find that Richard Thorburn deliberately killed Tiahleigh, he did so at the residence of the Thorburn family between 7.30pm and 9.30pm on the 29th of October 2015,' she said, handing down her findings on Friday.

Julene Thorburn, the foster mother of murdered schoolgirl Tiahleigh Palmer, felt she was the victim after the death of the minor

Trent Thorburn confessed to his mother Julene that he'd had sex with the schoolgirl and feared her stomach pains were a sign she was pregnant

While the exact cause of death could not be conclusively determined, Ms Bentley said Tiahleigh was most likely choked or asphyxiated.

Mr Thorburn sobbed while reading a one-page statement - he says was written about four years ago - in the Coroner's Court last week.

He said he had 'no recollection' of being told by his wife on the day Tiahleigh died that his son had previously had sex with the 12-year-old.

Asked whether there may be a link between the circumstances of him killing Tiahleigh and finding out about the sexual relationship, he answered: 'I don't know'.

He also told the inquest he was 'coerced into pleading guilty' earlier to multiple charges of sexual assault for offences unrelated to Tiahleigh's death.

They included a string of child sex offences after he sexually assaulted two young girls at his Brisbane home in 2015 and 2016.

Despite internal reviews and criminal trials, no one knows what happened to Tiahleigh in her final moments, a pre-inquest hearing was told in May.

Rick Thorburn is believed to have strangled Tiahleigh Palmer (pictured) in 2015 when he found out his son Trent had previously had sex with the minor

Trent Thorburn was sentenced to four years' jail in 2017 after admitting he had sex with Tiahleigh Palmer

'(Thorburn) has pleaded guilty to her murder but has never given an account, either on oath or otherwise, as to how he killed her,' counsel assisting the coroner Kate McMahon said during the hearing.

In the hours before Tiahleigh died, she had been to a hip-hop dance class where she complained of stomach pains.

That same night, Thorburn's son Trent confessed to his mother Julene that he'd had sex with the schoolgirl and feared the stomach pains were a sign she was pregnant.

Thornburn and his wife feared a pregnancy could mean Trent would go to jail for incest charges, according to earlier proceedings.

That night, Julene, Trent and brother Joshua went out, leaving Tiahleigh home alone with Rick Thorburn for two hours.

She was never seen alive again.

Tiahleigh's body - naked except for underpants - was badly decomposed when found by three fishermen on the banks of the Pimpama River near the Gold Coast on November 5, 2015.

Members of the Thorburn family were convicted of being part of the crime - Rick Thorburn for the murder, Trent for incest, and Julene and Joshua for being part of an elaborate cover-up.

Rick Thorburn was give a life sentence for murder.
The European Union today lost its legal action against AstraZeneca as a Belgian court ordered the drugs maker to deliver fewer vaccine doses than Brussels had demanded.

The bloc was suing for at least 120 million AstraZeneca doses by the end of June after it bitterly blamed Brexit Britain for its shortfall - despite leaders like Emmanuel Macron claiming the jab didn't work.

But a judge in Brussels ordered the Anglo-Swedish firm to deliver just 50 million doses by September 27, on top of the 30 million the firm had already provided in the first quarter - dealing yet another bloody nose to Ursula von der Leyen.

AstraZeneca hailed the judgment, saying it had already delivered more than 70 million doses to the EU - including the first quarter total - and would 'substantially exceed' the timetable set out by the judge.

The drugs firm said the judge 'also acknowledged that the difficulties experienced by AstraZeneca in this unprecedented situation had a substantial impact on the delay.'

But Von der Leyen claimed the ruling supported the EU's view that AstraZeneca - against which the bloc has recently launched a second lawsuit - had failed to meet its commitments.

'This decision confirms the position of the Commission: AstraZeneca did not live up to the commitments it made in the contract,' Von der Leyen said.

Ursula von der Leyen was dealt yet another bloody nose by a judge in Brussels on Friday who ordered the Anglo-Swedish firm to deliver 50 million doses by September 27

AstraZeneca hailed the judgment, saying it had already delivered 70 million doses to the EU and could 'substantially exceed' the timetable set out by the judge

In a statement, AstraZeneca said: 'AstraZeneca now looks toward to renewed collaboration with the European Commission to help combat the pandemic in Europe.

'The Company remains committed to broad and equitable distribution of the vaccine as laid out in the Advanced Purchase Agreement of August 2020.

'In fewer than twelve months, AstraZeneca has worked extremely hard to develop an effective vaccine at no profit and is the second-largest supplier to the EUs 27 member states.'

They added that their vaccine had shown a greater than 90 per cent reduction in severe disease and hospitalisations caused by Covid-19, as well as data from the UK which demonstrated 92 per cent effectiveness against the Indian variant.

AstraZeneca originally committed in a contract to do its best to deliver 300 million doses to the 27-nation bloc by the end of June, but production problems led the company to revise down its target to 100 million vaccines.

The supply cuts delayed the EU's vaccination drive in the first quarter of the year, when Brussels had initially bet on AstraZeneca to deliver the largest proportion of its doses.

That led to a furious dispute and to the EU's legal action to get at least 120 million doses by the end of June.

The court said in a statement that AstraZeneca must deliver 15 million doses by July 26, another 20 million by August 23 and another 15 million by September 27, for a total of 50 million more doses.

Should the company miss these deadlines it would face a penalty of '10 euros (8.57) per dose not delivered', the EU Commission said.

AstraZeneca said other measures sought by the Commission had been dismissed, and the court had found that the EU had no exclusivity or right of priority over other parties the drugmaker had contracts with.

Had the court sided with Brussels, AstraZeneca may have faced diverting vaccines intended for elsewhere to the EU.

The European Union last month launched a second lawsuit against the drugmaker seeking financial penalties for the delays to vaccine supply.

Today, 27 per cent of EU citizens have been fully vaccinated, while 46 per cent have received at least one dose. This compares to 62 per cent fully jabbed and 45 per cent with one dose in Britain.

The EU was languishing much further behind Britain when it launched a vaccine war in January after it was warned by AstraZeneca to expect a shortfall in doses.

Leaders like Macron lashed out at the UK, saying that the jab developed by Oxford University was only 'quasi-effective' - a claim later shown to be baseless scaremongering by the EU's own medicines regulator.

The bloc meanwhile lurched to a policy of embargoing exports, condemned as 'stupid' even by Jean Claude Juncker, to force AstraZeneca into delivering supplies.

Much of the blame for the EU vaccine roll out has been laid at Ursula von der Leyen's door.

And a third of Germans said the coronavirus crisis showed 'EU integration has gone too far' - a spike of 10 per cent compared to last year, according to the survey by the European Council for Foreign Relations (ECFR).

German disillusionment was laid bare in February with a front page splash in Bild, the country's most popular newspaper, with the headline: 'Dear Brits, we envy you!'

'The EU's poor performance in the vaccine roll-out risks transforming Brexit from a cautionary tale about Euroscepticism into a story of liberation from the sluggish bureaucracy of Brussels institutions,' the ECFR said in a policy brief.

During the legal action a lawyer for the EU, Charles-Edouard Lambert (centre), claimed that AstraZeneca decided to reserve production at its Oxford site for Britain

Lawyers for AstraZeneca Clemence Van Muylder, Hakim Boularbah and Stephanie De Smedt, arrive to attend a hearing at a Belgian court on May 26

As Britain raced ahead with rolling out the Covid doses, AstraZeneca supplied 30 million does to the Bloc by the end of the first quarter, instead of the 100 million the EU claimed it had pledged to deliver in its contract.

The EU blamed the manufacturer, but the reason why Britain and the United States have had such successful vaccine roll-outs compared to the EU is because they were able to secure the doses by cutting red tape.

Brussels, on the other hand, signed contracts with AstraZeneca much later due to its vast bureaucratic red tape.

They were also more reliant on receiving doses from Pfizer and Moderna, which were hit with early production woes.

The commission, which has procured vaccines on behalf of the whole of the EU, initially intended the AstraZeneca jab as the main workhorse in the bloc's inoculation drive.

It has now switched to the more expensive Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine as its mainstay.

In January, the European Medicines Regulator (EMA) approved the AstraZeneca jab for all age groups, but a number of EU countries, including France and Germany, refused to recommend it to people over 65.

At the beginning of March, France and Germany were forced into humiliating U-turns and approved the jab for 65 to 74-year-olds.

The EU launched a vaccine war in January when it was notified by AstraZeneca to expect a shortfall in doses as Brexit-Britain raced ahead with inoculations (file photo)

But just weeks later, they were among 13 countries which suspended use of the vaccine after sporadic reports of blood clots.

Now, a number of other countries have restricted the AstraZeneca's jab to older adults, as in France, for instance, it is reserved for those aged 55 and over.

On April 7, the regulator conceded there was a 'possible link' between AstraZeneca and blood clots, but said neither age group nor gender were a defining risk factor.

Most countries then restarted use of the vaccines after the EMA came out and said that the incidence of blood clots was actually lower among those who had received a jab than it was in the general population.
Nolan Levi Strauss, 27, pleaded guilty to a federal hate crime charge on Thursday over his December 2019 stabbing of a 48-year-old man in Oregon

A Colorado man who said he stabbed a stranger at at Arby's restaurant 'because he was black, and I don't like black people' has pleaded guilty to a federal hate crime charge.

Nolan Levi Strauss, 27, entered his plea on Thursday and now faces the possibility of life in prison for his attack on a 48-year-old black man on December 1, 2019.

The victim, who was not named, was sitting in a booth at an Arby's in Ontario, Oregon, where he'd applied for a job when Strauss entered the restaurant and came up behind him and stabbed him two times in the neck.

The victim managed to grab the knife the knife before an Arby's worker intervened and the victim scrambled away.

When the restaurant worker asked Strauss why he stabbed the man, the suspect replied: 'Because he was black, and I don't like black people.'

The stabbing unfolded at the Arby's restaurant above in Ontario, Oregon, on December 1, 2019

Strauss was arrested on the scene without any further incident.

The victim was evaluated at a local hospital in Ontario before being airlifted to a hospital in Boise for an emergency surgery of his neck's wounds.

A federal grand jury in Oregon returned a single-count indictment charging Strauss with a hate crime involving an attempt to kill on September 17, 2020.

He is expected to receive a maximum of life in prison at his sentencing on September 9 before US District Court Judge Michael J. McShane.

In a statement announcing Strauss' guilty plea on Thursday, Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke for the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division said: 'The defendant is being held accountable for his vicious, racially-motivated attack on a Black man who was targeted because of the color of his skin.'

Clark went on to say that racially motivated acts of violence must not be tolerated and promised her division will work with federal, state and local partners to ensure that individuals who commit bias motivated crimes are brought to justice for their actions.

'This crime serves as a horrifying reminder that racism and bigotry still exist and threaten the safety of communities of color,' said Acting US Attorney Scott Erik Asphaug for the District of Oregon.

'Hate crimes not only hurt victims, but spread fear across entire communities. This conviction should send a strong message that federal law enforcement will not tolerate hate-motivated acts of violence and will move swiftly to hold those responsible accountable.'

Kieran L. Ramsey, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI in Oregon also said that everyone has the right to go to work without being of afraid of falling victim to violence because of their look or how they live.

'We should all draw strength from our diversity and work together to protect our neighbors,' he said.
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South Carolina Republican Rep. Ralph Norman tore into Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on Thursday when he said it was 'quite unfair' to criticize Kamala Harris for not visiting the border.

The Biden administration announced Harris would be the 'border czar' 86 days ago, but she still hasn't been to the wall and has been under heavy scrutiny for her visit to Mexico and Guatemala two weeks ago to address the 'root causes' of migration.

Norman started the House Homeland Security Committee hearing by asking Mayorkas whether Harris should visit the border.

'I consider that question to be quite unfair,' Mayorkas replied.

'You're comments are just words, and they're very unfair,' Norman said. 'I asked you a simple question, and I would like for you to just answer simply.

'Does it make sense for the leaders of the free world to go in to talk and see what's going on at the border?

Mayorkas responded by saying that Harris was the attorney general of a border state, California, and was 'quite familiar with the situation'.

'But she's laughing at it!' Norman fired back. 'It's an insult to say that you're looking at the border wall  what do you have to look at? You're not building it'.

Texas GOP Senator Ted Cruz also criticized the Biden administration's response to the border crisis on Friday, saying they are 'quite simply' not doing their jobs and are failing to enforce the law.

South Carolina Republican Rep. Ralph Norman tore into Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on Thursday when he suggested it was 'quite unfair' to criticize Kamala Harris for not visiting the border

ROMA, TEXAS: Norman and Mayorkas had their testy exchange in the House hearings as migrants continued to cross the Rio Grande on rafts to get to the border overnight on Thursday

As they conducted their hearing, more migrants continued crossing the Rio Grande near Roma, Texas, to begin their bid for asylum.

Photos showed men, women and children in rafts and wading in the water in the dead of night, trying to reach the US.

The tense exchange Norman and Mayorkas also came off the back of criticism over Kamala's visit to Guatemala and Mexico and her testy responses to questions over whether she would visit the wall - that the Biden administration has vowed not to continue building.

In an interview with NBC's Lester Holt, she laughed when he asked why she hadn't visited the border.

'And I haven't been to Europe either,' she responded.

Last Wednesday, Customs and Border Protection released figures that show illegal crossings have exploded by 674 per cent in a year.

Border guards confronted 180,034 migrants in May - the fourth consecutive monthly rise.

The figures show the number of migrants rocketed by more than six-fold from the 23,237 who crossed from Mexico into the United States in May 2020.

Last year's number was far lower than usual because of the COVID-19 outbreak, but this year's figures still spell worrying news for Joe Biden, with 2021 on-track to record the highest number of illegal border crossings since 2006.

ROMA, TEXAS: A woman carrying her child makes her way to the border on Thursday night to begin her bid to seek asylum

ROMA, TEXAS: A migrant drags a raft across the Rio Grande towards the border on Thursday night

ROMA, TEXAS: Border guards holding flashlights guide migrants to be processed. Last Wednesday, Customs and Border Protection released figures that show illegal crossings have exploded by 674 per cent in a year

ROMA, TEXAS: Women and children, some wearing facemasks, cross the Rio Grande near in a raft Thursday night

Single adults still represented the majority of border-crossers, data from the U.S. Border Patrol showed.

In May there was a decrease in the number of unaccompanied minors, from roughly 16,910 to 13,906, Border Patrol found.

CBP also said that a majority of those who crossed the border were already expelled due to Title 42, which allows the U.S. government to quickly remove people using the COVID-19 pandemic.

Of the 180,034 crossers, 112,302 had already been expelled.

CBP also pointed out, according to Fox News, that Title 42 is leading people to try to cross the border more than once, which could also factor into the high numbers.

Axios reported last week that preliminary CBP data from the fiscal year 2021 showed that illegal crossings have been the most since 2006 - with four months still to go.

Harris' trip was meant to focus on the 'root causes' of migration that have led to families and unaccompanied children heading north to the border.

But she made a series of seemingly conflicting statements about her decision not to visit the border and enraged progressives by telling migrants: 'Do not come'.

By the end of her trip, at a press conference in Mexico City with President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, Harris insisted the trip was a success.

'Listen, I've been to the border before and I'll go again,' she said.

She also hinted that a border trip would be 'short-sighted', but did promise to visit without giving a date.

ROMA, TEXAS: A border patrol agent with its headlights on follows a group of migrants making their way to processing centers on Thursday night

This chart shows how 2021 border crossings - pictured in blue - rocketed on crossings made in 2020, represented by the brown line (2018 is pictured in gray, with 2019 in orange)

This graph shows the number of migrants caught by the Office of Field Operation (OFO) and US Border Patrol agents in April and May

The Biden administration announced Harris would be the 'border czar' 86 days ago, but she still hasn't been to the wall and has been under scrutiny for her visit to Mexico and Guatemala two weeks ago to address the 'root causes' of migration. On Friday she visited a vaccination site in Atlanta as part of her tour to get more shots in arms for Americans

Harris greets Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms after touching down at Hartsfield Jackson International Airport on Friday

CNN reported that officials were concerned within the administration that whatever progress Harris had made on the leader-to-leader level might have been undermined by her conflicting answers and PR missteps.

'It's left some of the administration officials perplexed, and the vice president's team frustrated,' the network Wednesday.

'There was hope the trip would be a success, and in the end, they feel it may have been overshadowed by some of her answers to these questions,' the network reported.

She also snapped at reporters a few times when questioned about a border visit. Among those asking about it was a CNN correspondent. Fox News correspondents have been hounding the White House on the topic for weeks, so it was unlikely to have surprised her team.

At the same news conference where she said she would go to the border, Harris also shrugged off the idea.

I think it's short-sighted, for any of us who are in the business of problem solving to suggest we're only going to respond to the reaction as opposed to addressing the cause,' she said.

It echoed her earlier comments in Guatemala, where she characterized such a visit as being for show.

'I came here to be here on the ground, to speak with the leader of this nation around what we can do in a way that is significant, is tangible and has real results,' she said.

'And I will continue to be focused on that kind of work as opposed to grand gestures.'

There is an element of showmanship in any foreign trip  and Harris was not shy about calling her own first foreign foray a victory.

'Do I declare this trip a success? Yes I do,' she said.
The heroic young Briton who saved her twin sister from the jaws of a crocodile in Mexico insisted Im no hero - as she gave the clearest account yet of the horrifying attack.

Georgia Laurie described how she fought off the ten-foot predator as the animal mauled her and tried to death-roll her twin Melissa  but then feared her sister was dead after she was taken under the water in a silent attack in a tropical lagoon.

Georgia spoke as it emerged that while Melissa is due to be released from hospital sooner than first expected, she will not be able to fly home to Berkshire for two weeks because she has to recover from a punctured lung.

The sisters had been taken to an unsafe part of the Manialtepec Lagoon - a coastal lagoon about 18 km west of Puerto Escondido in the State of Oaxaca - where crocodiles were nesting by an unlicensed tourist guide on June 6.

He had assured them it was safe and the sisters were swimming with two friends when Georgia spotted the crocodile. The sisters tried to swim to safety but the predator caught Melissa.

Speaking from Puerto Escondido in Mexico Georgia, 28, said: I saw her getting taken underneath the water and my worse fear became a reality  that Ive probably lost her. Shes dead.

I saw [the crocodile] coming towards us but they move very silently.

Melissa (left) who narrowly survived being attacked and dragged to the bottom of a lake by a crocodile faces a setback in her recovery, Mail Online has learned. Her twin Georgia (right), 28, saved her sister from the crocodile's jaws

Georgia (pictured) has spoken in more detail about how she fought off the crocodile but feared her sister was dead. She said: 'The adrenalin kicked in and I saw her body floating and I thought, at that moment, honestly, that she was no longer with us.'

Georgia (right) said she does not feel heroic and paid tribute to Melissa, saying: 'She fought for her own life, as well. She really, she really fought and clung on.' The twins are pictured earlier in their trip to Mexico

I meant they look like they are moving slowly but they are moving quick. And everything is just very quiet.

I actually heard her scream and I saw her being taken underneath by the crocodile.

And then I realized she was really in trouble when I was calling her name and there was no response from her.

The adrenalin kicked in and I saw her body floating and I thought, at that moment, honestly, that she was no longer with us.

But I grabbed her body and I pulled it towards me, I rested it on my chest and she was blue and I tried to revive her.

But then the crocodile came along, so I beat it off and it went away but then she started going into a fit, flaying her arms and legs, I think she thought it was still attacking her.

And I tried to calm her down and then it came back.

Melissa and Georgia's parents Sean and Sue have traveled to Mexico this week to be with their daughters. Mr Laurie said the attack has left his daughter with lasting physical and mental scars

And thats when I sustained actually the most injuries because it grabbed her on the leg and her behind and tried to death roll her and drag her away.

So I was beating it on its snout and it grabbed my wrist and my arm.

So I had to beat it off with the other, with my other arm.

Yeah, it was trying to juggle, like so many things at once, keeping her out of the way and trying, trying to get this thing off of her.

Despite her brave action to save her sister, she rejected any suggestion of being a hero when questioned.

Georgia, talking to the BBC, continued: Its a difficult one, I dont.

I think maybe that comes down to self-esteem.

If someone told me the same story Id say: Wow! Thats so brave of you. Like thats a really youre a hero.

But its hard to believe compliments yourself and when someone says these things to you because it feels surreal. The whole thing feels surreal.

It doesnt feel like it actually happened to me.

It was an out-of-body experience at the time.

So its just, its taken a time to process really, that I did that, that actually I did that.You know, I helped save my sisters life.

And she added that Melissa had also fought hard to stay alive.

Georgia added: But also, I want to touch on, she fought for her own life, as well.

She really, she really fought and clung on.

Melissa has healed quicker than doctors expected and should be well enough to be released from hospital within days despite suffering numerous injuries.

She had hoped to be able to then fly back to the UK with her parents who raced to Mexico to be with her this week - and then to continue to recuperate at the family home in Berkshire.

Georgia (right), who fought off a crocodile as it dragged her twin sister into a Mexican lagoon, has been seen walking near the hospital in between visits

Georgia (left) was comforted by a friend as she left the Angel Del Mar Hospital on Wednesday

But now medics have forbidden the 28-year-old zookeeper from flying for at least two weeks as she recovers from a punctured lung.

Taking to the skies before her lung is fully healed, Melissa has been advised, is against airline regulations and also presents a huge risk to her health.

So the family from Sandhurst, Berks, must decide whether parents Sean, 63, and Sue, 62, stay on in Mexico until Melissa is able to fly or whether they return home without her.

The couple had intended to return to Britain with their daughters early next week when they set out from home last Monday.

The twins and friends are pictured smiling in the hospital following the horrific crocodile attack in Mexico

But these medical complications have thrown their plans into disarray, a source close to the family has revealed.

They had flown out after sister Georgia had begged her mum to come to Mexico to support her.

Now the intrepid twin  who saved her sister from the jaws of the crocodile  is reluctant to return home half-way through her six-month travels.

The couple spent more than six hours at Melissas hospital bedside yesterday while they thrashed it out.

The source told MailOnline: 'Doctors have told Melissa she cannot fly until her lung is completely healed.

'To do so beforehand would not only break airline rules it would also be extremely dangerous. The change in the air pressure could rupture her lung and leave her gasping for breath.

'Melissa has amazed everyone with how quickly shes recovered but obviously it's going to take a lot longer till she's completely well and she wanted to do the second part of her recovery at home.

'So this news is obviously disappointing to her but Im sure she wont let it get her too down.'

The source added: 'Sean and Sue want to bring their girls home as soon as they can. They have suffered a terrifying ordeal which has scarred both of them.

'Melissa has very obvious physical wounds from the attack but Georgia also has mental scars from the experience too. They'll both be better off at home.'

Melissa Laurie's parents Sean and Sue and her sister Georgia (third, fifth and fourth from the left respectively) went to the lagoon where she was attacked by a crocodile with representatives of the local tourism industry to show that the area is safe if travelers go with licensed tour guides

Moises Salinas, 16, who works as a helper on a tour boat named Espatula Rosada, jumped into the shallow murky waters along the Manialtepec River to help rescue Melissa

The twins' parents landed in Mexico on Tuesday and went straight to the hospital to see Melissa.

A now-closed GoFundMe campaign set up by the family to cover the twin's medical expenses raised a whopping 43,813.
Britain's care homes could remain under some lockdown rules even when the rest of the country eventually unlocks, it emerged today.

The Government's scientific advisers have recommended restrictions be released more gradually in care homes to avoid a resurgence of the virus in the sector.

Elderly care home residents are extremely vulnerable to Covid and significantly more likely to become severely ill than the average person.

SAGE has urged ministers to lift care home curbs incrementally to judge how much impact each one has on infection levels, similar to how the national roadmap has worked.

The group said the emergence of new variants gave it cause for concern, despite the fact the vast majority of care home residents are fully jabbed.

However, experts acknowledged harsh restrictions on visits were highly damaging to the mental and physical wellbeing of residents.

They suggested softer rules like mask-wearing, personal protective equipment (PPE) protocols for staff and two-metre social distancing should remain.

Covid curbs are due to be lifted unilaterally in England on July 19 after the country's original June 21 Freedom Day was pushed back over fears about the Indian variant.

SAGE's recommendations for care homes were made in a report submitted to No10 on May 27, before the decision to delay the final step in the roadmap.

Britain's care homes could remain under some lockdown rules even when the rest of the country eventually unlocks, it emerged today (file)

More than a fifth of care home residents have died of Covid in South Tyneside, Darlington, Doncaster and St Helens since the start of the pandemic, MailOnline analysis of Office for National Statistics data suggests

British care homes were decimated in both waves of the epidemic, with almost 40,000 of the 150,000 Covid victims being elderly residents in social care. It led to extremely strict social distancing rules being implemented in the sector, which meant many residents went over a year without physical contact. Pictured: Dave Stallard can only see his wife when she crouches on the street near his care home in West Sussex due to current restrictions

It read: 'We know all the interventions have probably had some incremental effect, but we dont know the specific contribution of each measure.

'It is recommended that any mitigations/restrictions that are eased are done so in a measured manner and if possible in a way that allows for evaluation of the individual impact before further easing of restrictions.

Covid jabs made be compulsory for care home workers Matt Hancock this week confirmed Covid vaccinations will be made compulsory for care home staff despite backlash from furious unions and industry bosses. The Health Secretary told MPs it was paramount carers working with vulnerable residents are vaccinated against the disease 'in order to save lives'. The controversial policy will see all 1.5million people working in social care told to get inoculated within 16 weeks  or face losing their jobs or being redeployed. It applies to all carers as well as other workers in homes, including tradespeople, hairdressers and beauticians. Critics described it as a 'sledgehammer approach' which could worsen the social sector's staffing crisis, make it harder to recruit and force many to 'walk away'. Despite care workers being among one of the top priority groups for Covid jabs and being eligible since December, latest figures show just two thirds of them have had both doses of the vaccine. Announcing the move in the Commons today, Mr Hancock said the Government will 'ensure mandation as a condition of deployment for staff in care homes'. The Financial Times today reported ministers are also debating whether to make flu jabs compulsory for the same staff. Consultation is expected to begin on whether other health workers should also have the jabs, meaning Covid vaccines could also be made compulsory for the 1.4million employed by the NHS. Advertisement

'The case for this cautious approach is also underlined by the fact the impact of new variants in the context of a general easing of societal restrictions is still to be seen.'

But SAGE said that if vaccines continue to work well against emerging strains then Covid would pose the same threat to care homes as flu did before the pandemic.

Influenza kills on average 17,000 people a year but bad bouts can see up to 50,000 lives lost. Those most vulnerable are the elderly and sick.

In the report, SAGE said: 'Keeping all things equal and not removing any interventions, it is possible to anticipate the residual mortality risk in a vaccinated set of residents to be of the same order as pre-pandemic seasonal flu.

It added: 'While data doesnt allow us to produce exact estimates, the wave two mortality patterns in the homes that we know were significantly impacted by Covid in wave one were more akin (albeit slightly higher) to seasonal mortality patterns.'

British care homes were decimated in both waves of the epidemic, with almost 40,000 of the 150,000 Covid victims being elderly residents in social care.

It led to extremely strict social distancing rules being implemented in the sector, which meant many residents went more than a year without physical contact.

In-person visits were briefly resumed last summer but they were restricted when the second wave started to take off in the autumn. The prolonged isolation is said to have sped up the deaths of many frail residents.

Under current rules care homes are allowing five visitors per resident, who can visit individually or as a group.

However named visitors and residents are advised to keep physical contact to a minimum.

Physical contact like handholding is acceptable if hand washing protocols are followed.

Rules around hugging are still murky, with visitors advised to keep them brief and to a minimum, even though four in five adults have been given a jab already.

Visitors must also wear masks and they are required to take a rapid Covid test. Residents themselves are kept socially distanced from other residents. Staff giving care must wear face coverings and PPE at all times.

In its report last month, SAGE said there were other measures that could be implemented to reduce Covid risks in care homes that didn't involve social curbs.

The group said that offering statutory sick pay to carers could reduce large outbreaks by 40 per cent, citing a study of 5,100 care homes in Singapore.

The same study also found residents were 20 per cent less likely to get infected and staff 30 per cent.

The Government this week pushed through mandatory vaccines for care home staff in an attempt to keep care homes Covid free as the country unlocks.

The controversial policy will see all 1.5million people working in social care told to get inoculated within 16 weeks  or face losing their jobs or being redeployed.

It applies to all carers as well as other workers in homes, including tradespeople, hairdressers and beauticians.

Critics described it as a 'sledgehammer approach' which could worsen the social sector's staffing crisis, make it harder to recruit and force many to 'walk away'.

Despite care workers being among one of the top priority groups for Covid jabs and being eligible since December, latest figures show just two thirds of them have had both doses of the vaccine.
Sixteen crew members were filmed being rescued from a sinking ship in rough waters by helicopter in dramatic footage.

The first mate of the MV Mangalam raised the alarm on Thursday when the weather suddenly worsened and it started taking on water in the Arabian Sea.

Two rescue helicopters and a ship from the Indian Coast Guard were dispatched to the barge, which was sinking near the Raigarh district of Maharashtra in western India.

A member of the crew of the MV Mangalam is winched from the deck of the ship which is already partially underwater

The Indian Coast Guard later tweeted that the ship was reported to have run aground off the coast Raigarh district of Maharashtra in western India

All crew members were safely winched to safety as the bow of the vessel disappeared beneath the waves.

The coast guard later suggested that the Mangalam had run aground, and this had caused it to partially sink.

They tweeted: In a daredevil sea-air coordinated operation in inclement weather and rough sea conditions, Chetak helicopters ex-Daman & Ship Subhadra Kumari Chauhan rescued 16 crew from Barge MV Mangalam reported aground off #Revdanda #Mumbai today.

The dramatic rescue happened off the coast of the Raigarh district of Maharashtra in western India

Two helicopters were despatched to help the stricken MV Mangalam on Thursday

The cargo ship, built in 1994, ran into trouble in strong winds and heavy rain off the coast

All crew safe. @DefenceMinIndia.

One person replied to the post on Twitter: Great team and salute to all the team members to complete the task with patience and rescue all of them.

The MV Mangalam was built in 1994.
Former President Donald Trump ranted about 'the Blacks' he had done 'all this stuff for' who he didn't think would vote for him in the aftermath of the George Floyd protests - and blamed Jared Kushner for making him look weak.

In an excerpt of Wall Street Journal reporter Michael Bender's forthcoming book, 'Frankly, We Did Win This Election: The Inside Story of How Trump Lost,' the journalist writes about how Trump's handling of Floyd's murder marked the beginning of the end of his 2020 campaign.

During his 2016 campaign, Trump had leaned into 'law and order' themes, but felt the criminal justice reform bill he had signed - and Kushner had advocated for - in December 2018 had made him look weak and hadn't earned him goodwill from black Americans, Bender wrote.

'I've done all this stuff for the Blacks - it's always Jared telling me to do this,' Trump said on Father's Day 2020, less than a month after Floyd's death. 'And they all f***ing hate me, and none of them are going to vote for me.'

A forthcoming book reveals that former President Donald Trump was more sympathetic to George Floyd and critical of police behind-the-scenes than he was in public and also cluelessly made things worse by greenlighting the Tulsa rally (pictured) on Juneteenth

In Michael Bender's forthcoming book, 'Frankly, We Did Win This Election: The Inside Story of How Trump Lost,' the journalist says Trump's handling of George Floyd's death marked the beginning of the end of his 2020 campaign

It was Kushner who sounded the alarm that Floyd's death could be problematic.

One day after Floyd's Memorial Day death at a West Wing meeting about the COVID-19 pandemic, as aides were bemoaning the ongoing coronavirus crisis, Kushner said, 'I'm just going to stop you.'

'There is going to be one story that dominates absolutely everything for the foreseeable future. I'm already hearing from African-American leaders about the death of George Floyd in Minnesota,' Kushner said.

Some sources told Bender that White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows blew it off, a characterization he denies.

'Nobody is going to care about that,' Meadows reportedly said.

Bender's reporting also reveals that Trump was far more sympathetic to Floyd - and critical of the police - behind-the-scenes than he was publicly.

It took Trump several days before he watched the 9 minute and 29 second video of officer Derek Chauvin snuffing out Floyd's life - and he was horrified.

Trump was flying from Florida to Washington and surrounded by Kushner, social media director Dan Scavino and his National Security Advisor Robert O'Brien.

The president's face was contorted as he watched. He looked repulsed, Bender wrote, and turned away. He handed the phone back to aides before the video finished.

Trump blamed his son-in-law Jared Kushner for making him look weak by signing a criminal justice reform bill in December 2018 that he believed took away from his 'law and order' message and didn't help win over black voters

'This is f***ing terrible,' he responded.

In an Oval Office meeting with Attorney General Bill Barr and other aides the next day, Trump's tone was surprisingly critical of police.

'I know these f***ing cops,' Trump said, talking about stories he heard about savage police tactics growing up in Queens. 'They can get out of control sometimes. They can be rough.'

Publicly, Trump took the side of police and against the protesters.

'These THUGS are dishonoring the memory of George Floyd,' the president tweeted as some protests got out of hand in Minneapolis, where Floyd was killed, and other cities. 'When the looting starts, the shooting starts. Thank you!'

Bender's book also reveals that Trump cluelessly made things worse by greenlighting his first rally of the COVID era to take place in Tulsa, Oklahoma - the site of the single worst incident of racial violence in U.S. history - on Juneteenth, the date the marks the end of slavery in the U.S., which has been celebrated in the black community for years.

On Thursday, President Joe Biden signed a law making Juneteenth a federal holiday.

The Tulsa rally was planned by Trump's campaign manager Brad Parscale, who was trying to find a venue in a GOP-led state that had the least COVID-19 restrictions.

Not even Trump ally, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, wanted a rally in his state three months into the pandemic.

Parscale initially proposed the 11,300-seat Mabee Center, where Trump held a rally in 2016, as the site of the Tulsa rally - later upgrading to the 19,000-seat Bank of America Center.

And he suggested the date of June 19, a Friday.

Bender reported that nobody on the campaign team flagged that place or that date as problematic. Staffers at the Republican National Committee realized how it could be perceived and pushed back.

'Don't do this,' RNC Chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel warned Parscale. 'The media is not going to give us the benefit of the doubt, especially now.'

Trump, however, went ahead and announced the rally to the press pool.

'We're going to start our rallies back up now,' he told reporters. 'he first one, we believe, will be probablywe're just starting to call up - will be in Oklahoma.'

Asked when he would be in Tulsa, Trump replied, 'It will be Friday. Friday night. Next week.'

The Democrats took full advantage of what Bender described White House senior officials saying - that Trump was 'impaired by his stunning disregard for history' showing a 'vague or nonexistent' knowledge of slavery, the Jim Crow era and the black experience.

Trump was shocked about the outcry.

'Do you know what it is?' he said of Juneteenth - which his White House had sent a proclamation out for every year of his presidency.

Bender reported that Trump asked a black Secret Service agent about the holiday.

'Yes. I know what it is. And it's very offensive to me that you're having this rally on Juneteenth,' the agent replied.

That night, Trump announced he would be moving the Tulsa rally to the next day.

Bender scored an Oval Office interview with Trump in the run-up to the rally where the president told the Wall Street Journal reporter that 'nobody had heard of it,' speaking of Juneteenth.

Bender pointed out that the White House had put out statements every year.

Still, Trump said, 'I did something good.'

'I made Juneteenth very famous,' Trump added.
Italy is introducing mandatory testing and a five-day quarantine for visitors from Britain, in another blow to summer holiday plans.

Health Minister Roberto Speranza announced the new regulations on Friday, as concerns grow over the spread of the highly contagious Indian variant.

The new measures will come into force on Saturday and follows similar bans by France, Austria, and Germany, which have already introduced varying curbs on those entering from Britain.

Italy is introducing mandatory testing and a five-day quarantine for visitors from Britain, in another blow to summer holiday plans

Health Minister Roberto Speranza announced the new regulations on Friday, forcing Brits who travel to Italy to test and quarantine for five days

Britain on Friday said there had been a 79 per cent increase in weekly reported cases of the Delta coronavirus variant, which was first identified in India.

Britain on Thursday recorded 11,007 new daily coronavirus cases, with the emergence of the Delta variant pushing the figure above 10,000 for the first time since late February.

The variant now comprises 91 per cent of sequenced cases, Public Health England said.

Italy is currently on the UK's so-called Amber list, meaning visitors must quarantine for 10 days on their return and take two tests - on day two and day eight - before the are released.

Italy is currently on the UK's so-called Amber list, meaning visitors must quarantine for 10 days on their return and take two tests - on day two and day eight - before the are released

It comes as it was announced double-jabbed British holidaymakers could be given the green light to fly to nearly 170 countries from next month under new government plans.

Those who are fully vaccinated will provide evidence via the NHS app at border controls and then be able to enjoy trips to amber list nations without having to isolate for 10 days upon returning home.

The idea would see travellers obliged to take several PCR tests on their return, but if they come back negative, they won't have to remain stuck in their homes like under current rules.

Italy has been one of the European countries hardest hit by the coronavirus pandemic, but infection rates have fallen sharply in recent weeks

Italy was one of the worst hit European countries but cases and deaths have declined rapidly in recent months and restrictions in much of the country have been lifted

Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi warned his government would impose mandatory quarantine for British travellers if the Delta variant continued to spread at the G7 summit last week.

Italy will simultaneously lift curbs on travellers from the United States, Canada, Japan, and other European Union states who meet the requirements of the so-called Green Certificate issued by the EU.

That digital Covid certificate, which comes into force on July 1, will demonstrate whether a bearer has been vaccinated against Covid-19, has been recently tested or has acquired immunity from previously contracting the disease and recovering.

Italy will simultaneously lift curbs on travellers from the United States, Canada, Japan, and other European Union states who meet the requirements of the so-called Green Certificate issued by the EU

A ban on people arriving from India, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka will remain in place, Health Minister Roberto Speranza (pictured) added on Facebook

Currently those arriving from the United States, Japan and Canada must show a negative coronavirus test and quarantine for 10 days on arrival unless they come on one of a limited number of 'Covid-free' flights.

A ban on people arriving from India, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka will remain in place, Speranza added on Facebook.

Italy has been one of the European countries hardest hit by the coronavirus pandemic, but infection rates have fallen sharply in recent weeks and restrictions in much of the country have been lifted.

Spain has announced it will scrap rules on wearing masks outdoors from June 26 as Covid cases fall across the country.

It will come as a relief to those lucky enough to make it out to Spain for their holidays, especially sunbathers who might have found themselves returning with some very odd tan lines otherwise.

Currently, Spain is welcoming all fully-vaccinated tourists including Britons without the need for a negative Covid test or quarantine.

Arrivals must have received their final dose of an EU-approved vaccine at least two weeks before departure, with all vaccines currently in use in the UK qualifying.

Non-vaccinated arrivals are being accepted, provided they show a negative PCR or antigen test taken 48 hours before departure.
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A couple who were seen on camera allegedly leaving their dogs in a boiling hot car after being caught on camera apparently stealing from a cafe's tip jar have now been accused of eating 80 meals at a Harvester and walking out without paying.

Police have quizzed the couple at a police station in Sussex after officers traced their moves in Brighton on Saturday.

The couple were caught on on CCTV appearing to steal the staff tips after demanding a refund for their meals at rom at Carat's Cafe.

Later the same day they are alleged to have eaten a 'large' 80 meal for four people at the Harvester on the seafront but then walked out without paying.

At around 4pm the family walked into the Madeira Drive restaurant and ordered a racks of slow-cooked ribs for four people - costing 20.49 for an adult portion it is the most expensive items on the menu.

The couple and two boys aged around nine and seven and then spent an hour eating the ribs and drinking in the restaurant.

But when it came time to settle the bill they allegedly became abusive towards staff and walked out without paying.

A staff member, who would not be named, said: 'Yes, the same family came into our restaurant and spent an hour dining where they were absolutely horrible to staff.

'They ordered a large ribs and had four meals but they were very abusive to staff, really horrible and then they got up and left without paying.

'The incident has been reported to police and CCTV has been handed over. It was definitely the same couple.'

The couple were then filmed for a second time as they returned to their car in Brighton after police had been forced to smash a window because of concerns for two dogs locked inside in sweltering heat.

Today police confirmed the couple had been questioned by detectives investigating the thefts. However they have been released pending further enquiries.

A spokesman said: 'A man and a woman have been interviewed by police and remain under investigation whilst enquiries continue.'

Superintendent Rachel Swinney said: 'We are aware of the significant interest in this case, and I'd like to thank the public for coming forward with information.

A couple helped themselves to the tip jar at a cafe in Southwick, near Brighton, before complaining about food and receiving a full refund. Hours later, police smashed into the couple's car to rescue their two dogs who were found sweltering inside

'We are actively pursuing all lines of enquiry, and we will seek to identify if any further offences have been committed as our investigation continues.'

Superintendent Rachel Swinney of Sussex Police tonight said: 'The behaviour of the individuals concerned in both of these incidents will not be tolerated. I want to send a clear message to those visiting our county that we will actively pursue those who commit crime in Sussex.'

A spokesman for the force Sussex Police said: 'Police investigating the theft of money from Carats Cafe in Southwick on Saturday have formally identified two people in footage from the cafe.

'The investigation is progressing with the assistance of colleagues at Bedfordshire Police. The same two individuals were also involved in an incident in Madeira Drive, Brighton, whereby police responded to a welfare call in respect of two dogs locked in a car. The dogs were subsequently released from the car by police.'

The woman can be seen taking coins out of the tip jar while staff are busy at Carats Cafe and Bar in Southwick, near Brighton

The couple were filmed as they angrily confronted police for smashing the window of their black estate car.

It later emerged they were allegedly caught on on CCTV appearing to steal staff tips from Carat's Cafe on the same day.

In footage obtained by MailOnline, the couple are seen apparently taking the cash left for staff - after demanding a refund on the food they had eaten - from the family-run cafe.

Staff at Carats Cafe described the theft, which took place shortly before midday on Saturday, as 'unfair and completely unacceptable' and said the man and woman had received a full refund after ordering two breakfasts because they complained they were unsatisfactory.

It wasn't until management later checked the CCTV that they realised the couple had appeared to take coins from the tip jar and had also not paid for drinks which had been taken from fridges next to the counter.

The owners of a vehicle confronted police officers after they were forced to break into the car to rescue a beagle and another dog who had been left unattended inside while temperatures reached 75F on a scorching hot day on Brighton seafront

Pictured: The owners returned to the car and asked the police officers why they had smashed their vehicle's back window

This is the moment the officers were smashed the window to rescue a beagle and another dog who had been left alone inside

One officer attempted to use his baton before resorting to a glass punch to break the window to let fresh air into the vehicle

Zoe Kibble, the manager at Carats, estimates in total the couple cost the cafe 100, with the cost of the two breakfasts, the drinks and the tips that were allegedly taken.

Describing the team's disappointment, she added: 'We take on young people and it's going to have a knock on their confidence. They've worked hard for their tips on a really busy, hot weekend so for them to be told their food isn't good enough and have their tips taken from them is just not on.'

Ms Kibble says the unpleasant incident is a rare occurrence at the popular seafront eatery and that it is thought the couple were from out of the area.

Prior to their appeal, footage had already been shared of police breaking into the couple's car to rescue two dogs who had been left in sweltering heat only for the man and woman to complain about the damage.

The officer smashed the window which had been left slightly open but the car was not in shade and the two dogs were inside

Officers said the beagle and another dog looked instantly relieved when they had fresh air and water after the rescue on Brighton seafront, where temperatures reached 75F (24C) on Saturday.

Video shows one officer using his baton to smash the back window of the black vehicle as the owners rushed back to the scene in horror.

The woman can be heard saying 'you broke my window out' as the car alarm goes off.

Another officer can be heard responding to the woman, saying: 'It's a hot day. You shouldn't be leaving the dog in the car in this weather.'

A crowd of beach-goers gathered to watch the dramatic rescue unfold on Brighton seafront.

One witness told MailOnline: 'The police were called by a member of the public who noticed the dog in the car.

'The police attempted to contact the owner of the vehicle but they failed. This is when they attempted forceful entry to stop the risk to the pups from the heat. First the PC attempted to use his baton but this failed. Then he used a glass punch four times and the window smashed.'

One stall holder said: 'I couldn't leave my stall but there were several members of the public who were clearly concerned about the dog. It was a roasting day and the temperature in the car must have been horrendous.

'A couple of PCSOs turned up and then a regular police officer. They were worried as well and I think they did the right thing.

'I've heard the man claimed they'd only been away for 10 minutes but the commotion was going on for at least half an hour or more so that can't be true. The couple who left their dog in their car in that heat have only got themselves to blame.'

Police officers said the dogs looked relieved once they had fresh air and water after the dramatic rescue in front of a crowd

The couple, who had two boys, aged about nine and six, had parked their black estate car close to Brighton Palace Pier and the Sealife Centre before leaving the two dogs in their car with one window open slightly ajar.

Sussex Police said the owners were given strong words of advice on returning to the car a short time later.

The RSPCA told MailOnline the temperature inside of the car could have reached up to 117F.

Ms Kibble added: 'They sat down for their breakfasts and ate most of them before complaining to the manager who was working at the time. They said there was some hair in one and complained about the other as well.

'We don't get many complaints so we just offered a full refund. The manager noticed there were drinks on the table that weren't in the same order but at the time assumed they had been paid for separately.'

What should you do if you see a dog in a car during hot weather? The RSPCA says you should try and establish if the dog is showing any signs of heatstroke such as heavy panting or drooling. Other signs of heatstroke include lethargy and vomiting. If the dog is showing signs of heatstroke, the charity says dial 999 immediately. If police are unavailable and the situation becomes critical, you must be careful before taking the decision to smash the window as this could be considered criminal damage and you may have to defend your actions in court. Make sure you tell the police what you intent to do and why. Take pictures or videos of the dog and the names and numbers of witnesses to the incident. Advertisement

A crowd of beach-goers gathered to watch the dramatic rescue unfold on Brighton seafront before a police officer broke a car window to rescue two dogs trapped inside.

A witness said the owners appeared unaware of the dangers posed to animals left in hot vehicles.

The witness, who said the dogs were 'panting solidly', told the Sun: 'Where they had parked there is just no shade.

'At first it was 'what the f*** are you doing, why did you break my car window? I was only gone for 10 minutes'. The bloke obviously thought he was completely in the right. He didn't really seem to have much empathy.'

The RSPCA says that, despite the common belief it is OK if windows are open or the car is in shade, dogs should never be left alone in vehicles during hot weather.

The charity says a car can become as hot as an oven very quickly, even when it doesn't feel that warm.

When it's 22 degrees, in a car it can reach an unbearable 47 degrees within the hour and a dog in these conditions could be susceptible to heatstroke.

Launching their Dogs Die In Hot Cars campaign, RSPCA dog welfare expert Dr Samantha Gaines said: 'We know families love their pets and want to keep them close but, sometimes, it may be safer to leave your four-legged friends at home.

'Dogs can suffer from heatstroke during hot weather and this can be extremely dangerous, and even prove fatal.

'We're calling on pet owners to put the welfare of their dogs first this summer. If you're heading out and about then consider whether your pet may be happier in the cool at home, only walk them during the cooler hours of the day, and never leave your dog in a car unattended on a warm day.'

One stall holder said: 'I couldn't leave my stall but there were several members of the public who were clearly concerned about the dog. It was a roasting day and the temperature in the car must have been horrendous.

'A couple of PCSOs turned up and then a regular police officer. They were worried as well and I think they did the right thing.

'I've heard the man claimed they'd only been away for 10 minutes but the commotion was going on for at least half an hour or more so that can't be true. The couple who left their dog in their car in that heat have only got themselves to blame.'

The couple, who had two boys, aged about nine and six, had parked their black estate car close to Brighton Palace Pier and the Sealife Centre before leaving the two dogs in their car with one window open slightly ajar.

A spokesman for Sussex Police said about the dog incident: 'We were called about two dogs left locked inside a car in the heat of the day Saturday on Madeira Drive, Brighton.

'Police officers attended and tried to get a contact number for the owners of the car but were unable.

'Officers had no choice but to smash the side window to gain access and a kind member of the public donated a bottle of water.

'The owners were given strong words of advice on returning to the car a short time later.

'The dogs, who were much improved after fresh air and water, were left with the owners.

'Dog owners should never leave a dog alone in a car on a warm day. If you see a dog in distress in a hot car, dial 999.'

Regarding the alleged theft the spokesman said: 'Police are investigating after a man and a woman went into Carats Cafe in Basin Road South, Southwick, on Saturday (12 June) at about 11.39am and stole money from the staff tip jar worth about 30.

'The suspects also stole cakes and drinks from the front counter while distracting staff. Anyone who witnessed the theft or have any information about the suspects is asked to report online or ring 101.'

Did you see the rescue do you know the owners? Email emer.scully@mailonline.co.uk
Two dead migrants were discovered in less than 24 hours in a New Mexico town that sits on the United States-Mexico border.

The body of a 35-year-old woman from Mexico was discovered by U.S. Border Patrol agents at the base of Mount Cristo Rey overnight Thursday, Sunland Park Police Department Chief Javier Guerra told KVIA.

Guerra also said a second migrant was found hours later in a desert area not too far from Riverside Elementary School in Sunland Park, which is about 20 minutes from El Paso.

The causes of death have not been reported.

DailyMail.com reached out to U.S. Customs and Border Protection and the Sunland Park Police Department for comment.

U.S. Border Patrol agents discovered the bodies of two dead migrants in less than 24 hours Thursday near the United States-Mexico border in New Mexico. The body of a 35-year-old woman from Mexico was found at the base of Mount Cristo Rey

The discoveries come just a week after another two undocumented migrants were found dead in the Sunland Park border region.

A 24-year-old man from Mexico lost his life after he fell off a border wall June 11.

Several hours later, another man who illegally crossed the United States-Mexico border was found in a remote desert area off New Mexico Highway 273. Another individual flagged down the Sunland Park Fire Department and informed them that his friend was in need of emergency medical assistance. The friend later was declared dead.

A U.S. Border Patrol agent walks past the body of a person covered in a white sheet near the border wall in El Paso, Texas on June 11

U.S. Border Patrol agents conduct a training exercise in the Anapra area, in front of the wall that divides Sunland Park, New Mexico, from Ciudad Juarez, Mexico

This chart shows how 2021 border crossings - pictured in blue - rocketed on crossings made in 2020, represented by the brown line (2018 is pictured in gray, with 2019 in orange)

A CBP monthly report released June 10 showed that Border Patrol agents stopped 180,034 migrants in May along the southwestern border, a slight increase from 178,854 the prior month, with the increase driven largely by single adults.

From March to May more than 530,000 people were apprehended and pushed back into Mexico after attempting to cross without legal immigration documents.

There is no official estimate on how many did get through, but the sheer number of attempts suggests a rise in successful crossings, CBP officers have said.

Encounters with unlawful border crossers at the United State-Mexico border were at a low of 17,106 in April 2020. The numbers of encounters at the southwestern border increased during President Biden's first four months at the White House.
Britain's surge in coronavirus cases means people in their thirties are now more at risk of severe Covid than getting a blood clot from AstraZeneca's jab.

Spiralling infections caused by the super-infectious Indian 'Delta' variant may mean that the balance of risk is now in favour of vaccination with any of the available jabs.

Officials advised against giving AstraZeneca's jab to under-40s in May when it emerged that the risk of a blood clot was higher than the risk of ending up in intensive care with Covid. This was never the case for older people, whose Covid risk is higher.

When the decision was made the risk of ICU admission for people aged 30 to 39 was just 0.8 per 100,000.

The risk of developing cerebral venous thrombosis (CVT)  an ultra-rare blood clot in the brain  after AstraZeneca's vaccine for people of that age was 1.5 per 100,00, prompting the Government to only offer Pfizer or Moderna jabs to people under 40.

But now the risk of ICU admission with Covid for unvaccinated people in their thirties has more than doubled to 1.9 per 100,000, according to analysis by the Financial Times  meaning being unvaccinated is now riskier than taking the AstraZeneca jab for that age group.

And the current shortage in Pfizer's vaccine could prompt calls to start offering AstraZeneca jabs to young adults again in order to keep the rollout at pace.

Ministers admitted supply of the company's vaccine will be 'tight' over the next month as the country races to vaccinate more people than are becoming infected every day.

Britons in their thirties are now more at risk of Covid than from blood clots caused by AstraZeneca's jab because of the current surge in cases, analysis has shown

Ministers admitted supply of the Pfizer's vaccine will be 'tight' over the next month. (Pictured: People queueing in the rain for their vaccine in London today)

London Mayor Sadiq Khan on Wednesday pleaded for more Pfizer and Moderna vaccines to be sent to the capital to ensure its younger than average population can have a jab soon.

Other Indian variant hotspots across the country have also warned they may not be able to ease restrictions on the delayed 'Freedom Day' on July 19 without more vaccines.

Ian Ward, leader of Birmingham City Council, said: 'Unless the Government can deliver the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines in the right numbers, it's hard to see how we could safely unlock on July 19.'

Cases are surging ahead across the country again, with the more than 11,000 infections counted yesterday the highest daily figure since February.

What is cerebral venous sinus thrombosis (CVT)? Cerebral venous sinus thrombosis (CVT) is an extremely rare type of blood clot. It may also be abbreviated to CSVT or CVST. It occurs when the vein that drains blood from the brain is blocked by a blood clot, resulting in potentially deadly bleeding or a stroke. Symptoms can quickly deteriorate from a headache, blurred vision and faintness to complete loss of control over movement and seizures. John Hopkins University estimates it affects five in a million people in the US every year, which would suggest 330 patients in Britain suffer from the condition annually. According to the university, it can affect patients with low blood pressure, cancer, vascular diseases and those prone to blood clotting. Head injuries can also trigger the condition. Advertisement

But the JCVI has given no indication yet that it might switch course to jab under-40s with AstraZeneca's vaccine in order to meet demand.

The JCVI said: 'We have confidence in the government's current vaccine supply and our advice remains that there is a preference for an alternative to the AstraZeneca vaccine to be offered to those under 40 years of age.'

But a member of the committee told the FT it would be 'perfectly well able to adapt and change' with circumstances.

The committee member said: 'You could get to a place where the risk-benefit balance shifts back because the risk of infection is higher.

'But we remain wary over twisting and weaving too much because that generates public confusion and reduced confidence and also logistic complexity.'

No10 has never publicly released figures detailing exactly how many doses of each of the currently available vaccines are sent to each region, or how many are available in stockpiles.

Health chiefs have bought 100million doses of Pfizer but only 40million are expected this year. Around 24million have already been administered.

Another 17million doses of Moderna's jab have also been purchased  only 500,00 have been dished out.

Despite pressure to go faster to meet the new July 19 target, the national rollout has slowed to under half its peak speed.

Unvaccinated adults in their 20s  who are currently being vaccinated, with the roll-out moving to all adults today  are still less at risk from hospitalisation from Covid (0.8 per 100,000) than they are CVT (1.9) after having an AstraZeneca vaccine.

But their risk has quadrupled since May, when it was 0.2, suggesting it could overtake CVT if cases continue to skyrocket.

And there are also safety fears surrounding Pfizer's vaccine and myocarditis  an ultra-rare heart inflammation  which could prompt a change of approach from No10.

Britain has so far recorded just 34 cases of myocarditis after Pfizer jabs  a similar number to after the AstraZeneca vaccine, suggesting the risk isn't heightened for either of them  and only two after Moderna.

The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) says the number of people suffering the condition are 'similar or below expected background levels'.

But the MHRA's equivalent in the US  the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention  has called a meeting to discuss 226 plausible cases of the condition linked to Pfizer's jab.

The MHRA has so far given no indication it believes the threat of myocarditis is large enough to withdraw the use of Pfizer's vaccine.
One of the candidates in the election to succeed Len McCluskey as general secretary of Unite has withdrawn after a series of controversies.

Howard Beckett, an assistant general secretary of the union, said he will now support Steve Turner.

It came after he branded Home Secretary Priti Patel 'disgusting', said she should be deported and was suggested to believe the UK's defence budget should fund traveller sites.

His decision means there are now three candidates - Mr Turner, Sharon Graham and Gerard Coyne.

Mr Beckett and Mr Turner said in a joint statement: 'Both recognise the vision and strengths of their respective campaigns and Steve Turner recognises the key manifesto commitments and energy generated by Howard's campaign.

'They will both work to implement a blended manifesto, taking the best ideas from both candidates, when Steve Turner becomes general secretary.

Howard Beckett was in election to succeed Len McCluskey as general secretary of Unite

The hunt is on for the successor to Len McCluskey, Unite General Secretary, for next month

'Howard Beckett will campaign alongside Steve for the next two months to present a joint programme which includes greater support for workplace representatives, important new communications initiatives including Unite TV, upgraded education and training for members, an independent and progressive political voice, and a new structure for the union reflecting the diversity of our nations and regions.'

Voting among Unite members starts next month and the result will be announced in August.

Last month Mr Beckett was suspended by Labour after suggesting Home Secretary Priti Patel was 'disgusting' and should be deported.

He later apologised for the social media message but it was too late for him.

Mr Beckett made the remarks following protests in Glasgow over the detention of two men by Border Force officials.

Police Scotland released the Indian nationals after people surrounded the immigration enforcement van and prevented it from leaving on Thursday.

Amid protests in Glasgow over the detention of two men by Border Force officials during Eid he wrote: 'Priti Patel should be deported, not refugees'.

Mr Beckett originally said: 'Priti Patel should be deported, not refugees. She can go along with anyone else who supports institutional racism. She is disgusting.'

Later he put out a more repentant apology, saying 'I'm very sorry for my earlier tweet. I was angry to see Muslim Refugees being deported on the morning of Eid al Fitr.'

He also ran into trouble a fortnight ago after it was suggested he thought the UK's defence budget should be diverted to pay for gypsy and traveller sites.

In a statement announcing it would support Mr Beckett's candidacy, campaign group Labour Black Socialists said: 'He believes in a foreign policy that promotes peace not war.

'The government has 143 military bases in 42 countries - money that could be spent on reinforcing flood defences, making sites available for Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities, support for youth within communities, support for women suffering from domestic and gender-based violence.'

Mr Beckett warmly welcomed the group's endorsement, writing on Twitter: 'To have the support of Labour Black Socialists is inspiring.'
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Meghan Markle's close friend Omid Scobie today alleged that the Royal Family had 'several' conversations about Archie's skin colour before his birth and were 'unsympathetic' to the couple's complaints.

Mr Scobie also revealed that the Duchess of Sussex wants to fly back to the UK with her husband to celebrate the Queen's Platinum Jubilee next summer - but had no intention of visiting this month because of the birth of their daughter Lilibet.

The Sussexes' preferred royal reporter, who co-wrote their biography Finding Freedom, was speaking at an event at the Foreign Press Association in London where he made more incendiary comments about the Queen and Prince William including racism and 'unconscious bias' against Meghan in the family.

Harry and Meghan have been accused of causing a rift with the Windsors after dropping a series of damaging transatlantic 'truth bombs' about royal life, including claims to Oprah Winfrey that one senior royal asked how dark Archie's skin would be, before he was born.

But according to people at today's FPA event, including award-winning Australian journalist Jacquelin Magnay, Mr Scobie claims that Harry's family had known about this comment but were 'unsympathetic' to the couple's complaints.

Other conversations followed the first one and it became 'a much bigger issue' because Harry and Meghan suspected it was 'not just this one person' who was worried about how dark Archie's skin would be, he said.

The revelations come on the same day that Kate gathered a panel of experts at The London School of Economics to discuss the inaugural report of her new Royal Foundation Centre for Early Childhood. However, it is not clear when the two events were each arranged.

Omid Scobie, who wrote the Sussexes' biography Finding Freedom, was speaking at an event at the Foreign Press Association in London where he made more incendiary comments about the Queen and Prince William in relation to claims the royals are racist after comments about their son Archie

'There was one conversation that took place that affected them massively, when it came to someone within the royal family sharing concerns over the colour of Archie's skin, ' Mr Scobie said.

Mr Scobie said that the Queen's statement was designed to make people question the Sussexes' account and did not go far enough to condemn racism

'To Harry I can see how it is one conversation, to Meghan who would have been involved in the follow up conversations I can see  because there were other people aware of this conversation within the family and within the institution, that did also speak about it, some not so sympathetically.

'So you then are in a position where you start to feel well its not just this one person, it's others as well and it becomes a much bigger issue.'

Mr Scobie said 'pass' when queried if he knew who made the initial remark about skin colour, saying he only had one source and would not write about it because he had not verified with multiple contacts. He said it was a story for the couple to share should they ever want.

But cryptically he said: 'And at the time, the biggest conversation was 'did this come from a senior member of the royal family, a future head of state?'. If that individual is a head of state, then we as a public have a right to know because of course that is someone that is our head of state, head of the Commonwealth. And if they have an issue with race, we should know.'

Speaking to Oprah the Duchess of Sussex also accused the institution of not helping her when she was suicidal and pregnant with Archie.

The Queen responded by saying the issues were taken 'very seriously' but that 'some recollections may vary' and the matter would addressed by the family privately.

Mr Scobie hit out today and said the Queen's statement 'cleverly using the phrase recollections may vary' to 'cast doubts on Harry and Meghan's version of events but didn't denounce racism in any way whatsoever'.

Prince William also spoke out to deny the Royal Family is racist, and was said to be privately furious about the claims.

Mr Scobie said today: 'Other individuals within the institution didn't express the kind of understanding that should have been given.

"Even when William said we are not a racist family, they didn't condemn racism in any form whatsoever. We do not see the royal family ever do that. So of course it then continues this conversation about how anti-racism is the royal family, how much does the Royal Institution own its history and perhaps any kind of unconscious bias that may exist within the establishment or the family. None of these things ever seem to be addressed'.

William, who was visiting School2 in east London in March after the Oprah interview, William denied the family is racist (pictured). Omid Scobie said: 'Even when Prince William said they were not a racist family, again, they did not condemn racism in any form whatsoever'

As Prince William spoke out to deny the Royal Family is racist, the Duchess of Cambridge was seen sheltering from the rain with a vibrant rainbow umbrella as she arrived at Kensington Palace for an event on Friday

Kate, Duchess of Cambridge, attended a reception for parents of users of a Centre for Early Childhood, on Friday - the day of the launch of the Royal Foundation Centre for Early Childhood

Despite her husband being said to be privately furious about the latest, claims the royal, 39, looked stylish in a lavender ensemble as she waved at bystanders with a warm smile on her face

Meghan and Harry's media partners 'will expect something in return', Royal expert warns as they take five months paternity leave after giving Spotify 35 minutes of content so far in 18m deal Harry & Meghan holiday special now available on Spotify - the 34 minute episode is the only content available so far, aside from a three minute trailer for the podcast Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have so far broadcast just 35 minutes of podcast content on Spotify as part of their 18million deal - as a royal expert says the streaming giant will be expecting 'something in return'. The Duke, 36, and Duchess of Sussex, 39 - who are parents to two-year-old Archie - welcomed Lilibet 'Lili' Diana Mountbatten-Windsor earlier this month, on June 4 at 11.40am in Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital, California. And before stepping back into their various business engagements the couple will 'both take some proper time off' to adjust to life as a family of four at their 11million mansion in Montecito, California, a source close to the couple told Vanity Fair. Prince Harry's paternity leave means taking time out from his executive position at a Silicon Valley start-up that claims to be worth $1.7billion. For the couple the time-off also means temporarily stepping back from their multi-million-pound deals with Netflix and Spotify - which Harry told Oprah Winfrey he was persuaded to sign when he was 'literally cut off financially' from the Royal Family. The Sussexes were last heard on their Archewell Audio Spotify podcast for the 2020 Christmas special, and the platform had planned for 'a full-scale launch of shows' in 2021. It is understood that the couple will be paid the full 18million fee after their duties have been met, The Sun reports. Royal author Phil Dampier said: 'We're being told they're having up to five months off and people who are paying them a lot of money will expect something in return.' Mr Dampier questioned whether the couple may 'have too much on their plate' after securing numerous deals and agreements before the birth of their daughter. Advertisement

Meghan will not join Prince Harry when he returns to the UK later this month for the unveiling of Princess Dianas statue, it was announced yesterday.

Sources in the Duke and Duchess of Sussexs office have confirmed for the first time that she plans to stay at home in California following the birth of their daughter, Lilibet.

They were responding to reports in the US that the duchess was considering flying over for a whirlwind visit to support her husband at what will be a deeply emotional time for him.

An entertainment website cited sources saying Harry had found it difficult to return alone for the funeral of his late grandfather, the Duke of Edinburgh, and his relationship with his family had only worsened since. [Meghan] doesnt want that to happen again, a source was quoted as saying.

Yesterday palace insiders expressed surprise as they had heard no word that Meghan would be present. A Kensington Palace spokesman said it was a matter for the Sussexes.

Later in the day, Sussex sources spoke to the media to say the story was not true and pointed out the duchess had just had a baby. Lilibet Diana was born on June 4.

There was no mention, however, of the couples son Archie, two.

Many in royal circles are predicting that Harry, 36, will bring his son with him to see his British family for the first time since he was taken to Canada with his parents in January last year.

Harry will stay at Frogmore Cottage, his Windsor home, giving him privacy and the opportunity to visit the Queen at Windsor Castle.

The moving tribute to Diana was jointly commissioned by William and Harry in 2017 to mark the 20th anniversary of their mothers death and to recognise her positive impact.

Both brothers felt that an official statue of the princess was long overdue after the disaster of the official memorial fountain that was constructed to much public derision after her untimely death in 1997.

But its unveiling has been delayed by the fall-out between the brothers and the Covid pandemic.

It was made by sculptor Ian Rank-Broadley and will be installed in the Sunken Garden at Kensington Palace, Dianas home, on July 1.

It is the same spot where a tribute garden was planted to mark the 20th anniversary of her death and where Harry and Meghan announced their engagement in 2017.

In a joint statement, the brothers said: It has been 20 years since our mothers death and the time is right to recognise her positive impact in the UK and around the world with a permanent statue. Our mother touched so many lives. We hope the statue will help all those who visit Kensington Palace to reflect on her life and legacy.

Mr Rank-Broadley was seen as a very safe pair of hands for the commission.

His sculpture of the Queen was the model for the image of her that has been printed on British coins since 1998.

But while the Diana statue has in some ways brought Harry and William together, all eyes will be on the two warring brothers, whose once close relationship has disintegrated in recent years as a result of the Sussexes acrimonious split from the Royal Family.

Earlier this year the Sussexes conducted an explosive interview with Oprah Winfrey in which they made highly damaging claims about the Royal Family, including allegations of racism and a perceived lack of support over Meghans mental health issues.

Harry has also taken a number of vitriolic pot shots from across the Atlantic at his father, brother and the institution of the monarchy.

Although he was brought up at Kensington Palace and moved back there as an adult, it will no doubt be a challenging return for Harry.

Kensington Palace is very much his brother and sister-in-laws territory now. But the presence of his nephews and niece  George, Louis and Charlotte  whom he hasnt seen for a year and a half at least could help soothe troubled waters.
The EU looks set to cool the bitter Brexit standoff over sausage exports from Britain to Northern Ireland by agreeing a three month extension to the grace period.

In a potential breakthrough in the row, Brussels has signalled it is open to the UK's request to keep transition arrangements on chilled meat sales until the end of September.

Under the terms of the Northern Ireland protocol, British-made sausages and similar foods are due to be banned from being sold in the province at the end of this month.

But Boris Johnson has threatened to suspend the agreement if that happens - with the bloc raising the prospect of a trade war by saying it would retaliate.

The extension could give more time for frantic efforts to find a way through the impasse.

The position has been complicated by the dramatic implosion of the DUP, with party leader Edwin Poots being ousted after just three weeks in the job and powersharing at Stormont hanging in the balance.

On a visit to Yorkshire this afternoon, Mr Johnson said: 'I think that it's very important that the Northern Ireland government should be stable, it should enjoy support across parties, which it does, it's good it's back up and running.

'And what we want to do as the UK is ensure that we look after the stability of Northern Ireland, the peace process, and, of course, the union and movement of goods, people, services and capital to all parts of the union. That's what we're going to do.'

Boris Johnson (right) has threatened to suspend the Northern Ireland protocol over the row - with the EU's Maros Sefcovic (left) raising the prospect of a trade war by saying it would retaliate

The position has been complicated by the dramatic implosion of the DUP, with party leader Edwin Poots (pictured) being ousted after just three weeks in the job

In a statement last night, the EU Commission said it was open to a solution on extending the grace period to September 30.

A No 10 spokesman said the extension would 'allow movements to continue while we seek to find a longer term solution with the EU'.

It came as the US also agreed to drop a 25 per cent tax on single malt Scotch whisky for five years following Brexit.

The EU Commission statement read: 'The Commission will now assess this request.

'The Commission has already indicated its openness to finding solutions in line with the Protocol.

'However, for that to happen, the UK must fully implement the Protocol, which is the solution found to protect the Good Friday (Belfast) Agreement, the functioning of the all-island economy, and the integrity of the EU's Single Market.

'There is no alternative to the Protocol.

'When looking for solutions, providing stability and predictability for the people of Northern Ireland will be of paramount importance.'

Commission vice-president Maros Sefcovic will seek to arrange talks with Brexit minister Lord Frost and his team to discuss the request, the statement added.

A Government spokesman said: 'There is no case whatsoever for preventing chilled meats from being sold in Northern Ireland - any ban would be contrary to the aims of the Protocol and the interests of the people of Northern Ireland.'

Tories vented fury at DUP 'dinosaurs' amid complaints they are a 'recruiting sergeant' for a united Ireland after Mr Poots quit last night leaving powersharing hanging in the balance.

It means that Mr Poots becomes the shortest serving leader in DUP history. He was narrowly voted in as Arlene Foster's successor on May 14, following a revolt against the former First Minister by his supporters.

But a majority of the DUP's elected representatives turned on Mr Poots after he reached an agreement with Sinn Fein on Irish language legislation - a contentious issue for local unionists - to prevent the Stormont executive from collapsing.

Mr Poots, a creationist seen as a more hardline figure than Mrs Foster, then disregarded internal opposition to proceed with formally nominating ally Paul Givan as the new First Minister.

Mr Sefcovic is set for more talks with Brexit minister Lord Frost (pictured) over the protocol

The disarray has raised fears that the fragile Northern Ireland Assembly could collapse, just 18 months after it returned following a three-year hiatus.

Sir Jeffrey Donaldson is favourite to take over from Mr Poots, but he is believed to have a tense relationship with Mr Givan.

Tories turned their fire on the DUP over crisis, with one senior MP telling MailOnline that Mr Poots's plans have 'gone to sh**' because his allies 'can't count'.

'The DUP don't have a strategy apart from how best to put people off voting unionist,' the MP said.

'They are the biggest recruiting sergeant for a border poll and they just won't learn their lessons.'

The MP said unionists were being weighed down by having to appease 'creationist luddites'.

'It is extraordinary for a party which houses so many creationists how many dinosaurs are in it as well,' they added.
A Scottish shopping centre's pop-up area with six plastic seats in front of a television has been described as the 'worst fanzone in Europe'.

Antonine Shopping Centre in Cumbernauld, North Lanarkshire, launched the designated fan area earlier this week.

The zone was assembled so shoppers could follow all the Euro 2020 action ahead of Scotland's first game against Czech Republic on Monday.

An image shows how the two-metre wide area, placed in front of Superdrug, has been set up in the middle of the shopping centre walkway and sectioned off by string with flags attached.

Lauryn Keating posted a video to TikTok on Wednesday after being left shocked by the bleak-looking area.

In a video posted to TikTok by Lauryn Keating (pictured left), the two-metre wide area (right) at Antonine Shopping Centre in Cumbernauld, North Lanarkshire, can be seen in the middle of the shopping centre walkway and sectioned off by string with flags attached

Lauryn captioned the footage: 'Euro 2020 in Cumbernauld', followed by a face palm and crying with laughter emoji.

In the clip, she says alongside a photograph of the area: 'We all know Glasgow has the Fan Zone for the Euros, wait till I show you what Cumbernauld town centre has.

'What the f*** is that?

'Who f****** thought of that and who in their right mind is going to sit in the middle of a pure s***hole of a town centre outside Superdrug watching the Euros?'

The clip has since been viewed over 47,000 times and received hundreds of comments from viewers.

One social media user wrote: 'Just seen Cumbernauld's version of the fan zone and I am losing my mind.'

Antonine Shopping Centre (pictured above) launched the designated fan area earlier this week ahead of Scotland's first game against Czech Republic on Monday

Another said: 'Omg. Totally the worst fanzone in Europe, would have set the whole look off if the TV was an old Grundig.'

And a third commented: 'Walked past it the other day and everyone was sniggering at it.'

Others described it as the 'next level of tragic', while one person simply wrote: 'Only in Cambernauld.'

MailOnline has approached Antonine Shopping Centre for comment.
Canadas public safety minister says border restrictions on nonessential travel with the United States will be extended until July 21 as the country works on getting a higher percentage of Canadians fully vaccinated.

There are growing calls in the US to open the Canada-U.S. border for nonessential travel like tourism, but Canada has refused to do so until 20 percent of its residents are fully vaccinated.

The vaccination numbers in Canada pale in comparison to the US, which has administered 315 million total doses of the COVID vaccine as of Friday. Forty-five percent of the US population is fully vaccinated.

Meanwhile Canada has only administered 31,240,582 total doses of the COVID vaccine and just 12.8 percent of its population is fully vaccinated, according to data from the Government of Canada.

Twenty-four million Canadians - 64 percent of the population - have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine.

The U.S. has administered 315 million total doses of the COVID vaccine compared to 31,240,582 doses administered in Canada

The Canada-United States border crossing at the Thousand Islands Bridge has been closed to combat the spread of the coronavirus disease

There are growing calls in the U.S. to open the Canada-U.S. border for nonessential travel like tourism, but less than 20 percent of Canadians are fully vaccinated

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said the government wants to reach vaccination goals before opening up the border.

'We're still seeing cases across the country and we want to get them down,' Trudeau said.

'At the same time we also know we have to hit our targets of 75 perfect vaccinated with the first dose and at least 20 percent vaccinated with the second dose before we can start loosening things up because even a fully vaccinated individual can pass on COVID-19 to someone who is not vaccinated.'

Trudeau said the government needs to ensure communities to which fully vaccinated travelers return to are not at risk.

'Even though they are protected from hospitalization the people around them might not be,' Trudeau said.

The border between Canada and the US has remained closed to all nonessential travel for over a year.

Public Safety Minister Bill Blair tweeted on Friday that the move to extend the US-Canada border restriction until July 21 was made in coordination with the US officials.

'Our number one priority as we fight COVID 19 is keeping Canadians safe. In coordination with the US, we are extending restrictions on non-essential international travel and with the United States until July 21, 2021,' he tweeted.

Further details on planning measures will be released on Monday, Blair said.

'The government is planning measures for fully vaccinated Canadians, Permanent Residents, and others who are currently permitted to enter Canada and will provide further details on Monday, June 21,' he tweeted.

The Canadian government expects to have enough vaccine delivered for 80 percent of eligible Canadians to be fully vaccinated by the end of July.

Canada delayed administering a second dose to get more people a level of protection with the first dose faster and as the country waited for more supply to arrive.

Canada only started getting US manufactured vaccines in May as the US didn't allow for exports until then.

The country had largely been getting vaccines from Europe until Pfizer doses began arriving from Pfizer's Michigan plant in May, AP reported.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford's Progressive Conservative Party has been running campaign style ads that accuse Trudeau's federal government of failing to close borders to stop new variants of COVID-19 from entering the country.

Ontario only recently got through a third wave of infections fueled by community spread. Toronto, Canada's largest city, has largely been on lockdown for more than six months.
Gavin Williamson has urged parents to keep testing themselves and their children amid a row about how well self-tests actually work.

The Education Secretary wrote to parents of children in secondary schools and colleges across the country and said: 'We need you and your children to carry on testing twice a week.'

His letter insists the testing has 'played a vital role' in controlling the Covid outbreak despite concerns that the tests don't work well.

One of Britain's top Covid-fighting scientists, Professor Sir Andrew Pollard, of Oxford University, today said the constant testing of pupils was 'disruptive'.

And there are concerns high rates of false positive results - when people are wrongly told they have the virus and have to self-isolate - mean pupils are spending time out of class unnecessarily.

The Government gives rapid lateral flow tests to pupils and staff in secondary schools and, although branded the NHS 'self-tests', they are not actually designed to be used by people swabbing themselves but by trained medical professionals.

Education Secretary Gavin Williamson has urged parents to keep testing themselves and their children for Covid twice a week to stop school outbreaks of the virus

Experts have warned that Covid testing in schools is hugely disruptive and should be scrapped after it emerged up to 60 per cent of positive tests turn out to be negative when checked (Pictured: A girl tests herself at a school in Halifax)

Analysis of Test and Trace data by The Telegraph shows that around a third of positive lateral flow tests come back negative when checked against the higher standard PCR tests.





In March, the figure rose to 60 per cent for a week, the data revealed.

Professor Sir Andy Pollard, who led the Oxford vaccine programme, said the testing on such a huge scale was causing mass disruption.

He said children are not major drivers of transmission and added: 'The testing itself is picking up lots of cases, causing classes to be sent home and so on.

'We've got to get to a point where we're not impacting on education. And I think that impact on education could be a reason for vaccination.'

But Mr Williamson said in an open letter: 'With the increase in cases with variants of concern, it is important to continue regular testing in order to detect cases of coronavirus, stay ahead of the virus and keep Covid out of the classroom.

'This means that regular asymptomatic testing for all will continue, and we need you and your children who are in secondary school or college to carry on testing at home, twice a week.

'As you know, testing has been playing a vital role in our response to the virus. It is helping to break chains of transmission by identifying asymptomatic positive cases quickly.

'This means those who test positive can self-isolate, keeping other pupils and students in face-to-face education.

'Reporting all test results, positive or negative, helps the health experts have a clearer picture of any potential outbreaks in different parts of the country.'

Some of the highest infection rates in the country are currently among teenagers in secondary schools and colleges, and the Government must now consider whether to offer them vaccines in a bid to stop the virus spreading.

Experts on the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation are understood to have raised 'serious ethical concerns' about inoculating children because of the tiny risk they face of becoming seriously ill.

The group will release fresh guidance on the highly controversial topic of vaccinating children by the end of the week, according to the Telegraph.

It will urge No10 to hold off jabbing under-18s in the immediate future and wait for more safety data to come out of the US and Israel, where the plans are already in motion.

Cabinet minister Liz Truss said No10 would look 'very closely' at advice from the panel, which has helped steer Downing Street through the pandemic.

Meanwhile, one of the Government's senior scientific advisers warned of the ethical dilemma posed by vaccinating children  who face a one-in-a-million risk of dying from coronavirus.

SAGE's Professor Calum Semple, an expert in outbreak medicine at the University of Liverpool, said he is against vaccinating the 14million children in the UK.

Children's campaigners, who have raised opposition to any mandatory vaccination programme for school students, said they were 'very reassured' by the news.

But experts are divided on the topic, with some insisting it would help deal with the Indian variant.

Pfizer's jab has already been approved for 12- to 15-year-olds by the UK's Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA).

But it hasn't yet been deployed in the UK because ministers haven't given the green light to expanding the roll-out. Professor Chris Whitty this week hinted that children could get vaccines to stop the virus disrupting their education.

Pfizer's jab is already being used on children in the US  but concerns are mounting that it may be linked to heart damage in young adults. Some 226 myocarditis and pericarditis cases have been reported in the US following Pfizer and Moderna shots, mostly in men with an average age of 24.

Moderna's vaccine is poised for approval in the same age group in the US and both companies, as well as Johnson & Johnson, have begun trials for under-12s.

UK parents have already hit out at plans to inoculate children, with 50,000 signing a petition against Covid vaccinations for youngsters.

Teaching unions, meanwhile, have offered tentative support for an under-18 jab roll-out, if it helps tackle disruption to schooling.

A Whitehall source told the Telegraph: 'Nobody is going to green light the mass vaccination of children at this stage.

'Scientists want to see more data from the US and elsewhere before taking a firm stand either way.

'The JCVI will want to weigh up the benefits against the risks before vaccinating children and it wants more data.'

And International Trade Secretary Ms Truss this morning concurred that the JCVI would not be recommending jabs for children.

She told BBC Breakfast: 'Of course the Government will look very closely at the JCVIs recommendations.

'It is my understanding that they are not recommending the vaccination of under-18s and we will be saying more in due course about that.'

Meanwhile, Professor Semple said he is 'veering on not vaccinating children' because of their low risk of severe disease.

Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Today programme today, he said he would prioritise vaccinating hard to reach vulnerable people in the UK and sending jabs abroad.

Professor Semple said: 'The first thing to remember here is that risk and severe disease in children  Im talking about admission to hospital, admission to intensive care and death  the risk of death is one in a million.

MR WILLIAMSON'S LETTER IN FULL The Prime Minister announced on 14 June that step 4 of the roadmap would have to be paused for up to four weeks because of the spread of the new variant. With the increase in cases with variants of concern, it is important to continue regular testing in order to detect cases of coronavirus, stay ahead of the virus and keep covid out of the classroom. This means that regular asymptomatic testing for all will continue, and we need you and your children who are in secondary school or college to carry on testing at home, twice a week. As you know, testing has been playing a vital role in our response to the virus. It is helping to break chains of transmission by identifying asymptomatic positive cases quickly. This means those who test positive can self-isolate, keeping other pupils and students in face-to-face education. Reporting all test results, positive or negative, helps the health experts have a clearer picture of any potential outbreaks in different parts of the country. I want to thank you all for your efforts so far. I know that this has been an enormously challenging time for families, who have faced many pressures over the past 18 months. Your continued support in helping us fight the virus has been vital. Secondary pupils and college students, households and their bubbles, along with school and college staff have now completed more than 50 million tests since these were introduced back in January. That really is an incredible number and we need you to continue your efforts. It is wonderful to see so many children back in school and through your actions we can work together to keep everyone safe ensuring we can also keep your children in school with their friends. Letter posted online by the Department for Education. Advertisement

Experts on the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) are said to have raised 'serious ethical concerns' about vaccinating children - because of the low risk of youngsters becoming serious illness through Covid. It comes amid a kick-back from parents, with 50,000 people recently signing a petition against Covid vaccinations for youngsters. Pictured left: Health Secretary Matt Hancock. Pictured right: Campaigner Molly Kingsley from UsforThem

'And thats not a figure Im plucking from the air as a sort of average or guess. Thats a quantifiable risk.

'So were talking about vaccinating children here mainly to protect public health and reduce transmission and its accepted that teenagers who are biologically more like adults are more likely to transmit but the younger children really are not.

'The balance here is should the vaccine be pushed into the arms of hard to reach adults and should we spend efforts persuading hesitant adults to have a vaccine.

'And if we do have lots of vaccine left over, should we be sending it to countries in Europe and Africa and Asia where they havent got enough vaccine.'

He added that the spread of the Indian 'Delta' variant in schools should not be a cause for concern because it does not cause more serious illness in youngsters.

Professor Semple: 'Yes, the virus is spreading in schools because its got nowhere else to hide at the moment and thats confounding the challenge too.

'The Delta variant is more transmissible but its not causing greater disease in children per se.

'Its just that its not able to cause greater disease in the older adults because their vaccinated and the vaccines still pretty good.

'So Im veering on the not vaccinating children, only because of the ethical issues and the need to get the vaccine into older people.'

The Government should not roll-out its mass Covid vaccine programme for children until scientists get 'more data on the risks', top scientists will reportedly warn

Why children are less affected by Covid-19 Children are less at risk of developing severe Covid symptoms and dying from the disease due to a host of differences between the bodies and immune systems of youngsters and adults, a study shows. Australian researchers have identified several specific physiological differences which may explain why Covid-19 is rarely severe or fatal in children. These include strong, undamaged cells in their blood vessels which prevent inflammation and clotting; elevated levels of vitamin D; an immune system that is both fast acting and well-oiled; and fewer ACE2 receptors, which the coronavirus uses to infect cells. While Covid-19 causes well-documented respiratory problems in adults, particularly the vulnerable and elderly, other respiratory conditions also plague children. However, society's youngest are demonstrably less affected by coronavirus infection, making up only a tiny proportion of cases, hospital admissions and deaths. A recent study from the US looked at hospital admissions of children at seven different hospitals and found just just four per cent of children test positive for the virus. The research looked at tests of more than 135,000 children who went to hospital for various reasons before September 8. It revealed only 5,374 (4.0 per cent) of patients tested positive and, of this small percentage, only 359 (6.7 per cent) were hospitalised, with 99 in intensive care. Eight of the infected patients (0.15 per cent) later died. Six of the deaths were patients with 'complex preexisting comorbidities', the scientists say. But why this is the case has thus far remained a mystery, with scientists and doctors trying to get to the bottom of the mystery. Advertisement

Meanwhile, children's campaigners, UsforThem, today praised the news.

Co-founder Molly Kinsgley said: 'UsforThem are very reassured to see that JCVI are expected to recommend against a mass roll out of the Covid-19 vaccine to children in the immediate future.

'Whilst we recognise there may be a need for children with serious vulnerabilities to have the Covid-19 vaccine, we have always had serious concerns about the appropriateness of reliance on emergency use authorisation for a mass roll out to children given the lack of adequate, long term safety data.

'We are pleased to see that the JCVI have appeared to recognised the severity of the issues at stake and have, in our view, sensibly and rightly, followed the example set by the German STIKO in declining to recommend the vaccine for mass roll out in children at this stage.

'To suggest, as Chris Whitty did in the Q&A to the press conference earlier this week, that a benefit to children taking the vaccine would be to prevent school disruption is disingenuous.

'Once all adults have been vaccinated there should simply be no more school disruption and it would be unconscionable to suggest that education - which is a basic human right of children - is dependent on the willingness of the cohort or individual children to take a vaccine, and especially one for which there is no long term safety data.

'If what is being reported is correct it is a rare example of adults finally doing the right thing by children. We applaud the integrity shown by JCVI and hope that others in a position of responsibility for the health and welfare of children now follow suit.'

It comes after Professor Chris Whitty earlier this week hinted children could be given Covid jabs to stop the virus disrupting their education or increasing their future risk of physical or mental health problems.

England's Chief Medical Officer (CMO) told a Downing Street news conference that the 'wider question' was about whether such a programme would help limit Covid's disruption to schooling.

He said officials were still considering whether to vaccinate children but the 'big priority' was reaching over-18s in the summer.

Speaking at the Downing Street press conference earlier this week, he said: 'The key thing for children is safety.

'We know that the risks in terms of of physical disease to children, other than for some children with significant pre-existing problems of physical health, are much, much lower than for adults.

'So you wouldn't want to vaccinate unless the vaccine was very safe. Vaccines are now being licensed in some countries and we're accruing safety data on the safety of these vaccines in children.'

England's Chief Medical Officer (CMO) told a Downing Street news conference that the 'wider question' was about whether such a programme would help limit Covid's disruption to schooling

Scientists on the JCVI will reportedly recommend the Government looks to the US and Israel where children are already being vaccinated.

In the US, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommended that all children over 12 should get a Covid jab in May. Some 7.6million 12- to 18-year-olds have already had a first dose while 4.7million have had their second.

Meanwhile, Israel has recently started vaccinating children aged 12 to 15. France has also opened up vaccinations for children aged 12 and over.

If the UK Government does push on for a vaccine roll-out for children, it will most likely use the Pfizer vaccine.

The jab has already been deemed safe for use in those aged 12-15 by the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA).

A senior government source told the Telegraph: 'The Pfizer vaccine has been licensed for 12 to 15-year-olds by the MHRA, and a number of countries will be vaccinating children in those age groups.

'Ministers have not received advice, and no decisions have been taken.'

AstraZeneca's vaccine will almost certainly not be recommended for use in children, having already been advised against for under-40s by the JCVI because of its links to extremely rare blood clots in the brain.

The issue of vaccinating children is contentious, because studies show there is an extremely low risk of children becoming seriously ill through Covid.

The main benefit, it is thought, is to limit the spread of the virus in schools.

It comes as more than 50,000 people signed a petition against Covid vaccinations for youngsters

A study earlier this year revealed that those who do become infected three weeks after receiving one dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech or AstraZeneca vaccine were between 38 per and 49 per cent less likely to pass the virus on to their household contacts than those who were unvaccinated.

There is also data to suggest that teenagers are more likely to spread Covid  and this is one of the reasons behind potentially vaccinating children in the UK.

It comes as more than 50,000 people have now signed a petition against Covid vaccinations for youngsters.

The appeal to Parliament had raked in 54,895 as of Tuesday morning as it called on the government to avoid jabbing youngsters.

Retired paediatrician Dr Ros Jones created the page and called for officials to delay giving doses to under 18s until after 'Phase 3 trials are complete'.

She wrote: 'A risk vs benefit calculation does not support giving COVID-19 vaccines, which use novel technologies and are still in Phase 3 trials, to healthy children.

'Any rollout should not start until trials are complete and all findings are published and peer-reviewed on long-term safety data.

'Healthy children are at low risk from COVID-19 yet face known and unknown risks from COVID-19 vaccines.

'Rare, but serious, adverse events and deaths are being reported to monitoring systems around the world.

'Official guidance is updated as the side-effects become more apparent. Giving Covid-19 vaccines to healthy children to protect adults is unethical and unjustifiable.

'The Government has an ethical duty to act with caution and proportionality.'

The Government responded: 'The Government will continue to evaluate evidence and assess expert opinion before making a decision on routinely vaccinating children under 18 years old.'

Despite the backlash from parents, teachers' unions appear to be mostly in favour of jabbing children.

Joint General Secretary of the NEU Kevin Courtney said: 'The NEU would welcome the extension of vaccination to school students when and if that is approved - this would lead to children missing less in-person education.

'In the meantime we should continue to take all appropriate measures, including face coverings and better ventilation, to reduce the risks of transmission.'
A mother and her seven-year-old daughter have been found dead in an apparent murder-suicide at their the home in a wealthy Connecticut neighborhood, medical examiners said.

Tracy Do, 46, died by suicide with 'sharp-force injuries of torso and extremities', while her seven-year-old daughter Layla Malon died by drowning at their $1.8million home in Westpoint, according to police.

Officers from the Westport Police Department responded to a call about an unresponsive female at a Lyndale Park home on Thursday afternoon and discovered both the mother and daughter dead.

Initially, police believed that the case could have been a double homicide, but later said they believed it was a murder-suicide.

Police investigate the crime scene. where a Connecticut mom, 46, drowned her seven-year-old daughter at her $1.8M Connecticut mansion before taking her own life

Connecticut State Police were among those on the scene for the investigation

The crime scene was the site of an active investigation in Westport on Friday

Meanwhile, court records revealed that the mom was involved in a bitter property battle with her ex Eric John Malon over ownership of the expensive home, the New York Post reports.

The former couple, who never married, had been due before a remote court hearing on Friday morning.

They broke up back in 2018 and shared two children together, including 13-year-old Alexis, who was not hurt in the incident.

Police responded to a call of an unresponsive female at a Westport home (pictured) on Thursday afternoon when they discovered the body of a woman and pronounced her dead

When officers continued to search the home they also found the body of her seven year-old daughter as well

DailyMail.com has reached out to a member of the Westport Police Department for more information.

Westport police Chief Foti Koskinas released a statement Friday, saying, 'This is a horrible tragedy, and the police department is keeping the family as well as the community that was so deeply affected by this in our thoughts and prayers.'

Lt. David Wolf from the Westport Police Department told FOX 61 that the deaths were an isolated incident and that investigators believe there is currently no active threat to the community.

The mother and daughter lived in a 4,457 square-foot home on a private road.

The three-story mansion, which last sold for $515,000 in July of 2010, according to public records, has the current market value is $1,768,000, CT Post reported.

Court records show that the mansion was part of a bitter battle between Do and her ex-partner and father of the two children who lived there.

In October, Do sued for custody of the two children, saying that she worked for her partner's company for years without being properly compensated.

She also claimed her ex-partner promised a Westport home for Do and her children when the relationship ended.

Later, her partner would twice try to have Do evicted from the Westport home. The first attempt came in April, with Malon claiming she didn't pay $10,000 a month in rent.

Do had received an extension to July 16 just a week ago to respond to the second eviction attempt.

Westport is one of the five richest towns in one of America's five richest counties, according to the New York Times.

Court records show that the mansion may have been part of a bitter battle between Do and her ex-partner and father of the two children who lived there

Lt. Wolf told Fox 61 that the incident was a rare occurrence in the upper-class neighborhood.

'Fortunately things like that do not happen in Westport,' he said. 'It's a tragedy, our hearts go out to the family and it is devastating for the community and the family, of course.'

A neighbor told the CT Post that the family was known for their impressive Christmas decorations.

'They looked to be a very happy family,' Mark Kratter said. 'They had a very well manicured home with extensive Christmas decorations that populated the entire lawn on a 2-acre lot.'

Police said they are still processing the scene as of Friday.

Lt. David Wolf from the Westport Police Department (pictured) said the deaths were an isolated incident and that investigators believe there is currently no active threat to the community

Police have not yet confirm how many people lived inside the home and said as of Friday they are still processing the scene

A red van was seen being towed away from the property, but police would not confirmed who it belonged to.



In an email to parents, Westport Schools Superintendent Thomas Scarice confirmed the mother and daughter were part of the Westport Public Schools system.

'Late this afternoon, we were informed of the untimely and tragic loss of one of our parents and her beloved daughter,' Scarice wrote in an email to parents Thursday night.

Classes were cancelled at Coleytown Elementary School and Stepping Stones Preschool on Friday but mental health services were offered for parents and students.

'There are no words that could console the sense of sorrow we feel by this unspeakable tragedy. We want to express our deepest condolences to all those impacted by this heartbreaking loss,' the Superintendent said in his email.

Westport First Selectman Jim Marpe also expressed his condolences over the tragedy.

'Police, first responders, public school personnel and students have been directly impacted by this devastating event,' Marpe stated.

Flowers are seen on a bench outside of the street where the deadly incident took place

'The entire community shares in their grief and sadness. Westport is a caring community and I know we will come together to support those who need to begin the healing process.'

Several flower bouquets were left outside of the gate to the private street on a bench and one woman could be seen wiping tears away.

'Its just a big tragedy for this town,' Emily Greenberg told the Courant after dropping off flowers. 'We dont have this here.'
Chilling new bodycam footage has revealed how the officers on the front line were attacked as they tired to defend the Capitol during the January 6 riots.

In the video, the U.S. Justice Department identified one of the men who features prominently in the video as Thomas Webster.

The 54-year-old is a Marine veteran and retired NYPD officer is seen seen screaming profanities at police officers guarding the Capitol, hitting at least one with a flagpole before then tackling him to the ground in the 56-second clip.

Webster is facing seven federal charges for his involvement in the deadly insurrection, including assaulting a police officer, unlawfully entering Capitol grounds with a dangerous weapon and engaging in physical violence.

A complaint filed against Webster includes grabs from the footage - showing him wearing a red coat - recorded by the camera of the officer tackled to the ground.

In the video, the U.S. Justice Department identified one of the men who features prominently in the video as Thomas Webster, wearing a red biker jacket (pictured)

It also includes an interview conducted by the FBI with the attacked D.C. officer - named in the complaint only as as MPD Officer N.R. - who said Webster had pinned him to the ground and straddled him while trying to take off his helmet and gas mask while choking him with the chin strap.

'N.R. had been dispatched to that location in order to assist U.S. Capitol Police officers with protecting the Capitol grounds and building,' the complaint says.

'[Webster] attempts to attack N.R. by lunging toward him with the metal flagpole. Webster strikes at N.R. with the flagpole numerous times,' it alleges.

The alleged assault was also captured in photographs during the riots, showing the same man from the videos pinning a D.C. officer wearing a high-visibility jacket to the ground amid a crowd of people.

When contacted by the Washington Post after the video's release, James Monroe, an attorney representing Webster , decline to comment.

The previously unpublished video was released by the US Attorney's Office on Thursday as a result of a recent ruling in a court case, after more than a dozen news outlets sued for access to evidence gathered by the Justice Department.

Until now, it was only available to judges, but not to the public, according to CNN.

The 54-year-old is a Marine veteran and retired NYPD officer is seen seen screaming profanities at police officers guarding the Capitol, hitting at least one with a flagpole before then tackling him to the ground in the 56-second clip (pictured)

Webster is facing seven federal charges for his involvement in the deadly insurrection, including assaulting a police officer, unlawfully entering Capitol grounds with a dangerous weapon and engaging in physical violence

At the start of the video, Webster is seen emerging from the crowd of MAGA supporters holding a Marine flag and calling D.C. officers communists.

When one of the officers is seen pushing Webster back, he retaliates by lunging forward and shoving a metal barrier into the police officers.

'We see what I would describe as a look of pure rage,' U.S. Attorney Benjamin Gianforti said during a heading in February.

'His teeth are gritted. This is a man about to unleash some kind of violence.'

But during Webster's first court appearance in February, Munroe argued that his client was only reacting to being punched by a police officer.

'He's never been in a shooting incident in his career,' Monroe said. 'This was the one and only protest he's ever been a part of.'

Prosecutors argued back that 10 minutes of video leading up to the violent encounter shown in the newly released clip showed no such provocation.

A complaint filed against Webster includes grabs from the footage - showing him wearing a red coat - recorded by the camera of the officer tackled to the ground (pictured)

MPD Officer N.R. said Webster had pinned him to the ground and straddled him while trying to take off his helmet and gas mask while choking him with the chin strap

According to The Post, Webster was identified in part after a school administrator at his child's high school recognized him from dropping of his child at school.

Webster served as a police officer in New York for two decades, and even served in Mayor Mike Bloomberg's security detail, court filings show.

At least 19 current or former members of law enforcement have been arrested amid the investigations into the January 6 siege, The Post has reported.

'We are a part of a coalition of broadcasters working on the release of videos from the January 6th riots in several pending cases,' Gray Media, who secured the footage, said in a statement on Thursday reported by WNDU.

'One of the matters had a ruling today requiring release of body camera footage. The video clip was released by the US Attorney's Office today in response to the court ordering release. There is profanity in the video.

The alleged assault was also captured in photographs during the riots, showing the same man from the videos pinning a D.C. officer wearing a high-visibility jacket to the ground amid a crowd of people (pictured)

Webster served as a police officer in New York for two decades, and even served in Mayor Mike Bloomberg's security detail, court filings show

'Brief case background: U.S. v. Webster, Defendant is Thomas Webster, a United States Marine Corps veteran and retired New York City Police Department Officer, accused of assaulting an MPD officer with a flagpole.

'The court ruling today only related to release of the video, not merits of the charges.'

Despite widespread pictures and footage showing the attacks on the U.S. Capitol building - including police bodycam footage and surveillance tapes from inside and outside the building - Republicans have worked to play-down the events, and have blocked an effort to form an independent commission to investigate the riots.

The insurrection came after the Trump campaign held a 'Save America' rally on the Ellipse outside the White House on January 6, which saw the president speak for over an hour to a large crowd of MAGA supporters.

Trump has since faced accusations that he and other MAGA figures used the 'Save America' rally to rile up his supporters ahead of the riot.

MAGA protesters were told by Trump and his allies to head to Capitol Hill where lawmakers were scheduled to confirm Biden's presidential victory.

Trumps supporters gather outside the Capitol building in Washington D.C., United States on January 06, 2021. Lawmakers were forced to go into hiding for several hours as Capitol police grappled to take back control while the mob rioted in the Senate and House, invaded Nancy Pelosi's office and looted items

Pictured: Trump supporters clash with police and security forces as they storm the US Capitol in Washington, DC on January 6, 2021

'After this, we're going to walk down, and I'll be there with you. We're going to walk down. We're going to walk down any one you want, but I think right here. We're going to walk down to the Capitol, and we're going to cheer on our brave senators, and congressmen and women,' the president said during the event.

'We're probably not going to be cheering so much for some of them, because you'll never take back our country with weakness. You have to show strength, and you have to be strong.'

In the hours that followed, a violent mob stormed the Capitol, breaking through police barricades and smashing windows to enter the building.

Lawmakers were forced to go into hiding for several hours as Capitol police grappled to take back control while the mob rioted in the Senate and House, invaded Nancy Pelosi's office and looted items.

The Justice Department has charged at least 400 people in connection with the capitol riots so far, with defendants coming from 43 different states.

New defendants have been added nearly every day since the attack, and federal prosecutors have said in a recent court filing that they expect to charge at least 500 people in total.

Pictured: A supporter of President Donald Trump carries a Confederate battle flag on the second floor of the U.S. Capitol near the entrance to the Senate after breaching security defenses, in Washington, U.S., January 6, 2021

Supporters of US President Donald Trump gather on the West side of the US Capitol in Washington DC on January 6, 2021 where a noose has been erected

One female Trump supporter, US Air Force veteran Ashli Babbitt, was shot dead by Capitol Police as she tried to climb through a window.

Three other Trump supporters died after 'medical emergencies' related to the breach and Capitol Police Officer Brian D. Sicknick died from injuries sustained in the attack after he was allegedly hit over the head.

Hundreds of people have already been charged over their involvement in the riots, with prosecutors across the U.S. working to bring to justice those who stormed the U.S. Capitol, sending lawmakers into hiding as they began their work to affirm Joe Biden's victory.

The group included white nationalists, neo-Nazis and QAnon conspiracy theorists, coming from states as far-flung as Arizona and Oregon, while photographs from the riot have shown people wearing clothes with a range of antisemitic messages.
Wearing identical jackets and with their hair cut short, two brothers pose for prison mugshots after being jailed for grievous bodily harm.

The brutal men, Albert and Thomas Billingham, who were aged 22 and 19 respectively, were sentenced in 1875 to five years hard labour for beating and stabbing a park warden.

Their photographs are among more than 800,000 crime and punishment records which have been digitised by ancestry website findmypast.co.uk, in association with the National Archives.

The Billingham brothers were just two convicts in the newly-available records  which date from 1784 to 1939 - who served part or all of their sentence at London's Pentonville prison.

Britons can search the archive themselves to see if their ancestors committed a criminal offence, along with any sentence they received.

Wearing identical jackets and with their hair cut short, two brothers pose for prison mugshots after being jailed for grievous bodily harm. The brutal men, Albert and Thomas Billingham, were sentenced to five years hard labour for beating and stabbing a park warden in 1875

A mugshot of jewel thief George Bellamy, who was sentenced to transportation for seven years for stealing items worth 4,000 - including three rings and five bracelets  is another highlight of the archive.

Also seen are both men and women who have been sent to a 'certified inebriate reformatory' for drinking too much.

Under the Inebriates Act 1898, people were sent to the institutions if they had been convicted of drunkenness four times in one year.

The new collection also contains details of criminal cases, jails and prison ships.

As well as Pentonville, other famous prisons covered in the latest release include Wormwood Scrubs and Newgate.

Built between 1840 to 1842, Pentonville housed criminals who had been sentenced to imprisonment or were waiting to be transported to Australia, which was then a British colony.

The Billingham brothers served part of their sentence at Pentonville prison (depicted above in 1842)

George Bellamy (left) was sentenced to transportation for seven years for stealing items worth 4,000 - including three rings and five bracelets. David Dumpleton (right), then aged 32, was sentenced to 12 years at Pentonville in 1876 for manslaughter after the brutal killing of his wife Eliza

Thomas Wiffen (left) was sentenced to 10 years hard labour in 1876 for stealing 'five live fowls and 21 ducks'. He boasted nine previous convictions, including for domestic assault. Violent serial offender Timothy Dignum (right), from Liverpool, was sentenced to seven years hard labour and five years of police supervision for a string of offences in 1876

Prisoners were held in their own individual cells and were forbidden from speaking to each other when out exercising.

The records show that the Billingham brothers, who were chain makers from Stafford, were sentenced to hard labour after 'unlawfully and maliciously inflicting grievous bodily harm' upon Emmanuel Flavell.

Flavell, the keeper of the Saltwells Woods in Netherton, in the West Midlands. suffered what were described in contemporary newspaper reports as 'severe injuries' in the attack and was too weak to attend the trial of his attackers.

Other Pentonville inmates in the archive include the jewel thief Bellamy, who was sentenced to transportation after stealing jewellery from his mistress, Anne Goodwin, who he had once served as a footman.

Violent serial offender Timothy Dignum, from Liverpool, was sentenced to seven years hard labour and five years of police supervision for a string of offences in 1876.

This included the theft of trousers and a purse and one count of assault.

French serial book thief Charles Frontdier (left and right), who worked as a schoolmaster, was convicted in both 1876 and 1882 for stealing valuable books. It was in the second stint that he was sent to Pentonville and had his mugshot taken

Mary Ann Berringer, 64, was sent in 1910 to a 'certified inebriate reformatory' for three years due to her problem with alcohol. Under the Inebriates Act 1898, people were sent to the institutions if they had been convicted of drunkenness four times in one year

Lucy Anderson, aged 28, was also sent to for three years to a certified inebriate reformatory

David Dumpleton, then aged 32, was sentenced to 12 years at Pentonville in 1876 for manslaughter after the brutal killing of his wife Eliza.

Local newspaper reports revealed how Dumpleton had believed his wife was unfaithful when he killed her.

French serial book thief Charles Frontdier, who worked as a schoolmaster, was convicted in both 1873 and 1875 for stealing valuable books.

It was in the second stint that he was sent to Pentonville and had his mugshot taken.

Thomas Wiffen was sentenced to 10 years hard labour for stealing 'five live fowls and 21 ducks'. He boasted nine previous convictions, including for domestic assault.

Wiffen had also survived an earlier stint on board the notorious prison hulk 'Europa', which was moored off the coast of British territory Gibraltar

Hulks were essentially floating prisons, often converted warships left over from the Napoleonic wars.
A controversial group which was set up at a Cambridge college to examine the links between Winston Churchill, race and the empire, has been scrapped.

The team of academics and students at Churchill College decided to disband the group after heavy pressure to cancel a series of its events, it is understood.

The Working Group, which had been organised in the wake of George Floyd's murder in May last year, was to examine the former Prime Minister's views on race - but was accused by critics of being stacked with left-wing academics intent on smearing the World War Two Prime Minister.

It held an event called The Racial Consequences of Churchill, during which a panellist said wartime leader Sir Winston was the perfect embodiment of white supremacist philosophy.

The event also included claims that the British Empire was far worse than the Nazis.

Sir Nicholas Soames, Churchill's grandson accused the group of 'trashing' the wartime leader's reputation and suggested suggested the college should not be allowed to use his grandfathers name if it continues to smear it.

Churchill biographer Andrew Roberts had also accused the college of clearly premeditated malice and character assassination of the former Prime Minister.

Professor Priya Gopal, a member of the group, claimed she said the group might as well 'disband' after the college became 'rattled' from the event, but insisted that this had not happened and the college instead dissolved the group this week.

The Working Group, which was set up at Cambridge's Churchill college to examine the links between Winston Churchill (pictured), race and the empire, has been scrapped

Following the scrapping, Prof Gopal launched into a furious Twitter tirade at the 'entirely white' College Council and said it has an 'institutional' problem when it comes to 'race'.

But College Master Dame Athene Donald said she believed the Working Group had disbanded itself after taking the professor's comment at 'face value'.

In a statement, Churchill College Master Dame Athene Donald said the group, initially set up to 'critically assess' Churchill, seemed to have 'changed direction'.

Dame Athene wrote: 'The talks this year were intended to kickstart an ongoing discussion through different channels.

'However, at some point the Working Group seems to have changed direction.'

It comes after the British Empire was branded 'far worse than the Nazis' during a controversial debate hosted in February by Churchill College and the Working Group about Sir Winston Churchill.

The online discussion on 'The Racial Consequences of Mr Churchill' looked at his 'backward' views on empire and race and was held as part of a year-long 'inclusivity' review.

Contributor Kehinde Andrews, a professor of black studies at Birmingham City University, said: 'The British Empire was far worse than the Nazis. They lasted longer and killed many more people.'

It comes after an online event organised by the group came under criticism in February after academic Kehinde Andrews (pictured) branded the British Empire as 'far worse than the Nazis'

On Churchill, he added: 'There is no debate. His white supremacy is pretty much on record and the question here is why does Churchill still hold the level of popularity that he does? It's almost like he's been beatified  a saintly figure beyond reproach.'

Professor Andrews has previously accused Britain of being 'built on racism' and called RAF airmen who bombed Nazi Germany war criminals.

The comments at the debate were condemned as 'execrable' by the former leader's grandson, Sir Nicholas Soames.

The former Tory MP said: 'I think Sir Winston's reputation will withstand, with some ease, this sort of rant.

Sir Soames said the event marked a 'new low in the current vogue for the denigration in general of British history and of Sir Winston Churchill's memory'.

He also questioned whether the college should continue to benefit from the association with Churchill after hosting the event.

Professor Priya Gopal, a member of the group, said the college was 'very rattled' after the event and told the group that there could not be another panel discussion.

She said attempts to organise a third event on commemoration looking at statues and memorials to historical figures were subject to a 'back and forth' with the college, which subsequently said it could not officially host the event.

Prof Gopal, professor of post-colonial studies, claimed: 'People invested in myths of British imperial greatness have put pressure on the college not to have certain kinds of discussions around Churchill.'

She said due to 'frustration at the veto exercised by [the college] council' over future events, she said to the working group and the college master in May that the group 'should dissolve itself'.

But she claimed that this had not happened and the college had instead disbanded the group on Thursday via an email thanking them for their work.

She explained: 'They thanked us for our input and said our work was now over because we were never meant to be a long-term group anyway.'

The event, organised by the Working Group and hosted by Churchill College, came under fire by Churchill's grandson Sir Nicholas Soames (pictured) for 'trashing' the leader's reputation

Prof Gopal also said she was 'troubled' at the decision and had been of the understanding that the group would continue into 2022.

She added: 'It's deeply disappointing and very troubling in terms of what it means for academic freedom and for honest discussions around empire and race.'

Prof Gopal also claimed she was told 'the pressure from the family is immense', which she interpreted to be the Churchill family, and that 'one of them threatened to resign as a trustee' and 'would take the donors with him'.

But in a statement, Churchill College Master Dame Athene rejected the suggestion Churchill's family were involved in any decision around the Working Group's future.

She instead claimed the group was 'intended to have a finite lifetime, in this case the current academic year', and added that she believed the group had disbanded itself.

She explained : 'Despite there being some contact with Churchill's family, whose support (not least for the archives) has always been very important to the College, they are not involved in the College's governance processes, and the implication made in some quarters that they, Policy Exchange or the national press might have been steering matters, is to misunderstand our governance arrangements.'

Dame Athene said she had been told the group had decided they would not make recommendations on a third event, and that Prof Gopal said the group might as well dissolve itself.

She said: 'Rightly or wrongly, as master, I took that statement at face value: that they had in fact disbanded themselves.'

Dame Athene insisted that Churchill College will continue engaging in debates on historical figures, including Churchill himself, despite the disbanding.

She explained: 'Unfounded allegations are now being levelled both at the broad College community and at me personally.

'I would nevertheless stress that the College will continue engaging in debates, examining the actions of important historical figures including Churchill himself, and working on challenging attitudes.

'It will not stop us looking at all aspects of our community and our work to ensure we create an environment welcoming to all. Our work here has only just begun.'

College Master Dame Athene Donald said she believed the Working Group had disbanded itself and added that Churchill College (pictured) will still hold debates on historical figures

Responding to the college's statement in a furious Twitter thread, Prof Gopal said: 'I stand by my claims, and reject the tendentious and false rationale given for the dissolution today of the Churchill working party.

'It is true that several members of the working group had intended to resign.

'The disbanding today was a way for the college to pre-empt that imminent embarrassment.'

She added: 'Churchill College's Master, Athene Donald has disbanded the Working Group on Churchill, Race, and Empire.

'The third event in the series-on commemoration-did not get held due to pressure from the Churchill family and Policy Exchange, and the college taking fright after the backlash to the second event in February.

'Members of the Working Group (I was) were told that they had dissolved themselves (untrue) and that in any case, they had been constituted for a limited time (also not something they had been told).

'Cancel culture is real & disgraceful. Giving in to it is worse.

'NO PASARAN. Stand up to them. You and I will have to be cause the establishment will cave. And remember-activists for gender equality are not necessarily allies in the battle for racial justice.'

She also tweeted: 'I will say now publicly what I have said in multiple emails to the Master & College officers.

'Churchill College has a serious institutional problem when it comes to race, & the hagiography and mythologies around its founding figure contribute directly to that problem.'
Bernadette Walker was last seen alive on July 18 last year when Scott Walker, who she called her father but was not her biological father, collected her from her grandparents' house in Peterborough, Cambridge Crown Court heard

A mother who reported her teenage daughter missing to police told a 101 call handler that the photography student had 'run off before', a murder trial has heard.

Bernadette Walker was last seen alive on July 18 last year when Scott Walker, who she called her father but was not her biological father, collected her from her grandparents' house in Peterborough, Cambridge Crown Court heard.

The 17-year-old had claimed that 51-year-old Scott Walker had sexually abused her 'over a number of years' and prosecutors allege he killed her to 'prevent her pursuing her allegations of sexual abuse any further'.

Her body has not been found despite police searches.

Scott Walker is then accused of forming an 'unholy alliance' with Bernadette's 38-year-old mother Sarah Walker to mislead investigators, sending messages from Bernadette's phone and social media accounts to claim that she ran away, Lisa Wilding QC, prosecuting, said.

The court heard that Scott and Sarah Walker's phones were located in the vicinity of a lock-up garage in the early hours of July 20.

Scott Walker's Mercedes Vaneo was captured on an ANPR camera travelling north from Peterborough on the A16 at 12.37am, then both Scott and Sarah's mobile phones disconnected from the network within a minute of each other at 12.43am and 12.44am, Ms Wilding said.

She said that Bernadette's phone connected to several cell sites covering the Cowbit area of Lincolnshire between 12.54am and 1.30am.

The lawyer said that at 1am an iMessage was sent from Bernadette's phone to Sarah Walker's phone.

It said: 'For god's sake what the hell mum?

'Stop messaging my friends ...

'You tell anyone else I lied and I'm going to tell them I didn't and don't even have my phone.

'I will tell everyone dad's got it.

'I'm ok.'

Scott Walker, left, is accused of murdering Bernadette, 17, while her 38-year-old mother Sarah Walker is accused of perverting the course of justice

Ms Wilding said that a vehicle the same shape as the Mercedes Vaneo was seen entering a service station near Cowbit at 1.17am and left two minutes later.

She said text messages were sent from Bernadette's handset during that time, and the phone disconnected again at 1.29am.

Sarah Walker's phone reconnected to the network at 3.03am in the vicinity of her home in Peterborough, and Scott Walker's phone reconnected an hour later, Ms Wilding said.

Scott Walker downloaded an advice form from Childline at 10.20am on July 20, and at 1.31am on July 21 Sarah Walker contacted police via an online web chat function, the prosecution counsel said.

Sarah Walker wrote on the web chat: 'Hi, I just wanted some advice because our 17-year-old daughter ran off after a row.'

After a short exchange, the officer on the chat suggested she called 101, which she did at 3.10am, in a 50-minute call played to jurors.

Cambridgeshire Police launched a massive search for Bernadette, pictured, after she went missing on July 18

Despite an extensive search in areas surrounding Peterborough police have not yet recovered Bernadette's body

'I'm just ringing to report my 17-year-old daughter missing,' Sarah Walker said, with a call handler asking how long for.

'Well, she ran away on Saturday lunchtime but I knew where she was until she stopped messaging at 1am yesterday morning.

'I gave her the day to sort of sort it out a bit because it's not the first time she's done it.'

Sarah Walker said Bernadette 'has run off before'.

She said Bernadette had previously messaged to say she was at an ex-boyfriend's house.

Asked if she went to the boy's house to see if Bernadette was there, or if she made contact with the boy or his parents, she said: 'I didn't, no, because his parents are Polish and I, she doesn't speak a word of English.'

She said that another person asked the boy if Bernadette was there and he replied that she was not.

Scott Walker denies Bernadette's murder on or after July 18 last year.

He denies four counts of perverting the course of justice and Sarah Walker denies two counts of perverting the course of justice.

The trial continues.
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Liberal Washington Square Park residents have said they are afraid of asking for more cops to tackle the daily after-dark raves because they don't want to be viewed as less progressive.

New Yorkers living around the historic Manhattan park told the New York Times they feel it is 'time to draw the line' on the escalating parties which they claim have left many 'too afraid to go inside.'

However, they admitted their desire to rein in the revelry clashes with their attitudes toward policing at a time when liberals are calling for greater police reform in the wake of the cop killing of George Floyd.

Their concerns come as a professor questioned the motives behind some of the complaints about the noisy park raves, saying they are targeting young people of color.

'Is it really just about noise? What is it about really?' Setha Low, director of the Public Space Research Group at the Graduate Center at CUNY, told the Times.

'This is another old-fashioned conflict where one scenario is that you want your neighborhood to appropriate the park and take care of it. On the other hand, it is a public space resource for the city.'

The local residents in the rich, elite Greenwich Village neighborhood are largely white while the partygoers are typically more diverse and have traveled to attend the parties from other parts of the city.

Young people gather in Washington Square Park Thursday night which has become a party destination in recent months

People gather on benches in Washington Square Park Thursday night which has been the site of parties in recent months

A man appears to be selling alcohol from a cooler to partygoers in Washington Square Park, Manhattan Thursday night

Scooters lie on the ground in front of the iconic fountain Thursday night. Liberal residents have said they are afraid of asking for more cops to tackle the daily after-dark raves because they don't want to be viewed as less progressive

A fire eater performs in the public park in the heart of New York City Thursday night to entertain the crowd of people gathered

The public park in the heart of the Big Apple has been a growing source of tension in recent weeks.

With bars and restaurants facing tight restrictions over the last year due to the pandemic, it transformed into a popular party destination.

Now, as the parties and reports of crime increase - and COVID-19 restrictions have lifted - residents and ravers are coming to blows.

On the one side, young revelers say the park is public property. They question why they cannot use the space to enjoy parties and why the wealthy Greenwich Village homeowners nearby should have the power to decide who has access to it.

On the other side, residents claim the park has become a site of increased drug use and violence, leaving them scared to walk around the area and left grappling with the noise later into the night.

One resident whose family has lived in the same house around the park for almost half a century told the Times the park resembled 'a war' some nights.

'What pains me is that this park is for everyone, and now some people are too afraid to go inside,' said Erika Sumner, who is the head of the neighborhood association the Washington Square Association.

The public park in the heart of the Big Apple has been a growing source of tension in recent weeks. With bars and restaurants facing tight restrictions over the last year due to the pandemic, it transformed into a popular party destination

Young revelers say the park is public property and question why they cannot use the space to enjoy parties

People sit in front of the iconic fountain in the historic park which residents and ravers have been fighting over

People set up rails to sell clothes in the park Thursday night. New Yorkers living around the historic Manhattan park told the New York Times they feel it is 'time to draw the line' on the escalating parties

Residents claim the parties have left many of them 'too afraid to go inside' while some describe the scene like a 'war'

Another resident Carmen Gonzalez said she was concerned about rising drug use after her young daughter picked up a used syringe from the park.

'Once the sun comes down, the park changes drastically. It's time to draw the line,' she said.

However partygoers told the Times the park is a place to 'chill out' away from the violence and police hostility in some other parts of the city.

'This is the park you come to chill out,' said Edith Molina from the Bronx.

'In the Bronx, you have gang violence, and police run you out of parks. Here, police don't do anything.'

David 'Shaman' Ortiz, who organizes parties at the park, has branded critics of the noisy raves 'Karens' and 'Kevins.'

In an effort to tackle the simmering tensions and find solutions for both sides, a community meeting was held Wednesday.

Two partygoers dance together in the park Thursday night which proved to be a quieter night compared to many others

A professor questioned the motives behind some of the complaints from local residents about the noisy park raves

Partygoers in the park Thursday night. The park has become a party destination in recent months amid restrictions on bars and restaurants

The locals in the rich, elite Greenwich Village neighborhood are largely white while the partygoers are typically more diverse

People party into the night Thursday dancing and drinking until around 1.30am in defiance of the midnight curfew

A local resident was spotted speaking to a NYC Park employee amid rising tensions between locals and partygoers

Hundreds of locals joined the meeting at Lady of Pompeii Church to complain that the park 'has become a drug den' and a 'free-for-all'.

Several hundred turned up to air their grievances, with around 100 turned away from the meeting.

Meanwhile, protestors outside argued against an increased police presence at the park and claimed residents were just upset because 'it's bad optics for them [the white people] to see black and brown people' at the park.

Parties broke out at the park again Thursday night, though the scenes were much quieter than recent times.

People were seen dancing together, fire eaters performed to the crowd and some appeared to be selling alcohol from portable coolers.

People are seen gathering and dancing to music being played in the historic Washington Square Park Thursday night

Two women are seen chatting while sitting on the fountain in the heart of the Manhattan public park Thursday evening

A man skateboards through the park while dozens more gather to dance, drink and socialize in the park Thursday

The NYPD had imposed a 10pm weekend curfew on the park two weeks ago following complaints from residents.

This sparked clashes between police and the partygoers that night, with 23 people arrested and eight cops injured in a night of unrest on June 5.

The midnight closing time was restored after police on Saturday lifted a 10pm curfew that was prompted by local residents who said the crowds were making noise late at night while also making the area unsafe.

The curfew was then lifted, restoring its normal midnight cut-off time.

Since then, cops have taken a hands-off approach to enforcing the curfew, with revelers partying on well into the night.

Last Saturday, the park turned somewhat chaotic with two people stabbed, a man beaten and mugged of his phone and a 77-year-old cook at a nearby diner attacked.

Residents in New York City's elite neighborhood of Greenwich Village met with the NYPD on Wednesday over Washington Square Park. Protesters and police are seen outside the meeting

The line to get into the community meeting to discuss the rise in crime at Washington Square Park extended beyond the block

Protestors stand outside Our Lady of Pompeii Church, where a community meeting was being held about the situation
Paul Ritchie, 34, has been jailed for a year for bombarding MPs with a string of 'vile' emails including death threats

A businessman who bombarded MPs with a string of 'vile' emails including death threats has been jailed for a year.

Paul Ritchie, 34, pleaded guilty to 28 counts of sending an electronic communication with intent to cause distress or anxiety over a six-month period between March and August 2019.

His victims included former Commons speaker John Bercow, ex-Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, former home secretary Amber Rudd and SNP Westminster leader Ian Blackford.

Others targeted were former attorney general Dominic Grieve QC, ex-Liberal Democrat leader Jo Swinson, her successor Sir Ed Davey, and one-time London mayoral candidate and Cabinet minister Rory Stewart.

Ritchie was traced through two email addresses, including one linked to his business Snapr - a property services booking website - and arrested at his flat in Paddington, central London.

Judge Adam Hiddleston jailed Ritchie, of Dolphinton in Lanarkshire, for a year at Southwark Crown Court on Friday.

'I have no doubt that you did harbour a deep-seated animosity to those who held opposing views to your own and that appeared to have been your motivation,' the judge said.

His victims included former Commons speaker John Bercow, ex-Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn who he described as a 'terrorist' who 'should be hung for treason'

Ritchie, of Lanarkshire, pleaded guilty to 28 counts of sending an electronic communication with intent to cause distress or anxiety over a six-month period between March and August 2019

'The contents of those emails were vile.

'They included threats of violence, such as threats to shoot someone in the face and threats to kill, such as by way of decapitation.

'Those threats were not just directed towards the individuals but also in some case to their families as well.

'Those who received the emails would no doubt be left in fear for their personal safety and that of their loved ones.'

Prosecutor Ruby Selva earlier said Ritchie's victims had told of their 'upset, feelings of being unsettled and fear for their personal safety'.

She said Plaid Cymru leader Adam Price reported feeling 'unsettled, upset and concerned for his safety' after receiving an email telling him 'you deserve to get shot in the face you p****', while having dinner with his family following an appearance to discuss Brexit on the Andrew Marr Show.

Ritchie, from Lanarkshire, Scotland, also told former Home Secretary Amber Rudd (pictured) she 'faced being assassinated'

Chuka Umunna (left) and John Bercow were also the victims of malicious emails sent by Ritchie as current Speaker Sir Lindsey Hoyle told the court he should face the 'full force of the law'

In a statement to the court, Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle said 'the level of abuse, threats and intimidation' received by MPs had increased following the terrorist murder of Jo Cox.

'Those responsible should face the full force of the law at the appropriate level,' he said.

'The members should feel safe in the knowledge they are able to perform their role in democracy.'

A message Ritchie sent to Mr Corbyn in March 2019 read: 'You should be hung for treason you f****** terrorist.'

Judge Adam Hiddleston, jailing Ritchie, said: 'I have no doubt that you did harbour a deep-seated animosity to those who held opposing views to your own and that appeared to have been your motivation'

The same month, he sent an email to John Bercow's Speaker's Office saying: 'One in 17 million is bad odds for some nutter to pull a Jo Cox on you and your staff.'

A week later, he wrote: 'Be careful ... (y)ou wouldn't want to get run over.'

In other messages to Mr Bercow's office, Ritchie threatened: 'I'm going to milkshake you, you prick.' And he made references to Brexit and democracy.

In an email in May 2019 to former MP Chuka Umunna, who represented several parties, Ritchie wrote: 'You have been warned ... shut your f****** mouth boy.'

In July, he said: 'If you kill Brexit ... (w)e will kill you and your entire family.'

Southwark Crown Court heard that despite appearing to be pro-Brexit with the rhetoric used in his emails, Ritchie actually 'voted the opposite way' as his lawyer argued the messages did not reflect his political views

And he told Mr Stewart in June 2019: 'If you block Brexit ... you like likely (sic) be assassinated.'

But the court heard, despite appearing to be pro-Brexit with the rhetoric used in his emails, Ritchie actually 'voted the opposite way' as his lawyer argued the messages did not reflect his political views.

Emma Fenn, defending, said Ritchie felt 'genuine remorse and shame at the content of these messages', which 'do not bear any resemblance to his political views', with repeated references to Brexit despite him 'voting in the opposite direction'.

'He is a businessman, an educated man, who is really currently struggling, and who has unravelled,' she added.

The court heard Ritchie was suffering with depression and had been abusing drugs and alcohol at the time of the offences.
A Tory MP is facing trial accused of sexually assaulting a 15-year-old boy in 2008, it can now be revealed.

Imran Ahmad Khan, 47, the Conservative MP for Wakefield, West Yorkshire, said he denies 'in the strongest terms' an allegation he groped the teenager in Staffordshire.

Ahmad Khan, who was elected at the 2019 general election, appeared at Westminster Magistrates' Court on Thursday by video-link from his lawyers' office.

He can today be named after reporting restrictions were lifted.

Ahmad Khan, from Wakefield, faces a single count of sexual assault against the teenager, who cannot be identified because he is an alleged victim of a sexual offence, in 2008.

The Conservatives have suspended the whip from Khan. A spokeswoman for the Tory whips office said: 'Imran Ahmad Khan has had the whip suspended. As there is an ongoing court case we will not be commenting further.'

Imran Ahmad Khan (pictured), 47, the Conservative MP for Wakefield, West Yorkshire, said he denies 'in the strongest terms' an allegation he groped the teenager in Staffordshire

It was understood that the whip was suspended from the MP, meaning he will not be sitting as a Conservative in the Commons, when chief whip Mark Spencer was informed of the charges.

Khan was said not to have been on the parliamentary estate since the charges were brought and is not expected to return while the case is ongoing.

The charge, which was read out in court, states: 'In the county of Staffordshire you intentionally touched a boy aged 15 and that touching was sexual when he did not consent and you did not reasonably believe that he was consenting, contrary to Section 3 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003.'

Asked to indicate a plea to the charge, Ahmad Khan, who was represented by Sallie Bennett-Jenkins QC, said: 'Not guilty.'

In a statement released on Friday, Ahmad Khan said: 'It is true that an accusation has been made against me.

'May I make it clear from the outset that the allegation, which is from over 13 years ago, is denied in the strongest terms.

'This matter is deeply distressing to me and I, of course, take it extremely seriously.

'To be accused of doing something I did not do is shocking, destabilising and traumatic. I am innocent.

'Those, like me, who are falsely accused of such actions are in the difficult position of having to endure damaging and painful speculation until the case is concluded.

'I ask for privacy as I work to clear my name.'

Asked to indicate a plea to the charge, Ahmad Khan, who was represented by Sallie Bennett-Jenkins QC, said: 'Not guilty.' Pictured, Khan with the Prime Minister Boris Johnson

Chief magistrate Paul Goldspring said the case was not suitable for trial in the magistrates' court and sent the case to the Old Bailey.

He told Ahmad Khan: 'You must appear at the Central Criminal Court, the Old Bailey, on July 15 at 9.30am. Between now and then you are granted unconditional bail.

'If you do not attend on that occasion, unless there is a very good reason, you potentially commit an offence.

'Do you understand that?'

Ahmad Khan replied: 'I do.'

According to his website, the MP was born in Wakefield, where he attended the independent Silcoates School before going to university at the Pushkin Institute in Russia and graduating from King's College in London with a bachelor's degree in war studies.

Before entering Parliament, he worked for the United Nations as a special assistant for political affairs in Mogadishu.

The Crown Prosecution Service said it made the decision to charge after reviewing a file of evidence from Staffordshire Police.

Ahmad Khan, who was elected at the 2019 general election, appeared at Westminster Magistrates' Court (pictured) on Thursday by video-link from his lawyers' office

Stressing the need for a fair trial, Rosemary Ainslie of the CPS said: 'It is extremely important that there should be no reporting, commentary or sharing of information online which could in any way prejudice these proceedings.'

She added: 'The Crown Prosecution Service authorised police to charge Imran Ahmad Khan, MP for Wakefield, with one offence of sexual assault. The charge relates to an allegation of sexual assault in 2008.

'The CPS made the decision that Mr Khan should be charged after reviewing a file of evidence from Staffordshire Police.

'The CPS reminds all concerned that criminal proceedings against Mr Khan are active and that he has a right to a fair trial.'

Khan, one of the Red Wall MPs elected in 2019, will appear at the Old Bailey next month.

Staffordshire Police have probed the historic sexual assault claim for more than a year and never made a formal arrest.

Khan was sent a formal 'requisition' telling him to face the charge last month.

Staffordshire Police said in a statement: 'A man has been charged with a sexual assault in 2008.

'Imran Ahmad Khan, 47, of London, has been charged following an investigation by Staffordshire Police's CID.

'He will appear at the Central Criminal Court on Thursday 15 July.

'Staffordshire Police takes all reports of sexual offences seriously and has a team of specially-trained detectives to support victims. Anyone who has concerns should private message Staffordshire Police on Facebook or Twitter or call 101.'
High-profile Democratic campaigners for voting reform are falling into line behind Sen. Joe Manchin proposed compromise, setting up a clash with Republicans after Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said the plans would 'supercharge cancel culture' and retained a 'rotten core.'

The Senate is due to vote on Tuesday on a sweeping overhaul of election law, that will test Democratic unity in the face of Republican resistance.

On Friday former Texas Congressman Beto O'Rourke, who founded the voter registration group Powered by People, said Manchin's proposal represented progress.

'I am so grateful for what Sen. Manchin has done and what he's doing right now, he told CNN.

'He's trying to find a way to protect voting rights in this country at a moment that they are under attack in more than 40 states.'

Former Texas Congressman Beto O'Rourke is the latest high-profile Democrat to back Sen. Joe Manchin's compromise on voting reform. 'He's trying to find a way to protect voting rights in this country at a moment that they are under attack in more than 40 states,' he said.

Mitch McConnell, Republican leader in the Senate, made clear that Manchin's proposal would not change his party's opposition. 'It still subverts the First Amendment to supercharge cancel culture and the lefts name-and-shame campaign model,' he said

Democrats push to pass their For the People Act has ignited one of the most important political battles of the year so far.

It passed the House in March but got stuck in the Senate when Manchin said he could not vote for it as it lacked bipartisan support.

His compromise retains measures to expand early voting, make election day a holiday, and prohibit gerrymandering.

But it also includes provisions intended to satisfy Republicans, such as requirements for voter ID and making it easier for officials to remove people from voter rolls.

McConnell said Manchin's changes to the For the People Act, also known as S.1, did not go nearly far enough.

'It still subverts the First Amendment to supercharge cancel culture and the lefts name-and-shame campaign model,' he said.

'It takes redistricting away from state legislatures and hands it over to computers.

'And it still retains S.1s rotten core: an assault on the fundamental idea that states, not the federal government, should decide how to run their own elections.'

McConnell's deep opposition suggests his compromise may not have shifted the debate enough to win the 60 Senate votes needed to pass.

However, Democrats insisted Manchin's turnaround, from lone Democratic hold-out to a champion of compromise, showed what was possible.

'You have to see the progress, Democratic National Committee Chair Jaime Harrison told Politico.

'Many of us thought he was a "no," not only a "no," but a "hell, no," but it seems like he has softened his stance and he is willing to work to find some common ground to move forward.'

Democrats appeared to be coalescing Friday around changes to the bill proposed by moderate West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin, who had been the lone Democratic holdout on the legislation

The bill, known as the For the People Act, has been touted as Democrats' answer to a state level-GOP push to enact voting restrictions following the 2020 election. It passed the House in March, but has bogged down in the Senate as Democrats have debated among themselves  with Manchin ultimately declaring he couldn't vote for it because it lacked bipartisan support.

Yet Manchin's position has evolved and compromise appeared to be nearing after he proposed a series of changes this week to narrow its scope. His proposal received a boost Thursday when Stacey Abrams, a former Georgia gubernatorial candidate who is a leading Democratic voice on voting rights, said she 'absolutely' supported it.

'What Sen. Manchin is putting forward are some basic building blocks that we need to ensure that democracy is accessible,' Abrams told CNN.

Still, in a narrowly divided Senate where Democrats must count on Vice President Kamala Harris to cast tie-breaking votes, any compromise will likely be for naught unless changes are made to Senate filibuster rules, which Manchin and others oppose. For now, it takes 60 votes to overcome a filibuster and advance legislation.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., called Manchin's proposal 'equally unacceptable'

Over a dozen Senate Republicans took turns at the microphone during a Thursday news conference to denounce the bill, which they view as a federal overreach into state and local elections.

McConnell predicted all Republicans would remain in lockstep opposition regardless of what changes are made. Sen. Roy Blunt, the No. 4 ranking Senate Republican, noted the endorsement by Abrams, who is a lighting rod for GOP criticism.

'I actually think when Stacey Abrams immediately endorsed Sen. Machin's proposal it became the Stacey Abrams (bill), not the Joe Manchin (bill),' he told reporters Thursday.

As written, the Democrats' bill would bring about the largest overhaul of U.S. voting in a generation, touching nearly every aspect of the electoral process. It would blunt laws erected in the name of election security, like voter ID requirements, while curtailing the influence of big money in politics. It would create a nonpartisan process for redrawing congressional districts, expand mail voting and early voting, restore the rights of felons to cast a ballot, and scores of other provisions.

Manchin's counter-offer, which is intended to entice GOP support, would leave significant portions of the sprawling bill intact, while curtailing, rewriting or eliminating other key parts.

'Color me a little a little skeptical,' Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine, of Virginia, said of the possibility of bipartisanship.

What will ultimately come to the floor for a vote Tuesday remains unclear. Also not certain: whether Manchin will vote for it.

'We'll see what bill we have,' he told reporters Thursday. 'We don't know what bill we're going to have.'

Yet Manchin's position has evolved and compromise appeared to be nearing after he proposed a series of changes this week to narrow its scope. His proposal received a boost Thursday when Stacey Abrams, a former Georgia gubernatorial candidate who is a leading Democratic voice on voting rights, said she 'absolutely' supported it

A national voter ID requirement favored by Manchin has emerged as one sticking point with some Democrats.

Manchin's proposal is far softer than the strict photo ID requirements adopted by some states. It would require all states to check ID, but various documents including a utility bill could be used instead of a photo ID, a requirement already adopted by 15 states including Manchin's West Virginia.

'That is what we're negotiating,' said Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar, who is playing a lead role in guiding the legislation.

Polls have shown notable bipartisan support for voter ID requirements, and Democrats in their elections overhaul focused on the strictest ID laws. In the current Senate bill, Democrats would require states with an ID law to allow voters who show up without identification to cast a regular ballot as long as they sign an affidavit under penalty of perjury.

'We might squabble about one or two things,' said Sen. Raphael Warnock, of Georgia. 'But I am not about to sacrifice the good in the pursuit of the perfect.'

Klobuchar said she would continue to work on the bill over the weekend and was optimistic all 50 Senate Democrats would support it.

'If we reach unity on a voting bill in the Democratic Party, with all of the debates we've been having over the last few months, I don't think anything's over yet,' she said.
The NYPD released the video on Friday afternoon and asked for the public's help in identifying the gunman in the latest of nearly 150 shootings across the city this month.

The video opens with a boy and girl - believed to be around the ages of five and 10 - walking on a sidewalk before people scatter when a gunman chases a man in a red sweater.

The man in the sweater, who police believe was the intended target, barrels into the kids and knocks them down before the gunman runs up and fires multiple times in their direction.

The alleged target scrambles to his feet but trips in the three-person scrum before crawling over the kids to escape the hail of bullets.

The two children are momentarily pinned under the man in the sweater while he is shot at as the older girl is seen grabbing the boy and holding him tight in an attempt to shield him.

The man in the sweater was shot multiple times but is still alive, according to the NYPD, and amazingly, the children weren't shot or seriously injured.

This is the latest brazen act of violence in New York City - where shootings have skyrocketed since the pandemic gripped the country.

Shocking surveillance footage captured the moment two young children were trampled by a man as he tried to escape from a shooter who fired nearly a dozen bullets in the middle of a Bronx street and pointed his gun at the terrified kids

The suspect momentarily retreats with the victim on the ground

Then the gunman comes back for a closer shot and fires at the man with the two kids inches away from the victim

The gunman ran from the scene and took off with another suspect on a scooter.

NYPD said it doesn't have a motive for Thursday evening's brazen attack on Sheridan Avenue in the Bronx, and believe the man in the red sweater was the intended target.

The children aren't related to the victim and were just walking in the area when the shooting started.

The sun was still up when the shooting happened in the middle of a sidewalk lined with storefronts and potential witnesses.

Anyone with information regarding the suspects whereabouts can call Crime Stoppers at 800-577-TIPS.

NYPD say this man helped the gunman escape after he ran from the scene

Statistics show shooting crimes have been up this year city-wide compared to last year

Crimes have been rising throughout New York City, according to the NYPD

The shooting marked a continuation of New York City's descent into a lawless free-for-all where random attacks in the street happen nearly every day.

Felony assaults are up eight percent for the first six months of 2021, compared to the same period last year, rapes are up by 10 percent and robberies - which includes muggings - have spiked by nearly 40 percent this month.

The numbers are disturbing in themselves, but the violence has intensified and taken place in public places, like parks and subways, and in front of witnesses and surveillance cameras.

On Monday, an unidentified man attacked two people with a rock after an argument became physical on a Brooklyn-bound subway.

One of the victims was rushed to the hospital with bruising to the head and knee, and the other victim was treated at the scene, according to police.

On Thursday, a 15-year-old was stabbed to death by a 48-year-old man over a parking spot in the Bedford-Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn.

The victim, Tory Lovick, was pronounced dead at the hospital, and the suspect's identity will be released after he's formally charged, the NYPD said.

These are examples of individual acts of violence, but there are even larger crime-related issues plaguing the city.

There's a war brewing between residents in Greenwich Village and partygoers in Washington Square Park after pandemonium broke out last weekend in New York City's iconic Washington Park.

A wild, all-night rave ended with multiple people beaten and stabbed, and a diner cook being thrown through a window.

The New York City man behind out-of-control raves in Washington Square Park has said that fed-up wealthy residents should be the ones to leave. Partygoers are pictured on June 10

Two women are seen dancing during a massive rave in Washington Square Park last Friday. Local residents say anti-social behavior is making their lives unbearable

The New York Police Department's Sixth Precinct called an emergency meeting Wednesday night amid growing complaints from merchants and residents about the non-stop partying.

The meeting was met with dozens of protestors, who flocked by to park by nightfall. Although Wednesday night and Thursday were calmer than previous days, the NYPD said on Friday that they'll be on high alert this weekend.

Another major issue the residential and high-tourist area of Midtown Manhattan around around Times Square and Hell's Kitchen, where thousands of homeless people were moved to hotels during the pandemic.

Eight Avenue between Penn Station and The Port Authority Bus Terminal has become a drug corridor and a crime hot spot.

The police precinct that includes Times Square and many of the hotels where the homeless have been living saw a 183 percent spike in felony assaults and 173 percent spike in robberies so far this year compared to 2020, according to NYPD data.

Bill Bratton, former NYC police commissioner under mayors Rudy Giuliani and Bill de Blasio, on Monday warned American cities are in for a 'very, long dangerous summer'

Earlier this week, former NYPD commissioner Bill Bratton warned American cities, including New York City, are in for a 'very, long dangerous summer' as murder rates have skyrocketed

And there aren't any short- or long-term answers, Bratton told CNBC's Shepard Smith on Monday.

'Unlike the last crime epidemic that took decades to build up to the early '90s, this one has occurred, literally, overnight,' Bratton said.

'It's like the virus, it's literally, out of nowhere, and so solutions are not immediately apparent.'

Bratton, who earned the nickname 'supercop' for helping clean up the streets of New York City and Los Angeles, issued his warning on Monday as NYPD data showed shootings and murders in the Big Apple have increased by almost 70 percent and 12 percent, respectively.

In May, Governor Andrew Cuomo called the surge in violent crime a 'major problem' and said unless the NYPD gets a handle on it soon, the city would become undesirable.

'New Yorkers don't feel safe and they don't feel safe because the crime rate is up. It's not that they are being neurotic or overly sensitive - they are right.' he said.
Three sailors who were killed in the attack on Pearl Harbor during World War II have finally been identified nearly 80 years later thanks to advancements in anthropological and DNA analysis.

Navy Fireman First Class Floyd D. Helton, Navy Seaman First Class Walter S. Belt Jr, and Navy Seaman First Class David F. Tidball died in the attack on the morning of December 7, 1941, according to a statement by the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency.

Helton, of Somerset, Kentucky, was just 18 years old. Belt and Tidball were 25 and 20, respectively.

All three had been assigned to the battleship USS Oklahoma, which was moored off of the Hawaiian island of Oahu when it was attacked and capsized by the Japanese, killing 429 out of the total 2,403 Americans who died during the attack.

The United States would declare war on Japan the day after the attack on December 8.

Pictured: Navy Seaman Second Class Floyd D. Helton, 18, of Somerset, Kentucky was positively identified this week, nearly 80 years after dying in the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor

Officials identified Helton, 18, Navy Seaman First Class Walter S. Belt Jr. 25, and Navy Seaman First Class David F. Tidball, 20, all of which were assigned to the USS Oklahoma (pictured)

Most of the deceased that had been recovered from the battleship were not immediately identified, with officials burying them almost a decade after the attack in 1949 across 46 plots at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific, known as the Punchbowl, in Honolulu.

Officials with the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency began exhuming the remains in 2015 in an effort to identify them, with more and more sailors being ID'd in recent months.

Just last month, officials were able to identify Navy Fireman 3rd Class Welborn L. Ashby and Navy Seaman 2nd Class Howard Scott Magers through DNA provided by family members.

Magers - who was aboard USS Oklahoma along with Helton, Belt and Tidball - and Ashby were originally buried in the mass graves in the Punchbowl.

Officials had just previously identified another USS Oklahoma sailor last month, with U.S. Navy Seaman 2nd Class Howard Scott Magers being ID'd through family DNA in May

The attack on Pearl Harbor, which led to the Pacific portion of WWII with Japan, was called 'a day which will live in infamy' by then-US President Franklin D. Roosevelt

Ashby had been assigned to the USS West Virginia, which had 106 causalities during the attack on Pearl Harbor, a day then-US President Franklin D. Roosevelt said 'which will live in infamy'.

Magers was accounted for in December 2020 and Ashby in November 2019, and their remains were returned home to Kentucky on Memorial Day.

Officials have been identifying more and more sailors from the WWII Pacific attack thanks to surviving family members donating DNA to help with the identification of remains and advancements in anthropological and DNA analysis.

Helton, Belt and Tidball were positively identified by dental and DNA records, with Helton being set for burial on July 31, 2021, in Burnside, Kentucky, according to officials.

All of these recent identifications are being attributed to 'scientists from DPAA dental and anthropological analysis. Additionally, scientists from the Armed Forces Medical Examiner System used Y chromosome DNA (Y-STR) and autosomal DNA (auSTR) analysis' provided by surviving family members, according to the statement.
Hungarian police have released images of the moment a glamorous Canadian influencer and her Slovakian boyfriend were arrested after three months on the run.

Yun 'Lucy' Lu Li, 25, and her boyfriend, Oliver Karafa, 28, were apprehended in Budapest on Saturday, wanted on charges of murder over the fatal February shooting of Tyler Pratt, 38, in Ontario, Canada.

The couple - dubbed the 'millennial Bonnie and Clyde' - were additionally wanted on charges of attempted murder, after they were also accused of trying to kill Pratt's 26-year-old girlfriend. She was pregnant at the time of the February shooting and lost her unborn baby in the gunfire.

It's believed Li and Karafa both knew Pratt, with his alleged murder occurring during a 'business meeting'.

One dramatic arrest photo shows Li - who is the daughter of a wealthy and politically connected Canadian businesswoman - being placed into handcuffs by two female officers.

She was dressed in a chic white top, a miniskirt and Nike sneakers when she was nabbed by the police. It appears she made no attempt to conceal her identity in Hungary after fleeing from Canada.

Yun 'Lucy' Lu Li (pictured) and her boyfriend, Oliver Karafa, 28, were apprehended in Budapest on Saturday, wanted on charges of murder over the fatal February shooting of Tyler Pratt, 38, in Ontario, Canada

Karafa (pictured) is a native of Slovakia and is fighting extradition to Canada, where he was living before February's shooting

Meanwhile, two male officers apprehended her boyfriend, Karafa, who kept this head down as he was taken into custody.

The Toronto Sun reported that at a hearing in Hungary on Wednesday, Li 'consented to her extradition with the application of the principle of specialty, according to which... Canadian authorities may only prosecute her for the charges stated in the extradition request.'

Li is reported to have close connections to members of Canada's Liberal Party.

Her boyfriend, Karafa, is a native of Slovakia and will fight extradition back to Canada.

During the hearing new details about the murder mystery emerged as Karafa was accused of firing the fatal bullet in Pratt's death.

Yun 'Lucy' Lu Li, 25, and her boyfriend, Oliver Karafa, 28, were both apprehended in Budapest on Saturday, wanted on charges of murder over the fatal February shooting of Tyler Pratt, 38, in Ontario, Canada

The pair are accused of killing Tyler Pratt, 39, during a 'business meeting'

Li is reported to be from a wealthy family with ties to Canada's Liberal Party

On February 28, just after 7.15pm, police in Hamilton, a city in Ontario, Canada, responded to a shooting that occurred in an industrial park in Stoney Creek.

Pratt, a father-of-three, was pronounced dead at the scene. His girlfriend was hospitalized with serious injuries.

Investigators soon identified Karafa and Li as the people responsible for the shooting, although they would not say what led them to that conclusion.

Police learned that the couple fled to Eastern Europe within 24 hours of the incident, traveling through several countries, including Karafa's native Slovakia and the Czech Republic, before arriving in Budapest, Hamilton Police Det.-Sgt. Jim Callender told CBC.ca.

The Hamilton Police Service recognized the efforts of the Hungarian Fugitive Active Search Team in making the arrests.

Li's mother, Hong Wei 'Winnie' Liao, is president of the Toronto-based asset management firm Respon International Group with extensive political connections.

She has been photographed shaking hands with Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and posing with Ontario Premier Doug Ford.

Li is one of a set of triplets. She and her sisters have built a following for themselves on social media by posing in matching dresses and skimpy swimsuits.

'We are deeply shocked, disturbed and puzzled by Lucy's involvement in the unfortunate incident,' the family said in a statement to a Chinese news outlet, which was translated by The National Post.

In 2014, Karafa was found guilty of impaired driving causing death; driving while over legal limit of alcohol; criminal negligence cause death; and dangerous operation of a motor vehicle cause death. He was sentenced to five years in prison, CTV reported.

The conviction stemmed from an April 2012 crash in which Karafa got behind the wheel drunk and was driving at twice the speed limit when he crashed his car, causing his passenger, 19-year-old David Chiang, to be ejected from the vehicle and smash head first into a pole. Chang died at the scene.

Li (left) is one of a set of triplets. She and her sisters have built a following for themselves on social media by posing in matching dresses and skimpy swimsuits.

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Former Vice President Mike Pence was booed and called a 'traitor' at a Faith & Freedom Coalition event in Orlando Friday.

'It is great to be back with so many patriots. Dedicated to faith and freedom and the road to the majority,' Pence said at the 'Road to Majority'-themed event.

As he began thanking Ralph Reed, the head of the Faith & Freedom coalition, he was met with boos and people loudly shouting 'traitor!'

The Road to Majority conference attracted a number of conservative household names including Sens. Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Ron Johnson, Rick Scott, Marsha Blackburn, Lindsey Graham and House Minority Whip Steve Scalise.

And they pushed a number of right-wing talking points with Cruz, for example, remarking that 'critical race theory is bigoted. It is a lie, And it is every bit as racist as the Klansmen in white sheets.'

Cruz also said: 'I'm going to commit a radical act, I'm going to speak the truth. America is great. Christopher Columbus discovering America was a good thing. George Washington was an American hero. Thomas Jefferson was an American hero. Abraham Lincoln was an American hero.

He also lambasted the days when you could say 'Israel is our friend, boys and girls are different and the Wuhan virus came from Wuhan' without the 'fear of getting cancelled'

Former Vice President Mike Pence was booed and called a 'traitor' by audience members attending the Faith and Freedom coalition 'Road to Majority' event in Orlando, Florida

Audience members booed and shouted 'traitor' at former Vice President Mike Pence at an event in Orlando, Florida Friday

Pence barely introduced himself before the audience rebeled.

'And I want to thank my friend Ralph Reed for those overly generous words, I'm deeply humbled by them,' Pence said.

'Ralph Reed knows me well enough to know the introduction I prefer is a little bit shorter: I'm a Christian, a conservative and a Republican, and I'm honored to stand before you today,' he continued, as the shouts also continued.

In the lead-up to the January 6 MAGA riot, former President Donald Trump pushed Pence, who had a Constitutional duty to preside over Congress' counting of Electoral College votes, to throw out votes from key swing states - in an effort to overturn President Joe Biden's win.

'I hope Mike is going to do the right thing. I hope so. I hope so,' Trump told the crowd at the Ellipse on the morning of January 6, before droves of them stormed the Capitol. 'Because if Mike Pence does the right thing, we win the election.'

Trump falsely claimed to the crowd that Pence had 'the absolute right' to toss out Electoral Votes at his choosing.

Pence publicly said he didn't see it that way.

When rioters got to the Capitol later on January 6, some chanted 'hang Mike Pence' for his refusal to do Trump's bidding.

During Trump's second impeachment hearing, video footage showed Pence narrowly escaping from the crowd.

Trump never called to check in on him.

Earlier this month, Pence tried to push that he was still on Trump's good side telling an audience at the Lincoln-Reagan Dinner in Manchester, New Hampshire that he'd spoken to Trump 'many times' since they left office.

Former Vice President Mike Pence (left) appeared alongside his wife Karen Pence (right) at the Road to Majority conference Friday

The reaction to Pence comes five months after he refused to overturn the electoral college votes that ratified Biden's win

Sen. Ted Cruz spoke to the crowd Friday at the Road to Majority conference in Orlando, Florida. He said that critical race theory being promoted in some schools is 'as racist as Klansmen'

Florida Senator Marco Rubio also spoke at the event before Pence took to the stage Sen. Marco Rubio walks onstage at the Faith & Freedom Coalition's Road to Majority conference Friday in Orlando, Florida. Rubio is one of the state's two GOP senators

He admitted, however, that they do not 'see eye-to-eye' on the January 6 insurrection.

'But I will always be proud of what we accomplished for the American people over the last four years,' Pence said. 'And I will not allow Democrats or their allies in the media to use one tragic day to discredit the aspirations of millions of Americans,' he added.

He told the audience that he 'learned a lot serving alongside President Donald Trump.'

'Some people think we're a little bit different,' the ex-veep said. 'But I think what President Trump showed us was what Republicans can accomplish when our leaders stand firm on conservative principles and don't back down.'

'It was four years of consequence, four years of results,' Pence said. 'It was four years of promises made and promises kept.'
The Treasury could lose 32billion a year due to high-earners moving abroad as people begin to shift from working at the office to working from home, a study claims.

Highly-paid workers who live abroad will pay their income tax in their country of residence rather than to HMRC.

It may reduce the public purse by a sixth, adding to the economic crisis facing the UK, legal experts warn.

Employees in higher-paying jobs are more likely to be able to work from home, according to official data

New staff mobility, fuelled since the pandemic, also affects where corporate income tax goes and value is created.

There are implications for VAT too and where goods and services are purchased.

Co-lead author Professor Rita de la Feria, chair in tax law at the University of Leeds, explained: 'The acceleration of digitalisation and the spread of remote working internationally as a result of the pandemic poses very significant challenges to personal income taxes.

'New mobile workers are likely to be at top of the income distribution and even a small number could result in significant revenue losses to the UK, of between 6bn and 32bn.

'The likely effect will be a tightening of employment rules, introduction of new tax avoidance rules and increased personal income taxes competition with countries fighting to attract new mobile workers.

'The impact of these labour changes is likely to be more significant in countries like the UK, which relies heavily on income tax especially from a small number of high income - and now potentially mobile - taxpayers.

'How big these challenges are, and how countries will react to them, will be a key issue in the coming years.'

Employees in higher-paying jobs are more likely to be able to work from home, according to official data.

This included chief executives and senior officials, whose average earnings were 44.08 an hour, and legal professionals at 39.48 per hour.

Marketing and sales directors were also likely to work from home with a median earning of 37 an hour.

A total of 187 billion of income tax was paid in 2018-19 - with the bulk being met by high earners.

Over a third (35%) came from 4.2 million higher ratepayers and 31% from additional rate taxpayers.

Co-lead author Professor Rita de la Feria said the crisis has the potential for much wider economic and societal ramifications

An estimated 31 per cent of UK jobs can be carried out remotely - of which an as-yet-unknown share will be internationally mobile.

Only higher and additional rate taxpayers are likely to be internationally mobile.

The potential loss in income tax would be between two and ten per cent of the total revenue - 3.8bn to 19bn a year.

Including annual Social Security contribution losses of 2.7bn to 13bn a the total income tax loss would amount to 6.5 bn to 32.5 bn.

Global tax discussions have focussed on solving challenges to corporation tax posed by digitalisation.

But the pandemic-led shift to remote working could pose an even bigger crisis, said the researchers.

Prof de la Feria added: 'This crisis has the potential for much wider economic and societal ramifications than the challenges to corporation tax.

'The challenges of adapting our tax systems to a digital economy are far from over - indeed, they have just started.'

The findings in the British Tax Review back an analysis by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) last year.

It found people who earn higher hourly wages were more likely to be able to work remotely during the pandemic.

The ONS looked at how adaptable jobs are to remote working based on various factors.

These included whether the job has to be carried out in a specific location; the amount of face-to-face interaction with others; and whether the role requires physical activity.

The ONS also looked at whether the extent to which digital communication is integrated into the workplace.

It said professional occupations such as economists and actuaries alongside management, technical and administrative jobs were most likely to be done from home.

This was mainly because the roles involved relatively little face-to-face contact, physical activity or the use of tools or equipment.

Earlier this week a controversial Government plan to make working from home a legal right drew a backlash from business leaders.
President Joe Biden dismissed concerns Friday that US Catholic bishops would block him from receiving communion because of his pro-abortion stance.

'Thats a private matter, and I dont think thats going to happen,' he told reporters Friday at the White House when asked about a document that could rebuke him and Democrat politicians.

On Friday, U.S. Catholic bishops overwhelmingly approved the drafting of a 'teaching document' for Catholic politicians who support abortion.

The result of the vote - 168 in favor and 55 against - was announced Friday by the Most Reverend Allen H Vigneron near the end of a three-day meeting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops that was held virtually.

The bishops had cast their votes privately on Thursday after nearly three hours of impassioned debate.

Supporters of the measure said a strong rebuke of Biden was needed because of his recent actions protecting and expanding abortion access, while opponents warned that such action would portray the bishops as a partisan force during a time of bitter political divisions across the country.

'Thats a private matter, and I dont think thats going to happen,' he told reporters Friday at the White House when asked about a document that could rebuke him and Democrat politicians

Biden and his wife Jill attend Mass at the Cathedral of St. Matthew the Apostle during Inauguration Day ceremonies in Washington in January

As a result of the vote, the USCCBs doctrine committee will draft a statement on the meaning of Communion in the life of the church that will be submitted for consideration at a future meeting, probably an in-person gathering in November.

One section of the document is intended to include a specific admonition to Catholic politicians and other public figures who disobey church teaching on abortion and other core doctrinal issues.

Bishop Donald Hying of Madison, Wisconsin, said during Thursday's debate that he speaks with many people who are confused by a Catholic president who advances 'the most radical pro-abortion agenda in history,' and action from the bishops conference is needed.

'Theyre looking for direction,' Hying said.

Bishop Robert McElroy of San Diego countered that the USCCB would suffer 'destructive consequences' from a document targeting Catholic politicians.

'It would be impossible to prevent the weaponization of the Eucharist,' McElroy said.

Biden, who attends Mass regularly, says he personally opposes abortion but doesnt think he should impose that position on Americans who feel otherwise. Hes taken several executive actions during his presidency that were hailed by abortion-rights advocates.

The result of the vote - 168 in favor and 55 against - was announced Friday by the Most Reverend Allen H Vigneron (pictured, left) near the end of a three-day meeting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. Archbishop Jose Gomez of Los Angeles (right) also addressed the Catholic conference on Wednesday

The chairman of the USCCB doctrine committee, Bishop Kevin Rhoades of Fort Wayne-South Bend, Indiana, said no decisions have been made on the final contents of the proposed document. He said bishops who are not on the committee will have chances to offer input, and the final draft will be subject to amendments before it is put up to a vote.

Rhoades also said the document would not mention Biden or other individuals by name and would offer guidelines rather than imposing a mandatory national policy.

That would leave decisions about Communion for specific churchgoers up to individual bishops and archbishops. Cardinal Wilton Gregory, the archbishop of Washington, has made clear that Biden is welcome to receive Communion at churches in the archdiocese.

In this photo taken from video, Bishop Kevin Rhoades of Fort Wayne-South Bend, Ind., head of the doctrine committee for the U.S Conference of Catholic Bishops, addresses the body's virtual assembly
A family friend of daredevil Alex Harvill said through tears that she knew going to the Moses Lake Airshow in Washington on Thursday to watch him practice for an attempt at a world record 351-foot motorcycle jump that there was a chance he could lose his life.

'I really hoped it wouldn't [happen],' Debbie Williams told the local news station KREM2 after Harvill, 28, came up short and crashed into a dirt mound, suffering fatal injuries.

Williams offered an account of what took place as Harvill attempted the jump.

'The next thing I know, he went off the ramp and he didn't make it to the hill,' she recounted. 'His back tire...looks like it got caught and then he flew through the air and his helmet came off. And then you just start praying.'

WARNING: GRAPHIC VIDEO

Alex Harvill died on Thursday after crashing while gearing up for an attempt at a world record 351-foot motorcycle jump

The accident was witnessed by a large crowd of spectators and was caught on video.

'Everyone around there was traumatized by that,' said Williams, whose son was friends with Harvill.

Witness Becca Camden, a nurse, said watching Harvill's helmet come off his head was 'traumatic.'

The organizers of the event had medics on standby because they said they knew Harvill's jump was risky.

It took paramedics 2 minutes, 30 seconds, to reach Harvill and begin administering first aid. He was then loaded into an ambulance and whisked to the hospital.

Family friend Debbie Williams said through sobs it looked like Harvill's back tire caught on the ramp

The stunt biker's family has since released a statement to KREM2, which read: 'While this was obviously a very tragic event that unfolded, Alex was doing what he loved to do. And we thank everyone for their outpouring of support.'

Harvill leaves behind his wife of less than two years, Jessica, and their two sons, the youngest of whom was born a month ago.

On the eve of his fateful jump, Harvill posted a photo of his bike, dubbed Suzy, on his Instagram account, writing in the accompanying caption: 'Suzy is ready to be sent!'

A week prior, he uploaded a video of himself talking about the preparations for his upcoming world record jump.

'I'm finishing up my landing and my takeoff,' he says in the video while standing in front of a long ramp at Grant County International Airport. 'There's a few things left to do, little nuts and bolts, quite literally. But I'm ready to send this thing.'

After urging his fans to come out and watch him jump 350 feet on June 17, he playfully used his fingers to mimic the way his bike would ride up the ramp and soar in the air.

Daredevil Alex Harvill lost his life after a practice motorcycle jump resulted in a deadly crash

When Harvill lands, he hits the a dirt mound with a high enough impact to go flying

Video shows Harvill being loaded into the back of an ambulance after his botched jump on Thursday

On the eve of the fateful jump, Harvill shared on Instagram photos of his bike, 'Suzy,' including one featuring his eldest son

'It's gonna be just like that,' he said with a smile.

Harvill was at the Moses Lake Airshow in Washington, where spectators were recording his practice jumps ahead of the world record attempt.

iFIBER One reports that the fatal practice jump was his first of the morning and was a 150-foot jump.

In the video, Harvill can be seen riding his bike through a field before launching off a ramp.

During his jump, however, Harvill came up short of his destination and crashed into a dirt mound.

KIMA-TV reports that witnesses saw Harvill's helmet flying off of his head after the crash.

It then appears that Harvill is tossed forward from the bike, much to the shock of people witnessing the moment.

Spectators watching the stunt could be heard groaning as the video comes to an end.

The Grant County Coroner said that Harvill was attempting a practice jump when the crash occurred, with the injuries ultimately resulting in his death.

Harvill was reportedly taken to Samaritan Hospital in Moses Lake after first responders tried to treat him at the scene, before ultimately succumbing to his injuries.

An autopsy is scheduled to be performed on Friday to determine Harvill's cause of death.

'Our deepest sympathies go out to Alexs family, friends and loved ones,' the Grant County Sherriff's Office said on Facebook.

After the crash, the airshow where the jump was taking place vowed on Facebook to donate proceeds from the jump towards medical expenses for Harvill.

Harvill was seen on Instagram looking at the ramp where his fatal crash would occur

In the video from June 6, he mimic performing the jump off the ramp with his fingers

A giddy Harvill is seen pumping his fists in the video taken on June 6

The Moses Lake Airshow, where the jump took place, commented before Harvill's death

They have not commented publicly since Harvill's death was confirmed around 4:30pm ET.

Harvill was listed as one of the featured events in the airshow at the Grant County International Airport, set to run from Thursday to Saturday.

The 28-year-old was an accomplished daredevil who hailed from Ephrata, Washington.

On May 12, 2012, he set a world record at Toes Motocross Park in Royal City, Washington, for ramp-to-dirt distance jump, which he clocked in at 425 feet.

A year later, he went for the world record for dirt-to-dirt distance jump.

Harvill leaped over 297 feet at Horn Rapids Motorsports Complex in Richland, Washington, on July 6, 2013. He still holds that Guinness World Record.

He also competed in a number of sports, including the Canadian MX National Series, AMA Motocross, AMA Supercross and Arenacross, in addition to doing stunt work.

A month before his fatal world record attempt, Harvill posted about his goal on his website.

In video, Harvill can be seen on Thursday riding up to the ramp for his jump

Once he hits the ramp, he starts flying through the sky, all seemingly to plan

As his jump is unfolding, however, it becomes clear that Harvill may land short of his target

Witnesses claim that Harvill lost his helmet after the crash took place on Thursday

'I will be attempting another world record jump at this years airshow here in Moses Lake Washington. This time it will be Guinness World Records official for the Ramp to Dirt Motorcycle Distance Jump attempt,' Harvill posted.

'The current Guinness record... is held by Robbie Maddison who has courageously pushed the sport in many ways over the years,' he continued.

That record was set by Maddison over 13 years ago, back in March 2008.

Ahead of his record jump attempt, Harvill told the Columbia Basin Herald that he had been riding since he was four years old.

He also spoke of the inspiration of Evel Knievel, saying, 'Its so awesome that I can follow in his footsteps and have some local ties to him and just live on the daredevil motorcycle legacy of pushing the limits.'

Harvill was listed as one of the featured events in the airshow at the Grant County International Airport, set to run from Thursday to Saturday (bike pictured)

Alex Harvill is survived by his wife, Jessica, who he is pictured with on Instagram

Jessica was pregnant and gave birth to Alex's second child just one month ago

In 2017, Harvill suffered an injury after taking a jump too fast, resulting in a hard landing that sent him flying over the handlebars, shattering a heel.

'All the sudden I just saw I was going too far,' Harvill said. 'And at that point, theres nothing you can do.'

The accident forced him to reconsidering his racing career, though he ultimately got back into it and was even winning races prior to Thursday's tragedy.

Just one month ago, Harvill took to Instagram to announce the birth of Watson Robert Harvill, his second baby.

A GoFundMe campaign has been launched to help Harvill's widow and his two sons.
President Joe Biden announced that the U.S. hit another milestone Friday - that 300 million COVID-19 vaccine shots have been administered in the 150 days since he took office.

'Folks we're heading into a very different summer compared to last year. A bright summer. Prayfully, a summer of joy,' Biden said at the White House Friday before departing for a Father's day weekend trip to Wilmington, Delaware.

But Biden warned that COVID-19 was still a threat to unvaccinated Americans - especially those living in areas where vaccination rates are low.

'If you are unvaccinated you're at risk of getting seriously ill or dying or spreading it. People getting seriously ill and being hospitalized due to COVID-19 are those who have not been fully vaccinated,' Biden said.

And he also warned that the Delta variant was a 'serious concern.'

'It's a variant that is more easily transmissible, potentially deadlier and particularly dangerous for young people,' Biden said.

He pleaded with Americans to 'act, act now,' and get the vaccine, which has proven effective against the new variants.

President Joe Biden announced Friday that the U.S. had doled out 300 million COVID-19 vaccine doses

Biden set a goal to have 70 per cent of adults have at least one vaccine shot in their arms by the July 4 holiday, which may not be met

Biden warned that COVID-19 was still a threat to unvaccinated Americans - especially those living in areas where vaccination rates are low

While the number of infections has drastically decreased, Biden out unvaccinated Americans are still being hospitalized and dying from COVID-19, especially in areas with low vaccination rates

During his remarks he said that 65 per cent of Americans have now gotten at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine.

But as Biden marks a new milestone, he is in danger of failing to meet another: his target to have 70 per cent of Americans at least partially vaccinated by July 4, in a little over two weeks.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says 305 million vaccine doses had been administered as of June 1O.

Overall, about 172.4 million people, or 51.9 percent of the total U.S. population have received at least one dose of vaccine, according to the CDC.

About 141.6 million people, or 42.6 per cent of the U.S. population, have been fully vaccinated.

On Friday, the White House shared slightly updated numbers.

The pace of new vaccinations in the U.S. has dropped significantly from a high of nearly 2 million per day about two months ago, jeopardizing Biden's ability to hit the 70 per cent mark.

President Joe Biden spoke from the East Room Friday and pleaded with unvaccinated Americans to get their shots, warning of the more dangerous Indian Delta COVID-19 variant

CDC director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said on Friday that she expects the Indian 'Delta' coronavirus variant, B.1.617.2, to become dominant in the U.S.

Vice President Kamala Harris talks to George Mitchell as he receives a COVID-19 vaccine at a COVID-19 pop-up center at Ebenezer Baptist Church, Friday, June 18, 2021, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

The White House, in previewing Biden's remarks, says his whole-of-government approach to the vaccination effort has put the virus in retreat, which in turn has brought COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations and deaths to their lowest levels in more than a year.

The administration is in the midst of a month-long blitz to combat vaccine hesitancy and the lack of urgency some people feel to get the shots, particularly in the South and Midwest.

CDC Director Rochelle Walensky said Friday that she expects the Delta variant of the coronavirus will become the dominant strain in the U.S.

That strain has become dominant in Britain after it was first detected in India.

During an appearance on ABC's Good Morning America, she said the vaccines work and told Americans who get their shots 'you'll be protected against this Delta variant.'

Vice President Kamala Harris (right) stands with Sen. Raphael Warnock (left) as she speaks at a COVID-19 vaccine pop-up center at Ebenezer Baptist Church on Friday

Vice President Kamala Harris (right) talks to George Mitchell (left) as he receives a COVID-19 vaccine at a COVID-19 pop-up center at Ebenezer Baptist Church on Friday

Vice President Kamala Harris speaks at a COVID-19 vaccine pop-up center at Ebenezer Baptist Church on Friday

As part of the administration's vaccination push, Vice President Kamala Harris traveled to Atlanta on Friday to tour a pop-up COVID-19 vaccination site at Ebenezer Baptist Church, where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was a pastor until his assassination in 1968.

The current senior pastor is Sen. Raphael Warnock, who was elected in January.

Harris also spoke at a COVID-19 vaccination mobilization event at Clark Atlanta University, a historically Black school.

The Biden administration insists that even if the 70 per cent vaccination goal is unmet, it will have little effect on the overall U.S. recovery, which is already ahead of where Biden said it would be months ago.

For months, Biden has used July 4 as a date that could mark a beginning of a return to normalcy.

'On July 4 we're going to celebrate our independence from the virus as we celebrate our independence of our nation,' Biden said Friday. 'We want everyone to be able to do that.'

Earlier this week, the White House announced plans to host first responders, essential workers and military service members and their families on the South Lawn for a cookout and to watch the fireworks over the National Mall.

More than 1,000 guests are expected for what will be one of the largest events of Biden's presidency.

'Today, weve passed 300 million shots in 150 days. When I took office, our nation was in crisis. Today, the virus is in retreat and our economy has smashed previous records for job growth,' Biden tweeted later Friday afternoon. 'Thats just four months, folks.'
A senior New York City firefighter has been promoted after he sued the FDNY claiming his career was stalled over letters he wrote more than a decade ago criticizing the department's push for more black recruits.

Deputy Assistant Chief of Operations Michael Gala, 60, was promoted to Assistant Chief and received $95,000 plus $6,000 in backpay to resolve the suit he filed against the city in Brooklyn Federal Court last November, the New York Daily News reported Friday.

Gala's case stemmed from an incident in May 2020, when he was forced to repeat the phrase 'I am not the same man I was' after writing a handful of highly-critical letters to the Chief Leader newspaper regarding the FDNY's hiring practices back in 2007 and 2011.

Refusing to do so would have resulted in losing any chances of career advancement within the department, according to the lawsuit.

Pictured: Michael Gala, 60, was promoted and awarded over $100k in backpay and legal restitution after suing the FDNY for stalling his career over letters he wrote a decade ago

Gala, 60, was promoted to Assistant Chief last month and paid $6,000 in back-pay and another $95,000 in the resolution for the lawsuit he filed last November

The terms of the resolution required Gala to write a letter to clarify his old statements while expressing regret for the ways they were interpreted.

'I understand some concerns recently arose from letters I wrote many years ago in the Chief-Leader,' Gala wrote in the note last month.

'I sought to add my voice to an important debate that was raging at the time: how to increase diversity in the FDNY without modifying hiring standards. I did not intend my letters to offend anyone or to denigrate the importance of diversity.'

'My aim was to make clear that diversity could, and should, be achieved without sacrificing hiring standards. I regret that certain impertinent statements distracted from that point and caused anyone to question my commitment to diversity,' Gala wrote following the lawsuit's resolution.

In his original letters to the Chief Leader, Gala complained about the perils of being a white male firefighter and his perceived idea that minority opinions were valued more than his own.

'These apparently are the men who have all the answers as to whats wrong with the face of the New York City Fire Department,' he wrote in one letter.

'Simply stated, it is too white. It is not black enough ... If you are a black firefighter in this department and you have an opinion, then speak up, brother. If you are a female firefighter, then you may speak up as well.'

Pictured: the Brooklyn Federal Courthouse, where Gala filed his lawsuit against the FDNY last November

'However, if you are a white male firefighter, keep your bigoted, racist opinions to yourself ... God forbid someone started a white firefighters association.'

Gala's old letters were written at a time when the department was under siege from the Vulcan Society, a group of black firefighters who filed a federal class action lawsuit against the department over discrimination back in May 2007 and ultimately won the case in 2012.

In the spring of 2014, both the FDNY and the Vulcan Society entered into 'a settlement on the constitutional claims of intentional discrimination that awarded $98million for Black and Latino victims of discrimination, imposed new recruitment goals for the FDNY, enhanced education opportunities for firefighter applicants, and created the position of Chief Diversity Officer to ensure equal opportunity within the department,' according to the Center for Constitutional Rights.

Gala claimed that the department's decision not to promote him over his opinions regarding the FDNY's hiring practices violated his first amendment rights.

'Even if one disagrees with the plaintiffs statements from years ago regarding the FDNYs hiring standards ... there can be no disagreement about their status as protected speech,' his lawyers wrote in court documents.

The FDNY is expected to announce Gala's promotion officially later this month, according to the Daily News.

The department did not return DailyMail.com's request for comment on Friday.
The controversial psychiatrist who said that she fantasized about shooting white people during panel at Yale University in April has doubled down on her attacks saying white people are 'psychopathic' in a new interview.

Dr. Aruna Khilanani, who runs her own practice in Manhattan, delivered a talk titled Psychopathic Problem of the White Mind virtually to medical students and faculty back in April after being invited by Yale School of Medicine's Child Study Center.

Khilanani made stunning statements during her talk, including admitting she has had violent fantasies about shooting white people.

'I had fantasies of unloading a revolver into the head of any white person that got in my way, burying their body and wiping my bloody hands as I walked away relatively guiltless with a bounce in my step. Like I did the world a f**king favor,' Khilanani said during the talk.

Khilanani appeared on Marc Lamont Hill's Black News Tonight on Thursday and elaborated on claims she made in her Yale speech.

'Would it be fair to say, based on your expertise, that white people are psychopathic?' Hill asked Khilanani.

'I think so, yeah,' she replied. 'The level of lying that white people do that has started since colonialism, we're just used to it.'

Dr. Aruna Khilanani (right) appeared on Marc Lamont Hill's Black News Tonight on Thursday where she revealed she believes white people are 'psychopathic'

In our exclusive interview, Dr. Aruna Khilanani explains why she said there were no good apples among White people. She also explains her claim that White people are psychopathic. pic.twitter.com/CMfrz5vO3K  Marc Lamont Hill (@marclamonthill) June 17, 2021

When pressed by Hill about what specific lies she was talking about, Khilanani said white people reframed the horrors of colonialization.

'Every time that you steal a country, you loot, you say you've discovered something,' she told the host. 'This level of lies is actually part of history. We don't say that we killed all these people, we got rid of all the native Americans, we say we discovered America. You don't talk about the level of death, you don't actually talk about the level of what actually occurred.'

Khilanani told Hill that white people's re-telling of colonization 'sanitizes' the violence and that white people take credit for discovering things that already existed.

'This level of discovery is everywhere,' she said. 'You've discovered vegetarianism, you know. You've discovered yoga. Everything is a discovery. And it's all actually stolen.'

Khilanani told Hill on Thursday that the re-telling of colonization 'sanitizes' the violence and white people take credit for discovering things that already existed

Dr. Aruna Khilanani, (pictured) who runs her own practice in Manhattan, revealed she fantasized about 'unloading a revolver into the head of any white person' who got in her way in her April lecture

The comments seemed to double down on her April remarks where she went as far as to say that white people feel they are being bullied when people of color bring up race and described it as a 'psychological predicament'.

'They feel that we should be thanking them for all that they have done for us. They are confused, and so are we. We keep forgetting that directly talking about race is a waste of our breath,' she said.

'We are asking a demented, violent predator who thinks that they are a saint or a superhero, to accept responsibility. It ain't gonna happen.

'They have five holes in their brain. It's like banging your head against a brick wall. It's just like sort of not a good idea.'

After audio of her 50-minute lecture was published on Substack by journalist Bari Weiss earlier this month Khilanani's practice was bombarded with negative reviews that accused her of being anti-Semitic.

Yale professor of social and natural science Nicholas A. Christakis slammed her 'racism' which he said must be 'soundly rejected'

'The racism expressed by Dr. Aruna Khilanani  is deeply worrisome & counter-productive,' Christakis tweeted in early June. 'Of course, as an invitee, she is free to speak on campus. But her views must be soundly rejected.'
The British backpacker saved by her twin sister from the jaws of a crocodile in Mexico has left hospital after being brought back from the dead.

Melissa Laurie, 28, suffered horrific injuries after she was dragged under water and put into a death toll by the ten-foot predator.

But she was rescued by her twin Georgia who fought off three vicious attacks by punching the reptile repeatedly in the snout.

Hero Georgia has spoken about the horrifying moment she feared her twin was dead but insisted 'I'm no hero'.

The quick-thinking sister resuscitated Melissa before doctors put her in a medical induced coma to bring her back to life.

Now 12 days later Melissa has been released into the living care of her parents, Sean and Sue from Sandhurst, Berkshire, and sister Georgia.

Melissa (left), who narrowly survived being attacked and dragged to the bottom of a lake by a crocodile before her twin Georgia (right), 28, saved her, has been released from hospital

Melissa has been released into the living care of her parents, Sean and Sue from Sandhurst, Berkshire, and sister Georgia (trio pictured at the scene of crocodile attack)

The family were spotted leaving the Angel deal Mar private hospital in Puerto Escondido at lunchtime today.

It comes as twin Georgia revealed her sister will not be able to fly home to Berkshire for two weeks because she has to recover from a punctured lung.

The sisters had been taken to an unsafe part of the Manialtepec Lagoon - a coastal lagoon about 18 km west of Puerto Escondido in the State of Oaxaca - where crocodiles were nesting by an unlicensed tourist guide on June 6.

He had assured them it was safe and the sisters were swimming with two friends when Georgia spotted the crocodile. The sisters tried to swim to safety but the predator caught Melissa.

Speaking from Puerto Escondido in Mexico, Georgia said: I saw her getting taken underneath the water and my worse fear became a reality  that Ive probably lost her. Shes dead.

I saw [the crocodile] coming towards us but they move very silently.

The family were spotted leaving the Angel deal Mar private hospital in Puerto Escondido at lunchtime today. Pictured: The twins parents on Wednesday outside the hospital

Georgia (pictured) has spoken in more detail about how she fought off the crocodile but feared her sister was dead. She said: 'The adrenalin kicked in and I saw her body floating and I thought, at that moment, honestly, that she was no longer with us.'

Georgia (right) said she does not feel heroic and paid tribute to Melissa, saying: 'She fought for her own life, as well. She really, she really fought and clung on.' The twins are pictured earlier in their trip to Mexico

I meant they look like they are moving slowly but they are moving quick. And everything is just very quiet.

I actually heard her scream and I saw her being taken underneath by the crocodile.

And then I realized she was really in trouble when I was calling her name and there was no response from her.

The adrenalin kicked in and I saw her body floating and I thought, at that moment, honestly, that she was no longer with us.

But I grabbed her body and I pulled it towards me, I rested it on my chest and she was blue and I tried to revive her.

But then the crocodile came along, so I beat it off and it went away but then she started going into a fit, flaying her arms and legs, I think she thought it was still attacking her.

And I tried to calm her down and then it came back.

Melissa and Georgia's parents Sean and Sue have traveled to Mexico this week to be with their daughters. Mr Laurie said the attack has left his daughter with lasting physical and mental scars

And thats when I sustained actually the most injuries because it grabbed her on the leg and her behind and tried to death roll her and drag her away.

So I was beating it on its snout and it grabbed my wrist and my arm.

So I had to beat it off with the other, with my other arm.

Yeah, it was trying to juggle, like so many things at once, keeping her out of the way and trying, trying to get this thing off of her.

Despite her brave action to save her sister, she rejected any suggestion of being a hero when questioned.

Georgia, talking to the BBC, continued: Its a difficult one, I dont.

I think maybe that comes down to self-esteem.

If someone told me the same story Id say: Wow! Thats so brave of you. Like thats a really youre a hero.

But its hard to believe compliments yourself and when someone says these things to you because it feels surreal. The whole thing feels surreal.

Georgia (right), who fought off a crocodile as it dragged her twin sister into a Mexican lagoon, has been seen walking near the hospital in between visits

It doesnt feel like it actually happened to me.

It was an out-of-body experience at the time.

So its just, its taken a time to process really, that I did that, that actually I did that.You know, I helped save my sisters life.

And she added that Melissa had also fought hard to stay alive.

Georgia added: But also, I want to touch on, she fought for her own life, as well.

She really, she really fought and clung on.

Melissa has healed quicker than doctors expected despite suffering numerous injuries.

She had hoped to be able to then fly back to the UK with her parents who raced to Mexico to be with her this week - and then to continue to recuperate at the family home in Berkshire.

Georgia (left) was comforted by a friend as she left the Angel Del Mar Hospital on Wednesday

But now medics have forbidden the 28-year-old zookeeper from flying for at least two weeks as she recovers from a punctured lung.

Taking to the skies before her lung is fully healed, Melissa has been advised, is against airline regulations and also presents a huge risk to her health.

So the family from Sandhurst, Berks, must decide whether parents Sean, 63, and Sue, 62, stay on in Mexico until Melissa is able to fly or whether they return home without her.

The couple had intended to return to Britain with their daughters early next week when they set out from home last Monday.

The twins and friends are pictured smiling in the hospital following the horrific crocodile attack in Mexico

But these medical complications have thrown their plans into disarray, a source close to the family has revealed.

They had flown out after sister Georgia had begged her mum to come to Mexico to support her.

Now the intrepid twin  who saved her sister from the jaws of the crocodile  is reluctant to return home half-way through her six-month travels.

The couple spent more than six hours at Melissas hospital bedside yesterday while they thrashed it out.

The source told MailOnline: 'Doctors have told Melissa she cannot fly until her lung is completely healed.

'To do so beforehand would not only break airline rules it would also be extremely dangerous. The change in the air pressure could rupture her lung and leave her gasping for breath.

Moises Salinas, 16, who works as a helper on a tour boat named Espatula Rosada, jumped into the shallow murky waters along the Manialtepec River to help rescue Melissa

'Melissa has amazed everyone with how quickly shes recovered but obviously it's going to take a lot longer till she's completely well and she wanted to do the second part of her recovery at home.

'So this news is obviously disappointing to her but Im sure she wont let it get her too down.'

The source added: 'Sean and Sue want to bring their girls home as soon as they can. They have suffered a terrifying ordeal which has scarred both of them.

'Melissa has very obvious physical wounds from the attack but Georgia also has mental scars from the experience too. They'll both be better off at home.'

The twins' parents landed in Mexico on Tuesday and went straight to the hospital to see Melissa.

A now-closed GoFundMe campaign set up by the family to cover the twin's medical expenses raised a whopping 43,813.
An MS-13 gang member was sentenced to 50 years in prison on Friday in Houston in connection with his role in the killing of a 16-year-old witness in 2016.

Jose Guerra Sibrian, 37, and several other gang members lured Estuar Quinonez, 16, to Buffalo Run Park in Missouri City and shot him to death by firing at least 15 bullets.

Quinonez was a key witness in several murders committed by the gang members and his killers wanted to ensure that he would never talk, prosecutors said.

MS-13 gang member Jose Guerra Sibrian, 37, (pictured) was sentenced to 50 years in prison on Friday in Houston in connection with his role in the killing of a 16-year-old witness in 2016

Law enforcement officers from Missouri City are seen investigating the killing of Estuar Quinonez, 16, in Buffalo Run Park in 2016

Documents from The Harris County District Attorney's Office showed Sibrian had hidden in the park before the teenager was murdered.

The killing was initially planned when another gang member Douglas Alexander Herrera-Hernandez, 24, called gang leaders in El Salvador to ask for permission to eliminate the teenager.

Douglas Alexander Herrera-Hernandez, 24, was sentenced to life in prison on May 1, 2021 because of his role in the killing of the 16-year-old witness

Known as 'Terror', Herrera-Hernandez admitted that he arranged several gang members including Sibrian to hide in the park while two other members picked the victim up to take him there.

Herrera-Hernandez and other gang members began shooting Quinonez as he sat on a bench.

He was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole on May 1.

'We will continue to hold gang members accountable for their brutal, illegal actions that terrorize entire communities,' Harris County District Attorney Kim Ogg said.

'Targeting a witness is a vicious crime, and we will continue to seek justice for the victims and their families.'

Documents from The Harris County District Attorney's Office showed Sibrian had hidden in the park before the teenager was murdered. Investigators are pictured at the scene

Sibrian and Herrera-Hernandez were among two dozen MS-13 gang members who were indicted in Maryland on federal charges in racketeering related to murders, kidnapping, extortion and money laundering on July 1 in 2018.

The defendants were accused of murdering more than a dozen people between 2015 and 2017. Several of the defendants were charged in the kidnapping and murder of 21-year-old Jennifer B Rivera-Lopez.

Jennifer Rivera-Lopez (pictured) was 21-years-old when she was kidnapped and dismembered with a machete allegedly by members of the MS-13 gang in Maryland

Lopez was strangled and dismembered with a machete, and was buried in a shallow grave. Her body was found two months after her disappearance.

Most of the murders happened in Frederick and Montgomery counties, with several of the victims being dismembered.

'MS-13 is one of the most violent and ruthless gangs on the streets today,' Robert K. Hur, US Attorney for Maryland, said in a statement at the time, according to the Capital Gazette.

The gang members were alleged to have extorted people for money 'by threatening and using force, violence and fear', to finance the gang's activities, according to the indictment.

The gang members also are alleged to have sold marijuana to raise money to buy more marijuana and weapons for the gang, and to send to gang members in Maryland and other states, as well as in El Salvador.
A 17-year-old boy wearing a swastika armband was kicked out of a mall in Brazil Thursday after customers alerted mall security officers.

The teenager had the armband wrapped around the sleeve of a hooded sweatshirt as he walked around the shopping center in Caruaru, Pernambuco.

One of the security guards approached the teen and was captured on video reprimanding him for wearing the Nazi armband.

'This one wants to be famous,' the man said. 'You don't even know what you are wearing there.'

The teen is then grabbed by the arm in an attempt to toss him out of the mall before he quips, 'I'm in my freedom.'

He subsequently walks away from the guard and picks up his face mask from the floor.

A security guard grabs a 17-year-old boy by the arm before kicking him out of a mall in Brazil on Thursday after customers alerted guards that the teen was wearing a swastika armband. According to Brazilian law, any person can be sentence between one to three years and fined if they are found guilty of manufacturing, marketing, distributing or broadcasting 'symbols, emblems, ornaments, badges or advertising that use the swastika or swastika, for the purposes of dissemination of Nazism'

The teen defended the use of a swastika armband by telling mall security that he was free to do so. The use of Nazi symbols is considered a racial and prejudice crime in Brazil

The mall did not report the incident to police, but said in a statement that it rejects 'any and all forms of justification for the Nazi movement.'

The use of Nazi symbols is considered a racial and prejudice crime in Brazil.

Brazilian law states that a person can be sentenced to between one to three years and fined if they are found guilty of manufacturing, marketing, distributing or broadcasting 'symbols, emblems, ornaments, badges or advertising that use the swastika or swastika, for the purposes of dissemination of Nazism.'

However, Ricardo Santa Ritta, secretary of tourism for the city of Maceio in the northeastern state of Alagoas, went on Twitter to defend the teenager's use of the swastika armband, alleging that his 'freedom of expression' was being violated.

'Today I discovered that using any element with the 'swastika' is a federal crime in Brazil,' he wrote. 'I thought freedom of expression is allowed.'

The Brazilian mall did not report the incident to the local police, but said in a statement that it rejects 'any and all forms of justification for the Nazi movement

Ricardo Santa Ritta, secretary of tourism for the city of Maceio in northeastern state of Alagoas, went on Twitter to defend the teenager's use of the swastika armband, alleging that his 'freedom of expression' was being violated. But he then reversed course and blamed his comments on not being familiar with the Brazilian judicial system. On Friday, the Democratic Labour Party announced it would hold a meeting to revoke his political membership

Moments later Santa Ritta reversed himself, blaming his initial statement on his lack of knowledge of the Brazilian judicial system.

'Today I learned that wearing a swastika symbol is a federal crime. I honestly didn't know,' he tweeted. 'The previous post was my personal opinion. I found the discussion on freedom of expression interesting as a result of this.'

His mea culpa drew backlash from members of the Democratic Labour Party, which sought to dissociate itself from Santa Ritta and announced Friday that it would start the process to remove him from the party.

'80 years have passed since the perpetuation of the selective murders of six million people, under the Nazi symbol,' Democratic Labour Party said in a statement. 'We are in 2021 and we cannot allow or condone anyone who claims the right to express my support for Nazism, especially a public figure.'
Dr. Anthony Fauci has admitted that a group of top scientists held a secret February 2020 call where they said they thought COVID-19 'could possibly be an engineered virus.'

The nation's top disease expert told USA Today this week that the group decided on the emergency call that the situation around the virus's origins 'really needed to be looked into carefully.'

Publicly, Fauci adopted a stance that COVID-19 jumped naturally from animals to humans in a Chinese wet market close to the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China.

Fauci is now facing a backlash over his perceived flip-flopping about the origins of the virus as there is a growing belief that it was the result of a Wuhan lab leak.

Trump's ex-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows waded into the criticism Friday, slamming Fauci and the media for 'ignoring the facts and siding with China.'

'What actually should have happened is journalists should have done their job. There was a Pulitzer Prize waiting for somebody to report on it and candidly what they did is there was so much animosity toward Donald Trump, the president and his administration they weren't willing to look at the facts,' he told Fox.

'We had shared those with a number of reporters and you had Dr. Fauci and a number in the media that were willing to ignore it and actually side with China.'

Dr. Anthony Fauci has admitted that a group of top scientists held a secret February 2020 emergency call where they said they thought COVID-19 'could possibly be an engineered virus'

There is a growing theory that COVID-19 did not naturally jump from animals to humans but instead originated in the Wuhan lab during research into bat coronaviruses, before it was leaked - either accidentally or intentionally - into the world.

It's a theory that was long dismissed as a conspiracy touted by Donald Trump but has grown in prominence with experts and the Biden administration now investigating it as a real possibility.

Fauci repeated his claims to USA Today Wednesday that he always had 'an open mind' about the virus's origins but continues to believe it was most likely created naturally.

'I always had an open mind even though I felt then, and still do, the most likely origin was in an animal host,' he said.

Fauci pointed to the emergency call - which had never been revealed before now - as proof that he was open to the possibility the virus did not form naturally.

The call took place on February 1, just two days after the World Health Organization declared a global health emergency over COVID-19 and the US raised its travel warning on China to the highest level on January 30.

It was also when the nation recorded the first known case of person-to-person spread of the virus on US soil.

Fauci told USA Today the call had been his idea after Kristian Andersen, an infectious disease expert at Scripps Research Translational Institute in California, raised concerns with him that 'at first glance' the virus looked unusual.

On January 31, Anderson spoke to Fauci both by phone and email expressing his beliefs the virus may have been manufactured by humans, he said.

In an email, released in the trove last month, he told Fauci he and several other top scientists believed the virus's 'unusual features' meant it looked 'engineered.'

There is a growing theory that COVID-19 originated in the Wuhan lab (workers inside the lab in 2017) during research into bat coronaviruses

'The unusual features of the virus make up a really small part of the genome (<0.1%) so one has to look really closely at all the sequences to see that some of the features (potentially) look engineered,' the email read.

Anderson said the genome was 'inconsistent with expectations from evolutionary theory.'

He added that 'those opinions could still change' after closer analyses.

Fauci told USA Today Anderson had also expressed these concerns in a phone call with him and Jeremy Farrar, director the Wellcome Trust, that same day.

Fauci said he suggested to Anderson that 'we bring together a multidisciplinary team.'

'We agreed to convene by phone the next day.'

On the call were Fauci, Anderson, Farrar and NIH Director Francis Collins and several other international virology and disease experts.

Fauci told USA Today the conference call was 'a very productive back-and-forth conversation where some on the call felt it could possibly be an engineered virus.'

Others, meanwhile, believed the evidence was 'heavily weighted' toward natural transmission of the virus.

Trump's ex-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows waded into the criticism of Fauci Friday, slamming him and the media for 'ignoring the facts and siding with China'

'I remember it very well. We decided on the call the situation really needed to be looked into carefully,' said Fauci of the call.

Publicly, however, Fauci supported the theory that COVID-19 was engineered naturally.

'If you look at the evolution of the virus in bats and what's out there now, [the scientific evidence] is very, very strongly leaning toward this could not have been artificially or deliberately manipulated,' he told National Geographic in May.

This May, Fauci then changed tact saying he was 'not convinced' any longer that the virus evolved naturally.

But, Fauci was not the only expert whose public stance appears to have stood in opposition to the one behind closed doors.

Following the February 1 call the plan was for Anderson - who just 24 hours earlier spoke of the virus's 'unusual' genome that led him to believe it was 'engineered' - to spend the next two or three weeks looking into the virus sequences, Fauci said.

Yet, by February 4 - just three days after the emergency call - Anderson appeared to have had a change of heart, regaling in an email to other scientists that they should be 'more firm on the question of engineering' and slamming theories it had been deliberately engineered as 'crackpot.'

Andersen sent an email to scientists who were writing a letter for the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine to send to the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.

'I do wonder if we need to be more firm on the question of engineering,' he wrote, according to USA Today.

'The main crackpot theories going around at the moment relate to this virus being somehow engineered with intent and that is demonstrably not the case.

Fauci adopted a stance that COVID-19 jumped naturally from animals to humans in a Chinese wet market close to the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China (above). He is now facing a growing backlash over his perceived flip-flopping about the origins of the virus

Fauci with Jill Biden in New York last week. Dr. Anthony Fauci revealed a group of top scientists held a secret February 2020 emergency call about the origins of the virus and decided the virus's origins 'really needed to be looked into carefully'

'Engineering can mean many things and could be done for either basic research or nefarious reasons, but the data conclusively show that neither was done.'

He continued: 'If one of the main purposes of this document is to counter those fringe theories, I think it's very important that we do so strongly and in plain language ('consistent with' [natural evolution] is a favorite of mine when talking to scientists, but not when talking to the public  especially conspiracy theorists).'

Similarly, in March, Anderson was part of a team who concluded in the Nature Medicine Journal that 'we do not believe that any type of laboratory-based scenario is plausible.'

The lab leak theory has gained traction after it emerged that three workers at the Wuhan lab fell seriously ill with COVID-like symptoms in November 2019, months before China first reported the virus.

Fauci told a House Appropriations subcommittee in late May that the US gave the lab around $600,000 over a period of five years in grants for research in bat coronaviruses.

Emails obtained by conservative watchdog Judicial Watch indicate funding topped $820,000 over six years ending in 2019.

Infectious disease expert Kristian Andersen (pictured) raised concerns with Fauci on January 31 that the virus looked 'engineered'

The money was funneled to the lab via non-profit EcoHealth Alliance before funding was abruptly cut in April.

Fauci insisted the money did not go toward 'gain of function' research.

Such research involves taking a virus that could infect humans and making it more transmissible and/or pathogenic for humans.

Republicans are calling for Fauci to be fired over both the funding of the lab and what they claim has been a flip-flopping from the top doctor over the origins of the virus.

The storm erupted in recent weeks when leaked emails surfaced between him and other virologists in the early days of the pandemic, discussing the possibility the virus was genetically modified.

The emails reveal Fauci was warned by multiple experts in January 2020, on February 21, 2020 and April 16 2020 that the lab-leak theory was a possibility.

On April 18 2020, Fauci received an email from the head of a research group which partners with the Wuhan lab thanking him for publicly insisting that the evidence did not point to the lab as the source.

Last week, a classified report from influential government laboratory the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory also revealed that experts recommended as far back as May last year that more investigation was needed into the lab leak theory.

The report found the hypothesis of a lab leak to be plausible and its conclusions were used by the State Department as it probed the pandemic's origins in the last months of the Trump administration, according to the Wall Street Journal.

While China has tried to insist the virus originated elsewhere, academics, politicians and the media have begun to contemplate the possibility it escaped from the WIV - raising suspicions that Chinese officials simply hid evidence of the early spread

Fauci has defended his handling of the virus and denied trying to play down claims it may have come from a lab.

'That's honestly an accusation that I have to tell you, mildly, is preposterous,' Fauci said at The Wall Street Journal's Tech Health event last week.

'Right from the very beginning, when there was an issue of some people who looked at the virus and said maybe it might actually have been manipulated.

'And what we did is that they mentioned it to me, I called together a group of people and said "Let's take a look at this, make sure, get some virologic evolutionary biologizes together to take a look at it."'

He insisted most experts believed at the time it was 'very likely a natural evolution' but said 'we never ruled out the possibility' it may have been man-made.

'It wasn't like we were trying to hide anything,' he said.

Fauci also pushed back at claims he downplayed the theory for political reasons and called the criticism of him 'attacks on science' on MSNBC's Meet the Press Daily.

'It's very dangerous, because a lot of what you're seeing as attacks on me, quite frankly, are attacks on science because all of the things that I have spoken about consistently from the very beginning have been fundamentally based on science,' Fauci told host Chuck Todd.

Biden last month ordered US intelligence agencies to find answers about the virus's origins.

US officials have accused China of not being transparent about the pandemic and the origins of the virus.
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Schmoozing, showing off her toddler and flaunting a fabulous wardrobe, Carrie Johnson didn't put a well-heeled foot wrong at last week's G7 summit.

But look a little closer at Carrie, 33, and you'll spot something very familiar about the PM's wife.

From her floaty frocks to the dazzling rock on her finger, her taste in baby clothes to her holiday destinations, Carrie is an awful lot like the Duchess of Cambridge.

In fact, when Kate, 39, visited Cornwall for a day of G7 engagements, it was no wonder the two didn't attend the same event  they might have turned up in the same outfit. Here, SARAH RAINEY shows Carrie's the ultimate Copy-Kate...

SMART WESTMINSTER WEDDINGS

While Boris and Carrie's secret wedding last month wasn't a patch on Kate and Wills' grand ceremony back in 2011, the two events have plenty in common.

Both took place in Westminster; the former at Westminster Cathedral and the latter, of course, in the hallowed halls of Westminster Abbey.

Both couples decided to postpone their honeymoons; while travel restrictions make holidaying tricky for the PM and his new bride, Prince William had to be back at work at RAF Anglesey.

Both weddings took place in Westminster; the former at Westminster Cathedral and the latter, of course, in the hallowed halls of Westminster Abbey

While Boris and Carrie's secret wedding last month wasn't a patch on Kate and Wills' grand ceremony back in 2011, the two events have plenty in common

Carrie's Christos Costarellos dress had long sleeves, floral appliques and a lace overlay  just like Kate's  and she reportedly ordered three decoy dresses, another tactic inspired by the royal, in order to keep proceedings firmly under wraps.

One of the 30 attendees joked there was a 'total omerta' on divulging details of the PM's wedding, with staff at the small reception made to sign detailed non-disclosure agreements.

The same measures were in place at the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge's nuptials ten years ago.

LOYAL POOCH AT THEIR BECK AND CALL

Lupo, the royal cocker spaniel  who sadly died last November  was the apple of Kate's eye.

Having been bred from Michael and Carole Middleton's dog Ella, he joined the Cambridges in 2012, just a year before Prince George was born.

Similarly, Dilyn, the Welsh Jack Russell cross, was adopted by Carrie and Boris in 2019  a year before their son, Wilfred, joined the family at Downing Street. Both women are lifelong dog-lovers and have been pictured lavishing their pups with love.

Kate, a skilled amateur photographer, took a number of pictures of the family dog, including in official portraits of Prince George shortly after he was born.

Dilyn, meanwhile, seems to crave the spotlight somewhat more than his royal counterpart. Having accompanied Carrie on the campaign trail in 2019, he has his own (unofficial) Twitter profile, with over 5,000 followers, and features prominently on his mistress's Instagram account.

GLAMOROUS GETAWAYS TO THE CARIBBEAN

Whether swimming with stingrays in the Cayman Islands (in 2017) or frolicking on the beach in Barbados (in 2016), Carrie loves a Caribbean getaway.

Her Instagram abounds with snaps of white-sand beaches, aquamarine seas  and, of course, plenty of bikini shots as she flaunts her svelte figure for her followers.

While royal protocols state that Kate can't be photographed in swimwear or on a private beach, her passion for the Caribbean is no secret  and goes back at lot further than Carrie's.

The duchess has been holidaying on the private island of Mustique, where the Cambridges rent a 27,000-a-week luxury villa, with her family since 2008.

Carrie's Caribbean breaks aren't quite so exorbitant, but she has stayed at Sandy Lane Resort in Barbados, where rooms start at 480 a night.

Carrie's Caribbean breaks aren't quite so exorbitant, but she has stayed at Sandy Lane Resort in Barbados, where rooms start at 480 a night

IN SPARKLING COMPANY

Kate's 12-carat oval sapphire-and-diamond sparkler is an icon. Carrie stepped out wearing her own coloured oval gemstone surrounded by diamonds

Kate's 12-carat oval sapphire-and-diamond sparkler is an icon, valued at 390,000. Last March, Carrie stepped out wearing her own coloured oval gemstone surrounded by diamonds. Hers is a three-carat emerald, similarly set and worth around 35,000.

Carrie's shoes at last week's summit included 60 Zara heels, 175 sandals by LK Bennett and 530 Jimmy Choo stilettos, all brands owned by Kate. She has taken to pairing long dresses with nude courts, a classic royal manoeuvre, and owns several pairs of Superga trainers (55), which Kate has been wearing since 2016.

Carrie has even mimicked the trademark Middleton combo of long suede boots with opaque black tights.

DUPLICATE DRESSES

The Duchess donned an emerald-green gown by chic label The Vampire's Wife in Ireland last year, while Carrie chose a dress in the same distinctive designer's style to meet the Queen at the G7 summit last week

The two women's wardrobes look uncannily similar  and the dates show that, in almost every case, Kate wore it first, though given she has been in the public eye for longer, perhaps this shouldn't be a surprise.

For Boris's first speech outside No 10 in July 2019, his bride-to-be wore a red-and-pink floral tea dress by Ghost, accessorised with nude court shoes. Onlookers recognised the ensemble; just two weeks earlier, Kate had worn a red-and-pink chiffon dress and a pair of nude espadrilles to a charity polo match.

The Duchess donned an emerald-green gown by chic label The Vampire's Wife in Ireland last year, while Carrie chose a dress in the same distinctive designer's style to meet the Queen at the G7 summit last week.

Other royal-endorsed labels in Carrie's closet include Ghost, Eponine, Zara, Whistles, Roksanda Ilincic and Temperley London; indeed, the pair both own the same 750 Temperley 'Noa' coat and have worn it to Remembrance Day events (Kate in 2013, Carrie in 2019).

THAT BOUNCY BLOW-DRY

Kate relies on two trusted hairdressers: Chelsea-based Richard Ward and Amanda Cook Tucker, who accompanies her on royal tours. Carrie, meanwhile, has been spotted in Myla and Davis

Blonde Carrie and brunette Kate have similar-length locks, and Carrie's quickly cottoned on to the need to keep them looking their best.

Kate relies on two trusted hairdressers: Chelsea-based Richard Ward and Amanda Cook Tucker, who accompanies her on royal tours. Carrie, meanwhile, has been spotted in Myla and Davis, which has four London locations. Blow-dries there start at 45, and highlights at 128.

TRENDY TOTS ON FORM

Little Wilfred Johnson was the star of the show last week, toddling around while the grown-ups discussed international affairs

When not frolicking on the beach in his nappy, he was dressed to the nines for his meeting with the Bidens, wearing a 55 piped pique shirt and 49 tailored shorts by Rachel Riley. This was the exact outfit worn by Prince George in 2015

Little Wilfred Johnson was the star of the show last week, toddling around while the grown-ups discussed international affairs. When not frolicking on the beach in his nappy, he was dressed to the nines for his meeting with the Bidens, wearing a 55 piped pique shirt and 49 tailored shorts by Rachel Riley. This was the exact outfit worn by Prince George in 2015, when he went to meet his baby sister for the first time. Playing the cute kid card with world leaders is a tried-and-tested trick of the Cambridges. A dressing gown-clad George met the Obamas in 2016.

GREEN QUEENS

Kate has worn sustainable fashion for years, like this dress by Faithfull The Brand, while Carrie has been spotted in a similar dress by just-as-sustainable label O'Pioneers

Kate supports all sorts of causes, from children's mental health to endangered wildlife.

Carrie campaigns against plastic pollution with the charity Oceana and is patron of the Conservative Animal Welfare Foundation.

Both women's charitable attitudes extend to their wardrobes, too.

Kate has worn sustainable fashion for years, like this dress by Faithfull The Brand, while Carrie has been spotted in a similar dress by just-as-sustainable label O'Pioneers.

BLANKET BUDDIES

Wilf's cream blanket, shown on Carrie's Instagram last May, looked uncannily similar to George's (a 76 design by Nottingham-based GH Hurt & Son), seen outside the Lindo Wing in 2013.
Prince Albert II was photographed earlier today at the start of the 60th Monte Carlo TV festival without his wife Princess Charlene amid a high profile paternity suit.

The Princess, 43, travelled to South Africa earlier this year where she has a wildlife foundation - and Albert and their children twins Princess Gabriella and Hereditary Prince Jacques flew to South Africa to visit Charlene two weeks ago.

The former South African Olympian had been due to return to Monaco for the principality's Grand Prix which took place on May 26 where she was guest of honour.

However, she has not yet been seen in Monaco and royal officials said the princess was unable to travel because she had an ear nose and throat infection.

Prince Albert II of Monaco, left, was photographed next to Darren Star who was given the Monte Carlo TV festival's Golden Nymph award for his role in creating top shows such as Sex in the City and Beverly Hills 90210

Princess Charlene, pictured, has spent several months in South Africa to promote her wildlife foundation

When did Princess Charlene travel to South Africa and when was she last seen with her husband? January 27 - Charlene is pictured with Albert for the Sainte Devote Ceremony in Monaco. March 18 - Charlene is pictured at the memorial for the late Zulu monarch, King Goodwill Zwelithini at the KwaKhethomthandayo Royal Palace in Nongoma, South Africa April 2 - Charlene posts an Instagram picture of herself, Albert and their twins Jacques and Gabriella for Easter. It is unknown where the image was taken. May 8 - Albert, Jacques and Gabriella attend a Grand Prix event in Monaco May 10 - Albert attends Monaco Gala Awards in Monaco May 18 - Charlene shares her first picture from her conservation trip in South Africa June 1 - Prince Albert II, Jacques and Gabriella attend event at Oceanic Museum in Monaco June 3 - New photos emerge of Charlene on her conservation trip June 5- Charlene puts on a united front as she shares a photo with her family to mark her niece's fifth birthday with her brother's family and Albert and the twins. It is not known where the pictured was taken Advertisement

The prince, 63, has been embroiled in a paternity scandal after a woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, alleged the royal is the father of her 15-year-old daughter.

The palace were forced to comment on the princess's whereabouts ahead of the Monaco Grand Prix, which she had been due to attend with Albert.

In a statement issued at the time, the Royal Palace said: 'During a trip to the African continent as part of a wildlife conservation mission, SAS Princess Charlene contracted an ENT infection that does not allow her to travel.

'Unfortunately, she will not be able to attend the Monaco Formula 1 Grand Prix. SAS The Princess Charlene sends her best wishes to the Automobile Club of Monaco, organizer of the event, as well as to the drivers and teams involved in this great automobile competition.'

Instead the prince attended alone with their children.

The 63-year-old prince, who already supports two illegitimate children, is alleged to have had a relationship with a Brazilian woman which resulted in a daughter in 2005.

The claim, which his lawyers dismissed as a 'hoax', is particularly painful as he was dating Charlene at the time, having met the former Olympic swimmer in 2000.

The 34-year-old claimant  who cannot be named for legal reasons  says she had a passionate affair with Albert, leading to the birth of their daughter  whose name is also classified  on July 4, 2005.

Albert received a handwritten letter from the child, who is now 15, in September last year reading: I don't understand why I grew up without a father, and now that I have found you, you don't want to see me.

Legal papers were also filed, as lawyers for the claimant called on Albert to undergo a DNA test  just as he did before finally being identified as the father of two illegitimate children born in the 1990s and early 2000s.

In January, Charlene spoke publicly for the first time since the allegations, telling Point de Vue: 'When my husband has problems, he tells me about it. I often tell him, "No matter what, no matter what, I'm a thousand percent behind you. I'll stand by you whatever you do, in good times or in bad."

She has not been pictured in Monaco with her husband since late January and she's believed to have travelled to South Africa in mid-March.

The mother-of-two went on to say she also often tells her husband she will 'protect him' and will 'always be by his side.'

Charlene, who was raised in South Africa and represented the country at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, travelled to Thanda Safari in KwaZulu-Natal to learn more about being done by the Princess Charlene of Monaco Foundation South Africa to help save rhinos from poachers.

The princess took part in conservation operations including rhino monitoring and tracking, deployment with the Anti-Poaching Unit, educational wildlife photography sessions, and a White Rhino dart and dehorning exercise.

Princess Charlene of Monaco, who hasn't been spotted in the principality since the turn of the year, took to Instagram to share a sweet picture of her and the family

The royal, 43, put on a united front with her six-year-old twins and husband Albert, 63, as the family gathered around a birthday cake with Charlene's brother Sean Wittstock, 37, his wife Chantell, 34, their eldest son Raigen, 7, and the birthday girl

Passionate: Charlene, who was raised in South Africa and represented the country at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, travelled to Thanda Safari in KwaZulu-Natal to learn more about being done by the Princess Charlene of Monaco Foundation South Africa to help save rhinos

Flying solo! Her husband Prince Albert has continued with public duties with their children, taking them to the Oceanographic Museum of Monaco on Monday (pictured)

Last public outing together: Charlene and Albert were last pictured together in public in January at the Sainte Devote Ceremony in Monaco. On April 2, she shared a photograph alongside her husband Prince Albert and their children Jacques and Gabriella to mark Easter, although it is not clear where it was taken

Prince Albert stepped out at the Monaco Gran Prix on 22 May in Monte Carlo without his wife, Charlene, after an 'infection' prevented her from returning from South Africa

Photos of Princess Charlene with the animals and rangers were shared on Instagram.

'This entire experience moved me,' Charlene said.

'I connected with amazing people and spoke to the local trackers and anti-poaching units who all have an incredible passion for protecting our rhinos and environment.'

She continued: 'It filled me with immense joy to reconnect with the African people and spirit again. I was fascinated to learn more about the areas history and culture.

'How fitting to rediscover my love for Africa at a place aptly named Thanda, meaning "love" in the Zulu language!'
She has spoken fondly of her idyllic childhood in Berkshire.

So perhaps it is not too much of a surprise that the Duchess of Cambridge would be drawn back there now that her own family is complete.

The Daily Mail understands the future Queen and her husband Prince William have been quietly scoping out new schools  and potentially homes  in the appropriately named Royal County, with an eye to a possible move in the future.

Prince William and Kate Middleton have reportedly been quietly scoping out new schools - and potentially homes - in Berkshire. Pictured: William on George's first day at school in 2017

Their two eldest children Prince George, seven, and Princess Charlotte, six, are currently attending private Thomass prep school in Battersea, south-west London, which takes children until they are 13.

Their youngest child, three-year-old Prince Louis, attends the Willcocks Nursery a stones throw from their Kensington Palace apartment.

But raising their young family in the bustling capital is not believed to be part of the Cambridges long-term plans.

In recent weeks the couples discreet inquiries about  and visits to  future schools for their children in Kates home county have set local tongues wagging.

Sources are at pains to stress that any changes for the family will have no effect on their set-up at Kensington Palace.

It will remain their London home and office even after they become Prince and Princess of Wales.

Their two eldest children Prince George, seven, and Princess Charlotte, six, are currently attending private Thomass prep school in Battersea, south-west London

William, 38, and Kate, 39, have a comfortable home-office arrangement and are acutely conscious of the 4.5million cost to taxpayers of renovating their 20-room private family apartment, in addition to creating work space for staff.

What it means for Anmer Hall, their private home in Norfolk, is less clear. The couple love the house and the area where they have spent the vast majority of the past year home schooling their children during lockdown. They see it as their family home and no public money has been spent on it.

But Anmer is a long trek from London  often requiring the family to travel by helicopter  and is far from Kates parents, sister and brother who play a huge part in their childrens lives.

Some sources have speculated they could chose to rent privately in Berkshire as a short-term solution.

There are plenty of available properties on the Queens Windsor estate, they say.

Raising their young family in the bustling capital is not believed to be part of the Cambridges long-term plans (pictured in December)

But others have told the Mail the couple are likely to remain in London in term time, and this seems more likely.

In this case they are more likely to go for weekly or flexi-boarding options in Berkshire when the children are older as there is a plethora of highly rated boarding schools in the region.

And it means they could still use Anmer at weekends and holidays.

Both William and his younger brother Prince Harry happily boarded at Ludgrove School in Berkshire from the age of eight before moving to Eton at 13. Prince George turns eight next month.

Kate and her siblings were also boarders at one point or another in their formative years.

It is understood the couple are casting their net wider than just schools traditionally favoured by the Royal Family, although no firm decisions have been made. It is believed Ludgrove is not currently in the running for George.

The Duchess of Cambridge, Prince Louis, Princess Charlotte and Prince George attend a special pantomime performance at London's Palladium Theatre, on December 11, 2020

A source said: Nothing has been decided and of course they could very well decide to keep the children at Thomass, but William and Kate have recently visited schools in the Berkshire area, which has got a lot of people talking.

The big advantage of returning to the Home Counties is the proximity to Kates family, who settled there many years ago.

The duchesss parents Michael and Carole Middleton live in a 4.7million, seven-bedroom Grade II listed mansion, Bucklebury Manor. They also run their party goods business from a business park in the area and are very much hands-on grandparents.

Her brother James has also reportedly bought a 1.45million home in the same village for himself and fiancee Alizee Thevenet.

And while her sister Pippa, who is married to hedge fund manager James Matthews, lives in London, she is also a frequent visitor.

Kate, Pippa and James all attended preparatory schools in Berkshire. For Kate it was St Andrews Prep, which has returned to visit since her marriage.

Kensington Palace declined to comment.
A former Fleet Street editor who hid a lifelong support for the IRA secretly used a column in the terror groups newspaper to accuse journalists of colluding with security services, it can be revealed.

Ex-colleagues have accused Roy Greenslade of placing his own correspondents in danger after newly unearthed articles show how he claimed that mainstream newspapers were lying and manufacturing stories  all while holding an executive role at The Sunday Times.

The 74-year-old, who went on to edit the Daily Mirror, used a column in the republican newspaper An Phoblacht as the Troubles raged in the Eighties to claim that mainland newspapers were an excuse for journalism and suspended even their own shoddy rules when referring to the IRA. At the time, he was managing editor (news) at The Sunday Times, which railed against IRA attacks under the editorship of Andrew Neil, now chairman of new TV channel GB News.

Former Fleet St editor Roy Greenslade, pictured with his wife Noreen Taylor, has been accused of endangering the lives of his reporters by writing a column for an Irish republican newspaper

Greenlade wrote a column for Irish republican newspaper An Phoblacht under the pseudonym George King

A tranche of An Phoblacht newspapers obtained by the Daily Mail from the Linen Hall Library archives in Belfast reveal for the first time the full extent of Mr Greenslades duplicity.

In March 1988, under the pseudonym George King, he wrote that journalists working in Northern Ireland were manufacturing stories with the help of MI5 and the RUC [Royal Ulster Constabulary].

Seven months later, Liam Clarke, The Sunday Times award-winning Northern Ireland editor, received a death threat from the IRA and was forced to flee his home with his family and move into a safe house.

Unaware that his boss at the time was a columnist for the republican movement, Mr Clarke later wrote: For a journalist living and working in Northern Ireland to be accused of collusion with the security forces is life-threatening.

Mr Greenslade, a former Guardian columnist who is married to ex-Daily Mirror journalist Noreen Taylor, revealed his long affiliation with the IRA in an article for the British Journalism Review in February. He said he had supported its bombing campaign since the early Seventies and wrote for An Phoblacht as often as possible.

Former Sunday Times Northern Ireland editor Liam Clarke, pictured with his wife Kathryn Johnstone was forced to flee his home with his family after the IRA issued a death threat against him

He described standing bail surety for alleged Hyde Park bomber John Downey and his 50-year friendship with retired Sinn Fein politician Pat Doherty, also reportedly a former member of the Provisional IRA Army Council. Mr Greenslade said that the killing of civilians, albeit by accident, was justifiable. As the backlash grew, he resigned from his post as an honorary visiting professor in journalism at City, University of London, where he lectured on journalistic ethics.

The revelations raised questions about what information Mr Greenslade may have passed to the IRA. And the files throw new light on how his columns put reporters  and specifically Mr Clarke  in danger. In January 1988  in a column titled Behind the Lines  Mr Greenslade said journalists were writing about splits within the IRA without a single piece of evidence.

Greenslade was forced to resign his role at City University as a visiting professor lecturing on journalism ethics after his role with An Phoblacht was revealed

He wrote: This objective and informed comment from the specialists on the spot  the people in the know!  hints darkly at splits inside the IRA, a split between the IRA and Sinn Fein, a split between Adams and other republicans, any old split they fancy. They offer not a single piece of evidence, not even one of their favourite manufactured unattributed quotes in support of this theory. In October that year, Sunday Times reporter Mr Clarke was tipped off about an IRA plot to murder him, allegedly because of his articles about splits within the IRA. He died in 2015 from cancer.

Last night his widow Kathryn Johnston said: My entire family have been absolutely shattered and appalled by these extracts from An Phoblacht/Republican News from early 1988. They bring us back to the horror of the IRA plot to murder my husband.

Part of Liams work, at which he excelled, was to conduct hard-hitting investigations about struggles and division within the IRA, including exposes of tension among factions and intimate details of their military campaign. Shooting the messenger was a common IRA strategy. Liam had written many, many stories in The Sunday Times about splits and tensions within the IRA. When they couldnt kill those stories, they decided to kill the journalist instead.

In an article in March 1988, Mr Greenslade wrote: For years they [the British newspapers] have manufactured stories  plenty, with the help of MI5 and the RUC  but just as many by sticking to their own fantasies of objectivity. In an earlier article he said: There is no lie to which even the respected British papers will not stoop.

Last night Mr Neil, Mr Greenslades boss at the Sunday Times in 1988, said Mr Greenslades writings could have put journalists at risk.

Mr Neil said: He had this sort of Walter Mitty existence and was living two lives: a senior executive at a mainstream paper and being this IRA-loving columnist as well.

I think its very sad whats happened and even sadder he was such a pro-IRA person but thats what it was. I have no evidence he was responsible for anything we did or stopped anything we wanted to do about Northern Ireland.

Mr Greenslade did not respond to requests for comment.
Hidden in thick sea fog, the Border Force's powerful cutter Seeker raced from the middle of the English Channel carrying 30 migrants towards Dover on Thursday.

It had just plucked them from an unseaworthy black rubber dinghy launched from a French beach before dawn and destined for Britain's south coast.

Seeker's arrival at Dover port with 30 men of multiple nationalities did not merit a mention on the afternoon news.

Boat migrants, after all, had made headlines the day before when the Government announced 5000 have crossed the Channel this year. It is now predicted 10,000 will cross in 2021  a landmark for illicit sea immigration to this country.

The Border Force's powerful cutter Seeker (pictured on June 1) raced from the middle of the English Channel carrying 30 migrants towards Dover on Thursday

The cutter plucked migrants to safety under the eye of French Navy rescue ship Abeille Liberte, which was illegally in English waters from that morning. Pictured: Migrants brought into Dover Marina by Seeker on Thursday

Worryingly, the final tally could be higher still because thousands of migrants are currently waiting in France with the word 'England' on their lips.

Yet perhaps more concerning is what went on in the Channel before Seeker brought these 30 strangers to our shores.

We have discovered that the cutter plucked them to safety under the watchful eye of a French Navy rescue ship, Abeille Liberte, which was illegally in English waters of the Channel from 9.52 (British time) that morning.

Maritime tracking stations show Abeille Liberte had left the French port of Boulogne at 9.11 (British time) the previous evening before starting a night watch of the Channel.

It may even have spotted and escorted the rubber dinghy on its route from France towards England.

We don't know the full story. For Seeker, at least, appears to have been operating in secrecy that day. We understand no messages between it and Abeille Liberte were made on public radio channels  as is customary  before Border Force picked up the migrants.

Seeker appears to have been operating in secrecy that day. We understand no messages between it and Abeille Liberte were made on public radio channels - as is customary. Pictured: Migrants brought into Dover Marina by Seeker on Thursday

After the mid-Channel collection, Seeker (pictured on June 1) turned for home before suddenly disappearing off the radar at 12.43pm British time

And after the mid-Channel collection, it turned for home before suddenly disappearing off the radar at 12.43pm British time.

At that moment it had turned off its Automatic Identification System, known as AIS and used to pinpoint vessels' positions and stop collisions.

This meant the cutter's return journey to Dover with its migrant cargo was impossible to track for other ships or even maritime authorities monitoring the hundreds of sailings that day, in dangerously heavy fog in the Channel.

This covert behaviour follows the Mail's shocking expose this month of how another Border Force cutter had entered French waters to pick up migrants and ferry them to Britain.

The collection on the French side of the Channel was organised in a public radio channel conversation between senior crew of Border Force's Valiant and a French patrol ship Athos, that was heard by the Mail.

Our report sparked an investigation by Home Secretary Priti Patel, the result of which has not been announced publicly. But a Home Office source told us emphatically: 'The job of Border Force is to secure the UK's border, not to facilitate illegal entry into it.'

Since the expose, we have discovered a number of incidents that suggest Border Force is now trying to hide the way it is helping bring cross-Channel migrants into Britain. Seeker's activity on Thursday  when it did not use public radio and switched off the AIS  is only the most recent.

We have heard numerous reports of highly irregular radio silence on public airwaves in recent days between Border Force vessels and French Navy ships, meaning that arrangements for migrant handovers at the sea frontier in the centre of the English Channel cannot be overheard.

In addition, there are claims that Border Force vessels are illegally and dangerously switching off AIS which means migrant pick-ups are not fully monitored.

A Home Office spokesperson refused to respond to the Mail investigation, saying: 'we do not comment on operational matters in the Channel because to do so could provide an advantage to the ruthless criminals behind these crossings.'

At that moment, Seeker (rib pictured on Thursday) had turned off its Automatic Identification System, known as AIS and used to pinpoint vessels' positions and stop collisions

Seeker's return journey to Dover with migrants (pictured on Thursday) on board was impossible to track for other ships

Meanwhile, maritime border rules are being breached regularly by the French Navy.

The Abeille Liberte entered English waters this week and another French rescue ship on migrant patrol in the Channel  P618 Escaut, which did have its AIS operating  did so on Monday.

'The radio silence started after the balloon went up at the Home Office with the Mail revelation that Valiant was picking up migrants in French waters,' said the south coast sailor who handed us the public radio channel conversation for our expose proving Britain's Valiant was entering French waters to pick up migrants.

He added yesterday: 'The French are using the radio to call up Border Force, but Border Force is not answering. I am listening in all the time. I am sure the new silence is not a coincidence. Border Force don't want to be overheard.

'I believe they are using mobile phones instead of maritime radio to communicate with the French over any arrangements for mid-Channel migrant handovers.'

Last year, the Mail revealed that the French Navy routinely come into English waters, even close to the White Cliffs of Dover, to pass migrants to Border Force vessels.

We were told by a respected sea vessel tracking agency that the French captains also turn off their AIS to hide their 'operation purposes' and 'keep route information secret'.

The French, of course, say this is not a mess of their making. They say their priority is to preserve human life in the Channel. Brainwashed by people smugglers into believing that Britain is the best place to settle rather than Europe, the migrants often refuse to be rescued by the French Navy.

They have threatened to jump into the sea or even throw children overboard to avoid being picked up because they believe it will mean a return to France.

This, insist the French, leaves them with little option but to shadow the boats across the Channel where, once in English waters, the migrants know they will be brought to England.

But their argument flies in the face of Home Office pledges to stop the migrant boat flow to Britain. This week, a former coxswain of the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) wrote to Miss Patel offering a solution to the escalating crisis.

He showed a copy of his letter to the Mail in which he insists the French, by allowing unsafe migrant boats to leave their shores, are breaching their own very specific maritime laws.

Not even maritime authorities monitoring the hundreds of sailings that day, in dangerously heavy fog (pictured) in the Channel, could track Seeker on its return journey

The behaviour between Abeille Liberte (right) and Seeker follows the Mail's expose of how another Border Force cutter Valiant (left) entered French waters to pick up migrants

We have discovered incidents that suggest Border Force is trying to hide the way it is helping cross-Channel migrants to UK. Seeker's activity on Thursday (above) is only the most recent

Unlike the British and many other nations, the French have a set of strict maritime rules which dictate that no unseaworthy boats must ever be launched.

The former coxswain, Charles Sharrod, wrote in his letter: 'French maritime law clearly shows that these (migrant) vessels are sailing within the French territorial waters without the necessary (safety) qualifications.

'The French are, therefore, not enforcing their own laws and are allowing poorly equipped vessels to leave their shores in great numbers and at great risk to their occupants.'

Mr Sharrod's letter explained: 'All vessels in French waters within six miles of their coast must have a licensed operator/skipper if powered by an engine of more than six horsepower, a foghorn, lifejackets for all on board, 142 Newtons (32 pounds) of buoyancy force in any kind of inflatable, three red hand flares, a torch, a baler, and compass'.

Fines for overloading a vessel are 1500 and up to one year in prison. It has been evident for some time that the French have been ignoring their own maritime laws  as well as escorting illegal vessels out of their own territorial waters (into English waters).'

Mr Sharrod told us yesterday: 'A six horsepower engine is tiny and is used on tiny boats ferrying a couple of people around a port area from the mother ship.

'The migrants' boats have much bigger engines, and that means they are covered by French maritime laws.'

Before he retired, Mr Sharrod, 74, ran a business advising on contingency plans in times of national or international emergency, such as virus pandemics or disasters.

He devoted his spare time to being a volunteer coxswain for the RNLI, as had his father before him. Based in Hastings, East Sussex, there are few who know more about the sea, the English Channel, and their dangers, than him.

Importantly, Mr Sharrod believes that the very detailed French maritime laws trump the 26-year-old international convention for safety at sea which the French say they follow. This says that all mariners have a legal duty to preserve human life at sea and help vessels in distress.

Mr Sharrod told us: 'If these unseaworthy migrants' boats were not allowed to set off from Calais or Dunkirk beaches because they breach France's maritime law, then there would not be any migrant vessels in distress crossing the Channel so the convention would be irrelevant.'

Meanwhile, the migrants continue to be picked up by Border Force. This week the total brought to Dover has reached more than 300. On Thursday alone, the tally was 70.

Migrants continue to be picked up by Border Force. This week, the total brought to Dover has reached more than 300. Pictured: Migrants brought in by Seeker on Thursday

Last year, the Mail revealed that the French Navy routinely come into English waters to pass migrants to Border Force vessels (pictured: Seeker rib on Thursday)

Yesterday morning by breakfast time, 14 had been picked up by an RNLI lifeboat off the coast of Kent at Dungeness.

We have discovered that the Border Force cutter Valiant, highlighted in our expose, entered French waters on a second occasion on May 31 at 1.26 British time  two days after its controversial assignation with the Athos.

It is not known whether it was picking up migrants or liaising with the French Navy. Since that time and date, however, its AIS system has been switched off.

We also know that on its journey to Dover with the 30 migrants on Thursday, Seeker turned off its identification system.

As of yesterday at six in the morning, it had not been put on again. Why the secrecy?

It makes those such as the south coast sailor and Mr Sharrod think something is going on. Even a deliberate cover-up.
From the safety of their home in India, Karan and Arjun Mishra pull off cruel scam after scam. They prey on the vulnerable 5,000 miles away in Britain, persuading them to part with tens of thousands of pounds.

The brothers stole 180,000 from an 83-year-old widow in Somerset by tricking her into believing she was helping them catch criminals. It cost her her life savings.

Another victim, recently retired, is still too ashamed to tell her husband that she was conned out of 10,000. It was a hefty slice of their nest egg.

Karan Mishra (pictured) preyed on the vulnerable 5,000 miles away in Britain after pulling off a number of cruel scams

At least nine more are thought to have been targeted by the shameless pair.

They include Thomas Mulligan, 85, a retired NHS surgeon and devout Christian who is always keen to help others.

When he received a landline phone call from an Amazon cyber security representative who said he needed his help to stop evil hackers, he did everything they asked.

Little did he know that he was on the phone to the very criminals he was helping 'catch'  and they were about to drain his bank account. The widower was lulled into a false sense of security because the scammers already knew his bank details. It is likely they bought them online from hackers.

The fraudster's script THE FRAUDSTER: Hello sir/mam, My name is Alan Cooper and I am calling you from BT So how are you doing today? I can confirm your default gateway, your IP address which is 192.168.1.254 ... This call is in regards to your internet which you are using at your place. The reason I am calling you is, from last couple of days, the internet we have provided you, the IP address which is 192.168.1.254, is being misused outside UK VICTIM: Where are you calling from? I am calling you from BT which is in 81, New Gate Street, London, Postcode - EC1A 7AJ. As per the BT server result and investigation your IP address is being used from Nigeria. So thats why we called you so that we can stop those intruders rom using your internet or else we have to suspend your account for the next fortnight. OK? How do I believe you are from BT? I can confirm your default gateway, your IP address which is 192.168.1.254 I'm not a BT user No matter, whichever billing company you are with, you are using BT line and network.. AS you can understand Mr/Mrs  that if they have access to your internet connection they can also access your personal information or financial details. So first of all we have to disconnect your current IP address and provide you with the new IP details, connection and also provide you with proper securities and precaution. Advertisement

Karan told him that criminals had used his account and he was being chased for outstanding debt. He asked Mr Mulligan to make a payment of 10,000 into a specific bank account. Then they would be able to follow the money, catch the criminals and refund him in full.

After Mr Mulligan downloaded software under Karan's guidance, the scammers had complete control over his computer  including all his documents. Details of Mr Mulligan's passport and ID were all hoovered up.

Now the Mishras would try to empty Mr Mulligan's retirement pot. They set up a Binance account  a platform to trade cryptocurrency  in his name. This has a stringent verification process: email codes, documents and verification texts are all required.

But the fraudsters jumped through every hoop with ease. They even made Mr Mulligan look into the computer camera and blink three times  helping them pass another hurdle in the race for his cash. Then  just as the brothers went about their business of helping themselves to the pensioner's retirement pot  Mr Mulligan's mobile phone began to ring.

And into our story stepped our hero: a crusader against the online scammers, who goes by the pseudonym Jim Browning.

'Please don't announce this but I think you're on the phone with people who are trying to steal your money', Mr Browning said. Mr Mulligan hung up on the criminals, telling Mr Browning he believed he had been talking to 'cyber security' experts. Incensed, the Mishra brothers, still on Mr Mulligan's computer, began typing, telling him: 'You hang up the mobile call straight away.'

But it was too late. Thanks to Mr Browning's dramatic intervention the spell they had worked over the retired surgeon was broken.

Every moment was filmed by Mr Browning, who has turned the tables on the fraudsters and hacked into their computers.

The police were able to track the money and save 5,000. Santander would not refund the outstanding 5,000, though it said it was reviewing that decision.

So just who is Jim Browning  and how did he get involved?

He's an ethical hacker from Northern Ireland who fought back after he was targeted by bogus callers seven years ago.

An IT worker putting his knowledge to crime-busting use, he has infiltrated the computers of hundreds of scammers  sometimes hacking into three systems a day.

He reckons his one-man crusade has saved victims around 4million by derailing frauds and shutting down calls centres  at least five in India. The largest transaction he has managed to intercept during a live scam was 30,000.

Pictured: a raid on a scam call centre in India. An ethical hacker from Northern Ireland has saved victims around 4million by derailing frauds and shutting down calls centres

And the vigilante says he has saved ten people from the Kolkata-based Mishras since they targeted him last year. He had software set up to allow him to hack into criminals' computers.

That meant he was able to alert Mr Mulligan to the true identity of the 'security experts'.

The terrifying footage Mr Browning recorded shows the scammers connecting to the pensioner's computer before trying to buy thousands of pounds worth of cryptocurrency.

Never has Mr Browning's work been more needed, for Britain, it transpires, is the the 'scam capital of the world'.

We receive far more calls from phone fraudsters than any other country in the G20 and a Daily Mail investigation can reveal that:

Fraudsters have exploited the pandemic to steal 2.6billion since May 2020, up by 350million on the previous year. Experts fear the real amount is 'significantly higher';

The criminals have targeted the elderly, taking 425.3million from the over-70s;

They even prey on people aged 90 to 99, taking 80.8million  around 35,000 each on average;

Investigators have been shocked by the explosion in 'mass impersonation' scams, as fraudsters pose as officials from the NHS, HMRC or Royal Mail;

150,000 victims have authorised payments totalling 479million through their banks to fake officials and just 206.9million has been reimbursed;

The National Crime Agency believes a 'controlling mind' kingpin based in the UK is steering an international gang responsible for much of the fraud.

Set up on a second computer, Mr Browning's software allows him to access the criminals' systems.

This gives him access to vital information including their documents, their location and  crucially  it allows him to monitor their activities.

The anti-fraud crusader has alerts set up for when the criminals turn on their computers  meaning he can protect potential victims. He has also hacked into the security cameras of one call centre  allowing him to watch a room full of fraudsters in action targeting UK victims.

He told the Mail: 'I was getting really annoyed with scam calls and thought to myself 'As an engineer maybe I can do something about this  if I can't, then who can?'

Mr Browning goes along with the frauds, often giving out fake names and credit card details. This has earned him a place on the so-called 'mugs list'  a database of names, addresses and phone numbers of people who fraudsters believe are likely to fall for scams. He set up his YouTube account seven years ago in an attempt to warn others. Three years later he began 'hacking' into scammers' computers and sharing the results online.

His videos have been watched more than 201.4million times and he has amassed more than three million subscribers.

The first time Mr Browning gained access to a scammers' computer was accidental.

'One of the scammers told me his username and password for his computer and showed me how to reverse the connection, I couldn't believe it,' he said.

'I locked him out of his computer and blacked his screen and I could find out exactly who he was. It's exhilarating and fascinating.'

Mr Browning said he has prevented more than 1,000 victims  around 20 per week  being scammed.

'Even last week there was a group of scammers and I was able to stop every one of their victims being scammed out of tens of thousands of pounds,' he said. 'It's satisfying that you're stopping people losing money and that scammers are scratching their heads as to why the revenue is dropping.'

Mr Browning says some bogus call centres  some of which have been raided by anti-fraud police  employ up to 300 people. Bad luck, then, for the Mishra brothers to run into him.

They will most likely have bought their victims' details  including addresses and dates of birth  from other fraudsters.

They operated by telling their targets their computer had been hacked and that international criminals were committing fraud using their details.

Using their charm, the Mishras coaxed their victims into downloading TeamViewer  software which gives them remote access to their victims' computers and mobile phones.

The scammers ask the pensioners to log in to online banking and make a payment of between 5,000 and 10,000 to a 'safe' account. They claimed this would help them 'follow the money' and catch the criminals in the act.

Once their victims' accounts were compromised, the crooks aimed to plunder their savings. Mr Browning has been monitoring the brothers' laptop since last summer.

On it, he found spreadsheets containing thousands of British customers' personal details, including bank account numbers, passwords and memorable words.

There were also several scam scripts  step-by-step guides detailing what to say to gain the trust of unsuspecting victims  along with logos for major companies.

In one script, the brothers pose as staff from BT to warn victims their computer's IP address has been 'misused' in Nigeria and that fraudsters have access to their 'personal information or financial details'.

As well as Mr Mulligan, the Mail has tracked down three more people left devastated after the brothers swindled tens of thousands of pounds out of them.

The victims were so embarrassed they wished to remain anonymous. The Somerset grandmother, who lost 180,000, felt 'ashamed and worthless' after the Mishras exploited the pandemic to steal her life savings.

The 'absolutely horrific ordeal' also robbed her of her self-confidence  making her want to move from the home and village where she has lived for decades.

The bank did refund the missing money. But her daughter told the Mail: 'We were in the middle of Covid and you're talking about an old lady who was just about to have a pacemaker put in so she was very vulnerable.

'It took an enormous toll on her. For a while she didn't feel safe in her own house because she thought they knew where she lived. She thought they would turn up at her door.'

Another victim in east London nearly lost 20,000 to the scammers in December  but the bank refused the second transfer. She has been unable to recover the initial 10,000.

'You work hard enough to earn all this money, and then somebody takes it just like that', she said.

Documents on the criminals' laptop included several selfies of Karan posing with an expensive watch. Two of the pictures appear to be taken in a call centre, although it is not known whether this is where the fraud took place.

Other files included pictures of their identity documents and a meme depicting a room covered in cash, with the caption 'the only room I would like to clean!'.

Karan denied all allegations of fraud and scamming when confronted by the Mail outside his family home in Behala, a middle-class area of south-west Kolkata, insisting it was 'total bulls***'.

He claimed that his only work was helping his father run stationery shops.

Mr Browning said the Mishras' laptop had been switched on recently but there has been no evidence of them trying to carry out any scams since the Mail confronted them last month. It is not thought they were working with a third party in the UK.

Police in Behala said they continued to investigate online fraud cases, but were not aware of the Mishra brothers or allegations that they had scammed UK residents.

MPs last night called for the Government to set up an anti-scamming workforce to tackle the crisis. Chris Bryant, chairman of the committee on standards, said: 'The Government must wake up and take immediate action to fight the virus of fraud by warning people so they can protect themselves and start putting the criminals behind bars.'

Tory MP Ruth Edwards called for greater protections against scams to keep 'pace with both technology and the techniques used by those who seek to do us harm'.

Baroness Williams of Trafford, a Home Office minister, said: 'We have given an extra 63million to law enforcement so they can crack down on fraud and we are also recruiting specialist fraud officers as part of our commitment to recruit 20,000 new officers.

'This year alone they have taken down thousands of phone numbers as well as fake websites, email addresses and are going after those responsible for these heinous crimes.'

As for Thomas Mulligan, he knows he has had a narrow escape, saved by Mr Browning's crucial intervention.

He told the Mail: 'I thought I was an intelligent person and I was too aware to be caught, but I soon realised people can play on your good nature to scam you.

'They just seemed so credible that I was fooled. They convinced me. They were very organised.'

Retired for 23 years, he said he was 'very lucky' he could cope with the loss but, had Mr Browning not stepped in, 'it might well have been a different story.'
Shark Tank star Kevin O'Leary's wife Linda was 'bitchy' and tried to blame the boat she'd just crashed in to in a 'gruesome' collision in 2019 that killed two people, a court in Canada heard on Friday.

O'Leary has been charged with one non-criminal charge of careless operation of a vessel under the Canada Shipping Act for the death of Gary Poltash, 64, from Florida, and mother-of-three Susanne Brito, 48, from Ontario, who were both killed when Linda crashed the stargazing boat they were on in Lake Joseph in 2019.

On Friday, a witness on the boat the two victims' were sitting 'idly' in the water, looking at the sky, when Linda powered into them out of nowhere.

Shark Tank star Kevin O'Leary's wife Linda was 'bitchy' and tried to blame the boat she'd just crashed in to in a 'gruesome' collision in 2019 that killed two people, a court in Canada heard on Friday.

Gary Poltash, 64, from Florida, and mother-of-three Susanne Brito, 48, from Ontario, were killed in the nighttime collision

Linda's boat slid on top of theirs then went back into the water.

The witness said she immediately blamed them - suggesting they'd crashed into her, when they'd been still the entire time.

'The woman did all the talking at first and was like, kind of You hit us, or, I dont remember the actual words, but it sounded like she was, not confrontational, but pissed or bitchy, a little bit, excuse my language, just a little sassy.

'Honestly, I thought she was a teenager that hit our boat,' Cathryn Hibbard told the court.

She insisted that they had their lights on the entire time before they were hit and after.

'It was a gruesome scene on our boat. There were lights on in the boat, so you could see everything.'

Linda, who serves as the VP of Marketing for O'Leary Wines, was driving her and Kevin's luxury boat on Lake Joseph in Ontario, Canada on August 24 in 2019 when it collided with another vessel causing the two fatalities and injuring three others. Pictured: One of the O'Leary's boats

She said that before the O'Leary's hit them, there was 'complete silence.'

'It was absolutely silent, quiet, serene. It was like it came out of nowhere and was so fast,' she said.

The Ontario Provincial Police constable who went to the O'Leary's home also testified.

OPP Const. Breanne Marr said she arrived at the home to find Linda lying in bed, with one leg poking out of a blanket at the end.

There was an alcohol monitoring device at the end of the bed with the word 'alert' on it.

'She was advising that someone had made her a drink when she returned from the accident.

'She was very hostile toward us, she was not co-operative, she did not wish to speak to police any further, and, pretty well told us she was done talking,' she said.

Kevin O'Leary was cooperative, she said.

The trial has been adjourned until July.
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A rider died in a field after being brutally attacked as she tended to her horse in what is believed to be a murder-suicide.

Named locally as Gracie Spinks, 23, the part-time model was found seriously injured yesterday morning but died at the scene.

Roads in and out of Duckmanton in Derbyshire were cordoned off after her assailant reportedly fled towards a country park.

A primary school went into lockdown and local businesses were issued with a description of a suspect in grey jogging bottoms and a black top.

But by lunchtime police said the situation had been 'resolved' after a body was discovered.

Part-time model Gracie Spinks, 23, was found seriously injured in Duckmanton, Derbyshire, yesterday morning but died at the scene

Friends said she lived for horses and riding and took part in showjumping and dressage competitions with her favourite, named Paddy

Last night visitors dropped off flowers at the home where Miss Spinks lived with her mother in the nearby village of Old Whittington.

A villager, 28, who lives close to the spot where Miss Spinks was found, said: 'The word locally is that this was a very vicious attack and possibly a crime of passion.

'Gracie kept at least one horse on the land  it is grazing land where a number of people have horses and there is a temporary stable.

'As I understand it, Gracie was looking after her horse when she was attacked. It is just awful.'

Friends said she lived for horses and riding and took part in showjumping and dressage competitions with her favourite, named Paddy.

After Derbyshire Police set up roadblocks around the community close to the M1 outside Chesterfield yesterday, a local resident wrote on Facebook: 'I've been informed that, sadly, less than an hour ago a young woman was murdered on a farm less than half a mile from Poolsbrook Park.

'The perpetrator is believed to have fled towards the area of Poolsbrook Park. Anyone around that area please be careful.'

Roads in and out of Duckmanton in Derbyshire were cordoned off after her assailant reportedly fled towards a country park (pictured)

Friends of Miss Spinks, who worked for a local e-commerce company, posted tributes on Facebook last night with many saying she lived for horses and riding

It is understood that Miss Spinks, who had studied art and design at Chesterfield College, did occasional modelling work for a London agency and took commissions online to do pet portraits

Friends of Miss Spinks, who worked for a local e-commerce company, posted tributes on Facebook last night.

Charlotte Pemberton, 23, who grew up with her, wrote: 'RIP Gracie. Such a beautiful, kind young girl who's been taken far too soon. Fly high sweet girl.'

Alicia Jordan wrote: 'Oh Gracie Spinks Heartbroken doesn't even cut it... This world is so cruel.'

It is understood that Miss Spinks, who had studied art and design at Chesterfield College, did occasional modelling work for a London agency and took commissions online to do pet portraits.

Derbyshire Police said it was not looking for anyone else in connection with the deaths.

The force said: 'A woman was found injured in a field near to Staveley Road at around 8.40am. Paramedics attended and the woman, who was in her early 20s, sadly died at the scene.

'At 11am, the body of a man in his mid-30s was found in a field off Tom Lane, Duckmanton.

'We have traced and informed both families and specialist officers are supporting them at this time.'
Sir Keir Starmer could soon face renewed calls to resign after a poll showed that he is heading for another humiliating defeat in Labours former northern stronghold.

According to a survey for the Daily Mail, the Conservatives are six points ahead of Labour in Batley and Spen in Yorkshire, where a by-election takes place on July 1.

And the Labour leader will be unable to escape the blame if the result is as bad as the Survation poll suggests. Boris Johnson is way ahead of him on almost every count, personally and politically.

Remarkably, the Old Etonian Prime Minister is seen as a better champion for the North than Sir Keir, whose father was a toolmaker.

Most damaging of all, one in two of those who voted Labour in the 2019 election say they would be more likely to vote for the party if Sir Keir stepped aside for Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham.

According to a survey for the Daily Mail, the Conservatives are six points ahead of Labour in Batley and Spen in Yorkshire, where a by-election takes place on July 1

Sir Keir Starmer is pictured at England v Scotland at Wembley Stadium last night

Mr Burnham, a former Cabinet minister, has made no secret of the fact that he sees himself as a possible future Labour leader  and at 51, is six years younger than Sir Keir.

Victory in Batley and Spen would be the perfect tonic for Mr Johnson after his partys thrashing at the hands of the Lib Dems in the Chesham and Amersham by-election on Thursday.

But coming hard on the heels of Labours shattering by-election defeat in Hartlepool in May, it could prove to be one northern annihilation too many for Sir Keir.

Labour has held Batley and Spen for nearly a quarter of a century and won the 2019 election contest with a 3,525 majority.

But the Conservatives are in the lead on 47 per cent, followed by Labour on 41, according to the Survation poll.

In third place, on six per cent, is the Workers Party, led by former MP George Galloway. Labour officials say many of its supporters in Batley and Spen, where nearly one in five voters are Muslims, have defected to the veteran pro-Palestine candidate.

Mr Johnson is seen as the best Prime Minister by 55 per cent. Only 18 per cent say Sir Keir would do a better job in No 10. Barely one in three Labour supporters (36 per cent) say their leader would make a better premier.

Asked whether Mr Johnson or Sir Keir has the best policies, the Prime Minister wins by an average margin of nearly three to one on Brexit, the handling of Covid and the economy.

The Conservatives are in the lead on 47 per cent, followed by Labour on 41, according to the Survation poll

Even on the NHS, where Labour usually has a commanding lead, Mr Johnson beats Sir Keir by 45 to 30. A similar pattern emerges when voters in Batley are asked to assess the character of the two men.

Mr Johnson is seen as charismatic by nearly three times as many voters as the number who believe Sir Keir possesses that star quality.

Among all voters, Mr Johnson is seen as charismatic by 60 per cent, with Sir Keir only 23. Restricted to 2019 Labour voters, 51 per cent say Mr Johnson has charisma  but only 27 per cent attribute this quality to his rival.

Mr Johnson is regarded as stronger, more intelligent and  perhaps surprisingly, bearing in mind his colourful private life  more trustworthy.

One in two Batley and Spen voters (50 per cent) say Mr Johnson has a clear stand on issues, but this falls to fewer than one in three (32 per cent) for Sir Keir.

Four in ten (40 per cent) believe that Mr Johnson is best for the North, with just three in ten backing Sir Keir.

A total of 49 per cent say they would be more likely to vote Labour in Batley and Spen at the next general election if he was replaced by Mr Burnham.

The Old Etonian Prime Minister is seen as a better champion for the North than Sir Keir, whose father was a toolmaker. Pictured: Johnson canvasing in Batley

Among all voters in Batley and Spen, 34 per cent say they would be more likely to vote Labour if Mr Burnham was leader, while 22 per cent say they would be less likely.

Defeat in Batley will be especially wounding for Labour.

Candidate Kim Leadbeater, who has won praise for her campaign, is the sister of the areas hugely respected former MP Jo Cox, who was murdered by a Right-wing extremist in 2016.

Damian Lyons Lowe, of pollsters Survation, said: A victory for the Conservatives in red wall Batley and Spen after the hammering in blue wall Chesham would give Boris Johnson some comfort.

Keir Starmers dire personal ratings mean it wont be easy for him to distance himself from a Labour defeat.

The fact that half of those who voted Labour in 2019 in Batley say they would be more likely to vote for the party if Andy Burnham took over may lead to renewed calls for Starmer to step down.

Last night Sir Keir suffered a further blow as his director of communications Ben Nunn resigned.

The by-election follows the resignation of Batley and Spens MP, former Coronation Street actress Tracy Brabin, who was recently elected Mayor of West Yorkshire.
They were the words of a ghost, a message from the grave; written by a troubled, even frightened Princess, mother to a future king, who had been told by an unscrupulous BBC journalist eager to get a scoop that she was the target of an Establishment plot.

Now, eight years after the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, a copy of an incendiary note she penned to her butler is being recited by a tall, grey-haired peer of the realm to an audience of three other middle-aged men in a private drawing room on the first floor of St James's Palace. Nobody else knows that the gathering is taking place.

'I am sitting here at my desk today in October, longing for someone to hug me and encourage me to keep strong and hold my head high,' the peer begins to intone.

'This particular phase in my life is the most dangerous  my husband is planning an accident in my car. Brake failure and serious head injury in order to make the path clear for him to marry Tiggy.

'Camilla is nothing but a decoy so we are being used by the man in every sense of the word.'

Lord Stevens of Kirkwhelpington, who until a few months before was Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, has finished reading what is on the paper in his hand. He looks up and meets the eye of the man sitting in an armchair across the room.

This unprecedented meeting, which has never been described before (despite legal attempts to bring the transcript and notes into the public domain) took place at 5.15pm on Tuesday, December 6, 2005.

Eight years after the death of Diana, Princess of Wales (pictured with Charles), a copy of an incendiary note she penned to her butler was recited in a drawing room in St James's Palace

Cover of darkness suited both parties, sources have told the Mail. The subject to be discussed was nothing less than sensational; certainly highly embarrassing if not damaging to the monarchy.

Why such secrecy? Because this was to be a police interview rather than a conversation; an interview in which Prince Charles would be asked, to his face, about his complicity or otherwise in an alleged conspiracy to murder his estranged wife, Diana, Princess of Wales.

Nothing like this had happened before. It was the task of a modern high official  Lord Stevens  to question the heir to the throne about the death of the mother of his children; a seismic, epoch-defining tragedy of global interest, the ramifications of which inform what is happening today within the Royal Family, notably the rift between Buckingham Palace and Diana's younger son Prince Harry and his American wife Meghan.

July 1 this year marks the 60th anniversary of Diana's birth. She died, aged 36, following a crash in a tunnel in Paris in the early hours of August 31, 1997. She has been dead for a generation and remains forever young, lovely and enigmatic.

Those under the age of 35 will have little appreciation of her iconic status in the 1980s and 1990s; the aura surrounding the shy beauty who had transformed the 'stuffy and staid' image of the monarchy; the 'Di-mania' and worldwide fascination with the 'fairy tale' that went so wrong. Nor the impact of her passing.

Those alive then can recall today where they were when they heard the shocking news. And the manner of Diana's passing led to a host of conspiracy theories that are with us to this day.

The debate about factors that may have contributed to the death crash has re-intensified after publication last month of the damning 'Dyson report' into how the BBC's former star reporter Martin Bashir conned the Princess into granting his scoop Panorama interview with her in 1995.

Prince William has said the BBC's failures contributed to his mother's 'fear, paranoia and isolation' in her final years, while Prince Harry said the 'ripple effect of the culture of exploitation and unethical practices ultimately took her life'.

Diana's brother Earl Spencer went a stage further, saying he could 'draw a line' between his sister meeting Bashir in 1995 and her tragic accident in Paris two years later.

Today, the Mail begins a major investigative series into that fatal summer weekend, which will draw on new eyewitness accounts and personal recollections, as well as thousands of official documents and records.

Many of those interviewed have never spoken before in such vivid or personal detail. Among them is Lord Stevens, perhaps the foremost expert on the tragedy, having led the three-year British investigation into Diana's death.

For the first time he gives the inside story on his probe  codenamed Operation Paget  which took him into royal palaces and secret service headquarters and into conflict with conspiracy theorist in chief, Mohamed Al Fayed, whose son Dodi, Diana's then boyfriend, also died in the Paris crash, along with their Mercedes driver Henri Paul.

These testimonies present a forensic, compelling and revelatory narrative on the death of Diana, told by those who knew her or who were with her during her final days, hours, or even minutes.

And we will hear from those whose professional duties saw them play a lead role in the toxic aftermath, the legacy of which remains with us today.

On December 6, 2005, Lord Stevens met Prince Charles in a meeting to ask Prince Charles about his complicity in an alleged conspiracy to murder his estranged wife (both pictured)

Now, we can tell for the first time the inside story of one of Operation Paget's most extraordinary episodes: the moment a future monarch was asked why his former wife had suspected him of plotting her murder.

In January 2004 John Stevens was still head of Scotland Yard. He and a small team of police officers were tasked by then Royal Coroner Michael Burgess to begin an investigation which would be codenamed Operation Paget.

Their remit was to examine forensically more than 100 different allegations concerning an alleged Establishment murder plot that resulted in Diana's death, and the subsequent alleged cover-up of evidence.

These conspiracy theories had been most loudly disseminated by Al Fayed, the Egyptian owner of Harrods and the Ritz hotel in Paris. Without his tireless campaigning, the inquiry was unlikely ever to have been established.

His allegations of Buckingham Palace and MI6 complicity in the fatal crash would have carried little or no weight, were it not for two intriguing documents that seemed to foretell the circumstances of Diana's death.

The more significant of these was the aforementioned note, handwritten by Diana and left for her butler, Paul Burrell, in his pantry at Kensington Palace in October 1995, almost two years before she died.

It presented a head-spinning scenario. Diana apparently believed that Charles, from whom she was at that time separated but not yet divorced, intended to seriously injure or kill her in a car crash caused by mechanical sabotage.

He would then be free to marry again. The 'Tiggy' referred to in the note was Tiggy Legge-Bourke, the well-connected, unmarried 30-year-old who since 1993 had been nanny to Princes William and Harry.

(Diana resented her. In the months following the writing of the Burrell note it would be rumoured that Ms Legge-Bourke had become pregnant with Charles's child and had an abortion. Diana was reported to have been a source of this false allegation.)

Camilla, with whom Charles had been conducting an affair during his marriage to Diana, was to be cast aside, like his wife, in favour of the younger woman. Or so Diana predicted in the note.

Similar concerns  about her own safety, the possibility of a car accident and the motive behind deliberate sabotage  were made by Diana in a meeting with the lawyer Lord Mishcon on October 30, 1995.

It is perhaps no coincidence that, in the preceding weeks, she had been meeting Bashir, who we now know was feeding Diana a web of lies about Charles and the Royal Family.

S he informed Mishcon that she had been told by 'reliable' sources that efforts would be made to get rid of her, and Camilla would also be 'put aside'. She would not identify these 'sources' to Mishcon, who did not take her fears too seriously at the time.

Nevertheless, he made a note of her comments, which he passed on to the then Met Commissioner Sir Paul Condon in the wake of her death. Mishcon would be twice interviewed by Paget.

The Mail has been told Paget considered the Burrell note to be more important as potential evidence because it was written by Diana herself and was not a third-party account of a conversation.

Its authenticity would continue to be questioned by some of Diana's friends and staff who claimed Burrell had been able to mimic the Princess's style for Christmas cards.

But the Paget team had the letter examined by a handwriting expert. Stevens told the Mail he was satisfied it was the 'absolutely genuine' article.

Nevertheless, the existence of this note was kept secret by Burrell for eight years; even in January 2001, when police raided his home at 6.50am looking for items he had allegedly stolen from Diana's estate, the note was not among artefacts they discovered then.

The butler was subsequently charged with the theft of more than 300 of Diana's personal possessions. The first jury at his 2002 trial was discharged for legal reasons.

After a second jury was selected, the case collapsed following a remarkable intervention of the Queen, who informed the prosecution that Burrell had told her shortly after Diana's death that he planned to take many of her papers for safekeeping.

The unprecedented meeting has never been described before (despite legal attempts to bring the transcript and notes into the public domain). Pictured: Charles and Diana in February 1987

In October 2003 the butler cashed in on his most sensational possession. Having made a deal with Burrell, reported to be worth at least 400,000, the Daily Mirror newspaper ran a front page 'world exclusive' on the note and its contents.

In fact, the Mirror published only part of the text of the note. And a misleading part it was too. Presumably for legal reasons, the Mirror version ended with the words 'make the path clear for him to marry'.

The rest of the sentence, which named Tiggy, and the following sentence, which named Camilla, were missing. And so it was that anyone reading the Mirror that day might have been left with the impression that Diana believed Charles still intended to marry Camilla.

It would have taken a considerable leap of imagination  or inside knowledge of Diana's state of mind  to understand she was pointing her finger at the boys' nanny instead.

Burrell, when interviewed the following May, said he did not know what had prompted Diana to write the note. He had never seen or heard any evidence to substantiate it. And he handed over the original note to the Paget team.

The contents went far beyond the Mirror scoop. It not only included the passages naming Tiggy and Camilla but a further section, the Mail can reveal, in which Diana made observations about the Royal Family and the future of the monarchy.

It was no less than sensational, according to sources, and would still cause embarrassment today.

When it appeared in December 2006, the 832-page Paget report made only passing reference to Diana's claims made in the Burrell note.

'Paget had found no evidence to support Diana's expressed fears at that time, October 1995,' said a source. 'The note did not materially affect the conspiracy investigation.'

The authors also declined to name the woman (Tiggy) whom Diana accused Charles of wanting to marry in the Burrell note. Much to the fury of Al Fayed, Operation Paget confirmed the findings of an earlier French inquiry that the deaths were caused by a drunk chauffeur who lost control of his speeding car in a Paris underpass. This week Al Fayed, now 92, politely declined to comment.

The unexpurgated text of the 'Tiggy and Camilla' part of the Burrell note was not made public until December 2007, in evidence at Diana and Dodi's inquest. In April 2008 the jury returned a narrative verdict of 'unlawful killing [due to the] grossly negligent driving of the following vehicles and of the Mercedes.'

Why did the investigators take so long after the launch of Paget to confront Charles with the full contents of the note? Almost two years had passed.

'It was the natural sequence of events,' Stevens said. 'Yes, allegations had been made about the Prince of Wales and other royals but we had to find or examine the [existing] evidence before we approached him with formal questions . . . We found no other evidence to support the scenario suggested in Diana's note.

'We were left with the note, which in itself was not enough to make Charles a formal suspect. If he chose to assist Paget, he would be doing so voluntarily as a potential witness. We would not be interviewing him under caution.'

Charles could have declined to co-operate in any way. His father, Prince Philip, whom Al Fayed had accused of being a driving force in the alleged murder plot, had done just that, the Mail can reveal.

When Paget wrote to Philip to ask if he would like to comment on the allegations made against him, his written reply ran to just three words: 'No thank you.'

Now it was down to Charles to explain what he thought about a note that painted him as a murderous monster.

Police quizzed Charles over Diana murder conspiracy: Scotland Yard chief reveals how he was forced to quiz Prince of Wales over wild allegations that he plotted to kill his ex-wife

By Richard Pendlebury and Stephen Wright for the Daily Mail

A police chief today reveals why he was forced to quiz Prince Charles on allegations he plotted to kill Princess Diana.

Lord Stevens, a former head of Scotland Yard, says he had to 'follow the evidence' and question the prince over a note his ex-wife wrote claiming he was planning an accident in her car.

The unprecedented interview was conducted amid enormous secrecy at St James's Palace during a three-year investigation into Diana's death in a Paris car crash in 1997.

A crucial part of the probe was the note the princess had written predicting she would die through 'brake failure and serious head injury' so Charles could marry his sons' former nanny, Tiggy Legge-Bourke.

In the note Diana added: 'Camilla is nothing but a decoy so we are being used by the man in every sense of the word.'

Lord Stevens, a former head of Scotland Yard, says he had to question Prince Charles (pictured with Diana) over a note his ex-wife wrote claiming he was planning an accident in her car

Lord Stevens today confirms he read out her incendiary words, which would later fuel conspiracy theories about her death, at his meeting with Charles on December 6, 2005.

At the time, he says, he and his team of detectives had no idea what had made Diana so concerned about her safety.

Charles, who was interviewed by Lord Stevens as a witness and not a suspect, could not explain why his ex-wife had penned the note in October 1995 and left it in the pantry of Kensington Palace for her butler Paul Burrell.

Nearly two years after it was written 36-year-old Diana, her boyfriend Dodi Al Fayed and their chauffeur Henri Paul were all killed when their Mercedes crashed in a tunnel in Paris.

Today Lord Stevens suggests that rogue ex-BBC journalist Martin Bashir, who allegedly used bogus papers to con the princess into granting him a scoop BBC Panorama interview in November 1995, may have exploited her vulnerability and made her paranoid about her security around the time she wrote the note.

In a joint interview with the Daily Mail and a seven part Mail+ podcast series on Diana's death, the former police chief expresses his regret that he and his officers did not interview Mr Bashir during his investigation, Operation Paget.

He says: 'If there'd been an allegation then that Bashir had produced allegedly fake documents to Princess Diana, which is a criminal offence, we'd have investigated it. My goodness me, we would have done. But this has only come out recently, which is unfortunate.

'If we'd known at the time of Paget we would certainly, certainly have gone and seen him and interviewed him. And it would have been part and parcel of the inquiry to get to the bottom of it.

The unprecedented interview was conducted amid enormous secrecy at St James's Palace during a three-year investigation into Diana's death in a Paris car crash in 1997 (pictured)

'We don't know what Bashir was saying to Diana. But if he had put the fears in her mind which had caused her to write that note then that is what caused us to interview Charles. When we watched the Panorama interview at the start of the inquiry it didn't cross our mind that Bashir could have done anything fraudulent.

'After all, this was the BBC, this was their flagship programme and it was being broadcast to the world. There was nothing said in the interview we didn't know about by then. What we didn't know of course was how Bashir had managed to get it.'

Lord Stevens, who continued leading the Diana inquiry after he retired from the police in 2005, also tells the landmark Daily Mail series investigating her death:

Prince Charles initialled what was effectively a 'statement of truth' following his police interrogation in 2005;

The highly sensitive document has been filed at the National Archives in Kew and will not be made public until 2038;

The Duke of Edinburgh declined to be questioned over false claims made by Dodi's father Mohamed Al Fayed that he was a driving force in a murder conspiracy;

Witnesses told detectives that the princess was prone to 'wild thoughts';

A handwriting expert confirmed to Paget officers that Diana had definitely written the note she handed to Burrell, predicting her death;

Mr Al Fayed offered Lord Stevens extraordinary gifts during Operation Paget, including a pair of fresh stag's testicles culled from deer on one of his country estates and also Viagra, which the ex-Scotland Yard chief declined to accept.

In addition to Lord Stevens' explosive interview, the Mail today publishes the first British media interview with a French surgeon who was part of the hospital medical team that tried desperately to keep Diana alive.

Monsef Dahman performed surgery while she was still lying on her stretcher in the emergency room at the Paris hospital but her condition deteriorated and she was moved to an operating theatre.

Lord Stevens (pictured) today confirms he read out her incendiary words, which would later fuel conspiracy theories about her death, at his meeting with Charles on December 6, 2005

'We tried electric shocks, several times,' says Dr Dahman. 'But we could not get her heart beating again.' He also reveals that he witnessed some members of the media trying to infiltrate the wards and corridors to get close to those who had been treating Diana.

The exclusive interviews with Lord Stevens and Dr Dahman are the first part of the Mail's ground-breaking new series on Diana's death, which will run into next week.

Our five-month investigation has taken us around the world and will feature dramatic new testimony from key figures including other police officers, medical staff, Diana's friends and ex staff.

This newspaper has had access to high level sources who have never spoken before and for the first time we will provide the inside story on Operation Paget, which saw Lord Stevens liaise with the British and American intelligence agencies as he sought the truth over the princess's death.

Secrecy surrounding Lord Stevens' interview with Charles was a matter of great frustration to former Harrods owner Mr Al Fayed, who in 2007 made a vain attempt to obtain transcripts.

In April 2008 an inquest returned a narrative verdict of 'unlawful killing [due to the] grossly negligent driving of the following vehicles and of the Mercedes'.

The inquest jury also specified Paul's drink driving and the lack of wearing of seatbelts.

'Why do you think Princess Diana wrote this note, Sir?' When Charles was asked the killer question about Princess Diana note' to Paul Burrell alleging the Prince wanted her dead

By Richard Pendlebury and Stephen Wright for the Daily Mail

For Lord Stevens, the stakes could not have been higher.

'The interview was unique. Of course it was a unique situation,' he recalls to the Mail. 'But we approached it as we would any other witness.' Up to a point.

Although it was reported at the time that Stevens met Charles the circumstances and detail of the interrogation have never been revealed  until now.

It began with a letter from Stevens to Charles via the Prince's private secretary, Sir Michael Peat.

To prevent leaks and unwanted publicity and speculation it was agreed, on the Palace side, that only Charles and Sir Michael should know the meeting was to take place. No one in the Paget team would have knowledge of the event except for Lord Stevens and his senior investigator, DCS Dave Douglas.

Here was an interesting clash of outlooks. Douglas was a 48-year-old, working-class Geordie who, while a dutiful officer, had no time for the monarchy; any monarchy. In fact, while he greatly admired the Queen as a person, he was a republican at heart.

The Mail understands he would not have been terribly upset if Paget had in fact uncovered evidence of a royal plot against Diana. Indeed, he would have relished his role in such an iconoclastic situation.

Although it was reported at the time that Lord Stevens met Prince Charles (pictured) the detail of the interrogation on December 5, 2005, have never been revealed  until now

On December 6, 2005, Charles had a busy schedule with engagements throughout the afternoon and a reception for the Prince's Regeneration Trust evening.

The one engagement that did not appear in the Court Circular was the meeting with Paget's two most senior detectives.

They arrived at the Palace in Stevens's official BMW and were met in a courtyard by Sir Michael. The two investigators were led into the main building where preparations for the approaching Christmas season were evident.

They passed one dining room in which a table had been set with crackers and party hats for a festive staff lunch, a sight that contrasted with the seriousness of their own purpose.

On reaching the Prince's drawing room, Sir Michael left them to fetch the Prince. There was an unspoken tension; the sense of a new frontier and potential for embarrassment. But also a determination to follow professional procedure, as well as to observe ancient protocols.

These trepidations were dispelled a little when Charles arrived, with smiles and handshakes; as if he wasn't about to discuss whether or not he had plotted to kill his ex-wife.

'It's nice to see you again, Lord Stevens,' he said. And turning to Douglas: 'How is the inquiry going? What is it you want us to do today?'

The doors were closed. Sir Michael stayed in the room. The investigators sat on a sofa facing the Prince, who was seated in an armchair, with his private secretary on a sofa beside him. More small talk followed, pleasantries and general inquiries. Then they got down to business.

The interview began with Stevens producing a copy of Diana's note to Burrell and reading it aloud. In doing so, he repeated Diana's allegation that the Prince had wanted to harm or kill his wife and dump his then mistress (Charles had married Camilla in April 2005, only eight months before the Stevens' interview took place) so that he could wed the nanny of his two sons.

A moment of silent contemplation, the ticking of a clock and then Stevens' first question: 'Why do you think the Princess wrote this note, Sir?'

Charles replied: 'I did not know anything about [the note] until it was published in the media.'

'[So], you didn't discuss this note with her, Sir?

'No, I did not know it existed.'

'Do you know why the Princess had these feelings, Sir?'

'No, I don't.'

More questions.

The interview began with Lord Stevens reading Diana's note (pictured) to Burrell, where she alleged the Prince had wanted to harm or kill his wife and dump his then mistress

Charles was polite, engaged but unable, it seemed, to throw light upon what lay behind the note. The interview concluded with the question that is always asked at this juncture in a witness interview, whether the witness be a commoner or future king. 'Is there anything else you would like to tell me, Sir?'

'Nothing else, thank you,' said Prince Charles.

The questions and answers  slightly paraphrased here  had been taken down contemporaneously in longhand by Douglas. The following day a typed, two-page transcript of the interview statement was presented by Douglas to Sir Michael.

Prince Charles then checked and initialled each one of his answers. At the end of this unique document he inscribed his signature.

The document was returned to Paget with a covering letter from Sir Michael to confirm that Charles had indeed read the transcript of his statement and approved it.

The Mail understands that HRH's witness statement did not include the standard, concluding pledge-cum-warning that it was 'true to the best of my knowledge and belief and I make it knowing that, if it is tendered in evidence, I shall be liable to prosecution, if I have wilfully stated in it anything I know to be false, or do not believe to be true.'

It rather took the form of a statement of truth. 'He was the heir to the throne, after all,' says a Paget source. 'At the end of the day he was incredibly co-operative because he had nothing to hide,' says Stevens.

The original copy is no longer held by Scotland Yard  'it's too hot to handle. What commissioner would feel comfortable about being the custodian of that statement?' a source close to Paget commented.

AL FAYED'S PECULIAR POLICE GIFT Mohamed Al Fayed kept a close interest in Operation Paget's progress. Once a month, Lord Stevens or another senior member of the Paget team would meet him or his staff to provide an update. On a number of these occasions Al Fayed attempted to ply the chief investigator with gifts. At one of their first meetings, at Harrods, he presented Stevens with a plastic bag containing a pair of fresh stag's testicles, culled from the deer herd at his Highland estate. 'Eat them and they will give you strength and courage for your investigating,' he told Stevens. 'They will also improve your performance in the bedroom!' The Commissioner politely declined the present, as he did others offered by the tycoon  such as pills which Al Fayed claimed to be Viagra. Advertisement

Instead, it has been placed with other Paget-related documents in the National Archives at Kew, South-West London.

Under the 30-year rule, it will not be available for public examination until 2038. The location of the original Burrell note is not clear to the Paget team.

So what did give Diana cause to write such a note? What was it that led her to have such fears; that ultimately saw the heir to the throne being questioned by two detectives in the St James's Palace drawing room?

Was it the same 'reliable source' whose warnings were passed on to Lord Mishcon by the Princess?

Suspicion, not least by Lord Stevens, turns to one man; BBC journalist Martin Bashir and his fraudulent claims  revealed in detail by this newspaper  to successfully persuade Diana to give him an exclusive television interview in November 1995.

In several hours of interview with the Mail, Stevens made clear his regret that he and his Operation Paget team did not interview Bashir about his dealings with Diana in that period.

They would have done if they had known what they know now.

'If there'd been an allegation then that Bashir had produced allegedly fake documents to Princess Diana, which is a criminal offence, we'd have investigated it. My goodness me, we would have done,' he said.

'But this [aspect] has only come out recently, which is unfortunate. If we'd known at the time of Paget we would certainly have gone and seen him and interviewed him. And it would have been part and parcel of the inquiry to get to the bottom of it.'

He added: 'We don't know what Bashir was saying to Diana. But if he had put the fears in her mind which had caused her to write that note then that is what caused us to interview Charles.

'When we watched the Panorama interview at the start of the inquiry it didn't cross our mind that Bashir could have done anything fraudulent.

'After all, this was the BBC, this was their flagship programme and it was being broadcast to the world. There was nothing said in the interview we didn't know about by then. What we didn't know, of course, was how Bashir had managed to get it.'

Stevens confirmed that Paget did not interview Diana's brother, Earl Spencer. He told us: 'We weren't investigating the family and we didn't see Earl Spencer because of that.

'However, we did get an immense amount of information from [Diana's sister] Lady Sarah McCorquodale and Rosa Monckton [Diana's loyal friend], who were both very close to Diana. We got everything we needed from them.'

As revealed by the Mail, Earl Spencer alleges Bashir showed him fake bank statements to clinch an introduction to the Princess before his scoop interview.

And the Earl accused the rogue journalist, who recently resigned as BBC religious affairs editor, of making slanderous claims about senior royals as part of a 'web of deceit'.

He rejected the BBC's offer to take part in an inquiry into the allegations, saying he had no faith in its ability to investigate the alleged wrongdoing robustly or fairly.

Former Supreme Court judge Lord Dyson threw the book at the BBC for covering up a trail of deceit and forgery.

So what did give Diana (pictured) cause to write such a note? What was it that led her to have such fears; that ultimately saw the heir to the throne being questioned by two detectives?

Stevens said: 'Presumably Bashir would have been in communication with Diana in October 1995, leading up to the November TV interview, directly or possibly through Earl Spencer.

'Now we could never find any critical incident or event that led Princess Diana to be so paranoid at this time in 1995. So, at Paget, we just presumed that it was something she had imagined in her darker hours. And we did have witness statements saying she was sometimes likely to have 'wild thoughts' and that may well have been part of it.

'But I think my question, with hindsight  and I know the Paget team's question would be and we've discussed it  is this: 'Was Bashir aware of how fragile she was in the months leading to this interview? Or, did he say something to her through Earl Spencer or other channels that actually fed that paranoia?'

'Well, we don't know, to be frank, because until recently, we didn't know that Bashir had allegedly forged documents, which he'd used to convince her that people were out to get her.

'And we just thought that his interview with her was a straightforward arrangement giving her side of the marriage to Prince Charles. It may well be that Bashir stumbled across her at a vulnerable time in her life or he may have exacerbated her mental state or he may have generated that paranoia.

'We found no evidence to support her fears in the note. But maybe her fears were simply [based on] what Bashir had told her?

'If Paul Burrell had not disclosed that note in 2003, there would have been no reason to interview Charles.'

And if Bashir had not fed lies to Diana, would she have written the note at all?

More pertinently, would she have found herself hurtling into a Paris underpass to her death that fateful August night?

That is the question we will address on Monday, as witnesses from the night cast dramatic new light on a tragedy that defined an era.

My battle to save Princess Diana: First ever account of doctor's fight  in minute-by-minute testimony that destroys cruel smears she was allowed to die

By Richard Pendlebury, Stephen Wright and Rory Mulholland in Paris for the Daily Mail

MonSef Dahman works as a surgeon in the French Riviera town of Antibes, that 'billionaires' playground' which once charmed Picasso and F. Scott Fitzgerald and still attracts the Hollywood elite.

One of his specialities is treating the obese. Life is good there, his career fulfilling.

But there are particular times of year  the last day of August and then again on his son's birthday in November  when his thoughts darken; when they invariably return to an event which not only had a profound 'impact' on him personally but shocked the entire world.

'The thought that you have lost an important person, for whom you cared personally, marks you for life,' he says.

That is because for several hours in the early morning of Sunday, August 31, 1997, Dahman, the then young duty general surgeon in the biggest hospital in France, played a central role in the desperate fight to save the life of Diana, Princess of Wales. She had been critically injured in a car crash in the centre of Paris earlier that night.

In an exclusive interview, surgeon MonSef Dahman (pictured) has recalled how he was summoned to the Pitie-Salpetriere Hospital in Paris to attend to Diana, Princess of Wales

He has never spoken to a newspaper about this episode until now. But in an exclusive interview for this investigative series and forthcoming seven-part Mail+ podcast, he has recalled in dramatic and moving detail how he was summoned to the emergency department of the Pitie-Salpetriere Hospital in Paris to attend to a 'young woman' who turned out to be the most famous in the world.

Dahman, 56, also recalled a chilling story of his own experience of the perverse iconography and unscrupulous monetising of the Princess, even after her death.

One of his reasons for speaking now  he received no payment  was to reiterate how, in contradiction to the conspiracy theories which claimed they were somehow part of a murderous plot by the British Establishment, the French emergency medical staff involved that night made every conceivable effort to save Diana.

To suggest otherwise  as had been done by Mohamed Al Fayed and several lurid foreign magazines, among others  caused both bemusement and hurt.

A Parisian by birth, Dahman would not have been in his home city, let alone on duty, that night were he not about to become a father for second time.

Every August the French capital empties of those citizens who can afford to spend a month in the country or by the sea. If it were not for foreign tourists, the City of Light would be a ghost town.

'But I didn't take a vacation that summer,' he recalls to the Mail. 'For the extremely simple reason that my wife was pregnant with my son (they already had a daughter). As a result, I worked all summer.'

And work he did  long, long hours like the junior doctors and surgeons in our own NHS. His shift that weekend had started at 8am on Saturday.

He was still on duty at 2am the following morning, 'though of course it was not continuous activity. I did have moments of rest. In fact, if I remember correctly, it was a pretty easy day. I didn't have to deal with anything too difficult.'

That would change  dramatically. The Mercedes in which Diana was travelling crashed in the Alma tunnel at approximately 12.23am. Owing to the severity of her resulting injuries, she received lengthy treatment by doctors at the scene.

She then suffered a cardiac arrest while being moved to an ambulance. After being revived, she was transported by that ambulance to Dahman's hospital. She arrived there at 2.06am.

'I was resting in the duty room when I got a call from Bruno Riou, the senior duty anaesthetist, telling me to go to the emergency room,' Dahman recalls. 'I wasn't told it was Lady Diana, but [only] that there'd been a serious accident involving a young woman.

On August 31, 1997, Dahman played a central role in the desperate fight to save the life of Diana, who had been critically injured in a car crash in the centre of Paris (pictured)

'The organisation of the Pitie-Salpetriere hospital was very hierarchical. So when you got a call from [such] a high-level colleague that meant the case was particularly serious.' His rest room was only 50 metres from the accident and emergency department 'And so I got there fairly quickly. And then I realised the true seriousness of things.'

He recalls: 'My intern [his junior assistant] was in the room. But she was in a corner because she was a little overwhelmed by the gravity of the moment.' Riou was also present.

'That too was a sign of the special importance. And he was personally taking care of a lady who was lying on a stretcher, with a lot going on around her.'

Dahman, 33 at the time, was then informed that the unconscious figure on the stretcher was no less than Diana, Princess of Wales.

'It only took that moment for all this unusual activity to become clear to me,' he recalls with some understatement. 'For any doctor, any surgeon, it is of very great importance to be faced with such a young woman who is in this condition. But of course even more so if she is a princess.'

He was unwilling to describe certain aspects of the treatment she received at his hands, for reasons of patient confidentiality. The Mail has also chosen to excise certain details presented to the official inquiries into her death, but it is important to make clear how hard the team fought to save her life, and how desperate the circumstances.

Diana had been X-rayed on arrival at hospital. The resulting images of her chest showed she was suffering 'very serious internal bleeding'. As a result, she underwent a thoracic drain  excess fluid being removed from her chest cavity.

But haemorrhaging persisted and Diana was receiving transfusions of O-negative blood held in the emergency room, as her blood group had not yet been established

At around 2.15am she suffered another cardiac arrest. The situation had grown more critical. More extreme intervention was needed.

As she underwent external heart massage, Riou asked Dahman to perform a surgical procedure. He was to do so while Diana was still lying on the stretcher in the emergency room.

This circumstance was 'truly exceptional' and an indication of how parlous her situation had become. 'I did this (procedure) to enable her to breathe,' Dahman explains. 'Her heart couldn't function properly because it was lacking in blood.'

As a result of this intervention, Dahman discovered that Diana had suffered a significant tear in her pericardium, which protects the heart.

The prognosis worsened. It was now 2.30am. A miracle was needed. Dahman and Riou were joined in the emergency room by Professor Alain Pavie, perhaps France's top heart surgeon. He had been summoned from his bed at home. If anyone could save her, it was him.

Dahman, 56, also recalled a chilling story of his own experience of the perverse iconography and unscrupulous monetising of the Princess (pictured in Paris), even after her death

Pavie decided that Diana must be moved into one of the hospital's operating theatres. He suspected that the main source of her internal bleeding had not yet been found. Further surgical exploration was necessary.

It was this procedure that uncovered the most serious wound  a tear to Diana's upper-left pulmonary vein at the point of contact with the heart. Pavie sutured the lesion.

The most significant physical damage had been repaired. But to no avail. Diana's heart, which had stopped before the surgical exploration, would not restart. They were losing the battle to save her.

'We tried electric shocks, several times and, as I had done in the emergency room, cardiac massage,' says Dahman. 'Professor Riou had administered adrenaline. But we could not get her heart beating again.'

The team continued these resuscitation efforts for a full and ultimately fruitless hour.

'We fought hard, we tried a lot, really an awful lot. Frankly, when you are working in those conditions, you don't notice the passage of time,' says Dahman. 'The only thing that is important is that we do everything possible for this young woman.' He says he had felt hope at the start.

'We had people brought to Pitie-Salpetriere who were in a very poor state, more serious than Diana was when she arrived. It is one of the best centres in France for this type of trauma emergency. And we did save some of those people, which made us particularly happy and proud.

'But that did not happen here. We could not save her. And that affected us very much.'

At 4am the team, led by Pavie, accepted that no more could be done to revive their patient. It was a 'collegiate decision', Dahman recalls. They ceased all resuscitation efforts. The extraordinary life of Diana, Princess of Wales, had come to an end.

Several years later the esteemed British forensic pathologist Dr Richard Shepherd  who has been interviewed for this investigation's accompanying Mail+ podcast series  reviewed the medical evidence for the Paget inquiry into Diana's death, led by former Scotland Yard chief Lord Stevens.

Based on Dr Shepherd's expert opinion, Lord Stevens  who briefed Prince William and Prince Harry on his findings  concluded in his report: 'Those involved in the emergency treatment and surgery were highly qualified and experienced in their field. Their evidence showed that every effort was made to save the life of the Princess of Wales. No other strategy would have affected the outcome.'

D ahman could find no such consolation that fatal August night. On leaving the operating theatre he was both 'exhausted' and despondent. 'It is always a great disappointment to see someone young leave us,' he says.

'Also you suffer great physical fatigue because of the energy you have expended trying to save her. And so we were particularly shattered and tired. At the end, we were broken.'

He called his departmental boss to tell him what had happened  and to prepare him for the pandemonium that was likely to happen as a result  and then returned to the on-duty rest room.

He was too tired and low to take any notice of the French dignitaries  including President Chirac  who began to arrive at the hospital early that morning to pay their respects to Diana.

In the next days he was witness to an unpleasant and shaming aftermath. Some members of the media tried to infiltrate the wards and corridors to get close to those who had been treating Diana.

'Pitie-Salpetriere is a public hospital,' he says. 'The Princess was treated in a building where there were other hospital patients. We saw people disguising themselves [as medical staff], pushing trolleys, trying to get information. There was quite a lot of pressure on our security.'

One incident, which he has never spoken of before, sticks in his mind. 'When I was treating Diana I was wearing my white sabots [clog-like medical shoes]. And obviously in that situation you don't pay attention to anything but trying to save the patient. It was only the next morning I noticed that my clogs were stained with [her] blood.

'Anyway, the hospital is very large and I was walking between buildings, when a Frenchman, approached me and said, 'Ah, your clogs, I am interested in them. I want to buy them from you. They have the sang bleu [blue or royal blood] on them.'

Horrified, Dahman declined and as soon as possible cleaned the sabots he had worn that night: 'Which was the end of that story.'

But not the end for him.

'So here we have to consider the philosophy of life,' he says. 'It is a defining element, you can't escape that. The thought that you have lost an important person for whom you cared, marks you all your life.

'When it's a princess and you follow her funeral along with billions of other people, and you had tried to save her, that obviously marks you. It marks you all your life. Because it's so terrible that this beautiful person had such a tragic end.'

His own part in the tragedy nags at him. 'It varies according to what is going on in my life,' he says. 'When we get to August I think about it. It was the year my son was born and of course every anniversary of that I think about it.'

'I don't go back to it all the time because a lot of years have gone by. But every time a new book [about Diana's death] has come out [in France], it has been sent to me. So I have a collection of such books, unfortunately.'

Revealed: Bodyguard survivor of Princess Diana crash has rebuilt his life and is now AstraZeneca's global head of security

By Stephen Wright and Simon Trump for the Daily Mail

Bodyguard Trevor Rees-Jones, the only survivor of the crash in which Princess Diana died, has rebuilt his life and is global head of security for AstraZeneca, the Mail can reveal.

Despite suffering appalling injuries and severe memory loss, he has recovered sufficiently to land a huge job with the pharmaceutical giant behind one of the world's most effective Covid-19 vaccines.

It is not known if his role involves protecting key personnel involved in the vaccine programme, or guarding the firm's laboratories and intellectual property.

Despite suffering appalling injuries in crash which killed Princess Diana, bodyguard Trevor Rees-Jones (pictured) has recovered sufficiently to land a huge job with AstraZeneca

The former member of the Al- Fayed security team, who now calls himself Trevor Rees, was travelling in the front passenger seat of the Mercedes and was trapped in the wreckage, conscious but with severe facial trauma.

He was placed in an induced coma for ten days.

It took skilful reconstruction by surgeons, working from an old photograph, who used 150 titanium parts to piece him back together.

Mr Rees, 53, was also left with profound amnesia for several months.

Dr Maurice Lipsedge, an expert psychiatrist commissioned by Lord Stevens' Operation Paget inquiry, said Mr Rees had 'very limited recall' of what happened immediately before and after the crash and this was unlikely to ever change.

Mr Rees left his job with Mohamed Al-Fayed the following year.

He was the only survivor of the crash in which Princess Diana (pictured) died and was travelling in the front passenger seat of the Mercedes and got trapped in the wreckage

He published his own account of his experiences, with help from a ghost writer, in 2000 in a book called The Bodyguard's Story.

His first post after returning to work was with the United Nations in its department of peacekeeping.

He also spent six years with the US-based oil operations company, Halliburton, working his way up to director.

His LinkedIn entry describes him as being based in Shrewsbury and having experience in international operations.

Both AstraZeneca and Mr Rees, via his employers, declined to comment.
Boris Johnson has a unique ability to turn politics on its head. He was mocked for saying he would take the UK out of the EU and pulled it off; he got stuck on a zip wire and he turned it into a public relations triumph; he won a landslide election victory after leaving his wife for a woman 24 years his junior.

Demolishing Labours so-called Red Wall of seats in the North of England in the 2019 election seemed to be just another example of his ability to defy political gravity.

But he was brought down to earth with a bump early yesterday by the Lib Dems thumping victory in the Amersham and Chesham by-election.

It has sparked fears among some Tory MPs that Mr Johnsons remarkable success in the red wall in the North may have triggered a less welcome political reversal: that the Blue Wall of Conservative seats in southern England is in danger of crumbling.

Ministers played down the defeat in Chesham and Amersham, mostly pinning the blame on the HS2 rail link.

Boris Johnson was brought down to earth with a bump early yesterday by the Lib Dems thumping victory in the Amersham and Chesham by-election (pictured in Dewsbury on Friday)

Indeed, driving through the Chilterns a few days ago, I noticed several parts of the beautiful landscape gouged out to prepare for the giant diggers and the massive trucks needed to move all the earth, bringing havoc and filth to the area  and wrecking house prices.

But the 8,000 margin of the Lib Dem victory was so big, they could well have beaten the Tories even without HS2.

For while the railway has understandably enraged Conservatives in Amersham and Chesham, the defeat has highlighted a little noticed electoral pattern which has concerned Tory strategists for several years.

Despite Mr Johnsons stunning election success and the spectacular gains the Tories have made in the North, there are signs the party is doing less well in the South, stretching from the Severn Estuary to the Sussex coast and East Anglia.

According to one study of Mays local council results covering 82 Conservative Parliamentary seats in Gloucestershire, Wiltshire, Oxfordshire, Hampshire, Surrey, West Sussex, East Sussex, Kent, Hertfordshire and Cambridgeshire, the Tories would lose seven seats to the Lib Dems at the next general election. The seven seats are Winchester, Eastleigh, Eastbourne, Chippenham, Cheltenham, Watford and South Cambridgeshire.

The same survey said the Tories would gain Canterbury from Labour, making an overall loss of six in the Blue Wall.

Ministers played down the defeat in Chesham and Amersham (pictured), mostly pinning the blame on the HS2 rail link

If the Lib Dems can repeat the Amersham and Chesham upset, it would be back up to seven. You cannot blame Lib Dem leader Ed Davey for celebrating by taking a hammer to a plastic wall of blue bricks in a triumphant photocall.

But there is no need for No 10 to panic  yet.

The half-dozen or so Blue Wall seats purportedly at risk barely breaks through the grass compared to the towering red wall of 47 Labour seats in England that crumbled at the last election, including many in the North and Midlands.

And for all the humiliation of seeing Amersham and Chesham fall, arguably, Labours record low election vote of 622 was even worse for Sir Keir Starmer.

There are no Tory calls for Mr Johnson to resign.

If todays Mail poll, which indicates that Sir Keir is heading for another Red Wall defeat in the by-election in Batley and Spen on July 1, proves to be true, the Labour leaders army of Left-wing critics will demand his head.

In my view, that does not mean Mr Johnson can ignore the stirring in the shires.

And for all the humiliation of seeing Amersham and Chesham fall, arguably, Labours record low election vote of 622 was even worse for Sir Keir Starmer

A former senior Cabinet minister who spoke to the Mail on condition of anonymity said that the Chesham result marked a seismic change in the British landscape that Mr Johnson would ignore at his peril.

The ex-minister, who has a shires seat, said Tories who defected to the Lib Dems in the by-election had a number of gripes. They had been taken for granted by the Conservatives for too long, many voted Remain in the EU referendum and some objected to Mr Johnsons style. They were offended by the way he was loose with the truth.

But perhaps the biggest factor, said the ex-minister, was the downfall of Jeremy Corbyn as Labour leader.

Faced with the choice between a Marxist with links to apologists for terrorism and Mr Johnson, even the Prime Ministers biggest Tory sceptics had no trouble in marking their X by Conservative in the voting booth.

With the Corbyn threat gone, voting for another party held little fear for Conservative Boris doubters, said the former minister.

But perhaps the biggest factor, said the ex-minister, was the downfall of Jeremy Corbyn as Labour leader

The main political casualty of the Tories Amersham and Chesham debacle could be Mr Johnsons pledge to build hundreds of thousands of homes in the South.

It was one of the main complaints in the by-election.

Lib Dem activists told voters on the doorstep in the final days of the campaign: Vote Tory and the bulldozers arrive on Monday.

I am told that ex-Cabinet minister Theresa Villiers is in charge of a secret Tory Whats- App group made up of 90 mainly southern-based Conservative MPs determined to force the Prime Minister to perform a major U-turn on the housing pledge.

Former deputy prime minister Damian Green, MP for Ashford in Kent, explained to me: We are not going to level up the North by concreting over the South. At the current rate, the Home Counties will soon be a giant patio.

Isle of Wight Tory MP Bob Seeley warned the Government: Force-feeding communities in the South with endless more housing like foie gras geese is no way forward.

If we allow the developers free-for-all to go on, it will be political suicide. As Winston Churchill said, the problem with political suicides is that you live to regret them.
For Lord Stevens, the stakes could not have been higher.

'The interview was unique. Of course it was a unique situation,' he recalls to the Mail. 'But we approached it as we would any other witness.' Up to a point.

Although it was reported at the time that Stevens met Charles the circumstances and detail of the interrogation have never been revealed  until now.

It began with a letter from Stevens to Charles via the Prince's private secretary, Sir Michael Peat.

To prevent leaks and unwanted publicity and speculation it was agreed, on the Palace side, that only Charles and Sir Michael should know the meeting was to take place.

No one in the Paget team would have knowledge of the event except for Lord Stevens and his senior investigator, DCS Dave Douglas.

The interview was conducted amid enormous secrecy at St James's Palace during a three-year investigation into Diana's death in a Paris car crash in 1997.

A crucial part of the probe was the note the princess had written predicting she would die through 'brake failure and serious head injury' so Charles could marry his sons' former nanny, Tiggy Legge-Bourke.

In the note Diana added: 'Camilla is nothing but a decoy so we are being used by the man in every sense of the word.'

Lord Stevens today confirms he read out her incendiary words, which would later fuel conspiracy theories about her death, at his meeting with Charles on December 6, 2005.

At the time, he says, he and his team of detectives had no idea what had made Diana so concerned about her safety.

Although it was reported at the time that Lord Stevens met Prince Charles (pictured) the detail of the interrogation on December 5, 2005, have never been revealed  until now

Here was an interesting clash of outlooks. Douglas was a 48-year-old, working-class Geordie who, while a dutiful officer, had no time for the monarchy; any monarchy.

In fact, while he greatly admired the Queen as a person, he was a republican at heart.

The Mail understands he would not have been terribly upset if Paget had in fact uncovered evidence of a royal plot against Diana.

Indeed, he would have relished his role in such an iconoclastic situation.

On December 6, 2005, Charles had a busy schedule with engagements throughout the afternoon and a reception for the Prince's Regeneration Trust evening.

The one engagement that did not appear in the Court Circular was the meeting with Paget's two most senior detectives.

They arrived at the Palace in Stevens's official BMW and were met in a courtyard by Sir Michael. The two investigators were led into the main building where preparations for the approaching Christmas season were evident.

They passed one dining room in which a table had been set with crackers and party hats for a festive staff lunch, a sight that contrasted with the seriousness of their own purpose.

On reaching the Prince's drawing room, Sir Michael left them to fetch the Prince. There was an unspoken tension; the sense of a new frontier and potential for embarrassment. But also a determination to follow professional procedure, as well as to observe ancient protocols.

These trepidations were dispelled a little when Charles arrived, with smiles and handshakes; as if he wasn't about to discuss whether or not he had plotted to kill his ex-wife.

'It's nice to see you again, Lord Stevens,' he said. And turning to Douglas: 'How is the inquiry going? What is it you want us to do today?'

The doors were closed. Sir Michael stayed in the room. The investigators sat on a sofa facing the Prince, who was seated in an armchair, with his private secretary on a sofa beside him. More small talk followed, pleasantries and general inquiries. Then they got down to business.

The interview began with Stevens producing a copy of Diana's note to Burrell and reading it aloud.

In doing so, he repeated Diana's allegation that the Prince had wanted to harm or kill his wife and dump his then mistress (Charles had married Camilla in April 2005, only eight months before the Stevens' interview took place) so that he could wed the nanny of his two sons.

A moment of silent contemplation, the ticking of a clock and then Stevens' first question: 'Why do you think the Princess wrote this note, Sir?'

Charles replied: 'I did not know anything about [the note] until it was published in the media.'

'[So], you didn't discuss this note with her, Sir?

'No, I did not know it existed.'

'Do you know why the Princess had these feelings, Sir?'

'No, I don't.'

More questions.

The interview began with Lord Stevens reading Diana's note (pictured) to Burrell, where she alleged the Prince had wanted to harm or kill his wife and dump his then mistress

Charles was polite, engaged but unable, it seemed, to throw light upon what lay behind the note. The interview concluded with the question that is always asked at this juncture in a witness interview, whether the witness be a commoner or future king. 'Is there anything else you would like to tell me, Sir?'

'Nothing else, thank you,' said Prince Charles.

The questions and answers  slightly paraphrased here  had been taken down contemporaneously in longhand by Douglas. The following day a typed, two-page transcript of the interview statement was presented by Douglas to Sir Michael.

Prince Charles then checked and initialled each one of his answers. At the end of this unique document he inscribed his signature.

The document was returned to Paget with a covering letter from Sir Michael to confirm that Charles had indeed read the transcript of his statement and approved it.

The Mail understands that HRH's witness statement did not include the standard, concluding pledge-cum-warning that it was 'true to the best of my knowledge and belief and I make it knowing that, if it is tendered in evidence, I shall be liable to prosecution, if I have wilfully stated in it anything I know to be false, or do not believe to be true.'

It rather took the form of a statement of truth. 'He was the heir to the throne, after all,' says a Paget source. 'At the end of the day he was incredibly co-operative because he had nothing to hide,' says Stevens.

The original copy is no longer held by Scotland Yard  'it's too hot to handle. What commissioner would feel comfortable about being the custodian of that statement?' a source close to Paget commented.

AL FAYED'S PECULIAR POLICE GIFT Mohamed Al Fayed kept a close interest in Operation Pagets progress. Once a month, Lord Stevens or another senior member of the Paget team would meet him or his staff to provide an update. On a number of these occasions Al Fayed attempted to ply the chief investigator with gifts. At one of their first meetings, at Harrods, he presented Stevens with a plastic bag containing a pair of fresh stags testicles, culled from the deer herd at his Highland estate. Eat them and they will give you strength and courage for your investigating, he told Stevens. They will also improve your performance in the bedroom! The Commissioner politely declined the present, as he did others offered by the tycoon  such as pills which Al Fayed claimed to be Viagra. Advertisement

Instead, it has been placed with other Paget-related documents in the National Archives at Kew, South-West London.

Under the 30-year rule, it will not be available for public examination until 2038. The location of the original Burrell note is not clear to the Paget team.

So what did give Diana cause to write such a note? What was it that led her to have such fears; that ultimately saw the heir to the throne being questioned by two detectives in the St James's Palace drawing room?

Was it the same 'reliable source' whose warnings were passed on to Lord Mishcon by the Princess?

Suspicion, not least by Lord Stevens, turns to one man; BBC journalist Martin Bashir and his fraudulent claims  revealed in detail by this newspaper  to successfully persuade Diana to give him an exclusive television interview in November 1995.

In several hours of interview with the Mail, Stevens made clear his regret that he and his Operation Paget team did not interview Bashir about his dealings with Diana in that period.

They would have done if they had known what they know now.

'If there'd been an allegation then that Bashir had produced allegedly fake documents to Princess Diana, which is a criminal offence, we'd have investigated it. My goodness me, we would have done,' he said.

'But this [aspect] has only come out recently, which is unfortunate. If we'd known at the time of Paget we would certainly have gone and seen him and interviewed him. And it would have been part and parcel of the inquiry to get to the bottom of it.'

He added: 'We don't know what Bashir was saying to Diana. But if he had put the fears in her mind which had caused her to write that note then that is what caused us to interview Charles.

'When we watched the Panorama interview at the start of the inquiry it didn't cross our mind that Bashir could have done anything fraudulent.

'After all, this was the BBC, this was their flagship programme and it was being broadcast to the world. There was nothing said in the interview we didn't know about by then. What we didn't know, of course, was how Bashir had managed to get it.'

Stevens confirmed that Paget did not interview Diana's brother, Earl Spencer. He told us: 'We weren't investigating the family and we didn't see Earl Spencer because of that.

'However, we did get an immense amount of information from [Diana's sister] Lady Sarah McCorquodale and Rosa Monckton [Diana's loyal friend], who were both very close to Diana. We got everything we needed from them.'

As revealed by the Mail, Earl Spencer alleges Bashir showed him fake bank statements to clinch an introduction to the Princess before his scoop interview.

And the Earl accused the rogue journalist, who recently resigned as BBC religious affairs editor, of making slanderous claims about senior royals as part of a 'web of deceit'.

He rejected the BBC's offer to take part in an inquiry into the allegations, saying he had no faith in its ability to investigate the alleged wrongdoing robustly or fairly.

Former Supreme Court judge Lord Dyson threw the book at the BBC for covering up a trail of deceit and forgery.

So what did give Diana (pictured) cause to write such a note? What was it that led her to have such fears; that ultimately saw the heir to the throne being questioned by two detectives?

Stevens said: 'Presumably Bashir would have been in communication with Diana in October 1995, leading up to the November TV interview, directly or possibly through Earl Spencer.

'Now we could never find any critical incident or event that led Princess Diana to be so paranoid at this time in 1995. So, at Paget, we just presumed that it was something she had imagined in her darker hours. And we did have witness statements saying she was sometimes likely to have 'wild thoughts' and that may well have been part of it.

'But I think my question, with hindsight  and I know the Paget team's question would be and we've discussed it  is this: 'Was Bashir aware of how fragile she was in the months leading to this interview? Or, did he say something to her through Earl Spencer or other channels that actually fed that paranoia?'

'Well, we don't know, to be frank, because until recently, we didn't know that Bashir had allegedly forged documents, which he'd used to convince her that people were out to get her.

'And we just thought that his interview with her was a straightforward arrangement giving her side of the marriage to Prince Charles. It may well be that Bashir stumbled across her at a vulnerable time in her life or he may have exacerbated her mental state or he may have generated that paranoia.

'We found no evidence to support her fears in the note. But maybe her fears were simply [based on] what Bashir had told her?

'If Paul Burrell had not disclosed that note in 2003, there would have been no reason to interview Charles.'

And if Bashir had not fed lies to Diana, would she have written the note at all?

More pertinently, would she have found herself hurtling into a Paris underpass to her death that fateful August night?

That is the question we will address on Monday, as witnesses from the night cast dramatic new light on a tragedy that defined an era.

In addition to Lord Stevens' explosive interview, the Mail today publishes the first British media interview with a French surgeon who was part of the hospital medical team that tried desperately to keep Diana alive.

Monsef Dahman performed surgery while she was still lying on her stretcher in the emergency room at the Paris hospital but her condition deteriorated and she was moved to an operating theatre.

'We tried electric shocks, several times,' says Dr Dahman. 'But we could not get her heart beating again.' He also reveals that he witnessed some members of the media trying to infiltrate the wards and corridors to get close to those who had been treating Diana.

The exclusive interviews with Lord Stevens and Dr Dahman are the first part of the Mail's ground-breaking new series on Diana's death, which will run into next week.

Our five-month investigation has taken us around the world and will feature dramatic new testimony from key figures including other police officers, medical staff, Diana's friends and ex staff.

This newspaper has had access to high level sources who have never spoken before and for the first time we will provide the inside story on Operation Paget, which saw Lord Stevens liaise with the British and American intelligence agencies as he sought the truth over the princess's death.

Secrecy surrounding Lord Stevens' interview with Charles was a matter of great frustration to former Harrods owner Mr Al Fayed, who in 2007 made a vain attempt to obtain transcripts.

In April 2008 an inquest returned a narrative verdict of 'unlawful killing [due to the] grossly negligent driving of the following vehicles and of the Mercedes'.

The inquest jury also specified Paul's drink driving and the lack of wearing of seatbelts.

Police quizzed Charles over Diana murder conspiracy: Scotland Yard chief reveals how he was forced to quiz Prince of Wales over wild allegations that he plotted to kill his ex-wife

By Richard Pendlebury and Stephen Wright for the Daily Mail

A police chief today reveals why he was forced to quiz Prince Charles on allegations he plotted to kill Princess Diana.

Lord Stevens, a former head of Scotland Yard, says he had to 'follow the evidence' and question the prince over a note his ex-wife wrote claiming he was planning an accident in her car.

The unprecedented interview was conducted amid enormous secrecy at St James's Palace during a three-year investigation into Diana's death in a Paris car crash in 1997.

A crucial part of the probe was the note the princess had written predicting she would die through 'brake failure and serious head injury' so Charles could marry his sons' former nanny, Tiggy Legge-Bourke.

In the note Diana added: 'Camilla is nothing but a decoy so we are being used by the man in every sense of the word.'

Lord Stevens, a former head of Scotland Yard, says he had to question Prince Charles (pictured with Diana) over a note his ex-wife wrote claiming he was planning an accident in her car

Lord Stevens today confirms he read out her incendiary words, which would later fuel conspiracy theories about her death, at his meeting with Charles on December 6, 2005.

At the time, he says, he and his team of detectives had no idea what had made Diana so concerned about her safety.

Charles, who was interviewed by Lord Stevens as a witness and not a suspect, could not explain why his ex-wife had penned the note in October 1995 and left it in the pantry of Kensington Palace for her butler Paul Burrell.

Nearly two years after it was written 36-year-old Diana, her boyfriend Dodi Al Fayed and their chauffeur Henri Paul were all killed when their Mercedes crashed in a tunnel in Paris.

Today Lord Stevens suggests that rogue ex-BBC journalist Martin Bashir, who allegedly used bogus papers to con the princess into granting him a scoop BBC Panorama interview in November 1995, may have exploited her vulnerability and made her paranoid about her security around the time she wrote the note.

In a joint interview with the Daily Mail and a seven part Mail+ podcast series on Diana's death, the former police chief expresses his regret that he and his officers did not interview Mr Bashir during his investigation, Operation Paget.

He says: 'If there'd been an allegation then that Bashir had produced allegedly fake documents to Princess Diana, which is a criminal offence, we'd have investigated it. My goodness me, we would have done. But this has only come out recently, which is unfortunate.

'If we'd known at the time of Paget we would certainly, certainly have gone and seen him and interviewed him. And it would have been part and parcel of the inquiry to get to the bottom of it.

The unprecedented interview was conducted amid enormous secrecy at St James's Palace during a three-year investigation into Diana's death in a Paris car crash in 1997 (pictured)

'We don't know what Bashir was saying to Diana. But if he had put the fears in her mind which had caused her to write that note then that is what caused us to interview Charles. When we watched the Panorama interview at the start of the inquiry it didn't cross our mind that Bashir could have done anything fraudulent.

'After all, this was the BBC, this was their flagship programme and it was being broadcast to the world. There was nothing said in the interview we didn't know about by then. What we didn't know of course was how Bashir had managed to get it.'

Lord Stevens, who continued leading the Diana inquiry after he retired from the police in 2005, also tells the landmark Daily Mail series investigating her death:

Prince Charles initialled what was effectively a 'statement of truth' following his police interrogation in 2005;

The highly sensitive document has been filed at the National Archives in Kew and will not be made public until 2038;

The Duke of Edinburgh declined to be questioned over false claims made by Dodi's father Mohamed Al Fayed that he was a driving force in a murder conspiracy;

Witnesses told detectives that the princess was prone to 'wild thoughts';

A handwriting expert confirmed to Paget officers that Diana had definitely written the note she handed to Burrell, predicting her death;

Mr Al Fayed offered Lord Stevens extraordinary gifts during Operation Paget, including a pair of fresh stag's testicles culled from deer on one of his country estates and also Viagra, which the ex-Scotland Yard chief declined to accept.

In addition to Lord Stevens' explosive interview, the Mail today publishes the first British media interview with a French surgeon who was part of the hospital medical team that tried desperately to keep Diana alive.

Monsef Dahman performed surgery while she was still lying on her stretcher in the emergency room at the Paris hospital but her condition deteriorated and she was moved to an operating theatre.

Lord Stevens (pictured) today confirms he read out her incendiary words, which would later fuel conspiracy theories about her death, at his meeting with Charles on December 6, 2005

'We tried electric shocks, several times,' says Dr Dahman. 'But we could not get her heart beating again.' He also reveals that he witnessed some members of the media trying to infiltrate the wards and corridors to get close to those who had been treating Diana.

The exclusive interviews with Lord Stevens and Dr Dahman are the first part of the Mail's ground-breaking new series on Diana's death, which will run into next week.

Our five-month investigation has taken us around the world and will feature dramatic new testimony from key figures including other police officers, medical staff, Diana's friends and ex staff.

This newspaper has had access to high level sources who have never spoken before and for the first time we will provide the inside story on Operation Paget, which saw Lord Stevens liaise with the British and American intelligence agencies as he sought the truth over the princess's death.

Secrecy surrounding Lord Stevens' interview with Charles was a matter of great frustration to former Harrods owner Mr Al Fayed, who in 2007 made a vain attempt to obtain transcripts.

In April 2008 an inquest returned a narrative verdict of 'unlawful killing [due to the] grossly negligent driving of the following vehicles and of the Mercedes'.

The inquest jury also specified Paul's drink driving and the lack of wearing of seatbelts.

Devastating truth of the last days of Diana: Full tragic story of Princess's death and its toxic aftermath is revealed in a landmark series with new testimony that redefines royal history

By Richard Pendlebury and Stephen Wright for the Daily Mail

They were the words of a ghost, a message from the grave; written by a troubled, even frightened Princess, mother to a future king, who had been told by an unscrupulous BBC journalist eager to get a scoop that she was the target of an Establishment plot.

Now, eight years after the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, a copy of an incendiary note she penned to her butler is being recited by a tall, grey-haired peer of the realm to an audience of three other middle-aged men in a private drawing room on the first floor of St James's Palace. Nobody else knows that the gathering is taking place.

'I am sitting here at my desk today in October, longing for someone to hug me and encourage me to keep strong and hold my head high,' the peer begins to intone.

'This particular phase in my life is the most dangerous  my husband is planning an accident in my car. Brake failure and serious head injury in order to make the path clear for him to marry Tiggy.

'Camilla is nothing but a decoy so we are being used by the man in every sense of the word.'

Lord Stevens of Kirkwhelpington, who until a few months before was Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, has finished reading what is on the paper in his hand. He looks up and meets the eye of the man sitting in an armchair across the room.

This unprecedented meeting, which has never been described before (despite legal attempts to bring the transcript and notes into the public domain) took place at 5.15pm on Tuesday, December 6, 2005.

Eight years after the death of Diana, Princess of Wales (pictured with Charles), a copy of an incendiary note she penned to her butler was recited in a drawing room in St James's Palace

Cover of darkness suited both parties, sources have told the Mail. The subject to be discussed was nothing less than sensational; certainly highly embarrassing if not damaging to the monarchy.

Why such secrecy? Because this was to be a police interview rather than a conversation; an interview in which Prince Charles would be asked, to his face, about his complicity or otherwise in an alleged conspiracy to murder his estranged wife, Diana, Princess of Wales.

Nothing like this had happened before. It was the task of a modern high official  Lord Stevens  to question the heir to the throne about the death of the mother of his children; a seismic, epoch-defining tragedy of global interest, the ramifications of which inform what is happening today within the Royal Family, notably the rift between Buckingham Palace and Diana's younger son Prince Harry and his American wife Meghan.

July 1 this year marks the 60th anniversary of Diana's birth. She died, aged 36, following a crash in a tunnel in Paris in the early hours of August 31, 1997. She has been dead for a generation and remains forever young, lovely and enigmatic.

Those under the age of 35 will have little appreciation of her iconic status in the 1980s and 1990s; the aura surrounding the shy beauty who had transformed the 'stuffy and staid' image of the monarchy; the 'Di-mania' and worldwide fascination with the 'fairy tale' that went so wrong. Nor the impact of her passing.

Those alive then can recall today where they were when they heard the shocking news. And the manner of Diana's passing led to a host of conspiracy theories that are with us to this day.

The debate about factors that may have contributed to the death crash has re-intensified after publication last month of the damning 'Dyson report' into how the BBC's former star reporter Martin Bashir conned the Princess into granting his scoop Panorama interview with her in 1995.

Prince William has said the BBC's failures contributed to his mother's 'fear, paranoia and isolation' in her final years, while Prince Harry said the 'ripple effect of the culture of exploitation and unethical practices ultimately took her life'.

Diana's brother Earl Spencer went a stage further, saying he could 'draw a line' between his sister meeting Bashir in 1995 and her tragic accident in Paris two years later.

Today, the Mail begins a major investigative series into that fatal summer weekend, which will draw on new eyewitness accounts and personal recollections, as well as thousands of official documents and records.

Many of those interviewed have never spoken before in such vivid or personal detail. Among them is Lord Stevens, perhaps the foremost expert on the tragedy, having led the three-year British investigation into Diana's death.

For the first time he gives the inside story on his probe  codenamed Operation Paget  which took him into royal palaces and secret service headquarters and into conflict with conspiracy theorist in chief, Mohamed Al Fayed, whose son Dodi, Diana's then boyfriend, also died in the Paris crash, along with their Mercedes driver Henri Paul.

These testimonies present a forensic, compelling and revelatory narrative on the death of Diana, told by those who knew her or who were with her during her final days, hours, or even minutes.

And we will hear from those whose professional duties saw them play a lead role in the toxic aftermath, the legacy of which remains with us today.

On December 6, 2005, Lord Stevens met Prince Charles in a meeting to ask Prince Charles about his complicity in an alleged conspiracy to murder his estranged wife (both pictured)

Now, we can tell for the first time the inside story of one of Operation Paget's most extraordinary episodes: the moment a future monarch was asked why his former wife had suspected him of plotting her murder.

In January 2004 John Stevens was still head of Scotland Yard. He and a small team of police officers were tasked by then Royal Coroner Michael Burgess to begin an investigation which would be codenamed Operation Paget.

Their remit was to examine forensically more than 100 different allegations concerning an alleged Establishment murder plot that resulted in Diana's death, and the subsequent alleged cover-up of evidence.

These conspiracy theories had been most loudly disseminated by Al Fayed, the Egyptian owner of Harrods and the Ritz hotel in Paris. Without his tireless campaigning, the inquiry was unlikely ever to have been established.

His allegations of Buckingham Palace and MI6 complicity in the fatal crash would have carried little or no weight, were it not for two intriguing documents that seemed to foretell the circumstances of Diana's death.

The more significant of these was the aforementioned note, handwritten by Diana and left for her butler, Paul Burrell, in his pantry at Kensington Palace in October 1995, almost two years before she died.

It presented a head-spinning scenario. Diana apparently believed that Charles, from whom she was at that time separated but not yet divorced, intended to seriously injure or kill her in a car crash caused by mechanical sabotage.

He would then be free to marry again. The 'Tiggy' referred to in the note was Tiggy Legge-Bourke, the well-connected, unmarried 30-year-old who since 1993 had been nanny to Princes William and Harry.

(Diana resented her. In the months following the writing of the Burrell note it would be rumoured that Ms Legge-Bourke had become pregnant with Charles's child and had an abortion. Diana was reported to have been a source of this false allegation.)

Camilla, with whom Charles had been conducting an affair during his marriage to Diana, was to be cast aside, like his wife, in favour of the younger woman. Or so Diana predicted in the note.

Similar concerns  about her own safety, the possibility of a car accident and the motive behind deliberate sabotage  were made by Diana in a meeting with the lawyer Lord Mishcon on October 30, 1995.

It is perhaps no coincidence that, in the preceding weeks, she had been meeting Bashir, who we now know was feeding Diana a web of lies about Charles and the Royal Family.

S he informed Mishcon that she had been told by 'reliable' sources that efforts would be made to get rid of her, and Camilla would also be 'put aside'. She would not identify these 'sources' to Mishcon, who did not take her fears too seriously at the time.

Nevertheless, he made a note of her comments, which he passed on to the then Met Commissioner Sir Paul Condon in the wake of her death. Mishcon would be twice interviewed by Paget.

The Mail has been told Paget considered the Burrell note to be more important as potential evidence because it was written by Diana herself and was not a third-party account of a conversation.

Its authenticity would continue to be questioned by some of Diana's friends and staff who claimed Burrell had been able to mimic the Princess's style for Christmas cards.

But the Paget team had the letter examined by a handwriting expert. Stevens told the Mail he was satisfied it was the 'absolutely genuine' article.

Nevertheless, the existence of this note was kept secret by Burrell for eight years; even in January 2001, when police raided his home at 6.50am looking for items he had allegedly stolen from Diana's estate, the note was not among artefacts they discovered then.

The butler was subsequently charged with the theft of more than 300 of Diana's personal possessions. The first jury at his 2002 trial was discharged for legal reasons.

After a second jury was selected, the case collapsed following a remarkable intervention of the Queen, who informed the prosecution that Burrell had told her shortly after Diana's death that he planned to take many of her papers for safekeeping.

The unprecedented meeting has never been described before (despite legal attempts to bring the transcript and notes into the public domain). Pictured: Charles and Diana in February 1987

In October 2003 the butler cashed in on his most sensational possession. Having made a deal with Burrell, reported to be worth at least 400,000, the Daily Mirror newspaper ran a front page 'world exclusive' on the note and its contents.

In fact, the Mirror published only part of the text of the note. And a misleading part it was too. Presumably for legal reasons, the Mirror version ended with the words 'make the path clear for him to marry'.

The rest of the sentence, which named Tiggy, and the following sentence, which named Camilla, were missing. And so it was that anyone reading the Mirror that day might have been left with the impression that Diana believed Charles still intended to marry Camilla.

It would have taken a considerable leap of imagination  or inside knowledge of Diana's state of mind  to understand she was pointing her finger at the boys' nanny instead.

Burrell, when interviewed the following May, said he did not know what had prompted Diana to write the note. He had never seen or heard any evidence to substantiate it. And he handed over the original note to the Paget team.

The contents went far beyond the Mirror scoop. It not only included the passages naming Tiggy and Camilla but a further section, the Mail can reveal, in which Diana made observations about the Royal Family and the future of the monarchy.

It was no less than sensational, according to sources, and would still cause embarrassment today.

When it appeared in December 2006, the 832-page Paget report made only passing reference to Diana's claims made in the Burrell note.

'Paget had found no evidence to support Diana's expressed fears at that time, October 1995,' said a source. 'The note did not materially affect the conspiracy investigation.'

The authors also declined to name the woman (Tiggy) whom Diana accused Charles of wanting to marry in the Burrell note. Much to the fury of Al Fayed, Operation Paget confirmed the findings of an earlier French inquiry that the deaths were caused by a drunk chauffeur who lost control of his speeding car in a Paris underpass. This week Al Fayed, now 92, politely declined to comment.

The unexpurgated text of the 'Tiggy and Camilla' part of the Burrell note was not made public until December 2007, in evidence at Diana and Dodi's inquest. In April 2008 the jury returned a narrative verdict of 'unlawful killing [due to the] grossly negligent driving of the following vehicles and of the Mercedes.'

Why did the investigators take so long after the launch of Paget to confront Charles with the full contents of the note? Almost two years had passed.

'It was the natural sequence of events,' Stevens said. 'Yes, allegations had been made about the Prince of Wales and other royals but we had to find or examine the [existing] evidence before we approached him with formal questions . . . We found no other evidence to support the scenario suggested in Diana's note.

'We were left with the note, which in itself was not enough to make Charles a formal suspect. If he chose to assist Paget, he would be doing so voluntarily as a potential witness. We would not be interviewing him under caution.'

Charles could have declined to co-operate in any way. His father, Prince Philip, whom Al Fayed had accused of being a driving force in the alleged murder plot, had done just that, the Mail can reveal.

When Paget wrote to Philip to ask if he would like to comment on the allegations made against him, his written reply ran to just three words: 'No thank you.'

Now it was down to Charles to explain what he thought about a note that painted him as a murderous monster.

My battle to save Princess Diana: First ever account of doctor's fight  in minute-by-minute testimony that destroys cruel smears she was allowed to die

By Richard Pendlebury, Stephen Wright and Rory Mulholland in Paris for the Daily Mail

MonSef Dahman works as a surgeon in the French Riviera town of Antibes, that 'billionaires' playground' which once charmed Picasso and F. Scott Fitzgerald and still attracts the Hollywood elite.

One of his specialities is treating the obese. Life is good there, his career fulfilling.

But there are particular times of year  the last day of August and then again on his son's birthday in November  when his thoughts darken; when they invariably return to an event which not only had a profound 'impact' on him personally but shocked the entire world.

'The thought that you have lost an important person, for whom you cared personally, marks you for life,' he says.

That is because for several hours in the early morning of Sunday, August 31, 1997, Dahman, the then young duty general surgeon in the biggest hospital in France, played a central role in the desperate fight to save the life of Diana, Princess of Wales. She had been critically injured in a car crash in the centre of Paris earlier that night.

In an exclusive interview, surgeon MonSef Dahman (pictured) has recalled how he was summoned to the Pitie-Salpetriere Hospital in Paris to attend to Diana, Princess of Wales

He has never spoken to a newspaper about this episode until now. But in an exclusive interview for this investigative series and forthcoming seven-part Mail+ podcast, he has recalled in dramatic and moving detail how he was summoned to the emergency department of the Pitie-Salpetriere Hospital in Paris to attend to a 'young woman' who turned out to be the most famous in the world.

Dahman, 56, also recalled a chilling story of his own experience of the perverse iconography and unscrupulous monetising of the Princess, even after her death.

One of his reasons for speaking now  he received no payment  was to reiterate how, in contradiction to the conspiracy theories which claimed they were somehow part of a murderous plot by the British Establishment, the French emergency medical staff involved that night made every conceivable effort to save Diana.

To suggest otherwise  as had been done by Mohamed Al Fayed and several lurid foreign magazines, among others  caused both bemusement and hurt.

A Parisian by birth, Dahman would not have been in his home city, let alone on duty, that night were he not about to become a father for second time.

Every August the French capital empties of those citizens who can afford to spend a month in the country or by the sea. If it were not for foreign tourists, the City of Light would be a ghost town.

'But I didn't take a vacation that summer,' he recalls to the Mail. 'For the extremely simple reason that my wife was pregnant with my son (they already had a daughter). As a result, I worked all summer.'

And work he did  long, long hours like the junior doctors and surgeons in our own NHS. His shift that weekend had started at 8am on Saturday.

He was still on duty at 2am the following morning, 'though of course it was not continuous activity. I did have moments of rest. In fact, if I remember correctly, it was a pretty easy day. I didn't have to deal with anything too difficult.'

That would change  dramatically. The Mercedes in which Diana was travelling crashed in the Alma tunnel at approximately 12.23am. Owing to the severity of her resulting injuries, she received lengthy treatment by doctors at the scene.

She then suffered a cardiac arrest while being moved to an ambulance. After being revived, she was transported by that ambulance to Dahman's hospital. She arrived there at 2.06am.

'I was resting in the duty room when I got a call from Bruno Riou, the senior duty anaesthetist, telling me to go to the emergency room,' Dahman recalls. 'I wasn't told it was Lady Diana, but [only] that there'd been a serious accident involving a young woman.

On August 31, 1997, Dahman played a central role in the desperate fight to save the life of Diana, who had been critically injured in a car crash in the centre of Paris (pictured)

'The organisation of the Pitie-Salpetriere hospital was very hierarchical. So when you got a call from [such] a high-level colleague that meant the case was particularly serious.' His rest room was only 50 metres from the accident and emergency department 'And so I got there fairly quickly. And then I realised the true seriousness of things.'

He recalls: 'My intern [his junior assistant] was in the room. But she was in a corner because she was a little overwhelmed by the gravity of the moment.' Riou was also present.

'That too was a sign of the special importance. And he was personally taking care of a lady who was lying on a stretcher, with a lot going on around her.'

Dahman, 33 at the time, was then informed that the unconscious figure on the stretcher was no less than Diana, Princess of Wales.

'It only took that moment for all this unusual activity to become clear to me,' he recalls with some understatement. 'For any doctor, any surgeon, it is of very great importance to be faced with such a young woman who is in this condition. But of course even more so if she is a princess.'

He was unwilling to describe certain aspects of the treatment she received at his hands, for reasons of patient confidentiality. The Mail has also chosen to excise certain details presented to the official inquiries into her death, but it is important to make clear how hard the team fought to save her life, and how desperate the circumstances.

Diana had been X-rayed on arrival at hospital. The resulting images of her chest showed she was suffering 'very serious internal bleeding'. As a result, she underwent a thoracic drain  excess fluid being removed from her chest cavity.

But haemorrhaging persisted and Diana was receiving transfusions of O-negative blood held in the emergency room, as her blood group had not yet been established

At around 2.15am she suffered another cardiac arrest. The situation had grown more critical. More extreme intervention was needed.

As she underwent external heart massage, Riou asked Dahman to perform a surgical procedure. He was to do so while Diana was still lying on the stretcher in the emergency room.

This circumstance was 'truly exceptional' and an indication of how parlous her situation had become. 'I did this (procedure) to enable her to breathe,' Dahman explains. 'Her heart couldn't function properly because it was lacking in blood.'

As a result of this intervention, Dahman discovered that Diana had suffered a significant tear in her pericardium, which protects the heart.

The prognosis worsened. It was now 2.30am. A miracle was needed. Dahman and Riou were joined in the emergency room by Professor Alain Pavie, perhaps France's top heart surgeon. He had been summoned from his bed at home. If anyone could save her, it was him.

Dahman, 56, also recalled a chilling story of his own experience of the perverse iconography and unscrupulous monetising of the Princess (pictured in Paris), even after her death

Pavie decided that Diana must be moved into one of the hospital's operating theatres. He suspected that the main source of her internal bleeding had not yet been found. Further surgical exploration was necessary.

It was this procedure that uncovered the most serious wound  a tear to Diana's upper-left pulmonary vein at the point of contact with the heart. Pavie sutured the lesion.

The most significant physical damage had been repaired. But to no avail. Diana's heart, which had stopped before the surgical exploration, would not restart. They were losing the battle to save her.

'We tried electric shocks, several times and, as I had done in the emergency room, cardiac massage,' says Dahman. 'Professor Riou had administered adrenaline. But we could not get her heart beating again.'

The team continued these resuscitation efforts for a full and ultimately fruitless hour.

'We fought hard, we tried a lot, really an awful lot. Frankly, when you are working in those conditions, you don't notice the passage of time,' says Dahman. 'The only thing that is important is that we do everything possible for this young woman.' He says he had felt hope at the start.

'We had people brought to Pitie-Salpetriere who were in a very poor state, more serious than Diana was when she arrived. It is one of the best centres in France for this type of trauma emergency. And we did save some of those people, which made us particularly happy and proud.

'But that did not happen here. We could not save her. And that affected us very much.'

At 4am the team, led by Pavie, accepted that no more could be done to revive their patient. It was a 'collegiate decision', Dahman recalls. They ceased all resuscitation efforts. The extraordinary life of Diana, Princess of Wales, had come to an end.

Several years later the esteemed British forensic pathologist Dr Richard Shepherd  who has been interviewed for this investigation's accompanying Mail+ podcast series  reviewed the medical evidence for the Paget inquiry into Diana's death, led by former Scotland Yard chief Lord Stevens.

Based on Dr Shepherd's expert opinion, Lord Stevens  who briefed Prince William and Prince Harry on his findings  concluded in his report: 'Those involved in the emergency treatment and surgery were highly qualified and experienced in their field. Their evidence showed that every effort was made to save the life of the Princess of Wales. No other strategy would have affected the outcome.'

D ahman could find no such consolation that fatal August night. On leaving the operating theatre he was both 'exhausted' and despondent. 'It is always a great disappointment to see someone young leave us,' he says.

'Also you suffer great physical fatigue because of the energy you have expended trying to save her. And so we were particularly shattered and tired. At the end, we were broken.'

He called his departmental boss to tell him what had happened  and to prepare him for the pandemonium that was likely to happen as a result  and then returned to the on-duty rest room.

He was too tired and low to take any notice of the French dignitaries  including President Chirac  who began to arrive at the hospital early that morning to pay their respects to Diana.

In the next days he was witness to an unpleasant and shaming aftermath. Some members of the media tried to infiltrate the wards and corridors to get close to those who had been treating Diana.

'Pitie-Salpetriere is a public hospital,' he says. 'The Princess was treated in a building where there were other hospital patients. We saw people disguising themselves [as medical staff], pushing trolleys, trying to get information. There was quite a lot of pressure on our security.'

One incident, which he has never spoken of before, sticks in his mind. 'When I was treating Diana I was wearing my white sabots [clog-like medical shoes]. And obviously in that situation you don't pay attention to anything but trying to save the patient. It was only the next morning I noticed that my clogs were stained with [her] blood.

'Anyway, the hospital is very large and I was walking between buildings, when a Frenchman, approached me and said, 'Ah, your clogs, I am interested in them. I want to buy them from you. They have the sang bleu [blue or royal blood] on them.'

Horrified, Dahman declined and as soon as possible cleaned the sabots he had worn that night: 'Which was the end of that story.'

But not the end for him.

'So here we have to consider the philosophy of life,' he says. 'It is a defining element, you can't escape that. The thought that you have lost an important person for whom you cared, marks you all your life.

'When it's a princess and you follow her funeral along with billions of other people, and you had tried to save her, that obviously marks you. It marks you all your life. Because it's so terrible that this beautiful person had such a tragic end.'

His own part in the tragedy nags at him. 'It varies according to what is going on in my life,' he says. 'When we get to August I think about it. It was the year my son was born and of course every anniversary of that I think about it.'

'I don't go back to it all the time because a lot of years have gone by. But every time a new book [about Diana's death] has come out [in France], it has been sent to me. So I have a collection of such books, unfortunately.'

Revealed: Bodyguard survivor of Princess Diana crash has rebuilt his life and is now AstraZeneca's global head of security

By Stephen Wright and Simon Trump for the Daily Mail

Bodyguard Trevor Rees-Jones, the only survivor of the crash in which Princess Diana died, has rebuilt his life and is global head of security for AstraZeneca, the Mail can reveal.

Despite suffering appalling injuries and severe memory loss, he has recovered sufficiently to land a huge job with the pharmaceutical giant behind one of the world's most effective Covid-19 vaccines.

It is not known if his role involves protecting key personnel involved in the vaccine programme, or guarding the firm's laboratories and intellectual property.

Despite suffering appalling injuries in crash which killed Princess Diana, bodyguard Trevor Rees-Jones (pictured) has recovered sufficiently to land a huge job with AstraZeneca

The former member of the Al- Fayed security team, who now calls himself Trevor Rees, was travelling in the front passenger seat of the Mercedes and was trapped in the wreckage, conscious but with severe facial trauma.

He was placed in an induced coma for ten days.

It took skilful reconstruction by surgeons, working from an old photograph, who used 150 titanium parts to piece him back together.

Mr Rees, 53, was also left with profound amnesia for several months.

Dr Maurice Lipsedge, an expert psychiatrist commissioned by Lord Stevens' Operation Paget inquiry, said Mr Rees had 'very limited recall' of what happened immediately before and after the crash and this was unlikely to ever change.

Mr Rees left his job with Mohamed Al-Fayed the following year.

He was the only survivor of the crash in which Princess Diana (pictured) died and was travelling in the front passenger seat of the Mercedes and got trapped in the wreckage

He published his own account of his experiences, with help from a ghost writer, in 2000 in a book called The Bodyguard's Story.

His first post after returning to work was with the United Nations in its department of peacekeeping.

He also spent six years with the US-based oil operations company, Halliburton, working his way up to director.

His LinkedIn entry describes him as being based in Shrewsbury and having experience in international operations.

Both AstraZeneca and Mr Rees, via his employers, declined to comment.
A councilman in North Carolina has been slammed after he suggested making it a misdemeanor crime to donate food and money directly to homeless people.

Tariq Bokhari, who serves as a representative for Charlotte's 6th district, floated the radical idea during a council business meeting on Monday.

'People aren't getting it and they're still bringing food and money and resources directly to the folks that are out there right now,' Bokhari stated during a discussion about strategies to combat Charlotte's homelessness problem.

'They're only making themselves feel good, they're hurting the ultimate folks, perhaps we explore making that a misdemeanor'.

The misdemeanor charge would involve paying a fine if a person was caught giving resources directly to a homeless person.

Tariq Bokhari, who serves as a representative for Charlotte's 6th district, floated the radical idea during a council business meeting on Monday

Bokhari suggested that it would be better for people to donate resources to a proper charity instead.

'I think we need a heavier dose of tough love amongst this community, especially amongst those who continually give money, and food and clothing directly to these folks instead of giving them to the organizations that are designed to help them,' he stated.

However, fellow council member Renee Johnson voiced her strong opposition to the idea of making direct donations a misdemeanor.

'That's something that I would never support, especially when there's so many systemic barriers for individuals who are homeless,' she stated during the meeting, according to ABC11.

'People aren't getting it and they're still bringing food and money and resources directly to the folks that are out there right now,' Bokhari (right) stated during a discussion about strategies to combat Charlotte's homelessness problem.

Fellow council member Renee Johnson voiced her strong opposition to the idea of making direct donations a misdemeanor

Meanwhile, locals like Kenya Joseph, who works for the non-profit Hearts for the Invisible Charlotte Coalition, also spoke out against the proposal.

'It lacks humanity,' Joseph told the news network.

'In what world when we as a society are at a place where we would criminalize the act of humanity, care and consideration and compassion for others in any way, shape or form, there's a huge problem.'

Bokhari later clarified his comments on Twitter, saying: 'What we have been doing as a community for the homeless in Charlotte, though well intentioned, isn't producing the results we need. From tent city to aggressive panhandling, things are getting worse.'

'My intention has never been to harm the homeless community, rather make real change and positive outcomes for them,' he added.

A recent survey from the Mecklenberg County - in which the city of Charlotte is located - estimates that roughly 3,000 people are homeless.

The number has increased during the COVID-19 pandemic with encampments cropping up in various parts of the city.
Former President Donald Trump formally threw his weight Friday behind Alaska's Commissioner of Administration Kelly Tshibaka, who is challenging Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski in the 2022 GOP primary.

'Lisa Murkowski is bad for Alaska,' Trump said in a statement. 'I look forward to campaigning in Alaska for Kelly Tshibaka,' he added, giving her his 'Complete and Total Endorsement.'

Trump called Tshibaka a 'fighter who stands for Alaska values and America First.'

'She is MAGA all the way, pro-energy, strong on the Border, tough on Crime and totally supports our Military and our great Vets,' he continued. 'Kelly is a powerful supporter of the Second Amendment and JOBS!'

Former President Donald Trump officially threw his weight behind Alaska's Commissioner of Administration Kelly Tshibaka, who is challenging Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski in the 2022 GOP primary

Alaska Department of Administration Commissioner Kelly Tshibaka got former President Donald Trump's endorsement in the Alaska Senate GOP primary on Friday. Tshibaka announced she would challenge GOP Sen. Lisa Murkowski in late March

Trump hammered Sen. Lisa Murkowski for voting to confirm President Joe Biden's Interior Secretary Deb Haaland. In the statement Friday, he didn't mention she voted to convict him of inciting an insurrection, but he's vowed to take down Republicans who didn't vote in his favor

Trump said he was against Murkowski because she voted in favor of President Joe Biden's pick to head the Interior Department, Secretary Deb Haaland.

Haaland has said she is against drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, which Trump pointed out, saying Murkowski's vote for the former Democratic congresswoman was a vote against Alaskan jobs.

'Murkowski has got to go!' Trump said.

Left out of the statement was the fact that Murkowski was one of seven Republican senators who voted to convict Trump of inciting the January 6 insurrection during his second impeachment trial.

He has vowed to take out those Republicans who didn't tow the party line.

Trump is making good on that promise with a planned June 26 revenge rally outside of Cleveland in support of Congressional candidate Max Miller, a former Trump administration staffer, who is running to unseat GOP Rep. Anthony Gonzalez, another Republican who voted in favor of his impeachment.

Tshibaka jumped into the Alaska Senate race in late March.

By then, Trump had already told Politico he would 'not be endorsing, under any circumstances, the failed candidate from the great State of Alaska, Lisa Murkowski.'

'She represents the state badly and her county even worse,' Trump said. 'I do not know where other people will be next year, but I know where I will be - in Alaska campaigning against a disloyal and very bad Senator.'

Tshibaka, whose run was first reported by Fox News, said she was running to represent a 'new generation of Alaska conservatives.'

Her stances include being tough on immigration, pro-Second Amendment and anti-abortion.

Tshibaka is an Alaska native and went to high school in the state before attending Texas A&M University and then Harvard Law School, according to the Anchorage Daily News, who shared a copy of her resume when she was appointed by Alaska's governor to lead the Department of Administration in January 2019.

She spent nearly 17 years in the Washington, D.C. working for the federal government under the Bush 43, Obama and Trump administrations.

Tshibaka's website describes her as a 'fighter' who exposed 'waste, fraud and abuse' working for nearly 17 years in Washington, D.C.

Images from Kelly Tshibaka's Facebook page depict Murkowski, a Republican, as a 'LIBERAL' who stands with the 'radical left'

Tshibaka worked for the office of inspector general for the U.S. Postal Service, the Federal Trade Commission, the Director of National Intelligence and the Justice Department.

The Anchorage Daily News also reported that she and her husband Niki are pastors and launched the Lighthouse Fellowship during their time in D.C.

On her campaign website, Tshibaka describes herself as a 'fighter.'

'I fought hard to be the first in my family to pursue a college degree and attend law school. I fought to expose waste, fraud and abuse in government, and Ill bring that same fight to the US Senate where I will always defend Alaska values,' Tshibaka said.

Murkowski hasn't officially kicked off a 2022 re-election bid but she's fought off Republican challengers before.

In 2010, when former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin backed Murkowski's Tea Party challenger Joe Miller, Murkowski lost the Republican primary, but still won the general election race by mounting a successful write-in campaign.
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Head bowed, his hands handcuffed behind his back and wearing a black face mask and bullet-proof vest, Greek pilot Charalambos Anagnostopoulos was led into court yesterday surrounded by armed police.

What a contrast to other times we have seen the 33-year-old widower of young British wife, Caroline Crouch.

Who could fail to have been moved when, cradling their 11-month-old baby daughter Lydia in his arms, he was photographed gently placing a flower on her coffin at her funeral on the island of Alonissos last month? Or when he hugged her distraught mother at a memorial service on Wednesday  just hours before he finally confessed to murdering her at their home in Athens on May 11 and hatching an elaborate plot to evade justice.

For 37 days Charalambos Anagnostopoulos kept up the elaborate tale of how his wife Caroline was murdered in front of their 11-month-old daughter as he could only lie their helplessly bound to a bed at their home in the suburbs of Athens. Last night, police say he finally cracked and revealed he was the killer

Charalambos (Babis) Anagnostopoulos was led to court in Athens yesterday surrounded by heavily armed police

Shortly before his arrest on suspicion of murdering his wife Caroline, he was seen consoling her mother at a memorial service on June 17

The scenes at court, with so many armed officers, was an illustration of how high emotions are running in Greece following the sensational development.

The motive? It was as old as time itself. Caroline, who was 20, had threatened to leave him and take baby Lydia with her.

Countdown to murder and a sick cover up 0.35am: A CCTV camera on the ground floor of the couples home captures its last image of Babis sitting on the sofa with his infant daughter. Hes texting Caroline, upstairs, as they argue bitterly. 1.20am: Babis removes the memory card from the camera. He will later admit to snapping it in half and flushing it down the toilet. Evidence, police say, that Carolines murder was premeditated. 1.35am-4am: Babis and Caroline continue to exchange particularly hard and sharp text messages. Caroline messages a friend to say she is leaving her husband and attempts to book a hotel. The argument ends with Caroline ordering Babis out of the house and saying she wants a divorce. 4.01am: A fitness tracker attached to Carolines wrist shows a sudden burst of heart activity. Detectives believe this is the moment a physical fight broke out between the bitterly divided couple. 4.11am: Carolines fitness tracker shows that her heartbeat has stopped, she is dead. 4.11am-6am: Babis stages an elaborate break-in before dawn. Advertisement

I did not want to go to prison because I wanted to raise my daughter, he is said to have told officers after being interrogated for eight hours at the central police station in the Greek capital on Thursday. He is understood to have suffocated Caroline.

So momentous was the development that Greek TV interrupted broadcasts of Euro 2020 to break the news. Passers-by stopped at cafes to watch updates.

In court, Anagnostopoulos was officially charged with murder and, if convicted, faces life in prison.

With good looks and a glamorous job, he led an outwardly idyllic life in an impressive balconied villa in the affluent suburb of Glyka Nera.

To their neighbours they seemed like the perfect family; an impression reinforced by snaps of them on holiday, in such locations as Dubai, on social media. Their happiness was perhaps epitomised by a loving message posted on Carolines birthday. My awesome wife, closest friend, and best mum in the world, Mr Anagnostopoulos wrote touchingly.

For the past five weeks, ever since Caroline was killed, hes continued to play the role of the heartbroken widower; in public, at least, his mask never slipped; but it was all an act; a performance, we now know.

Behind the image of a blessed family life, Anagnostopoulos, known as Babis, was a jealous and controlling husband, friends revealed today.

And extracts from Carolines diary published on a Greek website reveal the truth about their often violent and unhappy relationship. I had a fight with Babis again, she wrote in 2019. I hit him, cursed him and broke the door.

In another extract, she said: Im thinking of leaving to go to my sister, she wrote. I do not know if I can continue with Babis.

Anagnostopoulos is the latest in a long line of killers to have cried crocodile tears for the cameras. Statistics might tell us most murders are committed by people known to the victim but even two weeks into the investigation police insisted Anagnostopoulos is not and has never been a suspect.

The authorities are now telling a different story; that they suspected him all along. The more cynical view is that this is just a face-saving exercise to avoid awkward questions about why it took so long to arrest him.

Either way, few culprits have concocted such an elaborate tissue of lies to cover their tracks.

The story he spun was this: three men  with foreign accents  broke into the house around 5am, tied him up and put insulating tape over his eyes. They had pointed a gun at his daughters head, he said. They then killed his wife and family dog, he said, before escaping with 10,000 in banknotes and 20,000 of jewellery.

It was a chain of events akin to a movie or TV plot. Anagnostopoulos, who trained as a helicopter pilot in the UK, told how he only managed to raise the alarm by using his nose to dial the number of the police and call a neighbour.

Investigators arrive at the scene of what they are told is an horrific burglary at the home in the Glyka Nera suburb of Athens on May 11

Police cordon off the property after walking into the gruesome scene. Caroline dead and the family's husky strangled with its leash

He couldnt possibly have made all this up, could he? Even now, it beggars belief. On the night of May 11 we quarrelled yet again, Anagnostopoulos is quoted as saying in his new testimony, parts of which were released by the police. She threw me out of our bed and I saw her taking the baby out of the cot. I lost my mind ... when I realised she was dead, I sought means of covering things up because there is an 11-month-old baby to consider.

Ahead of yesterdays hearing, it emerged he had accused his wife of being jealous and obsessed, saying he was worried about his daughters safety after the infant was thrown roughly in her crib.

Describing their relationship as having very good and very bad days, on the night of the murder he admitted his wife had screamed to him to leave the house and accused him of being a bad father.

A detailed transcript of his confession has been published on a Greek news website. I could not stand the fights any more, he said. She was obsessed and jealous.

We had another intense fight early that afternoon [of May 11]. When I went to the attic, she told me to leave the room and the house. She pushed me and then left the child abruptly and forcefully in the crib. The baby started to cry. I got annoyed, attacked her and pressed her face against the pillow or mattress.

I do not know how much time it took. I had no accomplice. When I realised she was dead, I started thinking about the baby and did not know what to do.

I decided to cover it up and made everything up.

I tied her hands to her back and put the blouse around her neck, close to her mouth. During his interrogation, he told detectives: I am sorry that I lied to you.

Anagnostopoulos speaks to reporters outside the home after returning to pick up personal possessions whilst accompanied by three police officers

Police described the crime as the 'most heinous' they have ever investigated, and say it was carried out with a 'brutality' that is rare in Greece. Pictured: the house where the murder took place

Anagnostopoulos holds his 11-month-old daughter during the funeral of his wife Caroline on the island of Alonissos in Greece on May 14

You all treated me well and I lied to you but I had to make sure that I stayed out of jail to be with my child. Anagnostopoulos went to the extraordinary length of strangling their puppy, Bruno, who was strung up from the stairwell after reportedly being drowned, brutality intended to point the finger of suspicion at a violent criminal gang.

It seems to have worked, whatever the police might be saying publicly now. An Albanian crime group comprising of Roma and other nationalities were being sought in connection with the murderous home invasion in Glyka Nera, it was reported at the time.

A near-perfect murder, officers called it, because forensic specialists found no signs of a break-in; no fingerprints; no DNA; nothing.

It was as if the burglars had bleached the entire house before leaving.

But the real killer had made several, fundamental mistakes: during the interrogation, he was presented with electronic evidence that contradicted his harrowing account.

The details which have now emerged really did resemble something from televisions CSI.

According to Babiss initial version of events, burglars broke into his house near Athens around 5am on May 11, tied him up alongside wife Caroline, robbed them, strangled her and then fled before he was able to call police at 6am.

But detectives say it was an elaborate fiction, and have laid out in detail what they believe happened inside the house on that night.

According to the police version of events, he broke a latch on a downstairs window, then ransacked hiding places where valuables were kept to make it look like a burglary. In a sick twist, he then drowned the couples seven-month-old husky puppy and hanged its body from a bannister, later telling police robbers must have killed it on their way in so it didnt wake them up.

Officers say Babis then blindfolded himself, tied himself to the bed, and called to a neighbour who alerted them to the burglary.

Anagnostopoulos weeps as he speaks to reporters outside the family home in Athens after the murder, saying he did not know his wife was dead until police arrived and took his blindfold off

Caroline Crouch is carried into the Agia Paraskevi church in an open casket for her funeral on the island of Alonissos

Almost every inhabitant of Alonnisos flocked to the island's Agia Paraskevi church to pay their respects to Caroline Crouch, the young Briton who they had adopted as their own

George Kalliakmanis, president of police in Attica, which covers Athens, told Greek news site Protothema detectives were struck by his coldness the very morning they arrived at his home and discovered his wife dead upstairs. His men had compared him to Oscar Pistorius, the South African Paralympian, who protested his innocence like Anagnostopoulos  at least to start with.

They kept their suspicions hidden, the police chief said, and pursued his burglary claim to avoid spooking him and risk panicking him into fleeing. Why did they suspect the break-in had been staged? He says because few of the cupboards and wardrobes had been searched, when intruders normally search everywhere, but in this case they appeared to have looked only in places that Anagnostopoulos had stored valuables.

Nevertheless, he led police on a merry dance, telling them the intruders were armed with a silver Colt and black pistol, weapons rarely found in Greece.

He was shown dozens of mugshots of criminals and played tapes to see if he could recognise the foreign language he claimed he heard one of the culprits speaking.

At one stage, a 36-year-old Georgian suspect was arrested and officers were planning to put him in an identity parade to see if Anagnostopoulos picked him out.

Who could have ever have imagined that their seemingly happy marriage would end in such a tragic way?

Greek public opinion shocked by vicious crime is how the state broadcaster summed up the countrys response to the atrocity on its website.

Carolines funeral was held on the island of Alonissos, just across the sparkling water from Skopelos, where Mamma Mia! was filmed.

It is where she spent much of childhood. Her mother runs a cleaning firm on the island, her father, who was born in Liverpool, had retired to Alonissos after a career in the armed forces and oil industry.

Caroline's friends and family arrive at the Agia Parakevi church for her funeral - many were carrying white flowers as they paid tribute to the 20-year-old mother

Babis Anagnostopolous shared a tribute to his wife Caroline Crouch. Under the photo taken on their wedding day he writes: 'Together forever. Have a nice trip my love'

Caroline's mother Susan Dela Guesta (pictured above at her daughter's graveside on the island of Alonnisos in Greece) told MailOnline how she cannot come to terms with the killing

After graduating from the University of Piraeus in Athens, where she studied statistics, Caroline worked as a high school teacher.

It was four years ago that met her future husband. They married in May 2018.

But behind the smiling photographs, behind the lovely house and enviable lifestyle, friends who knew the couple say Babis was a jealous and controlling husband and that Caroline was deeply unhappy.

She could not have the time she wanted with her friends and she was constantly expressing her complaints about his behaviour, one friend told another Greek news site.

Both she and her husband, it has now transpired, had been in therapy at the time of the murder, speaking to the same psychologist but during separate sessions.

During his brief court appearance on Thursday, his lawyer Vasilis Spyrou said his client had told him he regretted his action and wants to be punished.

He was remanded in custody ahead of a hearing next Tuesday when it is understood he will present a formal apology and enter pleas to the charges of murder, abuse of an animal and making false statements to police.

For those who loved Caroline, surely his punishment cant come too soon.

Nine days after the killing a 43-year-old Georgian national is pictured being dragged into a Greek police station where he came face-to-face with Anagnostopoulos

A helicopter carrying Babis takes off from a Greek island, carrying him to Athens where he is said to have confessed during eight hours of interrogations
Bodyguard Trevor Rees-Jones, the only survivor of the crash in which Princess Diana died, has rebuilt his life and is global head of security for AstraZeneca, the Mail can reveal.

Despite suffering appalling injuries and severe memory loss, he has recovered sufficiently to land a huge job with the pharmaceutical giant behind one of the world's most effective Covid-19 vaccines.

It is not known if his role involves protecting key personnel involved in the vaccine programme, or guarding the firm's laboratories and intellectual property.

Despite suffering appalling injuries in crash which killed Princess Diana, bodyguard Trevor Rees-Jones (pictured) has recovered sufficiently to land a huge job with AstraZeneca

He was the only survivor of the crash in which Princess Diana (pictured) died and was travelling in the front passenger seat of the Mercedes and got trapped in the wreckage

The former member of the Al- Fayed security team, who now calls himself Trevor Rees, was travelling in the front passenger seat of the Mercedes and was trapped in the wreckage, conscious but with severe facial trauma.

He was placed in an induced coma for ten days.

It took skilful reconstruction by surgeons, working from an old photograph, who used 150 titanium parts to piece him back together.

Mr Rees, 53, was also left with profound amnesia for several months.

Dr Maurice Lipsedge, an expert psychiatrist commissioned by Lord Stevens' Operation Paget inquiry, said Mr Rees had 'very limited recall' of what happened immediately before and after the crash and this was unlikely to ever change.

Mr Rees left his job with Mohamed Al-Fayed the following year.

The former member of the Al-Fayed security team was in the front passenger seat of the car and was trapped in the wreckage (pictured), conscious but with severe facial trauma

He published his own account of his experiences, with help from a ghost writer, in 2000 in a book called The Bodyguard's Story.

His first post after returning to work was with the United Nations in its department of peacekeeping.

He also spent six years with the US-based oil operations company, Halliburton, working his way up to director.

His LinkedIn entry describes him as being based in Shrewsbury and having experience in international operations.

Both AstraZeneca and Mr Rees, via his employers, declined to comment.

Police quizzed Charles over Diana murder conspiracy: Scotland Yard chief reveals how he was forced to quiz Prince of Wales over wild allegations that he plotted to kill his ex-wife

By Richard Pendlebury and Stephen Wright for the Daily Mail

A police chief today reveals why he was forced to quiz Prince Charles on allegations he plotted to kill Princess Diana.

Lord Stevens, a former head of Scotland Yard, says he had to 'follow the evidence' and question the prince over a note his ex-wife wrote claiming he was planning an accident in her car.

The unprecedented interview was conducted amid enormous secrecy at St James's Palace during a three-year investigation into Diana's death in a Paris car crash in 1997.

A crucial part of the probe was the note the princess had written predicting she would die through 'brake failure and serious head injury' so Charles could marry his sons' former nanny, Tiggy Legge-Bourke.

In the note Diana added: 'Camilla is nothing but a decoy so we are being used by the man in every sense of the word.'

Lord Stevens, a former head of Scotland Yard, says he had to question Prince Charles (pictured with Diana) over a note his ex-wife wrote claiming he was planning an accident in her car

Lord Stevens today confirms he read out her incendiary words, which would later fuel conspiracy theories about her death, at his meeting with Charles on December 6, 2005.

At the time, he says, he and his team of detectives had no idea what had made Diana so concerned about her safety.

Charles, who was interviewed by Lord Stevens as a witness and not a suspect, could not explain why his ex-wife had penned the note in October 1995 and left it in the pantry of Kensington Palace for her butler Paul Burrell.

Nearly two years after it was written 36-year-old Diana, her boyfriend Dodi Al Fayed and their chauffeur Henri Paul were all killed when their Mercedes crashed in a tunnel in Paris.

Today Lord Stevens suggests that rogue ex-BBC journalist Martin Bashir, who allegedly used bogus papers to con the princess into granting him a scoop BBC Panorama interview in November 1995, may have exploited her vulnerability and made her paranoid about her security around the time she wrote the note.

In a joint interview with the Daily Mail and a seven part Mail+ podcast series on Diana's death, the former police chief expresses his regret that he and his officers did not interview Mr Bashir during his investigation, Operation Paget.

He says: 'If there'd been an allegation then that Bashir had produced allegedly fake documents to Princess Diana, which is a criminal offence, we'd have investigated it. My goodness me, we would have done. But this has only come out recently, which is unfortunate.

'If we'd known at the time of Paget we would certainly, certainly have gone and seen him and interviewed him. And it would have been part and parcel of the inquiry to get to the bottom of it.

The unprecedented interview was conducted amid enormous secrecy at St James's Palace during a three-year investigation into Diana's death in a Paris car crash in 1997 (pictured)

'We don't know what Bashir was saying to Diana. But if he had put the fears in her mind which had caused her to write that note then that is what caused us to interview Charles. When we watched the Panorama interview at the start of the inquiry it didn't cross our mind that Bashir could have done anything fraudulent.

'After all, this was the BBC, this was their flagship programme and it was being broadcast to the world. There was nothing said in the interview we didn't know about by then. What we didn't know of course was how Bashir had managed to get it.'

Lord Stevens, who continued leading the Diana inquiry after he retired from the police in 2005, also tells the landmark Daily Mail series investigating her death:

Prince Charles initialled what was effectively a 'statement of truth' following his police interrogation in 2005;

The highly sensitive document has been filed at the National Archives in Kew and will not be made public until 2038;

The Duke of Edinburgh declined to be questioned over false claims made by Dodi's father Mohamed Al Fayed that he was a driving force in a murder conspiracy;

Witnesses told detectives that the princess was prone to 'wild thoughts';

A handwriting expert confirmed to Paget officers that Diana had definitely written the note she handed to Burrell, predicting her death;

Mr Al Fayed offered Lord Stevens extraordinary gifts during Operation Paget, including a pair of fresh stag's testicles culled from deer on one of his country estates and also Viagra, which the ex-Scotland Yard chief declined to accept.

In addition to Lord Stevens' explosive interview, the Mail today publishes the first British media interview with a French surgeon who was part of the hospital medical team that tried desperately to keep Diana alive.

Monsef Dahman performed surgery while she was still lying on her stretcher in the emergency room at the Paris hospital but her condition deteriorated and she was moved to an operating theatre.

Lord Stevens (pictured) today confirms he read out her incendiary words, which would later fuel conspiracy theories about her death, at his meeting with Charles on December 6, 2005

'We tried electric shocks, several times,' says Dr Dahman. 'But we could not get her heart beating again.' He also reveals that he witnessed some members of the media trying to infiltrate the wards and corridors to get close to those who had been treating Diana.

The exclusive interviews with Lord Stevens and Dr Dahman are the first part of the Mail's ground-breaking new series on Diana's death, which will run into next week.

Our five-month investigation has taken us around the world and will feature dramatic new testimony from key figures including other police officers, medical staff, Diana's friends and ex staff.

This newspaper has had access to high level sources who have never spoken before and for the first time we will provide the inside story on Operation Paget, which saw Lord Stevens liaise with the British and American intelligence agencies as he sought the truth over the princess's death.

Secrecy surrounding Lord Stevens' interview with Charles was a matter of great frustration to former Harrods owner Mr Al Fayed, who in 2007 made a vain attempt to obtain transcripts.

In April 2008 an inquest returned a narrative verdict of 'unlawful killing [due to the] grossly negligent driving of the following vehicles and of the Mercedes'.

The inquest jury also specified Paul's drink driving and the lack of wearing of seatbelts.

Devastating truth of the last days of Diana: Full tragic story of Princess's death and its toxic aftermath is revealed in a landmark series with new testimony that redefines royal history

By Richard Pendlebury and Stephen Wright for the Daily Mail

They were the words of a ghost, a message from the grave; written by a troubled, even frightened Princess, mother to a future king, who had been told by an unscrupulous BBC journalist eager to get a scoop that she was the target of an Establishment plot.

Now, eight years after the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, a copy of an incendiary note she penned to her butler is being recited by a tall, grey-haired peer of the realm to an audience of three other middle-aged men in a private drawing room on the first floor of St James's Palace. Nobody else knows that the gathering is taking place.

'I am sitting here at my desk today in October, longing for someone to hug me and encourage me to keep strong and hold my head high,' the peer begins to intone.

'This particular phase in my life is the most dangerous  my husband is planning an accident in my car. Brake failure and serious head injury in order to make the path clear for him to marry Tiggy.

'Camilla is nothing but a decoy so we are being used by the man in every sense of the word.'

Lord Stevens of Kirkwhelpington, who until a few months before was Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, has finished reading what is on the paper in his hand. He looks up and meets the eye of the man sitting in an armchair across the room.

This unprecedented meeting, which has never been described before (despite legal attempts to bring the transcript and notes into the public domain) took place at 5.15pm on Tuesday, December 6, 2005.

Eight years after the death of Diana, Princess of Wales (pictured with Charles), a copy of an incendiary note she penned to her butler was recited in a drawing room in St James's Palace

Cover of darkness suited both parties, sources have told the Mail. The subject to be discussed was nothing less than sensational; certainly highly embarrassing if not damaging to the monarchy.

Why such secrecy? Because this was to be a police interview rather than a conversation; an interview in which Prince Charles would be asked, to his face, about his complicity or otherwise in an alleged conspiracy to murder his estranged wife, Diana, Princess of Wales.

Nothing like this had happened before. It was the task of a modern high official  Lord Stevens  to question the heir to the throne about the death of the mother of his children; a seismic, epoch-defining tragedy of global interest, the ramifications of which inform what is happening today within the Royal Family, notably the rift between Buckingham Palace and Diana's younger son Prince Harry and his American wife Meghan.

July 1 this year marks the 60th anniversary of Diana's birth. She died, aged 36, following a crash in a tunnel in Paris in the early hours of August 31, 1997. She has been dead for a generation and remains forever young, lovely and enigmatic.

Those under the age of 35 will have little appreciation of her iconic status in the 1980s and 1990s; the aura surrounding the shy beauty who had transformed the 'stuffy and staid' image of the monarchy; the 'Di-mania' and worldwide fascination with the 'fairy tale' that went so wrong. Nor the impact of her passing.

Those alive then can recall today where they were when they heard the shocking news. And the manner of Diana's passing led to a host of conspiracy theories that are with us to this day.

The debate about factors that may have contributed to the death crash has re-intensified after publication last month of the damning 'Dyson report' into how the BBC's former star reporter Martin Bashir conned the Princess into granting his scoop Panorama interview with her in 1995.

Prince William has said the BBC's failures contributed to his mother's 'fear, paranoia and isolation' in her final years, while Prince Harry said the 'ripple effect of the culture of exploitation and unethical practices ultimately took her life'.

Diana's brother Earl Spencer went a stage further, saying he could 'draw a line' between his sister meeting Bashir in 1995 and her tragic accident in Paris two years later.

Today, the Mail begins a major investigative series into that fatal summer weekend, which will draw on new eyewitness accounts and personal recollections, as well as thousands of official documents and records.

Many of those interviewed have never spoken before in such vivid or personal detail. Among them is Lord Stevens, perhaps the foremost expert on the tragedy, having led the three-year British investigation into Diana's death.

For the first time he gives the inside story on his probe  codenamed Operation Paget  which took him into royal palaces and secret service headquarters and into conflict with conspiracy theorist in chief, Mohamed Al Fayed, whose son Dodi, Diana's then boyfriend, also died in the Paris crash, along with their Mercedes driver Henri Paul.

These testimonies present a forensic, compelling and revelatory narrative on the death of Diana, told by those who knew her or who were with her during her final days, hours, or even minutes.

And we will hear from those whose professional duties saw them play a lead role in the toxic aftermath, the legacy of which remains with us today.

On December 6, 2005, Lord Stevens met Prince Charles in a meeting to ask Prince Charles about his complicity in an alleged conspiracy to murder his estranged wife (both pictured)

Now, we can tell for the first time the inside story of one of Operation Paget's most extraordinary episodes: the moment a future monarch was asked why his former wife had suspected him of plotting her murder.

In January 2004 John Stevens was still head of Scotland Yard. He and a small team of police officers were tasked by then Royal Coroner Michael Burgess to begin an investigation which would be codenamed Operation Paget.

Their remit was to examine forensically more than 100 different allegations concerning an alleged Establishment murder plot that resulted in Diana's death, and the subsequent alleged cover-up of evidence.

These conspiracy theories had been most loudly disseminated by Al Fayed, the Egyptian owner of Harrods and the Ritz hotel in Paris. Without his tireless campaigning, the inquiry was unlikely ever to have been established.

His allegations of Buckingham Palace and MI6 complicity in the fatal crash would have carried little or no weight, were it not for two intriguing documents that seemed to foretell the circumstances of Diana's death.

The more significant of these was the aforementioned note, handwritten by Diana and left for her butler, Paul Burrell, in his pantry at Kensington Palace in October 1995, almost two years before she died.

It presented a head-spinning scenario. Diana apparently believed that Charles, from whom she was at that time separated but not yet divorced, intended to seriously injure or kill her in a car crash caused by mechanical sabotage.

He would then be free to marry again. The 'Tiggy' referred to in the note was Tiggy Legge-Bourke, the well-connected, unmarried 30-year-old who since 1993 had been nanny to Princes William and Harry.

(Diana resented her. In the months following the writing of the Burrell note it would be rumoured that Ms Legge-Bourke had become pregnant with Charles's child and had an abortion. Diana was reported to have been a source of this false allegation.)

Camilla, with whom Charles had been conducting an affair during his marriage to Diana, was to be cast aside, like his wife, in favour of the younger woman. Or so Diana predicted in the note.

Similar concerns  about her own safety, the possibility of a car accident and the motive behind deliberate sabotage  were made by Diana in a meeting with the lawyer Lord Mishcon on October 30, 1995.

It is perhaps no coincidence that, in the preceding weeks, she had been meeting Bashir, who we now know was feeding Diana a web of lies about Charles and the Royal Family.

S he informed Mishcon that she had been told by 'reliable' sources that efforts would be made to get rid of her, and Camilla would also be 'put aside'. She would not identify these 'sources' to Mishcon, who did not take her fears too seriously at the time.

Nevertheless, he made a note of her comments, which he passed on to the then Met Commissioner Sir Paul Condon in the wake of her death. Mishcon would be twice interviewed by Paget.

The Mail has been told Paget considered the Burrell note to be more important as potential evidence because it was written by Diana herself and was not a third-party account of a conversation.

Its authenticity would continue to be questioned by some of Diana's friends and staff who claimed Burrell had been able to mimic the Princess's style for Christmas cards.

But the Paget team had the letter examined by a handwriting expert. Stevens told the Mail he was satisfied it was the 'absolutely genuine' article.

Nevertheless, the existence of this note was kept secret by Burrell for eight years; even in January 2001, when police raided his home at 6.50am looking for items he had allegedly stolen from Diana's estate, the note was not among artefacts they discovered then.

The butler was subsequently charged with the theft of more than 300 of Diana's personal possessions. The first jury at his 2002 trial was discharged for legal reasons.

After a second jury was selected, the case collapsed following a remarkable intervention of the Queen, who informed the prosecution that Burrell had told her shortly after Diana's death that he planned to take many of her papers for safekeeping.

The unprecedented meeting has never been described before (despite legal attempts to bring the transcript and notes into the public domain). Pictured: Charles and Diana in February 1987

In October 2003 the butler cashed in on his most sensational possession. Having made a deal with Burrell, reported to be worth at least 400,000, the Daily Mirror newspaper ran a front page 'world exclusive' on the note and its contents.

In fact, the Mirror published only part of the text of the note. And a misleading part it was too. Presumably for legal reasons, the Mirror version ended with the words 'make the path clear for him to marry'.

The rest of the sentence, which named Tiggy, and the following sentence, which named Camilla, were missing. And so it was that anyone reading the Mirror that day might have been left with the impression that Diana believed Charles still intended to marry Camilla.

It would have taken a considerable leap of imagination  or inside knowledge of Diana's state of mind  to understand she was pointing her finger at the boys' nanny instead.

Burrell, when interviewed the following May, said he did not know what had prompted Diana to write the note. He had never seen or heard any evidence to substantiate it. And he handed over the original note to the Paget team.

The contents went far beyond the Mirror scoop. It not only included the passages naming Tiggy and Camilla but a further section, the Mail can reveal, in which Diana made observations about the Royal Family and the future of the monarchy.

It was no less than sensational, according to sources, and would still cause embarrassment today.

When it appeared in December 2006, the 832-page Paget report made only passing reference to Diana's claims made in the Burrell note.

'Paget had found no evidence to support Diana's expressed fears at that time, October 1995,' said a source. 'The note did not materially affect the conspiracy investigation.'

The authors also declined to name the woman (Tiggy) whom Diana accused Charles of wanting to marry in the Burrell note. Much to the fury of Al Fayed, Operation Paget confirmed the findings of an earlier French inquiry that the deaths were caused by a drunk chauffeur who lost control of his speeding car in a Paris underpass. This week Al Fayed, now 92, politely declined to comment.

The unexpurgated text of the 'Tiggy and Camilla' part of the Burrell note was not made public until December 2007, in evidence at Diana and Dodi's inquest. In April 2008 the jury returned a narrative verdict of 'unlawful killing [due to the] grossly negligent driving of the following vehicles and of the Mercedes.'

Why did the investigators take so long after the launch of Paget to confront Charles with the full contents of the note? Almost two years had passed.

'It was the natural sequence of events,' Stevens said. 'Yes, allegations had been made about the Prince of Wales and other royals but we had to find or examine the [existing] evidence before we approached him with formal questions . . . We found no other evidence to support the scenario suggested in Diana's note.

'We were left with the note, which in itself was not enough to make Charles a formal suspect. If he chose to assist Paget, he would be doing so voluntarily as a potential witness. We would not be interviewing him under caution.'

Charles could have declined to co-operate in any way. His father, Prince Philip, whom Al Fayed had accused of being a driving force in the alleged murder plot, had done just that, the Mail can reveal.

When Paget wrote to Philip to ask if he would like to comment on the allegations made against him, his written reply ran to just three words: 'No thank you.'

Now it was down to Charles to explain what he thought about a note that painted him as a murderous monster.

'Why do you think Princess Diana wrote this note, Sir?' When Charles was asked the killer question about Princess Diana note' to Paul Burrell alleging the Prince wanted her dead

By Richard Pendlebury and Stephen Wright for the Daily Mail

For Lord Stevens, the stakes could not have been higher.

'The interview was unique. Of course it was a unique situation,' he recalls to the Mail. 'But we approached it as we would any other witness.' Up to a point.

Although it was reported at the time that Stevens met Charles the circumstances and detail of the interrogation have never been revealed  until now.

It began with a letter from Stevens to Charles via the Prince's private secretary, Sir Michael Peat.

To prevent leaks and unwanted publicity and speculation it was agreed, on the Palace side, that only Charles and Sir Michael should know the meeting was to take place. No one in the Paget team would have knowledge of the event except for Lord Stevens and his senior investigator, DCS Dave Douglas.

Here was an interesting clash of outlooks. Douglas was a 48-year-old, working-class Geordie who, while a dutiful officer, had no time for the monarchy; any monarchy. In fact, while he greatly admired the Queen as a person, he was a republican at heart.

The Mail understands he would not have been terribly upset if Paget had in fact uncovered evidence of a royal plot against Diana. Indeed, he would have relished his role in such an iconoclastic situation.

Although it was reported at the time that Lord Stevens met Prince Charles (pictured) the detail of the interrogation on December 5, 2005, have never been revealed  until now

On December 6, 2005, Charles had a busy schedule with engagements throughout the afternoon and a reception for the Prince's Regeneration Trust evening.

The one engagement that did not appear in the Court Circular was the meeting with Paget's two most senior detectives.

They arrived at the Palace in Stevens's official BMW and were met in a courtyard by Sir Michael. The two investigators were led into the main building where preparations for the approaching Christmas season were evident.

They passed one dining room in which a table had been set with crackers and party hats for a festive staff lunch, a sight that contrasted with the seriousness of their own purpose.

On reaching the Prince's drawing room, Sir Michael left them to fetch the Prince. There was an unspoken tension; the sense of a new frontier and potential for embarrassment. But also a determination to follow professional procedure, as well as to observe ancient protocols.

These trepidations were dispelled a little when Charles arrived, with smiles and handshakes; as if he wasn't about to discuss whether or not he had plotted to kill his ex-wife.

'It's nice to see you again, Lord Stevens,' he said. And turning to Douglas: 'How is the inquiry going? What is it you want us to do today?'

The doors were closed. Sir Michael stayed in the room. The investigators sat on a sofa facing the Prince, who was seated in an armchair, with his private secretary on a sofa beside him. More small talk followed, pleasantries and general inquiries. Then they got down to business.

The interview began with Stevens producing a copy of Diana's note to Burrell and reading it aloud. In doing so, he repeated Diana's allegation that the Prince had wanted to harm or kill his wife and dump his then mistress (Charles had married Camilla in April 2005, only eight months before the Stevens' interview took place) so that he could wed the nanny of his two sons.

A moment of silent contemplation, the ticking of a clock and then Stevens' first question: 'Why do you think the Princess wrote this note, Sir?'

Charles replied: 'I did not know anything about [the note] until it was published in the media.'

'[So], you didn't discuss this note with her, Sir?

'No, I did not know it existed.'

'Do you know why the Princess had these feelings, Sir?'

'No, I don't.'

More questions.

The interview began with Lord Stevens reading Diana's note (pictured) to Burrell, where she alleged the Prince had wanted to harm or kill his wife and dump his then mistress

Charles was polite, engaged but unable, it seemed, to throw light upon what lay behind the note. The interview concluded with the question that is always asked at this juncture in a witness interview, whether the witness be a commoner or future king. 'Is there anything else you would like to tell me, Sir?'

'Nothing else, thank you,' said Prince Charles.

The questions and answers  slightly paraphrased here  had been taken down contemporaneously in longhand by Douglas. The following day a typed, two-page transcript of the interview statement was presented by Douglas to Sir Michael.

Prince Charles then checked and initialled each one of his answers. At the end of this unique document he inscribed his signature.

The document was returned to Paget with a covering letter from Sir Michael to confirm that Charles had indeed read the transcript of his statement and approved it.

The Mail understands that HRH's witness statement did not include the standard, concluding pledge-cum-warning that it was 'true to the best of my knowledge and belief and I make it knowing that, if it is tendered in evidence, I shall be liable to prosecution, if I have wilfully stated in it anything I know to be false, or do not believe to be true.'

It rather took the form of a statement of truth. 'He was the heir to the throne, after all,' says a Paget source. 'At the end of the day he was incredibly co-operative because he had nothing to hide,' says Stevens.

The original copy is no longer held by Scotland Yard  'it's too hot to handle. What commissioner would feel comfortable about being the custodian of that statement?' a source close to Paget commented.

AL FAYED'S PECULIAR POLICE GIFT Mohamed Al Fayed kept a close interest in Operation Paget's progress. Once a month, Lord Stevens or another senior member of the Paget team would meet him or his staff to provide an update. On a number of these occasions Al Fayed attempted to ply the chief investigator with gifts. At one of their first meetings, at Harrods, he presented Stevens with a plastic bag containing a pair of fresh stag's testicles, culled from the deer herd at his Highland estate. 'Eat them and they will give you strength and courage for your investigating,' he told Stevens. 'They will also improve your performance in the bedroom!' The Commissioner politely declined the present, as he did others offered by the tycoon  such as pills which Al Fayed claimed to be Viagra. Advertisement

Instead, it has been placed with other Paget-related documents in the National Archives at Kew, South-West London.

Under the 30-year rule, it will not be available for public examination until 2038. The location of the original Burrell note is not clear to the Paget team.

So what did give Diana cause to write such a note? What was it that led her to have such fears; that ultimately saw the heir to the throne being questioned by two detectives in the St James's Palace drawing room?

Was it the same 'reliable source' whose warnings were passed on to Lord Mishcon by the Princess?

Suspicion, not least by Lord Stevens, turns to one man; BBC journalist Martin Bashir and his fraudulent claims  revealed in detail by this newspaper  to successfully persuade Diana to give him an exclusive television interview in November 1995.

In several hours of interview with the Mail, Stevens made clear his regret that he and his Operation Paget team did not interview Bashir about his dealings with Diana in that period.

They would have done if they had known what they know now.

'If there'd been an allegation then that Bashir had produced allegedly fake documents to Princess Diana, which is a criminal offence, we'd have investigated it. My goodness me, we would have done,' he said.

'But this [aspect] has only come out recently, which is unfortunate. If we'd known at the time of Paget we would certainly have gone and seen him and interviewed him. And it would have been part and parcel of the inquiry to get to the bottom of it.'

He added: 'We don't know what Bashir was saying to Diana. But if he had put the fears in her mind which had caused her to write that note then that is what caused us to interview Charles.

'When we watched the Panorama interview at the start of the inquiry it didn't cross our mind that Bashir could have done anything fraudulent.

'After all, this was the BBC, this was their flagship programme and it was being broadcast to the world. There was nothing said in the interview we didn't know about by then. What we didn't know, of course, was how Bashir had managed to get it.'

Stevens confirmed that Paget did not interview Diana's brother, Earl Spencer. He told us: 'We weren't investigating the family and we didn't see Earl Spencer because of that.

'However, we did get an immense amount of information from [Diana's sister] Lady Sarah McCorquodale and Rosa Monckton [Diana's loyal friend], who were both very close to Diana. We got everything we needed from them.'

As revealed by the Mail, Earl Spencer alleges Bashir showed him fake bank statements to clinch an introduction to the Princess before his scoop interview.

And the Earl accused the rogue journalist, who recently resigned as BBC religious affairs editor, of making slanderous claims about senior royals as part of a 'web of deceit'.

He rejected the BBC's offer to take part in an inquiry into the allegations, saying he had no faith in its ability to investigate the alleged wrongdoing robustly or fairly.

Former Supreme Court judge Lord Dyson threw the book at the BBC for covering up a trail of deceit and forgery.

So what did give Diana (pictured) cause to write such a note? What was it that led her to have such fears; that ultimately saw the heir to the throne being questioned by two detectives?

Stevens said: 'Presumably Bashir would have been in communication with Diana in October 1995, leading up to the November TV interview, directly or possibly through Earl Spencer.

'Now we could never find any critical incident or event that led Princess Diana to be so paranoid at this time in 1995. So, at Paget, we just presumed that it was something she had imagined in her darker hours. And we did have witness statements saying she was sometimes likely to have 'wild thoughts' and that may well have been part of it.

'But I think my question, with hindsight  and I know the Paget team's question would be and we've discussed it  is this: 'Was Bashir aware of how fragile she was in the months leading to this interview? Or, did he say something to her through Earl Spencer or other channels that actually fed that paranoia?'

'Well, we don't know, to be frank, because until recently, we didn't know that Bashir had allegedly forged documents, which he'd used to convince her that people were out to get her.

'And we just thought that his interview with her was a straightforward arrangement giving her side of the marriage to Prince Charles. It may well be that Bashir stumbled across her at a vulnerable time in her life or he may have exacerbated her mental state or he may have generated that paranoia.

'We found no evidence to support her fears in the note. But maybe her fears were simply [based on] what Bashir had told her?

'If Paul Burrell had not disclosed that note in 2003, there would have been no reason to interview Charles.'

And if Bashir had not fed lies to Diana, would she have written the note at all?

More pertinently, would she have found herself hurtling into a Paris underpass to her death that fateful August night?

That is the question we will address on Monday, as witnesses from the night cast dramatic new light on a tragedy that defined an era.

My battle to save Princess Diana: First ever account of doctor's fight  in minute-by-minute testimony that destroys cruel smears she was allowed to die

By Richard Pendlebury, Stephen Wright and Rory Mulholland in Paris for the Daily Mail

MonSef Dahman works as a surgeon in the French Riviera town of Antibes, that 'billionaires' playground' which once charmed Picasso and F. Scott Fitzgerald and still attracts the Hollywood elite.

One of his specialities is treating the obese. Life is good there, his career fulfilling.

But there are particular times of year  the last day of August and then again on his son's birthday in November  when his thoughts darken; when they invariably return to an event which not only had a profound 'impact' on him personally but shocked the entire world.

'The thought that you have lost an important person, for whom you cared personally, marks you for life,' he says.

That is because for several hours in the early morning of Sunday, August 31, 1997, Dahman, the then young duty general surgeon in the biggest hospital in France, played a central role in the desperate fight to save the life of Diana, Princess of Wales. She had been critically injured in a car crash in the centre of Paris earlier that night.

In an exclusive interview, surgeon MonSef Dahman (pictured) has recalled how he was summoned to the Pitie-Salpetriere Hospital in Paris to attend to Diana, Princess of Wales

He has never spoken to a newspaper about this episode until now. But in an exclusive interview for this investigative series and forthcoming seven-part Mail+ podcast, he has recalled in dramatic and moving detail how he was summoned to the emergency department of the Pitie-Salpetriere Hospital in Paris to attend to a 'young woman' who turned out to be the most famous in the world.

Dahman, 56, also recalled a chilling story of his own experience of the perverse iconography and unscrupulous monetising of the Princess, even after her death.

One of his reasons for speaking now  he received no payment  was to reiterate how, in contradiction to the conspiracy theories which claimed they were somehow part of a murderous plot by the British Establishment, the French emergency medical staff involved that night made every conceivable effort to save Diana.

To suggest otherwise  as had been done by Mohamed Al Fayed and several lurid foreign magazines, among others  caused both bemusement and hurt.

A Parisian by birth, Dahman would not have been in his home city, let alone on duty, that night were he not about to become a father for second time.

Every August the French capital empties of those citizens who can afford to spend a month in the country or by the sea. If it were not for foreign tourists, the City of Light would be a ghost town.

'But I didn't take a vacation that summer,' he recalls to the Mail. 'For the extremely simple reason that my wife was pregnant with my son (they already had a daughter). As a result, I worked all summer.'

And work he did  long, long hours like the junior doctors and surgeons in our own NHS. His shift that weekend had started at 8am on Saturday.

He was still on duty at 2am the following morning, 'though of course it was not continuous activity. I did have moments of rest. In fact, if I remember correctly, it was a pretty easy day. I didn't have to deal with anything too difficult.'

That would change  dramatically. The Mercedes in which Diana was travelling crashed in the Alma tunnel at approximately 12.23am. Owing to the severity of her resulting injuries, she received lengthy treatment by doctors at the scene.

She then suffered a cardiac arrest while being moved to an ambulance. After being revived, she was transported by that ambulance to Dahman's hospital. She arrived there at 2.06am.

'I was resting in the duty room when I got a call from Bruno Riou, the senior duty anaesthetist, telling me to go to the emergency room,' Dahman recalls. 'I wasn't told it was Lady Diana, but [only] that there'd been a serious accident involving a young woman.

On August 31, 1997, Dahman played a central role in the desperate fight to save the life of Diana, who had been critically injured in a car crash in the centre of Paris (pictured)

'The organisation of the Pitie-Salpetriere hospital was very hierarchical. So when you got a call from [such] a high-level colleague that meant the case was particularly serious.' His rest room was only 50 metres from the accident and emergency department 'And so I got there fairly quickly. And then I realised the true seriousness of things.'

He recalls: 'My intern [his junior assistant] was in the room. But she was in a corner because she was a little overwhelmed by the gravity of the moment.' Riou was also present.

'That too was a sign of the special importance. And he was personally taking care of a lady who was lying on a stretcher, with a lot going on around her.'

Dahman, 33 at the time, was then informed that the unconscious figure on the stretcher was no less than Diana, Princess of Wales.

'It only took that moment for all this unusual activity to become clear to me,' he recalls with some understatement. 'For any doctor, any surgeon, it is of very great importance to be faced with such a young woman who is in this condition. But of course even more so if she is a princess.'

He was unwilling to describe certain aspects of the treatment she received at his hands, for reasons of patient confidentiality. The Mail has also chosen to excise certain details presented to the official inquiries into her death, but it is important to make clear how hard the team fought to save her life, and how desperate the circumstances.

Diana had been X-rayed on arrival at hospital. The resulting images of her chest showed she was suffering 'very serious internal bleeding'. As a result, she underwent a thoracic drain  excess fluid being removed from her chest cavity.

But haemorrhaging persisted and Diana was receiving transfusions of O-negative blood held in the emergency room, as her blood group had not yet been established

At around 2.15am she suffered another cardiac arrest. The situation had grown more critical. More extreme intervention was needed.

As she underwent external heart massage, Riou asked Dahman to perform a surgical procedure. He was to do so while Diana was still lying on the stretcher in the emergency room.

This circumstance was 'truly exceptional' and an indication of how parlous her situation had become. 'I did this (procedure) to enable her to breathe,' Dahman explains. 'Her heart couldn't function properly because it was lacking in blood.'

As a result of this intervention, Dahman discovered that Diana had suffered a significant tear in her pericardium, which protects the heart.

The prognosis worsened. It was now 2.30am. A miracle was needed. Dahman and Riou were joined in the emergency room by Professor Alain Pavie, perhaps France's top heart surgeon. He had been summoned from his bed at home. If anyone could save her, it was him.

Dahman, 56, also recalled a chilling story of his own experience of the perverse iconography and unscrupulous monetising of the Princess (pictured in Paris), even after her death

Pavie decided that Diana must be moved into one of the hospital's operating theatres. He suspected that the main source of her internal bleeding had not yet been found. Further surgical exploration was necessary.

It was this procedure that uncovered the most serious wound  a tear to Diana's upper-left pulmonary vein at the point of contact with the heart. Pavie sutured the lesion.

The most significant physical damage had been repaired. But to no avail. Diana's heart, which had stopped before the surgical exploration, would not restart. They were losing the battle to save her.

'We tried electric shocks, several times and, as I had done in the emergency room, cardiac massage,' says Dahman. 'Professor Riou had administered adrenaline. But we could not get her heart beating again.'

The team continued these resuscitation efforts for a full and ultimately fruitless hour.

'We fought hard, we tried a lot, really an awful lot. Frankly, when you are working in those conditions, you don't notice the passage of time,' says Dahman. 'The only thing that is important is that we do everything possible for this young woman.' He says he had felt hope at the start.

'We had people brought to Pitie-Salpetriere who were in a very poor state, more serious than Diana was when she arrived. It is one of the best centres in France for this type of trauma emergency. And we did save some of those people, which made us particularly happy and proud.

'But that did not happen here. We could not save her. And that affected us very much.'

At 4am the team, led by Pavie, accepted that no more could be done to revive their patient. It was a 'collegiate decision', Dahman recalls. They ceased all resuscitation efforts. The extraordinary life of Diana, Princess of Wales, had come to an end.

Several years later the esteemed British forensic pathologist Dr Richard Shepherd  who has been interviewed for this investigation's accompanying Mail+ podcast series  reviewed the medical evidence for the Paget inquiry into Diana's death, led by former Scotland Yard chief Lord Stevens.

Based on Dr Shepherd's expert opinion, Lord Stevens  who briefed Prince William and Prince Harry on his findings  concluded in his report: 'Those involved in the emergency treatment and surgery were highly qualified and experienced in their field. Their evidence showed that every effort was made to save the life of the Princess of Wales. No other strategy would have affected the outcome.'

D ahman could find no such consolation that fatal August night. On leaving the operating theatre he was both 'exhausted' and despondent. 'It is always a great disappointment to see someone young leave us,' he says.

'Also you suffer great physical fatigue because of the energy you have expended trying to save her. And so we were particularly shattered and tired. At the end, we were broken.'

He called his departmental boss to tell him what had happened  and to prepare him for the pandemonium that was likely to happen as a result  and then returned to the on-duty rest room.

He was too tired and low to take any notice of the French dignitaries  including President Chirac  who began to arrive at the hospital early that morning to pay their respects to Diana.

In the next days he was witness to an unpleasant and shaming aftermath. Some members of the media tried to infiltrate the wards and corridors to get close to those who had been treating Diana.

'Pitie-Salpetriere is a public hospital,' he says. 'The Princess was treated in a building where there were other hospital patients. We saw people disguising themselves [as medical staff], pushing trolleys, trying to get information. There was quite a lot of pressure on our security.'

One incident, which he has never spoken of before, sticks in his mind. 'When I was treating Diana I was wearing my white sabots [clog-like medical shoes]. And obviously in that situation you don't pay attention to anything but trying to save the patient. It was only the next morning I noticed that my clogs were stained with [her] blood.

'Anyway, the hospital is very large and I was walking between buildings, when a Frenchman, approached me and said, 'Ah, your clogs, I am interested in them. I want to buy them from you. They have the sang bleu [blue or royal blood] on them.'

Horrified, Dahman declined and as soon as possible cleaned the sabots he had worn that night: 'Which was the end of that story.'

But not the end for him.

'So here we have to consider the philosophy of life,' he says. 'It is a defining element, you can't escape that. The thought that you have lost an important person for whom you cared, marks you all your life.

'When it's a princess and you follow her funeral along with billions of other people, and you had tried to save her, that obviously marks you. It marks you all your life. Because it's so terrible that this beautiful person had such a tragic end.'

His own part in the tragedy nags at him. 'It varies according to what is going on in my life,' he says. 'When we get to August I think about it. It was the year my son was born and of course every anniversary of that I think about it.'

'I don't go back to it all the time because a lot of years have gone by. But every time a new book [about Diana's death] has come out [in France], it has been sent to me. So I have a collection of such books, unfortunately.'
A police chief today reveals why he was forced to quiz Prince Charles on allegations he plotted to kill Princess Diana.

Lord Stevens, a former head of Scotland Yard, says he had to 'follow the evidence' and question the prince over a note his ex-wife wrote claiming he was planning an accident in her car.

The unprecedented interview was conducted amid enormous secrecy at St James's Palace during a three-year investigation into Diana's death in a Paris car crash in 1997.

A crucial part of the probe was the note the princess had written predicting she would die through 'brake failure and serious head injury' so Charles could marry his sons' former nanny, Tiggy Legge-Bourke.

In the note Diana added: 'Camilla is nothing but a decoy so we are being used by the man in every sense of the word.'

Lord Stevens, a former head of Scotland Yard, says he had to question Prince Charles (pictured with Diana) over a note his ex-wife wrote claiming he was planning an accident in her car

The interview began with Lord Stevens reading Diana's note (pictured) to Burrell, where she alleged the Prince had wanted to harm or kill his wife and dump his then mistress

Lord Stevens today confirms he read out her incendiary words, which would later fuel conspiracy theories about her death, at his meeting with Charles on December 6, 2005.

At the time, he says, he and his team of detectives had no idea what had made Diana so concerned about her safety.

Charles, who was interviewed by Lord Stevens as a witness and not a suspect, could not explain why his ex-wife had penned the note in October 1995 and left it in the pantry of Kensington Palace for her butler Paul Burrell.

Nearly two years after it was written 36-year-old Diana, her boyfriend Dodi Al Fayed and their chauffeur Henri Paul were all killed when their Mercedes crashed in a tunnel in Paris.

Today Lord Stevens suggests that rogue ex-BBC journalist Martin Bashir, who allegedly used bogus papers to con the princess into granting him a scoop BBC Panorama interview in November 1995, may have exploited her vulnerability and made her paranoid about her security around the time she wrote the note.

In a joint interview with the Daily Mail and a seven part Mail+ podcast series on Diana's death, the former police chief expresses his regret that he and his officers did not interview Mr Bashir during his investigation, Operation Paget.

He says: 'If there'd been an allegation then that Bashir had produced allegedly fake documents to Princess Diana, which is a criminal offence, we'd have investigated it. My goodness me, we would have done. But this has only come out recently, which is unfortunate.

'If we'd known at the time of Paget we would certainly, certainly have gone and seen him and interviewed him. And it would have been part and parcel of the inquiry to get to the bottom of it.

Lord Stevens (pictured) today confirms he read out her incendiary words, which would later fuel conspiracy theories about her death, at his meeting with Charles on December 6, 2005

The unprecedented interview was conducted amid enormous secrecy at St James's Palace during a three-year investigation into Diana's death in a Paris car crash in 1997 (pictured)

'We don't know what Bashir was saying to Diana. But if he had put the fears in her mind which had caused her to write that note then that is what caused us to interview Charles. When we watched the Panorama interview at the start of the inquiry it didn't cross our mind that Bashir could have done anything fraudulent.

'After all, this was the BBC, this was their flagship programme and it was being broadcast to the world. There was nothing said in the interview we didn't know about by then. What we didn't know of course was how Bashir had managed to get it.'

Lord Stevens, who continued leading the Diana inquiry after he retired from the police in 2005, also tells the landmark Daily Mail series investigating her death:

Prince Charles initialled what was effectively a 'statement of truth' following his police interrogation in 2005;

The highly sensitive document has been filed at the National Archives in Kew and will not be made public until 2038;

The Duke of Edinburgh declined to be questioned over false claims made by Dodi's father Mohamed Al Fayed that he was a driving force in a murder conspiracy;

Witnesses told detectives that the princess was prone to 'wild thoughts';

A handwriting expert confirmed to Paget officers that Diana had definitely written the note she handed to Burrell, predicting her death;

Mr Al Fayed offered Lord Stevens extraordinary gifts during Operation Paget, including a pair of fresh stag's testicles culled from deer on one of his country estates and also Viagra, which the ex-Scotland Yard chief declined to accept.

In addition to Lord Stevens' explosive interview, the Mail today publishes the first British media interview with a French surgeon who was part of the hospital medical team that tried desperately to keep Diana alive.

Monsef Dahman performed surgery while she was still lying on her stretcher in the emergency room at the Paris hospital but her condition deteriorated and she was moved to an operating theatre.

'We tried electric shocks, several times,' says Dr Dahman. 'But we could not get her heart beating again.' He also reveals that he witnessed some members of the media trying to infiltrate the wards and corridors to get close to those who had been treating Diana.

The exclusive interviews with Lord Stevens and Dr Dahman are the first part of the Mail's ground-breaking new series on Diana's death, which will run into next week.

Our five-month investigation has taken us around the world and will feature dramatic new testimony from key figures including other police officers, medical staff, Diana's friends and ex staff.

This newspaper has had access to high level sources who have never spoken before and for the first time we will provide the inside story on Operation Paget, which saw Lord Stevens liaise with the British and American intelligence agencies as he sought the truth over the princess's death.

Secrecy surrounding Lord Stevens' interview with Charles was a matter of great frustration to former Harrods owner Mr Al Fayed, who in 2007 made a vain attempt to obtain transcripts.

In April 2008 an inquest returned a narrative verdict of 'unlawful killing [due to the] grossly negligent driving of the following vehicles and of the Mercedes'.

The inquest jury also specified Paul's drink driving and the lack of wearing of seatbelts.

Devastating truth of the last days of Diana: Full tragic story of Princess's death and its toxic aftermath is revealed in a landmark series with new testimony that redefines royal history

By Richard Pendlebury and Stephen Wright for the Daily Mail

They were the words of a ghost, a message from the grave; written by a troubled, even frightened Princess, mother to a future king, who had been told by an unscrupulous BBC journalist eager to get a scoop that she was the target of an Establishment plot.

Now, eight years after the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, a copy of an incendiary note she penned to her butler is being recited by a tall, grey-haired peer of the realm to an audience of three other middle-aged men in a private drawing room on the first floor of St James's Palace. Nobody else knows that the gathering is taking place.

'I am sitting here at my desk today in October, longing for someone to hug me and encourage me to keep strong and hold my head high,' the peer begins to intone.

'This particular phase in my life is the most dangerous  my husband is planning an accident in my car. Brake failure and serious head injury in order to make the path clear for him to marry Tiggy.

'Camilla is nothing but a decoy so we are being used by the man in every sense of the word.'

Lord Stevens of Kirkwhelpington, who until a few months before was Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, has finished reading what is on the paper in his hand. He looks up and meets the eye of the man sitting in an armchair across the room.

This unprecedented meeting, which has never been described before (despite legal attempts to bring the transcript and notes into the public domain) took place at 5.15pm on Tuesday, December 6, 2005.

Eight years after the death of Diana, Princess of Wales (pictured with Charles), a copy of an incendiary note she penned to her butler was recited in a drawing room in St James's Palace

Cover of darkness suited both parties, sources have told the Mail. The subject to be discussed was nothing less than sensational; certainly highly embarrassing if not damaging to the monarchy.

Why such secrecy? Because this was to be a police interview rather than a conversation; an interview in which Prince Charles would be asked, to his face, about his complicity or otherwise in an alleged conspiracy to murder his estranged wife, Diana, Princess of Wales.

Nothing like this had happened before. It was the task of a modern high official  Lord Stevens  to question the heir to the throne about the death of the mother of his children; a seismic, epoch-defining tragedy of global interest, the ramifications of which inform what is happening today within the Royal Family, notably the rift between Buckingham Palace and Diana's younger son Prince Harry and his American wife Meghan.

July 1 this year marks the 60th anniversary of Diana's birth. She died, aged 36, following a crash in a tunnel in Paris in the early hours of August 31, 1997. She has been dead for a generation and remains forever young, lovely and enigmatic.

Those under the age of 35 will have little appreciation of her iconic status in the 1980s and 1990s; the aura surrounding the shy beauty who had transformed the 'stuffy and staid' image of the monarchy; the 'Di-mania' and worldwide fascination with the 'fairy tale' that went so wrong. Nor the impact of her passing.

Those alive then can recall today where they were when they heard the shocking news. And the manner of Diana's passing led to a host of conspiracy theories that are with us to this day.

The debate about factors that may have contributed to the death crash has re-intensified after publication last month of the damning 'Dyson report' into how the BBC's former star reporter Martin Bashir conned the Princess into granting his scoop Panorama interview with her in 1995.

Prince William has said the BBC's failures contributed to his mother's 'fear, paranoia and isolation' in her final years, while Prince Harry said the 'ripple effect of the culture of exploitation and unethical practices ultimately took her life'.

Diana's brother Earl Spencer went a stage further, saying he could 'draw a line' between his sister meeting Bashir in 1995 and her tragic accident in Paris two years later.

Today, the Mail begins a major investigative series into that fatal summer weekend, which will draw on new eyewitness accounts and personal recollections, as well as thousands of official documents and records.

Many of those interviewed have never spoken before in such vivid or personal detail. Among them is Lord Stevens, perhaps the foremost expert on the tragedy, having led the three-year British investigation into Diana's death.

For the first time he gives the inside story on his probe  codenamed Operation Paget  which took him into royal palaces and secret service headquarters and into conflict with conspiracy theorist in chief, Mohamed Al Fayed, whose son Dodi, Diana's then boyfriend, also died in the Paris crash, along with their Mercedes driver Henri Paul.

These testimonies present a forensic, compelling and revelatory narrative on the death of Diana, told by those who knew her or who were with her during her final days, hours, or even minutes.

And we will hear from those whose professional duties saw them play a lead role in the toxic aftermath, the legacy of which remains with us today.

On December 6, 2005, Lord Stevens met Prince Charles in a meeting to ask Prince Charles about his complicity in an alleged conspiracy to murder his estranged wife (both pictured)

Now, we can tell for the first time the inside story of one of Operation Paget's most extraordinary episodes: the moment a future monarch was asked why his former wife had suspected him of plotting her murder.

In January 2004 John Stevens was still head of Scotland Yard. He and a small team of police officers were tasked by then Royal Coroner Michael Burgess to begin an investigation which would be codenamed Operation Paget.

Their remit was to examine forensically more than 100 different allegations concerning an alleged Establishment murder plot that resulted in Diana's death, and the subsequent alleged cover-up of evidence.

These conspiracy theories had been most loudly disseminated by Al Fayed, the Egyptian owner of Harrods and the Ritz hotel in Paris. Without his tireless campaigning, the inquiry was unlikely ever to have been established.

His allegations of Buckingham Palace and MI6 complicity in the fatal crash would have carried little or no weight, were it not for two intriguing documents that seemed to foretell the circumstances of Diana's death.

The more significant of these was the aforementioned note, handwritten by Diana and left for her butler, Paul Burrell, in his pantry at Kensington Palace in October 1995, almost two years before she died.

It presented a head-spinning scenario. Diana apparently believed that Charles, from whom she was at that time separated but not yet divorced, intended to seriously injure or kill her in a car crash caused by mechanical sabotage.

He would then be free to marry again. The 'Tiggy' referred to in the note was Tiggy Legge-Bourke, the well-connected, unmarried 30-year-old who since 1993 had been nanny to Princes William and Harry.

(Diana resented her. In the months following the writing of the Burrell note it would be rumoured that Ms Legge-Bourke had become pregnant with Charles's child and had an abortion. Diana was reported to have been a source of this false allegation.)

Camilla, with whom Charles had been conducting an affair during his marriage to Diana, was to be cast aside, like his wife, in favour of the younger woman. Or so Diana predicted in the note.

Similar concerns  about her own safety, the possibility of a car accident and the motive behind deliberate sabotage  were made by Diana in a meeting with the lawyer Lord Mishcon on October 30, 1995.

It is perhaps no coincidence that, in the preceding weeks, she had been meeting Bashir, who we now know was feeding Diana a web of lies about Charles and the Royal Family.

S he informed Mishcon that she had been told by 'reliable' sources that efforts would be made to get rid of her, and Camilla would also be 'put aside'. She would not identify these 'sources' to Mishcon, who did not take her fears too seriously at the time.

Nevertheless, he made a note of her comments, which he passed on to the then Met Commissioner Sir Paul Condon in the wake of her death. Mishcon would be twice interviewed by Paget.

The Mail has been told Paget considered the Burrell note to be more important as potential evidence because it was written by Diana herself and was not a third-party account of a conversation.

Its authenticity would continue to be questioned by some of Diana's friends and staff who claimed Burrell had been able to mimic the Princess's style for Christmas cards.

But the Paget team had the letter examined by a handwriting expert. Stevens told the Mail he was satisfied it was the 'absolutely genuine' article.

Nevertheless, the existence of this note was kept secret by Burrell for eight years; even in January 2001, when police raided his home at 6.50am looking for items he had allegedly stolen from Diana's estate, the note was not among artefacts they discovered then.

The butler was subsequently charged with the theft of more than 300 of Diana's personal possessions. The first jury at his 2002 trial was discharged for legal reasons.

After a second jury was selected, the case collapsed following a remarkable intervention of the Queen, who informed the prosecution that Burrell had told her shortly after Diana's death that he planned to take many of her papers for safekeeping.

The unprecedented meeting has never been described before (despite legal attempts to bring the transcript and notes into the public domain). Pictured: Charles and Diana in February 1987

In October 2003 the butler cashed in on his most sensational possession. Having made a deal with Burrell, reported to be worth at least 400,000, the Daily Mirror newspaper ran a front page 'world exclusive' on the note and its contents.

In fact, the Mirror published only part of the text of the note. And a misleading part it was too. Presumably for legal reasons, the Mirror version ended with the words 'make the path clear for him to marry'.

The rest of the sentence, which named Tiggy, and the following sentence, which named Camilla, were missing. And so it was that anyone reading the Mirror that day might have been left with the impression that Diana believed Charles still intended to marry Camilla.

It would have taken a considerable leap of imagination  or inside knowledge of Diana's state of mind  to understand she was pointing her finger at the boys' nanny instead.

Burrell, when interviewed the following May, said he did not know what had prompted Diana to write the note. He had never seen or heard any evidence to substantiate it. And he handed over the original note to the Paget team.

The contents went far beyond the Mirror scoop. It not only included the passages naming Tiggy and Camilla but a further section, the Mail can reveal, in which Diana made observations about the Royal Family and the future of the monarchy.

It was no less than sensational, according to sources, and would still cause embarrassment today.

When it appeared in December 2006, the 832-page Paget report made only passing reference to Diana's claims made in the Burrell note.

'Paget had found no evidence to support Diana's expressed fears at that time, October 1995,' said a source. 'The note did not materially affect the conspiracy investigation.'

The authors also declined to name the woman (Tiggy) whom Diana accused Charles of wanting to marry in the Burrell note. Much to the fury of Al Fayed, Operation Paget confirmed the findings of an earlier French inquiry that the deaths were caused by a drunk chauffeur who lost control of his speeding car in a Paris underpass. This week Al Fayed, now 92, politely declined to comment.

The unexpurgated text of the 'Tiggy and Camilla' part of the Burrell note was not made public until December 2007, in evidence at Diana and Dodi's inquest. In April 2008 the jury returned a narrative verdict of 'unlawful killing [due to the] grossly negligent driving of the following vehicles and of the Mercedes.'

Why did the investigators take so long after the launch of Paget to confront Charles with the full contents of the note? Almost two years had passed.

'It was the natural sequence of events,' Stevens said. 'Yes, allegations had been made about the Prince of Wales and other royals but we had to find or examine the [existing] evidence before we approached him with formal questions . . . We found no other evidence to support the scenario suggested in Diana's note.

'We were left with the note, which in itself was not enough to make Charles a formal suspect. If he chose to assist Paget, he would be doing so voluntarily as a potential witness. We would not be interviewing him under caution.'

Charles could have declined to co-operate in any way. His father, Prince Philip, whom Al Fayed had accused of being a driving force in the alleged murder plot, had done just that, the Mail can reveal.

When Paget wrote to Philip to ask if he would like to comment on the allegations made against him, his written reply ran to just three words: 'No thank you.'

Now it was down to Charles to explain what he thought about a note that painted him as a murderous monster.

'Why do you think Princess Diana wrote this note, Sir?' When Charles was asked the killer question about Princess Diana note' to Paul Burrell alleging the Prince wanted her dead

By Richard Pendlebury and Stephen Wright for the Daily Mail

For Lord Stevens, the stakes could not have been higher.

'The interview was unique. Of course it was a unique situation,' he recalls to the Mail. 'But we approached it as we would any other witness.' Up to a point.

Although it was reported at the time that Stevens met Charles the circumstances and detail of the interrogation have never been revealed  until now.

It began with a letter from Stevens to Charles via the Prince's private secretary, Sir Michael Peat.

To prevent leaks and unwanted publicity and speculation it was agreed, on the Palace side, that only Charles and Sir Michael should know the meeting was to take place. No one in the Paget team would have knowledge of the event except for Lord Stevens and his senior investigator, DCS Dave Douglas.

Here was an interesting clash of outlooks. Douglas was a 48-year-old, working-class Geordie who, while a dutiful officer, had no time for the monarchy; any monarchy. In fact, while he greatly admired the Queen as a person, he was a republican at heart.

The Mail understands he would not have been terribly upset if Paget had in fact uncovered evidence of a royal plot against Diana. Indeed, he would have relished his role in such an iconoclastic situation.

Although it was reported at the time that Lord Stevens met Prince Charles (pictured) the detail of the interrogation on December 5, 2005, have never been revealed  until now

On December 6, 2005, Charles had a busy schedule with engagements throughout the afternoon and a reception for the Prince's Regeneration Trust evening.

The one engagement that did not appear in the Court Circular was the meeting with Paget's two most senior detectives.

They arrived at the Palace in Stevens's official BMW and were met in a courtyard by Sir Michael. The two investigators were led into the main building where preparations for the approaching Christmas season were evident.

They passed one dining room in which a table had been set with crackers and party hats for a festive staff lunch, a sight that contrasted with the seriousness of their own purpose.

On reaching the Prince's drawing room, Sir Michael left them to fetch the Prince. There was an unspoken tension; the sense of a new frontier and potential for embarrassment. But also a determination to follow professional procedure, as well as to observe ancient protocols.

These trepidations were dispelled a little when Charles arrived, with smiles and handshakes; as if he wasn't about to discuss whether or not he had plotted to kill his ex-wife.

'It's nice to see you again, Lord Stevens,' he said. And turning to Douglas: 'How is the inquiry going? What is it you want us to do today?'

The doors were closed. Sir Michael stayed in the room. The investigators sat on a sofa facing the Prince, who was seated in an armchair, with his private secretary on a sofa beside him. More small talk followed, pleasantries and general inquiries. Then they got down to business.

The interview began with Stevens producing a copy of Diana's note to Burrell and reading it aloud. In doing so, he repeated Diana's allegation that the Prince had wanted to harm or kill his wife and dump his then mistress (Charles had married Camilla in April 2005, only eight months before the Stevens' interview took place) so that he could wed the nanny of his two sons.

A moment of silent contemplation, the ticking of a clock and then Stevens' first question: 'Why do you think the Princess wrote this note, Sir?'

Charles replied: 'I did not know anything about [the note] until it was published in the media.'

'[So], you didn't discuss this note with her, Sir?

'No, I did not know it existed.'

'Do you know why the Princess had these feelings, Sir?'

'No, I don't.'

More questions.

Charles was polite, engaged but unable, it seemed, to throw light upon what lay behind the note. The interview concluded with the question that is always asked at this juncture in a witness interview, whether the witness be a commoner or future king. 'Is there anything else you would like to tell me, Sir?'

'Nothing else, thank you,' said Prince Charles.

The questions and answers  slightly paraphrased here  had been taken down contemporaneously in longhand by Douglas. The following day a typed, two-page transcript of the interview statement was presented by Douglas to Sir Michael.

Prince Charles then checked and initialled each one of his answers. At the end of this unique document he inscribed his signature.

The document was returned to Paget with a covering letter from Sir Michael to confirm that Charles had indeed read the transcript of his statement and approved it.

The Mail understands that HRH's witness statement did not include the standard, concluding pledge-cum-warning that it was 'true to the best of my knowledge and belief and I make it knowing that, if it is tendered in evidence, I shall be liable to prosecution, if I have wilfully stated in it anything I know to be false, or do not believe to be true.'

It rather took the form of a statement of truth. 'He was the heir to the throne, after all,' says a Paget source. 'At the end of the day he was incredibly co-operative because he had nothing to hide,' says Stevens.

The original copy is no longer held by Scotland Yard  'it's too hot to handle. What commissioner would feel comfortable about being the custodian of that statement?' a source close to Paget commented.

AL FAYED'S PECULIAR POLICE GIFT Mohamed Al Fayed kept a close interest in Operation Paget's progress. Once a month, Lord Stevens or another senior member of the Paget team would meet him or his staff to provide an update. On a number of these occasions Al Fayed attempted to ply the chief investigator with gifts. At one of their first meetings, at Harrods, he presented Stevens with a plastic bag containing a pair of fresh stag's testicles, culled from the deer herd at his Highland estate. 'Eat them and they will give you strength and courage for your investigating,' he told Stevens. 'They will also improve your performance in the bedroom!' The Commissioner politely declined the present, as he did others offered by the tycoon  such as pills which Al Fayed claimed to be Viagra. Advertisement

Instead, it has been placed with other Paget-related documents in the National Archives at Kew, South-West London.

Under the 30-year rule, it will not be available for public examination until 2038. The location of the original Burrell note is not clear to the Paget team.

So what did give Diana cause to write such a note? What was it that led her to have such fears; that ultimately saw the heir to the throne being questioned by two detectives in the St James's Palace drawing room?

Was it the same 'reliable source' whose warnings were passed on to Lord Mishcon by the Princess?

Suspicion, not least by Lord Stevens, turns to one man; BBC journalist Martin Bashir and his fraudulent claims  revealed in detail by this newspaper  to successfully persuade Diana to give him an exclusive television interview in November 1995.

In several hours of interview with the Mail, Stevens made clear his regret that he and his Operation Paget team did not interview Bashir about his dealings with Diana in that period.

They would have done if they had known what they know now.

'If there'd been an allegation then that Bashir had produced allegedly fake documents to Princess Diana, which is a criminal offence, we'd have investigated it. My goodness me, we would have done,' he said.

'But this [aspect] has only come out recently, which is unfortunate. If we'd known at the time of Paget we would certainly have gone and seen him and interviewed him. And it would have been part and parcel of the inquiry to get to the bottom of it.'

He added: 'We don't know what Bashir was saying to Diana. But if he had put the fears in her mind which had caused her to write that note then that is what caused us to interview Charles.

'When we watched the Panorama interview at the start of the inquiry it didn't cross our mind that Bashir could have done anything fraudulent.

'After all, this was the BBC, this was their flagship programme and it was being broadcast to the world. There was nothing said in the interview we didn't know about by then. What we didn't know, of course, was how Bashir had managed to get it.'

Stevens confirmed that Paget did not interview Diana's brother, Earl Spencer. He told us: 'We weren't investigating the family and we didn't see Earl Spencer because of that.

'However, we did get an immense amount of information from [Diana's sister] Lady Sarah McCorquodale and Rosa Monckton [Diana's loyal friend], who were both very close to Diana. We got everything we needed from them.'

As revealed by the Mail, Earl Spencer alleges Bashir showed him fake bank statements to clinch an introduction to the Princess before his scoop interview.

And the Earl accused the rogue journalist, who recently resigned as BBC religious affairs editor, of making slanderous claims about senior royals as part of a 'web of deceit'.

He rejected the BBC's offer to take part in an inquiry into the allegations, saying he had no faith in its ability to investigate the alleged wrongdoing robustly or fairly.

Former Supreme Court judge Lord Dyson threw the book at the BBC for covering up a trail of deceit and forgery.

So what did give Diana (pictured) cause to write such a note? What was it that led her to have such fears; that ultimately saw the heir to the throne being questioned by two detectives?

Stevens said: 'Presumably Bashir would have been in communication with Diana in October 1995, leading up to the November TV interview, directly or possibly through Earl Spencer.

'Now we could never find any critical incident or event that led Princess Diana to be so paranoid at this time in 1995. So, at Paget, we just presumed that it was something she had imagined in her darker hours. And we did have witness statements saying she was sometimes likely to have 'wild thoughts' and that may well have been part of it.

'But I think my question, with hindsight  and I know the Paget team's question would be and we've discussed it  is this: 'Was Bashir aware of how fragile she was in the months leading to this interview? Or, did he say something to her through Earl Spencer or other channels that actually fed that paranoia?'

'Well, we don't know, to be frank, because until recently, we didn't know that Bashir had allegedly forged documents, which he'd used to convince her that people were out to get her.

'And we just thought that his interview with her was a straightforward arrangement giving her side of the marriage to Prince Charles. It may well be that Bashir stumbled across her at a vulnerable time in her life or he may have exacerbated her mental state or he may have generated that paranoia.

'We found no evidence to support her fears in the note. But maybe her fears were simply [based on] what Bashir had told her?

'If Paul Burrell had not disclosed that note in 2003, there would have been no reason to interview Charles.'

And if Bashir had not fed lies to Diana, would she have written the note at all?

More pertinently, would she have found herself hurtling into a Paris underpass to her death that fateful August night?

That is the question we will address on Monday, as witnesses from the night cast dramatic new light on a tragedy that defined an era.

My battle to save Princess Diana: First ever account of doctor's fight  in minute-by-minute testimony that destroys cruel smears she was allowed to die

By Richard Pendlebury, Stephen Wright and Rory Mulholland in Paris for the Daily Mail

MonSef Dahman works as a surgeon in the French Riviera town of Antibes, that 'billionaires' playground' which once charmed Picasso and F. Scott Fitzgerald and still attracts the Hollywood elite.

One of his specialities is treating the obese. Life is good there, his career fulfilling.

But there are particular times of year  the last day of August and then again on his son's birthday in November  when his thoughts darken; when they invariably return to an event which not only had a profound 'impact' on him personally but shocked the entire world.

'The thought that you have lost an important person, for whom you cared personally, marks you for life,' he says.

That is because for several hours in the early morning of Sunday, August 31, 1997, Dahman, the then young duty general surgeon in the biggest hospital in France, played a central role in the desperate fight to save the life of Diana, Princess of Wales. She had been critically injured in a car crash in the centre of Paris earlier that night.

In an exclusive interview, surgeon MonSef Dahman (pictured) has recalled how he was summoned to the Pitie-Salpetriere Hospital in Paris to attend to Diana, Princess of Wales

He has never spoken to a newspaper about this episode until now. But in an exclusive interview for this investigative series and forthcoming seven-part Mail+ podcast, he has recalled in dramatic and moving detail how he was summoned to the emergency department of the Pitie-Salpetriere Hospital in Paris to attend to a 'young woman' who turned out to be the most famous in the world.

Dahman, 56, also recalled a chilling story of his own experience of the perverse iconography and unscrupulous monetising of the Princess, even after her death.

One of his reasons for speaking now  he received no payment  was to reiterate how, in contradiction to the conspiracy theories which claimed they were somehow part of a murderous plot by the British Establishment, the French emergency medical staff involved that night made every conceivable effort to save Diana.

To suggest otherwise  as had been done by Mohamed Al Fayed and several lurid foreign magazines, among others  caused both bemusement and hurt.

A Parisian by birth, Dahman would not have been in his home city, let alone on duty, that night were he not about to become a father for second time.

Every August the French capital empties of those citizens who can afford to spend a month in the country or by the sea. If it were not for foreign tourists, the City of Light would be a ghost town.

'But I didn't take a vacation that summer,' he recalls to the Mail. 'For the extremely simple reason that my wife was pregnant with my son (they already had a daughter). As a result, I worked all summer.'

And work he did  long, long hours like the junior doctors and surgeons in our own NHS. His shift that weekend had started at 8am on Saturday.

He was still on duty at 2am the following morning, 'though of course it was not continuous activity. I did have moments of rest. In fact, if I remember correctly, it was a pretty easy day. I didn't have to deal with anything too difficult.'

That would change  dramatically. The Mercedes in which Diana was travelling crashed in the Alma tunnel at approximately 12.23am. Owing to the severity of her resulting injuries, she received lengthy treatment by doctors at the scene.

She then suffered a cardiac arrest while being moved to an ambulance. After being revived, she was transported by that ambulance to Dahman's hospital. She arrived there at 2.06am.

'I was resting in the duty room when I got a call from Bruno Riou, the senior duty anaesthetist, telling me to go to the emergency room,' Dahman recalls. 'I wasn't told it was Lady Diana, but [only] that there'd been a serious accident involving a young woman.

On August 31, 1997, Dahman played a central role in the desperate fight to save the life of Diana, who had been critically injured in a car crash in the centre of Paris (pictured)

'The organisation of the Pitie-Salpetriere hospital was very hierarchical. So when you got a call from [such] a high-level colleague that meant the case was particularly serious.' His rest room was only 50 metres from the accident and emergency department 'And so I got there fairly quickly. And then I realised the true seriousness of things.'

He recalls: 'My intern [his junior assistant] was in the room. But she was in a corner because she was a little overwhelmed by the gravity of the moment.' Riou was also present.

'That too was a sign of the special importance. And he was personally taking care of a lady who was lying on a stretcher, with a lot going on around her.'

Dahman, 33 at the time, was then informed that the unconscious figure on the stretcher was no less than Diana, Princess of Wales.

'It only took that moment for all this unusual activity to become clear to me,' he recalls with some understatement. 'For any doctor, any surgeon, it is of very great importance to be faced with such a young woman who is in this condition. But of course even more so if she is a princess.'

He was unwilling to describe certain aspects of the treatment she received at his hands, for reasons of patient confidentiality. The Mail has also chosen to excise certain details presented to the official inquiries into her death, but it is important to make clear how hard the team fought to save her life, and how desperate the circumstances.

Diana had been X-rayed on arrival at hospital. The resulting images of her chest showed she was suffering 'very serious internal bleeding'. As a result, she underwent a thoracic drain  excess fluid being removed from her chest cavity.

But haemorrhaging persisted and Diana was receiving transfusions of O-negative blood held in the emergency room, as her blood group had not yet been established

At around 2.15am she suffered another cardiac arrest. The situation had grown more critical. More extreme intervention was needed.

As she underwent external heart massage, Riou asked Dahman to perform a surgical procedure. He was to do so while Diana was still lying on the stretcher in the emergency room.

This circumstance was 'truly exceptional' and an indication of how parlous her situation had become. 'I did this (procedure) to enable her to breathe,' Dahman explains. 'Her heart couldn't function properly because it was lacking in blood.'

As a result of this intervention, Dahman discovered that Diana had suffered a significant tear in her pericardium, which protects the heart.

The prognosis worsened. It was now 2.30am. A miracle was needed. Dahman and Riou were joined in the emergency room by Professor Alain Pavie, perhaps France's top heart surgeon. He had been summoned from his bed at home. If anyone could save her, it was him.

Dahman, 56, also recalled a chilling story of his own experience of the perverse iconography and unscrupulous monetising of the Princess (pictured in Paris), even after her death

Pavie decided that Diana must be moved into one of the hospital's operating theatres. He suspected that the main source of her internal bleeding had not yet been found. Further surgical exploration was necessary.

It was this procedure that uncovered the most serious wound  a tear to Diana's upper-left pulmonary vein at the point of contact with the heart. Pavie sutured the lesion.

The most significant physical damage had been repaired. But to no avail. Diana's heart, which had stopped before the surgical exploration, would not restart. They were losing the battle to save her.

'We tried electric shocks, several times and, as I had done in the emergency room, cardiac massage,' says Dahman. 'Professor Riou had administered adrenaline. But we could not get her heart beating again.'

The team continued these resuscitation efforts for a full and ultimately fruitless hour.

'We fought hard, we tried a lot, really an awful lot. Frankly, when you are working in those conditions, you don't notice the passage of time,' says Dahman. 'The only thing that is important is that we do everything possible for this young woman.' He says he had felt hope at the start.

'We had people brought to Pitie-Salpetriere who were in a very poor state, more serious than Diana was when she arrived. It is one of the best centres in France for this type of trauma emergency. And we did save some of those people, which made us particularly happy and proud.

'But that did not happen here. We could not save her. And that affected us very much.'

At 4am the team, led by Pavie, accepted that no more could be done to revive their patient. It was a 'collegiate decision', Dahman recalls. They ceased all resuscitation efforts. The extraordinary life of Diana, Princess of Wales, had come to an end.

Several years later the esteemed British forensic pathologist Dr Richard Shepherd  who has been interviewed for this investigation's accompanying Mail+ podcast series  reviewed the medical evidence for the Paget inquiry into Diana's death, led by former Scotland Yard chief Lord Stevens.

Based on Dr Shepherd's expert opinion, Lord Stevens  who briefed Prince William and Prince Harry on his findings  concluded in his report: 'Those involved in the emergency treatment and surgery were highly qualified and experienced in their field. Their evidence showed that every effort was made to save the life of the Princess of Wales. No other strategy would have affected the outcome.'

D ahman could find no such consolation that fatal August night. On leaving the operating theatre he was both 'exhausted' and despondent. 'It is always a great disappointment to see someone young leave us,' he says.

'Also you suffer great physical fatigue because of the energy you have expended trying to save her. And so we were particularly shattered and tired. At the end, we were broken.'

He called his departmental boss to tell him what had happened  and to prepare him for the pandemonium that was likely to happen as a result  and then returned to the on-duty rest room.

He was too tired and low to take any notice of the French dignitaries  including President Chirac  who began to arrive at the hospital early that morning to pay their respects to Diana.

In the next days he was witness to an unpleasant and shaming aftermath. Some members of the media tried to infiltrate the wards and corridors to get close to those who had been treating Diana.

'Pitie-Salpetriere is a public hospital,' he says. 'The Princess was treated in a building where there were other hospital patients. We saw people disguising themselves [as medical staff], pushing trolleys, trying to get information. There was quite a lot of pressure on our security.'

One incident, which he has never spoken of before, sticks in his mind. 'When I was treating Diana I was wearing my white sabots [clog-like medical shoes]. And obviously in that situation you don't pay attention to anything but trying to save the patient. It was only the next morning I noticed that my clogs were stained with [her] blood.

'Anyway, the hospital is very large and I was walking between buildings, when a Frenchman, approached me and said, 'Ah, your clogs, I am interested in them. I want to buy them from you. They have the sang bleu [blue or royal blood] on them.'

Horrified, Dahman declined and as soon as possible cleaned the sabots he had worn that night: 'Which was the end of that story.'

But not the end for him.

'So here we have to consider the philosophy of life,' he says. 'It is a defining element, you can't escape that. The thought that you have lost an important person for whom you cared, marks you all your life.

'When it's a princess and you follow her funeral along with billions of other people, and you had tried to save her, that obviously marks you. It marks you all your life. Because it's so terrible that this beautiful person had such a tragic end.'

His own part in the tragedy nags at him. 'It varies according to what is going on in my life,' he says. 'When we get to August I think about it. It was the year my son was born and of course every anniversary of that I think about it.'

'I don't go back to it all the time because a lot of years have gone by. But every time a new book [about Diana's death] has come out [in France], it has been sent to me. So I have a collection of such books, unfortunately.'

Revealed: Bodyguard survivor of Princess Diana crash has rebuilt his life and is now AstraZeneca's global head of security

By Stephen Wright and Simon Trump for the Daily Mail

Bodyguard Trevor Rees-Jones, the only survivor of the crash in which Princess Diana died, has rebuilt his life and is global head of security for AstraZeneca, the Mail can reveal.

Despite suffering appalling injuries and severe memory loss, he has recovered sufficiently to land a huge job with the pharmaceutical giant behind one of the world's most effective Covid-19 vaccines.

It is not known if his role involves protecting key personnel involved in the vaccine programme, or guarding the firm's laboratories and intellectual property.

Despite suffering appalling injuries in crash which killed Princess Diana, bodyguard Trevor Rees-Jones (pictured) has recovered sufficiently to land a huge job with AstraZeneca

The former member of the Al- Fayed security team, who now calls himself Trevor Rees, was travelling in the front passenger seat of the Mercedes and was trapped in the wreckage, conscious but with severe facial trauma.

He was placed in an induced coma for ten days.

It took skilful reconstruction by surgeons, working from an old photograph, who used 150 titanium parts to piece him back together.

Mr Rees, 53, was also left with profound amnesia for several months.

Dr Maurice Lipsedge, an expert psychiatrist commissioned by Lord Stevens' Operation Paget inquiry, said Mr Rees had 'very limited recall' of what happened immediately before and after the crash and this was unlikely to ever change.

Mr Rees left his job with Mohamed Al-Fayed the following year.

He was the only survivor of the crash in which Princess Diana (pictured) died and was travelling in the front passenger seat of the Mercedes and got trapped in the wreckage

He published his own account of his experiences, with help from a ghost writer, in 2000 in a book called The Bodyguard's Story.

His first post after returning to work was with the United Nations in its department of peacekeeping.

He also spent six years with the US-based oil operations company, Halliburton, working his way up to director.

His LinkedIn entry describes him as being based in Shrewsbury and having experience in international operations.

Both AstraZeneca and Mr Rees, via his employers, declined to comment.
Whatever the pundits might claim, they didnt see this one coming. There was no BBC by-election special running into the early hours of yesterday morning .

The armies of Press (myself included) who flocked to Hartlepool to witness last months demolition of the Labour Party had barely given a moments thought to this weeks by-election taking place in the Prime Ministers own back yard.

And then  Kapow! as Boris Johnson might say. A constituency that has only ever known a Tory MP suddenly found itself represented by a Liberal Democrat as of yesterday morning.

Whats more, the Lib Dems Sarah Green did not just nick Chesham & Amersham. This wreck of a party managed to drag itself from its hospital bed and win by a stonking 8,000 votes.

In other words, this has been a result every bit as surprising as one of those Tales of the Unexpected by this constituencys most famous literary son, the late Roald Dahl.

Liberal Democrat candidate Sarah Green and Alistair Carmichael, Liberal Democrat MP for Orkney and Shetland, are greeted by party supporters upon arriving for the declaration in the Chesham and Amersham by-election

But then you need only drive along the snug little lanes and lush green hills around Dahls home near Great Missenden to get an inkling of why this true-blue Tory slice of the Home Counties has just ejected the all-conquering Conservatives. It is summed up in the two words on the red signs which stand at almost every road junction hereabouts: Works Traffic.

However you try to dissect this result, you come back to the same conclusion. People on the fringes of the great urban sprawl of South East England are fed up with development.

A few ardent Remainers have tried to pin this result on a lingering Brexit hangover (this area was pretty keen on remaining in the EU).

But wander around the handsome towns and pretty villages which make up this constituency and you hear a different story.

This seat sits both at the end of the London Undergrounds Metropolitan Line and also on the edge of the Chiltern Hills. It is surprisingly rural.

That may explain why everyone I meet is so sensitive to any prospect of further development. People are furious that this area is being ripped apart to make way for an HS2 London-to-Birmingham rail project from which they will derive zero benefit. Just last month, a huge drilling machine  nicknamed Florence  began eating its way into the Chilterns. There really is no going back now.

On top of all that come fresh Tory pledges to relax building controls, concrete over great chunks of the Green Belt and pepper the countryside with new housing estates.

Not once does anyone mention Downing Street wallpaper to me, let alone Dominic Cummingss fratricidal remarks or PPE provision. They are too busy complaining about HS2-related roadworks on the A413 or the fact that someone wants to cover another field with expensive houses.

ROBERT HARDMAN at an HS2 development site on the edge of Great Missenden, Buckinghamshire

And they all offer one other reason for the Lib Dems shock victory: hard graft. Party leader Sir Ed Davey and his entire national operation (whats left of it) have been focusing on this seat for weeks. When you look at the sheer amount of leaflet-dropping, youve got to give them their due. They put everything in to this, says Amersham ironmonger Carol Morris.

We even got sent these handwritten envelopes ... One friend of mine had a call reminding to her vote  and the caller turned out to be a Lib Dem worker in Carlisle!

Carol is deeply impressed by the Lib Dem operation  and she did not even vote for them.

Her shop, a delightful old-fashioned ironmongery which has been here for 37 years and which stayed open all through the pandemic selling everything under the sun (even on Christmas Day), is straight out of the Margaret Thatcher playbook.

It actually sits underneath the old constituency office of the former MP, Dame Cheryl Gillan.

A hugely popular champion of the area who hated HS2 and enjoyed thumping great majorities, Dame Cheryl died in April, hence the by-election.

Walking through neighbouring Chesham, stopping people at random, I hear the same message from Martin, an engineer (who has voted Tory previously but not this time), from pensioners Daphne and Richard (who both voted Tory this time) and from record shop owner Dale (who usually votes Tory but didnt bother voting at all).

All agree that the Conservatives have been complacent. Cosy up to the red wall all you like, Mr Johnson, but the blue wall is ready to bite you where it hurts.

As he enjoys a coffee on Cheshams charming high street, Peter van der Sluijs tells me he voted for Lib Dem Sarah Green despite being a member of the Labour Party.

I voted tactically  there was certainly no message for the current Labour leadership  but I have to say this result caught me by surprise, he says.

Boris Johnson dropped in for a photo opportunity here a few weeks ago with the Tory candidate, Peter Fleet (pictured), not that it did him much good

I think there was a general sense, even among Tories, of being taken for granted and of feeling ignored. Its not just HS2 but also these new planning laws. People are very concerned.

The new MP is fast asleep when I arrive, understandably given that she has not had any rest for 36 hours. But later on, I find some of the winning team celebrating in the Generals Arms, a busy pub in the centre of Chesham.

Boris Johnson dropped in for a photo opportunity here a few weeks ago with the Tory candidate, Peter Fleet, not that it did him much good.

I chat to Lib Dem stalwart Julian Heather, who is treating himself to a well-deserved glass of prosecco.

A former councillor in Lambeth for many years, he has spent the past five weeks travelling up from his south London home every day to help the party here in Chesham, knocking on thousands of doors.

We are the yellow peril! he laughs. The other parties might call us the cockroaches of British politics but the fact is that whatever happens, we always crawl out of the ruins and fight another day.

He hands me a leaflet which many people  including Tory insiders at Westminster  agree has played strongly in this by-election.

REVEALED: The threat facing the Chilterns from new planning laws. Inside, it is full of dire warnings about the threat to these green and pleasant hills if the Tories press ahead with what is presented as a free-for-all for the property developers.

It even includes a quote from Theresa May.

This patch used to be well-known as a location for Midsomer Murders. For now, at least, it is better-known for killing off the local Tory party. Given that the PMs own Uxbridge seat is next door, that will be causing a few jitters in Downing Street.

Hartlepool may have taught us that there is no longer any such thing as a safe Labour seat.

Chesham and Amersham is a reminder that, in 21st Century politics, there is no longer such a thing as a safe seat at all.
Former President Donald Trump says the Biden administration is trying to 'brainwash' American children with new school curriculum based on critical race theory and is dividing the country by race and gender.

Writing in RealClear Politics, the former president said that Biden is 'indoctrinating America's schoolchildren with 'some of the most toxic and anti-American theories ever conceived'.'

He wrote: 'For decades, the America-blaming left has been relentlessly pushing a vision of America that casts our history, culture, traditions, and founding documents in the most negative possible light.

'Yet in recent years, this deeply unnatural effort has progressed from telling children that their history is evil to telling Americans that they are evil.

'In classrooms across the nation, students are being subjected to a new curriculum designed to brainwash them with the ridiculous left-wing dogma known as critical race theory",' he added.

'The key fact about this twisted doctrine is that it is completely antithetical to everything that normal Americans of any color would wish to teach their children,' he continued.

Former President Donald Trump says the Biden administration is trying to 'brainwash' American children with new school curriculums based on critical race theory and is dividing the country by race and gender

Trump lashed out at President Joe Biden, seen arriving in Delaware Friday, claiming the Democratic administration is 'indoctrinating' America's schoolchildren with 'some of the most toxic and anti-American theories ever conceived'

Trump insisted that instead of helping kids understand that the US is the 'greatest, most tolerant nation in history', they are being taught that 'America is systemically evil and that the hearts of our people are full of hatred and malice'.

'Teaching even one child these divisive messages would verge on psychological abuse. Indoctrinating generations of children with these extreme ideas is not just immoral -- it is a program for national suicide,' he went on.

Republican-backed states across the country have introduced legislation banning critical race theory from schools.

Trump suggests that 'the left' have been able to get away with teaching critical race theory because 'not enough parents have been paying attention and speaking up'.

The academic theory developed in the 1970s and urges more emphasis on teaching children about racism and equal justice in the US.

It is based on the idea that racism is embedded in daily life, the legal system and policies.

Trump claimed the Department of Education is 'churning out radicalized teachers' and called on states to launch their own 1776 Commissions to ensure children are receiving 'patriotic educations'.

'To be clear, the overwhelming majority of our nations teachers are some of the most selfless and wonderful people there are  but regrettably, many have graduated from extremely biased education schools and may not even be aware of the degree to which leftist ideology has permeated their curriculum,' he writes.

He ends by saying: 'A nation is only as strong as its spirit. For our children, we must act before it is too late.'

Republican Senator Ted Cruz also slammed critical race theory at an event on Friday and said it was 'more racist than Klansmen'.

Also on Friday, Trump formally threw his weight Friday behind Alaska's Commissioner of Administration Kelly Tshibaka, who is challenging Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski in the 2022 GOP primary.

'Lisa Murkowski is bad for Alaska,' Trump said in a statement. 'I look forward to campaigning in Alaska for Kelly Tshibaka,' he added, giving her his 'Complete and Total Endorsement.'

Trump called Tshibaka a 'fighter who stands for Alaska values and America First.'

'She is MAGA all the way, pro-energy, strong on the Border, tough on Crime and totally supports our Military and our great Vets,' he continued. 'Kelly is a powerful supporter of the Second Amendment and JOBS!'

Trump said he was against Murkowski because she voted in favor of President Joe Biden's pick to head the Interior Department, Secretary Deb Haaland.

Haaland has said she is against drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, which Trump pointed out, saying Murkowski's vote for the former Democratic congresswoman was a vote against Alaskan jobs.

'Murkowski has got to go!' Trump said.

Left out of the statement was the fact that Murkowski was one of seven Republican senators who voted to convict Trump of inciting the January 6 insurrection during his second impeachment trial.

He has vowed to take out those Republicans who didn't tow the party line.

Trump is making good on that promise with a planned June 26 revenge rally outside of Cleveland in support of Congressional candidate Max Miller, a former Trump administration staffer, who is running to unseat GOP Rep. Anthony Gonzalez, another Republican who voted in favor of his impeachment.

Tshibaka jumped into the Alaska Senate race in late March.

Writing in RealClear Politics , the former president wrote that Biden is 'indoctrinating Americas schoolchildren with 'some of the most toxic and anti-American theories ever conceived'
Russian President Vladimir Putin is more popular among Republicans than President Joe Biden, according to two new polls.

Americans were surveyed just ahead of their summit in Geneva this week, amid discussion of how the U.S. president would demand answers about Russia's involvement in election rigging, ransomware attacks and Moscow's persecution of opposition politicians.

Yet the Economist/YouGov poll of 1500 Americans, published on the day of the summit, found that 18 percent of Republicans had a favorable view of Putin while only 14 percent had a similar view of their own president.

In the same way, it found that 64 percent of Republicans had an unfavorable view of Putin, while 82 percent viewed Biden in a negative light.

An Economist/YouGov tracker poll of 1500 Americans, published on the day that President Biden met President Putin, found that 18 percent of Republicans had a favorable view of Putin while only 14 percent had a similar view of their own president.

The Economist/YouGov poll also found that 64 percent of Republicans had an unfavorable view of Putin, while 82 percent viewed Biden in a negative light.

A poll by Morning Consult/Politico poll of almost 2000 people drew similar results.

Although the 11 percent of Republicans taking a favorable view of Putin was eclipsed by the 13 percent with a positive take on Biden, some 67 percent viewed the Russian president unfavorably compared with 85 percent who did not like the American president

A week earlier, the Economist/YouGov tracker poll also found that Republicans viewed Russia as less of a threat than Democrats do.

The stark divide was spotted by Will Saletan of Slate who said it was part of a realignment during the Trump years when the right's distrust of Moscow was reversed.

'Trump has delivered more than the Kremlin could have asked for: He turned Americans against one another, attacked our institutions, attempted a coup, and relentlessly defended Russian aggression,' he wrote.

'To this day, Trump denounces our government as illegitimate.

Biden met Putin for the first time as president on Wednesday, in Geneva. Ransomware attacks, the status of Ukraine, the treatment of opposition politicians in Russia and Moscow's attempts to interfere in U.S. elections were all on the agenda

'And he has built a political force that will serve Putin well in his confrontations with Biden: a Republican Party that has cooled to NATO and warmed to Russia.'

Trump met Putin in Helsinki three years ago. It was followed by a joint press conference during which he appeared to accept at face value Putin's assertion that Moscow had not tried to sway the 2016 election - despite U.S. intelligence agencies asserting that he had.

This week, Trump poured scorn on Biden's meeting and tried to portray the Helsinki meeting as a triumph.

'As president, I had a great and very productive meeting in Helsinki, Finland, with President Putin of Russia,' he said in a statement.

'Despite the belated fake news portrayal of the meeting, the United States won much, including the respect of President Putin and Russia.'

Biden aides said he had delivered a tough series of red lines, and warned Putin that he was isolating himself with his actions.

'He was clear and direct in where he was standing up and pushing back against Putin,' said Biden's national security adviser Jake Sullivan on Thursday.

'What you heard publicly was very much a reflection of what President Biden conveyed privately.'

Meanwhile, President Joe Biden's approval rating among Americans has dipped in recent weeks amid stalled negotiations and doubt about his ability to enact massive spending plans.

But the dip is far less pronounced than the drop in support for Congress's performance, according to a new poll by Monmouth University.

The number of voters who approve of the president's job performance fell from 54 percent in April to 48 percent in June, according to the study.

'Bidens rating is still in net positive territory, but it seems to have taken a dip with the growing uncertainty that his signature spending plans will be enacted,' said Patrick Murray, director of the independent Monmouth University Polling Institute.
In a major boost for British farmers, two of Britain's biggest supermarkets have pledged not to sell Australian meat  even if it is cheaper.

Tesco, the nation's largest grocer, and Morrisons will reject meat from Down Under following a historic trade deal that slashes tariffs.

British farmers fear they will be driven out of business if the market is flooded with low-cost Australian meat.

As much as 35,000 tons of tariff-free beef could arrive from Australia over the next year  equivalent to an eighth of the UK's total beef imports.

But some of the nation's leading supermarkets said yesterday they would stick with British suppliers.

Tesco, the nation's largest grocer, and Morrisons will reject meat from Down Under following a historic trade deal that slashes tariffs (file photo)

Morrisons said: 'All Morrisons fresh meat is 100 per cent British... from UK farmers we trust'

Tesco said it 'did not anticipate any change' to its British and Irish supply base following the deal. Chief executive Ken Murphy added: 'They produce local, high-quality produce and we're proud to work with them.'

Morrisons said: 'All Morrisons fresh meat is 100 per cent British... from UK farmers we trust.'

Sainsbury's said it 'sourced British as much as we possibly can', but sometimes looked abroad to 'ensure the best quality, value and availability'.

Aldi said it would continue to source its core range of fresh meat from Britain.

Waitrose said: 'We are deeply worried for the wider farming community at a time when they are facing unprecedented challenges.

'Our customers can rest assured that we'll continue to back British farmers and sourcing produce from them that meets our strict animal welfare and environmental standards.

Asda and Lidl did not comment.

The free-trade deal is the first agreement the UK has signed since Brexit.

International Trade Secretary Liz Truss said it would lead to 'lower prices for UK shoppers', leading some to infer British firms would be undercut.

The UK imports 46million of meat from Australia each year, 182million of consumer goods and 249million of wine.

The deal allows tariff-free trade for British exports such as whisky and cars and boosts Britons' right to work in Australia.
Labor has repeated its claim the federal government relied too heavily on the AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine for Australia's rollout as authorities admit new medical advice will further set the country back.

Medical experts are now recommending people under 60 receive the Pfizer jab due to the risk of extremely rare blood clots for AstraZeneca recipients.

But the 840,000 people aged 50 to 59 who have already had a single AstraZeneca dose have been told to get their second jab of that vaccine.

Lieutenant General John Frewen, who is overseeing rollout logistics, said the slowdown resulting from the updated vaccine advice would be short term.

Labor has repeated its claim the federal government relied too heavily on the AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine for Australia's rollout

But he refused to say whether that meant a delay of weeks or months.

'We will see a likely temporary reduction in daily vaccination rates, as people make informed decisions around what they want to do,' he said.

Two deaths have occurred in Australia from 3.8 million AstraZeneca doses.

National cabinet will meet on Monday to discuss what the increased reliance on Pfizer imports means for the immunisation program.

Labor on Friday seized on the setback to reignite its argument the government relied too heavily on a seamless AstraZeneca rollout.

Labor's Richard Marles said the latest Victorian lockdown and an emerging Sydney outbreak showed the importance of ramping up jabs quickly.

Australia continues to lag behind much of the world in vaccination rates with only around four per cent of adults receiving both doses.

'We are going to be living in the land of the lockdown until we get vaccinated,' the deputy opposition leader told the Nine Network.

Yet Health Minister Greg Hunt said he remains confident about Pfizer supplies even with the increased reliance on the imported vaccine.

Labor on Friday seized on the setback to reignite its argument the government relied too heavily on a seamless AstraZeneca rollout

Mr Hunt said re-booking people in their 50s who were down to get a first AstraZeneca jab would likely lead to a fall in vaccination rates.

Meanwhile, mask use is again compulsory on Sydney's public transport after a man picked up Covid-19 from 'fleeting exposure' with an infected shopper.

The man in his 50s caught the virus while shopping at Myer Bondi Junction on Saturday. He was on the same floor in the same section as a limousine driver believed to be at the centre of this week's outbreak.

The unvaccinated limo driver from Sydney's east and his wife were diagnosed with the coronavirus and subsequently infected a woman at a Vaucluse cafe.

The limo driver, aged in his 60s, transported international air crews.

The infections have prompted some states to tighten border restrictions for those who live in eastern Sydney or have attended the exposure sites.

Victorian Acting Premier James Merlino - whose state recorded one new virus case on Friday - said the Sydney outbreak was a 'sobering reminder that this virus is with us in our country and will be with us for quite some time'.
Atheists are just as happy as devout religious believers, a study said yesterday.

It confounded the long-accepted convention that confirmed Christians and the convinced followers of other faiths are happier and more content with their lives than those without religion.

But the researchers found that either a firm belief in God or strong atheist views are more likely to lead to a satisfied mind than a loose attachment to religious faith.

The findings were based on happiness surveys carried out in 24 countries which asked both about religious belief and levels of satisfaction with life.

Academics from the Journal of Happiness Studies at the University of Cologne divided levels of belief and non-belief into four categories and found that all except weakly religious showed similar levels of life satisfaction, and all were higher than the weakly religious group.

Atheists are just as happy as religious believers, a study revealed yesterday (file photo)

They said the importance of Christianity to happiness has been exaggerated because the evidence is often drawn from America and its large Bible Belt population of believers.

The findings conflict with those of some major international studies.

A project published in 2019 by the respected Washington-based Pew Research Centre said actively religious people were happier than non-religious people in half of the 36 countries it looked at. It found religious people were notably happier than others not only in the US, but in Japan, Australia and Germany.

A British study carried out by academics from Lancaster University said this spring that teenagers who believe in God have scored higher GCSE results than others.

The Cologne researchers said religion and happiness depend heavily on the country involved. In strictly religious countries, atheists are less satisfied with their lives, but ratings improve in more liberal countries with a high proportion of non-believers.

They suggested this could be linked to discrimination against atheists in theocracies or highly religious states.

It questions the long-accepted convention that Christians and followers of other faiths are more content than atheists or non-religious people (file photo)

The findings were based on the Swedish-based World Values Survey, a collaboration between social scientists covering 100 countries including Britain and 400,000 individuals.

Researcher Katharina Pohls said: Previous research has predominantly found evidence for a universal and linear relationship between religiosity and life satisfaction, which has led to the conclusion that highly religious people are more satisfied with life than non-religious people.

The reason for this belief is previous studies were mainly focused on US American samples, without taking the influence of differences between countries into consideration, as well as not differentiating between non-religious subgroups.

She added: The impact of religion on life satisfaction depends on multiple factors, amongst others, the type of non-religious subgroup to which an individual belongs, the countrys social norm of religiosity, and the societal level of development.
Mark Drakeford said nobody knows what the impact of the Indian variant will be in a month's time as he announced a four-week pause on further relaxation in Wales.

He warned that another lockdown was not 'completely inconceivable', although he stressed that it is 'highly unlikely'.

Mr Drakeford stressed the delay to easing restrictions cannot be extended indefinitely 'in search of perfection' in the data from scientists.

He said the four-week pause would allow Wales to get 'a sufficiently good handle' on the impact of the vaccine on illness and hospitalisation.

Mark Drakeford said nobody knows what the impact of the Indian variant will be in a month's time as he announced a four-week pause on further relaxation in Wales

'Then we will make a calculation about how much headroom we have, as we always do, to take further steps,' he added.

Asked if he could commit to easing restrictions completely after July 15, Mr Drakeford said: 'I can't say that because I do not know and nobody else knows what the impact of the Delta variant will be by then.'

He insisted that people in Wales are 'absolutely not in lockdown' and 'the vast bulk of freedoms are already restored'.

Mr Drakeford stressed the delay to easing restrictions cannot be extended indefinitely 'in search of perfection' in the data from scientists

On the likelihood of another lockdown this year, the First Minister said: 'I'm not willing to say that it is completely inconceivable. I think it is highly unlikely.'

Latest figures show there are nearly 490 cases of the Indian variant in Wales and more than four out of five new Covid-19 cases are attributed to it.

Two-thirds of these are not linked to travel or contact with another case.

Wales is aiming to roll out more than half a million doses of vaccine over the next four weeks, and the Welsh Government hope that delaying easements will reduce a potential peak of daily hospital admissions by up to half.
The Conservatives suffered a historic by-election defeat yesterday after losing a leafy Buckinghamshire seat for the first time.

Boris Johnson was urged not to forget his core voters in the Home Counties following the shock result in Chesham and Amersham.

The Prime Minister admitted that the result was disappointing after the Liberal Democrats managed to overturn a 16,000 Conservative majority.

Sarah Green romped home with a majority of more than 8,000 even though the seat has only ever had Tory MPs since it was created in 1974.

Lib Dem leader Sir Ed Davey said his partys victory would send a shockwave through British politics and claimed the result demonstrated that the Blue Wall of Tory southern seats could be vulnerable.

The Conservatives suffered a historic by-election defeat yesterday after losing a leafy Buckinghamshire seat for the first time

Tory MPs have warned the PM that in his desire to retain Red Wall seats in the North, he must not forget the partys traditional voters in the South.

Former leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith said many in the South were angry about Mr Johnsons planning reforms, which they fear will allow developers to build the wrong buildings in the wrong places.

That is a theme that is running through a lot of constituencies right now  particularly in the South and in London, he said. I urge the Government to think carefully about the next stage of this. We need to hold these seats as much as we need to win seats elsewhere.

If we dont pause to listen to what the concerns are before proceeding, then we will run the risk of having this repeated.

Mr Johnson thanked defeated Tory candidate Peter Fleet and said there were particular circumstances at play after his party lost one of its safest seats in England.

Many voters in Chesham and Amersham were angry at the HS2 project, which runs through the constituency.

Many voters in Chesham and Amersham were angry at the HS2 project, which runs through the constituency. Pictured: Daily Mail's Robert Hardman at an HS2 development site on the edge of Great Missenden

Asked if he was neglecting voters in the South in favour of those in the North, the PM told reporters: It was certainly a disappointing result.

There were particular circumstances there and we are getting on with delivering our agenda for the whole country, thats what one-nation Conservatism is all about. We believe in uniting and levelling up within regions and across the country.

The by-election was triggered by the death of former Cabinet minister Dame Cheryl Gillan, who took the seat with a majority of 16,233 in the 2019 general election  some 55 per cent of the vote.

In a stunning result, Miss Green took 56.7 per cent of the vote to secure a majority of 8,028 over the second-placed Tories.

Sir Ed told BBC Breakfast yesterday: I think this will send a shockwave through British politics. Liberal Democrats have had good wins in the past, but this is our best-ever by-election victory, and if it was repeated across the South, literally dozens of Conservative seats would fall to the Liberal Democrats.

People talked about the Red Wall in the North, but have forgotten about the Blue Wall in the South and thats going to come tumbling down if this result is mimicked across this country.

The Green Party came third in the by-election with 1,480 votes, with Labour trailing in fourth with just 622 votes, losing the partys deposit in the process.

Mr Johnson thanked defeated Tory candidate Peter Fleet and said there were particular circumstances at play after his party lost one of its safest seats in England

Polling expert Sir John Curtice told BBC Radio 4s Today programme that he made it the worst Labour performance in any by-election after the party took just 1.6 per cent of the vote.

It is a boost for the Lib Dems after they suffered a poor result in the 2019 general election. In her acceptance speech, Miss Green said: Tonight the voice of Chesham and Amersham is unmistakable.

Together we have said: Enough is enough, we will be heard and this Government will listen.

This campaign has shown that no matter where you live, or how supposedly safe a constituency may appear to be, if you want a Liberal Democrat member of Parliament, you can have a Liberal Democrat Member of Parliament.

The countrys newest MP and Sir Ed celebrated the triumph at a victory rally in the constituency yesterday, where the pair stood in front of a blue wall made of plastic bricks, which the Lib Dem leader then smashed with an orange hammer.

Major issues in the campaign included the HS2 rail line, which cuts through the constituency, and proposed planning reforms, which have sparked fears about building in the countryside around the seat in the Chilterns.

Defeated Conservative candidate Mr Fleet said: Clearly this was a very disappointing result, not the result that I was expecting, nor my team.

Sarah Green romped home with a majority of more than 8,000 even though the seat has only ever had Tory MPs since it was created in 1974

And Tory chairman Amanda Milling said the work starts now to show how its Conservatives that can deliver on the peoples priorities and regain their support and noted the concerns over planning and HS2 were loud and clear.

Writing in the Daily Telegraph she said: I am in no doubt that last nights result is a warning shot and we are listening. Over the coming weeks and months, we will take stock of what happened in Chesham and Amersham and look at how we can regain the trust of voters there.

She added: The Lib Dems won Amersham town council last month and threw the kitchen sink at this by-election.

I know there will be fears that we arent speaking to people in the South, but in those same elections we won councils across the South, including Cornwall, Southampton, Maidstone and Harlow.

A Conservative source said: By-elections are always difficult for the governing party, particularly 11 years into government, but there is no getting away from the fact this is a very disappointing result.
Forget all the usual indications of a thriving, welcoming community, such as village stores, coffee shops or a farmers' market; the surest signal is the presence of a bookshop.

And, much like cafes or village stores, they provide a social centre, encouraging visitors and locals to chat, browse, or find a corner and linger.

So perhaps when planning that next move, it's worth seeking out one of the UK's independent bookshops and the thriving community that comes with them.

Bestseller: Richard Booth's bookshop in Hay-on-Wye, at the foot of the Black Mountains

Hay-on-Wye

There is no better example of how books have proved transformative in every aspect of life than Hay-on-Wye in Powys, Wales, a town renowned for its bookshops and annual literary festival.

So famed for its tomes, it is able to attract tourists from around the world, as well as former presidents, Hollywood stars and politicians.

There are other handsome aspects to the town: for one, it is perched in the foothills of the Black Mountains.

'Once bookshops become established, they become attractions in themselves; a place to sit and read or have a cup of coffee while perusing the shelves,' says Andrew Cronan, associate director at Strutt & Parker's country house department.

Isle of Wight

The Goose secondhand bookshop in the village of St Helen's on the Isle of Wight is another treasure trove.

St Helen's is a quiet place, and there's plenty to read once inside the haven of The Goose, the charming, low-ceilinged gem which is next to a tea room.

Wadhurst

Barnett's of Wadhurst is a real pillar of the community and even invites residents to drop by for a chat. The shop stocks a range of modern and classic fiction and has a recommendations service.

The market town of Wadhurst is in a popular commuter area on the border of East Sussex and Kent with the train to London taking less than an hour.

More importantly, England's South Coast and, in particular Camber Sands, is 40 minutes away. The average house price is 532,088 but Wadhurst is included in lists of the UK's best places to live.

Inverness

It may be the fly-fishing and the hikes for some, but Leakey's Bookshop keeps others coming back to Inverness.

Providing the most intellectual of shelters from the cold with a wood-burning stove, this bookshop  considered to have the biggest collection in Scotland  possesses a magical charm over two floors of a former church.

'An independent bookshop adds a heritage to a place. It demonstrates the knowledge and history of a place and with this comes definite appeal,' says Andrew.

Stratford-upon-Avon

It seems only fitting the birthplace of William Shakespeare be included when mentioning bookshop towns.

Sitting on the beautiful river in Warwickshire, this town is home to Chaucer Head Bookshop which has a medieval shopfront and deals in rare and antiquarian books.

This shop is not the only attraction, there's Shakespeare's birthplace, the Royal Shakespeare Theatre and Anne Hathaway's cottage, all making Stratford-upon-Avon a literary enthusiast's dream.

Bideford

Walter Henry's is a Victorian-fronted bookshop in the north Devon town of Bideford. This looks as a literary emporium should, with huge, curved glass windows and display shelves laden with new offerings.

It's said that Michael Morpurgo often visits. Bideford is a historic harbour town on the west bank of the River Torridge. There's a Pannier (indoor) Market and plenty of independent shops.
In a humiliating turn of evolutionary fate, a new study shows that an extinct species of dwarf elephant evolved from one of the largest ever land mammals.

The island-dwelling dwarf elephant from Sicily had a shoulder height of approximately 6.5 feet (2 metres), and weighed 1.7 tonnes, say the study authors.

It descended from the straight tusked elephant (Palaeoloxodon antiquus), which, in comparison, had a shoulder height of 12 feet (3.7 metres) and weighed 10 tonnes and originally came from Germany.

So the dwarf elephant (Palaeoloxodon mnaidriensis) experienced a weight reduction of around 17,636 pounds (8,000kg) and height reduction of almost 6.5 feet (2 metres).

The puny dwarf, thought to have become extinct about 19,000 years ago, was just 15 per cent of its original body mass by the time its dwarfing process was complete.

It reduced in weight and height by a maximum of 440 pounds (200kg) and 1.5 inch (4cm) per generation  comparable to modern humans dwarfing to about the size of a Rhesus monkey (1.6 foot).

Reconstruction of an almost complete dwarf elephant skeleton at Gemmellaro Geological Museum, Italy. This species is called Palaeoloxodon mnaidriensis. This specimen was found in the same cave as the fragments the researchers used for their study - the Puntali cave

It descended from the straight tusked elephant Palaeoloxodon antiquus (pictured), which, in comparison, had a shoulder height of 12 feet (3.7 metres) and weighed 10 tonnes and originally came from Germany

The new study, involving Nottingham Trent University, the University of Potsdam in Germany and the Natural History Museum, used molecular and fossil evidence to define the minimum and maximum dwarfing rate of the species.

The team successfully recovered ancient DNA from dwarf elephant remains from Puntali Cave in the Italian island of Sicily, in the Mediterranean Sea.

The dwarf elephant remains have an estimated age of somewhere between 175,000 and 50,000 years, the team say.

'By combining ancient DNA with paleontological evidence we can show the timing of observable evolutionary changes with greater accuracy,' said Dr Axel Barlow, an expert in palaeogenomics and molecular bioscience in Nottingham Trent University.

Palaeoloxodon mnaidriensis was one of many prehistoric (and now extinct) dwarf elephant species

'The magnitude of dwarfing resulting from this rapid evolutionary process is truly striking, resulting in a loss of body mass of almost 85 per cent in one of the largest ever terrestrial mammals.

'As the descendants of giants, the extinct dwarf elephants are among the most intriguing examples of evolution on islands.'

Palaeoloxodon mnaidriensis  referred to by the researchers as 'Puntali' based on the cave where its remains were found  was one of many prehistoric (and now extinct) dwarf elephant species.

It lived as far back as 176,000 years ago before its extinction 19,000 years ago. The exact timeframe of the species is 'very difficult to pin down', study author Dr Johanna Paijmans at the University of Cambridge told MailOnline.

The team successfully recovered ancient DNA from dwarf elephant remains from Puntali Cave in Sicily (pictured)

INSULAR DWARFISM AND GIGANTISM Insular dwarfism is the reduction in size of large animals over generations trying to live in a small area. It may be advantageous to the survival of animals that become isolated on islands with unique environments, partly to reduce the size of their brain, which uses a lot of energy. Insular dwarfism compares with insular gigantism - an increase in size of large animals over generations trying to live in a small area. Insular dwarfism and gigantism is more pronounced in smaller, more remote islands for mammals and reptiles, research suggests. Advertisement

In comparison, the 10-tonne straight tusked elephant lived between 800,000 and 40,000 years ago  meaning the species' lifetimes on this planet overlapped.

'The Puntali dwarf elephant is specific to the island [Sicily], and the straight-tusked elephant is a species that had a wide range across mainland Europe,' Dr Paijmans said.

The straight tusked elephant would have colonised Sicily some time between 200,000 and 70,000 years ago, the team believe.

Colonisation of Sicily likely occurred during periods of cold climate when sea levels were lower, exposing land bridges that the elephants could have used to cross the water.

Because of their insular and isolated environments, evolution on islands can lead to extreme changes in a relatively short timeframe.

When species become smaller over time, this is known as insular dwarfism, and when they get bigger, this is insular gigantism.

Many island dwarfs and giants are now extinct and measuring the rate of change in extinct animals from fossils alone can be challenging due to the incompleteness of the fossil record, according to the team.

Pictured, the dwarf elephant sample used in the study, from which the DNA was taken for analysis

Also, molecular dating using ancient DNA to measure the rate of evolutionary change is hampered by the fact they often existed on islands with warm climates in which DNA does not survive well.

To overcome the challenge of DNA degradation, the researchers analysed a piece of petrous bone among the dwarf elephant remains.

The petrous is part of the skull that contains the organs of the inner ear  which is known to preserve DNA better than other parts of the skeleton.

By combining the DNA and fossil evidence the researchers were able to determine that this specific dwarf elephant's mitochondrial  or maternal  lineage diverged from the straight tusked elephant, which was from Neumark Nord in Germany.

Using the estimated age of the dwarf elephant fossil, the size and mass of the straight-tusked elephant and the estimated start of the dwarfing process, the team could calculate size and body mass reduction rate per year and per generation.

'It's such an achievement to successfully sequence an ancient mitochondrial genome from a Sicilian dwarf elephant, and to finally have DNA from a southern European straight-tusked elephant,' said Dr Victoria Herridge, an evolutionary biologist based at the Natural History Museum London.

'It opens the door for more studies of this kind, and with it the chance to finally crack one of the big mysteries of evolutionary biology  why elephants evolve to be so small on islands.'

The dwarf elephant remains are now being kept in the Gemmellaro Museum at the University of Palermo, Italy, where the specimens were sampled.

The study has been published in the journal Current Biology.
Russia and China have committed to work together on a moon base and lunar space station, but it will not be ready to house astronauts until at least 2036, the two countries said.

Known as the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS), it will consist of a surface moon base and station in lunar orbit, with construction expected to start in 2026.

The two nations have asked other international agencies to join them in the project, which will also include rovers and 'hopping robots' to aid eventual inhabitants.

NASA is working with the European Space Agency (ESA), as well as Canada and Japan on the Lunar Gateway, a modular crewed space station designed to operate in orbit around the moon and help astronauts reach the lunar surface from 2024.

While Russia and China are working together on the moon, the two will compete in low Earth orbit, with both planning their own space station to rival the International Space Station (ISS).

Known as the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS), it will consist of a surface moon base and station in lunar orbit, with construction expected to start in 2026

Russia and China have committed to work together on a moon base and lunar space station, but it won't be ready to take astronauts until at least 2036, the group said

Known as the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS), it will consist of a surface moon base and station in lunar orbit, with construction expected to start in 2026

INTERNATIONAL LUNAR RESEARCH STATION TIMELINE 2021: Work starts to scout sites on the surface of the moon for a base 2025: The final location for the surface base will be announced 2026: Work begins building the base, including launches to send robotic instruments to explore the moon 2036: Initial construction of the base and orbiting stations to be complete 2036: The first joint astronaut missions from China and Russia to be sent to the lunar station Advertisement

Roscomos, the Russian space agency, and the China National Space Administration (CNSA) announced the timeline for the new joint project at a space conference in St Petersburg on Wednesday and are in talks with ESA on a possible collaboration.

Thailand, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, who recently sent a probe to Mars, are also said to be considering joining the lunar effort.

A memorandum on lunar research and development was signed between China and Russia in March, which is what sparked this project.

The first phase, starting this year, will see them scout the moon using probes to determine the feasibility, then in 2025 they will pick a site for the moon base.

They plan to build the base on the moon between 2026 and 2036, with the first astronauts travelling to the base once construction is complete.

The base will provide scientists with the technology and resources to study the typography chemistry and internal structure of the moon, the group claim.

There will also be a space station between the Earth and the moon to support surface activities, acting as a 'go-between' for traffic between the two.

It is not yet known exactly when astronauts will be able to live on the lunar surface, as the initial operations are expected to be purely robotic, but the group say it is designed to support human exploration in the future.

Yanhau Wu from the CNSA said the plan is to focus on robotic exploration for the initial stages, with no human exploration for at least a decade.

'We will also do a lot of preparatory work and research work in this aspect,' Yanhua said at the space conference, as reported by Space.com.

Roscomos, the Russian space agency, and the China National Space Administration (CNSA) announced the timeline for the new joint project at a space conference in St Petersburg on Wednesday and are in talks with ESA on a possible collaboration

The Jade Rabbit lunar rover surveyed the moon's surface for 31 months and technology in the rover could help China and Russia select a site for their new moon base

THE NASA LUNAR GATEWAY NASA is working on a project to build the first lunar space station. The Lunar Gateway is part of a long-term project to send humans to Mars. It is designed to act as a solar powered communication hub, science laboratory and home to astronauts and scientists studying the moon. It will also act as a holding area for rovers, robots and crewed spacecraft heading to the lunar surface. The crew-tended spaceport will orbit the moon and serve as a 'gateway to deep space and the lunar surface,' NASA has said. The first module, HALO, covering logistics and habitat, is scheduled to launch on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket in 2024, with others to follow later. Advertisement

'So we hope to be able to actually send our researchers to the surface of the moon in the future for them to carry out missions on the surface of the moon.'

This is different to the NASA Lunar Gateway, which will act as a research station in its own right, sit in lunar orbit and provide a staging post for crewed lunar landings.

The first module of the Lunar Gateway will launch from Earth in 2024 atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket - a launch expected to cost NASA at least $300 million.

The Lunar Gateway forms part of the NASA Artemis mission, which could see the first woman and first person of colour sent to land on the lunar surface in 2024.

Artemis is designed to 'make lunar exploration more sustainable' and could include crewed missions to the surface of Mars from the mid-2030s.

Russia says it plans for the ILRS to be 'open to everyone interested' which includes both national space agencies and private companies.

It is a busy time in space for both Russia and China, with both agencies building their own space station and stepping up human launches.

China already has the first module of the Tiangong space station, Tianhe, up in orbit and crewed by three astronauts that launched from Earth yesterday morning.

The full station, expected to be about the size of the Soviet-era Mir space station, or a fifth the size of the ISS, will be finished by the end of next year.

So far NASA is the only agency to send astronauts to the moon, including Buzz Aldrin (pictured from Apollo 11) but Europe, China and Russia all expect to send humans to walk on the lunar surface by the middle of the next decade

The new station will include robotic explorers and communication stations allowing people to talk to Earth

Unlike Russia, China isn't involved in the International Space Station, due in part to concerns by the US over the close links between the Chinese military and its space program.

Russia is also working on its own space station, with construction of the first module underway, and expected to launch by the middle of the decade.

Like the ISS and Tiangong, it will operate in low Earth orbit and is expected to include a 'tourist module' to help fund its operation by accepting rich space-tourists.
Jet engines could soon be as quiet as a hairdryer after scientists developed a meringue-like material that cuts aircraft noise by up to 80 per cent.

The incredibly light aerogel is designed to improve passenger comfort by reducing the 105-decibel roar heard in the cabin during take-off by up to 16 decibels.

It can be used as sound insulation inside a plane's engines and would barely increase the aircraft's weight, researchers said.

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Noise-reducing: Jet engines could soon be as quiet as a hairdryer after scientists developed a meringue-like material (pictured) that cuts aircraft noise by up to 80 per cent

HOW DOES IT WORK? The plan is for the meringue-like aerogel to be installed in an aeroplane's engines to act as sound installation. Scientists from the University of Bath said it can reduce the 105-decibel roar heard in an aircraft cabin during take-off by up to 16 decibels. This would make the noise as quiet as a hair dryer. The material is also so light  weighing just 4.6 pounds (2.1kg) per cubic metre  that it would barely increase an aircraft's weight, the researchers said. Advertisement

The graphene oxide-polyvinyl alcohol aerogel weighs just 4.6 pounds (2.1kg) per cubic metre, according to scientists at the University of Bath, and could be in use within 18 months.

They say it will cost about 50 per cubic metre, which will be enough to cover a single Rolls-Royce engine, meaning an Airbus A320 can be made much quieter for just 100.

'This is clearly a very exciting material that could be applied in a number of ways  initially in aerospace but potentially in many other fields such as automotive and marine transport, as well as in building and construction,' said Professor Michele Meo, who led the research.

'We managed to produce such an extremely low density by using a liquid combination of graphene oxide and a polymer, which are formed with whipped air bubbles and freeze-casted.

'On a very basic level, the technique can be compared with whipping egg whites to create meringues  it's solid but contains a lot of air, so there is no weight or efficiency penalty to achieve big improvements in comfort and noise.'

Researchers from Bath's Materials and Structures Centre said they are now trying to improve the material's heat dissipation for fuel efficiency and safety reasons.

Although the team's initial focus is working with the aerospace industry to test the material as a sound insulator in plane engines, they say it could also be used to create panels in helicopters, or car engines.

Incredibly light: The aerogel (pictured) is designed to improve passenger comfort by reducing the 105-decibel roar heard in the cabin during take-off by up to 16 decibels

Quieter: It can be used as sound insulation inside a plane's engines and would barely increase the aircraft's weight, researchers at the University of Bath said (stock)

In 2018, research suggested that aeroplane noise from living under a flight path can dramatically raise the risk of a serious heart condition.

A study of more than 15,000 men and women found almost a quarter of those who suffered most developed atrial fibrillation (AF).

The disturbance to their heart rhythm was mainly caused by jet engines overhead as they were trying to sleep, say scientists.

Affecting up to 1.4 million adults in England alone, AF causes the heart to beat irregularly or very fast. It does not pump blood efficiently, leading to clots and strokes.

The study identified aircraft as the greatest source of noise pollution. It was responsible for 84 and 69 percent, respectively, during the day and night.

Previous research by Imperial College London has also suggested the risks of stroke, heart and circulatory disease were up to 20 per cent higher in areas with a lot of aircraft noise.

The University of Bath study was published in the journal Nature Scientific Reports.
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Chinese astronauts have settled in to the brand new Tiangong space station, an orbiting laboratory a fifth the size of the ISS and only a third complete.

The trio launched for the modular space station on a Long March-2F rocket at 02:22 BST yesterday from the Jiuquan launch centre in northwest China's Gobi desert.

Arriving six hours later, at about 08:00 BST, the first job was to start work setting up the brand new Tianhe module, which launched for space on April 29.

It is significantly smaller than the ISS, with just 1,700 cubic feet of living space compared to more than 11,000 cubic feet of space for humans on the ISS.

There will be 11 trips, including four with a crew to the station over the coming two years to finish construction, including launching the final two research modules.

When complete, Tiangong will have a total of three modules, making it closer to the Soviet-era Mir station than the ISS, which has 16 modules run by different nations.

It is significantly smaller than the ISS, with just 1,700 cubic feet of living space compared to more than 11,000 cubic feet of space for humans on the ISS

Chinese astronauts Tang Hongbo (L), Nie Haisheng (C) and Liu Boming (R) are now settling inside the Chinese space station core module Tianhe

The group of astronauts arriving on the Shenzhou-12 spacecraft, following their departure from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre in the Gobi desert in northwest China

ISS AND TIANGONG: HOW THEY COMPARE Length ISS: 239ft, Tiangong: 65ft Mass ISS: 925,335 lb, Tiangong: 220,000lb Occupancy ISS: 6, Tiangong: 3 Modules ISS: 16, Tiangong: 3 at completion Launch ISS: 1998, Tiangong: 2021 Living space ISS: 11,000 cubic ft Tiangong: 1,765 cubic ft Orbit ISS: 250 miles, Tiangong: 279 miles Lifespan ISS: 25 years, Tiangong: 15 years Nations involved ISS: US, Russia, Canada, Japan, Europe (Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, UK Tiangong: China Docking vehicle ISS: Soyuz, SpaceX Crew Dragon, Tiangong: Shenzhou-12 Advertisement

There are some similarities between Tiangong and the ISS, mainly in the underlying structure.

They are both modular, meaning new elements can be added to the core.

This also means that the entire station doesn't have to be launched at the same time, meaning that facilities can be made significantly larger due to launching modules one at a time.

The ISS has gradually built up to its current size over decades, having first launched in 1998 and it is possible for China to build on the initial three modules of Tiangong and make it larger over time.

It is a $150 billion science and engineering laboratory that orbits 250 miles above Earth and costs $4 billion a year to operate.

It isn't clear how much the smaller Chinese station cost to develop or will cost per year to operate, but is likely significantly less due to the much smaller size.

The ISS is made up of 16 modules including four built and funded by the Russian space agency, nine from the US, two from Japan and one from Europe.

There are talks of extra commercial modules being added to the station in the future, including one proposed by current NASA commercial partner Axiom Space.

But that depends on whether it is deemed safe to continue operations when it reaches end of life in 2025.

A top Kremlin official warned that 'disaster' was looming for the ISS, putting the lives of crew members at risk due to its age - by 2025 is will be 27 years old and was originally designed to last between 15 and 30 years.

This is part of what has prompted Russia and China to develop their own modular stations - with Russia's due to launch in 2025, when the ISS reaches 'end of life'.

Tiangong is currently expected to out live the ISS, as it is scheduled to operate until at least 2031, and possibly longer.

The first module for Tiangong is the Tianhe, which is the primary living quarters for the new Chinese station.

This will be joined by Wentian and Mengtian, two laboratory modules due to launch next year.

This was China's third space station, although this is the first to incorporate a modular design, similar to, but much smaller than the International Space Station.

Astronauts will spend three months on the station, preparing for the arrival of the next batch of astronauts and the final two modules that will make up Tiangong

China have not been allowed to be involved in the ISS, mainly due to concerns from the US over links between the Chinese military and its space program.

This has led to them developing their own independent space program, including launch vehicles, spaceships, probes, rovers and now the modular space station.

The three-member crew just launched for Tiangong are due to stay for three months in the main living module, named Tianhe, or Heavenly Harmony.

They will be carrying out science experiments and maintenance, space walks and preparing the facility to receive two additional modules next year.

Chinese state TV broadcast the launch and arrival at the station of the mission, including the moment it docked with the orbiting laboratory

While China concedes it arrived late at the space station game, it says its facility is cutting-edge.

The launch on Thursday also revived China's crewed space program after a five-year hiatus, leaving the astronauts on the station for three months, when it is expected they will be relieved by the next batch of astronauts.

With Thursday's launch, China has now sent 14 astronauts into space since it first achieved the feat in 2003, becoming the third country after the former Soviet Union and the US to do so using their own launch vehicles.

At a news conference Wednesday, China Manned Space Agency Assistant Director Ji Qiming said that the construction and operation of the space station will raise China's technologies and 'accumulate experience for all the people.'

The space program is part of an overall drive to put China on track for even more ambitious missions and provide opportunities for cooperation with Russia and other, mostly European, countries along with the United Nations.

China's space program has been a massive source of national pride, embodying its rise from poverty to the world's second-largest economy over four decades.

That has helped shore up the power of the Communist Party, whose authoritarian rule and strict limits on political activity have been tolerated by most Chinese as long as the economy is growing.

The Shenzhou-12 spaceship, carrying three Chinese astronauts, approached the Tiangong station just before 08:00 BST after a six hour flight

A Long March-2F carrier rocket, carrying the Shenzhou-12 spacecraft and a crew of three astronauts, lifts off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre in the Gobi desert, in northwest China

President and head of the party Xi Jinping has associated himself closely with that success, and Ji in his remarks cited Xi as setting the updated agenda for China's rise to prominence in space.

The first mission to the station also coincides with the celebration of the party centenary next month, an important political milestone.

There will be 11 more flights between now and the end of 2022 to complete development of the modular station.

Chinese astronauts Nie Haisheng, Liu Boming, and Tang Hongbo were even filmed inside the capsule on their way to the station

Tianhe - the core module in the Tiangong Space Station China is launching a modular space station similar to, but much smaller than the International Space Station. Known as Tiangong, or Heavenly Palace, the first module - Tianhe - was launched on April 29, 2021. The 59ft long living quarters will include a solar array and docking ports for spaceships and future modules. The final two parts of the space station are expected to launch in 2022. It will house up to three astronauts at a time for six months once operational. Orbit: 210 to 280 miles Mass: 180,000 to 220,000 lb Length: 65ft Diameter: 10ft Lifespan: 15 years Modules Tianhe - core module

Wentian - experiment module 1

Mengtian - experiment module 2

Xuntian - space telescope Advertisement

Some of these will be robotic and automated missions to place aspects of the station in orbit, others will be crewed to have astronauts install the modules.

Once the entire station is complete, it is expected that future missions will be purely scientific, similar to those of the International Space Station.

Much like the ISS, China is also expected to invite other nations to take part or send astronauts as part of the small crew.

This happened with the Soviet-era Mir space station, that saw British astronaut Helen Sharman spend time on the station with two Russian cosmonauts.

Mission commander Nie Haisheng, 56, and fellow astronauts Liu Boming, 54, and Tang Hongbo, 45, are former People's Liberation Army Air Force pilots with graduate degrees and strong scientific backgrounds.

All Chinese astronauts so far have been recruited from the military, underscoring its close ties to the space program.

For Nie, it is his third trip to space, and for Liu, his second following a mission in 2008 that included China's first space walk.

Tang, who was recruited as one of the second batch of candidates in 2010, is flying in space for the first time.

Future missions to the station will include women, according to officials, with stays extended to as long as six months and as many as six astronauts on the station at a time during crew changeovers.

The record for number of people on the International Space Station at one time is 13, set in 2009.

This includes astronauts from Russia, Japan, Europe and the US.

With China stepping up international cooperation and exchanges, it's only a matter of time before foreign astronauts join the Chinese colleagues on missions to the station.

People throughout China are watching the exploits of the astronaut crew on national television network CCTV

INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION MODULES The station is made up of 16 pressurised modules that humans can enter and work or live inside. Including four Russian modules, nine US modules, two Japanese modules and one European module. Russian modules: Pirs, Zvezda, Poisk and Rassvet US modules: Zarya, BEAM, Leonardo, Harmony, Quest, Tranquility, Unity, Cupola, and Destiny Japanese modules: JEM-ELM-PS and JEM-PM European module: Columbus Axiom Space has proposed a new commercial module for the station that would connect where the PMA-2 'space shuttle docking port' is based. Advertisement

Along with its crewed space program, China has been moving boldly into exploration of the solar system with robotic space ships.

It landed a probe on Mars last month that carried a rover, the Zhurong, which is conducting a range of surveys, looking particularly for frozen water that could provide clues as to whether the red plant once supported life.

Earlier, China landed a probe and rover on the moon's less explored far side, joining the Yutu, or Jade Rabbit, rover that was part of an earlier lunar exploration mission.

China also brought back the first lunar samples by any country's space program since the 1970s and officials say they want to send Chinese astronauts to the moon and eventually build a research base there.

Russia and China have committed to work together on a moon base and lunar space station, but it will not be ready to house astronauts until at least 2036, the two countries said.

Known as the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS), it will consist of a surface moon base and station in lunar orbit, with construction expected to start in 2026.

The two nations have asked other international agencies to join them in the project, which will also include rovers and 'hopping robots' to aid eventual inhabitants.

Russia is also working on its own space station, with construction of the first module underway, and expected to launch by the middle of the decade.

The International Space Station (ISS, pictured) is a $150 billion science and engineering laboratory that orbits 250 miles (400 km) above Earth and costs $4 billion a year to operate

Visitors look at a life-size model of the Tianhe core module of China's next space station at the Airshow China in Zhuhai in southern China's Guangdong Province in 2018

Roscosmos confirmed that its new space station would be made up of five modules including a 'commercial module that can accommodate four tourists.'

Vladimir Soloviev, a senior executive with RSC Energia said the commercial module will have two large windows and wifi access for the visitors.

The configuration will be based on the old Mir space station, operated by the USSR and later Russia, from 1986 to 2001 - the first modular space station ever built.

China's plan to build a space station will be smaller than the International Space Station, similar in size to the Soviet-era Mir space station that pre-dated the larger ISS

The modules will be blasted into orbit using the Angara-A5 launch vehicles from Plesetsk or Vostochny cosmodromes, Roscosmos confirmed.

Moscow hopes that space tourism can boost its space budget in coming decades and allow for the expansion of orbital activities - including the new station.

NASA is also increasingly looking to commercial partnerships to fund space activities, with Tom Cruise looking to film on the ISS in the next year or two.
The San Francisco International Airport (SFO) is now home to the largest population of endangered garter snakes.

Known as the most beautiful serpent in North America, this fantastically colored San Francisco garter snake was believed to have a population of just one or two thousand in the wild.

However, a study by the US Geological Survey and the US Fish and Wildlife Service determined that the 180-acre parcel of wetlands and uplands surrounding the airport host some 1,300 garter snakes.

Experts say this is the largest concentration of the snake ever to be discovered, which raises hope that the slithering creature's once dwindling population is on the rebound.

The San Francisco International Airport is now home to the largest population of the endangered garter snake

The San Francisco garter snake is a stunning serpent with an orange head, turquoise-blue body and bold stripes of orange and red.

Full-size adults can reach three feet or more in length, and they primarily feed on California red-legged frogs.

These frogs have also been found living at the airport, which may be why more than 1,000 garter snakes have moved into the area.

The creatures are living at the West-of-Bayshore, which is a protected habitat that stretches 180 acres across undeveloped land located across the Bayshore Freeway from the San Francisco International Airport, according to CBS News.

Known as the most beautiful serpent in North America, this fantastically colored snake was found to only have a population of 1,000 to 2,000 in the wild

Pictured is an aerial view of the San Francisco International Airport

And both the red-legged frog and garter snake are federally protected species.

SFO wildlife biologist Natalie Reeder told CBS: These results validate the environmental stewardship programs we have in place, to ensure endangered species can survive and thrive at SFO.

Airport officials have committed responsibility to manage the habitat, which also involves protecting species that call it home.

Garter snakes lost their natural habitat to agriculture, commercial and urban development and illegal collection (because of their beauty) led to the listing of the San Francisco garter snake as "threatened" in 1967, according to the Sacramento Fish & Wildlife Office.

However, a study by the US Geological Survey and the US Fish and Wildlife Service determined that the 180-acre parcel of wetlands and uplands surrounding the airport host some 1,300 garter snakes

Full-size adults can reach three feet or more in length, and they primarily feed on California red-legged frogs. These frogs have also been found living at the airport, which may be why more than 1,000 garter snakes have moved into the area

Its limited range, only on the San Mateo Peninsula, makes this species more susceptible to habitat destruction, marsh and pond drainage, and the decline of its main food item, the California red-legged frog, SFO shared in a statement.

Through cooperative efforts with the resource agencies and management of the West-of-Bayshore property, SFO is striving to protect and conserve the populations of San Francisco garter snake and California red-legged frog that occur there.

At one point most of the West-of-Bayshore parcel was part of the San Francisco bayland, which supported tidal salt marshes, sloughs, and seasonal wetlands.

The parcel was drained and used for agriculture until approximately 1969.

'The property supports a diversity of aquatic and upland habitats including seasonal wetlands, freshwater marshes, constructed drainage canals, riparian woodlands, and annual grasslands, SFO shard in the statement.
Young sharks, which live in egg cases known as mermaid purses, common on beaches around the world, could be at risk because of rising sea temperatures, a new study suggests.

Higher sea temperatures have shortened the freeze response time young sharks use to keep from being eaten by predators such as large fish and other sharks.

If the embryo goes into freeze response, it stops moving and the attention of predators goes elsewhere, and vice versa.

'This study has shown that many shark and ray species may reduce in number owing to increased predation as the oceans warm,' the study's lead author, Daniel Ripley, said in a statement.

'It's hard to say how exactly this will impact on the ocean ecosystem, but it's fair to assume there will be a knock-on effect; it's a major problem which is likely to get worse.

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Ripley and the other researchers looked at freeze response times of small-spotted catshark embryos at water temperatures of 15 degrees Celsius (59 degrees Fahrenheit) and 20 degrees Celsius (68 degrees Fahrenheit).

Young sharks, which live in egg cases known as mermaid purses that are common on beaches around the world, could be at risk because of rising sea temperatures

Mermaid purses can come in a variety of colors, shapes and sizes, generally wash up on beaches, entangled in seaweed

Researchers looked at freeze response times of small-spotted catshark embryos at water temperatures of 15 degrees Celsius and 20 degrees Celsius

There was a drastic change at 20 degrees, with the researchers noting there was a seven-fold decrease in the freeze response time

There was a drastic change at 20 degrees, with the researchers noting there was a seven-fold decrease in the freeze response time.

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the average global sea surface temperature has risen approximately 0.13 degrees C per decade over the past 100 years.

Mermaid purses, which can come in a variety of colors (black is somewhat prevalent) and shapes and sizes, generally wash up on beaches, entangled in seaweed.

'Many marine animals are cold blooded so rising sea temperatures have important consequences for them.'

'Shark embryos are already very vulnerable in their mermaids purses and our study suggests that one of their key survival strategies - freezing to hide from predators- may be significantly reduced by ocean warming.'

'Some species are already threatened, and others, we simply don't know enough about their numbers. But ocean warming may further harm their conservation and survival.'

'Shark embryos are already very vulnerable in their mermaids purses and our study suggests that one of their key survival strategies - freezing to hide from predators- may be significantly reduced by ocean warming,' researchers said

Nearly half - 45 percent - of sharks and rays lay their eggs in mermaid purses. It can take up to a year before they're hatched, making the survival of these embryos critical to the species survival.

'It's widely accepted that the worlds' oceans are likely to warm in the next 100 years,' Ripley continued.

'And according to the US environmental protection agency, sea surface temperatures have been higher over the three previous decades than at any other time since 1880.

'So the impact of rising ocean temperatures could be catastrophic on species of egg-laying sharks and rays, such as the Brown banded bamboo shark or the Thornback ray.

The research was recently published in Conservation Physiology.

In March 2020, a separate group of scientists found that rising ocean temperatures around the globe, as a result of climate change, are causing marine animals, birds and plants to flee from the equator towards the Earth's poles.

In July 2020, researchers found that shark populations have gone missing from nearly 20 percent of the world's coral reefs, due in large part to overfishing and human population density.
The US Air Force is creating microdrones that can flap their wings like a bird or insect.

The Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) is working with Airion Health LLC and using a 2014 patent to create a micro air vehicle (MAV) that can alter its speed and achieve 'insect-like maneuverability' for 21st century battlefields.

'Controllable forces would be generated by the wings based on position and velocity profiles, resulting in time-varying wing upstrokes and downstrokes, which, at times, may be asymmetrical,' a statement reads.

'The continuous process of updating the position and velocity, along with user-supplied inputs with a remote controller, will enable flapping wing MAVs to achieve the desired flight dynamics.

The US Air Force is creating microdrones that can flap their wings like a bird or insect. The Air Force Research Laboratory is working with Airion Health to create a micro air vehicle (MAV)

This MAV can alter its speed and achieve 'insect-like maneuverability' and it could be used for in-the-open surveillance, aerial swarm operations and battlefield situational awareness. A working MAV prototype will be developed within 15 months of the agreement

'Practical applications after successful implementation of the invention include, but are not limited to, in-the-open surveillance, aerial swarm operations, and battlefield situational awareness.'

The latter has become a 'major focus' for the Defense Department, according to Military.com.

Airion, which is headquartered in Los Angeles, describes itself as a company that was 'founded to solve complex problems for the US Armed Forces and the private sector.'

Airion Health's patent license agreement came from the Office of Research and Technology Applications (ORTA) at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio.

Airion Health's patent license agreement came from the Office of Research and Technology Applications at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio

A working prototype of the MAV will be developed within 15 months of the agreement, which was announced on Tuesday.

Joshua Laravie, the Technology Transfer Specialist and Domestic Alliance Program Manager for AFRL's Aerospace Systems Directorate, told Military.com the time frame is put out to 'illustrate and prove that Airion is making progress toward meeting the revenue goals required later in the license.'

According to the release, the MAV will be controlled with a remote controller, allowing the flapping wing MAVs to 'achieve the desired flight dynamics.'

'Controllable forces would be generated by the wings based on position and velocity profiles, resulting in time-varying wing upstrokes and downstrokes, which, at times, may be asymmetrical,' the release added.

It's unclear how small the MAV is or how much it would weigh. DailyMail.com has reached out to Airion with a request for comment.

In the release, Laravie said the Air Force was excited to 'license our technology to a small business that was building strategic relationships in the drone industry.'

'[We] are looking forward to supporting their efforts to commercialize an [Air Force] technology,' he added.
The meteorite that caused the 15-mile-wide Boltysh impact crater in central Ukraine did not play a part in the demise of the dinosaurs, a new study argues.

A team of geologists led by the University of Glasgow applied dating techniques to samples of melted rock created during the fiery landing of the meteorite, in Ukraine's Kivorohad Oblast region.

Analysis narrowed down the precise age of the impact to just over 65 million years ago  ruling out the chance that it contributed to the extinction of the dinosaurs.

It's already well known that the dinosaurs were wiped out by the Chicxulub impact event  a plummeting asteroid or comet that slammed into a shallow sea in what is now the Gulf of Mexico around 66 million years ago.

The collision released a huge dust and soot cloud that triggered global climate change, wiping out 75 per cent of all animal and plant species.

The Boltysh crater (pictured) is an impact crater - also known as an 'astrobleme' - in Ukraine. It is 15 miles (24km) in diameter

Boltysh is in the Kirovohrad Oblast (province), near the village of Bovtyshka, central Ukraine

SPACE ROCKS: FROM ASTEROIDS AND COMETS TO METEORS An asteroid is a large chunk of rock left over from collisions or the early solar system. Most are located between Mars and Jupiter in the Main Belt. A comet is a rock covered in ice, methane and other compounds. Their orbits take them much further out of the solar system. A meteor is what astronomers call a flash of light in the atmosphere when debris burns up. This debris itself is known as a meteoroid. Most are so small they are vapourised in the atmosphere. If any of this meteoroid makes it to Earth, it is called a meteorite. Meteors, meteoroids and meteorites normally originate from asteroids and comets. For example, if Earth passes through the tail of a comet, much of the debris burns up in the atmosphere, forming a meteor shower. Advertisement

Researchers from the universities of Glasgow, St Andrews, Leeds, and Aberdeen, contributed to the new research, which is published today in the journal Science Advances.

According to the team, Boltysh was created during one of the 'most volatile periods in Earth's geological history'.

Following the impact, the Boltysh impact crater filled over time with water and formed a lake, although today it is empty and surrounded by sedimentary rock.

Previous analysis of samples from the Boltysh crater, undertaken decades ago, suggested that the meteorite may have struck the Earth between 2,000 and 5,000 years before the Chicxulub meteorite impact in Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula.

The Chicxulub impact is widely believed to have caused the mass extinction event that made non-avian dinosaurs extinct, and the climate event that created the geological signature known as the CretaceousPaleogene boundary.

However, questions still remained over whether the Boltysh impact might have occurred close enough in time to have had an effect on both.

According to 2017 research, Chicxulub and Boltysh were formed 'at almost exactly the same time'. But the new study shows this is not true.

To determine the date of the Boltysh impact more precisely than ever before, the researchers selected four samples from two rock cores taken from Boltysh.

The samples consisted of rocks generated during the impact event and lake sediments that accumulated over time after the crater was formed.

They determined the age of the samples using the argon-argon dating facility run by Professor Darren Mark at the Scottish Universities Environmental Research Centre in East Kilbride.

Argon-argon dating measures the radioactive decay of potassium to argon. The level of decay acts as a 'rock clock', which ticks down over geological time and allows researchers to determine when the rocks were created.

The Chicxulub impact is widely believed to have caused the mass extinction event which made non-avian dinosaurs extinct (concept image)

'Thanks to the efforts of researchers around the world, argon-argon dating has become increasingly accurate over the last few years,' said study author Dr Annemarie Pickersgill at the University of Glasgow.

'That gives us a much sharper lens to examine the details of events like the Boltysh impact, and be able to determine with much more confidence exactly when they happened.'

The new analysis suggests that, in fact, the impact that caused the Boltysh impact crater happened 'very close to 65.39 million years ago'.

'That puts it firmly after the Chicxulub impact and the formation of the Cretaceous-Paleogene boundary, evidence for which is found in geological records around the world,' said Dr Pickersgill.

It was 650,000 years after Chicxulub  not between 2,000 and 5,000 years before at all.

The researchers selected four samples from two rock cores taken from the Boltysh impact crater in Ukraine (samples pictured)

Researchers performed argon-argon dating on the samples. Argon-argon dating measures the radioactive decay of potassium to argon

'The results allow us to place the Boltysh impact more accurately in our timeline of what happened to the Earth in the period after this mass extinction event, and better understand our deep geological history,' said Dr Pickersgill.

In the paper, the researchers draw links for the first time between their new dating of the Boltysh impact and evidence for a known 'hyperthermal' event found in the Earth's sediment record.

This period of extreme global heating is something scientists call the lower C29N hyperthermal.

Dr Annemarie Pickersgill of the University of Glasgow and co-author Professor Simon Kelley with the Boltysh rock core discussing climate implications of a medium sized impact

At that time in Earth's history, volcanoes in India known as the Deccan Traps were releasing vast amounts of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, accelerating a period of global climate change.

Evidence of the Deccan Traps' contribution to climate change has been found in sediment records around the world.

'Paleoclimatology aims to help us understand and adapt to today's changing climate by studying how our atmosphere responded to environmental stresses in the past,' said Dr Pickersgill.

'Being able to link the Boltysh lake sediments to the lower C29N hyperthermal is another piece of the jigsaw which will form a clearer picture of how our planet has responded to climate change in the past.'
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NASA will head to asteroid 16 Psyche - long thought to be the core of a dead planet - in 2022 to determine if it really contains enough metal that it's worth $10,000 quadrillion and could make every person on the planet a billionaire.

But one new study suggests it's more likely a pile of rubble.

The research, published in Planetary Science Journal, suggests that 16 Psyche is 82.5 percent metal, 7 percent low-iron pyroxene and 10.5 percent carbonaceous chondrite.

It could also have a bulk density, or how much empty space is inside, at 35 percent.

Those figures are well below previous estimates that said it could contain as much as 95 percent metal, making it chock full of iron, nickel and gold.

NASA will head to asteroid 16 Psyche in 2022, long thought to be the core of a dead planet that might contain so many metals it could be worth $10,000 quadrillion. One new study suggests it's more likely a pile of rubble

WHAT IS THE TIMELINE AND WHAT ARE THE KEY EVENTS? KEY EVENTS Launch: 2022

Solar electric cruise: 3.5 years

Arrival at Psyche: 2026

Observation Period: 21 months in orbit, mapping and studying Psyche's properties TIMELINE 2022 - Launch of Psyche spacecraft from Kennedy Space Center, Florida

2023 - Mars Flyby of Psyche spacecraft

2026 - Psyche spacecraft arrives in asteroid's orbit

2026-2027 - Psyche spacecraft orbits the Psyche asteroid Advertisement

'That drop in metallic content and bulk density is interesting because it shows that 16 Psyche is more modified than previously thought,' the study's lead author, UArizona undergraduate student David Cantillo, said in a statement.

'Psyche as a rubble pile would be very unexpected, but our data continues to show low-density estimates despite its high metallic content,' Cantillo added.

If it's more rubble-like and less metallic inside as Cantillo and the other researchers believe, it would be similar to other asteroids in the solar system, such as asteroid Bennu.

NASA's OSIRIS-REx mission recently started its 1.4 billion mile journey home after collecting 2.1 ounces of rock and dust from Bennu that could shed new light on how the solar system formed.

To come up with their findings, which have been peer-reviewed, the researchers recreated the surface of 16 Psyche in a lab, mixing different ingredients until the light patterns that saw matched those of the asteroid.

'Having a lower metallic content than once thought means that the asteroid could have been exposed to collisions with asteroids containing the more common carbonaceous chondrites, which deposited a surface layer that we are observing,' Cantillo said.

Nonetheless, Psyche 16 is still an enormous deal to scientists, as NASA notes.

It was the 16th asteroid to be discovered on March 17, 185 by Italian astronomer Annibale de Gasparis.

Psyche 16 takes roughly five years to orbit the Sun once, but only four hours to rotate on its axis, making a Psyche 16 day six times shorter than that on Earth.

It is approximately 114 miles wide, roughly the same size as the state of Massachusetts and contains one percent of all material in the asteroid belt, according to EarthSky.org.

Even if 16 Psyche is worth less than the $10,000 quadrillion figure that has been thrown out there (one that could destroy the world's economy), it's still valuable to researchers who hope to learn more about what they believe to be the remains of a long-ago planet.

The research suggests that 16 Psyche is 82.5 percent metal, 7 percent low-iron pyroxene and 10.5 percent carbonaceous chondrite

It could also have a bulk density, or how much empty space is inside, at 35 percent

Those figures are well below previous estimates that said it could contain as much as 95 percent metal, making it chock full of iron, nickel and gold

'The opportunity to study an exposed core of a planetesimal is extremely rare, which is why they're sending the spacecraft mission there,' Cantillo said, 'but our work shows that 16 Psyche is a lot more interesting than expected.'

The researchers also believe there is water on 16 Psyche's surface, so they will look to merge their data with other missions to asteroids to determine how much.

After giving it a go-ahead in 2017, NASA will send a mission to 16 Psyche, slated to launch in August 2022.

An artists' depiction of what the 16 Psyche spacecraft will look like. It is slated to launch in August 2022

The $117 million spacecraft - which NASA began building last July - will go into space on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket.

It will arrive at the asteroid in the asteroid belt in early 2026, following a gravity assist from Mars in 2023.

The craft will spend 21 months in orbit, mapping and studying the giant space rock's properties, with the goal of the mission to determine if it is indeed the core of planet-sized object.
Space tourism startup Space Perspective successfully completed its first unmanned test flight Friday of a gigantic balloon that will soon take humans to the edge of space.

The company launched a prototype of its stratospheric balloon 20 miles over Florida at 5:23am ET, putting in on schedule for the first commercial flight in 2024.

Its Neptune Once spaceship test vehicle took off from the Space Coast Air and Spaceport in Cape Canaveral and hit its planned altitude of 108,409 feet where it hovered for six hours before splashing down in the Gulf of Mexico.

With this flight, Space Perspective became the first space launch operator to fly from the Space Coast Spaceport, and put its on track for its first crewed test flight in 2023.

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Space tourism startup Space Perspective successfully completed its first unmanned test flight Friday of a gigantic balloon that will soon take humans to the stratosphere

Space Perspective is a new startup founded in 2020 by Jane Poynter and Taber McCallum, who previously co-founded World View  a firm that deploys sensors to the stratosphere attached to balloons to capture space imagery.

And they are using this idea to send humans to the edge of space.

Co-CEO and founder Poynter said in a statement: 'It is an incredible privilege launching from the space coast, where the history of human spaceflight was forged over the past decades and continues to build momentum today.

'Flying on Spaceship Neptune will be an extraordinary experience for our Space Explorers.

The company launched a prototype of its stratospheric balloon 20 miles over Florida at 5:23am ET, putting in on schedule for the first commercial flight in 2024

Its Neptune Once spaceship test vehicle took off from the Space Coast Air and Spaceport with the Space Perspective team standing by

As of December 202, Space has raised $7 million in a seed round, which is being used to test its technologies, Space News reports.

Space Perspective's Spaceship Neptune will host nine people and a mini bar, all of which will be encased in large windows.

The 'cruise' would entail a two-hour ascent into the atmosphere, where it will then hover over the Atlantic Ocean for another two hours.

'I could not be more proud of the performance of the team and the flight system. It was spectacular to witness the teamwork and the high level of expertise yield such a successful result,' said co-CEO and founder MacCallum.

'This test flight of Neptune One kicks off our extensive test flight campaign, which will be extremely robust because we can perform tests without a pilot, making Spaceship Neptune an extremely safe way to go to space.'

Space Perspective's Spaceship Neptune will host nine people and a mini bar, all of which will be encased in large windows

The 'cruise' would entail a two-hour ascent into the atmosphere, where it will then hover over the Atlantic Ocean for another two hours

Space Perspective may have hit a major milestone, but it will not be the first company to send tourists to space - Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin and Elon Musk's SpaceX are leading the industry.

Bezos recently closed an auction for a seat aboard its first crewed spaceflight, in which an unnamed bidder paid $28 million.

The July 20 launch - which coincides with the 51st anniversary of the moon landing - will be the first test of Blue Origin's New Shepard rocket with people on board, kicking off the company's space tourism business.

SpaceX is working with Axiom Space, which is building a privately-owned successor to the ISS.

The team plans to use Falcon 9 rockets to send tourists to space, with the first mission heading to the International Space Station in the second quarter of 2021.
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Spring has always been a popular time to visit Holland and a stunning new set of photographs by Dutch snapper Albert Dros confirms why.

Entitled 'Magical Spring in The Netherlands', the collection showcases showstopping images of Holland's famous tulip fields alongside shots of wildlife, wildflower-filled forests and windmills shot in the hazy spring light.

Dros has taken landscape photographs all over the world, from Kazakhstan to Dubai. During the pandemic, however, he refocused his attention on his home country, resulting in this album of breathtakingly beautiful shots.

'Spring in the Netherlands is just so pretty because all of the flowers start to bloom,' Dros told MailOnline Travel. 'We have of course our famous tulips, but we also have a lot of wildflowers that bloom everywhere.

'Then there are all the animals everywhere. The horses in the fields, the birds, the baby sheep. That in combination with the soft magical morning light makes it like a fairy tale'.

Scroll down to see Dros's magical collection of photographs.

Holland is famous for its windmills, but Dros revealed that the buildings are particularly stunning to photograph in the spring. He said: 'The windmill parks are super-beautiful in spring because there are many flowers around all of the windmills'

Tulips are an emblem of Holland. They bloom across the country from April to May. Dros said: 'I love to capture the colours of nature'

This photograph is entitled 'Be Different'. It depicts a checkered lily, which Dros explained is a 'very rare' sight in the tulip fields of Holland

Dros revealed that you have to be prepared to get up early to get the best photographs of Holland's windmills. He said: 'Be very early before sunrise - around 5 to 5.30am - before the tourists!'

Pictured is a full moon above a red tulip field. Dros said: 'Spring in the Netherlands is just so pretty'

Dros revealed that there are animals everywhere in Holland in spring. He said: 'The sounds of them in the early morning when they are the first to wake up always puts a smile on my face'

Pictured is a goose spreading its wings on a foggy morning. Dros said: 'Wake up at four in the morning and drive to a nice location in the countryside when there is some morning fog around, and youll be amazed how beautiful the country looks'

Dros called this purple-hued image Mill of the North. He said that the spring flowers blooming around Holland's windmills give the iconic structures 'that extra touch of magic'

Dros revealed that the atmosphere in the Netherlands feels different in spring. He said: 'I think it's mostly because its coming after the winter transition. Suddenly, trees start to get their green leaves again'

Pictured is one of the historical buildings at Zaanse Schans Windmill Park, a 20-minute drive north of Amsterdam. This area of Holland is full of windmills, wooden houses, barns, workshops and even a cheese factory

'The most important thing is knowing the weather and having the drive and passion to really wake up early for that magical light,' Dros said, explaining how to take a stunning springtime photo like this one

This pretty photograph showcases a forest with a carpet of hyacinth flowers. Talking about spring in Holland, Dros said: 'We have of course our famous tulips, but we also have a lot of wildflowers that bloom everywhere'

Dros explained how he likes to capture landscapes in 'the soft magical morning light'. Although he confessed that the light 'doesnt always happen of course'

'Right after the bloom of the tulips youll find many poppies in the Dutch countryside,' Dros revealed. 'This one was photographed right after sunset'

Entitled Tree of Life, this photo is one of Dros's favourites from his Magical Spring in the Netherlands collection. He said: 'Its fairly simple, but just really gives that spring feeling with all of the yellow flowers in the foreground and the blossoming tree in the middle. It almost looks like a painting'

In this heart-warming shot, a swan spreads its wings one early morning. Dros explained how timing is key to the photographs he takes. He said: 'It's like a fairy tale, when youre at the right place at the right time'

'Its like the country awakens from the winter sleep and transitions into the warmer phase,' Dros said, talking about how special Holland is in spring

This mesmerising shot shows a forest in the morning light. Dros explained that spring is his favourite time of year in Holland. Although he admitted that autumn comes a close second. He said: 'In autumn the same forests have so many golden colours'

In this striking shot, a dramatic thunder storm rages above a field of red tulips. Dros revealed: 'I had always wanted to take a shot like this and this year - 2021 - I finally succeeded'

This serene photograph depicts the first sunbeams of the day streaming through trees in a Dutch forest. Dros grew up in a town called Amersfoort, which is close to several national forests

'Spring is a magical season, especially in the Netherlands,' Dros said. 'There is so much beauty to see and to photograph - our tulip season, the lush greens everywhere, the cute animals, the windmills, and our beautiful forests, some covered with many flowers'

According to Dros, royal purple rhododendrons are a common sight in the forests of Holland in spring. He reveals that they start to bloom in earnest at the end of May

Pictured is a forest floor full of white wild garlic flowers. Dros said: 'Yes, it really does smell like garlic. But I like it'

On his blog, Dros reveals that 'different' tulips are removed by the growers. However, he said: 'I find them the most beautiful to photograph'

Dros has travelled the world as a photographer. He has taken snaps everywhere from Kyrgyzstan to Dubai. During the pandemic he refocused his attention on his home country, resulting in stunning shots like this springtime forest photo

Pictured is a close-up of a hyacinth flower. It took Dros two springs to capture all the images in his Magical Spring in The Netherlands collection

'Over the years, I learned to love and appreciate my home country more and more,' Dros said. 'The more you are away, the happier you are when you come back'

Describing this pretty image, Dros said: 'Some forest parts look like a jungle with all the greens. An interesting combination with the wild garlic forest floor'

You can find out more about Albert Dros's work on his website - www.albertdros.com.
The Real Housewives Of Atlanta star Falynn Guobadia claimed she quit modeling after she was allegedly humiliated by fashion designer Michael Costello at his runway show.

Falynn, 32, claimed she was left mortified after she was dismissed by Michael, 38, at his fashion show after successfully auditioning to walk in the event.

'In front of all of the models and his team, they come over to me and say, "Someone was supposed to call you. We don't need you for the show and have nothing for you to wear,'" Falynn recalled. 'All of the models gasped and covered their faces. I was embarrassed and ashamed. I ran outside and cried for two hours.'

The allegations come after Leona Lewis revealed she felt bodyshamed by Costello after he refused to dress her for a charity runway show.

'I never auditioned to model again': The Real Housewives Of Atlanta star Falynn Guobadia claimed she quit modeling after she was allegedly humiliated by fashion designer Michael Costello at his runway show

Controversy: The allegations against Michael Costello come after the designer faced accusations from Leona Lewis

Leona, who has since accepted Michael's apology, came forward with her story after Michael said he had suicidal thoughts after Chrissy Teigen allegedly attempted to torpedo his fashion career.

On her Instagram Stories, Falynn recalled auditioning for Michael's runway show for Los Angeles Fashion Week when she was 23.

To her surprise and despite being just five foot six, Michael invited her to walk in his show, and even complimented her on her figure and walk.

An excited Falynn arrived to the show with all the clothing she was asked to bring, but her everything changed once she noticed Michael and his sister eyeing her 'as if I were the scum of the Earth.'

'I was embarrassed and ashamed': The Real Housewives Of Atlanta star recalled the alleged incident which occurred when she was 23

Falynn claims Michael and his sister approached her in front of all the other models and asked her to leave the show.

Falynn posted her allegations to her Instagram Stories on Thursday as a reaction to current controversy surrounding Michael and Leona.

'What's unfortunate about this story is I had this same experience with Michael Costello, except as a model. And bc of this traumatic experience, unfortunately, it was the end of my pursuit to become a fashion model. I just couldn't bare the embarrassment. Him/his team made me feel very uncomfortable and inadequate.'

'I was ecstatic!' Falynn said she was thrilled to be selected by Michael himself to walk in his event

'I was 23 years old living in LA with not much but a dream. I went to audition for Michael Costello's LA Fashion Week where he complimented me on my body and my runway walk. I was ecstatic! I received an email with a list of underwear to purchase and instructions for the show. I'm thinking to myself I'm 5'6 and have been chosen to WALK! Which I never thought would happen for me.'

'When I arrived, I had my Victoria's Secret bag in hand with the underwear we were instructed to bring and was told to wait in line for makeup. I see Michael and his sister talking in a corner and looking at me with this look on their faces as if I were the scum of the Earth.

'Then, in front of all of the models and his team, they come over to me and say, "Someone was supposed to call you. We don't need you for the show and have nothing for you to wear."

Claims: Falynn claims Michael and his sister approached her in front of all the other models and asked her to leave the show

Speaking up: Falynn posted her allegations to her Instagram Stories on Thursday as a reaction to current controversy surrounding Michael and Leona

'All of the models gasped and covered their faces. I was embarrassed and ashamed. I ran outside and cried for two hours. I never auditioned to model again. It pains me to hear that Leona Lewis experienced such trauma. I pray this was a learning opportunity for Michael and his team.'

While Michael has not addressed Falynn's allegations, he has apologized to Leona for the experience she had with him, admitting it came as a surprise to hear about as she has continued wearing his dresses since the alleged experience she had with him in 2014.

'If I did unintentionally hurt you and and you continued to support me, I want to apologize to you directly. This caught me by surprise, I am completely blindsided, as you have always looked fabulous in my gowns, and I thought you truly loved them,' he wrote in his lengthy apology to Leona, who has since thanked him for the note.

Coming forward: Falynn posted her recollections of the alleged event on her Instagram Stories

Her allegations came after Michael said he had suicidal ideations after Chrissy and her stylist Monica Rose blacklisted him from the industry and went 'out of their way to threaten people and brands that if they were in any shape or form associated with me, they would not work with any of them.'

Costello told TMZ he's still waiting on an apology from Chrissy, who has been in the midst of controversy over bullying allegations.

He admitted to the site: 'I do not wish ill on anyone. We are all works in progress and we deserve the opportunity to prove that we can do better. But progress takes time. We must show through actions that we have changed. After all, action speaks much louder than a 10-minute apology written on a notepad.'

Apologies: Leona Lewis has accepted Costello's apology after she said she felt bodyshamed by him at a charity fashion show
Scheana Shay wowed in a fitted dress by White Fox boutique as she attended the Grand Opening of Kyle Chan's store in Los Angeles on Thursday.

It marked the 35-year-old reality star's first event appearance since giving birth to her daughter Summer Moon in late April.

Shay was joined by a few of her Vanderpump Rules costars, including Ariana Madix, Tom Sandoval, and Tom Schwartz.

Wow! Scheana Shay wowed in a fitted dress by White Fox boutique as she attended the Grand Opening of Kyle Chan's store in Los Angeles on Thursday

First appearance: It marked the 35-year-old reality star's first event appearance since giving birth to her daughter Summer Moon in late April

Scheana's figure flattering dress featured a racerback design and ruching down the sides.

She wore her long dark brown hair in a low bun and accentuated her already stunning features with makeup.

Specifically, Scheana's brown eyes were decked out with fluffy false lashes and her lips were dressed in nude pink lipgloss.

As for accessories, Shay kept things minimalistic by fastening a pair of gold geometric hoops to her ears.

Reunited: Shay was joined by a few of her Vanderpump Rules costars, including (L-R) Ariana Madix, Tom Sandoval, and Tom Schwartz

Keeping thing simple: As for accessories, Shay kept things minimalistic by fastening a pair of gold geometric hoops to her ears; Scheana pictured with Ariana Madix

To complete her red carpet look, she slipped her feet into a pair of black heeled booties.

Scheana and her boyfriend Brock Davies announced their daughter's arrival on April 27, one day after the reality star gave birth.

Since then, Shay has been sharing darling snapshots of her newborn daughter with her Instagram following.

Thrilled: Although she is still in baby bliss, Scheana seemed thrilled to be spending time with her Vanderpump Rules cast mates as she cozied up to them for several snaps on the event's star-studded step-and-repeat

Taking things up a notch: Specifically, Scheana's stunning brown eyes were decked out with fluffy false lashes and her lips were dressed in nude pink lipgloss; Ariana Madix and Scheana pictured

Support: The entire crew made sure to gather around to pose for pictures with the man of the afternoon, Kyle Chan, in order to further showcase their support for his store's opening; (L-R) Jesse Montana, Ariana Madix, Tom Sandoval, Kyle Chan, Tom Schwartz and Scheana Shay pictured

Although she is still in baby bliss, Scheana seemed thrilled to be spending time with her Vanderpump Rules cast mates as she cozied up to them for several snaps on the event's star-studded step-and-repeat.

The entire crew made sure to gather around to pose for pictures with the man of the afternoon, Kyle Chan, in order to further showcase their support for his first-ever store's opening.

Ariana looked gorgeous in a plunging A-line dress boasting a muted rainbow pattern that glistened in the light.

Taking the plunge: Ariana looked gorgeous in a plunging A-line dress boasting a muted rainbow pattern that glistened in the light

Lovebirds: The 35-year-old, who is romantically linked to costar Tom Sandoval (left), styled her bright blonde strands in a variety of effortless waves

The 35-year-old, who is romantically linked to costar Tom Sandoval, styled her bright blonde strands in a variety of effortless waves.

Sandoval looked suave in a brown suit jacket and matching trousers, which he paired with a flashy Gucci belt and a plain white tee.

The actor-turned entrepreneur, 37, rocked a neat coif and posed beside his lady love in a pair of bright white Gucci loafers.

Put together: The actor-turned entrepreneur, 37, rocked a neat coif and posed beside his lady love in a pair of bright white Gucci loafers

Suave: Sandoval looked suave in a brown suit jacket and matching trousers, which he paired with a flashy Gucci belt and a plain white tee

Gather around: Tom and Ariana pictured with Kyle Chan

Schwartz, who happens to be Sandoval's TomTom Bar partner, sported a more casual ensemble, consisting of a red flannel top, a pair of faded blue jeans, and a cap.

The crew was later joined by another Vanderpump Rules star, Jesse Montana, who put on a preppy display in a pale blue sweater vest and a pair of baggy kaki trousers.

The musician-turned-reality star had his hair swept to one side and accessorized with a single chain around his neck.

Keeping casual: Schwartz, who happens to be Sandoval's TomTom Bar partner, sported a more casual ensemble

More the merrier: The crew was later joined by another Vanderpump Rules star, Jesse Montana, who put on a preppy display in a pale blue sweater vest and a pair of baggy kaki trousers; Tom Sandoval, Tom Schwartz and Jesse Montana pictured

Proud: Schwartz beamed as he posed for a celebratory snap with store owner Kyle Chan

Nice touch: Jesse had his hair swept to one side and accessorized with a single chain around his neck

Also in attendance were cast members from the hit Netflix series Bling Empire, which premiered its first season in January 2021.

Kane Lim looked effortlessly cool in a light wash denim jacket layered over a pitch black tee and a pair of skinny jeans.

The founder of Kix Capital topped off the look with some solid black sneakers.

Bling Empire: Also in attendance were cast members from the hit Netflix series Bling Empire, which premiered its first season in January 2021; (L-R) Kane Lim, Kyle Chan and Kevin Kreider pictured

Cool: Kane Lim looked effortlessly cool in a light wash denim jacket layered over a pitch black tee and a pair of skinny jeans

Muscular: Kevin Kreider put his muscular model physique on display in a tight fitting grey t-shirt and a pair of dark wash denim jeans; Kane Lim and Kevin Kreider pictured

Kevin Kreider put his muscular model physique on display in a tight fitting grey t-shirt and a pair of dark wash denim jeans.

The Bling Empire hunk wore his hair in a sexy side swoop and sported a bit of well groomed facial hair.

Kreider had a pair of designer shades hanging from his shirt and a pendant chain around his neck.

Playful: In one snapshot from the event, Kevin could be seen embracing his stunning Bling Empire costar Kelly Mi Li (right)

Designer darling: Kelly turned heads in a silky black wrap dress that stopped just above her knees

In one snapshot from the event, Kevin could be seen embracing his stunning Bling Empire costar Kelly Mi Li.

Kelly turned heads in a silky black wrap dress that stopped just above her knees.

She emphasized her already time waistline by throwing on a Christian Dior belt featuring the designer's famous moniker.

Once inside, the Vanderpump Rules cast could be seen soaking up the atmosphere of the newly opened Kyle Chan storefront.

Renown: Kyle Chan is a renown jewelry designer, with his pieces being worn by the likes of Kendall Jenner and Lady Gaga; Kyle pictured

Atmosphere: Once inside, the Vanderpump Rules cast could be seen soaking up the atmosphere of the newly opened Kyle Chan storefront; Scheana, Adriana, and Kyle pictured

Kyle Chan is a renown jewelry designer, with his pieces being worn by the likes of Kendall Jenner and Lady Gaga.

The LA-based, Hong Kong-born designer also had his work featured in the Oscar nominated film La La Land, which starred Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone.

Kyle's jewelry pieces have been sold 'worldwide at over 300 retail locations.'

Well-deserved: Kyle posing with Vanderpump Rules star Tom Sandoval at the grand opening of his storefront in Los Angeles on Thursday

Going Hollywood: The LA-based, Hong Kong-born designer also had his work featured in the Oscar nominated film La La Land, which starred Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone; Kevin Kreider pictured
He's the hunky Australian model who is known for his edgy looks on runways around the world.

But on Thursday, Jordan Barrett opted for a more casual appearance as he stepped out for a gym session in New York City.

The 24-year-old looked worn out and distracted as he sauntered up the street with a pal, staring at his phone as he made his way through the city.

Casual chic: On Thursday, Jordan Barrett stepped out for a gym session in New York City - looking worlds away from his runway appearances in the process

For the occasion, Jordan wore a white T-shirt, baggy tracksuit bottoms and a jacket which he draped over his shoulder.

His luscious hair appeared unruly and wild after his stint at Gotham Gym, and he raised a slight smile as he texted one of his pals.

The Byron Bay native rounded out his sporty ensemble with black sneakers.

Fit and fabulous: For the occasion, Jordan wore a white T-shirt, baggy tracksuit bottoms and a jacket which he draped over his shoulder

Jordan's striking looks have seen him work alongside an impressive selection of A-list models over the years, including Kate Moss and Gigi Hadid.

Jordan, who has over 1.1million followers on Instagram, recently opened up on leaving his native Australia to live a life in New York.

'I'm not looking at it like I'm gone for good,' he confessed.

Fashion icon: Jordan, who has over 1.1million followers on Instagram, recently opened up on leaving his native Australia to live a life in New York

He also spoke about his battle with mental health, and said that returning to Australia for three months earlier in the year gave him time to reflect on himself.

'From being 17, and being extremely successful overseas in what I was doing, but not even really knowing what it was I was doing' he explained.

'When I was scouted, I didn't even understand what it meant to be a model. I didn't know what was going on in my mind. I didn't even know what a panic attack was until now.'
Sarah Hyland looked ready for summer as she stepped out in Los Angeles.

The 30-year-old actress, who starred in the hit sitcom Modern Family for 11 seasons, was casual and cool wearing a Baywatch t-shirt and Daisy Duke shorts as she ran errands on Wednesday.

It looked like Sarah was enjoying some downtime after recently wrapping filming the pilot for Epic, a new fairytale drama from Once Upon a Time creators Adam Horowitz and Edward Kitsis.

Out and about: Sarah Hyland looked ready for summer as she ran errands in Los Angeles

Hyland's vintage white cropped t-shirt showed off the XOXO star's taut midriff as she strolled out of a grocery store.

The iconic 90s show's trademark red logo was displayed across the front of the t-shirt.

Hyland flaunted her toned legs in a pair of high-waisted denim cut-off shorts that she paired with tan sandals as she pushed her cart out of the store.

The New York native picked up bouquets of sunflowers and peach-colored roses along with several bags of groceries.

Cheery: The New York native picked up bouquets of sunflowers and peach-colored roses

She carried a large beige handbag and covered her face with a burgundy mask.

Though mask mandates for fully vaccinated Californians were relaxed on June 15, many businesses still require them to enter.

A maroon scrunchie could be seen on one of her arms. The Vampire Academy actress accessorized with several beaded bracelets and layered a couple of gold necklaces

The 5ft2in beauty shielded her eyes with a pair of large black sunglasses.

Fit: Hyland flaunted her toned legs in a pair of high-waisted denim cut-off shorts that she paired with tan sandals

Sarah wore her hair half-up in a ponytail and half-down as her thick copper-colored curls cascaded over her shoulders.

The Wedding Year star debuted her new color and style back in February

She shared an image of her gorgeous red mane with the caption, 'Getting back to my Scottish/Irish roots. Also, I'm bored and watched all of Outlander for a second time.'

Hyland's locks are naturally curly and she recently got hair extensions to add length and thickness.

Gorgeous mane: Sarah wore her hair half-up in a ponytail and half-down as her thick copper-colored curls cascaded over her shoulders

Sarah revealed her new look on Instagram with a post in which she is seen posing in a low-cut animal print top.

She captioned the photo, 'Ok. Stay with me. Merida dressed up as Tarzan. Locks to match my curls by @chaviv_hair & color by @901artists.

The stunning star certainly resembled Merida, the redheaded Scottish Disney princess seen in the studio's 2012 animated feature film, Brave.

Fairytale -inspired: The stunning star certainly resembled Merida, the redheaded Scottish Disney princess seen in the studio's 2012 animated feature film, Brave

Last month, she shared some photos to Instagram taken during her stay in Ireland while she was filming Epic.

Posting a photo of herself with a horse at some stables, she wrote: 'So excited to be working on a project for the first time in over a year! I've already been overseas for a month with the most amazing cast, we started shooting yesterday, and let's just say that this is going to be... EPIC.'

She also shared a couple of snaps in which she's seen walking barefoot through trees and explained in the caption: 'Just a little witch barefoot in the woods of Ireland.'

Latest project: Last month, Hyland shared some photos to Instagram as she filmed Epic, a new fairytale drama from Once Upon a Time creators Adam Horowitz and Edward Kitsis

Filmed in Ireland: She also shared a couple of snaps in which she's seen walking barefoot through trees and explained in the caption: 'Just a little witch barefoot in the woods of Ireland'

Hyland's filming schedule meant that she was apart from fiance Wells Adams when he celebrated his 37th birthday in May.

The couple postponed their planned nuptials due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The sitcom star told People last October the two 'definitely want to get married one day and have the wedding of our dreams and have everybody that we love there.

'But we postponed wedding planning because we want to be able to focus on what's important right now. There is a lot going on in the world right now and that's what we should be focused on,' she said.
Comedian Lawrence Mooney has weighed in after being put on blast for sharing his controversial stance on the coronavius vaccine on national TV.

The 56-year-old took to his Triple M's Moonman in the Morning breakfast radio show to discuss his appearance on Thursday's Today Extra, where he admitted to not being vaccinated due to rare reports of complications with the AstraZeneca jab.

'All eyes turned to me and asked me if I'd been vaccinated,' Lawrence said on his show on Friday. 'There was a pile-on that ensured.'

Lawrence hits back: Lawrence Mooney has weighed in after being put on blast for sharing his controversial stance on the coronavius vaccine on national TV. On Thursday's Today Extra, Lawrence admitted he wasn't vaccinated and is 'hesitant'

It comes a day after Lawrence told Today Extra he wasn't vaccinated because he 'didn't want to die', which prompted them to hold an 'intervention'.

Hosts David Campbell and Belinda Russell and guest contributor Michelle Stephenson proceeded to cite stats that suggested people are more likely to die on a plane than from the AstraZeneca jab.

Free from the scrutiny during his own show on Friday, he insisted there wasn't a higher chance of dying from flying - maintaining that Qantas have 'never lost a life.'

The Moonman host pointed out that the Government changed the recommended age limit for the AstraZeneca jab to 60 just two hours after Thursday's debate.

'Pile-on': The 56-year-old took to his Triple M's Moonman in the Morning breakfast radio show on Friday to blast Today Extra hosts David Campbell and Belinda Russell for 'piling on' when he said he didn't have the vaccine because he 'didn't want to die'

AstraZeneca COVID Vaccine in Australia The AstraZeneca Coronavirus vaccine is the current recommended vaccine for Australia citizens over the age of 60. So far there have been 60 cases of blood clots from the AstraZeneca jab in the country. Nationally, there have been 3.3 million AstraZeneca shots administered. Advertisement

'You've been vindicating me for my hesitancy,' Lawrence continued. 'Dave Campbell, Belinda Russell, Michelle Stephenson, Today Extra, you can't pile onto me when the government immediately moves the goal posts, you can't!!' he said.

Lawrence felt the government's decision validated his concerns and was frustrated over the TV 'pile-on'.

'Have you been vaccinated Lawrence?' asked David Campbell on Thursday's program.

'No, I have not,' Lawrence responded, who added he was 'hesitant.'

When asked if he was 'worried about the AstraZeneca vaccine?' he replied: 'I don't want to die.'

This prompted a frenzied reaction from the Today Extra hosts, who both tried to reassure Lawrence, saying, 'you're not going to die!'

'This is an intervention,' asserted Lawrence. 'I know the stats!'

'You've got a higher chance of dying from flying than you do from AstraZeneca,' claimed Michelle.

'You're not going to die!': The Today Extra hosts tried to reassure Lawrence Mooney that the AstraZeneca vaccine was safe to take, citing stats that suggested you are more likely to die from flying than the jab. Pictured from left to right: David Campbell, Michelle Stephenson, comedian Vince Sorrenti and Sylvia Jeffreys
From Hot Potato to the Big Red Car, The Wiggles' beloved shows and music will now be available 24/7 and ad-free on a brand new streaming channel in the US.

Loop Media, a digital streaming agency based in California, have signed a landmark deal with the music group.

Thousands of hours of content starring current members Anthony, 58, Simon, 49, Emma, 31, and Lachlan, 35, will air, as well as shows featuring the older Wiggles' crew.

Big: Classic Australia kids' music group The Wiggles will get their very own streaming channel in the U.S. after signing a HUGE deal with Loop Media. Pictured left to right: Lachlan Gillespie, 35, Emma Watkins, 31, Simon Pryce, 49, and Anthony Field, 58.

No plans of distribution have been announced so far according to Deadline, but Loop Media presently streams in the United States, Canada and Latin America.

Before signing with Loop Media, The Wiggles previously streamed on Netflix (U.S.) and YouTube.

They have also had their shows play on both the Disney Channel and Nickelodeon.

Broad reach: The Wiggles' have previously streamed on Netflix (U.S.) and YouTube. They have also had their shows play on both the Disney Channel and Nickelodeon.

Jon Niermann, CEO of Loop Media, says he's had the 'pleasure' of knowing the original Wiggles group since the 1990's when he tried to bring them into the US market while he was working at Disney.

'Having the opportunity to launch their first branded channel with Loop Media is a reunion that we are very excited about,' he said.

'My kids and so many others have been entertained and influenced in such a positive way by their music as they grew up,' Jon added. 'We cant wait to make their amazing library of content readily available for new and old fans alike.'

A fruitful partnership: Jon Niermann, the CEO of Loop Media, says he's had the 'pleasure' of knowing the original Wiggles group since the 1990's when he tried to bring them into the U.S. market. 'Having the opportunity to launch their first branded channel with Loop Media is a reunion that we are very excited about,' he said.

Veteran Blue Wiggle Anthony Field says the new channel will mean the band will have 'generations of fans that now get a chance to see their favourite original videos.'

'Working with Jon again and his team at Loop Media to make this happen is a terrific moment for us,' the founder and performer said.

The channel is set to air in the coming months.
Anderson Cooper recently spoke about missing his son Wyatt's first steps during Wednesday's episode of The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.

The 54-year-old television personality revealed that he was 'really p***ed' when his former partner, Benjamin Maisani, texted him about his one-year-old son's big achievement.

The journalist and his ex ended their romantic relationship in March of 2018, but they plan to co-parent the toddler for the foreseeable future.

Unhappy dad: Anderson Cooper 'got really p***ed' when his ex, Benjamin Maisani, texted him about his son Wyatt's first steps during Wednesday's episode of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert

Cooper recalled that he was in the middle of an assignment when he got the notification about his son's steps, which startled him greatly.

He recalled, 'I was going to Israel last week, it was my first work trip for 60 Minutes, and I was doing an interview and I get this text from Wyatt's other dad, Benjamin, and he said, "He just walked!!"'

The television personality then expressed that he grew incensed over the text and that his former partner would have done better to conceal the fact for when he returned home.

He said, 'My reaction was fury ... I got really p***ed at Benjamin. I was like, "In my household when I grew up, you would lie about everything." He should have just lied!'

Stressful occasion: The television personality recalled that he was notified about Wyatt's first steps when he was on a work assignment in Israel

Looking back: The political commentator expressed that his former partner 'should have just lied' and not told him about his son's achievement

Cooper, having returned home, spoke about his young son's moving habits and humorously remarked that Wyatt 'walks like a drunken sailor.'

The journalist also spoke about his baby son's attempts at speech and noted that, although he had not taken to English quite yet, his effort was admirable nonetheless.

Anderson noted that his child 'talks in a dialect of Hindu or Urdu, I'm not sure ... It's incredible. It's a really interesting dialect.

'He doesn't make any sense at this point, but he's very committed to it,' Cooper added.

Doing his best: Cooper also told Colbert that, although his son has not mastered English, he currently 'talks in a dialect of Hindu or Urdu, I'm not sure'

The pair were romantically involved for over 10 years before they announced their amicable split in 2018.

However, he asked his former partner to reenter his life prior to the birth of his son, who was delivered with the help of a surrogate in April of last year.

Cooper partially named his child after his late father, who passed away when he was just 10-years-old.

Doing their thing: Although Cooper and Maisani split up in 2018, they agreed to co-parent Wyatt, who was welcomed via a surrogate (seen in 2018)

He spoke about the experience of becoming a father when his own was not present during his childhood and pointed out that he was not prepared for the experience.

Specifically, the journalist expressed that parenthood 'has made me sort of connect with my dad ... in a way that I never really anticipated.'

He also remarked that he was starting to recall experiences that he had with his father while he took care of his own son, which he was amused by.

'I remember things about my dad that I never remembered before because I'm experiencing them with Wyatt as a dad. It's really interesting,' he said.
Copenhagen (Theatre Royal Bath and touring)

Verdict: Mega brain-teaser

Rating:

Michael Frayn's 2000 play Copenhagen is guaranteed to make your little grey cells smoke like a summer barbecue.

Revived in Bath this week and touring with a cast of Haydn Gwynne, Malcolm Sinclair and Philip Arditti, it's a mentally demanding but brilliant drama about a secret meeting between Nobel Prize-winning nuclear physicists Niels Bohr and Werner Heisenberg in the Nazi-occupied Danish capital of 1941.

The big question that drives what becomes a high-end game of cat and mouse is simple: why did Heisenberg (Arditti) visit Bohr (Sinclair)?

Copenhagen is a mentally demanding but brilliant drama about a secret meeting between Nobel Prize-winning nuclear physicists Niels Bohr and Werner Heisenberg in the Nazi-occupied Danish capital of 1941. Pictured: Haydn Gwynne with Philip Arditti

Seatbelts and thinking caps are needed for the two-and-a-half-hour deposition that follows. And just to keep us on our toes, the event is modelled on Heisenberg's theory of subatomic physics, asserting that the fundamental state of all matter is uncertain.

Going over the encounter again and again, a bit like the Bill Murray film Groundhog Day, the same scenario throws up different answers each time. Why did Heisenberg visit Bohr? Was it to warn the half-Jewish Bohr about the SS coming to round up Denmark's Jews? Was it to spy on his work? Was it to show off? Was it for Bohr's blessing? Or was it to sound out Bohr on American plans to build a nuclear bomb?

These and myriad other questions never get a satisfactory answer, but that doesn't stop the characters searching, in a show which is as abstruse as it is dizzying.

At one point Heisenberg illustrates his famous uncertainty principle by comparing the unpredictability of subatomic matter to being a downhill skier travelling at 70mph and needing to turn left or right: 'In your head you go both ways, but your swerve is the decision.'

Nor does Emma Howlett's production (conceived with Polly Findlay for performance last year) take any prisoners. The pace is fast, and you simply have to cling on for dear life.

Malcolm Sinclair's (pictured) Bohr is urbane, considered and tenacious, determined to fathom his former pupil's purpose

Alex Eales's set is deceptively simple, with the action taking place under a giant 'O', which looks like an atomic halo looming over the actors' heads. Even the midges and mosquitoes of Bath do their bit to illustrate the point, by flying in and out of it like so many tiny electrons.

Amid a blizzard of theoretical physics and complex maths  including reference to 'matrix calculus', which even Heisenberg says he struggles to understand  the actors feed off each other's energy. And yet the hour-and-a-quarter first half is a slog, and it's not until the second half that the characters really achieve fission.

Sinclair's Bohr is urbane, considered and tenacious, determined to fathom his former pupil's purpose. Arditti's Heisenberg is sparkier and more intuitive in a performance of tireless mental and physical vigour.

Gwynne, as Bohr's wife Margrethe, acts as peacemaker, narrator and umpire who humanises the two men by observing and adjudicating between them.

Much as I loved the twists and turns between these characters, it would have been nice if Frayn's enriched theatrical uranium could have been condensed into a shorter, more intimate format. That way we lesser mortals might have been able to get more emotionally involved.

Until June 26, Theatre Royal, Bath (theatreroyal.org.uk or 01225 448844); then touring to Mayflower Studio, Southampton (June 28-July 3), Malvern Theatres (July 5-10), Cambridge Arts Theatre (July 12-17) and Rose Theatre Kingston (July 20-24).

Time Lords' frantic bid to save universe

Doctor Who: Time Fracture (Davies Mews, LondonW1)

Verdict: Gaga but fun

Rating:

Doctor Who is not known for being under-cooked, and nor is this 'immersive' spin-off that plunges us into the world of the BBC's sci-fi franchise with an appealing kooky relish.

It's two-and-a-bit hours of fullon Whovian mania, with babbling hyperbole and histrionic special-effects in a lavishly designed underground theme-park experience.

It all starts in a quiet London mews, off Bond Street. Entering a concrete bunker in groups of about 12, we are briefed on video by an MI5 chief (Gemma Redgrave) about a 'time fracture' that security forces have been monitoring since a weapon of unknown origin landed in Mayfair of 1942.

Doctor Who: Time Fracture is two-and-a-bit hours of fullon Whovian mania, with babbling hyperbole and histrionic special-effects in a lavishly designed underground theme-park experience. Pictured: Molly Walker

Our mission is to enter said time fracture and somehow 'save the universe'. From here, we are ushered by lab assistants into a Tardis-like control room filled with TV screens, where the hole-in-the-wall fracture is watched.

After messianic exhortations, further sci-fi bluster and safety procedure rehearsals, we are dispatched through the time fracture into a market in a parallel world.

Here, we are button-holed by various actors in multiple Whovian costumes. Through another hole in a wall we enter the court of Elizabeth I, where she is engaged in a round of Blind Date (for no obvious reason).

The whole performance is conducted in a cheerfully rowdy frenzy which can make it difficult to hear the competing actors, even when they are shouting at close range.

Through another hole in a wall we enter the court of Elizabeth I, where she is engaged in a round of Blind Date (for no obvious reason)

So the bar on board the space ship to the Time Lords' home planet of Gallifrey does come as a relief  and there's a sublime moment with a Silurian reptile woman, Lady Serestas (Daisy Winter-Taylor), singing Radiohead's hypnotic Creep.

As you may have guessed the story is completely gaga, but this is still a high-energy adventure which has been given a very impressive design.

Crucially, there are multiple encounters with Daleks, Cyborgs and Weeping Angel stone statues that edge their way down a blacked-out tunnel.

Although there are corny recordings of Jodie Whittaker at the end, no Doctor appears, and the closest is a Tom Baker-ish Howard Grater, who, with Molly Walker, is one of the many Time Lord Guides dotted around.

No sane Whovian (do any exist?) will want to miss this.

Show me the money!

The Money (County Hall, London)

Verdict: A too-tame treasure hunt

Rating:

Filthy lucre will usually bring out the worst in people. Not so in this low-stakes show  billed as 'a cross between a game and a theatrical experience'  at the old GLC building in London's County Hall.

The audience gather in the dour old debating chamber, supervised by two sternly ceremonial stewardesses.

Down below, in the front seats, eight top-price ticket holders are given a sum of (in our case) 160 to spend as they please. The rules are that they can't split the dosh, they can't give it to charity; whatever they decide must fall within the law and their decision must be unanimous.

The Money is billed as 'a cross between a game and a theatrical experience'  at the old GLC building in London's County Hall

The rest of the congregation, or 'silent witnesses', must not influence the decision.

But if they ring a bell, they can join the debate for a minimum contribution of 20. A digital clock is then started, and participants have one hour to decide. Failing that, the money is rolled over to the next session.

At my visit, two alphas quickly emerged: a bossy Aussie lady and an organisational nerd keeping track of the votes.

The charity exclusion was overcome by agreeing the money could be given to one trusted participant and a WhatsApp group was set up to oversee its dispersal.

Down below, in the front seats, eight top-price ticket holders are given a sum of (in our case) 160 to spend as they please

A handful of silent witnesses bought a place at the table, swelling the coffers to 270. Plant trees, one urged! Invest in struggling artists, cried another! Hand it over to staff at St Thomas' Hospital, demanded a third! Only one voice was frivolous: 'Everyone must have ice cream!'

Everyone got a drink instead and discussed the outcome, which was to buy a set of Lottery tickets in the hope of winning a bigger stash to give away.

Otherwise the spectacle was a little tame. It needs to raise the stakes with some red meat to turn it into a savage social experiment where we all have something to lose.
Former foreign minister Julie Bishop proudly unveiled her very own Barbie doll this week.

And on Friday, the 64-year-old tactfully side-stepped Kyle Sandilands' crude question about her doll on The Kyle and Jackie O show.

The radio shock jock, who always likes to push the envelop, asked: 'When you take all the clothes off on the Barbie what's going on there? Is it anatomically correct?'

Well answered: Julie Bishop tactfully side-stepped Kyle Sandilands' crude question on Friday about her Barbie after toy giant Mattel honoured the former foreign minister her with a doll, earlier this week

Avoiding the lewd question, the former politician answered: 'Now, the thing about Barbie is she comes in all shapes and sizes these days.

'Mattel has absolutely embraced diversity so you can get Barbies in all different skin tones, different body sizes,' she added.

The former diplomat noted only one difference between herself and her doll.

'This Barbie's kind of like me except the legs - my legs aren't that long, come on,' she laughed.

Cheeky: Kyle, who seemingly wanted to push the envelop, asked: 'When you take all the clothes off on the Barbie what's going on there? Is it anatomically correct?'

Tactfully done: But the former politician side-stepped his lewd question and noted the only one difference between herself and her doll: 'This Barbie's kind of like me except the legs - my legs aren't that long, come on'

Elsewhere, Julie said she was happy to jump on board when toy giant Mattel asked her to be their official Role Model for 2021 and design a doll in her likeness.

'They (Barbie) suggested the red shoes and so the suit went with it, and they've gone to so much detail it's incredible,' she said.

Her doll is dressed in a navy power suit and red sparkling heels - the same look she wore on the day of her resignation as foreign minister in 2018.

Just like Julie: Elsewhere, Julie said she was happy to jump on board with Mattel when they asked her to be their official Role Model for 2021 and design a doll in her likeness. 'They've gone to so much detail it's incredible,' she proudly said

Julie was presented with a doll in her likeness - which is the highest honour that can be bestowed by the Mattel toy company this week.

The doll, which is not for sale, comes with an Australian passport and a suitcase - a nod to her four-year tenure as Minister for Foreign Affairs as seen in photos captured by renowned photographer Russell James.

Julie said: 'I was genuinely thrilled to see a Barbie in my likeness, particularly as she was dressed in the outfit I wore when a resigned as Australia's Foreign Minister, a political role that I was honoured to hold.'

Standing out from the crowd: Mattel's custom doll pays homage to Julie's trailblazing career in both national and international politics, which spanned more than 20 years

Hard work: During her career she formalised a partnership between the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and the Australian Fashion Chamber to promote local fashion and design on the world stage. Pictured in London on April 17, 2018

Mattel's custom doll pays homage to Julie's trailblazing career in both national and international politics, which spanned more than 20 years.

During her career she formalised a partnership between the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and the Australian Fashion Chamber to promote local fashion and design on the world stage.

Julie stepped down as Foreign Minister in August 2018 and quit politics the following year.

She has since become a fixture on the social scene, and recently attended Australian Fashion Week in Sydney.

Exit: Julie stepped down as Foreign Minister in August 2018 and quit politics the following year

As of January last year, she has been chancellor of the Australian National University, and is the first woman to hold the position.

Julie also serves as Chair of the Telethon Kids Institute and Chair of the Prince's Trust Australia, and was recently appointed by the UK Government to the G7 Equality Advisory Council.

Barbie's Role Model program aims to inspire the next generation of women to break boundaries in diverse fields as part of Barbie's Dream Gap Project.

The Barbie's Dream Gap Project initiative raises awareness around factors that limit girls from achieving their full potential.
BAZ BAMIGBOYE: Actor James Norton felt a little broody after playing a dad in his new film. He grew so close to his on-screen son, that it left him with deep thoughts about starting a family of his own.
Knight of stage and screen Kenneth Branagh promises 'theatrical fireworks' in his update of The Browning Version which he hopes will tempt audiences back to the theatre.

He has changed the race and or gender of key characters in Terence Rattigan's most famous work as a 'way of keeping the 70-year-old play alive'. The star wants to create 'theatrical fireworks' with the Kenneth Branagh Company's new production of Rattigan's 1948 masterpiece.

The play is set on the last day at school of Andrew Crocker-Harris (Branagh), a brilliant but unpopular public school classics teacher who is married to unfaithful Millie (Lolita Chakrabarti), which is set to run at Riverside Studios in Hammersmith for three weeks from August 5.

The other key role is that of a pupil named Taplow, who in an act of unexpected kindness gives Crocker-Harris a parting gift  a second-hand copy of Robert Browning's translation of Greek tragedy Agamemnon.

The play is set on the last day at school of Andrew Crocker-Harris (Branagh), a brilliant but unpopular public school classics teacher who is married to unfaithful Millie (Lolita Chakrabarti, pictured), which is set to run at Riverside Studios in Hammersmith for three weeks from August 5

In Rattigan's play the character is John Taplow, but Branagh has cast actress Kemi Awoderu in the role. She is a graduate of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, as are all the company. The show's profits will go to the drama school, of which Branagh is president, for its Stage Critical fundraising campaign. Twenty per cent of seats will be 25 or under.

Another role, that of headmaster Dr Frobisher, becomes a headmistress and will be played by Wendy Kweh. Victor Alli, Sarah Eve and Joseph Kloska are also in the cast.

Branagh said that the play 'appears to be very English, tidy, polite and well-behaved', but it simmers underneath with 'romantic, sexual energy'.

In Rattigan's play the character is John Taplow, but Branagh (pictured) has cast actress Kemi Awoderu in the role

He added that after lockdown there is a need 'to go and see plays that are doing something you can't experience anywhere else. We are immensely grateful for what the streaming services and everything have done for us, but now I think that theatre needs to do things that are unique.'

Chakrabarti, who was made an OBE in the Queen's birthday honours last week for her playwriting (she won awards for Red Velvet and her adaptation of The Life Of Pi) and acting (she has three new drama series in various stages of production), said the world has changed since Rattigan wrote The Browning Version, 'but in the last year and a half, exponentially'.

She laughed and added: 'We've become aware of women! Fifty-one per cent of the population  we've become aware of them!' It's important, she said, to reflect these shifts in gender and race otherwise these beautiful, classic plays 'become museum pieces'. The Riverside will sell tickets on a socially-distanced basis, though if the Government sticks to its promise of axing such restrictions on July 19 more seats will be made available.

'We have to get going again,' Branagh said with urgency. 'There are livelihoods at stake.'

Chakrabarti, who was made an OBE in the Queen's birthday honours last week for her playwriting (she won awards for Red Velvet and her adaptation of The Life Of Pi) and acting (he has three new drama series in various stages of production), said the world has changed since Rattigan wrote The Browning Version (pictured), 'but in the last year and a half, exponentially'

During lockdown Branagh shot a new film called Belfast (with Caitriona Balfe, Jamie Dornan, Ciaran Hinds and Judi Dench). It's due out November 12. His own version of Agatha Christie's Death On The Nile, which he directed and stars in, has had a rocky voyage to cinemas because of scandals involving its star Armie Hammer, but will be released on Feb 11.

It will be interesting to see Branagh (left) as Boris Johnson in Sky mini-series This Sceptred Isle, also next year, even though I've stomached more than enough of the real one!

RADA members can buy tickets today for The Browning Version. General sales from June 21, via www.branagh-theatre.com
Rebel Wilson has been sharing snippets of her time on the set of upcoming film Senior Year for months.

And the Australian actress, 41, thrilled fans this week when she shared a selfie with co-star Alicia Silverstone.

Making a reference to the 1990s cult classic Clueless, Rebel captioned a black-and-white photo: 'As if! @aliciasilverstone #senioryear.'

'As if!': Aussie actress Rebel Wilson has thrilled fans after posting a selfie with Clueless star Alicia Silverstone on set of their new film Senior Year

The picture, which was posted on Friday, attracted more than 44,000 likes from fans.

According to Deadline, the movie follows a cheerleader (played by Rebel) who wakes after a 20-year coma and returns to high school.

The publication announced in early June that Alicia would also be joining the cast, which already includes This Is Us' Justin Hartley, Angourie Rice (Mare of Easttown ) and Chris Parnell (SNL).

Through the lens: Rebel is set to star as a cheerleader who wakes up from a 20-year coma, and returns to high school in the hopes of regaining her popular status and the prom queen title

Last month, Rebel shared footage from the set of the movie, alongside comedian Chris Parnell.

Both actors held the 'spirit fingers' cheerleader pose, made famous in the 2001 film Bring It On, with one arm up and the other swinging back and forth.

'Living my BRING IT ON fantasy in #SeniorYear,' Rebel wrote in the caption, as she revealed the film's March 2022 release date.

On set fun: Last month, Rebel shared footage from the set of the movie, alongside comedian Chris Parnell

Bring it on! Both actors held the 'spirit fingers' cheerleader pose, made famous in the 2001 film Bring It On, with one arm up and the other swinging back and forth

In the movie, Rebel's character attempts to regain her status and claim the prom-queen crown which had eluded her two decades earlier.

After a year-long break from acting, Rebel is one of the busiest actresses in Hollywood again with a number of projects in the works.

She recently wrapped filming The Almond and the Seahorse in the UK with French actress Charlotte Gainsbourg.

Senior Year is expected to hit cinemas in March 2022.
She put on a very stylish display when she attended Australian Fashion Week earlier this month.

And former Home and Away star Jodi Gordon stunned once again on Thursday as she glammed up for a night out on the town.

The 36-year-old actress slipped into a very daring bright pink dress, showing off her cleavage as she went braless underneath.

Don't move an inch! Jodi Gordon almost risked a wardrobe malfunction as she went braless under a bright pink dress for a night out on the town on Thursday

The brunette beauty accessorised with jewels from FRED Paris and a baby pink Fendi handbag, and was made up by celebrity makeup artist Max May.

The beauty maestro applied a stunning copper eye and a nude lip palette to her visage.

Jodi's glossy locks were coiffed in a straight style and parted down the middle.

All pink everything! The brunette beauty accessorised with jewels from FRED Paris and a baby pink Fendi handbag, and was made up by celebrity makeup artist Max May

Jodi recently returned to the modelling world after taking a break from acting.

And it appears she has well and truly hit her stride, as she stunned in a new loungewear campaign unveiled this week.

In a photo shoot posted to Instagram on Wednesday, Jodi offered a glimpse of her lacy bra while posing in a stylish pyjama set.

Sultry: Jodi recently returned to the modelling world after taking a break from acting. And it appears she has well and truly hit her stride, as she stunned in a new loungewear campaign unveiled this week

She cast a sultry gaze at the camera as she reclined on the deck of a rural property.

Her loungewear campaign comes after she attended Australian Fashion Week in a variety of stylish looks earlier this month.

Following a week filled with runways and media appearances, Jodi spoke about her return to the fashion world on Channel Seven's The Morning Show.

Chic: The 36-year-old offered a glimpse of lacy bra while posing in a stylish pyjama set

'[It was] great to see Australian fashion,' she told hosts Kylie Gillies and Larry Emdur.

She went on to say that by pursuing an acting career on soaps Neighbours and Home and Away, she had to 'step away' from the fashion industry for several years.

'I felt that doing Neighbours I stepped away from that little bit, so it was exciting to be back in the fashion world again,' she said.

Debrief: Her loungewear campaign comes after she attended Australian Fashion Week in a variety of stylish looks earlier this month. Following a week filled with runways and media appearances, Jodi spoke about her return to the fashion world on Seven's The Morning Show

During the five-day event, Jodi strutted her stuff at the Carriageworks venue in Redfern, Sydney.

She only made one misstep on the Monday she she suffered a minor wardrobe malfunction while modelling a Bally trench coat worn as a dress.

In footage shared to YouTube by Kobie Thatcher, Jodi was seen quickly readjusting her blue coat after nearly exposing her underwear.

Oh, no! During the five-day event, Jodi strutted her stuff at the Carriageworks venue in Redfern, Sydney. She only made one misstep on the Monday she she suffered a minor wardrobe malfunction while modelling a Bally trench coat worn as a dress

Proving she's a total pro, the model-turned-actress kept calm and composed during the blink-and-you'll-miss-it moment.

Jodi had amped up the sex appeal on day one of Fashion Week, showcasing her toned legs in the trench coat and a pair of $1,400 stocking boots by Fendi.

The brunette started her career as a model before joining the cast of Home and Away in 2005, playing pole dancer Martha MacKenzie.
He witnessed his co-host Allison Langdon injure herself while filming a segment for Today back in February, and Karl Stefanovic risked a similar fate on Friday.

The 46-year-old was left terrified after being forced to ride a shark 'torpedo' during the Today show's trip to New Zealand.

The reluctant TV host took a spin on the Hydro Attack, which is described as the 'ultimate blend of shark and machine' during the show's visit to Queenstown.

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Fear factor: He witnessed his co-host Allison Langdon injure herself while filming a segment for Today back in February, and Karl Stefanovic risked a similar fate on Friday

It came just four months after Allison, 42, badly hurt her leg during a water stunt gone wrong while filming in Burleigh Heads earlier in the year.

Allison was injured while hydrofoiling - a kind of surfboard that hovers above the water - during a pre-recorded segment for the breakfast program.

She was taken to hospital for treatment after what Channel Nine called 'an unfortunate accident'.

Extreme sport: Karl's wild ride came just four months after his co-host Allison Langdon badly hurt her leg during a water stunt gone wrong while filming in Burleigh Heads earlier in the year

Helping hand: She was taken to hospital for treatment after what Channel Nine called 'an unfortunate accident'

In New Zealand, an apprehensive Karl confessed he was afraid of sharks and didn't like the cold, making the ride less than enjoyable.

But Allison was highly amused, and laughingly asked Karl how he was feeling about his upcoming ride.

'How do you reckon I'm feeling?' he snapped.

After squeezing himself into the back of the shark-shaped vehicle, Karl had a moment of panic before the ride began.

Terrified: The reluctant 46-year-old TV host took a spin on the Hydro Attack, which is described as the 'ultimate blend of shark and machine', during the show's visit to Queenstown

Shark attack: After squeezing himself into the back of the shark-shaped vehicle, Karl had a moment of panic before the ride began

'What are the chances he'll die?' Allison jokingly asked, prompting a petrified Karl to respond, 'This is not funny.'

Despite initially declaring the ride 'rubbish', Karl was soon left speechless as it began to twist and turn in the water at speeds of up to 80 kilometres an hour.

The terrified Today host started to scream, with strategically placed cameras capturing every horrified expression.

Petrified: An apprehensive Karl confessed he was afraid of sharks and didn't like the cold, making the ride less than enjoyable

Meanwhile, back on dry land, Allison could be heard laughing into her microphone as her co-host feared for his life.

The shark then submerged itself two metres underwater, before breaking the surface and launching itself nose-first into the air.

A 'shell-shocked' Karl appeared to have been on the verge of becoming ill, moaning in between his screams.

Crying out for help: A 'shell-shocked' Karl appeared to have been on the verge of becoming ill, moaning in between his screams

'Have we put him through enough misery?' Allison laughed.

In a series of behind-the-scenes posts on the Today show's Instagram Stories on Friday, an alarmed Karl was told he'd be riding the Hydro Attack.

'What?! Mate, are you serious? We're going under the water... We're going under and jumping?' said the disbelieving star.
She enjoyed a night out on the town Wednesday with boyfriend Jacob Elordi.

But on Thursday, Kaia Gerber was by herself as she headed out in the city of Chino in California's San Bernardino County.

The model, 19, drove herself to a photo shoot in the neighborhood east of Los Angeles and showed off her taut midriff as she exited her luxury vehicle.

Model: She enjoyed a night on the town Wednesday with beau Jacob Elordi. But Kaia Gerber was by herself as she headed out to a photo shoot in the city of Chino outside LA Thursday

Kaia was dressed in a stripy short-sleeve crop top and a pair of blue jeans.

She had on white sneakers and wore her brunette shoulder-length hair with a center parting and tucked behind her ears.

The daughter of Cindy Crawford had a green purse over one shoulder and a cotton tote over the other and carried a large reusable water bottle.

Taut midriff: Kaia, 19, was dressed in a stripy short-sleeve crop top and a pair of blue jeans. She had on white sneakers and wore her hair with a center parting and tucked behind her ears

Work mode: The teen model had a green purse over one shoulder and a cotton tote over the other and she carried a large reusable water bottle

Meanwhile her romance with the Australian star of The Kissing Booth movies seems to be going from strength to strength.

The teen and the actor, 23, were first linked in September last year and have been virtually inseparable ever since.

On Wednesday night, the two held hands as they arrived for a party at West Hollywood club The Nice Guy.

Going strong: Kaia and actor boyfriend Jacob, 23, held hands as they arrived at West Hollywood club The Nice Guy on Wednesday night

Young love: The two have been virtually inseparable since they started dating in September last year

Last month, in an interview with American Vogue, the teen model spoke about her 'secure' and 'steady' relationship with Jacob.

Kaia explained: 'Being able to be with someone I trust, where we don't want anything from each other, having a safe, steady relationship like that, has really opened my eyes to the possibilities of love and what it feels like to love without conditions.'

She added: 'Lust is touching other people or wanting them, but love is really seeing someone.'

Kaia, who made her catwalk debut as a fashion model when she turned 16 in 2017, recently landed her first acting gig with a part in season 10 of Ryan Murphy's American Horror Story anthology series.

Catwalk princess: Kaia's modeling career officially began as soon as she turned 16. She made her debut walking the runway at New York Fashion Week in September 2017 (pictured)
She has been hiding her wedding ring for months after secretly tying the knot with Hollywood talent agent Patrick Whitesell.

But Pia Miller is not shy about flaunting the glittering diamond band anymore.

The Australian actress, 37, proudly flashed the bling as she headed to a business meeting on Thursday.

The jig is up! Pia Miller finally shows off her wedding ring during an outing in Sydney on Wednesday after hiding it for months following her secret wedding to multimillionaire Hollywood agent Patrick Whitesell

The former Home and Away star and Macabalm founder looked incredibly chic in a black cashmere sweater and wide leg trousers.

She jazzed up the outfit by wearing a pair of classic Vans sneakers on her feet and toted a Celine tote bag.

The Chilean beauty revealed her flawless visage by going makeup free, but shielded her eyes with a pair of designer sunglasses.

Pia recently hinted that something special had happened '90 days' ago in an Instagram post.

There it is! The Australian actress, 37, proudly flashed the bling as she headed to a business meeting

This was presumably a reference to the day she and Patrick - a talent agent whose clients include Hugh Jackman, Ben Affleck and Ryan Reynolds - tied the knot.

In a recent report by The Daily Telegraph, the pair were seen 'celebrating their newlywed status' with a takeaway dinner from the CicciaBella restaurant in Bondi.

Meanwhile, a friend of the couple, Sydney socialite Nina O'Brien, also let slip they'd tied the knot in a comment she posted on Instagram.

'Congratulations Mr. and Mrs. PPW,' Nina wrote, referencing the pair's initials.

Playing coy: Pia had been hiding the band when she was photographed for the paps

Nina also commented on another photo Pia shared to Instagram in April, which showed Patrick wearing what appeared to be a wedding ring.

She wrote underneath the image: 'Hello Mr and Mrs P' and added a love-heart emoji.

Pia, a Chilean-born model and actress, appears to have celebrated her honeymoon with Patrick in Cabo, Mexico, in March.

Hint: Pia's outing comes comes after she recently hinted that something special had happened '90 days' ago in an Instagram post. This was presumably a reference to the day she and Patrick tied the knot

Friends speak out: A friend of the couple, Sydney socialite Nina O'Brien (pictured), also let slip they'd tied the knot in a comment she posted on Instagram

Clue: 'Congratulations Mr. and Mrs. PPW,' Nina wrote, referencing the pair's initials

Ring-a-ding-ding! Nina also commented on another photo Pia shared to Instagram in April, which showed Patrick wearing what appeared to be a wedding ring

Hint: She wrote underneath the image: 'Hello Mr and Mrs P' and added a love-heart emoji

Celebrations: Pia, a Chilean-born model and actress, appears to have celebrated her honeymoon with Patrick in Cabo, Mexico, in March
She will always be Karl Stefanovic's little girl, but the Today show star's daughter Ava is growing up fast.

This week, the 16-year-old attended her first school formal.

In pictures shared by her mother Cassandra Thornburn, Ava was beaming.

All grown up! Karl Stefanovic's 16-year-old daughter Ava stunned in a gold gown as she attended her first school formal

The brunette stood out at the event in a gold dress with spaghetti straps.

She swept her hair back into a messy bun, while the front was parted down the middle.

Ava's added some glamour to her look by rocking a smokey eye, teamed with a creamy nude lipstick.

She finished off her outfit with a gold glomesh pouch and minimal gold accessories.

Golden girl! The brunette stood out at the event in a gold dress with spaghetti straps

All in the accessories! She finished off her outfit with a gold glomesh pouch and minimal gold accessories

Meanwhile, her date looked dapper in a classic black suit, with a white shirt and black tie to accessorise.

It is unknown if Karl was present for the milestone moment as he's currently visiting Queenstown, New Zealand for the breakfast show.

Along with Willow, Karl and Cassandra also share sons Jackson, 22, and River, 14.

Following his split from their mother in 2016, Karl and Jasmine met in late 2016 and married two years later, in December 2018.

The couple welcomed their first child together, daughter Harper, in May last year.

Baby daughter: Jasmine Yarbrough and her husband Karl Stefanovic welcomed their first child together, daughter Harper, in May last year.

Despite their age difference, sisters Willow and Harper have a close bond.

Earlier this year, Jasmine shared a cute photo to Instagram of the two girls spending quality time together.

And it appears the step-mother has a great relationship with Karl's eldest daughter as she shared a sweet tribute to her on her birthday in March, too.

Big sister: Karl shares 16-year-old Willow with his first wife, Cassandra Thorburn. Despite their age difference, Willow and Harper (pictured) have a close bond
The Block star Jess Eva has revealed her ongoing battle with incontinence in a candid new interview.

On Friday, the radio host told Daily Mail Australia that she wets herself '90 per cent of the time' on her Triple M breakfast show, after suffering the condition following the birth of her two children - Fred, six, and Matilda, four.

Jess also admitted she even sometimes sprays absorbent dry shampoo - designed for hair - directly 'on her undies' when things get out of control in the studio.

Speaking out: On Friday, radio host Jess Eva candidly discussed her ongoing battle with urinary incontinence - saying she wets herself '90 per cent of the time' on her Triple M breakfast show without warning

'I whoosh myself at the drop of a hat. 90 per cent of the time I wee myself during Moonman in the Morning, after I laugh or I cough or I sneeze,' she said.

'Sometimes I just dry shampoo my undies, and then go back into the studio because that's the only thing I can find!'

Jess, who shares her children with husband Norm Hogan, said the way her babies were born didn't particularly help with her condition.

'I whoosh myself at the drop of a hat. 90 per cent of the time I wee myself during Moonman in the Morning, after I laugh or I cough or I sneeze,' she said

'Fred had a head the size of a beach ball, so that was the beginning of the end,' she added. '...and then Tildy came out a little bit sideways.

'So even if I'm walking down to the supermarket and I have to cough, I have to stop, hold my legs and hope for the best.'

Jess added that she has absolutely no shame in discussing the topic, and hopes that more mums will speak out about it in the near future.

Family: Jess added that the condition emerged following the birth of her children Fred, six, and daughter Matilda, four, who she shares with husband Norm Hogan. All pictured

'Even at school pick-ups - I shout it from the rooftops,' she said.

'The more you talk about it, or if you have a couple of wines with the parents you realise there's practically a secret club of women who wee themselves.

'If you have the choice of weeing yourself on a daily basis, or having your children that you love - it's a pretty fair trade!'
Reps for Chrissy Teigen on Thursday said that a series of Instagram direct messages Project Runway alum Michael Costello posted online, claiming to be from the model, are not authentic.

Teigen's rep told Business Insider that the DMs - which the fashion designer, 38, said Teigen, 35, sent him in 2014 - had aesthetic inconsistencies with the timeframe of the alleged communications.

Costello took to Instagram Monday saying that Teigen - based on a faulty belief that he had posted racist messages online - torpedoed his fashion career and left him with suicidal ideations, after taunting him in DMs.

The latest: Reps for Chrissy Teigen, 35, on Thursday said that a series of direct messages designer Michael Costello, 38, posted online, claiming to be from the model, are not authentic

In screengrabs Costello said were DMs he exchanged with Teigen, she purportedly wrote to him, 'Racist people like you deserve to suffer and die. You might as well be dead. Your career is over, just watch.'

A rep for Teigen told Business Insider that there was manipulation in the messages Costello put online earlier this week.

The outlet noted it had 'found technical inconsistencies' in the messages, as multiple identifiers in the messages comes from different versions of the social media outlet, and Teigen's profile on it, over the years.

The outlet reported Teigen's messages did not have her verification checkmark, which would indicate that they were from later 2014, when the process was implemented on the social media site; Teigen had a checkmark around early 2015.

A rep for Teigen told Business Insider that there was manipulation in the messages Costello put online earlier this week

Backstory: Costello said that Teigen tormented him amid a misunderstanding that he had used a racial slur online, which he denied, and tried to explain to her at the time to no avail

Another conflicting feature was an icon for video chat, a feature that hadn't been put on the platform until June of 2018, according to Business Insider, next to a profile photo that Teigen had changed at lease two years earlier.

Costello said that Teigen tormented him as tried to explain to her at the time to no avail. He took to social media after Teigen publicly addressed her ongoing bullying scandal, apologizing in a Medium post on Monday morning in which she admitted to being a 'troll' and an 'a**hole' while insisting that she is 'no longer that person.'

Costello wrote on Monday, 'For the past 7 years, Ive lived with a deep, unhealed trauma.'

Teigen 'apparently formed her own opinion of me based on a Photoshopped comment floating around the internet which has now been proven to be false by Instagram and since taken down,' he wrote.

Costello, who shared texts illustrating the situation, said the model and cookbook author 'told me that my career was over and that all my doors will be shut from there on,' and took action to see to such.

Speaking out: Costello added a detailed message about the situation involving the model and her stylist

He said that both Teigen and her stylist Monica Rose had went 'out of their way to threaten people and brands that if they were in any shape or form associated with me, they would not work with any of them.'

Costello said that his efforts to plead his case to Teigen and Rose were for naught.

He said that in trying to get them 'to see the whole story before believing a false narrative a former disgruntled employee cast upon me, they didnt give me the time of day.'

In the wake of the exchange, Costello said that he 'didnt see the point of living' with his career in disarray.

'There was no way I can ever escape from being the target of the powerful elites in Hollywood.'

Costello said he is 'not okay,' adding, 'I may never be okay, but today, I am choosing to speak my truth.'

Costello captioned the post urging his followers not to respond with vitriol toward Teigen and Rose, stressing that it was his own personal process to move forward.

'You do not have to say anything mean or hurtful about them in the comments I am trying every day to love myself and forget this,' he said. 'This is step 1.'

The designer received supportive words from April Love Geary, Olivia Culpo, Audrina Patridge and LeAnn Rimes among others amid his public revelation.

A number of celebs including April Love Geary, Audrina Patridge and LeAnn Rimes chimed in with supportive comments for the embattled designer

He later told TMZ that he doesn't wish 'ill' on Teigen, saying: 'We are all works in progress and we deserve the opportunity to prove that we can do better.'

'But progress takes time. We must show through actions that we have changed. After all, action speaks much louder than a 10-minute apology written on a notepad.'

Costello's post comes as Teigen has come under fire in recent weeks for cruel posts on Twitter aimed at Stodden, Lindsay Lohan, Quvenzhane Wallis, and others.

In 2011, Teigen published a barrage of tweets telling then-16-year-old Stodden, who had just married 50-year-old actor Doug Hutchison, to 'go to sleep forever'.

Stodden said this was only part of the picture, saying Teigen would also 'privately DM me and tell me to kill myself.'

Stodden incurred relentless bullying both publicly and in private from Teigen, who tweeted at the then-teen in 2011: 'My Friday fantasy: you. dirt nap. mmmmmm baby', followed by: 'go. to sleep. forever.'

Old tweets from 2013 have also resurfaced in which she described nine-year-old Oscar nominee Wallis as 'cocky' and called Teen Mom star Farrah Abraham, then 21, a 'wh***'.

'Not a day, not a single moment has passed where I havent felt the crushing weight of regret for the things Ive said in the past': Chrissy Teigen (seen last month) has written a blog post to apologize for her past bullying tweets

Teigen has been the target of backlash since abusive tweets by the star, originally made in 2011, resurfaced online, including one that urged then 16-year-old TV personality Courtney Stodden (pictured above in 2019), who identifies as non-binary, to kill themselves

Lindsay Lohan was also the subject of an insensitive post by Teigen. A tweet from January 2011 read: 'Lindsay adds a few more slits to her wrists when she sees emma stone'

Relentless: In one tweet Teigen told the non-binary reality star to 'take a dirt nap,' which is slang for death

Hatred: In another tweet she told Stodden 'I hate you,' and insinuated that drugs must be responsible for her affected speech

'Lindsay [Lohan] adds a few more slits to her wrists when she sees emma stone,' read the tweet dated January 16 2011

Teigen apologized to Stodden last month, but the television personality, who identifies as non-binary, questioned the sincerity of the apology.

Earlier this month, Abraham, 30, said Teigen needs professional help over her 'highly disturbing' past tweets, and calls her an 'unfit person in society.'

'It's really just a pathetic statement after someone has gone to therapy publicly for sex shaming, working through my own depression, bereavement, and vulnerabilities at that time,' Abraham told Fox News.

In her Medium post, Teigen wrote that she plans to reach out personally to the other celebrities she insulted.

Row: Farrah Abraham calls Chrissy Teigen an 'unfit person in society' and tells her to 'get therapy'... after she called Teen Mom star a 'w***e' in past 2013 tweets amid cyberbullying scandal

Vitriolic: Teigen shared this tweet about Farrah in 2013

Amid the backlash, Teigen has been dropped by several companies, including Safely, the cleaning brand she founded with Kris Jenner; Macy's; Target; and Bloomingdale's.

The large retailers have removed her line of Cravings cookware from its shelves. Teigen has also pulled out of Netflix's Never Have I Ever.

Teigen was slated to be one of the guest narrators for the series, co-created by Mindy Kaling, but is exiting the gig amid the fallout following her cyberbullying scandal.

Teigen began by writing: 'Hi all. It has been a VERY humbling few weeks.

Teigen began by writing: 'Hi all. It has been a VERY humbling few weeks.'

'I won't ask for your forgiveness, only your patience and tolerance,' Teigen wrote

'I know Ive been quiet, and lord knows you dont want to hear about me, but I want you to know Ive been sitting in a hole of deserved global punishment, the ultimate "sit here and think about what youve done",' the supermodel wrote.

'Not a day, not a single moment has passed where I havent felt the crushing weight of regret for the things Ive said in the past.'

Teigen has been the target of backlash since abusive tweets by the star, originally made in 2011, resurfaced online, including one that urged a then 16-year-old Stodden to kill themselves.

Lohan was also the subject of an insensitive post by Teigen. A tweet from January 2011 read: 'Lindsay adds a few more slits to her wrists when she sees emma stone'

Under pressure: After the barrage of tweets came to light and people called for the model to be 'canceled' she issued an apology to Stodden

Moving on: 'I accept her apology and forgive her. But the truth remains the same, I have never heard from her or her camp in private,' Stodden wrote last month after the scandal broke

The tweet was shared by user @Leyton last month.

'I was a troll, full stop. And I am so sorry,' Teigen writes in her Medium post from Monday.

She added: 'There is simply no excuse for my past horrible tweets. My targets didnt deserve them. No one does.

'Many of them needed empathy, kindness, understanding and support, not my meanness masquerading as a kind of casual, edgy humor.'

Teigen continued: 'When I first started using social media, I had so much fun with it.

'I made jokes, random observations. Think of all the engineers, working day and night to develop this amazing new platform and technology, connecting people all over the world to learn, create, and find kindred spirits.

'And I used it to snark at some celebrities.'

Teigen writes that her tweets were borne out of being 'insecure, immature and in a world where I thought I needed to impress strangers to be accepted.'

'If there was a pop culture pile-on, I took to Twitter to try to gain attention and show off what I at the time believed was a crude, clever, harmless quip,' she wrote.

'I thought it made me cool and relatable if I poked fun at celebrities.'

Teigen wrote that when she is now confronted with some of her past posts, 'I cringe to my core.'

Chrissy Teigen founded Safely with Kris Jenner and previously appeared in its marketing materials

Jenner advertising the brand. She is said to be in 'crisis mode' after the bullying scandal erupted

'Ill honestly get sharp, stabbing pains in my body, randomly remembering my a*****e past, and I deserve it,' she wrote.

Teigen said that the Twitter persona she built as a 'bad a** b***h' was not in step with who she was as a person.

'I wasnt mean in my everyday life. More than once, someone would come up to me and say, Youre so much nicer in person,' she wrote.

'Why was that not a huge red flag?'

Teigen wrote that she wasn't 'deserving of sympathy' and that she explained this in order to provide 'context.'

'There's no justification for my behavior,' Teigen wrote.

'I'm not a victim here. The subjects of your sympathy - and mine - should be those I put down.'

Teigen wrote that she has changed and matured in recent years.

'The truth is, Im no longer the person who wrote those horrible things,' the cookware entrepreneur wrote.

'I grew up, got therapy, got married, had kids, got more therapy, experienced loss and pain, got more therapy and experienced more life.

'AND GOT MORE THERAPY.'

Teigen added: 'Life has made me more empathetic.

'Im more understanding of what motivates trolling  the instant gratification that you get from lashing out and clapping back, throwing rocks at someone you think is invincible because theyre famous.

'Also, I know now how it feels to be on the receiving end of incredible vitriol.

'Believe me, the irony of this is not lost on me.'

Teigen, who has two children with singing superstar John Legend, wrote that she hopes to set an example for their kids.

'The world needs more kindness and love and I want to contribute to it,' she wrote.

'Ive been on a path of self-improvement for the past decade and that path is going to continue.'

Teigen is feeling the financial pinch triggered by the backlash to her decade-old tweets.

She was dropped from the marketing campaign for Safely, the cleaning brand she founded with Kris Jenner, after sales reportedly plunged because of the controversy over her tweets.

The new brand, Safely, debuted in early May and included both stars in its marketing campaigns, but following the bullying scandal the 35-year-old model has not been seen once.

Before June 5, Teigen hadn't been seen on husband John Legend's Instagram since May 16 and hasn't posted on her own accounts since sharing an apology on Twitter on May 12. The couple is seen above in Los Angeles in February 2020

A source told The Sun: 'Kris Jenner has been in crisis mode for weeks with Chrissy's scandal.

'She likes Chrissy but she's a numbers girl first and their sales tanked after all of Chrissy's tweets came out.

'It's the worst case scenario for them, they just launched their cleaning brand days before the scandal.'

The backlash against Teigen's tweets is a blow to the brand, which had hoped to focus on her and her children in advertising campaigns.

Dailymail.com has contacted both Safely and Teigen for comment.

Earlier this month, Teigen made her first appearance on Instagram since the scandal erupted.

The model looked peaceful as she beamed with her daughter Luna, 5, while celebrating her first-ever dance recital. The image was posted to her husband's account.

At the time of the scandal, Target had discontinued their partnership with Teigen's line of Cravings cookware  though it was said the two came to an agreement in December before the social media eruption.

Expedia-owned rental site VRBO came under fire for recently running a promo with Teigen, Legend, and their kids Luna and Miles, to celebrate 'joy and togetherness'

But just weeks later, retail giant Macy's also dropped her cookware line and it was reported that Bloomingdale's also backed out of a huge deal with the internet personality.

Expedia-owned rental site VRBO came under fire for recently running a promo with Teigen, Legend, and their kids Luna and Miles, to celebrate 'joy and togetherness.'

The promo push on social media prompted many enraged users to speak out that the company shouldn't promote partnerships with a 'bully.'

After Vrbo retweeted an article about the commercial from People, one user responded: 'VRBO, cancel the collab you have with Chrissy NOW unless you support telling children to commit suicide.'

Another tweeted: Hey, @vrbo You're paying @chrissyteigen to do ads for you after she repeatedly messaged an abused minor, telling them to commit suicide? Really?'

'Using an abuser bully as a spokesperson no thanks,' another wrote.
Jess Eva has interviewed an abundance of local and international celebrities since joining Triple M's Moonman In The Morning.

But on Friday, the 36-year-old told Daily Mail Australia that one chat with an A-lister certainly stands out for all the wrong reasons - in the form of Motley Crue drummer, Tommy Lee.

The Block star was left horrified when the legendary musician hung up on her during a live radio chat, after she asked a forbidden question about his sex life.

Awkward! On Friday, radio star Jess Eva told Daily Mail Australia that one chat with an A-lister certainly stands out for all the wrong reasons - in the form of Motley Crue's Tommy Lee

'I got hung up on by Tommy Lee,' she laughed. 'I didn't know that there were rules. Sometimes in radio they don't give the announcers the rules, because if you tell them they sometimes forget it and ask the questions they shouldn't...'

But this tactic didn't quite work out for Jess, who quickly decided to ask about Tommy's ex partners - something his publicist, Jamie Roberts, had banned.

'I just remember Tommy Lee being a bit of a pants man, and having heaps of girlfriends. I asked him who was his favourite lover...' she added.

'This woman came on and said "interview is over" and hung up on us!'

Cringe: The Block star was left horrified when legendary musician Tommy Lee hung up on her during a live radio chat, after she asked a forbidden question about his sex life

Jess added the team were later re-joined by Tommy, but she was told to 'stay relatively quiet' in the corner.

'That was my first hang up, and no doubt it won't be my last. I meant it in good jest - I'm not a mean radio announcer, I would ask my mates the same question that I would ask someone on the phone!'

Hours after Tommy hung up on the radio interview, Roberts told Fox News that Jess should have 'played by the rules'.

No hard feelings: 'That was my first hang up, and no doubt it won't be my last. I meant it in good jest - I'm not a mean radio announcer, I would ask my mates the same question that I would ask someone on the phone!' Jess added

'Like most publicists, I made them, and everyone else that interviews Tommy, aware of the numerous topics that Tommy would be interested in and willing to talk about,' Roberts said.

She added: 'And I also told them that I would terminate the interview if they couldn't play by the rules.

'They didn't do their job. So I did mine. Of the 50 interviews we've done in the past week, they were the only ones who couldn't keep it together. It's unfortunate that they are blaming it on Tommy.'

'Who was the best one?' After discussing the album and the COVID-19 pandemic, Jess decided to ask a more personal question about Tommy's former lovers. He's pictured with ex-wife Pamela Anderson October 20, 2003 in Westwood, California

During the interview, Jess had said: 'You are a hero to many men around the world because you've romanced some hotties in your time.'

'Heather Locklear, Pamela Anderson, Naomi Campbell, Pink Out of all your lovers, who was the best one?'

As soon as Jess finished asking him the question, the phone line disconnected and a voice said: 'Goodbye.'

'Did he just hang up on me?' Jess asked her co-host.

'I think we just got hung up on because you went into a no-go zone,' Lawrence Mooney replied.
Roxy Jacenko was left furious on Friday after she was issued a fine for washing her car outside her office in Sydney's eastern suburbs.

Speaking to Daily Mail Australia at the time, the 41-year-old PR queen labelled the $272 fine 'totally ridiculous'.

'Not only am I parked over my own garage to use the hose that is situated within the garage, they have the audacity to book me whilst the car is being washed,' she said.

Fuming: Roxy Jacenko was left furious on Friday after she was issued a fine for washing her car outside her office in Sydney's eastern suburbs

Roxy added that the car was parked 'in a dead-end street' and was 'not obstructing anyone or any access'.

'Not only is Paddington in dire straits with "For Lease" signs on every second store, they want to fine people who are trying to revive and bring people to the area,' she said.

Roxy shared a series of photos from the security cameras installed outside her office on Instagram on Friday.

Caught on camera: Roxy shared a series of photos from the security cameras installed outside her office on Instagram on Friday

In the photos, Roxy's black SUV is parked out on the street, with soap suds running down into the storm water drain.

What appeared to be a hose sat on the ground, running underneath her car, and a man in the foreground is seen taking a photo of something on his phone.

A second photo showed a man appearing to wash her car out on the street, slightly stooped over with a hose in one hand.

Washed up: In the photos, Roxy's black SUV is parked out on the street, with soap suds running down into the storm water drain

'Can't even wash one's bloomin car in this suburb,' Roxy captioned the post.

'Fined whilst doing so, but don't worry we carried on and finished it - may as well we paid $272 (the fine) for the privilege'.

According to Sydney Water, you can't 'leave taps and hoses running unattended', and it's advised people wash their car 'using a bucket of water and a sponge'.

Outrage: Speaking to Daily Mail Australia at the time, the 41-year-old PR queen labelled the $272 fine 'totally ridiculous'

Many fans sympathised with Roxy, calling the fine an outrage, with one person commenting: 'Where else do they propose you do it?'

'GO AND FINE THE REAL CRIMINALS,' commented another, while someone else added, 'Super annoying'.

Wrote one person: 'So you can't even park in front of your home & wash your car!!! What a joke'.

'Not only am I parked over my own garage to use the hose that is situated within the garage, they have the audacity to book me whilst the car is being washed,' she said

According to a report by The Sydney Morning Herald in April, fines collected by the New South Wales government have skyrocketed by almost 30 per cent since 2019.

Revenue raised from fines now totals a record $81million, with this number continuing to rise.

Washing her car outside her office seems to be a regular occurrence for Roxy, with the publicist sharing a photo of it covered in suds back in May, too.

Keeping clean: Washing her car outside her office seems to be a regular occurrence for Roxy, with the publicist sharing a photo of it covered in suds back in May, too

It's not the first time Roxy's vehicle has landed her in trouble.

Earlier this month, she shared a photo of her car on the back of a tow truck as it was being driven away.

'The trouble maker of Paddington being officially moved to another spot,' she captioned the post.
He famously had his father Michael and grandfather Kirk inked on his torso during his seven-year prison stint.

And Cameron Douglas put his inkings on full display as he went shirtless in Venice Beach, California on Thursday.

The 42-year-old actor removed his blue and white striped muscle tank to reveal his chiseled physique and heavily-inked torso.

Body of work: Michael Douglas' son Cameron Douglas, 42, displayed his chiseled physique and heavily-inked torso as he went shirtless in Venice Beach, California on Thursday

One of the many tattoos Cameron has is a portrait of his father Michael from the 1987 film Wall Street across his abs, as well as Michael's name near his left rib cage.

The Kirk tattoo looks like it could be from his Oscar-nominated role in the Vincente Minnelli film The Bad and the Beautiful, while Cameron has 'timeless' etched beneath both portraits.

Cameron also has 'Take The Long Way Home' written across his chest and 'Tick' and 'Tock' on his left and right arms.

Inked: Cameron removed his blue and white striped muscle tank to reveal his array of tattoos. He famously had his father Michael and grandfather Kirk inked on his torso

The actor, who served seven years behind bars for drug offences, is the eldest son of Michael, 76, and film producer Diandra Luker, 65.

His grandfather thrice-Oscar nominee Kirk was also a screen legend who died last February aged 103.

Following his early release in 2016, Cameron welcomed daughter Lua with girlfriend Viviane Thibes, a yoga instructor, in 2017. They are also proud parents to five-month-old son Ryder.

Family ink: Cameron has tattoos of his father and grandfather Kirk on his stomach also 'Take The Long Way Home' written across his chest and 'Tick' and 'Tock' on his left and right arms

Roles: The tattoo of Michael is from when he played Gordon Gecko in the film Wall Street (left) while the Kirk tattoo looks like it could be from his role in The Bad and the Beautiful (right)

Speaking after his release, Cameron revealed his father Michael and stepmother Catherine Zeta-Jones, 51, 'never gave up on me'.

'My family never gave up on me, not for one second. Catherine is a scrapper, she's someone who came from Wales and clawed her way up to the very top through sheer talent and determination,' he told The Mail on Sunday in 2018.

'She never gives up on anything and she didn't quit on me. The love of my family got me through my darkest days.'

Casual: Cameron also stepped out in blue shorts that showed off the waistband of his white Calvin Klein briefs, teamed with white sneakers and tortoiseshell sunglasses

Cameron, who has made headlines throughout his life for drug arrests and trips to rehab, hit rock bottom in 2010 when he was sentenced to five years in jail.

Cameron was arrested in 2009 after police found him with almost a pound of methamphetamine in a New York City hotel, enough to charge him with intent to distribute.

A judge sentenced him to five years behinds bars in April of the following year, but his prison time was extended by four-and-a-half years in 2011 when he pleaded guilty to smuggling drugs into jail.

Family ties: Cameron, who served seven years behind bars for drug offences, is the eldest son of Michael, 76, and film producer Diandra Luker, 65. Cameron and Michael are pictured

Cameron's drug use began early in his life, and was detailed in a 2012 Brief of Amici filed in the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit after his conviction for unlawfully possessing the painkiller Suboxone and heroin while behind bars.

He went on to say: 'When that cell door slammed shut on the first night of my incarceration, I felt like I was in a bad dream, that I would wake up. But the dream carried on and got worse.

'I lived a nightmare for seven years but the love of my family never wavered.'

His pride and joy: Following his early release in 2016, Cameron welcomed daughter Lua with girlfriend Viviane Thibes, a yoga instructor, in 2017. They are also proud parents to five-month-old son Ryder (all pictured)

Cameron is Michael's only child from his first marriage to Diandra. They wed in 1977 and split in 1995, finalising their divorce five years later.

Michael began dating Welsh actress Catherine in March 1999, and they welcomed son Dylan in August 2000.

They married in New York in November of that year, and welcomed daughter Carys in April 2003.
Helen Mirren made Tonight Show history on Thursday night as she became the first person to do an interview in the bath.

The actress, 75, urged host Jimmy Fallon to be fast as she playfully joked she was 'running out of bubbles'.

Helen, who was on the show to talk about her latest film Fast and Furious 9, cut a glamorous figure as she enjoyed the luxurious bubble bath with a mountain of thick foam protecting her modesty.

Hilarious: Helen Mirren made Tonight Show history on Thursday night as she became the first person to do an interview in the bath

As she appeared on screen via a video link, a stunned Jimmy said: 'Oh my God. you are the absolute... you are the greatest. Oh my God, I love you.'

With a pink palette of make-up and her hair pulled off his face with a headband, Helen said: 'I'm in my favourite place in the world.'

Fallon then told her: 'You might be the first guest ever to be in the bathtub on the Tonight Show.'

Oops: The actress, 75, urged host Jimmy Fallon to be fast as she playfully joked she was 'running out of bubbles'

Hello! Helen, who was on the show to talk about her latest film Fast and Furious 9, cut a glamorous figure as she enjoyed the luxurious bubble bath

To which the Calendar Girls star replied: 'That's what's so brilliant about Zoom. I was thinking, you know: "Why not be in the place you love to sit and chat to people?" I love to chat to my husband while sitting in the bath, so why not do it to the whole of America?'

To which the host said: 'That's vert smart. That's why you're the best.'

Showing off her playful side, Helen joked: 'I'm running out of bubbles though, that's the problem. You're chatting away and my bubbles are going down.'

Stunned: As she appeared on screen via a video link, a stunned Jimmy said: 'Oh my God. you are the absolute... you are the greatest. Oh my God, I love you'

Funny: Showing off her playful side, Helen joked: 'I'm running out of bubbles though, that's the problem. You're chatting away and my bubbles are going down'

In the bath: Jimmy promised to do the interview 'very fast', to which Helen quipped in a nod to her new film: 'Yes fast and furious'

Jimmy promised to do the interview 'very fast', to which Helen quipped in a nod to her new film: 'Yes fast and furious'.

Talking about the new film, in which Helen plays criminal mastermind Magdalene Shaw, nicknamed Queenie, the actress revealed she 'begged, moaned and even cried a little bit' to star and producer Vin Diesel for a role in the franchise.

Helen also revealed her character Queenie was named after one of her aunts also called Queenie who came from a 'big east end family with 14 kids'.

Helen said: 'It was a very old London family and I had an Auntie Queenie. It's a proper east end name Queenie so I thought that would be a good name for her to have.'

Fast and Furious 9 will arrive in UK cinemas on June 24 and US cinemas on June 25.
She's certainly no stranger to star-studded events.

And French actress Catherine Deneuve, 77, wowed at the 2022 Dior Cruise fashion show at the Panathenaic Stadium in Athens on Thursday.

The age-defying beauty looked sensational in a matching rose-printed blouse and trouser combination.

Rose red: Actress Catherine Deneuve (pictured), 77, wore a co-ord as she attended the 2022 Dior Cruise fashion show at the Panathenaic Stadium in Athens on Thursday

Fashion forward: The age-defying beauty looked sensational in a matching rose-printed blouse and trouser combination

She co-ordinated her champagne gold and emerald green bracelet with her rings and earrings of the same kind, before accessorising her outfit with a jet black leather handbag and a pair of buckle-fastened heeled black clogs.

The Academy Award nominee's blushed makeup look complemented her crimson lips and nails while her coiffed sandy locks brought the Riviera beach look to Athens.

Also seen at Dior's show in Athens were stunning models Suki Waterhouse, 29, and Cara Delevingne, 28.

Suki opted for a floating number, rocking a sage green chiffon dress boasting a very low-cut neckline and long flowing sleeves.

Power poses: Also seen at Dior's show in Athens were stunning models Suki Waterhouse (left) and Cara Delevingne (right), who both ensured to showcase their impeccable fashion sense

The blonde beauty added to her boho-vibe by wearing her blonde locks down and styling her floor-length gown with a pair of scrappy sandals.

She completed her look by toting a small handbag by Dior and adding a long gold necklace with a selection of stones.

While Cara opted for a more fitted number, showcasing her physique in a silk dress with statement black straps.

Adding a splash of colour to her look, she donned a slick of bright red lipstick.

The Paper Towns actress also stars in the new Christian Dior campaign for their Gem Dior Collection. Cara wears the collection in the new promotional video with a range of colour acting as the backdrop.

Meanwhile, Anya Taylor-Joy dazzled as she attended the photocall alongside the two models.

Graceful: Anya Taylor-Joy (pictured), 25, looked every inch the Grecian goddess as she rocked a semi-sheer gown which boasted a sparkling gold material

The Queen's Gambit star, 25, looked every inch the Grecian goddess as she rocked a semi-sheer gown which boasted a sparkling gold material.

Anya looked incredible in her glittering ensemble, ensuring to work all of her angles as she showcased the look ahead of the show.

The beauty flashed a glimpse of her toned legs while moving around the light mesh material of her gown and flaunting her incredible physique.

Her gown also featured a chic cape-style detailing which saw the material of the dress fall over Anya's shoulders and down her back.

Letting her dress do all the talking, Anya kept her accessorises to a minimum only donning a selection of gold rings for the fashion event.

Wow! Catherine co-ordinated her champagne gold and emerald green bracelet with her rings and earrings of the same kind

Standing out: The Academy Award nominee's blushed makeup look complimented her crimson lips and nails while her quaffed sandy locks brought the Riviera beach look to Athens

Catherine is known for her illustrious career in French cinema, including the 1980 classic The Last Metro and Indochine in 1992, both of which earned her Cesar awards for Best Actress.

Her most recent on-screen appearance came in The Truth in 2019, which she starred in alongside Juliette Binoche, Ethan Hawke and Ludivine Sagnier.

The Umbrellas of Cherbourg star previously joined 99 other prominent French women in attacking the anti-harassment MeToo Movement.

The joint letter letter defended mens freedom to bother women.

Gorgeous: She's known for her illustrious career in French cinema, including the 1980 classic The Last Metro and Indochine in 1992, both of which earned her Cesar awards for Best Actress

Movie star: Her most recent on-screen appearance came in The Truth in 2019, which she starred in alongside Juliette Binoche, Ethan Hawke and Ludivine Sagnier

Dior's collection has a strong Greek influence, to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the Greek Revolution.

Lights and fire entertained the A-List audience during the night as models rocked ensembles following a white and blue colour scheme.

The models are due to be photographed at archeological sites and monuments around Greece.

Putting on a show: Lights and fire entertained the A-List audience during the night as models rocked ensembles following a predominantly white colour scheme
She wasted no time getting back to the gym after welcoming Cree in December.

Yet Kate Ferdinand revealed her six-month-old son wasn't missing out on spending quality time with her as she shared an adorable snap working out with her little one.

The 30-year-old reality star took to Instagram on Friday to share an adorable workout photo with her 1.4 million followers, which saw Cree joining her on an exercise mat.

'New gym buddy': Kate Ferdinand, 30, was joined by her son Cree, six months, in adorable workout photo shared to her Instagram on Friday

In the picture, Kate showed off her toned figure in a fitted black top and leggings.

Meanwhile Cree, who lay on his front on an exercise mat next to his mother, was dressed in a sky blue babygrow.

Penning a short caption for the picture, Kate wrote: 'New gym buddy.'

New mothers: Kate, Lydia Bright, 30, Georgia Kousoulou, 29, and Danielle Armstrong, 33, all met up for a catch up with their children on Tuesday

The workout session comes after Kate met up with Lydia Bright, Georgia Kousoulou and Danielle Armstrong with their children in the park on Tuesday.

The group were joined by their babies, nicknamed the 'next generation', for the sunny snaps which Georgia shared on Instagram.

Kate looked glowing in a pair of wide-leg linen trousers and a matching cropped jacket.

Underneath she donned a tiny black crop top, flashing a glimpse of her washboard abs as she cradled the youngster in her arms.

Her friend Lydia, also 30, posed up a storm with her daughter Loretta, 15 months, wearing a white denim button down dress.

Sweet: The group were joined by their young 'next generation' children for the sunny snaps which Georgia shared on Instagram

'The next generation': The four former TOWIE stars all welcomed their first children after leaving the show

The mother-of-one, who was matching with her young child, also wore a large straw hat and some round sunglasses.

Sharing a sweet snap of the four mothers, Georgia, 29, wrote: 'The next generation. Such a lovely day catching up with the girls & babies.

'No matter how long it's been, we will always have such a special bond.'

The new mother, who welcomed her son Brody, five weeks, at the beginning of May with Tommy Mallet, looked radiant, cutting a casual figure in a matching linen short co-ord.

Cute: Danielle, mother to one-year-old Orla, shared a sweet clip of her daughter meeting Georgia's baby son Brody for the first time

Keeping comfortable as she posed for snaps with her friends, Georgia kept her fluffy slippers on for the get together.

Taking to her Instagram Stories, Danielle, mother to Orla, 12 months, shared a sweet clip of her daughter meeting Georgia's baby for the first time.

The fitness guru wore skin-tight green leggings and a matching short-sleeve crop top which showcased her toned legs and sculpted abs.

She pulled her blonde tresses into a messy bun and donned a pair of fluffy Gucci sliders retailing at 750.

Danielle was the first of the group to leave TOWIE at the end of 2016 after her breakup from ex-boyfriend James Locke.

After starting up a romance with Rio Ferdinand, Kate left in April 2017 and in the same year Lydia announced she was departing the show.

Georgia and Tommy remained in the show until May this year, revealing they were saying goodbye to TOWIE as they became parents for the first time.
He has steadily grown his collection of tattoos over recent years.

And Brooklyn Beckham was showing off his impressive array of inkings on Thursday as he posed for a mirror selfie.

The aspiring photographer and model, 22, went shirtless in the new snaps uploaded to his Instagram Story as he gave fans a glimpse of the body art.

Shirtless: Brooklyn Beckham was showing off his collection of tattoos on Thursday as he posed for a mirror selfie

Brooklyn kept his face out of the picture and all the attention on the tattoos as he snapped away wearing a silver chain.

In the picture, inkings of roses, a snake, an essay on the back of his neck and the word 'Here' were visible.

Brooklyn later showed off a casual look posing in a cosy white jumper and dark jeans.

Relaxed: Brooklyn later showed off a casual look posing in a cosy white jumper and dark jeans

As well as his picture tattoos, Brooklyn now has five permanent tributes to his fiance Nicola Peltz, 26, whom he became engaged to in July last year.

In January he showcased a new inking on the back of his neck of a love letter written by his 'future wifey'.

The striking black and white snap showed the son of David and Victoria Beckham facing away from the camera, with the intimate words from Nicola written across his neck and upper back.

The tattoo read: 'My forever boy. Read this anytime you feel anxious. I want you to know how deeply loved you are.

'You have the kindest heart I've ever met and hope I never go a day without your love.

'I think you are so incredible. Just we can get through it all together if you breathe slow and trust. I love you beyond.

'Love always, your future wifey.'

Captioning the image, Brooklyn simply penned: 'Love letters .'

And while some of his followers were loving his testament of love, others were concerned about the long-lasting tribute should the happy couple split in the future.

Everlasting love: Earlier this year Brooklyn showed off a fifth tattoo tribute to his fiancee Nicola Peltz, taking to Instagram to display an inking on the back of his neck of a love letter written by his 'future wifey'

Brooklyn is well known for his love of inkings and has over 30 tattoos across his body.

It comes after earlier this week, Victoria Beckam was every inch the proud mother as she congratulated son Brooklyn for landing Vogue Hong Kong's first ever digital cover.

Brooklyn was unveiled as the cover star in an Instagram post on Wednesday, with the black and whit image showing him fiddling with his camera.

Gushing over her son's achievement, Victoria - who has herself starred on many international editions of the fashion bible - wrote: 'Congratulations @brooklynbeckham on your #VogueManHongKong digital cover!'

Bursting with pride: It comes after earlier this week, Victoria Beckam was every inch the proud mother as she congratulated son Brooklyn for landing Vogue Hong Kong 's first ever digital cover

Vogue Hong Kong unveiled Brooklyn as their cover star on Wednesday, writing on Instagram: '#BrooklynBeckham is #VogueManHongKong's first ever digital cover star! The 22-year-old has been in the public eye since birth - but what do you not know about #Brooklyn?

'The aspiring photographer shares what inspires and influences his work in an exclusive interview with #VogueManHongKong, out now on #VogeHongKong.'

The black and white digital cover sees Brooklyn staring into a mirror with his camera in hand before slowly raising his head.

Stepping in front of the camera is a rare move for Brooklyn, who is far more comfortable behind one.

Brooklyn's photography is creating an ever-growing portfolio of enviably high profile work, including shooting Sophie Turner, a Burberry campaign, and his dad David's sunglasses campaign. He has also interned with Rankin.
Emmerdale couple Jonny McPherson and Natalie J Robb have split-up after a whirlwind romance.

The actor, 39, who plays Dr Liam Cavanagh on the ITV soap, and Natalie, 46, (aka Moira Barton) secretly ended their relationship 'several months ago', reports Digital Spy.

The couple went public with their relationship in July last year, with Natalie revealing their romance blossomed during a charity trip to Lapland in December 2019.

All over: Emmerdale couple Jonny McPherson and Natalie J Robb have secretly split-up, with reports saying their relationship ended 'several months ago'

Jonny hinted at their break-up during an appearance on Lorraine on Wednesday.

The actor had previously moved in with Natalie at the start of lockdown 1.0 after just three months of dating, but questions were raised if they had split when he spoke to Lorraine about living on his 60ft narrowboat on and off for the past four years.

And while talking about his rescue dog Molly, host Lorraine Kelly appeared to hint at Jonny's new-found single status as she told him: 'She's perfect. You don't need a woman in your life, because you've already got one.'

Newly-single: Jonny hinted at their break-up during an appearance on Lorraine on Wednesday, with the host saying the actor's rescue dog Molly is the only woman he needs

Ended: The actor, 39, who plays Dr Liam Cavanagh on the ITV soap (pictured left), and Natalie, 46, (aka Moira Barton pictured right) secretly ended their relationship 'several months ago'

Throwback: The couple went public with their relationship in July last year, after their romance blossomed during a charity trip to Lapland in December 2019 (pictured with Ash Palmisciano)

Speaking about living on a boat, Jonny said: 'After living on it for about four years, I now feel that if I go to a normal house: "What do you do with all this space? There's so much."

MailOnline has contacted Jonny and Natalie's representatives for comment.

It comes as Jonny's character married Leyla Harding on Thursday night's episode of Emmerdale.

Ironic: It comes as Jonny's character married Leyla Harding (pictured) on Thursday night's episode of Emmerdale

Interesting: But fans are predicting a shock affair between Dr Liam Cavanagh and Bernice Blackstock, after the Dr was caught listening to secret voicemails from the hairdresser

But fans are predicting a shock affair between Dr Liam Cavanagh and Bernice Blackstock, after the Dr was caught listening to secret voicemails from the hairdresser.

Back in November, Jonny spoke about how lockdown had helped his romance with Natalie blossom.

Speaking about their relationship, Jonny told The Mirror: 'We had to make a decision as lots of couples did. We decided to move in together and so, yes, lockdown did fast forward our relationship.'

Break-up: During a talk about his rescue dog Molly, Lorraine told him: 'She's perfect. You don't need a woman in your life, because you've already got one'

Sweet: Speaking about his dog (pictured) to Lorraine, Jonny said: 'You never really know what you're going to get with a rescue dog, I think. She is an absolute diamond'

He went on: 'We get on so well. We come from quite different backgrounds but we are essentially the same person. We are both a pair of big kids. We have exactly the same stupid humour.'

The actor, who has played Dr Cavanagh since 2018, added the coronavirus lockdown was a 'real test' to see how their relationship would fare in the long-term.

He continued: 'There is nowhere to hide during lockdown. Its a real test of whether you do get on with a person and thankfully we got through with flying colours.'

Jonny added that they hadn't spend any real time together until that trip to Lapland, with the pair getting on 'like a house on fire.'

He went on to say that they're 'having a lovely time' together, with the workaholics often spending an evening 'discussing scripts and learning lines.'

Happier times: Last summer, Natalie, who has played Moira for more than 11 years, confirmed she was in a relationship with Jonny after rumours started swirling the pair were dating

Last summer, Natalie, who has played Moira for more than 11 years, confirmed she was in a relationship with Jonny after rumours started swirling the pair were dating.

The actress said she went on her first date with Jonny in January, but managed to keep things secret until June 2020, when it was revealed they were together.

She explained: 'Yes, Jonny McPherson and I started to see each other, our first date was in mid-January, and then we were just having a couple of dates in February.

'Then obviously in March, lockdown happened and we were together at the time that Boris Johnson announced it, so he's been staying with me, and they were saying, "Yes it could be six weeks, yes it might be eight weeks", and I was like, "Oh OK!"'

The actress told how she and Jonny grew close on a charity trip to Lapland, and their relationship progressed from there.

Announcement: The actress said she went on her first date with Jonny in January, but managed to keep things secret until June 2020, when it was revealed they were together

Natalie said: 'We just kind of evolved. We did a charity where you go out with children who have cancer and you take them to Lapland.

'We were on that, and its a day trip, so you're there and back in a day, and from then on we just sort of got to know each other better.

'I've worked with him and things, but I've got to know him better and just went on from there. A few text messages and things like that. We went out for a meal and the rest is history.'

Natalie even alluded to their passionate 'making up' sessions during lockdown, explaining: 'We've had a few wobbles, I'm not going to lie but the making up was fantastic.'

'We're very compatible, but he does leave lids off everything and doors open, he just leaves doors open, that's about it.'
She's hasn't released a studio album for six years.

But Natalie Imbruglia, 46, has announced she's making a comeback with her sixth record Firebird.

Australian Natalie's new offering will drop on September 24, her first since 2015's Male and fans can pre-order her new release from midnight on Friday.

Comeback queen: Natalie Imbruglia, 46, announced on Friday that she is releasing her sixth studio album Firebird on September 24 following a six year break

Work of art: Natalie's album Firebird is her first album since 2015's Male, and she is releasing single Build it Better on Friday (pictured on stage in 2015)

The star wrote on Instagram: 'I am beyond excited to share that my new album Firebird will be out September 24th and you can pre-order it TONIGHT at MIDNIGHT around the world! (sic)

The Torn hitmaker feels 'incredibly proud' of her comeback record.

She added: 'I am incredibly proud of this new album and I cant wait for you all to hear it! I hope you love it as much as I do.'

Chameleon: Natalie is not only known as a singer, she rose to fame on Australian soap Neighbours in which she played Beth Brennan (pictured in 1995)

Natalie also released new song Build It Better on Friday, two years after she signed with Sony BMG.

In July 2019, she wrote on Instagram: 'Im very happy to announce that I have just signed a record deal with BMG! What an amazing team.

'I have been busy writing for the past year and a half and cant wait to share these new songs with you all.'

The former Neighbours actress - who played Beth Brennan in the soap - gave birth to her first child, son Max, with the help of a sperm doner in October 2019.

Natalie later admitted she felt something was 'missing' before she had a child.

She said: 'I'm used to pushing the laws of probability in terms of what I've done in life.

'I've always managed to do things that are unlikely or improbable.

'Looking back, I had lovely friends, had been married, a beautiful home and a career that I was proud of.

'But I'd long been at the point where I knew something was missing and that thing became something I yearned for above anything else.'
Kim Kardashian has admitted she's worried what her children will think about her sexy selfies - but insists she won't stop taking them.

The 40-year-old reality star made the confession during the Keeping Up with the Kardashians reunion show, The Final Curtain Part 1, which aired on Thursday night on E!

Asked if she plans to stop producing her sexy content when she becomes a qualified lawyer, Kim insisted that she won't stop sharing her 'empowering' bikini selfies, but is concerned how they'll go down with her four children.

'I don't want to be an embarrassing mom': Kim Kardashian, 40, said she worries her children won't like her risque selfies as she appeared on the KUWTK reunion show on Thursday

Kim - who shares daughters North, eight, and Chicago, three, and sons Saint, five, and Psalm, two, with ex Kanye West - mused: 'I've thought about this.

'Then I thought, you can do it all. You can do whatever you want'.

The billionaire entrepreneur then recalled the first time she visited the White House in 2018 to advocate for criminal justice reform.

She admitted she'd posted a bikini snap just before, and recalled: 'I was like, "I just posted a bikini pic. I hope they're not looking at my Instagram while I'm, you know, in here!" And then I thought, you know what, you gotta be you'.

Studying: Asked if she plans to stop producing her sexy content when she becomes a qualified lawyer, Kim insisted that she won't stop sharing her 'empowering' bikini selfies

However, she confessed that since having her children she is far more conscious of the content she puts out on social media.

She explained: 'I don't want to embarrass my kids.

'Or make them feel a way if they're in high school and I'm the embarrassing mom that's like posing in selfies in bikinis. There will be limits.'

Her babies: Kim - who shares daughters North, eight, and Chicago, three, and sons Saint, five, and Psalm, two, with ex Kanye West - doesn't want to 'embarrass' her kids with sexy snaps

It then emerged that Kim, who appeared on the reunion show alongside Kourtney, Khloe, Kendall and Kylie, and mother Kris, sends her sexy pictures to family first for approval.

Khloe jumped in: 'We have group chats and Kim will continuously send the photo on it. I think we just do what we're comfortable with.

'There's a lot of things that some might do that I'm not as comfortable showing but and I'm sure vice versa so we just support each other for what we do.'

Looking out for her: It then emerged that Kim, who appeared on the reunion show alongside Kourtney, Khloe, Kendall and Kylie, and mother Kris, sends her sexy pictures to family first

Yet the sisters admitted they do often shut down photos that they think are, 'too much', with Kim revealing: 'There was a photo I wanted to post from my last trip and I listened to them.

'But it's National Peach Day soon and I was debating [posting it]', to which Kendall quipped back 'National Thirst Day!'

Fans can catch the second part of the 20th (and final) season reunion of Keeping Up with the Kardashians Sunday on E! or the following day on hayu.

One to watch: Fans can catch the second part of the 20th (and final) season reunion of Keeping Up with the Kardashians Sunday on E! or the following day on hayu
Kim Cattrall poked fun at her absence from Sex And The City reboot on Thursday after she fooled fans that she was embarking on a NASA mission.

The actress, 64, played Samantha Jones in the HBO series and declined to reprise her role in the revival called And Just Like That, which is currently in production.

However, Kim had fans convinced on Thursday that the real reason she wasn't taking part in the reboot was due to a NASA mission.

'Cosmo(politan)naut!' Kim Cattrall poked fun at her absence from Sex And The City reboot on Thursday after she fooled fans that she was embarking on a NASA mission (pictured 2013)

Clearing up the confusion, the actress shared an article from Slate magazine to her Instagram titled 'the exquisite fantasy that Kim Cattrall was going to space instead of doing the Sex And The City revival', which she captioned with: 'Cosmo(politan)naut!'

The hilarious joke came about after the NASA Twitter revealed on Monday that a mannequin would be sent to the moon later this year on the Artemis I mission.

Replying to the tweet on Tuesday, a Star Trek fan account joked that Kim had been chosen to fly aboard due to her role as Emmy in the 1987 film Mannequin.

Kim also starred as Valeris in the 1991 film Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, explaining her mention on the fan page.

No more Samantha! The actress, 64, played Samantha Jones in the HBO series and declined to reprise her role in the revival called And Just Like That, which is currently in production (pictured in show still)

Hilarious: However, Kim had fans convinced on Thursday that the real reason she wasn't taking part in the reboot was due to a NASA mission - which she cleared up by sharing an article from Slate magazine followed by the caption: 'Cosmo(politan)naut...'

The account wrote: 'Breaking news! @KimCattrall has been chosen to fly aboard @NASA 's #Artemis I mission which flies around the moon later this year. Congrats Kim, wishing you good vibrations!'

Showing off her humorous side, Kim replied to the tweet with a picture of herself in a NASA suit, which is believed to be taken in 2013 when she visited the U.S. Space and Rocket Centre.

To which the official NASA Twitter account replied with: 'That's one giant leap for manne-kind' in another nod at Kim's role in Mannequin, with the actress re-tweeting with: 'Dream realized!' followed by a kiss emoji.

Yet despite the three accounts joking, some fans became convinced that the reason Kim wasn't taking part in the Sex And The City reboot was due to her 'NASA mission'.

And just like that! The hilarious joke came about after the NASA Twitter revealed that a mannequin would be sent to the moon later this year on the Artemis I mission, to which a Star Trek fan account joked that Kim had been chosen due to her role in 1987 film Mannequin

So funny: Showing off her humorous side, Kim replied to the tweet with a picture of herself in a NASA suit, believed to be taken in 2013 when she visited the U.S. Space and Rocket Centre, with the official NASA Twitter account replying with: 'That's one giant leap for manne-kind'

One person said: 'I'm sorry but Kim Cattrall going to motherf**king SPACE instead of doing the Sex and the City reboot is the biggest Samantha move of all time. Absolute God-tier move.'

A different account put: 'They should also have this be the explanation as to why Samantha's not around on the show. She's in space.'

While another follower commented: 'Kim Cattrall flying around the moon instead of joining the Sex and the City reboot is such iconic behaviour.'

Yet other fans were quick to point out it was a joke with Kim replying to their tweets with wink emojis.

Iconic role: Kim played Emmy in the 1987 film Mannequin, which sparked the jokes about her going up to space as the 'mannequin' for the Artemis I mission (pictured in still)

Film credits: Kim also starred as Valeris in the 1991 film Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, explaining her mention on the Star Trek fan page (pictured in film still)

One person said: 'I love that a joke about Kim Cattrall being the *mannequin* that NASA is sending to space led some people to thinking she is really going to space.'

While a different person put: 'And the best part is: PEOPLE ARE BELIEVING IT IS TRUE hahaha youre the best, Kim! I love you to the moon and back!'

Kim later cleared up the confusion by sharing an article from Slate magazine titled 'the exquisite fantasy that Kim Cattrall was going to space instead of doing the Sex And The City revival', which explained she wasn't actually going to space.

Showing off her humorous side once again, the actress captioned the post with: 'Cosmo(politan)naut...' followed by a collection of cocktail and space emojis.

'Biggest Samantha move of all time!' Yet despite the three accounts joking, some fans became convinced that the reason Kim wasn't taking part in the Sex And The City reboot was due to her 'NASA mission'

While NASA also cleared up any confusion by tweeting: 'That would be fun! We wish we could bring you and everybody else along for the ride!'

It comes after Sarah Jessica Parker shared a sweet snap with her Sex And The City co-stars Cynthia Nixon and Kristin Davis on the set of the reboot last week.

While Kim declined to reprise her role, the returning three leading ladies on the much-loved sitcom looked thrilled to reunite for the first time on screen since the 2010 film Sex And The City 2.

'Together again,' Sarah, 56, captioned a photo of herself standing between Cynthia, 55, Kristin, 56, with New York City's glorious skyline behind them.

'People are believing it's true!': Yet other fans were quick to point out it was a joke with Kim replying to their tweets with wink emojis

After reading through their first episodes 'alongside all the fellas' and their 'newest cast members,' she gushed everything came together 'like an ice cream sundae.'

In response to Sarah's post, Kristin commented: 'Love you forever and ever '

On her own Instagram Story, the Deadly Illusions star documented her day on set, which included a look at their glamorous fitting rooms and a peek at their wardrobe.

'Just some of the hats,' she captioned one picture of rows of hats, headbands and designer clutches. 'We are so spoiled. It is a joy.'

Pictured: Kim pictured as Samantha, far right, with her SATC co-stars Kristin Davis, Sarah Jessica Parker and Cynthia Nixon L-R in throwback still

She also shared a snap of a stunning $4,495 Judith Leiber crystal cupcake clutch, which appeared in the first Sex And The City film.

Meanwhile, Cynthia shared the same group photo as Sarah with the caption: 'Friendship never goes out of style.'

Earlier in the day, Sarah had thrilled fans when she shared photos of the script to the Sex And The City revival, called And Just Like That.

The actress was at a table read for the new series which has been in the works for years.

Back together! It comes after Sarah Jessica Parker shared a sweet snap with her Sex And The City co-stars Cynthia Nixon and Kristin Davis on the set of the reboot last week

Girl gang: While Kim, who played Samantha Jones during SATC's initial run, declined to reprise her role, the returning three leading ladies on the much-loved sitcom looked thrilled to reunite for the first time on screen since 2010's Sex And The City 2 (pictured in 2008)

It was noted on the script that it had to be turned in at the end of the table read as producers want to keep the plot secret.

'1st Table Read. Got here way too early. Nerves all a wonderful jumble. X, SJ,' the New Yorker said in her Instagram caption for her 6.6M followers.

She also shared images of the place settings for Cynthia as Miranda, Chris Noth as Big, Kristin as Charlotte, Willie Garson as Stanford, Sara Ramirez as Che and Mario Cantone as Anthony.

The scripts read on top: 'And Just Like That, Please note these scripts will be collected at the end of the table read.' There was also a microphone, an ear piece, and a medical mask.

Wow: On her own Instagram Story, Kristin documented her day on set, which included a look at their glamorous fitting rooms and a peek at their wardrobe

'Just some of the hats,' Kristin captioned on picture of rows of hats, headbands and designer clutches. 'We are so spoiled. It is a joy.'

The HBO Max series promises to shed light on how the trio are continuing to navigate love and friendship in the Big Apple now that they are in their 50s.

Kim, who is reported to have had a falling out with Sarah, elected not to return for the new show.

However, plenty of other famous faces from the original series, that ran on HBO from 1998 to 2004, have confirmed they are participating in the reboot.

Chris Noth and John Corbett, who played Carrie's competing love interests Mr. Big and Aidan, have come on board the show.

Amazing! Kristin also shared a snap of a stunning $4,495 Judith Leiber crystal cupcake clutch, which appeared in the first Sex And The City film

Also signed up are Mario Cantone, David Eigenberg, Willie Garson and Evan Handler.

Mario will be back as Anthony Marentino, a gay wedding planner who worked with Charlotte before becoming her good friend.

David reprises his role as the sometimes-geeky Steve, who became the most serious love interest for Miranda and later married her.

Willie played Stanford Blatch, Carrie's greatest confidante and one of the only male characters to occasionally carry a storyline on his own.

First read: Last week, Sarah thrilled fans when she shared photos of the script to the highly-anticipated Sex And The City revival And Just Like That

Iconic: Also signed up are Mario Cantone, David Eigenberg, Willie Garson, pictured, and Evan Handler

He has been a favourite: Mario is seen in the Sex And The City movie in 2008

His character married Mario's wedding planner in the second Sex And The City movie, so fans may get a chance to see what married life is like for them.

Evan Handler rounds out the returning love interests as Harry Goldenblatt, a divorce lawyer who represented Charlotte when she splits from her husband Trey MacDougal (played by Twin Peaks' Kyle MacLachlan).

Despite initially being turned off by his appearance and demeanour, she falls for him and they marry later in the series.

It's happening: Sarah shared photos of Perry Street to Instagram last week

Familiar place: The Perry Street location doubles as the exterior of the apartment building that's home to Sarah's character Carrie Bradshaw on the HBO series and spin-off movies

Last week, Sarah also posted several photos to Instagram taken outside the Perry Street location. It doubles as the exterior of her character Carrie Bradshaw's apartment building.

'Pure coincidence AND JUST LIKE THAT, we find ourselves on this street called Perry the night before it all begins again,' she captioned the snaps.

She then added: 'MPK, here we go. And Im thrilled and terrified. X, SJ. '

'MPK' stands for Michael Patrick King, the longtime writer-director-producer of Sex And The City who is part of the reboot.

He's back: Plenty of famous faces from the original series that ran on HBO from 1998 to 2004 will be seen in And Just Like That including Chris Noth's Mr. Big who ended up marrying Carrie
She's set to play protagonist Anne Elliot in Netflix's upcoming 'modern and witty' take on Jane Austen's classic book Persuasion.

And Dakota Johnson transformed into her character on Tuesday as she was spotted filming scenes for the modern-day adaptation in Lyme Regis, Dorset.

The Fifty Shades Of Grey actress, 31, sported a taupe coloured regency-style coat as she filmed scenes for the new adaptation.

Filming: Dakota Johnson transformed into her character on Tuesday as she was spotted filming scenes for the modern-day adaptation of Persuasion in Lyme Regis, Dorset

Looking good: The Fifty Shades Of Grey actress, 31, sported a taupe coloured regency-style coat as she filmed scenes for the new adaptation

Dakota immersed herself into her role as she shot scenes alongside a co-star at the idyllic coastal location.

Beneath her long line coat, Dakota donned a dark grey dress, while her brunette tresses were swept up into an elegant up do.

The star appeared in good spirits as she giggled alongside her co-star amid breaks from filming.

Dakota later shed her outerwear and was seen in just her grey dress as filming continued for the movie.

Character: She's set to play protagonist Anne Elliot in Netflix's upcoming 'modern and witty' take on Jane Austen's classic book Persuasion

At work: Dakota immersed herself into her role as she shot scenes alongside a co-star at the idyllic coastal location

New role: Dakota immersed herself into her role as she shot scenes alongside a co-star at the idyllic coastal location

She was soon joined by other members of the cast also dressed in period costume as the scenes developed.

Among them were actor Cosmo Jarvis, who is said to be playing Anne's love interest Captain Frederick Wentworth.

Adhering to covid guidelines, the crew and members of production were seen wearing face masks as they operated filming equipment.

In April, Variety reported that Netflix's adaption will be a 'modern, witty approach' on the classic tale, however it seems that the costumes will not be updated.

Style: Beneath her long line coat, Dakota donned a dark grey dress

Lovely: Her brunette tresses were swept up into an elegant up do

Good times: The star appeared in good spirits as she giggled alongside her co-star amid breaks from filming

There is no official release date for the film yet, but filming has now kicked off with the stars seen shooting the upcoming adaption recently.

The Persuasion remake is the latest in a line of reinterpretations of Austen's classic novel and period dramas opting to embrace colour-blind casting, most notably following Netflix hit Bridgerton.

In January Netflix's vice-president of inclusion strategy revealed that Bridgerton's racially diverse cast was the result of an 'inclusion lens' being applied to casting decisions.

Verna Myers said the company supported diverse lead producers and showrunners for the series as well as its executive producer Shonda Rhymes.

Bridgerton is a romantic drama set in Regency London which re-imagines the period as one where black and white people were equal, with Phoebe Dynevor and Rege-Jean Page taking on the lead roles of Daphne and Simon.

What a view: The cast filmed with a stunning backdrop behind them

Change: Dakota later shed her outerwear and was seen in just her grey dress as filming continued for the movie

Supporting cast: She was soon joined by other members of the cast also dressed in period costume as the scenes developed

Co star: Among them were actor Cosmo Jarvis, who is said to be playing Anne's love interest Captain Frederick Wentworth

It features a very diverse and talented cast which also boasts Adjoa Andoh as Lady Danbury, Kathryn Drysdale as Genevieve Delacroix, Golda Rosheuvel as Queen Charlotte and Ruby Barker as Marina Thompson.

Ms Myers told The Guardian: 'Weve got to get folks in front of the camera and behind the camera. When that happens youre going to get something youve never seen before. Bridgerton is something we have never seen before.

'We help out all of our creative folks in content and marketing with what we call an inclusion lens, when theyre casting and when theyre green lighting: see who's there, see who isnt.'

Looking the part: Cosmo filmed alongside an actress sporting a billowing white dress

All good: The star appeared to be thoroughly enjoying filming scenes as Anne Elliot

Safe: Adhering to covid guidelines, the crew and members of production were seen wearing face masks as they operated filming equipment

Channel 5's Anne Boleyn drama also featured Jodi Turner-Smith as the leading lady, making her the first black actress to play the doomed queen.

The upcoming Persuasion film is set to focus on Jane Austen's protagonist Anne, a woman who doesn't want to conform to society's rules, choosing to live with her near-bankrupt family instead.

Anne remains unmarried at 27-years-old, but when she reconnects with a man she once rejected she realises she has another chance at love.

Persuasion was most recently adapted in 2007 with Sally Hawkins taking the role of Anne and Searchlight Pictures are currently also preparing to adapt the book for their own version which will star Succession's Sarah Snook.

Carrie Cracknell is set to make her directorial debut with the feature film, and made her name directing Jake Gyllenhaal in Broadway's production of Sea Wall/ A Life.

Ready: Carriages were spotted nearby as scenes were filmed for the Jane Austin adaptation

Trotting along: Actors in top hats and coats were seen guiding horses along ready for the scenes

Set: Work was underway to transform the area ready for filming

Wow: The cast and crew filmed in the idyllic Lyme Regis in Dorset

Diverse: The Persuasion remake is the latest in a line of period dramas to opt for colour-blind casting, most notably following Netflix hit Bridgerton (pictured, Rege-Jean as Simon, the Duke of Hastings, and Phoebe Dynevor as Daphne)

It was also revealed that Ron Bass and Alice Victoria Winslow have adapted the book for the silver screen.

Also set to be joining Dakota in the star-studded Netflix film is Crazy Rich Asian's star Henry Golding, with Deadline reporting he's set to play Mr William Elliot.

Mr. Elliot is described as an unscrupulous charmer who is 'black at heart' with 'no feeling for others'. In the novel, he is a distant relation of Anne's who comes into a great deal of money after his heiress wife dies.

He then swoops in on Anne's family who are facing serious financial problems after her profligate father spends them into debt.

Anne takes a liking to the dashing and charismatic Mr. Elliot who aggressively pursues her romantically and even plans to pop the question.

Her family adores William because of his money and status, which elevates them in the city of Bath by association, but Anne is less convinced.

Versions: Persuasion was most recently adapted in 2007 with Sally Hawkins taking the role of Anne (right and left) with Searchlight Pictures are also preparing to adapt the book for their own film

She discovers he only married his first wife for her money - and she is also fielding the affections of her old flame Frederick Wentworth who returns to the scene.

Elsewhere, Cosmo Jarvis is said to be playing Anne's love interest Captain Frederick Wentworth, and Nikki Amuka-Bird, who was seen shooting with Dakota on Monday, will also appear in the upcoming film as widow Lady Russell.

Suki Waterhouse and Richard E. Grant are also starring in the Netflix feature.
She's a veteran cast member on ITV2's popular reality show, The Only Way Is Essex.

And Chloe Sims admitted on Thursday that after 10 years on the show, she's unsure what her future may hold.

When told by a fan during an Instagram Q&A session that they hope she 'never leaves' TOWIE, the 38-year-old provided a very cryptic response.

Will she leave? TOWIE's Chloe Sims (pictured) admitted to Instagram fans on Thursday that she's uncertain of her future and could QUIT the show, during a candid Q&A session

'Please never leave TOWIE, the day you leave is the day I stop watching. By far my fave,' the fan wrote.

Chloe responded with 'I'll try not too (sic),' alongside playful emojis including a laughing monkey face.

However, she is yet to make any decisions on possibly leaving the show, responding to another fan with 'I have no idea' when asked if she will ever leave.

Cryptic response: 'Please never leave TOWIE, the day you leave is the day I stop watching. By far my fave,' the fan wrote. Chloe responded with 'I'll try not too (sic),' alongside playful emojis including a laughing monkey face

Uncertain: However, she is yet to make any decisions on possibly leaving the show, responding to another fan with 'I have no idea' when asked if she will ever leave

Achieving stardom: Since debuting on the show as the cousin of Joey Essex, Chloe has become a popular influencer, brand ambassador and social media sensation. Pictured on the show in 2012

Changing look: She is known for her glamorous persona and isn't shy in changing up her look, having previously experimented with Botox and filler. Pictured in a promo shot for the show in 2012

Since debuting on the show as the cousin of Joey Essex, Chloe has become a popular influencer, brand ambassador and social media sensation.

The mother-of-one is known for her glamorous persona and isn't shy in changing up her look, having previously experimented with Botox and filler.

Earlier this month, Chloe had a non-surgical bum lift and was sure to share a clip of herself undergoing the procedure on Instagram.

Stripping down to a lace thong and lying face down in a treatment room in Essex, the bombshell told her fans: 'I'm having a non-surgical bum lift. My bum has grown a lot, obviously from training and eating but it's gonna grow more.'

Procedures: Chloe has admitted to having had Botox and filler, as well as Brazilian bum lifts, however denies having had plastic surgery

Bum lift: Earlier this month, Chloe underwent a non-surgical bum lift in Essex and was sure to share a clip of herself undergoing the procedure on Instagram

An aesthetician could be seen applying vacuum cups to Chloe's buttocks as she explained: 'I'm about to close the cups onto your bum to increase the volume.'

Chloe assured viewers: 'It doesn't hurt weirdly enough, cause it looks like it's gonna hurt.'

The beautician echoed: 'No, the suction is pain-free. Well it should be pain-free.'

Chloe told fans: 'My bum has grown a lot, obviously from training and eating but it's gonna grow more'

Chloe assured viewers: 'It doesn't hurt weirdly enough, cause it looks like it's gonna hurt' as suction cups were applied to her buttocks

Chloe then asked: 'And how long do I have to stay like this for?' to which the aesthetician replied: 'All in all about 45 to an hour depending on your desired look. It's the equivalent of 15,000 squats.'

The TV personality then said: 'This is my first treatment with this machine but I have tried once with another machine. And how many treatments do you suggest?'

'About five,' was the response.

A description for the Brazilian bum lift treatment on Bodyrite Contour's Facebook page reads: 'A non-invasive painless, safe & highly effective procedure to enhance appearance of the buttocks without the need of silicone injections or surgery.'

Details: A description for the Brazilian bum lift treatment on Bodyrite Contour's Facebook page reads: 'A non-invasive painless, safe & highly effective procedure'

As for the technique involved, the description explains: 'Vacuum therapy stimulates the muscles, body contours, firms & lifts, breaks the cellulite and fat deposits, removes toxins and improves lymphatic drainage.

In 2018 Chloe flew to Marbella to undergo a Brazilian bum lift in a bid to boost her confidence.

She battled with insecurities about her derriere for years, also undergoing a Brazilian butt lift back in 2012.

Vacuum therapy: The vacuum therapy used on Chloe's derriere 'stimulates the muscles, body contours, firms & lifts, breaks the cellulite'

Confidence boost: In 2018 Chloe flew to Marbella to undergo a Brazilian bum lift, in a bid to boost her confidence (pictured in May 2021)

At the time, she told Now Magazine: 'Even before I was in The Only Way Is Essex I was surrounded by gorgeous girls with hourglass figures. Mine felt unsexy and boyish in comparison.

'I tried everything possible to overcome my body insecurities. I wore certain clothes to make my bum look bigger and even wore knickers with chicken fillet-type padding.

'I always had my bum in mind when I was buying clothes. I'd hate it most whenever I went on holiday and had to get into a bikini. It always looked awful, like a flat 'granny' bum. With age and gravity it only got worse. By the time I turned 30 I'd ended up with a droopy bottom.'
She is soon set to reprise her role as Daphne Bridgerton for season two of Netflix's hit series Bridgerton.

And as filming gets underway, a fresh-faced Phoebe Dynevor was spotted snapping up a new coffee machine out in London.

Ditching her usual glam on set for a more low-key look, the actress, 26, kept things low-key as she headed out in a collared sweatshirt and gym leggings.

Coffee on the go: A fresh-faced Phoebe Dynevor was spotted picking up a new coffee machine while out and about in London recently

A make-up free Phoebe ensured she is well prepared when in need of a caffeine fix and was seen carrying her new purchase while out in the city.

She scraped her red locks back into a ponytail and wore sandals while running errands in the sunshine.

Her appearance in town comes following news Bridgerton is filming again.

Production was seen getting underway at the historic Old Naval College at the University of Greenwich in May, with the cast back on set.

Low-key: The Bridgerton star, 26, ditched her usual glam on set for a much more casual look to run errands in the city

Keeping it casual: Phoebe paired together blue gym leggings with a collared sweatshirt

Natural beauty: Phoebe ditched the make-up for the outing and scraped her red locks back into a ponytail

Heavy load: She was seen lugging around her new purchase that will ensure she's always prepared when in need of a caffeine fix

Bridgerton is Netflix's most-watched series ever, as more than 82million households tuned in to watch after its release on Christmas Day last year.

The show turned Phoebe, who stars as a leading role alongside Rege-Jean Page's character the Duke of Hastings, into a household name - and while she has been confirmed to return, her co-star Page will not.

The actor, who became a fan favourite for his portrayal of the Duke, confirmed his shock exit in April.

Phoebe has since addressed Page leaving and confessed it had put a 'spanner' in the works.

Household name: Phoebe was thrust into the spotlight after making her debut in Bridgerton as leading lady Daphne Bridgerton

Dream team: She starred in the leading role alongside Rege-Jean Page who played the Duke of Hastings on the show

Speaking on Variety's Awards Circuit podcast last month, she revealed: 'I knew but yeah, I guess it is a spanner... but again, the show centres around the Bridgertons and there are eight books.'

Phoebe continued: 'I think maybe the fans of the books were more aware of that happening than the fans of the show. I think fans of the books know that every episode is about a different sibling.'

She reminded fans of the series that the second instalment of the period drama was always set to see Anthony Bridgerton - played by Jonathan Bailey - take centre stage.

His quest to find love and marry will be the main focus of the new series, with Phoebe adding: 'We're very much passing the baton. Obviously it's sad to see [Page] go, but I'm looking forward to being reunited with my family.'

Her comments came as Page discussed the pair's steamy sex scenes in the show and he admitted that he found it 'overwhelming' to see them play out onscreen.

'It was a spanner': Phoebe has addressed Page's exit as he won't be returning for series two and reminded fans next season was always set to centre around Anthony Bridgerton instead

'No one was sufficiently prepared. I wasnt sufficiently prepared, and I was there,' he told The Hollywood Reporter.

'I think people were grateful for the intensity of the romantic aspects of Bridgerton. Im not sure how grateful I was to watch it for myself,' he joked.

'It was overwhelming. But I think people were looking to be overwhelmed.'

He also addressed his Bridgerton exit and insisted he wasn't worried about leaving the show as his character not returning was 'what was meant'.

What he did fear, however, was 'the unknown' and likened leaving the show to graduating from high school.

Page confessed that on announcing his departure he had to leave his phone on the other side of the room, as he didn't want to see the public's immediate reaction.

Season two will see Sex Education star Simone Ashely join the cast.
Kylie Jenner is the richest of all the Kardashian/Jenner children with Kim Kardashian a close second.

A lot has been made of the 23-year-old star's wealth after she launched her best-selling lip kits that turned into Kylie Cosmetics.

But the mother to Stormi Webster tried her best to deflate any attention she received over her fortune during part-one of the Keeping Up With The Kardashians reunion on Thursday evening.

Don't talk to me about my money! Kylie Jenner deflated any attention on her about her billionaire status while on part one of the KUWTK reunion on Thursday

When host Andy Cohen said that she is the richest, Kylie shot back: 'I don't wake up and look at myself in the mirror, like, "Good morning self-made billionaire,"' she said, as Kim joked, 'I do.' Kylie added, 'But yeah, it's amazing.'

She said she got into makeup because of she was insecure about her lips. 'I have really small lips and I didn't ever think about it until I had one of my first kisses and a guy said to me, Oh my god, you're such a good kisser but you have such small lips,' she revealed. "From then on I felt un-kissable. I had an insecurity because this guy said something to me. Then I got this obsession with makeup because I would over-line my lips."'

And Cohen also opened his show by saying if he needed some money for his parking meter he would come to her, to which she barely smiled.

Kylie has a rocky past when it comes to her billionaire status.

In May 2020 the beauty slammed Forbes after it published a bombshell report accusing the Jenner family of inflating figures and 'forging' tax returns for the makeup mogul's cosmetics company.

Back off! When host Andy Cohen said that she is the richest, Kylie shot back: 'I don't wake up in the morning and look in the mirror and say, "I am a self-made billionaire"'

Not so much: And Cohen also opened his show by saying if he needed some money for his parking meter he would come to her, to which she barely smiled

It appears the star was taken by surprise at the article, which claims Kylie Cosmetics is not doing as well as the Jenners want people to think - and that the Lip Kit creator is not actually a billionaire.

Forbes named Kylie the world's youngest self-made billionaire in 2019 and again in 2020, and of her surprise over their latest article she wrote on Twitter: 'What am i even waking up to. i thought this was a reputable site. All i see are a number of inaccurate statements and unproven assumptions lol. ive never asked for any title or tried to lie my way there EVER. period'

She followed up with a quote from the Forbes report that accused the Jenners and their accountant of producing false tax returns. '"Even creating tax returns that were likely forged thats your proof? so you just THOUGHT they were forged? like actually what am i reading,' Kylie tweeted incredulously.

Not easy: Kylie has a rocky past when it comes to her billionaire status. In May 2020 the beauty slammed Forbes after it published a bombshell report accusing the Jenner family of inflating figures and 'forging' tax returns for the makeup mogul's cosmetics company. She denied it

She followed up with another post focusing on the positive, 'but okay i am blessed beyond my years, i have a beautiful daughter, and a successful business and im doing perfectly fine.'

In a detailed report based on public financial disclosures, Forbes accused the family of creating a 'web of lies' and said Kylie had inflated the size of her business and success. The publication accused her of 'lying about company figures and forging tax returns' to be dubbed a billionaire.

Based on filings from beauty giant Coty, which acquired a 51 percent stake of Kylie's makeup company in January 2020 at a valuation of $1.2 billion, Kylie Cosmetics generated revenues and profits that were far lower that the figures touted for years by the Jenner-Kardashian clan.

Good times: Kylie flashed her legs as she sat with mom Kris and sister Khloe

These shock claims come after Forbes put Kylie on the cover and hailed her the youngest self-made billionaire ever two years running. Forbes explained that it had been shown 2016 tax returns indicating revenue far higher than the numbers revealed by Coty's filing, and that there were only two explanations: Kylie Cosmetics' sales had utterly collapsed in the two years before the acquisition, or the tax returns were fabricated.

In 2020, Forbes claimed that their new calculations put Kylie's personal fortune at just under $900million.

Earlier this year she was dropped off Forbes' 35th annual billionaires list.

Also on the show the makeup mogul confessed that she was 'not thinking' about marriage 'right now,' to host Cohen, despite recently rekindling her romance with baby daddy Travis Scott.

The reality star also opened up about her very private pregnancy and even where things stand with ex-boyfriend Tyga, admitting they are 'not friends' anymore.

Wedding bells? Jenner insists she's 'not thinking' about marriage 'right now' despite recently rekindling with baby daddy Travis Scott

Jenner was asked 'Do you think marriage is in the cards for you,' which prompted her to briefly spill her thoughts.

'I'm not thinking about marriage right now, but I would hope to get married one day,' she coyly said with a smile.

And she continued to explain why the Houston-born rapper, 29, was not on the show very much, saying she 'never pressured him,' about it.

'I don't know,' she said of his minimal presence. 'I guess, sometimes, he didn't want to be filmed. I never pressured him to be on the show.'

Soft smile: Despite denying wanting to be married at this point in her life she spoke about the subject with a soft smile

On again! The former pair confirmed they were back on on June 15 as they walked the red carpet together in NYC, before she posted an intimate snap of her wrapped in his arms

Reunion look: The reality star also talked about her very private pregnancy and dished on where things stand with ex Tyga

Kylie also spoke about that status of things with ex Tyga who also dated Rob Kardashian's baby mama Blac Chyna.

'We're not friends, but we are okay. If I see him out, or if I run into him anywhere, you know, I always wish him well. I have no bad feelings towards him,' she told Cohen.

She also dished on her decision to keep her pregnancy away from both the public and the show, saying that she had already 'shared so much' of her life and didn't want to deal with others 'opinions' because she was only 19-years-old.

'I shared so much of my life. I was also really young when I got pregnant. And it was just a lot for me, personally. I didn't know how I would bring that to the public, too, and have, you know, everyone's opinions. I think it was just something that I needed to go through by myself.'

No bad blood: 'We're not friends, but we are okay. If I see him out, or if I run into him anywhere, you know, I always wish him well. I have no bad feelings towards him,' she told Cohen of Tyga

Young love: The pair dated when she was just 14 and he even performed at Kendall's 16th birthday party before things turned romantic; pictured 2016

Her statements about marriage come after the cosmetics founder confirmed she and the Sicko Mode rapper had rekindled their romance with an Instagram post on June 15 and a red carpet appearance.

At the Parsons Benefit in NYC, the pair posed for photos alongside daughter Stormi, three, and in an award acceptance speech Scott gushed: 'I love you wifey.'

A source told People that they were 'very sweet and cute together,' and held hands at the reception and that this time around there is a 'different energy' between the pair.

'Although they always got along, there is a different energy between them now. Kylie and Travis are very close again. Kylie flew to NYC to support him. It's just great to see them back together,' an insider shared.

Affectionate: A source told People that the pair were 'being very sweet and cute together' and in a speech he said 'I love you wifey'

'They never put any pressure on their relationship. The focus was always on being the best co-parents. They still keep separated homes in LA because this is what works for them,' it was added.

The pair had sparked romance rumors over the last few months after they took a trip to his native Houston and even spent the day at Disneyland. She also flew to Miami to ring in his birthday at the end of April where they were seen getting handsy in the club.

Despite splitting in 2019, TMZ reported in May that the pair were in an 'open relationship,' which prompted Kylie to hit back about the 'narrative' on social media.

'I'm not discrediting anyone who is in an open relationship but it's just careless and disrespectful to throw this narrative out there without knowing what's true,' she said via Twitter at the time.
Kim Kardashian opened up about how she is a 'completely different person' after being robbed of millions, at gunpoint, during Paris Fashion Week in October 2016.

Nearly five years after burglars broke into her hotel room, tied her up and stole $10 million of jewelry, the 40-year-old reality star revealed 'no expensive items ever come' into her home.

'As far as jewelry, if I'm wearing something, it's borrowed. It's fake,' she told Andy Cohen during the Keeping Up with the Kardashians reunion on Thursday night.

Terrifying: Kim Kardashian opened up about how she is a 'completely different person' after being robbed of millions, at gunpoint, during Paris Fashion Week in October 2016

She added: 'I can't sleep if I have jewelry in my safe, or money, or anything at my house. I just don't live my life like that.'

In addition to doubling her personal security, she has openly spoken about being less flashy and her hesitance over wearing expensive jewelry post-robbery.

'On a positive note, I'm a completely different person because of it, in the best way,' she reflected. '[Before the robbery], I had to have the coolest car, the best rims, the best outfit and I thought that I was the s**t because of that. I thought that made me.'

Traumatic: Nearly five years after burglars broke into her hotel room, tied her up and stole $10 million of jewelry, the 40-year-old reality star revealed 'no expensive items ever come' into her home; pictured in 2016 during Paris Fashion Week

'As far as jewelry, if I'm wearing something, it's borrowed. It's fake,' she told Andy Cohen during the Keeping Up with the Kardashians reunion on Thursday night

She continued: 'The things I valued before that happened were genuinely completely different than what I value now. It's fun to get dressed up and all this, but like, [material] things don't make me.'

The traumatic incident also 'significantly changed' her and sister Khloe Kardashian's relationship.

While noting 'Kim was obviously a great sister prior,' the 36-year-old Good American founder said there has been a 'significant shift in how' Kim 'caters to her relationships and the attentiveness that she now gives her family as opposed to red carpets or things.'

Big changes: In addition to doubling her personal security, she has openly spoken about being less flashy and her hesitance over wearing very expensive jewelry post-robbery; seen in 2016

'I mean, our relationship has significantly changed,' Khloe noted.

In October during an appearance on My Next Guest Needs No Introduction With David Letterman, Kim admitted to fearing her older sister Kourtney, 42, would return and 'find [her] dead' in their room at the Hotel de Pourtales.

'I kept on thinking about Kourtney, I kept on thinking, like, she's gonna come home and I'm gonna be dead in the room and she's gonna be traumatized for the rest of her life,' recalled Kim tearfully.'

Closer: The traumatic incident also 'significantly changed' her and sister Khloe Kardashian's relationship

'On a positive note, I'm a completely different person because of it, in the best way,' she reflected. '[Before the robbery], I had to have the coolest car, the best rims, the best outfit and I thought that I was the s**t because of that. I thought that made me'

She claimed that a gun was pointed directly at her as thoughts regarding the fate of her sister's safety flooded her brain.

Kim and Kourtney traveled to Paris, France together in October of 2016 to attend Paris Fashion Week.

The KKW Beauty founder noted that Kourtney had 'packed all [of Kim's] jewelry' for the trip, which was something she had 'never done before.'

Alone: Kim explained that on the evening of the robbery Kourtney left their hotel with the sisters' sole bodyguard, which meant Kim was completely alone in their suite; Journalists work as police officers stand guard outside Kim's hotel in Paris, France in 2016

Unsuspecting: Kim and Kourtney traveled to Paris, France together in October of 2016 to attend Paris Fashion Week; Kim pictured ONE DAY before the robbery in Paris in October of 2016

Scary: Kim explained that on the evening of the robbery Kourtney left their hotel with the sisters' sole bodyguard, which meant Kim was completely alone in their suite; seen with Kourtney the day before the robbery

Kim explained that on the evening of the robbery Kourtney left their hotel with the sisters' sole bodyguard, which meant Kim was completely alone in their suite.

Then around three o'clock in the morning, Kardashian remembered hearing 'stomping up the stairs' that sounded as if a group of people were inching closer and closer to her room.

Kim told David Letterman, 73, that something about the noise made her instantly feel as though 'someone was there to get [her],' so she decided to dial for help.

Then, to the KUWTK star's horror, a gang of intruders violently made their way into her hotel room and specifically demanded that she fork over a ring husband Kanye West, 43, had purchased for her.

As she continued to recall the terrifying event for Letterman, Kim broke down in tears.

She explained that, at the time of the robbery, she was only wearing a robe and one of the intruders aggressively 'grabbed her.'

Intuition: Then around three o'clock in the morning, Kardashian remembered hearing 'stomping up the stairs' that sounded as if a group of people were inching closer and closer to her room

Horror: Then, to the KUWTK star's horror, a gang of intruders violently made their way into her hotel room and specifically demanded that she fork over a ring husband Kanye West, 43, had purchased for her

'I was like, 'OK, this is the time I'm gonna get raped. Like deal, this is gonna happen, just prepare yourself,'' recalled Kim to Letterman.

'So, I did and then  I don't know why I'm crying, I've talked about this before  and then he tied me up with handcuffs and zip-ties and then duct tape and duct-taped my mouth and my eyes.'

Thankfully, no one was physically harmed during the course of the robbery, but Kim said the entire experience made her 'really paranoid' for a year's time.

She would have 'half a dozen' security guards posted up about her Calabasas home at all times.

The assailants were, eventually, arrested in January of 2017 and Kim learned that they were watching her every move 'for two years leading up until this moment.'

She alleged that the robbers had attempted to rob her on prior occasions, but their plans were thwarted due to the presence of Kim's husband Kanye.

'I didn't know that they had someone at the elevators, someone at the front, someone that moved the camera, someone that broke the door, someone in the getaway car.

'There was a whole team of people that had planned this,' she concluded.
Rob Delaney delighted his fans on Thursday as he posted a hilarious photo of himself wearing nothing but brightly coloured boxer shorts.

The 44-year-old Catastrophe star took to Instagram to share the silly picture with his 255,000 followers.

In the picture, Rob is seen holding his arms up and flexing his muscles as he wears almost nothing in his kitchen.

'Don't like it? Neither do I': Catastrophe's Rob Delaney hilariously posed in nothing but tie-dyed boxers and an eye mask in a new picture uploaded to his Instagram on Thursday

Rob's look is particularly noteworthy as he is seen wearing a pair of tie-died box shorts in blue, orange and red.

The only other addition to Rob's humorous ensemble is heated face mask he is seen wearing over his eyes.

Captioning the post, Rob wrote: 'I have new tie-dyed underpants & wear a calming heat mask at all times now. Dont like it? Neither do I.'

While Rob often shares amusing posts to his social media, he is also very open about his struggles regarding the death of his late son Henry, who died in 2018.

Rob recently took to Instagram to share a photograph of his late son sleeping, taken when he was only 15 months old and had just started chemotherapy.

Goofing around: The 44-year-old Catastrophe star took to Instagram to share the silly picture with his 255,000 followers (Pictured as Rob Norris in Catastrophe)

In a heartbreaking caption written alongside the snap he admitted: 'I miss caring for him!' after explaining how cancer surgery had damaged cranial nerves and left their son unable to swallow.

In the snap of his late son, Henry could be seen sleeping peacefully while dressed in a WALL-E baby grow, with his tracheostomy tube visible.

Rob penned: 'Look at my beautiful little chunker asleep. He's 15 mos old here and has just started chemo.

'You can clearly see his tracheotomy tube here too. The surgery to remove his tumor damaged cranial nerves, which took away his ability to swallow, thus the tracheostomy.

Having fun: Captioning the post, Rob wrote: 'I have new tie-dyed underpants & wear a calming heat mask at all times now. Dont like it? Neither do I'

'The things my wife and I had to learn to care for a one year old with a complex tracheotomy. But I wish to hell I was still doing it every day. I miss caring for him. Our son Henry.'

In April, the actor paid tribute to his late son Henry shortly after acknowledging what would have been his sixth birthday.

And Rob, a parent to three other sons with wife Leah, admitted he still doesn't know how he continues to function after being forced to endure the heartbreaking loss of a child.

Sharing an image of Henry as a baby with Instagram followers, he wrote: This little boy would've turned 6 the other day. He died of cancer a little bit before his third birthday.

'If you asked me how I carry on without him I would tell you I don't know.'

Rob revealed Henry was diagnosed with his brain tumour in 2016 after suffering persistent vomiting and weight loss, shortly after he turned one.

The infant underwent surgery to remove a tumour in addition to further treatment, spending 15 months in hospital. But his family were told his cancer had returned in the autumn of 20t, 17 before he passed away the following January.

In December 2018 Rob revealed Leah had given birth to their 'magical' fourth son that August, seven months after son Henry passed away.

Heartbreaking: At the end of last month, Rob took to Instagram to share a photograph of his late son Henry sleeping, taken when he was only 15 months old and had just started chemotherapy
She launched her new collection with fashion brand PrettyLittleThing last month.

And proving she's the perfect advert for the line, Ed Westwick's model girlfriend Tamara Francesconi sizzled in new snaps from the stunning shoot held in Santorini, Greece.

The latest pictures see Tamara, 24, oozing glamour in a very racy cut-out dress and heels, as she seductively kicks back in a villa located on the Greek island's stunning cliff top.

Wow factor: Ed Westwick's model girlfriend Tamara Francesconi sizzled in new snaps from her stunning PrettyLittleThing shoot held in Santorini, Greece

The shoot, which took place at Andronis Luxury Suites, sees Tamara leave little to the imagination in her pink patterned lace-up midi dress.

Not only does the revealing number boast a plunging neckline, but its barely-there middle teased a look at Tamara's incredibly toned figure, while a huge slit in the skirt ensured her catwalk worthy pins were on full display.

Looking bronzed, she teamed her outfit choice with woven mule heels, big gold Chanel earrings and voluminous locks.

She finished off the beach-inspired look with a deep red lip and let her dress take centre stage as she flaunted her modelling credentials.

Heating up: The model, 24, put on a sizzling display in a racy cut out dress from her collection

Model material: Tamara looked incredible as she kicked back in the leggy number and heels

Speaking about her collection with PrettyLittleThing - that includes everything from swimwear to chic holiday co-ords - Tamara said: 'It's one thing to be on a billboard, but to see my name on a billboard is just too crazy.'

The London-based influencer is dating former Gossip Girl star Ed - who is best known for playing Chuck Bass on the series also starring Chace Crawford, Leighton Meester and Blake Lively.

The pair have been together since October 2019, after Ed slid into Tamara's DMs on Instagram.

Glam: She teamed the risque dress with gold Chanel earrings and voluminous locks

Stunning: Tamara launched her line with fashion brand PLT last month and says it's been 'crazy' to see her name up on billboards

She recently revealed that she was 'obsessed' with Gossip Girl before she and Ed began dating and insists she 'manifested' the star into her life.

Speaking in a backstage interview from her shoot with Pretty Little Thing, Tamara opened up about her relationship with Ed and confessed: 'I was the biggest Gossip Girl fan known to man, I watched it religiously twice a year and I swear to god I manifested him actually in my life.

'It was actually so funny though because when I first started dating him - my whole group of friends we're super into Gossip Girl and more particularly my friend Annie - and when I first started dating him I had to sit her down and apologise to her, because she was so insulted.. like how dare I, she had dibs on him!'

Smitten: Tamara began dating Gossip Girl's Ed Westwick in 2019 after he slid into her DMs

Recalling how she and Ed first got talking, Tamara revealed: 'He direct message me out of the blue saying ''Hi,'' and I nearly fell off my chair, we then chatted for a while and he asked me on a date, which I assumed would be a dinner.

'Instead he took me to a butterfly sanctuary in Mayfair, we thereafter spent the whole day exploring London together, and the rest is history.'

Ed starred on Gossip Girl as Blair's love interest Chuck for its entire six-season run.

The show - which has now been given a reboot by HBO Max - wrapped in 2012 and since then, Ed has gone on to appear in TV series Snatch and movies Bone in the Throat, released in 2015 and starring The Crown's Vanessa Kirby, and The Crash.

Fans last saw Ed in American comedy thriller Me, You, Madness that was released in February, earlier this year.
Her mother, Anna Santi, passed away in April 2018 from a brain aneurysm.

And on Thursday, Tamzin Outhwaite, 50, paid tribute to her late mum with a moving social media post, on what would have been her 71st birthday.

The EastEnders star took to Instagram to share two photographs of her mother and an emotional message, admitting: 'We feel you all the time.'

'We feel you all the time!' On Thursday, Tamzin Outhwaite, 50, paid tribute to her late mum Anna Santi, with a moving social media post on what would have been her 71st birthday

Tamzin wrote: 'June 17th always reminding us of the circle of life. My mum and eldest child's joint birthday

'Mum always said, her first grandchild, on her birthday, was the best present she ever had Happy 71st mummy

'We all miss you but feel you all the time.. I have honestly never heard anyone say a negative word about my mum ( apart from her terrible time keeping) what a beautiful achievement x #alwaystryingtobemorelikeyou (sic).'

Back in May 2018, the Masked Dancer star confirmed that her former stockbroker mother had passed away as she uploaded a photo and shared the sad news.

Heartbreaking: Anna passed away in April 2018 from a brain aneurysm

Tribute: The EastEnders star took to Instagram to share two photographs of her mother and an emotional message

Tough: Back in May 2018, Tamzin confirmed that her mother had passed away

Captioning the image, she wrote: 'R.I.P Anna Patricia Santi. So lucky to have you as my mum. What an incredible human you were. Thank you Mum. You taught me how to live and you continue to teach me...'

Sharing a separate shot of her brothers Kes and Jake as children, the actress also revealed that Anna had passed away almost a month prior.

'These two beauties and I Lost our beautiful mum 3 weeks ago today, suddenly .....THE best mum ever,' she wrote.

Speaking to the Daily Mail in January 2018, the mother-of two-admitted she had adopted Anna's parenting skills and applied them to her relationship with her own daughters Florence, 13, and Marnie, eight.

Just like mum: In 2018, Tamzin admitted she had adopted Anna's parenting skills and applied them to her relationship with her own daughters Florence, 13, and Marnie, eight (pictured)

Grateful: 'My mother, Anna, used to drum that into me when I was a child. She would say I was a lucky girl to be given such amazing opportunities' said Tamzin (pictured in 2001)

She said: 'If there's one thing I've learned, it's that life is easier if you give things a positive spin.

'I don't constantly view the world through rose-tinted spectacles  but I do think a person who feels lucky is bound to be happier than someone who constantly feels hard-done-by or lives in a cloud of negative feelings.

'My mother, Anna, used to drum that into me when I was a child. She would say I was a lucky girl to be given such amazing opportunities, including going to the Sylvia Young Theatre School in London. So I do the same to my girls.

'Even if it's simply that they've drawn a picture that doesn't work out the way they wanted, instead of screwing it up and throwing it away, I always say: "Look at what you've done in a different way."

'If it's a portrait of a person whose nose has gone wrong, say, turn it into an elephant with its trunk instead.''
Bond girl Tanya Roberts has left her entire estate to her common-law husband Lance O'Brien.

Roberts died in January aged 65, amid a bizarre set of circumstances which saw her partner O'Brien and her rep Mike Pingel announce her death prematurely when she was still in ICU.

In a handwritten will, which O'Brien filed Wednesday in Los Angeles, Roberts says she wants O'Brien to have her $3 million home and pension money, despite writing 'I know you don't love me'.

Tanya Roberts - who passed away in January - left her estate to her common-law husband Lance O'Brien, it has been revealed

She asks for her goldfish and two dogs, Muttley and Sox, to be cared for by O'Brien, who she was with for 15 years.

The note, obtained by Page Six, also specifies she wants none of her possessions to go to her sister Barbara Leary or nephew Zack.

O'Brien was Roberts' partner for 15 years - the actress called him her best friend and 'true friend' in the hand written note

'My last will and testament. I want to leave my house [redacted] and all its belongings to my best friend Lance O'Brien - I also leave my dogs and my Pension Plan check to Lance O'Brien.'

Roberts also writes 'I have no reason to live' in the note, which was verified by her long-term publicist Pingel.

The will - which is not dated - continues, 'Nothing will go to my sister Barbara Leary or her son Zack Leary.'

According to Page Six, Leary filed paperwork Wednesday, contesting the will.

'P.S. Lance, I Know you don't love me but you have been a true friend and for that I'm gratefull [sic]. Have a good life and don't blame this on yourself. I was always to [sic] sensitive to live in this world. Signed Tanya Roberts aka Victoria Blum.' Roberts ends the note.

A handwritten will - called a holographic will under California law - is valid as long as it meets four different criteria.

It must be clear that the individual drafting the document intended it to serve as a will. There must also be no question that the person writing it was of sound mind at the time of drafting. The handwriting on the document must be verified as the drafters and the signature on the document must be verified as belonging to the person drafting the will.

Requests: Roberts asked O'Brien to take care of her goldfish and two dogs, Muttley and Sox

Cutting out her relatives: Roberts' note, obtained by Page Six, also specifies she wants none of her possessions to go to her sister Barbara Leary or nephew Zack. Leary contested the handwritten will on Wednesday

Roberts died on the evening of January 4 but in a strange turn of events her death was announced hours earlier by Pingel .

Pingel informed the media that she had died on January 3 at Cedars-Sinai Hospital in Los Angeles.

The following day obituaries for the star were published across the world - but the actress was still alive.

In an emotional interview with Inside Edition that afternoon, O'Brien broke down in tears as he received a phone call from the hospital.

'Now, you are telling me she's alive?' O'Brien said, his face torn in anguish.

Sobbing, he told the host: 'The hospital is telling me she is alive. They are calling me from the ICU team.'

Roberts had been suffering from an unspecified illness, thought to have stemmed from a UTI, which caused liver and kidney failure. She is also reported to have been suffering from hepatitis C.

Roberts, who had spent the day walking her dogs, complained of feeling unwell on Christmas Eve and collapsed in the night on the way to the bathroom.

She was rushed to hospital, where she tested negative for coronavirus, and was placed on a ventilator before her condition rapidly deteriorated.

Roberts died in January at 65, after a bizarre set of circumstances which saw her partner O'Brien and her rep Mike Pingel announce her death prematurely when she was still in ICU. O'Brien is seen here with Pingel after the actress was finally confirmed dead

Mix up: In an emotional interview with Inside Edition shortly after the initial reports of the star's death, O'Brien broke down in tears as he received a phone call from the hospital telling him Roberts was still alive

O'Brien said he went to the hospital on January 3 after doctors said the actress was fading fast and that she was going to die, TMZ reported. He said she opened her eyes and tried to grab him but that her eyes then closed again and she 'faded'.

Having said what he believed was his final words to her, he was left devastated and walked out of the hospital without speaking to medical staff.

On the same day, he appeared to claim that he had watched Roberts' 'last moments' and hours later news of her 'death' was being reported around the world.

He has since attempted to explain the confusion over how the death announcement came about and says he 'doesn't know' who to blame for the mix-up. The hospital has refused to comment on the case because of patient confidentiality.

'I turn around and she's completely passed out cold,' he told The Sun in a description of his harrowing visit to her bedside. 'I thought that was that, she wasn't going to recover.

'So when I came down the elevator I was distraught, I was lost, I was completely discombobulated. There was nobody there to guide me. I called her publicist Mike Pingel and I said I just said goodbye to Tanya.'

Friend and agent: Pingel - pictured here with the actress - verified the handwritten will

Pingel later issued a press release saying that Roberts - best known for appearing opposite Roger Moore in the 1985 Bond film A View To Kill - had died.

He explained: 'Lance truly believed Tanya had died.'

The rep said he'd learned the news of Roberts' 'death' from O'Brien, who told TMZ that he visited her at the hospital before she passed.

'As I held her in her last moments, she opened her eyes. I was able to see her beautiful eyes one last time. Tanya had the most beautiful eyes,' O'Brien said after the initial reports of her death.

'When she saw me and I was there, I saw her eyes open up. I felt good. I said: "Hey, her eyes are opening. Her eyes are opening." They told me that's just a reflex.'

Roberts appeared to be looking healthy and in good spirits late last year. She is pictured with Pingel in a photo from Facebook

Roberts frequently uploaded photos to Instagram, including a snap that showed her wearing a mask amid the COVID-19 pandemic as she signed fan photographs

Pingel then announced that the hospital had called O'Brien and informed him that Roberts was alive - as seen in the Inside Edition video.

By January 5 it was confirmed Roberts had died in the hospital.

Asked about the mix-up, a spokesperson for Cedars Sinai would only say: 'Due to patient confidentiality we cannot confirm or deny that anyone is a patient at Cedars Sinai.'

Speaking prior to her death Pingel said that Roberts' condition was 'dire'.

O'Brien told The Sun: 'Her kidneys are so far gone, her liver is so far gone, her gall bladder is so far gone. She also has a terrible blood infection. The doctors say it started out with a urinary tract infection.

Reports indicate that Roberts and O'Brien lived together at her home in Hollywood Hills - the same home Roberts' shared with her first husband, screenwriter Barry Roberts, who died in 2006. Tanya and Barry had been married for 32 years and had no children

'The doctors say theres no way shes going to be the same. She always told me she didn't want to be an invalid. She said if it got to this stage, end it for me.'

He said that he was unable to return to the hospital because he would need special permission due to the pandemic.

O'Brien said he had told doctors not to keep her on life support just so that he could see her: 'I have seen her already, I got to hold her.'

Before her collapse, insiders said Roberts seemed 'perfectly healthy' and was participating in video chats with her fans.

Reports indicate that Roberts and O'Brien lived together at her home in Hollywood Hills.

Public records indicate that it was the same home Roberts' shared with her first husband, screenwriter Barry Roberts, who died in 2006. Tanya and Barry had been married for 32 years and had no children.

Roberts played geologist Stacey Sutton alongside Roger Moore (above together) in his seventh and final James Bond movie in 1985
It's one of the most glamorous occasions in the British social calendar.

And Simon Cowell cut a very dapper figure while Charlotte Hawkins pulled out all the stops with a blue ensemble as they led the stars attending day four of Royal Ascot at Ascot Racecourse in Berkshire on Friday.

The music mogul, 61, looked sharp in a slick morning suit as he blissfully strolled into the venue on the rainy day.

Sharp: Simon Cowell cut a very dapper figure in a slick morning suit as he arrived for day four of Royal Ascot at Ascot Racecourse in Berkshire on Friday

Stunning: Charlotte Hawkins pulled out all the stops with a blue ensemble as she and Simon led the stars at the glamorous event

Hoping for some sun, Simon teamed his black tailcoat and grey trousers with a pair of black sunglasses, while he carried his essentials in a brown briefcase.

The X Factor judge was without his partner Lauren Silverman or ex Sinitta, both of whom accompanied him on day one of the event.

Meanwhile, Charlotte, 46, dazzled in a stunning blue mid-length dress, which she wore with an elaborate matching fascinator and shoes.

The Good Morning Britain star, who added a pair of delicate silver drop earrings, looked radiant as she posed for snaps as she attended yet another day at the races.

Also in attendance was This Morning chef Clodagh McKenna who looked elegant in a billowing pale pink dress and burgundy headband.

She appeared in good spirits as she posed with partner Harry Herbert.

While former Emmerdale star Natalie Anderson in a pretty pink number and a matching fascinator, with the actress added a black clutch bag and heels.

Meanwhile, former Made In Chelsea star Caggie Dunlop looked effortlessly chic in a cream trouser suit and fancy head piece.

Blue-tiful: The Good Morning Britain star, who added a pair of delicate silver drop earrings, looked radiant as she posed for snaps as she attended yet another day at the races

Racegoers at the event were forced to brave the rain and avoid sizable puddles as the heavens opened on Friday, which is in stark contrast to the glorious weather that graced day one.

Royal Ascot is part of a list of pilot events taking place, allowing 12,000 revellers to attend, before the possible lifting of all measures to curtail the Covid-19 pandemic in July.

Earlier this month, The Telegraph reported the Queen, 95, - an avid horse racing fan - would not attend this year's Ascot because of ongoing restrictions.

Ascot had been planning for an attendance of 4,000 a day. The new figure will allow all those who rolled over 2020 bookings to be accommodated with a 'material but not significant' number of tickets left over, according to a track spokesperson.

Lovely: Also in attendance was This Morning chef Clodagh McKenna who looked elegant in a billowing pale pink dress and burgundy headband

Happy couple: She appeared in good spirits as she posed with partner Harry Herbert

The number of spectators will be well below the usual attendance of over 300,000 over the five days but the increased number was welcomed by Frankie Dettori, whose 73 royal meeting victories have only been bettered by Lester Piggott (116).

Dettori, who was leading rider at the royal meeting for the seventh time last year, said: 'There's nothing better than Royal Ascot with people. I know it's not 60,000 (a day) but it's better than what we thought.

'Last year I was leading rider at Royal Ascot and won three Group Ones, including the Gold Cup. To have nobody there to see any of that, it was like someone had cut my arm off.

'Those are the biggest races we've got here and I won them in front of empty grandstands. It goes without saying it wasn't the same.'

Lovely: While former Emmerdale star Natalie Anderson in a pretty pink number and a matching fascinator, with the actress added a black clutch bag and heels

Looking good: Meanwhile, former Made In Chelsea star Caggie Dunlop looked effortlessly chic in a cream trouser suit and fancy head piece

Oh dear! Racegoers at the event were forced to brave the rain and avoid sizable puddles as the heavens opened on Friday

Visitors to the Royal and Queen Anne enclosures have to abide by a strict dress code, which does not allow bare midriffs or strapless dresses, but for guests in the Windsor and other enclosures the rules are more relaxed.

With the clue in the name, Royal Ascot is hugely popular with the monarchy and Her Majesty is usually a regular at the event. Before the Covid-19 pandemic, she had attended every year since ascending the throne.

Last year, dedicated Royal Ascot showed off their finest frocks and fascinators while celebrating the fourth day of the racing meet at home.

Even the most committed fans were left watching jockeys riding, wearing face masks, broadcast virtually.

Among the racing enthusiasts who stayed at home was the Queen, who has been forced to watch the event from Windsor Castle for the first time in her 68-year reign.

In an emotional note shared last year, Her Majesty praised the 'valiant' efforts of organisers and said she is sure it will still be the 'highlight' of the racing calendar, despite the 'different' circumstances.
Nicolas Cage's mother Joy Vogelsang died at the age of 85 on May 26 in her hometown of Los Angeles.

The Face/Off actor's mom, who battled mental health issues for decades, had been in the hospital for two weeks before her passing, Nicolas' bother Christopher shared on Facebook.

Nicolas, 57, had just started working on the movie The Retirement Plan when his mother died. Joy's funeral has yet to take place due to delays from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Sad loss: Nicolas Cage's mother Joy Vogelsang died at the age of 85 in her hometown of Los Angeles on May 26. Seen in 1998

Heartbreaking: Nicolas' brother Christopher shared on Facebook that he had been with his mother hours before her passing

Joy divorced Nicolas' father August Cage in 1976. The American academic, author and film executive died in 2009. In addition to Nicolas and Christopher, Joy also has son Marc Coppola, who works as a DJ.

Nicolas' brother Christopher shared on Facebook that he had been with his mother hours before her passing as he posted an older glamour photo of the woman.

'My mama died at 10:33pm 5/26,' said the director. 'I was with her all day but left for a couple hours and missed her passing by a couple hours so wasn't able to hold her hand to give her my love and affection before her journey to peace land.

'She had a very hard life with mental health issues. In all of that painful emotional chaos she still managed to teach me something super important... I learned from my mama what "affection" really means.'

Sad goodbye: 'My mama died at 10:33pm 5/26,' said the director. 'I was with her all day but left for a couple hours and missed her passing by a couple hours so wasn't able to hold her hand.' He also posted an old glamour photo of her

Better days: Nicolas and his mother, second from right, with Renny Harlin and Laura Dern in the 1990s

'Joy had been in the hospital for two weeks when she died and hadn't been well for a while,' a source told The Sun.

'She had a hard life but she was very kind and just really beautiful, a great cook and very charismatic. The funeral hasn't happened yet because there is a backlog due to Covid.

'We're hoping that Nic will be able to make it for the funeral now that it has been postponed because he is out of the country at the moment shooting a movie.

Cage has been filming The Retirement Plan with Ashley Greene; the movie is about a beach bum who lives in The Caymans. According to IMDB, Joy passed away on the first day of the movie shoot.

'Joy was incredibly proud of her sons and their achievements, she was a very affectionate woman,' the Sun source added.

His closest family: Cage's mother Joy, right, and his grandmother, left, in 2001

With his folks: His father August Coppola, far left, was an American academic, author and film executive. He died in 2009; seen in 1998

Nicolas was born in Long Beach, California to Joy and August. He attended Beverly Hills High School then UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television.

Through his father August, Nicolas is a nephew of The Godfather director Francis Ford Coppola and of actress Talia Shire.

Nicolas is also the cousin of directors Roman Coppola and Sofia Coppola.

The actor is best known for his appearances in the films Wild At Heart, Moonstruck and National Treasure.

He has been married five times: to Patricia Arquette (1995 to 2001), to Lisa Marie Presley (2002 until 2004), Alice Kim (2004 to 2016), Erika Koike (2019) and Riko Shibata (2021).
Real Housewives of Beverly Hills star Erika Jayne had been dropped by her legal team from the firm Dinsmore & Shohl LLP earlier this week, but are now back as her counsel.

The news comes amid the release of the new Hulu doc The Housewife and the Hustler - that delves into her embezzlement scandal with husband Tom Girardi.

Per court documents obtained by PageSix on Friday, the legal team are now back on the case and working with Jayne again - though it is unclear how they patched things up.

It is quite the turnaround after the legal firm said had said 'the relationship of trust and confidence that is essential to a properly functioning attorney-client relationship has broken down and, in the good faith assessment of counsel, the relationship is irreparable,' in court docs.

The firm, which was representing Jayne, 49, in the bankruptcy of her estranged husband Tom Girardi, said it had informed the Atlanta-born reality star of its decision on Monday.

Reversed: Erika Jayne's lawyers are BACK as her counsel just two days after asking judge permission to drop her amid embezzlement lawsuit and The Housewife and the Hustler doc

The firm had said it had advised the Bravo personality of 'the potential consequences of not timely securing replacement counsel' if she did not retain a new attorney in timely fashion.

The Housewife and the Hustler featured interviews with former clients accusing Girardi, 82, of financial theft in their cases, and noted Jayne's involvement in an LLC he had, with some funds allegedly being routed to her company EJ Global.

Tom was diagnosed with Alzheimer's and dementia in March, the same month his legal license in California was revoked.

Tom faces a litany of legal problems, including a $2 million class action lawsuit claiming fraud and embezzlement from the firm Edelson PC in connection with the 2018 Lion Air Flight 610 crash, in which all 189 people onboard died.

Details: The Housewife and the Hustler featured interviews with former clients accusing Tom Girardi, 82, of financial theft in their cases, and noted Jayne's involvement in an LLC he had, with some funds being routed to her company EJ Global

Tom was diagnosed with Alzheimer's and dementia in March, the same month his legal license in California was revoked

He and Jayne were sued for allegedly embezzling funds meant for families of victims, while Edelson PC, a firm for their ex clients, said in court docs their divorce last fall was orchestrated to 'fraudulently protect Tom and Erika's money' as they're 'on the verge of financial collapse.'

In the Hulu doc, attorney Sunny Hostin pointed out that Jayne is seeking to have her high-dollar items classified as 'separate property' in their split, claiming they were 'gifts to her.'

Reporter Brandon Lowrey of Law360 said in the doc that the estranged couple is 'together in these bankruptcy proceedings' and that 'it's going to be hard for her to say she didn't know that anything was going on.'

In a preview for the show's 11th season, Jayne said of the accusations, 'No one knows the answer but him.'

The couple rose to fame on Bravo's Real Housewives of Beverly Hills
He sensationally left his GMB co-hosting gig earlier this year, after a live war of words with the show's weatherman Alex Beresford.

But now, Lorraine Kelly, 61, has insisted Piers Morgan, 56, will return to Good Morning Britain 'in some shape or form' following his dramatic exit.

Lorraine says she has 'no doubt' he'll present the show again, warning: 'never count him out of anything!'

Interesting! Lorraine Kelly, 61, has insisted Piers Morgan, 56, will return to Good Morning Britain 'in some shape or form' following his dramatic exit in March

Lorraine told The Sun: 'He will be back in some shape or form, I have no doubt. I know nothing, but never count him out of anything.

'What's that game where you bash things and they keep coming back? That's him. I wouldn't be surprised if he came back. Nothing would surprise me about Piers.'

The daytime presenter also added that Piers is, however, busy hosting Life Stories, writing columns for MailOnline and doing a lot of tweeting.

Earlier this month, Piers claimed ITV bosses had been in touch asking him to return to GMB, telling The Sun he believes he could 'take the ratings back to where he left them' after a slump in viewing figures.

No doubt! Lorraine says she has 'no doubt' he'll present the show again, warning: 'never count him out of anything!'

Quit: Piers sensationally left his GMB co-hosting gig earlier this year, after a live war of words with the show's weatherman Alex Beresford over Prince Harry and Meghan Markle

He said: 'They reached out  there have been approaches. Never say never. I have no doubt I could take the ratings back to where I left them  but the doubt is, would anyone be allowed to do it that way again?

'I was hired to give very strong, honestly held opinions, which I did. But in the end I was asked to apologise for a genuinely held opinion.'

Piers stormed off GMB on in March as he discussed the infamous Harry and Meghan interview, where he expressed his belief that Meghan was lying during the chat with Oprah Winfrey and that the couple damaged the royal family's reputation.

The outspoken host left the daytime series after he insisted he 'didn't believe a word' of Meghan's account of suffering suicidal thoughts and experiencing racism at the hands of the royal family.

Previous presenters: Earlier this month, Piers claimed ITV bosses had been in touch asking him to return to GMB after a slump in viewing figures (Pictured with Susanna Reid)

Piers then walked off set after a fierce debate with Alex Beresford, in which the weather presenter accused Piers of unfairly 'trashing' Meghan, and branded him 'diabolical'.

When Piers walked off screen, Alex continued: 'I'm sorry but Piers just spouts off on a regular basis and we have to sit there and listen.'

Piers, who refused to apologise, later announced his resignation and tweeted his thanks to the GMB team, praising them for their 'hard work and dedication' that led to them beating their main breakfast TV rival.

And Piers shared his own reflections on the events of that fateful week in a piece for the Mail On Sunday shortly afterwards.

Piers called Alex 'GMB's occasional stand-in weatherman' and 'uptight' in the telling account, adding that the presenter hasn't messaged him since his exit unlike others on the show.

Decline: Piers' final episode was a ratings hit, beating BBC Breakfast's viewing figures for the first time ever, prompting him to thank the 'hard work and dedication' of the production team

Viewership for the ITV breakfast show has been in steady decline since Piers quit back in March, after peaking at 1.9 million viewers days before he left the show.

Following news that Piers had quit, the first show following his exit on March 10 saw ratings quickly take a hit, with an average of 1.24 million viewers watching Susanna react to her presenting partner's exit alongside stand-in Ranvir.

Numbers continued to slide as the week went on, and by the week's end ratings had slipped to just 850,000 viewers.

By Monday March 15, average viewers were down by 255,700 compared to the previous Monday.
Kerry Katona revealed her stomach in a 'no filter' snap on Friday as she admitted to feeling 'extremely miserable' following her recent weight gain.

The former Atomic Kittens star, 40, confessed to feeling 'unwanted, unloved, undervalued,' whilst declaring she 'hates herself' after failing to workout and indulging in unhealthy food.

The TV star also revealed that SkinnyJabs - a slimming injection brand - wreaked havoc with her body leaving it 'swollen', as she teased an appearance transformation with the help of Dr. Maurino Joffily.

Candid: Make-up free Kerry Katona revealed her stomach and underboob in a 'no filter' snap on Friday as she admitted to feeling 'extremely miserable' following her recent weight gain

Kerry captured her side profile in a mirror snap as she lifted her turquoise top to her bust and donned heart-print pyjama bottoms.

The mother-of-five tucked her blonde tresses away from her face as she gave a glum expression.

She said: 'Yep thats me In all my glory!! No more b******t guys this is as really as it gets! No filter and no photo shop!!

'My nipples are so far down that I now trip over them dont worry Im use to it now!

'After using the skinny jab for so long then just stopping my body has just swollen not helped the fact Ive done no training Im eating c****y food which means Im always in a c****y mood, I told you lot I would always be honest with you..

Real: The star, 40, confessed to feeling 'unwanted, unloved' and undervalued,' whilst stating she 'hates herself' after failing to workout and indulging in unhealthy food

'Im hurting Im upset Im hating myself but there is a man who is going to change all of that for me meet @maurino_joffily.' [sic]

She asked her followers not to pass judgement as she continued: 'I know this is gonna cause undivided attention but.

'Tell you what, go give him a follow and tell me what you think of his work it becomes a vicious cycle your unhappy so you eat s**t food then become miserable unhappy loathing and hating your body.

'What do you do?go straight to the fridge and stuff your face and in return returns makes you miserable and believe me Im feeling extremely miserable!!!!!

'Hearing undervalued or appreciated Fat miserable!! Unwanted and unloved True story! Just thought Id share please dont pass judgment [praying hand emoji].' [sic]

MailOnline have reached out to SkinnyJab for comment on Kerry's claim that stopping the injections left her body 'swollen'.

Helping hand: The star also revealed that SkinnyJabs, a slimming injection brand, left her body 'swollen', as she teased an appearance transformation with Dr. Maurino Joffily

Earlier in June, Kerry revealed that she is planning to drastically change her appearance after confessing she feels like she is getting 'jowls' and sometimes 'looks a mess'.

In her New! magazine column, she said: 'Im also going under the knife in July for my boob reduction, so Im going to tell him to tuck and suck everything on my tum while Im there. Its like going in for an MOT.

'Dont get me wrong, I embrace my body and I love my stretch marks. But I look at a picture of myself and I think "God, I look a mess"'.

Plans: Earlier in June, Kerry revealed that she is planning to drastically change her appearance after confessing she feels like she is getting 'jowls' and sometimes 'looks a mess'

It appears Kerry plans to undergo the dramatic transformation with the help of Dr. Maurino, a board certified plastic surgeon from Brazil who specialises in liposuction, breast augmentation and body contouring.

Earlier this year, Kerry revealed her taut stomach and slender waistline in a chic ensemble as she promoted her weight loss brand, SlimCare - previously known as Skinny Jabs.

Kerry looked effortlessly stylish in a beige jumper and patterned skirt as she posed up a storm at a photoshoot in Cheshire.

Incredible: Kerry revealed her toned stomach and slender waistline on Sunday in a chic ensemble as she promoted her weight loss brand, SlimCare

The images were part of Kerry's collaboration with the founder of the controversial weight loss injections (which act as an appetite suppressant), who she credits for her own body transformation.

Kerry has partnered with the CEO, Caroline Balazs, to re-brand the company with the new name 'Slim Care' following debate over their product's safety.

Fellow celeb Gemma Collins recently revealed that she regrets promoting the weight loss jabs after losing three stone through exercise and diet alone.

Speaking on the GC podcast she said: 'I kind of regret doing it but I feel like sometimes you're in such a desperate place and you want to lose weight but actually I've come away from all the diet promotion because I wish we could get rid of that word diet.

'It is so important that we keep getting that message home to people, that beauty is more than just these pumped-up faces, it's not all about that.'

Kerry was left outraged back in December when Holly Willoughby and Phillip Schofield criticised the weight loss treatment on an episode of This Morning.

Holly said to viewers: 'Could an injection a day help melt the kilos away? That's what Kerry Katona and Gemma Collins would have you believe.'

Later in the segment, the treatment was further condemned by the health care professional Dr Zoe Williams who called celebrities that promote SkinnyJabs 'irresponsible'.

Ripped figure: Kerry has collaborated with the founder of the controversial weight loss injections SkinnyJab (now named Slim Care), who she credits for her own body transformation (pictured in January)

'You're in such a desperate place': Kerry's fellow celeb Gemma Collins revealed that she regrets promoting the weight loss jabs after losing three stone through exercise and diet alone

She said: 'Personally I think it's irresponsible and dangerous because they're making out you can lose magnificent amounts of weight by using this drug and the truth is you can't. You still have to diet and exercise.'

Kerry later hit back at the criticism and told The Sun: 'I think it's very unfair they [This Morning] didn't have any of us on there. I'm not promoting this just for a pay cheque.

'Of course I get paid, but I also use the product ... I need to know if it works - and it worked for me.'The singer regularly posts online about the 250 jabs and has lost two stone since August after using them.
Scott Disick proved he will always have Khloe Kardashian's back, especially when it comes to defending her against cyberbullying from Instagram trolls.

After the 36-year-old reality star posted a number of sexy snaps of herself posing inside her blue Rolls-Royce on Thursday, she was hit by a snarky comment from the popular @90sAnxiety Instagram, which read: 'Who is she?!'

Clearly irked by the comment that seemed to imply the Good American founder was unrecognizable, Disick, 38, replied: 'Who isn't she? That's the question!'

Supportive: Scott Disick proved he will always have Khloe Kardashian's back, especially when it comes to defending her against cyberbullying from Instagram trolls; seen in 2019

While the Talentless founder and Khloe's sister Kourtney Kardashian ended their ten-year relationship in 2015, they are amicable co-parents and he has remained close to her entire family.

In a new trailer for the Keeping Up With The Kardashians reunion part two, which airs on June 20, the former couple both admitted they would still be together if it was not for the party boy's 'substance abuse' issues.

Toward the end of the clip, released on Friday morning, Disick stated that he has no problem with his ex moving on with other men then jokes he just wants to 'kill them.'

Not okay: After the 36-year-old reality star posted a number of sexy snaps of herself posing inside her blue Rolls-Royce on Thursday, she was hit by a snarky comment from the popular @90sAnxiety Instagram, which read: 'Who is she?!'

Defending Khloe: Clearly irked by the comment that seemed to imply the Good American founder was unrecognizable, Disick, 38, replied: 'Who isn't she? That's the question!'

The new teaser begins with host Andy Cohen reading a note from a fan.

The viewer asked Scott if he thinks he would have a 'shot' with Kourtney if he 'maintained his sobriety.'

Kourtney looks uncomfortable at having this topic come up as she looks down.

More to this story: Part one of the Keeping Up With The Kardashians reunion aired on Thursday evening. And already a teaser for part two was shared the very next morning. This new clip focuses on Kourtney Kardashian and her ex-partner Scott Disick with whom she shares three children.

'Yes,' said Disick.

Next Kourtney is asked if she feels the same, 'Yeah probably,' she mutters.

Kylie starts to laugh as she says, 'Sorry this is just so deep!' Cohen snaps back: 'It is deep.'

'I came out here to get it deep,' adds Disick as he was brought into the room after the ladies hashed things out.

It comes out: In the explosive interview , Scott and Kourtney both admit that they would still be together if it was not for the party boy's 'substance abuse' issues, insist they have not slept together in the past five years since they split and discuss Kourtney's subsequent romances which include Younes Bendjima and Travis Barker

Hard one: The new teaser begins with host Andy Cohen reading a note from a fan. The viewer asked Scott if he thinks he would have a 'shot' with Kourtney if he 'maintained his sobriety.' Kourtney looks uncomfortable at having this topic come up as she looks down. 'Yes,' said Disick

Another fan asks if Kourtney and Scott have slept together in the past five years adding no one believes they have traveled together and not gotten affectionate.

Khloe says, 'Oh my God!' as she is shocked by how personal the question is.

'People can't believe that but we have not,' says Kourtney as she smiles.

Uncomfortable: Kylie starts to laugh as she says, 'Sorry this is just so deep!' Cohen snaps back: 'It is deep.' 'I came out here to get it deep,' adds Disick as he was brought into the room after the ladies hashed things out

'For real you have not?' asks Cohen.

'For real we have not,' adds Kourtney as Scott says 'how annoying' which gets laughs.

'I feel like we're great friends and co-parents,' says Kourtney as Scott shoots her a hand gesture that says we're OK.

Cohen asks Kourtney what was a bigger deal breaker: Scott's substance abuse issues or his infidelity.

Hilarious: Toward the end of the clip, Disick says he has no problem with his ex moving on with other men then jokes he just want to 'kill them'

Kourtney and Scott began their whirlwind on-off romance after they met in 2006 at the Mexican home of Girls Gone Wild founder Joe Francis.

Their turbulent relationship was documented on the show and was beset by problems including his past alcohol abuse and rumors he was unfaithful.

The two welcomed three children into the world - Mason, 11, Penelope, eight, and Reign, six - but ended their romance for the last time in 2015.

She is currently dating Travis Barker, while he is in a relationship with Lisa Rinna and Harry Hamlin's 20-year-old daughter.
The feud between Shahs of Sunset's Golnesa 'GG' Gharachedaghi and Real Housewives of Orange County star Kelly Dodd continued to intensify on Thursday.

It all began when GG commented on a post about Kelly's exit from the Bravo show this week, praising the decision to replace her with RHOC vet Heather Dubrow.

'Soooo glad KD is gone' GG said in part, which sparked a furious response from Kelly who claimed she doesn't know who GG is, and a back and forth between the women has been ongoing since.

Hitting back: Shahs of Sunset's Golnesa 'GG' Gharachedaghi slammed Real Housewives of Orange County star Kelly Dodd as their feud continued to intensify on Thursday. Kelly continued to deny knowing who GG is and called her 'Goulash'

Kelly called GG 'Goulash' in one of her posts as she continued to deny knowing the Shahs star, and GG followed up by labelling Kelly as a bully.

'I would've thought getting fired for being a racist would've been a big enough lesson but I forgot we're talking about a privileged person that doesn't need to change their ways,' she wrote on Instagram.

'You are a bona-fide bully Ms. Dodd. I am so glad for your departure because when Bravo decided to create the first ever show about Middle Easterns [sic] on an American network called Shahs of Sunset, and the many other shows about different cultures, they also said f*** you to racism and the people whose souls are tainted, so good riddance.'

'So glad KD is gone': It all began when GG commented on a post about Kelly's exit from the Bravo show this week, praising the decision to replace her with RHOC vet Heather Dubrow

'I don't know her': Kelly responded to GG's comments by claiming she doesn't know who the Shahs of Sunset star is

Kelly, 45, had called GG the derogatory name while defending her statement that she doesn't know who GG is, after the Shahs' star shared a clip of Kelly talking about the series - which follows a group of Persian-American friends - with Andy Cohen.

Asked by Cohen which 'Non-Housewives show on Bravo' she'd want to be on, Kelly said: 'I would like to be on Shahs of Sunset ... because I'm just over the top.'

'I never said I never watched the show. This was five years ago, I haven't seen the show since,' Kelly ranted in a now deleted clip. 'In five years, I haven't seen the show, I don't know who this Go girl is, Goulash, whatever her name is.

'Don't know her. Did I see it, I'm sure I have, but I haven't seen it since in 5 years,' she added. 'Good luck, lady, I don't know who you are. Sorry.'

Fans have since pointed out that Kelly commented as recently as last month on a Mercedes Javid post about Shahs raving 'I'll be watching!'.

In a statement to TooFab, Kelly said in response to GG: 'This narcissist started this fight by attacking me and I still don't know who she is.

Busted: The fired RHOC star was then forced to defend her comments from an old interview with Andy Cohen where she said she'd love to star on Shahs of Sunset

Kelly doubled down on her claim that she doesn't know GG: 'Good luck, lady, I don't know who you are. Sorry.'

'I'm mostly Mexican and nearly 30% Native American. I'm not a racist and the privileges I have are the ones I've earned. I deleted the video because I'm sick of talking about this person and won't anymore. Come after me some more and I'll sue you.'

This comes after Kelly slammed her RHOC co-star Braunwyn Windham-Burke after it was revealed that both stars have been axed from the show earlier this week.

Dodd, 45, had faced intense backlash last year for her controversial opinions on COVID-19, as well as facing accusations of racism and homophobia, but on Thursday, she put the blame squarely on Windham-Burke, 43.

In a statement to TooFab , Kelly said in response to GG: 'This narcissist started this fight by attacking me and I still don't know who she is.' Kelly also threatened 'Come after me some more and I'll sue you.'

A text message sent from Kelly to Braunwyn says: 'This was your fault. We'd still be on the show if you didn't make things so dark and ugly and brought all that political "woke" BS.'

It goes on, 'Your lies about me, calling me a racist and a homophobe were horribly destructive and your phony storylines didn't help either.'

Known for their fights on the show, in November last year, Kelly accused Braunwyn, who is gay, of calling her 'a racist and homophobic (sic) in a nationally televised interview.'

Giving a classy clap back and ignoring the vitriol, Braunwyn replied in the text messages: 'Well I'm still sober and still gay, like I said if you ever want to talk I'm here'

Explaining the beef further, Kelly said on Instagram: 'I can't believe this Braunwyn has the audacity to text me !! She went on a podcast .. She said she was fired from the show because we all didnt like her because she's gay.'

'We'd still be on the show if it wasn't for your woke BS': Kelly (left) slammed her RHOC co-star Braunwyn Windham-Burke (right) for getting them both fired

'Not because she's a horrible person. Not because she treated everyone like s**t and made no effort to be friends with us. Not because she went on a press tour and made horrible accusations about us calling all of us homophobes and racist, Not because shes a terrible mother.'

She raged on: 'Not because she's a horrible person to her husband. The only reason she was fired is because she is gay. What a f***ing nut job classic narcissist! '

Variety confirmed the news that the ladies will not be returning for the 16th season earlier this week.

Attack: Kelly shared these screenshots of her sparring with Braunwyn on Thursday

Classy clap back: Ignoring the vitriol, Braunwyn replied: 'Well I'm still sober and still gay, like I said if you ever want to talk I'm here'

While Kelly and Braunwyn are not welcome on the cast any longer, Heather Dubrow is set to make a triumphant return to the show after taking four seasons off following her last stint in 2016 for season 11.

Dodd faced intense backlash last year for her controversial COVID-19 opinions and later toasted to being a 'super-spreader' while at a bar with friends amid strict lockdown and social distancing measures in California.

Bravo also cancelled the contracts for Elizabeth Lyn Vargas, who was on the most recent season.

Shannon Storms Beador, Gina Kirschenheiter and Emily Simpson will be back for another season in front of cameras.

Reports that Tamra Judge will also return have only been confirmed on the Housewives Wikipedia page.

Done: Kelly will not be returning for the 16th season of Real Housewives of Orange County, according to Variety; seen in 2019

Tweeting about the news on Tuesday, Kelly wrote: 'The last five years have been an amazing experience. The next five years will be even better. I am so grateful for all the love and support and so excited about the future.'

Kelly was dropped from her partnership with Positive Beverages in February due to her 'controversial views and opinions' on COVID-19.

She first partnered with the brand in February 2019 and regularly promoted the sparkling beverage on her social media accounts and in episodes of RHOC.

Statement piece: Kelly was back in the spotlight for sporting a Drunk Wives Matter hat at her surprise bridal shower in Orange County in October

Get the champs! Heather Dubrow is set to make a triumphant return to the show after taking four seasons off following her last stint in 2016 for season 11; seen in 2018

In January, Kelly and her friends toasted to being 'super spreaders' as they dined maskless in Newport Beach despite surging cases of the coronavirus throughout Southern California.

In response to being let go from the company, Kelly noted that she was 'glad I could help put Positive Beverage on the map and wish them well.'

'2020 has taught us that words have power and listening can unite ... we listened to you and have an important action to share,' the brand first shared.

Yikes: In January, Kelly and her friends toasted to being 'super spreaders' as they dined maskless in Newport Beach despite surging cases of the coronavirus throughout Southern California

'Our core values of wellness, community, diversity and inclusion should be reflected by our brand and anyone associated with it,' head of Brand Zach Muchnick comments, 'it has become clear over the past few months that Kelly's controversial views and opinions have distracted from our primary objectives, so effective today, we are no longer affiliated with Kelly Dodd-Leventhal.'

'We welcome all people - however they are and whatever they are passionate about - to Positive Beverage,' says CEO, Shannon Argyros, 'but there must always be an underlying layer of respect. Unfortunately, we feel Kelly's stance is no longer congruent with our core values. We appreciate her contributions during our affiliation, and she will always be a part of Positive Beverage's history, but we do not align with her opinions or global views while we uphold our own values and the values of customers.'

Dodd claimed she was 'getting a lot of hate for being at a restaurant we're allowed to be at' after California partially lifted dining restrictions amid the ongoing pandemic.

'The sheeple are mad,' she said. 'I'm not a super spreader because there's nothing to spread because we all got the vaccine and we don't have it, so there's nothing to spread about super spreaders.'

Dream team: Reports that Tamra Judge will also return have only been confirmed on the Housewives Wikipedia page

Kelly made headlines last April after saying on social media that she believed that the pandemic was 'Gods way of thinning the herd' as she argued with an Instagram user who called her out after taking a cross-country flight.

After a user wrote to Dodd, 'If non-essential workers keep traveling back and forth like you, it will last longer,' the reality star replied, 'Do you know how many people died from the H1N1, the swine flu or SARS? Its 25% get your facts straight you are only hearing numbers not the reality! Its Gods way of thinning the herd!'

She subsequently apologized for the remarks and attempted to clarify her statement.

'When I wrote that its "Gods way of thinning the herd," thats not what I meant,' Dodd said on Instagram Stories. 'What I meant was, "Do these pandemics happen because its Gods way?" Im not God. Im not insensitive.

'I feel bad for all the families that have lost loved ones, and I do think we should all stay at home and protect everybody. Thats not what I meant, and I want to apologize to anyone who got offended, OK? Im sorry.'

She apologized again while appearing on Watch What Happens Live, saying of her past controversy: 'It was insensitive and I apologize if I hurt or offended anybody.'
Kourtney Kardashian and her boyfriend Travis Barker seem to be getting a rush out of posting highly seductive photos on Instagram.

First the drummer was holding her bottom when in Utah, then on Thursday he repeated the move while in a recording studio.

And on Friday the musician - who used to be wed to Playboy model Shanna Moakler - posted new images where the Keeping Up With The Kardashians star was sitting on his lap with her legs open in his vintage convertible as he made a crude remark.

Loved up: Kourtney Kardashian and her boyfriend Travis Barker seem to be getting a rush out of posting highly seductive photos on Instagram. He did it again on Friday

'She likes riding with the top down,' was the suggestive comment made by Barker. Kourtney then replies, 'She sure does,' adding a black heart.

Kourtney had on a black tube top with matching leather slacks and her hair down while sitting on Travis Barker's lap.

They were also seen standing as the rocker cuddled her.

The night before the 42-year-old star put on an ultra affectionate display with the 45-year-old Blink-182 standout in a series of snapshots.

Kourtney could be seen straddling Travis as they shared a passionate kiss inside the rocker's lavish at-home recording studio.

The joy of being in love: The TV star laughed as she looked up while Travis also chuckled

With Travis' arms cradling her bottom, Kourtney modeled a pair of cut-off denim shorts and a white cropped tank top.

Her long raven hair was worn down and flowed down her back in soft waves.

Barker went shirtless for the steamy snaps, which allowed fans to get a look at portions of his extensive tattoo collection.

Kourtney did not write out a caption on her post, instead she communicated her feelings by means of heart and fire emojis.

What is going on here: In this image they are both standing up as he puts his arms around her

Not exactly classy but it works: 'She likes riding with the top down,' was the suggestive comment made by Barker

'My baby!' wrote Barker in the comment section, with Kourtney's little sister Khloe leaving several heart emojis.

Eagle-eyed fans noticed in the second shot of Kardashian's slideshow that Barker's friend and fellow musician Machine Gun Kelly was belting out lyrics in the recording booth.

Travis and Kelly are close pals, with Travis even producing the 31-year-old star's latest album Tickets To My Downfall.

Though she did not provide any hints about what music Travis and MGK have up their sleeves, Kourtney did provide another angle of her and her beau's make out session to her Instagram Story.

Affectionate: She put on an ultra affectionate display with her boyfriend in a series of snapshots uploaded to Instagram on Thursday

In the moment: Kourtney could be seen straddling Travis as they shared a passionate kiss inside the rocker's lavish at-home recording studio

The off center shot showed the loved-up pair pressed up against a white wall as Kourtney's legs remained wrapped around Travis' waist.

The couple have been heating up Instagram since going public with their romance in mid-February.

To confirm their relationship after weeks of speculation, Kardashian uploaded a photo of her manicured hand holding onto Travis' tatted one.

Heating up: The couple have been heating up Instagram since going public with their romance in mid-February; Travis and Kourtney pictured in April

Since then, the pair have not been shy about sharing their passion for one another with their respective social media followings.

Kourtney and Travis have also been working hard to blend and bond their families, being that they each have children from previous partners.

Kardashian shares three children, sons Mason, 11, and Reign, 6, and daughter Penelope, eight, with ex Scott Disick, while Barker shares son Landon, 17, and daughter Alabama, 16, with. ex wife Shanna Moakler.

The couple recently splashed out on a $12M Palm Springs home with both of their names being listed on the deed jointly.

Reunion: On Thursday, the highly-anticipated KUWTK reunion special, hosted by Andy Cohen, the entire Kardashian-Jenner discussed the long-running television show and the moments that made it so iconic

Ready for it! 'KUWTK reunion with Andy tonight on E! Whos gonna watch?' wrote Kourtney via Instagram, along with two snapshots showing off her reunion look

On Wednesday, a source continued to confirm previous talks about a future engagement for the longtime friends turned lovers, telling Us Weekly that it could be 'right around the corner.'

'An engagement could be right around the corner for Kourtney and Travis,' said the insider.

'The engagement would be very over the top since Travis loves impressing her. I wouldn't be surprised if it took place at their favorite place in the world, Disneyland, in front of the kids and family.'

Along with paving a future path with her boyfriend, Kourtney is bidding farewell to her famous family's reality television legacy.

Keeping Up With The Kardashians aired its final episode last Thursday after 20 seasons and 14 years on E!

On Thursday, the highly-anticipated KUWTK reunion special, hosted by Andy Cohen, the entire Kardashian-Jenner discussed the long-running television show and the moments that made it so iconic.

'KUWTK reunion with Andy tonight on E! Whos gonna watch?' wrote Kourtney via Instagram, along with two snapshots showing off her reunion look.

During Part 1, Kourtney's mom Kris Jenner revealed that she has found the 42-year-old to be the 'hardest to manage' of her famous brood.

Yikes! During Part 1, Kourtney's mom Kris Jenner revealed that she has found the 42-year-old to be the 'hardest to manage' of her famous brood

Already know: 'Well, if I'm gonna be honest...,' she began before Kourtney interjected: 'I already know the hardest!' with a cheeky smile

It came after Cohen asked Kris to name the both the easiest and the toughest of her kids when it came to being a manager.

'Well, if I'm gonna be honest...,' she began before Kourtney interjected: 'I already know the hardest!' with a cheeky smile.

'I think Kendall's the easiest. She's also the kid who when she was seven would put herself to bed every night and say "I'm done for the day, Mommy. My room is clean,"' which prompted an approving look from the model.

Andy doubled down as he asked her to share who gave 'the most lip,' as Kris said 'Kourtney,' to which her eldest also concurred that it was certainly true. 'Cause I don't want to do things if it's not something I'm really into doing. My answer is, like, no to most things. And if it's gonna be yes, like, I want to know every detail of what I'm gonna be asked of,' Kourtney said.

A teaser for part two was shared the very next morning. This new clip focuses on Kourtney and her ex-partner Scott Disick with whom she shares three children.

In the explosive interview, Scott and Kourtney both admit that they would still be together if it was not for the party boy's 'substance abuse' issues, insist they have not slept together in the past five years since they split and discuss Kourtney's subsequent romances which include Younes Bendjima and Barker.

More to this story: A teaser for part two was shared Friday. This new clip focuses on Kourtney and her ex-partner Scott Disick with whom she shares three children

Toward the end of the clip, Disick says he has no problem with his ex moving on with other men then jokes he just want to 'kill them.'

The new teaser begins with host Andy Cohen reading a note from a fan.

The viewer asked Scott if he thinks he would have a 'shot' with Kourtney if he 'maintained his sobriety.'

Kourtney looks uncomfortable at having this topic come up as she looks down.

'Yes,' said Disick.

Next Kourtney is asked if she feels the same, 'Yeah probably,' she mutters.

It comes out: In the explosive interview , Scott and Kourtney both admit that they would still be together if it was not for the party boy's 'substance abuse' issues, insist they have not slept together in the past five years since they split and discuss Kourtney's subsequent romances which include Younes Bendjima and Travis Barker

Kylie starts to laugh as she says, 'Sorry this is just so deep!' Cohen snaps back: 'It is deep.' 'I came out here to get it deep,' adds Disick as he was brought into the room after the ladies hashed things out.

Another fan asks if Kourtney and Scott have slept together in the past five years adding no one believes they have traveled together and not gotten affectionate.

Khloe says, 'Oh my God!' as she is shocked by how personal the question is.

'People can't believe that but we have not,' says Kourtney as she smiles.

Hard one: The new teaser begins with host Andy Cohen reading a note from a fan. The viewer asked Scott if he thinks he would have a 'shot' with Kourtney if he 'maintained his sobriety.' Kourtney looks uncomfortable at having this topic come up as she looks down. 'Yes,' said Disick

For real: Next Kourtney is asked if she feels the same, 'Yeah probably,' she mutters

For real you have not? asks Cohen.

'For real we have not,' adds Kourtney as Scott says 'how annoying' which gets laughs.

'I feel like we're great friends and co-parents,' says Kourtney as Scott shoots her a hand gesture that says we're OK.

Cohen asks Kourtney what was a bigger deal breaker: Scott's substance abuse issues or his infidelity.

Hilarious: Toward the end of the clip, Disick says he has no problem with his ex moving on with other men then jokes he just want to 'kill them'

'I mean the infidelity, I only knew about it at the end, so I think the substance abuse was the deal breaker.'

Andy asks if drinking led him into bad behavior

'I don't want to make any excuses for my behavior but I definitely wouldn't have done any of these things if I was sober but it was all wrong and I just thought it was normal to be honest.'

He added back then he did not aspire to a monogamous relationship because he was young but now he wants that.

Hee hee: Kim finds it very funny that Scott joked that he wants to 'kill' Travis

No sex: Another fan asks if Kourtney and Scott have slept together in the past five years adding no one believes they have traveled together and not gotten affectionate. Khloe says, 'Oh my God!' as she is shocked by how personal the question is. 'People can't believe that but we have not,' says Kourtney as she smiles

Kris asks how old he was when he started filming with them, he says 23, and Kris notes that is Kylie's age now.

Scott then says he does not get upset when Kourtney is linked to other guys then mutters he 'just wants to kill them' which makes the room laugh.

Kim asks, 'What did he say?' and Khloe repeats it which Kim finds very funny.

'Well, the last guy...' Scott says as Khloe agrees the 'last one' was no good. Kourtney jumped in that no one liked him.

Her 'last one' was Algerian model Younes Bendjima, 28. 'I was still there to try to help her through,' added Disick as the clip abruptly ends.
She never fails to turn heads in on trend outfits.

And Frankie Sims looked effortlessly stylish in emerald green jeans as she arrived at Bagatelle in West London on Friday.

The TOWIE star, 25 was joined by her sisters Chloe, 38 and Demi, 25, as they hit the town to celebrate their Nanny Linda's 82nd birthday.

Flawless: Frankie Sims looked effortlessly stylish in emerald green jeans as she arrived at Bagatelle in West London on Friday

Frankie looked flawless as she arrived at the French restaurant in the eye-catching trousers and a white floral Bardot cut top.

The bombshell wore her brunette tresses in a sleek straight style and let her long tresses cascade over her shoulders.

The reality star went full glam for the outing and sported a copper-toned eye shadow look and lashings of lipliner.

She toted a chic white mini bag and completed the ensemble with matching white heeled sandals.

Family fun: The TOWIE star, 25 was joined by her sisters Chloe, 38 and Demi, 25, as they hit the town to celebrate their Nanny Linda's 82nd birthday

Frankie was joined at the Mayfair eatery by her similarly stylish sisters Chloe and Demi as they posed with their grandma outside the restaurant.

The birthday girl Linda looked radiant in a nude coloured midi dress and yellow heeled sandals, as she smiled while surrounded by her granddaughters.

Making it clear where Frankie, Chloe and Demi got their sense of style from, she kept off the chill with a paisley jacket and toted a canary yellow mini bag.

Turning heads: Frankie looked flawless as she arrived at the French restaurant in the eye-catching trousers and a white floral Bardot cut top

Meanwhile, Demi channeled 60s vibes in a thigh-skimming green mini dress.

She styled the vintage look dress with a pair of heeled white sliders and toted an enviable mint green Prada shoulder bag.

Demi kept off the chill by draping a while blazer around her shoulders and completed the outfit with a silver bangle and matching watch.

She wore her platinum blonde tresses is loose beachy waves and looked picture perfect in glamorous makeup, including a light brown lipgloss.

Chic: Demi channeled 60s vibes in a thigh-skimming green mini dress, white heeled sliders and toted an enviable mint green Prada shoulder bag

And Chloe channeled a boho chic aesthetic for the family outing as she stepped out in a loose fitting black maxi dress and chunky gold platform heels.

She accessorised with a large black hat with gold charms around the edge and large black love heart earrings.

Chloe swept her caramel tresses up beneath the hat and smized for the camera with sultry winged-eyeliner.

Wow: Chloe channeled a boho chic aesthetic for the family outing as she stepped out in a loose fitting black maxi dress and chunky gold platform heels

The outing comes after Frankie looked completely loved-up as she posed with her new beau Jack for a sweet snap shared to Instagram.

The TOWIE star put on a leggy display in a stylish black blazer and could not hide her happiness as she held onto a large bouquet of roses.

Frankie cut a stylish figure in her fashionable blazer which she paired with a tight skirt and pair of metallic heeled sandals.

The brunette beauty wore her long locks down and styled straight, letting them cascade down her back and over her shoulders throughout the night.

Jack, who won the 2018 season of Love Island, also ensured to be looking his best for the outing, the location of which they did not reveal, in a white polo shirt.

Celebrate: The birthday girl Linda looked radiant in a nude coloured midi dress and yellow heeled sandals as she smiled while surrounded by her granddaughters

He appeared to be having a fabulous time with his new love, sharing several updates from their night out to Instagram and happily accepting kisses from the beauty.

The duo were first pictured kissing outside a bar in London at the end of May and have since made their relationship official, both sharing loved-up snaps.

The TV star was seen wrapping her arms around the former Love Island winner before leaving together in Jack's car later in the evening.

The passionate clinch had potential to reignite Frankie's feud with her love rival Chloe Brockett, 20, who has been rumoured to be dating Jack in recent months.

Stylish sisters: Frankie looked glamorous in a full face of makeup and wore her brunette tresses in a sleek straight style and let her long tresses cascade over her shoulders

However TOWIE's Chloe insisted that she's completely fine with her nemesis Frankie Sims and ex beau Jack Fincham striking up a romance.

The reality star took to Instagram last Monday to reassure fans there are 'no bad feelings' and to wish the new couple 'all the best'.

Chloe and Jack had been rumoured to be dating over recent months, while the brunette beauty had previously fallen out with her co-star Frankie over Harry Lee, 26.

Addressing the furore, Chloe shared a pink screen and wrote: 'Morning guys! I've had so many messages saying horrible things about Frankie and Jack...

Stylish: Demi kept off the chill by draping a while blazer around her shoulders and completed the outfit with a silver bangle and matching watch

'I just wanted to say me and Jack haven't been seeing each other for over a month, and Frankie owes me nothing! I wish them all the best [pink heart emoji]'

She also spoke about the relationship in an Instagram Q&A post, explaining why she used frog and tea emojis last Sunday when revealing Jack had tried to call her twice following his night out with Frankie.

Replying to a fan's question, Chloe penned: 'In all honesty, the story is me and Jack havent been seeing each other in a month I just found it strange how he was out with her and then tried calling me.. that was it. No bad feeling here.'
Pee-Wee's Playhouse star John Paragon's death stemmed from 'cardiovascular disease with other significant conditions of chronic alcohol abuse' according to the coroner report.

The actor was 66-years-old when he passed away at his Palm Springs home back on April 3rd 2021, according to Page Six.

Paragon famously played the role of Jambi the Genie on the beloved 1980s children's sitcom Pee-wee's Playhouse.

RIP: Pee-Wee's Playhouse star John Paragon's death was caused by heart disease spurred on by 'chronic alcohol abuse.' He's seen in 2014 above

Alaskan native Paragon's death was announced on Thursday by the Riverside County Coroner, but the did not reveal the cause until the following day.

Jambi the Genie, which required John to rock blue face paint and an elaborate turban, would appear on screen when the series' star Pee-Wee (played by Paul Reubens) would make a wish.

He also provided the voice for Pterri the Pterodactyl, who happened to be one of Pee-Wee's closest onscreen pals.

Pee-wee's Playhouse ran for a total of five seasons, from 1986 until 1990, on CBS, with Paragon writing and directing several of the episodes.

Where and when: The actor was 66-years-old when he passed away at his Palm Springs home back on April 3rd 2021

Iconic: Paragon famously played the role of Jambi the Genie on the beloved 1980s children's television series Pee-wee's Playhouse; Paul Reubens and John Paragon pictured in 1986

He first portrayed Jambi in Reubens' self-developed stage show The Pee-wee Herman Show, which aired as a special on HBO in 1981.

The show originally began as a midnight show at the iconic Groundlings theater in Los Angeles, where he and Reubens got their start.

In 1988, two years into Pee-Wee's Playhouse, Paragon and Reubens co-wrote a nearly 50-minute Christmas special for the series.

The Pee-wees Playhouse Christmas Special aired on December 21, 1988 and would go onto earn John an Emmy nomination for for Best Writing in a Childrens Special, according to TheWrap.

In character: Jambi the Genie, which required John to rock blue face paint and an elaborate turban, would appear on screen when the series' star Pee-Wee (played by Paul Reubens) would make a wish; John Paragon pictured in 1986

He also appear in the movies The Frog Prince (1986), Weird Al Yankovics UHF (1989) and the cannibal classic Eating Raoul (1982), as well as enjoying cameos on the show Seinfeld.

20-years after the conclusion of Pee-Wee's Playhouse on CBS, Reubens was able to wrangle most of the gang back together, including Paragon, to reprise their roles in the Broadway adaptation of Pee-wee Herman stage show in 2010.

Aside from his work in the Pee-Wee Herman universe, John has lent his acting chops to hit sitcoms like Cheers and Seinfeld.

He also had a recurring role in the 2010 revival of Elvira's Movie Macabre playing The Breather alongside Elvira, herself, Cassandra Peterson.
They're expecting their second child any day now.

And Matthew Morrison and his pregnant wife, Renee Puente, were busy taking care of business while out separatley in Los Angeles on Friday afternoon.

The 42-year-old Glee star was seen checking his phone as he pushed a stroller along the city's bustling streets.

Meanwhile his 36-year-old spouse was spotted exiting a salon after having a bit of pampering time.

Stepping out: Matthew Morrison was spotted running a few errands in Los Angeles on Friday prior to the birth of his second child with his wife Renee Puente

Taking it easy: Puente was later spotted exiting a salon after receiving a bit of pampering time

The expecting couple currently shares one son and previously announced that they would be adding another child to their family earlier this year.

Morrison was dressed in a white graphic-printed t-shirt while stepping out.

The Broadway performer kept it casual in the midst of a heatwave with a pair of shorts and a set of Birkenstock-style sandals, and he also wore a black trucker cap and sunglasses.

The What to Expect When You're Expecting actor wore a patterned facial covering to keep himself protected from COVID-19 as he spent time in public.

Puente was dressed in an orange strapless top that showed off much of her growing baby bump.

Comfy clothing: Morrison's wife was dressed in a strapless orange top and a pair of vibrantly patterned pants while spending time at the salon

She contrasted her top with a pair of vibrantly patterned pants and a set of open-toed sandals while making her way out of the salon.

The actress kept a black purse slung over her shoulder and tied her brunette hair up into a bun during her solo outing.

Morrison and Puente were first romantically connected in 2011, and the Tulip Fever actor popped the big question two years later.

The performer was previously engaged to actress Chrishell Stause in 2006, although the two broke off the engagement the following year.

Staying together: The Glee actor and his wife initially met in 2011 and went on become engaged in 2013 before they tied the knot a year later

The actor and his now-wife tied the knot in 2014 and went on to welcome their first son, whom they named Revel James Makai, aged three, in 2017.

Morrison went on to announce that he would be expecting a second child earlier this year through a post shared to his Instagram account where he shared a picture of his child's ultrasound.

The Broadway mainstay also wrote a lengthy message in his post's caption where he reflected on his family's experience quarantining together and expressed his excitement for adding another kid into the mix.

The performer began his message by writing: 'The thing that resonates most when I look back on this past year is the amplification of love that our little tribe has been gifted.'

Another one: Earlier this year, Morrison took to his Instagram account to announce that he and Puente were expecting to welcome a second child into their lives

Morrison then informed his followers that, although his wife experienced complications with fertility, they were happy to finally welcome another child.

'After 3 miscarriages, a pandemic, and the loss of many loved ones.... Renee, Revel, and I are elated to be bringing a little joy into the world,' he wrote.

The actor then expressed that he had learned about several new values that he and his spouse hoped to implement into their approach to raising their forthcoming kid.

Looking up: Although the Broadway mainstay admitted that his wife experienced complications with fertility, he noted that they were 'elated to be bringing a little joy into the world'

'Patience, reflection, and introspection are a few of the many tools that we have learned this year. And we are excited to bring those tools into our parenting,' he expressed.

Morrison wrote that he was aware that his followers wanted to see his new kid and remarked that his wife and son were just as excited as he was.

He noted: 'Cant wait to meet our little baby boy/girl? Who knows! We are waiting for the big day to greet the being that will change our family yet again!'
Rapper Slowthai has reflected on dealing with being 'cancelled' and his 'amplified' depression after sparking a furore at the NME Awards.

The rapper's second album TYRON was released a year after his infamous behaviour at the music event in February 2020 which saw him accused of sexually harassing comedian Katherine Ryan - who tweeted at the time she 'knew he was joking'.

Speaking about the controversy in an interview with NME, Slowthai, 26, said: 'My whole life I've championed people to be equal  you can do 100 good things and one little joke and you're turned into an evil person'.

Reflection: Rapper Slowthai has candidly discussed dealing with being 'cancelled' and his 'amplified' depression after sparking a furore at the NME Awards

After the Awards, Slowthai also admitted that his depression was 'amplified' however he also had other things going on at the time that were more 'pressing' than what people were saying online.

He told the publication: 'The Awards just amplified those feelings [of depression].

'When there's people blurting at you on the internet and waiting for your downfall, it gets a bit in your head, but at the time, I had other things in my life that felt more pressing than people on the internet believing I'm this monster of a man.'

Slowthai - who has Bajan and Irish heritage and lives in Northampton- also said that being 'cancelled' brought up painful childhood memories.

Furore: The rapper, 26, hit headlines in 2020 after an awkward exchange with comic Katherine Ryan at the NME Awards in which he leaned on her breasts and made lewd comments

He explained: 'Before when I was young and stereotyped as the bad kid, people  and my friends' parents  would treat me in a certain way because they thought I was from a certain place and acted in a certain way.

'My whole life I've had that animosity towards me.'

Candidly chatting further about his mental health, Slowthai said the best thing about chart-topping album TYRON's success was knowing it had helped others.

The rapper penned the album while battling his own depression and revealed that he was even having 'thoughts of suicide'.

He said: 'The best thing about it was not me coming out of a dark time; it was that it connected with people who had either felt the same or had been in a similar place.'

Looking ahead: Slowthai also discussed his mental health and plans for a festival, Happyland, in September joking that Harry and Meghan would come despite him calling the Queen a 'c**t'

Elsewhere in his interview with the publication, Slowthai, who is known for his colourful lyrics, also joked that he thinks Prince Harry and Meghan Markle would come to his festival despite him calling the Queen a 'c**t'.

Talking about the guest-list for Happyland, which is set for 25 September, Slowthai said: '[Harry] might be like, "You called my nan a c**t!" But I always thought he seemed like he would have a laugh. Me and him will be 'avin it!'

Already a controversial figure for his political statements, Slowthai sparked even more furore at the NME Awards in 2020.

Honest: He also told NME (magazine cover pictured) that being 'cancelled' brought up painful childhood memories

The rapper, who was awarded the Hero of the Year prize at the ceremony, had asked host Katherine Ryan to smell his cologne, referred to her as 'baby girl' and also put his arm around her waist in front of the audience.

He then leaned into her and said 'You ain't never had someone play with you liked I'd play with you', leading Ryan to fire back sarcastically: 'You are like the hottest guy I've seen.'

As the shocked audience watched on, the rapper replied 'Stop playing with me', leading Ryan to call him 'needle d***' to the delight of the crowd, who cheered her put-down.

Slowthai then went on to tell her she could earn him, but Ryan fired back: 'Or I could just earn loads of money and buy my own house without a man.'

Slowthai apologised and requested at the time his award be redirected to Katherine who later told told NME he hadn't made her uncomfortable and: 'I wish it had just stayed as a great rock'n'roll moment in the room.'

Apology: Slowthai apologised to Katherine after the show, calling his actions 'shameful'

All good: The Canadian comic said she knew Slowthai was joking and wasn't uncomfortable in tweets sent after the Awards show

Slowthai also made headlines after he posed with an effigy of Boris Johnson's severed head at the Mercury Prize ceremony in 2019.

The rapper has been an outspoken critic of the Conservative Party and often vilifies Brexit in his songs, once referring to former Prime Minister Theresa May as a 'd***head' in an interview with NME.

He has regularly referred to himself as a 'Brexit bandit' and is known to start chants of 'f*** Theresa May' at live shows.

The artist, whose debut was nominated for the prestigious album award, later said his act was merely metaphorical, and said he does not advocate violence.
She's one of the world's most beautiful women.

And Alessandra Ambrosio made that much clear while she headed to lunch at the celeb-beloved spot The Ivy in Beverly Hills on Friday.

There, the 40-year-old Brazilian bombshell strutted her stuff in high-waisted cut-off Daisy Dukes that showcased her endless legs.

Orange crush! Alessandra Ambrosio flaunted her mile-long legs as she headed to lunch in Beverly Hills on Friday

The stunning supermodel turned heads in an eye-catching neon orange long blazer while dropping her car off at the valet.

The Victoria's Secret Angel bared her taut tummy with a burnt orange crop top that she donned underneath her blazer.

Alessandra turned the streets of LA into her own personal catwalk as she stepped out of her car, sporting a pair of low-heeled woven straw sandals.

Ambrosio accessorized with a delicate gold watch, gold bracelets, a thick ring and several beaded necklaces including a long gold chain that hung beneath her crop top.

Stylish: The stunning supermodel turned heads in an eye-catching neon orange long blazer while dropping her car off at the valet

The brunette beauty's locks tumbled around her shoulders as she stepped onto the sidewalk.

The Vogue cover star was rocking a pair of flashy metallic orange and yellow sunglasses and carrying a white Hermes Birkin Epsom handbag with silver hardware.

Alessandra walked across the restaurant's famed outdoor patio and hugged a friend who was waiting for her.

Eye-catching: The Vogue cover star was rocking a pair of flashy metallic orange and yellow sunglasses and carrying a white Hermes Birkin Epsom handbag with silver hardware

Friendly greeting: Alessandra walked across the restaurant's famed outdoor patio and hugged a friend who was waiting for her

Legs for days: The model showed off her incredible tan legs in daisy duke shorts

Ambrosio shared several bikini photos to her Gal Floripa Instagram page this week where she was modeling a new bikini from her Underwater Dream Collection for summer.

The siren had on a white and pink number with frills here and there making it extra feminine as she held on to a cocktail with the shell of a mango as her cup.

The star said in her caption that she was in 'paradise' as she lay on a hammock by a pristine white sand beach.

Sandy day: Alessandra shared several bikini photos to her Gal Floripa Instagram page this week where she was modeling a new bikini for summer as she held on to a cocktail with the shell of a mango as her cup

It's been a busy year for Alessandra.

She has been in the throes of a PDA-packed relationship with her new beau Richard Lee ever since debuting their romance several months ago. She continued to spread the love as she locked lips with her hunky boyfriend in honor of his birthday on Tuesday.

The runway star posted a slideshow gushing about her birthday beau, including a snap of herself giving Richard a kiss on the lips.

The couple clinked glasses as they locked lips whilst enjoying a scrumptious meal at Kassi Beach House in Las Vegas.

Stellar: The siren from Brazil had on a white and pink number with frills here and there making it extra feminine

One of the flirty snaps captured the gorgeous twosome looking as smitten as can be as they shared a drink.

The birthday boy couldn't help but dote on his girlfriend as he affectionately puckered up to her in one of the snaps.

Alessandra and her boyfriend looked incredible for their night out celebrating Richard's big day.

The runway queen dazzled in a shimmering plunging red dress with head full of glossy brunette locks.

Bright idea: The star, 40, said in her caption that she was in 'paradise' as she lay on a hammock by a pristine white sand beach

Richard looked smart and sharp in a midnight blue T-shirt, grey slacks, and white sneakers.

Birthday kisses! Ambrosio continued to spread the love as she locked lips with her model boyfriend Richard Lee in honor of his birthday on Tuesday

Gushing about her other half, Alessandra posted in the caption, 'Happy birthday to my favorite person in the world @_bigasia. I Love you with all my heart meu coracao !!!'

Alessandra started off the day showering her boyfriend with attention.

The beauty treated her beau to breakfast in bed, serving the shirtless hunk a tray of candle-lit cake and other goodies.

The shirtless model blew out the candles to his decadent cake after Alessandra instructed him to make a wish.

It has been just a few months since Alessandra and Richard went public with their relationship, and the couple have been practically attached at the hip ever since then.

From volleyball sessions to their current trip to Las Vegas, the couple are clearly having the time of their lives with each other.

Alessandra shares two children - Anja, 12, and Noah, nine - with her ex-fiance Jamie Mazur who co-founded RE/DONE.

After splitting with Jamie, Alessandra got romantically involved with Italian fashion designer Nicolo Oddi who founded the brand Alanui with his sister Carlotta.

The pair split sometime in December, just months before the model sparked romance rumors with Richard with various dinner dates in February.
Dr. Dennis Cagle is the founder of Xaltm LLC who has been a pastor for 36 years and currently works as a church consultant. He is a former resident of McMinn County and current resident of Tellico Plains. He can be contacted at xaltm@yahoo.com
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP)  As both summer and the scheduling of a recall election date loom, Gov. Gavin Newsom wants to make sure Californians know about the cash payments and prize money he is doling out.

Newsom is delivering money to your pocket," a narrator says over a video of a smiling family gathered on a couch in a campaign ad Newsom released Thursday, his first of the recall. It references $1,100 in one-time cash payments he proposed in his state budget.

The spot is one of three now airing statewide on television, though the other two are negative, painting a dark picture of Republicans behind the effort. Their release follows two weeks of Newsom traveling the state as game show host, appearing at theme parks to award millions of dollars in prize money for vaccinations and to celebrate the end of most pandemic-related restrictions.

The celebratory atmosphere mirrors Newsom's growing confidence in his ability to fight off a recall. But some Republicans charge he's wrongly using taxpayer money to buoy his standing and ignoring the state's problems in favor of flashy events.

It certainly looks like over the last couple days that Gov. Newsom has decided to join the recall circus mentality," former San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer, a Republican running in the recall, said in a Twitter video. What this recall is really about is rolling up your sleeves and fixing our great state."

But the events showcased the advantage Newsom has over his rivals in his ability to generate headlines and get free media.

I think it is smart to break out beyond conventional political news," said Rob Stutzman, who served as spokesman for former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who had a taste for headline-grabbing appearances.

It's not going to play well with everyone but, at large, my guess would be this is probably smart of them," he added.

Amateur Republican political organizers launched the recall drive last year, and missteps by Newsom helped it gather enough signatures to make the ballot. It needs final certification before a date can be set, but that could come within weeks, potentially allowing for a September election.

Many of Newsom's allies believe an earlier election is better before a natural disaster strikes or greatly diminished virus cases unexpectedly surge.

The start of television ads by Newsom and some of his Republican competitors signal a new phase into the campaign, which will turn into a sprint once an election date is on the calendar.

Newsom's positive ad focuses on big spending initiatives in his proposed state budget, which he must sign by the end of the month. That includes up to $1,100 in cash payments to low-income and middle-class people, $4 billion in relief for small businesses and free preschool for all children.

His other ads, one in English and one in Spanish, attempt to tie the recall to extremist Republicans by showing images of people storming the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6. The English ad calls the recall an assault on democracy" while the Spanish one references comments by the recall's lead proponent about microchipping immigrants. That organizer, Orrin Heatlie, later said the comment, made on Facebook, was hyperbole and is not something he supports.

Sonja Diaz, founding director of the Latino Policy & Politics Initiative at the University of California, Los Angeles, said Newsom's positive ad presents messaging that will resonate with families and young people who have been hard hit by the pandemic by highlighting the cash payments, help for businesses and an expansion of preschool.

This is something that I think is really targeted to talk to the policy choices that are going to help younger Californians," she said.

Meanwhile, Faulconer dropped his first campaign ad on Monday, also in Spanish. It paints Newsom in a negative light, highlighting the closure of most schools during the pandemic, the state's struggles to contain homelessness, and the expansion of good behavior credits that could lead to earlier release for tens of thousands of people in prison.

As a heatwave hit the state, John Cox, another Republican candidate, said Newsom wasn't focused on the right issues. The state's independent system operator urged conservation on Thursday but said blackouts were unlikely.

While Gavin Newsom visits theme parks and appears on talk shows doling out tax dollars, California faces a looming energy crisis," Cox tweeted.

To be sure, Newsom's week wasn't a typical one for a politician. He drew 10 winners of $1.5 million prizes, danced with cartoon movie characters and hopped on a rollercoaster  with TV cameras rolling.

I think hes having a ball, I think hes a little bit more relaxed about the recall," said Sherry Bebitch Jeffe, a professor of public policy communication at the University of Southern California.

But, she said, the image of governor-as-game-show-host might appear too gimmicky for some people's liking. Still, the majority of people are likely to care more about what his actions mean for them than how he presents them.

It sounded an awful lot like a bribe to me, but I'm not the average voter," she said, referring to Newsom's television ad. She added, When was the last time you saw anybody, particularly anybody who's hurting, turn down free money?"
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP)  A team of 50 police officers who serve on a specialized crowd-control unit in Oregon and respond to Portland's ongoing, often violent protests have resigned en masse after a team member was indicted on criminal charges.

During a Wednesday night meeting, officers, detectives and sergeants on the Rapid Response Team voted to resign from the team because of a perceived lack of support from City Hall and from the district attorney over the past year, according to the mayors office and officers.

The move by officers to disband their own team came a day after Officer Cody Budworth was indicted and accused of fourth-degree assault stemming from a baton strike against a protester last summer.

I dont think it is just an indictment that caused this to happen, I think it is a very long complicated history of things that have gone on over the last 14 months, Acting Portland Police Chief Chris Davis said.

Davis told reporters Thursday that while the officers on the unit have left their voluntary positions and no longer comprise a team," they will continue with their regular assignments.

The Rapid Response Team is an all-hazard incident" unit that responds to natural or man-made disasters, large-scale searches and, most recently, public order policing or riots. Members of the team are trained in advanced skills related to crowd management, crowd psychology and behavior, team formations and movements, the use of enhanced personal protective equipment, use of force, and de-escalation and arrests.

Last summer, when Portland became the epicenter of Black Lives Matter protests following the murder of George Floyd, the team was on the front lines.

Many demonstrations devolved into clashes with officers late at night, and at times ended with vandalism, property damage and fires. The crowd-control team was the unit often directed to disperse groups after police declared unlawful assemblies or riots.

Our entire organization has been put through something none of us have ever seen through our careers  and at a level and intensity that I dont think any other city in the United States has experienced, Davis said.

In late October, the president of the police union, the Portland Police Association, sent the mayor and police chief a letter, urging both to stand up and publicly support Police Bureau members who voluntarily serve on the Rapid Response Team.

Our RRT members do not volunteer to have Molotov cocktails, fireworks, explosives, rocks, bottles, urine, feces and other dangerous objects thrown at them, wrote Daryl Turner, then-president of the union. He noted that the team members volunteer for the work without any specialty pay.

On Thursday, Davis acknowledged that members of the team have been exposed and subjected to unbelievable things" in the past 14 months, including ongoing protests, increased violence and the pandemic.

I understand that those are very complex issues, but I also understand their perspective, Davis said about the team's decision. If you put a human being through what they went through, that takes a toll.

While protests have significantly decreased in the city, there are still small protests by self-described anarchists in contained areas of Portland.

Davis said in the event theres a declared riot in the coming days, there will still be a police response from other officers within the bureau with as close to adequate resources as we can get."

Portland Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty, who has led efforts to defund the police and proposed disbanding the team last fall, said that the resignations are yet another example of a rogue paramilitary organization that is unaccountable to the elected officials and residents of Portland.

Earlier this week, for the first time in Portlands history, an officer from PPBs Rapid Response Team was charged with a misdemeanor for assaulting a photojournalist during a protest last summer, Hardesty said. Ironically, we now see some PPB officers engaging in the act they showed so much disdain for last summer by staging their own protest.

From May 29 through Nov. 15 last year, during the height of the social justice protests in Portland, the city's police used force more than 6,000 times, according to a U.S. Department of Justice report.

Budworth marked the first Rapid Response Team officer to face criminal prosecution stemming from force used during a protest. The police union has called the prosecution politically driven, and said Budworths baton push to a womans head was accidental.

Also this week, authorities said a Portland Police Bureau detective is under review by the Oregon Department of Justice for possible criminal charges related to use of force at last years racial justice protests.

I have confidence that the (Portland Police) Bureau will continue their mission to maintain public safety," Multnomah County District Attorney Mike Schmidt said Thursday. In the meantime, my office will continue to focus on the fair and just prosecution of criminal matters."
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It was learnt that the police have taken into custody a paternal uncle of the baby for questioning. The police said the man did not have any children of his own.  Representational image/By arrangement

HYDERABAD: The body of a two-month-old baby boy was found in a water tank on the terrace of his grandparents residence, hours after he went missing early on of Friday. The heartrending incident took place in Anjapur village on the outskirts of Hyderabad.

The boy Uma Maheshwar, was the only child of Latha and Tirumalesh, an autorickshaw driver, and was born to the couple after 12 years of their wedding.

According to the police, Latha noticed her baby missing from the bed around 4 am when she woke up. She immediately alerted her husband and others in the family and began searching in the house and then sought help from the neighbours and other villagers who joined the search.

After a three-hour search, they called in the Abullapurmet police for help. The police discovered the body in the water tank on the roof of the babys grandparents house. He was rushed to a hospital where he was declared dead.

The police said Latha came to her mothers house in Anjapur, 15 days ago. On Thursday night, as was usual, the baby was in bed with his mother and grandmother. The last time Latha saw her child was around 1 am, when she woke up and then went back to sleep, the police said.

When Latha work up at around 4 am, she saw her son missing and informed the others in the house. The family in turn alerted the villagers, who scoured the area in search of the baby, said Abdullapurmet inspector V. Swamy.

The police suspect jealousy within the family might have been the reason behind what they believe is the murder of the baby. The police, awaiting post mortem report, said they were not sure if the baby was killed and his body dumped in the water tank, of if the baby was alive when dropped into the tank.

It was learnt that the police have taken into custody a paternal uncle of the baby for questioning. The police said the man did not have any children of his own. Based on the complaint by Latha, the Abdullapurmet police booked a murder case under Section 302 IPC and further investigation is underway. Meanwhile, the police shifted the babys body to the Gandhi Hospital for an autopsy.
People play badminton along a street next to closed shops during a lockdown imposed to curb the spread of the Covid-19 coronavirus in Secunderabad on June 16, 2021. (Noah SEELAM / AFP)

Hyderabad: The process of unlocking after the second wave must be slow to control the Covid-19 situation, and lift of restrictions must not allow the formation of new variants of Sars-CoV-2, the Coronavirus strain which causes Covid-19. Experts state that if there is crowding and even small gatherings in poorly ventilated spaces, coupled with ignoring the face mask, there are chances of spread of the Coronavirus and Covid-19 super-spreader events.

To prevent this from happening, the local administration must be empowered to take action. The measures that are to be taken were supported by lessons provided by the Birhanmumbai Municipal Corporation, Nandurbar district in Maharashtra and Kerala, where surveillance was used to control the second wave.

Effective surveillance helped in controlling panic by building faith among the people that the administration would provide them access to healthcare facilities and timely treatment. These models used technology to guide people on the availability of beds and oxygen concentrators and provided the right picture with regard to Covid-19 data which helped in handling the situation.

These three models show that the local administration was able to build confidence in the people and reduce panic, explained Dr Rajan Shukla, associate professor of Indian Institute of Public Health.

State and local administrations have to learn to pre-empt or nip panic in the bud. Hiding information does not help. Instead, it leads to mistrust and increases desperation in the community. Public health systems are based on transparency and effective communication," Dr Shukla said.

Districts which continue to report a large number of cases must be mentioned clearly, and there must be measures taken to control Covid-19 spread to other districts. Effective management of the local administration along with state and Central governments is important in controlling the spread of Covid-19.

Strict implementation of Covid-19 appropriate behaviour (CAB) by engaging police, food and civil supplies and agriculture departments along with the women and child welfare department and gram panchayats is the way forward.

In a recent all-India survey by medical colleges it was found that 50 per cent of the people were wearing masks, of which 15 per cent were not wearing them properly. This means that only 35 per cent were wearing masks properly. The other half of the population was simply not wearing masks.

Experts said this would allow for opportunistic movement for the Coronavirus whose transmission process becomes easy. To prevent this, awareness campaigns must be conducted by ASHA, anganwadi and local administration workers on wearing masks and wearing them properly.

There is a major concern for rural areas in the recent reviews taken up by public health specialists, infection control specialists and senior doctors across the country wherein they insist that severe acute respiratory infections (Sars) must be continuously surveyed and reported.

This will help in early identification of cases and assist in tracking, tracing and treating of small pockets of infection early, as they arise. Public health centres and primary health centres in rural areas must notify these cases to nodal centres immediately.

Experts state that in the rural areas people are not aware of home-testing kits and ASHA and anganwadi workers must be equipped with these kits.

Providing isolation for Covid-19 patients in the second wave was found to be a challenge in rural areas, especially where the infection was seen as a taboo. A senior government official in the health department explained, It affected their psychology and acceptance was a challenge. It has to be dealt with in a better way as treating a patient in that manner leads to trauma."

The hope is that vaccination will reduce the burden of severe disease and that will ease the pressure on the healthcare systems and social lifestyles. To achieve this maximum people have to be vaccinated and till that is done CAB must be followed religiously, they said.

What experts say

How to handle the unlock process

Reach out to recovered patients to understand gaps in healthcare system

The hurdles that volunteers and family members faced must be revisited for better understanding to create effective systems.

Weekly tests per million population and test positivity rate are important parts of the surveillance scheme

Unlocking from the second wave must be measured with the behaviour of people and it must be slow.

Preparing for the next wave till vaccinations are completed must be the goal as till maximum people are vaccinated safety will be a challenge.

Inputs by Heart Care Foundation of India Dr K.K. Aggarwal Research Fund
As part of nation-wide protest against increased attacks on doctors fraternity being organised under the aegis of Indian Medical Association, the Gandhi Hospital doctors staged a protest on Friday. (Photo:DC)

HYDERABAD: Senior doctors of Indian Medical Association (IMA) and other members protested against the violence against doctors during Covid-19 pandemic here on Friday.

The manner in which doctors in emergency rooms and those treating Covid-19 patients were attacked was acrimonious, they said, adding that the doctors were blamed for no fault of theirs. The protesting doctors wore black badges, black shirts and black masks to protest the violence against them.

They protested for a few minutes in hospitals, outpatient departments and the IMA building in Koti and also gave their representation to the director-general of police M Mahender Reddy.

Dr Lav Kumar Reddy, president, IMA, TS chapter, said, "Attack on doctors must be a non-bailable offence. Covid-19 is a new disease which is evolving and blaming doctors does not help. Doctors died in both the first and second waves and some of them succumbed while treating patients."

In a meeting with various dignitaries from the non-medical sector, it was noted that there were attacks also by educated people on doctors. There were also planned attacks as was noted in a recent case in Hyderabad where a doctor was blamed for the critical status of the patient.

It was pointed out that this kind of behaviour was unbecoming and there must be strict rules which would deter people from taking these steps.

Members of both the medical and non-medical fraternity urged the government to take strict action to protect doctors and to ensure that emergency wards of all hospitals must have a security mechanism in place for their protection.
Hyderabad: The state government is most likely to lift the lockdown entirely from June 20, except in a few places in Khammam and Nalgonda districts where Covid-19 cases are yet to come under control. The government is also considering a proposal to continue with a shortened night curfew from 9 pm to 7 am for few more days.

The ongoing lockdown from 6 pm to 6 am will end on June 19. Official sources said Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao was in favour of lifting the lockdown as the Covid-19 situation had come under control.

The health department is learnt to have submitted a report to the CM stating that the restrictions since mid-April have helped contain the spread of the Coronavirus. The daily Covid-19 case numbers have fallen fell below the 1,500-mark and nine districts have reported zero positivity rate.

The health department opined that the situation does not warrant extension of the lockdown. It also cautioned that that strict measures should be taken to ensure that people follow Covid-19 norms like mandatory wearing of masks, social distancing and preventing mass gatherings.

Against this backdrop, the CM is likely to take a decision on lifting of lockdown from June 20.

The CM has also decided to undertake surprise visits of the districts from June 20 to inspect the progress of Palle Pragathi and Pattana Pragathi programmes besides inaugurating new collectorate complexes and launching several development programmes. The CM also wants to revive economic activity in the state which was impacted due to the restrictions since April. Kharif agriculture activity has also picked up across the state due to incessant rains in districts.

Official sources said CM is considering all these factors before taking a final call on the lockdown.
Locals said Malla Reddy has been facing financial hardships for the last few months. (Representational Image:PTI)

Hyderabad: Tension prevailed at Vemulaghat village in Medak district on Friday after Malla Reddy, a 70-year-old farmer displaced by the Mallannasagar project ended his life by jumping into a burning pyre. He formed the pyre from pieces of old wood taken from his demolished house.

The Opposition parties and locals alleged that the state government failed to pay him compensation after demolishing his house for the project. The government claims he had been allotted a 2BHK house in the Rehabilitation and Resettlement (R&R) Colony as per his wishes. Revenue officials allegedly played mischief.

The entire village had been evacuated by the government as it will be submerged by the Mallannasagar, which is part of the Kaleshwaram lift irrigation project. The R&R Colony is being developed by the state government for the project oustees.

A large police force was deployed at Vemulaghat to avoid any incident after Congress and BJP leaders tried to enter the village and meet the victim's family. BJP Dubbak MLA M. Raghunandan Rao and Congress leader Cheruku Srinivas Reddy were taken into custody.

The oustees of the Mallannasagar project had been given two options cash of Rs 5.4 lakh per family and a plot of 250 square yards at the R&R Colony or Rs 7.5 lakh along with a constructed 2BHK in the same colony. Officials say Malla Reddy had chosen the second option.

Locals said Malla Reddy has been facing financial hardships for the last few months. He lost his wife to cancer nine months ago. On learning this, the revenue department officials allegedly told Malla Reddy that he would not receive the house if he were to stay alone there. Two of his three married daughters have also died along with their husbands recently.

Upset and agitated over this, Malla Reddy collected some wooden logs from his demolished house on Thursday. Those who saw him doing this thought he was collecting the scraps to sell them but he lit the pyre and jumped into it.
The Chief Minister held a meeting with a few ministers at Pragathi Bhavan on Friday ahead of the Cabinet meeting. (Photo: twitter @TelanganaCMO)

HYDERABAD: Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao has convened an emergency meeting of state Cabinet on Saturday to discuss and take a decision on whether to lift lockdown entirely from June 20 or continue only night lockdown for a few more days.

The ongoing lockdown from 6 pm to 6 am will end on Saturday and the state government has to take a decision on the future course of action. Against this backdrop, the Cabinet will meet at 2 pm at Pragathi Bhavan. The meeting is also expected to discuss matters such as rainfall, kharif crop season, lifting of Godavari water through Kaleshwaram project, hydel power generation and other issues.

The Chief Minister held a meeting with a few ministers at Pragathi Bhavan on Friday ahead of the Cabinet meeting. Ministers T Harish Rao, V Srinivas Goud, Mohd Mahmood Ali and Koppula Eashwar were present.

The meeting triggered speculations that the Chief Minister discussed effecting a major reshuffle of IAS and IPS officers soon in the state, which has been pending for long. The last major reshuffle of IAS officers was undertaken in February 2020, when 50 IAS officers at all levels including district collectors were transferred.

Similarly, the major reshuffle of IAS officers was undertaken three years ago in August 2018. Most of the key departments have no full time IAS officers and are handled by in-charge officials. The government is planning to streamline administration by removing in-charges and appointing full-time officials for key departments.

Several IPS officers though promoted in 2019 were still working in old positions and the government wants to give them suitable postings. A few districts have no full-time SPs. Those working for over four years in the same places are likely to be transferred.
The joint collector explained that in fact payments to farmers must be made within 21 days after they sell their crop at paddy purchasing centres. But to curb irregularities and mediators enrolling as farmers, government is taking up pre-audit and final audit to identify the real farmers.  Representational image/DC Image

KAKINADA: Farmers of the two Godavari districts are agitated over state government not yet paying their dues totalling to around Rs 500 crore after procuring paddy in the last Rabi season.

The government had set up purchasing centres and procured paddy from farmers at the minimum support price (MSP) after the Rabi crop was harvested. But farmers are complaining that though more than two months have passed, the government has not yet credited amounts into their bank accounts. Because of this, they are facing financial hardships for cultivating their Kharif crops.

We need to pay money for purchasing paddy seeds and fertilisers, apart from paying wages to agriculture labourers. But our Rabi crop money is still held up with the government. How can we these purchase anything when we do not have money, asked Y. Srinivasa Rao, a farmer of P. Gannavaram mandal. He demanded that the government clear their arrears immediately.

Rajamahendravaram Rural MLA Gorantla Buchaiah Chowdary, Anaparti former MLA N. Ramakrishna Reddy, and TD leaders of P. Gannavaram mandal, including Dokka Nathbabu, staged a dharna in front of tahsildars office expressing concern over non-payment of arrears to farmers.

However, joint collector G. Lakshmisha said already more than Rs. 450 crore have been credited into bank accounts of farmers. Remaining arrears will be cleared within one week, he assured. He explained that in fact payments to farmers must be made within 21 days after they sell their crop at paddy purchasing centres. But to curb irregularities and mediators enrolling as farmers, government is taking up pre-audit and final audit to identify the real farmers. He said that the governments aim is to benefit the real farmers and not mediators or others.

The joint collector said farmers need not worry about their pending amounts, as they would be credited directly into their accounts soon.
The CM's districts' tour plans have kept the state administration on its toes, with public representatives of local bodies and officials rushing to complete long-pending works. (Photo: Twitter @TelanganaCMO)

Hyderabad: Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao will be on a spree visiting districts from June 20 to get a feel of the peoples pulse and take stock of the implementation of his government's schemes at the grassroots level besides launching a slew of development programmes.

The CM's hectic schedule is being loaded with surprise visits and scheduled tours to various villages and towns with an aim to bring the state administration closer to the people at a time the TRS is facing some odds.

The CM's districts' tour plans have kept the state administration on its toes, with public representatives of local bodies and officials rushing to complete long-pending works. The CM had recently warned them of action against those found slack in discharging their duties and said they could even face suspension or on-the-spot dismissal from service.

Notably, this will be the CM's first-ever full-fledged tour of districts since he took office seven years ago, and would inspect the implementation of the welfare schemes and development programmes at the grassroot level and interact with people directly.

On Friday, the CM spoke over the phone to Pogula Anjaiah, sarpanch of Vasalamarri village in Turkapalli mandal of Bhongir district and told him that he will be at the village on June 22. The CM said he will have lunch with the villagers and spend a full day with the villagers to discuss and devise village development plans. The CM has asked him to identify two suitable land parcels to have community lunch and for meeting with villagers.

KCR had announced he would adopt this village and develop it in November 2020 but could not visit the area so far.

The CM's district tours will begin with Siddipet on June 20, where he will inaugurate the new integrated collectorate complex. Later he will take up surprise inspections in a few villages and towns in Siddipet and Kamareddy districts. On June 21, the CM will visit Warangal and lay the foundation for a 24-storied government multi-specialty hospital.

Though the CM had promised a tour of all the districts at his very start of the first term, this never materialised. Except for visiting districts to launch a few welfare schemes and development programmes and inaugurate completed projects, the CM did not tour districts to interact with the people directly and seek their feedback on the performance of the government, public representatives and officials.

In his second term as CM from 2018, Chandrashekar Rao had promised to show what 'real administration' meant to people. In July 2019, he made a statement in the assembly saying that he will visit all the districts after August 15, by taking the entire official machinery with him and resolve issues of people on the spot. This too did not happen due to successive elections, outbreak of Covid-19 and subsequent lockdowns.

TRS sources said Rao is keen to focus on good governance for the remaining half of his tenure by visiting districts frequently and counter the opposition criticism that he confines mostly to Pragathi Bhavan or his farmhouse and remain inaccessible to the people.
Twitter, the micro-blogging giant, is no longer the hubless network of global chatter that its model would appear to indicate. After it failed to appoint a full-time officer in charge of compliance in India, its country managing director will be criminally liable for inflammatory or hateful remarks on the platform. In real terms, this means that the social media platform will now be responsible for what the Twitterati say. Not complying with one of the rules mandated by the Indian government has cost Twitter dearly, as it lost the very legal cover that would have enabled it to be treated as an intermediary. Intervention itself could come in the way of intermediary status.

Social media platforms have claimed to be common carriers, or hands-off intermediaries. Section 79 of the Information Technology Act offers a legal shield so long as Twitter remains an intermediary -- when it does not initiate message transmission, does not select the receiver, and does not modify the message. The loss of the safe harbour offered under Section 79 -- perhaps the first such experience in the world -- means that the essence of the business model of the social media has come crashing down. As with any house of cards, this crash was just waiting to happen. Arguably, a companys vulnerability is at its peak when a nations political values are being rewritten.

A newspaper editors job is to act as a gatekeeper, assigning various pages, positions, lengths and levels of prominence to news stories. Unlike a legacy editor, a social media platform does not edit the content of what we write. It is far more democratic in that way than a newspaper. The role of social media intermediaries in the current framework is not quite as simple, but whether they are completely hands-off is debatable. Whether in the way algorithms are written, or the level of engagement, or other protocols, there is a process of message prioritisation that essentially means one message can attain more visibility than another.

Syllogistically, assigning prominence to some content over other content should be seen as a form of editorial intervention.

This form of editorialisation, however indirect and driven mainly by those who wrote the programmes, means that the social media business model that is fed to us -- that the social media is truly a free marketplace of ideas -- should be questioned. Users may assume that because of the sheer volumes, their posts have the same chance of visibility and impact as their neighbours. Have social media platforms been transparent with us about how it all really works, and whether it is simply an organic process like Darwins theory of natural selection?

But the concern for the billions of social media users is much larger. Regulation comes at the price of more, not less, intervention. Liberal policies in a democracy implicitly must assume one factor that really is debatable: fairness. If a government tangles with private players and creates a shield of opacity from regular folks, it is unfair to the spirit of democracy. In the same spirit, is it fair to hold a company responsible for what its users do? After all, users are not employees of the company. Would the police charge the bicycle manufacturer for a rider who chooses to ride illegally on the wrong side of the road?

The difference is that in a social media model, the company and the user are bound by a trapeze-like relationship, bound to each other for a critical moment of usage. So, could the answer be an openly stated pre facto intervention? The problem with taking responsibility for content someone else creates is that any damage can only be mitigated after it is done. We may not have reached the stage of being able to prevent an impending message in time (although efforts in that direction could be ongoing). But if it were and Twitter did intervene before a tweet goes public, it would still lose its status as an intermediary. Perhaps as a first step in a precautionary method, Twitter could filter out the bots and fake profiles. Flagging posts for dubious content was always a great idea, but can it be pre facto and more transparent? If intervention is needed, should Twitters editorial job then be limited to accepting or rejecting posts?

It will be naive to assume that everything will go according to the spirit of the law. Twitter will now be an easier target for those who find a post inconvenient, and when users find that their legal responsibility is indirect at best, one wonders whether bad content will be prone to sink even further. In the Ghaziabad incident on the heels of the loss of Twitters indemnity, the Uttar Pradesh police named the company and some of its users in a First Information Report, accusing it of circulating a fake video. This means that the police has assumed a broader scope of culpability, holding both the platform and its users liable.

Twitter may therefore need a new operational model. Twitters India experience also could fortify the brewing idea that after decades of enjoying the status of being the most unregulated and unfettered among modern media technologies, the social medias growth may be cooling off. A report predicted these trends from nearly three years ago: An Oxford University-Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalisms Digital News Report had reported back in 2018 that for the first time since the phenomenon began, among users in 37 countries across continents (not including India, albeit), the dependence on social media for news consumption had showed a decline.

It is indeed astounding, as information technology minister Ravi Shankar Prasad pointed out, that an entity that projects itself as the flag-bearer of free speech should defy the law. That observation, however, should apply to governments and private corporations alike. Governments that promote nationalistic narratives, and the societies that are hegemonised into those narratives, prefer images, walls and controls. The new rule is a flag-bearer of that philosophy. Now we can expect less inconvenient chatter from the Twitterati. Free speech is illusory anyway, and if social media giants were to deny that any form of control exists, whether political or not, it would be a little rich. These platforms have been our public dhobi ghats for dirty linen. But it seems that is not how we prefer it.
A Chinese PLA J-16 fighter jet flies in an undisclosed location. China sent a record 28 fighter jets, 14 of them J-16s, towards the self-ruled island of Taiwan on Tuesday, June 15, 2021, the island's defense ministry said, the largest such display of force since China started flying planes towards the island last year. (via AP)

Taipei: Taiwan on Thursday reported another incursion by China, as seven Chinese air forces warplanes flew into the island's air defence identification zone (ADIZ).

It comes just two days after the People Liberation Army sent a record 28 planes to the island's ADIZ, South China Morning Post reported.

The newest incursions involved two newer-model J-16 fighter jets, four old model J-7 fighters and one Y-8 electric warfare aircraft.

In a statement, Taiwan's defence ministry said the planes had prompted the island's air force "to scramble jets, issue radio warnings and deploy air defence missile systems to monitor the activities of the planes".

It was the sixth time PLA planes had entered Taiwan's ADIZ this month, according to the ministry.

This comes after Taiwan signed two arms procurement contracts with the United States for High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems and Harpoon Coastal Defence Systems, which could significantly boost the island's asymmetrical warfare capability, according to a document released to the legislature by the defence ministry.

Beijing claims full sovereignty over Taiwan, a democracy of almost 24 million people located off the southeastern coast of mainland China, even though the two sides have been governed separately for more than seven decades

Recently, the Group of Seven Seven leaders issued a joint statement, slamming China for a series of issues and underscored the importance of peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait -- comments China condemned as "slander."

Taiwan has complained in recent months of repeated missions by China's air force near the island, concentrated in the southwestern part of its air defence zone near the Taiwan-controlled Pratas Islands.
India reported 62,480 new Covid-19 cases, 1,587 deaths in the past 24 hours, according to the Health Ministry. As many as 38,7167,696 samples have been tested for Covid up to June 17, of which 19,29,476 were tested yesterday. Stay tuned to DH for more updates.
By Om Gaur

The Ganges, or Ganga, is the holiest of Indias rivers, and most Hindus believe that dipping their body in it will purify their soul. But when the second wave of the coronavirus pandemic hit, the river also became an exhibit for the Modi administrations failures and deceptions.

The northern state of Bihar recently revised its death toll for April and May from 5,424 to 9,375. Private agencies tasked with conducting Covid-19 tests at Kumbh Mela, a Hindu religious festival in northern India that attracted millions of pilgrims in April  and that turned out to be a coronavirus superspreader event  reportedly falsified some 1,00,000 results.

The second wave of infections now appears to be ebbing, but the country is struggling to process the staggering toll  nearly 3,80,000 dead, the vast majority since just March  hobbled by the continuing obfuscation of both local and central authorities. Only, the holy Ganga does not lie.

On May 12, villagers in Buxar, a district in Bihar, found bloated and disfigured corpses floating in the river. Some 100 bodies were fished out there and in another district upstream, Ghazipur. A local senior police officer said the bodies had travelled downriver, from Uttar Pradesh.

I am the national editor of Dainik Bhaskar, a Hindi-language newspaper that sells about five and a half million copies a day across India, mostly to readers in small towns and villages. To get a clearer sense of the devastation caused by the pandemic among them, we sent 30 reporters and photojournalists to walk the banks of the Ganga in major cities and districts in Uttar Pradesh.

Our reporters counted 2,000 bodies on May 12 and 13 alone as they travelled 700 miles along the river. The bodies werent only floating in it: On some days, 65 or 70 were washing up on its shores. Yet by our calculations, based on official data, the state authorities claim that just 7,826 people died from Covid-19 between April 1 and May 13.

Shringverpur, a small village in southern Uttar Pradesh, is considered holy for its association with Lord Rama. Our reporters saw many bodies buried just a yard apart; hundreds of saffron shrouds wrapped around the corpses were poking up from the ground. Poor villagers who couldnt afford to buy wood to cremate their kin had sought some solace by burying them near a sacred site.

After more reporting, we estimated that between mid-April and mid-May some 4,000 corpses had been placed in shallow pits by the river along a stretch of less than one mile.

We might never have heard of this tragedy but for the weather. Rains in early May swelled the Ganga, tossing up corpses to the rivers surface and onto its shores. They washed off the dirt from the banks, exposing the bodies buried there.

The rains also laid bare the governments colossal failure to strengthen rural health care or ensure adequate vaccine supplies  or take responsibility for its shortcomings.

Uttar Pradesh has been governed by the BJP of Prime Minister Narendra Modi since March 2017, under Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, a Hindu monk turned politician. Adityanaths response in April to grave shortages of oxygen, ventilators and beds in intensive-care units throughout the state, and to the images of overcrowded cemeteries and crematories, was denials and threats. He directed state officials to invoke anti-terrorism laws against, and seize property from, people he accused of spreading rumours.

The Uttar Pradesh government records only deaths in hospitals. Yet many people from villages, where access to health care is limited, have been dying at home.

In mid-May, a doctor in Reotipur, a village of about 70,000 in Ghazipur district  the only doctor there  told one of our reporters that about 850 people had tested positive for the coronavirus. Some villagers told him that around 200 people there had died in April.

We are poor people, Mahendranath Upadhyay, a villager who lost three members of his family to Covid-19, told our reporter. We barely manage to earn enough to eat. We dont have the money for medical treatment.

Rural poverty has exacerbated the effects of the second wave of infections, but it was the Modi governments callous disregard that triggered the latest surge. The authorities allowed the Kumbh Mela pilgrimage, one of the worlds largest religious gatherings, in the spring, as well as elections in several states, including Uttar Pradesh.

And now, with just 3.per cent of Indians fully vaccinated to date, there is good reason to fear a devastating third wave.

When Modi was campaigning to become prime minister in 2014, he ran for a parliamentary seat from Varanasi, a holy city on the Ganges in Uttar Pradesh. He said then, I feel Mother Ganga has called me to Varanasi. Today, the Ganges is calling him out.
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A local DUP councillor has said that former party leader Edwin Poots had to quit after leaving colleagues out of Irish language discussions.

Mr Poots stood down after just 21 days in charge on Thursday evening, June 17.

At this time it is unclear whether newly appointed First Minister, Paul Givan, will remain in post or if there will be ministerial changes once a new leader is selected.

The Derry News spoke to DUP Aldermen Maurice Devenney and Alderman Hilary McClintock who were not willing to say who they support as next leader.

Both councillors said it is above my pay grade and for more senior members to decide.

DUP group leader on Derry City & Strabane District Council, Hilary McClintock, explained that people will have to put their name forward and the party will make a decision on it.

Asked why she believed Edwin Poots had to resign after just three weeks in the role, Alderman McClintock added: It would seem that the biggest issue was that Edwin said he was going to listen to his colleagues and at the first opportunity, unfortunately, he didnt listen to them.

I think that is the crux of the matter and parties have to make decisions.

A deal was agreed with the UK government to legislate for Irish language laws, as agreed in New Decade, New Approach, if Stormont does not.

A perceived concession over Irish language legislation has been a bone of contention for DUP representatives.

At a meeting on June 17 they voted overwhelming against nominating a First Minister because they wanted to Mr Poots to explain the basis of the agreement.

MP Sammy Wilson said the British government must not interfere in devolved issues at the behest of Sinn Fein.

However, its reported that Mr Poots went ahead and nominated Paul Givan as First Minister against their express wishes.

Alderman McClintock said: I think the issue is that the party didnt have time to discuss it.

The decision was only made somewhere between midnight and 1am and the party didnt have a chance to sit down and discuss it.

If theyd had an opportunity I dont know where that conversation would have went but at least they would have had an opportunity to air their views on it.

She concluded by saying DUP representatives in Derry will invite the new leader and ministers to the city to the North West to look at various issues but didnt specify what those are.
A 37-year-old man has been convicted of begging in Derry's city centre.

Anthony Catterson appeared before Derry Magistrates Court today charged with begging and indecent behaviour.

The court was told that the indecent behaviour offence related to an incident around 6pm on November 2, 2018 when Catterson was captured on CCTV urinating in public outside the Poundland store at Waterloo Place.

When police officers arrived on the scene, they found Catterson, whose address in court documents was given as Castlefin Road, Castlederg, to be intoxicated and he was cautioned for indecent behaviour.

In relation to the begging offence, this took place on June 25, 2019 close to the ATM machine of the Bank of Ireland branch at Strand Road in the city centre.

A police officer told the court that this would be known as a 'hotspot' for begging offences.

The officers said that on the day in question, police officers were on patrol in the area around 5pm when they observed the defendant sitting beside the ATM.

When a member of the public walked past him, Catterson was seen to make a gesture with his hands as if begging for money.

The officers said they also heard him ask the person for money.

A defence solicitor said that at the time Catterson had become 'estranged' from his family in Castlederg and was living rough in Derry.

The solicitor said he was now been reconciled with his family.

The judge said the offences were not to be 'condoned' before placing a conditional discharge on Catterson for one year for both offences.
Joint Statement of Elected Members at the UNSC Open Debate on Working Methods

Statement

Thank you Mr. President

I have the honour to deliver this statement on behalf of the current 10 elected members (E-10) of the Security Council: Estonia, India, Ireland, Kenya, Mexico, Niger, Norway, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Tunisia and Viet Nam.



Mr. President, allow me to express our appreciation to the Estonian presidency for convening this meeting and inviting the written participation of other Members of the United Nations. This is unfortunately necessary in a period where we still need to observe a lot of caution due to the COVID-19 pandemic. We thank Ambassador Inga Rhonda King, Permanent Representative of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and Chair of the Security Councils Informal Working Group on Documentation and other Procedural Questions (IWG); Ms. Karin Landgren, Executive Director of Security Council Report; and Ms. Lorraine Sievers, co-author of The Procedure of UN Security Council for their insightful briefings.



When the pandemic struck last year, no one had a grasp of the journey it has taken us on as we were not prepared for it. We should commend the Council for its quick response in formulating the COVID related working methods to adapt to the situation and ensure business continuity. It is important that we reflect on these working methods and formalize those which can continue to enhance the work of the Council. Agility has taken up a strong place in our work, as a critical element for the effective functioning of the Council, particularly during this extraordinary season.



The effects of the pandemic should not affect the value placed on transparency, accountability, efficiency and building of effective bridges between the Council and other organs and agencies of the United Nations. Actually, the pandemic has clearly demanded that we deliberately pause and look back and consider how best to move forward ensuring that the work performed and lessons learnt during this period are not lost to history. On the contrary, the work of the Council must be recorded for posterity so that this unprecedented season can also serve to improve the working of the Council.



Therefore, as we emerge from the pandemic we need to look to the future and agree on working methods which can withstand pandemics and any other major future disruptions of the normal working of the Council. We may start by agreeing that VTC meetings are considered formal meetings of the Council where the same Provisional Rules of Procedure apply- allowing for the participation of non-members, the possibility to vote in real time on procedural and substantive matters, to provide fully for multilingualism, and ensure the attendant record keeping- rather than developing again temporary special measures. As a first step, we will continue to engage actively as the E-10 in the work of the IWG under the Chairpersonship of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines to secure the eight draft notes currently under discussion.



As we adjusted to the new reality, there was more scrutiny on how the Council would continue executing its mandate. This promoted calls for more transparency from the Council including through the holding of more public meetings, wider representation by stakeholders such as women, civil society, youth, among others and interaction with the media. This resonates with the progressively improving working methods, implementation of note S/2017/507 and the provisional rules of procedure.



The Council has been using VTCs for meetings and consultations with increasing frequency. One of the benefits of working in a virtual format is the ability to secure the attendance of briefers from a wide range of stakeholders from across the world. Unfortunately, the year 2020 saw a significant decrease in the number of female Rule 39 briefers.



The monthly Presidency of the Council has a particular role contributing to the promotion of transparency of the Councils work through engagement with the wider UN membership, the media, civil society and other stakeholders, which includes briefings on the programme of work, conducting wrap-up sessions and producing monthly assessments. We welcome also the growing practice of Presidencies making and publicising monthly commitments on the implementation of Note 507 and the eight related Notes of 2019, and we emphasise their key role in creating and testing new practices under their presidencies.



This journey has not been devoid of challenges which however, also present great opportunities for the Council to seize. One of the greatest challenges to operational continuity of work is the technological capacity of the Secretariat, and the political will to ensure that virtual open debates can include the participation of the wider membership of the UN. Written contributions by non-Council Member States are not an appropriate substitution for their participation in such debates. A progressive approach would be consideration of holding meetings that combine in-person and virtual participation to attract a wide spectrum of briefers in choice events.



The Council greatly benefits from understanding the physical setting of conflicts, which is why field visits are of great importance. This important aspect of the Councils work has been greatly impeded by the precautionary travel restrictions necessitated by COVID-19 in the past year. However, with technological creativity and advancement, visits may be done virtually as we have already witnessed. We urge that these virtual visits be conducted only where travel is not possible, and be coordinated in corresponding frequency as would have been in-person visits to allow the Council to continue being more agile, responsive and contribute to the Councils prevention mandate.



Mr. President, at a time when the Council is under increased scrutiny, we should continue striving for more transparency, efficiency, effectiveness, democracy, inclusivity, accountability and balance. The Council needs to strike a healthy balance between public and private meetings, to both enhance the transparency and visibility of the Councils work, and encourage more interactivity of discussions and consensus building. In this regard, for effective participation, and in line with the promotion of multilingualism, the E-10 urges that effort be invested in ensuring that interpretation is provided, including in closed meetings. We also welcome the current engagement of the IWG on analysing ways to strengthen and improve the practice and procedure concerning the circulation of communications for the consideration of the Council.



The E-10 views that these ideals would be best achievable through a more equal distribution of work among all members of the Council in the spirit of burden-sharing. We therefore urge that cooperation be fostered among the outgoing, current and incoming elected members to help maintain the critically needed continuity. To help ensure this smooth rollover of E-10 membership, capacity building should be conducted for incoming members immediately upon their election. The envisaged capacity building would incorporate Chairs of subsidiary bodies to help incoming members have a clearer understanding of what entails Chairing of Subsidiary bodies. This should also help demystify penholdership arrangements and create linkages between penholderships and co-penholderships.



In order to promote transparency and the fair and equitable distribution of work- including current penholders agreeing to co-penholdership arrangements with E-10 members who have valuable experience to contribute, the provisions of Note 507 on the selection of Chairs of subsidiary bodies must be implemented. In particular, the informal process of consultations should start with incoming members as soon as possible after the elections and in conjunction with the envisaged capacity building.



The selection process must be carried out in a transparent manner and ensure the views of incoming members are taken into account in the allocation of roles. The expertise of elected members should be an additional factor in the process. In this regard, the consensus proposal by elected members needs to be respected. To promote efficiency and a smooth transition, the selection process should be done in a timely manner to allow incoming members to understand better and monitor closely the work of the subsidiary bodies they would Chair during the observation period commencing 1 October.



Targeted sanctions are an important tool to address threats to international peace and security and hence critical to the execution of the mandate of the Council. The E-10 underscores the importance of accountability and transparency in the work of sanctions committees. The working methods must align with international due process standards. We strongly believe in the need to increase the efficiency of UN sanctions through strengthening fair and clear procedures in sanctions regimes, including by creating review mechanisms similar to that of the Ombudsman of the 1267 Committee for other sanctions regimes. Additionally, the Council should take into account the efficacy of sanctions through evolving phases of conflicts and respond accordingly by periodically reviewing and suspending, lifting or strengthening measures as appropriate.



With respect to the working methods of subsidiary bodies, including Sanctions Committees, a transparent, open and evidence-based methodology needs to be followed. Any agenda items being introduced for consideration, and holds placed on listing requests or other matters of the Committees business, need to be supported in writing, with necessary justification by the requesting Member, to promote transparency and accountability, and ensure efficient record keeping. This would also help maintain the credibility of the work of the Committees and, in turn, the Council.



To satisfy both the Councils efforts to be both agile and promote transparency and the prevention of conflicts, we urge continued targeted periodic engagements with regional organisations. This should not only be limited to signature events, but also in covering topical arising issues such as exchange of experiences in regional management of the pandemic. Engagements with regional organisations also speaks to the importance of Chapter VIII of the UN Charter in executing the mandate of the Council.



Mr. President, on this note, the E-10 members recall that in the Council VTC on working methods of 2020, the critical and urgent need for reforms in the Security Council to reflect contemporary realities was underscored. While the Council needs to be more efficient, representative, transparent, accountable and democratic, it is the only UN organ that has been left behind in having a truly representative composition. The use, or threat of use of the veto, also continues to prevent the Council from acting on vital topics. We call for restraint on the use of the veto, especially on actions aimed to prevent and end mass atrocity crimes- the very heart of this Councils mandate- these imbalances should therefore, be addressed.



Finally, the E-10 reassures of its commitment to live up to the responsibility bestowed upon us through election by the Members of the United Nations- to efficiently and effectively execute the Councils mandate, and drive forward improvements in its methods of work.



Thank you.

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Statement at the UNSC Briefing on the Situation in Haiti

Statement

Thank you Mr. President. Let me also thank you, Special Representative La Lime, for your briefing today. My appreciation also to Ms. Ewald for her valuable presentation, and I also acknowledge the presence of the Interim Prime Minister Caude Joseph with us here today.

Mr. President, I want to focus on three points today.

The first, relates to the crossroads in Haitis political future. During our last meeting, we spoke of the opportunity 2021 offers to restore and revitalise democracy in Haiti. However, with fewer than 100 days remaining before the proposed first round of legislative elections, preparations must be urgently stepped-up so that the people of Haiti can exercise their democratic will at the ballot box. It has never been more important that the Haitian people choose their own legislators, and in time, their next elected President. We join the recent calls of the United Nations, the Organisation of American States and the European Parliament to ensure that credible, inclusive and transparent elections take place, in a safe and timely manner.

Elections, of course, are not an end in themselves. But they are a vital step on the path to restored and reinvigorated democratic institutions in Haiti. We reiterate our belief in the power of dialogue to generate understanding and create the space for agreed compromises and a path forward. Much remains to be discussed, including on constitutional reform. Those with such experience know the impact a representative citizens assembly, with the full and equal participation of women, can have on the deliberation of constitutional questions and generating shared investment in the future.

My second point, Mr. President, relates to the multiple structural and systemic challenges Haiti faces. We are gravely concerned by reports of continuing violence, insecurity, and economic depression, compounded by the challenge of responding to Covid-19.

Gang-related violence, prison overcrowding, lengthy pre-trial detentions, impunity for human rights violations and sexual and gender-based violence are issues of serious concern. We also note an alarming rise in the rate of kidnappings and homicides. The government must address pervasive issues in law enforcement and the justice system, and take urgent steps to progress the National Strategy for Community Violence Reduction. We welcome the establishment of the Board of the Legal Aid Council, with the support of BINUH.

Ireland also remains concerned about the shrinking civil society space, particularly as it affects Haitian women and youth. The combined pressures I have outlined are preventing women from asserting their rights and claiming their place in politics and in society. More than half of all households in Haiti are women led. What affects Haitian women affects the future trajectory of Haiti.

Finally, Mr. President, my third point. I wish to address the very grave humanitarian situation in Haiti. The scale of the challenge is truly daunting. We are particularly alarmed by widespread severe food insecurity, including, particularly regrettably, persistent child malnutrition. As we know the effects of malnutrition have intergenerational consequences, further undermining Haitis ability to build its future. This crisis requires a strong collective response from the international community. However, the safety and security of humanitarian workers, , who have suffered direct attacks in the course of their vital work, must be guaranteed. We call on the Haitian government to ensure the safety of all providing vital assistance. Given the security situation, the UN Humanitarian Air Service, is critical to the functioning of the UN Country Team and its partners. We are concerned at reports that its future activity is under threat due to underfunding.

Mr. President, as the Secretary Generals report rightly states, and despite the many interwoven challenges it faces, Haiti has numerous strengths. Not least its resilient people. The international community must match their resilience with continued commitment, support efforts to build faith in the electoral system and work with the new elected government to address the underlying issues holding Haiti back from building a future based on those strengths.

Thank you, Mr President

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Samsung has officially launched the Galaxy Tab S7 FE and Galaxy Tab A7 Lite as two new tablets with large displays in India. The Galaxy Tab S7 FE supports the S Pen stylus while the Tab A7 Lite is very affordable. The Galaxy Tab S7 FE is an addition to the Galaxy Tab S7 series that includes the Tab S7 and Tab S7+. The Galaxy Tab S7 FE is a powerful tablet that is powered by a Qualcomm processor with features like a large display, stereo speakers and a large capacity battery to boot.

With Remote working and virtual learning becoming the new normal, we, at Samsung, have pushed ourselves creatively and technically to develop two new landmark Tablets - Tab S7 FE & Tab A7 Lite. These exciting new Tabs help you become more productive, more creative, multi-task with ease and redefine the way that you work, study and play, said Madhur Chaturvedi, Director, Mobile Business, Samsung India.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S7 FE price and availability

The Samsung Galaxy Tab S7 FE is priced starting at Rs 46,999 for the base 4GB+64GB variant and Rs 50,999 for the 6GB+128GB option. Samsung is offering upto Rs 4,000 discount for HDFC Debit and Credit cardholders and Rs 10,000 off on the keyboard cover. The Galaxy Tab S7 FE goes on sale from June 23 across major offline and online stores in India.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S7 FE specifications

The Galaxy Tab S7 FE has a unibody design that measures 6.3 millimetres in thickness and weighs 608 grams. The Tab S7 FE is being offered in four colours- Mystic Black, Mystic Silver Mystic Green and Mystic Pink. The tablet supports the S Pen stylus that is provided in the box. It features a 12.4-inch Full HD+ (2560x1600 pixels) resolution display with narrow bezels on the sides that give it a 16:10 aspect ratio.

The Tab S7 FE is powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 750G processor with an octa-core CPU and Adreno 619 GPU. This is paired with upto 6GB RAM and 128GB storage with the tablet running on Android 11 based One UI 3.1. There is an option to add a microSD card of upto 1TB.

There is an 8MP camera on the back and a 5MP camera on the front for selfies. The Tab S7 FE is also equipped with dual stereo speakers that have been tuned by AKG. It is also compatible with Samsung DeX.

The Galaxy Tab S7 FE is equipped with a 10,090mAh battery that supports 45W fast charging but the charger is sold separately.

Samsung Galaxy Tab A7 Lite specifications and pricing

The Samsung Galaxy Tab A7 Lite has also launched in India featuring an 8.7-inch HD+ display that offers a 1340x800 pixels resolution with wide bezels on the top and the bottom. This tablet has a metal frame measuring 8 millimetres in thickness and weighs 366 grams. It is being offered in two colours- Gray and Silver.

The Tab A7 Lite is powered by the MediaTek Helio P22T processor with an octa-core CPU. This is paired with upto 4GB RAM and upto 64GB storage options to choose from. There is an option to add a microSD card of upto 1TB as well. It runs on Android 11 based One UI 3.1.

There is an 8MP camera on the back and a 2MP front-facing camera. The Tab A7 Lite has stereo speakers along with a headphone jack.

Samsung has equipped the Tab A7 Lite with a 5,100mAh battery that supports 15W fast charging out-of-the-box.

The Samsung Galaxy A7 Lite is priced starting at Rs 11,999 for the WiFi model and Rs 14,999 for the LTE variant. It goes on sale from June 23 in major online and offline retail stores across India.
The Sony Bravia XR A80J 65-inch 4K UHD TV has officially launched in India and is the first smart television of its kind to be powered by the Bravia XR cognitive processor. The Bravia XR A80J offers premium features such as Dolby Vision and Atmos along with support for Acoustic Surface Audio+, 4K HDR 120FPS and a dedicated gaming mode.

The new Bravia XR cognitive processor divides the screen into numerous zones and analyzes colour, contrast and details at once and every element is adjusted to the best value. This is something that traditional AIs cannot achieve as they detect and analyze elements individually. This translates into features such as the XR OLED contrast, XR Triluminos Pro, XR Motion Clarity, XR Sound Position technology and more.

Sony Bravia XR A80J price and availability

The Sony Bravia XR-65A80J is priced at Rs 2,99,990 in India and will be available to purchase from June 18 across Sony Centres, major offline and online stores across India.

Sony also plans to launch a 77-inch and 55-inch model of the Bravia XR A80J in India soon. The Pricing and availability details of these two will be revealed at the time of launch.

Sony Bravia XR A80J features

The Sony Bravia XR A80J features a 65-inch 4K (3840x2160 pixels) UHD OLED display. It is powered by the Bravia XR cognitive processor with features such as support for HDR10, HLG and Dolby Vision playback. This smart TV can do 4K upscaling and has a dedicated Netflix calibrated mode. There is a light sensor that automatically adjusts the picture brightness according to the ambient lighting conditions to provide a better visual experience.

It also supports 4K UHD game mode with a variable refresh rate going upto 120FPS with HDMI 2.1 compatibility and offers an ultra-smooth gaming experience with very low latency. The Bravia XR A80J has four HDMI ports, an ethernet port, a digital audio output, headphone output and three USB ports.

This Bravia XR A80J smart TV has two actuators and two subwoofers that make up the Acoustic Surface Audio+ speaker with support for Dolby Audio, Atmos and DTS Digital Surround. It is powered by Android TV and has 16GB of built-in memory.
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By MARK SHERMAN

Associated Press

WASHINGTON  The Supreme Court has dismissed a challenge to the Obama era health care law, preserving insurance coverage for millions of Americans.

The justices, by a 7-2 vote, left the entire law intact Thursday in ruling that Texas, other Republican-led states and two individuals had no right to bring their lawsuit in federal court. The Biden administration says 31 million people have health insurance because of the law popularly known as Obamacare.





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State officials may have to shut down a major power plant for the first time ever because of low water levels.



By ADAM BEAM

Associated Press

OROVILLE, Calif.  Each year Lake Oroville helps water a quarter of the nation's crops, sustain endangered salmon beneath its massive earthen dam and anchor the tourism economy of a Northern California county that must rebuild seemingly every year after unrelenting wildfires.

But the mighty lake  a linchpin in a system of aqueducts and reservoirs in the arid U.S. West that makes California possible  is shrinking with surprising speed amid a severe drought, with state officials predicting it will reach a record low later this summer.





. . .
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SEATTLE (AP)  Hiking season is underway in the Pacific Northwest and there's a new app for outdoor enthusiasts looking to explore some of Washington State's most popular trails.

We had this pandemic that created this need to go outside, said Mat Lyons, president of Trails, Recreation, Education, Advocacy, Development, or TREAD, a non-profit that connects people with public lands.





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Crime-law-enforcement

Catalytic converter thefts on the rise in Northeast Mississippi

ROBERT F. BUKATY | AP FILE A catalytic converter is seen at Industrial Metal Recycling in Oakland, Maine. Thieves looking to make easy money have been crawling under vehicles across Northeast Mississippi with saws and stealing catalytic converters, law enforcement officials say. Since early April, there have been more than a dozen reported converter thefts in Tupelo and Lee County.

TUPELO  Criminals looking to make easy money have been crawling under vehicles across Northeast Mississippi with saws and stealing catalytic converters.

The thieves are attempting to cash in on the precious metals  platinum and rhodium  contained within the catalytic converters, which help reduce harmful emissions from a cars exhaust.

For just a few minutes of work, someone can earn several hundred dollars.

Someone with a cordless sawzall (reciprocating saw) can cut through an exhaust system and have a converter out in about five minutes, said Roger Hussey, owner of Muffler Master in Tupelo. And a junk (used) converter can go for $100 to $200 apiece.

As a businessman, Hussey has to comply with Environmental Protection Agency laws. These including both holding any converter he removes for at least 15 days, but also filing paper detailing why the part was removed.

For people who arent as honest, there is always someone willing to purchase a converter, no questions asked, in order to recover the precious metals inside.

I have folks come by here several times a week wanting to buy old converters, Hussey said.

Since the weather warmed up in April, there has been a steady stream of people who have returned to their vehicles to find a key component of their exhaust system missing. There have been more than a dozen thefts reported in Tupelo and Lee County since early April.

The Corinth and Oxford police departments have seen a marked increase in these types of thefts. Prentiss County Sheriff Randy Tolar said hes seen only a few thefts in the county, but there have been numerous reported in Baldwyn and Booneville.

Tupelo Police Department spokesman Capt. Chuck McDougald and Detective Brittney Williams said most of the recent reports have been at businesses or in commercial areas under the cover of night.

We are dealing with more than one person, its not just here in Tupelo, Williams said. But I dont know if this is an organized effort. It is probably more word-of-mouth.

McDougald agreed, noting that criminals talk to each other. If one has a good idea, or an easy way to make money, they will tell others.

They are likely selling them to middlemen, who then take them up north to other states where they might pay more, Williams said.

While numerous thefts have been reported, officials believe there are many more that havent. Some people will take their lumps and just replace the converter without alerting the police, law enforcement officials said.

We are always looking for people to come forward and report these crimes so we can build a database and determine where we need to patrol more, McDougald said. Even if they dont know who did it, one of their neighbors might have a security camera that caught an image we can use.

In fact, it was a neighbors camera that led TPD to arrest Forrest Sowell, 48, of Belden, earlier this week for stealing a converter. He was charged with felony malicious mischief and is being held in the Lee County Jail on a $5,000 bond.

In many cases, the damage done to the vehicle in the removal process outweighs the scrap value of the catalytic converter. And most of the time, in their haste, the criminal doesnt always make their cuts in a place where it will be easy to repair.

Hussey said someone cut one of three converters off a Chevrolet van outside a McCullough Boulevard business recently. When Hussey could not find a replacement for the left converter, he had to replace the entire section. The price tag for the repair: $2,000.

Williams said the criminals have been hitting various vehicles, and they dont seem to be targeting any particular category.

But Hussey has noticed one trend.

The thieves are only going after the original equipment converters, Hussey said. The aftermarket ones dont bring jack on the junk market.


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KVIC reports record high turnover of Rs95,742 cr in FY'21 amidst pandemic

Khadi and Village Industries Commission (KVIC) has recorded its highest-ever gross annual turnover of Rs95,741.74 crore in the financial year 2020-21, a year completely marred by the Wuhan virus-led pandemic, compared with Rs88,887 crore in 2019-20, an increase of 7.71 per cent.

KVICs record performance in 2020-21 assumes great significance as production activities remained suspended for more than three months during the nationwide lockdown announced on 25 March last year. During this period, all Khadi production units and sales outlets too remained closed that severely affected the production and sales. KVIC swiftly rose to the prime ministers clarion calls for Aatmanirbhar Bharat and Vocal for Local. The innovative marketing ideas of minister for micro, small and medium enterprises, Nitin Gadkari further diversified KVICs product range, scaled up local production and paved the way for Khadis successive growth.

Compared to the year 2015-16, the overall production in Khadi and Village Industry sectors in 2020-21 registered a whopping 101 per cent growth, while gross sales during the period increased by 128.66 per cent.

A host of initiatives like launch of Khadi e-portal, Khadi masks, Khadi footwear, Khadi Prakritik Paint, Khadi hand sanitisers, etc, setting up of a record number of new PMEGP units, new SFURTI clusters, governments push to Swadeshi and KVICs historic agreements with paramilitary forces for supply of provisions, increased the turnover of village industry sector during the pandemic. Compared to the production of Rs65,393.40 crore in 2019-20, production in the village industry sector increased to Rs70,329.67 crore in FY21. Similarly, in FY21, the sales of village industry products stood at Rs92,214.03 crore compared to Rs84,675.29 crore in 2019-20.

The production and sales in the Khadi sector, however, slightly declined as spinning and weaving activities across the country took a major hit during the pandemic. The overall production in the Khadi sector in 2020-21 was recorded at Rs1,904.49 crore as compared to Rs2,292.44 crore in 2019-20, while the overall Khadi sales stood at Rs3,527.71 crore compared to Rs4,211.26 crore in the previous year.

KVIC chairman Vinai Kumar Saxena said that during the Pandemic, people responded enthusiastically to the calls of Aatmanirbhar Bharat and Vocal for Local. He said that during this period, KVICs main focus was to create sustainable employment for artisans and unemployed youth. Faced with economic distress, a large number of youths took up self-employment and manufacturing activities under PMEGP, which increased the production in the village industry sector.

At the same time, sales of Khadi and village industry products grew significantly following the prime ministers appeal to buy Swadeshi products.
Hoteliers in Louth are beginning to return to operation after closing last year, with businesses in Carlingford expecting a good summer ahead.

Terry McKevitt, manager of McKevitts Village Hotel in Carlingford, says that he is seeing good business since he reopened last week with pubs and restaurants.

On the business he has received since reopening last week, McKevitt says that it has been good, but government restrictions like outdoor dining only are holding them back for the time being.

Business has been good, but like its good between showers is the best way to say it. We have limited outdoor space and coverage so were particularly affected by an Irish summer, he continued.

McKevitt believes that the summer ahead will be a successful one, similar to last year when the hospitality industry reopened and domestic tourism became more popular.

I think its going to be a repeat of last year and last year I felt was very successful for the summer that was in it, says McKevitt, adding that people are willing to holiday in Ireland and get out and spend the money they have saved over the past year.

Alongside that, McKevitt believes that people will be willing to holiday this summer due to the almost six-month lockdown that the country faced after Christmas.

Theyve been locked up, literally in their own homes for the last five months. Theyre delighted to get out, he said.

According to McKevitt, they have between 85 and 90 per cent of their room capacity for the summer months filled already, with many people coming for short stays and breaks.

Since we have opened up, the phones have just been pretty much ringing off the hook, people are just trying to book short stays, he continued.

However, the pandemic has featured challenges for McKevitt, the main one being a loss of long term staff while the hospitality sector was shut.

Weve lost some good members of staff, good waiting staff that weve lost over the last number of months just for the reason that they couldnt rely on hospitality for a career moving forward.

They always felt that we were the first ones shut down so they just decided to move out of the industry altogether.

McKevitt is not concerned about another closure of hospitality, however, saying that low hospitalisation figures from Covid-19 and vaccination are a good sign for hospitality.

Overall, McKevitt is positive for the future of the family business, despite the challenges of the last year.

You cant say that this year hasnt been a terrible year but theres no point letting that get you down. You have to be positive about it and do as much as you can to increase footfall on your own business.
The LGBTQ+ Pride flag has been raised above Dundalk Townhall for the first time since 2014.

The flag-raising took place last Thursday, with Cathaoirleach of Dundalk Municipal District Maria Doyle making the decision to raise the flag during Pride Month.

Cllr Doyle said that she wanted to get it above the hall to provide solidarity to the LGBTQ+ community in Dundalk, saying that the entire town is behind them.

It was just a celebration really of the LGBT community in our area and its great to see it flying over the town hall, said Doyle.

Our town and not just our town, our district, our whole area supports our LGBT friends, relatives and neighbours Its just a sign of support I think.

Outcomers Dundalk, a support group for LGBTQ+ people based in town, also attended the flag-raising ceremony.

Bernie Quinn of Outcomers said that the flag being flown over the town hall means visibility and acknowledgement for the LGBT+ community in and around Dundalk.

I think it means visibility I think it means being seen, said Quinn.

I think that particular building, the town hall, is such a focal point of our town and I think its been a real cornerstone of community life.

To see the rainbow flag flying on the top of it, it just carries so much clout. It is so important.

I think the flag, coming in there this morning, makes my heart skip a beat.

This is the first year its been back up there since 2014 and its just amazing.

Quinn said that she had seen the flag flying on other buildings around the country, but that it fits best on top of the town hall in the middle of Dundalk.

The Pride flag flying atop the town hall

Quinn said that what is currently happening in Waterford, with Pride flags being cut down and homophobic signs being placed in windows, isnt something she thinks will happen in Dundalk and that the community has been hugely supportive.

The rise of that rhetoric is so dangerous, said Quinn, saying that those in Waterford who are responsible for cutting down the flags should be prosecuted.

All we ever want to do is to bring a bit of colour and to bring a bit of joy to the town.

Quinn said that due to Covid-19 restrictions, Dundalk Outcomers Pride celebrations that are due to kick off in July will not go ahead as usual, but that the group are incredibly excited for what Pride 2022 will bring.
Irish Water and Louth County Council are continuing with works to restore normal water supply to some customers in Dundalk impacted by discoloured water

Irish Water and Louth County Council investigated the matter and found a large burst on the network caused sediment to be dislodged and carried through the network to the customer tap.

Following the successful completion of repairs some customers continued to experience discoloured water.

Irish Water and Louth County Council undertook a programme of further investigations, which included monitoring at various locations throughout Dundalk town, and found that the build-up of sediment and the subsequent discolouration of water at customer taps was caused by the presence of manganese, a mineral which occurs naturally in the area.

Manganese is found naturally in many surface water (lake and river water) and groundwater (underground water) sources, including the River Fane, which is the source water for the Cavanhill Water Treatment Plant.

In response to this issue, a programme of works is currently taking place at the Cavanhill water treatment plant to reduce manganese levels in the final treated water, and therefore reduce the likelihood of sediment build-up in the network.

Following completion of the works at Cavanhill Water Treatment Plant, we intend to conduct a network flushing programme in Dundalk town and environs to clear the network of any remaining sediment. We will advise customers in advance of when we intend to commence this activity.

While Irish Water complete these essential works and further monitoring of the network, customers are advised that if their water is discoloured, to continue running the tap for a few minutes to restore the clear colour.

If the colour does not restore to clear, customers are advised not the drink the water as a precaution, and should contact Irish Water using the contact details below.

Irish Water can confirm that the Manganese levels found during our investigations are not at a level that would pose a risk to health, however we are continuing with enhanced monitoring both at the plant and in the network to keep the situation under close review.

In this regard we have been consulting with the Health Services Executive (HSE), who are the statutory authority in public health matters. If the situation changes, and a risk to public health arises, we will notify all affected customers immediately.

Irish Water apologises for any inconvenience as a result of this issue.

Customers with queries or concerns about the quality of their drinking water should contact the Irish Water customer care helpline, open 24/7 on 1800 278 278 or via Twitter @IWCare.
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Light rain early...then remaining cloudy with showers in the afternoon. Cooler. High near 60F. Winds NE at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 90%..

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EBRD President visits Poland

In her first visit to Poland as head of the EBRD, President Odile Renaud-Basso reiterated the Banks commitment to the country and readiness to address its most urgent challenges. This is demonstrated by the fact that 73 per cent of the Banks new investments in Poland in 2020 were in the green transition. The President met government representatives, the leadership of the Central Bank and businesses, and she also used the opportunity to introduce Elisabetta Falcetti as new head of Poland from September onwards.

Read more here and here

EBRD President warns against dangers of climate change

In a keynote address this week, EBRD President Odile Renaud-Basso warned against the economic dangers associated with climate change and called for urgent action: Simply scaling up our green financing will not be enough to address and overcome the challenge climate change presents the financial sector. We, as financial institutions, need to make our own institutions climate-resilient and do far more to support the low carbon and climate-resilient transition, she said in a joint EBRD/ECB conference.

Read the full speech

EBRD and partners promote digital trade

Leading trade finance to its next step, the EBRD has facilitated two trial transactions between National Bank of Greece and Citi on the digital trade finance network Contour. National Bank of Greece acted as an issuing bank and Citi as a confirming bank when the lenders completed test digital letters of credit. Both banks are part of the EBRDs Trade Facilitation Programme (TFP).

Learn more

How green hydrogen could power tomorrows industry

The transformative power of green hydrogen is the vision inspiring the current generation of politicians and planners as they plan a decarbonised year 2050. Even if renewable electricity is at the centre of these plans, there remains a need for other fuels to power heavy industry. Hydrogen has the potential for decarbonising sectors, but there remains a long way to go. The EBRDs Cristian Caretto explains: A number of institutions including the International Energy Agency expect the level of hydrogen use to grow from 70 million tonnes to more than 500 million tonnes a year by 2050. This will not happen at once, of course. But it looks like it might at least double by 2030.

Learn more

Project signings

Providing US$ 60 million to Kazakhstans Bank CenterCredit

In Kazakhstan, the EBRD is promoting green financing, lending to MSMEs and women entrepreneurs by providing a loan package of US$60 million in Kazakh Tenge equivalent to the countrys leading lender Bank CenterCredit (BCC).

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Funding boost for Ukrainian businesses as EBRD lends to Ukrgasbank

In Ukraine, the EBRD and the EU are providing new funds to MSMEs. The EBRD will lend the hryvnia equivalent of 25 million to Ukrgasbank, for loans to local companies to upgrade their processes and equipment and to advance sound health and safety practices.

Learn more here and here

Supporting tech-driven insurance company Hellas Direct

The EBRD is providing a mandatory convertible debt facility of 10 million to Hellas Direct Insurance Limited, a fast growing, tech-driven insurance company, to support its growth and provide the company with solvency capital. The debt facility is part of a larger financing round of 32 million.

Learn more

Investing US$ 50 million in green bond in Georgia

The EBRD has invested US$ 50 million in the first green bond issued by Georgian Railway (GR), the state-owned national railway company of Georgia, to be used to refinance GRs existing notes, which are maturing in 2022.

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Investing in first green bond issued by Turkeys QNB Finansbank

In Turkey, reinforcing its position as a leader in green finance and a strong supporter of capital markets, the EBRD invested US$ 50 million in a green bond issued by QNB Finansbank.

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Investing 20 million in Akropolis Groups debut Eurobond issue

The EBRD subscribed to a 20 million ticket as part of a 300 million Eurobond issue by Akropolis Group, the first such issuance by a real-estate company in the Baltic states, to support the groups expansion and refinance its existing debt.

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Donors

Start of works on Brcko port project

Manuela Naessl, EBRD Head of Bosnia and Herzegovina, attended the launch of works in the Brcko port, together with the EU Ambassador and other donors in the country. Funded under the Western Balkans Investment Framework the project will consist of the reconstruction of the port and preparing it to become a major transport hub.

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The event was widely covered by local media. Read more here

Gender Equality in Montenegro

Jaap Sprey, Montenegros RO Head, spoke at an event "Gender Equality and Economic Empowerment of Women in Montenegro" organized by the Secretariat of the Competitiveness Council. Jaap highlighted the Banks projects to address gender gaps, including our Women in Business Programme and our support for the Competitiveness Council which has started to apply a gender lens to regulatory impact assessment. Other speakers included the Minister of Economic Development, Jakov Milatovic and British Ambassador to Montenegro, Karen Maddox.

See more

Women-led businesses in the Western Balkans

We held a joint event with Sida where we listened to five gr inspirational stories of women-led businesses in Western Balkans and how weve helped them survive and flourish during the pandemic.

Learn more

EBRD Donors June newsletter

Pandemic-proof local food shopping in Montenegro, boosting Climate Action with new US$ 1 billion programme, modernising mineral-water production in BiH, and many more

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EU Development Days

EBRD Vice President Pierre Heilbronn attended this weeks EU Development Days: "EBRD is a major actor in the climate field. Over last 30 years weve devoted powerful tools and showed a strong track record on climate finance."

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EBRD in the news

Vlaho Kojakovic, EBRD Director, Property and Tourism, talked to Fortune Greece about the future of tourism, "green" financing, the projects in progress and Greeces bet on tourism.

Learn more (in Greek)

The production of green hydrogen from renewables could offer new opportunities for Turkeys exports to Europe, Cristian Carraretto, associate director of Green Economy and Climate Action at EBRD told Anadolu Agency in an interview.

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The EBRD on social media

EBRD President visied Poland this week where she met Polands President and the CEO of the Warsaw Stock Exchange amongst many others.

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The President has also written a personal note on the upcoming Annual Meeting inviting guests to register for the event

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The Bank is supporting parts of North Africa as part of a new commitment with the G7 DFIs, the IFC, AfDB and the EIB to commit to total investment of $80bn in private sector development in Africa over next 5 years

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Our Anne Fossemalle is now Invest Europe Chair for 2021-2022.

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Brilliant news for the EBRDs work in Chernobyl! The operational processing of spent nuclear fuel to the new ISF2 facility formally started last week.

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The Bank has announced its EBRD 2021 Annual Meeting and Business Forums discussion panels and some of the livestreamed events.

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The EBRD has published economic research on Covid-19s impact on Ukraines tourism industry.

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Subscribe to instant email updates on EBRD news about topics such as coronavirus and climate finance.

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EBRD supports innovative digital-driven insurance company in Greece

Mandatory convertible debt facility of up to 10 million to Hellas Direct

Funds will support growth and boost the companys solvency capital

The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) is providing a mandatory convertible debt facility of 10 million to Hellas Direct Insurance Limited, a fast growing, tech-driven insurance company, to support its growth and provide the company with solvency capital. The debt facility is part of a larger financing round of 32 million.

Existing shareholders of Hellas Direct, Portag3, a Canadian venture capital investor specialising in fintech opportunities, and the International Finance Corporation (IFC), a member of the World Bank Group, are also investing in this fundraising round alongside the EBRD.

Hellas Direct is a digitally enabled insurer established in 2011. It specialises in private motor vehicle insurance and residential property insurance in Greece and Cyprus.

The funds will support Hellas Directs growth, enabling the company to scale up its operations, increase its market share and continue offering innovative insurance products and digitalising the motor and home insurance value chain in Greece, where the insurance penetration ratio is one of the lowest in Europe.

It will also provide the company with the necessary solvency to fund insurance premia it expects to underwrite.

The EBRDs participation comes in the form of a mandatory convertible debt instrument, which is expected to qualify as unrestricted Tier 1 capital under the European Unions Solvency II Directive, which is a novel financing instrument tailored for this investment.

Andreea Moraru, EBRD Head of Greece and Cyprus, said: We are delighted to support Hellas Direct, a technology-driven insurance company offering innovative products and digitalising the insurance value chain in Greece. Accelerating digital transition, unleashing the power of technology to bring changes for the better, is among the top priorities for the EBRD. We are very proud to support the growth of an insurance market player with a unique, digital business model well-positioned in the post-Covid-19 world in scaling up its operations. We are confident that EBRD funding, know-how and strong presence on the Greek market will help Hellas Direct to continue improving its cutting edge service offerings and increase its market share.

We are really proud to welcome the EBRD into our group of investors at Hellas Direct. EBRDs funding, support and know-how will enable us to accelerate some of our longer-term strategic goals, as we expand to other blindspot markets in Emerging Europe, in order to replicate the multi-product, multi-channel approach we have successfully deployed in Greece. We are super excited and can't wait for the following months", said Alexis Pantazis, Executive Director of Hellas Direct.

Emilios Markou, Executive Director of Hellas Direct, added: Our aspiration at Hellas Direct is to become the dominant player in the wider regions mobility ecosystem. And we are really excited to be teaming up with one of the worlds leading investors, the EBRD, who will support us in our effort to pursue our strategic goals. This is a great opportunity for us to further optimise the service we offer to the consumer, by expanding our activity to multiple sectors.

The EBRD started operating in Greece on a temporary basis in 2015 to support the countrys economic recovery. To date, the Bank has invested more than 4.6 billion in over 75 projects in the corporate, financial, energy and infrastructure sectors of the Greek economy.
A well-known Cork city building will light up tonight with a message from Sinn Fein.

R&H Hall at Kennedy Quay will light up at 10.15pm on Thursday, June 17 with the message: 'It is time for Unity' as Sinn Fein starts a summer of campaigning to prepare for Irish Unity.

Cork TD Thomas Gould said Sinn Fein plans to hold a number of events in Cork over the summer months to highlight the growing momentum.

We will be holding a series of different events in Cork and nationwide over the coming months," he said. "Cork has always been at the forefront for a United Ireland.

"In the spirit of Terence MacSwiney and Tomas Mac Curtain, Cork is very much a part of that conversation, which we want to highlight tonight.

Deputy Gould praised the Tanaiste Leo Varadkar for his comments earlier this week when he said he believes a united Ireland could happen in his lifetime.

The comments this week by the Tanaiste were very welcome. The whole tone of his speech was encouraging. We want to start the discussions now. We want a Citizens Assembly group to be set up that will discuss the possibility of a united Ireland. We are looking for a future date for a Border poll. However, we also need to chart what way a united Ireland would look for everyone.

We are calling for unity. We want a conversation about it. We are looking to engage with every group. We want everybody to get involved and play their part.

"Preparations and discussions about what a United Ireland should look like must include all communities as equals."
A 52-year-old woman who fraudulently claimed 69,000 in carers allowance for her minding her elderly mother in Cork when she was actually living in London has now repaid 19,000 and wants to pay more.

Garda John Dineen, who is seconded to the Department of Social Protection, said Mary OCallaghan of Woodvale Road, Beaumont, Blackrock, Cork, used a significant amount of the money she defrauded for a significant amount of foreign travel.

He said she was very co-operative with the investigation since she was first approached by gardai and gathered 10,000 in compensation.

Defence barrister, Nikki OSullivan, said that the accused has now come up with an additional 9,000 since April.

Sinead Behan prosecution barrister said the state was happy to have sentencing further adjourned for more compensation.

Judge Sean O Donnabhain put it back until September 21.

Regarding further compensation the judge said, It may not change the outcome but it may ameliorate matters somewhat from the state point of view.

Garda Dineen said there were 243 counts of theft representing a total of over 69,000 by fraudulently claiming carers allowance for minding her mother in Cork when she (the defendant) was living in London.

Payments were made to her from 2013 to 2019.

It came to the Departments attention she was not living in the country, Garda Dineen said. "A Social Welfare inspector made various enquiries with Ryanair. He witnessed her flying in from Gatwick.

"And an investigation commenced."
New figures from Health Protection Surveillance Centre (HPSC) shed light on the number of cases of Covid-19 being reported in Cork.

The latest provisional figures show a total of 478 cases of the virus were recorded in Cork in the 14-day period from June 2 to June 15.

The figures show Cork has the sixth-highest 14-day incidence rate of the virus per 100,000 population nationally at 88.1.

The five-day moving average of confirmed cases from June 11 to June 15 was 37.

Yesterday, the acting Director of Public Health (HSE South), Dr Anne Sheahan said that the level of Covid-19 infection in Cork "remains stable".

Her comments came as Cork Kerry Community Healthcare announced that additional pop-up Covid-19 testing will be available in Bandon on Monday, June 21 and Tuesday, June 22.

The pop-up test site will offer free testing without appointment from 11am to 7pm on the grounds of Bandon Community Hospital at Cloghmacsimon.

This follows on from pop-up testing offered in recent weeks at a number of other locations across Cork.

The testing is available to those living in the area who are aged 16 and over, do not have Covid-19 symptoms and have not tested positive for Covid-19 in the last six months.

Anyone presenting for the walk-in testing must bring a photo ID and provide a mobile phone number to get their test results. The pop-up testing is part of a planned roll-out of walk-in testing in several parts of the region in recent weeks by the Department of Public Health (HSE South); the National Ambulance Service and supported by CKCH.

Dr Sheehan thanked Cork people who have come forward for pop-up testing as part of a planned roll-out of walk-in testing in several parts of the region in recent weeks.

She said that by coming forward for testing, people are helping the entire community to keep Covid-19 under control.

The level of Covid-19 infection in Cork remains stable and walk-in testing like this is one of the ways we can make sure that continues. I encourage anyone in the area to take up this opportunity for testing as it will help us to contain any cases of Covid-19 in the area, she said.
New figures show that 492 cases of Covid-19 were reported in Cork in the 14 days up to June 16.

According to the provisional figures from the Health Protection Surveillance Centre, Cork has the seventh-highest 14-day incidence rate of Covid-19 per 100,000 people nationally at 90.6.

Limerick has the highest 14-day incidence of the virus per 100,000 people at 346.3 while it is lowest in Sligo at 6.1.

The figures show the five-day moving average of cases in Cork is 34.

Nationally, 4,739 cases were reported in the same period.

This evening, Chair of the NPHET Irish Epidemiological Modelling Advisory Group, Professor Philip Nolan, said that all indicators of the disease are improving nationally.

In a tweet he said there was hope and optimism as we close out the week noting that the 14-day cumulative incidence is below 100 (95 per 100,000) for the first time since 17 Dec 2020.

Hope and optimism as we close out the week. 14-day cumulative incidence below 100 (95 per 100,000) for the first time since 17 Dec 20. 7-day average case count for today and the last five Fridays  a 27% fall.

21-May442

28-May409

04-Jun413

11-Jun327

18-Jun321



1/6 pic.twitter.com/tD3XTK6Hg2  Professor Philip Nolan (@President_MU) June 18, 2021

He urged people to get their vaccine as soon as it is their turn.

Meanwhile, in the few weeks left until we all have had the opportunity to be vaccinated, stick to the simple measures to prevent spread. We have come this far, and we are nearly there, he said.
Ireland could begin to receive the lions share of the European Unions Brexit adjustment fund before the end of the year.

The State is set to receive over 1 billion of the 5.34 billion Brexit Adjustment Reserve (BAR), under a provisional agreement reached today by the Council of the EU and the European Parliament.

Minister for Finance Paschal Donohoe welcomed the swiftly reached preliminary agreement, with the fund to support Ireland in managing the impact of Brexit.

The significant allocation of this special instrument to Ireland recognises the disproportionate impact of Brexit on key sectors, he said.

With todays agreement we are much closer to funds being disbursed before the end of 2021 and that is most welcome.

'Act of solidarity'

The Minister said the preliminary agreement between the Portuguese presidency of the Council and negotiators from the European Parliament must be endorsed by the two institutions, before the regulation can be adopted.

Minister for European Affairs, Thomas Byrne, said Government representatives had been relentless in arguing that allocation of the fund should reflect the countries most affected by Britains departure from the EU.

This is an act of solidarity from other EU member states to help us deal with the obvious negative effects of Brexit, he said of the preliminary agreement.

The fund is a one-off emergency payment designed to compensate businesses for lost trade, preserve jobs, help fishing communities and build customs facilities at ports.

Some 80 per cent of the total 5 billion fund will be disbursed as pre-financing, with 1.6 billion to be paid out in 2021, 1.2 billion in 2022 and 1.2 billion in 2023.

The remaining 20 per cent or 1 billion will be made available in 2025 and shared among EU member states depending on how the funding has been spent in the previous years.

Allocation of the fund to member states is based on three main factors, which are the value of fish caught in the UK-exclusive economic zone, the importance of trade with the UK and the population of maritime border regions with the UK.
Public health officials are mulling a recommendation against non-essential travel to the North due to the rise in Delta variant cases there.

The National Public Health Emergency Team (Nphet) may well have to give consideration to advising against non-essential travel to Northern Ireland, according to chief medical officer Dr Tony Holohan.

While Nphet has not formally given this advice, it is keeping a very close eye on the threat posed by variant cases in the North, Dr Holohan said.

Officials from the Republic are due to discuss the issue with their Northern colleagues on Friday.

More than 20 per cent of sequenced cases in the North are variant cases, compared to about 5 per cent in the Republic.

Speaking at a press briefing on Friday, Dr Holohan said the North is facing a significant challenge from the spread of the variant in some areas. He described Derry as a hotspot for the virus, with its seven-day incidence of 130 cases per 100,000 people one of the highest on the island.

Dr Holohan advised people to make their own risk assessments when deciding on travel to the North.

Officials are advising against non-essential travel to Britain, where the proportion of variant cases is now over 90 per cent in parts.

Summer holidays

On summer holidays, he said the continued advice for people is not to travel unless youre fully vaccinated.

Referring to the planned resumption of travel within Europe from July, he said Nphet would like to see this happen because of the extent of vaccination in the population, but the focus should be on people who are immunised.

Asked about people in their 20s, he said he would advise them not to travel if they are not vaccinated. There are plenty of good holiday opportunities in this country, he said.

In relation to parents who are vaccinated, he said Nphet would not be making recommendations about children because they are not at present being offered vaccines.
Three men have been arrested after an incident on Dublins South William Street that reportedly saw a group throw glass at restaurant workers.

The incident took place last night at around 9.30pm and resulted in one of the workers attending hospital for their injuries.

Gardai are investigating the incident, which follows recent reports of public disorder around the city centre area.

Gardai are investigating reports of a group of four persons causing a disturbance on South William Street, a Garda statement said.

It is reported the group threw glass and glass bottles at staff members of a premises in the area.

One such staff member attended St James Hospital for non-life threatening injuries.

Garda attended the scene and three men, two early 20s and one late teens, were arrested and taken to Pearse Street Garda station.
A High Court judge has ordered that two children of separated parents who were removed by their mother to the Republic from Northern Ireland must be returned there.

The children, aged eight and 12, were habitually resident with their mother in Northern Ireland until she removed them last autumn, without the fathers consent, and brought them to the Republic.

She opposed the father application for their return and the children said they wished to stay in the Republic.

In a judgment published this week, Ms Justice Mary Rose Gearty stressed the childrens return to the North was sought by their father under the Hague Convention on Child Abduction and not family law proceedings where the court could make decisions based on welfare grounds alone.

Safe return

Having concluded the children must be returned, she said she would hear any application for a stay, noting it is not proposed the father will become a carer for the children and had not offered undertakings in respect of their security and safe return.

The father, she found, had established he was exercising custody rights under the Convention at the time of the childrens removal without his consent.

The mother thus had to show the children would either be at grave risk if returned to North or are well established in the Republic, she said.

In alleging grave risk, the mother had claimed the father is a threat and danger to both children. She alleged, inter alia, he had been abusive physically and sexually and previously violated a restraining order obtained by her.

The judge said the dates of alleged offences on foot of which prosecutions were initiated against the father corresponded with supervised access visits, the only occasions the children were with the father before their removal. Each of the prosecutions were withdrawn.

Alleged conduct

There was insufficient evidence to decide whether the allegations about the father were true but, even if true, the alleged conduct was not sufficient to establish the children, if returned, would be at grave risk of harm from the father.

This was because the children are rarely in their fathers company and their access visits to him are supervised in a contact centre, as required under family court orders. The centre had confirmed, in the very few visits which occurred, the relationship between father and children appeared warm.

There was no evidence of grave risk to the children which cannot be addressed by the NI courts and social services, she added.

Children's objections

The childrens objections to returning to North appeared to relate to the general environs in the Republic, their friends and social context of their new home and school more so than to the father, she said. Their objections about him must also be seen in the context of relatively little contact with him over the years, which contact appeared not wholly negative.

An assessor had expressed the view the children appeared to have been exposed to chronic parental conflict, she noted. The judge was concerned how the younger child, who had not lived with her father since aged two, had built up a picture of parental conflict, save from hearing reports from her mother. No complaint was made about the fathers extended family in Northern Ireland, she noted.

The mother had not proven she would be destitute if she returns with the children to the North, she held.

The overarching concern of the Convention is to support the relationship of children with both their parents as being overwhelmingly in their best interests, save in the most unusual cases.

As the mother had not established grave risk or that the children are well settled in the Republic, their return must be ordered, the judge ruled.

As family law issues remain before the North's courts, a formal change of residence might later be made which accommodates regular access with the father, she noted. Removing the children without his consent was not an appropriate way of moving to a new home and there may be irreparable harm to the childrens long term psychological health if their relationship with their father is abruptly severed.
Muireann Duffy

Two Georgian nationals who facilitated human trafficking by providing people with false documentation in order to travel to the State have been sentenced.

Vakjtang Jokhadze (48) and Sophia Grdzelishili (46), who are legally divorced but reside together, acted as a distribution network to provide Georgian nationals with fake driving licences and identification cards from EU countries.

Dublin Circuit Criminal Court heard they received orders for false documents which would be passed on to someone who would create them. The accused would then post the false documents to their customers in various European countries.

The court heard it was not the case that people were coerced or forced to travel to the state for nefarious purpose such as prostitution or forced labour, but rather that asylum seeking and economic migration were the causes of the illegal immigration.

Plea

Jokhadze and Grdzelishili, both with an address at St Jarlaths Road, Cabra, Dublin, pleaded guilty to facilitating the trafficking of illegal immigrants within the State on respective dates between June 1st, 2019 and June 26th, 2019, and October 30th, 2019 and December 10th, 2019.

Jokhadze also pleaded guilty to money laundering, making a gain by deception and possession of false instruments at various locations in Dublin on dates between August 29th, 2012 and June 26th, 2019.

Gredzelishili also pleaded guilty to possession of false instruments at her address on October 30th, 2019 and December 10th, 2019.

Garnet Orange SC, prosecuting, told the court that it was the prosecution's case that all other offences were committed in order to facilitate the offences of human trafficking.

Passing sentence on Friday, Judge Martin Nolan said that for the service of facilitating illegal immigration into this country, the accused were paid considerable quantities of money.

Judge Nolan said the individuals using the services of the accused were not downtrodden or vulnerable people. He said they were people from Georgia who wanted to improve their financial lots and escape a country they did not want to live in.

He added that as human trafficking goes, this is not of a sinister variety.

'Serious matter'

Judge Nolan said what they both did was quite serious and to facilitate illegal immigration on this scale is a serious matter.

He said a court must engage in a balancing act where there is a dependent child. He said this was not such a serious case that it would require the court to adopt a course of imprisonment if it would seriously damage an innocent child by doing so.

The judge sentenced Jokhadze to four years imprisonment, which he backdated to when the accused first went into custody in October 2019.

He sentenced Grdzelishili to three years imprisonment, but suspended the sentence in its entirety on strict conditions.

Judge Nolan said if it were not for Grdzelishili having a teenage son, for whom she is the primary carer, she would be going to prison as he thought she deserved a custodial sentence.

During the sentencing hearing, Detective Sergeant Anthony Collins told Mr Orange that in the latter part of the last decade, a garda investigation commenced in relation to the illegal trafficking of people into the State, specifically focused on Georgian nationals.

Packages

Det Sgt Collins said the two accused were not the initial targets of the investigation. He said they came to the attention of gardai as the GPO was being used by numerous organisations gardai had an interest in and Jokhadze was observed sending packages.

In June 2019, the accused man attempted to post four packages in the GPO to various European countries. These packages were seized and found to contain collectively 15 false documents purporting to have been issued in several EU countries.

Det Sgt Collins explained that a criminal process that had been ongoing for 12-18 months prior to the accused's arrest involving people who were seeking false documents contacting the accused via messaging applications and being quoted a price list for various documents.

The accused acted as middle men in the process or as the distribution network, receiving the orders and then passing them on to the person who would make the false documents. The accused would then post the false documents to the customers in various locations in Europe.

Det Sgt Collins said that in general, these customers were Georgian nationals wishing to travel to Ireland in order to seek asylum, to simply live in the State or to travel to the UK.

They were provided with false documents purporting to be from Slovakia, Romania, Latvia or Lithuania, as EU documents received less scrutiny. The documents were of high quality and would pass muster for cursory inspection despite missing some security features.


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Consumers will spend more money shopping online this summer in response to ads they see on social media if deals are offered by vendors. Shoppers also are more receptive to chat commerce, a potential new trend.

Smartly.io, a social advertising automation platform for creative and performance marketers, on April 29 announced new research underscoring the role social media plays in influencing shoppers in a world changed by the pandemic.

Now more than ever, brands are seeking ways to stay relevant. Marketers must be prepared for every possible scenario as they face varying stages of reopening across regions. They also must be keenly aware of a range of preferences from consumers, noted Smartly researchers.

The Smartly survey found that consumers are still relying on social media to stay in touch. Specifically, more than half (56 percent) of global respondents and 64 percent of those in the UK said they are using social media to connect with friends and family.

Dynata conducted the global survey of 1,000 consumers in the U.S., UK, Germany, and Australia. The research explored consumer sentiment around social media today. The results offer eye-opening insights for brands to consider for their advertising strategies.

Consumers anticipate a return to normalcy. That, in turn, reflects their eagerness to spend, said Robert Rothschild, CMO, vice president and global head of marketing at Smartly.io.

"For brands, social media provides an opportunity to reach targeted consumers in an impactful way. To be successful, marketing teams must balance their strategy to current consumer preferences across platforms, formats, and audiences. Relevant, localized, and timely content will be key to winning share in a competitive marketplace." he told the E-Commerce Times.

Chatting Trending

Recent research by chat commerce provider Clickatell shows a growing interest among consumers in using the chat apps they use to talk to friends and family -- to make purchases. This could be a supplement to social media ads that influence consumers.

Although the report primarily focuses on the use of chat apps to deal with banks, it also shows increasing appeal for using chat apps to buy merchandise.

Clickatell's first Chat Commerce Trends Report finds that 70 percent of respondents would use a chat app with banks and retail vendors as a communications channel. The report also revealed that 77 percent are open to purchases via their chat apps.

The survey results released March 30 of over 1,000 U.S. banking consumers conducted by Dimensional Research in partnership with Clickatell suggest that chat is the next big thing for customer service, marketing, and payments. U.S. consumers show an interest in extending the use of chat from friends and family conversations to commerce.

Almost nine in 10 consumers already use chat apps, such as WhatsApp, Apple's iMessage, Facebook Messenger, Twitter, and Instagram chat on mobile devices, the research shows. It also demonstrates that 54 percent have used a chat app to talk to a business, with younger generations doing so at even higher rates.

Consumers have moved to chat in mass. It is becoming the number-one preferred digital engagement platform, according to Pieter de Villiers, CEO and co-founder of Clickatell.

"This research reveals that they are now ready to do business with the brands they love on their favorite chat apps," he said. "Banks and other brands need to meet consumers where they are, which is on chat, or risk losing mindshare."

Basic New Marketing Tool

Social media is becoming a fundamental part of the marketing stack, suggested Robert Rothschild in a Smartly blog discussing the "2021 Retail Social Advertising Forecast."

Retail has been well ahead of other industries with incorporating social media advertising in their marketing mix. The accelerated shift to e-commerce in 2020, driven by a global pandemic, further underscored the value of this strategy, according to Rothschild.

"It became clear that social advertising is essential to engaging the right consumers," he wrote in his Nov. 19, 2020 entry.

Facebook First

Facebook remains the most popular social media platform, according to the survey results, followed by YouTube and Instagram. More than one-third of global consumers (38 percent) said they have used Facebook the most in the month leading up to the survey.

YouTube polled at 18 percent, and Instagram came in at 15 percent. Additionally, global consumers are most open to receiving video ads on social media right now (27 percent), followed by photo carousels (23 percent), and Stories (19 percent).

One year and counting into the varying waves of Covid-19, pandemic fatigue has not hit consumers yet. More than half of global consumers (51percent) said they still want brands to acknowledge the pandemic in their ads. For example, they want to see how brands relate to safety measures and updated store hours.

Consumers are opening their wallets more as the pandemic continues to evolve. For instance, 35 percent of global consumers said the social media ads they encountered recently have spurred them to make a purchase online. That spending trend is up from 26 percent in August 2020 when Smartly.io previously surveyed consumers.

Additionally, 38 percent of global consumers said they would be most open to purchasing clothing/apparel via social media in the next 30 days. But they want added inducements such as deals and discounts.

Also, 45 percent of global respondents said they would like to see ads with deals and discounts from travel brands. This is particularly high in Australia, where 59 percent of respondents said they are looking for deals and discounts from travel brands' advertising.

Lastly, 55 percent of global respondents said they would like to see deals and discounts in advertising from grocery stores, followed by local offers from nearby stores (42 percent).

About the Study

Smartley.io commissioned Dynata to survey 1,000 adult consumers to understand their preferences and attitudes towards social media, including channel use, engagement with ads, and purchasing decisions.

Respondents were located in the U.S., UK, Germany, and Australia. All respondents were over the age of 18. The survey was conducted in March 2021.

Jack M. Germain has been an ECT News Network reporter since 2003. His main areas of focus are enterprise IT, Linux and open-source technologies. He is an esteemed reviewer of Linux distros and other open-source software. In addition, Jack extensively covers business technology and privacy issues, as well as developments in e-commerce and consumer electronics. Email Jack.


Tens of thousands of malnourished children risk dying in hard-to-reach areas of Ethiopia's conflict-wracked Tigray region, now hit by famine, the United Nations said Friday. "Without humanitarian access to scale up our response, an estimated 30,000-plus severely malnourished children in those highly inaccessible areas are at high risk of death," UNICEF spokesman James Elder told reporters in Geneva.

He said the UN children's agency was working with other organisations to help address the crisis, but was lacking access to large parts of the region. "An estimated 33,000 severely malnourished children in currently inaccessible areas in Tigray are at high risk of death," he said. "The world cannot permit that to happen."

His comments came a day after the UN said some 350,000 people in Tigray were facing famine, while two million more people were just a step away from those extreme conditions. "There is famine now in Tigray," UN humanitarian chief Mark Lowcock said Thursday, warning that "every expert you speak to will tell you this is going to get a lot worse". Lowcock said fresh data showed the number of people classified as being in famine conditions was "higher than anywhere in the world at any moment since a quarter of a million Somalis lost their lives in 2011". The UN has said that more than 90 percent of the more than five million people in the Tigray region need emergency food aid, and has urgently appealed for more than $200 million to scale up its response.

Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, winner of the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize, sent troops into the northern region in November to detain and disarm leaders of the Tigray People's Liberation Front, the region's former ruling party. He said the move came in response to TPLF attacks on federal army camps. Though he vowed the conflict would be brief, fighting continues more than six months later and reports of atrocities -- including the widespread use of rape -- are proliferating. Many leaders have warned of a major catastrophe.

The United States and the European Union on Thursday issued a plea for greater international efforts to tackle the emerging famine. International aid organisations have complained repeatedly that they are being denied access to the region by Ethiopian forces and troops from neighbouring Eritrea. Tommy Thompson, the World Food Programme's emergency coordinator, lamented a "lack of political will to grant humanitarian access."

Speaking to the Geneva briefing via video-link from Ethiopia, he said "we can't get to at all" a full quarter of the area where WFP aid was believed to be needed in Tigray.

"In many of these places, nobody has gotten there, and this is where we understand that people are dying," he said.

In addition to access, he said there was a dire need for more funding of aid operations, and for hostilities in the region to stop, pointing out how dangerous it was for humanitarians to work in the places they could get to.

"There have been nine humanitarians who have been killed thus far," he said, adding that aid workers were being confronted with increasing hostility at checkpoints, while beneficiaries were often seeing the aid they were given looted.

"We find ourselves faced often with enormous protection issues, of providing assistance to beneficiaries, only to have those beneficiaries robbed violently."

The World Health Organization agreed that the lack of access to those in need was taking a devastating toll.

"We have teams at the ready, we have mobile clinics... that could provide nutrition, healthcare, all the services," spokeswoman Margaret Harris told journalists, adding though that only two-thirds were operational.

"Our teams are being turned away by warring parties," she said, describing the situation as "a public health crisis".

"Malnourished children are more likely to contract many infectious diseases and die of (them), such as pneumonia, diarrhoea, malaria and measles," she said, also warning of worrying increases in Covid-19 infections.

"There is potential for an explosive situation."
Nitrogen from agriculture, vehicle emissions and industry is endangering butterflies in Switzerland. The element is deposited in the soil via the air and has an impact on vegetation- to the detriment of the butterflies, as researchers at the University of Basel have discovered.

In the journal Conservation Biology, the research team reports a connection between this unintentional fertilization and the low diversity of butterflies in Switzerland. More than half of butterfly species in Switzerland are considered to be at risk or potentially at risk. Usually, the search for causes focuses on intensive agriculture, pesticide use and climate change. A research team led by Professor Valentin Amrhein from the University of Basel, however, has been investigating another factor- the depositing of nitrogen from agriculture and exhaust fumes from industry and traffic in soils via the air.

It was already known from previous studies that too much nitrogen leads to denser vegetation, but with a smaller selection of plant species. Nitrogen stimulates the growth of less demanding plants in particular, with more specialized species being displaced. "We wanted to find out whether a nitrogen surplus also indirectly affects the diversity of butterflies via this change in vegetation," explains Dr Tobias Roth, lead author of the study.

The team analysed data from Biodiversity Monitoring Switzerland on the diversity and prevalence of plants and butterflies on 383 plots throughout Switzerland. The result was clear: the more nitrogen introduced via the air to the areas studied, the less diverse the vegetation and hence the butterfly species. "As caterpillars, some butterfly species need certain plant species as food, or are dependent on a certain microclimate," Roth explains. Over-fertilization results in open, warm and dry places becoming cooler, shadier and damper due to stronger plant growth.

The nitrogen surplus impacts the prevalence of a large number of butterfly species in Switzerland, such as those that prefer open and dry sites. The researchers saw the clearest effect in rare and endangered species. "Nitrogen from the air is likely to be an important factor in the reason why these species are endangered," Roth remarks. Existing literature on the diversity of butterflies explains the presence or absence of species primarily in terms of habitat quality or climate. A literature review by the research team revealed that plant diversity and vegetation density have so far received less attention. "We believe that the impact of nitrogen enrichment on butterflies has been underestimated," says Amrhein. Nitrogen appears to play a similarly extensive role as climate change when it comes to butterfly diversity.

READ ALSO: Why Mysuru photographer Samanvitha Rao believes that butterflies can teach us about climate change

While the researchers do not see a simple approach for improving the situation, technical improvements continue to offer a certain potential. "In the past, the slurry was sprayed on farmland, for example, and some of this was transferred to other areas of land by the wind," Roth explains. Today, he says, drag hoses are used increasingly to apply the slurry directly to the soil. This reduces nitrogen input via the air to other areas where it is not wanted. In addition, buffer zones and adapted landscape management can also help to partially mitigate the negative impact on sensitive habitats: this includes measures to prevent scrub encroachment, such as grazing or more frequent mowing. This is beneficial not only for demanding plant species but also for butterflies.

According to the researchers, however, there is ultimately no way around environmentally-friendly consumer behaviour when it comes to reducing unwanted nitrogen input, for example through the reduction of vehicle emissions and livestock farming. Around two-thirds of nitrogen input into sensitive ecosystems in Switzerland, today originate from ammonia emissions from livestock farming.
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After killing off the Clarity EV last year, Honda is ending production of its hydrogen fuel-cell and plug-in hybrid Clarity models this summer, Autoblog has reported. The decision reportedly came due to weak demand and Honda's new focus on electrification, according to Nikkei.

The Clarity fuel-cell vehicle was handicapped in the US from the get-go with a high $71,200 price tag and a lack of hydrogen refueling infrastructure in the US. With the end of the Clarity EV, PHEV and fuel-cell models, Honda is currently building no electrified models at all in the US.

However, the company said that it will build enough Clarity fuel-cell models for lessees into 2022 and will provide support for the foreseeable future. Honda previously announced that it would release an electric car for 2024 and plans to only sell zero-emissions EVs by 2040.

Those could include EVs, but Honda hasn't given up yet on hydrogen either, having struck a deal with GM to develop fuel cell vehicles. However, most hydrogen in the US is made by reforming natural gas, so the fuel still releases greenhouses gases even though only water comes out a fuel-cell vehicle's tailpipe.
If youd like to test out new PlayStation 5 features before they go live for everyone, heres your chance. Sony is opening a beta program for PS5 system software, with a view to testing what is apparently a major update for later this year. Maybe well be able to expand the SSD? Sony will reveal more details about incoming features in the next few weeks.

Signups are limited to PS5 owners in the US, UK, Canada, Japan, Germany and France, and you need to be over 18 to take part. If youre selected, youll receive an email with info on how to download the beta firmware.

Microsoft has been running the Xbox Insider Program for years, and even Sony has tapped on its users to beta test patches on the PS4 . However, this seems bigger. Sony might need all the testers it can muster: PS5 is in its early stages, and it can still be difficult to find stock.

 Mat Smith

Windows 10 meets macOS.

Engadget

After dabbling with the (now infamous) Windows 11 leak for several hours, Devindra Hardawar says it feels an awful lot like macOS. This might be down to the sheer virtue of this early build being a very uncluttered, even Kondo-ed version of Windows 10. To start though, theres a new centered Taskbar, which behaves like it has since Windows 95, housing the Start menu button, active apps and your choice of shortcuts. However, it's all icons now. Read on for Devindras full impressions.

The second person, after Bill Gates, to hold both roles.

Microsoft has named CEO Satya Nadella as chair, marking the first time a person has held both positions since Bill Gates stepped down as chief exec in 2000. Its definitely another vote of confidence for a CEO that has strengthened the company on almost every front: Microsoft is the world's second-most valuable company behind Apple, with a market value above $1.9 trillion. Nadella has also overseen several successful acquisitions, including Minecraft, LinkedIn, GitHub and, more recently, gaming behemoth ZeniMax. Continue reading.

Good, because I cant wait around for Loki.

Disney

No, it wasnt a time anomaly that meant you were seeing the latest episodes of Marvels time-traveling caper a day early: Disney+ will now release new episodes of its TV series on a Wednesday. The previous series dropped the latest episodes on Fridays, but it might be that Disney is trying to capture that watercooler vibe, ensuring more people discuss its latest shows before the weekend hits. Any original movie that'll launch on Disney+ will still premiere on a Friday, so you should still have something to watch. Continue reading.

Something to play while we wait for Metroid Prime 4.

Nintendo

We talk to the creative force behind the 15-years-in-the-making Metroid series, Yoshio Sakamoto, who has guided it since the early days. The producer explains what is happening in Metroid Dread and where it fits in the wider story of Samus. Continue reading.

Mobile users will have to wait until September to play 'Pokemon Unite.'

Its almost time for Pokemon Unite . The "free-to-start" MOBA will be released on the Switch in July, and on mobile devices in September. As before, the hook is the cross-platform play  you'll eventually get to square off against rivals regardless of the device you use.

Of course, Unite isnt entirely free. You can earn more in-game rewards through seasonal battle passes (which will cost real-world money), and buy Aeon gems, which can help you bring more Pokemon into fights or obtain items for both your pocket monsters and your trainer. Continue reading.

But wait, theres more...

Honda to end production of its hydrogen and plug-in hybrid Clarity cars

Microsoft's latest Whiteboard makes it easier to blend home and office work

China successfully launches first crewed mission to its new space station

Xbox Design Lab returns to help you customize your controller

Snapchat is removing its speedometer filter amid legal issues
Enid, OK (73701)

Today

Sunshine and clouds mixed. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. High 84F. Winds ENE at 10 to 15 mph..

Tonight

Mostly clear. Low 63F. Winds ENE at 5 to 10 mph.
Chrissy Teigen's bullying victim Farrah Abraham thinks the model shouldn't be canceled despite what everybody on social media is demanding.

The 30-year-old told Hollywood Life that she doesn't believe in "cancel culture" but believes that what has happened between her and Teigen has been traumatic not only to them but for "the next generation."

Abraham thinks that Teigen should do the following, "Do a fricking reset, because reflecting and reviewing helps people so much."

She also cited an example from her life when she left her MTV reality show in 2017.

"I reflected, I reviewed and I knew that I didn't want to put myself around a toxicity that made me act out in such horrible ways and it was very awful to be stuck in that rut."

Abraham added, "And whatever rut that Chrissy is stuck in, I think some good reflection, time away from work will help."

The former "Teen Mom" is still not ready to accept the cookbook author's apology for cyberbullying her on Twitter years ago because, as far as Abraham is concerned, Teigen has not formally apologized to her or any of the people she publicly shamed.

Speaking to TMZ, though Chrissy Teigen posted a lengthy letter on Medium, Farrah Abraham believes that she still lacked the "emotional or mental capability at this time to apologize properly to anyone."

Abraham insisted that what the Swimsuit Illustrated model wrote that said "'I can't handle what I've done and the damage I'm going to go take care of myself and my family'" is something "I don't ignore when I need to go and apologize to somebody."

If John Legend's wife "experienced a breakthrough," the reality star believes Teigen can become the "changed person she claims she is right now - but is not."

With Chrissy Teigen losing a lot of brand deals right now, Abraham hopes that this will be a wake-up call for the mother-of-two and "take care of herself."

Abraham even hopes that Chrissy Teigen could bounce back and have a promising career moving forward despite being bullied in the past.

READ ALSO:Ghislaine Maxwell Abused in Jail? Socialite's Disgusting Condition and 'Mistreatment' As An Inmate LEAKED

Chrissy Teigen's Non-Apology

Chrissy Teigen's old tweets have surfaced in the last few months where she cyberbullied and targeted different celebrity women.

Early this week, the 35-year-old posted an apology to realize that she was "insecure and immature."

Teigen claims she is in the process of "privately reaching out to people," but people like Abraham and the other victims have yet to hear from the model.

Meanwhile, Chrissy Teigen's husband was asked by TMZ how she's doing recently, and John responded, "She's doing great."

READ MORE: Kanye West Sports 'Jesus Mask,' 'Devil' Attitude During Deposition; Faces Sanctions [DETAILS]

See Now: Famous Actors Who Turned Down Iconic Movie Roles
Kim Kardashian has begun a new chapter in her life as she's currently studying to follow the footsteps of her late Father in the field of law, but will this hinder her from expressing her femininity in social media?

In the recent reunion of "Keeping Up With The Kardashians" following its finale, Andy Cohen asks the "KKW Cosmetics" CEO whether she will cover up or continue posting sexy photos on social media even if she becomes a lawyer.

"I thought about this... you can do it all, you can do whatever you want." she said. (watch a clip from the show below)

The reality TV star then proceeded to tell a story about the time she went to the White House as a speaker after she just posted a bikini photo, "I hope they're not looking at my Instagram while I'm here."

Kardashian continued to say an empowering message by stating that people should remain as they are, and it's freeing to be a 40-year-old woman who's in the best shape of her life.

She then stated that she would post a picture of her in a bikini if she wants because it's "powering."

Although the "SKIMS" founder is all for showing provocative pictures around the internet, she has her reservations, "I also don't want to embarass my kids or make them feel away."

READ NOW: Tati Westbrook Youtube Comeback Makes Explosive Revelations on Marital Problems, Controversies, and MORE

Other Kardashians feel "comfortable" with sexy appearance

Following Kim's statement, Cohen then asked the rest of the Kardashian-Jenner clan whether they would limit themselves in appearing suggestively.

Khloe then stated that the rest of her family is "comfortable" with what they're doing, and they support each other every step of the way.

Even though the support system is excellent within their family, Khloe revealed that they have a group chat where they ask each other if they're going to post specific photos. Kim said she was stopped one time when she attempted to share a photo of her butt for "National Peach Day."

Kim's law career

As we previously reported, the reality TV star revealed in an episode of "KUWTK" that she failed her baby bar exam even though she studied 10 to 12 hours a day and spent a lot of time away from her children.

Kim was so close to the passing grade, which is 560, but she only scored 474.

Although she experienced a significant failure in her law career, her sisters still support her no matter what.

In 2019, Kim announced that she would be studying to become an attorney. She also had experience in court before as she and her mentor, Van Jones, worked on a case to save Alice Johnson from a life sentence.

READ ALSO: Chrissy Teigen Bullying Victim Farrah Abraham Wants Model To Do THESE Amid Publicized Old Tweets

See Now: Famous Actors Who Turned Down Iconic Movie Roles
Is Angelina Jolie rekindling her romance with her former husband, Jonny Lee Miller?

According to reports, the "Maleficent" actress made a bold move to her ex by introducing two of her sons to him.

Last week, Jolie had been spotted in New York City with her kids and turned heads after arriving at Miller's apartment in Brooklyn.

After her first visit, Jolie was once again seen at Miller's apartment on June 15 with her son Pax, 17.

Two days later, The Sun reportedly that not only Miller met Pax, but also Angelina Jolie's youngest son, Knox, 12.

An insider revealed to the outlet that Miller and Knox "got on like a house on fire" during their first meeting.

They described the 12-year-old as a "sweet kid," and the insider believes Jolie decided that Knox was the easiest person to start his introductions with.

Meanwhile, Pax was also reportedly keen on meeting his mother's former husband.

"Pax was curious to meet this guy she's always spoken so fondly about."

Though Pax, Jolie, and Miller only hung out for a short period at the Brit's apartment, the insider also shared how they also got along well.

Angelina Jolie leaving her ex-husband Jonny Lee Millers apartment with her son Pax, when they were in NYC. pic.twitter.com/7wTuQoEnfK  best of angelina jolie (@bestofajolie) June 15, 2021

The insider also maintained that the "Tomb Raider" actress is excited about the possibility of Jonny Lee Miller being a confidant for her 17-year-old son.

The latter also expressed interest in moving to the Big City.

According to the insider, "Angie is very happy because Pax keeps making noise about moving to New York someday soon.

Maybe even for school." "She's glad he'll have someone she trusts around for him to go to for advice or just to see a friendly face."

#AngelinaJolie Daily Fail at its best  New Old pixs of Angie and kids visit to NYC - this time leaving the hotel. They cut out the kids - this was the day Angie, Pax and Knox were seen getting hotdogs. pic.twitter.com/9wdYU9nAwJ  Toastie (@Toastiewiththe) June 16, 2021

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Angelina Jolie, Jonny Lee Miller - Are They Dating?

But despite what everybody is saying, Angelina Jolie and Jonny Lee Miller have rekindled their romance; another source told People magazine that the two are "just friends."

The pair got married from 1996 until 1999 and have divorced on good terms.

In a previous interview with Heavy, Miller said that he doesn't regret the marriage and is not bitter about it ending.

"Marriage was something that didn't work out, and I had to make the decision sooner or later."

Angelina Jolie also referred to her ex-husband as "still a great friend" in previous interviews.

After their marriage, Angelina Jolie married Billy Bob Thornton from 2000 until 2003. Later on, she dated Brad Pitt in 2005, got married in 2014, and split in 2016.

Pitt and Jolie share six kids.

READ MORE: Kylie Jenner, Travis Scott 'Rekindled' Their Romance But On One Condition, Source Says

See Now: Famous Actors Who Turned Down Iconic Movie Roles
Prince Harry dated a lot of women before Meghan Markle came into the picture.

One of his most notable ex-girlfriends is Chelsy Davy. She and the Duke of Sussex dated for six years.

Before Meghan Markle's whirlwind romance with the royal, many royal experts strongly believed that he and Chelsy would eventually get married.

In a documentary about Prince William and Kate Middleton, Prince Harry and Chelsy discussed where experts see the last couple to be a "magical fit" for one another.

Richard Kay said that there was "great passion between the two of them when they're together."

He added, "There's electricity, there's sparks flying everywhere."

"You can tell though they have a very volatile relationship, tremendous shouting matches, screaming rows, but then they get back together again."

Amid the royal romances, Kay believed that Prince Harry and Chelsy Davy's relationship was the "real true thing. It's the real deal."

Astrologer Penny Thorton also agreed with Kay, saying that astrologically, Prince Harry and Chelsy "are a perfect match," even comparing them to the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.

During that time, she went on to say how it would be difficult for her to see how he will replace the Zimbabwe-born businesswoman with anyone else.

However, if the couple did end up getting married, Kay believed that it would be a very stormy marriage.

Because if they tied the knot, their on-again, off-again relationship was volatile.

Kay explained that they're often on shouting matches and screaming rows, but they would get back together in the end.

READ ALSO: Prince Harry To Skip Diana's Statue Unveiling? Expert Explains Why And It's Not Because of Lilibet or Meghan

Why Prince Harry and Girlfriend Chelsy Davy Broke Up

Many people suspected that the reason for their breakup was because Chelsy doesn't like all of the media attention she's been getting.

She even talked about it in an interview, recalling, "I found it very difficult when it was bad. I couldn't cope... I was trying to be a normal kid and it was horrible."

The Duke of Sussex's biographer Angelina Levin even noted that Chelsy realized she made the right choice of calling off their relationship after attending Prince William and Kate Middleton's royal wedding years ago.

Levin wrote in her 2018 biography "Harry: Conversations with the Prince," "Seeing the enormity and pomp of the day convinced Chelsy that she and Harry had been right to separate.

She added that though they have so many things in common, they came from different worlds - with the Prince, from the royal family and her, a commoner. It would never work for them, per Chelsy.

Despite their breakup, Prince Harry and Chelsy Davy remained on good terms.

She even attended Prince Harry's wedding to Meghan Markle in 2016 and was even invited to Prince Charles' 60th birthday.

READ MORE: Is THIS The Reason Prince Harry Is Losing So Much Hair?

See Now: Famous Actors Who Turned Down Iconic Movie Roles
Across the world, prisons are increasingly used as instruments of social control. With its huge undertrial population in jails, India is headed in the same direction. Measures like restricting visitors' access to prisons only aggravate the situation.

The Indian reality of prisons is a picture of jails overflowing with undertrial prisoners, most of whom are from poor and marginalised communities. Thousands of them continue to languish in prisons despite landmark judgments by the Supreme Court and various high courts.

Many of them are in prison for petty and minor offences and are unable to avail of bail due to a lack of suitable sureties or an inability to pay cash bail. The 2015 judgment of the Supreme Court by the two-judge bench of Justices Madan Lokur and U U Lalit to immediately release undertrial prisoners who have completed half the period of the maximum possible sentence on a Personal Recognizance (PR) Bond, is a reiteration of the earlier judgment of the apex court in September 2014 which passed the same directions. The Court has directed the National Legal Services Authorities (NALSA) to coordinate with state authorities and the home ministry to ensure that state undertrial review committees are established in every district within a month. These must consider release of undertrial prisoners entitled to the benefit of Section 436A of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC).
Apart from holding the Maratha reservations unconstitutional, the Supreme Court also interpreted the 102nd amendment to take away the power of state governments to designate communities as socially and educationally backward classes. This particular aspect of the Courts judgment is poorly reasoned, goes contrary to the express provisions of the Constitution and threatens to upset well-set principles and practices in relation to reservations in India.

The Supreme Courts constitution bench judgment in Dr Jaishree Laxmanrao Patil v The Chief Minister1 (hereinafter Patil) not only struck down the 2018 Maharashtra law but also interpreted the Constitution (One Hundred and Second Amendment) Act, 2018 (102nd Amendment Act) to the Constitution. Unlike its unanimous conclusion that the 2018 Maharashtra law was unconstitutional, the Court was unable to agree on the interpretation of the 102nd amendment. The five judges were split three to two on this aspect with Justice Ravindra Bhat, Justice Nageswara Rao and Justice Hemant Gupta in the majority and Justices Ashok Bhushan and Abdul Nazeer in the minority.

Continuing the analysis of the Patil judgment from last months column (Kumar 2021), in this column, I will first give a brief background to the 102nd amendment itself and its content before going into an analysis of the opinions of the judges on its interpretation. Given that Justice Bhat has delivered the opinion with the most detailed reasoning on this aspect on behalf of the majority and Justice Bhushan has spoken for both himself and Justice Nazeer, I will be comparing the approaches of the two judges in this context. In my view, Justice Bhats approach to interpreting the 102nd amendment is constitutionally unsound and in this column, I will also explain why, arguing that Justice Bhushans approach to the matter is correct.
2021-06-18

Maeci

The Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Luigi Di Maio, will be in Spain, today and tomorrow, to participate in the 18th edition of the Spain-Italy Dialogue Forum.

The Dialogue Forum, which will be attended by Prime Minister Mario Draghi and Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, is a traditional annual meeting between the most authoritative representatives of the business and academic worlds of the two countries. This year the focus of the debate will be the Next Generation EU and the Conference on the Future of Europe. The previous edition of the Forum had been held in Rome, on 19 and 20 October 2020.

On the sidelines of the Forum, the Minister will speak, in virtual format, at the plenary session of the Conference on the Future of Europe and will have a bilateral meeting with his Spanish counterpart Arancha Gonzalez Laya.
2021-06-17

Maeci

The Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Luigi Di Maio, received today, at the Foreign Ministry, the Speaker of the Libyan House of Representatives, Aguila Saleh. The meeting took place a few days before the Ministerial Conference on Libya to be held in Berlin, on 23 June, further evidence of the growing commitment by the international community to the United Nations action for peace and stability in Libya.

First of all, the Minister reiterated Italy's full support for the stabilisation of the country and its determination to cooperate with the interim authority and with all the institutions of the Libyan State, in order to support the next stages of the institutional transition process, in which the House of Representatives is called upon to play a decisive role.

In particular, he stressed the urgency of defining the constitutional and legal basis and approving the electoral law, so that the elections can actually be held on the scheduled date of 24 December.

Minister Di Maio also emphasised the importance of approving the unified budget for 2021, which is essential for improving social conditions in the country, and the urgency of fully implementing the ceasefire agreement, starting with the withdrawal of all foreign fighters and mercenaries from the country.

At the bilateral level, the Foreign Minister also confirmed Italy's interest in further consolidating the path to revitalising the Italian-Libyan partnership, as demonstrated most recently by the success of Prime Minister Dabaiba's visit to Rome and the interest in the Libyan market shown during the Business Forum held at the Foreign Ministry, on the sidelines of the meeting.

In addition to the reactivation of projects in the traditional sectors of cooperation, starting with infrastructure, Minister Di Maio also stressed that Italy is ready to initiate and deepen cooperation in other strategic areas, such as energy, culture, archaeology and health.
Researchers from Colorado State University, Amazon, and Dartmouth College published a new paper in the Journal of Marketing that examines the role of physical stores for selling "deep" products.

The study, forthcoming in the Journal of Marketing, is titled "How Physical Stores Enhance Customer Value: The Importance of Product Inspection Depth" and is authored by Jonathan Zhang, Chunwei Chang, and Scott Neslin.

While some traditional offline retailers are struggling and are closing stores (e.g., Macy's, Walgreens), online retailers are opening them (e.g., Amazon, Warby Parker). This conflicting trend raises the question, what is the physical store's role in today's multichannel environment?

The research team posits that products differ in the inspection depth - "deep" or "shallow" - customers require to purchase them. Deep products require ample inspection in order for the customer to make an informed decision. We propose that physical stores provide the physical engagement opportunity customers need to purchase deep products.

To test this thesis, the researchers conducted three studies. The first used transaction data from a national multichannel outdoor-product retailer. Two lab experiments demonstrated the same effect.

The large-scale transactional data involving 50,000 customers show that by using a "deep products in-store" promotional strategy to migrate new customers from a "low-value state" to a "high-value state," average spending per trip increases by 40%, long-term sales increases by 20%, and profitability increases by 22%.

The lab experiments show that:

-By onboarding new customers to purchase a "deep product in-store" as their first purchase from a new retailer, their re-patronage intention for this retailer increases by 12% compared to all other product/channel combinations.

-By directing new customers to purchase a "deep product in-store" as their first purchase from a new retailer, they are more likely to: 1) buy deep products in the future online, indicating that they generalize trust across channels; and 2) buy adjacent categories online, indicating that they generalize trust across categories.

The last decade has witnessed a marked increase in the opening of physical stores by online retailers, despite myriad changes in the retailing environment. This attests that these findings are not ephemeral. Zhang says "The general lesson of our research is for retailers to create a concrete, tangible, and multi-sensory experience for customers buying products that require this physical engagement. This sets the stage for favorable experiential learning and increased customer value." Retailers can do this in numerous ways:

First, when retailers find that a customer is buying deep products online but their spending is decreasing in value, they can provide a promotion for deep products in-store. This can increase customer value.

Second, retailers need to enhance physical engagement for deep products through merchandising and training sales personnel to walk customers through the engagement - e.g., by helping customers try and use deep products in-store.

Third, retailers cannot infer product inspection depth solely from predefined product categories because there is much variation in inspection depth within a particular category. Rather, management should infer inspection depth using the proposed measures, or expert, independent judges.

Fourth, retailers should use a deep/offline onboarding strategy for new customers. That is, they should use acquisition channels that encourage the first purchase to be deep/offline.

Zhang adds that "We also discuss related issues such as using stores versus showrooms; fielding full or limited staff; selling private label goods; designing loyalty and buy online, pickup in-store (BOPIS) programs; and leveraging technology to create physical engagement in online settings."

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Full article and author contact information available at: https:/ / doi. org/ 10. 1177/ 00222429211012106

About the Journal of Marketing

The Journal of Marketing develops and disseminates knowledge about real-world marketing questions useful to scholars, educators, managers, policy makers, consumers, and other societal stakeholders around the world. Published by the American Marketing Association since its founding in 1936, JM has played a significant role in shaping the content and boundaries of the marketing discipline. Christine Moorman (T. Austin Finch, Sr. Professor of Business Administration at the Fuqua School of Business, Duke University) serves as the current Editor in Chief. https:/ / www. ama. org/ jm

About the American Marketing Association (AMA)
The loss of a loved one can be a defining moment, even in the animal world. In chimpanzees, for example, individuals whose mothers die when they are young are smaller than their counterparts, reproduce less and are also more likely to die at a young age. But why? To find out, an international research team* led by a CNRS researcher** studied the short- and long-term effects of maternal loss on the stress levels of orphaned chimpanzees over a 19-year period. By comparing the levels of a stress hormone marker, cortisol, between young and adult orphans and non-orphans, the scientists found that young orphans were highly stressed; however, those who had lost their mothers for more than two years or who were adults at the time of the study were no more stressed than other chimpanzees whose mothers were still alive. This means that they do not suffer from chronic stress, unlike in humans, where children whose mothers die when they are very young are subject to chronic stress throughout their lives. According to the research team, chimpanzees often adopt young orphans, which could be one of several explanations why the stress of maternal loss does not persist. Since stress alone cannot explain the differences between orphans and non-orphans, the researchers now want to look at chimpanzee mothers to see whether they contribute to these differences, for example whether mothers offer protection to offspring that is not available to orphans. The results of this work were published in eLife on 16 June 2021.

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* - Also involved in this work were scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology (Germany), the Centre Suisse de recherches scientifiques Tai Chimpanzee Project (Ivory Coast Harvard University (USA), the University of Stirling (UK), Florida International University (USA), the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF; Central African Republic), the Robert Koch Institute (Germany) and l'Universite Felix Houphouet (Ivory Coast).

** - Working at l'Institut des sciences cognitives Marc Jeannerod (CNRS/Universite Claude Bernard Lyon 1)
Colorado State University Professor of Psychology Silvia Sara Canetto has spent many years researching patterns and meanings of suicide by culture, trying to make sense of the variability in women's and men's suicide mortality around the world. Suicide rates are generally higher in men than in women, but not everywhere - which suggests cultural influences.

Canetto and colleagues have completed a new study that provides insight into what may contribute to men's suicide vulnerability. The study tests Canetto's theory that men's suicide mortality is related to men's private-life behaviors, specifically their low engagement in family care work - not just the adversities they may encounter in aspects of their public lives, such as employment.

Theories of male suicide

Many theories have been proposed to explain male suicide, Canetto said. Most link men's suicide mortality to the stresses and the demands of their employment and their economic-provider roles. These theories typically predict that male suicide rates would be higher when their employment and economic-provider roles are under threat.

Within this perspective, the typical suicide-prevention recommendation is to strengthen men's employment/economic provider role, for example, via programs that protect or support finding employment. Studies show, however, that economic adversities, including male unemployment, do not fully explain men's suicide vulnerability.

According to Canetto, men overinvest in economic-provider work, and underinvest in family care work--a pattern that leaves them vulnerable when economic-provider work is threatened or lost.

Men's family caregiving, unemployment, and suicide

The multinational and multidisciplinary study, published in Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology by Canetto, Ying-Yeh Chen, ZiYi Cai, Qingsong Chang, and Paul Yip, offers evidence of a suicide-protective role for men who engage in family caregiving. In their study, family caregiving was defined as, for example, providing personal care or education for a child, and/or providing care for a dependent adult.

The researchers examined suicide, male family caregiving, and unemployment in 20 countries, including the United States, Austria, Belgium, Canada and Japan. Suicide rates were found to be lower in countries where men reported more family care work.

In countries where men reported more such care work, higher unemployment rates were not associated with higher suicide rates in men. By contrast, in countries where men reported less family care work, higher unemployment rates were associated with elevated male suicide rates. Incidentally, unemployment benefits did not reduce male suicide rates.

Taken together, the findings of this ecological study suggest that men's family care work may protect them against suicide, particularly under difficult economic circumstances, Canetto said.

"Our study took a public health perspective. It examined population-level social and economic factors that may be driving population suicide patterns, across a range of countries," Canetto said. "Its findings point to new directions for suicide prevention."

"It appears that men benefit from doing family care work in terms of suicide protection. Doing family care work would be a way for men to diversify their sources of meaning and purpose, as well as their social capital and networks" stated Canetto. Men's greater involvement in family care work would also relieve women of their disproportionate caregiving load, and give children more resources.

The study's findings suggest incorporating support for engagement in family care work in programs aimed at reducing men's suicide mortality. "This means expanding beyond dominant frameworks of men's suicide prevention with their employment-support focus," Canetto explained. "It also means going beyond treating suicide as just a mental health problem to be solved with mental health 'treatments.'"

Finally, Canetto pointed out that the study's findings are consistent with other research findings. Collectively, they suggest that "having both family care work and family economic responsibilities is more conducive to well-being, health and longevity for men and women than a gendered division of family labor."

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Link to paper:
A decade-long study of the most common forearm fracture in older adults revealed that personalized medicine catering to a patient's individual needs and environment, not age or X-rays, should guide treatment options.

Led by a Michigan Medicine physician, the research team examined treatment outcomes over two years for patients who fractured their distal radius, the larger of two bones in the forearm. They found no one-size-fits all method for treating the fracture, which more than 85,000 Medicare beneficiaries sustain annually.

"Traditionally, surgeons look at these broken bones on X-rays, and they have to assess various ways of fixing it based off fracture anatomy and patient age," said Kevin Chung, M.D., study lead and Charles B. G. De Nancrede Professor of Surgery at Michigan Medicine. "However, in older patients, we determined that the patient-centered care in tailoring particular treatments to their needs, social environment and risk tolerance for surgery are all considerations in prescribing treatment."

The new study, published in JAMA Network Open and funded by the National Institutes of Health, covered more than 180 participants studied at more than 20 global medical centers over a 10-year period.

"For hand surgery, this is the most intense, collaborative effort to try and answer a 200-year puzzle about distal radius fractures in older adults," Chung said. "It is one of the most common fractures in the world for this patient population - you have parents and grandparents that will get this fracture. For the good of public health, we needed to answer this question."

Participants in the trial were randomized to receive one of three treatment strategies, including volar locking plates, external fixation, and pinning. Those who chose not to have surgery were treated with casting. Although participants treated with volar plating reported better ability to perform daily tasks early on in the follow-up period of the trial, that gap between plating and other methods disappeared at the six-month mark. All participants were satisfied with the outcomes at the study's conclusion.

"Surgeons need to know how to perform all the techniques available to treat distal radius fracture, rather than being so ingrained to using just the plating system because, now, most trainees are taught just that system," Chung said. "But there are so many fracture patterns that require one to have all the tools and skills necessary to make sure patients receive tailored treatment for their injuries."

The results show that the interaction between the surgeon, the patient and the patient's family is key because satisfaction of the patients demands a much more personal approach than the singular interest of fixing a broken bone, Chung said.

"We know that chronological age doesn't determine a patient's physiological age," he said. "When someone is 70 years old, they may be physiologically 40-50. Those patients have a need to get back to physical activities and independent living, so we should treat them more aggressively."

Recruitment for a trial lasting 10 years proved difficult for the research team. The older people participating in this historic study, some struggling with transportation, wanted to help others, Chung said.

"It is difficult to participate in this trial because of the time and effort invested by the patients," he said. "These are special people. They contributed their lives for the science of helping other older patients who will suffer from this fracture. Their commitment is inspirational to us, which kept our research team going, despite overwhelming challenges. We are grateful to our study participants, the National Institutes of Health and the support of the American people."

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Paper cited/DOI: "Comparison of 24-Month Outcomes After Treatment for Distal Radius Fracture," JAMA Network Open. DOI: doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2021.12710
CHICAGO --- Scientists have long known the brain's hippocampus is crucial for long-term memory. Now a new Northwestern Medicine study has found the hippocampus also plays a role in short-term memory and helps guide decision-making.

The findings shed light on how the hippocampus contributes to memory and exploration, potentially leading to therapies that restore hippocampal function, which is impacted in memory-related aging and neurodegenerative diseases such as dementia, the study authors said.

In the study, scientists monitored participants' brain activity and tracked their eye movements while looking at different complex pictures. The scientists discovered that as we visually scan our environment and absorb new information, our hippocampus becomes activated, using short-term memory to better process new visual information to help us rapidly reevaluate situations.

How our memory helps us scan new environments

Imagine walking down the street and noticing an awkwardly parked car on your neighbor's lawn. Maybe you quickly dismiss it and move on. But when you see an ambulance and fire truck approaching your location, you connect the dots and look back to see the scene of an accident. By using short-term memory to guide where you look, the hippocampus allows you to reexamine the car and form a lasting memory of the accident.

"At any given moment, your brain rapidly initiates eye movements that you are typically unaware of," said corresponding author James Kragel, a postdoctoral research fellow at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. "Our findings suggest the hippocampus uses memory to inform where your eyes look, thereby priming the visual system to learn and reevaluate our environment on the fly.

"If you didn't look back and see the crash, you might not encode that important information, but in using short-term memory retrieval, you can tie those clues together and remember details that cue bigger memories. It all comes down to building connections among these disparate elements that allow you to remember them later in a much easier way."

The study will be published June 18 in the journal Science Advances.

"These findings emphasize that although hippocampal-dependent memory is typically considered a thing of the past, in fact, it operates in the moment to optimize our behavior and decision-making," said senior study author Joel Voss, associate professor of medical social sciences, neurology, and psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Feinberg. "This is key to understanding hippocampal function and developing effective treatments for memory disorders."

"It is as if you are using your memory to plan for what to expect, and then when it mismatches with what is actually unfolding, your hippocampus gets activated to reevaluate and update your current perception of what is going on," Kragel said.

Tracking eye movements to learn more about memory

The study was conducted on patients with epilepsy who were undergoing neurosurgical monitoring at Northwestern Memorial Hospital to localize the source of their seizures. They had electrodes implanted in their brains to map seizure-related brain activity. During their stay in the epilepsy-monitoring unit, participants performed a memory task in which they studied lists of complex scenes with multiple people and objects (e.g. someone sitting at a park bench with food on the table, things happening in the background) followed by a memory test.

During the test, the participants indicated whether a presented scene was old or new. Throughout the task, the authors simultaneously recorded eye movements and neural activity to link hippocampal activity to memory-guided behaviors.

When studying a scene for the first time, participants often returned their gaze to a location they had just viewed hundreds of milliseconds prior. These "revisitation" eye movements enhanced spatiotemporal memory for scenes (remembering where an object was located or the sequence in which something happened). Brain recordings revealed the brain networks involved in generating these "revisitations," as hippocampal activity shifted just before their execution. Increases in brain activity followed revisitations, which Kragel believes may form a lasting memory of the scene and its elements.

"This shows that the hippocampal contribution to memory unfolds over just hundreds of milliseconds during ongoing behavior, which is surprising given that the timecourse of its involvement, typically seen in long-term memory retrieval, is usually thought to be days to years," Voss said.

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Other Northwestern co-authors include Dr. Stephan Schuele, chief of epilepsy and clinical neurophysiology at Northwestern Medicine; Dr. Stephen VanHaerents, assistant professor of neurology, medical education and neurology at Feinberg; and Dr. Joshua Rosenow, professor of neurological surgery, neurology and physical medicine and rehabilitation at Feinberg.
Experiments suggest evidence for novel patterns of electronic charge distribution in a kagome material whose handedness can be manipulated with a magnetic field

An international team led by researchers at Princeton University has uncovered a new pattern of ordering of electric charge in a novel superconducting material.

The researchers discovered the new type of ordering in a material containing atoms arranged in a peculiar structure known as a kagome lattice. While researchers already understand how the electron's spin can produce magnetism, these new results provide insights into the fundamental understanding of another type of quantum order, namely, orbital magnetism, which addresses whether the charge can spontaneously flow in a loop and produce magnetism dominated by extended orbital motion of electrons in a lattice of atoms. Such orbital currents can produce unusual quantum effects such as anomalous Hall effects and be a precursor to unconventional superconductivity at relatively high temperatures. The study was published in the journal Nature Materials.

"The discovery of a novel charge order in a kagome superconductor with topological band-structure which is also tuneable via a magnetic field is a major step forward that could unlock new horizons in controlling and harnessing quantum topology and superconductivity for future fundamental physics and next-generation device research," said M. Zahid Hasan, the Eugene Higgins Professor of Physics at Princeton University, who led the research team.

The discovery's roots lie in the workings of two fundamental discoveries in the 1980's. One is the quantum Hall effect - a topological effect which has been the subject of decades-long research. The Hall effect was the first example of how a branch of theoretical mathematics, called topology, could fundamentally change how to describe and classify the matter that makes up the world. Important theoretical concepts on the quantized Hall effect were put forward in 1988 by F. Duncan Haldane, the Thomas D. Jones Professor of Mathematical Physics and the Sherman Fairchild University Professor of Physics, who in 2016 was awarded the Nobel Prize.

The second precedent was the discovery of the unconventional high-temperature superconductor which was the subject of the Nobel Prize in 1987. The unusual state of these superconductors has puzzled scientists. Important theoretical concepts on loop currents as a precursor of unconventional superconductivity were put forward in late 1990s by several theorists. In both cases, the key proposal is that the charge can flow in a special lattice to produce effects like orbital magnetism. However, direct experimental realization of such a highly speculative type of electronic quantum charge order is extremely challenging.

"The realization of orbital current type charge order would require the materials to have both strong interactions and special lattice geometries that were realized only the last few years," said Hasan.

Through several years of intense research on several geometrical lattice systems (Nature 562, 91 (2018); Nature Phys 15, 443 (2019), Phys. Rev. Lett. 123, 196604 (2019), Nature Commun. 11, 559 (2020), Phys. Rev. Lett. 125, 046401 (2020), Nature 583, 533 (2020), Nature Reviews Physics 3, 249 (2021), the team gradually realized that kagome superconductors can host such topological-type charge order. Dozens of superconductors with kagome lattices have been discovered over the last 40 years but none showed the desired pattern. One notable kagome superconductor is AV3Sb5 (A=K,Rb,Cs), which early experiments have shown to contain hints of a hidden order around 80 degrees Kelvin, making it a plausible platform for looking for the topological-type charge order.

"Superconductivity often suggests instabilities for the charge of the system, and the kagome lattice is known to be a frustrated lattice system," Hasan said. "The kagome superconductors can form various exotic charge orders, including the topological-type charge order related to their global band-structure. That led us to our search in this family, although it was not clear whether this superconductivity was unconventional when we started to work on this material."

The Princeton team of researchers used an advanced technique known as sub-atomic-resolution scanning tunneling microscopy, which is capable of probing the electronic and spin wavefunctions of material at the sub-atomic scale with sub-millivolt energy resolution at sub-Kelvin temperatures. Under these fine-tuned conditions, the researchers discovered a novel type of charge order that exhibits chirality - that is, orientation in a particular direction - in AV3Sb5.

"The first surprise was that the atoms of the material rearrange themselves into a higher-order (superlattice) lattice structure that was not expected to be there in our data," said Yuxiao Jiang, a graduate student at Princeton and one of the first co-authors of the paper. "Such a superlattice has never been seen in any other kagome system known to us."

The superlattice was the first hint to the researchers that there could be something unconventional in this material. The researchers further increased the temperature of the material to find that the superlattice disappeared above the critical temperature of the hidden phase estimated from the electrical transport behavior of the bulk of the material.

"This consistency gives us the confidence that what we observed is more likely to be a bulk ordering phenomenon rather than a surface effect," said Jia-Xin Yin, an associate research scholar and another co-first author of the study.

Hasan added, "For a bulk charge order, we need to examine further whether there is an energy gap and whether the charge distribution in the real space shows any reversal across the energy gap."

The researchers soon checked both points to confirm again that the unexpected charge order shows a striking charge reversal across the energy gap, which also disappears at the same critical temperature. The accumulated experimental evidence established that the researchers observed a charge order in a kagome material, which has never been reported in any other kagome system.

"Now we are in a position to ask the bigger question: whether it can be a topological charge order?" said Hasan.

Yin added, "Luckily, through our systematic research of geometrical lattice systems over recent years, we have developed a vector magnetic field-based scanning tunneling microscopy methodology to explore any potential topological feature of the material."

Fundamentally, the magnetic field applied on an electronic system leads to a nontrivial topology: the magnetic flux quantum (h/e) and quantum Hall conductance (Ne2/h, related to Chern number N, a topological invariant) are governed by the same set of fundamental constants, including the Planck's constant h and elemental charge e; the vector nature of the field can differentially interact with the chirality of topological matter to provide access to effects related to the topological invariant.

The researchers performed experiments on the charge order at zero magnetic field, a positive magnetic field, and a negative magnetic field. "Before the data was taken, we really didn't know what would happen," Hasan said.

Once the experiments were complete, Jiang said, the answer to the question of topological-like charge order was "yes."

"We found that the charge order actually exhibits a detectable chirality, which can be switched by the magnetic field," Jiang said.

The researchers are excited about their initial discovery. "Before the claim could be made, we still needed to reproduce this result multiple times, to rule out effects from the scanning probe, which may be extrinsic in nature," said Yin.

The researchers further spent several months to find that this magnetic field-switchable chiral charge order is ubiquitous in KV3Sb5, RbV3Sb5 and CsV3Sb5. "Now we are convinced that it is an intrinsic property of this class of material," Hasan added, "And that's very exciting!"

The magnetic field explicitly breaks time-reversal symmetry. Therefore, their observation shows that the chiral charge order in the kagome lattice breaks time-reversal symmetry. This is somewhat analogous with the Haldane model in the honeycomb lattice or the Chandra Varma model in the CuO2 lattice.

Researchers further identified the direct topological consequence of such chiral charge order. With the help of first-principle calculations of the band structure, the team found that this chiral charge order will produce a large anomalous Hall effect with orbital magnetism, which is consistent with the existing transport result which was interpreted differently in a previous work.

Now the theoretical and experimental focus of the group is shifting to the dozens of compounds with kagome lattice flatband properties and also superconductivity. "This is like discovering water in an exoplanet - it opens up a new frontier of topological quantum matter research our laboratory at Princeton has been optimized for," Hasan said.

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The research included contributions from scientists at Princeton University, the University of Zurich, the University of California-Santa Barbara, Wuhan National High Magnetic Field Center, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, the Paul Scherrer Institute, Cornell University, Nanyang Technological University, Boston College, Julius Maximilians University of Wurtzburg, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

In addition to Yu-Xiao Jiang and Jia-Xin Yin, equal contributions were made by Nana Shumiya of Princeton, M. Michael Denner of University of Zurich, Brenden R. Ortiz of the University of California-Santa Barbara, and Gang Xu of Huazhong University of Science and Technology.

The study, "Unconventional chiral charge order in kagome superconductor KV3Sb5," was published in the journal Nature Materials on June 11, 2021. DOI: https:/ / doi. org/ 10. 1038/ s41563-021-01034-y .

Experimental and theoretical work at Princeton University was supported by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation and sample characterization was supported by the U. S. Department of Energy. Support was also received from National Science Foundation, the California NanoSystems Institute, the German Research Foundation, and the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program.
Pioneering technology developed by UCL (University College London) and Africa Health Research Institute (AHRI) researchers could transform the ability to accurately interpret HIV test results, particularly in low- and middle-income countries

Pioneering technology developed by UCL (University College London) and Africa Health Research Institute (AHRI) researchers could transform the ability to accurately interpret HIV test results, particularly in low- and middle-income countries.

Academics from the London Centre for Nanotechnology at UCL and AHRI used deep learning (artificial intelligence/AI) algorithms to improve health workers' ability to diagnose HIV using lateral flow tests in rural South Africa.

Their findings, published today in Nature Medicine, involve the first and largest study of field-acquired HIV test results, which have applied machine learning (AI) to help classify them as positive or negative.

More than 100 million HIV tests are performed around the world annually, meaning even a small improvement in quality assurance could impact the lives of millions of people by reducing the risk of false positives and negatives.

By harnessing the potential of mobile phone sensors, cameras, processing power and data sharing capabilities, the team developed an app that can read test results from an image taken by end users on a mobile device. It may also be able to report results to public health systems for better data collection and ongoing care.

Lateral flow tests - or rapid diagnostic tests (RDTs) - have been used throughout the COVID-19 pandemic and play an important role in disease control and screening.

While they provide a quick and easy way of testing outside of clinical settings, including self-testing, interpretation of test results can sometimes be challenging for lay people.

Self-testing relies on people self-reporting results for clinical support and surveillance purposes. Evidence suggests that some lay caregivers can struggle to interpret RDTs because of colour blindness or short-sightedness.

The new study examined whether an AI app could support HIV testing decisions made by fieldworkers, nurses and community health workers.

A team of more than 60 trained field workers at AHRI first helped build a library of more than 11,000 images of HIV tests taken in various conditions in the field in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, using a mobile health tool and image capture protocol developed by UCL.

The UCL team then used these images as training data for their machine-learning algorithm. They compared how accurately the algorithm classified images as either negative or positive, versus users interpreting test results by eye.

Lead author and Director of i-sense Professor Rachel McKendry (UCL London Centre for Nanotechnology and UCL Division of Medicine) said: "This study is a really strong partnership with AHRI that demonstrates the power of using deep learning to successfully classify 'real-world' field-acquired rapid test images, and reduce the number of errors that may happen when reading test results by eye. This research shows the positive impact the mobile health tools can have in low- and middle-income countries, and paves the way for a larger study in the future."

A pilot field study of five users of varying experience (ranging from nurses to newly trained community health workers) involved them using the mobile app to record their interpretation of 40 HIV test results, as well as capture a picture of the tests to automatically be read by the machine learning classifier. All participants were able to use the app without training.

The machine learning classifier was able to reduce errors in reading RDTs, correctly classifying RDT images with 98.9% accuracy overall, compared to traditional interpretation of the tests by eye (92.1%).

A previous study of users of varying experience in interpreting HIV RDTs showed the accuracy varied between 80% and 97%.

Other diseases that RDTs could support include malaria, syphilis, tuberculosis, influenza and non-communicable diseases.

First author Dr Valerian Turbe (UCL London Centre for Nanotechnology) and i-sense researcher in the McKendry group said: "Having spent some time in KwaZulu-Natal with fieldworkers organising the collection of data, I've seen how difficult it is for people to access basic healthcare services. If these tools can help train people to interpret the images, you can make a big difference in detecting very early-stage HIV, meaning better access to healthcare or avoiding an incorrect diagnosis. This could have massive implications on people's lives, especially as HIV is transmissible."

The team now plan a larger evaluation study to assess the performance of the system, with users of differing ages, gender and levels of digital literacy.

A digital system has also been designed to connect to laboratory and healthcare management systems, where RDT deployment and supply can be better monitored and managed.

AHRI Clinical Research Faculty Lead, Professor Maryam Shahmanesh (UCL Institute for Global Health), said: "Trials we have conducted in the area have found that HIV self-testing is effective in reaching large numbers of adolescents and young men. However, HIV self-testing has been less successful in linking people to biomedical prevention and treatment. A digital system that connects a test result and the person to healthcare, including linkage to antiretroviral therapy and pre-exposure prophylaxis, has the potential to decentralise HIV prevention and deliver on UNAIDS goals to eliminate HIV."

Dr Kobus Herbst, AHRI's Population Science Faculty lead, added: "This study shows how machine learning approaches can benefit from large and diverse datasets available from the global South, but at the same time be responsive to local health priorities and needs."

The researchers also suggest that real-time reporting of RDT results through a connected device could help in workforce training and outbreak management, for example by highlighting 'hotspots' where positive test numbers are high. They are currently extending the approach to other infections including COVID-19, and non-communicable disease.

Former AHRI Director Professor Deenan Pillay (UCL Infection & Immunity), said: "As digital health research moves into the mainstream, there remain serious concerns that those populations most at need around the world will not benefit as much as those in high income settings. Our work demonstrates how, with appropriate partnerships and engagement, we can demonstrate utility and benefit for those in low- and middle-income settings."

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Left hands and right hands are almost perfect mirror images of each other. But whatever way they are twisted and turned, they cannot be superimposed onto each other. This is why the left glove simply won't fit the right hand as well as it fits the left. In science, this property is referred to as chirality.

Just like hands are chiral, molecules can be chiral, too. In fact, most molecules in the cells of living organisms, such as DNA, are chiral. Unlike hands, however, that usually come in pairs of left and right, the molecules of life almost exclusively occur in either their "left-handed" or their "right-handed" version. They are homochiral, as researchers say. Why that is, is still not clear. But this molecular homochirality is a characteristic property of life, a so-called biosignature.

As part of the MERMOZ project (see info box), an international team led by the University of Bern and the National Centre of Competence in Research NCCR PlanetS, has now succeeded in detecting this signature from a distance of 2 kilometers and at a velocity of 70 kph. Jonas Kuhn, MERMOZ project manager of the University of Bern and co-author of the study that has just been published in the journal Astronomy and Astrophysics, says: "The significant advance is that these measurements have been performed in a platform that was moving, vibrating and that we still detected these biosignatures in a matter of seconds."

An instrument that recognizes living matter

"When light is reflected by biological matter, a part of the light's electromagnetic waves will travel in either clockwise or counterclockwise spirals. This phenomenon is called circular polarization and is caused by the biological matter's homochirality. Similar spirals of light are not produced by abiotic non-living nature", says the first author of the study Lucas Patty, who is a MERMOZ postdoctoral researcher at the University of Bern and member of the NCCR PlanetS,

Measuring this circular polarization, however, is challenging. The signal is quite faint and typically makes up less than one percent of the light that is reflected. To measure it, the team developed a dedicated device called a spectropolarimeter. It consists of a camera equipped with special lenses and receivers capable of separating the circular polarization from the rest of the light.

Yet even with this elaborate device, the new results would have been impossible until recently. "Just 4 years ago, we could detect the signal only from a very close distance, around 20 cm, and needed to observe the same spot for several minutes to do so", as Lucas Patty recalls. But the upgrades to the instrument he and his colleagues made, allow a much faster and stable detection, and the strength of the signature in circular polarisation persists even with distance. This rendered the instrument fit for the first ever aerial circular polarization measurements.

Useful measurements on earth and in space

Using this upgraded instrument, dubbed FlyPol, they demonstrated that within mere seconds of measurements they could differentiate between grass fields, forests and urban areas from a fast moving helicopter. The measurements readily show living matter exhibiting the characteristic polarization signals, while roads, for example, do not show any significant circular polarization signals. With the current setup, they are even capable of detecting signals coming from algae in lakes.

After their successful tests, the scientists now look to go even further. "The next step we hope to take, is to perform similar detections from the International Space Station (ISS), looking down at the Earth. That will allow us to assess the detectability of planetary-scale biosignatures. This step will be decisive to enable the search for life in and beyond our Solar System using polarization", says MERMOZ principal investigator and co-author Brice-Olivier Demory, professor of astrophysics at the University of Bern and member of the NCCR PlanetS says.

The sensitive observation of these circular polarization signals is not only important for future life detection missions. Lucas Patty explains: "Because the signal directly relates to the molecular composition of life and thus its functioning, it can also offer valuable complementary information in Earth remote sensing." It can for instance provide information about deforestation or plant disease. It might even be possible to implement circular polarization in the monitoring of toxic algal blooms, of coral reefs and the effects of acidification thereon.

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Publication details:

C.H. Lucas Patty et. Al., Biosignatures of the Earth I. Airborne spectropolarimetric detection of photosynthetic life, Astronomy & Astrophysics https:/ / doi. org/ 10. 1051/ 0004-6361/ 202140845

SAINT-EX - Search and characterisation of exoplanets

The SAINT-EX research group (funded by the SNF Professorship of Prof. Brice-Olivier Demory) focuses on the:

-detection of temperate Earth-sized exoplanets (SAINT-EX observatory), -remote sensing of life in planetary atmospheres/surfaces (MERMOZ), -instrumentation for non-invasive, in-vivo cancer diagnosis and staging (BrainPol).

The MERMOZ (Monitoring planEtary suRfaces with Modern pOlarimetric characteriZation) project aims to investigate whether we can identify and characterize Earth's life from space, by building a benchmark library of surface feature signatures with remote full-Stokes spectro-polarimetry. In this framework, our planet is considered as a proxy for other solar system bodies and exoplanets.

MERMOZ is a project in partnership between the Universities of Bern, Leiden and Delft (NL).

The project's feasibility study is funded by the Centre for Space and Habitability (CSH) and the NCCR PlanetS.

More information on the SAINT-EX/MERMOZ research group: https:/ / www. saintex. unibe. ch/

NCCR PlanetS: Planet research made in Switzerland

In 2014, the Swiss National Science Foundation awarded the University of Bern the National Centre for Competence in Research (NCCR) PlanetS, which it manages together with the University of Geneva.

Since its involvement in the first moon landing in 1969, the University of Bern has been participating in space missions of the major space organizations, such as ESA, NASA, ROSCOSMOS and JAXA. It is currently co-leading the European Space Agency's (ESA) CHEOPS mission with the University of Geneva. In addition, Bernese researchers are among the world leaders when it comes to models and simulations of the formation and development of planets.

With the discovery of the first exoplanet, the University of Geneva positioned itself as one of the leading institutions in the field. This led, for example, to the construction and installation of the HARPS spectrograph on ESO's 3.6 m telescope at La Silla in 2003 under Geneva's leadership. This was followed by the ESPRESSO instrument on ESO's VLT telescope in Paranal. The "Science Operation Center" of the CHEOPS mission is also in Geneva.

ETH Zurich and the University of Zurich are also partner institutions in the NCCR PlanetS. Scientists from the fields of Astrophysics, Data Processing and Earth Sciences lead projects and make important contributions to NCCR PlanetS research. In addition, ETH is a world leader in instrumentation for various observatories and space missions.

The NCCR PlanetS is organized into the following research areas:

-Early stages of planet formation -Architecture of planetary systems, their formation and evolution -Atmospheres, surfaces and the interior of planets -Determination of the habitability of planets.

More information: http://nccr-planets. ch/

Bernese space exploration: With the world's elite since the first moon landing

When the second man, "Buzz" Aldrin, stepped out of the lunar module on July 21, 1969, the first task he did was to set up the Bernese Solar Wind Composition experiment (SWC) also known as the "solar wind sail" by planting it in the ground of the moon, even before the American flag. This experiment, which was planned and the results analyzed by Prof. Dr. Johannes Geiss and his team from the Physics Institute of the University of Bern, was the first great highlight in the history of Bernese space exploration.

Ever since Bernese space exploration has been among the world's elite. The University of Bern has been participating in space missions of the major space organizations, such as ESA, NASA, ROSCOSMOS and JAXA. It is currently co-leading the European Space Agency's (ESA) CHEOPS mission with the University of Geneva. In addition, Bernese researchers are among the world leaders when it comes to models and simulations of the formation and development of planets.

The successful work of the Department of Space Research and Planetary Sciences (WP) from the Physics Institute of the University of Bern was consolidated by the foundation of a university competence center, the Center for Space and Habitability (CSH). The Swiss National Fund also awarded the University of Bern the National Center of Competence in Research (NCCR) PlanetS, which it manages together with the University of Geneva.
A hydrogel that forms a barrier to keep heart tissue from adhering to surrounding tissue after surgery was developed and successfully tested in rodents by a team of University of California San Diego researchers. The team of engineers, scientists and physicians also conducted a pilot study on porcine hearts, with promising results.

They describe their work in the June 18, 2021 issue of Nature Communications.

In rats, the hydrogel prevented the formation of adhesions altogether. In a small pilot study, porcine hearts treated with the hydrogel experienced less severe adhesions that were easier to remove. In addition, the hydrogel did not appear to cause chronic inflammation.

Adhesions--organ tissue sticking to surrounding tissue--are a relatively common problem when surgeons need to operate again at the same site, which happens in 20 percent of cases every year in cardiac surgery. Re-operations are particularly common when the patients are children suffering from cardiac malformations--as the child's heart grows, additional interventions are needed.

Adhesions form within the first 30 days post-op and can complicate operations and increase the risk of mortality during interventions. In some cases, they can also interfere with proper heart function or completely prevent a repeat surgery. One of the paper's senior authors, UC San Diego bioengineering professor Karen Christman, experienced this when one of her uncles couldn't have a heart valve repaired because of severe adhesions.

"Our work is an engineering solution driven by a medical problem," said Christman, who co-founded a company, Karios Technologies, to bring the hydrogel into the clinic. "And now it's poised to significantly improve cardiac surgery, both for adults and children."

The work brought together not only bioengineers and physicians, but also chemists and materials scientists.

In academic medical centers such as UC San Diego, most surgeons conduct repeat operations and encounter adhesions fairly regularly. In this study, in rats, 70 percent of animals in the control group developed severe adhesions.

Currently there are no FDA approved products marketed for preventing adhesions after heart surgery. "This product will have a significant impact on the lives of many patients who potentially require repeat operations, either on the heart or anywhere else in the body," said Dr. Michael M. Madani, chair of the Division of Cardiovascular and Thoracic Surgery at UC San Diego Health and one of the paper's co-authors.

How it's made

By contrast, the hydrogel developed by bioengineers in Christman's lab is designed specifically to meet both the patients' and surgeons' needs. It's sprayable, so easy to apply. Once sprayed onto tissue, it binds to the heart muscle and turns into a soft, elastic coating that creates a protective barrier, while still allowing for movement. The gel can be easily removed from tissue and dissolves after more than four to six weeks.

The biggest challenge was making sure that the hydrogel attaches strongly enough to the heart but doesn't swell, as swelling can put dangerous pressure on the heart. Christman and team used what's known as crosslinking chemistry, which consists of linking two molecules together with a covalent bond, to accomplish this. Masaki Fujita, the paper's first author and a visiting scientist in the Department of Bioengineering at UC San Diego, had the idea of using a compound known as catechol, similar to what mussels use to adhere to rocks, to ensure the hydrogel stayed in place on the heart.

Catechol contains an amino acid, L-dopa, that is a muscle binding protein. In this case, it was added to the gel base, a water soluble polymer, known as PEG. The result is a hydrogel that sticks onto the organ it is applied to, but then creates a protective barrier that lasts at least up to four weeks before dissolving. By that point, adhesions are less likely to form. To the researchers' knowledge, it's the first time this type of formulation has been used for preventing adhesions after surgery.

Spraying device

Researchers also designed a device to safely and accurately spray the hydrogel inside the area where open heart surgery is being performed. The device houses the hydrogel's two main components in two different chambers. Each component is made of PEG with different reactive groups that crosslink together to form the hydrogel. One of the solutions also includes the catechol-modified PEG to ensure it stays on the heart. The two mix as they exit the device, forming a gel. The process is akin to using two cans of spray paint, for example blue and yellow, to create a third color, green.

Next steps and bigger picture

The next step is to do a large-scale trial in pigs to refine dosage and examine how the hydrogel binds to sutures and drains. The ultimate goal is to conduct a human pediatric study in 18 months to two years and bring the product to the FDA for approval in five years.

Karios Technologies is licensing the technology from UC San Diego. "We want feedback from surgeons," Gregory, CEO of Karios Technologies said. "We designed this material specifically for use on the heart and ease of use by the surgeon."

The technology could easily translate to other organs also requiring multiple operations and susceptible to adhesions, researchers said.

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The work was funded by the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute through the UC Center for Accelerated Innovation, and the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences through the UC San Diego Center for Clinical and Translational Research Institute.

Christman co-founded and holds equity interest in Karios Technologies, a startup that aims to commercialize the hydrogel technology. Dr. Madani is a consultant for the company. Christman, Fujita and Madani are inventors on patents and patent applications related to the work.
Irvine, CA - June 18, 2021 - A new study paves the way for the development of next generation therapeutics for the prevention and treatment of Clostridioides difficile infection (CDI), the most frequent cause of healthcare-acquired gastrointestinal infections and death in developed countries.

Published today in Nature Communications, the study reveals the first 3D structure of the Clostridioides difficile toxin B (TcdB) in complex with chondroitin sulfate proteoglycan 4 (CSPG4), a human receptor. The study was co-led by senior author Rongsheng Jin, PhD, a professor in the Department of Physiology & Biophysics at the University of California, Irvine, School of Medicine, and Min Dong, PhD, an associate professor at Harvard Medical School.

"TcdB is one of two homologous C. difficile exotoxins, which are major virulence factors responsible for the spread of C. difficile infections," explained Jin. "TcdB alone is capable of causing the full-spectrum of diseases associated with CDI in humans."

Previous studies had identified CSPG4 as a potential receptor for TcdB, however the pathophysiological relevance and molecular details were unknown. Results from this new study reveal a unique binding site involving TcdB and CSPG4, and also show that CSPG4-binding residues are highly conserved across most TcdB variants known to date.

CDI has become the most common cause of antibiotic-associated diarrhea and gastroenteritis-associated death in developed countries, accounting for approximately 223,900 infections, 12,800 deaths, and $1 billion in healthcare costs in the United States in 2017. It is classified as one of the top five "urgent threats" by CDC. There is also growing global concern surrounding the emergence of rapidly spreading hypervirulent C. difficile strains, reminiscent of the current COVID pandemic.

"What these new findings tell us is that a rationally designed CSPG4-mimicking decoy could neutralize major TcdB variants, providing a unique therapeutic avenue for combating some of the hypervirulent C. difficile strains," said Jin. In contrast, researchers also revealed that the therapeutic mechanism for bezlotoxumab, the only FDA approved anti-TcdB antibody, is sensitive to escaping mutations in some bacterial strains.

The current standard of care for CDI involves treatments using broad spectrum antibiotics, which often lead to frequent disease recurrence. While bezlotoxumab could reduce the recurrence rate of CDI in some patients, results from this and some earlier studies indicate it has weaker potency against some TcdB variants.

"We have designed a CSPG4-mimicking decoy based on the 3D structure we observed, which could neutralize major TcdB variants and is superior to bezlotoxumab on a major TcdB variant from a hypervirulent strain (TcdB2) in our studies. As a highly conserved cellular receptor of TcdB, a CSPG4 decoy molecule would be difficult for TcdB to escape, since any mutations that disrupt toxin binding to the decoy would also disrupt binding to its native receptors," said Jin.

The team of researchers has also developed a family of recombinant protein therapeutics based on these new findings, as well as on an earlier discovery on how TcdB recognizes another human receptor Frizzled (FZD).

"We are now examining the therapeutic features of these novel antitoxin molecules, and we believe they could provide broad-spectrum protection and neutralization against most known TcdB variants, thus improving existing antibody therapeutics for CDI," said Jin, whose team has filed a patent on these neutralizing molecules.

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This work was supported by part by the National Institutes of Health, Niedersachsisches Vorab, Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, and the Burroughs Wellcome Fund.

About the UCI School of Medicine

Each year, the UCI School of Medicine educates more than 400 medical students, and nearly 150 doctoral and master's students. More than 700 residents and fellows are trained at UCI Medical Center and affiliated institutions. The School of Medicine offers an MD; a dual MD/PhD medical scientist training program; and PhDs and master's degrees in anatomy and neurobiology, biomedical sciences, genetic counseling, epidemiology, environmental health sciences, pathology, pharmacology, physiology and biophysics, and translational sciences. Medical students also may pursue an MD/MBA, an MD/master's in public health, or an MD/master's degree through one of three mission-based programs: the Health Education to Advance Leaders in Integrative Medicine (HEAL-IM), the Leadership Education to Advance Diversity-African, Black and Caribbean (LEAD-ABC), and the Program in Medical Education for the Latino Community (PRIME-LC). The UCI School of Medicine is accredited by the Liaison Committee on Medical Accreditation and ranks among the top 50 nationwide for research. For more information, visit som.uci.edu.
Just as the skeleton and muscles move the human body and hold its shape, all the cells of the body are stabilised and moved by a cellular skeleton. Unlike our skeleton, this cellular skeleton is a very dynamic structure, constantly changing and renewing itself. It consists of different types of protein filaments, which include intermediate filaments and microtubules. Now, a research team from the University of Gottingen is the first to succeed in observing a direct interaction between microtubules and intermediate filaments outside the cell, and also in quantitatively measuring this interaction. The results of the study were published in Nature Communications.

Microtubules are dynamic filaments that constantly grow and shrink again and, in this way, are responsible for many important processes in cells. The research team observed that intermediate filaments stabilise microtubules: when intermediate filaments are added to microtubules, shrinkage is suppressed and thus the lifespan of the microtubules is extended. To investigate whether this is actually due to direct interactions between the two filaments, a single microtubule was positioned crossed with a single intermediate filament.

Dr Laura Schaedel, who shares first authorship of the publication with Charlotta Lorenz (PhD student at the Institute for X-ray Physics at the University of Gottingen), explains: "The intermediate filament was 'pulled' over the microtubule like a bow over a violin string." Lorenz adds, "This allows the two filaments to bind to each other. However, this bond is broken again shortly afterwards due to the pulling. The process of 'tearing apart' provides information about the strength of the bond." Professor Stefan Klumpp from the Institute for the Dynamics of Complex Systems at Gottingen University, who led the project together with Professor Sarah Koster from the Institute for X-ray Physics, says, "In addition, we used models and simulations to show that the direct interaction leads to stabilisation." The stabilisation of dynamic microtubules can be an important issue for biological cells, for example to regulate their local stability. "The interactions that we observed are important because they enable better understanding of cellular processes," says Koster.

These results are in turn relevant for understanding many other processes, such as those involved in diseased cells. The new method to take direct measurements of the actual interaction of two different biopolymers can also be applied to other protein filaments, as well as to non-biological fibres.

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Original publication: Laura Schaedel*, Charlotta Lorenz*, Anna V. Schepers, Stefan Klumpp#, and Sarah Koster#: Vimentin Intermediate Filaments Stabilize Dynamic Microtubules by Direct Interactions, Nat. Commun. 2021. Doi: 10.1038/s41467-021-23523-z . Text also available here: https:/ / www. nature. com/ articles/ s41467-021-23523-z

(*equal contribution; #corresponding author)

Contact:

Professor Sarah Koster

University of Gottingen

Institute for X-ray Physics

Friedrich-Hund-Platz 1, 37077 Gottingen, Germany

Tel: +49 (0)551/3929429

Email: sarah.koester@phys.uni-goettingen.de

http://www. uni-goettingen. de/ koesterlab
URBANA, Ill. - For the most accurate accounting of a product's environmental impact, scientists look at the product's entire life cycle, from cradle to grave. It's a grand calculation known as a life cycle assessment (LCA), and greenhouse gas emissions are a key component.

For corn ethanol, most greenhouse gas emissions can be mapped to the fuel's production, transportation, and combustion, but a large portion of the greenhouse gas calculation can be traced right back to the farm. Because of privacy concerns, however, scientists can't access individual farm management decisions such as fertilizer type and rate.

Nitrogen fertilizer data are an important piece of the calculation because a portion of these fertilizers wind up in the atmosphere in the form of nitrous oxide, a highly potent greenhouse gas. Corn nitrogen fertilizer data are publicly available at the national and state levels, but scientists argue this level of resolution masks what's really being applied on farms across the country and could lead to inaccurate LCAs for corn ethanol.

In a new study from the University of Illinois and the U.S. Department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory, researchers developed the first county-level nitrogen application datasets for corn, dramatically improving the accuracy of greenhouse gas calculations for the crop.

"Having good data is really important to foster both a shared discussion and greater confidence in LCAs. We've seen some abuses of life cycle analysis using really crude numbers, downscaling big averages that can really vary a lot. So even though the county level still isn't as precise as we would like, it's a big accomplishment to get to that scale," says Michelle Wander, professor in the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Sciences at Illinois and co-author on the study.

Hoyoung Kwon, principal environmental scientist in the Systems Assessments Center at Argonne and co-author on the study, says the protocol and findings will help the agricultural and bioeconomy community better understand the impacts of high-resolution nitrogen fertilizer data on corn-based biofuel LCAs.

"Nitrous oxide makes up about half of the total greenhouse gases associated with corn farming," Kwon says. "Now we can differentiate nitrous oxide emission associated with corn farming on the county level, and can show how much these emissions vary with location and farming practice."

Yushu Xia, who led the analysis and recently finished her doctoral program with Wander, used two approaches to determine county-level nitrogen fertilizer and manure usage.

The first, which Xia calls the top-down approach, was a bit like putting a puzzle together using different-sized pieces. At the county level, she found data for nitrogen fertilizer and manure inputs, but the numbers were aggregated across all crops, not corn specifically. The state level dataset included fertilized area in corn, so it was a matter of matching county with state. The state dataset also included nitrogen inputs, but aggregated them across fertilizer types. Data validation, or double-checking state and country information, therefore became another puzzle.

"For the top-down approach, we used data derived from fertilizer sales, information compiled by the Association of American Plant Food Control Officials. So we assume these numbers are relatively accurate; somebody actually bought that nitrogen. Yushu went through painstaking effort, basically using that crop data layer like a jigsaw puzzle to figure out how much corn is where and in what rotation over time. And then also for the manure: How many animals are there? Where are they? What kind of animal waste and how much? It's literally a budgeting effort to try to find out what's reasonable and true," Wander says.

Xia's second approach took corn yield, crop rotations, and soil properties from the county level and estimated nitrogen inputs based on the amount of nitrogen it would take to achieve that yield. Comparing the results of the two approaches told Xia farmers are applying nitrogen in excess of what's needed.

"Nationally, the weighted averages of corn nitrogen inputs based on corn planted area exceeded nitrogen needs by 60 kilograms per hectare, with a nitrogen surplus found in 80% of all U.S. corn producing counties," Xia says.

Excess application was most pronounced in the Midwest, followed by the Northern Plains. The Southeast and Northwest had comparatively low nitrogen application rates and surplus levels. Western states were more variable overall.

Xia says the technique can be useful beyond nitrous oxide emissions estimations.

"Our approach can also be used to estimate nitrogen leaching, ammonia emissions, other greenhouse gas emissions, or the water and carbon footprint. These data improvements can really help to create and utilize better ecosystem models and life cycle analysis."

Kwon indicates the new approach could potentially be used by policymakers at the national level.

"The EPA's national greenhouse gas inventory report currently uses state-level nitrogen fertilizer data to generate national estimates of nitrous oxide emissions from fertilizer. If they apply these high-resolution county-level data, they can refine those numbers on a national scale."

The results could also help farmers make more informed management decisions.

"Fertilizer prices are sky high right now, so since our results suggest some farmers are over-applying up to a third of their nitrogen, they could probably back off a bit and save some money," Wander says.

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The article, "Developing county-level data of nitrogen fertilizer and manure inputs for corn production in the United States," is published in the Journal of Cleaner Production [DOI: 10.1016/j.jclepro.2021.126957]. Funding was provided by the U.S. Department of Energy and USDA's National Institute of Food and Agriculture.

The Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Sciences is in the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences at the University of Illinois.
According to a study conducted by researchers from the University of Liege (Belgium), the lake is not only suffering from the introduction of the Nile perch into its waters

Lake Victoria, which came under the spotlight in 2004 by the documentary "Darwin's nightmare", is not only suffering from the introduction and commercialisation of the Nile perch. A study lead researchers from the University of Liege (Belgium) has highlighted other worrying phenomena, particularly climatic ones, which have an equally important impact on the quality of the lake's waters.

Located in East Africa, just south of the Equator, Lake Victoria is the source of the Nile and is the largest tropical lake in the world. With a surface area of 68,800 km (twice the size of Belgium), it is considered to be one of the largest water and fishery resources in East Africa, supporting more than 47 million people in the three neighbor countries (Uganda, Tanzania and Kenya).

Lake Victoria is best known to the general public following the release of the 2004 documentary Darwin's Nightmare, which focuses on the environmental and social effects of the Nile perch fishing industry. Voracious predator that can grow up to two metres long and weigh 200kg, the Nile perch is the largest freshwater fish. Its introduction into Lake Victoria in the 1950s and its population explosion in the 1960s gradually wiped out the native fish species living in the lake, causing a major ecological disaster. Today, the Nile perch population remains ubiquitous but has declined slightly due to overfishing, allowing some species to partially recover.

What is less well known - and perhaps interacting with the presence of the Nile perch - but equally damaging to the ecosystem, is the general water quality of the lake. "This declined sharply between the 1960s and the 1990s due to eutrophication, which is caused by increased inputs of nutrients (nitrogen and phosphorus) into the water bodies (rivers and lakes) as a result of increased human activities in the catchment area (intensive agriculture with fertilisers or domestic wastewater) resulting from population growth and economic development, explains Alberto Borges, FNRS Research Director at the Laboratory of Chemical Oceanography from the University of Liege. 

This eutrophication leads to a significant development of micro-algae (phytoplankton). In particular, cyanobacteria, blue-green micro-algae, can be problematic for human health as some forms are toxic. Moreover, the excess phytoplankton biomass (the organic matter from these algae) cannot generally be transformed by the rest of the food web," continues the researcher. This excess remains unused and stagnant at the bottom of the lakes, creating a phenomenon of anoxia, the absence of oxygen in the bottom waters of the lakes. This leads to the degradation of the ecosystem. 

Since the 1990s, no large-scale study of the water quality of Lake Victoria had been undertaken. It was within the framework of the LAVIGAS project - funded by the FNRS and led by Alberto Borges - that a research team was able to study the biomass and composition of phytoplankton as well as the nutrient status of the lake during three scientific missions (2018 -2019). This study shows that the phytoplankton biomass has decreased by about seven times compared to the 1990s," says the researcher, "and that the species composition has also changed in a subtle way." What seems to be good news for the environment of Lake Victoria may only be so on the surface...

Paradoxically, the quantity of nutrients remained comparable to that of the 1990s. This paradox can be explained, however, because in addition to nutrients, phytoplankton (like all plants) also need light to grow. In lakes, the amount of light for phytoplankton obviously depends on the solar radiation at the surface of the lake, but also on the depth of the water on which the phytoplankton cells reside. This depth, known as the mixing layer, depends mainly on the intensity of the wind. If the wind is intense, the depth of the mixing layer is greater, and the phytoplankton cells spend less time near the surface where the light is more intense, and do not develop as well," explains Alberto Borges. Our work shows that current weather conditions are windier than in the 1990s, so the depth of the mixed layer is greater and phytoplankton growth less intense than in the 1990s." The weaker winds of the 1990s were related to the prevailing conditions of El Nino, a natural oscillation in global climate that originates from the large-scale atmospheric circulation over the Pacific Ocean and affects climate worldwide.

This rather complex story shows that the established climate regime in the Pacific Ocean (El Nino) affects the ecology of a lake in Africa, on the other side of the planet! More specifically, it shows that the growth of phytoplankton - and therefore the rest of the food chain - in large tropical lakes responds to eutrophication in a complex way and is strongly modulated by climate," says Alberto Borges. "This means that the current improvement in water quality in Lake Victoria may only be temporary, and that conditions could deteriorate again in the future if vertical mixing in the lake decreases due to reduced wind intensity (a new period of prevailing El Nino conditions) or due to continued climate warming.

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Birds build nests to keep eggs and baby nestlings warm during cool weather, but also make adjustments in nest insulation in such a way the little ones can keep cool in very hot conditions. Mammals, such as rabbits or groundhogs, sleep or hibernate in underground burrows that provide stable, moderate temperatures and avoid above-ground conditions that often are far more extreme outside the burrow.

Michael Dillon, an associate professor in the University of Wyoming Department of Zoology and Physiology, was part of a research group that examined animals' ability to respond to climate change likely depends on how well they modify their habitats, such as nests and burrows.

So, how are these animals doing? Are they succeeding, struggling, or are their efforts a mixed bag in adapting their habitats to climate change?

"One of the key reasons that we wrote this paper is that we don't know the answer to this very important question!," Dillon says. "We hope the paper will encourage scientists to begin answering this question."

Dillon is a co-author of a paper, titled "Extended Phenotypes: Buffers or Amplifiers of Climate Change?," that was published June 16 in Trends in Ecology & Evolution. The journal publishes commissioned, peer-reviewed articles in all areas of ecology and evolutionary science.

The lead author of the paper is Arthur Woods, a professor of biological sciences at the University of Montana. Other contributors to the paper were from the University of Tours in Tours, France; and Stellenbosch University in Stellenbosch, South Africa.

The study investigated extended phenotypes, which are modifications that organisms -- birds, insects and mammals -- make to their habitats.

"An extended phenotype can range from simply a hole in the ground occupied by an animal to leaves rolled into cavities by insects, to nests of all shapes and sizes built by birds and mammals, to termite mounds and bee colonies," Dillon says.

Extended phenotypes are important because they filter climate into local sets of conditions immediately around the organism. This is what biologists call the microclimate.

Because extended phenotypes are constructed structures, they often are modified in response to local climate variation and, potentially, in response to climate change. This process is called plasticity of the extended phenotype.

"One example might be a bird nest that is well insulated to protect eggs or young birds from cold. As climates warm, if the bird does not adjust insulation in the nest, it may, in fact, cause the young to overheat," Dillon explains.

In another prime example, termites build mounds that capture wind and solar energy to drive airflow through the colony, which stabilizes temperature, relative humidity and oxygen levels experienced by the colony.

However, the idea of microclimates is broader than constructed habitats. Microclimates typically differ substantially from nearby climates, which means that the climate in an area may provide little information about what animals experience in their microhabitats.

As an analogy, although a weather station might tell the public that the temperature in Laramie is 90 degrees Fahrenheit, simply by moving from the south to the north side of a building, one can experience microclimates that are strikingly different and often not captured by the weather data, Dillon says.

The same is true of animals of many different sizes. For example, a moose can move from an open sagebrush landscape to a shaded river corridor to cool off; a snake can move from its underground hole to a sunny rock to warm up; and a tiny insect shuttling between the top and bottom of a leaf can experience temperature differences of more than 20 degrees Fahrenheit.

"So, animals use microclimates, both by simply moving but also by building structures, such as nests, burrows, mounds and mines," Dillon says.

Across the globe, rising levels of carbon dioxide in the Earth's atmosphere are causing temperatures to rise and precipitation patterns to shift. For biologists, a key problem is to understand current effects of climate change on species, and to predict future effects, including how species' ranges may shift and what the relative risks of extinction are for different animal species' groups.

The research team favors a renewed effort to understand how extended phenotypes mediate how organisms experience climate change.

"We need a much better understanding of the basic biophysical principles by which extended phenotypes alter local conditions," says Sylvain Pincebourde, an ecologist in the Insect Biology Research Institute at the University of Tours and one of the paper's co-authors.

Another key challenge is to understand how much plasticity there is in extended phenotypes, and how much and how rapidly they can evolve.

"At this point, we pretty much have no idea," Dillon says. "Can structures that buffer temperature variability keep up with the pace of climate change?"

###
June 18, 2021 - An experimental artificial heart includes an autoregulation control mechanism, or Auto-Mode, that can adjust to the changing needs of patients treated for end-stage heart failure. Outcomes in the first series of patients managed with the new heart replacement pump in Auto-Mode are presented in the ASAIO Journal, official journal of the American Society for Artificial Internal Organs. The journal is published in the Lippincott portfolio by Wolters Kluwer.

The study reports on the response to "pressure sensor-based autoregulation of blood flow" in ten patients for up to two years after implantation of the Carmat Total Artificial Heart (C TAH). "The C TAH Auto-Mode with built-in pressure sensors effectively produces appropriate physiological responses reflective of changing patients' daily needs and thus provides almost physiological heart replacement therapy," according to the new research. The lead author is Ivan Netuka, MD, of the Institute for Clinical and Experimental Medicine, Prague.

Auto-Mode may increase independence and quality of life in severe heart failure

Heart replacement pumps can restore cardiac output in patients with end-stage, biventricular heart failure (affecting both sides of the heart) whose only other option is heart transplantation. However, to enable patients to go home from the hospital and return to their usual activities, the pump should emulate normal heart function, with minimal need for adjustment.

To meet that goal, the C TAH incorporates an Auto-Mode that automatically adapts the pumping action of the right and left ventricles in response to pressure sensors located inside the device, based on parameters set by the physician. The goal is to mimic normal physiological responses to changing needs - particularly physical activity.

Dr. Netuka and colleagues analyzed the Auto-Mode's performance in the first 10 patients undergoing C TAH implantation in early European clinical experience. The patients were all men, average age 60 years. The C TAH was used as a bridge to heart transplantation in six patients and as a permanently implanted device in four.

In all patients, the artificial heart was successfully switched from manual control to Auto-Mode in the operating room. Auto-Mode led to "an immediate appropriate cardiac output response" to the targeted settings. Hemodynamic data recorded by the C TAH showed expected variations in pumping output of the left and right ventricles, in response to changes in pressures and heart rate. Heart rate averaged 78 to 128 beats per minute; blood pressure was normal as well.

Over almost five years of aggregate follow-up, medical teams made changes in the Auto-Mode settings just 20 times. Most adjustments were performed during the first 30 days after device placement. Only four were done after the patient went home from the hospital: a rate of about 1 change per 11 months.

"The reduced need for device management changes may contribute to greater autonomy for patients outside of the hospital environment and improvement in their quality of life," Dr. Netuka and coauthors write. They acknowledge that their study is an initial experience in a relatively small number of patients.

"Nevertheless," they add, "it represents a significant leap towards the next stage more physiological heart replacement therapy. The overall experience of more than four years of device performance represents a positive and promising outcome for the patients while requiring only minimal intervention from the clinicians." The researchers plan further refinements based on the preliminary results; future studies will provide data on response to exercise and hospital readmission rates. A US clinical trial of the C TAH is scheduled to begin soon.

###

Click here to read "First Clinical Experience With the Pressure Sensor-Based Autoregulation of Blood Flow in an Artificial Heart."

DOI: 10.1097/MAT.0000000000001485

About ASAIO Journal

ASAIO Journal, the official publication of the American Society for Artificial Internal Organs, is in the forefront of artificial organ research and development. On the cutting edge of innovative technology, it features peer-reviewed articles of the highest quality that describe research, development, the most recent advances in the design of artificial organ devices and findings from initial testing. Published in eight issues annually, the ASAIO Journal features state-of-the-art investigations, laboratory and clinical trials, and discussions and opinions from experts around the world.

About Wolters Kluwer

Wolters Kluwer (WKL) is a global leader in professional information, software solutions, and services for the clinicians, nurses, accountants, lawyers, and tax, finance, audit, risk, compliance, and regulatory sectors. We help our customers make critical decisions every day by providing expert solutions that combine deep domain knowledge with advanced technology and services.

Wolters Kluwer reported 2020 annual revenues of 4.6 billion. The group serves customers in over 180 countries, maintains operations in over 40 countries, and employs approximately 19,200 people worldwide. The company is headquartered in Alphen aan den Rijn, the Netherlands.

Wolters Kluwer provides trusted clinical technology and evidence-based solutions that engage clinicians, patients, researchers and students in effective decision-making and outcomes across healthcare. We support clinical effectiveness, learning and research, clinical surveillance and compliance, as well as data solutions. For more information about our solutions, visit https:/ / www. wolterskluwer. com/ en/ health and follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter @WKHealth.
Friday, June 18, 2021

As soon as details of the QUICK article got out, Jim Garrison was denying that he was the author.

Town Talk, Alexandria, Louisiana, April 3, 1967

It's interesting that Garrison complained that he "never told anyone the name of the person who fired the fatal shot at President Kennedy." He didn't say that didn't know the name of the assassin - he just hadn't told anybody.

An American reporter for the West German public radio broadcaster Deutsche Welle wrote to Jim Garrison the day after QUICK was released, detailing his attempt to authenticate it, in light of QUICK's bad reputation, asking him for confirmation or denial, and offering to bring any fraud to public attention:

Jim Garrison replied on April 14, denying involvement:

"I have no idea who dreamed this article up but it is neither my product nor is it authorized by me."

Carefully phrased, in light of what the next blog post will show. He never talked to a QUICK representative: no doubt true.

Mr. Jordan then wrote back:

There is no Garrison reply to his letter in his files. He probably decided to just let it go, and realized that a real investigation would reveal the truth about the article. So better to feign indignation, and then drop it.

Instead, Jim Garrison went into damage control mode, and turned to Der Spiegel, a very reputable mainstream magazine, who published an interview with him in its May 22, 1967 issue. An entire sidebar discussed QUICK magazine: (The first part discusses another QUICK controversy over a report about Stalin's supposed sexual antics)

Here is Don Jordan's translation of the second part of the article that I found in Jim Garrison's files:

The interview with Garrison was definitely damage control.

By this time, Garrison's focus had moved away from a homosexual conspiracy and towards the CIA - no doubt because the various critics pushed back, and because of the Paese Sera articles in Rome claiming an association between Clay Shaw and the CIA.

Here is an excerpt from the journal of Richard Billings: (entry for March 16, 1967)

Garrison now interested in possible connections between Shaw and the CIA . . . wants to check his tie to Mario Bermudez, international relations director for late mayor, Shep Morrison . . . Two leads re: CIA tie: article in March issue Humanite supposedly mentions Shaw's Company work in Italy.

and an entry from April 3, 1967:

Garrison is hot in the CIA angle.

You can read more about the Paese Sera articles here.

QUICK was mentioned in the Der Spiegel interview:

SPIEGEL: Pardon me, there are quite a number of Warren Report critics who have spoken of a second Oswald.

GARRISON: I want to tell you this: Of all the magazines, perhaps with the exception of "Quick," and certainly of all the American newspapers, none of them went as far as "Newsweek" in their guesswork. This magazine deserves a special medal for its imaginative excursion into poetry. What "Newsweek" has done is inexcusable. This magazine understands what it's all about, but spreads its wild baseless speculations.

SPIEGEL: We are by no means talking about just "Newsweek," there are a whole range of others ...

GARRISON: Yes. Concerning "Quick," I surely don't need to tell you what a wild story it was.

SPIEGEL: No, we know that.

Garrison was referring to a March 13, 1967 story in Newsweek by Hugh Aynesworth which also quoted him talking about homosexuality:

"The D. A. insisted he already had proof that Shaw, Ferrie and Oswald were conspirators, but was still looking for a "gay boy" who resembled Oswald who actually fired the fatal shots."

and:

"Moreover, D. A. Garrison's decision to concentrate on homosexuals, a relatively vulnerable group, tended to produce a line-up of alleged conspirators that much of the public found difficult to take seriously."

Garrison had a direct response to the Newsweek quote:

SPIEGEL: Mr. Garrison, how have you actually solved the Tippit case? Police officer J. D. Tippit was shot 45 minutes after the president. Since, in your opinion, Oswald did not shoot anyone on November 22nd, 1963 - who was it then ...

GARRISON: I don't want to say anything about Tippit.

SPIEGEL: ... perhaps a [or some] gay boy who - as it is often said - looked like Oswald?

GARRISON: Thank you for asking that, because at no point have we looked for a gay boy who looked like Oswald. This is an invention by "Newsweek". This magazine did not concern itself with the facts at all, but used all its power to bring every investigation into the assassination into disrepute. As "Newsweek" describes our investigations - that is very imaginative.

Homosexuality only came up two other times in the Der Spiegel interview:

SPIEGEL: Was it an anti-Castro conspiracy, a pro-Castro conspiracy, a homosexual conspiracy - or what other conspiracy?

GARRISON: The homosexual factor is insignificant. Some authors have blown it up a lot to - let's say - spice up their stories and make more money. But there is a Cuban factor, a very important Cuban factor.

Here are some very telling remarks by Garrison:

GARRISON: Certainly nobody can accuse me of being a communist. So I feel completely free to say that the Soviet government and press are more interested in the truth, more interested in knowing what actually happened to President Kennedy than the American government and press.

SPIEGEL: Is that really an interest in the truth? After all, the Soviet Union has banned the distribution of the Warren Report.

GARRISON: Perhaps it didn't meet their literary standards. But to come back to your question about Mrs. Oswald: She is a mother who has lost a son about whom many untrue things have been said, including the remark, which was wrongly attributed to me, that Oswald was a homosexual. That's not true, and I never said that. But it is only one example of the barrage that Mrs. Oswald has to go through. I am sorry for her and I am glad she is interested in a new investigation. Oswald was obviously involved in the affair. But that doesn't mean he shot anyone in Dealey Plaza in Dallas, It's perfectly clear that he didn't. I don't want to say more.

Note the fake indignation. Mrs. Oswald is suffering from a false allegation - which Garrison, of course, would never make - and he feels for her. But as we will show in an upcoming post, Garrison would tell another journalist that Oswald was a homosexual. And in a recurring pattern, Garrison would show the same indignation when the journalist reported the allegation.

Our next blog post about the QUICK article:

Jim Garrison Does it Again! He tells another reporter that Ruby and Oswald

were homosexuals and then then attempts damage control.

Previous Posts on the QUICK Article

Did a Homosexual Conspiracy Kill JFK?

Was the QUICK article about a homosexual conspiracy written by Jim Garrison? (Part One)

Was the QUICK article about a homosexual conspiracy written by Jim Garrison? (Part Two)
WASHINGTON, D.C. On Saturday, June 19th, Dr. Willie Jolley's Wealthy Ways Show on Sirius XM Radio will air his interview with Founder and Chief Executive Officer of The ActOne Group, Janice Bryant Howroyd.





Janice Bryant Howroyd is the first African American woman to build and own a billion-dollar company. She's an entrepreneur, educator, ambassador, businesswoman, author, and mentor.

The ActOne Group is the largest privately held, minority-woman-owned personnel company founded in the United States.

Howroyd opened the business in the back of a rug store in Los Angeles in 1978 with less than $1,000, which included a loan from her mother. Her agency now has more than 17,000 clients and 2,600 employees in 30 countries.

With her family, Howroyd owns several dozen properties including commercial and residential.

In 2019, she released her second book, Acting Up, sharing the model she lives by and continues to represent: that of a leader who works for good, for growth and innovation, for her family values, and for the same ideals upon which she founded her company.





The Willie Jolley Wealthy Ways Show airs every Saturday at 4pm ET, and Tuesday and Thursday at 6pm ET on Sirius XM 141 HUR Voices. Dr. Jolley also has a featured segment, "Wake and Win with Dr. Willie Jolley" on the Erica Campbell Show. His proven principles and strategies in his best-selling book, An Attitude of Excellence, are the result of work with Ford Motors, helping them come back from the brink of bankruptcy.

Dr. Jolley has gone on to be named "One of the Outstanding Five Speakers in the World" by the 175,000 members of Toastmasters International. He currently speaks virtually and internationally to organizations that want and need a comeback mindset.

To learn more about Dr. Willie Jolley and his speaking and professional development company, please visit www.winwithwillie.com.

Social Media:

Facebook: Dr. Willie Jolley



Instagram: @therealwilliejolley



Twitter: @williejolley
Friday, June 18, 2021

Fighting the Military Industrial Complex against heavy resistance:

Short history of the struggle to present Peace Economics to the world:

My life changed forever in March 1983 in my second Oregon State legislative session when I discovered that military spending does not stimulate economic growth like I had been taught in school, it depletes manufacturing instead. Presidents and many mainstream economists and academics still believe and teach classic Keynesian Economics (1936). Two years later I saw the graph that had inspired and motivated me in my files after my third and final Oregon legislative session in August 1985. An avaricious newspaper reader at the time, I was struck by the absence in news of ANY stories that confirmed my finding. This is still largely true today. So the engineer in me decided to test the bar chart out for accuracy. After six long months of filling thick spiral notebooks full of multi-year averagings and other techniques for looking for patterns in a century of annual statistics, I built a sixty-year model of economic growth with an astounding 99.9% accuracy. But the world did not beat a path to my door, so I wrote it up in Peace Economics (1986) as a powerful political friend offered to submit my name to the Pulitzer Prize committee.

Wargaming 1964-1974

Gary Gygax, the leader of all wargamers in the sixties asked me to join the new International Federation of Wargaming (IFW). While Gary was the most prolific writer in the wargaming journals of the time, I walloped him in a play by mail game of "Battle of the Bulge" in 1966, our only direct game together. His son says he talked about me all the time. Then I beat the editor of the Avalon Hill General (to his disgust) in a game of "Waterloo" to win the first wargaming tournament at GenCon VI in 1973. As Coordinator of Wargaming, I had a player rating twice as high above the average as the second ranked person and was unbeaten for all but one time. The point of this paragraph is that we all joked we must have had FBI records for our activity, my first inkling of the dark side of this "The US Empire Strikes Back" paper. Gary Gygax went on to invent "Dungeons and Dragons" in 1974 with fame and fortune to follow. I moved to Oregon in 1974, the last time I saw him. I had my friend Gary sell almost all my games at GenCon in 1974 as I moved on from my high school college years with wargaming and eventually got into politics in 1978.

CIA Application

In 1976 with an MBA degree and an engineering undergraduate degree, I applied for a CIA job. I thought it would be interesting and challenging work. But I freaked out when the interview was moved off campus to a local diner. I never showed up as it dawned on me that spy work could be very dangerous.

Trouble In River City

Peace activists and the Jesse Jackson campaign (1987) loved my work and spread copies of my work around to institutions and politicians like Ted Kennedy. Then a famous peace activist exploded in one of my three lecture workshops in a January 1990 "Peace Economy Conference" workshop in Miami, Florida. 24 books were bought out of 72 participants. That famous activist explosion workshop only sold three copies. This example shows how sensitive even peace movement people are about military spending. In January 1986 someone at the Progressive Magazine threw me out of his office, citing the New York Times as his source for not believing me. Alexander Cockburn, leftist writer, wrote a column contradicting Peace Economics, after I gave him a copy of my book after he spoke at the University of Oregon in the late 1980s. Thanks to the military Keynesianism of Larry Summers, Barack Obama took troops out of Iraq and tripled troops in Afghanistan falsely expecting stimulus that never came. This stunt stalled the economic recovery after the 2009 recession for a couple of years. Plenty of examples exist that show the lack of understanding that military spending reduces manufacturing job growth, contrary to the Keynesian presumption. Only Joseph Stiglitz, Clinton's economist, of all the famous modern economists, has seen the truth that lower military spending (after the Cold War ended) produced the economic growth surge of the 1990s. Even Robert Pollin, famous URPE economist, did not understand Peace Economics or the nineties surge and post 9-11-01 slump despite three times scheduling me to speak at URPE conferences in Cape Cod in the 1987-1989 period. When the Cold War ended producing the peace dividend of high economic growth in the 1990s, even local former "red mayor" peace activist of Madison Wisconsin Paul Soglin denied the existence of a peace dividend after the Cold War in a speech in front of me in the 1990s. Peace Economics fell out of favor in the 1990s without the Cold War threat. So I earned a doctorate in 2009 to establish academic credibility. But my economist doctorate major advisor on my dissertation limited me to a survey only approach to Peace Economics to avoid facing the main issues.

The Empire Strikes Back

After being a big hit at Youngstown State and the World Futures Society in 2013, Mitchell Davis of Washington DC accepted me at expertclick.com starting in October 2013. That same month the pentagon noticed my climate cycle theory and the CIA noticed my military spending theory. Then a leader in the peace and justice studies association from Georgetown, the leading school of CIA graduates, criticized me while others love my work. Leading world federalist Lucy Webster, Planethood author Ken Keyes, and a top War Resisters League person supported me and my work. This is my 255th press release on expertclick.com. as my reputation is steadily growing. Gandhi says first they laugh at you, then they attack you, then you win. Here I come in this 35th anniversary year of Peace Economics as I complete my anniversary book right now looking for reviewers this month or next. Hoping Ralph Nader will move to reviewer. In 1987 I answered the why question directed at Seymour Melman in an Oregon State conference because I knew he did not have a clue. Peace people are either anti-interventionists or anti-nukes, that's why peace economics has few friends among them. World Federalists, where I made five presentations in fall conferences 1998-2002, are much more practical and accepting of my ideas (example famous Lucy Webster who attended my workshop at the 1999 Hague Peace Conference hundredth anniversary). My invention of the term Peace Economics was to avoid the awful term "economic conversion" because nobody wants a religious conversion on their doorstep.

Transition

Moving from politics in Eugene Oregon to a CPA job in Madison Wisconsin in May 1993, I gave up local popularity for relative obscurity to concentrate on promoting my scientific findings rather than my political career. I had been warned by an Oregon legislator in 1989 about "watch your back challenging the military industrial complex." Later a Democratic Party opponent had placed a spy on my team when I ran for legislator in 1992. I had divisive opponents in the Party when I left Eugene, so I hoped to avoid divisiveness by channeling my energy to the activist community in Madison. I was kept off the board of Midge Miller's Madison Institute because I shared her doubts about the CIA whitewash of the JFK assassination. Still I had six presentations at the Madison Institute and six services at Prairie Unitarian Universalist Society. Who is Midge Miller? She was the woman who recruited Gene McCarthy to be the peace candidate for president in 1968 and ran against President Johnson and the Vietnam War. I gave her a last hug before cancer took her in 2008 just after the election of Obama. We had met on the floor of the 1984 Democratic Convention as delegates from the two different states of Oregon (me) and Wisconsin (her).

Latest Deep State Assault

I appeared on a WORT radio show 3-12-2020 and gave the final presentation of the Peregrine Forum the next night. A mysterious man listened to me who was later identified as a Madison "red squad" policeman. Then two months later a 23-year-old rookie mailman began a yearlong campaign of bullying and intimidating my partner and me before taking our mail for the second time in six months in violation of postal regulations. Then using all the Trump tactics of the big lie, the probable Marine brat mailman who was probably, given his name, a member of a pro-Trump fundamentalist church, and probably beaten growing up (common in conservative households) by his father who flies a Marine flag in front of the house he still lived at. Well, well, well. There is a good chance I had been targeted for this abuse as two police, two postal managers, and the city attorney all lied to me and ridiculed me. The city attorney would be disbarred if she lied to court like she lied to me, and the two police lied on the police report about the fake mail truck incident Joshua lied about. They mocked me over the use of the word "steal" rather than investigate the inappropriate nature of the mail taking by the mailman. For six months my partner was bullied to keep the mailbox empty, one slip up led to the incident. This police report was full of seven major lies by the mailman. Later the 911 call notes came out with several more lies and a phony hide in the garage story. Finally released two months later, just before scheduled trial, came out a complete video which exonerated me, showing that honking and cutting his mail truck in traffic were completely made-up stories. The Marine brat abused his power taking our mail, arranged for two others to call police before he did and arranged to block my access to his direct supervisor. The mail counter people sympathized with me while higher ups lied to protect the abusive mailman. Truth was the first casualty in this war against me, as first they laugh, then attack, then I will someday win. Mail management was compromised with a strange national assignment to police social media (under Trump appointee DeJoy), much like Kennedy's Peace Corps volunteers being used over the years by the CIA. Militarization everywhere. I would like to get affidavits on all these co-conspirators to deprive me of my constitutional right to petition my government over grievances. Weaponizing with false disorderly conduct charges turned an obvious mediation situation sour not unlike the "red squad" monitoring of peaceful protestors and activists. Taking on the military empire state is a constant challenge promoting Peace Economics for thirty-five years. Yet my math is conclusive as is the evidence for my proposition.

Short but comprehensive Booklet of half size pages about Peace Economics:

https://www.academia.edu/4108656/BOOKLET_for_Peace_Economics_11_charts_24p_2011

Please cite this work as follows: Reuschlein, Robert. (2021, June 18), "The US Empire Strikes Back" Madison, WI, Real Economy Institute. Retrieved from: https://www.expertclick.com/NewsRelease/The-US-Empire-Strikes-Back,2021257570.aspx

Dr. Peace, Professor Robert Reuschlein, Real Economy Institute, Nobel Peace Prize nominee 2016-2021 with accelerating interest from the deciding Norwegians. A consistently growing pattern shows intense interest in my work on my expertclick.com website; daily "hard looks" per year have gone from 2 to 3 to 48 to 128 to 200 to double last year's pace (221/115) so far, these 252 days since the last Peace award.

Contact: bobreuschlein@gmail.com Info: www.realeconomy.com
Banks and credit unions close for federal holidays, but many are keeping their branches open as the country commemorates Juneteenth as a national holiday for the first time.

President Joe Biden signed legislation Thursday afternoon making Juneteenth National Independence Day the countrys 12th national holiday. That wasnt enough notice for many financial institutions to mark the holiday by closing either Friday or today. Its likely many will observe the new holiday beginning next year.

BBVA USA, a national bank with about 20 branches in the San Antonio area, closed its branches and corporate offices early Friday afternoon in observance of Juneteenth  which is today.

BBVA was the only institution out of about a dozen contacted by the Express-News to confirm it will recognize the new holiday by closing.

The rest stayed open Friday. Those that are regularly open Saturdays will be open today, as well. June 19 is the anniversary of the end of slavery in 1865, when news of the Emancipation Proclamation was delivered to the last enslaved Americans in Galveston.

BBVAs decision to close early Friday is noteworthy because Pittsburghs PNC Bank, which recently acquired the Birmingham, Ala.-based institution in an $11.6 billion deal, kept its branches and offices open regular hours Friday.

The federal government observed the holiday Friday, so most federal employees got the day off. That included bank regulators with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and the Federal Reserve Board in Washington.

Employees with the Federal Reserve in Dallas werent so lucky. It was open Friday.

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., which also regulates banks, on Thursday encouraged institutions to inform customers of their plans regarding the holiday as soon as possible.

Given the timing, institutions are encouraged to consider the convenience and needs of their customers when making these decisions, the FDIC said in a statement.

Frost Bank, the largest regional bank based in San Antonio, planned to be open both Friday and today.

We just dont have enough time to do the adequate notifications to close, Frost spokesman Bill Day said Thursday.

The Texas Department of Banking, which oversees state-chartered banks, was open Friday even though Juneteenth has been a state holiday for more than 40 years.

Banks generally set their holiday schedule at the beginning of each year, usually following the holidays observed by the Federal Reserve System, said Charles Cooper, commissioner of the state banking agency.

Banks technically have the ability to observe this new holiday (Friday) or Monday, but since it just became law on June 17, banks have to take into consideration adequate notice to their customers, he said.

San Antonios Security Service Federal Credit Union also follows the Federal Reserves calendars, so the San Antonio institution planned to be open both days.

Once the Federal Reserve adjusts its schedule to reflect the new federal holiday, we will do the same, Security Service spokeswoman Brandy Ralston-Lint said in an email.

Chase Bank branches will be open today even though its Juneteenth because a significant number of customers who cant make it in during weekdays depend on Saturday branch access as an essential service, spokesman Greg Hassell said in an email.

San Antonio-based Vantage Bank Texass branches will operate on their regular schedule today.

We will determine later this year how to adjust our schedule to reflect the new federal holiday in the years to come, spokesman Alex Polanco said in an email.

Live Oaks Randolph-Brooks Federal Credit Union also will operate its usual schedule. It observed the holiday Friday with educational videos and potluck dishes at branches for staff, spokesman Salvador Guerrero said in an email.

Many institutions, including Chase and Wells Fargo, are providing employees with an an additional personal day or floating holiday to take sometime this year.

Our branches and operations centers will remain open as usual following their normal schedules, Wells Fargo spokeswoman Beth Richek said in an email. As a company, we will observe Juneteenth as a federal holiday starting next year.

Day, the Frost Bank spokesman, said it was encouraging employees who are able to use one of their two paid community-days off to volunteer in the community.

We think Juneteenth would be an appropriate time for them to use one of those, he added.

pdanner@express-news.net
The San Antonio areas unemployment rate dropped again in May as pandemic-induced restrictions eased and businesses continued to re-open throughout the region.

But the job forecast for the rest of the year is not as strong as it was in previous months, according to Keith Phillips, senior economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.

The regions jobless rate was 5.7 percent last month, down from Aprils 6 percent, the Dallas Fed reported Friday.

May unemployment was still up from the pre-pandemic rate of 3 percent recorded in February 2020. However, its significantly less than the peak unemployment rate of 14.1 percent, a record high reached in April 2020.

Despite the rate moving in the right direction, job growth slowed. San Antonio lost 1,000 jobs in May, according to the Dallas Fed.

A couple months ago, when vaccinations were increasing strongly and COVID was dropping sharply, we had pretty strong projections for the state, and my expectations for San Antonio... , and weve been disappointed, Phillips said. Job growth is still hanging on  its still positive. Jobs are growing overall. But its obvious that there are labor market constraints that are holding back job growth.

On ExpressNews.com: San Antonio area unemployment continues to fall from pandemic-era record highs as job growth slows

He said economists are debating the reasons, which include a hesitancy to return to work because of the virus, childcare concerns and low wages.

For many workers that make below $16 an hour, theyre financially better off by not working, he said. Obviously, that will be a strong incentive to not work now, but those extended unemployment benefits at the federal level are going to end this month.

On May 17, Gov. Greg Abbott announced Texas is opting out of additional federal unemployment payments related to the COVID pandemic, effective June 26. The move will cut $300 of weekly federal aid to unemployed Texans. Abbott said the move would help move workers back into jobs.

The change in federal unemployment benefits could create more job seekers and accelerate job growth, according to Phillips.

Another factor stalling job growth is the COVID-19 Delta variant, he said. The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation is predicting an increase in COVID hospitalizations through September.

Overall, were going to see continued growth, continued availability of jobs out there, but not at the pace we thought a few months ago, Phillips said.

On ExpressNews.com: Slower than what we anticipated: San Antonio jobs program still struggling to gain momentum

Job growth in San Antonio weakened through May, he said.

Construction jobs surged in March as homeowners and businesses repaired damage from Februarys winter storm, but the growth stalled as the repairs were completed.

Texas employers continue to add jobs, strengthening our economy and creating opportunities for Texas workers to connect to a rewarding career, Texas Workforce Commission Chairman Bryan Daniel said in a statement.

Statewide, the unemployment rate last month was 6.5 percent, down from 6.7 percent in April, according to the TWC. The national rate fell from 5.7 percent in April to 5.5 percent in May.

According to the Dallas Fed, the state gained 26,100 jobs in May. April saw 23,000 new jobs in the state.

In the San Antonio-New Braunfels area, more than 63,900 people were unemployed in May, the TWC said, down from 69,000 in April and 79,000 in March.

More than 8,000 people in the area filed for unemployment benefits last month, the fifth-highest number in the state, according to the workforce commission. Most applicants came from jobs in food service, restaurants, temporary help and day care.

The state agencys numbers arent seasonally adjusted, and it pegged San Antonios May unemployment rate at 5.3 percent, down from Aprils 5.7 percent. The TWC reported the state gained 34,400 jobs last month.

Brandon Lingle writes for the Express-News through Report for America, a national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms. ReportforAmerica.org. brandon.lingle@express-news.net
Paula Gold-Williams was caught in Winter Storm Uri in more ways than most as the CEO of San Antonios municipally owned utility, and she has a better perspective than most on settling the accounts and avoiding another massive failure.

CPS Energy, which supplies power to more than 840,000 customers, is different from most Texas energy companies. In addition to selling power, CPS generates power for the grid and kept 85 percent of its generator fleet going. But while it got paid when wholesale electricity prices maxed out, natural gas prices jumped 12,000 percent. leaving San Antonians with a huge bill.

CPS customers, meanwhile, created seven times the normal demand for energy during those five days. With only a limited amount of electricity available, the state grid operator ordered CPS to cut power to hundreds of thousands of angry customers. Gold-Williams was caught in the middle.

TOMLINSONS TAKE: ERCOT made the February freeze fiasco worse

Some politicians want to blame energy executives like Gold-Williams, while others want to quietly move on. They seem happy to let Texans transfer $16 billion to energy companies that profiteered during a statewide emergency. Gold-Williams is instead fighting for her customers.

I was feeling this all the way that we're going to have to use litigation as part of our strategy, she said. We did a blitz to the financial markets and said, `Hey, this is really tough stuff, but we are not only protecting San Antonio, but you're our lender and our funder. Before we just give money up and use our our access to your capital for something that could be illegal or illegitimate, we're going to fight.

CPS sued the states grid operator, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, alleging executives wrongfully held wholesale electricity prices at the maximum level for longer than necessary, costing utilities billions of dollars. Gold-Williams hopes to save her customers $300 million.

The utility sued 17 natural gas suppliers, contesting $700 million in bills for gas the utility bought during the winter storm. CPS alleges the firms price-gouged the utility for gas it had no choice but to purchase during a declared emergency.

Gold-Williams talked to state lawmakers, federal regulators, the Public Utility Commission and the Texas Railroad Commission, which regulates the oil and gas industry. When elected officials from both parties decided it was easier to just issue state-backed bonds and let Texans repay billions of dollars in unjust profits over the next 30 years, CPS did not give up.

We believe that no entity should gouge during a declared disaster, Gold-Williams told me during an interview at CPS headquarters. People suffered. And we all knew that people were suffering, but to look at that as a way to financially make profits and brag about that? We're going to fight that with everything we have.

She thinks a Texas jury will recognize that the markets broke during the freeze, and moneyed-interests who profited dont want to see it fixed.

I really think that a jury, hearing what the end result is, and having experienced what they experienced, will believe that we should be fighting this, she added. And we think in front of a jury, we have a chance to right something that nobody thought would happen.

Normally, elected officials should be calling out the immorality of how ERCOT and natural gas suppliers behaved during the February Freeze. They are supposed to protect citizens from corporations that exploit the public. Instead, we are relying on the CEO of a utility who could lose her post for defending her customers.

All Texans should rally behind Gold-Williams, because if CPS wins, it will set a precedent that will benefit us all.

Gold-Williams also wants to reintroduce the idea that generating electricity, or piping in natural gas, or supplying water is fundamentally a public service. She rejects the idea that corporations should make more money when customers become more desperate.

TOMLINSONS TAKE: Texas lawmakers make a big deal about nothing to prevent blackouts

Looking forward, Gold-Williams welcomes the new laws passed by the Legislature but insists they must do more. She thinks the wholesale market must find a way to pay for backup power without price-gouging. She thinks generators would benefit from connecting to the rest of the countrys power grids.

We believe in a portfolio approach, give yourself as many options as possible to solve a big issue, be diverse in your solution set, know the issues associated with everything you put in place, she said.

She also plans to fight climate change while ensuring her customers have affordable energy.

There's no perfect energy technology, not one, she added. People are trying to solve the issue by the technology when we need to be solving the objective. The objective is producing power when needed.

The Texas grid is old, failing and poorly served by a bad market design. Gold-Williams is trying to move it forward in a way that puts the customer first.

Tomlinson writes commentary about business, economics and politics.

twitter.com/cltomlinson

chris.tomlinson@chron.com
For the first time in its 153-year history, Frost Bank has hired an executive whose sole responsibility is to diversify the banks workforce and make its offices more welcoming to employees of all races.

Karen White, 61, a native of New Orleans, is the banks new chief diversity and inclusion officer, reporting directly to Chairman and CEO Phillip Green.

Green told employees about plans to recruit a diversity and inclusion officer in a Jan. 15 letter commemorating Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

In another letter to employees  this one dated June 15, 2020, soon after the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis  the CEO opened by saying: Just like you, I have been deeply troubled by the tragic events of the last several days and I feel compelled to reach out to you about it.

Our culture at Frost leaves no room for racism, injustice or hatred, he said. At Frost I assure you we are committed to the success of all who follow our core values of integrity, caring and excellence regardless of race or ethnicity.

White, a veteran of credit union and nonprofit management and an eight-year Frost Bank employee, began her new role June 1.

How much work does she have ahead of her?

When it comes to the banks leadership, a lot.

Cullen/Frost Bankers Inc., Frost Banks publicly traded holding company, has more than 4,500 employees in Texas and total assets of $42.5 billion. It does business in Texas increasingly diverse major metros  San Antonio, Austin, Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston and Corpus Christi  as well as in the Permian Basin in West Texas.

A bank spokesman declined to provide a demographic breakdown of the companys workforce but said that a majority of Frost Bank employees are people of color and more than half are women.

By comparison, at insurance and financial services company USAA, San Antonios second-largest private-sector employer, minority employees make up 47 percent of the workforce and women 53 percent. The company has had an officer overseeing diversity and inclusion efforts since 2009.

So Frost Bank may be late in adding a diversity chief  most major American corporations have had diversity officers for years. But the banks employees do reflect Texas fast-breaking shift toward a younger, more racially diverse population.

Unlike its directors and top executives.

Only three people of color sit on Frost Banks 12-member board of directors  San Antonios Carlos Alvarez, chairman and CEO of beer distributor Gambrinus Inc.; Anthony R. Chase, owner of ChaseSource, a Houston-based recruitment and consulting firm; and Cynthia Comparin, founder of Animato Technologies Corp. of Dallas. There are only three women on the board.

The banks 10 senior officers are only marginally more diverse, with three people of color and three women.

That makes Frost Bank no different from most other financial institutions.

A 2020 report by management consulting firm McKinsey & Co. and the W.K. Kellogg Foundation highlighted the lack of diversity among top executives in the financial services industry. They found that white men fill 33 percent of the entry level positions but sit in 70 percent of the C-suite offices.

Promoting and hiring more Blacks, Hispanics and Asians into the executive ranks would be good for banks business, according to the study.

Having a diverse executive team, board, or both correlates with higher profitability, the researchers said. For every 10 percent more racially or ethnically diverse a companys senior team is, earnings before interest and taxes is nearly 1 percent higher.

One big reason: The demographic makeup of America is changing; an increasing percentage of the talent pool are people of color. The most common age of white people in the United States is 58, whereas it is 27 for people of color.

This is where Karen White, who is Black, comes in.

Beginnings

Shes based in Houston but was visiting headquarters at Frost Bank Tower when I interviewed her Monday by Zoom. The downtown skyline was her backdrop.

We spent the better part of an hour talking about her formative years in New Orleans, a city famously shot through with racial tensions and inequities.

White was part of the second freshman class at St. Marys Dominican High School  a private, all-girls Catholic school  to include Blacks.

In my freshman year, when I went to meet with my counselor, she told me I shouldnt worry about ever going to college  I was just going to be a C student, and so I didnt need to worry about it, she recalled. And I hadnt even started. We hadnt even had our first grading periods.

She thrived in the classroom, despite the counselors prognostication. A tap and jazz dancer, she joined the schools dance troupe, excelled on stage and had to contend with the jealousies of her white counterparts.

White got her start in banking by happenstance.

At 26, with a degree in music education from Nicholls State University in Thibodaux, La., she worked at her mothers New Orleans day care center for a few years.

I decided it was time to stop working for my mom  that wasnt going very well, White said. So a girlfriend said, Hey, why dont you come work for the credit union that I belong to? And thats what I did.

Robin Jerstad / Contributor

Her first job in financial services  at the Louisiana Restaurant Associations credit union  was reminiscent of that first meeting with her high school guidance counselor.

White will pick up the thread from here. Ive edited the following transcript for brevity and clarity.

Q: What kind of workplace did you land in?

A: At this credit union, I was the only Black female. And I was the only female with a degree. So the executive director thought it would be nice to put me in a backroom and just have me look at loan documents. I didnt do anything of significance. I didnt meet with the members. But what I was doing was understanding the loan documentation process and what that meant  how to fill it out, what documentation was needed for folks to make loans.

Q: So she was trying to keep you out of the public eye?

A: It was not explicit, but the executive director  that was her unconscious bias.

I was just getting busy, looking at documents, understanding what was happening and how it happened. And at the same time, I was in the process of enrolling at Loyola University to start my MBA program.

Q: Did you ever broach it with her or anybody on the credit unions board?

A: The way I chose to approach it was to learn as much as I could about what was going on  to get a better understanding.

(The executive director left to run a different credit union, and White succeeded her. Then the woman recruited White to work at her new organization.)

I accepted the job because it was a way to join a larger credit union, a way for me to grow and get more experience.

Thats where the conflict started between us. And thats where we started to address the issues.

I dont know if you know anything about New Orleans, but it is really an unconscious-bias kind of city. So this particular lady was from a part of town that was just known for folks not being diverse. And she only had a high school education. And here I am with my four-year degree. The two other ladies at the credit union, the president and CEO and her sister, were both white women with four-year degrees, but they came from another state. So we started to bond, the three of us.

And (the executive director) was starting to feel left out. So she caused issues. But I knew how to take care of myself. I did my job. I staffed my committees. We started a new credit card program, and I opened more credit card accounts than she did. I just outperformed her in every aspect. She wasnt happy with that, but that was her issue.

Q: What problems did she create for you?

A: She just made it very uncomfortable for me. I had the skills to work with the finance committee, to give them what they needed. They were very impressed with the work that I was doing. So one of the things she did was she stopped me from presenting at the finance committee.

Q: What came next for you?

A: I met the Louisiana representative for the National Credit Union Administration (the industrys regulator), and we worked so well together that each time he had to come to New Orleans to clean up a credit union, he asked me if Id like to come and join him. So the last credit union I worked for before moving to Houston  thats how I got the job. I helped clean up things that they had done. We eventually had to merge with a local bank. But (the NACU representative) trusted me. He needed someone in that credit union who was going to be honest about what was going on and not protecting the board of directors.

(In the early 1990s, White moved to Houston, where she held posts at the United Way of Greater Houston and NationsBank, the forerunner of Bank of America. Frost Bank hired her eight years ago.)

Q: How did you come to be Frost Banks first diversity and inclusion officer?

A: Id built a reputation as a person whos inclusive and respectful of everyone. I treat everyone with dignity. And so when this position came up, I felt like this was something that I wanted to do, that I could help fulfill the vision that (Phillip Green) has. So I applied and went through an extensive interview process.

Q: Describe your discussions with Green before you accepted the job.

A: The first thing I wanted to know was where this position lies  if it was an executive position reporting directly to the CEO or if was it an HR or staff development position. I wanted to know because if that wasnt where this position would be  reporting to Phillip Green  it wasnt going be successful, in my humble opinion. Once that was answered, I felt comfortable applying for the position. I want to contribute to the success of an organization, and the only way I can do that is with accountability and authority.

Q: What is your mandate? What specifically are you in that position to do?

A: To help make sure that we make peoples lives better every single day. Its right in line with our core values, our mission to make peoples lives better. And its about making sure that everyone belongs.

Q: Demographically, do you think Frost Bank reflects the markets in which it operates?

A: Yes, I think it does. We do have some work to do, and thats part of what Phil and I will be working on. But for the most part we do.

Q: Will you be directly involved in the hiring process?

A: Yes, I will be involved there, and Ill be involved with all of our lines of businesses, helping to create that new lens to understand where we are  what executives are looking for, what the staffs looking for. So diversity, equity and inclusion are going to follow all the lines of our businesses. Its not like a piece over here that we just pulled into the picture.

Ill look at recruitment. Where are we recruiting? Who are we recruiting? I will talk with Phil and our other executive leaders about what kind of interview process can we bring. Youre looking at maybe having a blind interview process where youre looking at just qualifications  you dont know if its a male, you dont know if its a female. You dont know if theyre Black, white or a Martian. And what do they have in addition to their qualifications? Will they fit within our culture? Can they help us make peoples lives better?

I will be working very closely with HR.

Q: A year from now, would you expect to have hiring targets in place?

A: I dont know if well call it targets, but the goal will be to have a more diverse and inclusive organization. Well be working toward that.

Q: Looking at the makeup of Frost Banks board of directors and its senior executives  it definitely lacks diversity.

A: Were going to work on that. Thats one of the things thats very, very important to us.

Q: How much authority do you have to force that kind of change? Youre talking about senior executives and the board of directors.

A: Well, the fact that Im reporting to Phil Green says a lot to me  that I will have the authority that I need, and I will have his backing. And thats why Im extremely proud to have been offered this position. When it comes from executive leadership, that says to everyone that this is important.

greg.jefferson@express-news.net
Fiesta Fiesta officially returned to Hemisfair Park on Thursday after a years absence, kicking off the scaled-down 11-day celebration with an emotional uplift that organizers called a Peoples Parade.

Michael Quintanilla, known to many as San Antonios Mr. Fiesta himself, was the parades grand marshal, ready to set the tone with music, dance and his equally well-known Fiesta top hat, a platform for at least three feet of giant flowers and dozens of ostrich feathers.

Ive worn it before, but because of COVID, I just made it bigger, Quintanilla said.

Hes been parade marshal four times before. But Quintanilla had a special theme in mind this year, inviting 40 local medical workers who survived the front lines of the coronavirus pandemic to help him restart a party and restore the citys sense of normalcy.

Im so excited to be part of it, Quintanilla said. We call ourselves a Party With a Purpose, but in my own head Id like it to be a party filled with gratitude.

Fiesta runs through June 27 and will host only two parades: Thursdays opener and the River Parade on June 21. The festival usually involves roughly 115 events, but this year its down to about 40.

Because of this, Quintanilla said, he wanted the kickoff to be meaningful, a tribute to the many lives lost due to the pandemic  and the many lives saved.

Billy Calzada /Staff photographer

For me, its an honor to get this type of invitation from Mr. Quintanilla to allow us to get recognized, said Juan Jose Leal, a registered nurse and director of surgical services at Texas Vista Medical Center.

Billy Calzada /Staff photographer

I dont know how to describe it other than surreal, he said of the year 2020. But I am proud of the work that we did. From the president of the hospital, all the way to environmental services, everyone was kicking in that extra gear.

Leal, who has worked in health care for 26 years, is a regular Fiesta attendee, and even though the fight against COVID-19 isnt quite over yet, it was a relief to have a space to celebrate with the public, he said.

Fiesta organizers were completely on board with the idea, Quintanilla said, so he reached out to Texas Vista and University Health to help him get 20 front-liners from each institution to join the parade.

Getting them to sign up was apparently not an issue. The temperature was still at 96 degrees as medical staff from the two hospital systems began assembling on East Nueva Street. The short route would take them on a loop by way of Durango Street.

They gathered around Quintanilla, 67, a retired San Antonio Express-News fashion writer, who wore a white, hand-painted suit with the words walking masterpiece on his back and the giant hat nobody could miss.

They, too, wore colorful hats, decked with ribbons, flowers and even a Styrofoam cooler labeled, Fiesta Party Hat.

Its time to take a breath of fresh air, said Joe Moreno, a registered nurse who works at the Texas Vista emergency room and who put together the cooler hat at the last minute.

This is a blessing, said David Correa, a registered nurse and director of the University Health Resource Center. We saw many lives lost during this period. And thats the sad part about that whole situation  but we can celebrate that weve reached a milestone that weve got some type of normalcy and some type of control back.

They popped confetti guns and pulled a float with their sound system, the speakers disguised as pinatas. People cheered. Quintanilla danced.

Correa took the role of parade organizer for the two participating hospitals, making sure those interested knew where to meet and what to take, and even choosing the music that theyd be dancing to along the way.

We are very excited that we can collaborate with our health care community partners, Correa said. Even though we are two different (hospital) systems, we still take care of our patient population (together)  We depend on each other.

Quintanilla, loudly applauded when introduced by the Air Force Band of the West, was continually swarmed by onlookers who wanted a photo taken with him. And his hat.

He said he hopes people get out and reconnect with Fiesta in their own way, while keeping safety in mind.

This parade and Fiesta is such a signature event in San Antonio, Quintanilla said. We are re-emerging through Fiesta. But its also a way to remind us  with the medical front-line workers there  that we are not out of COVID, yet, totally. They are there to remind us to stay safe and be kind and respectful of each other.

danya.perez@express-news.net | @DanyaPH
Rating: Solid neighborhood option

Chi Chi Birds Hot Chicken owner Caleb Lott started his cooking career working as a line cook and a fast-food guy in his native San Antonio before heading off to Denver for what he calls the chef-coat experience at Sushi Den and the upscale steakhouse Guard and Grace.

But it wasnt until he wound up in California working at the Chanchos Tacos truck in Los Angeles  with lines stretching up to 500 deep  that he envisioned food trucks as a way of life. Coming back to San Antonio, he started Chi Chi Birds as a pop-up in his fathers backyard three years ago, then graduated in October to the trailer he parks outside Paper Tiger on the St. Marys Strip.

Chi Chi Birds specializes in boneless fried chicken breasts and tenders with a customized spice hierarchy, ranging from the unadorned naked to the red-hot reaper. The dry-rub spice levels ratchet up starting with paprika. Then cayenne gets added, then jalapeno, then habanero, then ghost pepper and blazing on up to Carolina Reaper and Trinidad Scorpion peppers.

For Spanish speakers getting a kick out of the trailers name being the slang for breasts, Lott says, yes, its partly that, because he uses only breast meat for his chicken. But it was also his nickname in high school, so stop it already.

On ExpressNews.com: Review: Cheap thrills, not much else, at Cerveceria Chapultepec

Mike Sutter /Staff

Best dish: Lotts time at the taco truck served him well, because the Crispy Bois tacos he makes at Chi Chi Birds ($13 for four) are the best things on the menu. They start with corn tortillas fried to order for a bubbly crisp shell that are then packed with two perfectly fried chicken tenders and dressed out with slaw, pickled pink onions, Bird Sauce and salsa.

The slaw is a blend of cabbage and kale stirred together with housemade spicy mayo called Bird Sauce, the tingly aromatics of 2 Gringos Chupacabra seasoning and just enough sugar. The result is four crispy tacos small enough for the street, but balanced enough to go beyond street food.

With a few exceptions, everything in this report was ordered extra hot, because they were out of the hottest reaper seasoning that day. If youre looking for the kind of spice showdown featured on YouTubes Hot Ones, this aint it. The chicken was about as spicy as a strong taqueria chile de arbol sauce rendered as a dry rub. Hot, but not so hot that it scorched all the flavor away.

Mike Sutter /Staff

Other dishes: Lott calls The Bird ($13) the plate that started everything. Its two big chicken tenders on Texas toast with a side of slaw, pickles and fries that are hand-cut, cooked to order and dusted with Chupacabra spice. The chicken is marinated in pickle juice before being dredged in seasoned flour and fried to order, and the bigger pieces of chicken let the flavor come through. Its juicy, tangy, hot and crunchy.

Chi Chi Birds Hot Chicken Location: At Paper Tiger, 2410 N. St. Mary's St., 210-473-6377, Facebook: @chichibirds Hours: 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Thursday-Sunday Takeout/delivery: Takeout and curbside available; no delivery See More Collapse

The tenders make a strong showing on The Mac Daddy ($13), as well. But the bowls mac and cheese stole the show with a subtle, creamy Mornay sauce that Lott and his team make right there in the trailer.

Chi Chi Birds plays the sandwich game with The Sando ($13 with fries), a big chicken breast wearing a loose, golden armor of breading in a hamburger bun, finished with slaw, Bird Sauce and pickled onions, a treatment that adds the sweetness, moisture and tanginess that most chicken sandwiches are missing.

After working for a time with the Jerk Shacks Lattoia Massey (aka chef Nicola Blaque) at her Pearl food hall stand Mi Roti, Lott took a tip from the celebrated chef and added a veggie sandwich, The Veg Head ($13 with fries). He marinates a thick slice of cauliflower in buttermilk, then dredges it in flour and fries it just like the chicken breast for a sandwich that doesnt just imitate chicken, it celebrates the earthy, funky grandeur of cauliflower.

On ExpressNews.com: 52 Weeks of Food Trucks

Mike Sutter /Staff

Fiestas finally back this year, but Chi Chi Birds celebrates it year-round with a Fiesta-grade chicken on a stick ($8) thats almost too big to fit on a stick.

Meanwhile, the Chi Chi Birds operation has become a kind of incubator. Lott also has a side hustle, the smash-burger concept Slam Daddy Baddies, and his sous chef Sergio Flores operates the burger and torta concept La Tortuga, both pop-ups working under canopies the way Lott did back in the day.

msutter@express-news.net | Twitter: @fedmanwalking | Instagram: @fedmanwalking
HONG KONG (AP)  Hong Kong pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily increased its print run more than fivefold to 500,000 copies as residents lined up Friday to buy the paper in a show of support for beleaguered press freedoms, a day after police arrested five top editors and executives.

The raid on the papers offices by hundreds of police and security agents  along with the freezing of $2.3 million worth of its assets  marked the first time a sweeping national security law has been used against the media. It was the latest sign of a widening crackdown on civil liberties in the semi-autonomous city, which has long cherished freedoms that dont exist elsewhere in China.

Police said the editors were arrested on suspicion of foreign collusion to endanger national security, based on over 30 articles that authorities said had called for international sanctions against China and Hong Kong.

On Friday, the National Security Department charged two men with collusion with a foreign country to endanger national security, according to a government statement. The two will appear in court on Saturday.

It did not name them, but the South China Morning Post newspaper cited an unnamed source saying they are Apply Daily's chief editor Ryan Law and Cheung Kim-hung, the CEO of Apple Daily's publisher Next Digital. The other three were being detained for investigation.

With anti-government protests silenced, most of the city's prominent pro-democracy activists in jail and many others fleeing abroad, people snapped up copies at newsstands and in convenience stores.

There are lots of injustices in Hong Kong already. I think there are a lot of things we cannot do anymore, said resident Lisa Cheung. Buying a copy is all what we can do. When the law cannot protect Hong Kong people anymore, we are only left to do what we can.

The front page of Friday's edition splashed images of the five editors and executives led away in handcuffs. Police also confiscated 44 hard drives worth of news material. A quote from Cheung, the arrested CEO of Next Digital, said Hang in there, everyone.

Another resident, William Chan, said he bought a copy of the paper as a show of support.

It was such a groundless arrest and suppressed freedom of the press, he said.

The national security law was imposed after massive protests in 2019 challenged Beijing's rule by calling for broader democratic freedoms. It outlaws subversion, secession, terrorism and collusion with foreign countries. The maximum penalty for serious offenders is life imprisonment.

Security Minister John Lee had on Thursday warned other journalists to distance themselves from those under investigation at Apple Daily. He said those arrested had used journalistic work to endanger national security and that anyone who was in cahoots with them would pay a hefty price.

The United States, which has imposed sanctions against Hong Kong and Chinese officials over the crackdown, strongly condemned the arrests and called for the immediate release of the five arrested.

We are deeply concerned by Hong Kong authorities selective use of the national security law to arbitrarily target independent media organizations, State Department spokesman Price said, adding that the suspected foreign collusion charges appear to be politically motivated.

As we all know, exchanging views with foreigners in journalism should never be a crime, he said.

British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said in a tweet that freedom of the press is one of the rights China had promised to protect for 50 years when Britain handed over Hong Kong in 1997.

Todays raids & arrests at Apple Daily in Hong Kong demonstrate Beijing is using the National Security Law to target dissenting voices, not tackle public security, Raab said.

European Union spokesperson Nabila Massrali said that the arrests further demonstrate how the National Security Law is being used to stifle media freedom and freedom of expression in Hong Kong. Media freedom and pluralism are fundamental to Hong Kong's success under the "one country, two systems" framework, she said.

In Beijing, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian rejected the foreign criticism and defended the government's action, repeating China's insistence that the national security targets only a small group of anti-China elements who disrupted Hong Kong and endangered the national security of the country."

No right or freedom, including freedom of the press, can break through the bottom line of national security," Zhao told reporters at a daily briefing.

Hong Kong is Chinas Hong Kong, Hong Kong affairs are purely Chinas internal affairs, and no country, organization or individual has the right to intervene," he said.

Apple Daily has pledged to readers that it will continue its reporting, and on Thursday night invited members of the media to its printing presses to watch its Friday edition roll off the press in a show of commitment.

Its founder Jimmy Lai is currently serving a 20-month prison sentence on charges of playing a part in unauthorized protests in 2019, and faces further charges under the national security law that could potentially put him away for life.

The paper's average daily circulation has been around 86,000 copies.
Larry W. Smith/Getty Images

A San Antonio man was arrested on charges of sexually assaulting a teenage girl after meeting her online, Kerrville police said.

Eric Gaulke, 53, was charged with six counts of sexual assault of a child.
Thirty school districts, including San Antonio Independent School District, and two associations signed a letter to urge Gov. Greg Abbott to add legislation funding virtual learning to any special session for other proposed laws.

A bill that would have ensured districts receive funding for each student enrolled in online-only classes died after Democrats broke quorum to kill a controversial voting bill. The bill was expected to be called at 11:40 p.m. May 30.

The signatories of the letter sent Wednesday noted that many districts scrapped plans to offer virtual learning this upcoming school year after the bill did not get a vote.

SAISD was one of those that suspended plans to provide a virtual school option for the next school year.

Laura Short, an SAISD spokeswoman, said they are keeping a close eye on the upcoming special legislative session, which could happen as early as next month, to see if virtual learning might gain some traction.

She said the district is offering a safe, in-person school experience for all students next year.

We ended this year on a safe, strong note, and we will begin on a strong note, too  beginning with our Summer Jumpstart program and again in the fall, Short said in an email.

We respectfully request that you add virtual learning to the list of items for the legislature to act on during any special session you call prior to the 88th Legislative Session, the letter reads. Over the past year, many students have discovered that virtual learning provides them with an opportunity to learn and grow in their own unique way.

A spokesperson for Abbott did not respond to a request for comment.

There is no new statutory framework authorizing remote instruction without the legislation, according to Texas Education Agency. The agency used disaster authority for the 2020-21 school year to OK funding for remote instruction, but that authority cannot be used for the new school year.

Under the proposal, districts and charters with a state-issued academic accountability rating of C or higher for the previous year would have been allowed to operate a local remote learning program. Districts that decided to offer such programs would have had wide discretion over which students could enroll.

The four largest school employees unions had opposed the original bill.

Most students are better suited in an in-person environment, according to the letter. But a number of students have benefited from virtual learning, such as those whove pursued outside interests, worked to support their family while still learning and others whove received treatment for different illnesses and health challenges.

There are thousands of students across the state of Texas who thrive in a virtual environment and we have an obligation to ensure that they receive the best education possible by providing them with the choice to receive their learning virtually, the letter reads. We have an opportunity to expand public school choice for families and meet our students where they are instead of letting them fall through the cracks of a system that was not built for them.

Staff Writer Jacob Beltran contributed to this report.

alejandro.serrano@chron.com
A San Antonio man charged with violating a protective order shortly before the killing of his estranged wife in May has been served with two more protective orders in the weeks after her death.

A Bexar County grand jury indicted Marc Louis Champoux on June 7 on the felony, accusing him of violating a court order to stay away from Samantha Lopez-Champoux, 28, who was shot to death May 24 in the drivers seat of her car in front of her three children.

Police say Marc Champoux is a person of interest but have not charged him in connection with the killing. The indictment alleges Champoux, 30, went to or was near the residence of Lopez-Champoux on May 4, violating a court order issued Sept. 5, 2019.

He had twice before been convicted of the same offense, prosecutors said. He was booked and released on $10,000 bail.

In the days after the killing, Champoux was served with two more protective orders: one from his estranged wifes neighbor on May 27, and another one from his mother-in-law on June 4.

The police told me that Samantha had called 911 for help over 100 times because of Marc. He is capable of anything, his mother-in-law wrote in an affidavit.

The neighbors affidavit said she feared Champoux would retaliate against her for helping Lopez-Champoux on numerous occasions, including seven times when he showed up at her apartment and allegedly abused and threatened them both.

In the document, she described two incidents in which Champoux used his thumb and forefinger to mimic a gun pointed at her.

I am afraid that he will keep his promises when he threatened me all the times that he did, the neighbor said in the document. I never thought he would go as far as he did with the assaults and abuse to Samantha and now am afraid that because I stood up for her before her murder, he will come after me now.

Officers found Lopez-Champoux dead in the drivers seat of a vehicle around 7:15 a.m. May 24 in the parking lot of the Beldon Apartments, 7511 Harlow Drive, just east of Austin Highway near Lanark Drive.

On ExpressNews.com: Written on the wall - McManus vents outrage after battered woman is slain in front of her three children

She was about to drive her three children to school, and they were in the back seat when their mother was shot, Police Chief William McManus said at the time.

Officers searched the immediate area and detained and questioned Champoux at his home nearby. He has not been charged in the shooting and remains a person of interest in the investigation, police said this week.

Court records and police reports indicate Champoux has a history of domestic violence incidents going back to October 2018 and has been convicted twice for violating protective orders barring him from contact with his wife. His latest arrest and indictment accuses him of the same offense.

Court records indicate Champouxs attorney is Linda S. Corley. She did not return calls and an email seeking comment.

In applying for court protection in September 2019, Lopez-Champoux wrote in an affidavit that she had dated Champoux for three years and they had been married for seven months. They separated April 6, 2019. They had a child, and she had two from a previous relationship, the document states. Court records indicate she filed for divorce in July 2019 but that it was not finalized.

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An arrest report from April 6, 2019, says Champoux was charged with assault-family-choking/strangulation and interfering with an emergency phone call.

Lopez-Champoux told officers her husband punched her in the face four times and tried to strangle her on the bed after he had come home drunk and she tried to ask him where he had been. She said she ran outside and that while she attempted to call police, he grabbed her cell phone and threw it into a creek.

Lopez-Champoux ran to a nearby gas station, where someone loaned her a cell phone to call police.

Officers found Champoux outside his wifes home in a car with a handgun and a child. Officers noticed red marks and blood smeared on Lopez-Champouxs face and a laceration on her left hand, possibly from when her husband pushed her into a window, according to the report.

Champoux told officers he struck his wife once in self-defense after she hit him four times, and he admitted he threw the phone in the creek, saying it belonged to him, according to the report. Officers saw no injuries on Champoux and completed a request for an emergency protective order that day.

On Sept. 26, 2019, Champoux pleaded no contest to the assault charge, which was reduced from a third-degree felony to a Class A misdemeanor because he had satisfied the terms of his pretrial supervision  even though the two arrests for violating protective orders occurred during that period. The pretrial program and time served kept him from having to serve a six-month sentence.

Police reports show Champoux was arrested three more times, accused of violating a protective order June 12 and Aug. 12, 2019, and April 11 this year, a little more than a month before Lopez-Champouxs death.

When she was shot, Champoux was free on bail after his latest arrest. The indictment last week formalized that charge.

Bexar County District Attorney Joe D. Gonzales said police have not yet presented his office with a case in the Lopez-Champoux shooting. He and Christian Henricksen, his chief of litigation, said following through on the protection order process is crucial.

Protective orders are an incredibly important tool, a deterrent, but they dont guarantee protection against a determined criminal, Henricksen said.

A piece of paper is not going to stop a bullet, Gonzales agreed. But it takes everyone who has the potential for harm to take this very seriously.  It is important to follow through  complete the application process, sign the documents and come to testify.

Court records are unclear what sentence Champoux received for his two previous misdemeanor convictions for violating protective orders.

His alleged third offense made the charge a third-degree felony. If convicted, he faces up to 10 years in prison and a possible fine of up to $10,000.

The case is assigned to the 290th District Court.

ezavala@express-news.net | Twitter: @elizabeth2863
Phyllis Viagran, one of San Antonios newly-minted council members, is drawing heat from state ethics investigators for identifying herself during campaign season as a councilwoman  before she won the seat.

The Texas Ethics Commission has put the Southeast Side councilwoman on notice for potentially violating state campaign law and committing a misdemeanor. The commission, which investigates potential violations of campaign ethics and finance law, is looking into a complaint that Viagran called herself a councilwoman while trying to raise money from campaign donors before the June 5 runoff.

At the time the campaign made the fundraising appeal, Phyllis Viagran wasnt the District 3 councilwoman. That was her sister Rebecca Viagran  who left after reaching term limits.

Laura Barberena, a longtime local political consultant who ran Viagrans campaign, said the campaign was not trying to confuse donors into believing that Phyllis was already the councilwoman  or that they were once more giving contributions to her sister. Barberena has blamed herself for the language  which she said was made in error.

It was a typo, Barberena said. It was a mistake. We were not trying to mislead anyone.

Nonetheless, the ethics commission is looking into the matter after receiving a complaint.

At issue is a May 2 fundraising email  the day after Viagran made it into the runoff with former state Rep. Tomas Uresti.

Now more than ever I need your help and support to make it to the finish line and win this together, Viagrans campaign wrote in the email.

It was signed Phyllis Viagran, District 3 City Council Councilwoman.

Thats a no-no under Texas law, which prohibits political candidates from knowingly identifying themselves as office-holders if they dont hold that office. The offense is considered a Class A misdemeanor, punishable by up to one year in jail and a maximum $4,000 fine.

The Ethics Commission is treating the matter as a Category One violation  essentially an offense the commission considers an open-and-shut case. Natalie McDermon, the commissions assistant general counsel, informed Viagran of the probe in a May 13 letter  three days after it received a sworn complaint about the matter.

Its highly unlikely Viagran will face criminal prosecution for the offense, not considered particularly minor or major, said Doug Ray, an Austin attorney and campaign finance law expert. More probable is that Viagran will face up to a maximum $300 fine  or none at all.

Viagran bested Uresti in the June 5 runoff with more than 60 percent of the vote.
In January 2010, San Antonio launched a series of three East Side reinvestment summits as a way to kick-start economic activity in a long-neglected part of the city.

The first summit, held in the auditorium of Sam Houston High School, included a brainstorming session in which attendees split up into three groups. The most frequently discussed topic was the fate of the Friedrich Building complex, a sprawling, dilapidated site that had been dormant for two decades.

The city was just beginning what then-Mayor Julian Castro dubbed the decade of downtown, a period in which our municipal government opened up its toolbox and deployed all manner of financial incentives to spur housing construction in the urban core, with the thought that it would combat sprawl and revive the center-city area.

This was during a period when city leaders put a premium on development and paid little notice to the possible side effects, such as gentrification, rising property values and displacement.

Along those lines, the Center City Housing Incentive Policy, created in 2012, gave away more than $100 million in incentives to developers over its first six years, resulting in more than 10,000 new housing units  most of them out of the price range of everyday San Antonians.

That led to a course correction from the council. But city leaders continue to struggle with questions about what kind of development is beneficial to the community and what kind of incentives are appropriate.

All those questions converged during the recent debate over the Friedrich complex. A Dallas-based developer, Provident Realty Advisors, has partnered with the nonprofit San Antonio Housing Trust Public Facility Corporation (PFC) on a plan to build 358 apartments at the Friedrich site.

Under the partnership deal, the Housing Trust PFC owns the property and leases it to Provident Realty, enabling the developer to completely avoid property taxes. For its part, Provident Realty must guarantee that at least half of its units will be affordable.

Thats where you need to read the fine print. Of the 179 units classified as affordable housing, 155 of them will be set aside for people at 80 percent of the area median income (AMI). For a studio apartment, that means an affordable monthly rent of $1,100.

Serious questions needed to be asked about the implications of this deal. But the Housing Trust PFC was in a hurry. The board is composed of five council members, and three of them were leaving office on Tuesday. So, on Monday morning, the board rushed through its approval by a 3-1 vote, with Roberto Trevino the lone dissenter and Adriana Rocha Garcia abstaining.

Putting aside the policy complexities, the action displayed an awful disregard for process.

Only a day later, a new East Side council member, Jalen McKee-Rodriguez, would take the oath of office. McKee-Rodriguez has serious concerns about the Friedrich project (which is based in his district), but the board was unwilling to wait even 24 hours to let his voice be considered.

It was also telling that the vote happened a day before one of the board members, outgoing West Side Councilwoman Shirley Gonzales, gave up her seat to young progressive Teri Castillo. Gonzales opposed Castillo in the recent District 5 runoff election for the very reason that she considered Castillo hostile to big development projects.

To do it right before a new council gets sworn in, its obvious what theyre trying to do, and thats wrong, said Maria Berriozabal, the first Latina ever to serve on the San Antonio City Council.

Berriozabal believes that the planned apartment complex will create more problems than benefits for the East Side.

Its new people coming in, she said. And the people who have been there for ages and ages and who have invested in their casitas for years, are not able to turn it over to their children, because their taxes have gone up.

For Trevino, the project simply came with too many loose ends.

We, as a city, should be finding the way to do the most good for the most people, Trevino said. Everything around that area is going to increase in value. Where is the answer for that? Did anybody set aside any monies for that?

Gonzales, in her eagerness to green-light the project, produced a profoundly weird moment last week, when she accused her council colleague, John Courage, of flat-out racism, because he questioned whether there were enough truly affordable units planned for the Friedrich complex, while supporting a mixed-income development in his North Side district.

Gonzales tried to turn Courages concern about affordability on the East Side into a case of him suggesting that people of color were not entitled to nice things. Thats not what the issue is about. Its about who will benefit from those nice things and who will get penalized. Whose pockets will be lined, and whose will be emptied.

The answers are not simple, but our ultimate concern should be the well-being of East Side residents, not Provident Realty.

ggarcia@express-news.net | Twitter: @gilgamesh470
One woman, a refugee, arrived in the United States in February. Originally from the Democratic Republic of Congo, she lived most of her life in a refugee camp in Tanzania. Although she still has some family at the camp, she has a job, receives resettlement services and lives with her husband in the U.S.

Another woman  an asylum-seeker and single mother from Honduras  fled after violent sex and gang attacks in her hometown. Instead of offering safety when she sought asylum, the U.S. held her at a detention center for two months and separated her from her child before releasing her shackled with an ankle monitor and without permission to work.

Both lives changed forever, yet due to their different statuses  refugee and asylum-seeker  they were treated differently. One refugee came to the U.S. and received legal status and refugee assistance. One asylum-seeker took the dangerous trip here, only to be incarcerated at an immigration detention center and separated from her child.

In 1951, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, or UNHCR, outlined the rights of refugees and the legal obligations countries must take to protect them, clearly stating refugees should not be returned to a country where they face serious threats to their life or freedom. This treaty granted people with refugee status federal recognition, a baseline of protection and assistance to help them start their new life.

But when asylum-seekers  who, like refugees, are fleeing serious threats to their life or freedom  enter the U.S., we do all we can to ensure they fail. In fact, as Vice President Kamala Harris said recently, America tells them to come legally or not make the trip at all. And for those who do make the dangerous journey looking for refuge, we throw them in prisonlike facilities, dont appoint them lawyers and put them into a system where deportation is the most likely outcome.

President Joe Biden has issued executive orders that recognize that our current system fails to uphold our international obligations, but we have yet to see real, concrete action on refugees or asylum-seekers. To meet our legal, international and moral obligations, we must change our entire perspective  this is not a law and order issue but a humanitarian one, and it needs a humanitarian response.

Asylum-seekers should not face a complex, traumatizing legal process behind bars; they should be able to reside with their families and sponsors while their applications for asylum are considered.

Rather than making every effort to exclude people from safety through programs such as Title 42, a rule put in place by President Donald Trump and continued under Biden to refuse asylum-seekers entry on the basis of public health, or expedited removal, which is a summary screening process that refuses asylum access and often results in deportation without the person ever seeing a judge, we should embrace the due process that is a cornerstone of our society and ensure each person seeking protection has access to the information and resources they need  like lawyers  for a meaningful day in court.

Providing asylum-seekers with the same support refugees receive is a start, but make no mistake, the refugee process needs a reset, too. Refugees spend years in camps, stuck in legal limbo while awaiting a decision on their lives. Trump dismantled our refugee-resettlement system so thoroughly that Biden initially expected the U.S. to resettle fewer than 15,000 refugees this year  the lowest number in decades, despite campaign promises to resettle up to 125,000.

In 1951, world leaders laid out lofty obligations for people fleeing persecution and seeking safety. Seventy years later, were still struggling to provide dignity and basic human rights for thousands of asylum-seekers. Hearing our vice president, whose family came to this country as immigrants, say to the people of Guatemala, dont come, was devastating.

Weve regressed, misstepped and violated the rights of those hoping to find a safe home. We need to do better, and we should start by living up to the aspirations set forth by leaders before us.

Marisol B. Girela is a RAICES clinical social worker who oversees the refugee resettlement programs, the community-donation center and clinical services program in San Antonio. Miriam Camero is the RAICES vice president of social programs.
An ugly wall that will never truly be built is a fitting project for Gov. Greg Abbott to pursue.

It is a monument to his painfully cynical brand of politics, one that placates the far right with a showy hollowness that some might confuse as boldness. Abbotts Great Wall of Texas is a political prop. Heres why:

Even if Texas could build a border wall (legally dubious), it cant afford to build one. The math on this is fairly straightforward. Abbott has said the state will use $250 million dedicated to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. This will go toward hiring a project manager and starting the wall.

But the Trump administration spent as much as $46 million per mile on some portions of its U.S.-Mexico border wall (not paid by Mexico), and funding options for Texas are limited to about $11 billion in the states rainy day fund. Beyond this, state lawmakers, who approved $1.1 billion for border security over the next two years for state troopers, havent allocated any funding specifically for a border wall.

Abbott has also launched a crowdsourcing campaign to raise private funding for a wall, but this strikes us an invitation for trouble. For precedent, consider the private We Build the Wall effort and the swirling allegations of fraud.

But even if Abbott can afford his wall in a meaningful way, its also unclear where Abbott can build it. The Trump administration managed to build about 450 miles of barriers on the border, but this included only about 50 miles of new border wall, according to various news reports. Most of the construction was to repair and update existing barriers. And nearly all the land along the Texas-Mexico border is privately owned, and not all landowners want a wall on their properties. Some might welcome one, but Abbotts wall would come with great gaps.

Then there is the question of legality. The federal government has jurisdiction over federal borders, so Abbotts effort to build a wall will end up in court, delaying any construction while also costing taxpayers.

If you dont think the governor of Texas  whip-smart, a former Texas Supreme Court justice and attorney general, and a master of obfuscation  doesnt know this, well, we have a border wall to sell you.

But wait  theres more. Abbott has also ordered DPS troopers to arrest immigrants who enter the country illegally for trespassing. But again, immigration is a federal issue, and there is a legal right to make an asylum claim. Expect more lawsuits.

To place these migrants, the Texas Department of Criminal Justice is moving inmates out of the Dolph Briscoe Unit in Dilley, which will serve as a central holding facility. That is, they will be held in prison.

We wonder what will Abbott do with immigrant families? Will he separate them by placing children in juvenile detention? Since he has ordered the closure of state-licensed shelters that house immigrant children, will he place children separated from their families with federal emergency shelters?

There is a certain refined sound and fury here. Polling has shown many conservatives will likely approve of Abbotts wall, hardly surprising given former President Donald Trumps popularity with Republicans. But its hard to see this as anything more than posturing.

The governor of Texas is proposing legally questionable maneuvers at a steep cost to taxpayers. His actions challenge existing asylum law, and could split apart families and burden local officials. It is reminiscent of Abbott alleging child abuse at the emergency childrens shelter at Freeman Coliseum here in San Antonio  and never providing any proof.

Abbotts not furthering the border discussion, hes leveraging it on the national stage. Its a sad indictment of these times that this resonates as leadership.
Anyone who has walked under or near high-voltage power lines has heard them crackle and hum. Thanks to the February freeze  and Texass free-market energy system  that noise will likely end up costing Texas taxpayers millions of dollars.

The sound is line-loss  electricity that disappears into the air during its trip through power lines, like water evaporates as it flows through canals. Typically its cost is an afterthought. Yet the astronomical price Texas regulators set for electricity during Februarys deep freeze meant the cost of the non-existent power quickly ballooned into huge bills.

In February 2020, line-loss charges cost Harris County about $17,000. This February the cost exceeded more than a half-million dollars, a 2,800-percent increase. In Tarrant County, the evaporated-electricity charges jumped nearly 6,000 percent  from $5,000 in February 2020 to more than $300,000 over the same period in 2021.

Its a breath-taker, said Tarrant County Judge Glen Whitley, chairman of the Public Power Pool, a cooperative that buys electricity for about 100 government agencies.

Call them the hidden taxpayer costs of the winter storm. Everyone agrees storm-related power price surges will cost Texans billions of dollars, much of it paid out over years of higher rates. But no one has totaled all the ways, large and small, that residents will pay for the event.

FAILURES OF POWER: How Texas politicians knowingly blew 3 chances to fix the failing power grid

Publicly funded state agencies needing to keep the lights and heat on during the freeze racked up huge bills. In February 2020, the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, which operates the states prisons, paid about $1.2 million for natural gas. This February the cost soared to nearly $8.5 million.

The University of Texas-Austin paid $940,000 for gas in February 2020. In 2021: $3.65 million.

Last month, state legislators passed laws to help companies borrow billions of dollars to pay for storm-inflated power costs and bill ratepayers over time to pay it back. Yet well before that, many Texas cities that own public utility companies already had been forced to scrounge up additional millions to cover gas and electric bills hugely inflated by the storm-caused shortages.

Outside of Dallas, Denton borrowed $140 million. Georgetown, just north of Austin, borrowed $48 million to cover the cost of providing electricity to its residents during the storm. Ratepayers will have to cover that, as well as a projected $5 million in interest and costs over the term of the loan.

Other cities dipped into their savings accounts to pay the storm-inflated power costs, depleting reserve funds. Garland siphoned millions from its rainy-day account. Weatherford, a small city outside of Fort Worth, drew down $13.7 million.

Now Playing: Video: Houston Chronicle Photo Staff

Wherever the money came from, eventually it will be repaid by local citizens, said Steve Moffitt, vice president of Schneider Engineering, a Boerne-based company working with municipal utility companies across the state to find the extra money. At the end of the day, it has to come from customers somewhere, he said.

The small city of Hearne borrowed $1.9 million to cover costs incurred by its publicly owned electric utility company. Ratepayers will pay off the debt over the next 10 years, said City Manager John Naron.

Usually if we get a $2 million loan, were fixing streets, the sewage system, street lights, he said. Now were borrowing $2 million and getting nothing for it.

In one week, nearly $50B in electricity

When the dust cleared on the biennial legislative session that ended June 1, one thing was clear. Although it was ordinary Texans who suffered when the freeze hit four months ago  millions were left shivering in the dark for days; hundreds died  it is also ordinary Texans who would foot much of the bill, said Tim Morstad, associate director of AARP Texas.

Consumers are being forced to prop up the system that failed us, he said.

Energy prices spiked during the mid-February storm for several reasons. Frozen natural gas facilities  some of which appear to have failed to properly weatherize their equipment  created a shortage sending prices soaring. Some electricity generation companies that appear to have inadequate weather protection also froze.

Generators dependent on scarce natural gas to make electricity shuddered to a halt. With production plunging, the Electricity Reliability Council of Texas  ERCOT  cranked up the price of electricity hoping to draw more power to the grid, and then kept it high for days.

The magnitude of the financial fallout is difficult to digest. Experts estimate that based on the sky-high prices, nearly $50 billion-worth of electricity was consumed in Texas during the one-week storm  250 times the normal cost, said Beth Garza, an energy analyst for R Street who from 2014 to 2019 was ERCOTs independent market monitor, which watchdogs the electricity market.

Jason Fochtman, Houston Chronicle / Staff photographer

Companies that had gas and electricity to sell cashed in on a Uri windfall. Some Wall Street investors made millions, too.

For those forced to buy gas and electricity during the height of the freeze it was expensive at best, catastrophic at worst. Brazos Electric Power Cooperative, the states largest and oldest member-owned electric company, declared bankruptcy after racking up about $2 billion in charges when its generators failed.

To spare ratepayers the financial pain of getting hit with giant utility bills all at once, last month state lawmakers passed several laws to help the biggest losers borrow money and pay it back over time. The laws are complex, and analysts and companies said they are still deciphering how they will be used.

Pending high-stakes legal battles over the storms giant bills add more uncertainty to the final tab. There are a zillion contractual disputes underway right now, said Garza, pointing out that those, too, will end up costing companies - and their customers -- giant legal fees.

Still, analysts projected the taxpayer tab would come to roughly between $7 and $9 billion. Yet that doesnt include numerous other hidden costs.

$3.6M dissolves into thin air

A spokesman for the Texas comptrollers office said the agency had not been asked to tally the total costs to state agencies forced to purchase power at inflated costs in February. But a survey shows that for those required to stay open, energy costs soared.

The University of Texas-Southwesterns gas bill ballooned nearly 20-fold, from less than $400,000 in January, to about $7.1 million in February.

Much bigger additional costs were incurred in local pockets across Texas by municipal utilities. In March, Hearst Newspapers detailed the millions of dollars-worth of inflated bills that publicly owned gas companies were struggling to pay after buying at storm prices.

Most were in small Texas cities that suddenly needed to come up with $1 or $2 million  a pittance in the big picture but an enormous challenge to local gas customers who will have to pay it back. And not all of the bills were small. Corpus Christi will borrow $35 million to cover extraordinary storm expenses owed by its citizen-owned gas utility. City ratepayers will cover it.

CPS Energy, the San Antonio public utility company that is the states largest, racked up nearly $700 million in extra natural gas charges. It is suing its suppliers for price gouging. In the meantime, the company has hinted that local ratepayers may have to cover the tab over the next 25 years.

I think its unconscionable, president and CEO Paula Gold-Williams recently told the editorial board of the San Antonio Express-News. I think people would have never assumed that during a declared disaster at the state and federal level wed see these types of prices.

Compared to the public gas companies, municipal electric utilities saw even larger bills. Several borrowed to cover the extraordinary costs.

New Braunfels, a mid-sized Central Texas city, needed a $100 million loan to cover the costs of keeping the lights and heat on for its residents. Thats more than the citys entire utility billings for a year, said spokeswoman Melissa Krause: One winter storm ate up our entire years budget. Ratepayers will repay it over time through small rate hikes, she said.

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Jason Fochtman, Houston Chronicle / Staff photographer

Kerrville will borrow about $25 million, said Mike Wittler, general manager for the citys public utility company. He said the city would most likely sell bonds to raise the money, with ratepayers repaying it over the next few years.

Robstown, a small city just outside of Corpus Christi, owns both a gas and electric utility company. In a normal February locals pay a total of about $470,000. This year the bill approached $7 million.

The town recently took out a 10-year $7.5 million loan from Frost Bank to cover the extra costs, said Roy Gutierrez, the citys utilities superintendent. Eventually its the ratepayers who have to take care of it, he said.

Russell Keene, a longtime lobbyist who has worked with both investor-owned and municipal gas and electric companies, estimated the public companies incurred more than a billion dollars that will largely have to be paid off by their ratepayers. While most municipal utilities are conservatively managed, no one could have foreseen the magnitude of these charges, he said.

Back at the Public Power Pool, Whitley said that members had locked in electricity rates with long-term contracts, so consumed-power charges didnt soar during Uri. Yet suppliers charged the co-op real-time rates for the line-losses  evaporated power  causing the normally tiny bill to spike.

In all, members taxpayers were charged about $3.6 million for electric power that literally vanished into thin air. Whitley said over 50 members were protesting the charges. The pools main electricity supplier has offered to spread out the charges to soften the blow.

eric.dexheimer@chron.com
BERLIN (AP)  American filmmaker Laura Poitras, known for her award-winning 2014 documentary on former U.S. intelligence contractor Edward Snowden and his revelations about the National Security Agency, has once again turned her camera on the watchmen.

In an exhibition that opened Friday in Berlin, Poitras examines the way the state monitors citizens' lives  both abroad and at home, in New York City.

While her early work on the war in Iraq and the U.S. government surveillance apparatus  including the Oscar-winning Citizenfour  follows the long trail of the Sept. 11 attacks, Poitras new show grapples with the issues of the past year: The COVID-19 pandemic and the fight for racial justice.

The goal remains, Poitras said, to create experience that has emotional resonance.

I want to interrogate power, she told The Associated Press in an interview ahead of the show's launch.

Together with artist Sean Vegezzi, Poitras puts viewers outside an NYPD outpost in Queens used by the Technical Assistance Response Unit, whose role is to monitor political protests. The unit employs military technology to gather intelligence, including on recent Black Lives Matter rallies, but officers seem unaware that they are being watched as they enter and leave the building.

A second video combines exterior shots of the Vernon C. Bain prison barge on the East River with three months of intercepted radio recordings between guards discussing the apparent use of force against inmates. The crowded prison  set up as a temporary facility almost three decades ago  saw high death rates from COVID-19 last year.

Poitras and Vegezzi said they were surprised that the prison's continued existence and the conditions there haven't been taken up by local politicians, given that most of the inmates are local residents awaiting trial for minor crimes.

As a New Yorker I hope that it's difficult to look at this prison ship and know that you are complicit in it, Poitras said, admitting: We are interested in getting this shut down.

The series is completed with a visit to little-known Hart Island, home to one of the largest mass grave sites in the United States with burials dating back to the Civil War era. Vegezzi, whose brother was among a prison detail from Rikers Island tasked with burying the dead, used a drone to show how detainees with little social distancing or protective equipment stacked coffins in deep trenches at the height of the pandemic. The Department of Corrections halted the practice after it became public last year.

The triptych's bleak, distanced footage contrasts with Poitras' 25-minute film Terror Contagion about Israeli spyware company NSO and its alleged role in the monitoring of activists around the world. Rights groups including Amnesty International claim that the company's technology has been licensed by repressive regimes to infiltrate the phones of dissidents and journalists, a charge that NSO rejects.

The film was made together with the research group Forensic Architecture, which says its members and collaborators have been hacked using the NSO spyware Pegasus. The group plans to release a broader investigation into the company next month.

Since the start of the pandemic, NSO has sought to apply its technology  originally designed to hunt down terrorists  to COVID-tracking tools, alarming human rights activists.

The pandemic rules and surveillance technology are definitely going to be exploited and normalized in future, said Poitras.

The filmmaker was herself the subject of intense surveillance by the U.S. government that started after she visited Baghdad in 2004 for her film My Country, My Country." After coming under heightened scrutiny for her work with Snowden, who remains in exile in Russia, Poitras was based for years in Berlin, a city she chose to return to for this latest exhibition.

The German capital has its own grim history of state surveillance. The show's gallery is located in the formerly communist-controlled east of the city. It also lies just a few hundreds yards from the bombastic new home of Germany's BND foreign intelligence agency.

Poitras and Vegezzi hope to take the exhibition to New York in the fall.

___

The exhibition Circles by Laura Poitras can be seen at Neuen Berliner Kunstverein from June 18 to Aug. 8.

___

Follow Frank Jordans on Twitter at www.twitter.com/wirereporter
MADISON, Wis. (AP)  The Wisconsin Legislature's budget-writing committee completed its work Thursday on the state's next two-year spending plan, paving the way for the Senate and Assembly to vote on it later this month.

Here are some highlights of the budget as currently written by the Republican-controlled Joint Finance Committee:

TAX CUTS

Bolstered by rosier revenue projections, Republicans inserted $3.3 billion in income and property tax cuts into the budget. The provisions include $2.7 billion in cuts for people who earn between $24,000 and $2654,000 annually and nearly $650 million in local property tax cuts for schools and technical colleges. The budget would backfill that lost revenue with state aid. Residents would see a property tax bill but schools would come out even.

K-12 SCHOOLS:

Republicans gave public schools an additional $128 million in state funding over two years, which is less than 10% of the $1.6 billion that Gov. Tony Evers proposed. Republicans defended the move, noting that Wisconsin schools are slated to receive $2.6 billion in federal coronavirus relief money. However, nearly all of that would have been in jeopardy unless the state spent nearly $400 million more on schools. The additional $647 million in state aid Republicans handed schools to replace revenue lost through property tax reductions satisfies the spending requirement, ensuring schools will receive all of the $2.6 billion in federal aid.

SPECIAL EDUCATION

The plan would reimburse school districts 30% of special education costs in the second year of the budget, up from 28.2% currently. Special education advocates say that is woefully inadequate. The Evers budget would increase reimbursement to 45% in the first year and 50% in the second.

UW SYSTEM:

The eight-year-old tuition freeze would end this fall under the GOP budget. UW schools would also receive just an $8.25 million increase in funding, compared with the $192 million Evers proposed.

TRANSPORTATION:

There are no gas tax or vehicle registration fee increases. The budget would authorize the start of the oft-delayed Interstate 94 expansion project in Milwaukee County, as Evers wanted. State funding for transit programs was cut in half in Milwaukee and Madison, but Republicans said that was because those Democratic strongholds are receiving hundreds of millions of dollars in federal coronavirus relief money.

BUILDING PROJECTS:

State building projects would receive $1.5 billion in funding, which is roughly $810 million less than what Evers wanted. The UW System would get about $629, down from the $1 billion Evers put forward.

STEWARDSHIP:

Wisconsins land stewardship program would be extended for four years instead of the 10 that Evers wanted. The budget also would make $32 million per year available to acquire land, which is the amount available now but less than half of the$70 million Evers proposed.

UNEMPLOYMENT:

The budget includes more money for vocational training for the disabled, and youth and adult apprentice programs with the goal of addressing the states worker shortage problem. However, Republicans rejected Evers call to spend $15 million to improve the system for administering unemployment payments. Republicans said Evers can use federal stimulus money for that.

BROADBAND:

Broadband expansion would get $125 million, which is less than the roughly $200 million Evers proposed. The money would also be borrowed rather than paid with cash, as Evers proposed.

BODY CAMERAS

Funding to pay for body cameras for Wisconsin State Patrol officers and Department of Natural Resources wardens is included, but funding was rejected for to equip state Capitol police officers with them.

JUVENILE PRISONS:

A state mental health center in Madison will be expanded to reduce the number of inmates at the states juvenile prisons, but Republicans did not include funding to build a new juvenile prison in Milwaukee County. Instead, only money for the planning process was included, which Democrats said would delay the closure of the troubled Lincoln Hills and Copper Lake juvenile prisons north of Wausau.

TEEN DRIVERS:

Teen drivers could opt out of taking a behind-the-wheel exam under a permanent policy that was tested during the coronavirus pandemic last year. To qualify, a driver must be applying for a non-commercial drivers license, successfully complete a driver's education course that includes 30 hours of behind-the-wheel experience and not have any moving violations within six months of applying. An adult must also consent to waiving the test.

WHATS OUT:

Evers proposals to legalize recreational and medical marijuana, expand Medicaid and restore collective bargaining rights for public workers were among the first items killed by the legislative committee. Also removed in one vote striking out nearly 400 Evers proposals were $1 billion in higher taxes on manufacturers and capital gains; increasing the minimum wage to $10.15 per hour by 2024; suspending enrollment in the private school voucher program; and creating a so-called red flag law that would allow guns to be seized from people deemed to be a danger by courts.
Fairfield, MT (59436)

Today

Sunshine and a few afternoon clouds. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. High 96F. Winds WSW at 10 to 15 mph..

Tonight

Partly cloudy skies. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 58F. Winds W at 5 to 10 mph.
A broad revolution is underway in the United States as traditional standards used to measure achievement and provide opportunity are being rejected by schools, corporations, and governments in favor of quotas based on race and gender.

On taking office, President Biden signaled that the nations long-held principle of equality for all had come to an end, signing executive orders to advance racial equity "across the Federal Government -- equity referring to the idea that merely treating everybody the same is not enough, and that an equal outcome for all people has to be the goal.

Over the last few months, many Ivy League and flagship state universities have moved away from a seemingly neutral measure long used to assess applicants  standardized test scores  to give minorities a better shot at admissions.

In May, Hewlett-Packard, the technology company with 50,000 employees worldwide, decreed that by 2030 half of its leadership positions and more than 30% of its technicians and engineers have to be women and that the number of minorities should meet or exceed their representation in the tech industry workforce.

That same month, United Airlines announced that half of the 5,000 pilots it would train at its proprietary flight school between now and 2030 will be women or people of color, with scholarships provided by United and JPMorgan Chase helping with tuition. There was nothing in the United announcement showing that there were enough qualified blacks and women in the pipeline so that a black/female quota of 2,500 new pilots could be filled, and nothing about what the company would do if there weren't enough qualified candidates.

Delta Airlines, Ralph Lauren, and Wells Fargo are among other major American companies to announce hiring quotas recently as a way to redress racial imbalances, according to Bloomberg News.

These are just some of the many woke initiatives embraced by many of the pillars of American society in the year since social justice protests erupted across the country in response to the murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer.

Supporters argue that racial preferences and quotas are necessary to end deeply entrenched disparities. Critics say that they are a new form of discrimination, no more justified than old forms that are widely rejected. And while the stated goal of affirmative action was to simply eliminate unfair discrimination, the equity movement is rooted in a far more expansive and pessimistic view of the United States as irredeemably white supremacist, a view meant to continually challenge American institutions and values.

The rapid transition from equality of treatment to equality of outcomes tests one of the basic post-civil rights principles of American life, namely that the same standards should be applied to all people. Once a measure is applied, not to the unique individual but to that individual's group identity, the idea that there are neutral, common, universally applicable standards gives way to something else, something subjective and political, with different measures applied to different people, depending on their sex, race, or other characteristics.

The issue of standards, moreover, is not just a matter of values or fairness. With the United States falling behind other countries in math and science, most notably China, standards are matters of competitiveness and national security -- even as the military, CIA and other federal agencies embrace equity.

But discontent over the pace of racial progress, fueled in the past year by the Black Lives Matter movement, has led to an explicit rejection of meritocracy and a call for old standards to make way for new ones. Explaining the companys adoption of quotas, Hewlett-Packard Chief Diversity Officer Lesley Slaton Brown said the COVID-19 epidemic and the George Floyd murder has really allowed us to do the double-click down on racial equality and the systematic and structural discrimination that exists.

In the recent past, that effort often involved working with the existing ideological framework of equality of opportunity and merit to identify worthy candidates. Now, the trend is to reject and redefine those standards.

As a community, we need a more comprehensive framework for what constitutes 'best' in hiring faculty and staff, Gregory Washington, the president of George Mason University in Virginia, wrote in an email sent recently to the entire school. Washington, who is GMU's first ever black president, denied that his call for greater diversity amounted to a quota system; instead, he said, it is a recognition of the reality that our society's future lies in multicultural inclusion.

Certainly it is true that the American future is multicultural. Still, to say that the concept of best needs to be redefined in racial terms is already a significant departure from the idea of neutral standards. To go from there to the notion that meritocracy is a racist stratagem is a sea change, but there is a lot of evidence that that is exactly where society is going, in both small ways and large.

In May, the Princeton University classics department announced that in an effort to combat systemic racism, it would no longer require classics majors to take Latin or Greek. This may be a good thing or a bad thing, but certainly it says that what was until recently a foundational qualification for the study of the classics -- the ability to read texts in their original language -- no longer applies, because some students, especially minority ones, didn't have the opportunity to study Latin or Greek in high school. But is it really OK for future professors of classics not to know Latin? Is that simply a new standard or a decline in standards?

From a very different area of American life, none other than the very august American Medical Association announced in May a new Strategic Plan to Embed Racial Justice and Advance Health Equity in medical education and practice.

The 80-page plan calls for, among other things, an expansion of medical school and physician education to include equity, anti-racism, structural competency, public health and social sciences, critical race theory, and historical basis of disease. It doesn't say whether adding those subjects to the medical school curriculum, which sounds a lot like instruction in the indelibly racist nature of America, will take away time from such other subjects as anatomy, microbiology, and genetics that are clearly more germane to the practice of medicine.

Scientific evidence tells us that racism has caused significant harm to people  and their health  throughout our nations history, Gregory E. Harmon, M.D., the AMA's president elect, who is white, said in an email to RCI, explaining the initiative.

Perhaps the most striking passages in the AMA document are those that have to do with equality and meritocracy, which it calls malignant narratives.

Seeking to treat everyone the 'same' ignores the historical legacy of disinvestment and deprivation, the document says of equality, while meritocracy is a narrative that attributes success and failure to individual abilities and merits. It does not address the centuries of unequal treatment that have historically robbed communities of the vital resources needed to thrive.

Some critics have noted that the Strategic Plan says nothing about competency; several doctors posting to the blog Legal Insurrection asked if members of the AMA would be comfortable allowing them or their families to be treated, as one of them put it, by those who have MD attached to their names solely in the name of equity ... not because of meritocracy or qualification.

The AMA rejects that view. Not only must we follow our oath to do no harm, Harmon said in his email to RCI, we must also prevent the harm that that inequity inflicts on communities and our nation.

There is, of course, some truth to the assertion that standards have been misused in the past. There was a time not that long ago when social connections, a genteel manner, even just having an Anglo-Saxon name, not to mention being white, were deemed to be qualifications in themselves, while to be black, female, or gay was disqualifying.

But what the AMA document, like woke doctrine in general, ignores is that the national effort to redress past wrongs has been going on for a long time in American life, making the matter of racial advantage and disadvantage more a matter of multivariable calculus than simple arithmetic. To be sure, there are racial imbalances. Only 3.2% of senior corporate executives, for example, are black. It's easy to see the demand for this number to increase, but there are many questions, involving both practicality and principle, about the use of racial quotas to achieve that goal.

On the practical side are the people hurt by them, both those unprepared for the roles as well as the qualified passed over. There is also the question of whether efforts like those at United and HP may simply run into the inconvenient fact that, for many complicated reasons, there simply aren't enough qualified minority candidates around to meet goals for rapid increases in their representation.

According to the National Science Foundation, black men and women, who are 12% of the general population, make up just 5% of working engineers -- this despite affirmative action programs and numerous other efforts over the years to recruit minorities into engineering programs in colleges and universities. How dramatic increases in a very short period can happen now remains unexplained.

As for American medicine, it's been a very long time since it was a white male preserve, as just about any visit to a large urban hospital, with their many Filipino and Indian physicians both male and female, will show. For several years now, more women have been accepted to medical schools than men, but while the numbers of blacks going to medical school has also increased, only 5% of physicians in the country are black or African American.

This is the case even though black students are now accepted into medical school at almost the same rate as whites, 41% of black applicants compared to 45% of whites. Medical schools, like other professional schools, have, moreover, been eager to increase these numbers for years, so that blacks, whites, and Asians are already being admitted under different criteria. In 2018, Princeton Review reports, blacks accepted at medical schools scored an average 505.7 on the MCAT, the standardized med school admission test  putting them in the 69th percentile of all test takers. By comparison, the average score for admitted whites was 512.2 (the 86th percentile) and 513.8 for Asians. Average undergraduate GPAs: 3.53 for blacks, 3.77 for both whites and Asians.

The Strategic Plan offers no concrete suggestions for further increasing the numbers of blacks in medical school, and it makes no analysis of whether it's even possible to do that. Is there a pool of qualified candidates that, somehow, is not being considered? Should medical school admission committees admit some of the applicants rejected in the past, even though that would increase the gap in test scores and GPAs between them and other students? Will teaching critical race theory to existing medical students increase minority representation?

Asked about medical school admissions, Harmon pointed to studies showing that medical students with midrange scores on the MCAT mostly succeed in medical school, though there is a tendency to overlook these applicants in favor of those with higher scores.

The authors of the studies argue that admitting students with lower MCAT scores would diversify the physician workforce. But given that black students are already being admitted at a significantly lower standard, at least as defined by MCAT, than whites and Asians, how much lower can the standard go? The studies give no answer to that question.

The AMA Plan also fails to address the question of principle raised by applying different standards to different groups. Is it fair to effectively prevent some qualified individuals from becoming doctors because their gender or race requires them to score higher than other genders or races? It's the same question that applies to the different standards applied to Asians, compared to both whites and blacks, in school admissions, a matter that is the subject of several lawsuits.

We are taught to study for the test, to get good grades, Kenny Xu, author of a forthcoming book An Inconvenient Minority: The Attack on Asian American Excellence and the Fight for Meritocracy, said in an email. Why? Because those good grades and test scores will, and should, lead to rewards in the future.

How would you feel if someone who studied a third as much as you did got an opportunity you've been wanting for years? That would be absolutely unfair. And yet, that is what woke ideology does.

Despite views like those, standardized tests have been under assault for years as obstacles to minority advancement, especially tests for elite high schools in such cities as New York, Boston, and San Francisco, and the SAT used for college admissions.

Elite schools including Lowell High School in San Francisco have dropped their admissions test in favor of a lottery system. This may increase racial diversity, but will the school be able to maintain its high academic standards? The same question applies to other elite schools such as the Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology in Virginia, rated by U.S. News as the best high school in the country, which is also jettisoning its former standardized test in favor of holistic admissions.

Similarly, last year, in what might prove to be a watershed decision, the regents of the University of California voted to phase out the SAT in admissions for the entire system, whose nine campuses make up the largest public university in the country.

All of this raises the possibility that the elimination of common, neutral standards will bring an end to the existence of elite schools for very gifted, very high-achieving students of the sort who will ensure American competitiveness in the future.

I wouldn't be surprised if in two or three years standardized testing is eliminated altogether, William Jacobson, a law professor at Cornell who runs the Legal Insurrection website, said in a Zoom interview. You see people saying that the whole concept of meritocracy is a device to maintain white supremacy. But if you eliminate testing that has commonality to it, how do you judge people?

A similar rejection of the idea of merit lies behind another initiative in California, where the state Board of Education has adopted a Framework proposing that all gifted programs in math instruction be eliminated, along with all acceleration and tracking  that is, grouping students in different classes according to their math aptitude.

The subject and community of mathematics has a history of exclusion and filtering rather than inclusion and welcoming, the Framework states. We reject ideas of natural gifts and talents ... and the cult of genius. Very early on, women and minorities get fixed labels of 'giftedness' and are taught differently in a system designed for privileged white boys, the Framework says.

No doubt, there's truth to the idea that some children are discouraged early when it comes to math, and that that holds them back. But the idea, as the Framework puts it, that all students are capable of becoming powerful mathematics learners and users seems utopian at the very least. Can all students become great mathematicians, violinists, or professional athletes, or is the very difference in natural abilities due to labels arbitrarily applied to children largely on the basis of their sex or race?

Moreover, the assertion that the system is designed for privileged white boys runs into someinconvenient facts: one is that plenty of privileged white boys can't do math to save their lives; another is that Asians, both boys and girls, many of them immigrants from very modest circumstances, outperform these privileged white boys by considerable margins. In addition, overall, girls get at least equal or higher grades than boys in math from elementary to high school, despite the stereotyping labels that, according to the Math Framework, hold them back.

As for gifted programs favoring whites while keeping minorities out, according to the very statistics included in the Math Framework, 32% of Asian boys and girls in California are in gifted programs, compared to 8% of whites and 4% of blacks. So it would seem indisputable that to eliminate these programs would have the effect of placing many Asians, but not many whites, in slower classes.

The solution to math disparities, according to the Framework, is to group all students of all aptitudes in the same class and for teachers to give differentiated work and more open math questions to all of them.

The Framework doesn't say exactly why this would be better than grouping more proficient math students in their own classes. Emails asking that and other questions were acknowledged by the Board of Education press office, but it did not respond to the actual questions.

American high school students have steadily been falling behind their Asian and European counterparts in math and science, most recently ranking 37th in the PISA, the Program for International Student Assessment, which gives a test to 15-year-olds in countries around the world. China's Shanghai ranks No.1.

The California Math Framework does not acknowledge that in Shanghai, the entirely opposite ideas about testing and standards are followed and implemented, with students tested early and often and placed into classes in accordance with their scores.

Regarding minorities in particular, public K-12 education all too often produces students unprepared to compete, thus leading to large disparities in admissions at universities, graduate programs and faculty positions, three math professors recently wrote in the online journal Persuasion.

This disparity is then condemned as a manifestation of structural racism. Resulting in administrative measures to lower the evaluation criteria. Lowering standards at all levels leads eventually to even worse outcomes and larger disparities, and so on in a downward spiral.
The impacts of the pandemic and changes to the UK's trading relationships have caused a significant drop in exports of food and drink to the EU.

UK food and drink exports to the bloc fell 47% in Q1 2021 compared to the same period last year, according to the Food and Drink Federation (FDF).

Looking at the wider picture, figures show that food and drink exports to the European Union have fallen by 2 billion compared with Q1 2019.

The FDF said the loss of 2bn of exports to the EU was a 'disaster' for the industry.

Non-EU food and drink exports exceeded the EU's share in Q1 2021, with sales around the rest of the world accounting for 55%.

Exports to nearly all EU Member States fell significantly, with sales to Ireland down by more than two thirds, while sales to Germany, Spain and Italy declined by more than half.

All of the UKs top 10 products exported to the EU fell significantly in value from 2019 to 2021, with whisky dropping 32%, chocolate 37% and lamb and mutton 14%.

Dairy products were most severely impacted, the FDF says. Compared to 2020, exports of milk and cream to the EU fell by more than 90%, and exports of cheese by two thirds in the same time period.

However, there has also been a return to strong growth in exports to East Asia, where there is high demand for quality UK food and drink.

In Q1 2021, exports to China (+28.2%), Hong Kong (+3.7%), Japan (+6.2%) and South Korea (+18.5%) were all above the levels seen in Q1 2020, when the Covid-19 pandemic triggered the early closure of hospitality sectors.

The UKs top three non-EU markets, US (11%), China (5%) and Singapore (3%), now account for 19% of the UKs total exports, a figure of 713m.

UK imports from the EU were also down 10%, driven by a number of factors including the closure of the hospitality sector, stockpiling in late 2020, reduced demand for ingredients as a result of the decline in exports to the EU, and import substitution.

This fall is set to increase when full checks are implemented at UK borders in 2022, the FDF warns.

Of the UKs top 10 products imported from the EU from 2019 to 2021, vegetables dropped 13.9%, wine 20%, and fruit 15.7%.

Products of animal original were also heavily impacted, with large falls in imports of EU pork, cheese, chicken and beef.

Dominic Goudie, head of international trade, the FDF, said the loss of 2bn of exports to the EU was a 'disaster' for the industry.

"[It is a] very clear indication of the scale of losses that UK manufacturers face in the longer-term due to new trade barriers with the EU," he added.

We set out a plan to mitigate these impacts by boosting support for exporters, and this was backed by the Trade and Agriculture Commission.

"The government must stop prevaricating and get behind these proposals to help exporters that have been shut out of trading with the EU.

John Whitehead, Food & Drink Exporters Association (FDEA), said it 'fully supported' the FDF in pressing government to boost support for exporters.

Whilst some of this large drop can be put down to end of year stockpiling, significant business has been lost as a direct result of the additional bureaucracy, customs delays and costs of trading with the EU.

"Experienced FDEA members are continuing to battle against inconsistent interpretations of regulations across the EU and having to weigh up whether the time and cost involved is sustainable.
The poultry sector has reported a 10% decrease in throughput within the last few weeks because of a shortage of workers, the industry has warned.

Brexit and the pandemic have meant workers from the EU have returned to their own countries, in turn impacting the UK poultry meat sector.

The industry has called on the government to address what it calls the 'Brexit labour crisis' to ensure British food 'never diminishes'.

Poultry is half the meat the country eats, and the sector has grown significantly beyond the UK labour availability in the areas it operates.

Over half (60%) of poultry meat workers  22,800 people  are nationals from European Union countries.

In the last few weeks alone, the industry has reported a 10% decrease in throughput because of the shortage of workers across farming and processing.

The British Poultry Council (BPS) has warned that limiting non-UK labour supply would 'jeopardise' food businesses and make access to British food 'harder'.

Chief executive Richard Griffiths said: British food producers have shown phenomenal resilience and worked incredibly hard to feed the nation amidst the biggest crisis of our lifetime.

"Now is the time for the government to support British businesses to ensure that quality British food never diminishes.

"We cannot run the risk of creating a two-tier food system where we import food produced to lower standards and only the affluent can afford high quality British produce.

Entry level roles, which require a Level 2 qualification, are where the sector is facing the greatest difficulty.

The sector also generally operates in areas of high local employment with a lack of available UK workers, with many showing 'negligible appetite' to move to other parts of the country.

And when it comes to non-UK labour  either from the EU or further afield  the industry has seen reducing numbers willing to come to the UK.

Mr Griffiths explained: The immigration barriers of salary and skill have been raised way beyond what we can manage, and the cost of bringing people is being prohibitive.

He said poultry meat businesses were determined to strike a balance between a skilled workforce and investing in innovation and technology.

While technology would create higher skilled jobs in the future, the industry would always be reliant on people, he added.

"Our sector has jobs that need skills, jobs that support our economy and communities, and jobs that ensure everyone has access to British food," Mr Griffiths said.

"The government must recognise food as a special case that is treated as a national security issue.

"Losing control of how we feed ourselves as a nation would undermine British food producers at a time when we should be looking to use Brexit as an opportunity to take matters of food security and nutrition into our own hands.

It comes after a new University of Exeter report said there was an 'urgent need' to change the perceived image of farming in order to prevent 'disastrous' labour shortages.

Researchers said the perceived image of farming as a career  'associations with low pay, long hours, and poor work-life balance'  needed to be reformed.

They also suggested that new entrants for permanent jobs in the industry should include people from a greater range of backgrounds, such as career changers and ex-offenders.
Calls are growing for fly-tippers to face tougher punishments as new figures show farmers are the group most affected by illegally dumped rubbish.

The Environment Agency's survey has again thrown into sharp focus the extensive problem that fly-tipping is causing for farmers and landowners.

There were 836 responses to its national waste crime survey, showing that farmers were most affected by large-scale fly-tipping.

It also shows that 15% of landowners had reported making an insurance claim to clear dumped waste.

Responding, the NFU said the rising number of incidents was having a 'devastating impact' on farming businesses across the country.

It is calling for urgent action, including tougher punishment and deterrents, to tackle fly-tipping as a priority issue for rural communities.

Deputy president, Stuart Roberts said: I hear every day about industrial-scale amounts of rubbish such as builders rubble, old furniture, kitchen appliances and used tyres being dumped in fields.

Our own rural crime survey in March revealed fly-tipping was the most prolific crime experienced by our members, with nearly half (48%) of those surveyed saying they had been affected by fly-tipping in 2020.

"Not only is it affecting the hard work of our farmers in producing food and caring for the environment, but its taking a huge toll on farming families both emotionally and financially."

More than 50,000 people recently signed an open letter to the new Police and Crime Commissioners calling for better collaboration to tackle prevention, clean-up and prosecution.

The NFU said that more education was needed on householders' legal obligations of disposing rubbish and how they could better reduce, re-use and recycle their waste.

The union added that the Environment Agency, police, local authorities, and farmers should work together to tackle the problems.

"In some areas these relationships work well but we want a more consistent approach across the whole country," Mr Roberts said.

"Everyone hugely values the benefits the countryside brings, and none of us want it blighted by huge amounts of rubbish being strewn across fields and on the sides of rural roads.

"Its important government and local authorities take the lead in making people aware of their responsibilities."
The NFU has warned the government that it is failing to recognise the significant impacts of the UK-Australian trade deal on sugar beet growers.

Earlier this week, both countries announced they had reached a trade agreement, marking the first major trade deal negotiated by the UK since it left the EU.

This is despite the farming industry raising concerns that producers could be overwhelmed if the market is flooded with lower-standard goods from Australia.

According to reports that have emerged from the Australia, sugar tariffs could be eliminated over eight years, but with an immediate duty-free quota of 80,000t, rising by 20,000t each year.

The NFU has warned that it was 'incredibly concerned' with the potential introduction of this and the impacts it would have on the UK sugar market.

The union's sugar board chair Michael Sly pointed out that Australian growers had access to plant protection products containing over 30 active ingredients which are illegal for outdoor use in the UK.

This included 13 which had actively been withdrawn and banned from use in the UK, Mr Sly explained.

"UK growers are subject to such different regulatory standards compared to our Australian cane growing friends," he said.

"The UK is one of the most efficient sugar producers in the world, so by all accounts should be well placed to compete with growers anywhere if we had access to the same tools and technologies.

"But British growers cannot compete against growers who follow a different rulebook."

He said it was 'completely unsustainable' to expect UK beet growers to be able to compete with cane growers in Australia, when UK growers had a 'significantly narrower toolbox' to draw on to tackle weeds, pests and diseases.

"By producing sugar in ways which would be illegal in the UK, Australian growers are able to reduce costs of production in a manner that UK growers are banned from doing," Mr Sly said.

Furthermore, the UK is set to become possibly the only country with any significant domestic sugar industry which allows completely free access for Australian sugar.

The NFU sugar board chair added that it was 'incredibly unusual' for sugar to be included within the UK-Australia FTA, as tariffs have remained on sugar in Australias trade deals with Japan and the US.

Mr Sly said: "Both of these sugar-producing countries are, like us, net importers. Surely the UK should have the same safeguards to ensure British sugar growers can continue to thrive?"
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Sunshine and clouds mixed. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. High 103F. Winds WSW at 10 to 15 mph..

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Mostly cloudy skies. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 83F. Winds S at 5 to 10 mph.
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Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - June 17, 2021) - Spanish Mountain Gold Ltd. (TSXV: SPA) (the "Company") has accepted a letter of resignation and retirement from Morris Beattie, a Director, Chairman of the Board and a significant technical advisor to the company. His resignation will be effective June 30, 2021.

Morris has accomplished his primary goals with Spanish Mountain and is now looking forward to retirement. He has overseen completion of our successful PFS (2021), passed on the technical details of the project to our engineering staff and he has managed our Board for several years. We thank him for his efforts which have been instrumental in bringing the company to its current positive position.

Morris wishes continued success to the staff, consultants, shareholders and the Board as the company continues to advance the Spanish Mountain Gold Project.

We wish him a long and enjoyable retirement.

W. Terry MacLean, a current Director, will replace Morris as Board Chairman on July 1, 2021. The company has initiated a search for two additional Directors.

About Spanish Mountain Gold

Spanish Mountain Gold Ltd. is focused on advancing its 100%-owned Spanish Mountain gold project in southern central British Columbia. The Company is simultaneously pursuing the dual objectives of delivering critical project milestones for the multi-million ounce Mineral Reserve and further expanding the overall Mineral Resource. The Pre-Feasibility Study (2021) demonstrates the Project's potential to be a mining operation with a robust production profile (>150,000 oz per year) and profitability (AISC $801 per oz) over a mine life of 14 years. Details on the Project and the Company are available on www.sedar.com and on the Company's website: www.spanishmountaingold.com.

On Behalf of the Board,

SPANISH MOUNTAIN GOLD LTD.

W. Terry MacLean,

Director

Inquiries:

SPANISH MOUNTAIN GOLD LTD.

Phone: (604) 601-3651

E-mail: info@spanishmountaingold.com

Website: www.spanishmountaingold.com



FORWARD LOOKING STATEMENTS: Certain of the statements and information in this press release constitute "forward-looking statements" or "forward-looking information" Any statements or information that express or involve discussions with respect to predictions, expectations, beliefs, plans, projections, objectives, assumptions or future events or performance (often, but not always, using words or phrases such as "expects", "anticipates", "believes", "plans", "estimates", "intends", "targets", "goals", "forecasts", "objectives", "potential" or variations thereof or stating that certain actions, events or results "may", "could", "would", "might" or "will" be taken, occur or be achieved, or the negative of any of these terms and similar expressions) are not statements of historical fact and may be forward-looking statements or information.



The Company's forward-looking statements and information are based on the assumptions, beliefs, expectations and opinions of management as of the date of this press release, and other than as required by applicable securities laws, the Company does not assume any obligation to update forward-looking statements and information if circumstances or management's assumptions, beliefs, expectations or opinions should change, or changes in any other events affecting such statements or information. For the reasons set forth above, investors should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements and information.

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.

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/87957
LONDON, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Last week, leaders from seven of the world's wealthiest countries gathered in Cornwall, UK, for the 2021 G7 Summit. The heads of state from Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the UK, the US, and representatives of the EU met to discuss global challenges - including a response to the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change. The leaders reaffirmed their goal to limit global heating to 1.5C and to protect and restore 30 percent of the natural world by the end of this decade. However, experts say that the summit failed to provide developing nations with the funds needed to cut greenhouse gas emissions and cope with the impacts of global warming.

The Caribbean is one of many regions globally that has seen the devastating impact of climate change. When category 5 Hurricane Maria struck Dominica, an island of only 72,000, in September 2017, more than 90 percent of the island's structures were destroyed. However, in the face of catastrophe, the country's Prime Minister, Dr the Honourable Roosevelt Skerrit, declared that the small country would commit to becoming the world's first climate-resilient nation by building back better and stronger.

Honourable Cozier Frederick, Dominica's Minister of Environment, Rural Modernisation and Kalinago Upliftment, told CS Global Partners that "Small countries like Dominica have done little to hyperbolise the climate crisis. Instead, we in Dominica are on our way to climate resilience because we have no other choice, we are left fending for ourselves. Global leaders need to live up to their climate commitments, otherwise, climate catastrophe will worsen for us all."

Today, with the help of the Citizenship by Investment (CBI) Programme, Dominica is constructing over 5,000 weather-proof homes for its citizens and investing in rehabilitating its agriculture and fishing industries. It is also working towards building a geothermal plant which will reduce the cost of electricity for consumers and provide electricity to the French islands of Guadeloupe and Martinique, which in turn will encourage foreign exchange.

CBI programmes legally grant citizenship status to applicants who invest in a host country's economy and do so much faster than traditional immigration processes. Dominica's CBI programme provides applicants with a swift processing time, thorough due diligence and affordable investment options channelled into health, education and employment initiatives on the island. With second citizenship from Dominica, individuals and their families can quickly formulate a Plan B and obtain global mobility without physically relocating, going through extensive interviews or waiting years as commonly associated with the traditional immigration process.

pr@csglobalpartners.com

www.csglobalpartners.com
LONDON (dpa-AFX) - Rio Tinto (RTPPF.PK, RIO.L, RIO, RTNTF.PK) said it has started operations at a new commercial scale demonstration plant to produce high-quality scandium oxide at its Rio Tinto Fer et Titane or RTFT metallurgical complex in Sorel-Tracy, Quebec. The $6 million project, in which the Government of Quebec contributed about $650,000 through the Quebec Plan for the Development of Critical and Strategic Minerals, was completed on time and on budget, less than six months after the start of construction. Six employees have been hired to operate the plant. Commissioning work is now being undertaken as production ramps up to a capacity of three tonnes of scandium oxide per 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.
DEARBORN (dpa-AFX) - Ford agreed to acquire Electriphi, a California-based provider of charging management and fleet monitoring software for electric vehicles. Terms are not being disclosed. Electriphi's team and services will be integrated into Ford Pro, Ford said in a statement. The acquisition is part of Ford's plan to invest more than $30 billion by 2025 to lead the electrification revolution for commercial and retail customers. The Electriphi acquisition is expected to close this month. The Electriphi acquisition comes as Ford prepares for the launch of all-electric versions of two of the high-volume commercial vehicles - the Transit van and F-150 pickup. Ford will start shipping E-Transit to customers later this year; F-150 Lightning Pro will be available in spring 2022. Based in Silicon Valley, Electriphi's team of more than 30 employees has developed and deployed a purpose-built electric vehicle fleet and charging management platform that simplifies fleet electrification. Ford Pro estimates that the depot charging industry will grow to over 600,000 full-size trucks and vans by 2030. This acquisition supports Pro's target to capture over $1 billion of revenue from charging by 2030. The company anticipates its growing capabilities and appeal to generate $45 billion in revenue from hardware and adjacent and new services by 2025 - up from $27 billion in 2019. In North America, Ford's share of Class 1 through Class 7 full-size trucks and vans exceeds 40%. In Europe, Ford has been the leading commercial vehicle brand for six consecutive years. 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.
According to Property in Turkey, Tourism and Travel are Helping to Boost Sales of Turkish Real Estate

LOS ANGELES, CA / ACCESSWIRE / June 17, 2021 / The founders of Property in Turkey, a company that assists people who are interested in purchasing property for sale in Turkey, are pleased to announce that the Turkish real estate market is definitely thriving.

To learn more about Property in Turkey and the services that they offer and/or to contact the company, please visit https://www.propertyinturkey.co.uk/contact-us/ .

According to recent sales statistics, 59,166 houses were sold in Turkey in May, 2021, which is a 16.2 percent increase compared to May, 2020. Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir saw the largest number of sales.

In addition, other house sales in Turkey grew to 48,606 in May, which was an almost 50 percent increase from last May. Also, 18,204 houses were sold for the first time in May, 2021-an 8 percent rise compared to May, 2020. Again, Istanbul was where most of the real estate transactions occurred, with the highest number of first time sales-3,153-taking place in the major city.

As a spokesperson for Property in Turkey noted, these statistics show how the Turkish real estate market continues to be one of the most vibrant in the world, attracting investors from across the globe.

"Travel and tourism are huge in Turkey, and as a result, international transactions in the Turkish real estate market are also significant," the spokesperson noted, adding that the team from Property in Turkey is hoping for a return to normal tourism figures after the global pandemic forced international travel to cease.

"However, property in Turkey sales have continued to thrive."

For people who wish to purchase a Turkish home, apartment, villa or other property, the team from Property in Turkey is ready and able to help. The team is highly knowledgeable about the Turkish real estate market and can help investors choose the best property for their needs.

"Over time we have forged strong working relations with developers and builders and can find the best locations for you to invest in as a holiday home, investment or a permanent residence and we have hand-picked the very best properties to offer you," the spokesperson noted.

About Property in Turkey:

At Property in Turkey, they offer expert unbiased advice about properties throughout the country for sale. They have a wealth of first-hand knowledge to steer people in the right direction, and because they work only with the leading developers and finest builders of Turkish properties, people can be confident that the team from Property in Turkey will find the right property for them. For more information, please visit https://www.propertyinturkey.co.uk/.

CONTACT:

Mr D Walker

+441483319349

SOURCE: Property in Turkey

View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/652224/Property-for-Sale-in-Turkey-is-Rising-Significantly-Notes-Property-in-Turkey
Convocation of extraordinary general meeting

The statutory manager of the Company (the "Manager") invites the shareholders of Leasinvest Real Estate Comm.VA/SCA (the "Company") to participate in the extraordinary general meeting of shareholders to be held on Monday 19 July 2021 at 13.00h (1.00 pm), at the registered office of the Manager at Schermersstraat 42, 2000 Antwerp, within the framework of the intention of the Company to become an integrated real estate group through an envisaged business combination with Extensa Group NV/SA and to renounce the status of public regulated real estate company ("GVV/SIR/BE-REIT"), as announced in its press release of 12 May 2021.1 For more information, reference is made to the Explanatory Note to the transaction.

In the meantime, the Company has completed the due diligence on Extensa and obtained a tax ruling regarding the exit from the GVV/SIR/BE-REIT status. The approval of the board of directors of the Manager and of the board of directors of Ackermans & van Haaren was also obtained.

Depending on the evolution of the Covid-19 situation, the Company and the Manager reserve the right to change the modalities of participation to the general meeting of 19 July 2021, should the corona measures be tightened, and will inform the shareholders thereof by means of a press release and on the website www.leasinvest.be.

In order to be able to exercise their voting rights even if the Company and the Manager, due to changing circumstances, would be forced to limit the physical access to the general meeting, the shareholders are advised to grant a power of attorney to the secretary of the meeting.

The documents regarding this general meeting (including the convening notice of the meeting, the Explanatory Note on the transaction and the full advice of the committee of independent directors (see below)) are available on the website www.leasinvest.be as of today under the section 'Investor relations' - General meeting.

Conflict of interest procedure

The proposed transactions that will be submitted for approval to the extraordinary general meeting include amongst others:

i. the voluntary renunciation by the Company of its GVV/SIR/BE-REIT status and the corresponding amendment of the articles of association;

ii. the conversion of the Company into a limited liability company with a collegial board of directors and the corresponding internalisation of the management of the Company through the contribution in kind into the capital of the Company of the shares in Leasinvest Real Estate Management NV/SA, which currently controls the Company (as statutory manager) and which is a 100% subsidiary of Ackermans & van Haaren NV ("AvH"), which itself holds (directly and indirectly) a stake of 30.01% in the Company (the "LREM Contribution"); and

iii. the contribution in kind into the capital of the Company of the shares in Extensa Group NV/SA, which is also a 100% subsidiary of AvH and a sister company of the Manager and of the Company (the "Extensa Contribution" and, together with the LREM Contribution, the "Contributions").

The aggregate contribution value of the Contributions amounts to 293,433,036 euros (of which the LREM Contribution amounts to 3,300,000 euros and the Extensa Contribution to 290,133,036 euros, as set out in the reports of the Manager regarding the LREM Contribution and the Extensa Contribution, respectively). The Contributions will be made on the date of the extraordinary general meeting, provided that the conditions precedent to which they are subject have been fulfilled (in particular if the items on the agenda relating thereto have been approved). Following the Contributions, a total of 4,075,458 new shares in the Company will be issued to AvH at an issue price of 72 euros per share. The total number of shares in the Company after the Contributions will amount to 10,002,102.

Since AvH controls the Company within the meaning of the old Companies Code ("CC") and is a related party within the meaning of the international accounting standards which have been approved in accordance with Regulation (EC) 1606/2002, the conflict of interest procedure of Article 657 juncto 524 CC and Article 7:97 of the Code of Companies and Associations ("CCA")2 is applied to the LREM Contribution and the Extensa Contribution for governance reasons.3

The committee of independent directors, consisting of the 5 independent members of the board of directors of the Manager (the "Committee"), assisted by an independent expert, Degroof Petercam Corporate Finance NV/SA, has assessed (the proposals for) the LREM Contribution and the Extensa Contribution, in accordance with Article 657 juncto 524 CC and Article 7:97 CCA. The opinion of the Committee of 14 June 2021 will be submitted to the extraordinary general meeting of 19 July 2021.

The board of directors of the Manager decided on 14 June 2021 to submit the aforementioned transactions to the extraordinary general meeting. The de facto representatives of AvH in the board of directors of the Manager, Mr Jan Suykens and Mr Piet Dejonghe, are "involved" in the Contributions in the sense of Article 7:97, 4, second paragraph CCA, and thus did not participate in the deliberation and the vote of the board of directors of the Manager on the proposals for the LREM Contribution and the Extensa Contribution.

In addition, the statutory auditor of the Company has reviewed the financial and accounting data mentioned in the relevant minutes of the board of directors of the Manager and in the aforementioned opinion of the Committee.

The conclusions of the opinion of the Committee and of the assessment of the statutory auditor are included at the end of this press release.

Opinion of the committee of independent directors in accordance with Article 657 juncto 524 CC and Article 7:97 CCA

The Committee considers that the Transactions are compatible with the Company's interest, taking into account the rationale of the Transactions and the potential benefits that may result therefrom for the Company.

Based on our analysis of the elements and documents brought to the Committee's attention, as well as the opinion of the independent expert, the Committee is of the opinion

- that the Transactions are not manifestly abusive, nor of a nature to cause disadvantages to the Company that will not be compensated for by other elements of the policy pursued by the Company;

- that the acquisition by Leasinvest Real Estate Comm.VA/SCA of the shares in its statutory manager, Leasinvest Real Estate Management NV/SA, by means of a contribution in kind at a contribution value of EUR 3,300,000, in exchange for the issuance of new shares at an issue price of EUR 72 per share, in the framework of the internalisation of the management by means of the conversion of the Company into a public limited company with a collegial board of directors under the CCA, does not entail an abusive advantage for AvH;

- that the acquisition by Leasinvest Real Estate Comm.VA/SCA of the shares in Extensa Group NV/SA, by means of a contribution in kind at a contribution value of EUR 290,133,036 against the issuance of new shares at an issue price of EUR 72 per share, does not entail an abusive advantage for AvH;

- that, consequently, the financial consequences of these transactions and the benefits thereof for the Company are not of a nature to cause the Company and its shareholders any manifest abusive disadvantage in view of the policy pursued by the Company.

Assessment by the statutory auditor in accordance with Article 657 juncto 524 CC and Article 7:97 CCA

Based on our review, performed in accordance with International Standard on Review Engagements 2410 "Review of Interim Financial Information Performed by the Independent Auditor of the Entity", nothing has come to our attention that causes us to believe that the accounting and financial information included in the minutes of the Board of Directors and in the opinion of the Committee of independent directors, both prepared in accordance with the requirements of Article 524 (juncto 657) CC and Article 7:97 (juncto 7:101, 1) CCA, would not be true and fair or would contain material inconsistencies when compared to the information available to us in the context of our engagement. We do not express an opinion on the suitability or merits of the transaction or on whether the transaction is legal and fair ("no fairness opinion").





For more information, contact



Leasinvest Real Estate



MICHEL VAN GEYTE

Chief Executive Officer

T: +32 3 238 98 77

E: michel.van.geyte@leasinvest.be (mailto:michel.van.geyte@leasinvest.be) On LEASINVEST REAL ESTATE



Leasinvest Real Estate Comm.VA/SCA is a Public BE-REIT (SIR/GVV) that invests in high quality and well-located retail buildings and offices in the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, Belgium and Austria.



At present, the total fair value of the directly held real estate portfolio of Leasinvest amounts to  1.13 billion, spread across the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg (56%), Belgium (28%) and Austria (16%).



Moreover, Leasinvest is one of the most important real estate investors in Luxembourg.



The public BE-REIT is listed on Euronext Brussels and has a market capitalization of

 442 million (value on 17 June 2021).







This announcement contains statements that are "forward-looking statements" or may be considered such. These forward-looking statements may be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology, including the words "believe," "estimate," "anticipate," "expect," "intend," "may," "will," "plan," "continue," "ongoing," "possible," "predict," "intend," "pursue," "try," "would" or "will," and include statements from the Company about the intended results of its strategy. Forward-looking statements, by their nature, involve risks and uncertainties, and readers have been warned that none of these forward-looking statements warrant any guarantee of future results. The Company's actual results may differ materially from those predicted by the forward-looking statements. The Company makes no commitment to provide updates or adjustments to these forward-looking statements unless legally required.







1 https://leasinvest.be/media/documents/2021_05_12_LRE_Growth_story_ENG_Final.pdf

2 In accordance with Article 41 1 of the Act of 23 March 2019 on the introduction of the Code of companies and associations and containing various provisions, the Company shall remain governed by the old Companies Code for as long as it has the legal form of a limited partnership by shares (but no later than 1 January 2024), on the understanding that, as from 1 January 2020, it shall also be governed by the mandatory provisions of the Code of companies and associations which apply to the NV/SA (public limited liability company), with the exception of the provisions of Book 7, Title 4, Chapter 1 (Management), whereby, in the event of a conflict between the mandatory provisions of the CCA and the mandatory provisions of the CC, the mandatory provisions of the CCA shall prevail. In view of this transitional regime, the Company should, in principle, only apply the provisions of the CCA, as far as conflicts of interest of the managing body are concerned. However, the corporate governance charter of the Company already refers to articles 7:96 and 7:97 CCA, so that the Company, to the extent necessary, has cumulatively applied the relevant provisions of the CC and the CCA.

3 Strictly speaking, Article 524 CC does not apply to the Contributions, to the extent that the final decision on the Contributions does not lie with (the board of directors of) the Manager but with the general meeting of the Company, although the FSMA recommends that the procedure be voluntarily applied by analogy in such a case. Article 7:97 CCA (which is part of Book 7, Title 4, Chapter 1 (Management) of the CCA) is excluded from the mandatory provisions regarding the NV/SA that already apply to the limited partnerships by shares that have not yet been converted into a legal form under the CCA. However, the Company applies Article 7:97 CCA on a voluntary basis in light of the implementation of European Directive EU 2018/828 of 17 May 2017 (SRD II) and the Company's corporate governance charter of 19 August 2020.





Attachment
WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - Pacific Gas and Electric Co., a subsidiary of PG&E Corp. (PCG), announced that rotating power outages were not needed Friday to maintain electric grid stability during the extreme heat that affected much of the state. The company noted that California's grid had adequate power supply to meet consumer demand due to electricity conservation. PG&E reached out to public safety partners across its service area and to about 121,000 customers after the California Independent System Operator or CAISO issued a Grid Warning mid-afternoon. The company told the customers that rotating outages were possible. The notification was intended to help those partners and customers begin to prepare. The company now said grid demand did not exceed supply despite the widespread triple-digit heat, due to the electricity conservation by Californians statewide in response to the CAISO's Flex Alert. Hot weather is expected to continue across the state and the West for another few days. CAISO has called for another Flex Alert on Friday, from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m., asking Californians to voluntarily conserve energy. The company noted that rotating outages are not Public Safety Power Shutoffs, which are conducted during specific high fire-threat conditions. 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.
LONDON (dpa-AFX) - Unite Group plc (UTG.L), on Friday, said is disposed two London properties to its London Student Accommodation joint venture or LSAV with GIC for 342 million, in line with book values and reflecting an average net initial yield of 4.0%. The properties are located in Wembley and Whitechapel and offer 1,358 bed spaces, of which the majority are direct-let to students. The two properties had a gross asset value of 338 million as at 31 December 2020 and are valued based on stabilised net operating income of 14.2 million for the 2020/21 academic year. The company further noted that LSAV would fund the acquisition through 208 million of equity from Unite and GIC and a 140 million 8-year loan facility provided by Barings. 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.


Mitsubishi Power's Savannah Machinery Works in Savannah, Georgia, shipped Brazil's first M501JAC gas turbine to Marlim Azul Energia's power plant in Macae, Rio de Janeiro. The plant will convert domestic pre-salt gas into electricity and become the most fuel-efficient and affordable gas turbine power plant in South America when it enters operation. (Credit: Mitsubishi Power)

Florida, USA, June 18, 2021 - (JCN Newswire) - Mitsubishi Power Americas, Inc. has shipped an M501JAC gas turbine to Marlim Azul Energia's power plant in Macae, Rio de Janeiro, which will become the most fuel-efficient power plant in South America when it begins operation in January 2023. The plant was the winning project at Brazil's gas-based energy auctions and will be the first in Brazil to use associated gas from Brazil's Pre-Salt basin.The M501JAC is the world's leading gas turbine with an efficiency greater than 64%, reliability of 99.6%, and the lowest carbon emissions per unit of power when used in combined cycle. The gas turbine's exceptional operational flexibility will enable Marlim Azul to complement intermittent wind and solar power generation and to efficiently convert domestic pre-salt gas into electricity with attractive prices for consumers.This gas turbine is capable of using up to 30% hydrogen fuel and can be upgraded to use 100% hydrogen fuel to meet the plant's future decarbonization needs.A Mitsubishi Power, Shell, and Patria Investments joint venture is investing BRL 2.5 billion (approximately USD 600 million) to construct the plant. Shell Brasil Petroleo Ltda. will supply natural gas from Brazil's offshore deep-water pre-salt basin.Bruno Chevalier, CEO of Marlim Azul Energia, said, "Our goal is to make energy generation from Brazilian pre-salt gas a reality. Mitsubishi Power's tailored solution for a 565 megawatt plant will enable us to lead the energy transition in South America. The JAC gas turbine is a reliable investment that will enable further decarbonization in our region."In addition to the gas turbine, Mitsubishi Power's solution includes TOMONI intelligent solutions to optimize power plant performance, flexibility, and reliability. It also includes a 25-year long-term service agreement providing all parts, repairs, and services as well as 24-hour support from the Service Engineering Team and remote monitoring services to help optimize performance by detecting anomalies and diagnosing plant performance.Demonstrating the strength of its global supply chain operation, Mitsubishi Power shipped the M501JAC unit, which was designed in Japan and manufactured in the United States, on schedule to South America while keeping safety and quality at the forefront during a global pandemic. Mitsubishi Power's 430,000 square foot Savannah Machinery Works in Georgia has maintained its 100% on-time delivery record throughout the pandemic. The Marlim Azul unit is the fourth JAC to ship from Savannah. Globally, Mitsubishi Power has booked 41 JAC gas turbine orders and Marlim Azul is the 12th JAC shipment.Paul Browning, President and CEO of Mitsubishi Power Americas, said, "Our JAC power island for Marlim Azul aligns with our mission to provide power generation and storage solutions to our customers, empowering them to affordably and reliably combat climate change and advance human prosperity. The project will increase Brazil's energy stability by using pre-salt natural gas.The gas turbine, like all our gas turbines, shipped hydrogen-ready for future deep decarbonization. We are committed to a long-term global effort to help our partners Shell and Patria achieve these ambitious goals. Together, we are creating a Change in Power."About Mitsubishi Power Americas, Inc.Mitsubishi Power Americas, Inc. (Mitsubishi Power) headquartered in Lake Mary, Florida, employs more than 2,200 power generation, energy storage, and digital solutions experts and professionals. Our employees are focused on empowering customers to affordably and reliably combat climate change while also advancing human prosperity throughout North, Central, and South America. Mitsubishi Power's power generation solutions include gas, steam, and aero-derivative turbines; power trains and power islands; geothermal systems; PV solar project development; environmental controls; and services. Energy storage solutions include green hydrogen, battery energy storage systems, and services. Mitsubishi Power also offers intelligent solutions that use artificial intelligence to enable autonomous operation of power plants. Mitsubishi Power, Ltd. is a wholly owned subsidiary of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd. (MHI). Headquartered in Tokyo, Japan, MHI is one of the world's leading heavy machinery manufacturers with engineering and manufacturing businesses spanning energy, infrastructure, transport, aerospace, and defense.Source: Mitsubishi Power, Ltd.Copyright 2021 JCN Newswire . All rights reserved.
LONDON (dpa-AFX) - Kerry Group plc (KYGA.L), on Friday, said it has agreed to sell its Consumer Foods' Meats and Meals business in the UK and Ireland to Pilgrim's Pride Corp. (PPC) for a cash consideration of 819 million, subject to routine closing adjustments. The financial results for the year ended 31 December 2020 attributable to the business were revenue of 828 million, EBITDA of 86 million, profit before tax of 63 million, and gross assets of 521 million. Kerry noted that it would use the sale proceeds for general corporate purposes and the continued strategic development of the Taste & Nutrition business. The deal is expected to close in the final quarter subject to customary closing conditions and regulatory approvals. Further, Kerry stated that it would separate and realign the remaining dairy-related activities within the Consumer Foods Business. 'The strategic review of the dairy business has been completed and there will be no disposal of the dairy business at this time,' Kerry Group 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.
LONDON (dpa-AFX) - Inchcape plc (INCH.L) said that it expects the strong first half performance will underpin full year results. It expects to deliver fiscal year 2021 profit before tax , pre-exceptionals, significantly ahead of the published market consensus of 216 million pounds. The company noted that its performance to date has exceeded its expectations. The company noted that there is still a high level of uncertainty about the second half, both in terms of the pandemic situation and issues relating to supply due to shortages of semi-conductors, which have had a limited impact on the Group to date. The Group's interim results will be published on 29 July 2021. 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.
HOUSTON (dpa-AFX) - U.K.'s Competition and Markets Authority or CMA Friday said it is investigating the anticipated joint venture between Baker Hughes Holdings LLC (BKR) and Akastor ASA. The agency said it is considering whether this transaction will result in the creation of a relevant merger situation under the merger provisions of the Enterprise Act 2002. It is also checking whether the creation of such a situation may be expected to result in a substantial lessening of competition within any market or markets in the U.K. for goods or services. The CMA announced the launch of its merger inquiry by notice to the Parties on June 18 and has a deadline of August 13 for its phase 1 decision. It was in early March that Baker Hughes and Akastor announced their deal to create a joint venture company that will bring together Baker Hughes' Subsea Drilling Systems business with Akastor's wholly owned subsidiary, MHWirth AS. The 50-50 JV is expected to deliver a global full-service offshore drilling equipment offering that will provide customers with a broad portfolio of products and services. The closing of the transaction was expected to occur in the second half of 2021. 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.
Tokyo and New York, June 18, 2021 - (JCN Newswire) - Eisai Co., Ltd. and Bristol-Myers Squibb Company (NYSE: BMY) announced today that the companies have entered into an exclusive global strategic collaboration agreement for the co-development and co-commercialization of MORAb-202, an antibody drug conjugate (ADC).MORAb-202 is Eisai's first ADC and combines Eisai's in house developed anti-folate receptor alpha (FRalpha) antibody, and Eisai's anticancer agent eribulin, using an enzyme cleavable linker. It is a potential best-in-class FR alpha ADC with a favorable pharmacology profile and demonstrated single agent activity in patients with advanced solid tumors. Eisai is currently investigating MORAb-202 in FRalpha-positive solid tumors (inclusive of endometrial, ovarian, lung and breast cancers) in two studies: a Phase 1 clinical study in Japan and a Phase 1/2 clinical study in the United States. The companies are planning to move into the registrational stage of development for this asset as early as next year.Under the agreement, Eisai and Bristol Myers Squibb will jointly develop and commercialize MORAb-202 in the following collaboration territories: Japan; China; countries in the Asia-Pacific region*; the United States; Canada; Europe, including the European Union and the United Kingdom; and Russia. Bristol Myers Squibb will be solely responsible for developing and commercializing the drug in regions outside of the collaboration territories. Eisai will remain responsible for the manufacturing and supply of MORAb-202 globally.Under the financial terms of the agreement, Bristol Myers Squibb will pay $650 million U.S. dollars to Eisai including $200 million U.S. dollars as payment toward Eisai research and development expenses. Eisai is also entitled to receive up to $2.45 billion U.S. dollars in potential future development, regulatory, and commercial milestones. The parties will share profits, research and development and commercialization costs in the collaboration territories and Bristol Myers Squibb will pay Eisai a royalty on sales outside of the collaboration territories. Eisai is expected to book sales of MORAb-202 in Japan, China, countries in the Asia-Pacific region, Europe and Russia. Bristol Myers Squibb is expected to book sales of MORAb-202 in the United States and Canada."MORAb-202 combines Eisai's in-house discovered antibody and payload using the company's advanced chemistry capabilities," said Haruo Naito, Chief Executive Officer at Eisai. "It is characterized by its payload of eribulin, which is a product of our modern synthetic organic chemistry that has already made contributions to patients with breast cancer and soft tissue sarcoma. Our collaboration with Bristol Myers Squibb will accelerate the development of MORAb-202 with the goal of bringing a potentially impactful treatment option to patients globally.""This global collaboration with Eisai is an important strategic fit for Bristol Myers Squibb as it extends our leading position in oncology with a differentiated asset that complements our broad solid tumor portfolio and leverages our deep internal development expertise," said Giovanni Caforio, M.D., board chair and chief executive officer, Bristol Myers Squibb. "We look forward to collaborating with Eisai as we work to bring this potential treatment option to patients in need as soon as possible."In regards to Eisai's financials, no revision will be made at this time to the consolidated earnings forecast for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2022, as announced on May 12, 2021. If Eisai determines that revisions are necessary based on the progress of our business and strategic options, Eisai will make an announcement as soon as possible.* South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau, Philippines, Vietnam, Lao People's Democratic Republic, Thailand, Cambodia, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, India, Australia, New ZealandSource: EisaiCopyright 2021 JCN Newswire . All rights reserved.
Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - June 18, 2021) - ArcPacific Resources Corp. (TSXV: ACP) ("ACP" or the "Company") is pleased to provide an update on initial results for the first four holes completed at the Rickard gold project (the "Property") near Timmins, Ontario. Holes one through four (ACP-R-21001 to ACP-R-21004) show gold present in anomalous values of less than 1 gram per tonne and up to 0.32 grams per tonne over 1 metre (from 62 to 63 metres in ACP-R-21002), which is highly elevated above background (the background value is less than 0.005 grams per tonne). The anomalous samples occur within zones of quartz-carbonate veining and albite-sericite-silica alteration showing a direct relationship between secondary fluid input and anomalous levels of gold (see Figure 1). This indicates that gold is being carried in the hydrothermal system but not being deposited in appreciable concentrations in the area of these initial holes. Coarse screen analysis on these samples also shows that the gold occurs predominantly in the coarse fraction of the sample with up to 2.35 grams per tonne assayed in the coarse fraction over the same interval. The presence of coarse gold may explain the sporadic nature of gold deposition especially within the extensional veins drilled. Continued work including initiation of a phase two drilling program is planned for this summer and will incorporate all information as it is received from the phase one program and will focus on targeting the newly identified north-south structures to identify potential favourable environment for gold deposition. Additional samples are pending and will be released as they become available.

Highlights



Successfully identified a large hydrothermal system including well developed quartz-carbonate veins, albite-sericite-silica alteration and a new orientation of controlling shear structures not previously recognized.

Gold confirmed to be present and introduced into the host rocks through secondary hydrothermal fluid flow, where anomalous gold values are strictly related to alteration zones and veining.

Multiple elements associated to gold bearing fluids identified including copper, molybdenum and tellurium.

Large fluid rich system present with potential for better mineralized gold zones where chemical or structural traps may occur.

Additional assays are pending and are anticipated to be released as they become available in the coming weeks.

Adrian Smith, CEO of ACP comments, "While these initial results are lower than we would like to see, we have clearly identified the presence of a significant hydrothermal system. This area has been subject to abundant high temperature fluid flow and has all the ingredients to potentially host a significant gold deposit. We are exploring in the right geological environment and the information gained from these initial holes and the observations on the structural relationship from phase one drilling is allowing us to refine our geological model and identify multiple new potential more favourable shear zones on the project. We will continue to inform our investors in a timely manner as results become available and look forward to utilizing this information in a positive way to lead us towards better potential zones within this large vein and shear zone system."

Figure 1 below is a cross-section view showing holes 1 to 3 (ACP-R-001 to ACP-R-003) showing the extensional quartz-carbonate veins branching out vertically and their close affinity to a diorite intrusion. Based on the vein orientations and projections, these veins may by syn- to post-formational with the diorite dyke and may converge at depth to form a more concentrated vein network. This vein system has historically shown high gold grades close to surface within the historic mine workings on the Property including select samples running up to 92.8 grams per tonne gold (from Resident Geologist of Ontario Dept. of Mines files) showing potential for higher grades to be concentrated elsewhere in this system.





Figure 1: Section S53713E, showing holes 1 through 3 with the geological interpretation and gold and copper values.

To view an enhanced version of Figure 1, please visit:

https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/6963/87959_fc162d6464125aa1_001full.jpg

Anomalous levels of iron sulphides, copper sulphide, molybdenum, and tellurium are also present in the veining and alteration. These elements together with the wide and consistent nature of the veining has confirmed that there is a large hydrothermal system present on the Property, and that the initial drilling is only testing a small part of that system. It is possible that zones with higher concentrations of gold may be present, especially in the zones proximal to or parallel to the predominant direction of shearing recently identified in the southern step out in hole 17 (ACP-R-21017). The remaining results for holes 5 to 17 are pending. Additional results will be released as they become available within the coming weeks.

Drill hole locations for holes 1 through 17 can be seen on the Company's website on the Rickard project page. Results from the phase 1 program will be incorporated into the Company's expanding project model which will provide a better understanding of the geological and structural controls on mineralization, and will enable the Company to plan for a proposed phase 2 program.

The Property covers a prospective 5,656 hectares of the Abitibi Greenstone Belt located approximately 70 kilometres from the town of Timmins in the Timmins Gold Camp which has produced over 80 million ounces of gold over the last 100 years. The Property is road accessible and sits within 25 to 60 kilometers of six currently producing gold mines and eight previous producers. Large areas of the Property remain untested and under cover.

QAQC

All NQ split core assays were obtained by either complete sample metallic screen/fire assay or standard 30-gram fire-assaying with ICP finish at ALS Minerals in Vancouver, British Columbia, or by entire sample screened metallic screen fire assay at Eastern Analytical in Timmins, Ontario. The complete sample metallic screen assay method is selected by the geologist. Drill program design, Quality Assurance/Quality Control and interpretation of results is performed by qualified persons employing a Quality Assurance/Quality Control program consistent with National Instrument 43-101 and industry best practices. Standards and blanks are included with every 10 to 20 samples for Quality Assurance/Quality Control purposes by the Company as well as the lab.

Disclosure

The Qualified Person ("QP") for the Company has not verified the historic sample analytical data disclosed within this release. While the Company has obtained all historic records including analytical data from the previous owner of the Property, the Company has not independently verified the results of the historic sampling.

Adrian Smith, P.Geo., is a QP as defined by National Instrument 43-101 for the above-mentioned project. The QP is a member in good standing of the Professional Geoscientists Ontario (PGO) and is a registered Professional Geoscientist (P.Geo.). Mr. Smith has reviewed and approved the technical information disclosed above.

About ArcPacific Resources Corp.

ArcPacific Resources Corp. (TSXV: ACP) is a Canadian based exploration company expanding the exploration initiative at multiple historic past producing gold and silver mines in the Timmins Gold Camp, Ontario, and in the Nicola Mining Division in Southern British Columbia. The Company is focused on creating shareholder value through new discoveries and strategic development of its mineral properties. For further information, please visit http://www.arcpacific.ca.

ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS

/S "Adrian Smith"

CEO and Director

The forward-looking statements contained in this press release are made as of the date hereof and ArcPacific Resources Corp. undertakes no obligations to update publicly or revise any forward-looking statements or information, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, unless so required by applicable securities laws.

Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Service Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

For further information, please contact us at info@arcpacific.ca or 1.778.331.3816.

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/87959
THIS ANNOUNCEMENT, INCLUDING THE APPENDICES AND THE INFORMATION CONTAINED THEREIN IS RESTRICTED AND IT IS NOT FOR RELEASE, PUBLICATION, DISTRIBUTION OR FORWARDING, IN WHOLE OR IN PART, DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY, IN OR INTO THE UNITED STATES, AUSTRALIA, CANADA, NEW ZEALAND, JAPAN, THE REPUBLIC OF SOUTH AFRICA OR IN OR INTO ANY OTHER JURISDICTION WHERE TO DO SO MIGHT CONSTITUTE A VIOLATION OR BREACH OF ANY APPLICABLE LAW OR REGULATION.

THIS ANNOUNCEMENT IS FOR INFORMATION PURPOSES ONLY AND DOES NOT CONSTITUTE OR CONTAIN ANY INVITATION, SOLICITATION, RECOMMENDATION, OFFER OR ADVICE TO ANY PERSON TO SUBSCRIBE FOR, OTHERWISE ACQUIRE OR DISPOSE OF ANY SECURITIES IN PENSANA PLC OR ANY OTHER ENTITY IN ANY SUCH JURISDICTION.

THIS ANNOUNCEMENT CONTAINS INSIDE INFORMATION AS STIPULATED UNDER THE UK VERSION OF THE MARKET ABUSE REGULATION (EU NO. 596/2014) AS IT FORMS PART OF UK LAW BY VIRTUE OF THE EUROPEAN UNION (WITHDRAWAL) ACT 2018 ("UK MAR").

18 June 2021

Pensana Plc

("Pensana" or the "Company")

Fundraise to raise15.0 million(approximatelyUS$21.1 million)

The Board of Directors of Pensana plc (LSE: PRE) is pleased to announce that the Company has successfully raised (the "Fundraise") gross proceeds of 15.0 million (approximately US$21.1 million) through the issue of an aggregate of 12,500,000 new ordinary shares of 0.001 each in the capital of the Company (the "Ordinary Shares") ("New Shares") at a price of 120 pence per share (the "Placing Price").

The Fundraise comprises of:

a placing by SI Capital Ltd ("SI Capital") (the "SI Capital Placing");

a placing by WH Ireland Limited ("WHI") (the "WHIPlacing");

the participation of the Chairman of the Company, Paul Atherley , in the SI Capital Placing for 600,000 (approximately US$846,000 );

investment by Fundo Soberano de Angola ("FSDEA"), the Company's largest shareholder for 1,250,000 Ordinary Shares representing 10% of the Fundraise; and

certain direct subscriptions (the FSDEA investment and these subscriptions being together the "Subscriptions"),

all at the Placing Price.

The Placing Price of 120.0 pence represents a 1.7% premium to the 10 day volume weighted average price of the Ordinary Shares for the period of 10 trading days prior to the publication of this Announcement and a 6.3% discount to the closing price on 17 June 2021.

The New Shares when issued, will be credited as fully paid and will rank pari passu in all respects with each other and with the existing Ordinary Shares, including, without limitation, the right to receive all dividends and other distributions declared, made or paid after the date of issue.

Completion of the SI Capital Placing, WHI Placing, and Subscriptions are subject to and conditional upon Admission. It is expected that settlement of the New Shares and admission of these shares to the Official List (Standard Listing Segment) and to trading on the London Stock Exchange's Main Market for listed securities will take place at 8.00 a.m. on or around 25 June 2021.

The SI Capital Placing has been conducted in accordance with the terms and conditions set out in placing letters entered into between placees in the SI Capital Placing and SI Capital.

The WHI Placing has been conducted in accordance with the terms and conditions set out in the Appendix to this announcement (which forms part of this announcement, such announcement and the Appendix together being this ("Announcement"). WHI is acting as bookrunner in connection with the WHI Placing.

In addition to the SI Capital Placing and the WHI Placing, Fundo Soberano de Angola (the Angolan Sovereign Wealth Fund), the Company's largest shareholder has through ASF Africa Mining LP subscribed for 1,250,000 new Ordinary Shares at the Placing Price pursuant to a Subscription, directly with the Company.

Key Highlights

The Company has successfully raised 15.0 million (approximately US$21.1 million ) in aggregate by way of the Fundraise, conditional inter alia upon Admission.

Continued support from the Angolan Sovereign Wealth Fund through the Subscription is in recognition of Angola's strategic objective of diversifying away from the oil and gas sector and supporting key mining projects.

The net proceeds of the Fundraise will enable the Company to progress the early-stage development of the Saltend and Longonjo projects with funds being applied to progress early stage construction, equipment, bulk materials and fabrication costs and site infrastructure in tandem with providing the Company with the flexibility needed in its working capital requirements as it looks to progress the main financing for the projects, which is currently targeted for Q4 2021.

It is expected that settlement of the New Shares and admission of these shares to the Official List (Standard Listing Segment) and to trading on the London Stock Exchange's Main Market for listed securities ("Admission") will take place at 8.00 a.m. on or around 25 June 2021 .

Details of the SI Capital Placing and the WHI Placing

Pensana intends to issue the SI Capital Placing Shares and WHI Placing Shares (together the "Placing Shares") to investors by way of two non-pre-emptive placings.

The Placing Price of 120.0 pence represents a 1.7% premium to the 10 day volume weighted average price of the Ordinary Shares for the period of 10 trading days prior to the publication of this Announcement and a 6.3% discount to the closing price on 17 June 2021.

The Placing Shares, when issued, will be credited as fully paid and will rank pari passu in all respects with each other and with the existing Ordinary Shares, including, without limitation, the right to receive all dividends and other distributions declared, made or paid after the date of issue.

The WHI Placing is also subject to the conditions and termination rights set out in a placing agreement entered into between the Company and WHI (the "Placing Agreement") including, among other things, Admission becoming effective and the Placing Agreement not being terminated in accordance with its terms. Further details of the Placing Agreement can be found in the terms and conditions contained in the Appendix to this Announcement.

The Fundraise does not require shareholder approval. Applications will be made for Admission. It is expected that settlement for the New Shares and Admission will take place at 8.00 a.m. on or around 25 June 2021.

Details of the Subscription

The Angolan Sovereign Wealth Fund has subscribed for the Subscription Shares at the Placing Price, conditional upon Admission, in order to raise approximately US$2.1 million (1.5 million). The Subscription Shares will also be admitted to trading at 8.00 a.m. on or around 25 June 2021.

The Subscription is being made on substantially the same terms on which the Angolan Sovereign Wealth Fund has previously subscribed for Ordinary Shares in the Company.

Following completion of the Fundraise, upon Admission, the Angolan Sovereign Wealth Fund will hold an aggregate interest in 22.3% of total issued share capital of the Company following Admission (the "Enlarged Share Capital").

PDMR Dealing

The Chairman of the Company, Paul Atherley, has agreed to acquire 500,000 SI Capital Placing Shares pursuant to the terms of the SI Capital Placing. The beneficial interests of the participating director as a result of the Fundraise are as follows:

Director Existing Ordinary Shares currently beneficially interested in Percentage of Existing Ordinary Shares Number of SI Capital Placing Shares to be acquired Resulting number of Ordinary Shares beneficially interested in on Admission Percentage of Enlarged Share Capital Paul Atherley 9,069,861 4.45% 500,000 9,569,861 4.43%

Use of Proceeds

The gross proceeds of the Fundraise of approximately US$21.1 million are expected to be used as follows although the timing of deployment of the funds will be subject to the progress of the main financing referred to below:

Saltend Solvent extraction ("SX") refinery$4.9m

Longonjo site infrastructure$3.4m

Longonjo concentrator plant$5.1m

Longonjo Mixed Rare Earth Sulphate ("MRES") plant$4.7m

General corporate expenses, exploration and deal costs$3.0m

The proceeds of the Fundraise are expected to enable the Company to continue progress towards the following milestones by the end of December 2021, subject to the progress of the main financing:

FEED of concentrator plant, MRES plant and SX refinery

Site clearance and construction readiness at both the Saltend and Longonjo sites

Long Lead items for Saltend ordered and deposits paid

Construction work packages finalised for Saltend and Longonjo

The Company anticipates needing to raise the main financing for its projects during the course of Q4 2021, which is expected to be a mixture of long dated debt and equity finance totalling, in aggregate, approximately US$400 million. Pensana has received indications of potential financial backing from major shareholders and approaches from a wide range of financial institutions. The actual timing of the main financing will determine the timing of the deployment of funds set out above and the Fundraise, if required, can provide the Company with the working capital flexibility needed to adapt to changes to the main financing timeline.

Trading Update

The Company is focussed on the production of the rare earth elements, Neodymium and Praseodymium ("NdPr"), used in the manufacture of magnetic metals in the electric vehicle and offshore wind markets, deemed essential for the societal transition to a green economy at a time when China dominates this supply chain. The Company released a detailed Business Plan in April 2021 setting out how it is looking to establish a supply chain of the rare earth metals required for the electric vehicle, wind turbine and other strategic industries including a financial summary of the proposed plan.

Longonjo

The Company has been granted a mining licence for its 84% owned Longonjo project in Angola. The Longonjo Project is currently engaged in completion of FEED and the Company is looking to achieve first production of concentrate in mid-2023.

The Company is targeting, subject to funding, to complete the procurement process at Longonjo by the end of 2022. The Company is then targeting completing construction and commissioning of both the concentrator and the MRES plants in H1 2023 and commissioning by the end of Q3 2023.

Saltend

Pensana has recently received conditional planning permission to begin the construction of the world's first sustainable rare earth processing hub at the Saltend Chemicals Park, the Humber, United Kingdom which will provide the Company with an independent and sustainable supply chain of these rare earth elements and would be one of only three major producers located outside China.

Pensana is aiming to produce c.12,500 tonnes of rare earth oxides annually, including c.4,500 tonnes of magnet metals rare earth oxides, representing approximately 5% of 2025 projected world demand.

The US$125 million facility plans to create over 100 direct jobs processing purified rare earth sulphates imported from the Company's state-of-the-art Longonjo mine in Angola. The Company is also in active discussion with a number of owners of rare earth projects which are currently in development with a view to establishing offtake agreements to supply the Saltend facility.

Subject to funding and entering into a lease of the facility (for which it has exclusivity), the Company is targeting to complete the procurement process at Saltend by the end of 2022 and completing construction in mid-2023 with commissioning taking place by the end of Q3 2023.

Saltend has also received first phase progression from the UK Government's 1 billion Automotive Transformation Fund.

Performance Rights

Given the progress on the Longonjo Project and the significant addition of the Saltend facility to the Business Plan, the remuneration committee of the Board intends to amend the performance criteria of the outstanding performance rights ("LTI") awarded to the Chief Executive Officer and the Chief Financial Officer upon their joining the Company to align with the Fundraise. In addition, it is the Board's intention that the performance conditions relating to the vesting of the final tranche of the Chairman's legacy LTI awards will be considered satisfied following completion of the Fundraise. These changes are expected to be implemented shortly following Admission and when implemented, 3,858,037 Ordinary Shares will be allotted and issued to the Chairman, 1,250,000 Ordinary Shares will be allotted and issued to the Chief Executive Officer and 1,000,000 Ordinary Shares will be allotted and issued to the Chief Financial Officer, in each case in accordance with the terms and conditions of the 2019 Employee Incentive Plan. Further announcements regarding this proposed issue will be made as required by market rules.

This announcement contains inside information for the purposes of Article 7 of Regulation (EU) No 596/2014 which is part of UK law by virtue of the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018. The person responsible for arranging this announcement on behalf of Pensana Plc is Tim George.



For further information: Pensana Plc Website:

Paul Atherley, Chairman / Tim George, CEO www.pensana.co.uk

contact@pensana.co.uk Broker and Bookrunner

SI Capital Ltd

Nick Emerson Tel: +44 (0)1483 413500 Bookrunner

WH Ireland Limited

Harry Ansell / Dan Bristowe (Corporate Broking)

Katy Mitchell (Corporate Finance)

Tel: +44 (0) 207 220 1666

About the Company

The Company is focussed on the production of the rare earth elements, Neodymium and Praseodymium ("NdPr") used in the manufacture of magnetic metals in the electric vehicle and offshore wind markets, deemed essential for the societal transition to a green economy at a time when China dominates this supply chain.

The Company has commenced development the world's first sustainable rare earth processing hub at the Saltend Chemicals Park, the Humber, United Kingdom which will provide the Company with an independent and sustainable supply chain of these rare earth elements.

The Saltend facility was part of the Humber's recently successful Freeport bid and will be in a position to import rare earth feedstock from sustainable sources around the world and export its high value products to automotive and wind turbine supply chains with minimal taxes or other imposts.

The Company will source its initial feedstock from its Longonjo mine in Angola. The near surface high grade mine which is linked to the Port of Lobito by a recently upgraded Benguela rail line and has been designed by UK engineering experts Wood Group plc to international standards which features zero carbon hydroelectric power and tailings storage facilities aligned to Church of England Pensions Board and ICMM guidelines.

The Company is in active discussion with third parties for the additional supply of sustainably sourced rare earth carbonates and will look to expand production capacity once such feedstock becomes available.

IMPORTANT INFORMATION

This Announcement includes statements that are, or may be deemed to be, "forward-looking statements". These forward-looking statements can be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology, including the terms "believes", "estimates", "plans", "anticipates", "targets", "aims", "continues", "expects", "intends", "hopes", "may", "will", "would", "could" or "should" or, in each case, their negative or other variations or comparable terminology. These forward-looking statements include matters that are not facts. They appear in a number of places throughout this Announcement and include statements regarding the Directors' intentions, beliefs or current expectations concerning, amongst other things, the Group's results of operations, financial condition, liquidity, prospects, growth, strategies and the industries in which the Group operates. By their very nature, forward-looking statements involve risk and uncertainty because they relate to events, and depend on circumstances, that may or may not occur in the future. A number of factors could cause actual results and developments to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements, including, without limitation: conditions in the public markets; the market position of the Group; the earnings, financial position, cash flows, return on capital and operating margins of the Group; the anticipated investments and capital expenditures of the Group; changing business or other market conditions; changes in political or tax regimes, exchange rates and clients; changes in governmental policies, and general economic conditions. These and other factors could adversely affect the outcome and financial effects of the plans and events described herein. Forward-looking statements contained in this Announcement based on past trends or activities should not be taken as a representation that such trends or activities will continue in the future. Subject to any requirement under the Listing Rules, UK MAR, neither the Company nor WHI nor SI Capital undertake any obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. Investors should therefore not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date of this Announcement.

No statement in this Announcement or incorporated by reference into this Announcement is intended to constitute a profit forecast or profit estimate for any period, nor should any statement be interpreted to mean that earnings or earnings per share for the current or future financial years would necessarily match or exceed the historical published earnings per share of the Company.

Certain data in this Announcement, including financial, statistical and operating information, has been rounded.

This Announcement is for information purposes only and shall not constitute an offer to buy, sell, issue, or subscribe for, or the solicitation of an offer to buy, sell, issue, or subscribe for any securities, nor shall there be any sale of securities in any jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful prior to registration or qualification under the securities laws of any such jurisdiction.

SI Capital Ltd, which is a member of the London Stock Exchange, is authorised and regulated in the United Kingdom by the FCA and is acting as bookrunner in connection with the SI Capital Placing. WH Ireland Limited which is a member of the London Stock Exchange, is authorised and regulated in the United Kingdom by the FCA and is acting as bookrunner in connection with the WHI Placing. Each of SI Capital and WHI are acting exclusively for the Company in connection with the matters referred to in this Announcement and for no-one else and will not be responsible to anyone other than the Company for providing the protections afforded to their respective clients, nor for providing any advice in relation to the contents of this Announcement or any transaction, arrangement or matter referred to herein.

This Announcement has been issued by and is the sole responsibility of the Company. No representation or warranty, express or implied, is or will be made as to, or in relation to, and no responsibility or liability is or will be accepted by either of SI Capital nor WHI(apart from the responsibilities or liabilities that may be imposed by FSMA or the regulatory regime established thereunder) or the Company or by any of their respective Affiliates or agents as to, or in relation to, the accuracy or completeness of this Announcement or any other written or oral information made available to or publicly available to any interested party or its advisers, and any liability therefore is expressly disclaimed.

The distribution of this Announcement and the offering of the New Shares in certain jurisdictions may be restricted by law. No action has been taken by the Company, SI Capital, or WHI that would permit an offering of such shares or possession or distribution of this Announcement or any other offering or publicity material relating to such shares in any jurisdiction where action for that purpose is required. Persons into whose possession this Announcement comes are required by the Company, SI Capital and WHI to inform themselves about, and to observe such restrictions.

Persons (including, without limitation, nominees and trustees) who have a contractual or other legal obligation to forward a copy of the Appendix or this Announcement should seek appropriate advice before taking any action.

The New Shares to which this Announcement relates may be illiquid. Prospective subscribers of the New Shares should conduct their own due diligence on the New Shares. If you do not understand the contents of this Announcement you should consult an authorised financial adviser.

Neither the content of the Company's website nor any website accessible by hyperlinks on the Company's website is incorporated in, or forms part of, this Announcement.

This Announcement is released by the Company and contains inside information for the purposes of UK MAR and is disclosed in accordance with the Company's obligations under UK MAR.

Notification and public disclosure of transactions by persons discharging managerial responsibilities and persons closely associated with them

1 Details of PDMR / person closely associated with them ("PCA") (a) Name Paul Atherley 2 Reason for the notification (a) Position/status Chairman (b) Initial notification/amendment Initial Notification 3 Details of the Issuer (a) Name Pensana Plc (b) Legal Entity Identifier code 213800H4QP6T9499RU64 4 Details of the transaction(s) (a) Description of the financial instrument Ordinary shares of 0.001 each (b) Identification Code GB00BKM0ZJ18 (c) Nature of the transaction Participation in placing (d) Currency (e) Price(s) and volume(s) Price(s) Volume(s) 120 pence 500,000 (f) Aggregated information N/A (g) Date of the transaction 18 June 2021 (h) Place of the transaction London Stock Exchange, XLON

APPENDIX

TERMS AND CONDITIONS OF THE PLACING

THIS ANNOUNCEMENT, INCLUDING THIS APPENDIX (TOGETHER, THE "ANNOUNCEMENT"), AND THE INFORMATION IN IT IS RESTRICTED AND IS NOT FOR PUBLICATION, RELEASE, DISTRIBUTION OR FORWARDING, DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY, IN WHOLE OR IN PART, IN OR INTO OR FROM THE UNITED STATES, AUSTRALIA, CANADA, NEW ZEALAND, JAPAN, THE REPUBLIC OF SOUTH AFRICA OR ANY OTHER JURISDICTION WHERE TO DO SO MIGHT CONSTITUTE A VIOLATION OR BREACH OF ANY APPLICABLE LAW OR REGULATION.

MEMBERS OF THE PUBLIC ARE NOT ELIGIBLE TO TAKE PART IN THE PLACING. THIS APPENDIX AND THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS SET OUT HEREIN ARE FOR INFORMATION PURPOSES ONLY AND ARE DIRECTED ONLY AT: (A) IN A MEMBER STATE OF THE EUROPEAN ECONOMIC AREA, PERSONS WHO ARE, UNLESS OTHERWISE AGREED BY WH IRELAND, "QUALIFIED INVESTORS" AS DEFINED IN ARTICLE 2(E) OF THE EU PROSPECTUS REGULATION (WHICH MEANS REGULATION (EU) 2017/1129) (THE "PROSPECTUS REGULATION"); AND (B) IN THE UNITED KINGDOM, PERSONS WHO: (I) FALL WITHIN THE DEFINITION OF "QUALIFIED INVESTORS" OF THE PROSPECTUS REGULATION, AS IT FORMS PART OF UK DOMESTIC LAW BY VIRTUE OF THE EUROPEAN UNION (WITHDRAWAL) ACT 2018 (AS AMENDED) ("EUWA") AND OTHER IMPLEMENTING MEASURES (SUCH PERSONS IN (A) AND (B) (I) BEING "QUALIFIED INVESTORS"); AND (II) ARE EITHER "INVESTMENT PROFESSIONALS" WITHIN THE MEANING OF ARTICLE 19(5) OF THE FINANCIAL SERVICES AND MARKETS ACT 2000 (FINANCIAL PROMOTION) ORDER 2005 (THE "ORDER"), OR FALL WITHIN ARTICLE 49(2)(A) TO (D) ("HIGH NET WORTH COMPANIES, UNINCORPORATED ASSOCIATIONS, ETC") OF THE ORDER OR TO WHOM IT MAY OTHERWISE BE LAWFULLY COMMUNICATED (ALL SUCH PERSONS TOGETHER BEING REFERRED TO AS "RELEVANT PERSONS"). THIS APPENDIX AND THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS SET OUT HEREIN MUST NOT BE ACTED ON OR RELIED ON BY PERSONS WHO ARE NOT RELEVANT PERSONS. ANY INVESTMENT OR INVESTMENT ACTIVITY TO WHICH THIS APPENDIX AND THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS SET OUT HEREIN RELATE IS AVAILABLE ONLY TO RELEVANT PERSONS AND WILL BE ENGAGED IN ONLY WITH RELEVANT PERSONS. PERSONS INTO WHOSE POSSESSION THIS ANNOUNCEMENT (INCLUDING THE APPENDICES) COMES ARE REQUIRED BY THE COMPANY AND WH IRELAND TO INFORM THEMSELVES ABOUT AND TO OBSERVE ANY SUCH RESTRICTIONS.

THIS ANNOUNCEMENT DOES NOT CONSTITUTE OR FORM ANY PART OF AN OFFER FOR THE SALE OR ISSUE, OR A SOLICITATION OF AN OFFER TO BUY, SUBSCRIBE FOR OR OTHERWISE ACQUIRE ANY SECURITIES IN ANY JURISDICTION IN WHICH SUCH OFFER, SOLICITATION OR SALE WOULD BE UNLAWFUL UNDER THE SECURITIES LAWS OF ANY JURISDICTION. NO PUBLIC OFFERING OF THE PLACING SHARES IS BEING MADE IN ANY SUCH JURISDICTION. ANY FAILURE TO COMPLY WITH THESE RESTRICTIONS MAY CONSTITUTE A VIOLATION OF THE SECURITIES LAWS OF SUCH JURISDICTIONS.

THIS ANNOUNCEMENT IS NOT FOR PUBLICATION OR DISTRIBUTION, DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY, IN OR INTO THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. THIS ANNOUNCEMENT IS NOT AN OFFER OF SECURITIES FOR SALE IN THE UNITED STATES. THE SECURITIES REFERRED TO HEREIN HAVE NOT BEEN AND WILL NOT BE REGISTERED UNDER THE U.S. SECURITIES ACT OF 1933, AS AMENDED, AND MAY NOT BE OFFERED OR SOLD IN THE UNITED STATES, EXCEPT PURSUANT TO AN APPLICABLE EXEMPTION FROM REGISTRATION AND IN COMPLIANCE WITH ANY APPLICABLE SECURITIES LAWS OF ANY STATE OR OTHER JURISDICTION OF THE UNITED STATES. NO PUBLIC OFFERING OF SECURITIES IS BEING MADE IN THE UNITED STATES.

EACH PLACEE SHOULD CONSULT WITH ITS OWN ADVISERS AS TO LEGAL, TAX, BUSINESS AND RELATED ASPECTS OF AN INVESTMENT IN PLACING SHARES. THE PRICE OF SHARES AND THE INCOME FROM THEM (IF ANY) MAY GO DOWN AS WELL AS UP AND INVESTORS MAY NOT GET BACK THE FULL AMOUNT INVESTED ON DISPOSAL OF SHARES. PAST PERFORMANCE IS NO GUIDE TO FUTURE PERFORMANCE.

The relevant clearances have not been, nor will they be, obtained from the securities commission of any province or territory of Canada; no prospectus has been lodged with or registered by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission or the Japanese Ministry of Finance or the South African Reserve Bank; and the Placing Shares have not been, nor will they be, registered under or offered in compliance with the securities laws of any state, province or territory of Australia, Canada, Japan or the Republic of South Africa. Accordingly, the Placing Shares may not (unless an exemption under the relevant securities laws is applicable) be offered, sold, resold or delivered, directly or indirectly, in or into Australia, Canada, Japan, the Republic of South Africa, New Zealand or any other jurisdiction in which such offer, sale, resale or delivery would be unlawful.

Solely for the purposes of the product governance requirements of Chapter 3 of the FCA Handbook Product Intervention and Product Governance Sourcebook (the "UK MiFIR Product Governance Requirements") and disclaiming all and any liability, whether arising in tort, contract or otherwise, which any "manufacturer" (for the purposes of the UK MiFIR Product Governance Requirements) may otherwise have with respect thereto, the Placing Shares have been subject to a product approval process, which has determined that the Placing Shares are: (i) compatible with an end target market of: (a) retail investors, (b) investors who meet the criteria of professional clients and (c) eligible counterparties (each as defined in paragraphs 3.5 and 3.6 of COBS); and (ii) eligible for distribution through all distribution channels as are permitted by MiFID II (the "Target Market Assessment"). Notwithstanding the Target Market Assessment, distributors should note that: the price of the Placing Shares may decline and investors could lose all or part of their investment; the Placing Shares offer no guaranteed income and no capital protection; and an investment in the Placing Shares is compatible only with investors who do not need a guaranteed income or capital protection, who (either alone or in conjunction with an appropriate financial or other adviser) are capable of evaluating the merits and risks of such an investment and who have sufficient resources to be able to bear any losses that may result therefrom. The Target Market Assessment is without prejudice to the requirements of any contractual, legal or regulatory selling restrictions in relation to the Placing.

For the avoidance of doubt, the Target Market Assessment does not constitute: (a) an assessment of suitability or appropriateness for the purposes of Chapters 9A or 10A respectively of COBS; or (b) a recommendation to any investor or group of investors to invest in, or purchase, or take any other action whatsoever with respect to the Placing Shares.

Each distributor is responsible for undertaking its own target market assessment in respect of the Placing Shares and determining appropriate distribution channels.

Persons (including, without limitation, nominees and trustees) who have a contractual right or other legal obligation to forward a copy of this Appendix or this Announcement of which it forms part should seek appropriate advice before taking any action.

These terms and conditions apply to persons acquiring Placing Shares pursuant to the Placing. Each Placee hereby agrees with WH Ireland and the Company to be bound by these terms and conditions as being the terms and conditions upon which Placing Shares will be issued or acquired. A Placee shall, without limitation, become so bound if WH Ireland confirms to such Placee its allocation of Placing Shares.

Upon being notified of its allocation of Placing Shares, a Placee shall be contractually committed to acquire the number of Placing Shares allocated to it at the Placing Price and, to the fullest extent permitted by law, will be deemed to have agreed not to exercise any rights to rescind or terminate or otherwise withdraw from such commitment.

In this Appendix, unless the context otherwise requires, "Placee" means a Relevant Person (including individuals, funds or others) who has been invited to participate in the Placing by WH Ireland and on whose behalf a commitment to subscribe for or acquire Placing Shares has been given.

Details of the Placing Agreement and the Placing Shares

WH Ireland and the Company have entered into a Placing Agreement, under which WH Ireland will, on the terms and subject to the conditions set out therein, undertake to use its reasonable endeavours to procure subscribers for the Placing Shares at the Placing Price.

In addition, the Company is seeking to raise approximately US$20.1 million ( 14.3 million) through the SI Placing and the Subscription. Neither the Placing, the SI Placing, nor the Subscription is being underwritten by WH Ireland or any other person.

The New Shares are expected to be issued on or around 25 June 2021. The New Shares will, when issued, be subject to the articles of association of the Company, will be credited as fully paid and will rank pari passu in all respects with the Existing Ordinary Shares, including the right to receive all dividends and other distributions (if any) declared, made or paid on or in respect of Ordinary Shares after the date of issue of the New Shares.

The Placing Shares will trade under PRE with ISIN GB00BKM0ZJ18.

Application for admission to trading of the New Shares

Application will be made to the London Stock Exchange and the Financial Conduct Authority for the New Shares to be admitted to trading on the standard listing segment of the Official List and to trading on the Main Market. Admission of the Placing Shares is expected to become effective and dealings in such shares are expected to commence at 8.00 a.m. on or around 25 June 2021. In any event, the latest date for Admission is 30 June 2021 or such later date as the Company and WH Ireland may agree (the "Long Stop Date").

Placing

This Appendix gives details of the terms and conditions of, and the mechanics of participation in, the Placing. No commissions will be paid to Placees or by Placees in respect of any Placing Shares.

Participation in, and principal terms of, the Placing are as follows:

WH Ireland is arranging the Placing as agent for, and broker of, the Company. WH Ireland is regulated by the FCA, are acting exclusively for the Company and no one else in connection with the matters referred to in this Announcement and will not be responsible to anyone other than the Company for providing the protections afforded to their respective customers or for providing advice in relation to the matters described in this Announcement. The number of Placing Shares to be issued at the Placing Price under the Placing will be agreed between WH Ireland and the Company. Participation in the Placing is only available to persons who are lawfully able to be, and have been, invited to participate by WH Ireland. WH Ireland is entitled to participate in the Placing as principal. The aggregate proceeds to be raised through the Placing will be agreed between WH Ireland and the Company. Each Placee's allocation will be agreed between WH Ireland and the Company and each Placee's allocation has been or will be confirmed to Placees orally, or in writing (which can include email), by WH Ireland (acting as agent of the Company) and a trade confirmation has been or will be dispatched as soon as possible thereafter. WH Ireland's oral or written confirmation will give rise to an irrevocable, legally binding commitment by that person (who at that point becomes a Placee), in favour of WH Ireland and the Company, under which it agrees to acquire by subscription the number of Placing Shares allocated to it at the Placing Price and otherwise on the terms and subject to the conditions set out in this Appendix and in accordance with the Company's articles of association. Except with WH Ireland's consent, such commitment will not be capable of variation or revocation by the Placee. As noted above, each Placee's allocation will, unless otherwise agreed between the Placee and WH Ireland, be evidenced by a trade confirmation issued to each such Placee by the WH Ireland. The terms and conditions of this Announcement (including this Appendix) will be deemed to be incorporated in that trade confirmation or such other confirmation and will be legally binding on the Placee on behalf of which it is made and except with WH Ireland consent will not be capable of variation or revocation by the Placee. Each Placee will have an immediate, separate, irrevocable and binding obligation, owed to WH Ireland (as agent for the Company), to pay to WH Ireland (or as WH Ireland may direct) in cleared funds an amount equal to the product of the Placing Price and the number of Placing Shares such Placee has agreed to acquire. Such Placee's obligations will be owed to the Company and to WH Ireland. Except as required by law or regulation, no press release or other announcement will be made by WH Ireland or the Company using the name of any Placee (or its agent), in its capacity as Placee (or agent), other than with such Placee's prior written consent. Irrespective of the time at which a Placee's allocation pursuant to the Placing is confirmed, settlement for all Placing Shares to be acquired pursuant to the Placing will be required to be made at the same time, on the basis explained below under "Registration and Settlement". All obligations of WH Ireland under the Placing will be subject to fulfilment of the conditions referred to below "Conditions of the Placing" and to the Placing not being terminated on the basis referred to below under "Right to terminate under the Placing Agreement". By participating in the Placing, each Placee agrees that its rights and obligations in respect of the Placing will terminate only in the circumstances described below and will not be capable of rescission or termination by the Placee. To the fullest extent permissible by law and the applicable rules of the FCA, neither WH Ireland nor any of its Affiliates shall have any liability to Placees (or to any other person whether acting on behalf of a Placee or otherwise whether or not a recipient of these terms and conditions) in respect of the Placing, the SI Placing and/or the Subscriptions. Each Placee acknowledges and agrees that the Company is responsible for the allotment of the Placing Shares to the Placees and WH Ireland and its Affiliates shall have no liability to the Placees for the failure of the Company to fulfil those obligations. In particular, neither WH Ireland, the Company nor any of their Affiliates shall have any liability (including to the extent permissible by law, any fiduciary duties) in respect of WH Ireland's conduct of the Placing, or of such alternative method of effecting the Placing as WH Ireland, its Affiliates and the Company may agree or determine.

Conditions of the Placing

The Placing is conditional upon the Placing Agreement being entered into and having becoming unconditional in all respects (save for Admission) and it not having been terminated. WH Ireland's obligations under the Placing Agreement in respect of, amongst other things, the Placing are conditional on, inter alia:

the release of this Announcement to a Regulatory Information Service by no later than 6:00 p.m. on 18 June 2021 ; the Company having received executed legally binding subscription letters from the Subscribers; the delivery by the Company to WH Ireland of certain documents required under the Placing Agreement; the Company having performed its obligations under the Placing Agreement which WH Ireland has, acting in good faith, deemed material to the extent that fall to be performed prior to Admission; none of the warranties or undertakings given in the Placing Agreement being untrue or inaccurate or misleading at any time before Admission, and no fact or circumstance having arisen which would constitute a breach of any of the warranties or undertakings given in the Placing Agreement on the dates on which they are given or would have rendered any of the warranties or undertakings given in the Placing Agreement untrue, incorrect or misleading if such fact or circumstance had occurred before the date of the Placing Agreement; the Placing Agreement not having been terminated by WH Ireland; and admission of the New Shares to the standard listing segment of the Official List and to trading on the Main Market becoming effective on or before 8.00am on 25 June 2021 or such later date as the Company and WH Ireland may agree, but not being later than 30 June 2021 .

If: (i) any of the conditions contained in the Placing Agreement, including those described above, are not fulfilled or (where applicable) waived by WH Ireland by the respective time or date where specified (or such later time or date as WH Ireland may notify to the Company (being not later than the Long Stop Date)) or (ii) any of such conditions becomes incapable of being fulfilled, the Placing will not proceed and the Placees' rights and obligations hereunder in relation to the Placing Shares shall cease and terminate at such time and each Placee agrees that no claim can be made by the Placee in respect thereof.

WH Ireland may, in its discretion and upon such terms as it thinks fit, waive, or extend the period for, compliance by the Company with the whole or any part of any of the Company's obligations in relation to the conditions in the Placing Agreement, save that the condition relating to Admission taking place by the Long Stop Date may not be waived. Any such extension or waiver will not affect Placees' commitments as set out in this Announcement or its Appendix.

Neither WH Ireland, the Company nor any of their respective Affiliates or officers, directors, employees, agents or advisers shall have any liability to any Placee (or to any other person whether acting on behalf of a Placee or otherwise) in respect of any decision they may make as to whether or not to waive or to extend the time and/or date for the satisfaction of any condition to the Placing nor for any decision they may make as to the satisfaction of any condition or in respect of the Placing generally and by participating in the Placing each Placee agrees that any such decision is within the absolute discretion of WH Ireland.

By participating in the Placing, each Placee agrees that its rights and obligations cease and terminate only in the circumstances described above and under "Right to terminate the Placing Agreement" below and will not be capable of rescission or termination by it.

Right to terminate the Placing Agreement

WH Ireland is entitled to terminate the Placing Agreement at any time prior to Admission by giving notice to the Company in certain circumstances, including, inter alia:

the Company is in breach of any provision of the Placing Agreement, or with the requirements of any laws or regulations (including UK MAR, FSMA or the Listing Rules) which is material in the context of the Placing or Admission; WH Ireland becomes aware of any circumstance which results in any of the warranties given in the Placing Agreement being untrue or inaccurate or misleading when given at the date of the Placing Agreement or would no longer be true or accurate or would be misleading if such warranties were repeated or deemed repeated at any time prior to Admission (by reference to the facts and circumstances then existing); it should come to the notice of WH Ireland that any statement contained in any of the Issue Documents (as defined in the Placing Agreement) is untrue or inaccurate or misleading or there has been an omission in the Issue Documents, in each case, which WH Ireland (acting in good faith) considers would be materially prejudicial to the Placing, and such matter may not, in the opinion of WH Ireland be addressed by the publication of a further document or the making of an announcement; in the opinion of WH Ireland there has occurred any material adverse change in the financial position and/or prospects of the Company and/or any other member of the Group which in the opinion of WH Ireland would be materially prejudicial to the Group or materially and adversely affect the Group, the Placing, the SI Placing, the Subscriptions, Admission or the subscription for the Placing Shares by Placees; or there having occurred any material adverse change in national or international financial, monetary, economic, political, environmental, or stock market conditions (including a significant and adverse worsening of the situation relating to Covid-19 in the United Kingdom and/or Angola ) which in the opinion of WH Ireland would be prejudicial to the Group or to the Placing or Admission.

If the Placing Agreement is terminated prior to Admission then the Placing will not occur.

The rights and obligations of the Placees will not be subject to termination by the Placees or any prospective Placees at any time or in any circumstances. By participating in the Placing, Placees agree that the exercise by WH Ireland of any right of termination or other discretion under the Placing Agreement shall be within the absolute discretion of WH Ireland and that WH Ireland need not make any reference to Placees in this regard and that neither WH Ireland nor any of its Affiliates shall have any liability to Placees whatsoever in connection with any such exercise or failure so to exercise.

No Prospectus

The Placing Shares are being offered to a limited number of specifically invited persons only and have not been nor will be offered in such a way as to require the publication of a prospectus in the United Kingdom or any equivalent document in any other jurisdiction. No offering document or prospectus has been or will be submitted to be approved by the FCA or the London Stock Exchange in relation to the Placing or the Placing Shares, and Placees' commitments will be made solely on the basis of the information contained in this Announcement (including this Appendix) and the business and financial information that the Company is required to publish in accordance with the Listing Rules (the "Exchange Information") or which it has otherwise announced by means of a Regulatory Information Service ("Publicly Available Information"). Each Placee, by accepting a participation in the Placing, agrees that the content of this Announcement is exclusively the responsibility of the Company and confirms that it has neither received nor relied on any other information (other than the Exchange Information/Publicly Available Information), representation, warranty, or statement made by or on behalf of the Company or WH Ireland or any other person and neither WH Ireland, the Company nor any other person will be liable for any Placee's decision to participate in the Placing based on any other information, representation, warranty or statement which the Placees may have obtained or received and, if given or made, such information, representation, warranty or statement must not be relied upon as having been authorised by WH Ireland, the Company or their respective officers, directors, employees or agents. Each Placee acknowledges and agrees that it has relied on its own investigation of the business, financial or other position of the Company in accepting a participation in the Placing. Neither the Company nor WH Ireland are making any undertaking or warranty to any Placee regarding the legality of an investment in the Placing Shares by such Placee under any legal, investment or similar laws or regulations. No Placee should consider any information in this Announcement to be or constitute legal, tax or business advice. Each Placee should consult its own solicitor, tax adviser and financial adviser for independent legal, tax and financial advice regarding an investment in the Placing Shares. Nothing in this paragraph shall exclude the liability of any person for fraudulent misrepresentation.

Registration and Settlement

Settlement of transactions in the Placing Shares will, unless otherwise agreed, take place on a delivery versus payment basis within the system administered by Euroclear UK & Ireland Limited ("CREST"). Each Placee will be deemed to agree that it will do all things necessary to ensure that delivery and payment is completed as directed by WH Ireland in accordance with the standing CREST settlement instructions which they have in place with WH Ireland (or as directed, if such an agreement does not exist).

Settlement of transactions in the Placing Shares (ISIN: GB00BKM0ZJ18) following Admission will take place within CREST provided that, subject to certain exceptions, WH Ireland reserves the right to require settlement for, and delivery of, the Placing Shares (or a portion thereof) to Placees by such other means that it deems necessary if delivery or settlement is not possible or practicable within CREST within the timetable set out in this Announcement or would not be consistent with the regulatory requirements in any Placee's jurisdiction.

It is expected that settlement of the Placing Shares will be on 25 June 2021 unless otherwise notified by WH Ireland and Admission is expected to occur on 25 June 2021 or such later time as may be agreed between the Company and WH Ireland, not being later 30June 2021. The trade date for the Placing Shares will be 18 June 2021.

Each Placee is deemed to agree that, if it does not comply with these obligations, WH Ireland may sell any or all of the Placing Shares allocated to that Placee on such Placee's behalf and retain from the proceeds, for WH Ireland account and benefit (as agent for the Company), an amount equal to the aggregate amount owed by the Placee plus any interest due. The relevant Placee will, however, remain liable and shall indemnify WH Ireland on demand for any shortfall below the aggregate amount owed by it and may be required to bear any stamp duty or stamp duty reserve tax or securities transfer tax (together with any interest or penalties) which may arise upon the sale of such Placing Shares on such Placee's behalf. By communicating a bid for Placing Shares, each Placee confers on WH Ireland such authorities and powers necessary to carry out any such sale and agrees to ratify and confirm all actions which WH Ireland lawfully takes in pursuance of such sale. Legal and/or beneficial title in and to any Placing Shares shall not pass to the relevant Placee until it has fully complied with its obligations hereunder.

If Placing Shares are to be delivered to a custodian or settlement agent, Placees should ensure that any form of confirmation is copied and delivered immediately to the relevant person within that organisation.

Insofar as Placing Shares are registered in a Placee's name or that of its nominee or in the name of any person for whom a Placee is contracting as agent or that of a nominee for such person, such Placing Shares should, subject as provided below, be so registered free from any liability to UK stamp duty or stamp duty reserve tax or securities transfer tax. Neither WH Ireland nor the Company will be liable in any circumstances for the payment of stamp duty, stamp duty reserve tax or securities transfer tax in connection with any of the Placing Shares. Placees will not be entitled to receive any fee or commission in connection with the Placing.

Representations, Warranties and Further Terms

By participating in the Placing, each Placee (and any person acting on such Placee's behalf) makes the following representations, warranties, acknowledgements, agreements and undertakings (as the case may be) to WH Ireland and to the Company:

that it has read and understood this Announcement, including this Appendix, in its entirety and that its subscription for Placing Shares is subject to and based upon all the terms, conditions, representations, warranties, acknowledgements, agreements and undertakings and other information contained herein and undertakes not to redistribute or duplicate this Announcement; that the shares in the capital of the Company are admitted to the standard listing segment of the Official List and to trading on the Main Market, and the Company is therefore required to publish the Exchange Information, which includes a description of the nature of the Company's business and the Company's most recent balance sheet and profit and loss account and that it is able to obtain or access such Exchange Information without undue difficulty and is able to obtain access to such information or comparable information concerning any other publicly traded company without undue difficulty; that its obligations are irrevocable and legally binding and shall not be capable of rescission or termination by it in any circumstances; that the exercise by WH Ireland of any right or discretion under the Placing Agreement shall be within the absolute discretion of WH Ireland and WH Ireland need not have any reference to it and shall have no liability to it whatsoever in connection with any decision to exercise or not to exercise any such right and each Placee agrees that it has no rights against WH Ireland or the Company, or any of their respective officers, directors or employees, under the Placing Agreement pursuant to the Contracts (Rights of Third Parties Act) 1999; that these terms and conditions represent the whole and only agreement between it, WH Ireland and the Company in relation to its participation in the Placing and supersedes any previous agreement between any of such parties in relation to such participation. Accordingly, each Placee, in accepting its participation in the Placing, is not relying on any information or representation or warranty in relation to the Company or any of its subsidiaries or any of the Placing Shares other than as contained in this Announcement, the Exchange Information and the Publicly Available Information, such information being all that it deems necessary to make an investment decision in respect of the Placing Shares. Each Placee agrees that neither the Company, WH Ireland nor any of their respective officers, directors or employees will have any liability for any such other information, representation or warranty, express or implied; that in the case of any Placing Shares acquired by it as a financial intermediary, as that term is used in the Prospectus Regulation or the UK Prospectus Regulation: (i) the Placing Shares acquired by it in the Placing have not been acquired on behalf of, nor have they been acquired with a view to their offer or resale to, persons in the United Kingdom or any member state of the EEA other than Qualified Investors or in circumstances in which the prior consent of WH Ireland has been given to the offer or resale; or (ii) where Placing Shares have been acquired by it on behalf of persons in the United Kingdom or any member state of the EEA other than Qualified Investors, the offer of those Placing Shares to it is not treated under either the Prospectus Regulation or the UK Prospectus Regulation as having been made to such persons; that any offer of Placing Shares may only be directed at persons in member states of the EEA who are EEA Qualified Investors and represents, warrants and undertakes that it has not offered or sold and will not offer or sell any Placing Shares to persons in the EEA prior to Admission except to EEA Qualified Investors or otherwise in circumstances which have not resulted in and which will not result in an offer to the public in any member state of the EEA within the meaning of the Prospectus Regulation; that any offer of Placing Shares may only be directed at persons in the United Kingdom who are Relevant Persons and represents, warrants and undertakes that it has not offered or sold and will not offer or sell any Placing Shares to persons in the United Kingdom prior to Admission except to Relevant Persons or otherwise in circumstances which have not resulted in and which will not result in an offer to the public in the United Kingdom within the meaning of the UK Prospectus Regulation. that neither it nor, as the case may be, its clients expect WH Ireland to have any duties or responsibilities to such persons similar or comparable to the duties of "best execution" and "suitability" imposed by the FCA's Conduct of Business Source Book, and that WH Ireland are not acting for it or its clients, and that WH Ireland will not be responsible for providing the protections afforded to customers of WH Ireland or for providing advice in respect of the transactions described herein; that it has made its own assessment of the Placing Shares and has relied on its own investigation of the business, financial or other position of the Company in accepting a participation in the Placing and neither WH Ireland or the Company nor any of their respective Affiliates, agents, directors, officers or employees or any person acting on behalf of any of them has provided, and will not provide, it with any material regarding the Placing Shares or the Company or any other person other than the information in this Announcement or the Publicly Available Information; nor has it requested WH Ireland , the Company or any of their respective Affiliates, agents, directors, officers or employees or any person acting on behalf of any of them to provide it with any such information; that the only information on which it is entitled to rely on and on which it has relied upon in committing to subscribe for the Placing Shares is contained in this Announcement and the Publicly Available Information, such information being all that it deems necessary to make an investment decision in respect of the Placing Shares and it has made its own assessment of the Company, the Placing Shares and the terms of the Placing based on this Announcement and the Publicly Available Information; that neither WH Ireland nor the Company nor any of their respective Affiliates, agents, directors, officers or employees has made any representation or warranty to it, express or implied, with respect to the Company, the Placing, the SI Placing, the Subscriptions, the SI Placing Shares, the Subscriptions Shares or the Placing Shares or the accuracy, completeness or adequacy of this Announcement or the Publicly Available Information; that the SI Placing is being conducted by SI Capital independently of the Placing and the Subscriptions are being made directly with the Company, independently of WH Ireland and WH Ireland has no responsibility for and excludes all liability for and shall be held harmless in respect of, all and any matters relating to or any claims arising from, the SI Placing and/or the Subscriptions; that it and the person(s), if any, for whose account or benefit it is subscribing for the Placing Shares is not subscribing for and/or purchasing Placing Shares as a result of any "directed selling efforts" as defined in Regulation S; that, unless specifically agreed with WH Ireland, it is not and was not acting on a non-discretionary basis for the account or benefit of a person located within the United States at the time the undertaking to subscribe for Placing Shares was given and it is not acquiring Placing Shares with a view to the offer, sale, resale, transfer, delivery or distribution, directly or indirectly, of any Placing Shares into the United States and it will not reoffer, resell, pledge or otherwise transfer the Placing Shares except pursuant to an exemption from the registration requirements of the Securities Act and otherwise in accordance with any applicable securities laws of any state or jurisdiction of the United States ; that it is not a national or resident of Canada , Australia , New Zealand , the Republic of South Africa or Japan or a corporation, partnership or other entity organised under the laws of Canada , Australia , New Zealand , the Republic of South Africa or Japan and that it will not offer, sell, renounce, transfer or deliver, directly or indirectly, any of the Placing Shares in Canada , Australia , New Zealand , the Republic of South Africa or Japan or to or for the benefit of any person resident in Canada , Australia , New Zealand , the Republic of South Africa or Japan and each Placee acknowledges that the relevant exemptions are not being obtained from the Securities Commission of any province of Canada , that no document has been or will be lodged with, filed with or registered by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission or Japanese Ministry of Finance and that the Placing Shares are not being offered for sale and may not be, directly or indirectly, offered, sold, transferred or delivered in or into Canada , Australia , New Zealand , the Republic South Africa or Japan ; that it does not have a registered address in, and is not a citizen, resident or national of, any jurisdiction in which it is unlawful to make or accept an offer of the Placing Shares and it is not acting on a non-discretionary basis for any such person; that it has not, directly or indirectly, distributed, forwarded, transferred or otherwise transmitted, and will not, directly or indirectly, distribute, forward, transfer or otherwise transmit, any presentation or offering materials concerning the Placing or the Placing Shares to any persons within the United States ; that it (and any person acting on its behalf) will make payment for the Placing Shares allocated to it in accordance with this Announcement on the due time and date set out herein, failing which the relevant Placing Shares may be placed with other subscribers or sold as WH Ireland may determine in consultation with the Company and without liability to such Placee; that it and any person acting on its behalf is entitled to subscribe for Placing Shares under the laws of all relevant jurisdictions which apply to it and that it has fully observed such laws and obtained all governmental and other consents which may be required thereunder or otherwise and complied with all necessary formalities and that it has not taken any action which will or may result in the Company or WH Ireland or any of their respective directors, officers, employees or agents acting in breach of any regulatory or legal requirements of any territory in connection with the Placing or its acceptance; that it (and any person acting on its behalf) has the necessary capacity and has obtained all necessary consents and authorities to enable it to give its commitment to subscribe for the Placing Shares and to perform its subscription obligations and will honour such obligations; that where it is acquiring Placing Shares for one or more managed accounts, it is authorised in writing by each managed account: (a) to acquire the Placing Shares for each managed account; (b) to make on its behalf the representations, warranties, acknowledgements, undertakings and agreements in this Appendix and this Announcement of which it forms part; and (c) to receive on its behalf any investment letter relating to the Placing in the form provided to it by WH Ireland; that it is either: (a) a person of a kind described in paragraph 5 of Article 19 (persons having professional experience in matters relating to investments and who are investment professionals) of the Order; or (b) a person of a kind described in paragraph 2 of Article 49 (high net worth companies, unincorporated associations, partnerships or trusts or their respective directors, officers or employees) of the Order; or (c) a person to whom it is otherwise lawful for this Announcement to be communicated and in the case of (a) and (b) undertakes that it will acquire, hold, manage or dispose of any Placing Shares that are allocated to it for the purposes of its business; if in a member state of the EEA and except as disclosed in this Announcement under "Details of the Placing", that it is (i) an EEA Qualified Investor and (ii) a "professional client" or an "eligible counterparty" within the meaning set out in EU Directive 2014/65/EU on markets in financial instruments (MIFID II), as implemented into national law of the relevant EEA state; if in the United Kingdom , that it is a Relevant Person and it undertakes that it will acquire, hold, manage and (if applicable) dispose of any Placing Shares that are allocated to it for the purposes of its business only; that, unless otherwise agreed by WH Ireland, it is a "professional client" or an "eligible counterparty" within the meaning of Chapter 3 of the FCA's Conduct of Business Sourcebook and it is purchasing Placing Shares for investment only and not with a view to resale or distribution; it has only communicated or caused to be communicated and will only communicate or cause to be communicated any invitation or inducement to engage in investment activity (within the meaning of section 21 of FSMA) relating to the Placing Shares in circumstances in which section 21(1) of FSMA does not require approval of the communication by an authorised person; that any money held in an account with WH Ireland (or its nominees) on its behalf and/or any person acting on its behalf will not be treated as client money within the meaning of the rules and regulations of the FCA. Each Placee further acknowledges that the money will not be subject to the protections conferred by the FCA's client money rules. As a consequence, this money will not be segregated from WH Ireland's (or its nominee) money in accordance with such client money rules and will be used by WH Ireland in the course of its own business and each Placee will rank only as a general creditor of WH Ireland; that it will (or will procure that its nominee will) if applicable, make notification to the Company of the interest in its ordinary shares in accordance with the Disclosure Guidance and Transparency Rules published by the FCA; that it is not, and it is not acting on behalf of, a person falling within subsections (6), (7) or (8) of sections 67 or 70 respectively or subsections (2) and (3) of section 93 or subsection (1) of section 96 of the Finance Act 1986; that it will not deal or cause or permit any other person to deal in all or any of the Placing Shares which it is subscribing for and/or purchasing under the Placing unless and until Admission becomes effective; that it appoints irrevocably any director of WH Ireland as its agent for the purpose of executing and delivering to the Company and/or its registrars any document on its behalf necessary to enable it to be registered as the holder of the Placing Shares; that, as far as it is aware, it is not acting in concert (within the meaning given in The City Code on Takeovers and Mergers) with any other person in relation to the Company; that this Announcement does not constitute a securities recommendation or financial product advice and that neither WH Ireland nor the Company has considered its particular objectives, financial situation and needs; that it has sufficient knowledge, sophistication and experience in financial, business and investment matters as is required to evaluate the merits and risks of subscribing for or purchasing the Placing Shares and is aware that it may be required to bear, and it, and any accounts for which it may be acting, are able to bear, the economic risk of, and is able to sustain, a complete loss in connection with the Placing; that it will indemnify and hold the Company and WH Ireland and their respective Affiliates, officers, directors, employees and agents harmless from any and all costs, claims, liabilities and expenses (including legal fees and expenses) arising out of or in connection with any breach of the representations, warranties, acknowledgements, agreements and undertakings in this Appendix and further agrees that the Company and WH Ireland will rely on the truth and accuracy of the confirmations, warranties, acknowledgements and undertakings herein and, if any of the foregoing is or becomes no longer true or accurate, the Placee shall promptly notify WH Ireland and the Company. All confirmations, warranties, acknowledgements and undertakings given by the Placee pursuant to this Announcement (including this Appendix) are given to WH Ireland for itself and on behalf of the Company and will survive completion of the Placing and Admission; that time shall be of the essence as regards obligations pursuant to this Appendix; that it is responsible for obtaining any legal, financial, tax and other advice that it deems necessary for the execution, delivery and performance of its obligations in accepting the terms and conditions of the Placing, and that it is not relying on the Company or WH Ireland to provide any legal, financial, tax or other advice to it; that all dates and times in this Announcement (including this Appendix) may be subject to amendment and that WH Ireland shall notify it of such amendments; that (i) it has complied with its obligations under the Criminal Justice Act 1993, and UK MAR, (ii) in connection with money laundering and terrorist financing, it has complied with its obligations under the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 (as amended), the Terrorism Act 2000 (as amended), the Anti-Terrorism Crime and Security Act 2001, the Terrorism Act 2006 and the Money Laundering, Terrorist Financing and Transfer of Funds (Information on the Payer) Regulations 2017 and (iii) it is not a person: (a) with whom transactions are prohibited under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act of 1977 or any economic sanction programmes administered by, or regulations promulgated by, the Office of Foreign Assets Control of the U.S. Department of the Treasury; (b) named on the Consolidated List of Financial Sanctions Targets maintained by HM Treasury of the United Kingdom ; or (c) subject to financial sanctions imposed pursuant to a regulation of the European Union or a regulation adopted by the United Nations (together, the "Regulations"); and, if making payment on behalf of a third party, that satisfactory evidence has been obtained and recorded by it to verify the identity of the third party as required by the Regulations and, if making payment on behalf of a third party, that satisfactory evidence has been obtained and recorded by it to verify the identity of the third party as required by the Regulations and has obtained all governmental and other consents (if any) which may be required for the purpose of, or as a consequence of, such purchase, and it will provide promptly to WH Ireland such evidence, if any, as to the identity or location or legal status of any person which WH Ireland may request from it in connection with the Placing (for the purpose of complying with such Regulations or ascertaining the nationality of any person or the jurisdiction(s) to which any person is subject or otherwise) in the form and manner requested by WH Ireland on the basis that any failure by it to do so may result in the number of Placing Shares that are to be subscribed for by it or at its direction pursuant to the Placing being reduced to such number, or to nil, as WH Ireland may decide in its absolute discretion; that it will not make any offer to the public of those Placing Shares to be subscribed for by it for the purposes of the Prospectus Regulation Rules made by the FCA pursuant to Prospectus Regulation Rules Instrument 2019 (FCA 2019/80); that it will not distribute any document relating to the Placing Shares and it will be acquiring the Placing Shares for its own account as principal or for a discretionary account or accounts (as to which it has the authority to make the statements set out herein) for investment purposes only and it does not have any contract, understanding or arrangement with any person to sell, pledge, transfer or grant a participation therein to such person or any third person with respect of any Placing Shares; save that if it is a private client stockbroker or fund manager it confirms that in purchasing the Placing Shares it is acting under the terms of one or more discretionary mandates granted to it by private clients and it is not acting on an execution only basis or under specific instructions to purchase the Placing Shares for the account of any third party; that it acknowledges that its commitment to acquire Placing Shares on the terms set out herein and in the trade confirmation will continue notwithstanding any amendment that may in future be made to the terms and conditions of the Placing and that Placees will have no right to be consulted or require that their consent be obtained with respect to the Company's or WH Ireland's conduct of the Placing; that it acknowledges that these terms and conditions and any agreements entered into by it pursuant to these terms and conditions shall be governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of England and Wales and it submits (on behalf of itself and on behalf of any person on whose behalf it is acting) to the exclusive jurisdiction of the English courts as regards any claim, dispute or matter arising out of any such contract, except that enforcement proceedings in respect of the obligation to make payment for the Placing Shares (together with any interest chargeable thereon) may be taken by the Company or WH Ireland in any jurisdiction in which the relevant Placee is incorporated or in which its assets are located or any of its securities have a quotation on a recognised stock exchange; that any documents sent to Placees will be sent at the Placees' risk. They may be sent by post to such Placees at an address notified to WH Ireland; that neither WH Ireland nor the Company owe no fiduciary or other duties to any Placee in respect of any representations, warranties, undertakings or indemnities in the Placing Agreement; that WH Ireland or any of its Affiliates may, at their absolute discretion, agree to become a Placee in respect of some or all of the Placing Shares; that no prospectus, admission document or other offering document has been or will be prepared in connection with the Placing and it has not received and will not receive a prospectus, admission document or other offering document in connection with the Placing or the Placing Shares; and that if it has received any confidential price sensitive information or inside information concerning the Company in advance of the publication of this Announcement, it has not: (i) dealt in the securities of the Company; (ii) encouraged, required, recommended or induced another person to deal in the securities of the Company; or (iii) disclosed such information to any person, prior to such information being made publicly available.

The Company, WH Ireland and their respective Affiliates will rely upon the truth and accuracy of each of the foregoing representations, warranties, acknowledgements and undertakings which are given to WH Ireland for themselves and on behalf of the Company and are irrevocable.

The provisions of this Appendix may be waived, varied or modified as regards specific Placees or on a general basis by WH Ireland.

The agreement to settle a Placee's subscription (and/or the subscription of a person for whom such Placee is contracting as agent) free of stamp duty and stamp duty reserve tax depends on the settlement relating only to a subscription by it and/or such person direct from the Company for the Placing Shares in question. Such agreement assumes that the Placing Shares are not being subscribed for in connection with arrangements to issue depositary receipts or to transfer the Placing Shares into a clearance service. If there are any such arrangements, or the settlement relates to any other subsequent dealing in the Placing Shares, stamp duty or stamp duty reserve tax may be payable, for which neither the Company or WH Ireland will be responsible, and the Placee to whom (or on behalf of whom, or in respect of the person for whom it is participating in the Placing as an agent or nominee) the allocation, allotment, issue or delivery of Placing Shares has given rise to such UK stamp duty or stamp duty reserve tax undertakes to pay such UK stamp duty or stamp duty reserve tax forthwith and to indemnify on an after-tax basis and to hold harmless the Company and WH Ireland in the event that any of the Company and/or WH Ireland have incurred any such liability to UK stamp duty or stamp duty reserve tax. If this is the case, each Placee should seek its own advice and notify WH Ireland accordingly.

In addition, Placees should note that they will be liable for any stamp duty and all other stamp, issue, securities, transfer, registration, documentary or other duties or taxes (including any interest, fines or penalties relating thereto) payable outside the UK by them or any other person on the subscription by them of any Placing Shares or the agreement by them to subscribe for any Placing Shares.

This Announcement has been issued by, and is the sole responsibility, of the Company. No representation or warranty express or implied, is or will be made as to, or in relation to, and no responsibility or liability is or will be accepted by WH Ireland or by any of its Affiliates or agents as to or in relation to, the accuracy or completeness of this Announcement or any other written or oral information made available to or publicly available to any interested party or its advisers, and any liability therefore is expressly disclaimed.

DEFINITIONS

The following definitions apply throughout this Announcement, unless the context requires otherwise:
TOKYO, June 18, 2021 - (JCN Newswire) - Hitachi Group announced today that it will take support measures for India and other countries facing various social problems such as disasters, accidents, and pandemics.To support India, Hitachi, Ltd. and Hitachi India Pvt. Ltd. will donate a total of approx. 50 million yen to the Japan Committee for UNICEF and charitable institutions in India. Hitachi, Ltd. has already provided 500 oxygen concentrators (worth approx. 30 million yen) to Hitachi Group companies in India. In addition to this, Hitachi Group companies in India will take support measures for employees including medical care. Through these efforts, Hitachi Group will contribute to supporting children, their families, and employees in India who are affected by COVID-19.Furthermore, Hitachi Group will introduce a social contribution scheme, whereby the company will match donations made by employees, as a measure of support for India and other countries facing various social problems. In fiscal 2021, donations up to approx. 30 million yen is planned by company side.Hitachi Group is taking steps to prevent the spread of the outbreak and to support employees, placing top priority on the health and safety of its employees and their families worldwide, as well as its stakeholders, customers, and partners. By introducing a social contribution scheme, employees and companies will work together to contribute to addressing social issues globally.How Hitachi is responding to Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19)https://www.hitachi.com/information/ImportantNotices/index.htmlAbout Hitachi, Ltd.Hitachi, Ltd. (TSE: 6501), headquartered in Tokyo, Japan, is focused on its Social Innovation Business that combines information technology (IT), operational technology (OT) and products. The company's consolidated revenues for fiscal year 2020 (ended March 31, 2021) totaled 8,729.1 billion yen ($78.6 billion), with 871 consolidated subsidiaries and approximately 350,000 employees worldwide. Hitachi is working to increase social, environmental and economic value for its customers across six domains; IT, Energy, Industry, Mobility, Smart Life and Automotive Systems through Lumada, Hitachi's advanced digital solutions, services, and technologies for turning data into insights to drive digital innovation. For more information on Hitachi, please visit the company's website at https://www.hitachi.com.Source: Hitachi, Ltd.Copyright 2021 JCN Newswire . All rights reserved.

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.
SINGAPORE, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Osome , a super-app that digitizes accounting and compliance services for SMEs, has raised $16M in a Series A funding from a group of investors including Target Global, AltaIR Capital, Phystech Ventures, S16VC, and Peng T. Ong, an angel investor. The capital enables Osome to expand its footprint internationally, as well as to fuel product integrations.

"Back-office operations are annoying, tedious yet mission critical for businesses, especially for SMEs. Remarkably, an average entrepreneur spends 68% of their time to deal with routine tasks vs 32% to strategize and deliver on their long term goals. Osome combines artificial intelligence software with operational excellence to automate administrative, accounting, payroll and tax-related work and help entrepreneurs focus on what they can do the best - growing their business", Victor Lysenko, co-founder and CEO of Osome, says. "We strive to build a future where small business owners can fully rely on the technology in their administrative routine".

The demand for Osome services has accelerated with COVID-19 as clients recognized the importance of automation. This has led to more than 100% YoY revenue growth and $9.5M ARR with over 6,000 happy customers in the UK, Hong Kong, and Singapore. Additionally, the company has identified a product / market fit in the fast-growing e-commerce segment and will double down on it in the next 18 months.

Osome's core offering is online accounting services for SMEs, especially those involved in e-commerce - ?ccountants take over the documents and convert them into actionable numbers, tax filings and reports, making accounting and bookkeeping service for online sellers as simple as ever. Osome checks compliance, tracks deadlines, files documents, and answers questions in a chat at any time of the day or week. The platform categorises and stores any documents you send, so nothing is lost, and then creates and files reports on time.

"We have supported Osome since the early days and are excited to continue our partnership in the latest round. We are especially happy about the strong growth Osome has shown in the expanding e-commerce segment. Online Sellers require unique tools and custom approaches to be serviced effectively and Osome's mix of technology and human expertise is the perfect solution", says Mike Lobanov, GP & COO of Target Global.


BRUSSELS (dpa-AFX) - The pound depreciated against its major counterparts in early European deals on Friday, after a data showed that the nation's retail sales dropped unexpectedly in May after a sharp surge in April when retail restrictions were eased.



Data from the Office for National Statistics showed that retail sales dropped 1.4 percent month-on-month in May, reversing a 9.2 percent rise in April and confounding expectations for an increase of 1.6 percent.



Excluding auto fuel, retail sales dropped 2.1 percent after rising 9.1 percent in the previous month. Sales were forecast to climb 1.5 percent.



On a yearly basis, the retail sales volume growth moderated to 24.6 percent in May from 42.4 percent a month ago. This was also slower than the expected expansion of 29 percent.



Sales, excluding auto fuel, logged an annual growth of 21.7 percent versus 37.7 percent expansion seen in April and economists' forecast of 27.3 percent.



Caution prevailed over the Fed's plans to start tapering its bond purchase program and an earlier than expected tightening of monetary policy.



The pound weakened to 1-1/2-month lows of 152.46 against the yen and 1.3855 against the greenback, off its prior highs of 153.77 and 1.3944, respectively. The pound is seen finding support around 149.00 against the yen and 1.36 against the greenback.



The pound dropped to a 2-day low of 0.8588 against the euro, after a rise to 0.8543 at 8 pm ET. The next likely support for the pound is seen around the 0.88 level.



The pound retreated from more than a 2-week high of 1.2799 against the franc, with the pair worth 1.2716. Should the pound falls further, 1.25 is possibly seen as its next support level.



Looking ahead, Eurozone current account for April will be published in the European session.



Canada new housing price index for May is set for release in the New York session.



Copyright RTT News/dpa-AFX

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First program from BioNTech's fully-owned mRNA cancer vaccine platform FixVac treats patients in a randomized clinical Phase 2 clinical trial

Phase 2 trial is based on positive results from Phase 1 Lipo-MERIT trial that demonstrated a favorable safety profile for BNT111 as well as durable objective responses observed in patients with melanoma who had progressed following prior checkpoint blockade

Trial is enrolling a total of 120 patients at clinical trial sites in the European Union, the United Kingdom, the United States and Australia

MAINZ, Germany, June 18, 2021; NCT04526899 ). The study is evaluating the Company's therapeutic cancer vaccine candidate BNT111 in combination with Libtayo (cemiplimab) in patients with anti-PD1-refractory/relapsed unresectable Stage III or IV melanoma. BNT111 is the lead product candidate from BioNTech's FixVac platform that targets a fixed combination of mRNA-encoded, tumor-associated antigens with the objective of triggering a strong and precise immune response against cancer and is fully owned by BioNTech.

The BNT111-01 trial which is being conducted in collaboration with Regeneron, was reviewed and approved by the regulatory authorities in Spain, Germany, Italy and Poland as well as in the United Kingdom, the United States and Australia. The open-label randomized trial evaluates the efficacy, tolerability, and safety of BNT111 in combination with Libtayo, an anti-PD-1 monoclonal antibody, being co-developed by Regeneron and Sanofi. The trial is enrolling a total of 120 patients and will evaluate the effects of the combination as well as single agents alone. The primary endpoint is the overall response rate of BNT111 in combination with Libtayo. Secondary endpoints include overall response rate in the single agent arms, duration of response, and safety. The first patient has been dosed in the EU. BioNTech retains global commercial rights to BNT111.

"Our vision is to harness the power of the immune system against cancer and infectious diseases. We were able to demonstrate the potential of mRNA vaccines in addressing COVID-19. We must not forget, that cancer is also a global health threat, even worse than the current pandemic," said Ozlem Tureci, M.D., Co-founder and Chief Medical Officer of BioNTech. "BNT111 has already shown a favorable safety profile and encouraging preliminary results in early clinical evaluation. With the start of patient treatment in our Phase 2 trial, we are encouraged to continue on our initial path to realize the potential of mRNA vaccines for cancer patients."

BNT111 is an intravenous therapeutic cancer vaccine candidate encoding for a fixed set of four cancer-specific antigens optimized for immunogenicity and delivered as RNA-lipoplex formulation. More than 90% of melanomas in patients express at least one of the four tumor-associated antigens encoded in BNT111 (NY-ESO-1, MAGE-A3, tyrosinase, and TPTE). BNT111 is one of the most advanced of five clinical-stage FixVac product candidates within BioNTech's development pipeline.

This Phase 2 clinical trial is based on previous results from the Phase 1 Lipo-MERIT dose escalation trial) that demonstrated a favorable safety profile in 89 patients with advanced melanoma. In addition, efficacy analysis of the Lipo-MERIT study in a subset of 42 metastatic melanoma patients previously treated with a checkpoint-inhibitorin July 2020.

The Company also plans to start randomized Phase 2 trials with mRNA vaccine product candidates in two additional programs in 2021 (FixVac: BNT113 and iNeST: BNT122). As part of its development strategy, BioNTech aims to rapidly advance its broad oncology pipeline and expects to bring additional candidates into late-stage clinical development and towards market entry within the next five years.

About FixVac

BioNTech's FixVac platform candidates consist of a fixed combination of mRNA-encoded non-mutated antigens shared within specific cancer types. They feature the Company's proprietary RNA-lipoplex delivery formulation which is designed to enhance stability and translation of the mRNA cargo as well as specifically target dendritic cells. Thus, the vaccine candidate aims to trigger a strong and precise innate and adaptive immune response against cancer cells overexpressing the respective antigen.

About BioNTech

Biopharmaceutical New Technologies is a next generation immunotherapy company pioneering novel therapies for cancer and other serious diseases. The Company exploits a wide array of computational discovery and therapeutic drug platforms for the rapid development of novel biopharmaceuticals. Its broad portfolio of oncology product candidates includes individualized and off-the-shelf mRNA-based therapies, innovative chimeric antigen receptor T cells, bispecific checkpoint immuno-modulators, targeted cancer antibodies and small molecules. Based on its deep expertise in mRNA vaccine development and in-house manufacturing capabilities, BioNTech and its collaborators are developing multiple mRNA vaccine candidates for a range of infectious diseases alongside its diverse oncology pipeline. BioNTech has established a broad set of relationships with multiple global pharmaceutical collaborators, including Genmab, Sanofi, Bayer Animal Health, Genentech, a member of the Roche Group, Regeneron, Genevant, Fosun Pharma and Pfizer.

For more information, please visit www.BioNTech.de

Forward-Looking Statements

This press release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These forward-looking statements may include, but may not be limited to, statements concerning: BioNTech's FixVac program candidate BNT111; timing for commencement of a Phase 2 trial as well as any data readouts; the registrational potential of any Phase 2 trial we may initiate for BNT111; the nature and characterization of and timing for release of clinical data across BioNTech's platforms, which is subject to peer review, regulatory review and market interpretation; the planned next steps in BioNTech's pipeline programs and specifically including, but not limited to, statements regarding timing or plans for initiation of clinical trials, enrollment or submission for and receipt of product approvals with respect to BioNTech's product candidates; the ability of BioNTech's mRNA technology to demonstrate clinical efficacy outside of BioNTech's infectious disease platform; the potential safety and efficacy of our other product candidates; BioNTech's anticipated market opportunity and size for its product candidates the rate and degree of market acceptance of BioNTech and Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine and BioNTech's investigational medicines, if approved; and BioNTech's efforts to combat COVID-19. Any forward-looking statements in this press release are based on BioNTech current expectations and beliefs of future events, and are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially and adversely from those set forth in or implied by such forward-looking statements. These risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to: discussions with regulatory agencies regarding timing and requirements for additional clinical trials; and the ability to produce comparable clinical results in future clinical trials.

For a discussion of these and other risks and uncertainties, see BioNTech's Annual Report on Form 20-F for the Year Ended December 31, 2020, filed with the SEC on March 30, 2021, which is available on the SEC's website at www.sec.gov . All information in this press release is as of the date of the release, and BioNTech undertakes no duty to update this information unless required by law.

Media Relations

Jasmina Alatovic

+49

Investor Relations

Sylke Maas, Ph.D.

+49
MoneyTV with Donald Baillargeon television program, Copyright MMXXI, all rights reserved. MoneyTV does not provide an analysis of companies' financial positions and is not soliciting to purchase or sell securities of the companies, nor are we offering a recommendation of featured companies or their stocks. Information discussed herein has been provided by the companies and should be verified independently with the companies and a securities analyst. MoneyTV provides companies a 3 to 4 month corporate profile with multiple appearances for a cash fee of $6,950.00 to $11,995.00, does not accept company stock as payment for services, does not hold any positions, options or warrants in featured companies. The information herein is not an endorsement by Donald Baillargeon, the producer, publisher or parent company of MoneyTV.

Werbehinweise: Die Billigung des Basisprospekts durch die BaFin ist nicht als ihre Befurwortung der angebotenen Wertpapiere zu verstehen. Wir empfehlen Interessenten und potenziellen Anlegern den Basisprospekt und die Endgultigen Bedingungen zu lesen, bevor sie eine Anlageentscheidung treffen, um sich moglichst umfassend zu informieren, insbesondere uber die potenziellen Risiken und Chancen des Wertpapiers. Sie sind im Begriff, ein Produkt zu erwerben, das nicht einfach ist und schwer zu verstehen sein kann.
SHANGHAI, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Human Horizons announced that Kevin Zhang has joined the company as Chief Digital Officer. The industry-leading new mobility and autonomous driving research company behind the premium high-performance super SUV, HiPhi X, has begun nationwide sales and customer deliveries in China and will be leveraging Kevin's technical expertise to increase production efficiency and improve the overall service experience.

In his new role, Kevin will be working alongside founder and CEO, Ding Lei, and the executive team that has grown Human Horizons into a world-class car manufacturer within a few short years. Recently, the company has also welcomed Michael Li as new Co-President and Chairman of Sales and Services, and Co-Founder Kevin Chen has changed role to become the company COO. These personnel changes reflect the company's entrance into a new stage of business evolution focusing on providing a consistent and seamless premium customer experience whilst further developing its international branding presence.

About joining the team, Kevin Zhang said, "It is my absolute honor to be joining the innovation powerhouse of Human Horizons. The mission of the company to leverage the latest in cutting-edge technology to create incredible products and provide outstanding services is something completely unique to Human Horizons. I am very excited to be playing a role in the company's digital future and look forward to working together with our users to create genuine value."

Welcoming Kevin on joining the team, Human Horizons founder and CEO, Ding Lei said, "Kevin not only brings with him a wealth of experience and resources in digital transformation, but also a reputation as being a pioneer in the use of big data and smart manufacturing. As production and delivery volumes of the HiPhi X continue to increase, we are excited to be able to work together with more and more users. I am very happy to welcome Kevin to the team, I have great confidence he will be an invaluable asset in our path to accelerate data-driven technological innovation."



A graduate from Jilin University of Technology with a Bachelor of Science degree in computational mechanics, Kevin Zhang has served as the head of the Oracle Enterprise Resource Planning department of Digital China, the head of the PCCW product department of PCCW, the deputy general manager of Sina Auto, and the co-president of Autohome Inc. At Autohome, Kevin was renowned for his innovative practices such as utilizing big data analytics, personalized smart advertising and successfully launching an online VR auto show. His expertise in data-driven digital transformation helped to triple the company's market value to around USD $11 billion and set them on a course for further growth.

About HiPhi

HiPhi is a premium brand created by Human Horizons and enhanced by its users. HiPhi X is an EV with a lightweight hybrid aluminum-steel construction and sustainable vegan leathers and recyclable materials which add to the sustainable nature of Human Horizons' EV products.

About Human Horizons

Human Horizons is established for R&D in innovative and leading intelligent mobility technologies as well as the industrialization of future-oriented smart vehicles. Furthermore, Human Horizons builds smart transportation technologies and contributes to the development of smart cities, which will redefine human mobility.

Forward-Looking Statement

This press release contains statements that may constitute "forward-looking" statements. These forward-looking statements can be identified by terminologies such as "will," "expects," "anticipates," "aims," "future," "intends," "plans," "believes," "estimates," "likely to," and similar statements. Statements that are not historical facts, including statements about Human Horizons' beliefs, plans, and expectations, are forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties. A number of factors could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in any forward-looking statement, including but not limited to the following: Human Horizons' strategies, future business development, and financial condition and results of operations; Human Horizons' limited operating history; risks associated with electric vehicles; Human Horizons' ability to develop, manufacture, and deliver vehicles of high quality and appeal to customers on schedule and on a large scale; Human Horizons' ability to grow manufacturing in its joint venture plant; product defects or any other failure of vehicles to perform as expected; Human Horizons' ability to build the Human Horizons and HiPhi brands; Human Horizons' ability to compete successfully; Human Horizons' ability to secure sufficient reservations of orders; changes in consumer demand and government incentives, subsidies, or other favorable government policies; general economic and business conditions globally and in China and assumptions underlying or related to any of the foregoing. All information provided in this press release is as of the date of this press release, and Human Horizons does not undertake any obligation to update any forward-looking statement, except as required under applicable law.

Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1536261/image1.jpg

Logo- https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1213394/HiPhi_Logo.jpg
Appointment to the newly created role of Chief Revenue Officer represents an important next step on iPoint's strategic path

Backed by Danish private equity investor GRO Capital A/S, iPoint is setting its sights on international growth

Peter Schmidt, who in his role as CRO is also one of the Managing Directors at iPoint, has an outstanding track record for delivering international success, obtained while serving at In Mind Cloud, Transporeon, Adobe, and PTC

iPoint-systems Gmbh, a leading global provider of product compliance and sustainability software, is pleased to announce the appointment of Peter Schmidt to the newly created position of Chief Revenue Officer within the Executive Leadership Team. The appointment reconfirms iPoint's strong ambitions within the global market, supported by Danish private equity investor GRO Capital A/S, its majority shareholder since late 2020, and signals further steps along the company's future growth path.

GRO Capital's participation as shareholder, following iPoint's 20-year owner-driven journey, has marked a new phase in the company's development, with the clear objective to accelerate growth globally, through product innovation and enhanced sales and marketing efforts. Thanks to the partnership, iPoint benefits from GRO Capital's profound experience in developing and growing innovative technology companies.

The appointment of Peter Schmidt, a proven leader with a strong track record in delivering international customer success, to the new role of Chief Revenue Officer represents a further step along iPoint's strategic path. Peter Schmidt enjoys an outstanding reputation within the industry and brings to iPoint a wealth of experience in building high-performance teams to deliver rapid growth on an international scale. While working as CCO at Transporeon Group from 2015 to 2019, Peter Schmidt oversaw multifold revenue growth and helped the company to become the leading cloud-based transport management platform. Prior to that, he served as General Manager and VP Enterprise Sales at Adobe and as Senior Vice President for the worldwide emerging geographies at PTC. Before joining iPoint on May 1, 2021, he was responsible for global sales and field operations at In Mind Cloud.

"I am very excited to welcome Peter Schmidt to the iPoint family", said Joerg Walden, CEO and Founder of iPoint. "Peter is an accomplished leader with an impressive track record of scaling business in the software industry on an international level. His vast experience, skills, and expertise will support us in achieving our ambitious goals, and I'm thrilled to have him on board as we embark on the next step of our growth journey to transform iPoint's vision of building an integrated digital platform for the Circular Economy into a long-term success story."

"iPoint has a great digital product and a strong customer base, and is now entering into an exciting phase. I have been hugely impressed by the company's successful journey so far and its growth ambitions for the future, driven by the increasing importance of sustainability and product regulations, as well as the rising complexity of global supply chains. I very much look forward to helping iPoint scale up its international sales efforts," said Peter Schmidt, Chief Revenue Officer of iPoint.

iPoint is a leading provider of software and services in the field of product compliance and sustainability with headquarters in Reutlingen, Germany. The company was founded in 2001, currently has around 170 employees and maintains a total of 14 offices in Europe, North America, and Asia. iPoint uses state-of-the-art software solutions to help companies analyze and evaluate the environmental, social, and economic impact of products and production processes in order to meet compliance requirements and sustainability goals, for example in the form of carbon footprint analyses. The company's customers include a wide range of well-known corporations, including Bosch, Ford, Fresenius, Hyundai, Miele, MTU Aero Engines, Panasonic, Roche, thyssenkrupp, and Toyota.

The company continues to explore new areas of business in cooperation with start-ups. The CarbonBlock solution, piloted by start-up and iPoint Group company CircularTree, together with Porsche, BASF and automotive supplier Motherson, enables companies to track CO2 emissions related to individual materials and parts across the entire supply chain, based on Blockchain technology.

About iPoint-systems gmbh

iPoint is a leading provider of software and services for environmental and social product compliance, process compliance, and sustainability. iPoint's solutions support companies in meeting and staying one step ahead of regulations and requirements such as REACH, RoHS, WEEE, ELV, Conflict Minerals- and Modern Slavery-related laws, as well as other trending developments in the compliance and sustainability arena. Since its founding in 2001, iPoint has been constantly expanding its portfolio to realize its vision of building an integrated digital platform for the Circular Economy. Further information: https://www.ipoint-systems.com/

About GRO Capital

GRO Capital is a leading North European private equity fund with an exclusive focus on mature B2B software and tech enabled companies with strong growth prospects. GRO Capital serves as active owners developing portfolio companies with a view to create long-term value. The partners behind GRO Capital have been investors in more than 20 technology and software related companies. iPoint is the fourth investment in GRO Fund II, a fund with a strategy to accelerate Northern European software companies. For further information about GRO Capital please visit: www.grocapital.dk

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210618005204/en/

Contacts:

IWK Communication Partner

Florian Bergmann James Gibbs

Tel.: +49 (0) 89 2000 30-30

E-Mail: GRO@iwk-cp.com
BRUSSELS/FRANKFURT/PARIS (dpa-AFX) - U.K. stocks fell on Friday after commodity prices saw a sharp decline amid dollar strength and uncertainty over Chinese policies to reduce speculation. A hawkish policy outlook from the U.S. Federal Reserve and weak retail sales figures released earlier in the day also dented sentiment. U.K. retail sales dropped unexpectedly in May after a sharp growth in April when retail restrictions were eased, data from the Office for National Statistics revealed. Retail sales dropped 1.4 percent month-on-month in May, reversing a 9.2 percent rise in April and confounding expectations for an increase of 1.6 percent. On a yearly basis, the retail sales volume growth moderated to 24.6 percent in May from 42.4 percent a month ago. This was also slower than the expected expansion of 29 percent. The benchmark FTSE 100 dropped 36 points, or half a percent, to 7,117 after declining 0.4 percent in the previous session. BP Plc fell 1.5 percent and Royal Dutch Shell lost about 2 percent as oil extended losses for a second straight session on dollar strength. Miners Anglo American, Antofagasta and Glencore were modestly lower as copper headed for its biggest weekly loss since March 2020. Tesco, Britain's biggest retailer, lost 2.5 percent after it reported a sharp slowdown in underlying U.K. sales growth in its first quarter. Inchcape shares jumped 3.8 percent after the automotive distributor delivered a better-than-expected performance in the first half and said full-year pre-tax profit will be 'significantly ahead' of market consensus. Irish food company Kerry advanced 1.8 percent. The company has agreed to sell its Meats and Meals business in the U.K. and Ireland to Pilgrim's Pride for 819m. 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.
Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - June 18, 2021) - Westminster Resources Ltd. (TSXV: WMR) (the "Company") announces that it has granted 1,025,000 incentive stock options to directors, officers and consultants of the Company that are exercisable at $0.30 per common share for a five-year term, in accordance with the Company's stock option plan. The stock options are subject to the acceptance of the TSX Venture Exchange.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:

"Jason Cubitt"

Jason Cubitt

President and Chief Executive Officer

Westminster Resources Ltd.

info@westminsterresources.com

westminsterresources.com

or

Carrie Howes

Investor Relations

Telephone: +1 416 837 0075

carrie@westminsterresources.com

ABOUT WESTMINSTER RESOURCES

Westminster is a Latin American focused mining exploration company. The Company holds a 100% interest in a package of highly prospective IOCG and porphyry copper projects in southwestern Peru within the country's prolific coastal copper belt-source of nearly half of Peru's copper production. The Company also recently acquired an option to purchase a 100% interest in the Mostazal copper project in Chile's Atacama Desert, one of the world's premier copper production jurisdictions.

Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Service Provider (as the term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy of accuracy of this news release.

Forward-Looking Statements

This news release contains certain forward-looking statements, which relate to future events or future performance and reflect management's current expectations and assumptions. Such forward-looking statements reflect management's current beliefs and are based on assumptions made by and information currently available to the Company. Readers are cautioned that these forward-looking statements are neither promises nor guarantees, and are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause future results to differ materially from those expected including, but not limited to, market conditions, availability of financing, actual results of the Company's exploration and other activities, environmental risks, future metal prices, operating risks, accidents, labor issues, delays in obtaining governmental approvals and permits, and other risks in the mining industry. All the forward-looking statements made in this news release are qualified by these cautionary statements and those in our continuous disclosure filings available on SEDAR at www.sedar.com. These forward-looking statements are made as of the date hereof and the Company does not assume any obligation to update or revise them to reflect new events or circumstances save as required by applicable law.

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/87967
BRUSSELS (dpa-AFX) - Croatia's jobless rate declined in May, figures from the Croatian Bureau of Statistics showed on Friday. The registered unemployment rate decreased to 8.2 percent in May from 8.9 percent in April. In the same month last year, jobless rate was 9.4 percent. The latest rate of unemployment was the lowest since May 2018. The number of unemployed persons decreased 7.2 percent to 138,030 in May from 148,744 in the previous month. Employment rose to 1.54 million persons in May from 1.526 million in the preceding month, data showed. 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.
UK Commercial Property REIT Limited

(An authorised closed-ended investment scheme incorporated in Guernsey with registration number 45387)

LEI Number: LEI number: 213800JN4FQ1A9G8EU25

(The "Company")

18 june 2021

RESULT OF ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING

At the Annual General Meeting of the Company held today, all Resolutions set out in the Annual General Meeting Notice dated 22 April 2021 were duly passed.

Details of the proxy voting results which should be read along side the Notice are noted below:

Ordinary Resolution For Discretion

(voted in favour) Against Abstain 1 993,638,821 5,000 136 526,736 2 994,116,546 5,000 3,963 45,184 3 994,053,517 5,000 65,739 46,436 4 994,094,555 5,000 4,466 66,670 5 994,083,294 5,000 4,099 78,299 6 993,127,398 5,000 955,825 82,469 7 993,160,522 5,000 922,702 82,468 8 993,158,416 5,000 906,579 100,697 9 993,160,522 5,000 922,702 82,468 10 991,800,518 5,000 2,265,360 99,814 11 993,161,406 5,000 904,473 99,813 Special Resolution For Discretion

(voted in favour) Against Abstain 12 994,076,820 5,000 43,689 45,184 13 989,440,219 5,000 4,517,918 207,556

Note - A vote withheld is not a vote in law and has not been counted in the votes for and against a resolution.

The Special Resolutions were as follows:

Special Resolution 12

THAT the Directors of the Company be and they are hereby generally empowered, to allot ordinary shares in the Company or grant rights to subscribe for, or to convert securities into, ordinary shares in the Company ("equity securities"), for cash including by way of a sale of ordinary shares held by the Company as treasury shares, as if any pre-emption rights in relation to the issue of shares as set out in the listing rules made by the Financial Conduct Authority under Part VI of the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (as amended) did not apply to any such allotment of equity securities, provided that this power:

(a) expires at the conclusion of the next Annual General Meeting of the Company after the passing of this resolution or on the expiry of 15 months from the passing of this resolution, whichever is the earlier, save that the Company, may before such expiry, make an offer or agreement which would or might require equity securities to be allotted after such expiry and the Directors may allot equity securities in pursuance of any such offer or agreement as if the power conferred hereby had not expired; and

(b) shall be limited to the allotment of equity securities up to an aggregate nominal value of 32,485,312 being approximately 10 per cent of the nominal value of the issued share capital of the Company (including treasury shares), as at 22 April 2021.

Special Resolution 13

THAT the Company, be authorised in accordance with section 315 of The Companies (Guernsey) Law, 2008, as amended, ('the Law') to make market acquisitions within the meaning of section 316(I) of the Law of its own ordinary shares of 25p each ("shares") (either for retention as treasury shares for future resale or transfer or cancellation), provided that:

(a) the maximum number of shares hereby authorised to be acquired shall be equal to 14.99 per cent of the Company's issued share capital on the date on which this resolution is passed:

(b) the minimum price (exclusive of expenses) which may be paid for a share is 25p, being the nominal value per share;

(c) the maximum price (exclusive of expenses) which may be paid for a share shall not be more than the higher of (i) an amount equal to 105 per cent of the average of the middle market quotations for a share taken from the London Stock Exchange's Daily Official List for the five business days immediately preceding the day on which the share is purchased an (ii) the higher of the last independent trade and the highest current independent bid on the London Stock Exchange;

(d) the authority hereby conferred shall expire at the conclusion of the next Annual General Meeting of the Company after the passing of this resolution or on the expiry of 15months from the passing of this resolution, whichever is the earlier, unless such authority is renewed prior to such time; and

(e) the Company may make a contract to purchase Shares under the authority hereby conferred prior to the expiry of such authority which will or may be executed wholly or partly after the expiration of such authority and may make a purchase of Shares pursuant to any such contract.

Enquiries:

Northern Trust International Fund Administration Services (Guernsey) Limited

The Company Secretary

Trafalgar Court

Les Banques

St Peter Port

Guernsey

GY1 3QL

Tel: 01481 745001
LONDON, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Inflexion is pleased to announce that it has acquired ANS, a leading provider of digital transformation and cloud managed services.

ANS and existing Inflexion investment UKFast will be brought together under one parent group to address the rapid market growth opportunity for digital and cloud services. The group will combine ANS's public cloud, DevOps, applications and data expertise with UKFast's leadership in private cloud, hosting and security, to create the UK's independent leader in secure cloud-led digital transformation across the public and private sectors.

Each business will continue to operate under its existing brand, while offering customers the full portfolio of offerings from across the extended group.

Founded in 1996, ANS's 270 team members enable customers on their digital transformation journey to public cloud. ANS is a key partner to Microsoft and Amazon Web Services (AWS). Founded in 1998, UKFast is a leader in private cloud hosting and security services with over 6,000 customers, and has a fast-growing public cloud offering. Both companies have industry leading customer satisfaction metrics, and together will be focused on deepening the skilled resources available to customer organisations working with increasingly complex IT landscapes.

As a new UK national tech champion, the combined group will launch a Digital Academy and enhanced apprenticeship programmes, and plans to hire more than 100 new staff over the remainder of 2021 to meet the strong market demand for digital technology and transformation skills.

Simon Turner, Managing Partner at Inflexion, commented, "ANS has built itself into a UK leader for public cloud services, complementing our existing investment in UKFast. Together, the businesses are well poised to accelerate their growth as the market for cloud and digital services continues to benefit from strong demand."

Paul Nannetti has been appointed Chair of combined group, bringing deep industry experience to the business. He was previously a member of the Capgemini Group leadership team, including most recently as CEO of the Cloud Infrastructure Services division. Paul commented, "The combined Group will be an incubator of leading-edge skills and capabilities to help our customers benefit from agile, affordable and scalable technologies to transform their businesses."

Paul Shannon, CEO of ANS, commented, "This deal is testament to the skills, experience and leadership of the ANS team whose passion and dedication have allowed us to become a leader in our sector. Inflexion's initiative provides a platform for us to accelerate our ambitious growth plans."

Ian Brown, CEO of UKFast, commented, "As a new UK tech powerhouse, the combined group creates tremendously exciting opportunities for our valued customers, our passionate team, and our trusted partners. With Inflexion's vision and support we are creating a unique digital transformation business."

Ian Brown of UKFast and Paul Shannon and Chris Hodgson of ANS will join the combined Group's Board.

The transaction sees the exit of ANS majority shareholder Scott Fletcher.

The investment is being made by Inflexion's Partnership Capital Fund II.





For further information, please contact:

Sarah Gestetner

020 7487 9820

sarah.gestetner@inflexion.com

About Inflexion

Inflexion is a leading mid-market private equity firm which invests in high growth, entrepreneurial businesses with ambitious management teams and works in partnership with them to accelerate growth. Inflexion's flexible approach allows it to back both majority and minority investments, typically investing 10m to 300m of equity in each deal.

With bespoke teams and dedicated capital, Inflexion's funds invest across a variety of sectors from offices in London, Manchester and Amsterdam. Inflexion helps businesses achieve the next stage of growth through M&A, international expansion, digital enhancement, talent development, commercial strategy, and access to Inflexion's global networks. It also benefits from a local presence in Bangalore, Boston, Sao Paulo and Shanghai dedicated to portfolio development, enabling investee companies to benefit from privileged access to these fast-growth markets.

Inflexion is one of Preqin's most consistent Top Performing Buyout Funds, and is a regular recipient of industry accolades for its success in growing the businesses it backs.

Funds advised by Inflexion Private Equity Partners LLP have funds under management of c.5.4bn.

Read more at www.inflexion.com

About ANS

ANS is a UK leading digital transformation provider, specialising in six technical capabilities to help organisations define and deliver end-to-end digital transformation. As a Microsoft Azure Expert MSP and an AWS MSP, ANS provides the technologies and education to empower customers to enhance services, improve business outcomes and uncover new possibilities.

Established in Manchester in 1996, ANS has a 300-strong team of culture-driven, customer obsessed digital transformation experts with disruption and innovation at the heart of everything they do.

With over 350 customers across the UK public and commercial sector space, ANS has honed their expertise across 9 sectors enabling them to provide extremely specialised solutions to solve specific business challenges. Key customers include Costa Coffee, TEDI-London, Flagship Housing, GMCA and Fenwick.

ANS has been celebrated for its culture, having listed in the Best Companies top 100 for 8 years, peaking at number 7. In 2013, ANS launched the ANS Academy to bridge the digital skills gap by nurturing the next generation of talent. Since launching, 100 apprentices have graduated with many securing permanent roles within the company including progression into team leader and management roles.

Building a better place to work and live is central to ANS' ethos. ANS nurtures a culture of diversity and inclusion by creating a workplace that supports equality and encourages employee wellbeing, success and enthusiasm. Having increased their diversity and inclusion activities with amazing results, the organisation hopes to set the precedent for other organisations to follow.

About UKFast

UKFast is a leading cloud, hosting, cybersecurity, and managed services provider.

With over 5000 customers across sectors such as eCommerce, financial services, software, technology and professional services, the company delivers secure cloud-led digital transformation and multi-award-winning managed services, with the highest customer NPS in its market.

UKFast's rapidly growing public sector business is an approved supplier across all three sections of the Government Digital Marketplace, G-Cloud 12, the Crown Commercial Service Framework for Cloud Services, and the Health and Social Care Network (HSCN). It is fully accredited for protectively marked data, with customers across Defence, Central & Local Government, Education, Police and Health sectors.

UKFast is a 100% carbon neutral business, and is committed to opening up technical career opportunities for everyone, creating a truly diverse workforce and inclusive environment where everyone can be themselves. Through its award-winning apprenticeship scheme UKFast is developing the next generation of technology leaders.
The "Prospects for Public Infrastructure Projects, Western Europe" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

This report provides a detailed analysis of the prospects for an acceleration in public infrastructure investment.

Ahead of the COVID-19 pandemic, investment in infrastructure construction in Western Europe had been gathering pace, increasing at an average of 3.3% a year on 2018-19, having remained stagnant over the previous few years.

Amid the COVID-19 crisis and the severe impact that this has had on economies across the region, governments and public authorities will likely be aiming to advance spending on infrastructure projects to reinvigorate the construction industry and the wider economy investment in infrastructure is generally considered to have a high multiplier effect, with the overall increase in economic value being higher than the value of direct investment itself.

According to the publisher, the public sector is funding around 70% of to the overall infrastructure project pipeline in markets in Western Europe, with a further 10% being funded under public-private financing arrangements. This presents governments with the opportunity to accelerate their investments and boost the development of infrastructure.

However, given the high cost of various COVID-19 support packages for businesses and households, government finances in the region are likely to be under stress, and this could limit the capacity for a renewed effort to accelerate public investment.

Given the increased focus on infrastructure investment as a potential path to generate growth momentum to offset the impact of the COVID-19 crisis on economic activity, the publisher has assessed the potential for governments to succeed with such efforts as well as illustrating scenarios reflecting this

Scope

This report provides an overall assessment of governments'/countries' potential to move forward with (accelerate) their public infrastructure works by considering a series of key factors: the size of the pipeline of projects in each country, the composition of this pipeline in terms of stages of development, the political momentum behind infrastructure investment, the state of the government's finance, and the economic recovery outlook.

It also provides analysis based on the publisher's construction projects showing total project values and analysis by stage of development from announcement to execution.

The analysis of the size of the project pipeline includes all public and public-private partnership projects as tracked by the publisher (including roads, bridges, railways, airports, ports, power, water and sewage infrastructure construction projects). It also provides an analysis by all projects at all stages of development from announcement to execution.

The top infrastructure construction projects in tender, award and execution stages are listed by sector and value.

It also lays out scenarios ("scheduled", "risk", and "accelerated") to illustrate the possible variation in the potential for spending on the pipeline of projects

Reasons to Buy

Assess all major markets in the region based on their prospects for accelerating infrastructure investment.

Gain insight into the key policies and issues that will impact the prospects for public infrastructure projects.

Review scenarios of potential spending on the project pipeline, and access a listing of the key projects being tracked.

Plan campaigns by country based on specific project opportunities and align resources to the most attractive markets.

Key Topics Covered:

Public Infrastructure Prospects

Can governments across the region accelerate infrastructure investment to offset COVID-19 disruption?

Austria Prospects for accelerating pipeline

Belgium Prospects for accelerating pipeline

Denmark Prospects for accelerating pipeline

Finland Prospects for accelerating pipeline

France Prospects for accelerating pipeline

Germany Prospects for accelerating pipeline

Greece Prospects for accelerating pipeline

Ireland Prospects for accelerating pipeline

Italy Prospects for accelerating pipeline

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/qizoho

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210618005272/en/

Contacts:

ResearchAndMarkets.com

Laura Wood, Senior Press Manager

press@researchandmarkets.com

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GUILDFORD, SURREY / ACCESSWIRE / June 18, 2021 / ANGLE plc (AIM:AGL OTCQX:ANPCY), a world-leading liquid biopsy company, confirms that its Annual General Meeting (AGM) will be held as a closed meeting at 2:00 pm on Wednesday 30 June 2021 at ANGLE plc, 10 Nugent Road, Surrey Research Park, Guildford, GU2 7AF in line with the arrangements set out in its AGM notice dated 4 June 2021 (AGM Notice). The AGM will be convened with the minimum necessary quorum of two Shareholders with the Chief Executive and Finance Director attending in person and the remaining Board members attending remotely.

Shareholders are reminded that, as set out on the AGM Notice, due to the ongoing guidance from the UK Government in connection with COVID-19 restrictions, this will be a closed meeting and Shareholders and any other persons will not be permitted to attend the AGM. Shareholders will not be able to vote online during the Meeting and are therefore strongly encouraged to submit their proxy votes online via www.signalshares.com or CREST where applicable. Please refer to the AGM Notice for further details.

Shareholders who wish to attend the AGM online should register for the event in advance via the following link: https://www.investormeetcompany.com/angle-plc/register-investor.

The Company will also be providing a business update for Shareholders after the formalities of the AGM are concluded. Shareholders may submit questions to the Board in advance of the AGM and business update by email to investor@angleplc.com before 5.00 pm on Tuesday 29 June 2021. The Board will not be able to answer all individual questions but will group the questions into themes and will endeavour to answer these during the update or as part of concluding matters.

The Annual Report and Financial Statements for the twelve-month period ended 31 December 2020 and Notice of AGM were posted to Shareholders on 4 June 2021, both of which are available for download on the Company's website, www.angleplc.com

For further information:

ANGLE plc +44 (0) 1483 343434 Andrew Newland, Chief Executive Ian Griffiths, Finance Director Andrew Holder, Head of Investor Relations finnCap Ltd (NOMAD and Joint Broker) Corporate Finance - Carl Holmes, Simon Hicks, Teddy Whiley ECM - Alice Lane, Sunila de Silva +44 (0)20 7220 0500 WG Partners (Joint Broker) Nigel Barnes, Nigel Birks +44 (0) 203 705 9330 FTI Consulting Simon Conway, Ciara Martin Matthew Ventimiglia (US) +44 (0) 203 727 1000 +1 (212) 850 5624

For Frequently Used Terms, please see the Company's website on https://angleplc.com/investor-relations/glossary/

Notes for editors

About ANGLE plc www.angleplc.com

ANGLE is a world leading liquid biopsy company with sample-to-answer solutions. ANGLE's proven patent protected platforms include a circulating tumor cell (CTC) harvesting technology and a downstream analysis system for cost effective, highly multiplexed analysis of nucleic acids and proteins.

ANGLE's cell separation technology is called the Parsortix system, and it enables a liquid biopsy (a simple blood test) to be used to provide the cells of interest to the user in a format suitable for multiple types of downstream analyses. The system is based on a microfluidic device that captures cells based on a combination of their size and compressibility. The system is epitope independent and can capture all types of CTCs as well as CTC clusters in a viable form (alive). CTCs enable the complete picture of a cancer to be seen as being an intact cell they allow DNA, RNA and protein analysis and may provide comparable analysis to a tissue biopsy. Because CTC analysis is a non-invasive process, unlike tissue biopsy, it can be repeated as often as needed. This is important because cancer develops and changes over time and there is a clear medical need for up-to-date information on the status of a patient's tumor. In addition, the live CTCs harvested by the Parsortix system can be cultured, which offers the potential for testing tumor response to drugs outside the patient.

The Parsortix technology is the subject of 26 granted patents in Europe, the United States, China, Australia, Canada, India, Japan and Mexico with three extensive families of patents are being progressed worldwide.

The Parsortix system has a CE Mark in Europe for the indicated use and, in the United States, a De Novo Submission has been made to FDA for the Parsortix PC1 system seeking FDA clearance with Class II Classification for use with metastatic breast cancer patients. FDA clearance is seen as the global standard. ANGLE is seeking to be the first ever FDA cleared system for harvesting CTCs for subsequent analysis.

ANGLE has also completed two separate 200 subject clinical studies under a program designed to develop an ovarian cancer pelvic mass triage test, with the results showing best in class accuracy (AUC-ROC) of 95.1%. The pelvic mass triage assay has undergone further refinement and optimisation and is currently in the process of a 200-patient clinical verification study.

ANGLE's technology for the multiplex evaluation of proteins and nucleic acids of all types is called the HyCEADTM Ziplex platform and is based on a patented flow through array technology. It provides for low cost, highly multiplexed, rapid and sensitive capture of targets from a wide variety of sample types. A proprietary chemistry approach (the HyCEAD method) allows for the capture and amplification of over 100 biomarkers simultaneously in a single reaction. The HyCEAD Ziplex system is extremely sensitive and is ideal for measuring gene expression and other markers directly from Parsortix harvests and was used in the ovarian cancer pelvic mass triage test to achieve best in class accuracy (AUC-ROC) of 95.1%.

ANGLE's proprietary technologies can be combined to provide automated, sample-to-answer results in both centralised laboratory and point-of-use cartridge formats.

ANGLE has established formal collaborations with world-class cancer centres and major corporates such as Abbott, Philips and QIAGEN, and works closely with leading CTC translational research customers. These Key Opinion Leaders (KOLs) are working to identify applications with medical utility (clear benefit to patients), and to secure clinical data that demonstrates that utility in patient studies. The body of evidence as to the benefits of the Parsortix system is growing rapidly from our own clinical studies in metastatic breast cancer and ovarian cancer and also from KOLs with 45 peer-reviewed publications and numerous publicly available posters, available on our website.

ANGLE has established clinical services laboratories in the UK and USA to accelerate commercialisation of the Parsortix system and act as demonstrators to support product development. The laboratories offer services to pharmaceutical and biotech customers for use of the Parsortix system in cancer drug trials and, once the laboratories are accredited, and tests validated, will provide Laboratory Developed Tests (LDTs) for patient management.

This information is provided by RNS, the news service of the London Stock Exchange. RNS is approved by the Financial Conduct Authority to act as a Primary Information Provider in the United Kingdom. Terms and conditions relating to the use and distribution of this information may apply. For further information, please contact rns@lseg.com or visit www.rns.com.

SOURCE: ANGLE plc

View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/652256/Angle-PLC-Announces-Annual-General-Meeting-update
Victoria, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - June 18, 2021) - Plurilock Security Inc. (TSXV: PLUR) (OTCQB: PLCKF) and related subsidiaries ("Plurilock" or the "Company"), an identity-centric cybersecurity solutions provider for workforces, has secured a purchase order with a California state taxation agency worth US$210,000.

After a competitive process, Plurilock secured the order by responding to the request for proposal (RFP), utilizing the team's proven track record of providing quality products and customer service. Per the purchase order, Plurilock will provide the agency with annual subscriptions of Commonlook Office & PDF software.

This order, the latest in a series of government contracts secured by Plurilock in recent weeks, demonstrates the Company's continued efforts to rapidly expand and serve state agencies in North America.

About Plurilock

Plurilock provides identity-centric cybersecurity for today's workforces. Plurilock offers world-class cybersecurity solutions paired with AI-driven, cloud-friendly security technologies that deliver persistent identity assurance with unmatched ease of use. The Plurilock family of companies enables organizations to operate safely and securely while reducing cybersecurity friction.

For more information, visit https://www.plurilock.com or contact:

Ian L. Paterson

Chief Executive Officer

ian@plurilock.com

416.800.1566

Roland Sartorius

Chief Financial Officer

roland.sartorius@plurilock.com

Prit Singh

Investor Relations

prit.singh@plurilock.com

905.510.7636

Forward-Looking Statements

This press release may contain certain forward-looking statements and forward-looking information (collectively, "forward-looking statements") related to future events or Plurilock's future business, operations, and financial performance and condition. Forward-looking statements normally contain words like "will", "intend", "anticipate", "could", "should", "may", "might", "expect", "estimate", "forecast", "plan", "potential", "project", "assume", "contemplate", "believe", "shall", "scheduled", and similar terms. Forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance, actions, or developments and are based on expectations, assumptions, and other factors that management currently believes are relevant, reasonable, and appropriate in the circumstances. Although management believes that the forward-looking statements herein are reasonable, actual results could be substantially different due to the risks and uncertainties associated with and inherent to Plurilock's business. Additional material risks and uncertainties applicable to the forward-looking statements herein include, without limitation, the impact of general economic conditions, the success of the Company in obtaining new or extended contracts or orders; the Company's ability to maintain existing customers or develop new customers; the Company's ability to successfully integrate acquisitions of other businesses and/or companies or to realize on the anticipated benefits thereof; and unforeseen events, developments, or factors causing any of the aforesaid expectations, assumptions, and other factors ultimately being inaccurate or irrelevant. This list is not exhaustive of the factors that may affect the Company's forward-looking statements. Many of these factors are beyond the control of Plurilock. All forward-looking statements included in this press release are expressly qualified in their entirety by these cautionary statements. The forward-looking statements contained in this press release are made as at the date hereof, and Plurilock undertakes no obligation to update publicly or to revise any of the included forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise, except as may be required by applicable securities laws. Risks and uncertainties about the Company's business are more fully discussed under the heading "Risk Factors" in its most recent Annual Information Form. They are otherwise disclosed in its filings with securities regulatory authorities available on SEDAR at www.sedar.com.

Neither TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/87932
Under the new provisions, which will come into force in 2023, a photovoltaic system will have to cover at least 30% of the roof area of a new building.From pv magazine Germany The Berlin House of Representatives passed the Berlin Solar Act on Thursday requiring the installation of photovoltaic systems on all new buildings in the German capital from 2023. The law's new provisions apply to all new buildings as well as to major renovations of roofs in existing buildings with usable areas of more than 50 square meters. The photovoltaic systems must cover at least 30% of the roof area. Alternatively, ...

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.
SAINT-CLOUD, France, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Ethypharm announces today that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Altan Pharma, a specialty pharmaceutical company that develops, manufactures and markets injectable medicines for hospital use.

Thanks to the strong presence of Altan Pharma in Spain, Ethypharm will reach full commercial coverage of the top 5 European markets upon closing, which is expected in the second half of 2021. Ethypharm will also benefit from an enlarged portfolio of high quality hospital injectable products and a rich pipeline of R&D projects, which fit perfectly with its existing Critical Care franchise.

"Altan Pharma's product portfolio and geographic coverage are highly complementary to those of Ethypharm. We look forward to welcoming Altan Pharma's teams, as we are convinced that together, our product portfolio, our R&D and our industrial expertise, will put us in a stronger position to fulfil our commitment to the patients we serve", said Bertrand Deluard, CEO of Ethypharm. "The Altan Pharma acquisition is an important milestone in Ethypharm's transformation journey. By entering the Spanish market and reinforcing our Critical Care franchise, Ethypharm proves once again its ability to execute on its long-term growth ambition."

"Joining an established European specialty pharmaceutical company, with a strong direct commercial presence in Europe beyond Spain and in major growth territories for injectable medicines, will be a booster for the international expansion of Altan Pharma's product portfolio"said Guillermo Herrera, CEO of Altan Pharma. "Since its inception in 1998, Altan Pharma has been committed to improving patient care by providing specialty medications of superior quality and value for the benefit of patients and caregivers."

Jefferies International Limited acted as sole financial adviser to Altan Pharma on the transaction.

About Altan Pharma

Altan Pharma is a specialty pharmaceutical company that develops, manufactures and markets injectable medications for the hospital and other provider segments. Altan is a premier, global injectable drug company that is committed to improving patient care by providing specialty medications of superior quality and value for the benefit of patients and caregivers.

Altan Pharma currently markets a portfolio of over 40 injectable medications used in pain and anaesthesia, epilepsy, oncology, anti-infectives, cardiovascular, and gynecology and is developing an attractive portfolio of additional products in these areas.

Altan Pharma realised almost half of its 2020 sales through its own commercial operations in Spain, with the other half coming from the successful development of an international network of distributors and partners in more than 40 countries.

Altan Pharma owns and operates two EU GMP manufacturing sites in Spain, located in Bernedo and Casarrubios, which offer a wide range of injectable forms, including flexible plastic bags, liquid vials, lyophilized vials and ampoules.

Circa 250 employees in R&D, manufacturing, market access, commercial and support functions make up the highly committed workforce of Altan Pharma.

For more information, visit www.altanpharma.eu

About Ethypharm

Ethypharm is a European pharmaceutical company focused on two therapeutic areas: the Central Nervous System and Critical Care. Ethypharm markets its drugs directly in Europe and China, and with partners in North America and the Middle East where its drugs are in high demand. The Group employs more than 1,500 people, mainly in Europe and China. Ethypharm works closely with authorities and healthcare professionals to ensure the appropriate use of and access to its medicines, by as many people as possible.

For more information, visit www.ethypharm.com and follow us on LinkedIn

Media Relations

Mai Tran, presse@ethypharm.com



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TOKYO (dpa-AFX) - Japanese conglomerate Toshiba Corp. (TOSYY.PK, TOSBF.PK) Friday said it will accelerate the selection process for a successor to Satoshi Tsunakawa as CEO that can drive the changes needed in Toshiba in the medium term.



In an open letter to the company's shareholders, Osamu Nagayama, Chairperson of Toshiba's Board of Directors, said the company will also conduct an inquiry, with third party participation, into why the recent unacceptable events occurred. An earlier investigation showed unfair practices in last year's board selection process. The company aims to stop recurrence of such incidents.



On Sunday, the company said it has amended slate of nominees for directors, committee members and executive officers as major shareholders demanded accountability after the investigation about last year's board selection process.



In mid April, Toshiba announced the appointment of Tsunakawa to succeed Nobuaki Kurumatani as Representative Executive Officer, President and CEO.



Nagayama now said, 'You would have seen that we have already taken decisive and immediate action following the release of the Investigation Report, amending the slate of nominees for directors, committee members and executive officers ahead of the upcoming AGM on June 25.'



The company further said it will begin a thorough search for additional independent Board members with strong experience in managing a complex global business.



The Board has hired Makinson Cowell, an independent global investor study firm, to gather non-attributable feedback to provide with a broad and transparent set of shareholder opinions as the firm makes important strategic decisions.



Copyright RTT News/dpa-AFX

TOSHIBA-Aktie komplett kostenlos handeln - auf Smartbroker.de
ATHENS, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Hellas Direct, an innovative, technology-driven insurance company operating in Greece and Cyprus, announced that it has raised a further EUR 32m in funding in its latest financing round, bringing the total raised to date to EUR 56m.

The company also welcomed on board a leading investor, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD). The EBRD is providing a mandatory convertible debt facility of EUR 10m to Hellas Direct, to support its growth and provide the company with solvency capital.

The EBRD is added to an all-star roster of investors backing Hellas Direct, including Portag3, the IFC (member of the World Bank Group), Endeavor Catalyst and well-known family offices including those of Jon Moulton and Lord O'Neill.

Hellas Direct is a digital-first, full-stack insurance company, empowered by cutting-edge technology and the use of advanced analytics. With its investors' support, it aims to accelerate its high organic growth in a post-Covid world, across multiple products and distribution channels. Empowered by the latest round of funding and using technology as a competitive edge, the company plans to expand into five blindspot European markets - which similarly to Greece and Cyprus tend to be overlooked by the global powerhouses - starting with Romania, in order to replicate the multi-product, multi-channel approach it has successfully deployed in Greece. The Group also plans to start offering its own credit product, as part of its strategy to dominate the mobility ecosystem in the broader region.

The EBRD is a multilateral bank that promotes the development of the private sector and entrepreneurial initiative in 38 economies across three continents. The Bank is owned by 69 countries as well as the EU and the EIB. EBRD investments are aimed at making the economies in its regions competitive, inclusive, well-governed, green, resilient and integrated. To date, the Bank has invested more than EUR 4.6b in over 75 projects in the corporate, financial, energy and infrastructure sectors of the Greek economy.

"We are proud to welcome the EBRD into our group of investors at Hellas Direct. Our investors' support will enable us to accelerate some of our longer-term strategic goals and to pursue a more aggressive acquisition strategy in the region," said Alexis Pantazis, Executive Director of Hellas Direct.

"We are excited to be teaming up with one of the world's leading investors. This is a great opportunity for us to further optimize the service we offer to the consumer, by expanding our activity to multiple sectors. Our aspiration is to make Hellas Direct the dominant player in the wider region's mobility ecosystem," added Emilios Markou, Executive Director of Hellas Direct.

"We are delighted to support Hellas Direct, a technology-driven insurance company offering innovative products and digitalising the insurance value chain in Greece. Accelerating digital transition, unleashing the power of technology to bring changes for the better, is among the top priorities for the EBRD. We are very proud to support the growth of an insurance market player with a unique, digital business model well-positioned in the post-Covid-19 world in scaling up its operations. We are confident that EBRD funding, know-how and strong presence on the Greek market will help Hellas Direct to continue improving its cutting edge service offerings and increase its market share," said Andreea Moraru, EBRD Head of Greece and Cyprus.

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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.
Fredericton, New Brunswick--(Newsfile Corp. - June 18, 2021) - TRU Precious Metals Corp. (TSXV: TRU) (OTCQB: TRUIF) (FSE: 706) ("TRU" or the "Company") is pleased to announce it has completed its non-brokered private placement (the "Offering") for gross proceeds of $3,499,250, as previously announced on May 20, 2021. Pursuant to the Offering, TRU issued 12,960,186 "flow-through" units of the Company ("FT Units") at a price of $0.27 per FT Unit.

Each FT Unit is comprised of one common share of TRU that qualifies as a "flow-through share" for the purposes of the Income Tax Act (Canada) (a "FT Share") and one "flow-through" common share purchase warrant (a "FT Warrant"). Each FT Warrant shall be exercisable into one common share of TRU (a "Share") at a price of $0.35 per Share until June 17, 2024.

Joel Freudman, Co-Founder & CEO of TRU, commented: "I am very pleased to welcome Eric Sprott as a major shareholder of TRU. Mr. Sprott's participation in this financing is a huge vote of confidence in the Company and the potential of our district-scale land package in the Central Newfoundland Gold Belt. We are also encouraged that the Offering was fully subscribed by institutional investors right from the start, including funds managed by Sprott Asset Management LP, which we consider a testament to our progress to date and our prospects going forward. This funding will allow TRU to proceed with an aggressive and comprehensive exploration program in summer 2021 and beyond, across our entire portfolio in the region, as announced on May 31st and June 15th."

The gross proceeds from the Offering will be used by the Company to fund exploration programs on the Company's mineral properties in the Central Newfoundland Gold Belt and other "Canadian exploration expenses" that qualify as "flow-through mining expenditures", as those terms are defined in the Income Tax Act (Canada), including: (i) a comprehensive two-phase exploration program at the Company's flagship Golden Rose Project; and (ii) a targeted and recently-expanded phase one drilling program at the Company's Twilite Gold Project.

An eligible finder received, on account of gross proceeds raised from subscribers to the Offering who were introduced by such finder, an aggregate of 1,036,814 units of the Company, each of which consisted of one Share and one Share purchase warrant (a "Warrant") exercisable into one Share at a price of $0.35 per Share until June 17, 2024.

The securities issued in the Offering are subject to a statutory hold period expiring October 18, 2021. The Offering is subject to final approval of the TSX Venture Exchange.

The securities issued pursuant to the Offering have not been, and will not be, registered under the United States Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the "U.S. Securities Act"), or any U.S. state securities laws and may not be offered or sold in the United States absent registration or an available exemption from the registration requirement of the U.S. Securities Act and applicable U.S. state securities laws. This press release shall not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy, nor shall there be any sale of, such securities in any jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful.

About TRU Precious Metals Corp.

TRU has assembled a portfolio of 5 gold exploration properties in the highly prospective Central Newfoundland Gold Belt. The Company has an option with a subsidiary of TSX-listed Altius Minerals Corporation to purchase 100% of the Golden Rose Project, located along the deposit-bearing Cape Ray - Valentine Lake Shear Zone. TRU also owns 100% of the Twilite Gold Project, located along the same Shear Zone, and 3 other under-explored properties including its Rolling Pond Property (under option) bordering New Found Gold Corp.'s high-grade Queensway Project. TRU's common shares trade on the TSX Venture Exchange under the symbol "TRU", on the OTCQB Venture Market under the symbol "TRUIF", and on the Frankfurt exchange under the symbol "706".

TRU is a portfolio company of Resurgent Capital Corp. ("Resurgent"), a merchant bank providing venture capital markets advisory services and proprietary financing. Resurgent works with promising public and pre-public micro-capitalization Canadian companies. For more information on Resurgent and its portfolio companies, please visit Resurgent's LinkedIn profile.

For further information about TRU, please contact:

Joel Freudman

Co-Founder, President & CEO

TRU Precious Metals Corp.

Phone: 1-855-760-2TRU (2878)

Email: ir@trupreciousmetals.com

Website: www.trupreciousmetals.com

To connect with TRU via social media, below are links:

Facebook

https://www.facebook.com/TRU-Precious-Metals-Corp-100919195193616

Twitter

https://twitter.com/corp_tru

LinkedIn

https://www.linkedin.com/company/tru-precious-metals-corp

YouTube

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHghHMDQaYgS1rDHiZIeLUg/

Cautionary Statements

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.

This press release contains certain forward-looking statements, including those relating to the Offering and use of proceeds thereof, the renunciation to the purchasers of the FT Units, the tax treatment of the FT Units, final approval of the Offering by the TSX Venture Exchange and the Company's plans regarding exploring its mineral exploration properties. These statements are based on numerous assumptions regarding the Offering that are believed by management to be reasonable in the circumstances, and are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties, including without limitation: risks inherent in mineral exploration activities; mineralization hosted on adjacent and/or nearby properties is not necessarily indicative of mineralization hosted on the Company's properties; challenges in identifying and completing transactions, on favourable terms or at all; volatility in financial markets, economic conditions, and precious metals prices; regulatory approval processes; and those other risks described in the Company's continuous disclosure documents. Actual results may differ materially from results contemplated by the forward-looking statements herein. Investors and others should carefully consider the foregoing factors and should not place undue reliance on such forward-looking statements. The Company does not undertake to update any forward-looking statements herein except as required by applicable securities laws.



THIS NEWS RELEASE IS NOT INTENDED FOR DISTRIBUTION TO UNITED STATES NEWSWIRE SERVICES OR FOR DISSEMINATION IN THE UNITED STATES

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/87979
Former BellRock Brands executive joins the company to further integrate commerce and business development

Toronto, Ontario--(Newsfile Corp. - June 18, 2021) - SLANG Worldwide Inc. (CNSX: SLNG) (OTCQB: SLGWF) ("SLANG" or the "Company"), a leading global cannabis consumer packaged goods (CPG) company with a diversified portfolio of popular brands, today announced the appointment of Mr. Hilal Tabsh as the Company's Chief Revenue Officer ("CRO"), effective immediately.

As a 20-year Consumer Packaged Goods (CPG) industry veteran, Mr. Tabsh brings a wealth of experience in leadership, strategy development, and expertise in sales, marketing, and distribution to his new role. Before joining SLANG, Mr. Tabsh worked as a Senior Vice President at BellRock Brands USA, a CPG platform within the global, legal cannabis industry. In this role, he led sales, marketing, and distribution efforts, coupled with the development of the company's e-commerce strategy, and was able to grow the distribution footprint by 10X during his time in the role.

Mr. Tabsh said, "I'm excited to join the SLANG Worldwide family, known for their legacy of high-quality products and innovation. I'm eager to focus on accelerating consumer reach to SLANG's superior product portfolio through strategic marketing efforts, as well as outlining a clear winning strategy for retail and expanding our footprint through effective distribution with our partners across North America."

Prior to this role, Mr. Tabsh was a Co-Founder and Partner at Limitless, a company based in Chicago. He helped develop Limitless lightly caffeinated sparkling water, which grew rapidly and was eventually acquired by Keurig Dr. Pepper in less than three years for an undisclosed amount.

Previously, Mr. Tabsh served eight years as the Head of Sales and Marketing for Red Bull North America, a subsidiary of Red Bull GmbH. In this role, he successfully managed 152 team members under his direct responsibility and over 200 distribution partners that were key to growing the Red Bull footprint across the U.S. He was responsible for partner development, product launches, sales and distribution strategies and goals. Mr. Tabsh also worked for seven years at Red Bull UAE, based in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, serving as Director of Sales and Marketing Strategy.

Chris Driessen, CEO of SLANG, said, "I am thrilled to welcome Hilal to the SLANG executive team. His deep experience, and success, in brand building, sales, marketing and growing distribution channels will be invaluable as we grow our business. Now that many of our recent acquisitions are nearing full integration, his skillset will be a tremendous benefit as we now look to rapidly scale distribution into multiple new markets."

To be added to SLANG's email distribution list, please email SLNG@kcsa.com with "SLNG" in the subject.

About SLANG Worldwide Inc.

SLANG Worldwide Inc. is a global leader in the cannabis CPG sector with a diversified portfolio of popular brands distributed across the United States. The Company specializes in acquiring and developing market-proven regional brands as well as launching innovative new brands to seize global market opportunities. For more information, please visit www.slangww.com.

Forward-Looking Statements

This news release contains statements that constitute "forward-looking statements." Such forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results, performance or achievements, or developments in the industry to differ materially from the anticipated results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are statements that are not historical facts and are generally, but not always, identified by the words "expects," "plans", "anticipates", "believes", "intends", "estimates", "projects", "potential" and similar expressions, or that events or conditions "will", "would", "may", "could" or "should" occur.

Forward-looking statements are necessarily based upon a number of estimates and assumptions that, while considered reasonable by management of SLANG at this time, are inherently subject to significant business, economic and competitive risks, uncertainties and contingencies that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied in such statements. Investors are cautioned not to put undue reliance on forward-looking statements. Applicable risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to regulatory risks, risks related to the COVID-19 global pandemic, changes in laws, resolutions and guidelines, market risks, concentration risks, operating history, competition, the risks associated with international and foreign operations and the other risks identified under the headings "Risk Factors" in SLANG's annual information form dated April 29, 2021 and other disclosure documents available on the Company's profile on SEDAR at www.sedar.com. SLANG is not under any obligation, and expressly disclaims any intention or obligation, to update or revise any forward-looking information, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as expressly required by applicable law.

Media and Investor inquiries

Investors@SLANGww.com

KCSA Strategic Communications

Phil Carlson / Elizabeth Barker

SLANG@kcsa.com

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/88002
PITTSBURGH, PA / ACCESSWIRE / June 18, 2021 / Vodka Brands Corp (OTC PINK:VDKB) has been successful in obtaining the Brazilian Trademark for the BLUE DIAMOND class of spirits.

Company CEO Mark Lucero said 'Having the Brazilian trademark for our BLUE DIAMOND Vodka brand is very important since Brazil is the largest country in South America has a population of over 211 million people. The combined USA, European Union, and Brazilian trademarks will help establish Blue Diamond as a global brand.'

The Blue Diamond Vodka brand has won Gold Medals in International competition and is produced from six row barley and pristine water from deep aquifers.

Vodka Brands Corp's mission is to develop and produce superior quality products with highly recognizable brand names and form strategic alliances to increase unit growth and geographic distribution.

Website www.BestVodkaBrands.com

Twitter: @VodkaBrands

Vodka Brands Corp is a publicly traded corporation (OTC PINK:VDKB) based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Vodka Brands Corp develops, produces, and distributes premium brands of vodka including Blue Diamond Vodka, White Diamond Vodka, and Diamond Girl Vodka.

Investor Relations Contact VodkaBrandsCorp@yahoo.com

Phone: +1 (412) 897-5076

Safe Harbor

This press release contains forward-looking statements, particularly as related to, among other things, the business plan of Vodka Brands Corp., statements relating to goals, plans, and projections regarding the Vodka Brands Corp.'s financial position and business strategy. The words or phrases 'would be,' 'will allow,' 'intends to,' 'may result,' 'are expected to,' 'will continue,' 'anticipates,' 'expects,' 'estimate,' 'project,' 'indicate,' 'could,' 'potentially,' 'should,' 'believe,' 'think,' 'considers,' or similar expressions, are intended to identify 'forward-looking statements.' These forward-looking statements fall within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Act of 1934 and are subject to the safe harbor created by these sections. Actual results could differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements as a result of a number of risks and uncertainties. Such forward-looking statements are based on current expectations, involve known and unknown risks, a reliance on third parties for information, transactions or orders that may be cancelled, and other factors that may cause our actual results, performance or achievements, or developments in our industry, to differ materially from the anticipated results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from anticipated results include risks and uncertainties related to the fluctuation of global economic conditions, the performance of management and our employees, our ability to obtain financing, competition, general economic conditions and other factors that are detailed in our periodic reports and on documents we file from time to time with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Statements made herein are as of the date of this press release and should not be relied upon as of any subsequent date. Vodka Brands Corp. cautions readers not to place undue reliance on such statements. Vodka Brands Corp does not undertake, and Vodka Brands Corp specifically disclaims any obligation, to update any forward-looking statements to reflect occurrences, developments, unanticipated events or circumstances after the date of such statement. Actual results may differ materially from Vodka Brands Corp's expectations and estimates. For more information about Vodka Brands Corp and the risks related to an investment in the Company, investors should review the Company's filing at www.sec.gov with their tax and financial advisor.

SOURCE: Vodka Brands Corp.

View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/652232/Vodka-Brands-Corp-Announces-Brazilian-Trademark
Mississauga, Ontario and Sacramento, California--(Newsfile Corp. - June 18, 2021) - Bee Vectoring Technologies International Inc. (CSE: BEE) (OTCQB: BEVVF) (CVE: BEE) (the "Company" or "BVT") is pleased to announce the appointment of Mark W. Kohler to its Board of Directors. Mr. Kohler is a Certified Corporate Director having obtained his ICD.D designation from the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto, and he holds Chartered Professional Accountant (CPA) and Chartered Accountant (CA) designations.

"On behalf of the Board of Directors, we are thrilled Mark has accepted the appointment and would like to welcome him to the Board. Mark's extensive experience across capital markets and technology will be a significant asset as we continue to accelerate the commercialization of BVT," said Michael Collinson, Chairman of BVT. "Mark's current and past Board experience will also strengthen BVT's corporate governance stance which is an important consideration as the Company looks to increase its reach in the US. We look forward to working closely with Mark."

Mr. Kohler has over 33 years of experience as an entrepreneur, investor, financial executive, and board member at leading technology and financial services organizations in North America. With extensive experience as a C-Level financial executive at both private and publicly listed growth organizations, he is best known as a keen supporter of technology companies, efficient capital deployment, and growth strategies.



"BVT has a very compelling technology and a strong patent portfolio, with a significant market opportunity in the global ag industry to be a leading provider of sustainable agriculture innovation," said Mr. Kohler. "I look forward to helping BVT accelerate the commercialization and growth of its technologies."



Mr. Kohler is the Chairman and CEO of Exelerate Capital (Toronto), a strategic advisory merchant banking group founded in 2001, that provides governance/risk/compliance (GRC), corporate finance, mergers and acquisitions, enterprise strategy, data privacy, and cyber security services to technology and high growth services organizations in Canada and the US.



He is also the Chairman of CloudMD Software & Services Inc., a digital health technology and EHS company based in British Columbia. Since Mr. Kohler joined its Board in March 2020, CloudMD has raised over $70 million and acquired six companies in 2020, and has raised an additional $63 million in the spring of 2021, resulting in a market capital increase from approx. $38 million to $425 million.



Mr. Kohler is known to be an innovator in his roles with Boards in North America, including in his past role as the Executive Chairman at QHR Corporation where he led the Board and management through its profitable and strategic transformation that resulted in the sale of the company to Loblaw Companies Limited for approx. $170 million. He was also the Chairman of the Board for Community Trust, one of Canada's leading OSFI - federally regulated Trust Companies (since sold to Questrade Inc.), where he led the design of the Bank's Enterprise Risk Management Framework, and the adoption of its leading Corporate Governance practices. Most recently, he was the Audit Committee Chairman at Versapay Corporation, which was sold at a significant gain to a US-based private equity fund in February 2020, for approximately $126 million.



In connection with Mr. Kohler's appointment to the Board of Directors, the Company has also granted him 125,000 restricted share units ("RSUs) under the Company's shareholder approved restricted share unit plan (the "RSU Plan"). The RSUs will vest immediately upon issuance and shall entitle Mr. Kohler the ability to acquire one common share (a "Share") of the Company underlying each such RSU by delivering a notice of acquisition to the Company in accordance with the RSU Plan. In accordance with the RSU Plan, the RSUs were priced at $0.31 based on the closing price of the Shares on the Canadian Securities Exchange (CSE) on June 17, 2021.



The Company also advises that Claude Flueckiger has resigned from the Board of Directors effective June 30, 2021. The Company wishes to thank Mr. Flueckiger for his numerous contributions to BVT and wishes him well with his current and future endeavors.



About Bee Vectoring Technologies International Inc.

BVT, an agriculture technology company, is a market disruptor with a significant global market opportunity in the $240 billion crop protection and fertilizer market. BVT has pioneered a natural precision agriculture system that replaces chemical pesticides and wasteful plant protection product spray applications by delivering biological pesticide alternatives to crops using commercially grown bees. BVT's award-winning technology, precision vectoring, is completely harmless to bees and allows minute amounts of naturally-derived pesticides (called biologicals) to be delivered directly to blooms, providing improved crop protection and yield results than traditional chemical pesticides - and improving the health of the soil, the microbiome and the environment. Currently, BVT has over 65 granted patents, over 35 patents pending in all major agricultural countries worldwide, and has US EPA registration of its Vectorite with CR-7 (EPA Registration No. 90641-2) for sale as a registered biological fungicide for use on the labeled crops.

Additional information can be viewed at the Company's website www.beevt.com. To receive regular news updates from the Company, subscribe at www.beevt.com/newsletter.

Company Contact:

Ashish Malik, President & CEO

info@beevt.com

Investor Contact:

Babak Pedram, Investor Relations

Virtus Advisory Group

Tel: 416-995-8651

bpedram@virtusadvisory.com

The CSE has neither approved nor disapproved the contents of this press release. The CSE does not accept responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. Certain statements contained in this press release constitute "forward-looking information" as such term is defined in applicable Canadian securities legislation. The words "may", "would", "could", "should", "potential", "will", "seek", "intend", "plan", "anticipate", "believe", "estimate", "expect" and similar expressions as they relate to the Company, "annual revenue potential", are intended to identify forward-looking information. All statements other than statements of historical fact may be forward-looking information. Such statements reflect the Company's current views and intentions with respect to future events, and current information available to the Company, and are subject to certain risks, uncertainties and assumptions, including: planted acres, selling price of competitive chemical pesticides and the US to Canadian dollar exchange rate. Material factors or assumptions were applied in providing forward-looking information. Many factors could cause the actual results, performance or achievements that may be expressed or implied by such forward-looking information to vary from those described herein should one or more of these risks or uncertainties materialize. These factors include changes in law, competition, litigation, the ability to implement business strategies and pursue business opportunities, state of the capital markets, the availability of funds and resources to pursue operations, new technologies, the ability to protect intellectual property rights, the ability to obtain patent protection for products, third-party intellectual property infringement claims, regulatory changes affecting products, failing research and development activities, the ability to reach and sustain profitability, dependence on business and technical experts, the ability to effectively manage business operations and growth, issuance of debt, dilution of existing securities, volatility of publicly traded securities, potential conflicts of interest, unlikelihood of dividend payments, the potential costs stemming from defending third-party intellectual property infringement claims, the ability to secure relationships with manufacturers and purchasers, as well as general economic, market and business conditions, as well as those risk factors discussed or referred to in the Company's Filing Statement dated August 14,2020, filed with the CSE and securities regulatory authorities in certain provinces of Canada and available at www.sedar.com. Should any factor affect the Company in an unexpected manner, or should assumptions underlying the forward-looking information prove incorrect, the actual results or events may differ materially from the results or events predicted. Any such forward-looking information is expressly qualified in its entirety by this cautionary statement. Moreover, the Company does not assume responsibility for the accuracy or completeness of such forward-looking information. The forward-looking information included in this press release is made as of the date of this press release and the Company undertakes no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking information, other than as required by applicable law. All figures are in Canadian dollars.

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/87972
Ottawa, Ontario--(Newsfile Corp. - June 18, 2021) - Molecule Holdings Inc. (CSE: MLCL) ("Molecule" or the "Company"), a Canadian craft-focused cannabis beverage production company, is pleased to announce that the company has entered into a sales amendment partnership with Great White North Growers ("GWNG") to sell into Quebec, via the Societe quebecoise du cannabis ("SQDC"), Quebec's exclusive wholesale and retail distributor for the province.

"We are excited to enter the Quebec market. We feel our unique family of beverages together with GWNG's experience and highly Quebec-centric focus is a winning combination. Entering Quebec is the first step in our national expansion, expecting to now pick-up speed since launching in Ontario in April," said Phil Waddington, President and CEO of Molecule.

"The decision to partner with Molecule makes good business sense for both companies. This partnership brings together a world-class product development and manufacturing team with a knowledgeable and experienced Quebec operator. We look forward to getting started right away," commented GWNG President and CEO Peter Schissler.

ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD

MOLECULE HOLDINGS INC.

Per: "Philip Waddington"

President, CEO and Director

For further information, please contact:

Andre Audet, Chairman and Co-Founder

Phone: 1 (888) 665-2853 x101

Email: andre@molecule.ca

www.molecule.ca

About Molecule Holdings Inc.

Molecule works with client-partners to engage in the production of cannabis-infused beverages and edibles. We provide the infrastructure, know-how, technology, and licensing for craft producers to create consumable cannabis products. Molecule's goal is to be the on-ramp for companies wishing to enter into the cannabis beverage and edibles market, but who choose not to go through the significant process of obtaining the required cannabis licences.

About Great White North Growers

GWNG is a privately held producer of premium pharmaceutical grade medical and recreational cannabis, based out of the Ville d'Anjou, a borough of the island of Montreal. GWNG's skilled team of legacy growers cultivates premium cannabis with a state-of-the-art vertical aeroponic growing system. Great White North Growers embraces an organizational culture of operational excellence, environmental consciousness, social responsibility, and entrepreneurial attitude.

Neither the Canadian Securities Exchange nor its regulation services provider accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this press release.

Forward-Looking Statements

Certain statements contained in this news release may constitute forward-looking information.

Forward-looking information is often, but not always, identified by the use of words such as "anticipate", "plan", "estimate", "expect", "may", "will", "intend", "should", and similar expressions. Forward-looking information involves known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results or events to differ materially from those anticipated in such forward-looking information. The Company's actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in this forward-looking information as a result of regulatory decisions, competitive factors in the industries in which the Company operates, prevailing economic conditions, and other factors, many of which are beyond the control of the Company. In this news release, the Company is making forward-looking statements with respect to rolling out nationally and selling into the Province of Quebec. The Company believes that the expectations reflected in the forward-looking information are reasonable, but no assurance can be given that these expectations will prove to be correct and such forward-looking information should not be unduly relied upon. Any forward-looking information contained in this news release represents the Company's expectations as of the date hereof and is subject to change after such date. The Company disclaims any intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking information whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required by applicable securities legislation.

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/88005


WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - The Supreme Court has dismissed a challenge to the Affordable Care Act in a decision that could mark the end of the line for major legal challenges to the Obama-era health care law.



It was the third major challenge that the Republicans posed against the Affordable Care Act that ensured health care coverage for millions of Americans. Some of its provisions, including coverage for pre-existing conditions like diabetes and cancer, and for children to stay on their parents' insurance plan until they turn 26, were popular.



Millions of low-income families and people with disabilities were assured health care because their states expanded Medicaid under this law.



After unsuccessful challenges in 2012 and 2015, a number of Republican-led states urged the apex court to block the entire law as unconstitutional.



The nine-member jury ruled that the lawsuit lacked standing to bring the case, and upheld the Act that President Barack Obama signed into law in 2010.



The lawsuit was rejected by a 7-2 majority decision as six members of the judicial panel joining Justice Stephen G. Breyer's opinion, with Justices Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch dissenting.



Justice Amy Coney Barret's support of the law was notable in the sense that Democrats vehemently opposed the Trump nominee's confirmation in October last year.



President Joe Biden described the Supreme Court decision as a major victory for more than 130 million Americans with pre-existing conditions and millions more who were in immediate danger of losing their health care in the midst of a pandemic.



'After more than a decade of attacks on the Affordable Care Act through the Congress and the courts, today's decision - the third major challenge to the law that the U.S. Supreme Court has rejected - it is time move forward and keep building on this landmark law,' he said in a statement.



The Biden administration's American Rescue Plan lowered health care costs and expanded coverage for millions of Americans through the Affordable Care Act. More than 1.2 million Americans had signed up for coverage under the law through a special enrollment period that Biden established in mid-February, which has been extended through August 15.



Biden said he looks forward to working with the Congress to build on this law so that the American people will continue to have access to quality and affordable health care.



Copyright RTT News/dpa-AFX

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BOULOGNE-BILLANCOURT (dpa-AFX) - Renault (RNSDY.PK, RNSDF.PK, RNT.L) has reached an agreement with trade unions that will allow its employees in France to work from home for up to three days per week, the French carmaker said in a statement on Friday. The new organization and workspace arrangements to improve on-site collaboration will be rolled out in several stages, starting in September 2021. The new hybrid work organization, which aims to get the best out of face-to-face and teleworking, will be implanted on a voluntary basis and will combine on-site and remote work. It is organized that two days of working from home per week, with an additional day working after getting the manager's permission. 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.
Hexagon Purus has received an order for hydrogen storage systems for KEYOU, a Munich, Germany-based clean mobility company. Hexagon Purus will supply hydrogen storage systems for KEYOU's H2 combustion engine DEMO Bus with a leading European OEM and its DEMO truck project.



Driving the energy transformation



KEYOU has redesigned the traditional internal combustion engine enabling it to run on hydrogen as sustainable and clean fuel, bringing about a large leap in propulsion development. The company has succeeded in developing an emission-free, yet cost-effective hydrogen drive for commercial vehicles - without compromising performance, capacity or range.

"KEYOU and Hexagon Purus share a common vision and a common interest - to drive the energy transition and achieve clean air everywhere," says Michael Kleschinski, EVP Hexagon Purus. "As more European countries and cities announce strategic policies to promote the decarbonization of mobility, more commercial vehicles-especially city buses and heavy-duty trucks-will be rapidly transitioned. KEYOU is dedicated to accelerating this development, and we are pleased to be a part of this exciting project."

"Hexagon Purus is a global leader and expert for hydrogen storage and tank systems with over 50 years of experience in high-pressure technology. Since hydrogen storage is an integral part of our technology, we're glad to have such a strong partner supporting us to realize our two prototype vehicles," says Thomas Korn, CEO, and co-founder of KEYOU.



Timing



Hexagon Purus' storage systems will be supplied from our Kassel, Germany and Kelowna, Canada facilities. The first deliveries will be in November 2021.



Contacts:

Karen Romer, SVP Communications, Hexagon Composites

Telephone: +47 950 74 950 | karen.romer@hexagongroup.com

Salman Alam, VP Corporate Development, Hexagon Purus

Telephone: +47 476 12 713 | salman.alam@hexagonpurus.com
Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - June 18, 2021) - Peekaboo Beans Inc. (CSE: BEAN) (OTC Pink: PBBSF) ("PK Beans" or the "Company") is pleased to announce that it has completed its previously announced acquisition (the "Acquisition") of Les Petits Terribles Inc. ("LPTI") from all of its securities holders (the "Vendors"). Pursuant to the Acquisition and the Share Purchase Agreement dated March 24, 2021, the Company acquired 100% of issued and outstanding shares of LPTI in consideration of an issuance of 4,000,000 common shares in the capital of the Company (each, a "Share") at a deemed price of $0.075 per Share.

"We believe that what kids put into their bodies is as important as what they put on their bodies," says CEO Traci Costa. "Parents are seeking healthy on-the-go snacks and meals for their on-the-go lifestyles, resulting in rapid industry growth. Adding high quality fuel for kids with our comfortable, sustainable and high quality clothing for kids, we will become a go-to brand in Children's wellness."

About Peekaboo Beans Inc.

PK Beans is an integrated and innovative children's wellness brand. From sustainable clothing options that kids love to wear, to healthy foods that fuel children's play, our mission is to provide the ingredients for a playful life. Together with our monthly adventure subscription box, consisting of interactive and engaging activities that educate and entertain, developed by an Emmy award-winning child psychologist and devoted kid-experts, our goal is to enrich, empower and nourish children through quality nutrition, clothing and play - every day. The company maximizes revenue by reaching sellers and online retailers through an omnichannel approach.

To learn more about PK Beans, visit: www.pkbeans.com

On behalf of the Board of Directors,

Peekaboo Beans Inc.

Ms. Traci Costa, President and CEO

(604) 279-2326

For more information, please contact the Company at:

IR@pkbeans.com

1-604-279-2326

Reader Advisory

This news release may include forward-looking information that is subject to risks and uncertainties. All statements within, other than statements of historical fact, are to be considered forward-looking. Although the Company believes the expectations expressed in such forward-looking information are based on reasonable assumptions, such information is not a guarantee of future performance and actual results or developments may differ materially from those contained in forward-looking information. Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those in forward-looking information include, but are not limited to, fluctuations in market prices, successes of the operations of the Company, continued availability of capital and financing and general economic, market or business conditions. There can be no assurances that such information will prove accurate and, therefore, readers are advised to rely on their own evaluation of such uncertainties. The Company does not assume any obligation to update any forward-looking information except as required under the applicable securities laws.

Neither the Canadian Securities Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the Canadian Securities Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

NOT FOR DISTRIBUTION TO UNITED STATES NEWS WIRE SERVICES OR FOR DISSEMINATION IN THE UNITED STATES

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/87937
Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - June 18, 2021) - Ridgestone Mining Inc. (TSXV: RMI) (OTCQB: RIGMF) (FRA:4U5) ("Ridgestone" or the "Company") is pleased to announce that it has filed on SEDAR an independent technical report (the "Report") prepared in accordance with National Instrument 43-101 - Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects ("NI 43-101") supporting the maiden mineral resource estimate for its Guadalupe y Calvo gold-silver project, previously reported in the Company's news release dated May 10th, 2021. The Mineral Resource Estimate was prepared in accordance with the guidelines of the Canadian Securities Administrators National Instrument 43-101; and have been estimated in conformity with generally accepted CIM "Estimation and Mineral Resource and Mineral Reserve Best Practices" guidelines.

The full technical report dated June 14th, 2021, with an effective date of May 20th, 2021, is entitled "2021 Technical Report and Mineral Resource Estimate, Guadalupe y Calvo Project, Chihuahua State, Mexico". The report was prepared for Ridgestone Mining Corp by Marc Jutras of Ginto Consulting Inc. and can be found under the Company's issuer profile at www.sedar.com.

About Ridgestone Mining Inc.

Ridgestone Mining has assembled a highly-experienced and dynamic team to explore and advance its projects in Mexico. The Guadalupe y Calvo gold-silver project, for which Ridgestone can earn a 100% interest, is host to an Indicated Resource of 356,000 gold-equivalent ounces plus an Inferred Resource of 460,000 gold-equivalent ounces. Ridgestone's 100%-owned Rebeico copper-gold project has high-grade copper and gold pervasive throughout the property with highlights including 1.56% copper plus 1.80 g/t gold intersected over 19.3 metres from surface at the New Year Zone and 2.78% copper plus 8.69 g/t gold over 2.0 metres from the Alaska Vein.

For further information, please contact:

Rad Rajaram - Manager Corporate Relations and Business Development

Telephone: 416-732-0604

This news release contains forward-looking statements or information (collectively referred to herein as "forward-looking statements"). Such statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results, performance or developments to differ materially from those contained in the statements and are not guarantees of future performance of the Company. In this news release such statements include but are not limited to any ongoing drilling programs, timing of such programs, or exploration results. No assurance can be given that any of the events anticipated by the forward-looking statements will occur or, if they do occur, what benefits the Company will obtain from them. These forward-looking statements reflect management's current views and are based on certain expectations, estimates and assumptions which may prove to be incorrect. A number of risks and uncertainties could cause our actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements, including those described in the Company's regulatory filings available on www.sedar.com. Should one or more of these risks or uncertainties materialize, or should any of the Company's assumptions prove incorrect, actual results may vary in material respects from those projected in the forward-looking statements. Readers are cautioned that the foregoing list of risks, uncertainties and other factors is not exhaustive. Unpredictable or unknown factors not discussed could also have material adverse effects on forward-looking statements. The impact of any one factor on a particular forward-looking statement is not determinable with certainty as such factors are dependent on other factors, and the Company's course of action would depend on its assessment of the future considering all information then available. All forward-looking statements in this news release are expressly qualified in their entirety by these cautionary statements. Except as required by law, the Company assumes no obligation to update forward-looking statements should circumstances or management's estimates or opinions change.

Neither TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/87943
One of only 30 EdTech companies in the world to be an official partner

BENGALURU, India, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Cuemath, a STEM.org accredited after-school, one-on-one math and coding program aimed at nurturing love and intuitive understanding of mathematics and coding for students in grades K-12, announces its partnership with Google for Education, to help transform teaching and learning experiences through Cuemath's platform.

Cuemath is one of only 30 EdTech companies in the world to sign a strategic partnership of this kind with Google for Education, and the first EdTech company in India to partner with Google's certification program for students and teachers.

Through the partnership Cuemath's students and teachers will be awarded Google for Education certification. Students who take a six or nine month Cuemath program will be awarded the Google CS First Creator Coder Certification, while their teachers will be given a Google Certified Educator Level 1 Certificate.

1000 of Cuemath's students have already been certified through the partnership with Google for Education, with >5000 students and >100 teachers expected to be certified by the end of 2021.

Cuemath's e-learning platform offers students live online classes - either one on one, or in small groups - for math and coding. Prices start as low as $15 per class, with flexible pricing plans available to make learning affordable.

Cuemath's app has received global recognition for its learning outcomes and is a proud recipient of STEM.org's Accredited Educational Experience Trustmark. In 2019, Grant Thornton - one of the largest US accountancy firms - ran an external study examining how well Cuemath students performed relative to non-Cuemath students. The Grant study demonstrated that Cuemath's students jumped on average two grades ahead of their peers, with 8th grade students outperforming other 10th graders on their SATs.

Manan Khurma, Founder and CEO of Cuemath, said:

"We're delighted to have partnered with Google for Education - and to be the first EdTech company in India, and one of only 30 companies in the world to be participating in Google's accreditation program. Accreditation that we can now award to our own Cuemath students.."

Together we can ensure Cuemath's students get the best opportunity to gain knowledge and develop 'real-world' skills. The First Creator Coder Certificate will help to ensure that every student has access to the collaborative coding and technical skills that will unlock opportunities in the classroom and beyond, no matter what their future goals may be."

About Cuemath

Cuemath is a global after-school, one-on-one math and coding program aimed at nurturing a love and intuitive understanding of mathematics and coding for students

It is powered by an adaptive learning platform, interactive visual simulations and the guidance of a LIVE teacher

Founded in 2013 by Manan Khurma , Cuemath is present in 20+ countries

, Cuemath is present in 20+ countries Cuemath is accredited by STEM.org and Google for Education and has received investment from Manta Ray Ventures, Aspada, Sequoia Capital and Alphabet's independent growth fund, CapitalG, among others

About the Google for Education accreditation program:

Google offers four levels of certification for educators: Level 1 - 2 Google Certified Educator, Google for Education Certified Trainer, and Google for Education Certified Innovator. To get started in the certification journey, teachers must pass the Level 1 exam by completing 15 hours of study plus a three-hour-long exam.

The Google for Education certificate for students will be initially given to students studying Cuemath's coding program. The program is designed for students aged 9-14 - with varying interests and experience levels - to learn skills such as collaboration and core coding concepts as they create their own projects with easy-to-use lesson plans, tutorials, activities, and resources.
NOT FOR RELEASE, PUBLICATION OR DISTRIBUTION, IN WHOLE OR IN PART, DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY, IN OR INTO OR FROM ANY JURISDICTION WHERE TO DO SO WOULD CONSTITUTE A VIOLATION OF THE RELEVANT LAWS OR REGULATIONS OF SUCH JURISDICTION

HSBC Continental Europe ('HBCE') has today signed a Memorandum of Understanding ('MOU') with Promontoria MMB SAS ('My Money Group'), its subsidiary Banque des Caraibes SA (the 'Purchaser') and My Money Bank ('MMB'), regarding the potential sale of HBCE's retail banking business in France. My Money Group, MMB and the Purchaser are under the control, directly or indirectly, of funds and accounts managed or advised by Cerberus Capital Management L.P.

The potential sale includes: HBCE's French retail banking business; the Credit Commercial de France ('CCF') brand; and, subject to the satisfaction of relevant conditions, HBCE's 3% ownership interest in Credit Logement, its 100% ownership interest in HSBC SFH (France) ('HSFH'), and the transfer of rights and obligations under the covered bonds programme at completion (together, the 'Business') (the 'Potential Transaction'). The potential sale is structured such that it may proceed even if the relevant conditions to transfer HSBC SFH and/or the 3% ownership interest in Credit Logement are not satisfied.

The signing of the MOU has been approved by the boards of directors of HBCE, My Money Group and the Purchaser. The Board of HSBC SFH (France) ('HSFH') has been informed of the Potential Transaction.

The MOU records the status of the negotiations between the parties and sets out the information and consultation process of HBCE and the Purchaser with their respective works councils, which will commence shortly. It also contains exclusivity commitments entered into by the parties.

Under the proposed terms of the Potential Transaction, HBCE and the Purchaser have agreed to take certain steps to manage the net asset position of the Business to be delivered at closing of the Potential Transaction ('Closing'). This includes HBCE taking steps for HSFH (or a similar vehicle) to issue covered bonds (up to EUR 2.0bn of which may be self-financed by HBCE).

The Potential Transaction is structured such that the parties may proceed to Closing even if the relevant conditions to transfer HSFH are not satisfied. In these circumstances the parties would put in place arrangements replicating for HBCE the economics that would apply had the relevant conditions been satisfied. If the parties were to proceed to Closing without the condition to transfer HSFH being satisfied, there would be deferred transfers to the Purchaser of certain home loans that would otherwise fall within the scope of the Potential Transaction, and HBCE will continue to comply with its obligations under the covered bonds programme. Similarly, if the steps the parties have agreed to take to manage the net asset position of the Business are implemented where the condition to transfer HSFH is not satisfied, the amount of home loans that would initially not fall within the scope of the Potential Transaction may be increased.

The Potential Transaction would be subject to clearance from relevant financial, governmental and regulatory approvals. Approvals would also be required in connection with the transfer of the interests in HSFH. However as noted above, the Potential Transaction would proceed even if these approvals were not obtained.

The Potential Transaction would be expected to close in the first half of 2023.

Note to editors:

1. HSBC Holdings plc

HSBC Holdings plc, the parent company of HSBC, is headquartered in London. HSBC serves customers worldwide from offices in 64 countries and territories in its geographical regions: Europe, Asia, North America, Latin America, and Middle East and North Africa. With assets of US$2,984bn at 31 December 2020, HSBC is one of the world's largest banking and financial services organisations.

2. HSBC Continental Europe

HSBC Continental Europe is a subsidiary of HSBC Holdings plc. HSBC Continental Europe is headquartered in Paris. HSBC Continental Europe includes, in addition to its banking activities in France, the activities of 10 European branches (Belgium, Spain, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Poland, Czech Republic and Sweden). HSBC Continental Europe's mission is to serve customers in continental Europe for their needs worldwide and customers in other Group countries for their needs in continental Europe

3. HSBC SFH (France)

HSBC SFH (France) is a funding vehicle used by HSBC Continental Europe for the issuance of covered bonds backed by mortgage loans issued by HSBC Continental Europe.

4. Credit Logement

Credit Logement operates as a provider of mortgage loan guarantees in the French market.

5. Banque des Caraibes

Banque des Caraibes ('BdC') is a universal bank regulated by the ACPR, and is currently operating in the French Caribbean under the My Money Group umbrella. BdC is ultimately controlled by funds and accounts managed or advised by Cerberus Capital Management L.P. The principal business of the Purchaser relates to retail and commercial banking.

6. Promontoria MMB

Promontoria MMB is a financial holding company of My Money Group and is regulated by the ACPR. Its owns majority shares notably in Banque des Caraibes and My Money Bank.

7. My Money Bank

My Money Bank is a bank regulated by the ACPR and is currently operating in Mainland France under My Money Group umbrella. MMB is ultimately controlled by funds and accounts managed or advised by Cerberus Capital Management L.P. The principal business of My Money Bank relates to debt consolidation and commercial real estate.

8. Lazard Co., Limited

Lazard Co., Limited, which is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority in the United Kingdom, and Lazard Freres SAS (together "Lazard") are acting exclusively for HSBC Continental Europe and for no one else in connection with the Potential Transaction and will not be responsible to anyone other than HSBC Continental Europe for providing the protections afforded to their clients or for providing advice in connection with the Potential Transaction. Neither Lazard nor any of their respective affiliates owes or accepts any duty, liability or responsibility whatsoever (whether direct or indirect, whether in contract, in tort, under statute or otherwise) to any person who is not a client of Lazard in connection with this document, any statement contained herein, the Potential Transaction or otherwise.

This announcement contains certain forward-looking statements with respect to the financial condition, results of operations and business of the group. Statements that are not historical facts, including statements about the group's beliefs and expectations, are forward-looking statements. Words such as 'expects', 'estimates', 'potential' and 'reasonably possible', variations of these words and similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements. These statements are based on current plans, estimates and projections, and therefore undue reliance should not be placed on them. Forward-looking statements speak only as of the date they are made. HSBC Continental Europe makes no commitment to revise or update any forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances occurring or existing after the date of any forward-looking statement. Forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties. Readers are cautioned that a number of factors could cause actual results to differ, in some instances materially, from those anticipated or implied in any forward-looking statements.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210618005341/en/

Contacts:

Media enquiries to:

Sophie Ricord sophie.ricord@hsbc.fr 33 6 89 10 17 62

Raphaele-Marie Hirsch raphaele.marie.hirsch@hsbc.fr 33 7 64 57 35 55
NOT FOR RELEASE, PUBLICATION OR DISTRIBUTION, IN WHOLE OR IN PART, DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY, IN OR INTO OR FROM ANY JURISDICTION WHERE TO DO SO WOULD CONSTITUTE A VIOLATION OF THE RELEVANT LAWS OR REGULATIONS OF SUCH JURISDICTION

HSBC Continental Europe ('HBCE') has today signed a Memorandum of Understanding ('MOU') with Promontoria MMB SAS ('My Money Group'), its subsidiary Banque des Caraibes SA (the 'Purchaser') and My Money Bank ('MMB'), regarding the potential sale of HBCE's retail banking business in France. My Money Group, MMB and the Purchaser are under the control, directly or indirectly, of funds and accounts managed or advised by Cerberus Capital Management L.P.

Commenting on the Potential Transaction, Jean Beunardeau, HBCE CEO said: "This potential transaction is an important step towards achieving our strategic goal of being a leading wholesale bank in Continental Europe for Corporate and Investment Banking, Markets and Private Banking, anchored in Paris, connecting our customers to HSBC's global network, and providing access to Continental Europe for HSBC's customers around the world. As importantly, this potential transaction would allow HSBC's French retail banking business to be sold to an experienced investor for whom retail banking activities will be at the heart of the strategy and therefore more able to support its development over the long term in France."

Commenting on the Potential Transaction, Noel Quinn, Group Chief Executive, said:

"The signing of an MOU for the potential sale of our French retail banking business represents a significant step in progressing the actions we announced during our strategic update earlier this year. It will enable us to dramatically simplify our business in Continental Europe and allow us to accelerate the transformation of our European wholesale banking franchise. We are committed to remaining as a leading international wholesale bank in Continental Europe, capitalising on our global network and serving our multinational customers both inbound and outbound."

The potential sale includes: HBCE's French retail banking business; the Credit Commercial de France ('CCF') brand; and, subject to the satisfaction of relevant conditions, HBCE's 100% ownership interest in HSBC SFH (France) ('HSFH') and its 3% ownership interest in Credit Logement (together, the 'Business') (the 'Potential Transaction'). The Potential Transaction is structured such that the parties may proceed to Closing even if the relevant conditions to transfer HSFH and/or the 3% ownership interest in Credit Logement are not satisfied.

The Business consists of a network of 244 retail branches, approximately 800,000 customers, EUR 21.5bn in customer loans and EUR 18.9bn in deposits balances associated with HBCE's retail banking activities in France, as well as certain other assets and liabilities. If the Potential Transaction were to proceed, the Purchaser intends to operate the Business under the CCF brand in mainland France.

It is anticipated that approximately 3,900 employees would transfer with the Business in accordance with relevant legislation.

HBCE through its subsidiaries HSBC Assurances Vie (France), HSBC Asset Management (France) and HSBC REIM (France) would continue its existing insurance and asset management activities, and the Potential Transaction would therefore involve such entities respectively entering into distribution agreements with the Purchaser for insurance and asset management products.

The signing of the MOU has been approved by the boards of directors of HBCE, My Money Group and the Purchaser.

The MOU records the status of the negotiations between the parties and sets out the information and consultation process of HBCE and the Purchaser with their respective works councils, which will commence shortly. It also contains exclusivity commitments entered into by the parties.

Financial terms

The terms of the Potential Transaction contemplate HBCE transferring the Business to the Purchaser with a net asset value of c. EUR 1.6bn, subject to adjustment (upwards or downwards) in certain circumstances, for a consideration of EUR1.

Any required increase to the net asset value of the Business to achieve the net asset value of EUR 1.6bn would be satisfied by the inclusion of additional cash within the scope of the Business transferred. In the event that the net asset value exceeds this target amount, the consideration would not be adjusted.

Under the proposed terms of the Potential Transaction, HBCE and the Purchaser have agreed to take certain steps to manage the net asset position of the Business to be delivered at closing of the Potential Transaction ('Closing'). This includes HBCE taking steps for HSFH (or a similar vehicle) to issue covered bonds (up to EUR 2.0bn of which may be self-financed by HBCE). The net asset position can be further reduced via arrangements agreed with the Purchaser including further secured funding to the Business, and/or temporary retention of certain home loans by HBCE for a period of three months If the net asset value of the transferred Business at Closing (calculated on the basis that certain actions have been taken by HBCE to manage the net asset position) is expected to exceed the target, HBCE would have the right to terminate the Potential Transaction (and therefore would be able to avoid an increased loss on sale).

Financial impact of the Potential Transaction

The sale would generate an estimated pre-tax loss (calculated on an IFRS basis) for HBCE of c. EUR 1.9bn. There would be no immediate tax benefit recognised in respect of the sale loss nor impairment. The vast majority of the estimated sales loss and impairment is expected to be recognised upon the classification of the Business as held for sale for accounting purposes, currently anticipated to be in 2022, with any remaining elements recognised by completion.

It is estimated that the sale of the Business would reduce credit RWAs at an HBCE consolidated level under ECB rules by up to EUR 5.8bn based on 31 December 2020 figures. HBCE has a consolidated common equity tier 1 capital ratio of 12.6% as at 31 December 2020. The pre-tax loss on sale would be partially offset by the reduction in credit RWAs at closing, and would be expected to lead to an estimated decrease in HBCE's common equity tier 1 capital ratio of 313 basis points (based on HBCE's RWAs at 31 December 2020).

As a subsidiary of the HSBC Group, HBCE benefits from the support of its parent company HSBC Bank plc, which stands ready to inject capital into HBCE as required to support its strategy and meet regulatory requirements at all times.

The HSBC Group has a strong capital position, with a common equity tier 1 capital ratio of 15.9% as at 31 December 2020. The pre-tax loss on sale is expected to lead to an estimated decrease in the HSBC consolidated common equity tier 1 capital ratio of 15 basis points (based on HSBC Group RWAs at 31 December 2020).

A reduction in the HBCE tangible net asset value of c. EUR 1.9bn would be expected upon Closing (based on the current estimate of the financial impact of the Potential Transaction). None of the current unsecured or subordinated debt issued by HBCE will transfer to the Purchaser as part of the Potential Transaction.

The financial impact of the Potential Transaction set out above is calculated on the assumption that HSFH and the 3% ownership interest in Credit Logement are within the scope of the Potential Transaction at Closing. If HSFH does not transfer at Closing, this would result in an initial lower reduction in RWAs of HBCE.

Given the financial terms of the Potential Transaction, it is not expected that the Potential Transaction will result in any net proceeds of sale for HBCE.

On Closing, the profit and loss and the assets and liabilities of the Business will no longer be consolidated into the consolidated financial statements of HBCE and HSFH, if the required consent for its transfer is obtained, will cease to be a subsidiary of HBCE.

HSBC does not anticipate that the Potential Transaction will lead to a change in the current issuer credit ratings of HBCE.

Indicative timetable, next steps and conditions

As noted above, the MoU sets out the information and consultation process by the parties of their respective employees' works councils and contains exclusivity commitments by both parties.

The information and consultation processes will commence shortly. If, following the outcome of these processes, the parties were to decide to proceed with the Potential Transaction, a governing transaction agreement would be entered into between HBCE, the Purchaser and My Money Group setting out the further terms for implementation of the Potential Transaction.

The Potential Transaction would be subject to clearance from relevant financial, governmental and regulatory approvals. Approvals would also be required in connection with the transfer of the interests in HSFH and Credit Logement; however as noted above, the Potential Transaction would proceed even if these approvals were not obtained.

The Potential Transaction would be expected to close in the first half of 2023.

Further information

As at 31 December 2020, the value of the gross assets of the Business to be sold was EUR 23.7bn, including EUR 21.5bn of customer loan balances. The Business also has customer deposit balances of EUR 18.9bn. During the financial years ended 31 December 2019, and 2020, respectively, the Business under HBCE ownership generated EUR 410m and EUR 406m of revenues, incurred EUR 578m and EUR 623m of operating costs, and recognised a EUR 1m net cost of risk reversal and EUR 19m net cost of risk charge. The loss before tax for the Business for the financial years ended 31 December 2019 and 31 December 2020 was EUR 167m and EUR 236m respectively. No loss after tax was recorded for the Business, as tax is applied at the entity level.

HSBC Global Banking and Lazard are acting as financial advisors to HSBC in connection with the Potential Transaction.

ends/more

Notes to editors

1. HSBC Holdings plc

HSBC Holdings plc, the parent company of HSBC, is headquartered in London. HSBC serves customers worldwide from offices in 64 countries and territories in its geographical regions: Europe, Asia, North America, Latin America, and Middle East and North Africa. With assets of US$2,984bn at 31 December 2020, HSBC is one of the world's largest banking and financial services organisations.1

2. HSBC Continental Europe

HSBC Continental Europe is a subsidiary of HSBC Holdings plc. HSBC Continental Europe is headquartered in Paris. HSBC Continental Europe includes, in addition to its banking activities in France, the activities of 10 European branches (Belgium, Spain, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Poland, Czech Republic and Sweden). HSBC Continental Europe's mission is to serve customers in continental Europe for their needs worldwide and customers in other Group countries for their needs in continental Europe

3. HSBC SFH (France)

HSBC SFH (France) is a funding vehicle used by HSBC Continental Europe for the issuance of covered bonds backed by mortgage loans issued by HSBC Continental Europe.

4. Credit Logement

Credit Logement operates as a provider of mortgage loan guarantees in the French market.

5. Banque des Caraibes

Banque des Caraibes ('BdC') is a universal bank regulated by the ACPR, and is currently operating in the French Caribbean under the My Money Group umbrella. BdC is ultimately controlled by funds and accounts managed or advised by Cerberus Capital Management L.P. The principal business of the Purchaser relates to retail and commercial banking.

6. Promontoria MMB

Promontoria MMB is a financial holding company of My Money Group and is regulated by the ACPR. Its owns majority shares notably in Banque des Caraibes and My Money Bank.

7. My Money Bank

My Money Bank is a bank regulated by the ACPR and is currently operating in mainland France under My Money Group umbrella. MMB is ultimately controlled by funds and accounts managed or advised by Cerberus Capital Management L.P. The principal business of My Money Bank relates to debt consolidation and commercial real estate.

8. Lazard Co., Limited

Lazard Co., Limited, which is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority in the United Kingdom, and Lazard Freres SAS (together "Lazard") are acting exclusively for HSBC Continental Europe and for no one else in connection with the Potential Transaction and will not be responsible to anyone other than HSBC Continental Europe for providing the protections afforded to their clients or for providing advice in connection with the Potential Transaction. Neither Lazard nor any of their respective affiliates owes or accepts any duty, liability or responsibility whatsoever (whether direct or indirect, whether in contract, in tort, under statute or otherwise) to any person who is not a client of Lazard in connection with this document, any statement contained herein, the Potential Transaction or otherwise.

This announcement contains certain forward-looking statements with respect to the financial condition, results of operations and business of the group. Statements that are not historical facts, including statements about the group's beliefs and expectations, are forward-looking statements. Words such as 'expects', 'anticipates','estimates', and 'potential', variations of these words and similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements. These statements are based on current plans, estimates and projections, and therefore undue reliance should not be placed on them. Forward-looking statements speak only as of the date they are made. HSBC Continental Europe makes no commitment to revise or update any forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances occurring or existing after the date of any forward-looking statement. Forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties. Readers are cautioned that a number of factors could cause actual results to differ, in some instances materially, from those anticipated or implied in any forward-looking statements.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210618005347/en/

Contacts:

Media enquiries to:

Sophie Ricord

sophie.ricord@hsbc.fr

+ 33 6 89 10 17 62

Raphaele-Marie Hirsch

raphaele.marie.hirsch@hsbc.fr

+ 33 7 64 57 35 55
Onureg is the first and only once-daily, frontline oral maintenance therapy in the European Union (EU) for patients with a broad range of acute myeloid leukemia (AML) subtypes

In the pivotal QUAZAR AML-001 study, Onureg significantly improved overall survival and relapse-free survival in patients with AML

Bristol Myers Squibb (NYSE: BMY) today announced that the European Commission (EC) has granted full Marketing Authorization for Onureg (azacitidine tablets) as a maintenance therapy in adult patients with acute myeloid leukemia (AML) who achieved complete remission (CR) or complete remission with incomplete blood count recovery (CRi) following induction therapy with or without consolidation treatment and who are not candidates for, including those who choose not to proceed to, hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT). Onureg isthe first and only once-daily, frontline oral maintenance therapy to demonstrate significant overall survival and show a relapse-free survival benefit in patients with a broad range of AML subtypes.

The centralized Marketing Authorization approves use of Onureg in all EU member states, as well as Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein.* Onureg is approved in the United States for the continued treatment of adult patients with AML who achieved first CR or CRi following intensive induction chemotherapy and who are not able to complete intensive curative therapy.1 In Canada, Onureg is approved as a maintenance therapy for adult patients with AML who achieved CR or CRi following induction therapy with or without consolidation treatment, and who are not eligible for HSCT.2

"An unmet need exists for maintenance therapy options for acute myeloid leukemia in the European Union, given responses to induction therapy may be of short duration and the risk of relapse is high, especially for patients not eligible for stem cell transplant," said Andrew Wei, MBBS, Ph.D., QUAZAR AML-001 lead investigator, Alfred Hospital and Monash University, Melbourne, Australia. "The approval of Onureg by the European Commission has the potential to clinically benefit and change the treatment paradigm of patients with acute myeloid leukemia, across a range of subtypes."

The EC approval of Onureg was based on results from the QUAZAR AML-001 study, a Phase 3, international, randomized, double-blind trial. Eligible patients were ages 55 years or older, had newly diagnosed AML, intermediate or poor cytogenetics, had achieved first CR or CRi following intensive induction chemotherapy with or without consolidation treatment (per investigator preference prior to study entry), and were not candidates for HSCT at the time of screening.3

"Today's approval of Onureg represents a significant advance for patients in the European Union living with acute myeloid leukemia, who have remained in urgent need of maintenance therapies for this aggressive blood cancer," said Noah Berkowitz, M.D., Ph.D., senior vice president, Hematology Development, Bristol Myers Squibb. "We are committed to helping to improve long-term outcomes and greatly extending survival for patients with hard-to-treat diseases, as we work collaboratively with European Union member states to make Onureg available to eligible patients as quickly as possible."

*Centralized Marketing Authorization does not include approval in Great Britain (England, Scotland and Wales).

About QUAZAR AML-001

QUAZAR AML-001, is a Phase 3, international, randomized, double-blind study. Eligible patients were ages 55 years or older, had newly diagnosed AML, intermediate or poor cytogenetics, had achieved first CR or CRi following intensive induction chemotherapy with or without consolidation treatment (per investigator preference prior to study entry) within four months (+/- 7 days) before randomization, and were not candidates for HSCT at the time of screening. The study enrolled 472 patients, randomized 1:1 to receive either Onureg 300 mg (N=238) or placebo (N=234) orally, once daily, for 14 days of a 28-day cycle, plus best supportive care and results were published in the New England Journal of Medicine in December 2020.*3,4

Median OS, the primary endpoint, from time of randomization was greater than two years (24.7 months; 95% CI: 18.7 to 30.5) in the Onureg arm compared to 14.8 months for placebo (HR: 0.69, 95% CI: 0.55 to 0.86; p=0.0009). The median duration of treatment was 12 cycles (1 to 82) for Onureg and 6 cycles with placebo (1 to 76).Median relapse-free survival was also significantly longer with Onureg than with placebo (10.2 months and 4.8 months, respectively; p<0.001). Overall health-related quality of life was preserved during Onureg treatment.4

The most common adverse events in both treatment arms were Grade 1 or 2 gastrointestinal events. Common Grade 3 or 4 adverse events were neutropenia (41% of patients treated with Onureg and 24% of patients with placebo) and thrombocytopenia (22% and 21%, respectively).4

*Individual results associated with regulatory authorities may differ from publication.

About AML

AML is one of the most common acute leukemias in adults.5 The worldwide incidence of AML has been estimated at more than 350,000 cases, and the estimated 5-year survival rate for AML in Europe is 17%.6 AML is characterized by the rapid growth of abnormal cells in the bone marrow and as such interferes with normal blood cell production and function. Because of the impaired production of red blood cells, platelets and white blood cells, it can present with signs of anemia, bleeding and infections.5 AML is a heterogeneous disease associated with diverse genetic mutations, and can rapidly progress and lead to death if not promptly treated.7 AML response to treatment may be of short duration, meaning following patients' initial response to chemotherapy, about 50% of patients relapse within one year, thus representing a significant unmet need for maintenance treatment options that prolong overall survival.8

About Onureg

Onureg, the first and only frontline maintenance therapy approved in the European Union for patients with a broad range of AML subtypes, is a once-daily oral hypomethylating agent that incorporates into DNA and RNA. The main mechanism of action is thought to be hypomethylation of DNA, as well as direct cytotoxicity to abnormal hematopoietic cells in the bone marrow. Hypomethylation may restore normal function to genes that are critical for cell differentiation and proliferation.9,10 Onureg is approved in the U.S. for continued treatment of adult patients with acute myeloid leukemia who achieved first complete remission (CR) or complete remission with incomplete blood count recovery (CRi) following intensive induction chemotherapy and are not able to complete intensive curative therapy. Onureg is also approved in Canada as maintenance therapy for adult patients with acute myeloid leukemia (AML) who achieved complete remission (CR) or complete remission with incomplete blood count recovery (CRi) following induction therapy with or without consolidation treatment, and who are not eligible for hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT).

U.S. IMPORTANT SAFETY INFORMATION

CONTRAINDICATIONS

ONUREG is contraindicated in patients with known severe hypersensitivity to azacitidine or its components.

WARNINGS AND PRECAUTIONS

Risks of Substitution with Other Azacitidine Products: Due to substantial differences in the pharmacokinetic parameters, the recommended dose and schedule for ONUREG are different from those for the intravenous or subcutaneous azacitidine products. Treatment of patients using intravenous or subcutaneous azacitidine at the recommended dosage of ONUREG may result in a fatal adverse reaction. Treatment with ONUREG at the doses recommended for intravenous or subcutaneous azacitidine may not be effective. Do not substitute ONUREG for intravenous or subcutaneous azacitidine.

Due to substantial differences in the pharmacokinetic parameters, the recommended dose and schedule for ONUREG are different from those for the intravenous or subcutaneous azacitidine products. Treatment of patients using intravenous or subcutaneous azacitidine at the recommended dosage of ONUREG may result in a fatal adverse reaction. Treatment with ONUREG at the doses recommended for intravenous or subcutaneous azacitidine may not be effective. Do not substitute ONUREG for intravenous or subcutaneous azacitidine. Myelosuppression: New or worsening Grade 3 or 4 neutropenia and thrombocytopenia occurred in 49% and 22% of patients who received ONUREG. Febrile neutropenia occurred in 12%. A dose reduction was required for 7% and 2% of patients due to neutropenia and thrombocytopenia. Less than 1% of patients discontinued ONUREG due to either neutropenia or thrombocytopenia. Monitor complete blood counts and modify the dosage as recommended. Provide standard supportive care, including hematopoietic growth factors, if myelosuppression occurs.

New or worsening Grade 3 or 4 neutropenia and thrombocytopenia occurred in 49% and 22% of patients who received ONUREG. Febrile neutropenia occurred in 12%. A dose reduction was required for 7% and 2% of patients due to neutropenia and thrombocytopenia. Less than 1% of patients discontinued ONUREG due to either neutropenia or thrombocytopenia. Monitor complete blood counts and modify the dosage as recommended. Provide standard supportive care, including hematopoietic growth factors, if myelosuppression occurs. Increased Early Mortality in Patients with Myelodysplastic Syndromes (MDS): In AZA-MDS-003, 216 patients with red blood cell transfusion-dependent anemia and thrombocytopenia due to MDS were randomized to ONUREG or placebo. 107 received a median of 5 cycles of ONUREG 300 mg daily for 21 days of a 28-day cycle. Enrollment was discontinued early due to a higher incidence of early fatal and/or serious adverse reactions in the ONUREG arm compared with placebo. The most frequent fatal adverse reaction was sepsis. Safety and effectiveness of ONUREG for MDS have not been established. Treatment of MDS with ONUREG is not recommended outside of controlled trials.

In AZA-MDS-003, 216 patients with red blood cell transfusion-dependent anemia and thrombocytopenia due to MDS were randomized to ONUREG or placebo. 107 received a median of 5 cycles of ONUREG 300 mg daily for 21 days of a 28-day cycle. Enrollment was discontinued early due to a higher incidence of early fatal and/or serious adverse reactions in the ONUREG arm compared with placebo. The most frequent fatal adverse reaction was sepsis. Safety and effectiveness of ONUREG for MDS have not been established. Treatment of MDS with ONUREG is not recommended outside of controlled trials. Embryo-Fetal Toxicity: ONUREG can cause fetal harm when administered to a pregnant woman. Azacitidine caused fetal death and anomalies in pregnant rats via a single intraperitoneal dose less than the recommended human daily dose of oral azacitidine on a mg/m2 basis. Advise pregnant women of the potential risk to a fetus. Advise females of reproductive potential to use effective contraception during treatment with ONUREG and for at least 6 months after the last dose. Advise males with female partners of reproductive potential to use effective contraception during treatment with ONUREG and for at least 3 months after the last dose.

ADVERSE REACTIONS

Serious adverse reactions occurred in 15% of patients who received ONUREG. Serious adverse reactions in =2% included pneumonia (8%) and febrile neutropenia (7%). One fatal adverse reaction (sepsis) occurred in a patient who received ONUREG.

Most common (=10%) adverse reactions with ONUREG vs placebo were nausea (65%, 24%), vomiting (60%, 10%), diarrhea (50%, 21%), fatigue/asthenia (44%, 25%), constipation (39%, 24%), pneumonia (27%, 17%), abdominal pain (22%, 13%), arthralgia (14%, 10%), decreased appetite (13%, 6%), febrile neutropenia (12%, 8%), dizziness (11%, 9%), pain in extremity (11%, 5%).

LACTATION

There are no data regarding the presence of azacitidine in human milk or the effects on the breastfed child or milk production. Because of the potential for serious adverse reactions in the breastfed child, advise women not to breastfeed during treatment with ONUREG and for 1 week after the last dose.

Please see full Prescribing Information and Summary of Product Characteristics for ONUREG.

Bristol Myers Squibb: Creating a Better Future for People with Cancer

Bristol Myers Squibb is inspired by a single vision-transforming patients' lives through science. The goal of the company's cancer research is to deliver medicines that offer each patient a better, healthier life and to make cure a possibility. Building on a legacy across a broad range of cancers that have changed survival expectations for many, Bristol Myers Squibb researchers are exploring new frontiers in personalized medicine, and through innovative digital platforms, are turning data into insights that sharpen their focus. Deep scientific expertise, cutting-edge capabilities and discovery platforms enable the company to look at cancer from every angle. Cancer can have a relentless grasp on many parts of a patient's life, and Bristol Myers Squibb is committed to taking actions to address all aspects of care, from diagnosis to survivorship. Because as a leader in cancer care, Bristol Myers Squibb is working to empower all people with cancer to have a better future.

About Bristol Myers Squibb

Bristol Myers Squibb is a global biopharmaceutical company whose mission is to discover, develop and deliver innovative medicines that help patients prevail over serious diseases. For more information about Bristol Myers Squibb, visit us at BMS.com or follow us on LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube, Facebook and Instagram.

Celgene and Juno Therapeutics are wholly owned subsidiaries of Bristol-Myers Squibb Company. In certain countries outside the U.S., due to local laws, Celgene and Juno Therapeutics are referred to as, Celgene, a Bristol Myers Squibb company and Juno Therapeutics, a Bristol Myers Squibb company.

Cautionary Statement Regarding Forward-Looking Statements

This press release contains "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 regarding, among other things, the research, development and commercialization of pharmaceutical products. All statements that are not statements of historical facts are, or may be deemed to be, forward-looking statements. Such forward-looking statements are based on historical performance and current expectations and projections about our future financial results, goals, plans and objectives and involve inherent risks, assumptions and uncertainties, including internal or external factors that could delay, divert or change any of them in the next several years, that are difficult to predict, may be beyond our control and could cause our future financial results, goals, plans and objectives to differ materially from those expressed in, or implied by, the statements. These risks, assumptions, uncertainties and other factors include, among others, that the outcome of pricing and reimbursement negotiations in individual countries in Europe may delay or limit the commercial potential of Onuregazacitidine tablets) for the additional indication described in this release, that continued approval of such product candidate for such additional indication described in this release may be contingent upon verification and description of clinical benefit in confirmatory trials, and whether such product candidate for such additional indication described in this release will be commercially successful. No forward-looking statement can be guaranteed. Forward-looking statements in this press release should be evaluated together with the many risks and uncertainties that affect Bristol Myers Squibb's business and market, particularly those identified in the cautionary statement and risk factors discussion in Bristol Myers Squibb's Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2020, as updated by our subsequent Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q, Current Reports on Form 8-K and other filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The forward-looking statements included in this document are made only as of the date of this document and except as otherwise required by applicable law, Bristol Myers Squibb undertakes no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statement, whether as a result of new information, future events, changed circumstances or otherwise.

References:

ONUREG U.S. Prescribing Information. Accessed February 2021. ONUREG Canada Product Monograph. Accessed January 2021. Clinical Trials.gov. Efficacy of Oral Azacitidine Plus Best Supportive Care as Maintenance Therapy in Subjects With Acute Myeloid Leukemia in Complete Remission (QUAZAR AML-001). Available at https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT01757535. Accessed February 2021. Wei, A. et al. New England Journal of Medicine 2020; 383:2526-2537; Oral Azacitidine Maintenance Therapy for Acute Myeloid Leukemia in First Remission. Available at: https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2004444. American Cancer Society. What is AML?. https://www.cancer.org/cancer/acute-myeloid-leukemia/about/what-is-aml.html. Accessed on: July 23, 2020. Maynadie et al. Haematologica. 2013 Feb; 98(2): 230-238. Int J Hematol Oncol Stem Cell Res. Acute Myeloid Leukemia-Genetic Alterations and Their Clinical Prognosis. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5767295/. Leukaemia Care. Relapse in Acute Myeloid Leukaemia (AML). https://media.leukaemiacare.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/Relapse-in-Acute-Myeloid-Leukaemia-AML-Web-Version.pdf. Accessed on July 23, 2020. Laille et al. PLoS One. 2015;10(8):e0135520 Garcia-Manero et al. J Clin Oncol. 2011;29(18):2521-7

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609-252-7509

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Nina.Goworek@bms.com
NOT FOR RELEASE, PUBLICATION OR DISTRIBUTION, DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY, IN OR INTO THE UNITED STATES, CANADA, NEW ZEALAND, AUSTRALIA, JAPAN, HONG KONG, SINGAPORE OR SOUTH AFRICA OR ANY OTHER JURISDICTION IN WHICH THE DISTRIBUTION OR RELEASE WOULD BE UNLAWFUL.

HELSINKI, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The initial public offering of Spinnova Plc ("Spinnova" or the "Company) to private individuals and entities in Finland (the "Public Offering") has been oversubscribed. Therefore, the subscription period for the Public Offering has been discontinued in accordance with the terms and conditions of the initial public offering today, 18 June 2021, at 4:00 p.m. Finnish time. The institutional offering continues in accordance with the terms and conditions of the initial public offering.

For further information

Janne Poranen, CEO

+358 400 138711

janne.poranen@spinnova.fi

Certified Adviser:

Alexander Corporate Finance Oy

+358 50 520 4098

DISCLAIMER

The information contained herein is not for publication or distribution, directly or indirectly, in or into the United States, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore or South Africa. The information contained herein does not constitute an offer of securities for sale in the United States, nor may the securities be offered or sold in the United States. Spinnova Plc (the "Company") does not intend to register any portion of the offering in the United States under the U.S. Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the "SecuritiesAct") or to offer securities to the public in the United States.

The issue, exercise and/or sale of securities are subject to specific legal or regulatory restrictions in certain jurisdictions. The Company or Carnegie Investment Bank AB, Finland Branch assume no responsibility in the event there is a violation by any person of such restrictions.

The information contained herein shall not constitute an offer to sell or a solicitation of an offer to purchase or subscribe, nor shall there be any sale of the securities referred to herein in any jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful prior to registration, exemption from registration or qualification under the securities laws of any such jurisdiction. Investors must neither accept any offer for, nor acquire, any securities to which this document refers, unless they do so on the basis of the information contained in the applicable prospectus published or offering circular distributed by the Company.

The Company has not authorized any offer to the public of securities in the United Kingdom or in any Member State of the European Economic Area other than Finland. With respect to the United Kingdom and each Member State of the European Economic Area other than Finland and which applies the Prospectus Regulation (each, a "RelevantMemberState"), no action has been undertaken or will be undertaken to make an offer to the public of securities requiring publication of a prospectus in any Relevant Member State. As a result, the securities may only be offered in Relevant Member States (a) to any legal entity, which fulfils the requirements of a qualified investor as defined in the Prospectus Regulation; or (b) in any other circumstances falling within Article 1(4) of the Prospectus Regulation. For the purposes of this paragraph, the expression an "offer of securities to the public" means a communication to persons in any form and by any means, presenting sufficient information on the terms of the offer and the securities to be offered, so as to enable an investor to decide to purchase or subscribe for those securities. The expression "Prospectus Regulation" means Regulation (EU) 2017/1129 of the European Parliament and of the Council, as amended.

This communication is directed only at (i) persons who are outside the United Kingdom or (ii) persons who have professional experience in matters relating to investments falling within Article 19(5) of the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (Financial Promotion) Order 2005 (the "Order") and (iii) high net worth entities, and other persons to whom it may lawfully be communicated, falling within Article 49(2) of the Order (all such persons together being referred to as "relevantpersons"). Any investment activity to which this communication relates will only be available to and will only be engaged with, relevant persons. Any person who is not a relevant person should not act or rely on this document or any of its contents.

Full terms, conditions and instructions for the contemplated initial public offering are included in the prospectus that has been prepared by Spinnova Plc in connection with the contemplated initial public offering. The Finnish language prospectus is available on the Company's website at www.spinnovagroup.com/fi/listautuminen and the English language offering circular is available on the Company's website at www.spinnovagroup.com/ipo.

Any offering to subscribe for the securities referred to in this communication will be made by means of a prospectus that will be provided by Spinnova Plc pursuant to an approval by the Finnish Financial Supervisory Authority and containing detailed information about the Company and management, as well as financial information. This communication is an advertisement and not a prospectus for the purpose of the Prospectus Regulation. Investors should not acquire any securities referred to in this communication except on the basis of information contained in a prospectus. Any approval and registration by the Finnish Financial Supervisory Authority of the prospectus shall not be considered as an endorsement of the securities that are the subject of the prospectus.

Certain statements in this communication are "forward-looking statements". Forward-looking statements include statements concerning plans, assumptions, projections, objectives, targets, goals, strategies, future events, future revenues or performance, capital expenditures, financing needs, plans or intentions relating to acquisitions, the Company's competitive strengths and weaknesses, plans or goals relating to financial position, future operations and development, its business strategy and the anticipated trends in the industry and the political and legal environment in which it operates and other information that is not historical information, investments, the contemplated initial public offering and listing, future cash flow generation, operating profit margin, financial position and liquidity. In some instances, they can be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology, including the terms "believes", "intends", "may", "will" or "should" or, in each case, their negative or variations on comparable terminology.

Forward-looking statements in this release are based on assumptions, many of which in turn are based on assumptions. By their very nature, forward-looking statements involve inherent risks, uncertainties and assumptions, both general and specific, and the risk exists that the predictions, forecasts, projections, plans and other forward-looking statements will not be achieved. Given these risks, uncertainties and assumptions, you are cautioned not to place undue reliance on such forward-looking statements. Any forward-looking statements contained herein speak only as at the date of this release. Save as required by law, the Company and the managers do not intend and do not assume any obligation, to update or correct any forward-looking statement contained herein.

This information was brought to you by Cision http://news.cision.com

https://news.cision.com/spinnova/r/public-offering-of-spinnova-has-been-oversubscribed-and-the-subscription-period-has-been-discontinue,c3370427
Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - June 18, 2021) - Quaterra Resources Inc. (OTCQB: QTRRF) (TSXV: QTA) ("Quaterra" or the "Company") is pleased to announce that all resolutions set out in the Company's notice of meeting and information circular were passed by shareholders at the Company's Annual General Meeting held on June 17, 2021. A total of 80,209,430 common shares were represented at the meeting representing 35.94% of the Company's outstanding common shares.

At the meeting, shareholders approved the appointment of PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP as auditors of the Company for the ensuing year. In addition, shareholders ratified the Company's 10% rolling stock option plan, and the Company's Shareholder Rights Plan. A copy of the Shareholder Rights Plan is available under the Company's profile on SEDAR at www.sedar.com. The Shareholder Right's Plan has been approved by the TSX Venture Exchange and requires ratification by shareholder resolution every three years.

At the meeting, shareholders also re-elected the following four directors: Thomas Patton, John Kerr, LeRoy Wilkes and Terry Eyton. Following the shareholder meeting, the board of directors appointed Travis Naugle as an additional director, and reappointed the following officers: Thomas Patton as Chairman, Travis Naugle as CEO, Stephen Goodman as President, Lei Wang as CFO and Lawrence Page, Q.C. as Corporate Secretary.

The Company also announces that it has granted 4,950,000 incentive stock options to directors, officers, employees and consultants pursuant to the Company's stock option plan. The options are exercisable at a price of $0.245 per share for a period of five years.

Drilling Update at MacArthur

On May 4, 2021 Quaterra began a 7,000 ft to 10,000 ft core drilling program at the MacArthur copper project (see News Release of May 7, 2021 for details). As of June 15, 2021 a total of 4,618 ft has been drilled with initial assay results from Skyline Assayers & Laboratories expected in July. The focus of the drill program is to provide additional data required to complete a prefeasibility study on the project including representative metallurgical samples.

About Quaterra Resources Inc.

Quaterra Resources Inc. is a copper-gold exploration company focused on projects with the potential to host large-scale mineral deposits attractive to major mining companies. It is advancing its Yerington copper project in the historic Yerington Copper District, Nevada. It continues to investigate opportunities to acquire prospects in North America on reasonable terms and the partnerships with which to advance them.

On behalf of the Board of Directors,

Stephen Goodman

President

For more information please contact:

Karen Robertson

Corporate Communications

778-898-0057

Jay Oness

Investor Relations

604-808-9479

Email: info@quaterra.com

Website: www.quaterra.com

Some statements in this news release are forward-looking statements under applicable United States and Canadian laws. These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties which may cause results to differ materially from those expressed in the forward-looking statements. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date thereof. The Company does not undertake to update any forward-looking statement that may be made from time to time except in accordance with applicable securities laws.

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.

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/88004


CHICAGO (dpa-AFX) - The 737 MAX 10, Boeing Co.'s largest 737 Max model, is taking its maiden flight today, reports said citing people familiar with the matter.



The flight after months of testing and certification will be around 10 a.m. local time from the Seattle area. The schedule could change depending on weather or other factors. Meanwhile, the jetliner is expected to enter commercial service in 2023.



The Max 10 will be the first one from the 737 MAX family to take flight since it received U.S. regulators' clearance in November last year to resume service after being grounded for nearly two years.



The Boeing 737 MAX, which was the world's biggest-selling aircraft, was grounded worldwide in March 2019 following two accidents within just six months, which together claimed 346 lives.



The Federal Aviation Administration in mid November had lifted its 20-month safety ban on the 737 Max aircraft, and on November 30, it issued first airworthiness certificate for one of the new Boeing 737 Max jets.



In January this year, the European Union and Britain cleared Boeing's 737 Max for return to service in their respective regions.



As per reports, the Max 10, the largest of the single-aisle jets, is the final planned Max model. The aircraft can seat up to 230 travelers in a single-cabin configuration and fly 3,300 nautical miles or about 6,000 kilometers if outfitted with an auxiliary fuel tank.



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HANGZHOU, China, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- China National Silk Museum in Hangzhou officially launched the 2021 Silk Road Week on the morning of June 18, themed Cultural Diversity and Sustainable Development, featuring a programme filled with activities, including the Annual Report of Cultural Heritage on the Silk Roads 2020, the Museum Directors' Forum, Curators' forum: Silk Roads and Digital Curation, Special Annual Conference of the Chinese Association of Dunhuang and Turfan Studies, among others.

Three physical exhibitions will also be open to the public, namely, Creation from Creature: Plants and Animals on the Silk Roads, Silk Roads on Silk Scarves, and Silk Roads International Photography Exhibition.

Meanwhile, the first fully online 3D exhibition is showing entitled, Gathering in the Galaxy: Great Treasures from the Silk Roads, containing 79 artifacts from 47 museums all over the world. Among them are national-level precious treasures, murals that require complex transportation, and fragile ceramics and porcelains, all "gathering remotely" online. Taking a cue from the geographical routes, the "Silk Roads Map" is the prologue and the exhibition is divided into four chapters: Steppe Silk Road, Silk Road of the Desert Oasis, Maritime Silk Road, and the Buddhist Silk Road.

Initiated by the China National Silk Museum, the Silk Road Online Museum (SROM) project partners with museums worldwide and compiles a platform with four distinctive categories: Digital Collection, Digital Exhibition, Digital Knowledge, and Online-Curating. Over 40 museums from 18 countries have joined the project including, the British Museum, the State Historical Museum in Russia, the Hirayama Ikuo Silk Road Museum in Japan, the Archaeological Museum of Thessaloniki in Greece, and the National Museum of Antiquities in Tajikistan. The project facilitates cooperation and mutual learning and provides an online research and curating platform for museum and university education.

The first edition of Silk Road Week was held successfully in Hangzhou in June 2020, attracting over 200 international museums and institutions to engage in various online and offline events. As an international cultural exchange activity, Silk Road Week aims to mark the anniversary for the day the Silk Road - from Chang'an to the Tianshan Corridor - was listed on the UNESCO World Heritage List on June 22, 2014.

The Silk Road Online Museum and exhibition is now officially open to the public: (https://iidos.cn/museum).

Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1536442/image_1.jpg


PARIS (dpa-AFX) - French drug maker Sanofi (SNY) said that the European Commission has approved Aubagio or teriflunomide for the treatment of pediatric patients 10 to 17 years of age with relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis or RRMS.



The approval was based on data from the Phase 3 TERIKIDS study. The approval confirmed Aubagio as the first oral multiple sclerosis (MS) therapy for first-line treatment of children and adolescents with MS in the European Union.



Aubagio was initially approved in the EU in 2013 for the treatment of adult patients with RRMS and the EC approval for the pediatric indication provides an additional year of marketing protection in the European Union.



Multiple sclerosis is a chronic neurodegenerative disease in which a person's immune system causes damage to the brain and spinal cord.



Last week, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration had rejected an application requesting the expansion of Aubagio for the treatment of children and adolescents, ages 10 to 17, with relapsing forms of multiple sclerosis.



The FDA deemed the data submitted were not sufficient to obtain approval of an indication in the pediatric population at this time. The FDA updated the Aubagio label to include safety data from the pediatric clinical trial program. The indicated use of Aubagio in patients 18 years and older remains unchanged, Sanofi said in a press release last week.



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CHICAGO, IL / ACCESSWIRE / June 18, 2021 / TruCrowd Funding, Inc. ("TCF" or the "Company"), an international business platform for crowdfunding and other financial services, announced today, that through Mr. Vincent Petrescu, TCF is the first U.S. based portal operator to be selected by EY Strategy and Consulting (EYSC) and the Tokyo Metropolitan Government, to join the Invest Tokyo program as an equity crowdfunding portal.

"I was pleased to be amongst the few U.S. funding portal owner-operators considered as a candidate for this Japanese economic initiative, stated Vincent Petrescu, the CEO of TruCrowd Funding, Inc. "Of course, I was more excited to discover that we were the only U.S. group approved to launch an equity crowdfunding portal in the Japanese markets."

(TruCrowd listed: Office of the Governor for Policy Planning [Tokyo] as an overseas financial company participating in the Tokyo market-fiscal 2020)

Management indicated that Mr. Petrescu was contacted in early 2020 by EYSC, to participate in the evaluation of U.S. equity crowd funding portal owner-operators who could be candidates to enter the Japanese financial markets. EYSC worked closely with Mr. Petrescu and TCF co-founder, Digital Asset Monetary Network, Inc., to assist TCF with meeting the requirements of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government. With EYSC acting as the lead consultant and Japanese liaison, Mr. Petrescu was able to establish the TruCrowd brand as the first US-based equity crowdfunding operator in Japan.

Now a subsidiary of TCF, the operations of TruCrowd Japan ("TCJ")-Japanese-based company owned by TruCrowd Funding, Inc.-will be rolled out in three stages. Once complete, TCJ will serve both the Japanese and U.S. equity crowdfunding markets, in a cross border styled collaboration, with other TCF subsidiaries and allied companies. Management indicated that TCJ is the first of four international funding portals that are slated to be launched by TruCrowd Funding, Inc. What is unique about TruCrowd Japan however, is that the initiative itself was originated by regulatory agencies and business institutions in Japan, not the Company.

Mr. Petrescu, who is also CEO of the top-rated, FINRA regulated, equity crowdfunding portal, TruCrowd, Inc., concluded, "As a business leader in this space, differentiating and building the TruCrowd brand is of the utmost importance. I believe that establishing a competitive global footprint will be one of our differentiators-enhancing brand visibility, brand loyalty, and our overall value proposition.

Lastly, and it goes without saying, we greatly appreciate the support given to us by EYSC and look forward to expanding the TruCrowd brand further around the world."

EY Strategy and Consulting / EY Japan: EY????????????????????? | EY Japan - part of the Ernst & Young network of member firms.

Tokyo Metropolitan Government: https://www.metro.tokyo.lg.jp/

Digital Asset Monetary Network (DigitalAMN): https://digitalamn.com/

ABOUT TruCrowd Funding, Inc.

TruCrowd Funding, Inc. is an international business services platform focused on crowdfunding and participation in the secondary markets, both in the U.S. and abroad. The business was founded by Vincent Petrescu, CEO of the top-ten rated, FINRA regulated, equity crowdfunding portal owner-operator, TruCrowd, Inc.

Twitter: https://twitter.com/v_petrescu

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vpetrescu/

Forward Looking Statements

Statements in this press release that are not statements of historical or current fact constitute 'forward-looking statements.' Such forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other unknown factors that could cause the Company's actual operating results to be materially different from any historical results or from any future results expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. In addition to statements that explicitly describe these risks and uncertainties, readers are urged to consider statements that contain terms such as 'believes,' 'belief,' 'expects,' 'expect,' 'intends,' 'intend,' 'anticipate,' 'anticipates,' 'plans,' 'plan,' to be uncertain and forward-looking. No information in this press release should be construed as any indication whatsoever of our future revenues, stock price, or results of operations.

Contact:

Vincent Petrescu

vp@TruCrowd.com

SOURCE: TruCrowd Funding, Inc.

View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/652257/TruCrowd-Funding-Selected-to-Participate-in-Japanese-Financial-MarketsLaunches-TruCrowd-Japan


WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - The White House announced that cases of coronavirus infections and deaths in the United States are at the lowest levels since the start of the pandemic.



'Instead of heading into a summer, like last summer - of isolation, uncertainty, and loss - we're headed into a summer of joy, celebration, and increasing freedom from the virus,' COVID-19 Response Coordinator Jeff Zients said at a routine news conference Thursday.



He told reporters that as a result of the success vaccinating Americans, cases and deaths are down more than 90 percent since President Joe Biden took office.



The United States on Thursday reported 11230 new coronavirus infections, taking the national total to 33,509,772. This is lower than the 7-day average of 12294.



This represents a decrease of about 16 percent from the prior seven-day average and is the lowest seven-day average since March 27, 2020.



291 new deaths reported on the same day took the total COVID death toll in the country to 600,935, as per the latest data from Johns Hopkins University. The 7-day average of COVID deaths has declined to 286 per day, the first time that average falling below 300 since March 27, 2020.



California reported the most number of cases - 985, while Texas recorded most deaths - 34 Thursday.



California is the worst affected state in terms of both the COVID metrics - 3,806,739 cases and 63,256 deaths.



The seven-day average of hospitalizations is about 2,000 per day, a decrease of about 10 percent from the prior seven-day period.



A total of 28,641,439 people have so far recovered from coronavirus infection in the country.



The coronavirus test positivity rate across the nation has fallen to 2.4 percent.



A total of 314,969,386 vaccine doses have been administered so far nationally.



More than 147.8 million people, or 44.5 percent of the US population, are fully vaccinated, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.



86 percent of K-through-12 educators and school staff had already been vaccinated by the end of May.



Thursday, the Biden administration announced an initiative called the Antiviral Program for Pandemics, which aims to catalyze the development of new medicines to combat COVID-19, and to prepare for other pandemic threats.



Towards this end, the government has allocated an investment of $3.2 billion from the American Rescue Plan as part of the COVID-19 Antiviral Development Strategy.



Out of this, $500 million has been earmarked for fundamental research and laboratory support; a billion for preclinical and clinical evaluation; $700 million for the development and manufacturing through NIH; and $1 billion to establish the Antiviral Drug Discovery Centers for Pathogens of Pandemic Concern.



CDC director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said that CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, or ACIP, will meet on Friday to review data on reports of myocarditis and pericarditis, or inflammation of the heart and surrounding tissue, reported among adolescents and young adults vaccinated in the United States.



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Montreal, Quebec--(Newsfile Corp. - June 18, 2021) - Darkhorse Technologies Ltd. (the "Company" and/or "Darkhorse") is pleased to announce it has entered into a landmark digital asset Partnership Agreement with the Darryll Holland and Kieren Fallon owned Harraton Court Stables ("Harraton Court").

Under the terms of the Partnership Agreement, Darkhorse has exclusive rights to act as the Harraton Court digital asset Business Management Partner for amongst other things, the processing and on/off ramping of cryptocurrencies, blockchain integration and for the worldwide dissemination of individual and syndicated racehorse sales packages.

Speaking on behalf of Harraton Court Stables, Charlie O'Neil commented, "Initially, the partnership will allow Harraton Court to explore the use of cryptocurrencies, digital assets and blockchain technology, the Darkhorse team have been at the forefront of introducing fintech to various industries for quite a while, we believe this partnership is one of the first instances of a professional horseracing stable exploring alternative fintech opportunities."

Initially, Harraton Court will experiment with cryptocurrencies as a way for horseracing enthusiasts to potentially own a racehorse and reward loyal fans with special discounts and race day experiences.

Head Trainer, Darryll Holland commented, "This ground-breaking Partnership Agreement with Darkhorse is another testament to our team and how the horseracing industry is adapting to digital change, it is becoming increasingly difficult for stables such as ours to gain global recognition and connect to the next generation of horseracing enthusiasts. Darkhorse offers that bridge, using their sophisticated technology and know-how we can now connect with a worldwide database of digital wallet holders and use cryptocurrency as a form of consideration. David and the Darkhorse team are changing the way traditional industries such as ours operate, specifically from a FinTech perspective, we have the opportunity to offer any digital wallet holder the option to become an actual real racehorse owner, that in itself is pretty cool and it fits in well with our overall vision, to become one of the world's most successful stables both on and off the racetrack."

Why Not Purchase a Harraton Court Racehorse Using Your Cryptocurrency: Harraton Court will soon offer any digital wallet holder located anywhere in the world the option to purchase a racehorse outright or participate in a more traditionally accessible syndicate model. Using cryptocurrency as a form of consideration to purchase, engaging with the digital wallet holder, and allowing the use of cryptocurrency as a form of consideration to purchase a racehorse, Holland & Fallon's intentions are to open their highly regarded stables to a whole new marketplace of Next-Gen horseracing enthusiasts.

Darkhorse Interim CEO, Mr. David van Herwaarde commented, "As we move our company into the next phase of a public listing, I'm delighted to say we have executed, as we believe, a first-of-its-kind partnership agreement with Harraton Court Stables, together we are combining the world of horseracing and the equine industry in general with multiple forms of digital asset backed products. Darryll and Kieren are two of the biggest riding talents of their generation, without question the guys are recognised horseracing legends, what they have created at Harraton Court is quite astonishing, we look forward to working with the whole team on this exciting new project. As a keen horseracing enthusiast myself, I've read that Paddy Power are offering 40-1 about the Harraton Court team sending out a Royal Ascot winner this year and 66-1 that they will celebrate a group 1 winner in 2021 and the same firm are offering 150-1 that the guys land a classic before the end of 2022; my monies are 100% on the guys to deliver on the track as well as off."

About Harraton Court Stables:

Harraton Court Stables lie on the north-west edge of the modern conurbation of Newmarket. It was built during the 1880s by John George Lambton, the third Earl of Durham and a major figure in the history of horse racing.

Today, Harraton Court Stables is an exciting new racing and training operation, led by top international Group 1 winning jockey, Darryll Holland as head trainer, alongside six-time champion jockey, Kieren Fallon. Harraton Court Stables has handpicked an elite training team offering the opportunity for groups of racing enthusiasts to share in top-quality racehorse syndicates, offering fun and affordable racehorse ownership under the care of two of horseracing's greats.

About Darkhorse Technologies Ltd:

Darkhorse Technologies Limited is a Business to Business (B2B) FinTech Group. The Company has established itself as a market leading service provider to the multibillion-dollar digital asset industry. Using sophisticated technology, we have bridged the commercialisation gap between cryptocurrency and financial services, establishing a disruptive line of business. By uniting these billion-dollar industries we have monetized a highly scalable digital asset backed business. Darkhorse is incorporated in Canada and has multiple business partners that operate across the globe.

Contact:

IR Manager

Darkhorse Technologies Ltd

Investor enquiries - corporateservices@darkhorsetek.com

Website: www.darkhorseteck.com

Forward-Looking Statements

Certain matters discussed within this press release are forward-looking statements including, but not limited to the timing and ability to enter into any additional acquisitions and expand our business, the ability to list the Company on a securities exchange as well as the size of future revenue or trading volume or future access to capital markets. Although Darkhorse Technologies Ltd believes the expectations reflected in such forward-looking statements are based on reasonable assumptions, it can give no assurance that its expectations will be attained. Darkhorse Technologies Ltd does not undertake any duty to update any statements contained herein (including any forward-looking statements), except as required by law. Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from expectations include general industry considerations, regulatory changes, changes in local or national economic conditions, our ability to access the capital markets on terms acceptable to us, or at all, our ability to comply with our contractual covenants, including in respect of our debt and other risks detailed from time to time in Darkhorse Technologies Ltd reports filed on SEDAR

THIS NEWS RELEASE IS NOT FOR DISTRIBUTION IN THE UNITED STATES OR TO U.S. NEWS AGENCIES

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/88023
18 JUNE 2021

JZ Capital Partners Limited(the "Company")

(a closed-end collective investment scheme incorporated as a non-cellular company with limited liability under the laws of Guernsey with registered number 48761)

Extraordinary General Meeting

The Board of Directors of the Company is pleased to announce that the Resolutions proposed at the Extraordinary General Meeting of the Company held today were duly passed without amendment by the required majorities.

Further details of the Resolutions are set out in the Circular and Notice of Extraordinary General Meeting dated 28 May 2021, copies of which are available on the National Storage Mechanism at: https://data.fca.org.uk/#/nsm/nationalstoragemechanism. Defined terms in this announcement shall, unless the context otherwise requires, have the same meaning as used in the Circular.

Shareholders should note that the approval of the Resolutions by the Shareholders of the Company represents the satisfaction of one of the conditions to which each of the Loan Note Proposal and the Orangewood Proposal were subject. There are however a small number of other standard conditions precedent that are required to be satisfied before the Proposals can become effective. It is anticipated that the outstanding conditions precedent relating to the Loan Note Proposal will be satisfied, and accordingly the Loan Note Proposal is expected to complete, on or before 25 June 2021. It is also anticipated that the outstanding conditions precedent relating to the Orangewood Proposal will be satisfied, and accordingly the Orangewood Proposal is expected to complete, before 25 June 2021, being the date falling five business days after the Shareholder approval to the Orangewood Proposal was obtained.

For information, the following proxy votes (which should be read alongside the Notice of Extraordinary General Meeting) were received prior to the Extraordinary General Meeting:

Votes for Percentage of votes cast for Votes against Percentage of votes cast against Votes withheld Resolution 1 41,719,903 99.90% 40,049 0.10% 19,159,899 Resolution 2 41,719,903 99.90% 40,049 0.10% 19,159,899

Note -A vote withheld is not a vote in law and has not been counted in the votes for and against a resolution.



For further information:

Ed Berry / Kit Dunford

FTI Consulting +44 (0) 20 3727 1046 / 1143 David Zalaznick

Jordan/Zalaznick Advisers, Inc. +1 (212) 485 9410 Sam Walden

Northern Trust International Fund Administration

Services (Guernsey) Limited +44 (0) 1481 745001

Important Notice

This announcement includes statements that are, or may be deemed to be, "forward-looking statements". These forward-looking statements can be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology, including the terms "believes", "estimates", "anticipates", "expects", "intends", "may", "will" or "should" or, in each case, their negative or other variations or comparable terminology. These forward-looking statements relate to matters that are not historical facts. By their nature, forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties because they relate to events and depend on circumstances that may or may not occur in the future. Forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance. The Company's actual investment performance, results of operations, financial condition, liquidity, policies and the development of its strategies may differ materially from the impression created by the forward-looking statements contained in this announcement. In addition, even if the investment performance, result of operations, financial condition, liquidity and policies of the Company and development of its strategies, are consistent with the forward-looking statements contained in this announcement, those results or developments may not be indicative of results or developments in subsequent periods. These forward-looking statements speak only as at the date of this announcement. Subject to their legal and regulatory obligations, each of the Company, the Investment Adviser and their respective affiliates expressly disclaims any obligations to update, review or revise any forward-looking statement contained herein whether to reflect any change in expectations with regard thereto or any change in events, conditions or circumstances on which any statement is based or as a result of new information, future developments or otherwise.

END
NINGBO, China, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- On June 8, 2021, the Sixth Meeting of the China-CEEC Business Council was held in Ningbo, Zhejiang province. At the meeting, representatives of chambers of commerce and businesses from China and Central and Eastern European Countries said that trade recovery required the joint efforts of all parties in the face of continued spread of the Coronavirus across the globe. Ms. Li Xiang, Founder and CEO of Coyote Bioscience (Beijing) Co., Ltd-a representative of Chinese enterprises, said: "We are willing to use the rapid nucleic acid testing that gives result in 30min to help build back trade in the post-epidemic era. Rapid testing plays a crucial part in food testing, custom clearance for trade and traveling, and COVID-19 preparedness and response of global conference.

Gao Yan, CCPIT Chairperson; Zheng Shanjie, Governor of Zhejiang Province; Robert Tomanek, Deputy Minister of Economic Development, Labor and Technology of Poland; Laszlo Balogh, Deputy State Secretary of the Ministry of Finance, Hungary and other state leaders and representatives of the Business Council attended the opening ceremony and delivered speeches.

Gao Yan said that over the past year, the members of the China-CEEC Business Council have joined hands in fighting against COVID-19, helped companies to resume work and production and contributed our part to the recovery and development of the world economy. CCPIT is willing to strengthen cooperation with council members to bridge the trade and investment cooperation between enterprises.
TALLIN, ESTONIA / ACCESSWIRE / June 18, 2021 / The tech company will be the main sponsor of the Global Blockchain Congress in Dubai on June 21 and 22.

Woonkly, the startup that aspires to become a unicorn, is going after the Middle East market as the main sponsor of the Global Blockchain Congress in Dubai, focused on decentralized finance and the very popular Non Fungible Tokens (NFTs).

Woonkly is an Estonian company dedicated to creating blockchain-based technology products. The founder and CEO is Daniel Santos, a serial entrepreneur, and Youtuber of economics and geopolitics.

'Entrepreneurship is a path that takes years where one day you feel on top of the world and the next you have nothing,' says Daniel Santos, known as 'Mr. Santos'.'

Disruption is one of the values of Woonkly, whose technological developments delve into decentralized finances and NFTs. So is empowering its users, to whom it plans to give back control over their data and finances, through products such as its NFT Decentralized Social Network.

Woonkly and NFTs

The world is changing, and new technologies are advancing rapidly. Woonkly is riding the wave and catering to these emerging sectors by creating breakthrough technologies so that any user can take advantage of the benefits of blockchain in everyday spaces such as a social network, investments, or buying art.

A digital artist sold through the famous auction house Christie's his NFT artwork 'Everydays: The first 5000 days' for about 58 million euros.

Woonkly is betting on this type of digital assets and will present in Dubai during the 7th Edition of the Global Blockchain Congress 'Celebrating DeFi And NFTs' by Agora Group, its next flagship product. An NFT Marketplace that converts in a few clicks any digital asset (Image, audio, text, or video) into a tradable NFT and also ensures the ownership of the same through the registration of the user with a KYC (Know Your Client), a system used to identify a person.

Woonkly today

As of today, Woonkly has a team of 35 professionals from all business fields, spread across several countries worldwide, and expects to be 60 by the end of the year.

The blockchain is an ecosystem where most things are yet to be done. This represents a tremendous market opportunity for Woonkly, as there are many areas in which it is necessary to innovate, and many needs to be covered. Woonkly has gone from being just a startup with an idea to a technology solutions company, 'Woonkly Labs,' that will surprise us by bringing the Blockchain to 'ordinary people.'

Contact Details

Esteban Diaz

+34 616 60 71 16

SOURCE: Woonkly

View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/652295/Woonkly-to-Sponsor-the-Most-Prestigious-Blockchain-Congress-in-Dubai
Indicative offering price range: 6.53 to 7.22 per share

Capital increase of 3,636,363 new ordinary shares (corresponding, for information only, to an amount of 25.0 million euros including issue premium 1

Divestment by i) Sofina, A PLUS Finance, Highland Capital Partners, Endeavour II LP, Trocadero 2015 LP, FIPS Tech Growth Secondary, DES Holding V LLC (the "Divesting Financial Shareholders"), Monsieur Denis Chavanis, DCH Invest, Madame Florence Pierre (the "Business Angels"), Monsieur Boris Saragaglia, Monsieur Jeremie Touchard et Monsieur Paul Lorne (the "Founding Shareholders", together with the Divesting Financial Shareholders and the Business Angels, the "Divesting Shareholders) of a maximum of 545,454 shares in the event that the extension clause is exercised in full (corresponding, for information purposes, to an amount of 3.7 million euros 1 ) and by (ii) the Divesting Financial Shareholders of a maximum of 627,272 additional shares sold in the event that the over-allotment option is exercised in full (corresponding, for information purposes, to an amount of 4.3 million euros 1

Total transaction amount based on the mid-point of the indicative price range: 33.1 million euros if the extension and over-allotment clauses are exercised

Subscription commitments from Financiere Arbevel and Amiral Gestion in amounts of 4.0 million euros and 6.0 million euros respectively (i.e. a total of 30% of the total amount of the operation 1

Closing of the Open Price Offer: July 1, 2021 (5:00pm CEST for physical subscriptions and 8:00pm CEST for online subscriptions)

Closing of the Global Offering: July 2, 2021 (1:00 pm cest)

Shares eligible to French PEA-PME subject to conditions

Gaia rating of 73/100 awarded by EthiFinance ("Advanced" level, 14 points higher than the benchmark)

Regulatory News:

Not for release, directly or indirectly, in the United States of America, Canada, Australia or Japan.

Spartoo (the "Company") (Paris:ALSPT), one of the leading online footwear and fashion retailers in Europe, is announcing the launch of its initial public offering ("IPO") with a view to having its shares admitted to trading on the Euronext Growth multilateral trading facility in Paris (ISIN: FR00140043Y1 ticker: ALSPT).

On June 17, 2021, the Autorite des Marches Financiers ("AMF") approved the Company's prospectus under number 21-233. The prospectus comprises the registration document approved on June 4, 2021 under number I.21-028, a supplement to the registration document approved on June 17, 2021, a securities note and a summary of the prospectus (included in the securities note).

Spartoo, one of the leaders in online sales of shoes and fashion items in Europe, supported by:

One of the widest ranges of fashion items in France and Europe , with more than 8,000 brands and more than 700,000 items, including 16 exclusive proprietary brands

, with more than 8,000 brands and more than 700,000 items, including 16 exclusive proprietary brands 12 years of uninterrupted growth and generation of a positive EBITDA since 2014

A distribution model geared to serving the European online footwear and apparel market, which was worth an estimated $84 billion in 2020 and is expected to grow by around 8% per year on average between 2020 and 2025 2

A customer-centric approach demonstrated by a very high level of customer satisfaction (Trustpilot rating of 4.3, one of the highest in its industry in France) and underpinned by its control over the whole value chain, including transport, logistics and after-sales service

(Trustpilot rating of 4.3, one of the highest in its industry in France) and underpinned by its control over the whole value chain, including transport, logistics and after-sales service Substantial economies of scale thanks to in-house technological expertise , based on the quality of its IT architecture and proprietary digital marketing tools

, based on the quality of its IT architecture and proprietary digital marketing tools SRI commitments at the heart of the Company's strategy: Spartoo recently achieved a Gaia rating of 73, which according to EthiFinance corresponds to an "Advanced" level of performance

Solid development objectives

supported by powerful competitive advantages

Spartoo is aiming to achieve3

GMV growth in CAGR of at least 15% per year between 2021 and 20244 and an EBITDA margin of around 7% in 2024.

3. Based on the Company's growth strategy as stated in section 5.3 of the registration document

4. Gross Merchandise Volume (GMV) represents the total value of goods and services sold net of VAT and net of returns CAGR: Compound Annual Growth Rate

Reasons for the offering: accelerate the development of its online and offline business as well as its service offering for professionals

The purpose of this capital increase is to provide the Company with the financial resources necessary to implement its growth strategy over the next three years, which is based primarily on (i) the development of its BtoC business, both online and offline, (ii) the development of third-party services and (iii) growth in sales and profitability. The amount of the investment is approximately 30 million euros.

At the end of 2021, the Group expects to achieve growth in its GMV of more than 10% compared to 2020 (it should be noted that the Group expects its GMV to grow by more than 30% in the first quarter of 2021 compared to the first quarter of 2020). Between 2021 and 2024, the Group expects to achieve growth in its GMV in TMCA of more than 15% per year.

At the end of 2024, the Group envisages an EBITDA margin of approximately 7%.

The estimated net proceeds of the issuance of the New Shares, which amount to approximately 22.2 million euros (based on the mid-point of the indicative price range of the Offer), will be used: (i) up to 50-60% of the funds raised, to improve the offering by investing in new product inventory, developing the range related to interior decoration and acquiring new brands, (ii) up to 35-45% of the funds raised to strengthen brand awareness by acquiring more expensive customers through investments in traditional and online media and by developing its stores, and (iii) up to 10-15% of the funds raised, to develop services for third parties.

If the capital increase is completed for 85% of the New Shares offered, the net proceeds of the issue will amount to approximately 17.6 million euros. Under this assumption, the Company remains confident in its ability to reach its announced GMV and EBITDA objectives. The Company considers that its 2021-2024 objectives would not be called into question and will have to adapt its strategy by reducing the amounts allocated to the acquisition of new products and new brands.

The funds raised through the capital increase will thus contribute to the realization of the 30 million euros investment plan, and the Company will seek, if necessary, additional financing, notably from banks and non-dilutive.

Structure of the offering

As part of the IPO, the offered shares are intended to be distributed through an overall offering (the "Offering"), consisting of:

a public offering in France in the form of an open price offer, mainly intended for individuals (the "Offre Prix Ouvert" or "OPO"), in which:

orders will be split on the basis of the number of shares requested: an A1 order component (from 1 to 200 shares) and an A2 order component (amount in excess of 200 shares);

A1 order components will have preferential treatment relative to A2 order components in the event that not all orders can be met in full;

A Global Placement mainly intended for institutional investors (the "GlobalPlacement") consisting of:

a placement in France; and

an international private placement in certain countries, with the exception, in particular, of the United States of America, Japan, Canada and Australia.

If the demand expressed in the OPO allows it, the number of shares allotted in response to orders issued as part of the OPO will be at least equal to 10% of the number of shares offered as part of the Offering (before any exercise of the extension clause and the over-allotment option). If demand for the OPO is less than 10% of the number of New Shares, the balance of the New Shares not allotted under the OPO will be allotted under the Global placement.

Size of the Offering

Capital increase of 3,636,363 new ordinary shares (corresponding, for information only, to an amount of 25.0 million euros including issue premium3

Extension clause

To fulfill subscription requests received as part of the Offering, the Divesting Shareholders may, depending on the extent of demand and after consultation with the global coordinators and joint bookrunners, decide to divest up to 545,454 shares (the "Extension Clause") representing up to 15% of the number of new shares.

The decision to exercise the Extension Clause will be made at the time the price is set, scheduled for July 2, 2021, and will be announced in the Company's press release and Euronext's notice announcing the results of the Offering.

The divested shares covered by the Extension Clause will be made available to the market at the Offering price.

Over-allotment option

To cover any surplus allotments, the Divesting Financial Shareholders will grant to Natixis (the "Stabilizing Agent"), in the name and on behalf of the global coordinators and joint bookrunners, an option allowing them to acquire a number of shares not exceeding 15% of the combined number of new shares and divested shares that may result from the exercise of the Extension Clause, i.e. up to 627,272 supplementary divested shares, thus facilitating stabilization transactions (the "Over-Allotment Option

The Over-Allotment Option will be exercisable, in part or in whole, at the Offering price, only once, at any time, by the Stabilizing Agent, in the name of and on behalf of the global coordinators and joint bookrunners, from the time the Offering price is determined and until the 30th calendar day from the start of trading of the Company's shares on Euronext Growthin Paris i.e., based on the indicative timetable, from July 7, 2021 to August 6, 2021 inclusive.

If the Over-Allotment Option is exercised, this information will be brought to the public's attention through a press release disseminated by the Company.

Indicative Offering price range

The price of the shares offered as part of the OPO will be equal to the price of the shares offered as part of the Global Placement (the "Offering Price

The Offering Price may fall within a range of between 6.53 and 7.22 per share, a range approved by the Company's Supervisory Board4 on June 16, 2021 and confirmed by the Board of Directors on June 17, 2021 (the "Indicative Offering Price Range

This information is given for information only and should not, in any circumstances, be considered an indication of the Offering Price, which may be set outside of this Indicative Offering Price Range.

Proceeds from the issue

The gross proceeds from the issue of new shares would be approximately 25 million euros (based on the mid-point of the Indicative Offering Price Range).

If 85% of the capital increase were carried out, the gross proceeds from the issue of new shares would be approximately 20.2 million euros (based on a price equal to the lower end of the Indicative Offering Price Range).

The net proceeds from the issue of new shares are estimated at approximately 22.2 million euros (based on the mid-point of the Indicative Offering Price Range).

If 85% of the capital increase were carried out, the net proceeds from the issue of new shares would be approximately 17.6 million euros (based on a price equal to the lower end of the Indicative Offering Price Range).

Subscription commitments received

The Company has received subscription commitments amounting to 10.0 million euros (i.e. 30% of the total Offering amount), summarized in the table below:

Investor Subscription commitments

(in millions) Financiere Arbevel 4.0 Amiral Gestion 6.0 Total 10.0

None of these subscription commitments constitutes a conclusion guarantee within the meaning of Article L. 225-145 of the French Commercial Code.

Abstention commitment by the Company

The Company will make an abstention commitment (from the time the placement agreement is signed) for a period of 180 calendar days following the Offering's settlement date, subject to certain usual exceptions.

Lock-up commitments

Boris Saragaglia, Jeremie Touchard and Paul Lorne, the Company's founding shareholders, will make a lock-up commitment (from the time the placement agreement is signed) for a period of 360 calendar days following the Offering's settlement date, subject to certain usual exceptions.

The Divesting Financial Shareholders and the Business angels, will make a lock-up commitment (from the time the placement agreement is signed) for a period of 180 calendar days following the Offering's settlement date, subject to certain usual exceptions.

Certain other managers (Jean-Francois Clei, Aymeric Moser and Francois Bordet) have undertaken to retain their shares for a period of 180 days following the settlement-delivery date of the Offer, subject to certain customary exceptions.

Divestments and price disparity

Existing shares will be sold by the Divesting Shareholders in the framework of the Offer in case of exercise of the extension clause and by the Divesting Financial Shareholders in the framework of the Offer in case of exercise of the over-allotment option. The most important sale represents 222,497 shares of the Company. The 1,172,726 shares to be sold will be allocated as follows:

Investors Total number of shares sold Boris Saragaglia 140,695 Jeremie Touchard 61,433 Paul Lorne 89,702 DCH Invest 15,903 Mme Florence Pierre 5,920 M. Denis Chavanis 2,693 Highland Capital Partners 222,497 Endeavour II LP 95,386 Sofina 187,339 A PLUS Finance 88,012 Trocadero 2015 LP 80,380 FIPS Tech Growth Secondary 73,328 DES Holding V LLC 109,438 Total 1,172,726

Indicative timetable for the transaction:

June 17, 2021 Approval of the Prospectus by the AMF June 21, 2021 Publication of the press release announcing the Offering and the release of the Prospectus Publication by Euronext of the OPO opening notice Opening of the OPO and the Global Placement July 1, 2021 Closing of the OPO at 5:00 pm (Paris time) for physical subscriptions and at 8:00 pm (Paris time) for online subscriptions July 2, 2021 Closing of the Global Placement at 1:00 pm (Paris time) Determination of the Offering Price Signature of the Placement Agreement Publication by Euronext of the notice announcing the result of the Offering Publication of the press release stating the Offering Price and the result of the Offering July 6, 2021 Settlement-delivery of shares issued under the OPO and the Global Placement July 7, 2021 Start of trading in the Company's shares on Euronext Growthon a trading line entitled "ALSPT" Start of any stabilization period 6 August 2021 Deadline for exercise of the Over-Allotment Option End of any stabilization period

Subscription arrangements

Persons who wish to participate in the OPO should submit their orders to an authorized financial intermediary in France, no later than July 1, 2021 at 5:00 pm (Paris time) for physical subscriptions and 8:00 pm (Paris time) for online subscriptions, if such an option is given to them by their financial intermediary.

To be taken into account, orders placed as part of the Global Placement must be received by Natixis or TP ICAP Europe no later than July 2, 2021 at 1:00 pm (Paris time), unless the Offering period is closed early (it being stipulated however that the duration of the Global Placement may not be less than three stock market trading days).

Subscription forms are not to be sent directly to the Company.

It is specified that:

each order must be for a minimum of 1 share;

- each person placing an order may place only one order with a single financial intermediary;

- if the application of the reduction rate(s) does not result in the allotment of a whole number of shares, that number will be rounded down to the nearest whole number;

- orders will be expressed as a number of shares, with no indication of the price, and will be deemed to be placed at the Offering Price.

Eligibility of the Offering to French PEA-PME

The Company confirms that it meets the PEA-PME eligibility criteria set out in the French implementing order of 4 March 2014 (decree no. 2014-283). Accordingly, the Company's shares may be held within PEA-PME accounts, which have the same tax benefits as standard PEA plans*.

These plans are subject to conditions and limits. Those interested should contact their financial advisor.

Spartoo share identification codes

Name: Spartoo

ISIN: FR00140043Y1

Ticker: ALSPT

Compartment: Euronext Paris

Business segment: E-commerce

Financial intermediaries

NATIXIS

BEYOND BANKING

TP

ICAP Global Coordinator

and Associate Bookrunner Global Coordinator

and Associate Bookrunner

Availability of the prospectus

Copies of the prospectus, which was approved by the AMF on June 17, 2021 under the number 21-233, composed of the document d'enregistrement filed with the AMF on June 4,2021 under number I. 21-028, the supplement to the document d'enregistrement approved on June 17, 2021 and a securities note (including a summary of the prospectus), may be obtained free of charge and upon request from Spartoo, 16 rue Henri Barbusse, 38100 Grenoble and from the internet websites of Spartoo (www.spartoo-finance.com) and the AMF (www.amf-france.org).

Risk factors

Spartoo draws the public's attention to Chapter 3, "Risk factors", of the document d'enregistrement registered with the AMF, and to Chapter 2 "Risk factors related to the Offering" of the securities note.

All information regarding Spartoo's planned IPO is available at www.spartoo-finance.com.

About Spartoo

With 8,000 brands and 700,000 items, Spartoo offers one of the widest selections of fashion items (shoes, ready-to-wear, bags) in more than 30 countries in Europe, thanks to its team of more than 400 employees of nearly 30 different nationalities. In 2020, the Group generated sales of 134 million, corresponding to a GMV (Gross Merchandise Value) of 194 million, 39% of which was generated internationally. With an integrated logistics platform and after-sales service, Spartoo stands out for its customer-centric approach, as evidenced by a very high customer satisfaction rate. The strategy is based on the strong synergies between the online sales model and the advantages of physical stores, which support loyalty and brand awareness. Capitalizing on its e-commerce know-how, Spartoo has also developed a complete range of services for professionals.

Disclaimer

No communication and no information in respect of the offering by Spartoo of the shares (the "Shares") may be distributed to the public in any jurisdiction where a registration or approval is required. No steps have been or will be taken outside of France in any jurisdiction where such steps would be required. The offering and subscription of the Shares may be subject to specific legal or regulatory restrictions in certain jurisdictions. Spartoo assumes no responsibility for any violation of any such restrictions by any person.

This announcement is not a prospectus within the meaning of Regulation (EU) 2017/1129 of the European Parliament and the Council of June 14th, 2017, as amended (the "Prospectus Regulation

With respect to the member States of the European Economic Area other than France (each, a "relevant member State") no action has been undertaken or will be undertaken to make an offer to the public of the securities requiring a publication of a prospectus in any relevant member State. As a result, the Shares can only be offered and will only be offered in relevant member States (a) to legal entities that are qualified investors as defined in the Prospectus Regulation or (b) in accordance with the other exemptions of Article 1(4) of the Prospectus Regulation.

For the purposes of this paragraph, the notion of an "offer to the public of Shares" in each of the relevant member States, means any communication to persons in any form and by any means, presenting sufficient information on the terms of the offer and the Shares to be offered, so as to enable an investor to decide to purchase or subscribe for those securities.

This selling restriction comes in addition to the other selling restrictions applicable in the other member States.

This press release and the information it contains are being distributed to and are only intended for persons who are (x) outside the United Kingdom or (y) in the United Kingdom who are qualified investors (as defined in the Prospectus Regulation as it forms part of domestic law by virtue of the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018) and are (i) investment professionals falling within Article 19(5) of the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (Financial Promotion) Order 2005, as amended (the "Order"), (ii) high net worth entities and other such persons falling within Article 49(2)(a) to (d) of the Order ("high net worth companies", "unincorporated associations", etc.) or (iii) other persons to whom an invitation or inducement to participate in investment activity (within the meaning of Section 21 of the Financial Services and Market Act 2000) may otherwise lawfully be communicated or caused to be communicated (all such persons in (y)(i), (y)(ii) and (y)(iii) together being referred to as "Relevant Persons"). Any invitation, offer or agreement to subscribe, purchase or otherwise acquire securities to which this press release relates will only be engaged with Relevant Persons. Any person who is not a Relevant Person should not act or rely on this press release or any of its contents.

This press release does not constitute or form a part of any offer or solicitation to purchase or subscribe for securities nor of any offer or solicitation to sell securities in the United States. The securities mentioned herein have not been and will not be registered under the U.S. Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the "U.S. Securities Act"), and may not be offered or sold, directly or indirectly, within the United States except pursuant to an exemption from or in a transaction not subject to, the registration requirements of the Securities Act. Spartoo does not intend to register any portion of the proposed offering in the United States nor to conduct a public offering of securities in the United States.

The distribution of this document in certain countries may constitute a breach of applicable law. The information contained in this document does not constitute an offer of securities for sale in the United States, Canada, Australia or Japan.

This press release may not be published, forwarded or distributed, directly or indirectly, in the United States, Canada, Australia or Japan.

The prospectus approved by the Autorite des marches financiers contains forward-looking statements. No guarantee is given as to these forecasts being achieved, which are subject to risks, including those described in the prospectus, and to the development of economic conditions, the financial markets and the markets in which Spartoo operates.

In case of exercise of the over-allotment option, Natixis (or any entity acting on its behalf), acting as a stabilizing agent in the name and on behalf of all global coordinating institutions and associated book runners, may, without being bound and having the right to terminate at any time, during a period of 30 days following the start of trading of the Company's shares on Euronext Growth in Paris, i.e., according to the indicative timetable, from July 7, 2021 up to and including August 6, 2021, carry out transactions with a view to maintaining the market price of Spartoo shares in a manner consistent with applicable laws and regulations and, in particular, Regulation (EU) No. 596/2014 of the European Parliament and of Council of April 16, 2014 supplemented by Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2016/1052 of March 8, 2016. Any stabilizing action aims to support the market price of Spartoo shares and may affect the share price.

MiFID II Product governance target market: According to the product governance requirements contained within: (a) EU Directive 2014/65/EU on markets in financial instruments, as amended ("MiFID II"); (b) Articles 9 and 10 of Commission Delegated Directive (EU) 2017/593 supplementing MiFID II; and (c) local implementing measures, the target market assessment in respect of the shares offered in the global offering (the "Offered Shares") has led to the conclusion that: (i) the target market of the Offered Shares is eligible counterparties, professional clients and retail clients, each as defined in MiFID II; and (ii) all channels for distribution of the Offered Shares are appropriate (the "Target Market Assessment"). Any person subsequently offering, selling or recommending the Offered Shares (a "distributor") should take into consideration the manufacturers' Target Market Assessment; however, a distributor subject to MiFID II is responsible for undertaking its own target market assessment in respect of the Offered Shares (by either adopting or refining the manufacturers' Target Market Assessment) and determining appropriate distribution channels.

The Target Market Assessment is conducted solely for the purposes of the manufacturer's product approval process and neither constitutes an assessment for any particular client of suitability or appropriateness for the purposes of MiFID II nor a recommendation to invest in, or purchase, or take any other action whatsoever with respect to the Offered Shares.

Notwithstanding the Target Market Assessment, the attention of distributors is drawn to the fact that: the price of the Offered Shares may decline and investors could lose all or part of their investment; the Offered Shares offer no guaranteed income and no capital protection; and that an investment in the Offered Shares is compatible only with investors who do not need a guaranteed income or capital protection, who are capable (either alone or in conjunction with an appropriate financial or other adviser) of evaluating the merits and risks of such an investment and have sufficient resources to be able to bear any losses that may result therefrom.

1 Based on the mid-point of the indicative offering price range.

2 Source: Euromonitor

3 Based on the mid-point of the indicative offering price range.

4 The Company was transformed into a societe anonyme with a board of directors on the day the prospectus was approved by the AMF.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210618005497/en/

Contacts:

Spartoo

04 58 00 16 84

investors@spartoo.com

NewCap

Louis-Victor Delouvrier

Nicolas Fossiez

Investor Relations

spartoo@newcap.eu

01 44 71 94 94

NewCap

Nicolas Merigeau

Media Relations

spartoo@newcap.eu

01 44 71 94 98
VANCOUVER, BC / ACCESSWIRE / June 18, 2021 / Marvel Discovery Corp. (TSXV:MARV)(Frankfurt:O4T1)(OTCQB:IMTFF); ("Marvel" or the "Company") is pleased to announce that its common shares have been approved for trading on the OTCQB Venture Market (the "OTCQB"), operated by the OTC Markets Group, New York. The Company commenced trading on the OTCQB at todays opening under the current symbol "IMTFF". The Company's common shares will also continue to trade on the TSX Venture Exchange under the symbol "MARV".

Karim Rayani Chief Executive Officer commented, "The QB listing will broaden our shareholder base in the U.S. to wider audience and expand our visibility creating better transparency allowing various platforms in the U.S. to execute orders with greater clarity creating more opportunity to share our story with our neighbors next door."

The OTCQB is the premier venture marketplace for entrepreneurial and developing US and international companies that are committed to providing a high-quality trading and information experience for their US investors. To be eligible, Companies must meet high financial standards, including be current in their financing reporting, follow best practice corporate governance, have a professional third-party sponsor introduction, demonstrate compliance with U.S. securities laws, and undergo an annual verification and management certification process. The OTCQB is recognized by the Securities and Exchange Commission as an established public market and provides current public information to investors that need to analyze, value, and trade securities. Investors can find current financial disclosure and Real-Time Level 2 quotes for the Company on www.otcmarkets.com.

About Marvel Discovery Corp.

Marvel, listed on the TSX Venture Exchange for over 25 years, is a Canadian based emerging resource company. The Company is systematically exploring its extensive property positions in:

Exploits Zone, Newfoundland (Slip and Victoria Lake - Au Prospects )

) Atikokan, Ontario (BlackFly - Au prospect )

) Red Lake, Ontario (Camping Lake - Au prospect)

Elliot Lake, Ontario (Serpent River/Pecors - Ni-Cu-PGE discovery ) & ( Uranium - REE's )

) & ( ) Quebec (Duhamel - Ni-Cu-Co prospect & Titanium, Vanadium, and Chromium prospect )

) Prince George, British Columbia (Wicheeda North - Rare Earth Elements prospect)

The Company's website is: https://marveldiscovery.ca/

ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD

Marvel Discovery Corp.

"Karim Rayani"

Karim Rayani

President/Chief Executive Officer, Director

Tel: 604 716 0551 email: k@r7.capital

Disclaimer for Forward-Looking Information:

Certain statements in this release are forward-looking statements which reflect the expectations of management. Forward-looking statements consist of statements that are not purely historical, including any statements regarding beliefs, plans, expectations or intentions regarding the future. Forward-looking statements in this press release relate to, among other things: completion of the proposed Arrangement. Actual future results may differ materially. There can be no assurance that such statements will prove to be accurate, and actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such statements. Forward-looking statements reflect the beliefs, opinions and projections on the date the statements are made and are based upon a number of assumptions and estimates that, while considered reasonable by the respective parties, are inherently subject to significant business, economic, competitive, political and social uncertainties and contingencies. Readers should not place undue reliance on the forward-looking statements and information contained in this news release concerning these times. Except as required by law, the Company does not assume any obligation to update the forward-looking statements of beliefs, opinions, projections, or other factors, should they change, except as required by law

Neither TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

SOURCE: Marvel Discovery Corp.

View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/652337/Marvel-Upgrades-Its-US-Listing-to-the-OTCQB
Centurion to acquire a Disruptive Water-Soluble Cannabinoid Technology Platform Delivering Rapid Onset, Increased Bioavailability, Premium Taste Profiles and Highly Competitive Cost Structure

Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - June 18, 2021) - Centurion Minerals Ltd. (TSXV: CTN) ("Centurion", or the "Company") wishes to provide an update on its previously announced Amalgamation Agreement (the "Agreement"), with HAI Beverages Inc. ("HAI"), whereby Centurion is acquiring 100% of the outstanding shares and assets of a wholly-owned subsidiary of HAI ("NewHAI") in exchange for common shares of Centurion (the "Acquisition" or "Transaction"). NewHAI holds all material assets of HAI and the Acquisition will constitute a reverse take-over ("RTO") of the Company.

Hai and Centurion continue to work diligently together on multiple aspects related to completing the transaction including: refining the business plan, preparing legal documentation for submission to the TSX Venture Exchange (the "TSX-V"), completing an audit of the Hai business, updating the corporate presentation, arranging financing and implementing the Centurion share consolidation.

Centurion is also working with Hai on commercializing the Hai products in South America with the short-term goal of procuring agreements with current licensed producers to manufacture and distribute water-soluble cannabinoids, in ready-to-drink and dry formulations. Hai is progressing well with the implementation of its business plan in certain South American jurisdictions through the Centurion team's introductions and relationships. Follow this link for the Hai Beverages corporate overview.

Financing



HAI and Centurion (the "Parties") have agreed to increase the financing from the initially announced $2,500,000, to $5,000,000 (the "Financing"). The Parties intend to undertake the Financing by way of private placement at $0.50 per Unit. Each Unit will consist of one common share and one share purchase warrant. The Parties anticipate that each Warrant shall have a term of 24 months commencing on the Closing Date and shall entitle the holder to purchase one common share at a price of $0.65.

Centurion Share Consolidation

The Company intends to undertake a (2 for 1) share consolidation immediately whereby 2 common shares shall be exchanged for 1 post-consolidation common share of the Company. The number of stock options, warrants and related exercise prices will also be adjusted in accordance with the consolidation ratio. For reference, the Company currently has 33,639,473 common shares issued and outstanding.

Warrant Extension

At present, the Company has 20,112,575 warrants exercisable at a price of $0.15 per share and expiring on various dates in 2021 commencing on July 10. Upon completion of the share consolidation, there will be 10,056,287 exercisable at $0.30. The Company intends to apply to the TSX-V for a one-year extension to the exercise expiry date of the warrants.

AGM Date Set

Thursday the 29th of July 2021 has been set as the Centurion Annual General Meeting ("AGM") date. Meeting notice and Management circular will be mailed shortly. To mitigate potential risks of COVID-19 to the health and safety of our shareholders, employees, and other stakeholders, the Company has established a conference call number 1-866-305-1460 (Passcode is 7680289) for those shareholders who wish to follow the proceedings.

About HAI

The HAI team has extensive experience in the beverage and consumer packaged goods industries, founding HAI to capitalize on the disruption of the alcohol beverage market by cannabis infused products. The HAI team's deep understanding of the global beverage market and its experience in developing successful beverage brands, resulted in a proprietary technology platform that delivers:

Rapid onset and high bioavailability, providing an experience similar to the sessionability of alcohol consumption;

A cost structure competitive with non-infused, mass market beverages; and

Multi-format product capabilities.

HAI has developed an extensive portfolio of technology and assets related to water-soluble cannabinoids (THC, CBD, and other cannabinoids), including:

A range of ready-to-drink beverage products targeting specific consumer groups. Seltzers, sodas, and a variety of carbonated cocktail formulations. Single-serve powdered drink offerings utilizing HAI's dry water-soluble technology. Teas, coffee, and mate (also known as cimarron), including K-Cup single serve formats, using a dry water-soluble formulation. A suite of advanced topical products that utilizes HAI's concentrates to enable rapid transdermal delivery of the active cannabinoid ingredients.

The HAI research team has successfully developed multiple infused beverage products containing highly bioavailable cannabinoids that deliver an equivalent experience to alcohol consumption and importantly, result in a rapid onset (within 3 to 5 minutes, compared to other available products having an onset of 15 to 45 minutes). The intellectual property Hai has developed around bioavailability and rapid onset led to HAI's first patent application.

Go-to-Market Strategy

HAI is implementing a two-prong, go-to-market strategy, focused on:

1) Procuring agreements with current licensed producers to manufacture branded and white-labelled water-soluble cannabinoids, in ready-to-drink and dry formulations; and

2) Royalty based licensing of intellectual property (the "IP") and processes to 3rd parties.

Centurion and HAI intend to pursue a cannabis beverage consumer packaged goods licensing and joint venture strategy anchored on the CannaEden operations in Uruguay. Through the CannaEden operation, and within legal jurisdiction parameters, the Company intends to initially pursue sales in Brazil, Argentina and Paraguay. Centurion and CannaEden have advanced discussions with multiple South American pharmaceutical and consumer packaged goods companies in a coordinated effort to quantify potential domestic and international markets as well as determine feasible products and distribution networks.

The Company will also continue to develop and advance markets of initial focus for HAI, including Mexico, Canada, and the U.S.-based Latino markets (a significant, but largely underserved, demographic group). Activity in the U.S. would be limited to CBD-infused beverage manufacturing or licensing of IP within the legal guidelines established by the target jurisdictions and policies of the TSX Venture Exchange (the "TSX-V").

CannaEden Amending Agreement

Pursuant to the Company's news release February 7, 2020, the Company has amended its original share purchase agreement (the "CannaEden Amending Agreement") with the Uruguayan group of companies doing business as CannaEden ("CannaEden") to align with the Company's planned share consolidation discussed above and the Financing. The CannaEden Amending Agreement amends certain provisions such that at closing, Centurion will issue 5 million shares (previously 10 million shares) in exchange for 100% of the issued and outstanding shares and assets of CannaEden. CannaEden will have the ability to earn up to an additional 3 million shares (previously 6 million shares) upon hitting the same revenue milestones as discussed above for NewHAI. The Company has also agreed to amend the Bridge Financing provision whereby CannaEden will have the option to receive either cash reimbursement, or common shares of the Company valued at $0.50, for expenditures incurred between execution date of the original share purchase agreement and closing of the Transaction.

Name Change

Subject to receipt of any necessary shareholder, Board of Director and or regulatory approvals, and coincidental with closing of the Transaction, the Parties propose to change the name of the Company to HAI Technologies Inc.

Trading in the shares of Centurion is expected to remain halted pending receipt of conditional approval from the TSX-V and/or closing of the Transaction.

ABOUT CENTURION

Centurion Minerals Ltd. is a Canadian-based company with a focus on South American asset development. The Company's lead investment has been its interest in the Ana Sofia Agri-Gypsum Fertilizer Project. The Company has been actively pursuing business opportunities in the South American cannabis and related products industry.

"David G. Tafel"

President and CEO

For Further Information Contact:

David Tafel

604-484-2161

Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

Completion of the transaction is subject to a number of conditions, including, but not limited to, Exchange acceptance and if applicable, shareholder approval. Where applicable, the transaction cannot close until the required shareholder approval is obtained. There can be no assurance that the transaction will be completed as proposed or at all. Investors are cautioned that, except as disclosed in the management information circular or filing statement to be prepared in connection with the transaction, any information release or received with respect to the transaction may not be accurate or complete and should not be relied upon.

This news release contains forward-looking statements concerning future operations of Centurion Minerals Ltd. (the "Company"). All forward-looking statements concerning the Company's future plans and operations, including management's assessment of the Company's project expectations or beliefs may be subject to certain assumptions, risks and uncertainties beyond the Company's control. Investors are cautioned that any such statements are not guarantees of future performance and that actual performance and financial results may differ materially from any estimates or projections. Such statements include, among others: conclusions of future economic evaluations; changes in project parameters as plans continue to be refined; failure of equipment or processes to operate as anticipated; accidents and other industry risks; delays and other risks related to construction activities and operations; timing and receipt of regulatory approvals of operations; the ability of the Company and other relevant parties to satisfy regulatory requirements; the availability of financing for proposed transactions, programs and working capital requirements on reasonable terms; the ability of third-party service providers to deliver services on reasonable terms and in a timely manner; market conditions and general business, economic, competitive, political and social conditions.

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/88052
Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - June 18, 2021) - Battery Mineral Resources Corp. (TSXV: BMR) ("Battery" or the "Company") is pleased to announce that the Company will be holding its annual general of its shareholders at 3 p.m. (Pacific Time) on Wednesday, June 30, 2021 (the "2021 AGM"). Due to precautions related the COVID-19 virus, the 2021 AGM will be held virtually only, via teleconference.

Shareholders of record as of May 26, 2021 are entitled to vote their common shares of the Company ("Common Shares") at the 2021 AGM. The Company encourages its shareholders to vote in advance of the 2021 AGM using the Voting Instruction Form or the Form of Proxy included with the mailed meeting materials. Shareholders are reminded that proxies must be received by 10:00 a.m. (Pacific Time) on Wednesday, June 30, 2021. Copies of the meeting materials are available under Battery's SEDAR profile at www.sedar.com.

Concurrent with the completion of its acquisition of the Punitaqui Mine Complex on May 28, 2021, the Company completed the first tranche of a private placement (the "Private Placement"), pursuant to which the Company issued an aggregate of 21,156,074 Common Shares ("Common Shares"), comprising approximately US$10.3 million of Common Shares at an issue price of US$0.52 per share and approximately C$800,000 of Common Shares at an issue price of C$0.65 per share. The Company is pleased to announce that a second tranche of 1,538,462 Common Shares for additional proceeds of US$800,000 will be completed on or about June 24, 2021, for aggregate gross proceeds of US$11.1 million and C$800,000.

About Battery Mineral Resources Corp.

Battery is a multi-commodity resource company which provides investors with exposure to the world-wide trend towards electrification. Battery is engaged in the discovery, acquisition, and development of battery metals (cobalt, lithium, graphite, nickel & copper), in North and South America and South Korea with the intention of becoming a premier and sustainable supplier of battery minerals to the electrification marketplace. Battery is the largest mineral claim holder in the historic Gowganda Cobalt-Silver Camp, Canada and continues to pursue a focused program to build on the recently announced, +1 million pound cobalt resource at McAra by testing over 50 high-grade primary cobalt silver-nickel-copper targets. In addition, Battery owns 100% of ESI Energy Services, Inc., a pipeline equipment rental and sales company with operations in Leduc, Alberta and Phoenix, Arizona. Finally, Battery is currently developing the Punitaqui Mine Complex, and pursuing the potential near term resumption of operations at the prior producing Punitaqui copper-gold mine. The Punitaqui copper-gold mine most recently produced approximately 21,000 tonnes of copper concentrate in 2019 and is located in the Coquimbo region of Chile.

For further information, please contact:

Battery Mineral Resources Corp.

Martin Kostuik

Phone: +1 (604) 229 3830

Email: info@bmrcorp.com

Additional Information

Scientific and technical information pertaining to the cobalt resource at McAra was extracted from the Company's NI 43-101 "Technical report on Cobalt Exploration Assets in Canada" dated as of May 26, 2020 with an effective date of March 31, 2020, prepared by Glen Cole (P. Geo) of SRK Consulting (Canada) Inc.

The securities offered pursuant to the Private Placement have not been, and will not be, registered under the U.S. Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the "U.S. Securities Act") or any U.S. state securities laws, and may not be offered or sold in the United States or to, or for the account or benefit of, United States persons absent registration or any applicable exemption from the registration requirements of the U.S. Securities Act and applicable U.S. state securities laws. This news release shall not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy securities in the United States, nor shall there be any sale of these securities in any jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful.

Neither the TSXV nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSXV) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this press release.

Forward Looking Statements

This news release includes certain "forward-looking statements" under applicable Canadian securities legislation. There can be no assurance that such statements will prove to be accurate, and actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such statements. Forward-looking statements reflect the beliefs, opinions and projections of the Company on the date the statements are made and are based upon a number of assumptions and estimates that, while considered reasonable by the Company, are inherently subject to significant business, economic, competitive, political and social uncertainties and contingencies. Many factors, both known and unknown, could cause actual results, performance, or achievements to be materially different from the results, performance or achievements that are or may be expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements and the parties have made assumptions and estimates based on or related to many of these factors. Such factors include, without limitation, the ability of the Company to obtain sufficient financing to complete exploration and development activities, risks related to share price and market conditions, the inherent risks involved in the mining, exploration and development of mineral properties, government regulation and fluctuating metal prices. Accordingly, readers should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. Battery undertakes no obligation to update publicly or otherwise revise any forward-looking statements contained herein whether as a result of new information or future events or otherwise, except as may be required by law.

NOT FOR DISTRIBUTION TO UNITED STATES NEWS WIRE SERVICES OR FOR RELEASE, PUBLICATION, DISTRIBUTION OR DISSEMINATION DIRECTLY, OR INDIRECTLY, IN WHOLE OR IN PART, IN OR INTO THE UNITED STATES

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/88010
Edmonton, Alberta--(Newsfile Corp. - June 18, 2021) - Radient Technologies Inc. (TSXV: RTI) (OTC Pink: RDDTF) ("Radient" or the "Company"), a commercial manufacturer of diverse, novel and high-quality cannabis extracts and packaged products, is pleased to announce that it has completed its first shipment of Tunaaaaroom Xtracts ("TRX") products to British Columbia and the Yukon. TRX products are now sold through provincially-licensed retailers in a total of 5 provinces, including the Northwest Territories, Saskatchewan, and Alberta.

Subsequent to its first shipment of TRX products to British Columbia, Radient has received a follow up order for the same products to be shipped to retailers in BC.

On December 8th 2020, Radient announced it had signed a licensing agreement with Tunaaaaroom to manufacture and distribute a wide range of premium cannabis extracts targeting cannabis consumers, to be sold across Canada under the Tunaaaaroon Xtracts brand.

Launch of New Tunaaaaroom SKUs This Summer

Due to the successful sales performance of TRX products, Radient and Tunaaaaroom will be launching a new line of SKUs including; live resin vape carts, caviar, THCa dimonds, and several other products expected to come to market this summer.

Update on Progress of Atomic Eh Brand

Radient is pleased to announce that its licensing partner brand, Atomic Eh, has now been successfully onboarded into Saskatchewan, Alberta, BC, and New Brunswick provincial distributors. The Company expects to ship its first products for the Atomic Eh brand late summer, and is working with Atomic Eh to get products onboarded in every province in Canada by the end of July.

On May 3rd 2021, Radient signed a definitive licensing Agreement (the "Agreement") with Atomic Eh to launch its first cannabis brand targeting under-served indigenous communities. Radient is working exclusively with Atomic Eh to roll out cannabis 2.0 products, including BHO extracts, vape cartridges, dry flower, edibles, and solventless extracts using Radient's distribution channels. According to the Agreement, Radient will manufacture between 25,000 - 50,000 units of product per month, to be sold under the Atomic Eh brand, providing Radient with additional product offerings on retail shelf space.

Radient CEO Harry Kuara commented, "We are very pleased that Radient's Tunaaaaroom branded products are now available in more Canadian provinces, increasing our footprint and customer touchpoints. Additionally, the successful sales performance of our TRX products in BC and Saskatchewan indicates that our high-quality products appeal to cannabis consumers. Our partnerships with Tunaaaaroom and Atomic Eh allow us to generate revenue while expanding our brand profile with the launch of additional SKUs in the coming months."

About Radient

Radient Technologies is a commercial manufacturer of diverse, novel and high-quality cannabis extracts and packaged products. Radient develops specialty products and ingredients that contain a broad range of cannabinoid and terpene profiles while meeting the highest standards of quality and safety. Radient also has a science lab that is focused on innovation with expertise in formulations and technologies offering unique solutions in the cannabis and wellness space. Please visit www.radientinc.com for more information.

SOURCE: Radient Technologies Inc.

For more information, please contact: ir@radientinc.com

Forward-Looking Information:

This press release contains "forward-looking information" within the meaning of applicable Canadian securities legislation. Forward-looking information includes, without limitation, statements regarding the growth of the Company's business operations. Generally, forward-looking information can be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology such as "plans", "expects" or "does not expect", "is expected", "budget", "scheduled", "estimates", "forecasts", "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". Forward-looking information is subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause the actual results, level of activity, performance or achievements of Radient, as the case may be, to be materially different from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking information. Although Radient has attempted to identify important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in forward-looking information, there may be other factors that cause results not to be as anticipated, estimated or intended. There can be no assurance that such information will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such statements. Accordingly, readers should not place undue reliance on forward-looking information. Radient does not undertake to update any forward-looking information, except in accordance with applicable securities laws.

NEITHER THE TSX VENTURE EXCHANGE NOR ITS REGULATION SERVICES PROVIDER (AS THAT TERM IS DEFINED IN THE POLICIES OF THE TSX VENTURE EXCHANGE) ACCEPTS RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE ADEQUACY OR ACCURACY OF THIS RELEASE.

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/88063
* Media Statement Border Closure Extension

Ottawa, Ontario--(Newsfile Corp. - June 18, 2021) - The Tourism Industry Association of Canada (TIAC) is today calling the extension of the Canada U.S. border closure a "gut punch" to the millions of Canadians working in the tourism industry. This delay is a blow to the entire tourism economy and sends the message that Canada is closed for safe, vaccinated travel. With the summer season now almost completely at jeopardy, morale in the tourism industry is at an all-time low. Adding insult to injury is the fact that Canadians can still fly to Las Vegas, Florida or anywhere in the U.S. without any quarantine on the U.S. side.

While there is hope that this closure will be modified during the coming days and weeks, TIAC is very concerned that businesses are now slowly being cut off from support while still being unable to operate due to border restrictions and travel prohibitions. As the Prime Minister said, Canada has had "tremendous success" in terms of Canadians being vaccinated. Now is the time to make science-based decisions on the border that build on that success.

Media Interviews: Beth Potter, President and CEO of the Tourism Industry Association of Canada is available for interviews by contacting:

Madison Simmons

Director of Government Affairs, TIAC

msimmons@tiac-aitc.ca /613-864-3079

- 30 -

About the Tourism Industry Association of Canada (TIAC)

Founded in 1930 to encourage the development of tourism in Canada, TIAC serves today as the national private-sector advocate for this $105 billion sector. Based in Ottawa, TIAC takes action on behalf of Canadian tourism businesses and promotes positive measures that help the industry grow and prosper.





Tourism Industry Association of Canada

To view an enhanced version of this graphic, please visit:

https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/7876/88067_c6de3a713411090a_001full.jpg

Source: Tourism Industry Association of Canada (TIAC)

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/88067
Anduril Industries, an Irvine, Calif.-based defense technology company, raised $450m in Series D funding and a post-money valuation of $4.6 billion.

The round was led by Elad Gil, with participation from Andreessen Horowitz, 8VC, Founders Fund, General Catalyst, Lux Capital, Valor Equity Partners, and D1 Capital Partners.

Led by co-founder and CEO Brian Schimpf, Anduril is a defense technology company building advanced technologies (including AI, computer vision, sensor fusion, optics and automation) to solve some of the most important & complex national security challenges. The companys AI powered software, Lattice, uses computer vision, machine learning, and mesh networking to combine real-time sensor data to create a single, autonomous operating picture and command and control platform.

Lattice ties together Andurils family of site security solutions deployed along the southwest border to provide situational awareness, and on military bases in the U.S. and abroad to autonomously detect, track, and interdict intrusions by people, drones, and other vehicles. Lattice is also the operating system that enables Andurils autonomous unmanned aircraft, such as the new Ghost 4 sUAS, to perform their missions.

Elad Gil is a serial entrepreneur, operating executive, and investor or advisor to private companies such as AirBnB, Airtable, Anduril, Benchling, Coinbase, Gusto, Instacart, Opendoor, PagerDuty, Pinterest, Square, Stripe, and others. Elad has invested in over 30 unicorn companies worth $1B or more, most of them at the seed or series A.

FinSMEs

18/06/2021
twine, a San Francisco, CA and NYC-based company that provides virtual, hybrid and in person networking solutions for events and remote teams, raised $3.3M in seed funding, bringing its total funding to $4.7M.

The round was led by Moment Ventures with participation from Coelius Capital, AltaIR Capital, AltaClub, Mentors Fund, Rosecliff Ventures, and Bloom Venture Partners. Clint Chao, founding Partner at Moment, will join twines board of directors.

Founded by Lawrence Coburn, Taylor McLoughlin, and Diana Rau, veterans of event technology pioneer DoubleDutch (acquired by Cvent in 2019), twine provides an initial product, which, used by customers such as Microsoft, Amazon, Forrester, and more, matches participants for rotating, one-to-one conversations around structured topics.

The company also announced the launch of its Cyber Cafe release, which includes a small group networking format, as well as new, branded experiences. It allows groups of up to 5 to network and collaborate within brandable, customizable, virtual networking rooms. The Cyber Cafe product release is in private beta, and will be generally available in July.

FinSMEs

18/05/2021
Geneva, NY (14456)

Today

Cloudy this morning with thunderstorms developing this afternoon. High 68F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 80%..

Tonight

Thunderstorms this evening followed by occasional showers overnight. Low 58F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 70%.
Motorola has introduced motorola defy, the companys latest rugged partnership made by CAT phone maker Bullitt Group, as a part of the partnership announced earlier this year. It is a waterproof phone (IP68) that can be submerged to depths of 1.5m for 35 minutes since it has a unique dual-sealed housing. In addition, it is drop proof to 1.8m and certified to military standards (MIL SPEC 810H), facing temperature extreme survivability from +55C to -25C, vibration and tumble tests.

The phone has a 6.5-inch HD+ screen protected by 0.7mm thick Corning Gorilla Glass Victus and 0.5mm recess and is usable with wet fingers. Other specifications as same as the Moto G9.

Motorola defy (2021) specifications

Display: 6.5-inch (1600720 pixels) HD+ LCD Max Vision display with Corning Gorilla Glass Victus protection, Usable with wet fingers

6.5-inch (1600720 pixels) HD+ LCD Max Vision display with Corning Gorilla Glass Victus protection, Usable with wet fingers SoC: Octa Core Qualcomm Snapdragon 662  up to 2 GHz 4 x Kryo 260 Performance (Cortex A73-based) + Up to 1.8GHz 4 x Kryo 260 Efficiency (Cortex A53-based)

Octa Core Qualcomm Snapdragon 662  up to 2 GHz 4 x Kryo 260 Performance (Cortex A73-based) + Up to 1.8GHz 4 x Kryo 260 Efficiency (Cortex A53-based) RAM: 4GB LPDDR4x

4GB LPDDR4x Software: Android 10, upgradable to Android 11

Android 10, upgradable to Android 11 ROM: 64GB, expandable memory up to 512GB with microSD

64GB, expandable memory up to 512GB with microSD Cameras: 48MP primary with f/1.7 aperture + 2MP Macro Vision Camera with f/2.4 aperture+ 2MP Depth; Night Vision Mode

48MP primary with f/1.7 aperture + 2MP Macro Vision Camera with f/2.4 aperture+ 2MP Depth; Night Vision Mode Front Camera : 8MP with f/2.2 aperture

: 8MP with f/2.2 aperture Fingerprint sensor

Water and Dust resistance (IP68)

MIL-STD-810H certified

Programmable Shortcut Key with Push to Talk (PTT) mode

Dimensions :169.878.210.9mm; Weight :232g

:169.878.210.9mm; :232g Connectivity: Dual 4G VoLTE, Wi-Fi 802.11 ac (2.4GHz|5GHz), Bluetooth 5.0, GPS + GLONASS, NFC, USB Type-C waterproof port

Dual 4G VoLTE, Wi-Fi 802.11 ac (2.4GHz|5GHz), Bluetooth 5.0, GPS + GLONASS, NFC, USB Type-C waterproof port Battery: 5000mAh with 20W Turbopower Charging

The motorola defy comes in forged green and black colours and is priced at 329 (US$ 292 / Rs. 29,075 approx.) / 279 (US$ 388 / Rs. 28,820 approx.) and will be available in select European and LATAM markets over the coming weeks.
When Apple launched their AirTags, one of the reasons for its success was the massive Find My network that utilized nearly every device in Apples ecosystem. Google is reportedly looking at developing their own version of the Apples network, by taking advantage of the Google Play Services app installed on Android smartphones.

Hidden within the code of Google Play Services version 21.24.13, there are references to a feature with the description  Allows your phone to help locate your and other peoples devices. This suggests that Google is working on the ability to find a device using Google Play Services.

At the moment, Google has a Find My Device app, which allows users to track any Android smartphone that they are signed in to with their Google account. If Google manages to expand upon this feature, they should be able to create a network to help people track their own lost or stolen device.

There are questions raised about user privacy and security with this feature, and Google will need to find solutions to ensure their devices are not vulnerable to malicious tracking, similar to how Apple built in various security measures in their Find My network.

The Google Play Service app is installed in nearly every Android phone outside of China, and this should be a huge advantage for the networks effectiveness. There are nearly 3 billion devices running Android, and a huge percentage of them are smartphones.

Source
Sagi Schwartzberg, a Fontana resident who was an attorney practicing law in Ontario, was taken into federal custody on June 18 on a charge of producing child pornography that alleges he paid a teenage girl to send him sexually explicit images. This photo was taken when he was originally arrested in Fontana on Feb. 17. (Contributed photo by Fontana Police Department)
USGS map

This map from the US Geological Survey shows the seismic waves from the 3.8 magnitude earthquake that happened at 3:18 p.m. ET in west-central Indiana.
PASCAGOULA, Miss. (AP)  A man on the Mississippi coast faces serious injures after being hit by a train Wednesday night while he was sleeping on the tracks.

WLOX-TV reports that the 63-year-old was hit at 9:15 p.m. on the railroad tracks in Pascagoula.

One of the mans arms and both of his legs were severed, police told the television station. Officers applied tourniquets and the man was transported to Singing River Hospital. He was later airlifted to USA Medical Center in Mobile.

The mans name has not been released. Police are still investigating, but say it appears the man was asleep on the tracks when the incident occurred.
NEWARK, N.J. (AP)  A new statue of George Floyd was unveiled at Newark's City Hall on Wednesday afternoon.

Mayor Ras Baraka along with actor and filmmaker Leon Pickney, who commissioned the statue, and artist Stanley Watts unveiled the 700-pound bronze statue that was donated this week to the City of Newark, according to WABC-TV.

Floyds murder at the hands of a Minneapolis police officer last year fueled a global movement for racial justice.

The statue will remain outside City Hall for at least one year.

"Hopefully when people walk by and they see it, and they participate, hopefully it inspires them to become active in the struggles that are happening right here in Newark and right here in New Jersey, Baraka said.
LAS VEGAS (FOX5) -- The Vax Nevada Days program is helping Nevadans become familiar with a lesser-known website that has all their vaccination
SPARTANBURG, SC (FOX Carolina)- At least one person is dead and three others are hurt after a shooting near Cleveland Park in Spartanburg on Thursday afternoon.
VIII ROCOCO MAGNOLIA by Clive Christian: A Seductively Indecent Chypre

Fragrance Reviews

I have never trusted brands that adorned their flacons with crowns. In my opinion, there are only two grounds for one to do so, namely: 1) if the country of origin has a current monarchy and the brand an official grant (i.e., you have a 'purveyor of the royal court' patent or personal involvement in one of the royals' charitable causes); 2) in case you are a fantasy-themed brand that builds their product line around fairytales about princes, princesses, dragons, unicorns and other magical creatures.

And, oh, there is one more, extremely British excuse: if you are punk. And not just any punk, but the Queen of Punk and the Mistress of Cheeky Sartorial Aesthetics, namely, if you are none other than Vivienne Westwood. The combination of irony and being extremely talented gives one the right, if not for everything, then for a great many things.

Everything else, in Edwardian jargon, is bedint. At the end of the 19th - beginning of the 20th centuries, when the class boundaries began to erode and those who did not inherit their furniture, but bought it in stores" poured into the previously closed aristocratic stratum, 'old money' got confused and tried to give 'new money' the cold shoulder. Snobbery is generally a good defensive tactic: it allows you to distance yourself from things that threaten your personal boundaries or, even more so, try to break them. The Nicolsons, the Sackville-Wests, and the Lees-Milnes of the near-Bloomsbury circle called bedint all that was vulgar, rude, stupid, overly intrusive, and made some kind of unfounded cultural claim. Where the word itself came from is not entirely clear: it was apparently coined by the fierce Victoria, Lady Sackville, the wife of the third baron, and it probably stems from the German verb "bedienen" (to serve). Be that as it may, bad taste in the broadest sense - not only aesthetic but also social - was branded bedint.

Not that the aristocracy was entirely comprised of people who were shining beacons of exquisite taste - despite the fact that in 18851900 there was a society club called 'Souls' and any mention of mundane things was forbidden at their parties (people attending talked strictly about philosophy, art, literature and other fine and wise things), for the most part, the upper class was notorious for being extremely down-to-earth, uneducated, with a narrow range of interests (horse racing, card games, hunting). And yet, at least they had their houses chock full of art, and when it is Van Dyck and Gainsborough who painted your ancestors' portraits while you yourself sat for De Laszlo just last week, you do willy-nilly develop a certain eye for culture.

What I was trying to say is that it is pretentious and bedint for a common middle-class brand to toy around with crowns. The same is true for adding the adjective 'royal' in a brand's name. But, alas, the stereotypical middle class is called 'aspiring' for a reason  these people always pretend they stand at least two steps higher on the social ladder than they actually do.

Clive Christian, however, has the right to his crown.

In the late 1990s, hidden under the floor of his family home (that was not inherited but purchased), he found an empty green glass flacon that once contained a perfume from Crown Perfumery. This brand was founded in 1872 in London and almost immediately received an unbelievable favor from Queen Victoria - permission to use the imperial crown for their stoppers, which was a token of the monarch's benevolence, as well as a quality mark for the brand. They say Queen Victoria herself used the brand's perfumes; especially for her, they created a perfume called Crown Essence. Her daughter-in-law, Princess of Wales and future Queen Alexandra, loved Crown Rose.

Photo from Clive Christian's archives, brief historical note

Over the last century, the brand changed owners many times, filed for bankruptcy, and became obsolete. It was revived only in 1993, and in 2000 the brand was purchased by Clive Christian - together with the crown, which, again, was not inherited but purchased.

Anyhow, there is a crown, and he is its rightful owner. Since then, the brand has come up with seventy-seven fragrances to date, and even though they, in classic nouveau riche style, boast of producing the most expensive perfumes in the world featuring the most exclusive ingredients, they do make true heritage perfumery, for which two ingredients are key: love of history and a penchant for complex, lush, old-fashioned compositions.

Well, the archives with historical formulas cannot hurt either. What the brand does with them is another question, but I must admit that I don't see anything of extreme value in the exact reconstruction of historical fragrances for commercial release: for educational purposes, yes, but a respectful and creative rethinking of old material is sometimes much more interesting.

Here we will talk about a single fragrance from a single collection dedicated to the Rococo era.

The Goddess Aurora Triumphing Over Night, 1755-56, Jean-Honore Fragonard

Rococ (the term itself was first used ironically and dismissively - the style was actually called 'rocaille' (Fr. shell)) came to replace the heavier, darker, and more geometric Barocco, starting around the 1730s. As with any kind of reaction, Rococo tried to veer as far away from its predecessor as possible, bringing forth the aesthetic of light pastel colors, ornateness, exaggerated gallantry, unbridled sentimentality, and decorative overload. Asymmetrical curls, seashells, acanthus leaves, birds, flower bouquets, fruits, cherubs, and all sorts of charming Eastern-inspired imagery from monkeys to pagodas to Chinese men filled the interiors of rich houses and even churches. On the outside, the architecture remained rather reserved - one would not be able to guess its presence right away - but on the inside, in the interiors, any guest would be inundated with a veritable flood of decorative elements in the style of "sorry, the horn of plenty has just exploded right here, we're dealing with the consequences."

Initially a decorative and applied arts style, Rococo quickly took over painting (Boucher, Fragonard, Tiepolo) and music, with the brightest representatives being Rameau and Couperin, as well as J.S. Bach's sons in Germany.

In England, Rococo was known as "the French taste." It certainly influenced furniture, porcelain, fabrics, and fashion but was overall less pronounced than in the rest of Europe, where the style marched triumphantly across the continent. A century and a half later, the same destiny awaited Art Nouveau.

The fifties and especially the sixties of the XVIII century saw the decline of Rococo; not the least role in that was played by the enlighteners - Voltaire and Blondel considered it their duty to raze it to the ground for superficiality, frivolity, and decadence. By the mid-eighties, the style had completely gone out of fashion, giving way to the austerity and seriousness of classicism.

It is in that very gallant era where Clive Christian found his inspiration for creating the brand's perfume Magnolia. When trying to characterize Rococo in just one word, your best bet would be 'excess.' Yes, the artwork of that period is charming, romantic (even though it is entirely devoid of any drama, so calling it sentimental would be more appropriate), and overly graceful - Sophia Coppola did a great job mocking the lacy aesthetic and innate infantilism of the French court in her Marie Antoinette with its macarons and Converse Chuck Taylors - however, all of it is completely, irredeemably overloaded by details and decorative elements.

In much the same way, Magnolia is also pompous, lush, overly ornamental  and excitingly beautiful at that. Truth be told, I don't find it to be Rococo in style at all - from the heavy black matte flacon with a golden band around the bottle's neck and the scarlet color of the font to the intoxicating aggressive potion it contains, the whole thing is rather late Barocco. It is insufficiently light, playful, or flighty for Rococo. Especially considering that...

... Magnolia is usually described as a Floral or an Amber-Floral fragrance, but no, ladies and gentlemen, it is neither of the two - we are dealing with a Chypre here. It is an intense, very sweet, dark Chypre in all of its classic bergamot-oakmoss glory.

I familiarized myself with Magnolia a while ago - and my emotions about the fragrance were quite ambivalent. I immediately liked the perfume's dove-colored, dense, and rather boozy note of mulberries, but it was putting me off with its armor-piercing (albeit not sugary) sweetness at the same time. Penhaligon's The Favourite, with its thick floral-musky spirit, helped me understand Magnolia - the former is an excellent dramatized XVIII century fragrance, compared to other modern eaux. To me, The Favourite is inseparable from its legend, from its era's aesthetic  the same is true for Magnolia: It requires hoop skirts, ribbons, frills, powder boxes, curved gilded furniture, and baskets full of roses (wear it with an office suit, and you'll implode from the cognitive dissonance). Or it demands all of the above, if not on the outside, then inside, in your head, although that certainly requires a fair amount of self-irony.

Madame de Pompadour, 1756, Francois Boucher

Boucher's portrait of Madame de Pompadour would be the perfect illustration here. Interestingly, it was the mighty mistress of Louis XV who at some point brought the decline of Rococo closer by sending her brother, Abel-Francois Poisson de Vandieres, marquis de Marigny, and several other artists, to Italy to study classical art and import it to France.

Anyhow, let's return to Magnolia, shall we? Well then, what we have is a secret chypre, powerful yet clandestine, as any good debauchery should be.

If you can imagine fruits capable of demolishing walls and flowers that can bring down entire small towns - well, you will find them here. With its insolence, Magnolia reminds me of the perfumery we had in the 1980s, yet thanks to the historical associations and a birth date that came thirty years later, it looks much more refined. All the notes are painted darker and juicier here than Mother Nature had ever intended them to be. The mandarins, peaches, and blackcurrants are not only overripe on their branches, but also quite loaded: they drop off right into a silver punch bowl overloaded with a cornucopia of rocaille curls, and now they are floating in sweet, almost black wine, making bubbles and even singing some frivolous tune with all their might. When bergamot joins them from one side and magnolia from the other, this menage a cinq manages to produce that very velvety mulberry note that is very recognizable, making you want to crush the berries in your fist until the bluish-purple juice runs through your fingers.

Still life with fruit and flowers, 1658-1722, Christian Berenz

To be completely honest, I don't remember what magnolia smells like- the one that is as tall as a house, with shining, huge yellow-white flowers that from afar look like a flock of mope-headed pigeons that landed on the tree's dark branches  last time I smelled one, I was still a child. Yet this big, round, straightforward as a ram fragrance suits it very well. I think it is half composed of a rose that's also white and very sweet; however, the rose is neither singing a solo nor part of a choir here; she primarily and almost exclusively plays the role of a different flower, which is unusual and very nice of her.

After the initial shell shock effect from this cart full of gifts from Flora and Pomona dumped right on your head passes, a captivating picture appears. Under the cover of the forest, on a blanket of green moss - prickly, herbaceous, stuffy, but strangely pillowy-soft and with a note of piercing plant freshness - we see shepherds and shepherdesses making a pit stop there for some gallant fun. All the mentioned flowers and fruits are still there but generously showered with the spicy gifts of the East: some cinnamon sticks, black cloves, freshly grated nutmeg, some semi-translucent petals of myristica fragrans, as well as some crushed almonds and pepper...

Pastoral Scene, 1737, Francois Boucher

Blind Man's Bluff, 1750-52., Jean-Honore Fragonard

And towards the very finale, when the fun comes to an end and the partakers leave, there is only the wonderful classic moss left, over which, scattered like memories, we see a bitten peach here and a rose-scented garter there.

It is then that you realize that all that excess, as it turns out, was a chypre from the very beginning; you begin to see its impeccable structure, and you marvel at how noble that Magnolia sounds despite the fact that everything the gracious Lord bestowed on her is bursting right out of the bodice in an utterly unbridled way.

Pan and Syrinx,1759, Francois Boucher

The combination of imperious chypre austerity with a bacchanalia of fermented flowers and fruits makes this scent self-confident, strange, daring, and... very comfortable. It gives you emancipation, disregard of convention, it is a broad gesture, a strong statement - "it is better to regret what has been done than what has not been done"... but without trying, in the whirlwind of pleasure, to forget about the empty void inside. These are not the last attempts (before the revolutionary nightmare) at hedonism for the sake of hedonism, or aesthetics for the sake of aesthetics, that are already beginning to digest themselves - and therefore, this is not quite Rococo.

This is exactly ce que mon coeur veut.

And it is indeed useful to know what one's heart truly desires.



Photographs of flacons: Clive Christian


After more than a year of Covid-19 pandemic restrictions, business activity and the economies of many countries are picking up worldwide, though unevenly. That includes international franchising. Here are 10 recent deals global brands have announced.

7-Eleven plans to open stores in Laos and Cambodia in the next 12 months. The first Cambodian store will open in the capital, Phnom Penh, later this year. In Laos, the first store is slated to open in Vientiane in 2022.

Chestertons, an international real estate services firm, announced the expansion of its operations in Spain, Greece, Cyprus, and Morocco through its franchise division, Chestertons Global Franchise Holdings.

Chuck E. Cheese has signed a franchise development agreement with EWAS Management Solutions to bring the brand to Romania. EWAS is owned by Gabriel Teodorescu and his wife Anda Teodorescu, who also operate Deziclean and are distributors for Gusto.

Dominos Pizza says it is set to create 350 jobs across Ireland, including new management positions, team members, and delivery drivers. The company already employs almost 2,000 staff and contract workers across its 85 Irish stores.

Herfy Food Services Company, Saudi Arabias largest fast-food chain with 385 units, has signed an agreement with EatRite Food Services, granting it franchise rights to open up to 50 outlets in Nigeria.

Realty One Group announced that Istvan Pasku has acquired the franchising rights in Spain. Pasku is an established businessman in multiple countries with a record of success as a marketer, entrepreneur, and franchisor.

School of Rock has opened its first location in Europe, in Madrid. Paulo Portela, the brands master franchisee in Brazil, Spain, and Portugal, intends to open 28 schools throughout Spain and Portugal over the next 10 years.

TNI King Coffee, a Vietnam-based coffee shop, has opened in Anaheim, California, 10 minutes walking distance from Disneyland. The brand, with more than 50 units in Vietnam and South Korea, plans to add 100 more stores this year and expand into the Middle East, Europe, Russia, and China.

Wendys is re-entering the U.K. after shutting its stores there more than 20 years ago. The U.S. burger brand opened its initial location there on June 2 in Reading. Wendys operates just over 6,800 restaurants, but only about 950 are outside the U.S.
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Legislative session ends are never pretty; This one could be ugly
State legislators may be home briefly  or they may not; state budget goes to the brink
Fort Wayne, IN (46808)

Today

Sunny to partly cloudy. High 74F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph..

Tonight

Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 54F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph.
Gainesville, TX (76240)

Today

Thunderstorms likely this morning. Then a chance of scattered thunderstorms this afternoon. High 86F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%..

Tonight

Mostly cloudy this evening with showers developing after midnight. Low 71F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 50%.
Galveston, TX (77553)

Today

Partly cloudy. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. High around 90F. Winds SSW at 10 to 15 mph..

Tonight

Cloudy this evening. Scattered thunderstorms developing after midnight. Low 81F. Winds SW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 50%.
Republicans in our nations capital, in a disturbing development, see no need to rehash the violence of Jan. 6, when a mob tried to thwart a presidential election. Nothing to see here. Move along.

We should disentangle many Oregon Republicans from the Q-Anon movement, election lies and other nonsense that is pushed and embraced by members of the national party and the Oregon GOP organization itself.

Also, to be clear, we arent trying to attack those who voted for Donald Trump in November. We didnt endorse Trump, but if you voted for him, thats fine. Thats how democracy works.

But Trump didnt win the presidential election. There wasnt widespread election fraud. Those who espouse some counter-narrative or hope for a coup continue to pose a threat to our nation.

It will be up to the county commissioners of Benton, Marion, Polk and Yamhill counties to determine a replacement for Nearman, and no timetable has been set, according to the Oregon Capital Bureau.

We hope that officials appoint a moderate Republican to replace Nearman, but wed take a staunch conservative as well if they can work with those of different stripes on key issues and dont believe in conspiracy theories.
The Lebanon school board is continuing to examine its options for a potential bond measure in 2022.

Lebanon Community Schools has the opportunity to receive between $4 million and $8 million in state matching funds if voters approve a bond to pay for necessary maintenance and improvements. The question is how large a bond  and how high a property tax rate  voters will be willing to approve.

The board members discussed the issue during their public session on June 10. The discussion centered on the Lebanon Community Pool, which needs extensive repairs. The price tag for a full remodel of the pool is about $9.5 million.

Quality journalism doesn't happen without your help Support local news coverage and the people who report it by subscribing to the Lebanon Express.

Superintendent Bo Yates asked the board if they support the pool project in that form.

What I need  is some direction on if you feel comfortable with us moving forward in this process at that price point, where that is going to be a total rehab, Yates said.

School board chair Tom Oliver said the decision will ultimately fall to the voters. He is interested in hearing from the community before putting the bond on the ballot. The district is currently working to hire a polling firm which will survey voters later this summer or in the early fall.
James Farmer (Folks should demand an audit, June 16 Mailbag) seems to believe the notion that if you repeat a lie often enough, people will believe it. Those are certainly words Donald Trump lives by.

However, in the case of the Oregon election, while Mr. Farmer is trying his best to intimidate Oregon political leaders to order an audit of the election, he has miserably failed to present any evidence of malfeasance, error or mismanagement. What does he expect an audit to find?

Recent days have shown us that the biggest threat to our elections was corruption coming from the White House and the Department of Justice. We now know more of the depth of Trumps attempts to overturn certified elections in several states.

There can be little doubt that any loss of faith in our election system is more attributable to Donald Trump and his Republican defenders than it is to our election systems or even the Russians.

And there is additional fallout from the Republican attempts to overturn a fair and well-managed election. Intimidation of election workers by Trump fanatics has driven many of those workers to back away, raising concerns about the ability of election officials to manage the midterm election next year.
Gillette, WY (82718)

Today

A mix of clouds and sun. Gusty winds diminishing during the afternoon. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. High 92F. Winds S at 20 to 30 mph..

Tonight

Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 61F. Winds S at 10 to 15 mph.
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At-risk species of freshwater fish reintroduced to Scotlands lochs

An at-risk species of fish has established itself in lochs across Scotland with the help of conservation managers and by rapidly adapting to its new environment, resulting in changes to their DNA, their ecology, and body shape, according to a new study.

In an urgent bid to conserve the freshwater powan species of fish, scientists introduced eggs and fish to new loch sites across Scotland over the past 30 years, with the aim of establishing new and robust populations.

The research  led by a team at the University of Glasgow  shows that the translocated fish have indeed established in their new loch homes. The new powan populations have lower genetic diversity than the original source populations, but not worryingly low.

By using state-of-the-art genome analysis techniques, the study showed that the translocated populations are tapping into specific regions of the genome in adaptive evolutionary changes to the new populations.

The powan (Coregonus lavaretus, sometimes known as Coregonus clupeoides) is one of Scotlands rarest fishes and found natively in only lochs Eck and Lomond. Powan is a species of high natural heritage value for Scotland, but is in worrying decline due to habitat destruction caused by climate change, increasing water temperatures and the of non-native ruffe fish in Loch Lomond, which voraciously feeds on powan eggs.

With the long-term health of the population depending on its genetic diversity and the evolutionary effect of translocation, the scientists wanted to find out how the populations changed, to look more closely at the species genetic health and determine if translocation was a successful strategy.

The study brought together a team of fish biologists, ecologists, and evolutionary geneticists at the Scottish Centre for Ecology and the Natural Environment (SCENE) and the Institute of Biodiversity, Animal Health and Comparative Medicine at the University of Glasgow; and the Limnological Institute at University of Konstanz in Germany and the UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology.

Lead author Dr Marco Crotti, who recently completed his PhD on these fishes, noted: We can see evidence of the translocation as changes in the powan genome and their ecology, but they are genetically healthy and are establishing.

Co-author Prof Colin Adams, Director of SCENE at the University of Glasgow, said: This study is important for biodiversity and conservation management: Actions to conserve fish populations need evidence of their success.

"This work shows that translocations were a successful way to help Scottish powan. The translocations worked as an emergency measure, but the best mitigation is preserving the original populations.

Co-author Prof Kathryn Elmer said: The translocation show how fast adaptation and evolution can occur in wild populations, even in just a few generations. This is natural selection in action - changes in DNA and genomes helping the fishes survive and establish in their new environment.

The study is published in the scientific journal Evolutionary Applications.

Photograph: Loch Shira by Colin Adams

Enquiries: ali.howard@glasgow.ac.uk or elizabeth.mcmeekin@glasgow.ac.uk / 0141 330 6557 or 0141 330 4831
Burlington, ON, June 17, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Eight-in-ten Canadians (79 per cent) recognize Indigenous businesses strengthen the countrys social fabric, according to a new national Leger survey.

Sodexo Canadas latest Indigenous Business Survey shows deep public support for Indigenous businesses. Seventy-nine per cent of Canadians recognize the importance of thriving Indigenous enterprises to the creation of sustainable economic opportunities for Indigenous peoples.

Three-quarters of Canadians (76 per cent) also believe supporting strong Indigenous businesses is an important pathway to healing Canadas relationship with First Nations, Inuit and Metis people.

The survey found strong support for action by the private sector to help Indigenous entrepreneurs develop and grow their enterprises.

Key findings

77 per cent agree Canadian corporations should include Indigenous owned and operated businesses in their supplier networks whenever possible.

71 per cent think Canadian corporations should help Indigenous entrepreneurs take their businesses to the next level.

Seven-in-ten Canadians (71 per cent) believe that on-going supports for Indigenous companies, such as training and mentoring, should be a long-term strategy for Canadian corporations.

65 per cent think companies doing business on or near First Nations, Inuit and Metis lands should obtain services from Indigenous businesses whenever possible.

74 per cent agree that Indigenous businesses have much to offer the Canadian economy.

59 per cent think robust Indigenous participation in Canadas economy should be a higher priority for government and the private sector.

The success of Indigenous businesses clearly matters to Canadians, says Tabatha Bull, president and CEO, Canadian Council for Aboriginal Business (CCAB). The fact that Canadians expect the private sector to step up with action to help Indigenous entrepreneurs sends a powerful message to decision makers. This broad public support will also fuel the optimism of Indigenous business owners. The role that procurement can play in offering a hand up will incentivize businesses to champion and encourage Indigenous business inclusion at all levels of business interaction and participation.

This year marks Sodexos 20th year of Progressive Aboriginal Relations (PAR) certification by CCAB. PAR certification commits businesses to develop strong, culturally supportive business relationships with Indigenous people and communities. Sodexo achieved the highest PAR certification (Gold) in 2004. The company, which currently has 84 Indigenous-owned enterprises in its Canadian supply chain, also provides a broad range of skills and management training initiatives to advance Indigenous entrepreneurs. Sodexo Canada works with 25 Indigenous partners located near First Nations, Inuit and Metis communities and 63 per cent of its Energy & Resources business segment employees are Indigenous.

Supports to Indigenous communities are also delivered in the form of scholarships and donations. Sodexos leadership in building relationships with Indigenous peoples is based on its 4R philosophy: Respect, Recognition, Revenue Sharing and Representation.

It is highly gratifying to see that a strong majority of Canadians share our belief in supporting a thriving Indigenous economy, says Erwin Joosten, Senior Vice President, Energy & Resources, Sodexo Canada. When provided with the right resources, the potential of Indigenous businesses is limitless. We believe its our duty to help these entrepreneurs innovate, grow and prosper. Our experience is that companies that have success engaging with Indigenous communities and businesses have two things in common: they base their relationships on respect for Indigenous culture and values and focus on constantly strengthening economic and business opportunities for their Indigenous partners.

National Indigenous History Month

In June, Canadians celebrate National Indigenous History Month to honour the history, heritage and diversity of Indigenous peoples in Canada. This celebration also creates the opportunity to recognize the strength of present-day Indigenous communities and the accomplishments of Indigenous entrepreneurs. The CCAB proudly showcases the considerable accomplishments of Indigenous entrepreneurs across the country and throughout the year. For more information go to www.ccab.com.

About Sodexo Canada

Sodexo delivers a wide range of customized solutions, designed to optimize work and living environments. Sodexo has been providing food and facilities management services in Canada for over 40 years, with a focus on enhancing safety, work process and well-being. Sodexo is a market leader in Canada. Sodexo has been recognized as a top employer for the past seven consecutive years. Sodexo is proud to have created the Sodexo Stop Hunger Foundation, an independent charitable organization that has raised over $3 million to fight hunger and donated more than one million meals to at-risk youth across Canada since 2007.

Sodexo is included in the CAC 40, FTSE 4 Good and DJSI indices.





Key figures  Sodexo Canada

10,000 employees

Recipient of Canadas Greenest Employer Awards 2021

Recipient of Canadas Diversity & Inclusion Employer Awards 2021

1 million consumers served daily

About CCAB

CCAB is committed to the full participation of Indigenous peoples in Canadas economy. As a national, non-partisan association, its mission is to promote, strengthen and enhance a prosperous Indigenous economy through the fostering of business relationships, opportunities, and awareness. CCAB offers knowledge, resources and programs to its members to cultivate economic opportunities for Indigenous peoples and businesses across Canada. For more information visit ccab.com.

Methodology

A survey of 1,589 Canadians was completed online between May 28th and May 30, 2021 using Legers online panel, LegerWeb. A probability sample of the same size would yield a margin of error of +/-2.5%, 19 times out of 20.






HANGZHOU, China and SUZHOU, China and NEW YORK, June 17, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- AnHeart Therapeutics Co., Ltd. (AnHeart), a clinical stage oncology company focused on underserved patients in global markets, today announced that the first patient has been dosed in a Phase II basket trial of taletrectinib for solid tumors containing NTRK fusions (NCT04617054).



In June 2021, Innovent Biologics, Inc. (HKEX: 01801) (Innovent), a biopharmaceutical company that develops, manufactures and commercializes high-quality medicines for the treatment of cancer, metabolic, autoimmune and other major diseases, entered into an exclusive agreement with AnHeart under which Innovent obtained exclusive rights to co-develop and commercialize taletrectinib in Greater China.

Building upon the promising preliminary results in the Phase II trial for non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with ROS1 fusions, we are moving forward with the Phase II trial of taletrectinib for NTRK fusion-driven solid tumors, said Bing Yan, MD, Co-founder and Chief Medical Officer of AnHeart. We plan to enroll approximately 40 patients in this open-label, single-arm, multi-center Phase II study in China.

Dr. Hui Zhou, Senior Vice President of Clinical Development, Innovent Biologics, stated, Many patients with rare conditions, like NTRK fusion-positive cancer have limited treatment options and poor access to targeted therapies. We are very pleased to see that our partner AnHeart is advancing the Phase II trial of taletrectinib in NTRK fusion-driven solid tumors. We will work closely with AnHeart to bring taletrectinib to patients in Greater China.

About Taletrectinib

Taletrectinib is an investigational next-generation TKI designed to effectively target ROS1 and NTRK with potential to treat TKI-naive or pretreated patients. ROS1 rearrangement is estimated to be an oncogenic driver in approximately 2 to 3 percent of patients with advanced NSCLC, and NTRK fusion is estimated to be an oncogenic driver in approximately 0.5 percent of patients across multiple advanced solid tumors. Theres very limited approved therapy available for advanced ROS1-positive lung cancer patients and NTRK-positive cancer patients in Greater China. After treatment with existing therapies, most patients eventually acquire resistance for which there are significant unmet medical needs globally.

Taletrectinib is currently undergoing three Phase II clinical studies, including (i) the Phase II study for first line treatment of TKI-naive and second line treatment of TKI-pretreated ROS1-positive non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) in China, (ii) the Phase II study for NTRK-positive solid tumors in China, and (iii) the Phase II study for first line and second line treatment of ROS1-positive NSCLC globally.

More information about the ongoing TRUST (Taletrectinib ROS1 LUng STudy) trial in ROS1 fusion positive NSCLC and the ongoing basket trial in NTRK fusion positive solid tumors of taletrectinib may be found by searching clinical trial identifiers NCT04395677 and NCT04617054, respectively at https://clinicaltrials.gov.

About AnHeart

AnHeart Therapeutics Co., Ltd. (AnHeart) is a clinical stage biopharmaceutical company developing novel oncology therapies. AnHeart is headquartered in Hangzhou, China with offices in Beijing, Shanghai and has a subsidiary AnHeart Therapeutics Inc. in New York. Led by a management team with a successful track record of clinical development, AnHeart is developing three clinical stage oncology programs globally. For more information, please visit: https://anhearttherapeutics.com/.

About Innovent

Inspired by the spirit of "Start with Integrity, Succeed through Action, Innovents mission is to develop, manufacture and commercialize high-quality biopharmaceutical products that are affordable to ordinary people.

Established in 2011, Innovent is committed to developing, manufacturing and commercializing high-quality innovative medicines for the treatment of cancer, autoimmune, metabolic diseases, and other major diseases therapeutic areas. On October 31, 2018, Innovent was listed on the Main Board of the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong Limited with the stock code: 01801.HK.

Since its inception, Innovent has developed a fully integrated multi-functional platform which includes R&D, CMC (Chemistry, Manufacturing, and Controls), clinical development and commercialization capabilities. By Leveraging the this platform, the company has built a robust pipeline of 24 valuable assets in the fields of cancer, metabolic, autoimmune disease and other major therapeutic areas, with 4 products officially approved for marketing in China  TYVYT (sintilimab injection), BYVASDA (bevacizumab biosimilar injection), SULINNO (adalimumab biosimilar injection) and HALPRYZA (rituximab biosimilar injection),  officially approved for marketing in China, one Biologics License Application (BLA) submission for sintilimab accepted by the U.S. FDA, 6 assets in Phase 3 or pivotal clinical trials, and an additional 14 more molecules in clinical trials. In 2019, TYVYT (sintilimab injection) was the first PD-1 inhibitor included in the National Reimbursement Drug List (NRDL) and the only PD-1 inhibitor included in the NRDL in that year.

Innovent has built an international team with advanced talented professionals in high-end biological drug biopharmaceutical development and commercialization, including many global experts. The company has also entered into strategic collaborations with Eli Lilly and Company, Adimab, Incyte, MD Anderson Cancer Center, Hanmi and other international partners. Innovent strives to work with many collaborators to help advance Chinas biopharmaceutical industry, improve drug availability and enhance the quality of the patients lives. For more information, please visit: www.innoventbio.com.

AnHeart Forward-Looking Statements

Statements contained in this press release regarding matters that are not historical facts are forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such statements are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties, and other factors that may cause our or our industrys actual results, levels of activity, performance, or achievements to be materially different from those anticipated by such statements. In some cases, you can identify forward-looking statements by terminology such as may, will, should, expects, plans, anticipates, believes, estimates, predicts, potential, intends, or continue, or the negative of these terms or other comparable terminology. Forward-looking statements contained in this presentation include, but are not limited to, (i) statements regarding the timing of anticipated clinical trials for our product candidates and our research and development programs; (ii) the timing of receipt of clinical data for our product candidates; (iii) our expectations regarding the potential safety, efficacy, or clinical utility of our product candidates; (iv) the size of patient populations targeted by our product candidates and market adoption of our product candidates by physicians and patients; and (v) the timing or likelihood of regulatory filings and approvals. Except as required by law, we assume no obligation to update these forward-looking statements publicly, or to update the reasons why actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in the forward-looking statements, even if new information becomes available in the future. This Presentation discusses product candidates that are under clinical study and which have not yet been approved for marketing by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration or regulatory agencies in other countries. No representation is made as to the safety or effectiveness of these product candidates for the use for which such product candidates are being studied.

Innovent Forward-Looking Statements

This news release may contain certain forward-looking statements that are, by their nature, subject to significant risks and uncertainties. The words "anticipate", "believe", "estimate", "expect", "intend" and similar expressions, as they relate to Innovent, are intended to identify certain of such forward-looking statements. Innovent does not intend to update these forward-looking statements regularly. These forward-looking statements are based on the existing beliefs, assumptions, expectations, estimates, projections and understandings of the management of Innovent with respect to future events at the time these statements are made. These statements are not a guarantee of future developments and are subject to risks, uncertainties and other factors, some of which are beyond Innovent's control and are difficult to predict. Consequently, actual results may differ materially from information contained in the forward-looking statements as a result of future changes or developments in our business, Innovent's competitive environment and political, economic, legal and social conditions. Innovent, the Directors and the employees of Innovent assume (a) no obligation to correct or update the forward-looking statements contained in this site; and (b) no liability in the event that any of the forward-looking statements does not materialise or turn out to be incorrect.

Contacts

AnHeart Media Contact:

pr@anhearttherapeutics.com

+86-021-6474 6017

AnHeart Investors Contact:

ir@anhearttherapeutics.com

+86-021-6474 6017

Innovent Media Contact:

pr@innoventbio.com

+86 512-6956 6088

Innovent Investors Contact:

ir@innoventbio.com

+86 512-6956 6088
THE INFORMATION CONTAINED HEREIN IS NOT FOR RELEASE, PUBLICATION OR DISTRIBUTION IN OR INTO AUSTRALIA, CANADA, ITALY, DENMARK, JAPAN, THE UNITED STATES, OR TO ANY NATIONAL OF SUCH JURISDICTIONS







NBPE Announces May Monthly NAV Estimate and Publishes Q1 2021 Report







18 June 2021

NB Private Equity Partners Limited (NBPE or the Company), a closed-end private equity investment company, today releases its 31 May 2021 monthly NAV update and Q1 2021 Quarterly Report.

Key Highlights

Portfolio continues to build on its strong performance in 2020

NAV per share of $25.43 (17.89), +14.7% in 2021

As of 31 May 2021 NBPEs NAV total return is 14.7% during 2021 year to date One year LTM NAV total return is 52.2%



After incorporating updated Q1 2021 private company valuation information, the 31 May 2021 NAV per share is $25.43 (17.89) 31 March 2021 NAV per share of $25.35, a $170.1 million, or $3.63 per share, increase relative to 31 December 2020 Additional $9.5 million, or $0.20 per share, NAV increase in April and May attributable to changes in public company valuations, FX rates and interest accruals $6.9 million of expenses, fee accruals, ZDP accrual and credit facility expenses during April and May



Realisations at significant uplifts to carrying value and cost

Performance predominantly driven by the previously announced seven full or partial realisations in 2021 year to date, with additional uplift expected in the coming months as additional transactions close Aggregate uplift of 110% to the December 2020 valuation; 3.6x cost across the seven transactions Approximately $120 million of the NAV increase in Q1 private valuation information was attributable to these seven companies, certain of which have closed and the remainder of which are expected to close over the coming months A further $20 million ($0.43 per share) of estimated NAV uplift is expected in the coming months as these investments close and/or additional valuation information is received from underlying managers



Significant cash realisations and IPO of Agiliti (NYSE: AGTI) Approximately $139 milion of cash distributions received year to date - including cash received through 31 May 2021 and additional proceeds received in June An additional $83 million is expected in the coming months as the remaining transactions described above close Agiliti completed its IPO on 23 rd April and as of 31 May 2021, gains in the share price have generated $7 million of NAV uplift relative to the 31 December 2020 valuation



$50 million invested or committed to five new investments during 2021 Credit facility is currently undrawn giving significant flexibility and resources Actively reviewing a high level of new investment opportunities Ability to be highly selective with pace of new investing  current portfolio is 116% invested



Peter von Lehe, Managing Director of Neuberger Berman, commented on the first quarter, NBPE has continued to build on its strong performance in 2020, reporting a NAV total return of almost 15% year to date. Year to date performance has been driven by realisations at significant uplifts to carrying value and cost, and strong operating performance across the portfolio. We believe the portfolio is well positioned to continue to generate value for shareholders, benefiting from a number of structural growth trends and the potential for further exits in 2021 and beyond.

Portfolio Valuation at 31 May 2021

The value of NBPEs portfolio as of 31 May 2021 was based on the following information1:

18% of the portfolio fair value was valued as of 31 May 2021 13% in public securities 2 5% in private direct debt investments

1% of the portfolio fair value was valued as of 30 April 2021 1% in private direct investments

81% of the portfolio fair value was valued as of 31 March 2021 80% in private direct equity investments







For further information, please contact:

NBPE Investor Relations +1 214 647 9593

Kaso Legg Communications +44 (0)20 3995 6673

Charles Gorman nbpe@kl-communications.com

About NB Private Equity Partners Limited

NBPE invests in direct private equity investments alongside market leading private equity firms globally. NB Alternatives Advisers LLC (the Investment Manager), an indirect wholly owned subsidiary of Neuberger Berman Group LLC, is responsible for sourcing, execution and management of NBPE. The vast majority of direct investments are made with no management fee / no carried interest payable to third-party GPs, offering greater fee efficiency than other listed private equity companies. NBPE seeks capital appreciation through growth in net asset value over time while paying a bi-annual dividend.

LEI number: 213800UJH93NH8IOFQ77

About Neuberger Berman

Neuberger Berman, founded in 1939, is a private, independent, employee-owned investment manager. The firm manages a range of strategiesincluding equity, fixed income, quantitative and multi-asset class, private equity, real estate and hedge fundson behalf of institutions, advisors and individual investors globally. With offices in 25 countries, Neuberger Bermans diverse team has over 2,300 professionals. For seven consecutive years, the company has been named first or second in Pensions & Investments Best Places to Work in Money Management survey (among those with 1,000 employees or more). In 2020, the PRI named Neuberger Berman a Leader, a designation awarded to fewer than 1% of investment firms for excellence in Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) practices. The PRI also awarded Neuberger Berman an A+ in every eligible category for our approach to ESG integration across asset classes. The firm manages $429 billion in client assets as of March 31, 2021. For more information, please visit our website at www.nb.com.





This press release appears as a matter of record only and does not constitute an offer to sell or a solicitation of an offer to purchase any security.

NBPE is established as a closed-end investment company domiciled in Guernsey. NBPE has received the necessary consent of the Guernsey Financial Services Commission. The value of investments may fluctuate. Results achieved in the past are no guarantee of future results. This document is not intended to constitute legal, tax or accounting advice or investment recommendations. Prospective investors are advised to seek expert legal, financial, tax and other professional advice before making any investment decision. Statements contained in this document that are not historical facts are based on current expectations, estimates, projections, opinions and beliefs of NBPE's investment manager. Such statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors, and undue reliance should not be placed thereon. Additionally, this document contains "forward-looking statements." Actual events or results or the actual performance of NBPE may differ materially from those reflected or contemplated in such targets or forward-looking statements.





1 Please refer to the valuation methodology section of the monthly report for a description of the Managers valuation methodology. While some valuation data is as of 31 March 2021 and 30 April 2021, the Managers analysis and historical experience lead the Manager to believe that this approximates fair value at 31 May 2021.

2 Includes Petsmart / Chewy as value is predominantly driven by the public value of Chewy.

Attachments
A wholly owned subsidiary of Vow ASA (jointly referred to as Vow) has signed an agreement with Wakefield Biochar to install an industry-scale Biogreen system at Wakefields facility in Valdosta, Georgia, USA.

The Biogreen system will transform biomass and bio-residues into high-quality biochar and contribute to Wakefields Advanced Materials and Soil Health divisions, which are addressing the fast-growing market for high quality biochar in the ever more environmentally concerned USA.

The agreement demonstrates the high relevance of Vow technologies for the biochar market and marks a breakthrough and an important step to rolling out Biogreen solutions in North America. It is testament to Vows ability to deliver advanced technology in industry-scale solutions, and our commitment to support companies in their efforts to decarbonise, said Vows CEO, Mr. Henrik Badin.

The USD 5.15 million turn-key system that Vow will deliver and commission in 2022 includes drying equipment, biochar production based on patented Biogreen technology, and conversion of CO2 neutral syngas into energy dedicated for the biomass drying.

The solution represents a first of multiple units that are planned to be implemented in the upcoming years by Wakefield Biochar to realise their Better Soil. Better World products strategy.

For Wakefield Biochar, production in Valdosta will become a platform to extend their strategy of manufacturing green commodities and creating a climate positive change in USA.

Biochar checks all the boxes for sustainable practices: it brings social benefits by reducing waste and improving the soil in communities; creates economical value by improving productivity of our agriculture; and offers strong environmental impact both by reducing the need of chemical fertilizers and performing as a carbon sink, said Tom Marrero, President of Wakefield Biochar.





For more information please contact

Henrik Badin, CEO, Vow ASA

Tel: + 47 90 78 98 25

Email: henrik.badin@vowasa.com





About Vow

Vow and its subsidiaries Scanship and Etia are passionate about preventing pollution. The companys world leading solutions convert biomass and waste into valuable resources and generate clean energy for a wide range of industries.

Cruise ships on every ocean have Vow technology inside which processes waste and purifies wastewater. Fish farmers are adopting similar solutions, and public utilities and industries use our solutions for sludge processing, waste management and biogas production on land.

With advanced technologies and solutions, Vow turns waste into biogenetic fuels to help decarbonise industry and convert plastic waste into fuel, clean energy, and high-value pyro carbon. The solutions are scalable, standardised, patented, and thoroughly documented, and the companys capability to deliver is well proven. They are key to end waste and stop pollution.

Located in Oslo, the parent company Vow ASA is listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange (ticker VOW).





This information is subject to the disclosure requirements pursuant to section 5-12 of the Norwegian Securities Trading Act.




English French

Good morning,

Please find below the press release issued today.

Best regards,

____________________________________________________________________

Marishka Martins

Group Press Office

Capgemini India | Mumbai

www.capgemini.com

Tel.: +91 9930835325

Email: marishka.martins@capgemini.com

_____________________________

Sogeti in Sweden exclusive winner of 220 million multi-year framework agreement





Stockholm, Sweden, June 18, 2021  Sogeti in Sweden, part of the Capgemini Group, has won an exclusive new Framework Agreement with the Swedish Transport Administration covering IT services for application development and management. The agreement initially runs over four years and can be extended for a further three.

Following a review of its IT operations, the Swedish Transport Administration , a government authority headquartered in Borlange, responsible for the long-term planning of Swedens transport system for road, rail, shipping and aviation, has signed a single supplier Framework Agreement with Sogeti Sverige AB (Sogeti Sweden).

This will see Sogeti in Sweden take responsibility for the resources and teams needed for application development and application management within the Swedish Transport Administration's IT operations. The contract period is four (4) years, with the government authority having the right to extend it by one (1) year + one (1) year + one (1) year.

The total value is 2,3 billon SEK (approximately 220 million Euros) over the maximum contract period of seven years.

The Swedish Transport Administration has specific objectives that it wants to achieve through this long-term collaboration with Sogeti that include:

Increased scalability in application development and application management

Greater innovation

Improved cost-efficiency

Reduced risks

We are extremely proud of this exclusive win, enabling us to deliver IT services for application development and management to the Swedish Transport Administration, commented Sergio de Brito, Head of Sogeti in Sweden. We look forward to being a proactive, innovative and agile partner, with high-quality delivery capabilities and credentials, providing access to our Groups extensive portfolio. Our technology experts and teams are 100% focused on creating value at speed in a cost-effective way, and are ready to support the Swedish Transport Administration's digitalization journey over the next seven years.

The new framework agreement entered into force on June 15, 2021.

About Sogeti

Part of the Capgemini Group, Sogeti operates in more than 100 locations globally. Working closely with clients and partners to take full advantage of the opportunities of technology, Sogeti combines agility and speed of implementation to tailor innovative future-focused solutions in Digital Assurance and Testing, Cloud and Cybersecurity, all fueled by AI and automation. With its hands-on value in the making approach and passion for technology, Sogeti helps organizations implement their digital journeys at speed.

Capgemini is a global leader in partnering with companies to transform and manage their business by harnessing the power of technology. The Group is guided everyday by its purpose of unleashing human energy through technology for an inclusive and sustainable future. It is a responsible and diverse organization of 270,000 team members in nearly 50 countries. With its strong 50 year heritage and deep industry expertise, Capgemini is trusted by its clients to address the entire breadth of their business needs, from strategy and design to operations, fueled by the fast evolving and innovative world of cloud, data, AI, connectivity, software, digital engineering and platforms. The Group reported in 2020 global revenues of 16 billion.

Visit us at: www.sogeti.se or www.sogeti.com





Attachment
Sydney, June 18, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Proactive, provider of real-time news and video interviews on growth companies listed in Australia, has covered the following companies:

Shree Minerals Ltd (ASX:SHH) is focused on exploration and development of its range of projects across Tasmania, the Northern Territory, Western Australia and New South Wales. Click here

Emperor Energy Ltd (ASX:EMP) has raised $1 million in a capital raise that was heavily oversubscribed within two hours. Click here

SUDA Pharmaceuticals Ltd (ASX:SUD) (FRA:E4N) has signed a global, exclusive licence agreement with Imperial College London for a novel invariant Natural Killer T (iNKT) cell therapy platform. Click here

Zelira Therapeutics Ltd (ASX:ZLD) (OTCMKTS:ZLDAF) (FRA:G1G) is buoyed that Curtin University researchers have developed a new technology that improves delivery of cannabidiol (CBD) based drugs into the brains of mice by up to 40-times. Click here

Arafura Resources Limited (ASX:ARU) (OTCMKTS:ARAFF) (FRA:REB) has welcomed support from the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility (NAIF) in relation to a potential senior debt facility as part of the funding package for its Nolans Rare Earth Project. Click here

Danakali Ltd (ASX:DNK) (LSE:DNK) (OTCMRKTS:DNKLY) says test-work conducted at its low-cost Colluli Potash Project in East Africa has confirmed production rates and outlines a path to lower operating and capital costs. Click here

Archer Materials Ltd (ASX:AXE) (OTCMKTS:ARRXF) (FRA:38A) has completed the sale of the Wadikkee and Carappee Hill tenements on South Australia's Eyre Peninsula to NextGen Materials Pty Ltd. Click here

Paradigm Biopharmaceuticals Ltd (ASX:PAR) (OTCMKTS:PBIGF) has received a key regulatory approval from Brazilian National Health Surveillance Agency ANVISA for its Phase 2 clinical trial evaluating the safety and tolerability of injectable (SC) pentosan polysulfate sodium (iPPS) versus placebo in subjects with Mucopolysaccharidosis type VI (MPS VI). Click here

Kin Mining NL (ASX:KIN) is turning its focus to regional exploration targets after a major fourth phase drilling campaign at its wholly-owned Cardinia Gold Project. Click here

Musgrave Minerals Ltd (ASX:MGV) (OTCMKTS:MGVMF) (FRA:6MU) has returned thick intersections in reverse circulation (RC) drilling at Big Sky prospect along a new gold corridor southwest of Lena deposit at the Cue Project in Western Australia. Click here

About Proactive

With six offices on three continents and a team of experienced business journalists and broadcasters, Proactive works with innovative growth companies quoted on the worlds major stock exchanges, helping executives engage intelligently with investors.

Proactive s platform delivers the right message to the right audience, digitally and in real time, leveraging a range of media, investment research, digital investor targeting and website development services to support over 1,000 fast-growing companies globally.

Proactives network reaches over 12 million engaged private, professional and institutional investors looking for opportunities.

 Our written and video content is published on Proactive sites that collectively attract up to 10 million views per month.

 We syndicate our content to hundreds of mainstream and specialist news sites that expand our reach into networks that can be difficult for press releases to penetrate.

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New York, June 18, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Reportlinker.com announces the release of the report "Brazil Data Center Market - Investment Analysis and Growth Opportunities 2021-2026" - https://www.reportlinker.com/p05915167/?utm_source=GNW



The growing digitalization in the country, increasing adoption of the cloud, the introduction of the local data security law by the local government, and the shift from on-premises to colocation data centers are some of the major factors driving the market. Sao Paulo will witness investments from Equinix and Scala Data Centers in seven data center facilities in the coming years. Brazil is the top data center market in Latin America, with about 17 unique third-party data center service providers operating over 44 facilities in the country. The market has grown significantly, with an increase in hyperscale data center development and investment by cloud service providers. The COVID-19 pandemic has also been a strong market enabler for digital transformation initiatives across private and public sector enterprises in Brazil.



The report considers the present scenario of the Brazil data center market and its market dynamics for the forecast period 2021?2026. It covers a detailed overview of several growth enablers, restraints, and trends in the market. The study includes the demand and supply aspects of the market.



KEY HIGHLIGHTS OF THE REPORT:

 5G networks to boost the countrys digital economy and heighten demand for high bandwidth networking infrastructure.

 In 2020, the countrys major data center service providers were Ascenty, Equinix, Scala Data Centers, and ODATA.

 Development of the hyperscale facilities is likely to increase in the adoption of more than 10 kW PDU racks in the market.

 In Brazil, there are over 75 Uptime Institute Tier III Certified facilities, which includes colocation and telecommunication, service providers.

 In 2020, Sao Paulo witnessed investment in around four facilities, with approximately USD 295 million.

 Rio de Janeiro, Sumare, and Hortolandia will witness significant investments from Ascenty and ODATA, adding an IT load capacity of more than 70 MW.



BRAZIL DATA CENTER MARKET INSIGHTS

 Brazil is the leading data center market in Latin America, driving over 40% of the overall investment in the region.

 Amazon Web Services (AWS) plans to invest over USD 230 million over the next two years to expand its data center presence in Brazil and strengthen its cloud infrastructure in Latin America.

 Brazil is the largest data center colocation market in the Latin America region and generated USD 680 million in 2020.

 Private cloud spending in Brazil is valued at around USD 600 million in 2021, with a 10% growth from 2020.

 Remote monitoring and management systems tools are gaining traction in the Brazilian data center market due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

 In 2021, the country will spend around USD 400 million on various Artificial Intelligence data center projects.

 The shift of workloads from on-premises to colocation facilities boosts retail and wholesale colocation in the Brazilian data center market.



BRAZIL DATA CENTER VENDOR LANDSCAPE

Brazil currently hosts over 75 data center facilities. Sao Paulo is the major market for data center development in Brazil. It is a prominent location for the establishment of cloud region and hyperscale facilities. For instance, Amazon Web Services is opening its cloud region in Sao Paulo. Ascenty, Equinix, ODATA, and Scala Data Centers are investing in developing the Tier III facilities, which are opened and were under construction in 2020. Microsoft plans to open a cloud region in Rio de Janeiro that is expected to be operational in H2 2021. Ascenty (Digital Realty), Equinix, ODATA, and Scala Data Centers are the key investors in the Brazil data center market.



IT Infrastructure Providers

 Arista Networks

 Cisco

 Dell Technologies

 Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE)

 Huawei Technologies

 IBM

 Lenovo

 NetApp

 Pure Storage



Construction Contractors & Sub Contractors

 AECOM

 Aceco TI

 Constructora Sudamericana S.A.

 Fluor Corporation

 ZFB Group

 Jacobs Engineering Group

 Quark



Support Infrastructure Providers

 ABB

 Axis Communications

 Caterpillar

 Eaton

 Generac Power Systems

 Honeywell International

 Legrand

 Munters

 Rolls-Royce Power Systems

 Rittal

 Siemens

 Schneider Electric

 STULZ

 Vertiv Group



Data Center Investors

 Ascenty (Digital Realty)

 Equinix

 ODATA

 Scala Data Centers

 Quantico Data Center



REPORT COVERAGE:

This report analyzes the Brazil Data Center market share and elaborative analysis of the existing and upcoming facilities, data center investments in terms of IT, electrical, mechanical infrastructure, general construction, and geography. It discusses market sizing and estimation of investment for different segments. The segmentation includes:



EXISTING VS. UPCOMING DATA CENTERS

 Existing Facilities in the country (Area and Power Capacity)

o Fortaleza

o Hortolandia

o Jundiai

o Rio De Janeiro

o Sao Paulo

o Sumare

o Vinhedo

o Other Cities

 List of Upcoming Facilities in the country (Area and Power Capacity)



BRAZIL DATA CENTER INVESTMENT COVERAGE



 Infrastructure Type

o IT Infrastructure

o Electrical Infrastructure

o Mechanical Infrastructure

o General Construction



 IT Infrastructure

o Servers

o Storage Systems

o Network Infrastructure



 Electrical Infrastructure

o UPS Systems

o Generators

o Transfer Switches & Switchgears

o PDUs

o Other Electrical Infrastructure



 Mechanical Infrastructure

o Cooling Systems

o Rack Cabinets

o Other Mechanical Infrastructure



 Cooling Systems

o CRAC & CRAH Units

o Chillers

o Cooling Towers, Condensers, and Dry Coolers

o Economizers & Evaporative Coolers

o Other Cooling Units



 General Construction

o Building Development

o Installation & Commissioning Services

o Building & Engineering Design

o Physical Security

o Data Center Infrastructure Management (DCIM)



 Tier Standard

o Tier I & Tier II

o Tier III

o Tier IV



 Geography

o Sao Paulo

o Other Cities



WHY SHOULD YOU BUY THIS RESEARCH?

 Market size available in the area, power capacity, investment, and colocation revenue.

 An assessment of the Brazil data center investment in the market by colocation, hyperscale, and enterprise operators.

 Data center investments in terms of area (square feet) and power capacity (MW) across cities in Brazil.

 A detailed study of the existing Brazil data center market landscape, an in-depth industry analysis, and insightful predictions about the Brazil data center market size during the forecast period.

 Snapshot of existing and upcoming third-party facilities in Brazil

o Facilities Covered (Existing): 44

o Facilities Identified (Upcoming): 15

o Coverage: Sao Paulo, Rio De Janerio, Hortolandia, Fortaleza, Sumare, Vinhedo, Jundiai, and Other Cities

o Existing vs. Upcoming (Data Center Area)

o Existing vs. Upcoming (IT Load Capacity)

 Data center colocation market in Brazil

o Market Revenue & Forecast (2020-2026)

o Retail Colocation Pricing

o Wholesale Colocation Pricing

 Classification of the Brazil data center market investments into multiple segments and sub-segments (IT, electric, mechanical, and general construction) with market sizing and forecast

 A comprehensive analysis of the latest trends, growth rate, potential opportunities, and growth restraints, and prospects for the market

 Business overview and product offerings of prominent IT infrastructure providers, construction contractors, support infrastructure providers, and investors operating in the market.

 A transparent research methodology and the analysis of the demand and supply aspect of the market.



KEY QUESTIONS ANSWERED:

1. What is the market size of Brazils data center?

2. How many existing data centers are there in Brazil?

3. What are the expected upcoming facilities in Brazil during the period 20212026?

4. What is the growth rate of the Brazil Data Center Market?

5. Who are the key investors in the Brazil Data Center Market?

Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p05915167/?utm_source=GNW



About Reportlinker

ReportLinker is an award-winning market research solution. Reportlinker finds and organizes the latest industry data so you get all the market research you need - instantly, in one place.



__________________________
New York, June 18, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Reportlinker.com announces the release of the report "Germany Data Center Market - Investment Analysis and Growth Opportunities 2021-2026" - https://www.reportlinker.com/p05796170/?utm_source=GNW



Over the last 57 years, the Germany data center market has grown significantly with the increase in the development of hyperscale data centers, and owing to the implementation of GDPR. In Germany, digital transformation strategies, the adoption of cloud computing by enterprises, IoT, AI, implementation of GDPR, and COVID-19 are the major factors fueling the growth of data centers, thereby, increasing the adoption of high-power computing servers.



KEY HIGHLIGHTS OF THE REPORT:

 Industry 4.0 and Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) expect to drive the market growth in Germany between 2020 and 2026. By the end of 2021, IoT spending is likely to cross over USD 45 billion.

 In 2020, NDC-GARBE Data Centers, Vantage Data Centers, and Trusted-Colo were among the new entrants in the data center market in Germany.

 CloudHQ and L3 Logistics Parks have planned to develop hyperscale campus in Germany.

 In 2020, German power grids and utility firms spent over USD 900 million to meet data center power demands in Frankfurt.

 M&A activities continue in the Germany data center market. In 2020, Dutch investment company, Penta Infra, acquired a data center facility with over 9,000 square feet in Dusseldorf. In 2021, Penta Infra acquired another data center in Hamburg for 16.4 million.



GERMANY DATA CENTER INDUSTRY INSIGHTS

 Germany is the second largest data center colocation market in Europe, with an estimated revenue of over USD 1 billion generated in 2020.

 Over 78% of organizations in Germany have adopted cloud services for at least one service, which is expected to grow at a rate of 2%-3% YoY during the forecast period.

 In 2020, over 32 smart city projects were selected and funded with over USD 420 million dollars to accelerate digital transformation in Germany.

 To make data centers climate neutral by 2030, data center operators and trade associations are committed to the European green deal. In Germany, T-Systems, ScaleUp Technologies, noris network, and others are part of this European green deal.

 The adoption of advanced technologies such as AI and big data analytics will increase the demand for high-performance all-flash storage arrays among data center facilities in Germany.



GERMANY DATA CENTER MARKET VENDOR LANDSCAPE

China Mobile International (CMI), Colt Data Centre Services, CyrusOne, Datacenter One, Digital Realty, envia TEL, Equinix, Iron Mountain IO, noris networks, and Maincubes One are some of the data center investors in Germany. CyrusOne Frankfurt IV facility will add over 70,000 square feet area of data center space and is expected to be online by Q4 2022.



IT Infrastructure Provider

 Atos

 Broadcom

 Cisco System

 Dell Technologies

 Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE)

 IBM

 Lenovo

 NetApp



Data Center Construction Contractors & Sub-Contractors

 AECOM

 Arup

 Collen Construction

 DPR Construction

 ICT Facilities

 KLEINUNDARCHITEKTEN

 Lupp Group

 Max Bogl

 Mercury Engineering

 M+W Group (Exyte)

 Royal HaskoningDHV

 STS Group

 Winthrop Engineering

 Zech Group



Support Infrastructure Providers

 ABB

 Caterpillar

 Cummins

 Delta Electronics

 Eaton

 KOHLER-SDMO

 Legrand

 Rolls-Royce Power Systems

 Piller Power Systems

 Riello UPS

 Rittal

 Schneider Electric

 Socomec

 STULZ

 Vertiv



Data Center Investors

 China Mobile International (CMI)

 Colt Data Centre Services

 CyrusOne

 Datacenter One

 Digital Realty

 envia TEL

 Equinix

 Iron Mountain IO

 KeyWeb

 Maincubes One

 NDC-GARBE Data Centers

 NewTelco

 NTT Global Data Centers

 Penta Infra

 Vantage Data Centers

 noris network



GERMANY DATA CENTER INVESTMENT COVERAGE

Infrastructure Type

 IT Infrastructure

 Electrical Infrastructure

 Mechanical Infrastructure

 General Construction



IT infrastructure

 Servers

 Storage Systems

 Network Infrastructure



Electrical Infrastructure

 UPS Systems

 Generators

 Transfer Switches & Switchgears

 PDUs

 Other Electrical Infrastructure



Mechanical Infrastructure

 Cooling Systems

 Rack Cabinets

 Other Mechanical Infrastructure



Cooling Systems

o CRAC & CRAH Units

o Chillers

o Cooling Towers, Condensers, and Dry Coolers

o Economizers & Evaporative Coolers

o Other Cooling Units



General Construction

 Building Development

 Installation & commissioning Services

 Building Design

 Physical Security

 Data Center Infrastructure

 Management (DCIM)



Tier Standard

 Tier I & Tier II

 Tier III

 Tier IV



Geography

 Frankfurt

 Other Cities



WHY SHOULD YOU BUY THIS RESEARCH?

 Market size available in terms of investment, area, power capacity, and colocation revenue.

 An assessment of the Germany data center market investment by colocation, hyperscale, and enterprise operators.

 Data center investments in terms of area (square feet) and power capacity (MW) across Thailand.

 A detailed study of the existing Germany data center market landscape, an in-depth industry analysis, and insightful predictions about the data center market size during the forecast period.

 Snapshot of existing and upcoming third-party facilities in the country

 Facilities Covered (Existing): 128

 Facilities Identified (Upcoming): 15

 Coverage: Frankfurt and Other cities (including Munich, Berlin, Hamburg, Nuremburg, Dusseldorf, among others)

 Existing vs. Upcoming (Data Center Area)

o Existing vs. Upcoming (IT Load Capacity)

 Data center colocation market in Germany by revenue & forecast (2020-2026)

o Retail Colocation Pricing

o Wholesale Colocation Pricing

 Classification of the market investments into multiple segments and sub-segments (IT, electrical, mechanical, general construction services, and tier standard) with market sizing and forecast.

 A comprehensive analysis of the latest trends, growth rate, potential opportunities, growth restraints, and prospects for the data center market.

 Business overview and product offerings of prominent IT infrastructure providers, construction contractors and sub-contractors, support infrastructure providers, and investors operating in the market.

 A transparent research methodology and the analysis of the demand and supply aspect of the market



KEY QUESTIONS ANSWERED:

1. How big is the Germany data center market?

2. How many existing data centers are in Germany?

3. What are the expected upcoming facilities in Germany during the forecast period?

4. Which regions are covered in this Germany data center research report?

5. Which factors are influencing the growth of the data center market in Germany?

Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p05796170/?utm_source=GNW



About Reportlinker

ReportLinker is an award-winning market research solution. Reportlinker finds and organizes the latest industry data so you get all the market research you need - instantly, in one place.



__________________________
New York, June 18, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Reportlinker.com announces the release of the report "Europe Data Center Colocation Market - Industry Outlook & Forecast 2021-2026" - https://www.reportlinker.com/p06096851/?utm_source=GNW

61% during the period 20202026.



The data center colocation market in Europe is an attractive asset with a better Return on Investment (ROI) than other commercial and industrial properties. In 2020, the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic was creating huge demand for cloud-based providers, and the majority of the workforce shifting to remote working in Europe. The need for colocation services led to strong utilization of existing data center space and drove service providers revenues by over 10% in Q1 and Q2 2020. The continuous adoption of cloud services among SMEs, with the rising interest toward the digital transformation of businesses by adopting solutions such as IoT, big data, and artificial intelligence. Governments across the region are reducing electricity prices and electricity taxes to attract data center operators to invest in their countries.



The following factors are likely to contribute to the growth of the Europe data center colocation market during the forecast period:

 Impact of COVID-19 on Data Center Market

 Increase in the Application of Cloud Connectivity

 Growing Submarine Cable & Inland Connectivity

 Rise in Colocation Investments



The study considers the present scenario of the Europe data center colocation market and its market dynamics for the period 2020?2026. It covers a detailed overview of several market growth enablers, restraints, and trends. The report offers both the demand and supply aspects of the market. It profiles and examines leading companies and other prominent ones operating in the market.



EUROPE DATA CENTER COLOCATION MARKET SEGMENTATION

The Europe data center colocation market research report includes a detailed segmentation by infrastructure, electrical infrastructure, mechanical infrastructure, general construction, service type, tier standards, geography. To overcome the challenges of VRLA batteries, vendors are introducing lithium-ion UPS solutions, Nickel Zinc, and Prussian Blue Sodium-ion batteries. In 2020, the adoption of lithium-ion UPS systems grew considerably. In terms of power infrastructure, UPS systems were the highest contributors to market investments by adopting VRLA battery-powered systems.

VRLA battery-powered UPS systems are most widely used in the data center environment and other industrial applications. The contribution from colocation providers will be high in lithium-ion UPS solutions. Vendors are continuously innovating with UPS solutions to boost efficiency and reduce cost. For instance, ZincFive, a US-based battery developer and manufacturer, launched a megawatt-class UPS system for data centers that is based on Nickel-Zinc batteries.



Datacenter operators are looking for efficient solutions to reduce their CAPEX and OPEX, conserve data center space, and reduce the power consumption of cooling units. Europe experiences colder climatic conditions and will continue to use indirect evaporative coolers and air/water-side economizers. Free cooling chillers that facilitate partial cooling using outside air are also highly preferred by several facilities. For instance, NTT Global Data Centers (e-shelter) London 1 data center facility is equipped with N+1 redundancy of water-based cooling systems supported by free cooling. In data center projects, the investment in cooling systems is expected to be 1520% of the overall cost, depending on the facility design and IT load.



The adoption of data center physical security systems mainly depends on the growth of retail colocation services, which requires higher security. The application of innovation in connected security products is boosting the growth in the Europe market. In the coming years, the Europe data center colocation market will witness increased robotic monitoring systems with sensors and video surveillance.



The retail colocation market is likely to be driven by the high demand for colocation services from organizations in developing countries. In comparison to wholesale colocation services, retail colocation services are highly suitable for those enterprises that require lesser computing power at a single site or across multiple locations to service global and local customers. The retail colocation market is expected to witness significant growth during the forecast period.



UPS and PDU systems of Tier II data centers are equipped with minimum N+N redundancy. The UK has around 16 Tier III facilities that are developed by local and global service providers, namely, Pure Data Centres, VIRTUS Data Centres (ST Telemedia Global Data Centres), Colt Data Centre Services, Fujitsu Services, and Ark Data Centres. A majority of under-developed projects across the region fall under the Tier III category. This trend is likely to continue throughout the forecast period. Many operators are expected to move to the Tier IV category based on the growth in rack power density and critical data center applications. Italy, Spain, and Luxembourg are the major locations with 32 Tier IV facilities.



Segmentation by Infrastructure

 Electrical Infrastructure

 Mechanical Infrastructure

 General Construction



Segmentation by Electrical Infrastructure

 UPS System

 Generators

 Transfer Switches & Switchgears

 PDUs

 Other Electrical Infrastructure



Segmentation by Mechanical Infrastructure

 Cooling Systems

o CRAC & CRAH Units

o Chiller Units

o Cooling Towers

o Condensers and Dry Coolers

o Economizers & Evaporative Coolers

o Other Units

 Rack

 Other Mechanical Infrastructure

 Cooling Technique

o Air-Based Cooling Technique

o Liquid-Based Cooling Technique



Segmentation by General Construction

 Core & Shell Development

 Installation & Commissioning Services

 Engineering & Building Design

 Physical Security

 DCIM



Segmentation by Service Type

 Retail Colocation

 Wholesale Colocation



INSIGHTS BY GEOGRAPHY

The data center market in Western Europe witnessed significant investment growth in countries such as the UK, the Netherlands, Germany, France, Ireland, Spain, Italy, Portugal, Belgium, and Switzerland. Multiple projects are being carried out by colocation, cloud, telecommunication, and internet service providers in Western Europe. The market will also witness the continuous adoption of cloud services among SMEs, with the heightened interest in the digital transformation of businesses by adopting solutions such as IoT, big data, and artificial intelligence. The demand for smart devices, coupled with growing internet penetration, will also fuel colocation facilities and corresponding infrastructure in the region.



Segmentation by Geography

 Western Europe

o UK

o Germany

o Netherlands

o France

o Ireland

o Switzerland

o Italy

o Spain

o Other Western European Countries

 Nordic Region

o Denmark

o Sweden

o Norway

o Finland & Iceland

 Central & Eastern Europe

o Russia & Czech Republic

o Poland & Austria

o Other Central & Eastern European Countries



INSIGHTS BY VENDORS

Equinix was the leading operator in the colocation market, and the average occupancy rate for Equinix data centers in Europe was around 80-85%. The company generated over USD 1.44 billion from colocation services, a jump of over 2.8% from the revenue generated in 2019. CyrusOne, with a share of around 5.7%, in terms of the area added in the Europe colocation market in 2020. It added around 238,000 square feet of data center space to develop around five facilities across the UK, Ireland, Germany, and the Netherlands.



Prominent Data Center Colocation Providers

 Aruba

 Bahnhof

 CyrusOne

 Colt DCS

 DATA4

 Digital Realty

 Equinix

 Global Switch

 Green Mountain

 NTT Global Data Centers

 QTS Realty Trust

 Virtus Data Centres (ST Telemedia Global Data Centres)



Other Prominent Data Center Colocation Providers

 3data

 acens Technologies

 Adam

 AzInTelecom

 Bulk Infrastructure Group

 China Mobile International

 CloudHQ

 Dataplace

 DigiPlex

 EcoDataCenter

 Euclyde Data Centers

 GlobalConnect

 Hydro66 Holdings

 Iron Mountain

 KDDI

 Keppel Data Centres

 maincubes One

 myLoc

 NDC-GARBE Data Centers Europe

 Nexica - Econocom Group

 Orange

 Rostelecom

 Scaleway Datacenter

 Telecom Italia Sparkle

 Turkcell

 T5 Data Centers

 Vantage Data Centers

 WORLDSTREAM

 Yandex Cloud

 Zayo Group



New Entrants in Europe Colocation Market

 AQ Compute

 Echelon Data Centres

 Global Technical Realty

 Stratus DC Management



KEY QUESTIONS ANSWERED:

1. How big is the global fencing market?

2. Which region would dominate the fencing market?

3. Who are the key players in the fencing market?

4. What are the key trends in the fencing market?

5. Which segment accounted for the largest fencing market share?

Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p06096851/?utm_source=GNW



About Reportlinker

ReportLinker is an award-winning market research solution. Reportlinker finds and organizes the latest industry data so you get all the market research you need - instantly, in one place.



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WESTPORT, Conn., June 18, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- HMG Strategy, the Worlds #1 digital platform for enabling technology executives to reimagine the enterprise and reshape the business world, is excited to be hosting its 2021 HMG Live! Toronto CIO Executive Leadership Summit on June 21. HMG Strategys highly interactive digital events bring together the worlds most distinguished and innovative business technology leaders to discuss the most pressing leadership, strategic, cultural, technology and career challenges and opportunities that technology executives face today  and into the future.



The 2021 HMG Live! Toronto CIO Executive Leadership Summit will focus on the role of the CIO and technology leaders in working with the CEO and line-of-business leaders to identify new opportunities in core, parallel and new markets.

CEOs are counting on CIOs and technology executives to identify new ways to grow the business and create new go-to-market models, said Hunter Muller, President and CEO at HMG Strategy. CIOs and technology executives can draw upon their unique view across the enterprise along with how people, processes and technology can be brought together to create new business services and new customer experiences.

HMG Strategy is also excited to have special guest speaker and bestselling author Stephen M.R. Covey share his insights on why a high-trust culture can operate with greater efficiency and at less cost along with recommendations for CIOs and technology executives to cultivate trust with the CEO, the Board and across the organization.

Top-tier CIOs and technology executives speaking at this event will include:

Ron Bennett , Global VP of IT, Linamar Corporation

, Global VP of IT, Linamar Corporation Roman Coba , VP Technology and CIO, Federated Co-operatives Limited

, VP Technology and CIO, Federated Co-operatives Limited Ed Corno , Chief Technology Leader, IBM Corporation

, Chief Technology Leader, IBM Corporation Stephen M.R. Covey , Global Authority on Trust, Leadership and Culture, The Franklin Covey Global Speed of Trust Practice

, Global Authority on Trust, Leadership and Culture, The Franklin Covey Global Speed of Trust Practice Martin Davis , CIO & Strategic Advisor, DUNELM Associates Ltd

, CIO & Strategic Advisor, DUNELM Associates Ltd Robert Falzon , Head of Engineering, Office of the CTO, Check Point Software Technologies Inc.

, Head of Engineering, Office of the CTO, Check Point Software Technologies Inc. Raymond Gilbert , Managing Partner, Causal Effects, Inc.

, Managing Partner, Causal Effects, Inc. Jameeka Green Aaron , CISO, Auth0

, CISO, Auth0 Meredith Harper , VP, CISO, Eli Lilly and Company

, VP, CISO, Eli Lilly and Company Michael Katz , Principal Security Specialist, Infoblox

, Principal Security Specialist, Infoblox Kyoko Kobayashi , Managing Partner, CIOs Beyond Borders Group

, Managing Partner, CIOs Beyond Borders Group Michael LaVallee , Managing Partner, Jobplex

, Managing Partner, Jobplex Kin Lee-Yow, CIO, CAA Club Group of Companies

CIO, CAA Club Group of Companies Samantha Liscio , Chief Technology Information Officer, Canadas CIO of the Year 2020, Public Sector, NIHR Clinical Research Network

, Chief Technology Information Officer, Canadas CIO of the Year 2020, Public Sector, NIHR Clinical Research Network Gina Loften , Chief Technology Officer, Microsoft U.S.

, Chief Technology Officer, Microsoft U.S. Laura Money , EVP & CIO, Sun Life Financial

, EVP & CIO, Sun Life Financial Kelly Shen , Senior Managing Director, Chief Technology & Data Officer, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board

, Senior Managing Director, Chief Technology & Data Officer, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board Andrew Vezina, VP & CISO, Equitable Bank

Valued Partners for the 2021 HMG Live! Toronto CIO Executive Leadership Summit include Akamai, Auth0, BetterCloud, Check Point Software Technologies, The CIO Association of Canada, Darktrace, Forescout Technologies, Globant, Horizon3.ai, Infoblox, Illumio, RingCentral, Rubrik, SafeGuard Cyber, SIM Toronto, Skybox Security, and Zscaler.

To learn more about the 2021 HMG Live! Toronto CIO Executive Leadership Summit and to register for the event, click here.

HMG Strategy will also be hosting its 2021 HMG Live! New York Global Innovation Summit on June 24. Timely topics to be discussed at this event will include the role that business technology executives can play in reimagining how the business operates, applying security innovation to address the evolving threat landscape, along with real-world use cases for applying hot technologies such as artificial intelligence, machine learning, robotic process automation, the Internet of Things, computer vision and augmented reality.

World-class executives speaking at the 2021 HMG Live! New York Global Innovation Summit will include:

Bashir Agboola, VP & Chief Technology Officer, Hospital for Special Surgery

VP & Chief Technology Officer, Hospital for Special Surgery Raj Badhwar , SVP, CISO, Voya Financial

, SVP, CISO, Voya Financial Ricardo Bartra , SVP & CIO, The Scotts Miracle-Gro Company

, SVP & CIO, The Scotts Miracle-Gro Company Colleen Berube , CIO & SVP Operations, Zendesk

, CIO & SVP Operations, Zendesk Michael Braine , CTO, Public Storage

, CTO, Public Storage Simon Cheng , SVP, Global Services, FPT Corporation

, SVP, Global Services, FPT Corporation Marc Ferrentino , Chief Strategy Officer, Yext

, Chief Strategy Officer, Yext Amanda Finch , CEO, Chartered Institute of Information Security

, CEO, Chartered Institute of Information Security Vivek Goel , VP, Automation, Reengineering and Transformation, UnitedHealth Group

, VP, Automation, Reengineering and Transformation, UnitedHealth Group Rocco Grillo , Managing Director  Global Cyber Risk Services & Incident Response Investigation, Alvarez & Marsal

, Managing Director  Global Cyber Risk Services & Incident Response Investigation, Alvarez & Marsal Douglas Hegley, Chief Digital Officer, The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Chief Digital Officer, The Metropolitan Museum of Art Rohit Jain , Senior Director, Finance Systems, Upwork

, Senior Director, Finance Systems, Upwork Beni Lopez , Managing Director, Industrial and U.S. Market, Softtek

, Managing Director, Industrial and U.S. Market, Softtek Ashish Parmar , CIO, Tapestry

, CIO, Tapestry Dr. Nalini Polavarapu, Head of Data Science  Customer Centricity, Bayer

Head of Data Science  Customer Centricity, Bayer Frank Price , SVP & Chief Information Risk Officer, Hudsons Bay Company

, SVP & Chief Information Risk Officer, Hudsons Bay Company Anna Ransley , VP, Digital and Technology, Heineken

, VP, Digital and Technology, Heineken Deepika Rayala , CIO, Yext

, CIO, Yext Hari Shah , CISO, Coach

, CISO, Coach Janet Sherlock , CIO, Ralph Lauren Corporation

, CIO, Ralph Lauren Corporation Colleen Tartow , Ph.D., Director of Engineering, Starburst

, Ph.D., Director of Engineering, Starburst Nicol Turner Lee, Senior Fellow and Director of the Center for Technology Innovation, Brookings Institution

Senior Fellow and Director of the Center for Technology Innovation, Brookings Institution Derek Vadala , Global Chief Cybersecurity Ratings Officer, Moodys Investors Services (MIS)

, Global Chief Cybersecurity Ratings Officer, Moodys Investors Services (MIS) Zheng Yang, PhD, Head of Technology and Data Innovation, Healthcare Affair and Patient Engagement, Boehringer Ingelheim

Valued Partners for the 2021 HMG Live! New York Global Innovation Summit include Akamai, Auth0, BetterCloud, Darktrace, Forescout Technologies, FPT Corporation, Globant, Horizon3.ai, Incorta, Illumio, NPower, RingCentral, SafeGuard Cyber, SIM New York Metro, Skybox Security, Softtek, Starburst, Zendesk and Zscaler.

To learn more about the 2021 HMG Live! New York Global Innovation Summit and to register for the event, click here.

HMG Strategy will also be hosting its 2021 HMG Live! Financial Services CIO Executive Leadership Summit on June 30. Timely topics to be discussed include whats required to cultivate a connected culture into the future  including one that embraces diversity, equity and inclusion, along with recommendations for leveraging advanced technologies and partnership that are enabling competitive differentiation and speed to market.

World-class executives speaking at 2021 HMG Live! Financial Services CIO Executive Leadership Summit will include:

Selim Aissi , SVP & CISO, ICE Mortgage Company

, SVP & CISO, ICE Mortgage Company Marianne Bachynski , CIO, Investments, AIG

, CIO, Investments, AIG Sandeep Bose , Unit CIO, Credit & Fraud Risk, American Express

, Unit CIO, Credit & Fraud Risk, American Express Stefanie Causey , Associate Partner, Salesforce Innovation Unit - Financial Services Sector, IBM Global Business Services

, Associate Partner, Salesforce Innovation Unit - Financial Services Sector, IBM Global Business Services Ariel Evans , CEO, Cyber Innovative Technologies

, CEO, Cyber Innovative Technologies Cindy Finkelman , Former CIO, FactSet Research Systems

, Former CIO, FactSet Research Systems Jameeka Green Aaron , CISO, Auth0

, CISO, Auth0 Vipin Gupta , CIO, Toyota Financial Services

, CIO, Toyota Financial Services Loren Hudizak , Chrome Customer Engineer, Google Chrome Enterprise

, Chrome Customer Engineer, Google Chrome Enterprise Michael Katz , Principal Security Specialist, Infoblox

, Principal Security Specialist, Infoblox Beni Lopez , Managing Director, Industrial and U.S. Market, Softtek

, Managing Director, Industrial and U.S. Market, Softtek David Mahon , Global CISO, Deloitte

, Global CISO, Deloitte Praful Mainker , Exec Director, Data Science, Consumer and Community Bank Compliance, JPMorgan Chase & Co.

, Exec Director, Data Science, Consumer and Community Bank Compliance, JPMorgan Chase & Co. Raj Marwah , SVP, Strategy and Business Innovation, Wells Fargo

, SVP, Strategy and Business Innovation, Wells Fargo Manav Misra , Chief Data and Analytics Officer, Regions Financial Corporation

, Chief Data and Analytics Officer, Regions Financial Corporation Christopher Parkin , Head of Industry Marketing, Adobe Document Cloud, Adobe

, Head of Industry Marketing, Adobe Document Cloud, Adobe Mel Reyes , Global Head of IT and Security, Getaround

, Global Head of IT and Security, Getaround Roland Selby , Vice President of Strategic Partnerships, NPower

, Vice President of Strategic Partnerships, NPower Sangy Vatsa , EVP, Global Chief Technology and Digital Officer, FIS Global

, EVP, Global Chief Technology and Digital Officer, FIS Global Anthony Vigilante, Managing Director, Chief Security Officer, MacKay Shields

Valued Partners for the 2021 HMG Live! Financial Services CIO Executive Leadership Summit on June 30 include Adobe, Akamai, Auth0, DarkTrace, Forescout Technologies, Google Chrome Enterprise, Globant, Horizon3.ai, Infoblox, Illumio, Nutanix, RingCentral, SafeGuard Cyber, SIM New York Metro, Skybox Security, Softtek and Zscaler.

To learn more about the 2021 HMG Live! Financial Services CIO Executive Leadership Summit and to register for the event, please click here.

To learn about HMG Strategys upcoming CIO and CISO Summits, click here.

HMG STRATEGYS 2021 GLOBAL LEADERSHIP INSTITUTE AWARDS

The HMG Strategy 2021 Global Leadership Institute Awards honor exemplary technology leaders and leadership teams who are delivering exceptional value to their organizations. This award recognizes those who have reimagined and reinvented themselves to place their organizations on the fast track to groundbreaking transformation in dynamic times. Technology executives and their teams who receive these awards are being recognized for accomplishments in the following areas: Diversity, Equity and Inclusion; Leading into the C-suite; Creating New Go-to-Market Business Models; Modernizing Enterprise Architecture; and Building a Culture of Trust.

World-class technology executives who were recognized for their contributions to their companies and to the industry at the 2021 HMG Live! Chicago CIO Executive Leadership Summit on June 17 include:

Ricardo Lafosse, CISO, The Kraft Heinz Company



To learn more about HMG Strategys 2021 Global Leadership Institute Awards and to nominate a deserving executive, click here.

HMG STRATEGYS CUSTOM WEBINARS AND DIGITAL ROUNDTABLES

On June 22, HMG Strategy will be hosting the HMG Security Innovation Webinar. Research conducted by HMG Strategy reveals that one of the top focus areas for CISOs and security leaders is working with the CEO and the executive team to enable innovation and grow the business. In this exclusive webinar, HMG Strategy President and CEO Hunter Muller asks the CEOs and leaders of innovative cybersecurity technology companies about the challenges they solve for clients, the innovation they deliver to companies, and how their solutions are differentiated in the market.

Speakers for this highly interactive event include Ritesh Agrawal, CEO, Airgap Networks Inc., Anthony DeCristofaro, President & CEO, FileFlex, and Nikhil Gupta, Co-Founder and CEO, ArmorCode.

To learn more about this event and to register for the webinar, click here.

To learn more about HMG Strategys upcoming and archived webinars, click here.

About HMG Strategy

HMG Strategy is the world's leading digital platform for connecting technology executives to reimagine the enterprise and reshape the business world. Our regional and virtual CIO and CISO Executive Leadership Series, authored books and Digital Resource Center deliver unique, peer-driven research from CIOs, CISOs, CTOs and technology executives on leadership, innovation, transformation and career ascent. HMG Strategy offers a range of peer-driven research services such as its CIO & CISO Executive Leadership Alliance (CELA) program which bring together the worlds top CIOs, CISOs and technology executives to brainstorm on the top opportunities and challenges facing them in their roles.

HMG Strategy also produces the HMG Security Innovation Accelerator Panel, a new webinar series thats designed to connect enterprise CISOs and security leaders with the most innovative cybersecurity companies from across the world.

The HMG Strategy global network consists of over 400,000 senior IT executives, industry experts and world-class thought leaders.

To learn more about the 7 Pillars of Trust for HMG Strategy's unique business model, click here.

A photo accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/a4fe121f-ad3b-41db-9f56-164635493865
SALISBURY, N.C., June 18, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- A select group of local food banks, community leaders and Food Lion associates were honored at the 2021 Food Lion Feeds Feedys Awards this week. The awards recognized individuals and organizations across several categories for their exceptional work to fighting hunger in the towns and cities Food Lion serves.



Caring for our neighbors in the towns and cities we serve is core to everything we do at Food Lion, so its important for us to honor and thank our community partners who share that care and commitment for our communities, said Jennifer Blanchard, director of community relations at Food Lion. Far too many of our neighbors remain food insecure, and unfortunately thats only worsened during the COVID-19 pandemic. Yet, our hunger-relief partners continue to innovate and adapt to meet the rising challenges, and were proud to support their efforts and recognize some of the many individuals, organizations and Food Lion associates who are leading the charge to help feed more neighbors in need.

The 2021 Feedy's Awards winners include:

The "Lion Heart" Award  Sheldon Livesay, Executive Director, Of One Accord, Inc., Rogersville, TN

The "Lion Heart" award recognizes an individual who demonstrates outstanding skills in coordinating and motivating groups of donors and volunteers for Food Lion Feeds' hunger-relief projects to benefit partner food banks. This winner was chosen based on his longstanding commitment to the food pantry he helped create in 1988. The food pantry, Of One Accord, has distributed nearly 19 million pounds of food to hungry neighbors. With one in three children living in poverty in the region, Livesays mission to address chronic hunger has grown to three food pantries staffed by over 450 volunteers. For a video highlighting Livesays work, click here.

The "Food King" Award  Feed More, Richmond, VA

The "Food King" award honors a food bank that demonstrates an outstanding commitment to ending hunger through financial support, innovation, encouragement and by motivating others to take leadership roles in hunger-relief programs and community involvement. This winner, which partners with more than 70 area Food Lion stores, piloted an innovative program to freeze, save and distribute dairy products before they expire, which led to an additional 25,000 pounds of dairy donated to greater Richmond-area neighbors. For a video highlighting the food banks work, click here.

The "Lion's Pride" Award  Mary Blanton, receiving manager at Store #623 (8006 Buford Ct., Richmond, VA 23235)

The "Lion's Pride" award recognizes a Food Lion associate who demonstrates outstanding skills in coordinating and motivating associates and volunteers for hunger-relief projects for the benefit of Food Lion Feeds and its partner food banks. This winner was chosen for her work leading the stores food rescue efforts, in which near-date food still safe for human consumption is donated to local feeding agencies. Because of Marys commitment, First Union Food Pantry received over 34,000 pounds of food, assisted nearly 10,000 families and reduced the amount of food it had to buy. For a video highlighting Marys work, click here.

The "Store That Roars" Award  Store #1368 (3301 M.L. King Jr. Blvd., New Bern, NC 28561)

The "Store That Roars" award honors a Food Lion store that demonstrates outstanding skills in coordinating and motivating store associates, customers and volunteers for hunger-relief projects to benefit Food Lion Feeds and its partner food banks. This store was chosen for its exceptional efforts to support the Food Bank of Central and Eastern North Carolina and its affiliated agencies through ongoing food rescue donations, and for its support of in-store Food Lion Feeds campaigns that benefit the food bank and its local agencies. For a video highlighting the stores work, click here.

Through Food Lions hunger-relief platform, Food Lion Feeds, the retailer has donated more than 750 million meals to neighbors in need since 2014 and has committed to providing 1.5 billion meals by 2025 through a combination of product, financial and equipment donations; disaster relief and recovery efforts; volunteer hours by associates; in-store retail campaigns; and the companys pioneering food rescue program. To learn more about Food Lion Feeds, visit www.foodlion.com/feeds.

About Food Lion

Food Lion, based in Salisbury, N.C., since 1957, has more than 1,100 stores in 10 Southeastern and Mid-Atlantic states and employs more than 82,000 associates. By leveraging its longstanding heritage of low prices and convenient locations, Food Lion is working to own the easiest full shop grocery experience in the Southeast, anchored by a strong commitment to affordability, freshness and the communities it serves. Through Food Lion Feeds, the company has donated more than 500 million meals to individuals and families since 2014 and has committed to donate 1.5 billion meals by 2025. Food Lion is a company of Ahold Delhaize USA, the U.S. division of Zaandam-based Ahold Delhaize. For more information, visit www.foodlion.com or job applicants may visit www.foodlion.com/careers.

CONTACTS: Food Lion Media Relations 704-245-3317 publicrelationsteam@foodlion.com

A photo accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/6f60f349-7469-4130-b2dd-bfdac440a322
United States, New York, New York City, June 18, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Top Iranian entrepreneur Mahan Teymouri and New York Times Bestselling Author of Compound Effect and publisher of Success Magazine Darren Hardy will hold an important event in the history of the management industry. With their vast experience, the two have organized a management and leadership virtual seminar that will be held in Tehran on June 25th, 2021.

This virtual conference provided by Mahan Teymouri International Holding seeks to grow and develop management and leadership knowledge for world managers, especially in Iran and the Middle East. As the top Iranian entrepreneur and founder of financial intelligence in Iran, Mahan Teymouri will speak at the conference about new strategies in the field of management and leadership in small businesses. In 2018, 2019, and 2020, he was recognized as a top manager and top young entrepreneur by prestigious Iranian publications. He has also published more than thirty books in the field of business management and more than three million educated people have taken his financial intelligence courses.

On the other hand, Darren Hardy who is a top management speaker will address the main concerns of managers, especially small business executives. Darren Hardy has had more than one billion students over the past 25 years and advised many executives from around the world. Hardy is also a New York Times best-selling author with books such as The Entrepreneur Roller Coaster, Living Your Best Year Ever and The Compound Effect which has sold over 1 million copies since its first publishing in 2010. He has a great deal of data on management success that will help bring about the best and most efficient returns for Middle East executives and leaders.

This virtual conference comes at a time when the management challenge is a main topic in the think tank of managers and leaders in the Middle East. The Middle East has attracted a lot of capital over the last ten years through European, American, and Asian countries, and this capital now needs the right management for growth and development.

The presence of large companies in the Middle East has also caused small business managers to face many difficulties, and in addition to all this, the corona and its aftermath have created a business crisis in the Middle East. Therefore, up-to-date knowledge of management and business leadership skills is one of the main needs of Middle East managers, especially in Iran.

If you are eager to participate in this wonderful virtual conference, you can book your seat right now. You can also visit Mahan Teymouri's website to get more information about this life changing conference. This conference will take you to your heart's desires.

For the original news story, please visit https://prdistribution.com/news/top-entrepreneur-mahan-teymouri-and-new-york-times-bestselling-author-darren-hardy-to-hold-big-seminar-on-management-and-leadership.html

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Covington, Kentucky, June 18, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Covington Latin Schools 94th annual commencement ceremony convened at 7:00 PM on May 22nd, 2021. The proceedings were held in-person at the Cathedral Basilica of the Assumption in Covington, Kentucky. However, attendance was limited to immediate family due to COVID-19 restrictions. Each of the eighteen graduates was dressed in semi-formal black apparel and adorned with brilliant yellow roses. Bishop Roger Foys, Headmaster Dr. John P. Kennedy and Superintendent Kendra McGuire presided over the graduation.

The eighteen seniors in the Covington Latin Schools class of 2021 will be distinguished as the smallest graduating class the school has seen since 1954. However, the accolades this class accumulated places them as one of the more decorated classes in Covington Latin Schools history. Together these eighteen seniors received over 3.2 million dollars in scholarship offers and were accepted to 42 colleges and universities across the country. On average each student received offers surpassing $800,000 in scholarships. With a 30.2 average ACT score, all eighteen students will continue their education at the college of their first preference. This exiting class will have a swift start on future academic endeavors, as on average each achieved twenty-one collegiate credits before ever leaving Covington Latin School. These twenty-one dual credits (credits that count towards high school and college) will mean many of these students will enter college as sophomores, bypassing their freshman year completely.

Covington Latin Schools Class of 2021 diplomas were bestowed upon:

Andrew Bruno Apollonio

Andrew Michael Blair

Madison Paige Denham

Katherine Elizabeth Hammerle

John Edward Hubbart

Abigail Sue Hyrne

Mia Bella Ionna

Allyson Elizabeth Knotts

Elizabeth Marie Longbrake

Boston Edwin Main

Shannon Kerry McCarthy

Laurynn Hailee Marie Smith

Brianna Marie Sweeney

Ella Maycee Thornberry

Mary Lauren Veazey

Kazuhide Watanabe

Keller William White

Jack Dalton Wilburn





Valedictorian Mary Lauren Veazey addressed her peers with an inspirational presentation referencing spirit, discipline, education and faith, intertwined within a multitude of praise, appreciation and hope. Covington Latins 2021 valedictorian also received the English Award, Leadership Award and the Faculty Award granted to the senior who most demonstrates the Covington Latin Schools motto of goodness, discipline and knowledge. She was also named the KHSAA Athlete of the Year for Diving. Miss Veazey will be attending Duke University in Durham, North Carolina.

After the ceremony Ella Thornberry continued a long-standing tradition by giving her Salutatorian speech at the graduation luncheon. Miss Thornberry, together with her words of grace, truly captured the spirit and spark of this graduating class. She will be attending Centre College in Danville, Kentucky.





Bishop Foys shared that this was his 180th graduation ceremony over his 19 years as Bishop of Covington. Bishop Foys saluted the graduating seniors, led all in prayer and thanked the parents, faculty and staff of Covington Latin School for their faith. He expressed the uniqueness that is Covington Latin School when he stated that the school may be:

often imitated, never duplicated - thats Covington Latin. The spirit, the tradition, the discipline, the education, the faith, can never be duplicated.

Then after praising the graduating class more for their unwavering spirit, discipline, education and faith, especially in the midst of the global pandemic, he professed in closing these words of wisdom:

as you go on to other pursuits, how you respond to difficulty, how you respond to challenges and how you respond to crises, will define who you are.

One of the more notable acts of this graduating class was the 2,000 hours of community service. Those acts of kindness, combined with their resilience, goodness, discipline, knowledge and faith are a tribute to the gift of a Catholic education. We wish them all the best as they seek to conquer the world.

Event photos can be found at the Covington Latin Schools Facebook page: (www.facebook.com/covingtonlatin) and the graduation ceremony can be watched on the Cathedral Basilica Vimeo page: (https://vimeo.com/553807116).

###

Covington Latin School is a co-educational, Roman Catholic, accelerated, college preparatory middle and high school; offering a classical education for gifted students. Our unique educational programs allow gifted students to move at a pace and complexity that suits their academic and social emotional needs. The aim is to form Christian leaders by challenging them to attain their academic, intellectual, social and moral potential. Since its inception in 1923, the Latin School has operated under the auspices of the Roman Catholic Bishop of the Diocese of Covington, Kentucky. The school is fully accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (S.A.C.S.) and is certified by the US Department of Education as a Blue Ribbon School. Covington Latin is ranked the #1 private school in Northern Kentucky by Cincinnati Magazine and named as a Top 3 school in the state of Kentucky.

For more information on Covington Latin School visit our website: www.CovingtonLatin.org

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Dallas, Texas, June 18, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The arrival of summer means  (drumroll)  its barbecue season yall! And theres no better way to celebrate than with Dickeys Legit. Texas. Barbecue.

Dickeys fans can now enjoy these smokin summer specials all season long at participating locations:

Whether its at home, in your local Dickeys restaurant or by the pool, summer is the perfect time to enjoy our slow-smoked, Texas-style barbecue, said Laura Rea Dickey, CEO of Dickeys Barbecue Restaurants, Inc. Plus, Fathers Day is right around the corner, so save dad from having to man the grill and let us cook the cue. Were excited to offer these delicious specials all summer long!

To learn more, follow Dickeys Barbecue Pit on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Download the Dickeys Barbecue Pit app from the Apple App Store or Google Play.



About Dickeys Barbecue Restaurants, Inc.

Dickey's Barbecue Restaurants, Inc., the worlds largest barbecue concept, was founded in 1941 by Travis Dickey. For the past 80 years, Dickeys Barbecue Pit has served millions of guests Legit. Texas. Barbecue. At Dickeys, all our barbecued meats are smoked onsite in a hickory wood burning pit. Dickeys proudly believes theres no shortcut to true barbecue and its why they never say BBQ. The Dallas-based, family-run barbecue restaurant franchise offers several slow-smoked meats and wholesome sides with 'No B.S. (Bad Stuff)' included. The fast-casual concept has expanded worldwide with international locations in the UAE and Japan. Dickey Family brands have over 550 locations nationwide. In 2016, Dickeys won first place on Fast Casuals Top 100 Movers and Shakers list, was named a Top 500 Franchise by Entrepreneur in 2018 and was named to Hospitality Technology Industry Heroes in 2021. Led by CEO Laura Rea Dickey, who was named among the countrys 50 most influential women in foodservice in 2020 by Nations Restaurant News and was recognized as one of the top 25 industry leaders on Fast Casuals 2020 Top 100 Movers and Shakers list, Dickey's Barbecue Pit has also been recognized by Fox News, Forbes Magazine, Franchise Times, The Wall Street Journal and QSR Magazine. For more information, visit www.dickeys.com.

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Beamsville, ON, June 18, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Today, the Canada Gazette, Part 1, proposing a ban on flavoured vape products except for tobacco, mint and menthol was published. The Canadian Vaping Association (CVA) is disappointed that Canada has proposed harmful regulation to address misguided moral panic, instead of supporting the greatest harm reduction opportunity of our lifetime. If the flavour ban is implemented, hundreds of thousands of smokers may be pushed back to smoking or to the black-market and many will die.

There is mounting evidence that flavours reduce cravings and increase smoking cessation success. Research from Yale School of Public Health finds that smokers that quit using a flavoured product are 2.5 times more likely to be successful. The study concludes, While proposed flavour bans are well-intentioned, they have disastrous outcomes. Legislation on vaping flavours must take the facts of smoking cessation and harm reduction into account, and we urge legislators against the widespread implementation of such bans

Additionally, through a campaign launched by consumer advocates, to date more than 90,000 Canadians have notified their Member of Parliament and Health Canada of the harm a flavour ban would inflict on themselves or their families. It is evident by todays publication that there is little sympathy for smokers as the lives and health of adult smokers have been disregarded.

We have repeatedly shared the science on vaping. Regulators are aware of the important role flavours play in the adoption of vaping by smokers. A flavour ban will reduce the appeal of the product and will sentence many smokers to their death. There is sufficient data from regions with flavour bans to provide a clear understanding of the consequences. Flavour bans do little to protect youth and instead increase smoking rates and strengthen the black-market, said Darryl Tempest, Executive Director of the CVA.

Moreover, the Canadian Constitutional Foundation has stated, flavor restrictions, have the potential to make [vapes] less attractive or effective as quit-aidsand are considered from the standpoint of potential interference [that could potentially interfere] with the right not to be deprived of life, liberty, and the security of the person protected by section 7 of the Charter.

The CVA encourages all stakeholders to submit feedback during the consultation period. We also encourage all elected members of the legislature to educate themselves on this issue. There are thousands of individual vapers that have chosen vaping to reduce their harm in every riding across the country. Surely, if the UK can track to be free of combustible tobacco by 2030, we can build better policies to exceed our current stated goal of 5% smoking prevalence by 2035. We must do better, said Tempest.
San Francisco, California, June 18, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Taiwan Tourism Bureau launched its latest campaign, Bring a Taste of Taiwan to Your Home, with a virtual cooking session concept in collaboration with Taiwan-based chef Chelsea Tsai from CookInn Taiwan. The event on June 17 aimed to introduce iconic Taiwanese food culture and shared with attendees how to make popular scallion pancakes and bubble milk tea in their homes.

Taiwanese people are known for their devotion to traditional, high-quality cuisine. Voted by CNN readers as the best food destination in the world, Taiwans culinary philosophy is to eat often and eat well. From fine dining to local gems, Taipei and Taichung City boast 30 Michelin-starred restaurants and more than 190 recommended restaurants in Michelins latest publication.

More than 70 guests joined the event to celebrate the culinary theme. The attendees received the ingredient boxes prior to the event, and on the day of they followed the Taiwanese chef to make their own scallion pancakes and bubble milk tea.

The director of the Taiwan Tourism Bureau San Francisco office, Linda Lin, said We are keeping up our communications with journalists and trade partners and providing them with the most updated market information and travel inspiration. Taiwan adheres to all health and hygiene regulations, providing safety for travelers. The Taiwan Tourism Bureau will provide further updates regarding the border reopening.

Currently, there are international travel restrictions between the United States, Canada and Taiwan. Non-Taiwan nationals without a valid Alien Resident Certificate (ARC) will be temporarily barred from entry. Exceptions may be made for individuals who obtain entry permission for emergency or humanitarian reasons. Special entry permits are issued by the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office (TECO) in the United States.

Commercial flights between the U.S. and Taiwan are available but limited. Travelers may contact airlines directly for information about flight options and be prepared for the implementation of travel restrictions.





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ABOUT THE TAIWAN TOURISM BUREAU

The Taiwan Tourism Bureau is the official government agency responsible for domestic and international tourism policy development and execution. There are three North American Tourism Offices located in New York, Los Angeles, and San Francisco.



For information about Taiwan, please visit: eng.taiwan.net.tw

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Crestview Hills, Kentucky - Cincinnati, Ohio, June 18, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- FUSIONWRX Inc. a rapidly growing digital marketing agency providing marketing, design, geofencing, social media, pay-per-click advertising, website creation and content development recently announced the promotion of Chelsea Vaal to Senior Designer and Marketing Manager. In this new role, Vaal will continue to work one-on-one with the current client base, while advancing her digital expertise and graphic design capabilities.

In her previous role with FUSIONWRX and Flottman Company, Vaal oversaw the pay-per-click program, social media placements, design and client relations. Through Vaals work ethic, determination and desire to help others succeed, FUSIONWRX has more than doubled their clientele base, increased revenue and most impressively have achieved a 95% retention rate.

We are really excited to promote Chelsea Vaal to this newly created position, shared Sue Flottman Steller, President and Co-Owner of Flottman Company and FUSIONWRX, Chelsea has been a key component to the growth of FUSIONWRX. She has personified digital marketing for many of our clients, by being their liaison to success.

Vaal joined FUSIONWRX and Flottman Company three years ago as a Marketing Coordinator and instantly outgrew her role by accumulating more and more responsibilities. Prior to her move to FUSIONWRX she worked with SouthComm Publishing as an Advertising Coordinator.

Vaal holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Communication Art and Design from the University of Louisville and is certified in both Social Media Management and Google Ads.

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About FUSIONWRX Inc, a Flottman Company: www.FUSIONWRX.com

FUSIONWRX Inc, a Flottman Company is an integrated digital and traditional marketing agency, serving clients in the food service, financial, educational and service industries. FUSIONWRX supplies clients with a multitude of media outlets to connect with their target audience, like digital ads, directory listings, print materials and social media communications. Growth in the fields of content management, geofencing and out-of-home media have diversified FUSIONWRXs service portfolio, adding to their product offerings. FUSIONWRX has experience working with companies of all sizes, including family and private businesses to leading Fortune 500 companies. FUSIONWRX are part of the 100-year-old Flottman Company Inc.s family of businesses which is are a third generation, family business and women owned. They are a three time recipient of the Print Solutions PEAK Award for Top Marketing, Cross-Media Campaign. Clutch, a global marketing research company, ranked FUSIONWRX amongst the top digital, public relations, web design and strategic marketing business-to-business firms in Cincinnati, Ohio.

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Gloucester, MA (01930)

Today

Showers early, then cloudy in the afternoon. Cooler. High 61F. Winds NE at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 40%..

Tonight

Cloudy this evening with showers after midnight. Low 59F. Winds NE at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 40%.
Gloucester, MA (01930)

Today

Showers this morning becoming less numerous during the afternoon hours. Cooler. High 61F. Winds NE at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 50%..

Tonight

Cloudy with occasional showers overnight. Low 58F. Winds NE at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 40%.
ELKHART [mdash] Helen Free was born Feb. 20, 1923 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to James S. Murray and Daisy Piper Murray, who died when Helen was six years old. Graduating as valedictorian of Poland Seminary High School in 1941, she attended the College of Wooster, initially majoring in Engli
FILE - In this June 28, 2020 file photo, armed homeowners Mark and Patricia McCloskey, standing in front their house along Portland Place confront protesters marching to St. Louis Mayor Lyda Krewson's house in the Central West End of St. Louis. Mark McCloskey, a St. Louis personal injury lawyer who gained national attention after he and his wife waved guns at racial injustice protesters who marched near their home last summer, is on the verge of a 2022 Senate run.
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Governor Northam Celebrates Grand Opening of The Sessions Hotel in Bristol

Tourism Development Financing Project represents a capital investment of $23 million, creates 75 new jobs

RICHMONDGovernor Ralph Northam is celebrating the grand opening of The Sessions Hotel in Bristol, Virginia, a project that will be supported by the Virginia Tourism Corporations Tourism Development Financing Program and reflects a total capital investment of $23 million and 75 new, full-time equivalent jobs.

The Tourism Development Financing Program is a gap financing program for larger-scale tourism development projects geared toward fostering partnerships with developers, localities, financial institutions, and the Virginia Resources Authority. The Sessions Hotel is the eighth project approved under this program.

The Sessions Hotel is expected to spur approximately $2.8 million in annual direct economic impact from traveler spending and a projected local tax benefit of nearly $556,019 during the first full year of operation.

The Sessions Hotel is a welcome addition to Virginias ever-growing travel and tourism industries, said Governor Northam. Tourism development is critical to rebuilding our economy and positioning the Commonwealth as a premier travel destination. Projects like this will help Bristol attract more visitors and businesses, bringing new jobs, and generating significant economic impact for the region.

Developed by Creative Boutique Hotels, LLC, The Sessions Hotel is a member of Tribute Portfolio, Marriott Internationals newest collection brand. The property is comprised of three historic buildings: the 1920s Jobbers Candy Factory, the 1915 Bristol Grocery building, and the 1922 Service Granary Mill. The Sessions Hotel has 70 high-end guest rooms, restaurant and bar, salon and day spa, barbershop, and a rooftop bar. In addition, the hotel will have a music and event venue with an outdoor performance stage created through a partnership with famed musician Jim Lauderdale.

Prior to the pandemic, travelers to Bristol alone spent $59 million, which provided over 500 work opportunities and resulted in $4.5 million in state and local taxes in 2019, said Secretary of Commerce and Trade Brian Ball. With the opening of The Sessions Hotel, more and more visitors will now be able to come to Bristol, stay longer, and spend more money, and this will help grow and support the region.

The Sessions Hotel is named for the 1927 Sessions, which were a series of recordings that led to the Big Bang of Country Music and thus leading to Bristol being named the Birthplace of Country Music. Today, Bristol is home to the Bristol Rhythm and Roots Music Festival.

Weve taken our time and perfected the overall guest experience with curated art, repurposed items from the buildings into functional pieces, designed creative, and high-end amenities that tell the story of the buildings and Bristol, said Kimberly Christner, partner in the project and President and CEO of Cornerstone Hospitality. Our guests will leave having a truly unique experience to share, and return with friends and family. Our team is more passionate than ever to share the Sessions experience with visitors far and wide.

This is an important addition to the City of Bristol and will enhance the traveler experience by offering a unique, modern lodging option for both business and leisure travelers, said Rita McClenny, President and CEO of Virginia Tourism Corporation. Travelers who love music, arts, culture, and outdoor adventures, will now have a fantastic place to stay after a busy day of taking in all Bristol has to offer.

The Sessions Hotel has created one of the most unique visitor experiences in the Commonwealth, which reinforces Bristols music heritage and sense of place, said Bristol Mayor Bill Hartley. The Sessions Hotel is the perfect addition to our community, as the adaptive reuse of these buildings preserves the character of our historic downtown while highlighting Bristols living musical heritage as the Birthplace of County Music.

For more information about The Sessions Hotel visit SessionsHotel.com. Information on the Virginia Tourism Development Financing Program is available at VATC.org/TDFP.

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For the French Grand Prix we return to a real circuit. After two weekends where Red Bull Racing seemed to be the strongest team, the question now is whether Mercedes can fight back. The second free practice session generally reveals a lot more, so don't miss any of it with GPblog's live coverage.

French Grand Prix - FP2 Liveblog

In Monaco and Azerbaijan, Mercedes missed out on many points in their title battle with Red Bull Racing. In Monaco, there was Valtteri Bottas' dramatic pit stop and Lewis Hamilton's lack of pace, and in Azerbaijan, both drivers finished outside the points, while Hamilton looked to be on his way to victory on the restart.

Is Mercedes bouncing back?

Seven points from two races is not up to Mercedes' standard, but with Max Verstappen's blowout in Baku, Red Bull also failed to take full advantage. Now that we've moved on from the street circuits, the question is whether Red Bull is still as dominant, or whether Mercedes can now string the wins together again.

In the second free practice session, most of the information becomes clear. The drivers are busy with the qualifying runs for the first part of the session, before doing the long runs at the end. Here we can see which teams are in a good position, and which teams might drop back a little. With GPblog's liveblog, you won't have to miss a thing of this session.
The battle axe between Pirelli and the teams has not been buried yet. Max Verstappen is annoyed that Pirelli haven't taken the blame and states that, contrary to the information Pirelli gives, the Italian tyre supplier does have all the data given to them by Red Bull.

Verstappen was leading the Azerbaijan Grand Prix and there seemed no problem. The Dutchman was in position to increase his lead in the standings, but a blowout ruined it all. As well as Verstappen's tyre, Lance Stroll's tyre also blew out. Pirelli have still pointed the blame at the teams, because they would use too low a tyre pressure.

Read more F1 Social Stint | Hamilton in the spotlight because of special shoes

Verstappen is fed up with Pirelli

"We have the data. We can see tyre pressures whilst driving and we gave it to them. We were not below the minimum so from our side we didn't do anything wrong as a team," said Verstappen when talking to Sky Sports. The Dutchman is therefore frustrated that Pirelli continues to shift the blame onto the teams despite everything.

"When two crashes, luckily everyone walked away from, happen and clearly both teams were operating within their limits. I don't understand why you can't say the teams didn't do anything wrong on track, they got the data we gave it to them."

Pirelli blames F1 teams

"I find that tough to take. When it's about safety when people could have been hurt that they just say in a vague way, 'we don't know what teams are doing'. Well we know what we have been doing and we showed it to them and it was within the limits," he added.

When Ted Kravitz asks further if Red Bull actually showed the data on tyre pressures during the race, Verstappen remains adamant: ''Yes, they saw it." Even when Kravitz says that Pirelli states that they don't have that data at their disposal, Max is clear. ''They've seen it.''
The French drivers have opted for special helmet designs for the French Grand Prix. Pierre Gasly and Esteban Ocon have clearly chosen the colours of their flag, while Monegasque Charles Leclerc returns to his very first helmet design.

Esteban Ocon will want to bounce back from his retirement in Azerbaijan this weekend. He will do so in a French Alpine car, but his helmet will also be wearing special colours this weekend. The colours red, white and blue are even more prominent on his helmet for this weekend.

Very happy to show you my @GPFranceF1 special helmet which I will be wearing this week end top job by @BellRacingHQ as always#EO31 #Chrome #sparkle pic.twitter.com/a5OhTENQTj  Esteban Ocon (@OconEsteban) June 17, 2021

French pride

A similar pattern can be seen at Pierre Gasly, who has chosen a predominantly white helmet for this weekend. On that white helmet many details can be found, but mainly the colours of the French flag.

daammnnn @PierreGASLY



racing at home in style pic.twitter.com/5WyclAwdUl  Scuderia AlphaTauri (@AlphaTauriF1) June 17, 2021

Charles Leclerc is of course not a Frenchman, but as a Monegasque he has chosen a special design for the race at Paul Ricard. He will drive with a yellow helmet with blue accents, with which he drove his very first kart race. The design should resemble Spiderman's web, Leclerc explained on Twitter.
Pirelli's tyre problems were the topic of conversation in France on Thursday. Max Verstappen and Lance Stroll both lost control of their cars on the fastest part of the track in Baku, and many drivers are worried that similar problems will occur in France.

Not only the drivers, but also the teams are worried. At Red Bull Racing they doubt if the measures taken are enough to prevent similar problems."Firstly, we were just pleased no driver was injured. Accidents on that straight with walls in close proximity are never good to see. We worked fully with Pirelli and the FIA for them to understand what has gone on," Christian Horner explained to Sky Sports.

Are Pirelli's measures enough?

The rumours were that Red Bull and Aston Martin were under-inflated during the race, causing the tyres to break down. Horner denies that and explains what was done after the investigation."We have worked within the guidelines that Pirelli and so on come up with. Why did it happen? The result is that pressures have been increased."

Tyre pressure has increased by 2 PSI, but Horner doubts it's going to be enough."Is 2 PSI enough to prevent something like that happening again? I don't know. We obviously need to rely on Pirelli and their technical expertise. Hopefully we won't see incidents like we saw in Azerbaijan.," Horner concluded.
Pirelli have often been criticised by drivers and teams, and after the Azerbaijan Grand Prix they were blamed once more. After the two tyre failures of Max Verstappen and Lance Stroll they only came up with a limited explanation, where no clear cause was indicated.

Martin Brundle agrees with this, although he also sees the problems Pirelli have in the investigation. "They check the pressures of the tyres when they leave the pits, but clearly you can't check them at 200 miles per hour except they have got very accurate sensors on them. Max uses the expression, it's all a bit vague and I agree with him. [Pirelli] are kind of pointing a finger at Red Bull and Aston Martin, but not really," he explained to Sky Sports.

Clashing interests between teams and Pirelli

"What's happening with all the [updates on the tyre document] is they are really tightening up what was already in place. You mustn't run the tyres at a lower pressure. Here, they must not run below 22 psi. The air in the tyre is a fundamental part of the integrity and structure of the tyre". Brundle believes that Pirelli have their interests at heart, but that the teams are obviously focusing on themselves.

"If you run a tyre that's punctured it very quickly falls apart so the air in the tyre is a fundamental part of it. The teams want the pressure down because it gives you more grip, Pirelli want it up because they don't want their tyres failing", Brundle concluded.
Aston Martin have disagreed with Pirelli's statement after Lance Stroll's accident in Azerbaijan. The Italian tyre company suggested that the problem was with Aston Martin themselves, but team principal Otmar Szafnauer claims that this is not true.

The Aston Martin driver was unsuspecting driving on the straight two weeks ago when his rear tyre suddenly burst. Stroll hit the wall hard and saw his race come to an end after just 30 laps. Over the following days, the tyre dealer carried out a major investigation, but without much result.

Read more Aston Martin strikes important blow and snaps up experienced designer from Alfa Romeo

Pirelli even pointed to Aston Martin instead of themselves. "We strictly followed the rules. According to our measurements, the air pressure of the tyres was at all times higher than the initial values prescribed by Pirelli," Szafnauer told Auto, Motor und Sport. "We do not use any special tricks to artificially lower the air pressure."

Aston Martin denies Pirelli's claim

Szafnauer points to Sebastian Vettel, who experienced no problems. "Sebastian was completely identical. We did nothing different at Lance. And there the tyres did not jump."
The mayor of London has admitted he is interested in welcoming Formula 1 to the British capital.

In May, Toto Wolff said: "Racing in London would top everything and I hope that the mayor of London and (prime minister) Mr Johnson read this and we get that going."

According to a new report in London's Evening Standard newspaper, some argue that London has lost its earlier status as a sporting capital of the world.

Mayor Sadiq Khan admits he "can't be complacent" in that area.

"We're speaking to Formula 1 and they're really receptive," he revealed.

"The reality is that the reigning champion of the world is a Brit. Lewis Hamilton is a credit to our nation and the sport, and it would be great to have a grand prix in the capital city - to have Silverstone and London on the calendar.

"I think next year would be too soon but I've been really impressed with those at Formula 1 and I'm keen to bring it as soon as possible," Khan added.

(GMM)
Dr Helmut Marko says he regards any psychological games with Toto Wolff or Mercedes as "background noise".

At Baku, Wolff moved his rhetoric that is normally aimed at Austrian countryman Marko to Red Bull team boss Christian Horner, calling him a "windbag".

Marko, 78, thinks it's simply an effort to disturb Red Bull amid the teams' head-to-head battle for 2021 spoils.

"We are not going to that level," he told RTL.

"We are absolutely concentrated on the racing. This background noise means nothing, at least to me."

In fact, Marko calls the entire saga over Red Bull's allegedly overly-flexible rear wing a "storm in a drinking glass".

He says Mercedes is even now complaining about some of Red Bull's pit equipment, but vowed to keep the team's focus on beating Mercedes on track.

"If you have a chance like this, you have to use it - and we will use it," said Marko.

"We have all suffered from the dominance of Mercedes for so long."

Marko says Mercedes is now hitting back, revealing that even a "Mercedes customer" - presumably Aston Martin - has recently been making "massive efforts" to "poach" Red Bull staff.

Marko says those efforts failed.

"We are all together as a team with a passion, an excitement and a hunger to win this world title," he said.

"Mercedes always had the advantage of a second in reserve in engine power, but that is no longer the case," Marko continued.

"We put a competitive car on the ground right from the start. Now it's all about the details."

The result of the "pressure we exert" on Mercedes is "altogether" the reason for Mercedes' recent mistakes and struggle for performance, Marko claims.

However, he warned that Mercedes should be stronger at Paul Ricard than on the streets of Monaco and Baku, because "two races like that cannot be the benchmark for the whole season".

(GMM)
Canada-based Covenant Energy Ltd. has chosen Haldor Topsoes HydroFlex renewable fuel technology to produce renewable diesel from vegetable oil. The 6,500 barrels-per-day renewable diesel unit will be built in Saskatchewan, Canada, and is scheduled to go into operation early in 2024.

Topsoe will also provide its H2bridge hydrogen technology based on the modular and highly efficient Haldor Topsoe Convection Reformer (HTCR) technology.

Covenant Energys new facility will produce renewable diesel with a significantly lower80% to 85%carbon footprint than conventional diesel and will thereby support Canadas goal of carbon neutrality by 2050 under the countrys clean energy diversification strategy.

With HydroFlex, customers can convert low value feedstocks to renewable fuels that qualify for the California Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS) credit. The HydroFlex process layout offers lower capital expenditure (CAPEX), but also a lower energy consumption during operation, resulting in a lower Carbon Index (CI).

Topsoes HydroFlex can be deployed in both grassroots units and revamps for co-processing or stand-alone applications.

Topsoes H2bridge delivers a circular solution to refineries and biorefineries by replacing fossil feedstocks with renewable LPG or naphtha to produce renewable hydrogen, thereby generating significant greenhouse gas emissions savings and lower the carbon intensity of the renewable fuels produced in the HydroFlex unit.

Covenant Energy was founded in 2019 with the mission to become a Canadian leader in the green fuel industry through the production of Renewable Diesel and Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF). To do so, Covenant Energy is developing a stand-alone Hydrogenation-Derived Renewable Diesel (HDRD) refinery in Canada, which will transform renewable feedstockswith a focus on Canadian prairie-grown canola oilinto a premium diesel product.

Covenant estimates that the facility will create demand for 35 million bushels of canola seed (worth roughly $500 million) to produce 325-350 thousand tonnes of canola oil feedstock per year.

While the ambition is to use predominantly Canadian canola oil as the feedstock and ship renewable fuels throughout Canada and Canadas northern communities, Covenants proposed location will be situated on a Class 1 railway, giving the ultimate flexibility to access feedstock from across Canada and the US, as well as providing the potential to sell product into the US market.
Electrify America announced an agreement with Mercedes-Benz USA to provide drivers of the all-electric EQS complimentary charging for two years at Electrify America EV charging stations. As the EQS luxury sedan hits showrooms this fall, its drivers will have access to ultra-fast charging at Electrify Americas more than 600 public stations across the country.

Under the agreement, first owners and lessees of the EQS will receive complimentary 30-minute charging per session for the first two years from Mercedes me Charge account activation. Drivers will be able to manage their charging plan through the proprietary Mercedes me Charge platform and driver app.

Furthermore, Electrify America and Daimler AG are providing drivers with Plug & Charge functionality per the ISO15118 standard, enabling EQS drivers with an activated Mercedes me Charge account to start a session and receive complimentary charging simply by connecting the Electrify America High Power DC charger, simply by plugging in. No manual steps for authentication or initiation will be required.

Electrify America is the first company to offer ISO standard-based Plug & Charge technology to multiple automakers in the United States. Electrify America offers the fastest charging technology available today to provide charging speeds of up to 150 and 350 kilowatts for capable vehicles, a breakthrough for the network that made its debut in May 2018.

Separately, future Mercedes-EQ battery-electric and Mercedes-Benz plug-in hybrid vehicles will also receive standard charging services. Under this agreement, drivers of eligible models will be able to locate Electrify America stations and check charger availability via Mercedes me Charge platform and driver app to initiate driver-paid charging sessions.
Fisker Inc. signed a binding agreement supporting manufacturing with Magna International. Along with the previously signed agreements on electric vehicle (EV) platform sharing and ADAS package, this finalizes the framework established between the two companies beginning in October 2020.

Fisker and Magna also confirmed that production of the all-electric Fisker Ocean SUV is projected to start on 17 November 2022 at Magnas manufacturing facility in Graz, Austria, where they have produced more than 3.7 million vehicles for several global automakers.

This agreement is broad-based and comprehensive, covering planned volumes, manufacturing costs and quality metrics over the programs lifecycle through 2029. It covers all stages, including the critical planning and launch phases. This agreement underpins all facility investments, including bodyshop, a clear path to start-of-production in November 2022 and rapid ramp-up to full run-rate production.

This contract strengthens the partnership between Magna and Fisker, providing opportunities to increase volumes with the Ocean or other FM29 architecture variants, as well as collaboration on efficiencies in the production process that may drive post-launch manufacturing and cost innovations.

The Fisker Ocean SUV will use a version of a Magna-developed electric vehicle architecture modified by Fisker to create the FM29 platform, and in the process, create new intellectual property (IP). Combined with Fisker-developed IP, the new aluminum-intensive FM29 platform is projected to deliver class-leading range and interior space at a Bill of Materials and manufacturing cost that enables the Ocean to enter the market at a starting MSRP of $37,499 in the United States (excluding EV-related subsidies) and below 32,000 in Germany (including taxes and EV-related subsidies)as well as offer compelling, high-value option packages to customers across the Oceans entire price range.
General Motors and Liebherr-Aerospace will join forces to develop a hydrogen fuel cell power generation demonstrator system for aircraft. The two companies will explore possiblities to develop an integrated system, customized to the performance and economic requirements of commercial aircraft.

The construction and testing of this demonstratorbased, in part, on GMs HYDROTEC fuel cell technologywill take place in a specialized laboratory multi-system integration testing at Liebherr-Aerospace in Toulouse (France). The demonstrator will incorporate GMs precisely crafted fuel cells, HYDROTEC power cube and fuel cell system, along with the GMs controls and models.





GM, through its relationship with Honda, is one of the worlds most advanced fuel cell developers in many industrial fields, now entering into aeronautics. GMs fuel cell business benefits from decades of investment in engineering and manufacturing expertise with high volume processes that can bring economies of scale to fuel cell production.

Aircraft are a great litmus test for the strength and versatility of our HYDROTEC fuel cells. Our technology can address customer needs in a wide range of useson land, sea, air or rail, and this collaboration with Liebherr could open up new possibilities for aircraft, transitioning to alternative energy power sources. GM Executive Director  Global HYDROTEC Charlie Freese

Liebherr is one of the worlds leading suppliers of integrated on-board aircraft systems. Liebherrs integrated aircraft system concept benefits from decades of investment in on-board thermal management and on-board power management.
A line of vehicles stretches along the eastbound lanes of Interstate 80 two weeks ago. According to Wyoming Department of Transportation spokesperson Stephanie Harsha, motorists can expect more delays as work continues this summer.

Residents regularly commuting along Interstate 80 have likely seen or been stuck in traffic backups on the eastbound lanes leading to Green River over the past few weeks. At least once, the traffic has backed up to the interstate's tunnels outside Green River.

According to the Wyoming Department of Transportation, as work continues at multiple locations around Rock Springs, people driving along the interstate can expect delays.

Stephanie Harsha, the public relations specialist for WYDOT District 3, said the worst backup seen on the interstate is attributed to bridge work occurring before Exit 99. She said the project called for a silicone foam deck to be dropped on the bridge, which also required the speed limit through the work zone to decrease to 25 mph.

She said more delays can be expected near the Baxter Road Interchange, which leads to the Southwest Wyoming Regional Airport, which she admits caught her off guard during a recent work trip to Cheyenne.

"The backup near Baxter Road surprised me," she said.

The largest problem for WYDOT's work on I-80 is the fact that more than 50% of the traffic traveling the interstate is made up of commercial trucks. Tractor-trailer combinations require more time to slow down and speed up, which can lead to problems as they attempt to merge onto the single lane of travel.

There's also a change in how traffic is diverted onto a single lane. Harsha said engineers plan for what's known as "zipper merging," a more efficient means of merging vehicles by requiring them to merge as they approach the road barriers, with every other vehicle in the other late allowing for a merge as opposed to merging as soon as they see a sign identifying a single lane of travel.

Harsha said WYDOT has not gotten many calls complaining of the delays drivers experience on the interstate, though admits people have complained on social media platforms. As roadwork continues throughout the summer and into the fall, Harsha said residents should be prepared for delays.
Some lawmakers are worried that school districts are using federal pandemic-relief and recovery funds to add new positions and purchase equipment that might add to ongoing costs for the state.

The anxiety stems from the fact that school districts have discretion in how to spend the Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief funds distributed to districts from the CARES and American Recovery and Reinvestment acts. Wyomings allotment of ESSER funds total $470 million so far, according to state and federal data. About 90% is directly available to school districts to spend at their discretion; state-level authorities, including legislatures, are not allowed to deny or add stipulations to district-level ESSER spending, so long as expenditures meet federal guidelines.

They [U.S. Department of Education] were very explicit that we are not able to limit the uses and were not able to even limit the time allowed to be able to utilize the funds, Wyoming Department of Education Chief Academic Officer Shelley Hamel told members of the Select Committee on School Facilities earlier this month.

In some instances, school districts in Wyoming have added nurses, custodians and other staff positions, as well as new programs, equipment and other investments that may need financial support after federal ESSER support runs out.

Its a growing concern of mine when we have federal funds and we see these types of expenditures going out for growing areas that we know we dont have funds for, committee member Rep. Landon Brown (R-Cheyenne) said. Brown also serves on the Joint Education Committee. We get talked to about jobs, and I really get scared hearing about eliminating these positions at the schools. It falls back on our shoulders as legislators and, frankly, it puts us in a sticky situation.

Initial priorities for ESSER dollars included personal protective equipment, moving to online classrooms, improving indoor air quality via upgrades in ventilation, filtration, heating and air conditioning and otherwise creating safe learning spaces for students, teachers and staff during the pandemic. The ESSER program has since expanded to more broadly support the reopening of schools and to support students who have been most severely impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic and are likely to have suffered the most because of longstanding inequities in our communities and schools that have been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the Office of Elementary and Secondary Education.

Some Wyoming school districts plan to institute programs to address learning loss due to the pandemic, student mental health, tutoring and to extend summer classes and school lunch programs, according to a preliminary report prepared for the Select Committee on School Facilities. Theyre also spending ESSER dollars on new computers, boosting cell and internet service, student counseling and after-school activities.

The whole process has worked extremely well, and has been very beneficial for the district, Campbell County School District Associate Superintendent for Instructional Support Dennis Holmes told members of the school facilities committee.

Committee member Sen. Lynn Hutchings (R-Cheyenne) said shes concerned that a lot of the ESSER spending doesnt seem directly tied to COVID-19 expenses.

I noticed one school, they put in money, or a request, for school lunches, lunch supplies, school supplies, activities and Chromebooks, Hutchings said. Not one thing seems to be COVID-related, except for the cleaning supplies and PPE.

Holmes said that although the pandemic connections might not be immediately obvious, ESSER spending is fully vetted by both the state and the federal government.

Its really hard to understand the scope of COVID on school districts and the many facets of how it has impacted learning, Holmes said.

Lawmakers and school officials agree that the injection of nearly half a billion in ESSER dollars into Wyoming schools and education programs comes at a crucial time. The main source for funding education in Wyoming  revenues from coal, oil and natural gas  appear to be in permanent decline, potentially creating a revenue gap of hundreds of millions of dollars in coming years. Meantime, lawmakers have failed to agree on potential new sources of education funding, instead relying on budget cuts.

So far theres not a full accounting for how school districts are spending ESSER funds  a task that is ongoing at the Wyoming Department of Education. Only 23 of 48 school districts requesting the funds responded to a survey by the state to provide an accounting of requests and spending.

Thats not for lack of full-faith accountability among school districts, Hamel said. The process has been rife with confusion during a time of chaos and uncertainty due to the pandemic and multiple iterations of the ESSER program under two presidential administrations. Select Committee on School Facilities Chairman Sen. Stephan Pappas (R-Cheyenne) asked WDE officials to establish a coordinating team between the department and state officials overseeing education capital construction and major maintenance programs.

While theres concern among lawmakers that school districts may be taking on continuing expenses that eventually fall on the states shoulders, some of the spending will also satisfy to-do items on the states own school maintenance list, saving the state money.

The challenge, for now, is to account for that spending among local districts and the state.

If theyre spending it on component systems or maintenance systems that would then not have to be repaired with major maintenance dollars, those [state funds] could go further, State Construction Department Planning and Finance Administrator Laura Anderson told lawmakers.

Wyoming Superintendent of Public Instruction Jillian Balow recently submitted Wyomings draft plan to the U.S. Department of Education for priority ESSER spending under the American Rescue Plan. Wyomings most recent ESSER allotment, this time under ARP, accounts for about $303 million of the total $470 million under the federal program so far.

Wyomings plan looks different than most states because our school doors were open during the 2020-21 school year, Balow said in a press release. School districts and community partners have a unique opportunity to strengthen teaching and learning for all students, especially those most negatively impacted by COVID-19 and its associated effects.

WyoFile is an independent nonprofit news organization focused on Wyoming people, places and policy.
Dear Editor,

King Kong is coming to Green River, Wyoming. Union Wireless would like to erect an eighty-foot 5G tower in a lot immediately east of Ace Hardware. At a Planning and Zoning meeting June 9, this was discussed and somebody made the statement that, It will be there, but nobody will see it. According to images provided, it will be totally conspicuous for a good quarter mile around, and it will seem like a giant ape menacing everybody who lives, works, shops, or visits the area.

For perspective, ask yourself, what is eighty feet tall in Green River? A rough guess is that the very tallest building is forty feet high; OK fifty, but where is that? Most structures near King Kongs spot are about twenty, but rarely over thirty feet high.

My personal concern stems from owning a nearby apartment building, and I am therefore concerned about property values. Its unclear if spending a lot of time near a 5G tower is detrimental to health, but many people all over the world believe that it causes major health problems, like neurological disorders or even things like Covid. 5G towers are sometimes vandalized or even felled over. Some or all of this is just the result of crazy conspiracy theorizing, which is, in fact, not unusual in Wyomign (whos the legitimate president for example), but the reality or perceived reality could certainly affect property values.

I am neither a scientist nor a health expert, but perhaps no one at the meeting was, either. So here we have a bunch of people discussing something that we have no qualifications to discuss, which we couldnt discuss anyway, because, according to Planning and Zoning Administrator Amy Cox, city government is not allowed to discuss things like possible health effects on the community, only the aesthetics of the project. Whereas we were not allowed to saying anything, and because no one would see King Kong, there couldnt possibly be anything to talk about; but talk we did.

In late May the city sent me a vague notification about the proposal, addressed to Adjacent Property Owner/Interested Party, and the time and place of the meeting.

I shared this information with my tenants, because I thought it was the decent thing, the democratic thing, to do.

In that area there are many working people at the Post Office, and several businesses, and there are many apartment tenants, and houses, very nearby.

Really, not too many Property Owners live or even work there, but there are a lot of Interested Parties, such as people who live or work there. My silly democratic beliefs make me think that all these people have a right, and a need, to know about this proposal.

I said so and got chewed out.

City Council member Gary Killpack vigorously insisted that city guidelines only require that property and business owners within one-hundred feet had to be informed, per city guidelines, and so the city was not negligent in informing people, and was in fact generous in informing me because my property is about two-hundred feet away. I eventually wondered if Garys next move was to take worker and tenant voting rights away.

City employees should be applauded for following guidelines, but too often these miss the mark completely, because guidelines are based on what has happened in the past, and never on the developing future. Sometimes a little initiative and consideration are helpful and appropriate, and shouldnt really be that big of a deal.

Though things may be boring in Green River now, just wait till King Kong gets there and everyone starts twitching and wheezing and Trump is reinstated as president, sooner than you think.

Although few will be able to vote, and property values will be down, well at least have better phones to play games on, and all the AI advantages of 5G, like 100% unemployment, and robots to bully us around.

Tom Gagnon

Rock Springs
The Sweetwater County Travel & Tourism Board (SWCTTB) hosted a ribbon cutting on Wednesday, June 9th at the Flaming Gorge Gateway Sign on U.S. Highway 191 South to celebrate the designation of the Flaming Gorge  Green River Basin Scenic Byway as an All-American Road. The SWCTT board, along with several partners around the byway, submitted an application to the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) in 2020 and the application was successful, making the byway one of only 37 designated All-American Roads in the Country.

This has been a dream, 20-plus years in the making, Jenissa Meredith, Executive Director of Sweetwater County Travel and Tourism said. I was fortunate to be involved in preparing this application over a decade ago when Dave Hanks, former CEO of the Rock Springs Chamber of Commerce, included me in the project, added Meredith. It is such an honor to see this designation finally become a reality, Meredith said.

Overall, the FHWA announced 49 new designations to the Americas Byways collection, including 15 All-American Roads (AAR) and 34 National Scenic Byways (NSB) in 28 states. This increases the number of Americas Byways to 184 in 48 states.

All-American Road is the highest level of designation and is reserved for byways that provide an experience that is so exceptional travelers would make a drive along the route the primary reason for their trip. This is the first time the FHWA has designated new Scenic Byways and All-American Roads since 2009.

Created in 1991, the National Scenic Byways Program is a collaborative effort to help recognize, preserve and enhance selected roads throughout the United States. The U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) recognizes certain roads based on one or more archeological, cultural, historic, natural, recreational and scenic qualities.

On September 22, 2019, the Reviving Americas Scenic Byways Act of 2019 was signed by the President and became Public Law 116-57. This law requires the U.S. Secretary of Transportation to solicit nominations for certain roads to be designated under the National Scenic Byways Program as National Scenic Byways or All-American Roads based on their archaeological, cultural, historic, natural, recreational, and scenic qualities.

The Flaming Gorge  Green River Basin route is located in the southwest corner of Wyoming on two north-south roadways extending from I-80 south to the Utah state line and paralleling the Green River and the Flaming Gorge National Recreation Area. The location is approximately 175 miles south of Grand Teton and Yellowstone National Parks and 180 miles east of Salt Lake City, Utah.

The Flaming Gorge is by far our greatest tourism asset. This designation will provide funding opportunities and will shine a spotlight on this area for travelers like never before, She said.

We are so fortunate to have such exceptional partners both locally and in Utah. This designation would not have been possible without the combined efforts of all of the key participants and corridor partners, Meredith said.

Additionally, in order to prepare the application, the Corridor Management Plan also had to be updated. Stakeholders focused on reassessing visitor experience needs and alternative options for delivering information, as well as developing strategies to continue to leverage the expertise of the byways public and private partners and build on marketing success.
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GREENWICH  Many parents upset with the school district for a variety of reasons  including its alleged teaching of critical race theory and its enforcement of a state COVID-19 requirement that students continue to wear masks  arrived at Central Middle School on Thursday evening as police and security stood nearby ahead of a meeting of the Board of Education.

The goal for today is, one, we want to get the language and the highly sexualized content out of the curriculum, said Jackie Homan, a leader of a group called the Greenwich Patriots that protested on those issues at Town Hall earlier this week. Theres no reason for unapproved items to be given to our children. It should go through the proper process.  Second, we want some transparency around the curriculum. We want the chance to opt out of things that we deem too offensive.

Homan, a parent of students in the Greenwich Public Schools, and others then headed into the meeting, for which many had signed up to speak during public comment.

One of the first to the podium, however, was Carol Sutton, president of the Greenwich Education Association.

Sutton, in her last meeting before stepping down as head of the teachers union, addressed the protesters in the room and the attacks leveled at teachers and classroom materials from many protesters.

I leave you with one very simple idea, Sutton said. We cant protect our students from ideas. We can only prepare them for ideas. And thats what the teachers will continue to do.

Curriculum has been a rallying point for the Greenwich Patriots, a loosely affiliated group of parents and concerned residents from Greenwich and surrounding cities and towns.

The group financed a Truth Truck, which has driven around Stamford and Greenwich with a rotating LED display of phrases. In the past, it warned against COVID-19 vaccines, but on Thursday as it made an appearance outside of Central, its message was Teach how to think/Not what to think and Stop using profanity-laced content.

In March, an educational cartoon video about physical and emotional abuse was shown to a remote second grade class that contained a depiction of a man with an erect penis standing near a child, an incident that Homan said concerned her.

We just wanted people to stand up and hear what we have to say, because what Ive found is that most of my friends, that arent paying close attention because they have to work, they have a job, theyve got other things going on in their lives, they dont have the opportunity to look at their childrens homework with a microscope, Homan said standing in front of the school before the meeting. Im not asking for a protest. We have some simple things, give us some transparency, stop the filth. I think theyre pretty reasonable messages. I hope they are.

The ideal outcome of today would be some assurance that were going to stop putting everything through a racial lens in the schools and that they will select curriculum in a transparent way, she added.

Homan was speaking about critical race theory, an academic framework for viewing race and power in relation to American history. Its alleged presence in schools has been the source of debate in the last year and has polarized people in Greenwich, as well as nationally. Superintendent of Schools Toni Jones has repeatedly denied that critical race theory is taught in Greenwich Schools.

In advance of Thursdays meeting, Greenwich Patriots placed signs throughout Greenwich that stated, Unmask our children, ban critical race theory, protect medical freedom.

The state Department of Education has repeatedly encouraged residents to wear masks, which are mandated inside school buildings. The COVID-19 vaccine is not mandatory for children, according to the state, but district officials have been encouraged to share information with students about it.

Paige Windle, a 30-year Greenwich resident, said she attended the gathering, not as a parent, but as a freedom fighter.

Windle and others raised concerns about mask mandates and said masks obstruct their childrens breathing, are awkward, impersonal and should not be required any longer as COVID-19 death and infection rates dwindle.

When things are mandated, when people are told they have to obstruct their breathing, ... then they should be allowed to say no and be supported for that decision, she said.

Masks were also the reason Marija Mikolajczak said she showed up.

I think theyve outlived their purpose, Mikolajczak said, adding that she wanted to ask the school board to end mask mandates.

Mikolajczak wasnt the only person with aspirations to speak during public comments. Before the official start, more than 40 people had signed up to speak.

Citing a potential for heightened disagreement the district requested a police presence at the meeting. Though counter-protesters were rumored, none showed up. The gathering outside the meeting remained peaceful and moved inside as the meeting began at 7 p.m.

tatiana.flowers@thehour.com @TATIANADFLOWERS

justin.papp@scni.com; @justinjpapp1; 203-842-2586
GREENWICH  Board of Education member Meghan Olsson announced Thursday at a meeting of Board of Education that she will be resigning her post.

Olsson, who teaches French at a school in Massachusetts, said she and her family are moving out of Greenwich on Aug. 1. She was elected to the board in 2017, and her term expires in November 2021.

Its been an honor to serve the community and the public school district, Olsson said after the meeting. Some really strong relationships have been forged.

The Board of Education will appoint an interim member to complete Olssons term, though no candidate has been named. Board Chair Peter Bernstein, a Republican, said a closed-door meeting in executive session would likely be scheduled for the near future to discuss filling the vacancy.

In 2019, Olsson took a teaching job at Jonas Clarke Middle School in Lexington, Mass. Initially, Olsson said she expected to step down from the board. But until now she has maintained a weekend residence in town and continued to serve.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Olsson said she was able to teach remotely, which enabled her to stay in Greenwich, and on the board, longer. A Democrat, Olsson had already said in April that she did not plan to run for reelection this fall.

In her absence, Olsson said she hopes the board can overcome financial obstacles  the school board has worked with tight budget constraints in her time  and continue to provide a premier education to all its students.

This has helped me have a voice and to be a voice for constituents that arent always heard, Olsson said. Thats been really fulfilling.

justin.papp@scni.com; @justinjpapp1; 203-842-2586
Realme posted episode 27 of its AskMadhav Q&A series where the CEO for India and Europe answers questions from the community. Fans had a lot of questions about the X7 Pro and Max this week, as well as inquiries about plans for future product launches.

The June 24 event will be a big one, it will bring the Narzo 30 and Narzo 30 5G that are currently missing from the Realme lineup in India. The Narzo line now has over 5 million users in India, says the CEO. The event will also bring a refreshed version of the 32 smart TV.

The Realme GT launched in Europe this week and is headed to India as well  Madhav promised it will arrive before Diwali (which starts on November 4). While the company has been focusing on sub INR 30,000 devices recently, the second half of this year will feature higher end devices starting with the GT.

Fans had more questions about the companys pricing strategy too  why does the Realme X7 Pro, a Dimensity 1000+ phone, cost more than the Realme X7 Max with a Dimensity 1200? The chipset is not everything says the CEO and points to the faster charging on the Pro (65W vs. 50W) and differences in the camera hardware.

Speaking of the X7 Max, a new colorway dubbed Milky Way will launch at the June 24 event and will be available from 12 noon. As for the X7 Pro, it will soon receive Realme UI 2.0 based on Android 11. Madhav was asked about how the work on Android 12 is progressing, he only said that more info will be announced soon.

Realme is working on its first laptop and first tablet, the plan is to launch those in India before the end of the year. Interestingly, Madhav said laptops, plural, so there could be multiple sizes if not multiple different models.

When asked whether Narzo will branch off as an independent brand, the CEO said no  the Narzo product line has a very specific focus, young users who value performance, and for now that is staying under the Realme umbrella.

Madhav was also asked about his thoughts about other brands adopting the "GT" name for their smartphones and there are no hard feelings - Realme prefers to focus on innovation and quality. We can't help but point out that Realme wasn't the first to introduce a phone with "GT" in the name, though, in fact, the first Snapdragon 855 phone was the Lenovo Z5 Pro GT.

Watch the video for more details (you can use the time stamps to jump to specific questions).
Google chimes in about the fate of current Wear OS watches and the new update

On Wednesday, Qualcomm issued a statement to XDA-Developers where a spokesperson confirmed that the most recent couple of generations of the Snapdragon Wear Platform would be capable of running the new, unified Wear OS version. A Google spokesperson later issued a statement to the same outlet.

User experience is a top priority for us. We have not confirmed eligibility or timeline on whether any Wear OS smartwatch will update to the new unified platform. There are many technical requirements in order to run the unified platform that ensures all components of the user experience are optimized.

Googles statement doesnt clarify anything. Instead, were back to not knowing whether any current Wear OS watches will be updated. We dont yet know what these technical requirements for running the unified Wear OS are.

Now that Samsung is in the picture with unifying Tizen into Wear OS, business interests may play a role, especially since both Qualcomm and Samsung make wearable chipsets. In addition, Samsung will reportedly be Googles partner in producing new chipsets for the Google Pixel 6 and Pixel Watch.

The most recent Snapdragon Wear 4100 is largely based on the Snapdragon 429 chipset but perhaps optimized for lower power draw, as per Anandtech, and the Wear 3100 chips that preceded (built on 28nm process) were considered outdated before they even arrived in wearables.

Mobvoi TicWatch Pro 3 powered by Snapdragon Wear 4100 Platform

Wear OS devices were often criticized for not being as smooth and snappy as Samsung and Apple Watch competitors and it was largely due to Qualcomms chipsets. It wasnt until the Snapdragon 3100/4100 chipsets came along that lessened the gap in overall performance, though Wear OS optimization over the years was a factor as well.

Samsung will reportedly offer more details about its upcoming smartwatch, which will run the unified Wear OS, on June 28 during the MWC. Perhaps we can make more sense of this when that happens.

Source




Haiti - Politic : Official travel of Jovenel Moise to Turkey





Thursday June 17, 2021, President Jovenel Moise accompanied by his wife Martine and a large delegation left Haiti for Turkey as part of an official travel. He will participate in the Antalya Diplomacy Forum. Security, energy and investments are on the agenda for the Head of State and the delegation that will return home Saturday.



It should be noted that the Antalya Forum, which opens this Friday is a high-level meeting with political leaders, diplomats, opinion-makers and academics, with the aim of exchanging ideas and meeting the challenges. international.



Let's remind that in August 2020, Haiti and Turkey strengthened their cooperation ties with the signing of seven agreements https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-31568-haiti-diplomacy-7-mom-signed-with-turkey.html



In mid-November 2020, Presidents Moise and his Turkish counterpart Reccep Tayyip Erdogan had telephone conversations as part of negotiations for the establishment of two floating power plants capable of extending electricity services to Port-au-Prince and Cap Haitian https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-32292-haiti-cooperation-electric-meeting-between-turkish-president-erdogan-and-jovenel-moise.html



In March 2021, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu visited Haiti as part of a regional tour and issued an official invitation to Haitian leaders.



See also :

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-32439-haiti-politic-the-two-turkish-floating-power-plants-will-be-installed-in-2021.html

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-32292-haiti-cooperation-electric-meeting-between-turkish-president-erdogan-and-jovenel-moise.html

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-31568-haiti-diplomacy-7-mom-signed-with-turkey.html

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-31311-haiti-politic-turkey-will-finance-2-power-plants-in-haiti.html



SL/ HaitiLibre






















Haiti - Insecurity : Situation in Haiti, UN report





Thursday, June 17, 2021 in the afternoon, the periodic report (every 120 days) of the United Nations Integrated Office in Haiti (BINUH), on the situation in Haiti, was presented to the United Nations Security Council at New York.



"[...] The report says about the security situation has been marked by significantly increased

levels of kidnappings, with 171 abductions reported in the first four months of 2021,

affecting all spheres of society and creating a pervasive sense of anxiety. Limited

results by the authorities in curbing crime, including a failed police operation in

March in Village de Dieu, a waterfront shanty town in the Port -au-Prince metropolitan

area, dealt a further blow to the nations confidence in the States capacity to ensure

public safety.



Perceptions of deteriorating security grew more acute as State measures to tackle crime and armed gang violence remained largely unsuccessful. The inability to restore and maintain order throughout the Port-au-Prince metropolitan area was highlighted by several key incidents, including a major prison break in Croix-des-Bouquets on 25 February, a failed police operation in Village de Dieu on 12 March and gang attacks in Bel-Air on 31 March and 1 April.



The sense of insecurity was also exacerbated by spikes in several security indicators. There was a 36 per cent increase in the number of kidnappings in the first four months of 2021, with 171 abductions reported, compared with 110 in the last four months of 2020. That alarming trend, including the abduction of a group of some 10 individuals, including 7 Haitian and French clergy members, on 11 April, stoked public frustration and galvanized the Catholic Church, along with the education and privatesectors, to lead national shutdowns in protest. The number of intentional homicides increased by 17 per cent, with 525 cases reported from January to April, compared with 436 in the last four months of 2020. Of note, police officers were increasingly targeted by gangs in reprisals, resulting in 18 officers being killed and 35 wounded. The Haitian National Police registered an uptick in armed robberies by common criminals riding motorbikes, in addition to armed gangs targeting bank customers and local entrepreneurs. The number of incidents of civil unrest increased by 30 per cent compared with the previous four months, with 486 episodes recorded from January to April, of which 410 were not peaceful. The number of instances of gender-based violence reported by the national health system increased by 19 per cent between January and April, while the police registered a 44 per cent decline in the number of rapes reported, from 56 to 39 cases.



The Superior Council of the National Police progressively adopted measures to respond to escalating public safety concerns. They included tightened controls over bank transactions to freeze financial assets of criminal groups, strengthened joint police/customs inspections at major seaports and increased oversight of private security companies to stem trafficking in arms. To deter kidnappings, the former Prime Minister, Mr. Jouthe, as head of the Superior Council, banned the use of tinted windows on all vehicles not bearing official or diplomatic license plates, while the national police Director General ad interim established an anti-kidnapping task force and a hotline to report incidents. The measures were widely criticized as ad hoc reactions rather than part of a comprehensive public safety plan.



Against that backdrop, the President requested additional assistance from the United Nations to take on the mounting crime and violence, which are exacerbating a dire socioeconomic situation. In response, senior United Nations police advisers were deployed in May to provide additional expertise in strengthening police intelligence and investigation capacity in anti-gang and violence reduction strategies.



Against that backdrop, the President requested additional assistance from the United Nations to take on the mounting crime and violence, which are exacerbating a dire socioeconomic situation. In response, senior United Nations police advisers were deployed in May to provide additional expertise in strengthening police intelligence and investigation capacity in anti-gang and violence reduction strategies.



The then Prime Minister convened in early April the first interministerial task force on the draft national strategy for community violence reduction, giving it a mandate to finalize the strategy and develop an immediate and integrated response to gang violence based on national priorities with, if necessary, a realignment of existing project priorities. The task force is to report back to the Office of the Prime Minister by the end of June. Meanwhile, womens community -based organizations in gangaffected neighbourhoods were consulted on the draft strategy by the National Commission for Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration, with a view to informing the work of the task force and reinforcing womens roles in peacebuilding by ensuring that women are included in community violence reduction programmes from the beginning, starting with the identification of community leaders, participants and beneficiaries of programmes.



In parallel, a task force led by the Ministry of Justice and Public Security completed its review of the draft law on firearms and ammunition, as part of a Peacebuilding Fund project on weapons and ammunition management implemented by UNDP with support from BINUH and the United Nations Regional Centre for Peace, Disarmament and Development in Latin America and the Caribbean. The Government also requested the United Nations Insti tute for Disarmament Research to lead a weapons and ammunition management baseline assessment to inform the drafting of a national action plan in line with the Roadmap for Implementing the Caribbean Priority Actions on the Illicit Proliferation of Firearms and Ammunition across the Caribbean in a Sustainable Manner by 2030, developed by the Caribbean Community.



Preparations continued for the implementation of the Peacebuilding Fund community violence reduction project to map community platforms and bett er support long-term socioeconomic development efforts in gang -affected areas. UNOPS, UNDP, BINUH and the United Nations Population Fund held coordination meetings with implementing partners, community representatives and State institutions to articulate a common strategic vision for intervention in the fragile Port-au-Prince neighbourhoods of Martissant and La Saline.



Lastly, the Peacebuilding Fund approved a new project to prevent violence,

manage conflicts, strengthen dialogue and combat gender -based violence in 2021. It has a budget of $1.5 million and is to be implemented by UNDP and UN -Women, in close partnership with BINUH. In line with Security Council resolution 1325 (2000), the Spotlight Initiative also partnered with the Womens Peace and Humanitarian Fund to channel institutional and programmatic funding in the amount of $1.2 million to civil society organizations working to prevent and respond to violence against women and girls."



Download the full statement by Helen La Lime, Special Representative of the Secretary General of the United Nations in Haiti, to the Security Council (PDF) : https://www.haitilibre.com/docs/la-lime-17-06-2021-en.pdf



HL/ HaitiLibre






















Haiti - Diplomacy : China blocks an US resolution on Haiti





Thursday, June 17, Prime Minister ai, Claude Joseph, took part in a special session of the United Nations Security Council on Haiti, organized as part of the presentation of a report by the Secretary-General of the Nations on the situation in Haiti https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34006-haiti-insecurity-situation-in-haiti-un-report.html



This meeting allowed the fifteen members of the Council to get a better idea of the evolution of the overall situation of the country since the last report presented in February 2021 and to express their position and appreciation with regard to the security climate, the human rights situation and the political process in Haiti.



Members of the Security Council are almost unanimous in recognizing the need for elections to be organized at all levels before the end of the year for the renewal of political staff and the democratic transfer of power to a President elected on February 7, 2022.



In his speech for the occasion, the Head of Government ai reported on the efforts of the administration in place to improve the social, political and economic situation of the country, and reaffirmed the commitment and unwavering will of President Jovenel Moise, to work to the appeasement of the socio-political climate and to organize free, honest and democratic elections with the widest possible participation of political actors and the population.



The Prime Minister said he recognized the complexity of the country's security situation, but he gave the guarantee that the police are determined to restore security throughout the national territory.



At the end of the interventions, China blocked at the UN Security Council, a resolution of support for Haiti drafted by the United States, which deplored "the deterioration of the political, security and humanitarian situation" stressing "the urgent need to hold free and fair presidential and parliamentary elections in 2021". According to some diplomat, this Chinese decision could be related to Haiti's unwavering support for Taiwan, which in turn actively supports its Caribbean ally.



In addition, on the sidelines of his participation in the Security Council, Prime Minister Joseph accompanied by the Deputy Ministers responsible for human rights (Stephanie Auguste) and electoral questions (Mathias Pierre), had a face to face with Antonio Guterres, Secretary General of the United Nations around the electoral process in Haiti. The Secretary-General renewed the UN's support for the political process in Haiti, including the organization of elections at all levels before the end of 2021.



SL/ HL/ HaitiLibre






















Haiti - News : Zapping...





A camp for people with disabilities, burned down

On Thursday, the camp on the runway of the former civil air force housing special needs people was set on fire by unidentified armed individuals.



Elections : PM asks UN 17 million

Speaking Thursday at the United Nations Security Council, Prime Minister a.i Claude Joseph requested assistance of 17 million dollars for the organization of the next elections including the constitutional referendum. Recall that Haiti has already deposited 33 million dollars in the trust fund to finance the referendum and other electoral activities whose budget was stimulated by the Provisional Electoral Council at 125 million US https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-33632-haiti-cep-where-is-the-financing-of-the-referendum-and-the-elections.html



Fake US visas : 2 crooks arrested

The named Johnson Louis and Roseberline Marcellus wanted by the Bureau of Financial and Economic Affairs for fraud, were arrested by the police from the Lascahobas police station (Dept. of the Center). They are part of a network that specializes in manufacturing fake US visas.



Arrest for mock kidnapping

The Central Direction of the Judicial Police (DCPJ) apprehended the named Chery Fenguens for having faked his own kidnapping in order to pocket 9,000 US dollars that members of his family had entrusted to him to deposit in a bank account.



Covid : The Minister of Youth is better

The Communication Unit of the Ministry of Youth, informs that Minister Ronald Gerard DMezard tested positive for Covid-19 and admitted to Mirebalais University Hospital two weeks ago, is doing well. After a week of hospitalization due to breathing difficulties, the Minister, who no longer shows symptoms of the disease, finds himself in solitary confinement at home and performs his duties remotely with serenity and confidence.



Carrefour : Aid is reaching the displaced

To help the displaced people of Carrefour, UNICEF transported 720 hygiene kits, 700 jerry cans, 10,000 masks, 212 mattresses, 70 tarpaulins and medical items to support an integrated mobile health clinic.



See also :

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-33947-haiti-armed-clashes-more-than-1-500-displaced-people-humanitarian-assistance-is-organized.html

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-33912-haiti-flash-gang-war-hundreds-of-people-flee-martissant.html



HL/ HaitiLibre


















Romney, WV (26757)

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Published on 2021/06/17 | Source

Actress Han So-hee has released a jewelry pictorial full of lovely charms.

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The pictorial, which is decorated with the cover of magazine First Look No. 221, is a pictorial with jewelry & watch brand STONEHENGE, which is full of fresh and lovely images of actress Han So-hee.

Han So-hee, who played the role of art student Yoo Na-bi in JTBC's new Saturday drama "Nevertheless" ahead of its first broadcast on the 19th, overwhelmed the eyes by showing bright visuals and a fresh and romantic atmosphere against the backdrop of a lively campus.

In particular, her own fresh smile, sensuous pose, and cool and refreshing style combined to create a highly complete pictorial as if she were sharing a day of college student Han So-hee.

In an interview that followed after the photo shoot, Han So-hee said, "It's a little complicated in the thoughts and actions of Yoo Na-bi. In fact, there are more parts that I think, 'if I were her, I wouldn't do this'. That's why I feel sorry for Yoo Na-bi. However, if I were in the past, I would have made a choice that was not much different from hers. I think there are a lot of different emotions that I can relate to", she said, expressing her affection for Yoo Na-bi's character.

As for Song Kang, who plays the opposite role in the play, "Song Kang seems to have a variety of aspects that look similar to his character Jae-eon, but do not look alike. I think Park Jae-eon has a much more attractive character than the original by adding Song Kang's original clear and playful appearance. He has good acting chemistry and gives good energy for the other actor to get immersed in the play".
By William Schwartz | Published on 2021/06/17

Ahead of the release of "Whispering Corridors 6: The Humming" the production company behind the film announced that rights to broadcast the movie had already been sold to twelve countries. These include Brunei, Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand, and of course, South Korea itself. "Whispering Corridors 6: The Humming" is the first title in twelve years for the series.

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Previous films in the Whispering Corridors series were not given numbered titles. These include "Memento Mori", "Wishing Stairs", "Voice Letter", and "A Blood Pledge". All of the films can be identified as the same series as they are all supernatural horror films that take place at girls' schools, a sentiment more clearly expressed in the Korean title, which reads as women's high school ghost story. "Whispering Corridors 6: The Humming" was released in South Korean theaters on June 17th.

Written by William Schwartz
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Published on 2021/06/17 | Source

Actress Lee Hanee is starring in the new SBS TV drama "One the Woman".

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The drama depicts a bad female prosecutor whose life is changed to that of a daughter-in-law of a conglomerate family who looks just like her due to memory loss.

Lee Hanee plays Kang Mi-na the daughter-in-law of the conglomerate family and Jo Yeon-joo the female prosecutor.

Lee Hanee's partner is Lee Sang-yoon who plays Han Seung-wook, a third generation conglomerate who still cherishes the innocence of his first love.

The drama premieres in the second half of the year.
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Editor: Out of every disaster, there can come a positive outcome. For example, whe
Last updated 6/18/2021 at 11:44am

From U.S. Attorney for the District of Montana

GREAT FALLS  A man accused of beating his dating partner on the Fort Belknap Indian Reservation and causing her substantial injuries admitted to an assault charge Wednesday, Acting U.S. Attorney Leif M. Johnson said.

Gordon Andrew Messerly Jr., 42, address unknown, pleaded guilty to assault resulting in substantial bodily injury. Messerly faces a maximum of five years in prison, a $250,000 fine and three years of supervised release.

Chief U.S. District Judge Brian M. Morris presided and set sentencing for Oct. 7.

Messerly was detained p...
Hill County Health Department Thursday reported the 46th COVID-19-related death for the county in a resident younger than 40.

Numbers have dropped substantially from last fall and early winter in this part of Montana, but new cases still are being reported  Hill, Blaine and Chouteau counties reported no new cases today, but Liberty County reported a new case  and the death shows that the virus is still impacting the area.

With Hill County at 46 COVID-19-related deaths, Blaine is at 24, Chouteau at seven and Liberty at one.

The state now has 1,651 deaths.

And officials are urgin...
North Central Senior Citizens Center

June 21-25

Senior center closed for now.

Medical transportation only for now. Call ahead for Fridays.

Menu

Monday  Sloppy Joe on a bun, tater tots, salad

Tuesday  Salad, baked ham, mashed potatoes with gravy, sunshine carrots, cake

Wednesday  Braised beef, mashed potatoes, salad, fruit

Thursday  Polish sausage, sauerkraut, au gratin potatoes

Friday  Soup, salad bar, chefs choice, dessert,

We want to thank everyone who helped the Senior Center with the rummage sale and cinnamon rolls last month. The total taken in was $1,59...
Chad David Williams, 50, passed away after a short, intense battle with COVID-19 at Northern Montana Hospital on October 24, 2020.

Cremation has taken place, and a memorial service will be held at 1:00 p.m. on Friday, June 25, 2021, at Van Orsdel United Methodist Church with Pastor Jack Mattingly officiating. His graveside service will take place at 3:00 p.m. in Highland Cemetery.

Chad's family has suggested memorial donations be made in his name to the Friends of the Havre Animal Shelter or the charity of the donor's choice.

Holland & Bonine Funeral Home has been entrusted with services and arrangements.

Please visit Chad's online memorial page and leave a message of condolence for his family at http://www.hollandbonine.com .

Chad was born on July 29, 1970, in Havre to David and Oma (Andersen) Williams. At 6 weeks old, his mother moved him and his sister to Okinawa, Japan, where his father was stationed. They then moved to Adak, Alaska, and then to Chesapeake, Virginia. Upon his father's discharge from the Navy, the family returned home to Havre.

From first grade onward, Chad was raised in Havre, graduating from Havre High School in 1988. He joined the U.S. Navy Reserves in 1989 and served until 1997, where he was trained in electronics and computers. His work in the Reserves made Chad a fire control man, servicing computers controlling the guns and missiles. During that time, he attended Northern Montana College, majoring in waste-water management and electronics.

He also married Gina Mayer early in 1992, and their son Brandon was born later that year. The couple divorced in 2005.

Chad moved to Helena to work at Helena Industries as the head of safety and maintenance, and he married Katherine Gilchrist in Helen in 2008. The couple divorced four years later.

In 2016, he returned home to Havre, and found a job working at Northern Montana Hospital as a bio-med tech, a position he absolutely loved. He remained there until his death.

Chad had a wonderful sense of humor, and he will always be remembered for his kindness, strength, and genuine compassion. He was always willing to help family and friends, but was steadfast in clinging to his convictions and beliefs. Chad has been referred to as a "true gentleman," a good guy who always helped, someone who made a lasting impact, a person who could make you laugh, and someone to be admired for his wit and wisdom.

He adored his "boys," his son Brandon and nephew Sam Ferry. He did his best to get together with them weekly to have dinner, play D & D, or go camping. He also dearly loved his "girls," Neuba and Patches, his feline companions.

He was preceded in death by his grandparents, Helen and Andy O.L. Andersen, Thea and Herb Williams and Olive Williams; and aunts LaVelle Black, Cathy Ingram, and Sharyn Andersen.

Chad is greatly missed by his son, Brandon Williams; parents, David D. and Oma M. Williams; sister, Tricia Williams Ferry; nephew, Sam Ferry; aunts and uncles Karen and Gene Cyr, Arnold Andersen, Mike Williams, and Leonard Black; cousins, Arnie, Andy, and Aaron Andersen, Reuel, Darin, and Ryan Cyr, Ginger Ingram Case, Angie Ingram, Mike, Shelly, and Penney Williams, Lenora Black Langman and Tom Cleese, and many, many friends.
(The Center Square)  An ambitious proposal to give a federal agency the ability to set and negotiate drug prices has members of Congress under pressure from both sides of the argument.

H.R. 3 would empower the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to negotiate the cost of many drugs in the American market and would cap prices based on rates in other wealthy countries.

Supporters of the legislation said it would lower the cost of prescription drugs significantly for consumers, many of whom are using federal tax dollars to pay for them.

Big pharmaceutical companies are charging Americans prices that are three, four, or even 10 times higher than what they charge for the same drugs in other countries  even though they admit they still make a profit overseas, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in 2020. That ends with H.R. 3, the Elijah E. Cummings Lower Drug Costs Now Act.

Others warn that handing a government agency the power to control some of the most common drugs in the market will stifle innovation and limit Americans access to newer, potentially life-saving therapies.

Because constraining drug revenue would lessen expected profitability of new drugs, H.R. 3 is likely to reduce incentives for research and development, a 2020 analysis from the nonprofit Commonwealth Fund read. A key policy consideration involves weighing the societal trade-off between fewer new drugs coming to market versus the increased affordability of existing drugs.

The House Energy and Commerce Committee soon could consider the newest iteration of the bill. A handful of centrist Democrats, some sitting on the aforementioned committee, have made it clear the measure is an overreach.

U.S. Rep. Scott Peters, D-California, and nine other lawmakers wrote Pelosi in May, stating how important it is to preserve our invaluable innovation ecosystem, and asked the speaker to seek a bipartisan option.

If this pandemic has taught us anything, its that we all, truly, must be in this together, they wrote.

Americans for Prosperity, a free-market nonprofit, has launched a series of ad campaigns pressuring lawmakers on the committee that have expressed doubts about H.R. 3 to vote against it.

A rationing scheme that puts the government in charge of Americans medicine cabinets is the wrong prescription that would only hurt those who need help, said Dean Clancy, senior health policy fellow at Americans for Prosperity. Lawmakers should stand firm against this deeply misguided legislation, and instead support a personal option that expands access to affordable medications without government price fixing.

In addition to Peters, AFP has targeted U.S. Reps. Mark OHalleran, D-Arizona; Kurt Schrader, D-Oregon; Lisa Blunt Rochester, D-Delaware; and Kathleen Rice, D-New York.

An earlier iteration of H.R. 3 made its way out of the House along mostly partisan lines in 2019 but couldnt garner the votes in the Senate.
(The Center Square)  Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear said Thursday he would be willing to entertain ending the states involvement in the federal subsidy for unemployed workers, but the issue of getting more Kentuckians back to work is more complicated than just the $300 extra in benefits unemployment recipients receive.

Republicans and industry groups have called on the Democratic governor to take that step after some businesses have claimed they are having a hard time finding workers they need for jobs opening up as the state has lifted the mask and social distancing regulations.

At a press conference Thursday, Beshear told reporters he would not set a date for when the pandemic subsidy participation would end. Instead, he called on business leaders to come together to find a solution.

Let's talk, he said. Lets create a smart incentive program. Let's get you the workers you need. I want to get Kentucky back to work. We can't have everybody still on PUA at the end of September, but let's admit a complicated problem is a complicated problem.

A recent study by the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce indicates the difference between the states labor participation rate was 4.8 percentage points lower than the nations rate in March.

A year earlier, the margin was 3.9 percentage points.

The Kentucky Chamber also referenced a U.S. Chamber poll of unemployed workers from earlier this month that found 49% of workers who lost their job during the pandemic were either not active at all or not very active in looking for a new job.

However, of those not actively engaged in a job search, 16% said the enhanced unemployment benefits made it not worth looking for a new job. Higher percentages of individuals said that childcare (24%), lack of job availability in their industry (28%) and lingering COVID concerns (26%) were concerns.

Beshear said the pandemic benefit pumps in $34 million to the state each week, with that money going to buy groceries. Thats an important benefit for families, especially for those who have held off looking for work because of childcare issues.

We don't want to lose those dollars that are helping them and are flowing through the economy, the governor said. "So our aim is to try to thread that needle and do it right. Not red or blue, just right.
'Cancel culture has reached Henderson County government,' commissioner says

Staff members and commissioners listen to a speaker who opposed Covid-19 vaccination campaigns. [PARKER NEWMAN/Hendersonville Lightning]

The Henderson County Board of Commissioners called an emergency meeting on Thursday evening to respond to what the county manager called YouTube's "blatant act of censorship" in removing the video of Wednesday's Board of Commissioners meeting from its platform.

"Do we live in the Soviet states of America now? I don't know," County Manager Steve Wyatt said Thursday night. "Commissoner Edney and I and others  Daniel (Andreotta) and Rebecca (McCall) and others have talked this afternoon" about the news  first reported by the Hendersonville Lightning  that Youtube had removed the video. Commissioners agreed to hold an emergency meeting at 2 p.m. Friday "to discuss this issue of this censorship  apparent censorshiop  of the June 16 meeting, and the implications for depriving Henderson County citizens of their constitutional rights, one of which is to question the government."

Wyatt said Commissioner Michael Edney, an attorney, could shed more light on the board's potential response to YouTube's action. Edney was not immediately reachable Thursday night.

It's unclear whether Youtube in the past has removed videos of other public meetings of elected bodies. The Henderson County Board of Commissioners has for many years  predating the pandemic  posted videos of its meetings that people could watch later.

"I've been doing this a long time. The answer is no," Wyatt said when asked if he was aware of other videos being taken down. "I am absolutely appalled of this blatant act of censorship. It's beyond the pale."

County officials say they don't know why YouTube removed the video but it appears likely  based on a side-by-side comparison of comments made by people who objected to the Covid-19 vaccination to YouTube's guidelines on coronavirus misinformation  that the public comment period triggered the decision.

"I'd like to know (why) but I know that there was a vigorour demonstration of democracy where these citizens questioned the government and you know what? When we can't do that anymore, it's over. So it's time to wake up. No. This cannot stand."

While the First Amendment bars the government from infringing on free speech and on citizens' right to air grievances about the government's actions, it does not force private companies to protect free speech.

"I know they're a private company, I understand," Wyatt said. "They're also a platform and if they're not regulated, by God, they need to be, because they're trampling on people's free speech rights."

Commissioner Daniel Andreotta emphasized in a Facebook post Thursday that the board on Wednesday stood against coercion or incentives for the Covid vaccine.
Juneteenth celebration is Saturday

Juneteenth, which became a national holiday Thursday when President Biden signed the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act into law, marks the day that U.S. Gen. Gordon Granger reached Galveston, Texas, with the news that slaves were free.

Sponsored by Star Lite Chapter #510 Order of the Eastern Star, the event in the Historic Seventh Avenue District includes free food and other activities. The food includes barbecue and baked beans, chips, hot dogs donated by Hot Dog World, plus pound cake and strawberry sodas.

"I am ecstatic about it," Melinda Lowrance, of Star Lite Chapter #510, said of the new Juneteenth holiday. "To go ahead and make it into a federal law is awesome. Now I believe the state has to enforce it and locally. And I do believe it will happen here in Henderson County because the city has embraced this celebration. I believe it will be pushed forward and made a legal holiday in the state of North Carolina."

Lowrance said she had been busy for three days preparing pork barbecue and barbecued chicken and another volunteer was busying making pound cake.

The Starlight Chapter, the Henderson County Public Library and Pardee Hospital will have information tables. "We're promoting the library," which will display black history books. "That's the whole idea, just to bring the community together and make them aware."

"We will have a deejay down there to play music," she said. "We will have that information available about Juneteenth, because a lot of people weren't even aware, didn't even know what it meant."

Gov. Roy Cooper proclaimed June 19 as Juneteenth Day in North Carolina, honoring the oldest known commemoration of the abolition of slavery in the United States.
Moffitt's ABC reform bills advance

RALEIGH  Several bills to help N.C. distillers and to loosen alcohol regulation in the state are moving through the General Assembly. Some have progressed to the floor, of both or one of the bodies, while others are mired in committee.





One measure, House Bill 693, on Wednesday, June 16, passed the N.C. House on second reading, 88-15, and was sent to the Senate. The move would allow alcohol to be sold and served on common carriers, such as charter buses. The Rev. Mark Creech, a consistent opponent of moves to loosen alcohol rules in North Carolina, said during an earlier committee meeting the move would create bars on wheels.



Rep. Tim Moffitt, a Hendersonville Republican who is primary sponsor of the bill, came to the General Assembly for the second time in 2020, when Gov. Roy Cooper, a Democrat, appointed him to fill Rep. Chuck McGradys seat in District 117. McGrady, a strong proponent of reforming the states antiquated liquor control system, had served two terms from Buncombe County, from 2011 to 2015.



H.B. 693, which creates a common carrier vehicle permit, authorizes the sale or service of malt beverages, unfortified wine, fortified wine, and mixed beverages in the passenger area of a common carrier of passengers for consumption, by passengers, during journeys of 75 miles or longer that dont end within 10 miles of the journeys origin.



Another measure, House Bill 781, Bring Business Back to Downtown, passed the House in May but is stuck in the Senate. The move generated much discussion before moving to the House Rules Committee.



The bill has two parts, said Moffitt, who is also primary sponsor of the H.B. 781. One, it would allow municipalities to create social districts. He pointed to the Streets at Southpoint in Durham as an example, where people would leave a restaurant and carry a cup of alcohol within a permitted area. The second aspect, Moffitt says, would allow bars and restaurants to, in effect, extend their premises, which the governor temporarily allowed in an executive order after the pandemic. H.B. 781 would make this permanent.



Local governments would have the option of opting in or out of the new rules, as they could with the so-called brunch bill a couple of years back.



House Bill 722, which would expand the size of growlers  refillable takeout containers for beer and cider  from two liters to four liters, has passed the House. It passed the first reading in the Senate but was referred to the Rules committee.



House Bill 890, was, as introduced, an all-encompassing measure, incorporating some measures that have already cleared one chamber of the General Assembly. It would allow people to order online and pick products up from state ABC stores, expand the size of growlers from two liters to four, loosen rules for tours in N.C. distilleries, and allow distillers to sell their products at festivals. Maybe most important  and also probably the biggest point of contention  is a provision in the bill that levels the proverbial playing field, allowing distilleries to operate like their beer and wine counterparts, apart from ABC control regarding hours of operation. As it stands, distilleries cant open if a local ABC is not open.



The measure passed the House and was referred to the Senate, where it passed the first reading May 12. Its now in Senate Rules. Other alcohol measures, such as House Bill 619, are stuck in committee. That bill would provide a sales tax exemption for equipment, machinery, and supplies used in creating certain types of alcohol. It passed a first reading in the House but was referred to committee.



The rules for alcohol in North Carolina are defined in Chapter 18B of the General Statutes, first written in the late 1930s.

Its like looking at the rings of a tree, Moffitt told Carolina Journal, regarding the complex and sometimes contradictory laws. Each ring tells a certain story about a session of the General Assembly. Moffitt says he searches for efficiencies, consistent interpretations. Inconsistent ones. You can see all these things, Moffitt says. What thats done is created somewhat of an inconsistency in the way that the (ABC) commission operates, and its not them. Its just an inconsistency of all the hodgepodge of and patchwork of laws.


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The Supreme Court unanimously ruled on Thursday that Philadelphia is not allowed to exclude a Catholic social services agency from its foster care system because the group does not want to serve same-sex couples.

Despite the ruling, the justices narrowly stopped short of a sweeping decision on non-discrimination policies and religious freedoms. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the ruling for six members of the court, which rested on an interpretation of the city's non-discrimination ordinance.

The city's policy allows authorities to provide exceptions to other groups based on secular reasons, which Roberts said should also be taken into consideration. Additionally, Roberts said the group's work in certifying foster care parents is not similar to a "public accommodation."

Unanimous Decision

The justice said it could not discriminate under the ordinance, arguing foster care parent certification is not readily accessible to the public, which involves an arduous process.

However, many lawmakers did not share the ruling of the decision despite the three liberal justices of the court expressing their support of Roberts and the majority. Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett also took the ruling's side, US News reported.

The opposition included Justices Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, and Neil Gorsuch. They argued separately that the ruling of the court treads around the issue of government power and religious beliefs.

Read Also: US Ends Trump-Era Policy Limiting Asylum for Survivors of Gang and Domestic Violence

Philadelphia officials employ the services of outside agencies when screening foster care parent candidates. As a policy, Catholic Social Services (CSS) refused to accommodate same-sex couples based on their religious convictions.

The city of Philadelphia then decided to stop working with CSS until it changed its policy about same-sex couples. However, instead of complying, CSS sued the city for allegedly violating its First Amendment rights to the free exercise of religion.

The voting ended with a unanimous result in support of the CSS group but had a 6-3 split on the reasoning with the majority limiting the reach of its decision. The court's decision was "certainly a loss," Richard Dearing, chief of the Appeals Division for the New York City Law Department said. He previously filed a brief for local governments supporting Philadelphia's decision.

Religious Freedom

CSS tried to overturn a 1990 Supreme Court decision called Employment Division versus Smith. Justice Antonin Scalia, a conservative and devout Catholic, authored the ruling. It wrote that there could be adverse effects to a religious group or person when the government enforces a generally applicable law or regulation despite being neutral, NPR reported.

Many conservative and religious advocacy rights groups expressed their agreement with the court's ruling, arguing the support of the three liberal members suggested further support for future legal disputes involving religious beliefs.

"The ruling was a strong ruling in favor of religious freedom, especially for social services providers," Lori Windham, a lawyer for the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty said. The group represented the agency and three foster parents during the case. He added the court was well aware it had no authority in excluding religious agencies for their beliefs, Reuters reported.

Related Article: Ghislaine Maxwell's Lawyers Laid Complaints Over Treatment in Jail, Days After Court Denies Bail Request

@ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
On Thursday, the Supreme Court dismissed the Affordable Care Act in a ruling which will keep the legislation untouched and retain millions of Americans' healthcare coverage. The judges ruled that the challenger had no legal power to bring the matter against the 2010 law. Judge Stephen Breyer delivered the 7-2 ruling.

The judges rejected the argument by Republican-led states and the former administration of Donald Trump, which urged the judges to invalidate the entire law.

The action focused on the individual mandate part of the Affordable Care Act, whereby those who do not sign up for health insurance were first penalized. The judges observed that the measures under consideration do not harm opponents since Congress has decreased the penalty for declining to purchase health insurance to zero in 2017. Two additional major issues in the Supreme Court have survived the Affordable Care Act, one in 2012 and another in 2015.

Earlier this month, the Department of Health and Human Services released a report showing that the Affordable Care Act covers 31 million Americans. Of this number, 11.3 million registered in Obamacare exchanges since February, while 14.8 million new-eligible low-income people registered in the Medicaid expansion since December. In the course of a special registration Biden started in mid-February to broaden its coverage to the uninsured, an additional 1.2 million Americans chose the 2021 policies, lasting till mid-August.

In a Twitter post on Thursday, Ken Paxton, Texas Attorney General who led the challenge and Republican efforts to repeal Obama-era policies through the courts, pledged to keep fighting the legislation, CNN reported.

Obama claims Affordable Care Act is secure

Former President Barack Obama stated that one of his greatest achievements in office was the passage of the Affordable Care Act.

Obama continued with laud to President Joe Biden, who worked on expanding the HealthCare.gov enrollment period and giving Americans greater financial incentives for participation in a health insurance package adopted earlier this year. The number of persons registered by the Affordable Care Act then reached historic numbers.

In the meanwhile, President Joe Biden supported making the extra pandemic benefits permanent. According to HuffPost, the President said, "Today's decision affirms that the Affordable Care Act is stronger than ever, delivers for the American people, and gets us closer to fulfilling our moral obligation to ensure that, here in America, health care is a right and not a privilege."

Read Also: $1.2 Trillion Infrastructure Plan Receives Bipartisan Support, But Democrats Raise Fresh Concerns

What does the court's ruling about the Affordable Care Act mean?

The Act allows parents to keep their children included in their health insurance up to age 26 and enables patients to get free mammograms, cholesterol checks, and birth control, as per WRCBTV. One of the most popular aspects of the legislation is its robust protection against pre-existing conditions, including preventing insurers from refusing coverage or charging more benefits based on people's health history.

According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, about 54 million Americans - or 27% of non-elderly people have illnesses that render them uninsurable in the individual market ahead of legislation. An Obama administration report shows as many as 133 million Americans might have been refused coverage, had their benefits delayed or limited, or had their health to pay more for individual market insurance.

While some parts of the Affordable Care Act are popular with most Americans, the public is still profoundly split by the legislation itself. Per Kaiser Family Foundation, approximately 54% of individuals expressed a favorable view and 39% had a negative perception of Obamacare.

Related Article: Court Says CDC's Eviction Moratorium To Continue; Several Advocates Call For Extension



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United States President Joe Biden signed the Juneteenth bill on Thursday, officially making it a federal holiday which commemorates the freedom of slaves and offers federal employees a day off beginning this Friday.

Biden said the signing of the bill would go down as one of his greatest honors while serving as president of the U.S. The Democratic leader was in the East Room of the White House with Vice President Kamala Harris when they signed the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act.

Harris expressed her belief of how far the country has come and how much farther is needed to be reached but noted the event was a momentous occasion for all Americans to be celebrated. The vice president became the first Black vice president when she won the 2020 elections. She said the legislation's passing had major significance because the place where the bill was signed was in a building enslaved people built.

Juneteenth a Federal Holiday

After the signing of the bill, Biden said America's newest holiday supported centuries-old divisions and addressed racial injustice. The Democrat said great nations embraced their most painful moments instead of ignoring them. He said remembering those moments was the beginning of learning how to "heal and grow stronger," USA Today reported.

Since the passing of Martin Luther King Day in 1983, the Juneteenth bill marks the first new national holiday politicians have passed. Biden added the passing of the legislation into a federal holiday would help Americans understand the country's history and celebrate the progress that has been made.

Read Also: National Republican Congressional Committee To Accept Cryptocurrency Donations in a Bid To Support Republican Candidates

On Thursday, the federal Office of Personnel Management announced most government employees would be observing the holiday on Friday despite June 19 falling on Saturday this year.

The name Juneteenth stems from the date June 19, 1865, when Maj. Gen. Gordon Grander announced the freedom of slaves in Galveston, Texas, following then-President Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation. Several months after, the 13th Amendment abolished slavery in the last three border states that have not yet been affected by Lincoln's order.

Representative Sheila Jackson Lee of Texas called the signing of the bill as a federal holiday was an acknowledgment of the original sin of slavery. The movement for the passing of the date as a federal holiday began last year when the Black Lives Matter demonstrations continued to call for justice after the death of George Floyd in the hands of a police officer, the New York Times reported.

Recognition of the Holiday

Before the signing of the bill, 49 states across the United States have already recognized Juneteenth as a state or ceremonial holiday. The last remaining state that has not yet done this was South Dakota. Then-Senator of Illinois Barack Obama co-sponsored the legislation to make Juneteenth a national holiday.

Many companies, including Nike, Uber, and Twitter, announced they would be giving their employees a day off for Juneteenth this year. Additionally, some governors in other states, including New York and Virginia, are also declaring the day a holiday for state employees, BBC reported.

Related Article: Juneteenth Becomes Federal Holiday, Commemorating the Freedom of Slaves

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Indonesian officials announced that more than 350 doctors and health care workers are infected with the COVID-19 virus despite being vaccinated against the disease.

The Indonesian Medical Association (IDI) announced that nearly all of the recipients of the vaccines were given China's Sinovac vaccine, Reuters reported.

Many of the infected individuals were found to be asymptomatic and self-isolated at home, Badai Ismoyo, head of the Kudus district health office in Central Java, said. The ones admitted in hospitals developed high fevers and experienced a continuous drop in oxygen saturation levels.

The district is struggling to contain the outbreak, which officials claimed is tied to the Delta variant, the coronavirus' more virulent strain. The outbreak caused bed occupancy rates in the district to rise to 90%.

With dozens of affected workers hospitalized, officials are concerned about the efficacy of the China-made vaccine against some variants which are believed to be more virulent.

Health Care Workers

Indonesian authorities designated health care workers as a priority group when choosing who to vaccinate first. Inoculation of the group began in January, making it one of the first groups to be vaccinated against COVID-19.

Between January to May, Indonesian officials reported a massive drop in the number of fatalities relating to the coronavirus pandemic, going from 158 to 13. However, the Java hospitalizations have generated renewed worries among public health experts.

Data gathered from the infected individuals showed they contracted the Delta variant of the coronavirus, which is known to be much more contagious than the original strain. Experts said it was given that the variant would cause a massive outbreak due to the majority of Indonesian health care workers getting Sinovac, which has not yet been tested against the variant in the real world.

Read Also: Illinois Residents Discovered to Have Been Infected With COVID-19 Before First Reported Cases in the US

The efficacy of the Sinovac vaccine against the new variants remained unclear, and a company spokesman, as well as Indonesia's Ministry of Health, did not provide information regarding the data.

Indonesian doctors and nurses have struggled with the coronavirus pandemic since March 2020, with the country recording one of the worst cases in Asia at more than 1.9 million cases and 53,000 deaths. Health care workers have also been impacted by the virus, killing 946 individuals.

Delta Variant

Authorities revealed at least five doctors and one nurse have lost their lives to the COVID-19 virus despite being vaccinated. LapoCOVID-19, a data initiative group, noted, however, that one of the victims only received their first shot of the treatment, Channel News Asia reported.

The Delta variant is responsible for the country's most recent surge of coronavirus cases after Ramadan. The national holiday caused millions of people to travel to their hometowns despite the government banning traveling for an extended distance.

Officials reported 12,624 new infections on Thursday, which was double the number observed in the previous week. Authorities noted the high number of cases has not been seen since January 30. The infections come amid the country slowly approaching two million cases and nearly 54,000 deaths, ABC reported.

Related Article: New Hampshire Teachers Label Unvaccinated Students Ahead of Prom; Parents Petition for Superintendent to Resign

Related Article: New Hampshire Teachers Label Unvaccinated Students Ahead of Prom; Parents Petition for Superintendent to Resign

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President Joe Biden rejected the characterization that he was "old friends" with Chinese President Xi Jinping as he avoided the question whether or not he would push the Chinese leader to cease blocking the COVID-19 origins' probe. However, Biden said that he was open to talks with China.

Biden welcomes potential to talk with Xi despite recognizing China as a global threat

Due to its more aggressive actions at home and internationally, the administration recognized China as the most significant global threat, but Biden's National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said Biden welcomes the possibility to talk to Xi, StraitTimes reported.

Sullivan pointed out that the President showed that there is a way forward without China with his introduction of the new infrastructure initiative with the G7. He also said that for the first time, a NATO Summit took China's security issue seriously. Sullivan also noted that the settlement of the EU-US aviation feud of many years reminded that the West is united against China's coercive tactics.

Despite these moves, Sullivan said that President Biden is not closed to the opportunity to communicate with China's Xi Jinping.

In February, President Biden spoke with China's leader over the phone. But, communication has been limited, with Sullivan and the Secretary of State Antony Blinken and top Chinese officials in Alaska meeting in person back in March.

Biden stated that it is necessary to talk in person, after his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Wednesday in Geneva.

Biden's point of view is also relevant to China and President Xi Jinping. In the future, he will seek out opportunities to interact with President Xi, Sullivan explained. He also noted that the President had no arrangements to meet with Xi. Both presidents are expected to attend a Group of 20 major economies conference in Italy in October.

Read Also: China Successfully Launches First Astronauts for Space Station Construction After Being Banned From ISS

US, allies hope for another COVID-19 origins probe

Laboratory leak fears were referred to as conspiracy theories in the meeting minutes between Wuhan lab experts and the WHO-China team. During a press conference in Geneva following a summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Biden was asked whether he will call Xi to urge him to open up China to the investigators looking into COVID-19.

Per The Washington Examiner, the President did not specify any specific actions he would take to persuade China to help in the investigation of the coronavirus pandemic's onset. Sullivan brought up concerns, including forced labor, which were discussed during the G-7. However, he made no specific promises about when or how a Biden-Xi meeting would occur, and he made no mention of the COVID-19 origins probe.

In March, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus stated that the lab leak theory needed more research.

The communique from this weekend's G-7 summit requested that the WHO conduct a follow-up into the COVID-19 origins' probe in China. During a brief April press conference, Biden stated that he had not yet confronted Xi about claims that China misled the world regarding the pandemic.

Biden's talks with the G7 industrialized nations, the European Union, NATO, and even Russian President Vladimir Putin - whose country is being squeezed by China - focused on the world's second-largest economy, the US president said. Biden has stated for a long time that China would be at the center of his administration's foreign policy, as per Bloomberg via MSN.

Related Article: NATO Leaders Claims China Presents "Systemic Challenges," Pledges to Counter Its Rise



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According to the Republican from Ohio, the Russian president was able to elaborate on recent events in the US that he used as a cudgel to lambast the US on the world stage.

Putin used Democrat narratives to drive his point home

Putin brought to discussion the Jan. 6 Capitol incident and the activities of the Black Lives Matter, tagging the protesters as "homegrown terrorists." This was the reason why Biden has gone after perceived dissidents, and the remarks caught the US president off guard, reported Newsmax.

The GOP member criticized what transpired in the summit as proof that the US president was not ready when he faced the Kremlin leader at all. Also, he did not counter the claims asserted by Putin, turning the summit one-sided.

On Newsmax 'National Report', Representative Turner said, "He [Putin] stated categorically that he is not Donald Trump and he's not putting America first, but we have no clue what he advocates for." The Republican from Ohio added, "As a consequence, you have a summit that could focus on specific domestic issues in the United States instead of the conflicts between the US and Russia."

One concession by Biden is the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, which is an apparent victory for Vladimir Putin to help his country economically and gain energy independence.

Read also: The G7 Summit Agenda Decided on by the Leaders to Move Forward After Cornwall Meeting

The Republican mentioned that the current acting secretary of the navy and the US administration will stop an important nuclear weapons program, which will give Russia a permission to modernize its nuclear arsenal. According to Turner, it is giving Moscow two wins; and Biden just allowed it to happen.

He stated that the president had no clear agenda when going into the summit and left with no victories for the US; instead Biden just gave Putin a platform to criticize the US.

It was strange according to him that Biden gave Putin a list of what not to lay a hand on about cyber-attacks. Turner described what happened like the schoolyard bully, who tore up another student's homework but the catch was some class homework would not be torn, or the school principal will know about it. Otherwise, the president gave the Kremlin leader a line where to cross and not to cross. Like telling his counterpart they can talk as long as he follows the rules.

Turner noted that the current US administration must determine its foreign policy like the former administration. "That most of the meeting of the current president with the EU, the G-7, and NATO, now the Geneve Summit has shown he conceded to their demands," said Turner.

By the end of the interview, Turner left an analogy that will surley get a lot of people thinking. He said, "We realize that he does not want to put America first, that, by the way, should be quite disturbing to everybody. It's the equivalent of stepping into the court and have your lawyer declare, 'You know, I really don't want you to succeed,'"per One News Page.

Turner says President Joe Biden's unpreparedness signifies that the US will not be represented by someone with America's interest.

Related article: Vladimir Putin Mocks Joe Biden As Common 'Career Politician' After He's Called Killer, Says Donald Trump Is Far Better

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On Wednesday, 50 of Portland police's highly trained rapid response unit voted unanimously to resign in response to the recent indictment of Officer Corey Budworth. Budsworth is facing a charge for allegedly assaulting a photographer during a protest in August.

The team that resigned served on a specialized Oregon crowd-control unit and was called to respond to protests in Portland.

During a Wednesday night union meeting, detectives, officers, and sergeants on the Rapid Response Team voted to quit the team due to a perceived lack of support from the district attorney and from City Hall over the past year after over 100 consecutive nights of protest coverage, indicated the mayor's office and officers and reported ABC News.

The indictment of one of the group's policemen seemed to be the last nail in the coffin, reported Oregon Live, and the resignations were implemented immediately, as indicated by the Portland Police Bureau.

Lack of Support

The Portland Police Bureau's Rapid Response Team is primarily responsible for ensuring public safety at crowd events. The assignment is voluntary and the policemen will remain on the force, pushing through with their regular assignments, according to the bureau.

Officer Corey Budworth was arraigned for one count of fourth-degree assault by a grand jury for allegedly using a baton on a freelance photojournalist during a protest on August 18 last year, reported Koin.

Read Also: South Carolina High Court Blocks Two Electric Chair Executions, Convicts Must Have Choice of Death by Firing Squad

Around 70 members comprised the group one year ago. A team lieutenant was called by Chief Chuck Lovell in order to inform him the members of the team, who serve voluntarily in the designations, voted to resign.

According to the Portland Police Association in a statement on Tuesday, "Unfortunately, this decorated public servant has been caught in the crossfire of agenda-driven city leaders and a politicized criminal justice system," reported Daily Mail.

According to the police union, that evening, a team of an estimated 200 protesters went to the Multnomah Building and defaced properties, including breaking windows. Multiple dumpsters were allegedly set on fire by the crowd. Many of those in the crowd came with covered faces and equipped with tactical helmets, as well as armed with varied weapons, the police said.

Footage of the incident was posted on social media platforms. Budworth appears to push Teri Jacobs and then struck her in the head with his baton. According to Jacobs, she was attacked despite having a press card. The police, on the other hand, said that she was part of the unruly crowd and that Budsworth's actions were justified.

A riot was later declared at the planned event after an individual from the crowd launched a Molotov cocktail into the Multnomah Building. This ignited a fire.

The mass resignation from the unit also comes at the heels of a state Justice Department review of another detective on the team, which was announced previously on Wednesday.

Related Article: China Marks 32nd Anniversary of Tiananmen Massacre, "Made Remarkable Progress That Amazed the World"

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A psychic from Manhattan and one of her associates dodged a prison sentence and were each given five months probation for defrauding victims out of hundreds of thousands of dollars on Thursday. The self-proclaimed psychics pleaded guilty to scheming to defraud and grand larceny charges.

Sarah Demitro and Ann Thompson each pleaded guilty in Manhattan criminal court and agreed to pay back victims a portion of their proceeds from the scam as part of a plea deal with prosecutors.

"Crime Pays"

"Crime pays," uttered a victim when the Midtown psychics got no jail time on Thursday for their theft of over $1 million from their clients. Another victim asked, "How can this be?" as she chased Manhattan Assistant DA Michael Perez out of the courtroom following the hearing, reported Daily News.

The two victims, in emotional statements made before the sentencing, pleaded with the judge to impose a stern sentence on the women, who they said preyed on them while they were emotionally and psychologically vulnerable. One of them claimed she was bilked out of more than $740,000 by Thompson.

One of the victims, an unidentified woman who traveled from Canada, said that she was the "perfect mark." She was standing around 30 feet from Thompson in the courtroom, reported New York Post. The victim added, "I never realized any human being could be so... utterly evil," reported Newsbreak.

Read Also: Heat Wave Bakes Western United States, 'A Signal of What the Future Might Look Like'

Plagued by Curses

A 59-year-old woman said she first met "Psychic Zoe" in 2013 following her payment of $5 for a psychic reading in Midtown while visiting her child in college in New York. That $5 reading sent her life spiraling out of control as she was swindled out of hundreds of thousands of dollars to the psychic who told her she was afflicted by a number of curses.

Two of their victims asked the Manhattan Supreme Court Justice to impose a more substantial sentence for the crimes committed by the psychics. They said that the scam drained them of their life savings meant for their retirement. The victim from Canada, who was disguised by a white wig, said she met Thompson during a trip to the city in Canada. She told the court that Ann Thompson said that she could have been a lawyer or a judge because she knew how to "game the system."

One of the victims was driven to homelessness, went through a divorce, and had suicidal thoughts after realizing that she had turned over her life's savings to the supernatural fraudster. She touted Thompson as her "own personal terrorist." She appealed to the judge to not let her out on probation.

The victims were disappointed over Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Gregory Carro's light sentence for Thompson or "Psychic Zoe" and her associate Demitro. As part of their deal, both Thompson and Demitro had to pay their victims more than $200,000.

Related Article: New Yorkers Celebrate With Firework Displays After Lifting of COVID-19 Restrictions, Honors Essential Workers

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Batches of blood pressure pills were recalled today after a cancer-causing chemical was found in them. After the discovery, pharmacies stocking the implicated medications - several different kinds of irbesartan and losartan - were ordered to withdraw them.

The UK medicine regulator has issued a recall for 31 batches of Irbesartan-containing products and two batches of Losartan products.

Batches of affected blood pressure pills included azido-tetrazole

The Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) said that the recall is a preventive step and that no evidence of patient harm has been found. The recall affects pharmacists and distributors and not patients.

An investigation into the previous recalls of similar items in 2018 and 2019 is still ongoing. On this matter, the MHRA is collaborating with other pharmaceutical authorities. Here are the affected batch numbers of blood pressure pills the health chiefs recalled, as per The Sun.

The MHRA, which oversees the safety of medicines in the United Kingdom, stated the batches in question included azido-tetrazole. Officials from the government have cautioned that the compound may raise the risk of cancer.

Dr. Ljiljana Fruk of Cambridge University identified azido-tetrazole as the world's "most explosive chemical" in 2019. "So the most explosive chemical was produced in the lab in 2011," she stated on the Naked Scientists radio show.

On the other hand, the MHRA claimed that the action was purely precautionary and that there was no evidence that it had caused any harm to patients. It warned people not to stop taking the medicines without first contacting their physician since doing so may be dangerous.

Per Daily Mail, it was also found that some of the contaminated blood pressure pills had been on the market for nearly two years. The recall is the latest in a long series of sartan-type medicine recalls after cancer-causing compounds were found in items produced in factories in China and India.

Read Also: More Than Half of Cosmetic Products Sold in the US, Canada Contain Cancer-Causing Ingredients, Study Reveals

Officials have not yet determined the cause of the contamination

Every year, millions of Britons with high blood pressure are administered irbesartan and losartan. The recall is limited as it only concerns pharmacies and distributors who carry the 31 batches provided by Brown & Burk UK Limited, Bristol Laboratories Limited, and Teva UK Limited.

These batches were initially delivered in September 2019, according to the MHRA.

Officials have yet to explain what caused the current contamination. However, they are frequently brought on by contamination in factories or during the manufacturing or storage process.

Chemical changes can be triggered by exposure to light, extreme temperatures, or even interactions with the drug's container. Industry analysts believe that China and India produce more than two-thirds of all drug product components, with China accounting for the lion's share. According to NHS data, over 2 million prescriptions for irbesartan-containing drugs were issued in England in 2017.

Dr. June Raine, the MHRA's Chief Executive, commented on the decision, saying that their goal is patient safety. As a precaution, they recalled batches of some sartan-containing medications while they are conducting an investigation.

It's worth noting that losartan and irbesartan-containing blood pressure pills are still accessible. If you're taking or stocking the affected blood pressure pills, Dr. Raine said, "It's important that healthcare professionals inspect their stock to quarantine and return these batches," Daily Express reported.

Related Article: 78 Brands of Sunscreen for Recall Over Carcinogen Contamination as Summer Looms



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North Korean Leader Kim Jong-Un on Wednesday warned of a potential food crisis as the country faces food shortages.

During a plenary meeting of the Workers' Party of Korea, Kim admitted that the nation is facing a "tense food situation," which he blamed on the wave of typhoons and floods that hit North Korea in 2020.

"In particular, the people's food situation is now getting tense as the agricultural sector failed to fulfill its grain production," Kim was quoted by the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) in a meeting, according to a reporting by The New York Times. "It is essential for the whole party and state to concentrate on farming," added Kim.

The North Korean leader also said the conditions and environment in his country were also worsening though there is an evident improvement in its economy.

Kim refused to disclose the scale of the shortages and the worsening conditions, but experts believe it to be serious after he called people to take an "arduous march" during a top-level political meeting in April.

What is the Arduous March?

For context, the term "arduous march" was last used to refer to a devastating famine that hit the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) in the early 1990s after Russia and China stopped sending food supplies and oil when the Cold War ended.

The North Korean regime then decided to cut food supply deliveries to the entire northeast region to ensure that the capital has enough food. This move lasted for two and a half years. Farmers also began stealing their own crops. The elite society also stole aid sent by other countries, leaving the impoverished North Koreans to starve.

Read Also: Delta COVID-19 Variant Spreads Across Indonesia, Killing At Least 5 Doctors, 1 Nurse

According to a relief worker who visited the nation in 1997, the famine led to malnutrition across people of all ages. North Koreans began to eat grass or forage for wild food to survive. Others were also forced to eat watery gruel, the worker told The Times.

North Korea continues to insist that only 225,000 to 235,000 died during the famine. However, experts estimate that the true death toll could be between 2.5 million to 3.5 million, as reported by the Wilson Center. In documents found after the famine, town and city health officials said up to 19% of their populations died in the famine.

Additionally, only 55% of people voted during the country's 1998 national elections. The statistics were impactful as the North Korean regime made it a crime not to vote.

Is North Korea Suffering Another Famine?

There are currently no signs that the DPRK is at risk of another devastating famine. However, the market prices of basic commodities, such as rice, have been rising sharply in recent weeks.

In Pyongyang, the nation's capital, a kilogram of bananas now costs $45, which puts each banana at $6.40, according to the Business Insider.

Some North Korean farmers were also asked to give at least two liters of their urine daily to help produce fertilizers, as reported by Radio Free Asia.

Related Article: Russia Discovers New COVID-19 Variant; Testing Whether Vaccines Work Against 'Moscow Strain'

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Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnel indicated on Thursday that he will not back an election reform proposal offered by Sen. Joe Manchin.

Manchin's plan contained about two dozen features, which include: banning partisan gerrymandering, a voter ID requirement, having at least 15 consecutive days of early voting for federal elections, and declaring Election Day a public holiday.

The Hill also reports that Manchin wants to have stricter requirements in the For the People Act when it comes to campaign finance. He specifies that he wanted funding disclosures for online and digital ads as well as more stringent requirements for campaigns and committees in reporting their foreign contacts.

However, the top Republican said he will reject the proposal by Manchin because the bill still has the same "rotten core," reported the Epoch Times.

A problem for Democrats

The Week reported McConnell's objections to Manchin's version, which is centered around his belief that this version is still essentially the original bill formulated by the Democrats. In the report, McConnell said, "And it still retains S1's rotten core: an assault on the fundamental idea that states, not the federal government, should decide how to run their own elections."

McConnell also zeroes in on the First Amendment. He believes that the bill will make cancel culture worse and take away state legislatures' powers of redistricting as well as open the door for computer-related irregularities.

McConnell's lack of support poses a problem. To pass legislation in the Senate, 60 votes are required. McConnell's statements essentially confirm that the Republicans will thumb down the proposal.

The criticism of the bill by McConnell comes ahead of a vote. Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer has slated the bill to be voted on early next week.

Read also: Manchin Says Under No Circumstance Would He Vote to Eliminate, Weaken Filibuster

The Manchin factor

Manchin is known for his friendly relationship with those on the other side of the aisle. The Democrat senator said, cited by Nation World News, "Democrats and Republicans must work to find a solution forward in Congress on federal voting rights reform, or we face furthering and weakening the Republic that swore to protect and defend as elected representatives."

Manchin, notably, has also expressed his disagreement with the For the People Act, reasoning that it is partisan. The version that will be put forward on the floor contains some minor changes, mostly related to giving states and localities a looser timetable to enact the contained provisions. These revisions also do not appeal to Manchin and he details to other members of the Senate what he agrees and disagrees with in the bill.

Despite their common opposition to the bill, McConnell is not swayed. The Republican gave the GOP's answer to Manchin's proposal when he criticized the For the People Act in a press conference. It all is but a confirmation that this election bill will arrive dead in the water because of a GOP filibuster.

Manchin's election reform proposal has been met with a refusal., and the Republicans are ready to fight it out on the Senate floor.

Related article: Bernie Sanders To Press Joe Manchin on Minimum Wage Increase

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Opponents of the Enbridge Energy Line 3 oil pipeline project in northwestern Minnesota continued their protests this week by disrupting traffic in front of an Enbridge equipment site, leading to 31 arrests
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Now Open

18 June 2021

Some travellers want to be pampered and leave the planning of their hotel stay to the professionals, while others prefer to take the reins and be the leader of their own holiday. Both are welcome at Rotterdams two new Le Marin Hotel locations: Le Marin Boutique Hotel (with restaurant Bar Bato) and Le Petit Marin Boutique Hotel.

Rotterdam boldness

Travellers who want to live like a local during their city visit will find themselves thrilled during their next trip to Rotterdam. Combining the cities bravado and elegance, Le Marin Boutique Hotel and his quirky little brother Le Petit Marin Boutique Hotel are located in pre-war Middelland neighbourhood in Rotterdam West. Here, guests of all kinds leave the world behind for a few days and recharge their batteries, finding renewed energy and inspiration while experiencing the authentic Rotterdam. The culinary-minded enjoy life with a table full of delicious bites and beautiful cocktails at the sunny terrace of Bar Bato. Both hotels are 15-minutes away from Rotterdam Central and are the perfect starting point for exploring the 'Maasstad'.

Petit or not so petit

Le Marin Boutique Hotel caters to the true epicurean looking for a complete experience and high-end service from beginning to end. A glass of bubbles accompanies the warm welcome and each morning starts with a delicious and extensive breakfast at Bar Bato. At the end of a full day of activities, guests can dive into their comfortable bed, and the spa-worthy bathroom calls for a well-deserved moment of relaxation. Both hotels owe their interior to Claire Ansems from interior design agency CLAIRE ANSEMS Defining Spaces. Claire designed five different rooms, created unique headboards exclusively for Le Marin Hotels and provided the reception area with beautiful, not to be missed wild sea entrance and complementing furniture.

At Le Petit Marin Boutique Hotel, guests will experience the same luxurious feeling and excellent service, but here it is all just a bit more casual and flexible. This is the place to be for guests who like to make their own plans and decide on the spot. Checking in is self-serviced and breakfast can be ordered through room service - whether on-the-go or a lazy meal in bed. The same goes for all the bites and drinks on the menu at Le Marin Boutique Hotel. For those in the mood for more fun, the doors of Bar Bato are wide open just 200 metres down the road.

Bar Bato

Bar Bato is the neighbourhood gathering place where hotel guests are ready to mingle with neighbours and hungry passers-by. The sunny terrace is located at the street entrance and offers a beautiful spot for food and and drinks. The first coffee of the day is a direct hit, the beer is cold, plates full of Charcuterie are filled with delicious flavours and the pizzas are already in the oven. Bar Bato is that loyal neighbour that is always ready to have friends over for fun. Whether it's for an early drink or a late lunch, the staff is thrilled to welcome its valued guests.

In the evening, Bar Bato offers three and four-course dinners with, among others, a grilled steak salad, Presse de Legumes and a lemon pie with mint crumbs. Of course, a completely vegetarian menu is also an option. When the sun has set but it's not yet time to head home, guests can grab a stool at the elegant and eye-catching bar and let the extensive cocktail menu full of 'Paloma's', 'Cuban Mules' and several G&T's keep the night alive.

Bar Bato will be open every day - including for non-hotel guests - until 10 PM and tables can be reserved via the Le Marin Hotels website. Here, of course, guests can also book a room for Le Marin Boutique Hotel and Le Petit Marin Boutique Hotel.

For the moment, the hospitality spaces - including the restaurant - are closed, but guests are invited to enjoy a delicious breakfast, and dinner in their room. Bar Bato is serving a 'plat du jour' with surprise dishes, the breakfast comes in the form of a breakfast box or a running buffet, and all the bites and drinks on the menu are ready to order.

Le Marin Hotels is a member of QL Hotels, a collection of 125+ independent hotels. 'Le Marin Hotels is the prototype of a boutique hotel. It perfectly matches the quality collection of QL Hotels. The design in boudoir style with dark colours feels chic, warm and welcoming. Furthermore, the location at the Henegouwerplein provides guests with a home base in one of Rotterdam's

hottest neighbourhoods,' says Mathilde van der Weerd, Managing Director of QL Hotels & Restaurants.

About QL Hotels & Restaurants

QL Hotels & Restaurants - founded in 2003 - is the hotel collection 125+ independent small and authentic quality hotels. Culinary enjoyment and overnight stays go hand in hand at QL. The QL Hotel collection is located in The Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany, France, Austria, Switzerland, Norway and Sweden. For more information, please visit www.qlhotels.com.
Now Open

18 June 2021

Tribute Portfolio, the growing collection of characterful, independent hotels from Marriott Bonvoy, Marriott International's extraordinary portfolio of brands, travel program, and experiential offerings, continues to expand its footprint in Japan with the opening of Hiyori Chapter Kyoto. Located in Japan's historical and cultural hub of Kyoto, the 203-room new hotel is the second Tribute Portfolio hotel in Japan and is set to showcase the hidden gems of Kyoto for travelers and locals who seek out independent experiences and crave a connection with the community when traveling.

The hotel features 203 elegantly appointed guestrooms including two signature suites. Drawing inspiration from Japanese tea ceremonies, the guestrooms feature key elements of Japanese tea rooms and are reimagined with a modern interpretation to offer functional beauty and comfort with a sense of tradition. The Chapter Factory located in the hotel lobby presentsa unique way for guests to connect with the local community. Acting as the hotel concierge, the Chapter Factory showcases a selection of curated travel stories from local insiders and hotel staff for guests to discover the hidden gems of Kyoto through a local lens. Guests are also encouraged to share their travel stories in Kyoto by adding new chapters to the Chapter Factory.

The hotel's signature all-day dining restaurant Matsunari offers Western and Japanese contemporary cuisines, serving breakfast and light meals, from baked goods to desserts and creative cocktails.

Hiyori Chapter Kyoto also has a fully-equipped, 24/7 fitness center as well as a traditional Japanese public bath, "Hiyori No Yu". The public bath features a granite bath and an open-air bath surrounded by lush greenery, for guests to relax and rejuvenate after a long day of exploring.
Appointment

18 June 2021

Springboard Hospitality, a leading Honolulu and Los Angeles-based hospitality management company, is pleased to announce the hiring of new key personnel at Kauai Beach Resort in Kauai, H.I.

Philip Egan is the new Director of Revenue Generation where he is responsible for growing average daily rate and increasing occupancy year-over-year, in addition to maximizing revenue per available room. Prior to joining Kauai Beach Resort, Egan worked as Director of Revenue Management at Hilton Waikiki Beach Resort in Honolulu. Egan graduated with a bachelor's degree from Iona College.
Appointment

18 June 2021

Concord Hospitality Enterprises is pleased to announce the appointment of Maria Maloney to the role of Director of Sales and Marketing for AC Hotel Miami Dadeland as it looks to its opening later this summer.

Bringing her multicultural and bilingual experience having worked in hotels since she was seventeen, Maloney assumes her position as Director of Sales & Marketing by overseeing business development activities, developing marketing opportunities and plans, implementing sales plans and managing staff. Maloney has held various sales roles for brands such as Doubletree, Indigo, Hilton, Accor, Hyatt, Pestana Hotel Group based in Portugal, and now Marriott. Her work in boutique properties has led her to acquire knowledge across the spectrum of market segments and geographies.
Appointment

18 June 2021

The Chief Sustainability Officer of the world's leading home furnishing retailer, Ingka Group (IKEA), has become the latest trustee to join the Sustainable Hospitality Alliance. Pia Heidenmark Cook brings 25 years' experience in the sustainability space, across academia, business and consultancy. Her expertise complements the experience of the existing trustees, which include leading sustainability consultants and industry executives from IHG Hotels & Resorts, Marriott International and Radisson Hotels Group.

Heidenmark Cook has worked at IKEA for over 13 years, leading and developing their sustainability agenda and led the development of the very first IKEA People and Planet Positive Strategy. She also brings experience of the hospitality sector having worked as Vice President for Responsible Business at the Rezidor Hotel Group, operator of the hotel brands Radisson Blu and Park Inn which included over 300 hotels in over 50 countries at the time. From autumn, Pia will become a senior advisor for IKEA, in addition to taking on non-executive director positions in boards across Europe and the US.

The Sustainable Hospitality Alliance welcomes Heidenmark Cook back to the hospitality industry. During her time at the Rezidor Hotel Group, Pia chaired the tourism branch of the Prince of Wales's International Business Leader's Forum, which was the forerunner to the Sustainable Hospitality Alliance.

Heidenmark Cook was officially appointed as a trustee at the Sustainable Hospitality Alliance Board meeting on 17 June 2021.
Appointment

18 June 2021

Today, Catbird - an independent hotel by Sage Hospitality Group opening July 2021 in Denver's RiNo Art's District - introduces Director of Sales and Marketing Austin Cooper.

Cooper joins the Catbird team with 13 years of experience in the hospitality industry. Cooper has held various sales roles within Hilton Hotels & Resorts, Warwick Hotels & Resorts, Kimpto n Hotels & Restaurants and Aparium Hotel Group. He brings to Catbird an intimate knowledge of the boutique and lifestyle sector of hospitality, in addition to a passion for mentorship and team guidance.

Cooper received a bachelor of science in hotel, restaurant and institution management, with a minor in entrepreneurial studies from Iowa State University. Outside of hospitality, Cooper has experience in real estate and commercial property management, floral and event design, as well as within the ethanol industry procuring grain.
Author

Brian Arevalo, is a Director with HVS, oversees the Cincinnati consulting and valuation division. Brian earned his masters degree from The University of Texas at Austins McCombs School of Business. Brians prior work in hospitality includes roles in hotel operations and corporate finance. In addition to work in the Cincinnati metro area, he contributes to and helps manage engagements throughout the region, including markets such as Indianapolis, Columbus/Dayton, Cincinnati, and Louisville, among many others. Contact Brian at (817) 680-7666 or [email protected]

More about Brian Arevalo
Opinion Article

18 June 2021

The COVID-19 crisis is unique in many ways, not least of which is that it led the interconnected world of business to experiment with its first global, supply-side disruption. In the hospitality industry, for example, during the first wave of the pandemic (April-May 2020), more than 70 percent of hotels in Europe were closed, international flights were less than 5% compared to the same period in 2019, and restaurants were forced to close and, if lucky, provide takeaway and delivery. The willful and concerted shutting down of the productive capacity of the economy thus forced managers, leaders, and educators to rethink their problem-solving approaches as past perspectives proved, in many cases, to no longer be as relevant as before. This has been shown to be true not only at the macroeconomic level of nations, but in all management fields as industries, firms, and individuals, began to make sense of the likely long-term impacts on their ecosystems.

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This reframing of perspectives is not so much about invalidating existing theories as it is about questioning the relative balance of specific parts of these theories. In other words, it is just as much about the process of rediscovering underappreciated conceptual lenses whose relevance has suddenly been made more salient through the COVID-19 experience. Additionally, the crisis seems to have accelerated pre-existing managerial trends pertaining to ecosystem design, business model innovation, technological mediation, and human creativity. For example, recent hospitality industry trends such as increased automation, brand authenticity and sustainable development will likely gain momentum as they address many of the industrys shortcomings laid bare by the crisis.

The shift in focus and perspective recommended by the scholars who have contributed to this paper, therefore, suggest that both educators and practitioners need to make a significant break from the past with regards to what matters in each academic discipline and managerial function. These recommendations foreshadow a radical departure from business as usual, which is reflected in the strategic nature of the changes being called for.

3.2 Greater uncertainty calls for nuanced and complex solutions

A recurring theme is the need to extend and refine existing concepts and theories to include a more nuanced view of the world. These extensions and refinements bring with them greater complexity to our understanding of how the world works. It is undeniable that the COVID-19 crisis has raised uncertainty to unprecedented levels: forecasts become guesses, firms try to reinvent themselves, customer needs are being redefined and physical workplaces redesigned. Greater complexity may be the necessary feature to effectively handle this higher level of uncertainty. This harks back to the Law of Requisite Variety' (Ashby, 1956) which advocates that, for a system to sustain itself over time, it should match the complexity of the environment in which it finds itself.

It is noteworthy that few of this papers scholars advocate for a push towards greater simplicity or a 'return to the core' as has, in the past, often been the touted remedy when hospitality firms face dire circumstances (Seo & Jang, 2013). On the contrary, many of the recommended content changes suggest the inclusion of extra dimensions to existing models rather than the removal of superfluous features in order to simplify them. Furthermore, these changes are, for the most part, strategic in nature, and deal with the very survival of the firm through greater resilience and adaptive capabilities. They are also both reactive (in response to the current crisis) and proactive (in anticipation of future ones). The multidimensional nature of the solutions, therefore, reflects the far-reaching and unpredictable repercussions of COVID-19 on tightly interconnected nations, economies, industries and their firms and people. For example, as governments closed borders, restricted movement of people and goods, and imposed new regulations, the interconnectedness of the many different hospitality and tourism sectors became evident as never before. This blurring of the boundaries between these different industries necessitates solutions developed using a systems-level view of these problems.

3.3 Achieving human-technology symbiosis will be key

This papers scholars also note that extant processes and tools are taking a backseat to human-driven contributions. These imply greater richness and complexity  to cope with emergent patterns of behavior that are no longer deterministic or linear - since they emphasize, both, emotional skills  greater creativity, aesthetics, and empathy  and cognitive skills  adoption of design thinking, systems thinking, and paradoxical thinking.

While individuals regain a central role in a world that is increasingly one of probabilities and scenarios rather than forecasts and plans, our scholars argue that they should do so with the help of the appropriate technologies. The human-technology symbiosis is a recurring theme throughout this paper, and thus may well be a managerial pre-requisite for dealing with, and preparing for, the unavoidable discontinuities with which firms have to contend. Parenthetically, these discontinuities also represent opportunities for those able to unlock the synergies that may emerge from the creation of new strategies and the adoption of technology-enhanced human interactions. The papers discussion of functional disciplines, including revenue, marketing and foodservice management, demonstrate that customer-facing technologies will be increasingly important and prevalent. They will, therefore, require a greater level of sophistication in order to strike the appropriate balance between historically high-touch experiences and the pandemic-driven need for technological mediation in the service-heavy hospitality industry.

References
Lubys Inc. has taken another step in its liquidation, agreeing to sell its Fuddruckers brand for $18.5 million to a North Carolina franchisee who already operates several of the burger restaurants.

Nicholas Perkins Black Titan Franchise Systems previously agreed to become a franchisee of more than a dozen company-owned Fuddruckers restaurants. The purchase of the business, announced yesterday, includes a promissory note and the assumption of certain liabilities, Lubys said in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. There can be no assurance that Lubys will realize or receive the full value of such consideration, it said in the filing.
After a hit and run accident during the February snowstorm, Jordan Harris desperately needed a rental after the accident left his car mangled.

Harris, 28, lives in the Dallas area, and the sprawling city is no place to be without a car. He was aghast when he saw his bill was $1,200 for renting a Mazda CX-5 for a week  more than three times the average cost.

In May, he found himself struggling again with rental cars. But this time it wasnt the rental fee. He couldnt find one at any price, forcing him to cancel a trip to Mississippi to visit a friend.

Its not like I was doing this at the last minute or anything, Harris said. I started looking two weeks in advance.

Harris situation isnt a one off. Rental-car companies sold off their fleetshundreds of thousands of vehicles during the pandemic when flights were grounded, businesses shut down and traveling was discouraged. Now, as vaccinated Americans rush to resume their travel, rental companies cant rebuild their fleets fast enough to meet the pent-up demand.

The companies efforts have been complicated by another post-pandemic shortage: computer chips. That has slowed the production of the new vehicles rental car companies need to replenish their fleets. As a result, analysts and rental car companies are warning travelers to brace for higher prices and book further in advance.

On HoustonChronicle.com: While leisure travel is making a comeback, a key driver of Houston's economy isn't so lucky

We are stuck in this situation probably through at least the end of the year, said Neil Abrams, president of Abrams Consulting Group, a New York-based car rental and car sharing consulting group. The second quarter of next year it will likely stabilize.

Abrams estimates about a one-third of U.S. rental fleets were sold off during the pandemic.

Harris, meanwhile, learned from his problem finding a rental car for his planned trip to Mississippi in May. He booked a Toyota Corolla for an August trip to Austin more than two months in advance.

Hell pay $312 for a Toyota Corolla for five days, about double what he says he would usually pay.

Surviving the pandemic

The strong demand and higher prices should help rental car companies recover after a disastrous 2020, Abrams said. Hertz was one of the first companies to fall victim to the plunge in travel during the pandemic, filing for bankruptcy last May as it halted the purchase of new vehicles for the rest of 2020.

Before the pandemic, Hertz had about 568,000 vehicles in its U.S. fleet. It disposed of about 200,000 vehicles last year, but the company said in recent news release that it plans to buy 229,000 vehicles in 2021.

"We're continuing to see improved demand and are optimistic about a sustained recovery, Paul Stone, Hertzs CEO, said in a statement. We're actively replenishing our fleet, despite the constraints of the global semiconductor shortage and its impact on the automotive supply chain.

Hertz wasnt the only rental car company to struggle. Avis revenues totaled $1.4 billion in the first quarter, down 22 percent from about $1.8 billion the same period in 2020. The company reported a first quarter loss of $170 million.

Avis cited manufacturer recalls and shortages in semiconductors as some of the challenges it has faced, according to financial filings.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Expect increased inflation until at least next year, economists say

Enterprise said in a statement that it anticipates high demand throughout the summer, and asked travelers to book as early as possible. Specialty vehicles such as vans, pick-up trucks, convertibles, and large SUVs are in particularly high demand, the company said.

Ken Daniel, 49, who lives on the west side of Houston, can attest to this. Usually he rents an SUV to take his family on their annual road trip to Florida, but stopped in his tracks after he saw the price. It would have cost about $2,500 for the week, about double what he usually spent.

He looked at Hertz, Enterprise and Avis Budget, but couldnt find a better deal. After crunching the numbers, he realized it would just be cheaper to fly.

We know things are a lot different now, but we didnt anticipate that, Daniel said. Were still under (the rental car price) with the flights, Uber and a hotel.

becca.carballo@chron.com
First time jobless claims rose for the first time in a month in both Texas and across the country, a surprising reversal as the economy rebounds.

About 20,000 people in Texas filed first time claims for unemployment benefits claims, up 2,000 from the previous week. Nationally, first-time filings for unemployment rose 37,000 totaled 412,000, the highest level of claims since May 15.

Claims are still near pre-pandemic levels and far below the peaks of last year, when millions of Americans, including hundreds of thousands of Texans, lost jobs as businesses shut down and governments imposed social distancing measures.

Texas Inc.: Get the best of business news sent directly to your inbox

The modest increase in claims last week come as states across the country, including Texas, roll back unemployment benefits put in place during the pandemic. Those measures have come in response to reports of labor shortages and slower-than-expected job growth in recent months, aiming to spur the unemployed to get back into the job market.

U.S. employment grew by a less-than-expected 559,000 jobs in May, after gaining a disappointing 278,000 jobs in May. In Texas, employers added only 13,000 jobs in April, after adding more than 100,000 in March.

The Texas Workforce Commission reports employment and unemployment statistics for May on Friday.

In late May, Gov. Greg Abbott said Texas will end federal pandemic-related unemployment assistance, included a benefits supplement of $300 a week, more than two months before the program was set to expire.

Last week, the Texas Workforce Commission said people receiving unemployment can no longer refuse a job for COVID-19-related reasons and still receive benefits, except on a case-by-case basis.

When the pandemic broke out, the commission put refusal guidance in place, so people could turn down work that put them or others at risk to COVID-19, and still collect unemployment.

For instance, unemployed workers who had COVID or a previous medical condition, acted as caregivers, or fell within a high-risk age group, could turn down a job without risking their benefits. Now that vaccines are widely available, TWC officials say they no longer feel that is necessary.

becca.carballo@chron.com
General Motors will boost its investments in electric vehicles and self-driving technology.

The Detroit automaker on Wednesday said it will increase investment in EVs and autonomous vehicle technologies to $35 billion through 2025, a 75 percent boost from its initial commitment of $20 billion in March 2020.

It is the second increase by GM, which raised the amount to $27 billion in November.

GM in January said it would produce only electric vehicles by 2035. The company has also set a goal to reach annual global EV sales of more than 1 million by 2025.

"We are increasing our investment to scale faster because we see momentum building in the United States for electrification, along with customer demand for our product portfolio," GM Chair and CEO Mary Barra said in a statement.

INSIGHT: More Texas companies are plugging into electric vehicles. Will shoppers follow?

In addition to a duo of battery plants currently being built in Ohio and Tennessee, GM said it plans build two more battery factories in the U.S. by mid-decade. The exact locations were not disclosed.

GM is stepping up in other modes of transportation as well.

On Tuesday, the company said it has partnered with transportation solution company Wabtec Corp., headquartered in Pittsburgh, to develop and commercialize the automakers battery and fuel-cell technologies for locomotives. Wabtec merged with GE Transportation in February 2019.

As well, GM is collaborating with Honda to build two EVs, an SUV for the Honda brand and an Acura for GM.

GM's increase in spending on EVs and self-driving technology comes a month after Ford unveiled the F-150 Lightning, an all-electric version of its best-selling pickup. The Michigan-based automaker has committed $11.5 billion to electrify some of its most popular vehicles.

In Texas, Tesla is constructing a gigafactory outside Austin to produce electric cars, pickup trucks and batteries. The manufacturing plant is expected to be completed before the end of 2021, with some operations potentially coming online sooner.
Texas barbecue continues to spin off in diverse and delicious ways, combining classic smoked meats with international cuisines for which cities like Houston have become known.

Recently, Asian cuisine has made its mark on Texas barbecue and beyond, with Houston-based purveyors Blood Bros. BBQ expanding to Las Vegas and pop-up restaurant specialists Khoi Barbecue continuing to wow crowds both at home and afar.

Both Blood Bros. and Khoi bring a Vietnamese point of view to their smoked meat offerings, and it is only a matter of time before other cuisines from Asia make their mark.

Such is the case at Curry Boys BBQ in San Antonio, which combines the lush, sweet and spicy traditions of Thai curry with the smoky, peppery flavor of Texas barbecue.

True to form, this new evolution of barbecue was born in Houston  literally.

Partners Andrew Ho, Sean Wen and Andrew Samia all grew up in the Houston suburb of Cypress.

Ho and Wen attended Langham Creek High School and Samia attended Cy-Fair High School, though they didnt know each other at the time.

Ho, who is Vietnamese American, and Wen, who is Taiwanese American, both grew up eating in Houstons Asiatown area, especially at the Viet-Cajun crawfish places that neighborhood is known for. Ho also frequented Luthers Bar-B-Q growing up, which was his dads favorite barbecue joint.

Ho and Wen met while attending the University of Texas at Austin. After graduation, Ho moved to Thailand and Vietnam to teach English. Wen visited frequently to travel.

The pair hatched a plan to open a Viet-Cajun crawfish joint in San Antonio, where Wen had a job opportunity if the restaurant business didnt pan out. Pinch Boil House, serving Southeast Asian-inspired seafood, opened in 2016 to rave reviews.

Around the same time, Samia opened Dignowity Meats in San Antonio, a restaurant focused on carnivore-inspired sandwiches. He went on to open a highly acclaimed Central Texas-style joint, South BBQ & Kitchen.

Ho and Wen first met Samia while eating at Dignowity, with their Cypress backgrounds making them fast friends. All of their restaurants continued to thrive into 2020, until the pandemic hit and they were forced to shut down.

Mostly out of boredom, the three restaurateurs organized an outdoor, socially distanced pop-up in mid-2020, combining Ho and Wens Thai curry specialty with Samias classic smoked meats. It created enough interest for them to consider a brick-and-mortar operation.

With little money to invest, they decided to boot-strap a small takeout joint in an eclectic and cacophonous neighborhood known as the St. Marys Strip, surrounded by bars and old-school Tex-Mex and Mex-Mex joints, with nearby obstacle-course-like street construction that would impress even the most jaded Houstonian.

To stand out from the crowd, they painted their tiny shack hot pink, set up picnic tables and never looked back. Its been a wild success from the beginning.

More Information Curry Boys BBQ 2334 N. St. Mary's, San Antonio, TX 78212 210-320-0555 curryboysbbq.com See More Collapse

And for good reason. The flavors of Ho and Wens Thai curries, including garlic, lemongrass, coconut milk and cilantro, provide a perfect complement to the smoky, peppery richness of Samias classic Central Texas brisket and other meats.

I expect Curry Boys BBQ will go on to bigger and better things, like a real-deal restaurant with dining room and all the bells and whistles. And that is well and good. But I suspect someday well be reminiscing about the good ol days of the tiny, hot-pink takeout shack where it all started. Get there while you can.

jcreid@jcreidtx.com

twitter.com/jcreidtx
BB's Tex-Orleans is making a suburban push with plans to open restaurants in Kingwood and Tomball this year.

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Emmanuel Alia - founder of Prauper Studios and curator of the "From Houston, With Love" art exhibition - poses for a photograph with a Polaris Slingshot painted by Shelbi Nicole. The 60-day collaborative art exhibition features work from over 20 local visual artists will be open June 18 through August 15. The exhibition is being housed at the former Forever 21 space in Downtown Houstons GreenStreet to feature 23,000 square feet of art. Photo: Godofredo A. Vasquez, Houston Chronicle / Staff photographer Photo: Godofredo A. Vasquez, Houston Chronicle / Staff photographer

Synthetic chandeliers, lacquered tables and blindingly white checkout counters are all remnants of 1201 Mains former occupant, Forever 21. Back when the fast-fashion retailer held court on the corner of Dallas and Main, party dresses and club wear glittered under the florescent lighting and mirrored walls.

Now through Aug. 15, a different sort of eye candy is on glaring display. From Houston, With Love, a 60-day collaborative exhibition, puts the works of approximately 30 artists under the spotlight. The 23,000 square-foot space contains nearly 150 pieces in total  very few fit into shopping bags, though almost everything is for sale.

The most expensive item is a $45,000 wooden sculpture by Christian Renonciat called The Grand Carton. On the low end, art prints and branded merchandise in the gift shop only cost $20. Organizers say that FWHL artists receive 85 percent of all sale proceeds.

Were always finding ways to help local artists be creative, says Katrina Buerger of Midway, a real estate and investment firm that owns and operates GreenStreet, the four-block, mixed-used development which houses FHWL. This is the second art exhibition weve had in there. Both times Ive thought, How did you come in here and envision this to be anything other than a retail space?

From Houston With Love When: Through Aug. 15 Where: GreenStreet, 1201 Main Details: prauper.com

The inaugural art activation, Collect It for the Culture III, ran for 30 days last winter. That introduction was fostered by the Heist Agency. Three months ago, Heist connected Midway with Prauper Studios, too.

Emmanuel Alia, a Houston-native who founded Prauper Studios in 2014, pulled the concept together in less than a month.

As an artist and a creative myself, a lot of high-level artists feel like they have to leave Houston for better opportunities or to experience something of this caliber, Alia says. We can attract what we want if we do it together.

Solving a puzzle

Houston is a city thats finding its identity, he adds. Our status in the art world is to be determined. With FHWL, his dream is for big business to use Texas creatives and painters for art projects and commissions instead of looking to Los Angeles or New York.

Tapping local talent is a priority for Midway, too.

Weve really taken a larger focus in the last year or two with our art programming. We have a strong relationship with Weingarten Art Group, now all of our lobbies are full of art in CityCentre. And they helped with the East River Project, covering six shipping containers with murals, Buerger shares. GreenStreet has such a strong art connection, too. It gives our community something to go and see. Heist Agency brought us Donkeeboy before to create some murals theres not a lot of places downtown that support local artists.

In the weeks leading up to FHWLs completion, Alex Donkeeboy Roman, Jr. and his mother, Sylvia Donkeemom Roman, were onsite painting a skyline mural side-by-side.

Alia found some of the other artists through Gremillion & Co. Fine Art, Inc. Roughly 20 are Houston-based, the rest hail from Germany, Venezuela and France, among other places. Choosing the right talent for FHWL felt like solving a puzzle.

Its whatever spoke to us the most, he says. The stories behind the art pieces, the titles. Whatever merged best in the space.

His favorite piece is a college by Dario De Leon. The submission was a last-minute entry, but Alia fell in love with the 20-foot piece featuring a rainbow of Indigenous people and their artwork. It proved a perfect fit for the staircase landing between the first and second floors.

Chairs as art

Cary Fagans Chairs are People sculptures are also standouts. Two are currently fashioned downstairs in the grand foyer. He stacks chairs in ways that you think would fall  hes mastered that art. Theres going to be a live chair stacking where hell let other people stack them, Alia says.

Fagan has done a similar event with Museum of Fine Arts, Houston in the past. A few months ago he was introduced to a Prauper staffer during a friends gallery show. By the time Fagan got home, someone had reached out to him about joining FHWL.

Three years ago he was a burnout photographer, fed up by the industry. Then inspiration struck in the most transient place.

I was traveling and found myself admiring chairs. I would be at the airport and leave a sculpture behind, he says. It was temporary, someone would eventually take it down, and I probably wasnt supposed to do that.

The medium stirred something within him. Fagan describes the practice as very meditative, a therapeutic form of communication and manipulation. He used to hesitate when chairs fell and made a noise; now he accepts that they move freely and fail forward.

I dont bind my chairs with anything, he explains. Those two sculptures took 25 to 30 minutes, but the first one fell so I had to do it again.

Mylar magic

Chandrika Metivier typically forms one of their Mylar installations over a singular, 14-hour period. That wasnt the case for their FHWL commission: a single-story mock-up house sculpted with BoPET, a polyester film resembling aluminum foil, better known as Mylar.

Once I realized that for the first time ever my art was going to be in a place where people could study it over a two-month period, it needed to be the most perfect version, they say. Their most recent iteration of Mylar took a full nine days.

Metivier was originally attracted to the material because it reminded them of silver. Silver to me is this timelessly, elegant color. Whatever Ive created using these sheets will look sort of timeless and futuristic.

They were drawn to the do-it-yourself element of Mylar. Their self-imposed challenge was to respect its pure properties, and not leave even fingerprints behind. Then something shifted once people started interacting with their work.

At first I didnt exploit it for its reflective elements, but viewers would try to look for themselves in the installation. This created an experience I didnt expect, they say. I didnt realize this is like a distorted reality now Im calling it Perfect Distortions, because people view it as a mirror.

Their new goal is to further the experience of engulfing viewers. Alia hopes to create that same sensation for everyone who visits FHWL. Now that doors are open, hes most looking forward to observing how peoples reactions change to the exhibition over time.

Meanwhile, the clock to restore 1201 Main to its full, tenant potential is ticking.

The space is actively being shown for a long-term lease, Buerger shares. Its such a prime location downtown right on the Metro. Theres lots of foot traffic, so it didnt make sense to leave the light off. Im glad we were able to transform this local space into something more than just a white box.

amber.elliott@chron.com
Gifts. Big ones too. A house. A lot to build the house on. A home full of new furniture.

The gifts and surprises keep coming for U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Stephen Netzley who was severely wounded in Afghanistan in May 2007. Operation FINALLY HOME has been helping the veteran regain his life surprising him with a new home, being built by Perry Homes, on a lot in the award-winning community of Bridgeland donated by the Howard Hughes Corporation.

On Thursday afternoon, Netzley and his daughter were invited to Gallery Furniture for what they thought was an interview with Lee Kirgan, vice president of construction for Operation FINALLY HOME. Instead, he was surprised after meeting philanthropist and Gallery Furniture owner and founder, Jim Mattress Mack McIngvale, with a donation of a house full of furniture to complete the trifecta of major gifts.

On HoustonChronicle.com: How Mattress Mack's family came to the aid of India, Houston's infamous tiger

As Netzley walked into the store, he was greeted by McIngvale, Kirgan, and Heath Melton, executive vice president of Master Planned Communities in The Howard Hughes Corporation.

Were here to let you know that Mack has agreed to donate $20,000 of furniture for your new home, Melton told the surprised soldier.

McIngvale was touched by his story.

We love taking care of veterans and I want to salute Operation FINALLY HOME and the Howard Hughes Corporation. Theyre the ones doing the heavy lifting and were donating the furniture. This wonderful, deserving serviceman is a tribute to all the great servicemen and women in this country and Operation FINALLY HOME stepped up and hit the ball over the fence for him, Mack said.

On HoustonChronicle.com: 'Notes of Love' inspires Army sergeant gifted a new home

Kirgan announced that the new home, which has been under construction since early February, will be ready to move in on July 9.

It can be his forever home. We built it large enough for him in the event he remarries and has other children, Kirgan said. As his condition progressively worsens, the home has already been modified for wheelchair access. Its not something they like to talk about, but Kirgan said it was imperative that the home be prepared for the inevitable.

Donating the lot for the new home was important to Melton.

At Howard Hughes, its very important for us to be a part of the fabric of the community and give back in any way that we can, he said.

In partnering with Operation FINALLY HOME is just a great way to do that, obviously with the military. Im a former military guy myself. Having that connection with the Army and giving back to any of our military men and women is very important to me, Melton said.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Operation FINALLY HOME, partners break ground on new home for Cypress soldier

Melton himself reached out to Gallery Furniture to see if theyd be interested, and they gladly said yes.

Its really good to help Stephen and his family to fill the house with furniture in their brand-new home, and a lot of love, he added.

It was overwhelming for Netzley who didnt know how he was going to fill the house with furniture.

Its very exciting, Netzley said. Its an absolute blessing. It takes a lot of stress and worry off my shoulders. That piece is figured out, he said. This is the best place to get furniture from.

Netzley was raised in meager means where he never had a bed for himself, most often sleeping on the floor or the couch.

He was encouraged by his two older brothers who had gone into the military to join up because he could have a bed to sleep on, three meals a day, and clothes were provided. For Netzley, who sometimes didnt see a meal every day, it was all very appealing.

The soldier said he was so appreciative to Mattress Mack and everything he does for the community.

The fact that they could help us out and help everyone else is a real blessing, the soldier said.

Netzleys mom, who was involved in theater, taught him how to rehab furniture and he was already looking for stuff to repurpose and put in his home. That burden is gone.

He hasnt started packing because he said he really doesnt have a lot. He will be taking some things, photos and memorabilia, of his mom who tragically passed away in December before she could see the house.

Netzley said she was content to know that he would be taken care of with the gift of the new home.

All his brothers have served in the military. The two oldest ones, infantry and forward observer, helped guide him and suggested he become a Cavalry scout for the Army.

He continues to go to school at the University of Houston graduating Magna Cum Laude with his bachelors and now working on his masters degree in counseling. He hopes to graduate next spring.

Once hes finished, he wants to use his new skills to help other military with counseling and reintegrating back into society following war.

His daughter Mrazy is an energetic four-year-old and takes a lot of time and devotion, but he wouldnt have it any other way.

They walked around the showroom at Gallery Furniture trying to identify furniture they might like for the new home. Mrazy has already picked out a television for her room.

Not knowing the sizes of the rooms or layout of the home just yet, Melton said Perry Homes has an interior designer that will assist the family with their selections.

We are absolutely thrilled at how amazing Stephen and Mrazys home turned out, said Matthew Gerdes, city president of Perry Homes.

The company provided the architecture team, interior designers, construction staff, and some material costs.

Building a home for a veteran is a great opportunity for us to do what we do best by using use our expertise to provide a fantastic benefit to a deserving veteran, Gerdes said.

Netzley recalls that day in May 2007 as the most traumatic day of his life. While in Afghanistan on a mission to escort Afghan soldiers, Netzleys unit took fire in an ambush along the route. They lost 18 Afghan soldiers and several American soldiers in the skirmish were critically or severely wounded. His back injuries escalated to the point the discs in his back are progressively worsening and he battles perpetual, radiating pain in both legs.

Preparing the bodies of the lost soldiers to be received back home contributes to Netzleys post-traumatic stress disorder.

Stephen and Mrazy were surprised on Nov. 23, 2020 in a Cypress park with the news from Operation FINALLY HOME, The Howard Hughes Corporation, Perry Homes, and the Houston Texans he had been selected to receive a personalized, mortgage-free home in Bridgeland, an 11,400-acre master planned community located in Cypress, Texas.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Soldier gifted new home in Bridgeland

He hasnt driven by to look at the progress being made on the construction of the house just yet.

I want to save it for when its finished, he said, his final surprise.

Were definitely ready to get in there and start making memories.

dtaylor@hcnonline.com
WHARTON - Qualified students of Wharton County Junior Colleges associate degree nursing program will soon have another avenue for financial assistance thanks to a new scholarship.

The Sister Mary Alma Pilarski Nursing Scholarship will provide one $4,000 scholarship annually to an ADN student entering their final year of the two-year program.

The late Sister Mary Alma Pilarskis grand-niece, Dr. Carol M. Ashton, M.D., of Blessing, funded the scholarship in honor of her aunts memory and for the purpose of encouraging students to pursue healthcare-related jobs in rural communities and to spawn careers in nursing education.

We are thankful for Dr. Ashtons support, said WCJC President Betty McCrohan. The scholarship will help students to make their dreams a reality.

Ashton credits Pilarski with being the inspiration for her own successful career as a physician.

I was fortunate to have Sister Alma in my life, she said. She changed the trajectory of my life and never realized the beneficial effect she had on me.

Born in 1907 in Mount Carmel, Pennsylvania, Pilarski joined the Congregation of Sisters of Saint Felix of Cantalice (the Felicians), a Catholic Franciscan community, in 1921. She entered the nursing profession after serving as an elementary school teacher, earning her bachelors degree in nursing education from Catholic University in Washington D.C. and her masters degree in education from the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. Pilarski worked in a hospital in Puerto Rico before transferring to the Blackwell General Hospital in Blackwell, Okla., where she organized and directed the states first school of practical nursing in 1948. From there, she went on to serve as director of nursing schools in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. In 1965, she founded and directed an Associate Degree Nursing program for Felician College in Lodi, New Jersey. She passed away in 1980 at the age of 72.

Ashton said Pilarski served as a positive influence for thousands of students pursuing careers in the healthcare field, noting that she was always accessible to her students, who loved her for her direct gaze, wisdom and wry sense of humor.

Scholarships such as the one created by Dr. Ashton offer an excellent opportunity to honor the memory of a loved one while giving back to the community, said Zina Carter, WCJCs director of marketing, communications and advancement. We hope this generous gift inspires others to do the same and invest in future generations.
The Woodlands Township officially restarted incorporation planning meetings and the main topic was the fate of local municipal utility districts if the township becomes a city.

After intensive analysis by two consulting firms resulted in recommendations to leave 11 local municipal utility districts independent if The Woodlands Township residents decide to incorporate, a dramatic change of course was presented Thursday night  abolition of the MUDs altogether.

On HoustonChronicle.com: The Woodlands officially restarts incorporation efforts

Former township president and general manager Don Norrell, now a paid consultant for The Woodlands, was present at the first incorporation planning meeting since February 2020. He has been working from his new home in Heath, Texas, on the complex issue at a pay rate of nearly $3,000 a week.

After the presentation, which was not an action item, board chairman Gordy Bunch said the information was, very thorough and very interesting.

Complex finances

Norrell told directors if the residents eventually approve becoming a city and also pass an initial maximum possible property tax rate, the new city council leadership could decide to abolish all local MUDs  11 in total in both Montgomery and Harris counties  and make a new city water and sewer utility.

MUDs are an important part of the incorporation discussion, Norrell said to directors, noting that consolidating all MUDs into a city utility is a very challenging situation because four MUDs have no debt.

The move is not mandatory, Norrell added, and can be done at any time in the future after the township theoretically becomes a city.

The stumbling block to the idea is the tax debt that seven of the 11 MUDs have. The 11 MUDs serve a combined 37,000 homes and businesses in The Woodlands, providing water and sewer service. The majority of the infrastructure, though, is owned by the San Jacinto River Authority.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Jace Houston of SJRA discusses subsidence in Woodlands

Four MUDs in the older portions of the township, Montgomery MUDs No. 1, No. 6, No. 7 and No. 36, have zero debt.

However the other seven MUDs have significant amounts of debt ranging from a low of Montgomery MUD No. 60s $10.1 million in debt to Harris-Montgomery County MUD 386s more than $151 million in debt. The total debt for all 11 MUDs is more than $285 million.

The MUDs generate revenue and pay for services with a combination of user fees charged to home owners and businesses as well as varying levels of property taxes. If the new city of The Woodlands creates a utility, leaders would need to decide how to charge users for the services, he added.

Norrell said in order to prevent inequity among residents who live in MUDs that have already paid off their debt, the new city could engage in some financial gymnastics by refinancing the 11 MUDS general obligation debt and then amoritizing it over a 20 to 30 year period.

The three options if The Woodlands becomes a city are to leave the MUDS as they are, independent entities with elected five-person board, or abolish them all and make a city utility. The third option would be develop an interlocal agreement between the new city and MUDs to have a hybrid system and shared duties.

Change of course

The presentation was a radical departure from past analysis and recommendations by two consulting firms  H.R. Green, who worked with the Matrix Consulting Group, and the Novak Consulting Group of Cincinnati, Ohio  which both had recommended leaving the MUDs alone.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Bunch, Rieser open to revisiting MUD takeover if Woodlands incorporates

Prior to the November 2020 township board election, board chairman Gordy Bunch and vice chairman Bruce Rieser both said at a campaign event they were open to the idea of absorbing the MUDs if incorporation ever became a reality.

Bunch said in October 2020 the board would revisit the issue once the COVID-19 pandemic was over and incorporation studies restarted.

On HoustonChronicle.com: The Woodlands plans to expand scope of flood task force

The initial review of the MUDs did not show a favorable timing to include absorption within a 2020 incorporation timeline. Now that the timeline has been moved back, the MUDs need to be revisited as they will likely fall within the five year plan of a future Incorporation date, Bunch said in fall 2020. There is an inflection point were MUD consolidations are a net positive to the majority of The Woodlands.

At the same event in October 2020, Rieser said the idea is complex, involves many moving parts and other issues, but that he was open to exploring the issue again.

Some see benefits

Laura Norton, a board member of Montgomery County MUD 47 and frequent participant in township board meetings, said there are great advantages to the township abolishing all MUDs and making a city utility.

There would be more transparency as the township board is more known, more reported on, and less obscure. Residents usually dont attend MUD meetings and are unaware of their activities. Wed be able to dissolve all the boards and the fees of the many directors, Norton said in an email. There would be efficiencies in tax invoicing, too, wed receive one bill, write one check and there would be less administrative expenses.

Norton also said if MUDs are abolished, their offices could even be consolidated and the Woodlands Water Agencys administrative building on Lake Robbins Drive could be sold. The aging facility is located in a prime area along the north shore of The Waterway which could be redeveloped.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Subsidence concerns heighten in The Woodlands

The disadvantage of taking over our debt  by MUDs that are debt free  is surely something to that gives pause but I think wed have a lot less debt had we operated, even in the past five years, under more transparency, she added. Thatd be a shame if it prohibits our total consolidation under the township, but it is definitely something we should work towards.

Bruce Cunningham, a well-known local MUD official and long-time board member of Montgomery County MUD 6, said he believes that if the township becomes a city, the new municipality should assume all duties and responsibilities of water service.

Three options are being considered on how to do it. One, retain the status quo and keep the MUDs as is. This is not realistic for a city, it wants to control its services. Two, have the city take over the water supply immediately. Again not realistic, if the township wants to get incorporation approved, because of the different tax rates in each MUD, Cunningham said in an email. This is where it should end up. There are many things that need to be worked out.

Cunningham also said the third option, an interlocal agreement with the MUDs and a new city, in his view, makes the most sense for a smooth transition to a total takeover.

MUDs with no debt, and those with similar debt tax rates, should be encouraged to consolidate to reduce their costs, Cunningham added. All the MUDs should continue to operate under the Woodlands Water Agency until the city is ready to take them over in total.

Montgomery County Pecinct 3 Commissioner James Noack said he is against raising taxes, which he said could occur if the MUDs are abolished by a new city of The Woodlands.

According to the townships own consultant, Don Norrell, consolidating the MUDS would increase taxes where there appears to be no benefit, Noack said in an email.

On HoustonChronicle.com: The Woodlands incorporation study eyes police, roads, MUDs

The fate of The Woodlands Water Agency, the entity that oversees and manages 10 MUDs in Montgomery County, if the township incorporates and decides to abolish the MUDs is not known. Norrell said in his presentation that the Woodlands Water Agency currently acts as a city utility on a annual budget of more than $8 million.

Jim Stinson, general manager of Woodlands Water, said he was not aware of Norrells presentation and the information presented Thursday.

I have not seen and I do not have any information on the township presentation, so I am unable to provide comment on the topic, Stinson said.

jeff.forward@chron.com
WASHINGTON (AP)  Black Americans rejoiced after President Joe Biden made Juneteenth a federal holiday, but some said that, while they appreciated the recognition at a time of racial reckoning in America, more is needed to change policies that disadvantage too many of their brethren.

Its great, but its not enough, said Gwen Grant, president and CEO of the Urban League of Kansas City. Grant said she was delighted by the quick vote this week by Congress to make Juneteenth a national holiday because it's been a long time coming.

But she added that we need Congress to protect voting rights, and that needs to happen right now so we don't regress any further. That is the most important thing Congress can be addressing at this time.

At a jubilant White House bill-signing ceremony on Thursday, Biden agreed that more than a commemoration of the events of June 19, 1865, is needed. Thats when Union soldiers brought the news of freedom to enslaved Black people in Galveston, Texas  some 2 1/2 years after President Abraham Lincolns Emancipation Proclamation had freed slaves in Southern states.

This day doesnt just celebrate the past. It calls for action today, Biden said before he established Juneteenth National Independence Day. His audience included scores of members of Congress and Opal Lee, a 94-year-old Texas woman who campaigned for the holiday.

Biden singled out voting rights as an area for action.

Republican-led states have enacted or are considering legislation that activists argue would curtail the right to vote, particularly for people of color. Legislation to address voting rights issues, and institute policing reforms demanded after the killing of George Floyd and other unarmed Black men, remains stalled in the Congress that acted swiftly on the Juneteenth bill.

Other people want the federal government to make reparations or financial payments to the descendants of slaves in an attempt to compensate for those wrongs. Meanwhile, efforts are afoot across the country to limit what school districts teach about the history of slavery in America.

Community organizer Kimberly Holmes-Ross, who helped make her hometown of Evanston, Illinois, the first U.S. city to pay reparations, said she was happy about the new federal holiday because it will lead more people to learn about Juneteenth.

But she would have liked Congress to act on anti-lynching legislation or voter protections first.

I am not super stoked only because all of the other things that are still going on, said Holmes-Ross, 57. You havent addressed what we really need to talk about.

Peniel Joseph, an expert on race at the University of Texas at Austin, said the U.S. has never had a holiday or a national commemoration of the end of slavery. Many Black Americans had long celebrated Juneteenth.

Juneteenth is important symbolically, and we need the substance to follow, but Black people historically have always tried to do multiple things at the same time," Joseph said.

Most federal workers will observe the holiday Friday. Several states and the District of Columbia announced that government offices would be closed Friday.

Juneteenth is the 12th federal holiday, including Inauguration Day once every four years. It's also the first federal holiday since the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday was added in 1983.

Before June 19 became a federal holiday, it was observed in the vast majority of states and the District of Columbia. Texas was first to make Juneteenth a holiday in 1980.

Most white Americans had not heard of Juneteenth before the summer of 2020 and the protests that stirred the nation's conscience over race after Floyd's killing by a Minneapolis police officer, said Matthew Delmont, who teaches history at Dartmouth College.

He said the new federal holiday hopefully provides a moment on the calendar every year when all Americans can spend time thinking seriously about the history of our country.

The Senate passed the bill earlier this week by unanimous agreement. But in the House, 14 Republicans voted against it, including Rep. Chip Roy of Texas. Roy said Juneteenth deserves to be commemorated, but he objected to the use of independence in the holiday's name.

This name needlessly divides our nation on a matter that should instead bring us together by creating a separate Independence Day based on the color of one's skin, he said in a statement.

Added Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Ariz., who also voted against the bill: We have one Independence Day, and it applies equally to all people of all races.

The sentiment was different in Texas, the first state to make Juneteenth a holiday.

I'm happy as pink, said Doug Matthews, 70, and a former city manager of Galveston who has helped coordinate the community's Juneteenth celebrations since Texas made it a holiday.

He credited the work of state and local leaders with paving the way for this week's step by Congress.

I'm also proud that everything started in Galveston, Matthews said.

Pete Henley, 71, was setting up tables Thursday for a Juneteenth celebration at the Old Central Cultural Center, a Galveston building that once was a segregated Black school. He said the Juneteenth holiday will help promote understanding and unity.

All holidays have significance, no matter what the occasion or what its about, but by it being a federal holiday, it speaks volumes to what the country thinks about that specific day, said Henley, who studied at the school before it was integrated and is president of the cultural center.

He said his family traces its roots back to enslaved men and women in the Texas city who were among the last to receive word of the Emancipation Proclamation.

As a country, we really need to be striving toward togetherness more than anything, Henley said. If we just learn to love each other, it would be so great.

Holmes-Ross recalled first learning about Juneteenth in church in Evanston, a Lake Michigan suburb just outside Chicago. Over the years, she said she made sure her three children commemorated the day with community events including food, dancing and spoken word performances.

She said it was about more than a day off for her family and expressed hope that it would be for others, too.

We were intentional about seeking out Black leaders and things we could celebrate as African Americans, Holmes-Ross said. Hopefully, people do something productive with it. It is a day of service.

___

Associated Press writers Margaret Stafford in Liberty, Mo., Sophia Tareen in Chicago and Jake Bleiberg in Dallas contributed to this report.
MEXICO CITY (AP)  The coronavirus pandemic and changing consumer habits threaten to put an end to a decades-old practice of allowing elderly people in Mexico to earn extra income as grocery store baggers.

Baggers over 60 had expected to return to stores last month as pandemic restrictions eased in Mexico City. But Walmart de Mexico, the countrys biggest retailer, announced this week that they wouldnt be allowed back.

The retail chain said Mexico City's ban on plastic bags and the pandemic meant customers no longer want other people touching their groceries.

Due to the health emergency, we have seen that our customers want to avoid third parties having contact with their purchases, Walmart de Mexico said in a statement. Added to this is the fact that under current law to protect the environment, we have stopped giving free, single-use plastic bags.

For this reason, our customers now bring their own reusable bags and they have become used to packing their own purchase, the statement continued.

Elderly baggers have held a series of protests over the last two weeks outside grocery stores and government offices, holding signs reading We Want to Work!

Its not fair, former grocery bagger Maria Guadalupe Garcia told the Telediario news program. I dont have anything other than this.

Lourdes Cuca put it this way: I need to work, because it is my emotional support.

The jobs  they are considered volunteers," not employees  are hardly lucrative. Some customers give them tips of about 1% of the bill or less, with many just leaving five or 10 cents.

In some places in Mexico, teenagers are baggers, but in others the elderly were given spots under a program arranged many years ago with the government's National Institute for the Elderly. Walmart said it had notified the Institute in December that the arrangement would not be renewed.

But the baggers only got word of the change in May, when Mexico City loosened pandemic restrictions amid a drop in case numbers. That is because the elderly baggers  whose age puts them at higher risk for severe COVID-19  had not been working at the stores since March 2020, and many had only recently contemplated the possibility of going back.

It's not just Mexico City; in early June, the legislature in the northern state of Tamaulipas approved a resolution urging that fully vaccinated elderly adults be allowed to return to work as grocery baggers to obtain some more income for themselves and their families.

Fadlala Akabani, Mexico City's secretary of economic development, said there are about 35,000 elderly baggers nationwide, and about 4,400 in the capital.

Of the 4,400 that the company had (in the capital), only 2,209 have tried to go back to work, Akabani said. So we are trying to relocate them in some (other) stores.

But if consumer habits really have changed, it's not clear how many other grocery chains will be open to the idea.

Under a program started by President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, people over 68 in Mexico receive a monthly supplementary income payment of about $65 per month. But given Mexico's woefully insufficient and spotty pension programs, many elderly people can't make ends meet.

At the same time, they complain that most employers are unwilling to hire them, a situation that will probably only get worse in the wake of the pandemic.

A weak pension system, an increase in under-the-table work and unfavorable labor market conditions are factors that affect the well-being of elderly people, the Institute said in a statement. A lot of elderly people are still independent and able to function, and they want to continue working and earning money, to make them feel useful and fulfilled.
PIERRE, S.D. (AP)  South Dakota Republican Gov. Kristi Noem has declared Friday a holiday for state workers in honor of Juneteenth.

Noem said her decision is in response to legislation signed Thursday by President Joe Biden establishing a new federal holiday commemorating the end of slavery.

All men are created equal. That is Americas foundational ideal, Noem said in a statement. Juneteenth celebrates an important day when we came closer to making that ideal a reality for all Americans, regardless of race."

Juneteenth is meant to remember June 19, 1865, when Union soldiers brought the news of freedom to enslaved Black people in Galveston, Texas. That was about 2 1/2 years after President Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation freed slaves in the Southern states.

I hope state employees take the opportunity to enjoy the beautiful South Dakota weather on their day off, Noem said.
AUGUSTA, Maine (AP)  A plan for a consumer-owned utility in Maine is in jeopardy after the Senate voted down a proposal it had initially approved.

The proposal by Democratic Rep. Seth Berry would create an independent nonprofit organization called Pine Tree Power Company to replace Central Maine Power and Versant. The Maine Senate passed a preliminary vote in favor of the move earlier this week, but voted it down by one vote on final enactment on Thursday night.
The Houston Chronicles COVID Help Desk is here to answer your questions about the virus, vaccines and how to navigate the new normal. Each week, a Chronicle reporter talks with physicians, researchers and legal experts to relay the latest information on the waning coronavirus pandemic.

This week, we answer a reader question about lawsuits against health care facilities and hospitals COVID infection, whether Texas public schools will require vaccination for eligible students and whether an areas vaccination rate directly affects the COVID case count.

I stayed in a hospital and contracted COVID-19. Can I sue the hospital if they have unvaccinated employees on staff?

The key to cases like this will be proving exactly how you contracted the virus, said Brad Nitschke, a lawyer with Jackson Walker and chair of the firms Pandemic Task Force. But proving causation is difficult.

The bar for filing a lawsuit is low in Texas, he said, which means the question is not whether you can sue, but what you can expect from filing a suit.

In Texas, the lawyers that defends health care facilities and hospitals can invoke immunity under a federal law, the Public Readiness and Emergency Preparedness Act, which protects those facilities from claims related to pandemic countermeasures, distribution of any vaccine, pandemic-related treatments or supplies, Nitschke said.

PODCAST: Were a tale of two COVID nations' Dr. Peter Hotez on the delta variant and a summer surge

PREP Act provides immunity from liability for claims of loss caused by, arising out of, relating to, or resulting from the administration or use of covered countermeasures to diseases, threats and conditions identified in the declaration. Gov. Greg Abbott issued a COVID-19 disaster declaration in March 2020, which has been extended again for the month of June.

Nitschke said Senate Bill 6 contains a broad immunity statute that will protect businesses from claims alleging a person was exposed to COVID-19. The bill is awaiting a signature or a veto on Abbotts desk. It was proposed in response to the pandemic and will only apply to cases of pandemic emergency, he added.

With Senate Bill 6, there is a high threshold of establishing causation, Nitschke said. I would expect a hospital or nursing home to say at this point in the pandemic, its very difficult to nearly impossible to know when and how someone got exposed to COVID-19. How do you know it was the nurse treating you?

Cruise ship lawsuits may see more movement in the courts, he said. Courts are more receptive to the causation argument when a sickened plaintiff was on a boat in the middle of the ocean for two weeks, he added.

Is it possible to see how vaccines are lowering the coronavirus case rate?

Looking at Israel is the best way to predict how vaccine distribution affects the COVID case rate, said virologist Ben Neuman, the Global Health Research Complex Chief Virologist at Texas A&M University and one of the worlds top experts on coronaviruses.

Israel was the first country to reach 50 percent vaccination; since that point and despite the new variants, coronavirus cases have remained at ridiculously low numbers, Neuman said. Israel is now 57 percent inoculated compared to the U.S.s 45 percent.

But its difficult to know if the vaccines alone are causing the dip in cases, he said.

On HoustonChronicle.com: After Abbott lifted Texas mask mandate, COVID has waned  but the flu hasnt

Its tough to separate wearing a mask and taking all the precautions and vaccine effects  they tend to go together, Neuman said. People who are more conscious and aware of the virus do everything they can to stop it and that has compounding effects. Its hard to tell exactly what is going on.

In Texas, Neuman is not sure that any counties, rural or urban, have a high enough vaccination rate to experience sterilizing herd immunity, which is when the virus dies out because it has few unvaccinated individuals to infect. Statewide, 46.5 percent of people 12 and older are vaccinated.

Controlling herd immunity keeps the virus at a low level, which is where we are now, he said. Collective immunity, where its not spiking crazily but its also not going away either.

The lower case rate can be attributed to a combination of vaccines, masking and social distancing.

Will Texas public schools require vaccination for the 2021-2022 school year?

In short, no.

The Texas Department of State Health Services set its rules for student vaccinations based on direction from the state legislature, said Lara Anton, a public information officer.

The COVID-19 vaccine is not required for public school enrollment at this time, Anton said in an email.

Diphtheria/Tetanus/Pertussis (Tdap) and subsequent booster shots, polio, measles, mumps and rubella (MMR), Hepatitis A 1, 2 and Hepatitis B and meningococcal (MCV4) are mandatory for public school students.

Newly-signed Senate Bill 968 outlaws vaccine passports and prevents businesses from asking customers to show vaccine cards upon entry or to receive services. Gov. Greg Abbott issued a similar executive order in April, though that applied only to state agencies and other organizations that receive public funding, such as public schools.

julie.garcia@chron.com

Twitter.com/reporterjulie

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A 3-year-old boy shot himself April 8 with a gun used by his father in a fatal robbery four days earlier, court records revealed on Thursday.

Nicholas Dwayne Thomas, 23, was charged Wednesday with capital murder in the robbery. In that case, he was accused of fatally shooting a man in front of his daughter outside a Dave & Busters in the 7600 block of the Katy Freeway.

He has also been charged with endangering a child in the April 8 shooting involving his son. Thomas remains in Harris County Jail in lieu of a $150,000 bail for the capital murder charge.

His attorney in the latter case, Walter McNab Miller IV, said he had just learned of the alleged connection when reached by phone Thursday evening. He said he was preparing to speak to his client at the jail.

Obviously Im going to look into it and see what needs to be done, Miller said. Its a tragic situation.

On April 4, court records say Thomas approached 37-year-old Miguel Vasquez while he was walking out of Dave & Busters with his juvenile daughter. Thomas put Vasquez in a chokehold, pointed the handgun to his head and demanded jewelry, court records say.

Video surveillance footage captured Vasquez running back to the Dave & Busters with his daughter while Thomas appeared to flee in a vehicle, records say. Vasquez told a security guard that he had been shot by a man who demanded his watch.

The guard called an ambulance. Vasquez later died at the hospital.

Four days later, Thomas left his gun where his son could access it, records say. The boy shot himself but survived, according to the Associated Press.

Further investigation revealed that a 9 mm shell casing found at the robbery scene came from a firearm used in April 8 incident, records say. From the April 8 case, police discovered the suspect had access to a white 2013 Nissan Altima with black rims, similar to the vehicle captured on surveillance cameras at the robbery scene.

The vehicles registration led police to Thomas common-law wife, who confirmed that she drives the vehicle and that Thomas owned a black pistol, records say. Police later used cellphone data to confirm he was at the robbery scene at Dave & Busters on April 4, records say.

They also confirmed through the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives that Thomas purchased the gun on November 2020 in Houston.

julian.gill@chron.com
Caroline Cheevers still recalls the panic. With Winter Storm Uri killing power across Houston, there seemed no help for her daughter, Hailey, a medically fragile 10-year-old who requires electricity to power the ventilator that keeps her alive.

Hotels were full or had no power. First responders were overwhelmed. And even though shed signed up for a state registry meant to help first responders plan for how to care for medically fragile Texans during disasters, she and her husband were on their own, scrambling to take care of Hailey and their three other disabled children.

A new law may change that. Senate Bill 968, which went into effect Wednesday, requires counties and municipalities to perform wellness checks of their medically fragile residents during disasters or other emergencies.

First sponsored by state Rep. John Bucy III, D-Austin, the bill was held up during the legislative session and could well have died on the vine. Instead, state Sen. Lois Kolkhorst, R-Brenham, folded the amendment into SB 968.

Bucy proposed the legislation after learning a constituent who lived a few streets over from him died, alone, because he failed to get critical dialysis treatment during the storm.

Fight to survive: Deep freeze imperiled Texas most vulnerable

Bucy had watched neighbors helping each other, checking on each other, huddling in homes that had power. But the storm showed a critical gap in how the state cares for its most vulnerable residents, he said.

The neighborly Texas spirit inspired this idea, he said. Its really about being your brothers keeper and looking out for one another.

During the deep freeze, the states disabled and medically fragile residents endured excruciating hardships, which in many cases proved fatal. In the months since the deep freeze, the tally of those who perished during the disaster has steadily grown. State numbers put the total at 111 deaths, but a Houston Chronicle analysis in April pegged the number at nearly twice that  many who died from lack of oxygen, kidney failure or other ailments caused by lack of medical treatment. And a recent analysis by Buzzfeed put the number even higher, well in excess of 700 deaths.

Under the new legislation, counties and cities will be required to check on certain residents  suffering from Alzheimers disease or debilitating chronic illnesses, dialysis patients, those dependent on oxygen treatment or who have medical conditions that require 24-hour medical supervision  who register on the State of Texas Emergency Assistance Registry.

The law requires such checks during extended power, water or gas outages, or state disasters.

A Chronicle investigation in April found significant problems with the STEAR Registry, a database of names, contacts and medical information on disabled or homebound residents  who can voluntarily register with the state  which the Texas Division of Emergency Management makes available to counties and cities. Local officials can then use the data to inform first responders, notify residents or offer services to those on the list. But few people know about the registry, and cities and towns are not actually required to use the information. It is only voluntary.

I dont know who cares about us: How Texas failed people with disabilities during the freeze

The new law law requires the state emergency management department and municipalities and counties using the registry to ensure medically fragile Texans receive wellness checks within 24 hours of a declared disaster. The checks can come in the form of automated calls and texts, personal followup calls, and  if those go unanswered  in-person visits.

Francisco Sanchez at Harris County Office of Emergency Management said: We look forward to the state taking a fresh look at how the emergency assistance registry can be better utilized. Weve made some adjustments to our plans, and we will meet or exceed whatever expectations there are of emergency management offices.

Some questions remain, particularly how local municipalities would implement the new law and pay for it.

Seth Christensen, a TDEM spokesman, said the agency understands the importance of working with those charged with implementing the new law. He stated the agency will continue to collaborate  to implement the law as passed by the legislature and signed by the governor.

Advocates for the states disabled and medically fragile residents said it was a positive, but incomplete, step toward making residents safer during emergencies.

The AARPs Amanda Fredriksen said the law takes an important step in setting expectations for local emergency management folks who choose to participate in STEAR.

This takes the STEAR program and gives it some focus and really addresses the needs of vulnerable Texans during an emergency or disaster, she said.

Houstons disabilities czar, Gabriel Cazares, called the legislation encouraging but said emergency planners would likely face another challenge: extreme distrust by disabled Texans whod signed up for other lists and registries in the past, only to find themselves on their own.

Its going to take time to build that trust, he said. And he noted that Texas Division of Emergency Management has ignored repeated recommendations in recent years to hire staff specifically focused on disability access and functional needs.

MURDER SPIKE: Houstons rate of unsolved murders is soaring. Experts question changes at HPD.

Disability Rights Texas attorney Stephanie Duke said concerns remain because jurisdictions are not required to participate with the STEAR registry  and many dont.

How many wellness checks are actually going to happen when you have jurisdictions that arent utilizing the info to begin with? she said.

Bucy said the bill provides wide latitude to the state emergency management department and other agencies to ensure municipalities comply with the law and could do so through its rule-making abilities.

Thats going to be a bit of an interpretation by TDEM, he said. This should be a tool to all medically fragile residents across the state.

Still, it marked a positive step toward addressing needs of people with disabilities during disaster, said Laura Stough, a professor of psychology at Texas A&M University who studies the impact of disasters on people with disabilities. At the same time, we have many more steps to go.

Cheevers, meanwhile, cant stop thinking about the storm and the peril it caused for her children. The storm forced her to have to split up their family, though eventually Texas Childrens Hospital opened an unused wing where she was able to take Hailey. But many other families had suffered just as much as she had, she said.

Talk was cheap, she said.

Its a great first step. I just hope they actually do it, not just put it in writing and say, We did something, Cheevers said. Theres a lot of medically fragile families I know of that got no help during the February storms.

st.john.smith@chron.com

twitter.com/stjbs
Texas A&M University system will observe Juneteenth Friday, giving all students and employees the day off to observe the holiday.

The announcement comes after President Joe Biden signed the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act Thursday, which establishes June 19 as a national holiday.

Juneteenth marks June 19, 1865, the day enslaved people in Galveston were finally told they were free. The Texas announcement came two years after President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation.

LIFT EVERY VOICE: African-American elders reflect on being Black in America

To recognize the observance, the Texas A&M System will close all 11 of its universities and eight state agencies Friday, June 18.

This is a special day that originated in Texas and were proud to honor it, A&M System Chancellor John Sharp said in written statement.

Employees who provide essential services or who are needed for support Friday should still report to work, but will be provided compensatory time off, according to the release.

MORE ON JUNETEENTH: Juneteenth was just the beginning of freedom for Black Texans

Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner commended Biden for his decision to sign the holiday into law and U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Houston, and Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, for helping pass legislation through the U.S. Congress to make it possible.

From this day forward, the federal holiday will remind the nation of the historical struggles Black Americans faced and the incredible progress made in the United States, Turner said in a written statement.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Im a custodian of their legacy: Descendants of the emancipated reflect on Juneteenth

Juneteenth, once known as Jubilee Day, is the oldest celebration commemorating the end of slavery in the United States.

On June 19, 1865, Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger arrived in Galveston flanked by hundreds of Black soldiers to announce that Texas 250,000 enslaved people were free. Months later, the 13th Amendment was ratified, abolishing slavery.

Texas was the first state to officially recognize Juneteenth in 1979.

Staff writer Joy Sewing contributed to this report.

brittany.britto@chron.com
Disasters have not fallen evenly on Iola and Port Arthur. Hurricane Harvey flooded almost the entire coastal city on the Louisiana border, which was damaged by Ike and Rita before that. Iola, a tiny Grimes County community 100 miles inland, largely is insulated from tropical storms.

Both cities applied for federal Harvey disaster aid distributed by the state. Iola pitched a wastewater system that would serve 379 people. Port Arthur proposed the replacement of century-old storm water pipes to help 42,000.

The state funded Iolas project. Port Arthur got nothing.

With our susceptibility to being affected by hurricanes, if those places got money, you know it wasnt fairly done, said Port Arthur Mayor Thurman Bartie.

A Houston Chronicle investigation found the $1 billion in aid distributed by the Texas General Land Office in May disproportionately flowed to inland counties with less damage from Harvey than coastal communities which bore the brunt of the storm.

The GLO also steered aid toward counties with a lower risk of natural disasters  by the states own measure  and sometimes to projects that help far fewer residents per dollar spent than unfunded projects in more vulnerable counties.

The lowest-risk counties that received awards, like Grimes, were only eligible because of the GLOs decision to add them. And in some cases, the state funded projects in these places even though they scored worse than applicants in the highest-risk counties, according to criteria the land office set.

Aransas and Nueces counties, where Harvey made landfall, did not receive a dime. Neither did Jefferson County, which recorded the highest rain totals. Same for Houston and Harris Countys governments, even though the county suffered the most deaths and flooded homes from the storm.

To get goose-egged is really disappointing, said Nueces County Judge Barbara Canales. The coast is going to get battered first.  How do you come out of $1 billion and Nueces isnt even on your radar?

Rep. Al Green, D-Houston, said his vote in Congress to approve the aid packages was to help Houston and the other most vulnerable coastal areas.

We know we have these storms coming again, and again, and again, Green said. We need to know GLO is going to help those most in need, and not circumvent the process by, for whatever reason, making sure that persons who are less needy are getting a portion of the funds.

The result is that Texas is missing an opportunity to protect coastal communities, which are especially at risk as climate change brings stronger and more frequent hurricanes, said Jim Blackburn, director of Rice Universitys Severe Storm Prediction, Education and Evacuation from Disasters Center. He questioned what role the GLO plays as a middleman for the federal aid, if not to direct money to large-scale projects that local governments rarely can afford on their own.

Some areas are more dangerous than others; they should be getting assistance, Blackburn said. Until weve got a serious, coherent strategy, I think were endangering the economic future of the Gulf Coast.

GLO spokeswoman Brittany Eck released a statement for the agency defending the process, saying inland counties are important to coordinating a response to tropical storms.

It is important that Texas inland counties are resilient as they provide vital assistance to our coastal communities during events such as asset staging, evacuations, sheltering, and emergency response/recovery, Eck wrote.

After bipartisan outcry from Houston-area officials, Land Commissioner George P. Bush said he would ask HUD to direct $750 million to Harris County. That fix, if approved, does nothing to address the concerns of other coastal communities.

Eighty-five percent of our county flooded (during Harvey), said Jefferson County Commissioner Everette Bo Alfred. You couldnt get into the county. Its unfair to think about us not even getting funding.

Godofredo A. Vasquez, Houston Chronicle / Staff photographer

Unequal distribution

After the devastating 2017 hurricane season, which included Harvey, Congress the following year approved $4.3 billion in U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development funds to help Texas recover and prepare for future storms.

Gov. Greg Abbott placed the General Land Office in charge of disbursing the mitigation aid, $2.1 billion of which was required to flow to HUD-designated counties, including those worst-hit by Harvey.

Distributing the aid in a manner communities accept as fair would always be difficult, since the cost of all potential projects far exceeds the money available. Competition became far tougher, however, when the GLO made an additional 29 counties eligible for its funding competition.

Eck noted that all of the additional counties were covered by the FEMA disaster declaration for Harvey. She said the major factor behind the disparity between Harvey damage and aid received was the fact that the federal government forbade Texas from using Harvey damage as a factor for distributing the funds.

Eck said high-risk counties that failed to win awards scored too poorly in other categories required by HUD, such as the share of low and moderate income residents served and a cost-benefit analysis.

Experts, however, said some of those criteria, which were developed by the GLO, were flawed and discriminated against populous communities. One divided the number of residents helped by a project over a jurisdictions total population, which lowered scores for the largest cities and counties.

Eck declined to explain how some lower-scoring projects were awarded over higher-scoring applicants.

MORE: The fight over federal disaster money in Texas, explained.

Instead of using Harvey damage, Texas developed a metric to determine which counties need the most protection. This considers all types of calamities  including flooding, hurricane winds and drought  and ranks counties by risk.

The state included this metric on its scoring rubric for projects, though the average winning project had a lower disaster risk than the average losing project, the Chronicle found. Put simply, applicants from counties Texas designated as the most vulnerable to natural disasters were less likely to be awarded this disaster aid.

In some cases, awards flowed to areas with high disaster risk; Galveston County received $179 million and San Patricio County got $38 million. Those were the exception, however. The remaining highest-risk counties  including Harris, Nueces, Aransas and Jefferson  secured 38 percent of the aid despite containing 88 percent of the eligible population.

In contrast, GLO awarded 40 percent of the $1 billion to counties with lower disaster risks, though they contain 8 percent of the eligible population.

Fourteen projects in the lowest-risk counties received funding, though they would impact few residents. A $4.1 million sewer upgrade in Snook, in Burleson County, will help 415 residents while $4 million in drainage improvements in Bedias, in Grimes County, will benefit 310.

In announcing the $5 million award for drainage improvements in Brenham, GLO cited in a press release the small Washington County citys proximity to the coast as a risk factor for flooding. It is 102 miles inland.

We all have a need

In Iola, Mayor Christina Stover said the city had been trying to fund a wastewater system for 13 years. It floods here too, she said, including a 2016 storm that swamped the post office. Homes here still rely on septic systems or simply discharge sewage directly into ditches, a health risk when those same channels overflow with rain.

Stover said she understands why residents in coastal communities are upset places like Iola were awarded disaster funds. However, she said, if the city is eligible for free aid, residents depend on her to apply.

Im sure that we all have a need, Stover said. I can assure you the city of Iola will do our very best to spend the least amount of funds possible to complete our project, and that any funds we could hand back, we would.

Wayland Carter, who owns a service station on Iolas main drag, had a more succinct message for skeptical coastal residents.

Tell them to come here and smell this (sh) and theyll understand why we got money, he said, gesturing toward the ditch in front of his business where sewage from other properties pools.

Godofredo A. Vasquez, Houston Chronicle / Staff photographer

Taken together, these projects in the lowest-risk counties cost $119 million and would help 51,000 people. A $97 million breakwater project in Nueces County would have benefited seven times as many people.

Nueces County Judge Barbara Canales said she was disappointed her county was snubbed because engineers had crafted their proposals carefully. The breakwater, a coastal barrier to protect Port Aransas from storm surges, was ambitious and expensive but modeled after a Hurricane Sandy recovery project New York had designed that won HUD funds.

I want to know whats wrong with my project, Canales said. If I had one criticism, I think the day you get denied, (the GLO) ought to provide you a full analysis of why.

Canales acknowledged that communities across Texas need better protection from disasters, but said the most vulnerable areas should be a priority. The GLO funding competition was tilted toward state-designated counties, however.

In some cases, projects from the state-designated counties won awards despite scoring lower than projects in HUD-selected counties. All nine of Harris Countys applications, as well as 14 of 22 projects from Jefferson, Nueces and Aransas counties scored higher than the lowest-scoring winning project from a GLO-selected county.

One of those was a $47 million joint proposal led by Aransas County for an underground fiber optic network that can withstand hurricanes. Harvey knocked out the areas 911 and first responder communications systems.

Eck said high-risk counties that failed to win awards scored too poorly in other categories required by HUD. An earlier Chronicle analysis found states had wide discretion over their funding competitions, however. Eck declined to explain how some lower-scoring projects were awarded over higher-scoring applicants.

Godofredo A. Vasquez, Houston Chronicle / Staff photographer

A second chance?

Harris County politicians, Republicans and Democrats, were united in disbelief they had been snubbed. They held press conferences, lambasted the General Land Office and appealed to the Biden administration. Within a few days, Bush announced he would ask HUD to give $750 million to the county.

Charlotte Moses, a Port Arthur councilwoman, said she has not seen that level of support from her local leaders. She suspects politics are to blame; Port Arthur is run by Democrats and most of its leaders at higher levels of government are Republicans.

Someone heard Harris Countys voice. How many people have you heard talk about the need for Port Arthur to be funded? Moses said. Youd be interviewing him if there was a voice, not me. Its going to take more than a cry from the local level.

The citys Republican congressman, Rep. Randy Weber, met with Port Arthur leaders last week but has made no public comment on that citys funding snub. He declined to speak with the Chronicle.

Moses said the need for help is plainly visible for anyone who wishes to see it. On a tour of the hard-hit Montrose neighborhood, she pointed out more than a dozen homes swamped by Harvey that remain vacant and unrepaired. A lifelong city resident, Moses knew many residents here.

She recalled talking to 80-year-old Rita Levy, who lived on Linkwood Street, as the storm approached. Levy told her she had put towels around her door in case flooding crept above the stoop. The neighborhood got 6 feet of water. A Coast Guard helicopter rescued Levy. She moved to Louisiana. Harveys high water mark still is visible on the front door.

Author Lucy Dennis had lived in her home on 13th Street less than two years before Harvey flooded it. She said friends already have moved away, tired of being battered by storms. Dennis son has vowed to make her leave if the house takes on water again.

I believe Port Arthur has a lot of potential, and I believe we can become that great city were bound to be, Dennis said. But if we dont get the help we need to keep us from being underwater, its not going to work.

She frets now about stronger storms fueled by climate change. A downpour three weeks ago brought water within a couple feet of her porch.

Nearby, houses on stilts, mostly rebuilds from Harvey, offered a reminder that Port Arthurs future lies in accepting the water will come. To the west, rumbling pierced the thick June air. Lightning streaked across the sky.

Another storm.

Zach Despart/Staff

Kaitlin Bain contributed reporting.

zach.despart@chron.com
Texas Southern University welcomed Lesia L. Crumpton-Young, a long-time top official at historically black colleges, as its new president Thursday.

Crumpton-Young, a former Texas A&M associate provost, is TSUs 13th president. She replaces Kenneth Huewitt, who was named interim president in April 2020.

I assure you that this will be an era of transformation, said Crumpton-Young, who thanked the university community for extending the maroon carpet for her arrival.

She vowed to enhance TSUs reputation, brand and partnerships, to spur economic and community development, to serve the under-served, and to promote research initiatives that address issues plaguing the community.

We will create an educational environment that will be second to none and ensure that our graduates are prepared to compete anywhere, anytime with any other graduates and that our degrees matter most to those who hold the degrees, Crumpton-Young said.

Crumpton-Young, 55, said she wants to hear from faculty, students, alumni and the greater community, and announced the launch of a presidents student advisory council, where shell listen to input from students.

Regent Chair Albert Myres said Crumpton-Youngs appointment, which officially begins July 1, is probably the most important selection of the past 30 years.

TSU Regent Marc Carter, who led the presidential search committee, said there were 40 candidates for the job, and Crumpton-Young was chosen from three final candidates.

Shes a wonderful role model, engineer, leader. Shes courageous. Its wonderful having her on campus. Shes a person the community and students can emulate, Carter said.

Crumpton-Young started her career in academia as one of the first Black women to become a full professor in engineering. She rose through the ranks as she worked to diversify the workforce, especially in science, technology, engineering and math fields.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Lack of funding, resources biggest challenges for athletics at historically Black colleges

Huewitt was named interim president in early 2020 when former TSU president Austin Lane was put on paid leave and then ousted by regents. The regents cited Lanes failure to take action or inform the board about fraud allegations involving a former law school official. The regents and Lane reached a settlement, which Lane said totaled to an $879,000 buyout package.

Not long after Huewitt assumed the role, the COVID-19 pandemic forced TSU and most other colleges to close campuses and go online. Crumpton-Young will have her work cut out for her, as Texas Southern University was among those to experience steep enrollment declines last fall. University officials said enrollment dropped by 22 percent as a result of the pandemic.

The university is also working to replace and repair many of its decrepit buildings and recently asked the state legislature for $300 million  much of it for construction  but was denied.

Despite this, Myres said Texas Southern is working to make pivotal changes that focus on students.

Texas Southern University will wait no longer. Its the time to be great again and also to show the greatness again, Myres said. We need to go forward as a university.

Crumpton-Young worked as provost and senior vice president for academic affairs and chief academic officer at Morgan State University, an HBCU in Baltimore, since 2019. Previously, she was an administrator at Tennessee State University, Texas A&M University and Mississippi State University.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Two Houston universities opened in 1927. One exploded in growth. The other stagnated.

In her roles, she started new hiring strategies to diversify the universities faculties and garnered seven-figure monetary gifts to fund student scholarships, research, and support diversity equity and inclusion as well as student and faculty success.

Crumpton-Young is currently a fellow in the African Scientific Institute. She received the U.S. Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Mathematics, and Engineering Mentoring from President Barack Obama in 2010.

She received doctoral, masters and bachelors degrees in industrial engineering from Texas A&M University, and a MBA from Tennessee State University.

Staff writer Rebecca Carballo contributed to this report.

brittany.britto@chron.com
In 2005, photographer Jim Olive strapped himself to a harness and hung out the doorway of a rented helicopter at sunset to capture a series of aerial images of downtown Houston.

The glittery skyscrapers. The aquariums Ferris wheel. The gently curving expanse of I-45 lit up by the headlights of rush hour commuters.

The University of Houstons Bauer business school used one of his copyrighted cityscapes from 2014 to 2017 on its website without authorization or credit. When Olive sent a cease-and-desist letter, UH officials removed it from the site. But by then, Olive thought, the damage was done. He sued, alleging the university had taken possession of his photograph in violation of copyright law.

Sixteen years later he learned the helicopter ride and artistry and planning and great expense and risk that went into it were for naught, when the Texas Supreme Court dismissed his case on Friday. The majority ruled UH was protected by sovereign immunity.

We are disappointed in the decision, which puts the intellectual property of all Americans at risk of uncompensated use by the state of Texas, said Olives lawyer, Owen McGovern. We are exploring all of our options, and strongly considering filing a petition for certiorari with the Supreme Court of the United States to bring our states jurisprudence in line with 150 years of Supreme Court precedent protecting intellectual property from use by the government without just compensation.

Shawn Lindsey, spokesperson for UH, said the university has great respect for artistic talent and federal copyright protections, but she indicated that the institution believes the decision stands on firm legal ground.

Olives expertise in skyline and aerial photography, developed on assignments during 50 years in more than 90 countries, had no bearing on his claim that the university improperly took possession of private property, the court wrote in its majority opinion Friday.

This was not a pure copyright suit, because you cant sue the government for copyright infringement, according to Joe Ahmad, a founding partner of the AZA law firm, who has no association with the case. The only way you can sue the government for a copyright violation is if it takes possession of your property, Ahmad said.

The key issue, according to the Texas justices, was whether the University of Houston constitutionally took or confiscated the photograph, which would entitle the photographer to compensation. Olive said in his suit UH officials downloaded an image that was for sale and omitted all the identifying copyright and attribution information before displaying it on several webpages belonging to the universitys business program.

The university contended it had sovereign immunity, an argument a Harris County trial court rejected. An appeals court reversed, determining that taking someones copyrighted information does not amount to a legal taking. Olive still had the right to use, license or stop using the work itself, according to the appeals judges.

The Supreme Court agreed. Its opinion asserts that UH did indeed violate Olives copyright but did not confiscate his property.

The justices determined that UH did not take possession or control of, or occupy, the copyright. Olive still retains the property rights despite the governments interference, they wrote.

Ahmad, who litigates trade secrets and intellectual property cases, said hes seen this issue pop up in a number of intellectual property cases and there is a lot of controversy among legal scholars. Ahmad said regardless of how alarming the ruling may sound to a layperson, its a sound legal opinion.

If the government takes your house because they need to build a highway over it, they need to pay you, they cant take your property without compensation, he said. The tricky part is its easy when were talking about real estate or other physical property, but how does that relate to intellectual property or in particular here, a copyright.

The court didnt think UH took anything from Olive that he didnt still have possession of, Ahmad said.

Olive, who is 75, recalled the photography session using film as technically difficult. Between the vibrations from the rotor blade and the pilot nailing the exact coordinates, it took several passes over downtown to get the shot.

Olive said after spending a ton of money on the lawsuit, hes very disappointed with the outcome, but theres more to it than money.

Its going to continue to be a problem for creatives to worry about theft of their images, their art, their music, he said. Anything thats copyrighted can be taken by the state without attribution or compensation.

The thing Im disappointed about is its the Bauer College of Business and Bauer teaches ethics, Olive said. And I just do not think this is ethical to steal an image.

gabrielle.banks@chron.com
DALLAS (AP)  Texas is transferring inmates from a state prison to make room for migrants detained by state authorities, a prison system spokesman said Thursday.

The prison system began moving inmates from the Dolph Briscoe Unit prison in Dilley to other prisons Wednesday, Texas Department of Criminal Justice spokesman Jeremy Desel said. The medium-to-minimum-security prison about 70 miles (113 kilometers) southwest of San Antonio has a staff of 233, including 165 security officers, and can hold 1,384 inmates, according to the TDCJ website.

This action will allow the unit to serve as a central holding facility for non-TDCJ detainees who have been arrested and charged with a state offense, Desel said in a statement.

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW: How Gov. Abbott's three-pronged border plan escalates clash with Biden

Dilley already is the location of a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility, the privately managed South Texas Family Residential Center, which can accommodate as many as 2,400 detainees, including children.

The move was made in response to Gov. Greg Abbotts order that state authorities arrest and confine migrants who are in the country illegally and committed a state or federal crime, he said.

Fortunately, the agency currently has the available bed capacity to assist in Operation Lone Star, Desel said.

On Wednesday, Abbott announced that the state's jails were looking for additional bed space to house the rising number of people being arrested. Abbott also said he would spend $250 million in state money and crowdsourced financing to continue the construction of walls along the Texas-Mexico border that then-President Donald Trump started and President Joe Biden suspended.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection said in a statement that it would not comment on Abbott's moves and defers to the State of Texas to speak to any steps they are taking to increase their enforcement posture.

Abbott's measures may be subject to legal challenges as the U.S. Supreme Court has consistently ruled that immigration law enforcement is the exclusive province of the federal government, including striking down efforts by Arizona Republicans a decade ago.

However, Abbott was scathing Wednesday in his criticism of the Biden administration's immigration and border protection policies. An Abbott spokeswoman repeated those criticisms Thursday in a statement.

While President Biden continues to ignore the crisis on our southern border and his duties to our country, Texas is stepping up and upholding the rule of law," said spokeswoman Renae Eze.

She also said the selection of the Briscoe Unit for migrant detention was because the prison was in a strategic location to house those arrested for committing a crime along the border and had adequate staffing to run the facility.

She did not respond to a question about whether the prison's workers were qualified to work with migrants who haven't been convicted of crimes.
Meet Rahel, 19, a human face of a brutal ethnic cleansing now underway in Ethiopia.

There were three soldiers, she said as she lay on a bed in a crowded hospital. They were asking me to take off my dress. I refused. I said, You can kill me.

The men paid no heed and gang-raped her, part of a scorched-earth counterinsurgency campaign of murder, rape, pillage and famine by Ethiopian and Eritrean troops against rebels and also against innocents like Rahel in the Tigray region of Ethiopia.

Countless thousands of Tigrayans have already been killed, and tens of thousands of children are in imminent danger of starving to death. This month the United Nations declared that Tigray was in the midst of the worlds worst famine in a decade.

Tigray has attracted little attention, partly because Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has kept out most journalists (expelling one working for The New York Times), so there arent many photos or video clips of the suffering.

Some photos were taken by Lynsey Addario, a conflict photographer and old friend who happened to be in Ethiopia to shoot photos for National Geographic, a visit approved long before the latest attacks. She interviewed nine women who had been raped as part of the ethnic cleansing.

Rahel told Addario: When I got home, I told my mother that I was raped and that I thought I might be pregnant. My mother kicked me out of the house and said, How can you get pregnant with these killers?

Rahel was being treated at a hospital in Tigray that soldiers had looted earlier. A hospital official said troops had carried off everything that they could and destroyed the rest, including X-ray machines, neonatal equipment, the contents of an OB-GYN center, pharmaceuticals and even medical records.

The violence follows decades of ethnic tensions in Ethiopia. For many years, Tigrayans ruled the country harshly, but Tigrayan domination ended in 2018, and Prime Minister Abiy initially won the Nobel Peace Prize for taking genuine steps toward peace and democracy. Then last November he dispatched armed forces to crush a mutiny in Tigray, leading to civil war. Abiy then invited in Eritrean soldiers who have been particularly brutal toward Tigrayans and who now seem unwilling to leave.

A Times colleague reported that soldiers had beaten a man to death with beer bottles. The United Nations reports that girls as young as 8 have been targeted for sexual assault. CNN chronicled a massacre of people attending Mass at a church.

In contrast to other countries where atrocities are unfolding, including Myanmar and Syria, Ethiopia is one where the United States has considerable influence, if we will use it.

President Joe Biden has denounced the large-scale human rights abuses. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has bluntly referred to ethnic cleansing, and the United States has imposed visa sanctions on some Ethiopian officials. Thats all welcome but seems tepid in the face of mass atrocities and starvation on this scale. I worked with Biden during the Darfur genocide and I know he cares about distant suffering; after seven months of brutality in Tigray, we need to see more signs of that concern.

The newest catastrophe in Tigray is mass starvation, with the U.N. reporting that 350,000 people are already suffering famine conditions. This is going to get a lot worse, said Mark Lowcock, the U.N. humanitarian chief.

The famine appears in part a tactic to starve a restive people into submission. Ethiopia has allowed some assistance, but soldiers have blocked or impeded much emergency aid, and Addario talked to one farmer who had four sons shot dead for working in their fields.

Shamefully, the U.N. Security Council has yet to discuss the crisis publicly. Thats because China and Russia are preventing a public meeting, claiming that this is Ethiopias internal matter.

Addario took one photo of a 5-year-old girl screaming in pain as her wounds were being cleaned after her family home was destroyed. An internal matter? Addario says nine people in the house were killed, including the girls sister, mother and grandfather.

When governments turn weapons on their own people, that is no longer a domestic affair. That is a challenge to our shared humanity.

Rape is being used systematically to terrorize and brutalize women and girls, Lowcock told a closed session of the Security Council this week, according to a copy of his remarks that I obtained. Eritrean soldiers are using starvation as a weapon of war.  Aid workers have been killed, interrogated, beaten, blocked from taking aid to the starving and suffering and told not to come back.

We cant stop every atrocity. We cant avert every murder or rape. We cant save the life of every starving child. But this is a rare case where we do have significant leverage: Ethiopia is the largest recipient of American aid in sub-Saharan Africa and a close security partner of the United States. We should apply every ounce of leverage we have to rein in a savagery in Tigray that increasingly reeks of genocide.
Theres a touching, beautifully illustrated new childrens book out thats drawing five-star reviews on Amazon and bringing adult readers to tears. Katy Has Two Grampas is by an Iowa man, Bob Schanke, and his Minnesota-based adult daughter, Julie Schanke Lyford. The storyline stems from an experience her daughter had as a preschooler and the authors say it may be the first childrens book to feature a pair of openly gay, married men as grandparents. That seems appropriate coming from one of the first U.S. states to have recognized a right to same-sex marriage, and one whose population skews older: up to 20 percent of Iowans are or will soon be 65 and up.

But the fact that the title character, Katy, has a pair of gay grandpas shell be bringing to class on Grandparents Day isnt presented as the source of the trouble that follows; its her difficulty communicating that because of a speech impediment.

Its like night and day comparing the joyful public reaction to this story with the outrage generated by the 1989 seminal childrens book Heather has two Mommies, about a girl who was born through artificial insemination to a lesbian mother and her partner. Heather became the American Library Associations ninth-most challenged book of the 1990s in the U.S., a lightning rod, according to the Los Angeles Times. It was banned and challenged, the subject of public debate and railed against in Congress.

The Katy book, titled as an homage to the one about Heather, according to the authors, seems to have garnered only praise so far.

But the evolution of attitudes during that period was also true of gay couples themselves. Just consider Bob Schanke and his spouse, Jack Barnhart, the Grampas in the new book, who are in their 37th year as a couple and once never expected or cared to marry. To Schanke, a now retired college theater professor, marriage was a straight thing to do. He and Barnhart, a retired social worker, each had already done it, with women.

In fact, before same-sex marriage was even perceived as a right worth fighting for, or one which could be won, some gay men and lesbians who finally felt safe coming out in the 70s and 80s, saw marriage as another social construct of a straight society they didnt need to emulate. But with the 2009 unanimous ruling of Iowas Supreme Court, when marrying each other actually became possible for Iowas same-sex couples, these two recognized the legal and financial advantages it could bestow. And on July 3, 2010, 25 years into being together, they had the profound experience of pledging an institutional commitment to one another.

Meanwhile Schankes daughter, Julie  from his marriage to former wife and still close friend Ruth  had made her way into adulthood campaigning for those rights because of her dad. She traveled Minnesota with the group Minnesotans United for All Families to advocate for marriage equality. Asked how she felt as a high schooler when shed first become aware her father was gay, she says matter-of-factly: To me it was a non-issue. It was a bigger issue to him. He couldnt understand why I wasnt more upset about it.  He was my dad and I loved him.

But she had to learn to navigate the attitudes of others in high school. I was allowed to tell my best friend. She didnt really speak to me anymore. Theyve since become friends again. And then there were her own dating experiences. After some awful reactions to her fathers orientation from prospective boyfriends saying things like, He can never be around our kids if we have them, she devised a simple test to gauge their suitability on the first date. Shed go to Blockbuster and check out either The Crying Game or The Bird Cage, both feature films with gay or transgender subtexts. If her dates were too shocked, it would be their last date. Her eventual husband, whom she married in 1999 and is still married to, was fabulous from Day 1.

Today Lyford is in her early 50s, her daughter Katy is in high school and her other daughter, Madi, in college. Schanke and Barnhart both are or soon will be 81, and are moving out of their longtime Pleasant Hill home with its hot tub, Tiki hut, luscious lawn and renowned former treehouse where friends would gather. (My parents, my late husband and I were lucky to be among them.) Theyre moving into a retirement community.

Time passes and some days you look up in amazement at how societal attitudes have evolved, to where Pride Month even feels mainstream. But theres a cyclical aspect to it and its easy to forget all the hard work of organizing and marching and advocating that went into changing laws and cultures  and the pushback.

You read the responses to this upbeat childrens book, which manages to subtly convey the universality of human experiences without sounding preachy or political  and note some dont even mention the gay part. Beautiful story about overcoming fear of public speaking, said one Amazon review. Absolutely beautiful example of how representation matters for all kids, said another. One person wrote of her mother who had speech problems as a child but was a product of a segregated school in the 50s so no one cared if little Black children had any issues. However, when the speech teacher came to her high school and worked with her, it made all the difference.

One woman wrote, I had no queer role models, no one to tell me everything is ok or tell me that a woman does not have to be with a man. I wish I had this book as a kid  my life would have gone very differently.

Basu is a columnist for the Des Moines Register.
College of the Ozarks is back in court asking for an injunction in their case against the Biden Administration.
Patricia McCloskey, left, and her husband Mark McCloskey leave a court in St. Louis, Thursday, June 17, 2021. The St. Louis couple who gained notoriety for pointing guns at social justice demonstrators last year has pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges. Patricia McCloskey pleaded guilty Thursday to misdemeanor harassment and was fined $2,000. Her husband, Mark McCloskey, pleaded guilty to misdemeanor fourth degree assault and was fined $750. The couple also agreed to forfeit both weapons they used when they confronted protesters in front of their home in June of last year.
Houston, MO (65483)

Today

A good deal of sunshine. High 83F. Winds NE at 10 to 15 mph..

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Wearing her heart sunglasses, Alicia Hernandez, center, joins around 150 people at a Missouri Jobs with Justice and partners press event and rally "to remind leaders that Medicaid Expansion is a constitutional right in Missouri, it will save lives, and bring money and jobs to our local economies" on Friday, May 14, 2021, at The Chouteau & Compton State Office Building. Photo by Laurie Skrivan, lskrivan@post-dispatch.com
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Adams Lifts State of Emergency, Gears Up for Summer & Fall Events

ADAMS, Mass.  The COVID-19 state of emergency in Adams is over.

Town Administrator Jay Green reported that Adams has lifted the state of emergency implemented for the pandemic. This originally went into effect in March 2020, and was lifted by the town to bring Adams into line with other local communities and the state of Massachusetts, which ended the public health emergency on June 15.

"Dare I say we are slowly approaching normalcy again," Green said Wednesday.

Selectman Joseph Nowak pointed out that despite the state of emergencies being lifted, local businesses may still require their patrons to wear masks. Moreover, Green said if COVID cases were to rise again in Adams, the Board of Health would have the authority to mandate masks independent of this decision by the Selectmen.

This, however, does not appear likely. Green reported that over roughly the last month, there were zero new reported cases of the novel coronavirus in Adams.

Adams joins Pittsfield, North Adams, and other towns in Berkshire County in lifting its state of emergency for the first time in more than a year.

In part to facilitate the return to normalcy, the Events Committee applied for and was granted space on the Town Hall lawn for outdoor movies on July 9, July 23, Aug. 6, and Aug. 20. These movies are family-friendly and begin at dusk. There will not be vendors, so attendees are advised to bring their own snacks and drinks.

In addition, the Events Committee requested and received approval for space at the Adams Visitors Center to hold outdoor concerts. These will be held on July 9, July 23, Aug. 6, and Aug. 20. These events will be held rain or shine.

In other news:
Juneteenth Celebrated as State, National Holiday

NORTH ADAMS, Mass.  Saturday is the first time that Juneteenth will be celebrated as state holiday but also as a national holiday.

The date has long been celebrated in parts of the country, sometimes as Emancipation Day, the day in 1865 when Union Army Gen. Gordan Granger proclaimed freedom for enslaved people in Texas, completing the end of slavery in the areas of the United States after more than 300 years. Juneteenth has been a state holiday in Texas for nearly 40 years.

President Lincoln had signed the Emancipation Proclamation nearly three years earlier but it would take the advance of the Union Army into the Confederacy to make freedom a reality.

Former Gov. Deval Patrick had first signed a proclamation recognizing Juneteenth in 2007 and, last July, Gov. Charlie Baker signed a bill making Juneteenth a state holiday.

After a whirlwind passage through Congress this past week, a bill making Juneteenth a national holiday was signed by President Biden on Thursday.

The June 19 holiday falls this year on Saturday, when it will be recognized in Massachusetts although local municipalities could decide to provide Friday as a day off. In the next two years it will fall on Sunday and Monday, creating a three-day weekend. However, with the date now a federal holiday, federal offices will be closed but some state and local government agencies may be open since holidays are often recognized through collective bargaining.

The Berkshire County branch of the NAACP will be hosting a rally at noon on Saturday at Park Square in Pittsfield. The branch's President Dennis Powell offered this commentary on the date's admission into the national holiday pantheon.

For Us, By Us

Black-eyed peas. Red velvet cake. Strawberry soda. If you're still following, then you already know what I'm talking about. That is to say  you understand without translation; there is no need for me to code switch. And that is very much the point.

In 2021, the Black vernacular has gone mainstream  corporate, even. "Bling bling" was in a Barbie commercial; "On fleek" is in the dictionary; Tiktok has all your kids saying "sheeeeeee." Yet, value is placed on culture derived from the Black experience  not the people themselves. White privilege "rediscovers" what Blackness has already created, and is celebrated for translating Black joy  for performing Blackness. This is not new. This is a long-standing tradition of white voyeurism into Black culture.

Still, until very recently, celebrating actual Blackness wasn't seen as profitable  not in a way where corporations like Nike and Google took public stands (albeit in exchange for proximity to Blackness ergo social currency). But as this trend shifts, and more and more predominately white institutions recognize the value of being non-Black while still being proximate to Blackness, assimilation threatens to further corrupt Black joy by satirizing Black culture.

Let me be clear: white-led organizations will never lead Black folk to liberation. Allyship begins at the bank. But Black spaces must be negotiated by Black folk. Any attempt to the contrary can only be interpreted as a ploy to garner social currency  Separating the two has allowed Blackness to be repackaged, as say Elvis or Miley Cyrus, before it is assimilated into American culture and monetized.

 which brings us back to black-eyed peas, red velvet cake, and strawberry soda. Now, if you weren't already aware, those words joined together are as Black as jumping over the broom. And the holiday with which they are associated is, in the vernacular: for us, by us.

Below, the proclamation making Juneteenth a federal holiday:

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A PROCLAMATION

On June 19, 1865  nearly nine decades after our Nation's founding, and more than two years after President Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation  enslaved Americans in Galveston, Texas, finally received word that they were free from bondage. As those who were formerly enslaved were recognized for the first time as citizens, Black Americans came to commemorate Juneteenth with celebrations across the country, building new lives and a new tradition that we honor today. In its celebration of freedom, Juneteenth is a day that should be recognized by all Americans. And that is why I am proud to have consecrated Juneteenth as our newest national holiday.

Juneteenth is a day of profound weight and power.

A day in which we remember the moral stain and terrible toll of slavery on our country  what I've long called America's original sin. A long legacy of systemic racism, inequality, and inhumanity.

But it is a day that also reminds us of our incredible capacity to heal, hope, and emerge from our darkest moments with purpose and resolve.

As I said on the 100th anniversary of the Tulsa Race Massacre, great nations don't ignore the most painful chapters of their past. Great nations confront them. We come to terms with them.

On Juneteenth, we recommit ourselves to the work of equity, equality, and justice. And, we celebrate the centuries of struggle, courage, and hope that have brought us to this time of progress and possibility. That work has been led throughout our history by abolitionists and educators, civil rights advocates and lawyers, courageous activists and trade unionists, public officials, and everyday Americans who have helped make real the ideals of our founding documents for all.

There is still more work to do. As we emerge from the long, dark winter of the COVID-19 pandemic, for example, racial equity remains at the heart of our efforts to vaccinate the Nation and beat the virus. We must recognize that Black Americans, among other people of color, have shouldered a disproportionate burden of loss  while also carrying us through disproportionately as essential workers and health care providers on the front lines of the crisis.

Psalm 30 proclaims that "weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning." Juneteenth marks both the long, hard night of slavery and discrimination, and the promise of a brighter morning to come. My Administration is committed to building an economy  and a Nation  that brings everyone along, and finally delivers our Nation's founding promise to Black Americans. Together, we will lay the roots of real and lasting justice, so that we can become the extraordinary country that was promised to all Americans.

Juneteenth not only commemorates the past. It calls us to action today.

NOW, THEREFORE, I, JOSEPH R. BIDEN JR., President of the United States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution and the laws of the United States, do hereby proclaim June 19, 2021, as Juneteenth Day of Observance. I call upon the people of the United States to acknowledge and celebrate the end of the Civil War and the emancipation of Black Americans, and commit together to eradicate systemic racism that still undermines our founding ideals and collective prosperity.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this eighteenth day of June, in the year of our Lord two thousand twenty-one, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and forty-fifth.

JOSEPH R. BIDEN JR.
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Uttar Pradesh police initiated a criminal investigation against independent news- website The Wire and three journalists Rana Ayyub, Saba Naqvi, and Mohammed Zubair on June 15 for sharing a video. The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and its Indian affiliate the Indian Journalists Union (IJU) demand the immediate withdrawal of the case.

The First Information Report (FIR) filed by an inspector at the Loni Border police station in Ghaziabad accused The Wire, Washington Post columnist Rana Ayyub, freelance journalist Saba Naqvi and co-founder of fact-checking website Alt News, Mohammed Zubair,of provoking communal sentiment by tweeting a video showing an elderly Muslim-man being beaten up by a group of men. Social media platform Twitter and three politicians from the opposition Congress Party are also mentioned in the FIR .

According to news reports, the video depicts Abdul Samad being thrashed by miscreants, who cut off his beard and forced him to chant a Hindu slogan Jai Shree Ram. The incident took place in the town of Loni on June 5.

The FIR states the accused violated Sections 153 (provocation to cause a riot), 153A (promoting enmity between religious groups), 295A (insulting religious beliefs), 505 (public mischief), and 120B (criminal conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code. If found guilty, they face prison penalties of up to one year. In the case of 120B (criminal conspiracy), it has a possible sentence of up to two years.

Journalists Ayyub , Naqvi and Zubair , who have reported critically about the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, claimed in social media posts that that they were merely highlighting the incident and there was no intention to provoke communal unrest.

The IFJs South Asia Press Freedom Report 2020-2021 noted Indias frequent misuse of laws, including sedition law, to suppress voices deemed to be critical of the establishment. The FIR against Twitter is the first case of its type following the Indian government passing its Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines And Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021.

The IJU president, Geetartha Pathak, said: Indian Journalists Union (IJU) condemns the lodging of criminal complaints against The Wire and three journalists. The IJU is deeply concerned about the tendency of the UP police to harass journalists critical of the government. The IJU demands immediate withdrawal of the FIR against the journalists."

The IFJ said: Criminalizing the sharing of news is a gross misuse of law. Selective law enforcement against journalists is Indias media freedom shame. The IFJ urges the government to withdraw the case against the case and let the media function independently.
The report Breaking the Silence: An Investigation into the Murder of Zubair Mujahid as part of A Safer World For The Truth initiative reveals how police investigators failed to obtain forensic report on the bullet that killed Zubair Mujahid, nor did it secure statements from key witnesses.



Zubair Mujahid, a correspondent for Daily Jang, Pakistan's largest Urdu newspapers, was killed on 23 November 2007 as he returned home on the back of a friends motorcycle. During his career, the journalist exposed police irregularities which led to a dismissal of many police officers from their posts. He also wrote a weekly column on Crime and Punishment which revealed mistreatment of authorities and landowners to the poor.



Following his murder, the local police department in Mirpurkhas district opened file for the investigation but failed to find the perpetrators. Another investigation by the Crime & Investigation Branch in Hyderabad again failed to further the investigation.



Khalid Sadaf, the brother of Zubair Mujahid, told the IFJ that Zubair Mujahid was a thorn in the side for police, administration and drug dealers and that this nexus resulted in his eventual murder. As he didnt compromise on his reporting, the Supreme Court took several Suo motu actions on his news. His assassination has created a vacuum in the Pakistani media, Sadaf said.



According to the IFJs South Asia Press Freedom Report 2020-2021 found that despite investigations being initiated by police, prosecution is almost null or inconclusive in most of the cases on crimes against journalists in South Asia.



PFUJ secretary general, Rana Muhammad Azeem, said: We stand with the family of Zubair Mujahid and demand the authorities to re-investigate the journalist's murder case under supervision of a powerful judicial commission so that justice be done and the culprits be put behind bars.



The IFJ said: Echoing the calls in this important report, the IFJ urges Pakistani authorities to acknowledge the flaws in this investigation and re-open the file on Zubair Mujahids murder."
Your company's mission is only as good as your execution, and being flexible to changes over the years is critical to executing successfully. This lesson was something that the team at Toms learned over the years, the Los Angeles-based company's chief strategy and impact officer, Amy Smith, said at Inc.'s virtual Purpose Power Summit this week.

In 2006, Blake Mycoskie founded the buy-one-give-one pioneer Toms with a mission of making shopping for shoes a charitable action. The model--for every pair of shoes purchased, another is donated to a person in need--became popular, and other mission-driven brands followed suit. However, the company retired this famous program in 2019 to instead donate a third of company profits to different charities and partners with the goal of making a larger impact.

"There's no doubt that the world around us is changing," Smith said of the decision to change models, which she says took her and her team over a year and a half to make before it was announced. While the original model had good intentions, she and her team realized that the degree to which it helped local communities varied widely, and it was best to allow some flexibility in Toms' charity work rather than defaulting to donating products. "It still generates giving. We still put that to work. We're just putting it to work in a different way," she said.

This year, Smith says the company's 15th anniversary has been a reflective time for her and her team to continue brainstorming the company's next steps. Below are a few insights they have learned about effectively evolving a company mission without losing impact.

Pass the Mic

If you're working with a charity or grassroots partner, Smith emphasized letting them be the ones to speak with your customers. "They're the best storytellers of their story," she said.

Providing your partner with your company's platform will not only help them see the value of your partnership, but it'll also help your customers understand what is happening in their community and how they're addressing those issues--and, ultimately, why you're choosing to fund them.

Learn From Criticism

"There's always going to be a negative voice out there," Smith said, as people are cynical about efforts made by for-profit companies. When this happens, she said to think of yourself as a lifelong learner and take that criticism seriously. Look at it, try to learn from it, and ask yourself if you're addressing unintended consequences from your support in the community. Once you do so, then when the negative comments come, you can feel confident in putting your best foot forward by sharing those mistakes and talking about your lessons learned.

Get Your Entire Team On Board With Changes
Warren Buffett, the chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, will turn 91 in August. Remarkably, at an age when most people have regressed to the caretaking of others, Buffett chugs along and continues to capture the world's attention as the greatest investor of this generation.

Buffett has amassed a following of millions who've learned many great investing tips. His sound wisdom doesn't end there. If you're a student or practitioner of good leadership, Buffett believes that long-term success is achieved not merely by your own doing, but by making smart leadership decisions that will yield results for yourself and your business.

Case in point: Buffett has learned that making smart leadership decisions requires modeling the leadership behaviors of the best managers.

Copy from the best

In Buffett's 2015 letter to shareholders of Berkshire Hathaway, he summarized how one arrives at leadership greatness in a few words:

Much of what you become in life depends on whom you choose to admire and copy.

The quote was in reference to Tom Murphy -- an exceptional leader who taught Buffett everything he learned about managing a company. Murphy built Capital Cities Communications into a telecommunications empire. In 1995, he sold the company (then Capital Cities/ABC) to Disney for approximately $19 billion.

Murphy, who was Buffett's biggest admirer, gave plenty of lessons on the best management practices that Buffett has adapted for his own companies, including:

1. Give autonomy to your employees

Autonomy, or the ability to control what you do, when you do it, and with whom, is one of the fundamental elements of what intrinsically motivates human beings, which leads to better performance.

Another great leader who believes in this premise is Hubert Joly, former chairman and CEO of Best Buy, whom I recently interviewed on the Love in Action podcast.

"Autonomy leads us to think creatively, which breeds innovation," Joly says. He's dead on, because innovation does not happen without the freedom to try out new ideas.

Autonomy is also motivating because it is more satisfying. But you need to set the right environment. Joly suggests:

Pushing decision making as far down as possible

Preferring a participative process

Adopting agile ways of working

Adjusting to skill and will

2. Learn to delegate your authority

Another type of mindset required to build your own success passed on from Murphy to Buffett is something that can be a benefit to every busy leader: Learn to delegate better.

Delegating doesn't come easy for perfectionists trying to solve problems on their own. To scale their businesses, leaders have to consciously trust other people's ability and brainpower to create and produce great things.

As one's management responsibilities grow, leaders and founders will eventually realize that they have to learn to delegate their weaknesses to other people's strengths.

The first pillar to successful delegation is to have a great team around you who can handle the task. And two-way trust must be established for anyone to feel comfortable delegating and sharing responsibilities.

3. Hire for integrity

Buffett learned from Murphy the competitive advantage that comes from having integrity guide business decisions. And it starts with whom you hire.

Buffett advises leaders to weigh integrity above all traits when assessing job candidates during the interview process. And for good reason: When it comes to hiring, it's a sure bet that some job candidates will display a lack of integrity in the interview process.

This why Buffett is quoted everywhere with this timeless piece of advice:

We look for three things when we hire people. We look for intelligence, we look for initiative or energy, and we look for integrity. And if they don't have the latter, the first two will kill you, because if you're going to get someone without integrity, you want them lazy and dumb.
Belize has long been considered a quiet corner of Central America, home to both the super-rich and the quiet, relatively harmonious Belizean people. The undeveloped cays, permanent sunshine and historical ties to Britain have meant that those seeking isolation, luxury and nature have been attracted to its pristine shores.

While geographically part of Central America, Belize feels much more Caribbean than Latin  thanks to the fact that English is the national language. Unlike the Caribbean, however, Belize boasts lush rainforests, mountains, and the kind of wide-open spaces that are harder to find on the cramped tourist destinations of neighbouring islands.

But behind the beauty of this natural paradise, there is a second, lesser-seen side to Belize.
Almost 50 tonnes of food is going in the bin each week reported Tesco, as experts warn the government of a heavy goods vehicle driver shortage.

During an industry-wide roundtable with ministers on Wednesday, organised by the Department for Transport, UK retailer Tesco highlighted that 48 tonnes of food had been wasted in the past seven days.

Industry experts have advised that there are not enough drivers to meet current demands.

Since the beginning of the year, 15,000 European lorry drivers, which were reinforcing our staffing, have left because of Brexit, because they didn't feel welcome and immigration problems, Rod McKenzie, CEO of the Road Haulage Association (RHA), told The Independent.

The tax changes that came in in April have also been difficult for them.

In addition, the RHA stated that some 30,000 lorry driver tests were cancelled last year, due to the pandemic.

That adds up to 30,000 potential lorry drivers, said McKenzie. There is an absolute danger to the UK supply chain on which we all depend - 95 per cent of what we have comes from the back of a lorry.

Whether you work in the food or building sector, there are clear delays.

The diver shortage is especially problematic when it comes to perishable goods, said Shane Brennan, CEO of the Cold Chain Federation.

If some chilled and very short life products cant be delivered they have to be destroyed, he told The Independent.

We are seeing the deployment of assets from the frozen food chain into the chilled food chain to try and avoid that wastage.

Everyone is trying to work out how we can cope with the demand with the lack of labour. We are in urgent talks across the industry and in government about what can be done to get us through the summer.

We are trying to do our day job without people.

Where safe to do so, Tesco and other UK retailers donate food to charities and food banks, but spoiled food often goes straight to landfill.

Average deliveries to food redistribution charity FareShare would be 150-160 tonnes per day, but are down to about 100, translating to 800,000 meals a week for people suffering from food poverty, the charity told The Grocer.

Food we would normally expect to receive into our warehouses on an average day is at risk of not reaching us, and therefore at risk of not reaching the vulnerable people we support, said Lindsay Boswell, CEO of FareShare.

The historic ability of the UK to deliver is now under threat, claims McKenzie, who suggested the government let European drivers back in, speed up and prioritise driver testing, and do more at apprenticeship level.

As a nation, our mindset when it comes to lorry drivers has to change, he claims: We need to make lorry drivers feel more loved - these guys do an essential job.
Common drugs used to treat high blood pressure have been recalled by the UKs medicines agency after being contaminated with an impurity that can increase the risk of cancer.

The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) stressed that they are recalling batches of the drugs from pharmacies and suppliers rather than patients and that there is no evidence they have caused harm, although investigations are ongoing.

The recall affects 31 batches of drugs containing Irbesartan and 2 containing Losartan, medicines which are used to treat high blood pressure, heart failure, type 2 diabetes and kidney disease in adults who also have high blood pressure.

Patients who take the affected drugs should speak to a doctor or pharmacist, the MHRA say, and should not stop taking their medicine without doing so. Government advice states that the health risk of suddenly stopping medication is higher than the potential risk posed by the impurity.

Dr June Raine, chief executive of the MHRA, called on healthcare staff to check their batches of sartan-containing drugs while the agency further investigates the issue.

Patient safety is our watchword. Were recalling batches of certain sartan-containing products as a precautionary measure while we continue our investigation. Its important that healthcare professionals check their stock to quarantine and return these batches, she said.

If youve been taking one of the affected products, speak with your doctor or pharmacist before stopping any treatment  they can address any concerns and can advise you on the best course of action.

The MHRA say that they have contacted UK licence holders of affected batches and asked them to quarantine the relevant stock.

They added that they are working with the Department of Health and Social Care to make sure that there are enough drugs available for people who ordinarily take them.

The MHRA is also working with the Marketing Authorisation Holders and other medicines regulators to determine any possible impact of contamination.

The 33 batches that have been recalled were supplied by Bristol Laboratories Limited, Brown & Burk UK Limited and Teva UK Limited.

The mutagenic impurity they contain is called 5-(4-(azidomethyl)-[1,1-biphenyl]-2yl)-1H-tetrazole, which can potentially increase the risk of cancer over time.

A full list of the affected batches can be found here.
Shamima Begum may have been trafficked to Syria as a child to be sexually exploited, her lawyers have told a court hearing.

The Home Office called the claim speculative and alleged that Begum had never referred to trafficking in media interviews from the Syrian camp where she is detained.

Fridays hearing was the latest stage of a long-running legal battle over the governments removal of Begums British citizenship.

In February, the Supreme Court ruled that the former Isis member could not return to the UK to fight her case, which sits with the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC).

Her lawyers told the court the Home Office had a legal duty to investigate whether Begum was a victim of trafficking when her citizenship was revoked on security grounds in 2019.

Samantha Knights QC said counter-terror police had suspicions of coercion and control at the time Begum left the UK, which she argued gives rise to the need to investigate the issue of trafficking.

In written submissions, Begum's legal team said the Home Office failed to consider whether she was a child trafficked to, and remaining in, Syria for the purposes of sexual exploitation and forced marriage.

Begum also wants to challenge the removal of her British citizenship on the grounds that it made her de-facto stateless and that the decision was procedurally unfair.

Begum left the UK for Syria aged 15, with two other schoolgirls from Bethnal Green in east London.

She was nine months pregnant when a journalist found her in the al-Hawl camp in northern Syria in early 2019, and her baby son later died.

Ms Knights told the court that Begum is currently held in the al-Roj camp in northern Syria, which is run by the Syrian Democrat Forces (SDF), where at least two British nationals are said to have died amid dire conditions.

15-year-old Amira Abase, Kadiza Sultana, 16, and Shamima Begum, 15, at Gatwick airport on their way to Syria in February 2015 (PA)

The barrister described the camp as a fundamentally unsafe environment, adding: Physical violence is common and psychological trauma is endemic.

The SDF, which also runs other camps and prisons for people captured from Isis territories, has repeatedly asked the UK and other countries to repatriate their nationals.

But the British government has been depriving surviving Isis members their UK citizenship in a bid to stop them returning.

Ms Knights said Begum was living in a situation of serious and present danger and asked SIAC to consider her proposed new grounds of appeal in November.

David Blundell QC, representing the Home Office, said Begum should not be permitted to change her grounds of appeal after two years of legal argument.

He argued that while Begum left the UK aged 15, she remained in Isis territory in Syria for a considerable period of time as an adult and only left when the terrorist groups caliphate was defeated.

It was at that stage, not when she was a child, that the deprivation decision was taken, he added.

In written submissions, Mr Blundell added: It is significant that the allegation is not that Begum was trafficked, but rather that she 'may have been' trafficked.

Timeline of the Isis caliphate Show all 19 1 /19 Timeline of the Isis caliphate Timeline of the Isis caliphate ISIS began as a group by the merging of extremist organisations ISI and al-Nusra in 2013. Following clashes, Syrian rebels captured the ISIS headquarters in Aleppo in January 2014 (pictured) AFP/Getty Timeline of the Isis caliphate Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi declared the creation of a caliphate in Mosul on 27 June 2014 Timeline of the Isis caliphate Isis conquered the Kurdish towns of Sinjar and Zumar in August 2014, forcing thousands of civilians to flee their homes. Pictured are a group of Yazidi Kurds who have fled Rex Timeline of the Isis caliphate On September 2 2014 Isis released a video depicting the beheading of US journalist Steven Sotloff. On September 13 they released another video showing the execution of British aid worker David Haines Timeline of the Isis caliphate The US launched its first airstrikes against Isis in Syria on 23 September 2014. Here Lt Gen William C Mayville Jnr speaks about the bombing campaign in the wake of the first strikes Getty Timeline of the Isis caliphate Isis militants sit atop a hill planted with their flag in the Syrian town of Kobani on 6 October 2014. They had been advancing on Kobani since mid-September and by now was in control of the citys entrance and exit points AFP/Getty Timeline of the Isis caliphate Residents of the border village of Alizar keep guard day and night as they wait in fear of mortar fire from Isis who have occupied the nearby city of Kobani Getty Timeline of the Isis caliphate Smoke rises following a US airstrike on Kobani, 28 October 2014 AFP/Getty Timeline of the Isis caliphate YPG fighters raise a flag as they reclaim Kobani on 26 January 2015 VOA Timeline of the Isis caliphate Isis seized the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra on 20 May 2015. This image show the city from above days after its capture by Isis Getty Timeline of the Isis caliphate Kurdish forces are stationed on a hill above the town of Sinjar as smoke rises following US airstrikes on 12 November 2015 AFP/Getty Timeline of the Isis caliphate Kurdish forces enter Sinjar after seizing it from Isis control on 13 November 2015 AFP/Getty Timeline of the Isis caliphate Iraqi government forces make the victory sign as they retake the city of Fallujah from ISIS on 26 June 2016 Getty Timeline of the Isis caliphate Iraqi forces battle with Isis for the city of Mosul on 30 June 2017 AFP/Getty Timeline of the Isis caliphate Members of the Iraqi federal police raise flags in Mosul on 8 July 2017. On the following day, Iraqi prime minister Haider Al Abadi declares victory over Isis in Mosul Getty Timeline of the Isis caliphate Members of Syrian Democratic Forces celebrate in Al-Naim square after taking back the city of Raqqa from Isis. US-backed Syrian forces declare victory over Isis in Raqqa on 20 October 2017 after a four-month long campaign Getty Timeline of the Isis caliphate Female fighters of the Syrian Democratic Forces celebrate in Al-Naim Square after taking back the city of Raqqa from Isis. US-backed Syrian forces declare victory over Isis in Raqqa on 20 October 2017 after a four-month long campaign AFP/Getty Timeline of the Isis caliphate Trucks full of women and children arrive from the last Isis-held areas in Deir ez-Zor, Syria in January 2019 They were among the last civilians to be living in the ISIS caliphate, by this time reduced to just two small villages in Syrias Deir ez-Zor Richard Hall/The Independent Timeline of the Isis caliphate Zikia Ibrahim, 28, with her two-year-old son and 8-month-old daughter, after fleeing the Isis caliphate, on Saturday 26 January 2019 Richard Hall/The Independent

Begum herself has never stated that she has been trafficked, despite having given numerous media interviews and provided instructions to her solicitors on a number of matters.

The absence of a claim that she has in fact been trafficked means this ground proceeds on an uncertain factual basis; it is entirely speculative.

The Home Office also argues that Begum's case should be put on hold until a separate case before SIAC, which is due to be heard next March, has concluded.

At Friday's hearing, the commission also considered the cases of three women who have all had their British citizenship revoked on the grounds of national security.

The three women, known only as C8, C10 and D4, are currently held in appalling conditions at the same al-Roj camp as Begum.

Their barrister, Julianne Kerr Morrison, said C8 has two very young children with her in the camp, while C10 has four young children with her, two of those have ongoing health issues.

Ms Morrison added that D4 was seriously unwell and has also been suffering from coronavirus.

Mr Justice Jay, who is presiding over the case, said he would aim to give his ruling in the last week of June.

Of around 900 people who left Britain to engage in the conflict in Syria and Iraq since 2014, around a fifth had been killed and 40 per cent have returned.

Additional reporting by PA
Senior Tories say Boris Johnson must change course or face more defeats in southern seats, with a warning the Liberal Democrats could become the natural party for the home counties.

Former Cabinet ministers are among worried Conservatives calling on the prime minister to accept the danger that his blue wall will crumble  in a mirror image of Labours plight in the north.

They spoke out after a defiant prime minister defended his planning shake-up  despite it being blamed for the crushing Chesham and Amersham by-election defeat  claiming it had been misunderstood.

Damian Green and David Davis told The Independent the controversial changes, attacked for allowing developers to ride roughshod over local democracy, must be rethought.

But other Tories pointed to a deeper problem of a government that proclaimed itself as One Nation, but whose actions dont match its words, as ex-health minister Stephen Hammond put it.

The Conservatives need to prove they are not guilty of the charge laid against Labour of complacency and taking communities for granted, Mr Hammond said.

Meanwhile, David Gauke, exiled from the Conservatives over Brexit, suggested 30 or 40 seats in the south of England were vulnerable to the Lib Dems, warning: Then the political map does begin to change.

If they can make the case that they are the natural party for the home counties, that they can represent pro-business, centre right voters, then theres an opportunity for the Liberal Democrats that they could take, the ex-justice secretary said.

There are 23 Tory seats which the Lib Dems would snatch on a 10 per cent swing  less than half that achieved in Chesham and Amersham  one recent analysis found. The Lib Dems have overturned a large Tory majority to win the Chesham and Amersham by-election, claiming a seat that had been a Conservative stronghold for decades.

The result sees Lib Dem Sarah Green become the countrys newest MP, taking 56.7 per cent of the vote to secure a majority of 8,028 over the second-placed Tories.

The Lib Dem victory sends a shockwave through British politics, said the partys leader Ed Davey, exposing the potential fragility of Mr Johnsons party in the blue wall of southern England.

The contest was triggered by the death of former minister Dame Cheryl Gillan, who won in Chesham and Amersham with a majority of 16,233 in the last general election in 2019.

They include the Surrey constituencies of foreign secretary Dominic Raab and his predecessor Jeremy Hunts, as well as Mr Hammonds Wimbledon seat.

Mr Green, Theresa Mays de-facto deputy prime minister, said, of the shock result: In many ways its an old-fashioned by-election protest, but we have to hear the obvious message about planning and over-development.

And Mr Davis, the former Brexit Secretary, said: Governments should always pay careful attention to by-election setbacks, even ones dominated by tactical voting and Liberal tricks.

The Chesham result implies that we should think hard about both HS2 and our prospective planning policy.

Former cabinet minister Theresa Villiers, writing in the Telegraph, also urged ministers to rethink their approach to planning reform saying the current housing targets in the south east of England were very high.

Gavin Barwell, Mrs Mays former chief-of-staff, said the by-election result in true-blue Buckinghamshire was a mirror image of Labours defeat in Hartlepool last month.

If you could replicate that at a general election, there will be other Conservative MPs in the southeast of England who will be quite worried about that, he predicted.

The criticism comes after Andrew Mitchell, another former cabinet minister, warned of defeat unless the Conservatives remained a broad church, as he attacked the overseas aid cuts.

But, speaking on a college visit, Mr Johnson rejected warnings of trouble in the south, calling them a bit peculiar, a bit bizarre and pointing to local election gains all over the place last month.

He appeared to point to the construction of the HS2 high-speed rail line as the reason for the shock defeat, referring to particular circumstances there.

And, on planning, the prime minister said: I think theres some misunderstanding about the planning reforms  even some wilful misunderstanding on the part of some of our opponents.

What we want is sensible plans to allow development on brownfield sites. Were not going to build on greenbelt sites, were not going to build all over the countryside.

In an article for The Independent, Mr Davey wrote: The pundits said it was impossible for any party to beat the Conservatives in Buckinghamshire.

Our resounding victory demonstrates the discontent, the frustration and the anger that so many people  even many who have voted Conservative all their lives  feel towards Boris Johnson.

But Mr Hammond told The Independent: The government says and wants to be One Nation, but its actions dont match its words.

Hinting at southern voters feeling neglected in the push to win the north, he added: If levelling up is good for north then it is good for Buckinghamshire and London.
Canadian millionaires who charted a private jet to a small First Nations settlement for Covid vaccines admitted to violating local pandemic restrictions, according to reports.

Former gambling executive Rodney Baker and his actress wife Ekaterina Baker, of Vancouver, pleaded guilty to violating the Civil Emergency Measures Act that required people to isolate for 14 days after entering Yukon, according to court records reported by The New York Times.

The couple received a backlash in Canada after extensive media coverage about the "wealthy white couple" who took vaccines intended for elderly Indigenous people.

The pair had flown from their home in Vancouver to the Yukon capital of Whitehorse on 19 January, where the two-week quarantine was mandatory, and then charted a flight further north to Beaver Creek, a settlement of about 100 that had been prioritised because of its older population from the White River First Nation, The Guardian reported.

The couple had claimed they worked at a nearby motel to receive the first dose of the Moderna vaccine, Yukon Community Services Minister John Streicker told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.

Mr Baker later resigned from his role as chief executive of the Great Canadian Gaming Corporation, which operates casinos and hotels across the country. His wife, a Russian-born actress, recently appeared in Fatman with Mel Gibson and Chick Fight with Alex Baldwin, Bella Thorne and Malin Ackerman, according to IMDB.

Yukon Territorial Court Justice Michael Cozens told the virtual hearing the couple would be fined a combined C$2,300; or $1,000 plus a $150 surcharge each, about USD $1,890 or 1,340 each.

The court heard that they also donated C$5,000 each to the UN-led global vaccine program Covax, according to the Associated Press, about USD $8,100 or 5,800, combined.

It may have helped the couple avoid jail time, with crown prosecutor Kelly McGill quoted by The Guardian that they considered a stronger sentence but the donations and guilty plea were "mitigating factors".

Judge Michael Cozens said during court proceedings that it was fortunate that no one got Covid as a result of the couples actions.

"There was harm, but the harm wasnt anyone catching Covid. It was certainly psychological," he said, according to CBC.
While the House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly in support of declaring 19 June, or Juneteenth, a national holiday, several members of the Republican party decided to oppose it.

The Juneteenth National Independence Day Act passed in the House with 415 votes in favour and 14 votes against  all from Republicans. The next day the Senate unanimously passed the measure and President Biden signed it into law on Thursday afternoon.

The bill recognises as a national public holiday 19 June 1865, the day enslaved people in Galveston, Texas, learned that the Civil War had ended and that they were free from slavery. Over 250,000 people in the state of Texas finally got their freedom, two and a half years after president Abraham Lincolns Emancipation Proclamation had freed all enslaved African Americans in rebel states. Texas recognised Juneteenth as a holiday in 1980, and was the first state to do so.

Juneteenth is as significant to African Americans as 4 July is to all Americans, Sheila Jackson Lee, a Democrat representative from Texas and a lead sponsor of the bill, said in a statement posted on Twitter.

Despite the overall sense of celebration around the declaration of the federal holiday, the 14 Republicans who voted against it raised a number of concerns, including over the name of the holiday and whether it conflates with the 4 July.

The 14 Republicans who voted against the bill are following:

Mo Brooks, Alabama

Andy Biggs, Arizona

Scott DesJarlais, Tennessee

Tom Tiffany, Wisconsin

Doug LaMalfa, California

Tom McClintock, California

Mike Rogers, Alabama

Ralph Norman, South Carolina

Chip Roy, Texas

Paul Gosar, Arizona

Matt Rosendale, Montana

Ronny Jackson, Texas

Thomas Massie, Kentucky

Andrew Clyde, Georgia

Some of them shared their reasons for opposing the holiday. I fully support creating a day to celebrate the abolition of slavery, a dark portion of our nations history, Mr Massie, the representative from Kentucky, said on the House floor on Wednesday. However, naming this day National Independence Day will create confusion and push Americans to pick one of those two days as their independence day based on their racial identity, he said.

Mr Massie is also one of the 21 Republicans who voted against awarding the Congressional Gold Medal to all police officers who responded to the 6 January attack on the Capitol by a pro-Trump mob. Apart from Mr Massie, Andy Biggs, Andrew Clyde, Chip Roy, Ralph Norman and Paul Gosar have also voted against both the measures.

Why cant we name this Emancipation Day, and come together as Americans, and celebrate that day together as Americans: Black and white, all colors, all races, all ethnicities, and then come together on Independence Day, which celebrates the creation of our country throwing off an oppressive government, he added.

Texas representative Chip Roy also argued over the name of the holiday and said the legislation should have gone through a House committee.

I believe its been often referred to in our history as Jubilee Day, as Emancipation Day, as Freedom Day  I would be amenable to any of those names, Mr Roy said in the House. I dont believe that the title National Independence Day works, and I would prefer that we just have a debate on that.

Arizonas Paul Gosar took to Twitter with his statement and said: Our country is divided, and the cultural and political Marxists are continuing their relentless efforts to divide this country further.

Juneteenth is more debunked Critical Race Theory in action. I reject racism. I reject the racial division people are promoting. I voted no because this proposed holiday does not bring us together, it tears us apart, he wrote. I cannot support efforts that furthers racial divisions in this country. We have one Independence Day, and it applies equally to all people of all races.

The term critical race theory has been increasingly used by Republicans to refer to any conversations about racism and anti-racism.

Montanas Rosendale also echoed that sentiment, claiming the holiday is an effort by the left to create a day out of whole cloth to celebrate identity politics as part of its larger efforts to make Critical Race Theory the reigning ideology of our country.

Ralph Norman of South Carolina posted a thread on Twitter also critiquing the naming of the holiday. He wrote that hes concerned the federal holiday will cost the federal government over a billion dollars.

Our Independence Day is 4 July. Period. Independence Day celebrates the anniversary of our declared independence from Great Britain, and its been that way for 245 years, Mr Norman wrote. If you want to call Juneteenth, for example, Freedom Day or Emancipation Day then fine  thats certainly worth considering. But calling it Independence Day is WHOLLY INAPPROPRIATE.

Scott DesJarlais of Tennessee said that he voted against the bill because he believes it is fiscally irresponsible to continue to create new paid holidays for federal workers while the majority of hard-working private-sector employees get left to pay the bill.

Ronny Jackson of Texas wrote: I support Texas Juneteenth holiday and I support all Americans who celebrate it, he said in a statement on Thursday. However, I do not support more days off for federal employees.

Tom McClintock of California wrote in his statement: I dont believe its healthy to reach into the dead past, revive its most malevolent conflicts and reintroduce them into our age.

Matt Rosendale said in a statement on Wednesday. This isnt an effort to commemorate emancipation, its very clearly tied to the larger hard-left agenda to enshrine the racial history of this country as the prime aspect of our national story.
In the wake of Republican election losses and the GOPs unfounded narrative of widespread voter fraud, more than a dozen states have passed sweeping elections reform laws that make it harder to vote, including criminalising handing out food and water to people waiting in long lines to cast their ballot at the polls.

Democratic US Senators Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley have introduced a bill that intends to push back on those efforts. The legislation would end hours-long lines at polling places that suppress hundreds of thousands of American votes, and to restore our Constitutional rights to vote in free and fair elections.

Scenes of long lines at voting precincts across the US have dominated Election Day coverage in recent years. Roughly 3 million voters waited 30 minutes or longer to cast their ballot in the 2018 elections, surpassing the acceptable threshold for wait times set by the Presidential Commission on Election Administration, according to the Brennan Center for Justice.

With the widespread closures of Election Day polling locations and the consolidation of voting precincts, voting rights advocates have warned that longer wait times could suppress voters who now face diminishing options to vote early or by mail to avoid crowded in-person voting.

More than 500,000 people did not cast a vote because of long lines in the 2018 elections, according to the Bipartisan Policy Center.

The POLL Act would require states to mandate audits by the Election Assistance Commission to determine how long voters wait to cast their ballots, and would supply $500m to states to help reduce wait times in unreasonably long lines.

No one should be shut out of the democratic process just because they cant spend hours waiting in lines to cast a ballot, Senator Wyden said in a statement. Making voting accessible and convenient shouldnt be a partisan issue.

Voters who wait longer than 30 minutes could be eligible for $50 through discrimination complaints, and $50 for every hour after, under the senators proposal.

Those penalties would increase if a court determines long lines were the result of intentional voter suppression.

Nearly 21,000 Election Day polling locations closed before the 2020 presidential election, down from previous presidential election cycles in 2016 and 2012, according to an analysis from VICE News, which found widespread closures as districts grappled with coronavirus-related closures, cost-cutting measures and lingering impacts from legislated voter suppression.

The changes represent a 20 per cent cut of polling locations nationwide within just four years.

Poll closures and long wait times disproportionately impact Black and Latino voters compared to white voters, several analyses have found.

In its 2020 report, the Brennan Center found that more than 6 per cent of Latino voters and 7 per cent of Black voters reported waiting 30 minutes or longer to vote. That figure falls to 4.1 per cent among white voters.

More generally, Latino voters waited on average 46 per cent longer than white voters, and Black voters waited on average 45 per cent longer than white voters, according to the report.

Counties that became less white over the past decade also had fewer election resources than whiter counterparts  the average county where the white population grew had 63 voters per poll worker and roughly 390 voters per polling place, the Brennan Center found.

But the average county that became less white had 80 voters per worker and 550 voters per polling place.

The landmark 1965 Voting Rights Act established that states with a history of voter discrimination must have federal approval before changing election rules  but those rules were tossed out in 2013 by a split US Supreme Court. Fifteen states closed more than 1,600 polls between 2012 and 2018.

A report from the Leadership Conference on Civil & Human Rights said that high courts decision catalysed a systemic examination of poll closures and other seemingly innocuous changes that could have negatively impacted voters of colour.

Senator Jon Ossoff of Georgia  where Republicans have passed a law that criminalises giving out food and water to voters  has promoted a Voter Access to Water Act to undermine those state-level restrictions and address long wait times at the polls.

Republicans have claimed that allowing people to hand out food and water would encourage electioneering at the polls, which is already illegal.

Georgia Governor Brian Kemp signed into law an elections bill that, among other measures, makes it a misdemeanor to give out food or water within 150 feet of a polling place or within 25 feet of a person standing in line to vote.

During a recent committee hearing for the For The People Act, Senator Ossoff pushed for his proposal to be included in the sweeping voting rights bill, but it was blocked by Senate Republicans.

The For The People Act proposes automatic voter registration, at least 15 consecutive days of early voting for federal elections, and standardises mail-in voting options and drop boxes for absentee ballots, among a host of other proposals wrapped into the bill.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is teeing up a vote for the measure, but it is likely to fail against a Republican filibuster, which needs at least 60 votes to overcome in the evenly divided Senate.
Board members of a democracy foundation reportedly raised concerns about Elise Stefanik, an ally of Donald Trump, after she rejected Joe Bidens election win in Congress in January  but no action was taken.

She was among dozens of Republicans who rejected 2020s election results in the aftermath of the Capitol riot on 6 January.

On Thursday, it was reported that Ms Stefanik  who recently became Republican conference chair following the ousting of anti-Trump congresswoman Liz Cheney  was a member of NEDs board.

The agency, founded in 1983, is non-partisan and works to further democracy abroad.

A NED spokesperson confirmed to Politico that board members raised concerns about Ms Stefanik with NED president Carl Gershman on 8 January, but said no further action was taken.

People are elected to three-year terms and shes in her first term and thats all I have to say about that, Mr Gershman said to Politico when approached for comment.

Its kind of like the Catholic Church appointing a self-described atheist as a cardinal, said Max Boot, of the Council on Foreign Relations. Elise Stefanik is part of the threat to American democracy.

Mr Boot continued: Its a travesty that shes on the board of an institution whose goal is to promote democracy.

Dick Gephardt, a former NED member and Democratic House speaker, also raised concerns and said: How is it consistent for someone like her to be on the board of NED given its mission for promoting democracy all over the world?

The Democrat went on to reference Republican attempts in a number of US states to reduce voting access in the wake of Donald Trumps defeat.

Ms Stefanik, who became a board member shortly after her election to Congress in 2018, also recently voted against the formation of a commission to investigate the Capitol riot, and has backed a Republican audit of ballots in Arizona.

That followed her election to Republican conference chair in the House, with the backing of Mr Trump.

The Independent has approached NED and Ms Stefanik for further comment.
Former President Donald Trump rang into Sean Hannitys Fox News show on Wednesday and criticised fellow Fox host Chris Wallace once again.

The jab at Mr Wallace came as Mr Trump and Mr Hannity discussed Hunter Bidens involvement in Ukraines gas and oil industry, agreeing it was odd how he got millions of dollars for his work.

Mr Trump brought up a September 2020 debate in which Wallace served as moderator, and during which Mr Trump kept interrupting Mr Biden with questions about his sons involvement in Ukraine.

Mr Trump claimed Mr Wallace was trying to protect the Bidens, despite the debate section surrounding the rise of China.

Chris Wallace protected him because he couldnt answer the question. So Chris Wallace protected him, good old Chris Wallace. Hell never be Mike, referencing Chris Wallaces father, one of the original correspondents of CBS 60 Minutes. Mike Wallace died in 2012.

In the interview with Mr Hannity, Mr Trump declared we no longer have a fair and free press.

Throughout his presidency, Mr Trump frequently attacked reporters and labelled the media fake news.

"Now lets talk about the president. He has done everything he can to undercut the media, to try to delegitimize us. And I think his purpose is clear: To raise doubts when we report critically about him and his administration that we can be trusted," Chris Wallace said while speaking at a Washington DC news media museum in 2019.
The husband of Caroline Crouch, a 20-year-old British woman, has confessed to killing her at their home in the Athens suburb of Glyka Nera last month.

Babis Anagnostopoulos, 33, initially told detectives his wife was murdered by thieves who broke into their home in the early hours of 11 May and tied them up.

However, the Hellenic Police said on Thursday the helicopter pilot had now confessed to the crime.

The perpetrator is [Ms Crouchs] 33-year-old husband, who confessed to his act, a statement released by detectives said.

Reports in Greek media claimed Mr Anagnostopoulos had admitted to strangling his wife during an argument while their baby daughter, who was not harmed in the incident, was only a few metres away.

Mr Anagnostopouloss apparent confession followed a six-hour interrogation, carried out after he was summoned for further questioning.

The development could spell the end of a month-long investigation into circumstances of Ms Crouchs killing, which had left police baffled, due to the lack of evidence found at the scene.

Mr Anagnostopoulos had told police he was tied up by three robbers, while a fourth stood guard, who put a gun to his childs head, strangled his wife, and then got away with 10,000 in cash.

But fresh analysis of smartwatch data and text messages between the married couple prompted officers to re-interview him.

Announcing the interview on Thursday, police told the Greek TV network Ant1: The husband of the victim in Glyka Nera is at the homicide department in order to be examined as the only eye witness following new data that has emerged from the inquiry.

Apostolos Skrekas, a Hellenic Police spokesperson, refused to elaborate on whether Mr Anagnostopoulos had acted on his own or hired accomplices when probed by local reporters.

Police from Athens collected Mr Anagnostopoulos by helicopter on Thursday from a nearby island. He had been attending a memorial service for his wife on the Aegean island of Alonissos, where she grew up, but was taken by boat to Skiathos where he was then flown back to the Greek capital for questioning.

Minutes before officers arrived, the suspect was photographed hugging Ms Crouchs mother, Susan Dela Cuesta, outside the chapel where mourners laid flowers at her grave.

Police said Mr Anagnostopoulos was informed he would be called in on that day and had agreed with him that he should attend the memorial beforehand.

We waited for the memorial service to end and then [Anagnostopoulos] was transferred to Police HQ, a police official told Ant1.

Ms Crouch, a statistics student at the University of Piraeus, moved to the island of Alonissos when she was eight. She met her future husband there and the pair were married in July 2019 in Portugal.

They welcomed their daughter in June last year.

Last month, Mr Anagnostopoulos posted a tribute to his deceased wife on his personal Instagram page. Alongside an image of the couple on their wedding day, he wrote: Together forever. Have a nice trip my love.
The husband of murdered British woman Caroline Crouch arrived at an Athens court on Friday in handcuffs and a bulletproof vest after being charged with her murder.

Helicopter pilot Babis Anagnostopoulos had initially claimed his 20-year-old wife died after violent burglars broke into their home on the outskirts of Athens last month as their young daughter slept.

He had said the men stole cash before escaping.

But his lawyers said that Mr Anagnostopoulos, 33, had now confessed to the crime, adding that he had expressed remorse for his actions. He had been arrested by police on Thursday evening.

Police investigators said analysis of data from a smartwatch worn by the victim had helped reveal inconsistencies in the pilots account of events.

An examination of the watch, mobile devices used by Crouch, and cameras, had established a timeline that contradicted the pilots testimony.

Everything was staged for the crime scene to look like the scene of a robbery, Costas Hassiotis, director of the greater Athens homicide division told reporters, adding that the suspect had tied his own hands and those of his dead wife.

In parts of his confession leaked to Greek media on Friday, the defendant claimed his wife had kicked me out of bed the night of the murder following a row.

That night, of the 11th of May, we had another fight, Anagnostopoulos admitted to the interrogators, according to reports. She kicked me out of bed, and I saw her putting the baby back in the crib as I was leaving.

Their daughter was unharmed, but the family dog was found choked to death, authorities said.

The story has shocked Greece and has made headlines worldwide. It prompted government officials to announce a 300,000 (257,000) reward for information about the crime.

Mr Anagnostopoulos was detained after authorities summoned him for questioning on Thursday while he was attending a memorial service for Ms Crouch on the Aegean Sea island of Alonissos, where she grew up.

Babis Anagnostopoulos, escorted by police, leaves the court in Athens (AP)

He was flown to Athens by helicopter from the nearby island of Skiathos, and interviewed for more than six hours before police announced that he was a suspect.

In a 16 May post on Instagram, Anagnostopoulos uploaded an undated photograph of the couple on a trip to Portugal for a wedding photoshoot, writing: Always together. Farewell, my love.

Greek police released a statement that read: The investigation of the homicide of a 20-year-old native that took place on May 11, 2021 in Glyka Nera is now closed. The perpetrator is her 33-year-old husband, who confessed to his act.
Poachers masquerading as rangers, magistrates allegedly taking bribes from kingpins and lenient sentences handed out to ruthless criminals - this is the current state of South Africas rhino crisis, according to campaigners.

Strict limits on travel due to coronavirus, imposed last year, had a positive effect on keeping poachers and smugglers at bay, with just 394 rhinos poached in the country in 2021, 30 percent fewer than the year before and the lowest yearly tally since 2011.

The majority of these incidents came from Kruger National Park (245) and the Kwa-Zulu Natal (93), according to South Africas Department of Environment, Forestry and Fisheries.

But with gates open again, the onslaught on rhinos and corruption inside courtrooms is once again rising, according to Jamie Joseph, head of the environmental charity, Saving the Wild.

Speaking from an undisclosed location in Africa, Ms Joseph told the Independent: For the last decade corruption has been driving rhinos into extinction, and its just getting worse.

The kingpins call the shots; we run the intel, they get arrested, but then they always get bail and never go to jail.

Ms Joseph alleged that kingpins were able to rule because of the dirty officers and magistrates on their payroll.

South Africa is home to 80 percent of Africas rhino population, but there are only about 25,000 rhinos left and roughly 1,000 are killed every year for their horn.

Stop the Illegal Wildlife Trade We are working with conservation charities Space for Giants and Freeland to protect wildlife at risk from poachers due to the conservation funding crisis caused by Covid-19. Help is desperately needed to support wildlife rangers, local communities and law enforcement personnel to prevent wildlife crime. Donate to help Stop the Illegal Wildlife Trade HERE.

But the violent and deadly trade has brewed in the country for decades; In 2007, the country lost just 13 rhinos to poaching; the next year, that number jumped to 83.

By 2014, a total of 1,215 had been killed in one year and deaths are still high.

The horns are made of keratin, the same substance as fingernails, which means they can grow back. They are considered to be worth more by weight than cocaine, and so traffickers go to great lengths to smuggle it out or in and around Africa.

Ms Joseph, a dedicated conservationist originally born in Zimbabwe, first launched what she describes as the Blood Rhino Blacklist in 2017  a list of allegedly corrupt magistrates and lawyers who she claims have taken bribes on rhino poaching and other crimes.

Her Blacklist investigations led the Ministry of Justice to suspend KwaZulu Natal Court President, Eric Nzimande.

Mr Nzimande, who was responsible for, among other things, the appointment of presiding officers to the provinces regional courts was suspended in October 2018.

He now he faces 112 disciplinary charges, including appointing acting regional court magistrates in return for payments.

Other cases of alleged corruption in courts include the case of alleged kingpin Dumisani Gwala, who is accused of running a trafficking ring.

He was arrested with rhino horn, but has pleaded not guilty to charges of dealing in protected wildlife parts.

An eight-month intelligence-driven operation led to Mr Gwalas arrest in December 2014.

It was hailed a significant bust as he had been caught several times before, but the cases had either been withdrawn, or the dockets suspiciously went missing, according to Ms Joseph.

The case of Mr Gwala is still ongoing but the campaigner said his trial at Mtubatuba Magistrates Court is long overdue.

It has been mired in controversy and back in 2017 several wildlife campaigners argued that the case needed to be moved to a different court.

The trial is now scheduled for June 28 this year after it was delayed 30 times, Ms Joseph told the Independent.

Jean-Pierre Roux, the former police endangered wildlife detective, who arrested Gwala, said: We faced corruption in all facets from police involvement in criminal activities, the robbery and corruption that comes after people are confronted or arrested to the corruption with the magistrates and prosecutors.

We had to deal with all of that.

(The Independent )

Mr Roux, who has faced death threats for getting too close to information, claimed that some police officers left or retired from forces due to the state of the alleged corruption.

I think proper vetting should be implemented as well as background checks. But then you must take into consideration as well, that not all criminals or corrupt officials start off corrupt but they change when they come in.

But another issue is that those good officials or rangers are afraid of speaking up out of fear of losing their lives because they might live in the same area as the criminal. They could get killed, he added.

But Ms Joseph claims that corruption doesnt just lie inside courtrooms in South Africa but it also takes place on the fields, where rangers should be protecting the wildlife.

She alleged that the greatest challenge the Kruger faces is the enemy within.

One bust includes that of Phineas Dinda, who is a former Sanparks full corporal in the Rangers Corps.

He was arrested in Tshokwane section in May 2019 and was found in possession of trespassing the Kruger National Park, conspiracy to commit a crime, and possession of an unlicensed firearm, live ammunition and an axe, reported the Times Live.

Dinda was jailed for 16 years.

Three other SanParks employees were arrested for poaching in October 2020, according to EWN News.

The two security guards and another worker from the technical services division were arrested during an operation between the park and the police.

In a statement published by Gareth Coleman, the managing executive of the Kruger National Park, at the time, he said: It is always disheartening when colleagues from Sanparks are involved in criminal activities.

It breaks down trust amongst employees which impacts our responsibilities to act as an effective conservation authority serving the people of South Africa, Mr Coleman said.

Ms Joseph, however, argues much more needs to be done as rangers are being forced to work with poachers masquerading as rangers.

The thing is, you can have all the money and all the technology and all the weapons and all the soldiers in the world. But if you lose the war on corruption, you lose the war on everything, she added.
The town of South Kingstowns school committee Monday fired Superintendent Linda Savastano just short of two years on the job. By a unanimous vote of the School Committee, members approved a separation agreement that the panel last week told its attorney to negotiate with Savastano. The panel Monday gave no public reasons for asking for her departure, but it is effective immediately. Her separation agreement includes continuing her full pay until Dec. 31 unless she is hired elsewhere and then a reduction schedule follows. In addition, both she and the school committee agree to avoid publicly criticizing each other. The move comes two weeks after Savastano admitted that she was responsible for the release of student directory information to a political group. Do you agree with the School Committee's decision? Let us know in this week's poll question.

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There have been some social media posts regarding the composition of COVAXIN where it has been suggested that the vaccine contains the newborn calf serum. The government has clarified that the facts have been twisted and misrepresented in these posts.

"The final vaccine (COVAXIN) does not contain newborn calf serum at all and the calf serum is not an ingredient of the final vaccine product," Union Health Ministry said.

Then, what is the role of the serum in making of the vaccine? Is newborn calf serum used to make Bharat Biotech's Covaxin?

Reuters

What role it plays

An RTI reply to applicant Vikas Patni suggests so. "The newborn calf serum is used in the revival process of Vero cells, which is further used for the production of coronavirus during the manufacturing of Covaxin," Bharat Biotech in a reply to the Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation (CDSCO) has said. The RTI asked if vaccine producers used fetal bovine serum (FBS) in making coronavirus vaccines.

In the clarification, the government reiterated the well-known use of calf serum, as also serum extracted from other animals, in the development of vaccines. These are needed to grow the disease-causing virus, bacteria or other pathogens in the laboratory, but do not themselves become an ingredient of the vaccine.



BCCL

How viruses are cultured

Vaccines like the one made by Bharat Biotech uses the disease-causing virus itself to trigger an immune response in human beings. The virus is killed, or inactivated, before being used in the vaccine, and injected into the human body, but it is still able to trigger an immune response.

To be used in the vaccine, the virus needs to be grown, or cultured, in the laboratory. Scientists try to create conditions conducive for the growth of these viruses by recreating the kind of environment that exists in an infected persons tissues. Therefore, solutions containing nutrients act as the growth medium for the virus.

Caixin

Why it is essential



These nutrients, like specific sugar and salt molecules, are extracted from tissues of suitable animals like horses, cow, goat or sheep. The virus grows in these nutrient-rich solutions. After that, it goes through several stages of purification that make it suitable to be used in a vaccine. There is no trace of the growth medium after the entire process is over.

Why calf serum

According to the website of the Food and Drug Administration of the United States, cow components are used mainly because cows are large animals, easily available, and rich in some of the useful chemicals and enzymes.

AP

Cow milk is a source of amino acids, and sugars such as galactose. Cow tallow derivatives used in vaccine manufacture include glycerol. Gelatin and some amino acids come from cow bones. Cow skeletal muscle is used to prepare broths used in certain complex media. Many difficult to grow micro-organisms and the cells that are used to propagate viruses require the addition of serum from blood to the growth media, it says.


In a development that may raise some alarm bells, traces of coronavirus were found in water samples taken from the Sabarmati river and Kankria and Chandola lakes in Ahmedabad.

According to local media, as many as 16 samples were taken in four months, out of which 5 samples from the three water bodies were found to have the virus.

Gujarat Tourism

Though the presence of the virus has been documented in sewage water across many countries, this is the first time it has been found in a waterbody.

Found in studies carried out by various institutions

The virus was found in studies carried out by the IIT Gandhi Nagar, School of Environmental Sciences, JNU, Delhi and others.

Another sample collected from Bharu river in Assam also had traces of the virus.

Gujarat Tourism

Though it is still unclear how the virus entered the water, at least in the case of Sabarmati river, the suspicion is on the many sewage lines that open into the water body.

Researchers are trying to study the implications of the presence of the virus in the river and lakes, including if the infection can spread through the water.

Recently, when hundreds of bodies of suspected COVID-19 victims were found floating in the River Ganga in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, locals had panicked fearing that they might get infected from the contaminated water.

BCCL

Last month, the Union Health Ministry had said: "Virus mainly spreads through the air at times when people are standing close and droplets released that would also lead to the spread but the COVID virus doesn't spread via water as the virus gets diluted in water."

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in the US have also said that there is currently no evidence that coronavirus is spread through the public water supply.
Saving money has been good for families during weddings amid lockdown. A couple in Tamil Nadu, went further ahead to donate Rs 37 lakh to the COVID relief fund, as per The New Indian Express.

Their initial budget was Rs 50 lakh. But Anu and Arul got it done for Rs 13 lakh on June 14.

IE

Even the wedding hall owner returned our rental advance, said Arul.

However, as the family elders decided not to postpone the wedding, we got married at the Vattamalai Angalamman temple with minimal attendance after taking permission from local authorities," he added.

PTI

Arul runs his family business selling plastic products. His family members are part of the Tiruppur West Rotary Club and donated to various charitable causes run by the organisation.


The United States has said vaccination is not a mandatory requirement for Indian students to travel to the country, a senior official of the Ministry of External Affairs said. India has clarified too that taking a WHO-approved vaccine is not mandatory for US-bound students to pursue higher education, reports The New Indian Express.

File

"No uniformity in these requirements"

There is no uniformity in these requirements... the US government has clarified that vaccination is not a mandatory requirement for travelling to the US for Indian students. I also understand that there are multiple conversations between the students and our universities," MEA spokesperson Arindam Bagchi said.

"We would obviously support our students. I think everyone concerned is interested in ensuring that the students are able to reach the universities and undertake regular classes and we hope that a constructive solution can be found, he said.

BCCL

Earlier this week, the US had assured that more visa appointments would be granted for Indian students after a rush for interview slots on Monday led to the embassy portal crashing.

Monitoring emergency approval of Covaxin

Reports had emerged that Indian students who had taken Covaxin or Sputnik V vaccines were being asked to revaccinate by universities as the two are not approved by the WHO yet. Bagchi said India is also monitoring the emergency use authorisation approval of Covaxin by the WHO.

Meanwhile, India said it favours a discussion on vaccine passports and urged it to be linked with vaccine equity as many developing nations are yet to inoculate their citizens.

BCCL

On Wednesday, a senior American diplomat assured that the Indian students will not require any proof of COVID-19 vaccination to enter the US, as quoted by PTI.

''They will need a negative report of their COVID-19 test taken within 72 hours prior to their departure," he added. The US embassy on Tuesday further informed that thousands of Indian students have secured US visa appointments for July and August since Monday and further added that it will open more appointments in the coming weeks.
A study conducted by NASA has revealed that Earth has experienced an imbalance in the 14-year period from 2005 to 2019, indicating that the absorption rate of the energy has been constant, but the reflection rate has dropped considerably, trapping more heat on our planet.

NASA

Also Read: Climate Change Is Shifting Earths Axis, Making Days Longer For Over 30 Years

The study (published in Advancing Earth and Space Science) showed that Earth usually takes in around 240 watts per square metre of energy from the Sun. In 2005, it was radiating around 239.5 watts, while creating a positive imbalance of 0.5 watts.



However, in 2019, this gap stretched to 1 watt per square metre. In case you were still finding this not considerable enough, this is similar to every person on Earth, using 20 electric kettles at once, according to Gregory Johnson at the NOAA in a conversation with the Washington Post.

Scientists were able to look for this imbalance using NASAs Clouds and Earths Radiant Energy System, (also known as CERES) suite of satellite sensors. Along with this, they also received data from a global array of floats dotted around the worlds oceans dubbed Argo, that gave an estimated rate of the heating of the oceans.

Around 90 percent of the excess energy from the imbalance often gets absorbed into the ocean, thus changes in ocean heat act as an indicator to match overall trends of incoming and outgoing radiation.

Dr Norman Loeb at NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, explains, The two very independent ways of looking at changes in Earth's energy imbalance are in really, really good agreement. They're both showing this very large trend, which gives us a lot of confidence that what we're seeing is a real phenomenon and not just an instrumental artefact.

Also Read: Rich Countries New Climate Targets Are Still Not Enough To Save Planet Earth

To look for primary factors behind the imbalance, scientists used a method that looked for changes in clouds, water vapour, contributions for trace gases and light output from the Sun.

They found that the doubling of the imbalance is partly due to an increase in greenhouse gases. However, the increase in water vapour is also contributing to this as it traps more outgoing longwave radiation.

On the other hand, a decrease in clouds and sea ice causes more absorption of solar energy as these white surfaces act as massive reflectors for the sunlight. Another factor that has contributed to this is the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) -- a phenomenon that affects the Pacific Ocean for two to three decades.

NASA

Also Read: Global Oceans Heated Up To A Record High In 2020, Due To Rapid Climate Change

A transition of PDO from cool to warm phase could also have contributed to this as intensely warm PDO phase began around 2014 and continued until 2020, dropping cloud coverage over the ocean and increasing solar radiation absorption rate.

Loeb added, It's likely a mix of anthropogenic forcing and internal variability. And over this period they're both causing warming, which leads to a fairly large change in Earth's energy imbalance. The magnitude of the increase is unprecedented.
A British man is facing six-month prison sentence in Singapore after refusing to wear a mask while taking a train ride home after work.

Benjamin Glynn, was put behind the bars for 28 hours before being given bail after a fellow commuter filmed him travelling without a mask and posted it on Facebook.

Benjamin Glynn/SWNS

Only hours later, Singapore police arrested Glynn at his home and charged him with a public nuisance offence.



According to a report in Daily Mail, Glynn thinks masks are pointless and fail to protect people from contracting COVID-19, and so didn't wear one while taking the train home from work.

It was reported that he faces up to six months behind bars, if found guilty.

Benjamin Glynn/SWNS

After his arrest, his passport was confiscated, which meant he couldn't return to the UK as planned with his partner and two children.



He also lost a new job he was due to start in the UK and fears he could have to spend as much as 12 months on bail before his trial.



The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, is assisting him.

"I had no idea anyone had even been filming, but it turned out a video of me unmasked on the late train home from work surfaced online. The police obviously saw it and the next day they were at the door," Glynn was quoted as saying by Daily Mail.

"I don't believe there is any evidence that masks protect you from Covid-19. Normally I would just tell people I'm exempt and it had never posed any issues before. But now I'm stuck here without my family and I don't even know when I will appear in court, never mind what my sentence will be," he added.

Representational Image/Reuters

Glynn had been working for a Singapore branch of a British recruitment company since January 2017.



Weeks before he was due to return to the UK for a new job, he was filmed without a mask near Raffles Place, the financial district of Singapore, on May 7.

In Singapore, it is mandatory to wear a mask when residents leave their homes, with very few exceptions.

Also read: US Anti-Vaxxers Are Wearing Masks To Protect Them From Vaccinated People
In a twist of fate, viewers will see Pragya meeting with a near-fatal accident and going missing in the penultimate episode before the leap and the narrative will fast-forward to two years down the line. (Genesis BCW photo)
The Biden administration has re-launched the International Entrepreneurs Program, also known as a start-up visa. The program is different from the E-2 visa, for which Indians and Chinese do not qualify. Above: File photo of Revolution LLC CEO Steve Case (left), and Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg (right) looking on as Indian American Aneesh Chopra, then Chief Technology Officer of the U.S., speaks during the President's Council on Jobs and Competitiveness High Growth Business and Entrepreneurship Aug. 2, 2011 in Palo Alto, California, where entrepreneurs could learn how public and private sectors can partner to create jobs through innovation. (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)
Radhika Fox is the CEO of the U.S. Water Alliance, a national nonprofit organization advancing policies and programs that build a sustainable water future. She is seen here speaking at the 2016 Concordia Summit at Grand Hyatt New York on Sept. 19, 2016 in New York City. (Paul Morigi/Getty Images for Concordia Summit)
Woodbridge, VA (22192)

Today

Mostly cloudy skies. Slight chance of a rain shower. High near 80F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph..

Tonight

Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Slight chance of a shower throughout the evening. Low 61F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph.
With a major research university right in our backyard, a strong military presence and innovative companies throughout the metro region, theres often a plethora of interesting science and technology news to be found in Southern Arizona. Heres a breakdown of the most interesting recent deve
A former New York Shake Shack manager has filed a lawsuit against the Detectives Endowment Association, the Police Benevolent Association, and about 20 unnamed officers accusing them of false arrest and defamation.

Marcus Gilliam and other employees were accused by officers of serving them poisoned milkshakes last June. In a lawsuit filed Monday, Gilliam said the subsequent interrogation caused him emotional and psychological damages and damage to his reputation.

Three officers complained that their shakes made them sick and had a bitter and unusual taste. Two hours later, 20 officers approached the establishment and began to treat the store as a crime scene, The New York Times reported.

As the investigation unfolded, police unions announced on Twitter that officers were intentionally attacked.

Tonight, three of our fellow officers were intentionally poisoned by one or more workers at the Shake Shack, the detectives union tweeted. Fortunately, they were not seriously harmed.

The Police Benevolent Association made a similar post later alleging that the drinks were intentionally spiked with a toxic substance, believed to be bleach or a similar cleaning agent.

Several news organizations then reported that someone may have intentionally poisoned the officers.

Rodney Harrison, the Police Departments chief of detectives at the time and now the chief of department, tweeted around 4 a.m. that the investigation found no criminality by the employees.

The Police Department referred questions about the case to the citys Law Department, which said it plans to review the matter.

The detectives union declined to comment. The Police Benevolent Association did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Shake Shack did not respond to a request for comment.

Gilliam is no longer an employee of the company.

Copyright 2021 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Topics Lawsuits New York
A French Michelin three-star chef is asking Allianz SE for 1.6 million euros ($1.9 million) in insurance claims for losses suffered by his restaurants during the countrys lockdowns, a person familiar with the matter said.

Chef Michel Troisgros has asked the German insurer to cover losses at his Michelin three-star restaurant Maison Troisgros, as well as another, Le Central, both located in central France, the person said, asking not to be named because the claims are private.

The chef is also negotiating with AXA SA for losses at his third restaurant, the person said.

Tensions between French restaurant operators and insurers over such claims have failed to dissipate after a year of public fights and legal disputes. AXA, which was ordered to compensate some restaurants, offered a 300 million-euro settlement to its policyholders last week, seeking to appease clients.

Representatives for Troisgros and AXA declined to comment. Allianz didnt immediately respond to requests for comment.

Troisgross claim was previously reported by Agence France-Presse.

Copyright 2021 Bloomberg.

Topics COVID-19 Profit Loss Allianz France
Akur8, the Paris-based insurtech firm that automates insurance pricing, has closed a Series B funding round of $30 million, bringing its total funding to $42 million.

This latest funding round will accelerate Akur8s international expansion, with a particular emphasis on furthering its U.S. footprint and establishing a presence in Asia Pacific in 2022. The funding round will also be used to accelerate Akur8s product development pipeline to cover the full pricing suite, develop U.S.-tailored features and create more value-added features to enhance existing modules.

The investment round closed less than two years after the property/casualty and health insurance pricing provider first commercialized its platform, and just 15 months after its Series A led by BlackFin Capital Partners and MTech Capital. Both companies are reinvesting in this round.

Founded in 2018, Akur8 aims to transform insurance pricing with its Transparent AI technology, developed to enhance non-life insurers pricing processes by automating risk and demand modeling. Akur8 said the technology empowers actuaries and pricing teams to make better, faster decisions.

Akur8s cloud-based solution automates the generation of pricing models while allowing actuaries to retain complete control over the process. Akur8 enables higher speed-to-accuracy and significantly accelerates the pricing time to market, while providing insurers with a highly robust and secure pricing process.

In less than two years, Akur8 has acquired more than 30 customers across 10 countries, including AXA, Generali, Munich Re, Canopius and Tokio Marine Kiln, as well as insurtechs Wakam and wefox. The Akur8 platform is used daily by 350 users within insurers pricing teams, to compute their pricing models across P/C, personal and commercial lines, and health.

Akur8s client footprint spans across a dozen countries in Europe, Asia and The Americas with offices in Paris, London and New York, where 20 nationalities are represented within its diverse team of 50 employees.

Samuel Falmagne, co-founder and CEO of Akur8, commented: We are happy to announce the closing of our Series B funding round and are grateful for the support we have seen from our investors. This latest milestone will enable us to accelerate the transformation of insurance pricing even further, fuel our international expansion in the U.S. and APAC, and equip P/C and health carriers with a state-of-the-art, integrated pricing solution that we have been building and refining tirelessly.

Source: Akur8

Topics InsurTech Tech Funding
The UK is struggling to put in place adequate measures to deal with rising sea levels and warmer temperatures caused by pollution, the governments independent adviser on climate matters has warned.

Average land temperatures in the UK have risen by around 1.2-degrees Celsius compared to pre-industrial levels, while sea levels have risen by 16 centimeters since 1900, the Climate Change Committee said in a report.

Yet adaptation isnt happening fast enough. In the last five years, more than half a million new homes were built that wont be resilient to future high temperatures, according to the panel. More than 4,000 heat related deaths have taken place in England alone since 2018.

The longer action to address these risks is delayed, the higher the costs the government and the UK public will face, the CCC said in a statement. The committee called on the countrys leaders to boost their efforts to address climate change, including delivering a better action plan to support adaptation planning.

The UK is hosting global climate talks this year, culminating with the United Nations COP26 summit in Glasgow in November. At the Group of Seven summit in Cornwall last weekend, world leaders including Prime Minister Boris Johnson stopped short of setting concrete measures to limit global warming to well below 2-degrees Celsius.

The CCCs report highlighted eight areas where urgent action is needed, including managing risks to soil health from flooding and drought, and addressing risks to human health from increased exposure to heat.

Photograph: Extinction Rebellion climate protesters hold a sign that says Global Warming is Real in the sea on the sidelines of the final day of the Group of Seven (G-7) leaders summit, in St. Ives, UK, on Sunday, June 13, 2021. The worlds richest governments are under mounting pressure to help poor countries fight climate change. Photo credit: Hollie Adams/Bloomberg.

Copyright 2021 Bloomberg.

Topics Climate Change
The enhanced ability to innovate is a principal motivator for Aons proposed acquisition of Aon and Willis Towers Watson. Its a message that Aon CEO Greg Case has been emphasizing since the $30 billion deal was announced in March 2020.

For the past three centuries, the insurance industry has essentially assessed risk in the rear-view mirror  looking backwards at loss profiles and then developing solutions and premiums, according to Case, who spoke recently at S&P Global Ratings insurance conference.

We Can Work It Out: Negotiations Likely on COVID-19 Reinsurance Losses

But risks have changed in the 21st century, and the insurance industry needs to respond in order to stay relevant with clients. Case said the industry must employ forward-looking analytics, content and insights to be able to assess cyber, intellectual property or climate risks.

Our ability to address client need and accelerate innovation will only get better in our pending combination with Willis Towers Watson, which continues to increase our commitment and excitement to the potential of the combined firm, he said in comments made during an April 30 earnings call.

During the S&P conference, Case said, the Aon-Willis Towers Watson merger is all about enhancing the industrys relevance, which has been slumping over the last 30 years.

Case spoke at the S&P meeting on June 9, just a few days before the U.S. Department of Justice announced that Aons purchase of WTW would hurt competition by leaving Americans with fewer choices, higher prices and lower quality services. Aon and WTW responded in a joint statement that they disagreed with the DoJs action, which reflects a lack of understanding of our business, the clients we serve and the marketplaces in which we operate.

The brokers said they remain fully committed to the benefits of our combination.

A research note compiled by GlobalData said: Aon and WTWs merger would allow for a combination of complementary solutions, capabilities and skillsets that would better assist consumers, during a time where the pandemic has drastically changed the way companies need to make innovative and rapid solutions that mitigate their operational risks. London-based GlobalData provides data analytics and analysis about the worlds largest industries.

R.J. Lehmann, a Senior Fellow with the International Center for Law & Economics in Portland, Ore. weighed in with the following comment: While its understandable that there are competition concerns, I would urge the Department of Justice to be cautious about interfering in a space where this combination could increase innovation and bring it to a much greater scale.

To bring innovation to major multinationals, you need brokers with global reach, he added during an interview.

At the S&P conference, Case explained that the Aon-Willis Towers Watson combination has nothing to do with being bigger, which he said is irrelevant to clients. Instead, he said, its all about creating a company fundamentally focused on innovation.

Bigger means nothing to clients. They dont care about that. What they care about, he added, is what the industry is doing on their behalf thats going to help them lead their businesses more effectively.

With their focus on innovation, Aon and Willis Towers Watson are looking for ways to be more effective in bringing new content and new insights to clients, Case continued.

Declining Industry Relevance

He said the industry overall isnt doing enough to develop content for long-tail risks such as pandemic, cyber and climate change as well as the risks to intangible assets (which include intellectual property, data, brand and reputation). As a result, he added, the industry is becoming less relevant to clients.

Case said one measure of industry relevance is to look at risk placement as a percentage of GDP, which continued to rise between the 1970s and 1990s. As the economy grew during those two decades, the insurance industry grew proportionately more than the economy because we were helping clients on things that were truly relevant for how they built their businesses.

But, in the mid-1990s, the industrys relevance started declining.

This doesnt mean we havent done great things on behalf of clients. It just means that intellectual property and intangible assets now represent 85% of the value of companies, for which the insurance industry isnt generally providing solutions. On the other hand, in the 1970s, he said, the figure for intangibles was around 20%.

What is the industry doing to address and defend intangible assets? Case said the answer is: Not much.

He cited cyber as another example where the industry isnt doing enough to help clients.

Cyber insurance is a $7 billion-$8 billion premium program now across our industry, but our clients are facing upwards of $600 billion in potential connected loss. Fundamentally, were not doing enough. We are becoming less relevant in the context of client need, which continues to go up, he said.

Case said the proposed merger of Aon and Willis Towers Watson aims to help the insurance industry break the downward trend for relevance. He described the combination as a step, the best step, we can take to help break that trend.

Creating Net New

Case said the merger will benefit everyone  clients, the market and competitors.

Everyone benefits because we want to create net new. Net new in climate, net new in intangible assets and intellectual property. Net new in cyber. Net new in pandemic, which weve got to be able to think about.

He suggested the merged company will act as a bridge between capital, clients and new markets. Heres now he explained it.

Capital isnt going to commit to a new market unless it understands how it can make a difference and get a return, he said.

In addition, clients are not going to buy a product unless they can describe to the C-suite how its going to help them improve operating performance, strengthen their balance sheet, and reduce their volatility.

Building Bridges

Weve got to be the bridge, Case continued, noting that part of being a bridge is creating understanding via data, analytics, content and insight.

How do you take a cyber market from $7 or $8 billion and make it $25 or $30 billion? How do you take an intangible asset market, which is largely nothing, and actually make it a $100 billion market? he questioned. Thats doable. Thats within reach if we can develop and drive the [needed analytics].

He described one success story in the area of intellectual property where insurance products have been created to help entrepreneurs borrow against their intangible assets, their patent portfolios. With such products, entrepreneurs dont have to give up equity to raise capital, Case explained.

In many respects, the analytics, the insight required means we are compelling clients to say, Wow, this can help my business. I want to invest. I want to pay for this' When that happens, he noted, its natural that capital (from insurers and investors) will follow.

If the insurance industry is going to move the curve on relevance, its got to create content that is compelling for clients, which is what the Aon-Willis Towers Watson combination is trying to get done.

Although the deal with Willis Towers Watson was announced before the pandemic, Case said, The pandemic amplified every reason were doing Aon-Willis Towers Watson. It increased the need for innovation and increased the awareness and understanding of the need for innovation.

During the meeting, Case said, the brokers were hoping to close their combination as early as possible in the third quarter. But that was before the Department of Justice announcement.

Related:

Topics Mergers InsurTech Aon Willis Towers Watson
Fire has destroyed a western Iowa business that made pipe organs for churches, schools and customers from around the world, officials said.

The fire at Dobson Pipe Organ Builders in Lake City was reported around 4 p.m. on June 15, officials said. Firefighters found the building engulfed in flames that caused its exterior walls to collapse.

One employee of the company was burned when he discovered the fire and tried to put out the flames, according to authorities. The State Fire Marshals Office said it believes the fire was started by a malfunctioning fan that caused sawdust to ignite.

Lake City is about 70 miles (112.7 kilometers) northwest of Des Moines.

Dobson Pipe Organ Builders was founded in 1974 by Lynn Dobson, a Carroll, Iowa, native who attended Wayne State College in Nebraska, according to the business website. During his years at the college, he built an organ in a shed on his familys farm that he sold to Our Saviors Lutheran Church in Sioux City, Iowa, where it is still played.

Copyright 2021 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Topics Iowa
A Texas company pleaded guilty to a federal Clean Water Act violation and agreed to pay a $1 million fine for damaging a pipeline that leaked more than 5,000 gallons of oil in a Louisiana bay in 2016, the U.S. Attorneys Office in New Orleans said on June 16.

Court records show the plea agreement with Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Co. was filed on June 15.

Prosecutors said in a document accompanying the plea agreement that an employee of a subcontractor for the company struck a pipeline while operating a marsh buggy excavator vehicle. Oil spilled into Bay Long, south of New Orleans, during work on a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration project to restore a barrier island.

At the time of the accident, the Coast Guard reported trying to capture and treat an estimated 200 oiled birds, while collecting 6,000 gallons of oily water.

Prosecutors said Great Lakes had failed to keep pipeline companies up to date on their work and failed to adequately supervise the employee.

Copyright 2021 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Topics Texas Louisiana
The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday threw out a lawsuit accusing Cargill Inc. and a Nestle SA subsidiary of knowingly helping perpetuate slavery at Ivory Coast cocoa farms, but sidestepped a broader ruling on the permissibility of suits accusing American companies of human rights violations abroad.

The 8-1 ruling authored by Justice Clarence Thomas reversed a lower court decision that had allowed the lawsuit, brought on behalf of former child slaves from Mali who worked at the farms, filed against the companies in 2005 to proceed.

The court ruled the claim could not be brought under the Alien Tort Statute, which lets non-U.S. citizens seek damages in American courts in certain instances, because the plaintiffs did not show that any of the relevant conduct took place within the United States.

Nearly all the conduct that they say aided and abetted forced labor  providing training, fertilizer tools, and cash to overseas farms  occurred in Ivory Coast, Thomas wrote.

The business community has long sought to limit corporate liability under this law.

Nestle never engaged in the egregious child labor alleged in this suit, and we remain unwavering in our dedication to combating child labor in the cocoa industry, a Nestle spokesperson said.

A Cargill spokesperson said the company is committed to keeping child labor out of the cocoa supply chain.

We do not tolerate the use of child labor in our operations or supply chains and we are working every day to prevent it, the spokesperson said.

Paul Hoffman, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, said the ruling has delayed our clients long quest for justice. But Hoffman added that he intends to refile the lawsuit with more detailed allegations on conduct that he said took place in the United States.

It is significant that the courts ruling rejected the most extreme arguments for limiting human rights cases, Hoffman said.

The justices stopped short of definitively deciding the question of whether U.S. companies can ever be sued under the 1789 law. Cargill and Nestle had asked the court to bar such lawsuits in all circumstances.

The lawsuits targeted the U.S. subsidiary of Swiss-based Nestle, the worlds biggest food producer, and commodities trader Cargill, one of the largest privately held U.S. companies.

The plaintiffs accused the companies of aiding and abetting human rights violations through their active involvement in purchasing Ivory Coast cocoa and turning a blind eye to the use of slave labor on the farms despite being aware of the practice in order to keep cocoa prices low.

A federal district court in Los Angeles dismissed the lawsuit twice, most recently in 2017. That court found that the claims were barred by recent Supreme Court decisions that made it harder for plaintiffs to sue corporations in U.S. courts for alleged violations overseas.

The San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in 2018 revived the claims, citing the allegations that the companies provided personal spending money to local farmers to guarantee the cheapest source of cocoa. The 9th Circuit found that the payments were akin to kickbacks and that the low price of cocoa was dependant upon the child slave labor.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and other business interests backed the two companies in the case.

The Supreme Court in 2013 and 2018 cases limited the ability of plaintiffs to sue corporations in U.S. courts under the Alien Tort Statute for overseas human rights violations. The court said in those rulings that there needed to be a strong connection between the alleged conduct and actions that took place in the United States.

(Reporting by Lawrence Hurley; Editing by Will Dunham)

Topics Lawsuits
Medical guidelines help doctors understand the best way to treat health conditions yet many doctors do not adhere to them, and this is a problem in particular for patients with back pain, according to scientists at University of Utah Health and MDGuidelines.

People with lower back pain injury miss 11 more days of work in a year when they only receive treatments for lower back pain that are not recommended by medical guidelines compared to people treated according to guidelines, according to their study that was published in PLOS ONE on June 17.

The claims study also showed that opioid prescriptions have been substantially reduced over time as adherence to medical guidelines has improved.

The closer peoples care follows evidence-based guidelines, the faster their back pain resolves, by quite a bit, says the studys senior author Kurt Hegmann, M.D., director of the University of Utah Rocky Mountain Center for Occupational and Environmental Health.

That may be so, but 65% of the people included in the study received at least some non-recommended treatments for lower back pain. Among the nearly 60,000 people whose medical claims were analyzed:

 14% received non-recommended treatments only,

 51% received a mix of non-recommended and recommended treatments,

 14% received recommended treatments only,

 and 21% did not receive any medical intervention.

People who received recommended treatments combined with non-recommended treatments saw an intermediate benefit, missing a median of eight workdays within the year as compared to those who exclusively received recommended treatments.

The most common non-recommended treatments were prescriptions for opioids, which are discouraged because they reinforce debility instead of exercise and can be addictive, and X-rays, which can lead to inaccurate diagnoses.

The most common recommended treatments were nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs and muscle relaxants.

The data came from California workers compensation claims between 2009 to 2018 from employees who had uncomplicated, acute lower back pain or strain, the most prevalent injury in the workplace. The researchers tracked whether treatments prescribed in clinic visits within the first week after injury were categorized as recommended or non-recommended in the peer-reviewed American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine (ACOEM) guidelines, with the assumption that similar treatment patterns would continue in any subsequent clinic visits. The scientists then calculated the number of lost workdays within the first year after injury.

[Editors Note: Conflict of Interest Disclosure: Gaspar and Wizner are employed by MDGuidelines, which is the sole proprietor of ACOEM guidelines. Hegmann is editor-in-chief of the ACOEM guidelines.]

Opioids Reduction

While a large proportion of workers received non-recommended treatments, health care providers improved adherence to medical guidelines over time. In 2009, 10% were treated according to guidelines, but that rose to 18% by 2018. The treatment practice that changed most drastically was opioid prescriptions, which fell by 86% over those nine years.

The reduction in opioids prescription is particularly impressive, Hegmann said. In this case, the insurer is likely to not pay for opioids even if they are prescribed. It suggests whats possible when the carrot of good health care is missed and instead the stick of compliance with a guideline is in place.

Clinical practice guidelines are based on systematic reviews of scientific evidence and are designed to guide health care providers as they decide how to treat their patients health conditions. Typically, guidelines are updated every few years, which the researchers say can make it difficult for health care providers to keep up. Doctors may not adhere to guidelines because they arent aware of them, dont know how to implement the recommended treatments, prefer to continue practices theyve used in the past, or for other reasons, according to the authors.

Still, the large reductions in opioid prescriptions for lower back pain suggest that added incentives, such as insurers refusing to pay for non-recommended treatments, increases adherence to guidelines. Hegmann and the studys first author, Fraser Gaspar, Ph.D., said that implementing decision support tools and other ways to promote adherence to guidelines will be better for patients.

Being out of work impacts many facets of your life, said Gaspar, who carried out the research when he was a scientist at MDGuidelines. In addition to the physical disability thats causing the person to miss work, the worker is making less money, while they often incur additional costs and experience mental strain. Getting people back to their normal lives is really important, and our research shows that following guidelines makes that happen faster.

Source: In addition to Hegmann and Gaspar, Matthew S. Thiese, Ph.D., and Kerri Wizner, M.P.H., are co-authors on the study. The research published as Guideline adherence and lost workdays for acute low back pain in the California workers compensation system in PLOS ONE.
Severe drought and searing temperatures are not the only proof that Californians should be worried about wildfires this year.

A glaring piece of evidence that theres ample cause for concern is this: those who will be on the hook for paying for losses from fires are increasingly forking over sizable sums of money for better fire modeling to try and cut losses.

California last year saw 4.2 million worth of acres burned, roughly 10,000 structures destroyed or damaged and 31 fatalities. Economic loss from wildfires in 2020 was roughly $19 billion, according to Aons 2021 Weather, Climate and Catastrophe report, which shows that five Western fires each accounted for more than $1 billion in losses.

Insurers have responded in several ways. Getting smarter is one way.

Sales of two fire models have been going up noticeably for CoreLogic, an Irvine, Calif.-based provider of data and analytics.

And its not just more insurers buying the models. Reinsurers have increasingly been purchasing CoreLogics wildfire models, the company says.

Sales of both their Wildfire Risk Score and the U.S. Wildfire Model are up markedly, according to Shelley Yerkes, the product manager for CoreLogics wildfire models.

Insurance rates being charged havent been commensurate with the growing risk, so the losses insurers have incurred in the past few years have bled into the reinsurance ranks, forcing reinsurers to react, Yerkes explained.

Huge losses have penetrated deep into the insurance layers, she said. And now reinsurers are seeing that their paying out a lot in that additional coverage. They need pricing tools.

California regulators this week approved a plan by Farmers Insurance to assess wildfire risk by using a tool that combines artificial intelligence with high-resolution aerial photography. The carrier said the Z-Fire risk scoring model developed by Zesty.ai is expected to make standard coverage available to an additional 30,000 homeowners.

Modeling is expensive, so it says something that insurers are beefing up in this area. Depending on the size of an insurers book, Yerkes said the cost for the CoreLogic models could be in the millions-of-dollars over multiple years of licensing.

The CoreLogic Wildfire Risk Score is a deterministic wildfire model that evaluates the risk of a property by returning a 5 to 100 score. The model considers elements like slope, vegetation/fuel and proximity to higher risk areas. The probabilistic CoreLogic U.S. Wildfire Model combines agents of damage including ignition sources, spread and suppression with structural vulnerability. Burn and smoke damage is accounted for, and the model accounts for weather conditions. Once damage ratios are calculated, the model applies insurance conditions to determine financial loss.

Beside working to better model their risk, insurers have also began to pull back and write less in wildfire prone areas.

Homeowners in Californias high-risk areas are finding it difficult to obtain property insurance outside of the California FAIR plan. The number of California homeowner policies that insurers declined to renew rose 31% to 235,250 in 2019 from 179,458 in 2018, while the number of policies issued through the FAIR plan rose to 190,196 from 140,138, according to a report by the California Department of Insurance.

California Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara in May called for property insurers in the state to step up and do more to help residents and businesses deal with wildfires.

The surplus lines market has also been taking up the slack where the admitted market has left off.

According to the Surplus Line Association of California, surplus lines premiums in 2020 in California grew 22.7%, while the surplus lines item count grew 8%, with wildfires driving some of those increases.

A recent report from the group shows the average premium per commercial transaction for May, the latest data available, rose from $9,000 during the same period in 2018 to $27,000. The average premium per homeowners/residential transaction rose from $2,500 in 2018 to $7,500 in May.

Both markets hardened substantially and trendlines indicate continued hardening into 2022, the report states.

Its unlikely pressure will be taken off rates anytime soon.

The fire forecast for the Western U.S is ugly. More than 25% of the region is under exceptional drought conditions, the most severe category used by the U.S. Drought Monitor.

And record temperatures are being experienced by several states in the region. A National Weather Service advisory issued at the start of the week warned of the personal dangers from the heat: Very High Heat Risk. Increase in heat-related illnesses, including heat cramps, heat exhaustion, and heat stroke. Heat stroke can lead to death.

Californias fire season, which historically began around September, is starting earlier and lasting longer every year.

What weve noticed is that our wildfire seasons has been averaging an extra 75 days, so its starting earlier and lasting longer, said Lynnette Round, information officer at CalFire.

Round said fuel moisture levels this year are already down at a level not typically seen until late July.

Our fuel moistures have dried quite a bit, she said. It just ups the chances of wildfire starting and moving quickly.

The state has already been planning for the worst. Gov. Gavin Newsom expedited $536 million for wildfire preparation through Senate Bill 85 in April, including $25 million in funds to assist home-hardening projects.

This gave the state an additional 1,400 full-time firefighters, who Round said have already been brought on board and trained.

That help is welcome, but Yerkes doesnt hold out much hope for any assistance from Mother Nature.

In California we are in a very big deficit right now and thats going to continue through the rest of the year, Yerkes said. We are looking at a really potentially big fire season.

Drought alone doesnt start fires  you still need an ignition.

Last year the lightning ignitions were responsible for many of the fires on the Westcoast, however most fires tend to be due to humans  roughly 80% of fires are human caused, data shows.

With people returning to their normal activities as the pandemic winds down, Yerkes is preaching caution.

With things getting back to more normal, you could expect that people are back to doing what they always did before the pandemic and I would expect 80% human caused ignitions to be likely, she said.

Related:

Topics Carriers Catastrophe California Natural Disasters Trends Wildfire
Stockmarkets are focusing on the huge imbalances between supply and demand as the global economy roars back from the Covid crisis, hence the price of shipping containers has trebled, many raw materials are in short supply, and inflation is now dominating market thinking.

Inflation is bad for stock prices, if it leads to a rise in interest rates.

If rates were to rise, company earnings would be less attractive and therefore lead to lower valuations, and any correction to valuations could be severe.

The authorities in the US say recent price rises are transitory, a message the market has bought into. For the past decade passive investing has been extraordinarily successful.

Just buying the index has made substantial returns.

However, given the over-extended valuations of the US stocks, where may Irish pension funds are invested, means this strategy may come to an end. And looking for investments elsewhere, may mean the return of the stock picker.

There are a number of hot plays out there though caution is required because there has been some serious ramping of prices from all those US stimulus cheques.

Climate change stocks is one such hot stocks area. It includes electrical vehicle battery components and uranium metal. There are several ways to invest in uranium, so be careful.

In the past, we liked the uranium mining companies and investing in the miners has been a winner.

However, when you invest in a stock of a mining company you are exposed to how well it is run.

At the moment, we are invested in the metal itself, which has gained 20% this year but could have further to rise.

Carbon credit markets are a relatively new asset class for climate change.

The US special presidential envoy for climate John Kerry and senator Lindsey Graham have put their faith in international carbon markets as a way of fighting climate change.

My view is that a lot of the Covid stimulus investment in the US, Japan, and from Europe will be directed at the carbon market, because it will likely meet the environmental and social and corporate governance sustainable goals. It is where capital is going.

Carbon has a low correlation to all other asset classes and is already a large and growing market which governments fully support to boost green initiatives.

Targets to cut emissions by 2030 and beyond are quite aggressive, which all but guarantees carbon credits will increasingly be more valuable in time because they are limited in supply.

This is one of the most exciting long-term investments.

Peter Brown is senior investment advisor at Baggot Investment Partners

We like uranium as a long-term investment. It also has an exceptionally low correlation to traditional asset classes but the carbon-credit market absolutely dwarfs that of the metal.

Apart from considerations on climate change, we like a number of stocks based on conventional and simpler current metrics.

One such simpler play is the insurer FBD. We bought into the shares on the back of its price dip on the legal dispute over Covid pandemic insurance.

However, we believe the fundamentals of the company are strong and following the acquisition of RSA, smaller insurers may come into focus.

Just a note of caution; with all investments you need to be able to allocate in accordance with your risk profile.

These types on investment may not be suitable or accessible to all.

Also, you need to know when to cut and run.

Peter Brown is senior investment advisor at Baggot Investment Partners at pbrown@baggot.ie
In 1969, Pfizer became one of the first biopharmaceutical companies to locate to Ireland, establishing a base in Ringaskiddy, Co Cork. Pfizer has since become both the largest pharmaceutical sector investor in the country and one of Irelands leading employers.

Today there are over 800 people at the Ringaskiddy site, and a combined workforce of more than 4,000 people across five locations in Cork, Kildare and Dublin.

Furthermore, the capital investment by Pfizer since its establishment here over five decades ago now exceeds $8 billion and business interests range across manufacturing, shared services, R&D and commercial operations.

Every day, Pfizer colleagues work across developed and emerging markets to advance wellness, prevention, treatments, and cures that challenge the most feared diseases of our time. The Irish sites manufacture leading medicines and vaccines in the areas of pneumococcal disease, arthritis, inflammation, cancer, anti-infectives, haemophilia, pain and stroke.

Recent investments

Pfizer has continued to invest and upscale its sites across Ireland and as recent as last November announced a 300 million capital investment supporting the further development of existing manufacturing sites in Grange Castle Dublin, Newbridge Kildare and Ringaskiddy Cork.

Dr Paul Duffy, Pfizer, VP of Global Supply.

The investment will provide additional manufacturing and laboratory capacity creating approximately 300 roles, with additional anticipated construction roles in Ringaskiddy, estimated to be completed over the next two to three years.

Ringaskiddy site

The Ringaskiddy facility plays a key role in scaling up new products in cooperation with Pfizer Global Research and Development to ensure their timely approval and launch.

Operationally, Pfizer Ringaskiddy exports bulk pharmaceuticals, the active ingredients in its medications, to Pfizer plants around the world. In 2014, a $30 million specialist hi-tech laboratory facility opened at the site: The New Product Technology Laboratory.

The investment, which was supported by the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation through IDA Ireland, enabled the Ringaskiddy plant to meet the move to smaller volume, new products requiring unique technology and capability.

An aerial view of the Pfizer site in Ringaskiddy, Co Cork.

The current and latest investment includes the initial stage of a project to construct a development facility on the existing Ringaskiddy site to manufacture pharmaceutical compounds for Pfizers clinical trials globally.

This is a very important development as it expands Pfizers role in Ireland from the manufacturing of already approved medicines into supporting the earlier phases of new medicine development.

Speaking about the significance of the development at the Ringaskiddy site, Dr Paul Duffy, Vice President, Pfizer Global Supply; it is a strong vote of confidence in the capability of our people that has enabled the Ringaskiddy site to be chosen as the location to manufacture investigational compounds for our clinical trials globally and we look forward to seeing that new facility become operational.

Demand for key people

Meanwhile, the demand in the bio-pharmaceutical industry for key personnel such as chemical and process engineers, and chemists is outstripping supply. At Pfizer and particularly with the recent announcements from the Ringaskiddy site, there are multiple active roles being advertised currently and many more being added over the coming months.

The roles being recruited for comprise a broad range of highly skilled roles including analysts, technicians, engineers, scientists, technologists, quality specialists, data analysts and chemists.

Clair Murphy, centre, Pfizer Ringaskiddy site lead, showing the facility to Triona Curran and Amy OReilly during a 2019 (pre-Covid) visit from the WiSTEM Society at UCC. Picture: Adrian OHerlihy

People are at the core of Pfizer values and skilled employees are crucial to maintaining competitiveness, Paul Duffy concludes: Having a high-quality workforce here is very important.

While Pfizer continues to play a key role in impacting the health of people with the medicines they discover and develop, there also continues to be a corporate social responsibility to the local community. In Cork, Pfizer does this by giving back to the community through school partnerships and supporting local charities and sporting organisations.

Future innovations

Aside from all the investment and opportunities mentioned above, Pfizer continues to innovate and collaborate to find the breakthroughs that change patients lives.

Gene therapy is one area which holds particular promise and one where Pfizer has been focusing with various investments and R&D spend.

Clair Murphy, centre, Pfizer Ringaskiddy site lead, showing the facility to Triona Curran and Amy OReilly during a 2019 (pre-Covid) visit from the WiSTEM Society at UCC. Picture: Adrian OHerlihy

Gene therapy is a new generation of medicine where a functioning gene is delivered to a targeted tissue in the body to produce a missing or non-functioning protein.

By using genes as medicine, the underlying cause of a disease can be targeted at the cellular level, potentially with just one treatment.

Collaboration has played a big role in the company innovating and their work with BioNTech on the vaccine showcases what is possible when a true partnership exists.

The key to our approach is collaborating in new and dynamic ways with other innovators across the health landscape including academic scientists, patient foundations, governments, other biopharmaceutical companies and treating physicians, says Paul Duffy.

For more information or to find out about current roles in Pfizer Ireland, check out www.pfizer.ie
British finance minister Rishi Sunak has ruled out any further extension of Covid-19 supports to affected businesses, despite the UK government forcing many companies to close for an extra four weeks.

"What we did was deliberately go big and go long in terms of the support, we erred on the side of generosity," Mr Sunak said in an interview with the Financial Times.
Ireland is experiencing "near elimination" of Covid-19 in the vaccinated population, but Chief Medical Officer Dr Tony Holohan has advised the public against non-essential travel to the UK amid concerns over the fast-spreading Delta variant.

The advice does not yet include travel to Northern Ireland from the Republic, but Dr Holohan said he is "concerned" about the situation across the border.

He will consult with public health leaders in the North today, which will inform ongoing considerations.

"We're strongly advising against non-essential travel between here and the UK, because of the concerns in terms of transmission of the Delta variant," said Dr Holohan.

The seven-day incidence that we've seen across Northern Ireland, and particularly Derry, in recent days, we know it will be of concern to our colleagues in Northern Ireland, and it is of concern to us.

"We are expressing our concern about that. We haven't formally advised on that at this moment in time. We're keeping a very close eye."

Dr Holohan acknowledged the challenge in Northern Ireland with the Delta variant, which makes up in excess of 20% of new cases there in the most recent data available.

He has also appealed to unvaccinated people who are now mainly in their 20s and 30s to stay in Ireland until they get their shots.

There is a risk of being exposed to the virus at present if travelling abroad without being vaccinated, he said.

There are plenty of good holiday opportunities in this country," he said.

The advice was issued as the HSE cautioned that the speed of the vaccine rollout programme will slow down in July.

More than 300,000 jabs are being administered each week, but this is likely to drop to 200,000 in July, with only two supply lines available  Moderna and Pfizer.

Those vaccines are the only ones available to younger age cohorts, under advice from the National Immunisation Advisory Committee.

The Government had previously set a target of 450,000 doses a week by mid-June, contingent on supply.

Despite this, the situation remains broadly positive, with infections collapsing among the vaccinated.

Dr Holohan said: "We are now experiencing near-elimination of Covid-19 in the vaccinated population.

"If you are fully vaccinated you can safely resume normal life  meeting other fully vaccinated people from up to two households indoors without masks or social distancing, and meeting unvaccinated people from one other household indoors and without masks."
A rally against the Northern Ireland Protocol has heard calls for the DUP not to nominate a new First Minister until it is abandoned.

Paul Givan remains First Minister following the resignation of Edwin Poots as DUP leader, but could be replaced when a new leader is chosen.

If they refused to nominate a replacement, powersharing would collapse.

People take part in a Loyalist protest in Newtownards, County Down, against the Northern Ireland Protocol (Brian Lawless/PA)

Several hundred people turned out at the Square in Newtownards, Co Down on Friday, for a protest against the Protocol, organised by leading Brexiteers Kate Hoey and ex-MEP Ben Habib.

Leader of the Traditional Unionist Voice party, Jim Allister, launched a stinging attack on Edwin Poots and called on the DUP to effectively collapse Stormont unless the Protocol is abandoned.

He told the crowd: The British Government had a choice, are we going to please Sinn Fein or are we going to please the DUP?

They chose to please IRA Sinn Fein. Why? Because they had the measure of the DUP.

And it was that spineless, hopeless, pathetic, useless attitude that enabled them to do it.

He added: What do we now need to do? What needs to be done in Stormont is the new DUP leader needs to find a backbone, and he needs to resign the First Minister.

He needs to say to the British Prime Minister, there will be no First Minister so long as there is a Protocol.

Several hundred people attended the protest (Brian Lawless/PA)

He claimed the Protocol was designed to partition the United Kingdom and to annex Northern Ireland into the EU.

He said the EU were preparing us for what they see as the ultimate outcome of Irish unity, which was greeted with chants of never and over my dead body from the crowd.

Former Labour MP Kate Hoey said the Protocol is taking away our British identity and accused the Government of using Northern Ireland as a weapon.

She added: Im afraid the wining and dining that goes on in Brussels paid off.

The EU wanted to punish the United Kingdom for daring to leave their club and cynically used the issue of the Irish border and the Belfast Agreement as the weapon.

The demonstration saw five protest parades marching towards the town centre in Newtownards.

Hundreds of protesters waved Union flags and held banners saying Dublins Choice: Peace or Protocol?, which bore an image of Tanaiste Leo Varadkar, as well as No Irish sea border and Enough is enough.

A protest in Newtownards, County Down, against the Northern Ireland Protocol (Brian Lawless/PA)

Others held signs saying Prosecutions for the Bobby Storey funeral and Chief Constable must resign, in reference to Covid breaches at a Republican funeral that went unpunished.

Former Brexit Party MEP Ben Habib told the crowd: The real villains in this story are the EU and the Irish Government, because they have falsified and misrepresented entirely what the customs border on the island of Ireland would be.

But Im afraid that those to whom you have given your allegiance, the Westminster Government, they are the ones who have really forsaken you because they should have stood up to that false narrative.

Loyalist activist Jamie Bryson said Unionist identity was more important than constitutional principles.

He said: We respect our cherished principle of parliamentary sovereignty. But our fundamental British identity means more to us than any constitutional principle.

Protesters hold banners at the demonstration (Brian Lawless/PA)

That should come as no surprise, because Parliament sought to subjugate Ulster in 1912, and thats why Edward Carson raised an army.

So if it is the choice between respecting the will of Parliament or our Union, then theres only ever going to be one winner.

A statement by Ards and North Down Loyalist Collective said: Our platform of four high-profile speakers will send a clear message that the violence-rewarding, Union-dismantling Protocol must go.

Baroness Hoey, Jim Allister and Ben Habib are currently leading a High Court challenge against the Irish Sea border, and Jamie Bryson separately took the initial step in bringing High Court proceedings in 2019 which were halted pending the ratification of the Withdrawal Act by Parliament.
A 407,000 Lego-style footpath extension in Cork City should be disability proofed to make it work better for everyone.

That is the call from the mobility campaign group, Pedestrian Cork, after figures released under Freedom of Information revealed the scale of public investment on MacCurtain St during the pandemic.

Spokesperson Orla Burke said Cork City Council got a lot right during its Reimagining Cork programme, which has resulted in the pedestrianisation of over a dozen city streets, and the conversion of many areas into outdoor dining spaces.

But theyre not going to get everything 100% right, she said.

I would have concerns about the spending of public money that actually makes public space less accessible to people.

I think that with some consultation, the space on MacCurtain St could work better for all citizens.

She said people with restricted mobility, particularly wheelchair users and the visually impaired, have difficulties navigating the streetscape since the footpath extensions were installed last September.

Following consultation with local businesses, a modular temporary footpath system, imported from Spain, was installed over the course of about three weeks to extend the width of some 120m of footpath on both sides of the street by just over 2m, to facilitate outdoor dining for a range of food-related businesses along the street.

But Ms Burke said the decision to use the existing footpaths for tables, and to direct pedestrians onto the extensions, has caused difficulties for those with mobility issues.

The motivation for doing it was positive. It was done to support local ratepayers, the lifeblood of the city, she said. There was consultation where such work was done elsewhere and that has led to positive results around the city.

But this was delivered under Section 38 and there was no need for public consultation. For those with mobility issues, especially the visually impaired, they know their city through experience, by navigating routes for years.

The result of some of these interventions is like having the carpet pulled out from under you, its like being in a new city. Some consultation could see this space becoming a better space for all.

The city councils director of operations, David Joyce, said the footpath extension project was a rapid response to a specific need and was the only construction methodology that would have delivered the required change to that street in a short space of time.

Each street is unique, and the interventions on each street have to be different, he said. We were faced with specific challenges on MacCurtain St.

If we needed to build out the footpaths, we would have had to dig up the road and dig up and relocate the drainage network  at much more significant cost and it would have taken much longer. This modular system was the most cost-effective approach. Its deployment did not require reconfiguration of the drainage network.

He said the council is actively and aggressively enforcing the parking legislation to deter people parking on the modular extensions.
The DUP is looking for another new leader after Edwin Poots announced his intention to quit after a brief but tumultuous reign in the partys top job.

Mr Poots resignation, tendered only three weeks after he was ratified in the role, came after an angry party revolt against his decision to nominate a Stormont First Minister on Thursday.

A party statement announcing his departure followed a heated three-hour crisis meeting of party officers in the DUPs east Belfast headquarters on Thursday night.

The dramatic move came after the vast majority of DUP MLAs and MPs earlier voted against Mr Poots decision to proceed with reconstituting the Stormont Executive, amid party anger at a UK Government pledge to grant Sinn Fein a key concession on Irish language laws.

The announcement by Mr Poots, who currently remains Stormont Agriculture Minister, concluded a hugely turbulent 24 hours in Northern Ireland politics  a period in which power-sharing appeared to have dodged another crisis following the nomination of First and deputy First Ministers in a special Assembly sitting, only for the administration to be plunged back into uncertainty hours later with Mr Poots departure.

Serious question marks now hang over the future of newly appointed Stormont First Minister Paul Givan, who was nominated alongside deputy First Minister Michelle ONeill on Thursday.

It is unlikely a new DUP leader would keep him in position and he could well choose to quit of his own accord before he is replaced.

A planned meeting of ministers from the Northern Ireland Executive and Irish Government will not now proceed in Armagh on Friday.

An electoral college made up of DUP MLAs and MPs will decide who will lead the party next. It remains to be seen whether it will be a contested race.

Jeffrey Donaldson, who lost last months leadership contest by 19 votes to 17, will be seen as a clear favourite by many.

In a statement following the party officer meeting on Thursday, Mr Poots said: I have asked the party chairman to commence an electoral process within the party to allow for a new leader of the Democratic Unionist Party to be elected.

The party has asked me to remain in post until my successor is elected.

This has been a difficult period for the party and the country and I have conveyed to the chairman my determination to do everything I can to ensure both unionism and Northern Ireland is able to move forward to a stronger place.

Mr Poots was voted in as Arlene Fosters successor on May 14, following a revolt against the former first minister instigated by supporters of Mr Poots.

Edwin Poots leaving the Chamber after nominating Paul Givan (bottom right) as First Minister hours before resigning as DUP leader (Brian Lawless/PA)

The Lagan Valley MLA was formally ratified as leader on May 27, meaning he officially served just 21 days in the role.

On Thursday morning, a sizeable majority of MLAs and MPs voted against Mr Poots decision to reconstitute the power-sharing Executive with Sinn Fein in what was a bruising internal meeting.

The vote was held just minutes before the process for nominating Stormonts leaders began in the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Members were furious that Mr Poots intended to nominate his Lagan Valley constituency colleague Paul Givan as First Minister after Sinn Fein convinced the UK Government to legislate for Irish language laws at Westminster.

An announcement by the UK Government in the early hours of Thursday, committing to pass the stalled laws in the autumn if they were not moved at the Stormont Assembly in the interim, was enough to persuade Sinn Fein to drop its threat not to nominate a deputy First Minister as joint head of the devolved Executive.

However, many DUP politicians had warned against a Government intervention on such a sensitive devolved issue and they were enraged that Mr Poots was still prepared to enter a new coalition on that basis.

Paul Givan and Michelle ONeill outside Stormont after they were nominated First Minister and deputy First Minister on Thursday (Kelvin Boyles/PA)

They claimed the DUP and the Government were caving to ransom politics by Sinn Fein.

The revolt against Mr Poots relates to a stand-off between the DUP and Sinn Fein over the thorny language issue which has been threatening the future of the fragile institutions in Belfast.

The issue came to a head this week as a result of the process required to reconstitute the Executive following the resignation of Mrs Foster as First Minister.

The joint nature of the office Mrs Foster shared with deputy First Minister Ms ONeill meant her departure automatically triggered the removal of Ms ONeill from her position  as one cannot hold post without the other.

While Mr Poots had vowed to implement all outstanding aspects of the 2020 New Decade, New Approach (NDNA) deal that restored power-sharing, he has declined to give Sinn Fein a specific assurance that he would move on the language element of the NDNA deal in the current Assembly mandate, a key demand of the republican party.

Amid the dispute, earlier this week Sinn Fein asked the UK Government to step in and move the legislation at Westminster instead.

DUP figures had warned UK Secretary of State Brandon Lewis against such a step, calling it an overreach into devolution.

However, early on Thursday, the Secretary of State announced that the Government would table the language legislation at Westminster in October if Stormont had failed to do so by the end of September.

Mr Poots later voiced opposition to legislating on the issue at Westminster but said he would still proceed with nominating Mr Givan as First Minister.

This prompted outrage among the partys elected representatives who viewed it as rolling over on a longstanding republican demand.
The recent publication of the Inspector of Prisons Annual Report has highlighted some major deficiencies in the complaints system within Irish prisons.

The criticisms were well made, but the report also referenced issues that require further examination at the Dochas Centre for Women.

In the early months of the pandemic, the inspector made a single visit to all the States prisons to check on conditions, apart from the Dochas, which she visited three times in April and May 2020.

There was a high degree of cocooning in the Dochas at the time, due to the pandemic, but that alone should not have required three visits.

The inspector, Patricia Gilheaney, does not record why the extra visits to the Dochas were undertaken, but she did compile a report on the issue for the justice minister, which, according to her annual report, she submitted in August 2020.

The report on the visits has not been published.

Responding to the inspectors annual report, Fiona Ni Chinneide of the Irish Penal Reform Trust called for the publication of this and other reports.

The lack of any published prison inspection or monitoring reports in Ireland during the first half of the pandemic has prevented proper public scrutiny of the treatment of men and women behind prison walls, said Ms Ni Chinneide.

At this rate, the report into the Dochas and the other prisons will not see the light of day until the pandemic has passed, and any shortcomings highlights can be dismissed as history.

If there were no shortcomings or criticisms from the inspector, the failure to publish is completely baffling.

That is not the only troubling information in the annual report as far as the Dochas is concerned.

Inspector of prisons Patricia Gilheaney. Picture: Jason Clarke Photography

Ms Gilheaney reported on the receipt by her office of unopened letters which prisoners are entitled to send.

This is designed to ensure that a prisoner can communicate with the inspector in confidence about issues the prisoner does not want to share with management.

In 2020, the inspectors office received 59 such letters emanating from nine prisons.

Fifteen, by far the greatest number, came from the Dochas. Of those, 11 were sent in October 2020.

The previous month was significant in the womens prison because the chaplain, whose role includes advocacy for prisoners, left her post, citing health concerns due to a culture within the prison which she described as one of fear, indifference, hostility, and ineptitude.

The chaplain, Claire Hargaden, explained her decision in a letter to the director-general of the Prison Service, saying that the prisoners lived in fear.

Upon making a compliant, some have found themselves under a spotlight and victims of harassment and further unfair treatment, she wrote.

Around the same time that Ms Hargaden left her post, the governor of the Mountjoy campus, Martin ONeill, went on extended leave. Ms Hargaden had mentioned Mr ONeill in her letter to the director-general.

Gov ONeills presence has been a foil to this [culture], providing support that has alleviated both my stress and the significant stress of the prisoners here, and modelling a compassionate, intelligent leadership that is so desperately needed," she wrote.

However, it is impossible for him to be here at all times and, as the prisoners have described it to me themselves, their lives are hell when he is not here.

Is it a coincidence that in the month after the departure of Mr ONeill and Ms Hargaden there was a flurry of confidential correspondence from the women in the Dochas to the inspector?

Had their lives indeed become the hell that Ms Hargaden described? The inspector does not provide any answers to these questions in her annual report.

There may well be good reason why Ms Gilheaney is reticent on this matter, and a hint to that effect is contained in another paragraph in the annual report.

In the chapter entitled Investigations, the inspector writes the following: In July 2020, the inspector raised a concern with the minister. The minister requested the inspector to carry out an investigation under Section 31(2) of the Prisons Act 2007. The terms of reference were agreed in September 2020. The investigation was ongoing at year-end.

The interior of the Dochas Centre in Mountjoy, pictured in 2004. Picture: Collins, Dublin

Last November, the Irish Examiner published the detail of the investigation in question, which has not been made public, and concerns serious allegations emanating from the Dochas about management practices.

The issue was brought to the attention of Ms Gilheaney and, as she references in her annual report, she raised a concern with the minister who requested the investigation. That investigation was due to be completed last December, but now, six months later, there is still no sign of it.

The various investigations, unpublished reports, and confidential correspondence with the inspector from women prisoners would be worrying under normal circumstances, but things have not been normal in the Dochas for a while.

The chaplains 2019 report, Irish Examiner in the published last September, highlighted a number of serious issues, including:

Overcrowding;

Out-of-cell time reduced by a third;

Complaints about verbal abuse, xenophobic remarks, threatening language, and pointed exclusion/favouritism of others.

The report noted these incidents were attributed to a small number of staff, and not the vast majority.

There is nothing in the inspectors report to indicate whether any of these issues have been addressed.

Instead, there is delayed publication of reports which could throw light on the situation, but is a matter for the department.

What is increasingly obvious is that the inspectors office does not enjoy the kind of independent, robust powers that would provide proper scrutiny of life behind the walls of the Dochas Centre, and all the other prisons in the State.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un ordered his government to be prepared for both dialogue and confrontation with the Biden administration  but more for confrontation.

North Korean state media reported the remarks on Friday, days after the United States and others urged the North to abandon its nuclear programme and return to talks.

Kims statement indicates he will likely push to strengthen his nuclear arsenal and increase pressure on Washington to give up what North Korea considers a hostile policy toward the North, though he will also prepare for talks to resume, some experts say.

During an ongoing ruling party meeting on Thursday, Kim analysed in detail the policy tendencies of the US under President Joe Biden and clarified steps to be taken in relations with Washington, the Korean Central News Agency said. It did not specify the steps.

Kim stressed the need to get prepared for both dialogue and confrontation, especially to get fully prepared for confrontation in order to protect the dignity of our state and ensure national security, it said.

Kim Jong Un at the Workers Party meeting on Thursday (Korean Central News Agency/Korea News Service/AP)

In 2018-19, Kim held a series of summits with then-president Donald Trump to discuss North Koreas advancing nuclear arsenal. But the negotiations fell apart after Trump rejected Kims calls for extensive sanctions relief in return for a partial surrender of his nuclear capability.

Bidens administration has worked to formulate a new approach on North Koreas nuclear programme that it describes as calibrated and practical.

Details of his North Korea policy havent been publicised, but US officials have suggested Biden will seek a middle ground between Trumps direct meetings with Kim and former President Barack Obamas strategic patience to curb Kims nuclear programme.

Earlier this week, leaders of the Group of Seven wealthy nations issued a statement calling for the complete denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula and the verifiable and irreversible abandonment of North Koreas nuclear and missile programs. They called on North Korea to engage and resume dialogue.

Sung Kim, the top US official on North Korea, is to visit Seoul on Saturday for a trilateral meeting with South Korean and Japanese officials. His travel emphasises the importance of three-way cooperation in working toward complete denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula, the State Department said.

Kim Jong Un has recently threatened to enlarge his nuclear arsenal and build high-tech weapons targeting the US mainland if Washington refuses to abandon its hostile policy toward North Korea.

In March, Kims military performed its first short-range ballistic missile tests in a year. But North Korea is still maintaining a moratorium on long-range missile and nuclear tests in an indication that Kim still wants to keep prospects for diplomacy alive.

Kim Jong Un addressing the meeting on Thursday (Korean Central News Agency/Korea News Service/AP)

Kwak Gil Sup, head of One Korea Cenrer, a website specializing in North Korea affairs, wrote on Facebook that Kims statement suggested hes taking a two-track approach of bolstering military capability and preparing for talks. But he said Kim will more likely focus on boosting military strength and repeating his demand for the US to withdraw its hostile policy, rather than hastily returning to talks.

Kim said last week that North Koreas military must stay on high alert to defend national security.

Analyst Cheong Seong-Chang at the private Sejong Institute in South Korea said North Korea will likely return to talks but will not accept a call for immediate, complete denuclearisation. He said North Korea may accede to a proposal to freeze its atomic programme and partially reduce its nuclear arsenal in phased steps if the Biden administration relaxes sanctions and suspends its regular military drills with South Korea.

Cha Duck Chul, a deputy spokesman at South Koreas Unification Ministry, said its closely monitoring the Norths ongoing political meeting and wants to re-emphasise the best way to achieve peace on the Korean Peninsula is through dialogue.

In Beijing, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijiang called for renewed dialogue between North Korea and the US, saying that we believe that the Korean Peninsula situation is facing a new round of tension.

Kim called the ruling Workers Partys Central Committee meeting taking place this week to review efforts to rebuild the economy, which has been severely crippled by pandemic border closings, mismanagement amid the US-led sanctions, and storm damage to crops and infrastructure last year.

On Tuesday, Kim opened the meeting by warning of potential food shortages, urging officials to find ways to boost agricultural production because the countrys food situation is now getting tense.

He also urged the country to brace for extended COVID-19 restrictions, suggesting North Korea would extend its border closure and other steps despite the stress on its economy.
Two men have appeared in court charged with the shooting of black equal rights campaigner Sasha Johnson at a 30th birthday party in south London.

The mother-of-two remains in a critical condition in hospital after being shot in the head.

She was injured during a silent disco in the garden of a house on Consort Road in Peckham just before 3am on Sunday May 23.

Another person was shot in the leg.

On Friday morning, Prince Dixon, 25, of Gravesend, Kent, and Troy Reid, 19, of Southwark, south London, appeared at Bromley Magistrates Court charged with conspiracy to murder.

The two cases were heard separately due to social distancing regulations.

Magistrate Phiroze Neemuchwala remanded both Reid and Dixon into custody ahead of their next appearance at the Old Bailey on June 25.

The two defendants spoke only to give their names and addresses and to confirm they had understood the proceedings.

It brings the total number of people charged over the shooting to four.

Cameron Deriggs, 18, of Lewisham, south-east London, was charged on May 28 while Devonte Brown, 18, of Southwark, south London, was charged on June 12.

Sasha Johnson has been involved in the Black Lives Matter movement (Victoria Jones/PA)

Brown is due to appear at the Old Bailey for a plea hearing on July 7 while Deriggs will appear at the same court on June 25.

Detective Chief Inspector Richard Leonard, who is leading the Metropolitan Polices investigation, said on Thursday evening the investigation had made significant progress in the past three weeks.

But he said police had been hampered by a lack of witnesses.

I know that there were at least 30 people there on the night Sasha was shot, Mr Leonard said.

Someone must have seen or know something that could help us get justice for Sasha and her family.

Ms Johnson is a founding member of the Taking The Initiative Party and has been a prominent

figure in the Black Lives Matter movement since last summer.

Police have said previously they do not believe she was the intended victim of the shooting.
Burma Myanmar Junta Kills Two Detained Civilians

Kwan Saik village in Myingyan Township. / CJ

Two detained civilians, including the son of a National League for Democracy (NLD) member, were reportedly shot dead by junta forces following a knife attack on an alleged junta informant in Mandalay Region on Wednesday.

On Tuesday afternoon, around 50 junta troops raided Kwan Saik village in Myingyan Township and detained 18 villagers after a former village head, U Myint Kyaw, who has been accused of being an informant, was stabbed by an unidentified man near Myingyan towns entrance that morning.

U Myint Kyaw is seriously injured in hospital.

A villager, whose relative was detained, told The Irrawaddy on Friday that all but two detainees were released on Wednesday night after being interrogated about the knife attack in Myingyan.

The villager said the junta force announced that two detained villagers  Ko Chit Ko, around 35, the son of an NLD member, and U Sein Win, about 50  were killed while trying to escape.

They were both reportedly shot while leading junta troops to the suspected attackers house on Tuesday night, according to the villager.

He said he heard shots near Kwan Saik that night.

A villager was reportedly forced to retrieve their bodies from under a bridge near the village.

Their bodies have not been returned. The villager said the families of two victims have fled the village since the juntas raid.

Several ward and village administrators in Myingyan and junta personnel have been attacked by the unknown assailants.

On Friday, a traffic police officer was shot dead by an unknown gunman in Myingyan.

An army major and captain were shot dead in the town on May 27 and June 3.



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Burma Striking Tanintharyi Teachers Threatened by Myanmar Junta

Anti-regime protesters call for a boycott of 'military's slave education' in Tanintharyi's Launglon Township on May 23. / CJ

Myanmars military regime is using threats, dismissals and arrests to try and force striking school staff in Tanintharyi Region to return to work, after the juntas reopening of public schools on June 1 flopped due to a lack of teachers.

Seven teachers in the region have been arrested for joining the civil disobedience movement (CDM) and refusing to work under the regime. On Monday, the junta sentenced three detained teachers to three years in prison each for incitement.

Less than a quarter of schools in Tanintharyi Region, southern Myanmar, opened on June 1 because so many teachers and education staff are on strike in protest at military rule. Those schools that have reopened are reporting a very low attendance of pupils, with parents and students choosing to boycott school enrolment under the regime.

A member of the Basic Education Teachers Union in Tanintharyi who requested anonymity said that several striking teachers and education staff have been told to return to work, or else the regime will arrest their family members and seize their possessions.

One township education administrator who was on strike for two months was forced back to work after her family were threatened, the teachers union member said.

Hundreds of teachers who have joined the CDM are now in hiding to avoid arrest.

Some 7,236 teachers and education staff in Taninitharyi Region were recently removed from their duties.

In Kin Maw Village in Tanintharyi, where just four out of 180 pupils at the local primary school are attending classes, parents were threatened alongside teachers in an effort to get children back in school.

In a video file shared by Khit Thit media, a military colonel told the Kin Maw teachers and village elders that he wants at least 90 students to show up by June 21, and threatened to seize their children if that fails to happen.

An official with the Myanmar Teachers Federation, who was recently suspended from one of Yangons universities for joining the CDM, said that despite the juntas threats many of the striking teachers and education staff are determined to continue to fight until the fall of the dictatorship and the return of a civilian government elected by the people.



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Myanmar Junta Kills Two Detained Civilians

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Unidentified Bodies Found After Myanmar Junta Troops Occupy Kayah Village
Burma Unidentified Bodies Found After Myanmar Junta Troops Occupy Kayah Village

Local residents burn unidentified bodies in Ngwe Taung. / CJ

Villagers in Kayah States Demoso Township found more than a dozen unidentified bodies on returning to their homes in Ngwe Taung village-tract, after fleeing their villages because of fierce clashes between junta troops and civilian resistance fighters.

Kayah State in southeast Myanmar experienced intense fighting between regime soldiers and a combined force of the Karenni Nationalities Defense Force (KNDF) and peoples defense forces (PDF) between May 21 and June 12. The heaviest fighting was in Demoso Township.

Most of the corpses found in Ngwe Taung were barely recognizable and villagers helped cremate them in line with Buddhist funeral rituals.

We have cremated eight bodies in Ngwe Taung. One of the corpses was the father of a Buddhist monk from Htee Pwint Kan Monastery. He took shelter at the monastery for two weeks, but went back home to take care of his cattle. He was shot on his way home. We know nothing about the other bodies, said one villager.

Residents of Ngwe Taung returned to their homes on June 14 after the fighting ended to find the unidentified bodies in four different wards of the village-tract.

Locals have taken care of the bodies found near their homes. As far as I know, at least 16 bodies have been found, another Ngwe Taung resident told The Irrawaddy on Thursday.

Locals said that they assume the bodies found inside wards and villages were civilians and that the ones found on roads and farms were civilian resistance fighters.

However, a member of the Demoso PDF denied that any of the corpses were those of PDF fighters. They are not PDF fighters. We retrieve every member shot during battle. Those bodies were civilians shot dead by the Myanmar military. In Ngwe Taung, some of the bodies had been partially eaten by dogs. They were the bodies of civilians, he said.

Despite that, local residents confirmed to The Irrawaddy that almost all the bodies found in Ngwe Taung could not be identified.

Ngwe Taung lies on the Demoso-Loikaw highway. Junta troops reportedly occupied the village-tract after villagers had fled the fighting. The regimes Light Infantry Battalion 427 and Infantry Battalion 102 are based near the village-tract.

Over 40 houses and shops in Ngwe Taung were broken into and valuables stolen during the military occupation, said villagers. Some buildings and cars were also set on fire. Troops from both sides are still deployed in Demoso Township, although there have been no clashes since June 13.

But locals from Loikaw and Sanpya 6th Mile village, located between Loikaw and Demoso, reported hearing artillery fire on Tuesday and Wednesday.



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A Call to Action on Behalf of Myanmars Daw Aung San Suu Kyi

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Guest Column A Call to Action on Behalf of Myanmars Daw Aung San Suu Kyi

Myanmar State Counselor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi (center) in 2019. / State Counselors Office

Every thought, every word, and every action that adds to the positive and the wholesome is a contribution to peace. Each and every one of us is capable of making such a contribution.  Daw Aung San Suu Kyi

Daw Aung San Suu Kyi turns 76 this week, detained in an unknown location, the civility of house arrest far removed.

On May 24 of this year, images surfaced of Myanmars State Counselor and Nobel Peace Laureate, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, bound and guarded in a military tribunal, where she faces a sentence of life in prison, based on fraudulent charges from a corrupt and torturous totalitarian regime, led by the general-turned-dictator, Min Aung Hlaing.

In light of the recent military coup in Myanmar, it is of the utmost importance that we critically reevaluate the narrative in which Daw Aung San Suu Kyi has been wrongly vilified by the media. We must remember who she is and what she stands for. This is not a trivial matter, but one of immense significance. She is a bastion of hope and a beacon of democracy for the people of her country, and particularly for those who have been detained, tortured or silenced since the onset of the coup.

The military takeover, initiated on Feb. 1, began with the seizure of State Counselor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and other prominent, democratically elected leaders, including Myanmar President U Win Myint.

The Tatmadaw is the official name for Myanmars military, but given the explicit disregard for the rule of lawwitnessed around the worldit is no longer a term that can accurately be used to describe the armed forces. Instead, the regime could be best recognized by the acronym MAH-SAC, or Min Aung Hlaings State Administration Council, a terrorist body that can be likened to the early stages of Pol Pots Khmer Rouge in Cambodia.

Since the takeover, Myanmars ongoing Civil Disobedience Movement can be seen live on social media. Each day that passes brings about new civilian deaths.

During this reign of terror, 864 people have been killed and 4,893 have been imprisoned, many of whom have been tortured. These political prisoners are artists, poets, professors, doctors, nurses, teachers and democratically elected civilians who have dared to speak out against this assault on universal human rights. These activists are an inspiration for democracy in actiondemocracy, in its purest and rawest form.

This is the movement that Daw Aung San Suu Kyi has worked tirelessly to achieve, for nearly 40 years, starting in 1988 with her Revolution of the Spirita nationwide struggle to awaken a love of freedom and achieve peace throughout her country.

I bring this situation to your attention with a degree of intimacy: Having worked in Southeast Asia from 2016 to 2019, I visited Myanmar many times. During a particular visit in 2017, I was invited to visit Mahasi Sasana Yeiktha, a renowned meditation center in Yangon. It was here that I met Alan Clements, one of the first Westerners to be ordained as a Buddhist monk in what was then Burma; and it was here that Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and many other members of the National League for Democracy (NLD) received classical Buddhist training from the late Venerable Mahasi Sayadaw.

Clements intimately knows Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. He met with her over six months inside her home in Yangon, shortly after her release from her first six years under house arrest in July 1995. The conversations they shared ultimately formed the basis of Clements internationally acclaimed book, Aung San Suu Kyi, The Voice of Hope: Conversations with Alan Clements. This book and Clements recently released, four-volume set, Burmas Voices of Freedom (co-authored with Fergus Harlow), highlight the ethical and spiritual principles of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and her courageous approach to bringing democracy to Myanmar.

When Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, along with her political party, the NLD, won the general election in 2015, she addressed three key issues: to amend the military conceived 2008 constitution; establish rule of law; and bring about internal peace. She stated, We need peace in our country. We have had armed conflict in our country from the very first day it became independent on Jan. 4, 1948. We are now at a juncture of our history where we have the opportunity to put an end to internal conflict.

Understanding Daw Aung San Suu Kyis resolve to meet these goalswhile facing the constant challenge to bring about reconciliation in a multiethnic country that has been traumatized by decades of violencewe can begin to understand the deeply nuanced appeal she will make three years later in The Hague in front of the International Court of Justice (ICJ), where crimes against the Rohingya in Rakhine State were alleged to violate the Genocide Convention treaty that Burma ratified in 1956.

In addressing the allegations, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi clearly stated, Even before the events of 2016-2017 Muslim, Buddhist and other communities in Rakhine faced what the Kofi Annan Advisory Committee described as complex challenges of low development and poverty rooted in enduring social conflict between the communities. She outlined the ways in which the Myanmar civilian government is committed to addressing these challenges, and to bringing about religious tolerance.

These efforts included a campaign to expedite citizenship; an assurance that all children born in Rakhine, regardless of religious background, would be issued birth certificates; and that more scholarships would be awarded to Muslim students, providing them the opportunity to attend classes at universities across the country.

Daw Aung San Suu Kyi did not seek to deny or cover up the tragedy that occurred in Rakhine State in 2016 and 2017. Nor did she try to justify the militarys brutal actions against the Rohingya minority. By highlighting the cyclical violence that has taken place within the community, she sought to present the full complexity of the situation and demonstrate the need for a commitment to the process of truth and reconciliation. She wanted an opportunity to address these war crimes through a domestic, criminal justice process that would build credibility in emergent democratic institutions.

Failing to recognize the nuanced nature of this position, the majority of the media portrayed her as a handmaiden for genocide. This could not be further from the truth.

Those who know the history of Myanmar intimately, know the tightrope Daw Aung San Suu Kyi has been forced to navigate in her unwavering pursuit to bring freedom and democracy to her people, and reconciliation between ethnic groups nationwide. In 2008, the NLD was prohibited from participating in the establishment of a national constitution. Min Aung Hlaing and his military have consistently discredited the NLDs sweeping wins in general elections; oftentimes, the so-called free and fair elections have been used as a way to target members of the opposition for arrest and/or torture.

Clements said it best in a Facebook livestream posted on May 24, the day pictures first circulated of Daw Aung San Suu Kyis abduction: In 1988 Aung San Suu Kyi began what would be called a revolution of the spirit. She employed, along with the people of her country, an epic expression of non-violence. But it is deeper than that=beyond a willingness to refuse using weaponsit is the absolute refusal to villainize or demonize. The radiance of making friends with enemies. Refraining from violence. Refraining from vilification. The courageous, open-heartedness to reconcile even with those who persecute and torture. It is beyond imagination that today this woman, along with the president and numerous other elected civilians sit in a military prison in some undisclosed location in the country waiting to be sentenced to a life in prison.

This is a clear moment for decisive action. We must demand that she be released immediately. We must demand it now. She is more than just a symbol. She is a truly inspirational female leader on the global stage and deserves to live out her remaining days in peace, celebrated for her legacy, rather than vilified in ignorance.

Right now, the people of Myanmar are fighting for the most essential form of freedom. They are fighting for the ability to think, feel and openly express what is true in their hearts, minds and conscience. To speak without fear of being taken from their homes in the dead of night and imprisoned or tortured.

Daw Aung San Suu Kyi stands for these brave women and men and we must stand withand forher and the people of her country. Please speak out at this urgent moment and let your voice be heard.

Brenna Gonderman is an independent thinker who is dedicated to the progress of democracy. She has spent many years living and working in Southeast Asia.



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It is finally Friday! Reward yourself on this last day of the work week by enjoying a burger or one of the other delicious meal options offered by our participating #tasteofkeybiscayne restaurants.

#Meal-Deals for #burgerfriday, June 18, 2021

Brasas KB

#burgerfriday special. delicious Half-Pound Hamburger, with one side and a soda, only $10.99 - loaded it up with a fried egg, bacon, cheese and pickles to make it a "completa" for only $4 more! Can't beat the quality! Unmatched value!

Have you tried our Peruvian Chicken Rotisserie for lunch or dinner that include 2 sides and sauce of your choice: huancaina, aji amarillo, huacatay and olivas negras peruanas.

Open for Outdoor Dining, Takeout or Delivery.

Call (786) 615-2399 to place a takeout order. Open Noon to 8 p.m.

328 Crandon Blvd, Galleria Shopping Center

D'Lite Bistro & Bakery

Who says eating healthy means sacrificing taste and flavor? Not at DLite!

We are a unique and healthy restaurant that serves salads, wraps, sandwiches, bowls, protein smoothies and cold press juices made fresh every morning  including gluten-free, vegetarian and keto options.

Better than a burger for Meat Lovers... our grilled picanha is a must try with this delicious Fattoush Salad!

We open at 7 a.m. daily and close at 8 p.m. everyday except Sat and Sun when we close at 6 p.m.

DLite is located in the Arcade Mall, 180 Crandon Blvd. To place an order, call (305) 882-9284 or visit us online by clicking here.

Pops Burger

What better place to dine on #burgerfriday than a burger joint? At Pops, we love burgers, made with 100% certified Angus beef. We offer everything from the most basic burger or cheeseburger, to our new Signature Burgers!!

Visit us today and enjoy a delicious double-cheeseburger! And do not forget to add our unique crinkle fries.

We also serve Hot Dogs, nachos with chili and many other favorites, in addition to shakes and desserts in a safe and family style setting and we are pet friendly!

Pops Burger is located in the Square Mall, at 260 Crandon Blvd, Key Biscayne

We are open at Noon to 9 p.m. seven-days a week. We close at 10 p.m. on Friday and Saturday.

To place an order, please call 786-401-7474 or to order online, click here.

We offer dine-in, takeout and delivery via UberEats and Postmates

DUNE Burgers on the Beach

Our burgers are so good that once youve tried you will come back for more! Nothing screams Friday like a burger by the beach!

DUNE is the stylish, yet casual, beach lounge at The Ritz-Carlton's beach for global appetizers, gourmet burgers & champagne.

Located in the Ritz-Carlton Key Biscayne, 455 Grand Bay Dr, Key Biscayne. You can reach them at (305) 365-4500.

They are open Thursday to Sunday from 11 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.

For more information, click here.

La Scala

Fridays are Osso Bucco days at La Scala and ours has the reputation of being the best on the island. Guaranteed.

Open for Indoor & Limited Outdoor Dining (reservations recommended) and Takeout

Come in even if just to say hello!

The popular Italian Bistro now offers their delicious meals to enjoy at home and thanks you for the great support from the community while they enjoy La Scala cuisine at home.

To place a takeout order call (786) 773-3633 or visit us online by clicking here.

Open 5 to 10 p.m.

180 Crandon Blvd  Arcade Shopping Center.

Artisan Kitchen & Bar

Join us. Open for Indoor dining & expanded Outdoor dining, Takeout or FREE Delivery.

What makes an Artisan burger Friday perfect? Add a craft beer!

We deliver our famous craft beers. Call for your favorite, or take advantage of our Wine sale! All our white & red wine bottles are $12 - and we will deliver

Hours of operations: Mon - Sat 8 AM to CLOSE

Sunday Brunch 9 AM to 4 PM

Call us directly at (305) 365-6003 to place an order.

Place your Order Online here

PANNA

At PANNA we like to say we offer a taste to remember, the place you love. We are serving the most delicious Venezuelan food combined with other traditional delights from Colombia and Argentina in a fast-service, friendly and casual setting.

TEQUEBURGER is all you need this Friday. We combine two of your favoritesTequenos + Burger what you get is our exclusive Tequeburger!

Convenient order online for takeout or delivery. Click here.

We are located at 600 Crandon Blvd, Suite 130, Key Biscayne next to Winn Dixie. You can reach us at (305) 456-0886

AMICI At Key Biscayne

In Italian, AMICI means friends and that is what you will find at AMICIs a friendly atmosphere surpassed only by the excellent Authentic Italian cuisine.

To make a reservation call (786) 453-0974 or Email

And for today, try our Amicis Burger 8oz lean beef, Burger, provolone cheese, romaine lettuce, tomatoes, onion, bacon, brioche bun, fries! Gourmet burger for only $13.99

AMICI at Key Biscayne is located inside The Towers of Key Biscayne at 1111 Crandon Blvd.

To see the complete email and the history of the family behind the excellence that is AMICI, click here.

Boaters Grill & Lighthouse Cafe / Bill Baggs

The restaurants inside Bill Baggs Cape Florida State Park  the popular Boaters Grill, located at No Name Harbor and accessible by boat, and the beachside Lighthouse Cafe are open and ready to serve.

What says Burger Friday more than a perfectly cooked burger and fries, enjoyed beachside under the shadows of the Lighthouse?

Outdoor dining is our specialty.

Boaters Grill is open Sunday through Wednesday from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. and Thursday through Saturday from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m.

Lighthouse Cafe is open 7-days a week, from 9 a.m. to Sunset

The restaurants are located inside Bill Baggs State Park, at 1200 Crandon Blvd., Key Biscayne.

You can reach them at (305) 361-0080

Costa Med Bistro

Sometimes all you need is a loaded burger and a lot of fries! A Costa Burger is the solution for this Burger--Friday  and the islands place to see and be seen has the best burger in Key Biscayne

Place your takeout order online by clicking here!

Costa Med, a TripAdvisor Traverlers Choice nominated restaurant, is located in the Square Shopping Center. 260 Crandon Blvd. Offering Indoor & Outdoor Dining with expanded seating, Takeout.

Reservations suggested. Call Antonio or Harold at (305) 361-7575

Hours.

Lunch Mon to Sat: Noon a.m. to 4 p.m.

Dinner Mon to Sat: 6 p.m. to 10:00 p.m. / Sun 6 p.m. to 9:30 p.m.

Open Seas Cafe

Beach. Burger. Friday. Perfection.

This Friday, try our delicious cheeseburger. Only $8.95. Add sweet potato fries! Order from the beach and we will deliver it to you!

Come and tantalize your senses in a true beachside setting at OpenSeas Cafe, you local favorites, like our signature conch fritters or our renowned fish tacos for a treat you wont forget. Our frozen daiquiris or flavorful margaritas are the perfect combination for beach and sun.

We are located in Crandon Park / South Beach at 6747 Crandon Blvd. Key Biscayne. We are open 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. (weather permitting).

Call or text us at (786) 305 4747 for more information or order. Visit us online by clicking here.

Ayesha Indian Restaurant

Open for Indoor & Outdoor Dining, Takeout or Delivery.

Friday! What a perfect day for a perfectly cooked delicious South Indian meal. How spicy do you like it.

And no matter what dish you try, experience our signature dessert, Gulab Jamun!

For our full menu or to order online, please click here.

FREE APPETIZER when you spend $50 and FREE DELIVERY

Tuesday  Sunday 5 to 9:30 p.m.

Call (786) 953-4761 to place a takeout order

328 Crandon Blvd - #115 Key Biscayne

The Golden Hog

Eat Local. Help local. Shop Safely. Email us your order! Click here.

Want to treat yourself to something truly uniquely delicious? Try our Burger! Grilled to perfection while you wait!

Todays menu:

Soups & Creams: Chicken Quinoa / Lentil / Tomato Basil

Main Course: Asado Negro (Eye Round) / Hawaiian Chicken / Salmon Fillet / Lobster Mac-N-Cheese

Side Dishes: White Rice / Mixed Vegetable / Yuca Fries

The Golden-Hog has a complete line of specialty groceries for delivery.

Golden Hog puts safety first, and has taken steps to ensure the safety of employees and customers, investing in shields, masks and gloves for safety, and the store is set up for social distancing. Shop with confidence.

Call (305) 361-1300 to place a delivery or take out order; you can order online here.

Novecento

Deep in the heart of the island, Novecento is the neighborhood hotspot.

Friday. Beer. Burger. Outdoor seating. Novecento. Perfection!!! Try our HAMBURGUESA NOVECENTO. Grilled hamburger, mozzarella, ham, bacon, butter lettuce, tomato, green olive-mayonnaise and fried egg on sesame brioche bread with our hand cut fries

Place your takeout or delivery order at 305-362-0900

Novecento Key Biscayne Bistro Argentino is located at 620 Crandon Blvd in Key Biscayne.

Open daily Noon to 10 p.m.

You can order online by clicking here

Sake Room

This Friday, we are featuring our unique Ichiban tuna tartar! A must try!

Or try us for lunch. Specials starting at $10.99

Open for Indoor & Outdoor Dining, Takeout or Delivery.

Or still enjoy Sake quality at home!

FREE* Crunchy Crab Salad!!!

New hours! 3 p.m. to 10 p.m.

Call (305) 456-0488 to place a takeout or delivery order directly

Following all CDC safety protocols

328 Crandon Blvd Ste 108, Galleria Shopping Center

Grub hub  UberEats also available. Please if you can call us first

*Offer good on any $50+ order

Randazzos Italian Seafood and Classics

Open for indoor & outdoor dining, Takeout or delivery. Reservations recommended

Do not settle. What is better than a burger this Friday? Randazzos famous homemade meatball!

Call us directly to order at (305) 456-0480. Offering Randazzos own delivery service. Local and safe

Open Monday, Wednesday to Sunday from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. Open until 11 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays

Closed Tuesdays

328 Crandon Blvd Ste 112, Galleria Shopping Center

Outside the island delivery via @Postmates or @UberEats

Tacopolis

Tacopolis, where everyday is Taco-Day!! Only eat tacos on days that end in a Y but today, we are featuring our delicious loaded Burger al Pastor - or our loaded burger, unique and delicious

Tacopolis was born as an idea in Cancun Mexico with the goal of creating a casual and relaxed atmosphere, serving authentic Mexican dishes

Open 7-days a week, 11 a.m. to 9 p.m.

Open for Outdoor dining, Takeout or delivery but our own service of find us on UberEats

They are located in the Square Shopping Center at 260 Crandon Blvd, Key Biscayne.

To place a phone order, call 786) 703-5523. To order online, please click here.

Tutto Pizza & Pasta

Open for Indoor & Outdoor Dining, Takeout or Delivery.

Fridays Burger burger special! Give me a burger!!! Or two!!!

Lunch special. Burger Friday Twofer - Two Classic Burgers plus two Soft Drinks for only - $22.00

Offering No Contact Delivery  simply request that when ordering online  click here  or by calling (305) 361-2224.

Sun- Thur 11:30 am -10:30pm

Fri-Sat 11:30 am  11pm

328 Crandon Blvd #111, Key Biscayne / Galleria Shopping Center

Kazumi

Open for Indoor & Outdoor seating, Takeout or Delivery!

Make it a Wagyu Beef Slider Friday! We top it off with a fried egg for perfection!

Modern Japanese fusion restaurant, offering creative treatments & creativity in our dishes for takeout and delivery by our own employees. Available for lunch and dinner.

Open Monday through Saturday from Noon to 10 p.m.

Only accepting credit card payments.

To place an order call (305) 361-2675 or order online here.

Milanezza

Treat yourself to a Milanezza burger!!! Add a cold beer its Friday!!!

Lunch specials server between 11 a.m. and 4 p.m.

Shot safely for groceries. Our Milanezza Mercadito offers 1-hour delivery of daily fresh fruits & vegetables, Argentina grass fed black-angus beef, all natural chicken, amazing seafood & homemade pastas. We also deliver miga sandwiches, alfajores, milanezzas, empanadas and much more.

Offering delivery from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m.

To place a delivery or takeout order, call (305) 646-1001. Or save 10% by ordering online. Use code ONLINE. Order online here.

Open for Indoor & Expanded Outdoor Dining, Takeout or Delivery from Milanezza, a Tripadvisor Travelers Choice Restaurant, is located in the CVS Plaza

KEBO

Open for Indoor & Shaded Outdoor Dining, Takeout or Delivery.

Try a KEBO Wagyu Burger! Quality at its best!

While picking up your order, visit our Kebo-Store with some Spanish delicacies like virgin olive oil, chorizos and more. Call us to place your order.

Call (305) 365-1244 to order a KEBO meal. Kebo is a TripAdvisor Traverlers Choice nominated restaurant

Check back tomorrow for more specials as we add more restaurants to #tasteofkeybiscayne-To-Go

And please remember to order from the restaurant directly before using one of the apps  this way we support the local restaurants by saving them the commission they are charged, which at times is as much as 30%
Student loans could easily get overwhelming, especially since it's hard earning income in this time of crisis. Fortunately, online tools are available for you to quickly and easily manage your student loans.

These tools can also help you create a repayment plan that best suits your needs and goals, including a loan cancellation option!

Student loans are still open to eligible individuals who want to apply. However, it often gets challenging to manage due to financial situations, family conditions, or goal-driven decisions that need a lot of money. Federal Student Aid, the official website of the U.S. government, is offering a Loan Simulator you can use to compute, plan and repay your student loans.

Student Loan Repayment Strategy

Using the Student Loan Repayment Strategy, you can create a repayment plan based on your needs and goals. It also offer syou different options like an income-driven repayment strategy, extra payment strategy, or even consolidating your loans to reduce the total amount.

Struggling With My Student Loan Payments

If you're struggling to pay the student loans because you have no money, the government offers a strategy to lower your monthly payments or to stop them altogether temporarily. Apply on this program to consider suspending payments or avoid loan default.

Borrowing More Student Loans

The same online tool can simulate options of Borrowing More Money to pay for education expenses and finish your studies. It will also inform you about federal student loan limits and selecting the right school where you can borrow more student loans.

Read Also: Ethereum Max Price Surge: Kim Kardashian Promotes New Token

Budget Apps to Help in Student Loan Repayment

Cnet also reported some of the best budget apps you can use in 2021. These apps are available for Android and iOS and could easily monitor your budget, lifestyle, and goals in a non-obtrusive method. Use these apps to save your money and help you plan out your student loan repayment.

Mint

Mint is a popular budget app used by many for nearly a decade now. This is a free application that syncs your spending pattern, auto-categorizes it, and creates fun comprehensive reports on all your transactions. You can sort these reports according to category, dates, or hashtag labels. Also, Mint is a beginner-friendly application for first-time budgeters.

You Need a Budget

You Need a Budget is a super-detailed and intricate budget planning app. After agreeing to the privacy terms, this app could connect your savings account, checking account, and even local credit unions or institutions. This app monitors all your money down to the last remaining dollar and categorize them according to your spending pattern.

Goodbudget

Goodbudget is the best app used for traditional household money management. It uses an interface similar to Checkbook systems and even categorizes your transactions manually, inside different envelopes. This is the best choice for budgeteers who want to take complete control of their budget management in a digital interface.

You could also try applying for a Loan Cancellation and Borrower's Defense by checking on this article.



Related Article: Student Loan Forgiveness 2021: How to Apply for Borrower Defense After Massive Loan Cancellation
Huntsville, TX (77320)

Today

Mostly sunny early then increasing clouds with heavy thunderstorms this afternoon. High 91F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 70%..

Tonight

Variable clouds with scattered thunderstorms. Low near 75F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 70%.
Ithaca, NY (14850)

Today

Cloudy skies this morning followed by scattered showers and thunderstorms during the afternoon. High around 70F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 50%..

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Thunderstorms this evening giving way to periods of light rain late. Low 59F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 70%.
Alibaba reports that the carbon emission per order during 6.18 sales dropped by 18% compared to last year. Alibaba cites the reduction due to its increased use of clean energy and green logistics.

Alibaba launched a large-scale campaign during its annual 6.18 Mid-Year Shopping Festival sale to reduce its carbon emission on its retail platforms Taobao and Tmall.

According to Alibaba, carbon emission per order during the 6.18 sales has been cut by 18% compared to last year.

The achievement was driven by Alibabas algorithm, which has been deployed to support Alibabas retail platform with its AI features including image search and personalisation recommendation.

The algorithm upgrade, underscored by Alibaba's machine learning technology, has resulted in a reduction of computing resources while delivering shopping experience.

Alibaba says the continued use of clean energy such as wind and photovoltaic power in data centres, as well as green logistics featuring smart packaging and rooftop photovoltaic power stations, have also contributed to the reduction in energy consumption.

Alibaba chief technology officer Li Cheng explains: In addition to using more renewable energy in our cloud facilities, we are also investing in our proprietary AI technology to cut down the amount of carbon emissions from our e-commerce platforms.

Cheng adds: To make our sustainability strategy more effective, we have been working on both the back-end infrastructure and front-end application, with a mission of making the 6.18 sales a low-carbon event and achieving carbon neutrality for our business in the near future.

As a responsible corporate citizen and technology pioneer, we shall be pursuing not only business values, but also social values that encompass environment friendliness and ecological sustainability. Moving forward, we would like to share our energy-efficient technology with our customers and partners, so we can contribute to a greener future together, Cheng concludes.

Alibaba Clouds data centre in Zhangbei County in Northwestern China, which plays a role in supporting Alibabas e-commerce business, recorded a reduction of over 8,000 tons of carbon dioxide during the 6.18 sales thanks to wind power. Since 2018, Alibaba has participated in a wind power trading program in Zhangbei, which encourages businesses entering into electricity trading contracts with wind power enterprises.

As of May this year, the total electricity generated from wind energy, purchased by Alibaba, reached 450 million kilowatt-hour. This resulted in a reduction of nearly 400,000 tons of carbon dioxide. Alibaba Clouds other data centre in Inner Mongolia also increased its use of wind and photovoltaic power to 45% of the total energy mix as of May this year, jumping from 38% last year.

Cainiao Network, Alibabas logistics arm, also reveals that through its distribution centre, smart packaging algorithm, and rooftop photovoltaic power station, the carbon emissions from its value chain during the 6.18 sales have been reduced by over 13,000 tons.

Ele.me, Alibabas local service platform, delivered 20 million food takeaway orders without plastic cutlery during the 6.18 sales. As a result, the total energy saved by not supplying cutlery approximates 400 tons of carbon emission, equating to planting 22,000 Haloxylon trees.
Microsoft is rolling out new updates in its Teams platform to create natural and engaging meeting experiences in a hybrid work setup. The update will also include meditation exercises to teach employees how to unplug after work hours.

Microsoft believes that hybrid work is the future. To empower employees to succeed in hybrid work, business leaders will need to reimagine their organisations with a new operating model for people, places, and processes.

Microsoft Teams is mission-critical to this vision for a more flexible world of work. Teams, Microsoft says, ties together meetings, chat, calls, collaboration, and business process automation in a single app.

Microsoft is focused on building experiences in Teams that are designed to ensure all voices are heard including people not in the room, empowering everyone to connect and engage, from anywhere and at any time. For easier collaborations, synchronously and asynchronously, Microsoft announces the Microsoft Fluid canvas innovationsin Teams and beyond.

COVID-19 also taught workers that meeting fatigue and digital overload is real, and remote work has challenged everyones well-being. To help, Microsoft has built Microsoft Vivaan integrated employee experience platforminto Teams, so that employees can find ways to protect time and preserve their well-being right in the flow of their work.

Participate on equal footingat home, onsite, or on the go

Microsoft announces enhancements to Teams meetings and Microsoft Teams Rooms and are built to create experiences for every participant.

Over the course of this year, Microsoft will roll out front row in Teams Rooms, a room layout that makes interactions feel natural and gives in-room participants a greater sense of connection to remote participants.

Microsoft moved the video gallery to the bottom of the screen so remote participants are face-to-face with those in the room. Meeting content is now surrounded by contextual meeting information like the agenda, tasks, and notes. Meeting chat will also be clearly visible to those in the room.

Teams Rooms will expand screen real estate using new video layouts that disperse the video gallery across multiple displays when content is not shared. The increased space means remote participants show up larger and appear more realistic.

Microsoft will also bring more features from desktop to Teams Rooms this summer, to help bring attention to remote participants engaging in the meeting. These features include live reactions, spotlight, and the ability to pin multiple video streams (coming this fall) and chat bubbles when using the classic video grid layout.

Remote participants should also be able to see who is in the meeting room, and whats happening. Jabra, Logitech, Poly, and our newest Teams device partner, Neat, are using AI-powered camera technologies to provide new video views optimised for hybrid meetings to allow every person in the room to be seen clearly.

The Teams intelligent speakers from Epos and Yealink are now generally available and are built for Teams Rooms and use Microsofts voice recognition technology in Teams to attribute remarks to the meeting room speaker in the transcript. With speaker attributed-meeting transcription, people can focus on contributing to the conversation instead of taking notes, and those who missed the meeting can see a record of the conversation after the meeting.

Microsoft introduces Teams Rooms on Surface Hub experience. Surface Hub is purpose-built for teams to meet and co-create, wherever they work, and the next generation of Teams on Surface Hub brings more of your favourite meetings features and controls from the desktop to the meeting room, including a modernised meeting stage, Together Mode scenes, and PowerPoint Live.

Coming this fall, the new Microsoft Whiteboard experience will also be available on Surface Hub, so everyone can draw on the same digital canvas.

Microsoft also creates a hybrid work-focused Whiteboard experience where all attendees can collaborate across the same digital canvas. Available in summer 2021, new features will enable anyone to bring existing content to Whiteboard to co-author; and new templates will help groups to ideate faster.

Effective hybrid meetings require every participant to be able to present, and experience an engaging and inclusive presentation. PowerPoint Live features help create a shared space for collaboration and contributions from everyone in the meeting. Slide translate allows attendees to see the presentation in their chosen language, for instance. The inking experience allows users to annotate their PowerPoint as they present or they can use a laser pointer to call attention to key points.

Users can look for latest features in the Teams mobile app as well. They can now access PowerPoint Live and Dynamic view on their mobile devices. Custom background is also now on iOS and coming soon to Android.

Collaborate in the flow of work

Microsoft announces new Fluid components in chat to create live, collaborative experiences that can be edited in real-time and shared across Teams and Office apps. Microsoft also expands its Fluid components for Teams meetings, OneNote, Outlook, and Whiteboard for easier collaboration across Teams and Office apps.

It introduces new chat features that further support asynchronous collaboration, so users can keep the work moving forward in between meetings. Pin a message to provide chat members with quick access to critical content anytime, and reply to a specific chat message maintaining context within the ongoing conversation.

Meetings have increased over the past year, along with unstructured communications. Research by the Work Trend Index shows the average Teams user is sending 45% more chats per person per, week than they did one year ago.

And ad-hoc, unstructured meetings are on the rise as well. To address this digital overload, new Fluid components in Teams meetings can co-create an agenda, take notes, and assign tasks, right within the Teams meeting, and access persistent recap content whenever they need it.

And the note, agenda, and tasks from meetings will be automatically placed in the new meeting notes home of OneNote. While the meeting is underway, take the discussion a step further by ideating and brainstorming together by creating and editing live Fluid components in Whiteboard. Fluid components can also be leveraged across Outlookin email or the calendarto manage time, agenda, notes, and tasks across apps.

Protect time and prioritise well-being

Weekly meeting time for Teams users has more than doubled since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Later this month, Microsoft is bringing a curated set of guided meditations and mindfulness exercises from Headspace to the Viva Insights app in Teams to help users start their day grounded, relax your mind before a big presentation, or disconnect from work in the evening.

Building upon the Viva Insights ability to schedule daily focus time to work uninterrupted with Teams notifications silenced, Microsoft is introducing a new focus mode in the Viva Insights app later this year.

This will feature Focus music from Headspace and implement timers to help users make progress on important tasks in regular intervals with breaks planned in between.

Remote work has eliminated physical boundaries between work and life leading to an increase in after-hours chats. Microsoft wants to help people find balance and protect personal time.

Later this year, Viva Insights will offer the ability to configure quiet time to silence mobile notifications from Outlook and Teams outside your working hours as well as provide personalised insights on how well you are disconnecting.

Quiet time settings will also be available for users in Teams and Outlook mobile and accompanied by IT administrator controls in Microsoft Endpoint Manager to support the creation of organisation-wide policies to mute after-hours notifications.
Since grabbing headlines in early May, the high profile ransomware incident impacting the US oil pipeline system Colonial Pipeline has attracted significant attention from both media and information security spaces, given the events scope and impact.

While news updates as more evidence emerges, lacking from the discussion so far is a network-centric view of the general behaviours and detection possibilities associated with ransomware deployment.

So heres an overview of the event, the behaviours linked to similar ransomware operations, the importance of network visibility, and possibilities for network detection and monitoring to meet these adversaries and related malicious activities head-on.

Background

On May 7, 2021, Colonial Pipeline suffered a ransomware incident. While all available information indicates that ransomware impacted only enterprise IT systems for Colonial, the company pre-emptively shut down linked industrial control systems (ICS) out of an abundance of caution.

Subsequently the intrusion and resulting disruption were linked to a ransomware variant known as DarkSide. Active since at least August 2020, DarkSide operates under a Ransomware as a Service or affiliate model where the group provides double-extortion ransomware services to other entities that execute the actual network breach and capability deployment.

DarkSide then manages negotiations and payment to both decrypt a victims information and to stop the selective leaking of data exfiltrated from the target network.

While DarkSide-related activity has continued in a relatively steady state since its initial discovery in 2020, the Colonial Pipeline incident is notable given its disruptive impact. While neither the first notable cyber intrusion in pipeline systems, nor the first ransomware event on pipeline infrastructure, Colonials pre-emptive shutdown of critical systems triggered a halt in their operations.

The disruption induced reactions from panic buying of gasoline through statements from the White House. Although Colonial was able to begin restoring operations as early as May 12, 2021, the shock and short-term impacts of the event were felt across both policymaker and information security circles.

Ransomware entity intrusion tradecraft

DarkSide ransomware impacted multiple victims since discovery in 2020. Yet while this ultimate payload inducing network disruption (and data theft for extortion) is concerning, defenders should focus on the preliminary steps enabling ransomware execution rather than the ransomware family itself.

In this respect, given the affiliate model through which adversaries deploy DarkSide, the ransomware variant can be linked to multiple behavioural profiles.

Multiple vendors provide insight into initial access, entrenchment, and subsequent lateral movement activity linked to DarkSide deployment. Among the most notable examples are the following:

Initial reporting from Digital Shadows in September 2020

Cyberreason Nocturnus overview of activity in April 2021

Varonis reporting, subsequently updated after the Colonial incident

An overview of recent DarkSide behaviours from FireEye, also after the Colonial incident

Observations from incident response engagements from Sophos

Further analysis from Palo Alto Unit 42

These are all valuable contributions to the discussion concerning DarkSides deployment, and my company highly recommends that defenders review these items for awareness and to become familiar with this threat.

Yet all these items largely focus on host-based actions and observations, which is unsurprising, as most of the entities in question are involved in host-based security solutions. In addition to these observations, defenders possess a multitude of options for tracking behaviours over the network related to DarkSide deployment, as well as other ransomware operations.

Initial access mechanisms

Adversary deployment of DarkSide ransomware is linked to a variety of initial access mechanisms, as one would expect given that multiple entities relate to its use. Based on a review of available literature and analysis, my company identifies the following as primary Darkside affiliate mechanisms to initially breach victim networks:

Phishing activity leveraging malicious attachments

Credential replay attacks against external-facing services, such as Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP)

Use of publicly disclosed exploits against external-facing services, such as vulnerabilities in externally accessible VPN appliances (including CVE-2021-20016).

While these represent known vectors linked to DarkSide affiliate operations, the specific mechanism used to infiltrate Colonial Pipeline is not known at present. Nonetheless, these initial intrusion mechanisms align well with common tradecraft associated with not only criminal operations (such as ransomware), but also advanced persistent threat (APT) or state-directed intrusions.

While one specific VPN exploit is called out in research from FireEye, my company assesses that other publicly disclosed exploits have likely been used as part of intrusions leading to ultimate ransomware deployment more generally.

Given the significant increase in disclosure and subsequent use of exploits targeting external-facing appliances such as VPN concentrators, network defenders should anticipate rapid moves by a variety of adversaries, whether related to DarkSide or not, to take advantage of such potential ingress points.

Lateral movement and command and control activity

Once inside victim networks, DarkSide-related intrusions leverage a combination of built-in system tools (such as LoLBins) and publicly or commercially available tools for varying levels of network communication and functionality. Such items are deployed to both spread throughout the victim network, as well as to maintain command and control (C2) over any implants or tools. Examples include:

The Sysinternals remote command execution utility PSExec

Commercially available remote access tools such as TeamViewer

The PuTTY-related application Plink

The commercially available (but frequently pirated or cracked) Cobalt Strike

The publicly available Custom Command and Control (C3) framework

Network enumeration tools such as ADRecon and BloodHound for mapping victim Active Directory instances

Tunneling C2 traffic, including RDP, via The Onion Router (TOR) to mask activity

Additionally, adversaries leverage built-in tools such as RDP and server message block (SMB) connections to enable tool or capability deployment and lateral movement in victim environments, combined with continuous credential harvesting via tools such as Mimikatz.

At this stage, endpoint-related visibility becomes valuable in assessing an intrusion in many cases. However, even the best endpoint visibility on its own is insufficient to track, detect, and monitor elusive adversaries.

This is especially the case for internal network movement. By pairing network monitoring and visibility with robust network security monitoring, defenders can ensure that all possible avenues for intruder operation are accounted for.

Like the initial access vectors, the lateral movement and C2 mechanisms identified here are hardly unique to DarkSide deployment. Instead, these techniques encompass behaviours also deployed by entities ranging from APTs to other, criminal actors.

By establishing monitoring for either external communication linked to the tools or techniques listed above, or examining internal communication flows for lateral movement activity, defenders can identify malicious behaviours even when endpoint and similar visibility can be evaded.

Data exfiltration

One other component to DarkSide-related operations, along with some other ransomware families, is the use of double extortion to prompt payment. In addition to encrypting data, victim information is stolen with threat of publication unless payment is made.

Identifying large-scale data exfiltration in progress can be an indicator of imminent disruptive actions, and if caught in time may allow for defenders to respond quickly to prevent further harm. Based on reporting from researchers at Red Canary on general trends in this space, as well as specific observations on DarkSide, the following tools and techniques appear associated with double extortion operations:

Use of cross-platform, free tools such as Rclone or WinSCP

Mega.io-focused tools such as MEGAcmd or MEGAsync

Although not conclusively proven, media reporting indicates at least in the Colonial incident that criminals leveraged cloud hosting infrastructure, specifically from Digital Ocean, as an intermediary for data exfiltration as part of this process.

The above behaviours provide a variety of potential detection possibilities. Examples include simple tracking of large, anomalous traffic flows indicative of large-scale data exfiltration to use of specific service and destination combinations (such as WinSCP to an Autonomous System Number (ASN) associated with a cloud provider).

Network visibility and monitoring

The mechanisms identified above are not distinct to DarkSide deployment; this provides a substantial benefit to defenders in that identifying general techniques associated with such intrusions will enable defensive coverage over a wide number of potential adversaries.

Moreover, given the efforts by DarkSide-related entities (as well as numerous other threats) to evade endpoint detection and response (EDR) solutions as part of fundamental tradecraft, bolstering host-centric visibility with robust network monitoring can enable organisations to detect such operations at multiple phases of the cyber kill chain.

Establishing network visibility and monitoring not only at the network edge but also for internal network traffic can enable powerful defensive responses covering a variety of threats. Looking at the behaviours identified in the previous sections, various defence and alerting mechanisms emerge from initial access through lateral movement and code execution.

External monitoring

Monitoring external scanning or authentication brute force activity can be difficult given the sheer volume of activity from multiple services, malicious actors, and other entities. Yet being able to differentiate security-significant signal from background noise is critical in articulating meaningful, sustainable network defence.

For example, identifying exploit scanning activity, such as for the VPN vulnerability linked to DarkSide deployment above, may rapidly result in numerous alarms for various commercial or academic scanners attempting to identify vulnerable instances. Instead of attempting to chase every single potential vulnerability scan, defenders should seek higher-quality, lower-volume detections to ensure focused and efficient operations.

By viewing network security events not as atomic, discrete objects but as interrelated items linked through time and execution, powerful possibilities emerge for detection and analysis.

For example, identifying linked activity such as a vulnerability scan of an external-facing service (or an explicit attempt to exploit that service) followed by scanning or authentication activity from that victim host to other, internal hosts within the network can flag likely initial intrusion actions and adversary attempts to expand access.

By linking the discrete observations into a complex, high-confidence analytic of malicious behaviour, defenders can not only ensure response to only high-severity, high-confidence events, but also alert on tradecraft linked to numerous threat actors.

Similar methodologies apply to credential stuffing, brute force, or guessing activity. Again, a variety of scanners and other items will likely be engaged in such activity on a daily basis.

But identifying instances of dedicated scanning or brute forcing from a single source, or such activity followed by anomalous network traffic from the recipient of such activity, can narrow observations to likely compromise scenarios. Defenders can then vector resources and efforts appropriately to these events to initiate incident response operations, minimising time to detection and time to recovery.

Other possibilities exist related to specific services and protocols. For example, in DarkSide operations deploying parties tunnel RDP via TOR in order to mask operations. While evading attempts to identify external RDP connections, this still requires communication to TOR nodes.

Tracking and identifying TOR nodes and related traffic can serve as a potentially powerful way to either enable more robust monitoring or, if blocked, reduce network attack surface.

Similarly, by identifying combinations of activity such as network traffic flows indicative of large-scale data movement or exfiltration to untrusted or unfamiliar network infrastructure or ASNs, key portions of the double extortion model can be flagged prior to completion.

Internal network communication

Network monitoring and defence does not end at the perimeter; to deal with current threats (whether criminal actors or APTs) such visibility and response must extend to internal network communications.

By leveraging a visibility fabric or deploying dedicated sensors inside the perimeter to track host-to-host traffic and similar flows, defenders can gain valuable visibility into adversary behaviour that can identify intrusions in progress that boundary monitoring or EDR solutions otherwise miss.

For example, DarkSide deployment, along with multiple other actor behaviours, frequently uses credential theft followed by mapping a share over SMB for file transfer, then execution, via a tool such as PSExec.

Identifying the concrete behaviours behind this activity and establishing alerts when these events are identified in sequence (authentication to host, SMB share mapped to another host, followed by file transfer of an executable or scripting object to the newly mapped host) can reveal instances of lateral movement.

While it is possible such actions could identify legitimate system administrator activity, in well-orchestrated environments such instances can be rapidly dispositioned, while the existence of an analytic identifying these linked network-specific events can flag actions related to a variety of threat actors.

Additional opportunities include monitoring of traffic flows and authentication activity, such as when an adversary deploys legitimate tools such as RDP. In these cases, identifying a number of attempted or successful authentication attempts from a single host to multiple hosts inside the network can indicate an adversary attempting to break out of an initial network foothold.

Further visibility, including being able to track precisely what credentials or user accounts are used, can reveal compromised accounts and other valuable response information.

Overall, the goal is to establish a combination of visibility into internal network traffic flows and combine this with an understanding of adversary tradecraft and operations to produce high-confidence alerting on observed activity.

When paired with external network monitoring and endpoint defence, network defenders can severely impede adversary operations, ensuring multiple potential detection points throughout the attackers lifecycle.
Cybersecurity company Proofpoint has identified a malware called LastConn which has targeted government institutions in the Middle East and global government organisations associated with geopolitics in the region.

The malware is distributed by TA402, a threat actor also known as Molerats, a Middle Eastern advanced persistent threat (APT) group that often targets entities in Israel and Palestine, in addition to other regions in the Middle East.

Proofpoint says the custom malware implant it identified enables the threat actor to conduct reconnaissance on the target host and exfiltrate data.

Proofpoint lists key findings as:

TA402 leverages political and military themes, including the ongoing conflict in the Gaza Strip, to entice users to open attachments and click on malicious links.

TA402 activity is largely focused on entities operating in the Middle East, especially government or government-adjacent organisations.

TA402s custom malware called LastConn is used to gain access to and conduct information gathering activities.

LastConn uses a number of unique features to deter automated threat analysis and make manual analysis difficult.

TA402 is a highly effective and capable threat actor that remains a serious threat, especially to entities operating in and working with government or other geopolitical entities in the Middle East, says Proofpoint.

Researchers anticipate TA402 will remain very active, based on its return to weekly threat activity as of June 2021. It is likely TA402 continue its targeting largely focused on the Middle East region.

To defend against exploitation, Proofpoint recommends recipients pay close attention when downloading and opening password protected archives, and only open them from trusted sources.

To read the Proofpoint report on the malware attacks on government organisations click here.
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UpNest compiled census population data between 2010 and 2019, the most recent year available, to find the fastest-growing metropolitan areas. Combining this data with the Purchase-Only Housing Price Index, which measures the average change in prices of single-family homes, UpNest found how t Click for more.
A funeral service for George Zickuhr, of Brownsboro formerly of Jacksonville, is scheduled at 10 a.m. on Tuesday, July 6, 2021 at Autry Funeral Home Chapel in Jacksonville. He will be laid to rest at Cathedral in the Pines in Tyler. George passed away on June 27, 2021. Arrangements by Autry 
Jacksonville, TX (75766)

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Thunderstorms likely this morning. Then a chance of scattered thunderstorms this afternoon. High 87F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 70%..

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Scattered thunderstorms early, then variable clouds overnight with more showers at times. Low 72F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 60%.




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This week's Pride Month events create space for everyone

Pride Show at The Rose is part of a larger effort to introduce, engage with Jackson Holes LGBTQ community.
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Susan covers the towns of Somers and Ellington. She joined the JI in May 2021 and graduated from Skidmore College. She recently completed docent training for the Wadsworth Atheneum and hopes to start giving tours some time next year.
JUSTICE INFO IN-DEPTH INTERVIEWS Amzat Boukari-Yabara

Historian specialised in the African continent

French historian Amzat Boukari-Yabara, a specialist on the African continent as well as Brazil, explores the international dimension of demands for reparations related to slavery and the colonial period. In this straight-talking interview, he shines a light on how the big Western former colonial powers have responded on the thorny issue of reparations.

JUSTICE INFO: If we look at recognition and reparations for colonial crimes by the big European former colonial powers, who do you think has the worst record on reparations?

AMZAT BOUKARI-YABARA: I think France is bottom of the class  or at least it was the first to set a bad example  because it imposed a debt on a liberated country. Im talking about Haiti. This debt imposed on Haiti at the time of its independence in 1804 is a fundamental moral and ethical issue with regard to France and reparations. In exchange for recognizing its independence, won through a war, Haiti was forced to pay France 150 million francs in compensation to the former slave-masters. This kind of vicious practice, consisting of taking back with one hand what has been given with the other, has been repeated in the context of neo-colonial policies; you are given independence and in exchange the former colonial power keeps control of your resources. This behaviour is in Frances DNA. If we take the example of Guinea Conakry, how did its independence come about? Sekou Toure said no to General de Gaulle and the people followed him. In reprisal, the colonial forces sabotaged everything as they left the country, making Guineas independence impossible because it was against the will of France. This dimension of sabotage is very particular to the French case, and today these are things that require reparations. Ill say it straight: I think France is bottom of the class on the issue of reparations.

The United States is a different matter, a special case. Why? Because even before the abolition of slavery, free Blacks were given a territory in Africa, Liberia. At the time of abolition, there was also some vague material compensation that did not, however, erase centuries of exploitation. At the same time, there is an American tradition of legal battles, which means that the issue of reparations has targeted companies. Those whose capital was based on slavery have a strong incentive to pay up, for the sake of their image. Scholarship systems and affirmative action policies have been put in place. This can be considered a form of reparations, recognizing social and structural inequalities. But it is clear that in each case, the United States has only acted under pressure from those concerned, notably the civil rights movement, which called for social justice to counter a form of economic racism that dates back to slavery.

Theres an interesting parallel to be drawn between France and the United States, because as France is a Republic it does not recognize differences, colour: everyone is supposed to be equal, whereas in fact this is not the case, and certain groups have historically been rendered structurally inferior compared with the average. At one point, it was felt that there was a real imbalance with regard to women, so gender parity was imposed for equality and justice. But on the ethnic question, the debate is still ongoing, and it is more complicated than in the United States because there are few ethnic statistics, and they cannot be used except for certain public policies that specifically target a group of people. When it comes to trying to reduce inequalities and put in place reparative policies, it not surprisingly doesnt work.

I would add Brazil to the list of bad pupils. First, the abolition of slavery was very late, in 1888. Second, there was no policy of reparations and integration of African populations. On the contrary there was, as in the whole of Latin America, a policy of Japanese, French and European immigration to make the African populations disappear. For the past 30 years, there have been Afro-Brazilian struggles to obtain symbolic recognition, but I think France, the United States and Brazil are the main bad guys on this issue of reparations.

There has not been much in the way of reparations in Spain, Italy or Portugal. Why not include them in this list?

The case of Spain is a bit complicated because it did not itself practice the slave trade and slavery; it had it done by other countries, mainly Portugal, England and Holland. Secondly, the specificity of Spain, Italy and Portugal was their link with the Catholic Church, which was a big factor in everything these three countries did in the last six centuries. These are countries that pursued colonial policies, policies of predation, but are less developed and industrialized than France, the US or even Brazil. The latter had a system of direct trade with the African continent, without going through Portugal, which calls for a different, more local approach to the question of reparations. For example, in Benin, demands from descendants of Afro-Brazilians and Beninese are managed locally.

In the case of Italy, the reparations aspect concerns more the colonial period. When Benito Mussolini invaded Ethiopia in the 1930s to avenge Italys defeat in 1896, he plundered the country and seized the Aksum obelisk, which Italy returned to Ethiopia in 2008. (For the record, Italy invoked all possible technical difficulties to delay the repatriation of this monument, which was done with the help of a Russian cargo ship specially equipped because of the weight of the obelisk). Libya also negotiated reparations with Italy in connection with colonization, but in exchange for helping fight immigration. We can see that Italy, Spain and Portugal are countries that, in a power struggle, can make gestures of reparation because they do not have the same power status to defend as France, the United States or the United Kingdom.

Is there a good pupil among the European powers?

Germany is often cited because it has a history of reparations with the Hereros and with the Jews  both of which are linked to genocides, a particularity that morally and legally requires reparations. Perhaps we can also speak of the United Kingdom, in some respects, because commissions have been created, notably in the framework of the Commonwealth, to address the issue of reparations in relation to the management of imperial history, whereas in the French case the central theme that should be reparations is rather debt, development aid, etc. One can see the difference between a liberal, positive, mercantile Anglo-Saxon vision and a conservative, chauvinistic and even denialist French vision. This is why it is interesting to compare the European powers.

Then, among the good students, there could be Canada. Things have been achieved symbolically with respect to the First Nations. However, mining lobbies control this issue and their interests and the stakes are different, very current, because these are still existing populations that are trying to get their culture back.

With regard to Asian countries, Japan and China have been in conflict since the Nanking massacre in 1937. This is a huge trauma and a historical dispute that still affects Chinas attitude towards Japan, and the issue of reparations is hot. It is currently at the heart of the diplomatic relationship between the two countries.

At the level of the Belgian State, at the political level, work still needs to be done, but the dynamics are there!

What about Belgium?

In 2001, Belgium launched a commission on the assassination of Congolese leader Patrice Lumumba, but there were no real conclusions, since it simply recognized a kind of moral responsibility. Nothing has been done on the penal level or even on the memorial level. This year, human remains, Lumumbas tooth, will be returned to the Congo. And in 2020, it also initiated a truth commission on its colonial past. It is really during the last decade that groups have got active; they have done an enormous amount of work on the colonial heritage in Belgium, including the human heritage (buried people, human remains) and this seems to me to be very interesting indeed.

At the level of the Belgian State, at the political level, work still needs to be done, but the dynamics are there! We can see that Belgians are not doing it willingly, but more and more elected officials are a product of this colonial history and take the issue of reparations to heart. In Belgium in particular, there is a need for healing, for the restoration of dignity; most of the people concerned are Belgians of African origin, but they claim something for their country of origin while wishing to remain Belgian! It is interesting, because there is a real altruistic side. This dynamic can also be found to some extent in France.

Nevertheless, we will have to learn lessons from the way in which the restitution of Lumumbas tooth is carried out, as the Belgian authorities do not wish to assume their responsibilities and the Congolese authorities are no more committed, despite the establishment of a protocol.

How do you explain that no official request for reparations seems to have come from Somalia or Eritrea, former Italian colonies, or from Guinea Bissau and Angola, former Portuguese colonies?

The former Portuguese colonies gained their independence through war, so I think they are in a different relationship than territories that were just decolonized. For Guinea-Bissau and Cape Verde, no particular request for reparations has been made to Lisbon, but in reality, the Portuguese colonies subcontracted to England or to South Africa. So money from the slave trade, slave economy and colonial economy of Portugal ended up in the accounts of British banks. The demands that could be made could therefore be aimed at specific companies and sectors.

As for Somalia, it has not asked for reparations because it simply has other problems. It is a country in a very complicated situation, with a fragmented territory.

Benin is a model in the way it seeks to make history a tool of national pride, sometimes with contradictions

In Africa is Benin, which was a Portuguese and then French colony, a model in terms of demands for reparations, some of which have been successful?

I think Benin is a country where there is a tradition of conciliation, dialogue, and peace, and the question of reparation goes hand in hand with this. Kingdoms still exist there and there are still very strong cults and traditions. All of this necessarily calls for a return [of looted works] and even for a continuity of historical memory. For me, Benin is a model in the way it seeks to make history a tool of national pride, sometimes with contradictions, in particular the important role of civil society, internal political agendas and interests that go beyond repairing memory of the past. There are undeniable financial and economic interests that are linked to tourism for the country, for which it wants to sell a good image. Take the example of the museums that are being built in the country for the restitution of works of art: it is symbolic for many people, it touches them, and they will be happy to have a looted cultural heritage returned to them. But to put it very clearly, the construction of museums is also part of an economic tourism project for public and private Franco-Beninese interests. And the real question that arises from this is what will accompany these constructions: what educational policy, what showcase for these works, and especially what financing? Given the state of the cultural budget in Africa, this will be financed either by the private sector or by foreign donors.

You just have to look at the Afro-descendant youth in France, they are insurrectional because their history has never been taken into account.

More generally, in your opinion what is at stake in the current demands for reparations for colonial crimes in France?

For me, these are simply issues of democracy. I think that when you live in a country, whether you are French or not, you are part of the life of that country and its people. The question of reparations means giving back to all those who are invisible because of their foreign origin or their social status, their share of existence, dignity, recognition and their share of memory. This work, which is democratic, is similar to the work on the teaching of French history. We cannot teach the history of a country that is the second largest maritime power in the world in isolation. There are also questions of values, especially for a country that claims to be a country of human rights and that is not capable of institutionalizing the principle of repair. This raises questions because the principle of reparations says that once you know what you have repaired, you understand its fair value and you will not break it again. The fact that there are no reparations implies that you might do it again.

In this process of reparations, there is also offering apologies. However, we have a political class that uses the term repentance as if we were waiting for the confession of a sin, whereas the populations concerned expect to receive concrete reparations, and also a real apology. This is the impasse of the Taubira Law [a 2001 law recognizing the slave trade and slavery as a crime against humanity]: it is attacked for promoting repentance, but it does not address reparations. It is true that it puts France as the first country to recognize slavery as a crime against humanity, but it does not impose anything binding. In my opinion, it is a problem of institutionalizating reparations. In the US and UK, research centres have been working on these issues for a long time. In France, it is more recent, with the Repairs project, which has just published a database making it possible to trace reparations  paid to slave owners  at the time of the abolition of slavery.

Finally, another thing that explains why all this is a process that takes time is that a policy of reparation allows for the completion of mourning. In the so-called Afro-descendant populations, there is a lot of trauma, and reparations would allow for this mourning to be completed. You just have to look at the Afro-descendant youth in France, they are insurrectional because their history has never been taken into account.

Recommended reading Colonial Crimes: World map of justice initiatives
Ivory Coast has successfully negotiated a day big on risk after its former president Laurent Gbagbo returned home, but analysts say the high emotions underscore the need for national healing.

Thousands of supporters lined the streets of Abidjan on Thursday to celebrate the return of a man they revere as a hero, but who for others stirs memories of turmoil and bloodshed.

The turnout for Gbagbos long-awaited homecoming was smaller than some had predicted, but tensions were high.

Police made massive use of tear gas to disperse crowds and, according to Gbagbos Ivorian Popular Front (FPI) party, arrested several dozen of his followers.

These regrettable incidents, to our knowledge, did not lead to loss of human life or even major property damage, but they should not obscure the truth, commentator Venance Konan wrote in the pro-government Fraternite Matin daily.

We all want our new history to be written under the theme of complete and genuine reconciliation, of a sacred union in the face of the great perils that we are going to have to face, and which are called Islamic terrorism, deforestation, Sahelisation.

Gbagbo, 76, was Ivory Coasts president from 2000 until 2011  a time of rebellion, division and repeatedly postponed elections.

He was arrested in April 2011 after a months-long conflict sparked by his refusal to concede electoral defeat at the hands of todays president, Alassane Ouattara.

He was then hauled off to the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague to face charges of crimes against humanity resulting from the war, which claimed some 3,000 lives.

After a lengthy trial, Gbagbo was acquitted in January 2019. The verdict was upheld on March 31, paving the way for his return.

Ouattara says he welcomes Gbagbos return, and has vowed to give him all the honours and rewards due to a former president.

The authorities hope he will play the part of statesman who will calm the waters after electoral violence last year that left scores of dead and once more divided the country.

 Politics later 

In his first public words on arrival, Gbagbo steered clear of the thorniest issues, saying he would make a political address at a later time.

He thanked FPI followers for the support and congratulated them for their showing in legislative elections in March  the first time in a decade that the party had taken part in a ballot.

He said he was glad to return to Ivory Coast and Africa after being acquitted and spoke with sorrow at being unable to see his mother before she died, as he was in jail in The Hague at the time.

Gbagbo is seen by his followers as a doughty defender of the poor and oppressed.

His rose to prominence in the 1970s as a leftwing campaigner who fought against the one-party system that was installed in Ivory Coast after it gained independence from France.

He was jailed for almost two years and spent years in exile in France.

Fear of bitterness or revenge by Gbagbo are being played down by his party, who see him as a healer.

Thursdays incidents belong to the past, his spokesman, Justin Katinan Kone, told AFP.

We are determined to move towards national reconciliation, come what may.

 Ouattara meeting? 

Groups representing the victims of the 2010-2011 post-election violence have condemned the impunity he has received. They also point to a 20-year jail sentence Gbagbo was given in absentia for looting the Central Bank of West African States during the conflict.

The authorities have already hinted that this sentence will be lifted.

The big question, on the day after Gbagbos return, is whether he will meet his former nemesis.

Nothing has been scheduled, but it is conceivable, said Katinan Kone, adding that for now Gbagbo has to rest.
A former Liberian warlord was jailed for 20 years in Switzerland on Friday, becoming the first person from the country to be convicted of war crimes committed during the bloody conflict there a generation ago.

Alieu Kosiah, 46, who was arrested in Switzerland in 2014, was found guilty of multiple atrocities committed during the first of Liberias back-to-back civil wars, in which about 250,000 people died between 1989 and 2003.

The verdict handed down by Switzerlands Federal Criminal Court in the southern city of Bellinzona marks the first time a Liberian has been convicted  either in the west African country or anywhere else  of war crimes committed during the conflict.

Kosiah, who denied the charges, stood accused of committing a string of war crimes while commander of the United Liberation Movement of Liberia for Democracy (ULIMO) armed group.

He was found guilty of 21 out of the 25 charges, including ordering or participating in the killing of 17 civilians and two unarmed soldiers.

He was also found guilty of rape, and having deployed a child soldier, ordered lootings, and of repeatedly inflicting cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment on civilians.

He was sentenced to 20 years in prison, minus the more than six and a half years spent in detention.

The court also ordered him to be expelled from Swiss territory for 15 years.

When the proceedings opened last December, Kosiah was the first Liberian to face trial over alleged war crimes committed during the countrys first civil war, from 1989 to 1996, according to Human Rights Watch.

Liberias former warlord-turned-president Charles Taylor was convicted in 2012 of war crimes and crimes against humanity  but that was over atrocities committed in neighbouring Sierra Leone, not in his own country.

The ULIMO armed group was created to fight Taylors rebel force.

Switzerland recognises the principle of universal justice, allowing it to try people suspected of committing the most heinous international crimes regardless of where they were committed.

But Kosiahs case marked the first time its civilian court system has heard an international war crimes case.

Liberias two civil wars were marked by numerous massacres committed by often drugged-up fighters, mutilations, and sexual violence used as a weapon of war.

Most of the commanders of the different groups fled the country after the wars ended in 2003.

But more than 15 years on, many of those in charge back then still hold positions of political and economic influence in the country.

The underlying causes of the conflict  including ethnic divisions and economic disparities  remain strongly felt in Liberian society.
A former Liberian warlord was jailed for 20 years in Switzerland on Friday, becoming the first person from the country to be convicted of war crimes committed during the bloody conflict there a generation ago.

In a ruling hailed as historic, Alieu Kosiah, 46, was found guilty of multiple atrocities committed during the first of Liberias back-to-back civil wars, in which about 250,000 people died between 1989 and 2003.

Switzerlands Federal Criminal Court in the southern city of Bellinzona said in a statement it had found Kosiah guilty of violating the laws of war.

The verdict marks the first time a Liberian has been convicted  either in the west African country or anywhere else  of war crimes committed during the conflict.

This is completely historic, human rights lawyer Alain Werner, who represented four of the seven plaintiffs in the case, told AFP.

He said the verdict, and especially the fact that the judges had so clearly stated they believed the accounts of the victims who have been fighting for years for justice was an enormous relief.

Human Rights Watch also hailed the landmark conviction.

The verdict is a breakthrough for Liberian victims and the Swiss justice system in cracking the wall of impunity, Balkees Jarrah, HRWs associate international justice director, said in a statement.

 Murder, rape 

Kosiah was found guilty of 21 out of the 25 charges against him for war crimes committed while commander of the United Liberation Movement of Liberia for Democracy (ULIMO) armed group.

He was found guilty of ordering or participating in the murder and killing of 17 civilians and two unarmed soldiers, as well as rape, and having deployed a child soldier.

He was also found to have ordered lootings, cruel and humiliating treatment of civilians and had repeatedly himself inflicted cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment on civilians and mishandled corpses, the court found.

He was sentenced to 20 years in prison  which was the maximum sentence possible in Switzerland at the time the crimes were committed, the court said.

The more than six-and-a-half years Kosiah had spent in detention would be deducted from the sentence, it added.

After serving his sentence, he would be expelled from Swiss territory for 15 years, the court ruled.

He was also ordered to pay a total of 51,100 Swiss francs ($55,450, 46,720) in compensation to the seven plaintiffs in the case.

 Swiss first 

When the proceedings opened last December, Kosiah was the first Liberian to face trial over alleged war crimes committed during the countrys first civil war, from 1989 to 1996.

Liberias former warlord-turned-president Charles Taylor was convicted in 2012 of war crimes and crimes against humanity  but that was over atrocities committed in neighbouring Sierra Leone, not in his own country.

The ULIMO armed group was created to fight Taylors rebel force.

Switzerland recognises the principle of universal justice, allowing it to try people suspected of committing the most heinous international crimes regardless of where they were committed.

But Kosiah, who settled in Switzerland in 1998 and was arrested there in 2014, is the first person tried in the countrys civilian court system over international war crimes case.

This verdict is historic on two levels, both for Switzerland and for Liberia, Werner said.

Liberias two civil wars were marked by numerous massacres committed by often drugged-up fighters, mutilations, and sexual violence used as a weapon of war.

Most of the commanders of the different groups fled the country after the wars ended in 2003.

But more than 15 years on, many of those in charge back then still hold positions of political and economic influence in the country.

The underlying causes of the conflict  including ethnic divisions and economic disparities  remain strongly felt in Liberian society.
After U.S. President Joe Biden designated June 19 as a federal holiday, black Americans rejoiced on Thursday, but some said that although they appreciate the recognition during the racial liquidation in the country, more is needed To change policies that are unfavorable to many of their brothers.

Its great, but its not enough, said Gwen Grant, president and CEO of the Kansas City City League. Grant said she was pleased that both houses of Congress quickly voted this week to designate June as a federal holiday because it has been a long time.

But she added, We need Congress to protect voting rights. This needs to happen now so that we dont go backwards. This is the most important thing that Congress can resolve at this time.

At the cheering White House bill signing ceremony, Biden agreed that it is not only necessary to commemorate the events of June 19, 1865. It was then that Union soldiers brought the news of freedom to the enslaved black people in Galveston, Texasabout two and a half years after President Abraham Lincolns Emancipation Proclamation released slaves in the southern states.

This day is not just a celebration of the past. It requires action today, Biden said before the establishment of June Festival National Independence Day. His audience included dozens of congressmen and Opal Lee, a 94-year-old Texas woman running for this holiday.

Biden talked with Opal Lee after signing the contract. (Evan Wucci/Associated Press)

Efforts to limit education

Biden regards voting rights as an area of ??action.

Republican-led states have enacted or are considering legislation, and activists believe that these legislatures restrict voting rights, especially for people of color. Legislation addressing the voting rights issue, and the police reforms required after the killing of George Floyd and other unarmed blacks, remained stagnant in Congress, which took swift action on the June Festival Act.

Others hope that the federal government will provide compensation or financial compensation to the descendants of slaves to make up for these mistakes.

At the same time, efforts are being made across the country to restrict school districts teaching about the history of slavery in the United States

Community organizer Kimberly Holmes-Ross helped her hometown of Evanston, Illinois, become the first city in the United States to pay indemnities. She said she is happy with the new federal holiday because it will guide more people to learn about June Festival.

But she hopes that Congress will first take action on anti-lynching legislation or voter protection.

Holmes-Ross, 57, said: Im not really excited because everything else is going on. You havent solved what we really need to talk about.

People celebrate on the historical anniversary of the June Festival in Galveston, Texas. ((Jenny Freynolds/Galveston County Daily News via The Associated Press)

Many states are already celebrating June

Penil Joseph, an expert on race issues at the University of Texas at Austin, said that the United States has never had a holiday or a national commemoration of the end of slavery. But many black Americans have long celebrated June Festival.

June is iconic and we need to follow the essence, but black history has always tried to do multiple things at the same time, Joseph said.

Most federal workers will celebrate the holiday this Friday because the 19th is the weekend. Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser and Maryland Governor Larry Hogan announced that state and city government offices will be closed on Friday to commemorate June Festival. Public schools in the District of Columbia will also be closed on Friday.

June Festival is the 12th federal holiday, including the inauguration day every four years. This is also the first federal holiday since the creation of Martin Luther King Holiday in 1983.

Before June 19 becomes a federal holiday, most states and the District of Columbia will comply with this rule. Texas designated June as a holiday for the first time in 1980.

The Senate passed the bill unanimously earlier this week. But in the House of Representatives, 14 Republicans voted against, including Texas Representative Chip Roy. Roy said the June Festival is worthy of commemoration, but he opposed the use of independence in the name of the festival.

House Majority Whip James Clayburn (center left) reached out to Congressman Maxine Waters, and members of the Congressional Black Caucus celebrated the June National Independence Day Act. (J. Scott Applewhite/Associated Press)

He said in a statement: This name unnecessarily divides our country on one issue, but should unite us by creating a separate independence day based on a persons skin color.

Arizona Rep. Paul Gossall also voted against the bill. He said: We have an Independence Day, and it applies equally to all people of all races.

The mood in Texas is different. This is the first state to make June Festival a state holiday.

Im very happy, said 70-year-old Doug Matthew, a former city manager of Galveston, who has helped coordinate the June festival in the community since Texas made it a holiday. Celebrations.

He believes that the work of state and local leaders paved the way for Congress to take action this week.

Im also proud that everything started in Galveston, Matthew said.
Biden and Erdogan agreed that Turkey will take the lead in ensuring the safety of Kabul Airport after the U.S. forces withdraw.

An American official said that President Biden and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan agreed during their meeting in Brussels this week that as the United States withdraws from Afghanistan, Turkey will play a leading role in ensuring the security of Kabuls airport. .

But the official said that the two leaders failed to resolve a long-standing dispute that caused tension between Washington and Ankara over Turkeys purchase of the Russian-made S-400 surface-to-air missile system.

US National Security Adviser Jack Sullivan told reporters on Thursday that Biden and Erdogan discussed the security of Afghanistans airports during their meeting at the NATO summit on June 14.

According to a Reuters report, Sullivan said that Erdogan had requested US support to help ensure airport security, and Biden promised to provide such support.

The leaders have made a clear commitment that Turkey will play a leading role in ensuring the safety of Hamid Karzai International Airport, and we are now studying how to implement it to achieve this goal, Sullivan said.

Sullivans remarks provided the first details of the American side of the meeting between Biden and Erdogan. He told the President of the United States Ankara will not change its position Russian S-400 missile system.

In 2019, a new S-400 Triumphal surface-to-air missile system was deployed at a military base outside the town of Gvardesk near Kaliningrad, Russia [File: Vitaly Nevar/Reuters]

Ankaras purchase of Russian air defense weapons interfered with the US plan to sell advanced F-35 fighter jets to Turkey.Washington has Remove Ankara from the F-35 fighter jet program And impose sanctions.

I told [Biden] They should not expect Turkey to take different steps on the issue of F-35 and S-400, because we have done what we have to do for F-35 and provided the necessary funds, Erdogan said on his return from Azerbaijan. Tell reporters on the flight. Thursday.

We must pay close attention to developments. We will follow up on all our rights, he said.

Turkey and the United States have differences on many other issues, including policy differences in Syria and the Eastern Mediterranean.

The two leaders sounded optimistic after the meeting, but they did not announce any concrete progress. One potential area of ??cooperation is Afghanistan, where Ankara has offered to guard and operate Kabul Airport after the withdrawal of U.S. and NATO forces in the coming weeks.

With the withdrawal of Western troops, the security of the airport is critical to the operation of the diplomatic mission in Afghanistan.

Last week, a Taliban spokesperson said Turkey should withdraw Withdrawal from Afghanistan in accordance with the 2020 U.S. withdrawal agreement, but Sullivan said that the Talibans comments did not prevent detailed and effective Safety plan The United States is uniting.

Obviously, we take seriously the concern that the Taliban or other elements in Afghanistan will attack the Western or international presence We believe that what the Taliban publicly says should not or will prevent the current efforts to establish such a secure presence, Sullivan said .

As president, Biden adopted a calmer tone towards Erdogan than his predecessor Donald Trump. Biden quickly admitted that the 1915 massacre of Armenians was a genocide, and Biden stepped up his criticism of Turkeys human rights record.

It is not clear whether Biden raised human rights issues with Erdogan during the meeting. Sullivan hardly provided any details. If any, S-400 deadlock Will be resolved.

They discussed. The issue was not resolved. The two sides promised to continue the dialogue on the S-400, and the two teams will follow up on the outcome of the meeting, he said.
A power of attorney is a legal document that grants a person the power to act or make decisions on behalf of the person who created the power of attorney. The person selected to make the decision is called the agent or de facto agent, and the person who creates and signs the power of attorney is called the principal. The power of attorney can be broad, granting the ability to make all decisions on behalf of the client, or it can be very narrow, limited to one type of decision, such as health care.

If you are granted power of attorney As an agent of someone you know, you may have some questions about how to perform your duties. Read the authorization document carefully so that you can understand when your authorization starts, immediately or later, and whether your authorization scope is broad or specific. As an agent, you may need to sign documents on behalf of the principal. The following information covers questions about who can sign as an authorized agent and how.

Sign confidently with RocketSign  Obtain a fast digital signature through optional lawyer advice.

Who can sign the power of attorney?

The only person legally authorized to sign the power of attorney is an individual Named agent In the power of attorney file. In many cases, the principal will appoint an alternative or alternate agent in case the first option is not available for some reason. It is possible to designate two or more people to act as agents at the same time, but this is not always recommended because conflicts may occur.

If you are not the only agent, you will need to find out whether you are a joint agent along with the other person named in the power of attorney. Concurrent agents can act independently of each other. Joint agents make decisions together, and if they disagree, they need to find a way to reach an agreement. Instructions on how to resolve conflicts are sometimes included in the power of attorney.You might consider Ask a lawyer If you have questions about how to resolve conflicts with other agents.

What is the correct way to sign the authorization form?

First, before you go to any meeting that needs to be signed on behalf of the principal as an agent, make sure you bring power of attorney with you. Although the client may have submitted a copy of the agreement to medical institutions and financial institutions, it is best to have a copy in case they request it (whether it is comparing the two or unable to find their copy). You may need to call in advance to confirm if there are other documents or identification documents that you need to bring with you. For example, you need to bring at least a photo ID, such as a drivers license or ID card, to verify your identity.

The correct way to sign as an agent is to first sign the principals full legal name, then write by, and then sign. You may also want to indicate that you are signing as an agent by writing after signing: an agent, a de facto agent, a letter of authorization or a POA.

What happens when you sign as a power of attorney agent?

When an agent signs a document, its signature has the same legal effect as the principal. This means that any agreements signed, decisions made, or transactions conducted are legally binding, just as if the client had signed a document.

What are some examples to illustrate how to sign as a power of attorney agent?

Most agencies or agencies will have their own specific format requirements on how to sign as a power of attorney agent. The reason for this is that they can track the signing of the documents in case there are any disputes in the future. You can call and ask before an appointment or meeting to determine in advance which format is preferred.

When you sign on their behalf, the principals name will always appear first.

Sam Jones, After Katherine Spalding, Agent

Richard Smith, After Megan Smith, The lawyer actually

Diego Martinez, After Maria Espinosa,POA

Shirley Rodriguez, After Jose Sanchez, power of attorney

Making decisions, signing documents, or acting on behalf of others as an agent can be a major responsibility.If you have any questions about acting as a power of attorney, you may need Ask a lawyer.

This article contains general legal information and does not contain legal advice. Rocket Lawyer is not a law firm, nor is it a substitute for a lawyer or a law firm. The law is complex and changes frequently.For legal advice, please Ask a lawyer.
Experts say that routine Covid tests conducted in schools may disrupt education and should be cancelled.

Data analysis shows that up to 60% of positive Lateral flow test The result then becomes negative at the time of the examination.

? Read our Coronavirus Live Blog Get the latest update

5 A student conducts a lateral flow test at Outwood College in the Woodlands, Doncaster, Yorkshire Credit: PA

5 Experts warn that regular testing may interrupt childrens education Credit: Reuters

Professor Sir Andrew Pollard, who leads the Oxford Vaccine Project, said that the impact of regular testing on childrens education means that it may be easier to vaccinate them.

He says Telegraph Children are generally not severely affected Coronavirus disease, But if the testing procedure detects a large number of cases, it means that students must self-isolate and cannot attend classes.

The expert explained: I think the impact on education may be a reason for vaccination.

If the children are not affected too much, then the test obviously cannot protect them because they are not greatly affected. So is the test done to protect other people?

Currently, about 200 schools across the country are participating in an experiment to assess whether daily testing can replace self-isolation.

School trial

This means that if a student is determined to be a positive case, the rest of the class will be tested daily instead of self-isolating for 7 days.

Students who test positive will also receive PCR detection On the 2nd and 7th day, the other students will mainly take the traffic test later.

The government stated that the main phase of the experiment started in April, a few schools participated in the early phase of the experiment, and the experiment started in mid-March.

A spokesperson for the Ministry of Education said that they will review daily contact tests at the end of this month as a potential alternative to self-isolation.

But today, 23 British scholars wrote to the Minister of Education Gavin Williamson Warn him about the potential impact of the test on education.

5 The academic community has contacted Gavin Williamson to warn him of the impact of the test on education Credit: LNP

Daily Telegraph analysis shows that there have been many false positives in the horizontal flow test.

After checking with a more accurate PCR test, about one-third of the lateral flow test results are negative.

In March, this proportion rose to 60%, when 379 of the 624 positive tests were found to be false.

But last year, a study in Liverpool also found that these tests failed to find positive cases about 50% of the time.

However, a recent analysis by NHS Test and Trace found that the specificity of the lateral flow test is at least 99.9%.

5 A student takes a sidestream Covid-19 test in the gymnasium of Park Lane College in Halifax Credit: Agence France-Presse

5

This means that for every 1,000 lateral flow tests performed, there will be less than one false positive result.

Experts say that false alarms will not only cause school disruptions, but will also make tracking the pandemic more difficult.

Currently, it has not been decided whether to recommend jabs to children.

The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunization is assessing the risks and benefits and will inform the ministers of its recommendations.

But yesterday, a source close to the committee said that it is unlikely to recommend vaccination for children. era report.

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The insider said: Its just of no value. They know that they think its inappropriate and strongly believe that their children should not be vaccinated.

A government spokesperson said: A small number of secondary schools and universities are participating in an independently supervised and voluntary daily exposure test as an alternative to self-isolation, which has been approved by the Public Health Research and Ethical Governance Group of the United Kingdom.

The trial will end at the end of June, and the survey results will be considered at that time to provide information for future use of daily contact testing in schools.
The justices ruled that the food company won the case with a score of 8 to 1. Six adult Malian citizens claimed that they were taken away as children and forced to work on a cocoa farm in neighboring Ivory Coast.

On Thursday, the US Supreme Court supported food giants Nestle and Cargill in a lawsuit claiming that they deliberately purchased cocoa beans from African farms that use child labor.

The justices ruled that the food company won the case with a score of 8 to 1. Six adult Malian citizens claimed that they were taken away as children and forced to work on a cocoa farm in neighboring Ivory Coast.

The judges said that the appeal court was wrong to allow the groups litigation to proceed.

Although the defendants injury occurred entirely overseas, the Ninth Circuit found that the defendant could file a lawsuit in federal court because the defendant company allegedly made asignificant operational decision in the United States. The Ninth Circuit wrongly allowed the lawsuit Keep going, Judge Clarence Thomas wrote in the courts majority opinion.

The case was dismissed twice in the early days before being resumed by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. When the case was debated in December, the administration of then President Donald Trump supported Nestle and Cargill.

The argument of this group from Mali is that Minneapolis-based Cargill and Switzerland-based Nestles US branch helped and abetted their slavery as children, including purchases from farms that used child labor. Cocoa beans. The organization filed a lawsuit in an attempt to file a class action on behalf of themselves and the thousands of other former child slaves they said.

Nestle and Cargill said they have taken measures to combat child slavery and denied any wrongdoing.

The case involved a law promulgated by the first Congress in 1789, the Alien Tort Act, which allowed foreign citizens to sue for human rights violations in US courts. The judges question is whether it allows lawsuits against American companies.

In recent years, the High Court has restricted the use of the Foreign Tort Law. In 2018, the court ruled that foreign companies should not be sued in accordance with the law. In this case, the court rejected attempts by Israeli victims of attacks in the West Bank and Gaza to use a US court to sue the Jordan-based Arab Bank, which they said provided funds for the attack.

The case is Nestle USA v. Doe I, 19-416, and Cargill Corporation v. Doe I, 19-453.
Diplomats said that the United Nations General Assembly will vote on a non-binding resolution on Friday that condemns the military government of Myanmar and calls on member states to curb the influx of weapons into this violent country.

The vote will take place on the same day that the Security Council holds informal talks on the situation in the country. The military overthrew the democratically elected leader Aung San Suu Kyi and seized power on February 1.

The draft resolution of the General Assembly obtained by Agence France-Presse was formulated after several weeks and was carried out after the talks between the Western countries and the member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). It acts as a mediator in a crisis.

A diplomat told Agence France-Presse on Thursday that the two sides will see the resolution passed by consensus rather than by voting on Friday.

The position of Myanmars main ally, China, remains unclear. The diplomat said that any country can request a vote, and Beijing can abstain from voting by then.

In mid-May, the first attempt to get a text on Myanmar passed was stopped so that Western diplomats could negotiate with ASEAN member states to obtain the greatest support for the initiative.

The initial effort called for an immediate cessation of the direct and indirect supply, sale or transfer of all weapons, ammunition and other military-related equipment to Myanmar.

But the new text is obviously more vague, calling on all member states to prevent the flow of weapons into Myanmar.

Effective collective measures

In a recent letter to the United Nations, Burmas special envoy to the United Nations called for effective collective measures against the military because of the deadly suppression of dissidents for months, resulting in more than 860 deaths.

Kyaw Moe Tun-who supports Comprehensive arms embargo on Myanmar -Enthusiastically rejected the coup detat on February 1st and ignored the militarys claim that he no longer represents Myanmar.

The United Nations still considers him a legitimate envoy of the country.

In principle, the Security Council is more likely to consider an arms embargo, which is binding in this case, but Chinas veto makes this unlikely.

Yes, folks, this is the US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin sitting at the table with Myanmar Secretary of Defense Myo Tun U at the ASEAN Defense Ministers Meeting + pic.twitter.com/is54FeIwcb  Bill Hayton (@bill_hayton) June 16, 2021

The draft resolution of the General Assembly called for the restoration of democracy in Myanmar, the release of all civilian leaders detained, and the military immediately cease all acts of violence against peaceful demonstrators.

It also requires the implementation of a Five point plan Drafted by ASEAN in April, including the appointment of a special envoy for the group.

The text, co-sponsored by more than 50 countries, also called on the military to allow Christine Schraner Burgener, the UN Special Envoy in Myanmar, to visit the country and allow humanitarian aid to pass safely.

Even if diplomats continue to put pressure on the Myanmar generals, ASEAN officials continue to meet with Myanmar officials appointed by the military. Myanmar joined this 10-member organization in 1997, when the country was ruled by the military.

On Wednesday, Myathan U, an official designated by the Myanmar military government, attended the organizations meeting of defense ministers. US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin also attended the meeting.

Human rights organizations and the Myanmar opposition have been criticizing the international community for providing legitimacy for the Myanmar coup by meeting with military officials.
Sources said that WeChat, Douyin and other apps targeted by Trump are eligible for review by the Biden team.

People familiar with the matter told Reuters that US President Joe Bidens executive order aimed at protecting sensitive American data will force some Chinese apps to take stricter measures to protect private information if they want to stay in the US market.

The goal is to prevent adversaries such as China and Russia from obtaining large amounts of personal and proprietary business information.

The U.S. Department of Commerce may issue subpoenas to collect information about certain smart phones, tablets, and desktop computer software applications. According to people familiar with the matter, the agency may negotiate its terms of use in the United States or ban these applications.

Bidens June 9th order Replace President Donald Trumps 2020 ban on popular Chinese apps Wechat, Owned by TikTok of Tencent Holdings Co., Ltd. and ByteDance Co., Ltd. The U.S. court stopped these injunctions.

U.S. officials shared many of the concerns Trump mentioned in his ban DouyinAccording to a person familiar with the matter.Its worth noting that they are worried China It can track the location of US government employees, establish personal information files for extortion and conduct corporate espionage activities.

Due to a stronger legal framework, the new order may eventually capture more applications than the final Trump order. Reuters first reported on the details of how the Biden administration plans to implement the order, including seeking support from other countries.

A source said that US officials have begun discussions with allies to adopt similar methods. It is hoped that partner countries can reach an agreement on the applications that should be banned.

U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo (Gina Raimondo) will determine the target applications for U.S. action, but they must meet Certain standardsFor example, they must be owned, controlled, or managed by individuals or entities that support the military or intelligence activities of foreign adversaries such as China or Russia.

WeChat, Douyin

A spokesperson for the Ministry of Commerce stated that if Raimundo believes that an application has unacceptable risks, she has the right to directly notify all parties at her discretion or publish information in the official government daily newspaper.

A spokesperson for the Ministry of Commerce stated that the company will have 30 days to raise objections or propose better data protection measures.

Given the escalating tensions between Washington and Beijing, the ability of the Chinese government to exercise control over companies, and the number of Chinese apps used by Americans, apps from China are most likely to be targeted by the Department of Commerce.

A source said that WeChat, TikTok and eight other apps targeted by the Trump administration in the past few months are eligible for review by the Biden team.

Trumps goals also include Ant Groups Alipay mobile payment application, WeChat Pay, Tencent Holdings Limiteds QQ Wallet, Tencent QQ, CamScanner, SHAREit, Alibaba Group subsidiary UCWeb released VMate, and Beijing Jinshan Office Softwares WPS Office.

According to another person familiar with the matter, some of the apps named by Trump have serious data protection issues, but it is not clear why other apps pose a greater risk to national security.

The first source said that the order will apply to commercial applications, including applications for banking and telecommunications, as well as consumers.

At the same time, apps related to other US opponents such as Iran or Venezuela have been blocked under broader sanctions.
Travel restrictions on the Canada-US border will last at least one month.

Public Security Minister Bill Blair said that the Canadian and US governments will extend restrictions on non-essential international travel until July 21.

He added in a tweet that the government will provide detailed information on Monday about plans to allow fully vaccinated Canadians and permanent residents to enter the country.

Between us and#COVID19When fighting, our first priority is to ensure the safety of Canadians. In coordination with the United States, we will extend the restrictions on non-essential international travel and the United States until July 21, 2021. @Billy Blair

Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020, border measures have been in place. As vaccination rates have climbed, businesses on both sides of the border  and more and more US lawmakers  are exerting pressure to relax restrictions in Canada.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau stated that 75% of Canadians must be vaccinated before restrictions are lifted. In response to this situation, Trudeau added that the epidemic needs to be at a stage where it can handle minor emergencies without the risk of wider spread.
A United Nations report found that as the COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated some pre-existing driving factors, the number of forcibly displaced persons reached a new high at the end of 2020.

In a report released on Friday, the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) found that by the end of 2020, 82.4 million people were forcibly displaced globally, the highest number on record.

It was 41 million in 2012 and 79.5 million in 2019.

As a result, more than 1% of the worlds population, 1 out of 95 people, are now forcibly displaced. In comparison, it was 1 in 159 in 2010.

The report found: The dynamics of poverty, food insecurity, climate change, conflict, and displacement are increasingly interconnected and mutually reinforcing, driving more and more people to seek safety and security.

The United Nations stated that despite the overall decline in 2020, nearly half of the worlds reported conflicts and violent incidents have increased, and due to the prolonged conflict, extreme weather and the economic impact of COVID, the scale of the food crisis in 2020 will increase. The severity has further deteriorated. -19 Exacerbated the pre-existing situation.

Although people trying to apply for asylum face unprecedented challenges in 2020, and new applications have dropped by 1 million, the United Nations has found that the number of refugees worldwide has increased from 20.4 million in 2019 to nearly 20.7 million by the end of 2020.

Approximately 21,000 unaccompanied or separated children filed new asylum applications in 2020, up from 25,000 a year ago.

8 out of every 10 cross-border displaced persons are from 10 countries; Syrians top the list with 6.8 million, followed by Venezuelans with 4 million.

Turkey hosted nearly 3.7 million refugees in 2020, making it the most populous country in the world.

At the same time, the number of internally displaced persons (IDP) is 48 million-the highest level on record.

Colombia still reports the highest number of internally displaced persons, with 8.3 million internally displaced persons by the end of 2020.

In the early stages of the pandemic, UNHCR and the International Organization for Migration were forced to suspend their resettlement departures for several months, but they later resumed.

The report found: As many governments close borders for extended periods of time and restrict internal movement, only a small number of refugees and internally displaced persons can take advantage of solutions such as voluntary return or resettlement to a third country.

Only 34,400 refugees were resettled to third countries, a decrease of 69% compared to 2019. It is estimated that about 1.4 million refugees need resettlement.

Future Trends

According to the United Nations, the food crisis forecast for 2021 is just as worrying, with countries such as South Sudan, Syria and the Central African Republic at risk of famine.

Similarly, according to data from the World Bank, the number of people trapped in extreme poverty due to COVID-19 is expected to rise to an unprecedented level  between 119 million and 124 million in 2020.

Based on this trajectory, the question is no longer whether more than 100 million people will be forcibly displaced-but when, the United Nations said.

Obviously, the need to prevent conflicts and ensure solutions for the displaced has never been more urgent, it added.

However, the report says that as the US government announces that it will accept more resettlement refugees, there are some hopeful signs-it will reach 62,500 in 2021 and 125,000 in 2022.

Colombia also announced in February that it would grant temporary protection status to more than 1 million Venezuelans.
In Gordon Browns life, he witnessed great changes in the world. The boundaries of finance, trade and communications have been opened. For some people, huge opportunities have already arisen. But for others, globalization has removed the barriers to protecting their safety, wages, and well-being. The result was a disagreement, and now Covid-19 has deepened the disagreement.

The dilemma of globalization is the core Seven ways to change the world, It joins an ever-expanding library of works, provides answers to questions in the global system, and describes the path to a better, post-pandemic future.

Browns reflection on this is very important. As a politician, the former British Prime Minister has been trying to figure out how to take advantage of the benefits of globalization and manage risks since the 1980s. Unleashing global finance has brought cheaper mortgages, but it has also brought about a financial crisis. Freer trade may bring cheaper food, but local farmers are bankrupt-who do you believe will supervise overseas suppliers?

In the 1990s, many centrist politicians believed that globalization at full speed could be managed through a combination of stronger global governance and generous aid to help the poorest countries compete. This is clearly still the core of Browns view. His book emphasizes the challenge.

Among them, he called for more funding for development, including the Marshall Plan for Africa. Recall that starting in 1997, Brown was part of the Labor government. The government changed British aid, adopted a spending target of 0.7% of GDP, and created an independent aid agency. But under the leadership of Boris Johnson, the current Conservative government suspended aid pledges and merged the Department of International Development (DfID) with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

After the recent G7 summit, Brown described the resulting vaccine promise as a Unforgivable moral failureObviously, in the current climate, his proposal of providing more agreed funds for health, education, achieving net zero carbon emissions and sustainable development goals will be difficult to achieve.

Just as important as this book is the reform of global governance. In several of the seven ways Brown has changed the world (divided into seven chapters), he brings together the ideas he has been constructing since the late 1990s. Reforming the International Monetary Fund to establish a financial early warning system echoed the changes he demanded after the 1997 Asian financial crisis. Similarly, he called for the adoption of the United Nations tax treaty to ensure fairer taxation, and to strengthen the cooperation between the United Nations and the World Bank to advance the sustainable development goals, which echoes the arguments made by Brown at the turn of the century.

In response to the pandemic, Brown advocated strengthening the World Health Organization and formulating a burden sharing formula for global health contributions. This formula reminds me of a formula created nearly 80 years ago to distribute donations (and votes) to the IMF. Then a lot of political realism ensures that the United States becomes the leading role of global institutions. This is essential to ensure that the United States agrees to participate.

The Browns formula for global health contributions calculates 27% for the United States and 13% for China (6% for the United Kingdom), and is supported by the chapter on US-China cooperation, which reflects this for the worlds two largest superpowers , A practical cooperation on an item-by-item basis may be the best way forward.

The problem is that compared with the speed of globalization, the pace of reforming international institutions is slow

The problem is that compared with the speed of globalization, progress in reforming international institutions has been slow. As he pointed out, about 23 years after he proposed the global tax reform in the G7, the United States announced its support for the global minimum tax system for the first time. Brown believes that this is not enough. This highlights the challenge.

This is not a self-congratulation book. If anything, Brown downplayed his central role in involving G7. Write off debt It was the poorest developing country in 2005 and convened the G20 in 2009 to agree on a bold plan to deal with the global financial crisis. However, these extraordinary successes undoubtedly continue to push him to believe that cooperation and institutional reforms are the way to manage globalization.

As he travels through public health, financial stability, a zero-carbon future, better humanitarian aid, closing tax havens, and preventing nuclear proliferation, I have been thinking about alternatives to decisively and collectively. How should governments better manage globalization? There is no doubt that better global governance will make some efforts easier. But given the slow progress, national-level efforts should definitely be doubled. In other words, there may be more room for decisive action alone than some indecisive international cooperation.

Respected

This book is an authoritative synthesis of ideas. It is not so much about how to build a fairer and better world, as it is about how global cooperation can contribute to achieving this goal. But behind this positive agenda, since Brown first entered the government in 1997, the predicament of globalization has deepened and intensified. The strong global governance and more generous aid programs he called for at the time looked more dangerous than ever.

Seven ways to change the world: How to solve the most pressing problems we face, By Gordon Brown, Simon & Schuster, RRP 25, 512 pages

Ngaire Woods is the Dean of Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford

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forum

after Andrea Picciotti-Bayer





4:37 PM

This article is a forum in the court Decide in Fulton v Philadelphia.

Andrea Picciotti-Bayer is the person in charge of the Conscience Project and was previously the legal counsel of the Catholic Association.

Anti-Catholic paranoia is no longer in the past. When Philadelphia severed its relationship with the Catholic Social Service (a foster care program run by the church), it was equivalent to putting up a Catholics do not need to apply sign outside its Public Service Department. City officials asked the agency to recognize same-sex marriage as a prerequisite for social services, but they were unsuccessful. Their request was ruthless (and downright annoying). In a foster care crisis, this disregard for religious beliefs will backfire anyway. And, as the Supreme Court explained on Thursday, this is unconstitutional.

The court unanimously ruled that Philadelphia violated the First Amendments free exercise guarantee. Chief Justice John Roberts pointed out in writing for the court that CSS only seeks a facility that enables it to continue to serve the children of Philadelphia in a manner consistent with its religious beliefs; it does not attempt to impose these beliefs. To anyone else. He also pointed out that even New York City recognizes that CSS has been a bright spot in New York Citys foster care system for a long time. This is a point worth remembering.

The Catholic Church in Philadelphia has a long tradition of caring for children in need. Beginning in the early 1900s, the Catholic Childrens Bureau was established and composed of the Trinity Missionary Sisters, who were the early Catholic pioneers of American social work. Their work continues with the unremitting efforts of the CSS staff. In the 1950s, the city began to promote foster placement.CSS can today as long as Cooperate with the municipal government to place children in foster families.

I submitted a copy About Friends of the Court Supports CSS on behalf of former foster and adoptive parents and former foster children served by Catholic institutions. In the past 40 years, an adoptive parent, Winnie Perry, has raised more than 100 children through CSS. Perry believes that CSS was forced to shut down in Philadelphia as terrible. Too many children need their help, she exclaimed. Jamie Hill, a former foster child who grew up in a CSS-certified foster family, also stood up for the agency. How did Hill react when he learned that the city had severed ties with the agency? We are better than this. This problem did not come up suddenly. This is part of the Catholic Churchs eternal teaching. I am really shocked that the government can force a religious organization to do something against their beliefs.

Strangely, many civil rights organizations support the government in this situation. More importantly, the American Civil Liberties Union-an organization established to defend civil liberties- Representative intervener Who is on the side of the city.New York Times article Recently commented that the organization risked abandoning its original and unique mission in pursuit of the glory of progress. Its role is in Fulton Is a perfect example.

In the United States, the existence of many faith-inspired service groups like CSS is under unprecedented threat. This will have a huge impact on the social structure of the United States.The Bridgespan Group recently published a Learn In six samples of cities of different sizes and demographics, it was found that organizations inspired by faith accounted for 40% of social safety net spending. The beliefs that motivate the establishment of places of worship are also aligned with non-profit organizations that seek to transform many of the religious doctrines of charity and caring for those most in need into professional services to communities across the country.

The pressure of progressive ideas is now found in all levels of the Biden administration, as well as in many state and local governments across the country, and cannot tolerate truly diverse viewsespecially when these views are inspired Traditional religious teaching. In contrast, courts are reluctant to ignore the basic guarantees of the Constitution.Judgment in FultonLet me remind you that it is consistent.

Justices Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, and Neil Gorsuch agreed with the courts decision.They are ready to consider how to deal with the previous decision of the court Employment Division v. Smith. in Smith, The court held that the Constitution did not require facilitation for religious opponents in a neutral, universally applicable law. Alitos agreement correctly pointed out Smith Suddenly, the precedent of nearly 40 years was pushed aside. He argued that the decision was a serious shelving and the time has come for a reexamination.Justices Amy Connie Barrett and Justice Brett Kavanaugh also reserved the possibility of reconsideration. Smith future.

Alitos 77-page consent will become an important blueprint for the court to review future cases involving religious anti-discrimination laws. And, make no mistake, these cases will come. Not long ago, Alito made a similar contribution to the courts religious freedom jurisprudence.When the court unanimously decides Hosanna-Tabor v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission In 2012, when ruling that the federal discrimination law did not apply to the selection of religious leaders by religious organizations, Alito emphasized in his consent that the court should pay attention to the functions performed by people working for religious organizations when determining the status of ministers. He argued that the exception should apply to anyone who leads a religious organization, performs worship services or important religious ceremonies or ceremonies, or serves as a messenger or teacher of his faith.His analysis will constitute the courts Our Lady of Guadalupe School v. Morrisi-Beru, Extend the ministerial exception to religious teachers in Catholic parish schools.

At the end of the day, Fulton This is an important condemnation of overzealous government officials who have weaponized anti-discrimination laws against traditional religious beliefs. Prepare for the reaction of dissatisfied progressives.
More than 59 million qualified voters in Iran will determine the fate of the four candidates in the race to succeed President Hasan Rouhani.

Fearing low turnout, Ebrahim Raisi, the head of the conservative judiciary, is widely regarded as the leader, and opinion polls for the Iranian presidential election have begun.

Irans nearly 60 million qualified voters will determine the fate of the four candidates in the race to succeed President Hassan Rouhani. A group led by Supreme Leader Ali Hosseini Khamenei banned hundreds of candidates, including reformists and those allied with Rouhani.

Voting starts at 7 am local time and ends in 1930 GMT, but can be extended by two hours. The result is expected around noon on Saturday.

Due to the uncertainty surrounding Irans efforts to revive its 2015 nuclear agreement and the growing poverty in the country after years of US sanctions, Iranian analysts see the vote turnout as a referendum on the leaderships handling of a series of crises.

After voting in the capital Tehran, Khamenei said: Every vote is important to vote for your president This is important to the future of your country.

National television shows that long lines have formed outside polling stations in several cities.

State-related polls and analysts named the 60-year-old hardline judicial director Rethy as the front runner. If elected, Raisi will become the first serving Iranian president who was sanctioned by the US government in 1988 for participating in the mass execution of political prisoners before taking office, and his time as the head of Irans internationally criticized judicial institution. The worlds top executioner.

Wearing a black headscarf, Raisi indicated in Shia tradition that he was a direct descendant of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, and later voted in a mosque in southern Tehran, waving to those who gathered to vote.

Raisis victory will confirm the political demise of Rouhani and other pragmatic politicians. The United States has decided to withdraw from the nuclear agreement and re-impose sanctions to stifle reconciliation with the West.

But Iranian officials said that this will not affect Irans efforts to restore the agreement and get rid of severe oil and financial sanctions, because the countrys ruling elite realizes that their political destiny depends on coping with worsening economic difficulties.

Former Central Bank Governor Abdolnasser Hemmati ran for the election as a moderate candidate, but did not receive the same support as the outgoing President Hassan Rouhani, who has a limited term and cannot run for the post again. .

Tensions between the United States and Israel remain high, and they are believed to have carried out a series of attacks on Irans nuclear facilities and assassinated scientists who created their military atomic program decades ago.
The police dismissed the psychics allegations about where Madeleine McCann is

The German police dismissed a psychics claim that Madeline McCann was buried in a forest only 6 miles from where she disappeared-because they had already searched it, and Sun Online could exclusively disclose it.

50-year-old Michael Schneider successfully found the remains of several missing persons. He provided the police with the exact location of what he believed to be the body in Portugal.

He contacted BKA-the German equivalent of the FBI-four weeks ago to provide detailed information, and they allegedly replied: Your information will be properly incorporated into our work.

But Sun Online can exclusively reveal that the McGrady police have ruled out the clairvoyant crazy claim that the worlds most famous missing child was buried in the woodland near Praia da Luis.

According to reports, the German prosecutor Christian Walters, who is now leading the pursuit of McGrady, had previously used clairvoyance to assist in other cases.

But a source close to the McGrady investigation told Sun Online that Portuguese officials had warned their German counterparts that the area had been searched.
A Quebec lawmaker called for an investigation into a video showing a Montreal police officer kneeling on the neck of a young black teenager with his face pressed against the sidewalk. This photo is reminiscent of George Flo. Ides last moments.

Frantz Benjamin, a member of the Liberal Party of Quebecs National Assembly representing the Viau constituency of Montreal, said several voters called him about this video.They said it would cause mass trauma, reminding them that Freud had told the Minneapolis police more than 20 times that he could not breathe Before he died May 25, 2020.

The Montreal video was filmed on June 10 by a passerby in front of a bus stop in the Villeray district of the city.

According to a spokesperson for the Montreal City Police Department (SPVM), the police officer at station 31 is answering a phone call from Georges-Vanier High School about a fight involving a dozen young people from different schools.

The video, obtained by Canadian Radio, was about one and a half minutes long and did not show the incident that led to physical intervention.

First, two officers kneeled on a black young man for about 15 seconds. They seemed to twist his hands behind his back. One police officers left knee was placed on the boys neck and face, and the other police officers knee appeared to be on the boys lower back.

The young man did not seem to resist or move in any way. Cant hear what he said.

Officials nail down the youth

About 15 seconds later, the two police officers got up. The officer who pressed his knees on the boys neck stood up briefly, adjusted the boys body posture, and then knelt on the back of the boys neck with his legs.

The officer stayed in this position for another 37 seconds.

While still suppressing the youth, the police officer searched a bag and handed an object to his colleague. The police officer then appeared to show the object to the camera, saying that the teenager was arrested for possessing a stun gun.

In addition to the content seen in the video, it is not clear how long the police officer stayed on the boys neck, because he restrained the boy at the beginning and end of the video.

In a later interview, the police told Radio Canada that two minors were accused of carrying weapons and are currently investigating the incident.

If the use of force is unreasonable, the government will take the necessary actions, SPVM spokesperson Const said. David Shane.

Shane urges caution when watching such videos, as the camera angle can be misleading. Shane said that every time an officer used force, he would fill out a report and review it.

Quebec MP Frantz Benjamin said he was shocked by the video of two Montreal policemen kneeling on the young man. (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation)

The mayor wants answers

MNA Benjamin said he wrote to Police Chief Sylvain Cullen and called for an investigation into police behavior.

This is shocking, he said. It was even more shocking when we saw that there was no resistance.

Montreal Mayor Valerie Plante also asked SPVM to clarify what happened.

In a statement to Radio Canada, she said: The circulating images are worrying. This investigation should shed light on the entire intervention.

The images of the intervention once again reiterated the importance of implementing body cameras, and we are working with our partners.

Abdelhaq Sari, a city councillor from the northern district of Montreal and a security critic of Ensemble Montreal, the official opposition to the city hall, said the video raises serious questions.

An independent investigation must be conducted to clarify this incident, Sarri said.

This arrest method should only be used when danger is imminent. Of course this is not the case when the suspect is handcuffed.

Kneeling on your neck is not against the rules

SPVM does not prohibit kneeling on the suspects neck, said Stephane Wall, a former sergeant and training instructor. He said the technology is used to force suspects to surrender, but it must be done quickly.

Wall said that once the suspect is handcuffed, the knees should move more toward the shoulders.

Frederic Boisrond, a sociologist who has served as SPVMs independent strategic consultant since last summer, told Radio Canada that he is concerned about the methods and methods of the agents.

A young man was handcuffed to his neck and knelt on one knee-which reminds us of a rather disturbing picture. I didnt expect to see this in Quebec in 2021, Boironde said.

On August 24, 2020, Ensemble Montreal filed a motion to stop any police tactics that impede the suspects breathing.

The bill stated that these strategies can only be used as a last resort.The bill passed Montreal City Council, but it is not binding because SPVM, like any police station in Quebec, follows the rules set by the provincial government.

For more stories about the experience of black Canadiansfrom anti-black racism to success stories in the black communitycheck out Black Canadians, a CBC project that Canadian blacks can be proud of. You can read more stories here.
This Chinesca will open on Friday night near the Spring Arts community in Philadelphia, near Union Transfer.New bar restaurant Owned by Michael and Jeniphur Pasquarello of 13th Street Kitchens (Kensington Dormitory, Prohibition Taproom, Cafe Lift).



The food is inspired by the city of Mexicali, Mexico, especially the Chinatown neighborhood commonly known as La Chinesca.Have The influence of Mexico, China and Southern California.

menu Including dishes made for sharing, including a variety of snacks and large dishes. Tortillas use flour tortillas, It is made and pressed in-house, using durum wheat flour from Castle Valley Mill in Doylestown.

Although most tortillas in Mexicali in tradition They are all made with lard, La Chinescas will use grape seed oil.

The Taco started to offer includes beef leg with traditional clear soup; mushrooms with rajas, cabbage, almonds and poblano cream; fish with cabbage and cream; and pork adobada and gringa cheese.

Courtesy / Ben Wentzel Drinks include a variety of cocktails, beer, wine and soda.

The beverage plan includes local craft beer and some bottled beers, such as Tecate and Corona. Beer service, inspired by Mexicalis Caguamas, where large glass bottles of beer are wrapped in newspaper and limes, and 32 ounces of Modelo and Corona Familiar will also be provided.

Two California-based beverage options include Flying Embers Spiked Pineapple Chili Kombucha and Golden Road Brewings Mango Cart. Strawberries, limes and pineapple cactus Seltzers made from blue agave from Mexico will also be on the list. The restaurant will also sell wine in glass bottles, as well as exclusive bottled wines from LA Cetto Winery.

The cocktail list is dominated by mezcal and tequila.

The helm of the La Chinesca kitchen is Nicholas Bazik, he is the culinary director of 13th Street Kitchens, and David Goody is the executive chef.

Bazik was recently responsible for the transformation of Kensington Quarters, and now its new focus is on sustainable seafood and coastal cuisine. Goody most recently served as the culinary director of CookNSolo.

Bazik and Goody collaborated on ticket prices, inspired by the teams trip to Mexicali before the pandemic.

From street stalls offering tacos to Chinatown underground restaurants providing diners with a cool break, the most notable inspiration is the hospitality of the locals, according to a press release.

Courtesy / Ben Wentzel In the main dining area of ??La Chinesca.

This China Card is located in The site of the former Jiffy Lube, abandoned for about 10 years. Inside, the bar has 18 seats. There is a low seating table and two refurbished shipping containers, providing additional dining areas.

The basement provides private dining for up to 50 guests. It is decorated with salvaged church benches and newspaper prints on the walls. Outdoor seating is provided on the front terrace and rear deck.

Open on weekends, the restaurant is open from 4pm to 10pm after that, China Daily Open from Wednesday to Thursday from 4pm to 11pm, Saturday from noon to 11pm and Sunday from noon to 10pm

Welcome in, you can book through Resy.
The deployment comes as the country enters the third wave of the epidemic, and the number of new cases per day has doubled in the past two weeks.

The South African government said on Friday that South Africa is deploying military medical personnel to its commercial centers and most populous provinces to help health workers respond to the surge in coronavirus.

South Africa is the worst-hit country on the African continent and has entered the third wave of COVID. The number of new cases per day has doubled in the past two weeks.

Gauteng-home to the administrative capital of Pretoria and the financial center of Johannesburg-is the current epicenter of the outbreak, accounting for approximately 60% of the latest daily increase.

Acting Minister of Health Mmamoloko Kubayi-Ngubane said at a virtual press conference on Friday: We have requested more capabilities in military assistance to assist Gauteng.

She said the deployment will start today.

The military will provide support to health workers and help with community testing and contact tracing.

The number of daily infections on Wednesday increased by 13,246, the highest level in five months. In the past two weeks, the number of hospitalizations has increased by nearly 60%.

To date, the country has recorded more than 1.7 million cases, including at least 58,323 deaths.

Earlier this week, President Cyril Ramaphosa slightly tightened restrictions to curb the spread of infection and ease pressure on hospitals.

As South Africa is working hard to roll out its vaccination program, the third wave of infections has arrived.

Since February, only about 2 million single injections have been injected. The governments announced goal is to fully vaccinate at least 40 million people by the end of 2022.

So far, vaccination is only open to health workers and people over 60, although teaching, police and military personnel will receive their first vaccination this month.

At the beginning of the coronavirus outbreak in South Africa last year, more than 70,000 troops were deployed to help enforce strict lockdown measures.

The soldiers returned to the barracks in October.
Deputies were dispatched to the area of Highway 90, Iowa, Louisiana for a female walking down the road nude on Thursday, June 17, 2021, at 11:00 pm.

While responding dispatch asked Iowa Police department to respond and attempt to locate the female. Upon arrival deputies were advised by Iowa Police they found female walking westbound from Lacassine, and she was completely nude.

During the investigation the female, Wanda Faye Vincent, 39, of Iota, LA admitted to deputies she had taken drugs and removed her clothing and lost the clothing.

Deputies transported Vincent to the parish jail and booked her on obscenity and an outstanding warrant for simple burglary.
Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries enforcement agents are investigating a boating fatality that occurred in Caldwell Parish on June 15.

LDWF agents recovered the body of Clifford Jewell, 69, of Columbia, from the Boeuf River around 8 a.m. on June 17.

LDWF agents received information around 10:30 a.m. about a single vessel boating incident with a missing operator. Agents responded immediately and began search for Jewell.

According to Jewells wife, they were traveling in the vessel when they struck a submerged object, which ejected Jewell into the water without resurfacing. Jewells wife was able to call 911 for help.

LDWF will be the lead investigative agency for this fatal boating incident. Jewell was not wearing a personal flotation device when he entered the water. His body was turned over to the Caldwell Parish Sheriffs Office to determine an official cause of death.
BATON ROUGE  Louisiana State University of Alexandria (LSUA) Hosted Gov. John Bel Edwards today for a groundbreaking for the Drainage and Infrastructure Project on the LSUA campus.

After more than 10 years of working to secure federal and state funding for the project, the Governor and numerous other elected officials convened at LSUA to commemorate the historic achievement.

We believe in higher education in Louisiana. Im proud that we have been able to work together to provide solutions and support for our students in Central Louisiana. LSUA has seen tremendous growth recently, and it is my honor to be here today to celebrate this extraordinary event, said Governor Edwards.

At the state level, $2.7 million was allocated from the State Bond Commission Capital Outlay. Federal Flood Mitigation funding, made available through the Louisiana Watershed Initiative, provided an additional $3.5 million for the project.

The Drainage & Infrastructure Project Groundbreaking was a significant event for LSUA. The bipartisan support we received from local, state, and federal officials ensured that this was not only a win for Central Louisiana, but for the State of Louisiana. We appreciate the support we received from all delegations and were extremely grateful to have Governor John Bel Edwards join us to break ground on the campus. This project will solve numerous drainage problems at LSUA, but will also modernize the infrastructure and campus as a whole. Our students will greatly benefit from this support, said Dr. Paul Coreil, LSUA Chancellor.

Infrastructure improvements consists of, but not limited to, enhancements to the main campus entrance on Highway 71, major drainage issues, street overlays and new lighting.

Womack and Sons Construction Group received the bid for the project and began on site in early June.
From New Orleans to Lake Charles, the entire Louisiana coast was impacted by last years hurricane season. Homes were lost, and lives changed forever but if there is a word to describe the people of the coast it's this.

Resilient, southwest Louisiana is resilient.

2 Major hurricanes, A Hurricane, and a Tropical Storm. Coastal Louisiana was ravaged after a relentless 2020 hurricane season. In a region that hadnt seen a strong hurricane since the 2005 season, Southwest Louisiana was hit not only 1 but 2 hurricanes including Category 4 Laura. Storm surge was a large issue for the entire state with over 3 feet of water along the entire coast with water levels reaching about 18 feet in Cameron Parish. In these parishes, the oil and gas industries took a direct hit from the powerful storms that made landfall impacting those that lived nearby.

Whenever they had the explosion, the citizens had to shelter in place, now people are thinking, well a hurricane just occurred so there arent many citizens there, but there were people here that had to shelter in place, who breathed in those dangerous chemicals. Says Roishetta Ozane of The Vessel Project and Healthy Gulf

While last year was abnormally active for the region, it served as a reminder of the changing climate and the challenges that coastal Louisiana has and will face coming.

I think that definitely a wake-up call for the community. If you get republicans who typically dont talk about climate change and global warming, when you get them to have those conversations I think that it is a wake-up call for everybody. We were impacted by 2 of the largest hurricanes in this region in decades and then on top of that we had a freeze and then on top of that we had the flooding on May 17th. It has just been natural disaster after natural disaster after natural disaster and I think that these things are going to continue to occur and it's not going to get better it's gonna get worse as our climate here in Louisiana warms. Climate change is happening, global warming is happening we just have to make sure that we here in southwest Louisiana are doing what we can do to the best of our ability to prepare for what's coming.

For many communities along the coast, the path back to normal will continue for years even as they try to build back from the rubble, but in the words of Ozane they are resilient and they will be back stronger than ever.
Park Seo Joon proves that he is on his way to worldwide stardom as he teams up with W Korea for the newest campaign shoot of Chanel Beauty.

The "Itaewon Class" star sizzles as he shows off his modeling skills for the publication's latest cover.

Park Seo Joon Graces W Korea

In the official photo, the 32-year-old South Korean heartthrob flaunted his strong face features and radiant skin for W Korea magazine.

He also worked alongside Chanel Beauty for their latest skincare line known as Hydra Beauty. This features the French luxury brand's signature white camellia ingredient that helps provide moisture and makes the skin youthful and supple.

It appears that Chanel's Hydra Beauty Camellia Glow Concentrate is the secret to Park Seo Joon's radiant and glowing complexion.

Prior to this, W Korea magazine posted the behind-the-shoot scenes over their official Instagram that illustrate how Park Seo Joon nailed the campaign shoot.

READ MORE: Get to Know More about Park Seo Joon's Online Fan Meeting to Celebrate His 10th Anniversary

Park Seo Joon Hailed as Chanel Beauty Ambassador

The South Korean star became the French luxury brand's ambassador for their skincare line back in 2020.

He also shared this achievement on social media as he teases his fans with a creative post.

Over Park Seo Joon's Instagram, the actor shared a snap behind the clapperboard with a note that says, Chanel.

The actor also wore a black suit and the iconic brand's crystal brooch pin.

Aside from the luxury brand, the "What's Wrong with Secretary Kim" has a long list of endorsements under his belt--this includes Marni by Mue, Wooyoungmi, Raf Simons, and more.

Park Seo Joon to Star in "Captain Marvels 2"

His appearance in W Korea magazine comes after reports citing that the 32-year-old actor will appear in the highly anticipated Marvel sequel.

Earlier this week, rumors sparked that Park Seo Joon will be seen next to Hollywood actress Brie Larson for "Captain Marvels 2."

Amid the exciting news, his agency Awesome ENT says that they have "no comment" towards the issue.

Interestingly, multiple reports noted that after filming his upcoming movie "Concrete Utopia," the Hallyu star will head to the United States for filming.

"Captain Marvels 2" is slated to premiere on November 11, 2022, in the United States.

Apart from Park Seo Joon, two South Korean celebrities were also set to appear in other MCU sequels.

"Train to Busan" actor Ma Dong Seok will appear on "Eternals" as well as Claudia Kim for "Avengers: Age of Ultron."

Park Seo Joon in Talks to Star in Drama Opposite Han So Hee

The "Fight For My Way" star has been receiving several offers following the success of the 2020 drama "Itaewon Class."

Aside from "Captain Marvels 2," Park Seo Joon is in talks to star opposite Han So Hee for the upcoming drama "Gyeongseong Creature," also known as "Hard Creatures."

If he agrees with the offer, he will play the role of Jang Tae Sang, a wealthy man of Bukchon.

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT: Park Seo Joon Expected to Join Hollywood Actress Brie Larson in Upcoming Movie 'Captain Marvel 2'





KDramastars owns this article.

Written by Geca Wills
Often, we tend to overlook these actors' characters as fathers in the K-dramas we watch. But as we celebrate Father's Day, we share with you some of the excellent Korean actors who impressed the viewers with their iconic father roles and truly deserve immense praise for portraying the pillar of the home.

Happy Father's Day to all the fantastic appa / abeojis in the world!

Lee Do Hyun in "18 Again"

Promising actor Lee Do Hyun is one of the known versatile Korean actors today, and thanks to his performances in just a year, he has been receiving lots of love from viewers worldwide.

Unlike many rising stars, Lee Do Hyun already challenged himself by taking on challenging roles and has worked with several projects to build his name in the industry.

And through his hard work and natural talent in acting, Lee Do Hyun impressed the audiences with his role as a young father in the hit JTBC series 18 Again.

This opened a lot of doors for the Sweet Home star. He perfectly immersed himself as a loving and protective dad who does everything for his children. He played as the younger version of Hong Dae Young (Yoon Sang Hyun).

Yoo Jae Myung in "Vincenzo"

Notable actor Yoo Jae Myung has made another excellent portrayal in tvN's legal-comedy drama Vincenzo. He portrayed Hong Yu Chan, a lawyer and father of Hong Cha Young (Jeon Yeo Bin).

Despite having a rough relationship, Hong Yu Chan remains a father to his sharp-tongued daughter. He also became a father figure to Vincenzo Cassano (Song Joong Ki) while adjusting to his life in Seoul.

His role in Vincenzo may be short but left a significant impact on the story.

Viewers were moved by his grit and selflessness, especially his heart for the needy - which inspired him to name his law firm "Jipuragi," meaning "the last straw." He is a hero and a father to all his clients, and Hong Cha Young is the proudest to be her father's daughter.

Park Ho San in "True Beauty"

Who wouldn't forget actor Park Ho San for his heartwarming and comical character in tvN's romantic-comedy series True Beauty?

Starring as Im Jae Pil, he became the first and only person who believed in Lim Ju Kyung (Moon Ga Young) among the members of the family.

Even though his wife nagged at Lim Ju Kyung, Im Jae Pil stood up for her.

His shoulder is always ready for his daughter to cry and lean on when things get tough, and he's the one who understands her the most.

Plus, he also became a father figure to Lee Su Ho (Cha Eun Woo), and treated him as his true son.

Jo Jung Suk in "Hospital Playlist"

Jo Jung Suk has such an adorable chemistry with the child star Kim Jun who plays as his son in the drama Hospital Playlist.

Their father and son relationship warms the hearts of HP fans.



As a supportive and loving father to Lee Woo Joo (Kim Jun), Lee Ik Joon (Jo Jung Suk) always prioritizes his son no matter how busy his schedule is.

What's more impressive is that he also has time to look after his health by exercising, despite his hectic schedule as a doctor!

Sung Dong Il in "Reply 1997" & "Reply 1988"

And the most iconic among all is veteran actor Sung Dong Il, who's played as abeoji in a plethora of K-dramas.



His natural father vibe is what makes his role more convincing, not to mention that he can be funny, serious, emotive, everything - proving his versatility.

Sung Dong Il can effortlessly immerse into his role efficiently. Who doesn't even know him, honestly?

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
MEDFORD, Ore.  The high-speed pursuit of a wanted man riding a motorcycle ended Wednesday afternoon when he struck a police vehicle and crashed on the I-5 interchange in Phoenix, according to the Jackson County Sheriff's Office.

Sheriff's Office deputies attempted to pull 34-year-old Christopher Lee Ridders over in White City just before 3 p.m. on Wednesday, but the man sped away on his black Harley Davidson motorcycle, "driving recklessly and at high speeds while running red lights and splitting traffic."

Officers abandoned the pursuit out of concern for public safety, but multiple agencies tracked him as he headed south.

Ridders reached the Phoenix exit 24 interchange and tried to pull a u-turn at the off-ramp to head towards oncoming traffic, the Sheriff's Office said. Moments later, he collided with a police vehicle, crashed, and was taken into custody.

The Pacific Northwest Violent Offender Task Force sought Ridders on multiple warrants out of Washington County, according to the Sheriff's Office  including a parole violation and charges for second-degree robbery, second and third-degree assault, first-degree theft, and assault on an officer.

The chase on Wednesday resulted in further charges for attempting to elude by vehicle, reckless driving, and reckless endangering.

Ridders was taken to the Jackson County Jail, awaiting return to Washington County for prosecution.
CAVE JUNCTION, Ore.  Investigators from a constellation of law enforcement agencies descended on six properties around the Selma and Cave Junction areas on Thursday, serving search warrants for illegal marijuana.

The Josephine Marijuana Enforcement Team (JMET) served the warrants with help from multiple local, state, and federal agencies and task forces.

According to the Sheriff's Office, investigators seized and destroyed more than 200,000 plants across the six properties. Agents also seized a number of water pumps, generators, trailers, and a tractor "as instruments used in criminal conduct relating to the illegal growth of marijuana."

Though a large number of people were detained and interviewed, the Sheriff's Office said that no arrests had been made as of Friday morning.

Recent statements from law enforcement in Josephine and Jackson counties suggest that they have stepped up the pressure on unlicensed and illegal grows of late. At the beginning of June, Josephine County listed the results of more than a dozen raids since the beginning of the year, though these search warrants did not yield as many plants combined as those conducted this week.

Oregon State Police announced last week that it had participated in a raid east of White City in Jackson County.
MEDFORD, Ore.  A local man will serve almost 17 years in prison for his part in a string of armed robberies that took place in 2018 and 2019, according to the Jackson County District Attorney's Office.

Christian Miller worked with several co-conspirators to steal marijuana and cash, the DA's office said. The men would arm themselves, dress in tactical gear, then "raid" locations with large quantities of cannabis while posing as law enforcement.

The first of three robberies happened on May 11, 2018. According to the DA's office, Miller and a co-defendant set up a drug deal at the White City Ponds. When the other party arrived, Miller awaited them in tactical gear  announcing that they were DEA and that it was a raid. The victims were held at gunpoint while the suspects stole marijuana, cash, and credit cards.

A second robbery happened just days later, on May 24. Miller set up another drug deal, then made a deal with some co-conspirators to provide a gun if the other men would carry out the robbery. Police later found Miller with zip ties, tactical gear, guns and ammunition.

Court documents indicate that Miller was charged in November of 2018 with unlawful possession of a firearm, but he was released at his arraignment less than a month later.

The third robbery occurred nearly a year after the second, on March 23 of 2019. Miller and his co-defendants set up a drug deal at a house on Dodge Road. They arrived wearing tactical gear, announcing that they were with the Sheriff's Department. The victims were handcuffed or zip-tied and then pepper-sprayed. Miller and his crew stole almost 100 pounds of marijuana.

A Jackson County Sheriff's Office investigation eventually identified and arrested all of the conspirators. After gaining a search warrant for Miller's house, detectives found tactical gear, guns, masks, handcuffs and zip ties. Miller later admitted to planning the robberies, posing as law enforcement, and stealing marijuana and cash.

Miller is the last of these suspects to be sentenced. He pleaded guilty to four counts of robbery in the first degree, one count of conspiracy to commit robbery, one count of robbery in the second degree, one count of unlawful use of a weapon, two counts of criminal impersonation of a peace officer, and one count of aggravated theft in the first degree.

Miller was sentenced to serve 200 months in Oregon state prison under Measure 11, followed by three years of post-prison supervision.
MEDFORD, Ore.  Officials from the Medford Water Commission sent out a request that residents of the area voluntarily reduce their water usage due to a "critical" shortage of the chlorine that is used in water treatment processes.

The shortage is not limited to Medford, but stems from production issues across the country  both from COVID-19 impacts and "unprecedented events" at several major plants, the commission said.

"Our water treatment method uses chlorine, in the form of sodium hypochlorite, in very small amounts to ensure our water is safe to drink," the Medford Water Commission said in a statement. "Both our primary and secondary water sources are of high quality but require additional treatment to meet drinking water standards set by Oregon Health Authority."

Officials said that they will be doing what they can to stretch the limited supply of sodium hypochlorite that they have on hand.

"Part of these operational changes will result in an excess of air in the pipelines, causing the water to appear cloudy. This cloudiness will dissipate over time, and is due to air bubbles, not poor water quality," the Commission said.

The request for voluntary reduction in water usage applies to Medford, Central Point, Eagle Point, Phoenix, Talent, Jacksonville, and White City.

Some recommendations for reducing water usage include eliminating any sources of water waste, such as any known leaks at homes or businesses; reducing vehicle washing or using facilities that recycle water; sweeping paved surfaces instead of washing them; avoid filling pools, hot tubs, ponds, and water features; curtailing sprinkler use where possible; and making sure to turn off water when brushing teeth, shaving, and rinsing dishes.

"These voluntary usage reductions will remain in place until demand levels come down and the chain of supply for sodium hypochlorite has been reestablished. If demand continues to remain at high levels or increases, mandatory restrictions may be imposed," the Medford Water Commission said.

According to the Oregon Office of Emergency Management, the current chlorine shortage stems from a "major electrical failure" at Westlake Chemical in Longview, Washington. Westlake supplies much of the Pacific Northwest with the chlorine used to disinfect drinking water and treat wastewater.

"The failed piece of equipment is in the process of being repaired at an off-site location due to the nature of the damage. Westlake is evaluating its options to bring the Longview plant back online and is actively working to help supply chlorine through the market, other Westlake plants or other means necessary to help alleviate the current supply shortage," OEM said.
The last person who asked me that is still missing.

If you need me, I'll be underwater.

It's a dry heat.

You call this hot? Bring it on.

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In an analysis of nearly 2 million people who had a Covid-19 diagnosis between February and December 2020, a new white paper study from FAIR Health points to the dangers of contracting Covid-19 and how symptoms for some can last well beyond what is hoped for after surviving the infection.

Nearly a quarter of Covid-19 patients, 23.2%, had at least one post-Covid condition 30 or more days after their initial diagnosis, according to the study posted on Tuesday.

While post-Covid conditions were found to a greater extent in patients who had more severe Covid-19, they were also found in a "substantial" share of asymptomatic cases.

Half of patients who were hospitalized with Covid-19 had a post-Covid condition 30 days or more after their initial diagnosis, as did 27.5% of those who had symptoms but were not hospitalized and 19% who were asymptomatic.

Pain and breathing difficulties were the top two conditions cited. Most of the post-Covid conditions studied were more common in females, yet there were 12 conditions that were more commonly experienced by males.
President Joe Bidens trip to Europe provides positive confirmation of collaboration and stability among nations on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean.

This contrasts markedly with the history of the twentieth century. Total wars of unprecedented destructiveness characterized that bloody era.

So far, the twenty-first century has avoided that fate. You would not know that if you relied on major media. Much of the coverage of President Bidens trip has been a biased melodrama, celebrating the successor to his alarming, destructive, wicked predecessor in the White House.

At both the summit of the G7 leaders in Britain and the NATO summit in Brussels, Biden has emphasized the priority of alliance relations. This is a welcome return to customary U.S. leadership.

However, Donald Trumps destructiveness fortunately was mainly rhetorical. His complaint that Europe should do more for NATO actually is a sustained theme of U.S. administrations dating back to the early 1950s. History is the antidote to superficial commentary.
EUGENE, Ore. -- With the U.S. Olympic Trials set to begin tomorrow, the priority for law enforcement agencies is keeping everyone safe.

"We're working hard -- all of us in law enforcement -- to keep it safe but a partnership with the community is key to that," said FBI agent Ryan Dwyer said. "So we just encourage folks to be vigilant and keep an eye out for things."

RELATED: NO DRONE ZONE IN PLACE FOR THE U.S. OLYMPIC TRIALS AT HAYWARD FIELD

He said "if you see something, say something" is the approach for the weekend. When reporting suspicious activity to local authorities, it is important to describe specifics, including:

Who or what you saw

When you saw it

Where it occurred

Why it is suspicious

Oregon Office of Emergency Management (OEM) and U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) will be working to keep everyone safe in partnership with TrackTown USA, University of Oregon, the Oregon Fusion Center, Lane County and the City of Eugene.

In addition to the community approach, Agate Street will be closed to thru traffic throughout the duration of the 10-day event. There will be security checkpoints, metal detectors, and even police dog units in the area.

"In addition to those restrictions, there will be a restriction of drone flying in the area as well. They potentially pose a risk to large, crowded events," Dwyer said. "We are not aware of any specific threats to the trials."
JUNCTION CITY, Ore. -- Amid a massive chlorine shortage, Junction City officials say they have a two-week supply of chlorine.

Longview, Washington, manufacturing facility Westlake Chemical recently suffered electrical failures, causing a chlorine shortage in Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and Northern California. Chlorine is used to disinfect water before it is released into distribution systems.

However, Junction City says its tap water is still clean and safe to drink and they have a 14-day supply.

Officials in Eugene and Springfield also said customers would not see any issues caused by the shortage.

Despite this, some residents in Junction City aren't thrilled about the chlorine shortage. Jessi Beat, a bussiness owner and mother, said she doesn't normally trust the water.

"A lot of people are affected, especially in their homes. You've got young children, you're scared to put them in the bath water, you're scared to give them a shower, you're scared to let them drink the water. You're constantly wondering is this safe, is this okay? Do I let it sit, or should I boil it first?" said Beat.

MORE: STATEWIDE CHLORINE SHORTAGE NOT EXPECTED TO AFFECT EUGENE-SPRINGFIELD WATER

The manufacturing facility should be repaired by the end of the month, according to the Oregon Office of Emergency Management.

Jason Knope, city administrator in Junction City, said the city is confident that changes being put in place will help move the city forward.

Were mindful of the situation, but were not in a panic, Knope said.

Residents like Beat still want to know what they can do to save some water.

"We want to really understand why there's a shortage, you know and how we can fix that shortage and what things we need to do as a city to make it happen," said Beat.

According to the Oregon Office of Emergency Management, the only water that should be used is drinking water.

And over the weekend, the city is implementing their own measures to save water, such as shutting off water in local parks and other city-owned areas. If there are no improvements, then the city will ask residents to do their part to save water. This includes not washing your car or not watering your lawn. Basically, any outdoor activities that aren't needed.

"Were confident that well need to effect the changes we need to," Knope said.
NORTH BEND, Ore.  A stretch of Highway 126 near milepost 39 that had been closed for hours due to a manhunt is back open, but the search continues.

Law enforcement officials said the whereabouts of a man believed to have killed three people in North Bend are still unknown. He's believed to be armed and dangerous. People should remain vigilant and report any suspicious activity to police immediately.

It started just before 10 a.m. when police were called to a hit-and-run in the RV campground area at the Mill Casino in North Bend. One person died, and a second was taken to the hospital in critical condition.

Just minutes later, police were called to a shooting at Herbal Choices Marijuana Dispensary where a person was killed.

In a trailer parked at the Mill Casino campground area, police found a third body. They said the person, who was born in 1938, had died from homicidal violence.

A 2019 White Dodge 3500 pickup truck initially linked to the suspect belonged to the victim found in the trailer, police said. The vehicle was found crashed on Highway 126 near Noti, and it had been set on fire.

According to a witness, the driver was armed with a handgun and ran into the woods.

Police have yet to identify the suspect, and the public are urged to not approach him. If you witness anything, or happened to pick up a hitchhiker in the area, you are asked to call 911.

Its not known if the suspect had a connection to the victims prior to the incidents.
EUGENE, Ore. - A statewide chlorine shortage could affect the state's water supply, according to the Oregon Office of Emergency Management.

A major electrical failure at a chlorine manufacturer in Longview, Washington created the critical chlorine shortage.

Westlake Chemicals supplies chlorine for most of the West Coast, emergency officials said. The company is experiencing an electrical failure and is expected to be offline at least until the end of June to undergo repairs.

However, officials in Eugene and Springfield believe customers will not see any issues.

In a release, Meredith Clark with the Springfield Utility Board (SUB) said Thursday that they have adequate supplies of chlorine gas to last through the expected duration of the shortage. They anticipate limited or no impacts to the Eugene-Springfield water supply.

Clark said the areas three water providersEugene Water and Electric Board (EWEB), SUB and Rainbow Water Districthave been in regular communication during this supply shortage. The utilities have standing mutual assistance agreements in place, including water system interties, should the shortage become prolonged.

SUB uses chlorine in small amounts to disinfect water before it is released into our distribution system.

EWEB said their not concerned due to the fact that in 2019, EWEB stopped using chlorine gas and instead implemented an improved system for disinfecting drinking water.

This new system allows them to produce chlorine at their Hayden Bridge Filtration Plant using electricity, salt and water to create sodium hypochlorite, which is liquid bleach.

EWEB currently has plenty of good water from the McKenzie River, abundant electricity and a 75-day supply of the coarse salt used in the electrolytic conversion process to produce sodium hypochlorite. There is no shortage of salt.

EWEB with support from our Board of Commissioners chose to invest in this state-of-the-art disinfection system for the benefit of our entire community, said Karen Kelley, EWEB Water Operations Manager. I am thrilled to see the return on our investment in our ability to continue providing safe and reliable drinking water throughout this supply chain shortage.

Oregonians are asked to limit outdoor water use for things like watering lawns and filling swimming pools to extend the states chlorine supply.

The state of Oregon has published information about the steps it is taking at https://www.oregon.gov/oem/emops/Pages/2021-Chlorine-Shortage.aspx
EUGENE, Ore. -- A Eugene man was arrested Sunday night after police say he broke into two homes.

Rodney Retzman, 57, was taken to the Lane County Jail on charges of first-degree burglary, harassment and resisting arrest.

At about 6 p.m. on June 13, police responded to the 500 block of East 12th Avenue to a report that a man had entered a home without permission and left, walking south on Patterson Alley.

Police say they located a man fitting the description on the 1200 block of Patterson Alley and asked him to stop. Retzman reportedly sat down on the steps of a home.

When a resident of the home went inside, Retzman followed and shut the door behind him, police said. The officer tried to get him to stop and went inside after. Police said the officer saw Retzman grabbing the woman as she tried to get out.

Retzman then reportedly charged at the officer, who pushed Retzman to the ground. When the suspect grabbed a bat, the officer used a Taser to take him into custody, police said.

Police added that investigation revealed Retzman had stolen an article of clothing from the first home.
By Ruth Anderah

The registered trustees of Makerere University Retirement Benefits Scheme have dragged the institution to court for alleged failure to remit over Shs4bn to the scheme.

In their suit they filed before the High Court Civil Division, the trustees contend that by a Trust Deed dated September 10th, 2009 they agreed with Makerere University to remit to the scheme on a monthly basis 15 percent of the salaries paid to the institutes employees.

According to the deed, 5 percent was to be deducted from the employee and 10 percent from the university as the employer and each employee was to get his or her own share upon retirement, early termination, or to be given to family upon death.

However, the applicant contends that for the last three months of March, April, and May 2021 the Makerere University only remitted to the Scheme 5 percent being the employee contribution and did not remit 10 percent being the employer contribution.

The documents before the court also indicated that on 15th June 2021, the Trustees demanded the unremitted contributions but they were shocked when the University Secretary directed the Human Resources and Bursar to remit to the National Social Security Fund the unremitted contributions for three months.

According to Yusuf Kiranda, the University had a statutory duty to remit its staff contribution to NSSF adding that NSSF sued Makerere University over the non-remittance of staff social security contributions, and management based on the councils resolution was engaging NSSF with the view to settle the matter out of court.

The letter dated 14th June 2021 also shows that the University Council resolved that  Management remits the unremitted statutory social security contributions for staff to NSSF.

Through their lawyers of Acardia Advocates, the registered trustees now want a declaration that the acts of the university in remitting the contributions to NSSF is in breach of the terms of the Trust Deed.

They also want a permanent order restraining the University from remitting the monies to NSSF as well as to be paid costs of the suit.

The Assistant Registrar of the Civil Division Agnes Alum has already issued summons to Makerere University to put in a defense within 15 days or else the court will proceed and deliver judgement in their absence.
By Ivan Ssenabulya

President Museveni is set to address the nation today to brief Ugandans about the current situation.

According to the presidential press secretary Linda Nabusayi, the presidents address will be broadcast on all television and radio stations at 8pm.

He is expected to, among other things; outline additional measures to be undertaken by the government to curb further spread of Covid-19.

In his last address on June 6th, the president announced a 42-day partial lockdown that saw all education institutions closed and inter-district travel banned, among other measures.

Uganda currently has 67,215 with 542 deaths and 48,823 recoveries.
Weather Alert

...HEAT ADVISORY IN EFFECT UNTIL 7 PM PDT SATURDAY... ...EXCESSIVE HEAT WARNING IS CANCELLED... * WHAT...Hot temperatures with highs in the mid 90s to near 100. Lows in the mid 50s to upper 60s. * WHERE...Quincy, Pomeroy, Nezperce, Cheney, Hayden, Nespelem, Ephrata, Odessa, Winchester, Worley, Othello, Brewster, Wenatchee, Peck, Moses Lake, Rockford, Cashmere, Coulee City, Spokane, Wilbur, Bridgeport, Coeur d'Alene, Craigmont, Omak, Okanogan, Lapwai, Culdesac, Lewiston, Davenport, Entiat, Grand Coulee, Clarkston, Post Falls, Gifford, Kamiah, Oroville, Chelan, and Ritzville. * WHEN...Until 7 PM PDT Saturday. * IMPACTS...Hot temperatures may cause heat illnesses. PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS... Drink plenty of fluids, stay in an air-conditioned room, stay out of the sun, and check up on relatives and neighbors. &&
Kilgore, TX (75662)

Today

Thunderstorms likely. High 86F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 100%..

Tonight

Scattered thunderstorms early, then variable clouds overnight with more showers at times. Low around 70F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 40%.
IFA Sheep Chairman Sean Dennehy has called on the Minister for Agriculture Charlie McConalogue to implement the necessary controls as a matter of urgency to tackle the issue of irresponsible dog ownership.

He said farmers patience with the authorities on this issue is fast running out. An incident in the last week left over twenty more sheep fatalities from dog attacks in Co Tipperary.

Sean Dennehy said the significant increase of dog attacks in recent months is a serious concern for sheep farmers and the message is simply not getting through.

The Minister for Agriculture must advance controls and enforcements for negligent dog owners. We need a single national database for all dogs in the country that identifies the dog owner who is responsible, he said.

There must be appropriate sanctions in place for those who fail to have their dog under control at all times, and for those whose dogs are identified worrying/attacking livestock, he said.

The IFA Sheep Chairman said the lack of action from the Government and local authorities to put appropriate sanctions in place to deal with the irresponsible behaviour of dog owners is unacceptable.

Sean Dennehy said the IFA No Dogs Allowed campaign will continue, highlighting the damage uncontrolled dogs inflict on cattle and sheep and the urgent need for appropriate legislation to protect farmers and their livestock.
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The main Irish opposition party, Sinn Fein has risen 3% in public opinion according to the latest Ipsos MRBI survey to 31%.

Sinn Fein has a four point lead on its nearest rivals Fine Gael in the latest poll.

Fine Gael is in second place on 27%, which is down 3 and Fianna Fail stands at 20%, up 6.

Support for the Green Party and Labour was unchanged at 6% and 3% respectively.

The Social Democrats dropped a point to 2%, while People Before Profit saw the opposite effect, up one point to 2%. Independents and others were down six points to 13%.

The Governments approval rating has jumped by 10 points since February, with more than half of voters, 53%, saying they are satisfied with the coalition.

Meanwhile in Northern Ireland, the nomination of First and Deputy First Ministers is expected to happen later today, meaning the Executive will be restored four days after Arlene Foster resigned as First Minister.

This comes after the British government has agreed to introduce an Irish language act in Northern Ireland if the Stormont Assembly fails to do so by the end of September.

Also read: Is Leitrim the best place to live in Ireland?
Kilkenny councillors have called for Town and Village Renewal grants to be allocated by locals and not government officials who may never have set foot in the county.

Changes to the focus of this years scheme prompted concerns from Callan Thomastown area councillors.



Fears were raised that already-planned projects might not be funded past the first phase, because applying to a government department is a shot in the dark.



A presentation was made by Annette Fitzpatrick, of the councils Community Section, who explained the details of this years scheme. She said this year there will be a focus on funding projects that encourage remote working and that address town centre living.



Kilkenny County Council can submit up to eight applications to the Department of Rural and Community Development, in several different funding brackets. At least two applications must be for areas not funded before.

June 18 is the closing date for expressions of interest from community groups.



We can all see the benefits of the Town and Village Renewal Scheme, its been fantastic for Kilkenny, Cllr Michael Doyle said. But the focus changing is a little bit of a concern for me, for existing projects that have already received funding.



He gave the examples of projects in Inistioge and The Rower that have received funding under the scheme but will need a second phase of funding to complete projects.

Ms Fitzpatrick explained that these types of projects will be directed to apply for funding under other schemes, if possible. They are not excluded from the Town and Village Renewal scheme, but it will be taken into account they have been funded before.



Drawings are done and there has been public consultation in The Rower and Inistioge on those projects, Cllr Doyle pointed out. If they have to be funded out of the councils own budget it wont happen overnight, he said. The changes might hinder the projects and that was a concern for him.

Area Engineer, Declan Murphy, told the meeting that there is also 4.6million of funding available under the Active Travel scheme this year and he will be looking to this to fund projects like footpaths and road crossings.



Director of Services, Mary Mullholland, said the Town and Village Renewal guidelines were clear that public realm projects should be directed to apply to the Active Travel grant.



Cllr Peter Chap Cleere said his problem with the Town and Village Renewal Scheme was that decisions were made at government department level. Our Community Section in Kilkenny is the best in the country. They can put so much work into a project that might not get approved.

He said several years ago the Town and Village Renewal grant was given to the county council to allocate. Its not that way now but I would love to see it, because we take a shot in the dark going to the department. As a county we are not trusted to pick the project that would be most beneficial to us.

He asked that they write to the department to change the structure of the allocations so the Community Section in conjunction with councillors decide where funding goes. We are better placed than someone in Dublin who may have not set foot in Kilkenny in their lives.

Cllr Doyle agreed. We are definitely best placed. The Community Section does unbelievable work, then we send up the application and its a lottery.

Cllr Deirdre Cullen supported the call, saying changing criteria meant that there is a potential that some projects will be unfinished.
FOREST CITY, Iowa  A North Iowa nursing home has been ordered to pay $6 million to the children of a former resident over allegations of neglect and recklessness.

Darlene Weaver, 83 of Buffalo Center, died in June 2017. In November 2017, Weavers children filed a lawsuit against the Timely Mission Nursing Home in Buffalo Center for wrongful death, negligence, breach of contract, dependent adult abuse, and loss of consortium. The lawsuit accused Timely Mission Nursing Home of failing to provide appropriate medical care, preventing falls or other injuries from occurring, negligent hiring, inadequate training of staff, and covering up adult abuse, neglect, and negligence.

The lawsuit claimed the nursing homes failure to provide proper care was the cause of Darlene Weavers decline in health.

A jury was sworn in and a civil trial finally began on June 2. Court records show the jury returned a verdict on Thursday that found Timely Mission Nursing Home had been negligent and awarded her children $2 million for pre-death pain and suffering, $1 million for pre-death loss of full mind and body, $1 million for loss of relationship, and $2 million in punitive damages.

Timely Mission asked for a directed verdict to avoid having it go to the jury. District Court Judge James W. Drew ruled Friday that Weavers children presented enough evidence to justify a jury verdict and he ordered Timely Mission to pay the $6 million judgment with interest.
CHARLES CITY, Iowa  A Floyd County teen accused of threatening people while carrying a firearm gets a deferred judgment.

Jamal Brandon Smith, 19 of Charles City, pleaded guilty to carrying weapons for an incident on August 27, 2020. Authorities say he approached a group of people, shouting and making threats to the group while Smith was carrying a long gun.

Smith has been sentenced to two years of supervised probation and must pay a $855 fine. If he satisfies all the terms of his sentence, this conviction will be removed from his record.
MASON CITY, Iowa - In a matter of weeks, the night sky will be illuminated with dazzling fireworks displays, and pyrotechnic afficionados are looking for the best bang for their buck.

Since June 1, It's Lit Fireworks has been selling everything from firecrackers and rockets, to mortar shells and larger cakes. Owner Dan Winterfeld says business has been off to a hot start, and on pace to meet last year's record setting pace. However, he says the fireworks industry is enduring a shortage of inventory, largely due to factory issues in China, where a good majority of fireworks are produced, as well as the coronavirus and high demand. Nonetheless, he has tried to keep price points down for customers.

"This year, shipping has went up a lot with every product coming from overseas, but we kept it as minimal as we could. We're ready for a great season, we're stocked heavily here, and people want to celebrate their freedom."

And don't be alarmed; there will be plenty of products for customers to choose from.

"We ordered way early, we have great contacts, we go factory direct through contacts. We're going to have enough product."
MASON CITY, Iowa - A controversial pro-police bill is now law in Iowa.

Governor Kim Reynolds signed Senate File 342, also known as the 'Back the Blue' bill, at the Iowa Law Enforcement Academy in Johnston on Thursday. Under the new law, rioting becomes a felony instead of a misdemeanor, and anyone who is convicted of unlawful assembly in Iowa could face up to two years in prison. In addition, there are stricter penalties for protesters who block roads and highways. It also makes it more difficult to sue law enforcement officers for most on-duty actions.

Cerro Gordo County Sheriff Kevin Pals supports the law, and the state's affirmation of support for law enforcement.

"We know that we're supported, it was just nice that the state passed this law, good or bad. I think it's a more positive message they're trying to send instead of a negative."

While he supports people exercising their first amendment rights, he notes that blocking roads and resorting to violence is not the answer.

"I think most of us in law enforcement agree that protesting is OK to do, but just do it lawfully."

Nearly all Democrats in the legislature voted against the bill, arguing that the penalties were too harsh, and that GOP leaders turned their backs on racial justice efforts.
MASON CITY, Iowa  MercyOne North Iowa Medical Center just recently completed its 300th case of prostate surgery using minimally invasive robot technology.

Dr. Timothy Mulholland performed the surgery with the da Vinci XI system and was assisted by Dr. Kevin Rier.

The da Vinci system allows us to handle the most delicate tissue even in confined spaces like the pelvis, using only small incisions, says Dr. Mulholland. The robot gives us more range of motion with our instruments by translating our hand movements in real time, bending and rotating instruments.

MercyOne says robot-assisted surgery allows for smaller incisions, earlier discharge from the hospital, significantly less pain and faster return to normal daily activities.

In the past ten years, our surgeons have performed a total of more than 2,500 cases through robotic surgery at MercyOne, says Dr. Adams. More than 500 were urology procedures.

MercyOne North Iowa says it has seven surgeons across several specialties qualified to use the da Vinci XI system.
ROCHESTER, Minn.  A convicted killer in Illinois is now going to prison in Minnesota.

Corey Lydell Pendelton, 43 of Rochester, was first arrested in August 2020 after police said they found three handguns, ammunition, and around three grams of methamphetamine in Pendeltons home. He pleaded guilty to illegal firearm possession.

Pendelton was next arrested in December 2020 for selling drugs. Investigators say a search of a Rochester hotel room being rented to Pendelton found cocaine, methamphetamine, and heroin. He pleaded guilty to one count of first-degree sale of drugs.

Pendelton was sentenced Friday to a total of eight years and two months in prison, with credit for 92 days already served.

Authorities say Pendelton was previously convicted of second-degree murder in Cook County, Illinois.
Sienna Urbina paints a mural on the east wall of the Markland Mall on Nov. 6, 2020. The mall is partnering with students at Indiana University Kokomo to bring a new mural to the south side of the property that will be complete by the middle of August.
Weather Alert

...Forecast flooding changed from Minor to Moderate severity and increased in duration for the following rivers in Missouri... Missouri River at Jefferson City. River forecasts are based on observed precipitation and forecast precipitation for the next 24 hours. PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS... Turn around, don't drown when encountering flooded roads. Most flood deaths occur in vehicles. Rainfall heavier than forecast could cause river levels to rise even higher than predicted. The National Weather Service will monitor this developing situation and issue follow up statements as conditions change. This product, along with additional weather and stream information, is available at https://water.weather.gov/ahps2/index.php?wfo=lsx. && ...Forecast flooding increased from Minor to Moderate severity and increased in duration until early Monday morning... The Flood Warning continues for the Missouri River at Jefferson City. * Until early Monday morning. * At 7:45 PM CDT Thursday the stage was 26.0 feet. * Flood stage is 23.0 feet. * Moderate flooding is occurring and moderate flooding is forecast. * Recent Activity...The maximum river stage in the 24 hours ending at 7:45 PM CDT Thursday was 26.1 feet. * Forecast...The river is expected to rise to a crest of 26.1 feet just after midnight tonight. It will then fall below flood stage Saturday evening. * Impact...At 26.0 feet, Pumping from a ditch in Hartsburg, MO begins. At this height...numerous county roads near McBaine... Easley...and Ashland are flooded. These include Coats Lane... Grocery Branch...Burr Oak...Old Plank...Cedar Tree...Jemerson Creek...Christian School...Claysville...and Soft Pit Hill Roads. && Fld Observed Forecasts (7 pm CDT) Location Stg Stg Day/Time Fri Sat Sun Mon Tue Missouri River Jefferson Cit 23.0 26.0 Thu 7 pm 26.1 22.8 19.0 15.3 11.8 &&
Kendallville, IN (46755)

Today

Sunshine and a few afternoon clouds. High 73F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph..

Tonight

Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 52F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph.
(ST. JOSEPH, Mo.) The decision to go into law enforcement right now might be tough sell for some, but for new officer Dillon Davis, it was a no brainer.

"It seemed like the obvious choice for me," He said.

Fresh out of Missouri Western State University's Regional Law Enforcement Academy, Davis said he's aware of the challenges currently facing law enforcement personnel, hes using them as fuel to push forward.

"I made the decision to be a law enforcement officer before a lot of the worst of that," He said. "It made me more sure that this is the decision I want to make."

Davis, wholl be joining the St. Joseph Police Department, is just one of nine who graduated from the academy Thursday night.

Families, friends and fellow members of law enforcement gathered to commend the graduates for making the choice to enter the field of law enforcement in such a crucial time.

"Our communities need good men and women to step up right now," Bill Puett, Buchanan County Sheriff said.

As discussions continue surrounding police policies and reform, local law enforcement say guiding cadets in the academy on the right path means more now than ever before.

"The biggest thing we can leave with anybody is do the right thing for the right reason," Eric Protzman, commander SJPD said.

Davis, along with the other nine graduates are ready to leave their mark on law enforcement across Northwest Missouri.

"Everybody has their own story and experiences and I just hope that my experiences in life up to this point will be able to help relate to the community in a special way and help them." Davis said.

Davis will join two other graduates in the St. Joseph Police Department. Other graduates in the program will move on to other departments of law enforcement in the area including the Cameron Police Dept., Grundy County Sheriff's Office and The Kansas City International Airport Police.
UPDATE: JUNE 28 AT 5:30 P.M.

With 262 fire personnel on scene, the Crooked Creek Fire remains at 72% containment with a reported size of 3,924 acres, according to Custer Gallatin National Forest.

On the east side if weather conditions allow, crews will be conducting a small burnout operation to secure the edge of the fire. The burnout operation will put some noticeable smoke in the air for anyone near the Pryor Mountains.

Firefighters will continue to patrol and monitor for hot spots on the south side of the fire. The heavy equipment task force will continue working on the shaded fuel break along the north central side through timber stands.

UPDATE: JUNE 27 AT 7:23 P.M.

Containment on the Crooked Creek Fire is now at 72% according to the Custer Gallatin National Forest.

UPDATE: JUNE 27 AT 11:20 A.M.

As of Sunday morning, the Crooked Creek Fire is reported to be 3,922 acres large and 32 percent contained.

On Saturday, firefighters continued to patrol and monitor the south side of the fire along containment lines an update from the Bureau of Land Management said.

The heavy equipment task force continued to work on a shaded fuel breakthrough timbered areas near the Sage Creek Road on the north side of the fire.

Around the northeast corner and along the east side of the fire, crews continued construction of a combination of direct and indirect hand lines where safe to do so.

Along the northeast, side crews are preparing indirect line in anticipation of potential small burnout operation.

Firefighters continued to monitor for any threat to the Pryor Mountain Wild Horse Range southeast of the fire. At this time, the fire is not impacting the wild horse herd according to the update.

Planned actions for Sunday include crews continuing to patrol and monitor for hot spots on the south side of the fire.

The heavy equipment task force which consists of a dozer, feller buncher, and skidder will continue working on the shaded fuel break along the north-central side through timber stands according to the update.

On the east side, crews will continue to construct direct and indirect line moving both from both the south and north.

A burnout operation will be done to secure the eastern fire line if weather conditions allow. The operation will put noticeable smoke in the air the Bureau of Land Management said.

Firefighters will be staffing in several locations and will continue to mop up hot spots or pockets of heat along the fire line.

UPDATE: JUNE 25 AT 9:13 P.M.

With 246 personnel battling the fire, InciWeb reports that it is now 32% contained and 3,922 acres in size.

UPDATE: JUNE 24 AT 10:50 P.M.

The fire is 25% contained, according to InciWeb.

Crews patrolled and monitored the south side of the fire along containment lines.

On the north side the heavy equipment task force worked to build a shaded fuel break through several stands of timber along the Sage Creek Road in anticipation of a potential burnout operation to secure the fires edge.

There are 236 personnel working to contain the fire.

UPDATE: JUNE 22 AT 9:30 P.M.

The size of the fire remains at 5,400 acres with 0% containment.

There are now 231 personnel assigned to the fire.

Fire crews continued work on protecting structures, historical resources, the Dryhead Creek watershed and high voltage powerlines Tuesday.

According to InciWeb, firefighters continued to monitor for any threat to the Pryor Mountain Wild Horse Range, which is southeast of the fire. They say it is not currently impacting the herd.

The Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS) was delayed, so it will be rescheduled for Wednesday. When it arrives, it will be able to conduct a more accurate mapping flight of the fire area.

All the Custer Gallatin National Forest lands northeast of Forest Road 2308 and east of Forest Road 2085 are under a Forest Closure Order and temporarily closed to the public.

All BLM lands in the north Pryor Mountains within Township 8 South, Ranger 28 East and the entirety of Sykes Ridge Road in Carbon County are also under a BLM closure.

Temporary Flight Restrictions are still in place over the Crooked Creek Fire. This also applies to unmanned aircraft systems or drones.

UPDATE JUNE 20 AT 6:35 P.M.

Cooler temperatures, light rainfall and higher humidity experienced across South Central Montana on Sunday resulted in minimal fire activity with the Crooked Creek Fire.

The Montana Bureau of Land Management (BLM) reports the fire is still at 5,400 acres with 20-percent containment.

An outbuilding was destroyed Saturday, and there are now 221 personnel assigned to the fire.

Management of the Crooked Creek Fire will transition Monday morning from the current local Type 3 organization to Northern Rockies Type 2 Incident Management Team #4, which is managing the nearby Robertson Draw Fire.

Sundays respite from the hot and dry weather will be short lived. Rain showers in the area will end Sunday evening, with temperatures increasing significantly on Monday, the BLM reports. A return to well above normal temperatures and dry conditions is forecast for the region by mid-week.

UPDATE JUNE 19 AT 6:45 P.M.

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) reports the Crooked Creek Fire is now 20 percent contained and is 5,400 acres large.

BLM said in an update that despite the hot, dry and windy conditions and active fire behavior Saturday, the fire grew eastward only 200 acres.

An outbuilding was reportedly destroyed.

At this time a Red Flag Warning remains in effect until 9:00 pm Saturday for south central and southeastern Montana including the Crooked Creek Fire area.

The forecast calls for an incoming cold front to bring some rain over the fire starting Sunday morning going into the afternoon, along with a brief cool down the BLM reports. Hot and dry conditions are forecast to return by mid-week.

Firefighters plan to continue point protection of critical infrastructure, build additional fire line and reinforce fire line already constructed on Sunday.

UPDATE JUNE 18 AT 7:15 P.M.

The Crooked Creek Fire is now reported to be 10 percent contained as of Friday evening.

An update from the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) says the fire grew 100 acres since Thursday and is now estimated at 5,200 acres.

With the addition of more resources including another firefighting helicopter and another 20-person Type 2 Initial Attack hand crew, firefighters were able to build containment line along 10 percent of the fire perimeter on Friday the BLM reports.

UPDATE JUNE 17 AT 7:11 P.M.

Additional firefighting resources arrived on scene of the Crooked Creek Fire Thursday, bringing the total number of people working on the fire to 69.

The Vale Hotshots and a Type 2 Initial Attack hand crew along with several wild land fire engines and a water tender were added.

Billings Airtanker Base air tankers are being used for retardant drop on the fire, and a Temporary Flight Restriction has been established over the area of the Crooked Creek Fire to provide a safe environment so firefighting aircraft may operate in the area.

At this time both the USDA Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management have issued closure orders for public lands in the area surrounding the fire in the interest of public safety.

Stage 1 Fire Restrictions were also implemented Thursday morning on BLM-managed lands in Carbon County.

At this time, the fire is 5,100 acres large and 0 percent contained.

UPDATE: JUNE 17 AT 4:25 P.M.

The Carbon County Sheriff's Office has issued a pre-evacuation warning for residents in the Sage Creek area.

Both the U.S. Forest Service and the BLM have issued closure orders for the fire area due to public safety. The BLM has also implemented Stage One Fire Restrictions on BLM-managed lands in Carbon County.

According to InciWeb, it is estimated that the fire will be contained on Saturday, July 17, around midnight.

InciWeb also states there is a total of nine personnel working the fire.

UPDATE: JUNE 16 AT 7:31 P.M.

The Bureau of Land Management is reporting the Crooked Creek Fire has grown to 5,100 acres.

At this time the fire is 0 percent contained.

Three air tankers from Billings Air Tanker Base were dispatched to drop retardant on the fire before nightfall Tuesday.

Firefighting efforts resumed Wednesday with three large air tankers and a BLM helicopter and wildland engine.

UPDATE: JUNE 16 AT 2:18 P.M.

The Crooked Creek Fire near the Pryor Mountains is now 4,500 acres, according to InciWeb. The Crooked Creek fire is located in the Pryor Mountains along the Carbon County and Big Horn County border on National Forest System lands adjacent to the Crow Indian Reservation.

The Custer Gallatin National Forest, Beartooth Ranger District, has issued a closure order of all National Forest System lands, including roads and trails, for the protection of public health and safety, according to InciWeb. The Carbon County Sheriff's Department has issued a pre-evacuation warning for the Sage Creek area. The fire is currently staffed by one BLM wildland engine and a helicopter. Three large airtankers are conducting retardant drops on the fire. A map of the closure area has been attached below. Note, the area affected by the closure is highlighted in purple:

UPDATE: JUNE 16 AT 9:33 A.M.

The Crooked Creek fire burning in the Pryor Mountains is an estimated 500 acres, Al Nash with Bureau of Land Management tells us.

Nash says the fire is mainly located on the Crow Reservation in Carbon County

CARBON COUNTY, Mont. - Crews are responding to a wildfire in the Pryor Mountains.

The Beartooth Ranger District said the fire was reported Tuesday afternoon.

There are no size estimates at this time.

We will bring more information as it becomes available.
UPDATE: JUNE 27 AT 11:34 A.M.

Mop-up work continued on the Robertson Draw Fire Saturday.

Crews also completed work to chip wood debris along the East Side Road Custer Gallatin National Forest reported in an update.

On Sunday, the south and east sides of the fire will continue to be patrolled and monitored for any hot spots or pockets of heat along the containment lines.

Crews will grid the fire edge again and look for pickets of heat, and suppression repair of interior dozer lines will be continued on the eastern side the update said.

On the northwest side firefighters will continue to patrol and monitor the hand lines.

The structure protection group will work on some additional fuels reduction planning.

If the weather clears, firefighters will return to the plateau and south of Mt. Maurice area on the west side of the fire to check on that area, Custer Gallatin National Forest said in the update. The initial attack group will remain prepared to respond to any new fire starts.

UPDATE: JUNE 26 AT 12:10 P.M.

Custer Gallatin National Forest reports the Robertson Draw Fire is 29,838 acres large and is now 65 percent contained.

On Friday, crews continued to patrol and mop up along the southern and eastern sides of the fire.

Firefighters on the northwest side of the fire Friday continued to mop up and search for hot spots along the hand line as well as continued work chipping woody debris along the East Side Road as a part of a contingency line tied into US Highway 212.

The Structure Group finalized the equipment list that is needed to set up structure protection actions in the Highway 212 corridor.

An initial attack group was identified and prepared to respond to any new fires.

Planned actions for Saturday include paroles and monitoring of the south and east sides of the fire for any hot spots or pockets of heat along the containment lines.

On the northwest side, firefighters will continue to construct the contingency fire line between the fire area and the East Side Road and use a chipper to dispose of the wood debris and haul it away the report says.

If the weather clears, firefighters will return to the plateau and south of Mt. Maurice area on the west side of the fire to check on that area, Custer Gallatin National Forest said in an update. An initial attack group is identified and will be prepared to respond to any new fire starts.

Evacuation warnings are still in effect for areas located south of Red Lodge and east of US Highway 212. Residents are asked to have a household evacuation plan and to remain vigilant and aware of the fire situation and their surroundings.

At this time, the North and South Grove Creek Road, Gold Creek Road, Ruby Creek Road, Meeteetse Trail, and Robertson Draw Road are closed to public use.

As of 8:00 am Saturday, the Forest Closure Order has changed and all lands west of US Highway 212 are now open to public use.

All Custer Gallatin National Forest System lands south of Point of Rocks in the Rock Creek drainage and east of US Highway 212 are still closed under a new Forest Closure Order.

This includes trailheads, campgrounds, dispersed camping areas, and the USDA Forest Service Recreation Residences in Corral Creek and Spring Creek. This is in addition to the Closure Area encompassing the Line Creek Plateau.

A Closure Order is also in effect on all Bureau of Land Management lands lying West of State Highway 72, South of State Highway 308, and East of US Highway 212 in Carbon County.

UPDATE: JUNE 25 AT 4 P.M.

The Forest Closure will be lifted in the area on the west side of Highway 212 at 8 a.m. on Saturday, June 26.

According to Custer Gallatin National Forest trails, facilities, campgrounds, and Snow and Sheep Creek Recreation Residences will be accessible to the public. This includes the Lake Fork trail, Parkside, Greenough, Limber Pine, and MK Campgrounds.

The area east of Highway 212 from the forest boundary to the Wyoming state line, encompassing all of the Line Creek plateau, Rattin and Sheridan Campgrounds, Spring Creek and Corral Creek Recreation Residences will remain closed until further notice.

The entire Custer Gallatin National Forest remains under fire restrictions. On the Beartooth Ranger District NO FIRES are permitted, metal camp ring or otherwise. However, camp stoves powered by gas with an on and off switch are allowed.

UPDATE: JUNE 23 AT 8:23 A.M.

The Robertson Draw Fire is now burning 29,601 acres and is 53 percent contained as of Wednesday morning.

Fire crews with the Red Lodge Fire Rescue, Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation, Northern Rockies Incident Management Team, U.S. Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management wrote in a release smoke was visible in the south side of the fire where crews did the burnout operation Monday.

The release said Fire Use module and Helicopter module completed building a fuel break from the north end of the Line Creek Plateau north towards Mount Maurice while also looking for hot spots along the fire's edge. Additionally, the structure protection group completed structure evaluating and planning.

Fire crews wrote in the release they will look for heat spots along the containment line on the east side of the fire Wednesday. They will focus on the creek draw with clusters of aspen trees containing heat.

Crews on the northwest side will resume building the contingency fire line between the fire area and the East Side Road and work toward farther up the slope, the release said. Crews will start removing vegetation along the East Side Road.

On the south side, crews will resume mop up efforts at the containment line where the burnout happened. Fire crews said in the release smoke may be visible from this area.

Due to forecasted thunderstorms and lightning, crews will come back from the plateau on the west side. The structure will standby for initial response in the event new fires ignite in the area.

Hot and dry weather patterns cover the region this week through next week. A cold front is expected to move through the area Wednesday afternoon, possibly causing small thunderstorms and lightning with little precipitation.

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UPDATE: JUNE 22 AT 8:24 A.M.

The Robertson Draw Fire is now burning 29,596 acres and is 53 percent contained as of Tuesday morning.

The Red Lodge Fire Rescue wrote in a release crews did burnout operations along the Robertson Draw trail and a mid-slope containment line on the south side of the fire Monday to clear out unburned fuels.

Some smoke traveled to the Highway 212 corridor. RLFR said crews monitored the eastern part of the fire for smoke and heat along the containment line.

A Division Supervisor, 10-person Wildland Fire Module and a helicopter crew in the west side worked on fuel breaks and a hand line going north towards Mount Maurice. Crews will continue building a fuel break and hand line in this area Tuesday.

RLFR said the team is spike camping for several nights in the mountains. A structure protection team resumed evaluating summer cabins for secure space and if they would need to put in a sprinkler system, and they are expected to complete this Tuesday.

Crews will monitor and extinguish spots of heat along the containment line on the eastern side of the fire Tuesday, RLFR said crews will work on a creek draw that has a cluster of aspen trees holding heat.

On the south side, crews will mop up the containment lines from Monday's burnout operation.

Crews will build a contingency line between the fire area and the East Side Road in the northwest side. Crews will look for patches of heat farther up the slope and cool along the edge of the fire.

Evacuation warnings are still in effect, and all the Custer Gallatin National Forest System lands south of Point of Rocks in the Rock Creek drainage are closed under a Forest Closure Order. Bureau of Land Management lands located west of state Highway 72, south of state Highway 308 and east of U.S. Highway 212 in Carbon County are closed.

Beartooth Highway, Highway 212, remains open.

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UPDATE: JUNE 21 AT 6:30 A.M.

The Robertson Draw Fire is 45 percent contained as of Monday morning, according to a briefing from the incident command.

The incident command said the lower elevation with grass and brush has been contained, and crews are working on the higher elevations, such as Maurice Mountain, Monday.

There was a grizzly bear with cubs north of Maurice Mountain Sunday, so crews had to leave the area for safety reasons.

UPDATE: JUNE 20 AT 6:08 P.M.

Evacuation warnings have been lifted for the areas of North and South Grove Creek, Gold Creek, Ruby Creek, and Robertson Draw east to Highway 72.

Although the evacuation warnings have been lifted, road access is still restricted to local access.

The Custer Gallatin National Forest says the area south of Red Lodge along the east side of Highway 212 is still under an evacuation warning.

Residents are being told to remain vigilant and be ready to evacuate.

All the Custer Gallatin National Forest System lands south of Point of Rocks in the Rock Creek drainage are still closed under a Forest Closure Order.

UPDATE: JUNE 20 AT 11:37 A.M.

As of Sunday morning, the Robertson Draw Fire is now reported to be 13 percent contained and 29,437 acres large.

Fire activity Saturday continued to be in the upper reaches of the Grove Creek and Line Creek drainages similar to previous days the Custer Gallatin National Forest reports.

Fire crews on the east side continued to patrol and cool down any remaining pockets of heat, and some containment was accomplished on that part of the fire.

An indirect line, a constructed fire line built by hand or equipment and located a certain distance ahead of the active fire, was completed by firefighters on the south side who tied it to an old fire scar.

Fixed-wing CL-415 water scooper aircraft were again used to make water drops on this part of the fire.

On the northwest side, firefighters continued to scout areas for fire line and worked on a direct fire line.

The Structure Protection Group continued work on assessments involving identifying and labeling the locations and access routes to structures. The group also made a task list of preparation work that would be needed to defend the areas around structures including sprinkler systems and reducing the amount of flammable vegetation.

On Sunday, crews will continue to patrol along the east side of the fire and will grid areas as needed.

Firefighters on the south side will strengthen the indirect fire line and prepare for the fire as it moves in that direction.

On the northwest side, firefighters will start working on indirect hand and equipment constructed fire line working to connect the line from the fire area going west to East Side Road.

UPDATE: JUNE 19 AT 12:20 P.M.

Fire crews and equipment continued to mop up along the east side edge of the Robertson Draw Fire an update from the Custer Gallatin National Forest said.

Most of the fire activity Friday continued to be in the upper reaches of the Grove Creek and Line Creek drainages the update says.

On the south side, firefighters continued work tying an indirect line into an old fire scar.

On the northwest side, firefighters continued to scout for indirect line locations.

According to the Custer Gallatin National Forest, Division Supervisor and 10-person Wildland Fire Module are spike camping on the west-central side of the fire and scouted indirect line locations.

The Structure Protection Group continued their work on assessments and developing a structure protection plan for structures northwest of the fire.

Crews will continue to patrol and mop up along the east side of the fire and will grid areas as needed Saturday.

Firefighters on the south side will finish their work on the indirect line and prepare the line for the fire as it moves in that direction.

On the northwest side, crews will move forward with plans for indirect hand line and some dozer line construction.

The structure protection group will keep moving through their assessments of private structures to the northwest and west of the fire and develop a plan to protect structures should there be a need to do so.

A Red Flag Warning is in effect from 12:00 pm until 9:00 pm for the fire area so fire managers will continually be monitoring the fire activity in relation to the weather conditions.

Evacuation warnings are still in effect and all the Custer Gallatin National Forest System lands south of Point of Rocks in the Rock Creek drainage are closed under a Forest Closure Order.

The Robertson Draw Fire is currently at 27,566 acres and is 0 percent contained.

UPDATE: JUNE 18 AT 10:55 P.M.

A Red Flag Warning has been issued in the Robertson Draw Fire area for Saturday, June 18, from noon to 9 p.m.

Firefighters have made great progress over the past few days. However, significant areas of uncontrolled fire exist, especially on Mt Maurice south of Red Lodge. While the expected conditions are not as extreme as last Tuesday, there is potential for rapid fire growth.

Red Lodge Fire Rescue is warning residents near the fire to monitor fire conditions and be ready to leave should those conditions change.

UPDATE: JUNE 18 AT 5:12 P.M.

In an update Friday afternoon, the Northern Rockies Incident Management Team reported that two CL Water Scoopers have been requested to help with firefighting efforts on the Robertson Draw Fire.

At this time, the Cooney Reservior is being used to supply water to the aircraft, and Buffalo Bill Reservoir may be used as well.

The aircraft generally needs a lake that is at least six feet deep and1-2.5 nautical miles according to the update.

Fire crews are working to tie in dozer lines to burned areas that have cooled down in the rangeland grass areas.

Air tanker water and retardant drops are being conducted along the northwest side of Mt. Mauriceand southern areas to check fire spread.

Crews will continue to tie in fire lines where needed, mop up pockets of heat and any areas of fire located around private structures.

On the south side of the fire, crews will continue to look for opportunities to build fire line.

Additional fire crews have been ordered and will be arriving.

Aerial resources will continue to drop water or retardant, based on fire activity.

UPDATE: JUNE 18 AT 11:04 A.M.

The Roberson Draw fire has grown to 24,470 acres and is 0 percent contained as of Friday morning.

Firefighters made progress on several areas of the fire Thursday, the Northern Rockies Incident Management Team reported in an update.

Planned actions for Friday include crews continuing to work on indirect line and utilize aircraft as necessary.

On the eastern and northeastern sides of the fire, crews will continue to patrol and mop up any areas of heat or smoke along the fireline. On the northwest side, firefighters will continue to plan indirect line and begin to start some of that work.

Structures will be assessed by the structure protection group and they will develop a structure protection plan which will include flagging access roads as well as numbering structures.

The crew on the west side of the fire will scout for opportunities to work on an indirect or direct fire line based on the fire activity at the head of the Line Creek drainage according to the update.

The North and South Grove Creek Road, Gold Creek Road, Ruby Creek Road, Meeteetse Trail, and Robertson Draw Road that are in Evacuation Warning status remain closed to general public use.

Evacuation orders have been lifted for the areas of North and South Grove Creek, Gold Creek, Ruby Creek, and Robertson Draw east to Highway 72.

The areas will remain in evacuation warning, and residents are recommended to have a household evacuation plan ready.

UPDATE: JUNE 17 AT 8:50 P.M.

As of 6 p.m., June 17, Evacuation Orders have been lifted for the areas of North and South Grove Creek, Gold Creek, Ruby Creek, and Robertson Draw east to Highway 72.

These areas will remain in evacuation warning status, but residents can return to their homes. All area residents are recommended to have a household evacuation plan ready.

The North and South Grove Creek Road, Gold Creek Road, Ruby Creek Road, Meeteetse Trail, and Robertson Draw Road that are in Evacuation Warning status remain closed to general public use.

All the Custer Gallatin National Forest System lands south of Point of Rocks in the Rock Creek drainage are closed under a Forest Closure Order. This includes trailheads, campgrounds, dispersed camping areas, and the USDA Forest Service Recreation Residences in Corral Creek, Spring Creek, Snow Creek and Sheep Creek.

The areas within the Forest Closure Order remain in evacuation and include the USDA Forest Service Recreation Residences in Corral Creek, Spring Creek, Snow Creek and Sheep Creek. This is in addition to the Closure Area encompassing the Line Creek Plateau.

The Beartooth Highway (US Hwy 212) remains open.

Temporary flight restrictions are still in place for airspace over the fire to allow crews to receive air support in containing the blaze.

According to InciWeb, fire crews had success in all divisions of the fire on Thursday.

Fire resources are working up a plan on the west end to use an existing trail and natural barriers to create indirect line and take advantage of the possible moisture that could come into the area over the weekend.

The majority of fire activity reportedly was in the Grove Creek and Line Creek drainages actively burning midslope timber with short upslope runs, group torching, and spotting.

A night shift will work Thursday evening to mop-up pockets of heat around any structures.

UPDATE: JUNE 17 AT 11:50 A.M.

An infrared flight early Thursday morning mapped the Robertson Draw Fire at 24,273 acres.

The Northern Rockies Incident Management Team reports that on Thursday, fire crews will work along the northeastern, eastern, and southeastern sides of the fire to continue to tie in fire lines where needed, mop up pockets of heat and any areas of fire located around private structures.

Crews on the south side will continue to look for opportunities to build fire line.

On the northwest side of the fire near Mt. Maurice, the Division Supervisor and operations personnel will begin scouting the fire area and develop a strategy for suppression.

A structure protection group has been organized and will be working on structure assessments and planning according to the Northern Rockies Incident Management Team.

Additional fire crews have been ordered and will be arriving. Aerial resources will continue to drop water or retardant as needed based on fire activity.

While evacuation orders are still in place, any affected residents in evacuated areas that need to return to their homes briefly can contact the Sheriffs Office to make arrangements for a Deputy Sheriff escort.

A temporary flight restriction is also in place for the air space over the Robertson Draw Fire, which also applies to unmanned aircraft systems or drones.

UPDATE: JUNE 17 AT 7:02 A.M.

The Robertson Draw fire grew to 24,273 acres by Thursday morning morning, Mariah Leuschen-Lonergan with Custer Gallatin Public Affairs tells us.

Additionally, the fire destroyed 8 major structures and 13 secondary structures or outbuildings, the Custer Gallatin National Forest reported on Facebook.

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UPDATE: JUNE 16 AT 10:14 P.M.

Evacuation Orders are still in place for North and South Grove Creek, Gold Creek, Ruby Creek and Robertson Draw east to Highway 72, according to a release from Custer Gallatin National Forest. All other evacuation orders and evacuation warnings have been lifted. This does NOT include the USDA Forest Service Recreation Residences in Corral Creek, Spring Creek, Snow Creek and Sheep Creek. Residents and visitors are encouraged to be vigilant and aware of the situation and your surroundings. If residents in areas still under evacuations need to return to their homes briefly, they may do so with a Sheriff deputy escort. You can contact the Sheriffs Office at 406-446-1234 to make arrangements. All Custer-Gallatin National Forest Service lands south of Point of Rocks in the Rock Creek drainage are closed. This includes: trailheads, campgrounds, dispersed camping areas and the USDA Forest Service Recreation Residences in Corral Creek, Spring Creek, Snow Creek and Sheep Creek. This is in addition to the closure area encompassing the Line Creek Plateau. However, the Beartooth Highway (U.S. Hwy. 212) is still open. The sheriff confirmed that eight major structures and 13 secondary structures or outbuildings were lost in the fire. Those property owners are being notified.

UPDATE: JUNE 16 AT 5:45 P.M.

According to InciWeb, Evacuation Orders are still in place for residents in the following areas:

Area south of Highway 308 from Red Lodge to Highway 72, east of 72 to the Wyoming border. This excludes the town of Bearcreek and Belfry.

The area west of Meeteetse Trail Road, and the east side of Highway 212 from Meeteetse Trail Road to Westminster Spires Church Camp.

USDA Forest Service Recreation Residences in Corral Creek, Spring Creek, Snow Creek and Sheep Creek.

All campgrounds, dispersed camping and trailheads from the Lake Fork north to Red Lodge including the dispersed camping area just west of the Lake Fork Road.

The town of Bearcreek is under an evacuation warning. The order was put in place by the county sheriff and recommends residents leave their homes immediately. People with medical, functional or other needs should consider evacuating if possible.

An area closure is also still in place for the area south of Highway 212, east to the area along the Beartooth Front and south to the Wyoming border. This does not include the campgrounds and homes along East Side Road.

Line Creek Road remains closed in Wyoming.

The following roads will also remain closed to through traffic: Meeteetse Trail Road, Grove Creek Road and Robertson Draw Road.

The fire remains at 0% contained. Approximately 200 personnel are assigned to the incident with more personnel incoming.

Crews are working on structure protection, along with building dozer line and tying into cold burned black to secure portions of the fire's edge. Retardant lines were placed throughout the day along the northwestern edge of Mt. Maurice.

Much of Wednesday, smoke and growth occurred on the southern perimeter of the fire and on an interior bowl on the southern side of Mt. Maurice.

UPDATE: JUNE 16 AT 11:29 A.M.

As of Wednesday morning, the Robertson Draw Fire is estimated to be 21,000 acres large.

An update from the U.S. Forest Service says the fire had significant growth yesterday with challenging fire weather and high sustained winds.

The update says the firefighting situation is challenging due to continued record high temperatures with relative humidity in the single digits.

Extreme fire behavior on Tuesday made fighting the fire safely on the ground nearly impossible and the high winds preventing aircraft from fighting the fire with retardant and water drops challenging. Engines were placed on structure protection, as safe to do so, the update reads.

The update says the weather Wednesday is more favorable towards firefighting efforts, however, shifting winds may cause more growth on the South and Eastern portions of the fire.

Priorities remain structure protection, building line around the fire and as always, firefighter and public safety.

The fire is continuing to actively burn along the east side of Line Creek Plateau into sage and grass south of Bear Creek and Belfry and around Mount Maurice, south of Red Lodge.

According to the update, the fire is not within the wilderness area, and firefighters have been using aircraft to deliver water and retardant to the fire line since the fire was reported.

Aircraft resources are working the fire to deliver water and retardant when conditions are safe to fly.

All evacuation orders are still in place.

A virtual and in-person public meeting is planned for, Wednesday, June 16 at 7:00 p.m. at Red Lodge High School Gym, 800 Chambers Ave N. in Red Lodge.

The meeting will be live-streamed on the Custer Gallatin National Forests Facebook page here.

UPDATE: JUNE 16 AT 9:54 A.M.

The Robertson Draw fire has grown to 21,000 acres Wednesday morning, according to the Custer Gallatin National Forest.

UPDATE: JUNE 15 AT 6:30 P.M.

The area along Rock Creek and Meeteetse Trail Road being Evacuated, according to a release from Custer Gallatin National Forest. This includes all homes in the area west of Meeteetse Trail Road and on the east side of Highway 212 from Meeteetse Trail Road to Westminster Spires Church Camp. This also includes all USDA Forest Service Recreation Residences in Corral Creek, Spring Creek, Snow Creek and Sheep Creek. All campgrounds, dispersed camping and trailheads are closed in this area on both sides of Highway 212 from Red Lodge to the Lake Fork of Rock Creek, including the camping area to the south of the Lake Fork Road.

Evacuation Orders are also now in place for homes south of Highway 308 from Red Lodge east to Wolf Creek Road (with the exception of the Town of Bearcreek), south of Wolf Creek Road to Highway 72, east side of Highway 72 to Grove Creek Road and everything north of Grove Creek. The Town of Bearcreek is under an Evacuation Warning.

A shelter has been set up at the Red Lodge Community Church at 308 S. Broadway. Small pets are welcome as long as they are restrained.

The Red Cross will be setting up a shelter at the Veteran Memorial Civic Center in Red Lodge at 215 14th Street West.

The Robertson Draw Fire area remains under a Red Flag Warning until 10 p.m. tonight.

UPDATE: JUNE 15 AT 6:05 P.M.

The area west of Meeteetse Trail Road and the east side of Highway 212 from Meeteetse Trail Road to Westminster Spires Church Camp are under an Evacuation Order, according to InciWeb.

USDA Forest Service Recreation Residences in Corral Creek, Spring Creek, Snow Creek, and Sheep Creek are also under an Evacuation Order.

An evacuation warning is issued from the county sheriff. He alerts people to be ready to go if needed. People with medical, functional, or other needs should consider evacuating if possible.

An area closure is in place for the area south of Highway 212, east to the area along the Beartooth Front and south to the Wyoming border. This does not include the campgrounds and homes along East Side Road.

Line Creek Road is also closed in Wyoming.

Roads closed to through traffic include: Meeteetse Trail Road, Grove Creek Road and Robertson Draw Road.

UPDATE: JUNE 15 AT 5:45 P.M.

According to our on-scene reporter, the Carbon County Sheriff's Office is issuing an Evacuation Order for the Meeteetse Trail area.

An area closure is in place for the area south of Highway 212, east to the area along the Beartooth Front and south to the Wyoming border, according to InciWeb.

This does not include the campgrounds and homes along East Side Road. However, Line Creek Road in Wyoming is also closed.

The following roads are closed to through traffic, only local access is allowed: Meeteetse Trail Road, Grove Creek Road and Robertson Draw Road.

UPDATE: JUNE 15 AT 4 P.M.

North and South Grove Creek are under an Evacuation Order, as of 3:21 p.m., according to a Facebook update from the Custer Gallatin National Forest.

The following locations are now under Evacuation Orders:

Gold Creek

Ruby Creek

North Grove Creek

South Grove Creek

The following areas are under Evacuation Warnings:

The area west of Meeteetse Trail Road, and the east side of Highway 212 from Meeteetse Trail Road to Westminster Spires Church Camp. USDA Forest Service Recreation Residences in Corral Creek, Spring Creek, Snow Creek and Sheep Creek.

Individuals with medical, functional or other needs should consider evacuating if possible.

UPDATE: JUNE 15 AT 8:36 A.M.

RED LODGE, Mont. - Gold and Ruby Creek areas are under evacuation again as of 7 a.m. Tuesday after the Robertson Draw Fire grew to 2,000 acres from 200 acres overnight.

Custer Gallatin National Forest Public Information Officer Billy Chapman told Montana Right Now there is a possibility of extreme fire conditions worsening due to the weather, and the fire has a chance of going into the main fork of Rock Creek.

Chapman told us the following areas are under evacuation warning, meaning these areas aren't currently under evacuation but could be later:

North and South Fork Grove areas

Area west of Meeteetse Trail Road, east of Highway 212 and down to Westminister Spires Church Camp

A Type 2 fire crew is on the way to battle the fire.

RED LODGE, Mont. - The Robertson Draw Fire burned about 200 acres Monday, which has the town's mayor a little worried because the fires usually don't start this early.

"I just couldn't believe it was happening this early. Usually, our fire season is towards the end of July and August," Red Lodge Mayor William Larson said.

Red clouds loomed over Red Lodge this afternoon, as the fire burned just 12 miles away.

Mayor Larson is no stranger to fires, but says he's worried about tourism season.

"We have a full blown July coming up, starting with the rodeo during the first week, and that whole month is full," Larson said.

And after a rough economic year in 2020, fires just don't help small businesses.

"I talked to some store owners this morning and everyone's having a great year, but they are a little concerned after last year," Larson said.

The situation could be worse, but the Forest Service and Red Lodge Fire had to take some drastic measures Monday.

"No structures are currently threatened, but we do have evacuations in place in Ruby Creek and Gold Creek," Amy Hyfield, with Red Lodge Fire, said.

For now, part of the Custer-Gallatin National Forrest is shut down.

"Highway 212 from about Mt. Morris to Reno Lake, and then South to the Wyoming border and east to Beartooth Front," Hyfield said.

But a big factor with this will be the wind. We'll have a Red Flag warning in place through Tuesday.

"The wind and the high temperatures with that, we do expect higher fire activity," Hyfield said.

But there's no reason to panic, for now.

"We don't feel like the community of Red Lodge or the surrounding communities are threatened at this time, just the evacuated areas," Hyfield said.
HARDIN, Mont. - The body of a 40-year-old Michigan man was found along Interstate I-90 north of Lodge Grass by joint efforts of the Big Horn County Sheriffs Office and Crow Tribe search and rescue personnel on Thursday, June 17.

In a release, the body was identified as Michael Anthony Savona of Clinton Township, Michigan.

The Sheriffs Office and Montana Highway Patrol began investigating the circumstances of an abandoned vehicle located on the shoulder of Interstate I-90 on June 15, following a Montana Department of Transportation employee reporting the abandoned vehicle.

Available evidence shows the cause of death to be a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

No autopsy was conducted due to the nature of the apparent cause of death. The case remains open should there be any information which presents the possibility of foul play. Any further information will be made available when appropriate.

Any persons with information concerning this death should contact the Sheriff's Office at (406) 665-9780.
HELENA, Mont. - Governor Greg Gianforte wrote a letter to the National Parks Service, saying he is concerned that they appear, unwilling to commit to an aggressive initial response to wildfires.

In the letter sent to Deputy Director Shawn Benge of the National Park Service, Gianforte says Montana is committed to managing forests to reduce the risk of catastrophic wildfires, on top of containing, fighting and extinguishing wildfires.

Following the 2021 Fire Season Briefing, Gianforte reported that much of Montana is in moderate to extreme drought conditions, which increases the risk of a severe fire season. However, Gianforte said local fire managers are committed to reducing wildfire risk across the state.

During the Fire Season Briefing, representatives from several agencies were present, with a representative from the National Park Services (NPS) providing remarks via phone.

When I asked Jay Lusher, regional fire management officer with NPS, if NPS would share Montanas commitment to an aggressive initial response to wildfires, including extinguishing fires, Mr. Lusher indicated some fires on NPS lands in Montana would receive that response, Gianforte wrote. When I followed up to clarify whether all fires would be subject to an aggressive initial response, Mr. Lusher indicated not all fires would be extinguished when they are detected.

Gianforte went on to say he hopes they can reach a resolution in which all fires on NPS lands in Montana, aside from those that are critical to maintaining a healthy ecosystem, will receive an aggressive initial response.

We must have a coordinated approach to fighting fires in Montana, and that involves having a pro-active plan to ensure we promptly extinguish fires that threaten structures or put communities at risk, the letter reads. ... While we must protect the natural ecosystem, we must also protect Montanans homes and communities. I am concerned that NPS appears unwilling to commit to an aggressive initial response to wildfires.

Gianforte requested a meeting with Benge to discuss resolving the reported issue.

You can read the full letter from Governor Greg Gianforte here.
BILLINGS, Mont. - A Billings man with previous felony convictions that prohibited him from owning firearms was sentenced Friday.

According to the Department of Justice, on Dec. 19, 2019, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agents learned from a confidential informant that 36-year-old Wayne Jennings Cooper wanted to sell firearms and drugs court documents say.

Cooper was found to have previous felony convictions that prohibited him from possessing firearms and that he was on state probation following an investigation.

A controlled purchase was set up by agents where cooper sold an individual a .380 caliber, semi-automatic pistol along with a loaded magazine.

Cooper also reportedly gave the individual what was purported to be five grams of meth but turned out to be a cutting agent.

Wayne Jennings Cooper has been sentenced to 30 months in prison to be followed by three years of supervised release.
ROME, JUN 18 - Italy's COVID-19 Rt transmission number is 0.69, according to the latest weekly coronavirus monitoring report of the health ministry and the Higher Health Institute (ISS), substantially stable with respect to 0.68 last week, sources said Friday. The COVID-19 incidence, however, stayed on a downward trend, with 16.7 cases for every 100,000 inhabitants, compared to 25 cases a week ago, the sources said. The monitoring report will be presented later on Friday after being examined by the government's 'control room' COVID-19 taskforce. The proportion of Italy's intensive-care places taken up by COVID-19 patients is 6%, with the number of coronavirus sufferers in ICUs down from 688 on June 8 to 504 on June 15. No region is above the critical threshold of 30%. The proportion of ordinary hospital-ward beds occupied by COVID patients at the national level is also 6%, with the number dropping from 4,685 on June 8 to 3,333 on June 15. The report said that all of Italy's regions and autonomous provinces are currently low risk for COVID-19, except for Basilicata, Friuli-Venezia Giulia and Molise, which are considered moderate risk. (ANSA).
ROME, JUN 18 - European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen will be in Rome on Tuesday June 22 with the EC's verdict on Italy's post-COVID National Recovery and Resilience Plan (PNRR) as part of a tour of European capitals to give the green lights to national plans, an EC spokesperson said Friday. It is expected to be a thumbs up. Italy will spend over 220 billion euros of EU funds to make the country greener and more modern as it recovers from its biggest peacetime recession. Reforms to cut red tape and speed up a snail-paced justice system will go hand in hand with the plan. Italy is getting the biggest single chunk of the EU's 750 billion Next Generation EU Recovery Fund. Von der Leyen will meet Premier Mario Draghi Tuesday at Rome's iconic Cinecitta cinema studios and theme park. (ANSA).
ROME, JUN 18 - A 34-year-old Slovakian man was arrested Friday for beating to death an Italian man in his home in Reggio Emilia on June 12 for an as-yet unclear motive, sources said. Milan Racz allegedly smashed Aniello Iazzetta's head in by bashing it off the wall repeatedly, police said. He then fled with his Ukrainian girlfriend, also present at the scene of the alleged crime, and has only now been caught. Racz has been charged with murder aggravated by petty motives while his girlfriend has been charged with aiding and abetting. An autopsy on Iazzetta showed he died almost instantly. (ANSA).
ROME, JUN 18 - Health Minister Roberto Speranza said Friday he had signed a new ordinance introducing a five-day quarantine with an obligation to have a COVID test for all those arriving in Italy from the United Kingdom. The move comes amid a resurgence in infection figures in the UK due to the Delta (India) variant. (ANSA).
NAPLES, JUN 18 - Two envelopes containing a total of three bullets were sent Friday to the deputy chair of Campania's regional council in Naples, Valeria Ciarambino of the populist 5-Star Movement (M5S), police said. They were caught by post-office scanners and given to police who told the M5S member. The first envelope contained two bullets and no message while the second contained one bullet and the message "Shut up". Ciarambino told police she had never before received death threats or been the victim of other acts of intimidation. The Naples prefecture is weighing whether to assign her a police escort. (ANSA).
ROME, JUN 18 - A record 13.4 tonnes of cocaine were seized in Italy last year, according to the annual report from the Central Directorate for Antidrug Services (DCSA) released Friday. The cocaine haul was 62.2% higher than 2019, when the rise on 2018 was even higher, 127.8%, the report said. The DCSA said they would try to establish if last year's rise could have been influenced by the "stop and go" effect of COVID lockdowns. Some 78.7% of seizures were made at borders, 98.1% of them at maritime borders. The bulk of the big catches were in January and February, when 3,330 kg was seized in the port of Livorno, 338 kg in La Spezia and 1,128 kg at Gioia Tauro, the report said. This was before the COVID lockdown. Seizures also picked up again in October-December, including 2,862 kg in four separate operations, three at Gioa Tauro where the Calabrian 'Nrrangheta mafia operates and one at Ancona. 'Ndrangheta, which controls the European cocaine trade and has its major import point at Gioia Tauro, is Italy's richest and most powerful mafia having supplanted Cosa Nostra of Sicily. (ANSA).
ROME, JUN 18 - A 37-year-old trade unionist, Adil Belakhdim, died on Friday after being hit by a truck while taking part in a picket of logistics workers outside the Lidl facility in Biandrate, in the northern province of Novara, his union, COBAS, said. The driver fled the scene in the lorry but was subsequently tracked down by Carabinieri police on a motorway, sources said. Premier Mario Draghi on Friday expressed dismay about the death. "I am pained by the death of Adil Belakhdim," Draghi said during a visit to Barcelona. "It is necessary for light to be shed on what happened immediately". The lorry driver, a 25-year-old Italian, was arrested later Friday and taken to jail. He has been charged with vehicular homicide and resisting arrest. (ANSA).
ROME, JUN 18 - Health Minister Roberto Speranza on Friday signed an ordinance in force from Monday turning all of Italy bar the Val d'Aosta into a low-COVID risk white zone. Even Basilicata, Calabria, Campania, Marche, Tuscany, Sicily and the autonomous province of Bolzano will turn white along with the other regions. (ANSA).
ROME, JUN 18 - Italy's COVID-19 Rt transmission number is 0.69, according to the latest weekly coronavirus monitoring report of the health ministry and the Higher Health Institute (ISS), substantially stable with respect to 0.68 last week, sources said Friday. The COVID-19 incidence, however, stayed on a downward trend, with 16.7 cases for every 100,000 inhabitants, compared to 25 cases a week ago, the sources said. The monitoring report was presented lon Friday after being examined by the government's 'control room' COVID-19 taskforce. The proportion of Italy's intensive-care places taken up by COVID-19 patients is 6%, with the number of coronavirus sufferers in ICUs down from 688 on June 8 to 504 on June 15. No region is above the critical threshold of 30%. The proportion of ordinary hospital-ward beds occupied by COVID patients at the national level is also 6%, with the number dropping from 4,685 on June 8 to 3,333 on June 15. The report said that all of Italy's regions and autonomous provinces are currently low risk for COVID-19, except for Basilicata, Friuli-Venezia Giulia and Molise, which are considered moderate risk. ISS President Silvio Brusaferro said the infection curve was now among the lowest in the EU and many towns and cities had no cases. (ANSA).
MILLER COUNTY, Mo.  A fisherman was found dead earlier this week, about 30 miles downstream from Bagnell Dam, on the Osage River.

According to the Miller County Sheriff's Office, on June 16, 2021, they received a phone call from a camper at the Osage-Tavern State Wildlife Area near St. Elizabeth about a fisherman that was possibly missing. Miller County Deputies arrived on scene and found fishing gear on the bank of the Osage River and a vehicle believed to be that of the missing person.

Based on witness statements from other campers, investigators believed that the missing person intended to go fishing and unintentionally entered the river. Miller County Deputies along with the help of the Osage County Sheriffs office, Missouri State Water Patrol and the Missouri Dept. of Conservation, conducted a 3-day search for the missing person by watercraft. On June 18, 2021 the body of a male subject was located after Cole County received a 911 call from a bystander. The body was located near St. Thomas, about 10 miles downstream from where the man went into the river. Based off victim description and clothing, authorities believe this is the missing person from the Osage-Tavern Conservation area. The missing person's family has been notified and positive identification and an autopsy will follow.
Webber said a recent cooking class that was to be held at the restaurant was cancelled but will be held at a later date.

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We had one we were going to run last Wednesday (June 2), and the class was full and at the last minute we had a lot of cancellations, Webber said. So were going to run that one again July 21.

Webber said another reason the restaurant is opened for limited hours is because he is having difficulty finding staff.

Its really hard to find staff, Webber said. Im hoping we will level off a little bit with people getting back to work.

Webber said he hopes the restaurant will be open during its regular hours again in the fall.

Were working on it, Webber said. Were doing as much as we can right now.

Cuoco Pazzo Eatz & Drinkz opened for business May 29, 2020.

The North Edwards Boulevard property was the location for the Red Geranium restaurant, which closed Jan. 1, 2020 after about 35 years in business.

A company called RGLG LLG purchased the property from previous owner, Swatek Sales Corp., for about $1.5 million on March 5, 2020. But its again listed for sale

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In a sign of the rulings impact, the court sent two cases of people convicted of drug crimes based partly on trash searches back to lower courts to determine whether the evidence should be thrown out.

Dissenting justices, including Chief Justice Susan Christensen, warned that the decision was out of step with the vast majority of states and outlawed a tactic used to gather evidence of drug manufacturing and dealing. They said people have no expectations of privacy when they put their trash on the curb.

The majoritys reasoning  that officers cant use investigative techniques that would be illegal for private citizens  is nonsensical and calls into question the legality of several other law enforcement practices, dissenting justices said.

Christensen said the reasoning would invite legal challenges against officers who make warrantless traffic stops, search private property and seize guns under emergency or other circumstances that have long been allowed by courts.

Unfortunately, our state law enforcement officials are now left with a guess-and-see approach to many actions previously considered lawful, undermining public safety in the process, Christensen wrote.
A provision in state law that allows blood samples to be taken without a warrant from incapacitated drivers being investigated for drunken driving is unconstitutional, the state Supreme Court said Friday.

But ruling in the facts of the case that led to the decision, the court said in a unanimous decision that blood drawn from a Madison woman who was unconscious following a fatal crash was permitted because the officer who ordered the blood sample taken without a warrant was operating under the law as it stood at the time, calling it a "good faith" exception.

The court's ruling came in the case of Dawn Prado, now 54, who was charged in 2015 with homicide by drunken driving for a December 2014 crash in Fitchburg that killed another driver. The case has languished since 2016, when a Dane County judge threw out the results of a blood sample taken from Prado, ruling that a police officer should have obtained a search warrant to get the sample.

Since then, the Prado case has awaited appellate court rulings in other cases that appeared to be on point, but none directly answered the questions posed in her case.
Background Text: Judges 6:1-33, 8:32

Devotional Text: Hebrews 11:32

Today, we are continuing in the Book of Judges as we celebrate Fathers Day.

Last week, we began looking at the life of Gideon, the fifth judge of Israel. We saw how an angel of the Lord came to him declaring that God had chosen him to save his people from their eastern enemies. We ended last week with Gideon tearing down his own fathers altar to the false god, Baal, along with the pole next to it. Then, he built an honorable altar to the one true God and, using the wood scraps from the pole, sacrificed one of his fathers bulls to the God of Israel.

The next day, when the townspeople wanted to kill Gideon for what he had done, Joash, the father of Gideon, spoke up on his behalf. His words to the people were that if Baal did not like what Gideon had done then he should defend himself, if he were truly a god.

Instead of being angry with his son, Joash protected him with his words. Words that showed Joashs own faith in the true God had not been lost. When Gideon stepped out by trusting in God, it became a first step in teaching Gideon that God could use him.

Now we continue with Judges 6:33 and onward. We find that the Midianites, along with the other eastern countries, banded together, joining forces and crossed over the Jordan and camped in the Valley of Jezreel.

This valley was one of the most fertile spots for growing crops. The takeover by the eastern countries would mean ruin for the livelihood of the Israelites.

Again, God used his chosen man, Gideon, who, filled with the Holy Spirit, would take action. In verses 34-35, Gideon blew a trumpet and summoned the tribes that were nearby to follow him.

However, before going to war, Gideon once again tested God.

Have you ever heard the term putting out a fleece? This phrase comes from Gideon, who said to God in verse 37, Look, I will put a wool fleece on the threshing floor. If there is dew only on the fleece and the rest of the floor is dry, then I will know that you will save Israel by my hand as you said.

In the morning, it happened just as Gideon had asked.

However, Gideon, asking God not to be angry with him, asked another test of God with the fleece. This time, Gideon asked that the fleece be dry while the surrounding floor would be wet with dew. Once again, God did as Gideon had asked.

Even today, we hear of people testing Gods direction by putting out a fleece, although an actual fleece is not usually a part of the test. As we seek to follow Gods direction, we do question if it is from God, from time-to-time. God does not always make his direction known to us by answering a test to help us understand his will. But, sometimes he surely does.

Trusting in the Lord

As we move onto chapter 7, we see how the tables have turned, as God tests Gideons trust in him to defeat the Midianites.

Gideon had gathered an army of 32,000 men. However, God informed him that was too many. Basically, God said to Gideon, How will the people know they were delivered by my hands. There are so many warriors, they will boast that they themselves accomplished the defeat.

Through various forms of winnowing down the numbers, Gideon was finally left with only 300 men against the vast army of the Midianites camped in the valley.

Gideon began to feel nervous. Could the Midianites really be defeated by so few men? So God advised Gideon to sneak into the enemy camp at night to see what the enemy warriors were thinking.

As Gideon, along with his servant Purah, went down to the camp undercover at night, they heard one of the men telling about a dream he had.

A round loaf of barley bread came tumbling into the Midian camp. It struck the tent with such force that the tent overturned and collapsed (Judges 7:13b).

A friend of the one who had the dream interpreted it for him in the next verse: This can be nothing other than the sword of Gideon, son of Joash, the Israelite. God has given the Midianites and the whole camp into his hands.

Gideon, encouraged by what he heard, worshipped God and woke the men back at his camp.

In verses 17-24, we find the 300 men going down to the edge of the enemy camp at about 10 p.m. Gideons army blew their trumpets loudly, smashing their jars and holding their torches. Together, they shouted, For the Lord and for Gideon!

They created such confusion that the Midian army ran about, even fighting with one another. God had used Gideon to win the battle with just 300 men, retrieving the fertile lands along the Jordan River for Israel.

Before ending todays life of Gideon, there are just a few more items to consider. In Judges 8:22-23, the Israelites wanted to make Gideon their king. Gideon refused, stating, The Lord will rule over you.

Afterwards, verse 28 records that During Gideons lifetime, the land enjoyed peace for 40 years. Before Gideon died, at a good old age, he had 16 wives and fathered 70 sons.

Gideons story begins with a young man unsure of his God. It ends with his wholehearted trust in God and his own growth into a mighty man who brought peace to his people. Gideon had tested God and God had shown Gideon his power. As Gideons trust and willingness to follow God grew, God tested Gideons faith when he reduced the Israelite army from 32,000 to 300 men.

This is God, ever with us, ever helping us if we but put our trust in him.
Lancaster Farmings Eric Hurlock explains why the upcoming National Hemp Tour is so important  both to him and to the agricultural industry.
U.S. annual cheese consumption has increased by over 5 pounds per person over the past 10 years. The Martin family at Country Sunrise Creamery has been ahead of that curve, producing cheese since 2007.

The Martins produce about 5,000 pounds of cheese annually.

Moses Martin is the farms head cheesemaker, but his son Nelson, along with Nelsons children, are part of the production team as well.

When Nelson Martin moved back to his family farm in 2004, his plan was to grow the herd, which had around 80 cows at the time.

I was convinced that bigger, better, faster, smarter was the way to get ahead, Martin said.

But after working full time at the farm for two years, he decided that to stay profitable in the conventional dairy industry, he would have to keep expanding.

So in 2006 Martin started researching raw milk and decided to start selling directly from a garage at the farm while also continuing to produce for Land OLakes.

His direct marketing of raw milk eventually led him to cheese.

The idea was to get that ball rolling so that when the time comes where we need to get off the conventional train, that we would have something to go to, Martin said. We had an interest in making cheese. My parents went to cheesemaking school for three days, and theyve been making cheese ever since.

When their contract with Land O Lakes ended in 2016, the Martins reduced their herd size because they only needed to keep up with their retail demand.

Currently, the Martins milk 30 to 40 cows, which provide enough milk for their raw milk, cheese and yogurt sales. And they added an on-farm store for more retail space.

The Martins make cheese most Fridays, and all varieties are available year-round.

We bottle what we need throughout the week, and then on Friday, whatever is left gets made into cheese, Martin said.

Many of cheeses sold at the creamery are cheddar-based with added flavors such as garlic and hickory smoke.

I would say the best seller is just the regular cheddar, Martin said.

The Martins also make Jack cheeses and a special sweddar cheese, created by Moses Martin, which uses Swiss cultures but is processed like cheddar.

He has a loyal following of people that come for just that, Martin said of his dads invention.

Raw milk outsells cheese at the farms store, but Martin has had better success with his cheese wholesaling to stores and roadside stands.

The creamerys products are also sold at Palmyra Farmers Market and Homestead Market in Tamaqua. And Martin has launched an online store.

Its really new, and it has been slow to take off, he said.

But thats not a big problem for Martin, who prefers customers come out and see the farm while shopping.

Theres a huge disconnect, you know, between people and where their food comes from, Martin said. Online sales is not the same as going to the farm and getting it.

Closing that disconnect is one of the main goals of the Pennsylvania Cheese Guild and its cheese trail, on which Country Sunrise Creamery is a stop.

Follow the Trail to Good, Local Cheese

The cheese trail includes 32 cheesemakers, all of whom are members of the guild. The list of locations is at pacheeseguild.org/cheese-trail-map.

The guild was launched in 2015 to promote high-quality cheesemaking and build consumer interest in artisan fromage.

The trail is a key part of the mission, and its a great tool to help people find local cheese, said Kerry Kaylegian, an associate research professor at Penn State and one of the founders of the guild.

Visiting businesses on the cheese trail is also a fun activity for consumers, especially after a year of pandemic-related restrictions and cancellations.

Martin enjoys having people at the farm, and even hosts farm tours and a customer appreciation day.

Theres other ways to farm, but for us, we like meeting the customers and hearing their stories, he said.

And customers who decide to embark on the cheese trail will be able to find a lot of tasty options. Pennsylvania cheeses have won both national and international awards, Kaylegian said.

She said the guild wants to encourage consumers to try local, artisan cheeses, whether the farms are part of the trail or not.

As for Martin, he said Country Sunrise Creamery has a cheese variety for any meal.

I like them all, he said. Theres different occasions for different ones. Like the cranberry orange, you dont put that on your scrambled eggs. But cheese is like the icing on a cake in any meal.
#Kuwait will lift the entry ban for #vaccinated non-citizens from August, the government announced.



Government spokesman Tareq Al-Mezrem said the inbound travellers must present a certificate of #Covid19 vaccination to enter the country, reports Xinhua news agency. pic.twitter.com/ZVHecXmaJA IANS Tweets (@ians_india) June 18, 2021

(SocialLY brings you all the latest breaking news, viral trends and information from social media world, including Twitter, Instagram and Youtube. The above post is embeded directly from the user's social media account and LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body. The views and facts appearing in the social media post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY, also LatestLY does not assume any responsibility or liability for the same.)
On this sustainable Gastronomy Day, the UN is encouraging folks around the world to eat responsibly and avoid unnecessary wastage in the interest of saving this planet.

The way we eat is pushing our planet beyond its limits. It's igniting a biodiversity crisis and a climate emergency. This #SustainableGastronomyDay, see how you can be part of the sustainable food movement for healthier people and planet. https://t.co/akECslKt9G pic.twitter.com/0T0aVwdm2T  UN Development (@UNDP) June 18, 2021

(SocialLY brings you all the latest breaking news, viral trends and information from social media world, including Twitter, Instagram and Youtube. The above post is embeded directly from the user's social media account and LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body. The views and facts appearing in the social media post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY, also LatestLY does not assume any responsibility or liability for the same.)
Salma Hayek returns to the big screen in the 2021 movie, "Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard," where she plays a combustible, foul-mouthed Latina. The movie hit the U.S. theaters on Wednesday, June 16.

In a statement, Salma said that the film will appeal to many middle-aged women. The Mexican-American actress also added that at the present time, age discrimination still exists especially in women. However, she emphasized that her character, Sonia Kincaid, does not put up with this notion.

From a Cameo to a Lead Role

According to La Presia Latina, in 2017, Salma Hayek made a cameo appearance in the film 'The Hitman's Bodyguard'. However, in the film's sequel, the 54-year-old actress is one of the lead stars alongside Ryan Reynolds, Antonio Banderas, and Samuel L. Jackson.

Moreover, Salma stated that she was happy to be given more rein in molding her character. Hayek shared that the film's director Patrick Hughes was very welcoming on how she molded the character as she pleased.

Meanwhile, she mentioned that her co-star Ryan Reynolds was also pleased that she was taking on a bigger role.

Salma also stated that she really enjoyed playing the role of Sonia in 'The Hitman's Bodyguard,' despite only having to play the role for two days in 2017. She was also very thrilled that she was given another chance to play the role and also explore Sonia's character.

The 54-year-old actress also stated that she was excited when Hughes told her that she will be one of the three protagonists in the sequel.

Salma Hayek plays the role of Sonia Kincaid, the wife of notorious hitman, Darius Kincaid, played by Samuel L. Jackson. In the first film, Michael Bryce (Reynolds) was hired to be the bodyguard of Darius Kincaid.

ALSO READ: Rita Moreno Defends Lin Manuel Miranda Over "In the Heights" Colorism Issue

'Salma Would Be a Better Hitman' - Ryan Reynolds

Salma Hayek's co-star Ryan Reynolds stated that she would be a better fit to be a hitman and a bodyguard, People reported.

In an appearance on Good Morning America on Tuesday to promote the film, Reynolds was asked who he thinks would be a better hitman, conman, and bodyguard among the lead cast. Reynolds immediately answered that he and Jackson are just all for show.

However, he stated that Salma would make an amazing hitman who is also a bodyguard on the side. He also added that Salma also got a bit of being a conman on the side.

Reynolds also added that if he ever went to that kind of life, he would probably look for Salma. He also joked that he would probably just take her and strap her in front of his body as a human shield and run towards danger.

On the other hand, Salma laughed about Reynolds' comment and stated that she was very flattered because he believes that he would be safe when she is around.

In the 2021 film, Salma's Sonia and Reynold's Bryce teamed up to rescue Jackson's Darius as he was taken by a madman.

RELATED ARTICLE: "In The Heights" and "Crazy Rich Asians" Director, Jon Chu Addresses Colorism Issue in His Latest Film

WATCH: Salma Hayek and Ryan Reynolds talk new film, The Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard' l GMA - Good Morning America
Authorities from Arizona caught the suspect in the series of shooting incidents that killed one and injured at least 13. The said incident happened on Thursday in different areas such as Glendale, Peoria, Surprise, and along the freeways, according to a report from ABC 15.

Authorities confirmed that the suspect fired at multiple people in 90 minutes in several cities located in West Valley. Authorities believed that the suspect acted alone when the shooting incident erupted.

READ NEXT: Miami Mass Shooting: 2 Dead, More Than 20 Hurt; $125,000 Reward Offered to Find Killers

Suspect for Arizona Shootings Arrested

Details were not furthered out by the officials, but NBC News reported that the suspect was an adult male and was taken into custody by the Surprise police officers. In a tweet, Surprise Police Department also alerted the public saying that the suspect was driving a white Volkswagen Tiguan.

ACTIVE POLICE SITUATION - Shooting near 11400 W Bell Road - suspect at large - possibly driving a white VW Tiguan  Surprise Police Dept (@Surprise_PD) June 17, 2021

Surprise and Peoria police confirmed that the shooting spree totaled eight separate incidents. Investigators believed that the first shooting incident occurred at the border of Glendale and Peoria at around 11:10 in the morning. Fox 4 reported that four of the eight shooting incidents occurred in Peoria alone.

Although the specifics of the eight shootings were not yet available, the suspect continued to shoot people until he was detained at around 12:42 in the afternoon.

"What I can tell you is that the suspect that we're seeing, the vehicle that we're seeing, he's been taken into custody," said Tommy Hale, a police sergeant from Surprise Police Department, assuring that the public has no reason to feel unsafe. Hale narrated that the suspect pulled into the parking lot and did not attempt to shoot the police officers.

Despite being held by the authorities, the motive for the series of shooting in Arizona was still not identified by the officers. The weapon was also found inside the vehicle of the suspect, but details about it were also not furthered.

"We don't have an idea of what this person [suspect] was thinking when he went out and did this [shootings]," said Peoria Sergeant Brandon Sheffert. Sheffert also pointed out that they want to discover the motive because a lot of people were affected and scared due to the incident.

Multiple agencies are helping in the investigation. The agencies were composed of Surprise Police, Glendale Police, Maricopa County Sheriff's Office, FBI, and ATF.

1 Dead, 13 Injured After Series of Shooting in Arizona

Although the suspect was now under the custody of the authorities, the gunmen were still able to hurt innocent people.

Four individuals were confirmed to be shot including one that was fatal. The deceased victim was found on the Lopp 101 and Thunderbird, which resulted in the closure of the freeway. Shot victims were also reported on different areas such as 115th Avenue and Bell Road of Surprise, and 99th Avenue and Northern Avenue.

Meanwhile, Sheffert confirmed that not all the victims were shot in the incidents. Some of them sustained injuries from broken glass due to a car crash.

The 13 injured victims after a series of Arizona shootings were expected to survive as they sustained non-life-threatening injuries.

READ NEXT: Colorado Shooting: Armed Suspect Who Shot Firefighter in the Leg Identified, Still on the Loose

WATCH: 1 Killed, 3 Others Shot and 9 More Injured in West Valley Shooting Spree - From ABC15 Arizona
President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris signed a bill establishing Juneteenth National Independence Day as an official federal holiday.

Joe Biden signed the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act in the East Room of the White House on Thursday, June 17, flanked by Vice President Kamala Harris, who signed the bill in her capacity as Senate president, Yahoo! News reported.

It was the first federal holiday created since 1983 when former President Ronald Reagan established Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

The Juneteenth National Independence Day commemorates June 19, 1865, when enslaved Black Americans in Galveston, Texas received the news of freedom. It was two months after the Confederacy had surrendered.

Top officials said the law takes effect immediately and is scheduled to be celebrated on Friday, June 18, because it is the closest weekday.

READ NEXT: Governor Greg Abbott Approves Bill Allowing Texas to Carry Handguns; No Permit, License Needed

Joe Biden and Kamala Harris Sign the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act

During a jubilant White House ceremony, Joe Biden emphasized that the new federal holiday will make Americans learn from the history the country has faced. Furthermore, the president pointed out that the holiday would celebrate the progress of the United States.

The Guardian reported that Joe Biden noted that U.S. reckoning with its history was essential even though the history was painful and shameful.

The president also underscored that great nations must "come to terms with the mistakes they made" to begin to heal and grow from that moment.

Joe Biden also highlighted that the signing of Juneteenth as a federal holiday would be one of his greatest honors as president of the U.S.

Kamala Harris also spoke in the ceremony and recalled the historic nature of Juneteenth.

"We are gathered here in a house built by enslaved people. We are footsteps away from where President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation. And we are here to witness President Joe Biden establish Juneteenth as a national holiday... Today is a day of celebration," the vice president said.

Black lawmakers who worked hard to make the bill advance in Congress were also present during the ceremony in the White House. And although they were victorious, the bill had faced opposition in the House, with 14 GOP representatives voted not in favor of the law.

The bill passed with a vote of 415-14 in the House on Wednesday, June 16, a day after it was unanimously passed in the Senate, with Kamala Harris signing it with her capacity as president of the Senate.

Juneteenth National Independence Day Declared as Federal Holiday

Although Juneteenth National Independence Day Act was signed into law, many Black Americans said more is needed to address systemic racism in the country.

Gwen Grant, president and CEO of the Urban League of Kansas City, said marking Juneteenth as a federal holiday was great, but it's still not enough.

Grant noted that Congress should be protecting and focusing more on voting rights. Grant emphasized that safeguarding voting rights is the "most important thing" that Congress should address at this time.

The signing of the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act into law by Joe Biden and Kamala Harris comes as more state legislatures move to limit students' exposure to critical race theory.

READ NEXT: President Joe Biden's Administration to Expand Program Allowing Central American Minors Into the U.S.

WATCH: Biden Declares Juneteenth a Federal Holiday - From ABC News
California Governor Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency on Thursday, June 17, amid a major heat wave that is stressing power grids in states across the western U.S.

According to Fox News, parts of California and a handful of regions in other states in the west experienced daily temperatures as high as 118 degrees this week.

Gavin Newsom signed the emergency proclamation to free up additional power capacity as part of the state's preparation for the extreme temperatures.

During a heat wave last summer, more than 200,000 residents suffered two days of rolling power outages. The California governor and state utility leaders were widely criticized that time because it was the first time Californians had to deal with such issues in nearly 20 years.

READ NEXT: California Gov. Gavin Newsom Offers Vacation Incentives to Further Promote COVID Vaccinations

California Governor Gavin Newsom Declares State of Emergency Amid Heat Wave

Apart from alerting residents to take caution amid the heat wave, the state of emergency issued by the governor will also ease restrictions on backup generators, auxiliary engines, and other sources of carbon-powered electricity.

"The proclamation suspends certain permitting requirements, allowing the use of backup power generation and freeing up additional energy capacity," the governor's office said. Newsom's office further noted that this would help alleviate the "heat-induced demands" on the state's energy grid.

During the state of emergency, which is expected to last until June 18, fuel consumption and air-quality restrictions on utility companies would also be rolled back.

Apart from Gavin Newsom, several agencies in the state also joined in urging the Californians to cut back on power consumption.

The state's leading power grid operator issued a statewide "Flex Alert" earlier in the day, asking residents to conserve power. It also suggested setting thermostats above 78 degrees and avoiding using major appliances such as dishwashers and washers.

California News Times reported that the California Independent System Operator also issued an alert on Wednesday, June 16, calling for a five-hour voluntary power conversation effort during peak hours from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. on June 17.

"If tens of thousands of households adjust their consumption moderately, it can have a significant impact on the whole [state]," the state's main power grid operator said.

On the other hand, the National Meteorological Service issued Thursday, June 17, excessive heat warnings to most areas located in the southwest region, including Arizona, southern Nevada, southern Utah, and most of California.

The Reason for Heat Waves in The West

Aside from California, parts of New Mexico, Arizona, Montana, Wyoming, and Utah witnessed high temperatures due to heatwaves this week.

Associated Press reported that Phoenix hit a record-breaking heat of 118 degrees on June 17 and was expected to hit 116 degrees by Friday, June 18, and Saturday, June 19.

But there are reasons behind the extreme heat experienced in the western region. Senior meteorologist Marvin Percha noted that the heat comes from "jet stream" winds over the west that move across the United States and "vast swaths of soil sucked dry by a historic drought."

Percha and the other scientist noted that the heat wave in California and several other states was unusual because it arrived earlier and was staying longer than the previous years.

READ MORE: Alyssa Milano Is 'Considering' Congressional Run Against Rep. Tom McClintock of California's 4th District in 2024

WATCH: Heat Wave Hammers Western America, Stoking Power Outage and Wildfire Concerns - From CNBC Televsion
At least 16 migrants were arrested after police officers chased their motorboat that crashed into a seawall on the Intracostal Waterway in Pompano Beach, Florida on Thursday, June 17.

Local and federal officials arrested some of the migrants floating in the sea after they jumped into the water during the chase. The incident was the latest among the increasing number of migrants trying to cross the sea to reach the United States.

Boat Carrying Migrants Crashed in Florida's Pompano Beach

According to Sun-Sentinel, the Broward Sheriff's Office said the crash happened in the area of Southeast 28th Avenue and Atlantic Boulevard at around 8:45 a.m. Officials said the migrants would be transferred to the custody of Customs and Border Protection.

Authorities did not disclose the nationality of the said migrants, but one of them told WPLG Local10 that they came from Jamaica.

He shared that there's killing in Jamaica, and they want a better life since there's no life in Jamaica right now. The migrant noted that they went to The Bahamas first before heading to Pompano Beach in Florida.

Witness David Dube, who began recording the boat coming in, said the boat was moving in real slow and zigging and zagging, and anyone who can see it can tell that something was not right.

The boat crashed into the seawall as a law enforcement boat sped through the water with a police helicopter hovering overhead.

A person in a video from a witness can be heard in the footage shouting, saying it was the craziest thing he had ever seen in his life. He also said that the scene was like in the video game "Grand Theft Auto."

Witness Gregory Krupa shared that he was sitting at the pier when the boat sped by. Krupa noted that the sheriff's boat came out real quick while the other boat crashed into the seawall.

After crashing, he said about three or four individuals jumped into the water while one woman on the boat gave up and put her hands on her head, Wink News reported.

READ NEXT: Customs Seize $17.6M Worth of Cocaine Hidden Inside Ship Near Puerto Rico

Migrants Crossing Attempts

Early estimates showed that this year would be a busy year for migrants crossing attempts. As of February, at-sea interceptions numbers had already outpaced all of 2020 for people immigrating just from Cuba, which is based on the most recent available data.

With 1,200 miles of coastline used by thousands of recreational and commercial boaters, Florida is ripe for smuggling undocumented people to the U.S. Most migrants were brought by boat or for others trying to make it ashore with makeshift boats.

Around 15,000 migrants have been caught and stopped at sea in the past five years by the Coast Guard District 7 group that covers the coastlines of Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina. The Caribbean basin, the Virgin Islands, and Puerto Rico were also under their radar.

The trek going to the U.S. involves a number of dangers. It includes intense storms, especially during hurricane season, and crashes that leave people stranded.

Earlier this year, three migrants from Cuba survived by only consuming coconuts for 33 days on an island near the Bahamas after their boat crashed while trying to reach the U.S.

READ MORE: Surveyor Picks Up $1.2M Cocaine on Florida Beach While Conducting Turtle Nesting Study

WATCH: Possible Migrants Detained in Pompano Beach -From WPLG Local 10
Authorities are now searching for the person responsible for the abandoned baby who was found in a trash can inside a public restroom in a park in Lynwood, California.

On June 11, the newborn baby boy was found in the trash inside a women's restroom at Yvonne Burke-John D. Ham Park. Based on a statement from authorities the child could have been born between June 9th and June 11th.

Hispanic or African-American Descent

According to Fox News, the police stated that the abandoned baby may be of Hispanic or African-American descent. After receiving the report about the abandoned baby, paramedics rushed to the scene to treat the boy.

The baby was then taken to the nearest local hospital to be treated. As of the moment, the authorities have stated that the child will remain in the hospital to be observed. They assured that he is in stable condition.

Police are still trying to identify the parents of the child.

In a statement, Lt. John Adams of the Special Victims Bureau of the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department said that he is still unsure why the baby was abandoned by the parents in such a manner. However, he speculated that age could be a huge factor in decision-making.

Moreover, Lt. Adams added that the adoption process for the abandoned baby is now underway during a press conference held on Thursday. He also added that the department has been contacted by several people who have expressed their interest in adopting the baby.

Lt. Adams also stated that some of those who were interested are detectives of the sheriff's department, medical staff, and fire personnel.

He also pointed out that several nurses who have treated the baby asked about adoption. Adams stated that the abandoned baby has become sought after and famous, Fox 11 reported.

ALSO READ: Mystery Surrounding the Plane Found in California Lake Is Solved

Authorities Look for Person of Interest

The LA County Sheriff's Department has asked for the help of the public in seeking out a person of interest in the endangerment and abandonment of the baby left in a restroom trashcan.

According to detectives, they already have a copy of the surveillance video from the area and are currently studying them to identify any person who may have more information on the incident.

In a report by Patch, the sheriff's department has already released sketches of a female who was seen pushing a pink stroller in the area where the abandoned baby was found. The woman is now being sought by the police to be questioned.

The person of interest was described by the LASD as "Female, Hispanic, late teens to early 20s, 5'4", 120-125lbs, dark complexion, wavy hair."

In connection to the incident, authorities reminded people that California has a Safely Surrendered Baby Law. The law took effect in January of 2001 and states that any infant can be surrendered at any fire station or hospital by a person with custody or a parent within the first 72 hours of birth without being questioned.

More than 180 newborns have been safely surrendered since the program was launched.

RELATED ARTICLE: Texas Family Welcomes Third Baby With the Same Birthday; Parents Revealed Children Different Due Dates

WATCH: Person of interest still wanted after baby found abandoned in trash can - FOX 11 Los Angeles
Hikers & Bikers is the name of a new food truck will be opening in Clonaslee on Saturday, June 26.

The Sweeney sisters, Sinead and Maura, are the driving force behind the new cafe on wheels which will be located on Main Street and will be open from 10am to 4pm every weekend.

Hikers & Bikers will sell items such as gourmet sandwiches, organic coffee, and other snacks.

The coffee will be supplied by ANAM coffee, one of the smallest roasteries in Ireland.

Sinead explains how it all came about.

What made us get into the food truck was since we have been young we have always been helping our mam with preparing food for different family and friends events. Our family has a strong passion for good quality food and flavour which actually inspired us to go into home economics teaching, she said.

Sinead says herself and Maura love tripping around and discovering new food places and felt that the setting of Clonaslee was ideal for others to come to discover good quality food and coffee in a beautiful setting.

As home economists we know the importance of good quality food taking sustainability into account and thereforetry our best to source our ingredients from local suppliers. Our meat is from our local butcher Ger Kelly and our coffee is a beautiful specialty coffee that is organic and from one of the smallest roasters in Ireland, who also are passionate about sustainability and fair trade, they are called ANAM coffee, Sinead said.

The pair are starting with the food truck but are hoping to develop a glamping site in the village once up and running.

Sinead and Maura have set up the business together and told us where the inspiration came from.

Our dad Donal was very much a community man and was involved in most things in the village, explained Sinead.

He helped in the developing of the community centre and the new school here in Clonaslee.

Sinead and Maura say that the name of the food truck, Hikers & Bikers, is inspired by their fathers love of walks through the mountains.

He even has a walk in the Slieve Blooms named after him- Sweeneys walk, said Sinead.

The sisters are also proud of the fact he was one of the founder members of the St Stephens Day Clonaslee Walk for Laois Hospice.

Their late dad is remembered every year by the organiser who lit the flame on an initiative that has raised huge and invaluable funds for the vital services provided by Laois Hospice over many years since.

Make sure to catch up with Sinead and Maura where they'd love to meet you all at the opening on Saturday, June 26, where delicious food and coffee is promised.

We are really excited about this new venture and hope to see many new people on their travels, concludes Sinead.

If you cant make it on the big day, Hikers & Bikers will be open every weekend from then on.
The number of cases taken by workers against employers in Laois and Offaly has trippled in three years according to local TD Brian Stanley.

The Laois Offaly TD said new data provided to Sinn Fein which shows 336 breaches in employment law and abuse of workers rights were detected after Workplace Relations Commission investigations in Laois/Offaly over the past two years.

He said this underlines the need for additional WRC investigators and improved workers rights legislation.

Unfortunately the figures for Laois/Offaly actually doubled from 112 breaches of workers rights in 2019 to 224 in 2020. This is a worrying trend and underlines the fact that we have some distance to go yet in terms of workers rights. In 2019 Laois had 36 breaches of Employment Law but this more than doubled in 2020 to 76. The figures for Offaly are even more startling with the number of breaches going from 76 in 2019 to 148 last year.

Despite being underfunded and under-resourced, the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) does fantastic work on behalf of workers across this state," he said.

Dep Stanley, who is chair of the Dail public accounts committee, said that in spite of the challenges posed by the pandemic the WRC carried out 7,687 inspections in 2020 and managed to recover almost 1.7m in unpaid wages for workers. He added that since 2011, the WRC has recovered almost 18m in withheld wages for workers.

Sinn Fein have also obtained data which shows the scale and number of breaches of employment law detected by WRC investigations since 2015. In those six years, the WRC has detected breaches in employment law in more than one-third of all investigations. Of the number of cases investigated, 35.9% found breaches by employers for non-payment of the minimum wage, employment permits, protection of young persons, annual leave and public holiday breaches, unpaid wages, among others.

Sectors such as food and drink, retail and wholesale, hair and beauty, and construction, to name but a few, have seen consistent breaches of employment law in recent years. The breadth, scale and nature of these breaches reveal a dark underbelly of Irish economy, which must be stamped out.

The WRC is underfunded and understaffed, it has only 53 inspectors carrying out this work, despite being authorised to recruit 90 inspectors back in 2006. It is essential that additional inspectors are recruited immediately.

In addition, this data also reinforces the need for workers being given the legal right to collective bargaining through their recognised Trade Union so they can stand up for workers and protect them against such abuses," he said.

The Laois based TD said the government cannot continue to turn a blind eye.

"There has to be protections for workers on one hand, and consequences for employers who ride roughshod over employment law and workers rights on the other," he said.
A mature Portlaoise housing estate that is decades old will have to wait another while before being taken in charge by Laois County Council.

An update on Broomville, an estate built behind Fielbrook off the Dublin road, was requested by Cllr Caroline Dwane Stanley at the June meeting of Portlaoise Municipal District.

I hoped it was this year, they are a long time waiting. The residents are doing great work, with a biodiversity project planned next year, and Youthreach involved there as well, but there is a section of wall to be reinstated. There is a massive gap in a wall to be replaced as you can see from the photo they provided, she said (below).

Cllr Dwane Stanley praised the residents also for planting over 100 trees, and she praised the council who have almost fully replaced the broken wall, with just one section left to do.

Her motion was supported by Cllr Catherine Fitzgerald who said that she had given money from her budget before to repair the wall before.

"This is one of the estates left out of the taking in charge process. it is nearly 30 years old. The wall was broken down as a shortcut to Forest Park. I am a bit disappointed at that answer," she said.

Laois County Council replied that 36 estates are on a list to be taken in charge in the next 3 years. Broomville is scheduled for 2022.
All options are still up for consideration in the bid to find a solution to the traffic problems in Carrick-on- Shannon and a detailed design of any bypass proposal is still two years away, the Carrick-on- Shannon Municipal District meeting heard this week.

The meeting was told that no decision has been made on whether Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII) will elect for a road or a non-road based solution.

A two week extension has already been granted for the public consultation process presently underway and although Carrick-on-

Shannon county councillors unanimously supported a motion calling for a further extension of this period, it is unlikely that this will happen.

Leitrim County Council will now contact the TII and point out that councillors have expressed a desire to extend the current consultation period beyond that of June 25.

However, the Council itself has no authority to extend this period, the authority to do so ultimately lies with the TII as the N4 is a national route.

Acting Senior Engineer at Leitrim County Council, Terry McGovern, explained that the whole process of developing a bypass solution for the county town will have to move through eight separate phases.

At the moment the process is currently at phase two and he stressed that at all times in the process there will be consultation with those potentially impacted.

He said that at this stage the objectives for the project have been set along with the study areas and he said that the constraints in these possible areas are currently being looked at.

Following the current consultation process the designers will come up with a number of alternatives and options to alleviate the traffic pressure points in Carrick-on-Shannon.

He pointed out that nothing is set in stone at the moment and the option finally selected may not be a road based solution at all.

Even if a road based solution is selected, Mr McGovern pointed out that there are a number of considerations to be looked at as to what will best address the problem and best fit.

He said this could involve a do minimum option where the existing roadway is used. There is also, he said, a management option which also leaves the road as it is at the moment but may involve the inclusion of traffic lights or other structures to manage the flow of traffic.

He acknowledged that a large list of possible corridors for a bypass have also been included for consideration but stressed that some cannot fit into the criteria they are being assessed on and ultimately this will decide whether they are proceeded with.

He pointed out that Leitrim County Council will not be determining the outcome on this project adding at the end of the day it is An Bord Pleanala who will make a decision on this and it is the TII (Transport Infrastructure Ireland) who will put forward the final proposal (to An Board Pleanala) for decision, not Leitrim County Council.

Every single option and alternative will be looked at and all will be assessed against set criteria, said Mr McGovern.

He believes that the preferred option will be selected by the end of 2021 acknowledging that if this is a roads based solution it will be in the form of a corridor.

He said at present it is too early in the process to say what the design of the proposed solution will be as you're jumping several stages to seek a design at this time.

Mr McGovern said he totally understood concerns about the way the consultation process is being carried out but stressed this was because of Covid and added that the present methods were working way better than bringing a crowd to a hall to view a map on a wall.

He accepted that not everyone would find the current process suitable but pointed out that people are being granted half hour private meetings with two members of the consulting team and that people are also being provided with maps of their own property and told of how their property could potentially be affected.

He said that the detail being provided in this public consultation is very high and urged people to arrange an appointment to either speak with the consultation team online or via phone.
One of the men accused of abducting and assaulting Quinn Industrial Holdings director Kevin Lunney asked gardai to leave his family alone after one of his son's died and another family member was repeatedly stopped on the street. The man, known as YZ because he can't be named for legal reasons, came to Store Street garda station in Dublin on 6 May 2019. Sgt Fergal McDonagh today told the Special Criminal Court that he agreed to mediate between YZ and gardai in the area. Having spoken to gardai, Sgt McDonagh phoned YZ and told him that gardai would continue to do their job but would not "harass" his family. YZ thanked Sgt McDonagh, the court heard.

Sean Guerin SC, who is prosecuting YZ and three other men, called Sgt McDonagh as part of the prosecution's attempts to link the accused men to phone numbers allegedly used during the abduction and assault on Mr Lunney.

Sgt McDonagh told Mr Guerin that YZ gave him a phone number ending 717 that the prosecution alleges was regularly in contact with Cyril McGuinness, now deceased, around the time of the abduction and assault. The prosecution alleges that McGuinness instructed the four accused by phone.

Sgt McDonagh said he phoned the 717 number and was satisfied that the person he spoke to was YZ.

The 40-year-old man known as YZ, Alan OBrien (40), of Shelmalier Road, East Wall, Dublin 3, Darren Redmond (27), from Caledon Road, East Wall, Dublin 3 and Luke OReilly (67), with an address at Mullahoran Lower, Kilcogy, Co Cavan have all pleaded not guilty to false imprisonment and intentionally causing serious harm to Mr Lunney at Drumbrade, Ballinagh, Co Cavan on September 17, 2019.

Mr Lunney has told the court that he was bundled into the boot of a car near his home and driven to a container where he was threatened and told to resign as a director of Quinn Industrial Holdings. His abductors cut him with a Stanley knife, stripped him to his boxer shorts, doused him in bleach, broke his leg with two blows of a wooden bat, beat him on the ground, cut his face and scored the letters QIH into his chest. They left him bloodied, beaten and shivering on a country road at Drumcoghill in Co Cavan where he was discovered by a man driving a tractor.

The court today also viewed CCTV footage of various vehicles on the M1 and M3 motorways, and in Dublin and Cavan on dates in September 2019. The prosecution alleges that Mr Lunney's attackers used a silver Renault Kangoo, a Citroen Berlingo Van with red lightning bolts on the sides, a black Audi A4 and a BMW to plan and carry out the offences.



The trial continues on Monday in front of Mr Justice Tony Hunt, presiding, and Judge Gerard Griffin and Judge David McHugh.
Ireland West Airport Knock welcomed the return of commercial flights today (June 18) after 160 days.

The first arrival, a Ryanair flight from London Stansted, landed at 9.08 this morning, with the return flight departing at 9.48 a.m.. A further two flights are due from London Luton and Liverpool later this morning and this afternoon.

Its been so long we nearly forgot what they looked like



Great to welcome @Ryanair back to the airport after 160 long days #aviation #goodtobeback pic.twitter.com/9BIFmOblc4  Ireland West Airport (@Irelandwest) June 18, 2021

Ireland West Airport Knocks flight schedule should expand in the coming weeks and months with more UK flights coming on stream. European and sun-holiday destinations are set to return to the schedule on June 19.

From July, travel will be allowed within the European Union, as Ireland signs up to the EU Digital Green Certificate scheme, which will allow those who are fully vaccinated, those who have recovered from Covid-19 or have a negative PCR test, to travel within the EU. Ryanair will be operating flights to a number of sun destinations from mid-July onwards.

The airport is following all protocols and guidelines put in place.

Passengers arriving from the UK on Friday will be required to show a negative PCR test. They wouldnt be allowed to travel from the UK if they didnt have one. It will just be a second check by the immigration services here.

If passengers dont have a negative test result there will be a requirement to go into hotel quarantine until a test is carried out. So, people will see a different airport for the first few weeks, there will be army personnel here to manage the hotel quarantine process if passengers are arriving and have pre-booked hotel quarantine or in cases where passengers dont have a negative PCR test confirmation with them.
DannY Bullman was born in Limerick in 1971 and grew up in St Marys Park. He is a songwriter, fronting the band Black Mariah and now lives in Austria. He also has a tattoo studio in Thomas Street, Limerick for the last 22 years which he started with his brother Sean, who now runs that business. Danny is a rebel with a cause and that cause is making great music that vents the rage of a generation of like-minded souls in a subculture that has felt excluded and marginalised by mainstream values.

As a child, Elvis was his hero. At the age of five he could sing nearly all his songs! At that time, in primary school, it wasnt uncommon for the teachers to get him singing Elvis hits, while standing on a table at the top if the class!

As Dannys tastes headed for the rock genre, there were many influences, such as Thin Lizzy, Guns N Roses, Rory Gallagher, Whitesnake, Iron Maiden. Now with the more modern rock bands he listens to Godsmack, Five Finger Death Punch, Brand New Sin, Alter Bridge, Stone Sour, Slipknot etc.

Whereas primary school was affirming for Bullman secondary school was a different experience.

He attended Christian Brothers, Sexton Street, which, he says, Definitely was not a positive experience. He believes he was corralled into subject choices that neither suited his aptitude nor interest and feels aggrieved at, Not being allowed do some of the classes I wanted to do, like art, for example adding, I have never had an art class in my life, yet I can carve, sculpt, engrave, paint, draw etc. Clearly Danny was undeterred by that obstacle in his ambitions.

Reflecting on school life as a teenager Danny says, Individuality seemed like it was frowned upon and if you thought or looked different you were pressed to conform.

When Danny did share his dream he was told he would have no future as a tattoo artist and that there wasnt a future in music either. Obviously Danny didnt let that stop him. I was always told in school that I was a dreamer, like it was some kind of insult he says and adds, But my mother always said that the world was built by dreamers. Become whatever you want to be. What your mind can conceive your body can achieve. However, Danny wants to acknowledge that, There were some great teachers in Sexton Street too

Bullman was never in a band in Limerick but most of his friends were musicians. He explains, I was more concentrated on my tattooing back then, to the point of actually selling a guitar to buy some tattoo equipment! He has been in other bands before Black Mariah  Auslander and Head Rush. Although Bullman plays guitar he is lead vocalist in Black Mariah with Steve Destiny (Bass), Jimmy Spike (rhythm and lead guitar) and El Farido (drums).

The cover of the album was designed by Limerick digital artist, Ken Coleman. In several reviews the band has been compared to Iron Maiden, Motorhead and Thin Lizzy.

Rockvideos, said about a live gig, that there were, Shades of Motorhead, Thin Lizzy and Iron Maiden evident in anthemic songs that rattle your bones often times making excellent use of harmonics and driving beats.

Metal-Temple said, Their sound might be described as a mixture of bands such as Thin Lizzy, Motorhead and Motley Crue, with a signature of two guitars bringing twin harmonic solos as well as dual harmonic rhythms, it packs a serious punch.

I asked Danny, If you could only have one album what would it be? His answer: Live and Dangerous, Thin Lizzy.

Bullman moved to Austria about twelve years ago, explaining, I moved here mainly because of the music scene. There is a venue for every genre of music and pre-covid there was a gig nearly every night to suit your taste.

Before pandemic restrictions kicked in Black Mariah had already started pre-recording new material. So as soon as we can we have to get back working on that and some other material that has been written since Danny says.

He has been involved in many music productions including commissions to write songs for other projects. He informs me that Black Mariah did one song written for a specific compilation album which featured several legendary rock bands. Danny also had a second song on this album with a band he put together especially for it, called Wildstyle Allstars, featuring Danny on vocals, Richard Fortus (Guns N Roses) on guitar, legendary guitarist Steve Saluto, Marco Mendoza (Whitesnake) on bass and Tim McCarver (from Murder FM) on drums. This album was the first rock album in twenty years to break into the Austrian mainstream charts. It entered at number three!

Black Mariah has an International following also. It always surprises me how many people know the band. I have seen people wearing our bands t-shirts in cities as far apart as Toronto and Moscow says Danny.

Danny laughs as he describes his music as Anger-fuelled rock n roll filled with decadence and attitude.

Before lockdown the last gig that Black Mariah did was a double headline with a band called Sulphur. The bass player is from Marilyn Manson, the guitarist from Prodigy and the drummer from The Jesus and Mary Chain, Rob Holiday is both bass for Manson and guitar for Prodigy.

We talked about Black Mariahs YouTube video/song Killer Inside and Danny explained - The song is about the ability in man to kill. I wrote it after watching so much violence and war on the news and after a visit to the military museum in Vienna. I came out of there in a sombre mood, shocked and saddened by what I had seen and how many different ways man has invented to kill, torture and maim each other. If you watch the video closely you will see the killers makeup moving from person to person to show that everyone has the ability to kill. With all of mankinds beauty  we have created art, architecture, poetry, etc.  yet man can be a very callous and brutal creature.

Bad boy he is not! Danny is a sensitive and kind person with a caring heart and that is very evident. He admits that a lot of Black Mariahs songs are anger-fuelled but he clarifies,

We always try to put lyrics to music that uplifts. Some of the topics can be quite difficult  depression, addiction etc. but I am not a lover of music that brings you down.

I asked if, as he says, his music is anger-fuelled, What are you raging against and what do you stand for?

He opened up, Some of the more personal songs relate to my experience. For example, Hate is about how I always felt and was treated as different due to how I looked. Being heavily tattooed was frowned upon in society back then. I was not left in to bars and clubs when I was younger. Today its normal, for many, to have tattoos but back then I could hear the whispered comments of disapproval.

Despite being told he had no future the catch line in the song is about him being above all that and how hate was too strong an emotion to waste on people like that. If you have a dream or an idea, follow it through Danny advises, adding, The only person that can stop you achieving your dream is yourself, nobody elses opinion really matters.
THIEVES didnt just steal diesel from a County Limerick farmer and damage his tank  they also polluted the local river.

Their criminal and reckless endeavours brought back memories of a major fish kill in the river Loobagh in Kilmallock seven years ago.

Their actions have been condemned by local councillor, Mike Donegan and chair of the local angling group, Eamon ORiordan, who both contacted the council to report it.

A spokesperson for Limerick City and County Council said they received reports on Bank Holiday Monday morning of a sighting of oil in the river at North Bridge, Kilmallock

Council staff attended the scene, noted the slick and worked their way back upstream along a tributary of the river that converges with it just upstream of North Bridge.

They also noted traces of the hydrocarbon in the stream at Springwell Bridge and at Bawntard Bridge about two miles east and close to Bulgaden.

They then spoke with a farmer who was working nearby and he directed them to a green diesel tank which he uses to top-up his vehicles.

He advised council staff that there had been a theft of a significant quantity of green diesel from the tank and that the thieves had left the valve open, presumably when whatever containers they were using had been filled. The remaining diesel had then worked its way with gravity into the stream, said the council spokesperson, who added that the crime has been reported to gardai.

It is difficult to estimate when the theft took place as the water in the stream is slow moving and it may have taken some time for the slick to reach North Bridge.

Roads foreman Sean O Meara provided invaluable local knowledge and with the rest of the staff, arranged for a boom to curtail the pollution to be deployed on Monday evening. It will remain whilst the environmental engineer and staff monitor and evaluate along with the senior roads supervisor, said the council spokesperson.

In contrast to the fish kill due to an agricultural effluent system failing in 2014, no trout or salmon died on this occasion, said Mr ORiordan.

The chairman of Kilmallock and Kilfinane Anglers Association said diesel floats on top of the water and it will dissipate over time. In good news, Mr ORiordan said fish stocks have improved in the locality in recent years. This is due to the works carried out by the angling association and others.

We always have to acknowledge the effort of farmers. When you have a combined effort then you see a result, said Mr ORiordan, who also praised the council staff and Inland Fisheries Ireland for their response on a Bank Holiday Monday.

Cllr Donegan, who smelled the diesel while taking his dog for a stroll on the Priory walk, also praised council staff for going beyond the call of duty and erecting the boom.

Great credit must go to council staff. On the Saturday of the same weekend there was a sewage overflow in Bruree. Within two hours of contacting them they had a truck out clearing it up. As a member of Maigue Rivers Trust I will be discussing these incidents at our municipal district meeting, said Cllr Donegan.
FIVE Limerick farmers who are the subjects of the At Home on the Farm exhibition at Limerick City Gallery of Art have met in person for the first time to view the exhibition.

The five, who participated in the making of the exhibition by artist Mary Burke, were welcomed to the gallery by the Deputy Mayor of the City and County of Limerick Cllr Asad Talukdar.

The participating farmers are Dan Browne, June Danaher, John McNamara, Morgan Murphy and David Ryan.

Mary Burkes engagement with the individual farm families created a hugely immersive exhibition which tells the personal stories and complexities of farming in Limerick and in Ireland.

At Home on the Farm was initially online due to restrictions for Covid-19, however, people now have a chance to visit it in person. The exhibition continues until 27 June 2021 at Limerick City Gallery of Art at Pery Square in the city.

All five farmers made an huge impact on Mary Burke, who speaks with genuine passion for all of them.

Take for example John MacNamara and the quality of his grassland, she says. Or, the wonderful treasure trove of curiosities that Morgan Murphy has amassed in his barns and outbuildings. It was impossible for me not to document and celebrate these things.

She talks with equal enthusiasm about all the farms she visited from Dan Brownes majestic barn and traditional farm buildings in Thomastown, to June Danahers fine pedigree Limousine suckler calves in Shanagolden and David Ryans timeless lakeside farm at Lough Gur abutting a 15th century castle.

There's been a tendency in the past to romanticise the Irish landscape. I wanted to avoid that. These are working farms, that are functional and lived-in. I wanted to convey a sense of the industrial farm infrastructure against the natural landscape, she added.

Commenting on the exhibition, broadcaster and writer Manchan Magan said: Few artists have managed to capture the timeless integrity and fraught complexity of agriculture at this transitional time. Artist, Mary Burkes work in At Home on the Farm will remain an eloquent testament to farming in Ireland at a seminal point in its 6,000 year existence.

A fully illustrated catalogue with essays by Manchan and academic, Niamh Nic Ghabhann is available to purchase from LCGA for 20.

Two further exhibitions are also on view at Limerick City Gallery of Art: SKIN DEEP by Mary Ruth Walsh and Cows are Mostly Silent a selection of work from the Permanent Collection, curated by Adam Stoneman.
THE Health Service Executive has announced it will open a new self-referral walk-in test centre at Arthurs Quay Park in Limerick city centre.

The pop-up clinic will run from Monday, June 21, to Wednesday, June 23 at the former Tourist Office building at the entrance to the park.

The Department of Public Health Mid West is particularly encouraging young people who are unvaccinated and may have attended large gatherings in the last two weeks to attend for testing.

"We are also urging businesses to encourage their staff to avail of this clinic, which is located in the heart of Limerick city," said as spokesperson.

The Arthurs Quay testing centre will run alongside the pop-up centre at St Josephs Health Campus, which has been extended further and will continue to operate until Monday, June 28 inclusive and the permanent centre at Eastpoint Business Park on Ballysimon Road.

The new walk-in clinic at Arthur's Quay Park is being led by the National Ambulance Service, and supported by HSE Mid-West Community Healthcare and Public Health Mid-West.

Temporary centres have also been opened at Rathkeale, Kilmallock and Moyross since mid-May when concerns first emerged about case numbers in Limerick.

The Department of Public Health Mid West says the latest test centre forms part of a month-long active case finding operation, led by Public Health Mid-West which has seen more than 25,000 people tested with more than 1,450 cases detected in Limerick.

Dr Mai Mannix, Director of Public Health Mid-West, said: The public has shown great leadership in their response to this large community outbreak. Even though we are seeing Covid trends go in the right direction in Limerick, we remain concerned about the current prevalence of infection in the community. The current level of Covid-19 is still higher than it was when we first noticed a worrying trend a month ago."

Dr Mannix says a number of large workplace outbreaks are still being managed and that a significant level of close contacts are being identified in local businesses.

"We also continue to manage large outbreaks connected to indoor social activity, including house parties among unvaccinated people. This kind of high-risk activity will keep infection levels at a high level, and will continue to cause disruption in a wide variety of settings in the community. If you have symptoms, or you are concerned that you may have been exposed to possible infection, please get tested to help us bring this outbreak under control," she said.

Public Health Mid-West is currently managing Covid-19 situations in 48 workplaces, involving 142 cases and an estimated 198 close contacts.

The vast majority of these workplaces are in Limerick, and are in retail, supermarkets, offices, salons, beauticians, and factories.
Known for running witty social media campaigns, Amul and Fevicol's cheeky take on Ronaldo's Coca-Cola snub is now a viral social media advertising campaign for both brands. Two of the worlds best-known drinks brands have felt the viral ripples caused by simple gestures from Cristiano Ronaldo and Paul Pogba.

In its ad, Fevicol, which manufactures adhesives, said: Na bottle hategi, na valuation ghategi (Neither the bottles will move nor will the valuation drop)."

Attending a Euro 2020 post-match press conference, the Portugal striker Cristiano Ronaldo removed two bottles of Coca-Cola kept in front of him and asked people to drink water.

R S Sodhi, MD at Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation(GCMMF) tweeted an ad with the Amul girl that said Not bottling one feelings."

Coca-Cola lost $4 billion in market value as stock prices dropped 1.6% as they went from being worth $242 billion to $238 billion.

Manchester United Paul Pogba on Tuesday moved a bottle of non-alcoholic Heineken NV beer out of sight when giving a press conference at the UEFA Euro 2020 tournament, where hes representing France.

Pogbas move came just hours after Heineken had quipped about Ronaldos preference for agua" on Twitter.

Ronaldo has 299 million followers on Instagram alone.

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Throughout the ages, the Milky Way has hung above humanity in the sky, a beautiful marvel shining steadily each night.

Nowadays, most city-bound folks rarely see the full splendor of our home galaxy stretching across the heavens. Luckily, there are photographers all over the world with the skills to show off what many skywatchers are missing.

Here, we take a look at the winners of the 2021 Milky Way Photographer of the Year competition from the travel and photography site Capture the Atlas.

Chamber of Light

(Image credit: Spencer Welling)

Spencer Welling

Utah, United States

A lone figure seems to hold a star in their hand as the Milky Way passes between remote cliffs at Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument. Located in a remote part of protected land in the desert of Utah, the area provides exquisite views of the night sky.

Dragon's Lair

(Image credit: Daniel Thomas Gum)

Daniel Thomas Gum

Mungo, Australia

In many cultures, our local galaxy acts as a bridge to other worlds. Here, it can be seen connecting distant peaks in a rugged landscape in a part of New South Wales, Australia, that is a 12-hour drive from Sydney. The photographer, Daniel Thomas Gum, had a picture in mind for an otherworldly "Game of Thrones"-style image, waiting for everything to line up to get the perfect shot.

Riano

(Image credit: Pablo Ruiz)

Pablo Ruiz

Riano, Spain

Clouds, ice, water, rocks and sky can be seen in this amazing winter composition from northern Spain. The elemental image, taken at the Riano Mountain Reservoir, shows the Milky Way arcing over a mountain range and lighting up the night sky.

Temple of the Sun

(Image credit: Bryony Richards)

Bryony Richards

Utah, United States

In this photo, the Milky Way appears to shoot out from Capitol Reef National Park's iconic Temple of the Sun monolith in Wayne County, Utah. The natural sandstone structure got its name because it was said to remind early visitors of an ornate Gothic cathedral towering above the flat desert floor.

Rising from the Dust

(Image credit: Lorenzo Ranieri Tenti)

Lorenzo Ranieri Tenti

Tenerife, Spain

The rugged volcanic landscape of Teide Volcano National Park provides the perfect backdrop for the curving galaxy in the sky. The yellow glow seen near the horizon is caused by dust particles blown in a wind known as the Calima, which shoots up from the Sahara desert to the island of Tenerife in the Atlantic Ocean.

Grantecan

(Image credit: Antonio Solano)

Antonio Solano

La Palma, Spain

The peak of Roque de los Muchachos ("Rock of the Boys") on the island of La Palma is one of the most coveted astronomical sites in the world, providing clear views of the night sky. Many telescope domes dot the mountain as part of the Roque de los Muchachos Observatory, one of which is seen here with the Milky Way above it.

Mt. Taranaki Milky Way

(Image credit: Larryn Rae)

Larryn Rae

Mount Taranaki, New Zealand

The second-highest point of the North Island of New Zealand can be found on the dormant volcano of Mount Taranaki. Sticking out of the mountain's side is another dormant volcano, known as Fanthams Peak, where this shot was taken. Getting the image was a challenge, the photographer said, requiring a 4-hour climb in rushing winds to reach the icy summit.

The Watchman

(Image credit: Brandt Ryder)

Brandt Ryder

Utah, United States

An old juniper tree can be seen in the foreground of this photo, taken at Zion National Park, in Utah. The angular sandstone mountain known as The Watchman perfectly complements both the ragged tree and the Milky Way shooting through the sky.

Volcanos and Cross

(Image credit: Tomas Slovinsky)

Tomas Slovinsky

Villarrica volcano, Chile

One of Chile's most active volcanoes, Villarrica, provides an amazing accompaniment to our galactic home in this photo. Features of the night sky that can be seen only in the Southern Hemisphere appear prominently here, including the Southern Cross, which hangs just above the volcano itself.

Night Lovers

(Image credit: Mohammad Hayati)

Mohammad Hayati

Hormozgan province, Iran

Surreal curving rocks rise up from a region along the southern coast of Iran near the Persian Gulf. The twisting structures almost look like lovers gazing at the beautiful Milky Way.

Paradise

(Image credit: Marcin Zajac)

Marcin Zajac

Big Sur, California

The Pacific coast looks downright tropical in this composition from California. The blue-water cove features palm trees, dramatic cliffs and even a waterfall tumbling to the ocean beneath the night sky.

Devil's Throat

(Image credit: Victor Lima)

Victor Lima

Iguazu Falls, Brazil

Located at the border of Brazil and Argentina, Iguazu Falls is a complex of tumbling water that collectively makes up the largest waterfall in the world. One of the main falls, called the Santa Maria Jump, rushes in many directions beneath the river of the Milky Way in the sky.

Navajo Nights

(Image credit: Christine Kenyon)

Christine Kenyon

New Mexico, United States

The Bisti/De-Na-Zin Wilderness in the southwestern U.S. looks like an alien world, with incredible rock features rising beneath the Milky Way. Translated from Navajo, "Bisti" means "among the adobe formations," while "De-Na-Zin" translates to "Standing Cranes," a reference to the crane petroglyphs found in the area.

Nyctophilia

(Image credit: Jose Luis Cantabrana)

Jose Luis Cantabrana

Victoria, Australia

Two enormous rocks jut from the ocean in Victoria, Australia. "Nyctophilia" means "friend of the dark" in Greek, an apt name for this beautiful shot of the night sky.

Adk Magic

(Image credit: Daniel Stein)

Daniel Stein

New York, United States

Tucked away in upstate New York are the Adirondacks, parts of which have been designated as "Forever Wild." Photographer Daniel Stein used the mountains' remoteness to capture this amazing image of the galaxy reflected in a small lake.

Originally published on Live Science.
A crowd of people queue to get into Zion National Park in Utah in 2019.

Across the United States, national parks are facing an unprecedented number of visitors as COVID-19 restrictions end and people who have been stuck at home for over a year take advantage of their newfound freedom.

This is leading to long lines and traffic jams as hikers and outdoor enthusiasts flock to these open spaces, with some parks even turning people away. In Utah, around 194,000 people visited Arches National Park in April, a 15% increase from the number of visitors during the same month in 2019, and at Canyonlands National Park, the increase has been even greater, at around 30%, according to The Wall Street Journal .

And in Tennessee, Great Smoky Mountains National Park has seen a flood of visitors so far this year, according to news site wymt ; as of May 20, the National Park Service (NPS) had recorded more than 3.13 million visitors to the park, representing a 115% increase from the same time in 2020, when the pandemic kept people in lockdown mode.

Related: Top 10 most visited national parks

Most of this "overflow" across the nation is coming from visitors who have never been to a national park before, according to The New York Post . Now, experts fear that overcrowding will ruin not only people's experience but also the parks themselves.

"That is why it is such a difficult problem," Michael Childers, a historian and national park expert at Colorado State University, told Live Science. "We all want to experience these places, but we can't all go at once."

Visitors parked bumper to bumper along the road at Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming in 2020. (Image credit: Shutterstock)

Overcrowding issues

There are two main problems with the overcrowding of national parks. For one, the visitor experience suffers.

"The national parks were created so that visitors could experience the natural beauty and history of a place," Childers said. "This is difficult to do if you are queuing up to hike or trying to find a parking spot."

The second  and more serious  problem is that throngs of visitors also put a significant strain on the environment in and around national parks.

Related: The 10 least visited national parks

For instance, overcrowding has harmed the giant sequoia trees (Sequoiadendron giganteum) in California's Yosemite National Park .

"Yosemite overcrowding was damaging the rather shallow root systems of the giant sequoias," Childers said. "While the National Park Service did build a raised walkway to solve some of this problem, too many visitors driving to, parking and scrambling around the trees remains a problem."

With more people come more litter, more noise, more pollution from cars and an increased chance of human-animal encounters, all of which can have a negative impact on the environment, Childers said.

Historic problem

The number of people visiting national parks is increasing compared with pre- pandemic levels, but overcrowding has been an issue for national parks before the first case of COVID-19.

In 2019, more than 327 million people visited national parks in the U.S., which is more than double the 159 million people who visited the parks in 1969. Going back another 50 years to 1919, only 781,000 people visited national parks, representing just 0.2% of today's numbers, according to the NPS .

Tourists at an overcrowded overlook at Grand Canyon National Park in Arizona in 2017. (Image credit: Shutterstock)

"This is not a new issue," Childers said. "But the pandemic does appear to have accelerated a historic surge in visitation throughout the system."

In the past, two other significant increases in visitor numbers occurred.

"The first was in the 1920s, when the automobile made travel much more affordable to a larger number of people," Childers said. "The second was in the 1950s, when national affluence caused a huge spike in tourism."

On both occasions, the federal government increased spending for national parks to build new buildings, roads, bathrooms and lodges to help accommodate the demand, Childers said. "This solved the immediate problem but also served to make the parks even more accessible, which is what we are struggling with today."

Potential solutions

So what can be done to help national parks deal with the current overcrowding and limit its environmental impacts?

"There is no single solution to the problem," Childers said, "but rather a combination of things."

One option involves more government spending. The funds could be used to continue improving the infrastructure necessary to accommodate more people, such as ticket machines to reduce queues, bigger parking lots to alleviate traffic and more amenities, such as bathrooms, water fountains, trash cans and picnic areas. But an even more important step would be to hire more people to look after the parks.

"The national parks have been chronically understaffed for decades," Childers said. "We must invest in more rangers, scientists and administrative staff if we are going to properly steward these places."

Another option is to require people to book their trips to the biggest national parks. This would limit the number of people who could visit the parks and provide opportunities to allow access to a wider diversity of people, such as first-time visitors, Childers said. However, this would likely be an unpopular solution for frequent visitors and local businesses.

The final option is for visitors to take on the responsibility themselves. "We, the visitors, have to change our expectations that we can visit and experience the more popular parks whenever and however we want," Childers said. "This shift in expectations is likely the most difficult, but the most impactful" thing we can do.

However, despite the need for reform, Childers still believes that national parks are vital and wants as many people to be able to experience them as possible, with some limits.

"The idea of the national parks is to provide respite and contemplation of wondrous places," Childers said. "The more people who can enjoy this, the better, but we need to find a way to do so so that future generations can also enjoy them."

Originally published on Live Science.
U.S. officials are investigating an unusual outbreak of tuberculosis (TB) infections in people who had spinal surgery. They suspect the culprit is a potentially tainted bone repair product, according to news reports.

More than 100 people may have been exposed to TB bacteria through this product, called FiberCel, during spinal surgeries that occurred this spring, according to The Washington Post . FiberCel is a putty-like substance made from human bone tissue that's used during various orthopedic and spinal surgeries, the Post reported.

Early this month, the maker of FiberCel, Aziyo Biologics Inc., issued a recall of a single lot of the product after one hospital reported that seven out of 23 patients who received FiberCel developed post-surgical infections, and four of these tested positive for TB, according to the recall notice from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) .

The recalled lot came from a single donor cadaver, and it had been shipped to 20 states, according to a statement from Aziyo Biologics . A total of 113 patients received the recalled product, with most suspected TB cases in Indiana and Delaware, the Post reported.

Related: 27 oddest medical cases

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) , which is investigating the outbreak along with the FDA, these 113 patients "are likely to have been exposed to MTB" or Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bacteria that causes TB. The CDC is recommending that all patients who received the recalled product should undergo treatment for TB, which typically involves taking antibiotics for six to nine months.

Although Mycobacterium tuberculosis typically attacks the lungs, "TB bacteria can attack any part of the body such as the kidney, spine and brain," according to the CDC . The bacteria typically spreads from person to person through the air. However, most people who are infected with TB have "latent TB," in which the immune system keeps the infection at bay and people don't develop symptoms. But if a TB infection becomes "active," the bacteria can grow, and the disease can be fatal if untreated. People with weakened immune systems are at greater risk of developing an active TB infection.

The spread of TB through bone grafts is extremely rare  so rare that regenerative medicine companies such as Aziyo Biologics are not required to test their bone products for TB bacteria, according to the Post. The last time a case of TB transmission like this occurred was in 1953, the Post reported.

Officials are currently investigating how the FiberCel product may have become contaminated, the Post reported.

Originally published on Live Science.
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Brazilian director Ale Abreu and his team gave Annecy audiences a first look of his much anticipated new feature film Perlimps on Thursday, also sharing his fluid storyboarding process and the methods he uses to create his unique visual style.

The Oscar-nominated director of Boy and the World and his assistant director Viviane Guimaraes spoke via video link from Brazil while the films executive producer, Ernesto Soto Canny joined moderator Denis Walgenwitz and a live audience for the presentation in Annecy.

The film is set in the rainbow saturated Enchanted Forest and tells the story of two secret agents  a wolf boy and a bear girl  who work for enemy kingdoms and are dispatched to the forest on the same mission: to save the mysterious Perlimps from terrible giants that have surrounded the forest.

In appearance and in strength they are the opposite of each other  ones kingdom is more about gadgets and technology the others is more romantic embracing myths and nature. But they will need to join forces with each other to succeed. A great part of the screenplay was to play off these personalities, said Abreu.

While Abreu penned the script, Guimaraes explained that while they worked on drafts of the film for financiers and the producers, the story, characters and even the look of the film have continued to evolve throughout the production process.

Because the story exists in Ales imagination he doesnt need to write it down, because hes at ease with the images. For him its easier to work on the storyboard and write the dialogue as it goes along, she revealed.

According to Guimaraes, this process involved Abreu explaining the story to a team of five or six storyboard artists over a period of four months and splitting the film into sequences. Post-It notes with story detail or editing suggestions were then attached to each scene.

That enabled us to throw out bits that were confusing, and strengthened the bits we wanted to keep, she added.

During the first stage of the production 12 artists traveled 190 miles from Sao Paulo to live in the middle of the Santo Antonio Mountains to be in a quiet place where everyone could focus. I also wanted to imbue them with a feeling of being in a forest, Abreu added.

Hands-on Abreu was also responsible for the art direction and he added that there was no color of the rainbow that was off limits as colors and prisms of light guided the animations look. Ive used the entire color spectrum! he added.

The films tropical hued impressionist backgrounds involved creating random paint smears in different colors to form the basis of each scene, Abreu revealed in a behind-the-scenes video.

These backgrounds were scanned and drawn digitally with only certain elements outlined - A trunk here, a leaf there  while the rest of the background is left out of focus.

The animation, which is being produced by Sao Paulo-based production company Buriti Filmes, uses hand drawn on paper and 2D/3D computer techniques.

Abreu explained that he was able to maintain the hand drawn look by flipping between layers in Photoshop as if he were using layers of paper.

The director added that he was also keen to hold each drawing for three or four frames  a similar ratio to Anime  to preserve the action lines and the fluidity of movement: I was keen to keep things as gestural as possible, he said.

When the pandemic struck, the team disbanded from their artists residence and switched to remote working practices from all corners of Brazil and globally, and both the compositing and the composing were done virtually.

A virtual meeting room was set up with the films score composer  the body percussionist Andre Hosoi  who used different parts of his body, electronic music and Chinese instruments to create the films unique sound.

Abreu estimated that the 80-minute project, which is being co-produced by Sony Pictures International Productions and the film arm of Brazilian TV giant Globo, will be complete in nine months. It is scheduled for a 2022 release date.

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Michael Brown Sr., father of Michael Brown, who was killed in Ferguson, Mo. by a police officer at age 18, has appeared in his fair share of documentaries and recorded countless interviews since his sons death in 2014. But there was something about Ferguson Rises, filmmaker Mobolaji Olambiwonnus take on the Brown familys story, that felt different.

Its giving us fathers a voice, Brown tells Variety, joined by Olambiwonnu and the films producer David Oyelowo to discuss the new doc. The media runs right to the woman  its okay, thats what they do  [fathers are] supposed to be the strength and take it, take it, take, it. But we hurt, too.

Thats why Brown says he is honored to be at the center of this new narrative about his sons life, his death and how the events of Aug. 9, 2014 impacted the citizens of Ferguson, before the Black Lives Matter movement grabbed the attention of people across the country and around the world.

My intention, particularly with the integration of Michael Brown Sr. into the story, was that we have to understand that Black men feel, that Black men have emotions, that Black men are impacted by things in the same way that we all are, Olambiwonnu says of the doc, which debuted Tuesday at Tribeca and is part of the film festivals Juneteenth lineup.

Unfortunately, cinema has not done a very good job of depicting a three-dimensional Black male, he continues. So my intention was to make a film that spoke to that humanity, and by extension, spoke to the humanity of all the residents.

Finding a way to humanize this Black son, his Black father and, as a result, Black men in general was a big part of the reason Oyelowo signed on to produce the film under he and his wife Jessicas Yoruba Saxon Productions banner. Gigi Pritzker serves as executive producer on the documentary.

Its very rare to see a Black father at the center of his pain and progress through the circumstances that so many have found themselves in, Oyelowo says. Im really, really proud of the film, and its a massive honor for us to be part of telling a story that I think needed to be told in its totality, in a more comprehensive way, than was able to be told, six or seven years ago.

The award-winning actor and producer was already well-aware of the Browns story. In fact, Oyelowo had just wrapped filming Ava DuVernays Selma, in which he played Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., in the weeks before Brown was killed, and he explains that the young mans death had a profound impact on the entire production.

We had just made this film about the desperate fight for voting rights and the marginalization, subjugation, brutalization and victimization of Black people historically in America, Oyelowo says. We thought we were making a history piece that of course shines a light on today, but we wrapped on July 3 and Michael Brown Jr. was murdered on August 9  a murder very akin to what we saw with Jimmie Lee Jackson in the film. We had just gone through this process of showing what to be Black in America has been historically, and here we were again.

Over the next few months, Oyelowo recalls the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement and the rollout for Selma moving along parallel tracks, as the actors and filmmakers spoke out in support of Black people and against racial injustice while on the films press tour. The worlds fully intersected when Olambiwonnu came calling with the documentary, which was in its earliest stages, and Oyelowo was eager to help shape the films story.

This journey I had been through as an actor, as a man, and as someone who likes to think of themselves as an activist also, he says of the offer. It just felt like this was something, that I not only couldnt escape  and I didnt particularly want to escape  but somehow, there is a divine calling to be a part of continuing to showcase this injustice.

Olambiwonnu came to make the documentary under similar circumstances, saying he felt called to go to Ferguson shortly after seeing the news of Browns death, despite knowing no one in the area.

My wife was seven months pregnant at the time with our son, who is now six-and-a-half years old, so that shows you how long weve been working on the film, the filmmaker explains. Unfortunately, it really struck a chord with me because I was arrested and framed by the police when I was 19. And as an African who came to this country and was unaware of a lot of the dynamics that took place, my big awakening happened then.

Even though I was able to get those charges expunged from my record, it left an indelible mark on me, he continues, explaining that it was the moment when he realized the world looked at him as African American and all of the stigma and stereotype that have come with that designation. I couldnt help but think when Michael Brown was killed at 18, that that could have happened to me, if my situation had turned in the wrong direction, if my encounter with police had gone wrong.

So, as a father-to-be, Olambiwonnu decided to paint a new narrative for his son about what the future could look like for Black people.

I want him to understand that you can find hope, love and beauty in the midst of tragedy. That you can find purpose in your pain, he says. I literally just grabbed the camera with a friend of mine, cinematographer Jerry Henry, and we just we flew out as soon as possible, as soon as my wife gave permission.

Once the men had boots on the ground, Olambiwonnu began the process of setting up interviews with Fergusons citizens. One of his earliest calls was to Browns foundation, but the attempts to reach the Brown family for an interview kept coming up dry. Instead, the two men met by chance at a local fish fry restaurant.

The beginning of our relationship was around fried fish, Olambiwonnu laughs. I jumped up out of my seat, ran up to and spoke to them, and they gave me permission to get that first interview. That led to all the other subsequent interviews and spending time with them over the years. It was a great pleasure and an honor to spend time with Mike.

The documentarian gets choked up as he recalls what it was like filming with the Browns. I get really emotionally moved because I just cant imagine what what the family has gone through, he explains, near tears. And for them, to say, Hey, you can spend time with us. You can come inside our house. That they let me film them in the midst of all that, was really moving to me and a precious gift. Its something that I dont take lightly.

For the doc, Olambiwonnus cameras followed Brown and his family home, where the father talks about his son, and also bring him back to the site where his son was killed.

I really dont go to ground zero unless its once a year to commemorate on Aug. 9, Brown says of the scene. I get my peace at the grave. I go where dont nobody go. I sit at the grave when I get a peace of mind with him. Im able to talk, get out what I want to say on a personal level towards him.

Oyelowo emphasizes why scenes like those are so important to include in the narrative  its the unfortunate power of imagery to counteract the dehumanizing narratives about Black people that are so pervasive in media.

The only thing that seems to move the needle is a consistent insistence that people take another look and an actual insight into our humanity, he explains. And the only way I can do that is on the Selma bridge, for Dr. King and his cohorts to orchestrate cameras being there at the ready to see the brutalization of us as Black people. For the cameras to happen to be on when George Floyd is being murdered. Thats the point beyond which our humanity is suddenly in your face enough that you feel the need to move. Our doing of this documentary is another attempt at the same thing.

It unfortunately takes us being seen to be brutalized, he continues. It takes a moment where a person who doesnt look like us, who isnt from where were from, and doesnt have the debilitating history that we have had to endure having to momentarily be in our shoes because they see a father  not just a Black man, but a father  dealing with the loss of his son. They see a grown man being murdered slowly by an indignant, defiant white policeman who casually has his knee on his neck.

Because the examples of dehumanization of Black people are so pervasive, Oyelowo explains, theres a domino effect. And thats not including Americas history of demonizing Black people.

If you dont see us being murdered, or tortured, or lynched, or marginalized or brutalized, the thing you get instead is us being criminalized, he explains. The first thing that happens after Mike Brown Jr. is murdered is to criminalize him. The first thing that happens when George Floyd is murdered is to criminalize him. So the thing we have to consistently do is humanize ourselves.

Humanizing ourselves is what got the Voting Rights Act passed soon after the incident on the Edmund Pettus Bridge, he goes on. Humanizing ourselves through those nine plus minutes of seeing George Floyd murdered is what got Derek Chauvin convicted. It took that video and a global pandemic where the Earth is brought to its knees  the entire globe  for us to see justice in the kind of case where we never see justice. And Mike Brown, Jr. hasnt had justice as it pertains to how he was murdered.

From his perspective, Brown feels its important to reflect back on the memories of his son, whether for the documentary or by wearing his old clothes.

I have learned how to accept [the memories], instead of being so mad that they have ended. But theres so many memories to where I cant run out, so Ill be all right til my death, he explains. He changed the world, and Im fighting for him still. His purpose and his legacy means a lot to this family. Im just doing what Im supposed to do as a father.

In 2014, Brown established the Michael Brown Chosen for Change Foundation, which is featured in a particularly powerful scene of the documentary as other parents of children killed in incidents of racial violence gather to honor their fallen family members.

Its sadly how we met. But just to be united, or be around people that understand, is always a good feeling, Brown explains. They say I help them, they just dont know theyve helped me. Because a lot of people think that Im okay. I guess thats just how I come off.

He adds: But I tell them all the time, its just important for the world to see us as a unit, us still standing together, us still standing strong with our head up as we still fight for justice for our children.

Its that resilience that not only inspired Olambiwonnu while making the film, but that the director says is key to America learning how to move towards real societal progress.

I think the humanity of America rests with with Black people. America has an opportunity to really wake up to itself by looking at the pain and suffering of Black people, he explains. What America has to learn and needs to study is that is the resilience of Black people. In spite of all this Black people have still managed to rise up and do great things.

We just had the 100 year anniversary of the Tulsa massacre  Black people built something incredible 100 years ago, and it was destroyed, and we see that over and over again, building and destroying, but we keep building, he continues. I think if people really looked at Black people as human beings, they would say, Wow, what an impressive group of people, to have gone through all that, and still be able to rise, to build, to pray, to believe and still be able to have faith. Thats how America needs to look at Black people, instead of as criminals or as people that dont deserve to be in this country.

More than anything though, the filmmaker hopes that audiences will understand the larger message he hopes to tell through the microcosm of Ferguson, as we all reevaluate our commitment to creating a better world moving forward.

We have an opportunity here to make history, to stand up and transform the way in which we see Black people, and to notice that there are people all over the world who are standing with us, Olambiwonnu says. That that solidarity extends beyond the boundaries of race, that there are people who understand that that human beings deserve dignity, deserve rights and deserve to be to be treated accordingly. It was about really demonstrating that for my son and other peoples children.

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Game of Thrones co-executive producer Vince Gerardis is developing Provvidenza, a prequel to Italys national literary classic I Promessi Sposi (The Betrothed) to be set in a 16th-century plague-stricken Milan that is dirty, dark, lethal and corrupt.

After setting up a Rome-based company called CIAO, Gerardis  who specializes in packaging big world-building film and TV projects based on literary properties, such as Game of Thrones  has now partnered with Italian publisher Rizzoli which in October will publish a Promessi Sposi prequel novel, written by young Italian scholar Francesco Musesti and titled Lodovico.

Gerardis has also teamed up with Rome-based producer Maria Grazia Sacca, who is heading up his Italian outpost. They have started shopping the project to broadcasters and streamers.

The prequel novel is centered around the backstory of the character of Friar Christopher, who before converting, murdered a nobleman in a duel, and also that of other characters in the Italian classic: the ruthless aristocratic male known as The Unnamed; a thug named Griso; the pious Cardinal Borromeo; and the novels modest female protagonist Lucia, whose backstory in the prequel becomes imbued with witchcraft.

The prequel TV series spinoff of the gothic tale follows the travails of two lovers amid wars, famine, bread riots and the plague, and will retain the novels same apocalyptic backdrop, albeit almost 40 years earlier, which is an important element.

In the novel, the plague changes the destiny of the main character [Renzo], said Sacca, who called the prequel TV project very current, due to COVID-19.

In our story the plague is a central element like winter in Game of Thrones,' she noted.

I believe that within Promessi Sposi and their surrounding world, there is something greater to optimize, Gerardis said. Its a no-brainer for Italy, he added. If ever there was a property to do some kind of business beyond film content, this should be it.

Provvidenza is being shopped as a dark tragedy set in a cruel but still entirely human-centered society with the nocturnal and psychological elements of some of the Batman movies; the carnal and spiritual aesthetic of Caravaggio paintings; and Game of Thrones-type storylines.

Gerardis will be travelling to Italy in July to attend the Audio-Visual Producers Summit, organized by Italys TV producers association APA and the Producers Guild of America in the southern town of Matera.

CIAO, which stands for Creativita Italiana Americana Organizzata, or organized Italian/American creativity, is represented internationally by CAA Global TV agent Micheal Gordon.

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UPDATED: Users of HBO Max reported widespread issues in trying to access the WarnerMedia streaming service Friday, with the technical problems lasting about an hour.

According to uptime-monitoring site DownDetector, user reports of problems with HBO Max spiked around 2:15 p.m. ET. Among the most-reported problems, about 39% were related to log-in, with server connections at 35% and video streaming errors at 24%. The error reports spanned the U.S. and appeared concentrated in the Northeast, Chicago and Los Angeles, according to DownDetector.

HBO Maxs customer service account on Twitter acknowledged the issues, writing in a post at 2:28 p.m. ET, Were aware some customers may be experiencing issues streaming #HBOMax and appreciate your patience as we work to resolve this as quickly as possible.

Were aware some customers may be experiencing issues streaming #HBOMax and appreciate your patience as we work to resolve this as quickly as possible.  HBOMaxHelp (@HBOMaxHelp) June 18, 2021

At around 3 p.m. ET on Friday, user problem reports for HBO Max began to subside, according to DownDetector.

HBO Maxs help account tweeted that Full service has now been restored at 3:25 p.m. ET, advising customers that they may need to restart their apps.

In an apparently unrelated issue, HBO Max on Thursday (June 17) mistakenly sent out an empty test email to a portion of our HBO Max mailing list this evening, according to the @HBOMaxHelp account on Twitter. We apologize for the inconvenience, and as the jokes pile in, yes, it was the intern. No, really. And were helping them through it. That email had the subject line Integration Test Email #1 and said in the body, This template is used by integration tests only.

The snafus come after HBO Max experienced with scattered technical issues for more than an hour on May 25. And on May 30, the service was down for about a half hour when the finale of Mare of Easttown, the gritty limited-series crime drama starring Kate Winslet, was set to premiere.

As of the end of March 2021, HBO Max and HBO combined had 44.2 million domestic customers (including 9.7 million retail HBO Max subs), up 2.7 million sequentially from 41.5 million at the end of 2020.

On June 2, WarnerMedia launched HBO Max With Ads, priced at $10 per month, a 33% discount from the regular $15 per month ad-free tier. The ad-supported version offers the same content with the exception of the Warner Bros. films being made available on HBO Max day-and-date with theaters.

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A group of more than 300 MSNBC employees are mounting a unionization drive with the Writers Guild of America East to represent writers, talent bookers, fact-checkers and others in editorial at NBCUniversals all-news cable network.

On Thursday, a group dubbed @MSNBCUnion posted a letter on social media signed by more than 200 employees that called on NBCUniversal parent Comcast to voluntarily recognize the WGA East as the collective bargaining agent for about 315 employees of MSNBC and the news program The Choice, which airs on NBCUs Peacock streamer. MSNBC president Rashida Jones said in a memo sent Thursday that the company will require an election.

Unionization is the best way to ensure a fair equitable and safe workplace, the letter stated. The focus of WGA Easts collective bargaining will be to advocate for equal pay for equal work and work/life balance that meet our families needs; diversity at every level of production; clear job descriptions and access to career development; a say in what the post-COVID-19 workplace looks like; and fair compensation for the hours we all spend to deliver the news.

In her memo, Jones said an election was the appropriate next step.

I respect our employees right to decide whether they want to be represented by a union, and I believe our employees should be able to make such an important decision through a standard election process, Jones wrote. An election supervised by the government allows all affected employees the chance to express their view on unionizing through a secret ballot. It is important to give everyone who would be included the chance to understand what this would mean before making their choice.

On Friday, WGA East executive director Lowell Peterson repeated the call for voluntary recognition from MSNBC.

MSNBC needs to follow its own progressive principles and honor the decision made by its editorial employees to unionize with the Writers Guild of America, East, Peterson said. These are smart, engaged people who came to their decision after months of informed conversations, and a super-majority declared their support publicly by signing a petition. We urge management to correct its course and recognize the union voluntarily, promptly.

The jobs that the WGA East hopes to cover at MSNBC include news writers as well as talent bookers, fact checkers as well as booking producers and planners. Those jobs have not been covered by union contracts at MSNBC over the 25 years since the cabler launched in 1996 as a joint venture of NBC and Microsoft.

The WGA East hopes to make inroads at MSNBC after historically being kept mostly out of NBCUniversal although it does represent writers at NBC News Studios, which produces unscripted programs for various outlets. On the other hand, the WGA East has had a foothold representing writers at CBS News and ABC News since the guild was founded in 1954.

Writers who work for NBC News digital platforms (which are distinct from MSNBC operations) rallied in December 2019 and are now represented by the Communications Workers of Americas NewsGuild arm.

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Speaking at a Netflix recruitment panel at the Annecy Animation Festival on Wednesday, filmmaker Michael Francis Williams (David Makes Man) dropped new details about the animated feature he is co-directing for the global streamer.

Its the first movie of this size set in Africa, and thats what brought me to the project, said Williams, who will share directing duties with Frank E. Abney III (director of the acclaimed short Canvas, pictured above). Its a tentpole movie, a big swing for Netflix, and a real statement.

Were very intentionally trying to expand whats happening behind the camera as well in front, Williams continued. The film is set in Africa, full of Africans, and the industry is obviously not. So weve been doing quite a lot of work trying to foster relationships with folks on the continent.

Williams, who directed the pilot to the Peabody winning series David Makes Man, will make his animation debut with the upcoming, as-of-yet untitled, film, and he explained that the prospect of introducing new voices into the animation ecosystem drew him to the project.

We want to do something that hopefully shifts the needle a bit on the culture of animation, giving folks who dont get access to what can be [a difficult industry to break into], he said. Well be setting up workshops and writers camps to find talent from the [still unannounced] country and filter them into the production.

Spanning five countries and two continents, the global voices panel featured a diverse cross-section of storyboard artists, 3D modelers, and background specialists who opened a window into work-life at the streamer. Other panelists included animation recruiter Camille Leganza and artists Izzy Burton, Wei Li, Angela Smaldone and Gustavo Cosio.

Once the panelists introduced themselves and described their paths into the industry, the subject of remote work took the forefront. For over an hour the panelists described  with surprising candor  the agonies and ecstasies of working for an international studio from the comfort of home.

Both the England-based Burton and the Mexico-based Cosio agreed that remote work allowed them to access and integrate into the global animation  to work in Hollywood, in other words  without having to relocate to Los Angeles. If it wasnt this way, Im not sure I would have been able to work for a U.S. animation studio, said Cosio.

At the same time, the panels didnt hide the new challenges remote work entails. There are a lot of elements of creative storytelling that can be very spontaneous in a studio, the Vancouver-based Wei Li said. You go for a lunch and a spark hits, you start acting the scene out. Here, that spontaneity is missing.

The industry pros came at the subject from a number of angles, discussing how working remotely with colleagues on the other side of the globe affected their schedules and workflows, and enumerated the various strategies theyd devised to better foster human connection and shared trust with collaborators they only saw on the other side of a screen.

Fostering questions from panel viewers about possible employment opportunities, Leganza cautioned interested parties against cold pitches, explaining that the company preferred to screen through existing channels like talent agencies. She also reiterated that the new way was here to stay. After COVID-19 is done, whenever that is, Leganza said, were still going to be working like this. Its exciting, and I do think there will be a lot of innovation.

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Over the course of just three features, filmmaker Lisa Immordino Vreeland has already made a stamp on that documentary subgenre culture hounds find most irresistible  the 20th-century personality portrait  taking names we know well (Diana Vreeland, Peggy Guggenheim and Cecil Beaton) and sharing the private realms of their creative worlds. With Truman & Tennessee: An Intimate Conversation, she delivers two titans for the price of one, drawing parallels between novelist Truman Capote and playwright Tennessee Williams, whose real-life friendship-cum-rivalry serves as a natural dummy on which to hang a tailored homage to this quintessential pair of queer literary pioneers.

The trouble  and its no small obstacle  is that unlike Immordino Vreelands previous subjects, Capote and Williams were wordsmiths, not visual artists, which makes them harder to represent on screen. As such, the resulting project feels better suited to book form than that of a feature-length movie, and the devices she uses, like hiring The Boys in the Band castmates Jim Parsons and Zachary Quinto to read excerpts from interviews and elsewhere as if speaking to one another, cant quite compensate for the hokey montages strung together from old photographs and calendar-art shots of sun-crowned clouds and leaves blowing in the wind.

Still, the resourceful helmer could hardly hope for two more intriguing subjects than these, whose complementary Southern upbringings and shrewd understanding of human nature reflect one another nicely. They were vastly different individuals as well, but the movies strategy is to find the affinities, which it does early on by juxtaposing each of their appearances on The David Frost Show  a trick that could be used to compare any two of the talk-show hosts many guests, but one that serves to kick off the movies imagined conversation between Capote and Williams.

At the outset, the movie sets up the two mens meeting  Capote was 16, Williams 29  as Parson recites in Capotes pinched nasal accent, It really was a sort of intellectual friendship, though people inevitably thought otherwise. The movie doesnt dwell on such speculation, although its not shy about considering the two mens love/sex lives, thanks in part to Frosts probing interviewing technique. Its hard to imagine a contemporary interviewer asking such direct questions of an openly gay public figure (these days may be more tolerant, but it comes in denying the sexual dimension of homosexuality).

Out at a time when so many celebrities remained closeted, these two admired one anothers company and even vacationed together (with their respective partners) in Italy  a platonic version of the Christopher Isherwood-Don Bachardy pairing depicted in Chris & Don: A Love Story perhaps. As in that documentary, their private lives are as significant as both parties better-known artistic output. Immordino Vreeland realizes that some audiences know more about her subjects than others, and weaves her various themes  ambition and superstition, jealousy and acclaim, daddy issues and remembrances of their mothers  around a chronological account of their careers. This she does without the usual crutch of outside experts, relying on the two mens words to supply perspective.

But here the film hits a snag, since neither Capote nor Williams ought to be defined by the Hollywood films that came of their work, and yet, the documentary is obliged to lean on their movies over the books or plays. Marlon Brando may have changed the course of acting with A Streetcar Named Desire, but that revolution happened four years earlier on the Broadway stage, so scenes from the film, while hardly irrelevant, dont tell the whole story. Similarly, the movie version of Breakfast at Tiffanys, while certainly beloved, isnt nearly as interesting to any Capote fan as the novel, in which the authors voice comes through (and where the character was imagined as more of an unfinished type, a la Marilyn Monroe, whom he wanted for the role). Capote was disappointed by the casting of Audrey Hepburn; ergo, clips from the movie actually misrepresent his vision.

The experience of watching Truman & Tennessee will surely feel familiar to anyone who has ever purchased a shrink-wrapped coffee-table book about a beloved subject, only to take it home, open it and realize the treatment doesnt quite measure up. Its a pleasure to spend an hour and a half in the resurrected company of these two intellects, but the experience feels like the lazy alternative to reading biographies about either man, while the iMovie-style editing strategy of slow-fading between layers of old photographs makes them feel like ghosts of a long-forgotten past.

Reviewed online, Los Angeles, June 17, 2021. Running time: 86 MIN.

Running Time: Running time: 86 MIN.

Production

(Documentary) A Kino Lorber release of a Fischio Films production, in association with Peaceable Assembly, Gigantic Studios. Producers: Lisa Immordino Vreeland, Mark Lee, Jonathan Gray, John Northrup. Co-executive producer: Brian Devine, Brook Devine.

Crew

Director: Lisa Immordino Vreeland. Camera: Shane Sigler. Editor: Bernadine Colish. Music: Madi.

With

Jim Parsons, Zachary Quinto.

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WarnerMedia Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) has added country manager roles for seasoned company executives Sylvia Rothblum, Pierre Branco, and Jamie Friend.

Rothblum is now country manager for Germany, Austria and Switzerland, in addition to her current role as head of TV distribution for the region. During her 20-year tenure at the company she has played a central role in building WarnerMedias business in Germany, Austria and Switzerland as well as overseeing overall content distribution strategy across multiple platform.

Branco is country manager for France and Benelux. He will retain his responsibilities as country manager for Middle East, North Africa and Turkey, and Africa, and head of affiliate and ad sales for EMEA. During his 15-year career at WarnerMedia, Branco has held several senior leadership roles across diverse international markets where he has played an integral role driving strategic business decisions.

Friend has been appointed country manager for Nordic and Central and Eastern Europe, in addition to his current role as CFO for WarnerMedia EMEA. Since joining the company eight years ago, Friend has held a number of senior strategy and finance roles.

The appointments come in the wake of WarnerMedia veteran Iris Knobloch stepping down after 25 years in various senior leadership roles, most recently as president of WarnerMedia France, Benelux, Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

Rothblum, Branco and Friend will work closely with Priya Dogra, president, WarnerMedia EMEA and Asia (excluding China).

Dogra said: Sylvia, Pierre and Jamie are proven leaders with exceptional strategic expertise and a deep understanding of our business. They bring a passion for our much-loved brands and franchises and an appreciation for strong relationships with our distribution partners. Their formidable business acumen will help drive further growth and innovation for our company in these important markets.

Pictured (L-R), Jamie Friend, Priya Dogra, Sylvia Rothblum, Pierre Branco.

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Judith Zaffirini took home a major national honor this week.

Texas District 21 state senator was announced to have won the National Federation of Press Womens 2021 Professional Communications Contest for her impact with Zaffirini Communications.

According to contest organizers, Zaffirini was chosen for her business offerings of professional communication services like consulting, workshops, seminars, keynote addresses and writings.

I am very excited to be named the National Sweepstakes Winner because it affirms our standard of excellence in communicating with constituents, said Zaffirini, who was presented a plaque and a $250 prize. To win 15 national and 41 statewide awards for projects as varied as speeches, newsletters and press releases in print, electronic and social media underscores my commitment to reaching out to them via their preferred channels of communication.

The first Hispanic woman elected to the Texas Senate, Zaffirini said that it demonstrates how legislators can apply their professional skills to better benefit those that they represent. By using her skills in communication and journalism, she states that she can represent her constituents better.

In light of the win, Zaffirini believes that she will continue to encourage women of all ages who may be considering the field of communication. She highlighted how the field can impact peoples lives as well as save them.

One example that comes to mind is using my communication skills to inform and to persuade powerful decision makers to fund AIDS medication and adult crisis mental health programs, Zaffirini stated.

Regarding the award, she believes that the recognitions reinforce the ability of women to excel in all the arenas within the communication and journalism field. This would result in better role models who then move on to influence the new generation of female communication professionals.

My life and experience empowered me to open my mind and my heart to address the issues that were the focus of the communiques that were award-winning entries in this communication contest, Zaffirini stated. They afforded me countless opportunities to communicate about issues ranging from education, the environment and domestic abuse to cronyism and corruption, criminal justice, and unemployment.

Because I care so passionately about helping the very young, the very old, the very poor, persons with disabilities and veterans, I was able to define problems and their solutions through award-winning communication projects in a variety of print, electronic and social media.

According to the NFPW, they are a nationwide organization of women and men pursuing careers across the communications spectrum, including print and electronic journalism, freelancing, new media, books, public relations, marketing, graphic design, photography, advertising, radio and television.

Among the communication fields, the organization works to promote professionalism and ethical activities in journalism and communication by providing valuable networking, peer recognition and mentoring opportunities in an effort to protect a free press among the first amendment.

Judith Zaffirini is a talented communication professional who understands the many different channels available to share one's message, NFPW President Gwen Larson said. Being able to adapt messages to a myriad of outlets is a special talent.

Zaffirini attended the Ursuline Academy and earned her bachelors, masters and doctorate communication degrees at the University of Texas at Austin.

I embrace communication strategies first learned in graduate school at UT, including practicing the Socratic method of asking questions; employing Aristotles ethical, emotional and logical appeals, whether listening, speaking, writing or reading; and applying Blooms higher order thinking skills to identify and solve problems, she said. I attribute my success as a senator largely to my communication skills and work ethic, and to my mantra  Serviam (I shall serve)  learned from the Ursuline nuns.

Mary Jane Skala of Kearney, Nebraska  a reporter for the Kearney Hub  finished in second place in the competition. According to the NFPW, she writes features and covers health issues for her newspaper. She also writes a weekly column about moving to the sometimes-quirky corn and cattle country after 40 years as a newspaper editor in Cleveland. She was the NFPW sweepstakes winner in 2020 and 1996.

Additionally, NFPW says that Lori Potter  retired earlier this year after being a writer and photographer for the Kearney Hub  took third place. Potter, also of Kearney, Nebraska, is a former NFPW national president and currently serves as treasurer of the NFPW Education Fund. Potter holds the NFPW record for most sweepstakes wins in the contest. She was the national winner in 2018, 2014, 2012 and 2008.

Delaware Press Association captured the first-place affiliate award. Delaware also won the top affiliate award in 2007 and 2011.

cocampo@lmtonline.com
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott signed Texas Senate Bill 1474 into law establishing the I-27 Advisory Committee to provide TxDOT with information regarding concerns and interests along the Ports-to-Plains Corridor in Texas, as well as advise TxDOT on transportation improvements that impact the Ports-to-Plains Corridor.

S.B. 1474, sponsored by Senator Charles Perry (28th Dist.) along with cosponsors, Senator Roland Gutierrez (19th Dist.), Senator Kel Seliger (31st Dist.) and Representative Four Price (87th Dist.), was signed by the House and Senate and sent to Abbotts office on May 20 and signed into law on Monday, June 15.

Members of the I-27 Advisory Committee, outlined in the bill, include 10 county judges or their designee from the counties of Dallam, Howard, Lubbock, Midland, Moore, Potter, Sherman, Tom Green, Val Verde and Webb.

The legislation also identifies seven mayors or designees from cities of Amarillo, Big Spring, San Angelo, Del Rio, Laredo, Lubbock and Midland.

The I-27 Advisory Committee, created by this Legislation, is an important next step in the goal of moving food, fiber and fuel from Texas to the world, said Lubbock County Judge Curtis Parrish. I look forward to continuing to work with my fellow county judges and mayors, as we move forward with this very important transportation project.

The mayors will meet prior to Oct. 1 to appoint the remaining members of the I-27 Advisory Committee. These appointments will include three members who are economic development professionals selected by the geographical segments identified in the H.B. 1079 Ports-to-Plains Interstate Feasibility Study; one member who is a business representative from the agriculture industry; one member who is a business representative from the international trade industry; and one member who is a business representative from the energy industry.

My congratulations to Gov. Greg Abbott in signing Texas Senate Bill 1474, which establishes the I-27 Advisory Committee, Laredo Mayor Pete Saenz said. This committee will be composed of 10 county judges, seven mayors  or their designees  and others to be appointed by them. The purpose of the committee is to provide vital advisory input to TxDot on any matters that may impact the planning, construction, development or on other concerns that may arise related thereto, on the Ports to Plains I-27 Corridor in Texas.

I am pleased to say that the City of Laredo and Webb County will be a part of this committee, and I stand ready to serve with my fellow committee colleagues to make this corridor a reality so as to better connect Port Laredo  being the largest land port in the Western Hemisphere  to other cities and markets in West Texas, the USA and beyond.

The committee will meet a minimum of twice per state fiscal year but may meet more often at the request of TxDOT or the advisory committee chair. All meetings of the committee, remote or in person, will be open to the public. The first full meeting of the committee will be held within 30 days of the appointment of the remaining members of the advisory committee.

As we begin establishing the roadmap for the future of trade and commerce for the state of Texas, the extension of Interstate 27 is vital to our future economic growth, Ports-to-Plains Alliance Chairman John Osborne. On behalf of the Ports-to-Plains Alliance, we appreciate the support of Gov. Abbott as well as the sponsors of this bill, particularly Sen. Charles Perry and Rep. Four Price.
ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast (AP)  Former President Laurent Gbagbo returned home to Ivory Coast on Thursday, a decade after his refusal to concede defeat in a presidential election sparked months of violence that left more than 3,000 people dead.

Gbagbo was extradited to the International Criminal Court at The Hague in 2011 and spent eight years awaiting trial on war crimes charges. A judge acquitted him in 2019, saying prosecutors had failed to prove their case.

The verdict was appealed but upheld in late March, clearing the way for Gbagbo to leave Belgium, where he had spent the past two years.

After coming down the steps to the runway, Gbagbo soon made his way to a vehicle that was then surrounded by crowds as it headed toward the city.

He later made a brief but emotional speech to his supporters at his former campaign headquarters in Cocody.

I am happy to return to Ivory Coast and to Africa, he said before adding: I know that I am Ivorian but in prison I knew that I belonged to Africa.

While the government led by his longtime rival President Alassane Ouattara has allowed Gbagbos return to Ivorian soil, there already have been concerns about what impact his presence will have on the nation's political stability. It is not immediately known whether the 76-year-old ex-president will seek to re-enter politics.

Tensions between the jubilant crowds and security forces were high, with tear gas being used to disperse people coming to greet Gbagbo near the airport on Thursday. Clashes continued later along the route Gbagbo's vehicle took toward his former campaign headquarters.

His opponents, though, maintain he should be jailed in Ivory Coast, not given a statesmans welcome. Some demonstrated outside Gbagbos residence in the Cocody on Wednesday.

Thursday remained mostly a day of jubilation for Gbagbos supporters, who long have maintained his prosecution was unfair and politically motivated. The ex-president garnered nearly 46% of the vote in 2010 and maintains a strong base of supporters.

After his arrival we want peace and reconciliation, we want to live together because we were born together so we are obliged to live together said Chief Tanouh, a traditional leader from the country's east.

Ouattara, who was ultimately declared the winner of the 2010 vote and has been president of Ivory Coast ever since, did not greet Gbagbo at the airport Thursday. The current president won a controversial third term in office late last year after the opposition claimed many of its candidates were disqualified including Gbagbo.

It still remains unclear what will become of other pending criminal charges against the ex-president.

Gbagbo and three of his former ministers were sentenced to 20 years in prison on charges they broke into the Abidjan branch of the Central Bank of West African States to get cash amid the post-election crisis in January 2011.

Its unlikely that Ivorian authorities will jail the ex-president, says Ousmane Zina, a political scientist at the University of Bouake. However, Ouattara is likely to attach conditions to Gbagbos return in an effort to avoid reigniting tensions of the past, he added.

Before granting a pardon or amnesty, he will want to obtain a guarantee that the country will remain peaceful, Zina said.

___

Associated Press journalists Krista Larson in Dakar, Senegal; and Bishr El- Touni, Mark Carlson and Lorne Cook in Brussels contributed.
JERUSALEM (AP)  The Palestinian Authority called off an agreement whereby Israel would transfer 1 million doses of coronavirus vaccines to it in exchange for a similar number later this year, hours after the deal was announced on Friday.

The Palestinians said the doses, which Israel began shipping to the occupied West Bank, are too close to expiring and do not meet their standards. In announcing the agreement, Israel had said the vaccines will expire soon without specifying the date.

Palestinian officials had come under heavy criticism on social media after the agreement was announced, with many accusing them of accepting subpar vaccines and suggesting they might not be effective.

There was no immediate comment from Israel, which had largely shut down for the weekly Sabbath.

Israel said Friday it would transfer around 1 million doses of soon-to-expire coronavirus vaccines to the Palestinian Authority in exchange for a similar number of doses the Palestinians expect to receive later this year.

Israel, which has fully reopened after vaccinating some 85% of its adult population, has faced criticism for not sharing its vaccines with the 4.5 million Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and Gaza.

The disparity has played out across the globe as the bulk of vaccines went to wealthy countries. As those countries have made progress containing their own outbreaks, they have recently begun pledging supplies for poorer countries that were left behind for months.

The new Israeli government, which was sworn in on Sunday, said it would transfer Pfizer vaccines that are close to expiring, and that the Palestinian Authority would reimburse it with a similar number of vaccines when it receives them from the pharmaceutical company in September or October. Up to 1.4 million doses could be exchanged, the Israeli government said in a statement.

We will continue to find effective ways to cooperate for the benefit of people in the region, Foreign Minister Yair Lapid tweeted after the deal was announced.

COGAT, the Israeli military body that coordinates civilian affairs in the occupied territories, said it had coordinated the delivery of the first 100,000 doses to the West Bank on Friday.

The Palestinians portrayed the agreement differently, saying Pfizer had suggested the transfer as a way of speeding up its delivery of 4 million doses that the PA had already paid for in an agreement reached directly with the drug company.

This is not an agreement with Israel, but with the Pfizer company," Palestinian Health Minister Mai Alkaila said earlier Friday, before the deal was called off.

At a press conference Friday evening, she said health officials who inspected the vaccines found they did not meet standards and so we decided to return them.

Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh ordered the cancellation of the agreement and the return of the vaccines to Israel, his spokesman said. Ibrahim Milhim said the Palestinians would not accept about-to-expire vaccines from Israel, citing the official Israeli statement.

Vaccines from Pfizer, authorized in the U.S. in December, typically have a six-month shelf life. It wasnt immediately clear when the 1 million batch that Israel was to give the Palestinians was produced.

An Israeli security official said the batch of vaccines that were transferred on Friday are to expire in two weeks. The official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media, said further shipments were planned in intervals also several weeks ahead of expiration.

Israel has carried out one of the most successful vaccination programs in the world, allowing it to fully reopen businesses and schools. This week, authorities lifted the requirement to wear masks in public, one of the last remaining restrictions.

Rights groups have said that Israel, as an occupying power, is obliged to provide vaccines to the Palestinians. Israel denies having such an obligation, pointing to interim peace agreements reached with the Palestinians in the 1990s.

Those agreements say the PA, which has limited autonomy in parts of the occupied West Bank, is responsible for health care but that the two sides should cooperate to combat pandemics. Israel has offered vaccines to the more than 100,000 Palestinians from the occupied West Bank who work inside Israel, as well as Palestinians in east Jerusalem.

Gaza is ruled by the Islamic militant group Hamas, which is considered a terrorist organization by Israel and Western countries. Israeli officials have suggested linking any supply of vaccines to Gaza to the return of two Israeli captives and the remains of two soldiers held by Hamas.

The PA has said it is acquiring its own supplies through agreements with private companies and a World Health Organization program designed to aid needy countries.

To date, around 380,000 Palestinians in the West Bank and around 50,000 in Gaza have been vaccinated. More than 300,000 infections have been recorded in the two territories, including 3,545 deaths.

Israel captured the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem in the 1967 Mideast war. The Palestinians want a state in all three territories. There have been no substantive peace talks in more than a decade.

___

Associated Press writers Fares Akram in Cairo, and Isaac Scharf and Areej Hazboun in Jerusalem contributed to this report.
NEW YORK (AP)  A rabid dog imported into the United States this month has sparked a public health investigation across several states.

Health officials say a dog brought to the U.S. from Azerbaijan that ended up with a family in Chester County, Pennsylvania began acting strangely. It later tested positive for rabies and was euthanized. At least 12 people were exposed to the animal.

The dog was one of 34 animals  33 dogs and one cat  imported by an animal rescue organization from Azerbaijan to O'Hare International Airport in Chicago on June 10.

The animals were not in the main cabin of the plane or main terminal of the airport. Travelers through OHare are not considered to be at risk, but health officials are checking to see if other animals in the shipment are infected and are still tracking down the pets' new owners.

Rabies no longer regularly spreads among dogs in the U.S., but imported animals are considered a risk for new outbreaks.

Federal agencies are working with health officials in Pennsylvania, Illinois, Indiana, New Jersey, and New York on the investigation.

The incident marks the fourth rabid dog imported into the U.S. since 2015. The three previous were rescue dogs that arrived with rabies vaccination certificates that were later found to be fraudulent.

This week, the CDC announced that starting July 14 it will impose a year-long ban on dogs from more than 100 countries  including Azerbaijan  where rabies is still a problem. The ban is being imposed because of a spike in the number of puppies denied entry because they werent old enough to be fully vaccinated.

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The Associated Press Health & Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institutes Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
U.S. Border Patrol Laredo Sector agents arrested two migrants with active warrants, authorities said.

On Tuesday morning, Cotulla Station agents along with a small unmanned aircraft system and Texas Department of Public Safety Troopers encountered a group of 19 migrants during a train inspection. One migrant was identified as Edson Villanueva-Santiago. A records check revealed he had an active warrant out of California for willful deliberate premeditated murder. Villanueva-Santiago was turned over to La Salle County Sheriffs Office for extradition.

Later, a second wanted migrant was found with a group of people who were arrested when they were hopping on a train near Encinal, Texas. Authorities identified him as Guillermo Alejandro Diaz-Vargas, a man with an active warrant out of Saint Charles, Illinois forsexual assault of a minor. He was turned over to La Salle deputies for extradition.

Efforts with the community and our law enforcement counterparts aid in addressing threats to national security that include terrorism, transnational criminal organizations, illicit networks, and other cross-border risks, Border Patrol said. Effective border security is essential to defending not only the U.S. border, but throughout the entire country to promote a just society and improve human rights. Dangerous criminals such as these endanger our community and pose a threat to the entire country.
The U.S. House of Representatives voted Tuesday to award the Congressional Gold Medal to all police officers who responded during the Capitol riot on Jan. 6 with overwhelming bipartisan support.

But 21 Republican representatives voted against HR 3325, including four from Texas, the Washington Post's Felicia Somnez reports.

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Reps. Louie Gohmert, Michael Cloud, Chip Roy, and Lance Gooden all voted against the measure. Gohmert, Cloud and Gooden had all voted against Congressional Gold Medals for Capitol police when it was first introduced in March, the Washington Post's Colby Itkowitz and Meagan Flynn reported.

Several Republicans who voted against the measure previously said they objected to the use of the words "insurrection" and "temple," according to Somnez.

Roy released a statement explaining his opposition toward HR 3325.

Today, I voted against H.R. 3325 that awards Congressional Gold Medals to police officers that protected the Capitol building on January 6th," Roy wrote. "I previously voted in favor of H.R.1085 in support of those brave men and women. However, this legislation has since been amended to include events that have absolutely nothing to do with January 6th....Democrats are playing political games with the tragedy of April 2, 2021, when Officer William 'Billy' Evans was killed and Officer Kenneth Shaver was injured by a man obsessed with the Nation of Islam who slammed his vehicle into the north barricade of the U.S. Capitol complex."

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Gohmert tweeted that he was introducing a different bill to honor Capitol police supported by Cloud and Gooden.

"Our brave Capitol Police deserve the upmost [sic] respect, which is why I have introduced a bill that serves as a tribute to our officers rather than using them as political pawns," Gohmert wrote.

The legislation passed overwhelmingly with 406 "yes" votes. The Capitol police, the Metropolitan Police Department of the District of Columbia, the Smithsonian Institution and the Architect of the Capitol will all receive medals.

The Smithsonian Institution and the AOC will display their medals alongside a plaque honoring other law enforcement agencies that protected the Capitol on Jan. 6.
Kawau Coastguard will hold an open day at the Sandspit Yacht Club marina on Saturday, June 26, from 10am to 2pm, and everyone is welcome.

The public will be invited to board Kawau Coastguards Naiad rescue boat, take a look at the engines and learn how a rescue operation is performed.

Crew members will share stories of local rescues and will be available to answer questions.

There will also be model cardboard rescue boats for children to take home.

The Kawau crew is looking to sign up 12 new volunteers to help share the load across crew members and make the vital service an easier job for everyone. Last year, the crew helped 239 people get home safe after 107 callouts.

Crewman Paul Steinkamp says the majority of callouts are from October to April, so now is a great time to join and get trained before summer.

He says joining Coastguard is a way to learn new skills and help people  sometimes saving them from a life and death situation.

You dont need a lot of boating experience. We will train you in basic boat handling and first aid, all the way up to more technical stuff like radio operation, navigation and search patterns, Paul says.

New volunteer crew members are teamed up with senior members as well as a certified skipper when attending callouts.

Last month, crews assisted a yacht that had had an electrical failure in the dark at 7pm. Once on the water, the crew found that the forecasted 20-knot north-westerly wind was in fact a 35-knot gale.

Bouncing through the north channel with waves washing over the roof, they located the vessel one nautical mile from Te Arai after noticing the flashing of a hand-held torch.

On board, a frightened father and daughter were struggling for their lives as their boat threatened to wreck on the point. Crews took several attempts to toss a towline as the vessels pitched side to side.

Once it was tied, Kawau Coastguard slowly towed the yacht around Cape Rodney.

There was a huge sigh of relief as the vessel was placed safely in the calmer waters of Leigh Harbour to sort out in the following days. They were very grateful to be alive, Paul says.

In addition to volunteers to crew the rescue boat, Kawau Coastguard also needs dry crew volunteers for a variety of tasks. This can include performing mechanical maintenance, driving a tractor or selling lottery tickets.

Info: Email Paul Steinkamp at paulandpat@xtra.co.nz.



The property is for sale by negotiation.

Lighthouse donation to Coastguard NZ

Coastguard New Zealand will receive a $50,000 donation from the proceeds of the sale of a 25-hectare property on the headland at Cape Rodney, which has an operational lighthouse.

The lifestyle block at 100 Omaha Block Access Road has been listed by Bayleys Matakana agent Kellie Bissett. It has a capital value of $6.4 million.

Ms Bissett says the philanthropic-minded vendor has pledged to make the donation from the proceeds once the sale has been made.

The working lighthouse, at the tip of the headland, has been flashing since 1967. Today it is solar powered and fully automated. It has an LED light that projects 10 nautical miles into the Hauraki Gulf.

Coastguard chief executive Callum Gillespie says the lighthouse has been keeping mariners safe for decades and the donation will help continue the tradition of saving lives at sea.

The property also has a four bedroom 1980s cedar house and a shearing shed. It borders Goat Island Marine Reserve and has views to Little Barrier Island.


Matariki starts this month.

Communities across Mahurangi have organised a range of events featuring music, food and traditional crafts to celebrate Matariki  the Maori new year, from June 19 to July 11.

Matariki is named after the bright stars in the Pleiades cluster, which rise into the night sky each winter.

For Maori, it was traditionally a time to celebrate as crop harvesting had come to an end, freeing up time for festivities and family time.

This year, Te Hana Te Ao Marama is hosting a Nga Whetu o Te Rangi  Reach for the Stars singing workshop on the weekend of July 3 and 4.

Participants will get to stay on the marae overnight and all meals are supplied.

Four experienced tutors, Clyde Tukaiora Connell, Bonnie Low, Wendy Nute and Robert Nute, will help attendees to release the musical talents within.

Organiser Linda Clapham says it will be a weekend for music lovers of all abilities to get together and celebrate with song.

The workshop will conclude with a free concert open to the wider community, featuring songs produced in the workshop. The concert is on Sunday, July 4, from 2pm to 4pm. Cost to attend the workshop is $80.

Te Hana Te Ao Marama is also holding a Kaipara moana seafood festival on Saturday, July 31, from 11am. It will include a tour of the village and a telling of the story of how princess Te Hana swam from Pouto to Tapora.

The festival will conclude with a seafood buffet consisting of catch of the day from the Kaipara. Only 80 spaces are available and tickets are $60. For both events, email tehana@xtra.co.nz.

Unity Collection in Matakana is hosting a Matariki celebration on Saturday, June 26, at 11am, with a kapa haka performance by children from Pakiri School.

Unity founder Tania Rupapera will announce a calendar of wananga workshops celebrating Maori culture. Dates are still to be confirmed, but events will include a ta moko workshop with Rangi Kipa, a poi workshop with Ngamata Skipper, a weaving workshop with Shona Tawhiao and a pounamu workshop with Sands Carving Studio.

Those interested can sign up to the newsletter at www.unitycollection.co.nz to receive updates.

The Whangateau Residents & Ratepayers Association and the Whangateau Hall are hosting a Matariki potluck dinner on July 2. The community is invited to bring a plate and hear about the importance of Matariki to Maori.

Ngati Manuhiri Settlement Trust and the Mahurangi East Land Restoration Project is hosting a Matariki planting day on Sunday, July 11, at 10am, at Te Muri Regional Park. Access to the park will be via buses from the Puhoi Pioneers Memorial Park. To register, search planting day Te Muri at

www.eventbrite.co.nz.

From next year June 22 will be a public holiday to celebrate Matariki.
Lovers of distinctive gifts and quality homewares should head to Silverdale Village, where Hibiscus Gifts, a spacious new store has recently opened in Agency Lane.

The shop is owned by Jing Wang, who moved to Red Beach with her family from west Auckland last year. Having run an importing company with her husband for more than 10 years, Jing was keen to use her knowledge of overseas markets to open a shop with items that cant be found anywhere else.

We want to sell different things that are unique to us, she says. Most of our products are one of a kind. If you buy something here, you will be the only one to have that item. People dont want the same things as everyone else.

The shop includes a wide range of wooden furniture from France and Italy, gift items from Australia and Asian cashmere scarves. There is also womens clothing, linen, china mugs, greetings cards, jewellery, beach towels and robes, vases, hats, prints, mirrors, artificial plants and flowers, and a selection of lamps, including several with Tiffany-style stained glass shades.

Jing says she chose the original heart of Silverdale for Hibiscus Gifts because people come to look around and browse through whats on offer, as well as for the Saturday market, which brings in extra weekend foot traffic. And although the global pandemic has presented problems in getting some stock shipped and in-store from overseas, she is positive about the future.

It was not the perfect time to start our business, but homeware makes people feel good and warm, so I think its better to open a good shop, she says. Silverdale Village is really nice, its not the same as the modern part. People here are very kind and generous. Were new here, so we need time for people to get to know us, and come in and have a chat.
Lockport, NY (14094)

Today

Cloudy this morning with thunderstorms developing this afternoon. High 67F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 60%..

Tonight

Scattered thunderstorms during the evening. Partly cloudy skies after midnight. Low 57F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 60%.
Local News, Press Releases

By Chris Boyle Published: June 18 2021

After years of advocating, Suozzis efforts to take down derelict buildings are finally coming to fruition.

Congressman Tom Suozzi (D-Long Island, Queens) met with Colonel Matthew Luzzatto, Army Corps of Engineers New York District Commander and District Engineer, at the Northport VA to announce that the demolition of buildings of 1 and 2 will begin by the end of the June.

The current buildings stand as a stark example of Northports aging infrastructure and are an eyesore that misrepresents the care veterans deserve

After years of advocating, these derelict buildings are finally coming down, said Suozzi. This is a huge victory for the Northport VA and our veterans and is something that I have been prioritizing since I came to Congress in 2017. When you pull into the Northport VA, the first things you see are these two decaying and decrepit buildings. But at the end of the month, that will be no more.

Suozzi who has worked with the Department of Veterans Affairs to demolish the structures since his election in 2017, has said the dilapidated buildings  which are surrounded by hazard fencing because of the risk of falling debris  sends the wrong message to the public about how the facility cares for its veterans. Thats why since coming to Congress, Suozzi has worked to improve the image and quality of care at the Northport VA.

The demolition of these two decaying buildings, which are the first structures one sees upon entering the Northport campus, will yield much-needed parking for the facility which cares for more than 30,000 veterans a year.
Michigan City Soul Steppers getting back into rhythm with largest event ever on Juneteenth
(Alliance News) - Carnival PLC on Friday said its Princess Cruises has extended plans to begin US sailings again, adding Los Angeles, San Francisco and Fort Lauderdale to the destinations cruises will depart from this autumn.

In May, the cruise ship operator said it would restart cruises starting with voyages from Seattle to Alaska in July.

Between September 25 and November 28 eight ships will recommence travel to the Caribbean, Panama, Hawaii, and the California Coast, Carnival said.

"As we continue our return to service, it is a thrill for us to be able to bring more cruise vacation options to our travel-starved guests," said Jan Swartz, Princess Cruises president.

"We appreciate the support of government and port officials who we worked closely with to make these travel opportunities available."

The trip plans come after the US Centers for Disease Controla& Prevention relaxed guidance on cruise ships last month.

In May, the company said some of its units have resumed cruises in Europe and the Caribbean.

AIDA Cruises, Costa Cruises, Cunard, Holland America Line, Princess Cruises, Seabourn and P&O Cruises have begun sailing from global ports in Europe and the Caribbean, Carnival said.

Back in March of last year, the US CDC recommended people to avoid travelling on cruise ships.

Carnival shares were down 1.2% at 1,739.20 pence in London on Friday.

By Will Paige; willpaige@alliancenews.com

Copyright 2021 Alliance News Limited. All Rights Reserved.
(Alliance News) - The UK government is looking to privatise public broadcaster Channel 4 as soon at next year, Financial Times reported on Thursday.

Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public-service television network, perhaps best known for hosting the Great British Bake Off.

Government ministers will be launching a formal consultation within a week on the future of the 38-year old channel, with privatisation happening as early as 2022, the newspaper said.

The advent of video streaming will likely have an effect on any sale price of the channel, which is funded solely by advertising, according to the FT.

Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden has decided to reopen the debate over the "best model" for the government-owned but privately funded broadcaster, "including an outright sale", the FT said, citing "people briefed on the plans".

Privatising the channel has been explored by ministers more than half a dozen times since the 1980s but has consistently been ruled out because of the likely impact on programming and the independent television sector.

https://www.ft.com/content/7c8bffd3-74ca-455d-835e-4557b645c504

By Greg Roxburgh; gregroxburgh@alliancenews.com

Copyright 2021 Alliance News Limited. All Rights Reserved.
(Alliance News) - Foodservice firm Kerry Group PLC on Friday said it has agreed to sell its Consumer Foods' Meats & Meals business in the UK and Ireland to Pilgrim's Pride for EUR819 million.

The Tralee, Ireland-based firm, however, confirmed that it will retain its dairy business. Kerry in February announced it is conducting a strategic review of the business and in April, it said talks for a potential sale were suspended.

Kerry shares were 3.8% higher at EUR110.05 each on Friday morning in London, valuing the company at EUR19.49 billion.

The meats business the company has agreed to sell is a manufacturer of branded and private label meats, meat snacks, food-to-go and meat-free products, with its brands including sausage maker Richmond, Fridge Raiders and Rollover.

The Meals business primarily serves the UK market and "specialises in authentic ethnic chilled and frozen ready meals, multi-cuisine ready to cook ranges, and home delivery meals under the Oakhouse brand."

The Meats & Meals business achieved revenue of EUR828 million and pretax profit of EUR63 million for 2020.

Kerry plans to use the sale proceeds for the ongoing strategic development of the Taste & Nutrition business, as well as for general corporate purposes.

The deal is expected to close in the final quarter.

"Following today's announcement, we will separate and realign the remaining dairy-related activities within the Consumer Foods Business. The strategic review of the dairy business has been completed, and there will be no disposal of the dairy business at this time," it added.

By Eric Cunha; ericcunha@alliancenews.com

Copyright 2021 Alliance News Limited. All Rights Reserved.
Today

Mostly cloudy this morning with thunderstorms developing this afternoon. High 88F. Winds WNW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 70%. Locally heavy rainfall possible.

Tonight

Thunderstorms likely this evening. Then a chance of scattered thunderstorms overnight. Low 73F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 70%.

Tomorrow

Thunderstorms likely. High near 85F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 80%.
It was announced today that from June 19, a new Te Reo Maori top 10 will feature in the official New Zealand Music Charts.

Nga Waiata Kairangi I Te Reo Maori O Te Rarangi 10 O Runga, the Official Top 10 Te Reo Maori Singles of the week, will showcase the biggest songs with vocals that are primarily sung in te reo.

There is a general requirement that at least 70 percent of all the vocals on a track must be performed in te reo Maori in order to be considered - an initiative musicians like Stan Walker say will help the language survive and prosper.

"I can only explain the Maori experience, history and culture through te reo - to explain it in English is to diminish it," Walker explained in a statement.

"Often when I talk in English, I need to switch to a te reo word as there is no English word to capture exactly what I want to say. If te reo is lost, to be Maori is lost.

"My language must be a living, breathing organ - not a dusty, unread book in a library."

Recorded Music chief executive Damian Vaugh said the introduction of the new chart shows the New Zealand music industry is progressing positively.

"The fact that there is enough new waiata being recorded in te reo Maori to warrant the creation of a standalone chart is evidence that the industry is evolving and changing.

"As te reo Maori continues to become more mainstream in Aotearoa, we will continue to support the efforts of the industry to embrace Te Ao Maori."

Meanwhile, award-winning hip hop artist Rei said there was still a lot of work to do to move past "this current period of tokenism into one of normalisation", and that an integrated chart that highlighted te reo music would help achieve this.

"[It will] force [music] program directors to take more notice of what we're doing."
Lee unveils posters celebrating

Tennessees grand divisions,

225 years of statehood

On Thursday, Gov. Bill Lee unveiled three limited-edition posters highlighting each Tennessee grand division to celebrate 225 years of statehood. Tennesseans are invited to share an untold story and request a poster at www.Tennessee225.com.

From the Mississippi River to the Great Smoky Mountains, our grand divisions reflect their own unique character and represent the best of Tennessee, Lee said in a news release. I invite Tennesseans to submit untold stories that celebrate every corner of our state as we commemorate 225 years of statehood.

The limited-edition posters, designed by famed artist Justin Helton of Knoxville, highlight the culture and beauty of each Tennessee grand division.

 Staff Report

Former doctor gets 3 years

for illegal opioid distribution

A former Tennessee doctor who pleaded guilty to unlawfully distributing opioids has been sentenced to three years in prison, the Justice Department said.

Darrel R. Rinehart, 66, of Indianapolis, admitted to distributing controlled substances, primarily opioids, to four patients without a legitimate medical purpose 18 times between December 2014 and December 2015, the agency said. Rinehart also admitted to distributing hydrocodone in January 2016 to a patient who did not have health issues justifying the prescription, the statement said.

Rinehart, who ran a clinic in Columbia for decades, was indicted in 2019 on 19 counts of distributing a controlled substance, The Tennessean reported.

A joint investigation by The Tennessean and The Indianapolis Star brought the case to the attention of the U.S. Attorneys Office, which stepped in to investigate.

At least five of Rineharts patients suffered fatal overdoses that were at least partially blamed on drugs he prescribed between March 2015 and January 2016, the newspapers reported, citing public records.

 Associated Press

Commission selects 3 candidates

to fill judicial vacancy

Tennessees Trial Court Vacancy Commission on Wednesday selected three possible candidates to fill a vacancy in the 19th Judicial Circuit.

The commission selected Robert T. Bateman, Carl Daniel Brollier Jr. and Max D. Fagan, according to a news release. The commission chose the three from five candidates who applied. Gov. Bill Lee will now make the final selection.

The district covers Montgomery and Robertson counties.

The vacancy was created by the appointment of Judge Jill Bartee Ayers to the Court of Criminal Appeals.

 Associated Press
(The Center Square)Gov. Bill Lee and Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds sent a letter June 10 to U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee ranking member Sen. Chuck Grassley, offering support for oversight hearings on the Biden administration's handling of unaccompanied migrant children.

We believe the hearing should also address the Biden administrations failure to provide notice and transparency in their movement of unaccompanied migrant children into states, the letter said.

The letter referenced a May 20 overnight flight into the Chattanooga airport, where children reportedly were put on buses and sent to areas throughout the southeast.

The Tennessee Department of Safety and Homeland Security reached out to federal counterparts and were told those federal agencies had no knowledge of the flights.

The Biden administration is secretly transporting migrants to communities throughout the United States, including in Tennessee, without the knowledge of or permission of the communities involved, said U.S. Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tennessee. President Bidens failed immigration policies have turned every town into a border town. The Senate Judiciary Committee should immediately hold an oversight hearing on the crisis at our southern border. I applaud Gov. Lee for his efforts to protect our state and the people who are being trafficked by the Mexican cartels.

The letter said the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services told the Tennessee commissioner of safety during a phone call that flights should not be happening in the dead of night. The letter also cites reports of similar middle-of-the-night flights into Knoxville and the Tri-Cities area in northeast Tennessee.

According to the letter, HHS said during the call eight children on the Chattanooga flight were put into care in Tennessee, while others went to Alabama, Georgia, Kentucky, Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina.

We hope that our experiences help to shed light on the challenges faced by governors across the country as we are forced to respond to the Biden administrations failed policies at the border, the letter said.

Iowa had similar complaints, citing an April 22 flight into the Des Moines airport that HHS also confirmed with the state May 21.

The governors asked for transparency on the flights and/or a way to confirm flights into their states involving unaccompanied migrant children in the future.

Tennessee recently announced it was forming a 10-member Joint Study Committee on Refugee Issues in response to the flights. The Chattanooga Times Free Press reported the Tennessee Department of Children's Services approved a license for a Chattanooga shelter to house unaccompanied migrant children in 2020. The shelter, operated by the Georgia-based Baptiste Group, began accepting children in November as part of federally funded shelters across the country.
The Denmark vs Belgium match on Thursday night was paused for 60 seconds in the 10th minute of the encounter, with players and fans paying tribute to Christian Eriksen. The minute was chosen because of his No.10 shirt number and the tribute was agreed by both sets of players before kick off.

Referee Bjorn Kuipers oversaw the temporary stoppage, as players and fans applauded for a full minute before the action resumed.

The match took place at the same stadium where Eriksen suffered his collapse on Saturday, at the Parken Stadium in Copenhagen. Fans had messages of support for the midfielder from before kick off, happy that he is doing well in hospital.

Denmark led 1-0 at the moment of the stoppage, thanks to Yussuf Poulsen's second minute goal. But, Belgium came from behind with strikes from Thorgan Hazard and Kevin de Bruyne.
Marshall, TX (75670)

Today

Cloudy skies this morning followed by thunderstorms during the afternoon. High near 85F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 80%. Locally heavy rainfall possible..

Tonight

Scattered thunderstorms during the evening, with mostly cloudy skies after midnight. Low 67F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 60%.
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Goldie Wilkinson, 90 of Alderson died Tuesday, June 29, 2021. Family will greet friends and relatives 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. Thursday at Bishop Funeral Service. Funeral service will be 2:00 p.m., Friday at Bishop Chapel of Memories Burial will follow in Memory Gardens Memorial Park Cemetery.
Click for the latest, full-access Enid News & Eagle headlines | Text Alerts | app downloads

Kelci McKendrick is police and court reporter for the Enid News & Eagle.

Have a question about this story? Do you see something we missed? Do you have a story idea for Kelci? Send an email to kelcim@enidnews.com
Marietta, GA (30060)

Today

Scattered thunderstorms during the morning. Cloudy skies this afternoon. High 81F. Winds W at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%..

Tonight

A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible early. Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 62F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph.
Atlanta, GA (30303)

Today

Cloudy. Periods of light rain this morning. High around 80F. Winds W at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 80%..

Tonight

A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible early. Partly cloudy skies. Low 64F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph.
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Marietta, GA (30060)

Today

Showers and thundershowers likely, especially during the morning. High 81F. Winds W at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 70%..

Tonight

A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible early. Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 63F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph.
Meadville, PA (16335)

Today

Thunderstorms likely this morning. Then a chance of scattered thunderstorms this afternoon. High 66F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 80%..

Tonight

Partly to mostly cloudy skies with scattered thunderstorms during the evening. Low 56F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%.
The Chinese Communist Party has been reluctant to release relevant information. Reports based on US intelligence have suggested the lab collaborated on projects with the Chinese military," the essay in WSJ said."But the most compelling reason to favor the lab leak hypothesis is firmly based in science. In particular, consider the genetic fingerprint of CoV-2, the novel coronavirus responsible for the disease COVID-19," the experts said.They say that the genome sequencing of COVID-19 suggests that the virus was manufactured inside a Chinese laboratory.SARS-CoV-2's genetic sequencing almost certainly demonstrates that it is an artificially-manipulated virus developed in a laboratory, they say.Quay. who had briefed the US Congress on the virus' origins early last year and published a 193-page study in January suggesting the virus was "laboratory derived", and Muller, a Physics Professor at University of California Berkeley, wrote the op-ed in theThe experts argued that "the most compelling reason" to support the lab leak theory wasn't related to the circumstantial evidence about Chinese experiments in coronavirus gain of function research, alleged illnesses among lab workers at the Wuhan Institute of Virology or US intelligence reports, but because SARS-Cov-2's "genetic footprint has never been observed in a natural coronavirus"."In gain-of-function research, a microbiologist can increase the lethality of a coronavirus enormously by splicing a special sequence into its genome at a prime location.Doing this leaves no trace of manipulation. But it alters the virus spike protein, rendering it easier for the virus to inject genetic material into the victim cell.Since 1992, there have been at least 11 separate experiments adding a special sequence to the same location. The end result has always been supercharged viruses," they said in the op-ed.COVID-19 has the genome sequencing 'CGG-CGG' and the experts assert that no naturally occurring coronavirus - such as SARS or MERS - has ever had a CGG-CGG combination."The CGG-CGG combination has never been found naturally. That means the common method of viruses picking up new skills, called recombination, cannot operate here," they wrote in the"A virus simply cannot pick up a sequence from another virus if that sequence isn't present in any other virus"."At the minimum, this fact - that the coronavirus, with all its random possibilities, took the rare and unnatural combination used by human researchers - implies that the leading theory for the origin of the coronavirus must be laboratory escape," they wroteSource: IANS
Newly developed Artificial Intelligence-based model can be acquired easily and at a larger scale from different countries and for all genders and age groups.

A team of researchers from RMIT University accessed datasets from two of these platforms -- Covid-19 Sounds App and COSWARA -- to train the algorithm using contrastive self-supervised learning, a method by which a system works independently to encode what makes two things similar or different.With further development, their algorithm could power a diagnostic mobile phone app, said lead author Hao Xue, Research Fellow in RMIT's School of Computing Technologies."We've overcome a major hurdle in the development of a reliable, easily-accessible and contactless preliminary diagnosis tool for Covid-19," said Xue, Research Fellow in RMIT's School of Computing Technologies."This could have significant benefit in slowing the spread of the virus by those who have no obvious symptoms. A mobile app that can give you peace of mind during community outbreaks or prompt you to seek a Covid test -- that's the kind of innovative tool we need to better manage this pandemic," Xue added.Xue said the method they developed could also be extended for other respiratory diseases like tuberculosis.While this is not the first Covid cough classification algorithm to be developed, the RMIT model outperforms existing approaches.According to co-author Professor Flora Salim, previous attempts to develop this type of technology, like those at MIT and Cambridge, relied on huge amounts of meticulously-labeled data to train the AI system."The annotation of respiratory sounds requires specific knowledge from experts, making it expensive and time-consuming, and involves handling sensitive health information," she said.Moreover, cough samples from one hospital or one region to train the algorithm also limits its performance outside that setting."What's most exciting about our work is we have overcome this problem by developing a method to train the algorithm using unlabeled cough sound data. This can be acquired relatively easily and at a larger scale from different countries, genders and ages," Salim noted.Source: IANS
It is very common for heads of states to gift something or the other whenever they meet their foreign counterparts. For example, our Prime Minister, Narendra Modi was once gifted a rather dope-looking pair of Maybach sunglasses, when India hosted a convoy of German delegates.



 Reuters

Keeping this tradition in mind, the president of the United States, Joe Biden, gave Vladimir Putin, the president of Russia, a cool pair of aviators, made out of 23 karat gold.



 Reuters

Joe Biden has always been a fan of aviator styled sunglasses, and can often be seen wearing them, even when he was the vice-president to former President Obama.



Moreover, what is of interest, is that he doesnt stick to a single brand - From RayBan to DKNY, he has been seen wearing a wide variety of brands.

 Reuters

The sunglasses that Joe Biden gifted Putin, come from Randolph, a label that specialises in making sunglasses for the US Armed Forces.



The sunglasses that were gifted to President Putin, are called the Concorde Teardrop Sunglasses in 23k Gold. They start at $239 for a very basic set-up and go all the way up to $299 or roughly about Rs 23,000.

 AFP

The one that President Biden got for President Putin, apparently had some nifty personalisations which would make his particular sunglasses, a one-off.



 Reuters

Randolph Engineering, the company that owns the Randolph Label, is seen as a proper, blue-blooded American brand. The company which was founded n 1973, makes these sunglasses by hand in a small town in Massachusetts.



Because these sunglasses are handbuild, they take about 6 weeks, and over 200 steps to make one pair.

 Rudolph

Randolph Engineering also supplies about 25000 pairs of sunglasses to the US Armed forces, every month. This is the reason, why many political pundits are going bonkers over the symbolism that is behind this gift.



Say what you will but both the Presidents, Joe Biden & Vladimir Putin are men of style.

Joe Biden has always been a fan of the classic tear dropped aviator, and as we said, has often been spotted wearing a pair.

President Putin, on the other hand, is an avid watch collector and a horologist and owns some of the most sought after timepieces.

 Reuters

It will be really interesting to see, what President Putin gifts President Biden. A watch from his very own personal collection is certainly not out of the question.


If you live in India or have at least seen Hindi movies, you have got to be familiar with the fact that the administrative system within the country clearly doesn't always function as it should according to the books.



 Twitter

To put it simply, the officials trying to do good or be honest are often pushed around and transferred from one place to another till the time they get used to the system.



Well, putting our theory to test is an IAS officer from Madhya Pradesh, who has been up in the news for slamming this "system" after being transferred around nine times in a period of 54 months.

 Twitter/News18 Hindi

Lokesh Kumar Jangid, an IAS officer from the 2014 batch, has been posted as SDM Shahdol, deputy secretary urban development, CEO Jila Panchayat Harda, additional collector Guna, additional managing director Rajya Siksha Kendra, additional collector Barwani, before being reverted back as additional managing director Rajya Siksha Kendra, recently.



Clearly frustrated, the 35-year-old IAS officer expressed his helplessness against the system for which he was removed from a closed group of Madhya Pradesh IAS officers Association (MPIASOA) on the Signal app.

The incident came to light after screenshots of Jangid's conversation were leaked online.

On Monday (June 14), he had posted:

"Interestingly while those who mint money from all kinds of mafia, get transferred from field to field. And those with IMPECCABLE INTEGRITY get thrown to Secretariat on transfer.

Calling the Civil Services Board a joke, Jangid had said that he would reveal more once his hands aren't tied under the rules of conduct.

Stability of tenure in Madhya Pradesh and the joke of an institution called Civil Services Board. I will come out with a book post-retirement and hopefully bring the facts before everyone to see. Right now, my hands are tied by the bloody conduct rules.

He also revealed how he was removed for calling a collector 'weak'.

of course, who's who in the bureaucracy are mere Nero's Guests these days. The same thing happened in Shahdol when I was SDM. I told Collector that he's a weak Collector, which he bloody was. And I was removed on that ground Jangid wrote.

 Twitter

Following the leak, the Madhya Pradesh government has served a notice to Jangid over "indiscipline" and has been told to respond within a week for it.



Most of the bureaucrats who have worked with Jangid had pledged that he is one of the honest IAS officers in the state, while also admitting that they have no doubts over his integrity.
The Indian National Congress alleged on Thursday that Prime Minister Narendra Modi wants to suppress the voice of 140 more Indians with its new IT rules.

Congress chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said that the Indian Governments action on social media platforms is only aimed to 'suppress the freedom of speech expression of the Indian people'.

 Youtube_Indian National Congress

The Congress spokesperson said this in the context of the government taking action against Twitter and removing it from any form of legal protection as an intermediary.



The Government has asked Twitter to comply with the new IT rules or officially known as the intermediary guidelines.

Twitter had received multiple warnings from the government and finally, lost its "safe harbour protection in India over non-compliance.

Union Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad also blasted Twitter for deliberately" choosing the path of non-compliance despite the government giving it multiple opportunities.

It is astounding that Twitter which portrays itself as the flag bearer of free speech, chooses the path of deliberate defiance when it comes to the Intermediary Guidelines, Prasad said in a statement posted on Twitter.

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However, Surjewala said that Twitter does not write anything of its own and it is the people of the country who are writing against the government and its policies.



"Prime Minister Modi wants to suppress the voice of 140 crore Indians. It is the fight for the freedom of speech. Today, journalists in the country cannot write against this government, else they will lose their job or life. In such a situation, only YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, social platforms are left and Modi ji himself is the creation of such platforms," he told reporters.

"Twitter does not write anything of its own. It is the people of India -- the youth, the Dalits, the farmers, the poor -- who write against the government and criticise Modi ji, then they have problems. Now, they want to lock down every social media platform as well and this is their intention," the Congress leader said.

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Twitter did say earlier this week that the company has appointed an interim Chief Compliance Officer, however, it seems like it was too late for the social media giant to assuage tensions with the Indian government.



As of today, Twitter India MD has been summoned by the UP police and needs to report in within 7 days over the incident that happened in Ghaziabad.
Meridian, MS (39302)

Today

Mostly cloudy early followed by heavy thunderstorms this afternoon. High 82F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 60%. Locally heavy rainfall possible..

Tonight

A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible early. Partly cloudy. Low 66F. Winds light and variable.
As the pandemic winds down, so does the Minnesota Legislatures battle over Tim Walzs emergency powers
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Louai Al Zouabi

Louai Al Zouabi

My name is Louai Al Zouabi. I came from Syria in April 2015. Life in Syria became difficult and I felt unsafe for myself and my family. My family and I went to Jordan and lived in a camp for four years. The health conditions and the living arrangements were not good in the camp.

We applied for refugee status and were accepted to move to the United States. We knew we will be safe there and were happy to move.

Once we arrived in the United States, we realized that there will be a lot of work we need to do. New language, new culture and learn new systems. We received help from the resettlement agency to which we were assigned, USCRI in Dearborn. The staff there was very supportive and provided us with the guidance necessary to be able to do the things we needed to do, such as learn English, enroll our children in school and find employment. I knew from the beginning that I did not want to stay home and live on public assistance, I wanted to work and provide for my family, but also to help others just like others helped me when I needed it.

My case manager informed me of a great program, Individual Development Account (IDA), that helps working refugees save money to purchase a car. I enrolled in this program and I attended financial literacy classes and saved money from my paycheck every month until I was able to buy a car. Now, I have my own business as an Uber driver. Having this job gives me the flexibility to also help others in my community, as this was my goal from the beginning. I can provide transportation for those who cannot afford it, especially refugees in their first few weeks of arrival in the United States.

My family and I are grateful to live in a peaceful country and to be able to rebuild our lives in a welcoming community.
Mai Xiong

Mai Xiong

My parents were farmers who were born and lived in the remote mountainous areas of Laos. We are of Hmong descent. The Hmong people are an ethnic minority group that over centuries, migrated from China into Laos and neighboring countries in order to maintain its own culture, language, and religious practices.

From 1959 to 1973, thousands of Hmong men and boys were recruited by the United States government to protect American soldiers and rescue downed American pilots during the Vietnam War. My father was 17 years old when he was recruited. As of result of their involvement in the American effort, the Hmong were seen as traitors to the communist Lao government and ordered to be persecuted.

When the U.S pulled out of Laos in the late 1970s, my parents spent years hiding in the jungles. In 1979, they fled for their lives -swimming across the Mekong River in the middle of the night into neighboring Thailand. My family, like thousands of Hmong, were placed in refugee camps as they arrived. In December of 1984, my mother gave birth to me in the Ban Vinai refugee camp in Loei Providence.

In 1987, when I was three years old, my family was accepted into the United States under the refugee relocation program. We flew from Bangkok to Ohio with nothing but the clothes on our backs.

Life was very hard for my parents. They did not speak English and had no formal education. They risked their lives for the safety of their children and focused on raising us to become contributing members of our new country. My parents instilled in my siblings and me the importance of hard work and education so that we would not struggle like them.

In 2003, I was accepted to the College for Creative Studies in Detroit to pursue my passion for art and design. I graduated in 2007 with my Bachelor of Fine Arts.

In 2017, I built an e-commerce store and company designing clothes inspired by my Hmong heritage. My company quickly grew out of our home and in 2019, we opened our storefront in Warren.

In 2020, I ran for public office and was elected in November 2020 as the first Hmong American elected official in Macomb County. I'm now at a point in my life where I can give back and that is why it is an honor for me to be serving others and giving back to the community that has given my family so much.
Noura Al Qalam

Noura Al Qalam

My name is Noura and I am from Syria. I fled the country with my husband and two small daughters because of war. We knew that continuing to stay there will not be safe, so we left Syria and moved to Jordan. Once there, we applied for refugee status and waited seven years for our case to be reviewed and a decision made. The waiting time was very long and difficult. Once we were asked if we agree to be resettled in the United States and we said yes, we received an appointment for our first interview. It took 4 years after this appointment for our case to be approved and travel scheduled, and on August 20, 2020 we left for America. We traveled to Oklahoma where we experienced the first encounter with a Refugee Resettlement agency and workers. They were very kind and welcomed us with joy. Although we were overwhelmed by their care and kindness, we wanted to come to Michigan and join a larger Syrian community.

A day later we moved to Michigan where we were received by Samaritas, the local resettlement agency. It was the middle of a worldwide pandemic and it was very difficult for us all, but the agency and its staff assisted us with finding a home in Detroit and help meet our other needs. We also received help from ACC who provided us with a laptop and other useful supplies for the entire family. Again, we experienced so much love and caring from everyone! Our family is hardworking, and we informed them that we want to work, study, and take care of ourselves as soon as possible. We did not want to be a burden to anyone, not a person, agency or the country that welcomed us.

I cannot say that it was easy to adapt. Everything was new to us. The streets, language, money, culture, school for our children. We met respectable people who helped us navigate all these new places and systems, through a global pandemic. It has been less than a year since we moved here, but we can say that we already belong. My two daughters are enrolled in school and are learning English. Their teachers praise them on how well they are doing, and we are very proud. I enrolled in an English as a Second Language class to improve my language skills. My husband is working and supporting our family. The company my husband works for is owned by a previous refugee just like us. He, too, wanted to contribute to the community and is now hiring other refugees and helps them succeed. It's our goal to also be good citizens and help others just like others helped us.

I hope that our lives continue to develop joy and happiness here in America. I have a wish that the rest of my family - my mother, father and siblings - will come to America so our family is complete.
Tamara Silva Peregrin

Tamara Silva Peregrin

My name is Tamara Silva Peregrin, I am a naturalized U.S. citizen who is an optimistic person and full of passion for life. I would like to share my story so that it may help others on their personal journey.

In 1994, I left Cuba trying to reach the U.S. Florida's keys in a homemade boat with 23 other people. Some died at sea and some others like me were rescued by the US Coast Guard and transported to the U.S. Naval Base in Guantanamo, Cuba. At that time, Guantanamo Naval Base housed 35,000 people in refugee camps under the strictest military rules. On May 2, 1995, the U.S. Government changed its policy allowing for the immigration process to begin for many at the camp. I volunteered my time at Guantanamo teaching young children, interpreting in a refugee Art Gallery, and working for the Military Information Support Team (MIST).

In January 1996, I arrived in Michigan to fulfill my dream of freedom and opportunity. Twenty-one days after my arrival I found my first job with the help of the St. Vincent Catholic Charities/Refugee Resettlement Program (St. VCC). I would have preferred finding a job in teaching since I earned a Bachelor of Arts in Education. I was, however, happy to attain any job that would allow me to stand on my own. While working this full-time job, I pursued studies at Lansing Community College. Two years later I had the opportunity to become an employee at St. VCC under the Refugee Resettlement Program. There, I worked as a Job Developer and Case Manager for almost 19 years. Our main priority in the program was to resettle refugee families in the Lansing area and help adults become self-sufficient through employment, and not depend on public assistance. St. VCC also offered free classes and training to teach refugees how to achieve independence, regardless of their background education, language, and any other barrier they may be experiencing.

I am currently working at Peckham Inc. as a Bilingual Vocational Services Specialist. Peckham Inc. is a nonprofit vocational rehabilitation organization, that provides job opportunities for people with disabilities such as mental health, physical and socioeconomic barriers. I help people develop work-related skills and I provide resources that allow them to keep their job long-term and to become self-sufficient.

I hope my story and journey will encourage others to have confidence in themselves and not fall into the belief that they must depend on social and government assistance to live in the U.S. Most people who come to this country have the intention of being independent and productive, and I believe they should be able to just that.

I am happy to be a citizen of this great country. I am part of the Cuban-American community who make a significant contribution to the local community, and the place I call home. I adore this country and I am happy to serve at my capacity.
State Treasurer: Grant Will Help Southwest Michigan Plan for Adjustment and Recovery from Nuclear Power Plant Closure in 2022

State Treasurer: Grant Will Help Southwest Michigan Plan for Adjustment and Recovery from Nuclear Power Plant Closure in 2022

June 18, 2021

State Treasurer Rachael Eubanks today applauded the announcement of more than $1.2 million in grant dollars being awarded for economic recovery and planning purposes as Southwest Michigan prepares for the closure of the Palisades Nuclear Generating Station in 2022.

The U.S. Commerce Department's Economic Development Administration (EDA) is awarding a $969,261 grant to the Southwestern Michigan Planning Commission to develop an economic recovery strategy ahead of the closure of the Palisades. This grant will be matched with $242,316 in state and private funds provided by the Michigan Department of Treasury, Michigan State Housing and Development Authority and Consumers Energy.

"Our energy supplies are changing -- and the Michigan Department of Treasury is proactively working with communities as we all navigate closures of existing facilities that have been important parts of local economies for decades," State Treasurer Rachael Eubanks said. "This is an opportunity for us to help bring together resources and expertise to support communities as they chart their economic future. Together, we can create a blueprint to recover from such a loss and create a just transition for these communities."

The grant's funds are part of a statewide effort to implement the Energy Transition Impact Project (ETIP). Created under Executive Directive 2020-10, ETIP helps communities in Michigan overcome significant issues associated with the closure of an aging power plant, such as reduced tax base, lost employment, significant reduction in services, site remediation, environmental justice and the need for economic development.

With community input, the state Treasury Department has been providing analysis, assistance, expertise and planning to assist in developing an energy transition strategy for areas affected by changes in the energy industry and the sources of energy generation.

"Van Buren County believes in a proactive, holistic approach to mitigate the job, real estate, human capital and tax revenue impacts resulting from the closure of Palisades," said John Faul, Palisades Project Director for Van Buren County. "We welcome and appreciate the wonderful opportunity this project presents to collaborate with our state and federal partners for investment in Van Buren County that we expect to grow out of this work."

Obtaining the U.S. Commerce Department's EDA grant required the efforts of federal, state, local and private industry partners to collectively work together.

"Consumers Energy is committed to investing in Michigan communities as we transition to new energy resources to power our future," said Brandon Hofmeister, president of the Consumers Energy Foundation. "The Consumers Energy Foundation is proud to show that through our $140,000 grant to support Southwest Michigan's efforts to continue to grow and thrive."

This project is being partially funded under EDA's Assistance to Nuclear Closure Communities program. Closures of nuclear power plants throughout the United States have had a significant impact on the economic foundations of surrounding communities through sudden job losses and a reduction to the local tax base. The EDA works with communities facing structural economic adjustments, including those impacted by nuclear power plant closures.

To learn more about ETIP, go to Michigan.gov/ETIP.

# # #

Press Contacts: Danelle Gittus or Ron Leix, Treasury Public Information Officers, at 517-335-2167
MSHDA Board approves Qualified Allocation Plan and loan commitments for affordable housing developments

MSHDA Board approves Qualified Allocation Plan and loan commitments for affordable housing developments

Media Contacts:

Katie Bach, Bachk@michigan.gov

Anna Vicari, VicariA@michigan.gov

June 18, 2021

LANSING, Mich. - During its June board meeting, the Michigan State Housing Development Authority Board approved the agency's 2021-22 budget, the bi-annual plan for administration of Low-Income Housing Tax Credits (LIHTC) in Michigan, and several financial transactions that create and preserve affordable housing.

The Qualified Allocation Plan (QAP), amended every two years, reflects MSHDA's priorities for allocating Low-Income Housing Tax Credits (LIHTC) for rental housing. The plan was created with extensive partner and public input and addresses the state's highest affordable housing needs and the efficient use of the tax credits. Changes focus on providing urban and rural balance in the distribution of resources, Green building standards, Tribal Housing, disaster credits, overburdened households, deep rent and income targeting, and a commitment to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.

"This plan aims to ensure the equitable distribution of resources throughout the state, the production of more units and resource efficiency, greener and healthier housing, as well as a commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion to inform future QAP policy," said Chad Benson, MSHDA rental development director.

The QAP now goes to Governor Gretchen Whitmer for her review and signature.

The board approved separate loan commitments in the amount of more than $13.7 million for two phases of the Reverend Dr. Jim Holley Residences in Detroit. The development sits within the city's greater downtown and is in a federally recognized Opportunity Zone, an area with a high demand for affordable housing. A building at 9001 Woodward Avenue will be demolished to make way for new construction of 60 family units with first class amenities.

In other action, the MSHDA Board:

approved a $500,000 loan to Circle Drive I Apartments for minor rehabilitation of the 129-unit family community in the Elmwood area of Detroit.

adopted an inducement resolution for Cambridge Square of Flint, for the proposed acquisition and rehabilitation of the 160-unit family development in Flint Township. Approving the inducement resolution will allow the project to incur costs necessary for rehabilitating the property. The construction will create an estimated 20-30 temporary construction jobs, and the property will retain roughly 20 professional jobs.

adopted an inducement resolution to cover costs incurred in the proposed acquisition and rehabilitation of a property on Cherry Hill Road in Inkster. The family and elderly communities on the property will be owned by separate entities. Cherry Hill Townhomes will consist of six, two-story buildings with 36 townhome style family units. The residents will benefit from a comprehensive rehabilitation of the development. Cherry Hill Place has one seven-story tower with 150 one- and two-bedroom elderly apartments. The units will be remodeled or rehabilitated with updates to resident units, common spaces, and exterior and grounds.

"These actions ensure there is an adequate supply of safe, decent and affordable housing preserved for seniors and families with low and moderate incomes in eligible distressed areas," said Gary Heidel, MSHDA acting executive director. "The temporary and permanent jobs generated from these developments also will have a positive ripple effect on the surrounding neighborhoods and their local economies."
World Refugee Day highlights contributions of refugees, celebrates Michigan being a safe, welcoming state

World Refugee Day highlights contributions of refugees, celebrates Michigan being a safe, welcoming state

Friday, June 18, 2021

CONTACT: Camara Lewis, 517-930-4928

LANSING, Mich.-- With over 70 million people around the world forced to flee their homes due to violence and persecution, Gov. Whitmer proclaims June 20 as World Refugee Day in Michigan, to highlight Michigan as a safe and welcoming home to many looking for hope and opportunity, and to acknowledge their struggle and protect their human rights.

Refugees living in the U.S. and several Michigan cities make tremendous contributions to our economy as earners, taxpayers and consumers just like all immigrants, and to ensure their collective success the state's Office of Global Michigan (OGM) offers supportive services as they adjust to their new homes.

"Michigan has stepped up to meet the needs and welcome thousands of refugees who are in eager to be contributing members of society," said OGM Director Fayrouz Saad. "Through our services and resources, we are providing a sturdy foundation to rebuild their lives and opportunities for success."



OGM's Refugee Services program leverages federal, state and local resources to ensure refugees can contribute to their highest potential and use their talents to make Michigan continue to thrive. The program contracts with various non-profit and local agencies to provide social services to help people start over, become self-sufficient and integrate with their new community.

Five Michigan agencies, funded through the federal Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration in the Department of State, provide initial reception and placement services for the first 30 to 90 days in the United States for people who have just arrived in the country with refugee status.

The following agencies in Michigan assist with that initial resettlement process:

The state recognizes World Refugee Day as a time engage in conversation about the global need to welcome refugees and understand that fleeing their home country is often just the beginning of a difficult journey.

"We encourage Michigan residents to recognize the perseverance and accomplishments of their new neighbors and reflect on the severity of the global refugee crisis," Saad added.

Join the conversation online using #WorldRefugeeDay and visit Michigan.gov/ImmigrantHeritage for the digital toolkit and refugee stories.

Quotes from refugees who have made Michigan home

"I hope my story and journey will encourage others to have confidence in themselves and not fall into the belief that they must depend on social and government assistance to live in the U.S.," said Cuban American Tamara Silva Peregrin, who fled Cuba in 1994. "Most people who come to this country have the intention of being independent and productive, and I believe they should be able to just that."

"I immigrated to the United States in 2019 from Kenya because I wanted to make a better life and really to actualize my full potential," said Brain Nagila, who fled Kenya in 2019. "It was not an easy journey but I kept hope alive and yearned for a better tomorrow."

"In August 2020, we moved our family to Michigan where we were received by Samaritas, the local resettlement agency," said Noura Al Qalam, who fled war in Syria. "It was the middle of a worldwide pandemic and it was very difficult for us all, but the agency and its staff assisted us with finding a home in Detroit and helped meet our other needs."
Benson: Juneteenth is an opportunity to recommit to racial equity

Benson: Juneteenth is an opportunity to recommit to racial equity

JUNE 18, 2021

As Juneteenth became a national holiday this week, Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson reflected on the historic moment and the opportunity it provides to advance racial justice in our state and nation.

"Juneteenth celebrates the freedom of Black Americans and the dignity of all Americans by marking the date our country ended a horrific, inhumane chapter in our history," said Benson. "As Secretary of State, I remain committed to increasing racial equity and access in our public services, our elections and our democracy to build a more just society for all."

On June 19, 1865, over two years after President Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation marked a formal end to slavery in the United States, Union troops finally arrived in Galveston, Texas, bringing with them the news that the Civil War had ended and informing the last enslaved Black Americans that they were free. Since then, Juneteenth has been observed by African American communities across the nation, celebrating the end of slavery in the United States and honoring the struggle for freedom of African Americans.

"We at the Michigan Department of State continue the community-building work that has been carried out by Black Americans since they became liberated," said Assistant Secretary of State Heaster Wheeler. "Just as the freed slaves built businesses, churches, educational institutions and families, our department provides the critical services, credentials and means of democratic empowerment so that all Michiganders can realize our nation's promise of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness."

President Biden signed the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act on Thursday, establishing June 19 as a federal holiday. Governor Whitmer signed a proclamation today declaring June 19 as Juneteenth Celebration Day in Michigan.

# # #

For media questions, contact

Aneta Kiersnowski at 517-342-4592

We welcome questions and comments at the Contact the Secretary of State page.

Customers may call the Department of State Information Center to

speak to a customer-service representative at 888-SOS-MICH (767-6424).
VILLAGE OF MECOSTA  Elvis is in the building, or he will be in Bromley Park.

The village of Mecosta will kick off Fourth of July weekend  and its Music on the River summer concert series  Friday, July 2, with a performance by Elvis impersonator Jake Slater. The award-winning tribute artist will take attendees back to Elvis' hey days in the 1950s, through the 60s and into the 70s.

Adding to the nostalgia, classic cars will line the downtown Mecosta streets beforehand for a Vintage Car Show.

The celebration continues Saturday morning with the July Fourth Parade and finishes at dusk Sunday with a fireworks show.

Schedule of events

 Vintage Car Show: 4-6 p.m. Friday, July 2, in downtown Mecosta.

 Jake Slater, Elvis Impersonator: 6:30-8 p.m. Friday, July 2, at Bromley Park.

 11 a.m. Saturday, July 3, in downtown Mecosta. Participants will line up along North Franklin Street at 10:30 a.m.

MUSIC ON THE RIVER

The village of Mecosta's annual summer concert series, Music on the River, will continue Fridays throughout the summer.

After Elvis leaves the building, or Bromley Park, acoustic band "Just Jammin" will perform folk, country and gospel music July 9.

All concerts will be from 6:30-8:30 p.m. Fridays at Bromley Parks. Organizers recommend attendees bring a non-alcoholic beverage, lawn chairs or blanket, jacket, sunscreen and bug spray. Concerts will relocate to the Free Methodist Church, 101 E. Main, Mecosta, due to inclement weather.

Schedule of performers

 July 2: Elvis tribute artist Jake Slater

 July 9: Just Jammin. Led by Pam Bowman with her hammered dulcimer, the acoustic band will play folk, country, and gospel songs.

 July 16: Calabogie Road will provide an evening of real Bluegrass music with fiddle, mandolin, bass, and 5-string banjo.

 July 23: The Mark Swanson Trio. With his acoustic guitar, Mark will play the songs you will remember from a few years ago, along with bandmates Kevin (percussion) and Bob (bass).

 July 30: The Blue Water Ramblers will lead attendees through the traditional songs of America, folk songs from the past, and songs of Michigan and the Great Lakes.

 Aug. 6: Outlaw Express. This high energy band delivers classic and modern country with classic rock and blues. Will take requests.

 Aug.13: Down River Dan. Michigan's premier blues/rock band are very popular in southeastern Michigan.

 Aug. 20: Country Classics. Mark, Ben, and Mark will sing country hits from the Golden Age, including Hank Williams, Johnny Cash and more.

 Aug. 27: Sea Cruisers will take attendees back to the good ole days with classics.
MANISTEE COUNTY  Gypsy moth caterpillars have taken residence in wooded areas throughout the county, covering walkways and leaving some trees bare.

These moths are an invasive species  a term for non-native pests that can harm native ecosystems and threaten local species.

In its caterpillar stage, the insect caused widespread defoliation in Michigan from the mid-1980s to the early 1990s, according to the Michigan Department of Natural Resources. A large population of gypsy moths in 2020 led to more caterpillars hatching this spring in localized areas across the states lower peninsula.

Typically between late May and mid-July, the caterpillars emerge to feed on the leaves of around 300 tree species  though they have a particular affinity for oaks, according to information from the Michigan State University extension.

During an outbreak, the density of gypsy moth caterpillars can be so high that many trees are heavily defoliated.

When outbreaks occur in oak or aspen forests, more than 1 million caterpillars per acre can be feeding on tree leaves, wrote MSU extension entomologist Deborah McCullough in a June 2020 article published in the News Advocate.

Each insect can consume up to 9 square feet of leaves during its caterpillar stage, according to McCullough. While this means trees can be defoliated by late June, most hardwood species are able to bounce back after producing new leaves two to three weeks later.

Feeding can last between three to seven weeks, before the insects spin cocoons, pupate and hatch into their moth form.

The leaf-eating caterpillars are hairy, up to two inches long and have a pattern of blue and dark-red spots. The adult male moths are dark buff in color and fly, whereas females are white with black wavy markings and do not fly, according to a DNR press release.

More unpleasant for homeowners is the resulting abundance of fecal pellets called frass which can rain from infested trees and accumulate on surfaces.

In most cases, gypsy moth caterpillars are more of a nuisance in residential areas than to forests, according to DNR forest health specialist James Wieferich.

Gypsy moths rarely kill trees in Michigan, said Wieferich in a 2019 statement. Only stressed trees suffering from problems like drought, old age or root damage are at high risk.

HOW TO GET RID OF THEM

While it may not impact the wider moth population, recommendations from the MSU extension also include remedies that can help residents protect individual trees.

The moths will create egg masses along tree trunks and branches by the late fall and winter that can be destroyed by either scraping them off and dropping them into a container of detergent, or by burning or burying them, according to the MSU extension.

Officials recommend searching for moth egg masses on trees, firewood and outdoor furniture and caution against leaving any eggs or bits of egg mass on the ground as they can often hatch the following spring.

Other methods to combat these invasive insects can include tree tar or tree banding, as well as some sprays. A spray containing a naturally occurring bacterium called bacillus thuringiensis var. kurstaki, can be effective against gypsy moths, but can also be lethal to some native moth species and their caterpillars, according to MSU extension documents.

The best time to spray is when caterpillars are small, usually through mid-June. When caterpillars are massing, spraying tree trunks with a mixture of dish soap and water or scraping caterpillars into a bucket of soap and water also are effective, wrote McCullough.

Landowners troubled by gypsy moths can also contact Josh Shields, a forester and wildlife biologist with conservation districts in Manistee, Mason and Lake Counties to discuss their specific situation.

"This is a very contentious issue," said Shields in an email. "I am already overwhelmed with phone calls and emails from landowners with questions about this pest and I prefer to guage each landowner's situation in my 2.5 county coverage area in order to provide specific recommendations."

Shields can be reached by dialing (231) 889-9666 or through email at joshua.shields@macd.org.

Officials say the gypsy moth outbreak is also unlikely to continue at its current levels. Populations typically remain high for two to three years then collapse and return to low levels, according to the DNR.

This population collapse is usually the result of a virus called nucleopolyhedrosis (NPV) that targets gypsy moth caterpillars.

At times when populations are high, the caterpillars must compete with one another for space and resources causing stress, which makes them more susceptible to the disease, according to information from the MSU extensions integrated pest management department.

After a year or two of heavy defoliation, the NPV disease, in combination with a fungal disease and other natural enemies, will generally control the outbreak. Gypsy moth populations usually remain at low levels for five to 10 years and sometimes longer, the information stated.

To determine whether NPV is at work in a certain location, look for dead caterpillars attached to tree trunks in an upside-down "V" position. Caterpillars affected by the E. maimaiga fungus also remain attached to trunks but hang straight down.

These natural enemies of the gypsy moth are now well-established across Michigan and are actively reducing populations. To date, these pathogens have limited the size and length of outbreaks to just a few years, eliminating the need for spray programs, according to the DNR.

Visit the MSU Extension website to learn more about gypsy moth caterpillars.

A list of Michigan businesses licensed to apply pesticides is available at Michigan.gov/MDARDPABL. Additional information about pesticide laws and regulations is available at Michigan.gov/MDARDPestCert.

For more information about the DNR's Forest Health Program or to view last year's Forest Health Highlights report, visit Michigan.gov/ForestHealth.

Related:

How to handle gypsy moth outbreaks in Michigan

Gypsy moth caterpillars are out and about

Gypsy moths numbers are rising in Michigan

Gypsy moth issues persist, but might soon fade away

Has your property been impacted by gypsy moths?

Contact scott.fraley@pioneergroup.com to share your experience along with any photos or tips on how to deal with this invasive insect.
Iranians were voting Friday on who should be the country's next president amid tensions with the West over its tattered nuclear deal with world powers.

While the race is wide open due to President Hassan Rouhani being term limited from running again, authorities barred his allies and nearly every reformist from entering the race.

That has analysts believing hard-line judiciary chief Ebrahim Raisi is the clear front-runner. The only competitor who represents a stand-in for Rouhani's administration, the former Central Bank chief Abdolnasser Hemmati, has argued others in the race serve as proxies for Raisi and allow the cleric to avoid criticizing him directly.

Heres a look at the candidates competing.

EBRAHIM RAISI

Raisi, 60, is a hard-line cleric close to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei who has vowed to combat poverty and corruption.

In 2016, Khamenei appointed Raisi as head of the Imam Reza charity foundation, which manages a vast conglomerate of businesses and endowments in Iran. Khamenei called Raisi a trustworthy and highly experienced person, causing many to wonder if he might also be a possible successor to the supreme leader himself.

He lost his 2017 presidential challenge to Rouhani, though he earned over 15 million votes in the contest. After the loss, Khamenei appointed the former law professor to be the head of the country's judiciary. There, he's waged a televised anti-corruption campaign that resonated with a public frustrated by graft.

His candidacy also has revived the controversy surrounding the 1988 mass execution of thousands in Iran, one of the darkest moments of Irans post-revolution history still not recognized by its government. Raisi served on a panel involved in sentencing the prisoners to death. He hasnt commented publicly on the accusation.

ABDOLNASSER HEMMATI

Hemmati, 64, served for several years at the head of Iran's Central Bank under Rouhani and amid the renewed American sanctions that followed the U.S.' unilateral withdrawal from Tehran's nuclear deal. Though serving in Rouhani's government, he's repeatedly described himself as an independent candidate.

Hemmati, an economics professor, has worked as the head of both private and government banks, as well as Iran's central insurance agency. He also once served as Iran's ambassador to China for a short period.

The technocrat has drawn attention for appointing his wife, Sepideh Shabestari, as one of his representatives and top advisers in Iran's short election season. He's a black belt in karate as well, something that drew the public's interest.

Hemmati has said his goals as president include decreasing poverty through better economic ties with the world, implementing a smaller government and getting the country off of the black list of the Financial Action Task Force, an international agency that monitors terrorism funding.

Other candidates include:

AMIRHOSSEIN GHAZIZADEH HASHEMI

Hashemi, 50, is considered by analysts to be a low-profile conservative politician. He's served as a parliament member since 2007 and now is a member of the parliament's board of chairmen, which manages the legislature's affairs. An ear-nose-and-throat specialist surgeon by profession, Hashemi has vowed to restore Iran's stock market in the first three days in office, a tough goal as the market's value has nearly halved in the last year.

MOHSEN REZAEI

Rezaei, 66, is a former leader of Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard and has been a hard-line candidate in several elections. He's wanted by Argentina on an Interpol Red Notice over his alleged involvement in the 1994 bombing on a Jewish center in Buenos Aires that killed 85 people. Both Rezaei and the Iranian government deny orchestrating the attack. He also faced criticism over allegedly mismanaging battles in the 1980s Iran-Iraq war and his tension with Iran's regular military. He serves now as the secretary of Expediency Council, which arbitrates disputes between parliament and Iran's constitutional watchdog, the Guardian Council. Rezaei also threatened in Iran's first presidential debate to imprison Hemmati.
BRASILIA, Brazil (AP)  As Brazil hurtles toward an official COVID-19 death toll of 500,000  second-highest in the world  science is on trial inside the country and the truth is up for grabs.

With the milestone likely to be reached this weekend, Brazil's Senate is publicly investigating how the toll got so high, focusing on why President Jair Bolsonaro's far-right government ignored opportunities to buy vaccines for months while it relentlessly pushed hydroxychloroquine, the malaria drug that rigorous studies have shown to be ineffective in treating COVID-19.

The nationally televised hearings have contained enough scientific claims, counterclaims and outright falsehoods to keep fact-checkers busy.

The skepticism has extended to the death toll itself, with Bolsonaro arguing the official tally from his own Health Ministry is greatly exaggerated and some epidemiologists saying the real figure is significantly higher  perhaps hundreds of thousands higher.

Dr. Abdel Latif, who oversees an intensive care unit an hour from Sao Paulo, said the fear and desperation caused by the coronavirus have been compounded by misinformation and opinions from self-styled specialists and a lack of proper guidance from the government.

We need real humane public health policy, far from the political fight and based on science and evidence," he said.

Brazils reported death toll is second only to that of the U.S., where the number of lives lost has topped 600,000. Brazil's population of 213 million is two-thirds that of the U.S.

Over the past week, official data showed some 2,000 COVID-19 deaths per day in Brazil, representing one-fifth the global total and a jump public health experts warn may reflect the start of the country's third wave.

Bolsonaro has waged a 15-month campaign to downplay the viruss seriousness and keep the economy humming. He dismissed the scourge early on as a little flu and has scorned masks. He was not chastened by his own bout with COVID-19. And he kept touting hydroxychloroquine long after virtually all others, including President Donald Trump, ceased doing so.

As recently as last Saturday, Bolsonaro received cheers upon telling a crowd of supporters that he took it when infected.

The next day, he declared, I was cured.

He pushed hydroxychloroquine so consistently that the first of his four health ministers during the pandemic was fired and the second resigned because they refused to endorse broad prescription of the medicine, they told the Senate investigating committee.

The World Health Organization stopped testing the drug in June 2020, saying the data showed it didn't reduce deaths among hospitalized patients. The same month, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration revoked emergency authorization for the drug amid mounting evidence it isn't effective and could cause serious side effects.

Nevertheless, the notion that medicines like hydroxychloroquine work against COVID-19 is one of the main things the fact-checking agency Aos Fatos has been forced to debunk continually for the past year, according to Tai Nalon, its executive director.

This didnt change, mostly because there is a lack of accountability of doctors and other medical authorities who propagate this sort of misinformation, and the government supports it, Nalon said. "Basically it takes only the president to make any fact-checking efforts not useless, but less effective.

In fact, the Senate hearings that began in April have turned into a forum for dueling testimony from doctors who are either pro- or anti-hydroxychloroquine, creating what some experts fear is a misimpression that the drugs usefulness is still an open question in the international scientific community.

A Health Ministry official who is a pediatrician told the Senate that there is a much anecdotal evidence of its effectiveness and that the ministry provided guidelines for its use without explicitly recommending it. Fact-checkers cried foul, saying the ministrys own records show it distributed millions of the pills nationwide for COVID-19 treatment.

A cancer specialist and immunologist who has been one of the drug's biggest champions  and is said to be an informal adviser to the president  also testified, decrying demonization of a drug she said has saved lives. But fact-checkers proved her wrong when she claimed Mexico is still prescribing it for COVID-19.

Still, the drug is celebrated across social media, including Facebook and WhatsApp. And other misinformation is circulating as well.

Bolsonaro told a throng of supporters on June 7 that the real number of COVID-19 deaths in 2020 was only about half the official death toll, citing a report from the national accounting tribunal  which promptly denied producing any such document.

The president backtracked but has publicly repeated his claim of mass fraud in the death toll at least twice since.

Epidemiologists at the University of Sao Paulo say the true number of dead is closer to 600,000, maybe 800,000. The senators investigating the government's handling of the crisis ultimately hope to quantify how many deaths could have been avoided.

Pedro Hallal, an epidemiologist who runs the nations largest COVID-19 testing program, has calculated that at least 95,000 lives would have been spared had the government not spurned vaccine purchase offers from Pfizer and a Sao Paulo institute that is bottling a Chinese-developed shot.

When the U.S. recorded a half-million COVID-19 deaths, President Joe Biden held a sunset moment of silence and a candle-lighting ceremony at the White House and ordered flags lowered for five days. Bolsonaros government plans no such observance.

The Health Ministry is instead trumpeting the 84 million doses administered so far. The number is mostly first shots; just 11% of Brazils population is fully vaccinated.

The Senate committee will name at least 10 people as formal targets of its investigation by next week, members told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity. That could lead to a recommendation of charges by prosecutors. The list includes the pediatrician and cancer specialist who testified, the current health minister and his predecessor.

For his part, Bolsonaro has said the investigation amounts to persecution.

Last week, microbiologist Natalia Pasternak, who presides over the Question of Science Institute, a nonprofit that promotes the use of scientific evidence in public policies, went before the committee and decried the government's denialism. She lamented that the myth of hydroxychloroquine won't seem to die.

In the sad case of Brazil, its a lie orchestrated by the federal government and the Health Ministry, she said. "And that lie kills.

___ Biller reported from Rio de Janeiro. AP videojournalist Tatiana Pollastri contributed from Valinhos, Sao Paulo.
MANISTEE  Manistee City Council will meet next week for a special meeting to discuss the city manager search.

"At the June 15, 2021 regular meeting of city council, council took action to direct the city manager to schedule additional interviews of candidates as may be requested by council and/or direct further solicitation of potential candidates through the Michigan Municipal League or otherwise," reads the agenda.

Council could take action on this item during the meeting at 6 p.m. on June 22 at the Ramsdell Theatre.

On Tuesday, council appointed Manistee's Chief Financial Officer Ed Bradford for the interim position, which will take effect at 5 p.m. on July 2.

In January, City Manager Thad Taylor announced that he intended to retire on July 2. Manistee City Council has entered into a contract with the Michigan Municipal League to identify a replacement for Taylor.

During public meetings on May 12 and 13, five candidates were interviewed for the position. Greg Elliott, a Manistee native who currently serves as administrator for the City of Adrian, was given a conditional offer for the position by the city council after its final round of interviews on May 13.

On Tuesday, council voted against approving a contract with Elliott as it was presented.

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As summer officially begins, Delta College is looking ahead to fall when it welcomes students at the new Downtown Midland Center, located just blocks from bustling Main Street.

Enrollment is now open for new and current students to take in-person classes in the 33,000-square-foot building during the fall semester, which begins August 28. Students can take business, health, science and transfer courses in a variety of online and face-to-face formats. Visit delta.edu/admissions-aid to get started.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP)  Iran's presidential election Friday will determine who will lead the country's civilian government as tensions remain high between the Islamic Republic and the West over its tattered nuclear deal with world powers.

WHO IS RUNNING?

Among the four candidates, hard-line judiciary chief Ebrahim Raisi appears to be the front-runner based on state-linked polling. Abdolnasser Hemmati, the former head of Irans Central Bank, appears to be representing moderates in the race. Also running are Mohsen Rezaei, a former Revolutionary Guard commander; and Amir Hossein Ghazizadeh, a current lawmaker. At the country's three debates, it appeared to instead be a two-man race as candidates largely targeted Hemmati for criticism over being part of the administration of current President Hassan Rouhani until recently.

WHO IS NOT RUNNING?

Rouhani, whose government reached the 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, is term limited from seeking another four years in office. The Guardian Council, Iran's constitutional watchdog that approves candidates, also barred a number of prominent candidates from running this year. They included Ali Larijani, a conservative former parliament speaker who in recent years found himself allied with Rouhani. Also barred was former hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. He still remains popular for his populist policies while in office despite his antagonism of the West. While Larijani accepted being blocked, Ahmadinejad has urged his supporters not to take part in the vote. Meanwhile, women remain barred from running, as do those calling for wholesale change in the country's government.

WHAT IS AT STAKE?

Iran's president oversees the civilian arm of the country's government. The president sets domestic policy, which is important as Iran has faced years of crushing sanctions from the U.S. after then-President Donald Trump unilaterally withdrew America from Tehran's nuclear deal. Those economic problems have seen nationwide protests twice in Rouhani's time in office. Iran also has faced wave after wave of new cases in the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. The presidency also sets the tone for how Iran interacts with the wider world. However, the winning candidate will be under Iran's supreme leader, who has final say on all matters of state.

WHAT POWER DOES THE SUPREME LEADER HAVE?

At the heart of Irans complex power-sharing government created after the 1979 Islamic Revolution is the supreme leader. The supreme leader also serves as the countrys commander-in-chief of its military and the powerful Revolutionary Guard, a paramilitary force that also has vast economic holdings across Iran. An 88-member elected clerical panel called the Assembly of Experts appoints the supreme leader and can remove one as well, though thats never happened. Iran's current supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, is 82  leading some analysts to suggest this might be the last election he oversees.

SO IS IRAN A DEMOCRACY?

Iran describes itself as an Islamic Republic. It holds elections and has elected representatives passing laws and governing on behalf of its people, though the supreme leader has the final say on all state matters. However, the Guardian Council barred most allies of Rouhani and reformists from running in this election. Those who led Irans Green Movement after Ahmadinejads disputed 2009 re-election also remain under house arrest. Iran does not allow international observers to monitor its elections, which its Interior Ministry oversees. Security forces answering only to the supreme leader also routinely arrest and hold closed-door trials for dual nationals, foreigners and those with Western ties, using them as pawns in international negotiations. Raisi, as the head of the judiciary, faces international criticism for those arrests.

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Follow Jon Gambrell on Twitter at www.twitter.com/jongambrellAP.
CARSON CITY, Nev. (AP)  Record-breaking heat and historic drought in the U.S. West are doing little to discourage cities from planning to welcome millions of new residents in the decades ahead.

From Phoenix to Boise, officials are preparing for a future both with more people and less water, seeking to balance growth and conservation. Development is constrained by the fact that 46% of the 11-state Western region is federal land, managed by agencies like the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management that are tasked with maintaining it for future generations.

That's led officials in states like Nevada and Utah to lobby the federal government to approve land transfers to allow developers to build homes and businesses on what had been public land. Supporters in the two states have won over environmentalists in the past with provisions that allocate proceeds to conservation projects, preserve other federal lands and prevent road construction, logging or energy exploration.

A small group of opponents is arguing that routinely approving these kinds of swaps to facilitate growth isn't sustainable, particularly in areas that rely on a shrinking water supply.

For the seven states that depend on the Colorado River  Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming  a regional drought is so severe that less water is flowing to Lake Mead and Lake Powell, the two manmade reservoirs where river water is stored.

If the level of Lake Mead keeps dropping through the summer as projected, the federal government will likely issue its first-ever official shortage declaration, which will prompt cuts in the share of water Arizona and Nevada receive.

The predicament is playing out in the Las Vegas area, where environmental groups, local officials and homebuilders united behind a proposal from U.S. Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto that was heard in the Senate this week.

The Nevada Democrat is pushing what she calls the largest conservation bill in state history to designate more than 3,125 square miles (8,094 square kilometers) of land for additional protections  roughly the size of Delaware and Rhode Island combined  and 48 square miles (124 square kilometers) for commercial and residential development, which is about the size of San Francisco.

Some conservationists support the proposal because it would add federal land to the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area for recreation and reclassify some undeveloped parts of Clark County, where Las Vegas is located, and the Desert National Wildlife Refuge as Bureau of Land Management wilderness areas," which carry stronger protections than national parks.

Jocelyn Torres, field director for the Conservation Lands Foundation, said at the Senate hearing Wednesday that the protections would restore lands to more efficiently capture carbon, which would help mitigate rising temperatures.

Our public lands present our best chance to address climate change, our biodiversity crisis and invest in our local communities and economy, she said.

The effort mirrors land management pushes made over the past decade in Washington and Emery counties in Utah to designate wilderness and sell other parcels to developers to meet growth projections. The U.S. Census Bureau reported that St. George, in Washington County, was the nation's fifth-fastest growing metro area last year.

In both regions, affordable housing is among officials' top concerns. Soaring home prices in California have added to a flow of people leaving for nearby states like Nevada, Arizona and Colorado, where open land, lower tax rates and jobs are attracting new residents.

The fast-growing Las Vegas area lacks the housing supply to meet projected population growth. A 2019 University of Nevada, Las Vegas, study that Cortez Masto's legislation references projected the population in Clark County would increase 35%, to 3.1 million residents, by 2060. That spike will be difficult to accommodate without building in existing communities or public lands.

Due to this federal ownership, our options for planning and development are very constrained and require constant coordination with federal agencies, Clark County Director of Environment and Sustainability Marci Henson said.

Growth may stretch an already limited water supply. Water officials support the proposal, which allocates funding to maintaining the channels used to recycle wastewater through Lake Mead. The region has enacted some of the U.S. West's most aggressive conservation measures, including an outright ban on decorative grass in certain places, to prepare for growth.

Last year, water officials projected a worst-case scenario in which consumption patterns and climate change could force them to find other supplies as soon as 2056. Critics say the projections are concerning.

This legislation doesn't have an identified, sustainable supply of water going out 50 years in the future, said Kyle Roerink, executive director of the Nevada-based conservation group Great Basin Water Network. When you couple that with everything that were reading about at Lake Mead and the Colorado River, it's very precarious to be putting forward a bill that invites another 825,000 people to the Mojave Desert.

Southern Nevada Water Authority General Manager John Entsminger said in a statement that the proposal "helps secure the water resources and facilities that SNWA needs to provide reliable and safe water to our customers for decades to come.

When Cortez Masto's proposal was introduced, there was little mention of how water factors into plans for future growth or if the conservation components of the bill could have any impact.

Roerink said the plan's funding allocations for water infrastructure need to be accompanied by additional serious, realistic modeling" of the Colorado River.

When an entity says, Let's go and build some homes in this region,' theres an implication that waters going to be there in perpetuity," he said.

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Associated Press reporter Suman Naishadham in Washington, D.C., contributed to this report. Metz is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.

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This story was first published on June 18, 2021. It was updated on June 19, 2021, to correct the title of Marci Henson and the spelling of her first name. She is the Clark County director of Environment and Sustainability, not Air Quality Department director, and her first name is spelled Marci, not Marcie.
The Michigan Sugar Festival makes its return this weekend after being canceled last year due to the pandemic, although not all of the traditional events will be back this time around.

A key change with this years festival is it has been condensed to two days instead of four, but many of the favorite events are back with plenty to do and to enjoy, according to organizers.

The 56th festival starts Saturday, June 19, and continues through Sunday, June, 20. Throughout the event there will be lots of garage sales.

At 8 a.m., Saturday, June 19, the Sebewaing Rotary will host the Beet Feet 5K run and walk at Bay Shore Camp.

The Sebewaing Fire Departments chicken BBQ will be Saturday, June 19 from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m., or until sold out. It will be at Sebewaings Main Park Pavilion.

However, the tickets are available only by pre-sale. The tickets are $12 and available for sale at: Sebewaing Ace Hardware, Sebewaing Light and Water, Kundinger & Kroll, Cornerstone Venture, Mast's Coffee, and Kauffold Agency.

The grand parade will be back also on Saturday. The lineup starts at 8:30 a.m., with step off at 10:30 a.m. There is a $5 participation fee.

A winning float will be selected from the following categories: clowns and characters, cars and trucks, music and bands, floats with choreography of costumes and music, and religion.

Then, from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m., Saturday, there will be inflatables provided by Bay Shore Camp for the children to play on in the village park, and a cornhole tournament at 1 p.m. in the park also.

And, at 1 p.m., the Michigan Sugar Queen and Court will be introduced on the main stage.

Other events on Saturday include a car cruise from 6-9 p.m., in downtown Sebewaing, a polka party with the Kowalski Brothers at the main stage, from 1-3 p.m. and the Charles W. Liken Museum and the Old Township Hall Museum will be open Saturday and again on Sunday.

The evening wraps up with fireworks.

Events on Sunday, June 20, from 8 a.m. to noon include the Unionville-Sebewaing Area School Districts Future Farmers of American breakfast, and a community worship service in the village park.

There will also be childrens games at 1 p.m., in the park, and a candy drop at 2:30 p.m. at the main ball diamond.

Other activities include a vehicle and motorcycle show at the Sons Life Missionary Church in downtown Sebewaing, and then the Justified Quartet will perform on the main stage.

The last event will be the raffle drawing of the Michigan Sugar Festival buttons. The buttons sell for $2 and will be available for sale throughout the festival, as well as special festival T-shirts will be for sale.

And, one of the best parts of the festival is the food. There will be a variety of food trucks. Hot Rods BBQ, Taste of Bay City, Bechler's Fun Foods as well as brats by the Lions Club, tacos in a bag, and Michigan Sugars cotton candy are just a few of the tasty offerings.

For more information or entry forms, call Julie Epperson at 520-508-0323.
Besides providing electrical service to parts of the Thumb Area, Thumb Electric Cooperative also wants to start providing fiber-optic internet service.

When TEC started sending out notices about that service, there were some misunderstandings about what the cooperative wanted.

The Novesta Township Board of Trustees was one of the municipalities that received a letter asking them to waive fees associated with amending the franchise agreement to allow TEC to install fiber optic throughout the township.

The way the communication was worded led the board to believe the company didnt want to pay the Metropolitan Extension Telecommunications Rights of Way Oversight Act fee, which would have been a loss of revenue.

The METRO Act was designed for telecommunication companies to cut through red tape to obtain permits without having to pay excessive fees and deal with unnecessary delays.

The board worried that allowing that would cause other telecommunication companies to also ask for fees to be waived, which would mean a further loss of revenue.

Because of that, the township board denied TECs request in April.

However, that was not what TEC was requesting, according to township Trustee Jesse Robinson.

The request was for the township not to charge the company for legal fees if it had an attorney review the proposed contract, Robinson explained.

The township received a letter from TEC General Manager Dallas Braun explaining the companys intention.

TEC was not requesting any preferential treatment in regard to waiving any other fees or taxes that may be assessed by local, state or federal governmental bodies, Braun explained in a letter.

TEC was just requesting the township not charge it if the township had its legal counsel review the agreement.

After learning that TECs intent was not to avoid paying the METRO Act, the board approved the revised 30-year franchise agreement in May to allow the company to develop high-speed, fiber-optic internet service in the township.

In 1937, TEC and other cooperative electrical services were formed to provide electricity to rural areas because the investor-owned companies at that time only wanted to serve densely populated cities and towns.

Due to that, electric cooperatives like TEC were formed to bring electricity to underserved rural areas.

According to Braun, that is similar to what TEC is trying to do now  bring high-speed internet to underserved rural areas.

TECs board of directors approved developing fiber-to-the-home internet service to the Thumb Area.

TEC is excited to parallel its electrification mission of the 1930s with its new mission in 2021 of bridging the rural digital divide, explained Braun.

To do that, TEC tentatively plans to invest $75 million to provide FTTH internet service in the Thumb Area and to start that infrastructure development this year.

FTTH internet service in rural areas will be a game changer in the economy, education, healthcare, and more, Braun pointed out.

Shortly after the Novesta board approved the revised franchise agreement that included internet service, the Michigan Public Service Commission approved TECs designation as an eligible telecommunications carrier, which allows the cooperative access to federal funds to help construction of the broadband infrastructure in areas lacking access to high-speed internet.

Also, the Federal Communication Commissions Rural Digital Opportunity Fund will provide up to $20.4 billion toward the expansion of broadband to unserved and underserved areas, with a focus on improving network speeds.

TEC and other rural electric cooperatives formed the National Rural Telecommunications Cooperative.

In December 2020 the NRTC was awarded $59,402,901 to be used in Michigan to provide service to 44,534 locations over 10 years, a portion of which is to be assigned to Thumb Electric, for doing business as TEC Fiber.

Also, the commission approved a license for TEC to provide basic local exchange phone service in its service area also.

Unrelated to TEC, the commission also approved a temporary license for Starlink. The licenses approval is a required step toward ETCs designation for a California company to provide satellite-based internet in areas of Michigan lacking access to high-speed broadband.

Correction: A previous version of this story incorrectly stated that the temporary license for Starlink was approved for the cooperative. The story has been corrected.
GENEVA (AP)  War, violence, persecution, human rights violations and other factors caused nearly 3 million people to flee their homes last year, even though the COVID-19 crisis restricted movement worldwide, the U.N. refugee agency said in a report Friday.

In its latest Global Trends report, UNHCR said the world's cumulative number of displaced people rose to 82.4 million  roughly the population of Germany and a new post-World War II record.

Filippo Grandi, the United Nations' high commissioner for refugees, said conflict and the fallout from climate change in places such as Mozambique, Ethiopia's Tigray region and Africas Sahel area were key drivers of refugees and internally displaced people in 2020.

Such factors added hundreds of thousands to the overall count, the ninth consecutive annual increase in the number of forcibly displaced people. The millions who have fled countries such as Syria and Afghanistan due to protracted wars or fighting have dominated the U.N. agency's tally for years.

This is telling, in a year in which we were all locked down, confined, blocked in our homes, in our communities, in our cities, Grandi said in an interview before the report's release. Almost 3 million people have had to actually leave all that behind because they had no other choice.

COVID-19 seems to have had no impact on some of the key root causes that push people to flee, he said. War, violence, discrimination, they have continued, no matter what, throughout the pandemic.

UNHCR said 1% of all humanity is now displaced, and there are twice as many forcibly displaced people than a decade ago. Some 42% of them are under 18, and nearly 1 million babies were born as refugees between 2018 and 2020.

Many of them may remain refugees for years to come, the agency's report said.

UNHCR, which has its headquarters in Geneva, said that 99 of the more than 160 countries that closed their borders because of the coronavirus did not make exceptions for people seeking protection as refugees or asylum-seekers.

Grandi acknowledged the possibility that many internally displaced people who couldn't leave their own countries will eventually want to flee abroad if the pandemic eases and borders reopen..

A good example is the United States, where already we have seen a surge in people arriving in recent months, Grandi said, referring to a a U.S. provision called Title 42 that let authorities temporarily block asylum-seekers from entry for health reasons. Title 42 will be lifted eventually  and I think this is the right thing to do  but this will have to be managed.

Asked about U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris recent trip to Central America, where she told people hoping to migrate to the U.S. do not come, Grandi expressed hope that the remark was not reflective of overall U.S. policy.

"I think that messaging indeed, as it was reported, is stark, and maybe shows only one part of the picture now, Grandi said, adding that he had heard a more complex response from other officials in Washington when he was there recently.

Among recent hotspots, Grandi said hundreds of thousands of people were newly displaced in Mozambique and the Sahel last year, and up to 1 million in the Tigray conflict that started in October.

Im worried that if the international community is not able to stop these conflicts, we will continue to see the rise in the numbers, he said.

The report said that at the end of last year there were 5.7 million Palestinians, 3.9 million Venezuelans and an additional 20.7 million refugees from various other countries displaced abroad. Another 48 million people were internally displaced in their own countries. Some 4.1 million more sought asylum.

Turkey, a neighbor of Syria, has taken in the most refugees in absolute numbers  3.7 million. The figure is more that twice that of the No. 2 host country, Colombia, which borders Venezuela. Afghanistan's neighbor Pakistan was third.

David Miliband, president and CEO of the International Rescue Committee, said the UNHCR counts should be a wake up call for the international community. He appealed in particular to the European Union.

The triple threat of conflict, climate change and COVID-19 continues to destroy lives and livelihoods, demanding a truly global response, Miliband said. As one of the worlds wealthiest and most stable regions, the EU can and must be at the forefront of these efforts.

Jan Egeland, secretary-general of the Norwegian Refugee Council, decried an epic failure of humanity" and said many more people are on the move today than at any time during World War II.

The majority of people fleeing today are on the move because of manmade conflicts," Egeland said. What is lacking is the political will and leadership to end these wars."

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Lederer reported from the United Nations in New York.

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Follow APs global migration coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/migration
LONDON (AP)  In a surprising result, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson's Conservative Party has been easily defeated in a special election for a seat that it has held for decades.

The Liberal Democrats, which was in a coalition government with the Conservatives between 2010 and 2015 before seeing its electoral fortunes wane dramatically, won Thursday's election in Chesham and Amersham, 35 miles (57 kilometers) northwest of London.

Sarah Green, the Liberal Democrat candidate, picked up around 57% of the vote and won a seat the Conservatives have held since it was created in 1974. She added around 30 percentage points to the party's result from the 2019 general election.

This Conservative Party has taken people across the country for granted for far too long, Green said Friday.

Her party leader, Ed Davey, said the result sent a shockwave through British politics by showing that the blue wall of Conservative seats in southern England could be vulnerable.

There are many Conservatives across the country who are now worried, said Davey, who celebrated by smashing a blue wall made up of cardboard boxes with an orange mallet.

Chesham and Amersham are quiet, leafy, prosperous towns that are synonymous with traditional Conservative territory, in much the same way that the post-industrial towns in northern England have identified with the opposition Labour Party.

The Conservatives have made big inroads into Labour's red wall in recent years, winning a swathe of seats on a combination of factors, notably Johnsons insistence that he would ensure that Britain leaves the European Union after years of parliamentary haggling. Having secured that, Johnson has managed to capture more support in Labour's traditional heartland by promising to level up Britain through big infrastructure spending and other initiatives.

However, there are concerns among some Conservative supporters that the growing focus on northern seats has alienated the party's more traditional  and potentially more liberal  southern supporters. In the 2016 Brexit referendum, 55% of voters in Chesham and Amersham voted to remain in the EU, in sharp contrast to many of the constituencies the Conservatives have recently turned blue.

Johnson denied that he was neglecting the party's traditional base and said there were particular circumstances at play in Chesham and Amersham.

We believe in uniting and leveling up within regions and across the country, he said.

The reasons for the Conservatives' heavy defeat varied, though national issues such as the government's handling of the coronavirus pandemic and its pro-Brexit stance clearly played a role.

"In remain-voting, middle-class seats in the south of England, the Conservative coalition has been weakened to some degree in the wake of Brexit, and the Liberal Democrats are the party that in many instances are best-placed to profit from that, and that's what they've managed to do in Chesham and Amersham," polling expert John Curtice told the BBC.

Local issues were also at play. Voters consistently voiced concerns about a high-speed rail line that will cut through the region and link London to the big cities in the north of England, such as Birmingham and Manchester.

This is a beautiful place, but people are totally against whats happening with the railway, and I think thats what has driven this," said Jit Mistry, the owner of Chesham Post Office.

Planning reforms proposed by the government also have sparked fears about more buildings in the countryside.

The defeated candidate, Peter Fleet, acknowledged the Conservatives had to rebuild trust and understanding with voters.

Despite the election's outcome, Johnson can still rely on a big majority of around 80 seats in the the 650-member House of Commons.
BRUSSELS (AP)  A Belgian court ruled Friday that coronavirus vaccine-maker AstraZeneca had committed a serious breach of its contract with the European Union amid a major legal battle over delivery obligations that has tarnished the companys image.

The court ordered AstraZeneca to deliver a total of 80.2 million doses to the EU from the time the contract was agreed up until Sept. 27. The ruling said the company did not appear to have made a best reasonable effort to meet the delivery schedule because it had not used its U.K. production sites.

But the Anglo-Swedish company claimed victory, saying that this was far fewer than the 120 million doses that the EUs executive branch, the European Commission, was seeking in total by the end of June. It also welcomed the courts acknowledgement that it was under unprecedented pressure.

AstraZeneca was seen as a key pillar of the EUs vaccine rollout. Its contract with the Commission foresaw an initial 300 million doses being distributed, with an option for another 100 million, but the speed of deliveries was far slower than the company originally thought.

We are pleased with the Courts order, Executive Vice-President Jeffrey Pott said in a statement. AstraZeneca has fully complied with its agreement with the European Commission and we will continue to focus on the urgent task of supplying an effective vaccine.

The Commission, for its part, also claimed a victory in that the judge had ordered the company to respect a delivery schedule of 15 million doses by July 26, 20 million doses by August 23 and 15 million doses by Sept. 27. It ordered a fine of 10 euros ($12) per dose not delivered.

This decision confirms the position of the Commission: AstraZeneca did not live up to the commitments it made in the contract. It is good to see that an independent judge confirms this, Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said.

This shows that our European vaccination campaign not only delivers for our citizens day by day. It also demonstrates that it was founded on a sound legal basis, she said in a statement.

AstraZenecas image has been hurt by the slow pace of its vaccine production, but despite EU dissatisfaction with the speed of deliveries the Commission still recommends the companys shots as effective protection against the coronavirus.

Ultimately, AstraZeneca is likely to meet the courts order with ease. It had already supplied 30 million doses until the end of March. From March to June, it supplied a further 40 million doses. That leaves it with just over 10 million of the 80.2 million doses to provide by Sept. 27.

Two further hearings have been scheduled for September in case the Commission is still not satisfied.

From the beginning, the Commission has claimed that it launched the emergency legal procedure, which started at the Brussels Court of First Instance last month, simply to secure the vaccine doses that EU member countries were promised.

It accused AstraZeneca of acting in bad faith by providing shots to other countries, notably Britain, and argued that the company should have used its production sites in the U.K. to help fill the EUs order.

But AstraZeneca argued that the challenges of producing and delivering the vaccine could not have been foreseen during a once-in-a-century pandemic, and that its U.K. sites were primarily meant to be used to service its contract with the British government.

In its 67-page ruling though, the court suggested that the company might not have used all the means at its disposal, including the Oxford Biomedica and Halix sites in the U.K., to meet its EU supply schedule. This could be perceived as not making a best reasonable effort to fulfil its contract.

In its statement, AstraZeneca said that it now looks forward to renewed collaboration with the European Commission to help combat the pandemic in Europe.

While its deliveries will continue this year, the Commission has already decided not to renew its contract with the company.
Sure youve heard of Stonewall, but what do you know about the Kalos Society? Youve read about the AIDS crisis, but are you aware of how it galvanized the LGBTQ community locally?

For a small state, Connecticut has an extensive LGBTQ history that goes back much farther than the legalization of same-sex marriage in 2008.

William J. Mann, a professor at Central Connecticut State University, LGBT Center interim coordinator at CCSU and a gay activist, has observed first-hand how Connecticuts policies and cultural views have shifted when it comes to the LGBTQ community.

In 2019, Mann had his students collaborate with the Connecticut Historical Society on a research project that explored all aspects of the states LGBTQ history. The project is available to view online.

Mann noted that Connecticut was really ahead of the curve in many ways. While the Nutmeg state was the second state in the country to legalize same sex marriage, activists within the state have been working for decades to improve the protections for members of the LGBTQ community.

Courtesy of William J. Mann

This year, Connecticut has two important policy anniversaries: the 30th anniversary of the Gay Rights Bill and the 10th anniversary of the Trans Rights Bill.

While the Gay Rights Bill was finally passed in 1991, an earlier iteration of the bill was brought to Hartford back in 1970. (Keep in mind, Stonewall occurred in New York City in 1969.)

Connecticut actually had its own gay support/advocacy group in the Kalos Society from the early 1960s, so in many ways the community in Connecticut, particularly in Hartford, was already doing the kinds of organization and community building that would take the national movement almost another decade to start, Mann said. Connecticut also was one of the first states to overturn its sodomy law in 1967. In 1970, just a few months after Stonewall, Connecticut gay activists put in the first gay rights bill. It took another 21 years to pass, but already in 1970 Connecticut activists were thinking proactively about how to ensure rights for LGBT people.

Mann explained that the Kalos Society was a gay activist group that was born from a support group called Project H. Mann said the Kalos Society helped push the first iteration of the gay rights bill forward in 1970.

From that, some of these people who were then inspired and empowered by it created the Kalos Society. Kalos was the very first group to stage a public demonstration, and they would protest against police brutality, he said. It was a groundbreaking group and many of the people who were involved in Kalos went on to be involved in other ways as well.

When discussing some of the most important moments in the states LGBTQ history, Mann cited the inclusion of gay and lesbian people to the states hate crimes protection law in 1990.

That was huge, because that said we are worth being protected. We are a protected class. Once that was codified into law getting the gay rights bill passed a year later was  if not easy, it certainly made it easier because this was already a group that was being protected in state law, he said.

AIDS

During the 80s and 90s, as the AIDS crisis ravaged the gay community nationally, Mann said the epidemic galvanized LGBTQ activists.

AIDS was devastating the community and it was the activism of people with AIDS and their supporters who really got the legislature to start looking at gay lives and the diversity of gay lives, he said. We were no longer fighting for just theoretical rights at this point. We were fighting for our lives.

In 1988, a Connecticut man named Richard Riehl was murdered in a hate crime. Mann said that this particular death struck a chord within the LGBTQ community.

Richard Riehls death in 1988 was a turning point in many ways, Mann said. You have to understand the context, because this was right in the midst of the AIDS crisis, so our friends were dying. Gay men, bisexual men, transgender women were dying and everyone was losing friends, and then we read about this murder of a gay man who was murdered in a homophobic hate crime, and it just kind of triggered something. People had had enough. They were saying, were under assault at every angle here. It just rubbed so many people wrong. We had demonstrations and rallies and so many people would turn up. We hadnt seen anything like it before. People were finally motivated and galvanized to do something.

Mann said that it was a dark time to live through and that, in some ways, the COVID-19 pandemic reminds him of the AIDS crisis.

Changing tides Over the course of several decades, LGBT activists in CT were able to make significant change to state policies. 1970 - LGBT activists brought the first gay rights bill to Hartford. 1971 - Connecticut abolishes a law that banned "homosexual acts." 1989 - John Bonelli is the first openly gay person to run for municipal office. 1990 - Politicians add sexual orientation to the list of those protected against hate crimes. 1991 - Gay Rights Bill passes. 1993 - DMV in CT allows transgender people to correct their gender on their licenses. 2008 - Connecticut is the second state to legalize same sex marriage. 2011 - Trans Rights Bill passes. 2017 - Connecticut bans conversion therapy for minors People you should know Here is a small sampling of figures from Connecticut's LGBTQ community who have worked toward a better and more inclusive future. Keith Brown - Founded Gay Spirit Radio in 1982; member of the Kalos Society. Tollie Miller and Carolyn Gabel - Ran the Reader's Feast Cafe, an important LGBT community space. John Bonelli - First openly gay man to run for municipal office in 1989; ran for Hartford's City Council. Joe Grabarz - First openly gay state legislator in 1990. Robin McHaelan - Founded True Colors during the '90s. Linda Estabrook - Director of the Hartford Gay Lesbian Health Collective. Victor D'Lugin - AIDS activist. Manuel Magaz - Founded Latinos Contra Sida in 1986. Jerimarie Liesengang - Trans advocate and founder of It's Time Connecticut. Surina Khan - First Woman of Color to serve as an editor of CT gay news magazine Metroline. Regina Dyton and Diana Lombardi - Both instrumental in getting the Trans Rights Law passed. Pedro Segarra - First openly gay mayor of Hartford. Michael Dickens - Founder of Men of All Colors Together. Meg Bachtel - A key organizer of Fairfield County for Gay Rights Law. Betty Gallo - Longtime lobbyist for gay rights. Anne Stanback - Chair of statewide organization for gay rights law. Terri Reid - Founder of the CT LGBT Film Festival in 1988. Mucha Mucha Placer - Drag queen and founder of the House of Pleasure. See More Collapse

It was almost as if the world was ending. There was no hope, there was no cure and there was nothing from the federal government, no direction, and it reminds me of the Covid pandemic. When Covid first started moving through the country most of the people who were dying were old and infirm and it was almost like the urgency wasnt there to save these people and prevent the spread. It was almost as if they were expendable and thats certainly how gay and trans people felt in the 1980s and the 1990s.

Living through history

Much of Connecticuts LGBTQ history isnt widely known and Mann attributed that to the mainstream medias minimal coverage on the LGBTQ community.

For an awfully long time the mainstream media didnt cover gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender stories. If anything it was maybe some pictures from the Pride parade and they would always pick the most outrageous pictures to publish, he said.

Mann notes that the media began to cover the community during the AIDS crisis, but only shared the tragic stories.

There were very few stories about the resiliency and increased political activism that happened in the community due to AIDS. So we really dont begin to see human stories until marriage equality where we actually see queer people victorious and being triumphant.

Interestingly Mann said that the legalization of same sex marriage took many activists by surprise.

This was something that came very suddenly in many ways. It wasnt on our radar in the 1990s. We were fighting AIDS. We were getting gay rights bills passed. No one ever thought that marriage equality would come so quickly, and when we began to see states legalizing same-sex marriage it was wow we really are moving into a new world. It was euphoric because people felt finally that they were being recognized as full human beings. You could now have a wedding that would be legally recognized. You could now have a marriage that was more than just a piece of paper.

While same-sex marriage was a positive advancement, Mann said that other concerns the LGBTQ community had were pushed to the side when the spotlight fell on marriage equality.

For all the good that marriage equality brought about, there was also a divergence from other issues. Everything became about marriage in the early 2000s so we lost some of the fights for full equality for access, for healthcare, and certainly trans rights had been sidelined during the Gay Rights Bill because they felt it wouldnt have passed if they included trans people. So we should have passed the transgender rights bill back in 2005 or something like that, but it had to wait until 2011.

Mann, who teaches a course about LGBTQ history at CCSU, noted that his students are always surprised to learn about the communitys history. When his students worked on the research project in 2019, he said they looked into the untold stories and went beyond the politics to look at the cultural, mental health and intersectionality of the communitys past.

Every group should know its history and should be allowed to learn about its history. The past informs what we do in the present and the future, he said. Its empowering for younger people to learn about the history of their group.

As an activist and an editor for Metroline, a LGBTQ publication, Mann has had a front-row seat to how the states policies and social climate has shifted its stance on the LGBT community.

You know, we were working towards a future that was more equal and more inclusive and more equitable, but it was hard to imagine that when there were very few role models and very few examples of successful gay lives. It was hard to imagine when that would happen, I guess we thought it would happen when we were very, very old and suddenly things started happening very quickly, he said. When youre living through it you don't really see it as history.

tinamarie.craven@hearstmediact.com
TOKYO  A member of the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force was bitten in the chest by a bear on Friday morning as it breached the main gate of Camp Okadama in Hokkaido, a JGSDF spokesman said.

The soldier, who was guarding the gate when the bear approached at about 7:50 a.m., suffered minor injuries to his chest, the spokesman said. Its customary in Japan for some government officials to speak to the media on condition of anonymity.

The bear left the base, which is in the city of Sapporo, at about 8:15 a.m., the spokesman said, adding that the animal did not cause any damage or affect base operations.

A local hunters group shot and killed the bear just after 11 a.m. northeast of Okadama Airport, which is adjacent to Camp Okadama, the spokesman said.

The bear, which was between 5 feet and 6 feet tall, had attacked and injured other people before entering the base, according to the Asahi newspaper.

Those victims include a 40-year-old man who suffered serious injuries, including a broken chest bone, in an attack in a residential area, the newspaper reported. A woman in her 80s and a man in his 70s received minor injuries.

The bear was first spotted in a residential area at about 3:30 a.m., according to Jiji Press.

It had also entered the grounds of Okadama Airport, including the runway, temporarily shutting down the runway and canceling some flights, according to the Asahi report.
WACO, Texas  A judge denied a request to suppress the confession of a woman accused of helping kill and dismember Spc. Vanessa Guillen, who was missing for about two months before her remains were found.

U.S. District Judge Alan D. Albright rejected to toss Cecily Ann Aguilar's confession after 2.5 hours of testimony Wednesday, according to the Houston Chronicle.

Lewis Berray Gainor, Aguilar's defense lawyer, argued that police deliberately violated the law by waiting to give Aguilar her Miranda Rights until after she confessed on June 30, 2020.

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Aguilar, 23, helped Army Spc. Aaron Robinson, 20, of Calumet City, Illinois, kill, dismember and dispose of Guillen's body in nearby woods, federal and state investigators said.

Robinson killed himself July 1, the day Guillens remains were found near the Leon River in Bell County, officials said. The remains were identified as Guillens on July 6.

Two of the investigators who heard Aguilar's confession initially took the stand at the hearing Wednesday.

A Texas Ranger and a Waco police officer on the federal task force investigating Guillens April 2020 disappearance detailed the conversation recorded in the interrogation room.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Mark Frazier played video clips of the confession to a rapt courtroom that shows Aguilar outline the gruesome details of Guillens slaying. She also helped officers by reaching out to Robinson, the suspected killer, via cell phone.

Related: Army Disciplines 13 Leaders, Confirms Murdered Soldier Vanessa Guillen Was Sexually Harassed
TAN-TAN, Morocco  More than 7,000 troops from the United States, African and NATO countries on Friday wound up a large-scale training exercise in the northwestern section of a continent increasingly threatened by Islamist extremists and military strife.

The U.S.-led African Lion war games lasted almost two weeks and took place in regional U.S. ally Morocco, Tunisia and Senegal. The annual drills, the largest in Africa, were skipped last year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Maj. Gen. Andrew Rohling, commander of the U.S. Army's Southern European Task Force Africa, said it had been an "exceptional" exercise.

"It has helped our interoperability, our joint capabilities, and provided readiness and a good opportunity to build cohesion across the forces," he said Friday.

But there was a hitch at the start, with Spain withdrawing from the war games citing budgetary reasons. Press reports however attributed the move to Spain's poor relations with Morocco, a former key ally.

The two countries have been at loggerheads since Spain took in the leader of the Polisario Front independence movement  Morocco's No.1 enemy  for COVID-19 treatment in a Spanish hospital earlier this year. The Polisario is fighting for independence for the Western Sahara, a vast region that Morocco claims as its own.

During the exercise, Morocco held some airborne operations near the Western Sahara and not far from Polisario refugee camps in Tindouf, in neighboring Algeria.

"Those activities have been perfectly conducted and agreed upon between the two militaries," Moroccan Brigadier Gen. Mohammed Jamil told The Associated Press.

Asked whether any action spilled into the disputed Western Sahara, Gen. Rohling said only that the locations "have not changed since the beginning of our construct of this exercise last year," before the Spain-Morocco crisis.

Africa faces several potential crisis points, from inroads made by Islamic State, al-Qaida and Boko Haram fighters to power struggles and coups. In addition to the threat from Islamist extremists in the Sahel, militaries in places like the Democratic Republic of Congo and Central African Republic come under attack by other armed groups vying for control of the region's mineral resources.

The participating countries were the U.S., Morocco, Tunisia, Senegal, Italy, The Netherlands and Britain. Observers also attended from countries including Egypt, Qatar, Niger and Mali.

Elaine Ganley in Paris and Krista Larson in Dakar contributed.
After an unprecedented year of back-to-back domestic missions and combat deployments, the National Guard's top general expects the Pentagon to lean even more heavily on the Guard moving forward.

"Given the uncertain future and budget priorities, we expect the Department of Defense to rely on the National Guard more, not less," General Daniel Hokanson, chief of the National Guard Bureau said in the force's annual posture statement this month. "Therefore, we must be ready to execute our three core missions; fighting America's wars, securing the homeland, and building enduring partnerships."

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Since March 2020, many elements of the National Guard have been tasked with a large list of domestic missions including pandemic relief, responding to numerous protests and natural disasters, and securing the Capitol after the pro-Trump insurrection on Jan. 6.

However, those missions are winding down. According to the Guard's posture statement, which gives an overview on the force's goals next year, going back to training for war will be a top priority.

The Guard has continued to juggle missions abroad amid its domestic deployments, all while maintaining civilian careers and not having access to all the resources given to their active-duty counterparts, such as child care.

Currently, there are more than 20,000 Guard troops deployed in support of missions in the Middle East, Africa and Europe, according to the National Guard Bureau.

The Guard is also sending thousands of soldiers to three-week rotations at combat training centers, or CTCs, which are used to evaluate a brigade's ability to perform in combat. CTCs are often the last stop for a brigade before it gets an overseas mission.

Two National Guard brigades are training at the National Training Center in Fort Irwin, Calif. this year: Mississippi Army Guard's 155th Armored Brigade Combat Team which is there right now, and Oklahoma's 45th Infantry Brigade Combat Team in July.

Three brigades are training at the Joint Readiness Center in Fort Polk, La. this year: Ohio's 37th Infantry Brigade Combat Team in July, and Indiana's Security Force Assistance Brigade in August.

Beyond the traditional warfighting domains on land, the Guard is aggressively posturing itself in space. Key leaders, including Hokanson, have advocated to Congress the need for a Space National Guard.

"The National Guard retains decades of depth and expertise in space operations," Gen. John Raymond, the chief of the Space Force said in a statement. "Guardsmen are masters of their trade and many work directly with the space industry. Every day, guardsmen conduct missile warning, satellite command and control [and] analyze space intelligence and conduct space electronic warfare operations on behalf of combatant commanders around the globe."

Currently, the Guard provides 60% of the Space Force's offensive electronic warfare capability, according to the Guard's posture statement.

The National Guard has 14 space units across seven states and one territory: Alaska, California, Colorado, Florida, Hawaii, New York, Ohio and Guam.

The previous National Defense Authorization Act instructed the Defense Department to brief lawmakers on the viability and practicality of a Space Force Reserve or Guard element.

-- Steve Beynon can be reached at Steve.Beynon@military.com. Follow him on Twitter @StevenBeynon.

Related: Space Guard 'Among My Most Pressing Concerns,' National Guard Chief Tells Congress
The Air Force is asking for a delay in funding over its brand-new T-7A Red Hawk trainer as it works through a technical issue that has pushed its development by at least a year.

During a House Armed Services Committee hearing on the fiscal 2022 budget, Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Charles "CQ" Brown said technical issues have pushed back the plane's "Milestone C," a review that happens before a program can enter the full production phase.

The Air Force had planned to ask for $206 million next year for research and development on T-7, but will ask for just $189 million instead. Advance timetables show the Red Hawk is being delayed roughly 15 months from the original "Milestone C" decision date.

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"Our focus and commitment to the T-7 has not waned," Brown said Wednesday during the hearing. "We want to make sure the money aligns with where the program is."

The Air Force on Friday cited parts shortages -- due to COVID-19's effect on the global supply chain -- initial design delays, and additional required testing for the setback. The decision is now expected in late 2023.

"The T-7 Advanced Pilot Training program has inherent schedule risk because of the aggressive nature of the program's schedule," the service said in an email. The additional testing, the service said, has to do with the aircraft's wing rock, meaning the aircraft has the potential to enter an uncontrollable roll while flying at certain angles of attack.

The Air Force said the issue was discovered during the testing phase -- much earlier than in the traditional operational test and evaluation phase -- because of the T-7's early prototyping and digital engineering process.

The T-7 is manufactured using digital engineering, giving developers the ability to design and change blueprints with more flexibility as they create armaments or tools.

"The wing rock issue will be resolved via a flight software update that will correct for this phenomenon," officials said.

The initial design delays were due to a problem with contracting suppliers. "Digital model-based engineering would not have alleviated these concerns," the service said.

Boeing said the wing rock issue will not affect the integrity or design of the jet, said Deborah VanNierop, a company spokeswoman.

"Having the production relevant jets before Engineering & Manufacturing and Development (EMD) is a first and has allowed early learning which provides us the benefit of identifying issues early and reducing risk," VanNierop said in an email. "We have flown 246 EMD test flights to date, with flight test sortie rates significantly higher than in traditional test programs, and continue to achieve revolutionary aircraft build times."

She added, "New software is already loaded into the aircraft [and is] being prepped for the start of phase two testing. We will be validating the software into July."

Despite the Air Forces time projection, Boeing expects the delay will be seven months, the company told Military.com.

In September 2018, the Air Force awarded Boeing Co. a $9.2 billion contract to build a replacement aircraft, with a working name of T-X. In 2019, the service rebranded the T-X as the T-7A Red Hawk, named in honor of the Tuskegee Airmen. The T-7 is built in partnership with Sweden's Saab.

The Air Force has committed to buying 351 T-7A jets, 46 simulators and associated ground equipment.

The development delay has some families worried about the continued use of the Northrop Grumman-made T-38 Talon, some of which date to the mid-1960s.

The service has seen a number of accidents in the aircraft over the last five years, some of them fatal.

"The T-38 is the only Air Force training jet for the fighter path so these men and women have no choice but to climb into these antiquated cockpits daily," Don and Carlene Wilkie told Military.com via email.

Their son, 2nd Lt. Travis Wilkie, died in 2019 while attempting to execute a formation landing alongside another jet at Vance Air Force Base, Oklahoma. The second lieutenant, and his instructor pilot, Lt. Col. John "Matt" Kincade, were killed in the crash. Following the release of the investigation into the accident, all the Wilkies saw was that the pilots had been saddled with the blame. But because of the crash, the service suspended formation landings indefinitely.

Still, the family questions why it will take years to replace the Air Education and Training Command's principal training aircraft, and fear more accidents in the aging jet will claim more lives. Despite the age of the trainer fleet, the Air Force has said there is no reason for concern.

"Bringing on the successor to the T-38 is important," Maj. Gen. Craig Wills, 19th Air Force commander, said last year. "But it's no question that we're maintaining [the T-38] exceptionally well and that we're committed to maintaining a safe fleet of airplanes [until that happens]," Wills said in an interview. "If I didn't think the fleet was safe, we wouldn't be flying."

"Just because we don't have a replacement isn't enough reason to keep flying a 60-year-old deathtrap," the Wilkies said. "To us, it's a ticking time bomb."

-- Oriana Pawlyk can be reached at oriana.pawlyk@military.com. Follow her on Twitter at @Oriana0214.

Related: F-16 Pilot's Runway Death Forces Reckoning Over Tight Flight Hours, Training Gaps
Guam has been an American territory since the United States took it from Spain in 1898, with only one interruption -- the brutal three-year occupation by the Japanese Empire during World War II.

Liberating Guam required the United States Marine Corps to call in a couple of platoons filled with special operators: jungle fighting dogs of war. They were the Devil Dogs' devil dogs. But the island would become the final resting place for many of them.

To honor their sacrifice, the U.S. military established the National War Dog Cemetery there, where it is to this day.

Not long after the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, the Japanese assaulted American forces on Guam, taking the island in just two days. They would hold it until it could be recaptured by U.S. Marines in 1944.

A war dog and handler walk on the beach on Guam, 1944. (U.S. Marine Corps)

When the Marine Corps returned to the island after three years of brutal Japanese occupation, they brought with them the 2nd and 3rd War Dog Platoons. These uniquely trained dogs, mostly Doberman Pinschers, were able to counter Japanese defense tactics, which wreaked havoc on the Marines assaulting them.

Dogs were used to sniff out land mines obscured by the jungle floor. They warned Marines of ambushes in caves and woods, found booby traps and snipers and kept watch over their troops at night, when the Japanese liked to sneak up on sleeping positions.

Hundreds, maybe thousands of Marines owe their lives to their four-legged scouts. The memorial itself features the names of 25 war dogs who landed on Guam and gave their lives protecting U.S. troops from harm.

Their service to the Marines was so effective on Guam that every Marine division in the Pacific was assigned a war dog platoon.

After the island was secured, the 25 dead dogs were buried at the initial landing area. Their remains were eventually moved to the Marine cemetery on the island and white headstones were added to the cemetery.

In the 1980s, retired veterinarian William W. Putney traveled to Guam. He had helped train the dogs as a Marine captain and served as the commanding officer of both platoons during their heroic effort to retake Guam from the Japanese.

What Putney found was disheartening for their old skipper and trainer. The graves were unkept and overgrown with weeds and other plants. The sacrifices of these canine Marines who paved the way for dogs to serve in every conflict since World War II seemed completely forgotten.

Putney was able to raise funds to restore the War Dogs Cemetery and build a monument to all military working dogs -- past, present and future.

The main monument features a Doberman Pinscher named Kurt who saved the lives of 250 Marines on Guam by warning them of a Japanese ambush in the jungle. On the monument, Kurt's ears are upright as he maintains his watch over his resting fellows. The base of the monument is inscribed with the names of the 25 dogs who lost their lives in the battle to retake Guam.

Read more about the Marine Corps War Dogs of World War II in Putney's 2001 book, "Always Faithful: A Memoir of the Marine Dogs of WWII."

-- Blake Stilwell can be reached at blake.stilwell@military.com. He can also be found on Twitter @blakestilwell or on Facebook.

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It took a national scandal over a Facebook group called Marines United to force a true reckoning within the Marine Corps about its cultural problems with sexual harassment and misogyny. Four years later, how has the service -- and the military at large -- come in putting an end to this toxic behavior and creating a safer and more equal place for all troops to serve? Scott Jensen, a former leader of the Marines' Sexual Assault Prevention and Response program, joins Left of Boom to give the military a report card on its progress.

Subscribe to the Left of Boom podcast:

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Mentioned in this episode:

Marines United

Sexual Harassment and Assault in the Military

Military Social Media

Sexual Assault Prevent and Response

Me Too in the Military

Women in the Military

The following is an edited transcript of this episode of Left of Boom:

Hope Hodge Seck 0:00

Welcome back to Left of Boom. I'm your host, Military.com managing editor Hope Hodge Seck. In March 2017, when I was still covering the Marine Corps full time, the community was rocked to its core by a news report from my friend Thomas Brennan for Reveal News. He reported on an unofficial Facebook group called Marines United, where sickening things were happening, including the sharing and distribution of nude images of female service members without their consent. Congress was horrified and top brass promised changes. But a lot of Marines and veterans, particularly women, said leaders were just waking up to a toxic culture that had existed with impunity for years. Today, we'll talk to Scott Jensen, a retired Marine officer who used to run the Marines' sexual assault prevention and response program, and then after retirement became a prominent advocate for cultural change in the Corps. Four years after Marines United, how far has the Marine Corps come? And how much work remains to be done?

Scott Jensen, welcome to the show.

Scott Jensen 1:06

Thanks, Hope It's great to be here with you all today.

Hope Hodge Seck 1:09

Tell me where were you when the report by Thomas Brennan was published in March 2017, revealing that this group of Marines and veterans on Facebook were, among other things, swapping nude photos of female service members without their consent. Where were you? And what was your reaction to hearing about this?

Scott Jensen 1:30

Yeah, I was I was shocked. I was about a year out of retirement at that point. So I, you know, I had been out of the Marine Corps about a year and had led, as you know, the behavioral programs for the Marine Corps where I was responsible for sexual assault prevention and response. And I heard the report in the news. And then obviously, because of the role I'd been in, had a number of people forward me the information as well. I was shocked and frankly, dismayed. On the other hand, I wasn't surprised because of indicators that we'd had, you know, for several years to including the time I was in uniform, have something like this that could occur.

Hope Hodge Seck 2:14

Can you talk more about that? What indicators were you seeing?

Scott Jensen 2:19

Well, it wasn't a surprise to any of us that there was behaviors going on, particularly online, that ran counter to what we were saying publicly and what our position was in the Marine Corps on taking care of people, protecting people, particularly women, who were being targeted by people online. The challenge, obviously, was how much of that targeting was being done by true Marines, and how much of that was being done by people who were claiming to be Marines. And then those who were retired or veterans, who, you know, you have less control over. I have one stark recollection: I was traveling across the Marine Corps, and I was in Iwakuni. And a young Marine female came up to me and said, Sir, this is what we're dealing with. And she showed me something online that had occurred, that was very negative behavior. And by the background, it was clear that it occurred while the head of the SAPR program was visiting the workspace, because of the dates on the back of the board. So you know, there were young women facing these types of challenges. And there was so little fear of doing this, that even having somebody from the headquarters of the Marine Corps, who was targeting this type of behavior, wasn't enough to prevent it from occurring while I was on site. And you know, we were getting reports of and seeing information that indicated that these type of activities are going on and we wanted to try to blunt it.

Hope Hodge Seck 3:58

Why do you think it was that the Marine Corps, at least from an outsider's perspective, seem to struggle so much with getting their arms around the online social media aspect of this larger cultural problem?

Scott Jensen 4:13

You covered it in the last part of your sentence. It was this larger cultural problem, you know, social media and our behavior, wherever we are, is an extension of what we believe, how we act, what we've been told is right and wrong. And then the actions that occurred that reinforced that action. And, you know, I think it's very indicative and was very indicative of the acceptable culture at the time, which is frankly, a culture that still exists, that's very challenging, of a lack of respect for underrepresented populations, particularly gender-based but you know, it extends to to racial and other identity issues as well, and it just flows over into social media. The issue with social media is it can move around so much. You can shut something down and it can pop right back up. The anonymity of it and the ability to say things and do things where you're not being held accountable for it exacerbates that that issue. So I think that's why it overflowed into social media.

Hope Hodge Seck 5:21

Your last tour in the Marine Corps -- so you've talked about it, you're director of sexual assault prevention and response. And that was a job you were handpicked by the Commandant of the Marine Corps to fill. So how did that come about in the in the flow of your career?

Scott Jensen 5:40

Great question. It's kind of almost the humor of the Marine Corps that a combat helicopter pilot gets plucked out of out of a role and ends up running behavioral programs and the sexual assault program for the Marine Corps. I believe it was a series of activities that began when I was an operational commander, as a colonel and my focus on the topics of you know, everything from dealing with suicide issues, and trauma issues, and the sexual assault, harassment, behavior really issues. As an operational commander, I think that got the attention of the assistant commandant and the commandant. The assistant commandant at the time had been my MEF commander. I was a colonel, so and he and I were relatively close. And I think it was probably on his recommendation, I don't know for sure, it was never explained to me. You know, I have a daughter that's in the Navy, she was going to the Naval Academy. I was particularly interested in it from that aspect as well. But it began well before my daughter joined the service. And, and so you know, I was flattered, I was also challenged. I was the wing forward commander in Afghanistan, came home, spent a couple of months at home, and then got the call that we'd like you to come up and take over this program. So it was flattering, and very challenging. You know, it's not an easy topic. If it were easy to solve, we would have solved a long time ago,

Hope Hodge Seck 7:09

The Marine Corps -- and there may, of course, be mitigating demographic factors here -- for a long time has had the most dramatic statistics in terms of sexual harassment and assault. They've been the service in which that's most prevalent. That job, did it give you any new insights into cultural dynamics of the service or the root causes that you might not previously have been aware of?

Scott Jensen 7:35

Well, to a certain degree, yes. I mean, it gave me an insight as to the complexity of the problem. It also reinforced to me that in order to work and solve these issues, is going to require, you know, breaking some China. You can't stick with the same processes and systems as they exist, without changing some pretty drastic things. Like how we hold people accountable. You know, how we reinforce behaviors, you can't just change a few sentences, send out some guidance from above, tell people it's unacceptable, and then turn around and continue to do things do business the same way. You know, that's, that's really what I became very apparent to me is it was going to require some revolutionary change, for us to really get to the heart of this in several areas.

Hope Hodge Seck 8:32

And I know that you closely tracked the fallout of Marines United and the response from leaders in a number of roles that that you held. And at this point, you're retired from the Marine Corps. Was that China, in fact, being broken? What do you see as the fundamental elements of leadership response? And was it enough? Was it right?

Scott Jensen 8:55

I think they were nibbling on the edges. And I don't think I don't think we've still broken the China. And this isn't just in the Marine Corps. This is Department of Defense-wide. I do applaud the very quick activity once Marines United popped and it was, you know, it was just so much in their face that the Marine Corps leadership really responded quickly and effectively, and, you know, put out policies and started demonstrating behavior themselves, saying. This is unacceptable. So I do applaud the effort that they took there, but had they broken China two or three years earlier, we may have prevented Marines United altogether. There were suggestions made, it would have been hard, it would have taken money, it would have taken a change in thinking but there were ways to influence that by how we track behavior online. And what we did online, and there were always reasons why we couldn't do it. We couldn't do it. We couldn't do it, which to this day I disagree with. But those were the decisions that were made. But to the broader question of breaking China, what do we do talking about, I think a better look at how we integrate women into the service, a better look at how we respect how a diverse population of service members actually contributes to the national security rather than looking at them as deterrence to contributing to readiness. You know, in some ways, some of it is finding ways to grow the population of diverse populations. If you're going to keep women down at below 10% of a population, you're always going to have an issue of looking at them in different ways. If you increase that population and have a broader and more diverse population of service members, particularly in the gender area -- but that doesn't happen unless you change policies that make things more inviting for women. If you're looking at the assault rates and harassment rates, and say, Hey, please come join us, we treat everyone the same. When you can look at the statistics, how many women are going to be raising their hand saying, Yeah, let me join, you know, I want some of that. They're making obvious decisions. So, so how we recruit, but also how we measure behavior. You know, I'm shocked that we have a system that says, okay, physical fitness, twice a year, we're going to measure you for your physical fitness. And we have certain standards, and here's the line. And if you fall below that line, you either need to fix yourself and get above the line, or we're going to ask you to leave. And we record that in personnel reports and how we measure people's performance. It's a very deliberate and detailed line. We don't do that with behaviors. We don't measure leaders and managers and people's behavior and say, Hey, here's the standard, and you either fall below or above the standard. And if you fall below the standard, you have a choice, you can stay there, and we're going to kick you out. Or you can change your behavior to a behavior of excellence, and then we'll promote you, we'll give you command will give you all the opportunities that exist. Those type of things require complete change to a report a management system, that's breaking China, that's revolutionary, that's hard. You know, those type of activities, I think, are really what it will come down to, you know, and we've tracked for years addressing the military justice system as well, and making the appropriate changes there to better support the the topic.

Hope Hodge Seck 12:24

That's a lot. And I know, there are strong defenders of the status quo in all these cases. And just to give you a chance to kind of lay out, you know, what you were seeing at the time, I'm sure there are people who would say, well, you're advocating for all these changes that should have happened before Marines United, but in some ways you were the guy in charge of this particular piece of the pie in those preceding years. Can you take me behind the scenes and what you were pushing for and how people were pushing back, just what that looked like?

Scott Jensen 12:56

Part of it, Hope, is just the bureaucracy of it. And where the offices lie that deal with sexual assault and harassment, you know, they're, they're down in the in the manpower channels, within DoD and within the services. To push ideas up requires weaving and bobbing and getting to the right locations. And you're competing against funding and readiness requirements that are buying airplanes, and, you know, equipping, buying new rifles, and you know, all those things that are competing for resources. And I think where our office locations were, and how we reported, that didn't really give us a balance of being able to compete and get those types of ideas up into the right people, competing priorities. You know, from the Marines United standpoint, there were ways to monitor online behavior that were being used across the country, by civilian law enforcement agencies and others, that were very useful in predicting where bad things might happen. And they were relatively low cost. And I was really pushing for, you know, systems like that to consider how we monitor. But the head of sexual assault doesn't have any money or any control of computer systems or the distribution of money or directing that two generals who own two different portfolios talk to each other. There were food fights that were turf wars, and it's very easy to point back and find the legal reasons to say that this won't work because it's illegal, when, in fact, probably, if it was being done elsewhere, it probably wasn't as illegal as people were suggesting. It was just a good excuse that no one could argue it. You know, that's classic DoD. It's illegal, therefore, we can't do it. And no one's there to be able to say, well, could we question whether it's illegal or not? And could we find a legal way to do something very similar to that though? To the challenges of trying to get new ideas pushed up, I think another area that that I was working on and still espouse this day is just the idea of understanding behaviors at microclimate levels. Right now DoD really only measures climate and culture at the O-5, you know, a lieutenant colonel or a Navy commander level of command and up. And that really gives subordinate leaders and managers somewhat of an out in that no one's really looking at how their culture and climate is at lower levels within a unit, and finding ways of measuring that. Again, breaking China to a certain degree, totally changing how we go about looking at climate and culture. You know, you look at the stories that we see, even today, in the last three months, the stories of, of young men and women who have been not treated well, and have been set aside or retaliated against, a lot of that behavior is happening at a very small-unit level, behind closed doors. They're not happening by commanders clear up at the lieutenant colonel and colonel level. And so how do we know when those things are happening and blunt it? If we have no way of measuring it, and then again, holding people accountable, if there are challenges there, you start holding people accountable in a very positive way, you start rewarding excellence at a much lower level. And miraculously, people start changing their behavior, you know, so those were two areas, you know, and examples of things that I was pushing for, and I still do to this day, to solve some of these problems.

Hope Hodge Seck 16:40

Is there anything that you wish you could go back and and do in that role, you know, with the benefit of hindsight? Or do you just feel like, this system was not set up to move the needle forward? And it took this crisis to get people rethinking all this?

Scott Jensen 16:57

Yeah, boy, that's a great question. You know, I, I really felt like I put my heart and soul into what I was doing. I walked away with a very clear conscience. With my time in service, I did everything that that I could, you know, I had this dual role, right, of representing the military and our policies. And, you know, you and I spoke when I was in uniform, and, was interviewed. And I was there to defend the policies that later on, I was, you know, also questioning, helping our leaders prepare for congressional testimony. I always wonder, could I have pushed harder? Should I have put more in there? You know, you do question yourself in that regard. But frankly, I, you know, I walked away with a clear conscience that I had done as best as I could. And, you know, I think a measure of that is I continued, you know, I'm, I retired in 2016. And here I sit today still advocating and, and pushing for positive reforms. And we've seen incremental reforms, you know, we have seen changes, the examples of the response to the Marine Corps with online social media activity, they responded, and that's the nice thing about the military. They've proven it over and over again, they get an order. Finally, somebody, we take the time, we emphasize to leaders, they make a decision. And then we're used to executing, you know, we follow orders. And you can see that with racial integration, you can see that with the lifting of Don't Ask, Don't Tell, you know, there was pushback, right. And then, finally, we got to a point where a decision was made. And they're able to execute very quickly and set a great example for the rest of society.

Hope Hodge Seck 18:43

So you moved to become the CEO of the organization Protect Our Defenders in October 2017. Was the move to the organization at all prompted or influenced by the Marines United fallout? And then how did that job change affect how you were engaging with the issue?

Scott Jensen 19:07

It was coincident, you know, I was I saw the opportunity at Protect our Defenders, I still serve on their board of directors. And it was the topic and my desire to stay engaged that led me to Protect our Defenders. Not any, you know, Marines United was just again an example of why I felt like I still needed to just stay engaged on the topic. I wanted to lend my credibility. I knew the topic. I had very strong views of how we could change policy, you know, write laws, to better support the men and women who serve and I saw it as a readiness and national security, imperative, as well as just a common human decency imperative, to help those those who serve So yeah, I went to Protect our Defenders so that I can continue to serve in a different way. And obviously, once you're out of uniform, you're able to speak with the media, talk with people on the Hill, in much less restricted forms, and give your opinions of things. And that comes with risk. It still does, you know, I mean, if you're advocating with strong views, you're going to irritate people, you're going to irritate a lot of people. And I'm very certain that I have irritated a lot of people. But I tell you what, throughout my time with Protect our Defenders, and in this advocacy space, I can't tell you the number of young men and women who have reached out to me and thanked me for carrying their message and representing them. And there are so few middle-aged bald white men carrying these types of messages out that it stands out. And you know, I will take the negative that has come from it for the very much heavier positive of being able to to represent people who have no voice and see the very impactful process. Hope, a small story: I sold a pickup truck a few months ago, a truck I'd had forever. On Facebook, some guy reaches out to me and says, Hey, I think I just bought your truck. And I said, Okay, so we exchanged, you know, some back and forth, kind of weird, he found me, you know, I don't know how he found me, something was left in the truck that must have had my name on it, which is scary. But this guy has a daughter who's in the Navy in the behavioral programs. And he told me that she was very excited to make the connection. He knew my name. Four years later, because his daughter had written part of her thesis on my work in the Marine Corps.

Hope Hodge Seck 21:52

That's remarkable.

Scott Jensen 21:53

You know, stories like that are very heartening to, to the work that you do. So I've been very satisfied and wrote and has been very rewarded for the work that I've done.

Hope Hodge Seck 22:03

Well, so now we're four years on from sort of the breaking of this news of Marines United, that really seemed like a turning point in awareness, if nothing else. The military, like the entire country had another reckoning later in 2017, over the "Me Too" movement, and we've had several evolutions on different fronts with different issues since then, particularly in 2020. When you look at the Marine Corps, and I suppose the military as a whole, I would love to kind of break down how things have changed, how things are improved, and maybe ask you to give a grade to certain aspects, and then kind of expand on what you're seeing, and what's better, what still needs improvement. Let's start with monitoring social media, increasing emphasis on professional behavior, and not cyberbullying, those kinds of things here in 2021. How would you grade the the Marine Corps and the military as a whole?

Scott Jensen 23:13

That's a great way of phrasing it, I think I would do probably a "B" in that regard. Some things that we didn't see five years ago that we see now, examples of the senior enlisted of the services speaking out on social media, responding when they see bad behavior. You know, that was something we were really asking for five years ago was, when we see a negative comment on a Facebook page, having some senior leaders step in and say, Hey, Marine, that's not in keeping with our standards. And I disagree with you. Those types of statements can really blunt that behavior because, you know, people respond to those, particularly the senior enlisted leaders, so I think they're progressing. In many fronts there, positively.

Hope Hodge Seck 24:00

Alright, the next issue I wanted to talk about is training and awareness, whether that's with sexual harassment, sexual assault, gender discrimination, all of those things. How are we doing now in 2021?

Scott Jensen 24:14

Oh, boy, I'm going to go C-minue. C, C-minus only because it's an average. And I think they're maintaining the average. You look at the statistics that really don't bear out that, that the training is having the impact that it should, when you look at the number of incidents and their number of records that continue, the number of cases that are being brought forward. It just doesn't seem like they're moving the needle over the last five years, really over the last 30 years. When it comes to those types of awarenesses that are changing behaviors.

Hope Hodge Seck 24:50

Same question for diversity in recruiting and retention. I do know that the Marine Corps still has the fewest number of women. I'd like to know what you think is changing what is staying the same. And again, how you'd grade the Marine Corps and the services.

Scott Jensen 25:07

You know, I'd really like to give them up in the B's, I'm going to keep it at a C right now because I want to see the progress. But there are some positive indicators. Some things like integrating the boot camp, training women on both coasts in the boot camp, particularly in the in the Marine Corps. I think DoD-wide, some of the services are demonstrating leadership in how they look at some of the racial disparity issues that they've been dealing with, as well as gender disparity issues. The Air Force is taking it on the chin in many regards. And I think they've responded very positively. Over the last couple of years, the Army's program seems to be great running and growing as well. I'm particularly intrigued by the Navy's program, how they've integrated kind of a whole-sailor mentality into this type of behavior. So, to me, I'd love to see, I think there's positive trends going on. But to me, you know, I take like the gender integration at the boot camps in the Marine Corps. It's all a matter of how it's being perceived by the boots on the ground, and how the drill instructors and the commanders and the leaders are communicating that. And if they're communicating it as forced down upon us by on high by liberal Democrats, by however it wants to be articulated, then it won't ever be successful. You know, we are taught from the very first stage that we take orders, and then we treat them as our own. And part of the problem that has been in these integration issues is we're not following that mantra. We're not internalizing it, accepting it as our own, and then moving out in that regard. That's why I say I've got to see what the trends hold. In this. I will say that I'm encouraged by [Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin's] very upfront directive on on taking a pause and asking for immediate feedback. And I'm impressed by those that have been appointed. In the committees and the commissions that are looking at this, there are people that I hold in high regard, and I trust to look at alternative ways of doing things. And then again, "Ok, let's look in 190 days, were they willing to break China have they started to, to move in ways that that make big changes." Then I'll be thinking more about towards the C-plus, Bs, maybe in a few months, we'll see how it goes.

Hope Hodge Seck 27:33

Final area to grade and it's something you hit on earlier in our conversation: structural issues and policies that, whether intended or not, functionally discriminate against women or other groups. This has been a big focus in 2020-2021. And I've even noted with interest, there's been a coalition of female Marine Corps officers agitating for change with things like policies that discriminate against pregnancy and things like that. So how would you grade the Marine Corps and the services in how are they addressing this issue?

Scott Jensen 28:11

Yeah, I think C, C-plus, almost my same exact thoughts as the previous grading session, the trajectories, the ideas are there. But let's see how they implement it. Because you know, whether you're talking about that and some policies, I applaud, you know, maternity, you know, helping new mothers have gap time to raise young children and other opportunities, and then the opportunity to come back in and continue in service. There are steps being taken, it needs to become holistic, and it needs to become, how's the message being received, if women are looked down upon if they take time out, to raise their children for a couple of years, and then come back in? How do they maintain their competitive nature for promotions, commands, those types of things. I do believe, again, that the commissions and committees that have been formed as a result of the presidential transition, Secretary Austin's focus and work and promises, could take us down into a whole new area. And I'd love to see that trajectory go up. And you and I talk in a year, and I give A's across the board. But I think it's a little too early to tell that we are at that point, and there are definite leading indicators from both DoD and the administration. That indicates that we are primed to make some big changes. And to break some China to do that. And then move on, make the decision break the China, our armed forces are the most resilient, responsive, capable, innovative groups in the world. You tell them, you make them do it, they'll do it. They'll do it well, and then we'll move on and we're adaptable. But you know, I go back, I was talking to a group two nights ago, reflecting on a quote from 1992, from then Secretary of the Navy Sean O'Keefe, about how we don't accept this type of behavior. It's against our views. And anyone who can't get along with that needs to get out. 30 years ago, and I think you and I could go back through the records and find senior leaders, quoting almost that same chapter and verse every two or three years up until this time. So to me, the proof is in the pudding, show me the activity, show me the changes, don't just pay lip service to it. And then I'll start increasing my grade levels.

Hope Hodge Seck 30:37

When you talk about the way forward from here, the path ahead. Do military leaders now have all the tools that they need, as long as they have the will to break China as you said? Or are there any places that you think Congress needs to put in place a mandate and give that extra kind of force of law?

Scott Jensen 30:59

Well, I think they do have the tools they need if they want to choose that. But I also think that there are going to be some need to be some legislative changes that demand the carrot and the stick. I firmly believe that if our military leaders wanted to do this, these things, they don't need legislative mandates to do it. But history has proven that oftentimes legislative mandates or some type of research restrictions until things get done by holding back money is a forcing function. We still have room to grow in the military justice reform areas. I believe that we have a bigger chance this year now with the legislature and who's in the leadership and what we're hearing from both sides of the aisle. And you know, we've given it enough time, it's time for a legislative mandate on military justice improvement. That's an area I do believe will require legal reform to really make the change that's necessary. I do believe there also need to be legislative mandates that ask at least for follow up and reforms and call people for hearings to to report on how they're doing if not being very specific, indirect legislative language that directs a different way of monitoring culture and climate change within units and organizations.

Hope Hodge Seck 32:20

Scott Jensen, thank you for your time today. It's been a great conversation. Really appreciate your insights and your honest reflection on this pivotal period in military history.

Scott Jensen 32:35

Well, thank you so much.

Hope Hodge Seck 32:41

Thanks, once again for joining us here at Left of Boom. I'm so grateful for your support and the thousands of downloads this show has gotten in just one year. If you've got ideas for other themes to tackle, send them my way at podcast@military.com. I'll give you a shout-out on a future episode if you do. And in the meantime, remember you can find all the news and information you need about your military community every day at Military.com.
As you get ready to exit the military or if youve been out of the service for a while and are looking to launch a company, there are some important things to know and do.

Some veterans rush into business ownership because they dont want to report to someone else, they are attracted to the independence and freedom that comes with entrepreneurship, they want to take advantage of incentives and programs specifically for veteran entrepreneurs or they find it hard to secure traditional employment, among other reasons.

Whatever the reason, before taking the plunge into entrepreneurship, there are three people you should talk to.

1. Your Spouse/Family

While it might seem obvious to talk to your spouse and family about your ideas for entrepreneurship, Im surprised each time I speak to a new business owner and their spouse or partner hasnt fully been part of the vision for business ownership.

The people who support you, love you and who are financially, physically and emotionally participating in your career decisions should be included in your choice to take on the risk and reward of business ownership. Talk to your spouse about how much upfront money, time and additional resources you will be investing in the business. Discuss the best-case scenarios and the worst-case outcomes of this venture with the people who are closest to you. Be willing to listen to their concerns, questions and ideas to ensure they are fully bought in to, and supportive of, your vision.

This way, you can rely upon them when times are tough and celebrate with them when times are great.

2. Your Financial Advisers

Whether you have a financial planner, accountant, family friend or fellow veteran who is knowledgeable and trustworthy about budgeting and finances, consult an expert about how to allocate your resources properly so that you can invest in your business and grow your vision without jeopardizing your security or your familys future.

These conversations can be hard because talking about money can be unpleasant, but it will be tempting to keep putting more and more money into the business as time progresses. The absence of a solid plan means you might risk more than youre comfortable with. Good counsel here is valuable.

3. Other Entrepreneurs

If you will be pursuing a franchise option, starting a business from the ground up or taking over a business someone else started, talk to as many other business owners and entrepreneurs as you can.

Ask specific and direct questions about what they did that worked, and what they did that they regret. Tell them about the business that youll be starting and glean insights from their experience. The more you can learn from people who have done it well as well as from those who failed, the better you will be set up for success.

While research shows that veterans do very well as business owners, when starting a new business, its tempting to want to launch full steam ahead -- with all the enthusiasm, passion and energy of a true entrepreneur. But this is often where mistakes happen. Instead, gather a support system, enlist the expertise of financial pros and talk to others who have been down the path to ensure youll make decisions that set you and your business up for long-term success.

Want to Know More About Veteran Jobs?

Be sure to get the latest news about post-military careers as well as critical info about veteran jobs and all the benefits of service. Subscribe to Military.com and receive customized updates delivered straight to your inbox.
MMD Information on the date of the Annual Meeting of Shareholders

The Board of Directors of Milestone Medical Inc. (Company) informs that the Annual Meeting of

Shareholders of the Company shall be held on August 18, 2021, at 9:00 am ET in Roseland, New Jersey, United States of America at the corporate office of the Company, located at 425 Eagle Rock Avenue, Suite 403. The record date for the notice of the meeting, the record date for voting, and the date of the determination of beneficial ownership shall be June 20,2021. Further information concerning the Meeting will be given by the Issuer by way of subsequent current reports and at the Companys website http://medicalmilestone.com/generalmeetingsofshareholders.html.
The Union Ministry of Information & Broadcasting said in a statement on Thursday that the government has amended the Cable Television Network Rules, 1994, adding a statutory mechanism to redress citizen's grievances/complaints.

The rules have been amended in accordance with the provisions of the Cable Television Network Act, 1995, the ministry said.

It also said that the notification is significant as it paves the way for a strong institutional system for redressing grievances while placing accountability and responsibility on the broadcasters and their self-regulating bodies.

"The Cable Television Network Rules have been amended to provide for a statutory mechanism, which would be transparent and benefit the citizens. At the same time, self-regulating bodies of broadcasters would be registered with the Central government," the statement said.

At present, there is an institutional mechanism in the form of an inter-ministerial committee to address the grievances of citizens relating to violation of the Programme/Advertising Codes under the Rules. Similarly, various broadcasters have also developed their internal self-regulatory mechanism for addressing grievances.

Some broadcasters had also requested for giving legal recognition to their associations/bodies.

While expressing satisfaction over the existing mechanism of grievance redressal set up by the Central government, the Supreme Court in its order in the matter of Common Cause Vs Union of India & Others' in 2000 had advised to frame appropriate rules to formalise the complaint redressal mechanism.

At present, there are over 900 television channels which have been granted permission by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, and all of them are required to comply with the Programme and Advertising Code laid down under the Cable Television Network Rules.

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.
S&P Global Ratings revised its rating outlook on ICICI Bank Ltd to stable from negative, reflecting the agency's expectation that the lender's capitalisation will remain strong over the next 24 months, despite some deterioration in asset quality owing to COVID-19.

S&P also affirmed its 'BBB-' long-term and 'A-3' short-term issuer credit ratings on the India-based bank. "We revised the rating outlook to reflect our view that ICICI Bank will maintain its strong capital position over the next 24 months. The bank will benefit from the sale of stake in subsidiaries and gradual normalisation of earnings, which should reduce risks associated with its capital position," it says.

The ratings agency forecast ICICI Bank will maintain a risk-adjusted capital (RAC) ratio of more than 10% over the next 24 months. It says "Our expectation factors in 13%-14% credit growth for the bank, an improvement in earnings, and sale of stake in insurance subsidiaries over the period."

ICICI Bank's stressed loans (non-performing loans and restructured loans) are likely to remain high compared to those of international peers. S&P says it expects the bank's stressed loans to peak at 6% of total loans in fiscal 2022 lower than its estimate of 11%-12% for the Indian banking industry.

The ratings agency forecast ICICI Bank's credit costs will be about 2.0% of total loans in fiscal 2022 before normalising to the long-term average of about 1.5% from fiscal 2023.The Bank's new non-performing loans (NPLs) are likely to stay elevated in fiscal 2022 due to the impact of the second wave of COVID-19 infections.

"In our view, localised lockdowns will hit small and midsize enterprise (SME) borrowers the most. Retail loans, especially unsecured personal loans, and credit card debt, are also vulnerable. For ICICI Bank, SME loans (accounting for 4.2% of total loans), personal loans (6.7%), credit cards (2.4%) and rural loans (10%) could contribute to the increase in NPLs," the ratings agency added.

ICICI Bank has made COVID-19 related provisions to the tune of 1% of advances, which should help smoothen the hit from pandemic-related losses, S&P says, adding, the Bank's better customer profile and underwriting relative to the Indian banking system should limit losses.

Most of ICICI Bank's retail loans are to salaried professionals and have low loan-to-value ratios for example, average for home loans is 65%. Moreover, 65%-75% of loans in key retail segments such as mortgage, vehicle, and personal loans are to existing liability customers.

According to S&P, ICICI Bank's aggressive write-off strategy and recovery of NPLs should also contain its stressed loans. It says, "ICICI Bank's lower credit costs than in the past should enhance its profitability. We estimate core earnings will be 1.3%-1.6% of assets over the next two years, with further upside possible from the sale of stake in subsidiaries."

In its base case, the ratings agency says, ICICI Bank will maintain its strong market position, strong capital, better-than-system asset quality, and good funding and liquidity over the next 24 months.

"An upgrade of ICICI Bank is unlikely in the next one to two years because that would require an improvement in the bank's financial profile as well as the sovereign credit rating on India. Our assessment of ICICI Bank's financial profile may improve if the bank's asset quality strengthens to levels in line with international peers, and it maintains its capitalization at a strong level," S&P concludes.
Weather Alert

...HEAT ADVISORY REMAINS IN EFFECT UNTIL 9 PM MDT THIS EVENING... * WHAT...High temperatures in the mid to upper 90s. Some areas may exceed 100 degrees at times. * WHERE...Portions of central, north central, and west central Montana. * WHEN...Until 9 PM MDT this evening. * IMPACTS...Hot daytime temperatures may cause heat illnesses. PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS... Drink plenty of fluids, stay in an air-conditioned room, stay out of the sun, and check up on relatives and neighbors. Young children and pets should never be left unattended in vehicles. Take extra precautions when outside. Wear lightweight and loose fitting clothing. Try to limit strenuous activities to early morning or evening. Take action when you see symptoms of heat exhaustion and heat stroke. To reduce risk during outdoor work, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration recommends scheduling frequent rest breaks in shaded or air conditioned environments. Anyone overcome by heat should be moved to a cool and shaded location. Heat stroke is an emergency! Call 9 1 1. &&
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Lansdale, PA (19446)

Today

A few isolated thunderstorms developing this afternoon. High 79F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 30%..

Tonight

Some clouds. Slight chance of a shower throughout the evening. Low 58F. Winds light and variable.
Local veterans groups got a first hand look June 29 of the newly completed Lorain County VA Outpatient Clinic in Sheffield Village, highlighti
Lorain

Juneteenth Law passed just in time for Lorain's Bluesfest
Lorain City Schools will hire specialists in operations and autism for the upcoming school year, according to school board actions from a special meeting June 18, 2021.
A Fathers Day Parade on the final day of the Festival of the Fish entertained and enthralled the community despite the heat June 20 in Vermilion.
Moultrie, GA (31768)

Today

Partly cloudy skies this morning. Thunderstorms likely during the afternoon. High near 85F. Winds WSW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 90%. Locally heavy rainfall possible..

Tonight

Thunderstorms during the evening will give way to cloudy skies after midnight. Low 71F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 70%.
After falling to record lows last summer amid the pandemic and oil market crash, drilling activity continues its recovery.

Oilfield services firm Baker Hughes and data analysis firm Enverus said Friday the US rig count rose nine rigs to 470 this week, 204 rigs or 77 percent higher than the 266 at work a year ago. Baker Hughes said it was the highest level since April 2020 and is up 93 percent since setting a record low of 244 last August.

There were 373 rigs drilling for oil, up eight rigs for the week and 184 rigs more than the 189 seeing crude last June. There were 97 rigs drilling for natural gas, up one and 22 more than the 75 drilling for natural gas a year ago.

Texas added two rigs for 221 at work statewide. A year ago there were 111 rigs at work, 110 less than this week. New Mexico was unchanged at 75 rigs. Almost all producing states joined Texas in adding rigs  California, Colorado, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Utah and Wyoming. Only Oklahoma and West Virginia showed modest declines for the week.

The Permian Basin inched up one rig to 237 rigs at work in the region, 105 more than the 132 active rigs last year.

Lea County, New Mexico, remained the most active in the Permian with 44 rigs, unchanged for the week. Midland County added four rigs for 39 while Eddy County, New Mexico, followed with 30 rigs, unchanged for the week.

Martin County added two rigs for 18. Loving County likewise added two rigs for 16. Howard County was unchanged at 13 rigs and Upton County was also unchanged at 12 rigs.

The Energy Workforce & Technology Council reported this week active well service rigs rose by 1.4 percent in April to reach 936 rigs, the highest total since the onset of the pandemic last March.

The council reported that while the active well service rig count has more than doubled since a pandemic low of 456 last April, the number remains 10.5 percent below the February 2020 total of 1,046 rigs.

In April, the sector added 10 rigs in the Rocky Mountains, seven in the ArkLaTex region and three in the eastern US. Rig utilization held steady at 37 percent, up from pandemic lows of 17 percent in April and May of 2020 but still below pre-pandemic norms of around 45 percent.

Enverus Rig Analytics, which has a different timetable and criteria than Baker Hughes, reported Thursday the US rig count fell 12 to 522, down 3 percent for the month but 86 percent higher year-over-year.

The most notable changes in the last week, according to Enverus Rig Analytics, were a five-rig increase to 60 rigs running in the Gulf Coast and a three-rig drop to 43 in Appalachia. Looking at movement over the last month, the situation is reversed: The Gulf Coast is 10 rigs down while Appalachia is actually up by two.

In Appalachia, the most active operators are Ascent Resources and Southwestern Energy, which are running four rigs each. Operators running three rigs are Antero Resources, Chesapeake Energy, EQT Corp., National Fuel Gas subsidiary Seneca Resources, Tug Hill Operating and Cabot Oil & Gas.

For the sake of comparison, there are 56 rigs running in Ark-La-Tex, the other major gas area in the U.S. Most of those rigs are targeting the Haynesville. The most active operators are Aethon Energy (nine rigs), Comstock Resources (five), Indigo Natural Resources (five), Rockcliff Energy (four), GeoSouthern Energy (three), Sabine Oil & Gas (three) and Vine Energy (three). The Ark-La-Tex count is down by three on the week and down two on the month but up nearly 50 percent, or 27 rigs, on the year. Only five Appalachian rigs have been added over the last year.
When Carlos and Marcy Madrid reopened Brew St. in October with a vegan menu, they wanted to keep the community atmosphere established by the previous owners and create a restaurant both vegans and meat-eaters would love.

That was really such an important aspect of creating that social community where its come as you are, were not judging people, were not trying to force any lifestyle on people, Marcy Madrid said. We really want to create a place where anyone can come no matter their food preferences, no matter what their lifestyle preferences are  they can come and feel accepted and welcome, and they can find something without feeling singled out.

The Madrids purchased Brew St. from Julie Kent and her daughter, who were looking to sell the space following the COVID-19 economic downturn. They said Kent wanted to sell to people who would preserve the cafe as a cornerstone of the community.

Because Brew St. was most known for its coffee and pastries, the Madrids hired the previous pastry chef and asked her if she could make old staples  like the mocha tease cake, lemon bars and cinnamon buns  with vegan substitutes. They also added more pastries, including scones and oil-free donuts.

They developed the menu with their favorite recipes from when they started eating plant-based five years ago and took inspiration from vegan restaurants in Dallas, Austin and California. Some of the most popular menu items are the street tacos and street corn, chili Frito pie, burgers with Beyond meat and pizzas. Dairy and meat options are also available with any meal for those who want them.

New vegan menu items, including fish tacos, buffalo chicken salads, lasagna and meatball subs will be available starting next month.

Marcy Madrid transitioned to eating plant-based in 2015 after she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. She said cutting out meat and dairy has stopped the progression of her disease, but it was isolating at first to make the switch.

You don't realize how social eating a meal is until you have that taken away, she said. I never realized how emotionally intertwined we are with our food and sharing our meals with people until all of a sudden you have to be different, and you cant share that.

Carlos and Marcy Madrid said they wanted to create a restaurant where those who were vegan or who were eating less meat or dairy for health reasons could feel comfortable eating out with family and friends.

The restaurant and coffee house has also served as a place where students can study and those working at home during the pandemic can get out of the house, they said. They said they have several regulars drive from Odessa because theres not a similar option to study or work there.

Carlos Madrid said it was challenging to open a restaurant during the pandemic and they could tell when cases were spiking in the community based on how many customers they were seeing.

If you go by the rules of when and how you should open up a new restaurant, doing it in the middle of a pandemic where restaurants are being restricted in capacity and people aren't going to public social places like restaurants, we certainly didn't follow the rulebook, Marcy Madrid said.

They said the communitys support for local businesses and their Christian faith are the major reasons they were able to open and be successful. Theyre hoping to open a second location in the future, possibly in Odessa.

Brew St. Brew and Food is open 6:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Wednesday, and 6:30 a.m. to 11 p.m. Thursday through Saturday. They have live music on Fridays and Saturdays and open mic nights the first Thursday of every month.
DHARMSALA, India (AP)  The new president of the Tibetan exile government said on Thursday he will do his best to resume a dialogue with China after more than a decade, and that a visit by the Dalai Lama to Tibet could be the best step forward.

The Buddhist spiritual leader has expressed his wish to go to Tibet to his birthplace, Lhasa and some other places depending on his physical condition, Penpa Tsering said in an interview with The Associated Press. The Dalai Lama lives in the northern Indian town of Dharmsala, where the exile government is based.

Penpa Tsering, 53, said the Dalai Lama is eager to settle the China-Tibet dispute and he "will leave no stone unturned" to achieve that.

China doesnt recognize the Tibetan government-in-exile and hasnt held any talks with representatives of the Dalai Lama since 2010. Beijing accuses the Buddhist leader of seeking to separate Tibet from China, which he denies. Penpa Tsering supports the Dalai Lamas position.

Penpa Tsering, the former speaker of Tibets parliament-in-exile, was sworn in last month as president in Dharmsala, where the Dalai Lama has lived since he fled Tibet after a failed uprising against Chinese rule in 1959.

He said China should take a middle-way approach that would give autonomy to Tibetans allowing them to protect their culture and language, without full independence.

"That can bring some traction to the contacts or negotiations between the two sides," he said.

He strongly criticized China for restricting the Tibetan culture and language, which he said is the foundation of Tibetan Buddhism.

The language is very important but today it has become something only taught in a language class. All other subjects at school are taught in Chinese, and the Chinese leaders are not even following a two-language system in which you give equal weight to both languages. That, as well as the government policy of not publishing official documents in Tibetan, is striking at the very root of Tibetan existence. If our language goes, the religion will also go away slowly.

Penpa Tsering is taking over the Tibetan government-in-exile at a time when Chinese President Xi Jinping is seeking to put his imprint on virtually every aspect of life across the vast county. Chinas ruling Communist Party is pushing to Sinicize Tibetan life through programs that separate Tibetans from their language, culture, and especially, their devotion to the Dalai Lama.

Tibet rights groups report frequent detentions, economic marginalization, a suffocating security presence and heavy pressure for Tibetans to assimilate with Chinas Han majority while pledging loyalty to the Communist Party.

China denies curbing religion in Tibet and says the Himalayan region, which has been governed by the Communist Party since 1951, has been Chinese territory since the mid-13th century. Many Tibetans say they were effectively independent for most of their history, and that the Chinese government wants to exploit the resource-rich region while crushing its cultural identity.

Some Tibetan groups advocate independence for Tibet since little progress has been made in talks with China.

Exiled Tibetans chose Penpa Tsering in elections held in January and April. It was the third direct election of the Tibetan exile leadership since the Dalai Lama withdrew from any political role in the running of the exile government in 2011. Nearly 64,000 Tibetans living in exile in India, Nepal, North America, Europe, Australia and elsewhere voted.

Penpa Tsering was elected to its parliament in 1996 and became its speaker in 2008. Last month, he succeeded Lobsang Sangay, who had completed his second five-year term as president. The 45 people elected to the exile parliament represent traditional provinces of Tibet, religious constituencies, and Tibetan communities abroad.

Penpa Tsering was born in India after his parents fled Tibet after the failed uprising against Chinese rule in 1959. "Since I haven't seen my own country, we are basically Indians in that sense," he said.
WACO, Texas (AP)  A judge denied a request to suppress the confession of a woman accused of helping kill and dismember Spc. Vanessa Guillen, who was missing for about two months before her remains were found.

U.S. District Judge Alan D. Albright rejected to toss Cecily Ann Aguilar's confession after 2.5 hours of testimony Wednesday, according to the Houston Chronicle.
COLUMBIA, Mo. (AP)  Missouri's Republican governor and attorney general said in a defiant letter to the U.S. Department of Justice on Thursday that they stand by the state's new law that would ban police from enforcing federal gun rules.

Gov. Mike Parson and Attorney General Eric Schmitt wrote that they still plan to enforce the new law, which Parson signed Saturday. The measure penalizes local police departments if their officers enforce federal gun laws.

Schmitt and Parson wrote that they will fight tooth and nail to defend the right to own guns as spelled out in the state constitution and the new law.

We will not tolerate any attempts by the federal government to deprive Missourians of this critical civil right, they wrote.

In a letter sent Wednesday night and obtained by The Associated Press, Justice Department officials pointed out that federal law trumps state law under the U.S. Constitutions Supremacy Clause.

Brian Boynton, an acting assistant attorney general at the Justice Department, said in the letter that Missouri's law threatens to disrupt the working relationship between federal and local law enforcement and noted that the state receives federal grants and technical assistance.

Missouris new law would subject law enforcement agencies with officers who knowingly enforce federal gun laws to a fine of about $50,000 per violating officer.

Boynton said Missouris law conflicts with federal firearms laws and regulation and that federal law would supersede the states new statute. He said federal agents and the U.S. attorneys offices in the state would continue to enforce all federal firearms laws and regulations. He asked that Parson and Schmitt clarify the law and how it would work in a response by Friday.

Schmitt is running for U.S. Senate.

Republican lawmakers who pushed Missouris new law said they were motivated by the potential for more restrictive gun laws under Democratic President Joe Biden.

Republican Sen. Eric Burlison, of Battlefield, helped pass the bill and said he's not aware of any federal gun laws currently enforced that are not also illegal under state law. But he said the legislation, HB 85, will prevent local law enforcement from enforcing any wild ideas later enacted under Biden.

If this administration wants to go down a path of enforcing unconstitutional gun grabs, then our law enforcement officers, through HB 85, will not be lifting a finger to help them," Burlison said.

State Democrats have argued the law is unconstitutional and will likely get overturned if challenged in court.

Similar bills were introduced in more than a dozen other states this year, including Alabama, Arkansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Utah, Wyoming, New Hampshire, North Dakota, South Dakota, West Virginia and Iowa. In Texas, the governor has called for the state to become a so-called Second Amendment sanctuary.

Several states passed similar laws under then-president Barack Obama, though judges have ruled against them.

Prosecutors in Missouri's attorney general's office have withdrawn from nearly two dozen federal drug, gun and carjacking cases in St. Louis, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported. They had been working with federal counterparts as part of the Safer Streets initiative that Schmitt touted in 2019.

Schmitt spokesman Chris Nuelle said in a statement that the Attorney General's Office has been replacing prosecutors as is the natural course in the Safer Streets Initiative.

We have been and continue to be committed to fighting violent crime, and were also committed to protecting law abiding citizens Second Amendment rights, Nuelle said.
UNITED NATIONS (AP)  The U.N. General Assembly unanimously elected Antonio Guterres to a second term as secretary-general on Friday, giving him another five years at the helm of the 193-member organization at a time a deeply divided world faces numerous conflicts, the growing impact of climate change, and a pandemic still circling the globe.

Guterres, the only candidate for the U.N.s top post, said he was humbled and energized by the support of the worlds nations and said the driving theme of his second term will be prevention in all its aspects -- from conflicts, climate change, pandemics to poverty and inequality.

Ambassadors in the assembly chamber burst into applause as Assembly President Volkan Bozkir announced Guterres re-election by acclamation, without a vote. Just before the announcement, Estonias U.N. Ambassador Sven Jurgenson, the current Security Council president, read a resolution adopted by the 15-member council recommending Guterres for a second term.

Under the U.N. Charter, the General Assembly appoints the secretary-general on the recommendation of the Security Council.

The council said this year it would only consider applicants backed by a U.N. member state and Guterres was the only candidate nominated by a U.N. member, his home country Portugal where he previously served as prime minister. The countrys current president, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, was in the assembly chamber to watch the event.

Immediately after his re-election, Guterres took the oath of office and delivered an address urging U.N. member nations to do everything we can to overcome current geostrategic divides and dysfunctional power relations.

There are too many asymmetrics and paradoxes, he said. They need to be addressed head on.

What we are living through today in terms of mistrust is, I hope, an aberration," the U.N. chief said, but it cannot become the norm.

Guterres pledged to give it my all to ensure the blossoming of trust between and among nations, large and small, to build bridges and to engage relentlessly in confidence building -- and to seek to inspire hope that we can turn things around, that the impossible is possible.

Guterres said the world is facing a number of dramatic fragilities, singling out the pandemic, climate change, lawlessness in cyberspace and the geopolitical divide, and stressing that this must be addressed by bringing together the worlds nations and strengthening multilateralism.

This is a time to understand that each country alone can do nothing... that countries must come together, he said. To rebuild trust is the way to make the impossible possible. If we remain divided, the impossible will remain impossible and the fragilities of this world will present themselves into bigger suffering for the people, especially the most vulnerable of the vulnerable.

Guterres said the most important lesson he learned in his first term is the need to rebuild solidarity and trust, and if there is something I need to do better in my second term is to make sure that I do everything I can to rebuild trust -- trust among governments, trust between people and institutions, and trust in the United Nations.

The secretary-generals re-election was immediately welcomed by U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Blinken called Guterres a results-oriented" and capable leader in a demanding role.

The United States looks forward to continuing our strong and constructive relationship ... as we advance the urgent task of bringing about a more peaceful world and prosperous future, Blinken said. The United Nations is an indispensable anchor of the multilateral system" where nations work together to meet such unprecedented challenges as the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, human rights, development, migration, and humanitarian crises.

Merkel praised Guterres commitment to peaceful solutions to conflicts, climate protection and innovative solutions to global problems in his first term.

She thanked Guterres for helping set up the COVAX facility to get vaccines to poorer countries and said: The coronavirus pandemic in particular has shown us that the United Nations ability to react quickly to current challenges is essential.

Guterres came under fire in his first term for failing to criticize Russia, China and the United States, whose support he needed for a second term, especially on human rights issues including Chinas crackdown on Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang and Russias targeting of dissidents. Former U.S. president Donald Trump's America First" policy was sharply at odds with Guterres' insistence that nations can only solve problems by working together.

With his second term assured, Human Rights Watchs U.N. Director Louis Charbonneau said Guterres should start calling out all governments that commit human rights abuses, including those that are powerful and protected.

His legacy will depend on his willingness to speak out for all the oppressed, wherever they are, Charbonneau said.

Traditionally, candidates for the U.N.s top job have been nominated by a U.N. member state, but that is not a requirement in the U.N. Charter or in a resolution adopted by the General Assembly in 2015. This year, seven individuals submitted applications to be secretary-general without backing from any government, including former Ecuadorian President Rosalia Arteaga.

The 2015 resolution made the previously largely secretive selection of the secretary-general more open and transparent, allowing member states for the first time to see basic information about all candidates, including their resumes, and to question them at open sessions.

Guterres, a former U.N. refugee chief, was elected by the assembly to succeed Ban Ki-moon after a hotly contested and transparent race in October 2016 that initially included 13 candidates -- seven women and six men. Guterres took office on Jan. 1, 2017.



Geir Moulson in Berlin and Matthew Lee in Washington contributed to this report
Sun Valley, ID (83353)

Today

Sunshine early followed by mostly cloudy skies this afternoon. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. High 83F. Winds SSE at 5 to 10 mph..

Tonight

Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 57F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph.
Muskogee, OK (74401)

Today

Cloudy skies early, then partly cloudy this afternoon. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. High 87F. Winds ENE at 5 to 10 mph..

Tonight

Mostly clear. Low 63F. Winds ENE at 5 to 10 mph.
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DAVID BROOKS became a New York Times Op-Ed columnist in September 2003. He has been a senior editor at The Weekly Standard, a contributing editor at Newsweek and the Atlantic Monthly, and he is currently a commentator on The PBS Newshour.
Lanny A. Kope , EdD has been a hospital trustee for over forty years, serving on urban and rural hospital boards. He is the immediate past Board Chair of Sierra Vista Regional Health Center and has had a national responsibility as Chair of the American Hospital Associations Committee on Governance. Dr. Kope is also an University of Phoenix faculty member in Health Care.
DETROIT (AP)  The head of Detroit's big international auto show says it will return to the Motor City next year, but with smaller indoor displays, and more emphasis on experiencing vehicles and technology outside.

The North American International Auto Show was canceled last year due the coronavirus pandemic and will be replaced this year by an event at a racetrack north of Detroit.

But Rod Alberts, executive director of the Detroit Auto Dealers Association, which runs the show, says that next year there will be an event in the city's downtown.

That's the place it belongs, Alberts told the Automotive Press Association of Detroit on Thursday.

But he said the show will have to change from the past, when automakers built elaborate and costly multi-story displays and unveiled their most important new models. Now car companies are finding they can get good exposure and spend less by doing virtual unveilings outside of auto shows, where vehicles can get overshadowed by other debuts. Some automakers had pulled out of Detroit and other shows.

Alberts said Detroit and other shows have to change to appeal more to millennials, which are two generations after baby boomers and like to experience things rather than just view them.

He envisions a mainly a walkable outdoor event encompassing the entire downtown, with smaller displays and maybe some electric-vehicle driving indoors. It would be during good-weather months instead of the traditional frigid January in Detroit.

You can't just keep doing the same things over and over again, Alberts said.

The show had been scheduled at the downtown convention center for September of this year, but in January organizers decided to replace it with an outdoor event called Motor Bella at the M1 Concourse track in Pontiac, Michigan.

Alberts said Motor Bella could be incorporated into a future downtown auto show, or could be a separate event in the future. It will have track driving, an off-road driving area, and displays by automakers and technology companies. He said there will be new vehicle debuts at the event from Sept. 21-26, but he wasn't sure how many.

Last month, the Chicago Auto Show announced that it would be back downtown in July. The New York International Auto Show is scheduled to make a comeback from Aug. 20-29 at the Javits Convention Center, while the Los Angeles Auto Show is to return from Nov. 19-28 at the citys convention center.
Heat is to be expected during the summer, but people sometimes forget the dangers that can accompany extreme heats.

The Illinois Department of Public Health is reminding people to take precautions as a heat advisory remains in place until 7 p.m. today and heat indices reach 105 degrees Fahrenheit.

Temperatures Saturday and Sunday also are supposed to be in the 90s across west-central Illinois, with a triple-digit heat index both days.

The state health department suggests that people stay in a well-air-conditioned area during the hottest hours of the day and that those without air conditioning seek cooling in a public place.

Cale Hoesman, chief deputy for Greene County Sheriffs Department and director of Greene Countys Emergency Services Disaster Agency, said emergency cooling shelters are available, if needed.

We recommend that people stay inside, especially (those) with a medical condition, Hoesman said. Drink lots of fluid if you have to be outside.

When drinking fluids, though, one should avoid coffee, tea, soda and alcohol, which can dehydrate instead of hydrate, Hoesman said.

Heat stroke can come easily, he said.

You can have an onset of that before you even know it, he said.

Heat stroke symptoms, according to IDPH, include a body temperature of 103 degrees Fahrenheit or higher; hot, red, dry or damp skin; a strong, fast pulse; and headache, dizziness, nausea or confusion. Heat stroke is a medical emergency and requires immediate medical attention.

We advise people to stay out of the sun and do everything they can to stay cool, Hoesman said, adding that people also can help prevent heat-related emergencies in others by paying close attention to any symptoms they might have.
PITTSFIELD  Pike County officials have reached an agreement with the countys workers unions to resolve some concerns surrounding next months switch to a new pay schedule.

The Pike County board approved a pay schedule adjustment earlier this year that would result in employees receiving less pay this month.

Board Chairman Jim Sheppard said the move was necessary and employees are not against the switch, but are concerned about covering their expenses with a smaller paycheck.

We opened negotiations with the union and had some very cordial meetings, Sheppard said. We found a solution that worked.

Employees now are paid on the 10th and 25th of each month. The check on the 1oth covers employee hours through the 15th, paying for hours theyre expected to work between the 10th and 15th, Sheppard said.

When a person calls out sick or otherwise doesnt work the expected hours, current policy is to adjust for the discrepancy on the next pay check.

Starting in July, the schedule will change so workers are paid only for hours already worked, Sheppard said.

The July 10 check will reflect the major switch, covering June 15 through June 30. Pay for hours worked from June 1 through June 15 will be split into two June checks to ease the transition, Sheppard said.

All full-time county employees impacted by the switch will receive a check reflective of their base salary.

We are going to be using some of our American Recovery Plan funds, Sheppard said. This is a one-time offer that we did for all our full-time employees. We can time it so itll be at the same time as the switch.

Sheppard said the county still will not be taking insurance premiums from the check as it normally does, nor will it be paying stipends on this check.

Its something for them, for coming to work every day and doing their jobs, Sheppard said.

The switch also hopefully will prevent future issues regarding the number of hours employees work. The board recently approved back pay for employees after several hours were not claimed during the past several years.

With the time and attendance being switched to a new payroll system, that should take care of it, Sheppard said.
Jacksonville School District 117s board will seek community input on whether to renovate or close Murrayville-Woodson Elementary School as part of its Vision 117 plan, a long-term plan for the districts educational facilities.

The school board met Wednesday evening at Jacksonville Middle School to discuss its options for district-wide renovations and construction. City leaders and several Murrayville-Woodson residents also attended.

The district is moving forward with plans to renovate Washington Elementary School and revising Vision 117 to rule out  for now  the closure of the Washington and Murrayville-Woodson school buildings and construction of new buildings, Superintendent Steve Ptacek said.

The school board will not vote on whether to close Murrayville-Woodson until the community engagement process is complete and the board can analyze its data for help in making a decision, Ptacek said.

The process will start as soon as July, he said.

Board member Teresa Wilson suggested using a committee for the engagement process that would let the whole community decide.

I want to know what the community really thinks and not just Murrayville-Woodson, she said.

Ptacek now intends to put together a 10- to 12-person committee that includes representatives from each elementary school, two school board members, three or four members of the business community and other community members.

Enrollment, especially at Murrayville-Woodson school, is a major concern.

The school building needs emergency repair, including around $500,000 in repairs  to windows, brick work and the roof  that should be done as soon as possible, Ptacek said. Emergency repair would allow Murrayville-Woodson to remain open for three to five years while the district conducts an analysis of its future enrollment.

Renovations at Washington school are expected to cost $11 million and be completed by September 2024, Ptacek said. The district is using money from the sale of bonds related to the extra sales tax to fund the Washington renovations.

Several members of the Murrayville-Woodson community spoke to the school board Wednesday night, concerned about possibly closing Murrayville-Woodson school.

We want to see our school prosper and see a future for our school, said Jay Lewis, Murrayville village president. Its kind of hard to make our communities prosper and get our enrollment up when our school is in limbo from year to year. It makes it hard not only to bring in new families and get our enrollment up, but businesses. If you dont have a future with our school it basically kills both of our communities.

Murrayville resident and police officer Jason Wardell said he is concerned about traffic around South Jacksonville Elementary School and how it would affect Murrayville-Woodson students getting there if Murrayville-Woodson school closed.

Bruce Milner, Woodsons village president, said Murrayville and Woodson are viable communities. He worried that adding more time on the bus for students being transported to another school would take its toll.

Being on the bus for three to four hours a day is just not a viable option, Milner said. The school is at the heart of our community. Its a good place and a good school.

Closing the school would impact the community, he said, citing housing, business and development.

Jeremy Johnson of Murrayville also opposed a longer bus ride for students, saying it would tire them. That, in turn, would affect their learning and, ultimately, test scores, he said.

Getting on a bus when its dark out also can be a safety issue, he said.

If you take our school out of our community, we no longer have a community school, said Betsy VanBrocklin of Murrayville.

Ptacek said he will commit to having a decision on Murrayville-Woodson schools future within the next three to five years.

The community engagement committee will meet and have an initial report to the board by the boards Dec. 15 meeting.
A heat advisory is in effect for west-central Illinois from 1 to 7 p.m. today, with heat index values expected to reach 105 degrees.

Hot temperatures will combine with high humidity and increase the risk of heat illnesses, according to the National Weather Service.
WASHINGTON (AP)  Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand is on the brink of success in her yearslong campaign to get sexual assault cases removed from the military chain of command. But getting over the finish line may depend on whether she can overcome wariness about broader changes shes seeking to the military justice system.

There is now widespread support for using independent military lawyers to handle sexual misconduct cases, but Gillibrand is promoting legislation that goes beyond that, extending that change to all major crimes. Top Pentagon officials and key lawmakers are open to the sexual assault shift, but they say applying it more broadly requires far more study and debate.

In an interview with The Associated Press, Gillibrand said the wider change is necessary to combat racial injustice within the military, where studies have found that Black people are more likely to be investigated and arrested for misconduct. She intends to press that point in the coming days.

Asked if she might compromise on her bill, Gillibrand said that time has passed. Weve been doing that for eight years. Weve been getting something through every year, and some things just dont work. You need this broad-based reform, the New York Democrat said. This is a bill whose time has come.

For years, however, lawmakers have framed their push for change in the military justice system around problems with sexual misconduct cases. Victims  largely women  have long said they are reluctant to file sexual assault or harassment complaints because they fear they wont be believed or will face retaliation. Theyve complained that allegations are sometimes dismissed by a good ol boys network among unit commanders or that attackers get away with minimal punishments.

Those complaints have resonated, and support has grown on Capitol Hill and in the Pentagon, where senior defense leaders acknowledge that, despite years of effort, they've made little progress combating sexual misconduct in the ranks. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, for the first time said they were open to taking sexual assault and harassment charges out of the chain of command.

But both also said that extending the change to all major crimes would require more time and review.

Similarly, Sen. Jack Reed, chair of the Armed Services Committee, supports the change for sexual misconduct and said this week that he believes it will get committee approval. But he said he wants more thorough discussion within the committee for changes that affect the entire Uniform Code of Military Justice.

The worst thing we can do to victims of sexual assault is to move a bill through that cant be implemented effectively or on time, creates too large a workload for too few qualified military judge advocates, imperils prosecutions, leads to convictions being overturned on appeal, or results in neglected cases because the necessary attention cannot be devoted to them, he said.

Reed, a Rhode Island Democrat, said Pentagon estimates indicate the broader bill would require more senior qualified lawyers than the department has, and will take 180 days to implement. He also has repeatedly objected to Gillibrands efforts to get unanimous approval to move her bill separately to the full Senate for a vote, saying it should be included in the overall defense bill.

Asked about cost, Gillibrand said it will be very little because the prosecutors already are in place and they already take the cases to court.

The Pentagon, however, believes it won't be that simple, and that if lawyers are pulled out of the chain of command to handle major crimes, others will be needed to deal with other cases and duties, such as desertion, military discipline or legal policy reviews.

Jeh Johnson, former Pentagon general counsel, wrote in the Lawfare blog on Wednesday that Gillibrand's bill appears to require a whole new bureaucracy. ... No one should be under the illusion that the broad mission contemplated by the bill can be carried by a small band of elite JAGs in a suite someplace in northern Virginia.

Johnson said a change for sexual assault crimes is long overdue, but added, Congress should take care to fashion a solution commensurate with the problem at hand, and not go too far.

Gillibrand, who has 65 other Senate supporters for her bill, acknowledged that overcoming committee leaders' opposition will be a challenge.

Having the chairman and ranking member opposed to this reform is highly problematic if this bill goes to the committee, said Gillibrand, adding, It would be easier if the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff or the secretary of defense supported our proposal.

An independent review commission set up by Austin has recommended a similar change for sexual misconduct but did not consider other crimes in its study. Its plan would have judge advocates report to a civilian-led Office of the Chief Special Victim Prosecutor, and they would decide whether to charge someone and if the charge goes to court martial. The panel is expected to give Austin a report on prevention and victim support programs shortly, and he will then send his own recommendations to the president.

The Pentagon, said Gillibrand, will use the panel's initial report to confuse members of Congress, and they will try to muddy the waters and say, weve already looked at this and they only recommended that sexual assault come out of the chain of command.

She said she hopes lawmakers will be convinced by data that shows racial bias in prosecution decisions made by the military. And she argued that limiting the change to sexual assault would be discriminatory  setting up what some call a pink court to deal with crimes usually involving female victims.

Im deeply concerned that if they limit it to just sexual assault, it will really harm female service members. It will further marginalize them, further undermine them, and theyll be seen as getting special treatment, she said.

Eugene R. Fidell, a military law expert at New York University Law School, agreed, saying a separate system that largely benefits women will hurt unit cohesion. And he noted opponents' concerns that taking all major crimes out of the chain of command could result in fewer prosecutions. He said that's possible, but added that independent attorneys should make those decisions, and the result would be a higher conviction rate.

Gillibrand is pledging to keep going to the Senate floor, seeking to have her bill considered separately. I will continue to do so until I convince Jack Reed that he should not stand in front of this bill," she said.
Australian spy avoids jail in East Timor espionage scandal View Photo

CANBERRA, Australia (AP)  A former Australian spy was released from court on Friday with a three-month suspended prison sentence over his attempt to help East Timor prove that Australia spied on the fledgling nation during multibillion-dollar oil and gas negotiations.

The former spy, publicly known as Witness K, and his lawyer, Bernard Collaery, had been charged in 2018 with conspiring to reveal secret information to the East Timorese government.

Former East Timor President and Prime Minister Jose Ramos-Horta is among leaders of the impoverished half-island nation of 1.5 million to urge Australia to drop the persecutions.

K pleaded guilty on Thursday at the beginning of a two-day sentencing hearing in the Australian Capital Territory Magistrates Court. The public and media were excluded when classified evidence was discussed.

Magistrate Glenn Theakston sentenced K to three months in prison fully suspended. K, who was hidden behind black screens in the courtroom throughout the hearing, must also pay a 1,000 Australian dollar ($840) security bond to be of good behavior for 12 months.

K had faced up to two years in prison. The maximum has been increased since his offense to 10 years as Australia tightens controls on secrecy.

The Australian government has refused to comment on allegations that K led an Australian Secret Intelligence Service operation that bugged government offices in the East Timorese capital, Dili, in 2004 during negotiations on the sharing of oil and gas revenue from the seabed that separates the two countries.

The government canceled Ks passport before he was to testify at the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague in 2014 in support of East Timors challenge to the validity of the 2006 treaty.

The East Timorese argued that the treaty was invalid because Australia had failed to negotiate in good faith by engaging in espionage.

There was no evidence heard in open court of a bugging operation, which media had reported was conducted under the guise of a foreign aid program.

But K and Collaery had prepared for the East Timorese government two affidavits that identified K as a former ASIS member and details of ASIS functions.

Theakston noted that the case was unusual because Ks offense was committed in plain sight of Australian authorities.

That suggests to me it was brazen and indifferent or mistaken, Theakston said.

Theakston said it was open to him to find K had made a mistake rather than a deliberate breach based on a perception of justice.

The judge described K as an elderly man more than 70 years old who had had the threat of prison hanging over him for eight years.

The ASIS secrecy rules were strict and absolute for serving and former officers, Theakston said.

Defense lawyer Robert Richter said Mr. K had suffered from not being able to travel overseas with his wife because of the loss of his passport.

Richter blamed Ks post-traumatic stress disorder, clinical depression and anxiety for his offense. He argued for K to escape a conviction being recorded for reasons that will be made clear in closed court.

Collaery has pleaded not guilty and wants to fight the charge in an Australian Capital Territory Supreme Court trial without media or the public being excluded.

Collaery was allowed to sit in the public gallery of Ks hearing during the closed and open hearings. Collaery declined to comment on the sentence.

Richter told The Associated Press, I think its a fair outcome.

Prosecutor Richard Maidment declined to comment on the result.

Australia and East Timor agreed on a new maritime border treaty in 2018. A year later, the Australian prime minister arrived in Dili to formalize the agreement and was targeted by street protests demanding charges against K and Collaery be dropped.

By ROD McGUIRK

Associated Press
Canada: Pfizer, Moderna preferred 2nd dose after AstraZeneca View Photo

OTTAWA, Ontario (AP)  Canadas National Advisory Committee on Immunization said Thursday people who got the AstraZeneca vaccine as their first dose should get Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna for their second shot.

On June 1, committee had said AstraZeneca recipients could get Pfizer or Moderna for their second shot if they wanted, but Thursday went further to say an mRNA vaccine was the preferred choice.

Since the advisory committee first looked at mixed vaccine schedules, new evidence is starting to emerge suggesting immune responses are better when a first dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine is followed by an mRNA vaccine as a second dose, said its vice-chair Dr. Shelley Deeks, in the new guidance documents.

The committee also updated its previous recommendation that people at high risk of exposure to, or serious illness from, COVID-19, could opt to get AstraZeneca rather than waiting for Pfizer or Moderna. Now it says everyone should always get the mRNA vaccines first, unless they are allergic to them.

Deeks said the advice is based on the growing supply of Pfizer and Moderna, and the risk of vaccine-induced blood clots associated with AstraZeneca. But she is still trying to reassure people who got one or two doses of AstraZenecas vaccine that they are nevertheless well protected.

Anyone who has already received two doses of AstraZeneca/Covishield can rest assured that they are protected, particularly against severe illness, she said. There is no need for a third dose at this time.

Dr. Theresa Tam, the chief public health officer of Canada, said the new evidence in favor of mixing different types of vaccines included four studies in Germany.

Its really the immunogenicity, that immune response, after that mixed-dose schedule thats resulted in NACI updating this recommendation, because all the accumulated studies essentially suggest that immune response is a better response, said Tam at a news conference in Ottawa.

One of those studies from Germanys Saarland University, published early data Wednesday saying giving Pfizer as the second dose after AstraZeneca, or two doses of Pfizer only, generated far more antibodies and T cells as two doses of AstraZeneca.

Almost 25 million Canadians have now received at least one dose of vaccine, and almost 6 million are now fully vaccinated. As of June 5, 2.1 million people had received one dose of AstraZeneca, and 15,186 had received two doses.

There are no further shipments of AstraZeneca currently scheduled, but there are about 600,000 doses still left from previous deliveries.

There are 14 million doses of Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna being delivered this week and next, including a donation of 1 million doses of Modernas COVID-19 vaccine from the United States that was to arrive in Canada Thursday night.
LONDON (AP)  Britains government has apologized to rape victims for declining conviction levels, with senior Cabinet ministers saying theyre deeply ashamed by the downward trend in bringing sexual offenders to justice.

The governments Rape Review, published Thursday, said the situation was totally unacceptable and that authorities are determined to change it.

Figures from the Crown Persecution Service showed that 1,439 suspects were convicted of rape or lesser sexual offenses in England and Wales in 2020  the lowest level since records began  despite reports of rape to police almost doubling since 2015.

Of an estimated 128,000 reported cases of rape or attempted rape each year, just 1.6% result in a charge. The review said it found no one specific cause for the overall drop in prosecutions.

These are trends of which we are deeply ashamed. Victims of rape are being failed, Justice Secretary Robert Buckland, Home Secretary Priti Patel and Attorney General Michael Ellis wrote.

Thousands of victims have gone without justice. But this isnt just about numbers  every instance involves a real person who has suffered a truly terrible crime, they added.

The report set out recommendations such as reducing cross-examination of victims in court by conducting pre-recorded interviews and focusing more on the behaviors of the suspect rather than the accuser.

Buckland said he wanted to move away from the obsessive focus on the credibility of the victim. Emphasis should instead be put on the suspects offending past, to help ensure decision-making is based on evidence, rather than subjective judgments of victim credibility, the report said.

Max Hill, Director of Public Prosecutions for England and Wales, said the stark drop in cases that have successfully been brought before a jury meant that too few victims are seeking justice.

While some campaigners welcomed the governments apology, most said the review fell short of expectations.

Overall, while there are individual elements of the governments report that are encouraging, its hard to identify any big commitments that will radically and swiftly improve the experience of the justice system for victims and survivors, said Amelia Handy, policy lead for Rape Crisis England and Wales.

By SYLVIA HUI

Associated Press
2 journalists killed in Mexico, 3 dead so far this year

MEXICO CITY (AP)  Prosecutors in southern Mexico said reporter Gustavo Sanchez Cabrera was shot to death Thursday, and another journalist was killed just west of Mexico City, bringing to three the number killed so far this year in the country. Two other reporters have disappeared.

The prosecutors office in the southern state of Oaxaca said Sanchez Cabrera was riding a motorcycle with another person on a rural road when gunmen opened fire on them.

There was no immediate information on the condition of the other person. The attack occurred in Oaxacas isthmus region.

A person with knowledge of the case who was not authorized to be quoted by name said Sanchez Cabrera had been wounded in a shooting attack outside his home last year, and had asked for protection under a federal program that sometimes provides cameras or police guards for journalists who heave been attacked or threatened.

Sanchez Cabrera had technically been accepted into the program but had not yet received any protection, according to that person.

Jan-Albert Hootsen, the Mexico representative for the Committee to Protect Journalists, said Sanchez Cabreras case showed nothing has changed for reporters in Mexico despite government promises to prevent such killings.

Press groups say nine journalists were killed in Mexico in 2020, making it the most dangerous country for reporters outside of war zones.

The government was clearly remiss in its responsibilities, Hootsen said.

Reporters Without Borders demanded a thorough investigation into the threats and attacks that he had reported earlier related to his work as a journalist, adding we regret that protection mechanisms  did not reach him in time.

Also Thursday, the prosecutors office in Mexico State, which borders Mexico City, said Enrique Garcia was killed Wednesday night in the township of Metepec, west of the capital.

Garcia worked as a journalist, but on the night he was killed it appeared he was working as a driver for a ride-hailing app.

The office said he may have been killed in a robbery.

At least two journalists have disappeared this year in the violence-wracked northern border state of Sonora, and in May, online journalist Benjamin Morales Hernandez was abducted and killed in Sonora. Morales Hernandez ran an community news site called Noticias Xonoidag.

By MARIA VERZA

Associated Press
Update at 2:25 p.m.: CAL Fire dispatch reports that crews have knocked down the blaze that ignited in a home in the 550 block of Dragoon Circle near Racetrack and Snell roads in Sonora. Firefighters were able to keep the flames from spreading to any nearby vegetation.

Nearly half the house was engulfed in flames when firefighters arrived on the scene. Five people were able to get out of the house unharmed. One dog was confirmed rescued, but CAL Fire dispatch did not have an update on another dog and cat that were believed to be inside the home.

Crews will remain on scene mopping up for the next hour. What ignited the fire is under investigation.

Update at 2 p.m.: Firefighters are getting a handle on a house fire in Sonora. CAL Fire now confirms the address of the home is in the 550 block of Dragoon Circle near Racetrack and Snell roads. When firefighters arrived half the house was engulfed in flames. CAL Fire reports five residents inside were able to escape the flames unharmed. One dog has been rescued from the home, but another pooch and a cat remain inside.

CAL Fire dispatch reports crews have kept the flames from spreading to any nearby vegetation and are currently working to knock down the fire inside the home. There is plenty of activity in the area, so the public should avoid the area.

Original post at 1:40 p.m.: Sonora, CA  Firefighters are battling a house fire in Sonora.

The flames broke out in a home in the 11500 block of Racetrack Road near Snell Road and Dragoon Circle. When firefighters arrived half the house was engulfed in flames. CAL Fire reports all residents made it out for the home, but two dogs are trapped inside. There is plenty of activity in the area, so the public should avoid the area.
CAL OSHO Logo View Photo

Sacramento, CA  The CAL OSHA Board voted 5-1 to adopt reduced workplace mask regulations.

The new guidelines allow those fully vaccinated against COVID-19 to no longer wear masks or worry about social distancing, in most all situations. It is similar to the guidance that took effect in California on June 15 for social settings.

Immediately after the vote, Governor Gavin Newsom issued an Executive Order to waive the 10-day legal review period so that the change can be implemented immediately. The rules apply to almost all workplaces, including retail stores, factories and business offices.

It ends some recent confusion. Just over a week ago the CAL OSHA Board had passed revised restrictions that would have been more strict than social settings. That move was criticized by business groups and state lawmakers.
Palestinians call off 1M dose vaccine exchange with Israel View Photo

JERUSALEM (AP)  The Palestinian Authority called off an agreement whereby Israel would transfer 1 million doses of coronavirus vaccines to it in exchange for a similar number later this year, hours after the deal was announced on Friday.

The Palestinians said the doses, which Israel began shipping to the occupied West Bank, are too close to expiring and do not meet their standards. In announcing the agreement, Israel had said the vaccines will expire soon without specifying the date.

Palestinian officials had come under heavy criticism on social media after the agreement was announced, with many accusing them of accepting subpar vaccines and suggesting they might not be effective.

There was no immediate comment from Israel, which had largely shut down for the weekly Sabbath.

Israel said Friday it would transfer around 1 million doses of soon-to-expire coronavirus vaccines to the Palestinian Authority in exchange for a similar number of doses the Palestinians expect to receive later this year.

Israel, which has fully reopened after vaccinating some 85% of its adult population, has faced criticism for not sharing its vaccines with the 4.5 million Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and Gaza.

The disparity has played out across the globe as the bulk of vaccines went to wealthy countries. As those countries have made progress containing their own outbreaks, they have recently begun pledging supplies for poorer countries that were left behind for months.

The new Israeli government, which was sworn in on Sunday, said it would transfer Pfizer vaccines that are close to expiring, and that the Palestinian Authority would reimburse it with a similar number of vaccines when it receives them from the pharmaceutical company in September or October. Up to 1.4 million doses could be exchanged, the Israeli government said in a statement.

We will continue to find effective ways to cooperate for the benefit of people in the region, Foreign Minister Yair Lapid tweeted after the deal was announced.

COGAT, the Israeli military body that coordinates civilian affairs in the occupied territories, said it had coordinated the delivery of the first 100,000 doses to the West Bank on Friday.

The Palestinians portrayed the agreement differently, saying Pfizer had suggested the transfer as a way of speeding up its delivery of 4 million doses that the PA had already paid for in an agreement reached directly with the drug company.

This is not an agreement with Israel, but with the Pfizer company, Palestinian Health Minister Mai Alkaila said earlier Friday, before the deal was called off.

At a press conference Friday evening, she said health officials who inspected the vaccines found they did not meet standards and so we decided to return them.

Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh ordered the cancellation of the agreement and the return of the vaccines to Israel, his spokesman said. Ibrahim Milhim said the Palestinians would not accept about-to-expire vaccines from Israel, citing the official Israeli statement.

Vaccines from Pfizer, authorized in the U.S. in December, typically have a six-month shelf life. It wasnt immediately clear when the 1 million batch that Israel was to give the Palestinians was produced.

An Israeli security official said the batch of vaccines that were transferred on Friday are to expire in two weeks. The official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media, said further shipments were planned in intervals also several weeks ahead of expiration.

Israel has carried out one of the most successful vaccination programs in the world, allowing it to fully reopen businesses and schools. This week, authorities lifted the requirement to wear masks in public, one of the last remaining restrictions.

Rights groups have said that Israel, as an occupying power, is obliged to provide vaccines to the Palestinians. Israel denies having such an obligation, pointing to interim peace agreements reached with the Palestinians in the 1990s.

Those agreements say the PA, which has limited autonomy in parts of the occupied West Bank, is responsible for health care but that the two sides should cooperate to combat pandemics. Israel has offered vaccines to the more than 100,000 Palestinians from the occupied West Bank who work inside Israel, as well as Palestinians in east Jerusalem.

Gaza is ruled by the Islamic militant group Hamas, which is considered a terrorist organization by Israel and Western countries. Israeli officials have suggested linking any supply of vaccines to Gaza to the return of two Israeli captives and the remains of two soldiers held by Hamas.

The PA has said it is acquiring its own supplies through agreements with private companies and a World Health Organization program designed to aid needy countries.

To date, around 380,000 Palestinians in the West Bank and around 50,000 in Gaza have been vaccinated. More than 300,000 infections have been recorded in the two territories, including 3,545 deaths.

Israel captured the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem in the 1967 Mideast war. The Palestinians want a state in all three territories. There have been no substantive peace talks in more than a decade.

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Associated Press writers Fares Akram in Cairo, and Isaac Scharf and Areej Hazboun in Jerusalem contributed to this report.

By JOSEPH KRAUSS

Associated Press
California: People must look for work to get jobless aid

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP)  California will stop giving unemployment benefits to people who are not actively applying for jobs, Gov. Gavin Newsoms administration announced Thursday.

Federal law requires people who are out of work to be actively looking for jobs to be eligible for unemployment benefits. But the federal government let states waive that requirement during the pandemic because so many businesses were ordered to close.

California has waived its work-search rule since March 2020. But Thursday, the Employment Development Department said it would resume the requirement July 11.

California offers many resources to help people to find safe and suitable careers and training opportunities that keep the economy moving, agency director Rita Saenz said.

The coronavirus pandemics economic effects were so strong and so sudden that most states made significant changes to their unemployment benefits programs to accommodate the crush of new claims.

Since the pandemic began, California  the nations most populous state with nearly 40 million people  has processed more than 20 million unemployment claims and paid out more than $128 billion in benefits.

Normally, the most money someone can get from unemployment benefits in California is $450 per week. But Congress has added an additional $300 per week on top of that because of the pandemic. That extra money wont expire until September.

But as coronavirus cases have fallen while more people are getting vaccinated, employers have said they are having a hard time finding people to work. In response, most states have already required people to look for work in order to be eligible for unemployment benefits. And 25 states have stopped paying the extra $300 per week in benefits in an attempt to prod people back into the workforce.

Newsom, who will likely face a recall election later this year, has resisted most of those changes. Earlier this month, Newsom said other states decision to end the extra $300 weekly benefit was based on politics, not economics.

This week, Newsom lifted most coronavirus restrictions on businesses, heralding it as the states grand reopening. But data from the U.S. Department of Labor show around 2 million people are still receiving unemployment benefits in California.

Anecdotally, many employers have said they are having trouble finding workers. Californias 45 workforce development boards, which aim to get people placed in jobs, say fewer people have been coming to them seeking work, according to Michael Bernick, research director for the California Workforce Association.

Workers are not coming back to their job fairs in any significant numbers, he said.

California has added more than 390,000 jobs since February. In April alone, California accounted for 38% of all new jobs added in the U.S. But that same month, California still had the second-highest unemployment rate in the country at 8.3%.

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Associated Press reporter Christopher Rugaber contributed reporting from Washington.

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This story has been corrected to say the additional $300 benefit from the federal government is paid weekly, not monthly.

By ADAM BEAM

Associated Press
SEOUL, South Korea (AP)  North Korean leader Kim Jong Un ordered his government to be prepared for both dialogue and confrontation with the Biden administration  but more for confrontation  state media reported Friday, days after the United States and others urged the North to abandon its nuclear program and return to talks.

Kims statement indicates hell likely push to strengthen his nuclear arsenal and increase pressure on Washington to give up what North Korea considers a hostile policy toward the North, though hell also prepare for talks to resume, some experts say.

During an ongoing ruling party meeting Thursday, Kim analyzed in detail the policy tendencies of the U.S. under President Joe Biden and clarified steps to be taken in relations with Washington, the Korean Central News Agency said. It did not specify the steps.

Kim stressed the need to get prepared for both dialogue and confrontation, especially to get fully prepared for confrontation in order to protect the dignity of our state" and ensure national security, it said.

In 2018-19, Kim held a series of summits with then-President Donald Trump to discuss North Korea's advancing nuclear arsenal. But the negotiations fell apart after Trump rejected Kims calls for extensive sanctions relief in return for a partial surrender of his nuclear capability.

Bidens administration has worked to formulate a new approach on North Koreas nuclear program that it describes as calibrated and practical. Details of his North Korea policy havent been publicized, but U.S. officials have suggested Biden will seek a middle ground between Trumps direct meetings with Kim and former President Barack Obamas strategic patience to curb Kims nuclear program.

Earlier this week, leaders of the Group of Seven wealthy nations issued a statement calling for the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula and the verifiable and irreversible abandonment of North Koreas nuclear and missile programs. They called on North Korea to engage and resume dialogue.

Sung Kim, the top U.S. official on North Korea, is to visit Seoul on Saturday for a trilateral meeting with South Korean and Japanese officials. His travel emphasizes the importance of three-way cooperation in working toward complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, the State Department said.

Kim Jong Un has recently threatened to enlarge his nuclear arsenal and build high-tech weapons targeting the U.S. mainland if Washington refuses to abandon its hostile policy toward North Korea.

In March, Kims military performed its first short-range ballistic missile tests in a year. But North Korea is still maintaining a moratorium on long-range missile and nuclear tests in an indication that Kim still wants to keep prospects for diplomacy alive.

Kwak Gil Sup, head of One Korea Center, a website specializing in North Korea affairs, wrote on Facebook that Kims statement suggested hes taking a two-track approach of bolstering military capability and preparing for talks. But he said Kim will more likely focus on boosting military strength and repeating his demand for the U.S. to withdraw its hostile policy, rather than hastily returning to talks.

Kim said last week North Koreas military must stay on high alert to defend national security.

Analyst Cheong Seong-Chang at the private Sejong Institute in South Korea said North Korea will likely return to talks but wont accept a call for immediate, complete denuclearization. He said North Korea may accede to a proposal to freeze its atomic program and partially reduce its nuclear arsenal in phased steps if the Biden administration relaxes sanctions and suspends its regular military drills with South Korea.

Cha Duck Chul, a deputy spokesman at South Koreas Unification Ministry, said its closely monitoring the Norths ongoing political meeting and wants to reemphasize the best way to achieve peace on the Korean Peninsula is through dialogue.

In Beijing, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijiang called for renewed dialogue between North Korea and the U.S., saying that We believe that the Korean Peninsula situation is facing a new round of tension.

Kim called the ruling Workers Partys Central Committee meeting taking place this week to review efforts to rebuild the economy, which has been severely crippled by pandemic border closings, mismanagement amid the U.S.-led sanctions, and storm damage to crops and infrastructure last year.

On Tuesday, Kim opened the meeting by warning of potential food shortages, urging officials to find ways to boost agricultural production because the countrys food situation is now getting tense. He also urged the country to brace for extended COVID-19 restrictions, suggesting North Korea would extend its border closure and other steps despite the stress on its economy.

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Associated Press writer Kim Tong-hyung contributed to this report.
TOKYO (AP)  A wild brown bear on the loose in a city in northern Japan wounded four people, entered a military camp and disrupted flights at an airport Friday before being fatally shot.

The bear was seen wandering through the streets of Sapporo in the early hours of Friday, triggering a number of calls to police. Over the next eight hours, Hokkaido police said the bear injured a woman in her 80s, a man in his 70s and a man in his 40s before attacking a soldier.

Police said the condition of those injured was not known, but the Asahi newspaper reported that the man in his 40s suffered serious injuries to his chest, back and limbs after he was mauled by the bear while walking on a street.

Video on local television showed the bear wandering a street in Sapporo. Chased by a car, it crossed a busy road and forced its way into the Ground Self-Defense Forces Camp Okadama. The bear knocked down a soldier on duty at the gate.

The soldier suffered cuts to his chest and stomach, but his injuries were not life threatening, according to the Defense Ministry.

Next the bear ran through the camp and entered the runway at a nearby airport, causing several flights to be grounded.

The bear then ran into a forest, where it was shot by local hunters.

Toshihiro Hamada, an official at the Sapporo city environmental department, said authorities were investigating how the animal ended up in the city.

We are sorry that four people were injured, Hamada said.

Brown bears roam mainly in Hokkaido forests, but experts say they have been increasingly spotted in inhabited areas looking for food, especially during the summer.

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Follow Mari Yamaguchi on Twitter at https://www.twitter.com/mariyamaguchi
Pay raises are in store for Plainview Independent School District educators and staff members.

The Plainview ISD School Board unanimously approved increases in pay Thursday night for all district employees, including substitutes.

Returning educators and librarians who spent at least a semester with the district through the 2020-2021 school year will receive an extra $2,500. Brandy Merrick, chief people officer, said the average teacher salary across the district is $50,000 and the $2,500 amounts to 5% of that.

Other employees  administrators, the custodial and maintenance teams, paraprofessionals, professionals and support staff  who return for the 2021-2022 school year will receive an increase of 3% of the midpoint pay for their corresponding pay step plans.

We feel our staff has earned that, said Superintendent H.T. Sanchez.

The raise keeps the district competitive within its market, Merrick said.

While the pay raise will be notable among returning employees paychecks, the increase will also apply to starting pay for new and future employees. The starting pay for new employees will be higher than that of seasoned employees, Merrick explained.

The anticipated budget impact is about $1.3 million for the district.

The pay increase is the 10th approved for Plainview ISD in as many years.

The increased cost of living is one factor that led to the decision to grant another raise.

Raises will be implemented for every district employee except the superintendent.

The district will also contribute more to employee health plan costs.

Board members unanimously approved a $31 dollar contribution increase for employee healthcare plan per month.

The district is required to contribute $150 to employee insurance plans, Merrick said. Plainview ISD contributes more than double that amount. The district and the state will now cover $402 of an employees health care plan each month. The districts contribution is now $327 and the states remains at $75.

The increase will impact the districts budget by about $216,500.

Substitute teachers and teachers aides will also receive higher pay for the 2021-2022 school year.

Teachers aides will now receive $65 per day  the first increase since 2001.

Substitute teachers will also receive more based on education levels. Substitute teachers with no degree will receive $80 per day, those with a degree will receive $90 per day and those with a degree and a teacher certification will receive $100. This is the first increase for these rates since 2010.

The district will also pay long-term substitutes an additional $30 per day based on the credentials previously listed.

The increase was implemented with the idea to maintain competitive rates compared to neighboring districts in an effort to keep substitutes, Sanchez explained.

School districts have experienced a shortage of substitutes  a problem amplified by the COVID-19 pandemic. It was also noted that some of the districts substitutes end up joining the district.

Some of our best subs always become paraprofessionals, Merrick said.

The district maintained about 30 substitutes who became support staff through the COVID-19 pandemic and helped fill in for short- and long-term absences, she added.

Good subs are a necessity for the district and, Sanchez noted later, theyre always tough to come by.

For the first time, the district will also pay stipends to mentor teachers and employees who provide translation services.

It takes time to be a teaching mentor, Sanchez said.

First year teachers need support, he added.

Starting in the 2021-2022 school year, teachers who agree to be mentors to new educators will receive a $1,000 yearly stipend distributed in two $500 payments  one in December and one in June.

The district will also pay between $750 to $1,000 to staff members who can provide language translation services throughout the year.

In a presentation given before discussion of stipends, Director of Language Acquisition Mary Sanchez noted that translation services are primarily needed for Spanish language speakers across the district. However, there are also a handful of families who speak Chinese, Korean and/or Vietnamese.

Individuals who take on the supplemental duty of providing translation services will be tested on how well they can communicate the language they would potentially translate.

Prior to pay increase discussions, the school board also approved use of ESSER III funds allocated for school districts through the American Rescue Plan. The district issued a public notice last week to inform the community of its plans to apply for the funding and invited the public input.

The funding was designated to help make up for learning gaps created by the COVID-19 pandemic.

All items were approved unanimously with 5-0 votes during Thursdays meeting. Board members Tyler James and Adam Soto were absent.
BOSTON (AP)  A software bug at a major network provider briefly knocked dozens of financial institutions, airlines and other companies across the globe offline during peak business hours in Asia.

Akamai, which runs one of the internet's main content-delivery systems, said the outage Thursday was not caused by a cyberattack, but rather a software bug on a service that protects customers against denial-of-service attacks.

Many of the 500 affected Akamai customers had their traffic rerouted in minutes but it took more than four hours to fully restore the system, the Massachusetts company said. Akamai operates mirrors of customer websites in 135 countries  known as edge servers  designed to speed access to them.

The Hong Kong Stock Exchange and the four largest U.S. airlines were among those impacted. Akamai does not name its customers but says they include more than 300 of the world's banks, more than 30 airlines, more than 200 national government agencies and 825 retailers.

Many of the outages were reported by people in Australia trying to do banking, book flights and access postal services at mid-afternoon. Many services were back up and running after an hour or so.

Banking services were severely disrupted, with Westpac, the Commonwealth, ANZ and St George all down, along with the website of the Reserve Bank of Australia, the country's central bank. The Reserve Bank cancelled a bond-buying operation due to technical difficulties facing several banks that were to participate.

The airline Virgin Australia was also affected and cited the Akamai content delivery system. It said flights largely operated as scheduled after it restored access to its website and guest contact center.

Outages briefly spiked on American, Delta, United and Southwest airlines. Because the disruptions happened late at night in the U.S. when few planes were taking off, airline representatives said there was little to no effect on flights.

Southwest, which has suffered two other, unrelated technology issues this week, said its website and other internet-based tools were briefly disconnected but flights were not affected. United said there were no lingering issues early Thursday.

The disruptions occurred only days after many of the world's top websites went offline briefly due to a software disruption at Fastly, another major web services company. The company blamed the problem on a software bug triggered when a single customer changed a setting.

Brief internet service outages are not uncommon and are only rarely the result of hacking or other mischief. However, the recent outages have underscored how vital a small number of behind-the-scenes companies have become to running the internet.
Click here to read the full article.

John Paragon, best known for his role as Jambi the Genie on the television series Pee-wees Playhouse, has died. He was 66.

Paragon died in his residence in Palm Springs, Calif. on April 3, according to a press release from the Riverside County Sheriffs Department. A representative for the Sheriffs Department confirmed to Variety that Paragons cause of death was heart disease and chronic alcohol abuse.

Born in Anchorage, Alaska on Dec. 9, 1954, Paragon got his start in show business as part of the L.A.-based improv group The Groundlings, where he worked alongside comics Paul Reubens and Phil Hartman. In 1986, Paragon reunited with Reubens on his Saturday morning childrens show Pee-wees Playhouse, in which Paragon portrayed the teal-faced Jambi the Genie and provided the voice for Pterri. In addition to his role on the series, Paragon also wrote 24 regular season episodes and co-wrote its 1988 Christmas special with Reubens, which earned them a daytime Emmy nomination that same year.

Paragons other roles include Eating Raoul in 1982, Echo Park in 1985, the titular character in The Frog Prince, Cheers, a recurring role as Cedric on Seinfeld, The Elvira Show and Elviras Movie Macabre. In 2011, Paragon reprised his role as Jambi the Genie in the television movie The Pee-wee Herman Show on Broadway, and voiced Pterri in a skit on Saturday Night Live that same year.

Paragon also worked with Disney Imagineering to develop ways to incorporate improv into theme park attractions. He particularly worked on Lucky the Dinosaur, the first free-roaming audio-animatronic figure ever introduced to Disney parks.

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Lisa Krantz /San Antonio Express-News

Locals who live for the spookiest time of year have something extra creepy to look forward to this fall.

The San Antonio Paranormal Fest is set to return in 2021 to the historic, 154-year-old Victorias Black Swan Inn on Saturday, September 18. The unique festival combines history and mystery as well as ghost stories and otherworldly fun.
San Antonio's fourth Stout House location is now open on the far Northside.

The Stout House at TPC joins locations in Helotes, Stone Oak and on Potranco.

RELATED: El Remedio's third birria, mariscos food truck arrives in San Antonio

The new location opened Thursday and is in its soft opening phase. Bar patrons are asked to "be patient" as staff adjusts and gets acquainted with the new operation.

The new bar is located at 22810 U.S. Highway 281.

READ MORE FROM MADALYN: Comfort Cafe readies second location for grand opening this weekend

Stout House's other locations are at 11851 Bandera Road, 18730 Stone Oak Parkway and 9218 Potranco Road.
Medina Lake is now "fully infested" with zebra mussels. The lake is about 43 miles west of San Antonio.

The invasive species were first sighted at Medina Lake in February, according to the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department. It was the first time the critters have been found in the San Antonio river basin.

In late May, officials followed up by conducting intensive shoreline and snorkeling surveys that located numerous zebra mussels in the water. The most recent discoveries indicated the species are reproducing at Medina Lake, designating it as "fully infested," TPWD stated in a news release Thursday.

RELATED: 5 tips to follow to keep invasive zebra mussels out of San Antonio lakes

Courtesy Texas Parks and Wildlife Department

Zebra mussels are one of the most problematic aquatic invasive species in the state, as they put native fisheries at risk and can coat and clog water infrastructure, such as pipes, causing millions of dollars in damage.

On Thursday, TPWD also announced Lake Brownwood, near Abilene, and Inks Lake, near Burnet, are also "fully infested." In Texas, the species has now spread to 32 lakes, with 27 of them being fully infested.

"As zebra mussels are continuing to spread westward and southward to new areas in Texas, and as those lakes become fully infested, nearby lakes have an increased risk of being invaded and it is vital that boaters take steps to clean, drain, and dry boats to help slow the spread," Monica McGarrity, senior scientist for aquatic invasive species, states in the release. "Boats owned or recently purchased that have been stored in the water must be decontaminated before moving them to another lake to prevent the spread of these highly invasive mussels."

Boaters and anglers who transport the mussels can face a fine of up to $500 per violation, according to TPWD.

The department is also encouraging lake visitors to help keep track of the spread by photographing and report sighting of mussels. Reports can be sent to aquaticinvasives@tpwd.texas.gov.
Sometimes a person is filled with so much rage and anger that lotus poses and pan flute music just cant take one down the path of enlightenment.

Thats why rage yoga exists.

Yes, you heard that right  rage. Its a yoga class unlike anything else practitioners of the Eastern art engage in. Sure, there is stretching, centered breathing and the recitation of mantras. But there is also a lot of screaming, swearing, drinking and heavy metal music.

In Houston, you can get in on the action at 8 p.m. every first Thursday of the month at Buffalo Bayou Brewing Company under the guidance of rage yoga instructor Ashley Duzich. Classes are $20 each.

It is yoga that allows you to release all of your negative emotions in a safe space, Duzich said. Its basically a yoga practice that youre allowed to scream and let go of all the sh*t youre feelingand man, 2020 was a bunch of sh*t.

She started offering classes at Buffalo during the pandemic after the previous brewery in which she was teaching closed. At Buffalo, attendees are in outdoor tents in the parking lot where she has marked spots for the yoga mats six and a half feet apart. It can accommodate up to 20 people  and their dogs. Children are not welcome.

The responses to the idea ride the spectrum.

I get everything from oh my god, thats the greatest thing ever, to youre a horrible person and you are destroying yoga,' Duzich said.

READ MORE: How to pick the best yoga pants for your body type and style

Duzich learned rage yoga from Lindsey Istace, whom she refers to as the creator and mother of rage yoga. Duzich was at a low point in her life, having made an unwelcome move to Croatia. She Googled yoga and heavy metal and found Istaces rage yoga page.

I had to have it, Duzich said. I didnt even question it. I had no money to my name and I was still buying this. I needed this.

Ashley Duzic on Instagram

Eventually, in February of 2017, she would fly to Calgary, Canada where she became the first and (then) only American to become a certified rage yoga teacher.

Istace was also in a time of emotional upset when she created rage yoga. She was in the middle of a bad breakup, something she points out can make a person a little nuts.

I was finding that I was feeling super not OK and it wasnt really a feeling I could sweep under the rug. It kept leaking out, Istace said. In my personal practice, I felt like that meant I was doing it wrong and that just wasnt really the case. I leaned into it and found it really powerful when I had this space to just be not OK, even if it was colorful.

Her organic experiment snowballed, she said. Istace joked about it on social media and someone told her she should teach a class. She began doing workshops and festivals and then regular classes and teacher certification.

It got kind of out of control, ya know, Istace said.

What does a rage yoga class look like?

Both women describe it as an offering for people who are just on the cusp of engaging in yoga but may be turned off by the traditional trappings of the practice. Still, Istace says the experience is more like a conventional class than a person might expect.

Everybody always pictures a bunch of people just screaming F-words and blasting metal and for sure, that can absolutely be a feature, Istace said. But honestly, the flow of rage yoga is very similar to that of a regular yoga class.

They start with connecting to their breath and their bodies. They go through poses and stretches. The difference is that throughout the session, there are a lot of F-bombs and middle fingers.

Several traditional yoga postures take on new names. For example, the cat cow becomes the bad backup dancer. A favorite pose of Duzichs is what she calls the fireballs to knee the balls pose. It starts with people in a lunge position holding their hands out with fingers spread as if casting a fireball spell. She then has them transition into a high kick.

We call that kneeing the balls, Duzich said. I tell them to picture their mortal enemy standing in front of them and just kicking them in the balls.

Ashley Duzic on Instagram

In other words, everything gets a little ragey. The practice, she said, isnt about postures, but about releasing emotions.

It doesnt matter if youre doing the pose right or even doing the same pose as us, Duzich said. Its about doing what is right for you and your body. As long as youre just letting go and having a good time, thats what matters.

READ MORE: LaMarcus Aldridge joins Naomi Osaka, Michael Phelps in amplifying mental health struggles

Another move that in traditional yoga is called a Four Fold, they dub Let That Sh*t Go. Its based on a classical cleansing breath that starts as a mountain pose and on the exhale, you squeeze your diaphragm, pushing out all the stale air and flopping forward with a deep guttural noise or an expression of whatever makes you angry.

You dont just exhale, you let out all your bullsh*t, Duzich said. One of the best things weve ever heard was, I told you to close the refrigerator!

Istace cited her favorite as a person who growled with fury, I asked you to wash the dishes yesterday!

Both are big fans of colorful language, encouraging people to do no harm, take no sh*t.

There is a lot of energy behind your curse words, Istace said. Culturally, weve put such focus on them for a long time, that there is power in just owning them.

And while they are optional, both teachers cited frequent use of fist unicorns, a hand gesture with two middle fingers stuck up in a powerful fist thrust.

Istace believes there is something for everyone in yoga. If they are comfortable with the classical style, they can go to yoga studios. If not, they can give rage yoga a try. She especially recommends it for people coming out of the mess that was 2020.

There is something to be said for a safe space to yell and let go, Istace said. There is something beautiful in a room full of people you may or may not know just screaming F-words and flopping your body around like some angsty teenager.

She says youre not angry for long. Its about letting go of the anger, not just holding onto it or throwing a temper tantrum. Its why, she explains, there is so much more laughter in the classes than most people expect.

You let it out and you realize how silly it is and that its OK, Istace said.

Word-of-mouth marketing is their gold standard. Duzich focuses on making sure everyone is having fun and not taking themselves too seriously.

Rage yoga is more than a practice, she said. Its an attitude designed to make you zen as f*ck. Thats exactly why we say its not for everyone. Were not hating on you, so dont come hating on us.
The Civil War ended on April 9, 1865 when General Robert E. Lee of the Confederate Army surrendered at the Appomattox Courthouse in Virginia. But for slaves in some areas of the U.S., especially Texas, the news of their freedom did not come until months later on June 19 (and two years after the Emancipation Proclamation.)

That day, now known as "Juneteenth," is celebrated each year with festivals and parades all across the country.

RELATED: Historical photos show faces of former slaves living in San Antonio

In 1860, the U.S. Census Bureau reported that more than 182,000 slaves lived in Texas, amounting to almost a third of the state's population. But only about 600 African-Americans lived in San Antonio at the time, due largely to the city's geography and lack of rainfall preventing the cultivation of cotton.

For the most part, the city supported slavery during the 1800s, but a large chunk of the area's German-speaking immigrants opposed it. When the state voted on secession, 46 percent of San Antonians were opposed, though only 24 percent voted against it statewide.

Six years ago, MySA.com found photos taken by the U.S. Works Progress Administration of former slaves that settled in the area more than 60 years after they were freed.
Martha Stewart Bids Adieu to the Hamptons By Hosting A List Book Party at Historic $30 Mil Mansion Showbiz 411. Smart move. The Hamptons are not a defensible position. Mark Blythe

Davos is dead, and the coronavirus killed it FT (Vlade). Hot stuff.

The Climate Culture Shock Is Coming Bloomberg. Just 0.2% of Fortune 100 board members have any experience with climate. Thats going to have to change. I dont see why. Nobody on Boeings board has any experience with aircraft manufacturing. Oh, wait.

The CalPERS Executive Team Demands a New Loyalty Oath! Tony Butka, CityWatch

Were Not In A Real Estate Bubble Surviving Tomorrow, Medium. Deck: Its far worse than that. Im not a real estate maven. Perhaps readers who are will weigh in.

Bond spreads collapse as investors rush into corporate debt FT

One Failed Bridge in Memphis Is Costing Business Millions (not pay-walled) WSJ.

#COVID19

The potential stickiness of pandemic-induced behavior changes in the United States PNAS

China?

The Relentless Wave Vietnam Weekly

A Way of Life Almost Lost in Kampong Phluks Fishing Community Cambodianess. Tonle Sap; see NC here.

Myanmar

India

Vaccines and oxygen run out as third wave of Covid hits Uganda Guardian

UK/EU

Argentine Port Unions Plan Strike Over Vaccine Access MarineLink

We are not communists: Castillo seeks to allay fears in divided Peru Reuters

New Cold War

Russia and Its Neighbors, Thirty Years after the Fall Valdai Discussion Club

Biden Administration

Our Famously Free Press

Imperial Collapse Watch

The Fort Bragg Murders Rolling Stone. Gruesome.

Covid-19: Technology That Saves Lives  But Can the NHS Afford it? Bright

Class Warfare

MSNBC won't voluntarily recognize the WGA, and wants a vote on unionizing, per email pic.twitter.com/vKxeSLTBzr  Ben Smith (@benyt) June 17, 2021

If Obama had passed card-check, as he [snort] promised to do, the MSNBC workers would have a union today.

Latinx Files: In the Heights and the pitfalls of Latinx representation LA Times

Toni Morrison Hated Hamilton So Much She Funded a Play About Lin-Manuel Miranda Newsweek. Stoller on Hamilton.

Antidote du Jour (via):

Bonus antidote:

Acting selflessly to help others in need was long thought to be a trait confined to mammals, in particular humans and great apes. But a new study has found that African grey parrots volunteer assistance to both their good friends and mere acquaintances https://t.co/WKZ1rYnCsv pic.twitter.com/hZBAp4clga  Massimo (@Rainmaker1973) June 16, 2021

See yesterdays Links and Antidote du Jur here.
By Lambert Strether of Corrente.

Zephyr Teachout (see NC here, here, and here), in her wonderful new book Corruption in America, begins with a careful study of how the Framers of the Constitution thought about gifts and corruption. (The opening chapters of the book lay the groundwork for a full-throated assault on Citizens United, which this post would discuss if it were a review, which it is not). Teachout writes (p. 19 et seq), of the political culture of their time. Forgive the lengthy extract:

One of the customs of the international community was the giving and receiving of personal presents to Ambassadors. Gifts were especially given at the end of diplomatic tours. They were often very expensive, and were understood to be a supplement on salaries. This practice was hateful to the Americans because it symbolized and embodied part of a particular culture they rejected. In the founders minds, luxury represented a kind of internal corrosion  even in cases where there was no external dependency, a man coulud be tempted into seeking out things for himself, instead of seeking out things for the country. The final notorious gift in the post-Revolutionary period was the snuff box and portrait given to Benjamin Franklin. This ostentatious, diamond-decorated gift was troubling Franklins diamonds embodied a whole set of fears about patriotism in general, loyalty in a republic, and the particular, time-sensitive concerns about how extremely elaborate gifts might sway Franklins attitude toward his semi-permanent residence  Paris  and against his American home. Given Franklins outsized role in the American political landscape, and Frances wealth, this particular gift portended more than warmth and friendship. It was a show of power. [Article 1, Section 9] is one of the more strongly worded prohibitions ini the Constitution: No person holding any office of profit or trust under them [the United States] shall, without the consent of Congress, accept any present, emolument, office, or title of any kind whatever, from any king, prince, or foreign state. Virginian Edmund Randolph, describing the clause to the Virginia delegates as they were deciding whether or not to ratify the Constitution, explained: This restriction was provided to prevent corruption. An accident, which actually happened, operated in producing the restriction. A box was presented to our Ambassador by the king of our allies. It was thought proper, in order to exclude corruption and foreign influence, to prohibit any one in office from receiving or holding any emoluments from foreign states. The lack of an exception for small tokens in the gifts clause is striking.. Moreover, it forbids presents  not bribes. No exchange or agreement is required to bring it within the ban. That fierce rejection of of any kind whatever reveals a commitment to transforming the political culture that persisted fromo the Revolutionary era to the Constitutional era. It was a ban on a culture of gift giving .

(For anyone triggered by emoluments, its not just Trump, who adhered as slavishly to our norms of gift-giving as much as he violated others.)

The Framers understanding of human nature was sound. From Adam Graycar and David Jancsics in Gift Giving and Corruption, International Journal of Public Administration:

Simmel (1950, p. 387) claimed that all contacts among men rest on the schema of giving and returning the equivalence. The most powerful driver of gift exchanges is reciprocity, a universal norm that can be found in almost all cultures. The origin of the universal norm of reciprocity can be tracked back to ancient religious rituals, when people offered sacrifices to the gods as an act that should have been necessarily reciprocated (Mauss, 2002). Forms of reciprocity exist in all societies to this day. Although the economics literature claims that altruistic giving exists when giving is not followed by a return from the recipient (Rose-Ackerman, 1998), anthropologists believe that gifts always trigger a return or at minimum, a feeling of obligation to repay favors on the receiver side (Douglas, 2002). The unreciprocated gift makes the person who has accepted it feel inferior because of the sense of indebtedness and the receiver will seek to get rid of such obligation by reciprocating (Ferraro, 2004; Malinowski, 1922; Mauss, 2002; Strathern, 2012).Reciprocity means lending resources to someone in the present and demanding (or at least hoping for) a return in the future (Peebles, 2010).

One tiny example of reciprocity: A friend, taking on the public office that is called citizenship, went on a tour of our state-owned, privately looted mis managed landfill. When they reached the top  wonderful view, you can see for miles  they were greeted by a table on which were set forth gifts: hot dogs, condiments, chips, soda, and so forth. The landfill operators understanding of human nature was sound; they meant to create a reciprocal obligation. Its harder to criticize somebody when youve eaten their food!

Heres a more pernicious example from today. David Sirota quotes Jacky Rosen, D-Nev, who encouraged She also encouraged members of the Chamber of Commerce to meet lawmakers over private dinners:

What you can do, as a business roundtable, whether it is at the national level, [is] bring us together for some off-the-record dinners , let us just talk and get to know each other and get to know you, Rosen said. Or whether its in our own communities, we can do those same things. Its important that you sometimes just sit down and get a chance to know people without necessarily a formal agenda. And that carries you through a lot of things .

Ill bet it does (although the prospect of a Representative soliciting gifts makes me a little queasy. Does the Chamber of Commerce really need guidance in how the game is played?

Here is a third example from the world of Big Pharma, from a member of the NC Covid Brain Trust:

I have a good friend and former collaborator who was a leader in research at [a nationally recognized nonprofit American academic medical center] and is/was on the board of [Big Pharma Company]. Very sophisticated and impressive, no mystery why they wanted him. He was paid $250,000 a year for his trouble, which I found out by accident when digging around the interwebs about some [Big Pharma Company] (insulin pricing, I think it was). I asked him how he could give objective advice to the C-Suite in [Big Pharmas City] if they were paying him $5,000 a week to stop by a few times a year and hang out in the executive board and dining rooms while staying at whatever Ritz Carlton wannabe is downtown. No (good) answer forthcoming. He was one of the lower paid trustees. The sociologists have determined that any gift from a Big Pharma rep is enough to alter prescribing behavior . Stack of Post-it notes, cheap ballpoint pen, lunch, all good enough because your average primate engages in reciprocal behavior. I doubt they are still sending their marks to Pebble Beach for the weekend. Pity. When I was at Johns Hopkins Big Pharma sales reps were declared persona non grata on campus IIRCwhat do independent practicing internists do with them? And do they still all look the same?

Is it too cynical to suggest that the culture of gift-giving in medicine has affected both political support for, and prescription of, Big Pharmas biggest product rollout in years, Covid vaccines?

A final example from everybodys favorite obstructionist Democrat, Joe Lieberman Joe Manchin. From Ryan Grim:

On Monday, Joe Manchin met with a group of wealthy donors to coordinate a strategy to defend the filibuster. The biggest threat to it, he argued, was Republicans refusal to support a January 6th commission, because it made anybody who claimed bipartisanship is still possible look like a buffoon, with people saying to him, Hows that bipartisan working for you now, Joe? The obvious solution, then, he argued, is to find a handful of Republicans who will switch their votes and support a commission. A key target, he said, is Missouri Republican Sen. Roy Blunt. His suggestion was extraordinary for how explicit it made the link between legislative behavior and the pursuit of post-career riches. Roy Blunt is a great, just a good friend of mine, a great guy, Manchin said in audio The Intercept obtained.  Roy is retiring. If some of you all who might be working with Roy in his next life could tell him, thatd be nice and itd help our country. That would be very good to get him to change his vote . And were going to have another vote on this thing. Thatll give me one more shot at it.

Forget it, Jake. Its K Street.

* * *

Looking back at Article I, Section 8, theres a loophole you could drive a tru mp : It really ought to read accept any present, emolument, office, or title of any kind whatever , from any king, prince, or foreign state . (I thought it was simpler to generalize it, rather than attempt to parse out all the kinds of private entities that might seek to curry favor with the government.) I doubt that would stamp out gift-giving entirely, but it would sure put a crimp in the culture. The same should be written into the bylaws of professional associations (which I assume would cover institutions like CalPERS, a fine example of the culture of gift-giving; see NC here at junket).

If the Framers had access to a Time Machine, and could fast-forward to the present day, they would see a culture, and a political culture, that had become  at least with respect to corruption  everything they sought to avoid, and tried to engineer the Constitution to prevent.
By Alexander Ahammer, Assistant Professor, Johannes Kepler University Linzl, Dominik Grubl, PhD candidate in Economics, Johannes Kepler University, and Rudolf Winter-Ebmer, Professor at Labour Economics at the University of Linz and at the Institute for Advanced Studies, Vienna and CEPR Research Fellow. Originally published at VoxEU.

COVID-19 and the policies enacted to tackle virus transmission have led to a wave of unemployment in Europe and the US. This column uses data from Austria to examine the impact of downsizing by a firm on the health of people who remain at the firm. It finds a significant increase in drug prescriptions and hospitalisations following mass layoffs, driven primarily by mental and cardiovascular conditions. The authors argue that stress due to fear of job loss, rather than increased workloads, is the more likely explanation.

Downsizing is a frequently used tool to stabilise firms in distress. Recently, COVID-19 and the policies enacted to tackle virus transmission have led to a wave of unemployment in Europe and the US (e.g. Baek et al. 2020). This is particularly concerning in times of a pandemic because an increase in unemployment can exacerbate problems in the already strained health sector. The health effects of job loss and labour market shocks have been widely documented in the literature (e.g. Kuhn et al. 2009, Adda and Fawaz 2021). In a recent study (Ahammer et al. 2020), we show that downsizing also affects the health of workers who remain in the firm. These effects can occur when staff reductions lead to psychological stress in the workforce. This can be the case, in particular, if the remaining workers fear for their own jobs or are pushed into new tasks and responsibilities.

To investigate the health effects of downsizing, we look at workers who remained in firms that underwent mass layoffs between 1998 and 2014 in Upper Austria. Since surviving a mass layoff is not random, we construct a control group of workers from other firms who themselves survive a mass layoff, but at a later point in time. These workers should have similar unobservable characteristics compared to our treatment group and differ only in the timing of the mass layoff they are exposed to.

Effects on Workers Health

Our central results, based on dynamic difference-in-differences estimates, suggest a significant increase in drug prescriptions and hospitalisations following mass layoffs among workers who remain with the firm. These results are shown in Figure 1. In each graph, the dots indicate the estimated effect of mass layoff in a certain quarter, relative to the base quarter (the quarter of the mass layoff). The blue area is the 95% confidence interval and the dashed line is the 90% confidence interval of the estimate. These effects are persistent and, in fact, become stronger over time. This is not surprising, given that stress arguably takes some time to take its full toll on the body. As recent medical studies have shown, even minor stressful events can lead to serious health problems that linger for ten years or longer (e.g., Korkeila et al. 2010).

Figure 1 Effects of mass layoffs on workers who remain at the firm

Notes: These graphs show dynamic difference-in-differences estimates for the effect of a mass layoff on health outcomes of workers who remain with the firm, each over a period of 6 quarters before to 6 quarters after the mass layoff. The 95% confidence interval is indicated by the blue area, the 90% confidence interval is shown as a dashed line. In all regressions, we control for worker age and tenure.

These effects appear to be driven primarily by mental and cardiovascular conditions, both of which have been linked to work stress in the occupational health literature. For example, workers are 20% more likely to seek psychotherapy following mass layoffs. Prescriptions for antidepressants, however, increase later and to a lesser extent, which is also true for musculoskeletal conditions. For cardiovascular drugs such as beta blockers or anti-cholesterol drugs we see an immediate increase, but not for strokes or heart attacks. In general, it seems that workers with pre-existing conditions tend to be more affected by downsizing. We find no evidence for effects on alcohol or drug abuse.

Fear Of Own Job Loss Or Higher Workload?

How can these health effects be explained? Are workers afraid of losing their own jobs? Or does stress arise because downsizing leads to restructuring and thus to a greater workload? We consider the latter to be less likely, because our estimated health effects are somewhat stronger for smaller layoffs. When fewer workers are laid off, it is less likely that a systematic redistribution of work tasks will follow. Furthermore, mass layoffs have little effect on wages of the remaining workers in our sample. If they were given more responsibilities following mass layoffs, we would expect salary jumps sooner or later, but this is not consistent with our results.

Stress due to fear of job loss, on the other hand, is the more likely explanation. This is supported by the fact that more vulnerable workers, such as older low-wage workers, are more affected. Furthermore, the health effect occurs only in communities with above-average unemployment rates and is larger for workers whose spouses earn below-average wages. These groups of people each face the greatest costs of potential unemployment and therefore will also tend to be more fearful of job loss.

Downsizing Requires Management and Policy Action

Downsizing thus affects the health of workers who remain at the firm. Such externalities impose significant costs on the firm itself, as sick leaves increase substantially after mass layoffs. Evidence for such spillovers has been scarce in the literature. This has important implications for policy and management. If health effects are not offset by compensating wage increases, a specific layoff tax along the lines of Blanchard and Tirole (2008) could be useful. Such a tax would internalise the external effects of (mass) layoffs, such as costs for unemployment benefits. Likewise, measures such as targeted health counselling or prevention can be helpful in dampening health effects on workers remaining in the company.

References available at the original.
(Natural News) Despite Joe Biden running on a platform of unity to bring Americans back together, before he was even sworn in, he reneged on this promise by alienating tens of millions of Trump supporters  essentially declaring them the enemy.

(Article by Matt Agorist republished from TheFreeThoughtProject.com)

Dont dare call them protesters, Biden said after the largely peaceful march on DC which ended with a few hundred goons out of tens of thousands of peaceful protesters raiding the capitol. They were a riotous mob. Insurrectionists. Domestic terrorists. Its that basic. Its that simple.

While some of the folks certainly thought they were part of some coup, the reality of the situation was nothing at all as serious as the media and establishment has reported since.

Just like Trump used Antifa violence to bolster the police state and add stricter penalties for protests, Biden is using the riot at the capitol to do the same. We predicted this outcome in January, and now it is escalating even further.

In February, using the DHS National Terrorist Advisory System  or NTAS  the Department of Homeland Security issued a warning that anger fueled by false narratives, including unfounded claims about the 2020 presidential election, could lead some inside the country to launch attacks in the coming weeks.

This was the first time we could find that this warning was issued over a domestic terror threat. And, although that warning was issued in February, four months later, weve yet to see anything materialize. There have been no protests, no attacks on the capitol, nothing. In spite of Americans largely returning to normal, the White House is doubling down.

This week, President Joe Bidens administration announced their plans to create a means of family and friends to snitch on each other  to fight the non-existent threat of domestic terrorism.

In a teleconference on Monday, a senior administration official told reporters of a plan that sounds reminiscent of the Minority Report by attacking pre-crime.

We will work to improve public awareness of federal resources to address concerning or threatening behavior before violence occurs, the official said.

The official went on to explain how this would work, which involves family members and friends snitching on each other.

We will work to improve public awareness of federal resources to address concerning or threatening behavior before violence occurs. And on that, I would just note that one of the things were talking about is the need to do something in this space, like the See something  If you see something, say something concept that has been promulgated previously by DHS. This involves creating contexts in which those who are family members or friends or co-workers know that there are pathways and avenues to raise concerns and seek help for those who they have perceived to be radicalizing and potentially radicalizing towards violence.

Notice how they use the word potentially to imply that certain completely legal political speech has the potential to incite violence. Then, as if big tech censorship and spying wasnt enough, the official mentioned increased information sharing between tech platforms to help combat this potential for radicalization.

Any particular tech company often knows its own platform very well, the official noted. But the government sees things  actually, threats of violence  across platforms. They see the relationship between online recruitment, radicalization, and violence in the physical world.

Closing out the conference, the official encouraged Americans to come together with their government rulers to combat the non-existent threat in a line that sounded like it was uttered directly from Heinrich Himmler himself.

We are investing many agencies of the government and resourcing them appropriately and asking our citizens to participate, the official said. Because, ultimately, this is really about homeland security being a responsibility of each citizen of our country to help us achieve.

The state asking family members to snitch on each other is the exact same scheme out of every totalitarian regime throughout history. When you sever the trust between children and their parents or friends and family, you can easily mold the children and other state-dependent shills into obedient pawns of the regime who will have no problem outing their subversive family members and friends to authorities.

In Soviet Russia, there was a famous story used to inspire children to inform on their parents. It was the story of Pavel Trofimovich Morozov  a Soviet youth who was praised by the state run media as a martyr. According to the story, which has very little evidence of actually happening, Pavlik denounced his father to the authorities and was in turn killed by his family.

Regardless of whether or not the story was true, it became the subject of reading, songs, plays, a symphonic poem, a full-length opera and six biographies  all which pushed the idea that opposing the state was selfish and reactionary, and state was more important than family. The apotheotic cult had a huge impact on the moral norms of generations of children, who were encouraged to inform on their parents.

Those who fail to see history repeating itself are ensuring that it indeed will. Totalitarian regimes thrive off of pitting citizens against each other and this is ultimately the last step before complete despotism. Time to pay attention America.

Read more at: TheFreeThoughtProject.com and Tyranny.news.
(Natural News) Carey Gillams new book, The Monsanto Papers: Deadly Secrets, Corporate Corruption, and One Mans Search for Justice, tells the story of Dewayne Lee Johnsons struggle to survive and his legal battle against Monsanto.

(Article republished from ChildrensHealthDefense.org)

Johnson has non-Hodgkin lymphoma, a type of cancer he alleges was caused by glyphosate, the key ingredient in Monsantos Roundup weedkiller.

Gillams book, released in March, illustrates the impact of Monsantos deception when the company lied to health officials, scientists and consumers about the safety of its Roundup products.

Gillam told Childrens Health Defense Chairman Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., on the RFK Jr The Defender Podcast, that emails dating back to the 1980s show the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was working very hard to put Monsantos interests above the interests of public health.

An investigative journalist with 30 years experience covering food and agricultural policies and practice, Gillam said the EPA doesnt require any independent long-term safety testing of Monsantos formulated Roundup products. They look only at the active ingredient glyphosate, but not the formulated product, which contains other ingredients.

Scientists have found the formulations can be more dangerous because of the enhanced synergistic effect when you mix chemicals with surfactants, said Gillam. The EPA still to this day doesnt require these long-term tests on these formulated products.

Gilam said:

Approximately 40% of men and women in the United States are expected to get cancer in their lifetimes, according to the National Cancer Institute. Its just unbelievable that we are being told that we need to accept and  learn to live with cancer and get different treatments and have our body parts cut off and get radiated when we know that pesticides and chemicals and environmental toxins are big contributors to cancer.

Purchase Gillams new book here, and listen to the full interview here:

Read more at: ChildrensHealthDefense.org and EPAWatch.org.
(Natural News) Dr. Anthony Fauci has been accused of misleading Congress about the taxpayers money given to the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) to study bat coronaviruses.

The director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) said during a Senate questioning that $600,000 was donated to the WIV in the span of five years, but documents obtained by conservative activist group Judicial Watch revealed that the actual figure was $826,277.

These new documents show that funding for the Wuhan Institute was greater than the public has been told, said Tom Fitton, president of Judicial Watch, which uncovered the discrepancy by using a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request. That it has taken a year and a federal lawsuit to get this first disclosure on COVID and Wuhan is evidence of cover-up by Faucis agency.

Fauci, also the chief medical advisor to President Joe Biden, told a Senate hearing on May 25 that the U.S. funded the lab at the center of speculation about the origins of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

We had a modest collaboration with very respectable Chinese scientists who were world experts on coronavirus, and we did that through a sub-grant from a larger grant to EcoHealth [Alliance], Fauci said, referencing a nonprofit group that supported research into coronaviruses.

The larger grant was about $600,000 over a period of five years. So it was a modest amount. The purpose of it was to study the animal-human interface, to do surveillance and to determine if these bat viruses were even capable of infecting humans.

Internal emails expose Faucis lies

Internal emails within the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and its sub-agency NIAID showed the true scale of funding. (Related: Fauci Virus: Shocking new evidence proves covid-19 began with Dr. Anthony Fauci and NIAID.)

In a document dated April 21, 2020, the Wuhan lab funding from NIAID via EcoHealth was detailed under the headline NIAID Subawards to Wuhan Institute of Virology. The project title was Understanding the Risk of Bat Coronavirus Emergence.

In numerous interviews and public appearances, Fauci maintained that the money donated to the Wuhan lab was not meant for gain-of-function experiments, which are conducted to make viruses more contagious or deadly.

But in another appearance before the Senate last month, Fauci admitted that there is no way to know if Chinese scientists at the WIV lied and conducted gain-of-function experiments on bat coronaviruses using U.S. tax money.

Theres no way of guaranteeing that, Fauci said at a Senate Appropriations Committee hearing, responding to a question from Republican Senator John Kennedy. But in our experience with grantees, including Chinese grantees, which we have had interactions with for a very long period of time, they are very competent, trustworthy scientists.

EcoHealth Alliance received $123 million from government

Recent reports emerged that NIAID may not be the only government organization funding the Wuhan lab. (Related: Pentagon exposed for funneling $39 million to Peter Daszak, EcoHealth Alliance to produce novel coronavirus bioweapons.)

EcoHealth Alliance, the same nonprofit group that used federal grants to fund research into coronaviruses at the WIV, reportedly received $39 million from the Pentagon and $123 million overall from different government agencies until last year.

Exactly how much of that money went toward research at the WIV is unknown.

The lab-leak theory has been gaining momentum since Biden asked the intelligence agencies to take a closer look at the possibility and pressured the World Health Organization to get the underlying data from China.

Biden on May 26 said the intelligence agents were divided on two possible scenarios: laboratory leak and natural transfer from animal to human. I have now asked the intelligence community to redouble their efforts to collect and analyze information that could bring us closer to a definitive conclusion, and to report back to me in 90 days, said Biden.

But the president also said a final answer may never be found given the way that China refused to cooperate in the early days of an outbreak, which has gone on to kill 3.8 million people around the world.

Follow Pandemic.news for more news and information related to the coronavirus pandemic.

Sources include:

DailyMail.co.uk

TheHill.com

TimesNowNews.com
(Natural News) A reporter for a Fox affiliate in Houston has been suspended after exposing her bosses corruption and illustrating how they deceive viewers to protect their advertisers.

Ivory Hecker, a dayside reporter on the 5 and 6 oclock news for FOX 26 Houston, shared recordings of her superiors and colleagues with Project Veritas that highlighted the censorship theyve been directing at stories on topics like COVID-19 and Bitcoin. She added that the affiliates leadership has been submitting to the corporate interests of Fox instead of being transparent with viewers.

She told Project Veritas: Theres a narrative. Yes, it is unspoken. But if you accidentally step outside the narrative, if you dont sense what that narrative is and go with it, there will be grave consequences for you.

One incident she shared had a decidedly racial tone, with Assistant News Director Lee Meier telling her that stories were judged based on certain demographics and that a poor African-American audience would not be interested in Bitcoin stories.

She was particularly unhappy about the pressure network execs placed on her to minimize stories that paint the controversial drug hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) in a positive light as a COVID-19 treatment. Her bosses said she shouldnt have questioned United Memorial Medical Center Chief of Staff Dr. Joseph Varan about the drug in an interview in which he touted its success. She said Fox wrote a defamatory letter about the incident and put it in her file to stop her from moving up in the company.

On July 29, she voiced her frustration on Instagram about Facebook and Twitters censorship of Dr. Stella Immanuel, a doctor who has been vocal about her success in treating COVID-19 patients with HCQ. In a post entitled A free press = a free people, she wrote: Freedom of information is critical to the freedom of the people, as history has told time and time again.

Lets shed light on all information and let the public decide rather than hiding information from the public. Is this woman making false or harmful claims? Then leave the video up and allow us to expose those things.

Ad dollars mean vaccines cant be painted in a negative light

She said that ad dollars from the CDC and other money-making incentives were behind the censorship. Fox 26 Sales Coordinator Jennifer Bourgeois admitted on tape how the CDC has been influencing their station and others quite heavily because of the amount of money theyre throwing at ad campaigns, which is setting the stage for how these networks cover major health issues like COVID-19.

Vaccines are a potential money maker for Fox, Hecker stated. Fox gets paid for that. As a viewer, you need to look at who is advertising on this TV station, and youve got to realize  surely that the TV station doesnt want to hurt its advertisers.

She also said that she had turned down an opportunity to work as a reporter for a global Chinese news network because she doesnt like the way the communist government censors reporters  and now she is on the receiving end of censorship right here in the U.S.

Hecker once had a meeting with Fox News execs, who told her that what she needed to be successful in her career was getting in line with the narrative. That conversation left her so frustrated that she says she would turn them down if they offered her a job. In fact, she told the Daily Beast that she no longer wants to work in corporate media.

Why did she decide to expose her network? Hecker said she wanted to shed light on these issues because she wants viewers to know that they are being deceived and she does not wish to participate in the corruption that goes on there.

It is sad but not surprising that this brave journalist lost her job for trying to do what all journalists strive to do and the reason many go into the business in the first place: to give people the information they need to make the best decisions possible about their lives  and not just the side of the story that corporate sponsors want people to hear.

Sources for this article include:

DailyMail.co.uk

ProjectVeritas.com

HoustonChronicle.com
(Natural News) The newest wrinkle on pandemic corruption is how most of the medical and public health establishment refuses to accept natural immunity, obtained through COVID infection, as equivalent to or even better than the artificial immunity obtained from vaccines.

(Article by Jack Metir republished from SurvivalBlog.Science.blog)

The reason is simple. The more that natural immunity is accepted, the more reason there is to reject getting one of the experimental COVID vaccines. Half the US population from kids to adults likely have natural immunity, even though most never suffered any serious ill effects from being infected.

And there clearly is an ongoing bulldozer over facts run by President Biden all the way through the entire federal and state public health system to coerce Americans to get vaccinated.

Their efforts could fail if most of those with natural immunity acted rationally and decided not to take any of the increasing risks from the experimental vaccines.

No big money can be made from all those with natural immunity. For that bonanza for drug companies to fully materialize natural immunity has to be ignored, dismissed or otherwise discounted and discredited. More bad science.

Think of the refusal to respect natural immunity akin to what the government has done to stop widespread use of cheap generics for early home/outpatient COVID treatment that cures and prevents infection. This early action was key for the success of the wait-for-the-vaccine pandemic strategy.

To understand the full measure of this latest corruption here are recent developments and revelations.



On May 19 the FDA issued guidance that clearly said If you have not been vaccinated: Be aware that a positive result from an antibody test does not mean you have a specific amount of immunity or protection from SARS-CoV-2 infection. Antibodies in blood are a basic way to determine immunity. So, the FDA clearly does not want people who have natural immunity to use antibody test results as a replacement for vaccine certification. If this was allowed, then millions of Americans who rightfully fear many negative health impacts from vaccines would have a way to prove with antibody test results that they do not need vaccination because they already have natural immunity. This could greatly reduce the financial bonanza sought by big drug companies and facilitated by the federal agencies.

The position of FDA is also that antibodies provided by the vaccines are superior to the antibodies developed from being infected by the virus. In other words, vaccines create antibodies and protection that the regular antibodies created by natural immunity do not provide. This is false and bad science.

That government position is contradicted by empirical study data according to the eminent Yale University epidemiologist Dr. Harvey Risch. He explained that serum antibodies and T-cell antibodies  the white blood cells that attack infections  demonstrate past history of infection. And that even though antibodies may be different between people with natural immunity versus those in vaccinated people this difference is irrelevant. These natural antibodies are proof of past infection, said Risch. Past infection is extremely strong evidence of immunity. But FDA does not want to jeopardize the vaccine market by acknowledging an antibody blood test could and should substitute for vaccine certification.

A key outspoken proponent for natural immunity is Johns Hopkins physician Marty Makary. In a powerful article, The Power of Natural Immunity he informs the public with sound science. Here are some of his key points. Theres ample scientific evidence that natural immunity is effective and durable, and public-health leaders should pay it heed. A huge number of Americans have natural immunity because though Only around 10% of Americans have had confirmed positive Covid tests, but four to six times as many have likely had the infection. Rather than credit vaccination for positive results, Makary makes this key point: the effect of natural immunity is all around us. The plummeting case numbers in late April and May werent the result of vaccination alone, and they came amid a loosening of both restrictions and behavior.

Read more at: SurvivalBlog.Science.blog and Conspiracy.news.
(Natural News) Leading Republican politicians and other conservative figures are calling on White House Chief Medical Advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci to resign or be fired by the administration of President Joe Biden.

People are calling on Faucis resignation or firing after his emails were released through Freedom of Information Act requests. The emails revealed his changing recommendations regarding the use of face masks and his early dismissal of the lab leak theory. This theory argues that the Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19) was engineered in a lab in China, where it leaked after infecting an employee.

Additionally, these figures want Fauci to step down following revelations that the National Institutes of Health sent grant funding to the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

Fauci needs to step down, said Republican Sen. Marsha Blackburn during an appearance on Fox News.

The Biden administration should ask him to step away from his post, she added. Her colleagues in the Senate, Sens. Marco Rubio of Florida and Tom Cotton of Arkansas, have also called for Fauci to be removed from his post as Chief Medical Advisor to Biden and as director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

For 16 months we have seen Dr. Fauci withhold information, dismiss plausible explanations of COVIDs origin and outright lie to Congress, said Rubio during a different interview on Fox News. He is supposed to be a fact-based public health official, not a pundit distorting the truth to conform with his personal judgment.

Rubio added that, if the president is actually committed to science and the truth as he claims, then he should fire Fauci.

Dr. Fauci has lost the confidence of the American people with his repeated evasions, misdirection and politicized statements, said Cotton. If he wont resign, Joe Biden should fire him.

These three senators are not alone. House Minority Leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy of California has also called on Fauci to either step down or be fired.

The American people dont have trust in Dr. Fauci, said McCarthy during an appearance on Breitbart News radio show. Lets find a person we can trust. Take politics aside, I mean were talking about American lives here.

[He needs to go], because you do not have the trust in him, he added.

Other Republicans calling for Faucis departure include Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri and Reps. Guy Reschenthaler of Pennsylvania and Warren Davidson of Ohio.

Conservative journalists criticize Fauci

The opinions these Republican figures have regarding Fauci were made worse when, on Wednesday, June 9, the doctor went on mainstream media outlet MSNBC to address the criticisms he has been receiving. He responded by saying that the attacks on him are attacks on science.

All of the things that I have spoken consistently from the very beginning have been fundamentally based on science, claimed Fauci during his interview with MSNBCs Chuck Todd. Sometimes those things were inconvenient truths for people and there was pushback against me, so if you are trying to, you know, get at me as a public health official and a scientist, youre really attacking not only Dr. Anthony Fauci, youre attacking science.

Fauci was responding to a question regarding the supposed dangers that come with discrediting public health officials. He claimed doing so could make people lose confidence in the countrys mass vaccination program.

Following these comments, conservative pundits and journalists have come out to strongly criticize Fauci for equating himself with scientific truth.

The man does think hes some kind of deity, said Fox News anchor and journalist Laura Ingraham. His argument is essentially I am the science. I am the truth.'

Her colleague at Fox News, Tucker Carlson, took a swipe at the doctor by calling him King Tony Fauci during his show.

Normal people dont talk that way, he said. Its not Fauci who just believes he is immune. You are not allowed to say anything negative about him or the culture revolution.

Despite the furious calls from conservatives for Fauci to leave his positions of power, it appears that the White House is supporting the doctor.

The White House has defended Fauci from his critics, calling him an undeniable asset to the country during the coronavirus pandemic. White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said she cannot imagine any circumstance where Biden would ever fire Fauci. The president himself has said he is very confident in Fauci.

Learn more about the contents of Faucis emails by reading the latest articles at Pandemic.news.

Sources include:

DailyMail.co.uk

FoxNews.com 1

FoxNews.com 2
(Natural News) Royal Caribbeans Odyssey of the Seas was scheduled to leave Port Everglades on July 3rd. The cruise was halted after eight crew members tested positive for COVID. Strange enough, all eight COVID-positive crew members were vaccinated for COVID, proving yet again that these spike protein bioweapons do not stop people from testing positive for COVID or transmitting infection. Royal Caribbean has discovered that the VACCINATED cause outbreaks, and vaccines are not magic elixirs that prevent infection at all times.

The good news is that only two of the positive COVID cases showed any kind of symptoms, and these symptoms were mild, like any other cold virus. Testing positive for COVID and not having any sign of sickness is a pattern that has occurred for both the vaccinated and the unvaccinated populations for over a year. Even though NONE of these positive cases on the Odyssey of the Seas represent a viable public health concern, the CDC has quarantined hundreds of non-infected, vaccinated crew members and halted the ships operations! The ships inaugural sailing date is now July 31st. Under the current testing standards, the CDC will always find a COVID CASE no matter if a person is vaccinated or not. Under the current quarantine standards, ships will never sail again and peoples lives will be disrupted for no reason!

Cruise ship industry and basic human liberties are under attack

For over a year, Royal Caribbean and the rest of the cruise ship industry have begrudgingly acquiesced to the CDCs unlawful medical edicts and false authority, hoping that the agency would give people their basic liberties back. But as the industry comes to rely on the CDC for basic economic and personal freedoms, more of those individual liberties are taken away. The cruise ship industry has not been allowed to operate at all under the CDC guidelines, as thousands of cruise ship employees are forced to take part in an experiment that alters their cells and distributes spike proteins into their blood. All this time, the CDC guidelines advertise safety while continuing to violate bodily autonomy and informed consent principles.

By targeting the cruise ship industry specifically, the CDC is contradicting their own guidance and discriminating against one industry over all other industries. The CDC no longer responds to infectious disease outbreaks in an evidence-based manner. This rogue agency of unelected officials has abused their authority, locking down an industry without giving individuals a choice to assume their own risks. Individuals have assumed risks with infectious viruses, bacteria and fungi for centuries, without having to take part in an experiment and passport system that further enslaves them and promotes future outbreaks.

There are many reasons someone might seek medical attention on a cruise ship, (including heart attacks, aneurysms, and blood clots caused by COVID vaccines) but in the case of Odyssey of the Seas, COVID is not one of the reasons. Nevertheless, the CDC has the power to shut down the entire cruise for another two months and isolate vaccinated people who did everything to their body that the CDC wanted.

Florida fighting back against CDC to ensure that unvaccinated people arent segregated

The CDC has kept the cruise ship industry locked down for over a year in order to implement Fourth Reich vaccine passports in the United States. The Florida state legislature has fought back against vaccine passports, and has passed a law to punish any rogue entity (such as the CDC) which threatens to violate the medical privacy of an individual or discriminate against a person based on their vaccination status. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is poised to enforce that law, putting the rogue CDC on notice. Consequentially, all cruise ships that sail out of Florida cannot legally require passengers to prove their vaccination status. Individuals in Florida will NOT be segregated or abused. They will be treated with dignity and can assume their own level of risk, as was always the case. As for the vaccinated: They will continue to test positive for COVID and spread spike proteins and other diseases; therefore, they SHOULD NEVER receive preferential treatment or be given special privileges.

Sources include:

HotAir.com

NaturalNews.com

NaturalNews.com

NaturalNews.com

NaturalNews.com

NaturalNews.com
(Natural News) Ticks have been turning up in areas that were once believed to be free of the blood-sucking parasites, according to a study led by researchers from Colorado State University.

Published in the journal Applied and Environmental Microbiology, it showed that disease-carrying ticks, which were once thought to inhabit woodlands, are also present near Northern Californias coastline. The arachnids inhabit the grassy areas on sand dunes that people have to walk through to get to the beach.

The study also showed that as many as 31 percent of the ticks along that coastline carry harmful bacteria that can cause diseases. Such a high rate of disease-carrying ticks was surprising, said study lead author Daniel Salkeld, a board member of the Bay Area Lyme Foundation. [It] makes you rethink the local disease risk.

Ticks are thriving near Northern California beaches

Wooded areas of the Northeast are the epicenter for ticks in the United States. Scientists are expecting a rise in tick populations this year due to a warm winter. More ticks means more tick-borne illnesses like Lyme disease. Though rarely fatal, Lyme disease can spread to the heart and the nervous system if left untreated.

Nearly half a million Americans are treated for Lyme disease each year, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Finding ticks early is key to avoiding Lyme disease. (Related: The symptoms of acute and chronic Lyme disease and how to treat it.)

Of the 48 species of ticks in California, six have demonstrated interest in feeding on human blood. But just one of those, a species called the western black-legged tick (Ixodes pacificus), carries the bacteria that causes Lyme disease.

Salkeld has been studying ticks for over a decade. On a research trip to Northern California in late May, he saw numerous western black-legged ticks at collection points in Marin, San Mateo and Santa Clara counties. Salkeld also found that the ticks were particularly abundant in the Marin Headlands, a hilly peninsula north of San Francisco.

As part of the research trip, Salkeld collected ticks in all stages of development in the grassy areas near Stinson Beach in Marin County. He said he never found ticks there before. Unfortunately, its difficult to say why western black-legged ticks are suddenly thriving near Northern California beaches. But Salkeld has a few ideas.

Ticks prefer warm weather and high humidity. So although Californias droughts help control tick populations, the shorter winter may extend the period in which they are active. People are beginning to spend more time outdoors because of warmer weather and pent-up demand for recreation amid the coronavirus pandemic, said Salkeld. This means that more people risk contracting tick-borne diseases.

Plus, warmer weather promotes activity among known tick hosts, such as squirrels, lizards and deer. Moreover, warming temperatures are expected to expand the range of habitats that are favorable to ticks. Salkeld fears this will contribute to the spread of Lyme disease. That said, its still too early to say anything definitive.

Looking at patterns of human cases across years isnt straightforward since there may be annual variations, said Salkeld. Plus, the picture can be complicated by warming weather and changes in awareness or surveillance of Lyme disease. Its hard to determine a particular trajectory of human cases.

But this doesnt mean people shouldnt take precautions when hiking or going to the beach, particularly in places where ticks have been spotted. Linda Giampa, president of the Bay Area Lyme Foundation, said she has little doubt that Lyme disease has already taken a stronger hold in Northern California. Its definitely increasing in ticks. Its basic ecology.

Giampa also said there may be more tick hot spots in beaches further south, such as in Malibu, Manhattan Beach and Newport Beach. I know its down there.

Learn more about Lyme disease and how to treat it at Medicine.news.

Sources include:

News.Yahoo.com

SFGate.com

CDC.gov
(Natural News) The wreckage that our country faces did not start with the Biden administration. The socialist tendencies of the progressive socialist Democrats started way back in the era of Woodrow Wilson. Since then, the government has required the citizenry to bow down to the false god of governmental power.

(Article by John C. Velisek republished from AllNewsPipeline.com)

Senator Bernie Sanders has stated, and Chyna Joe has echoed, that we can use the Covid 19 crisis to change the basic tenets of government and society work. Instead, the word-salads and doublespeak will work to tie the power they crave by aligning with such other areas as climate change, gun control, and the continuing racial divisiveness already being seen in our country. Biden talks of white supremacy and diversity as hallmarks of his enlightenment without ever defining what he means.

Those of the left are fearful of many things. Nationalism, liberty, patriotism, free speech are now being called evil by those who wish to destroy our country. Corporatism cannot take over until the worlds nations are one, with corporatist oligarchs deciding everything for everyone. These oligarchs will allocate resources. In that way, those of fallen countries can not retaliate. If there is any feedback, they will take the resources like taking a toy from a little child for misbehaving. These corporatists will not hesitate to use any effort to collapse our culture and economics to ensure the United States will fall and become just another asset for the socialists and corporatists to split amongst themselves.

The leftists feel they do not need to explain or define what they mean about any garbage they fill the airwaves with. They feel they are correct, that you must agree with the diktats they spew forth to the masses, and that they have a narrative that will take no questions and allows no deviation. And it must be understood that your doing right or wrong does not matter to them. Morality is irrelevant. Because they think that their cause is just, the principles of duty, honor, and country are irrelevant to them. It is all about power, the power they crave to instruct every part of our lives.

Big Media, Big Tech, the Media work in lockstep to spread disinformation, suppression of free thought, and the wolfpack social justice soy-boys that descend on any that disagree with the socialist agenda. They are very careful to stay unknown and to determine that all media promulgate the talking points that their handlers have told them Biden, along with his handlers in China and the progressive socialist party, has now started to send illegal aliens into the countrys interior to the red states that did not vote for him. This serves two purposes for the globalists running the country.

Because they are not tested at the border, but quickly rushed to other areas of the country without notification, there is no way to determine how many have Covid. Those that do have Covid, (thousands by CBP counting) will spread to areas all around the country. Then the politicized experts will declare an emergency and shut down the economy once again.

And, if the aliens survive Covid, the progressive socialists think they will be reliable voters, knowing that more freebies will come their way if they vote for the leftists.

Biden, as President, is the greatest threat to the United States and the world. He is the doddering old man who is being used by the internal elements in our country intent on tyrant and oppression.

The difference is that using the old soviet buzzwords of the past, the new form of tyranny uses the word woke. It is being used to proclaim that they are better than anyone else, more intelligent than you, and know what is best for you. And what does it mean to be woke? Ask any woke socialist, and you will hear of such things as anti-white racism and social justice.

You will be lectured about the destruction of such things like morality, respect, and liberty as anachronisms no longer required by society. You will hear of the baseless arguments against religion, especially the Catholic and Christian faiths. (Muslims are fine) and you will hear of how the majority of the country are low IQ bigots because they disagree with homosexuality.

I as a Christian, have been called homophobic and oppressive because I disagree. A belief in traditional marriage and morality is considered old-fashioned. Woke is nothing more than lies that the progressive socialists tell themselves, so the anarchy they hope to take our country down will be better received by the citizens of this country.

The American people are starting to understand the forces of socialism tyranny that mark the behavior of the forces aligned against the American people. They know that suppression of free speech and expressions that they claim are thought crimes, the Coercion of the people to submit to whatever the woke believe is best for them, the disruption and elimination of free thinkers who recognize and oppose what the woke is doing.

The progressive socialist will ignore laws that attempt to stop the march that is on to totalitarianism. They hope they can take the agenda far enough that there will be no way at the next election to bring an honest government back. People are awake now; there wont be any stealing in the next election.

Chyna Joe needs to make some changes. Declaring himself as a moderate when he did what campaigning he did, has been proven to be a lie, not the first and not the last from the left. Happily being led by the progressive socialists into destruction, he reads his teleprompter and goes back to his handlers to be told what a great leader he is. Biden is nothing more than a placeholder until the leftists feel they have enough power to toss him aside and take the power they feel is theirs.

Lets hope the American people will decide not to allow that to happen. In the progressive socialist administration of Chyna Joe, the powers that be in media, academics, celebrities, and the progressive leftists themselves have a plan to force the citizens of this country to fit the mold within the schedule to take power they have worked on for many years. The agenda is a reprise of the Obama fundamental transformation of the culture and beliefs of their heroes like Karl Marx and Saul Alinsky. They have shown no care about individual rights but intend to force the individuals into the ideology. The moderate Biden lied to the American people on many aspects of his philosophy. Far from being an uniter, Chyna Joe has aligned with the progressive socialists that are his advisors and even his Cabinet.

Read more at: AllNewsPipeline.com
(Natural News) If you have ever wondered why television news is constantly interrupted by advertising for the latest drug offerings from Big Pharma, look no further than Blackrock and Vanguard, two of the worlds largest asset management companies, which just so happen to own both the drug industry and the media.

BlackRock and Vanguard are currently the top two owners of Time Warner, Comcast, Disney and News Corp. These four media conglomerates own and control more than 90 percent of the United States media landscape, which explains why their collective coverage of world events all centers around the same propaganda.

Though most people have never heard of them, BlackRock and Vanguard are also the silent monopoly owners of many other facets of the economy. They are said to hold ownership in some 1,600 American firms which, as of 2015, held combined revenues of $9.1 trillion.

If you add in State Street, BlackRock and Vanguard also have a stake in nearly 90 percent of all S&P 500 firms. Vanguard is also the largest shareholder of BlackRock  Vanguard having direct links to many of the worlds oldest and richest families.

If the name BlackRock sounds familiar as of late, that is because this entity is also gobbling up real estate, usually at well over asking price. This is a big reason why real estate prices are the highest they have ever been.

This is wealth redistribution, and it aint rich peoples wealth thats getting redistributed, tweeted the account @APhilosophae.

Its normal American middle class, salt of the earth wealth heading into the hands of the worlds most powerful entities and individuals. The traditional financial vehicle gone forever.

What this means is that BlackRock and Vanguard together own pretty much everything there is to own, which explains why everything is now moving in one general direction, straight towards a Great Reset. No matter the industry or the sector, BlackRock and Vanguard more than likely hold a stake and control the movement.

The stock of the worlds largest corporations are owned by the same institutional investors. They all own each other, one resource explains.

This means that competing brands, like Coke and Pepsi arent really competitors, at all, since their stock is owned by exactly the same investment companies, investment funds, insurance companies, banks and in some cases, governments.

By 2028, BlackRock and Vanguard will own almost everything

What about the smaller investment companies, you might be asking? Those, too, are owned by larger investment companies like BlackRock and Vanguard, which sit at the top of the financial pyramid.

The power of these two companies is beyond your imagination, the aforementioned resource goes on to explain. Not only do they own a large part of the stocks of nearly all big companies but also the stocks of the investors in those companies. This gives them a complete monopoly.

A Bloomberg report states that both these companies in the year 2028 together will have investments in the amount of $20 trillion. That means that they will own almost everything.

The following video has more:

In truth, BlackRock and Vanguard are one and the same, seeing as how the latter is the largest shareholder of the former. Among the family names tied into the two are the Rothschilds, the Bushes, the British Royal family, the Du Ponts, the Vanderbilts and the Rockefellers.

All of these families have been pushing for a New World Order for centuries, and it would appear as though they are on the verge of achieving their goal through the destruction of world financial systems, the gobbling up of all real estate, and eventually the total abolition of private property.

Soon, everything will be owned by this handful of wealthy families via their financial terrorism mechanisms, which include funds like BlackRock and Vanguard that are quickly vacuuming up all of the worlds resources.

Big Pharma is another huge part of this process, as the industry continues to pump out drugs and vaccines that are dumbing down the masses and making them more compliant with this grand takeover.

According to Simply Wall Street, in February 2020, BlackRock and Vanguard were the two largest shareholders of British drug giant GlaxoSmithKline (GSK). Pfizer, the creator of one of the two mRNA vaccines for the Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19), is also largely owned by BlackRock and Vanguard.

As we have seen throughout the past year, the Chinese Virus pandemic was the vehicle needed to deliver the final death blow to the world economy. Many small businesses were forced to close forever, while large corporations owned by BlackRock and Vanguard thrived like never before.

This was not an accident and was all built in to the plandemic agenda, which was hatched long ago as a means through which to steal the rest of the worlds remaining resources and place them in the control of the elite.

To keep everything on track, the media, which is also owned by BlackRock and Vanguard, has been towing the line to keep ordinary people from figuring out what is actually going on until it is already too late. We are almost at that point now as Americas financial system teeters at the brink of no return, which is no accident and was planned for such a time as this.

Importantly, BlackRock also works closely with central banks around the world, including the U.S. Federal Reserve, which is a private entity, not a federal one, warns Dr. Joseph Mercola. It lends money to the central bank, acts as an adviser to it, and develops the central banks software.

More related news about the Great Reset can be found at Collapse.news.

Sources for this article include:

NoQreport.com

ZeroHedge.com

NaturalNews.com
(Natural News) Online rumors have been circulating over the past few days that four British Airways pilots have died, and that British Airways is in crisis talks with the British government about these deaths. In attempting to dismiss this rumor, Reuters ran a fact check article that actually confirms the deaths of the four pilots.

Via Reuters:

The spokesperson, however, confirmed the authenticity of the four condolence books, as four company pilots had recently passed away. Our thoughts are with their family and friends, they said, adding that none of the deaths was linked to vaccines.

British Airways, like nearly all airlines, is aggressively pushing vaccines for both its employees (including pilots) and passengers. Earlier this year, for example, British Airways launched its own vaccine passport.

According to Reuters, there is no truth to the claim that British Airways is in crisis talks with the British government. However, if such crisis talks were taking place, they would no doubt be classified as a national security issue, so Reuters wouldnt be told about this anyway. That doesnt mean they are taking place, but if weve learned anything over the last 18 months, its that when the controlled corporate media debunks things related to covid, that usually means the claims are true.

Various videos, including the following video posted on Brighteon.com, covers the rumor that numerous vaccinated British Airways pilots have died and that British Airways is in crisis talks. Note that this video does not claim this is all confirmed, but classifies the claim as a rumor.

The video carries audio of an unknown British person explaining that the British Airways pilots who died were fit and in their 40s or 50s.

The fact checkers in the corporate media have been extraordinarily rapid in working to debunk these claims as false. However, as this video asks, Is it normal to have four pilots from one airline dying in one week?

Again, it seems the narrative pushers want us all to believe this is just another covid coincidence.

There sure are a lot of coincidences taking place lately, especially in those who are being injected with spike protein bioweapons labeled vaccines.

Notice that nobody at Reuters or across the media dares fact check the true claim that vaccines contain spike proteins, and that spike proteins cause blood clots and vascular damage, because both of those claims are confirmed facts that cannot be refuted.
(Natural News) On Friday, June 11, Rep. Chip Roy of Texas 21st congressional district introduced a bill that would ban members of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from purchasing land in the United States.

The Securing Americas Land From Foreign Interference Act will ensure that Texas land never comes under the control of the CCP by prohibiting the purchase of U.S. public or private real estate by any members of the CCP, said Roy during an interview with The Spectator World. He further stated:

In their quest for global domination, China has been buying up land and strategic infrastructure all over the world and in the United States. Direct Chinese investment in the U.S. economy is a major threat to the American way of life and requires that we take serious action to thwart the Chinese Communist Party from ever seizing control of strategically valuable domestic assets in the U.S.

Roy backed up his statements with evidence in his press release. He said that data from the Department of Agriculture shows that foreign investors, including Chinese ones, control over 35.2 million acres of agricultural land in the country as of Dec. 31, 2019. The congressman has compared this to owning enough land to cover the state of Ohio.

Chinese investors have a stake in about 191,652 acres. This represents 2.7 percent of all privately held agricultural land and 1.5 percent of all land in the country.

Roys home state of Texas has the second-highest amount of foreign ownership, with three million acres being owned by foreign investors. He even cites one specific example of a Chinese land purchase in Texas.

One China-based energy corporation has recently purchased over 130,000 acres of land near Laughlin Air Force Base near the small city of Del Rio. The fact that so much land was purchased near a critical defense facility raised a lot of eyebrows.

According to Roy, the Chinese energy corporation is attempting to build a wind farm at the site to access the U.S. power grid. (Related: Biden hands over control of Americas power grid to communist China.)

If U.S. citizens cannot buy land in China, then CCP members should not be able to buy land in the U.S., said Roy. This is a huge national security threat. We shouldnt allow U.S. land to be under the control of U.S. adversaries.

Listen to this special Situation Update breaking news episode of the Health Ranger Report, a podcast by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, as he talks about how China may begin waging a total war against America in the next few months.

Roys bill would compel the president to stop members of the CCP from purchasing land

Currently, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, an inter-agency committee chaired by the Secretary of the Treasury, reviews some purchase agreements with foreign entities seeking to acquire land in the country.

If Roys bill passes, it will demand that President Joe Biden take whatever action is possible to prohibit any further purchase of land in the U.S. by members of the CCP.

This proposed ban covers all 50 states and Washington, D.C. It also includes the territories of the U.S. Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, the Northern Mariana Islands, Guam and American Samoa.

Roys bill was co-authored by Reps. Lance Gooden and Randy Weber of Texas and Rep. Ken Buck of Colorado, all of whom are Republicans.

The bill does not go into detail about who is considered a member of the CCP. According to information from Chinese news outlets, around one in every 15 individuals in China is considered a member of the communist party. CCP members potentially include everyone from fishermen, herdsmen, entrepreneurs, intellectuals and politicians.

The congressmans office has not responded to queries to expound on who the bill considers a member of the CCP.

This bill was submitted right after the Senate voted to approve legislation that would increase investment in American science and technology programs. These are meant to combat Chinas continued rise in these fields. The bipartisan legislation, known as the Innovation and Competition Act, provides $200 billion in funding for American scientific and technological advancements for the next five years.

Roys bill also comes after Biden signed an executive order extending and expanding former President Donald Trumps ban on Americans investing with certain Chinese companies. The blacklist now includes 59 corporations with ties to Chinas surveillance industry and the military-industrial complex.

Learn more about Chinas plans to take over the country by reading the latest articles at InvasionUSA.news.

Sources include:

DailyWire.com

SpectatorWorld.com

DailyCaller.com

TheHill.com

Roy.House.gov

Breitbart.com

Newsweek.com
(Natural News) Any person living in Florida who was arrested or fined this past year for not social distancing or wearing a face mask will be pardoned of their crime, thanks to the diligence of Gov. Ron DeSantis.

In a 3-1 vote, the four-member Board of Executive Clemency approved the Republican governors decision to vindicate anyone who was unfairly punished by state or local government officials for making their own health decisions throughout the course of the Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) plandemic.

This action is necessary so that we can recover, have a good transition to normal operations, and also just a recognition that a lot of this stuff was way, way overboard, DeSantis stated.

The pardon applies to both civil and criminal penalties levied on individuals and businesses that were punished for breaking unscientific, unnecessary directives.

The only board member who voted no on the pardon was Democrat Nikki Fried, who currently works as Floridas State Agriculture Commissioner. Fried is also running for governor next year as a challenger to DeSantis.

Our local governments stepped up to protect the people of our state, Fried claims. They did what was best for the interests of their communities.

When asked how many people will be pardoned as a result of the decision, DeSantis office did not respond.

No human being should ever be forced to take medicine, no matter the perceived threat

The decision follows an executive order issued by DeSantis back on May 3 suspending all local pandemic emergency mandates effective July 1. That order is coming into effect in just a few short days.

DeSantis also signed Senate Bill 2006 last month, passed by Florida lawmakers back in April, granting himself the power to override local emergency orders. The bill also bans so-called vaccine passports and imposes a fine of $5,000 per violation for any person or business that attempts to enforce them.

Both of these moves represent the evidence-based thing to do, DeSantis says, adding that any further restrictions really are saying you dont believe in the vaccines, you dont believe in the data, you dont believe in the science.

Weve embraced the vaccines, DeSantis further stated. Weve embraced the science on it.

We hope that resident Melanie Joseph, an asthmatic mother who had her child taken away from her by Broward County District Judge Dale C. Cohen after she was spotted without a mask outdoors, will be one such person who is pardoned and reunited with her family.

It is important to clarify that DeSantis executive order suspending local emergency mandates only applies to governments, and not businesses.

Floridians like Mike and Jillian Carnevale should have never faced criminal charges for not requiring mask in their businesses, DeSantis stated about the Broward County gym owners who were targeted for refusing to enforce mask orders on their patrons.

Today, we took action in Florida to reject the overreach of local authorities through unnecessary and unscientific mask mandates.

DeSantis went on to talk about how no business should ever be forced into economic ruin for violating any government order that is unreasonably restrictive of rights and liberties.

The same applies to human beings, who should not be forced into self-isolation or told they must cover their breathing holes against their will just because someone else has been misled into believing that medical freedom and bodily autonomy puts others at risk.

It cannot be stated strongly enough that face masks, social distancing and lockdowns have never once been proven to do anything beneficial. At the same time, all of these things have continually been proven to cause significant harm.

More related news stories about Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) tyranny can be found at Pandemic.news.

Sources for this article include:

TheEpochTimes.com

NaturalNews.com
(Natural News) A unit within the Portland Police Department known as the Rapid Response Team has voted unanimously to resign after one of its members was criminally indicted over his response to riots that occurred in the city back in August 2020.

Sources within the police bureau told The Post Millennial that they are not okay with Officer Corey Budworth being indicted and charged with one count of fourth degree assault for merely doing his job in responding to the civil unrest, demonstrations and riots that occurred in Portland.

Multnomah District Attorney Mike Schmidts revealed earlier in the week that Budworths charge is a misdemeanor.

According to reports, Budworth and the Rapid Response Team had responded to a call on the night of Aug. 18, 2020. Antifa militants were throwing Molotov cocktails into the County Sheriffs Department Headquarters, and the unit merely attempted to stop them.

In this case, we allege that no legal justification existed for Officer Budworths deployment of force, and that the deployment of force was legally excessive under the circumstances, reads a statement from Schmidt.

My office will continue to do everything we can to ensure justice is done without error or delay and that we make sure our work and practices are rooted in fairness and equity.

Portland has politicized policing, and the future looks bleak

Budworth apparently struck Teri Jacobs, an activist photographer and one of the rioters present during the melee, with a baton. Video footage posted to social media shows Budworth hitting Jacobs in the head from behind with it, then again as she fell to the ground.

Related footage shows other officers in the unit tackling and arresting people, as well as pepper spraying them. Some of the individuals appear to be engaging in violence while others are only shown protesting.

Dealing with a situation like that is difficult and complex, and it would be far too simplistic to just blame the cops for being unreasonably brutal without knowing the details leading up to the incidents that were captured on tape.

Because of this, it is simply unfair to blame Budworth of wrongdoing, some say, when he was merely doing his job. This is why the unit has decided to stand with him by stepping down entirely, at least until the situation is no longer politicized.

Unfortunately, this decorated public servant has been caught in the crossfire of agenda-driven city leaders and a politicized criminal justice system, the police union indicated in a statement, describing Jacobs as a criminal rioter.

To indict Budworth for dealing with her under the guise of holding police accountable is frivolous, in a sense, and demonstrates Portlands continued antagonism against law enforcement.

So, what typically happens, is the riot team gets called out to be prepared for a huge protest, sources told The Millennial Post.

Then patrol officers from all three precincts are on standby which gets activated when the protest starts. This means all patrol calls go to priority calls only, basically only active assaults, shootings, and person crimes only get responded to. All other calls hold indefinitely until the protest is over or the next day.

Without a riot team, Portland Police say they have no clue whats going to happen, seeing as how Portland continues to remain a hotbed of violence.

We dont have enough patrol officers to be pulled from the road to handle huge crowds, one officer told the media. We are only backups with no gear like the riot team has.

As it turns out, there are massive protests scheduled for this upcoming weekend, and Portland now has no way to contain them should things spiral out of control as they usually do.

More related news about the collapse of society because of bad political policy can be found at Chaos.news.

Sources for this article include:

ThePostMillennial.com

NaturalNews.com
(Natural News) An official at the European Medicines Agency (EMA) said that countries should stop administering the AstraZeneca Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19) to people 60 years old and above. The officials remarks followed fears of blood clotting and low platelet count reported in younger people who got the vaccine. While the European regulator deemed the vaccine safe for all age groups, other EU member states have limited its use to the elderly.

EMA COVID-19 Task Force Chairman Dr. Marco Cavaleri said his remarks about the AstraZeneca vaccine on June 13. He told the Italian newspaper La Stampa: In a pandemic context, our position was and is that the risk-benefit ratio [for the AstraZeneca vaccine] remains favorable for all age groups.

The Italian newspaper then asked whether health authorities should eschew the AstraZeneca vaccine for those above 60 years of age. Cavaleri responded in the affirmative, saying: Many countries, such as France and Germany, are considering it in the light of greater availability of mRNA vaccines.

The EMA official continued that it would be better for European countries to use mRNA COVID-19 vaccines such as those from Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna. According to the health official, this is because COVID-19 cases are dwindling and the younger population is less exposed to risks related to the disease.

Back in March of this year, Italy paused its COVID-19 inoculations using the AstraZeneca vaccine over reports of post-vaccination blood clotting. It resumed the use of the British vaccine the following month after the EMA insisted its benefits outweighed any risks. However, the regulator recommended that the vaccine be preferably used for people older than 60.

The Italian government announced during a June 11 news conference that it would limit the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine to people above 60 years old after a teenager who got the vaccine died. Reuters reported that 18-year-old Camilla Canepa died on June 10 after her May 25 vaccination. She suffered from low platelet count, brain hemorrhage and abdominal blood clots  which eventually led to her death.

Italian COVID-19 Emergency Commissioner Lt. Gen. Francesco Figliuolo told reporters during the June 11 briefing: [The] AstraZeneca [vaccine] will only be used for people over 60. Italian Higher Health Council President Franco Locatelli, the governments chief medical adviser, added that people below 60 years old who had already received a first dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine should be given a different vaccine for their second dose.

Other countries have permanently dropped AstraZeneca vaccine

While Italy limited its use of the AstraZeneca vaccine, other nations have removed it from their respective COVID-19 vaccination programs. Health authorities in Denmark, where the first cases of blood clots following AstraZeneca vaccination were reported, initially suspended the vaccine in March 2021. A month later, the Danish Health Authority (SST) announced that COVID-19 vaccinations will continue without the AstraZeneca vaccine.

In an April 14 statement, SST Director General Sren Brostrm said: Based on the scientific findings, our overall assessment is [that] there is a real risk of severe side effects associated with using the COVID-19 vaccine from AstraZeneca. We have, therefore, decided to remove the vaccine from our vaccination program. He added that permanently halting the use of AstraZenecas COVID-19 vaccine has been a difficult decision. But Brostrm nevertheless continued that Denmark [had] other vaccines at [its] disposal such as the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines. (Related: Denmark permanently stops rollout for AstraZeneca vaccine, citing concerns about blood clots.)

Meanwhile, Norway also followed the footsteps of its southern neighbor and suspended the AstraZeneca vaccine. According to a Bloomberg report, Norwegian Prime Minister Erna Solberg announced the suspension during a May 12 news conference. The government has decided that the AstraZeneca vaccine will not be used in Norway, not even voluntarily, she told reporters.

Solbergs advice followed a recommendation by the Norwegian Institute of Public Health (NIPH) to suspend the vaccines use in Norways COVID-19 inoculation program. NIPH Infection Control and Environmental Health Division Director Geir Bukholm said on April 15: We now know significantly more about the connection between the AstraZeneca vaccine and the rare and serious incidents of low platelets, blood clots and bleeding. Based on this knowledge, we have arrived at a recommendation that the AstraZeneca vaccine be removed from the coronary vaccination program in Norway. (Related: Norwegian health agency recommends banning AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine due to blood clot risks.)

Visit VaccineDamage.news to read more about the dangers of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine.

Sources include:

TheEpochTimes.com

Reuters.com

SST.dk

Bloomberg.com

FHI.no
(Natural News) Although accurate numbers are difficult to come by, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) conservatively estimates more than a third of Americans (at least 114.6 million) have been infected with SARS-CoV-2. There is ample reason to believe that in most of these individuals, SARS-CoV-2 infection induces long-term immunity.

(Article republished from ChildrensHealthDefense.org)

For example, a December 2020 study by Singapore researchers found neutralizing antibodies (one prong of the immune response) remained present in high concentrations for 17 years or more in individuals who recovered from the original SARS-CoV.

More recently, the World Health Organization (WHO) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) published evidence of durable immune responses to natural infection with SARS-CoV-2.

Even back in March 2020, the NIHs Dr. Anthony Fauci shared his view (in an email [p. 22] to Ezekiel Emanuel) that their [sic] would be substantial immunity post infection.

Yet despite these recent findings, health authorities are largely ignoring natural immunitys stellar track record. In fact, as the American Institute of Economic Research reported, it appears in order to promote the COVID vaccine agenda, key organizations are not only downplaying natural immunity but may be seeking to erase it altogether.

Until recently, the Mayo Clinic reported that individuals who survived the 1918 influenza pandemic were immune, 92 years later, to H1N1 influenza. However as economist Jon Sanders noted, the Mayo Clinic removed the mention of 1918 influenza immunity from its website this spring. And late last year, the WHO was caught attempting to unscientifically exclude immunity developed through previous infection from the very definition of herd immunity.

Why, asks Sanders, are Americans being kept in the dark about the fact that so many have faced COVID-19 and won  and, therefore, dont need a vaccine?

Policy reversal

The evidence that natural immunity is strong and long-lived goes back decades. In contrast, the one-dimensional immunity conferred by vaccination and vaccine boosters is often fickle, short-lived or altogether absent.

The well-studied phenomenon of vaccine failure observed following mass vaccination against illnesses such as measles, pertussis and influenza  and the serious or fatal breakthrough infections we are now observing after COVID shots  have proven this point repeatedly.

The CDCs indiscriminate advice to the segment of the population that has recovered from COVID-19 to get a COVID vaccine stands in stark contrast to the agencys approach to other infections.

For example, CDC does not recommend measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccination for individuals who have confirmation of past infection or who were born in the pre-MMR era, when everyone got those childhood diseases.

Recognizing that vaccination is beside the point for people who acquire immunity naturally  by experiencing a given illness naturally  CDC likewise tells individuals who have lab confirmation of disease-induced immunity against varicella that they do not need to get a chickenpox vaccine.

Surprising criticism from insiders

Online medical news outlet MedPage Today, owned by leading Internet information and services company J2 Global, describes itself as a trusted source for clinical news coverage across medical specialties.

For the most part, this translates into bland mainstream coverage that, in the COVID era, has included heavy promotion and endorsement of the public health party line on vaccination.

However, the publications Enterprise & Investigative team also professes to be willing to shine a light on wrongdoing in medicine  whether individual, corporate or governmental as well as following the money in healthcare.

Of late, this investigative team appears to have decided to blow the whistle on the suppression of discussion about natural COVID immunity. On May 28, MedPage published an op-ed bluntly titled Quit Ignoring Natural COVID Immunity. Days later, Dr. Marty Makary, MedPage Today editor-in-chief, in public interviews reiterated many of the arguments laid out in the op-ed.

Dr. Jeffrey Klausner, one of the op-eds two co-authors, is a former CDC medical officer and frequent advisor to the CDC, NIH and WHO. In their op-ed, Klausner and co-author Noah Kojima ask why we are so focused on vaccine-induced immunity  while ignoring natural immunity and also criticize policy-makers for ignoring the complexities of the human immune system  including the evidence that both B cells and T cells contribute to post-COVID cellular immunity.

Arguing that protection among COVID-recovered individuals is similar to or better than vaccine-induced immunity, they also condemn the U.S. Food and Drug Administrations (FDA) advice against using antibody testing, instead urging the following:

[P]olicymakers should include natural immunity as determined by an accurate and reliable antibody test or the documentation of prior infection  as evidence of immunity equal to that of vaccination [emphasis added]. That immunity should be given the same societal status as vaccine-inducted [sic] immunity. Such a policy will greatly reduce anxiety and increase access to travel, events, family visits, and more  allowing [those who have recovered] to safely discard their masks, show their faces, and join the legions of those vaccinated.

In his public statements, Makary has been even more outspoken, describing the sidelining of natural COVID immunity  which he believes is probably lifelong  as [o]ne of the biggest failures of our current medical leadership.

According to Makary, the CDCs relentless focus on vaccine-induced immunity and its demonizing of individuals who choose not to get a COVID vaccine makes the agency the most slow, reactionary, political CDC in American history.

Makary, whose other professional roles include professor of medicine and public health at Johns Hopkins University and election to the National Academy of Medicine, also remarked, I never thought Id say this, but please ignore the CDC guidance.

Makary has also expressed dissent on the topic of COVID vaccines and children. In a June 10 opinion piece in MedPage Today, Makary told parents to think twice before giving the COVID vax to healthy kids, characterizing the risk of a healthy child dying of COVID as between zero and infinitesimally rare. (Blunting the force of this statement, however, Makary signaled his support of COVID-19 vaccination in any child with a medical condition, including being overweight  which means at least 54% of American children).

In a June 13 television appearance, Makary continued to criticize the CDC, accusing it of sitting on a lot of data, including important information about the serious heart complications now being experienced by adolescent recipients of the COVID injections. According to a news account, Makary suggested that fanaticism governs the aggressive push for COVID vaccination, again citing the insanity of insisting on a vaccine to immunize those already immune.

Pushback welcome

In early June, Childrens Health Defense called for an immediate halt to COVID vaccination of minors, pointing to the significant risk of adverse events, including blood clots and heart inflammation, and the vaccines unknown long-term effects.

Scientists recently offered a dramatic explanation for some of these adverse outcomes, disclosing that the spike protein in the Pfizer and Moderna injections is actually a pathogenic toxin that accumulates in organs and tissues and crosses the blood-brain barrier.

In this context, reminders about the role and benefits of natural immunity can counterbalance the dangerous and false herd immunity rhetoric that seeks to justify COVID vaccines for kids.

Readers of The Defender are also likely familiar with the numerous conflicts of interest that make it so difficult to trust advice from officials at captured agencies like the CDC and the FDA. When insiders cloaked with titles and prestige from the public health establishment put forth critiques of these agencies, we would be foolish not to pay attention.

In the context of the growing censorship of any information that runs counter to government and industry claims, pushback from all corners is welcome, particularly when it is grounded in both evidence and common sense.

Read more at: ChildrensHealthDefense.org and Conspiracy.news
(Natural News) On Monday, Houston television reporter Ivory Hecker made national news when she told viewers on air that KRIV, her Fox outlet, was muzzling me to keep certain information from you, and that shed been working with undercover journalistic outlet Project Veritas to record censorship at the station.

(Article by C. Douglas Golden republished from WesternJournal.com)

On Tuesday, Project Veritas aired the first clips Hecker recorded along with a sit-down interview with the now-fired Hecker about her time at the station.

The clips revealed a cult-like environment in which higher-ups and government ad dollars can dictate content. A photographer says the station hires producers straight out of college because [t]hey just regurgitate what they are fed. Reporting on hydroxychloroquine to treat COVID-19 was nixed. A sales coordinator says the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are in the pocket of the station because they spend so much ad money.

Perhaps most of all, the video can be seen as a vindication for former President Donald Trump, who frequently complained about media bias, particularly as it informed coverage of COVID-19.

From the inside, yes, theres a narrative, Hecker said in the interview. It is unspoken. But if you accidentally step outside the narrative, if you dont sense what that narrative is and go with it, there will be grave consequences for you.

Hecker was initially suspended after the video went public. On Tuesday, she told The Daily Beast shed been fired.

In one clip of a meeting Hecker recorded with higher-ups, one of the speakers can be heard saying, It is not about the viewers. Its about what our CEO reads. Its about what our GM reads.

The reporter, who mostly worked the 5 p.m. and 6 p.m. news programs, went viral Monday when she announced  before a standard weather story  that shed recorded conversations with colleagues at the station and was taking them public.

BREAKING: Fox 26 Houston TV Reporter @IvoryHecker Informs Network LIVE ON AIR That She Has Been Secretly Recording Them and Intends on Telling Her Story to Project Veritas#Fox26Whistleblower pic.twitter.com/ZLNRSrhAgy  [email protected] (@EricSpracklen) June 14, 2021

Before we get to that story I want to let you, the viewers, know that Fox Corp. has been muzzling me to keep certain information from you, the viewers, and from what I am gathering I am not the only reporter being subjected to this, she said. I am going to be releasing some recordings about what goes on behind the scenes at Fox because it applies to you, the viewers.

I found a nonprofit journalism group called Project Veritas thats going to help put that out tomorrow, so tune into them, but as for this heat wave across Texas, you can see what its doing to AC units.

I dont think a whole lot of people cared about air conditioning units at that point.

In her Project Veritas interview, Hecker described a newsroom environment in which stories were chosen based on what racial demographics they might appeal to, not on how they informed viewers. For instance, in one case, an assistant news director, Lee Meier, said she wouldnt run Bitcoin stories in certain situations because of black viewership.

But deciding stories based on demographics is one thing. Making decisions based on politics is another.

One major area of thorny coverage was hydroxychloroquine, the controversial drug some said showed promise in treating COVID-19 patients  and which was touted last year by then-President Donald Trump and some medical experts.

However, coverage of the drug was quickly shut down in the mainstream media and dismissed as quackery, in part because of the political implications. Hecker said she ran up against that brick wall when she tried covering the drug.

In particular, she said, she wrote a social media post outside of her reporting for the station about censorship surrounding hydroxychloroquine and a video that went viral featuring Houston physician Stella Immanuel, who claimed in July 2020 that hydroxychloroquine could stop the coronavirus pandemic in 30 days.

Fox came at my throat for standing up against censorship, Hecker told Project Veritas founder James OKeefe.

The video of the interview is below.

In one segment, she told OKeefe, she asked Dr. Joseph Varon, the chief of critical care at United Memorial Medical Center in Houston, about hydroxychloroquine.

You know, thats a great question, Varon said. And the answer is yes, we have used it. I mean, we know that its a drug that has been politicized up to the wazoo. Weve used it. We use it with good success.

Hecker said she initially got good feedback at the station about the story. For her social media post about censorship, however, it was apparently a different story.

Susan Schiller, the vice president and news director at KRIV, wasnt impressed, according to Heckers recordings.

You need to cease and desist posting about hydroxychloroquine, she said on a phone call Hecker recorded.

In my opinion youve failed, as a reporter, to not know more if you were going to post about hydroxychloroquine, that you didnt look it up, and look at the latest post, the latest research about it.

Hecker said that I have never, to this day, advocated for that drug, but that the network effectively muzzled her.

Theres also vaccine advertising and stories about vaccine availability  something the outlet has apparently leaned into hard. A Project Veritas undercover reporter got a KRIV photographer to talk about why they were the all-vaccine, all the time channel.

We hire producers  which are the ones that write the show  that are right out of college, David Lanier said. About 25 years old, they dont pay em squat  They just regurgitate what they are fed. And so thats how it ends up being that, its low-hanging fruit  Theyre doing vaccines across town? Well, lets go get video of that.

Project Veritas also tracked down KRIV sales coordinator Jennifer Bourgeois, who said that every other commercial was about COVID-19 because the CDC was paying for them and they were in a dying business.

Yeah, they [CDC] are spending money. They are spending money because they can, Bourgeois said. Yeah, they can. They [CDC] are in the pocket. You know? Theyre there.

While Bourgeois didnt necessarily say the CDC could influence coverage at the station when asked  saying it was above me  Bourgeois acknowledged that it can [happen], a lot of stuff can happen.

Vaccines are a potential moneymaker for Fox, Hecker said.

And youve got to realize  surely that the TV station doesnt want to hurt its advertisers.

This isnt to say that vaccines are problematic or that hydroxychloroquine works. Hecker said neither in her interview with Project Veritas James OKeefe.

Its evidence of how the narrative-building machine works, however  and how it skews politically.

Especially in the case of COVID, Hecker is in the process of making a convincing case Donald Trump was right all along about the media and its bias.

Read more at: WesternJournal.com
(Natural News) For the duration of his four-year term, President Donald Trumps Marxist critics called him a tyrant, a bigot, a racist and a fascist, though he was none of those things.

Trump is the first Republican president in a generation to expand his partys voting base into black and Hispanic communities; bigots and racists dont normally accomplish that feat. As to his authoritarianism, not a single critic can point to one constitutional or civil right he took away.

By comparison, however, Joe Biden, through his handlers, has become quite the fascistic tyrant, as proven by his administrations treatment of the Jan. 6 MAGA protesters. Its nothing short of abysmal, not to mention blatantly unconstitutional.

American Greatness Julie Kelly, who has been monitoring the treatment of Jan. 6 protesters arrested and thrown into the horrific D.C. Jail, notes that they and their families are recounting episodes of physical and mental abuse that is more akin to a third-world dictatorship than a constitutional republic.

And finally, some in Congress are demanding to know whats going on.

This week, five Republican senators sent a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland regarding his offices handling of January 6 protesters, she reported. The letter revealed the senators are aware that several Capitol defendants charged with mostly nonviolent crimes are being held in solitary confinement conditions in a D.C. jail used exclusively to house Capitol detainees.

Kelly adds: Joe Bidens Justice Department routinely requestsand partisan Beltway federal judges routinely approvepre-trial detention for Americans arrested for their involvement in the January 6 protest. This includes everyone from an 18-year-old high school senior from Georgia to a 70-year-old Virginia farmer with no criminal record.

Meanwhile, all across the country, left-wing cadres of Washingtons deep state Marxists  the Antifa and Black Lives Matter anarchists who destroyed, rioted, beat and injured police officers for months last year  are breathing free air. Few of them have been charged, and that includes those who besieged a federal courthouse for weeks on end in Portland, attempting to burn it down with federal agents inside.

When those agents reacted and did their jobs, they were ripped by congressional Democrats, with the second in line to the presidency, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California, actually referring to them as storm troopers  a purposefully divisive reference to Adolph Hitlers Nazi shock troops during World War II.

In fact as Kelly notes, a letter from one of the DC Deplorables who remains behind bars, denied bail and even denied a court appearance and hearing, wants to know the same thing.

I would like to voice my confusion as to why left-wing rioters are set free and shown mercy while being the source of hundreds of riots last year all over the country, causing billions of dollars in damage, dozens of deaths, yet the right-wing rioters from Jan. 6th are treated in the harshest terms, Mellis wrote to Kelly in an email last week.

He added: We are charged with every possible offense and held in the DC jail on solitary [sic] confinement and treated inhumanely. For example, a correctional officer from a different pod came to C2B screaming at us late at night on 6/1/21 because we had just sang God Bless America [sic] from behind our locked doors like we do every night. Being as we are on lockdown 22 hours a day its nice to keep morale up through patriotism. When [name omitted by American Greatness], my next door neighbor, informed the officer that we were just singing God Bless America the officer responded by yelling, F**k America!

Who gets locked up indefinitely and stuffed into solitary confinement for 22 hours a day  in Americafor basically trespassing on government property?

Trump supporters, of course, thats who. And thats what these blatantly unconstitutional incarcerations are about  punishing Trump supporters.

We dont have a level playing field anymore when it comes to equal justice under the law. The Biden regime has changed the paradigm.

Sources include:

AmericanGreatness.com

NaturalNews.com
(Natural News) In the latest insane push for vaccine fanaticism at the expense of legitimate science, the medical establishment is now trying to memory hole any mention of natural immunity in previous pandemics, hoping that humanity will forget about the very existence of the human immune system. The only route to immunity, according to corrupt, quack science officials like those from the CDC, FDA and WHO, is to receive a vaccine injection. Thus, natural antibodies dont count, they claim.

Even the Mayo Clinic is now retroactively removing natural immunity content from its own website. As explained by Childrens Health Defense:

Until recently, the Mayo Clinic reported that individuals who survived the 1918 influenza pandemic were immune, 92 years later, to H1N1 influenza. However as economist Jon Sanders noted, the Mayo Clinic removed the mention of 1918 influenza immunity from its website this spring. And late last year, the WHO was caught attempting to unscientifically exclude immunity developed through previous infection from the very definition of herd immunity.

Why, asks Sanders, are Americans being kept in the dark about the fact that so many have faced COVID-19 and won  and, therefore, dont need a vaccine?

The answer, of course, is that if health authorities recognized the role of natural immunity, they wouldnt be able to achieve their depopulation / extermination goals by vaccinating 70% of U.S. adults with a deadly bioweapon. If natural immunity were recognized, then a simple antibody test would confirm a person doesnt need a vaccine since theyve already conquered covid on their own.

The concept of vaccine passports is also threatened by natural immunity, since those who developed their own antibodies in response to pathogen exposure shouldnt need a vaccine passport, nor be required to participate in such a passport scheme. The existence of natural antibodies, by itself, is the only immunity needed. Yet the vaccine zealots (and their complicit bureaucrats and regulators) now pretend natural immunity doesnt exist, demanding everyone be vaccinated.

The covid vaccine, of course, contains spike protein bioweapons, engineered at Wuhan and designed to destroy human tissue. This is probably why four British Airways pilots just recently died after receiving vaccine injections.

Airlines and cruise lines are seeing infections, hospitalizations and deaths among vaccinated employees

Post-vaccine deaths are now hitting the transportation sector, with British Airways now confirming that four pilots have died, following the airlines launch of its own internal vaccine passport program.

Cruise line Royal Caribbean is also now canceling another cruise after covid outbreaks have struck eight vaccinated crew members, as reported by HotAir.

And Reuters is now confirming that hundreds of doctors in Indonesia have been stricken with covid  with many of them hospitalized in serious condition  after being fully vaccinated. From Reuters:

More than 350 doctors and medical workers have caught COVID-19 in Indonesia despite being vaccinated with Sinovac and dozens have been hospitalised, officials said, as concerns grow about the efficacy of some vaccines against more infectious variants dozens were in hospital with high fevers and falling oxygen-saturation levels.

Reuters blames the outbreak on the Delta variant of covid, which is nothing but a cover story to hide the truth that vaccines are causing the infections, hospitalizations and deaths. Why? Because covid vaccines contain spike protein nanoparticles which are genetically engineered biological weapons created in Wuhan and designed to attack and destroy human tissue.

VAERS is currently reporting nearly 6000 post-vaccine deaths in the United States, by the way. That number is sure to accelerate as the HHS data entry teams try to catch up with their six-week backlog in entering VAERS death reports.

Get the full story in todays Situation Update podcast

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(Natural News) The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is trying to erase the human immune system entirely by attempting to get everyone vaccinated for the Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19), including those who already had it and now have lasting natural immunity.

Despite the fact that even Tony Fauci, the establishments medical god, admitted in a March 2020 email that their [sic] would be substantial immunity post infection to the Chinese Virus, the CDC is hellbent on getting a needle into every arm, all the while downplaying, to quote the American Institute of Economic Research (AIER), and possibly even trying to erase, the concept of natural immunity.

This is fanaticism rather than science, a growing number of doctors now warn. Both the CDC and the World Health Organization (WHO) are pushing the same anti-immunity agenda, with the latter having completely redefined the term herd immunity back in December to only include people who have been jabbed.

Dr. Jeffrey Klausner, one of the co-authors of a new op-ed published by MedPage Today, asks alongside fellow co-author Noah Kojima why the medical industry is so focused on vaccine-induced immunity while ignoring natural immunity. Are humans suddenly no longer equipped to handle any type of illness without a Big Pharma injection?

The complexities of the human immune system are being completely ignored by policymakers, who are scrapping centuries of scientific data in favor of plandemic pseudoscience, which rejects the notion that natural immunity exists at all.

Despite solid evidence that both B cells and T cells contribute to post-covid cellular immunity without the need for a vaccine, the medical establishment is now pretending as though God-given immunity is fake. The only type of immunity that now exists is vaccine-induced immunity.

Entitled, Quit Ignoring Natural COVID Immunity, the op-ed goes on to condemn the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for contributing to fake science by completely doing away with antibody testing as if antibodies are no longer a relevant marker for immunity against disease.

Biden regime is an ongoing bulldozer over facts concerning natural immunity

Dr. Marty Makary, MedPage Todays editor-in-chief, is also outspoken on the issue, noting that natural immunity to the Wuhan Flu post-infection is probably lifelong, and that there is no need for vaccinations at all. To claim otherwise is [o]ne of the biggest failures of our current medical leadership, he says.

The CDCs relentless focus on vaccine-induced immunity and corresponding demonization of people who choose not to get injected renders the agency the most slow, reactionary, political CDC in American history, he says.

Makary, who also teaches medicine and public health at Johns Hopkins University, is actually going so far as to tell people to please ignore the CDC guidance on Chinese Virus injections because it has deviated so far from sound science as to constitute junk science.

The more that natural immunity is accepted, the more reason there is to reject getting one of the experimental COVID vaccines, writes Jack Metir for the Survival Blog.

Half the U.S. population from kids to adults likely have natural immunity, even though most never suffered any serious ill effects from being infected.

The Biden regime is, of course, in on the scam, pushing the false notion that natural immunity does not exist and that people can only stay safe against the Chinese Virus if they get an experimental gene therapy injection.

The truth is that there is simply no money to be made from people staying healthy the natural way, which is why the government will not shut up about the vaccines. Big money players have a lot to gain from mass injection, and a lot to lose if people just say no to the drugs like how we were always taught to respond to drug dealers.

Think of the refusal to respect natural immunity akin to what the government has done to stop widespread use of cheap generics for early home/outpatient COVID treatment that cures and prevents infection, Metir further writes. This early action was key for the success of the wait-for-the-vaccine pandemic strategy.

As for Makary, he remains strongly opposed to Chinese Virus injections, especially in children. In a separate opinion piece published on June 10, he warned parents to think twice before giving the shots to their healthy kids, as the risk of a healthy child dying from covid is between zero and infinitesimally rare.

Two days after that op-ed was published, Makary appeared on television to criticize the CDC for sitting on a lot of data that would expose the vaccine agenda as a sham. The CDC is also trying to hide the fact that healthy children everywhere are now dying, thanks to Chinese Virus injections.

Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) deception is everywhere. To keep up with the latest, check out Pandemic.news.

Sources for this article include:

ChildrensHealthDefense.org

NaturalNews.com

Science.blog
(Natural News) Many Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19) survivors still have not fully recovered months after the initial infection. Many are saying they still have not fully recovered their sense of smell. Many others are saying their senses of smell and taste have become radically distorted. These people are now misplacing different odors.

The condition wherein a persons sense of smell has become distorted is known as parosmia. People who have experienced parosmia have described how scents that they used to find pleasant are now unbearable. If they try to eat food that smells different to them, it might make them feel nauseous or sick.

Some scientists already have a hypothesis for how COVID-19 might damage a persons sense of smell, but these experts believe more research is necessary to understand the viruss long-term impacts. More research is also required to understand the possible treatments for smell-impaired COVID-19 survivors. (Related: Coronavirus survivors regain their sense of smell by going through fragrance journey with renowned perfumer.)

A distorted sense of smell can be dangerous for people unable to smell danger

One person whose sense of smell has been distorted by the virus is Marcel Kuttab, who got infected and recovered from the coronavirus last year.

Kuttab, 28, a pharmacist from Massachusetts, first noticed something was off last year while she was brushing her teeth. Her toothbrush tasted dirty, and so she threw it out and got a new one. But then she noticed that it was her toothpaste that was the problem.

This was just the start of her olfactory troubles. Onions, garlic and meat were all putrid and coffee began smelling like gasoline.

Kuttab wanted to figure out what she could and could not eat, and so she experimented to figure out what foods her senses could tolerate. You can spend a lot of money in grocery stores and land up not using any of it, she said.

For Janet Marple, 54, a corporate banker from Minnesota, coffee and peanut butter smell like burning rubber or a sickly kind of sweet.

I literally hold my breath when shampooing my hair, and laundry is a terrible experience. Even fresh-cut grass is terrible, said Marple.

Brooke Viegut, 25, from New York City, started experiencing parosmia in May 2020. She caught COVID-19 in March of that year during a business trip to London. Like many others, she lost her sense of smell.

But before Vieguts sense of smell returned, she started experiencing parosmia. The smell of garlic, onions and meat became unbearable for her. At one point, she even thought broccoli smelled like chemicals and many fruits tasted like soap.

Today, Viegut still has not fully recovered. But she has become more optimistic because a lot of different foods now taste as they should. Id say thats progress, she said.

But Viegut is still concerned that her distorted sense of smell might lead to her getting into an accident, especially if she is unable to detect a gas leak or a fire. This is what happened to a family in Waco, Texas, back in January. Nearly all the members of the family lost their sense of smell because of prior COVID-19 infections. They escaped, but they discovered the fire too late and it burned their house down.

Health experts learning more about parosmia

Before the coronavirus pandemic, parosmia did not receive a lot of attention from health experts.

We would have a big conference, and one of the doctors might have one or two cases, said Dr. Nancy E. Rawson, vice president and associate director at the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia. Monell is an internationally recognized nonprofit research group that focuses on research linked to taste and smell.

Despite the lack of attention on parosmia, health experts know enough about it to come to certain conclusions. For example, one French study blamed parosmia on upper respiratory tract infections.

Today, scientists have discovered more than 100 reasons why a persons sense of smell might disappear or become distorted. These causes included viruses like COVID-19, as well as sinusitis, head trauma, and neurodegenerative disorders like Parkinsons disease and Alzheimers disease.

But one thing scientists do not have is a timeline for when parosmia will disappear. Mainstream media outlet the New York Times interviewed five COVID-19 survivors who first developed parosmia in the late spring and early summer of 2020. None of them have fully regained their normal senses of smell and taste.

Clare Hopkins, the president of the British Rhinological Society and one of the first health experts to sound the alarm regarding smell loss and distortion, believes people can be optimistic despite the lack of information.

There are daily reports of recovery from long haulers in terms of parosmia improving and patients being left with a fairly good sense of smell, she said.

Learn more about how COVID-19 continues to affect the lives of survivors by reading the latest articles at Pandemic.news.

Sources include:

DNYUZ.com

DailyMail.co.uk

Healthline.com
OTTAWA, Ontario (AP)  Canada's National Advisory Committee on Immunization said Thursday people who got the AstraZeneca vaccine as their first dose should get Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna for their second shot.

On June 1, committee had said AstraZeneca recipients could" get Pfizer or Moderna for their second shot if they wanted, but Thursday went further to say an mRNA vaccine was the preferred" choice.

Since the advisory committee "first looked at mixed vaccine schedules, new evidence is starting to emerge suggesting immune responses are better when a first dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine is followed by an mRNA vaccine as a second dose, said its vice-chair Dr. Shelley Deeks, in the new guidance documents.

The committee also updated its previous recommendation that people at high risk of exposure to, or serious illness from, COVID-19, could opt to get AstraZeneca rather than waiting for Pfizer or Moderna. Now it says everyone should always get the mRNA vaccines first, unless they are allergic to them.

Deeks said the advice is based on the growing supply of Pfizer and Moderna, and the risk of vaccine-induced blood clots associated with AstraZeneca. But she is still trying to reassure people who got one or two doses of AstraZenecas vaccine that they are nevertheless well protected.

Anyone who has already received two doses of AstraZeneca/Covishield can rest assured that they are protected, particularly against severe illness, she said. "There is no need for a third dose at this time.

Dr. Theresa Tam, the chief public health officer of Canada, said the new evidence in favor of mixing different types of vaccines included four studies in Germany.

"Its really the immunogenicity, that immune response, after that mixed-dose schedule thats resulted in NACI updating this recommendation, because all the accumulated studies essentially suggest that immune response is a better response, said Tam at a news conference in Ottawa.

One of those studies from Germanys Saarland University, published early data Wednesday saying giving Pfizer as the second dose after AstraZeneca, or two doses of Pfizer only, generated far more antibodies and T cells as two doses of AstraZeneca.

Almost 25 million Canadians have now received at least one dose of vaccine, and almost 6 million are now fully vaccinated. As of June 5, 2.1 million people had received one dose of AstraZeneca, and 15,186 had received two doses.

There are no further shipments of AstraZeneca currently scheduled, but there are about 600,000 doses still left from previous deliveries.

There are 14 million doses of Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna being delivered this week and next, including a donation of 1 million doses of Modernas COVID-19 vaccine from the United States that was to arrive in Canada Thursday night.
As controversy looms regarding the future of the 1913 portion of the New Canaan Library, a number of councilmen sang the praises of referendums as a way to continue to resolve town-wide disputes. Heated debate ensued as one did not.

Councilman Tom Butterworth urged his fellow councilmen not to encourage residents to call for a referendum on the library issue. He said it would be disruptive and costly at the Town Council meeting on Wednesday, June 16.

The fact that we have a referendum as a tool in a democracy is a good thing, but it can be overused, Butterworth said.

This discussion comes just weeks after a failed referendum to overturn the approved Board of Education budget. New Canaan has only had five referendums in the past 30 years.

A current application before the Planning and Zoning Commission calls for a new 42,642 square-foot modern library building that includes plans for a green to be placed where the 1913 library structure currently stands. The current library would temporarily remain standing and would be removed after construction is completed.

The commission has received hundreds of letters and petitions with each over 1,000 signatures on them, from both sides of the issue.

I dont think we should be teasing people with the notion that if you have a small contingent of people who are very angry that a referendum is a good idea, Butterworth said, noting that proponents of a referendum need to have a lot of support.

The recent referendum on the school budget failed to get 2,045 votes  or 15 percent  of electors required by Town Charter.

According to town charter, it takes 50 signatures of electors for a notice of intent; five percent of electors signature on a petition to a prompt a referendum; at least 15 percent of electors to overrule a town council vote and then 15 percent of yes votes.

Councilman Steve Karl feels it necessary to find out how the public feels about the library project. To me it would be a good bellwether if people support it or not, he said.

Karl noted one possible olive branch offered by the library, a pavilion made from the facade of the antique structure that library officials have agreed to erect.

Councilwoman Penny Young believes most people want a new library. It is an issue of with or without the preserved building, she said.

Butterworth said that a referendum is inconsistent with the towns practices.

Chairman John Engel argued that a referendum serves a purpose.

There is no way of knowing whether it is a small group of people or a large group of people, Engel said, adding that he supports the practicality of referendums. If 1,000 people out there feel really strongly about sidewalks, a school administration building, start times or the library, I applaud you come out and get 500 signatures and let us know how you feel.

First Selectman Kevin Moynihan estimated the referendum would cost in the range of $10,000 to $12,000.

On Thursday, registrar Joan McLaughlin and Town Clerk Claudia Weber forwarded estimates totaling $8,885 from the most recent referendum to Hearst Connecticut Media .The estimates did not include costs the New Canaan Public Schools or the Department of Public Works incurred.

Town Council rehashed thoughts over the recent school budget referendum. It wasnt an insignificant number of people who wanted to take a second look the school start plan, Councilman Maria Naughton said .

Mauro rejected Butterworths characterization of referendum voters, saying they arent just a small group of angry people.

Butterworth thought it was incongruous with how the Town Council voted the school budget, repeating that he did not understand why people dont stand up and defend the decisions youve made.

He is referencing back to March 31, when the Town Council passed the $154.5 million operating budget unanimously, which included the $92.3 million school budget.

Naughton said that proponents of the referendum should be proud of the decision they made.

They absolutely have the right, I am just saying I dont understand why you guys encourage them, Butterworth said.

The referendum was held to undo a vote taken prior to the budget vote after Councilman Mike Mauro made a motion, seconded by Naughton. They moved to reduce the Board of Education budget by $463,337, the amount projected for a change in start times midyear in the 2021-22 academic year.

Butterworth pointed at Mauro for prompting the referendum. Mauro defended his motivation.

It was a motion made because I thought it was the right thing to do, Mauro said, adding he wanted to defend the opinions of some parents. It wasnt to give a lifeline to those who want to move a referendum.

Karl supported Mauro, who then took aim back at Butterworth.

Mauro took exception to Butterworths repeated questioning of why the rest of the councilmen refused to defend your votes.

Saying you guys are a bunch of cowards for not standing up for your decision, Mauro said to Butterworth, who did not use the word coward to categorize any of his fellow councilmembers during Wednesdays meeting. You are wrong about that.
Gov. Ned Lamont, quick to announce his support for a bill legalizing recreational pot for adults after it won final legislative approval Thursday, intends to sign the bill into law in the coming days.

Lamonts office had not released details as of Friday afternoon about whether the bill signing will be marked with a public event or happen quietly at the Capitol. Either way, ceremonial joints will not be handed out, as legalization will take effect July 1 and public buildings are smoke-free.

The governor was in Fairfield County Friday, first in Norwalk to highlight a new summer program for children at the Maritime Aquarium then in Wilton to celebrate Weir Farms new designation as a National Historic Park, before going home to Greenwich for the weekend.

The Senate gave final passage to marijuana legalization Thursday, voting for a third time, on the 50th anniversary of President Richard Nixon declaring the war on drugs.

The governor, who made it a campaign promise in 2018 to legalize adult-use cannabis, announced within minutes of the Senate vote that he looked forward to signing the bill and moving beyond this terrible period of incarceration and injustice.

Lamonts signature will come after months of intense scrutiny and debate on the bill, which received just one Republican vote, and not on the last version, as that lawmaker, Sen. Kevin Wikos, R-Canton, was absent for the Senates final tally.

Obviously this bill has been heavily negotiated from February to now. I think all parties involved at this point are satisfied with the outcome. We look forward to a bill signing next week and the end of prohibition July 1, Rep. Steve Stafstrom, D-Bridgeport, said Friday.

Stafstrom and fellow co-chairman of the legislative Judiciary Committee, Sen. Gary Winfield, D-New Haven, were two of the bills main advocates.

As to whether Stafstrom expects a high-profile bill signing, he said Lamont proposed the original bill. Normally on a governors bill there will be pomp and circumstance.

House Majority Leader Jason Rojas, another champion of the bill, said he expected a ceremonial bill signing early next week, but exact plans will be finalized by the governors office.

Itll be a moment to mark a lot of hard work on the part of a lot people on an important bill this session that had lots of interest from lots of people of all walks of life inside and outside the Capitol building, Rojas, D-East Hartford, said Friday.

The new law will take effect in phases, starting on July 1, when it will be legal for adults over 21 to have an ounce-and-a-half of marijuana, plus another five ounces in a locked container. Retail sales in Connecticut could begin as soon as the spring of 2022.

National marijuana advocates have called the legislation a model for the country given its focus on providing business opportunities in the industry to those most affected by drug enforcement policies.

julia.bergman@hearstmediact.com
KAMPALA, Uganda  Uganda is tightening its lockdown measures to try and stem a surge in coronavirus infections in the East African country that is seeing an array of variants.

The measures announced late Friday by President Yoweri Museveni include a ban on private and public transportation within and across districts, including in the capital Kampala. Only vehicles carrying cargo and those transporting the sick or essential workers are permitted to operate on the roads.

The normally crowded shops in downtown Kampala have also been ordered shut. An ongoing nighttime curfew will stay in place. The new measures will last 42 days.

Uganda is among some African countries seeing a dramatic rise in the number of infections amid a vaccine shortage. It has confirmed a total of 68,779 infections, including 584 deaths. The actual totals are believed to be much higher. Only a few thousand samples are tested daily.

The Africa director of the World Health Organization spoke Thursday of a sobering trajectory of surging cases in Africa that she said should rouse everyone to urgent action.

Africas 1.3 billion people account for 18% of the worlds population, but the continent has received only 2% of all vaccine doses administered globally.

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MORE ON THE PANDEMIC:

 Biden promotes milestone of 300M vaccine shots in 150 days

 Leaders of Germany, France urge vigilance regarding virus variant

 AP-NORC poll: Many Americans resuming pre-virus activities

 Top medical adviser says no fans safest for Tokyo Olympics

 Brazil still debating dubious virus drug amid 500,000 deaths

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Follow more of APs pandemic coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-pandemic and https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-vaccine

___

HERE'S WHAT ELSE IS HAPPENING:

THE HAGUE, Netherlands  The Dutch government is dropping almost all of its remaining coronavirus restrictions, with the exception of social distancing, starting June 26 as vaccinations gather pace and infection rates fall sharply.

Dutch caretaker Prime Minister Mark Rutte said Friday that from next Saturday people no longer need to wear face masks at indoor public places where social distancing is possible. Masks will still be mandatory on public transport and at the countrys airports.

Rutte says that the government also is dropping its advice to work from home, freeing employees to return to their offices if they can do so while observing social distancing.

The Netherlands is the latest European nation to wind back its lockdown measures as infection rates drop across most of the continent. Events like music festivals will be allowed if people attending can show they have been vaccinated, tested negative or have already had COVID-19 in the previous six months.

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ALBUQUERQUE, N.M.  New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham said Friday that all remaining pandemic-related public health restrictions on commercial and day-to-day activity in the state will be lifted July 1, clearing the way for restaurants and other venues to operate without any capacity limits and for cities to plan in-person Fourth of July celebrations and other summer festivals.

The Democratic governor made the declaration as state health officials continued to crunch the vaccination numbers following a push that included a multimillion-dollar sweepstakes and other cash incentives.

Lujan Grisham had wanted at least 60% of residents 16 and older to be vaccinated two weeks ahead of the reopening. Her office said vaccinations stood at 59.4% on Thursday but that the state was expected to hit its goal with the inclusion of federal data that had yet to be calculated.

Still, the governor said that she had hoped the vaccination numbers would be higher by now and warned against the dangers that variants of the virus pose for unvaccinated people.

State officials say businesses will still be authorized to require masks, distancing or other health precautions against the spread of COVID-19.

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BERLIN  The leaders of Germany and France have called for vigilance to prevent the spread of a coronavirus variant that this week prompted Britain to delay a planned relaxation of pandemic restrictions.

Chancellor Angela Merkel says while Germany has low numbers of coronavirus infections, the aggressive delta variant could lead to a rise in new cases.

We cant pretend that corona is over, Merkel said. Even though theres a feeling on such a warm summers evening that its all over, one can see from the example of Lisbon that things can quickly change.

Portuguese authorities on Thursday banned travel in or out of the capital region for upcoming weekends in response to a spike in delta variant cases.

Merkel spoke ahead of a working dinner with French President Emmanuel Macron, the first time she has hosted a foreign leader in Germany since last year. Macron says the European Union will discuss at an upcoming summit how to better harmonize travel restrictions during the pandemic.

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JERUSALEM  The Palestinian Authority is calling off an agreement whereby Israel would transfer 1 million doses of coronavirus vaccines to it in exchange for a similar number later this year.

The Palestinian Authority says the doses, which Israel began shipping to the occupied West Bank on Friday, are too close to expiring. Palestinian officials had come under heavy criticism on social media after the agreement was announced earlier on Friday, with Palestinians accusing them of accepting subpar vaccines and suggesting they might not be effective.

In announcing the agreement, Israel said the vaccines will expire soon without specifying the date. There was no immediate comment from Israel, which had mostly shut down for the weekly Sabbath.

So far, about 380,000 Palestinians in the West Bank and 50,000 in Gaza have been vaccinated. More than 300,000 infections have been recorded in the two territories and 3,545 confirmed deaths.

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.WASHINGTON  The White House says President Joe Biden will announce 300 million COVID-19 shots have been administered in the 150 days since he took office on Jan. 20.

But as Biden marks a new milestone in the fight against COVID-19 on Friday, another goal may fall short -- his self-imposed target to have 70% of Americans at least partially vaccinated by July 4.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says 305 million vaccine doses had been administered as of June 1O. Overall about 172.4 million people, or 51.9 percent of the total U.S. population, have received at least one dose of vaccine, according to the CDC.

About 141.6 million people, or 42.6% of the population, have been fully vaccinated.

The pace of new vaccinations in the U.S. has dropped significantly from a high of nearly 2 million per day about two months ago. The administration is in the midst of a blitz to combat vaccine hesitancy, particularly in the South and Midwest.

Vice President Kamala Harris traveled to Atlanta on Friday to tour a pop-up COVID-19 vaccination site at Ebenezer Baptist Church, where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was a pastor until his assassination in 1968.

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NEW DELHI  A health official says India, the worlds largest manufacturer of vaccines, wants to resume exports of coronavirus doses after its domestic needs are met.

Dr. Vinod K. Paul said in an interview with The Associated Press: Once our immediate need of vaccinating a significant proportion of Indian people is achieved .... we would then like to play the role of serving others and providing vaccines to them.

Paul defended the Indian governments move to restrict vaccine exports in April during a huge surge in infections. In January, the country began exporting vaccines to more than 90 countries. But the exports were halted when infections soared in India, leaving many developing countries without adequate supplies.

New cases are finally tapering off after exceeding 400,000 a day in May, a global record. But authorities are gearing up for another possible wave of infection and are focusing on increasing vaccinations. Currently, less than 5% of Indias people are fully immunized.

Confirmed coronavirus cases in India have surpassed 29 million, while confirmed deaths have surged beyond 380,000. Experts believe both numbers are vast undercounts.

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TORONTO  Canadas public safety minister says border restrictions on nonessential travel with the United States will be extended until July 21.

Public Safety Minister Bill Blair says the move has been made in coordination with the U.S. He says Canadas top priority is to keep Canadians safe during the pandemic. The border between Canada and the U.S. remains closed to all nonessential travel.

The restrictions were announced in March 2020 in the early months of the pandemic and have been extended every month. There are growing calls in the U.S. to open the Canada-U.S. border for nonessential travel like tourism, but less than 20% of eligible Canadians are fully vaccinated.

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BRASILIA, Brazil  The official COVID-19 death toll in Brazil is about to hit 500,000, the second highest in the world behind the United States.

Official data showed some 2,000 COVID-19 deaths per day in Brazil in the past week, representing one-fifth the global total. Only 11% of Brazils population is fully vaccinated.

Brazils Senate is investigating how the toll got so high, focusing on why President Jair Bolsonaros far-right government ignored opportunities to buy vaccines for months while it relentlessly pushed hydroxychloroquine. Thats a malaria drug that rigorous studies have shown to be ineffective in treating COVID-19.

The nationally televised hearings have contained scientific claims, counterclaims and outright falsehoods. The skepticism has extended to the death toll itself, with Bolsonaro arguing the official tally from his own Health Ministry is greatly exaggerated. However, some epidemiologists saying the real death number is significantly higher  perhaps hundreds of thousands higher.

Bolsonaro has waged a 15-month campaign to downplay the coronavirus and keep the economy humming. He dismissed the scourge early on as a little flu and scorned masks. He tested positive for COVID-19 last year.

The U.S. recently surpassed 600,000 confirmed deaths.

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GENEVA  Top World Health Organization officials warned about rising numbers of COVID-19 cases and deaths in Africa, saying a huge number of countries have been forced to suspend giving second doses of coronavirus vaccines because of short supplies.

WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus cited a 52% rise in coronavirus cases and a 32% rise in deaths in Africa related to the pandemic in the last week, and we expect things only to get worse.

A growing number of wealthy countries have pledged to share billions of doses, but WHO officials say time is of the essence.

Dr. Bruce Aylward, a top adviser to the WHO chief, estimated more than 30 or 40 countries initially set to receive second doses of AstraZeneca doses wont be getting them right away. He says the U.N. health agency was working with manufacturers for more doses.

Aylward says countries in sub-Saharan Africa and parts of Latin America, the Middle East, and South Asia have all been hit hard by this.

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ROME  Italy will require five days of quarantine for travelers arriving from Britain, starting on Monday.

Under an ordinance signed on Friday by Health Minister Roberto Speranza, those travelers must take a COVID-19 swab test upon arrival in Italy.

Officials are concerned about an increase of COVID-19 cases in Britain involving the delta variant, which has been detected in only a small number of cases in Italy.

Italy also will allow entry from the United States, Canada and Japan for those who meet the requisites for a European Union Green Certificate. Those requisites include vaccination, documented recovery from COVID-19 or a negative swab test performed within 48 hours of arrival in Italy.

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TOKYO  The top medical adviser to the Japanese government says the safest way to hold the Tokyo Olympics is without any fans.

Dr. Shigeru Omi issued his suggestions in a report to the government and organizers. Fans from abroad have already been banned. Organizers are to announce early next week if some local fans should be allowed.

His suggestions seem at odds with organizers and the International Olympic Committee. Reports suggest organizers want to allow up to 10,000 fans in some venues. Ticket sales were to account for $800 million in income. Much of it will be lost and government entities will have to make up the shortfall.

Japan has registered 14,000 confirmed deaths from the coronavirus. Only 15% of Japanese have at least one COVID-19 vaccination. Much of the public has been opposed to holding the Tokyo Olympics, which start July 23.

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WASHINGTON  The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention director Rochelle Walensky says she expects the delta variant will become the dominant coronavirus strain in the United States. The delta variant, first detected in India, has become dominant in Britain.

As worrisome as this delta strain is with regard to its hyper transmissibility, our vaccines work, Walensky told ABCs Good Morning America on Friday. She encouraged Americans to get vaccinated and youll be protected against this delta variant.

Walensky says next week an advisory committee will look at reports of heart inflammation among some 300 people under age 30 who received a coronavirus vaccine.

Over 200 million doses of vaccine have been given, and really, these events are really quite rare, said Walensky, adding heart issues generally improve with rest and standard medications.

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PARIS  French President Emmanuel Macron has kissed two World War II veterans on the cheeks, returning to a tradition that was abandoned at the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic.

French authorities have recommended people to avoid la bise, the custom of giving kisses of greeting, to avoid spreading the virus. Macron kissed the veterans on Friday while wearing a mask.

The president, who had COVID-19 in December and since been vaccinated against the disease, awarded the Legion of Honor to Leon Gautier, 98, a member of a French elite unite that took part in Normandy D-Day landings in 1944 and fellow World War II veteran Rene Crignola, 99, during a ceremony marking Gen. Charles De Gaulles June 18, 1940 appeal for the people of France to resist the Nazis.

The French government this week announced a relaxation of virus restrictions, including allowing people to forego masks outdoors. A nighttime curfew is set to end on Sunday.

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New Castle, PA (16103)

Today

Variable clouds with thunderstorms, especially this morning. High 68F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 50%..

Tonight

A few clouds. Slight chance of a shower throughout the evening. Low 53F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph.
Krishnachand K By

Express News Service

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Despite its adverse effect on the state's finances, the COVID-19 pandemic has not dimmed Kerala's charm as a preferred destination for global IT firms. As part of their shift in focus to tier-II cities in the country, major IT companies are looking for space in technology parks in Kochi and Thiruvananthapuram for their future investment plans. Its abundant talent pool and quality research facilities are why Kerala is the top choice of the firms.

Already, IT giant IBM has started recruitment in Kochi for starting a development centre, which would be the first such facility in the state. IBM also has plans to start such a centre in the capital. US-based AgiliteGroup, a global IT consulting company focusing on Big Data, AI and analytics, too is opening its new development centre in Technopark, Thiruvananthapuram, and planning to hire 500 professionals within a year. The firm, which has centres in Mumbai and Hyderabad, chose Thiruvananthapuram next due to the strategic advantage it offers for scaling up in the post-pandemic work culture.

Existing firms, including Nissan Digital and Ernst and Young (EY), in the capital are also on expansion mode. Earlier, there were rumours Nissan Digital would leave Technopark. However, these companies have started recruitment as part of expanding their facility. Technopark and Infopark are also working to woo more companies to set up operations in the state.

Several big companies are planning to set up offices in the upcoming Taurus Embassy tech zone in Technopark Phase-III as well. The proposed research hub and development centre of TCS at Technocity is also a feather in the cap of the state's IT sector. The positive trend has brought a new lease of life for many graduates and engineers in the state as it will generate employment in their home state.

A report by global consultant firm ANSR said major global firms looking to hire for their captive units in India are ramping up headcounts in tier-II and tier-III towns, including Thiruvananthapuram and Kochi. According to ANSR, which helps companies set up offshore units, tier-II locations are attracting companies due to their robust supply chain network, engineering and research facilities. John M Thomas, CEO of IT parks, Kerala, told The New Indian Express that many big firms are looking at Kerala as a future IT investment destination.

During the pandemic, many techies preferred to work from their home state. Moreover, the talent pool, quality of life and research facilities made the IT biggies select Kerala as their future investment hub. Though the companies still follow the 'work from home' model, it will not affect the investment by IT majors. We too are identifying the companies and taking up formal proposals with them, he said.

Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, who holds the IT portfolio, had earlier said the IT revolution has been in progress in the state for over 30 to 45 years now and the state continues to be at the forefront of modern technological advances.

Robin Alex Panicker, an IT entrepreneur, said, Migration of talent back to their hometowns due to the pandemic is forcing technology majors to favourably look at tier-II cities like Thiruvananthapuram for expansion. Also, biggies like Nissan Digital, Infosys, TCS, EY and UST, which already have a presence here, are expanding fast. Startups like CareStack and Thoughtline too are expanding. Kerala has much to benefit from the new normal post-pandemic. We hope authorities are already acting on a plan to maximise the benefit.

ALSO WATCH | Kerala's Covid-19 fight: A tale of two waves | TNIE Documentary
Sesa sen By

Express News Service

Grappled with weakened finances, mounting debt and inability to quickly adapt to the changing consumer behavior brought by Covid-19 protocols, small businesses in huge numbers are disappearing.

The number of distressed small firms looking to exit have doubled to 20 per day during the second wave of disruptions as compared to the first.

While these businesses may be pint-sized (less than Rs. 2 crore), these failures could wreak longer-lasting unemployment and broader economic damage.

Since April 2020, at least 4,900 owners have listed their businesses for sale with restaurants, fashion, gyms, cloud kitchen and event management companies dominating the space, according to data shared by online dealmaking firm SMERGERS.

In response to the Covid-led revenue shock, businesses that are looking to close include mostly those who are in services industries, such as, food, main street fashion and educational services, said Vishal Devanath, Founder & CEO  SMERGERS.

These firms are looking to sell their businesses primarily because of financial hardships on the back of nil sales and rising cost especially due to physical distancing and mandated operational restrictions that began during the pandemic.

Manufacturing MSMEs, too, have their own set of challenges such as rise in raw material prices, delay in payments from retailers and distributors, labour shortage, etc.

The survivors of the first wave are now left with zero capital to even update their business models. At the same time, they are scared to take on more debt to grow.

Broadly, there is no concept of mergers and acquisition (M&A) for small businesses. It is either a fire sale of assets or savvy investors infusing funds to help them sustain the short-term uncertainties.

In fact, Devanath says, investors are seeing through the opportunity to pick up long-term businesses at beaten-down valuations.

What we are seeing on our platform is that healthcare, technology, food and beverage are the top three sectors where buyers are showing interest, he added.

Call for support

India has approximately 6.3 crore-odd micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) contributing to 30 per cent of the nation's GDP. Of this, over 80 per cent are micro enterprises with a turnover of less than Rs. 5 crore.

While some have been trying to liquidate the assets, a myriad of small firms are not digitally empowered which have left them with no option but to shut shop.

Over 10,000 companies were shut down voluntarily in the country between April 2020 and February this year, the latest data available with the Ministry of Corporate Affairs showed.

But again, that is only a part of the carnage as the spate of silent failures goes largely uncounted because real-time data on small business is notoriously scarce.

One of the primary issues that led to closure of small businesses is no wage support.

According to Vinod Kumar, President, India SME Forum, about 42-44 per cent of the businesses in the services industry and 12 per cent in the manufacturing space were forced to shut down with no access to credit at all.

The coverage of all the financial assistance combined, that were rolled out by the central government to help Covid-hit MSMEs, is less than 12 per cent. Consider this.

Only 33 lakh MSMEs were estimated to benefit from the widely-advertised Emergency Credit Line Guarantee Scheme (ECLGS), which means 95 per cent of the small businesses were already left to survive on their own, explained Kumar.

Similarly, other schemes and financial packages have barely reached this stratum of business owners.

Both the Centre and the states must come out with a uniform set of policies, be more agile on how they want to create and save jobs because if these small businesses are not able to survive, then there will be a dearth of jobs. Corporates simply cannot fill the deep unemployment hole, he added.

To be sure, the MSME sector provides employment to almost 12-14 crore people.
By Express News Service

CHENNAI: The AIADMK on Thursday warned the DMK against intimidating the IT wing office bearers of the AIADMK. Partys top leaders Edappadi K Palaniswami and O Panneerselvam, in a joint statement said, Let the DMK focus on providing good governance first.

Palaniswami and Panneerselvam said that the DMK men, after coming to power, started exhibiting their anti-democratic attitude across the State and have been unleashing violent attacks against the office bearers of the Information Technology (IT) wing of the AIADMK.

False cases are being foisted against the IT wing office bearers of the AIADMK. We strongly condemn this. The DMK men are engaged in atrocities against the AIADMK when they have other important work to do for the State. It is nothing but betraying the people, both leaders added.

Meanwhile, following the resignation of Chennai Zone IT wing secretary Aspire K Swaminathan, the party had re-organised the IT wings of Chennai and Coimbatore zones and appointed M Kovai Satyan as the Chennai zone IT wing secretary.
Sahaya Novinston Lobo By

Express News Service

CHENNAI: A Chennai police team on Friday morning arrested PUBG gamer Madhan Manikkam from the house of one of his relatives in Dharmapuri. A special police team from the CCB nabbed Madhan minutes after his lawyer had moved the Madras High Court for anticipatory bail. He was booked by the police after it recently came to light that he was indulging in obscene chats when playing PUBG online with others and sharing the same on YouTube also.

According to the sources, police narrowed down on Madhan on Thursday night and knowing that he would be nabbed soon, his counsel moved the Madras High Court for anticipatory bail. Before the bail petition, the police nabbed Madhan and Justice M Dhandapani observed that the anticipatory bail petition was 'infructuous' since the accused was already arrested before the hearing.

Police sources said they are bringing Madhan to Chennai and he will be later produced before a judicial magistrate. Police had registered cases under different sections of the IPC including use of obscene words and cheating, Information Technology Act and The Indecent Representation of Women Prohibition Act, 1986.

On Wednesday, the Central Crime Branch arrested Madhans wife Kruthika after it was found during investigation that it was she who often conversed with Madhan in foul language in the videos.

The police on Tuesday registered a case against the PUBG gamer on charges of using obscene language in his gaming videos that were uploaded on YouTube also.

The police alleged that they have received over 100 complaints from different localities.

The Chennai police on Wednesday arrested 26-year-old Kruthika from their residence in Salem. Sources said that she was brought to Chennai along with Madhan's father and brother. She was interrogated and remanded in judicial custody.

A police officer privy to the case said, "They did this to make the channel popular. Kruthika is also the admin of the channel and uploaded the videos on YouTube."

Sources added that when they arrested Madhan, he allegedly pleaded that he did not realise that most of his viewers are minors or children.

Police also added that Madhan and Kruthika are engineering graduates and have completed Electronics and Communications Engineering. A native of Salem, Madan is a full-time YouTuber and posts PUBG videos on his channel called 'Toxic Madan 18+'.

Madhan has over 8 lakh subscribers on his YouTube channel. The majority of the complaints were on the obscene chats but some also alleged they were cheated.
Sahaya Novinston Lobo By

Express News Service

CHENNAI: The Chennai police have formed a special team to trace former IT minister M Manikandan who has been booked on charges of raping an actress on the false promise of marriage. Following the dismissal of his anticipatory bail plea by the Madras High Court, Manikandan allegedly went absconding.

The actress had earlier lodged a complaint that Manikandan cheated her on the false promise of marriage and had a relationship with her for three years.

The former IT minister in the AIADMK government was booked two weeks ago by the All Women's Police, Adyar, based on her complaint. Police booked the case against him under various sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) including rape, causing miscarriage and cheating.

The actress alleged that she met Manikandan in 2017 when he was minister and got close to him after the latter promised to do business together in Malaysia. She had reportedly tagged along with him to several places during his official tours. She alleged that she was tortured and also forced by him to abort after becoming pregnant by him.

Police sources said a special team has been deployed to Madurai and Ramanathapuram to trace Manikandan.
Gayathri Mani By

Express News Service

NEW DELHI: Students are upset with CBSEs assessment policy for Class XII board examinations this year, with hundreds of them voicing their unhappiness on social media.

Calling the policy unfair, they demanded entrance test-based admissions in central universities like Delhi University (DU).

Aryan Kohli, a student of GD Goenka public school, Vasant Kunj said, No student focuses on Class XI and many schools resort to tough marking in Class XI and XII pre-board exams. I can still understand Class XI marks being counted as the streams and subjects are the same, but why consider Class X marks?

Shaurya Sharma of St. Marks School echoed the same views.

Students performance changes after Class X. When I was in Class X, despite studying hard and preparing well, I could not score above 90 because of anxiety and fear as I was giving boards for the first time and was weak in math and science. Thats why I took Humanities stream. They should not consider Class X marks.

Sharma said, No student will take the option that they have given to appear for boards exams whenever its conducted because till then, universities would have completed their admission process. I think the government should implement the Central Universities Common Entrance Test now because universities like DU have very high cut-offs. I want to pursue Psychology and I dont think I will secure a seat in DU if they conduct merit-based admissions.

Another student Preet Shukla said, It is unfair. The only solution is to conduct entrance test based admissions.

The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) informed the Supreme Court on Thursday that it will be adopting a 30:30:40 formula for evaluation of marks for class 12 students based on results of class 10, 11 and 12 respectively.

Thirty per cent marks will be based on class 10 board exam, another 30 per cent from class 11 and 40 per cent marks based on the performance in the unit, mid-term and pre-board tests of class 12.

The exams for class 12 were cancelled by CBSE on June 1 in view of the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.

"The proposed methodology may seriously disadvantage students showing progress over a period of time. CBSE, as a system, has never rewarded consistency in performance. It was built on the concept of one high-stakes exam."

"To begin with, that is a wrong system. One cannot try to correct it with this kind of criterion, especially so in a year when the students have gone through so much trauma.

The evaluation criteria released by CBSE for class 10 was far superior," said Manit Jain, Chairman, FICCI ARISE, a collegium of stakeholders aimed at promoting quality education.

According to Vishnu Kartik, CEO of The Heritage schools, the criteria decided by CBSE achieves the limited objective of providing a time-bound implementable framework but it is far from being a fair and accurate methodology.

"The alternative formula for arriving at class 12 board exams is simple to implement and easy to understand. It achieves the limited objective of providing a time-bound implementable framework. But is it a fair and near accurate methodology? Far from it. Our past data shows that performance in class 11 or 10 is not a reasonable prediction of performance in class 12."

"There is no scientific reason to include the 'best of three' class 10 scores as it has no impact on many class 12 subjects," he said.

The silver lining of this proposed formula is in the hope that it can drive some long-term structural and cultural reforms.

For one, the suggested external moderation committee will bring in much-needed accountability in schools to strengthen internal assessment processes and hopefully, students realise the need to learn consistently across grades and not just for the final exams, Kartik said.

Rajat Goel, the Director of MRG School in Rohini said the criterion declared by CBSE and approved by the Supreme Court raises questions on some very important aspects.

"Students tend to get a little relaxed in class 11, hence the average passing percentage is slightly on the lower end.

Apart from this, subjects in class 10 like social science, and no demarcation of physics, chemistry and maths are entirely different from the ones in class 12.

"Additionally, there are vocational subjects like fine arts, physical education as well as in class 12 which gives students a chance to increase their overall score. All of this considered, this new evaluation criteria has stirred some relevant doubts and appear as not a fair assessment method for students seeking to build their future with these marks as a foundation," he said.

The board has decided that for class 10, the marks based on the average theory component of the best three performing subjects of the main five subjects would be considered and their weightage would be 30 per cent.

Shishir Jaipuria, the chairman of Seth Anandram Jaipuria Group of Educational Institutions said the decision to base 30 per cent marks on the best-of-three subjects in class 10 is a good one because the board exams provided a standard assessment.

"Classes 11 and 12 have integrated syllabus, and considering a student's performance in these classes makes it a very comprehensive evaluation. Moderation of class 11 and 12 marks is a relief to those students who could not perform well. I believe that a combination of these three should provide a reasonably fair assessment and reduce chances of a discrepancy between a student's academic potential and marks allotted," he said.

According to the policy decided by a 13-member panel set up by the board, the theory paper evaluation formula is 30 per cent weightage will be given to Class 10 marks, 30 percentage weightage to Class 11 marks and 40 per cent weightage to Class 12 marks obtained in unit test/mid-term/pre-board exams.

The CBSE scheme further elaborated that for Class 10, the 30 per cent marks based on average theory component of best three performing subjects out of main five subjects will be taken.

For Class 11, the 30 per cent marks based on theory component of final exam will be taken and for Class 12, the 40 per cent marks based on unit test/mid-term/pre-board exams will be taken.

"The marks of practical/internal assessment of Class XII will be on actual basis as uploaded by the school on the CBSE portal," the CBSE said, adding that the total marks awarded should be in consonance with the past performance of the school in class-XII board examinations.

In case, any student is not able to meet the qualifying criterion, he/she will be placed in "Essential Repeat" or "Compartment" Category.

The board has said that the subject wise marks assessed by the school for 2020-2021 should be within a range of +/-5 marks obtained by the students in the school in the subject in the reference year.

"However, the overall average marks for the school assessed in 2020-2021, for all the subjects, should not exceed the overall average marks obtained by the school by 2 marks in the specific reference year. In case, data for a school for only two years' is available then the best performance out of two years will be taken and in case, data is available for only one year, the same will be taken," it said.

The schools have been asked to form a five member result committee for finalising the results.

"CBSE will make available an online module to claim the honorarium which will be remitted directly into the account of committee members. As marks of class 11 and class 12, component will be awarded at school level, they will strictly not be comparable across schools due to the variations in the quality of question papers, the evaluation standard and processes, the mode of conduct of exams, etc."

"Therefore, to ensure standardisation, each school will have to internally moderate the marks to account for the school level variations by using a reliable reference standard," the policy said.

The CBSE has asked schools to finalise results and upload it on the portal by July 15 while the final result will be declared by July 31.

(With PTI Inputs)
By Express News Service

HYDERABAD: The body of an infant was found in the water tank of their house at Anajpur in Abdullapurmet under the Rachakonda commissionerate on the city outskirts on Friday.

Police registered a murder case and started an investigation.

K Purushotham Reddy, ACP, Vanasthalipuram, said the house was locked and there are no signs of any outsider entering the house. We are suspecting the role of the insiders," he said.

Latha, who got married more than a decade ago, was residing at her parents home at Anajpur village where she delivered a male child two months ago. Her elder brother and sister-in-law also live in the same house.

Latha's husband lives at Chintalkunta, LB Nagar.

On Thursday night, around 1 am, Lathas parents woke up to attend natures call. Before getting back to sleep, they checked all the doors and the main gate was closed properly. Around 4 am on Friday when Latha woke up, she found the child missing. She immediately woke her family members and all started searching.

Soon, upon informed, the cops rushed to the spot and inquired about the case from the locals and checked for clues from the CCTV cameras in the area. Later, they searched in the water tank on the terrace and found the child in it.

The body was pulled out and sent to hospital but was declared dead there.

Police found that the family also has a pet dog, which usually does not allow outsiders. With this clue and after examining the house, police ruled out any role of an outsider in the case. Dog squad and clues team were also called in to examine the spot.

Police sent the body for postmortem and are questioning the family members.
By Express News Service

HYDERABAD: In a freak mishap in the Rajiv Gandhi International Airport at Hyderabad, Narasimha Reddy (42), a plumber working for a third-party facilities management agency, died while checking drainage lines for leakages.

Two other workers identified as Zakir and Ilyas, from the same agency, who were working with Narsimha Reddy, escaped unhurt in the incident, which occurred around 8 pm in the International Arrivals area, said police. DCP Shamshabad N Prakash Reddy said a case of causing death due to negligence (304A of the IPC) has been registered against the agency Faber Sindoori Facility Management Services for not taking safety measures while executing cleaning works.

A spokesperson of GMR said a worker of Faber Sindoori Facilities Management Services was found dead on Thursday. The cause of death is yet to be ascertained. We are offering all our support to the family of the deceased, he said. On Thursday night, a team from Faber Sindoori Facility Management Services was assigned to attend to a drainage leakage.

Narasimha Reddy, Zakir and Ilyas climbed the drainage line which is located in the roof of the International arrivals area and entered the vent, while their other team members were waiting down, assisting them. This drainage line is of the departure area, which is located above the arrivals area. They poured acid into the drainage pipes to arrest the leakage.

But thick smoke emitted from the acid, due to which all three fell unconscious and collapsed in the vent, which is around 6 feet in height and width. When there was no response from them, the workers below, alerted the rescue teams, who rushed to the spot and pulled the three persons out from the vent. They were rushed to the Apollo Health facility at the airport. Narasimha Reddy was declared dead, while the other two recovered after first aid. Narasimha Reddys body was shifted for a post-mortem. It is suspected that he died due to asphyxia.
By Express News Service

KOCHI: With the CBSE finally releasing its assessment plan for Class 12 students, a section of students, parents and even teachers have expressed reservations with the new criteria. The Board on Thursday presented the plan before the Supreme Court, as per which the Class 12 result will be evaluated based on the students performance in Class 10 (30% weightage), Class 11 (30%), and Class 12 (40% - based on unit test/mid-term/pre-board).

Many are especially bothered by the schools practice of conducting very difficult model examinations and being stingy during the evaluation of the answer papers, which could now end up affecting the students final results.

We understand why Class 10 marks are being considered. As the examination was conducted by the Board, it has some credibility, said Aravind P T, Class 12 student of Nirmala Public School, Muvattupuzha. But I think it is illogical to include the marks of Class 11 as well. We were never told that these marks would be considered for our finals. Also, this is the year in which all school-related activities are led by Class 11 students, who were likely to have been more focused on extracurricular activities than studies, he said.

Dia Harikumar, Class 12 student of Devagiri CMI public school, Kozhikode, echoed Aravinds sentiments. Compared to Classes 10 and 12, students dont take Class 11 exams seriously. If you take just a cursory look at the students performance over the two years, it could be seen that there is a great difference in the marks they got in Class 9 and Class 10. They perform way better for Board exams, she said.

Though she agrees with the decision to cancel the Boards for the safety of the students, considering Class 11 marks for the assessment will backfire, she said. Also, model examinations conducted in our schools are very tough. So, the marks obtained too will be low, she added.

Some teachers too have expressed concern that the scores according to the new criteria wont be similar to what the students would have scored if the exams were conducted. Class 12 model examinations are held in a very strict manner  with difficult question papers and stingy evaluations. But this will become a problem now, said Jaya Sabin, teacher at Greets Public School, Ernakulam.

According to Haridas P, principal, Valuvanadu Vidyabhavan, Perinthalmanna, the CBSE has asked schools to choose the year in which they have performed best as a reference point, and award marks accordingly. This is to prevent schools from being too liberal while evaluating the students. But this will adversely affect their marks, he added.

Divya Harikumar, a parent, pointed out that while the assessment plan would not hurt the students who have been studious from the get-go, it was going to harm those who fall in the middle category. Some students have a penchant for giving their best in the last moment, and have been seen to perform very well. This criteria will be a rude shock to them, she said.

Meanwhile, many others welcomed the plan. According to Abdul Nassar, general secretary, All India Private Schools and Childrens Welfare Association Kerala State, the new criteria is an effective strategy of assessment. By evaluating their performance in this manner, students will get apt results. I am satisfied with the CBSEs decision, said Nassar, who is also the manager of Goodwill English School, Pookkottumpadam, Malappuram.

Indira Rajan, secretary-general, Council of CBSE Schools Kerala, said the decision was made after due deliberations. The assessment plan will not affect the students adversely. They also need not worry about their admissions to degree courses. A request has been sent to the National Education Board to consider making the admission procedures uniform throughout the country, keeping in mind our current situation, she added.
By Express News Service

VIJAYAWADA: In a major crackdown, Commissioners Task Force (CTF) sleuths along with Food Safety Department raided 14 godowns and seized large amounts of banned tobacco products, ganja and cash under One Town police station limits in the city here on Wednesday night.

One Town CI P Venkateswarlu along with food safety department officials raided 14 godowns at Iron Centre and Samarangam Chowk. The police said Rs 5 lakh cash, banned tobacco products such as gutka, foreign cigarettes along with ganja were seized.

In the preliminary probe, we came to know that two persons were identified as accused and are currently absconding. A case has been booked against them and further investigation is on, the CI said.
By PTI

NEW DELHI: Private hospital chain Fortis Healthcare on Thursday announced that Sputnik V, the third anti-coronavirus vaccine approved for use in India, will be available at its Gurgaon and Mohali facilities as part of a limited pilot roll-out from Saturday.

The vaccine stock has been procured directly from Dr. Reddy's Laboratories according to government guidelines, it said.

"The two-dose vaccine will be available at Fortis Memorial Research Institute, Gurugram, and Fortis Hospital, Mohali," the private hospital chain said in a statement.

In the coming days, the vaccine will be available at more Fortis hospitals across 11 cities as part of the phase-wise pilot project.

Dr Ashutosh Raghuvanshi, MD and CEO, Fortis Healthcare, said, "Fortis is actively working towards ensuring that as many Indians as possible are fully vaccinated. To date, our units were only providing Covaxin and Covishield."

"However, we are pleased to announce that Fortis, in collaboration with Dr. Reddy's Laboratories, is among the first to provide a third vaccine option, at Fortis Memorial Research Institute and Fortis Hospital Mohali, with the dual objective of expanding and scaling up the vaccination drive and lowering the infection risks to future mutations of the virus."

Earlier, Delhi's Indraprastha Apollo Hospital and Madhukar Rainbow Children's Hospital had also said they will start administering the Russian COVID-19 vaccine by June 20.

The Centre has fixed the price of the vaccine at Rs 1,145 per dose.

The maximum price of Covishield for private COVID-19 Vaccination Centres (CVCs) has been fixed at Rs 780 per dose, while that of Covaxin is Rs 1,410 per dose.

Russia's Gamaleya National Research Institute of Epidemiology and Microbiology has developed the vaccine and the Russian Direct Investment Fund is marketing it globally.

Hyderabad-based Dr Reddy's Laboratories, the marketing partner for the vaccine in the country, has been importing the shots from Russia.

Over a period of time, the vaccine is also going to be manufactured in India.

Sputnik V uses two different viruses that cause the common cold (adenovirus) in humans.

It employs a different vector for each of the two shots, given 21 days apart.

According to Gamaleya and the RDIF, Sputnik V has demonstrated an efficacy rate of 92 per cent.
By PTI

NEW DELHI: Union Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar on Friday ruled out repealing the three new farm laws but said the government is ready to resume talks with protesting farmer unions on provisions of the legislations.

The government and unions have held 11 rounds of talks, the last being on January 22, to break the deadlock and end the farmers' protest.

Talks have not resumed following widespread violence during a tractor rally by protesting farmers on January 26.

Thousands of farmers, mainly from Punjab, Haryana and western Uttar Pradesh, have been camping at Delhi's borders for more than six months in protest against the three laws that they say will end state procurement of crops at MSP.

The Supreme Court has put on hold the implementation of the three laws till further orders and set up a committee to find solutions.

"Government of India is ready for talks with farmers. Except for repeal, if any farmers' union wants to talk on provisions of the Act even at midnight, Narendra Singh Tomar will welcome it," the agriculture minister said in a video posted on his Twitter account.

Three union ministers, including Tomar and Food Minister Piyush Goyal, have held 11 rounds of talks with the protesting farmer unions.

In the last meeting on January 22, the government's negotiations with 41 farmer groups hit a roadblock as the unions squarely rejected the Centre's proposal of putting the laws on suspension.

During the 10th round of talks held on January 20, the Centre had offered to suspend the laws for 1-1.

5 years and form a joint committee to find solutions, in return for protesting farmers going back to their respective homes from Delhi's borders.

The three laws -- The Farmers' Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Act, 2020, The Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Act, 2020, and The Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act 2020 -- were passed by the Parliament in September last year.

Farmer groups have alleged that these laws will end the mandi and MSP procurement systems and leave the farmers at the mercy of big corporates, even as the government has rejected these apprehensions as misplaced.

On January 11, the Supreme Court had stayed the implementation of the three laws till further orders and appointed a four-member panel to resolve the impasse.

Bhartiya Kisan Union President Bhupinder Singh Mann had recused himself from the committee.

Shetkari Sanghatana (Maharashtra) President Anil Ghanwat and agriculture economists Pramod Kumar Joshi and Ashok Gulati are the other members on the panel.

They have completed the consultation process with stakeholders.
By PTI

NEW DELHI: The Rajasthan government on Friday told the Supreme Court that self-styled godman Asaram Bapu, serving a life term in two rape cases, has been hospitalised and is in intensive care unit.

A bench of Justices Indira Banerjee and M R Shah was informed by senior advocate Manish Singhvi, appearing for Rajasthan, that Asaram's plea for transferring him to an ayurvedic centre near Haridwar in Uttarakhand has become infructuous as now he cannot be shifted due to his hospitalisation.

Senior advocate Siddharth Luthra, appearing for Asaram, said his client has been admitted to the hospital and the court should call for the medical records.

"We don't know what his ailments are. This court should order for the calling of his medical records from the state as the hospital authorities will not give the details to them," Luthra said.

The bench said however that it was adjourning the matter till reopening of the court after the summer vacation.

On June 8, the state government had told the top court that Asaram is fit and stable but trying to change the venue of his custody on the pretext of medical treatment.

The state government had made this submission to the apex court in its reply to Asaram's fresh plea, seeking suspension of his sentence and interim bail to undergo treatment for various ailments at an ayurvedic centre near Haridwar in Uttarakhand.

Asaram is serving varying jail terms including life sentences in two sexual assault cases.

"The accused/petitioner with ulterior motives has been attempting to change the venue of his custody, under the guise of medical treatment.

Such change, with due respect, is an abuse of the process of law," the state government had said in its affidavit.

"The accused is also deliberately delaying the pending trial at Gandhi Nagar as well as Jodhpur, raising such pleas with mala fides whereas he is stable and fit," it had said.

The state government had said Jodhpur is one of the rare centres, where both the allopathic and ayurvedic treatments are available.

It had also said Asaram was tested positive for COVID-19 on May 6 and was having mild symptoms, with low-grade fever and was treated properly.

Apprehending threat to the life of family members, father of the child rape-victim has also moved the top court opposing the bail plea of Asaram.

The application for intervention has been filed in the pending petition of Asaram in which he has sought suspension of his sentence and interim bail to undergo treatment for various ailments at an Ayurvedic centre near Haridwar in Uttarakhand.

A Jodhpur court, on April 25, 2018, had sentenced Asaram to life in prison after finding him guilty of raping a teenage girl in his ashram in 2013.

The plea filed through advocate Utsav Bains has said that in case Asaram is admitted to interim bail, there is likelihood that out of vengeance, he may get the applicant, his daughter and his family members killed.

On June 4, the apex court had sought the Rajasthan government's response to Asaram's plea for the court's permission for the treatment at an ayurvedic centre near Haridwar.

The top court had then orally observed that it was not inclined to grant interim bail by suspending the self-styled godman's sentence.

Asaram had sought the suspension of his sentence for two months saying he needed to get "holistic" treatment of his multiple ailments at a medical centre near Haridwar.

Asaram has moved the apex court, challenging the Rajasthan High Court order which had earlier dismissed his plea for the suspension of his sentences to undergo treatment at a medical centre of his choice.

The plea of Asaram has been filed through lawyer Saurabh Ajay Gupta.

Asaram's accomplices Sharad and Shilpi were also sentenced to 20 years in jail by the court in the 2013 case for their roles.

The teenager had said in her complaint that Asaram had called her to his ashram in Manai area near Jodhpur and raped her on the night of August 15, 2013.

The 16-year-old girl from Shahjahanpur of Uttar Pradesh was studying at Asaram's ashram in Chhindwara in Madhya Pradesh.

He was also convicted in a 2002 rape case and sentenced to 20 years in prison.

Asaram is also facing a rape case in Surat in Gujarat.

He was arrested in Indore and brought to Jodhpur on September 1, 2013 and is in judicial custody since then.
Rajesh Kumar Thakur By

Express News Service

PATNA: Bihar on Wednesday became the first state in the country to have administered a record number of jabs against COVID-19 in a single day.

A total number of 6,62,507 people of all age groups were vaccinated in the state on Wednesday.

Confirming this, Additional Chief Secretary of Health, Pratyay Amrit -- the man behind the successful turnaround in the control of pandemic, said: Following the instructions of CM Nitish Kumar and Health Minister Mangal Pandey to ramp up vaccination, the health department created a record by vaccinating 6,62,507 people in a single day becoming the first state in the country to do so."

ALSO READ | Bihar's COVID-19 curbs relaxed further; night curfew to remain from 8 pm to 5 am

Providing a break-up of Wednesday figures, Amrit said: East Champaran district administered the highest number of doses at 45,683, followed by 42,650 in Bhagalpur, 37,546 in Muzaffarpur, 33,812 in Madhubani, 32,120 in Patna and other districts".

He said that the government has set a target of vaccinating 6 crore people in the next six months starting from July.

He said that even across the flood-prone areas, the health department will continue inoculating the people through special arrangements in the days to come.

He added that 718 'Tikka express' vehicles in rural and 121 in urban areas are carrying out vaccinations against the Covid-19 on a mission mode.

He also said that the Aanganwadi and the ASHA health workers have already been trained in identifying the affected areas and take measures to control seasonal diseases like cold, cough, cold, diarrhea, and cholera in these places.



ALSO WATCH:
By PTI

KOLKATA: The Calcutta High Court on Friday adjourned hearing to June 24 in West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's petition challenging the election of Leader Of Opposition Suvendu Adhikari from Nandigram.

The matter was mentioned by Banerjee's lawyer before the court of Justice Kaushik Chanda as per the list for hearing.

Justice Chanda asked the petitioner's lawyer to serve copies of the election petition to the opposite parties and fixed the matter for hearing on Thursday.

In her petition, the Trinamool Congress chief accused BJP MLA Adhikari of committing corrupt practises as envisaged under Section 123 of the Representation of the People Act, 1951.

Banerjee also claimed in the petition that discrepancies were committed in the counting process.
By Express News Service

NEW DELHI: Citing first studies from India from healthcare workers, top officials on Friday underlined that Covid vaccines offer substantial risk reduction against hospitalisation, ICU care, and the need for oxygen.

The studies have come out from two prestigious healthcare institutions, Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, Chandigarh, and Christian Medical College, Vellore.

In a press briefing by the Union Health Ministry on Covid status on Friday, VK Paul, member (health), Niti Aayog, who heads the national task force on Covid, said that vaccination offered a 75-80% risk reduction against hospitalisation from infection in vaccinated individuals, as compared to those unvaccinated.

The possibility of such individuals (vaccinated) needing oxygen support is around 8% and the risk of ICU admission is only 6% in vaccinated persons, he said.

Healthcare workers are very high-risk groups. They live and work where theyre exposed to high viral loads in ICU and in coronavirus wards, said Paul

Studies show that if vaccination is done, then the need for hospitalisation decreases by 75 to 80%. Even if the infection takes place, the hospitalisation chance falls to 20 to 25%.

ALSO READ | Such breaches will hasten third wave: Delhi HC concerned over Covid norm violation in markets

He added, without naming the CMC study but citing its findings that oxygen demand is only 8% in vaccinated individuals as compared to those who have not received the vaccines.

The data also shows that in terms of ICU admissions, the risk is only 6%.. Protection is 94%..This is powerful data from reasonable sized studies. The risk of serious disease is low. One study observed one death among 7,000 but it involved comorbidities, said the top official.

The CMC study, released on a preprint server for medical sciences last week, had said that one dose of Covid vaccine offered 61% protective effect against infection, while two doses offered 65%.

Significantly, one dose reduced the risk of hospitalisation by 70% and two doses by 77%.

Among the staff members who received vaccines, no deaths were reported and only one staff member of the medical institution has died but he had had several comorbidities and did not receive the vaccine, the paper said.

The study from PGI, Chandigarh on the other hand showed that while there were 1.6% instances of breakthrough infections in vaccinated healthcare workers, vaccines offered significant protection against hospitalisation and death.

ALSO WATCH | Covid 19 Update: India logs lowest deaths in 61 days
By PTI

NEW DELHI: The Union Health Ministry has urged all states and Union Territories to review in detail and ensure prompt steps for the safety and wellbeing of healthcare workers while strictly implementing the amended Epidemic Disease Act.

Healthcare workers are the most crucial resources in COVID-19 management on all fronts, said Joint Secretary in the Union Health Ministry Lav Agarwal in a letter to additional chief secretaries, principal secretaries and health secretaries of all states and Union Territories.

On multiple occasions, the Health Ministry has highlighted the need to ensure the safety and security of healthcare workers at their living and working premises, he said.

"Our endeavours to manage COVID-19 are replete with examples of commitment by our healthcare workers at all levels.

"While the country at large has applauded the efforts of the health fraternity, there were examples of them being stigmatized and even violence resorted to against healthcare workers," the officer pointed out.

Recently, there have been reports of physical violence against doctors, healthcare workers and other professionals particularly from Assam, West Bengal and Karnataka, the letter by Agarwal stated.

ALSO READ: IMA doctors protest in Delhi over violence against healthcare professionals

"Such incidents impact the morale of our healthcare workforce who have shown exemplary commitment against all odds in COVID-19 management.

"Considering the importance of the issue, it is requested that all states may undertake a detailed review and ensure that prompt and necessary steps are taken for healthcare workers safety and wellbeing besides strict implementation of the amended Epidemic Disease Act," he said.

The joint secretary in the health ministry said the Centre had brought an ordinance and later notified it as an act, under which violence against healthcare personnel is a non-bailable and cognizable offence.

On April 22 last year, the Health Ministry had issued an ordinance to amend the Epidemic Diseases Act, 1897, providing protection to healthcare personnel and their property against violence during epidemics.

It was notified as an act on September 29, 2020.

The amended Act states that "whoever commits or abets the commission of an act of violence against healthcare service personnel, or causes damage or loss to any property" shall be punished with imprisonment and with a fine.

Such offences are also cognizable and non-bailable, the letter highlighted.
By PTI

AHMEDBAD: Gujarat police have registered the first FIR in the state under the newly-notified law against forcible or fraudulent religious conversion through marriage, and arrested a 26-year-old man in Vadodara city, a senior official said on Friday.

Based on a complaint, the Gotri police of Vadodara filed the FIR and arrested Samir Qureshi under the Gujarat Freedom of Religion (Amendment) Act, 2021, which invites stringent punishment for forcible religious conversion through marriage.

Qureshi, who runs a mutton shop with his father, allegedly lured a woman of another religion by posing as a Christian and introduced himself to her as Sam Martin on social media in 2019, deputy commissioner of police, Zone 2, Vadodara city, Jayrajsinh Vala said.

"According to the complainant, Qureshi, using his fake identity on social media, trapped her in the name of love and then raped her. The accused started blackmailing her using her objectionable photos and forced her to marry him. He even forced her to undergo an abortion during their courtship," he told reporters.

The girl, who was under the impression that Qureshi is a Christian, learnt about the accused and his faith around a year ago when a "nikah" ceremony was organised instead of a Christian wedding after she agreed to marry him, the official said.

After marriage, the accused first changed her name and then started forcing her to convert, Vala said, adding that the accused also verbally abused the victim using casteist slurs.
By PTI

NEW DELHI: A nationwide protest called by the Indian Medical Association over recent incidents of violence against healthcare professionals and demanding a central law to curb such cases, was held on Friday.

The Indian Medical Association (IMA), in a statement, said as many as 3.5 lakh doctors, with proper Covid protocol, participated in the agitation.

All across the country, in every state, in different hospitals, the doctors and healthcare professionals wore black badges, ribbons and black shirts, and raised slogans Save the Saviours' and uploaded their photographs on social media, the statement said.

As many as 3.5 lakh doctors, individually and in groups, with proper Covid protocol, participated in this, it said.

The IMA said medical professionals from other specialty organisations like ASI, API, FOGSI, among others, also joined the protest, while several corporate hospitals put up hoardings demanding safety of doctors.

In Delhi, in 10 different places, including outside AIIMS, the protest was organised by the doctors, junior doctors and medical students, it said in the statement.

The IMA and its branches also submitted a memorandum to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, requesting him to ensure safety of the medical fraternity and also take appropriate action against people involved in spreading fake news against Covid vaccination and its protocol.

"In many medical colleges, students boycotted their classes and organised virtual students' parliament in which more than 1,000 students participated.

Today, the national president and the secretary general, IMA met Union health secretary and submitted the memorandum to him.

They also met Delhi Special Police Commissioner and requested for enhancing security for the hospitals," the statement said.

The apex medical body said women doctors also organised special protest meets in various parts of the country.

The doctors have sought enhanced security of hospitals and that the hospitals be declared as protected zones.

"Those who assault doctors or the profession should be punished under the fast-track trial mode. IMA believes that the Government of India will respond to this unified peaceful protest and initiate steps to bring a central law, and ensure the medical fraternity serves without fear in the hospital premises.

IMA urges that these demands be fulfilled ahead of July 1, the Doctors' Day, as a gift to the suffering medical fraternity," the statement added.

In Delhi, a group of doctors belonging to both the IMA and FAIMA (Federation of All India Medical Association) stood with placards outside the AIIMS main gate to raise their voice on the issue.

The doctors, both in government and private sectors, organised standing protest in front of the secretariat in Kerala, and in various district headquarters besides hospitals.

About 35,000 doctors of the IMA Tamil Nadu branch also joined the nationwide protest.

Our members wore black badges as a sign of protest. Our medicare service to the patients remained unaffected," A K Ravikumar, honorary state secretary of IMA, told PTI.

Cases of violence against doctors and other healthcare workers have been reported lately from some parts of the country, including Jammu and Kashmir and Assam among other places.

On June 1, a doctor at a medical facility in Hojai in Assam was allegedly assaulted by attendants following the death of a patient suffering from Covid and pneumonia at Udali Model Hospital.

The National Human Rights Commission had later taken cognisance of the case and asked the Assam government and the state police chief to inquire into the alleged assault and take "needful, preventive and punitive action" in the case.
Mayank Singh By

Express News Service

NEW DELHI: For the first time the warships of the Indian Navy (IN) and the European Union Naval Force (EUNAVFOR) have got together to conduct a complex naval operations at sea in the Gulf of Aden. A total of five warships from four navies are participating in the exercise on 18th and 19th June 2021.

Indian Navy on Friday said in a statement, "Ships of the four navies will endeavour to enhance and hone their war-fighting skills and their ability as an integrated force to promote peace, security and stability in the maritime domain."

A virtual "Information sharing Exercise" is also being conducted between the Indian Navy Information Fusion Centre  Indian Ocean Region and Maritime Security Centre-Horn of Africa on 18 June 21, Indian Navy added.

EUNAVFOR was formed in 2008 to establish the executive EU military maritime operation for Somalia  Op ATLANTA to counter acts of piracy and armed robbery off the Somali Coast.

Indian Naval ships have continued to be deployed for Anti-Piracy operations in the Gulf of Aden and off the coast of Somalia since 2008.

EUNAVFOR and the Indian Navy converge on multiple issues including counter piracy operations and protection of vessels deployed under the charter of World Food Programme (UN WFP).

Indian Navy and EUNAVFOR also have regular interaction through SHADE (Shared Awareness and Deconfliction) meetings held annually at Bahrain.

Indian Naval Ship Trikand, Guided Missile Frigate, mission deployed for Anti-Piracy Operations, is participating in the Exercise. Other warships include Italian Navy Ship ITS Carabinere, Spanish Navy Ship ESPS Navarra, and two French Navy Ships FS Tonnerre and FS Surcouf.
By PTI

RANCHI: The Jharkhand government is on high alert to contain any possible third wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, following suggestions of experts that any laxity may lead to serious consequences, officials said on Friday.

The state government issued a detailed document to deal with the possibility of the third wave, which may lead to an increased number of infections among children.

"Experts suggest that the Coronavirus is mutating at a fast pace and any kind of lethargy may lead to serious complications. With the inputs received from the experts, the state government of Jharkhand is on high alert regarding this matter.

Efforts are being undertaken to enhance and up-grade the existing medical infrastructure," an offficial statement said.

Claiming that the dedication and commitment of the Hemant Soren government have resulted in containing the second wave, it said that with few restrictions in place, the state is moving towards lifting all the curbs.

To deal with the expected third wave, the state government has started preparing its machinery in advance, it said.

"Experts anticipate that in the third wave children are at greater risk whereas, this does not give any guarantee of adults being unaffected.The government is also working on generating awareness among people.

Along with the preparedness of the government to deal with this potential threat, parents are also expected to discharge their responsibilities," the statement said.

It said that as per the detailed information in the state's book 'Manuals for Preparation, Prevention and Planning for Covid-19, Third Wave in Jharkhand, the Way Forward', most infected children may not show any symptoms or may exhibit very mild symptoms.

Common symptoms include fever, cough, shortness of breath, fatigue, body aches, running nose, sore throat, diarrhoea, loss of taste or smell, it said, adding that due to the tender age, children will be unable to explain their symptoms, but the parents need to be on alert.

The government issued detailed protective measures to avoid infection in children, including paying close attention to their hygiene.
By PTI

AHMEDABAD: Gujarat Sahitya Academy chairman Vishnu Pandya has criticised a poem by Gujarati poetess Parul Khakhar on bodies floating in the Ganga river that criticised the Centre's handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, saying that the work is being misused by "liberals, communists and literary Naxals" to spread "anarchy" in the country.

While several writers have extended their support to Khakhar and criticised Pandya for his stand, the chief of the Academy, a state government-controlled body, remained firm on his views, saying the poem targets Prime Minister Narendra Modi and "defames" Indian people, democracy and society.

Khakhar's poem "Shab-Vahini Ganga" (corpse-carrying Ganga) criticises the Centre over its handling of the pandemic by making a reference about the bodies of COVID-19 victims floating in the river Ganga in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar at the peak of the second wave.

The poem became an instant hit and was translated into different languages and shared widely on social media platforms.

In an editorial in the June edition of the Academy's official publication "Shabdashrushti", Pandya has criticised the poem without specifically naming it.

The article was titled "No, this is not a poem, it is a misuse of a poem for anarchy".

"Many have praised this poem. But this piece cannot be considered a poem at all. That was just pointless anger, a jugglery of words, defaming Indian people, democracy and society. How can you call this a poem?" Pandya wrote.

He further pointed out that the poem has been misused by people who are anti-Centre and are against its nationalist ideologies.

The poem has been used as a "shoulder to fire from" by those elements, he said.

"Communists and those so-called liberals want to create anarchy in the country. They are active in all fields and also jumped into literature with malicious intentions. These literary Naxals want to influence those unsuspecting people who would relate their personal grief with this poem," Pandya stated.

He further said the Academy can never agree with what has been written in the poem, and said some elements had turned the work into a "weapon to tear apart the social fabric".

While Khakhar was not available for comment, over 100 Gujarati writers, led by Manishi Jani of Gujarati Lekhak Mandal, came out in support of the poetess, who is also being targeted through social media.

In a statement, Jani said Gujarati writers "condemn the attempts to muzzle the voice of a writer and stand firmly in support of a Parul Khakhar".

In his defence, Pandya said he was never against Khakhar and the Academy even supported her financially in the past for her literary works.

"Parul is a good poetess. But this poem does not fit in the literary standards. Her piece only reflects prejudice against Prime Minister Narendra Modi. One must refrain from using derogatory words like 'naked king' in a poem," Pandya said.

"I can never agree with the idea of misusing a poem to create anarchy in the country. Criticism of the establishment must be there. Even we used to criticise governments. But there must be a balance in it," he added.
By Express News Service

NEW DELHI: India on Thursday slammed Pakistan for passing the International Court of Justice (Review & Reconsideration) Bill, 2020, with shortcomings and urged Islamabad to address them. The Bill was passed by Pakistans National Assembly last week and provides right to appeal to Indian death-row convict Kulbhushan Jadhav.

The bill has a provision for inviting the municipal court to decide whether any prejudice has been caused to Jadhav on account of the failure to provide consular access in accordance with a verdict of the International Court of Justice (ICJ). We call upon Pakistan to take steps to address the shortcomings in the Bill, Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Arindam Bagchi said. He added a municipal court cannot be the arbiter of whether the state has fulfilled its obligation under international law.

Bagchi said the Bill further invites the municipal court to sit in appeal, as it were, over the judgement of the ICJ. Jadhav, a retired Navy officer, was arrested and sentenced to death by a Pakistani court on charges of espionage and terrorism. India approached ICJ for denial of consular access to Jadhav. The ICJ ruled in avour of India and directed Pakistan to make provisions for review of the sentence.

Afghanistan issue part of India-Qatar talks

India on Thursday confirmed that the Afghanistan issue was discussed between External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and top Qatari leadership during his two visits to the Gulf nation. The Ministry of External Affairs said the leaders exchanged views on the Afghanistan situation.
Sumi Sukanaya Dutta By

Express News Service

NEW DELHI: Over 5 months after the Covid vaccination drive was launched in the country, just about 5% of the adult population in India is now fully vaccinated, the government figures show.

As per details shared by the Union Health Ministry in a press briefing on Friday, 5.03 crore people in India, with an adult population of 94 crores, have received two doses of Covid vaccines.

The total vaccinations in India, on the other hand, have now reached 27.07 crore which means over one-fourth of the adult population in India has received at least one dose of coronavirus vaccine.

Globally, nearly 80 countries are ahead of India in terms of fully vaccinated population.

For the past one week, the average daily vaccination in the country has been about 30.57 lakh, woefully short of 40 lakh daily vaccinations targeted by the Centre for this month. The highest daily vaccination for this month was 38.20 lakh on June 14, but even this could not match the highest daily vaccination of over 40 lakh in April's first week.

ALSO READ | Covid vaccination lowers chances of hospitalisation by 75-80 per cent, says Govt

Even more worryingly, the daily vaccinations have been on a downward curve since June 14, a day when maximum Covid vaccine doses were administered this month and this is not an ideal situation, warn experts.

A member of the national Covid task force who did not wish to be identified said that in order to achieve the target of vaccinating all individuals by the year's end, the country should be vaccinating at least 70-75 lakh individuals every day, if not more.

But we are far short of this target largely due to low vaccine availability, he said.

While insisting that about 50% more Covid vaccines are available in June, as compared to last month, the Centre however had asked states to substantially accelerate the pace of vaccinations.

It had said that 10 crore and 90 lakh doses of Covishield and Covaxin will be available respectively in June apart from nearly 1 crore doses of Sputnik V.

The average daily Covid vaccinations in May had come down by a whopping 40% as compared to April, even though inoculations opened for all adult population in India from the beginning of last month.

As of now, India is using three vaccines against Covid19, Covaxin, Covishield, and the Russian vaccine Sputnik V, available in limited quantities at few private hospitals while its efforts to procure other vaccines from abroad are yet to yield any results so far.
By PTI

NEW DELHI: India on Friday said the onus is on China to address the remaining unresolved issues relating to the eastern Ladakh row and that peace and tranquillity along the frontier were key for the restoration of normal relations between the two sides.

In an interactive session at a virtual conference, Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla said the entire basis of the relationship was predicated on having peace and tranquillity along the border.

"Today, that is not the case," he said, referring to "multiple provocations" along the Line of Actual Control in eastern Ladakh by China last year.

"We have obviously seen this as a unilateral provocation, we have tried to deal with it through negotiations and through talks, and to some extent, we have addressed some of the issues that had arisen out of this situation that was created by China," he said.

The foreign secretary said there are still issues that needed to be addressed.

"But there are still friction points and there are still issues that we need to and we are very clear that until these issues are addressed and our border areas are peaceful and tranquil, we will not be able to go into what is known as a normal relationship as we go forward," he said.

"How do you see that situation evolving and I think we will have to be guided by the progress and the level of cooperation, the willingness that you see on the part of China in how we take the issues forward," Shringla added.

He was replying to a question on India's ties with China at the conference organised by the Public Affairs Forum of India (PAFI).

The foreign secretary said the onus is on China to ensure that the remaining issues are addressed.

"Obviously the fact is that we need to work on it, we have to see how to; we are obviously looking at resolving the issues. The onus is on China to ensure that the issues that remain are addressed," he said.

In his address on India's foreign policy in the post-Covid world, Shringla also said "the rise of China has also placed us in a central role at the geopolitical stage."

"It is our largest neighbour and one with which we share more than just a border and proximity. We have also had to confront a specific strategic challenge posed by China and its tactics on our shared border," he said.

India and China were locked in a military standoff at multiple friction points in eastern Ladakh since early May last year.

However, the two sides completed the withdrawal of troops and weapons from the North and South banks of Pangong lake in February following a series of military and diplomatic talks.

The two sides are now engaged in talks to extend the disengagement process to the remaining friction points.

India has been particularly pressing for disengagement of troops in Hot Springs, Gogra and Depsang.

Shringla said India has a fair amount of trade and economic linkages with China and mentioned supply chains and raw materials for Indian industry, saying a part it comes from the neighbouring country.

"Obviously, as with any other country, there are economic and other factors which form part of that relation, an inter-dependent relation.

But I think the entire basis of that relationship has been predicated on having peace and tranquillity on our borders.

"After all, in 1988, when we decided to open a dialogue and normalise relations with China, it was based on the borders remaining settled," he said.

Shringla said it was decided to isolate the border-related issues until both sides could sit down and try and address them without impacting the relationship.

He said both sides have been fairly clear that a normal relationship is based on the borders being peaceful and tranquil.

On Thursday, External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Arindam Bagchi said early completion of the disengagement process in the remaining friction points in eastern Ladakh could pave the way for both Indian and Chinese troops to consider de-escalation and ensure full restoration of peace and tranquillity in the border areas.

There was no visible forward movement in disengagement of troops in the remaining friction points as the Chinese side did not show flexibility in their approach on it at the 11th round of military talks.

Last month, Army Chief Gen MM Naravane said that there can be no de-escalation without complete disengagement at all friction points in eastern Ladakh and that the Indian Army is prepared for all contingencies in the region.

Gen Naravane also said that India is dealing with China in a "firm" and "non-escalatory" manner to ensure the sanctity of its claims in eastern Ladakh, and that it was even open to initiating confidence-building measures.

In his address, Shringla also said that completely new threats and security challenges such as terrorism, climate change and biological and other non-traditional threats have emerged and continue to emerge.

"New technologies have created both new industries and new political currents.

Non-traditional threats and new technologies have combined to form a whole new spectrum of sub-conventional security challenges," he added.
By PTI

NEW DELHI: Prime Minister Narendra Modi is likely to chair a meeting with all political parties from Jammu and Kashmir on June 24 as part of the Centre's initiatives to bolster political processes, including holding assembly elections, in the union territory, officials said here on Friday.

The meeting -- the first such exercise since the Centre announced the abrogation of Jammu and Kashmir's special status and its bifurcation into union territories in August 2019 -- is likely to be attended by Union Home Minister Amit Shah and other central leaders.

The central leadership has begun the process of inviting National Conference (NC) chief Farooq Abdullah, PDP chairperson Mehbooba Mufti, Altaf Bukhari of the Jammu and Kashmir Apni Party (JKAP), and People's Conference head Sajjad Lone for the discussion, the officials said.

Mehbooba told PTI Friday night that she had received a call from the Centre for a meeting on June 24.

"I am yet to take a decision. I will discuss with my party members and take a final call," she said.

Both Abdullah and Mehbooba had served as chief minister of the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir.

Asked about the prospect of talks with the Centre, CPI(M) leader and spokesperson of the People's Alliance for Gupkar Declaration (PAGD) M Y Tarigami said there has been no word from New Delhi, but added that if it happens, it would be welcomed.

"We have never closed our doors for meaningful engagement with the Centre. Though I have no information about any dialogue, if it happens, it will be welcomed," Tarigami told PTI from Srinagar.

The PAGD is an alliance of some parties in Jammu and Kashmir, including the NC and the PDP, that was formed in the aftermath of the Centre's August 2019 decisions.

JKAP president Bukhari said, "I welcome, if and when, the talks take place.

This vindicates our position of March 2020 when we had made it clear that dialogue is the only mechanism to restore democracy and statehood for Jammu and Kashmir."

"Better late than never as the solution to all our problems lies with New Delhi and nowhere else," he added.

The Jammu and Kashmir units of the BJP and the Congress are also likely to be part of these discussions, which are being seen as part of efforts to strengthen normal political processes in the union territory.

The officials said the delimitation commission under the leadership of Justice (retd) Ranjana Desai, which was set up immediately after the passage of the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Bill in Parliament, is likely to expedite its work and submit its report.

The commission was set up in February 2020 and has been given an extension of one year in March this year.

Barring Bukhari, other leaders have served a spell of detention following the August 2019 decision of the Centre to abrogate special status of Jammu and Kashmir and bifurcate the erstwhile state into union territories -- Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh.

In the District development Council election last year, the PAGD surged way ahead of the BJP and its allies, including the JKAP, by bagging 110 seats out of 280 with the National Conference emerging stronger with 67 seats within the alliance.

The BJP was the single largest party with 75 seats.

The political mainstream of the union territory, especially those having a strong base in Kashmir Valley, have been critical of successive administrations of the union territory for neglecting the demands of the people and raising questions on the development slogan raised post August 2019.
By PTI

NEW DELHI: Amid a tussle between the Union government and Twitter over the new IT rules, officials of the microblogging site on Friday deposed before a parliamentary panel chaired by Congress' Shashi Tharoor over preventing misuse of social media.

Earlier this month, the Centre issued a notice to Twitter giving it one last chance to "immediately" comply with the new IT rules and warned that failure to adhere to the norms will lead to the platform losing exemption from liability under the IT Act.

The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Information and Technology, chaired by Tharoor, had last week summoned Twitter over issues related to misuse of the platform and protection of citizens' rights.

ALSO READ: UP Police send legal notice to Twitter India MD over Ghaziabad assault video

Twitter India's public policy manager Shagufta Kamran and legal counsel Ayushi Kapoor deposed before the panel on Friday.

Twitter and the Centre have been at loggerheads over several issues for the last few months.

The microblogging site had faced backlash when it briefly removed the 'blue tick' verification badge from the personal account of Vice-President M Venkaiah Naidu and of several senior RSS functionaries, including its chief Mohan Bhagwat.

Earlier, Delhi Police had sent a notice to Twitter, seeking an explanation of how it described an alleged "Congress toolkit" against the Central government as manipulated media.

The police reportedly had also questioned Twitter India MD Manish Maheshwari on May 31 and visited the Twitter India offices in Delhi and Gurgaon on May 24 over the toolkit issue.
By PTI

RAIPUR: A woman Naxal was killed in a gun-battle with security forces inside a forest in Bastar district of Chhattisgarh on Friday, a senior police officer said.

Three weapons and a huge cache of Maoist camping material were recovered from the encounter site, he said.

The gunfight took place around 8 am in the forest of Chandameta-Pyarbhat villages when joint teams of security forces were out on an anti-Naxal operation, Inspector General of Police (Bastar range) Sundarraj P told PTI.

The operation was launched based on the inputs about the presence of some members belonging to Maoists' Darbha division, which has been instrumental in carrying out several deadly attacks in Bastar, along the borders of Bastar and Surkma districts, around 350 kms away from capital Raipur, he said.

Personnel belonging to the District Reserve Guard (DRG) units from Bastar, Dantewada and Sukma and CRPF 80th battalion were involved in the operation, he said.

The exchange of fire took place between the DRG team of Bastar and the Naxals, he said.

"After the exchange of fire stopped, the body of a woman Naxal clad in 'uniform' along with one AK-47 rifle, two pistols and a huge amount of camping materials were recovered from the spot," he said.

The identity of the killed cadre was yet to be ascertained, the IG said, adding that a search is still underway in the nearby areas.
Vineet Upadhyay By

Express News Service

DEHRADUN: Haridwar district police on Friday formed special investigation team (SIT) to probe the fake Kumbh Covid testing case.

Senior superintendent of police Senthil Avoodai Krishna Raj S, Haridwar district, told The New Indian Express, that "The SIT has been formed to investigate the matter efficiently. Such complex cases need more attention and resources hence the decision."

Meanwhile, Max Corporate Services, the firm against which FIR has been lodged in Kumbh fake testing case, approached the Uttarakhand High Court challenging the legality of the FIR on Friday.

Dr. Kartikey Hari Gupta, counsel for the firm told The New Indian Express, "We have pleaded before the Honble Court that our client entered into contract with nationally accredited laboratories for conducting Rapid-Antigen testing during the Kumbh. Both Laboratories namely Nalwa Laboratories Private Limited and Dr. Lal Chandani Labs Limited both are Indian Council of Medical Research accredited labs and

Max Corporate Services is merely a service provider."

ALSO READ | Kumbh Mela 'fake' Covid testing: FIR registered against one firm, two path labs

Uttarakhand police on Thursday registered case against one firm and two pathology labs for allegedly forging over one lakh Covid-19 tests during Kumbh Mela in Haridwar district.

Case has been registered under sections of Epidemic Act, 1897, Disaster Management Act, 2005, IPC 420 (forgery), 468(forgery), 471(fraudulently using as genuine any document or electronic record), 120B (criminal conspiracy), 188 (punishment for disobedience to an order duly promulgated by a public servant), 269 and 270 (likely to spread infection).

The FIR among other things mentions that between April 13 to May 16, the positivity rate of the samples tested by the lab empanelled by the firm stood 0.18 per cent which rose suspicions as it was way below 5.3 per cent PR, which was considered normal for Haridwar in the said duration.

"If any fake testing has been done, Max Corporate Services has no role to play and infact is willing to unearth if any such thing has happened. As per the Government work Order, we facilitated the testing through these two labs. All the sample collection and other data entries were done well with the knowledge and supervision of the government authorities. We have requested the Honble Court to protect the petitioner from any coercive measures of police and in whatever manner government wants to investigate, our client is ready and willing to cooperate," added Dr Gupta.
S Vijay Kumar By

Subhash Kapoor was arrested in October 2011 in Germany over idol smuggling charges and he is still an undertrial in India in June 2021. This is despite a mountain of evidence unearthed and revealed by US Homeland Security seizures and criminal prosecutions under Operation Hidden Idol in New York by the Manhattan district attorneys office. The operation had also revealed a complex web of middlemen, including receivers in Hong Kong, collaborators and suppliers across India, and restorers in London and America; it also yielded over 2,622 artefacts and a further 38 from various other returns.

During Prime Minister Narendra Modis official visit to the US in June 2016, America said it would return a historic 200 sculptures (independent India had restituted only 19 artefacts till 2012). But after five years, only 17 have come home. The rest are stuck in red tape as a senior team from the ASI comprising two experts on an inspection to New York in early 2019 could certify only close to a 100 and even those have not been restituted. Meanwhile, countries like Afghanistan, Pakistan, Nepal and Sri Lanka have already accepted close to 50 artefacts linked to Kapoor, with the Afghans topping with 33 restitutionsa big thank you to the Manhattan DAs office for these.

Even a casual glance shows the pan-India nature of this looting empire but why is that the only state that is prosecuting Kapoor is Tamil Naduthat too with only seven cases? Some of these are clearly open-and-shut cases, which makes it more baffling as to why states are reluctant to charge an art dealer already arrested over running an international smuggling racket and worse, even come forward to claim their artefacts.



Take Madhya Pradesh for instance. The Goddess Mahakoka of Barhut was worshipped as a family deity. The owners in the 1970s registered it with the ASI. On the night of 18 July 2004, robbers broke in and stole her and an FIR was registered the next day. She was broken into three parts to aid smuggling and eventually put together by the now-charged restorer Richard Salmon in Brooklyn on 2 May 2006. Kapoor was listing her for sale for $15 million or about Rs 100 crore! She was seized in 2012 and has since remained in the US. No attempt has been made by the MP police to link the FIR to Kapoor yet.Or Andhra Pradesh. In October 2000, robbers hit the 2,000-year-old Buddhist site of Chandavaram, an ASI site museum at that! Shockingly this organised gang robbed the museum not once but thrice, on 23 February 2001 and again on 23 March 2001 after the October 2000 heist. They apparently came in tractors, tied up security guards, policemen and looted the site in broad daylight. Till date there is no clarity on what all were stolen but what is shocking is until a German scholar pointed out that a Kapoor-linked object from Chandavaram was with the National Gallery of Australia (marked as stolen by investigative journalist Jason Felch in 2012) in 2017, this was not picked up by the ASI. More shockingly, it was only after the physical restitution that the ASI museum accepted that it was stolen from there. There was no initiative apart from filing the mandatory FIR. On 15 August 2019, an anonymous British collector voluntarily surrendered a limestone pilaster from the same site to the Indian High Commission in London; another matched from the same theft has been sold by Wiener Galleries via a Christies auction in March 2012 and it remains untraced after that. Similar objects sold via Kapoors Art of the Past are still on display in the Louvre Abu Dhabi and Asian Civilisations Museum, Singapore. Despite the physical return of the Chandavaram Worshippers of the Buddha frieze in January 2017 that had a sales invoice of $595,000 and fake provenances created by Kapoor, the Andhra police do not even deem it fit to charge him over the case.

We could give such examples for many more states.

What could explain the lack of intent from the custodians? We analysed 10 cases in Indian courts where law enforcement failed to prosecute heritage crimes, in an attempt to assess the main reasons and see if any lessons can be learnt from the experiences. They range from procedural lapses, sheer incompetence, red tape, loopholes in the law and institutional decay.

In this article, we look at a classic case from Tamil Naduheard in front of the Madurai Bench of the Madras HC in June 2014of a theft that happened on 17 December 1990 at the Viswanathaswamy temple in Anaikudi, Kumbakonam wherein many idols were stolen. A series of arrests made in 1991 of the eight members of the gang revealed the gruesome nature of this theft: The Murugan idol was found in two pieces, head portion and body; Valli was broken into three parts, and buried in the bank of a dry rivulet; the Deivayanai idol was recovered buried under a tamarind tree; Chandrasekara Siva found in five parts; Sivakami in three parts buried underground; another Amman idol hidden inside a granary in a house; Sokkar and Sivakami found hidden in a river bed.

It is pertinent to note that in this case, the theft is connected to the mistaken belief that there is high gold content in panchaloha idols. The robbers wilfully cut the bronzes and used acids to test for gold; scientific tests have shown that the actual precious metal content is a miniscule percentage.

What is actually shocking is not any of the above but the fact that despite all this, the accused were acquitted in 2002. Despite the mountain of evidence, why were they acquitted by the trial court?

1. The stray statement that there was no property register in the temple by P.W.3 (prosecution

witness) had been one of the grounds for the trial court to acquit the accused. The register was subsequently traced in 2014 but why it was not found earlier was never probed.

2. The police failed to secure the broken locks of the temple on the day of the theft and the fingerprint expert could not match any prints.

3. Tamil Nadu amended Section 380 of the IPC in 1993, which deals with theft in houses and robbery, and reduced the sentence for temple robbery by half. This amendment still stays, which means that if someone steals from a house or temple in the rest of India, he will get seven years in jail, but for stealing from a place of worship in Tamil Nadu, he gets a maximum of three years and a fine of `2,000. Further, since the theft occurred in 1990, the court held that the police used the wrong section to book the thieves and they were acquitted.

4. The case of theft was for only seven missing idols but the seizures were of nine idols.

5. The photographs submitted to the Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments Department were not signed by any HR&CE official and just wrapped in a cover with the temple name written on it and the names of each idol underneath the pictures.

It took over a decade for the injustice to be reversed when the case came to a more focused court in 2014. But after all this trouble, what did the idol thieves get in the 2014 trial? Of the eight accused, four of them received three years rigorous imprisonment and the rest two years.

The inferences are pretty clear in this case: temples need to maintain a property register; HR&CE has to maintain an image archive that can stand scrutiny in court; the 1993 TN special amendment to the IPC has to be removed; officers should be trained to secure theft premises; and the judiciary should be more stringent in punishing heritage crimes and criminals.

Finally, for the HR&CE, just having an archive is not a solution. Rather periodic audits and inventory checks of the same need to be undertaken. But this is easier said than done as we will see from other cases in subsequent columns.

S Vijay Kumar, Co-Founder, India Pride Project, and author of The Idol Thief

(The India Pride Projects #BringOurGodsHome initiative has helped bring many stolen idols back to our country)

(vj.episteme@gmail.com)
Biswajit Dhar By

In the midst of the raging second wave of Covid infections came the rather unwelcome news from the National Statistics Office (NSO) that the pandemic had caused the Indian economy to decline by 7.3 per cent in FY21, the lowest ever registered since Independence. The only redeeming aspect of this economic performance was that until a few months ago, the contraction was expected to be closer to 8 per cent. It was the better-than-expected performance of the economy in Q4, of 1.6 per cent, that helped in improving our performance in the previous fiscal. How do we read the numbers presented by the NSO, and what do these mean for the Indian economy going forward?

At the outset, it would be useful to consider the areas in which the Indian economy performed relatively better in Q4. In three sectors, Q4 numbers were significantly better than those recorded in the previous quarters. The manufacturing sector grew by almost 7 per cent over the corresponding period in 2019-20, while electricity, gas, water supply and other utility services recorded a 9 per cent growth. Construction was the best performing sector, having expanded by 14 per cent . But while these sectors recorded their highest quarterly growth rates in Q4, agriculture, the only sector to have kept itself away from the gloom, expanded by just 3.1 per cent, the slowest growth across quarters during the financial year just gone by.

Some words of caution need to be added while interpreting the sectoral growth numbers, especially for the three better performing sectors mentioned above. All these sectors had performed poorly in Q4 of 2019-20, and therefore the so-called base effect had influenced the NSOs latest set of numbers. This was particularly true for manufacturing, which had contracted by over 4 per cent in the closing quarter of the previous financial year due to a steep fall in output of close to 23 per cent in March 2020. The contraction was partly due to the impact of the lockdown announced in the last week of the month, but it was also due to the structural infirmities besetting Indias manufacturing that had caused this sector to contract in three quarters during 2019-20. It was in response to the falling fortunes of the manufacturing industries that the government had decided to take an important step for their revival through the Production Linked Incentive (PLI) Scheme. With regards to agriculture, while there is no assessment on whether the ongoing farmers agitation has had any impact on the growth performance of the sector, it may be difficult to argue that this development has left Indias farms untouched.

Appropriate policy measures like the PLI Scheme can go a long way in improving the supply side constraints, but these may turn out to be less than adequate if the demand side continues to remain sluggish. The Indian economy is consumption-led, with private final consumption expenditure (PFCE) enjoying a share of 57-58 per cent of the GDP in recent decades. However, since 2017-18, the annual growth of PFCE had declined from 7 per cent to 5.5 per cent, and with consumers demanding less, most sectors faced uncertainties even before the pandemic-induced crisis had set in. The across-the-board impact of the Covid crisis on livelihoods had seriously impacted PFCE during the previous fiscal, resulting in its decline by 9.1 per cent and reducing its share in the GDP to 56 per cent, the lowest ever.

Is the demand side likely to bounce back anytime soon? Not likely, if the job market numbers provided by the CMIE and the Consumer Confidence Survey of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) are considered. According to the CMIE, the unemployment rate was 14.7 per cent in the third week of May and it was the first time since the lockdown in 2020 that it was in double digits. More worrying was that labour force participation had virtually stagnated at 40 per cent, indicating the deep catharsis in the labour market. Moreover, the RBIs bi-monthly Consumer Confidence Survey has been reporting that consumer sentiments have consistently remained downbeat. In the latest survey for May 2021, a majority reported that their expectation was that the economy will worsen one year ahead, while nearly half felt that the employment situation will worsen.

With domestic demand unlikely to recover soon, can exports provide the growth trigger for the Indian economy? This is distinctly possible as most of the major economies are well on their way towards recovery. But then, the government and business must work on ways to facilitate exports, including through improving the efficiencies of Indian industry, thus enabling it to increase its footprint in global markets.

Biswajit Dhar

Professor, Centre for Economic Studies and Planning, School of Social Sciences, JNU

(bisjit@gmail.com)
Bibek Debroy By

Just between you and me, shouldnt the World Bank be encouraging MORE migration of the dirty industries to the LDCs [Least Developed Countries]? I can think of three reasons. Those reasons are: health-impairing costs of pollution are lower in such countries, costs of pollution are non-linear, and demand for a clean environment is higher when income increases. Public memory is short and current controversies metamorphose into future forgetfulness. Few people will recognise that quote now. It was a memo written by Lawrence Summers, then chief economist of the World Bank, in 1991. At that time, there was a controversy and Lant Prichett (who wrote it, Summers only signed it) argued the memo was meant to be sarcastic.

Why does pharmaceutical research, such as clinical trials, increasingly occur in developing countries? One can give it a positive spin, highlighting educational improvements in such countries, strengths in R&D, pools of scientists, improved infrastructure, lower costs and availability of a diversified patient pool. Nonetheless, it will be naive to brush aside the enticement of Mammon and fewer regulatory safeguards in these countries. Such safeguards that exist will rarely be enforced and likelihood of judicial punitive damages will be remote. The Summers memo may, or may not, have been sarcasm. But those three reasons have been imbibed by pharmaceutical research.

That proposition is exacerbated for bacteriology and virology. Both have helped the cause of medical science and human development. But when the gene of a bacterium or virus is modified in a lab, the resultant genie may not always remain in the bottle. Although that was a different age and a different setting, one is reminded of Mary Shelley. It was very different when the masters of science sought immortality and power; such views, although futile, were grand: but now the scene was changed. During Covid and lockdown, most of us must have watched movies where a virus threatens human survival. Contagion, Virus, Outbreak, Train to Busan, 12 Monkeys, The Omega Man, Operation Delta Force, Deadly Outbreak, Mission Impossible II, Code Name Trixie, Winds of Terrorthere are quite a few. Before you correct me, these are about biological threats, not necessarily viruses. Notice that when it is a virus, we prefer to blame alien origins (The Andromeda Strain), pigs and bats (Contagion), monkeys (Outbreak), terrorists (12 Monkeys). The villain is generally someone other than the virologist. The finger isnt pointed at the Frankenstein who has messed around in the lab. Even when a virus is leaked from a lab, we tend to blame a non-human villain like a rat (The Missing are Deadly).

This is the stuff of fantasy and fiction. But fiction has inched closer to reality. In any event, in the name of advancement of medical research, virologists have been exceedingly non-transparent about the genetic manipulations that they do, euphemistically termed gain-of-function research. Thanks to investigative work by Monali Rahalkar, Rahul Bahulikar, The Seeker, DRASTIC and others I dont know about, we know the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) was working on modifying the bat coronavirus. The lab leakage proposition is dismissed as circumstantial. Most people have a fair idea that circumstantial evidence isnt direct proof or testimony and given the requirement that guilt must be proved beyond reasonable doubt, circumstantial evidence isnt enough for conviction. Thats based on watching too many simplified law-related series and films, or perhaps reading Sherlock Holmes. I have in mind Holmes in The Boscombe Valley Mystery. Circumstantial evidence is a very tricky thing, answered Holmes, thoughtfully. It may seem to point very straight to one thing, but if you shift your own point of view a little, you may find it pointing in an equally uncompromising manner to something entirely different.

Perhaps. But contrary to the fair idea most people have, circumstantial evidence alone is sufficient to convict, both in civil and criminal cases, even in the absence of direct evidence. There are any number of court cases to establish this. Try the book by Mel Harmon, titled, A Trout in the Milk. The title is explained by Henry David Thoreaus quote, Some circumstantial evidence is very strong, as when you find a trout in the milk. Lets be clear. There is nothing circumstantial about the WIV working on modifying the bat coronavirus. Thats direct evidence. Can pathogens be accidentally leaked from labs? There is a long list of such biosecurity incidents, more common than we are ready to admit. They have occurred in a range of countries, including China. Thats direct evidence too. There are gradations of bio-safety levels (BSLs), from the lowest of BSL-1 to the highest of BSL-4. For deadly viruses, nothing less than BSL-4 should suffice and even then, there is a possibility of leakage. A lot has been made about a facility in WIV obtaining BSL-4 status in 2015, the first one in China to do so. Logicians talk about fallacies of defective induction or false generalisation. One facility achieving BSL-4 does not mean all did. Indeed, several labs at the WIV and also at the Wuhan Centre for Disease Prevention and Control operated at BSL-2 and BSL-3 levels. Thats also direct evidence, not circumstantial.

But for the Wuhan virus, the average person might not have known that virologists were engaged in gain-of-function research; WIV was working on modifying the bat coronavirus; this research was funded by the West; bio-safety levels fell short of BSL-4. We now know what virologists, especially funders, knew all along. This knowledge isnt circumstantial.

Bibek Debroy

Chairman, Economic Advisory Council to the PM

(Views are personal) (Tweets @bibekdebroy)
By Express News Service

KOLAR: The state government should immediately call for an Assembly session to discuss the post-lockdown situation, said former Chief Minister HD Kumaraswamy.

Addressing mediapersons after distributing provisional kits organised by Malur Ramae Gowda and Mallesh Babu in Bangarpet, he said if the government fails to call for an Assembly session immediately, the JDS would launch an agitation.

Kumaraswamy said it will pave the way to discuss various issues in the Assembly and as a responsible leader, he will also give suggestions to the government to help the people.

The former Chief Minister also said the amount announced for people who are facing problems including auto rickshaw drivers and street vendors is not sufficient. Nothing prevented the BJP government from announcing more funds for the needy, he said.

The BJP leaders should end their internal differences and work hard to solve the problems immediately, he said, and also alleged that there is corruption in all departments in the state.

He also came down heavily on former Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, alleging that he has no right to speak on the JDS and added that the party is working for the development of the people.
By Express News Service

MALAPPURAM: The brave action of an autorickshaw driver, Jouhar N, of Palathol in Perithalmanna helped the police nab Vineesh Vinod, who was fleeing the scene after killing his former schoolmate Drishya, daughter of Balachandran of Eladu, for rejecting his love request.

Vineesh flagged down Joufars autorickshaw around 8.15am at Palathol, which is one-and-a-half kilometres away from the crime scene and tried to fool the latter to escape from the area. However, Joufar handled the situation intelligently and took Vineesh literally for a ride to the police station.

Vineesh asked Jouhar to help him escape as his motorcycle had met with an accident and that his friend was injured. He told me that his motorbike collided with a car. He also lied to me that locals in the area rushed his friend to a nearby hospital and that he was running away from the scene fearing that the other residents would attack him as he was speeding, Jauhar said.

Jouhar promised to take Vineesh to the Perithalmanna police station, but the latter asked him to drop him outside and go back. He promised me that he would send me the travel charge to my home. By that time, police and locals from Eladu reached Palathol, searching for Vineesh. One of my friends from Eladu called me on the phone and told me about the developments, Jouhar said.

Jouhar acted smartly to avoid an attack from Vineesh. He would have attacked me and escaped if he came to know that I was aware of Drishyas killing. I started talking to him. I mainly talked to him about the insurance coverage for accidents.

My plan was to stop the autorickshaw close to a person who could stop him from running away. When my vehicle reached near the Perithalmanna police station, I saw my friend Subin. I stopped the autorickshaw close to him and asked him to catch Vineesh. Then, we handed him over to the police at the station, Jouhar said. Kerala Womens Commission chairperson M C Josephine said in Malappuram that repeated murders in retaliation to rejecting love proposals show lack of alertness by police in handling such cases.

CRIME OF PASSION

Murder most foul

Four years ago, Kerala was shocked to hear about the tragic incident that happened inside the library at the School of Medical Education, Kottayam, where a girl student was set ablaze by her former lover who had been her senior. The man also died of burns.

Lekshmi, 21, a final-year Bachelor of Physical Education student at the Gandhi Nagar centre of SME was killed by her senior Adarsh Suneendran, 26, on February 1, 2017. Adarsh, who came to her classroom with a can of petrol, poured that over her. When she ran into the library, he followed and embraced her and lit fire.

Incidents of crime of passion have repeated in different parts of the state since then. Though perpetrators are held by the police soon after most of the incidents and even courts punishing them in some cases, frustrated youths repeat the crime again.

Recent incidents in state

March 12, 2019 @ Tiruvalla, Pathanamthitta: 20-year-old Kavitha Vijayakumar set ablaze by her stalker Ajin Reji Mathew after she rejected his love plea. The youth hacked her and then poured petrol and set her on fire.

April 4, 2019

@ Chiyyaram, Thrissur: Engineering student Neethu, 22, set ablaze by her ex-lover Nidheesh. She was stabbed several times before he poured petrol and set her on fire.

June 15, 2019 @ Vallikunnam, Alappuzha: Woman police constable Soumya Pushpakaran, 34, killed by her colleague Ajas. Soumyas scooter was followed by Ajas in a car. He knocked her down and hacked her before pouring petrol and setting her ablaze. Ajas who suffered serious burns died in the hospital later.

October 9, 2019 @ Kakkanad, Ernakulam:

A 17-year-old plus two student killed by her ex-lover who barged into her house, poured petrol and set her ablaze around midnight. The 24-year old culprit, Mithun, also died of burns

Jan 6, 2020 @ Karakkonam,

Tpuram: Ashika, 21, killed by her former lover Anu who barged into her house and slit her throat. The youth then committed suicide by slitting his throat.

Jan 8, 2020 @ Kaloor, Kochi: A 17-year-old Plus Two student from Kaloor killed by ex-lover Safar Shah who picked her up in a car and went to Malakkappara on Kerala-Tamil Nadu border. The body of the girl, who died of stab wounds, was found dumped in a plantation at Varattapara in TN.

Apart from these, there were at least a dozen incidents in which women were attacked and inflicted serious injuries on them by jilted lovers in the last three years.
Harish Murali By

Express News Service

CHENNAI: The Tamil Nadu government on Friday informed the Madras High Court that it is willing to extend COVID-19 cash relief to transgender persons without insisting upon ration cards.

The state's advocate general R Shunmughasundaram submitted before the bench of Chief Justice Sanjib Banerjee and Justice R Subbiah that the government has decided to extend the benefit to all transgenders irrespective of whether they possess the registration cards.

Transgender rights activist Grace Banu had moved the court seeking extension of the COVID cash relief to all transgenders in the state even if they don't possess any valid registration or identification papers.

During the hearing on Friday, the state submitted that only 2,956 transgenders have been provided with the first lot of cash relief and there are a further 8,493 transgender persons who are entitled to receive the same benefit.

The bench recorded the submissions, but observed that the only reservation it has was that the grant should not be abused. It said some form of recording the name and address of the beneficiary should be followed.

Since the state has agreed to extend the benefit to all transgenders irrespective of whether they are registered or not, an appropriate modality should be worked by which the transgenders receive the benefit and yet, the system is not misused, it added.

The court adjourned the plea to July 9 for the state government to file a report on whether any genuine transgender has been left out.
S Kumaresan By

Express News Service

CHENNAI: Chief Minister MK Stalins meeting with the Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday symbolises Stalins non-confrontational approach towards the Centre after becoming the Chief Minister. A reading of Stalins actions in the last 40 days shows that he has raised concerns over policy issues with the Union government even while keeping away the political tone.

During the election campaign, DMK was one of the strong critics of the BJP-led government. After the election victory, he has not made any critical statements against the Union government. Even while raising concerns over various issues, his language had been that of persuasion. This is in strong contrast with other Chief Ministers like West Bengals Mamata Banerjee. In cases where the State showed its strong opposition to the Union government, Stalin had left the job to his cabinet colleagues.

For example, when the State government asked its officials to skip the meeting called by the Union Education Minister, it was School Education Minister Anbil Mahesh Poyyamozhi who spoke on the matter. Despite our request to hold discussions at the Minister-level, the Centre has chosen to go ahead with its plan to hold discussions only with the officials. Protesting this, we have boycotted this meeting, he said.

Another one is the protest highlighted by the State Finance Minister PTR Palanivel Thiaga Rajan during the GST council meeting over the sharing of revenue to the State and pending dues of the state share in GST revenue. Both are policy decisions of the party and there is visibly no political motivation against the BJP led Union government.

Even in a letter to Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan, for urging special allocation of vaccine to state, the Chief Minister MK Stalin only highlighted the grievance of the State that it had not received vaccines proportionate to its population size.

During the election campaign, DMK president MK Stalin and his son Udhayanidhi Stalin slammed the Union government for not taking any steps to establish the AIIMS hospital at Madurai except for laying the foundation stone. But, in his letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi on June 5, he requested Modi for taking steps to establish the facility at the earliest and did not charge the Centre union government for its lethargic attitude.

Besides, even various alliance parties of DMK urged the State not to cancel the plus two examinations in line with the decision of the CBSE, the state government took a cue from the CBSE and cancelled the plus two examinations. Likewise, the Chief Minister also constituted a committee to assess the setbacks of NEET instead of taking severe steps to scrap the NEET since he urged the AIADMK regime to take severe steps to get an exemption to Tamil Nadu from the NEET.

Some sources in DMK, who are close to party leadership opined over the recent amicable performance of Stalin that before assuming the public office we were in the Opposition. Hence, we have to condemn the ruling parties whether it be the union government or the state government for their wrongdoings. Now, we are running the government. So, we have to follow some decorum in communicating with the Union government, said a party insider.
By Express News Service

CHENNAI: The State on Thursday informed the Madras High Court that it is planning to introduce mobile procurement centres and said it has set up 468 godowns across rice-growing regions.

The issue pertains to the first bench of Chief Justice Sanjib Banerjee and Justice Senthilkumar Ramamoorthy taking suo motu cognizance based on a newspaper report that farmers from southern districts lost their paddy stock kept at procurement centres due to rains.

On Thursday, State advocate general R Shumugasundaram submitted to the bench that an exclusive meeting was held with the authorities of the Cooperative Department. The department has set up 468 godowns to store the paddy procured from farmers which can contain 3.34 lakh tonnes of grains.

The bench recorded the submissions, however, sought clarity on the stocks left to rot due to the rains. The bench then directed the State to file a report.
By Express News Service

MEDAK: A 70-year-old farmer ended his life by jumping into a burning pyre which he made from wooden scraps of his own demolished house in Vemulaghat village in Medak district.

Malliah, one of the oustees, was forced to take this extreme step after he was denied a 2BHK house in the Rehabilitation and Resettlement (R&R) colony. The colony is being developed by the Telangana government for residents who will lose their homes to the Mallannasagar reservoir.

Following the incident, a heavy police force has been deployed at Vemulaghat to avoid any untoward incident.

ALSO READ: Vexed with apathy of govt officials, Mallannasagar oustees approach SHRC

The oustees of the Mallannasagar project were given two options-- either Rs 5.4 lakh per family and a plot of 250 square yards at the R&R colony or Rs 7.5 lakh along with a constructed 2BHK in the same colony.

As per sources, in 2019, Malliah chose the second option, in lieu of losing his house to the Mallannasagar reservoir project.

Malliah has had several hardships since last year. He lost his wife to cancer around nine months back. On learning this, the revenue department officials allegedly told Malliah that he will not receive the house if he were to stay alone there.

Two of his three married daughters also passed away along with their husbands, and one of the two couples died recently.

Upset and agitated over this, Malliah collected some wooden scraps from his demolished house on Thursday. Those who saw him thought that he is collecting the scraps to sell them at a price. Unfortunately, this wood became Mallaiah's funeral pyre.

Malliah was planning to move into the newly constructed 2BHK house along with his surviving daughter and son-in-law.

(If you are having suicidal thoughts, or are worried about a friend or need emotional support, someone is always there to listen. Call Sneha Foundation - 04424640050 (available 24x7) or iCall, the Tata Institute of Social Sciences' helpline - 02225521111, which is available Monday to Saturday from 8 am to 10 pm.)
By Express News Service

HYDERABAD: In what is being seen as a setback for former minister Eatala Rajender, the Telangana High Court has refused to stay the State government inquiry into allegations of encroachment of lands of Sri Sitarama Swamy temple at Devarayamjal in Shameerpet on the outskirts of Hyderabad. The government had constituted a four-member committee of IAS officers to probe the allegations.

The IAS officers committee was constituted to investigate charges that Rajender and a few others had encroached 1,521 acres of temple lands in Devarayamjal, valued at Rs 1,000 crore. The committee is headed by Panchayat Raj secretary M Raghunandan Rao.

The High Court, on Thursday, while hearing a petition filed by Sada Kesava Reddy, refused to stay GO No. 1,014 and maintained that the government had the freedom to initiate an inquiry into the allegations. It wanted to know what was wrong if the government conducted a survey to identify the lands that belonged to the Devarayamjal temple.

The bench wondered how the petitioner could seek a stay of the GO and whether the petitioner wanted encroachment of temple lands to continue. The court held that it was the responsibility of the committee to conduct a survey and submit a report to the government. It however agreed with the petitioner that before conducting the survey, the government should issue notices to those who were in possession of the lands in question.

The HC directed the petitioners to cooperate with the inquiry officers by submitting whatever documents they had in support of their claims. It declared that if the petitioners did not cooperate with the inquiry committee, the government was free to take action against them.
By Associated Press

LONDON: Security failings leading up to the terrorist bombing during an Ariana Grande concert at Manchester Arena four years ago meant multiple "missed opportunities" to save lives on the night, an official inquiry concluded on Thursday.

On May 22, 2017, Libyan-origin suicide bomber Salman Abedi blew himself up outside the arena just as the pop concert was concluding, killing 22 people and injuring hundreds more.

The attack was later claimed by the Islamic State (ISIS) terrorist network.

Sir John Saunders, who is the chair of the investigation into the terror attack, said the attacker should have been identified as a threat before he detonated his device outside.

"The security arrangements for the Manchester Arena should have prevented or minimised the devastating impact of the attack. They failed to do so," Saunders said.

"There were a number of opportunities which were missed leading to this failure. Salman Abedi should have been identified on 22 May 2017 as a threat by those responsible for the security of the arena and a disruptive intervention undertaken," he said.

Had that occurred, I consider it likely that Abedi would still have detonated his device, but the loss of life and injury is highly likely to have been less," he added.

In a first report from the inquiry, Saunders said the arena's operator SMG, security company Showsec, and British Transport Police (BTP) were "principally responsible for the missed opportunities" but there were also "failings by individuals".

The "most striking missed opportunity" was that a member of the public, Christopher Wild, raised concerns about Abedi to security guard Mohammed Agha minutes before the bombing -- but the effect of the steward's actions "was to fob (Mr Wild) off", he said.

The retired High Court judge said that the responsibility for the attack lies with Abedi and his younger brother Hashem, who was jailed for life for helping plan the atrocity, but his inquiry had to decide "whether more could and should have been done" to stop the bomber.

Among a series of recommendations in his report, Saunders said a "Protect Duty" for better security at venues should be written into law, following a campaign from the mother of victim Martyn Hett.

The inquiry's report is the first of three being published in the coming months.
By PTI

COLOMBO: India on Friday rejected as "blatantly false" the local media reports about the Indian Navy's alleged assault on a group of Sri Lankan fishermen, saying no such incident has taken place.

A group of 13 local fishermen claimed that they had ventured into the sea on May 7 onboard trawlers 'Thushan 1' and 'Thushan II' and were physically assaulted by the Indian Navy in the international waters around Diego Garcia on June 4.

"They demanded drugs from us even after we told them that we were only fishermen," two fishermen told the local Hiru TV on Thursday. Responding to their claims, the Indian High Commission here denied that the fishermen had been assaulted by the Indian Navy.

"Media reports on June 17 stating that a group of Sri Lankan fishermen was attacked physically by the Indian Navy are blatantly false. We deny any such incident having taken place," the High Commission said.

"The Indian Navy is a highly disciplined and professional force which discharges its responsibilities in an impeccable manner," it said in a statement.

India is firmly committed to addressing all fishermen-related issues between India and Sri Lanka in a humanitarian manner through established bilateral mechanisms and understandings, it added.

After the media reports, Secretary to the Fisheries Ministry Indu Rathnayake told the local media here that a discussion will be held with India after the report is investigated.

Indian fishermen have also alleged in the past that the Sri Lanka Navy attacked them while poaching on Sri Lanka borders.

In October last year, a leader of the fishermen claimed that groups of Indian fishermen were attacked by the Sri Lankan Navy personnel using bottles and stones while fishing near Dhanushkodi, resulting in injuries to some and damage to their gear.

Fishermen from both countries are arrested frequently for inadvertently trespassing into each other's waters. The fishermen issue has become a major irritant in the bilateral ties.

In January, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar visited Sri Lanka and met with Fisheries Minister Douglas Devananda. He raised the fishermen issue and reviewed bilateral cooperation in fisheries.

"We look forward to the early return of our fishermen from Sri Lanka," Jaishankar had said. Later, a three-member committee was appointed by the Sri Lankan government which will make recommendations on measures to stop poaching by Indian fishermen inside the country's waters after four people were killed when an Indian trawler capsized after colliding with a Sri Lankan Navy vessel.
By PTI

ISLAMABAD: With India stepping up its diplomatic activities in Afghanistan's peace process as the US prepares for the troops withdrawal, a jittery Pakistan has said that at times it feels that New Delhi's presence in the war-torn country is perhaps "larger than it ought to be".

Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi's remarks to Afghanistan's Tolo news channel comes days after External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar met US Special Representative for Afghanistan Reconciliation Zalmay Khalilzad in Qatar's capital Doha on Tuesday and exchanged perspectives on the war-ravaged nation and the region.

"Obviously, you have sovereign relations and you have bilateral relations and you have every right to have sovereign and bilateral relations with India. You have trade with India. They come and carry out development work there, that's completely fine with us," Qureshi said during the interview which will be telecast on Saturday.

"But at times we feel that their presence is perhaps larger than it ought to be because they don't share a border with you," he said, according to the excerpts of the interview posted by the news channel on its Twitter handle.

When asked whether India's presence in Afghanistan bothers Pakistan, Qureshi said, "Yes, If they use your (Afghan) soil against us, it bothers me." Asked how India is using Afghan soil for anti-Pakistan activities, he alleged: "Yes, they are. By carrying out terrorist activities." During the interview, Qureshi also sought to absolve the Taliban for the spike in violence in Afghanistan, saying it would be an "exaggeration" to blame the insurgent group for the bloodshed.

"Again, if you try and create this impression that the violence is high because of the Taliban again, that would be an exaggeration. Why do I say that? Aren't there other elements over there who are playing the role of a spoiler?" On a question on the forces responsible for the violence, Qureshi said: "Daesh (the Islamic State), like forces within Afghanistan who gain from the war economy, who want to perpetuate their power, who are not seeing beyond their nose and just want to hang on to power."

The Taliban and the Afghan government are holding direct talks to end 19 years of war that has killed tens of thousands of people and ravaged various parts of the country.

The intra-Afghan began as the US and the Taliban signed a landmark deal in Doha on February 29, 2020 following multiple rounds of negotiations to bring lasting peace in war-torn Afghanistan and allow US troops to return home.

India has been keenly following the evolving political situation after the US signed the peace deal with the Taliban. The deal provided for the withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan, effectively drawing curtains on America's longest war.

India has been a major stakeholder in the peace and stability of Afghanistan. It has already invested close to USD three billion in aid and reconstruction activities in the country.

India has been supporting a national peace and reconciliation process which is Afghan-led, Afghan-owned and Afghan-controlled.

During his visit to Qatar, Jaishankar on Tuesday met US special envoy Khalilzad in Doha and exchanged perspectives on the war-torn nation and the region. Khalilzad briefed him on the recent developments in Afghanistan.

The minister also met senior members of the Qatari leadership and discussed the issue of Afghanistan among other matters as Doha is involved in the Afghan peace process.

In March, Afghan foreign minister Mohammad Haneef Atmar visited India during which Jaishankar conveyed to him India's long-term commitment towards a peaceful, sovereign and stable Afghanistan.

India on Thursday said its vision for Afghanistan is driven by an approach of pro-development and pro-democracy and that it is for the Afghan people to judge each of their partners on the basis of past actions.

In early March, Jaishankar and Khalilzad spoke over the phone and discussed the developments pertaining to the Afghan peace talks.

In the same month, Jaishankar attended the 9th Heart of Asia Ministerial Conference in Tajikistan's capital, Dushanbe, where he voiced 'grave concern' over violence and bloodshed in Afghanistan and said that there is a need for a genuine 'double peace' in and around the war-torn country.

Jaishankar also said that India has been supportive of all the efforts being made to accelerate the dialogue between the Afghan government and the Taliban, including intra-Afghan negotiations.
By PTI

KARACHI: A man has been sentenced by a court in Karachi to 12 years imprisonment for harassing his former wife online.

In a landmark judgement, which supports the recent drive against online crimes by law enforcement and security agencies, Arshad Hadi was found guilty of creating a fake account on Facebook and posting his former wife's "indecent pictures and videos" in 2016.

He was also fined Rs 3 million.

District and sessions' judge (East) Khalid Hussain Shahani announced the verdict, after recording evidence and final arguments from both sides.

According to details, the woman's father had lodged a complaint against Hadi with the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) Cyber Crime Wing after he kept on harassing her even when she took divorce from him.

The woman had sought divorce and dissolution of marriage after complaining of his "sub-human inimical activities".

The public prosecutor added that the accused had taken some indecent pictures and videos of his former wife under threat of assault and murder with ulterior motives to blackmail her when they lived in Sharjah in the UAE.

The prosecutor said Hadi had started harassing the woman online since 2016 when he came to know that she was getting remarried.

"He also sent her indecent videos to the victim's father and sister from a fake ID on Facebook when he came to know that she was re-marrying," he said.

He said the accused had admitted that the Facebook ID was in his use through which he was sending "vulgar and illicit messages".

The prosecutor said that the investigators seized a laptop, a mobile phone, a tablet, and an internet device and successfully recovered the data from these devices.
By PTI

HOUSTON: Residents in the US state of Texas can carry handguns without a license or training starting September 1 after Governor Greg Abbott signed a controversial permitless carry gun bill into law.

Abbott held a ceremonial bill signing Thursday at the Alamo, a key historical symbol of Texas pride, in San Antonio.

He called it a measure of freedom and self-defence, while also connecting it to his ongoing fight with the Biden administration over the flow of migrants across the border with Mexico.

"There is a need for people to have a weapon to defend themselves in the Lone Star State," Abbott said.

Texas is nicknamed the "Lone Star State" for its former status as an independent republic and as a reminder of the state's struggle for independence from Mexico.

In signing HB 1927 into law, Texas joins a handful of other conservative-led states that have passed measures this year allowing some form of permitless carry and expanded gun rights at the state level.

The law, a huge win for gun rights advocates, was one of the most controversial measures passed in this session.

Bill supporters said the legislation would simply restore Second Amendment rights to law-abiding Texans, while critics have said the move will only lead to more gun violence.

Opponents of the bill have pointed to incidents of gun violence in Texas including the 2018 Santa Fe High School shooting that left 10 dead and the 2019 mass shootings at an El Paso Walmart and Midland-Odessa that left 30 people dead.

Last week, one person was killed and 13 were injured in a mass shooting in downtown Austin.

Texas police chiefs and some firearm instructors who run licensing courses have also opposed the bill.

Before the permitless carry law, applicants for a license would have to attend a training class, pass a shooting proficiency test and exam, and undergo fingerprinting and background checks.
By PTI

WASHINGTON: President Joe Biden is marking another milestone in his quest to bring the COVID-19 pandemic under control and help Americans return to a more normal way of life.

Biden will announce that 300 million COVID-19 shots have been administered in the 150 days since he took office on Jan.20, the White House said in previewing the president's latest coronavirus update to the American people, set for Friday afternoon.

But as Biden marks a new milestone, he is in danger of failing to meet another: his target to have 70% of Americans at least partially vaccinated by July 4, in a little over two weeks.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says 305 million vaccine doses had been administered as of June 1O.

Overall, about 172.4 million people, or 51.9 percent of the total US population have received at least one dose of vaccine, according to the CDC.

About 141.6 million people, or 42.6% of the US population, have been fully vaccinated.

The pace of new vaccinations in the US has dropped significantly from a high of nearly 2 million per day about two months ago, jeopardizing Biden's ability to hit the 70% mark.

The White House, in previewing Biden's remarks, says his whole-of-government approach to the vaccination effort has put the virus in retreat, which in turn has brought COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations and deaths to their lowest levels in more than a year.

The administration is in the midst of a month-long blitz to combat vaccine hesitancy and the lack of urgency some people feel to get the shots, particularly in the South and Midwest.

As part of that effort, Vice President Kamala Harris travelled to Atlanta on Friday to tour a pop-up COVID-19 vaccination site at Ebenezer Baptist Church, where Dr.Martin Luther King Jr.was a pastor until his assassination in 1968.

The current senior pastor is U.S.Sen.Raphael Warnock.

Harris also plans to speak at a COVID-19 vaccination mobilization event at Clark Atlanta University, a historically Black school.

The Biden administration insists that even if the 70% vaccination goal is unmet, it will have little effect on the overall U.S.recovery, which is already ahead of where Biden said it would be months ago.

Biden wants to celebrate July 4 as a summer of freedom from the virus.

Earlier this week, the White House announced plans to host first responders, essential workers and military service members and their families on the South Lawn for a cookout and to watch the fireworks over the National Mall.

More than 1,000 guests are expected for what will be one of the largest events of Biden's presidency.
By PTI

LONDON: In a surprising result, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson's Conservative Party has been easily defeated in a special election for a seat that it has held for decades.

The Liberal Democrats, which was in a coalition government with the Conservatives between 2010 and 2015 before seeing its electoral fortunes wane dramatically, won Thursday's election in Chesham and Amersham, 35 miles (57 kilometers) northwest of London.

Sarah Green, the Liberal Democrat candidate, picked up around 57 per cent of the vote and won a seat the Conservatives have held since it was created in 1974.

She added around 30 percentage points to the party's result from the 2019 general election.

This Conservative Party has taken people across the country for granted for far too long, Green said Friday.

Her party leader, Ed Davey, said the result sent a shockwave through British politics by showing that the blue wall of Conservative seats in southern England could be vulnerable.

There are many Conservatives across the country who are now worried, said Davey, who celebrated by smashing a blue wall made up of cardboard boxes with an orange mallet.

Chesham and Amersham are quiet, leafy, prosperous towns that are synonymous with traditional Conservative territory, in much the same way that the post-industrial towns in northern England have identified with the opposition Labour Party.

The Conservatives have made big inroads into Labour's red wall in recent years, winning a swathe of seats on a combination of factors, notably Johnson's insistence that he would ensure that Britain leaves the European Union after years of parliamentary haggling.

Having secured that, Johnson has managed to capture more support in Labour's traditional heartland by promising to level up Britain through big infrastructure spending and other initiatives.

However, there are concerns among some Conservative supporters that the growing focus on northern seats has alienated the party's more traditional  and potentially more liberal  southern supporters.

In the 2016 Brexit referendum, 55 per cent of voters in Chesham and Amersham voted to remain in the EU, in sharp contrast to many of the constituencies the Conservatives have recently turned blue.

Johnson denied that he was neglecting the party's traditional base and said there were particular circumstances at play in Chesham and Amersham.

We believe in uniting and leveling up within regions and across the country, he said.

The reasons for the Conservatives' heavy defeat varied, though national issues such as the government's handling of the coronavirus pandemic and its pro-Brexit stance clearly played a role.

"In remain-voting, middle-class seats in the south of England, the Conservative coalition has been weakened to some degree in the wake of Brexit, and the Liberal Democrats are the party that in many instances are best-placed to profit from that, and that's what they've managed to do in Chesham and Amersham," polling expert John Curtice told the BBC.

Local issues were also at play.

Voters consistently voiced concerns about a high-speed rail line that will cut through the region and link London to the big cities in the north of England, such as Birmingham and Manchester.

This is a beautiful place, but people are totally against what's happening with the railway, and I think that's what has driven this," said Jit Mistry, the owner of Chesham Post Office.

Planning reforms proposed by the government also have sparked fears about more buildings in the countryside.

The defeated candidate, Peter Fleet, acknowledged the Conservatives had to rebuild trust and understanding with voters.

Despite the election's outcome, Johnson can still rely on a big majority of around 80 seats in the the 650-member House of Commons.

(AP) IND 06182158 NNNN
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WESTPORT  Police say a woman and her 7-year-old daughter were found dead Thursday inside a home in the north side of town.

Police said they responded to a Lyndale Park home around 4 p.m. Thursday after a report of a unresponsive female. Police said they found a woman dead inside the home and conducted a search of the rest of the residence and discovered the child.

UPDATE: Deaths being investigated as possible double homicide

Westport Schools Superintendent Thomas Scarice said Coleytown Elementary School and Stepping Stones Preschool will be closed Friday for normal activities, but will be open for parents and students for mental health services.

Late this afternoon, we were informed of the untimely and tragic loss of one of our parents and her beloved daughter, Scarice wrote in an email to parents Thursday night. There are no words that could console the sense of sorrow we feel by this unspeakable tragedy. We want to express our deepest condolences to all those impacted by this heartbreaking loss.

Scarice said the district has begun to mobilize all of our resources to provide the necessary support to our students and faculty, and offered links to mental health resources.

A large police presence  including a state police major crimes unit van  remained at the home late Thursday night.

The large two-story residence sits on the corner of Lyndale Park, a private drive, and Weston Road, just off the Merritt Parkway and roughly two miles north of Westports downtown. A cut stone wall rings the front of the property, topped with a wrought iron fence.

Police could be seen standing at the front entrance to the home, which looks out across an empty front yard to Weston Road. At one point, a team of investigators appeared to be searching the grounds just in front of the homes three-bay built-in garage, before walking up to the front door.

Police said they believe the incident was isolated and we do not believe that there is any active threat to the community.
SHERMAN  The Sherman Library will offer Remembering Rex Brasher  Painter of Birds, a free online presentation by Gerri Griswold, on Thursday, June 24, at 7 p.m.

This program via Zoom will focus on the prolific avian painter from Kent, an announcement said. Brasher produced 875 watercolors depicting 1,200 species and sub-species of North American birds. Brasher recorded more than twice as many birds as his predecessor John James Audubon, who painted 489 species. All of Brashers original works were once on display at Harkness Memorial and today reside under lock and key at the University of Connecticuts Dodd Center.
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Veteran first responders Chip Ball, left, and Matt Workman suffer from work-related PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome). Both said they have already seen the benefits from First Responders for First Responders, a recently formed support group that helps fellow first responders better cope with their job-originated psychological problems.
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New study challenges long-standing assumptions about disease severity in infants, and suggests that standard qPCR interpretations underestimate the true burden of other highly contagious diseases, such as COVID-19 and influenza.

Pertussis, also known as "whooping cough," remains a significant cause of death in infants and young children around the world and, despite global vaccination programs, many countries are experiencing a resurgence of this highly contagious disease.

A new study by Boston University School of Public Health and the University of Georgia's Odum School of Ecology presents evidence that could help explain this resurgence: asymptomatic individuals. Lots of them.

Published in the journal eLife, the study suggests that most adults and many children who contract pertussis display no symptoms at all--a reversal of what many experts have long believed about an infection that can cause months of violent coughing fits and "whooping" sounds.

The paper builds upon a 2015 study in which the researchers discovered a series of weakly positive pertussis infections after collecting nasal swab samples from 2,000 mother/infant pairs in Zambia every 2-3 weeks for several months, using quantitative PCR (qPCR) diagnosis. In a standard qPCR analysis, these low-intensity signals would be discounted as false-positive results. But the repeated clusters of mother/infant cases, which illustrated a natural arc of infection as the infection ran its course, suggested that these weak PCR signals provided important information about disease.

The fact that we found concordance within the mother/infant pairs told us that, in all likelihood, even the weakly affected mothers are contagious at close range, and are probably infecting their babies." Dr. Christopher Gill, co-lead author of the study and associate professor of global health at BUSPH

Asymptomatic spread is not a unique phenomenon with infectious diseases, he says, but as the world has seen with COVID-19, the ability to detect asymptomatic infections early and accurately through qPCR can provide vital information about the epidemiology and burden of diseases.

"This was a quest to understand weakly positive qPCR and then determine what proportion of pertussis transmissions are coming from asymptomatic people," Gill says.

To confirm that these weak signals were accurate and relevant, the researchers conducted a closer analysis for the eLife study, and discovered additional evidence supporting the likelihood of asymptomatic transmission. The cluster of weak signals aligned with stronger signals, indicating that they occurred during an outbreak; the clusters reflected the natural rise and fall of an epidemic; signals were strongly clustered within mother/infant pairs; and the stronger the qPCR signal, the more likely individuals were to experience symptoms.

Confident in their findings, the researchers then compared the symptomatic cases to the asymptomatic cases and discovered that about 70% of infected mothers displayed no symptoms, and about 25% of infected babies displayed no symptoms. And infants with only mild symptoms (cough or runny nose) comprised over 50% of infections.

"We expected this in mothers, since pertussis becomes less severe with age and repeat exposure," says co-lead author Dr. Christian Gunning, post-doctoral researcher at UGA's School of Ecology. "But mild and asymptomatic infection in infants was assumed to be quite rare. And what we see here is the opposite--severe pertussis in infants is the exception rather than the rule."

The findings underscore the need for a shift in the way qPCR tests are interpreted, Gill says.

"Using a 'line in the sand' approach to interpret results is too simplistic and leads us to discard true and useful information," he says. "If one were trying to map a flu season, it would make more sense to use the weakly positive PCR results as an early warning of impending flu outbreaks, rather than waiting for symptomatic patients with very strong PCR results to start showing up in the ER."

Gunning agrees, saying disease surveillance plays an important role in preventing and responding to disease outbreaks. "Our results differ from traditional approaches that medical doctors use to diagnose and treat patients," he says. "When we tested many people many times, we could 'peer under the hood' and see a lot of hidden infections in this population."

Gunning says that a similar approach could help monitor for outbreaks of COVID. "To control disease outbreaks, we need to know when and where the disease has spread. New strategies like wastewater monitoring could leverage weak qPCR signals to give us a better, fasteridea of who's at risk, and allow us to more quickly intervene. And if you only look at sick people, you're going to miss a lot."
The American College of Cardiology and Heart Rhythm Society, in collaboration with the Bristol Myers Squibb-Pfizer Alliance, are launching an innovative project to improve management of atrial fibrillation in underserved communities. TRANSFORM: Atrial Fibrillation Quality Initiative (TRANSFORM: AF) will give clinicians and health systems tools to improve adoption of guideline-directed medical therapy in targeted patient populations by putting the right resources in front of the right people at the right time to drive measurable changes in performance.

Atrial fibrillation (AFib) is the most common cardiac arrhythmia worldwide and a leading cause of stroke, heart failure, cardiovascular morbidity and sudden death. When AFib remains untreated, there is a fivefold higher risk of developing stroke and a twofold higher risk of death from stroke; however, up to one-third of patients experience no symptoms and are unaware they have AFib.

"Early and effective treatment is critical for appropriate management of AFib, but some communities are disproportionately impacted by this disease because of low rates of early intervention," said James Januzzi, MD, TRANSFORM AF co-chair, ACC Board of Trustees member and director of the Dennis and Marilyn Barry Fellowship in Cardiology Research at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH). "Through TRANSFORM: AF, we're giving clinicians tools to better understand AFib risks to improve treatment decisions and monitoring for future complications in a way that meets vulnerable patients where they are."

TRANSFORM is an 18-month program that will provide a comprehensive set of tools and resources for appropriately managing atrial fibrillation by leveraging telehealth, monitoring tools and virtual care. Lessons learned from the project will help to ensure that telehealth and virtual care improve access to equitable healthcare, rather than exacerbate existing inequalities in our healthcare system.

TRANSFORM AF provides us a unique opportunity to use telemedicine and artificial intelligence to better identify, risk stratify and treat the underserved vulnerable population, enabling collaborative and patient-centered care." Jagmeet Singh MD PhD, TRANSFORM AF co-chair, member of the HRS Governance Committee and founding director of the Resynchronization and Advanced Cardiac Therapeutics Program at MGH

The program will be overseen and driven by the clinical leadership of ACC and HRS, along with the ACC's Taskforce on Health Equity and HRS's Digital Health Committee. The groups will initially conduct a baseline assessment with support from HealthReveal, a leading clinical artificial intelligence company, to identify high-risk patient populations from underserved communities experiencing economic disparities and barriers to care within selected regions and systems of focus.

Assessment findings will inform the most effective tools and educational interventions to address identified gaps in care, including patient education tutorials, quality improvement clinician toolkits, digital consumer health monitoring devices and clinician education. Through the alliance, HealthReveal will recommend life-saving patient care interventions to increase physicians' adherence to guideline- directed medical therapy, preempt future adverse cardiovascular events and improve patient outcomes.

This initiative is the latest under the TRANSFORM umbrella. ACC introduced TRANSFORM as a new kind of quality research program aimed to improve health care by transforming the quality of care across the multi-faceted areas of cardiovascular disease. TRANSFORM programs leverage clinical registry data, office-based interventions and partnerships to include the pharmaceutical and medical device industry, health plans, employers, clinicians and patients.

HRS quality improvement (QI) efforts support that vision through our Optimize Outcomes initiatives that...
Testicular cancer is the most common cancer among men under 40 in Europe and the USA. National statistics from the Cancer League indicate 471 new cases and 12 deaths in Switzerland. In general, the prospects for successful treatment of testicular cancer are good over time and, especially with early diagnosis, even further improved. Even if metastases are already present, testicular cancer can be successfully treated with appropriate therapy in the majority of cases.

New classification enables even more targeted treatment

The primary treatment for testicular cancer is the removal of the affected testicle. However, the disease is often only discovered at a stage where metastases are already present and then, after the primary surgical procedure, follow-up drug or radiological treatment is necessary. The new data have been used to make a more detailed classification of metastatic disease stages, making it possible to plan and carry out therapy in an even more targeted manner.

In many cases, we may be able to administer medication a little more selectively. At the same time, we have an increased certainty that we will not miss any case with an aggressive progression. And with the new classification, the benefits for the patient are twofold: a reduced treatment burden with respect to chemotherapy and increased certainty in terms of outcome." Prof. Dr. med. Jorg Beyer, co-initiator of the study project and first author of one of the two publications of the IGCCCG Update Consortium

International research consortium conducts extensive study

Previous treatment guidelines were based on data from 1975 to 1990 involving a total of 5862 patients. The new study compared these results with more recent data from 1990 to 2013 and a larger number of patients. The International Germ-Cell Cancer Collaborative Group Update research consortium (IGCCCG Update Consortium) examined data from 30 medical centers in 17 countries (Australia, Europe, Russia and America). The study included documentation of 12 149 patients with metastatic testicular cancer. Particular attention was paid to potential criteria that could help refine classification.

And another piece of good news: better prognosis for testicular cancer patients

Compared with the original data, the new study results revealed that the prognosis has improved significantly in all cases. In the "good prognosis" classification, 5-year survival increased from 86% to a new 95%. And in the "intermediate prognosis" group, this value increased from 72% to 88%. The improvement was most impressive in the group with widely metastasized disease and the poorest prognosis: 5-year survival increased from 48% to 67%. Prof. Dr. med. Daniel Aebersold, Chairman of the Board of UCI University Cancer Center Inselspital, adds: "The study impressively demonstrates the progress made in cancer therapy. In just well over twenty years, it has been possible to significantly improve the prospects of a long-term tumor-free life after a testicular cancer diagnosis."

Prospects

The next step will be to incorporate the consortium's findings into treatment guidelines and reduce the burden of cancer therapy. In addition, new approaches to the treatment of metastatic testicular cancer need to be considered, such as those currently being investigated in a SAKK study which aim to combine radio- and chemotherapy. It can be assumed that optimized therapies for testicular cancer will lead to a further improved prognosis with reduced treatment intensity in the coming years.
Scientists have identified a new class of targeted cancer drugs that offer the potential to treat patients whose tumors have faulty copies of the BRCA cancer genes.

The drugs, known as POLQ inhibitors, specifically kill cancer cells with mutations in the BRCA genes while leaving healthy cells unharmed.

And crucially, they can kill cancer cells that have become resistant to PARP inhibitors - an existing treatment for patients with BRCA mutations.

Researchers are already planning to test the new drug class in upcoming clinical trials. If the trials are successful, POLQ inhibitors could enter the clinic as a new approach to treating a range of cancers with BRCA mutations, such as breast, ovarian, pancreatic and prostate cancer.

Scientists at The Institute of Cancer Research, London, and the pharmaceutical company Artios, explored the potential of using POLQ inhibitors in treating cancer cells with defects in the BRCA genes.

Their study, published today (Thursday) in Nature Communications, was funded by Artios, Cancer Research UK and Breast Cancer Now.

For some time now, scientists have known that genetically removing a protein known as POLQ killed cells with BRCA gene defects, although drugs that prevent POLQ from working had not been identified.

In this new work, the researchers identified prototype drugs that not only stop POLQ from working, but which also kill cancer cells with BRCA gene mutations.

Both BRCA genes and POLQ are involved in repairing DNA. Cancer cells can survive without one or other of them, but if both are blocked or their genes switched off, cancer cells can no longer repair their DNA and they die.

Researchers found that when cells were treated with POLQ inhibitors, cancer cells with BRCA gene mutations were stripped of their ability to repair their DNA and died, but normal cells did not. By killing cancer cells with BRCA gene mutations, while leaving normal cells unharmed, POLQ inhibitors could offer a treatment for cancer with relatively few side effects.

Researchers also found that POLQ inhibitors work very well when used together in combination with PARP inhibitors.

The addition of POLQ inhibitors meant that PARP inhibitors were effective when used at a lower dose. And in laboratory tests in rats and in organoids - three-dimensional mini-tumours grown in the lab - POLQ inhibitors were able to shrink BRCA-mutant cancers that had stopped responding to PARP inhibitors because of a defect in a set of genes known as the 'Shieldins'.

This suggests that POLQ inhibitors could offer an alternative treatment where PARP inhibitors are no longer working. Researchers believe that using a POLQ inhibitor in combination with a PARP inhibitor in patients with cancers that have faulty BRCA genes could prevent resistance from emerging in the first place.

Scientists at The Institute of Cancer Research (ICR), funded by Breast Cancer Now and Cancer Research UK, discovered how to genetically target PARP inhibitors against BRCA-mutant cancers and, with colleagues at The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust, helped run clinical trials leading to the first PARP inhibitor being approved for use.

The next step will now be to test POLQ inhibitors in clinical trials led by Artios.

Study co-leader, Professor Chris Lord, Professor of Cancer Genomics at The Institute of Cancer Research, London,and Deputy Director of the Breast Cancer Now Toby Robins Research Centre at the ICR, said:

"All cells have to be able to repair damage to their DNA to stay healthy - otherwise mutations build up and eventually kill them. We have identified a new class of precision medicine that strips cancers of their ability to repair their DNA. This new type of treatment has the potential to be effective against cancers which already have weaknesses in their ability to repair their DNA, through defects in their BRCA genes. And excitingly, the new drugs also seem to work against cancer cells that have stopped responding to an existing treatment called PARP inhibitors - potentially opening up a new way of overcoming drug resistance. I'm very keen to see how they perform in clinical trials."

Professor Paul Workman, Chief Executive of The Institute of Cancer Research, London, said:

"It's exciting that the new POLQ inhibitors should provide a different approach to treating cancers with BRCA gene defects - and particularly that this class of drugs should retain their activity in cancers that have developed resistance to PARP inhibitors. Most exciting of all is the potential of combining POLQ and PARP inhibitor drugs to prevent the evolution of BRCA-mutant cancers into more aggressive, drug-resistant forms - a major challenge that we see in the clinic."

Study Co-Leader, Dr Graeme Smith, Chief Scientific Officer at Artios Pharma, Cambridge, said:

"These exciting preclinical results provide a clear rationale for future clinical studies with a POLQ inhibitor. At Artios, we are on track to initiate our POLQ clinical programme before the year end to explore POLQ inhibition in the sensitive cancer types that this study has uncovered. Our planned POLQ inhibitor clinical studies will leverage these results, exploring combination treatment with PARP inhibitors and different types of DNA damaging agents."

More than 25 years ago we helped discover the BRCA gene, which spurred on our scientists to work with others to develop PARP inhibitors, which are now benefiting many patients. But we are always trying to find newer and better ways to outstep cancer, especially when it stops responding to current treatments. By revisiting weaknesses in the BRCA repair pathway, researchers have not only found a way to make PARP inhibitors more effective, but they may have also identified an entirely new class of targeted drugs for BRCA cancers, which could include pancreatic cancer which has limited treated options. We look forward to seeing if these promising results in the lab transfer into benefits for patients when tested in trials." Michelle Mitchell, Chief Executive at Cancer Research UK

Dr Simon Vincent, Director of Research, Support and Influencing at Breast Cancer Now, said:

"Men and women with a change in one of their BRCA genes are at greater risk of being diagnosed with breast cancer, and around 5% of the 55,000 cases of breast cancer diagnosed in UK each year are caused by an inherited altered gene, which includes BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes.

"It's therefore hugely exciting that POLQ inhibitors could provide a targeted treatment option for people whose cancer is caused by altered BRCA genes. As a targeted treatment, we hope that POLQ inhibitors could be a kinder alternative, with less side effects than current treatment options.

"Drug resistance is a major hurdle that we must tackle to stop women dying from breast cancer, so it is also exciting that POLQ inhibitors offer a hope of overcoming resistance in some cases.

"We hope that future research will confirm that POLQ inhibitors can benefit people with breast cancer in these ways."
The pandemic-caused recession and a federal requirement that states keep Medicaid beneficiaries enrolled until the national emergency ends swelled the pool of people in the program by more than 9 million over the past year, according to a report released Thursday.

The latest figures show Medicaid enrollment grew from 71.3 million in February 2020, when the pandemic was beginning in the U.S., to 80.5 million in January, according to a KFF analysis of federal data. (KHN is an editorially independent program of KFF.)

That's up from about 56 million in 2013, just before many states expanded Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act. And it's double the 40 million enrolled in 2001.

Medicaid, once considered the ugly duckling compared with the politically powerful and popular Medicare program, now covers nearly 1 in 4 Americans. In New Mexico, the ratio is more than 1 in 3.

Together, Medicaid and Medicare cover 43% of Americans.

More than three dozen states since 2014 have used billions in ACA funding to expand coverage beyond traditional Medicaid populations to cover adults with incomes below 138% of the federal poverty level, or about $17,800. At the end of 2020, 14.8 million newly eligible adults were enrolled in Medicaid because of the ACA.

States that have seen at least an 80% increase in Medicaid enrollment since 2013 are Kentucky (157%), Nevada (129%), Alaska (94%), Colorado (92%), Montana (88%), Oregon (85%) and New Mexico (80%).

Although Medicaid has often been criticized for having too few physicians who accept its low reimbursement rates, state officials say they have weathered the surge with few complaints from enrollees about accessing health services. One key reason is the dramatic downturn in people seeking medical care during the pandemic because they were mitigating their risks of contracting covid. Also, doctors were able to fit in more patients efficiently through telehealth appointments after federal rules expanded reimbursement for those services.

"We have no access issues," said Karen Kimsey, Virginia's Medicaid director. Since March 2020, Virginia Medicaid has added 308,000 members, a 20% increase, state officials said. With the exception of a shortage of some licensed mental health providers, state officials said they have enough providers to handle the increased demand.

Typically, a surge in Medicaid enrollment can cripple state budgets, but a covid relief package passed by Congress last year boosted the federal share of its funding for traditional Medicaid by 6.2 percentage points. Before the pandemic, Washington paid on average about 56% of Medicaid costs, with poorer states getting a larger share of federal funding.

However, the funding hike required states to not remove anyone from the program during the public health emergency unless they die or move out of state.

The increase in federal contributions does not apply to enrollees covered by the ACA Medicaid expansion. The federal government already pays for at least 90% of their expenses.

Among the big winners from the enlarged Medicaid rolls are private health plans, which most states use to cover their enrollees. Health plans such as those run by managed-care titans UnitedHealthcare, Molina Healthcare and Centene Corp. receive a payment from states each month based on enrollment. That means these insurers can profit if they control costs, but they lose money if expenses to treat enrollees are too high.

"We are seeing plans' revenues go up and utilization of health services decline, which is a recipe for increased profits," said Massey Whorley, a Medicaid expert with the consulting firm Avalere.

Because of the way they are paid, health insurers benefited financially during the pandemic compared with other major health industry sectors, such as hospitals, physicians and nursing homes forced to stretch budgets for extra staffing and protective gear for workers while their revenues shrank due to waning demand.

Most health experts expect the Biden administration to maintain the nation's health emergency status until at least the end of the year. Administration officials have said they will give states at least 60 days' notice before ending the emergency so states can prepare to determine who is still eligible for Medicaid and help those who leave the program transition to other coverage.

"What we are seeing now is the high-water mark for Medicaid enrollment," Massey said.

Helping to drive Medicaid enrollment this year was the Biden administration's decision to reopen the ACA insurance marketplace from March until Aug. 15. About 331,000 people who applied as part of that special enrollment were eligible for Medicaid or the Children's Health Insurance Program.

Anthony Fiori, an analyst with the consulting firm Manatt Health, said some states likely have adjusted payments to health plans when annual contracts were negotiated to account for a drop in health care use. He noted many states have limits on how much health plans can make in profits.

Matt Salo, executive director of the National Association of Medicaid Directors, said some states are considering lowering the rates they pay insurers per person.

As more people get fully vaccinated, Salo said, states expect an uptick in enrollees seeking care that they have put off during the pandemic, which will increase costs. "There will be a lot of pent-up demand that might explode in the near future," he said.

Several health plans have told Wall Street investors that the pandemic has been good for their financial health.

Molina CEO Joseph Zubretsky said in April that the company's Medicaid enrollment at the end of March was 3.9 million members, an increase of 260,000 since December. Since the pandemic started, the company estimates, it has added more than 700,000 Medicaid members with no plateau in sight.

"For every month the national covid emergency gets extended, it would produce about $150 million of revenue to our annual total," he said.

Zubretsky predicted many will remain on Medicaid longer.

"The low-wage service economy, the sandwich shops, the restaurants, the dry cleaner shops aren't coming back real fast, and I still think there will be a significant amount of that membership that will be on Medicaid for an extended period of time," he said.
Extremely ill newborns often present parents and doctors with very complex medical challenges and difficult ethical issues. Research by the VUB-UGent research group End of Life Care showed in a recent study that infant mortality under the age of one year is preceded in 61% of cases by an end-of-life decision with a possible shortening of life. Such decisions are not taken lightly and are always in the best interests of the child.

Stopping or not starting a potentially life-prolonging treatment occurs in 37% of all deaths of children under 1 year. In addition, in 14% of cases, medication with a possible life-shortening effect was administered and in 10% of all cases medication was administered with the explicit aim of hastening the end of life.

Although decisions to discontinue life-prolonging treatment are the most common, the number of children who die after receiving medication with an explicit intention to shorten their lives is striking. Researcher Laure Dombrecht: "These are most likely critical situations where the intensive care that was started leads to a stable condition of the child, but where a very poor quality of life was expected despite continued optimal care."

Neonatologist Professor Filip Cools of UZ Brussel confirms:

Sometimes we have to conclude that the future for a newborn looks very bleak, and in conversations between the parents and the care team the question is asked whether we can spare the child from all this suffering. It can then be a particularly difficult balancing act between acting in the best interest of the child, while respecting legal and ethical boundaries. Fortunately, the complex domain of palliative care or "comfort care" in newborns has received more and more attention in recent years, both among health care providers and researchers."

These neonatal mortality rates must be interpreted within their overall context. About 66,000 children were born annually in Flanders in 2016-2017; approximately 10,000 of these are admitted to a neonatology department; and ultimately in Flanders only about 230 of them die before the age of 1 year.

The prevalence estimates on end-of-life decisions for newborns in Flanders are comparable with figures from the Netherlands where 63% of deaths before the first birthday are preceded by an end-of-life decision with a possible or explicit life-shortening effect. Researcher Laure Dombrecht: "These figures demonstrate the challenging clinical reality of medical decision-making in extremely ill neonates with a low survival rate or with a strong impact on quality of life."

In the Netherlands, the so-called Groningen protocol has been in existence since 2005, which provides strict guidelines under which the administration of medication with an explicit intention to shorten life in newborns can be tolerated. There is no such guideline in Belgium. Opinions on such a Flemish protocol are divided: "More evaluation and monitoring of the practice can regulate and guide an ethically loaded decision-making process, but at the same time it could limit neonatologists, parents and other stakeholders from making decisions that they believe are justified and are in the best interest of the child", concludes researcher Laure Dombrecht.
Adding an immune checkpoint inhibitor to anti-HER2 treatment in breast cancer does not improve pathological complete response (pCR), according to the primary analysis of the IMpassion050 trial presented today during the ESMO Virtual Plenary.

The phase III trial is the first to report data comparing a neoadjuvant anti-HER2 based regimen with or without the anti-PD-L1 antibody atezolizumab in patients with high-risk, HER2-positive early breast cancer.

The standard treatment for high-risk, HER2-positive early breast cancer is dual anti-HER2 blockade plus chemotherapy. While antibody therapy may enhance innate and adaptive immunity and activate cellular cytotoxicity, there is evidence that combination with a checkpoint inhibitor may further enhance the immune response. IMpassion050 evaluated the efficacy and safety of neoadjuvant atezolizumab versus placebo in patients receiving dose-dense anthracycline and taxane-based chemotherapy as a sequential treatment in combination with the antibodies pertuzumab and trastuzumab.

The trial enrolled 454 patients with high-risk HER2-positive early breast cancer, meaning they had a primary breast tumour size of >2 cm, and pathologic confirmation of nodal involvement. Patients were randomly allocated in a 1:1 ratio to the two treatment arms and received six months of neoadjuvant therapy. Following surgery, patients resumed their allocated treatment with atezolizumab versus placebo. Patients with pCR continued pertuzumab and trastuzumab while those with residual disease could switch to trastuzumab emtansine (T-DM1).

The co-primary endpoints were pCR in the intention to treat (ITT) and PD-L1 positive populations. Event-free survival (EFS), overall survival and safety were secondary endpoints. The trial was stopped prematurely when the Independent Data Monitoring Committee judged that there was an unfavourable benefit-risk profile with the intervention. The data were analysed early, with three patients still to undergo surgery.

In the ITT population, pCR was achieved by 62.4% of the atezolizumab arm and 62.7% of the placebo arm (p= 1.0). In the PD-L1 positive population, pCR was achieved by 64.2% of the atezolizumab arm and 72.5% of the placebo arm (p= 0.2). Regarding safety, there were higher rates of grade 3/4 adverse events (AEs; 51.8% versus 43.6%) and serious AEs (19.5% versus 13.3%) in the neoadjuvant phase with atezolizumab versus placebo, respectively.

During neoadjuvant treatment, four patients in the atezolizumab group died compared to no patient in the placebo group. Of the four deaths, two fatal events were assigned to study treatment- - one due to alveolitis and one due to septic shock, although it is not clear whether these were immune-related.

Lead author Prof Jens Huober, professor?of gynaecologic oncology at the Breast Centre St. Gallen, Switzerland, said:

Overall, the safety profile was consistent with other combination studies with atezolizumab, with no new side-effects. It is important to note that this was a selected population of high-risk HER2-positive patients to justify the potential toxicity of the additional drug and because patients with HER2-positive, node negative, smaller tumours do well with standard treatment."

Huober added: "The additional immunotherapy in this setting did not enhance the pCR rate in the overall population or in any subgroup. However, what counts for patients are EFS and overall survival (OS), which were secondary endpoints and we need longer follow-up for those results. In addition, there is some evidence in triple negative breast cancer that pCR may not be the best endpoint for measuring the efficacy of immunotherapy."

Commenting on the study, Dr Carmen Criscitiello, scientist and senior physician at the European Institute of Oncology in Milan, Italy said: "At trial level pCR is not a robust and validated endpoint for efficacy so the findings should be interpreted with caution until there are long-term results on EFS. In triple negative breast cancer, immune checkpoint inhibition added to standard neoadjuvant therapy modestly increased pCR rate in the GeparNUEVO and KEYNOTE-522 studies - yet EFS was significantly improved in both studies."

Criscitiello added: "In the metastatic setting, the benefit of adding an immune checkpoint inhibitor to chemotherapy is largely confined to the PD-L1 positive population. In the neoadjuvant setting, benefit in patients with triple negative breast cancer has been observed in the overall population and in both PD-L1 positive and negative subgroups. In the IMpassion050 PD-L1 positive group, the pCR rate was numerically inferior in the experimental arm compared to the control arm, suggesting a numerical opposite trend in PD-L1 negative tumours. This indicates the need to better investigate biological differences on the impact of PD-L1 by disease setting."

Criscitiello said the findings on safety should be examined carefully given the curative setting. She said: "Toxicity is more or less in line with what has been reported with similar combinations in other settings. There is a need to investigate if there is any link between atezolizumab and the treatment-related deaths, although - except alveolitis - they were not typical immune-related side-effects. In the curative setting we should be even more conservative and cautious when we look at the toxicity that may be induced by a new treatment. So far, this combination has not demonstrated an improvement in pCR rate, so the balance between risk and benefit should be carefully monitored before considering this therapeutic strategy."
Convalescent plasma therapy was associated with better survival in blood cancer patients hospitalized with COVID-19, especially in sicker patients. The findings by the COVID-19 and Cancer Consortium (CCC19) are newly published in the peer-reviewed journal JAMA Oncology.

The Mays Cancer Center, home to UT Health San Antonio MD Anderson, is part of the CCC19. The international consortium is composed of 124 medical centers and institutions in North and South America that conduct research to learn how COVID-19 affects cancer patients.

Dimpy Shah, MD, PhD, is an epidemiologist and assistant professor of population health sciences at The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio, and a member of its Mays Cancer Center. She serves on the CCC19 steering committee, leads the consortium's Epidemiology Core Committee and is a co-senior author on the study.

Early case reports suggested that cancer patients with COVID-19 benefitted from convalescent plasma, but this is the first analysis that associated convalescent plasma with improved survival using this large, real-world data set." Dr. Dimpy Shah, MD, PhD, epidemiologist and assistant professor of population health sciences, UT Health San Antonio

The analysis compared the 30-day death rates of hospitalized adults with both blood cancer and COVID-19 from patient data supplied by the CCC19 consortium institutions. The analysis compared treatment data from 143 patients who received convalescent plasma and 823 who did not.

"Our study showed a 48% reduced risk of death for COVID patients who had blood cancer and had received convalescent plasma compared to similar patients who did not receive this treatment," she said. "This survival benefit with convalescent plasma was even greater in patients who were admitted to the intensive care unit (60% reduced risk of death) and those who needed mechanical ventilation (68% reduced mortality)," she said.

Blood cancers are associated with defects in the immune system. They begin either in the bone marrow, where blood is made, or in cells of the immune system. These types of cancer include leukemia, lymphoma and multiple myeloma.

Plasma is the largest component of human blood. Red blood cells, white blood cells and platelets are other major blood components. Convalescent plasma is plasma donated by patients who have recovered from an infection, such as COVID 19, and has been used to treat other patients suffering from the disease. Convalescent plasma was used to treat patients during the 1916 poliomyelitis outbreak in New York and during the 1918 Spanish flu epidemic, as well as later for viral infections.

"While acknowledging the limitations of non-randomized observational data, this study provides an important signal regarding the benefits of convalescent plasma. We recommend that researchers conduct randomized clinical trials to prospectively evaluate the benefits of convalescent plasma in patients with blood cancer and severe COVID-19," added Pankil Shah, MD, PhD, MSPH, assistant professor of urology at UT Health San Antonio. As the lead data scientist, Dr. Pankil Shah performed the analysis for this CCC19 study.

Ruben Mesa, MD, FACP, executive director of the Mays Cancer Center, added, "Membership in the CCC19 is just one example of our cancer center's commitment to provide the best possible care for patients throughout South Texas. In addition to providing evidence-based treatments, we also offer our patients participation in hundreds of cancer clinical trials led nationally and at our cancer center that evaluate the newest possible treatments."

He continued: "Throughout the pandemic we have safely cared for our patients and encourage the public to continue getting cancer screenings to avoid the possible progression of undiagnosed cancer to stages where it is more difficult to treat. We are open and ready to safely provide cancer screenings, research opportunities and treatment to the people of South Texas."

Other authors on the study include corresponding author Jeremy Warner, MD, MS, FASCO, associate professor medicine at Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC); lead author Michael Thompson, MD, PhD, oncologist and hematologist with Advocate Aurora Health and Advocate Aurora Research Institute; and additional lead author Jeffrey Henderson, MD, PhD, associate professor of medicine and molecular microbiology at Washington University.

The CCC19 was formed in early 2020 to rapidly collect data as part of an effort to understand the unique effects the coronavirus has on cancer patients.
A large, retrospective, multicenter study involving Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis indicates that convalescent plasma from recovered COVID-19 patients can dramatically improve likelihood of survival among blood cancer patients hospitalized with the virus.

The therapy involves transfusing plasma -; the pale yellow liquid in blood that is rich in antibodies -; from people who have recovered from COVID-19 into patients who have leukemia, lymphoma or other blood cancers and are hospitalized with the viral infection. The goal is to accelerate their disease-fighting response. Cancer patients may be at a higher risk of death related to COVID-19 because of their weakened immune systems.

The data, collected as part of a national registry, indicate that patients who received convalescent plasma from donors who had recovered from COVID-19 had a death rate of 13.3% compared with 24.8% for those who did not receive it.

The difference was especially striking among severely ill patients admitted to intensive care units (ICUs). Such patients treated with convalescent plasma had a death rate of 15.8% compared with 46.9% for those who didn't receive the treatment.

These results suggest that convalescent plasma may not only help COVID-19 patients with blood cancers whose immune systems are compromised, it may also help patients with other illnesses who have weakened antibody responses to this virus or to the vaccines. The data also emphasize the value of an antibody therapy such as convalescent plasma as a virus-directed treatment option for hospitalized COVID-19 patients." Jeffrey P. Henderson, MD, PhD, associate professor of medicine and of molecular microbiology, Washington University

The research is published June 17 in the journal JAMA Oncology.

Henderson collaborated with researchers from the international COVID-19 & Cancer Consortium (CCC19) formed over a year ago to collect and analyze data on the disease's unique interactions. More than 70 institutions in the consortium -; including Advocate Aurora Health in Wisconsin and Illinois, Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, Tenn., and the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. -; participated in this study.

The scientists looked back at patient data to compare the 30-day mortality of 966 hospitalized adults with a blood cancer, such as leukemia, lymphoma or multiple myeloma, who also were diagnosed with COVID-19. The patients, whose average age was 67, were hospitalized at some point from March 17, 2020, through Jan. 21, 2021, due to complications from COVID-19.

Of the patients studied, 143 received convalescent plasma, and 823 did not. Of the 338 patients admitted to ICUs because of severe COVID-19 symptoms, such as difficulty breathing or cardiac distress, those who received the treatment were more than twice as likely to survive.

"In March 2020, the Food and Drug Administration provided a pathway for hospitalized patients to receive COVID-19 convalescent plasma if requested by their physicians," Henderson explained. "After this, the decision to give convalescent plasma was made by physicians and patients on a case-by-case basis. There were no restrictions on when during the course of illness convalescent plasma could be given to patients."

Early in the pandemic, many scientists urged evaluation of convalescent plasma to treat the virus, based on the plasma's historical effectiveness in fighting other viruses. During the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic, some newly infected patients were treated successfully with plasma from people who had recovered from the flu. Additionally, during the outbreaks of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) in 2002 and 2003, health-care workers used plasma transfusion experimentally and, in many cases, successfully to treat small numbers of people. SARS is caused by a coronavirus closely related to the one that causes COVID-19.

However, limited data on the novel coronavirus also caused pause among physicians. Randomized controlled trials -; the gold standard in research -; proved elusive, in most cases, due to the time required to prepare and coordinate adequate trials, and the need for scientists to prioritize among multiple investigational treatment options. Some preliminary results also disappointed, showing convalescent plasma only worked as a treatment in the general patient population if infused within days after diagnosis in patients who hadn't yet progressed to having severe complications.

"As more COVID-19 patients began receiving convalescent plasma, we started hearing physicians around the country report remarkable clinical improvements following convalescent plasma infusions in COVID-19 patients with blood cancers and antibody deficiencies, some of whom were already very ill," said Henderson, one of several physicians who formed the COVID-19 Convalescent Plasma Program Leadership Group to study the use of convalescent plasma for treating COVID-19. "I have seen one of my own patients with blood cancer quickly improve after receiving convalescent plasma. Similar stories that were often very detailed suggested that a formal study would help physicians with decisions they were already making on a daily basis."

During the past year, over phone calls, emails and Zoom chats, updates on convalescent plasma -; its historical success and its prospects for COVID-19 -; were a staple in conversations between Henderson and his longtime friend and co-author Michael Thompson, MD, PhD, who also was his roommate during undergraduate school at the University of Wisconsin in Madison. Thompson is now an oncologist and hematologist at Advocate Aurora Health, and Advocate Aurora Research Institute, both in Wisconsin, as well as a member of the steering committee of the COVID-19 & Cancer Consortium.

"It became increasingly evident that patients with leukemia, lymphoma and other blood cancers were particularly susceptible to severe COVID-19 and that COVID-19 may develop in a unique way in these patients," said Henderson. "We discussed that we might learn something from patients in the COVID-19 & Cancer Consortium, and things started to snowball from there."

Henderson contacted fellow researchers in the COVID-19 Convalescent Plasma Program, including Michael J. Joyner, MD, who is a professor of anesthesiology at the Mayo Clinic and works closely with the FDA. Thompson reached out to Jeremy Warner, MD -; a professor of medicine at Vanderbilt, a steering committee member of the COVID-19 consortium and who operates the CCC19 registry. Together, the researchers plumbed the group's registry of de-identified data abstracted from medical records.

"The data started coming fast and furious," Henderson recalled.

"Given that patients with blood cancers have higher mortality rates from COVID-19, we suspect our findings, along with other similar cases not in this database, support using convalescent plasma to improve survival in these patients," Thompson said.

Henderson and Thompson contributed equally as the study's first authors. Joyner is a co-author, and Warner is the senior author. "Despite the inevitable limitations of retrospective data, we find these results compelling and certainly hope that they will be quickly investigated in a prospective clinical trial," Warner added. "We are exploring future research, including whether there is an interplay between patient factors and treatments received prior to the development of COVID-19, such as B-cell depleting monoclonal antibodies."
The coronavirus disease (COVID-19), caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), continues to spread worldwide. To date, over 177.13 million cases have been reported, and over 3.8 million have lost their lives. Finding effective treatments that can mitigate severe disease remains a crucial area of scientific research.

Drug repurposing for COVID-19 helps scientists identify potential drugs to treat COVID-19 without going through the rigorous process of formulation, clinical trials, and gaining regulatory body approval. Many of the drugs used for COVID-19 today were initially developed for other pathogens.

Early-stage trials from scientists at the University of Pennsylvania, USA, demonstrates that cyclosporine A (CSA), a calcineurin inhibitor that modulates cytokine production, may have potential antiviral properties against coronaviruses.

In the study, which appeared on the medRxiv* pre-print server, the researchers aimed to test whether a short course of CSA can help combat COVID-19.

What is cyclosporine A (CSA)?

Cyclosporine is a natural cyclic polypeptide immunosuppressant isolated from the fungus Beauveria nivea. Cyclosporines exact mechanism of action is unknown, but scientists believe it may involve binding to the cellular protein cytophilin, inhibiting the enzyme calcineurin.

The complex CSA-cyclophilin interferes with a complex of phosphatases known as calcineurin that plays an imperative role in the immune response. The drug acts as an immunosuppressant commonly used after an organ transplant to reduce the immune systems activity, preventing organ rejection.

COVID-19 and cytokine storm

The SARS-CoV-2 infection varies in severity, with a majority of patients experiencing mild to moderate illness. Severe pneumonia occurs in about 15 percent of cases and drives mortality. People who are at a higher risk of developing severe COVID-19 include the elderly, those who have compromised immune systems, and those with comorbidities.

COVID-19 is characterized by immune dysregulation or a cytokine storm, an orchestrated response that involves infected cells, macrophages, T cells, and other immune cells. The cytokines or chemokines are produced and can affect the respiratory tract, causing widespread lung inflammation.

Further, severe COVID-19 patients tend to have high interleukin 2 (IL-2), IL-7, IL-19, tumor necrosis factor (TNF), granulocyte colony-stimulating factor (G-CSF), C-X-C motif chemokine ligand 10 (CXCL10), monocyte chemoattractant protein 1 (MCP1), and macrophage inflammatory protein (MIP) in the blood.

Increased levels of these cytokines, C-reactive protein (CRP), and ferritin, accompanied by lymphopenia, are usually seen in severely ill COVID-19 patients. These are hallmarks of patients experiencing macrophage activation syndrome.

The study

The researchers tested whether a short course of treatment with CSA was safe for COVID-19 patients. They treated ten hospitalized but non-critically ill patients with CSA at an initial dose of 9mg/kg/day orally divided into dosing every 12 hours.

The researchers conducted a therapeutic drug monitoring on the second day, and every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday during active dosing. The succeeding cyclosporine dosing was adjusted to target a trough level of 200 to 300ng/mL without a maximum dose level.

During the treatment, five patients reported adverse effects, but none were serious. None of the enrolled participants needed intensive care unit-level care, and all patients were able to return home from the hospital.

The researchers found that the CSA treatment was linked to reduced cytokine and chemokine levels in the blood, both of which are associated with hyper-inflammation in COVID-19.

In conclusion, short courses of CSA appear safe and feasible in COVID-19 patients requiring oxygen and therefore, may be a useful adjunct in resource-poor or resource-limited health care settings, the team concluded in the study.

One advantage of CSA is the cost-effectiveness of the treatment since drug acquisition costs are low, and it is widely available in oral pill and liquid formulations. Hence, the team showed that CSA is a potentially effective treatment for SARS-CoV-2 infection. It has anti-inflammatory properties, is widely available, low cost, and safe to use.

With further research that corroborates the teams findings, CSA may prove a cheap, safe and effective therapy for COVID-19 patients.

*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 new study shows that depleting mouse blood of the protein ADORA2B led to faster declines in memory, delays in auditory processing, and increased brain inflammation.

Cognitive Decline. Image Credit: FGC/Shutterstock.com

Exploring the origin of brain aging through oxygen deprivation

With the global increase in life expectancy, the number of people who will experience age-related cognitive decline will increase in association. As the amount of oxygen in blood also declines with age, a team of researchers made of Texan and Chinese scientists led by Quinfeng Qiang, hypothesized that aging in the brain might be naturally held at bay by adenosine receptor A2B (ADORA2B).

Indeed, mounting evidence suggests that oxygen levels decline with age, leading to a series of responses such as the activation of macrophages to release more pro-inflammatory chemokines and cytokines. Altogether, this process is often referred to as inflammaging, and may help scientists explore the reasons underlying cognitive decline as well as providing insights into the process of aging.

In the present study, the researchers examined the role of adenosine receptors in the brain. Although research has considered these receptors for some time, most studies have focused on neurons or immune cells of the brain. However, little is known about the functional role of erythrocytes, which are the only cells carrying and delivering oxygen to every cell in the body, in age-related cognitive decline.

The ADORA2B protein is expressed on the membrane of red blood cells is known to help release oxygen from the blood cells making it available to use in the body. Specifically, increased levels of ADORA2B activate AMP-activated protein kinases that activate bisphosphoglycerate mutase (BPGM). Importantly, BPGM is an allosteric modulator of hemoglobin that counteracts the effects of hypoxia.

To test this hypothesis, researchers created mice that lacked ADORA2B in their blood and compared behavioral and physiological measures with control mice. This will then provide key insight into the role of the ADORA2B-BPGM signaling axis.

The study published in the open-access journal PLOS Biology demonstrated that the older mice displaying the typical characteristics of cognitive decline including poor memory, hearing deficits, and higher brain inflammatory responses, were all higher in mice lacking the ADORA2B protein.

Additionally, after experiencing a period of oxygen deprivation, the behavioral and physiological effects on young mice without ADORA2B were much greater than those on normal young mice.

An irreplaceable function in oxygen delivery

The findings, therefore, demonstrate that brain aging is naturally reduced by ADORA2B, whose main function is oxygen delivery to support activity.

Further studies are needed to determine the fluctuations in ADORA2B levels, and if they naturally decline with age. The implications for applying such results also extend to developing drug treatments that can activate or enhance ADORA2B expression to reduce cognitive decline.

Red blood cells have an irreplaceable function to deliver oxygen to maintain bioenergetics of every single cell within our body. However, their function in age-related cognition and hearing function remains largely unknown. Our findings reveal that the red blood cell ADORA2B signaling cascade combats the early onset of age-related decline in cognition, memory, and hearing by promoting oxygen delivery in mice and immediately highlight multiple new rejuvenating targets". Dr. Xia

In conclusion, the authors indicate that the findings reveal a promising therapeutic target in erythrocytes to counter early aging and age-related impaired cognition and hearing function. Nevertheless, this is primarily a mechanistic finding that demands further validation in humans.
For the third time in nine years, the Affordable Care Act has survived a constitutional challenge at the Supreme Court. In a 7-2 decision, the court ruled that the states and individuals who filed the latest challenge lacked standing to sue.

Meanwhile, Democratic lawmakers are looking for ways to expand health benefits as they pull together spending plans on Capitol Hill. And criticism is growing of the Food and Drug Administration, which approved a controversial drug to treat Alzheimer's disease over the recommendation of its own expert outside advisers.

This week's panelists are Julie Rovner of KHN, Joanne Kenen of Politico, Mary Ellen McIntire of CQ Roll Call and Rachel Cohrs of Stat.

Among the takeaways from this week's episode:

The ACA decision Thursday was a signal that the Supreme Court is moving beyond Republican arguments that the landmark health law is unconstitutional or should be overturned. At least one other challenge is still working its way through the court system, and the Supreme Court may still be called on to settle questions about specific provisions or aspects of implementation. But it appears that legal challenges are no longer an existential threat to the overall law.

The first major ACA case that made its way to the Supreme Court was one brought by business groups. But over time, industry has come to accept the ACA and most businesses do not want to see more challenges that threaten the entire law.

The court's decision leaves Republicans in a tough position. Their opposition to the law has become a standard part of the party's identity, yet Republican lawmakers never put forward a strong vision for a replacement or a path to meeting the country's health care needs if the ACA were overturned. Because health care policy issues are not front and center on Capitol Hill at the moment, Republicans have time to formulate a new strategy. But they may need a message when Democrats move soon to make permanent the enhanced insurance subsidies for plans on the ACA marketplace.

The congressional clock is ticking as Democrats strategize on a variety of policies, including infrastructure and those health premium subsidies. If bipartisan deals are not made soon, Democratic leaders will likely push to use a complicated process called budget reconciliation that allows some types of bills to be passed by a simple majority in the Senate and not be subjected to a filibuster. Health provisions could be part of such a bill, such as lowering the eligibility age for Medicare, establishing higher insurance subsidies and allowing Medicare to negotiate drug prices.

One of the most popular options Democrats would like to add to a reconciliation bill would be expanding Medicare benefits to cover dental, vision and hearing care.

As the country continues to transition to a new normal as the covid pandemic eases, some employers are mandating that workers be vaccinated  but, in some instances, workers are refusing. The issue has already led to a legal fight over a Houston hospital's mandate and is likely to spread. Workers argue that the vaccine has not yet been formally approved by federal regulators, having received only emergency authorization. That could change soon, though, because at least two vaccine makers are asking for a former approval from the FDA.

Also this week, Rovner interviews Andy Slavitt, who ran Medicare and Medicaid in the Obama administration and most recently helped head up the covid response effort for President Joe Biden.

Plus, for extra credit, the panelists recommend their favorite health policy stories of the week they think you should read, too:

Julie Rovner: Politico Magazine's "How the Anti-Abortion Movement Used the Progressive Playbook to Chip Away at Roe v. Wade," by Mary Ziegler and Robert L. Tsai

Joanne Kenen: The Atlantic's "The Texans Challenging Obamacare Have No Standing," by Nicholas Bagley

Rachel Cohrs: KHN's "In Alleged Health Care 'Money Grab,' Nation's Largest Hospital Chain Cashes In on Trauma Centers," by Jay Hancock

Mary Ellen McIntire: The New York Times' "Many Post-Covid Patients Are Experiencing New Medical Problems, Study Finds," by Pam Belluck

Also: Roll Call's "CDC Issues Guidance for Treating 'Long COVID' Patients," by Mary Ellen McIntire
In the mid-14th century Europe was devastated by a major pandemic - the Black Death - which killed between 40 and 60 per cent of the population. Later waves of plague then continued to strike regularly over several centuries.

Plague kills so rapidly it leaves no visible traces on the skeleton, so archaeologists have previously been unable to identify individuals who died of plague unless they were buried in mass graves.

Whilst it has long been suspected that most plague victims received individual burial, this has been impossible to confirm until now.

By studying DNA from the teeth of individuals who died at this time, researchers from the After the Plague project, based at the Department of Archaeology, University of Cambridge, have identified the presence of Yersinia Pestis, the pathogen that causes plague.

These include people who received normal individual burials at a parish cemetery and friary in Cambridge and in the nearby village of Clopton.

Lead author Craig Cessford of the University of Cambridge said:

These individual burials show that even during plague outbreaks individual people were being buried with considerable care and attention. This is shown particularly at the friary where at least three such individuals were buried within the chapter house. Cambridge Archaeological Unit conducted excavations on this site on behalf of the University in 2017. The individual at the parish of All Saints by the Castle in Cambridge was also carefully buried; this contrasts with the apocalyptic language used to describe the abandonment of this church in 1365 when it was reported that the church was partly ruinous and 'the bones of dead bodies are exposed to beasts'.

The study also shows that some plague victims in Cambridge did, indeed, receive mass burials.

Yersinia Pestis was identified in several parishioners from St Bene't's, who were buried together in a large trench in the churchyard excavated by the Cambridge Archaeological Unit on behalf of Corpus Christi College.

This part of the churchyard was soon afterwards transferred to Corpus Christi College, which was founded by the St Bene't's parish guild to commemorate the dead including the victims of the Black Death. For centuries, the members of the College would walk over the mass burial every day on the way to the parish church.

Cessford concluded, "Our work demonstrates that it is now possible to identify individuals who died from plague and received individual burials. This greatly improves our understanding of the plague and shows that even in incredibly traumatic times during past pandemics people tried very hard to bury the deceased with as much care as possible."
In early January 2021, travelers returning to Tokyo, Japan, from Amazonas, Brazil, were screened for COVID-19 at the airport. A few days later, the National Institute of Infectious Disease of Japan announced that the travelers had returned with a new variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus.

That variant, known as gamma, or P.1, led to a deadly surge in COVID-19 cases in Brazil this spring, and has now spread across the world. More than 200 cases have been detected in Wisconsin. Whether current vaccines are as effective against the gamma variant remains unknown.

In a new study using variant virus recovered from one of the original travelers, researchers in the U.S. and Japan have found that vaccination with an mRNA vaccine induces antibody responses that would protect humans from infection with the gamma/P.1 variant. Hamsters previously infected with the virus strains first circulating in early 2020 were also protected from infection with the gamma variant nine months later.

The findings, the researchers say, suggest that previous SARS-CoV-2 infection and vaccines that are based on earlier strains of the virus still provide protection against infection with gamma. The study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on June 17, 2021.

The animals were quite protected. There may be people who get infected with this variant even though they are vaccinated or were previously infected, but they shouldn't get severe disease." Yoshihiro Kawaoka, Study Lead, Professor of Virology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Veterinary Medicine and the University of Tokyo

However, he says, "that is not consistent with what has been happening in Brazil," where there have been reports of people reinfected with the gamma variant after recovering from infection with an earlier strain. It's possible, Kawaoka says, that COVID-19 immunity lasts longer in hamsters than in humans, or that cases documented as reinfections are actually first infections.

Kawaoka's research team established the Syrian hamster model for COVID-19 last year, after demonstrating that hamsters are highly susceptible to the SARS-CoV-2 virus and develop disease similar to humans, like ground glass opacity in their lungs. They also develop lasting antibodies that protect against reinfection.

"Animal models are great because (they allow us to) test vaccines, test drugs, test monoclonal antibodies and even do pathogenesis (studies)," says Kawaoka.

In fact, his team studied the gamma variant in hamsters because, while previous studies suggested P.1 might bind better to cells and resist antibodies created by previous infections or vaccination, little is known about the variant's ability to replicate in the body, how much illness or pathogenesis it causes, or how well immune responses react to the virus.

The researchers infected hamsters with either the P.1/gamma variant isolated from the traveler, or with one of two earlier strains of the virus from human samples -- one isolated from a patient in February 2020, and the other from a patient with a non-variant globally predominant strain. Each of the strains replicated similarly in the nose and lungs of hamsters and caused similar illness affecting the lungs.

Next, Kawaoka's team looked at whether antibodies in convalescent sera from 35 recovered COVID-19 patients or from people who'd received the Pfizer-BioNTech mRNA vaccine could neutralize each of the three viral strains.

Following a natural infection or vaccination, the body produces antibodies that learn to recognize the spike protein of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which is responsible for binding to cells. Should people encounter the virus again, antibodies recognize the spike protein and subsequently fight off or limit the extent of infection.

Earlier studies have shown that a spike protein mutation -- E484K, found in gamma variants -- can change the spike protein's identity just enough that the variant can slip past these defenses. However, antibodies in the blood of vaccinated individuals reacted to all three strains, including gamma.

Antibodies in the blood of recovered COVID-19 patients were also effective at neutralizing each of the strains. However, of the 35 patients, one had been infected with gamma and the antibodies from this individual were less reactive to the non-variant strains.

The researchers say these findings suggest there are some important differences in the spike protein of gamma that might influence immunity, warranting further monitoring. Additionally, Kawaoka's group found that gamma, but not other strains of SARS-CoV-2, can infect and replicate in mice, suggesting that the spike protein interacts differently with cells than earlier strains.

The researchers also found that hamsters that had recovered from infection with either of the earlier strains of SARS-CoV-2 were protected against viral replication in their lungs if reinfected with either the same strain or the gamma variant, three weeks and nine months later.

However, gamma was recovered in the nasal passages of reinfected animals in both groups. The amount of virus in the nasal passages of reinfected animals was 1,000-fold lower than animals infected for the first time.

Finally, the researchers studied whether convalescent plasma from three patients infected with SARS-CoV-2 in early 2020 could protect against viral replication in the nose and lungs of hamsters. They found that convalescent plasma, but not plasma from patients who did not have COVID-19, limited virus replication in the lungs of hamsters infected with the prevailing non-variant strain and with gamma/P.1. Virus was found in their nasal passages.

Vaccination, Kawaoka says, is the best way to seek protection from SARS-CoV-2 and emerging variants, including the delta variant, also known as B.1.617.2. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently designated the delta version as a variant of concern due to evidence that it transmits more readily.

Peter Halfmann, research associate professor at UW-Madison and co-leader of the study, added that the gamma and delta variants are circulating in Madison and other parts of the U.S., highlighting the importance of vaccination.

"The difference between the original strain and (delta) and the original strain and (gamma) is similar," Kawaoka adds, noting: "The (delta) variant may become prevalent but it shouldn't be extremely concerning as long as you are vaccinated."

With SARS-CoV-2 changing as it spreads, some versions of the virus will disappear as new variants emerge, as happened with a European variant in early 2020 that quickly eclipsed the original virus first found in China.

"At least in the vast majority of the population, we don't have good immunity to SARS-CoV-2, so the selective pressure on the virus at the moment is transmissibility," Kawaoka says, explaining why new variants that successfully spread tend to be more transmissible than those that came before. "But it will change. We should expect to see the selective pressure become immunity."

This is why vaccines will likely need to be modified in the coming years, he explains, in order to protect against a virus that will evolve to evade the protections we devise so long as spread of the virus remains high, or if our immune systems don't maintain defenses for long enough to prevent reinfections.

"We don't know which one is going to be the case ... it's too early to say how long immunity to this virus lasts," he says. "Hamsters look different from humans, anyway. It's difficult to predict."
Christopher Richmond keeps a running tab on how many workers at the ManorCare skilled nursing facility he manages in western Pennsylvania have rolled up their sleeves for a covid-19 vaccine.

Although residents were eager for the shots this year, he's counted only about 3 in 4 workers vaccinated at any one time. The excuses, among its staff of roughly 100, had a familiar ring: Because covid vaccines were authorized only for emergency use, some staffers worried about safety. Convenience mattered. In winter, shots were administered at work through a federal rollout. By spring, though, workers had to sign up online through a state program  a time-sucking task.

ManorCare urges every worker to be immunized against covid but turnover has vexed that effort. Managers at ProMedica, a nonprofit health system that operates ManorCare and senior care facilities in 26 states, faced a workforce conundrum familiar to all manner of providers during the pandemic: how to persuade essential workers to get vaccinated  and in a way that didn't drive them away. Raises and bonuses, costing millions of dollars, did not move the needle to 100%.

Animus toward the vaccine created turmoil for some providers. Dr. Eric Berger, a pediatrician in Philadelphia who opened his practice more than a dozen years ago, enforced mandatory shots in May and saw six of his 47 staff members walk out. Berger said he worked for months to educate resistant workers. In April, he learned that several, women in their 20s and 30s, had attended a private karaoke party. Within days, four staffers were infected with covid.

Berger, who had seen in-office costs for protective equipment soar, then set a deadline for shots. He looks back with steely resolve over the last-minute "I quit" texts he received  and the hassle of finding a new receptionist and billing and medical assistants.

"Fortunately, we had some wonderful people who put in extra time," he said. "It's been stressful, but I think we did the right thing."

Brittany Kissling, 33 and a mother of four, was one of the hesitant workers at Berger's practice who decided  largely for financial reasons  to get vaccinated. The clinic manager couldn't afford to lose her job. But she said she was nervous and that most of the workers who left recoiled at being told vaccinations were not negotiable. "I was a no-show my first time," Kissling said about her first vaccine appointment. "I was scared. There were a lot of unknowns."

But Kissling said Berger's practice has spent "thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars" on masks and even paid workers for five days a week when they worked only two during the pandemic's worst months. She said she understood how and why the karaoke episode prompted a mandate. "I get it from the business side," said Kissling, about the requirement. "I do think it's fair. I do think it is tough."

Berger saw no other choice. "Vaccines are fundamental to our practices. That's what we do," he said. "Some got it in their heads that it could cause infertility; some had other reasons. It's frustrating  [and] I don't think it was political. If anything, most of these people are apolitical."

At ManorCare, managers decided money could make a difference. Bonuses  up to $200 per employee  were added as an incentive, which in Pennsylvania alone cost ProMedica $3 million, said Luke Pile, vice president and general manager for ProMedica Senior Care skilled nursing centers.

Richmond, at ManorCare, said the resident council has been pivotal in keeping the focus on the risks of covid to the elderly  and no one there needs a reminder about the stress of the past year. According to Medicare records, the facility had 107 cases of covid among staffers and residents  and 14 deaths among residents beginning in March 2020.

"I constantly wear a mask. Not out of fear, but I don't want to spread it by being asymptomatic," Richmond said. "I tell people here: Whatever is happening in the community, that is what is happening in the community. But we are a health care institution and caring for the elderly. We need to be constantly vigilant."

Richmond and other administrators admit it can be a struggle to understand why some health workers are unmoved by the science.

"Everything has been so polarized this past year. I don't know that there is a single reason that individuals don't get the vaccine," Pile said. "In trying to educate people, personally and professionally, we talk about the history and science. Unfortunately, individual opinions don't always align with that."

Mandating vaccines is a step that ProMedica has yet to take, even as more businesses, universities and health care providers do so. A few long-term care operators, such as Atria Senior Living, operating in the United and Canada, and Juniper Communities, announced mandates. Some have been met with lawsuits from workers aligned with conservative groups. In May, more than 100 staffers at Houston Methodist Hospital filed suit to dispute and derail the hospital system's compulsory vaccination. A judge dismissed the challenge this month on the grounds that the hospital's requirement did not violate state or federal law or public policy.

Last week, the U.S. Labor Department issued a temporary emergency standard for health care workers, saying they face "grave danger" in the workplace when "less than 100 percent of the workforce is fully vaccinated."

In Pennsylvania, whose population ranks among the oldest according to 2019 census data, statistical snapshots published in April underscored the need for vigilance. Two state agencies overseeing skilled nursing care and personal care homes reported that only half of their workers were vaccinated. Covid was notably devastating to long-term care facilities nationwide in 2020; some of Pennsylvania's deadliest outbreaks were reported by local media in places shown later to have low staff vaccination rates.

A survey by the Delphi Group, begun in March 2020 with over 700,000 Facebook respondents ages 18 to 64, recently was analyzed by researchers from Carnegie Mellon and the University of Pittsburgh, who found that health care workers were largely leading the vaccine uptake. But there were notable differences over the winter among people working, side by side, in health care settings.

Pharmacists, physicians and registered nurses were the least hesitant to get vaccinated. Home health care aides, EMTs and nursing assistants showed the highest hesitancy among front-line health workers. Overall hesitancy across professions decreased from January to March 2021, as much as 5 percentage points, as vaccinations expanded, according to the analysis by the university researchers.

University of Pittsburgh researcher Wendy King said people indicated they were receptive to the vaccine if they were familiar with its science. Educators, overall, displayed the least hesitancy; workers in construction, mining and oil/gas extraction showed the greatest. Half of those who were hesitant cited possible side effects  a fear that could be eased by education, King said. A third among the hesitant gave other reasons: They didn't believe they needed the vaccine. They didn't trust the government. Or they didn't trust the covid-19 vaccines.

"We expected hesitancy to vary by group, but how much they varied was surprising," King said. "These were not people who were anti-vaccine, but they were worried about the effect of the vaccine."

Still, King said the percentage who didn't trust the government was alarming. "If somebody doesn't understand the vaccine, that's one thing. If you don't trust that government, that is a much more difficult issue to address."

That may change as two prominent vaccine makers approach full approval by the Food and Drug Administration. Pfizer and BioNTech applied for approval in May; Moderna applied in early June. A recent KFF poll found nearly a third of unvaccinated adults said they would be more likely to get a vaccine once it was fully approved by the FDA.

At ProMedica, Pile described a multipronged approach in such states as Florida and Pennsylvania, home to large elderly populations. On-site counseling in groups, with familiar doctors and staff, helped persuade some who were reluctant, he said. Short videos on why and how the vaccine worked were readied. ProMedica senior medical staff flew to Florida to advise as the National Guard arrived at its facility in Pinellas County, the health system's first to receive the vaccine.

Falon Blessing, a nurse, manages other practitioners at ManorCare Health Services Center throughout the Tampa region. She recounted how employees had wondered aloud how such newly created vaccines could be safe.

"I think people at first just wanted to know: I'm not going to grow a tail in five years," she said. "But then there was a momentum. It wasn't so much 'Are you going to get vaccinated?' but rather 'Of course, I'm going to get vaccinated.'"

During three vaccinations sessions ended in January, though, the facility reached about the same rate as Pennsylvania overall  about 76% of its workers were vaccinated. That rate has fallen to 62% this month because of attrition. An education effort continues, a ProMedica spokesperson said.

"My takeaway was it mattered to have one-on-one discussions," Pile said. "If you talk to 10 people, why they wouldn't get the vaccine, you'd get 10 different reasons."

"And there were political opinions  what they heard on Facebook  and then they'd say: I want to see how it goes," he said.

The questions and qualms about vaccines came at the end of a deeply distressing pandemic year for health care workers, and facilities are now finding fewer applicants for essential care.

By spring, ProMedica had 1,500 job postings in Pennsylvania alone, compared with a typical 400 openings. Pile said ProMedica raised wages in dozens of locations, though he declined to provide wage ranges or rates. It spent $4.5 million in Pennsylvania from March through last week  and still supplemented its workforce across the U.S. by hiring through staffing agencies.

"In 2020, we spent over $32 million on staffing agencies," he said. Through this spring, ProMedica was on course to spend $66 million on staffing agencies for 2021, said Pile, who has worked in the care sector for 18 years.

"I have less employees than ever before," he said. "I have never seen anything like it."

The Pennsylvania Health Care Association, an advocacy group, surveyed members in April to better understand vaccine reluctance. Zachary Shamberg, the group's president, said it found that defining "hesitancy is not that simple."

Shamberg said PHCA focused on why people had yet to be immunized and the characteristics of the workforce were telling: About 92% of all its workers are women; 65% are between ages 16 and 44. Among them, some worried early on about possible infertility from the new vaccine, he said, and some wanted to wait for the single-shot Johnson & Johnson vaccine. Others were sick with covid and were advised, once recovered, not to get a vaccine for 90 days.

Shamberg was also critical of the state data. Those surveys, taken in March and released in April, reflected a time when the vaccine was new to many people.

Pennsylvania, a battleground state in recent presidential elections, remains politically charged, and Shamberg noted that politics likely plays a role among holdouts. In recent months, PHCA enlisted churches and doctors' consortiums to change minds. Keeping residents and workers safe should be a priority in a state that, in a few years, will face a "silver tsunami" of residents in their 80s, Shamberg said.

In recent weeks, there has been clear momentum among the general population for shots in Pennsylvania. The state now ranks among the top 10 states in the nation to administer first doses of vaccines, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"Pennsylvania is a big and diverse state," Shamberg said. "And it's interesting why some of our staff in western Pennsylvania were hesitant versus workers in the city of Philadelphia."

"The vast majority of workers in Philadelphia are female and, among them, minority populations that have some inherent distrust based on historical experience. Then you go out west and you have a more conservative viewpoint  and a distrust of government today and a distrust of government vaccine."
The Centre for Health Protection today said it is investigating three additional COVID-19 cases involving patients who arrived from Cyprus and Indonesia.

A total of 32 cases were reported in Hong Kong in the past 14 days, including three local cases, of which one is from an unknown source.

Meanwhile, four schools now covered in the compulsory testing notice due to outbreaks of upper respiratory tract infection or influenza-like illness.

For information and health advice on COVID-19, visit the Governments dedicated webpage.
Jeffersonville, IN (47130)

Today

Cloudy skies early, followed by partial clearing. High 79F. Winds NNE at 10 to 15 mph..

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Mostly clear. Low 58F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph.
Goldsboro, NC (27530)

Today

Showers and thunderstorms likely. Storms may contain strong gusty winds. High 79F. Winds WSW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 90%. Rainfall may reach one inch..

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Scattered thunderstorms during the evening. Cloudy skies after midnight. Low 66F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 50%.
(Newser)  Matthew McConaughey would have plenty going for him in a Texas campaign for governor, Sen. Ted Cruz acknowledged Thursday. "He's a movie star," Cruz said, "and a good-looking, charming, affable movie star can be a really formidable candidate on the ballot." That doesn't mean he wants the Academy Award winner in the race, Politico reports. "I hope Matthew decides not to run," Cruz said, per the Hill.

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The Republican senator, who said he knows the 51-year-old actor slightly and likes him, said on Hugh Hewitt's radio show that he hopes McConaughey stays out of the race next year against Republican Gov. Greg Abbott. Cruz called Abbott a "close friend and mentor." The actor, who lives in Austin, has been looking into launching a campaign. (Read more Matthew McConaughey stories.)
(Newser)  Gov. Greg Abbott invoked not just the imagery of the Alamo when he signed a package of legislation relaxing gun control laws in Texashe called on the head of the National Rifle Association to line up with him. The governor staged a bill-signing ceremony Thursday in San Antonio, a day after actually signing the bills, the Austin American-Statesman reports. One of the new laws allows anyone 21 or older to carry a handgun in public without a permit. Until now, a permit was required, as was training and a criminal background check. "There is a need for people to have a weapon to defend themselves in the Lone Star State," Abbott said, per the AP. Wayne LaPierre, NRA boss, said: "People want to be able to protect themselves. And thank God that Texas is leading the way for the country."

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At the same time, demonstrators including Moms Demand Action protested the new laws outside the governor's mansion in Austin. The other six measures, all of which take effect Sept. 1, per the American-Statesman, will:

Prohibit government contracts with any entity that discriminates against the firearm industry.

Keep hotels from enacting restrictive gun policies.

Grant people carrying handguns more choices on which holster to wear.

Take firearm suppressors off the list of prohibited weapons under the Texas Penal Code.

Decree firearms manufacturers and sellers essential businesses.

Bar state and local governments from enforcing new federal gun regulations.

The head of the Texas Municipal Police Association says the new legislation will make it tougher for officers to determine whether someone carrying a gun is allowed to, per Reuters . (Read more gun laws stories.)
(Newser)  One person was shot dead and a dozen others injured after a man allegedly went on a drive-by shooting spree over the course of an hour and a half in Arizona's Phoenix metro area Thursday morning. Police say there were "eight incidents," CNN reports. Of the 12 people hurt, three were shot and the others were injured by shrapnel and debris. All are expected to survive, reports the Arizona Republic, which has a list of all the West Valley incident locations.

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The suspect, an adult male, was taken into custody after a firefighter spotted his vehicle, which police were searching for, AZFamily.com reports. Details, including a motive, are not yet clear, but ABC News reports that police don't think road rage was involved. All the victims were adults, and there are no other suspects. (Read more Phoenix stories.)
(Newser)  ObamaCare survived another Supreme Court challenge Thursday, with justices, including two of the three appointed by former President Trump, upholding the law in a 7-2 ruling that declared 19 GOP-led states and two individuals did not have standing to challenge the law. That's the biggest margin of victory for the health care law in the three SCOTUS challenges it has faced, and analysts say it appears increasingly safe from Republican attempts to overturn it in the courts. Some takeaways:

TrumpObamaCare's savior? Philip Bump at the Washington Post argues that Trump's failed efforts to dismantle the law helped boost its popularity by raising awareness of what it actually contained. Republicans did manage to strip the law of the individual mandate, but instead of collapsing as predicted, ObamaCare survived "unburdened" by the unpopular mandate, he writes. Click for the full piece.

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"The war appears to be over." ObamaCare advocatesand some Republican lawmakerssay the law appears to be here to stay, though further efforts at repeal have not been ruled out, the Hill reports. "The war appears to be over and the Affordable Care Act has won, says Stan Dorn at the health care advocacy group Families USA.

ObamaCare advocatesand some Republican lawmakerssay the law appears to be here to stay, though further efforts at repeal have not been ruled out, the Hill reports. "The war appears to be over and the Affordable Care Act has won, says Stan Dorn at the health care advocacy group Families USA. Republicans switch focus . The AP spoke to more than a dozen GOP lawmakers after Thursday's decision and none of them suggested taking another shot at repeal. "Just practically speaking, you need 60 votes in a Republican Senate, a Republican president, right?" said Sen. Bill Cassidy. "And we've tried that and were unable to accomplish it." Instead, the lawmakers called for controlling health care costs and other changes.

. The AP spoke to more than a dozen GOP lawmakers after Thursday's decision and none of them suggested taking another shot at repeal. "Just practically speaking, you need 60 votes in a Republican Senate, a Republican president, right?" said Sen. Bill Cassidy. "And we've tried that and were unable to accomplish it." Instead, the lawmakers called for controlling health care costs and other changes. The battles to come. The ruling has ended the "era of existential fights" for ObamaCare, according to the New York Times, but there will be more health care battles to come. Many Democrats now want to expand coverage, but the party is divided over proposals and whatever steps they take in that direction, potentially including lowering the age for Medicare eligibility or adding a public option, will face firm opposition from Republicans and industry groups.

The ruling has ended the "era of existential fights" for ObamaCare, according to the New York Times, but there will be more health care battles to come. Many Democrats now want to expand coverage, but the party is divided over proposals and whatever steps they take in that direction, potentially including lowering the age for Medicare eligibility or adding a public option, will face firm opposition from Republicans and industry groups. Ruling "allows all parties to move on." Health care strategist Chris Jennings, who has advised the last three Democratic administrations, tells Politico that the ruling is "significant in that it allows all parties to move on, to either build up or tear down." The courts, he says, "are basically saying: Stop it, move on, you have every ability if you want to alter this bill, but do it by the books."

Health care strategist Chris Jennings, who has advised the last three Democratic administrations, tells Politico that the ruling is "significant in that it allows all parties to move on, to either build up or tear down." The courts, he says, "are basically saying: Stop it, move on, you have every ability if you want to alter this bill, but do it by the books." Obama speaks out. "This ruling reaffirms what we have long known to be true: the Affordable Care Act is here to stay," the former president tweeted. He added: "Now we need to build on the Affordable Care Act and continue to strengthen and expand it."

(Read more ObamaCare stories.)
(Newser)  A brown bear invaded one of Japan's largest cities Friday, storming through a military base and airport, before it was shot and killed. Four people were injured by the bear, which was spotted running through residential neighborhoods and scaling fences in Sapporo on the northern island of Hokkaido. "Given that it is the breeding season right now, it's highly conceivable that the male was chasing after a female bear, and in the process wandered into a residential area," Shinsuke Koike, a bear expert at Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology, tells the Washington Post. It reports such encounters are on the rise in Japan, where a shrinking rural population has allowed bears to expand their territory into mountain foothills and flatlands. It's "to the point of bears living right behind people's backyards," says Koike.

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Environment Ministry data shows two people were killed and 158 were injured in encounters with bears in 2020, while at least 6,861 bears were killed, per the Post. This bear met that same fate after injuring four people, including an 80-something woman, per the Times of London. A man in his 40s was mauled from behind, suffering various injuries including broken ribs, per the outlet. A soldier was also injured as the bear forced its way through the gates of a military base run by Japan's Self-Defense Forces, per the Guardian. The bear also climbed a fence at Sapporo Okadama airport, where eight flights were canceled. Ten schools were closed. Hunters were recruited to take down the bear, as Koike says tranquilizing it would have taken too long, risking further incidents. The bear fell around 11am local time, eight hours after it was initially spotted. (Read more bear attack stories.)
(Newser)  You can stop looking for the fountain of youth now. It does not exist, according to new research, which finds its likely impossible to slow the rate of aging due to biological constraints. While that might seem like a foregone conclusion, an unprecedented study brought together scientists from 42 institutions in 14 countries to test the theory that species face a relatively fixed rate of aging from adulthood. This involved monitoring 30 species of primates over decades so their lifespans could be compared to those of humans. The same general pattern of mortalitya high risk of death in infancy, followed by a rapid decline into early adulthood, then a constant rise with advanced ageappeared across populations of gorillas, baboons, chimpanzees, and guenons in the wild and in zoos, as well as modern and historical human populations, including hunter-gatherers, per the Guardian.

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This suggests that "rather than slowing down death, more people are living much longer due to a reduction in mortality at younger ages," Oxford University researcher Jose Manuel Aburto says in a release. He notes life expectancy in 17th-century Europe was low because many people died young. "More people get to live much longer now," thanks to "medical, social, and environmental improvements." But "the trajectory towards death in old age has not changed." Indeed, "this study suggests evolutionally biology trumps everything." Basically "human death is inevitable  no matter how many vitamins we take, how healthy our environment is or how much we exercise," co-lead author Fernando Colchero of the University of Southern Denmark says in another release. He leaves a little hope for those aiming to live forever, though, noting scientific advances might yet achieve "what evolution could not." (Read more aging process stories.)
(Newser)  When Amy Coney Barrett replaced Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the Supreme Court last year, it resulted in what is usually described as a 6-3 advantage for conservatives over liberals on the court. But two big decisions Thursdayone on ObamaCare and the other on a Catholic group that refuses to work with gay couplessuggest that a different kind of breakdown is happening on the court. Coverage:

In an analysis at CNN, Joan Biskupic writes that 3-3-3 seems to be the new pattern. One trio is the "center-right" of Chief Justice John Roberts, Brett Kavanaugh, and Barrett. Another trio is made up of liberals Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan. And the last is made up of conservatives Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, and Neil Gorsuch.

In Thursday's rulings, the three liberals joined the center-right (as did Clarence Thomas) in the ruling that dismissed a challenge to ObamaCare. And though the court sided with the Catholic group in the other case, the protection offered was limited, and the decision went nowhere near as far as the more conservative justices wanted.

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At Politico, Josh Gerstein notes that the three more conservative justices, particularly Alito, issued sharply worded critiques seemingly aimed at the other GOP appointees. "Some liberal legal commentators noted that the most carefully dissected rhetorical sparring is now taking place among members of the new six-justice conservative majority, with the three remaining liberal justices often left as mere spectators," Gerstein writes.

Alito, for instance, wrote in the Affordable Care Act case that "no one can fail to be impressed by the lengths to which this Court has been willing to go to defend the ACA against all threats." And in the other case, which involved a foster care agency in Philadelphia, he complained that the court "has emitted a wisp of a decision that leaves religious liberty in a confused and vulnerable state." As South Texas College of Law Professor Josh Blackman puts it to Politico: "I think Alito was just pissed."

The outcomes of Thursday's cases "mean the court potentially will close out Justice Amy Coney Barrett's first term with no watershed conservative victories," writes Greg Stohr at Bloomberg. "Although the court still has 15 remaining cases, including a clash over the Voting Rights Act, the term's theme so far has been more incrementalism than revolution." Stohr notes, however, that a truer test might come in the fall, when Roberts has scheduled an abortion case with the potential to dismantle Roe v. Wade.

Matt Ford at the New Republic digs more into the Philadelphia decision and sums up the narrow outcome: The court "is still strongly inclined to favor litigants who bring religious freedom claims before it, and has handed down a series of major rulings in their favor in recent years," he writes. But "the justices appear unwilling to rule conclusively that religious beliefs can overcome anti-discrimination laws that protect gay and transgender Americans in all casesat least for now."

(Did former President Trump inadvertently save ObamaCare?
(Newser)  The Palestinian Authority called off an agreement for Israel to transfer 1 million doses of coronavirus vaccines to it in exchange for a similar number later this year, hours after the deal was announced on Friday. The Palestinians said the doses, which Israel began shipping to the occupied West Bank, are close to expiring and do not meet their standards. In announcing the agreement, the AP reports, Israel had said the vaccines "will expire soon" without specifying a date; Pfizer doses typically have a six-month shelf life. Palestinian officials had already come under criticism, with many accusing them of accepting subpar vaccines and suggesting they might not be effective. There was no comment yet from Israel, which has fully reopened after vaccinating some 85% of its adult population. Israel faced criticism for not sharing its vaccines with the 4.5 million Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and Gaza. The disparity has played out around the world as the bulk of vaccines went to wealthy countries. As those countries made progress containing their outbreaks, they began pledging supplies for poorer countries that were left behind.

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The new Israeli government, which was sworn in on Sunday, said that it would transfer Pfizer vaccines that are close to expiring, and that the Palestinian Authority would reimburse it with a similar number of vaccines when it receives them from the pharmaceutical company in September or October. "We will continue to find effective ways to cooperate for the benefit of people in the region," Foreign Minister Yair Lapid tweeted. COGAT, the Israeli military body that coordinates civilian affairs in the occupied territories, said it had coordinated the delivery of the first 100,000 doses to the West Bank on Friday. The Palestinians portrayed the agreement differently, saying Pfizer had suggested the transfer as a way of speeding up its delivery of 4 million doses that the PA had already paid for in an agreement reached directly with the drug company. "This is not an agreement with Israel, but with the Pfizer company," Palestinian Health Minister Mai Alkaila said Friday before the deal was called off.

(Read more coronavirus vaccine stories.)
(Newser)  Former Vice President Mike Pence opened to cheers Friday at a Faith and Freedom Coalition conference in Florida. But they didn't last. "It is great to be back with so many patriots dedicated to faith and freedom and the road to the majority," Pence began, drawing applause. But calls of "traitor!" grew louder as he continued, the Hill reports. Some in the crowd also seemed to yell "no" as Pence went on, per NBC, and there were attendees removed from the room. Supporters of former President Trump have been unhappy with Pence for his role in the certification of President Biden's Electoral College victory in January. Pence conceded this month that he and Trump still disagree about that.

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In the rest of his Kissimmee speech to the policy conference, Pence, a potential presidential candidate in 2024, focused on criticizing President Biden and the Democratic Party. "It's amazing to think in 2020 Joe Biden actually campaigned as a moderate, and he's governed as one of the most liberal presidents in history," Pence said in warning against "a socialist nightmare." Although Pence did not refer to the Jan. 6 Capitol riot this time, per CNN, he didn't distance himself from his former boss, either. "President Trump taught us what Republicans can accomplish when we stand firm on conservative principles and don't back down," Pence told the crowd. (Read more Mike Pence stories.)
Some people simply felt it was too soon: that this film would re-open wounds which have barely begun to heal.

Much of the commentary raised interesting questions about storytelling and ownership: who has the right to tell this story? Who is the film for? What is the point of committing such horrifying events to screen?

Today on The Detail, Emile Donovan sits down with Robert Sarkies, director of the 2006 film Out of the Blue which told the story of the 1990 Aramoana massacre; and migrant film expert Arezou Zalipour, to discuss the delicate nature of filming a real-life tragedy.

Dunedin filmmaker Sarkies was in his early 20s when David Gray killed 13 people at Aramoana, a small beachside settlement, in November 1990. He says They Are Us wrestles with a similar question at its core.

"It's a terrible event. It's inevitable that a film, at some point, will be made about it. Then the question is: who should make that? Who has the right to make that? And there's no easy answer."

More than a decade later, after making the iconic 1999 film Scarfies, Sarkies was approached by a producer friend of his, and asked to read Bill O'Brien's book about the massacre, which the producer had optioned.

"I could see two things: I felt it was inevitable that this film would be made, because the material was so compelling.

"And secondly, I felt that, if it was to be made, it needed to be made responsibly. It needed to be made by someone who could have empathy, and basically do it right. And I felt, being from Dunedin and having some concerns about how that story might be told in the wrong hands, I trusted myself to tell it. I took on the responsibility."
Despite increases to paid parental leave entitlements in recent years, New Zealand still ranks poorly when it comes to access to childcare, according to a new UNICEF report.

We ranked a lowly 39th out 41 rich countries in the OECD and European Union for paid parental leave - ahead of only Switzerland and the United States.

And the childcare that's on offer isn't as accessible as it should be, largely down to cost - we're ranked 36th there.

All up, UNICEF places New Zealand at 33rd overall in the new report, Where Do Rich Countries Stand on Childcare?.

"In order for tamariki to have the best start in life, we need to ensure parents have the support they need and can access affordable and quality childcare," said Michelle Sharp, UNICEF New Zealand chief executive. "When we invest in social policies that benefit parents and children, the whole nation benefits."
Local

Council members Verano, Moyer against filing lawsuit for countywide reassessment

SHAMOKIN  Council members Charlie Verano and Barbara Moyer believe city officials should have discussed a countywide reassessment with Northumberland County commissioners and leaders from other municipalities before proposing a lawsuit as a means to generate revenue.

Im not saying a reassessment, which hasnt been done in 49 years, isnt needed, but it shouldnt be forced by filing a lawsuit, Verano said Thursday afternoon. And it shouldnt be a political issue.

Verano said forcing the county to conduct a reassessment of properties, which is estimated to cost more than $5 million, is not the right thing to do.

Council shouldnt be voting on this before discussing it with the county commissioners and officials from other municipalities that also will be affected by this, Verano said. A countywide reassessment affects everyone in the county and they should be involved with any planning.

He said the citizens of Shamokin have gone through a lot recently and dont need to unnecessarily face another tax increase to pay for a lawsuit.

There is a lot of bitterness and animosity out there, Verano said. Pushing for something like this is not a good idea without having a dialogue. The city doesnt have money to pay for a lawsuit. We should have a plan in place before voting on a lawsuit. Plus, we need the commissioners support in making improvements to the city rather than forcing a lawsuit down their throats.

The councilman concluded, I am against filing a lawsuit. We dont know how Shamokin will fare out with a reassessment. I wont vote for it.

Verano, whose term expires at the end of the year, is not seeking reelection.

Moyer, who is seeking reelection to another four-year term, said, Although we need a solution to our projected budget shortfall, the suggestion to sue the county to force reassessment seems premature. Even though it is presented as an option in our exit plan, no discussion of reassessment has ever taken place other than general conversation.

She agrees that going 49 years without assessing properties benefits no one and is unacceptable. But she said making a blanket statement that property taxes will go up is not the whole picture.

She added, The real issue seems to me that once again we may be attempting to burden the property owner, those people who have truly invested in Shamokin. It is true that some property owners tax bills will go up, some will go down and some will stay the same. Although we cannot avoid reassessment forever, I dont believe we all understand the issues completely, the ramifications of reassessment, and exactly how it will play out.

The councilwoman wants to see some independent information presented on the pros and cons of reassessment.

Moyer said a roundtable discussion with state, county and local officials should be done. She also recommended talking with people in other communities who have faced forced reassessment to get their opinions.

Moyer said she would like to see a presentation on the subject that is backed by facts, not opinions.

I believe we need to collaborate with county officials rather than sue the county, she said.

As we go forward toward exiting Act 47 status, we have been presented with options that unfortunately most are unhappy with, Moyer said. With the study commission not in play, I am always willing to work toward a solution. However, just the perspectives presented by Act 47, the county and council tell me that we are not all on the same page or have the same understanding of the reassessment issue. Lets get our facts straight and work together on a solution.

Northumberland Countys last assessment occurred in 1972.

Prepared by Stevens & Lee Consultants, the Pennsylvania Economy League and Financial S&Lutions, the citys three-year exit plan from Act 47 for financially distressed municipalities recommends city council lobby county commissioners for a countywide reassessment as a means to increase revenue.

The exit plan said the Third Class City Code does not provide the necessary taxing authority to allow the city to fund current service levels without becoming a home rule municipality or reassessment by the county.

The city is searching for ways to increase revenue in anticipation of the lapse of Act 47, which would reduce its earned income tax (EIT) rate from 2% (1.5% to the city) to 1% (.5% to the city). Voters twice turned down the election of a government study commission, eliminating any immediate possibility of forming a home rule charter with an earned income tax high enough to fill an approximate $759,000 annual budget shortfall without the enhanced EIT.

According to the exit plan, the countys current assessment is older than the median age of the people living in the city and county.

When Shamokin entered Act 47 in 2015, it was at its limit for general purpose real estate millage, leaving no room to gain additional general purpose revenue if needed through a property tax increase. The city remains at the current general purposes limit of 35 mills.

Outgoing Shamokin Mayor John Brown and Councilwoman Jennifer Seidel, who is running for mayor in the Nov. 2 general election, are in favor of filing a lawsuit against the county to conduct a countywide reassessment.

Shamokin Councilman Scott Roughton described a countywide reassessment as a double-edged sword in that property taxes could decrease for some, but the county could raise taxes to pay for the reassessment.

He previously said the reassessment issue was mentioned at a recent city workshop, but there was no discussion on the issue before Seidel and Brown talked about it at Monday nights council meeting after being asked by former Northumberland County Commissioner Vinny Clausi if they favored a lawsuit.

At the meeting earlier this week, Roughton, Verano and Moyer said they didnt have enough information to support the filing of a lawsuit.

Northumberland County Commissioner Chairman Sam Schiccatano agrees that a reassessment is long overdue, but said now is not the time to burden county taxpayers with a procedure that is estimated to cost more than $5 million.

The Act 47 exit plan states that property reassessment is misunderstood by many, with most believing that property reassessment means increased property taxes.

In truth, old assessments lead to a greater likelihood that there is an unfair tax burden from property to property based on age, new construction and property improvements made, the exit plan authors say.

The exit plan states that reassessment is not a windfall of revenue for governmental agencies. Pennsylvania law, it explains, requires governmental agencies to lower their tax rate in a proportional amount to the new assessed values. For example, if the taxable assessed value doubles, the governmental agency is required to reduce its millage rate by half.

After completion of reassessment some taxpayers bills will go up, some will go down and some will stay the same, the plan states. However, all taxpayer assessments will be more equitably distributed based on current assessed values.

The mayor previously said that since residents have voted to continue to operate as a traditional third class city, the city will have to reduce services in an amount needed to cover any projected budget shortfall, unless a county reassessment is completed within the time frame of the three-year exit plan, the city receives special authorization from the state Legislature or it borrows $5 million, which would increase property taxes by 40%.
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Gov. Mike Dunleavy talks with the media outside the Westmark Hotel after meeting Thursday, June 10, with the Greater Fairbanks Chamber of Commerce. Photo courtesy of Kevin Goodman, Office of the Governor
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TDT | Manama

The Daily Tribune  www.newsofbahrain.com

The High Criminal Court jailed two people on money laundering charges to three years in jail and slapped each of them with a fine of BD5,000.

The court also ordered to confiscate BD20,000 from the first and BD10,000 from the second suspect. Public Prosecution charged them with laundering funds collected illegally, offering investment services without obtaining a license from the competent authorities, embezzlement of funds, and engaging in unlicensed financial and commercial activities.

The head of the Financial Crimes and Money Laundering Prosecution said the suspects laundered the money obtained from an illegal source, also found to be offering investment services illegally. The suspect, officials found, was also convicted previously for offering financial services illegally.

Public Prosecution opened an investigation, authorising officers to look into transactions carried out by the two suspects. Officers, based on evidence gathered, took the suspects into custody. The suspects during interrogation also confessed to their crimes.
TDT | Manama

The Daily Tribune  www.newsofbahrain.com

Bahrain Minister of Labour and Social Development Jameel Humaidan yesterday congratulated Sonia Muhammad Janahi for winning a seat on the board of the International Labour Organisation.

Janahi will serve on the ILO board as an alternate member for The Business Owners Group of West Asian Countries for three years (2021-2024).

She was elected to the board by the unanimous consent of the member states and coordination meeting of Arab business owners in West Asian countries. Sonia Janahi is the first Arab businesswoman to hold this position since the founding of the International Labour Organisation.

In a congratulatory message to Sameer Abdullah Nass and Janahi, a Bahrain Chamber member, the minister hailed the election as a pioneering achievement for Bahrain in the international forums. The victory, the minister said, also confirmes the status of Bahraini women in the international arena.

Janahi said the achievement reflects the progress Bahrain has made in the labour and production sector. The Bahrain Chamber, in a statement, congratulated Janahi on the achievement, stressing that the decision to nominate her to the organisation stemmed from multiple successes achieved by the Bahraini women.


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Connecticut saw continued hiring momentum as May ended and more than 21,000 people came off unemployment insurance  but with a possible hiccup after advanced data showed one major benefit program seeing a subsequent spike the first week of June.

According to the U.S. Department of Labors latest tally on Thursday, Connecticut had less than 162,000 workers receiving unemployment compensation via federal programs the last full week of May, down from about 183,000 people only one week before.

But the number bounced upward by nearly 7,000 claimants in DOLs primary unemployment insurance program, with a slight increase as well in people filing initial claims for benefits who had not been receiving them previously.

Starting in June, Connecticut workers must provide weekly evidence they are searching for work to receive unemployment benefits, whether signing up for training, submitting applications, hitting job fairs or making connections through social media websites like LinkedIn.

The Connecticut Department of Labor is scheduled to release updated employment estimates next Tuesday. DOL estimated the states unemployment rate at 8.1 percent as of April, more than double the states rate on the eve of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Over the course of the economic collapse and rebound, the federal government has tacked on extra pay for those receiving benefits, while subsidizing private-sector payrolls through the Paycheck Protection Program and others. Those expanded payments are scheduled to revert to normal levels come September.

With DOL having issued about $9 billion in compensation since the start of the pandemic, Gov. Ned Lamont is offering workers $1,000 to take full-time jobs; through midweek, more than 2,000 had signed up for the perk. Workers must stay on the job at least eight weeks to collect the payoff from the Connecticut Department of Revenue Services.

Despite the 160,000-plus Connecticut workers still on the sidelines  some of them independent workers drawing unemployment under pandemic relief programs  employers say it remains a challenge to fill jobs, both entry-level and those requiring advance skills.

Everyone I talk to is having the same problem, said Mike Castagna, CEO of MannKind which is in the process of hiring 100 people for its Danbury pharmaceutical manufacturing plant. Workers are scarce.

On Wednesday, U.S. Rep. Jim Himes, D-Conn., said it has been an entrenched problem that dates back to before the pandemic, when Connecticut unemployment dropped as low as 3.5 percent in 2019.

Pre-COVID, I would go to business after business after business that would tell me, Ive got job openings but applicants dont have the soft skills, Himes said. Do we just let that be, as an inevitable outcome of the market? Or is there some moral compulsion or patriotic compulsion to try to fix that?

Dante Bartolomeo, Gov. Ned Lamonts choice to replace outgoing labor commissioner Kurt Westby, spoke Thursday in Wethersfield on the ongoing efforts to get people back to work.

We now have a fully functional contact center ... where you can talk to someone, mostly you can get in right away  we have 200 folks working there, Bartolomeo said Thursday. If you cant get in right that day, you can make an appointment virtually.

Dan Haar contributed to this report.

Alex.Soule@scni.com; 203-842-2545; @casoulman
The political infighting is all finished in the Connecticut marijuana legalization debate. And man, there was a lot of it, right to the last day.

Now the state turns to creating and enforcing the rules for recreational cannabis. What does that mean for you? Some details arent yet clear, like how many stores well see. Some aspects of the 295-page bill that Gov. Ned Lamont will soon sign into law remain open to interpretation.

And of course, no law is carved in stone. These things will change and evolve over time, said Rep. Steve Stafstrom, D-Bridgeport, co-chairman of the legislatures Judiciary Committee and a key sponsor of the bill.

Heres what we know now. Every bit of this applies strictly to people age 21 or older.

Generally when we talk about marijuana, we mean any cannabis product that contains THC, the psychoactive ingredient. There are some differences in the law between smokable and edible forms; you can consume gummie and chocolates most anyplace, as long as youre not driving.

When does the law take effect and what happens then?

Starting July 1, you can have more marijuana than you can possibly consume in a reasonable time. It will become perfectly legal to possess  no infraction and certainly no arrest  but you cant sell it. Thats still a crime. Stores are targeted to open in mid-2022, but a lot has to happen first.

Can I smoke pot in public after the bill goes into effect?

As with tobacco, smoking pot is prohibited in public buildings, most workplaces and stores, state parks and lots of other places. The bottom line is, anyplace that smoking tobacco is illegal, either smoking or vaping cannabis will also be illegal, Stafstrom said. The bill expands the no-smoking list to include areas within 25 feet of any doors, windows or intake vents of public buildings. That means you cant walk down a sidewalk smoking a joint if its within 25 feet of a store  but that provision doesnt kick in until Oct. 1 of this year. As for walking down the street in a residential area, thats open to interpretation by police so its not yet clear. An example of the complexity: The bill gives cities and towns a lot of leeway to determine whether smoking marijuana is allowed on property they own or control, such as local parks.

How about in a car, if Im not driving?

Nope. You cant smoke marijuana even as a passenger in a motor vehicle that is being operated on any public road, highway or parking lot with more than 10 spaces.

How will police be able to tell if Im driving under the influence?

Each police officer will be certified to tell whether someone is high, Stafstrom said, based on new training they will all receive. And the state will train many more drug recognition experts, whose testimony will be admissable in court.

Can I smoke pot on my private property in clear view of the public, such as sitting in a chair on my front lawn  even if children are just a few feet away?

Yes.

How much am I allowed to possess starting July 1?

You can carry up to 1.5 ounces of plant material or equivalent in other forms. In addition, you can have up to 5 ounces in a locked container at home or in a locked glove compartment or the trunk of your car.

How much will I be allowed to grow at home, and when?

Medical patients may cultivate up to three mature and three immature cannabis plants starting Oct. 1, 2021. Anyone else will have to wait until July 1, 2023, with the same plant limits, the state Department of Consumer Protection said.

Where exactly can I grow the plants?

They must be inside, not outdoors, at your primary residence.

Can I sell any pot that I grow? Can I give it away as a gift?

No, you cant sell any marijuana even if you grow it yourself, unless you hold a license from the state. You are allowed to give away cannabis as a gift.

Can I go to the store and buy it for a friend who then pays me back for the cost?

No, receiving compensation is the same as selling, even if youre just picking it up for a friend and not profiting.

Can my employer prohibit me from using THC products? How about while not at work?

This is a complex area but generally, employers will have leeway under Connecticut law to bar employees from using marijuana  certainly at work, and also outside of work. We have the most employer friendly protections of any legalization bill Ive seen in the country, Stafstrom said. Some types of workers fall udner even stricter guidelines, including firefighters, police, commercial drivers and certain federal employees and contractors. We were very sensitive to the fact that we are a state that has a heavy concentration of defense manufacturers, Stafstrom said.

What is the best estimate of when the first stores will open?

The governors office at first said May 2022, and now is wavering on that goal. Before anyone opens retail doors, the state must license growers and retailers and license an entire supply chain, which then must be up and ready. Most states have taken longer than a year to open.

How many stores we will see in, say, five years?

The number could be very large, rivaling the number of package stores  but market conditions will play a strong part in determining who opens. Cities and towns will also be able to prohibit marijuana dispensaries through their zoning powers.

What is the maximum amount I will be able to buy?

One ounce of cannabis, or an equal amount of THC products per day at a single retailer. Medical patients have higher limits.

Will the ingredients for blended THC products such as edibles and vape be listed?

Yes, unlike in many states.

Will we see colorful trade names for products, such as Purple Haze and Grand Master Trashed, which are not allowed in the medical dispensaries?

Yes, as long as they arent designed to appeal to teens and young kids. But the rules may limit flashy packaging or colors.

dhaar@hearstmediact.com
NEW MILFORD  A brightly colored rainbow is a permanent resident in New Milford.

The town repainted its rainbow crosswalk during their Bank Street Block Party in honor of Pride month on Thursday night.

Local business owner Elora Herberick spearheaded the initial painting of the crosswalk last June when Bank Street was shut down during the summer.

Herberick, who runs Evolve Yoga on Bank Street, was inspired to bring a rainbow crosswalk to the town after visiting Great Barrington, Mass., and seeing one there. She said she thought a crosswalk like that in New Milford would brighten up the downtown area and show support to the LGBTQ community.

But 12 months later, the initial paint was faded and needed repainting.

So, on Thursday night, a group of volunteers from the LGBTQ+ community set to work repainting the rainbow. This time, they used longer-lasting, more durable paint.

We did it bigger, better. Its permanent, said Herberick.

Even though it was a simple art project, the impact of its message can be a big one, Herberick said.

After receiving initial positive responses to the painting of the crosswalk last year, Herberick said she wanted to make it more permanent. She talked to the mayor and the transportation department about making that a reality.

I couldnt have done it without the mayors support, Herberick said.

Jessica Reis, whose Bank Street business, Reis Learning Center, is located near the crosswalk, said the painting process was a communitywide effort, bringing in different businesses and volunteers to make the rainbow a reality.

The materials for the repainting were provided by the Village Center for the Arts, located across the Green, and other volunteers helped paint the stripes. The towns support was also integral in the project actually taking place, according to Reis.

We're especially excited that this is now a permanent installation at the top of Bank [Street], Reis wrote to Hearst Connecticut Media.

Its not the first rainbow crosswalk to grace the region.

In Litchfield, two local mothers started an initiative through their group, Litchfield Pride, to paint a crosswalk on North Lake Street at the community field. They got town approval for the project in April, but did the actual painting in early June.

The repainting of the crosswalk on Bank Street also follows another New Milford Pride celebration.

Last weekend, residents organized one of the towns first known Pride events  a picnic on the town green  sponsored by Southern Litchfield Pride, a new group started by three New Milford residents. At the time of the picnic, Bass also put a pride flag outside of Town Hall.

Roughly 125 people were in attendance at the picnic, according to organizer Lauren Burke. Afterward, Burke said that they had lots of sign-ups for their new group, which was one of the goals of the event.

This past week, Danbury Mayor Joe Cavo caught flack from local activists and leaders after raising a Pride flag at City Hall without input from the LGBTQ+ community.

The mayor said usually groups reach out to City Hall to plan the events and raise a flag months in advance.
DANBURY  A celebration will be held Saturday afternoon to honor Juneteenth.

The family-friendly event will discuss history of the day and include music from an African drum group, said Jacqueline Elam, who is part of Thought and Light Ministry, which is running the program. Fun activities for kids will be held, she said.

Juneteenth honors the end of slavery in the United States and recognizes the anniversary of June 19, 1865, when Union solders arrived in Galveston, Texas, and ordered the enslaved people there be freed.

The event will be held at City Hall from noon to 2 p.m. The Greater Danbury NAACP will also host a breakfast from 9 a.m. to noon Saturday at the Carter L. Marshall Elks Lodge in Danbury.
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP)  California on Friday started offering residents a digital record of their coronavirus vaccinations that they can use to access businesses or events that require proof they got the shots.

The states public health and technology departments said the new tool allows Californians access to their COVID-19 vaccination records from the states immunization registry and includes the same information as the paper cards issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

To access the information, Californians will enter into a state website their name, date of birth and email or phone associated with their vaccine records and they will be asked to create a four-digit PIN. The record will include a QR code that users can save to their mobile phones.

With nearly 20 million people fully vaccinated in California and proof of vaccination already required in some circumstances such as travel, state health officials felt there would be demand for the tool, though it remains optional, said Dr. Erica Pan, the state's epidemiologist.

The odds are someone is going to misplace their paper CDC card and a digital COVID-19 vaccine record provides a convenient backup, she told reporters.

Following a drop in COVID-19 infections and rise in vaccinations, California lifted many pandemic-related restrictions this week, though everyone must continue to wear masks in some places such as mass transit and health facilities.

Vaccinated people are no longer required to wear masks at most indoor locations, though the unvaccinated still must do so. Businesses can choose whether to operate on an honor system for who must wear face coverings, require everyone to wear them or use a vaccine verification system.

Vaccine verification has been a thorny issue in many U.S. communities. About two dozen states have banned state-required vaccine passports and some, including Texas, also barred businesses from requiring vaccinations.

New York offers electronic vaccine verification through a digital app called Excelsior Pass.

California is giving residents quick access to their individual records in a database the state already maintains on immunizations, which residents could already get by making a request, said Amy Tong, director of the state's department of technology.

Businesses that use a QR scanner would see the same information as residents  their name, birthdates and vaccination details, she said. They would not be able to store the data for future use.

California officials said the tool is not mandatory, and refrained from using the word passport  which has become a politically-fraught term  in the announcement.

Los Angeles County has already been allowing residents to access electronic vaccine records and get a QR code on their phones.

In Orange County, public health officials previously discussed the idea but backtracked following community opposition.

Lucy Dunn, president and chief executive of the Orange County Business Council, said businesses want an option for vaccine verification so they can take measures to keep their workers and customers safe, especially since paper records can more easily be falsified.

It helps keep us informed as to who is vaccinated and not, she said. "Its voluntary, personal, protected and as easy as adding it to your smart phones digital wallet like an airline boarding pass.

-

Taxin reported from Orange County. Associated Press writer John Antczak contributed to this report from Los Angeles.
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP)  California has regained more than half of the 2.7 million jobs it lost at the start of the coronavirus pandemic, officials said Friday, a trend driven by restaurants and hotels hiring more people as the nations most populous state reopens its economy.

Employers added 104,500 new jobs in May as California's unemployment rate dipped slightly to 7.9% from 8% in April. It's still one of the highest unemployment rates in the nation, but it is the fourth month in a row that the state has added at least 100,000 new jobs.

California has now regained 1.4 million jobs from the depths of April 2020, when a stay-at-home order had forced many businesses to close.

A third of those gains have come from the leisure and hospitality industry. Since May 2020, restaurants and hotels have added 420,400 jobs, the most of any sector. But the industry is still about 450,000 jobs below its pre-pandemic high.

Despite the gains, businesses have reported difficulty finding enough people to work. About 2 million people are still getting unemployment benefits in California, which include an extra $300-per-week because of the pandemic. That extra benefit doesn't expire until September.

If it werent for the labor shortage that we are experiencing, the employment gain in California would have been much higher, said Sung Won Sohn, a professor of finance and economics at Loyola Marymount University.

Nationwide, California has accounted for 23% of all job growth since February, according to Dee Dee Myers, director of the Governor's Office of Business and Economic Development. Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom, who will likely face a recall election this fall, has proposed billions of dollars in additional aid for businesses and tax rebates for residents as part of the state's new operating budget set to take effect in July.

We've regained more than half the jobs we lost over the past year. But there's still a long way to go, Newsom said.

The monthly employment numbers are somewhat jarring given the state's history of job growth. Before the pandemic, it would have been exceptional to add 20,000 new jobs in one month. Now, California is routinely adding more than 100,000 jobs as coronavirus restrictions end.

It's unprecedented. We haven't had these types of swings over the past 50 years, said Michael Bernick, a former director of the California Employment Development Department and an attorney with the Duane Morris law firm.

Those gains are possible because of the state's unprecedented job losses during the pandemic. While the bulk of those losses happened over two months, it could take another year or two before the state eclipses its pre-pandemic employment levels.

California's labor force  the number of people who have jobs or are looking for them  increased by about 12,400 people in May, to 18.9 million. That's still below the pre-pandemic high of 19.5 million people.

On Thursday, state officials announced they would no longer give unemployment benefits to people who are not actively looking for work, starting on July 11. California had suspended that requirement during the pandemic.

The May jobs report is based on a survey from the week of May 12. Back then, California still was imposing capacity limits on businesses depending on how widespread the virus was in their area. Newsom ended those rules Tuesday, allowing businesses to open at maximum capacity.

It could take a few months before the impact of that decision shows up in the state's jobs report.
SANTA FE, N.M. (AP)  New Mexico will provide extra pay worth up to two weeks of salary for longtime state employees who skipped using their paid vacation time in 2020 amid the pandemic, under an initiative from the governor approved Friday.

The State Personnel Board unanimously approved the payout plan for rank-and-file executive-branch employees and political appointees at agencies under the control of Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham. It applies to state workers who have accrued large balances of vacation time that might otherwise expire.

Under ordinary circumstances, state employees lose without payment any unused vacation leave in excess of 240 hours at the end of the year.

State Personnel Secretary Ricky Serna said that the unused vacation time expiration deadline for 2020 was delayed under extraordinary circumstances. The governor's initiative offers up to 80 hours of salary to people who still have not used their excess vacation allotments, Serna said.

Their call to duty made it very difficult for those employees to take that leave that they have earned, Serna said.

The initiative will cost an estimated $850,000 and affect 810 employees, he said. State workers still can decline the June payments and use their accumulated vacation time for 2020 until July 9.

The plan was approved as Lujan Grisham ramps up her campaign for reelection, amid a state general-fund budget surplus and pressure from public labor unions to restore proposed pay raises that were reined in by Legislators in June 2020.

Lujan Grisham has not yet released detailed plans for how $1.7 billion to New Mexico in new federal relief will be used from a package approved in March by President Joe Biden.

She has pledged a commitment to replenish New Mexicos depleted unemployment insurance trust, at a cost of up to $600 million, to stave off tax increases for businesses.

Serna said the vacation payouts that will be doled out next week recognize extraordinary efforts by many state workers during the pandemic.

There were just a number of state employees at all levels that were just dedicated to being here day-in and day-out. This is a measure that recognizes that level of service," he said.

Serna said that state financial officials believe agency budgets have enough funding to cover the unused vacation time payments without new appropriations by lawmakers.

Serna noted that vacation options were limited during the pandemic.

Under aggressive public health orders, New Mexico previously shut down its state parks, museums and historical sites and intermittently ordered self-quarantines for travelers entering the state or returning to it.

Serna also oversees the state unemployment insurance system following the May departure of Workforce Solutions Secretary Bill McCamley.
DENVER (AP)  U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra visited a mobile vaccine clinic near Denver on Friday to promote COVID-19 shots among underserved communities of color that have some of the nation's lowest vaccination rates.

He also met with Democratic Gov. Jared Polis, getting briefly interrupted by the governors dog, Gia, and another dog dashing through their closed-door session, giving the two a laugh. They discussed the state's pandemic response and a new law creating a state-administered health insurance plan designed to reduce premiums and costs of care as well as get more people covered.

Later, Becerra, the agencys first Latino leader, and Democratic members of Colorados congressional delegation toured a mobile vaccine clinic focused on underserved communities in the Denver suburb of Aurora, which is nearly 30% Hispanic. Its one of nine mobile units made from converted buses.

While Hispanic people make up 20% of Colorado's population, less than 10% have been vaccinated, according to the states vaccine dashboard. Across the U.S., a lack of vaccine access and distrust of the medical field within minority communities has made it harder to vaccinate those populations.

Democratic Rep. Jason Crow, whose district includes Aurora, said many minorities and immigrants have trouble finding the time to get vaccinated while working multiple jobs, highlighting the need for the state's mobile resources.

Where you are, we will go. Donde tu estas, iremos nosotros, Becerra said.

He asked Latino communities to identify trusted leaders to operate as vaccine ambassadors" to convince those who are still hesitant. He reminded the public that the vaccine is free, noting that some may not believe there are no gimmicks attached to receiving the shot.

However, recent data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows that Latino populations have received a higher proportion of administered vaccine doses in the last two weeks, narrowing the disparity, the Department of Health and Human Services said.

Becerra also met faculty and students at the Metropolitan State University of Denver to hear about the effects of a grant his agency gave for behavioral health workforce training.

Becerra said the U.S. is so far behind on behavioral health services but that the pandemic has opened the door for the federal government to invest in mental health and substance abuse disorders.

I think, to some degree, that taboo aspect of talking about it has dissipated, Becerra told The Associated Press. I think COVID really forced people to recognize that there are people who are really suffering from stress and beyond.

The secretarys visit included a discussion of the effects of President Joe Bidens American Families Plan on communities of color. The $1.8 trillion program increases spending for early and secondary education, child care and paid family and medical leave.

Becerra talked about increasing access to the plan's child tax credits with Deidre Johnson, CEO and executive director of the Denver-based Center for African American Health, which focuses on Black health disparities. About 90% of eligible families are automatically enrolled, but the administration is working with community leaders like Johnson to increase participation.

Qualified families will receive up to $300 per month for each child under 6 and up to $250 per month for children 6 to 17. The credit was previously capped at $2,000 and only paid out to families with income tax obligations after they filed with the IRS.

Becerra said his visit to Colorado highlights the Biden administration's interest in partnering with states where you see innovation and change in lowering health care costs and improving access to affordable prescription drugs  measures state lawmakers passed this year.

___

Nieberg is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.
If we talk about the environment, then climate change and environmental conservation have been a global topic of discussion worldwide. But the need of the hour is to rise up and take action on climate change rather than just mere talks.

Today, the world is facing an unprecedented set of circumstances: the global climate crisis, as well as the coronavirus pandemic. This has shaken our economy and overall health. But rather than fearing the uncertainty and the challenges that lie ahead, we come across an impressive young Indian girl leading the fight for a better world. Meet 18-year-old Rajlakshmi V Patil  a Student, an Author, an Environmentalist, an Activist, and more. She has published a book on her poems Mystic which has gained a lot of popularity with readers.

During their adolescent years, most of the teens are busy with studies or other activities and hardly are concerned about our environment or contributing to society. However, in our country, there are many bright minds who think ahead of their time and achieve remarkable accomplishments. One such young achiever is Mumbai-based Rajlakshmi Patil. Her focus has always been on creating a better world. And she is duly supported and motivated by her parents Dr. Vijay D Patil and Shivani Vijay Patil to make a real difference in the community.

If we talk about the environment, then climate change and environmental conservation have been a global topic of discussion worldwide. But the need of the hour is to rise up and take action on climate change rather than just mere talks. Rajlakshmi, with a passion for protecting the environment, is doing the best she can and confidently making her voice heard for a better future for the coming generations. Here are some of her notable achievements:

She spearheaded the Beat Air Pollution Campaign  June 2019 in collaboration with the United Nations Environment. She participated in various environmental campaigns with the Schools Green Council and the D Y Patil Faculty from September 2019 to  Present. Rajlakshmi raised awareness about the role of trees in reducing air pollution. For this, she even participated with 90 students in an event to encourage tree plantations in the area. And theres more.

She recently graduated from her international boarding school  Aiglon College in Switzerland with the environmental prize. This environmental prize is awarded to the student who has shown in their actions that they understand the tenet that to deal with a global environment issue one must first deal with the issue at a local level. At a young age, Rajlakshmi has been a part of several campaigns and cleanliness drives and strongly advocates for a clean and green environment. She feels that Mother Earth does not need a change. In fact, human beings attitude and behaviour towards the environment must change in order to conserve nature. We need to start improving our habits of living and automatically the environment will become better.

Recently corona pandemic has taken the entire world by storm, so the young Rajlakshmi with her friend had organized a fund-raising campaign to help the people in need. She had managed to raise more than 1lakh rupees. They utilized this money collected from funds to aid the frontline workers and others who are working to help those affected by the coronavirus. They used the funds to buy essentials such as groceries, masks, sanitary products, and other items for workers who are dedicatedly and tirelessly working for saving lives in our country.

Apart from being a champion for environment conservation, and a social activist, Rajlakshmi is also a noted Author. She has been writing some heart-touching poems since the age of 13 and has continued doing so till the present. Her collection of poems has been published as a book named Mystic which is an anthology of the poems she has written and expresses her thoughts and aspirations. She fondly remembers her grandfather, DR D Y Patil, who has been an inspiration in her life. Her poems have been inspired by different circumstances in her life  during her stay at the boarding school in the beautiful Alps and in Mumbai, the city of dreams and other phases of her life. She beautifully pens down her emotions and feelings into words which soothes ones mind.

With the motto in life, Service before self, Rajlakshmi is marching ahead with a humble attitude to bring about a positive change in society and selflessly serve the people of her nation.
This move is both political and military in purpose, for it would not only allow the PLA guarding the border immediate reservists to call upon in case of a conflict, but also generate some goodwill with the Tibetans, whose lands were annexed decades ago by the Communist regime of China.

The Peoples Liberation Army (PLA) of China has begun raising a militia composed of native Tibetan volunteers that are to maintain security near the Indian border with Sikkim. This can be a considerable factor in the larger Indo-China conflict, especially if large number of youths volunteer, resulting in China enjoying an increased manpower pool to draw from in Tibet.

It is hinted that this new force will be trained at police institutes and PLA camps for duties at check posts close to the border and maintaining law and order in the surrounding country. Most of these check points will be around xiaokang villages near the border. These are somewhat prosperous villages and towns with people that live a comfortable lifestyle. The Tibetan militia could also be used for policing these communities.

This move is both political and military in purpose, for it would not only allow the PLA guarding the border immediate reservists to call upon in case of a conflict, but also generate some goodwill with the Tibetans, whose lands were annexed decades ago by the Communist regime of China.

Chinas president Xi Jinping was quoted as saying in 2013 that to govern the country well China must first govern the frontiers well, and to govern the frontiers well they must first ensure stability in Tibet.

The intel report suggests that this recruitment drive by China might not have any direct impact on India but given the current situation between the two countries, any step that China takes cannot be ignored.
The Chinese navy is sailing its new destroyers in the South China Sea as its shipbuilding spree continues. This could further bolster an already belligerent Beijing.

New satellite images studied by the Center for Strategic and International Studies show the progress China has made with regards to its third aircraft carrier which is being built at the shipyards in Shanghai. With eyes on the Indo-Pacific region, Chinas latest carrier is bigger than the first two and more sophisticated in terms of the technology deployed.

As per Chinese media reports, the Chinese navy is sailing its new destroyers in the South China Sea as its shipbuilding spree continues. This could further bolster an already belligerent Beijing which already conducts incursive drills in the South China Sea region. For long china has invaded the waters of many countries of the region, claiming it to be their own, even building on islands in the region. In a bizarre situation so rapid is the Chinese navys expansion that it is running out of big cities to name the warships after.

The Indo-pacific has also seen multiple drills conducted by the US, Japan and Australia in what were strong signals to China. The question now remains, how will this new carrier boost Chinas plans and how to check Chinas ever increasing bullying tactics in the Indo-pacific and beyond.
The tiny elephants that were once found on Sicily were some of the smallest elephants ever to have existed, but quite extraordinarily they are descended from one of the biggest land mammals ever to have lived: the straight-tusked elephant.

These animals were genuine giants, with some individuals reaching up to 4.5 metres tall and tipping the scales at 14 tons. An adult straight-tusked elephant could very easily have rested its chin on the back of a bull African savannah elephant.

But new research is revealing that it took a surprisingly short period of time for this miniaturisation to occur, perhaps just 40 generations for the huge ancestors to shrink to the tiny islanders.

The change in size over this time would have been the equivalent of an adult human shrinking to the size of a rhesus macaque monkey.

Dr Victoria Herridge is a researcher at the Museum whose focus is on the tiny elephants once found on a number of the islands in the Mediterranean, and was involved in the paper published in Current Biology.

'We have sequenced the mitochondrial genome from one of the skulls of an elephant from Puntali cave in Sicily,' explains Victoria. 'This is amazing, because up to now there has been no DNA evidence at all from any of the southern European population of straight-tusked elephants. We've only had ancient DNA from German specimens.'

This is largely due to the environments in which the fossils were preserved, with the heat and humidity making it exceedingly difficult for any DNA to survive. The team were able to extract and sequence DNA from the petrous bone, a small and very dense bone found in the base of the skull, and one that is renowned for preserving ancient DNA.

The results have shown that the straight-tusked elephant lineage that led to the tiny elephants on Sicily actually split away from the German elephants around 400,000 years ago, even though these miniature elephants are only thought to have been isolated on Sicily within the last 200,000 years.

This is intriguing because it suggests that in the gap between these dates, there was something interesting going on with the populations of these giant herbivores within continental Europe, perhaps a divide between those living in the north and those in the south.
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP)  California regulators on Thursday approved revised workplace pandemic rules that allow employees who are fully vaccinated against the coronavirus the same freedoms as when they are off the job, including ending most mask requirements.

The revised regulations approved by the governor-appointed California Occupational Safety and Health Standards Board come after weeks of confusion. The rules adopted in a 5-1 vote, with one member absent, now conform with general state guidelines that took effect Tuesday by ending most mask rules for vaccinated people.

Gov. Gavin Newsom immediately issued an executive order waiving the usual 10-day legal review. The new rules will take effect as soon as they are filed with the secretary of state.

While I understand the proposal in front of us today is extremely controversial and inconvenient, now I dont think is the time to let our guard down, said David Harrison, a labor representative on the board who voted for the revised rules. We need to do everything reasonable, and I highlight reasonable ... within our power to protect employees in California and across the country."

The rules apply in almost every workplace in the state, including offices, factories and retailers.

They are intended to ensure that workers are protected while businesses resume normal or near-normal activity, Eric Berg, deputy chief of health for Californias Division of Occupational Safety and Health, known as Cal/OSHA, told the board.

Business groups had sought the changes but argued they didn't go far enough. They supported conforming rules for businesses with state guidelines patterned after the latest federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommendations.

The California Chamber of Commerce, which represents more than 14,000 members, still praised a decision it said "will help employers move forward and fully reopen.

Board member Laura Stock, an occupational safety expert who cast the lone opposition vote, warned that the pandemic is not over.

This has real consequences that people can get sick and die due to exposure in the workplace," Stock said.

She said the rules go too far by eliminating physical distancing and workplace partitions and allowing workers to self-report their vaccination status, while relying too heavily on people to be vaccinated.

Whats very difficult is to figure out what the balance is so that were doing the most good for the most people, but not at all dismissing the vulnerable in our population," said Chris Laszcz-Davis, a management representative on the board.

The move comes after the board did a double-twisting backflip in recent weeks when it first postponed, then rejected, then adopted, then rescinded rules that would have allowed workers to forgo masks only if every employee in a room was fully vaccinated against the coronavirus.

Fully vaccinated employees will not need to wear masks, except in locations like mass transit and classrooms, where they are required for everyone, or in the event of outbreaks.

Physical distancing also will end except for certain workers during major outbreaks. Vaccinated employees wont need to be tested or quarantine unless they show symptoms, even if they have close contact with an infected person.

Employers must document that workers who skip masks indoors are indeed fully vaccinated. But employers have the choice of requiring workers to show proof of vaccination or allowing employees to self-report their status, with the employer keeping a record of who does the latter.

They also could decide to require everyone to remain masked  vaccinated or not. And vaccinated employees will still be able to wear masks if they choose without facing retaliation.

Public comments to the board before the vote largely split along management and employee lines.

Rob Lapsley, president of the California Business Roundtable, said the requirements that employers provide masks and keep track of employees' vaccination status add record-keeping that could create liability and privacy issues.

"They do remain a significant barrier to fully reopening the economy, Lapsley said.

Loosening the masking rules while a majority of Californians are not fully vaccinated and dangerous variants spread will sicken many and likely kill some workers as protections ease, countered Mitch Steiger, a legislative advocate for the California Labor Federation, AFL-CIO.

The California Chamber of Commerce praised the move to immediately end social distancing obligations instead of waiting until July 31, as Cal/OSHA had initially proposed. And employers must now provide the most effective N95 masks for free to unvaccinated employees only upon request, under the latest revision.

Newsom promised to provide a one-month supply of the masks after business groups complained they would have to stockpile the N95s in competition with healthcare workers.

There were 700 California workplace outbreaks and more than 10,000 infections in the last 30 days, Cal/OSHA's Berg said, but he said the N95s are the best alternative as other protections wane.

Lapsley's organization, joined by groups representing restaurateurs, manufacturers, retailers and others, in a statement called the revised rules a step in the right direction but asked Newsom to end what they said are confusing differences between state rules and federal guidelines.

There is still more work to be done and these new Cal/OSHA regulations do not ensure that the economy can roar back, the groups said.
Companies across the U.S. say that they are committed to doing their part to tackle climate change. But their pledges do not go far enough for many elected officials and environmental advocates.

Reflecting the growing pressure on corporations, Connecticut Attorney General William Tong and nearly a dozen of his counterparts sent a letter this week to the Securities and Exchange Commission that called on the financial regulator to require companies to do more to respond to climate change. They argue that the country faces an environmental and economic emergency, with others such as U.S. Rep. Jim Himes supporting their efforts.

J. Scott Applewhite / Associated Press

We ignore the climate crisis at our own peril. Climate change is already costing us billions of dollars and unchecked will touch every aspect of our lives, including our financial systems, Tong said in a statement this week. Our coalition is calling on the SEC to enact common sense requirements for U.S. companies to report and disclose how much financial risk they face because of climate change. This is a crucial step to protect Connecticut investors and shield our financial institutions from the devastating consequences of climate change. Full transparency around climate risks will strengthen our economys resilience.

In their joint letter to the SEC, Tong and 11 other state attorneys general asked the SEC to mandate that companies, both public and private, assess climate change-related risks affecting their businesses and disclose that information to investors. They asserted that the SECs current disclosure requirements were insufficient.

Requiring companies to disclose climate-related information is entirely consistent with the SECs practice, since its inception nearly 90 years ago, the letter said. From the creation of the SEC with the passage of the Exchange Act in 1934, one of the Commissions major purposes has been to ensure that investors receive material, accurate, adequate information for their investment decisions. Mandatory climate-related disclosures are the next step in pursuing that goal.

Contributed /

The SEC did not respond to an inquiry from Hearst Connecticut Media about its response to the letter.

Tong joined the attorneys general of California, Delaware, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New York, Oregon, Vermont and Wisconsin in signing the letter. All of them are Democrats, including Tong, who was elected in 2018 to his first term as attorney general.

The majority of U.S. companies do not make any climate change-related disclosures, and the disclosures that they do make are often boilerplate, suggesting that the companies are not thoroughly evaluating or disclosing their exposure to climate change-related risks, according to Tongs announcement of his signing the letter.

Climate-related weather events have already imposed more than $600 billion in direct economic damages on U.S. companies since 2016, and climate change indicators show that temperatures are rising, flooding is occurring more frequently and wildfire seasons are lengthening, the letter said, citing data from the Environmental Protection Agency and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Relevant to investors, the impact of physical weather events has required  and will continue to require  firms to make capital investments in new and hardened climate-resilient infrastructure or risk reducing long-term yields and creditworthiness.

Himes, a member of the House Committee on Financial Services, backed the attorneys general.

The SEC is about protecting investors, and the way they protect investors is by demanding companies disclose material information, Himes, a seventh-term Democrat who represents Connecticuts Fourth Congressional District, said in an interview. Climate change is material to just about everything This isnt liberal wish-listing. This is something thats going to touch the viability of every business on the planet.

Widespread push for change

A number of other groups are also pressuring big companies to do more to take on environmental threats.

At the June 3 annual meeting of Norwalk-based travel-services provider Booking Holdings, the No. 424 company on this years Fortune 500 list, shareholders voted to approve a request for the firm to issue a climate transition report. At the same time, they turned down a proposal for Booking to hold an annual advisory stockholder vote on its climate policies and strategies. Both were advisory non-binding votes.

A message left for Booking seeking comment on those votes was not returned.

In his announcement of the letter to the SEC, Tong cited the recent election of three new members to Exxons board who intend to push the company to address climate change, as well as the overwhelming passage of a shareholder resolution demanding that Chevron reduce its carbon emissions.

At the same time, some of Connecticuts leading investment firms are ramping up their work on environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG) issues.

Westport-based Bridgewater Associates, the worlds largest hedge fund, announced in April a new sustainable investing venture. A reference point for the firm is the United Nations 17 Sustainable Development Goals. Climate change figures among the concerns covered in those objectives.

What we love about the UN Sustainable Development Goals is theyre very broad, Karen Karniol-Tambour, Bridgewaters co-chief investment officer for sustainability, said in a recent interview. They have a comprehensive vision where the pieces are interconnected. For example, to deal with the climate, youre not making people poorer. Its all kind of one view. And theyre very widely agreed upon and accepted.

Contributed photo /Bridgewater Associates

Environmental concerns also influence the state governments investment strategy. In March, state Treasurer Shawn Wooden announced Connecticuts first investment solely focused on renewable energy, with a $100 million commitment to a fund managed by BlackRock, the worlds largest asset manager. The fund focuses on wind and solar energy and aims to meet the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

There are some of the view that you actually cant invest in ways in that are beneficial to society and generate good returns. I have just the opposite philosophy, Wooden, a first-term Democrat, said in a recent interview. The reason we are so committed to ESG is because we believe that that is how we are going to maximize returns in the future, while managing risk.

pschott@stamfordadvocate.com; twitter: @paulschott
WASHINGTON (AP)  Black Americans rejoiced Thursday after President Joe Biden made Juneteenth a federal holiday, but some said that, while they appreciated the recognition at a time of racial reckoning in America, more is needed to change policies that disadvantage too many of their brethren.

Its great, but its not enough, said Gwen Grant, president and CEO of the Urban League of Kansas City. Grant said she was delighted by the quick vote this week by Congress to make Juneteenth a national holiday because it's been a long time coming.

But she added that we need Congress to protect voting rights, and that needs to happen right now so we don't regress any further. That is the most important thing Congress can be addressing at this time.

At a jubilant White House bill-signing ceremony, Biden agreed that more than a commemoration of the events of June 19, 1865, is needed. Thats when Union soldiers brought the news of freedom to enslaved Black people in Galveston, Texas  some 2 1/2 years after President Abraham Lincolns Emancipation Proclamation had freed slaves in Southern states.

This day doesnt just celebrate the past. It calls for action today, Biden said before he established Juneteenth National Independence Day. His audience included scores of members of Congress and Opal Lee, a 94-year-old Texas woman who campaigned for the holiday.

Biden singled out voting rights as an area for action.

Republican-led states have enacted or are considering legislation that activists argue would curtail the right to vote, particularly for people of color. Legislation to address voting rights issues, and institute policing reforms demanded after the killing of George Floyd and other unarmed Black men, remains stalled in the Congress that acted swiftly on the Juneteenth bill.

Other people want the federal government to make reparations or financial payments to the descendants of slaves in an attempt to compensate for those wrongs. Meanwhile, efforts are afoot across the country to limit what school districts teach about the history of slavery in America.

Community organizer Kimberly Holmes-Ross, who helped make her hometown of Evanston, Illinois, the first U.S. city to pay reparations, said she was happy about the new federal holiday because it will lead more people to learn about Juneteenth.

But she would have liked Congress to act on anti-lynching legislation or voter protections first.

I am not super stoked only because all of the other things that are still going on, said Holmes-Ross, 57. You havent addressed what we really need to talk about.

Peniel Joseph, an expert on race at the University of Texas at Austin, said the U.S. has never had a holiday or a national commemoration of the end of slavery. Many Black Americans had long celebrated Juneteenth.

Juneteenth is important symbolically, and we need the substance to follow, but Black people historically have always tried to do multiple things at the same time," Joseph said.

Most federal workers will observe the holiday Friday. Several states and the District of Columbia announced that government offices would be closed Friday.

Juneteenth is the 12th federal holiday, including Inauguration Day once every four years. It's also the first federal holiday since the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday was added in 1983.

Before June 19 became a federal holiday, it was observed in the vast majority of states and the District of Columbia. Texas was first to make Juneteenth a holiday in 1980.

Most white Americans had not heard of Juneteenth before the summer of 2020 and the protests that stirred the nation's conscience over race after Floyd's killing by a Minneapolis police officer, said Matthew Delmont, who teaches history at Dartmouth College.

He said the new federal holiday hopefully provides a moment on the calendar every year when all Americans can spend time thinking seriously about the history of our country.

The Senate passed the bill earlier this week by unanimous agreement. But in the House, 14 Republicans voted against it, including Rep. Chip Roy of Texas. Roy said Juneteenth deserves to be commemorated, but he objected to the use of independence in the holiday's name.

This name needlessly divides our nation on a matter that should instead bring us together by creating a separate Independence Day based on the color of one's skin, he said in a statement.

Added Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Ariz., who also voted against the bill: We have one Independence Day, and it applies equally to all people of all races.

The sentiment was different in Texas, the first state to make Juneteenth a holiday.

I'm happy as pink, said Doug Matthews, 70, and a former city manager of Galveston who has helped coordinate the community's Juneteenth celebrations since Texas made it a holiday.

He credited the work of state and local leaders with paving the way for this week's step by Congress.

I'm also proud that everything started in Galveston, Matthews said.

Pete Henley, 71, was setting up tables Thursday for a Juneteenth celebration at the Old Central Cultural Center, a Galveston building that once was a segregated Black school. He said the Juneteenth holiday will help promote understanding and unity.

All holidays have significance, no matter what the occasion or what its about, but by it being a federal holiday, it speaks volumes to what the country thinks about that specific day, said Henley, who studied at the school before it was integrated and is president of the cultural center.

He said his family traces its roots back to enslaved men and women in the Texas city who were among the last to receive word of the Emancipation Proclamation.

As a country, we really need to be striving toward togetherness more than anything, Henley said. If we just learn to love each other, it would be so great.

Holmes-Ross recalled first learning about Juneteenth in church in Evanston, a Lake Michigan suburb just outside Chicago. Over the years, she said she made sure her three children commemorated the day with community events including food, dancing and spoken word performances.

She said it was about more than a day off for her family and expressed hope that it would be for others, too.

We were intentional about seeking out Black leaders and things we could celebrate as African Americans, Holmes-Ross said. Hopefully, people do something productive with it. It is a day of service.

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Associated Press writers Margaret Stafford in Liberty, Mo., Sophia Tareen in Chicago and Jake Bleiberg in Dallas contributed to this report.
FAIRFIELD  College students started preparing this week for a statewide summer program supporting at-risk K-12 youth.

Up to 500 Corps members serving as teachers, counselors and mentors through the College Corps CT Summer Program began training with Fairfield University in sessions that range from understanding the pandemics impact on students to creating inclusive environments.

The initiative matches college students with summer enrichment programs for a $4,500 stipend, paid for with about $3 million in pandemic relief funds to staff offerings for K-12 students whose school years were disrupted by COVID-19.

Well, we have all these undergraduates, and theyll be looking for work, Laurie Grupp, dean of the Graduate School of Education and Allied Professions at Fairfield University, said of their thought process. What can we do for them?

College Corps came out of discussions since the winter about post-pandemic recovery, from addressing learning loss and preparing for in-person school this fall to supporting kids and their social and emotional skills.

Educators and government officials saw an opportunity in summer learning, but said they recognized the camps would need additional staff.

All undergraduates who attend Connecticut colleges and universities or live in state were eligible to apply, including spring 2021 graduates. More than 1,000 undergraduate students expressed interest, according to Fairfields recruitment numbers.

Young people are just eager to get back out there and contribute and get involved, said Grupp.

Participants in this weeks online training were put into groups of up to 20 Corps members to prepare them for camps and classrooms. Students meet with facilitators and attend two live online sessions per day.

Each group is discussing the pandemics toll on children, how to engage students from all backgrounds and create inclusive environments, and training in social and emotional learning. The curriculum was put together by Fairfield faculty.

Corps member Cameron Phillips, who was matched with District Arts and Education in New Haven this summer, is also leading group discussions this week. She described many of the sessions as eye-openers, including a lesson on accommodating students of all abilities.

Im really excited to get out there and help with these programs that are so needed after the year that weve all had, she said. Phillips is a recent graduate of the University of New Haven and an incoming MFA student at Western Connecticut State University.

Even though the pandemic isnt over, anything that can fill in the gaps for students who are falling behind and give them some semblance of normalcy is something Im excited to do, she said. Its important work and I didnt think Id be able to be part of it.

Facilitator Donna Rogers-Jones, who is pursuing her masters degree in teaching English to speakers of other languages at Fairfield University, said she has noticed her college students are bringing their own experiences to group discussions.

Even as we are training these Corps members to interact in classrooms with children, said Rogers-Jones, they themselves experienced the same trauma.

It was very interesting to hear these undergraduates take ownership of their mental health and of their own experiences, and being isolated from their friends, their schools and their regular routine, and how they dealt with this, she said.

That sentiment was shared by many of the group heads who spoke with Hearst Connecticut Media.

Im working with undergraduate students who have had their own experiences of academic loss and dislocation throughout the pandemic, said Suzanne Solensky, a lead facilitator in the program and an adjunct faculty member at Fairfield in the honors program.

Its not just for the K-12 students; its also for some of these undergraduate students who are going to learn valuable skills about how do you be a leader, how do you step up to an occasion, how do you be flexible and resilient, she said. A lot of them have a deep desire to work with kids, and they want to make something positive out of the pandemic.

Grupp, the Fairfield dean, also said she sees a two-pronged benefit for young student and their teachers-to-be.

Our primary goal is for the K-12 students to have an enjoyable summer in a way thats different from what they just experienced, said Grupp. I think you can say the same for the undergraduate students.

Grupp added that college students will also be exposed to careers in education and working with children, while learning key life skills and earning some income.

Training groups will meet for periodic check-ins throughout the summer, which Grupp described as a space for sharing concerns, asking for additional resources and supports, she said. We didnt want to just put them out there and leave them.

Of the 235 summer programs that received education department grants, Fairfield estimated nearly 175 have requested one to three Corps members to help staff their programs.

Some of the summer programs start on site as early as next week and run for seven weeks.
GERMANTOWN, Tenn. (AP)  Three police officers in Tennessee were justified in fatally shooting an armed man who began raising a gun toward them, a county prosecutor concluded.

Shelby County District Attorney General Amy Weirich announced the decision Thursday after reviewing a report from the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation that included witness interviews, videos, crime scene photos, ballistics and autopsy results, news outlets reported.
A company hired to help extinguish a fire that gutted a northern Illinois chemical plant this week used foam containing toxic compounds that have tainted surface waters and groundwater across the U.S., officials said Thursday.

The private contractor sprayed the foam for about three hours Tuesday at the Chemtool Inc. factory near Rockton, despite concerns raised by government regulators the previous day, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency told The Associated Press.

The chemicals later were cleaned up and stored in a container, Fire Chief Kirk Wilson said at a news conference Thursday. Earlier, outside experts told the AP it would be difficult to prevent at least some of the material from seeping into groundwater.

The foam was made with chemicals belonging to a group known as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, which are used in a wide variety of industrial and household products, EPA said. They have been linked to numerous health problems including cancer and damage to organs including the liver, kidneys and thyroid gland.

Foams containing PFAS typically are used to extinguish highly flammable or combustible fires involving gas tankers and oil refineries, EPA said in a statement. Wilson said he ordered the company to switch to another type of foam that didn't have PFAS after regulators informed him that PFAS-containing foam was being used.

No contamination of groundwater or the nearby Rock River with the compounds has been detected but tests are underway, the Illinois EPA said in a separate statement to AP.

We will be fully transparent with the public and share test results and additional guidance as soon as we are able to do so, the state agency said.

Authorities are still investigating the cause of explosions Monday that tore through the plant near the Wisconsin state line, prompting evacuation of about 1,000 residents within a 1-mile (1.6-kilometer) radius of the plant.

Chemtool, which manufactures lubricants, grease products and other fluids, hired U.S. Fire Pump to help extinguish the fire. The Louisiana-based company pumps high volumes of water and foams to smother large industrial fires.

Crews dug a trench around the facility and placed booms in the Rock River to prevent runoff from escaping, Wilson said Wednesday, adding there had been no release of toxins into waterways and that hazardous materials are contained at this point.

In an email responding to AP inquiries, EPA said officials with the agency and with Illinois' environment department had raised concerns with Chemtool on Monday about using foam containing PFAS and requested a discussion about it with leaders of the firefighting operation.

The next day, after realizing the foam pumping was underway, the state and federal agencies requested a halt to review containment controls, EPA said.

Since then, foam which does not contain PFAS has become available onsite and that is what is being used for fire-suppression operations, the federal agency said.

U.S. Fire Pump marketing executive Jonny Carroll declined comment.

Alicia Gauer, spokeswoman for The Lubrizol Corporation, parent company of Chemtool, said before the foam was applied, we provided all requested information, including safety data sheets, to incident command and those at the scene. We followed all notifications protocols throughout the process.... We have been and will continue to be fully transparent, coordinated and supportive with all those involved."

The Illinois EPA said the foam initially used was a flourinated surfactant that could contain PFOA, or perfluorooctanoic acid, and PFHxA, or perfluorohexanoic acid. Both are among some 5,000 PFAS compounds with oil- and water-resistant properties used in clothing, furniture, cookware, food packaging, cosmetics and other goods.

They are described as forever chemicals because they don't degrade in the environment or the human body.

U.S. manufacturers have phased out PFOA and PFOS, the most common and widely studied compounds in the group.

But it remains legal to use PFAS chemicals in firefighting foam except in a few states, said Melanie Benesh, a staff attorney for the Environmental Working Group, an advocacy organization. Congress has ordered a halt to use of PFAS in military fighting foams by 2025.

U.S. Fire Pump used 3,200 gallons of the PFAS foam mixed with 71,000 gallons of water for the Chemtool fire, the state agency said.

Visual inspections do not indicate any impacts to Rock River at this time" but tests are continuing, it said.

Groundwater, from which the town draws its drinking water, also will be evaluated. The closest municipal well is 1.25 miles (2.01 kilometers) from the ruined factory, the Illinois EPA said.

Vacuum trucks have sucked water from trenches, where soil samples are being taken, and the plant grounds, the agency said.

Linda Birnbaum, a toxicologist and former director of the National Institute for Environmental Health Sciences, said it was amazing that the company would use PFAS-containing foam when alternatives were available.

If they contained the stuff so that it doesn't leave the area, that's good, Birnbaum said. But you can't totally keep it from reaching the ground; some of it is going to run off. The problem with these chemicals is that they never go away."

The volume of PFAS-containing foam used on the fire was relatively small, said Betsy Southerland, former director of science and technology with the U.S. EPA's Office of Water. Still, PFAS chemicals easily infiltrate soil and reach groundwater, where they could migrate to streams or wells, she said.
WASHINGTON (AP)  The Supreme Court sided with food giants Nestle and Cargill on Thursday and threw out a lawsuit that claimed they knowingly bought cocoa beans from farms in Africa that used child slave labor.

The justices ruled 8-1 that an appeals court improperly let the lawsuit against the food companies go forward. The companies had been sued by a group of six adult citizens of Mali who claimed they were taken from their country as children and forced to work on cocoa farms in neighboring Ivory Coast.

Although respondents injuries occurred entirely overseas, the Ninth Circuit held that respondents could sue in federal court because the defendant corporations allegedly made major operational decisions in the United States. The Ninth Circuit erred by allowing this suit to proceed, Justice Clarence Thomas wrote in a majority opinion for the court.

The case had been twice dismissed at an early stage before being revived by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. When the case was argued in December, then-President Donald Trump's administration backed Nestle and Cargill.

The Malian citizens had argued that Minneapolis-based Cargill and the American arm of Switzerland-based Nestle aided and abetted their slavery as children by, among other things, buying cocoa beans from farms that used child labor. The group sued seeking to bring a class action lawsuit on behalf of themselves and who they say are thousands of other former child slaves.

Nestle and Cargill have maintained throughout the case that they have done nothing wrong and that they have taken steps to combat child slavery. In statements following the ruling both Nestle and Cargill repeated that they remain committed to working to combat child labor in the cocoa industry.

The case involves a law enacted by the very first Congress in 1789, the Alien Tort Statute, which permits foreign citizens to sue in U.S. courts for human rights abuses. But Thomas said this case wasn't properly in U.S. courts.

Nearly all the conduct that they say aided and abetted forced labor  providing training, fertilizer, tools, and cash to overseas farms  occurred in Ivory Coast. ... But allegations of general corporate activity  like decisionmaking  cannot alone establish domestic application of the ATS, he wrote.

Attorney Paul Hoffman, who argued the case for the Malian citizens at the high court, said in a statement that he was disappointed that the Court has delayed our clients' long quest for justice. But he said it was not the end of the case. He said intends to ask a lower court to be allowed to amend the groups lawsuit and allege that Cargill and Nestle controlled the system of forced labor from the United States.

The high court in recent years has limited the use of the Alien Tort Statute. In 2018, the court ruled that foreign businesses cannot be sued under the law. In that case, the court rejected an attempt by Israeli victims of attacks in the West Bank and Gaza to use U.S. courts to sue Jordan-based Arab Bank, which they said helped finance the attacks.

The case is Nestle USA v. Doe I, 19-416, and Cargill Inc. v. Doe I, 19-453.
SANTA FE, N.M. (AP)  A New Mexico Hispanic fraternal order is suing the mayor of Santa Fe over damage to a historical monument by activists last year and the citys proposal to permanently remove it.

In a lawsuit filed Wednesday in state district court, the Union Protectiva de Santa Fe argues that the 152-year-old stone obelisk is a legally protected historical site under state law and that its removal dishonors Hispanic veterans.

A group of around 40 mostly white activists tore down the stone obelisk last year after other statues and monuments across the U.S. were toppled over concerns about racism.

In Santa Fe, inscriptions at the base of the monument honored Union soldiers who died fighting Indigenous tribes and Confederate soldiers. One inscription that described Indigenous people as savage was chiseled out in 1974 and never repaired.

The lawsuit asks a judge to prevent the city from spending any time or money on modifications to the historic downtown park until the stone obelisk is restored.

That would hobble Mayor Alan Webbers plans to have an independent commission determine the statue's fate. Despite calling for the removal of the obelisk, he emphasized that he would respect the final decision of the commission. A proposal for a commission to take on that task is being considered by the city council next month, with an estimated budget of $265,000.

In addition to being a 19th century war memorial, the obelisk is a marker of the land grant issued from Spanish colonial royalty to Hispanic families that conquered the area in the 1600s.

Its a reference point that anchors heritage and religious processions for traditional Hispanics and serves as a reminder of genocide for Native Americans.

Were protecting our history, culture and our traditions, and our religion also, said Virgil Vigil, President of Union Protectiva de Santa Fe.

For Vigil, a Vietnam War veteran and helicopter pilot, honoring the veterans is a major focus.

This is respecting our soldiers that gave their lives to maintain the freedom that we have and to end slavery, he said in an interview Monday, near the grey wooden box that covers the remnants of the obelisk.

Vigil has been an outspoken critic of Webbers handling of protests over the obelisk and the removal of a statue of Spanish conquistador Don Diego de Vargas from a downtown park. He said his organization has been shut out of conversations over the monuments future.

This lawsuit is not the way forward, Webber said, adding that the commission would start its work very soon.

A heated argument between the two during a chance encounter at a restaurant near the Plaza was reported by the Santa Fe New Mexican.

Webber called for removal of the obelisk last year, months before activists tore it down on Oct. 13 during a protest marking Indigenous Peoples Day.

The daytime destruction happened after police left the area in a move the mayor said was meant to prevent physical violence.

I am angry the vandals tore down the obelisk before it could be removed to safety. I dont approve of it. I think we needed to have a conversation, Webber said.

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Attanasio is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on under-covered issues. Follow Attanasio on Twitter.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP)  Iranians voted Friday in a presidential election dominated by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's hard-line protege after the disqualification of his strongest competition, fueling apathy that left some polling places largely deserted despite pleas to support the Islamic Republic at the ballot box.

Opinion polling by state-linked organizations, along with analysts, indicated that judiciary chief Ebrahim Raisi  who already is under U.S. sanctions  was the front-runner in a field of only four candidates. Former Central Bank chief Abdolnasser Hemmati is running as the moderate candidate but hasnt inspired the same support as outgoing President Hassan Rouhani, who is term-limited from seeking the office again.

As night fell, turnout appeared far lower than in Irans last presidential election in 2017. At one polling place inside a mosque in central Tehran, a Shiite cleric played soccer with a young boy as most of its workers napped in a courtyard. At another, officials watched videos on their mobile phones as state television blared beside them, offering only tight shots of locations around the country  as opposed to the long, snaking lines of past elections.

Balloting came to a close at 2.a.m. Saturday, after the government extended voting to accommodate what it called crowding at several polling places nationwide. Paper ballots, stuffed into large plastic boxes, were to be counted by hand through the night, and authorities said they expected to have initial results and turnout figures Saturday morning at the earliest.

My vote will not change anything in this election, the number of people who are voting for Raisi is huge and Hemmati does not have the necessary skills for this," said Hediyeh, a 25-year-old woman who gave only her first name while hurrying to a taxi in Haft-e Tir Square after avoiding the polls. "I have no candidate here.

Iranian state television sought to downplay the turnout, pointing to the Gulf Arab sheikhdoms surrounding it ruled by hereditary leaders and the lower participation in Western democracies. After a day of amplifying officials attempts to get out the vote, state TV broadcast scenes of jam-packed voting booths in several provinces overnight, seeking to portray a last-minute rush to the polls.

But since the 1979 revolution overthrew the shah, Iran's theocracy has cited voter turnout as a sign of its legitimacy, beginning with its first referendum that won 98.2% support that simply asked whether or not people wanted an Islamic Republic.

The disqualifications affected reformists and those backing Rouhani, whose administration both reached the 2015 nuclear deal with world powers and saw it disintegrate three years later with then-President Donald Trump's unilateral withdrawal of America from the accord. Former hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, also blocked from running, said on social media he'd boycott the vote.

Voter apathy also has been fed by the devastated state of the economy and subdued campaigning amid months of surging coronavirus cases. Poll workers wore gloves and masks, and some wiped down ballot boxes with disinfectants.

If elected, Raisi would be the first serving Iranian president sanctioned by the U.S. government even before entering office over his involvement in the mass execution of political prisoners in 1988, as well as his time as the head of Irans internationally criticized judiciary  one of the worlds top executioners.

It also would put hard-liners firmly in control across the government as negotiations in Vienna continue to try to save a tattered deal meant to limit Iran's nuclear program at a time when Tehran is enriching uranium at its highest levels ever, though it still remains short of weapons-grade levels. Tensions remain high with both the U.S. and Israel, which is believed to have carried out a series of attacks targeting Iranian nuclear sites as well as assassinating the scientist who created its military atomic program decades earlier.

Whoever wins will likely serve two four-year terms and thus could be at the helm at what could be one of the most crucial moments for the country in decades  the death of the 82-year-old Khamenei. Speculation already has begun that Raisi might be a contender for the position, along with Khameneis son, Mojtaba.

Khamenei cast the first vote from Tehran, urging the public to "go ahead, choose and vote.

Raisi, wearing a black turban that identifies him in Shiite tradition as a direct descendant of Islams Prophet Muhammad, voted from a mosque in southern Tehran. The cleric acknowledged in comments afterward that some may be so upset that they dont want to vote.

"I beg everyone, the lovely youths, and all Iranian men and women speaking in any accent or language from any region and with any political views, to go and vote and cast their ballots, Raisi said.

But few appeared to heed the call. There are more than 59 million eligible voters in Iran, a nation of over 80 million people. However, the state-linked Iranian Student Polling Agency has estimated a turnout will be just 44%, which would be the lowest since the revolution. Officials gave no turnout figures Friday, though results could come Saturday.

Fears about a low turnout have some warning Iran may be turning away from being an Islamic Republic  a government with elected civilian leadership overseen by a supreme leader from its Shiite clergy  to a country more tightly governed by its supreme leader, who already has final say on all matters of state and oversees its defense and atomic program.

This is not acceptable, said former President Mohammad Khatami, a reformist who sought to change the theocracy from the inside during eight years in office. How would this conform to being a republic or Islamic?

For his part, Khamenei warned of foreign plots seeking to depress turnout in a speech Wednesday. A flyer handed out on the streets of Tehran by hard-liners echoed that and bore the image of Revolutionary Guard Gen. Qassem Soleimani, who was killed in a U.S. drone strike in 2020. A polling station was set up by Soleimanis grave on Friday.

Some voters appeared to echo that call.

We cannot leave our destiny in the hands of foreigners and let them decide for us and create conditions that will be absolutely harmful for us, said Tehran voter Shahla Pazouki.

Also hurting a moderate like Hemmati is the public anger aimed at Rouhani over the collapse of the deal, despite ongoing talks in Vienna to revive it. Irans already-ailing economy has suffered since, with double-digit inflation and mass unemployment.

It is useless, said Ali Hosseini, a 36-year-old unemployed resident in southern Tehran, about voting. Anyone who wins the election after some time says he cannot solve problem of the economy because of intervention by influential people. He then forgets his promises and we poor people again remain disappointed.
NEW HAVEN  Opinions abound about accessory dwelling units  aka in-law apartments in the city with many strong ones expressed on all sides over the past couple of weeks.

Part of the debate, for residents and officials, centers on whether whether allowing such accessory dwelling units would increase the availability of affordable housing in New Haven and whether the issues are linked. Increasing congestion remains is concern

ADUs and affordability  I see those are separate issues, said City Plan Commission Chairwoman Leslie Radcliffe, making reference to one of the key reasons City Plan staff had for recommending the change, which was part of a larger zoning proposal that grew out of recommendations from the citys Affordable Housing Task Force.

Radcliffe also noted this week that ... There are just so many questions that I have.

I dont think we can talk about ADUs and affordability at the same time, if were going to continue to link them together, said Radcliffe.

I think this is something that we really dont need to be in a rush to do, Radcliffe said.

Congestion

Residents have come out for and against the proposed change, which would make legal a practice that long has been widespread throughout the city.

We dont need any more congestion in the Hill, said Greenwich Avenue resident John Carlson.

Being a resident basically 15 years in Hill South, the only place where I know where this would work are in homes with existing driveways, Carlson said. So Im against this ADU proposal. Hill South doesnt need any more congestion.

Mary E. O'Leary /Hearst Connecticut Media /

Wooster Place resident Anstress Farwell, executive director of the New Haven Urban Design League, is in favor of ADUs, but said she understands the concerns of Hill South residents about possible congestion and lack of parking.

Elizabeth Holt, director of preservation services for the New Haven Preservation Trust, said in a letter that she believes the link between ADUs and affordability is questionable at best. She said she believes the proposal should be withdrawn in light of all the concerns raised.

Resident Kevin McCarthy said he is against the change and skeptical it would increase the availability of affordable housing.

Developers are businesspeople, McCarthy said. They will set rents as high as they possibly can.

But Nash Street resident John McFadyen was in favor of it.

I think this is commonsense zoning, said McFadyen, who said that a few years ago he was able to legally dig out our basement and add a one-bedroom apartment to our home.

The change increased our taxes by 30 percent but allowed us to add the most affordable housing unit on our block, he said. It increased our grand list value by $100,000.

Lighthouse Road resident Neil Olinski also was in favor of allowing accessory dwelling units.

The biggest thing is, this will improve property rights, giving homeowners rights to do more with their houses, Olinski said.

City Plan Vice Chairman Edward Mattison said he has been interested in the issue for years. The problem is that the devil is in the details, he said.

What hes found from talking to people not just in the area but around the country is that in some places its working out and some places its not, he said.

City Plan Executive Director Aicha Woods told the commission that in its first phase, which would only allow ADUs where the propertys owner is living in one of the units, any changes would be very mild, with all allowed changes to dwellings needing to fit within existing envelopes, or existing buildings.

Mary E. O'Leary /Hearst Connecticut Media file /

The first phase would not result in a lot of ADUs, she said. More would be allowed in the second phase to follow, she said. Phase 2 also would have some specific design guidelines ... and make it easier to build new structures on properties.

The proposal to allow ADUs would do so without requiring additional parking, and reduce minimum lot size from 5,400 square feet to 4,000 square feet.

The Board of Alders representative on the commission, Adam Marchand, D-25, said he wondered whether the move would actually increase the supply of affordable housing.

Commission member Ernest Pagan said he had some reservations where we dont know what this is going to do with some of the more dense neighborhoods. But he said he also sympathizes with people on fixed incomes who want to live with a relative so they can stay in their home.

All neighborhoods are not the same in the city of New Haven, said Radcliffe.

Woods pointed out that this is the beginning of a process and there will be plenty of opportunities for residents to express their opinions before anything changes.

I also want to just really make clear that any ADU is subject to the same kind of building codes as any other kind of construction, she said. ... I want to make clear that we are not taking away any of those requirements. Its just a zoning matter. Were taking away some of the barriers.

After hearing more from residents on the proposed zoning text change to allow accessory dwelling units this week, the City Plan Commission closed the public hearing.

But commission members will continue talking about it at a special meeting at 6 p.m. July 7 on Zoom, with the link to be posted with the agenda on the City Plan Commission website at https://bit.ly/35wZd1G in the days preceding the meeting.

I think a lot of the questions that I had not thought of were raised by the public, Radcliffe said.

The meeting also will include a public hearing on the new inclusionary zoning proposal before both the City Plan Commission and Board of Alders.

City Plan then will make a recommendation on ADUs to the Board of Alders, which has the ultimate power to approve or reject the proposed change.

mark.zaretsky@hearstmediact.com
NEW HAVEN  Frank Pepe Pizzeria Napoletana has been named the 9th best pizza in the nation by a travel and food site.

This should come as no surprise to local pizza lovers, as Pepes is known here as an iconic institution not just in New Haven, but to the country. Their cultural contributions have a lasting impact on our nations culinary history, according to Elm City Mayor Justin Elicker.

Even U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal (and there is a division in New Haven between fans of the big three  Pepes, Sallys Apizza and Modern Apizza) has said When you think of pizza, you think of Pepes.

Interactive: A look inside New Haven apizza

And heck, theres even a movie about the best city pies, entitled Pizza: A Love Story, of course, and made by self-proclaimed ridiculous pizza snobs.

The real question is how Pepes  which is among a wide selection of lauded pizza in New Haven  landed at only 9th place in the Big 7 Travel lineup.

According to Big 7, it has the in on food as it creates content across three channels  Big 7 Travel, Big 7 Hotels and Big 7 Food.

Weve searched high and low across the country for the best family pizzerias, hip newcomers and the old classics, a spokeswoman said in an email. The list, which is now in its 3rd year, was determined from a combined score of readers suggestions throughout the year, online user reviews and Big 7 Travels team.

Weve got the 50 best spots for pizza in the US you simply have to try in 2021  one for every state, the site said about its new rankings.

In a separate post on the best pizza in Connecticut, the travel site list Pepes as No. 1 in the state.

Pepes, as popular with area residents as it is further afield, also is known to draw its share of celebrities over the years. In 2019, for instance, Ron Howard dropped in for a a fresh tomato pie. Vice President Kamala Harris, however, fed her staff from Sallys Apizza during a visit to New Haven in March. More recently, NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio took a jab at New Haven pizza while explaining ranked-choice voting, and New Haven pizza was featured on Good Morning America,

Big 7s Top 10 Best Pizzas in the USA 2021 included:

1. Tonys Pizza Napoletana  San Francisco, California

2. Ops  Brooklyn, New York

3. Pizza Delicious  New Orleans, Louisiana

4. Bricco Coal Fired Pizza  Westmont, New Jersey

5. Pequods Pizza  Chicago, Illinois

6. Roostica  Key West, Florida

7. Buddys Pizza  Detroit, Michigan

8. Diavola  Indianapolis, Indiana

9. Frank Pepe  New Haven, Connecticut

10. Posto  Boston, Massachusetts
Five guns and nearly a kilogram of crack cocaine were found scattered around a Manchester home when authorities served warrants this week in connection with a lengthy undercover narcotics investigation, according to police.

The focus of the probe was a local crack cocaine dealer, identified by police as Josiah Cadette, 28. Also arrested was Cadettes girlfriend, Nysha M. Sanchez, 26.

The East Central Narcotics Task Force  comprised of members from Manchester, South Windsor, Glasonbury and Vernon police  wrapped up the investigation on Tuesday by serving warrants in connection with the case in Vernon and Manchester, according to Sgt. Shawn Krom, the task force supervisor.

When investigators served the search warrants, Krom said, Sanchez and a 3-year-old were at the Manchester residence.

Investigators said they seized nearly a kilogram of cocaine, five guns, multiple high-capacity magazines including a drum magazine for a pistol with 50-round capacity, over $12,000 in cash and two vehicles.

The amount of cocaine seized had an estimated street value of $50,000, Krom said. He said the drugs and guns were found scattered in various areas of the home, with no regard for the presence or safety of the toddler.

Krom said the child was placed in the care of a family member and the state Department of Children and Families was notified.

Cadette was taken into custody and processed at Vernon police headquarters on charges of possession of a controlled substance, sale of a controlled substance. He was held on a $75,000 bond on those offenses. Krom said Cadette is expected to face additional charges once investigators submit arrest affidavits based on the search warrants.

Sanchez was processed at Manchester police headquarters on charges of possession of narcotics, possession with intent to sell, operation of a drug factory, possession of drug paraphernalia within 1,500-feet of a school, two counts of risk of injury to a minor, criminally negligent storage of a firearm and possession of a high-capacity magazine.

Anyone with information on illegal drug activity in the Manchester, South Windsor, Vernon and Glastonbury communities is asked to call 860-645-5548.
FLINT, Mich. (AP)  A group of people indicted in the Flint water scandal has no right to challenge the evidence in District Court, a judge said.

The decision is a defeat for five people who were charged with felonies through indictments, which are rarely used in Michigan courts.
WEST HAVEN  Robbin Watt Hamilton wants to see good things.

Watt Hamilton, the city councilwoman for the 5th District, has spent weeks collaborating with city officials to plan the first official Juneteenth event in the city.

With all the social issues theres been, this is the right time to highlight those issues in a good light. Its still part of American history and its a good way to educate all people about the milestones African Americans have taken in the U.S., she said.

Juneteenth, which passed the U.S. Senate for recognition as a federal holiday this week and was signed into law by President Joe Biden, is recognized as a celebration of the end of slavery, when news of slavery abolition reached the final enslaved people in Texas on June 19, 1865.

Watt Hamilton said she believes its important for the city to have its own celebration, which will be held Saturday. Many residents are used to traveling to neighboring New Haven for cultural celebrations, but Watt Hamilton said there is much to celebrate within West Haven itself.

People want to learn and want to know. We have a good population of Black and brown people, so why not highlight some goods things? she said.

Councilwoman Trenee McGee, D-7, said she sees West Haven holding its own event as a sign of progress.

Most of our constituents would go to New Haven, and not only for Juneteenth, but even for Black history events, she said. There was an awareness that took place last summer where people woke up a little bit and realized this is happening to the Black community and communities of color, and I think now is the time we all have to amplify voices.

Last summer, George Floyd, a Black man in Minneapolis, was killed by a police officer in a moment captured on video, leading to national protests. Floyds murder hearkened back to previous high-profile killings of Black people  particularly over the last decade  and became part of an ongoing reckoning around racism.

I think were going in with reasonable expectations: to come together, learn and have a great time and celebrate freedom, but to work towards being freer. I think thats very important for right now, McGee said.

The citys Juneteenth event is scheduled to take place at Brent Watt Park on Tile Street from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Watt Hamilton said there will be singing, dancing, poetry, drumlines and food trucks.

Additionally, the city Health Department will run a COVID-19 vaccination clinic at the event.

We can catch the hesitators and will probably provide some sort of incentive, Watt Hamilton said. Its just to give those people on the fence a little nudge to get vaccinated. I think we should use every opportunity where theres large groups of people to bring the vaccinations to where they are.

Mayor Nancy Rossi said she supports both Watt Hamiltons efforts and the presence of the vaccination clinic.

When you look at the senior population, their vaccination rate is really high. As it starts going down the order of age, it gets lower and lower. There are still a lot of people who are not vaccinated for whatever reason, she said. The more available it is, the more easy access, I think the better off people will be.

According to state data, as of June 9, 94.22 percent of West Haven residents over 65 had received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine. According to the data, 71.41 percent of residents between 45 and 64 have received one dose and 48.74 percent of residents from 15 to 44 have received one dose. The most common vaccines require two doses, spaced roughly one month apart.

brian.zahn@hearstmediact.com
BOLTON, N.C. (AP)  Charges have been filed against a white North Carolina firefighter who is shown in a video pointing a gun at a Black motorist, a sheriff's office said Friday.

A news release from the Columbus County Sheriffs Office said Shantasia Donique Williams, 24, of Wilmington was driving past a traffic accident in Bolton on June 15 when she used a median to turn around and return to the scene.
MADISON, Wis. (AP)  Wisconsin Republicans wrapped up revisions on the 2021-23 state budget Thursday night by leaning on unprecedented revenue projections to build a roughly $3.3 billion tax cut into the spending plan.

Lawmakers learned last week the state is projected to collect $4.4 billion in tax revenue over the last three years more than expected, sending Republicans scurrying into meetings to hammer out a tax cut plan. They emerged on Thursday afternoon with a plan that calls for slicing income taxes by $2.7 billion and local property taxes for schools and technical colleges.

The GOP would accomplish the income tax cut largely by reducing the tax rate for people making $23,930 to $263,480 from 6.27% to 5.3%. According to the nonpartisan Legislative Fiscal Bureau, a taxpayer making between $40,000 and $50,000 would see a $115 reduction in tax year 2022.

Certainly an excellent step in the right direction for the state of Wisconsin, said Rep. Mark Born, co-chairman of the finance committee. Certainly the type of thing that we are, I guess, excited to do with the budget surpluses weve built. We are taking more from the citizens of Wisconsin than we need."

Democrats on the committee complained that three-quarters of the income tax cuts would go to people making $100,000 or more. They said Republicans could easily cut taxes for people in the lowest income brackets but passed.

This proposal just doesn't cut it, Rep. Greta Neubauer said.

The committee approved the income tax cuts on an 11-4 vote. All four Democrats on the committee voted against it.

The committee also approved provisions designed to ensure that Wisconsin schools will receive $2.6 billion in federal coronavirus relief money. Republicans on the committee earlier this year gave state schools an additional $128 million in the budget, less than 10% of the $1.6 billion Democratic Gov. Tony Evers proposed. The state needed to spend almost $400 million than what the GOP allocated to secure the federal aid.

The provisions adopted Thursday would cut local property taxes levied by schools and technical colleges by $647 million and replace that revenue with state aid. Schools would come out even but the moves would technically satisfy the federal requirement to spend more state dollars on schools, the fiscal bureau's director, Bob Lang, told the committee.

The panel adopted those changes on another 11-4 vote, with all the Democrats voting against the provisions.

GOP leaders announced at a news conference that the total tax cuts will translate to $1,200 in savings for a typical family through income tax and property tax relief.

Republicans said at the news conference that they planned to eliminate the personal property tax, which businesses pay on items such as furniture and machinery, leaving the impression they would include those provisions in the budget. They set aside $202 million to backfill the lost revenue for local jurisdictions but didn't eliminate the tax, saying said they would do that through separate legislation.

In other moves Thursday, the committee:

Approved spending about $1.8 million to give guards working at understaffed prisons an extra $5 an hour.

Approved spending $87.4 million to give state workers a 2% raise in each year of the budget.

Granted Democratic Attorney General Josh Kaul permission to withdraw Wisconsin from a multistate lawsuit challenging Trump administration obstacles to abortion. Twenty Democratic-led states sued the Trump administration in 2019 after it created a rule banning taxpayer-funded family planning clinics from referring patients to abortion providers and prohibiting federally funded family planning clinics from being housed in the same facility as abortion providers. The states decided to drop the lawsuit after the Biden administration said it would undo the rule by the end of 2021.

The budget now goes to the full Senate and Assembly, with the first floor votes expected during the last week of June.

Approval in both houses will send the budget to Democratic Gov. Tony Evers, who can use his powerful line-item veto to rewrite the document to his liking.

___

Follow Todd Richmond on Twitter at https://twitter.com/trichmond1
BRANFORD  Less than two months after adopting a 2021-22 academic calendar, the school board has revised it to take into account two Jewish holidays and buck the trend as far as Columbus Day goes.

Some school districts  Branford included  had moved away from recognizing the name of the federal holiday on the second Monday of October that honors the Italian explorer now associated by some with the violent colonization of the Americas.

The Branford district calendar adopted in April simply wrapped the Oct. 11, 2021, holiday into a four-day October Recess.

At a June 16 school board meeting, however, the board voted to add back in Columbus Day but gave it equal billing with Indigenous People Day.

It will be labeled Columbus/Indigenous People Day.

It is kind of a paradox to have those two (names) juxtaposed on the same line, said Board of Education Chairman John Prins. I welcome the controversy that might arise from it. These are difficult conversations.

On the previously adopted calendar, the federal holiday was a day off from school, but not labeled at all.

That did not sit well with the Italian-American community, members of which reportedly sent district officials letters urging the Columbus name be reinstated.

Its a weighty issue, said board member Peter Berdon. We are in a community with a large number of Italian Americans who look to Columbus Day as a day of recognition of Italian Americans.

Removing it, he said, is seen as a slap in the face.

Hannah Bloomquist, a student representative on the board, said while the district should celebrate Italian Americans, it should not be recognizing the man.

I stand strongly against it, Bloomquist said. I wish to recognize the indigenous people upon which genocide was committed.

Meredith Gaffney, who served on a committee that developed the calendar, called the idea of recognizing the day with both names weird but a step in a better direction.

Other school boards that have wrestled with the issue have found alternative solutions, after some hit or miss.

In Bridgeport, for instance, Columbus Day was made Indigenous People Day only to be renamed again as Italian Heritage Day. The change came not only at the behest of Italian-American organizations in the city, but Indigenous groups that said they would prefer a day of recognition separate from one traditionally associated with Columbus.

Meanwhile, the start of school in Branford, planned for the day after Labor Day  Sept. 7  now will be Sept. 8 since the first day of Rosh Hashanah falls this year on Sept. 7. The district also added Sept. 16 as a day off in observance of Yom Kippur.

As such, the end of school will be pushed back two days, to June 17  barring snow days  to adhere to the states 180-day school year mandate.

Superintendent of Schools Hamlet Hernandez told the board that the Jewish holidays had been eliminated in an attempt to create a calendar with fewer breaks and to get out of school by mid-June.

After adoption, however, the district heard from the Jewish Federation.

Although staff and students who observe the holiday can take it off, Berdon said as one of the few Jewish kids in his class growing up in Branford, he always felt he missed quite a bit by taking the two most important days in the Jewish calendar off while everyone else was in school.

His own kids, Berdon added, have gone to school on those days because they felt they couldnt afford to miss something.

It made us feel different, Berdon said.

On the flip side, Berdon said he recognizes Branford is becoming increasingly diverse, with multiple languages spoken and many holidays observed.

Because Rosh Hashanah falls on what would have been the first day of school, several board members worried about the disruption that would be caused if a number of teachers were to take the day off.

Board member Tim Raynor suggested an earlier start to the school year, in August.

Coming out of COVID, putting students back in school early might be a good idea, Raynor said.

Others rejected that idea over concerns it would affect teacher preparation for the new school year and completion of the Walsh Intermediate School construction project.
Niagara Falls, NY (14301)

Today

Scattered thunderstorms developing this afternoon. High 71F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 60%..

Tonight

Scattered thunderstorms during the evening. Partly cloudy skies after midnight. Low around 60F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 50%.
A 22-year-old unemployed man, Kehinde Olajide has been sentenced to death by hanging for armed robbery in Ekiti State. A High Court sitting ...





A 22-year-old unemployed man, Kehinde Olajide has been sentenced to death by hanging for armed robbery in Ekiti State.

A High Court sitting in Ado Ekiti on Thursday sentenced Kehinde for involvement in robberies.

He was docked for arming himself with dangerous weapons to rob Dayo Folorunsho, Saka Yusuf, Adeoye Oluwatosin, Adeola Oluwatobi, Olayemi Aremu, Hambali Ojo and Ayodele Oluwafemi of their belongings.

Justice Lekan Ogunmoye who pronounced the judgement, said that the prosecution had proved ingredients of armed robbery against the convict without any reasonable doubt.

Ogunmoye said, He is hereby sentenced to death by hanging until he is dead. May God almighty have mercy upon his soul.

The convict and others who were involved in the alleged robbery were charged with nine count charges bordering on conspiracy, unlawful possession of firearms and robbery.

The three other men involved in the robbery include, Kareem Azeez (24), Bamisile Lateef (28) and Adebayo Basiru (25).

The Judge, however, acquitted them for lack of proof of the offence they were charged for.
Liberian President, George Weah says he is saddened by the death of founder of Synagogue Church of All Nations, SCOAN, Prophet T.B. Joshua. ...





Liberian President, George Weah says he is saddened by the death of founder of Synagogue Church of All Nations, SCOAN, Prophet T.B. Joshua.

Weah said Joshua greatly impacted in his life.

The President said the Clergyman had impacted so many lives, including his, before Joshuas passing on Saturday, June 5, 2021 at the age of 57.

Weah had come to value the spiritual guidance of the Televangelist ever since the 2017 visit and worship service he had with SCOANs congregation.

At the time, TB Joshua called President Weah his brother, whom he said was here today because he loves his country and wants Gods choice for his country he is not here to impose himself.

He had also offered prayers for the Liberian nation and people.

The President conveys his condolences to TB Joshuas family, the Nigerian people, the church and all those around the world impacted by his loss.

He urged them to take solace in the Lord.
President Muhammadu Buharis spokesman, Femi Adesina, has hit out at prophets of doom, who have predicted that Nigeria will break up into ...

President Muhammadu Buharis spokesman, Femi Adesina, has hit out at prophets of doom, who have predicted that Nigeria will break up into different parts.

In his weekly article on Friday, Adesina claimed that these prophecies were put out during the administrations of at least three former presidents.

He listed them as Olusegun Obasanjo, Umaru YarAdua and Goodluck Jonathan.

According to him, these predictions continued into the two terms Buhari has served.

However, Adesina boasted that Nigeria continues to live and will surely survive.

When Chief Olusegun Obasanjo was President between 1999 and 2007, they predicted that he was going to be the last President of a united Nigeria. It didnt happen.

When Umaru YarAdua came, they said he was too sick to hold Nigeria together. The country stood.

Under Goodluck Jonathan, they said he was too weak, and different components of the country would soon say, to your tents oh Israel. Nigeria survived.

And for six years under Muhammadu Buhari, they have not changed their songs, Adesina wrote.

He added that But Nigeria lives. It trudges on from day to day, month to month, and will surely survive.
The Kebbi State Police Command has refuted reports that one of its vans was hijacked by bandits and used to kidnap students from Federal Gov...





The Kebbi State Police Command has refuted reports that one of its vans was hijacked by bandits and used to kidnap students from Federal Government College, Birnin Yauri, Ngaski Local Government Area on Thursday.

The Commands spokesman, DSP Nafiu Abubakar, in a statement on Friday said the White Hilux Van with registration No. kBSJ 29 belonging to a High Court judge with the inscription of Kebbi State Judiciary, was the vehicle hijacked by bandits on Birnin Yauri road.

The command said Hilux was the vehicle used in the kidnapping attack and not a police van as alleged in the said reports.

The attention of the force has been drawn to reports that a police vehicle was used in kidnapping about 50 students of the FGC.

A white Hilux Van with registration No. kBSJ 29 belonging to a High Court judge with the inscription of Kebbi State Judiciary, hijacked by bandits on Birnin Yauri road was the one used in kidnapping students and not a police vehicle as stated by some media stations, DSP Abubakar said.

He explained that reports making the rounds alleged that 50 students were kidnapped from the school were false, adding that the force is yet to ascertain the number of students taken away.

The Command wishes to make it clear and set the records straight that we are yet to ascertain the number of students missing as rescue operation is still ongoing.

Abubakar said the Command would continue to brief members of the media as events unfold.
Bola Tinubu, national leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC), has congratulated Rotimi Akeredolu, governor of Ondo, on his victory ...

Bola Tinubu, national leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC), has congratulated Rotimi Akeredolu, governor of Ondo, on his victory at the court of appeal.

On Wednesday, the court of appeal sitting in Akure, Ondo state, dismissed an appeal filed by Eyitayo Jegede, candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), challenging Akeredolus victory in the October 2020 governorship election.

Tinubu, in a congratulatory message on Thursday, said the judgement delivered by the court of appeal affirms that the rule of law is meant to protect the will of the people in a free and fair electioneering process.

He also urged the governor to continue to work with other candidates for the development of state.

The Appeal Court decision stood for the vital proposition that the rule of law serves to protect the sovereign will of the people when expressed in free and honest elections, Tinubu said.

Congratulations to Ondo State Governor, Oluwarotimi Akeredolu, and his Deputy, Lucky Aiyedatiwa, for the Court of Appeal judgment affirming their overwhelming victory in the governorship election in the state.

By this judgement, the appellate court clearly shows that Governor Akeredolu and Deputy Governor Aiyedatiwa were the candidates who the people of Ondo chose to pilot their affairs for the next four years.

The confidence the people repose in the Akeredolu administration has been well earned and should be wholly respected.

It is time to now place partisan politics on the shelf for the moment so that these former political contestants can join hands as much as possible for the good and development of Ondo State.

Once again, I rejoice with Governor Akeredolu, Deputy Governor Aiyedatiwa, our teeming APC members in Ondo and, indeed, the good people of the state over this court victory.
Watertown, NY (13601)

Today

Thunderstorms. High around 70F. Winds NE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 100%..

Tonight

Variable clouds with showers and scattered thunderstorms. Storms more numerous this evening. Low 57F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 50%.
Professor Universe returns to the New Orleans Public Library at 2 p.m. June 23 to present "The Great Chicken Melodrama," a brand-new, one-person spectacle that will take kids on a thrilling, emotional roller coaster of love, loss and science.

During this hourlong theatrical Zoom performance, kids will learn how DNA works, how genes are passed on, how animals change due to the environment, tons of fun facts about exotic animals and more.

Professor Universe (aka Dallas Akins) and his production company, Wow O'Clock, create kids' science programs that are attention-grabbing and educational. Akins has degrees in physics and theater, and went to Ecole Philippe Gaulier, a clown school in France. He previously has performed in-person at the library (and was requested back by patrons and branch staff alike).

"The Great Chicken Melodrama" is sponsored by the Friends of the New Orleans Library for the 2021 SUMMER FUN program. Register at nolalibrary.org/events.

COMICS CLUB: Comic-loving kids are invited to join the New Orleans Public Librarys newest book club, Bubble Talk, which will meet for the first time at 1 p.m. June 25 on Zoom.

Bubble Talk is a space for children ages 7 to 11 to come together to talk about all things graphic novel. Junes title is Guts, a semiautobiographical tale by Raina Telgemeier that explores childhood anxiety, growing up, and gathering the courage to face and conquer your fears.

Visit catalog.nolalibrary.org to reserve a copy of Guts, which is available in both print and e-book formats. Register for Bubble Talk at nolalibrary.org/events.

GET CRAFTY: Yarn and thread artists of all ages are invited to the librarys Virtual Yarn Arts Craft Circle at 3:30 p.m. June 26. Participants can share skills and techniques to learn from and with one another while working on their own projects.

The group, which is sponsored by the Friends of the New Orleans Public Library, will meet on the second and fourth Saturdays of every month through July. New members are always welcome. Register at nolalibrary.org/events.

VIRTUAL ZOO: Audubon Zoo will pay the library a virtual visit June 29 to teach children about some of the areas invasive species and how to help protect Louisianas fragile ecosystems. Participants will learn all about what invasive species are, how they got here and why they matter. Audubons Virtual Visits are sponsored by the Friends of the New Orleans Public Library.

Visit nolalibrary.org/events to register.

AESOP'S PUPPETS: The library has partnered with Atlantas Center for Puppetry Arts to present Aesops Fantastical Fables Puppet Show at 2 p.m. June 29 on Zoom.

This virtual puppet show brings three classic tales to life: The Lion and the Mouse, The Boy who cried Wolf and The Tortoise and the Hare. This interactive performance of puppetry is sponsored by the Friends of the New Orleans Public Library.

Dr. Gabriel Morley is director of the New Orleans Public Library.
If you happen to be driving along La. 25 between Covington and Folsom, you might do a double take at the sight of a 15-foot wooden alligator tipped on its tail alongside the road, or a gigantic carved stallion rearing up on its haunches.

These sculptures, hewn from tree stumps, are the work of Covington artist Steve Tresvik. A Vietnam veteran and former professional cook, Tresvik learned how to carve sculptures when he turned blocks of ice into works of art as executive sous chef with the Hyatt Hotel in Nashville, Tennessee.

I started with a simple ice carving using primitive chipper carving tools, and had a lot of bloody knuckles to show for it," Tresvik said. "But when the restaurant hired a guy from Japan, it turned out he knew a lot about ice carving, and came with his own set of custom tools."

Eventually, Tresvik got his own personalized carving tools and became adept at the chilly, glittering art of ice sculpture.

Tresvik hails from a little town 100 miles north of New York City. Haute cuisine and ice carving were not originally part of his life plan. A stint in the Navy, in fact, had him contemplating becoming a Navy SEAL. But then, during three tours of Vietnam, he was assigned to kitchen duty  and lo and behold, he had a knack for cooking.

When Tresvik left the Navy, he enrolled in the acclaimed Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, New York, under the GI Bill. Upon graduation, an ad in Gourmet magazine prompted him to apply at The Fairmont in Dallas, where he became a cook in 1977. He only stayed 1 1/2 years, but he met his wife, Maria, at the hotel. They've been together ever since.

After Tresvik worked 40 years as a chef all over the country, the couple retired to Covington. He no longer carves ice, because these days ice is carved with computer-aided design that lets the carver plug in specifications, hit start and stand back as the sculpture is created.

But, Tresvik said, he's always looking for new challenges and saw there was a lot of wood around St. Tammany to experiment on. He decided to try his hand at woodcarving, using the chain saw he was so familiar with.

The jump from ice carving to woodcarving, three years ago, was a bit intimidating at first, but YouTube videos answered a lot of questions, and as Tresvik likes to say, whether its ice or wood, you begin with a block. Since ice is slicker and the chain saw cuts through it more quickly, he could do a fish on a wave in less than 30 minutes, whereas wood takes a bit longer.

Hes become very proficient in bears, eagles and his signature alligators. He also creates dolphins, rabbits and horses, like that giant stallion perched on the side lawn of his workshop and visible to everyone driving along the highway.

While hes awash in pine on the north shore, Tresvik prefers white oak or cedar for his carvings.

The carvings have turned into a small business for Tresvik. Debbie Hogan, who lives in Pleasantville Estates in Covington, turned a tree into a showpiece when she had Tresvik carve a flying eagle into the 15-foot-tall stump.

Hogan found the sculptor after she called a tree service to come to her house and give her a price for taking down a dying water oak.

The estimate was going to be even more expensive for the stump removal than it was for cutting down the tree," Hogan said. "Then the technician suggested I call Steve Tresvik and see if he could carve a decorative element into the tree, which would eliminate stump removal altogether.

Tresvik went through designs with Hogan, and they settled upon an eagle in flight. The artist arrived with his scaffolding and within six days had erected a work of art.

I like his work so much that Ive now commissioned him to design a glass-top coffee table, held up by one of his slinky alligators, Hogan said.

Tresvik is working on a canoe with three paddling bears for another commission.

But Hogan is next in line again. Shes saved a couple of stumps that look like the letter Y, and says shed like Tresvik to replicate her dear departed Yorkies. Tresvik has said hed like to master the art of portraiture, so its a perfect fit.

Most of Tresvik's carving is done with chain saws. Now he's adding various routers and airbrushes for the many intricate designs on his sculptures.

I started out with bears, and the first one was so awful I actually burned it," Tresvik said. But a year later, even my brother was giving me kudos. And its been more rewarding than ice carving, because its permanent. After all, who wants to construct a piece youre really proud of, only to have it turn into a pool of water three hours later?"

Email Leslie Carde at lesliecardejournalist@gmail.com

+4 Mega-rich MacKenzie Scott donates $2.7B to nonprofit organizations, including 3 in New Orleans Philanthropist MacKenzie Scott, former wife of Amazon.com mogul Jeff Bezos, announced Tuesday that she would give more than $2.7 billion to no

+4 Leggy Bourbon Street legend Chris Owens is back, with in-person Fathers Day appearance Eternal entertainer Chris Owens plans to croon My Heart Belongs to Daddy during a Fathers Day blowout at her Bourbon Street nightclub on Ju
Things looked bleak last summer for Restaurant des Familles, a one-of-a-kind restaurant perched on the bayou down in Crown Point.

A fire that broke out July 13 caused heavy damage, and owners Brooke and Bryan Zar faced the prospect of rebuilding their family business when the pandemic was already ravaging the restaurant business in general.

But they vowed to reopen Restaurant de Familles, and when they do, later this year, the Zars will unveil more than just a rebuild.

Check out the video walk-through below from Lachin Architects

They are now developing a new, expansive outdoor dining area to more fully meld with the verdant Louisiana setting around the property. Its also another example of local restaurants embracing the outdoor dining that became a necessity for many during the pandemic.

With insurance wrangling and permitting done, Bryan Zar expects to reopen the restaurant in the fall of 2021.

Built in a handsome country home, Restaurant des Familles sits along Bayou de Familles, just outside the National Park Service Barataria Preserve, en route to the fishing camps and swamp tours of Lafitte.

The restaurant can often feel like an extension of the Barataria Preserve. From the window-lined dining room, visitors can look up from their seafood gumbo and crabmeat-topped redfish Marcel to see alligators cruise past, egrets take wing and turtles basking in the sun just outside.

The new patio will stretch along the front of the property, with an elevated, covered deck and an open-air patio.

The other side of the restaurant, facing the bayou, and the interior will look mostly the same as before when the work is complete.

It took us 10 years to get the restaurant just the way we wanted it, and then we had the fire, said Zar. So now its going back to how we had it.

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The patio should also give the restaurant more flexibility to balance its local regulars and the tourists who arrive, often by the busload, from bayou outings.

We love the tourists, but we always want to be able to serve our regulars dropping in for lunch, and well be able to do more for both with this, Zar said.

Restaurant des Familles was first opened in 1993 by Pat Morrow, a local schoolteacher.

Bryan Zar worked at Restaurant des Familles starting as a busboy in high school in the mid-1990s. In 2009, he and Brooke bought the restaurant and have run it ever since.

The Zars also run Nola Caye, an island-style restaurant they opened in the Warehouse District late in 2019, just a few months before the pandemic shutdowns began. Zar said Nola Caye has bounced back and is now seeing better business than in the span before the pandemic.

Restaurant des Familles will be a food vendor at the upcoming Jean Lafitte Seafood Festival, June 25-27.

Restaurant des Familles

7163 Barataria Blvd., Crown Point

Projected reopening: fall 2021

+9 Central City BBQ is expanding with Tex Mex restaurant at this Metairie crossroads Theres no lack of spots for a taco platter and a margarita around town these days, but a new restaurant now taking shape will bring something

+8 Be sure to catch the bigger, better Jean Lafitte Seafood Fest coming up June 25-27 Louisiana seafood may be the biggest draw, but music, art, and the pristine setting of a nature preserve are also main attractions at the Jean

+7 Pop-up hit Bubs Burgers opens Mid-City restaurant, with gratitude for a lost friend Bubs Burgers opened its new restaurant in Mid-City on June 8 with a short menu of smash burgers and a remarkable story of a business that has
Following a week of protests and increasingly angry opposition to her planned move of City Hall to Congo Square, Mayor LaToya Cantrell Friday afternoon sought to reframe the controversy as a long planned "engagement process with the community.

Though their involvement in this process may come as news to residents of Treme, in a statement released by her office Cantrell insisted her administration is open to other options for the relocation of City Hall and for the renovation of Municipal Auditorium.

But the statement also makes clear the onus remains on residents to convince her not to move City Hall into their neighborhood, rather than following a more traditional model of community engagement. For instance, she notes in the release that I am open to feasible alternative proposals, but I will not allow the Auditorium to be demolished by neglect. (Feasible funded proposals are welcome.)

In the statement Cantrell also makes clear that moving to Congo Square is the de facto option. For instance, in a set of guiding principles for moving forward, Cantrell says she now intends to engage the cultural community and the residents of Treme to see if there is a path forward for a City Hall move and enhancement of Congo Square and the surrounding area.

What the process for considering other sites for City Hall would look like  assuming it occurs  is unclear. For instance, she said she will only consider viable options, though how she would define viable is unknown. She also said she would be open to creating a commission to publicly review all of the options  starting at the beginning of the year and which would make a recommendation to the administration.

Setting up such a commission would be politically advantageous for Cantrell: it would punt a final decision on where to move City Hall until after this falls re-election, removing a source of anger among many voters. Plus, it would free her to ignore residents of Treme if she chose to move forward with her plan to turn Municipal Auditorium into a government complex.

+3 'Can't Tell Cantrell:' Treme rallies for second line in opposition to City Hall relocation plan Mayor LaToya Cantrell wants Treme residents to just trust her when she says putting the offices of a government once tasked with enforcing sla

Despite clear opposition from Treme residents  whose historically Black neighborhood has repeatedly been carved up by economic development projects  for months, Cantrell has seemed set on pushing her planned $100 million relocation plan through.

On Thursday, hundreds of people  including members of the original Freedom Riders, Black Panthers, musicians and even Councilmember Kristin Gisleson Palmer  gathered in Congo Square to protest Cantrells plan. Speakers were harshly critical of the plan.

Palmer accused the city of failing to ask residents of Treme if they were open to the idea of having City Hall as a neighbor and several opponents repeatedly referenced the fact that Cantrell is from Los Angeles in questioning her commitment to protecting the historic site. It was the second protest of the week, and a clear demonstration that the movement against her is quickly growing.

Cantrells statement took a more rose-colored view of events, falsely casting the protests as part of an engagement process on the move.

Over the past several weeks we have increased the engagement process about what should be done with Armstrong Park, City Hall, and the Municipal Auditorium in a holistic, productive way, the statement read. As part of that process, last night we heard from many of the neighbors and other residents who demand and deserve to have their voices heard. This ongoing dialogue is healthy as we continue our progress on such a vital issue.
A Louisiana woman who went viral after she used Gorilla Glue spray in her hair to make it hold is launching her own haircare line after surgery and a months-long recovery process to regrow her hair.

Tessica Brown, a St. Bernard Parish native, became known as the "Gorilla Glue girl" after going viral on TikTok in February for mistakenly spraying the super-strong glue in her hair when she ran out of hairspray.

After a weeks-long battle to remove the glue in a sedated four-hour procedure in California, in addition to four months of regrowing her hair, Brown has launched a hair care line called Forever Hair that she said has helped her grow back the locks she lost, she told The Times-Picayune on Thursday.

St. Bernard Parish woman goes viral after using Gorilla Glue as hairspray A St. Bernard Parish woman's TikTok post has gone viral after she documented her bout with Gorilla Glue that she used as a makeshift hairspray

So far, Brown has advertised three hair products in addition to merchandise on her tbforeverhair.com website.

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For six weeks after her procedure, Brown stopped using any product with chemicals on her hair or scalp, but when she was able to again, she was happy to see that in a short amount of time, her hair growth stimulating oil was working. She said her new hair growth will let her wear her favorite hairstyle, a ponytail.

"The thing with me, if anybody has known me since I was young, I love a ponytail," Brown said.

Brown's edge control product can also be used for one of her favorite beauty tricks, styling edges. Brown said she is excited to do her three daughters' hair with her new product.

Brown said losing her hair was hard but she said she is excited about helping women become more confident through her brand.

"At this point, this is for everybody," Brown said.
This time, there was no 11th-hour surprise. But once again, Fred Heebe and Jim Ward, owners of the River Birch landfill in Waggaman, found a way to dodge a public accounting of what their detractors have long portrayed as an improper influence campaign meant to keep potential rivals at bay -- and as much local garbage going into their dump as possible.

On the eve of trial of a civil racketeering lawsuit that was filed a decade ago, the two men settled with their accuser, Waste Management, one of the largest garbage companies in North America. Terms of the settlement, noted in the case's lengthy docket on Friday by U.S. District Judge Carl Barbier, were not disclosed. The case was set for trial Monday.

Heebe and Ward, who have always denied any underhanded dealings, admitted no wrongdoing in settling the case.

Ten years ago, federal prosecutors bent on exposing public corruption in and around New Orleans had two big targets in their sights: Heebe and former Mayor Ray Nagin. Nagin was suspected of taking bribes from city contractors. Heebe, along with Ward, his stepfather, was being scrutinized over steps he took to clear the garbage-disposal arena of rivals.

Things worked out very differently for the two men. For Nagin, the federal vise steadily tightened, and in 2013 he was hit with a 21-count indictment. The next year, he was convicted by a jury and sentenced to a decade in prison.

Heebe had other plans. He was represented by some of the citys most aggressive defense attorneys, who pushed back as federal investigators dug into how he secured a near-monopoly on the local landfill business. They didnt wait for the feds to strike, however; instead they launched a late counterstrike, disclosing that two top prosecutors had routinely posted comments - using aliases - on news stories about cases that the U.S. Attorneys Office was handling.

The scandal turned the office upside down, ending the long reign of U.S. Attorney Jim Letten. More remarkably, it won Heebe and Ward, his partner in the River Birch landfill, the equivalent of a pre-emptive pardon. The Department of Justice, which rarely even confirms the existence of investigations, announced in 2013 that its inquiry into Heebe and Ward was over, and that neither would be charged. Their landfill continued to prosper.

What, precisely, the men might have been charged with was never known, although the broad strokes -- that they were allegedly conspiring with local politicians to keep rivals at bay -- were clear enough. The civil trial that had been set to begin Monday was likely going to be the closest to a hearing of the feds' abortive case that the public would ever see.

Waste Management competed bitterly with River Birch for the bonanza of dumping fees generated by Hurricane Katrina. Waste Management estimated its lost profits were in the tens of millions of dollars, although Barbier had put a lower ceiling on the firm's losses.

Even so, a verdict against River Birch could have been very costly, in part because civil claims under the Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act allow winning parties to collect triple damages.

Lawyers for the various parties would not comment for this article.

The backdrop

Nagins conviction by now is ancient history, and his prison term is over, too, thanks to the pandemic. In April 2020, the Bureau of Prisons released him to home confinement several years early.

But the former mayor -- and his criminal record -- would have loomed large over the River Birch trial. The case largely hinged on a couple of key questions:

Whether a flurry of campaign contributions that Heebe and Ward funneled to Nagin in the chaotic final days of the 2006 mayoral election amounted to bribes, and if so;

Were the payments part of a broader pattern of unethical business practices on the part of Heebe and Ward.

Waste Management argued that a crucial figure in that alleged broader pattern was Henry Mouton, a former Louisiana Wildlife and Fisheries Commission member who pleaded guilty in 2011 to federal charges. Mouton said he took hundreds of thousands of dollars in payoffs from Heebe and Ward in exchange for his help lobbying public officials to shut down River Birchs rivals.

Ex-New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin, due for 2023 release, sent home early due to coronavirus Former New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin was released from federal prison Monday, about three years before he was due to complete his 10-year prison

One of those was Waste Managements 100-acre Chef Menteur landfill in New Orleans East. Through a series of entities that federal investigators described as sham companies, River Birchs owners cut checks totaling $20,000 to Nagins campaign four days before the runoff. Shortly after receiving the money - and winning the election - Nagin abruptly shut down the Chef landfill, which he had helped open a few months earlier by using emergency powers granted to him after Katrina.

In a deposition given partway through his prison stint, Nagin denied that the late cash infusion was a bribe, or that he gave Ward and Heebe any assurances he would close the rival dump. In fact, he said he had always planned to let the landfills emergency authorization expire. Waste Management, which spent millions to ready the property, says it never would have done so had it known the dump was only going to be open a few months.

In contrast to Nagin, Mouton admitted he took bribes to help River Birch shut down its rivals. Still, River Birchs attorneys pointed out repeatedly, and accurately, that Mouton had no actual authority in his role as a Wildlife and Fisheries commissioner, a volunteer, appointed position. As such, they argued the money he took could not fairly be described as a bribe.

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While Nagins testimony would have been a focus of the trial, he was not going to take the stand. Nor was Mouton.

A surprise decision

The timing of the payments made by Heebe and Ward was not Waste Managements only ammunition.

Bribery lawsuit involving landfill owners, ex-New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin gets new life Seven years ago, West Bank landfill owner Fred Heebe and his stepfather, Jim Ward, pulled off a stunning coup, exposing an online-commenting s

The mayors sudden decision to close the landfill shocked leaders of the state Department of Environmental Quality at the time. They viewed the dump as a linchpin of efforts to remove Katrina debris. It also surprised Nagins sanitation director, Veronica White, who was expected to be called as a witness in the trial.

Coincidentally, Barbier, the judge overseeing the civil case, had a role in sorting out the mess over the sudden closure 15 years ago. Waste Management sued at the time, saying it should be allowed to keep the landfill open, and Department of Environmental Quality officials agreed.

At the time, Barbier made no effort to hide his annoyance at the Nagin administrations incoherence.

Ive got to tell you, apparently theres been a huge change of heart several times, he told the citys attorney in August 2006. I dont understand the citys position here at all. Its very confusing.

In the end, Barbier determined that Nagin had the authority to let the dumps emergency authorization expire.

Ray Nagin abruptly reversed his position, killed a New Orleans landfill receiving storm debris Mountainous piles of debris from the Lakeview homes devastated by Hurricane Katrina's floodwaters after the levee walls broke are brought to a

Even if Waste Management had been able to persuade a jury that Heebe and Ward conspired unjustly with Nagin and others, it had little hope of collecting the $50 million or so that it estimated it lost. Barbier, an appointee of President Bill Clinton, had ruled months earlier that Waste Management was eligible to claim no more than four months of lost profits, because Nagin by December 2006 had stopped invoking his emergency authority.

That would have amounted to about $4.2 million, although under the rules of civil RICO cases, plaintiffs who can prove racketeering may collect three times their loss, plus other fees. That likely would have capped the potential payout in a jury trial at $15 million and $20 million.

Whatever the settlement agreed to Friday calls for Heebe and Ward to pay, it's likely well within their means. A court document estimated their landfill alone was worth $250 million, and they have numerous other holdings.

Both sides had high-powered attorneys. Waste Management is represented by a group from Phelps Dunbar, a white-shoe New Orleans law firm, as well as the Washington firm Baker Botts. Heebe and Wards legal team includes, among others, Kyle Schonekas and Billy Gibbens, the lawyers who blew up the federal investigation into River Birch and the U.S. attorneys office in 2013.

Given that legal horsepower, its perhaps not surprising that the litigation was approaching its 10th anniversary. Barbier's order dismissing the suit was the 620th item in the case docket, a list that included dozens of complex motions.

There were other reasons the case had such a long lifespan. It was initially put on hold because of the criminal investigation into Ward and Heebe. When that case foundered, the suit was revived. Another long delay came after Kurt Engelhardt, who preceded Barbier as the trial judge over the case, threw out most of Waste Managements allegations.

But the garbage giant appealed to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, to which Engelhardt had by then been promoted by President Donald Trump. A three-judge panel on the higher court overruled their new colleague, and Waste Managements case was reborn.

Engelhardt had connections to other players in the case. When Heebe and Ward pushed to unmask the pseudonymous commenters in the U.S. Attorneys Office, Engelhardt joined the crusade, eventually directing the Justice Department to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate the commenting scandal.

The judge owed his appointment to the federal bench to then-U.S. Sen. David Vitter; he had served as Vitters campaign treasurer. Vitter also was an ally of Heebe and Ward. He was among the politicians who questioned hasty decisions by the Department of Environmental Quality to open landfills around the region, moves that also drew scorn from environmental advocates.

While the upcoming trial had seemed likely to be the closest thing to a public airing of the allegations against River Birchs owners, Heebe and Ward are still targeted in at least one other pending case over their campaign giving.

The state Board of Ethics in 2012 filed a lawsuit accusing River Birch of violating Louisiana ethics laws by making donations through nine straw companies. That suit has been in abeyance since 2017 because of Waste Managements litigation.

Ethics officials have said they planned to revive the case once the Waste Management suit is resolved.
The corporate owner of the Seacor Power is using millions of dollars in insurance funds from the capsized vessel to pay down a significant portion of its outstanding debt, raising concerns among attorneys for the dead crew members' families that less money could be available to compensate them for the loss of their loved ones.

Seacor Marine Holdings Inc., the Houston-based owner of the Seacor Power and dozens of other offshore support vessels, said in securities filings last week that it plans to use $25 million in hull and machinery insurance on the sunken vessel as part of a plan to settle a debt of more than $117 million.

The agreement with its lender, J.P. Morgan Chase Inc., would allow it to pay $50 million in two installments to clear itself of the full amount of its loan, reducing the company's overall debt by 24% to just over $350 million.

This transaction significantly de-levers our balance sheet (and) further advances our previously stated strategy to maintain full financial flexibility," said John Gellert, Seacor Marine's CEO, in a statement to investors last Friday.

The move comes as the company is facing multiple lawsuits from survivors of the April 13 capsizing as well as relatives of the deceased. Thirteen of the 19 crew perished, seven of whom were never recovered and are presumed dead.

So far, 14 lawsuits have been filed against Seacor Marine and its subsidiaries, as well as Talos Energy, owner of the oil platform where the Seacor Power was heading when a violent storm sent it tumbling over into the water. The latest filing came Wednesday from the widow of Gregory Walcott, one of the crew members whose body was never found.

The company has said it expects to pay about $15 million to the salvage company that has been working for the past two months, first to try and locate any survivors and in more recent weeks to assess damage and plan to bring the hull back to port.

The company's potential liability for damages will depend on whether the cases are tried in front of juries in the various courts in which they were filed, or if the company is successful in its "limitation of liability" suit filed in federal court earlier this month.

In the limitation suit, Seacor Marine is seeking to limit death and personal injury damages to a total of $5.7 million, an amount which includes funds from a $650,000 estimated scrap value for the vessel. That would be covered by a separate liability insurance Seacor Marine had for the Seacor Power.

The debt deal marks a significant improvement for Seacor Marine's finances. The company has about $1 billion in assets, the value of which is mostly in the 80 or so offshore supply vessels it owns, including 14 lift boats.

The value of its fleet, which the company puts at about $700 million, is largely secured by debt. According to its latest financial report, the company had about $68 million in cash on hand at the end of March, just prior to the Seacor Power accident.

The company is seeking to use an 1851 maritime law that limits death and injury payments to the residual value of the vessel plus "$420 per gross registered ton," for circumstances in which the owner could not have foreseen nor taken precaution against the events that caused the tragedy.

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The federal court typically rules against companies trying to limit their liability when there is a question about the owners' knowledge about the risks the vessel was subject to.

But attorneys for several of the claimants said they will take a two-track approach in case the judge rules to allow Seacor Marine to limit its liability.

Ian Taylor, an attorney at Lewis Kullman Sterbcow and Abramson, which is representing several claimants, said that while they will challenge Seacor Marine's attempt to limit liability, they will also ask the court to block the companies attempt to use the $25 million insurance to pay down debt.

Instead, they will try to have those proceeds added to the liability fund.

"Claimants are confident that the evidence will show that the shipowner and the operator will not be entitled to limit their liability because discovery will show the owner did have privity and knowledge that the vessel was unseaworthy," Taylor said. He added that his clients would also "be pursuing and analyzing all potential options to increase the fund," including making a claim on the hull and machinery insurance proceeds.

Frank Spagnoletti, an attorney who has filed lawsuits in Texas for several of the plaintiffs, said that whether or not the victims' families can make a claim to the insurance money, the move to shield it from them will not play well with survivors.

"They will find it offensive that the company has moved to limit their liability to $5.7 million but taken care of their own financial situation before consideration of the victims and loved ones of the dead," he said.

The company declined to comment further than the statement to investors.

In that statement, Gellert, the CEO, said: "We remain focused on our response to the Seacor Power incident and expect to complete the recovery efforts in July."

"We continue to grieve for our crew members, partners and the loved ones of those who were lost, he added.
Fred Heebe and Jim Ward, owners of the River Birch landfill in Waggaman, have settled a long-running lawsuit that accused them of paying bribes and using other unfair business practices in a conspiracy to monopolize the garbage-disposal business in southeast Louisiana.

Terms of their settlement with plaintiff Waste Management, one of the biggest garbage companies in North America, the plaintiff in the decade-old suit, were not available. A terse note in the online court docket posted Friday and signed by U.S. District Judge Carl Barbier said simply that the court had been "advised by counsel for the parties that all of the parties to this action have firmly agreed on a compromise," and that the case was therefore dismissed.

After years of delays and intense pre-trial skirmishing, the matter was set to go to trial Monday. Waste Management had been seeking tens of millions of dollars in damages caused by the 2006 closure of its Chef Menteur landfill in New Orleans East.

Lawyers for the two sides couldn't be immediately reached.
When Rachel Hutchinson decided to go to Louis Armstrong Park Thursday evening to protest Mayor LaToya Cantrell's plan to move City Hall to the Municipal Auditorium, the 35-year-old had to explain what she would be doing there to her 5-year-old son, Harley.

"We're going to a gathering to protest the Queen of Nola because she's trying to move her castle to the Municipal Auditorium, and we don't want her to do that because Congo Square is sacred ground," she told him.

"I didn't wanna miss this!" Harley proclaimed.

Rachel, Harley and hundreds of others  young, old, Black, White  gathered at the park Thursday to march in opposition to the proposal, which would use federal funds and city-issued bonds to turn the dilapidated former event hall into New Orleans' seat of government.

The march featured a brass band and speakers who attacked Cantrell and her plan. After about two hours it ended at Duncan Plaza across from the current City Hall building.

Protestors not only called for an end to the relocation plan, but also urged the city government to put the $38 million in available FEMA funding towards rehabilitating the building or creating a new, culturally significant space in its place. Ideas ranged from the creation of a Civil Rights museum to reopening the space as an auditorium to be used for high school graduations and other events as it had been in the past.

"I'm sure that a lot of people right here in New Orleans, they have no idea of what this land means," said Chuck Perkins, a local spoken word poet who emceed the rally. "We should do a better job of telling the story, and using it to uplift our people, to uplift the people who've made great contributions and, and I think City Hall would probably bury that."

Opposition to the plan has grown in recent weeks, and the march on Thursday marked the second time this week that Treme residents and like-minded supporters hit the streets. The growing opposition has also taken on political implications ahead of citywide elections later this year.

+3 'Can't Tell Cantrell:' Treme rallies for second line in opposition to City Hall relocation plan Mayor LaToya Cantrell wants Treme residents to just trust her when she says putting the offices of a government once tasked with enforcing sla

Among those at the rally to show their disapproval of the idea was City Councilmember Kristin Gisleson Palmer, whose district included the neighborhood of Treme and who has announced her intention to run for an at-large seat on the council later this year.

"Quite frankly, the people of Treme need to be at the table for any type of decision on this and they have not been," she said. "City Hall is supposed to be reflective of the people and it's become very evident to me that no one really supports this project."

Gisleson Palmer also said she is concerned that moving City Hall to the auditorium could lead to further displacement of longtime residents in Treme. The majority-Black neighborhood has suffered through other redevelopments over the decades that cut up the area, and has been on the forefront of gentrification in recent years.

Mayors have discussed moving City Hall for decades, and administration officials began floating a potential move to Armstrong Park soon after Cantrell took office in 2018. Early ideas included building atop the auditorium and included adding a seven-story parking garage to the grounds to accommodate large numbers of city workers.

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But as planning has progressed, the Cantrell administration has scaled back those ambitions. Earlier this month, officials said that renovations would only occur inside the Municipal Auditorium itself and not the surrounding areas.

+3 Planned City Hall move to Municipal Auditorium scaled back amid growing opposition in Treme Mayor LaToya Cantrell's administration is scaling back its plans to move the seat of New Orleans' government into the Municipal Auditorium, an

And in the face of recent opposition, Cantrell has stood steadfast in her desire to make the move.

"This is not a takeover. This is breathing new life into a historic building, the Municipal Auditorium, to where it will serve a purpose and a need that the city has currently," she said at a press conference on Wednesday.

One aspect of the proposed move which has been particularly contentious is the fate of Congo Square if the project persists as planned. Congo Square holds significance to New Orleans' Black community as the site where enslaved Africans could congregate with one another and celebrate their native cultures through song, dance, and music on Sundays.

The Mayor promised on Wednesday that "Congo Square will not be touched at all" during the construction of the new City Hall.

But Ansel Augustine, 43, a lifelong Treme resident who attended the demonstration, said that even if Congo Square isn't disturbed, he still has concerns over the space's accessibility to the public.

"If you build the City Hall here  along with the parking structures, along with the businesses that come with it  will we still have access to this place? Will it still be safe for us to be here, to be our authentic selves? Will they want the drummer's here while City Hall is doing business? Will they want tourists coming around here, talking about the history?" he said. "The culture of the city is under attack and that's the problem."

Sabrina Mays, one of the principle organizers of the march, called the city's plan "nothing but a land grab." She said the purpose of the protest was to show Mayor Cantrell what the space means to locals. "This issue is an issue that the Mayor does not relate to because she was not born and raised here. There's a sense of spirit, there's a sense of connectedness that says to us: this is our issue. This is our Waterloo."

Mays, 66, said the next step for the Save Our Souls Coalition, which is made up of 33 separate community organizations, is to draft a position paper to "let folks know there's a plan in place."

Mays added that the coalition will share that plan with the Mayor when she "invites all 33 of us to the table."
Arnold Tassin, of Westwego, served in the Vietnam War, and he vividly remembers coming home. When we returned, everyone was against the Vietnam War, and we were told to not wear our uniform. We wore civilian clothes.

"But now in todays world, things have changed, and they appreciate the military, and they appreciate the job they are doing.

Tassin was among those who attended the June 13 grand opening of Honor Square in Westwego, the monument that was the vision of Mayor Joe Peoples to show appreciation to veterans as well as to those who served in other ways.

Honor Square honors all who have served, our military, policemen, firemen, emergency medical technicians, senators, state representatives, mayors, city council members and city workers, Peoples said at the opening ceremony.

Flags representing each branch of the military line the square, located at the corner of Avenue A and Fourth Street.

On one side is a wall with the names of elected officials. Statues representing the police, fire, and EMS are in each corner. Among them is the name of the recently deceased Chief Raymond Fio Gisclair, Jr., listed with other elected fire chiefs.

The back wall has the names of veterans who sacrificed their lives, as well as those who are still living. If a veteran lived in Westwego and served in the military, his or her name can be listed on the plaque.

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Leroy Schouest, who served in the Army during the Vietnam War, has his name on the plaque, as does Tassin.

It makes me feel good to bring my granddaughter up there to see my name. She took out a pencil and paper and traced my name and brought it to school to show her little friends. She makes me proud, he said.

You will never forget a veteran. There is Veterans Day and Memorial Day, but with this monument, you are remembered all year.

During the ceremony, Peoples recognized some of the other veterans sitting in the audience along with Tassin and Schouest: Jack Lopipero, Bob Nolan, and Kenny Cantrell. "We thank you, he said.

Richard Lemoine, a 99-year-old resident who could not attend the event, was in the military on June 6, 1944, D-Day. We want to give him a round of applause for what he did for our country Peoples said. Imagine being a young boy and landing on foreign land to fight. How scary it must have been.

Former state Sen. John Alario noted the importance of the square.I think it was a great vision he (Peoples) had to bring this to our community to honor all those who served, and to give tribute to those who gave their life so each of us can enjoy a nice, peaceful, and good life.
Arthur Morrell, a fixture in local politics who served as the Orleans Parish Criminal District Clerk of Court for the past 15 years, announced his retirement Friday, setting up an open election for a coveted citywide post.

Morrell, 78, said that he will not run in the Oct. 9 primary for the job, which involves running elections and managing criminal court files. 1st City Clerk of Court Austin Badon confirmed after Morrell's announcement that he will run, and 2nd City Clerk of Court Darren Lombard is also a rumored contender.

Morrell's successor will take office May 2, 2022, he said.

While Morrell's move gives him more time to race thoroughbreds  a passion outside of work  his family dynasty could stay a force in local politics. His son JP is running for a seat this fall on the City Council, where his wife, Cynthia Hedge Morrell, was once a member.

After graduating from Southern Universitys law school in 1978 and practicing law, the elder Morrell represented District 97 in the Louisiana House of Representatives from 1984 until his election as clerk in 2006.

The office was in shambles after Hurricane Katrina and the contentious tenure of Kimberly Williamson Butler, and Morrell promised to put it back on a sound footing.

Pointing to pictures of the storm's devastating effect on court files, Morrell said in a press conference that he fulfilled his pledge.

"We've done a lot since then," Morrell said. "When I first got here we still had IBM typing machines. We've upgraded the office. Pretty soon we'll have our own network, where it will be difficult to hack."

Elections also ran smoothly on his watch, Morrell said.

His long tenure has been defined by fights with City Hall over funding. While he's independently elected, Morrell is dependent on the city for financing under state law. Morrell won several court battles against the city, but he failed at securing a long-term political solution, and the dispute repeatedly spilled out into public when he threatened to cut services.

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In January 2020, Morrell went nuclear, promising to furlough nearly his entire staff if he didn't get more money from the city. Mayor LaToya Cantrell essentially gave in and boosted his funding, and Morrell returned to work. Then came the pandemic, which led to massive disruptions in court operations.

"The incoming clerk... will have to figure out some kind of way to get the money," Morrell said. "Because the city, again, is responsible, but you'll always have that problem with getting more money into the clerk's office."

Morrell trounced his last challenger in 2014 and his only opponent was knocked off the ballot in 2017. Yet while he never had trouble at the ballot box, courthouse stakeholders increasingly complained in recent years about technological and bureaucratic roadblocks.

Unlike many large clerks offices in Louisiana, theres still no way to access court files online. Only well into the pandemic did the office begin accepting briefs electronically.

Morrell long blamed his budget battles with the city for his reliance on paper files. He also said it was the city's fault when he trimmed the hours of his bail window, effectively slowing some peoples release from jail by hours. He once closed the window altogether ahead of a hurricane -- without telling judges.

On Friday, Morrell noted that unlike other clerks, he isn't responsible for civil records and thus doesn't receive the filing fees they generate.

Since the pandemic, the clerks office has also been the source of complaints about its opaque and slow-moving expungement process.

Morrell blamed other agencies. "Because of the pandemic, some agencies were not up to par, so all we had to do was wait until those documents came back to us," he said.

Awkwardly, Morrell is the defendant in a civil lawsuit related to his son JPs signature issue, the reversal of non-unanimous jury verdicts. The March suit claims that the clerk's office has stonewalled a non-profit researcher seeking the paperwork for 194 defendants who may have been convicted by split juries.

A defense attorney said she also faced hurdles on old split-jury cases.

There is so much opportunity in New Orleans to innovate and to make records more accessible, particularly to those whose freedom and liberty is dependent on access to the records of their conviction, said Jamila Johnson, of the Promise of Justice Initiative. We look forward to working with whoever is in this role.
A 74-year-old man was carjacked at gunpoint at 11:40 a.m. Wednesday in the 8000 block of Lake Forest Boulevard (map) in West Lake in New Orleans East, police said.

The man was pulled over on the side of the road when two men came up to him and demanded his car. The men drove away in the victim's black Dodge Ram, with a Louisiana license plate reading C920474, the NOPD said.

Another man was carjacked Wednesday around 7 p.m. in the 13900 block of Hayne Boulevard (map) in New Orleans East, the NOPD said.

Two man came up to the victim, 25, while he was in his car. One men pointed a gun at the victim, demanding his car. The victim complied and both men got in the victim's car and drove away, NOPD said.

A 30-year-old woman was carjacked Thursday around 5:30 a.m. in the 1200 block of Delery Street (map) in the Lower Ninth Ward. A man came up to the victim, pointing a gun at her and demanding she get out of her car. The victim got out, and the man left in her red 2020 Hyundai Elantra, the NOPD said.

+8 Portia Pollock's killing in New Orleans sparks debate over pretrial release, ankle monitors Visibly frustrated New Orleans City Council members, under pressure to respond to high violent crime rates, held a hearing Wednesday to public

A 32-year-old man was also robbed at gunpoint in the 600 block of Loyola Avenue (map) in the CBD Wednesday around 9 p.m. The victim called for a ride, and an unknown man in the back seat robbed the victim at gunpoint, demanding his bag. The man gave it up, and the man left, the NOPD said.
A teenage boy was fatally shot by another boy early Friday in the Desire neighborhood, the New Orleans Police Department said.

Officers said the two boys were "handling" a gun in the 3000 block of Deers Street (map) when one pointed it and fired, wounding the other. The victim was taken to a hospital, where he died.

Police said the shooter was arrested. They didn't specify the charged against him or say whether they think the shooting was intentional.

The homicide was one of several incidents in New Orleans over 24 hours.

31-year-old man found shot in Florida area

Around 10:30 a.m. Thursday, a 31-year-old man was found with gunshot wounds after police responded to a 911 call reporting gunshots.

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Police found the man on the ground with multiple gunshot wounds in the 2100 block of Louisa Street (map) in the Florida area near St. Roch. The man was brought to the hospital by EMS, police said.

17-year-old shot in drive-by in Treme

A 17-year-old man was shot at the intersection of North Claiborne Avenue and Kerlerec Street (map) in Treme shortly after midnight Friday, police said. The victim was standing on the corner of the intersection when a car pulled up and people started shooting at him, according to NOPD. The victim was shot multiple times before EMS brought him to a local hospital, police said.

50-year-old man stabbed in Bywater

A 50-year-old man was stabbed after he and another man began arguing in the 3100 block of Dauphine Street (map) in the Bywater Thursday around 11 p.m.

The suspect hit the man with a hand-held mirror and when it broke, he picked up a piece of the broken mirror and stabbed him in the chest, NOPD said.

No other information was immediately available.
Xavier University is getting $5 million from Google as part of an effort to increase diversity in STEM careers, officials announced Thursday.

The private, Catholic university in New Orleans is one of 10 HBCUs, or historically Black colleges and universities, to get such a grant from the tech giant, Google chief diversity officer Melonie Parker announced in a press release.

"These institutions are actively shaping the next generation of Black leaders and are helping build a more diverse workforce across all industries," Parker said of the colleges and universities that will share $50 million. "This investment further solidifies our commitment to providing access and opportunities for underrepresented groups in tech."

Xavier officials said the one-time funds, which are unrestricted, would allow the university to give more scholarships and better develop curriculums in STEM, or science, technology, engineering and math, subjects.

It will also help build basic tech infrastructure like WiFi, cloud storage, and hardware, officials said.

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The investment is part of Googles "Pathways to Tech" initiative, announced earlier this year. In addition to investing in HBCUs, the program is designed to help job seekers find tech roles and ensure that Black employees have more opportunities.

Although tech is a growing industry, and Google is among companies trying to diversify hiring, people of color are still woefully underrepresented. Last year, for example, Google released numbers showing that only 5.9% of its employees and contractors were Latino and 3.7% were Black.

The Google grant money comes about a year after Xavier got $20 million  the largest private gift in the school's nearly 100-year history  from MacKenzie Scott, the famous philanthropist and ex-wife of Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos.

In the news release from Google, Gov. John Bel Edwards said the Google funds would help further the mission of Xavier, an "exemplary HBCU" that has long helped educate Louisianans, while U.S. Rep. Troy Carter said the investment in his alma mater would ensure "equal access to future workforce opportunities" for current students.

State Sen. Karen Carter Peterson said the donation "sends a clear signal that the City of New Orleans is on the map in the tech industry, open for business, and with lots of room to grow."
The New Orleans area, the River Parishes and three central Louisiana coastal parishes are under a tropical storm warning for a weak but moisture-intense low pressure system that is likely to strengthen before making landfall near Morgan City early Saturday, according to the National Hurricane Center.

In southeast Louisiana, the warning covers Ascension, Assumption, Livingston, Jefferson, Orleans, Lafourche, Plaquemines, St. Bernard, St. Charles, St. James, St. John the Baptist, St. Tammany, Tangipahoa and Terrebonne parishes. Along the central coast, it covers Iberia, St. Mary and Vermilion parishes but not Lafayette.

While included in heavy rainfall advisories, Baton Rouge and adjacent parishes are in the warning area.

Gov. John Bel Edwards declared a state of emergency after the Hurricane Center labeled the system Potential Tropical Cyclone Three on Thursday afternoon and predicted it will become Tropical Storm Claudette on Friday afternoon. Forecasters warn not to focus on the storm's center, as its biggest effect is expected to be the delivery of as much as 10 inches of rain to the north and east of the center. That would inundate portions of Louisiana east of the Atchafalaya River and parts of Mississippi and Alabama.

The storm could deliver wind gusts of greater than 45 mph and a possible tornado or two in southeast Louisiana from Friday evening through Saturday.

"Right now everyone in Louisiana along the coast needs to be paying attention," Gov. John Bel Edwards said Thursday, "because we have rivers that are already high and drainage ditches that are already full. Smaller rain than we may have experienced last month could be just as catastrophic."

At 7 p.m., the storm's center was about 455 miles south of Morgan City with maximum sustained winds of 30 mph. It was moving north at 9 mph. It's expected to reach tropical storm strength by Friday evening, when it approaches the Louisiana coast, then weaken back to tropical depression strength after making landfall early Saturday.

The tropical storm warning covers the Gulf Coast from Intracoastal City in Louisiana to the Alabama-Florida border and includes metropolitan New Orleans and lakes Pontchartrain and Maurepas.

A flash flood watch has been issued for all of southeast Louisiana and south Mississippi from Friday afternoon through Sunday morning, with 6 to 10 inches of rain expected and possibly higher amounts at some locations. In New Orleans and Baton Rouge, as much as 8 inches of rain is expected.

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A coastal flood warning is in effect from Intracoastal City east along the east bank of the Mississippi River and extending along the Mississippi Gulf Coast to the Alabama line. Between 2 and 3 feet of water are expected, but the National Hurricane Center decided against issuing more stringent storm surge watches and warnings.

A coastal flood advisory for 1 to 2 feet of water is in effect for areas along the north, south and western shores of lakes Pontchartrain and Maurepas, where high tides might also be elevated by rainwater from the storm over the next few days.

"Visible satellite images show that the cloud pattern associated with the broad area of low pressure located over the southwestern Gulf of Mexico is gradually becoming better organized," National Hurricane Center meteorologists Richard Pasch and Dan Brennan said at 4 p.m. "Deep convection is beginning to form a broad curved band over the eastern portion of the system, similar to what one might see in a developing subtropical cyclone."

"Although the upper-level winds are not particularly favorable for development, with lots of westerly shear over the area, the global models do suggest tropical/subtropical cyclogenesis within the next 12 hours or so," they said. "Given the proximity of the disturbance to land, which requires tropical storm warnings at this time, advisories are being initiated on this system as a potential tropical cyclone."

An Air Force Reserve Hurricane Hunter airplane based at Keesler Air Force Base, Mississippi, investigated the system on Thursday afternoon did not find a well-defined center. Forecasters think there won't be much strengthening of the storm before it makes landfall.

After landfall, the system is predicted to turn northeast and head toward the southern Appalachian Mountains.

In New Orleans, officials urged residents to move vehicles to neutral grounds beginning Friday at noon, and warned them not to block intersections, streetcar tracks, sidewalks or bicycle paths.

The Sewerage & Water Board is expected to watch the storm carefully. The agency has all main drainage pumps working but only half of its in-house power system's electric generators available. Two main workhorse turbines remain down since one exploded in late 2019 and the other failed ahead of Hurricane Zeta in 2020. Repairs aren't expected to be complete until late in the 2021 hurricane season.

S&WB officials say their system can handle from 2 to 6 inches of rain at a time.

In Jefferson Parish, government administration officials said they were closely monitoring the weather. They said 192 permanent pumps were operational and eight more portable pumps have been sent to Grand Isle and Lafitte. Public Works officials said workers were cleaning catch basins and drain lines, but they urged residents to clear debris from streets and drains to reduce street flooding.

"Residents are reminded to stay indoors and away from windows during severe weather events," the administration said. "In the event of a tornado, shelter in an interior room on the ground floor."
New Orleans officials warned residents to monitor the disturbance that is expected to become Tropical Storm Claudette as early impacts from the system began to arrive in the city Friday.

UPDATE: Tropical Storm Claudette still hasn't formed, but highly likely on Saturday; see Louisiana forecast

The Sewerage and Water Board said 98 of 99 drainage pumps are ready for service, as well as two turbines and all five backup diesel generators.

The S&WB has cautioned in recent months that the power supply to its drainage system is in a "fragile state," and announced last week that repairs to two of its turbines would take longer than previously expected.

Still, the utility says it currently has enough power to run all of the necessary pumps.

+5 S&WB turbine repairs delayed, leaving New Orleans drainage system in precarious state New Orleans' drainage system will be in a vulnerable state well into hurricane season as repairs to two of the Sewerage & Water Board's ma

City leaders urged drivers to move their vehicles to neutral grounds and other high locations by noon Friday, citing the disturbance's potential to dump heavy rain on the city over the weekend.

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Crews are working extended hours Friday to clear leaves and debris in front of catch basins, and the city has asked its contractors to secure construction sites.

Public transit will continue to run in the city as long as weather conditions allow.

"This is a reminder that we are at the beginning of hurricane season, and now is the time to review emergency plans, gather emergency supplies, and stay informed," city officials said in a press release.

The disturbance is expected to continue to strengthen in the Gulf of Mexico and become a tropical storm this weekend, potentially as soon as Friday. It would be the third named storm this season.

The National Weather Service has said the greatest risk for rain from the storm is in south and southeast Louisiana, and that the storm could make landfall by Saturday. Rainfall is expect to total between six and 10 inches, with pockets of more than 10 inches possible in some places.

Isolated tornadoes will also be possible Friday and Saturday, as well as coastal inundation of up to 3 feet along the open coast and 1 to 2 feet of inundation in the tidal lakes.
We have an official Juneteenth.

Not only does the calendar say June 19, the United States government and the state of Louisiana have officially recognized Juneteenth. After the U.S. Congress created the newest federal holiday with the passage of the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act, President Joe Biden signed it into law Thursday. Even before his signature touched the paper with the first character, the Office of Personnel Management announced that federal employees would be off Friday since the official holiday falls on a Saturday. New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell asked City Council to approve granting city employees an official day off, and they did. Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards took action Wednesday, after the U.S. House of Representatives approved the law and before the president returned from a trip abroad, granting state employees a half-day off Friday.

Juneteenth isnt new. Most states have recognized Juneteenth for years. But what happened this week is rather remarkable. In an era where it seems bipartisanship is a dream, some recent actions are worth highlighting.

The U.S. Senate passed the measure on Tuesday, unanimously. The U.S. House of Representatives voted in favor of the bill on Wednesday, 415-14. Biden signed it, making it law Thursday.

In Louisiana, the House of Representatives passed a bill offered by Rep. Larry Selders, D-Baton Rouge, 87-0 and the Senate passed the bill 37-0.

Lets pause for a moment and cheer the unanimous cooperation in Louisiana and the overwhelming support in the U.S. Congress.

Im happy to recognize Juneteenth, but I want us to do a couple of things: accurately reflect Juneteenth history, and make federal holidays such as Martin Luther King Jr.s birthday and Juneteenth meaningful with substantive action and impact.

I hope White folks dont think Black folks have been keeping something to ourselves. We havent. There are plenty of Black people who havent been celebrating Juneteenth. Its especially big in some parts of Texas because some people continue to say it was the day slavery ended. It was not. It was the day in 1865 when some enslaved Black folks learned that President Abraham Lincolns Emancipation Proclamation was effective Jan. 1, 1863. Because the deal was not complete, the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution made it law on Dec. 6, 1865. Folks in Galveston, Texas were visited by Union soldiers who told them  more than two years later  that the Civil War had ended and enslaved people were free.

After a long struggle and a Stevie Wonder song (Happy Birthday), the Kings birthday holiday was created in 1983. Juneteenth was created in 2021. Theres been some positive progress in the 38 years, but we should build on important observances by appreciating and celebrating our differences, not tearing others down. We should build upon the 1965 Voting Rights Act and give people more ways to vote for anyone they choose rather than limit access.

If we believe all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness, we should work to make these words true. With the official recognition of Juneteenth, lets agree that part of being equal, part of our life, liberty and happiness is intrinsically tied to making fair and just policing, living rather than minimum wages, reasonable housing options for all, equitable education and employment opportunities and federally protected voting rights.

Most of these matters should be subject to the power of the people, making voting rights an ultimate priority so the people can push to eliminate social ills and determine paths for equality with votes. For decades, the federal government ensured voting rights fairness with preclearance requirements for a number of local governments and states, including Louisiana. Moving polling stations, updating electoral districts and other such moves had to be approved after a review based on patterns of racial discrimination. The U.S. Supreme Court gutted the law, giving state legislatures and other bodies a signal that it is OK to make significant voting changes without review.

No one who appreciates, celebrates and observes Kings birthday, Juneteenth or the Fourth of July should be comfortable or satisfied that whats happening in state legislatures across this country is the right thing to do. We need a national strategy. We need national fairness. We need equality.
LONDON (AP)  German Chancellor Angela Merkel made her final visit to Britain on Friday before she steps down later this year, laying out her hope that relations between the two countries can be reset following years of Brexit-related tensions.
Max Townsend leaves the courtroom after the first day of the 2020 Moore hit-and-run trial concludes. Townsend was charged with three counts of second degree murder, three counts of leaving the scene of an accident resulting in a fatality and four counts of leaving the scene of an accident resulting in injury.
Harrisburg, Pa. - Some states across the country, like California, have provisions in their state constitutions which allows voters to recall certain elected officials before their re-election year.

California is in the midst of their second recall on a governor in the past two decades.

Holders of these offices hold nearly unilateral authority over certain policy matters. When these officials use that power to implement policies contrary to the public interests and public safety, voters should be provided with the authority to remove that official from office at any time. My legislation provides a mechanism for this., said State Rep. Martina A. White (R-Philadelphia), the bills main sponsor.

According to White, to initiate the process, a circulator must first gather signatures of electors equal to 25% of the total votes cast for the position in question in the preceding election.

In H. B. 822, the office holder who is subject to the recall petition will be given 10 days to opt to resign and, if they do not, a recall election will be scheduled within 60 to 90 days from the expiration of that period.

If a majority of electors vote to in favor of the recall question, that official will be removed from office.

The bill is co-sponsored by Reps. Craig Staats, Bud Cook, Mike Jones, Frank Ryan, Rob Kauffman, Barb Gleim, George Dunbar, David Zimmerman, Ryan Warner, Valerie Gaydos, Dan Moul, Tommy Sankey, Jeff Wheeland, David Rowe, Stan Saylor, Dawn Keefer, Darryl Metcalfe, and Mike Armanini.
Williamsport, Pa.  Authorities say a New York man charged with four counts of rape was charged with more felonies after being released on $150,000 monetary bail.

Casey Lewis Guyer, 37, of Little Falls, N.Y. was charged with corruption of minors, sexual assault, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, and statutory sexual assault less than two weeks after posting bail for his previous case. All charges are felonies.

Guyer was also charged with two counts each of misdemeanor indecent assault of a person less than 16 years of age and indecent exposure.

Related Reading: New York man charged with rape of Muncy teen

Guyer was charged in Feb. with a slew of felonies that included two counts of rape, four counts of statutory sexual assault, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, and sexual assault.

Records show Guyer was held on $150,000 monetary bail but posted the amount on June 1.

On June 11, he was given $75,000 monetary bail for new charges brought against him.

According to the affidavit, on Feb. 10 of this year Guyer reached inside the pants of an accuser and grabbed his penis. The accuser told authorities a similar incident occurred in a bathroom at the same residence.

Troopers said an incident also occurred in the summer of 2020 when Guyer removed his pants and attempted to make the accuser sit on his lap. According to the report, the accuser was able to escape to another part of the home.
Pottstown -- Rev. Donald G. Nice, 88 of Pottstown and formerly of Jersey Shore, passed away on Monday, June 14, 2021 unexpectedly at his residence in Pottstown.

He was born December 11, 1932 in Nanticoke, Luzerne County, a son of Andrew and Anna (Jurish) Nice. He was a graduate of Nanticoke High School, Bloomsburg University and Gettysburg Theological Seminary.

Pastor Don was a U.S. Army veteran during the Korean War and a member of the U.S. Army Reserve. He was a member of St. Lukes Lutheran Church in Gilbertsville. Pastor Don was ordained June 1, 1966 and moved to Jersey Shore in 1977, when he was appointed Pastor of St. John Evangelical Church on Thompson Street. He retired in October of 1998 after serving St. John for over 21 years.

Pastor Don was involved in many church volunteer activities and memberships; Camp Chaplain for Sequanota Outpost, South York District Cabinet, and secretary, one term, Delegate to the LC.A. Biannual Assemblies: 1974, 1976 and 1980, York District Cabinet and secretary, two terms, York County Council of Churches liaison to the Ecumenical Relations Committee of Penna. Council of Churches, 2 terms, York County Council of Churches Director and chairperson of the Department of Ecumenical Concerns, two terms, assisted Dr. Martin Tozer, Lutheran, and Dr. Horace Sills, Evangelical Reform in the dissolving of St. Marks Union Church. He also sponsored a prisoner parolee, was President York County Pastoral Fellowship, 1971-1972, participated in Roman Catholic/Lutheran Dialogues-"Papal Primacy," supervised two seminarians in their offsite internships, served as congregations 'Construction Supervisors 'for St. Paul's, East Freedom Educational Unit and St. Jacob's, York New Salem Education, multi classroom and offices units, Central Penna. Synod Committee of Deans Chairman, two terms, Dean for Williamsport District Cabinet, E.L.C.A., two terms, Dean for the West Branch Conference, E.L.C.A., two terms, elected Upper Susquehanna Synod Council representative, one term, elected Upper Susquehanna Synod clergy representative to Region 8 Council, 1987-1996, elected representative on Upper Susquehanna Synod Consultation Committee, six years, served on the Upper Susquehanna Synod initial Transition Team, Nominating Committee, and the E.L.C.A. Synod Consultation Committee, Bishop Timlins invitation to act as 1985 Ecumenical Observer at the Scranton Diocesan Synod II Completion Phase, served as initial chairman for the Gettysburg Seminary/Susquehanna University Learning Center and Interim Pastor for six congregations.

Pastor Don was proudly involved in many community volunteer activities; Claysburg, Pa. facilitator, director and first President for Public Library, York New Salem, Pa. fire company Chaplain, Jersey Shore Public Library director, treasurer and Chairman of Finance Committee for 12 years, Jersey Shore Borough Civil Service Police Commission, 10 years, and chairman for last eight years, Jersey Shore Y MCA director and trustee, 2 terms, facilitator, trustee/ treasurer for the Lewis L. Carpenter Christian Athlete Memorial Award, 15 years, Chairman, Jersey Shore Hospital Chaplaincy Committee, 4 years, Jersey Shore Social Ministry "The Love Center" director and treasurer, 6 year, President of Jersey Shore Lions Club 1985-1986, Chaplain, and director of Jersey Shore Fire Company, Member of emergency response committee Upper Pottsgrove, Chairman of the police committee of Upper Pottsgrove Township.

Pastor Don is survived by his wife, the former Ruth (Volansky). They were married July 27, 1963, sharing 57 years together. He is further survived by his children Lois Horne (Randall) of Millington, Tennessee and Jonathan Nice (Michele Byrnes) of Lansdale; two granddaughters, Emily and Sarah, his sister Evelyn Augustine and his niece Diane Augustine, both of Norristown. He was predeceased by his daughter, Ruth Ellen Nice in 2002.

Pastor Nices Life Tribute will be held Saturday, June 19, 2021 at 10 a.m. from St. John Lutheran Church 229 South Broad Street Jersey Shore, PA 17740 with Rev. Dr. Kerry Aucker officiating. A public visitation will be held from 9-10 a.m. at the church. Interment will follow in Jersey Shore Cemetery where full military honors will be accorded by the Jersey Shore Honor Guard.

His family suggests in lieu of flowers, memorial contributions can be made to either St. John Lutheran Church or the Ruth Ellen Memorial Scholarship fund, c/o Jonathan Nice, 2635 Shady Lane, Lansdale, PA 19446.

Arrangements have been entrusted to Rearick-Carpenter Funeral Home Jersey Shore.

To leave your fondest memories or condolences please visit www.rearickcarpenter.com.
Calhoun, GA (30701)

Today

Cloudy skies early, followed by partial clearing. High around 85F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph..

Tonight

Mostly clear. Low 61F. Winds light and variable.
Bigstory

Venue change for Juneteenth festival in Rome due to weather

Drew Angerer/Getty Images/TNS U.S. President Joe Biden signs the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act into law in the East Room of the White House on June 17, 2021, in Washington, D.C. The Juneteenth holiday marks the end of slavery in the United States and the Juneteenth National Independence Day will become the 12th legal federal holiday  the first new one since Martin Luther King Jr. Day was signed into law in 1983.

Due to expected bad weather the Juneteenth celebration will held be at the Charles C. Parker Center, 1325 Kingston Hwy. NE Rome, Ga. 30161

Previously posted:

President Joe Biden signed legislation into law on Thursday to establish June 19 as Juneteenth National Independence Day, a federal holiday commemorating the end of slavery in the United States.

I have to say to you, Ive only been president for several months, but I think this will go down, for me, as one of the greatest honors I will have as president, he said during the broadcast signing ceremony Thursday afternoon.

Referred to as our nations second Independence Day, it marks the moment when the last Black Americans were freed from slavery.

The Emancipation Proclamation did not mean freedom for everyone. It only freed enslaved people in states that had rebelled against the Union. But on June 19, 1865, U.S. Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger announced a proclamation in Galveston, Texas, that ended the enslavement of all Black Americans.

Biden said that all Americans can learn from history to celebrate and grapple with the distance the country has come, as well as to see the distance still needed to travel.

During the ceremony, Biden said its not enough to acknowledge the holiday but people should use it as a day of reflection and action.

We cant rest until the promise of equality is fulfilled for every one of us in every corner of this nation, he said. That to me is the meaning of Juneteenth.

The local Juneteenth celebration on Saturday at Greater Mt. Calvary Baptist Church is all inclusive, Rome NAACP President Sara Dahlice Malone and fellow NAACP member Larry G. Morrow Sr. said.

Olivia Gunn Rome NAACP President Sara Dahlice Malone (right) and First Vice President Larry G. Morrow Sr. stand in front of Pleasant Grove Baptist Church.

This event is not just for African Americans and not just for the older generation, said Malone. In order to teach our history we need to celebrate our history, and coming together at this Juneteenth festival is one way we can work with each other to share history and learn together.

Its a celebration as well as a deeply personal and reflective time.

We dont have to be told when to go to bed, when to get up, or when to eat. I am most thankful for the freedom to attend church and to serve the Lord without permission, Malone said. I want our youth to know that the hymns that we sing now had a meaning back in slavery days. The songs were conversations.

Living though times of legally enforced racial segregation as well as socially enforced segregation leaves its scars. But being able to see those sometimes invisible bonds give way, Morrow said, can lead to a sense of joy.

Ive experienced a lot of segregation in my life. Theres a certain amount of joy that you get from being released from it, Morrow said. After all that weve seen go on, celebrating Juneteenth makes a lot of people feel free. And so, it just makes me feel real good.

Celebrate

This is the second year that the Juneteenth celebration has been hosted at Greater Mt. Calvary Baptist Church, at 445 E. 14th St. Festivities will begin at 4 p.m. and will include on-site voter registration, voter education, NAACP adult and youth membership sign up.

The COVID-19 vaccine will be provided by the Floyd County Health Department. Free hot dogs and trimmings will be provided and food trucks will be on site as well.

A replica of Freedom, the horse that Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger rode in on, will be on display and I think that will be a big attraction, said Malone.

Willie Mae Samuel, a local playwright and Rome News-Tribune columnist, previously used it in one of her plays.

Juneteenth organizers hope to see the entire community participate in this years celebration and take advantage of an opportunity to enjoy fellowship.

Olivia Morley, File In this June 2020 file photo, the Rev. Terrell Shields of Greater Mount Calvary Baptist Church welcomed people to the Juneteenth celebration at the church and said that the 2020 event would be the first of many in the years to come.

We have a lot of new young members, and we have quite a few White members and some who serve on the board. We all work together to serve the community, said Morrow.

Education

Its a shame, he said, that many such historic events that Americans could learn from arent included in the school curriculum.

Like the Tulsa Massacre, I was not taught anything about Juneteenth in school. I was a History major and still didnt know about Black Wall Street, the Tulsa Massacre, or Juneteenth, he said. Im just learning more about Juneteenth now, and Im in my 70s.

Theres concern over recent moves by Gov. Brian Kemp and the Georgia School Board to exclude talking about critical race theory in classrooms, a topic not generally introduced until college level courses.

People dont want to talk about what happened or teach what really happened back then. But it did happen, and our children have a right to know, to learn, to be taught all of history, Malone said.

Samuel Malone, Malones husband and fellow NAACP member, voiced his thoughts on why such a debate is taking place in the first place,

Looking at all of history makes America look in the mirror, he said. Not everyone wants to face the fact that we came through a time of slavery.
Rome, GA (30161)

Today

Isolated thunderstorms during the morning. Cloudy skies this afternoon. High around 85F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 30%..

Tonight

Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 63F. Winds light and variable.
The POCO X3 GT is on its way to market, having passed through the FCC. The upcoming POCO handset is another Xiaomi re-brand, this time of the China-only Redmi Note 10 Pro. The POCO X3 GT will feature a Dimensity 1100 SoC, a 120 Hz and a 5,000 mAh battery, among other compelling components.

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Earlier this month, MIUI code revealed that Xiaomi was working on a global version of the Redmi Note 10 Pro. To save confusion, we mean the Redmi Note 10 Pro that Xiaomi launched in China last month, not the Redmi Note 10 Pro that it already sells globally or its India-exclusive sibling. According to the code, the Redmi Note 10 Pro's global name will be the POCO X3 GT, building off the POCO X3 that Xiaomi released in September 2020.

It seems that the POCO X3 GT has now turned up on the FCC, too. While the documentation published does not reveal the device's name, it confirms that the 21061110AG is a POCO handset. Additionally, the 21061110AG has already appeared on an IMEI database as the POCO X3 GT, underlining that Xiaomi is on the verge of announcing a new POCO handset.
Roseburg, OR (97470)

Today

Some clouds this morning will give way to generally sunny skies for the afternoon. High 92F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph..

Tonight

Clear to partly cloudy. Low around 60F. Winds NNW at 10 to 15 mph.
FISHERS HILL  Bertha Von Hillern was a champion endurance walker and nationally celebrated muralist at a time when most women didnt do eith
Shenandoah County Department of Social Services seeing 'significant' rise in workload as area emerges from pandemic
Franciscan Physician Network Heart Center Michigan City added a cardiothoracic surgeon and nurse practitioner.

Board-certified cardiothoracic surgeon Timothy Swain and board-certified nurse practitioner Martha Drake joined the team of heart specialists at the heart center at Franciscan Health Hospital at 3500 Franciscan Way in Michigan City.

Swain studied at the University of Illinois College of Medicine in Peoria and completed his residency in general surgery at the Lankenau Hospital General Surgery Program in Wynnewood, Pennsylvania.

"He has fellowships in cardiothoracic surgery from Lankenau Hospital and University of Rochester, Strong Memorial Cardiac and Thoracic Surgery in Rochester, N.Y.," Franciscan Health said in a news release.

Drake earned a bachelor's degree in nursing at Valparaiso University, a master's degree with a focus on being an adult clinical nurse specialist and family nurse practitioner at Purdue University Northwest and a doctorate of nursing practice at PNW.

She specializes in heart failure disease, arrhythmias, electrophysiology and cardioMEMS.

Doctors at Franciscan Physician Network Heart Center Michigan City are accepting patients for both in-person and virtual visits.
Northwest HealthPorter Hospital in Valparaiso has added new, next-generation technology to reduce the risk of stroke for patients suffering from the most common type of heart arrhythmia.

It is now one of the first hospitals in Northwest Indiana to offer patients suffering from non-valvular atrial fibrillation a one-time implant procedure with a left atrial appendage closure device as an alternative to long-term blood thinners. The heart team at the hospital has implanted the new FDA-approved device in 24 patients thus far.

Our success with the left atrial appendage closure procedure has been life-changing for our patients. The new device we have started using at Northwest HealthPorter is an effective stroke risk reduction alternative for many AFib patients, especially those with a reason not to be on blood thinners, said Ashley Dickinson, CEO for Northwest Health. Providing this procedure offers a potentially life-changing stroke risk treatment and will allow us to treat a broader range of patients going forward.

Northwest Health cardiologists first treated a patient with the left atrial appendage closure device in 2016, when an earlier version of the technology was in use.
PORTAGE  A man threatened police, claiming he was an angel, after being arrested for a warrant and driving while under the influence, police said.

James Matthew Dewitt faces charges of intimidation, OWI while endangering a person, OWI while endangering a person with a prior conviction, OWI, resisting law enforcement and disorderly conduct, according to Porter Superior Court records.

Around 6 p.m. Wednesday police were called to a report of loud music coming from a vehicle in the 2900 block of Bryant Street, according to a Portage Police Department report. It was also reported the driver was allegedly drinking alcohol.

The vehicle had driven away but returned to the area while an officer was still on scene. The officer saw the vehicle was driving left of center and activated his emergency lights, and the driver then parked at his residence and began to walk toward his front door.

The officer met the man at the front of the home and told him to stop multiple times but the man refused and kept walking. The officer then grabbed the mans arm, but he pulled away. The officer grabbed the man again, and was able to pull him back to his front lawn, with another officer assisting. The man continued to try and get away from the officers but was handcuffed once a third officer came to the scene.
A group of veterans on a cross-country bicycle journey are a sampling of what to expect in the future as a robust trail network draws tourists on two wheels, says Mitch Barloga, known as the "Trail Czar" at the Northwestern Indiana Regional Planning Commission.

Five veterans are planning to ride over 3,700 miles along the route of the Great American Rail-Trail  or as close as possible where the trail isnt completed yet. They are expected to travel the Veterans Memorial Trail in southern Porter and Lake counties today. They plan to stop at the Vietnam War Memorial at Stoney Run County Park, the Korean War Memorial in Leroy and the Community Veterans Memorial in Munster. The Veterans Memorial Trail, which runs from Hebron to downtown Crown Point, will eventually include memorials to veterans from both world wars and the Middle East.

They left the U.S. Capitol on May 26 on their way to La Push, Washington.

The partnership between the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy and Warrior Expeditions aims to show the importance of the outdoors and therapeutic recreation in trauma recovery, organizers said.

The Great American Rail-Trail is about half finished, Barloga said. It will be the nations first multi-use cross-country trail. This will be a big old deal when it gets done, he said.
CHESTERTON  The renovated pavilion at Indiana Dunes State Park has been a long time coming, but seven years and more than $5 million later, its opening to the public soon.

The pavilions general store is already open, selling snacks, soft drinks, phone chargers, beach towels and more to beachgoers. The Dari Dip is also open, selling ice cream and other treats.

The renovated pavilion will offer a cafe on the first floor, an event space for 175 people on the second floor and a rooftop bar and grill for up to 150 people.

Tom Collins Jr., of Pavilion Partners, said he expects the restaurant and bar will open July 15. Another 60 employees are needed to join the 25 already hired. The event space is expected to open July 1.

Some finishing details remain, but the extensive renovation is substantially complete.

It was a shell

The facility was worse than I imagined when he went inside to survey what needed to be done, Collins said. It was a shell.

A 1973 renovation of the pavilion removed windows and replaced them with bricks. The building fell into decades of decline. For most of my lifetime, it was a storage shed with some toilets, said Chuck Williams, of Pavilion Partners. Besides the restrooms, the building was primarily used for storing sawhorses and pylons.

It was basically gutted, Williams said. There wasnt even a floor in half of the first floor.

The roof had been penetrated in about 50 places, Williams said. His vision called for a rooftop bar and grill, so that required more than just fixing the roof. It had to be reinforced with steel beams, rebar and additional concrete to make it strong enough to hold the customers expected to go on the roof for a few drinks and a million-dollar view of Lake Michigan and the beach.

The entire building had to be tuckpointed. The exterior lights were originally gas but had been converted to electric decades ago. The flickering bulbs in there now are a tribute to the original gas flames. Four of the lights are replacements, but the rest are original.

I was very hesitant and reluctant in the beginning, Collins said.

Restrooms had been torn out before he got involved, so the first order of business was to erect a $659,000 structure to provide restrooms, showers and changing rooms for beachgoers.

When it was built

The pavilion dates back to 1930, just five years after Indiana Dunes State Park opened to the public.

Theres really a lot of history here, Williams said. When this building was built, there was no Chicago skyline. From the rooftop, the skyline was easily visible Thursday afternoon.

The building has essentially the same layout today as it did in the 1930s, Williams said, with restaurants on the second and third floors. A notable exception is that two areas on the roof once held sleeping quarters for lifeguards, he said.

The original restrooms in the building were removed to make room for more seating in the cafe.

The marquee added to the south side of the building is identical to the one that had been there when the building opened. The former owner of Landmark Signs followed the original design to make a duplicate.

Collins said a surprise he found during the renovation was very small remnants of original hand paintings on the ceiling, which have been replicated on sound panels.

Beginning the renovation

Williams said he was on a family vacation in Hawaii in 2009, sitting in a building on the beach that reminded him of the state park pavilion. At the same time, the Indiana Department of Natural Resources was trying to figure out how to come up with the money to renovate the pavilion.

Williams showed his idea to Dan Bortner, then director of the state parks and now the DNR commissioner, and then to Rob Carter, who was DNR commissioner at the time.

About two years later, the DNR issued a request for proposals for the renovation.

Pavilion Partners won, with a costly plan for an extensive renovation and restoring lakeside dining to the pavilion.

Lorelei Weimer, executive director of Indiana Dunes Tourism, said a 2005 destination audit done for the agency suggested the iconic pavilion be developed into a bigger tourism destination.

We just knew this was an iconic building. We knew we had to be doing more, she said.

It was underutilized, Weimer said. The tourism agency had other projects higher on the to-do list, but the DNR was already working on it.

Parks across the country, including elsewhere in Indiana, partner with private companies to operate park facilities, she noted.

Weimer and Indiana Dunes Tourism became staunch supporters of Pavilion Partners plan to renovate and reopen the pavilion. So were Speros Batistatos and his Lake County agency, South Shore Convention and Visitors Authority, along with the Northwest Indiana Forum.

Controversial project

The project quickly became controversial. Environmentalist Jim Sweeney and Dunes Action, a group formed to oppose the project, tried to block it.

One obstruction after another was thrown up by the people opposed, state Rep. Ed Soliday, R-Valparaiso, said. These two guys just kept hanging in there.

These two guys (Williams and Collins) were called some pretty horrible names, Soliday said.

A major stumbling block was the desire for a liquor license for the restaurant. Sales of alcoholic beverages are a major factor in a restaurants profitability.

The Porter County Alcoholic Beverage Commission meeting on the issue was moved to the Porter County Expo Center because of the number of people expected to attend. The room was packed.

People will drown, opponents consistently testified. Show me the data, and Ill believe you, Soliday said.

After the Porter County board voted 3-1 to deny the liquor license, state Reps. Tom Dermody and Greg Eberhart carried the legislation to allow a liquor license at the pavilion. Without them, this place wouldnt be here, Soliday said. It was just the triumph of common sense.

To have a building just sitting here deteriorating wasnt serving anyone, he said.

Another controversy was the Pavilion Partners proposal to build a separate structure east of the pavilion for a banquet facility. Dunes Action members vehemently opposed the proposal.

Williams said that was always a phase 2 plan. He and Collins are just focused now on the pavilion itself, he said, and not worrying at the possible future banquet facility.

Collins said some of the critics have seen the renovated building and been impressed enough that they offered to help assemble some of the furniture.

I would like to thank Jim Sweeney and everyone at Dunes Action for holding us accountable, Collins said.

A long time coming

The road to completion of the renovation has been a long one. DNR Commissioner Bortner put it in perspective.

Bortner told Tuesday of bringing his 10-year-old son to the pavilion at the start of the project so he could see what shape the building was in then. Bortners son couldnt attend the ribbon-cutting ceremony but promised his dad he is looking to returning soon  along with his wife.

Today, guests from all over the world come here to enjoy the special place here in the park, he said.

After the ceremony, two women from Kentucky who were visiting the park went to the rooftop to admire the view. Kentuckys parks dont have anything like the Indiana Dunes State Park pavilion, they said.

Along the boardwalk on the north side of the pavilion is a railing that lists the names of Indianas governors throughout history.

Williams said he hopes the newly renovated pavilion, now 91 years old, will be around another 100 years.

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She completed the program in the first part of her junior year and put her new certification to use in April 2020 when she started working for an assisted living facility.

"It's just like being at home taking care of the people you care about," she said.

McGee, who will study biology at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis in the fall with hopes to eventually become a surgeon, said she recommends the CNA program to anyone who thinks they are interested in nursing or the medical field. Not only does it offer certification and job opportunities, but she said it teaches skills and that could apply to other roles in the medical field.

For Harris, becoming a CNA is not only the first step of her medical career, but an opportunity to better respect and relate to future colleagues. Even when she is a registered nurse or eventually a trauma surgeon, she will understand what the CNAs are doing.

She said she always tries to treat her patients how she would want to be treated. If she wants to brush her teeth and wash her face every day when she wakes up, she wants them to be able to do the same.
CROWN POINT  The troubled Crown Theater and two of its investors hope to put a finale on their financial differences.

Frank and Louis Traina, of Crown Point, will explore an out-of-court settlement of their lawsuit, seeking to collect substantial monetary damages from Crown Theater operator Brad Strom.

Three years ago, Strom took over the Crown Theater, which had operated as an independent movie house on the citys courthouse square from 1926 until it closed in 2013.

Strom renovated the building and announced he would reopen it as a live theater venue.

But undisclosed financial difficulties left the theater dark and debtors, including dozens of customers who purchased access to future performances, demanding repayment.

The dispute has prompted several civil suits in Lake Superior Court that have left Strom facing orders of restitution and penalties of more than $577,000.

The Trainas sued last year alleging they loaned Strom $70,000 in 2018 to reopen the Crown and he agreed to repay that amount with interest at a rate of 100% per year.

The Trainas then loaned Strom an additional $15,000 in 2019 to help him out of a financial hardship.
Hall did not identify himself to colleagues, he told jurors, because he did not want others to overhear, thus making it impossible for him to keep going undercover among protesters.

Boone's lawyer, Patrick Kilgore, said the texts about violence were taken out of context, but offered no excuse for the racist texts. He said Boone was not near the attack on Hall, and only later helped other officers in what he thought was a lawful arrest.

Although a portion of the arrest was caught in photos and on video, Myers lawyer, Scott Rosenblum, said Costantin was speculating about what happened the rest of the time. He said Hays damaged the phone when Myers was elsewhere, and he said a flawed investigation forced Hays and other officers to lie about what happened to comport with prosecutors version of events.

Rosenblum said his client was pleased with the outcome of the trial. "Id be surprised if they are going to require Chris to go through yet a third trial," Rosenblum said.

Hall settled a civil lawsuit against police for $5 million earlier this year. He was left permanently injured by the attack, with damage to discs in his neck as well as other injuries.

Robert Patrick  314-340-8131 @rxpatrick on Twitter RPatrick@post-dispatch.com

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Asked about travel related to the Euro2020 soccer tournament, Merkel said it was good to see thousands of fans at the recent Germany-France match in Munich again.

But when I see completely full stadiums in other European countries, then Im a bit skeptical whether thats the right answer to the current situation, she said  a reference to Hungary, where authorities have allowed games without limiting spectator numbers.

Merkel spoke ahead of a working dinner with French President Emmanuel Macron, the first time she has hosted a foreign leader in Germany since last year.

Macron said it was important to be vigilant about the new variant and the European Union would discuss at an upcoming summit how to better harmonize travel restrictions during the pandemic  something the bloc has struggled to do more than a year after the start of the outbreak.

EU countries have administered at least one dose of vaccine to roughly half of their populations, while more than a third have received both shots. Britain, which left the bloc last year, has a higher vaccination rate.
Even though I am a Democrat, I always keep a look-out for Republican office holders that are worth their salt. One of these is our senior US Senator, Todd Young. He recently sponsored, along with Democrat Chuck Schumer, the Endless Frontier Act. This law expands the National Science Foundation to put the US back in the forefront of 21st century technologies where we have fallen badly behind, especially to the so-called Peoples' Republic of China. It passed overwhelmingly (68-32) in a Senate that usually can't do anything in a bipartisan fashion. However, there were naysayers. Among them, surprisingly, was Sen Young's Indiana colleague, Mike Braun. Mr. Braun's reasoning: "Red ink will do us in faster than Red China." Really?
Rebecca Hall and Hugo Martinezs WAKE: THE HIDDEN HISTORY OF WOMEN-LED SLAVE REVOLTS (Simon & Schuster, 208 pp., $29.99) is a recovery project of a different sort: It dramatizes Halls search for any evidence she can find of female slave rebellion, across centuries of archival documents. The details are often tantalizing, heartbreaking and scarce. And while Hall (a lawyer and historian) does present a chapter on her grandmother Harriet, born into slavery, who wanted to stay in Omaha in 1913 to fight the Klan while her husband urged a move to Chicago, the most searing narratives locate us in uprisings in colonial New York City and on a 1769 English slave ship. Wake imagines  which is to say, it scripts and visualizes  the stories of the women Hall finds in archives, about whom she knows only small bits of information from incomplete records. She positions this as trying to do a service to the dead: All I can do for them is imagine their story. Martinezs black-and-white drawings carry enough detail to reconstruct these lives but look loose enough to feel evocative and poetic.

Wake is especially powerful when treating the visual culture of slavery, such as the infamous, often-reproduced 1787 Brookes Diagram, which displays the maximum number of slaves allowed by regulation for stowage in horrifically packed ship quarters. Martinez and Hall reprint and counter the diagram, offering panels of individual faces and bodies, aiming to restore humanity to those previously illustrated as cargo. As Hall reports, there was a revolt on one in 10 slave ships; and the more women aboard, the more likely a revolt. Wake, then, is operating in the wake of slavery, and in a state of being awake to the past, a process Hall frames as both devastating and grounding.

Image From Factory Summers.

When I first started FACTORY SUMMERS (Drawn & Quarterly, 152 pp., $22.95), by the French Canadian cartoonist Guy Delisle, the phrase that kept coming to mind was aggressively modest. Was Delisle, by turning to his teenage job at a pulp and paper mill, just scraping around for more stories, having already published a slew of celebrated comics travelogues (starting with the riveting Pyongyang: A Journey in North Korea in 2005)? This slim volume really grew on me, though: Its a poignant, understated book that avoids overexplaining (except bits on machinery and how paper is made), allowing the reader to linger in the gaps across vignettes. Some of these quiet episodes are quite lovely, especially those limned at the edges with mourning. The gulf between Delisle and his divorced father, for instance, also a mill employee, is vast; they rarely see each other, even when working in the same building. The break room scenes, in which the young Delisle is silent, often center on sex (in surprising ways; I felt jolted out of a reverie by their frank, explicit content) and are reported with a keen ear. Factory Summers is the key to Delisles nonfiction oeuvre: It shows his growing curiosity, in those formative years, both about how things function structurally and about people  and how he learned to listen to them. Its light touch makes a big impact.
One went to Yale, the other to Harvard. One was a federal prosecutor in Brooklyn, the other in Manhattan. One would be the first woman to lead the Manhattan district attorneys office, the other, the first Black person.

The two leading Democratic candidates for Manhattan district attorney, Tali Farhadian Weinstein and Alvin Bragg, have similar pedigrees, and one recent poll showed them effectively tied as the primary nears its conclusion on June 22.

But Ms. Farhadian Weinstein has given her campaign $8.2 million in recent weeks, multiplying her lead in a fund-raising battle she was already dominating and drawing the ire of rivals who say she is trying to buy the election. She has spent some of the money on televised attacks that other candidates, including several who were not directly targeted, have said are inappropriate.

The vitriol was on full display Thursday at the only in-person debate of the primary, as the eight candidates in the race lobbed attacks at one another while focusing much of their energy on Ms. Farhadian Weinstein.
A St. Louis couple who gained national notoriety last year after they were filmed pointing guns at demonstrators walking near their home each pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge on Thursday and agreed to pay a total of nearly $3,000 in fines. The couple, both lawyers, also agreed to give up the guns they had brandished in the confrontation.

Patricia McCloskey pleaded guilty to second-degree harassment and will pay a $2,000 fine. Her husband, Mark, who is running for a U.S. Senate seat from Missouri, pleaded guilty to fourth-degree assault and will pay a $750 fine.

As part of the plea deal, Ms. McCloskey gave up the Bryco handgun she brandished during the June 2020 confrontation, and Mr. McCloskey agreed to relinquish ownership of the weapon he used, an AR-15 rifle. Neither will face jail time under the plea deal.

In a brief interview, Joel J. Schwartz, a lawyer for the McCloskeys, said, They are very happy with the disposition of the case and will have the fine paid as early as possible and look forward with moving on with their life and focusing on his campaign for the U.S. Senate.
By all appearances, President Bidens much-anticipated meeting with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia was not warm, but neither was it hot.

As he became the fifth American president to sit down with Mr. Putin, Mr. Biden on Wednesday made an effort to forge a working relationship shorn of the ingratiating flattery of his immediate predecessor yet without the belligerent language that he himself has employed about the Russian leader in the past.

If their opening encounter in Geneva proves any indication, theirs seems likely to be a strained and frustrating association, one where the two leaders may maintain a veneer of civil discourse even as they joust on the international stage and in the shadows of cyberspace. The two emerged from two and a half hours of meetings having reviewed a laundry list of disputes without a hint of resolution to any of them and no sign of a personal bond that could bridge the gulf that has opened between their two nations.

Their assessments of each other were dutiful but restrained. Mr. Putin called Mr. Biden a very balanced, professional man, while Mr. Biden avoided characterizing his counterpart. This year, the president had agreed with an interviewer that Mr. Putin was a killer. But on Wednesday, Mr. Biden said that he had no need to discuss that further. Why would I bring it up again?
WASHINGTON  Senate Democrats have begun privately weighing a sprawling economic package that could be as large as $6 trillion even as a bipartisan group of senators works to draw support for a much narrower infrastructure plan that would devote $579 billion in new money to fund physical public works projects.

The details of both plans remain in flux, as lawmakers work to maneuver some, if not all, of President Bidens economic agenda around the 60-vote filibuster threshold in the Senate and past razor-thin margins in the House. For now, the divergent efforts are proceeding in parallel, with centrist senators in both parties pushing forward on their compromise proposal and Democrats preparing to use the fast-track budget process known as reconciliation to avoid a Republican filibuster of their far larger plan.

The truth is both tracks are moving forward very well, and both tracks need each other, said Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the majority leader. We want to work with our Republican colleagues on infrastructure where we have common ground, and Democrats believe we have other priorities that the Senate must consider above and beyond a bipartisan infrastructure bill.

The breadth of those priorities became clearer in a meeting Mr. Schumer convened with Democrats on the Budget Committee on Wednesday, where lawmakers discussed taking unilateral action on a package that could be as large as $6 trillion, with at least half of it paid for, should the bipartisan talks fail to produce a deal, according to four people familiar with the discussion. The details of the emerging discussions were reported earlier by Politico.
With a test vote on the measure looming next week, Mr. Manchins opposition to the voting rights measure threatened to be a major embarrassment for Democrats. Republicans were eager to pounce and proclaim that with Mr. Manchin on their side of the vote tally, it was the opposition to the bill that was bipartisan, not the legislation itself.

So if Mr. Manchin could be brought on board by granting him some pride of authorship on provisions Democrats deemed reasonable and worthwhile, they appeared more than ready to agree. As Mr. Schumer took procedural steps to set up a vote on the elections bill as early as Tuesday, a spokesman was quick to note that the measure being put on the floor could act as the vehicle for the voting rights legislation being discussed with Senator Manchin.

With Mr. Manchins support, Democrats could then claim at least a symbolic victory, if not a legislative one, when Republicans block the bill through a filibuster.

And a filibuster there will be. With Mr. Manchin suddenly within reach for the Democrats, Republicans on Thursday escalated their attacks on the voting rights bill, portraying it as a power-grabbing abomination. They were not impressed by the West Virginians tinkering.

Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader, assailed Mr. Manchins approach, pointedly noting in a statement that it was backed by Ms. Abrams.

It still retains S. 1s rotten core, he said.

Though some Republicans had previously expressed willingness to talk to Mr. Manchin about a potential elections compromise, it seemed impossible to imagine even a few  let alone 10  of them siding with Democrats on a measure that was eliciting such wrath. Mr. Blunt indicated there was no conceivable Democratic bill he could support.

In a show of the depth of the partys opposition and outrage, 15 other Republicans joined Mr. McConnell at a news conference on Thursday. One by one, they impugned the measure and the Democrats for backing it, vowing to defeat it.
The Australia Letter is a weekly newsletter from our Australia bureau. Sign up to get it by email.

On Wednesday afternoon, between interviews in Canberra, my phone buzzed with a disturbing message from my wife: New Covid case in Sydney, at the movie theater.

Wed gone to see a different film than the 60-something driver who carried the dangerous Delta variant, but we were at the same place at the same time on Sunday afternoon, which meant that me, my son and my wife were all within the dragnet of yet another outbreak.

So freaking annoying, my wife wrote.

What followed was definitely that, and all too familiar. The canceled plans. The scramble to get tested. The self-isolation. It was a personal version of the story I had just published that same day  about how Australia and so many of the countries in Asia that led the world in containing the coronavirus are now stuck languishing in the race to put it behind them.

Id written the article with local reporting and help from my colleagues in South Korea, Japan, Taiwan and elsewhere. I never expected to be thrown so quickly into the maelstrom again myself. But maybe, just maybe, its valuable. My experience, so far at least, points quite clearly to what Id heard from so many others about the mix of competence and caution  or is it complacency?  that has defined this Covid moment in Australia, and sparked everything from resignation to rage.
JERUSALEM  Israeli airstrikes hit several sites in Gaza on Thursday night for the second time in three days, after Palestinian militants sent incendiary balloons into farmland in southern Israel for the third day in a row.

There were no reported casualties in either Israel or Gaza, but the exchange raised the specter of a return to full-scale conflict for the first time since an 11-day air war ended nearly a month ago.

The Israeli Army said it had targeted military compounds and a rocket launching site near Gaza City and Khan Younis, two of the biggest cities in the strip, shortly before midnight on Thursday. A Hamas-linked media outlet in Gaza reported hits on sites near Gaza City and Khan Younis, as well as in Jabalia, a town in the north of the strip.

About an hour later, early on Friday morning, sirens sounded in areas of southern Israel close to Gaza, a warning that the Israeli military said was prompted by gunfire from militants in Gaza, not rockets, which might have led to an even more forceful Israeli response.
She is a renowned ballerina known for dazzling technique and charismatic portrayals in title roles like Giselle. He is a Russian magnate and impresario with a reputation for brashness and ambition.

Natalia Osipova, a star at the Royal Ballet in London, and Vladimir Kekhman, the artistic director of the Mikhailovsky Theater in St. Petersburg, were once close collaborators.

But a conflict over Osipovas schedule in recent days has strained their relationship and escalated into an extraordinary public feud.

It all began when it became clear that Osipova would be unable to dance in La Bayadere this week at the Mikhailovsky. Instead of relying on the usual diplomatic language of cast change announcements, in which absent stars tend to be described in vague terms as indisposed, Kekhman posted a blistering 328-word statement on the theaters website attacking Osipova, saying she had feigned illness and accusing her of lying.
BERLIN  The members of ruangrupa, the Indonesian artist collective leading the next edition of Documenta, are under no illusions about the scale of the task they face. It will be the first time a group of artists has curated the five-yearly contemporary art mega-show  and theyre planning it in the middle of a pandemic.

Then there is Documentas fearsome reputation to reckon with.

Curating the show, which is set to take place next summer and fall, is one of the art worlds most coveted tasks because of the freedom it offers and the weight it carries in defining the direction of contemporary art. Documenta is also a barometer for changes in the world around it, as a major new exhibition in Berlin demonstrates.

We are standing on the shoulders of giants, said Farid Rakun, an artist in ruangrupa.

Documenta: Politics and Art, running from Friday through Jan. 9 at the Deutsches Historisches Museum, examines how Germanys politics, in particular, have shaped Documenta, which is now in its 15th iteration. It also explores how Documenta, in turn, has reflected Germany: its post-World War II reluctance to confront the Holocaust, its position on the front lines of the Cold War, its reaction to the 1960s youth revolution and, more recently, its environmental and postcolonial anxieties and its embrace of a globalized world.

The last Documenta, held in 2017, drew more visitors than the Venice Biennale, but the show at the Deutsches Historisches Museum takes visitors back to 1955, when Documenta began on a much smaller scale. Then, West Germany was emerging from postwar deprivation to become a major economic power, and its government wanted to secure a global position as a cultural force, too.
The commercial market is not good for our science, said Jim Kirkland, the state paleontologist of Utah. He has been trying to track down a fossil fish skull critical to his research for decades, but after it disappeared into a maze of private hands, it is nowhere to be found, he said.

These are world-class specimens, a lot of them coming out of Montana and Wyoming, from private ranch lands, and thats completely legal, Mr. Kirkland said. Because fossils are selling for so much, more ranchers are leasing land to private excavators for extra income.

Stan sold for more than $30 million, he said. When ranchers hear those kinds of numbers, as a scientist you dont get to work on ranches anymore.

Many dealers do approach museums first, Mr. Kirkland said, and try to avoid selling items of scientific value. Anything of scientific importance, we try to stay away from auctioning, Mr. Lindgren said.

But the lines are blurry; parts of what Mr. Kirkland says he believes to be a fossil of a not-yet-identified species of dinosaur are scattered all over the United States, separated before research could be done. The commercial guys didnt know that it was new, and if they had they wouldnt have sold it, but its been piecemealed, he said. Its tragic sometimes. I just wish museums had the money.

These issues may be less problematic when it comes to specimens like ammonites and gogottes, both of which of which have been widely studied. But they remain scarce and high-quality specimens are hard to find, which is part of the draw for private collectors.
Maybe the wall is to keep Ted Cruz from fleeing to Mexico the next time theres an emergency.  JIMMY KIMMEL

OK, so, one state can do its own foreign policy? It reminds me of that famous headline after Pearl Harbor: Delaware Declares Dela-war.  STEPHEN COLBERT

Abbott was clear on wanting money and wanting wall, but the other details were pretty fuzzy. As one reporter put it, He says Texans can donate their private land and money to the project, but he cant say what the project will look like, how many miles will be built or where it will be built. So its less of a border policy and more of an improv show.  STEPHEN COLBERT
Bankers flock back to Manhattan

Thousands of Goldman Sachs employees returned to their desks in New York this week, marking the beginning of the postpandemic era of investment banking. Their counterparts at Barclays were back en masse too, while others are trickling in more slowly. What did many Wall Streeters first week back in the office look like? DealBook has been asking around.

Goldman had live music. (Not DJ D-Sol.) To foster a celebratory atmosphere, the bank hosted performances outside its headquarters, with funk on Tuesday and salsa on Thursday. Inside, the dress was notably more casual than it was prepandemic (a lot of Allbirds, we hear), which made the interns in their full suits stand out even more. For lunch, Goldman brought in food trucks from Cousins Maine Lobster, Van Leeuwen and more. The bank required employees to log their vaccination status in a company system last week.

The scene was more muted elsewhere. At Barclays there was no music, and social distancing was enforced at the cafeteria, with half the stations closed and stickers on the floor designating where to stand. Over at JPMorgan, which wont require bankers to come back to the office until next month, an executive who has been there intermittently spotted one sign that more employees are returning: The newsstand near the office sold out of its copies of The Times before 9:30 a.m.
Good morning. I took to The New York Times Magazine this week to write about a remarkable 20th century restaurateur named Henri Charpentier, who was raised in the kitchens and dining rooms of the French Riviera, labored under Auguste Escoffier and Cesar Ritz in Paris, and moved to New York in the early 20th century, where he opened his restaurant Henris, in Lynbrook. One of the dishes Charpentier served there showed up in a cookbook my friend Julie found in a used bookstore in the Midwest a few years ago: fluke au gratin (above).

Its a remarkable, elegant dish, and a simple preparation appropriate to any firm, mild white-fleshed fish. Make a buttery sauce with chopped shallots, garlic, chives, parsley and mushrooms, and brighten it with lemon juice and white wine. Spoon some of it into a shallow roasting pan, place your fillets on top, then add the rest of the sauce, some bread crumbs and dots of butter. Roast it for a few minutes until the fish has just cooked through. Serve with rice and asparagus, maybe? Itd be a lovely meal on Saturday night.

Charpentier was a raconteur (his memoir Life a la Henri reads a bit like a first draft of A Gentleman of Moscow), and he long insisted that he invented the dessert crepes Suzette at 16, while serving a dinner for the Prince of Wales, later King Edward VIII. In his telling, a beautiful French girl named Suzette was there. While making tableside crepes for dessert, he accidentally flamed them with brandy, but passed it off as intentional. The prince thought the dish tasted superb. Charpentier offered to name it in his honor. But the prince told him, We must always remember that the ladies come first. We will call this glorious thing crepes Suzette.

Historians quibble with this story. But maybe you could make the crepes for dessert all the same.

Other things to cook this weekend: recipes to celebrate Juneteenth on Saturday; recipes to celebrate Fathers Day on Sunday.
People are asking themselves  largely driven by the pandemic, but compounded by the social unrest thats going on  where are we headed? There are concerns about the economic future. People are reeling about what happens to jobs, local businesses. They are yearning for situations that are less disruptive and more predictive, so they can start to feel back in control of their lives.

From a strategic perspective, youd better be talking about factors like authenticity and truth and timelessness  those kinds of constructs always have been an important part of the luxury mind-set, and never more than now.

How should brands be courting customers?

The customer experience is paramount. There needs to be an acknowledgment of how the consumer is feeling. It would be clueless to say, This is over, lets go out and party. The strategy should be to adopt a tonality of understanding and comfort. Hard to explain, but you get the idea. It is more about tone than words.

What other product qualities are consumers interested in?

Design and features are important. But in this environment, investment value  in the sense of buying a product that is holding its value  is another important part. One of the lessons people talk about in my interviews is that they have a yearning to be responsible. We realize how uncertain the world is. All of this changes our mind-set about how secure we feel, where we shop and what we buy. Its this business of making a responsible choice, as opposed to saying, This is the latest color.

Does that mean that desire for classic, vintage-inspired watches will continue at the expense of more avant-garde or contemporary styles?
Mr. Rohr, best known in watchmaking circles for his 25-year involvement in the highly respected TimeZone online forum, had spent two years mulling his own project. His immediate success  thanks in large part to his involvement in TimeZone  left him with nothing else to sell.

His next collaboration came in March 2020, with the young Italian micro-brand Unimatic. All 100 watches sold out in 53 seconds, he said. In total last year, he says, he sold 664 watches, some collaborations with watch manufacturers including MB&F and Habring, others his own creations.

Without the internet, it would have been impossible for me to do this, he said. Ten years ago, you needed an office, you needed a showroom, you needed to go to Basel. Now I work out of my kitchen.

Mr. Rohr says hes like a movie producer: He takes the risk, financing each project, working with brands who become the movies directors. He then manages marketing, distribution and sales. The stakes, though, are high: If one of my launches doesnt do well, it could kill the business.

In addition, his unusual approach has brought its own problems. People create scalping or purchasing bots and buy the watches faster than a human being can for the purpose of selling them on, he said. In May, his website crashed under the weight of traffic following the release of his collaboration with Ming, a hot Malaysian property. When his watches appear on the secondary market, he said, its often for two or even three times the retail price.

Its a good problem to have, but it is still a problem, he said. On June 1, he announced he would be working with the digital authentication company Selinko and issuing each of his watches with a Near Field Communication, or NFC, authenticity card. This way, ownership will be traced, he said. I will use technology to fight those guys.
As a mob enforcer, Ferry (Frank Lammers) shows the world a somewhat misleading persona in this Dutch-language gangster flick by Cecilia Verheyden.

Beneath Ferrys bruising, beer-keg-shaped frame is a well of sweetness. His mob boss, Brink (Huub Stapel), a salt of the earth type, treats the bleached-blonde Ferry like a son. But when Brinks own son, Matthijs (Tim Linde), is killed, he wants Ferry to avenge his death, pitting his enforcers unquestioning loyalty against his softer heart.

While tracking Matthijss three killers southward, Ferry is forced to reconnect with his estranged sister Claudia (Monic Hendrickx), who has cancer. Along the way, the ferocious Ferry falls for the bubbly Danielle (Elise Schaap), but his happiness is short-lived when he learns a startling truth about her. Switching between puffy-faced barbarism and bashful sweetness, Lammers gives a wonderful physical performance. Watching him grapple with the enforcers internal turmoil subverts the tough guy trope by making Ferry an absorbing gangster character study.

I Am All Girls

Stream it on Netflix.
With abortion governed by a viability standard, women and babies are pitted against each other. Every advance that can save a wanted baby delivered early is a further constraint on women who do not want to carry their children to term. Researchers studying artificial wombs are warned that their research is threatening to abortion-rights advocates.

This tension was apparent in the years after Roe. In the 1983 case Akron v. Akron Center for Reproductive Health, Justice Sandra Day OConnor observed in her dissent that advances in medicine were already making the Roe standards obsolete. She wrote: As the medical risks of various abortion procedures decrease, the point at which the state may regulate for reasons of maternal health is moved further forward to actual childbirth. As medical science becomes better able to provide for the separate existence of the fetus, the point of viability is moved further back toward conception.

The court held in Akron that requiring second-trimester abortions to be performed in hospitals was unreasonable. Doctors had adapted the dilation and evacuation method for the second trimester, performed outside hospitals, and it posed little risk to the mother. Justice OConnor noted in her dissent that medical advances affected both parts of Roes balancing test. While a 28-week cutoff for viability seemed reasonable at the time of Roe, medical conditions had changed and fetal viability in the first trimester of pregnancy may be possible in the not too distant future.

We havent hit that milestone yet, but the viability standard has always been a moving target. A decade before Roe v. Wade was decided, President John Kennedy lost his son Patrick Bouvier Kennedy when he was born five and a half weeks prematurely. The boy weighed just under five pounds, and he did not survive because of a breathing disorder.

Thanks to advances in neonatology, Patrick would almost certainly have survived if he were born today. A baby born at five and a half weeks prematurely isnt considered at high risk, merely moderately or late preterm. When I was pregnant for the seventh time, after six miscarriages, I kept careful track of the week, praying to make it past 22 weeks, when my baby would have a shot at survival if something went wrong. I scrolled through the Twitter feed of TwentyTwoMatters, looking at pictures of babies who were less than a pound at birth and seeing them celebrate sixth birthdays. Viability wasnt a promise, but these children were proof that I could begin to hope.
The Northern struggle made clear that abolishing slavery would not, on its own, lead to justice or even basic fairness for free Black Americans.

In October 1864, just before President Abraham Lincoln was elected to a second term, a large group of Black activists met in Syracuse, N.Y. Many had been writing, speaking and working for racial justice for decades. Most were from the free states, but a handful made the trip from slave states like Tennessee, Virginia and Florida.

In an Address to the American People, the convention insisted that the nation must not only abolish slavery but erase from its statute-books all enactments discriminating in favor or against any class of its people and establish one law for the white and colored people alike. The vote, the delegates insisted, was the keystone in the arch of human liberty without which the whole may at any moment fall to the ground.

The Syracuse meeting also had a practical vision. It founded a National Equal Rights League to demand a recognition of Black Americans rights as citizens of the United States. Northern and Southern delegates returned home to start their own branches. In fall 1865, George T. Downing of Rhode Island, who attended the Syracuse meeting, led an effort to send Black lobbyists to Washington to push for federal legislation that would affirm the principle of racial equality.

Republicans in Congress were ready. Some had been involved in prewar Northern struggles for racial equality. Others recognized that the nation was at a crossroads and that abolition would mean little without federal protections for Black Americans.

The Congress that met in 1865-66 adopted the nations first civil rights statute, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and the 14th Amendment. These measures passed despite full-throated Democratic opposition, including charges  so familiar today  that the new policies interfered with the prerogatives of the states and gave Black Americans unfair advantages over whites.

Juneteenth, then, should serve not only to remind us of the joy and relief that accompanied the end of slavery, but also of the unfinished work of confronting slaverys legacy. Thanks to the efforts of generations of activists, laws that explicitly discriminate based on race are a thing of the past. But todays conservatives echo their 19th-century predecessors when they justify federal inaction on voting rights with arguments about states rights and spurious claims of electoral corruption. These arguments join a growing attack on the teaching of American history itself.
To the Editor:

Re Presidents Joust Even as They Seek to Ease Relations (front page, June 17):

The summit meeting on Wednesday between Vladimir Putin and Joe Biden shows clearly that Mr. Putin is in command. The reason: He is a man of lawless action who has not been punished through equivalent action.

Mr. Putin annexed Crimea in 2014 and, shortly after, invaded eastern Ukraine, where Russian forces and sympathizers are still holding ground. In the 2016 U.S. presidential elections he was responsible for a misinformation campaign that may have helped Donald Trump win the presidency. Finally, this year, he has turned a blind eye to Russian hackers infiltrating government and business computer systems in the U.S. After all of this lawless activity, the U.S. has taken relatively weak reciprocal action through the imposition of sanctions.

Wednesdays meeting did little to punish or deter Mr. Putin. He gave up no ground and offered no intention to redress the lawless actions. Mr. Putin is still a largely unpunished outlaw who has the U.S. entreating rather than acting seriously. Why should he stop when there is little action to stop him?

Raymond Comeau

Belmont, Mass.

To the Editor:

The meeting between Presidents Joe Biden and Vladimir Putin is spun in different ways, but one small point that I find very significant happened after Mr. Bidens news conference. His last response to an inquiry from a CNN reporter about why he was confident that Mr. Putin would change his behavior was sharp and derogatory.
In his farewell address as president last week, Mr. Greear warned against an S.B.C. that spends more energy decrying things like C.R.T. than they have of the devastating consequences of racial discrimination. And another former president of the convention, the Rev. James Merritt, said, I want to say this bluntly and plainly: if some people were as passionate about the Gospel as they were critical race theory, wed win this world for Christ tomorrow.

Even if you believe, as I do, that some interpretations of critical race theory have problematic, illiberal elements to them, it is hardly in danger of taking hold in the 47,000-plus congregations in the convention, which is more theologically and politically conservative than most denominations. What is ripping through many Southern Baptist churches these days  and its not confined to Southern Baptist churches  is a topic that went unmentioned at the annual convention last week: QAnon conspiracy theories.

Dr. Moore, who was an influential figure in the Southern Baptist Convention until he split with the denomination just a few weeks ago, told Axios, Im talking literally every day to pastors, of virtually every denomination, who are exhausted by these theories blowing through their churches or communities. He said that for many, QAnon is taking on all the characteristics of a cult.

Bill Haslam, the former two-term Republican governor of Tennessee, a Presbyterian and the author of Faithful Presence: The Promise and the Peril of Faith in the Public Square, put it this way in a recent interview with The Atlantic:

I have heard enough pastors who are saying they cannot believe the growth of the QAnon theory in their churches. Their churches had become battlegrounds over things that they never thought they would be. Its not so much the pastors preaching that from pulpits  although Im certain theres some of that  but more people in the congregation who have become convinced that theories are reflective of their Christian faith.

According to a recent poll by the conservative American Enterprise Institute, nearly a third of white evangelical Christian Republicans  31 percent  believe in the accuracy of the QAnon claim that Donald Trump has been secretly fighting a group of child sex traffickers that include prominent Democrats and Hollywood elites. White evangelicals are far more likely to embrace conspiracy theories than nonwhite evangelicals. Yet there have been no statements or resolutions by the Southern Baptist Convention calling QAnon incompatible with the Baptist Faith & Message, which six S.B.C. seminary presidents said about critical race theory and any version of critical theory late last year. Too many Southern Baptist leaders, facing all sorts of internal problems and dangers, would rather divert attention and judgment to the world outside their walls. This is not quite what Jesus had in mind.

The drama playing out within the convention is representative of the wider struggle within American Christianity. None of us can fully escape the downsides and the dark sides of our communities and our culture. The question is whether those who profess to be followers of Jesus show more of a capacity than they have recently to rise above them, to be self-critical instead of simply critical of others, to shine light into our own dark corners, even to add touches of grace and empathy in harsh and angry times.

That happens now and then, here and there, and when it does, it can be an incandescent witness. But the painful truth is it doesnt happen nearly enough, and in fact the Christian faith has far too often become a weapon in the arsenal of those who worship at the altar of politics.

Rather than standing up for the victims of sexual abuse, their reflex has been to defend the institutions that cover up the abuse. Countless people who profess to be Christians are having their moral sensibilities shaped more by Tucker Carlsons nightly monologues than by Jesus Sermon on the Mount.
Ballet upholds narrow ideals for everyone: for men, the archetype of the chivalrous prince; for women, the elusive swan or sylph. Women are expected to look weightless (an image reinforced by the pointe shoe), men more outwardly muscular.

Within these confines, women typically face greater pressure to conform.

Challenging those expectations can be risky and isolating. But more celebrations of difference are emerging. Over the past year, queer ballet dancers, in particular those socialized as women in their training, have been forging stronger networks and creating work that affirms theyre not alone.

  

Written and narrated by Michael Wilson
Before the pandemic, Tony Dopazo leased an office in Boston and used co-working spaces in Brooklyn for his company, Metro Tech Services, an IT provider for start-ups and biotech companies. Then the pandemic lockdown forced him, like countless others, to work remotely. That meant he was on the phone with clients from his apartment building, Level, in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.

At first, with the common areas in his rental building closed by Covid restrictions, Mr. Dopazo, 47, hunkered down in his one-bedroom, which was brutal, he said, everything mish-mashing into one big blob of time. But after the common spaces opened in September, he started going down to a co-working area in a ninth-floor lounge every day.

The arrangement affords some mental separation from his home, he said, and, with other tenants working in the same space, he has companionship. When he needs to print or scan something, he heads to the ground-level business center. If hes hungry, he returns to his apartment to make a sandwich, and for a break, he can take a dip in the buildings pool.
When the coronavirus pandemic began, the Elgorts  the photographer Arthur; his wife, Grethe Barrett Holby; their daughter, Sophie, with her husband and their 3-year-old daughter; and their sons, Warren and Ansel  hunkered down together in their family home of 40 years on Long Island.

To pass the time, Sophie, who is 35 and also a photographer, began asking her father, who is 81 and made his name by taking fashion photography from the studio to the street, about the stories behind some of his most famous images.

He told her about Kate Moss dancing on a table at Brasserie Lipp, Stella Tennant diving fully clothed into a pool and the Rolling Stones blowing smoke at each other while making Tattoo You. All of it became part of what soon turned into an Instagram TV series, Behind the Lens With Arthur Elgort.

Part family lore, part relationship study and part photographic history, the conversation is still going strong, even though the Elgorts are no longer quarantining under one roof. In honor of Fathers Day, Sophie and Arthur agreed to reveal what happens when a pair of photographers turn the lens on themselves.
Katherine Clark Harris and Abhishek Gupta were driving back from the Napa Valley region of California  where they had spent their first Valentines Day together  to Mr. Guptas San Francisco home in 2018.

Ms. Harris, 32, a native New Yorker then living in Washington, was navigating the hourlong return trip when they suddenly veered off course.

Mr. Gupta, 39, who had been dating Ms. Harris for two months at that point, did not get angry. Instead, he smiled, as her poor sense of direction only served to enrich his feelings for her.

Sure, we got lost, and it was going to cost us two hours, Mr. Gupta said. But that was two more hours that I got to spend with Kate.
Patrick David Davies-Griffith and Jonathan Edward Eifert had it with their local dating scenes in 2017  Mr. Eifert in Philadelphia and Mr. Davies-Griffith in New York  so each extended his dating radius to the 100-mile limit on the Bumble app.

Hey man, Handsome pix and nice to see we matched, said Mr. Eifert, when he first reached out to him in May, and shared his Instagram handle.

Mr. Davies-Griffith, intrigued by Mr. Eiferts Instagram photos and several thousand followers, was cordially flirty.

Likewise Jonathan, said Mr. Davies-Griffith, who grew up in Cairns, Australia, in Far North Queensland. You have a bit of a modeling shoot going in your pix.
I have always wondered how these busy politicians get clothing help: Nancy Pelosi, Jill Biden, Vice President Harris. They cannot possibly take the time to plan their wardrobes. Whats the secret?  Searle, Eugene, Ore.

For some reason, the reality that politicians (and their partners) often have help selecting their public-facing wardrobes has always been treated like a dirty little secret. No one directly involved ever wants to talk about it.

The fact that Meredith Koop, one of Michelle Obamas aides, served in part as a fashion adviser/assistant was an open secret during the administration, although one that was rarely acknowledged outright. Currently it is widely accepted within the fashion world that Vice President Kamala Harris has someone who helps her, but officially that person has not been acknowledged. Ask the East Wing about Jill Bidens image-making, and you get shooed away as if you were an annoying Chihuahua.

And yet, as you point out, if any rational person took the time to consider the situation, it would be clear that:

1. In politics, a dress or a tie is never just a dress or a tie; it is a communications tool.

2. Given their schedule, its not like our political leaders have the luxury of scratching their heads and gazing into their wardrobes every morning to figure out how they want to use those tools each day.

3. Window shopping or otherwise perusing what is in store or on the runway is not possible given their profile and security concerns. (And they might not like the optics of lots of Amazon trucks pulling up outside the house.)
Do you have any routines or rituals to start your workday?

I like to go for a walk in the morning just to get grounded; I try to get a couple of miles in every day, and I usually walk in nature, whether in a park or alongside water, like at Fishermans Wharf or the Palace of Fine Arts, which has a lake outside and many swans Ive come to know. I feel its crucial because I spend so much time indoors alone.

What is the rest of your day like?

I dont really have a typical day. It depends on the project Im working on. When Im editing video, for example, thats all I do. I try to work in the morning because my concentration is purest then; later on, my brain runs away.

Whats the first piece of art you ever made?

When I was young, my brothers were given art lessons at the Cleveland Museum of Art. No lessons for me. I was the girl. Instead, Id spend that time looking at Cezanne and Gauguin, memorizing the Rembrandts and Turners, the artworks that became my teachers. One afternoon, when we returned home from the museum, I was determined to paint. I mixed some food coloring into glasses of water, cut off some of my hair with a scissors, found a pencil and rubber bands and made a brush. But it didnt work  my hair was too curly. I think the first real art, the first original works I made, were the Breathing Machines, which got kicked out of the Berkeley Art Museum in 1972 because they had sound. It was a drawing show, and I thought sound sculptures worked because sound travels through the air like a line. I installed the pieces in the show, but when I went back with friends the next day, the gallery was empty. All my work had been taken out. Gone. The curator accused me of putting media in, which she insisted was not art. So my first museum show was a completely empty room. After that, I thought, Who needs a museum anyway?

Whats the first work you ever sold?

That was much later. [Laughs] I knew [the French art critic] Pierre Restany, who introduced me to [the Swiss collector] Donald Hess in the early 90s. I think Donald canceled four times before he finally came to my studio, but then he bought everything that was in it, including the entire original Roberta collection, which was 300 pieces. It was not a lot of money, but at that time I was living in a basement and didnt have a car, so it was a godsend. Hes the one who told me to edition things; I didnt even know enough to do that. And he bought number one of every edition after that.

How do you know when youre done with an artwork?

It tells me. Sometimes it takes five years, sometimes 35. Roberta and CybeRoberta come from the same source and are very much alike, but there is a shift because the technology shifted. So its kind of like a rebirth. My documentary on the feminist art movement, !Women Art Revolution (2011), took four decades to make. Viewers see the artists in it age, have frustrations and eventually triumph. I accumulated 250 hours of footage, so when I was finally ready to tell their story in their words, it took four more years to edit everything.

How much of your work these days involves being online?

A lot of it, about 80 percent. I think its getting worse, particularly with Covid.
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This week, Amazon acknowledged reality: It has a problem with bogus reviews.

The trouble is that Amazon pointed blame at almost everyone involved in untrustworthy ratings, and not nearly enough at the company itself. Amazon criticized Facebook, but it didnt recognize that the two companies share an underlying problem that risks eroding peoples confidence in their services: an inability to effectively police their sprawling websites.

Learning from the masses is a promise of the digital age that hasnt panned out. It can be wonderful to evaluate others feedback before we buy a product, book a hotel or see a doctor. But its so common and lucrative for companies and services to pay for or otherwise manipulate ratings on all sorts of websites that its hard to trust anything we see.

The persistence of bogus reviews raises two big questions for Amazon: How much attention does it really devote to stopping bogus customer feedback? And would shoppers be better off if Amazon re-evaluated its essence as an (almost) anything-goes online bazaar?
Influential conservative voices have spread an unfounded theory, relying on a misinterpretation of legal terminology, that the F.B.I. organized the Jan. 6 siege on the Capitol.

The Fox News host Tucker Carlson, citing the work of the right-wing website Revolver News, speculated about the governments involvement on his show on Tuesday. Clips of Mr. Carlsons argument have circulated widely on social media this week, accumulating millions of views and getting shared by Republican members of Congress like Representative Matt Gaetz of Florida and Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia.

Strangely, some people who participated in the riot havent been charged, Mr. Carlson said. Look at the documents. The government calls these people unindicted co-conspirators. What does that mean? It means that in potentially every case, theyre F.B.I. operatives.

The Justice Department did not respond to a request for comment. But legal experts said this speculation was illogical and far-fetched. Conspiracy is defined as an agreement between two or more people to commit a crime. An undercover federal agent or informant cannot be counted as a conspirator because those operatives do not actually intend to carry out the crime, the Congressional Research Service  the nonpartisan research agency for Congress  explains.
It is believed that Shakespeare wrote this play on the heels of a pandemic. Has that been on your mind in preparing for this show during such a unique time?

Yes. It is informed by that bubonic plague, where the ordinary citizen, if you will, was reacting to the same things we were reacting to: fear, outrage, chaos, stasis, all of the rules of society that come to bear when the playing field has been finally leveled. What the pandemic did was to create a kind of society where everyone had to obey the same rules  whether youre rich or poor or white or Black, you have to wear the face mask, you have to practice physical distancing, you have to shelter in place. And this drove people nuts. It drove me nuts.

So part of what we are revealing here is that the king that we are encouraged and taught to have so much empathy for is probably one of the most specific illustrations of unmitigated white male supremacy, and all of the evils that go with it  like homophobia, misogyny  thats all part of the kings character. You cant see it immediately because its hidden by so much language. But when you strip that language away, you see exactly that this is a man, to put it mildly, who does not like womanhood and blames everything on what he sees as the evil of his daughters. So the lesson that he knows at the end, when he bemoans the death of Cordelia, is a lesson for us in the 21st-century world. The lesson we learn about empathy is for 21st-century America still going through the woes of the pandemic.

Did you approach this role differently than you did 15 years ago?

The first thing I did was to forget that I had done King Lear before. I had to look at this man through the eyes of someone who was now closer to his specific age. Thats why I mentioned that the first time I did it, I was 60. The second time Im doing it, Im 75. So the next time I do it, I will be age-specific: King Lear is remembered to be 83. And I am going to do it a third time.
Missouri has become the latest state to throw down a broad challenge to the enforcement of federal firearms laws, as Republican-controlled state legislatures intensify their fierce political counterattack against President Bidens gun control proposals.

A bill signed by Gov. Mike Parson over the weekend  at a gun store called Frontier Justice  threatens a penalty of $50,000 against any local police agency that enforces certain federal gun laws and regulations that constitute infringements of Second Amendment gun rights.

At least eight other states  Arizona, Arkansas, Idaho, Montana, North Dakota, Tennessee, Texas and West Virginia  have taken similar action this year, passing laws of varying strength that discourage or prohibit the enforcement of federal gun statutes by state and local agents and officers.

The new law is about protecting law-abiding Missourians against government overreach and unconstitutional federal mandates, Mr. Parson and the attorney general, Eric Schmitt, said in a letter defending the law on Thursday to the U.S. Justice Department. They said the state would reject any attempt by the federal government to circumvent the fundamental right Missourians have to keep and bear arms to protect themselves and their property.
Three people were found dead in a North Carolina river on Thursday after floating over a dam and drowning, according to the Rockingham County Sheriffs Office. Two members of the group remain missing.

They were among nine local residents who trekked out to the Dan River around sunset on Wednesday, the authorities said.

On Thursday, an employee at Duke Energy called 911 and said that four people were holding on to a single recreational inner tube in the river and appeared to need help, according to Sam Page, the sheriff of Rockingham County.

They were all holding on for dear life, Sheriff Page said.

The four people were rescued and taken to a hospital, he said. Their injuries were not life-threatening, according to Rodney Cates, the Rockingham County emergency services director.
More than six decades after Marion Hood was rejected by Emory Universitys School of Medicine, he received another letter from the school. This time, it was an apology for refusing to admit him into its medical program because he was Black.

Your rejection letter serves as a somber reminder that generations of talented young men and women were denied educational opportunities because of their race, and our society was denied their full potential, said the letter, which was sent in March and signed by Vikas P. Sukhatme, dean of the Emory University School of Medicine. An apology does not undo our actions. It is an acknowledgment of the pain that was caused by our school, and an opportunity for us to share our regret directly with you.

As part of its Juneteenth programming, Emorys School of Medicine on Thursday apologized to Dr. Hood, now 83, at a virtual event for students, faculty and staff members.
I am a woman and a lesbian, a minority of minorities, Madeline Davis told the 1972 Democratic National Convention in Miami Beach. Now we are coming out of our closets and onto the convention floor.

That speech was heard by few outside the Miami Beach Convention Center, delivered just after 5 a.m. on July 12, and the party platform plank that she and other gay and lesbian delegates were supporting  a proposal to enact anti-discrimination statutes to protect gay and lesbian Americans  did not pass.

But it was still a watershed day for lesbian and gay rights. In taking the dais, Ms. Davis, who died on April 28 at 80, stood as the first openly lesbian delegate to a national political convention in the United States. Along with Jim Foster, a gay delegate from San Francisco, she spoke to an increasingly progressive-leaning party that would nominate George S. McGovern, the liberal senator from South Dakota, for president.

In 2012, after the Democratic Party had included in its platform, for the first time, language about marriage equality, Ms. Davis reflected on her pioneering efforts decades earlier in an interview with NPR. Ive been working in gay rights for 40 years, she said, so I came to this information after a long journey, and I thought, Isnt that nice?
WASHINGTON  As President Bidens September deadline for ending the long war in Afghanistan approaches, a bipartisan coalition in Congress is stepping up efforts to ensure that Afghans who face retribution there for working alongside American troops and personnel are able to immigrate to the United States.

The group of Republicans and Democrats, many of them military members or veterans who have worked with translators, drivers and fixers in Afghanistan and other combat zones, is racing to put in place legislation to help the Afghan allies, as they are often called, before American troops go home, leaving those allies unprotected against revenge attacks by the Taliban. The lawmakers want to make it easier for the Afghans to qualify for special visas, to expedite the process of obtaining one and to get them out of Afghanistan as soon as possible while they await authorization to live legally in the United States.

More than 18,000 Afghans who have worked as interpreters, drivers, engineers, security guards and embassy clerks for the United States during the war are stuck in a bureaucratic morass after applying for Special Immigrant Visas  available to people who face threats because of work for the United States government  with some waiting as long as six or seven years for their applications to be processed.

The number of backlogged cases doesnt count family members, an additional 53,000 people, or the anticipated surge in applications as American troops withdraw.
WASHINGTON  During the 2020 campaign, President Biden pledged to transform the Department of Housing and Urban Development into a frontline weapon in the fight against racial and economic inequality.

But when his transition team took over last fall, it found a department in crisis.

The agencys community planning and development division, the unit responsible for a wide array of federal disaster relief and homelessness programs, had been so weakened by an exodus of career officials that it was faltering under the responsibility of managing tens of billions of dollars in pandemic aid, according to members of the team.

And it was not just the planning unit. In some divisions, as many as 25 to 30 percent of jobs were unfilled or occupied by interim employees. The losses were concentrated among the ranks of highest-skilled managers and policy experts, many of whom had been overruled, sidelined, exiled and eventually driven away under President Donald J. Trump and his appointees.

Roughly 10 percent of the agencys work force left during Mr. Trumps first years in office, according to agency estimates. But that came on top of a decade-long decline resulting from attrition, poor recruitment and budget deals cut by the Obama administration with a Republican-led Congress at the time that prevented the agency from replacing departing employees.
With less than two weeks remaining to fulfill President Bidens pledge to share 80 million doses of coronavirus vaccine with countries in need, production problems at an Emergent BioSolutions manufacturing plant are forcing the administration to revise its plan to send AstraZeneca doses overseas.

Officials are now working to replace tens of millions of doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine that it had initially planned to include in the donation with others made by Pfizer and BioNTech, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson, according to people familiar with the discussions. Those three vaccines are authorized for emergency use in the United States; AstraZenecas is not.

A pattern of serious lapses at the plant, in Baltimore, has thrown into question the fate of more than 100 million doses of both the AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson vaccines made there. The Food and Drug Administration is poring over records of virtually every batch that Emergent produced to determine if the doses are safe. The F.D.A. has so far ruled that about 25 million Johnson & Johnson doses made at the factory can be released but has made no decision on the AstraZeneca doses.

AstraZenecas vaccine is significantly cheaper than the other three vaccines: The federal government paid less than $4 per dose, compared with as much as $19.50 for Pfizer. An administration official said that if the AstraZeneca doses made by Emergent are declared safe, the supply will ultimately be shared with other nations.
But manufacturing problems at a factory in Baltimore run by Emergent BioSolutions, Johnson & Johnsons subcontractor, have had serious consequences for the vaccine. Because of a major production mishap that resulted in a two-month shutdown in operations, Johnson & Johnson has essentially been forced to sit out the brunt of the pandemic in the United States while Pfizer and Moderna, the other federally authorized vaccine makers, provided almost all the nations vaccine stock.

Johnson & Johnson has had to throw out the equivalent of 75 million doses, and the regulatory authorities in Canada, South Africa and the European Union also decided to pull back millions more doses made at the Baltimore plant. The company has been able to deliver less than half of the 100 million doses it promised the federal government by the end of this month.

Dr. Anne Zink, Alaskas chief medical officer, said that in her state, Johnson & Johnsons shot had become a victim of its own timing. By late February, when it was authorized by the Food and Drug Administration, Alaska had figured out how to get two-dose vaccines to remote areas, leaving the one-shot regimen less crucial than she had initially imagined.

Dr. Clay Marsh, West Virginias Covid-19 czar, said that the pause and Johnson & Johnsons later authorization  more than two months after Pfizers and Modernas  deprived it of a halo effect. By the time West Virginia had an ample supply of all three vaccines, he said, people started to get this concept that maybe theres something better about being immunized with Pfizer and Moderna.

The Johnson & Johnson shot had also suffered from a social network effect, said Andrew C. Anderson, a professor of public health at Tulane University who researches vaccine hesitancy. Most Americans who were inoculated in the early months of the vaccine campaign received Moderna and Pfizer shots, and so their friends and family were less likely to deviate and accept a different brand.

In Louisiana, hospitals in the New Orleans area have started offering the Johnson & Johnson shot to people on their way out of the emergency room; the thinking is that people will be more likely to accept the vaccine when a doctor who has treated them asks them to take it. And in Arkansas, where only a third of the population is fully vaccinated, state officials are offering Johnson & Johnson doses to agriculture, manufacturing, wastewater and poultry workers, with gift certificates for hunting and fishing licenses as a reward.
For many political veterans in the state, Ms. Sinemas stance is hardly surprising, given that she has worked with Republicans throughout her career. But many activists are furious that she has not shifted her position with Democrats now in control of the House, Senate and White House, and Republicans repeatedly blocking their legislation. Activists have openly talked about recruiting a challenger to Ms. Sinema in the primary race for her seat in 2024, when she is up for re-election.

Senator Sinemas leadership has been deeply disappointing, said Alejandra Gomez, a co-executive director of Lucha, a civil rights group that has helped several Democrats win in the state. Whats very clear is that now that we have a majority, she does not know how to govern. She does not know how to take advantage and be nimble.

Arizona is roughly evenly split among Democratic, Republican and independent voters. And both Ms. Sinema and Ms. Hobbs were elected thanks to coalitions of moderate independents and progressive activists whose get-out-the-vote efforts have shifted the state to the left. (Aides to Ms. Sinema point out that all of the Democrats who have won statewide elections in recent years have billed themselves as moderates.)

Historically, Ms. Hobbs and Ms. Sinema share a similar approach and background  both worked as social workers before entering politics and have built reputations as bipartisan dealmakers. In the past, Ms. Sinema was something of a mentor to Ms. Hobbs, encouraging her to run for office and ascend in state politics.

But Ms. Hobbs has distanced herself from Ms. Sinema in recent weeks. And many activists on the left see the potential for the secretary of state to become something that the senator is not: a political leader powered in part by constituents frustration. Some of Ms. Hobbss early success suggests that anger at Republicans is fueling her campaign  she has said that her strong fund-raising of more than $1 million in the last six months probably would not have been possible without the recount. Nearly every time she is attacked by Mr. Trump or other prominent Republicans, she said, her donations surge.
Republicans lost the 2018 midterm elections after Democrats flipped their strategy from deflecting attacks on the law to defending its most popular provisions. A year later, supporting an expansion of Medicaid, a signature piece of the law, helped Democrats win governors races in deep-red Louisiana and Kentucky.

Hopefully, this will be the end of the line, said Brad Woodhouse, the executive director of the liberal group Protect Our Care and one of many Democrats who took a victory lap after the Supreme Courts ruling on Thursday. If Republicans continue to do this, they are likely to continue to lose elections on this issue.

The changed politics reflect a policy that has become part of the American social fabric. As of this month, a record 31 million people receive insurance through its plans. And nearly every American is touched by programs mandating things like calorie counts on menus, expanded services for disabled people, free breast pumps for nursing mothers and a host of other benefits.

Last year, the law became more popular than ever, with 55 percent of people expressing a positive view of it  the highest rating since the Kaiser Family Foundation began tracking opinions of the act in 2010. More than 70 percent of Americans and 67 percent of Republicans believe it is important that popular provisions protecting Americans with pre-existing conditions remain in place.

This kind of deep rooting in American life is exactly the outcome many Republicans feared after the law was passed. Ever since President Franklin D. Roosevelts New Deal during the Great Depression, lawmakers have rarely shown the ability or the will to pare back major entitlements  the term for government assistance programs that are open to all who qualify and are not subject to annual budget constraints. After periods of bitter political controversy, Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid all became widely accepted  and popular with voters.

Although the court, in its latest ruling, rejected the plaintiffs claims based on legal standing, not substance, some scholars believe that the conservative majority on the Supreme Court was sending a message about future constitutional challenges to the law.

You have to look at that increased support and say that the court is making clear that the time for legal challenges to the Affordable Care Act is over, said Andrew J. Pincus, a partner at Mayer Brown and experienced Supreme Court litigator, pointing to the 7-to-2 ruling in the case.
Former President Donald J. Trump endorsed Kelly Tshibaka on Friday in her race against Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, giving his support to an outsider candidate who promoted false claims of election fraud last year and has written articles in support of gay conversion therapy.

Lisa Murkowski is bad for Alaska, Mr. Trump said in a statement, criticizing her vote to confirm Deb Haaland as secretary of the Interior Department. Murkowski has got to go!

Ms. Murkowski was censured by the Alaska Republican Party in March for her vote to convict Mr. Trump during his second impeachment trial. The state party said it did not want her, a moderate Republican who has represented the state since 2002, to identify as a Republican in the 2022 election.

The National Republican Senatorial Committee, however, has endorsed Ms. Murkowski, noting that its position is to defend Republican incumbents.
GENEVA  A former Liberian warlord was found guilty of war crimes including murder, cannibalism and the use of child soldiers in Switzerlands criminal court on Friday  the first conviction specifically for atrocities in Liberias back-to-back civil wars between 1989 and 2003 in which a quarter-million people are thought to have died.

The court found the former warlord, Alieu Kosiah, 46, guilty on 21 of the 25 charges against him, including ordering the killing of 13 civilians and two unarmed soldiers, the murder of four other civilians, as well as rape, cruel treatment of civilians and using a child soldier in armed hostilities. Mr. Kosiah, a former commander of the United Liberation Movement of Liberia for Democracy, or ULIMO, was sentenced to 20 years in prison, the maximum sentence allowed under Swiss law.

This is a landmark judgment, not only because it is the first war crimes conviction against a Liberian commander, but because it shows it is possible to convince a court with testimonies of victims, even almost 30 years after the facts, said Alain Werner, the director of the Geneva-based legal organization Civitas Maxima, which was instrumental in Mr. Kosiahs arrest and which represented some of the plaintiffs.

Switzerland recognizes universal jurisdiction, which allows for the prosecution of serious crimes committed in other countries. The trial, held in the Alpine town of Bellinzona, was the first time Swiss federal courts have prosecuted war crimes in the about a decade since they took over jurisdiction from military tribunals.
MALE, Maldives  The largest Covid-19 treatment facility in the Maldives has nearly 300 beds and a steady supply of oxygen. But as the country reported some of the worlds highest caseloads per capita last month, Covid wards ran low on another essential resource: employees.

At worst, we had one nurse to attend to 20 patients in the general wards, said Mariya Saeed, the head of the Hulhumale Medical Facility in Male, the capital. We needed human resources to provide proper care to the many bedridden elderly, but the nurses were exhausted.

The pandemic has triggered shortages of health workers around the world, forcing governments to scramble. Spain, for instance, launched an emergency plan last year to recruit medical students and retired doctors for Covid duty. And in India last month, Prime Minister Narendra Modi asked local officials to start recruiting final year medical students.
SEOUL  North Koreas leader, Kim Jong-un, ordered his government to prepare for both dialogue and confrontation with the United States, state news media reported on Friday. It was his first reaction to the Biden administrations new policy on how to deal with the countrys growing nuclear and missile threat.

After a monthslong policy review, the White House said in April that it had reached a clear understanding that the efforts of the past four U.S. administrations had failed to denuclearize North Korea, although they had tried both dialogue and sanctions. It added that President Biden would pursue a calibrated, practical approach that is open to and will explore diplomacy with North Korea.

During a meeting of the ruling Workers Party on Thursday, Mr. Kim made a detailed analysis of the Biden administrations North Korea policy, clarified appropriate strategic and tactical counteraction and stressed the need to get prepared for both dialogue and confrontation, especially to get fully prepared for confrontation, the Norths official Korean Central News Agency reported.

Although the news agency said that the party had unanimously adopted a resolution, it did not disclose details. It indicated that the meeting would continue on Friday.
TAIPEI, Taiwan  Officials in a county in Taiwan are facing a storm of criticism after banning foreign laborers from going outside as part of an effort to stamp out a cluster of coronavirus infections among workers at several technology manufacturing companies.

Under the measures announced last week by the authorities in the central county of Miaoli, thousands of migrant workers, mostly from Vietnam and the Philippines, are prevented from leaving their dormitories except to travel to and from their jobs at high-tech factories. Some workers expressed concern that the conditions in the cramped dormitories, where as many as six people share a room, could spread the virus further.

Other workers who were in close contact with infected colleagues have been sequestered at quarantine centers. In some of those facilities, activists say that workers were served spoiled food or had no running water.

Officials have not said how long the restrictions will be in place. At a news briefing last week, Hsu Yao-chang, the Miaoli County magistrate, dismissed migrant workers complaints.
After a slow start, Chinas Covid-19 vaccination drive is in full swing as the authorities chase the ambitious target of fully vaccinating 40 percent of the countrys nearly 1.4 billion people by the end of this month.

China has administered more than 945 million vaccine doses, more than a third of the global total, according to the New York Times vaccine tracker. With about 17 million shots injected every day this month, China is on pace to surpass a billion shots in the coming days.

The national campaigns early lag came in part because China first prioritized vaccine exports and, because lockdowns and mass testing had largely tamed the virus, many Chinese felt little urgency about getting vaccinated. In mid-March, China had administered only about 65 million doses. In April, it was giving only 4.8 million doses per day.

Many Chinese had also been hesitant to get the shots, in part because of past scandals involving Chinese-made vaccines. Only domestically produced vaccines are being offered in the country.
LONDON  Last Sunday evening, shortly after Prime Minister Boris Johnson had finished selling his vision of a Global Britain to world leaders at a Group of 7 summit meeting in Cornwall, a new television news channel took to the airwaves across the country. It offered a rather different vision of Britain.

While Mr. Johnson talked of his country being an open, outward-focused player on the global stage, the new channel, GB News, struck a bluntly populist, patriotic tone. Its chief on-air personality, Andrew Neil, condemned cancel culture and vowed to stick up for the kind of people who do not pay much attention to G7 meetings.

We are proud to be British, Mr. Neil declared in a punchy opening monologue. The clue is in the name.

The juxtaposition speaks to a country that, five years after voting to leave the European Union, is still wrestling to fashion a post-Brexit identity. While Mr. Johnson played the statesman in Cornwall, his government spends much of its time catering to the same pro-Brexit audience as GB News  a fact that seems to be playing to the channels advantage in its early days.
LONDON  Thousands of rape and sexual assault victims have been failed by the criminal justice system, according to a British government review released Friday that cited a dramatic fall in convictions in England and Wales in recent years, prompting an apology from government ministers.

In an interview with the BBC, Justice Secretary Robert Buckland said that the findings of the review revealed systemic failings to deal with complaints made by victims at all stages of the criminal justice process.

He added: The first thing I think I need to say is sorry, its not good enough. Weve got to do a lot better.

The review, which only covered cases with adult victims but acknowledged that children and young people were also subject to sexual assaults, was commissioned in March 2019 by the Conservative government. The review was intended to address the decline in rape prosecutions, which the Ministry of Justice said fell 59 percent, and convictions, which have dropped by 47 percent, since 2015-2016.
BRUSSELS  In a rush of hope that Europe has turned the page on its pandemic ordeal, the European Union on Friday urged its member countries to open their doors to American leisure travelers, after more than a year of tight restrictions and economic slump.

Most countries are expected to open to Americans immediately  if they havent already  including Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Portugal and Greece, among others. For the tourism powerhouses of Europe, especially, the ruling offered long-awaited relief that they could begin recouping their economic losses from the pandemic as summer weather arrives.

We have a lot of American guests and we actually stayed in touch with them over the pandemic, said Richard Fischer, 37, a general manager at the Circus Hotel, in the heart of Berlin. They are really looking forward to coming, and we are looking forward to having them!

A recent rise of cases in Europe involving coronavirus variants prompted some caution about the E.U.s move, and calls for continued vigilance. But after an early struggle to secure vaccines for many Europeans, the improvements in vaccination and case counts that allow the opening are crucial signals that the European bloc can still deliver for its members in times of trouble  a significant moment of cohesion in the wake of Britains exit from the union.
In one example, our investigation found that private detectives working on a case with Mr. Hardmans firm, Hogan Lovells, traveled to France to try to pay a potential witness to testify against an enemy of President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia.

But perhaps the biggest advantage is how lawyers like Mr. Hardman enabled their clients to pursue their foes by winning what one judge called a legal nuclear weapon  court orders freezing a defendants assets worldwide. These orders are similar to the ones the U.S. government uses against terrorists or arms dealers, except they emerge from civil proceedings.

Much of this is initially secret, with orders in many cases issued before the target is aware or has been found liable in a trial. Even lawyers specializing in the freezing orders are uncertain how many are issued. But the fact that London lawyers, judges and private investigators are now deeply immersed in the savage political battles of the post-Soviet world is eliciting concern.

Were being asked in the U.K. to adjudicate on political dynamics that English courts dont fully understand, said Tom Mayne, a researcher at Exeter University, who focuses on how English courts handle corruption cases related to the former Soviet Union. It seems like an abuse of English law courts, because were basically reinforcing the status quo of the regimes in these kleptocratic countries.

Lawmakers in Britain are increasingly expressing alarm over Russian influence, warning in a parliamentary report last year that a growing industry of London professionals, including lawyers and private investigators, has emerged to service the needs of the Russian elite.

As the Russia Report laid bare, an industry of enablers has grown up in our capital city to protect and sustain the interests of corrupt elites, said Lisa Nandy, who leads on foreign affairs for the opposition Labour Party. The court system has now become the latest battleground as they seek to use the institutions of an open society to defend ill-gotten gains.

Mr. Hardman and his proteges at Hogan Lovells have been industry leaders in representing powerful clients from the former Soviet Union, routinely working with Diligence, a London private intelligence firm with a reputation for aggressive surveillance. The firms are teamed up on behalf of Russias Deposit Insurance Agency in pursuit of Sergei Pugachev, a onetime confidant of Mr. Putin now accused by the state of stealing more than $1 billion from a Russian bank, which he denies.
When he reached Rome in 2002 he got an entirely different education, he said, in a world of sexually active gay priests. He fell for a renowned Franciscan who had a bevy of young admirers and who dumped him five months later. You never forget your first love, he said, with a shrug, adding, Clearly all of this put me completely in crisis.

One confessor told him not to worry so much. Another said he should never have become a priest, but now that he was, he was one forever. Sacerdos in eternum, he said he was told. Youve got to think of eternal damnation. The important thing, the priest said, was to remain chaste.

In the Vatican, he said, that was easier said than done. He asked for a year of sabbatical, shed his collar and enrolled in the University of Naples. The priesthood seemed in his past.

But in the summer of 2003, the Vatican contacted him about a slot in its Latin division. He went to the Apostolic Palaces third loggia, the seat of the secretary of state, the equivalent of the prime ministers office, with walls frescoed by Raphael. He aced the Latin exam and got the job.
Covid News: U.S. Is Working to Send Doses Abroad by Replacing AstraZeneca Shots With Others A vaccine deal between Israel and the Palestinians has collapsed. The U.S. is likely to miss President Bidens goal of having 70 percent of adults partly vaccinated by July 4. Follow our latest coverage of the coronavirus pandemic.

To meet a global vaccines pledge, the U.S. seeks to replace the millions of AstraZeneca doses under review. Troubles at an Emergent BioSolutions plant have thrown a wrench into the Biden administrations plans to share doses abroad. Credit... Jim Lo Scalzo/EPA, via Shutterstock With less than two weeks remaining to fulfill President Bidens pledge to share 80 million doses of coronavirus vaccine with countries in need, production problems at an Emergent BioSolutions manufacturing plant are forcing the administration to revise its plan to send AstraZeneca doses overseas. Officials are now working to replace tens of millions of doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine that it had initially planned to include in the donation with others made by Pfizer and BioNTech, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson, according to people familiar with the discussions. Those three vaccines are authorized for emergency use in the United States; AstraZenecas is not. A pattern of serious lapses at the plant, in Baltimore, has thrown into question the fate of more than 100 million doses of both the AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson vaccines made there. The Food and Drug Administration is poring over records of virtually every batch that Emergent produced to determine if the doses are safe. The F.D.A. has so far ruled that about 25 million Johnson & Johnson doses made at the factory can be released but has made no decision on the AstraZeneca doses. AstraZenecas vaccine is significantly cheaper than the other three vaccines: The federal government paid less than $4 per dose, compared with as much as $19.50 for Pfizer. An administration official said that if the AstraZeneca doses made by Emergent are declared safe, the supply will ultimately be shared with other nations. The doses the administration is now working to send overseas this month will be a part of existing orders from the other manufacturers that have not been delivered to states, one person familiar with the planning said. Tens of millions of doses of the three U.S.-authorized vaccines that have already been delivered to states are sitting unused. Over 175 million people in the U.S. have received at least one dose  more than 62 percent of the total population over 12 years old, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and more than 148 million, or 52 percent, are fully vaccinated. Until the White House announced last week that it would share 500 million doses of the Pfizer vaccine with the rest of the world, the AstraZeneca doses made up the bulk of the administrations vaccine diplomacy commitments. Mr. Biden committed in late April to sharing as many as 60 million doses of AstraZenecas vaccine with other nations, pending the F.D.A.s continuing review of Emergent. In May the White House said it would send at least an additional 20 million doses of other vaccines overseas, bringing the total to 80 million by the end of June. Earlier this month, the White House explained how it would distribute an initial 25 million doses out of the 80 million across a wide range of countries. Millions of those have already been sent and more will be sent imminently, a White House spokesman said. Jeffrey D. Zients, the White Houses Covid-19 response coordinator, said on Thursday that 80 million doses would be allocated by the end of the month, but did not specify what kind. He said the administration was working with other countries on complicated logistical issues, including securing needles, syringes and alcohol pads that would go with the doses. Well allocate all the initial 80 million doses in the coming days, with shipments going out as soon as countries are ready to receive the doses, Mr. Zients said at a news conference. Therell be an increasing number of shipments each and every week as we ramp up these efforts. In order to share vaccines other than AstraZenecas, one person familiar with the plan said, the administration will most likely need permission from the manufacturers. Those discussions are still continuing, the person said. Noah Weiland, Sheryl Gay Stolberg and Tracking Coronavirus Vaccinations Around the World More than 3.13 billion vaccine doses have been administered worldwide, equal to 41 doses for every 100 people.

A just-announced deal for Israel to bolster the Palestinian vaccination drive collapses. A Palestinian receiving a vaccine this month in the village of Dura, near Hebron, in the West Bank. Credit... Hazem Bader/Agence France-Presse  Getty Images JERUSALEM  A deal to supply Palestinians with more than one million unused Israeli coronavirus vaccine doses collapsed Friday night, just hours after it was first announced, amid a public disagreement between the Israeli and Palestinian leaderships about whether or not the vaccines were too close to their expiry date. The new Israeli government said Friday morning that it would give between 1 million and 1.4 million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine to the Palestinian Authority in a trade that would see the authority donate a similar number back to Israel once its own supply arrives in September or October. But the authority later rejected the entire deal after receiving a first tranche of about 100,000 doses on Friday evening. A spokesman for the authority, Ibrahim Melhem, said that the specifications of the doses did not conform to the agreement, and that they were too close to their expiry date to be administered in time. The authority will instead wait for a direct delivery of four million new vaccines from Pfizer later in the year, Mr. Melhem said. An Israeli official, who asked to remain anonymous because he was not authorized to speak publicly, said that the initial batch of doses would expire at the start of July, which was enough time for Palestinian health workers enough time to administer them. The official added that the authority had been aware of their expiry date before agreeing to their delivery, and said the authority had only scrapped the deal because they had been criticized by Palestinians for agreeing to receive vaccines perceived to be of poor quality. The official also said that none of the remaining 900,000 doses would have been delivered less than two weeks before their expiry date. Negotiations over the deal began in secret several months ago, before Naftali Bennetts new government succeeded that of Benjamin Netanyahu, who was replaced by a narrow vote in Parliament last Sunday. The announcement follows months of debate about whether Israel, where a successful vaccine campaign has created a largely post-pandemic reality, has a moral or legal responsibility to give its spare vaccines to Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, where infection rates are far higher. In February and March, Israel gave vaccines to more than 100,000 Palestinians who work as day laborers in Israel, but resisted vaccinating millions of other Palestinians living under some form of Israeli control in the West Bank and Gaza. Instead, the Palestinian Authority ordered several hundred thousand vaccine doses from the global sharing initiative, Covax, and several million from Pfizer-BioNTech. Separately, the United Arab Emirates donated tens of thousands of doses of Russias Sputnik V vaccine to Palestinians in Gaza. Israeli officials said that the Oslo Accords, the interim agreements between Israel and Palestinian leaders signed in the 1990s, give the Palestinian Authority responsibility for its own health care system. But rights campaigners noted that other parts of the Oslo Accords require Israel to work with the Palestinian leadership during an epidemic, while the Fourth Geneva Convention obliges an occupying power to coordinate with the local authorities to maintain public health within an occupied territory, including during epidemics. Israel controls all imports to the West Bank, most of which is under full Israeli control, and shares control of imports to Gaza with Egypt. Those who accepted Israels narrative about the donations said the authoritys refusal to accept the vaccines had dented claims that Israel was to blame for the slow vaccination rate among Palestinians. But those who believed the Palestinian narrative said that Israel had acted in bad faith by making the authority an offer that it had no choice but to refuse.

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Unlikely to meet his July 4 vaccination goal, Biden focuses on a different milestone. Video transcript Back bars 0:00 / 0:58 - 0:00 transcript Biden Pleads With Americans: Get Vaccinated Now With the nation unlikely to reach President Bidens goal of having 70 percent of adults partly vaccinated against the coronavirus by July 4, he trumpeted a different milestone: 300 million shots given in his first 150 days. Im pleased to announce that today we will have reached the mark of 300 million shots in arms in just 150 days. Folks, were heading into a very different summer compared to last year, a bright summer, preferably a summer of joy. And the truth is that deaths and hospitalizations are drastically down in places where people are getting vaccinated, but unfortunately, cases and hospitalizations are not going down in many places in the lower vaccination rate states. But the good news is we have the solution. The science and the data are clear: The best way to protect yourself against these variants are to get fully vaccinated. So please, please, if you have one shot, get the second shot as soon as you can. If you havent gotten vaccinated get vaccinated now. With the nation unlikely to reach President Bidens goal of having 70 percent of adults partly vaccinated against the coronavirus by July 4, he trumpeted a different milestone: 300 million shots given in his first 150 days. Credit Credit... Stefani Reynolds for The New York Times With the United States unlikely to reach President Bidens self-imposed deadline of having 70 percent of American adults partly vaccinated against the coronavirus by July 4, he trumpeted a different milestone: 300 million shots administered in his first 150 days in office. Mr. Biden spoke about the vaccination drive from the White House as his administration makes a last push to reach the July 4 goal. Vice President Kamala Harris and the health and human services secretary Xavier Becerra were both on the road Friday, trying to drum up enthusiasm about the vaccine. Ms. Harris was in Atlanta and Mr. Becerra was headed to Colorado. Its an important milestone, the president said, touting his administrations work. It just didnt happen on its own or by chance. He described the federal effort as the one of biggest, most complicated logistical challenges in American history. Mr. Biden took office warning of a dark winter ahead, as deaths were near peak levels and vaccinations were barely underway, and he is clearly trying to portray the virus as in retreat as he nears six months in office. A fact sheet distributed by the White House in advance of Fridays remarks noted that 15 states and Washington, D.C., have gotten at least 70 percent of adults one shot. The results are clear: America is starting to look like America again, and entering a summer of joy and freedom, the document proclaimed. When Mr. Biden set the July 4 goal in early May, he said meeting it would demonstrate that the United States had taken a serious step toward a return to normal, and for many people that already seems to be the case. This week, California and New York lifted virtually all of their pandemic restrictions on business and social distancing. But the time frame is tight. An analysis by The New York Times shows that, if the rate of adult vaccinations continues on the seven-day average, the country will fall just short of Mr. Bidens 70 percent goal, with 67.6 percent of American adults having had their first shot by July 4. As of Friday, 65 percent of adults have had at least one shot, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But the number of Americans getting their first shot has been dropping steadily, from about 500,000 a day to about 200,000 a day since Mr. Biden announced that June would be a month of action to reach his goal. I dont see an intervention that could really bring back an exponential increase in demand to get the kind of numbers that we probably need to get to 70 percent, said Dr. Marcus Plescia, chief medical officer of the Association of State and Territorial Health officials. Every day it seems like its starting to trickle along. So I think realistically, probably the best thing we could do is to try to get to steady state at this lower level. Experts say that from a disease control perspective, the difference between 67 percent and 70 percent is insignificant. But from a political perspective, it would be the first time Mr. Biden has set a pandemic-related goal that he has not met. Mr. Biden has continually set relatively modest targets for himself and exceeded them, including his pledge to get 100 million shots in the arms of Americans by his first 100 days in office. Annie Karni contributed reporting. Sheryl Gay Stolberg and

A judge blocks the C.D.C. from enforcing its rules for cruise ships in Florida, a win for the industry. A passenger cruise ship at Port Everglades in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., last week. Credit... Joe Raedle/Getty Images A federal judge ruled on Friday that, beginning on July 18, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention would no longer be allowed to enforce its rules intended to prevent the spread of the coronavirus on cruise ships that dock in Florida. The judge, Steven D. Merryday of the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida, granted Floridas request for a preliminary injunction blocking the C.D.C. from enforcing the rules in Floridas ports, finding that they were based on stale data and failed to take into account the prevalence of effective vaccines. The judge said that, from July 18, the rules will persist as only a nonbinding consideration, recommendation or guideline, the same tools used by C.D.C. when addressing the practices in other similarly situated industries, such as airlines, railroads, hotels, casinos, sports venues, buses, subways, and others. The ruling was a victory for Florida, a cruise industry hub, which had challenged the rules in April, arguing that they were crippling the industry and causing the state to lose hundreds of millions of dollars. Florida also argued that the C.D.C. had exceeded its authority and had acted arbitrarily and capriciously when it issued the rules last year. Todays ruling is a victory for the hardworking Floridians whose livelihoods depend on the cruise industry, the states attorney general, Ashley Moody, said in a statement. The federal government does not, nor should it ever, have the authority to single out and lock down an entire industry indefinitely. Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida called the ruling a victory for Florida families, for the cruise industry, and for every state that wants to preserve its rights in the face of unprecedented federal overreach. The C.D.C. has been wrong all along, and they knew it, he said in a statement. The C.D.C. did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Friday night. In his ruling, Judge Merryday gave the agency until July 2 to propose a narrower injunction that would allow cruise ships to sail in a timely fashion.

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GLOBAL ROUNDUP Court orders AstraZeneca to deliver fewer vaccine doses to the E.U., and other news from around the world. Doses of AstraZenecas Covid vaccine being administered last month at a mosque in Cologne, Germany. Credit... Thilo Schmuelgen/Reuters BRUSSELS  AstraZeneca must send the European Union 50 million additional doses of its Covid vaccine by late September, a court in Brussels said Friday in a ruling on a bitter fight between the bloc and the Anglo-Swedish company. That is hundreds of millions fewer than the bloc demanded. In another boost for AstraZeneca, the ruling said that failure to supply the smaller number of doses, on a timetable ending Sept. 27, would incur a penalty of 10 per dose (about $12)  and not that amount per dose per day, as the E.U. wanted. The European Commission, the blocs executive arm, claimed victory in a part of the ruling that found that AstraZeneca chose not to use all means at its disposal to deliver the doses in the contract with the E.U., and compelled the company to make its best efforts to fulfill its obligations in the future. The contract was signed under Belgian law, putting the dispute in the hands of Belgian courts. This decision confirms the position of the Commission, said the bodys president, Ursula von der Leyen. AstraZeneca did not live up to the commitments it made in the contract. It is good to see that an independent judge confirms this. But the ruling eases pressure on AstraZeneca, and the companys general counsel, Jeffrey Pott, said he was pleased. The two sides could still appeal, but given their expressions of satisfaction, that seemed unlikely. Under Belgian law, a separate lawsuit over damages will be tried in September. The ruling offered AstraZeneca a lift in a bruising year. Its cheap and easy-to-store shot has been used in 135 countries, including poorer nations, but the discovery of that a small number of recipients have developed exceedingly rare, serious blood clots has prompted some nations to place restrictions on its use. The dispute with the E.U. began in January, when AstraZeneca, citing production problems, substantially cut its expected deliveries for the first quarter of the year, even as coronavirus cases were picking up across the continent. The vaccine, which the company developed with Oxford University, was the pillar of the E.U.s vaccination plans, and officials accused AstraZeneca of using the promised doses to serve Britain, which had just left the bloc and had signed an earlier contract with the company. On April 26, the bloc sued to compel AstraZeneca to deliver a total of 300 million doses by September, as it said the company had agreed to, and proposed penalties including 10 million (about $11.9 million) a day for each of four alleged breaches of contract, which could have rapidly ballooned into the billions. Following a court hearing last month, AstraZeneca accelerated its E.U. deliveries, and now, having sent 70 million doses, faces a maximum of 100 million in penalties. But with its trust in AstraZeneca broken, the E.U. has shifted its reliance from AstraZenecas vaccine to Pfizer-BioNTechs shot and mRNA vaccines in general. In other news from around the world. The European Union vaccine campaign has gathered speed in the last month, with about 55 percent of the adult population having received at least one shot. The bloc seems to be on track to fulfill its goal of having 70 percent of adults fully vaccinated by the end of July. President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda announced new restrictions to help control a rising wave of cases just weeks after closing down schools and suspending public gatherings and prayers. The new restrictions, which went into effect Friday, include a ban on travel, except for cargo transport and essential workers. The restrictions will last for 42 days.

Fiji , the Pacific archipelago nation of about 900,000 people, is fighting a major outbreak. Leading health officials have asked Australia to deploy a medical support team to its capital, Suva. The government has so far resisted calls to impose a national lockdown, instead using local restrictions, to help contain the virus.

The final games of Europes biggest soccer championship may be moved out of London after Britain extended limits on travel and crowd sizes. The governing body that runs European soccer is in talks with the government regarding exemptions that would allow thousands of fans from overseas to watch the semifinal and final matches of the Euro 2020 at Londons Wembley Stadium next month. UEFA announced it has a contingency plan, but it added that it is confident the games will be played in London as planned.

In Taiwan , health officials in the central county of Miaoli have come under criticism for coronavirus-related restrictions that ban some foreign tech laborers from all non-essential travel. The regulations prevent migrant workers, largely from Vietnam and the Philippines, from leaving their dormitories unless going to and from work at several technology manufacturing companies, where there have been a cluster of cases. Activists say the measures are discriminatory, and workers fear that the cramped conditions could be a breeding ground for the virus.

The Delta variant, first found in India, is now the most prevalent version in Moscow. Quickly rising case numbers put Russia at risk of following in the path of other countries such as India that seemed to have squelched infections only to see a resurgence.

Britain made people in England ages 18 and older eligible to be vaccinated, Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Friday. The broadening of eligibility comes days after a surge in cases of the highly transmissible Delta variant led Mr. Johnson to keep restrictions in place for an additional four weeks.

The E.U. recommends that U.S. tourists be allowed to visit Europe, but its member states have final say. Video transcript Back bars 0:00 / 1:06 - 0:00 transcript E.U. Recommends Lifting Nonessential Travel Ban After a year of tight coronavirus restrictions, the European Union recommended on Friday that its member states lift the ban on nonessential travel for visitors from the United States. I can indeed confirm that the council made this morning, the decision to enlarge the list of countries from which nonessential travel is permitted also for nonvaccinated travelers. So the additions include Albania, Lebanon, North Macedonia, Serbia, Taiwan and the United States. This is something that is a decision by the council and that the council communicated upon. So I would refer you to the councils press release for details. Of course, this is welcome, welcome news that the epidemiological situation in more and more countries now allows the council to take this decision. And in this context, we are in close contact with the U.S. administration on the issue of safe resumption of all travel between the E.U. and the U.S. And we have received reassurances that this is a high-priority issue for the U.S. administration. More practically, the first meeting of the joint E.U.-U.S. experts working group on this issue is scheduled for this afternoon. This group, which is a group that aims to exchange information and expertise to reinitiate safe and sustainable travel between the E.U. and the U.S. After a year of tight coronavirus restrictions, the European Union recommended on Friday that its member states lift the ban on nonessential travel for visitors from the United States. Credit Credit... Susan Wright for The New York Times The European Union recommended on Friday that its member states lift the ban on nonessential travel for visitors from the United States, a move sure to be welcomed by Americans eager to travel to the continent after more than a year of tight restrictions. The recommendation is nonbinding, and each member state can decide what regulations, including quarantines, to impose on visitors. Americans have been mainly barred from Europe as the United States grapples with one of the highest caseloads in the world. The opening is also expected to provide relief for southern European countries that are highly dependent on tourism, including Italy and Portugal. Those countries pressed the European Commission, the executive arm of the European Union, to act so that the entire summer tourism season would not be hurt by the absence of Americans, who are considered relatively big spenders. Despite the blocs recommendation, Europeans are still barred from entering the United States for nonessential travel even if they have been fully vaccinated, following a sweeping travel ban announced by President Donald J. Trump in March 2020 and extended in January by President Biden. The formal decision on Friday was made by Europes economy ministers, who agreed to add the United States to a list of countries considered safe from an epidemiological point of view. That means that travelers from those countries should be free to enter the bloc, even if they are not fully vaccinated, on the basis of a negative PCR test for an active coronavirus infection. But the European Union cannot compel member nations to open to American visitors. Each country is free to keep or impose more stringent restrictions, such as an obligation to quarantine upon arrival or to undergo a series of further tests. Countries like Greece and Spain, more heavily dependent on tourism, already moved in recent weeks to reopen to tourists from outside the European Union, including from the United States. The European Commission criticized those early moves.
But most voters interviewed on Friday did not seem to have such strong views about any particular candidate. They were there to vote because they always had, or because they believed in the system, or because, like Sadigheh Sarlak, 75, a retired teacher, they resented what they felt was foreign meddling in Iran.

I voted only because I was so annoyed by the Americans and their media, she said outside the polling station in Saadat Abad, a well-to-do area in north Tehran. She voted for Mr. Raisi.

Efat Rahmati, 54, a nurse, said it was strange that the Iranian authorities had excluded so many candidates from the race, a fact that many Iranians said had paved the way for Mr. Raisi to win. But she had still decided to vote, partly out of a personal liking for Mr. Raisi, and partly because the authorities have more knowledge than me about this issue, she said. I think Raisi was better than the rest anyway.

Maryam Afshani, 28, a pharmacist, had resolved to sit out the election, figuring that little had come from her voting in the previous two races. Then, at 6 p.m. on Friday, she changed her mind, arriving at the polls in Saadat Abad an hour later to cast her ballot for Mr. Hemmati.

I want a change, she said. And if I dont participate, maybe Im responsible.

Farnaz Fassihi contributed reporting from New York.
JERUSALEM  For months, rights campaigners have argued that Israel has a moral and legal duty to vaccinate millions of Palestinians living under Israeli occupation. For months, Israel resisted that argument, vaccinating only about 130,000 Palestinians with permits to work in Israel.

On Friday morning, the new Israeli government went some way toward answering its critics, announcing a deal to supply from between one million and 1.4 million vaccine doses to the Palestinian Authority. In return, the authority was to give Israel the same number of doses once its own supply arrived in the fall from Pfizer-BioNTech.

But just hours later, the authority ripped up the agreement, sending back about 100,000 doses that Israel delivered earlier in the day, amid a public disagreement between the Israeli and Palestinian leaderships about whether or not the vaccines were too close to their expiration date.

A spokesman for the authority, Ibrahim Melhem, said that the specifications of the doses did not conform to the agreement, and that they were too close to their expiry date to be administered in time.
The Portuguese authorities ordered a weekend lockdown of the capital region of Lisbon starting on Friday in an attempt to blunt a recent surge of new infections, offering a powerful reminder that even as Europe seeks to reopen more fully, the virus still poses challenges.

The decision came after Portugal registered this week its highest number of new cases since March, jumping by more than 1,300 in the past 24 hours.

Public health officials said that the rise in cases was steepest around Lisbon and they estimated that roughly half of the new cases involved the Delta variant, first detected in India and on the rise in other countries, including Britain.

The weekend lockdown goes into effect at 3 p.m. on Friday and lasts until 6 a.m. on Monday. While in effect, residents in the Lisbon region will be prohibited from traveling outside their home area, an attempt to keep the spread of the virus confined.
Its the first time Ive owned a boat, because I was told you dont own these things, you charter them, Mr. Pierce said. I had multiple problems with chartering. There was a general lack of availability but also a lack of choice.

Mr. Pierce, who divides his time between Puerto Rico and Florida, said he justified the purchase because he lives next to the water. But in his first few months of ownership, he has been paying what he called a never-ending stream of expenses you dont expect.

It consumes a great deal of capital, he said. Yesterday, I got a bill for some woodwork, and it was $150,000.

One alternative between outright ownership and chartering is the country club model. Barton & Gray and Freedom Boat Club are two of the big clubs. Their members have access to a wide range of boats but have to reserve them and may not always be able to use the boat they want when they want it  on Fathers Day, for instance, or the Fourth of July, when lots of members want to be on the water.

The goal of the Freedom Boat Club, which is owned by the large boat maker Brunswick, is to get people out in smaller vessels that they can captain themselves. The club charges an initiation fee of $5,000 to $7,000 and then monthly dues of $350 to $450, depending on the market. Its 40,000 members have access to about 3,200 boats, all under 24 feet long.

Freedom Boat Club has added nearly 10,000 members since the pandemic began, said Brenna Preisser, president of the business acceleration division at Brunswick. Boating is one of those great social-distancing activities, she said, adding that the club has one boat for every eight to 10 members.

Barton & Gray operates more like a full-service country club, charging a $20,000 initiation fee and annual dues. Those dues vary from $39,000 to use the smallest boats, at 36 feet, to $114,500 to use any boat in the fleet and to be first in line for reservations a season in advance. (In the summer, the boats are up North, but they go to Florida and the Carolinas for the winter.) Most members pay $54,000, which gives them access to all the boats but limits them to booking four charters at a time.
The surge in leisure travel as pandemic restrictions lift and a tight supply of rental cars have brought out the criminals this summer, consumer watchdogs say.

The Federal Trade Commission as well as consumer groups and rental companies are warning travelers about schemes that lure them into booking phony reservations through fake customer service numbers and websites.

The problem is that rental car companies have been whipsawed in the pandemic, dealing first with a sudden and extended drop in demand and now with an equally sudden increase in bookings. The result has been higher prices and more challenges in reserving cars during peak times in popular tourist areas. That may leave customers vulnerable to bogus offers that appear to provide the car not only that they want but at a seemingly more reasonable rate, said Emily Wu, a lawyer with the Federal Trade Commissions division of consumer and business education.

Theres a lot less availability of rental cars, Ms. Wu said.

Recent complaints to the AARP Fraud Watch Network and the Better Business Bureau describe similar schemes. In some cases, consumers did not realize they had been duped until they showed up at the rental counter to learn there was no record of their reservation.
San Antonio wants a PR firm to help pitch it as an electric vehicle-friendly city.
IFA sheep chairperson, Sean Dennehy, said factories are freely offering 7.60/kg and deals on transport to secure lambs, with higher deals available for larger numbers. Cull ewes are making 3.20-3.50/kg.

Supplies of suitable finished lambs are tight and market conditions are strong, pointed out Mr Dennehy this week.

Hogget supplies have significantly decreased in recent weeks, reducing the number of sheep available for slaughter, he said.

The kill to-date is running 8% behind last year and with the cold weather slowing lamb finish, the number of suitable lambs available remain low.

A total of 1,001,500 sheep have been processed in the first 22 weeks of 2021 which is running 78,855 behind the same period in 2020.

Imports from Northern Ireland for direct slaughter have totalled 91,314, which is back by almost 30,000 on last year added the IF sheep spokesperson.

The IFA Sheep Chairman said a combination of flock building in New Zealand and Australia, and strong import demand from China, is contributing to a global shortage of sheep meat.

The food service sector demand will continue to grow over the summer months and tight supplies will create favourable market conditions for lamb, he also pointed out.

The mart trade has also strengthened, with good quality cull ewes in demand. Prices are comparable or above what factories are paying in some cases.

Mr Dennehy also stressed that farmers should avoid selling underweight lambs and sell hard to maximise returns in what he described as a positive market for sheep meat.
The Irish Natura & Hill Farmers Association (INHFA) have contested the narrative that the current CAP proposals will undermine the income of Irish farmers.

INHFA president, Colm ODonnell, stated how nationally under a full flattening of payments 72,710 farmers will gain, representing 60% of all farmers.

With the EU Parliament holding their ground for the full flattening of payments it is he added unbelievable that a Parliament in Brussels is more in touch with the needs of Irish farmers than many of the public and farming representatives here.

A full flattening of Pillar 1 payments would see all farmers paid a national average by 2026 of 265/ha which includes the proposed eco-scheme. This stated ODonnell will be delivered through the convergence of payments over the lifetime of the CAP Programme.

Another proposal outlined at EU level is the option to front-load payments through the Complementary Redistributive Income Support for Sustainability (CRISS). This allows Ireland to target additional payments on the first number of hectares to support small holders. To fund this a country can put a limit on the maximum payment and if required apply a cut to the overall Pillar 1 budget.

Mr ODonnell outlined how the INHFA are supporting this as it will benefit small holders and potentially increase the payments for farmers on the first 10-20ha to over 300/ha.

With increased focus in the new CAP on delivering improved outcomes for the environment Mr ODonnell stated how many of our farmers have been doing this without the proper recognition or reward.

It is, he added, vital that the delivery of public goods in terms of improved water and air quality, improved biodiversity and mitigating against climate change is remunerated in the upcoming CAP.  The EUs Nature Fitness Check has established how our designated lands are delivering between 2-3 billion each year to our economy which translates into almost 3,000/ha. In the new CAP we must ensure this output is recognised in the same way that farming output is.

Concluding, the INHFA President stressed how despite suggestions made by some the current proposals will deliver for the vast majority of Irish farmers.
Bakers in Offaly and other counties around Ireland are invited to put their brown bread baking skills to the test in the 2021 edition of National Brown Bread Baking Competition.

There's a grand prize of 15,000 for the overall winner of the competition held in association with the National Ploughing Association (NPA) and the Irish Countrywomens Association (ICA).

NPA Managing Director Anna May McHugh said: The NPA are delighted that the hugely popular National Brown Bread Baking competition is returning this year. Every year the interest grows and the standard is escalating with hundreds of entries from all around the country. Despite having to cancel this years Trade Exhibition due to Covid the National Ploughing Competitions will take place from Sept 15th to 17th and plans are in place to build a programme of activities around #Ploughing2021 including digital activations for all to get involved with and the highly anticipated National Brown Bread Baking winner will be announced on the final day. 

Hilda Roche, President of the ICA said: The members of the Irish Countrywomens Association are very much looking forward to participating in this years National Brown Bread Baking Competition. I wish everyone the very best of luck.

If you think you have the recipe for success, log onto www.aldi.ie/brown-bread- competition or www.ica.ie for information on how to enter, full terms and conditions and competition rules.

The winners brown bread will be stocked in all Aldi Stores in Ireland for twelve months and they will receive a grand prize of 15,000.

The competition will be open to all members of the public (over 18). All successful entrants will be contacted on August 20, to attend the finals, due to take place on September 10 in Howth Castle Cookery School, with the winner then announced on September 17.

All entrants will be asked to drop off their freshly baked bread at one of the following Aldi stores on the prescribed date below picture of last year's winner Marie McCarthy:

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 4 9am- 11am

Aldi Head Office Naas, Newbridge Road, Naas, Co. Kildare, W91 VE40.

Aldi Swords, 10 Seatown Rd, Townparks, Swords, Co. Dublin, K67 V2N7.

Aldi Athlone, Golden Island, Ankers Bower, Athlone Co. Westmeath N37 FC04.

WEDNESDAY, August 11 9 am - 11 am

Aldi Macroom, Oakwood, Sleveen East, Macroom, Co. Cork, P12 ER89.

Aldi, Newcastle West, , Co. Limerick, V42 KD35.

Aldi, Main Street, Gort, Co. Galway, H91 PV44.

WEDNESDAY, August 18 9 am - 11 am

Aldi New Ross, Marshmeadows, New Ross, Co. Wexford, Y34 NP48.

Aldi Castlebar, Lannagh Rd, Garryduff, Castlebar, Co. Mayo, F23 TV29.

Aldi Cavan, Dublin Rd, Tullymongan Upper, Cavan, H91PK29.

Group Buying Director, John Curtin said, "At Aldi, we are a proud supporter of Irish suppliers and producers, so we are delighted to sponsor The National Brown Bread Baking Competition again this year and to be able to host the competition during these challenging times. Last years winning product Maries Brown Bread has been a great success, and we want to ensure that Irelands best bakers have the opportunity to take part in this fantastic competition again this year. We look forward to sampling Irelands best brown bread in the coming weeks and announcing the winner on September 17th in Howth Castle Cookery School.
This is a printing office, proclaims an old poster in the National Print Museum on Haddington Road, Dublin. Crossroads of civilisation; refuge of all the arts against the ravages of time; armoury of fearless truth against whispering rumour; incessant trumpet of trade. From this place words may fly abroad, not to perish on waves of sound, not to vary with the writer's hand, but fixed in time having been verified in proof. Friend, you stand on sacred ground - this is a printing office. The terminology might seem oldfashioned to the modern sensibility and the tone may seem tongue in cheek, but as well as tongue in cheek there's also a sense of sincerity about the statements. And the sincere sentiments expressed in the poster remain as true today as they ever did. A current Local Ireland advertising campaign highlighting the importance of newspapers in our lives points out some of the reasons newspapers are essential parts of a nation's life. Newspapers, the campaign says, foster a sense of community, and they also reveal matters of interest to the general public, matters which the general public would have remained ignorant of otherwise. They reveal things which happen behind closed doors, things which some would like to draw a veil over but which should be made known.

There's a dangerous, anti-democratic streak in human affairs and democracy is a fragile flower. A properly functioning press is a vital component of a healthy democracy. At the moment, worryingly, the press feels like democracy sometimes does - a bit fragile. Looking towards the future there's a sense of tottering uncertainly.

During the weekend Rosalind suggested we visit the National Print Museum. It was an inspired idea because it's a fantastic museum and I absolutely loved it. The experience was deeply nostalgic and memory-filled for me. Printing presses and linotype machines were on display, replicas of which I would have seen in operation in the old Midland Tribune offices on Emmet Street, Birr, when I was a lad in the 1970s. Back then I had little idea of what was actually happening, what it was all about, but those memories are very precious to me now. In the front office stood the magnificent-looking 160 year old Eagle Proof Press, which had been in use in the Tribune until the late 1960s. In the other offices there was a bustle of activity as people went about their jobs, including Linotype operators, compositors, printers and journalists. There was a dark room with a revolving door where photographs were developed. My grandfather had his own office, a small place with a fine, sturdy, wooden table. Every week he wrote articles which were well-known for being extremely well written. The atmosphere in the company was industrious and friendly.

In the compositors' room were cases of metal type. The compositors would receive the typed copy from the journalists and would arrange the cases of metal type according to what they read on the pieces of paper. Until the 1880s, all type was set by hand, just as Gutenberg had done 400 years earlier. But in 1884 the Linotype machine was invented. This machine could cast a full line of type in one piece of metal. In 1887 the Monotype machine was invented, which could cast separate pieces of type. Both machines made typesetting much quicker and more efficient; and they remained in use, with some advancements and improvements, until the 1980s when they were overtaken by modern computer technology.

For all our worship of the digital screen today, I think there is something in us which will always respond in an emotionally positive way to the printed product, because, as one writer said a few years ago, Print is beauty bound. He added that words printed on paper give our written language the vision of colour, tone, size, shape, form and weight. Print is like the singing voice of the written word. This voice invites us to engage our senses in the act of reading and looking. It adds vibrancy and variation to the meaning of what we read and see.

Printed artefacts such as my decades-old newspapers and my hundreds-of-years-old books capture the spirit of the age in which they were created. Through them, we connect not only with the content but also with the materials used, and with the evocative evidence of passing time and human interaction (dog-ears, margin notes, coffee and wine stains). In their visual style and interpretation they provide evidence of the social and historical context in which they were created. We somehow feel closer to the era in which they were written. In this digital age, printed items remain as essential as ever to our lives. If you don't believe this then think of every printed item or object that you encounter or use during your typical week. Now imagine what the world would be like without them. It would be a considerably duller place.
The reality is that theres more that unites us than divides us, says Zino Akaka of Media Movers. We all have shared values core to who we are as human beings.

Akaka is the Project Coordinator for Media Movers, which is an arm of narrative change charity On Road Media. The charity brings together young people with migrant backgrounds to work with media and pop culture professionals in the United Kingdom. By emphasising shared values, they aim to influence and inspire better coverage on migration, shifting away from negative, toxic and divisive narratives that can often dominate the media landscape.

On Road Media also recently contributed to the toolbox - a seven-step guide to rethink and change narratives on migration - developed by UN Human Rights and partners and launched last year as part of the #StandUp4Migrants campaign.

Akaka arrived in the United Kingdom in 2004 from Nigeria. Her own experience as a migrant, she says, helps her understand some of the emotions, frustrations and fears that people arriving to a new country may have, and assists in her work to encourage more positive media coverage.

I dont claim to fully understand everything  we all have our own individual experiences  but I think it creates a bond of trust between us.

Akaka and her colleagues ambition to change the narrative on migration starts with focusing on popular culture outlets with audiences of over a million. They work with producers of TV dramas, soaps and podcasts, as well as with news media and celebrities, to analyse the messages that are influencing consumers subconscious and to inspire a different, more effective and positive way to speak about migration.

The work is so valuable because you see the effects of it trickle down into policy, but also into peoples lives in the way they perceive themselves when they engage with media and with society in general, says Akaka.

Towards a new narrative

The issue with some of the fearful narratives, notes Akaka, is that, sadly, it drives people away from each other, and that causes people to really double down on what they believe.

Akaka believes shared human values can turn this narrative around. We all deserve to have a safe space to live, she says. We all deserve to live without fear, no matter where were from or how we grew up. We all deserve to have systems in place that work for us and with us rather than against us.

When the media spotlights these unifying aspects, says Akaka, it helps people understand migration through a different lens and fully grasp the emotional element.

From there can come real change, policy change. We like to say that were creating the foundation so that we can all build a big house together.

Solidarity and kindness: core human beliefs

Exploring the everyday stories of migrants in the media is a key asset in highlighting shared humanity, Akaka says.

As a society, we are people who care about people. Kindness and solidarity are core to our beliefs. If the media focuses on the bigger picture, while telling individual stories, as human beings, we can more easily identify and recognise the problems that a person may face are not their fault.

While there are many organisations working for narrative change, Akaka believes a lot can be done at the individual level, too. It can simply be the way we have conversations with others, she says, by remembering our shared values and reflecting on how we frame our messages.

Akaka says she is often told by young migrants that they just want to see stories that show the reality of their experiences.

Those experiences can be difficult at times, as for everyone else. But theres also so much joy in being a migrant. Theres so much joy in the community they have. And I think thats what they really want to see in the stories that are told.

They just want the truth.



UN Human Rights launched the #StandUp4Migrants campaign on International Migrants Day in December 2020 to reshape the narrative on migration. Ahead of World Refugee Day on 20 June 2021, share your stories and the vision of the world you want to see with us on social media by using the hashtag #StandUp4Migrants.

Disclaimer: the views, information and opinions expressed in this article are those of the persons featured in the story and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.
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Funded by a Second Grant, Collaborative Photo Project Captures Haunting Beauty of Melting Glaciers at Night and Will Donate NFTs Artist returns to photograph changing glaciers at night five years later, partnering with indigenous people and supported by a second American-Scandinavian Foundation grant. NFTs will be made and portions of sales going to indigenous groups. Giovinco identifies as someone with disabilities, having psoriatic arthritis and fibromyalgia. Fine art photographer Steve Giovinco returns to Greenland 
A push is underway on Capitol Hill and beyond for a full-blown investigation of the coronavirus outbreak by a national commission like the one that looked into 9/11
The Pentagons top general says he will consider a systematic fix to how the U.S. military keeps track of its guns
CELINA [mdash] Doyle Eugene Brittain Doyle Eugene Brittain was called to the lord on Wednesday, June 9th of 2021 in Mckinney, Texas. Doyle was born in Sigourney, Iowa and one of six children to the late Alfred and Bertha Brittain. His late siblings were Verle, Orbie, Eldon, Ruby, and Vera. H
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Stephen Michael Covington graduated from Mayo Clinic Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation residency on June 11 in Rochester, Minnesota.

He is a 2009 Dow High School graduate and completed his undergraduate and medical school at Michigan State University. During his medical training, he co-authored five articles in peer-reviewed journals and won the 2021 G. Keith Stillwell Memorial Award for Outstanding Resident Research.
The Four Lakes Task Force is encouraging local residents to tell their lawmakers they support legislation proposed in the Michigan Legislature to help local dam restoration efforts.

On May 19, Rep. Annette Glenn announced a plan was in the works to assist the Midland area, one year after the mid-Michigan dam breaches. A dollar amount is not specified in the proposed bills, however, Glenn along with other state officials, are calling the bill package, the $500 million plan.

This plan would create three funds to provide funding for dam safety projects, including: The Dam Risk Reduction Revolving Loan Fund for projects prioritizing risk reduction; The Dam Safety Emergency Action Fund for emergency response activities by the state where a dam owner fails to pay for necessary work; and The Emergency Dam Safety Grant Program for dam rehabilitation or removal. The grants would provide matching funds to federal funding or seed money for independent projects.

The unthinkable happened one year ago in Sanford and Midland  and this disaster should serve as a wakeup call for our entire state, said Glenn, in the May 19 statement. The resilience and unity shown by our community after this tragedy will serve as inspiration to demand and do better as a state related to dam safety. We must put in the hard work necessary to ensure something like this never happens again anywhere in Michigan.

Glenn was not able to speak with the Midland Daily News in time for publication.

The delegated authority for Midland and Gladwin counties, Four Lakes Task Force, shared support for the House and Senate bills.

Restoration: Dam repair funding bills

Dam repair funding bills include: House Bill 4907 (corresponding Senate Bill 469) and House Bill 4904 (corresponding Senate Bill 470).

The FLTF said the group is urging elected officials to allocate $225 million to the repair of the Secord, Smallwood, Edenville and Sanford dams for the restorations of the Four Lakes in Midland and Gladwin counties.

This will significantly lessen the burden on property owners and ensure a long-term, sustainable future for the dams, lakes, their communities, and ecosystem, the group said. These bills will help make affordable for all property owners any future special assessment in connection with the dam operations and ensure an uninterrupted path to restoring our lakes and dams.

Michigan dams: Dam safety bills

In addition to helping Midland and Gladwin counties with restoration efforts, other legislation could improve safety measures for dams across the state.

Dam safety bills include: House Bill 4903 (corresponding Senate Bill 471) and House Bill 4906 (corresponding Senate Bill 468).

If passed, these bills would amend Part 307 and Part 315 of the Natural Resource and Environmental Protection Act of 1994 to improve dam safety.

The recent bills place more requirements on the owners of dams. These bills also give increased oversight and authority to the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy as it relates to dam safety.

This is a historic opportunity to improve dam safety in Michigan and FLTF welcomes the opportunity to participate in the development of an improved Michigan dam safety program, as these bills progress through the House and Senate over the coming months, said the Four Lakes Task Force in a community email regarding proposed legislation. Much of our implementation is based on FLTF moving forward using standards that we expect will be aligned with expected new laws.

In part of the groups support, Four Lakes Task Force is encouraging residents to reach out to local state officials to share their support for the legislation.

Four Lakes Task Force asks the lake communities and other local residents to voice support for the recent legislation to Michigan elected officials, including: U.S. Senators Debbie Stabenow and Gary Peters; State Sen. Jim Stamas; U.S. Reps. John Moolenaar, Daniel Kildee, Debbie Dingell and Brenda Lawrence; State Reps. Annette Glenn and Roger Hauck; Gov. Gretchen Whitmer; and House Speaker Jason Wentworth.

Glenn will be accessible to Midland and Pinconning constituents on Friday, June 25. Her office is holding local office hour events. The first event in Midland will take place from 11 a.m. to noon at the Midland Business Alliance, located at 300 Rodd St., Suite 101. The Pinconning event will be from 1 to 2 p.m. at Pinconning City Hall, located at 208 South Manitou St.
The Michigan House has approved House Bills 4557-61, Rep. Annette Glenns plan to waive or prorate medical license fees charged during the COVID-19 pandemic shutdown.

The plan, which was approved on Thursday, June 17, would allow a wide variety of occupations to seek prorated fee reimbursements if their workplace was closed because of a state mandate.

Specifically, Glenns measure deals with reimbursements for licenses in public health and health care  which could include nurses, mental health professionals, respiratory therapists and many others if they were not allowed to work during 2020.

Other measures in the package would allow reimbursements for skilled trade licenses, food service and liquor licenses, and numerous other occupational licenses.

Michigan is slowly but surely bouncing back from the pandemic, and this effort is one of the many ways the Legislature is assisting the recovery, said Glenn, R-Midland. Its also a simple, common-sense step to ensure people arent forced to pay for state-issued licenses the state did not allow them to use.

Many of the fee reimbursements would be prorated  for example, if a business was shut down for three months or 25% of the year, the license holder could seek proration or credit of 25% of the associated fee. A license holder paying $120 for an annual license in this example would instead be required to pay $90. The other $30  if already paid  would be reimbursed through a credit when renewing the license for the next year.

So many people are still struggling with the financial fallout of the pandemic  these measures will help, Glenn said.

House Bills 4557-61 now move to the Senate.
Saginaw Valley State University Professor Tami Sivy has been recognized as one of the state's three recipients of the Michigan Distinguished Professor of the Year award, which recognizes the outstanding contributions and dedication exhibited by the faculty from Michigans 15 public universities to the education of undergraduate students.

Sivy is a professor of chemistry at Saginaw Valley State University and has been the department chair for the past six years. She earned her bachelor of science in biochemistry from Calvin College and her Ph.D. in chemistry and biochemistry from the University of Colorado, Boulder. Since joining the SVSU faculty in 2008, Sivy has been at the forefront of cultivating exceptional undergraduate student experiences through research and community partnerships.

Sivys teaching philosophy is centered around not only honing students critical thinking skills but in helping them realize their education and knowledge can lead to delight in learning the material. Her philosophy is appreciated and recognized by her students and colleagues. She has won multiple awards during her tenure at SVSU including the Franc A. Landee Award for Teaching Excellence, the most prestigious teaching award available at the university. Sivy also was an exchange professor at Shikoku University in Tokushima, Japan, where she served as an ambassador of SVSU to the community and taught undergraduate courses.

Dr. Tami Sivy represents the best of teaching, research and dedication to student success, stated Daniel J. Hurley, CEO of the Michigan Association of State Universities. She mentors and empowers her students, symbolizing the excellence in higher education for which Michigans public universities are globally renowned.

Through her goal of empowering students and encouraging them to take control of their learning, Sivy has mentored more than 50 students at SVSU in laboratory research. She teaches classes at every level, including introductory and general education chemistry courses, and is responsible for the entire upper-level biochemistry curriculum.

Sivy is a steering committee member of the Saginaw Bay Environmental Science Institute at SVSU. She contributed to development of a mobile lab and its curriculum that has been used for outreach for area students, and she has mentored many regional high school teachers and students in environmental research projects. She and her undergraduate students have been at the forefront for rapid DNA testing for detection of fecal contamination and its sources at beaches and rivers.

Because of Sivys previous experience with freshwater testing, the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy asked her to assist it in adapting testing for the COVID-19 virus in wastewater. She was the first in the state to rely on a team of undergraduate students for this testing, and since then they have worked tirelessly to detect COVID-19 in local communities, including on SVSUs campus and in seven surrounding counties.

As a faculty member at SVSU, Dr. Sivy positively impacts the classroom and surrounding community through her research on water quality. She is a teacher who mentors and understands the needs of students. Her dedication to the success of students and her commitment to her community, colleagues and SVSU are well evident, stated Deborah R. Huntley, provost and vice president for academic affairs at Saginaw Valley State University.

The two other 2021 recipients include Dr. Thomas Werner of Michigan Technological University and Dr. Yunus Zeytuncu of University of Michigan-Dearborn.
UNITED NATIONS (AP)  In a rare move, the U.N. General Assembly on Friday condemned Myanmars military coup and called for an arm embargo against the country in a resolution that demonstrated widespread global opposition to the junta and demanded the restoration of the countrys democratic transition.

Supporters had hoped the 193-member U.N. General Assembly would approve the resolution unanimously by consensus, but Belarus called for a vote. The measure was approved with 119 countries voting yes, Belarus voting no and 36 countries abstaining including Myanmars neighbors China and India, along with Russia.

U.N. special envoy Christine Schraner Burgener warned the General Assembly after the vote that the risk of a large-scale civil war (is) real.

Time is of the essence, she said. The opportunity to reverse the military takeover is narrowing and regional threat increasing.

The resolution was the result of lengthy negotiations by a so-called Core Group including the European Union and many Western nations and the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations known as ASEAN, which includes Myanmar.

A U.N. diplomat said there was an agreement with ASEAN to seek consensus. But in the vote, its members were divided. Myanmar, whose U.N. ambassador supports the ousted democratic government, voted yes along with Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam and the Philippines while Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Brunei abstained.

Even though the resolution didnt get the overwhelming support its backers hoped for, the action by the General Assembly, while not legally binding, reflects international condemnation of the Feb. 1 coup that ousted Aung San Suu Kyis party from power and put her under arrest along with many government leaders and politicians, as well as strong opposition to the military crackdown on protesters demanding an end to the armys takeover.

The resolutions approval follows calls for more aggressive U.N. action by many countries and Myanmars U.N. Ambassador Kyaw Moe Tun, who has been charged with treason by the military junta. He urged the international community to take the strongest possible action to immediately end the military coup."

The more powerful U.N. Security Council, whose resolutions are legally binding, has adopted several statements on Myanmar, including condemning the use of violence against peaceful protesters, calling on the military to restore the democratic transition and exercise utmost restraint and on all sides to refrain from violence. But it has never been able to condemn the coup or authorize an arms embargo or other sanctions because of an almost-certain veto by China, and possibly Russia.

The coup reversed years of slow progress toward democracy in Myanmar, which for five decades languished under strict military rule that led to international isolation and sanctions. As the generals loosened their grip, culminating in Aung San Suu Kyis rise to leadership in 2015 elections, the international community responded by lifting most sanctions and pouring investment into the country. The coup took place following November elections, which Suu Kyis party won overwhelmingly and the military contends were marred by fraud.

The resolution calls on Myanmars military junta to restore the countrys democratic transition, condemns its excessive and lethal violence since the coup, and calls on all countries to prevent the flow of arms into Myanmar.

The resolution also calls on the armed forces to immediately and unconditionally release President Win Myint, State Counsellor Suu Kyi and other government officials and politicians detained after the coup, and all those who have been arbitrarily detained, charged or arrested.

We must continue to call for maximum restraint and condemn all forms of violence, Schraner Burgener stressed. Inclusive political dialogue is urgently needed.

EU Ambassador Olof Skoog said the resolution sends a strong and powerful message, calling it the broadest and most universal condemnation of the situation in Myanmar to date.

It delegitimizes the military junta, condemns its abuse and violence against its own people and demonstrates its isolation in the eyes of the world, he said. The U.N. community of nations has expressed resounding support to the people of Myanmar -- that their human rights and freedoms must be protected, and that their democratically elected leaders must be released from detention.

Richard Gowan, U.N. director of the International Crisis Group, said he is only aware of three previous General Assembly resolutions condemning coups in this way since the end of the Cold War -- Haiti in 1991, Burundi in 1993 and Honduras in 2009.

The assembly has called for arms embargoes and sanctions, including on Israel and South Africa during the Cold War, Gowan said, but this is a rare call to stop arms flows, and Western diplomats deserve credit for getting a fairly clear and firm call to halt arms supplies to Myanmar, especially as ASEAN members had doubts about such language.

Assessing the impact of the resolution, Gowan told The Associated Press, The junta will shrug this resolution off, but it will make it harder for them to try to normalize their relations with the wider world, and present the coup as a fait accompli.

The General Assembly has effectively warned the generals that if they keep hold of power, they are resigning themselves to pariah status indefinitely ... (and) has sent a clear message that U.N. members are not willing to sweep the coup under the rug, Gowan said.

Schraner Burgener, the U.N. envoy, told the assembly: Inclusive political dialogue is urgently needed.

We must continue to call for maximum restraint and condemn all forms of violence, she said.

The resolution calls on Myanmar to swiftly implement a five-point action plan adopted at an ASEAN summit on April 24. It plan calls for stopping violence, establishing a constructive dialogue of the parties, appointment of an ASEAN special envoy as mediator, ensuring delivery of humanitarian aid and the mediators visit to Myanmar.

The resolution also addresses another major issue facing Myanmars military  its relations with ethnic minorities, especially Rohingya Muslims in northern Rakhine state. Over 700,000 Rohingya fled a military crackdown in in 2017 and are now in camps in Bangladesh.

The General Assembly expressed concern over the human rights of the Rohingya and other minorities, singling out the denial of citizenship to almost all Rohingyas and reiterating the responsibility of the Myanmar armed forces to respect the human rights of all persons in Myanmar.

It recalled the mandate of the U.N.s Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar, which is collecting evidence of the most serious international crimes. In a report in 2019, it said Myanmars government should be held responsible in international legal forums for alleged genocide against the Rohingya.

The resolution called on Myanmars armed forces to immediately facilitate a visit by Schraner Burgener.
The following list includes recent reports from the Midland County Sheriffs Office and the Midland Police Department. Compiled by reporter Andrew Mullin.

Tuesday, June 15:

11:58 p.m.  Officers responded to a weapons offense on Grove Street.

11:57 p.m.  Officers responded to an OWI/OUID in the area of Isabella and Smith streets.

8:51 p.m.  A deputy responded to a two-vehicle traffic crash in the City of Coleman. There were no injuries.

8:29 p.m.  Deputies were dispatched to assist EMS and Coleman Fire with a 60-year-old male who was experiencing a medical emergency and also requested to be transported to ER for his medical emergency and a mental health evaluation. The man was transported to ER prior to deputies arriving.

8:20 p.m.  A deputy was sent to Ingersoll Township for a check wellbeing after the 911 caller observed a verbal argument and possible assault. Contact was later made with the parties involved, and it was determined to be a parental discipline issue. There was no assault.

7:31 p.m.  A deputy spoke with a 23-year-old Hope Township male regarding ongoing issues he was having with his neighbor. The complainant stated he was grading his driveway when the neighbor came out and started a verbal argument over spilled gravel. The argument was verbal only and the complainant advised he handled the issue civilly. A report was requested to document the incident and no further assistance was requested.

6:59 p.m.  Officers responds to a two-vehicle crash on Eastman Avenue.

3:14 p.m.  Officers responded to a two-vehicle class on Joe Mann Boulevard.

3:08 p.m.  Deputies were dispatched to an unknown situation where a woman was screaming and bleeding that was called in by a passerby. Upon contacting the resident, a 49-year-old Homer Township woman, she advised she had an argument with her boyfriend's 25-year-old son who had since left due to having warrants. She said there was no assault, but the dog became aggressive when the male was yelling, and the woman tried to stop the dog. The dog then bit her on the hand causing a laceration. The laceration had stopped bleeding while deputies were on scene and she refused medical treatment. An isolation notice was issued regarding the dog bite.

11:05 a.m.  Officers responded to a case of larceny on Jefferson Avenue.

11:00 a.m.  An animal control deputy dispatched to Porter Township to investigate loose cattle. Three calves were located, and a deputy assisted in capturing the calves and placing them in the owners trailer to be returned to their pen. No further action necessary at that time.

10:56 a.m.  A deputy was dispatched to an Edenville Township residence to meet with a 31-year-old man reference a dispute over an easement. The man advised there is an easement shared with a 50-year-old neighbor and the neighbor. The 53-year-old man who resides in the neighborhood had mowed the easement area for the 50-year-old man and had cut grass that appeared clearly on the caller's property. The 53-year-old advised it was not intentional and he has cut the grass on and off for years prior to the caller moving in. The caller advised he did not want them on his property, and this was advised to both the 50-year-old man and the 53-year-old man.

2:57 a.m.  A deputy was dispatched to an Edenville Township residence to assist paramedics with a medical alarm. The 57-year-old female resident would not come to the door for EMS. The Deputy observed the female through a window, and she appeared to be in good physical health. The female spoke to a deputy through the window and stated she did not need assistance.

1:12 a.m.  Officers responded to a drug overdose on Crescent Drive.

12:08 a.m.  Officers responded to a drug overdose in the area of Colorado and Iowa streets.
Where Colorado lacks sandy beaches and ocean waves is made up in mountain lakes and rivers. Here are 10 places to go paddle boarding in the mountains of Colorado.

Authors Note: Some spots in this list require an entrance fee. Lifeguards may not be employed or always on duty at some of these places to paddleboard. Prepare for cold water and avoid shock by wearing a wetsuit or drysuit. Always wear a Personal Flotation Device, which is required by law at most bodies of water in Colorado.

Grand Lake (Photo) Credit Rocky Mountain SUP Big Soda Lake (Photo) Credit Helen H. Richardson/The Denver Post (via AP) Dillon Reservoir (Photo) Credit OutThere Colorado Staff Lake San Cristobal, Lake City (Photo) Credit Kelsey Brunner Horsetooth Reservoir (Photo) Credit marekuliasz (iStock) Paddle Boarding Rampart Reservoir (Photo) Credit Brycen McCright Quail Lake (Photo) Credit Seth Boster Arkansas River, Salida (Photo) Credit Jacob Boomsma (iStock) North Star Nature Preserve, Aspen (Photo) Credit Thaddeus Roan South Catamount Reservoir (Photo) Credit Liz Henderson
BLOOMINGTON  When Tari Renner announced that he wouldn't seek a third term as Bloomington mayor, he also said he wasn't "going anywhere."

But more than a month after leaving City Hall, Renner, a 63-year-old Democrat, is eyeing a new destination  the Illinois House.

"I have talked with some people in Springfield and depending on some other calculations and conversations I would definitely consider running for the 91st (seat)," Renner confirmed to The Pantagraph this week.

The dogleg-shaped 91st House district contains most of the urban core of Bloomington-Normal and stretches west to the suburbs of Peoria. No current lawmaker lives in the district.

It captures the campuses of Illinois State University, Heartland Community College, Illinois Central College's East Peoria location and Illinois Wesleyan University, where Renner has taught political science for nearly three decades.

A resolution passed by the House explaining legislators' reasoning for why districts were drawn as they were states the 91st District "maintains a community of interest among college students, faculty and staff" by keeping ISU and IWU "together and united within a single representative district."

Renner called the new district "primarily a Bloomington-Normal district," but acknowledged that it "does press to East Peoria and other parts where there are very few people."

The 91st also collects the villages of Carlock, Congerville, Goodfield and Bartonville.

It compliments the adjacent 92nd House District  held by Democratic State Rep. Jehan A. Gordon-Booth  that covers the cities of Peoria and West Peoria and the village of Peoria Heights.

Peoria Mayor Rita Ali last month told a joint House-Senate Redistricting Committee she thought grouping her urban area with the Twin Cities would "be good for us in terms of addressing the needs and attracting resources to both areas."

Both areas in the 2020 election voted strongly Democratic, while the rural portions that separate them lean heavily Republican.

"The (new legislative) map was quite artfully drawn," Renner said.

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In Bloomington, the district's boundaries catch all of Wards 1, 4, 6 and 7, and slivers of Wards 2, 5 and 8. It avoids Wards 3 and 9 altogether.

Renner in his 2017 bid for a second mayoral term earned the most votes in every ward in the city except for Ward 8.

He lost by more than 50,000 votes, however, in 2004 when he ran as the Democratic candidate for Illinois' 11th congressional district. The district at the time included the Bloomington-Normal area.

"Having been a mayor of a metro-sized city where you actually have to do things, understanding problem solving and getting things done at the bottom of the federalism food chain  that would be helpful in Springfield," Renner said.

To be a viable candidate, Renner may also need to lean into his 12 years of experience as a Democrat on the McLean County Board and flex his relationships with party monoliths like U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, who endorsed Renner during his 2009 bid for Bloomington mayor.

"There's few people I know who work harder on a campaign than Tari Renner," said Justin Boyd, who served as the chairman of Renner's 2017 mayoral bid. "Could he do it and be competitive? Absolutely."

Boyd said "someone like Tari" representing Bloomington-Normal in the General Assembly "would be beneficial for all of us."

Were Renner to make it to Springfield, he'd at least have a friend in Republican State Rep. Dan Brady, who Renner maintained a healthy relationship with during his mayoral tenure.

Brady during a visit to the Miller Park Zoo this week told The Pantagraph that if Renner has the ambition and the support to run for the seat, then he should go for it.

Even still, Renner said serving as a state legislator is "much more salient" and a "whole different world" than leading as mayor.

"If I do decide to do this," Renner said. "I'll have to do a little more soul searching first."

Contact Timothy Eggert at (309) 820-3276. Follow him on Twitter: @TimothyMEggert

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It was clear from the start of the start of the 102nd Illinois General Assembly that this year would be different.

Not only were lawmakers forced to conduct business in different ways, such as holding remote committee hearings, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but there was a new man at the top of the Illinois House of Representatives.

House Speaker Michael Madigan, the longest-serving state House speaker in American history, was toppled by his own caucus amid a corruption probe that has ensnarled some of his closest allies and confidants.

This paved the way for the election of State Rep. Chris Welch, D-Hillside, as the first Black speaker in Illinois history.

In an interview in his statehouse office with Lee Enterprises state government reporter Brenden Moore and Quincy Media statehouse bureau chief Mike Miletich, Welch reflected on his first six months on the job.

Here's that interview, lightly edited for length and clarity:

***

BRENDEN MOORE: Youve been on the job for six months. What has surprised you most?

SPEAKER CHRIS WELCH: I think the thing that surprised me most was the amount of time involved. This is really a very time-intensive job if you're going to do it well. If you care about the state and want to do a good job, youve got to put the time in. It's really seven days a week, especially while we're in session. We're here pretty much Monday through Friday  we being the leadership team, me and my senior staff. And then on weekends, I'm in my district office. So even when I'm home, I'm not home.

BM: Walk us through a typical day for a Speaker of the House? Whether it was you or Speaker Madigan, we dont see you on the House floor much.

CW: There is no typical day, every day is quite different. Although, I would say that everyday is definitely filled with a lot of meetings. You don't get to spend a lot of time on the floor because you're the administrator, you're the one that runs this place, keeps the trains on the tracks. We have a whole lot of people that work for this operation that keep us going and so we have personnel issues that we have to deal with, we also have our members that want to come in and see me all day  and that's Democrats and Republicans. And my policy is if a member of this chamber wants to meet with the speaker, I meet with them, Democrat or Republican.

Every day is a new day and, you know, I love coming into this building each and every day I have the opportunity to be the speaker.

MIKE MILETICH: Can you think back to some of your favorite accomplishments over this past year?

We were able to get things done in a bipartisan way, like ethics reform and Medicaid reform. We did some great things around here and we're just getting started. So I'm looking forward to some even bigger things happening down the road.

BM: Are there items left unchecked on your list? You said you were just getting started, what more would you like to accomplish?

CW: If I had a priority list, I would tell you everything on my priority list got done. We got some big things done that had only been talked about before: the omnibus affordable housing bill, expanding voter rights in our elections bill.

While folks across this country are passing bills to suppress voter participation, we passed a law that is going to increase voter participation. Those are big victories. Now I have a bonus list of items that if we can get those done, I consider those bonuses.

There's so many things that we can do here when we're here. We just have to roll up our sleeves and, and, and put the partisanship aside and get it done.

BM: Speaking of partisanship, theres a sign outside your office that says its a new day, which has been a slogan of yours this past session. But, some Republicans dont feel like its a new day.

CW: I don't even think Republicans believe what they're saying. If they would drop their talking points for a minute and you actually talk to them outside of the playground that we're in, they would be honest with you and tell you that it is a new day. Many of them have come and sat in this office and they've said, everyone of them, this is the first time they've ever been in the speaker's office.

I have thank you notes in my office  I got one when I arrived here today from a Republican, thanking me for the help that I gave on an initiative. There's countless of those. I'm not gonna put individuals out there, that's not what I'm here to do. They know that I'm here, they know that I've been accessible and open to them and working with them, and I have helped not just Democrats, but several Republicans get priorities done this session. I'm gonna continue to do that, regardless of the partisan political rhetoric that's being spewed out there.

MM: What is your relationship like with the governor and the other legislative leaders?

CW: I have a great relationship with the governor and the other legislative leaders. I don't think we're gonna ever always agree. I think what's important is when you have a good relationship as a foundation, when you disagree, you disagree respectfully. And I think that's what's happened this session.

To me, it's extremely important that you do this job in an open, accessible way. And you do it with everyone: the governor, the leaders, the rank-and-file members, the public, you guys

When I come in here, I try to do the best that I can. But I think every day we can be better. And will we be better next session? I think we will, because we're going to learn from what happened here and we're going to continue to build on that and try to be better.

MM: There were some members of your caucus that aired disagreements with one another on the House floor. But you have said disagreements are a good thing. Explain that a little bit.

CW: Well, we have a diverse caucus. Diversity is a strength in our state, and it shows up in our caucus. Diversity comes in a whole lot of different forms. It comes in race, religion, gender, ethnicity, culture and, with that comes a diversity of thought. And when you govern from a big-D democracy standpoint, you can't stifle debate, you have to let the debate take place. I've always said as long as that debate is professional and courteous, it should go forth. We need civility and compassion in politics, but we also need debate. That's extremely important. And I think what you saw here was democracy on display, and I'm proud of that.

BM: Youve talked about openness and transparency. Youre on social media frequently, often posting pictures of various guests who come into your office  a place many had never seen during the previous speakers tenure. Was that a deliberate point?

CW: I think the only way to govern is to be yourself. I am who I am, it's not gonna change. If you look at me and the way I operated before I became speaker, I've operated the same way. If you go back on my social media and look at what I did when we were in session and welcome visitors to my office, it's the same Chris Welch. I can't be any different. That's who I am. I think if I tried to be different and not accessible and not transparent, I wouldn't enjoy the job.

MM: The session started with your election as the first Black speaker. It ended with the governor signing a bill making Juneteenth a state holiday. How do you feel that there could be a young boy or girl thats looking up to you knowing that youre in this room?

CW: It's awesome. How we started the session and how it's ending is just poetic to me. And for me personally, to be the first black speaker of the Illinois House, the first black person to serve in this role in our state's 200 plus year history, is just truly an honor and a privilege that I'll never forget for the rest of my life

MM: In a time when there are many states that are taking voting opportunities from minority communities, could this be an example for other states across the country that diverse voices are needed?

CW: We are an example. This is what happens when you govern with... increased participation in our, in our democracy. But there's a lot of people still in this country that don't want to see this happen. There's a lot of people in this country that want to see us go backward where people of color and women don't have opportunities in this space. We're not going back there, we're moving forward. We're going to continue to progress. At least we're going to lead in Illinois, and to be the example of how things should be done.

BM: The former speaker was heavily involved in reelecting his members from a strategy and a fundraising standpoint. How involved do you plan to be?

CW: Very involved. I'm the leader of our Democratic Caucus. And, as any leader would, you get involved to support your members. And I'm going to do whatever they ask me to do. I'm going to visit their districts, I'm going to support them every step of the way because without them, there is no Chris Welch. Without them, there is no first Black Speaker of the House. Without them, there's no us. So, what's my job? To help them in any way that I can.

MM: What do you think former Speaker Madigan would say about this past session?

CW: I think he said we did okay. He didn't say a lot of words. You can do better. We did okay.

BM: Have you spoken with the former speaker since being elected?

CW: I spoke with him a couple of times very early on, so I haven't spoken with him in some time now, you know. But I'm sure I'll talk to him again.

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BLOOMINGTON  Driving down the road Thursday afternoon, Linda Foster had a huge smile on her face.

After so many years of fighting for local, state and federal governments to acknowledge the celebration of the end of slavery in the United States, Juneteenth is finally recognized as a federal holiday.

"This is a historic moment," said Foster, who is the president of the Bloomington-Normal branch of the NAACP. It is a sad moment in time for our country, but it's a great, exciting time for our country to acknowledge that it was a travesty what happened to slaves, that they were still slaves when they were free."

President Joe Biden on Thursday signed legislation that was passed by Congress to set aside Juneteenth, or June 19th, as a federal holiday. I hope this is the beginning of a change in the way we deal with one another, he said.

It commemorates the day in 1865 that Union troops arrived in Galveston, Texas, and informed the last enslaved Black Americans that the Civil War had ended and they were free.

The holiday has also been called Juneteenth Independence Day or Freedom Day.

Often celebrated at first with church picnics and speeches, the holiday spread across the nation and internationally as Black Texans moved elsewhere.

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The bill was sponsored by Sen. Edward Markey, D-Mass., and had 60 co-sponsors. Bipartisan support emerged as lawmakers struggle to overcome divisions that are still simmering following the police killing last year of George Floyd in Minnesota.

Gov. J.B Pritzker also signed a bill this week to make Juneteenth a state holiday in Illinois, beginning next year. But state offices now will be closed Friday because Biden signed the federal legislation, Pritzker said Thursday.

Im pleased to see the federal government join Illinois in recognizing Juneteenth as an official holiday, offering all Americans a day to reflect on the national shame of slavery and the work we must do to dismantle systemic racism," Pritzker said in a statement. Most importantly, let us stand shoulder-to-shoulder with Black Americans who will celebrate Juneteenth as a milestone in their fight for every ounce of the freedom that is their God-given right  and continue with them in that fight.

While many states commemorate the ending of slavery, only some observe Juneteenth as an official holiday. The number has grown following last summers reckoning over racial injustice, most recently including Maine and Washington.

Foster said Biden "is taking on the responsibility in his position to tell a country that this is a new day for us to begin healing."

The holiday reflects recognition that's long overdue, she said.

"No longer should we act like it didnt happen, and no longer should we ignore it," said Foster. "Having a holiday puts an exclamation point on it and says how important this day is and how it allows healing to occur, because the government acknowledges it, cities acknowledge it."

The Chicago Tribune and Associated Press contributed to this report.

Contact Sierra Henry at 309-820-3234. Follow her on Twitter: @pg_sierrahenry.

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Blood banks consider themselves prepared when they have about three days' worth of the normal blood supply, according to the American Association of Blood Banks. A task force says blood supply in the U.S. has dropped to "red" level, meaning most inventories have less than a one-day supply.
Chicagos slow walk toward civilian oversight of the Police Department stalled Friday in an extraordinary City Council committee meeting that saw Mayor Lori Lightfoot withdraw her plan while a competing proposal from grassroots groups was blocked by pro-police aldermen and mayoral allies.

With neither proposed ordinance making it out of the Public Safety Committee, the yearslong stalemate over how much control a civilian board should have over police policy and other important matters continues.

Sponsors of the grassroots plan tried to introduce a revised ordinance that dropped a demand for a public referendum on a citizen board with the power to remove the police superintendent.

But that proposed revision, a bid to clear the way for the rest of the proposal, was tabled on a 10-9 vote after a motion by pro-police Northwest Side Ald. Nick Sposato. Its backers, knowing several aldermen thought the proposal still gave too much power to the citizen board, subsequently withdrew the ordinance.

The Lightfoot administration also apparently didnt see much chance for success with its proposal, which keeps much of the power over the police department with her office. That proposal was also pulled before a vote.

The meeting was the latest delay in a fight between Lightfoot and activists that has stretched on for years.

Ald. Carlos Ramirez-Rosa, who backs the grassroots plan, said Lightfoot was just stalling for time by getting her allies on Public Safety to refuse to consider the groups revised proposal.

They know it will pass, and we hope we get a chance to pass it out of the committee, Ramirez-Rosa said. Nobody said it was going to be easy to pass this over the mayors objections.

If Ald. Chris Taliaferro, the Public Safety committees chairman, doesnt schedule another meeting before Wednesdays council meeting, sponsors of the grassroots plan could use a parliamentary maneuver to try to force their revised plan to the floor for an up-or=down vote. Such a move, however, would face stiff opposition from Lightfoot.

Going into Fridays meeting, neither plan had support from several pro-police aldermen.

While the 19-member Public Safety Committee is stacked with aldermen who mostly support Lightfoot, several members are even more staunchly pro-police, some of whom argue more oversight is not needed.

There are already a dozen agencies and groups with Police Department oversight, and eventually the federal consent decree will be in place, and that will be the law, Sposato said before Fridays meeting. Theres way, way, way too much police reform already.

The revised grassroots plan would still give a civilian board power to hire and fire the head of the Civilian Office of Police Accountability, set Police Department policy and present a vote of no-confidence in the police superintendent to the City Council. The Lightfoot ordinance gives the civilian board much less power, and more of an advisory role.

Lightfoot pledged to present a civilian oversight plan within 100 days of taking office in 2019, but then backed off on that deadline, saying it was more important to get it right.

The mayors latest plan would initially create a temporary oversight board, selected by her office. Elected three-person panels in each of the citys 22 police districts would then nominate people to the seven-person commission, but the mayor would have final say on its makeup.

The police superintendent would be chosen via a process not unlike whats being used now, Lightfoot said in introducing the plan last month, with the commission presenting three candidates to the mayor, who ultimately would get to pick a finalist for aldermen to consider.

The mayor also would select the heads of the Police Board and the Civilian Office of Police Accountability, she said.

The seven-person board would be able to vote on a resolution of no-confidence in the superintendent, but wouldnt have power to remove the top cop

Ramirez-Rosa predicted the grassroots plan would have better odds in the full council than the committee.

As we all know, the roster of the Public Safety Committee is much more conservative and whiter than the City Council as a whole, he said. So we hope it passes in committee, and then if it doesnt, we will reassess our options for the full council.

Before the language was changed Friday, the version designed by the grassroots groups called for Chicagoans to vote on a referendum to create a 11-member civilian board. The board would be made up of nine elected members and two members appointed by the board itself, and would have authority to hire and fire the police superintendent. It also would be able to submit the Police Department budget and negotiate contracts with the Fraternal Order of Police.

Three of the nine elected commissioners would come from the North Side, three from the South Side and three from the West Side.

If the referendum failed, three elected community board members in each police district would have the authority to nominate seven board members who would have less regulatory authority over the department, much like the commission Lightfoot envisions.

In a statement after the meeting, a mayors office spokesman said Lightfoot remains committed to passage of a strong and effective civilian oversight ordinance.

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The forced closure of a southwestern Illinois coal plant is off the table for now after lawmakers, including metro-east Republicans and Democrats, united in opposition to energy legislation this week.

The state Senate adjourned from a special session Tuesday after negotiators failed to make a deal that would satisfy environmentalists, unions, utilities and pro-coal legislators. One sticking point was how to eventually decommission the coal-fired Prairie State Energy Campus in Marissa and the City, Water, Light, and Power plant in Springfield.

A plan from earlier in the week would have forced the closure of the plants by 2035. Central and southern Illinois lawmakers came together to oppose that measure over concerns about utility bill increases, job loss and reliable energy, said state Sen. Terri Bryant, R-Murphysboro.

Senate President Don Harmon, D-Oak Park, said he's confident different groups can come together under a new plan, but downstate lawmakers aren't so sure.

"I don't know how you move these sections closer together if southern and central Illinois voices are being drowned out," Bryant said.

Prairie State sits in the district represented by state Rep. Charlie Meier, R-Okawville, who said municipalities that own shares of the coal plant are "on the hook for $4 billion in debt" up to 2050 whether they get energy from it or not. Thirty-six Illinois municipalities such as Highland, Mascoutah and Freeburg are locked into long-term contracts to pay for the construction debt of Prairie State. He added that Illinois doesn't generate enough renewable energy to produce reliable electricity.

"In this bill, they're going to retrain our workers. Our schools, our taxing districts, they're going to send millions down here and help us all out with that," Meier said. "But let's talk about some broken promises. Let's see what southern Illinois gets. ... Why should we believe any promise they make to us? It's not going to happen."

Two metro-east Democrats also opposed the legislation. A group of 52 lawmakers sent a letter to Gov. J.B. Pritzker decrying the proposed closure of coal-fired power plants. State Rep. LaToya Greenwood, D-East St. Louis, and state Sen. Chris Belt, D-Swansea, both signed despite recent criticism from environmental activists for not supporting legislation that would close Prairie State.

"If legislation is enacted to close these plants in 2035, before the end of their useful lives, there will be devastating consequences," the letter said. "Thousands of employees will lose their jobs, stifling economic activity in areas of the state where jobs can often be hard to come by."

At a recent protest outside Belt's office in East St. Louis, Rev. J. Kevin James of Macedonia Baptist Church recognized the senator's achievements as a member of the Illinois Legislative Black Caucus, but called on him to support closing Prairie State.

"While we celebrate the successes we have had and the accomplishments that Senator Belt has made, we cannot let moments of celebration overshadow our responsibility to environmental justice," James said.

Pritzker said a further negotiated bill could give concessions to the coal industry. One proposal would force coal plants to capture carbon instead of releasing it into the atmosphere, a developing technology known as carbon sequestration, potentially allowing the coal plants to operate until 2045.

"Let me make myself perfectly clear. Our long-term goal is to create meaningful climate change policy that makes Illinois a leader in protecting our people, the environment and the clean energy industry that we can grow," Pritzker said at a news conference in Springfield Wednesday. "That means that a bill claiming to contain meaningful decarbonization measures but does not pass muster on the details, and does not move us toward a clean energy economy, is not a real climate bill."

Harmon, the Senate president, said legislative leaders were awaiting environmentalists and labor representatives to work out their differences so the General Assembly could return for a vote, Capitol News Illinois reported. It's an example of how lawmakers give too much power to "special interest groups," said state Rep. Jason Plummer, R-Edwardsville.

"You have all these special interest groups, you have all these insiders," Plummer said. "These things are being hashed out behind closed doors. Who is in that room representing the ratepayers? Who is in that room representing the people paying the bills?"

While opponents want more time to build up renewable infrastructure and phase out coal, clean energy advocate J.C. Kibbey of the Natural Resources Defense Council says every day lost on energy legislation is a day lost to devastating climate change. The United States needs to reduce carbon emissions to zero by 2050 in order to help stabilize Earth's temperature, Kibbey said.

"Wealthy countries like the U.S. and forward thinking states like Illinois are going to have to have to move more quickly than that to avoid catastrophic climate change," Kibbey said. "That's just common sense."

Jack Darin, director of the environmental group Sierra Club Illinois, called the impasse "beyond disappointing."

"Illinois' largest polluter was again able to stall this plan to deliver clean air, jobs, and equity to Illinois communities," Darin said in an emailed statement. "We are delayed, but not defeated, and our work to deliver a better future to Illinois will continue until we've secured a plan to get our state to a 100% clean energy future by transitioning away from fossil fuels."

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Imposing a minimum global tax on corporations has long been a priority of the United States, which rightly wants to avoid having big American multinationals claiming domicile in some low-tax or no-tax haven, costing the Treasury billions, perhaps trillions. So notch a victory for Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen in getting the G-7 Western economic powers to agree to a 15% floor on taxation for these roving giants. Wherever they are, from New York to London to Frankfurt to Tokyo, they would have to pay.

The minimum tax is one of the two pillars of the plan. The other is levying taxes where companies operate, and not just the address of the CEO. So Facebook and Apple and Google and Amazon and Microsoft, all with their top bosses sitting on the West Coast but doing billions in business all over the world, would need to contribute in those locales. This was a goal of the Europeans aimed at the U.S. tech sector. Still, only firms with a profit margin of 10% or higher would be liable for this, so maybe some of them could duck underneath it.

For all the elbow bumps or handshakes, seven countries isnt the whole world. The larger G-20 will take it up next, which critically includes China, a huge trading nation, but often a rogue player, befitting its dictatorial government. Beijings undermining norms and cheating in so many other areas, from tariffs to piracy of intellectual property, cannot be tolerated when setting new tax policies.

And for a global tax to work, there needs to be global adoption, which will be years away.

But the concept is the right one, since asserting a post office box in Switzerland or some tropical offshore haunt as the legal home-base to dodge taxes is terribly unfair to those who pay their share without such maneuvers.

Now lets see if someone tries a lunar HQ. Come to think of it, maybe thats why Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk are so fixated on space travel.

New York Daily News

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The Jews killed their own, now the US bishops are trying to do the same. It wasn't bad enough when Joe Biden called a drunken truck driver, who killed his wife and their 10 month old daughter, a drunken truck driver. He was told by the doctors that they didn't know whether either Beau or Hunter (2 and 3 years old, at the time) could be saved.

As we all know the insurrectionists could not be called insurrectionists, so the people who saved their sorry asses while they were in hiding could not be honored.

Our wonderful billionaires, who pay a whopping 3.4% of their income, cannot be ostracized because they have been singled out by the horrible Biden administration. The religious right party needs to know that giving a percentage does not "single out" anyone. Get back to your gerrymandering, before it's too late. It keeps you off the streets and among the people that you allegedly represent.

If we go back several centuries, we will find three people who were simultaneously excommunicated twice, an all-time world record. This time preceded Martin Luther's tacking up his critique of the hierarchy of the all-knowing church by a few centuries. In the 13th century, there were three popes, all reigning at the same time. One was French, one was German and one was Italian, naturally. Each of them excommunicated one another, of course.

So, you see that the U.S. bishops have a sound reason to come down on Joe Biden. They have a centuries old precedent for doing so. And they have the backing of the entire religious right party. In case you're wondering, the "schism" ended after wandering in the desert for 40 years with another conclave. Italian wine won the day.

Chris Niemann, Belleville

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Back on May 24, Patently Apple posted a report titled "Rumor claims that Apple is now assisting TSMC obtain COVID-19 Vaccines as a new wave of the Virus hits Tech companies in Taiwan hard." Foxconn's plant in India was hit hard earlier in May and Foxconn is now trying to ensure iPhone 13 production isn't affected in Taiwan.

Beyond Apple's assistance, Foxconn and TSMC have now joined forces in the hopes of negotiating on the government's behalf for COVID-19 vaccines, a spokesman said earlier today, but warned he couldn't guarantee success.

Taiwan is trying to speed up the arrival of the millions of vaccines it has on order as it deals with a spike in domestic cases, although infections remain comparatively low. Only around 6 per cent of Taiwan's 23.5 million people have received at least one of the two-shot coronavirus vaccine regimen.

The government has come under pressure to allow private firms to buy vaccines, and said while it welcomes the idea and is willing to help, they have to provide proof from vaccine producers they have shots and are willing to sell them.

Speaking to reporters after Gou said he was seeking a meeting with President Tsai Ing-wen to discuss his plans to buy 5 million shots from Germany's BioNTech SE, Cabinet spokesman Lo Ping-cheng said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co Ltd (TSMC) wanted to donate an equal amount.

Lo said BioNTech had told Gou, who wants to make the purchase through his Yonglin Education Foundation, on Wednesday they will only sell vaccines to governments.

"A good method is for the government to, under this framework, authorise TSMC and the Yonglin Education Foundation to buy them and then donate to the government," he said.

He said the government was, with the help of the German government, continuing its own talks with BioNTech, adding there was no guarantee Gou or anyone else would succeed.

"Even if Mr Gou can discuss this with the original manufacturer or an agent, can he get them to sell sufficient vaccines? Honestly, nobody knows."

Earlier on Friday, Gou said he wanted to meet Tsai to discuss the proposal and that he had "absolutely no political or commercial intentions in this matter".

TSMC said it "confirmed the initiative", but offered no other details. BioNTech declined to comment. For more on this, read reports from CNA or Reuters.
Payson, AZ (85541)

Today

Partly to mostly cloudy skies with scattered thunderstorms mainly during the morning. High 86F. Winds WSW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%..

Tonight

Mostly cloudy skies this evening will become partly cloudy after midnight. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 67F. Winds E at 5 to 10 mph.
If Windows 10 was supposed to be the last version of Windows, why is there a Windows 11? Great question.

Like the answer to many questions, the answer is, it depends.

The authenticity of the concept of Windows as a service began in 2015, when Microsoft launched Windows 10. Over time, Microsoft said then, the company would simply deliver ongoing updates, adding features and patching bugs on the Windows 10 platform. But, as we know now, whatever Microsoft adds to Windows, its still Windows.

But Microsoft representatives never said that Windows 10 would be the last version of Windowsnot really. That comment was actually made by Jerry Nixon, a Microsoft developer evangelist who spoke at the companys Tiles, Notifications, and Action Center presentation about Windows 10 at Microsofts Microsoft Ignite conference in 2015. According to the transcript of the session, Nixons comment was more of a throwaway line, one that he literally referred to as a segue. Microsoft developers could never talk about what they were currently working on, he said, only what they had worked on and released. That changed with Windows 10, because it was all one platform.

All the stuff thats coming, because even though we were announcing Windows 8.1, we were all really working on Windows 10, Nixon said at the time. Its sort of a bummer in its own way. But thats not whats happening today.

Right now were releasing Windows 10, and because Windows 10 is the last version of Windows, were all still working on Windows 10, Nixon continued. And its really brilliant. So I can say things like, yeah, were working on interactive tiles and its coming to Windows 10 in one of its future updates, right.

Microsoft didnt deny what Nixon said, but it also didnt back up the last version of Windows, either.

Recent comments at Ignite about Windows 10 are reflective of the way Windows will be delivered as a service bringing new innovations and updates in an ongoing manner, with continuous value for our consumer and business customers, says a Microsoft spokesperson in a statement to The Verge at the time. We arent speaking to future branding at this time, but customers can be confident Windows 10 will remain up-to-date and power a variety of devices from PCs to phones to Surface Hub to HoloLens and Xbox. (Italics added.)

In other words, all Microsoft would officially confirm then is the concept of Windows as a service, and that there would be ongoing patches and updates. Microsoft declined to comment on the record.

So what is Windows 11?

Based upon the hands-on time that weve spent with a leaked build of Windows 11, you can very much argue that Microsofts original statement is still valid today. Microsofts Windows 11 looks very much like Windows 10+: a foundation of Windows 10 with a graphical update that includes a new Taskbar orientation and icons, a new Start menu, Widgets, and not much more (for now). Its a break from Windows 10, but it very much builds upon it, too. Virtually all of the familiar Windows 10 apps make an appearance in Windows 11.

Microsoft has yet to acknowledge Windows 11. The company hasnt provided any context for what Microsoft chief executive Satya Nadella calls the next generation of Windows. We simply dont know whether Windows 11 will be the foundation for Windows going forward, or whether this is a parallel development track like Windows 10 S, for example. (We think this is unlikely, but we dont know for sure.)

Really, though, Windows 11 is a branding exercise. Windows 11 is still Windows, and its still Windows 10, much like Windows 10 carried forward elements found within Windows 8. Microsoft will patch it, and likely continue to add featurrs, whatever it is -- "Windows as a service" isn't going away. Expecting Windows to carry forward Windows 10 until the end of time, though, was likely unrealistic. So yes, right now it appears that Nixons statement was wrong, and that Microsoft does plan to move on from Windows 10. But give Nixon a break, too: He made an enthusiastic, throwaway comment that ended up being understood as company policy.
Some banks across the globe have responded to the pandemic by focusing on employee and customer health, payment relief and immediate business stabilisation (capital preservation, in particular).



For the majority of organisations, sustainability became less of a priority, or was, at the very least, relegated to the bottom of the boardroom agenda. Despite this, many argue that in a post-pandemic world, environmental, social and governance (ESG) strategies will be pivotal to rebuilding and growing the economy. If so, how do African banks successfully incorporate ESG into overarching business imperatives and make a positive impact in the communities and environment that they operate in whilst retaining profitability?



Lead rather than follow



We have already seen tighter regulations, increasing policymaker expectations and civil society pressures to comply with ESG requirements. Whats more, investors are overly cautious about risk mitigation, given the current environment; acknowledging the inherent exposures that climate change and social discontent bring with them. Not forgetting younger generations advocating powerfully for more sustainable modes of living and of doing business, that increasingly only want to bank with institutions who they deem to be ethical and responsible.



Organisations can no longer afford to approach sustainability as a nice to have or as a function separate from the real business. It is critical that ESG principles become a central discussion in the boardroom, and that specific committees or roles are dedicated to achieving set goals - ensuring that sustainability is embedded within the core business strategy and operating model. This could include the appointment of senior roles for sustainability, tasked to lead ongoing strategy and implementation.



Ultimately, banks should be responsible for driving the industry agenda forward (bringing specific ESG deadlines closer) and going above and beyond, rather than simply complying with current legislative frameworks and waiting on additional rules to be enforced.



Balancing green and green



One obvious area of contribution is green financing - directing funds towards sustainable companies, investments and initiatives that generate the most positive environmental, social and economic impact, and by supporting clients to transition to more sustainable business models.



In Africa, ESG considerations are becoming increasingly important in lending decisions, especially those which include natural resources and extraction. Lenders now place additional focus on the impact of the funding on a countrys developmental goals, the environment and its people.



However, as one would expect, a significant portion of the balance sheet includes so-called brown assets, and consequently, banks will need to find a balance between profit and fiduciary duties towards shareholders, and the achievement of ESG targets.



Of course, simply pulling the plug on certain investments - such as those involving coal and energy producers in countries that rely heavily on the resource to generate base load electricity - could result in detrimental consequences, including wide-scale unemployment and a complete economic halt. Yes, banks will start shifting towards funding that meets specific green criteria, however, data and extensive information gathering will be required to outline potential scenarios and how best to address them.



Having said this, the cost of renewable energy is certainly decreasing, and technology is evolving, making implementation and adoption much easier. While the continent has far to go in maximising energy security and implementing sustainable energy sources, great strides have been made in varying the energy mix. Other facets banks are able to explore are loans focused on green home improvements, ESG connected bonds/ funds or partnering with development financial institutions (DFIs) to achieve specific aspirations.



Measurement, measurement and measurement



One of the biggest sector debates around ESG has been the effective measurement of success. Specific targets need to be set, whether this starts with internal auditing of paper usage, carbon emissions or the extent of green financing. Perhaps it could entail a customer and community trust index or highlight the contribution made to the development of small businesses, education and continental capacity building. Here, it is essential that every level of the business participates, and that all employees are held accountable. Sector cooperation also allows for standard evaluation processes.



Tracking and reporting environmental impact metrics, alongside financial metrics, provides organisations with a full view of business performance. This can help focus efforts to ensure results, increase accountability and transparency towards stakeholders, and highlight operational inefficiencies and cost saving opportunities.



Absa Group Limited is one of the funding signatories of the UNs Principles for Responsible Banking, joining a coalition of banks globally who want to play an active role in shaping a sustainable future. These Principles provide Absa with the tools to capitalise on new business opportunities within the sustainable development economy, whilst effectively managing risk.



Going forward, it is clear that institutions that dont start considering ESG in every decision (operational and strategic), will inevitably inhibit ongoing growth plans, and will also become the unwilling targets of regulatory and public scrutiny. Now is the time to embrace (green) possibilities.



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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The Minister of Finance, Mr Ken Ofori-Atta, has told Parliament that the government paid $937.5 million to three independent power producers (IPPs) for excess capacity charge between 2017 and 2020.



He said out of the amount, AKSA was paid $347 million, Karpower $359 million and Cenpower $251 million.



Giving a breakdown of the payments, Mr Ofori-Atta stated that AKSA was paid $35.7 million in 2017, $59.4 million in 2018, $136.8 million in 2019 and $115.3 million in 2020.



In the case of Karpower, he said, the company received $65.5 million in 2017, $108.9 million in 2018, $138 million in 2019 and $46.8 million in 2020.



With regard to Cenpower, the finance minister indicated that the company received no payment in 2017 and 2018 but was paid $86.5 million in 2019 and $144.8 million in 2020.



Urgent question



Mr Ofori-Atta disclosed these when he answered a question by the National Democratic Congress (NDC) Member of Parliament (MP) for Tamale North, Mr Alhassan Sayibu Suhuyini, who asked which IPPs had received payment from the government for excess capacity charges and how much was paid to the companies in the last four years.



The MP also sought to know the quantity of megawatts (MW) that was determined to be the excess power for which the $937.5 million was paid.



In response, Mr Ofori-Atta described the latter question by the MP as a legitimate question, but told the House that he had to go and prepare to furnish the House with the accurate answer.



He, however, told the House that the power sector was a crucial area, for which reason the government had been negotiating with the three IPPs to bring down the cost of excess capacity charges.



Mr Speaker, we have gone a long way with AKSA, Karpower and Cenpower and co, so that the whole issue of take-or-pay will be reviewed and well come down to more tolerable and sustainable levels, he said.



McKinsey & VRA



On the question why McKinsey and Company Inc. Ghana and the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) agreed to suspend a June 2018 contract, which was aimed at increasing tax revenue collection, Mr Ofori-Atta said the two entities signed a three-year service agreement which would have ended in 2021.



However, because of a leadership change at both the board and the management levels of the GRA in 2019, the McKinsey agreement, among others, was reviewed to ensure that it was in line with the new strategic direction.



The finance minister said after the review, the GRA and McKinsey mutually agreed to change the focus of the agreement from supporting only the immediate need to increase revenue collection in the 2018/2019 fiscal year to a long-term objective to create a sustainable revenue collecting entity.



Mr Speaker, the new contract, therefore, represents this new strategic direction and is focused on three areas of digitisation, performance management and supporting the creation of a transformation office to build internal capacity, Mr Ofori-Atta said.



The finance minister said per the contract agreement, McKinsey had been paid $7 million up-to-date and the new contract summed up to about $9 million.



Answering an urgent question by the Minority Leader, Mr Haruna Iddrisu, on total amount of temporary advances from the Bank of Ghana (BoG) to the government of Ghana for the 2020 financial year, Mr Ofori-Atta said the devastating impact of the pandemic required urgent actions to contain its negative and harsh impact on lives and livelihoods.



The minister said as part of measures to mitigate the impact of the pandemic on public finances, the Governor of BoG, the Controller and Accountant General and he triggered the central banks asset purchase programme, in line with Section 30(6) of the BoG Act, 2002 (Act 612) to provide the government with GH10 billion through the purchase of the government of Ghana COVID-19 Relief Bonds to help finance COVID-19 and related residual expenditures.



He said since the facility was raised under Section 30 of Act 612, which related to borrowing under emergency, it was structured as a long-term facility and not subjected to Section 30 (3) where repayments were to be done within three months after granting the advance.



The terms of the COVID-19 relief bonds programme are as follows: programme size GH10 billion, tenure 10 years or two-year moratorium and repayment (amortising after repayment), he said.



Mr Ofori-Atta said the GH10 billion was issued in two tranches, with the first tranche issued being GH5.5 billion on May 15, last year, and the second GH4.5 billion issued on September 9, last year.



Mr Speaker, consequently, the first repayment (principal and domestic interest due) will be reflected in debt repayment schedule for the 2022 budget statement and economic policies of the government.



Mr Speaker, the GH10 billion was the clear major transactions that were done from our own drawdown of deposits and from the BoG, the finance minister said.



Mr Ofori-Atta added that there were no temporary releases from the central bank to the government last year.

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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In an increasingly globalised economy, a countrys most precious resources are not extracted from deep within its bowels. It is not the oil, gold or cocoa that will, in the end, lead to Ghanas economic prosperity.

Our greatest and most critical resources are the men and women who lead our industrialisation efforts, turn the wheels of technology and innovation, run our businesses and cater for our physical and mental health needs and all the other constituents of our workforce.



No nation has developed without a well-educated and dedicated critical mass of workforce to pursue its developmental aspirations.



There are many nations who have achieved higher levels of development with only a fraction of Ghanas natural wealth; they relied on qualified and patriotic citizens to achieve their enviable status. The arc of success of these nations can only provide key lessons for Ghana. if we are to spur economic growth within the context of a globalised knowledge economy, then we will need to grow a capable workforce characterised by creativity and innovation, nationalistic zeal and a sense of moral purpose and duty.



A plethora of studies have shown that a well-educated and skilled workforce is indispensable for economic transformation and shared growth.



The school curriculum plays a particularly important role in this regard. If you are what you read, you are even more so what you study. The learning experiences we offer our children accounts, in large part, for what they eventually become.



Irrelevant curriculum



Unfortunately, our curriculum appears to have long failed to keep up with the changing times and demands of the moment. For far too long, we had remained tethered to the colonial ideal of producing graduates who are little more than pliant paper pushers.



Over the last three decades, our educational system and the school curriculum and assessment, in particular, appear to have done little to encourage or foster the kind of curiosity that leads to world-changing innovation.



The results of this have been evident for long. In global tests that assess application of knowledge and reasoning, even our best students struggle. Something about our education has been holding our students back and stifling their ability to lead world-beating innovations, life-changing discoveries and wealth-creating ideas.



In 2016, for instance, the National Education Assessment found more than 70 per cent of students struggling to achieve basic competencies in English and Mathematics. Similar discernible patterns were observed at the early grade level where less than five per cent could read with comprehension as reported in the EGRA/EGMA studies.



Earlier, the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study assessments consistently ranked Ghana at the bottom of the global table in Science and Maths. Attempts to uncover the underlying cause of this phenomena produced common findings that included curriculum overload and lack of performance standards to guide teaching and learning.



These findings raised important issues for policy makers. Curriculum overload, particularly, leads to poor fidelity of implementation as teachers and schools make their own value judgements about what should and should not be taught in their lessons.



Reforms



Against this backdrop, the Nana Akufo-Addo led government, on taking over in 2017, considered the development of a new curriculum as part of a comprehensive school reform agenda that included teacher education reform, school management and accountability, and improved education service delivery in general.



The government, particularly the President, believed that the expanded access to education that it was pursuing, would be fatally compromised if it was not complemented by enhanced relevance and quality of education expressed in the form of curriculum materials.



There had been previous attempts to revise our school curriculum. None of such attempts, however, seemed to have attacked the very core of the problem.



None had sought to explicitly answer the question what kind of Ghanaian do we want walking on our streets a generation from now? in such a direct and sustained manner as these present reforms do.



In September 2019, after two years of extensive curriculum review process, the government introduced a standards-based curriculum at the kindergarten to primary levels, with emphasise on core and foundational skills such as the four Rs - Reading, wRiting, aRithmetic and cReativity  while also nurturing in the children a lifelong passion for learning and discovery.



This was in sharp contrast to the earlier objectivists-based curriculum we have so long relied on. Developed on the bases of the B. F. Skinners and Edward Thondikes behaviourists learning theories, the objectivists-based curriculum encouraged leaners to demonstrate competence by reciting or regurgitating concepts; an approach understood in the extant literature as drill and practice.



In contrast, with the emphasis on set grade-level expectations, the standards-based curriculum highlights what learners are expected to know, understand and be able to do (with emphasis on doing).



Textbooks and other instructional resources that align with the expectations of the new curriculum have since been developed, approved and are currently being procured by government to facilitate the reform efforts.



Results



Reform efforts, however, must be matched at the various levels of education in order for them to achieve the intended policy outcomes.



This is why the common core curriculum for lower and upper secondary levels was developed and subsequently approved by cabinet for implementation this year.



This was originally designed as a programmatic curriculum with the view to aligning the lower secondary curriculum more closely to the upper secondary school in accordance with the governments vision of a comprehensive secondary school system.



Besides following the objectivists model of curriculum, the existing JHS curriculum had a number of limitations both in terms of content and structure.



For instance, the 1987 reforms, led by the recently deceased Dr Emmanuel Evans-Anfom (may his soul rest in peace), aligned our lower secondary closer to the primary school than upper secondary, to form the basic school system under the governments FCUBE programme.



This relationship has since influenced many policy choices including curriculum decisions, teacher recruitment and training, evaluation and certification.



A major unintended consequence, for instance, was the strengthened link between primary school and lower secondary school, and the weakened link between the lower and upper secondary school in terms of access and quality.



That the Anamuah-Mensah committee in 2002 considered an additional year at the upper secondary school as a remedial period for the poor quality of education at the junior secondary school level and  for the selection of programmes highlights the significance of this problem.



The introduction of the free SHS policy has addressed the access aspect of the problem involving transition from JHS to SHS. The common core curriculum, on the other hand, attempts to address the quality aspect in the form of improved learning experiences based on a common (core) curriculum from JHS1 to SHS1, thereby conceptualising lower and upper secondary as a collective whole.



Students may be streamed through elective subjects after first year of upper secondary. This is in contrast to the current approach where students are grouped either by academic ability or by choice on entering upper secondary education.



Research findings



A significant body of research shows that early streaming of students into pathways (grammar or vocational education) impacts negatively on learning outcomes. It was against this background that the high-level ministerial technical committee led by former Minister for Education, Prof. Dominic Fobih, which conceptualised the common core programme recommended a six-year curriculum system, combining JHS and SHS; with JHS 1-SHS 1 as the foundational learning stage, and SHS 2-3 for university and work preparation.



This distinctive feature of the common core curriculum, among others, is important for two reasons. First, given that the option for students to specialize is delayed at least for a year, specialisation will occur at a relatively older age.



This could help students and parents become better informed about options and about the consequences of early specialisation.



Second, students who complete JHS would still have more work to cover in the programme and could even prepare with their available textbooks while at home waiting to enter SHS, thereby making efficient use of time and instructional resources.



Standards-based curriculum



Beyond these, it is essential that students, who have been exposed to the standards-based curriculum at the primary level, transit to a curriculum system that complements the new curriculum in its purpose and characteristics. Otherwise, we risk compromising the gains that we would have made in fostering real world skills of the young ones.



As the common core curriculum is currently envisaged to finish at SHS1, final assessment would most likely be at the end of SHS1. This assessment needs to prioritise the validity with respect to the higher order skills in the common core (the Core Competences).



This could involve project work, teamwork, problem solving, among others, with more open-ended tasks, in order to allow students the scope to demonstrate the skills required.



Schools and teachers may be incentivised to provide high levels of support for students and/or mark generously, which will have implications for reliability.



This writer, therefore, recommends that there be two different assessments for the common core programme, each optimised to a different purpose. One would be for placement in Senior High School and one for assessing the core competences.



Exact decisions about when and how these will take place can only follow decisions about the curriculum organisation, assessment and school structure, among others.



In conclusion, the common core programme is a crystallisation of the Presidents vision of producing an educated and skilled workforce to power the nations development agenda.



With the common core programme supported with instructional resources and a highly motivated teacher workforce, we anticipate to have within a generation, a critical mass of innovators, critical thinkers and leaders who are at par with the best from anywhere in the world and can hold their own in the competitive global arena.



Backed by rigorous and faithful implementation, the common core programme stands us in good stead of finally making good on that promise made to a hopeful nation some 64 years ago, that we are capable of managing our own affairs.



The writer is the Member of Parliament for Kwesimintsim, immediate past Director-General of the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment, and Vice Chairman of the Parliamentary Select Committee on Education.









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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Deputy General Secretary of the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP), Nana Obiri Boahen has patted the back of the Deputy Attorney-General designate, Alfred Tuah-Yeboah for supporting his [Obiri Boahen] advocacy for the death penalty to be implemented in the country.



According to him, he fully supports the death penalty which is enshrined in Act 29 of the 1992 Constitution, instructing the killing of those who have been found guilty and convicted for intentionally murdering innocent people.



I am all for the death penalty; if someone has intentionally committed a murder, the person must be killed too. What the lawyer said, for me it is not something new; it is actually my song I have been singing that he is intensifying for me because the law says that if someone intentionally commits a murder, the culprit must also be killed and that is the law, it has not changed, he posited.



Speaking on Okay FMs 'Ade Akye Abia' Morning Show, Lawyer Obiri Boahen maintained that the issue of the death penalty is simple as whoever kills with the sword must die by the sword as enshrined in the 1992 Constitution.



He, however, chastised and disagreed with those who are canvassing for amnesty and human right in a well-established case of deliberate killing in the court; adding that the advocators should also consider the violation of the fundamental human rights of the dead and allow the law to take its full course to serve justice in the country.



So if people talk of amnesty and human right when the law explicitly talk of killing a convicted murderer, I dont understand those people. We should all consider how people deliberately murder others as some people intentionally ambush victims and kill them or armed robbers go to rob a house and kill innocent people and others rape and kill the victim and at some point remove certain parts of the body after killing the victim, and when these people are caught and found guilty by the law, some people somewhere are talking of considering their human right and amnesty after a competent court of jurisdiction has pronounced them guilty of the crime. Does the dead person have no human right? I honestly dont want to hear such things," he chastised.



Therefore, Nana Obiri Boahen turned the heat on the past Presidents from 1992 to the current President of the Republic, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo for their refusal to sign for the criminals be killed.



To him, such acts of the past and the present leaders from 1992 to date amount to injustices to the victims and the families who have lost their dear ones; insisting that he does not agree with them for refusal to sign the sentences for justices to be carried out.



I dont know why whenever the court finds people guilty of a murder case and the court sentenced the convicted person to death, all the past and present leaders from 1992 refused to endorse the sentence so that the guilty ones would be killed too. I dont know if they hear some voices asking them not to sign or endorse the sentence. If they will not sign, then they are doing a lot of injustices to some of us because the circumstances in which some people are killed are sad, he opined.

Source: Daniel Adu Darko/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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The Deputy General Secretary of the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP), Nana Obiri Boahen has described some comment made by the Inspector-General of Police (IGP), James Oppong-Boanuh as irresponsible and needless.



The IGP noted that despite the alarming rate of insecurity in the country, citizens should be modest in their expectations from the police.



He explained that several developed countries are still battling crime, therefore, the recent spate of crime rise, however alarming, is not peculiar to Ghana.



He was responding to calls for his retirement during a visit to the family of the late Constable General, Emmanuel Osei, who was killed by armed robbers on Monday afternoon.



We are doing what we can to protect the people of Ghana. There is no society in the world where there is no crime. Even in the USA, UK and Sweden, where they, more or less have everything, they still have crime. The only place that doesnt have crime is heaven and we are not in heaven, he said.



But Obiri Boahene in an interview with NEAT FMs said the security is a failure  after condemning his comments.



He has to apologize to Ghanaians and the bereaved family. This is unacceptable, he noted.



Listen to interview below





Source: King Edward Ambrose Washman Addo/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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Planing Officer from some districts MMDAs, Civil Society Organizations, (CSO) have been schooled on standard of Service Delivery in their Various Assemblies.



They were also urged to make it a mandate or prioritize engaging end users in the project formulation at the conception and planing stages.



Planning officers must offer every group, particularly the vulnerable, children, aged, including major stakeholders the opportunity to contribute their views and concerns in the quest to solving their developmental problems.



Speaking at the training in Koforidua, Mr. Bernard Anabah the public Policy and Advocacy specialist for GSAM said the new focus which emphasizes citizens participation in measuring quality of service delivery in some critical areas including water and sanitation, Health, Basic Schools, delivery is hoped to improve accountability, transparency and performance at the local government level.



He added that , the move is to strengthen citizen's oversight in the service delivery.



And for effective delivery and results, GSAM activity, funded by USAID organised a trainer of trainers workshop to equip participants made up of planing Officers from the MMDAs with Basic quality standards for ensuring service delivery facilities.



He said Ghana Strengthening Accountability Mechanisms ( GSAM) activity has shifted it's focus from monitoring capital projects which it has engaged in since 2014 to 2020.



And has been monitoring effective service delivery at the local level to help measure the impacts of the projects on the beneficiaries.



The Volta Regional Economic planning officer, Rev. Isaac Adza Tettey speaking to participants said, he believes such engagements would help to develop a Sense of community ownership and address the issue or residents denying the use or patronizing of some completed projects because they feel left out at the Early stage of the projects construction.



Rev. Isaac Adza again indicated that the planning officers must make it a duty to adhere to the planning guidelines from the national development planning commission in the preparations of their medium term development plan in order to achieve good results.



According to him the local government service council has set out service delivery standards for adoption by MMDAs in performing their duties, and including participation, professionalism, transparency, client focus , efficient and effective use of resources, as well as accountability.



Thus it is important they apprise themselves with these standards to meet the aspirations of the people in the performance of their duty.

Source: Michael Akrofi









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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Atik Mohammed, Executive Secretary of the Mass Action Movement, has urged the leadership of National Security to upgrade their security tactics to clamp down on criminals in the country.



According to him, crime has become sophiscated, so to fight it demands a high level of sophistication.



He was commenting on the recent criminal activities in the country which involve recent armed robbery attacks on bullion vans.



There have been two bullion van attacks within the week.



On Monday, June 14, a Police officer and a woman in her forties were shot dead by armed robbers who attacked a bullion van at Jamestown in the Greater Accra Region.



The driver survived by gunshot wounds while two other women on the vehicle escaped unscathed.



Another bullion van attack reprotedly happened on Thursday, June 17 on the Kasoa road.



The occupants escaped unhurt amidst gunshots from the assailants.



Expressing concerns over the recent happenings, Atik Mohammed charged the National Security to train more experts to be proactive in fighting crimes.



He stated, "It is just not enough to change labels. You go and change BNI to NIB. It doesn't imply that their work has become unique or you've taken it to the next level. You merely changed labels and changing of labels does not fight crime. I would have expected that the BNI early on used to do their work in this form but [AB] we have introduced a new technology. We have trained people to become experts in areas where we didn't have experts in earlier.''



Atik Mohammed asked, ''what are our security agencies doing to make sure that they are at par? In fact, with crime, you always have to be ahead. What are they doing to equip themselves well enough to be ahead of these criminals?"



"Society is growing; it's modernized. Crime is keeping pace . . . The truth is that it is outpacing [the way] even though there is modernity but crime is also trying to keep pace. But our management of crime or fight against crime is not at pace with what the criminals are doing. When you look at our security architecture, it's lagging behind," he emphasized.





Source: Ameyaw Adu Gyamfi/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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A crew in a bullion Van with registration number GN 6956- 17 has survived an armed robbery attack on the Winneba 'Accra highway on Thursday, June 17.



The van, which was shot by some unknown assailants at the Okyereko and Dominase portion of that stretch, had a driver and two policemen on board with an amount of GH550,000.00.



Confirming the incident to the Ghana News Agency, Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) Irene Oppong, said all occupants escaped the gunshots.



She said at about 1900 hours on Thursday, the Winneba Divisional Police received news that the van enroute Winneba from Accra, had been attacked.



The Police on hearing about the incident provided an escort team to the Bullion Van, which brought them back to Accra.



She stated that the case was under investigations to bring culprits to book.

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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Defence Minister, Dominic Nitiwul has mounted a spirited defense for the decision by President Akufo-Addo to charter a private jet for foreign trips for 15,000 pounds an hour.



He argued that safety and security of the president was the ultimate factor in deciding the type of aircraft used for his travels.



The Member of Parliament for North Tongu, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa had in a Facebook post last month alleged that President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo spent a whopping Ghc2.8m on a private jet on his recent trips to France and Johannesburg.



The ranking member on the Foreign Affairs Committee of Parliament alleged that the president decided to rent an aircraft that cost the Ghanaian taxpayer 15,000 an hour.



He further added that the President left Accra for Paris on the 16th of May and then from Paris to Johannesburg and back to Accra on the 25th of May accumulating a total of 23 hours amounting to a colossal 345,000. At the current exchange, the amount totals GHS2,828,432.80.



The former Deputy Education Minister subsequently filed an urgent question in Parliament demanding answers from the Defence Minister.



Responding to the claims in Parliament on Wednesday, June, 16, 2021, Hon. Dominic Nitiwul argued the Presidential jet is handicapped in handling long-distance travels which will require refueling.



He also revealed that the jet lacks enough luggage capacity as well as a place for the president to shower while onboard the presidential jet.



The decision to travel to long and multiple destinations such as the president travelling to France, Belgium and South Africa, will always require a larger aircraft even when the Falcon is airworthyWhen the President is travelling with more than 20 people for a business tripyou will need more than just a Falcon, otherwise, the people will have to go more than a day ahead of the president to prepare themselves.



The president himself must go more than a day ahead to prepare himself because no president can shower in this aircraft, so you cant move from this aircraft straight into a meeting, Mr Nitiwul added.







Source: kasapafmonline.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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Charles Owusu says he has resigned as Head of Monitoring Unit of the Forestry Commission with immediate effect.



The PPP stalwart dropped this news during a panel discussion on the Friday edition of Peace FM's ''Kokrokoo''.



Charles Owusu was appointed by the late Kwadwo Owusu Afriyie, who was the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Forestry Commission and a former General Secretary of the ruling New Patriotic Party.



Mr. Owusu Afriyie, popularly called Sir John, passed away last year after reportedly contracting the deadly Coronavirus and was buried on Thursday, June 3, 2021.



Charles Owusu became the Head of Monitoring Unit of the Commission in President Nana Akufo-Addo's first term and has since played instrumental role in preserving and restoring the country's forest reserves.



He emphasized that his resignation has nothing to do with Sir John's death but rather feels he has done an adequate job for someone else to continue his good works.



''As I currently sit here, I have written to the Forestry Commission that I want to rest. I have resigned from the Forestry Commission," he told host Nana Yaw Kesseh.





Source: Ameyaw Adu Gyamfi/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
GhanaCelebrities.Com has chanced on a heartbreaking video where the girlfriend of the police officer, Emmanuel Osei killed in a bullion van robbery has expressed her pain.



Police officer, Emmanuel Oseis girlfriend has shared a video capturing a moment of fun they had together. They are seen relaxing and caping a good time at an unidentified resort.



Her caption on the video has rather got people tearing because it reveals the pain shes in.



She wrote on the video, Kobby I miss you, please come back



Police officer, Emmanuel Osei was killed a few days ago in a bullion van robbery at Adedenpo, near James Town in Accra.



The officer was escorting a bullion van when some notorious robbers on a motorbike wielding gun attacked the van killing him instantly!



According to report, he received gunshots in his head whilst the driver on the van escaped death with severe injuries.



Another woman, Afuah Badu who raised an alarm of what was going on was also chased and killed by the robbers.



The robbers made away with an undisclosed amount of money plus AK47 gun for the officer.



Report says the police has put a GHC20 bounty on robbers to help fished them out and deal with them.



Watch the video below;























































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Those who are probably hoping that media personality Captain Smart will change or be tamed will have a long wait because he says nothing in this world will ever change him.

Captain Smart, who recently joined Media Generals Onua FM/TV, said it was only death that could tame him.



In a chat with Graphic Showbiz recently, Captain Smart said, If anyone out there thinks there is anything that can change my Ghana agenda, then the person should stop wishing because there is nothing in this world that can stop me from doing this.



We have an attitude here in Ghana which should be checked. How will the country be if we all should keep quiet? There are so many things going on that need to be addressed and I will do that. I love being called Ghanaian, I dont want to be called a national of any other country than Ghana.



According to him, his love for Ghana was so intense that he was willing to sacrifice himself to make it a better place.



I love this country so much that I am willing to give my life if it comes to that. If blood is needed to make Ghana great, I will gladly give mine. When I die, I should be buried the next day," he said.



Captain Smart also stated that he would not hesitate to leave a space in which his Ghana agenda was threatened.



The truth is that it doesnt matter where I find myself; if I get that feeling that my Ghana agenda is threatened because of someones interest, I will leave.



Even here at Media General, if I see that thing I will leave. If I have personal issues with my employees, I will draw their attention and we will sit and discuss them, but if it is because someone has a friend somewhere and because of that I need to stop doing my work, especially when what I am talking about is a well-investigated thing, I will pack and go, he said.



Captain Smart, who is known for his confidence and bravery, revealed where he got the traits from. I had a grandmother who told me while growing up that life was in two ways; it was either you lived your life or someone lived it for you, and I chose to live my life. She then said if that was the case, then I needed to be truthful and sincere, he stated.



He said while on suspension from his previous workplace, Angel FM, he got about seven offers but picked Media General because their offer stood out.



I had about seven offers and I called my wife for us to go through. Where I have gotten to in life, Im not after money, I just want a place where there are structures and Media General has them. Another thing was that I wasnt looking for contracts that were binding, he said.



Sharing his thoughts on the media space, the 41-year-old said, People working in the media space need equipment to work with, they need to be paid well so that they do not get drawn into doing the bidding of politicians and lastly, media ownerships should be checked.



Revealing who he is behind the confident facade we see, Captain Smart says he loves to sing. I am a praise and worship leader in my church, Church of Pentecost, Ofankor District. I love singing and I am also simple, respectful, very dynamic and a prayerful person.











Source: graphic showbiz









Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority.

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A section of the eastern slopes of the Canadian Rockies is seen west of Cochrane, Alta., Thursday, June 17, 2021. A joint federal-provincial review has denied an application for an open-pit coal mine in Alberta's Rocky Mountains, saying its impacts on the environment and Indigenous rights aren't worth the economic benefits it would bring. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jeff McIntosh
The Montreal Police logo is seen in Montreal on Wednesday, July 8, 2020. Some Quebec politicians are calling for an investigation after a video was released that appears to show a Montreal police officer with his leg on a young Black man's neck during an arrest. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Paul Chiasson
Logansport, IN (46947)

Today

Mainly sunny to start, then a few afternoon clouds. High 74F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph..

Tonight

Clear skies. Low around 50F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph.
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The minivan slips into a parking lot where a White woman hops out to hug a Black woman. Roughly the same age, they hail from opposite sides of the history they are about to confront.

For 18 months, as COVID-19 derailed their plans, the women have waited for this moment.

They shove suitcases in the trunk, buckle up side-by-side, then hit the interstate. The coming journey will take them from Charleston, the port city where about 40 percent of captive Africans arrived, to Georgia and Alabama, where many of those enslaved people toiled in bondage.

They plan to stop at key civil rights sites with a simple, yet complicated, goal: to better understand how racism became rooted so deeply that it can feel impossible to weed out.

Both are native South Carolinians, both raised during segregation. But each carries that history in her own way.

Margaret Seidler, the White woman, grew up in the country club set of Charleston. She thought her family arrived after the Civil War, but recent genealogy research revealed otherwise: Her ancestors include the worst of the city's slave traders.

Polly Sheppard, the Black woman, survived a violent eruption of modern-day racism. On June 17, six years ago almost to the day, a white supremacist sat in on Bible study at Emanuel AME Church and, after almost an hour, opened fire. He killed nine of her friends and pastors because of their race, then spared her so that she could tell the story of what he'd done.

The murderer had hoped outrage over his actions would prompt a return to segregation.

Instead, the two women met because of it.

Down South Carolina's country roads, they head first to Montgomery, Ala. As the hours go by, and the fields of corn and soybean pass, they share stories.

Polly describes growing up in Florence, picking cotton each fall, tobacco in summers. She graduated high school in 1963  the year 11 Black students desegregated schools in Charleston, officially making South Carolina the last state to do so.

Florence, like most districts in the state, didnt follow suit until 1970. Polly was well into her long nursing career by then.

Margaret attended the private, all-girl Ashley Hall  then the newly integrated Charleston High.

All right, folks! her husband Bob calls from the drivers seat. Were in Alabama.

Not 10 minutes later, they pass a sign for Dixie General Store, then a large Confederate flag flying atop a pole. Five smaller iterations of it follow.

Polly peers out the window.

Look at that.

Margaret shakes her head. "I'm sorry."

Then and now

In Birmingham, they stay in a hotel near the 16th Street Baptist Church, where Ku Klux Klan members planted a bomb that killed four little girls one Sunday in 1963.

The church anchors an intersection with a history that still haunts America.

Four months before the bombing, the nation watched uniformed men blast children, who were protesting segregation, with high-powered fire hoses. Police dogs snapped at their young bodies.

Margaret hops from the van and faces the park where it happened. The church rises beside her as they head into the Birmingham Civil Rights National Monument, which opened in 2017. Polly slips in unrecognized, as she wants.

The exhibit hall greets visitors with two old water fountains. One labeled colored resembles a rusty urinal. The other looks clean and modern.

Margaret gestures toward them. This is what I had growing up. Wheres our civil rights museum in Charleston?

Nobody answers, because there isnt one.

Around a few bends, they stop at the metal bars of a jail cell.

A month before the children marched, police arrested Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. While locked up, he wrote his famous Letter from a Birmingham Jail.

When Margaret and Polly read that King was arrested and jailed that day for parading without a permit, Margarets eyes widen.

Justin Hunt, she says. Justin Hunt!

Hunt, a 31-year-old Charleston activist, was arrested in April after protesting police brutality. His charges? Disorderly conduct  and failure to get a permit for a protest.

The two women look at each other.

That is the same exact thing, Margaret says.

Polly's lips press together.

It goes around, she says.

As the women meander separately, Margaret arrives at an exhibit detailing a list of requests Black leaders sent White ones following police attacks on the protestors. They sought things like police sensitivity training, improved police-community relations and a citizen review board.

This is just like  she trails off.

She thinks about the Illumination Project, which she helped found and facilitate after the Emanuel massacre and the shooting death of Walter Scott by a White police officer in North Charleston.

Illumination Project leaders presented officials with 86 strategies for improving police-community relations. Major goals? Police training, improved police-community trust and a police-citizen advisory counsel.

Margaret joins her husband on a bench in the lobby and tears up.

I dont want to die and not have some kind of substantial shift, she says.

Polly lingers, reading about John Lewis and former President Barack Obama, and then walks down a long hall toward the lobby. When she gets there, a mural of George Floyd's face stares back at her.

She stops, a short woman before the large image.

Polly raised four sons. She cared for Black men locked up in jail. She survived a White mans hate.

As she ducks into the gift shop, Floyds image lingers.

Bonds of friendship

After lunch, they head to Montgomery. The women reminisce about Charleston of old, although they didn't meet until shortly after the church shooting when Margaret spearheaded a tribute to those killed.

Just weeks later, on the exact same Sunday, they both happened to walk into Mount Zion AME Church.

Margaret, outraged by the massacre, had decided to cross the weeks most segregated hour and join a Black church. Polly arrived seeking support and a house of worship where she didnt see the bodies of her old friends and pastors every time she went to the kitchen or restroom.

They became friends.

About six months later, Polly and fellow shooting survivor Felicia Sanders got an invite: Would they speak at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia?

Polly said no. She couldnt possibly address such a huge crowd.

But Margaret had taught public speaking for years. She offered help. In her kitchen, she gave some advice: Plant your feet. Balance your weight. Clench your glutes.

When she got onstage, Polly planted her feet. She balanced her weight. She looked at the teleprompter.

To heal, we must forgive, she began.

Her voice sounded strong. She felt strong. She mentioned the shooter.

So much hate. Too much. But as Scripture says, she waved her glasses, love never fails.

So. I. Choose. Love! The glasses came down with each word.

Together we can fight for that change! Together we can heal! Together we can love!

The crowd roared.

In the van, Margaret imitates with flourish: Together!

The women howl with laughter.

Then Margaret remembers what courage the moment required. She leans over to whisper, That had to be so scary.

Marking history

The next day, they arrive at The Legacy Museum, which opened in 2018 to expose the historical pipeline from enslavement to mass incarceration. It is run by the Equal Justice Initiative, which provides legal representation to prisoners, especially those who might have been wrongly convicted.

Polly worked as a nurse at the Charleston County jail for 14 years. She cares deeply about these issues.

The trio steps inside the museum, greeted by a sign that notes: You are standing on a site where enslaved people were warehoused.

Nearby, a map plots slave investors offices around the immediate area.

It reminds them of Broad Street in Charleston, where Margaret discovered one of her ancestors ran an auction house that sold upward of 10,000 human beings. She recently got a marker put there, but laments that Charleston otherwise lacks such openness about its history.

How did Montgomery come to do so much better? Yesterday, they stopped at a sign outside EJI's office that explains 164 slave traders operated in the city between 1848 and 1860. Many worked on the street where they stood.

Margaret's dream is to erect these kinds of markers around Charleston. But she isn't exactly sure how to do it.

Moving through time, from haunting holograms of enslaved people for sale, they pass postcards featuring Black people hanged in extrajudicial executions. Photographs show the mass arrests of non-violent civil rights protesters. And then, the modern eras war on drugs and mass incarceration of Black men.

Polly worked at the jail during that war on drugs. It all feels very personal.

She walks to an interactive exhibit of all documented lynchings from 1877 to 1950. Its searchable by state and county.

Charleston County shows four, all men killed in the 1919 race riot downtown. Polly is dubious that the number is only four. Her home county of Florence lists nine. In all, the museum has documented 189 across South Carolina.

A woman standing beside her begins to cry.

The whole truth

That afternoon, they sit on firm black couches in EJIs lobby. Before leaving Charleston, Bob emailed its staff letting them know Polly would be in town and would love to meet Bryan Stevenson, the lawyer of Just Mercy fame who is its founder and director.

Trey Walk, a friendly man with the title of justice fellow, greets them.

In a conference room, Bob explains their road trip. Margaret asks about all the markers in town.

Walk outlines EJIs Community Remembrance Project, which has placed more than 40 markers at sites of racial violence.

You need to learn the history you havent been taught, he says.

Polly nods. Its important to tell the truth.

The whole truth, Margaret adds.

Suddenly, the conference room door opens. And there stands Stevenson, a trim man with a boyish smile.

Hello, hello! he says. Thank you, thank you for coming.

He beelines to Polly and hugs her.

I read about you and what youve said and what youve done," he says. "I am just so grateful for your peace and your love and your heart. It really moves me. It inspires me. We are just honored to have you here  honored.

Margaret claps.

Polly thanks him.

They talk about the plaques around town. When he moved to Montgomery, he says, the city had 59 Confederate markers and monuments. He couldnt find the word slave anywhere.

We always tell people that we have to tell the truth, he says. The truth is not always comfortable. Its not always popular. Its not always easy. But we have to tell the truth.

Before he leaves, Polly asks him to sign her copy of his book.

He opens the cover, and the room falls silent.

To Polly Sheppard,

An amazing human being who has inspired me and millions of others. Thank you for your hope and your witness!

Polly chuckles with delight. They hug again.

When the trio departs, Margaret bounds across the street toward their hotel, promising: Im ready to open Charleston up!

Polly laughs. I can see them running you out on a rail.

Arm-in-arm, they enter their hotel.

Uneven progress

The last time Polly walked on the Edmund Pettus Bridge, it was 2017, and John Lewis was there. That meant hordes of other people were, too, all walking toward a press conference at the top.

This time, she wants to cross it on her own terms.

Rain pummels the van during the hour-long drive to Selma, and it doesn't cease when they arrive. They have brought umbrellas, but Polly is 76, and Margaret worries about her friends balance on the slick uphill walk.

Plus, they have checked out of their hotel. If they get soaked, a three-hour drive to Atlanta looms ahead.

They cruise across the rusty white bridge, then pull over. After travelling more than 500 miles to this apex of their journey, they all wonder: What if the rain doesn't ease up?

Bob reads aloud a description of the 1965 "Bloody Sunday" march, when troopers beat Lewis and other protestors on the bridge.

As he does, the rain lightens. It stops.

They zoom back to the bridge and park on the main street, lined with timeworn buildings, then step outside.

The bridge, named for one of Alabamas most famous racists, rises ahead. It looks fairly small, given the enormity of what it represents. Heavy traffic barrels over its tight four lanes.

"Im getting goosebumps," Margaret says, "to think what this represents.

As they trek up its thin pedestrian lane, traffic roars just feet away. A white pickup truck accelerates hard right when it reaches them. Its tires squeal beside Polly, kicking up mist and making her jump.

An older man trudges ahead of them using a cane.

Looks like life hasnt changed, right? Margaret says. Hes not walking across the bridge because hes doing an exercise walk.

Hes got no transportation, Polly says.

No transportation. And hes in bad health.

They look at the decaying structures around them.

When you don't want to change  Polly says.

When you dont want to change over time, what do you get? Margaret asks.

Thats right. What do you get?

It looks like this.

When they reach the top, Polly peers at the sky, suddenly grateful.

Not a drop. And look at all the clouds!

Im telling you, Margaret says, this trip is divine.

When they turn around to head down, a few clouds break. On one side of the bridge, ominous dark ones still loom. On the other, the sun shines.

The long road home

In Atlanta the next morning, they wait in line for the National Center for Civil and Human Rights to open.

At an exhibit, popping in headphones, the women sit side-by-side at a lunch counter. A recording plays. White people curse at them. A man threatens to stab them in the neck with a fork. Their stools vibrate, as if the furious crowd is kicking them.

The women tear up. It feels so real.

They reach an exhibit about King's murder. Near a photograph of his body, Walter Cronkite breaks the news: A well-dressed young White man was seen running from the scene.

Polly's thoughts fly to another White man fleeing the scene of murder, this one 47 years later as she frantically dialed 911.

On the long drive home, the women gossip about church friends, old friends and political figures. They have driven more than 1,000 miles together, and now both ponder what to do with their new knowledge.

"We've learned a lot about what we could do in Charleston," Margaret says.

Margaret plans to contact EJI to pursue markers at key sites in Charleston.

Ive got to keep doing this, she says.

You think you cant make a difference, Polly says, but if you step out, youd be surprised.

Polly wants a tour company to organize Black and White travelers to take trips like this one, together.

The women agree that White and Black people must learn more about their joint history. But people also must share life experiences if they want to root out racism and the de facto segregation that persists.

Juneteenth celebrations Go to postandcourier.com/charleston_scene/ for a roundup of events celebrating Juneteeth, now a federal holiday, to remember the emancipation of enslaved people across the South.

"I just don't know how many people would hop on a bus together and drive to Alabama," Margaret says.

Polly thinks they would.

"Sometimes you've got to offer them something."

After a while, passing fields of corn and soybean, Margaret confesses: I thought racism was over  until Mother Emanuel.

Polly turns and looks at her, surprised. They know so much about each other. And yet, with more than 60 years of unshared history behind them, still so little.

You did?
Passengers and flights continue to return to Charleston International, leading officials to project a new high will be reached by mid-summer.

"We are scheduled to have July as the greatest month of this airport," Elliott Summey, CEO of the Charleston County Aviation Authority, said of the expected number of air travelers.

The projection came after the state's busiest airport reported that its May passenger count came in at nearly 88 percent of the pre-COVID-19 level.

Last month, nearly 410,000 arrivals and departures traveled through the airport, up 700 percent from the 51,000 tallied a year earlier. In May 2019, traffic totaled roughly 469,000.

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Through May, the airport has seen about 1.2 million travelers coming and going in 2021. That compares to about 887,000 for the same period in 2020 and nearly 1.9 million in 2019, which was the busiest year ever for Charleston International.

No traffic records are expected to be broken this year, but passenger volume is poised to rebound further with the addition of startup Breeze Airways and with other established carriers adding flights from the Lowcountry.

Summey said Charleston International is recovering about 20 percent faster than the national average. June could bring it close to 100 percent of pre-pandemic passenger levels.

"Leisure travel has come back," Summey said. "Business travel is taking a bit longer, but I see it coming back."
Charleston's largest hotel and the centerpiece of the revitalization that transformed the downtown area into a world-renowned tourism destination is up for sale.

Citing its "long-term strategy," the owner of the 433-room Belmond Charleston Place has hired a global real estate firm to "explore market interest for the possible sale" of the property, a spokesperson said in a written statement.

"During the process, Charleston Place will continue its day-to-day operation as usual with Belmond's signature hallmarks of unscripted service and genuine hospitality," the statement said.

A marketing brochure sent out to potential bidders by the commercial real estate firm CBRE Inc. described Charleston Place as "the cornerstone of Charleston's world-renowned Historic District" and its location as the "best possible" in the market.

Between its guest rooms, dining venues, meeting space and upscale retail shops, Charleston Place occupies about 3.2 acres, bound by King, Meeting and Market streets.

The 70-page brochure did not include an asking price, but a sale would almost certainly set a record for a commercial property in the region.

The development was championed by then-Mayor Joe Riley in the 1980s to spur the revitalization of a faltering downtown that's since become one of the crown jewels of the South Carolina tourism economy.

Opened in 1986 as The Omni by a group led by late shopping center magnate Alfred Taubman, it was first sold for $80 million  roughly the cost it took to build it  in 1995 to Sea Containers Ltd. It then ended up in the hands of Orient-Express, which rebranded all of its properties as Belmond in 2014 and two years later completed an extensive $41 million renovation of Charleston Place. The company also cut a $22.8 million check to pay off a $10 million government loan that helped finance the original development.

The property changed hands yet again in 2019, when France's luxury retail and lifestyle conglomerate LVMH Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy snapped up the entire Belmond portfolio for $3.2 billion.

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The marketing materials describe the purchase offer as likely the "only opportunity" for the world's biggest luxury hotel brands to enter the Charleston market because of the "extremely high barriers to entry" and "legally irreplaceable scale" of Charleston Place.

Much of the firm's pitch stresses the "competitive advantage" of Charleston Place and the "economic moats" that protect it. Essentially, nothing like it could ever be built in the downtown area again based on current city ordinances that restrict the size and location of new hotels. In the Historic District, the cap is 50 rooms.

"Charleston Place is truly impossible to replicate, representing a generational acquisition opportunity for both hotel owners and core real estate investors," according the brochure. "Charleston Place likely represents the only opportunity for brands such as 1 Hotels, Fairmont, Four Seasons, Montage, Ritz-Carlton, St. Regis or Waldorf-Astoria to enter the Charleston market."

A financial overview in the document shows just how much COVID-19 affected the property in 2020. Revenue per room declined by about 66.5 percent last year to about $86. Total operating revenue for the property, including income from rooms and food and beverage sales, tumbled by a similar amount, to $29.3 million.

Belmond Charleston Place was one of dozens of properties in the Charleston area that temporarily closed during the early weeks of the pandemic.

The latest market data show Charleston's hotel industry is on the rebound. For a four-week moving average ending June 6, Charleston ranked fourth among all markets for occupancy, according to the hospitality data and analytics firm STR.

Within the local market, Belmond Charleston Place competes with a "small set of properties," the memo stated, "most notably," Hotel Bennett and The Dewberry, which are farther up the peninsula near Marion Square. It also vies for guests with a "select group" of much smaller high-end boutique lodgings such as The Spectator and The Planters Inn.

The hotel also is poised to recapture large group bookings, assuming the conference and convention business ramps up again.

"Featuring 41,000 square feet of refined and distinctive meeting space, Charleston Place is the preferred luxury meeting destination on the South Carolina coast," the brochure pointed out.
RIDGEVILLE  Federal funds from the COV1D-19 relief effort are paving the way for $6.8 million in roadway improvements at the State Ports Authority's business park in Dorchester County.

The grant for the Ridgeville Industrial Campus is from the U.S. Department of Commerce's Economic Development Administration. It will be matched with $1.7 million in local funds.

The SPA bought the 950-acre property, which is roughly 30 miles from the Port of Charleston's terminals, for $16.2 million from WestRock Co. in 2018 namely to provide warehouse space for shippers, with an emphasis on retailers.

Walmart became the parks first anchor tenant when it announced plans about a year ago for a $200 million distribution center on 250 acres where imported merchandise would be sorted at a 3 million-square-foot warehouse and sent to regional centers.

The project is expected to boost the port's annual cargo volume by about 70,000 containers.

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At 3 million square feet, the logistics site off of Interstate 26 will be Walmart's third-largest in the country and employ up to 1,100 workers at full capacity. It will include two buildings, 2,200 spaces for trucks and 500 loading docks. It will support roughly 850 stores in a 150-mile radius and will also fulfill e-commerce orders.

Work began in March and the opening is scheduled for next April.

The roadwork grant is part of the federal CARES, which provided the Economic Development Administration with $1.5 billion in COVID-19 relief funds.
Santee Cooper is likely to extend the employment agreements for its two top leaders next week, days after a sweeping reform bill was signed into law that keeps the utility under state ownership.

The public power provider's board is expected to review a proposal to retain chief executive officer Mark Bonsall and deputy CEO Charles Duckworth for another six months at a June 21 meeting in Pinopolis, according to a notice.

Their work contracts expire July 7.

Under the terms of their last six-month extensions, Bonsall and Duckworth were to be paid $1.1 million and $560,000 per year, respectively, unchanged from when they joined Santee Cooper.

Under newly enacted reforms, their salaries must be approved by legislative panel.

Bonsall and Duckworth, power industry veterans who had worked together in Arizona, were recruited in mid-2019 to provide management stability at a time when Santee Cooper was in crisis from the fallout of the failed expansion of the V.C. Summer plant.

The financially disastrous project ran up bills totaling more than $9 billion before construction on two new reactors being built at the Fairfield County nuclear station was abandoned in July 2017.

Santee Cooper was responsible for 45 percent of the costs under a joint venture with the former South Carolina Electric & Gas, which has since been acquired by Dominion Energy.

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Legislators debated for years about whether the state-owned utility should be sold as well.

Santee Cooper is facing major changes now that Gov. Henry McMaster has signed the reform bill into law.

For instance, nine of its 10 board members will be ousted and replaced. The new law also gives lawmakers, the S.C. Public Service Commission and the Office of Regulatory Staff influence over many of the utility's business decisions, from debt financing to real estate sales to rates.

Lawmakers determined earlier this year that selling off Santee Cooper was no longer an option, citing a lack of interested bidders. An offer from NextEra Energy of Florida was rejected as insufficient.

In signing the reform bill into law June 15, McMaster said he'd still prefer to sell Santee Cooper because the seemingly endless debates over how to restructure the utility demonstrates that elected officials shouldn't be involved.

South Carolina no longer has a need to provide, and never had the legal obligation to own, a state-owned utility, and the political process does not include the private-sector expertise nor the means necessary to effectively oversee Santee Coopers operations, McMaster wrote to House Speaker Jay Lucas.

Santee Cooper said in prepared remarks issued June 15 that it "embraces reform as provided" in the law.

"Throughout this process, we have listened to the concerns of legislators and others, and we have already begun preparing to meet these new requirements that will increase our transparency and accountability," according to the statement. "Our employees are committed and working very hard toward a leaner, greener utility that creates savings for customers and value for all."
Amazon is working on a biopic on Robert Smalls, a politician, publisher, businessman and maritime pilot who was born into slavery in Beaufort and worked as a waiter at the Planters Hotel in Charleston.

Smalls, who learned to sail in Charleston Harbor, in 1862 commandeered a Confederate ship docked near Fort Sumter and escaped to freedom.

He led other enslaved people in South Carolina to freedom as well and went on to be elected to Congress.

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Smalls authored legislation that made South Carolina the first state to provide a free and compulsory public school system in the United States. He also founded the Republican Party of South Carolina.

The Amazon biopic "Steal Away" will feature the true story of his daring escape and rise as a politician in Beaufort during the Reconstruction Era.

According to IMDb and Deadline, the film will be directed by Charles Burnett of the classic film "Killer of the Sheep."

In 2018, Burnett was honored by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences with a Governors Award.

Deadline also reported that Malcolm M. Mays, filmmaker and FX series "Snowfall" actor, has been tapped to write the script.

Mays, who wrote the reboot of "New Jack City" for Warner Bros., was a protege of the late two-time Oscar-nominated filmmaker John Singleton.

His film entitled "Trouble" aimed to shed light on the African American and Latin American tension in South Central Los Angeles, where he grew up.

A release date has not yet been set for the Smalls biopic.
Charleston, SC (29403)

Today

Cloudy early, then thunderstorms developing this afternoon. Storms may contain strong gusty winds. High 84F. Winds SW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 80%..

Tonight

Thunderstorms likely this evening. Then a chance of scattered thunderstorms overnight. Low 71F. Winds WSW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 80%.
For decades, Greenville County has kept its forensics, drug and DNA labs, property and evidence and records divisions separate from its Sheriffs Office.

The arrangement allows County Council direct oversight and maintains separation in responsibility for evidence leading up to a case trial. Greenville County Sheriff Hobart Lewis wants that to change.

Lewis has asked to shift the departments from the countys Department of Public Safety to the Sheriffs Office. He said the move would improve communication and would allow more deputies to be trained to handle forensics requests for crime scenes like obtaining fingerprints from car burglaries, which have increased across the county.

He said 43 of the states 46 counties operate with those departments under the control of the sheriff.

Im talking about providing service to the county, Lewis said. Im not talking about popularity. Im not talking about money. Im not talking about power or influence, I assure you. This is all about service.

Several council members questioned the move and the idea of ceding control of the departments to the Sheriffs Office. They noted the legal scandal of previous Sheriff Will Lewis and the councils inability to rectify that situation beyond asking for his resignation, which he declined to give. Will Lewis was found guilty of misconduct by a public officer in 2019. He spent three weeks in jail but appealed the ruling. The state Supreme Court hasnt yet ruled on his appeal.

Last week, Councilman Mike Barnes, who chairs the councils Public Safety Committee, motioned for the county to transfer those departments to the Sheriffs Office as part of the countys budget allocation. After a brief discussion, he held his motion until the council could further explore the issue. That first opportunity came June 17 at the councils budget workshop.

Councilwoman Liz Seman asked Lewis if he believed the county was not providing good service to its residents under the current system.

I certainly think it could be better, Lewis said. I think its been a bare minimum.

Lewis mentioned forensics in particular and said he often has to tell residents whose crime scenes werent processed for smaller burglaries that he isnt in charge of that department. The county provides forensics to each municipality in addition to the Sheriffs Office on a first-come, first-served basis.

Lewis said he had not discussed the issue with the head of the Public Safety Department or the head of the forensics division. He said he spoke to County Administrator Joe Kernell about the idea but had not made a formal request before it came up at the council meeting.

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If there are operational issues, I think we should address the operational issues before we make a wholesale change, said Councilman Lynn Ballard. Ballard said the current system provides autonomy and separates the chain of custody or evidence so it doesnt jeopardize a case if a sheriffs deputy comes under investigation.

The person who occupies the office of the sheriff is critical and must be considered if this change were to be made, he said. The current sheriff, Hobart Lewis, is an honorable and honest man. His immediate predecessor? I dont think I need to say any more than that.

Any potential move would affect about 80 employees. Lewis said he had no qualms with the current department heads and didnt expect a change to come with cost savings.

Were not cutting anybodys jobs, Lewis said.

He said he thought it would streamline operations, allow better communication and would make people readily available to the Sheriffs Office.

Councilman Dan Tripp asked Lewis about the perception that taking the departments into the Sheriffs Office looks like the fox guarding the henhouse.

In the wake of George Floyds murder and turmoil over policing in America is now the appropriate time?, Tripp asked.

Lewis said he is aware of that issue and that his department has worked to deescalate situations locally. He said he believes hes built up a modicum of trust in the past 15 months as sheriff and understands where the county stands on issues of race and policing.

Council members and county officials said they would continue to investigate the issue and see if there were adjustments that could be made.

Something of this magnitude, I would suggest we need to take a hard look at it, Kernell said.

He said the county must keep in mind that the public safety department's mission is to support all law enforcement agencies in the county, not just the Sheriffs Office. Kernell said any potential change couldnt be handled as a part of the budget process and would need to be made by an ordinance, which would require three readings by council.
A five-bedroom, European-style home near the heart of downtown Greenville has sold for $1.755 million.

Construction on the 4,488-square foot residence in the Woodland Park at Cleveland Forest subdivision was completed earlier this year. Tom Marchant of Marchant Real Estate was the listing agent, and also represented the buyer.

The custom-built home at 60 Woodland Way features 10-foot ceilings, multiple fireplaces, top-of-the-line appliances and an elevator shaft that can used for closets or the installation of an elevator. The residence includes exterior touches such as wrought-iron handrails, a large cupola over the back porch, and a fireplace with television hookups above the mantle.

Woodland Park is a 22-lot community in the Alta Vista area, near Cleveland Park, the Swamp Rabbit Trail and downtown Greenville. Lots in the development range from .219 to .386 acres and vary in price from $385,000 to $550,000. Croft Architecture of Greenville was retained to ensure quality controls for new home construction, with suggested styles including but not limited to Tudor, French Country, Colonial, Revival, Victorian and English Manor.

Inspired Cottage coming to Verdae

The 2021 edition of Milestone Custom Homes Inspired Cottage will be on display in the Hollingsworth Park neighborhood of Verdae, a master-planned community on Greenvilles Eastside.

The 2,470-square-foot iCottage is located at 138 Jessen Drive in the custom cottage community of Bella Grove, a traditional neighborhood in the 300-acre Hollingsworth Park development. Milestone Custom Homes created the Inspiration Home brand in 2009 to showcase elite building methods, captivating design, and innovative products at the forefront of the home building industry.

Features of the four-bedroom, four-bath cottage include timeless architectural lines, built-in flexibility with indoor/outdoor living, smart storage solutions, tall, light-maximizing windows and lofted ceilings, high-performance and energy efficient technologies, cohesive fixtures and state-of-the-art engineering. Coldwell Banker Caine will host open house weekends at the cottage June 17-20 and June 24-27.

This 2021 edition takes it a step further with a specific focus on health and wellness features born out of the past years experiences and challenges. The suite of air-improvement systems captures contaminants, pollutants, allergens, pollen, and more, to ensure the air that enters and is kept within the home is clean and healthy.

After a year that brought so much intense focus to individual and collective health practices and during which we spent the majority of our time at home, it was a top priority for us to be able to showcase a home designed to promote an individuals continuing physical, emotional, mental, and social ability to thrive within their environment, said Jerry Fay, Milestone co-owner. The iCottage represents the future of truly living well.

Joys Rodenfels to vie for Olympic berth

Annie Rodenfels, the corporate wellness coordinator for Joy Real Estate of Taylor and Mauldin, has earned a berth in the U.S. Olympic Track and Field trials and will vie later this month for a spot on the team heading to Tokyo.

Rodenfels qualified for the trials in the 3,000-meter steeplechase by winning the event at the Flames Invitational in Cleveland, Tenn., in April. She will bid for an Olympic berth on June 20 and 24 In Eugene, Ore. The top three finishers in the trials will qualify for the Tokyo Games, with the fourth-place finisher named as an alternate.

A two-time national champion at Division III Centre College in Kentucky, Rodenfels trains in Greenville with ASICS Greenville Track Club-Elite.

Allen Tate contributes $111,000 to arts

Allen Tate Realtors and employees contributed $111,000 to local arts and cultural programs and United Way agencies in North and South Carolina through its Tate Cares combined giving campaign. The month-long campaign was held in May.

The annual campaign gives all Allen Tate agents and employees the opportunity to support arts and cultural organizations and United Way agencies in local communities throughout the Carolinas. During the past 24 years, Allen Tate agents and employees have contributed more than $5.55 million through Tate Cares.

Headquartered in Charlotte, Allen Tate Realtors has Upstate branches located in Greenville, Anderson, Easley, Simpsonville, Greer, Seneca and Salem.

Caine Names Circle of Excellence Recipients

The Circle of Excellence distinction was recently bestowed on a number of agents at Greenvilles Coldwell Banker Caine who achieved the milestone of $1 million in listing or closing volume, or four units listed or closed in the month of May.

Recipients were Andrew Little, Andy Turner, Annette Starnes, Brenda Brooks, Cathy Pinion, Chelsi McCoy, David Hurst, David Seaver, Donna Morrow, Drew Torres, Gene DuBois, Heidi Putnam, Helen Hagood, Hunter Hurst, Jackson Bailey, Jacob Mann, Jake Dickens, Jennifer Wilson, Jimmy Fuqua, Jordan Corbett, Judy McCravy, Julia Ross, Kiersten Bell, Kim Johnson, Kim Lyon, Kimber Roberts, Laine Tucker, Lori Hope, Marshall Jordan, Mary Ashleigh Browning, Melissa Jones, Norell Mitchell Grissett, Rhonda Porter, Ronda Smith, Rosana Quintero, Sherry Tate, Stephanie Burger, Steve Babb, Steve Mussman, Suzanne Cook, Thomas Cheves, Tracey Cappio, Tracy James, Trysti Lowe, Val Hubber, Virginia Hayes and Wes Boyd.

An agent group receiving the distinction for May, which requires $1.5 million in listing or closing volume or six units listed or closed, was the Hurry Team.

Joyner, Caine welcome new agents

Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices C. Dan Joyner Realtors of Greenville recently announced the addition of two new agents, with Lisa DuBose joining the Woodruff at Five Forks office and Leslie McBee-Cobb joining the companys Pelham Road branch.

DuBose, a Greenville native previously sold real estate in the Upstate from 2005 through 2010, where she was a top producer for her company. She kept her license active, and recently received her broker license. Also from Greenville, McBee-Cobb holds a journalism degree from the University of Georgia and a nursing degree from Lander University. She has worked as a registered nurse for the past 17 years.

Also, Coldwell Banker Caine recently welcomed Lee Anne Van Heule as a residential agent to its Greenville office. A Greenville native since 1979, she brings and banking and legal background to her new position.

Revitalization Award nominees sought

The Greater Greenville Association of Realtors is seeking nominees for the 2021 Revitalization Awards, which celebrate those who have invested a substantial amount of time and money into a property and seen it greatly impact an area of the community.

Eligible properties include but are not limited to individual residential homes, subdivisions, commercial businesses, multifamily dwellings, public property such as parks and trails, or historic homes or landmarks. Deadline for entry is July 30. Contact GGAR at (864) 672-4427 for further information.

Agent Spotlight and open house ads

Upstate real estate agents can now be featured on The Greenville Post and Couriers website, as well as place free ads for open houses.

Realtors interested in being showcased in The Greenville Post and Couriers Agent Spotlight can submit their information here. Required information includes a short bio as well as contact information. A different agent will be spotlighted each week on the real estate homepage.

Agents interested in placing a free ad for open houses can submit their information here. The ads run free for seven days in The Greenville Post and Couriers open house listings.
After a dip in the number of people getting COVID-19 vaccines in South Carolina in early June, the pace of shots in arms has picked up slightly through the middle of the month.

At a low, about 71,000 people got a COVID-19 vaccine in the week leading up to June 3. The two following weeks saw the number of shots delivered speed up to about 100,000.

With 40 percent of the population fully vaccinated, South Carolina remains months away from any hopes of reaching herd immunity, generally accepted to be in the 70 percent to 80 percent range.

Statewide numbers

New cases reported: 120 confirmed, 70 probable.

Total cases in S.C.: 492,667 confirmed, 102,781 probable.

Percent positive: 2 percent.

New deaths reported: 1 confirmed, 1 probable.

Total deaths in S.C.: 8,618 confirmed, 1,174 probable.

Percent of ICU beds filled: 70 percent.

S.C. residents vaccinated

DHEC's vaccine dashboard shows 46.7 percent of the state's residents have received at least one shot of a COVID-19 vaccine.

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Hardest-hit areas

In the total number of newly confirmed cases, Florence County (15), Charleston County (14) and Greenville County (11) saw the highest totals.

What about tri-county?

Charleston County had 14 new cases on June 18, while Berkeley County had seven and Dorchester County had five.

Deaths

The death from COVID-19 confirmed June 18 was a person between age 18 and 34.

Hospitalizations

Of the 142 COVID-19 patients hospitalized as of June 18, 34 were in the ICU and 17 were using ventilators.

What do experts say?

A study published in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases on June 15 offers new evidence that COVID-19 arrived in the United States weeks before the first case was confirmed in Washington state on Jan. 21, 2020.

Researchers looked for antibodies in about 24,000 people who voluntarily gave blood samples for study during the early weeks of the U.S.' epidemic in January, February and March of last year.

Of those thousands, seven were identified as having a positive test before the first confirmed case in their respective states, according to the study.

"Our findings indicate SARS-CoV-2 infections weeks prior to the first recognized cases in 5 U.S. states," researchers wrote.

The conclusion should come as little surprise, given it has been widely theorized that undiagnosed coronavirus disease cases were circulating sooner than Jan. 21, 2020.
The bells tolled at 9 p.m. in downtown Charleston and the crowd stood in silence as they listened to the pastor dressed in black read nine names.

The Rev. Clementa Pinckney, Myra Thompson, Ethel Lance, Cynthia Graham Hurd, Sharonda Coleman-Singleton, Susie Jackson, DePayne Middleton Doctor, Tywanza Sanders and the Rev. Dan Simmons Sr.  nine names, nine lives whose loss on June 17, 2015, irrevocably changed the Holy City.

At least 50 people gathered at 8 p.m. on June 17 in front of Emanuel AME Church on Calhoun Street to remember those names, marking the sixth anniversary of the racially motivated mass shooting that continues to scar the Black community.

"I'm so grateful that you are here to remember," said Marlena Davis, a church member.

The pastor, Thomas Dixon, opened the vigil with a prayer for unity.

"We saw the ramifications of what hate causes," Dixon said. "We've been challenged to overcome that hate with good."

He invited Damon Fordham, a history professor at The Citadel, to speak about the role Emanuel AME Church has played in the community.

Emanuel has been a symbol of freedom and of Black resilience with deep ties to the Civil Rights movement, Fordham said.

"It's important to remember the history of resilience," he said.

For many present, the need for outspoken activism was as strong as ever.

Davis pointed to groups that continue to fly Confederate battle flags at the Battery on Sundays, the same flag, she said, that the church shooter worshiped.

"It's beyond an insult," she said. "We've got to get out there and put our boots on the ground and make some good trouble."

Others expressed disappointment at the public rhetoric around the church shooting, saying the city made an initial show of unity before returning to business as usual.

"I'm very disappointed with Charleston," said Christopher Cason, who is better known as Papa Smurf. "Charleston turned its back. Y'all need to face up to what y'all been doing."

They pointed in particular to an event on June 21, 2015, days after the shooting.

Thousands of people turned up for the Bridge to Peace and Unity Chain, which saw crowds of people holding hands span the entire length of the Arthur Ravenel Jr. Bridge in a show of unity and peace that gained national attention.

At a time when other cities rioted, Charleston stayed peaceful.

But for Dixon, Cason and others, the real story of how Charleston was saved from further violence in the wake of the Emanuel shooting hasn't been fully told.

It was Black community leaders like S.C. Rep. Wendell Gilliard, Elder James Johnson, Tory Fields and others who kept the community from rioting, they said.

Despite the frustration the overwhelming message on June 17 was that the city still needs to come together.

"Let me know that you believe in a better way," Dixon said, in his opening prayer. "We're all we got. The more we love together, the better off we'll be as a community."

As they spoke, a group of women stood behind the gathered crowd holding signs, including of nine people, nine victims, nine lives who've forever changed Charleston.
WALTERBORO  The Post and Courier has filed a lawsuit against the Colleton County Sheriff's Office and State Law Enforcement Division, accusing the two agencies of violating the S.C. Freedom of Information Act.

Reporters Olivia Diaz and Jamie Lovegrove were denied access to public records generated by police investigating the June 7 slayings of Paul Murdaugh, 22, and his mother, Maggie, 52, at the family's home in Islandton, according to the complaint, which was filed June 17 in 14th Circuit Common Pleas Court in Walterboro.

The Charleston newspaper seeks access to reports generated by the Sheriff's Office and SLED, as well as recordings of any 911 calls related to the case.

The organization also requests damages of attorneys' fees and costs.

Under the state's FOIA law, certain records, including incident reports or other reports that "disclose the nature, substance, and/or location of any crime or alleged crime," must be provided to members of the public if they are requested in person. The law does permit certain redactions, but the exemptions are narrowly tailored and must be applied on a line-by-line basis.

South Carolina law is clear here: Any member of the public should be able to walk into the Colleton County Sheriffs Office or SLED headquarters and gain access to these records," said Mitch Pugh, executive editor of The Post and Courier.

Neither SLED nor the Colleton County Sheriff's Office responded on June 17 to requests for comment about the lawsuit.

The investigation into the June 7 killings of Paul and Maggie Murdaugh, members of a prominent South Carolina law family, has attracted state and national attention.

John Marvin Murdaugh and Randolph Randy Murdaugh IV, Pauls uncles and Maggies brothers-in-law, appeared on "Good Morning America" on June 17 to ask for the public's help in solving the case. They also revealed that Paul Murdaugh received threats from strangers before the deaths.

Alex Murdaugh called 911 at 10:07 p.m. to report the deaths of his son and wife. Sheriff's deputies dispatched to the scene found the mother and son dead of multiple gunshot wounds outside the family's residence at 4147 Moselle Road.

The Sheriff's Office asked SLED to assist in conducting the double murder investigation that night. The case remains under investigation and no one has been charged in the homicides.

Despite the public interest, law enforcement officials have released scant details about the case, and denied formal requests for records under the state's FOIA law.

According to the lawsuit, Diaz visited the Sheriff's Office on June 9 to request the incident report and any supplemental reports generated as part of the investigation. The reporter was provided a one-line incident report, which provided only the barest details about the crime.

More information was contained in supplemental reports, according to the incident report, but sheriff's officials refused to turn those over to Diaz. Shalane Lowes, public information officer for the Sheriff's Office, told Diaz the agency could not release the supplemental reports because it would impede the murder investigation, according to the paper's lawsuit.

Diaz said she respected the needs of the investigation but that the records were public under the state FOIA law. She offered to sit in the waiting area while the reports were redacted, if any redactions were appropriate.

Jason Chapman, captain of criminal investigations for the office, then came out and told Diaz that the records would need to be provided by SLED, since the Sheriff's Office recused itself in the investigation, the lawsuit contends.

The following day, Lovegrove attempted to request the supplemental reports at SLED's headquarters in Columbia. Lovegrove, a politics reporter, was denied entry into the building, according to the lawsuit.

Pugh, the paper's executive editor, said this was not the first time local agencies and SLED have tried to withhold public information by claiming release of the information would hinder the investigation, an overly broad exemption.

"The public understands some information may need to be withheld," he said. "But in the absence of information, rumor and gossip spread like wildfire, which is detrimental to law enforcement and the public. We hope this litigation will help these public agencies better understand their duties under the Freedom of Information Act.

The Post and Courier sent a letter June 10 to SLED Chief Mark Keel warning him his agency is violating FOIA law.

Keel did not respond to that letter.

Hiding public information in supplemental reports has become commonplace among some area law enforcement agencies over the past several years, particularly when it comes to high-profile murders, rapes and robberies.

But such information was made public by the Legislature to help people make informed decisions about safety in their communities and how law enforcement uses their tax money.

State lawmakers, in fact, changed the Freedom of Information Act in 1998 to make clear that supplemental reports also are public records, not reservoirs of hidden facts. The amended law requires police to release all reports detailing the nature, substance and location of crimes.

In the Murdaugh case, state and county law enforcement officials have said there is no immediate threat to the public, yet no suspects have been named or arrests made. That has left residents confused and on edge, with rumors spreading quickly to fill the void in official information, The Post and Courier's lawsuit contends.

Some police departments have moved away from such secretive tactics.

In 2012, Charleston police caught flak for hiding crime details in supplemental reports that they refused to release to the public. City officials insisted there was no policy to do so, but then a memo surfaced in which a top commander instructed officers on how and what to hide. He even erroneously suggested that supplemental reports can be withheld from the public until investigations are completed.

The citys police chief vowed to do better, and he did. The department now provides both incident and supplemental reports upon request, generally redacting only personal information such as Social Security numbers or highly sensitive information that could impact a prospective arrest. Most major law enforcement agencies in the Charleston area have taken a similar stance.
Watching ocean waves crash on the South Carolina shoreline leaving seashells in their wake and pipers scrambling on the sand, I am reminded that everything has a place and a function in Gods world.

Looking back over the 25 years I have served as president and CEO of the Sisters of Charity Foundation of South Carolina, I see similarities between the ocean and our philanthropic ecosystem.

To succeed, we rely on the assistance of volunteers, board members, community leaders, staff members and grantees. We all play a role.

In addition to marking our 25th anniversary, the foundation reached a significant milestone this month, meeting the $80 million mark in grants awarded.

These dollars have helped more than 3,000 organizations in all of the states 46 counties.

We also have partnered with other funding organizations and government agencies to leverage our grant dollars to bring another $42 million into the state in support of the foundations work.

Sisters of Charity has aided grantee partners during the most trying times of South Carolinas recent history, including the 1,000-year flood, the Emanuel AME Church shooting and the COVID-19 pandemic.

Our staff has had the blessing of meeting thousands of state nonprofit leaders who are carrying out the Sisters mission through our grant funding by serving the most marginalized and vulnerable with humble hearts and steadfast determination.

Like the waves, we will remain constant to our mission of strategically using resources to reduce poverty through the action, advocacy and leadership of the Sisters of Charity of St. Augustine for many more years to come.

TOM KEITH

President and CEO

Sisters of Charity Foundation of SC

Middleburg Drive

Columbia

Thanks, Manchin

I want to thank Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., for standing up for our country and for seeing the big picture on what makes our country great.

If Democratic senators are able to remove the filibuster from the rules of the Senate, we will truly be on a path to losing our republic.

Thank you, Sen. Manchin, for standing up and following your heart.

I remember the following saying by the late President Ronald Reagan:

Freedom is a fragile thing and its never more than one generation away from extinction. It is not ours by way of inheritance; it must be fought for and defended constantly by each generation, for it comes only once to a people. And those in world history who have known freedom and then lost it have never known it again.

JOE MAYO

Gunnison Street

Mount Pleasant

Stop health cuts

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As many of us begin thinking about the return to normal, the long-term impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic will affect all of us for years to come.

Health care providers are no exception.

For specialty providers like physical and occupational therapists, the pandemic caused patient volume to plummet.

Data shows that physical therapy saw a 34% drop in Medicare spending between January and June 2020, while the challenges of safely providing care caused costs to rise.

If that wasnt bad enough, federal health policy is dealing another blow by advancing devastating Medicare cuts that threaten to limit patient access and harm the sustainability of the health care system.

Congress must step in to stop more Medicare cuts to specialty care before its too late.

Health care providers and seniors are counting on them.

DANELLE LOUDER

Bienville Road

North Charleston

Floods and housing

The front page of the Monday Post and Courier reiterates our ongoing flooding problem. Right next to it is an article about adding more housing on some lots.

Covering land is one of the major problems that adds to flooding in our area.

HARRIET PRATT

Ravens View

Johns Island

Edisto ancestors

Greg Estevez will delve into finding Edisto Island African American ancestors as part of the celebration and recognition of Juneteenth, which celebrates slaves being freed by President Abraham Lincolns Emancipation Proclamation.

Estevez is a direct descendant of the family who owned the Hutchinson House, the oldest house on Edisto Island associated with the black community after the Civil War. It was the residence of Henry Hutchinson, a freed slave.

Estevez is also the author of Edisto Island: The African American Journey and a board member of the Edisto Island Museum.

His talk, Finding Our Edisto Island Ancestors, will be 2-4 p.m. Saturday at the New First Baptist Church Fellowship Hall on Edisto Island.

For more information, call 904-386-1274.

JIM WENTHE

Russell Creek Road

Edisto Island
U.S. Sen. Tim Scott said he's optimistic that Democrats and Republicans can reach an agreement on a police reform bill, but it may take longer than the June deadline he had previously hoped for.

President Joe Biden originally wanted to be able to announce a deal on widespread police reform legislation by May 25, the one-year anniversary of George Floyds murder in Minnesota. Scott has previously told reporters it was "June or bust" to get the bill across the finish line.

During a meeting with business leaders and former Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan in Charleston on June 18, Scott said he'd like to see at least the framework of the reform bill done by the end of this month.

"I hope that in the next seven to 10 days we'll have the blueprint marked out so that while we're out of Washington the folks who write the text will have it," Scott said. "But we still need to have the consensus on what we're going to write. And I do think there's a better than 50 (percent) chance that we'll get there."

When asked about a June 30 deadline, he said time is not on their side.

"I'm optimistic that we'll have the framework where we are all in consent that this is what we're going to do," Scott said. "So, that happens and we have reason to be optimistic. But, as Speaker Ryan can tell you, as we get later in the summer, less gets done. And the longer you wait, the harder it is to be optimistic."

Lawmakers have been negotiating for months as Republicans and Democrats have been working to come to an agreement on reforming the countrys law enforcement after a series of police-involved deaths in the past months.

Scott is seen as a Republican point man for any bipartisan effort on the federal response to police issues just as Democrats get behind their package of reforms.

One of the biggest points of contention is qualified immunity, a legal doctrine that shields police officers from being sued. Democrats want to do away with it, and Republicans want to make it keep it in place.

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Scott made his comments about police reform during a visit to the Charleston Tech Center. In addition to Ryan, also present were South Carolina Republican U.S. Reps. Joe Wilson and Ralph Norman.

The politicians listened to area business leaders as they talked about how they utilize the Charleston Tech Center, which was developed in an Opportunity Zone under the legislation for the program pushed by Scott in Washington.

Opportunity zones are designated areas of land that draw dollars and development by using tax incentives. The federal program went into effect with the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act near the end of 2017.

Ryan, a Republican from Wisconsin who served as Speaker of the House from 2015 to 2018 and was a vice-presidential candidate in 2012, was in Charleston to promote Scott's Opportunity Zone initiatives. Since leaving office, Ryan has started a nonprofit called The American Idea Foundation which focuses on creating economic opportunities.

Scott is up for reelection in 2022 and has raised more than $2.2 million in the last quarter for his bid, according to the Federal Election Commission. Although he has said this will be his last time running for his Senate seat, speculation is growing if he has interest in the White House in 2024.

When asked if he think Scott should run for president in 2024, Ryan stepped aside.

"I think he's working on 2022," Ryan said. "He'll think about those things later."
A couple of years ago I saw a middle-aged Caucasian couple and their three young children walk past the mayors office in Dededo. When I asked Read more
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In this Friday, May 21, 2021 file photo, a customer walks behind a sign at a Nordstrom store seeking employees, in Coral Gables, Fla. Health insurance, paid vacation and retirement tools should be the baseline, not the bar, for employer-provided benefits. Employees want benefits that meet their needs, not the needs of previous generations. Benefits that reflect the times include tuition and student loan assistance, remote work, inclusive health and leave plans, and mental health resource.
@montcocourtnews on Twitter

Carl Hessler Jr. is a multi-media reporter who writes about crime and justice from the Montgomery County Courthouse for 21st Century Media Newspapers Greater Philadelphia area publications. Follow Carl on Twitter: @MontcoCourtNews
Joe Bidens disgraceful performance at the G7 meeting and subsequent appearances abroad included his peddling of lies intended to discredit his political enemies, while at the same time putting his own country in a bad light. But Biden sees no problem with thatthe only enemies he cares about are in the GOP.

Thus, Biden lied about the mostly peaceful protest at the Capitol on January 6, claiming falsely that rioters killed officer Brian Sicknick:

Thats a ridiculous comparison, Biden said. Its one thing for literally criminals to break through cordon, go into the Capitol, kill a police officer, and be held unaccountable than it is for people objecting and marching on the Capitol and saying, You are not allowing me to speak freely. You are not allowing me to do A, B, C, or D.'

No one killed a police officer on January 6; the medical examiner ruled, as has been widely reported, that Sicknick died of natural causes. But Biden is happy to portray his own country as violent and lawless as long as he can cast blame on political opponents.

Similarly, Biden launched into an attack on the Republican Party during a press conference in Belgium:

The Washington Posts Anne Gearan asked Biden about our allies worrying about the continued hold that Donald Trump has over the Republican Party and the rise of nationalist figures like him around the world.

Leaders of some other countries worry that we might again have a president who puts America first. Biden took pains to reassure them:

But I think its appropriate to say that the Republican Party is vastly diminished in numbers; the leadership of the Republican Party is fractured; and the Trump wing of the party is the bulk of the party, but it makes up a significant minority of the American people.

All of this is fantasy. The vastly diminished Republican party controls 61 state legislative chambers to 37 for the Democrats, and there currently are 27 Republican governors to 23 Democrats. Republicans control one-half of the Senate and are within striking distance of capturing the House, having made significant gains in 2020.

American reporters do their best to cover for the doddering Biden, but foreign observers are not fooled. In the Telegraph, Nile Gardiner writes: A weak Joe Biden is badly out of his depth.

The Biden Presidencys approach so far has largely been a rerun of the Obama administrations lacklustre leading from behind doctrine. Biden called for a new Strategic Stability Dialogue with Moscow, with echoes of Hillary Clintons much vaunted Russian Reset back in 2009. The reset was a spectacular failure, and was followed in 2014 by the Russian invasion and annexation of Crimea.

***

Agreeing to this summit was a mistake by the White House. It is hard to see what the conceivable benefit would have been for the United States.

***

Putins press conference was a masterclass in disinformation, with repeated attacks on the United States, combined with thinly veiled menace aimed directly at anyone who dares to oppose him at home or abroad, and he clearly relished the chance to put his poisonous messaging across to an audience of millions in the West.

***

In contrast [to President Trump], President Biden already looks out of his depth on the international stage, and both Moscow and Beijing have grown more assertive since he entered the Oval Office. Biden did not have a good G7 summit, and at times looked confused, struggling to make points coherently and mixing up countries such as Syria and Libya. His European tour began disastrously, with a poorly judged attack on the British Government over the Northern Ireland border. On the European stage, the US president also failed to develop a coherent, robust strategy for confronting China, on top of his mixed messages on Russia. This has only served to encourage division within Europe and given cover to those countries, such as Germany, that are seeking an accommodation with Beijing and Moscow.

Its going to be a long four years, assuming Biden can hang on that long.
Yes, no matter what

Yes, but it depends on variety

No, for medical reasons, uncertainty

No, principle

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On March 30, a former Nigerian minister announced on Twitter that he had taken the COVID-19 vaccine. Strange news! For over a year since the virus was first detected in Nigeria, his name, Femi Fani-Kayode, rang a deterrent bell of anti-vaccination.

Apart from his many political jabs against the ruling party, fraud allegations and their resultant court cases, Mr Fani-Kayode had before that date, played a leading role in the league of COVID-19 vaccination opposers and confronters.

At one time, he described the vaccine as a ploy to create a new world order, at another he tagged vaccination an exercise that would result in the deaths of millions. To further dissuade his followers, he would tweet unconfirmed information and conspiracy theories being peddled against the virus.

A regular reference for journalists, Mr Fani-Kayode was once described by a fact-checker as one who makes bogus statements, capitalising on his large social media followership to spur the spread of disinformation and misinformation.

All reports on his conversion (those encountered in the course of research for this report) made references to his earlier comments on the virus but none made pragmatic efforts in measuring the former ministers previous disparaging comments on his followers.

On Twitter, the announcement was greeted with mixed reactions. To some, it was only a matter of time, they knew all along he would be vaccinated for travel access. To others, mostly those who refused to be converted alongside him, another soldier in the fight against vaccination had deserted. A few questioned his advertent mislead of many followers.

The numbers before conversion

One of the first notable, misleading COVID-19-related tweets by Mr Fani-Kayode was on March 29, 2020, when he claimed that the virus was a ploy to create a new world order and get the United States President, Donald Trump, out of power. Elections in the U.S. were about seven months away then.

One of the many objectives of the Illuminati & those that are behind the coronavirus pandemic & the emergence of a New World Order is to get @realDonaldTrump out of power in this years pres. election by sparking off a massive recession & crashing the American &world economy, he tweeted.

The tweet as of Monday, June 14, had garnered 6,904 retweets, likes and comments and thousands of duplication across many platforms. Some fact-checking efforts were deployed to counter these claims but not long enough, Mr Fani-Kayode released two more fearsome tweets about COVID-19 vaccines.

On April 30, he warned Nigerians not to take vaccines which by then were in the trial stages. In doing so, he made three unfounded, totally false claims. Firstly, that vaccination would result in millions of deaths; secondly, that Nigeria was about to enact a law to make vaccination compulsory for all, and thirdly, that the vaccines are meant to depopulate the world.

The first of these three claims conform with the popular misconstrued comment of Robert Young, an alternative medicine practitioner, who at a meeting of a conspiracy theory group said that vaccination is a chemical warfare to depopulate the world. The video was widely shared by many but a fact-check revealed that the comment was made earlier in 2019, before the detection of COVID-19, in respect of the different vaccines given to children in the first six years. Despite the fact-checking efforts, Mr Fani-kayode still shared the video in January 2021.

Two days later, on May 2, Mr Fani-Kayode tweeted again, @WHO are set to begin Covid 19 vaccine trials in our country. EVIL! Not only have our people been turned into Guinea pigs to test Gates killer vaccine but our leaders are also passing a law which will make the use of that evil vaccine compulsory. What a mess! I weep for Nigeria.

Some of his tweets may, at this period (with multiple vaccine roll out in many countries) come as laughing items, but they were sacred voices of caution when they were made. They were tweeted when a large part of Nigeria was on lockdown enforced to curtail the effect of the virus.

The lockdown notwithstanding, over 200 people, including Abba Kyari, the then Chief of Staff to the President of Nigeria, Muhammadu Buhari, had died of the virus; confirmed cases were in total of thousands; patients were treated in isolation centres with close monitoring; worse still, researches on the virus had not reached advanced stages, hence, conspiracy theories held sway. In short, it was a time of panic and tweets by Mr Fani-Kayode readily reinforced peoples fears and biases.

How then did a panic monger convert?

The conversion and the dangers inherent in peddling falsehood

Against the nature of his comments, Mr Fani-Kayode announced on March 30, 2021, that he had taken a jab. Despite my initially strong reservations I bowed to sound logic and superior reasoning and took my Covid 19 vaccine today, he wrote in a thread of tweets.

He went further to explain the sound logic and superior reasoning to include persuasions from his political associates and the fact that his hero, Donald Trump, had taken it, despite his initial opposing stance.

As of the morning of Monday, June 14, his announcement tweets had a total of 1,173 likes, comments and retweets; a less than 10 per cent faction of interaction when compared to four of his falsehood spreading tweets examined in this piece.

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This confirms the concerns of some researchers who have discovered that a good percentage of people who come in contact with false information dont care about the follow-up fact-checks. A recent survey by Zignal labs showed that 86 per cent of Americans who read news articles on social media do not always fact-check.

Not done, the ex-minister still used the opportunity of his vaccination to peddle falsehood about vaccines.

He wrote in the thread, The Covid vaccines we are taking in Nigeria are not Bill Gates vaccines and neither are we being used as Guinea pigs. These ones are tried & tested, have already been approved & have been administered successfully throughout the world. This is the Oxford Azrazeneca brand.

There is a world of difference between what we are being given in Nigeria & the exploratory vaccines that @WHO had wanted to test Africans with which we spoke against & resisted last year. Most importantly Bill Gates& his foundation have no connection with Oxford Azrazeneca.

I would not touch anything Bill Gates with a barge pole for obvious reasons. Mark it.

One notices that he recounted some of his earlier misinformation about the vaccines but not all that came in contact with the falsehood are impressed.

One of his followers replied sarcastically; I praise your patriotism for agreeing to be one of our guinea pigs. Well done. Another wrote; nonsense with rolling eyes emoji.

Perhaps this reply captures the question you might readily want to ask; You got convinced by your sister and friend. What about the thousands you convinced and made to see the vaccine as devil products?

This publication was produced as part of IWPRs Africa Resilience Network (ARN) programme, administered in partnership with the Centre for Information Resilience(CIR), the International Centre for Investigative Reporting (ICIR) and Africa Uncensored.
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The Nigerian Army has announced the rescue of two teachers and five students among those kidnapped in Kebbi State.

PREMIUM TIMES had reported the recent attack by bandits in Yauri, which led to the abduction of some students and teachers at a federal government school by suspected bandits.

A policeman was killed during the attack.

Read the army statement below.

FGC Yauri Attack: Troops Rescue some Teachers, Students, Recover 800 Cows

Nigerian Army troops operating under the auspices of Operation Hadarin Daji who have been on a hot pursuit of kidnappers and bandits following an unfortunate abduction incident in Federal Government College, Birnin Yawuri yesterday 17 June 2021 have so far, rescued two Teachers and five students after a fierce exchange of fire with the criminals.

The rescue followed an initial encounter with the abductors in the early hours of today 18 June 2021 after trailing the kidnappers from Yawuri through Riyao to Sombo community, where the kidnappers who had split into two groups fled, with one group conveying the abducted children , while the second group conveyed rustled cattle.

The Land troops in conjunction with elements of the Nigerian Air Force, who provided close air support during the rescue mission intercepted the two groups at about 2.30 am and engaged them in a fire fight leading to the successful rescue of the teachers and students. The troops also recovered 800 cattle rustled by the bandits.

The gallant troops are still on the heels of the kidnappers in order to rescue the remaining abductees still in captivity.

Sadly, a casualty was recorded during the exchange. A female student was found to have given up the ghost as a result of exhaustion. The rescued teachers and students will be handed over to the Kebbi State Government.

The Nigerian Army appreciates the cooperation so far from good spirited citizens and wish to solicit for more. The Chief of Army Staff Maj Gen Faruk Yahaya has directed the Commander to spare no effort until all the abducted persons are safely rescued and reunited with their loved ones.

ONYEMA NWACHUKWU

Brigadier General

Director Army Public Relations
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Former Nigerian president, Goodluck Jonathan, has described the founder of the Synagogue Church Of All Nations, T.B. Joshua, as a devout man of God who served God with humanity and relentless passion.

Mr Jonathan, in a statement published on the churchs social media page, said he was saddened to hear about the death of Mr Joshua.

As a Christian leader, TB Joshua and his Ministry exemplified Christ in faith, love and charity; positively impacting the lives of many Nigerians, Africans and millions of people across the world, Mr Jonathan said.

I condole with his family, his church and millions of his followers across the world. May God grant them peace and strength to cope with the loss.

Mr Joshua died on June 5, a few days before his 58th birthday. His church, in a statement announcing his passing, did not disclose the cause of his death.

His funeral ceremony will begin July 5, according to the church.

Weah pays tribute

Also, in his tribute to Mr Joshua, the Liberian president, George Weah, expressed deep sadness at the SCOAN founders death.

President Weah had come to value the spiritual guidance of the televangelist ever since the 2017 visit and worship service he had with SCOANs congregation. At the time, TB Joshua called President Weah his brother, who he said was here today because he loves his country and wants Gods choice for his country he is not here to impose himself.

He has also offered prayers for the Liberian nation and people.

SCOAN visitors

Both African leaders had been guests at Mr Joshuas SCOAN in the past.

Ahead of Liberias presidential election in 2017, Mr Weah, who was among the leading candidates, visited Mr Joshua at SCOAN headquarters in Lagos, where the preacher said he was not favouring any candidate in the election.

Mr Jonathan visited the church in September 2014, following the collapse of a five-storey building in the church in which more than 80 people died.

In 2015, following Mr Jonathans inability to gain re-election as president, Mr Joshua claimed he called the president by phone and told him he would lose at the polls.

He told his congregation God said to him: This message should be delivered to your president, that whatever the outcome of this election, his regime has come to an end. He should accept to save the lives of millions.
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The Senate is working currently on a bill to set aside 30 per cent of seats at the National Assembly and 40 per cent of seats at states houses of assembly for young people.

The Deputy Senate President, Ovie Omo-Agege, made the disclosure in Lokoja on Friday at a symposium to mark the 46th birthday of Gov. Yahaya Bello of Kogi State.

The theme of the symposium was: Insecurity in Nigeria and the Role of Youths.

If youths are given such an opportunity, they will not have the time to participate in protests when they will be seated at executive council meetings, Mr Omo-Agege, who is also the chairman of the Senate Committee on Constitution Amendment, said.

He said once the law was put in place, youth in the country would become more engaged and focus less on crimes and criminal activities.

Extolling Mr Bello, Mr Omo-Agege said the governor had been regarded as a role model for youth, noting that the country would like to create more young people like the governor to occupy top positions in governance.

The lawmaker said the ruling APC was proud of Mr Bello and his performance as governor in Kogi, pointing out that he (Bello) had contributed greatly to the growth of the APC.

You have made great efforts to grow the party for us, especially through your efforts in mobilising youths and those with special needs into the party. Our party is proud of you, Mr Omo-Agege said.

According to him, Mr Bello had done exceedingly well and has represented his generation well with President Muhammadu Buhari admitting that his generation is ready to pass the baton to the younger generation.

We have listened to all the speakers and how they have talked of the role you played in bringing security to Kogi State, Nigerians are proud of you.

We all knew how the state was before you became governor and your efforts can be seen clearly, he said.

(NAN)
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The new Theatre Commander for the Joint Task Force Operation Hadin Kai, Christopher Musa, a major general, on Friday assumed duty in Maiduguri, the Borno State capital.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that Mr Musas appointment followed the elevation of the former Theatre Commander, Farouq Yahaya, as the Chief of Army Staff (COAS).

Mr Musa was handed over the mantle of leadership at a ceremony by the Acting Theatre Commander, Felix Omoigui, a major general.

Speaking to journalists, Mr Musa called for support and understanding of all stakeholders in the fight against insurgency, which he said required regular strategic reviews.

ALSO READ: Nigerian Army urges Boko Haram terrorists to surrender

Asymmetric warfare like Boko Haram is a continuous war. It is evolving and we have to also evolve in our approach, Mr Musa said.

The commander also solicited the support of the media in the counter-insurgency operation.

He pledged to maintain openness in his leadership of the newly reconstituted military Joint Task Force.

(NAN)
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The federal government says it will continue to collaborate with the Chinese government in the area of provision of critical infrastructure in the country.

The Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina, stated this when he hosted the Chinese Ambassador to Nigeria, Cui Jianchun, in his office at the State House, Abuja on Friday.

He said: Nigeria has a high respect for China and what China is helping Nigeria to achieve particularly in the area of infrastructure.

President Buhari came at a time of severe infrastructure deficit in the country and resolved to make a difference and he is making that difference with the assistance of China.

Nigeria appreciates China a lot for these and will continue to collaborate with it.

The presidential spokesman said the Nigerian president had been to China two times in furtherance of the relationship and looked forward to greater collaboration.

He assured the ambassador that the presidential media office was ready to join hands with the Chinese in advancing the relationship.

In his remarks, the ambassador, who was recently posted to Nigeria, said he was at the villa to solicit for the support of the media office of the President.

He also expressed his gratitude for the strong relations with his country and to seek ways to make it stronger.

Mr Cui expressed delight for witnessing the flag off of the Lagos to Ibadan rail project and unfolded his 5 Goal Nigeria-China Growth, Development Progress (GDP) strategy to take the bilateral relations to higher levels.

ALSO READ: Nigeria plans to obtain more loans from China

He said the 5-Goal strategy revolved around Political Support; Economic Cooperation; Military Collaboration; International Coordination and People to People Bond among others, built on the existing Belt and Road Initiative of the Chinese government.

Mr Cui, who is the 14th Chinese Ambassador to Nigeria, said he looked forward to celebrating 50 years of friendship and bilateral relations between the two countries in October.

Also at the event was the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu.

(NAN)
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No fewer than 13 persons sustained various degrees of injuries on Thursday night following a Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) tanker explosion at Mobolaji Bank Anthony Way, opposite Sheraton Hotels and Towers, Ikeja.

About 25 cars were destroyed as a result of the explosion which occurred at about 10.32 p.m.

Ibrahim Farinloye, Acting Zonal Coordinator, South-West Zonal Office, National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), confirmed the development to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Ikeja on Friday.

Mr Farinloye said the explosion threw the environment into panic due to the huge fire caused by the incident.

He said the explosion was alleged to have been caused by leakage while the LPG tanker was in motion.

The resulting fire travelled with the wind to the premises of Ogun State Property Investment Company (OPIC) Plaza besides Sheraton Hotels, which houses different commercial outfits including a Chinese Restaurant.

The fire was put out at about 12.30 a.m., after concerted efforts of five fire trucks from the Lagos State Fire Service and two trucks from the Lagos State Emergency Management Agency Response Unit.

The initial search and rescue activities revealed that 13 persons sustained various degrees of burns. Out of this, nine are males while four are females, Mr Farinloye said.

According to him, the affected victims were attended to at the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital (LASUTH) for First Aid.

He said four of the victims with severe injuries were later transferred to the Trauma and Burns Centre at Gbagada General Hospital, Lagos.

Preliminary assessment of vehicles damaged indicated that about 25 were destroyed as of now.

Comprehensive post-disaster assessment on the extent of general damages would be done later today, Mr Farinloye added.

He said the Commissioner of Police, Lagos State Command, Hakeem Odumosu, led the team which took charge of crowd control and helped to restore normalcy.

(NAN)
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An Ikeja Division of the Lagos State High Court on Wednesday convicted the former managing director of Bank PHB, Francis Atuche, and the banks former chief financial officer, Ugo Anyanwu, of 25.7 billion fraud.

They were both found guilty of 22 of the 27 counts of conspiracy and stealing charge proffered against them by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) in 2011.

While Mr Atuche was sentenced to six years in prison, Mr Anyanwu got four years.

Mr Atuches wife, Elizabeth, who faced trial alongside the duo, was, however, found not guilty of the two counts of conspiracy and stealing brought against her.
World leaders have continued to pay tributes to Kenneth Kaunda, the former president of Zambia who died Thursday.

Mr Kaunda, the founding president of the Southern African nation, died on Thursday at the age of 97.

Known by his initials of KK, He led his country from 1964 until 1991 and is known as one of the giants in the continents fight against colonialism.

Tributes have poured in for the late president, with condolences coming from world leaders including Nigerias President Muhammadu Buhari, former Nigerian Presidents Olusegun Obasanjo and Goodluck Jonathan and former Nigerian Vice President Atiku Abubakar.

African Union

The Chairperson of the African Union Commission, Moussa Faki Mahamat, said it is with indescribable sense of loss that he

learnt of the passing of Mr Kaunda.

Africa has lost one of its finest sons, Mr Mahamat said. He embodied the true sense of Pan-Africanism, placing his own country Zambia at grave risk in order to provide safe harbour for the liberation movements of Southern Africa as well as its peoples.

The African Union stands in solidarity with the Kaunda family, the people and the Government of the Republic of Zambia as we mourn and honour the life of a freedom fighter, statesman, visionary and liberation struggle icon, he said.

President Buhari

President Buhari said he received the passing of Mr Kaunda with great shock, sending condolences to the family, the government and people of Zambia.

He was one of the greatest Africans and world leaders of all time who loved his country and people profoundly, Mr Buhari said. We cant forget in a hurry how Kaunda gave shelter to anti-apartheid freedom fighters from South Africa and from former Rhodesia.

He described Mr Kaunda as one of the loudest voices for the liberation of Africa from colonialism and imperialism, saying he did so with passion and sincerity.

It is impossible to reflect on Kaundas legacy without acknowledging his selflessness and passion for service, Mr Buhari said in a statement by his spokesperson, Garba Shehu.

Jonathan

Nigerias former president, Goodluck Jonathan, described Mr Kaunda as a foremost Pan-Africanist who was of great significance to the continents struggle for liberation.

I am deeply saddened, Mr Jonathans office said in a statement. Not only was he of very great significance to Africas struggle for liberation he was also quite significant to me. I met him as a much younger politician and I am glad to have maintained a close relationship with the great sage.

His life was a pattern of good works, Mr Jonathan said. His post Presidential work in providing relief for HIV/AIDS patients, as well as promoting practices and measures to curb the spread of the virus are remembered.

Obasanjo

Mr Obasanjo expressed his heartfelt condolences in a moment of great loss to Zambians and indeed all Africans.

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Mr Kaundas death brings to an end the pioneers and forefathers who led the struggles for decolonisation of the African continent, Mr Obasanjos spokesperson said in a statement.

He urged all Africans and friends of Africa to take solace in the knowledge that President Kaunda has gone home to a well-deserved rest and to proudly take his place beside his brothers.

Atiku

Former President Kenneth Kaunda was the last of his generation that epitomised the liberation struggle on the African continent, Mr Abubakar wrote on Twitter.

His passing away is the end of an era. We remain eternally grateful for his services to Zambia and the continent. May his soul rest in peace., the former vice president said.

U.S.

The United States joined the international community in mourning the passing of Mr Kaunda, honouring his memory and his service to the people of Zambia and across Africa.

He was steadfast in uniting Zambias 73 tribes through his commitment to One Zambia, One Nation, the U.S. said. He advocated against discrimination of people living with HIV/AIDS and was a tireless advocate for the poor and marginalized.
The fraud and money laundering charges against Peter Nwaoboshi, a senator representing Delta North, was dismissed Friday by Justice Chukwujekwu Aneke, who said the EFCC failed to prove the elements of the offences for which it charged the lawmaker.

The lawmaker and his two companies were subsequently discharged and acquitted.

Mr Nwaoboshi was arraigned alongside Golden Touch Construction Project Ltd and Suiming Electrical Ltd before a Lagos Division of the Federal High Court in 2018 over N322 million fraud and money laundering charges.

The EFCC in suit number FHC/L/117C/18 arraigned the three defendants for acquiring a property named Guinea House, Marine Road, in Apapa, Lagos, for N805 million and that N322 million out of the N805 million, which Mr Nwaoboshi and the firm paid for the property, which it said was part of proceeds of fraud.

Delivering his judgment on Friday, Mr Aneke said the ingredients of the offence the defendants were charged with in counts 1 and 2 were not proved and they could not be found guilty of the crime.

Judgment

Mr Aneke began reading his judgment in a courtroom packed with lawyers and journalists at 9 a.m. and it lasted just under an hour.

According to the judgment, in his final address, the second defendant, Mr Nwaoboshi, through his counsel, Emmanuel Kachukwu (SAN), maintained that the prosecution, based on the evidence produced before the court, had not proven their case beyond a reasonable doubt.

The prosecution did not demonstrate that the second defendant or any other defendant acquired the property known as Guinea House or that Guinea House was acquired with proceeds of unlawful act because documents are not in evidence.

The evidence of prosecution witness did not reveal that there was a transfer of the sum of N322m from the third defendant to the vendor of Guinea House or that the said sum of N322m was a proceed of unlawful act, the written address read.

The second defendant further said the evidence of PW1 (first prosecution witness), which the prosecution heavily relied on, is hearsay and lacking in evidential value and was derived from an anonymous person who was not called as a witness.

He submitted that the evidence is lacking in credibility and that the elements of the charges had not been proved. He urged the court to reject the evidence.

In his judgment, Mr Aneke said the only full evidence offered by the complainant or prosecution is the evidence of PW2 from Zenith Bank.

The evidence proved that the third defendant obtained a loan of N1.2 billion from Zenith Bank for purchase of additional equipment and as provision of working capital.

It also proved that the loan of N1.2 billion together with interest of N24 million was properly granted to the third. Nothing else was proved by the complainant or prosecutor in this case, the judge said.

He further said the financial statement of the defendant is not evident before the court and none of its content evident of any relevance in the case.

They need to tender an agreement between the owners of the land and the first and second defendants in sections 128 of the evidence act. The admissible evidence, in this case, does not even show the owners of the said Guinea House.

Apart from the first element of defence charged which has not proved that the first and second defendant acquired Guniea House, none of the other evidence as stated above have been proved.

How could they have been proved when the statement of account of the third defendant of Sterling Bank was tendered and rejected in evidence?

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The rejection of the same statement of account means that any facts concerning or relating to the N322 million paid by the third defendant to the Lagos government cannot be proved. Coupled with this is the fact that Sterling Bank officials were not called to testify and probably tender exhibits F and F10. The prosecutions case collapsed, the judge said.

Mr Aneke further said that it is the statement of account of the third defendant of Zenith Bank that could show that apart from the loan of N1. 2 billion from Zenith Bank, there is no other money or sufficient money in the account of the third defendant to pay the N322 million.

He said that proved that the N322 million was paid from N1.2 billion and not from any other money belonging to the third defendant.

The result is that none of the evidence or elements on count 1 has been proved. On count 2, the ingredients of the offence charged with count 1 have to be proved before the third defendant will be found guilty or the first and second defendants taken for the offence charged.

That is to say the offence in count 2 has not been committed, while the primary or principal offence as contained in count 1 has not been proved.

The result is the prosecutions case against the defendants are accordingly discharged and acquainted, Mr Aneke said.

Mr Nwaoboshi, alongside his two companies, was then freed from the charges against them by the EFCC.
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The World Bank has called on the Nigerian government to create the environment for a more predictable foreign exchange management system.

The bank said the Central Bank of Nigerias management of the foreign exchange regime was a fundamental cause of the nations foreign exchange crisis.

In its bi-annual Nigerian Development Update, the bank said the way the exchange rate was managed limited access to foreign exchange and thus adversely affected investor confidence and investment appetite.

Significant spreads between the official, the IEFX, and the parallel exchange rate persisted throughout 2020 and as of April 2021, the spread between the official and the IEFX rate was estimated at 8% and between the IEFX and the parallel rate, reached 18% (the spread between the official and the parallel rate was 27%), the World Bank added.

Nigerias foreign exchange policy has been riddled with uncertainties in recent time, owing largely to policy incoherence on the parts of different officials of government.

The Central Bank of Nigeria had last month adopted the Nafex rate as the governments official exchange rate for the naira, effectively devaluing the currency by 7.6 per cent.

The bank also introduced a naira-for-dollar scheme to boost remittance inflows.

In its report, however, the World Bank noted the two-month naira-for-dollars scheme introduced by the CBN in March 2021 to serve as an incentive for increased remittance inflows through formal channels was extended indefinitely in May and was preceded by regulatory directives in December 2020that mandated all licensed operators to pay remittances in dollars.

The bank said that while the scheme may indeed encourage the use of the formal channels, it is not clear that incentive payments will increase remittances to the country.

The World Bank also called on the CBN to allow the I&E FX market function properly by allowing a more market-friendly approach for exchange rate transaction.

While the CBN has taken steps towards operationalizing unification of exchange rates, greater flexibility will be necessary to support the recovery, it said.

Until oil companies are allowed to sell FX receipts to IEFX bank participants, CBN would still have an important role to play as supplier of FX.

In this scenario, participating banks in the FX market will start to play an expanded role that goes beyond just executing buy/sell orders of its clients to start acting as market makers, meaning that they start to quote two-way prices buying and selling on its own behalf and carrying a stock of FX. With increased flexibility, the CBN could start intervening only to smooth large fluctuations and work toward ensuring a single, market-driven rate.

The bank added that keeping market stakeholders fully informed of such efforts would help attract both domestic and foreign investment.

The right mix of exchange-rate flexibility and expanded supply (e.g., through banks and FX agents) would enable the FX market to efficiently allocate resources, which would allow the CBN to focus its interventions on smoothing large and disruptive FX fluctuations, the bank said.
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The National Economic Council (NEC), one of Nigerian governments highest advisory and decision-making bodies, is planning to convene a special meeting to review reports of various judicial panels of enquiry set up last year to probe cases of police brutality in the country.

Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo, who chairs the NEC, said this in a statement issued by his spokesperson, Laolu Akande, at the end of the 117th meeting of the council on Thursday.

He said the reports of some of the panels, commonly known as #EndSARS panels, have now started coming to the council.

The panels were set up in most of the states of the federation and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja, in the wake of the October 2020 #EndSARS protests against police brutality.

Shaken by the protests, the government quickly granted the protesters demand for the dissolution of the notorious Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS).

The NEC, with the Vice-President as the chair, and the 36 state governors, some federal cabinet members, the governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, and some other top government functionaries, as members, had also recommended the setting up of the judicial panels of enquiry to address the grievances of victims of police brutality in the country.

NEC special session

Mr Osinbajo announced on Thursday that a special meeting of NEC would soon be convened to consider the implementation of the reports, including remedies, redress and compensations.

It will be recalled that the judicial panels were recommended after adoption of a resolution by NEC to address nationwide complaints of police brutality after the President dissolved the Police SARS unit. Almost all states in the federation set up the panels including the Federal Capital Territory.

The Vice President at todays (Thursday) meeting announced that a special session of NEC will soon be convened to consider all the reports that are ready from the judicial panels set up late last year to address the concerns of the Nigerian people on police brutality allegations and other related issues.

That meeting would also consider the implementation of the reports including remedies, redress and compensations, the statement from the Vice-Presidents office read in part.

Concerns

Many have raised concerns about the governments history of lukewarm attitude towards implementation of reports of such panels.

As important as the setting up of the panels was considered to be in assuaging accumulated grievances of many victims of police brutality, many state governments did not inaugurate the panels.

In some states, the #EndSARS panels were inaugurated but abruptly stopped sitting.
The Centre for Democracy and Development (CDD) has objected to the appointment of a member of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), Lauretta Onochie, as a National Commissioner of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).

President Muhammadu Buhari had written to the Senate in October last year seeking her confirmation and that of others as national commissioners of the nations electoral body.

Ms Onochie is not only a member of the APC but also the special assistant to the president on Social media.

It is on the ground of her social media campaigns for the current administration and other alleged undemocratic behaviours that individuals and civic groups called on the president to withdraw her name from the list.

Disregarding public and civil groups agitations, the Senate, on June 9 set in motion the process of screening the Delta State-born-Onochie as INEC commissioner.

In a statement by its Director, Idayat Hassan, on Thursday, CDD said the appointment of Ms Onochie to serve in such a nonpartisan office could spell doom for Nigerias democratic principles if the Senate allowed it.

It asked the lawmakers to reject the nomination to save the country from further ridicule.

The Centre said it had petitioned the Senate highlighting the effects of such a move on INEC and the countrys electoral process at large if allowed to pass through the assembly.

First, Ms Onochie is from Delta State, the same state from which Barrister May Agbamuche-Mbu, a current national commissioner, hails. Barrister Agbamuche-Mbus tenure is not ending until December 2021, the Centre said.

Also, Mr Mike Igini, the Resident Electoral Commissioner for Akwa Ibom State, hails from the same state and his tenure will end in August 2022. Neither Mrs Agbamuche-Mbu nor Mr Igini has been removed from office.

Therefore, Ms Onochies confirmation will contravene the Federal Character principle as enshrined in the 1999 constitution of Nigeria as amended. President Buharis renomination of Ms Onochie from Delta State promotes inequity and appears to send a message that there are no qualified and non-partisan persons in the other South-South states worthy of appointment into INEC.

The group said Ms Onochies appointment had also made mockery of a part of Nigeria constitution which forbids a political party member or partisan individual from being appointed to such office.

Second, Ms Onochie does not hide her partisan support for the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and she is likely a card-carrying member of the party.

It is also important to realise that her partisanship is the reason she was appointed to her current role as an aide to President Muhammadu Buhari on Social Media.

This, therefore, precludes her from being appointed into INEC. Section 156(1) and Item F, Paragraph 14 of the Third Schedule of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999, forbid an appointee to INEC to be a political party member or a partisan individual.

There is no doubt that Ms Onochie will continue to protect the interest of the APC if confirmed by the Senate. Moreover, CDD believes strongly that she will represent political baggage that could damage the Commissions legitimacy. Any elections she oversees will likely be subjected to multiple litigations, even in a genuine win by the APC and other parties, CDD stated.

The Centre also said the appointment was a breach of Section 30 (Paragraph 14, Part 1 of the Third Schedule to the Constitution) which forbids anyone of questionable character from being appointed into the election management body.

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It said, The nominee, in past elections, particularly ahead of the 2019 General Elections, used her social media handle (@laurestar) to peddle fake news, with the intent to delegitimise INEC.

She also peddled fake news when she shared photographs of a Nasarawa-Jos road construction project purportedly done by the Muhammadu Buhari administration.

CDDs fact check traced the images she posted to a foreign construction project shared on iStock photos, where she lifted the images.
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The Presidency says President Muhammadu Buhari will participate in the 59th Ordinary Session of the ECOWAS Authority of Heads of State and Government in Accra, Ghana, on Saturday.

The Presidents spokesman, Garba Shehu, confirmed this development in a statement on Friday in Abuja.

Mr Shehu said the president would depart Abuja on Saturday to join other Heads of State of Government of ECOWAS for the mid-year statutory meeting of the regional bloc.

He, however, stated that Mali would not be participating in the summit following its recent suspension from the group.

According to him, former President Goodluck Jonathan of Nigeria, ECOWAS Special Envoy and Mediator to Mali, is expected to present a report on his latest working visit to the West African country to the Summit of the Heads of State.

The Heads of State and Government will also receive a report on ECOWAS institutional reforms, single-currency programmes and a memorandum on the proposed mechanism of rotation of ECOWAS Member States candidature to the Chairmanship of the African Union.

A communique will be issued at the end of the Summit.

The 59th Ordinary Session of the ECOWAS Heads of State and Government was preceded by the 46th Ordinary Session of the ECOWAS Mediation and Security Council (MSC) at the Ministerial Level and the 86th Ordinary Session of the ECOWAS Council of Ministers, in Accra, Ghana, he added.

The MSC, comprising of Ministers responsible for defence and foreign affairs from ECOWAS Member States, considered the security situation in the ECOWAS region, among other topical issues on the agenda.

The 86th Ordinary Session, however, considered a memorandum on the post-Covid-19 industry recovery plan, the 2021 mid-term report of the President of the ECOWAS Commission and the ongoing institutional reforms at ECOWAS, among others.

The presidential aide revealed that the president would be accompanied by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Geoffrey Onyema; Minister of State, Foreign Affairs, Zubairu Dada; Minister of Defence, Bashir Magashi, and the Minister of Health, Osagie Ehanire.

Others on the presidents entourage include the Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Zainab Ahmed; the National Security Adviser, Babagana Monguno; Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Godwin Emefiele, and the Director-General of the National Intelligence Agency (NIA), Ahmed Rufai.

(NAN)
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The U.N. General Assembly unanimously elected Antonio Guterres to a second term as secretary-general on Friday, giving him another five years at the helm of the 193-member organisation at a time a deeply divided world faces numerous conflicts, the growing impact of climate change, and a pandemic still circling the globe.

Ambassadors in the assembly chamber burst into applause as Assembly President Volkan Bozkir announced Guterres re-election by acclamation, without a vote.

Just before the announcement, Estonias U.N. Ambassador Sven Jurgenson, the current Security Council president, read a resolution adopted by the 15-member council recommending Guterres for a second term.

Under the U.N. Charter, the General Assembly elects the secretary-general on the recommendation of the Security Council.

Guterres was the only candidate nominated by a U.N. member state, his home country Portugal where he previously served as prime minister, and the countrys current president was in the assembly chamber to watch the event.

Immediately after his re-election, Guterres took the oath of office and delivered an address urging U.N. member nations to do everything we can to overcome current geostrategic divides and dysfunctional power relations.

There are too many asymmetrics and paradoxes, he said. They need to be addressed head on.

.@antonioguterres reappointed for second term as UN Secretary-General. pic.twitter.com/OZcDPJf5Cn

 United Nations (@UN) June 18, 2021

Guterres expressed hope that what we are living through today in terms of mistrust is, I hope, an aberration but it cannot become the norm.

Traditionally, candidates for the U.N.s top job have been nominated by a U.N. member state, but that is not a requirement in the U.N. Charter or in a resolution adopted by the General Assembly in 2015.

That measure made the previously largely secretive selection of the secretary-general more open and transparent, allowing member states for the first time to see basic information about all candidates, including their resumes, and to question them at open sessions.

Guterres, a former U.N. refugee chief, was elected by the assembly to succeed Ban Ki-moon after a hotly contested and transparent race in October 2016 that initially included 13 candidates  seven women and six men. Guterres took office on Jan. 1, 2017.

This year, seven individuals submitted applications to be secretary-general without backing from any government, including most recently former Ecuadorian President Rosalia Arteaga.

France 24 is Premium Times syndication partner. We have its permission to republish content.
Israeli jets launched air strikes on Gaza overnight Thursday to Friday after militants in the Palestinian territory again set off incendiary balloons into southern Israel, the army and AFP journalists said.

The fire balloons and air strikes are the latest violence heaping pressure on a fragile ceasefire between Israel and Gazas Hamas rulers that came into place on May 21, ending 11 days of heavy fighting.

Over the past day, arson balloons were launched from the Gaza Strip into Israeli territory, Israels military said in a statement.

In response fighter jets struck military compounds and a rocket launch site belonging to the Hamas terror organisation.

AFP journalists in the Palestinian enclave also reported hearing explosions, which the army said hit sites in both Gaza City and in Khan Yunis, in the south of Gaza, home to some two million people.

Soon after the strikes, Hamas militants opened fire with heavy machines guns towards the Jewish state, as Israeli warning air raid sirens rang out.

Palestinian militants in Gaza launched balloons for a third day running on Thursday, according to Israeli firefighters battling the blazes sparked by the devices.

The balloons are basic devices intended to set fire to farmland and bush surrounding Gaza.

Army ordered to increase readiness

After the first wave of fire bombs sparked blazes on Tuesday, Israels military launched a retaliatory wave of strikes early Wednesday.

Then, as the balloons continued, the air force launched a second round of strikes overnight Thursday to Friday.

This weeks air strikes on Gaza were the first under Israels new government headed by Naftali Bennett, whose ideologically disparate coalition on Sunday ousted long-serving prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Israel army chief Aviv Kohavi late Thursday issued orders to increase the IDFs (Israeli Defense Forces) readiness and preparedness for a variety of scenarios including a resumption of hostilities, the army statement read.

The IDF will continue to strike military capabilities and infrastructure belonging to the terror organisation, and holds the Hamas as responsible for all events transpiring in the Gaza Strip, the statement added.

The new exchanges of fire come as Egypt tries to consolidate the ceasefire it helped broker.

The conflict killed 260 Palestinians including some fighters, according to Gaza authorities.

In Israel, 13 people were killed, including a soldier, by rockets fired from Gaza, the police and army said.

Cairo, along with the United Nations, are hoping to support the reconstruction of Gaza following a war that saw whole tower blocks reduced to smoking rubble and key infrastructure smashed.

The densely crowded Mediterranean enclave has been under an Israeli blockade since 2007.

Israeli army chief Kohavi is due to leave Tel Aviv on Saturday for a six-day visit to the United States for talks.

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He is the first top Israeli official to do so since the new coalition government headed by Bennett took over on Sunday.

Kohavi will visit the US militarys Central Command (Centcom) in Florida, with items on the agenda to include Gazas Islamist rulers Hamas and Israels arch-foe Iran, as well as Hezbollah, the Tehran-backed Lebanese Shiite Muslim group.

Kohavi will discuss common security challenges, an army statement said, including issues related to the Iranian nuclear threat, Iranian regional entrenchment in the Middle East, (and) Hezbollahs force build-up efforts.

France 24 is Premium Times syndication partner. We have permission to republish content.
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The management of the Nuhu Bamalli Polytechnic Zaria, Kaduna State has announced the reopening of the institution for academic activities as from Monday.

The polytechnic suspended all academics activities after an attack by bandits at the UPE campus of the institution.

PREMIUM TIMES had reported how bandits attacked the campus, kidnapping lecturers and students.

According to a statement signed by its Information and Protocol Officer, Mahmud Kwarbai, the institution is reopening on Monday.

Sequel to the improvement of security situation and the measures taken by the State Government and the School

Management to ensure the safety of lives and property in the Polytechnic, I am directed to inform all students and the

Polytechnic Community that school will re-open on Monday, June 21, 2021.

Therefore all students are to resume for normal Academic Activities

Meanwhile there is no official information either from the school or the police eon whether the kidnapped students and lecturers have been rescued or released by the bandits.

A staffer of the institution, Hadiza Mohammed, told PREMIUM TIMES on Friday that those kidnapped have not been released.

The students and lecturers kidnapped are still in the captivity of bandits. We do not have any information about their release. Meanwhile, the family of one of the kidnapped students has said the bandits have contacted them, she said.
President Muhammadu Buhari has assured Nigerians he would fulfil all the promises he made to them in 2015.

Despite mounting insecurity rocking virtually all parts of the nation and economic challenges many Nigerians are facing, Mr Buhari also said he will fulfil the set objectives of his administration.

PREMIUM TIMES reported how the president has failed to secure the country and ensure the safety of its citizens years after he was elected as president.

The retired general has also failed to ensure economic stability six years after he was elected as president. Economic stability, security and war on graft were the major promises he made to Nigerians when he was seeking their votes.

He is currently serving out his second tenure which will end in 2023.

The president gave the assurance on Friday at State House Abuja when he hosted members of the Muhammadu Buhari and Osinbajo Dynamic Support Group.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the Group was in the Villa to officially present to the president their book titled  A Compendium of 5-Year Achievements of President Muhammadu Buharis Administration from 2015  2020.

The MBO Dynamic Support Group Officers and team members saw the good in our administration from the time we came in 2015.

It is this commitment that led to the production of the book, and I sincerely hope and believe that Nigerians will always see and cherish positivity in all that this administration has done as it continues to work assiduously to accomplish, Mr Buhari said.

He commended the organisation for the support and the efforts to come up with the publication as it would serve as a documentation of some of the administrations achievements.

The birth of this book from inception to production is due to the unrelenting efforts of the MBO Dynamic Support Group Officers and over two million groups of supporters that have continuously stood by our administration in our quest to deliver on our social contract to all Nigerians and ensure the dividends of democracy to our people.

I am extremely pleased with the production team and those who travelled across the country monitoring and collating data on our projects to enable us present an evidence based account of our stewardship, he said.

The president thanked them for braving all challenges, sacrificing time and resources to ensure that the project came to life.

Despite the global challenges of COVID-19 that impeded socio-economic activities of the world including our country Nigeria in 2020, you all worked tirelessly with limited resources and by tasking one another to produce this historic book.

We recognize and appreciate your drive, skills, creative abilities and your personal resources invested in this project and immense devotion to produce the book.

I thank you once again for your unwavering commitment to this administration and legacy and look forward to the wide circulation of our achievements perfectly captured in this book to all citizens and those willing to see that we succeed to the end for the benefit of all, Mr Buhari added.

The group was led by its Coordinator, Usman Ibrahim. He disclosed that the publication highlighted milestones of the Buhari administration in critical sectors like economy, rail, anti-corruption war, social investment, and many others.

The 295-page book, the coordinator said, captures several aspects of your outstanding achievements in various sectors with monumental impacts on every part of the country.

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Mr Ibrahim further said: Mr President, you are breaking records, you are making history, and we are proud to say that despite the challenges confronting us, good things are still happening.

(NAN)
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The fact of the matter is that Nigeria has lost the process of thinking about policy and ensuring that policies are effective, and that the institutions which produce them actually think, plan and monitor these policies, to make sure that they provide the public good that government had intended when they were designed.

Public policy refers to a set of actions selected from alternatives, on the basis of the assessment of given conditions, to guide and determine the successful delivery of a public good. What is important in the choice of any policy is never the good intentions behind the policy but the impact it would have through the delivery of the public good. The key issues in determining policy choices, therefore, are feasibility, production of intended effects and positive impact, in relation to the targeted public good. In Nigeria however, it appears there is very little reflection on what the desired success of public policy is and how we will know when we get there.

One example is the recent decision to temporarily suspend the activities of Twitter because of the harm it does in producing and sustaining hate messages that impact negatively on national cohesion. In other words, the intended positive impact in government thinking is to improve social relations and unity in the country, which is very good. As such, Twitter is disallowed from operating in Nigeria by the government and within minutes, most Twitter users circumvent the measure by using VPN technology and continue what they were doing on the platform. Meanwhile, because government now has a clear policy decision on Twitter, its spokespersons and supporters, who were previously countering fake news and hate speech on the platform, all withdrew, creating a situation in which there are no longer alternative voices against fake news and hate speech on the platform. The real effect of the policy decision, therefore, is an increased access of Nigerians to fake news and hate speech without any alternative voices from government and its supporters. The impact of the policy move, so far, is the opposite of what was desired. There was no real thinking about the policy before its implementation.

A second example was the recent ban placed by the Central Bank on banks and financial institutions from servicing cryptocurrency transactions in the country. In other words, crypto exchanges and related companies that previously allowed users to deposit or withdraw their funds directly from their bank accounts can no longer do so. The intention of the policy was to reduce the ability of corrupt individuals from stealing public resources or engaging in criminal activity and hiding the proceeds as digital money. The intention was to save Nigerians from scammers in the digital economy and combat corruption. The real effect of the policy is that it has driven the transactions underground. Most crypto transactions were initially through registered banks and financial institutions, and government could monitor what was going on. With the ban, the transactions have moved to the peer-to-peer cryptocurrency trading platforms, where government can no longer monitor what is going on. The volume of transactions in cryptocurrencies has not gone down, from all indications. All that has happened is that government now knows much less about what is happening.

As Nigerian citizens continue to lose millions to cryptocurrency fraud, Nigerias regulatory authorities have remained quiet on this matter and are not in a position to take corrective actions to shield citizens and venture capitalists in the country against cryptocurrency fraud. Did the Central Bank do its research before implementing this policy?

Industry reports indicate that Nigeria has the second highest volume of crypto transactions in the world, with a remarkable trading volume of $1.5 billion and over 1.5 million users, despite the ban. These 1.5 million Nigerian traders are, due to the government policy, more susceptible to scammers, as they engage in direct trade without the protection of financial institutions. Most of them are hardworking Nigerians who think there is value in saving in cryptocurrencies and that the public policy has affected their interests negatively. As Nigerian citizens continue to lose millions to cryptocurrency fraud, Nigerias regulatory authorities have remained quiet on this matter and are not in a position to take corrective actions to shield citizens and venture capitalists in the country against cryptocurrency fraud. Did the Central Bank do its research before implementing this policy?

Maybe the most serious policy madness was the establishment of the Institute for Peace and Conflict Resolution (IPCR) in 2000 by the Olusegun Obasanjo regime, in response to the rising incidents of conflicts across the country. It is a policy think tank whose mandate covers research and interventions towards strengthening Nigerias response capacity in the promotion of peace, conflict prevention, management and resolution. In the 21 years since its establishment, the need for the institute has become even more crucial, as conflicts have broadened and intensified. Sadly, through the lack of critical thinking, the Institute was placed under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which has zero mandate for internal security and peace building.

Each year, the Institute does it work and sends it to the Foreign Ministry, which throws the report to the dust bin because it has no mandate for the work. The IPCR case proves my point because violent conflicts are threatening Nigerias existence, yet no one in government has noticed that we have a very important institution to help the country, which however cannot function because it has been placed under the tutelage of a Ministry without the mandate to act on its work. The intended public good of addressing rising insecurity is not being performed and the error in its placement has not been addressed for over two decades.

The work of the Institute for Peace and Conflict Resolution should provide the empirical basis for the work of government in developing policy measures aimed at addressing violent conflicts that have emerged, and above all developing and implementing peace building measures to address them.

The irony is that the IPCR has been doing significant work in conducting the Strategic Conflict Assessment (SCA) of the country since 2002. The SCA provides detailed field information, data and analysis on conflict prevention and management strategies for government institutions and communities at all levels. It also established the Nigerian Peace Academy (NPA) as a training vehicle for developing the capabilities of individuals, groups and organisations in the area of alternative dispute resolution (ADR), as well as the peaceful management and resolution of conflicts.

The Strategic Conflict Assessment pays attention to the contexts of conflict  trends of violent conflicts, stakeholders, and the impact and implications of conflicts for inter-group relations, state-society relations, and all spheres of human security. Nigeria needs this institution to achieve its mandate and all States in the country need peace building institutions to address the current crisis. The work of the Institute for Peace and Conflict Resolution should provide the empirical basis for the work of government in developing policy measures aimed at addressing violent conflicts that have emerged, and above all developing and implementing peace building measures to address them. So far, only two States have embarked on the path of establishing specialised state level peace building institutions  Kaduna and Plateau States.

The fact of the matter is that Nigeria has lost the process of thinking about policy and ensuring that policies are effective, and that the institutions which produce them actually think, plan and monitor these policies, to make sure that they provide the public good that government had intended when they were designed.

A professor of Political Science and development consultant/expert, Jibrin Ibrahim is a Senior Fellow of the Centre for Democracy and Development, and Chair of the Editorial Board of PREMIUM TIMES.
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These tech companies with reach into the bedrooms  and the minds  of billions of people around the world, have become so powerful the CEOs of these organisations have emerged as the real world leaders. Except we negotiate with them urgently, and figure how we stand with them, we are facing a different kind of tyranny, even as we try to run away from the civilian dictatorships that have riled us for so long.

The Nigerian government banned the powerful microblogging site, Twitter, a couple of weeks back. It sounded like the impossible had been done, but the state retains the power to determine what to allow and what not to. Every rule under globalisation and international trade also has provisions and exceptions for national security. So, all the Nigerian government had to do was dive under the national security excuse, but enough knocks and blows have followed the decision, with a few taps on the back, notably from Donald Trump, a former U.S. president, who was totally humiliated by the tech platform. Trump had already lost the elections but was fighting tooth and nail to save his seat. At some point, Twitter deleted his tweets and eventually yanked him off the platform quite unceremoniously. Facebook did the same, even if in a less sensational manner. Trump supporters believe that these new tech platforms are biased towards the liberal left anyway, and that they may have become political in support of Democrats. Nigerian government has also laid heavy allegations against Jack Dorsey, for his not-too covert role in the protests that rocked Nigeria to her foundations in October 2020. The Minister of Information, Lai Mohammed, claims that Dorsey has questions to answer for his open support for, and financial sponsorship of the EndSARS protests in which 37 policemen, six soldiers, 57 civilians were killed, while property worth billions of naira were destroyed. According to Mohammed, 164 police vehicles and 134 police stations were razed to the ground, 265 private corporate organisation were looted while 243 public property were looted.

Well, every action, and inaction does have consequences. The war between Twitter and Nigeria may be long and drawn out, in spite of the opprobrium that the Nigerian government has attracted, including words of rebuke from the embassies of the top countries in the world. But it is hard to wash Jack clean of these allegations. My thinking is, you can provide a platform, and enforce your rules strictly without anyone having to know your name or see your face. However, when you start to tweet in favour of one party or the other, and when you direct such actions against one of your customers, then you have openly taken sides and are no longer a fair adjudicator in the matter. Jack Dorsey is a politician, much more than a Mark Zuckerberg, even though Mark controls 2.5 billion people, in comparison to Jacks 300 million. If Facebook was a country, it will have the population of China and India combined. That is phenomenal. Twitter, however, has the advantage of being able to pass instant information. The psychologist behind the business model of Twitter must have in mind the need to feed on peoples restlessness for information (most of which they do absolutely nothing with), as well as their Attention Deficit and Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), hence the limiting of texts in twitter to just 280 characters per tweet. It used to be 160 or thereabouts. Facebooks psychologist must have had in mind, the secret desire that people nurse, to show off their real or imagined achievements  and their computer-enhanced looks, of course.

It is not only in Nigeria that Twitter has encountered issues. In India too. And in increasing number of locations around the world. In 2011, as the U.K. contorted under widespread riots, PM David Cameron threatened to shut down Twitter. Germany, France and other Western European countries criticised what they call digital oligarchy, after Facebook and Twitter shut down Trump. China never allowed Twitter in, rather getting some of her smart young people to build their own. Twitter was very effective during the Arab Spring and indeed it undid Hosni Mubarak. At the heart of that protest was a certain young man named Wael Ghonim, who was then an executive with Google Egypt. These tech companies with reach into the bedrooms  and the minds  of billions of people around the world, have become so powerful. Indeed they can make or mar societies. They can bring down or install governments. They can set a country on fire, or attract visitors, tourists and investors. Therefore, the CEOs of these organisations have emerged as the real world leaders. Except we negotiate with them urgently, and figure how we stand with them, we are facing a different kind of tyranny, even as we try to run away from the civilian dictatorships that have riled us for so long.

what frightened me the most were his references to some system that they the powerful countries were putting together, which will hand over a lot of power to technology and tech firms. He asked them  even if rhetorically  that we speak up now and ensure that some of our values in todays normal worldcould make it into the new world that they were creating.

I have repeated, ad nauseum, the speech by PM Boris Johnson, which he gave at the United Nations in September 2019. It was a most-frightening speech, to those who can digest what exactly he meant. I shared this speech, especially around the time that COVID-19 held the world by the jugular. There were references to vaccines by Johnson, even as at then, but what frightened me the most were his references to some system that they the powerful countries were putting together, which will hand over a lot of power to technology and tech firms. He asked them  even if rhetorically  that we speak up now and ensure that some of our values in todays normal world (which is no longer so normal since COVID-19 made its debut) could make it into the new world that they were creating. He said that machines will not know any extenuating circumstances, as they will determine who gets what going forward. This is how he put it:

No one can ignore a gathering force that is reshaping the future of every member of this assembly; there has been nothing like it in history. When I think of the great scientific revolutions of the past; print, the steam engine, aviation, the atomic age, I think of new tools that we acquired and over which we the human race have the advantage; which we can control. And that is not necessarily the case in the digital age. You may keep your secrets from your friends, from your parents, your children, your doctor, even your personal trainer. But it takes real efforts to conceal your thoughts from Google And if that is true today, in future there may be nowhere to hide. Smart cities will polulate with sensors, all joined together by the Internet of Things; pollards communing invisibly with lamp posts, so that there is always a parking space for your electric car, so that no bin goes unemptied and no street unswept, and the urban environment is as antiseptic as a Zurich pharmacy But this technology could also be used to keep every citizen under round-the-clock surveillance. A future Alexa will pretend to take orders, but this Alexa will be watching you clacking her tongue and stamping her toes. In future, voice connectivity will be in every room. Your mattress will monitor your nightmares, your fridge will beat for more cheese, your front door will sweep wide open the moment you approach, like some silent, invincible butler. Your smart meter will go hustling on its own accord for cheaper electricity and every one of them minutely transcribing your habits in tiny electronic shorthand stored not in their chips or in their innards; no where you can find it, but in some great cloud of data that lowers ever more oppressively over the human race; a giant dark thundercloud waiting to burst and we have no control over how or when the precipitation will take place Data is the crude oil of the modern economy and we are now in an environment where we dont know who should own these new oil fields. We dont know who should have the right or the title to these gushers of cash and we dont know who decides how to use that data. Can these algorithms be trusted with our lives and hopes shared. The machines and only the machines decide whether or not we are eligible for a mortgage or insurance or surgery or medicines we should receive? Are we doomed to a cold and heartless future in which computer says yes or computer says no with the grim finality of an Emperor empower in the arena How do you plead with an algorithm? How do you get it to see extenuating circumstances and how do we know that the machines have not been insidiously programmed to fool us or even to cheat us? We are already using all kinds of messaging services, that offer instant communication at minimal costs, but these same programmes, platforms could also be designed for real-time censorship of every conversation with offending words automatically deleted. Indeed, in some countries, this happens today. Digital authoritarianism is not, alas the stuff of dystopian fantasy but of an emerging reality. I believe governments are being simply caught unawares by the unintended consequences of the internet; a scientific breakthrough, far more reaching in its everyday psychological impact than any other invention since Guttenberg! At stake is whether we bequeath a Orwellian world designed for censorship and repression and control or a world of emancipation, debate and learning where technology threatens famine and disease but not our freedoms So the mission of the United Kingdom and all who share our values must be to ensure that emerging technologies are designed from the outset for freedom, openness and pluralism, with the right safeguards in place to protect our people Month by month, vital decisions are being taken in academic committees, company board rooms and industry standards groups. They are writing the rule books of the future, making ethical judgements, choosing what will or what will not be rendered possible. Together we need to ensure the new advances reflect our values, by design. We need to find the right balance between freedom and control, between innovation and regulation, between private enterprise and government oversight. We must insist that the ethical judgement inherent in the design of new technologies are transparent to all, and we must make our voices heard more loudly in the standard bodies that write the rules. Above all we need to agree to a common set of global principles to shape the norms and standards that will guide the government of emerging technologies.

I dont like Twitter for that. I really do not understand what Dorsey and friends actually had in mind to build. What is more? The rules are so amorphous. No one is sure of what to do to get verified. Its almost like joining a cult. They do it whenever it catches their fancy and for whoever they want to confer their favour upon. In this age and time? Where is the science in all these?

I re-read the above statement, which I came short of repeating in full, with mouth agape. Johnson said it all. Tech companies have gotten so powerful, they have started to shut out ideas that do not agree with them. The lines are blurred. As it has been levied against Twitter: the same platform that took down Trump and censored Buhari, still harbours some crazy extremists and their content. Their algorithms somehow did not pick those ones up. How and why does a Dorsey have to personally intervene on such issues? Why does his sentiment have to matter? And if his machines are to do the job, how do we also get heard? Our opinions should really matter, as his customers, on the back of whom he makes his billions. I believe that the Facebook algorithm is far more advanced, as I have been sent to jail on that platform on a number of occasions, sometimes for very flimsy reasons, or sometimes their algorithm picks something it deems offensive, in the past three years. I have had to reject their decisions on a number of occasions, but the fact remains that they act first and hear complaints later. This cannot be fair. My idea of these tech platforms is that they should leave room for inputs from their customers, who actually pay them for service. As we fight the tyrants we know, using their platforms, are we creating a fiercer, hungrier tiger inside whose innards we may end up? I notice that every depiction of the future in Hollywood is about dystopia; no prediction of the future has ever painted a picture of more glory and functionality. It is all doom and gloom. Are we hastening that dystopia? Unwittingly? Should we spare some time, some mind share and keep an eye on this other monster  technological, digital, tyranny?

I am actually not a Twitter person. But I feel for those addicted to that platform for their news. I think I already spend too much time on social media, even though I may not be one of the heavier users. Nigerians spend an average of four and a half hours on social media daily, second in the world behind Philippines. Both countries have issues but Philippines exports their youth en masse to places like the United Arab Emirates, to earn money as service people; something they are damn good at. This means that our government is not engaging the youth enough. There are opportunities for jobs here that the government is refusing to create. I am not big on Twitter, perhaps because I really dont want, or need, to be the first person that gets a breaking news. Who needs that? It is great to build a big followership and get noticed each time you post a tweet but I have realised that large followership also opens one to trolls. I see what our youths do on Twitter  which allows for a lot more anonymity that other platforms  and I weep. Many of our young people have honed their talents at abusing and cursing people on there. They call it dragging. Our young people take delight in damaging the reputation of anyone that catches their fancy, and when the horde comes, theres nothing anyone can do. Slander is no longer a thing. They drag peoples families  wife, children, parents  into these bile-filled beastliness that can only make all of them involved worse, and turn them into very bitter individuals. They call it savage tweets. I dont like Twitter for that. I really do not understand what Dorsey and friends actually had in mind to build. What is more? The rules are so amorphous. No one is sure of what to do to get verified. Its almost like joining a cult. They do it whenever it catches their fancy and for whoever they want to confer their favour upon. In this age and time? Where is the science in all these?

Thats that for Twitter. I hope they resolve their issues with the Nigerian government and get better with their rules going forward. I also hope all these social media madness does make our youths into better persons and better leaders, as their time has now come to run the country. But there is one last complaint I have. It doesnt have to do with Twitter but underlines the need for us to think hard about this new phenomenon of social media dictatorship. Perhaps it is an unintended consequence. I recall being blocked out of Facebook for sharing content on some past ills done to African countries by some powerful Western country. They will have none of it. Of late, a lady complained that Tiktok deleted her post about slavery in Africa. So, we may be submitting to tech tyranny that has been preprogrammed to only show the picture of a rosy world from the perspective of the Caucasian males who created them. There goes our history forever. Boris warned, even though he is one of the chief conspirators. Say, was he warning, or mocking?

Tope Fasua, an economist, author, blogger, entrepreneur, and recent presidential candidate of the Abundant Nigeria Renewal Party (ANRP), can be reached through topsyfash@yahoo.com.
As I write, I have the feeling that as the compass of the Communist Party of China (CPC) clocks a hundred years this July 1, China will be standing on an elevation like the Great Wall, viewing the world and thinking how to remould it, possibly in its own image

It was Monday, November 5, 2018. I was engaged in my favourite pastime whenever I visit China  climbing the Great Wall. Below it, the country sprawled and you could have a birds eye view.

As I write, I have the feeling that as the compass of the Communist Party of China (CPC) clocks a hundred years this July 1, China will be standing on an elevation like the Great Wall, viewing the world and thinking how to remould it, possibly in its own image.

The country is one of the most battered in history. When it resisted being force-fed opium by the colonialists, the British, in 1839, battered it to submission and in 1841, took Hong Kong as a war booty, which it kept for 156 years.

Unlike other territories directly colonised by single powers or countries, China was too large to be colonised by a single country, so a concert of eight powers  Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Russia, Austria-Hungary, Japan and United States  chopped it up for exploitation. When in 1899-1900, the Chinese rose to throw the foreigners out of their country in what came to be known as the Boxer Revolution, those eight powers sent a combined 51,755 soldiers to suppress the revolt.

The defeat of the Boxer Revolution, rather than dampen the enthusiasm of the Chinese to take control of their country, inspired in them a feeling of patriotism and pride. A group rejected the Western political system and sought for alternatives. It found that in the writings of two Germans, Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, who taught that humanity at its cradle ran a communal system before the rise of a new system, which had the Lords of the land, on one hand, and the landless, on the other hand.

They wrote that a revolution took place where those who own capital, propelled by the industrial revolution, overthrew the feudal system and established capitalism, which is a system based on the exploitation of the masses by the few who own capital.

They concluded that the former would, in turn, overthrow the capitalists and establish a humane, non-exploitative system called communism. Messrs Marx and Engels had then encapsulated their ideas and programmes into a declaration they called the Communist Manifesto.

What had seemed mere theory to many became praxis when in November, 1917, the Russian followers of Marx and Engels, led by a local lawyer called Vladimir Illiych Lenin, carried out a successful revolt which became known as the Bolshevik or Russian Revolution.

At the time the congress held on July 23, 1921 in a sitting room on the ground floor of a residential apartment on 76-78 Xingye Lu in, intiandi in Shanghai, the CPC had only 53 members in the country. The 13 delegates at the congress had security concerns and had to move the meeting to a boat in Jiaxing, East China, in the Zhejiang Province.

A Chinese educationist, Chen Duxiu, then 42, and an intellectual, Li Dazhao, who was ten years younger, decided to carry out a similar revolt of the poor, the disposed and the oppressed in their country. They co -founded the CPC and called its first congress in July, 1921.

At the time the congress held on July 23, 1921 in a sitting room on the ground floor of a residential apartment on 76-78 Xingye Lu in, intiandi in Shanghai, the CPC had only 53 members in the country. The 13 delegates at the congress had security concerns and had to move the meeting to a boat in Jiaxing, East China, in the Zhejiang Province.

Those in attendance included Chen Duxiu, who became the partys founding General Secretary (1921-27), Li Dazhao, who was to be executed in the struggle for the revolution, and Mao Tse Tung (Zedong) one of the two delegates of Hunan who was to take over the leadership of the CPC on March 20, 1943.

He proved to be a great mobiliser, teacher and military commander. He taught his comrades that: A revolution is not a dinner party, or writing an essay, or painting a picture, or doing embroidery; it cannot be so refined, so leisurely and gentle, so temperate, kind, courteous, restrained and magnanimous. A revolution is an insurrection, an act of violence by which one class overthrows another.

In practical warfare, he taught the revolutionaries: When the enemy advances, withdraw; when he stops, harass; when he tires, strike; when he retreats, pursue.

He argued that: War can only be abolished through war, and in order to get rid of the gun it is necessary to take up the gun.

On power relations, he argued that: All political power comes from the barrel of a gun. The Chinese communist party must command all the guns, that way, no guns can ever be used to command the party.

In situating slavery and racialism in the historical context, Mao argued that: The struggle of the Black people in the United States for emancipation is a component part of the general struggle of all the people of the world against U.S. imperialism, a component part of the contemporary world revolution.

while having a strong private sector, the Chinese economy is public sector-driven, with component states conducting independent foreign trade with other countries. China does not allow the so-called market forces to determine its economy or exchange rate.

He famously said women are essential for any change to take place in society because: Women hold up half the sky.

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Tse Tung, famously known as Chairman Mao, led the CPC to victory over the nationalists on October 1, 1949 and declared the establishment of the Peoples Republic of China (PRC).

The phenomenal economic rise of China challenges the belief that only capitalism can grow a modern economy. It also defeats the argument that the private sector is the engine of economic development. As such, while having a strong private sector, the Chinese economy is public sector-driven, with component states conducting independent foreign trade with other countries. China does not allow the so-called market forces to determine its economy or exchange rate.

Part of Chinas contribution to the world is its ability to feed, clothe, shelter, educate and provide healthcare and social security for 1.412 billion human beings or 18.48 per cent of the world population. In 25 years from 1990, it lifted 746 million persons out of poverty and at the end of 2020, China eradicated poverty in the entire country.

The Chinese strongly discourage corruption by executing those found guilty. While the controversy about the origins of COVID-19 rage, China has given the world two COVID-19 vaccines from Sinopharm and Sinovac. Also, while powerful countries like Britain have been hoarding COVID-19 vaccines, China has been distributing its vaccines especially in Africa and Asia, in some cases, free.

I do not hold out China as an angel sent to the world; the truth is that every country primarily works for its own interests. However, humanity should have a common commitment to social justice.

Since its revolution, China has had challenges like breakaway Taiwan, the Cultural Revolution, the Gang of Four issue, pro-Western Democracy Tiananmen Square protests and the two-state experiment in Hong Kong. But none of these has weakened the CPC in any significant way. If anything, the party seems stronger and more confident today than it has ever been. But then, nobody knows what is in the bowel of tomorrow.

Owei Lakemfa, a former secretary general of African workers, is a human rights activist, journalist and author.
Today, most of the oligarchs resisting the needed structural changes to make Nigeria work cannot even travel back to their villages These people are so drunk with money, power and privilege, which they traded with personal freedom and for which they mortgaged their countrys future. Like the goldfish, they have fed fat on Nigeria till their stomach ripped apart and its easy to tell that these emperors have no clothes.

In 1845, the Illustrated London News ran an interesting story about a certain dog breed discovered in Newfoundland that was noted to act in some strange ways. For days it would act disinterested and withdrawn before being seen to throw himself in the water and endeavour to sink by preserving perfect stillness of the legs and feet. Each time he did it, he was rescued but would often repeat the attempt until finally, he held his head under water, choked and died.

Its been more than a century since the publication of that London dog article, and animal suicide has come to be identified as any kind of self-destructive behaviour displayed by various species of animals, resulting in their death. Even cats, dogs and horses could sometimes eat themselves to stupor, but nothing compares to the golden fish. Many fancy goldfish varieties are known to binge on fish flakes, until they die from the rupture of their stomachs. How could a living specie get so greedy to the point of eating itself to death?! Well, truth is, if you find the attitude of the goldfish embarrassingly perplexing, then you do not know man. Certainly, you have never met a Nigerian.

Just recently, 17 governors, representing all the states that make up Southern Nigeria, met in Asaba to discuss the way forward for a country in crisis. They repeated similar calls made by other eminent Nigerians from every sector, including organised labour, business and religious leaders, academics, and political party chieftains, who have all weighed in on what could be a lasting effort to stem the tide of widespread insecurity and senseless killings in the country.

Even many northern groups, who before now had approached the issue of restructuring with a six-foot pole, are starting to come around it. Following a two-day summit in April this year, held to address the socio-economic and political issues plaguing Nigeria, in general, and the north, in particular, the Northern Elders Forum (NEF) and other opinion leaders of the region, threw their weight behind calls for the restructuring of the country. In a communique issued after the summit, the group stated that, the North believes that restructuring the country is now a vital necessity for survival as one united entity. They concluded that for Nigeria to realise its potentials for economic and political development, that would be the only way forward.

For many years now, restructuring has inarguably become the most popular word in the Nigerian political lexicon. A slew of legal luminaries, constitutional scholars, political leaders, interest groups, you name it, all have at various times and in different forum identified the military imposed 1999 constitution as the single most important factor behind the recent ethnic agitations in Nigeria and the accelerated descent to anarchy. The All Progressives Congress (APC) government ran a whole campaign on restructuring and President Jonathans 2014 confab harped on it.

If there is any consensus from these entire groups, its the fact the 1999 Constitution gave birth to a centre that is so power-drunk and overwhelmed. Abuja today is like a man with modest means, who however has to cater for 36 completely dependent wives. He is also forced to choose how to dispense love to them. Nigeria needs emergent restructuring, with more power devolved to the states, the kind of arrangement similar to what obtained before the khaki boys came calling.

Within the ranks of the Nigerian oligarchs, especially from the North, there seems to be this gross misconception that restructuring is some kind of cold-war the South is openly waging against the Arewa house. Or how else does anyone explain Attorney General Malamis diatribe against proponents of restructuring?

Open grazing is another topical issue and most agree that it has now become an unsustainable practice. Opinion leaders drawn from across our geographical and ethnic divides now advocate ranching in line with best practices of animal husbandry that obtains all over the world. Even Governor Aminu Masari of President Buharis home State of Katsina, was quoted to have said that open grazing is un-Islamic and not the best for herders. The only little problem is that the oligarchs in control of the levers of power have no intention of listening to anyone but themselves.

Within the ranks of the Nigerian oligarchs, especially from the North, there seems to be this gross misconception that restructuring is some kind of cold-war the South is openly waging against the Arewa house. Or how else does anyone explain Attorney General Malamis diatribe against proponents of restructuring? For many like him, that word is only a smokescreen used to conceal a sinister motive, which is to permanently wrestle power and resource control from the North, and it has nothing to do with the overall health and well being of the republic.

But its not only with restructuring, even the issue of Boko Haram is another area where the fight against the deadly terror group is hampered by the warped perceptions of some critically important stakeholders. Part of the greatest impediment to defeating the insurgency is that some Hausa-Fulanis in the Moslem North see the fight against the insurgency as some sought of religious war.

Both President Buhari and his current Minister for Communication and Digital Economy, Sheikh Isa Ali Pantami, at various times have been quoted to have made statements that seemed to suggest having soft spots for the terror group. Our Muslim brothers did not deserve to be killed like pigs, the Minister reportedly said. And by Muslim brothers, he meant battle-hardened Boko Haram terrorists.

Just recently, Bukar Tanda, a legislative aid to Abdulkadir Rahis, the member of the federal House representing the Maiduguri Metropolitan Council, was booted out over his Facebook post about Abubakar Shekau. He was reported to have described the erstwhile blood-thirsty Boko Haram leader as courageous, saying he lived the life of a hero and died a true hero. Really?

The biggest threat to restructuring is that humans generally detest any action that could potentially whittle down their power for any reason. This predilection for territorial protection is not unique to leaders of Northern extraction but also shared with their Southern counterparts. It doesnt even matter that such action would, in the long run, serve their interest better or make way for greater societal good.

The Nigerian house is being consumed by a raging inferno but instead of looking for ways to quench it, the landlords of Aso Rock are busy standing guard at the door with rifles in hand and shooting at some phantom targets. In the end, when the house gets razed to the ground, they will realise that, all along they have been fighting an imaginary war.

The biggest threat to restructuring is that humans generally detest any action that could potentially whittle down their power for any reason. This predilection for territorial protection is not unique to leaders of Northern Nigerian extraction but also shared with their Southern counterparts. It doesnt even matter that such action would, in the long run, serve their interest better or make way for greater societal good. Except, of course, if your are a Mikhail Gorbachev who was in love with such fancy terms as Perestroika and Glasnost.

Humans, naturally, are about that power grab and even not long ago we heard the story of a certain Attorney General who advised his principal, an elected civilian president, to suspend the Constitution and roll out marshal laws. The chief law officer of the land urging the one who swore to protect the Constitution to break the law. Only in Nigeria!

President Jonathan would have gone ahead with implementing the 2014 confab recommendations but instead kicked the can down the road, hoping to win the second term. We can only speculate what would have been the fate of our country had his government acted fast and decisively. Even Obasanjo, before now, was not a big fan of restructuring. In fact, a Vanguard newspaper article of July 8, 2017 quoted him as being against restructuring, stating that what needed restructuring was the mindset of Nigerians.

Today, most of the oligarchs resisting the needed structural changes to make Nigeria work cannot even travel back to their villages, let alone spend a night in their stately but lizard-infested mansions there. Instead, they have become unfortunate inmates in the high walls of their Abuja prisons. These people are so drunk with money, power and privilege, which they traded with personal freedom and for which they mortgaged their countrys future. Like the goldfish, they have fed fat on Nigeria till their stomach ripped apart and its easy to tell that these emperors have no clothes.

Osmund Agbo, a public affairs analyst is the coordinator of African Center for Transparency and Convener of Save Nigeria Project. Email: eagleosmund@yahoo.com

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Tanko Sununu, the lawmaker representing Shanga/ Yauri/ Ngaski federal constituency of Kebbi State, has disclosed that before the latest attack in Yauri, Kebbi State, bandits have been attacking the community uninterrupted.

According to the lawmaker, the bandits had informed the people they would be back to attack the community.

PREMIUM TIMES had reported the attack by bandits in Yauri, which led to the abduction of some students and teachers at Federal Government School by suspected bandits.

A policeman was killed during the attack.

Mr Sununu said, last week, over 300 bandits with AK 47, attacked the communities in Yauri and operated for eight hours uninterrupted.

A week ago we had another calamity when bandits mentioned by eyewitnesses numbering about 250 to 300, each with AK-47 rifles and using very strong motorcycles, came into my constituency.

They had a field day and operated for more than eight hours going house to house, room to room, collecting money, handsets, motorcycles and cattle, he said.

The lawmaker said the people had initially fled the community after the attack because the bandits warned that they would be back.

Taking it seriously, some people refused to go back and in the early hours of today, they repeated what they had done earlier and they came into the constituency, somehow around 10.30 or thereabout.

They were able to have access after strong fight with some security guards, police that are guarding the Federal Government College, Birnin Yauri and they made inroad into the school. They succeeded in kidnapping some teachers and an unaccounted number of students.

Some of the students and security men are currently receiving care at the General Hospital Yauri, following gun injuries.

Mr Sununu called on the federal government to help ensure security in the state, as he noted that rice farmers and others are unable to go to farm due to insecurity.

He added that parents cannot feel free to send their wards to school for fear of being kidnapped.

Mass abductions

Abduction has become pervasive in Nigeria, with bandits targetting schools across the country.

Most often, the abductors demand money to release the victims.

PREMIUM TIMES had in a report detailed the timeline of abductions by bandits and kidnappers.
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The Akwa Ibom Government said it has spent N10 billion on erosion control projects in the state in the last nine months.

The Commissioner for Environment, Charles Udoh told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Eket on Friday that the money was spent on two major sites.

The two major sites are Etim Umana Erosion and St. Luke Hospital erosion control projects, he said.

The commissioner said businesses, houses and other infrastructure have been displaced by erosion and flood in the areas.

According to him, more cities in Akwa Ibom are prone to gully erosion due to the natural topography and soil texture in those locations.

This automatically means that whenever there is a downpour, we are in the rain belt, gully erosion will become a problem, he said.

He said the building of houses on the right of way and farming on the slope of gully were some causes of gully erosion.

Mr Udoh said the flood on IBB Avenue in Uyo, if not checked, could have a spill effect on erosion control.

We are receiving a major drain to evacuate flood water because if you allow flood water to be there (IBB avenue) for a long time, it will begin to hit the crux of the earth surface.

Then erosion will begin to prick in, especially in a place like Uyo that the soil texture is loose, Mr Udoh said.

The commissioner said the state government had rescued more than 100 houses, including the entire St. Luke and School of Nursing in Etim Umana, from erosion.

The state government alone, he said, could not solve the states erosion problem, that is why it was seeking for intervention (ecological funds) to do that.

Mr Udoh said the state government had identified 10 erosion sites to carry out control projects but lacked the funds to execute the job.

We are trying to access the ecological funds, we hope that we will have some success.

He said some residents of Uyo, Ibesikpo-Asutan and Itu local governments still live in erosion-prone areas despite being asked to evacuate the sites.

(NAN)
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Five persons were on Friday arraigned in Enugu, Enugu State, for allegedly forming Junior Vikings and Burkina Faso confraternities.

The defendants are Ekemeka Kingsley, 21; Chinagorom Ugoama, 17; Nnamani Ifesinachi, 24; William Emeka, 24, and Nwafor Tochukwu 19.

They appeared before an Enugu South Magistrates Court Grade 1 on a two-count charge of conspiracy and unlawful association.

The prosecutor, E.I Ajokwu, told the court that the defendants and others still at large, on May 23, conspired among themselves to become members of the cult groups.

Mr Ajokwu said it was in the process of forming the groups at Amechi Aukwunaw, Enugu, that they were arrested.

According to him, the action of the defendants contravened Section 8 (17) of Enugu State Public Order Law, 2010, which forbids secret cult activities.

The defendants pleaded not guilty to the charge.

Counsel to the defendants, J.I Onovo, applied for their bail.

My Lord, the alleged offence is bailable under Section 88 of the Administration of Criminal Law of Enugu State and Section 36, Sub-section 5 of 1999 Constitution as amended.

Their parents are here, in the court, to take them as sureties and they are responsible people who will provide them whenever court wants them, he said.

The prosecutor did not object to the bail application.

The Chief Magistrate, R.O. Nwebiem, granted the defendants bail in the sum of N100, 000 each and a surety each in like sum.

Mr Nwebiem ordered that the sureties must have evidence of tax payment to the state government.

The case was adjourned to July 14 for substantive hearing.

(NAN)
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A businessman, Seun Peters, has lamented the looting of his office by hoodlums during Thursdays gas explosion incident which damaged part of Ogun State Property Investment Company (OPIC) Plaza, in Ikeja.

Mr Peters, the Managing Director, Rolling Video Games, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Friday that his company, located in the plaza, suffered several losses due to the incident.

NAN reports that five persons were killed while 11 others suffered varying degrees of injury after a Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) tanker exploded in front of the plaza at about 10.30 p.m. Thursday night.

No fewer than 25 cars were also destroyed, while a part of the building was severely damaged by the explosion.

On Friday, the Lagos State government said it had begun an investigation into the incident.

Mr Peters said: Three of my official vehicles were burnt and they tried to break into my van and my office was looted.

I wonder why, because if there is a fire incident, I dont know why people will now use that opportunity to try to loot offices and shops.

I think they should stop this dangerous trend when places are burning, rather than look for a solution to it, hoodlums try to take that opportunity to loot.

He said the office was vandalised by the hoodlums who carted away some cash, electronic gadgets, and wristwatches.

Luckily, they didnt take any of my documents because obviously, they are not useful to them, but the whole place is in a mess, Mr Peters said.

(NAN)
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An Ikeja Magistrates Court on Friday remanded a 23-year-old ex-convict, Taiwo Sunmonu, for alleged armed robbery four months after he was released from Kirikiri prison.

The magistrate, O. A. Odubayo, ordered that the file should be sent to the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) for advice.

The defendant would not take his plea pending the advice from the DPP.

Mrs Odubayo ordered that the defendant should be kept at Kirikiri Correctional Centre.

She adjourned the case until July 15 for DPPs advice.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the defendant, whose address was not provided, is being tried for conspiracy and armed robbery.

Earlier, the prosecutor, Adesunkanmi Adejumola, a sergeant, told the court that the defendant committed the offences along with some other persons still at large on March 12 at 11.00 p.m. at Ajayi Street, Ijanikin, Lagos State.

Rearrested

Mr Adejumola said the defendant, who was released from the Kirikiri prison in November, 2020, served a five-year jail term in connection with an armed robbery incident.

He said the defendant again armed himself with dangerous weapons and robbed Mr Opeyemi Owolabi of his phone valued at N20,000 and N2,000 cash.

The defendant was arrested by police operatives attached to Ijanikin Division, when they responded to a distress call, but his accomplices escaped.

One locally-made pistol and live ammunition were recovered from him, he said.

Mr Adejumola said the offences contravened Sections 297(1)(2)(a) and 411 of the Criminal Law of Lagos State, 2015.

NAN reports that Section 297 stipulates 21 years imprisonment for armed robbery, while Section 411 prescribes two years for conspiracy.

(NAN)
Plattsburgh, NY (12901)

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Carbon Neutrality At Your Fingertips

DUBAI, UAE, May 30, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- No one is too small to make a positive impact on the planet. This is what a new Dubai based start-up, Olive Gaea, is ready to prove as it launches the first carbon offset platform in the MENA region today.

Having the sixth largest per capita carbon footprint in the world, UAE residents and businesses will now be able to become carbon neutral or even carbon positive by removing their own carbon emissions from the atmosphere in just a couple of clicks.

"Climate change is a real, urgent threat. We all share the responsibility to act in order to preserve our planet and, ultimately, our very future. The good news is that each one of us can now actually help solve this problem," says Olive Gaea's Founder and CEO, Vivek Tripathi.

Olive Gaea calculates the carbon footprint of any individual or business through a simple yet science-based questionnaire. It then provides dedicated plans and a list of carbon offsetting solutions and verified climate projects, and allows users to track progress and get rewarded driving more positive change through monthly and annual subscriptions. Moreover, the platform allows customers to offset purchases made on e-commerce businesses including grocery orders, food and fuel delivery, and online stores, among others.

Accountability, trustworthiness, and transparency are at the heart of the process. Olive Gaea only supports carbon offsetting projects that are handpicked and verified by third party agencies like Verra and Plan Vivo. The platform is also powered by precise geo-tagging and QR code tracking, so users can know the exact location and the impact they help to generate with new plantation projects in just a few clicks.

"We launched Olive Gaea to create a world where people can feel proud about their climate story. Our goal is to make carbon offsetting affordable, helping everyone, anywhere, anytime to build a resilient climate future," says Vivek.

Olive Gaea's carbon offsetting is not about paying to eliminate a sense of guilt for excessive emissions or an unsustainable lifestyle. According to Vivek, offsetting carbon emissions must always go hand in hand with sustainable strategies that aim at reducing the environmental footprint in the first place. Yet, carbon credits are still needed to offset the remaining carbon emissions's balance.

In fact, while some of the carbon emissions can be prevented and reduced, both businesses and individuals find that with the current technologies it is still impossible or way too expensive to fully eliminate their emissions. That's where carbon offsetting solutions like Olive Gaea come into play.

Vivek explains: "With our platform, we aim to generate the awareness needed to act sustainably; understanding and measuring our own environmental footprint is the first step to a more conscious lifestyle. We believe in action and in the power of each individual's choices to preserve our planet and our future."

Under the 2015 Paris Agreement, nearly 200 countries have endorsed the global goal of limiting the rise in average temperatures to 2.0 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, and ideally 1.5 degrees. To meet this target, global greenhouse-gas emissions should be cut by 50 percent of current levels by 2030 and reduced to net zero by 2050.

The UAE is one of the signatories of the Paris Agreement and has recently reaffirmed its goal to become a global leader in the green economy and address climate change. Having launched prominent strategic initiatives spanning from the National Agenda 2021 to the Energy Strategy 2050 and the Dubai 2040 Master plan, just to name a few, the country still faces an extremely high per capita carbon footprint.

UAE residents, in fact, generate around 22 tonnes of CO2 emissions annually on average against a global average of 4.8 tonnes, way above the limit that would allow the world to meet the Paris Agreement's targets and limit global warming. Olive Gaea, while supporting the UAE's strategy to focus on sustainable development and green economy, helps both companies and people to balance out their carbon emissions.

Research shows that, alongside cutting CO2 emissions, carbon offsetting and voluntary carbon credits can help achieve the net zero target by financing climate-action projects that generate additional benefits including biodiversity protection, pollution prevention, and local community support and development. According to the Taskforce on Scaling Voluntary Carbon Markets (TSVCM), the demand for carbon credits could increase 15 times or more in the next decade, pushing the global carbon credit market's value to no less than $50 billion by 2030.

To know more about Olive Gaea, visit www.olivegaea.com

About Olive Gaea

Founded by Vivek Tripathi and Apurva Bhandari, Olive Gaea is a web/mobile application where businesses and individuals can calculate their carbon footprint and choose to offset it through easy subscription plans in a couple of clicks.

Carbon footprint is a measure of GHG emissions released due to a particular activity, such as cooling your home, heating your lunch, or taking a flight from Dubai to London. Some of the activities, like producing phones, flying planes, or eating meat are particularly carbon-intensive. Staked together over a certain period of time, those activities make up your individual or business carbon footprint. Calculating your personal or business footprint is the first step to owning your climate story. Olive Gaea developed simple and accurate tools that let you find out the exact sources of emissions from your lifestyle and business operations and what can be done about them.

Related Links

https://www.olivegaea.com/



SOURCE Olive Gaea
The EBRD is added to an all-star roster of investors backing Hellas Direct, including Portag3, the IFC (member of the World Bank Group), Endeavor Catalyst and well-known family offices including those of Jon Moulton and Lord O'Neill.

Hellas Direct is a digital-first, full-stack insurance company, empowered by cutting-edge technology and the use of advanced analytics. With its investors' support, it aims to accelerate its high organic growth in a post-Covid world, across multiple products and distribution channels. Empowered by the latest round of funding and using technology as a competitive edge, the company plans to expand into five blindspot European markets - which similarly to Greece and Cyprus tend to be overlooked by the global powerhouses - starting with Romania, in order to replicate the multi-product, multi-channel approach it has successfully deployed in Greece. The Group also plans to start offering its own credit product, as part of its strategy to dominate the mobility ecosystem in the broader region.

The EBRD is a multilateral bank that promotes the development of the private sector and entrepreneurial initiative in 38 economies across three continents. The Bank is owned by 69 countries as well as the EU and the EIB. EBRD investments are aimed at making the economies in its regions competitive, inclusive, well-governed, green, resilient and integrated. To date, the Bank has invested more than EUR 4.6b in over 75 projects in the corporate, financial, energy and infrastructure sectors of the Greek economy.

"We are proud to welcome the EBRD into our group of investors at Hellas Direct. Our investors' support will enable us to accelerate some of our longer-term strategic goals and to pursue a more aggressive acquisition strategy in the region," said Alexis Pantazis, Executive Director of Hellas Direct.

"We are excited to be teaming up with one of the world's leading investors. This is a great opportunity for us to further optimize the service we offer to the consumer, by expanding our activity to multiple sectors. Our aspiration is to make Hellas Direct the dominant player in the wider region's mobility ecosystem," added Emilios Markou, Executive Director of Hellas Direct.

"We are delighted to support Hellas Direct, a technology-driven insurance company offering innovative products and digitalising the insurance value chain in Greece. Accelerating digital transition, unleashing the power of technology to bring changes for the better, is among the top priorities for the EBRD. We are very proud to support the growth of an insurance market player with a unique, digital business model well-positioned in the post-Covid-19 world in scaling up its operations. We are confident that EBRD funding, know-how and strong presence on the Greek market will help Hellas Direct to continue improving its cutting edge service offerings and increase its market share," said Andreea Moraru, EBRD Head of Greece and Cyprus.

Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1536531/Hellas_Direct_European_Bank.jpg

Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1536532/Hellas_Direct_Logo.jpg

SOURCE Hellas Direct
NEW YORK, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Secret Atlas , the home of small ship voyages to remote areas of the Arctic, announces the addition of two new luxury expeditions to Iceland and Greenland for Summer and Fall 2021. Renowned for private luxury charters , group adventure expeditions, and photography tours of no more than twelve passengers aboard a fully-crewed vessel, Secret Atlas offers a highly personalized and transformative travel experience. The new restriction-free chartered expeditions to the majestic wilderness of Iceland and Greenland fully embody the mission of Secret Atlas: to revive the lost spirit of exploration.

Secret Atlas was created by two passionate explorers and conservationists intent on making Arctic travel more personal and more sustainable. Allowing for deep exploration of areas that are otherwise inaccessible, Secret Atlas brings travelers closer to nature with a lower impact on wildlife and natural habitats.

"We live in a fast-paced world, and we are forgetting how to live in close contact with nature and the elements  we are forgetting how to be adventurous," remarks Secret Atlas co-founder Michele D'Agostino. "With Secret Atlas, we aim to share our love of the great beauty of the polar region with our intent for more mindful travel to provide a much richer travel experience."

ABOUT THE NEW EXPEDITIONS

Secret Atlas expeditions to Iceland and Greenland offer safe, restriction-free travel for those in search of a transformative travel experience. Embark on a privately chartered small ship voyage to explore the majesty of Iceland or Greenland. Step aboard the MV Balto, a luxury expedition vessel crewed by a team of experts with decades of experience safely navigating Arctic waters. The vessel features spacious cabins with mahogany-paneled interiors, en-suite bathrooms, sauna, full bar, library, and dining room with meals prepared on-board by a private chef.

EAST GREENLAND: The Forbidden Coast Private Expedition

Experience a truly authentic wilderness expedition to the seldom visited coast of East Greenland on a safe, luxury expedition yacht. Cross the Denmark Strait to reach the virtually uninhabited east coast of Greenland, exploring Scoresby Sound, the longest fjord system on earth. Sailing on Zodiac landing crafts to explore and hike ashore, visit remote Greenland settlements and witness the mystical scenery featuring cathedral-sized icebergs led by an expedition leader who will take you on a real expedition.

ICELAND EXPLORER: The Land of Fire and Ice Bespoke Private Expedition

Experience Iceland's untamed wilderness from the safety of your own private luxury expedition yacht for up to 12 guests. Explore Iceland's remote scenic West Fjords, sailing on Zodiac landing crafts to hike ashore in the stunning natural wilderness of Hornstrandir nature reserve. Visit remote fishing villages, submerge in therapeutic volcanic hot springs, and visit Fagradalsfjall, Iceland's newest active volcano.

ABOUT SECRET ATLAS

Secret Atlas is the home of small ship voyages that explore the world's most remote locations in the Arctic, including Svalbard, Greenland, and Antarctica. Created by veteran explorers devoted to sustainability and slow travel, the bespoke small group adventures of Secret Atlas provide voyagers a truly experiential view of nature, while minimizing the impact on wildlife and the environment. Secret Atlas specializes in highly customizable expedition micro-cruises, photo tours, and luxury voyages aboard a fully staffed private vessel that can accommodate up to twelve guests. For those in search of the adventure of a lifetime, Secret Atlas delivers a transformational travel experience that revives the lost spirit of exploration.

For bookings and further information, please contact hello@secretatlastravel.com and visit www.secretatlastravel.com

SOURCE Secret Atlas
PARIS, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- On the third day of the 2021 Viva Technology show, taking place in Paris on June 16-19, LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton (LVMH) revealed Bambuser as the winner of the 5th LVMH Innovation Award during a dedicated award ceremony. Bambuser, a startup specialized in Live Stream Shopping, was chosen as the overall winner by Bernard Arnault, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Toni Belloni, LVMH Group Managing Director, and the members of the selection committee.

For five years now, the LVMH Innovation Award has been one of the highlights of the Viva Technology show, which has itself become a key event for the world's innovation ecosystem and is considered to be Europe's biggest startup and tech event.

For the 2021 Innovation Award, more than 850 entries were received from around the world. A total of 28 startups from 12 different countries were selected as finalists, notably reflecting their ability to enhance the customer experience.

"Innovation is an absolute obsession at LVMH. It's what lets us continually heighten the appeal and desirability of our Maisons. We fuse luxury and technology together, and the finalists of the 2021 Innovation Award will bring us their capacity to nourish this encounter even more. Their entrepreneurial spirit joins and inspires our own," says Toni Belloni, Managing Director, LVMH.

Bambuser is a startup specialized in Live Stream Shopping. It helps brands host live shopping sessions online, with influencers or sales associates. These shows are hosted natively on the brands' websites, enabling them to own the look and feel of the experience and manage conversations, data and check-out. The startup's clients include Parfums Christian Dior and Make Up For Ever.

"At Bambuser we are on a mission to change retail. We are so proud to contribute to do this with the LVMH Group. Any startup needs more than just a mission to succeed: a dedicated and highly skilled team that doesn't take no for an answer, and that one important customer who believes in you and wants to trailblaze with you, and that is what LVMH is to us," says Sophie Abrahamsson, Chief Commercial Officer, Bambuser.

Bambuser will have the opportunity to benefit from a 6-month personalized support as part of LVMH's accelerator program, "La Maison des Startups," which has been based at the Station F startup campus in Paris since 2018.

Contact information

Sherry Smith, Corporate Communications, Bambuser AB | [email protected]

ABOUT BAMBUSER

Bambuser is a software company specializing in interactive live video streaming. The Company's primary product, Live Video Shopping, is a cloud-based software solution that is used by customers such as global e-commerce and retail businesses to host live shopping experiences on websites, mobile apps and social media. Bambuser was founded in 2007 and has its headquarters in Stockholm.

ABOUT VIVA TECHNOLOGY

In only 4 years, VivaTech has become Europe's biggest startup and tech event and is recognized worldwide as a powerful catalyst for business transformation, startup growth and innovation for the common good. VivaTech brings together in Paris every year business leaders, startuppers, investors, researchers and thinkers from around the world for a unique experience combining inspiration, networking and innovation discovery. Starting 2021, VivaTech will be enriched with a digital platform that will bring together an even larger community of innovators. In 2019, VivaTech had already reached 231 million people worldwide, bringing together 124,000 visitors including more than 13,000 start-ups, 3,000 venture capital firms and 2,500 journalists from 124 countries. The 5th edition of VivaTech will be held on June 16-19, 2021. For more information, visit https://vivatechnology.com.

This information was brought to you by Cision http://news.cision.com

https://news.cision.com/bambuser/r/bambuser-wins-2021-lvmh-innovation-award,c3370386

The following files are available for download:

https://mb.cision.com/Main/15749/3370386/1434078.pdf Release https://news.cision.com/bambuser/i/bambuser-at-vivatech-2021,c2927307 Bambuser at VivaTech 2021 https://news.cision.com/bambuser/i/bernard-arnault----sophie-abrahamsson,c2927308 Bernard Arnault & Sophie Abrahamsson

SOURCE Bambuser
ZURICH and NEWPORT BEACH, Calif., June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- BC Platforms (BCP), a global leader in healthcare data management, analytics, and access and CureDuchenne, a leading global non-profit organisation focused on finding and funding a cure for Duchenne muscular dystrophy, today announced a new collaboration. As part of the collaboration, CureDuchenne has integrated BCP's Discovery and Research Platform (DRP) into its newly launched CureDuchenne Link global data hub.

Wider reaching than a registry or biobank, CureDuchenne Link directly connects data and biosamples provided by the Duchenne and Becker muscular dystrophy community to scientists and those involved with drug development. By reducing the need to search for data connected to biosamples, this data hub helps accelerate the discovery of biomarkers, as well as the development of future treatments, including new gene therapies and exon-skipping approaches. BCP's role in this 10-year project is to provide a data hub that can fully integrate with a variety of data sources through its DRP, including aggregate data management and data sharing. BCP will support data repository storage, as well as management and analysis tools for genomic, phenotypic, sample, and whole genome sequencing data.

Debra Miller, Founder and CEO of CureDuchenne, said: "Working with partners such as BCP ensures CureDuchenne Link delivers a world-class data hub. This monumental project breaks down existing information silos and offers qualified researchers access to participant data and biosamples in one all-encompassing platform. CureDuchenne Link can effect real change for Duchenne research and this is propelled through the expertise of the BCP team."

Nino Da Silva, Deputy Managing Director, BCP, commented; "We are delighted to support CureDuchenne with the launch of CureDuchenne Link, leveraging our DRP. It enables distributed analysis models and scales tertiary analysis of genomic and clinical data combined. The repository will provide an invaluable single, unified, HIPAA-compliant platform accessible by clinicians, researchers, and drug developers to deliver novel insights into drug development. Ultimately, we hope that the data hub will help scientists address this devastating disease and its high unmet medical need. As part of our vision to build the world's leading analytics platform for healthcare and industry, our interoperable data infrastructure can provide a strong backbone for global collaborations such as CureDuchenne Link.

Duchenne is a rare, progressive muscle-wasting disease affecting around 1 in every 5,000 boys, including around 15,000 individuals in the US, and approximately 300,000 worldwide. There are thousands of mutations associated with Duchenne, resulting in a wide variance in how the disease progresses as well as its response to therapies. It is typically diagnosed around 5 years of age, leading to an inability to walk by age 12, and death around age 30. Becker muscular dystrophy is a form of the disease related to Duchenne.

About BC Platforms

BC Platforms is a global leader in providing a powerful data and technology platform for personalized medicine, accelerating the translation of insights into clinical practice. Our technology drives the infinite loop between personalized care and research discoveries, leveraging latest science, deep technical expertise, strategic partnerships, and harmonized, diverse data collections. Our high performing genomic data discovery and analytics platform enables flexible data integration, secure analysis and interpretation of molecular and clinical information. Additionally, BC Platforms has developed a Global Data Partner Network BCRQUEST.com, which provides genomic and clinical cohort data for pharmaceutical and medical research and development. BC Platforms' vision is to build the world's leading analytics platform for healthcare and industry, providing access to diverse genomic and clinical data and samples from more than 5 million subjects, consolidated from a global network of Data Partners.

Founded in 1997 from an MIT Whitehead project spinoff, the Company has a strong scientific heritage underpinned by over 20 years of working in close collaboration with a network of leading researchers, developers, and industry partners. BC Platforms has global operations with its headquarters in Zurich, Switzerland, research and development in Espoo, Finland, and presence in London, Boston and in Singapore. For more information, please visit www.bcplatforms.com or follow us on LinkedIn @BC Platforms.

About BC Platforms' Discovery and Research Platform

BCP's Discovery and Research Platform is a data and research management solution for clinical genomics studies. Genomic and phenotypic data is collected and stored on the platform, and users have access to data and tools through an application account. All common data types for NGS, GWAS, variant analysis, linkage, and other statistics can be managed on the platform. The Discovery and Research platform scales up from small candidate gene studies to large international collaboration environments. It supports the organisation of genomic and clinical projects to distinguish between studies and user groups. The platform also provides fine-grained access management and auditing tools for building quality certified processes.

About CureDuchenne

CureDuchenne is recognized as a global leader in research, patient care and innovation for improving and extending the lives of those with Duchenne muscular dystrophy. As the leading genetic killer of young boys, Duchenne affects more than 300,000 individuals living today. CureDuchenne is dedicated to finding and funding a cure for Duchenne by breaking the traditional charitable mold through an innovative venture philanthropy model that funds groundbreaking research, early diagnosis, and community education. For more information on how to help raise awareness and funds needed for research, please visit www.cureduchenne.org.

Contact information:

Tero Silvola

BC Platforms AG

[email protected]

Katja Stout

Scius Communications

[email protected]

CureDuchenne (Media Contact)

Ranggin Hedayat

The Brand Amp

[email protected]

SOURCE BC Platforms
June 28, BCBSIL 's Blue Door Neighborhood Center(BDNC) locations are hosting a virtual webinar, "Pride Month: The Fight Continues", from noon until 1pm. This community discussion features BCBSIL's Pride Alliance  an HCSC business resource group - and the Potocsnak Family Division of Adolescent & Young Adult Medicine at Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children's Hospital of Chicago.

June 29, the Blue Door Neighborhood Centers are joining with Above & Beyond for "Taking Pride: Mental Health within the LGBTQ+ Community". This virtual discussion will examine the relationship between stress, mental health and substance use disorders within the LGBTQ+ community.

Additionally, our employee volunteerism program, Blue Corps, has curated opportunities for employees to support Pride-month activities such as a Pride Month Senior Food and Greeting Card Drive with the Center on Halsted and Pride Month Tie-Dye project with Ignite.

June is recognized as Pride month in commemoration of the 1969 Stonewall Uprising in New York City, a series of demonstrations by the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer or questioning community.

"PRIDE month activities are a great way to demonstrate our supports for LGTBQ+ communities, but PRIDE is more than a month," said Krishna Ramachandran, vice president, provider performance for BCBSIL. "Year-round we support our employees, our members and our families and work to ensure we are promoting a culture of commitment to equity, diversity and inclusion."

Through our grant and sponsorship programs, BCBSIL has provided nearly $750,000 in funding over the last 10 years to organizations focused on supporting LGBTQ+ communities and causes, including: Springfield PrideFest, AIDS Foundation Run & Walk Chicago, Peoria Proud's River City Pride Fest and Howard Brown Health Center's 63rd Street location, serving Chicago's Englewood neighborhood.

Employee Empowerment

Our Business Resource Group, Pride Alliance, is a lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and allies group that fosters diversity through educational seminars, an open membership policy, networking, mentoring, community outreach efforts and employee cultural awareness activities. In addition to partnering on the June 28th BDNC webinar with the Blue Door Neighborhood Center, Pride Alliance is hosting a series of educational employee seminars this month on topics such as Transgender Programs and Resources, LGBTQ+ Inclusion in Healthcare as well as a webinar sponsored by Diversity Best Practices, one of BCBSIL's diversity and inclusion partners.

BCBSIL has been a longtime sponsor and participant in Chicago's annual PRIDE parade, usually held in June. This year, the parade has been postponed until October  giving our employees another opportunity to celebrate PRIDE and honor the contributions of LGBTQ+ individuals in their fight for equality.

SOURCE Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois

Related Links

http://www.bcbsil.com


SAO PAULO, June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Braskem Netherlands Finance B.V. ("Braskem Netherlands Finance") today announces the results of the offer to purchase for cash any and all of the outstanding 3.500% Notes due 2023 (the "2023 Notes") issued by Braskem Finance Netherlands (the "2023 Notes Offer"). Braskem America Finance Company ("Braskem America Finance" and, together with Braskem Netherlands Finance, the "Offerors" and each, an "Offeror") today announces the results of the offer to purchase for cash any and all of the outstanding 7.125% Notes due 2041 (the "2041 Notes" and, together with the 2023 Notes, the "Notes") issued by Braskem America Finance Company (the "2041 Notes Offer" and, together with the 2023 Notes Offer, the "Offers").

As of 5:00 p.m. (New York City time), on June 17, 2021 (the "Expiration Date"), as reported by D.F. King & Co., Inc., the information and tender agent for the Offers, the principal amounts of the Notes listed in the table below have been validly tendered and not validly withdrawn. These amounts do not include any amount of the Notes tendered pursuant to the Guaranteed Delivery Procedures (as defined in the Offer to Purchase).

In addition, certain general conditions to the Offers as described in the offer to purchase dated June 11, 2021 (the "Offer to Purchase") have been satisfied, and each of the Offerors has accepted for purchase Notes that were validly tendered and not validly withdrawn prior to the Expiration Date, as summarized in the table below. Each of the Offerors will pay the applicable Consideration (as defined in the Offer to Purchase) for each US$1,000 principal amount of Notes validly tendered and accepted for payment, plus Accrued Interest (as defined in the Offer to Purchase).

Title of Security Security Identifiers Principal Amount

Outstanding(1) Principal Amount Tendered and Accepted(2)(3) 3.500% Notes due 2023 CUSIP: 10554T AA3 / N15516 AA0 ISIN: US10554TAA34 / USN15516AA01 US$206,895,000 US$70,465,000 7.125% Notes due 2041 CUSIP: 10554CAA0 / U1065PAA9 ISIN: US10554CAA09 / USU1065PAA94 US$750,000,000 US$163,015,000





(1) As of March 31, 2021. (2) As reported by D.F. King & Co., Inc., the information and tender agent for the Offers as of the Expiration Date. (3) Does not include US$6,247,000 principal amount of 2041 Notes tendered pursuant to the Guaranteed Delivery Procedures (as defined in the Offer to Purchase), which remain subject to the holders' performance of the delivery requirements under such Guaranteed Delivery Procedures (as described in the Offer to Purchase).

The settlement date with respect to each of the Offers is expected to occur on or about June 22, 2021.

The Offerors have retained Credit Agricole Securities (USA) Inc. and Santander Investment Securities Inc. to serve as dealer managers and D.F. King & Co., Inc. to serve as information and tender agent for the Offers. The Offer to Purchase, the related Notice of Guaranteed Delivery and any related supplements are available at the D.F. King & Co., Inc. website at www.dfking.com/braskem . The full details of the Offers, including complete instructions on how to tender Notes, are included in the Offer to Purchase. Holders of Notes are strongly encouraged to carefully read the Offer to Purchase, including materials incorporated by reference therein, because they contain important information. Requests for the Offer to Purchase and any related supplements may also be directed to D.F. King & Co., Inc. by telephone at +1 (212) 269-5550 or +1 (888) 644-6071 (US toll free) or in writing at [email protected] . Documents relating to the Offers, including the Offer to Purchase and the Notice of Guaranteed Delivery, are also available at www.dfking.com/braskem . Questions about the Offers may be directed to Credit Agricole Securities (USA) Inc. by telephone at +1 (866) 807-6030 (toll free) or +1 (212) 261-7802 (collect); and Santander Investment Securities Inc. by telephone at +1 (855) 404-3636 (toll free) or +1 (212) 940-1442 (collect).

This press release shall not constitute an offer to purchase or a solicitation of acceptance of the offer to purchase, which are being made only pursuant to the terms and conditions contained in the Offer to Purchase. The Offers are not being made to, nor will the Offerors accept tenders of Notes from, holders in any jurisdiction in which the Offers or the acceptance thereof would not be in compliance with the securities or blue sky laws of such jurisdiction. In any jurisdiction where the laws require the Offers to be made by a licensed broker or dealer, the Offers will be made by the dealer managers on behalf of the Offerors.

None of the Offerors, the information and tender agent, the dealer managers or the trustee with respect to the Notes, nor any of their respective affiliates, makes any recommendation as to whether holders should tender or refrain from tendering all or any portion of their Notes in response to the Offers. None of the Offerors, the information and tender agent, the dealer managers or the trustee with respect to the Notes, nor any of their respective affiliates, has authorized any person to give any information or to make any representation in connection with the Offers other than the information and representations contained in the Offer to Purchase.

Neither the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, any U.S. state securities commission nor any regulatory authority of any other country has approved or disapproved of the Offers, passed upon the merits or fairness of the Offers or passed upon the adequacy or accuracy of the disclosure in the Offer to Purchase.

About Braskem Netherlands Finance, Braskem America Finance and Braskem

Braskem Netherlands Finance, a private company with limited liability (besloten vennootschap met beperkte aansprakelijkheid) incorporated under the laws of the Netherlands, is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Braskem Netherlands B.V., which, in turn, is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Braskem S.A. ("Braskem"). Braskem Netherlands Finance was established primarily to act as a finance subsidiary of Braskem.

Braskem America Finance, a corporation incorporated under the laws of the State of Delaware, is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Braskem America, which, in turn, is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Braskem. Braskem America Finance was established primarily to act as a finance subsidiary of Braskem.

Forward-Looking Statements

Statements in this press release may be "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of Section 27A of the U.S. Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E of the U.S. Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, which are subject to risks and uncertainties. Other than statements of historical fact, information regarding activities, events and developments that Braskem expects or anticipates will or may occur in the future are forward-looking statements based on management's estimates, assumptions and projections. Many forward-looking statements may be identified by the use of words such as "expect," "anticipate," "intend," "plan," "believe, "estimate" and similar expressions. Forward-looking statements contained in this press release are predictions only and actual results could differ materially from management's expectations due to a variety of factors, including those described the section titled "Risk Factors" in Braskem's Annual Report on Form 20-F for the year ended December 31, 2020. All forward-looking statements attributable to Braskem or the Offerors are expressly qualified in their entirety by such risk factors. The forward-looking statements that the Offerors make in this press release are based on management's current views and assumptions regarding future events and speak only as of their dates. The Offerors assume no obligation to update developments of these risk factors or to announce publicly any revisions to any of the forward-looking statements that the Offerors make, or to make corrections to reflect future events or developments, except as required by the U.S. federal securities laws.

DISCLAIMER

This press release must be read in conjunction with the Offer to Purchase. This announcement and the Offer to Purchase contain important information which must be read carefully before any decision is made with respect to the Offers. If any holder of Notes is in any doubt as to the action it should take, it is recommended to seek its own legal, tax, accounting and financial advice, including as to any tax consequences, immediately from its stockbroker, bank manager, attorney, accountant or other independent financial or legal adviser. Any individual or company whose Notes are held on its behalf by a broker, dealer, bank, custodian, trust company or other nominee or intermediary must contact such entity if it wishes to participate in the Offers. None of the Offerors, the dealer managers, the information and tender agent and any person who controls, or is a director, officer, employee or agent of such persons, or any affiliate of such persons, makes any recommendation as to whether holders of Notes should participate in the Offers.

SOURCE Braskem Netherlands Finance B.V.
SACRAMENTO, Calif., June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- An experienced lawyer and the founder and managing partner of Penney and Associates Injury Lawyers, Fred Penney throws out some suggestions for those first getting started in building their law practice. https://www.penneylawyers.com/locations/roseville/ . This is a very brief practical guide on how to build a law practice. According to the American Bar Association of the lawyers that responded to their survey in 2020 only 26% were solo practitioners. The survey also showed that 30% were at law firms with 2-9 lawyers, 17% were at firms with 10-49 lawyers, 5% of the lawyers were at law firms with 50-99 lawyers, 10% were at law firms with 100-499 lawyers and finally 12% were at law firms with 500 or more lawyers. https://www.americanbar.org/groups/law_practice/publications/techreport/2020/ssf/ .

IN THE BEGINNING

I remember just passing my bar in 1992 and I was clerking at a large nationally recognized personal injury law firm. I thought to myself, I can do this and soon began to consult with several experienced solo practitioners about starting my own personal injury law firm. Most advised me to wait several years to start my practice so I could obtain a little more experience in the courtroom. Only one experienced lawyer had the faith in me and told me that if I wanted to eventually start my own practice, now was just as good of a time as any other. However, one piece of advice he gave me that I will never forget, I would later learn was crucial and impacted the success of my practice for years. The most important thing for a young lawyer, he said, is to latch on to another experienced lawyer and work on cases together. For example, if a case came into my office, I should study that area of law and then bring in an experienced lawyer as co-counsel. I worried that this would just build up the experienced lawyer's practice more. He agreed but advised me that it was the price to be paid to receive the experience at the hand of a seasoned trial lawyer. It is better to lose a few clients to another lawyer and get the experience from that trial lawyer than trying to do it on your own without any experience.

Find your niche as a lawyer and stay in that lane of traffic, try not to flip flop to different areas of law. I believe that a lawyer that does a little bit of everything is one that has not mastered his or her area of law. There will be times you will be tempted to take on a case that is outside of your lane to help pay the bills. Resist this urge. You must look at the long-term goal, to get a reputation throughout your legal and local community as an attorney that only handles one area of law. If you jump around practicing different areas of law, you will find that others will be confused about what you do and never really know if you fit within a certain area of law that they need help. The most damning thing though is the fact that other lawyers will not refer cases to you. If you are a personal injury lawyer but decide to dabble in a little bit of estate planning, bankruptcy, or corporate law then you just lost personal injury referrals from lawyers that practice in bankruptcy and estate planning. In other words, the lawyers that are staying in their lane will not want to refer to you because you keep jumping in their lane.

Get in touch with lawyers in your area of practice and take the small cases that they do not want to handle. At the beginning of my practice, I knew I had to build up my clientele fast. I was a personal injury lawyer, and I knew the managing partner of the largest personal injury law firm in the nation. I went to that lawyer and told him that I would take those cases that he did not want and would handle the cases from the beginning to the end. I even offered to pay them part of the fee in accordance with the ethics of the State of California. This did two things. First. my caseload built quickly and second, I had access to experienced trial lawyers to talk to about the cases if needed. I then found a few other experienced lawyers outside this national law firm to associate in on cases as needed. The most surprising thing that I found was that like anything in business when doing huge volume, you sometimes miss little gold nuggets. What would happen on occasion is that this large national law firm was so busy with the volume of cases coming through sometimes they did not have time to carefully review a case and thought it was not particularly good and would pass it down to me. When in essence with some hard work and deep review I would find that the case was good and had a substantial certainty of a very favorable outcome. This soon got out to other big firms and the next thing I knew within one year I could not handle all the cases that were being referred to me by other people and law firms.

WHERE DO I OPEN MY OFFICE?

The number one cliche you hear is location, location, location. Well, I agree it is a silly cliche, but it is important. This is an especially important question that needs to be answered at the beginning of your career as a lawyer. Though one can move and make changes, it is important build a base early in your practice. Once you plant your stake so to speak, you can become well known in that community as being a lawyer in your area of law. I always marvel at the lawyers that plant their stake somewhere and five or ten years later move somewhere else. I believe with a few exceptions that is not the right way to build a practice. I knew that I needed to plant my stake somewhere and once I did, I would have to work hard to build a solid foundation of trust and credibility in the surrounding communities.

Choosing that right place to open your law practice. I believe that it is to your advantage to open your practice in an area that you already have a foothold. Maybe a place where you grew up or where your family knows quite a few people. If the aforementioned is not possible maybe open your law practice in a place that your culture, beliefs, or interests are going to help you connect with the community. For example, if you are a boater and love to be out on the water, maybe you start your law firm in an area where there are a lot of boaters, and you can join clubs or mingle with those that have the same interest. If you are a person that was raised on a farm, maybe you start your law firm in an area where there are several people that represent that type of community. This however is only secondary to opening your practice in an area that you already have established friends, family, and acquaintances. Your hometown or known community gives you a good starting point to talk to those people you already know about your law practice.

FIRST TRIAL

My first trial was on or about 1993. I was about one year or so into my practice. The case was given to me by another large national firm, and they did not want to take the case to trial, believing it would be too difficult to win. I took the case on, a disputed liability case where a car struck a parked snowplow. The first thing I did was meet with several experienced trial lawyers that were just starting out with their practice. These attorneys were experienced having worked at other firms or with the district attorney's office. I found one of these lawyers that had recently opened his own office with years of trial experience that happened to need more cases and because of this he agreed to be co-counsel in the case. There were two people injured in the accident and I represented one party and he represented the other. We still worked on the case together with him handling probably two thirds of the witnesses. I learned more in those 7 or 8 days of trial than I had learned in all of law school and the time clerking at other law firms. I learned the basics of evidence at trial, pitfalls that occur within a trial, how to pick a jury and the nuances of mastering the courtroom. No, I was not the best trail lawyer after that trial, but I had a solid foundation. After that experience I was able to handle a trial with several smaller cases without the help of a mentor. Only after obtaining these valuable experiences was able to handle the larger cases. This experience was invaluable and in my opinion the best way to build your practice.

WHAT THE EXPERTS SAY

I had the opportunity to interview lawyer marketing expert Dimple Dang who is based out of Chicago Illinois. https://player.fm/podcasts/dimple-dang .

Frederick Penney: Ms. Dang, tell me a little about yourself and about your expertise in helping law firms build their brand.

Dimple Dang: I have been in marketing for over twenty years, starting first in yellow pages, selling google pay per click, then writing articles for attorneys that appeared in lawyer magazines. I have a podcast where I talk about all things marketing and especially the latest trends in social media including Instagram, Tik Tok, LinkedIn, Clubhouse, and other marketing outlets. I am good at looking at a law firm and assessing what would be the best strategy to build their clientele within their budget.

Frederick Penney: What marketing advice would you give a lawyer that is just striking out on their own as a sole practitioner?

Dimple Dang: That is a great question. When first starting out you need to focus on a short-term marketing strategy but then incorporate your short-term business strategy with your long-term strategy. This is what I mean. A short-term business strategy would be advertising on Google with pay per click, this helps you bring in leads immediately. Simultaneously, you work on your long-term strategy which would consist of creating a good website, creating blog posts, getting someone that knows how to help with search engine optimization, social media, and other online strategic focus. However, one of the most important things to do is be consistent in weekly or bi-weekly blog posts and building your website with as many pages as possible. A professional marketing and website individual would be able to help a new firm get going this. Remember when building a website Google is going to look at the different websites and if a law firm has 100 pages of relevant content on its site the algorithm will generally choose that website over a law firm that only has a 20-page website. This is a very brief overview.

Frederick Penney: Once your law firm is established and you are doing quite well, how does a firm increase their marketing reach?

Dimple Dang: Once you are established you need to continue to push your personal brand. This is an ongoing process to continue to get you and your law firms name out into the public. There are so many ways of doing this, the list is exhaustive. However, it is important to focus on yourself as the founder or sole practitioner and the publicity will naturally follow or flow to your law firm. This is a never-ending process. There are so many platforms that you can build your brand including Instagram, Facebook, Tik Tok, LinkedIn, Clubhouse, and many others. I believe you need to have an Instagram account and get proficient in posting reels which are short videos. This is the latest trend. You can also put that same content on YouTube or Facebook. Make sure your Reels are relevant to your industry and interesting so your followers and those who see the post do not lose interest. Use Instagram live to tell your followers about who you are and what you do. Make sure you relate to your audience and let them get to know you in a little more personal way. I know it sounds like a lot and it is, but you can manage it with the help of professionals.

GO AND DO IT NOW

Now that you have a good idea how to get started with your own law practice, you need to weigh the pros and cons of working for someone else or going out on your own. When you do decide to go out on your own do not look back, push forward with a conviction that you can succeed. You will fall and make mistakes but get back up and keep pushing. Sometimes it is scary and a sacrifice to start your own law firm. It does cost money and you may have to sacrifice a few things in life to get started, but there is usually no better time to start your own law firm than now.

SOURCE Penney and Associates

Related Links

https://www.penneylawyers.com


"We are proud to have Jessica join our board of directors," says Patricia (Patti) A. Husic, President and CEO of Centric Bank and Centric Financial Corporation. "She brings a strong history of corporate governance, financial acumen, and risk oversight to our directorship. Jessica's leadership in the construction industry and prior publicly traded bank board experience are valuable assets, and her passion for 'building to improve lives' is evident not only in the built environment but in her non-profit work too."

As one of Pennsylvania's Best 50 Women in Business and a Woman Owned Business of the Year by the SBA, Meyers is highly regarded as a leader, entrepreneur, philanthropist, and voice for the next generation of women in business. In 2003, she founded JEM Group, central Pennsylvania's only woman-owned commercial construction company. In the years since, she has grown the firm into one of the largest and most respected commercial construction companies in the Commonwealth. A Penn State University alumnus and a resident of the Harrisburg, PA, region for 30+ years, Meyers knows first-hand the needs of small business owners, women business owners, and entrepreneurs.

"Board diversity is critical to the long-term success of Centric Financial Corporation and welcoming Jessica Meyers to our directors' team will further strengthen our leadership impact," says Donald E. Enders, Jr., Chairman of the Board.

"It is with great pride that I accept the role and responsibility as a board member of Centric Financial Corporation," says Meyers. "Balancing enterprise risks and opportunities and managing a growing company provide a strong complement to Centric's culture. Patti Husic and her team have led JEM Group through several growth cycles, and I am confident that my women-owned business experiences will enhance Centric's reputation as a community-centered bank where the lending and decision making remain local and independent."



Meyers serves on the boards of The Salvation Army Harrisburg Capital City Region, YWCA of Greater Harrisburg, as board chair of AAA Central PA, co-chair of Top Taste with the Central Pennsylvania Food Bank, and is a former trustee for Harrisburg University.

ABOUT CENTRIC FINANCIAL CORPORATION AND CENTRIC BANK

An American Banker 2020, 2019, and 2018 Best Banks to Work For, three-time American Banker Most Powerful Women in Banking Top Team, three-time Best Places to Work, and Top 50 Fastest-Growing Companies for seven years, Centric Bank is headquartered in south central Pennsylvania with assets of $1.1 billion and remains a leader in organic loan growth. A locally owned, locally loaned community bank, Centric Bank provides highly competitive and pro-growth financial services to businesses, professionals, individuals, families, and to the health care and dental industries with the Doctor Centric Bank Division. Centric Bank was named an American Banker Top 200 Community Banks in the U.S. in 2021, 2020, and 2019.

Founded in 2007, Pennsylvania-based Centric Bank has financial centers located in Harrisburg, Hershey, Mechanicsburg, Camp Hill, Doylestown, Devon, and Lancaster, as well as a loan production office in Devon and an Operations and Executive Office campus in Hampden Township, Cumberland County. To learn more about Centric Bank, call 717.657.7727 or visit CentricBank.com. Connect with them on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram. #FinancialLifeline #WeRevolveAroundYou.



Centric Financial Corporation is traded over the counter (OTC-Pink) with the ticker symbol CFCX.

Contact: Anne Deeter Gallaher

Tel. 717.580.4856

[email protected]

SOURCE Centric Financial Corporation

Related Links

http://www.centricbank.com


COLUMBUS, Ga., June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Aflac , a leading provider of supplemental insurance products in the United States, is recognized as a 2021 Civic 50 honoree by Points of Light, the world's largest organization dedicated to volunteer service. For the fourth consecutive year, the insurer was named to the coveted list as one of the 50 Most Community-Minded Companies in America for its leadership and community focus through a year marked by social change and a pandemic-exacerbated environment. Points of Light announced the 2021 list during a digital celebration earlier this week.

"Aflac's mission is to care for our policyholders, employees and stakeholders so they can take care of what matters most to them. So we are proud of the culture of compassion we have created, particularly through an extremely challenging year in 2020," said Aflac U.S. President Teresa White. "It is an exceptional honor to be recognized among the top civic-minded companies in the nation, as it's a testament to our philosophy that doing good is good business  from growing our philanthropic impact with innovations like My Special Aflac Duck to continuing our long-standing commitment to implementing sustainable practices and prioritizing diversity, equity and inclusion in the workplace."

Aflac's bedrock of good corporate responsibility proved more important than ever in 2020, as the pandemic and social unrest in the U.S. compelled business leaders to activate business continuity protocols and exposed corporate culture and its corporate social responsibility footprint under a microscope. A leader in the fight for social justice for more than 65 years, the insurer boasts nearly 50% minority and 65% women in its workforce. In fact, in a recent company survey, 91% of employees stated that Aflac has created an environment where people with diverse backgrounds can succeed. The company also had a 15-point spike in the Human Rights Campaign Foundation's 2021 Corporate Equality Index score with its support of the Georgia Hate Crimes Bill and the Business Roundtable. Additionally, Aflac's board of directors is 64% ethnic minorities/women, which includes African American representation on the board since the 1990s.

The company's legacy of doing the right thing extends beyond its corporate walls or boardroom. This year, Aflac Global Investments, the asset management subsidiary of Aflac Incorporated, partnered with Sound Point Capital Management, LP, to fund an initial $1.5 billion real estate loan portfolio with $500 million aimed at accelerating development for communities in need and supporting economic empowerment.

In 2020, 50% of Aflac's philanthropic expenditures were earmarked toward minority causes, including $1.5 million to the Aflac Cancer and Blood Disorders Center's sickle cell disease program and a $25 million investment in the Black Economic Development Fund. In addition, the company spent approximately $39 million with diverse suppliers, a 58% increase from the previous year.

Aflac also donated more than $11 million to organizations that provide PPEs and other safety equipment to first responders battling the COVID-19 crisis as well as to organizations that focus on mental and emotional health issues for those on the front lines.

Lastly, in 2020, Aflac employees volunteered nearly 18,000 hours and gave $400,000 to the Aflac Cancer and Blood Disorders Center of Children's Healthcare of Atlanta, including Aflac's independent sales agents, who donated nearly $6.7 million from commission checks. Since 1995, Aflac has contributed more than $152 million to the Aflac Cancer Center, with $6 million of this amount designated to its sickle cell disease program  annually caring for nearly 2,500 children with cancer and more than 4,800 children with sickle cell disease, hemophilia and other blood disorders in the U.S.

"Points of Light believes that corporate leadership and commitment to civic engagement are critical to strengthening communities," said Points of Light President and CEO Natalye Paquin. "We thank Aflac for their investment in the communities where they live and work and look forward to supporting them in leveraging their time, talent and assets to make transformational change."

The Civic 50 was launched in 2012, providing a roadmap for good corporate citizenship and showcasing how committed companies are moving social impact, civic engagement and community to the center of their business. The Civic 50 survey is administered by True Impact, a company specializing in helping organizations maximize and measure social and business value. The survey instrument consists of quantitative and multiple-choice questions that inform the Civic 50 scoring process. According to Points of Light, the Civic 50 is the only survey and ranking system that exclusively measures corporate involvement in communities.

To learn more about the Civic 50 survey and the 2021 honorees, please visit www.Civic50.org.

Visit esg.aflac.com for more information about Aflac's commitment to environmental, social and governance (ESG) efforts.

About Aflac Incorporated

Aflac Incorporated (NYSE: AFL) is a Fortune 500 company helping provide protection to more than 50 million people through its subsidiaries in Japan and the U.S., where it is a leading supplemental insurer, by paying cash fast when policyholders get sick or injured. For more than six decades, insurance policies of Aflac Incorporated's subsidiaries have given policyholders the opportunity to focus on recovery, not financial stress. Aflac Life Insurance Japan is the leading provider of medical and cancer insurance in Japan, where it insures 1 in 4 households. For 15 consecutive years, Aflac Incorporated has been recognized by Ethisphere as one of the World's Most Ethical Companies. In 2021, Fortune included Aflac Incorporated on its list of World's Most Admired Companies for the 20th time, and Bloomberg added Aflac Incorporated to its Gender-Equality Index, which tracks the financial performance of public companies committed to supporting gender equality through policy development, representation and transparency, for the second consecutive year. To find out how to get help with expenses health insurance doesn't cover, get to know us at Aflac.com or Aflac.com/Espanol .

About Points of Light

Points of Light is a global nonprofit organization that inspires, equips and mobilizes millions of people to take action that changes the world. We envision a world in which every individual discovers the power to make a difference, creating healthy communities in vibrant, participatory societies. Through affiliates in 250 cities across 37 countries, and in partnership with thousands of nonprofits and corporations, Points of Light engages 5 million volunteers in 14 million hours of service each year. We bring the power of people to bear where it's needed most. For more information, visit: www.pointsoflight.org .

Media contact  Jon A. Sullivan, 706.763.4813 or [email protected]

Analyst and investor contact  David A. Young, 706.596.3264, 800.235.2667 or [email protected]

SOURCE Aflac Incorporated

Related Links

Aflac.com


ComputeCoin is the incentive layer built onto Pekka, a geo-distributed computing platform designed to remedy the cloud industry's major pain pointssuch as escalating costs and data privacy problems. The utility token enables the Pekka community to share computing power and mine cryptocurrencies while establishing trust in the network through a novel consensus algorithm, known as "Proof of Honesty" (PoH).

The project is poised to push the boundaries of distributed cloud computing by propelling the industry into a new era defined by community governance, transparency and trust.

ComputeCoin's patented consensus algorithm  PoH  makes the sharing economy business model sustainable in the cloud-services sector. It solves the "verifiable computing problem," a dilemma that stumped the computing field for decades.

Previously, users of distributed cloud networks had no way of validating the results of outsourced computing tasks. PoH provides users with an unfailing method to assess the validity of computation outcomes.

The decentralized cloud computing ecosystem hosts a global community of businesses (SMEs); computing power providers, including individuals and data centers alike; miners; and developers. Smaller enterprises that need robust cloud computing services at a more affordable rate than AWS, Google or Azure can use ComputeCoins to rent computing power from providers around the world.

Providers, in turn, earn ComputeCoins just by listing their computer(s) on the marketplace. They can earn more rewards the longer their machine(s) stay listed and the more power they contribute to the marketplace. They'll also receive ComputeCoins for every computing task executed by their machine(s).

Computing power providers and miners can use their machine(s) to simultaneously mine multiple cryptocurrencies, including ComputeCoin. Normally, a single computer can mine only one cryptocurrency at a time.

Finally, developers can earn ComputeCoin by adding to the richness of Pekka's cloud services, which range from 3D rendering to machine learning and more.

ComputeCoin is currently raising capital in a private placement.

SOURCE ComputeCoin
SAN FRANCISCO, June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- diaTribe Change applauds the Supreme Court's ruling in California v. Texas upholding the Affordable Care Act. The decision ensures that millions of people living with diabetes and prediabetes in the US will continue to receive the care they need and deserve.

The Supreme Court on Thursday voted 7-2 in favor of upholding the ACA, with Justice Samuel Alito and Justice Neil Gorsuch dissenting.

Kelly Close, founder of The diaTribe Foundation, said, "The ACA allows many people with diabetes and millions of other Americans to receive the care they need, care that enables people to use technology and therapies that help them live healthy and happy lives."

The ACA helps people with diabetes in particular by outlawing discrimination against people with preexisting conditions, expanding healthcare coverage for young adults, and increasing access to free preventive health services. Learn more about how the ACA benefits people with diabetes here.

"We hope this ruling clears the way for health policy that makes even deeper improvements in enabling consistent, affordable, easy to access care for all Americans," said Kelly, a longtime diabetes advocate.

At diaTribe Change, we acknowledge that there is still plenty of work to do in improving health care for people with diabetes, regardless of their insurance status. We are committed to changing the course of diabetes so that every person can live happy, healthy, and more hopeful lives. Join us in our work to advocate for people with diabetes here.

About diaTribe Change:

diaTribe Change, an advocacy platform of The diaTribe Foundation, is a platform committed to changing the course of diabetes through advocacy and action. For articles and information, visit us at diaTribeChange.org.

The diaTribe Foundation was founded with a mission to improve the lives of people with diabetes, prediabetes and obesity, and to advocate for action to address this growing public health crisis.

SOURCE diaTribe Change
LOS ANGELES and SEOUL, South Korea, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- POINTek, Inc., a global leader and provider of high performance athermal AWGs, announced launching of new Dual Mode Athermal AWG Multi/Demultiplexer Modules capable of supporting DWDM athermal AWG Multiplexer/Demultiplexer function for 5G fronthaul application and GPON/XGPON for FTTH application.

Figure 1. Hybrid Athermal AWG with a Bulit-in GPON/XGPON Splitter Figure 2. Athermal AWG with an Expansion Port for GPON/XGPON Connectivity

The Hybrid AWG with a Built-in Splitter performs dual functions (hence, dual mode) of purely point-to-point 5G DWDM wireless fronthaul as well as GPON/XGPON/XGSPON point-to-multipoint FTTH (see Figure 1). The Hybrid AWG consists of 5G Wireless Fronthaul 20-CH DWDM Upstream and 20-CH DWDM Downstream ports with a GPON/XGPON Splitter connectivity. The AWG with an Expansion Port performs dual functions of purely point-to-point 5G DWDM wireless fronthaul as well as an expansion port for GPON/XGPON/XGSPON point-to-multipoint FTTH (see Figure 2). The AWG with an Expansion Port consists of 5G Wireless Fronthaul 20-CH DWDM Upstream and 20-CH DWDM Downstream ports with an expansion port to implement GPON/XGPON external Splitter connectivity.

"This new dual mode AWG Multi/Demultiplexer operates with C-band wavelengths and it is basically equipped with a GPON/XGPON expansion port for FTTH upgrade if desired. This expansion port can be connected to a GPON/XGPON/ XGSPON Splitter operating at 1310/1270nm and 1490nm/1577nm for GPON/XGPON(XGSPON) respectively," according to Dr. Donald Yu, CMO of POINTek, operating from Los Angeles, California. Yu explains that the Splitter can be connected to the Expansion port, thereby enabling the Telecom Service providers to manage broadband equipment timely. incrementally, and cost-effectively. "This dual mode AWGs designed for specific market and application targets constitute just-in-time addition to many of our existing athermal AWG products," Yu adds.

POINTek's Athermal AWGs are 100% passive and individually customized for specific markets and applications. Every AWG vendor seeks specific discrimination solutions, but POINTek's optical packaging technique not only enables the company to manufacture all types of customized Athermal AWGs but also allows to escalate its athermalization technology one level high, ideally suited for merging DWDM with GPON/XGPON to affect the dual mode application with a single yet powerful athermal AWG module design.

"Due to the excellent athermal and low insertion loss characteristics, this hybrid AWG family is a perfect solution to support both 5G Wireless Fronthaul and FTTH incrementally and independently," says Dr. T.H. Rhee, CEO of POINTek. "We meet customer's unique operational environment optimally. For example, we can provide this new dual mode athermal AWG for meeting the emerging broadband infrastructure deployments where 5G Wireless fronthaul upgrade is needed in priority or where FTTH with existing GPON or upgrade to XGPON is desired on top of on-going 5G wireless fronthaul infra," Rhee adds.

POINTek's Hybrid Athermal AWG Multi/Demultiplexer solution with either a Built-in Splitter or an Expansion Port for GPON/XGPON Splitter offers a timely and appropriate solution to on-going Broadband Infrastructure upgrade globally.

About POINTek, Inc.

Launched in 2000 with the goal of developing cutting edge Planar Optical Waveguide Technology, POINTek has become a global leader in the following two decades since its establishment, providing top-quality high performance athermal AWGs. POINTek specializes in packaging and manufacturing AAWG based DWDM optical device products. For more information, explore https://pointekinc.com/Dual-Mode-Athermal-AWGs-for-5G for detailed device architecture and features on the POINTek home page, POINTek, Inc. (pointekinc.com).

Media Contact:

Donald Yu

[email protected]

USA +1 (714) 519-4943

SOURCE POINTek Inc.

Related Links

http://pointekinc.com


ATLANTA, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- With the potential for severe weather and heavy rain expected over the weekend, Georgia Power encourages customers to monitor local weather conditions and keep safety first as inclement weather moves across the state. The company is ready to respond to any service interruptions as quickly and safely as possible.

Severe weather can happen anytime across Georgia:

Before a Storm: Know your risks of flooding and tropical storm or hurricane strength winds. Check your emergency kit, unplug major appliances and charge cell phones in case you lose power.

Know your risks of flooding and tropical storm or hurricane strength winds. Check your emergency kit, unplug major appliances and charge cell phones in case you lose power. During a Storm: Have several ways to receive emergency notifications and weather updates. Take safe shelter inside a sturdy building away from windows and doors. Avoid contact with conductors of electricity - appliances, metal objects and water.

Have several ways to receive emergency notifications and weather updates. Take safe shelter inside a sturdy building away from windows and doors. Avoid contact with conductors of electricity - appliances, metal objects and water. After a Storm: Never touch any downed or low-hanging wire, including telephone or TV wires that touch a power line. Never pull tree limbs off power lines or enter areas with debris or downed trees as downed power lines may be buried in wreckage. Additionally, do not walk or drive through standing water or step onto saturated ground where downed lines may be present.

Additional Tools You Can Use:

Outage & Storm Center  Available at www.GeorgiaPower.com/Storm, customers can visit this site to sign up for Outage Alerts, report and check the status of outages, and access useful safety tips and information. Customers can report and check the status of an outage 24 hours a day by contacting Georgia Power at 888-891-0938.

Available at www.GeorgiaPower.com/Storm, customers can visit this site to sign up for Outage Alerts, report and check the status of outages, and access useful safety tips and information. Customers can report and check the status of an outage 24 hours a day by contacting Georgia Power at 888-891-0938. Outage Map  Housed within the Outage & Storm Center, Georgia Power's interactive Outage Map provides near real-time information, allowing users to see where outages are occurring across the state and track estimated restoration times.

Housed within the Outage & Storm Center, Georgia Power's interactive Outage Map provides near real-time information, allowing users to see where outages are occurring across the state and track estimated restoration times. Georgia Power Mobile App  Download the Georgia Power mobile app for Apple and Android devices to access storm and outage information on the go.

Download the Georgia Power mobile app for Apple and Android devices to access storm and outage information on the go. Outage Alerts  Subscribe to the free Georgia Power Outage Alert service to receive personalized notifications and updates via text message.

Infrastructure Investment  Reliability and Resiliency

The company continually invests in infrastructure to increase the day-to-day reliability of its systems and shorten outage and repair time. The company's use of Smart Grid technology and increased automation in recent years mean an increased ability to more quickly isolate outages that do occur to smaller numbers of customers and reroute power remotely for improved reliability.

In addition, Georgia Power's operational plans, systems, infrastructure and generating plants are all designed to enhance the resiliency of the network to best withstand major occurrences, such as severe weather events, including tornadoes, hurricanes and extreme heat or cold. Resiliency investments include upgrading transmission and distribution infrastructure across the power grid, including making power lines more durable.

About Georgia Power

Georgia Power is the largest electric subsidiary of Southern Company (NYSE: SO), America's premier energy company. Value, Reliability, Customer Service and Stewardship are the cornerstones of the company's promise to 2.6 million customers in all but four of Georgia's 159 counties. Committed to delivering clean, safe, reliable and affordable energy at rates below the national average, Georgia Power maintains a diverse, innovative generation mix that includes nuclear, coal and natural gas, as well as renewables such as solar, hydroelectric and wind. Georgia Power focuses on delivering world-class service to its customers every day and the company is recognized by J.D. Power as an industry leader in customer satisfaction. For more information, visit www.GeorgiaPower.com and connect with the company on Facebook (Facebook.com/GeorgiaPower), Twitter (Twitter.com/GeorgiaPower) and Instagram (Instagram.com/ga_power).

SOURCE Georgia Power

Related Links

http://www.georgiapower.com


HUNTINGTON BEACH, Calif., June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Beacon Healthcare Systems restarted live conferences by hosting its Leadership Summit, June 4-6, in Scottsdale, Arizona. The event featured a stellar line-up of health insurance regulatory and compliance experts to discuss and forecast the direction Medicare and Medicaid will take under the new administration.

The agenda explored CMS directional changes specific to Medicare, Medicaid, and SNPs; how to maintain a 5-Star Rating; and new reporting requirements for social determinants of Health (SDoH) activities. Highly regarded industry experts punctuated the agenda, including Anne Crawford (ATTAC Consulting Group), Jennifer Young (Rebellis Group), Karen Connolly (KW Connolly & Associates), and John Tanner, Beacon's Chief Compliance Officer.

At a Lunch and Learn, Beacon showcased its payer regulatory and compliance modules and their impact on audits, reporting, and timeliness. The presentation illustrated how these solutions will support the latest CMS direction. Solutions covered included: Enrollment Manager, Universe Scrubber, and Supplemental Benefits in addition to Beacon's flagship Virtual Compliance Manager and Virtual Appeals Manager modules.

"We were thrilled to participate in this event as we are ready to get back to conferences," said Jennifer Young from Rebellis Group. "Sharing the new D-SNP compliance and A&G processes with other conference experts and attendees and talking about potential ramifications of non-compliance validated that health plans will have a challenging time getting these new requirements implemented."

"Virtual events are nice, but it's so much better for discussion when we can come together in person," said Ken Stockman, chief executive officer of Beacon. "We decided it was time, so we made the investment, but also understood that not all businesses have opened up travel, so we made it a hybrid event to meet everyone's needs. The feedback on the content and format has been excellent."

Twenty health plans and healthcare organizations participated in the Leadership Summit either on site or virtually.

About Beacon Healthcare Systems. Beacon Healthcare Systems streamlines the business of healthcare through reliable innovative technology delivered by industry experts. With a focus on appeals, grievances, compliance, enrollment, supplemental benefits, and analytics, Beacon HCS is the first place health plans turn when they are looking for a trusted, experienced partner who can help them reduce costs, grow revenue and achieve their strategic goals. Founded in 2011, Beacon HCS is a privately held California-based company with a technology center located in Austin, Texas. beaconhcs.com. Beacon is hiring!



Photo(s):

https://www.prlog.org/12874109

Press release distributed by PRLog

SOURCE Beacon Healthcare Systems
SAN FRANCISCO and SUZHOU, China, June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Innovent Biologics, Inc. ("Innovent", HKEX: 01801), a world-class biopharmaceutical company that develops, manufactures and commercializes high-quality medicines for the treatment of cancer, metabolic, autoimmune and other major diseases, announced that the first patient has been dosed in a Phase II basket trial of taletrectinib for solid tumors containing NTRK fusion (NCT04617054).

In June 2021, Innovent entered an exclusive agreement with AnHeart Therapeutics Co., Ltd. ("AnHeart"), a clinical stage oncology company focused on underserved patients in global markets, under which Innovent obtained exclusive rights to co-develop and commercialize taletrectinib in Greater China.

Dr. Hui Zhou, Senior Vice President of Clinical Development, Innovent Biologics, stated, "Many patients with rare conditions, like NTRK fusion-positive cancer have limited treatment options and poor access to targeted therapies. We are very pleased to see that our partner AnHeart is advancing the phase II trial of taletrectinib in NTRK fusion driven solid tumors. We will work closely with AnHeart to bring taletrectinib to patients in Greater China."

"Building upon the promising preliminary results in the Phase II trials for non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with ROS1 fusions, we are moving forward with the Phase II trial of taletrectinib for NTRK fusion-driven solid tumors," said Bing Yan, MD, Co-founder and Chief Medical Officer of AnHeart. "We plan to enroll approximately 40 patients in this open-label, single-arm, multi-center Phase II study in China."

About Taletrectinib

Taletrectinib is an investigational next-generation tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI) designed to effectively target ROS1 and NTRK fusion mutations with potential to treat TKI-naive or pre-treated patients. ROS1 rearrangement is estimated to be an oncogenic driver in approximately 2 to 3 percent of patients with advanced NSCLC, and NTRK rearrangement is estimated to be an oncogenic driver in approximately 0.5 percent of patients with other advanced solid tumors. More information about the ongoing TRUST (Taletrectinib ROS1 LUng STudy) trial and the basket trial in NTRK fusion positive solid tumors of taletrectinib may be found by searching clinical trial identifiers NCT04395677 and NCT04617054, respectively at https://clinicaltrials.gov.

On 1 June 2021, Innovent and Anheart announced an exclusive license agreement for the co-development and commercialization of AnHeart's lead drug candidate, taletrectinib  a next-generation tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI) designed to effectively target ROS1 and NTRK - in Greater China, including mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan.

About Innovent

Inspired by the spirit of "Start with Integrity, Succeed through Action," Innovent's mission is to develop, manufacture and commercialize high-quality biopharmaceutical products that are affordable to ordinary people. Established in 2011, Innovent is committed to developing, manufacturing and commercializing high quality innovative medicines for the treatment of cancer, autoimmune, metabolic diseases, and other major therapeutic areas. On October 31, 2018, Innovent was listed on the Main Board of the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong Limited with the stock code: 01801.HK.

Since its inception, Innovent has developed a fully integrated multi-functional platform which includes R&D, CMC (Chemistry, Manufacturing, and Controls), clinical development and commercialization capabilities. By leveraging this platform, the company has built a robust pipeline of 24 valuable assets in major therapeutic areas, with 4 products officially approved for marketing in China - TYVYT (sintilimab injection), BYVASDA (bevacizumab biosimilar injection), SULINNO (adalimumab biosimilar injection) and HALPRYZA (rituximab biosimilar injection), one Biologics License Application (BLA) submission for sintilimab accepted by the U.S. FDA, six assets in Phase 3 or pivotal clinical trials, and 14 more molecules in clinical trials. TYVYT (sintilimab injection) was included in the National Reimbursement Drug List (NRDL) in 2019 as the historically first PD-1 inhibitor entering in NRDL and the only PD-1 included in the list in that year.

Innovent has built an international team of advanced talented professionals in high-end biopharmaceutical development and commercialization, including many overseas experts. The company has also entered into strategic collaborations with Eli Lilly and Company, Adimab, Incyte, MD Anderson Cancer Center, Hanmi and other international partners. Innovent strives to work with all relevant parties to help advance China's biopharmaceutical industry, improve drug availability to ordinary people and enhance the quality of the patients' lives. For more information, please visit: www.innoventbio.com.

About Anheart

AnHeart Therapeutics Co., Ltd. ("AnHeart") is a clinical stage biopharmaceutical company developing novel oncology therapies. AnHeart is headquartered in Hangzhou, China with offices in Beijing, Shanghai and has a subsidiary AnHeart Therapeutics Inc. in New York. Led by a management team with a successful track record of clinical development, AnHeart is developing three clinical stage oncology programs globally.

Innovent Forward-Looking Statements

This news release may contain certain forward-looking statements that are, by their nature, subject to significant risks and uncertainties. The words "anticipate", "believe", "estimate", "expect", "intend" and similar expressions, as they relate to the Company, are intended to identify certain of such forward-looking statements. The Company does not intend to update these forward-looking statements regularly.

These forward-looking statements are based on the existing beliefs, assumptions, expectations, estimates, projections and understandings of the management of the Company with respect to future events at the time these statements are made. These statements are not a guarantee of future developments and are subject to risks, uncertainties and other factors, some of which are beyond the Company's control and are difficult to predict. Consequently, actual results may differ materially from information contained in the forward-looking statements as a result of future changes or developments in our business, the Company's competitive environment and political, economic, legal and social conditions.

The Company, the Directors and the employees of the Company assume (a) no obligation to correct or update the forward-looking statements contained in this site; and (b) no liability in the event that any of the forward-looking statements does not materialise or turn out to be incorrect.

AnHeart Forward-Looking Statements

Statements contained in this press release regarding matters that are not historical facts are "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such statements are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties, and other factors that may cause our or our industry's actual results, levels of activity, performance, or achievements to be materially different from those anticipated by such statements. In some cases, you can identify forward-looking statements by terminology such as "may," "will," "should," "expects," "plans," "anticipates," "believes," "estimates," "predicts," "potential," "intends," or "continue," or the negative of these terms or other comparable terminology. Forward-looking statements contained in this presentation include, but are not limited to, (i) statements regarding the timing of anticipated clinical trials for our product candidates and our research and development programs; (ii) the timing of receipt of clinical data for our product candidates; (iii) our expectations regarding the potential safety, efficacy, or clinical utility of our product candidates; (iv) the size of patient populations targeted by our product candidates and market adoption of our product candidates by physicians and patients; and (v) the timing or likelihood of regulatory filings and approvals. Except as required by law, we assume no obligation to update these forward-looking statements publicly, or to update the reasons why actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in the forward-looking statements, even if new information becomes available in the future. This Presentation discusses product candidates that are under clinical study and which have not yet been approved for marketing by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration or regulatory agencies in other countries. No representation is made as to the safety or effectiveness of these product candidates for the use for which such product candidates are being studied.

SOURCE Innovent Biologics
BELLEVUE, Wash., June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Merna Elaggar is being recognized by Continental Who's Who as a Top Broker for her exemplary contributions in the real estate industry and her professional excellence at Merna Elaggar & Windermere Real Estate.

Merna Elaggar recognized by Continental Who's Who

Having led impressive careers in architecture and interior design, Mrs. Elaggar demonstrates an innate ability to help you truly make a house a home. She readily draws up designs to help buyers make their visions a reality and to help sellers attract the right audience of potential buyers. Additionally, she guides you through the market and will counsel you through the process of design, like paint colors or furniture arrangements, to help you maximize your new investment. Mrs. Elagger is truly passionate about helping clients achieve their goals and is determined to do so at Windermere Real Estate in Bellevue. She specializes in the Medina, Bellevue, Kirkland, Sammamish, Bothell, Mill Creek, Everett, and Maple Valley areas.

In light of her academic achievements, Mrs. Elaggar received a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Interior Design in 2010. She then became a Certified Negotiation Expert and a Luxury Marketing Specialist by the National Association of Realtors.



As a testament to her professional excellence, Mrs. Elaggar's commitment to client satisfaction has led her to receive numerous industry awards and accolades. She was honored with the Rising Star Real Estate Agent Award by 5 Star Professional in 2018 and 2019. She was named 10 Best Real Estate Agents in Washington State in 2019 by the American Institute of Real Estate Professionals. She is also listed as Top 15 Bellevue Real Estate Broker on Social Media in 2017 and in Who's Who in America in 2019. Mrs. Elaggar was also named by Home Snap Top 15% of Production in the Nation.



Born and raised in Egypt, Mrs. Elaggar speaks three languages. She enjoys traveling in her free time and is always on the lookout for the world's best roller coaster.



Mrs. Elaggar dedicates this honorable recognition to her husband Mina Abouseif, of 14 years. She lives with her husband and two daughters in Sammamish.



To learn more, please visit www.mernarealestate.com



Contact: Katherine Green, 516-825-5634, [email protected]

SOURCE Continental Who's Who

Related Links

http://www.continentalwhoswho.com


SINGAPORE, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Nuevocor, a preclinical-stage biotech company specializing in gene therapy for cardiomyopathies, has announced the completion of an oversubscribed $24 million Series A financing round. The round was co-led by EVX Ventures and Boehringer Ingelheim Venture Fund (BIVF), with EDBI, Xora Innovation, SEEDS Capital and other investors joining the syndicate.

The funds will be used to accelerate the preclinical development of its lead programme, an adeno-associated virus (AAV)  based gene therapy for patients suffering from dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) due to mutations in the lamin A/C (LMNA) gene. The company also plans to address other untreatable cardiomyopathies using their novel target discovery platform.

Nuevocor's founding CEO, Dr Yann Chong Tan stated: "We are delighted to have this strong group of investors join us in developing gene therapy-based treatments that have the potential to restore cardiac function in diseased hearts. The current standard of care for dilated cardiomyopathy only serves to delay disease progression, and the only cure is to have a heart transplant. At Nuevocor, we hope to give patients a new lease of life through our technology."

XQ Lin, Chairman of EVX Ventures, commented, "We are thrilled to co-lead Nuevocor's Series A round alongside other top tier investors. Nuevocor is the latest company to emerge from our venture creation ecosystem. We look forward to supporting Nuevocor's path towards the clinic and bringing new medicines to patients in need."

"Nuevocor is trying to apply a very innovative and challenging approach using gene therapy for the treatment of genetically-driven, dilated cardiomyopathies. We are excited to see that the company is exploiting the potential of genetic suppressors to change the course of these diseases and hopefully to significantly extend the life span and improve the life quality of DCM patients," said Dr. Weiyi Zhang, Managing Director of BIVF Asia.

Headquartered in Singapore, Nuevocor is a privately held preclinical-stage biopharmaceutical company focused on developing AAV gene therapy for the treatment of genetically defined cardiac diseases with high unmet need. Nuevocor's lead program, lamin A/C dilated cardiomyopathy (LMNA DCM) gene therapy is based on decades of research into fundamental mechanisms underlying LMNA-associated disease enabled by development of novel technologies on the part of scientific co-founders Colin Stewart and Brian Burke of the Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR). Together with AAV gene therapy and cardiac disease modelling expertise of scientific co-founders Mark Kay from Stanford University and Jianming Jiang from the National University of Singapore respectively, Nuevocor is well-positioned to treat LMNA and other genetic cardiomyopathies, amongst other cardiac diseases.

"Singapore has made long-term R&D investments to drive health outcomes and economic growth, and to build the local biotech ecosystem. A*STAR is proud to have supported our spin-off Nuevocor in translating excellent science from bench to bedside so they can develop more effective gene therapies for hard-to-treat cardiac diseases, for better patient outcomes," said Professor Ng Huck Hui, Assistant Chief Executive, Biomedical Research Council, A*STAR.

About LMNA dilated cardiomyopathy

LMNA mutations are the #2 cause of familial DCM, affecting approximately 60,000 people in the US and EU alone. The mutation confers amongst the worst prognosis of all DCM, with increased risk of arrhythmogenic DCM and sudden cardiac death. Being an autosomal dominant disease characterized by gain-of-function of the mutant Lmna protein, conventional gene replacement therapies would be ineffective for LMNA DCM. Nuevocor's innovative approach to gene therapy circumvents this roadblock.

About EVX Ventures

EVX Ventures is a global VC that builds, incubates, and invests in biotech companies. With a focus on disruptive therapeutics platform technologies and novel therapeutic modalities, they invest in global technologies to redefine the therapeutics of tomorrow. Learn more at www.evx.ventures

About Boehringer Ingelheim Venture Fund

Created in 2010, the Boehringer Ingelheim Venture Fund GmbH (BIVF) invests in groundbreaking therapeutics-focused biotechnology companies to drive innovation in biomedical research. BIVF is searching for significant enhancements in patient care through pioneering science and its clinical translation by building long-term relationships with scientists and entrepreneurs. BIVF's focus is to target unprecedented therapeutic concepts addressing high medical needs in immuno-oncology, regenerative medicine, infectious diseases and digital health. For more information, visit www.boehringer-ingelheim-venture.com.

Contact:

[email protected]

SOURCE Nuevocor
VANCOUVER, BC, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ - Numinus Wellness Inc. ("Numinus" or the "Company") (TSXV: NUMI), a mental health care company advancing innovative treatments and safe, evidence-based psychedelic-assisted therapies, is pleased to announce that it has received approval to graduate to Tier 1 Issuer status on the TSX Venture Exchange (the "TSXV"), effective June 18, 2021.

By qualifying for up-listing to the TSXV's top tier under the Life Sciences industry segment, Numinus will benefit from improved service standards, reduced compliance obligations and increased access to institutional investors.

"This up-listing is another indication that Numinus has effectively advanced its healthcare strategy, met its business objectives and built a rapidly scalable growth platform to lead the emerging sector of psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy," said Payton Nyquvest, President, CEO and Chair, Numinus. "Going forward, we expect to achieve near-term catalysts across our business including clinic acquisitions, new intellectual property, MDMA and psilocybin compassionate access trials, in-clinic ketamine-assisted therapy and further up-listings in the US and Canada. All of this is aimed at creating shareholder value, and supporting our ambition to help as many people as possible heal and be well."

The TSXV classifies listed issuers into different tiers based on standards including historical financial performance, stage of development and financial resources. Tier 1 is the TSXV's premier tier and is reserved for the TSXV's most advanced issuers with the most significant financial resources.

About Numinus

Numinus Wellness (TSX-V: NUMI) helps people to heal and be well through the development and delivery of innovative mental health care and access to safe, evidence-based psychedelic-assisted therapies. The Numinus Wellness model - including psychedelic production, research and clinic care - is at the forefront of a transformation aimed at healing rather than managing symptoms for depression, anxiety, trauma, pain and substance abuse. At Numinus, we are leading the integration of psychedelic-assisted therapies into mainstream clinical practice, and building the foundation for a healthier society.

Learn more at numinus.ca , and follow us on Facebook , Twitter , and Instagram .

Forward-Looking Statements

This news release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of applicable securities laws. All statements that are not historical facts, including without limitation, statements regarding future estimates, plans, programs, forecasts, projections, objectives, assumptions, expectations or beliefs of future performance, are "forward-looking statements". 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 statements that certain actions, events or results "may", "could", "would", "might" or "will" be taken, occur or be achieved. Such forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results, events or developments to be materially different from any future results, events or developments expressed or implied by such forward looking statements. Such risks and uncertainties include, among others, dependence on obtaining and maintaining regulatory approvals, including acquiring and renewing federal, provincial, municipal, local or other licences and any inability to obtain all necessary governmental approvals, licences and permits to operate and expand the Company's facilities; regulatory or political change such as changes in applicable laws and regulations, including federal and provincial legalization of psychedelic therapies, due to inconsistent public opinion, perception of the medical-use of psychedelics, delays or inefficiencies or any other reasons; any other factors or developments which may hinder market growth; the Company's limited operating history and lack of historical profits; reliance on management; the Company's requirements for additional financing, and the effect of capital market conditions and other factors on capital availability; competition, including from more established or better financed competitors; the need to secure and maintain corporate alliances and partnerships, including with research and development institutions, customers and suppliers; the development and implementation of medical protocols and treatment standard operating procedures for the use of psychedelic therapies; the Company's goals to develop and implement partnerships with research organizations and other key players in the integrative mental health industry; the Company's ability to successfully withstand the economic impact of COVID-19; the medical benefits, safety, efficacy, dosing and social acceptance of psychedelics; the approval and/or success of compassionate access clinical trials; the cultivation and harvest of Psilocybe mushrooms; and the availability of trained personnel and medical professionals. These factors should be considered carefully, and readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on such forward-looking statements. Although the Company has attempted to identify important risk factors that could cause actual actions, events or results to differ materially from those described in forward-looking statements, there may be other risk factors that cause actions, events or results to differ from those anticipated, estimated or intended. There can be no assurance that forward-looking statements will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in forward-looking statements. The Company has no obligation to update any forward-looking statement, even if new information becomes available as a result of future events, new information or for any other reason except as required by law.

Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

SOURCE Numinus Wellness Inc.

Related Links

https://numinus.ca/


PHILADELPHIA, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- "Lay Down Weapons" is a call by Worshipful Grand Master of Prince Hall Grand Lodge, free and accepted Masons of Pennsylvania, in honor of Juneteenth to all Heads of Houses of Prince Hall Pennsylvania. They will be asked to also participate in a social media campaign to invoke the message: END THE VIOLENCE.

When: 9:30 am. on JUNETEENTH (Saturday, June 19, 2021)

What : Members of the Master Masons and Eastern Stars and their families will circle the grounds of the Grand Lodge 3 times and then enter the grounds where they will witness a reading of a Proclamation read by the Most Worshipful Grand Master Jones that will address many community concerns but leading with Stopping the Violence and calling for all to put down arms and worship life  not violate it.

The Proclamation will also call on all members of Master Masons and Eastern Stars and their loved ones to end every message they post on all social media to include a STOP THE VIOLENCE personal sign off.

Gun locks will be distributed.

Where: Grounds of the Prince Hall Grand Lodge, 4301 North Broad Street, Philadelphia

Who: Most Worshipful Grand Master, the Honorable Donald C. Jones, calling on all Prince Hall Grand Lodge Masters and Eastern Stars to come fully regaled to participate in Juneteenth.

Why: It was on June 19, 1865, when a Union General and his mostly Colored Troops freed the last vestige of slavery in the state of Texas. On June 17, 2021, the President of the United States, Joe Biden, signed the bill calling Juneteenth National Independence Day (June 19] commemorating the end of slavery as a National Holiday.

https://www.princehall-pa.org/

Media Contact: Keith Coleman - 215 606 7484 - [email protected]

SOURCE Prince Hall Grand Masons Lodge
Project showcases technology that stores energy in water underground to compliment renewable energy projects

EDMONTON, Alberta, June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Taking a step towards reliable renewable energy in Alberta, Quidnet Energy and Emissions Reduction Alberta (ERA), with funding from the Government of Alberta, launched an ambitious project to develop an ultra-low-cost, multi-gigawatt (GW) geologic energy storage resource in Alberta, utilizing Quidnet's modular pumped hydro storage technology. This project taps into the tremendous talent of Albertans who will continue to build long-lasting careers in the energy industry.

The Alberta project is a key part of Quidnet's mission to accelerate decarbonization by developing and deploying similar-scaled geologic storage resources in major wholesale electricity markets throughout North America. The project has received $5 million in funding from ERA and will take place at Quidnet's geologic test site in Brooks, AB.

Quidnet's Geomechanical Pumped Storage (GPS) technology stores energy in the form of water compressed between layers of shale and enables renewable energy projects to store excess energy for extended periods of time, to be released when the grid needs power. Quidnet's technology provides balance to the grid and optimizes utilization of transmission infrastructure for delivering renewable generation to load centers for grid decarbonization.

"Alberta is seizing the opportunity to invest in reliable renewable energy projects that will continue to support long-lasting careers in the energy sector. Energy storage solutions like the one developed by Quidnet Energy, store excess energy from renewables in geological formations and dispatch it when demand increases on the power grid. By unleashing further private sector investments in clean energy solutions, Albertans can continue to build careers in this dynamic industry that is helping to grow and diversify our provincial economy."

Jason Nixon, Minister of Environment and Parks, Government of Alberta

"Renewable power resources, such as solar projects, work best when their output can be stored until the grid needs it. Quidnet Energy's modular pumped storage technology provides the long-duration energy storage that can make widespread use of renewable resources reliable and effective. We are proud to be working with visionary partners like Emission Reductions Alberta to demonstrate the ways Quidnet's technology can enable solar and other renewable resources to supply emission-free electricity to Alberta and the electric system across North America."

Joe Zhou, Quidnet Energy CEO

"Quidnet's technology is building on the innovation and technical expertise of Alberta's oil and gas industry to help solve a key challenge with renewable energy: the need for reliable and long-term energy storage. This project is another example of Alberta taking action to develop the solutions the world needs to achieve its emissions reduction goals."

Steve MacDonald, ERA CEO.

"This innovative energy storage project with Quidnet Energyalong with Alberta's other investments in carbon lowering technologies--is establishing the province as an international leader in the energy transition and a beacon for others to follow."

Mike Biddle, Evok Innovations Managing Director and Quidnet Board Member

Quidnet is developing energy storage projects in Texas, Ohio, and New York State, demonstrating GPS technology's cost-efficiency, terrain-variable deployment, and modular, long-duration capabilities. With per-kilowatt installed costs projected at less than 50 percent of batteries and traditional pumped storage, the Quidnet Energy systems can be configured for applications with 10-hours or more of storage duration. The modular design allows it to be scaled to the needs of specific projects and built on a diverse array of terrain.

Because Quidnet's technology is built around subsurface technology and processes, it is seizing the opportunity of the tremendous talent of Alberta's oil and gas workers who will continue to build long-lasting careers in the energy industry.

"Quidnet's GPS technology is a novel form of hydroelectric energy storage. It uses time-tested well-drilling and construction technologies to pump water under pressure into subsurface geologic formations to store energy. When the stored energy is needed, the water is released to drive hydroelectric turbines to power the electric grid," Zhou explained.

With successful completion of the project, Quidnet would look to deploy GPS facilities across the Alberta power grid, including near solar and wind power facilities.

For more information contact: Emissions Reduction Alberta Kevin Duncan 403.431.2859 [email protected]

Quidnet Energy Steven C. Sullivan 518-441-7272 [email protected]



ABOUT EMISSIONS REDUCTION ALBERTA (ERA):

For more than 10 years, ERA has been investing the revenues from the carbon price paid by large final emitters to accelerate the development and adoption of innovative clean technology solutions. Since ERA was established in 2009, they have committed $646 million toward 204 projects worth $4.5 billion that are helping to reduce GHGs, create competitive industries and are leading to new business opportunities in Alberta. These projects are estimated to deliver cumulative reductions of 37.7 million tonnes of COe by 2030. Please visit https://eralberta.ca.

ABOUT QUIDNET ENERGY

Based in Houston, Texas with offices in San Francisco and Saratoga Springs, Quidnet's patented GPS technology utilizes excess renewable energy to store water beneath ground under pressure. When renewable energy is not producing this pressurized water drives hydroelectric turbines producing electricity to support the grid at a fraction of the cost of Li-ion and for much longer duration. Quidnet's technology is an adaptation of centuries-old gravity-powered "pumped storage," but without the massive land requirements and reliance on elevated terrain. Please visit www.quidnetenergy.com.

SOURCE Quidnet Energy

Related Links

http://www.quidnetenergy.com


HAMILTON, Bermuda, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Seadrill Limited ("Seadrill" or the "Company") (OSE: SDRL, OTCPK:SDRLF) and the Issuer announce that, further to the announcement made by Seadrill and the Issuer on June 11, 2021, the Issuer is in advanced discussions with certain holders of the Issuer's 12.0% senior secured notes due 2025 (the "Notes") around a proposed restructuring of the Notes. Further to the announcement on June 11, 2021, this announcement also provides an update on the provisional liquidation process in respect of SeaMex Ltd. ("SeaMex").

Restructuring of the Notes

The Issuer and certain holders of the Notes are in advanced discussions around a comprehensive restructuring of the Notes. The expectation is that a restructuring support agreement documenting key commercial terms will be entered into in the near term, following which Seadrill and the Issuer will publish a further announcement.

In connection with the restructuring discussions, the Issuer and certain holders of the Notes have agreed to further extend the existing forbearance agreement announced on 19 April 2021, and extended on May 17, 2021, May 27, 2021 and June 3, 2021 until the earlier of June 25, 2021 and any termination of the forbearance agreement.

The purpose of the forbearance agreement is to allow the Issuer and its stakeholders time to finalise negotiations in respect of the restructuring, which may involve the use of a court-supervised implementation process, including potentially a pre-packaged or pre-arranged Chapter 11 process, or scheme of arrangement.

SeaMex restructuring

The restructuring discussions described above also include a restructuring proposal in respect of SeaMex, a 50/50 joint venture between one of the Issuer's subsidiaries, Seadrill JU Newco Bermuda Ltd, and an investment fund controlled by Fintech Holdings Limited ("Fintech"). The key terms of this proposal include:

materially deleveraging SeaMex's balance sheet by equitizing all or a significant proportion of the approximately $454 million of subordinated debt owed to subsidiaries of the Issuer; and

of subordinated debt owed to subsidiaries of the Issuer; and injecting short-term liquidity into SeaMex in order to bridge towards a refinancing of SeaMex's senior secured bank debt as part of a comprehensive restructuring of SeaMex's balance sheet; and

Following the execution of a debt trade on June 16, 2021, certain holders of the Notes have agreed to become the owners of all of the SeaMex group's approximately $190 million of senior secured bank debt.

SeaMex provisional liquidator appointment

John C. McKenna of Finance & Risk Services Ltd, and Simon Appell of AlixPartners UK LLP, have today been appointed as joint provisional liquidators in respect of SeaMex by an order of the Supreme Court of Bermuda (the "JPLs"). The JPL appointment was supported by Seadrill, Fintech and the SeaMex board of directors.

The appointment of the JPLs will benefit from funding in order to bridge towards an orderly restructuring of SeaMex's balance sheet for the benefit of all stakeholders, including employees, customers and suppliers.

The restructuring may include, if the JPLs consider it to be consistent with their duties and in the best interests of SeaMex, a sale of SeaMex's subsidiaries to a wholly owned subsidiary of the Issuer in exchange for (i) the release of all or substantially all of the subordinated debt owed to subsidiaries of the Issuer; and (ii) a novation of SeaMex's guarantee of the senior bank debt, to implement the restructuring described above. An independent valuation of the SeaMex group has been obtained and the JPLs intend to conduct an accelerated market testing process in respect of SeaMex, to ensure that any proposed transaction maximises value for creditors as a whole when compared to alternative options that may be capable of implementation. In the absence of a consensual agreement with Fintech on restructuring terms, the proposed restructuring may result in Fintech ceasing to have an equity interest in the go-forward SeaMex group.

The proposed SeaMex restructuring and JPL appointment is only at the SeaMex holding company level and will not impact the operational activities of the business. There will similarly be no impact to employees, customers or suppliers.

The Issuer intends to continue to engage in a constructive dialogue with SeaMex's key customer, Pemex Exploracion y Produccion ("Pemex") in relation to the recovery of historic unpaid invoices (including approximately $245 million which have been issued but remain unpaid (Copades)), and potential amendments to the terms of SeaMex's contracts with Pemex. In the meantime, the Issuer is taking steps to seek consents from the Noteholders to obtain access to funds in the Issuer's mandatory offer holding account to ensure the SeaMex group has continued access to funding.

About Seadrill

Seadrill is a leading offshore drilling contractor utilizing advanced technology to unlock oil and gas resources for clients across harsh and benign locations across the globe. Seadrill's high quality, technologically advanced fleet spans all asset classes allowing its experienced crews to conduct its operations from shallow to ultra-deep-water environments. The company operates 43 rigs, which includes drillships, jack-ups and semi-submersibles.

Seadrill is listed on the Oslo Brs and OTC Pink markets. For more information, visit https://www.seadrill.com/ .

FORWARD LOOKING STATEMENTS

This news release includes forward looking statements. Such statements are generally not historical in nature, and specifically include statements about the Company's plans, strategies, business prospects, changes and trends in its business, the markets in which it operates and its restructuring efforts. These statements are made based upon management's current plans, expectations, assumptions and beliefs concerning future events impacting the Company and therefore involve a number of risks, uncertainties and assumptions that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied in the forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date of this news release. Consequently, no forward-looking statement can be guaranteed. When considering these forward-looking statements, you should keep in mind the risks described from time to time in the Company's regulatory filings and periodical reporting. The Company undertakes no obligation to update any forward looking statements to reflect events or circumstances after the date on which such statement is made or to reflect the occurrence of unanticipated events. New factors emerge from time to time, and it is not possible for the Company to predict all of these factors. Further, the Company cannot assess the impact of each such factor on its business or the extent to which any factor, or combination of factors, may cause actual results to be materially different from those contained in any forward looking statement.

This information is subject to the disclosure requirements pursuant to section 5-12 of the Norwegian Securities Trading Act.

CONTACT:

[email protected]

020 3745 4960

This information was brought to you by Cision http://news.cision.com

SOURCE Seadrill Limited
JACKSONVILLE, Fla., June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Nationally syndicated radio talk show host Mark Kaye painted a portrait of President Donald Trump during his live radio show. The painting was inspired by President Joe Biden's son Hunter revealing that he has changed careers once again and is becoming a professional artist.

Painting that is better than Hunter Biden's Mark Kaye painting live during his syndicated radio show

"When we reported that Hunter Biden was painting full time, we laughed," explains Kaye. "But when we heard that art dealers were prepared to offer $500,000 to $1,000,000 for an original Hunter Biden painting, we cried. That's when we decided that if a talentless ne'er-do-well like Hunter Biden could get millions of dollars for his paintings, so could we!"

Mark Kaye didn't create the portrait alone. He crowdsourced ideas from his listeners all around the world.

"We took live phone calls from our fans and asked them what we should paint," explains Kaye. "If they asked for it, we painted it. That's how we ended up with our portrait of President Donald Trump. He's a fan favorite to say the least."

In addition to President Trump, listeners to the show suggested Kaye paint a wall, a pickle, a pink flamingo, and a bat smoking a cigarette.

"The bat," says Kaye, "is symbolic of the Covid-19 pandemic which was originally linked to the infamous flying rodent. The cigarette dangling out of his mouth is an homage to Hunter Biden himself."

Kaye's portrait is currently for sale via online auction at BETTERTHANHUNTER.com with an asking price of $10,000 or best offer.

"We've seen Hunter Biden's work and, quite frankly, this painting is way better. That's why we decided on BETTERTHANHUNTER.com," says Kaye. "As far as the $10,000 asking price, well, we didn't want to be greedy. Plus, people love a bargain. Instead of paying $1,000,000 for a painting by the President's son, you can get one that is better than Hunter's for a fraction of the price. It's a real steal!"

Within minutes of listing the sale, fans of the Mark Kaye Show had driven the price up to $2100.

The auction ends on Monday, June 21st, at 2:45 eastern time. The winner will be announced LIVE during The Mark Kaye Show.

Media contact:

Mark Kaye

[email protected]

202-740-6781

SOURCE The Mark Kaye Show
BRADENTON, Fla., June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- American Torch Tip Co., a global leader in welding product manufacturing, recently announced the launch of their new, upgraded website. This updated site adds a sharp new look and feel, which allows users to seamlessly navigate over 20,000 products and cost-saving solutions, such as the GCS25 program, which guarantees savings of 25% on plasma cutting consumable spend for select systems.

"We are proud to continue our tradition of re-investment in tools and resources that will allow us to better meet the needs of our customers," says Bill Schriver, Executive Sales Director at American Torch Tip Co.

"With the launch of this new website, American Torch Tip Co. will be able to communicate the full breadth of our offering of products and solutions designed to optimize welding and cutting operations and to provide great economy and high quality to users around the world."

The website features testimonials, brochures, technical guides, cut charts, a wealth of blog articles, and e-catalogs for MIG Welding, TIG welding, plasma cutting, oxy-fuel cutting, laser-cutting, and thermal spray.

Users can request a catalog, view schematics, learn about product solutions, and browse ATTC's entire product offering and request a quote with the click of a button. A live chat feature is also available during business hours.

About American Torch Tip Co.: With over 80 years of manufacturing experience, several patented technologies, and a robust global distribution network, ATTC is a one-stop-shop for thousands of products spanning six welding and cutting technologies. Backed by some of the best warranties in the industry and the American Way guarantee, ATTC offers both off-the-shelf and custom-tailored solutions to save you time and expense.

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American Torch Tip

American Torch Tip is a cutting & welding equipment manufacturer, including consumables, torches and accessories. We are premium welding manufacturers.

SOURCE American Torch Tip
LIANYUNGANG, China, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- On the afternoon of June 18, the 2021 Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) International Round Table was successfully held in Lianyungang city, Jiangsu province. The conference was co-hosted by the Secretariat of the SCO and Lianyungang Municipal People's Government, with the theme of "enhancing international cooperation in economy and trade, and promoting facilitation in merchandise exports and imports among SCO member states".



The SCO Secretariat and relevant officials from SCO member states, observer countries, and dialogue partner countries participated in the meeting in the form of "online + offline". The meeting was chaired by Fang Wei, the Mayor of Lianyungang city. Vladimir Norov, Secretary-General of the SCO Secretariat, Hui Jianlin, Deputy Governor of Jiangsu Province, and Xiang Xuelong, Secretary of the CPC Lianyungang Municipal Committee delivered speeches.



As a strong fulcrum for the Belt and Road intersection and the important node city in the New Eurasian Continental Bridge Economic Corridor, Lianyungang assumes the role of a two-way opening window and a sea-land conversion hub. In recent years, with the vigorous economic development of the SCO countries and the in-depth implementation of the Belt and Road Initiative, Lianyungang is making every effort to build the SCO overseas base and the China-Kazakhstan logistics cooperation base. The cooperation effects and demonstration effects achieved caused widespread concern.



On the basis of the cooperation results of the first SCO Round Table, using the SCO's actual needs and long-term development of international industrial cooperation and special product trade as entry point, this year's meeting aims at new trends and explores new ideas, new countermeasures, and constructs the international logistics cooperation relationship of mutual respect, mutual support, and win-win cooperation.



Participants affirmed the important contribution of Lianyungang in the SCO member states in fighting the COVID-19 and coping with its negative impact, and noted the huge development potential of port of Lianyungang, and believed that the urban logistics and industrial clusters should be used more actively. It is to strengthen the multilateral cooperation and exchanges in the SCO Free Trade Zone, and develop cooperation in the transportation, transshipment and processing of transnational goods under the framework of the national strategy and the Belt and Road Initiative.



For more details, please visit http://www.scoilp.gov.cn/Default.aspx?mpid=10

SOURCE Lianyungang Municipal People's Government
MUNICH, June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The European Patent Office (EPO) today honored two U.S. researchers with the European Inventor Award 2021. Indian-American chemist Sumita Mitra won the innovation prize in the "Non-EPO countries" category for her invention that successfully integrated nanotechnology into dental materials. Serbian-American biomedical engineer and university professor Gordana Vunjak-Novakovic won the Award's Popular Prize, having received the most votes from the public in an online poll. Vunjak-Novakovic, who had been nominated in the "Lifetime achievement" category, opened new horizons in regenerative medicine by developing a way of growing new tissue ex vivo (outside the body) using the patient's own cells.

Download press material on Sumita Mitra

Download press material on Gordana Vunjak-Novakovic

EPO President Antonio Campinos said: "Sumita Mitra took an entirely new path in her field, and demonstrated how technological innovation, protected by patents, can transform a sector, and in this case bring benefits to millions of dental patients. Her invention remains commercially successful nearly 20 years after its launch  another reason why she is an inspiration to the next generation of scientists."

Commenting on the Popular Prize, EPO President Antonio Campinos said: "This Award underlines how innovation touches the lives of people everywhere in the world. After an incredibly challenging year, public enthusiasm for Gordana Vunjak-Novakovic's invention also reflects a firm optimism that human creativity, passion for innovation and ingenuity will help us move towards a brighter future."

The 2021 European Inventor Award ceremony was held digitally for the first time and was open to the public who tuned in to the event from around the world. The Award, one of Europe's most prestigious innovation prizes, is presented annually by the EPO to distinguish outstanding inventors from Europe and beyond who have made an exceptional contribution to society, technological progress and economic growth. The finalists and winners in five categories (Industry, Research, SMEs, Non-EPO countries and Lifetime achievement) were selected by an independent international jury. The Popular Prize is decided by the public, who select their favourite inventor from among the 15 finalists.

SOURCE The European Patent Office
WASHINGTON, June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- U.S. press leaders strongly criticized on Thursday the latest assault on press freedom in Hong Kong--a police raid on the offices of the Apple Daily newspaper.

National Press Club President Lisa Nicole Matthews and NPC Journalism Institute President Angela Greiling Keane issued the following statement:

"The people of Hong Kong are well acquainted with freedom of the press and understand its value in making society more efficient and just. They should not have to stand for this attack on journalism and journalists. We stand with our brothers and sisters in Hong Kong and call for an end to this campaign of terror against truth."

More than 100 police officers raided Apple Daily's offices on Thursday and arrested five executives and editors at the paper and its parent company, Next Digital, according to news reports. The police cited "collusion with a foreign country or with external elements to endanger national security."

Authorities also froze the company's accounts and cautioned readers not to repost some of the Apple Daily's articles online.

Next Digital and Apple Daily founder Jimmy Lai is currently in prison and on trial for alleged violations of a draconian national security law imposed by China in 2020. Lai was sentenced earlier this year to 14 months in prison under a separate charge: for allegedly organizing and participating in illegal demonstrations in 2019.

Thursday's raid was the latest in an escalating series of attempts to rein in Hong Kong's decades-long tradition of free expression--a campaign of repression that grew after enactment of the 2020 national security law.

In recent months, authorities in Hong Kong have cracked down on a public broadcaster, warned journalists against publishing "fake news," and convicted a journalist for false statements after a report that was critical of police.

Founded in 1908, the National Press Club is the world's leading professional organization for journalists. The Club has 3,000 members representing nearly every major news organization and is a leading voice for press freedom in the United States and around the world.

The National Press Club Journalism Institute, the Club's non-profit affiliate, promotes an engaged global citizenry through an independent and free press and equips journalists with skills and standards to inform the public in ways that inspire civic engagement.

Contact: John Donnelly, NPC Press Freedom Team Chairman: [email protected] 202-650-6738.

SOURCE National Press Club

Related Links

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MIAMI, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Businesses that use the Shopify platform are already off to a good start. Shopify comes with a great suite of built-in tools for creating an e-commerce website. While these tools can help businesses get a lot done, it can be hard to improve SEO rankings for a Shopify website using only built-in tools. Search engine optimization is one of the most effective forms of digital marketing and working with a Shopify SEO agency like 1Digital is one of the best ways to get the most out of any Shopify store.

1Digital Agency

1Digital Agency has been focused on offering SEO campaigns for businesses across a wide range of popular e-commerce platforms, including Shopify. For businesses that need a team of Shopify SEO experts to help increase their website's SEO value, their team of SEO specialists and writers are happy to help. They know the intricacies of different platforms, so they have developed proprietary Shopify SEO strategies so businesses can get the most out of their website.

SEO campaigns have a lot of advantages over other forms of digital marketing. The whole idea of SEO is to make a website more attractive to search engine algorithms through on-site optimization and the production of backlinks. While other marketing options like paid traffic can be effective, businesses end up paying for every click whether that click leads to a conversion or a bounce.

While optimizing a website is crucial for SEO, content is the foundation of any good SEO campaign. Building backlinks from content pieces across the web is a great way to show search engine algorithms that a business is an authority in its field. That is where their team of content writers can help. They produce the kind of content that search engine algorithms love to see, so they are only producing quality backlinks.

This expertly written content combined with 1Digital Shopify SEO services can help to increase both organic traffic and conversions. Their history of incredible results speaks for itself. In addition to offering well-planned campaigns, they also have a team of project managers that offer regular updates and meetings so SEO clients always know how their campaigns are performing.

While 1Digital is a great Shopify SEO agency, they are also experts in all things e-commerce. Their team includes designers, developers, and support staff that allow them to offer a wide range of digital services to their clients. Because their team specializes in offering great work and clear communication, many businesses choose 1Digital for future projects after experiencing the ease of working with them.

Any e-commerce businesses that are looking for a team of Shopify SEO experts can reach out to the team at 1Digital for a free e-commerce SEO audit. Their team will put together a comprehensive audit and schedule a meeting to discuss what they can do to help increase organic traffic. To reach a member of their team, just call 888.982.8269 or send an email to [email protected].

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SOURCE 1Digital Agency
CHANGZHOU, China, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The high power 600W+ PV industry will play a critical role in helping China achieve its goals of achieving a CO2 emissions peak by 2030 and carbon neutrality by 2060, says Gao Jifan, honorary president of the China Photovoltaic Industry Association.

Gao, who is also chairman of Trina Solar, made the remarks in an address at the SNEC Expo in Shanghai, in early June.

"The key to accomplishing the goal of carbon neutrality lies in giving precedence to wind and PV power, while minimizing or even eradicating thermal power," Gao said in his address at the expo, the world's most influential and international solar trade fair.



Gao talked of market trends and the latest technological achievements and the way to carbon neutrality, and said new-energy industries are more important than ever before.

Renowned experts, academics, business leaders, heads of government and industry associations and other senior figures gathered to exchange views and share their experience and insight.

Talking of the historic opportunities for the PV industry Gao set out his vision for its growth.



"Industry coordination with mutual innovation and shared benefits will create a new, customer-centric industry ecosystem that will help achieve carbon neutrality," he said.

The vision was already being realized, he said. Last year Trina Solar unveiled its 600W Vertex module series and strongly advocated deep end-to-end supply chain integration and innovation. The company led dozens of other companies to jointly found the 600W+ PV Open Innovation Ecological Alliance, which has taken the lead in promoting the high-quality growth of the 600W+ PV industry, Gao said.

The 600W+ PV industry chain drives technological innovation and harnesses the strengths of each segment while coordinating the supply chain, he said. It also promotes standardization and wards off potential risks from excessive overlapping investment in same-class technology as the industry is upgraded, he said.

The alliance now has 78 companies as members, covering the whole supply chain, including silicon wafers, cells, system integration processes and certification bodies. The aim is to restructure the supply chain into a new and complete ecosystem, Gao said,



"This opens new avenues for reducing LCOE and pushes the industry faster toward carbon neutrality both in China and worldwide."

Trina Solar says it expects more rapid growth based on 600W+ advanced technology. Gao reiterated his vision, saying: "As the world leading PV and smart energy IoT total solutions provider, Trina Solar has now moved into the 3.0 age. Trina Solar is resolute in its mission of solar for all and will continue to do all it can to push for the creation of a new-energy, carbon-free world."

About Trina Solar

Founded in 1997, Trina Solar is the world leading PV and smart energy total solution provider. The company engages in PV products R&D, manufacture and sales; PV projects development, EPC, O&M; smart micro-grid and multi-energy complementary systems development and sales, as well as energy cloud-platform operation. In 2018, Trina Solar launched Energy IoT brand, established the Trina Energy IoT Industrial Development Alliance together with leading enterprises and research institutes in China and around the world, and founded the New Energy IoT Industrial Innovation Center. With these actions, Trina Solar is committed to working with its partners to build the energy IoT ecosystem and develop an innovation platform to explore New Energy IoT, as it strives to be a leader in global intelligent energy. For more information, please visit www.trinasolar.com.

SOURCE Trina Solar Co., Ltd
DUBLIN, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Healthcare Smart Beds Market Size, Share & Trends Analysis Report by Application (Hospitals, Outpatient Clinics, Medical Nursing Homes, Medical Laboratory & Research), by Region, and Segment Forecasts, 2021 - 2028" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

The global healthcare smart beds market size is expected to reach USD 740.6 million by 2028. It is expected to expand at a CAGR of 7.6% from 2021 to 2028. Hospital beds are the most utilized component in hospitals. Patients spend extended periods of time on these beds, which makes it vital for hospitals, nursing homes, and other healthcare settings to ensure the quality and comfort of these beds in order to aid the fast recovery of patients. The introduction and incorporation of smart technologies in hospital beds in recent years have greatly assisted nursing and healthcare staff in recording, monitoring, and analyzing minute details of the patients' health for effective patient care.



There has been a rising demand for precise and rapid medical care across the globe and early detection of any changes in vital signs is crucial for the proper monitoring of the patient. These medical smart beds are becoming an important resource in assisting medical teams for the continuous monitoring of patients and numerous studies have shown their efficacy in healthcare settings. A recent study conducted by Harvard Medical School highlighted that the use of smart beds could help in reducing code blue events by 86% and as a result, this reduces the average stay of ICU patients who have been transferred from the surgical unit by 45%.



With the rising demand for comfort in hospitals, increasing healthcare expenditure, and emerging technological advancements, the demand for smart beds is also rising across the healthcare sector. Smart beds are integrated with sensors and control panels that monitor and relay the vitals of patients for timely intervention. Home healthcare has been gaining significant traction across the globe as it helps save considerable costs for patients. A majority of the cost of hospital treatments is associated with high-quality facilities and amenities at the hospitals. This is driving families of patients with chronic illnesses to invest in smart beds so that they can take care of the patients from the comfort of their own homes without any additional cost.



Companies are introducing new innovative products to address the evolving needs of hospitals and gain a competitive edge over other manufacturers. For instance, in October 2020, Stryker launched a new smart bed called ProCuity, which is a completely wireless hospital bed with a number of smart patient monitoring features. ProCuity has been incorporated with Stryker's Secure Connect technology, which helps in providing a wireless method to connect to nurse call systems. The nurse call system helps in streaming parameters such as bed configuration, exit alarms, the position of side rails, and movement to hospital information systems (HIS). This helps in keeping a note of all important readings and observe the changes.



Healthcare Smart Beds Market Report Highlights

By application, the hospitals segment is projected to expand at the fastest CAGR in terms of revenue as well as volume from 2021 to 2028 owing to the rising incidences of in-patient admissions due to chronic ailments, such as cancer, kidney failure, and heart diseases.

In terms of revenue, North America dominated the market by accounting for over 55.0% share in 2020. This is attributed to the augmented usage of healthcare smart beds in acute care or long-term care facilities.

dominated the market by accounting for over 55.0% share in 2020. This is attributed to the augmented usage of healthcare smart beds in acute care or long-term care facilities. Europe is projected to expand at the fastest revenue-based CAGR of 7.8% from 2021 to 2028 owing to the increasing demand for better healthcare among the aging population and growing investment in smart technologies.

Key Topics Covered:



Chapter 1. Methodology and Scope



Chapter 2. Executive Summary



Chapter 3. Healthcare Smart Beds Market Variables, Trends & Scope

3.1. Market Introduction

3.2. Penetration & Growth Prospect Mapping

3.3. Impact of Covid-19 on Healthcare Smart Beds Market

3.4. Industry Value Chain Analysis

3.4.1. Sales/Retail Channel Analysis

3.4.2. Profit Margin Analysis

3.5. Market Dynamics

3.5.1. Market Driver Analysis

3.5.2. Market Restraint Analysis

3.5.3. Industry Challenges

3.5.4. Industry Opportunities

3.6. Business Environment Analysis

3.6.1. Industry Analysis - Porter's

3.6.1.1. Supplier Power

3.6.1.2. Buyer Power

3.6.1.3. Substitution Threat

3.6.1.4. Threat from New Entrant

3.6.1.5. Competitive Rivalry

3.7. Roadmap of Healthcare Smart Beds Market

3.8. Market Entry Strategies



Chapter 4. Consumer Behavior Analysis

4.1. Consumer Trends and Preferences

4.2. Factors Affecting Buying Decision

4.3. Consumer Product Adoption

4.4. Observations & Recommendations



Chapter 5. Healthcare Smart Beds Market: Application Estimates & Trend Analysis

5.1. Application Movement Analysis & Market Share, 2020 & 2028

5.2. Hospitals

5.2.1. Market estimates and forecast, 2016 - 2028 (USD Million) (Thousand Units)

5.3. Outpatient Clinics

5.3.1. Market estimates and forecast, 2016 - 2028 (USD Million) (Thousand Units)

5.4. Medical Nursing Homes

5.4.1. Market estimates and forecast, 2016 - 2028 (USD Million) (Thousand Units)

5.5. Medical Laboratory and Research

5.5.1. Market estimates and forecast, 2016 - 2028 (USD Million) (Thousand Units)



Chapter 6. Healthcare Smart Beds Market: Regional Estimates & Trend Analysis

6.1. Regional Movement Analysis & Market Share, 2020 & 2028

6.2. North America

6.2.1. Market estimates and forecast, 2016 - 2028 (USD Million) (Thousand Units)

6.2.2. Market estimates and forecast, by application, 2016 - 2028 (USD Million) (Thousand Units)

6.2.3. U.S.

6.2.3.1. Market estimates and forecast, 2016 - 2028 (USD Million) (Thousand Units)

6.2.3.2. Market estimates and forecast, by application, 2016 - 2028 (USD Million) (Thousand Units)

6.3. Europe

6.3.1. Market estimates and forecast, 2016 - 2028 (USD Million) (Thousand Units)

6.3.2. Market estimates and forecast, by application, 2016 - 2028 (USD Million) (Thousand Units)

6.3.3. Germany

6.3.3.1. Market estimates and forecast, 2016 - 2028 (USD Million) (Thousand Units)

6.3.3.2. Market estimates and forecast, by application, 2016 - 2028 (USD Million) (Thousand Units)

6.3.4. U.K.

6.3.4.1. Market estimates and forecast, 2016 - 2028 (USD Million) (Thousand Units)

6.3.4.2. Market estimates and forecast, by application, 2016 - 2028 (USD Million) (Thousand Units)

6.3.5. France

6.3.5.1. Market estimates and forecast, 2016 - 2028 (USD Million) (Thousand Units)

6.3.5.2. Market estimates and forecast, by application, 2016 - 2028 (USD Million) (Thousand Units)

6.3.6. Italy

6.3.6.1. Market estimates and forecast, 2016 - 2028 (USD Million) (Thousand Units)

6.3.6.2. Market estimates and forecast, by application, 2016 - 2028 (USD Million) (Thousand Units)

6.3.7. Spain

6.3.7.1. Market estimates and forecast, 2016 - 2028 (USD Million) (Thousand Units)

6.3.7.2. Market estimates and forecast, by application, 2016 - 2028 (USD Million) (Thousand Units)



Chapter 7. Competitive Analysis

7.1. Key Global Players, Recent Developments & Their Impact on The Industry

7.2. Key Company/Competition Categorization (Key innovators, Market leaders, Emerging players)

7.3. Vendor Landscape

7.3.1. Key Company Market Share Analysis, 2020



Chapter 8. Company Profiles

8.1. Stryker Corporation

8.1.1. Company Overview

8.1.2. Financial Performance

8.1.3. Thickness Benchmarking

8.1.4. Strategic Initiatives

8.2. Hill-Rom Holdings Inc.

8.2.1. Company Overview

8.2.2. Financial Performance

8.2.3. Thickness Benchmarking

8.2.4. Strategic Initiatives

8.3. Invacare Corporation

8.3.1. Company Overview

8.3.2. Financial Performance

8.3.3. Thickness Benchmarking

8.3.4. Strategic Initiatives

8.4. Paramount Bed Holdings Co., Ltd.

8.4.1. Company Overview

8.4.2. Financial Performance

8.4.3. Thickness Benchmarking

8.4.4. Strategic Initiatives

8.5. LINET

8.5.1. Company Overview

8.5.2. Financial Performance

8.5.3. Thickness Benchmarking

8.5.4. Strategic Initiatives

8.6. Joerns Healthcare LLC

8.6.1. Company Overview

8.6.2. Financial Performance

8.6.3. Thickness Benchmarking

8.6.4. Strategic Initiatives

8.7. Stiegelmeyer GmbH & Co. KG

8.7.1. Company Overview

8.7.2. Financial Performance

8.7.3. Thickness Benchmarking

8.7.4. Strategic Initiatives

8.8. Arjo

8.8.1. Company Overview

8.8.2. Financial Performance

8.8.3. Thickness Benchmarking

8.8.4. Strategic Initiatives

8.9. Volker GmbH

8.9.1. Company Overview

8.9.2. Financial Performance

8.9.3. Thickness Benchmarking

8.9.4. Strategic Initiatives

8.10. Favero Health Projects SpA

8.10.1. Company Overview

8.10.2. Financial Performance

8.10.3. Thickness Benchmarking

8.10.4. Strategic Initiatives

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/6xvig3

Media Contact:

Research and Markets

Laura Wood, Senior Manager

[email protected]



For E.S.T Office Hours Call +1-917-300-0470

For U.S./CAN Toll Free Call +1-800-526-8630

For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900



U.S. Fax: 646-607-1904

Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716

SOURCE Research and Markets

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SEATTLE, June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Continuing its longstanding commitment to safety, BNBuilders was recently awarded its second Associated General Contractors (AGC) safety award this year. The firm was awarded the top 2021 Build Washington Award for Construction Safety from the AGC of Washington in the General Contractor-Building over 500,000 worker hours category, and was recognized at a virtual award ceremony on May 20, 2021. BNBuilders was also recently awarded a Construction Safety Excellence Award (CSEA) from the AGC San Diego Chapter. BNBuilders was presented with the top recognition in the Building Division: 1,000,001  2,500,000 work hours category at the virtual ceremony on January 26, 2021. These safety awards identify BNBuilders as one of the West Coast's top general contractors for safety performance, occupational health management, and risk control. Excelling in each of these areas, BNBuilders is setting the standard for safety best practices in the construction industry.

With this year's AGC safety awards, BNBuilders is continuing its years-long record of industry-leading safety. Last year, after winning a California regional CSEA, BNBuilders went on to compete nationally and won a first place CSEA during the 2020 AGC National Convention. The company also won a regional and national CSEA in 2019. AGC's prestigious safety awards program is known for its rigorous selection process, with a comprehensive review of a written application and a verbal interview with a panel of judges.

BNBuilders has numerous safety protocols which have helped ensure a safe and healthy work environment for all. A few of its safety practices include a weekly Safety Coordination meeting with more than 100 people, and a "Safety Champions" program which allows team members to award an on-the-spot gift card to those who go above and beyond to assure safe working conditions. The company also created numerous protocols and programs to address COVID-related issues, including programs to create cohesion amongst individuals working remotely to minimize feelings of loneliness and isolation, and a rotational program for offices and trailers to limit contact between team members. For jobsites, a few COVID safety protocols include daily health screenings, the implementation of a Triax Proximity Detection System worn on hard hats which audibly alerts staff if they in "close contact" of another individual, contact tracing, and cleaning high touch areas multiple times per day.

Leary Jones, Corporate Safety Director for BNBuilders, states, "I'm very proud of our project staff and the hard work they do each day to ensure the safety and health of all our team members. It is a monumental task under any circumstance, but it is truly an extraordinary accomplishment in the middle of a pandemic, and when we have so many new team members to familiarize with our safety culture."

BNBuilders has grown exponentially while maintaining its outstanding safety record. In the past two years, BNBuilders has nearly doubled its overall staff size, from more than 500 to more than 1,000. In the same timeframe, the company's Safety department has tripled from eight (8) to twenty-five (25) team members, to make certain that safety remains a top priority across the company.

Brad Bastian, President & Co-Founder of BNBuilders, states, "Receiving these safety awards is truly a high honor in our book. Our safety team, led by Casey Blake and Leary Jones, has been very successful in prioritizing safety from pre-construction through project completion. A great data point about Leary: he was the first African American safety instructor in the US Air Force. Leary has been pioneering safety throughout his career. We're thrilled to have both Casey's and Leary's extraordinary expertise and work ethic at BNBuilders."

AGC is the nation's top organization for construction and contracting professionals that connects members with opportunities for advocacy, education, career development and networking; access to state and local governments; and innovative programs and events. The AGC of America has 89 local and state-wide chapters, representing more than 27,000 firms.

About BNBuilders

Founded in 2000 in Seattle, BNBuilders is a West Coast general contractor that specializes in complex projects for clients in the life sciences, education, healthcare, public, and technology sectors. They are known for their innovative solutions to highly technical issues, comprehensive preconstruction services, passion for sustainable construction practices, and commitment to the communities in which they do business. With four offices, 1,000+ employees, and a strong presence in the California and Washington construction markets, BNBuilders is a leader and preferred contractor on the West Coast. For more information, visit www.bnbuilders.com.

Contact: Beth Binger

BCIpr

619-987-6658

[email protected]

SOURCE BNBuilders

Related Links

www.bnbuilders.com


WASHINGTON, June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The Alliance for Lasting Liberty (ALL), a coalition of LGBT and religious freedom advocates, issues the following statement in response to the United States Supreme Court's Decision in Fulton vs. City of Philadelphia:

In the last calendar year, the Supreme Court of the United States has handed major victories to religious rights (in Fulton vs. City of Philadelphia) and LGBT rights (in Bostock vs. Clayton County). Both sets of rights are important, and the Court has now established major guardrails clearly protecting them.

Still, the Court's decision does not comprehensively address the issues covered by the Fairness for All Act and the power to do so belongs to Congress. All nine members of the Supreme Court and the vast majority of Americans clearly believe that LGBT rights and religious freedom both deserve

respect and protection.

We continue to call on Congress to pass comprehensive federal legislation that protects LGBT people and the free exercise of religion.

About the Alliance:

The Alliance for Lasting Liberty (ALL) is a coalition of religious and LGBT individuals and organizations who support Fairness For All legislation. ALL believes LGBT Americans should have civil rights protections when it comes to employment, housing, and publicly available services; and religious Americans  and their faith-based institutions  should be able to live, work, and serve their community in ways that are consistent with the teachings and tenets of their faith.

Media Contacts:

Kerry Troup: 202-679-2702 / [email protected]

Jennifer Porter Gore: 202-725-1103 / [email protected]

SOURCE Alliance for Lasting Liberty
MIAMI, June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Alpha Holding, S.A. de C.V., ("AlphaCredit" or the "Company"), a leading technology-enabled, financial services company, announced today that the Company has elected to exercise a 30-day grace period with respect to the USD$15 million cash interest payment due on June 19, 2021 with respect to its 10.0% Senior Secured Notes due in 2022 (the "Notes").

As a result, the Company will not make the coupon payment scheduled on June 19, 2021. An ad hoc group of holders of over 50% in principal amount of the Notes (the "Ad Hoc Group") has formed and has appointed financial and legal advisors that are engaged in dialogue with the Company. The Company expects to utilize the 30-day grace period to continue discussions with the Ad Hoc Group and its advisors.

About AlphaCredit

Alpha Credit is a technology-enabled, financial services company in Latin America that provides consumer loans to individuals and financial solutions for SMEs in Mexico and Colombia.

Forward-looking statements

This release includes "forward-looking statements." Forward-looking statements are not statements of historical fact and reflect the Company's current views about future events. The words "believe," "estimate," "expect," "anticipate," "project," "will," "intend," "seek," "could," "should," "may," "potential" and similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements. However, the absence of these words does not mean that the statements are not forward-looking. Although the Company believes that its expectations reflected in forward-looking statements are reasonable and are based on reasonable assumptions, certain risks and uncertainties could cause actual results to differ materially from the projections, anticipated results or other expectations expressed in this release. These risks and uncertainties include, without limitation, risks associated with our ongoing creditor discussions, including our ability to negotiate agreements with our creditors on commercially favorable terms or at all, limitations on the availability of capital, volatility in the Company's business, and the Company's ability to comply with its financial and other covenants and metrics in its financing agreements. Any forward-looking statement speaks only as of the date on which such statement is made, and the Company assumes no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements made herein or any other forward-looking statements made by the Company, whether as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise. This communication shall not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy securities.

SOURCE AlphaCredit
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla., June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Altitude is a beverage designed with wholesome energy in mind. The tonic began as a startup aimed at helping pilots stay awake without the fear of a sugar crash. Since its launch, the effective energy booster has resonated with an ever-increasing audience of professionals that stretches across the globe.

Altitude is a drink on a mission. The product is the American offshoot of the European parent brand PilotsFriend  a company that was created with a purpose. PilotsFriend was founded back in 2003 by a group of NATO pilots who found that there was no genuine solution to help them stay awake during their long shifts spent on the flight deck. Energy drinks were all the rage at that point, but regulations and health concerns made them difficult to utilize. On top of that, many of the energy options on the market were filled with synthetics and had a tendency to end in a terrible energy crash. The potential for jittery hands and exhausted endings made it difficult to justify the use of such extreme measures.

The result was PilotsFriend and its North American counterpart Altitude. The founders of the startup spent years working with nutritionists, scientists, and doctors to come up with a powerful, health-conscious list of ingredients. When all was said and done, they had developed a formula that opted for natural stimulants like Cola nut and Guarana seeds over synthetic alternatives. It also included black carrot, chokeberry, ginger, cardamom, and a smorgasbord of other nutritionally packed elements. All of these ingredients joined forces to provide a fast-acting yet prolonged energy kick that also helped with digestion, inflammation, and immune health.

While the product was initially created with pilots in mind, it wasn't long before it began to be used outside of the cockpit, as well. Tired professionals from all walks of life reveled in the ability to down a healthy beverage that gave them a genuine, sustainable pick-me-up.

Since its inception, PilotsFriend has caught on like wildfire throughout the European energy industry. It recently entered the U.S. market, as well, under the Altitude label and has quickly begun to make its mark on the multi-billion dollar North American energy drink industry. With its healthy ingredients, energetic efficacy, and a clean, professional image, there's no knowing how far this innovative product will go as it continues to build a rapport with consumers both at home and abroad.

Please direct inquiries to:

Levi Moorman

(954) 649-7855

[email protected]

SOURCE Altitude
TSX Venture Exchange (TSX-V): LIT

Frankfurt Stock Exchange (FSE): OAY3

OTCQB Venture Market (OTC): PNXLF

VANCOUVER, BC, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ - Argentina Lithium & Energy Corp. (TSXV: LIT) (FSE: OAY3) (OTC: PNXLF), ("Argentina Lithium" or the "Company") announces that at the Annual General & Special Meeting of shareholders held on June 16, 2021, each of the 3 nominees listed in the management information circular filed on May 18, 2021 with regulatory authorities were elected as directors of the Company. 17,158,240 shares were voted representing 39.87% of the outstanding shares of the Company.

The Company is pleased to announce all resolutions received support from our shareholders at the meeting. Incumbent directors Joseph Grosso and Nikolaos Cacos were re-elected and Darren Urquhart was elected to the Board of Directors of the Company.

About Argentina Lithium

Argentina Lithium & Energy Corp is focused on acquiring high quality lithium projects in Argentina, and advancing them towards production in order to meet the growing global demand from the battery sector. The management group has a long history of success in the resource sector of Argentina, and has assembled a first rate team of experts to acquire and advance the best lithium properties in the world renowned "Lithium Triangle". The Company is a member of the Grosso Group, a resource management group that has pioneered exploration in Argentina since 1993.

ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD

"Nikolaos Cacos"

_______________________________

Nikolaos Cacos, President, CEO and Director

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.

SOURCE Argentina Lithium & Energy Corp.
NEW YORK, June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Pitroda Art is pleased to present the final public installation of artwork by 15 artists participating in Movement: Art for Social Change, the annual juried exhibition that celebrates artists as champions of positive social change. The 14 artworks, selected by a renowned jury and responding to the theme of racial justice and equity, will be projected onto The Brooklyn Public Library in New York City on June 21 from 9 p.m. until Midnight.

Photo by Maurice Evans, courtesy of Pitroda Art.

The art projection in New York City is the fifth public art projection by Pitroda Art on a cross-country tour of major U.S. cities.

The iconic locations for the art projection tour were carefully curated to tell a larger narrative of racial justice across the U.S. In Washington, D.C., the projection was on the Black Lives Matter Plaza, the city's notorious street mural a stone's throw from the White House. In Atlanta, the birthplace of the civil rights movement, the artwork lit up the City Hall. In Los Angeles, the artworks were featured in the historic West Adams neighborhood, dubbed Sugar Hill, where infamous Black entertainers laid the groundwork for the Fair Housing Act, while in Chicago, the projection was showcased in the Bronzeville Art District, the largest African American Art District in the U.S.

In addition, Pitroda Art launched an auction of the selected artworks in partnership with Mastercard on its Priceless.com platform, closing on June 23. A portion of the purchase price will be donated to the National Urban League, a historic civil rights organization dedicated to economic empowerment, equality and social justice.

The 14 artworks, selected by a panel of jurors, represent poignant, timely interpretations of Black history, racial identity and the current realities of the Black diaspora.

PARTICIPATING ARTISTS

Antoine Williams (USA), Asiko (UK), Heather Haynes (Canada), Kadiejra O'Neal (Barbados), Lloyd Foster (USA), Mark Wilson (USA) and Paola Zarate (USA), Nombuso Dowelani (South Africa), Paul Ogunlesi (Nigeria), Penda Diakite (USA-Mali), Rohan Patrick (USA), Segun Aiyesan (Nigeria), Tim Davis (USA), Tsoku Maela (South Africa), Winfred Nana Amoah (Ghana).

Pitroda Art is a social enterprise that promotes global contemporary art through curated collections. It was founded by passionate art lovers from three different continents, Sam Pitroda (India/USA), Sonja Miokovic (Serbia/Canada) and Carolina Pozo (Ecuador/USA). Their initiative Movement: Art for Social Change features quarterly curated art collections that explore pressing social issues around the world.

The Brooklyn Public Library is among the borough's most democratic civic institutions, serving patrons in every neighborhood. Established in 1896, it is one of the nation's largest public library systems with nearly 700,000 active cardholders. It is a recognized leader in cultural offerings, literacy, out-of-school-time services, workforce development programs, and digital literacy.

MEDIA CONTACT:

Angie Kordic, Olu & Company

[email protected]

Related Images

movement-art-for-social-change.jpg

Movement: Art for Social Change, Atlanta City Hall, May 20, 2021

Photo by Maurice Evans, courtesy of Pitroda Art.

Related Video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NYjPAFcpHdM

SOURCE Pitroda Art
DALLAS, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- ATP Flight School opens new ATP JETS airline training center in Irving, TX, to scale capacity and deliver the Airline Transport Pilot Certification Training Program (ATP CTP).

ATP Flight School

Located just south of the Dallas Fort Worth International Airport, ATP JETS is currently the largest ATP CTP provider for the nation's airlines, and the new 29,380 sq. ft. training center increases capacity to deliver this airline-required program. Students take part in four days of virtual instructor-led ground school, then attend the state-of-art ATP JETS facility for three days of simulator training. Adjoining class and briefing rooms complement a 4,800 sq. ft. simulator bay housing up to nine flight training devices. Over 8,400 sq. ft. of flex space designated for future expansion allows the new training center to continue to scale and meet the demand for airline pilots.

With over 30 hiring partnerships, airlines recognize the quality and professionalism of ATP-trained pilots, including Delta Air Lines through Delta Propel and United Airlines through United Aviate. Most recently, ATP JETS' advanced training capabilities in Dallas have allowed ATP to partner with Frontier Airlines. The Frontier Direct Program offers an enhanced ATP CTP and enables ATP graduates to progress straight to the flight deck at Frontier.

The new ATP JETS facility follows the opening of a newly constructed flight training center at the Arlington, TX airport where students train to become airline pilots in ATP's Airline Career Pilot Program. "Dallas is not only a hub for aviation but ATP, with more graduates having gone on to fly for American Airlines than any other major," said Michael Arnold, director of marketing for ATP. "As we continue to scale capacity to meet airline hiring demand, Dallas will play an important role in delivering efficient, industry-leading airline pilot training."

Media Contact

Michael Arnold

Director of Marketing

ATP Flight School

[email protected]

(904) 595-7950

14 CFR part 142 programs provided by ATP Jet Simulation, Inc. All trademarks, trade names, service marks, product names, company names, logos, and brands used or mentioned herein are property of their respective owners in the United States and other countries. Mention of them does not imply any affiliation with or endorsement by them.

Related Images

atp-jets-is-currently-the-largest.jpg

ATP JETS is currently the largest ATP CTP provider for the nation's airlines, and the new 29,380 sq.

SOURCE ATP Flight School
LONDON, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Bluejay Mining plc ("Bluejay" or the "Company") (EPIC: JAY) (Market: AIM) (Sector: Mining), the AIM, FSE listed and OTCQB traded exploration and development company with projects in Greenland and Finland, is pleased to announce that, further to the award of its Exploitation Licence announced on 14 December 2020, the Government of Greenland has approved the Exploitation and Closure Plan (the "Plan") for the Dundas Ilmenite project ("Dundas" or the "Project").

The Plan, which was submitted by the Company after the Exploitation Licence was awarded, is the final Government-level approval required before construction at Dundas can commence.

Bo Mller Stensgaard, CEO of Bluejay Mining, commented: "The Permit covering the Dundas Ilmenite Project's Exploitation and Closure Plan is the final Government approval required to enable the commencement of construction. Following the receipt of our approved Exploitation Licence, we continue to finalise the optimisation planning and engineering sign-off, together with advancing discussions with partners to form a strong project financing syndicate.

"The Greenland Government has remained supportive of the Project throughout a recent Parliamentary election and the Covid-19 pandemic, and we look forward to developing our project portfolio in Greenland in the most sustainable way possible, while respecting local stakeholders."

Naaja H. Nathanielsen, Minister of Housing, Infrastructure, Mineral Resources and Gender Equality, stated: "We are pleased to announce approval of the Exploitation and Closure Plan for the Dundas Ilmenite Project. This project provides new opportunities for the local community and marks a stepping-stone for the mining sector. We look forward to the continued cooperation with Bluejay Mining and Dundas Titanium on this and their other projects in Greenland."

About The Exploitation and Closure Plan

The Exploitation Plan sets out the exploitation of the mineral deposit, including aspects of the infrastructure, geology, environment, fiscal, socio-economy, and health and safety. The Closure plan is a technical plan describing the removal of equipment and installations, such as buildings and other technical installations when operations have finally ceased.

For further information please visit http://www.bluejaymining.com.

Notes

Bluejay is listed on the London AIM market and Frankfurt Stock Exchange and its shares also trade on the OTCQB Market in the US. With projects in Greenland and Finland, its most advanced project is the Dundas Ilmenite Project in Greenland, which is being developed towards production in the near term.

The Company's strategy is focused on securing financing ahead of commencing commercial production at Dundas in order to create a company capable of self-funding exploration on its current projects and future acquisitions.

Bluejay holds three additional projects in Greenland - the 2,897sq km Disko-Nuussuaq Magmatic Massive Sulphide nickel-copper-cobalt-platinum group element-gold project, which has shown its potential to host mineralisation similar to the world's largest nickel-copper mining district at Noril'sk-Talnakh, northern Russia; the 692sq km Kangerluarsuk zinc-lead- silver project, and the 2,555 sq km Thunderstone project which has the potential to host large-scale base metal and gold deposits. In Finland, Bluejay has agreed a joint-venture agreement with Rio Tinto Mining and Exploration Ltd at its Enonkoski Project.

SOURCE Bluejay Mining plc

Related Links

https://bluejaymining.com


SEATTLE, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Boeing's [NYSE: BA] 737-10, the largest airplane in the 737 MAX family, today completed a successful first flight. The airplane took off from Renton Field in Renton, Washington, at 10:07 a.m. and landed at 12:38 p.m. at Boeing Field in Seattle.

"The airplane performed beautifully," said 737 Chief Pilot Capt. Jennifer Henderson. "The profile we flew allowed us to test the airplane's systems, flight controls and handling qualities, all of which checked out exactly as we expected."

Today's flight was the start of a comprehensive test program for the 737-10. Boeing will work closely with regulators to certify the airplane prior to its scheduled entry into service in 2023.

"The 737-10 is an important part of our customers' fleet plans, giving them more capacity, greater fuel efficiency and the best per-seat economics of any single-aisle airplane," said Stan Deal, president and CEO of Boeing Commercial Airplanes. "Our team is committed to delivering an airplane with the highest quality and reliability."

The 737-10 can carry up to 230 passengers. It also incorporates environmental improvements, cutting carbon emissions by 14 percent and reducing noise by 50 percent compared to today's Next-Generation 737s.

As a leading global aerospace company, Boeing develops, manufactures and services commercial airplanes, defense products and space systems for customers in more than 150 countries. As a top U.S. exporter, the company leverages the talents of a global supplier base to advance economic opportunity, sustainability and community impact. Boeing's diverse team is committed to innovating for the future and living the company's core values of safety, quality and integrity. Learn more at www.boeing.com.

Contact:

Jessica Kowal

Boeing Communications

+1 206 660-6849

[email protected]

SOURCE Boeing

Related Links

http://www.boeing.com


CENTREVILLE, Va., June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- CARFAX has been named a 'Top Workplace' by The Washington Post for the eighth consecutive year. CARFAX is one of only 15 companies in the Washington, D.C. area to receive the prestigious honor eight times since the award began in 2014.

"The continued recognition from The Washington Post is a testament to the dedication of Team CARFAX to our mission and unique culture," said Dick Raines, president at CARFAX. "CARFAX is centered around a mission of helping millions of people confidently shop, buy, service and sell used cars. This past year was an unprecedented one for all of us, but I'm proud of the continued focus on our mission and the passion to maintain the unique CARFAX culture even in a remote world. We continue to invest in a team of outstanding people to help ensure a positive work-life balance. This award is particularly meaningful because it's based on the feedback from CARFAX employees."

The unique CARFAX culture is defined by a set of principles known as the CARFAX Playbook, which emphasizes teamwork and playing to employee strengths. The work environment is a rare blend of a high achieving, high-energy workforce coming together in a casual laid-back setting. Work-life balance is brought to life with programs like a summer 4-day work week being piloted in 2021.

CARFAX has been a staple of the Northern Virginia business community for more than 30 years. The expert in vehicle history since 1984, CARFAX is a leader in consumer-information technology with a database of more than 26 billion records. Over the years CARFAX product offerings have expanded to include Used Car Listings and Car Care, a program designed to help car owners better maintain their vehicles. Outside the office, Team CARFAX has been a long-time supporter of the annual Bike to the Beach DC program, which raises money for autism research.

"Now in its eighth year, The Post's Top Workplaces list continues to highlight the companies in the Washington-area that are leaders in company satisfaction and engagement," said Washington Post Top Workplaces editor Dion Haynes. "Throughout the past 15 months, these companies have had to make quick decisions in order to keep their employees safe while also balancing productivity and efficiency, and their employees have taken note of this great work."

This was the second year CARFAX was recognized in the Large Company category, and it took the seventh spot on the list. CARFAX currently has over 1,000 employees  with more than 123 new team members joining Team CARFAX in 2020 alone.

Selection for The Post's Top Workplaces list is based solely on employee feedback gathered through an anonymous third-party survey administered by research partner Energage, LLC, which measured several aspects of workplace culture, including alignment, execution, and connection.





The Washington Post hosted a virtual awards ceremony on June 17 to recognize the top-ranked companies. For more about The Washington Post's Top Workplaces and to see the full list of this year's honorees click here.

Find your career at CARFAX by visiting www.carfax.com/careers.

About CARFAX

CARFAX, part of IHS Markit (NYSE: INFO), helps millions of people every day confidently shop, buy, service and sell used cars with innovative solutions powered by CARFAX vehicle history information. The expert in vehicle history since 1984, CARFAX provides exclusive services like CARFAX Used Car Listings, CARFAX Car Care, CARFAX History-Based Value and the flagship CARFAX Vehicle History Report to consumers and the automotive industry. CARFAX owns the world's largest vehicle history database and is nationally recognized as a top workplace by The Washington Post and Glassdoor.com. Shop, Buy, Service, Sell  Show me the CARFAX. Based in London, IHS Markit is a world leader in critical information, analytics and solutions.



About The Washington Post

The Washington Post is an award-winning news leader whose mission is to connect, inform, and enlighten local, national and global readers with trustworthy reporting, in-depth analysis and engaging opinions. It combines world-class journalism with the latest technology and tools so readers can interact with The Post anytime, anywhere.

About Energage, LLC

Headquartered in Exton, Pa., Energage (formerly known as WorkplaceDynamics) is a leading provider of technology-based employee engagement tools that help leaders to unlock potential, inspire performance, and achieve amazing results within their organizations. The research partner behind the Top Workplaces program, Energage has surveyed more than 47,000 organizations representing well over 16 million employees in the United States.





SOURCE CARFAX

Related Links

www.carfax.com


RADNOR, Pa., June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The law firm of Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP announces that a securities fraud class action lawsuit has been filed in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York against RLX Technology Inc. (NYSE: RLX) ("RLX") on behalf of those who purchased or acquired RLX American Depository Shares ("ADSs") pursuant or traceable to RLX's January 2021 initial public stock offering (the "IPO").

Lead Plaintiff Deadline: August 9, 2021

Website: https://www.ktmc.com/rlx-technology-class-action-lawsuit?utm_source=PR&utm_medium=link&utm_campaign=rlx_technology

Contact: James Maro, Esq. (484) 270-1453

Adrienne Bell, Esq. (484) 270-1435

Toll free (844) 887-9500

RLX claims to be the "No. 1 branded e-vapor company in China," which it also claims is its "largest potential market." On January 22, 2021, the defendants priced the IPO at $12 per ADS and filed the final prospectus for the IPO, which forms part of the Registration Statement.

On June 2, 2021 RLX published its first quarter 2021 financial results, announcing only a 48% increase in net revenues quarter over quarter, and second quarter guidance suggesting that its gross margin would "remain steady." Following this news, RLX's shares declined, closing on June 4, 2021 at $9.90 per ADS, down nearly 9% from its June 3, 2021 close of $10.87 per ADS. Before the commencement of the lawsuit, RLX's shares traded as low as $7.89 per ADS, or more than 32% below the IPO price.

RLX investors may, no later than August 9, 2021 , seek to be appointed as a lead plaintiff representative of the class through Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP or other counsel, or may choose to do nothing and remain an absent class member. A lead plaintiff is a representative party who acts on behalf of all class members in directing the litigation. In order to be appointed as a lead plaintiff, the Court must determine that the class member's claim is typical of the claims of other class members, and that the class member will adequately represent the class. Your ability to share in any recovery is not affected by the decision of whether or not to serve as a lead plaintiff.

Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP prosecutes class actions in state and federal courts throughout the country involving securities fraud, breaches of fiduciary duties and other violations of state and federal law. Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP is a driving force behind corporate governance reform, and has recovered billions of dollars on behalf of institutional and individual investors from the United States and around the world. The firm represents investors, consumers and whistleblowers (private citizens who report fraudulent practices against the government and share in the recovery of government dollars). The complaint in this action was not filed by Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP. For more information about Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP please visit www.ktmc.com.

CONTACT:

Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP

James Maro, Jr., Esq.

Adrienne Bell, Esq.

280 King of Prussia Road

Radnor, PA 19087

(844) 887-9500 (toll free)

[email protected]

SOURCE Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP

Related Links

http://www.ktmc.com


Denny's Restaurants is one of the brands licensed and operated by Northland Properties in Canada, the force behind a breadth of hospitality and sports brands including Sandman Hotel Group, The Sutton Place Hotels, Moxie's Grill & Bar, Chop Steakhouse & Bar the Dallas Stars, Grouse Mountain and Revelstoke Mountain Resort..

Incorporated in 1963 by founder, Bob Gaglardi, Northland Properties has flourished into a diversified group of companies and is recognized as one of the fastest growing hospitality groups.

"It is our people that drive the success at Denny's and all other Northland Properties hospitality brands. We are committed to taking care of our employees and are always looking for ways to recognize their efforts and inspire them. As we continue to grow, XTM's Today Solution enables our staff at Denny's to receive their tips and due backs quickly, easily and directly without corporate involvement and at no cost to them or the restaurant", said Deborah Gagnon, President & COO at Denny's Canada and Vice-President at Northland Properties Corporation.

"From grilled chicken and burgers to their Hearty 9-grain pancake breakfast, Denny's sets the standard for family dining," said Marilyn Schaffer, XTM CEO. "We are really excited to support Denny's Canada staff with easy access to their gratuities. There's no better way for a smart organization to inspire their employees than by offering quick and easey access to their earnings."

Also announced today, in adherence with its restricted share unit ("RSU") plan (the "RSU Plan") pursuant to which the Company may grant options and RSUs to attract, motivate and retain directors, officers, employees and consultants, and to align the interests of plan participants with those of the Company's shareholders, XTM announced that on June 11, 2021 it issued 304,054 RSUs to its Chief Financial Officer and strategic Business Development executives, which vest immediately upon their grant. The RSUs were issued as part of the contractual and discretionary compensation set out for such employee and consultants.

About XTM

XTM, www.xtminc.com, is a Miami and Toronto-based fintech innovator in the neo-banking space, helping businesses and service workers in the hospitality and personal care space disseminate and access earned wages and gratuities. XTM's Today Solution, comprised of a free mobile app and a Visa or Mastercard debit card with free banking features, is used by thousands of restaurants, salons and staff across Canada and the United States. XTM is a global card issuer and real-time payment specialist and our technology is used by Restaurants and Salons at no charge to automate and expedite worker payouts and eliminate cash from their ecosystems. XTM's Today solution drives enterprise value with efficiency and a bespoke user experience designed specifically for restaurateurs and personal care services.

About Denny's Restaurants Canada

Vancouver-based Northland Properties Corporation (dba Denny's in Canada) currently owns and operates 59 Denny's Restaurants across Canada. Northland Properties Corporation is a franchisee of DFO, Inc. Part of the highly-regarded Denny's organization, Northland has a well-deserved reputation for quality and guest satisfaction. From fluffy pancakes to crispy bacon and juicy burgers to something from the Fit Fare Menu, guests will always find delicious value and variety 24-hours a day. Dencan Franchise Systems, Limited Partnership (under the Northland umbrella) is the master franchisee in Canada providing franchises for Denny's Canada locations.

This news release contains "forward-looking information" and "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of applicable securities laws (the "forward-looking statements"), within the meaning of applicable Canadian securities legislation, including expected performance of XTM, the expectation that businesses with which XTM does business or have committed to do business will in the expected timeline, the continuing trend toward electronic payment methods, that the integrations will attract new business owners to use the Today program, and the general conditions and revenues of XTM. Forward-looking statements are statements that are not historical facts and are generally, although not always, identified by words such as "expect", "plan", "anticipate", "project", "target", "potential", "schedule", "forecast", "budget", "estimate", "intend" or "believe" and similar expressions or their negative connotations, or that events or conditions "will", "would", "may", "could", "should" or "might" occur. While XTM can make best efforts to estimate when businesses will re-open or back to pre-Covid 19 business levels there are no guarantees this will happen in the time the Company expects or if at all. All such forward-looking statements are based on the opinions and estimates of management as of the date such statements are made. These forward-looking statements are made as of the date of this news release. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on forward-looking statements, as there can be no assurance that the future circumstances, outcomes or results anticipated in or implied by such forward-looking statements will occur or that plans, intentions or expectations upon which the forward-looking statements are based will occur.

The CSE has not approved nor disapproved the contents of this press release, and the CSE does not accept responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

SOURCE XTM Inc.

Related Links

http://www.xtminc.com/


Frequently Asked Questions:

What are the major market threats?

The pressure from substitutes and a high level of threat from new entrants has resulted in the moderate bargaining power of suppliers.





The pressure from substitutes and a high level of threat from new entrants has resulted in the moderate bargaining power of suppliers. What is the expected price changes in this market?

The Electric Car Chargers Market is expected to have a CAGR of 25.62% during 2021-2025.

Request for a FREE sample to access the definite purchasing guide on Electric Car Chargers procurement.

Who are the top players in the market?

Schneider Electric SE, Siemens AG, ABB Ltd., Tesla Inc., Eaton Corp. Plc, ChargePoint Holdings Inc., Webasto SE, ENGIE SA , Blink Charging Co., and Efacec Power solutions SA, are some of the major market participants.





Schneider Electric SE, Siemens AG, ABB Ltd., Tesla Inc., Eaton Corp. Plc, ChargePoint Holdings Inc., Webasto SE, , Blink Charging Co., and Efacec Power solutions SA, are some of the major market participants. What are the pricing models followed by buyers?

Subscription-based model, consumption-based model, and perpetual license model are the widely adopted pricing models in Electric Car Chargers Market.

SpendEdge suggests three forecast scenarios (optimistic, probable, and pessimistic) considering the impact of COVID-19. SpendEdge's in-depth research has direct and indirect COVID-19 impacted market research reports.

Related Reports on Electrical Components Include:

Fiber Optic Cables - Forecast and Analysis : The fiber optic cables will grow at a CAGR of 13.27% during 2021-2025 . Prices will increase by 2.5%-4.5% during the forecast period and suppliers will have a moderate bargaining power in this market.





The fiber optic cables will grow at a . Prices will increase by during the forecast period and suppliers will have a moderate bargaining power in this market. Contact Center Infrastructure Sourcing and Procurement Report : This report evaluates suppliers based on ability to provide customized services, system capable of call blending, capability to improve end-user customer experience, and real-time reporting.





This report evaluates suppliers based on ability to provide customized services, system capable of call blending, capability to improve end-user customer experience, and real-time reporting. Solar Panels - Sourcing and Procurement Intelligence Report: Trina Solar Co.Ltd., JinkoSolar Holding Co. Ltd., Canadian Solar Inc., JA Solar Technology Co. Ltd., Hanwa Q Cells Co. Ltd., GCL-Poly Energy Holdings Ltd., LONGi Green Energy Technology Co. Ltd., Risen Energy Co. Ltd., HELIENE Inc., and Itek energy are among the prominent suppliers in solar panels market.

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To access the definite purchasing guide on the Electric Car Chargers that answers all your key questions on price trends and analysis:

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Which pricing models offer the most rewarding opportunities?

Table of Content

Executive Summary

Market Insights

Category Pricing Insights

Cost-saving Opportunities

Best Practices

Category Ecosystem

Category Management Strategy

Category Management Enablers

Suppliers Selection

Suppliers under Coverage

US Market Insights

Category scope

Appendix

About SpendEdge:

SpendEdge shares your passion for driving sourcing and procurement excellence. We are the preferred procurement market intelligence partner for 120+ Fortune 500 firms and other leading companies across numerous industries. Our strength lies in delivering robust, real-time procurement market intelligence reports and solutions.

Contacts

SpendEdge

Anirban Choudhury

Marketing Manager

Ph No: +1 (872) 206-9340

https://www.spendedge.com/contact-us

SOURCE SpendEdge

Related Links

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SOURCE BizVibe
"As the world moved toward remote work in 2020, surveillance and risk management took on greater importance for capital markets firms. As such, the judges were most impressed with Eventus' new automation tools so clients can streamline various mundane and repetitive tasks," said Wei-Shen Wong, Asia Editor for WatersTechnology.

Vince Turcotte, Eventus Sales Director, Asia Pacific, said: "Our Validus platform is gaining momentum in the APAC region, thanks to our dedicated real-time service model and our in-region sales presence, and more clients speaking with their peers about the technology, flexibility and depth of experience across our team. We have done particularly well with exchanges and firms looking to participate in the fast-growing digital asset space, where we are uniquely positioned to help them meet and exceed industry standards for surveillance, well as anti-money laundering (AML) and transaction monitoring. We're grateful to WatersTechnology for this high honor, and we look forward to serving an ever-growing base of clients in the region."

Eventus last year made hundreds of enhancements to Validus, including adding new capabilities for anti-money laundering (AML) and transaction monitoring. The firm also introduced new automation capabilities enabling clients such as digital asset market centers to far more efficiently self-manage their surveillance models and cast a wide net for alerts, sifting through the noise and better highlighting which alerts require human review.

On June 22 and 23, Eventus and the Association for Digital Asset Markets (ADAM) are hosting a complimentary virtual conference, Shining a Light on Digital Asset Markets 2021, on key issues affecting digital asset markets, featuring leading influencers in cryptocurrency regulation, legislation, enforcement and markets, as well as institutional market participants.

Eventus in April won the award for Best Sell-Side Market Surveillance Provider in WatersTechnology's 2021 Sell-Side Technology Awards, as well as Markets Media's Markets Choice Award for Best in RegTech for the second consecutive year. Additional awards bestowed last year included the FOW International Award for Market Surveillance Solution of the Year and the RegTech Insight Award for Best Trade Surveillance Solution for the Dodd-Frank Act  both second consecutive wins in the respective categories.

About Eventus Systems

Eventus Systems is a leading global provider of multi-asset class trade surveillance and market risk solutions. Its powerful, award-winning Validus platform is easy to deploy, customize and operate across equities, options, futures, foreign exchange (FX), fixed income and digital asset markets. Validus is proven in the most complex, high-volume and real-time environments of tier-1 banks, broker-dealers, futures commission merchants (FCMs), proprietary trading groups, market centers, buy-side institutions, energy and commodity trading firms, and regulators. The company's rapidly growing client base relies on Validus and Eventus' responsive support and product development teams to overcome its most pressing regulatory challenges. For more, visit www.eventussystems.com .

SOURCE Eventus Systems

Related Links

https://www.eventussystems.com


SALT LAKE CITY, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- EyeCare4Kids, a global 501(c)(3) nonprofit, headquartered in Salt Lake City, is having a growing impact helping children with vision deficiencies and the word is getting out!

Featured in the June issue of Costco Connection, the monthly magazine from Costco Wholesale Corporation, the EyeCare4Kids history and new service goals are highlighted. Costco Connection, with circulation and readership in the tens of millions, is helping Costco members discover one of the most impactful charities in the world.

EyeCare4Kids Arizona Grand Opening Vision for Vision article

The article, Vision for Vision, found on page 103, introduces the new five-year EyeCare4Kids campaign Sight The World. This initiative will dramatically expand its reach from serving children throughout the United States to "helping any child, anywhere in the world receive quality vision services and glasses." Our goal is 1 Million kids by 2025!

In April, the organization opened its first clinic in Arizona in collaboration with the Alhambra Elementary School District in Glendale, a suburb of Phoenix. Alice Cooper headlined the ribbon-cutting grand opening to support the organization having a permanent presence in the region.

Videos:

https://f.io/rxbWfiHL

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1_AhMtUUF1yWzvhpPhVr2g1P7vsUD79K2/view

Celebrating its 20th anniversary in 2021, EyeCare4Kids has provided nearly 400,000 visually impaired children from low-income and underserved families with vision screenings, professional eye exams, and new prescription eyeglasses at minimal or no cost. The need is staggering:

1 in 4 youth in the U.S. have vision deficiencies; that number increases to 40% for individuals in poverty.

80% of learning during a child's first 12 years occurs through the eyes.

Uninsured children are three times more likely to go without eyeglasses in favor of other necessities.

EyeCare4Kids now has clinics in four states: Utah, New Jersey, Arizona, and Nevada. For many years, it has also operated mobile vision clinics in Utah, Arizona and Nevada to reach more children in remote areas.

For more information about EyeCare4Kids and how you can help or contribute to Sight The World, visit our website at EyeCare4Kids.org or contact:

Mary McMartin

EyeCare4Kids Utah Headquarters

#740.507.2088

[email protected]

SOURCE EyeCare4Kids

Related Links

http://EyeCare4Kids.org


NASHVILLE, Tenn., June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Genesco Inc. (NYSE: GCO) ("Genesco" or the "Company") today sent a letter to shareholders highlighting the collective strength of its Board of Directors, which has been significantly refreshed and comprises the right mix of skills and experience to advance Genesco's footwear focused strategy, deliver long-term value to shareholders, and position the Company for sustainable growth.

Genesco urges shareholders to protect the value of their investment by voting the BLUE proxy card today "FOR" all nine of the Company's highly qualified directors. The Company's Annual Meeting of Shareholders is scheduled to be held on July 20, 2021. Shareholders of record as of close of business on June 28, 2021 will be entitled to vote at the meeting.

The letter can be viewed here.

About Genesco Inc.

Genesco Inc., a Nashville-based specialty retailer and branded company, sells footwear and accessories in more than 1,455 retail stores throughout the U.S., Canada, the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland, principally under the names Journeys, Journeys Kidz, Little Burgundy, Schuh, Schuh Kids, Johnston & Murphy, and on internet websites www.journeys.com, www.journeyskidz.com, www.journeys.ca, www.littleburgundyshoes.com, www.schuh.co.uk, www.johnstonmurphy.com, www.johnstonmurphy.ca, www.nashvilleshoewarehouse.com, and www.dockersshoes.com. In addition, Genesco sells footwear at wholesale under its Johnston & Murphy brand, the licensed Levi's brand, the licensed Dockers brand, the licensed Bass brand, and other brands. For more information on Genesco and its operating divisions, please visit www.genesco.com.

Forward-Looking Statements

This release contains forward-looking statements, including those regarding the performance outlook for the Company and all other statements not addressing solely historical facts or present conditions. Forward- looking statements are usually identified by or are associated with such words as "intend," "expect," "believe," "should," "anticipate," "optimistic" and similar terminology. Actual results could vary materially from the expectations reflected in these statements. A number of factors could cause differences. These include adjustments to projections reflected in forward-looking statements, including those resulting from the effects of COVID-19 on the Company's business, including COVID-19 case spikes in locations in which the Company operates, the roll-out of COVID-19 vaccines and the public's acceptance of the vaccines, additional stores closures due to COVID-19, the timing of the re-opening of our stores, the timing of in-person back-to-work and back-to-school and sales with respect thereto, weakness in store and shopping mall traffic, restrictions on operations imposed by government entities and/or landlords, changes in public safety and health requirements, and limitations on the Company's ability to adequately staff and operate stores. Differences from expectations could also result from stores closures and effects on the business as a result of civil disturbances; the level and timing of promotional activity necessary to maintain inventories at appropriate levels; the imposition of tariffs on product imported by the Company or its vendors as well as the ability and costs to move production of products in response to tariffs; the Company's ability to obtain from suppliers products that are in-demand on a timely basis and effectively manage disruptions in product supply or distribution, including disruptions as a result of COVID-19; unfavorable trends in fuel costs, foreign exchange rates, foreign labor and material costs, and other factors affecting the cost of products; the effects of the British decision to exit the European Union and other sources of market weakness in the U.K. and Republic of Ireland; the effectiveness of the Company's omni-channel initiatives; costs associated with changes in minimum wage and overtime requirements; wage pressure in the U.S. and the U.K.; weakness in the consumer economy and retail industry; competition and fashion trends in the Company's markets; risks related to the potential for terrorist events; risks related to public health and safety events; changes in buying patterns by significant wholesale customers; retained liabilities associated with divestitures of businesses including potential liabilities under leases as the prior tenant or as a guarantor; and changes in the timing of holidays or in the onset of seasonal weather affecting period-to-period sales comparisons. Additional factors that could cause differences from expectations include the ability to renew leases in existing stores and control or lower occupancy costs, and to conduct required remodeling or refurbishment on schedule and at expected expense levels; the Company's ability to realize anticipated cost savings, including rent savings; the Company's ability to achieve expected digital gains and gain market share; deterioration in the performance of individual businesses or of the Company's market value relative to its book value, resulting in impairments of fixed assets, operating lease right of use assets or intangible assets or other adverse financial consequences and the timing and amount of such impairments or other consequences; unexpected changes to the market for the Company's shares or for the retail sector in general; costs and reputational harm as a result of disruptions in the Company's business or information technology systems either by security breaches and incidents or by potential problems associated with the implementation of new or upgraded systems; the Company's ability to realize any anticipated tax benefits; and the cost and outcome of litigation, investigations and environmental matters involving the Company, and the impact of actions initiated by activist shareholders. Additional factors are cited in the "Risk Factors," "Legal Proceedings" and "Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations" sections of, and elsewhere in, the Company's SEC filings, copies of which may be obtained from the SEC website, www.sec.gov, or by contacting the investor relations department of Genesco via the Company's website, www.genesco.com. Many of the factors that will determine the outcome of the subject matter of this release are beyond Genesco's ability to control or predict. Genesco undertakes no obligation to release publicly the results of any revisions to these forward-looking statements that may be made to reflect events or circumstances after the date hereof or to reflect the occurrence of unanticipated events. Forward-looking statements reflect the expectations of the Company at the time they are made. The Company disclaims any obligation to update such statements.

Important Additional Information and Where to Find It

Genesco has filed a definitive proxy statement (the "Proxy Statement") and accompanying proxy card in connection with the solicitation of proxies for the 2021 annual meeting of Genesco shareholders (the "Annual Meeting"). INVESTORS AND SHAREHOLDERS ARE STRONGLY ENCOURAGED TO READ THE PROXY STATEMENT AND ACCOMPANYING PROXY CARD AND OTHER DOCUMENTS FILED WITH THE U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (the "SEC") CAREFULLY AND IN THEIR ENTIRETY WHEN THEY BECOME AVAILABLE AS THEY WILL CONTAIN IMPORTANT INFORMATION. Shareholders may obtain the Proxy Statement, any amendments or supplements to the Proxy Statement and other documents filed by Genesco with the SEC for no charge at the SEC's website at www.sec.gov . Copies will also be available at no charge in the Investors section of Genesco's corporate website at www.genesco.com .

Participants in the Solicitation

Genesco, its directors and certain of its executive officers may be deemed to be participants in the solicitation of proxies from Genesco shareholders in connection with the matters to be considered at the Annual Meeting. Information regarding the names of Genesco's directors and executive officers and certain other individuals and their respective interests in Genesco by security holdings or otherwise is set forth in the Annual Report on Form 10-K of Genesco for the fiscal year ended January 30, 2021, and in the Proxy Statement. To the extent holdings of such participants in Genesco's securities have changed since the amounts described in the Proxy Statement, such changes have been reflected on Initial Statements of Beneficial Ownership on Form 3 or Statements of Change in Ownership on Form 4 filed with the SEC.

SOURCE Genesco Inc.

Related Links

http://www.genesco.com


DUBLIN, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Antisense & RNAi Therapeutics Global Market Report 2021: COVID-19 Growth and Change to 2030" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

This report focuses on antisense & RNAi therapeutics market which is experiencing strong growth. The report gives a guide to the antisense & RNAi therapeutics market which will be shaping and changing our lives over the next ten years and beyond, including the markets response to the challenge of the global pandemic.



Major players in the Antisense & RNAi therapeutics market are Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Benitec Biopharma Ltd., Gene Signal, GlaxoSmithKline Plc, Ionis Pharmaceuticals, Marina Biosciences, Quark Pharmaceuticals, Sanofi S.A, Acuitas Therapeutics, and Antisense Therapeutics Ltd.



The global antisense & RNAi therapeutics market is expected to grow from $1.11 billion in 2020 to $1.2 billion in 2021 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 8.1%.

The growth is mainly due to the companies resuming their operations and adapting to the new normal while recovering from the COVID-19 impact, which had earlier led to restrictive containment measures involving social distancing, remote working, and the closure of commercial activities that resulted in operational challenges.

The market is expected to reach $1.79 billion in 2025 at a CAGR of 11%.



The antisense & RNAi therapeutics market consists of sales of antisense & RNAi therapeutics products and related services by entities (organizations, sole traders and partnerships) that develop antisense & RNAi therapeutics to treat various diseases. RNA interference (RNAi)-based and RNA-based antisense oligonucleotide therapies are advanced methods used for the treatment of various respiratory diseases including chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and asthma. In addition to this, antisense & RNAi therapeutics finds its application in curing cancer, infectious diseases, cardiovascular diseases, and genetic disorders.



The antisense & RNAi therapeutics market covered in this report is segmented by technology into RNA interference; antisense RNA. It is also segmented by route of administration into pulmonary delivery; intravenous injections; intra-dermal injections; intraperitoneal injections; topical delivery; other delivery methods and by indication into oncology; cardiovascular diseases (CVDs); respiratory disorders; neurological disorders; infectious diseases; other.



The high cost of RNA interference-based drugs is expected to act as a major restraint for the growth of the antisense & RNAi therapeutics market in the future. For instance, according to Future Medicine, the price of Onpattro is approximately $450,000 per year. Onpattro (patisaran) is the RNA interference-based drug used for the treatment of the polyneuropathy of hereditary transthyretin-mediated (hATTR) amyloidosis in adults.

Stringent regulations, long product approval process, high development cost, and a comparably small number of patients are few factors leading to the high cost of RNA interference drugs, which is expected to hinder the antisense & RNAi therapeutics' market growth in upcoming years.



Major companies operating in the antisense & RNAi therapeutics market are undertaking strategic initiatives such as collaborations and partnerships for product innovation to sustain in the increasingly competitive market, companies are developing innovative products as well as sharing skills and expertise with other companies. While companies have long collaborated with each other as well as with academic and research institutions in this market by way of partnerships, and in or out-licensing deals.

This trend has been increasing over recent years. For instance, in August 2020, Blackstone Life Sciences, a global investment company, and Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Inc., an RNAi therapeutics company, announced the closing of a $2 billion strategic financing collaboration to accelerate the advancement and development of RNAi therapeutics.

Under the agreement, Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Inc. will receive $150 million from Blackstone Life Sciences for the development of vutrisiran and ALN-AGT, Alnylam's cardiometabolic disease programs. In 2018, Biogen and Ionis announced a collaboration to develop antisense drug candidates for neurological diseases.

This collaboration utilizes Biogen's expertise in neuroscience research and drug development and Ionis' knowledge in RNA targeted therapies with the goal of developing a broad pipeline of investigational therapies. The two companies signed an agreement for 10 years.



Key Topics Covered:



1. Executive Summary



2. Antisense & RNAi Therapeutics Market Characteristics



3. Antisense & RNAi Therapeutics Market Trends And Strategies



4. Impact Of COVID-19 On Antisense & RNAi Therapeutics



5. Antisense & RNAi Therapeutics Market Size And Growth

5.1. Global Antisense & RNAi Therapeutics Historic Market, 2015-2020, $ Billion

5.2. Global Antisense & RNAi Therapeutics Forecast Market, 2020-2025F, 2030F, $ Billion



6. Antisense & RNAi Therapeutics Market Segmentation

6.1. Global Antisense & RNAi Therapeutics Market, Segmentation By Technology, Historic and Forecast, 2015-2020, 2020-2025F, 2030F, $ Billion

RNA Interference

Antisense RNA

6.2. Global Antisense & RNAi Therapeutics Market, Segmentation By Route of Administration, Historic and Forecast, 2015-2020, 2020-2025F, 2030F, $ Billion

Pulmonary Delivery

Intravenous Injections

Intra-dermal Injections

Intraperitoneal Injections

Topical Delivery

Other Delivery Methods

6.3. Global Antisense & RNAi Therapeutics Market, Segmentation By Indication, Historic and Forecast, 2015-2020, 2020-2025F, 2030F, $ Billion

Oncology

Cardiovascular Diseases (CVDs)

Respiratory Disorders

Neurological Disorders

Infectious Diseases

Other

7. Antisense & RNAi Therapeutics Market Regional And Country Analysis

7.1. Global Antisense & RNAi Therapeutics Market, Split By Region, Historic and Forecast, 2015-2020, 2020-2025F, 2030F, $ Billion

7.2. Global Antisense & RNAi Therapeutics Market, Split By Country, Historic and Forecast, 2015-2020, 2020-2025F, 2030F, $ Billion



Companies Mentioned

Alnylam Pharmaceuticals

Benitec Biopharma Ltd.

Gene Signal

GlaxoSmithKline Plc

Ionis Pharmaceuticals

Marina Biosciences

Quark Pharmaceuticals

Sanofi S.A

Acuitas Therapeutics

Antisense Therapeutics Ltd.

Arbutus Biopharma (formerly known as Tekmira Pharmaceuticals)

Bio-Path Holdings Inc.

Calando Pharmaceuticals

Dicerna Pharmaceuticals

Enzon Pharmaceuticals Inc

Gradalis

iCo Therapeutics

miRagen Therapeutics

Olix Pharmaceuticals

OncoGeneX Pharmaceuticals

Lorus Therapeutics (Aptose Biosciences)

Regulus Therapeutics

Rexahn Pharmaceuticals

Rxi Pharmaceuticals

Santaris Pharma A/S (Roche)

Sarepta Therapeutics

Silence Therapeutics Plc

Sirnaomics Inc.

Tekmira Pharmaceuticals

Cenix BioScience

Sirnaomics

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/3zmpgf

Media Contact:

Research and Markets

Laura Wood, Senior Manager

[email protected]

For E.S.T Office Hours Call +1-917-300-0470

For U.S./CAN Toll Free Call +1-800-526-8630

For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900

U.S. Fax: 646-607-1904

Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716

SOURCE Research and Markets

Related Links

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DUBLIN, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Continuing Medical Education Market - Global Outlook and Forecast 2021-2026" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

The continuing medical education market is expected to grow at a CAGR of approximately 7% during 2021-2026.

The report considers the present scenario of the continuing medical education market and its market dynamics for the period 2020-2026. It covers a detailed overview of several market growth enablers, restraints, and trends. The study covers both the demand and supply sides of the market. It also profiles and analyzes leading companies and several other prominent companies operating in the market.



Continuing medical education is a highly specialized field, and it has firmly established disciplines. Healthcare is one of the industries where the acceptance of online and blended learning replaces traditional classroom learning at an incredible pace.

The trend in continuing medical education is moving towards combining cognitive science with 3D gaming technology to help physicians learn through the virtual experience. The simulation-based CME teaching is performed in multiple therapeutic areas. The continuing medical education market simulation is being accepted by most of the top providers across the globe.



CONTINUING MEDICAL EDUCATION MARKET SEGMENTATION



The global continuing medical education market research report includes a detailed segmentation by delivery method, providers, speciality, geography. Some professionals prefer more classroom training since many group activities are conducted and help to increase knowledge transfer.

With the introduction of e-learning, healthcare professionals are shifting their interest towards e-learning. The advent of the COVID-19 pandemic is soaring the growth of e-learning in the CME market. The online teaching platform has seen a boom for one decade. The increasing penetration of the internet is fueling online activities that can be accessed whenever the participant wants to complete them.



Physicians' membership organizations provide the CME program that is specifically developed as per the needs of particular specialization. These physician member associations also provide specific free CME programs to their members in the organizations. The physicians can keep up with the newest developments through their association membership benefits, including conferences.



Many physicians' associations, NGOs fighting against cancer, and insurance companies provide various oncology-based CME courses to increase the knowledge regarding cancer treatments and their diagnostics. The rising number of cases is expected to drive the CME programs related to the oncology segment worldwide.

INSIGHTS BY GEOGRAPHY



North America to dominate the global CME market and will lead the industry during the forecast period. The innovative activities have increased the demand for the CME programs in this region. Canada is one of the most significant countries in medical education innovation in North America.

The requirement of the credit points for the physicians has demanded them to adopt the CME program much faster in Canada. The increasing demand for the CME programs made many providers enter the CME providers platform. The CME market in North America is expected to grow at a CAGR of over 5% during the forecast period.

COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE



The vendors in the CME market are startups, educational companies, branded medical schools, NGOs, physician associations, Insurance companies. Several regional vendors are investing in the latest topics of CME as per the requirement in their country, especially in Europe, APAC, and North America. T

he industry is creating opportunities for both existing and new players. Vendors are increasingly focusing on launching innovative delivery methods to penetrate and tap the enormous growth potential of the market.

Albert Einstein College of Medicine is one of the largest medical school-based continuing Medical Education (CME) providers in New York.



Prominent Vendors

Acadoodle

Afya

Albert Einstein College of Medicine

of Medicine Antidote Education Company

AMA EdHub

AO North America

AcademicCME

AffinityCE

Amedco

American Medical Seminars

AXIS Medical Education

Aspirus

COPIC Insurance Company

CME Outfitters

Curi

Current Reviews

Carlat CME Institute

CMEPlanet

Cine-Med

CME Procedures

Clinical Care Options

Continuing Education Company

EXCEL CME

EB Medicine

Essential CME

Forefront Collaborative

Greeley Company

Global Education Group

HonorHealth

Indiana University School of Medicine

Intellectures

King Fahad Medical City

Kenes Group

MedExpert Group of Companies

Med Learning Group

Medicus

Med-IQ

MEDtalks

MedScape

NORCAL Mutal Insurance Company

Opus Medicus

PESI Healthcare

Research To Practice

Rockpointe Corporation

Relias

Stanford Medicine

Salus Global

Sidra Medicine

Siyemi Learning

Tower Health

University of North Dakota

University of California, Irvine

UpToDate

World Class CME

Key Topics Covered:



1 Research Methodology



2 Research Objectives



3 Research Process



4 Scope & Coverage

4.1 Market Definition

4.2 Base Year

4.3 Scope of The Study



5 Report Assumptions & Caveats



6 Market at a Glance



7 Introduction

7.1 Overview

7.2 Impact Of COVID-19 On CME Market



8 Market Opportunities & Trends

8.1 Next-Generation Simulation Technology For CME

8.2 Increased Demand For Mobile Platform Education

8.3 Increased Demand For Shorter Cme Programs



9 Market Growth Enablers

9.1 Stringent Regulatory Mandates

9.2 Adoption Of Digital Learning

9.3 Growth In Student Enrolment In Medical Schools



10 Market Restraints

10.1 Pharma Influence Creates Biased CME Content

10.2 Challenges for Healthcare Professionals IN LMICS



11 Market Landscape

11.1 Market Overview

11.2 Market Size & Forecast

11.3 Five Forces Analysis



12 Delivery Method

12.1 Market Snapshot & Growth Engine

12.2 Market Overview

12.3 Classroom Training

12.4 E-Learning

12.5 Regularly Schedule Series (RSS)

12.6 Journals



13 Providers

13.1 Market Snapshot & Growth Engine

13.2 Market Overview

13.3 Physician Membership Organization and Other NPO

13.4 Publishing/Educational Company

13.5 School Of Medicine

13.6 Hospital/Healthcare Delivery System



14 Specialty

14.1 Market Snapshot & Growth Engine

14.2 Market Overview

14.3 Oncology

14.4 Cardiology

14.6 Infectious Disease

14.7 Orthopedic

14.8 Gastroenterology

14.9 Pediatric

14.10 Primary Care



15 Geography

15.1 Market Snapshot & Growth Engine

15.2 Geographic Overview



21 Competitive Landscape

21.1 Competition Overview

21.2 Market Share Analysis



22 Prominent Vendors



For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/9nkqx8

Media Contact:

Research and Markets

Laura Wood, Senior Manager

[email protected]

For E.S.T Office Hours Call +1-917-300-0470

For U.S./CAN Toll Free Call +1-800-526-8630

For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900

U.S. Fax: 646-607-1904

Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716

SOURCE Research and Markets

Related Links

http://www.researchandmarkets.com


DUBLIN, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Viral Vectors and Plasmid DNA Manufacturing Market Size, Share & Trends Analysis Report by Vector Type (AAV, Lentivirus), by Workflow, by Application, by End Use, by Disease, by Region, and Segment Forecasts, 2021 - 2028" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

The global viral vectors and plasmid DNA manufacturing market size is expected to reach USD 8.6 billion by 2028

The market is expected to expand at a CAGR of 18.8% from 2021 to 2028. The robust pipeline for gene therapies and viral-vector-based vaccines has primarily driven the market.



Amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, the demand for viral vectors has rapidly increased especially in vaccinology. This led to expanding manufacturing capabilities by operating players to meet the growing demand. The application of these vectors in vaccine development has witnessed significant growth in 2020.



Also, an increase in the number of gene therapy-based discovery programs initiated by biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies is expected to drive the demand for scalable production of gene therapy vectors. Owing to this, several private and public agencies are providing funds to accelerate advancements in the manufacturing processes for viral vectors.



Besides, the implementation of single-use technology can lead to significant savings in capital, operating costs, materials, and labor. The use of this equipment will enhance efficiency and improve flexibility, leading to high yields of the final product. Thus, advancements in single-use technology directly impact revenue growth in this space.



Viral Vectors And Plasmid DNA Manufacturing Market Report Highlights

The Adeno Associated Virus (AAV) segment accounted for the significant revenue share in 2020. High usage and promising results in gene therapy clinical trials have boosted its adoption.

Moreover, several biopharma companies are offering their viral vector platform for the development of AAV-based gene therapy products, thereby driving the segment.

The downstream processing segment dominated the market in terms of revenue share. This can be attributed to the availability of advanced purification products.

Owing to the rising demand for cost-effective and scalable manufacturing processes, companies are involved in the development of the upstream cell culture processes.

This is anticipated to result in the notable growth of the upstream processing segment.

The vaccinology segment dominated the market in terms of revenue share in 2020.

The SARS-COV-2 pandemic has supplemented the use of vectors in this segment.

With the active engagement of the research community in the R&D of advanced therapies, research institutes captured the maximum revenue share in the market.

The initiation of several R&D programs by pharmaceutical and biopharmaceutical companies to combat the COVID-19 crisis would further propel market growth.

A rapidly growing pipeline of advanced therapy products for various cancer types has led to lucrative revenue generation in the cancer segment.

North America maintained its dominance in 2020 owing to the high number of entities engaged in offering products and services for viral vector manufacturing in the U.S..

maintained its dominance in 2020 owing to the high number of entities engaged in offering products and services for viral vector manufacturing in the U.S.. Furthermore, the remarkable success of viral vector-based Kymriah, Yescarta, and ZOLGENSMA in the U.S. has also contributed to regional dominance.

In Asia Pacific , the market is projected to witness the fastest growth rate owing to industrialization and clinical transformation of gene therapy in the region.

, the market is projected to witness the fastest growth rate owing to industrialization and clinical transformation of gene therapy in the region. Companies continue to make focused attempts to expand their manufacturing facilities as well as service portfolio to maintain their market presence.

Key Topics Covered:



Chapter 1 Executive Summary



Chapter 2 Research Methodology



Chapter 3 Market Variables, Trends, & Scope

3.1 Market Segmentation & Scope

3.2 Market Dynamics

3.2.1 Market drivers analysis

3.2.1.1 Robust pipeline for gene therapies and viral vector vaccines

3.2.1.2 Technological advancements in manufacturing vectors

3.2.1.3 Highly competitive market and various strategies undertaken by market entities

3.2.2 Market restraint analysis

3.2.2.1 Regulatory, scientific, and ethical challenges associated with gene therapy and viral vectors

3.2.3 Market challenge analysis

3.2.3.1 Production capacity challenges

3.2.3.2 Manufacturing challenges pertaining to large scale production of vectors

3.2.4 Market opportunity Analysis

3.2.4.1 Facility expansion for cell and gene therapies

3.3 COVID-19 Impact Analysis

3.4 Viral Vector Production: Stepwise Challenges & Solutions

3.4.1 Host cell production & banking Needs

3.4.2 Viral vector production, Fill & Finish: challenges & solutions

3.4.3 Viral vector production, analytics: challenges & solutions

3.5 Penetration & Growth Prospect Mapping for Vector Type, 2020

3.6 Industry Analysis - Porter's

3.7 SWOT Analysis, By Factor (Political & Legal, Economic and Technological)

3.8 Penetration & Growth Prospect Mapping for Prominent Industry Players, 2020

3.9 Manufacturer's Landscape

3.10 Viral Vector Production Capacity Mapping Analysis

3.10.1 North America: capacity & service mapping

3.10.2 Europe: capacity & service mapping

3.10.2.1 Cobra Biologics (Sweden and the U.K.)

3.10.2.2 Biovian (Finland)

3.10.2.3 Oxford Biomedica (U.K.)

3.10.2.4 Lonza Pharma & Biotech (The Netherlands)

3.10.2.5 FinVector Oy (Finland)

3.10.2.6 Fujifilm Diosynth Biotechnologies (Denmark)

3.10.2.7 Fujifilm Diosynth Biotechnologies (U.K.)

3.10.2.8 Catalent Inc. (Belgium)

3.10.2.9 Novasep (Belgium)

3.10.2.10 Exothera (Belgium)

3.10.2.11 Delphi Genetics SA (Belgium)

3.10.2.12 Yposkesi (France)

3.10.2.13 VIVEbiotech (Spain)

3.10.2.14 MolMed SpA (Italy)

3.10.2.15 Anemocyte (Italy)

3.11 List of Companies with Portfolio Comprising Vector-based Therapeutic Candidates

3.12 List of Vector Manufacturers



Chapter 4 Viral Vector Production: Costs

4.1 Cost Models for Viral Vector Production

4.1.1 Campaign model

4.1.2 Day rate model

4.1.3 Hybrid model

4.2 Viral Vector Manufacturing Pricing Analysis

4.2.1 Parameters affecting price

4.2.2 AAV: Pricing analysis

4.2.3 Lentivirus: Pricing analysis

4.2.4 Adenovirus: Pricing analysis

4.2.5 Retrovirus: Pricing analysis

4.2.6 Plasmid: Pricing analysis

4.2.7 Gene Synthesis Cost

4.2.8 Genes/ Gene Fragment Cost Analysis



Chapter 5 Viral Vector Production & Yield Analysis

5.1 Production Yields: Biomarin, Spark Therapeutics & Solid Biosciences

5.2 Various Modes of Vector Production to increase & achieve Target Doses

5.2.1 Adenoviral vectors

5.2.2 Gamma- retroviral (MLV - murineleukemia virus) vectors

5.2.3 Lentiviral vectors

5.2.4 AAV vectors

5.2.5 rAAV vectors

5.2.5.1 rAAV Production: challenges & solutions

5.3 Total vector quantity produced per day and yield volume using different cell culture systems

5.4 Measures undertaken to optimize manufacturing of viral vectors for cell and gene therapy

5.5 Analysis of large- and small-scale production of viral vectors based on batch size

5.5.1 Small-scale/laboratory-scale cell culture systems

5.5.2 Large-scale cell culture systems

5.6 Common Practices for Small-Scale (10-50L) Adenovirus Vector Manufacturing



Chapter 6 Viral Vector Manufacturing: Process Economic Considerations & Challenges

6.1. Technological Advances in Manufacturing

6.1.1. Stable producer cell lines

6.1.2 Transient production

6.1.3 Lentiviral vector production process

6.1.3.1 Developments in LentiVector platform

6.2 CoGs Analysis of the Baseline Process

6.2.1 Raw material

6.2.2 Labor costs

6.2.3 Process costs

6.3 Regulatory Expectations

6.4 Approaches for Viral Vector Supply Gene Therapy

6.4.1 Gene therapy manufacturing facilities: trends & types

6.4.2 Gene therapy road map: key external trends



Chapter 7 Viral Vector Manufacturing Market: Strategic Alliances

7.1 Is The Time Right To Invest In Gene Therapy Sector?

7.2 Strategic Approaches for Market Scale-Up

7.2.1 Partnership models

7.2.2 Acquisition

7.2.3 Minority interest (ownership)

7.2.4 Joint venture

7.2.5 Alliance

7.2.6 Franchise

7.3 Collaborations in Viral Vector Manufacturing Market

7.3.1 Breakthrough growth: Lonza, Oxford Biomedica & others



Chapter 8 Vector Type Business Analysis

8.1 Market: Vector Type Movement Analysis

8.2 Adenovirus

8.3 Retrovirus

8.4 Adeno-associated Virus (AAV)

8.5 Lentivirus

8.6 Plasmid DNA

8.7 Others



Chapter 9 Workflow Business Analysis

9.1 Market: Workflow Movement Analysis

9.2 Upstream Processing

9.2.1 Market estimates and forecast, 2017 - 2028 (USD Million)

9.2.2 Vector amplification and expansion

9.2.3 Vector recovery/harvesting

9.3 Downstream Processing

9.3.1 Market estimates and forecast, for 2017 - 2028 (USD Million)

9.3.2 Purification

9.3.3 Fill finish



Chapter 10 Application Business Analysis

10.1 Market: Application Movement Analysis

10.2 Antisense & RNAi Therapy

10.2.1 Market for antisense, & RNAi therapy, 2017 - 2028 (USD Million)

10.3 Gene Therapy

10.4 Cell Therapy

10.5 Vaccinology

10.6 Research Applications



Chapter 11 End-use Business Analysis

11.1 Market: End-use Movement Analysis

11.2 Pharmaceutical and Biopharmaceutical Companies

11.3 Research Institutes



Chapter 12 Disease Business Analysis

12.1 Market: Disease Movement Analysis

12.2 Cancer

12.3 Genetic Disorders

12.4 Infectious Diseases

Companies Mentioned

Merck KGaA

Lonza.

FUJIFILM Diosynth Biotechnologies U.S.A. , Inc.

, Inc. Cobra biologics ltd.

Thermofisher scientific inc.

Waisman Biomanufacturing

Genezen laboratories

YPOSKESI

Advanced BioScience Laboratories, Inc. (ABL inc.)

Novasep holding s.a.s.

Orgenesis Biotech Israel Ltd (formerly ATVIO Biotech ltd.)

Vigene Biosciences Inc.

General Electric Company (GE healthcare).

CEVEC. pharmaceuticals gmbh

Batavia Biosciences B.v.

Biovion oy

Wuxi AppTec Co., Ltd.

VGXI, Inc.

Catalent Inc.

Miltenyi Biotec gmbh

Sirion biotech gmbh.

Virovek incorporation

BioNTech IMFS GmbH

VIVEbiotech s.l.

Creative biogene

Vibalogics GmbH

Takara bio Inc.

Cell and Gene Therapy Catapult

bluebird bio Inc.

Addgene Inc.

Aldevron LLC.

Astellas Pharma, Inc.

BioMarin Pharmaceutical, Inc.

RegenxBio, Inc.

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/7nb0k2

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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Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716

SOURCE Research and Markets

Related Links

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In his new role, Kevin will be working alongside founder and CEO, Ding Lei, and the executive team that has grown Human Horizons into a world-class car manufacturer within a few short years. Recently, the company has also welcomed Michael Li as new Co-President and Chairman of Sales and Services, and Co-Founder Kevin Chen has changed role to become the company COO. These personnel changes reflect the company's entrance into a new stage of business evolution focusing on providing a consistent and seamless premium customer experience whilst further developing its international branding presence.

About joining the team, Kevin Zhang said, "It is my absolute honor to be joining the innovation powerhouse of Human Horizons. The mission of the company to leverage the latest in cutting-edge technology to create incredible products and provide outstanding services is something completely unique to Human Horizons. I am very excited to be playing a role in the company's digital future and look forward to working together with our users to create genuine value."

Welcoming Kevin on joining the team, Human Horizons founder and CEO, Ding Lei said, "Kevin not only brings with him a wealth of experience and resources in digital transformation, but also a reputation as being a pioneer in the use of big data and smart manufacturing. As production and delivery volumes of the HiPhi X continue to increase, we are excited to be able to work together with more and more users. I am very happy to welcome Kevin to the team, I have great confidence he will be an invaluable asset in our path to accelerate data-driven technological innovation."



A graduate from Jilin University of Technology with a Bachelor of Science degree in computational mechanics, Kevin Zhang has served as the head of the Oracle Enterprise Resource Planning department of Digital China, the head of the PCCW product department of PCCW, the deputy general manager of Sina Auto, and the co-president of Autohome Inc. At Autohome, Kevin was renowned for his innovative practices such as utilizing big data analytics, personalized smart advertising and successfully launching an online VR auto show. His expertise in data-driven digital transformation helped to triple the company's market value to around USD $11 billion and set them on a course for further growth.

About HiPhi

HiPhi is a premium brand created by Human Horizons and enhanced by its users. HiPhi X is an EV with a lightweight hybrid aluminum-steel construction and sustainable vegan leathers and recyclable materials which add to the sustainable nature of Human Horizons' EV products.

About Human Horizons

Human Horizons is established for R&D in innovative and leading intelligent mobility technologies as well as the industrialization of future-oriented smart vehicles. Furthermore, Human Horizons builds smart transportation technologies and contributes to the development of smart cities, which will redefine human mobility.

Forward-Looking Statement

This press release contains statements that may constitute "forward-looking" statements. These forward-looking statements can be identified by terminologies such as "will," "expects," "anticipates," "aims," "future," "intends," "plans," "believes," "estimates," "likely to," and similar statements. Statements that are not historical facts, including statements about Human Horizons' beliefs, plans, and expectations, are forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties. A number of factors could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in any forward-looking statement, including but not limited to the following: Human Horizons' strategies, future business development, and financial condition and results of operations; Human Horizons' limited operating history; risks associated with electric vehicles; Human Horizons' ability to develop, manufacture, and deliver vehicles of high quality and appeal to customers on schedule and on a large scale; Human Horizons' ability to grow manufacturing in its joint venture plant; product defects or any other failure of vehicles to perform as expected; Human Horizons' ability to build the Human Horizons and HiPhi brands; Human Horizons' ability to compete successfully; Human Horizons' ability to secure sufficient reservations of orders; changes in consumer demand and government incentives, subsidies, or other favorable government policies; general economic and business conditions globally and in China and assumptions underlying or related to any of the foregoing. All information provided in this press release is as of the date of this press release, and Human Horizons does not undertake any obligation to update any forward-looking statement, except as required under applicable law.

SOURCE Human Horizons
DUBLIN, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The "HVAC Linesets Market by Material Type (Copper, Low Carbon), End-Use (Residential, Commercial, Industrial), Implementation (New Construction, Retrofit), and Region (APAC, North America, Europe, MEA, South America) - Global Forecast to 2026" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

The global HVAC linesets market size is projected to reach USD 11.4 billion by 2026 at a CAGR of 10.0% from USD 7.1 billion in 2021.

Urbanization and increase in residential construction, growing trends of smart homes, increasing demand for air conditioners, and significant growth in number of data centers and their power density are driving the market for HVAC linesets. However, local cooling solutions and rising environmental concerns are expected to restrain this market. Rising global temperatures and heat islands and growing income to propel the demand for HVAC systems are expected to offer significant growth opportunities to the manufacturers. Major challenges faced by players in this market are passive cooling and free cooling solutions and adoption to new refrigerants.

In terms of value, the carbon segment is projected to account for the largest share of the HVAC lineset market, by material type, during the forecast period.

Copper is the most preferred material among the lineset manufactures, for application in the HVAC industry. Some of the primary advantages of copper line sets for application in heating and cooling installations in all kinds of residential and commercial buildings are its malleability, easy to join, durable, and 100% recyclability. The copper material type is forecasted to dominate the HVAC market, due to the rising residential construction in the US, China, India, and Indonesia. Also, due to the COVID-19 the sales of split ACs increased in the US, as more and more people were operating in the work from homes scenario for which they needed a comfortable temperature environment in their homes.

Commercial to be the largest end user during the forecast period.

In the commercial end-use industry, cooling solutions like air conditioners are primarily demanded by offices, hospitality sector, super markets & hypermarkets, banks, and data centers. The commercial end-use segment primarily uses low carbon steel based line sets, and require very high volumes of the same. The total volume of the HVAC lineset is much higher in case of commercial end-use industry, as compared to the residential one. This is due to the greater building area in commercial buildings, more free space to cool, and a greater number of connections of lineset.

Retrofit is projected to register the highest CAGR during the forecast period.

Retrofit projects are designed to integrate new components into existing HVAC networks. Retrofitting provides a more cost-effective way to improve system performance without the need to replace the entire system. The green building initiative and steps taken to reduce the adverse effects on the environment caused by old HVAC systems is boosting the adoption of new HVAC line sets in retrofits. When a major component in either the outdoor or indoor unit of a traditional heat pump system or air conditioner fails, both units should be replaced because newer equipment is carefully matched for optimal efficiency and operating pressures.

The APAC region leads the HVAC lineset market in terms of value.

APAC is the fastest-growing region for HVAC lineset market. The growth in demand for HVAC linesets in the region can be largely attributed to factors such as high population, increasing industrial growth, and stringent environmental norms. Moreover, the rising number of end-use industries in the region is also leading to innovations and developments in the field of HVAC lineset, thereby fueling the growth of the APAC HVAC lineset market.

Key Topics Covered:

1 Introduction

2 Research Methodology

3 Executive Summary

4 Premium Insights

4.1 Attractive Opportunities in the HVAC Lineset Market

4.2 HVAC Lineset Market, by Material Type

4.3 HVAC Lineset Market, by End-Use Industry

4.4 HVAC Lineset Market, by Implementation

4.5 HVAC Lineset Market, by Region

4.6 APAC: HVAC Lineset Market

4.7 HVAC Lineset Market: Major Countries

5 Market Overview

5.1 Introduction

5.2 Market Dynamics

5.2.1 Drivers

5.2.1.1 Urbanization and Increase in Residential Construction

5.2.1.2 Growing Trends of Smart Homes

5.2.1.3 Increasing Demand for Air Conditioners

5.2.1.4 Significant Growth in the Number of Data Centers and Their Power Density

5.2.2 Restraints

5.2.2.1 Local Cooling Solutions

5.2.2.2 Rising Environmental Concerns

5.2.3 Opportunities

5.2.3.1 Rising Global Temperatures and Heat Islands

5.2.3.2 Growing Income to Propel the Demand for HVAC Systems

5.2.4 Challenges

5.2.4.1 Passive Cooling and Free Cooling Solutions

5.2.4.2 Adoption of New Refrigerants

5.3 Porter's Five Forces Analysis

5.3.1 Bargaining Power of Suppliers

5.3.2 Threat of New Entrants

5.3.3 Threat of Substitutes

5.3.4 Bargaining Power of Buyers

5.3.5 Intensity of Competitive Rivalry

5.4 Value Chain Analysis

5.4.1 Raw Material Suppliers

5.4.2 HVAC Line Set Manufacturers

5.4.3 Distributors

5.4.4 HVAC System Manufacturers

5.4.5 End-users

5.5 Patent Analysis

5.5.1 Introduction

5.5.2 Methodology

5.5.3 Document Type

5.5.4 Insights

5.5.5 Jurisdiction Analysis

5.5.6 Top Companies/Applicants

5.6 Yc-Ycc Drivers

5.7 Ecosystem Mapping

5.8 Average Pricing Analysis, by Material Type

5.9 Tariff Policies & Regulations

5.9.1 the Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol

5.10 Trade Analysis

5.10.1 Import-Export Scenario of HVAC Lineset Market

5.11 COVID-19 Impact on HVAC Lineset Market

5.11.1 Impact of COVID-19 on HVAC Industry

5.11.1.1 Impact of COVID-19 on Building & Construction Industry

6 HVAC Lineset Market, by Material Type

7 HVAC Lineset Market, by End-Use Industry

8 HVAC Line Set Market, by Implementation

9 HVAC Lineset Market, by Region

10 Competitive Landscape

10.1 Overview

10.2 Market Ranking of Key Players

10.3 Market Share Analysis of Top 5 Players

10.4 Market Evaluation Matrix

10.5 Company Evaluation Quadrant

10.5.1 Star

10.5.2 Emerging Leaders

10.5.3 Pervasive

10.5.4 Participants

10.6 Strength of Product Portfolio

10.7 Business Strategy Excellence

10.8 Competitive Leadership Mapping of SMEs

10.8.1 Star

10.8.2 Emerging Leaders

10.8.3 Emerging Companies

10.8.4 Pervasive

10.9 Competitive Situation & Trends

10.1 Key Players' Strategies Operating in North America

10.11 Market Ranking of Key Players in North America

10.12 Market Share Analysis of Top 5 Players Operating in the North American Region

10.13 Domestic vs International Suppliers

11 Company Profiles

11.1 Daikin

11.1.1 Business Overview

11.1.2 Financial Assessment

11.1.3 Operational Assessment

11.1.4 Products Offered

11.1.5 Recent Developments

11.1.6 Winning Imperatives

11.1.7 SWOT Analysis

11.1.8 Analyst's View

11.1.8.1 Key Strengths/Right to Win

11.1.8.2 Strategic Choices Made 182

11.1.8.3 Weaknesses and Competitive Threats

11.2 Halcor

11.2.1 Business Overview

11.2.2 Financial Assessment

11.2.3 Operational Assessment

11.2.4 Products Offered

11.2.5 Recent Developments

11.2.6 Winning Imperatives

11.2.7 SWOT Analysis

11.2.8 Analyst's View

11.2.8.1 Key Strengths/Right to Win

11.2.8.2 Strategic Choices Made

11.2.8.3 Weaknesses and Competitive Threats

11.3 Hydro

11.3.1 Business Overview

11.3.2 Financial Assessment

11.3.3 Operational Assessment

11.3.4 Products Offered

11.3.5 Recent Developments

11.3.6 Winning Imperatives

11.3.7 SWOT Analysis

11.3.8 Analyst's View

11.3.8.1 Key Strengths/Right to Win

11.3.8.2 Strategic Choices Made

11.3.8.3 Weaknesses and Competitive Threats

11.4 Kme Se

11.4.1 Business Overview

11.4.2 Financial Assessment

11.4.3 Operational Assessment

11.4.4 Products Offered

11.4.5 Recent Developments

11.4.6 Winning Imperatives

11.4.7 SWOT Analysis

11.4.8 Analyst's View

11.4.8.1 Key Strengths/Right to Win

11.4.8.2 Strategic Choices Made

11.4.8.3 Weaknesses and Competitive Threats

11.5 Mueller Streamline Co.

11.5.1 Business Overview

11.5.2 Operational Assessment

11.5.3 Products Offered

11.5.4 Recent Developments

11.5.5 Winning Imperatives

11.5.6 SWOT Analysis

11.5.7 Analyst's View

11.5.7.1 Key Strengths/Right to Win

11.5.7.2 Strategic Choices Made

11.5.7.3 Weaknesses and Competitive Threats

11.6 Cerro Flow Products LLC

11.6.1 Business Overview

11.6.2 Operational Assessment

11.6.3 Products Offered

11.7 Jmf Company

11.7.1 Business Overview

11.7.2 Operational Assessment

11.7.3 Products Offered

11.8 Zhejiang Ice Loong Environmental Sci-Tech Co. Ltd

11.8.1 Business Overview

11.8.2 Operational Assessment

11.8.3 Products Offered

11.9 Feinrohren S.P.A.

11.9.1 Business Overview

11.9.2 Operational Assessment

11.9.3 Products Offered

11.10 Diversitech Corporation

11.10.1 Business Overview

11.10.2 Operational Assessment

11.10.3 Products Offered

11.10.4 Recent Developments

11.11 Foshan Shunde Lecong Hengxin Copper Tube Factory

11.11.1 Business Overview

11.11.2 Operational Assessment

11.11.3 Products Offered

11.12 Zhejiang Hailiang Co. Ltd.

11.12.1 Business Overview

11.12.2 Financial Assessment

11.12.3 Operational Assessment

11.12.4 Products Offered

11.12.5 Recent Developments

11.13 Start-Ups

11.13.1 Linesets Inc.

11.13.2 Cambridge-Lee Industries LLC

11.13.3 Hmax

11.13.4 Icool Usa, Inc.

11.13.5 Pdm US

11.13.6 Mm Kembla

11.13.7 Mandev Tubes

11.13.8 Uniflow Copper Tubes

11.13.9 Kobelco & Materials Copper Tube Co. Ltd.

11.13.10 Mehta Tubes Limited

11.13.11 Klima Industries

12 Appendix

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/cu9ipm

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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SOURCE Research and Markets

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To pursue his new venture, Murray left his position as Managing Partner at Danahy & Murray, a firm he founded in 2004. For 16 years, he led Danahy & Murray toward success in the field of insurance claim litigation.

Attorneys Kimberly Murray and Kimberly Armistead will be joining Murray + Murray, in addition to Ocie Murray, Jr., who will serve as "of counsel." Danahy & Murray's former management team and a group of paralegals will also be joining the new firm.

The new firm will allow Murray to take his insurance litigation practice to provide his clients with specialized, high-quality, client-focused legal representation. "It was a bold move, but I believe the team is right, and now is the time to refocus my practice with the right people," he explained.

Murray holds positions with the Florida Justice Association, and has worked with the Florida Association of Public Insurance Adjusters and the Florida Policyholder Cooperative. He is a frequent speaker on insurance issues related to first-party insurance claims.

Murray is consistently recognized by the Florida Super Lawyers publication as a "Super Lawyer" for his work in insurance litigation. He is also a member of the Million Dollar Advocates Forum and was awarded an "AV" Preeminent Rating by Martindale-Hubbell, signifying that he has been determined to have the highest level of skills, integrity, and ethical standards in the area of insurance coverage.

Murray + Murray welcomes Florida homeowners, businesses, condominiums, and hotels with insurance-related issues to contact them for highly skilled and experienced legal representation.

About Murray + Murray

Murray + Murray is a Florida insurance litigation law firm that holds your insurance company accountable when it violates the duties owed to you as the policyholder. Our firm specializes in handling insurance claims for homeowners, businesses, condominiums, and hotels in first-party insurance disputes and bad faith claims. For more information, please visit: https://murraylawgroup.com/ .

Contact:

Murray + Murray

109 N Brush St # 350

Tampa, FL 33602

(813) 567-5600

https://www.murraylawgroup.com/

SOURCE Murray + Murray

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TYSONS CORNER, Va., June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Intelligent Office, the leader in business services, providing members dedicated offices, conference room rentals, virtual address, phone reception and customer service, and a number of other virtual services, is unveiling a new 20,000 square foot space during its grand re-opening week starting June 21st. Guests are invited for a week-long celebration after months of significant updates and renovations.

The week-long celebration will include VIP events each day, starting with the Vienna Business Association & Reception on June 21st. The following days will consist of: Loudon Chamber on June 22nd, Tower Club & Team Network/Reception on June 23rd, Tysons Corner Chamber/ Private Reception on June 24th, and finally, the Dulles Regional Chamber on June 25th.

Tysons Corner is located on the third floor of the Bank of America building with easy access to the 495, 267 and 66 highways. Intelligent Office has taken a bold step in expanding this office suite footprint from 8,000 square feet to a 20,000 square foot state of the art business center. Strategically located within walking distance from the Tysons Metro, mall shopping and a variety of gourmet restaurants, its location is desirable for the on-the-go business professional.

"The renovated facilities were designed with the mindset of servicing small, medium and large companies from a variety of business industries," said franchisee owner, Hari Ramamurthy. "We are also catering to a wide-range of industries from startups to well established local companies."

The newly renovated Tysons Corner business center includes:

55 dedicated offices with brand new furniture

Adjustable lift desks

Guest chairs

New carpet

Multiple conference rooms ranging in size

Virtual offices

Business lounge

A cafe kitchen and large co-working space

Two copy/print stations that service all clients

The new Tysons Corner location also features high end state of the art video conferencing rooms, Bluetooth access controls that can be accessed via your smart phone, free covered parking, and high-end wireless projectors with drop down large screens. In addition, the new Pike and Gallows Business Center can seat up to 70 people. The Pike and Gallows reception support area provides: double warming ovens, bread warmer, commercial ice maker, dishwasher, sink, serving counter and coffee station, making it ready to service a diverse range of meeting requirements.

"I am incredibly passionate about the Intelligent Office concept and am excited to reopen and continue helping small businesses throughout the community grow," said franchisee partner, Praveen Bagalkotkar.

"As businesses continue to implement work from home policies and downsize, we are prepared to provide entrepreneurs spaces to rent that are private and clean. We are also prepared to help companies that are looking to cut down on costs, like expensive leases, as our virtual services can support them effectively," said Chief Revenue Officer, Brandon Barr.

Intelligent Office's goal is to provide the virtual assistants, rentable office space, phone answering services, and virtual mailboxes to small business owners and entrepreneurs so they can spend less money on fixed costs like leases, administrative, and IT related support staff. With a wide range of virtual services that includes appointment scheduling services and CRM database management, Intelligent Office strives to help solopreneurs, micro-enterprises and SMEs exceed their goals.

About Intelligent Office

Founded in 1995 and franchising since 1999, Intelligent Office provides private and productive offices and meeting space along with customized virtual administrative and phone answering services so small business owners and entrepreneurs can spend less on fixed costs like leases, administrative and IT related support staff. With 56 locations open, Intelligent Office offers a variety of virtual services including phone answering services, appointment scheduling services, and a virtual address. Intelligent Office has 7 locations throughout the DC Metro area including Alexandria, Fairfax, Arlington, Reston, Tysons Corner, Washington, D.C., and Rockville. Intelligent Office also operates in British Columbia, Alberta and Ontario as well as 20 US states, Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, Idaho, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio and Pennsylvania. For more information, please visit: https://www.intelligentoffice.com.

SOURCE Intelligent Office

Related Links

https://www.intelligentoffice.com


WASHINGTON, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Leader in accessibility services and technology, iYellow Group, announced today the merging of its subsidiaries, TCS Interpreting, TCSAccess, and iYellow Captions. The transition is marked by a major rebranding.

The group is an evolution of Abacus N Bytes, Inc., a technology store founded by Phil and Myrna Aiello, Deaf entrepreneurs and parents of iYellow Group founder and CEO Jessica Aiello, in 1982 in Greenbelt, MD. iYellow Group is led by founder and CEO Jessica Aiello.

Founded in 2020, iYellow Group is the parent company of Maryland-based TCS Interpreting, TCSAccess, and iYellow Captions. American Sign Language interpreting, assistive technology procurement and training, and CART/captioning. Together, these companies provide a unique set of capabilities, serving the Deaf, blind, visually impaired, and DeafBlind communities, which sets them apart from other companies delivering similar service.

"At iYellow, it's our ongoing mission to advance equitable access by breaking barriers to communication. Bringing our individual companies under one umbrella will allow us to provide a united front as leaders in equitable access," says Jessica Aiello, Founder/CEO. "Additionally, this message called for a new look to match. Our bold, new identity is reflective of our continuous commitment to the communities we serve."

The first stage of the rebrand consisted of renaming the TCSAccess and TCSInterpreting subsidiaries. Renamed as iYellow Access and iYellow Interpreting respectively.

Furthermore, redesigns encompassed the entirety of iYellow's online experience, including revamped logos and a redesigned website for iYellow Group.

To learn more about iYellow Group and to see its brand-new look, please visit: https://www.iyellowgroup.com

About iYellow Group

iYellow Group was founded in 2020 and is led by founder and CEO Jessica Aiello. iYellow Group is the parent company of iYellow Access, iYellow Interpreting, and iYellow Captions. Providing ASL Interpreting, live captioning services as well as Assistive Technology procurement and training. The combined capabilities of all three companies position the iYellow Group to serve the Deaf, blind, visually impaired, and DeafBlind communities, unlike any other company.

Contact Information

Diana McCown

[email protected]

SOURCE iYellow Group
SANTA ROSA, Calif., June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Darius Anderson, the CEO of Sonoma Lab Works, California's premier cannabis testing lab and the CEO of Kenwood Investments, LLC announced today that Sonoma Lab Works' employees unanimously voted to join the United Food and Commercial Workers Union (UFCW), Local 5 for employee representation.

"We are pleased to have our employees join UFCW Local 5 and fully support their decision," said Darius Anderson, CEO of Kenwood Investments, LLC and Sonoma Lab Works, the highly regarded, licensed testing lab which operates a state-of-the-art, 8,000 square foot laboratory offering testing services to clients throughout California. "While many cannabis dispensary employees have unionized throughout California, Sonoma Lab Works is the first testing laboratory to unionize," said Darius Anderson. The lab's employees are a mix of highly educated scientists, engineers, assistants, and office staff.

Darius Anderson stated further that, "One of my goals when I led Kenwood Investments' acquisition of Sonoma Lab Works in 2019 was to professionalize the cannabis testing business in order to protect consumers, employees and our clients. As the cannabis industry expands in California and nationally it is important that employees have union representation to meet these goals so that employees can benefit from the industry's growth," Darius Anderson said.

Kenwood Investments, LLC is a California opportunistic investment company led by Darius Anderson that acquired Sonoma Lab Works in 2019. Darius Anderson is the CEO of Kenwood Investments, LLC and Sonoma Lab Works. Since 2019, Kenwood Investments' senior management team, along with the management team hired to run Sonoma Lab Works, have successfully managed Sonoma Lab Works as a profitable and growing business in California's robust cannabis market.

Jim Araby, Director of Strategic Campaigns for UFCW, Local 5 said, "We are extremely happy to have worked closely with Sonoma Lab Works' employees and management on this first union contract for a cannabis laboratory. We would like to thank Darius Anderson, CEO of Sonoma Lab Works, for his leadership in making this historic contract happen."

The UFCW now represents more than 2,000 cannabis workers in California, primarily in the retail dispensary space, and the unanimous vote by Sonoma Lab Works' employees makes it the first licensed laboratory in the State to have union representation.

About Sonoma Lab Works

Sonoma Lab Works is a Bureau of Cannabis Control licensed testing lab and is the lab of choice for companies looking to bring new cannabis products to market. Sonoma Lab Works provides research and development and State mandated compliance tests for its clients. Sonoma Lab Works utilizes state of the art equipment and proprietary methodologies to provide best in class test results for consumers and its clients. The lab's employees are a mix of highly educated scientists, engineers, assistants, and office staff who provide analytical, testing, research, and development services to its clients, allowing Sonoma Lab Works to work side-by-side with its clients to help new ideas grow beyond inception as they make their way to dispensary shelves. Darius Anderson CEO of Kenwood Investments, LLC and other investors acquired the lab in January 2019.

About Kenwood Investments, LLC

Kenwood Investments, LLC was founded by Darius Anderson in 2000. Since that time, Kenwood Investments, LLC's investment focus has been on opportunistic investments in retail, real estate, media, tourism, and hospitality projects. In 2019, Darius Anderson led Kenwood Investments' acquisition of Sonoma Lab Works and it has provided important management expertise to Sonoma Lab Works since that time. Kenwood Investments, LLC has a successful track record of developing one-of-a-kind projects in Northern California and has invested over $1B for its own account and its investors during the last 20+ years. Kenwood Investments, LLC is based in Sonoma, California, and is managed by a group of seasoned professionals who have worked with Darius Anderson and Kenwood Investments, LLC for decades.

Contact: Jay Wallace

Phone: 415-601-2081

[email protected]

SOURCE Kenwood Investments
CLEVELAND, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- KeyCorp (NYSE: KEY) announced today that it will host an investor meeting in New York City on Tuesday, March 1, 2022 at 8:30 a.m. ET. Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Chris Gorman and other members of Key's senior leadership team will discuss the company's strategy, performance, and outlook.

Attendance in person is for institutional investors and analysts, by invitation only. For those not in attendance, a live audio webcast and presentation materials will be available at www.key.com/ir. Presentation slides will be posted on KeyCorp's website prior to the event. If you are unable to join, or wish to hear a re-broadcast, access www.key.com/ir and select Events & Presentations.

KeyCorp's roots trace back 190 years to Albany, New York. Headquartered in Cleveland, Ohio, Key is one of the nation's largest bank-based financial services companies, with assets of approximately $176.2 billion at March 31, 2021. Key provides deposit, lending, cash management, and investment services to individuals and businesses in 15 states under the name KeyBank National Association through a network of over 1,000 branches and approximately 1,400 ATMs. Key also provides a broad range of sophisticated corporate and investment banking products, such as merger and acquisition advice, public and private debt and equity, syndications, and derivatives to middle market companies in selected industries throughout the United States under the KeyBanc Capital Markets trade name. For more information, visit https://www.key.com. KeyBank is Member FDIC.

SOURCE KeyCorp

Related Links

www.key.com


RESTON, Va., June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Leidos Holdings, Inc. (NYSE: LDOS) and Leidos, Inc. (together "Leidos"), a FORTUNE 500 science and technology leader, today announced that it has extended its offers to the holders of (i) $500,000,000 aggregate principal amount of its 2.950% Notes due 2023 (the "2023 Notes"), (ii) $500,000,000 aggregate principal amount of its 3.625% Notes due 2025 (the "2025 Notes"), (iii) $750,000,000 aggregate principal amount of its 4.375% Notes due 2030 (the "2030 Notes") and (iv) $1,000,000,000 aggregate principal amount of its 2.300% Notes due 2031 (the "2031 Notes" and together with the 2023 Notes, the 2025 Notes and the 2030 Notes, the "Notes"), to exchange each series of Notes (the "Exchange Offers") for a like aggregate principal amount of Notes with substantially identical terms other than that such new notes have been registered under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended.

The Exchange Offers, which had been scheduled to expire at 5:00 p.m., New York, New York time, on June 18, 2021, will now expire at 5:00 p.m., New York, New York time, on Monday, June 21, 2021, unless further extended by Leidos. The Exchange Offers are being extended due to the announcement that June 18, 2021, will be a federal holiday. All other terms, provisions and conditions of the Exchange Offers will remain in full force and effect. Citibank, N.A. (the "Exchange Agent") has been appointed as the exchange agent for the Exchange Offers.

Leidos has been informed by the Exchange Agent that, as of 5:00 p.m., New York, New York time, on June 17, 2021, the principal amounts of the Notes set forth in the table below had been validly tendered and not validly withdrawn:

2.950% Notes due 2023

CUSIP No. ISIN Total Outstanding Tendered Notes Total Remaining % Tendered 52532X AA3 US52532XAA37 $495,075,000 $295,493,000 $199,582,000 59.7% U5254F AA3 USU5254FAA31 $4,925,000 $0 $4,925,000 0%

3.625% Notes due 2025

CUSIP No. ISIN Total Outstanding Tendered Notes Total Remaining % Tendered 52532X AC9 US52532XAC92 $499,379,000 $427,937,000 $71,442,000 85.7% U5254F AB1 USU5254FAB14 $621,000 $107,000 $514,000 17.2%

4.375% Notes due 2030

CUSIP No. ISIN Total Outstanding Tendered Notes Total Remaining % Tendered 52532X AE5 US52532XAE58 $749,630,000 $525,840,000 $223,790,000 70.1% U5254F AC9 USU5254FAC96 $370,000 $50,000 $320,000 13.5%

2.300% Notes due 2031

CUSIP No. ISN Total Outstanding Tendered Notes Total Remaining % Tendered 52532X AG0 US52532XAG07 $997,500,000 $809,342,000 $188,158,000 81.1% U5254F AD7 USU5254FAD79 $2,500,000 $500,000 $2,000,000 20.0%

This press release shall not constitute an offer to sell, or the solicitation of an offer to buy, nor shall there be any sale of any securities in any jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful prior to registration, qualification or exemption under the securities laws of any such jurisdiction.

About Leidos

Leidos is a Fortune 500 information technology, engineering, and science solutions and services leader working to solve the world's toughest challenges in the defense, intelligence, civil, and health markets. The company's 40,000 employees support vital missions for government and commercial customers. Headquartered in Reston, Va., Leidos reported annual revenues of approximately $12.30 billion for the fiscal year ended January 1, 2021. For more information, visit www.Leidos.com.

Cautionary Statement Regarding Forward-Looking Statements

The forward-looking statements contained in this release involve risks and uncertainties that may affect Leidos' operations, markets, products, services, prices and other factors as discussed in filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission (the "SEC"). Without limiting the foregoing, forward-looking statements often use words such as "believe," "anticipate," "plan," "expect," "estimate," "intend," "seek," "project," "target," "goal," "may," "will," "would," "could," "should," "can," "continue" and other words of similar meaning in connection with a discussion of the transaction or future operating or financial performance or events. These risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, economic, competitive, legal, governmental and technological factors. Accordingly, there is no assurance that the expectations of Leidos will be realized. Unlisted factors may present significant additional obstacles to the realization of forward-looking statements. Consequences of material differences in results as compared with those anticipated in the forward-looking statements could include, among other things, business disruption, operational problems, financial loss, legal liability to third parties and similar risks, any of which could have a material adverse effect on Leidos' consolidated financial condition, results of operations or liquidity. For a discussion identifying additional important factors that could cause actual results to vary materially from those anticipated in the forward-looking statements, see Leidos' filings with the SEC, including "Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations" and "Risk Factors" in Leidos' annual report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended January 1, 2021 and in its quarterly reports on Form 10-Q which are available at http://www.Leidos.com and at the SEC's web site at http://www.sec.gov. The forward-looking statements contained in this release are made only as of the date of this release. Readers are cautioned not to put undue reliance on forward-looking statements. Leidos assumes no obligation to provide revisions or updates to any forward-looking statements should circumstances change, except as otherwise required by securities and other applicable laws.

Contact:

Melissa Duenas

(571) 526-6850

[email protected]

Thomas Doheny

(571) 474-4735

[email protected]

SOURCE Leidos

Related Links

http://www.leidos.com


ATLANTA, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ - Liberty Defense Holdings Ltd. ("Liberty" or the "Company") (TSXV: SCAN) (OTCQB: LDDFF) (FRANKFURT: LD2), a leading concealed weapons and threat detection solutions company, is pleased to announce that it has received Depository Trust Company (the "DTC") eligibility, making the Company's common shares eligible for electronic clearing and settlement and improving accessibility for US investors.

The DTC is the largest securities depository in the world and facilitates electronic settlement of stock certificate transfers in the United States. The shares of the Company, trading under the symbol "LDDFF" on the OTCQB in the United States, are now eligible to be electronically cleared and settled through the DTC making them "DTC eligible". This electronic method of clearing securities accelerates the settlement process for investors and brokerages.

"We are extremely pleased that Liberty is now DTC eligible, which will provide US investors easier and quicker access," said Bill Frain, CEO of Liberty Defense. "Our goal is to simplify the process for investors, enhancing liquidity and accessibility of the Company's stock."

On Behalf of Liberty Defense

Bill Frain

CEO & Director



About Liberty Defense

Liberty Defense (TSXV: SCAN, OTCQB: LDDFF, FRANKFURT: LD2) provides multi-technology security solutions for concealed weapons detection in high volume foot traffic areas and locations requiring enhanced security such as airports, stadiums, schools, and more. Liberty's HEXWAVE product, for which the company has secured an exclusive license from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), as well as a technology transfer agreement for patents related to active 3D radar imaging technology, provides discrete, modular, and scalable protection to provide layered, stand-off detection capability of metallic and non-metallic weapons. Liberty has also recently licensed the millimeter wave-based, High Definition Advanced Imaging Technology (HD-AIT) body scanner and shoe scanner technologies as part of its technology portfolio. Liberty is committed to protecting communities and preserving peace of mind through superior security detection solutions. Learn more: LibertyDefense.com

FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS

When used in this press release, the words "estimate", "project", "belief", "anticipate", "intend", "expect", "plan", "predict", "may" or "should" and the negative of these words or such variations thereon or comparable terminology are intended to identify forward-looking statements and information. Although Liberty believes, in light of the experience of their respective officers and directors, current conditions and expected future developments and other factors that have been considered appropriate, that the expectations reflected in the forward-looking statements and information in this press release are reasonable, undue reliance should not be placed on them because the parties can give no assurance that such statements will prove to be correct. Such statements and information reflect the current view of Liberty. There are risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially from those contemplated in those forward-looking statements and information.

By their nature, forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which may cause our 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. There are a number of important factors that could cause Liberty's actual results to differ materially from those indicated or implied by forward-looking statements and information. Such factors include, among others: currency fluctuations; limited business history of the parties; disruptions or changes in the credit or security markets; results of operation activities and development of projects; project cost overruns or unanticipated costs and expenses; and general development, market and industry conditions. The parties undertake no obligation to comment on analyses, expectations or statements made by third parties in respect of their securities or their respective financial or operating results (as applicable).

Liberty cautions that the foregoing list of material factors is not exhaustive. When relying on Liberty's forward-looking statements and information to make decisions, investors and others should carefully consider the foregoing factors and other uncertainties and potential events. Liberty 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 Liberty as of the date of this press release and, accordingly, are subject to change after such date. Liberty 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 the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this press release.

SOURCE Liberty Defense Holdings Ltd.

Related Links

www.libertydefense.com


Glassdoor, one of the world's largest job and recruiting websites, determined the winning chief executives by applying its proprietary algorithm, which takes into account the quantity, quality and consistency of Glassdoor-approved company reviews shared by U.S.-based employees between May 2, 2020 and May 1, 2021. Gross received a 97% approval rating based on anonymous and voluntary Glassdoor reviews submitted by Medical Guardian employees throughout the past year.

"It's an immense honor to be recognized by Glassdoor as a Top CEO," Gross said. "Supporting and empowering the amazing Medical Guardian team is one of my biggest priorities as a leader and I am humbled by their confidence in me as we collectively work to empower older adults to confidently live their lives without limits."

When employees submit reviews about their employer on Glassdoor, they are asked to rate several factors tied to their employment experience. These include rating sentiment on their CEO's leadership and senior management. Specifically, when rating their CEO on Glassdoor, employees are asked whether they approve, disapprove or have no opinion of their CEO's performance.

Across the approximately 1.5 million employers reviewed on Glassdoor, the average CEO approval rating is 73%.

"Over the past year, company leaders around the world faced unprecedented challenges to support employees during the COVID-19 crisis. Now, the employees have spoken and it's clear that these CEOs excelled and found new ways to support their people when the world of work flipped upside down," Glassdoor CEO Christian Sutherland-Wong said. "I extend my sincerest congratulations to this year's Employees' Choice Award winners."

Employers considered for the small and medium list must have received at least 35 company reviews, including at least 35 CEO approval ratings and at least 35 senior management ratings during the eligibility period. For reporting simplicity, CEO approval ratings are displayed as whole numbers, though calculations extend beyond the thousandth decimal place to determine final rank order. Complete award methodology can be found and downloaded here.

About Medical Guardian

Founded in 2005, Medical Guardian is a leading provider of innovative senior health solutions. The company offers a full suite of connected care medical alert systems that empower older adults to live a life without limits. A member of the National Aging in Place Council, Medical Guardian is headquartered in Philadelphia and provides nationwide support to more than 160,000 aging Americans who are ready to take on the next chapter of their lives while remaining safe in their own homes. Whether it's an in-home system, mobile device with GPS/Wi-Fi capabilities, or an all-in-one wearable medical alert smartwatch, Medical Guardian has the personal medical alert device to meet an array of needs and lifestyles. For more information about Medical Guardian, visit medicalguardian.com .

About Glassdoor

Glassdoor combines all the latest jobs with millions of reviews and insights to make it easy for people to find a job that is uniquely right for them. As a result, Glassdoor helps employers hire truly informed candidates at scale through effective recruiting solutions like employer branding and employee insights products. Launched in 2008, Glassdoor now has reviews and insights for more than one million companies around the world. For more information, visit glassdoor.com.

SOURCE Medical Guardian

Related Links

www.medicalguardian.com


WEST TISBURY, Mass., June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Genevieve Press is proud to announce that author/photographer Michael Blanchard, fresh on the heels of dual gold medals at the 2020 Benjamin Franklin Awards for Through A Sober Lens- A Photographer's Journey (Most Inspirational Book of the Year, Best Interior Book Design), has brought home the gold again with the reissue of Fighting For My Life, winner of the Best Art and Photography prize at the 2021 competition.



The reissue of Fighting For My Life features all new photographs Rainbow over the Edgartown Lighthouse, Martha's Vineyard

The Benjamin Franklin Awards, presented by the Independent Book Publisher's Association, are regarded as one of the most prestigious and competitive contests in the book industry. Ironically, Mr. Blanchard's original background was in the healthcare industry. Prior to his struggles with alcoholism and the journey of recovery chronicled in his books, he'd never seen himself as a writer or photographer. Based on his collection of gold medals, the publishing industry begs to differ.



Mr. Blanchard's work has drawn praise from prominent figures in art and media. Dan Lyons, the New York Times best-selling author of Disrupted and head writer on the HBO series SILICON VALLEY describes Mr. Blanchard's writing and photography as "pure inspiration." Stephen Okazaki, an Oscar-winning documentary filmmaker, calls Mr. Blanchard's writing "deeply moving and personal, told with honesty and heart."



Fighting For My Life was originally published in 2014 soon after Mr. Blanchard began his journey of sobriety. The updated version features new photographs and an updated author's preface.



"The first edition of Fighting for my Life was published when I first learned the power of expression through photographs," Mr. Blanchard explains. "The book in many ways saved me. I learned I could channel both pain and joy through the writing and the editing of photographs. As the book sold, people would reach out from all over the country to thank me for keeping hope alive for those suffering from addiction."



Mr. Blanchard's artistic mission remains one of hope in the face of the struggles posed by alcoholism and addiction. He describes the gold medals as a powerful affirmation of his message.



"For my art and photography to be recognized by the IBPA means the world," he says.



To contact Genevieve Press email [email protected], visit www.asoberlens.com,, or call Julian Wise directly at 774-563-0109. To contact Michael Blanchard, email [email protected] or visit http://www.blanchardphotomv.com/. Michael Blanchard's books are available at Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble, Walmart.com, Target.com, and directly from Genevieve Press.

SOURCE Genevieve Press
CLEVELAND, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- NACCO Industries, Inc. (NYSE: NC) announced today that it received notification on June 17, 2021 that the contract mining agreement between Bisti Fuels Company, a wholly owned subsidiary of NACCO, and the Navajo Transitional Energy Company ("NTEC") will be terminated effective September 30, 2021.

Bisti Fuels currently supplies coal from the Navajo Mine to the Four Corners Power Plant through the agreement with NTEC. NTEC will assume control and responsibility for operation of the Navajo Mine upon termination of the contract mining agreement. All liabilities, including mine reclamation, are the responsibility of NTEC. As required under the agreement, it is anticipated NTEC will pay NACCO a termination fee of approximately $10 million.

Bisti assumed operation of the Navajo Mine on January 1, 2017, and between 2017 and 2020, Bisti contributed pre-tax earnings between $4.5 million and $5.8 million annually. Excluding the termination fee, the termination of the contract mining agreement does not materially impact NACCO's outlook for 2021, but it will have a material unfavorable effect on NACCO's long-term earnings. The contract was scheduled to expire in 2031, with seasonal operations, and reduced coal production levels, beginning in the third quarter of 2023.

"While this is a disappointing outcome, we recognize that our customer, NTEC, has the capabilities to manage this operation, and has made a business decision to do so. We are proud of our employees, and the work they have accomplished during our oversight of the Navajo Mine. We empowered employees to greatly improve the safety culture, and act as strong stewards for environmental excellence," said J.C. Butler, President and CEO of NACCO and The North American Coal Corporation.

During North American Coal's tenure as operator of the Navajo Mine, the operation received the Sentinels of Safety Large Coal Processing Award from the National Mining Association, the Excellence in Surface Coal Mining Reclamation Award from the U.S. Department of the Interior's Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement, the National Mineral Education Award, the National Mine Safety and Health Training Award, and the Community Outreach Award from the Interstate Mining Compact Commission, as well as the Excellence in Reclamation Award from the New Mexico Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Department for STEM related outreach and education.

Mr. Butler added, "As described in our 2020 annual report, we remain steadfastly focused on our two key strategies, Protect the Core and Grow and Diversify. We are working diligently to support our North American Coal customers, and we continue to execute on key initiatives developed over the last several years as part of our strategy to Grow and Diversify. We are purposefully and deliberately diversifying into other businesses that leverage our core skills, capabilities and reputation. We are building a strong portfolio of affiliated businesses for growth and diversification through North American Mining which is rapidly building a business focused on aggregates and non-coal mineral production, Catapult Mineral Partners which is driving growth in our Minerals Management segment, and Mitigation Resources of North America which is focused on providing environmental offset solutions."

Forward-looking Statements Disclaimer

The statements contained in this news release that are not historical facts are "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. These forward-looking statements are made subject to certain risks and uncertainties, which could cause actual results to differ materially from those presented. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date hereof. The Company undertakes no obligation to publicly revise these forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances that arise after the date hereof. Among the factors that could cause plans, actions and results to differ materially from current expectations are, without limitation: (1) changes to or termination of a long-term mining contract, or a customer default under a contract, (2) a significant reduction in purchases by the Company's customers, including changes in coal consumption patterns of U.S. electric power generators, or changes in the power industry that would affect demand for the Company's coal and other mineral reserves, (3) the ability of the Company to access credit in the current economic environment, or obtain financing at reasonable rates, or at all, and to maintain surety bonds for mine reclamation as a result of current market sentiment for fossil fuels, (4) failure to obtain adequate insurance coverages at reasonable rates, (5) the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, (6) changes in tax laws or regulatory requirements, including the elimination of, or reduction in, the percentage depletion tax deduction, changes in mining or power plant emission regulations and health, safety or environmental legislation, (7) changes in costs related to geological and geotechnical conditions, repairs and maintenance, new equipment and replacement parts, fuel or other similar items, (8) regulatory actions, changes in mining permit requirements or delays in obtaining mining permits that could affect deliveries to customers, (9) weather conditions, extended power plant outages, liquidity events or other events that would change the level of customers' coal or aggregates requirements, (10) weather or equipment problems that could affect deliveries to customers, (11) failure or delays by the Company's lessees in achieving expected production of natural gas and other hydrocarbons; the availability and cost of transportation and processing services in the areas where the Company's oil and gas reserves are located; federal and state legislative and regulatory initiatives relating to hydraulic fracturing; and the ability of lessees to obtain capital or financing needed for well development operations and leasing and development of oil and gas reserves on federal lands, (12) changes in the costs to reclaim mining areas, (13) costs to pursue and develop new mining and value-added service opportunities, (14) delays or reductions in coal or aggregates deliveries, (15) changes in the prices of hydrocarbons, particularly diesel fuel, natural gas and oil, (16) the ability to successfully evaluate investments and achieve intended financial results in new business and growth initiatives, (17) the effects of receiving low sustainability scores which could result in the exclusion of the Company's securities from consideration by certain investment funds, and (18) disruptions from natural or human causes, including severe weather, accidents, fires, earthquakes and terrorist acts, any of which could result in suspension of operations or harm to people or the environment.

About NACCO Industries, Inc.

NACCO Industries, Inc., through a portfolio of mining and natural resources businesses, operates under three business segments: Coal Mining, North American Mining and Minerals Management. The Coal Mining segment operates surface coal mines under long-term contracts with power generation companies and an activated carbon producer pursuant to a service-based business model. The North American Mining segment provides value-added contract mining and other services for producers of aggregates, lithium and other minerals. The Minerals Management segment acquires and promotes the development of oil, gas and coal mineral interests, generating income primarily from royalty-based lease payments from third parties. In addition, the Company's Mitigation Resources of North America business provides stream and wetland mitigation solutions. For more information about NACCO Industries, visit the Company's website at www.nacco.com.

SOURCE NACCO Industries, Inc.

Related Links

http://www.nacco.com


WASHINGTON, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Who would you invite to 'the cookout?' National Expungement Works (N.E.W.) , the organization that has shaped the nationwide conversation around expungement and legal relief impacting millions, broaches this thought-provoking topic and many others as part of its fourth annual observance of Juneteenth. Made possible by the generosity of Green Thumb Industries (GTI) , a leading national cannabis consumer packaged goods company, N.E.W. will host the premiere screening of "Who's Invited to the Cookout" on Saturday, June 19, 2021, at 7:00 pm ET.

As with their groundbreaking work to center expungement in harm reduction, N.E.W. 's annual Juneteenth community celebrations helped ignite the movement that blossomed into a federal holiday. The day June 19 has additional significance for the organization as N.E.W.'s genesis can be traced to a barbeque to mark the holiday in 2018.

"While we applaud the distinction of Juneteenth as a federal holiday, we recognize that collectively more needs to be done and that we cannot do this work without altruistic partners. Thank you to GTI for coming on board as the first American company to sign on as an event sponsor," said N.E.W. Founder and Visionary LaTorie Marshall. "We appreciate the partnership of GTI for co-hosting a safe place to eat, talk things out, and rest while we are finishing each other's sentences; that's how we celebrate. Equally, don't forget the jokes and laughter."

'The cookout' as defined by UrbanDictionary.com , is "a metaphorical gathering of the Black community," exclusive to its members except for those who receive an invitation. The question ultimately posed by N.E.W. is regarding who is welcomed into Black spaces and how that correlates to allyship, wellness, social responsibility, and economic and political justice.

"'Who's Invited to the Cookout' takes place around a virtual dinner table with a family-style conversation from the perspective of justice-impacted voices, legal perspectives on legislation and its compounded impact on the Black community, and healing practices for coping, surviving, and thriving within this system of injustice," said Jessica Jackson, Director of Operations for N.E.W. "These conversations are necessary when honoring the legacy of Juneteenth and celebrating in fellowship with our community. Trust and believe every speaker will have a full plate, a selected track on our playlist!"

"We're honored to sponsor N.E.W.'s Juneteenth celebration highlighting the important conversations about social responsibility and economic and political justice in our society," said Green Thumb SVP of Government Affairs Dina Rollman. "Green Thumb strongly believes in N.E.W. and their work around expungement and community empowerment, and feel it is our responsibility to support broadening awareness of the history of Juneteenth. We are looking forward to hearing from each speaker and celebrating Juneteenth with N.E.W."

To join N.E.W. during their community Screening of "Who's Invited to the Cookout," please visit https://bit.ly/newcookout on Saturday, June 19th at 7:00 pm ET.

About National Expungement Works

National Expungement Works (N.E.W.) is a year-round project that offers expungements, ceilings and pardons, and other forms of legal relief to individuals with convictions on their records. These convictions can restrict access to housing, employment, education, public assistance, and voting rights long after sentences have been served. N.E.W. year-round events build up to their week of action known as National Expungement Week. offer many wraparound and legal services to restore people's rights, access to resources, and uplift communities. For more information, please visit nationalexpungementweek.org or on Instagram and Twitter .

Media Contact:

Heather Carter

[email protected]

631-861-4723

SOURCE National Expungement Works
ATLANTA, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Atlanta-based realtor Shante Davis launches Wealth$hare, a revolutionary desktop and mobile application (coming soon), which provides direct access to community funded, revolving interest free loans. Utilizing a breakthrough and an easy-to-use automated system, Wealth$hare allows its members to contribute, receive, recycle, and reinvest within the community, with thousands of dollars revolving into the community since its April 2021 launch. The Wealth$hare platform aims to increase financial self-sufficiency across the global economy, eliminating financial distress while helping to revive communities all over the world, through access to capital and education.

Shante Davis W$ CEO

"The goal isn't more money. The goal is living life on your terms." Chris Brogan

For some, 2020 was a struggle, while for others like Atlanta- based real estate agent Shante Davis; 2020 became her most lucrative year in business, being named as Keller Williams' Rookie of the Year, in the midst of the pandemic. While Mrs. Davis was excited about the growth of her personal business, she could not truly celebrate as the pandemic had shifted the financial security of so many lives, directly affecting her family and friends.

In response to the pandemic and the increasing gap in wealth disparity, Mrs. Davis sought to positively impact disenfranchised communities excluded by the mainstream financial services industry, providing the medium necessary for equal opportunity and access. Mrs. Davis began to research and implement strategies from the notorious rotating savings clubs that scoured the internet. Upon educating herself on the pros and cons of the concept; Mrs. Davis set out to provide an alternative solution to the concept that would yield more stability and bring long term results. During that research, from July 2020 to September 2020, 3.5 million dollars revolved amongst the community, then operated under another name; bringing a whole new meaning to "Sharing the Wealth."

At the height of success, Mrs. Davis decided to take a step back from her real estate career; utilizing her real estate income; she hired a team of lawyers, actuarial scientist, business consultants, technology and app developers; to curate the Wealth$hare desktop and the later release of the mobile app (Summer 2021).

"Our mission is to provide financial freedoms to families for generations to come" -Shante Davis, Wealth$hare CEO

About Wealth$hare: Founded July 15, 2020, Wealth$hare is a financial organization whose mission is to improve the quality of life and financial outlook of our members by encouraging financial literacy while providing access to revolving, community funded, zero-interest loans. The company is headquartered in Atlanta, GA. To learn more, visit unlockwealthshare.com. Like us on Facebook and Follow us on Instagram @unlockwealthshare.

For media/press inquiries: [email protected]

3379 Peachtree Road NE, Suite 555

Atlanta, GA 30326

P: 866.655.1426

F: 404.260.3365

www.unlockwealthshare.com

SOURCE Wealth$hare
Nursing Skills joins Nursing Pharmacology as part of a five-book series of high quality, nationally peer-reviewed nursing titles available for free digital download. Nursing Fundamentals will be available later this summer followed by Nursing: Mental Health & Community Concepts , and Nursing Management and Professional Concepts , which will be available in 2022. XanEdu is the preferred print partner with Open RN and will offer each textbook in low cost print available through campus bookstores or Amazon.

Nursing Skills will also be offered via XanEdu's FlexEd digital courseware platform, a proven technology that begins with OER textbook content to keep costs low. Enhanced content and tools are carefully curated and assembled using cognitive psychology-driven design to guide students toward mastery of each topic. This "course-in-a-box" platform leverages experienced educators to create supplemental content including video, case studies, homework, lecture slides and more. Because all materials are provided, the transition to these new materials is easy for instructors. FlexEd's Nursing Pharmacology has been widely welcomed in the marketplace as an affordable and effective alternative to expensive course materials for nursing students.

"The missions of Open RN and XanEdu are closely aligned. We are thrilled to be part of the effort to provide OER and cost-effective, high-quality nursing education solutions for nursing programs around the country," said John DeBoer, CEO of XanEdu.

Nursing Skills and the other titles in this series are aligned to state nursing standards and contain active study tools designed to assist students as they learn challenging concepts and how to apply them to patient care. The material is written to guide students in the manner in which they will be tested with the new NCLEX Next Generation test questions. Because these titles are open resources, other nursing programs across the country will be able to easily customize to their own specifications, providing engaging, accurate, free content to their students.

Open RN is funded by a grant from the US Department of Education to address the skyrocketing costs of textbooks which limit access to education for many students. XanEdu is the preferred print partner for Open RN and will offer the full suite of titles in low-cost print versions as they are published.

ABOUT XANEDU

XanEdu has been increasing student engagement and enhancing learning outcomes since 1999 by delivering innovative solutions across the education spectrum. We are committed to advancing the education tools for tomorrow through innovative products and services that meet students' evolving learning styles. We incorporate cutting edge technology while maintaining our commitment to affordability and accessibility. XanEdu is a privately held company headquartered in Ann Arbor, MI.

More information can be found at xanedu.com or by writing [email protected] .

ABOUT OPEN RN

The Open Resources for Nursing (Open RN) project is led by Chippewa Valley Technical College and funded by a $2.5 million grant from the Department of Education to create 5 open educational resource (OER) nursing textbooks and 25 associated virtual reality scenarios. The textbooks are collaboratively written by Wisconsin Technical College System (WTCS) nursing faculty and undergo a national review process by nursing faculty, administrators, librarians, nursing students, and industry representatives. The free Open RN e-books contain online learning activities and virtual simulations to assist students to apply concepts to patient care. The projected impact of the Open RN project for WTCS students is $1.5 million annually in textbooks savings. The books are also being adopted nationally and internationally by nursing faculty, resulting in additional student savings.

More information about the Open RN project is available at https://www.cvtc.edu/landing-pages/grants/open-rn

Contact:

Joyce Mueller

[email protected]

SOURCE XanEdu Publishing, Inc.; Open RN

Related Links

http://www.xanedu.com


PHILADELPHIA, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- It's long been known that people living with HIV experience a loss of white matter in their brains. As opposed to gray matter, which is composed of the cell bodies of neurons, white matter is made up of cells that produce myelin, a fatty substance that coats neurons, offering protection and helping them transmit signals efficiently. A reduction in white matter is associated with motor and cognitive impairment.

Earlier work by a team from Penn Dental Medicine and Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) found that antiretroviral therapy (ART)the lifesaving drugs that many with HIV use dailycan reduce white matter, but it wasn't clear how the virus itself contributed to this loss.

In a new study using both human and rodent cells, the team has determined how HIV prevents the myelin-making brain cells called oligodendrocytes from maturing, reducing white matter production. When the researchers applied a compound blocking to this process, the cells were once again able to mature. The work appears in the journal Glia .

"Even when people with HIV have their disease well-controlled by antiretrovirals, they still have the virus present in their bodies, so this study came out of our interest in understanding how HIV infection itself affects white matter," says Kelly Jordan-Sciutto , professor at Penn Dental Medicine and the study's co-senior author. "By understanding those mechanisms, we can take the next step to protect people with HIV from these impacts."

Jordan-Sciutto and Judith Grinspan , CHOP research scientist and Professor of Neurology at Penn Medicine, have been collaborating to elucidate how ART and HIV affect the brain. Their previous work on antiretrovirals had shown that commonly used drugs disrupted the function of oligodendrocytes, reducing myelin formation.

In the current study, they aimed to isolate the effect of HIV on this process by looking at human macrophages, one of the major cell types that HIV infects.

Ultimately, the researchers want to discern the effects of the virus from the drugs used to treat it in order to better evaluate the risks of each.

"When we put people on ART, it's important to understand the implications," says Jordan-Sciutto. "Antiretrovirals may prevent the establishment of a viral reservoir in the central nervous system, which would be wonderful, but we also know some drugs have unintended consequences, which may include altering white matter." Read more on the study >>

Contact: Beth Adams, [email protected]

SOURCE Penn Dental Medicine

Related Links

http://www.dental.upenn.edu


WASHINGTON, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- In celebration of the upcoming first official day of summer on June 20, the National Park Foundation is announcing the winners of the special edition 2020 "Best of the Decade" Share the Experience photo contest and launching the 2021 competition. Last year's contest invited amateur photographers to submit their favorite shots from a decade of adventures in national parks and recreational lands and waters, with safety top of mind.

View the collection of winning photos on the National Park Foundation's blog today.

The winners of the National Park Foundation's 2020 Share the Experience photo contest. Learn more and enter the 2021 contest at sharetheexperience.org. Video credit: Rebecca Guldin/National Park Foundation

"Each photo is a unique perspective of the beauty and history that surrounds us. More than natural beauty, the images capture moments of wonder, inspiration, and deep personal connection experienced by people across the country," said National Park Foundation President and CEO Will Shafroth. "This summer, the National Park Foundation is excited to join our partners in safely welcoming people back, and welcoming some folks for their very first time, to national parks and recreational lands and waters."

Over 13,400 photos were submitted to the contest, which ran from June 25, 2020, through December 31, 2020.

Top Three Winners

The warm glow of a flashlight-lit rooftop tent invites onlookers into the scene as they also admire the Milky Way galaxy rising above the San Juan National Forest. This photo, captured by Mark Gruenhaupt , is the grand prize winner of the 2020 Share the Experience photo contest and will be featured on the National Parks and Federal Recreational Lands Pass.

, is the grand prize winner of the 2020 Share the Experience photo contest and will be featured on the National Parks and Federal Recreational Lands Pass. A photograph by Rudi Jensen of his brother walking out to the edge of the stunning shoreline at Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore took second place.

of his brother walking out to the edge of the stunning shoreline at Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore took second place. Third place went to Kathy Ritter for her photo of a magical moment when the orangish yellows of the sky created an unforgettable reflection in the water at Apache-Sitgreaves National Forests.

View the full collection of winning photos, including the category winners and fan favorites, on the National Park Foundation's blog.

"Booz Allen Hamilton is proud to celebrate the 2020 Share the Experience contest winners who have demonstrated that even during a challenging year, the outdoors provided an outlet for the public, along with moments of wonder, beauty and normalcy," said Julie McPherson, executive vice president, Booz Allen Hamilton. "Our firm is proud to support the National Park Foundation and participating federal agencies to help everyone, from seasoned outdoor enthusiasts to families heading out to their local park for the first time, capture these inspiring moments, and discover and plan many more incredible recreation opportunities through the Recreation.gov website and mobile app."

The National Park Foundation is also excited to launch the 2021 Share the Experience photo contest with co-sponsor Booz Allen Hamilton, the contractor and partner for the Recreation.gov platform. This year's contest invites amateur photographers to submit their favorite recent shots, while continuing to keep safety top of mind.

The grand prize for the winning image is $10,000, followed by $5,000 and $3,000 for second and third place. Winners also receive outdoor gear provided by Celestron, Hydro Flask and Osprey Packs, hotel packages courtesy of Historic Hotels of America, and an annual National Parks and Federal Recreational Lands Pass.

Prizes will also be awarded for fan favorites and the following five categories:

Adventure & Recreation

Share photos of your favorite activities and adventures highlighting the diversity of exhilarating moments for all that can be experienced on recreational lands and waters across the country  from fishing to hiking to interpretive tours and more. And be sure to #RecreateResponsibly!

Outdoors for All

Featuring people, of all ages, backgrounds, and abilities, who love to explore and experience recreational lands and waters. Share photos of family and friends that demonstrate how recreational lands and waters are for all of us.

Historical & Cultural

From the homes of civil rights leaders to spaces that bore witness to national movements, to battlefields where people fought for freedom and more, this category spotlights the multifaceted and multicultural stories of the United States and the places that preserve them.

Scenic, Seasons & Landscapes

The scenic vistas, sweeping landscapes, and beautiful flora of recreational lands and waters can be found in far-off locales or closer to home than you think. Capture fall foliage, forests, winter wonderlands, flowers, mountains, deserts, canyons, lakes, seashores, rivers, and more.

Wildlife

Take a walk on the wild side with photos of the incredibly diverse array of animals that call recreational lands and waters home. Remember to keep your distance and stay safe!

The 2021 Share the Experience photo contest is hosted by the National Park Foundation and Booz Allen Hamilton in partnership with the National Park Service, the Bureau of Land Management, the Bureau of Reclamation, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the U.S. Forest Service, and Recreation.gov. Share the Experience is the official photo contest of America's national parks and federal recreational lands and waters, showcasing the more than 500 million acres of federal lands and waters and drawing entries from across the United States. The 2021 contest is now open and accepting entries through December 31.

Please visit sharetheexperience.org to learn more about the contest, including how to submit an image, the full list of prizing, and the rules. You can also follow @NationalParkFoundation on Instagram for photo inspiration.

ABOUT THE NATIONAL PARK FOUNDATION

The National Park Foundation works to protect wildlife and park lands, preserve history and culture, educate and engage youth, and connect people everywhere to the wonder of parks. We do it in collaboration with the National Park Service, the park partner community, and with the generous support of donors, without whom our work would not be possible. Learn more at nationalparks.org.

Related Links:

SOURCE National Park Foundation
HONG KONG and SHANGHAI, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Ping An Life's reform is driven by a combination of digital empowerment and a "heartwarming" value system, said Peter Ma, Chairman of Ping An Insurance (Group) Company of China, Ltd. (hereafter "Ping An" or the "Group", HKEX: 2318; SSE: 601318). Mr. Ma spoke at the 25th Ping An Life Insurance Summit in Chongqing.

The "Chinization" of Ping An Life's development

Mr. Ma said Ping An Life has had three distinct stages of growth. Ping An Life was a pioneer in China's life insurance industry when it was founded in 1994. It drew on the Taiwanese insurance business model, which had taken Western models and adapted it for its local culture.

As international insurance companies entered the Chinese market, Ping An entered the second development stage of "internationalization". It looked to global competitors and adopted their professional operational approaches, management theories and talent.

Now, Ping An Life is in the third stage, "Chinization", creating an innovative made-in-China approach to developing life insurance. With rising living standards in China, customers have become more aware of insurance and want high quality options. "We must accelerate to seek transformation in response to the call of the times," Mr. Ma said: "Our goal is to learn from outstanding international systems, processes and standards, while developing a life insurance model in line with the requirements of the new era in China. With technology empowerment, we will provide customers insurance products with heartwarming services."

A digital revolution in insurance

Technology is the key to Ping An's "heartwarming" insurance products and services. Over the past decade, Ping An Group has invested heavily in technology to compete globally. As of the first quarter of this year, Ping An had filed more than 32,000 applications for technology patents, leading in financial technology and digital medical technology, and in third place for artificial intelligence patents worldwide.

Ping An has been upgrading its life insurance business with technology, from operations to sales agent performance management to customer service. Ping An Life established a database with millions of entries of data via AI-powered AskBob, providing services for over 800,000 users, with a per capita usage frequency of over six times per day. The database has become a smart training platform for agents' lifelong learning and continued education, helping them to strengthen overall capabilities. Ping An Life's smart insurance tool provides customers with AI-enabled insurance demand analysis and insurance planning. In 2020, the smart insurance tool generated written premiums of over RMB15.0 billion from customer conversion for Ping An Life. Ping An is also optimizing its digital life insurance platform and plans to roll it out across China, helping all industry players increase productivity and revenue.

Going beyond settling claims to comprehensive health care

"Traditionally, insurers only settle claims after an accident happens, which only guarantees financial security. However, customers need not just an insurance policy but professional and thoughtful services in health protection, medical care, elderly care, and daily life and they expect our timely help," Mr. Ma said.

China's 14th Five-Year Plan, which began this year, emphasizes enhancing insurance capabilities and developing the elderly care insurance system, Mr. Ma said.

Ping An's technology-driven health care ecosystem enables insurers to go beyond insurance to also meet customers' health care needs. The ecosystem connects health care services to customers, so that every customer will be provided with one general practitioner and one care assistant to access Ping An's health management, medical management, chronic disease management, critical illness management, and elderly care management services at any time.

Mr. Ma noted that when customers buy insurance, they are not just signing a contract: they also expect a commitment to protect their families. Ping An will continue to improve service quality and further its operation and management reforms to support the development of insurance industry as well as China's economic development and social stability.

About Ping An Group

Ping An Insurance (Group) Company of China, Ltd. ("Ping An") is a world-leading technology-powered retail financial services group. With over 220 million retail customers and 611 million internet users, Ping An is one of the largest financial services companies in the world. Ping An focuses on two over-arching domains of activity, "pan financial assets" and "pan health care", covering the provision of financial and health care services through our integrated financial services platform and our ecosystems; in financial services, health care, auto services and smart city services. Our "finance + technology" and "finance + ecosystem" transformation strategies aim to provide customers and internet users with innovative and simple products and services using technology. As China's first joint stock insurance company, Ping An is committed to upholding the highest standards of corporate reporting and corporate governance. The Group is listed on the stock exchanges in Hong Kong and Shanghai. Ping An ranked 6th in the Forbes Global 2000 list in 2021 and ranked 21st in the Fortune Global 500 list in 2020. Ping An also ranked 38th in the 2020 WPP Kantar Millward Brown BrandZTM Top 100 Most Valuable Global Brands list.

For more information, please visit www.group.pingan.com and follow us on LinkedIn - PING AN.

SOURCE Ping An Insurance (Group) Company of China, Ltd.

Related Links

www.group.pingan.com


SALT LAKE CITY, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- While Ameritech College of Healthcare is nationally accredited, and a candidate for Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities (NWCCU) institutional accreditation, the College is seeking initial institutional accreditation from (NWCCU).

As part of that process, the college has scheduled an accreditation visit to its campus on October 4-6, 2021. Comments related to Ameritech College of Healthcare's qualification for initial institutional accreditation are invited, and may be sent to:

Comments should be addressed to:

Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities

8060 165th Ave NE, Ste 100

Redmond, WA 98502

www.nwccu.org

425.558.4224

Comments must be received no later than September 3, 2021 to obtain a copy of NWCCU's Commission Policy A-5, Public Notification and Third Party Comments, go to www.nwccu.org , or contact the Commission Office at (425) 558-4224.

Signed comments are forwarded, as received, to Ameritech College of Healthcare, to the evaluation committee, and the Commission.

About Ameritech College of Healthcare

Ameritech College of Healthcare was established in 1979, committed to creating learning environments that create skilled and confident health professionals. Over the past several decades, thousands of graduates have chosen Ameritech to assist them with their career transition into nursing and other healthcare fields.

The college is known for its combination of speed and academic rigor. With fast-paced programs, students who graduate from Ameritech are well-prepared for their career and have leading licensure pass rates in the state of Utah. The college offers programs in nursing and occupational health, with pre-licensure nursing pathways at the associate, bachelor, and master levels, as well as a post-licensure RN-BSN, BSN-MSN and an occupational therapy assisting program.

Media Contact:

[email protected]

SOURCE Ameritech College

Related Links

https://www.ameritech.edu


SAN MATEO, Calif. and KYOTO, Japan, June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Rakuten Medical, Inc. (HQ: San Mateo, Calif.; Chairman and CEO: Hiroshi Mikitani; hereinafter "Rakuten Medical") and Shimadzu Corporation (HQ: Kyoto, Japan; President and CEO: Teruhisa Ueda; hereinafter "Shimadzu") today announced a joint development and commercialization agreement to advance a medical device for use on the Illuminox platform. This partnership will allow for the development of a medical device using optical measurement technologies to support cancer treatment by photoimmunotherapy.

Therapies developed on the Illuminox platform involve administering a targeting moiety conjugated with one or more dyes, which is illuminated by light at a specific wavelength. Light illumination of the targeted cells transiently excites the drug, and pre-clinical data have shown this excitation elicits rapid and selective necrosis of targeted cells through a biophysical process.

Based on this agreement, both companies will use their expertise to work toward the joint development of technology that will allow visualization, measurement, and recording of the reaction of the dye to light illumination in real-time. This will allow for optimization of light irradiation depending on the tumor. Both companies will cooperate to aim for commercialization of the medical device using the technology on a worldwide basis.

Rakuten Medical is developing therapies on its Illuminox platform, an investigational treatment platform based on a cancer therapy called photoimmunotherapy developed by Dr. Kobayashi and team from the National Cancer Institute in the United States. In September 2020, Rakuten Medical announced that its wholly owned subsidiary Rakuten Medical Japan K.K. received conditional marketing approval in Japan from the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare for ASP-1929 Photoimmunotherapy and a laser light device to treat unresectable locally advanced or recurrent head and neck cancer, and began commercialization in January 2021. Shimadzu is focusing on creating innovative products and services, which combine analytical measurements with diagnostic imaging in the healthcare field. Utilizing its measurement technologies, Shimadzu has worked with cancer institutes in both USA and Japan for the development of photoimmunotherapy at the pre-clinical stage.

About Rakuten Medical, Inc.

Rakuten Medical, Inc. is a global biotechnology company developing precision, cell-targeting investigational therapies on its Illuminox platform, which, in pre-clinical studies have been shown to induce rapid and selective cell killing and tumor necrosis. Outside of Japan, Illuminox therapies have not yet been approved as safe or effective by any regulatory authority. Rakuten Medical is committed to its mission to conquer cancer and aims to realize a society where cancer patients can lead fulfilling lives. With its headquarters, and research and development base in the United States, Rakuten Medical has 6 locations in 5 countries, Japan, the Netherlands, Taiwan and Switzerland. For more information, visit www.rakuten-med.com.

About Shimadzu Corporation

With "Contributing to Society through Science and Technology" as the corporate philosophy and "Realizing Our Wishes for the Well-being of Mankind and the Earth" as the management principle, Shimadzu Corporation operates in various fields such as testing and measuring instruments, medical systems, aircraft equipment, and industrial machinery and equipment. For the development of photoimmunotherapy, Shimadzu has also signed joint development agreements with the National Cancer Institute and the National Cancer Center Hospital East to advance the development of measurement technologies for photoimmunotherapy.

About Illuminox Platform

The Illuminox platform is an investigational platform based on a cancer therapy called photoimmunotherapy, which was developed by Dr. Hisataka Kobayashi and team from the National Cancer Institute in the United States. Rakuten Medical is developing the Illuminox platform as a technology consisting of a drug, device and other related components. The drug component of the platform consists of a targeting moiety conjugated with one or more dyes leading to selective cell surface binding. The device component consists of a light source that locally illuminates the targeted cells with non-thermal light to transiently activate the drug. Pre-clinical data have shown that this activation elicits rapid and selective necrosis of targeted cells through a biophysical process that compromises the membrane integrity of the targeted cells. Therapies developed on Illuminox may also result in local and systemic innate and adaptive immune activation due to immunogenic cell death of the targeted cells and/or the removal of immunosuppressive elements within the microenvironment. Outside of Japan, Illuminox therapies have not yet been approved as safe or effective by any regulatory authority.

Forward Looking Statements

This press release contains forward looking statements that correspond to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 and other application securities laws. These statements include various risks, uncertainties, and assumptions that may cause Rakuten Medical's business plans and results to differ from the Company's current anticipated results, beliefs and expectations expressed in this press release. These "forward looking statements" include, but are not limited to, information about the potential benefits of the collaboration between Rakuten Medical and Shimadzu, the status and development of our products and therapies, including ASP-1929, potential development of new fluorescence imaging technologies for photoimmunotherapy on a worldwide basis, Rakuten Medical's Illuminox platform development, necessary regulatory approvals, and commercial success of the product or technology may not be achieved. Forward looking statements may include words such as "expect," "believe," "hope," "estimate," "looks as though," "anticipate," "intend," "may," "suggest," "plan," "strategy," "will," and "do", and are based on our current beliefs. Except to the extent required by applicable law, we undertake no obligation to publicly update this or any other forward-looking statement, whether because of new information, future developments or events, changes in assumptions, changes in the factors affecting forward-looking statements. If one or more forward-looking statement(s) is updated, no inference should be drawn that additional updates will be made to those or other forward-looking statements.

SOURCE Rakuten Medical, Inc.

Related Links

https://rakuten-med.com


12,000 bidders from 58 countries competed for 4,000 items in the June 15  16, 2021 auction

HOUSTON, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ - Ritchie Bros. June Houston, TX auction saw a 30% increase in both gross transaction value and bidder registrations year over year. The two-day unreserved auction attracted 12,000 bidders and generated US$56+ million in GTV.

"Our marketplaces continue to drive record-breaking demand, with online equipment views per lot for our Houston auction up 84% from our June 2020 event," said Alan McVicker, Regional Sales Manager, Ritchie Bros. "This unprecedented demand is driving strong pricing across all equipment categories. In this week's Houston sale, we saw particularly hot pricing for truck tractors and vocational trucks. We also achieved great returns for a package of 65 pipelayers, despite the volatility in that industry. We encourage consignors to contact us today to take advantage of this 2021 seller's market."

Approximately 87 percent of the equipment in the Houston auction was purchased by U.S. buyers, including 52% sold to Texas buyers, while international buyers from as far away as Australia, Vietnam, and the United Kingdom purchased the remaining 13 percent. With 100% of bidding done online, Ritchie Bros. saw a 22% increase in watchlist adds per lot and a 39% increase in PriorityBids per lot.

Five Big Sellers:

2017 Caterpillar PL87 pipelayer  US$545,000

2008 Caterpillar 587T pipelayer  US$380,000

2017 Caterpillar PM622 cold planer  US$220,000

2015 Peterbilt 389 day cab heavy haul truck  US$150,000

2019 Peterbilt 365 tri-drive day cab heavy haul truck  US$112,500

AUCTION QUICK FACTS: HOUSTON, TX (JUNE 15 - 16 2021)

Gross Transaction Value (GTV): US$56+ million

Total Registered Bidders: 12,000

Total Number of Lots: 4,000+

Total Number of Consignors: 600+

Ritchie Bros. will sell more than 60,000 equipment items and trucks in its upcoming auctions, including a Northeast Regional Auction on June 22  23; a Great Lakes Regional Auction on June 24  25; and our next Texas auction in Fort Worth on July 20  21. The company also has weekly featured online auctions at IronPlanet.com and a daily reserved option with Marketplace-E.

About Ritchie Bros.:

Established in 1958, Ritchie Bros. (NYSE and TSX: RBA) is a global asset management and disposition company, offering customers end-to-end solutions for buying and selling used heavy equipment, trucks and other assets. Operating in a number of sectors, including construction, transportation, agriculture, energy, oil and gas, mining, and forestry, the company's selling channels include: Ritchie Bros. Auctioneers, the world's largest industrial auctioneer offers live auction events with online bidding; IronPlanet, an online marketplace with featured weekly auctions and providing the exclusive IronClad Assurance equipment condition certification; Marketplace-E, a controlled marketplace offering multiple price and timing options; Mascus, a leading European online equipment listing service; and Ritchie Bros. Private Treaty, offering privately negotiated sales. The Company's suite of solutions also includes Ritchie Bros. Asset Solutions and Rouse Services LLC, which together provides a complete end-to-end asset management, data-driven intelligence and performance benchmarking system. Ritchie Bros. also offers sector-specific solutions including GovPlanet, TruckPlanet, and Kruse Energy, plus equipment financing and leasing through Ritchie Bros. Financial Services. For more information about Ritchie Bros., visit RitchieBros.com.

Photos and video for embedding in media stories are available at rbauction.com/media.

SOURCE Ritchie Bros.
NEW YORK, June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ --

WHY: New York, N.Y., June 17, 2021. Rosen Law Firm, a global investor rights law firm, reminds purchasers of the securities of Ubiquiti Inc. (NYSE: UI) between January 11, 2021 and March 30, 2021, inclusive (the "Class Period"), of the important July 19, 2021 lead plaintiff deadline.

SO WHAT: If you purchased Ubiquiti securities during the Class Period you may be entitled to compensation without payment of any out of pocket fees or costs through a contingency fee arrangement.

WHAT TO DO NEXT: To join the Ubiquiti class action, go to http://www.rosenlegal.com/cases-register-2069.html or call Phillip Kim, Esq. toll-free at 866-767-3653 or email [email protected] or [email protected] for information on the class action. If you wish to serve as lead plaintiff, you must move the Court no later than July 19, 2021. A lead plaintiff is a representative party acting on behalf of other class members in directing the litigation.

WHY ROSEN LAW: We encourage investors to select qualified counsel with a track record of success in leadership roles. Often, firms issuing notices do not have comparable experience or resources. The Rosen Law Firm represents investors throughout the globe, concentrating its practice in securities class actions and shareholder derivative litigation. Rosen Law Firm has achieved the largest ever securities class action settlement against a Chinese Company. Rosen Law Firm was Ranked No. 1 by ISS Securities Class Action Services for number of securities class action settlements in 2017. The firm has been ranked in the top 4 each year since 2013 and has recovered hundreds of millions of dollars for investors. In 2019 alone the firm secured over $438 million for investors. In 2020, founding partner Laurence Rosen was named by law360 as a Titan of Plaintiffs' Bar. Many of the firm's attorneys have been recognized by Lawdragon and Super Lawyers.

DETAILS OF THE CASE: According to the lawsuit, defendants throughout the Class Period made false and/or misleading statements and/or failed to disclose that: (1) Ubiquiti had downplayed the data breach in January 2021; (2) the attackers had obtained administrative access to Ubiquiti's servers and obtained access to, among other things, all databases, all user database credentials, and secrets required to forge single sign-on (SSO) cookies; (3) as a result, intruders already had credentials needed to remotely access Ubiquiti's customers' systems; and (4) as a result of the foregoing, defendants' positive statements about Ubiquiti's business, operations, and prospects were materially misleading and/or lacked a reasonable basis. When the true details entered the market, the lawsuit claims that investors suffered damages.

To join the Ubiquiti class action, go to http://www.rosenlegal.com/cases-register-2069.html or call Phillip Kim, Esq. toll-free at 866-767-3653 or email [email protected] or [email protected] for information on the class action.

No Class Has Been Certified. Until a class is certified, you are not represented by counsel unless you retain one. You may select counsel of your choice. You may also remain an absent class member and do nothing at this point. An investor's ability to share in any potential future recovery is not dependent upon serving as lead plaintiff.

Follow us for updates on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-rosen-law-firm or on Twitter: https://twitter.com/rosen_firm or on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/rosenlawfirm.

Attorney Advertising. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.

Contact Information:

Laurence Rosen, Esq.

Phillip Kim, Esq.

The Rosen Law Firm, P.A.

275 Madison Avenue, 40th Floor

New York, NY 10016

Tel: (212) 686-1060

Toll Free: (866) 767-3653

Fax: (212) 202-3827

[email protected]

[email protected]

[email protected]

www.rosenlegal.com

SOURCE Rosen Law Firm, P.A.

Related Links

www.rosenlegal.com


"We are pleased to continue our expansion in the Western United States and enter our 17th state with the acquisition of Adventure RV, the #1 RV dealer in Wyoming," added Jon Ferrando. "We are also excited to add new locations in Indiana and Georgia with the acquisitions of The RV Center and Mid-State RV. We welcome over 100 new associates from these three stores into the RVR family."

With over 30 years in business, Mid-State RV operates on a 24-acre campus on I-75 in Byron, Georgia. Mid-State's facility includes a state of the art 22,000 square foot collision repair center with a paint booth. Mid-State RV is the #1 Forest River dealer in Georgia.

Adventure RV, the #1 volume RV dealer in Wyoming, has a superior brand mix including Grand Design, Jayco and Keystone products. Adventure RV has a sales and service facility on 10 acres conveniently located just north of the Colorado border near the I-80 and I-25 interchange.

The RV Center is located on Highway 30 in the Fort Wayne market, the second largest metro area in Indiana, providing RVR an attractive expansion of its Midwest footprint with a strong brand mix including Jayco, Forest River, and Grand Design products.

To learn more about the RV Center, Mid-State RV, Adventure RV and RV Retailer, please visit www.rvone.com, www.greatrvdeals.com, www.midstaterv.com and www.rvretailer.com.

About RV Retailer, LLC

RV Retailer, LLC is a leading recreational vehicle retail company in the United States with the goal of providing an outstanding sales, service and ownership experience for recreational vehicle customers with a focus on new and used sales, service and parts, and customer financial services. RV Retailer is led by co-founders Jon Ferrando, Chief Executive Officer and President, and John Rizzo, Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer. Jon Ferrando and John Rizzo were instrumental in building America's largest automotive retailer from start-up to over $20 billion in revenue. RV Retailer's leadership team has over 250 years of automotive and RV retail industry experience.

RV Retailer has 58 RV stores in Alabama, Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Missouri, Ohio, New York, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Utah and Wyoming. Regional store brands include: RV One Superstores, Motor Home Specialist, ExploreUSA, Sonny's Camp-N-Travel, Cousins RV, Camper Clinic, Lifestyle RVs, Family RV Group, Mid-State RV, Northgate RV and Tom's Camperland, which sell a wide range of new and used RV brands with thousands of RVs in inventory.

SOURCE RV Retailer, LLC

Related Links

http://www.rvretailer.com


MOSCOW, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Sheremetyevo International Airport was ranked as the 10th best company in Russia for corporate communications and corporate relations and its communications department was ranked 6th best in Russia, according to the results of the VIII All-Russian rating of directors and departments for corporate communications and corporate relations TOP-COMM 2021.

Anna Zakharenkova, Public Relations Director of Sheremetyevo Airport, was ranked 8th among directors of corporate communications and corporate relations, 13th among managers for the most effective work in external communications, and 17th among managers for in the area of internal corporate communications.

In 2020 and the first half of 2021, Sheremetyevo Airport significantly dominated the media space of the Moscow Aviation Hub, generating significant publicity and engaging in broad public outreach for a number of large-scale events with the participation of government agencies and representatives of the Government of the Russian Federation. These included the opening of new infrastructure facilities and comprehensive measures to prevent the spread of the coronavirus infection in the Russian Federation, as well as implementation of measures aimed at saving jobs and keeping airport employees working.

Special attention was paid to highlighting the current and in-demand services for passengers and guests of Sheremetyevo as international flights resumed, particularly the world's first COVID-19 rapid test service and public vaccination services, together with RDIF, available at an airport.

Today, A.S. Pushkin Sheremetyevo International Airport implements an extensive informational and educational program to acquaint Russian and foreign passengers with the richest historical and cultural heritage of the country through the use of unique media systems, art objects and special exhibitions.

The effectiveness of the communication activities of Sheremetyevo Airport is regularly confirmed by authoritative industry awards and ratings. In 2020, Sheremetyevo became a laureate of the Formula of Movement, a national award for achievements in the area of transportation and transportation infrastructure, in the category of Best PR-activity in the Current Year, for the media coverage of health preventive measures for passengers and staff.

"On behalf of Sheremetyevo Airport, I would like to thank the ACMR's expert community for the high assessment of our activities and media representatives for constructive cooperation in covering the most important events at Sheremetyevo Airport," said Anna Zakharenkova, Public Relations Director of JSC SIA. "Together we have done important informational work for the benefit of passengers, and for protecting the health of our citizens and foreign citizens, which means we have made our modest contribution to a great common cause."

The All-Russian TOP-COMM rating is annually compiled by the Association of Communications and Corporate Media Directors of Russia (ACMR) using a mathematical model based on factual data on activities for the previous calendar year provided by the rating participants. One of the main objectives of the project is to identify and publicly recognize successful industry professionals and identify the best corporate communications and corporate relations companies in Russia. The participation in this rating is evidence of the company's high media activism, as well as the openness and transparency of its activities in external and internal communications.

The heads of the departments for corporate communications, corporate relations and their structural divisions of the largest Russian and foreign companies operating in Russia are claiming places among the TOP-100 in the TOP-COMM rating.

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.

Additional information is at http://www.svo.aero.

SOURCE Sheremetyevo International Airport

Related Links

http://www.svo.aero


LONDON, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Shoptalk, the leading U.S. conference in the retail, grocery and fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) industries, has announced their global expansion with the relaunch of Shoptalk Europe. Taking place at ExCeL London on 6-8 June 2022, Shoptalk Europe will provide a platform for the entire European retail ecosystem to come together to reimagine the future of retail.

Across the three days, Shoptalk Europe will host 200+ truly diverse industry leading speakers - from established retailers to innovative new startups and prolific investors. Half of the speakers and agenda will focus on grocery and FMCG related topics. Over 25 speakers have confirmed a year ahead of the event, including:

La Redoute International - Michael Truluck , CEO

, CEO Mister Spex - Dirk Graber , CEO

, CEO Outfittery - Julia Bosch, CEO & Co-Founder

Julia Bosch, CEO & Co-Founder Olaplex - JuE Wong , CEO

, CEO Cosabella - Guido Campello , CEO & Creative Director

, CEO & Creative Director Chiquelle - Pouya Boland , Co-Founder & CEO

, Co-Founder & CEO FTD - Charlie Cole , CEO

, CEO WM Morrisons - Matt Kelleher , Group CIO

- , Group CIO John Lewis - Cassandra Hicks Bergsland , Director of Omnichannel

, Director of Omnichannel MediaMarktSaturn N3XT - Sonja Moosburger , Managing Director

- , Managing Director Stanley Black & Decker - Heather Kang , President & GM, International Commerce

, President & GM, International Commerce Pizza Hut - Helen Vaid , Global Chief Customer Officer

, Global Chief Customer Officer Randa Apparel & Accessories - David Katz , EVP & Chief Marketing Officer

, EVP & Chief Marketing Officer Fressnapf - Lars Kietzer , Chief Product Owner & VP Product

, Chief Product Owner & VP Product PepsiCo - Anna Farberov , GM PepsiCo Labs, Global Venture & Innovation

, GM PepsiCo Labs, Global Venture & Innovation Zalando - Carsten Keller , VP, Direct-to-Consumer

, VP, Direct-to-Consumer Crocs - Jessica Alsing , VP Digital Commerce, Asia & EMEA

, VP Digital Commerce, & EMEA Sonae - Bruno Mourao, Head of IT Transformation & IT Strategy & Experimentation

Bruno Mourao, Head of IT Transformation & IT Strategy & Experimentation Endeavour Drinks Group, a unit of Woolworths Group - Benjamin Thompson , Head of Digital Transformation

, Head of Digital Transformation Mars - Gary Arora , Global Launchpad Lead & Head of Seeds of Change Accelerator

, Global Launchpad Lead & Head of Seeds of Change Accelerator Atomico - Sasha Astafyeva , Partner

, Partner dan pearlman Group - Nicole Srock .Stanley, Founder & CEO

.Stanley, Founder & CEO YourStudio - Tom Philipson , Co-Founder & Managing Director

, Co-Founder & Managing Director IGD - Susan Barratt , CEO

, CEO The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania - Barbara Kahn , Baker Professor of Marketing

Shoptalk Europe will welcome 2,500+ attendees from large retailers and brands, startups, technology companies, investors, media and analysts to learn, network, collaborate and evolve. "We've been blown away by support from sponsors and speakers alike," said Sarah Netherway, Event Director, Shoptalk Europe. "The need for a top-quality retail event in Europe is very evident from the early support we've received."

"Shoptalk is unique in the way it unites all parts of the retail ecosystem, from across Europe and beyond," said Katy Fryatt, Launch Director, Shoptalk Europe. Shoptalk Europe ran successfully in 2017 in Copenhagen, Denmark. "We're excited to be building an event of the calibre and scale that Europe needs."

Early confirmed sponsors for Shoptalk Europe include Awin, BlinkReceipt, Bloomreach, Checkout.com, commercetools, Cymbio, Flow Commerce, Forter, Halla, Localistico, Manhattan Associates, Narvar, NewStore, Nextail, Northfork, Pacvue, Pinterest, Pitney Bowes, Pixlee TurnTo, Proximity Insight, Riskified, Salsify, Shoppermotion, Shopware, Signifyd, Syndigo, Taggstar, True Fit, UntieNots and Yotpo.

The Shoptalk Europe community will also be invited to take part in Shoptalk Fall Meetup. Shoptalk Meetups bring large, curated groups together for double opt-in virtual meetings and peer group discussions, and have successfully facilitated an aggregate of more than 33,000 online meetings for more than 4,000 participants to date. Shoptalk Fall Meetup takes place 19-21 October 2021.

For more information, visit: www.shoptalkeurope.com and www.shoptalkfall.retailmeetup.com

About Shoptalk

A Hyve Group plc (LSE: HYVE:LN) event, Shoptalk is widely known for organising retail's best and fastest growing events, and bringing together thousands of industry changemakers to collaborate at unparalleled scale across a broad range of online and offline use cases and innovative new formats, including Tabletalks, Hosted Meetings and Meetups. For five years, Shoptalk has defined the retail industry's community of innovators by bringing established retailers and brands together with direct-to-consumer and tech startups, large tech and Internet companies, venture capital investors, real estate developers, equity analysts, media and others. For more information, visit www.shoptalk.com and www.shoptalkeurope.com .

About Hyve:

Hyve Group plc is a next-generation global events business whose purpose is to bring together and connect entire sector ecosystems from all corners of the globe. We meet our customer needs to learn, network and trade via both market leading in-person and online events. Hyve Group plc is all about globally consistent best practice and unrivalled quality. Our vision is to create the world's leading portfolio of content-driven, must-attend events delivering an outstanding experience and ROI for our customers. Hyve's market leading portfolio of global brands include: Shoptalk, Spring Fair, MosBuild, Bett, Mining Indaba and recently acquired Retail Meetup, a ground-breaking digital platform enabling online networking and trade to take place at scale.

Where business is personal, where meetings move markets and where today's leaders inspire tomorrow's.

SOURCE Shoptalk
LONDON, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Last week, leaders from seven of the world's wealthiest countries gathered in Cornwall, UK, for the 2021 G7 Summit. The heads of state from Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the UK, the US, and representatives of the EU met to discuss global challenges  including a response to the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change. The leaders reaffirmed their goal to limit global heating to 1.5C and to protect and restore 30 percent of the natural world by the end of this decade. However, experts say that the summit failed to provide developing nations with the funds needed to cut greenhouse gas emissions and cope with the impacts of global warming.

The Caribbean is one of many regions globally that has seen the devastating impact of climate change. When category 5 Hurricane Maria struck Dominica, an island of only 72,000, in September 2017, more than 90 percent of the island's structures were destroyed. However, in the face of catastrophe, the country's Prime Minister, Dr the Honourable Roosevelt Skerrit, declared that the small country would commit to becoming the world's first climate-resilient nation by building back better and stronger.

Honourable Cozier Frederick, Dominica's Minister of Environment, Rural Modernisation and Kalinago Upliftment, told CS Global Partners that "Small countries like Dominica have done little to hyperbolise the climate crisis. Instead, we in Dominica are on our way to climate resilience because we have no other choice, we are left fending for ourselves. Global leaders need to live up to their climate commitments, otherwise, climate catastrophe will worsen for us all."

Today, with the help of the Citizenship by Investment (CBI) Programme, Dominica is constructing over 5,000 weather-proof homes for its citizens and investing in rehabilitating its agriculture and fishing industries. It is also working towards building a geothermal plant which will reduce the cost of electricity for consumers and provide electricity to the French islands of Guadeloupe and Martinique, which in turn will encourage foreign exchange.

CBI programmes legally grant citizenship status to applicants who invest in a host country's economy and do so much faster than traditional immigration processes. Dominica's CBI programme provides applicants with a swift processing time, thorough due diligence and affordable investment options channelled into health, education and employment initiatives on the island. With second citizenship from Dominica, individuals and their families can quickly formulate a Plan B and obtain global mobility without physically relocating, going through extensive interviews or waiting years as commonly associated with the traditional immigration process.

[email protected]

www.csglobalpartners.com

SOURCE CS Global Partners
MIAMI, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- SmileFy Inc. released the latest update of its advanced smile design software, which features 3D Smile Design as a chairside solution for dentists to create facially guided dental mock-ups in-office and in just a few minutes. The 3D Smile Design module comes just weeks after announcing the smile design software to the cosmetic dentistry community.

SmileFy Inc.

With the recent rise of 3D dental printers making their way into practices of every size, more and more practitioners are becoming aware of the benefits of embracing digital dentistry, like increased predictability and lower costs. SmileFy's 3D Smile Design makes the digital workflow simpler and reliable so, paired with their knowledge and clinical expertise, dentists can yield the best possible esthetic outcomes for their patients.

Doctors and dental labs will be able to collaborate on patient cases directly from the SmileFy software, encouraging better communication and improved turnaround times. They can initiate treatment plans with more accuracy by incorporating intraoral scans, 3D facial scans, and CBCT scans to predict and visualize the end result before starting treatment - a big game-changer in the dental field as it works to improve integrated workflows. They will also be able to export unlimited 3D Smile Designs as open projects to proceed with 3D printing and manufacturing preparations with any CAD/CAM software.

"Our goal with SmileFy is to bring the most innovative technologies at your fingertips. We want to empower clinicians to use technology to improve the way they provide patient care and meet patient expectations. We aim to provide technology that is simple and easy to use so doctors spend more time doing what they love," says Ralph Georg, SmileFy founder and creator.

SmileFy features and benefits include:

An intuitive user interface for the dentist to access from iPhone, iPad, and Mac.

Facially driven, natural-looking Smile Simulations generated by SmileFy's Artificial Intelligence.

Digital Patient module for a 3D view of your patient's head using all your digital files such as intraoral scans, CBCT scans, and Bellus 3D facial scan.

3D Smile Design to create digital wax-up in-office in a few minutes.

Extensive library of natural tooth shapes.

Exporting unlimited 3D smile design STLs.

Collaboration option for dentist and dental lab technicians to access case files and designs.

To learn more or sign up for a demo, please visit www.smilefy.com.

Contact

Michelle Carpio

Senior Business Development Manager

[email protected]

786-713-1168

Related Images

image1.png

SOURCE SmileFy Inc.
"The word 'freedom' has significant meaning to the People and history of Southwest Airlines," said Gary Kelly , Southwest Airlines' Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer. "We're eternally grateful to those who have served and are currently serving in our Armed Forcesincluding the more than 7,400 veterans and 1,500 military spouses in our Southwest Family. Our Purpose is to connect People to what's important in their lives through friendly, reliable, and low-cost air travel. We simply couldn't fulfill our Purpose if not for the sacrifices and dedication of our military men and women. We appreciate their service and bravery in providing a blanket of freedom for our country."

Freedom One was unveiled to Southwest Employees during a Company celebration at the Southwest Airlines Technical Operations Hangar at William P. Hobby International Airport in Houston, where attendees included Southwest Military Ambassadors, Military Council, winners of the Company's prestigious President's Award, and others. Military Ambassadors are Southwest Employees who are veterans and military spouses. They serve as a resource for the Company to foster inclusion for veterans and service members.

The specialty plane features 50 stars and 13 stripes and becomes a high-flying tribute to 50 years of Southwest Airlines service with a symbol of unwavering pride for our Nation and its heroes. It is the first Boeing 737-800 to join the airline's unique paint schemes. Other special paint schemes on Southwest Boeing 737-700s include: Arizona One, California One, Colorado One, Florida One, Illinois One, Lone Star One (Texas), Louisiana One, Maryland One, Missouri One, Nevada One, New Mexico One, and Tennessee One.

Before unveiling Freedom One, Kelly announced Southwest is offering an Employee gift to recognize and appreciate active Southwest Employees in the milestone moment for Southwest Airlines: 50,000 Rapid Rewards bonus points deposited later this year into the account of each Employee who chooses to accept the gift.

"Southwest revolutionized the travel industry since our very first flight on June 18, 1971a time when less than 15% of Americans ever had traveled by air," said Kelly at the Employee celebration. "The People of Southwest democratized the skies with friendly, reliable, and affordable air travel, and what better way to honor you, our Employees, on our 50th Anniversary than by offering a gift of 50,000 Rapid Rewards points."

Southwest's first flights operated on what was known as the Texas Triangle, between Dallas, Houston, and San Antonio. Throughout the next fifty years, Southwest grew to become the nation's largest domestic airline, carrying up to 1 in the 4 travelers in the United States. Today, Southwest operates one of the world's largest fleets of Boeing 737s, serves 121 destinations throughout North America, Employs more than 56,000 People, and is consistently ranked among the best airlines and best employers in the world.

Following the Southwest Employee celebration, Freedom One departed Houston, headed for Dallas. Pilots and Flight Attendants onboard are Southwest Employees who served in the military or in the reserves. Additionally, a military veteran dispatched the flight from Southwest's Network Operations Control facility in Dallas. As the aircraft approached Dallas, it followed the Federal Aviation Administration's HERBZ navigational flight path to the airport, recently named in honor of Southwest Founder Herb Kelleher.

Customers are invited to share their photos of Freedom One using #FreedomOne on social media. Freedom One merchandise will be available for purchase beginning June 21 online at Southwest The Store.

To access Freedom One broadcast quality footage and high-res images, as well as photos from the Southwest Employee celebration, visit swamedia.com.

ABOUT SOUTHWEST AIRLINES CO.

In its 50th year of service, Dallas-based Southwest Airlines Co. continues to differentiate itself from other air carriers with exemplary Customer Service delivered by more than 56,000 Employees to a Customer base that topped 130 million Passengers in 2019. Southwest has a robust network of point-to-point service with a strong presence across top leisure and business markets. In peak travel seasons during 2019, Southwest operated more than 4,000 weekday departures among a network of 101 destinations in the United States and 10 additional countries. In 2020, the carrier added service to Hilo, Hawaii; Cozumel, Mexico; Miami; Palm Springs, Calif.; Steamboat Springs; and Montrose (Telluride), Colo. Thus far in 2021, Southwest has initiated service to Chicago (O'Hare) and Sarasota/Bradenton both on Feb. 14; Savannah/Hilton Head and Colorado Springs both on March 11; Houston (Bush) and Santa Barbara, Calif. both on April 12; Fresno, Calif. on April 25; Destin/Fort Walton Beach on May 6; Myrtle Beach, S.C. on May 23; Bozeman, Mont. on May 27; and Jackson, Miss. on June 6; and will begin service to Eugene, Ore. on Aug. 29; Bellingham, Wash. on Nov. 7; and Syracuse on Nov. 14.

The carrier issued its Southwest Promise in May 2020 to highlight new and round-the-clock efforts to support its Customers and Employees well-being and comfort. Among the changes are enhanced cleaning efforts at airports and onboard aircraft, along with a federal mandate requiring every person to wear a mask at all times throughout each flight. Additional details about the Southwest Promise are available at Southwest.com/Promise.

Southwest coined Transfarency to describe its purposed philosophy of treating Customers honestly and fairly, and low fares actually staying low. Southwest is the only major U.S. airline to offer bags fly free to everyone (first and second checked pieces of luggage, size and weight limits apply, some carriers offer free checked bags on select routes or in qualified circumstances). Southwest does not charge change fees, though fare differences might apply.

Southwest is one of the most honored airlines in the world, known for a triple bottom line approach that contributes to the carrier's performance and productivity, the importance of its People and the communities they serve, and an overall commitment to efficiency and the planet. Learn more about how the carrier gives back to communities across the world by visiting Southwest.com/citizenship.

Book Southwest Airlines' low fares online at Southwest.com or by phone at 800-I-FLY-SWA.

SOURCE Southwest Airlines Co.

Related Links

http://www.southwest.com


DUBUQUE, Iowa, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Spahn & Rose Lumber Co. has entered into an agreement to purchase Metro Building Products, based in Marietta, Georgia.

"Metro Building Products shares the same values and corporate culture as Spahn & Rose," says Dave Davis, Spahn & Rose's CEO. "Like Spahn & Rose, Metro provides outstanding service to both contractor and homeowner customers. This was a unique business opportunity, and we're very proud to have Metro join Spahn & Rose."

Spahn & Rose Dubuque, Iowa

Spahn & Rose has no plans to change Metro Building Products' name, marketing focus or local management, Davis says.

The planned acquisition unites two successful longtime lumber and building-material companies. Founded in 1904, Spahn & Rose is a leading lumber distributor in the Midwest and has been named one of the top 100 lumber and building-materials distributors in the country by ProSales, a newsletter that reports on contractor and construction-industry trends.

Joe McKenzie and his wife, Tina, founded Metro Building Products in 1991. The company serves professional builders, remodelers and homeowners in Atlanta, Kennesaw, Smyrna, Sandy Springs, Vinings and several other communities throughout Cobb County in northwest Georgia. Metro specializes in high quality building materials including cedar, douglas fir timbers, decking, cedar shakes, Big Green Egg grills, and iron & aluminum railings.

"For more than three decades, Metro Building Products has always maintained a high level of customer service while providing quality products to contractors and homeowners," McKenzie says. "Metro has been growing and thriving, and with Spahn & Rose we're going to have new and exciting opportunities to serve our customers."

The acquisition of Metro Building Products will mark the third major addition for Spahn & Rose in the past three years. In February 2019, it acquired the Lake Geneva, Wisconsinbased Dunn Lumber, and in February 2020, it acquired Reinbeck, Iowabased Moeller & Walter Lumber.

About Spahn & Rose Lumber Co.

Spahn & Rose Lumber Co., which has been serving the professional contractor since it opened in 1904, is a leading lumber and building-materials distributor in the Midwest. Spahn & Rose Lumber currently operates 23 locations throughout Iowa, Illinois, and Wisconsin. Spahn & Rose provides high-quality building materialswindows, doors, cabinets, drywall, roofing, decking, lumber and moreenabling builders, contractors and homeowners to buy easier and build better.

Press Contact

Jacque Arensdorf

Director of Marketing

563.582.3606 x308

[email protected]

SOURCE Spahn & Rose Lumber Company
SANTA CRUZ, Calif., June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- While 92% of digital media pros report general productivity has improved while working from home, over half (63%) say transferring files has become more difficult, according to a new study commissioned by Santa Cruz Software that surveyed over 500 design professionals. In addition to work-from-home trends, the survey asks questions about version control and asset management challenges among digital media pros compared to a similar survey conducted one year ago.

Time spent working from home skyrocketed this past year due to the pandemic, and respondents expect working from home is here to stay. Over 97% of respondents work from home at least once a week with nearly half (40%) working from home full time, compared to only 19% working at home full time two years ago. Of those polled, 92% predict one year from now they will continue working from home at least once a week. Only 8% expect to return to the office full-time in one year, as opposed to 29% before the pandemic.

Over four in five (83%) of respondents are spending time finding lost assets at least once a week, up from 73% in 2020. In fact, 11% are searching for lost assets hourly. In some cases the productivity losses are enormous. Nearly three-quarters of designers spend at least three hours a week managing versions, and a staggering 15% are spending over six hours a week managing versions. Interestingly, the name "John" was listed as the most common name for the person in their organizations who consistently makes the most asset mistakes, two years in a row!

An efficient way of managing assets remains essential: 97% believe their productivity would radically improve if they had working files/assets accessible from within the Adobe application. The results were similar regardless of the kind of Adobe applications used, though when asked what app they most commonly use Adobe Photoshop was ranked highest.

"The difficulty of managing digital asset versions has long tormented multi-media professionals, and this has only become more pronounced during the pandemic when many are working remotely," said Mark Hilton, CEO of Santa Cruz Software. "Time spent managing assets is costing professionals  and their businesses  countless hours in lost productivity. Working from home is here to stay, and this survey confirmed what many designers knew already  streamlining access to files from within apps is the preferred workflow. At Santa Cruz Software, we are pioneering ways for creatives to access their cloud-based content right from Adobe apps, benefiting everyone involved."

About Santa Cruz Software

Santa Cruz Software offers a suite of tools to connect Adobe applications to other Cloud Services, enabling teams to collaborate seamlessly on projects without ever leaving their applications. Enjoy simplified version control, easy asset search, and seamless connection between your shared team assets. Santa Cruz Software features are designed to streamline brand compliance, empower collaboration between teams, and increase productivity. Our solutions range from integratable Dynamic Templates based upon Adobe InDesign (PrintUI), DAM connectors for Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator,Adobe InDesign, Adobe Premiere and Adobe After Effects (LinkrUI), and turnkey collateral/campaign portals (BrandingUI).

All trademarks and product names are the property of their respective companies.

Media Contact

David Haefele

FortyThree, Inc.

[email protected]

831.401.3175

SOURCE Santa Cruz Software

Related Links

https://santacruzsoftware.com


VANCOUVER, BC, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ - Taseko Mines Limited (TSX: TKO) (NYSE American: TGB) (LSE: TKO) ("Taseko" or the "Company") today announced the voting results from its 2021 Annual General Meeting held yesterday. Additionally, the Company announces the retirement of Russell Hallbauer, Chief Executive Officer, and John McManus, Chief Operating Officer, effective June 30, 2021. Russ will remain a Director of the Company, and Stuart McDonald, currently President, will also assume the role of Chief Executive Officer. Richard Tremblay will be promoted to Senior Vice President, Operations and Richard Weymark has been appointed Vice President, Engineering.

Ron Thiessen, Chairman of the Board, commented, "On behalf of the Board and all stakeholders, I would like to thank Russ and John for their 16 years of achievements at Taseko, and congratulate them on their retirements after long and distinguished careers in the mining industry. Russ' leadership and vision during his tenure as CEO has resulted in a company that achieved significant production growth and established an unparalleled pipeline of mining projects. His experience and dedication helped the Company navigate through some of the most challenging periods ever experienced in financial markets, and also generate over $900 million of operating cash flow. John's operating background was foundational as Gibraltar went through a multi-year, $800 million expansion and ramp up. John has also been instrumental in advancing the Florence Copper project since its acquisition in 2014."

Russell Hallbauer, CEO and Director, commented, "We have had a succession plan in place for our internal technical team for a number of years. Richard Tremblay, Senior VP Operations, has over 30 years of experience in mining operations in BC and has been a key member of the team since joining Taseko in 2014 as General Manager of our Gibraltar Mine. In 2019 he was appointed Vice President, Operations and since then he has been responsible for oversight of the Gibraltar Mine, and all activities related to development of Florence Copper and our other projects."

"Richard Weymark, Vice President Engineering, joined Taseko in 2018 as Chief Engineer and previously spent 10 years in progressively senior roles at Teck's Highland Valley Copper operation including roles in mine engineering, mine operations and tailings dam construction. Richard will continue to focus on the advancement of the engineering and environmental aspects of Taseko's pipeline of development projects."

AGM voting results

A total of 141,179,859 common shares were voted at the Annual General Meeting, representing 49.9% of the votes attached to all outstanding common shares. Shareholders voted in favour of all items of business before the meeting, including the election of all director nominees as follows:

Director % Votes in Favour Anu Dhir 93.7% Robert Dickinson 87.1% Russell Hallbauer 97.9% Peter Mitchell 98.3% Kenneth Pickering 97.8% Ron Thiessen 93.4%

Detailed voting results for the 2021 Annual General Meeting are available on SEDAR at www.sedar.com.

Stuart McDonald

President

No regulatory authority has approved or disapproved of the information contained in this news release.

CAUTION REGARDING FORWARD-LOOKING INFORMATION

This document contains "forward-looking statements" that were based on Taseko's expectations, estimates and projections as of the dates as of which those statements were made. Generally, these forward-looking statements can be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology such as "outlook", "anticipate", "project", "target", "believe", "estimate", "expect", "intend", "should" and similar expressions.

Forward-looking statements are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause the Company's actual results, level of activity, performance or achievements to be materially different from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. These included but are not limited to:

uncertainties about the effect of COVID-19 and the response of local, provincial, federal and international governments to the threat of COVID-19 on our operations (including our suppliers, customers, supply chain, employees and contractors) and economic conditions generally and in particular with respect to the demand for copper and other metals we produce;

uncertainties and costs related to the Company's exploration and development activities, such as those associated with continuity of mineralization or determining whether mineral resources or reserves exist on a property;

uncertainties related to the accuracy of our estimates of mineral reserves, mineral resources, production rates and timing of production, future production and future cash and total costs of production and milling;

uncertainties related to feasibility studies that provide estimates of expected or anticipated costs, expenditures and economic returns from a mining project;

uncertainties related to the ability to obtain necessary licenses permits for development projects and project delays due to third party opposition;

uncertainties related to unexpected judicial or regulatory proceedings;

changes in, and the effects of, the laws, regulations and government policies affecting our exploration and development activities and mining operations, particularly laws, regulations and policies;

changes in general economic conditions, the financial markets and in the demand and market price for copper, gold and other minerals and commodities, such as diesel fuel, steel, concrete, electricity and other forms of energy, mining equipment, and fluctuations in exchange rates, particularly with respect to the value of the U.S. dollar and Canadian dollar, and the continued availability of capital and financing;

the effects of forward selling instruments to protect against fluctuations in copper prices and exchange rate movements and the risks of counterparty defaults, and mark to market risk;

the risk of inadequate insurance or inability to obtain insurance to cover mining risks;

the risk of loss of key employees; the risk of changes in accounting policies and methods we use to report our financial condition, including uncertainties associated with critical accounting assumptions and estimates;

environmental issues and liabilities associated with mining including processing and stock piling ore; and

labour strikes, work stoppages, or other interruptions to, or difficulties in, the employment of labour in markets in which we operate mines, or environmental hazards, industrial accidents or other events or occurrences, including third party interference that interrupt the production of minerals in our mines.

For further information on Taseko, investors should review the Company's annual Form 40-F filing with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission www.sec.gov and home jurisdiction filings that are available at www.sedar.com, including the "Risk Factors" included in our Annual Information Form.

SOURCE Taseko Mines Limited

Related Links

www.tasekomines.com


WASHINGTON, June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The following is a statement from Teamsters General President Jim Hoffa and Marcus King, Director of the Teamsters' Human Rights and Diversity Commission, on the signing of legislation that would memorialize Juneteenth, the June 19 anniversary of the day in 1865 when enslaved African Americans in Texas were finally notified they had been freed as a result of the end of the Civil War two months earlier, as a paid federal holiday.

"One year ago, in the wake of unjustified deadly actions taken by some members of law enforcement against Black Americans across the country, the Teamsters endorsed a Juneteenth federal holiday to recognize the day more than a century and a half ago when the last of those enslaved received their legal freedom. We are pleased to see President Biden and Congress follow through with its creation.

"But just as real justice for African Americans didn't result from that notification in 1865, the fight for equality doesn't end here either. This union recognizes that we all must do more to ensure people of color can live their lives and have full access to the same rights and freedoms that so many of us enjoy without fear of reprisal. Creating a Juneteenth holiday doesn't do that by itself, but it will continue America's evolution towards truly bringing liberty and justice for all, and acknowledging our shared history.

"For more than a century, the Teamsters have stood for racial equality. And we remain resolute in continuing to serve as leaders in ensuring that all workers, no matter their race, ethnicity, religion, gender identity or sexual orientation, receive equal pay and protections on the job. That's what this union can do to make sure our nation lives up to its promise."

Founded in 1903, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters represents 1.4 million hardworking men and women throughout the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico. Visit www.teamster.org for more information. Follow us on Twitter @Teamsters and "like" us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/teamsters.

Contact:

Ted Gotsch, (703) 899-0869

[email protected]

SOURCE International Brotherhood of Teamsters

Related Links

http://www.teamster.org


DUBLIN, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Thailand Data Center Market - Investment Analysis and Growth Opportunities 2021-2026" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

Thailand Data Center Market Will Witness Investments of USD 1 Billion By 2026, Growing at a CAGR of 8% During 2021-2026.

This report offers analysis on the Thailand Data Center market share and elaborative analysis of the existing and upcoming facilities, datacenter investments in terms of IT, electrical, mechanical infrastructure, general construction, and geography. It discusses market sizing and estimation for different segments with respect to the investment in the facilities.



The adoption of 100 GbE switches among data centers in Thailand is likely to grow due to cloud data center deployments. The Thailand data center market includes about 14 unique third-party data center service providers, operating more than 30 facilities. In addition, the country also consists of several on-premises or dedicated data centers owned by local enterprises. The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated digital transformation in Thailand.



KEY HIGHLIGHTS OF THE REPORT:

Retail colocation dominates the market with around 90% share, with wholesale colocation contributing the remaining 10% of the market share.

TCC Technology, NTT Global Data Centers, INET Thailand , CAT Telecom, UIH, WHA, True IDC, SUPERNAP (Switch), and CSL are some of the prominent colocation providers in the country.

, CAT Telecom, UIH, WHA, True IDC, SUPERNAP (Switch), and CSL are some of the prominent colocation providers in the country. The active implementation and adoption of 5G in the country have also paved the way for the adoption of IoT solutions in the country.

SUPERNAP Thailand and PTT data center facility are the two facilities in Thailand certified as Tier IV by Uptime Institute.

certified as Tier IV by Uptime Institute. Architects 49 offered design service for The Stock Exchange of Thailand's data center facility.

THAILAND DATA CENTER MARKET INSIGHTS

Digital transformation in Thailand is fueling the adoption of cloud-based services, which, in turn, is growing the demand for data centers in the country.

is fueling the adoption of cloud-based services, which, in turn, is growing the demand for data centers in the country. Thailand's cloud computing market is expected to reach around USD 700 million by 2026, generating around 30,000 jobs in the next five years. The big data market in the country is expected to grow by 15% YoY in the coming years.

by 2026, generating around 30,000 jobs in the next five years. The big data market in the country is expected to grow by 15% YoY in the coming years. In 2016, the Thailand Board of Investments announced tax incentives for data centers that include an eight-year tax privilege, and favored electricity rates, for data centers built in an area of at least 21,500 square feet.

The government's Thailand 4.0 initiative promotes the adoption of IoT technology for smart city initiatives, and digital transformation of industries is promoted under the Industry 4.0 initiative.

In Thailand, the IoT market is driven by consumer-related IoT, like manufacturing, logistics, and transportation.

Phuket , Chiang Mai , Khon Kaen , Chon Buri, Rayong, Bangkok , and Chachoengsao, among other cities are working towards the development of smart cities in Malaysia .

, , , Chon Buri, Rayong, , and Chachoengsao, among other cities are working towards the development of smart cities in . ST Telemedia Global Data Centres and Frasers Property Bangkok Phase I data center facility will add over 80,000 square feet of IT space by Q4 2021.

Huawei Technologies plans to build its third modular data center facility in the country.

THAILAND DATA CENTER MARKET VENDOR LANDSCAPE



Bangkok has a high number of facilities, clustered and smaller in area, with larger facilities located further away from the city. Arista Networks, ATOS, Cisco Systems, Dell Technologies, Fujitsu, Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE), IBM, Inspur, Lenovo, and NetApp are some of the IT infrastructure providers in the market. The rack power density to increase in the country due to hyperscale data center investments during the forecast period.



IT Infrastructure Providers

Arista Networks

ATOS

Cisco Systems

Dell Technologies

Fujitsu

Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE)

IBM

Inspur

Lenovo

NetApp

Data Center Construction Contractors & Sub-Contractors

ARUP

Architects 49 Limited

Plan Architect

Chaan

Meinhardt Group

PPS Group

QTC Group

Finishing Touch Design Studio

Support Infrastructure Providers

ABB

Caterpillar

Cummins

Cyber Power Systems

Delta Electronics

Eaton

Fuji Electric

HITEC Power Protection

Kohler

Mitsubishi Electric

Legrand

Piller Power Systems

Rittal

Schneider Electric

Vertiv Group

Data Center Investors

ST Telemedia Global Data Centres

Huawei Technologies

KT Corporation

Internet Thailand (INET)

True Internet Data Center (TRUE IDC)

WHY SHOULD YOU BUY THIS RESEARCH?

Market size available in terms of investment, area, power capacity, and colocation revenue.

An assessment of the Thailand data center market investment by colocation, hyperscale, and enterprise operators.

Data center investments in terms of area (square feet) and power capacity (MW) across Thailand.

A detailed study of the existing Thailand data center market landscape, an in-depth industry analysis, and insightful predictions about the data center market size during the forecast period.

Snapshot of existing and upcoming third-party facilities in the country

Facilities Covered (Existing): 31

Facilities Identified (Upcoming): 3

Coverage: Bangkok and Other Locations (Chon Buri, Saraburi, Pathum Thani, Chiang Mai , Khon Kaen , & Songkhla)

and Other Locations (Chon Buri, Saraburi, Pathum Thani, , , & Songkhla) Existing vs. Upcoming (Data Center Area)

Existing vs. Upcoming (IT Load Capacity)

Data center colocation market in Thailand by revenue & forecast (2020-2026)

by revenue & forecast (2020-2026) Retail Colocation Pricing

Wholesale Colocation Pricing

Classification of the market investments into multiple segments and sub-segments (IT, electrical, mechanical, general construction services, and tier standard) with market sizing and forecast.

A comprehensive analysis of the latest trends, growth rate, potential opportunities, growth restraints, and prospects for the data center market.

Business overview and product offerings of prominent IT infrastructure providers, construction contractors and sub-contractors, support infrastructure providers, and investors operating in the market.

A transparent research methodology and the analysis of the demand and supply aspect of the market.

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/723hug

Media Contact:

Research and Markets

Laura Wood, Senior Manager

[email protected]



For E.S.T Office Hours Call +1-917-300-0470

For U.S./CAN Toll Free Call +1-800-526-8630

For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900



U.S. Fax: 646-607-1907

Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716

SOURCE Research and Markets

Related Links

http://www.researchandmarkets.com


Over 300 residents, community members and business professionals attended the highly anticipated event. While the Greater Indian Land Chamber of Commerce presided over the ceremonial welcoming and ribbon-cutting, Watercrest Executive Chefs Julio Trejo and Sebastien Watteau dazzled the crowd with a gorgeous spread of culinary delights. Attendees enjoyed live music from Rumor Mill , floral arrangements by Gather , and the fabulous cupcakes of Barb Giglio, while photographer Jennifer Rohlinger captured special moments. Executive Director Tammy Mullins, kicked off the event, giving special thanks to The Carolina Gateway newspaper and Weston Group, in-house therapy, for their continued support.

"We are honored to be part of this spectacular community and thank the Greater Indian Land Chamber of Commerce and our community partners for their outstanding partnerships," said Tammy Mullins, Executive Director of Watercrest Fort Mill-Indian Land. "We look forward to growing relationships and welcoming seniors to our family here at Watercrest."

Watercrest Fort Mill  Indian Land is a signature Watercrest product offering 75 assisted living and 32 memory care apartments with premium accommodations, resort-style amenities, and world-class care. Ideally located at 8154 English Clover Lane, the community boasts a stunning promenade, pool, fireplace, signature water wall, multiple dining venues, and children's play space. Additionally, Watercrest's uniquely designed Market Street Plaza, showcases an 'outdoor' streetscape with numerous LifeBUILT programming touches; a highlight and crucial element of their multi-sensory memory care programming. For information, please contact the community at 803-590-7005.

About Watercrest Senior Living Group

Watercrest Senior Living Group was founded to honor our mothers and fathers, aspiring to become a beacon for quality in senior living by surpassing standards of care, service and associate training. Watercrest senior living communities are recognized for their luxury aesthetic, exceptional amenities, world-class care, and innovative memory care programming offering unparalleled service to seniors living with Alzheimer's and dementia. A certified Great Place to Work, Watercrest specializes in the development and operations of assisted living and memory care communities and the growth of servant leaders. For information, visit www.watercrestseniorliving.com.

SOURCE Watercrest Senior Living Group

Related Links

http://www.watercrestseniorliving.com


" We should all be inspired to think like Joe. He shares how to get from 'where you are' to 'where you want to be' by thinking outside the box. What a fascinating life! "  Jack Canfield, Author of the Chicken Soup for the Soul series.

In 1967, Joe owned 16 "variety stores" when a Texas retail force was positioned to come to California and challenge Joe's success. That "Texas force" was the 7-11 retail chain. This created a cathartic reaction in Joe. But he was destined not to fail.

The concept for Trader Joe's coalesced from several pieces of stimuli: a popular Theme Park boat ride, movies like "Beyond the Reef" were playing in the theaters, and the fact that Trader Vic's had invented and popularized the Mai Tai drink with little umbrellas. All of these pieces came together in Joe's mind to form his final vision.

"At a time in American history when frozen dinners and processed foods were the trusted staples, Joe saw the opportunity to create a different type of grocery store for the 'over-educated and underpaid' consumer, the burgeoning middle class. The book is filled with stories of brilliant marketing moves, including the story about 'Extra-large eggs' that readers will surely enjoy."  Leroy Watson, Joe's first employee, and life-long friend.

In his own words, Joe takes us on a journey from the different phases and business strategies of Trader Joe's which in many ways mirrored the same growth and expansion Joe went through personally throughout the process. From the "Good Time Charlie" phase where the signature Hawaiian shirt was born to the "Whole Earth Harry" phase in which the organic food strategy came to fruition to the "Mac the Knife" phase which catapulted Trader Joe's to the success it still enjoys today.

Joe Coulombe passed away in 2020 at the age of 89 during the publication of this book. In celebration of his life and as a true labor of love, co-author Patty Civalleri and Joe's right-hand man Leroy Watson, have made it their mission to fulfill Joe's legacy by following through with the publication of Joe's book.

Becoming Trader Joe is now being packaged as a limited episode series for sale to the cable and streaming platforms. "This is a true 'David and Goliath' story," said Civalleri. "Joe went up against the big guys and by all accounts, he shouldn't have succeeded." The book Becoming Trader Joe is scheduled for release on June 22, 2021.

Joe's book can be found on Amazon.com or at a bookstore near you.

Author Bio:

Joe Coulombe (1930  2020) founded Trader Joe's in 1967 which has become one of America's most beloved grocery store chains. Coulombe successfully built the Trader Joe platform until his retirement in 1988 and is thought to be one of the great American entrepreneurs. Coulombe grew up on an avocado farm just outside of San Diego, California. He attended Stanford University earning a Bachelor's Degree in Economics and a Masters in Business. Coulombe served on several corporate boards and consulted for many companies including Patrinis, Sport Chalet, Big 5, and Thrifty Corp. Joe and his beloved wife Alice were married over 60 years and have three children.

Co-Author Bio:

Patty Civalleri is a historian, global archaeology professional, public speaker, and award-winning author, who has traveled internationally exploring lost civilizations and international cuisine. Civalleri's travel books have won 14 global awards including the coveted Irwin Award for the 2017 Best International Travel Book of the Year. Civalleri has served on several boards including the Director's Council of the Cotsen Institute of Archaeology at UCLA and the Board of the Center for Medieval & Renaissance Studies at California State University in Long Beach. She has a passion for international cuisine and is a self-proclaimed foodie who loves to cook. Civalleri resides in Long Beach with her husband Roger.

CONTACT:

Patty Civalleri

PattyCivalleri.com

[email protected]

310-384-5664

SOURCE Patty Civalleri
"Now in its eighth year, The Post's Top Workplaces list continues to highlight the companies in the Washington-area that are leaders in company satisfaction and engagement," said Washington Post Top Workplaces editor Dion Haynes. "Throughout the past 15 months, these companies have had to make quick decisions in order to keep their employees safe while also balancing productivity and efficiency, and their employees have taken note of this great work."

"We are so proud to receive this recognition for the 2nd year in a row," said Gautam Ijoor, Alpha Omega Integration's President & CEO. "It was particularly gratifying to achieve such an acknowledgment given the challenges of 2020. This award is a real testament of AOI's genuine commitment to apply cutting edge technologies that help government agencies achieve their mission."

AOI is an 8(A) small business who wants to make big change in the Government Technology industry. Focused on key technologies like cloud, robotic process automation, AI/ML, and IT modernization, Alpha Omega's team is committed to supporting the success of individuals, the industry, and the country.

The Washington Post hosted a virtual awards ceremony on Thursday, June 17 to recognize the top-ranked companies. For more about The Washington Post's Top Workplaces and to see the full list of this year's honorees, visit link.

Alpha Omega Integration is an 8(a) SB created in 2014 that provides high quality, collaborative IT and business consulting services, with the expertise and capabilities to serve customers in the commercial and public sectors. At Alpha Omega, we are committed to quality and continuous process improvement, demonstrated by our CMMI-DEV ML 5 appraisal, as well as ISO/IEC registration for 20000-1:2018, 27001:2013, and 9001:2015. Our clients include HHS, DoD, USDA, Department of Homeland Security, HUD, Department of State, NASA, Department of Commerce to include NOAA and Census Bureau, and the Small Business Administration. Alpha Omega is a mission-focused, client-centric, results-driven organization. For more information, visit http://www.alphaomegaintegration.com

www.alphaomegaintegration.com

8(a) | CMMI ML5 | ISO 9001:2015 | ISO 20000-1:2018 | ISO 27001:2013

CIO-SP3 | 8(a) STARS II | SPARC | GSA IT Schedule 70

SOURCE Alpha Omega Integration

Related Links

http://www.alphaomegaintegration.com/


LAS VEGAS, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Top Ad Consulting proudly won the first Textie Award hosted by Rumble Up for their campaign "Flip The House" in the text message fundraising category. The award makes them the number one congressional text fundraiser in the country and recognizes them for excellence in the use of P2P texting.

Top Ad Consulting received second place behind a much larger Senate campaign, a big feat for a Congressional campaign.

"We are so pumped that we won the award. This means that we wrote the best Congressional fundraising text in the country. This means we likely beat larger Senate campaigns to get the award. We came in second overall, but we were the top Congressional race represented in the award," said Top Ad's President Anastacia Shelton. "Full credit goes to our amazing team!"

The Texties are a new political award exclusively dedicated to highlighting excellent use cases of peer-to-peer texting by leading campaigns and organizations using Rumble Up across the country. Entries are judged based on the overall effectiveness of their P2P message, and winners are recognized as leaders in the campaign industry for effective use of innovative technology in their awarded category.

"Our clients typically see 100x returns. It's great to get recognition for the work that our team puts into crafting a great message that gets great returns," said Shelton. "We are getting calls right and left from people that want to take their brand to the next level."

Shelton believes that the winning of this award shows how her company is able to create success for Top Ad's clients. Her company has seen a large growth in business in 2021, bringing on dozens more clients through word of mouth alone. She attributes it to keeping her clients happy and providing excellent customer service.

"The people we work with are more than just clients. They're family," commented Shelton. "We keep in touch with them all the time, we remember their birthdays, and we genuinely care about their wellbeing. It's this belief that has kept bringing us more business in such a short amount of time."

Top Ad Consulting also recently became a member of the American Association of Political Consultants (AAPC). They are the largest multi-partisan organization of political and public affairs professionals in the world and are dedicated to improving democracy.

"Top Ad joined the American Association of Political Consultants because we wanted to be among the best in the industry," said Shelton in an announcement. "We feel our company brings a unique perspective to advertising and consulting and we are excited for the chance to network with others in the group."

Top Ad is serving corporations, political and non-profit clients. They are a premium award-winning ad agency and consultancy based in sunny Las Vegas, Nevada.

You can learn more about them by visiting https://topadconsulting.com.

Media Contact:

Anastacia Shelton

702-329-0504

[email protected]

SOURCE Top Ad Consulting

Related Links

http://www.topadconsulting.com


LONDON, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- TripGift is pleased to announce that they have been selected as a 2021 winner of the Business Excellence Awards. The annual business celebratory awards program by Acquisition International Magazine, the international monthly digital business magazine committed to bringing its corporate readers up to the minute news, business insight and analysis, as the voice of modern business.

TripGift One gift card - travel anywhere

The international multi-award-winning TripGift is a first-of-its-kind, market-leading worldwide digital self-serve online travel booking platform, multi-currency digital travel Gift Card and Processor. Its unique gift card API fulfilment and 'hero' global gift card brands offers over 1.5 million products, which can be booked directly on its brand websites in each of its 34 currencies available worldwide.

Cary George, CEO of TripGift, added: "We are all itching to travel again, with demand building like we have never seen before. Our multi-currency brand capabilities and distribution strategy, offers customers 'escapism and something to look forward to'. We are thrilled to win this award and I dedicate this to all of our amazing team and strategic partners who share and support execution of our mission, to seamlessly deliver our unrestricted omni-channel travel branded currency experience to customers worldwide."

Business success can be defined in a multitude of ways and can be found in all locations, regardless of industry. Despite the difficulties of the last 16 months, companies still innovate, create and experiment with new ideas every day. Some have achieved growth in the face of immense turbulence, others have honed an expert team that deliver customer satisfaction every day. Whatever the market or sector, business excellence is still apparent and on full display.

Now in its seventh year, the Business Excellence Awards are truly the cornerstone of Acquisition International's annual celebratory programmes. Awards Coordinator Steve Simpson took a moment to comment in light of the announcement, "once again, it has been an absolute pleasure to speak to robust businesses and find out how they continue to innovate and create in their respective industries. I wish them a fantastic rest of the year ahead".

About TripGift

The International multi-award winning TripGift is a first-of-its-kind, market-leading worldwide digital self-serve online travel booking platform and digital travel and eLearning Gift Card, a Better Lifestyle brand company operating globally, headquartered in London, UK. Enabling secure and safe online cash payments via 600,000+ retail outlets worldwide to purchase travel experiences and online learning courses, its hero brands consist of AirlineGift, HotelsGift, eLearnGift, FlystayGift, RentacarGift, TripGift and ToursGift, creating meaningful, memorable and amazing happy travel experiences for its global customers.

TripGift B2B services

TripGift's Business-to-Business operations transform innovation to value, its Gift Card Processor with API fulfilment, Co-branded websites and Microservices brand capabilities, powers the world's largest companies to enable local and global Rewards, Awards, Incentives and Loyalty Points conversion and redemption for unrestricted Travel and eLearning digital gift cards to use online, which it has made as easy as sending a secure digital multi-currency gift code, uniquely redeemed and booked directly on its brand websites in 34 currencies. Successfully delivering local and international travel and eLearning redemption experiences to customers in over 244 countries worldwide. Further information on TripGift B2B services is available at tripgift.com

About Acquisition International Magazine

Acquisition International is a monthly magazine brought to you by AI Global Media Ltd, a publishing house that has reinvigorated corporate finance news and reporting. Its topical news articles make it a valued read, and this readability ensures that advertisers will benefit greatly from their investment.

AI works alongside leading industry analysts to ensure we publish the most up-to-date figures and analysis. The magazine has a global circulation, which brings together all parties involved in deal making and, in an increasingly global deal market, we are uniquely positioned to reach the deal makers that matter.

Contact details

David Fleming, Head of B2B Global Partnerships | [email protected]

Related Images

tripgift-travel-gift-cards.png

TripGift - travel gift cards

TripGift One gift card - travel anywhere

SOURCE TripGift
NEW YORK, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- United Spinal Association and approximately 200 advocates from across the country gathered virtually on June 14-16 for the 2021 Roll on Capitol Hill, meeting with their representatives in Congress to ensure that people with spinal cord injuries and disorders (SCI/D) are included in shaping disability policies.

Roll on Capitol Hill provides United Spinal members a platform to amplify their voices on issues that impact their health and independence, share their experiences as wheelchair users, and be proactive in advocating for disability rights at both the state and national level.

"We need events like Roll on Capitol Hill, more than ever. The stories we tell about being able to land our dream job, move to our dream cities, and live truly independent lives, or proudly roll across the stage at graduation, continue to be matched by those who remain underserved by our society. There's so much work to be done," said Vincenzo Piscopo, United Spinal's president and CEO.

This year, with 200 virtual Congressional office visits completed in one day, Roll on Capitol Hill attendees advanced key issues in meetings with their Congressional representatives, including:

Accessible, affordable, adoptable, secure and reliable broadband that works for everyone, including people with disabilities.

Greater access to transportation so that people with disabilities can be active within their communities and maintain their health and independence.

Greater access to telehealth and critical coverage of home- and community-based services.

Improved access to caregiving supports for veterans and expanded health care eligibility for veterans living with toxic exposure illnesses, now and in the future.

Increased funding for Spinal Cord Injury (SCI) Model Systems which provide a comprehensive, multidisciplinary system of care, research, and resources for people with SCI.

In advance of Roll on Capitol Hill, members attended a training session where they learned more about United Spinal's policy priorities from experienced disability advocates and Congressional staffers.

On the afternoon of June 16th, United Spinal hosted a Congressional and Corporate Advisory Council Reception to recognize individuals dedicated to strengthening disability rights and inclusion. Awardees included:

Natalie Barnhard  2021 Finn Bullers Advocate of the Year Award

 2021 Finn Bullers Advocate of the Year Award U.S. Senator Jerry Moran of Kansas  2021 James J. Peters Distinguished Veterans Legislator Award

of  2021 James J. Peters Distinguished Veterans Legislator Award U.S. Representative Dina Titus of Nevada  2021 United Spinal Outstanding Congressional Leadership Award

"This award is such an honor because I'm able to bring awareness to the changes I am working hard to make here in my community. As an advocate I hope to make lasting changes for people who live with SCI/D with their physical recovery and create a better quality of life for everyone through physical rehabilitation, accessibility, care, and support," said Barnhard.

The reception also commemorated United Spinal's 75th Anniversary and its mission to build an inclusive world that empowers all people with disabilities. United Spinal highlighted the impact of its programs and services and recognized the vital support of its corporate partners, which make a substantial difference in the lives of individuals with disabilities, their families, friends, and caregivers.

"Thank you for letting me know my voice matters. This is such a cool organization and I hope this is just the first of many years that I can be a part of Roll on Capitol Hill. I'm excited," said Davita Carter, a grassroots advocate from Illinois.

For additional information about the public policies that United Spinal addressed at Roll on Capitol Hill, visit http://unitedspinal.org/action-center/.

United Spinal gratefully acknowledges its 2021 Roll on Capitol Hill sponsors for their support of its mission.

About United Spinal Association

United Spinal is a national 501(c) (3) nonprofit membership organization formed in 1946 by paralyzed veterans and is dedicated to improving the quality of life for all Americans with spinal cord injuries and disorders (SCI/D), including multiple sclerosis, spina bifida, ALS and post-polio. It played a significant role in writing the Americans with Disabilities Act, and made important contributions to the Fair Housing Amendments Act and the Air Carrier Access Act. Membership is free and is open to all individuals with SCI/D. United Spinal was instrumental in getting New York City to create sidewalk curb ramps and accessible public transportation that has been used as a model for many United States cities. In 2021, United Spinal is celebrating 75 years of building an inclusive world that welcomes wheelchair users and all people with disabilities.

SOURCE United Spinal Association

Related Links

www.unitedspinal.org


LAS VEGAS, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Vegas PBS, in partnership with Save Red Rock and Escape Adventures, hosted a free bike ride in Blue Diamond to celebrate the finale of Outdoor Nevada's fourth season. June 12, 2021 was also proclaimed as Outdoor Nevada Day, coinciding with National Get Outdoors Day. Loyal fans of the program had the opportunity to meet host John Burke during the event and multiple notable dignitaries were in attendance, including U.S. Congresswoman Susie Lee, Nevada State Senator Mo Denis, City of North Las Vegas Councilman Scott Black and Clark County Commissioner Justin Jones.

Vegas PBS Celebrates National Get Outdoors Day: With Outdoor Nevada Bike Ride and Proclamation Ceremony Vegas PBS Celebrates National Get Outdoors Day: With Outdoor Nevada Bike Ride and Proclamation Ceremony

Outdoor Nevada is Vegas PBS' Emmy award-winning series that explores the Silver State and promotes its many local adventures and attractions. The proclamation recognizes Outdoor Nevada's contributions to state tourism, cultural enrichment and outdoor recreational activities.

In ten new episodes this season, host John Burke takes viewers to some of the most beautiful and interesting locations in the Silver State and meets the people behind them. Vegas PBS members are also able to binge watch all 10 episodes with the Vegas PBS Passport streaming service.

From hikes to pickleball, booze, beasts and beyond, Burke will introduce even the most experienced explorers to new adventures available for everyone. He joins a late-night downtown Las Vegas bike ride, gets up close to local wildlife including snakes and Bighorn sheep, hikes Sloan Canyon and Spring Mountains, tastes moonshine at the Pioneer Saloon and so much more. Each episode is packed with the people and places that make Nevada a one-of-a-kind location to explore. Viewers will take a trip to a national monument, learn about a local art scene, get away from it all by fishing and delve into local conservation efforts. From a meteor shower to hiking a fifteen-year-old fire burn scar, the beautiful and unique scenery captured in Season 4 will take viewers on a visual journey that will make all residents proud to call Nevada home.

Outdoor Nevada airs on Vegas PBS Channel 10, on Wednesdays at 7:30 p.m.

About Vegas PBS

Vegas PBS is a member-supported public television service providing educational content for over 50 years. Vegas PBS builds community through television, education services, and unique experiences that create a sense of place, civic and social capital. For 12 consecutive years, Vegas PBS has remained among the top five most-watched PBS stations in the country. The station offers five unique secondary channels: Create, VEGAS PBS KIDS, WORLD, Rewind and Jackpot! The station collaborates with community partners to create award-winning content that examines informational, cultural, historic, and educational regional issues.

Vegas PBS viewers can access their favorite shows across multiple platforms including broadcast, vegaspbs.org, the PBS Video App and the PBS KIDS Video App. For more information, visit vegaspbs.org or find us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and YouTube.

Contact:

Jennifer Bradley

702.234.9385

[email protected]

SOURCE Vegas PBS
NEW YORK, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- While the Covid-19 pandemic continues to deal a serious blow to the Black community, a group of Black healthcare professionals told WebMD that the devastation exposed long-standing health inequalities, as it also mobilized them to speak out against racism in healthcare and work for substantive change.

In two far-reaching interviews, the physicians were blunt in their assessment of a healthcare system that has known for decades that racism and health inequality were implicit in the poor health outcomes in communities of color. But the stark racial disparities in Covid-19 infection rates and mortality  Black people were three times more likely to be hospitalized than non-Hispanic white Americans and two times more likely to die of Covid  brought the issue to the forefront and underscored that the time for analysis had passed.

That said, on the eve of Juneteenth, they voiced reasons for hope in the growing acknowledgment within the public health and policy communities that simply doing research and assessing health outcomes data, without acting on it, is no longer acceptable.

Interviews and highlights:

Coronavirus in Context video episode with WebMD Chief Medical Officer John Whyte, MD, MPH:

Why do communities of color still face health inequities? with Karyne Jones, President and CEO, the National Caucus & Center on Black Aging:

"We weren't surprised (at the racial disparities in Covid cases and deaths), but we were obviously outraged. Health inequities are still a major issue in communities of color and Covid just really put a spotlight on that."

Six Black Healthcare Workers Look Back , with:

Jenay Powell, MD, executive director of the White Coats Black Doctors Foundation and internal medicine resident, University of Tennessee Health Sciences Center, Nashville:

"I think we need to do due diligence and make sure the awareness is not short-lived. Disparities are systemic and longstanding, and they won't be fixed overnight. Continuing to put a spotlight on the determinants of health and other factors that lead to these poor health outcomes is going to be the key to ultimately making improvements."

Lutricia Harrison, Doctor of Nursing practice and advanced nurse practitioner, Houston:

"We, as Black healthcare professionals, cannot stand on the sidelines and be quiet anymore. It is our duty and obligation to be an advocate for the patients and ourselves."

Rodney Hood, MD, president, the Multicultural Health Foundation, San Diego:

"You don't want to distribute (health services) equally, but rather equitably. 'Equitably' is based on need. That's how you catch up. Once you catch up, you can start talking about equal."

Medell Briggs-Malonson, MD, chief of health equity, diversity, and inclusion, UCLA Health, Los Angeles:

"We have started to acknowledge more the ribbon of humanism that connects us all. We are finally starting to look at each other and say, 'You deserve the best, I deserve the best.'"

Idoroenyi Amanam, MD, hematologist-oncologist, City of Hope, Los Angeles:

"The distrust of our healthcare system in certain communities is based on America's past. When we interact with certain patients, we have to know the origin of these misgivings."

Danielle J. Johnson, MD, fellow, American Psychiatric Association, Mason, OH:

"It has been rewarding to see more people willing to get (mental health) treatment and to know that the stigma of seeking treatment is reduced, but also taxing to hold others' trauma while dealing with it myself. It's sad to know that so many people are struggling."

Max Jordan Nguemeni Tiako, fourth-year medical student, Yale School of Medicine:

"Being in healthcare and witnessing so much suffering, specifically inflicted upon Black people because of inequality in our society, does something to the psyche of Black health care workers."

About WebMD Health Corp.

WebMD Health Corp., an Internet Brands Company, is a leading provider of health information services, serving patients, physicians, health care professionals, employers, and health plans through our public and private online portals, mobile platforms, and health-focused publications. The WebMD Health Network includes WebMD Health, Medscape, Jobson Healthcare Information, MediQuality, Frontline, QxMD, Vitals Consumer Services, MedicineNet, eMedicineHealth, RxList, OnHealth, Medscape Education, and other owned WebMD sites. WebMD, Medscape, CME Circle, Medpulse, eMedicine, MedicineNet, theheart.org, and RxList are among the trademarks of WebMD Health Corp. or its subsidiaries.

SOURCE WebMD Health Corp.

Related Links

http://www.webmd.com


To the people of China, Changsha is a city of heroes. The revolutionary thought from here has inspired generations. Mao Zedong, who saved the Party's cause several times, spent his youth studying, living and working here. This is also where Mao Zedong Thought was formed. Mao's early years in Changsha provided inspiration for China's revolution and the founding of the CPC.

In one of his famous poems -"Changsha-to the tune of Qin Yuan Chun" wrote in 1925, Mao said, "I ask, on this boundless land, who rules over man's destiny?" At that time, the CPC forged cooperation with the Kuomintang in the Great Revolution (1924-1927).

In January 1925, Mao returned to Hunan from Shanghai and organized several peasant movements. The reactionary warlord, Zhao Hengti was furious with Mao for his actions, and ordered to arrest him.

Under such circumstances, Mao had to leave Changsha for Guangdong. He joined the Great Revolution, organized peasant associations and attended the Peasant Movement Training Institute. Before he left Changsha, he wrote that poem.

The Hunan First Normal University, known as a "Thousand-Year Institution of Higher Learning and Hundred-Year Normal School," was formerly known as Changsha Southern City Academy and founded by Zhang Shi, a famous Neo-Confucianist in the Southern Song Dynasty (1127-1279). Mao studied and worked here for eight years from the spring of 1913 to the winter of 1921.

Mao once said in an interview, "I experienced a lot here, at Hunan First Normal University. My political thought began to take shape here. It was also here where I gained my first experience in social action." It is clear that the First Normal University meant a great deal to Mao Zedong.

From 1913 to 1918, during his five and a half years' study in the university, he studied hard to expand his knowledge, and laid a deep academic foundation. He paid great attention to social practice, conducted investigations in rural areas, sponsored a night school for workers, and successfully organized his very first military action -"Disarming Routed Troops at Houzishi."

Mao was a student of distinction during his time in the Hunan First Normal University. He read plenty of classics in university. His reading notes alone filled many baskets. The tens of thousands of words of annotations and insights fully show his meticulous attitude toward learning and reading. In addition, he advocated the notion of "civilizing one's spirit but savaging one's body."

Taking cold showers is one of Mao's ways to exercise his body. Mao believed that taking cold baths would firm his will and prepare his body for more important work.

With his profound knowledge, strong physique and broadened horizons, Mao was well-prepared and determined to "transform China and the world". His mental and physical fitness also laid a solid foundation for the arduous Long March later on.

At the same time, Mao met several good teachers while studying in the university. Some of them had acquired deep knowledge, and some were well-versed in both Chinese and Western knowledge, for example, Mr. Yang Changji. Among his teachers, there were those who loved the country and their countrymen, and explored the way to save the country and the people, such as Mr. Xu Teli. Under their influence, Mao aspired to save the country and determined to study hard and strengthen his body.

The Hunan First Normal University cultivated a great leader for China, who saved the country from misery (at that time). The university is a cradle of talent that educated many revolutionaries in China. In 1950, Mao returned to his alma mater and expressed his encouragement and hope to the faculty and students. "To be a teacher of the people, one must first be a pupil of the people," said Mao.

SOURCE China.org.cn
LAFAYETTE, Ind., June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- William McBride, Ph.D., is being recognized by Continental Who's Who as a Top Educator for his remarkable contributions to the field of Education and in recognition of his role as an Arthur G. Hansen Distinguished Professor at Purdue University.

Garnering over fifty years of experience in the field of education, Dr. William McBride has led an impressive career. Throughout his acclaimed career, Dr. McBride has gained extensive expertise in the areas of Social and Political Philosophy, Legal Philosophy, and Continental European Philosophy. In his previous years, Dr. McBride taught at Yale University for nearly a decade and has lectured at Northwestern University, Sofia University in Bulgaria, and the Korcula Summer School.



Encountering people with a different professional orientation that they have thought superior to all others, Dr. McBride distinguishes this crucial factor as one of the prime challenges he has faced throughout his career. When asked his advice to newcomers in the industry, Dr. McBride notes the importance of retaining a commitment to the truth as he or she sees it, and not be daunted by initial setbacks, if such there are, in seeking employment.



An academic scholar, Dr. McBride earned an AB from Georgetown University. Thereafter, Dr. McBride attended the University of Lille from 1959 to 1960, where he was a Fulbright Fellow. Later, Dr. McBride attended Yale University where he obtained his Master of Arts degree as a Woodrow Wilson Fellow in 1962. He then went on to receive his Ph.D. at Yale in 1964 and was awarded a Social Science Research Council Fellowship.



Remaining abreast of the latest industry developments, Dr. McBride is an active member of several international and national scholarly organizations including the International Federation of Philosophical Societies (FISP), of which he was President from 2008-2013; the International Council for Philosophy and Human Sciences; and the North American Society for Social Philosophy, of which he is past President.



In light of his professional achievements, Dr. McBride has been recognized by several elite organizations for his exemplary work in the field including Who's Who in America; Who's Who in America Education; Who's Who in the Midwest; Who's Who in the World. He served as the first American Secretary-General and then President of the International Federation of Philosophical Societies (FISP), and gained an immense amount of international connections that led to these positions. Dr. McBride has established himself as a prominent figure in professional philosophy.



A respected voice in his field, Dr. McBride is well-known for sharing his breadth of expertise. He is the author of several written works including "From Yugoslav Praxis to Global Pathos," "Social and Political Philosophy," and "Social Theory at a Crossroads."



In his spare time, Dr. McBride enjoys traveling and considers himself a news buff.



In looking to the future, Dr. McBride hopes to publish at least one more book, preferably more, while continuing professional involvement globally.



Dr. McBride dedicates this recognition to Gerard F. Yates.



For further information, please visit https://www.purdue.edu/



Contact:



Katherine Green

516-825-5634

[email protected]

SOURCE Continental Who's Who

Related Links

http://www.continentalwhoswho.com


CHICAGO, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- With over 80 percent of workers voting in favor of union representation, Modern Cannabis (MOCA) Budtenders in the Logan Square neighborhood of Chicago have joined Teamsters Local 777  the second location at the company to do so.

"Congratulations to everyone on this groundbreaking victory," said Jim Glimco, President of Local 777. "These workers and their brothers and sisters at the River North location, they are at the vanguard of one of the most exciting things happening in the American labor movement right now. By setting an example of what can happen when workers join together in solidarity, they are leaders not just at their shops, not just in Chicago cannabis, but for the entire industry."



The Teamsters have been making significant inroads throughout every facet of the budding cannabis industry as political support for legalization continues to grow both in Washington and in state houses throughout the country. Earlier this week, another group of cannabis workers in Adelanto, Calif. also voted to join the Teamsters.

Jack Herwitch is a budtender at the Logan Square location.

"Proper representation provides protection for the worker that is not afforded by at-will employment," Herwitch said. "It sets an operational standard that equals the playing field between the employer and the worker, and generates mutual respect."

Founded in 1937, Teamsters Local 777 represents workers in a wide variety of industries throughout the Chicago area. For more information, go to https://www.teamsters777.org/.

Contact:

Kara Deniz, (202) 497-6610

[email protected]

SOURCE Teamsters Local 777

Related Links

https://www.teamsters777.org


STAVANGER, Norway, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Norwegian proposal and CPQ software specialist Xait acquires Privia, a worldwide provider of capture and proposal management-specific solutions to the government contractor market. This is Xait`s second acquisition in the last seven months.

Xait offers a complete all-in-one co-authoring software solution for teams to collaboratively create, manage and produce documents. XaitPorter, the company's core software solution, enables hundreds of people across multiple locations to work together simultaneously on large and complex business documents such as tenders, proposals, contracts and reports. With XaitPorter, document creation is done up to 70% faster, with higher quality, security and win rates.

With the acquisition of Privia, Xait will be adding on over 10,000 users from industry-leading organizations large and small, from KBRwyle, Optum, ManTech International and Idemia, to its collaboration solution XaitPorter. Privia was established in 2005 and is located in Virginia, USA. The company has 5 employees, who will be joining the Xait team.

"We are pleased to welcome Privia and their team of experts to Xait, adding industry knowledge to our fully integrated co-authoring solution. Together we can provide both streamlined and optimized document production and calculations, maximizing customers' revenues from bids and proposals and other business-critical documents," says Eirik Gudmundsen, Xait CEO.

Celebrating its 20th anniversary in 2020, Xait is experiencing strong growth from its leading position in the global oil and gas supply industry, with major corporations such as Honeywell, Siemens and ABB on the client list.

"Xait has become a true industry-agnostic challenger in the fast-growing co-authoring, automation and collaboration software market. We experience strong interest from major corporations in industrial products, IT, life science and government contractor markets, all looking for the right solution to manage their complex tender and documentation creation processes. We look forward to continuing our international expansion with an even stronger offering, helping our clients win more business," Gudmundsen continues.

David Valdez, Privia CFO, is looking forward to joining the Xait team. "We are committed to helping our government contractor customers collaborate, save time and deliver winning proposals. I can't think of a better partner than Xait and their benchmark team co-authoring and automation software with whom to continue this journey. Together, our industry expertise, sense of purpose and passion for customer success makes us greater than the sum of our parts. Our team is really looking forward to being part of Xait's continued customer-focused product development and growth journey, helping even more companies around the world to win new revenue," says Valdez.

Kris Saether, Xait CCO concludes:

"The ability to respond to complex and strategic proposals is critical to long-term success for most businesses. Together with Privia we will be able to provide digital solutions for commercial excellence to meet our client needs today and in the future."



The purchase price is undisclosed.

For more information, please contact:

Eirik Gudmundsen, Chief Executive Officer,

mobile: +47 971 44 836, email: [email protected]



Silje Stensland, Global Media Contact and Marketing and Communications Director,

mobile: +47 922 65 803, e-mail: [email protected]

About Xait

Xait is a global software technology company providing enterprise customers with solutions for document co-authoring, automation, collaboration and intelligent pricing.

Our cloud-based software XaitPorter is a complete all-in-one co-authoring solution enabling companies to create high-quality documents with contributions from many authors simultaneously. XaitPorter simplifies and streamlines document production, so that a company can maximize revenue from bids and proposals and other business-critical documents.

Our second product, XaitCPQ, helps organizations win more deals at better margins, by making it really quick and really easy to correctly build and price combinations of products and services, and to do so at scale.

Automates complex pricing

Prevents people from making mistakes

Applies best practice to your pricing and quoting



In a nutshell, we help our clients win business by supporting their sales enablement efforts from quote to contract.

Xait was founded in 2000.

This information was brought to you by Cision http://news.cision.com

https://news.cision.com/xait-as/r/xait-acquires-privia-to-ramp-up-in-the-government-contracting-market,c3370398

The following files are available for download:

https://mb.cision.com/Main/20087/3370398/1434128.pdf Press release (PDF) https://news.cision.com/xait-as/i/eirik-gudmundsen-xait-ceo,c2927319 Eirik Gudmundsen Xait CEO https://news.cision.com/xait-as/i/david-valdez-privia-cfo,c2927320 David Valdez Privia CFO https://news.cision.com/xait-as/i/kris-saether-xait-cco,c2927318 Kris Saether Xait CCO

SOURCE Xait AS
SANTA BARBARA, Calif., June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- With 1,700 employees based in Pune, India, Yardi has had many staff personally impacted by the COVID-19 surge that has drastically affected India over the last several months.

Yardi Software India Private Limited (YSIPL), the India division of the global real estate technology company, has worked on corporate social responsibility (CSR) measures consistently since its inception in 2004. The Pune CSR team used its relationships with support organizations and hospitals to identify 10 hospitals in need of financial assistance to address the current virus surge and prepare for future outbreaks.

The hospitals will split a $1.3 million donation from Yardi. The funds will be used for medical equipment such as ventilators, ICU equipment, compressors, oxygen concentrators, BiPAP machines, as well as help to set up hospital oxygen plants for future use.

"Most of the hospitals we have chosen are providing free or discounted primary and tertiary services to the poor. We hope that the greater support that the low-income groups need will be facilitated and increased through our donations to these hospitals," said Bharati Kotwal, Head of CSR at YSIPL.

Yardi also financially supported the India response efforts of Direct Relief International, a Santa Barbara-based global medical aid non-profit.

"India is experiencing severe shortages of medical oxygen and oxygen concentrators," said Bhupi Singh, executive vice president of Direct Relief, during the recent surge. "Oxygen is among the most important needs of patients who are severely ill with COVID-19, and who often arrive at hospitals with extremely low blood-oxygen levels. India is also in critically short supply of intensive care medications, COVID-19 treatments and vaccines, intubation supplies, ventilators, PPE and hospital beds."

Worldwide, Yardi has consistently stepped up to offer funds, resources and support during emergencies over the decades, including $6 million to food banks and other organizations during the first year of the pandemic. The company also developed its Rent Relief software and service platform to help states, counties and cities manage more than $1 billion in emergency assistance. The software has been deployed across the U.S. Mortgage Relief will further assist governments as they disburse aid to households unable to make mortgage payments and utilities.

About Yardi

Yardi develops and supports industry-leading investment and property management software for all types and sizes of real estate companies. Established in 1984, Yardi is based in Santa Barbara, Calif., and serves clients worldwide. For more information on how Yardi is Energized for Tomorrow, visit yardi.com.

Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/737275/Yardi_Logo.jpg

SOURCE Yardi
This follows encouraging results from a seismic data survey, allowing Emperor to build an updated and more accurate structural interpretation of the Judith Gas Field.

It was oversubscribed in two hours, so weve had to scale back quite aggressively, said Carl Dumbrell.

( ) has raised $1 million in a capital raise that was heavily oversubscribed within two hours.

The funds strengthen the companys balance sheet and will also fund further exploration activities at its wholly-owned Judith Gas Field in Victorias Gippsland Basin.

This raise follows encouraging news from a 3D seismic data survey, which significantly increased data quality and resolution, allowing Emperor to build an updated structural interpretation of the Judith Gas Field.

Incredible support

Emperor director Carl Dumbrell told Proactive it had been overwhelmed by the support in the capital raise.

Weve had huge support, it was oversubscribed in two hours, so weve had to scale back quite aggressively, he said.

We can only thank people for their ongoing support, and we encourage everyone to continue supporting us on market.

State of play at Judith

Emperor Energy owns the VicP/47 permit area, of which the Judith Gas Field forms part.

The permit area, part of the offshore Gippsland Basin, is in Australias premier hydrocarbon province and adjacent to the Kipper gas field being developed by Esso/BHP as part of its Kipper-Tuna-Turrum gas project.

Were close to Melbourne and surrounded by infrastructure, we have excellent relationships with all of the regulators and our stakeholders and our permit is in excellent standing, which is mission-critical for any resources company, Dumbrell said.

Emperor recently analysed 3D seismic data of the Judith Gas Field, acquired from global seismic company CGG in mid-2020, which has significantly increased data quality and resolution.

The company has noted a dramatic improvement in data resolution across the entire gas field except for relatively small areas at the top of the structure close to the major Rosedale Fault where the combination of steep dips and fault shadow effects still leaves these high areas with some reduction in seismic resolution.

The reason we did that was to de-risk the Judith structure ahead of exploration drilling, Dumbrell said.

The results were extremely positive, with the structural interpretation of the Judith Gas Field carried out using the new 3D seismic data validating our previous interpretation, which is really important.

Amplitude Versus Offset (AVO) analysis, which allows comparison in the variations of fluid properties present in the porous space of the target gas sands, shows strong responses through the Judith Gas Sand 2 and Judith Gas Sand 3.

An AVO study is the best indicator other than drilling a well, and it correlates with historical results - overall, this is a comprehensive result achieved by our team, which de-risks everything going forward.

Looking ahead

The AVO results are seen as providing significant exploration upside for the planned Judith-2 Well that is designed to intersect the Longtom 200 Gas Sand at a depth of approximately 3000 metres.

The strong AVO gas response is evident over more than 500 metres of vertical relief, similar to the Judith Gas Sands 2 and 3.

Further analysis is to be carried out on the Judith Gas Sand 1, Judith Gas Sand 4, various additional Longtom sands and the extension of the Kipper Gas Sands into the Vic/P47 Permit area.

The extent of AVO response indicates the nature of the multiple stacked gas targets that exist within the Judith Gas field.

Gas is the energy of the future in Australia and we are transitioning towards it, Dumbrell said.

We expect our project will be one lead into the hungry energy market.

- Daniel Paproth
The company will distribute the kit in Malaysia through its long-term partner, Zuellig Pharma, with strict adherence to conditions imposed by MDA.

Holista has already secured an initial order for 15,000 units worth $95,000 in Malaysia

Holista CollTech Limited ( ) has received permission from the Medical Devices Authority (MDA) of Malaysia to import and distribute an antigen-based SARS-CoV-2 rapid test kit (RTK-AG) developed and manufactured by Guangdong Hecin Scientific Inc. of China.

The company will distribute the kit in Malaysia through its long-term partner, Zuellig Pharma, with strict adherence to conditions imposed by the MDA.

With the approval, the company has already secured an initial order for 15,000 units worth $95,000 in Malaysia.

Special access to import kits

MDA has stipulated that Holista can import up to 45,000 units of the antigen rapid test kits to Malaysia within the first three months of the permission for importing medical devices under the Medical Device (Exemption) Order dated June 14, 2021.

The first 15,000 units will be shipped by the end of June 2021, and the order marks the first commercial transaction of SARS-CoV-2 test kits by the company.

These test kits will be used to detect the presence of the SARS-CoV-2 viral antigen from nasal swabs within 15 minutes.

It is for screening purposes by healthcare professionals and not the sole basis for diagnosis and exclusion decisions.

The maiden order was from Klinik Mutiara, part of Amegajaya Sdn Bhd, a medical consultancy that works closely with Malaysia's Ministry of Health and related agencies.

Approval for other countries

Apart from Malaysia, Holista has the rights to distribute the two Hecin products in Brunei, Thailand, Indonesia, Philippines, Taiwan, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Singapore and the UK.

The sales and distribution of the said test kits are also subject to securing the respective countrys regulatory approvals.

Hecin has granted exclusivity to Holista until December 31, 2021, subject to Holista achieving sales performance in the respective countries by July 2021.

Due to the current pandemic, it is taking time to obtain regulatory approvals from the respective country's regulatory bodies.

However, Holista is in the process of negotiating with the Chinese company for a further extension following the Malaysian MDA approval.

Guangzhou-based Hecin has developed diagnostic products for nucleic acid, immunofluorescence, flow cytometry, as well as medical reagents, amongst others.

Hecin has conducted clinical trials for the antigen test kits in Daye City Centre for Disease Control and Prevention within China.
Srinagar, June 18 : The annual Mata Kheer Bhawani Mela is being celebrated on Friday at the Ragnya Devi deity Shrine situated in Tullamulla village of J&Ks Ganderbal district.

Tullamulla shrine in addition to being the holiest shrine of the local Kashmiri Pandit community is also the symbol of centuries old eclectic culture and brotherhood among different communities of Kashmir.

The festival is celebrated each year on Zyestha Ashtami which coincides this year with June 18.

Because of the ongoing pandemic, no large gathering of devotees is being allowed at the shrine today although the traditional Puja will be held with limited number of devotees.

Kashmiri Pandits have been keeping their annual tryst with the deity despite their mass exodus in 1990s because of separatist violence.

Scores of Pandits have thronged the shrine on the Mata's annual festival as they keep on coming to celebrate the festival from different parts of the country after migration from the Valley.

Local Muslims have kept the flame of co-existence and brotherhood alive by waiting outside the shrine with milk filled earthen pots to receive the Pandit devotees on the annual festival.

Despite the bloody violence that has claimed thousands of lives in Kashmir during the last 30 years, local Muslims have received their Pandit brothers with open arms during the festival at Tullamulla.

The spring inside the shrine has historic significance as locals believe that the colour of its water on the festival day forebears the events those follow till the next year.

Legend has it that Mata Ragnya Devi was displeased with the licentious life led by Ravana and she ordered Hanuman to shift the seat of the deity from Sri Lanka to Tullamulla.

Local Dharmarth Trust maintains the shrine complex spread over a large piece of land surrounded by springs.

Lt Governor Manoj Sinha has greeted the people on Jyeshtha Ashtami and said that the festival is an example of the pluralistic values of the land of Sufi saints and Rishis.
Welington, June 18 : New Zealand citizens aged over 60 will be offered vaccination from July 28 and those aged over 55 from August 11, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said.

The rollout of the vaccine to the general population will be carried out in age groups as is the approach commonly used overseas, with those over 45 years old to receive vaccine invitations from mid to late August, those over 35 years old from mid to late September, and everyone else being eligible from October, Ardern told a press conference on Thursday.

"Our vaccination program is ahead of plan, with nearly 1 million doses administered and operating at 107 per cent of target," Xinhua news agency quoted the Prime Minister as saying.

"From the end of July, we will enter a new phase of our vaccination program when we start receiving the bulk of our vaccines and are able to broaden the rollout considerably to the wider population," she said.

"When it's your age bands' turn to be vaccinated you will receive an invitation from the Ministry of Health to make a booking.

"You will get this invite either by email, text, mail or by phone," the Prime Minister said, adding the risk of Covid-19 increases as one gets older.

The government will be putting in place measures such as mass vaccine events, workplace vaccinations and vaccinations for entire rural and isolated communities all at once, Ardern said.

She added that every eligible New Zealand resident will have the opportunity to be vaccinated by the end of the year.
Seoul, June 18 : South Korea's ICT ministry said has revoked conformity assessments on around 1,700 pieces of communications equipment from nearly 400 companies, including Huawei Technologies and tech giant Samsung Electronics, after they submitted falsified test records.

Under South Korea's radio wave law, communications equipment needs to undergo conformity assessments that check their impact on other equipment and the human body, to manufacture, sell or import them.

The Ministry of Science and ICT said it canceled assessments on 1,696 pieces of equipment from 378 companies as they were based on falsified test records.

The equipment will be withdrawn from distribution channels and the companies will also be barred from receiving new conformity assessments for the equipment in question for one year, reports Yonhap news agency.

The cancellation marks the first for the ministry and comes after an investigation last year that detected the falsified test records.

The ministry said that companies had submitted test reports that appeared to have been issued by the US office of the global testing and certification organisation Bay Area Compliance Laboratories (BACL) but were, in fact, from its Chinese offices.

While South Korea acknowledges test results from the US-based BACL through an agreement with the US, it does not recognise tests by the organisation's Chinese offices.

The ministry said that while companies argued they were not involved in the fabrication process of the test records, the equipment was still up for cancellation regardless of their intent under the radio wave law.

Chinese closed circuit TV camera maker Hangzhou Hikvision Digital Tech Co. was the top offender with false records on 224 pieces of equipment, followed by Chinese dronemaker SZ DJI Technology Co. at 145 and Huawei at 136, according to the ministry.

Samsung Electronics placed 10th with 23 false records on equipment, such as wireless speakers.
Aligarh : , June 18 (IANS) The Uttar Pradesh Anti-Terrorist Squad (UPATS) has arrested two Rohingyas, identified as Mohamed Rafique and Mohammed Amin, from Makdoomnagar area under the Kotwali police station of Aligarh.

The arrest was made on Thursday after it was established that they were living in India on forged documents.

The ATS team also recovered six gold biscuits, Aadhar cards and UNHCR cards from their possession.

They ATS arrested the two on a tip-off given by one Noor Alam and Amir Husain, who were arrested in Ghaziabad last week.

ATS sources said the arrested persons were involved in helping other Rohingyas to enter the country through different channels.

Inspector General of police, ATS, GK Goswami, who led the operation, said that for the first time Rohingyas were caught with six gold biscuits weighing 100 gram each.
Helsinki, June 18 : Finland has extended intra-European Union (EU) border controls until July 11, but announced the easing entry requirements from June 21 onwards.

Kirsi Pimia, the permanent secretary of the Ministry of the Interior, said at a press conference here on Thursday that it is necessary to extend the controls as the alternative measures for border health controls require parliamentary approval and have not been submitted to Parliament yet, reports Xinhua news agency.

However, from June 21, Finland will allow travel by sea, land and air from the EU and Schengen area, if the traveller has proof of a completed Covid vaccination at least two weeks earlier, or proof of having recovered from the disease within the last six months.

The decision also allows tourism.

As an exception, all workers employed in Finland can enter the country without the vaccination requirement, but must be tested upon arrival and remain in voluntary quarantine until a second testing in 72 hours.

Besides, Finland on Thursday ceased border controls for arrivals from Poland and Hungary while continuing to control arrivals from other Schengen countries.

Of the non-Schengen countries, Finland lifted restrictions for Monaco, Romania and San Marino.

Finland has already abolished restrictions for arrivals from Australia, South Korea, Israel, Singapore, Rwanda and New Zealand.

Cruisers can call on Finnish ports but travelers cannot enter the country, according to the current border restrictions.
Unnao : , June 18 (IANS) Uttar Pradesh Director General of Police (DGP) H.C. Awasthi has sought an explanation after photographs showed policemen using a basket and a plastic chair as a riot gear during a clash.

The UP police chief sought an explanation from SP Unnao, Anand Rao Kulkarni, on why the force was ill-equipped to handle the mob despite intelligence inputs.

ASP Rae Bareli, Vishwajit Srivastava, will head the probe.

Awasthi said a casual approach while handling aggressive mobs amounts to exposing cops to high and avoidable risk.

The DGP said that an elaborate SOP and sufficient riot gear have been provided to districts to deal with law-and-order situations, but the Unnao police force was ill-equipped.

The clash took place when the local people staged a protest, demanding compensation for two persons who had died in a road accident.

The Unnao police accused Bhim Army of instigating the violence.

The SP said that on Tuesday, two men, Rajesh and Vipin, died in a road accident and the next day, families told police they would cremate the bodies.

"However, some members of Bhim Army incited the families and they placed the bodies on the Rae Bareli-Unnao highway, blocking the arterial stretch to the city. They also demanded Rs 20 lakh as compensation. When police reached the spot to pacify them, members of Bhim Army started pelting stones at police. In the ensuing attack, a few cops sustained injuries. The situation was brought under control when senior police officers reached the spot," said the SP.

Four policemen -- SHO Sadar Kotwali Dinesh Mishra, police outpost in charge Akhilesh Kumar and constables Ram Asrey Yadav and Vijay Yadav -- have been suspended for dereliction of duty.

He further said that 43 people had been arrested and on basis of photographs and CCTV footage, the police were tracking down Bhim Army members to book them under stringent IPC sections.
Kuwait City, June 18 : Kuwait will lift the entry ban for vaccinated non-citizens from August, the government announced.

Addressing a press conference on Thursday, government spokesman Tareq Al-Mezrem said the inbound travellers must present a certificate of Covid-19 vaccination to enter the country, reports Xinhua news agency.

Meanwhile, Kuwaiti citizens will not be able to travel outside the country unless they have received two doses of the vaccine approved by the Ministry of Health, he added.

In addition, those who have been vaccinated will be allowed into malls, gyms, salons, and restaurants from June 27, Al-Mezrem said.

Kuwait decided in February to stop the entry of non-citizens to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

Kuwait has so far reported 334,216 coronavirus cases and 1,842 deaths.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
June 18 : Akshay Kumar starrer Prithviraj has been facing protests by a section of people over the title of the film. While the film faced threats by the Karni Sena in Mumbai, now Akhil Bharatiya Kshatriya Mahasabha held a demonstration against the film in Chandigarh, demanding a title change.

Akhil Bharatiya Kshatriya Mahasabha has reportedly demanded that the name of the film doesnt show respect to Prithviraj Chauhan, the last of the Hindu emperors, and should be titled Hindu Samrat Prithviraj Chauhan or Emperor Prithviraj Chauhan. They also demanded that the film be shown to the representative of the organisation before its release as they want to make sure that there is no controversy and the history of the king is not tampered with. During the protest, slogans were shouted and effigy of the film's producer, director and lead actor Akshay Kumar was burnt. The organisation also warned that if the makers fail to address their demands, they will face the same fate as it did to Padmaavat and Jodhaa Akbar in the past.

Earlier, Karni Sena had also demanded that the film should be shown to Rajput historians so that the facts and historical accuracy can be checked. Karni Sena had also warned that YRF will be responsible in case of any agitation.

Prithviraj is a historical action drama film helmed by Chandraprakash Dwivedi and produced by Yash Raj Films. The film is based on the life of Prithviraj Chauhan. While Akshay Kumar plays Prithviraj Chauhan, Manushi Chhillar, who makes her Bollywood debut with the film, plays his wife Sanyogita. The film also stars Sanjay Dutt, Sonu Sood, Ashutosh Rana, Sakshi Tanwar, Manav Vij and Lalit Tiwari.

Originally, slated to release in cinemas on Diwali 2020, the film shootings were halted due to coronavirus. Now, the makers are aiming to release in theatres on November 5, 2021 coinciding with Diwali.
Beirut, June 18 : Lebanon's General Labour Union held a general strike in protest against the country's deteriorating political, living and economic conditions and also demand the formation of a new government.

Labourers and representatives of different economic sectors, both public and private ones, took part in the strike which was staged on Thursday in major cities, reports Xinhua news agency.

The Ministry of Interior announced that many of the main roads in the capital Beirut, the north and east of the country were blocked by burning rubber tires and waste containers.

In a sit-in here, Bechara al-Asmar, president of General Labour Union, warned against the collapse of all health, educational and economic systems, pointing out that the minimum monthly wage in Lebanon stands at fewer than $30 after the Lebanese pound lost 90 per cent of its value.

In his speech, al-Asmar called for "protecting what is left for Lebanon and forming a rescue government that paves the way for political stability and economic solutions".

"Stop killing the Lebanese and take the initiative of forming a rescue government, as the Lebanese people have become desperate about their lives," he said, warning against complete chaos in the absence of a powerful state.

Lebanon has been mired in a governmental deadlock since the resignation of former Prime Minister Hassan Diab's cabinet on August 10, 2020, days after the Port of Beirut blasts on August 4, 2020, which claimed the lives of 190 people, injured at least 6,000 others and left some 300,000 homeless.

Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri was appointed on October 22 but he hasn't been able to form a cabinet because of his disagreement with President Michel Aoun over the distribution of ministerial posts.

In their last meeting held this March, Aoun and Hariri again failed to reach a consensus on cabinet formation, raising concerns about further instability and a total economic and financial collapse in the country.

Figures released by the World Bank showed that over 50 per cent of the Lebanese people have become "poor".

In a new report released on June 1, the World Bank said that Lebanon's prolonged severe economic depression may place it among the 10 most severe crises globally since the mid-19th century.
New Delhi, June 18 : A Dominican court has ordered Indian fugitive businessman Mehul Choksi to be remanded at the Dominica State Prison despite a decline in his health, the local media reported.

According to Dominica News Online, a news outlet in the Carribean island, Magistrate Pearl Williams on Thursday ordered that Antiguan citizen and businessman Mehul Choksi who is wanted in India for alleged bank fraud, to be remanded at the Dominica State Prison.

Choksi, who pleaded not guilty to illegal entry into Dominica, was remanded into police custody at the Dominica China Friendship Hospital (DCFH) where he has been a patient since May 29.

On June 2, 2021, at Choksi's first court hearing where the charge was read to him, the acting Director of Public Prosecution (DPP), Sherma Dalyrample, made an application before the Chief Magistrate Candia Carrette George pursuant to Section 212 of the Magistrate code of procedure, to have him brought before a Magistrate every three days to be further remanded until he is discharged from the hospital.

This application came under review by Magistrate Williams on June 11, however, she reserved her ruling as a bail application for Choksi was being heard in the High Court on the same day.

On Thursday, the 62-year-old diamantaire was expected to appear before the court for reporting and further remand but his attorneys presented a medical report to the court which indicated that Choksi's health has deteriorated and as a result, he was unable to attend.

However, Magistrate Williams ordered Choksi to be remanded at the State Prison as she stated, based on the law, she does not have the jurisdiction to remand the accused to the hospital every three days.

Dissatisfied with her decision, three of Choksi's attorneys -- Julien Prevost, Zena Moore-Dyer and Gina Dyer-Munro, who were present at the court, objected claiming that their client is now in a bad state, and the decision to remand him to the state prison is appalling as bleeding in the head is one of his conditions.

The attorneys argued that there must be a certain level of "humanity" in how the court operates and everyone should be treated fairly.

Despite the heated argument in court, Magistrate Williams remained resolute in her decision and said her order will stand. She said arrangements will be made for the court to visit the hospital for Choksi to be remanded at the prison.

Attorneys for Choksi said they will go to the High court to prevent the order.

The Magistrate remanded Choksi until June 24, where he will appear before the court to be further remanded whilst his trial for illegal entry is expected to commence on June 25.

The matter of Habeas Corpus filed by Choksi's attorneys in the High Court has been adjourned sine die.

The 62-year-old diamantaire who gained citizenship in Antigua and Barbuda in 2017, is wanted by the Indian investigative agencies for allegedly cheating the Punjab National Bank of Rs 13,500 crore, one of India's largest bank frauds in decades.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Seoul, June 18 : As the South Korean tech giant LG exits the mobile business, it may soon start selling iPhones at its stores in the country, the media reported.

According to Business Korea, tech giants Apple and LG are still in the process of negotiations with some major pieces to work out, like will these Apple corners within the LG stores be operated by Apple employees or will LG employees from the mother-store help out, reports GSMArena.

A final decision has not been reached yet, according to an LG Electronics official.

However, "LG probably wants to close the deal by the end of July, which is when the last sales of LG phones will come to an end".

There are over 400 LG Best Shop locations around South Korea, so this could be a major expansion of Apple retail space in the country.

In April, the company announced that it will be withdrawing from the mobile business.

The South Korean company said in a regulatory filing that its mobile communications (MC) unit will no longer produce and sell handsets after July 31, citing a slump in business and fierce competition in the industry as the reasons behind the decision.

The announcement came two months after the company said its MC division is open to "all possibilities" for its future operations.

The company said its exit from the mobile business will lead to a decline in revenue in the short term but will eventually improve its financial status and management efficiency in the longer period.
Baghdad, June 18 : Iraq has signed a contract to drill 96 oil wells in the West Qurna-1 oil field located in the southern province of Basra to raise the production, according to a statement by the Ministry of Oil.

The state-run Basra Oil Company and the contractors for the West Qurna-1 oil field, ExxonMobil company and the US' Schlumberger International, signed the contract on Thursday, reports xinhua news agency.

Minister of Oil Ihsan Abdul-Jabbar Ismail said during the signing ceremony that the contract "will increase oil production in the Qurna-1 oil field by 200,000 barrels per day (bpd) in the coming five years".

Meanwhile, Deputy Minister of Oil Karim Hattab said the current production in West Qurna-1 is 380,000 bpd out of a production capacity exceeding 500,000 bpd.

The oil field also produces around 150 million cubic feet of associated gas on a daily basis, he added.

Iraq's West Qurna-1 oil field, which holds more than 20 billion barrels of expected recoverable reserves, is among the largest in the world.

Iraq's economy heavily relies on crude oil export, which accounts for more than 90 per cent of the country's revenues.
Puducherry, June 18 : Mahe district in the Union Territory of Puducherry has injected the first dose of the Covid-19 vaccine to 90 per cent of its population, officials said on Friday.

With this achievement, Mahe district has become second in the country to administer the first dose to 90 per cent of its population after South Delhi.

Mahe has a population of nearly 45,000. Of this, the targeted population for vaccination is much less as the under 18 age group were excluded.

Of the 20,908 adult population above the age of 45, 90 per cent have been given the first dose of the vaccine, according to the Mahe regional health department officials.

Twenty-three per cent of this population above the age of 45 was given the second dose of the vaccine as well, officials said.

Other than this, approximately 85 per cent of the 13,050 people between the age group of 18-44 have also been given the first dose of the vaccine.

Shivraj Meena, Regional Administrator, Mahe, told IANS: "When I took charge, there was confusion and people were a bit reluctant to take the jab fearing side effects. Immediately I called upon a meeting of political parties, religious leaders and other concerned people and explained to them the need to expedite the process of vaccination for the betterment of society.

"I also told that if we don't vaccinate the second wave is going to hit us badly and luckily for me, people understood the gravity of the situation and we could carry out the vaccination drive properly." He also said that meticulous planning was behind the success of the vaccination drive in the Mahe area.
Kochi, June 18 : Ever since a bean-shaped structure in the Arabian sea, about seven km west off the Kochi coast, was put out using the Google Maps satellite image showing the formation of an 'island' under the sea, talks have begun, that only a detailed study would reveal, what it is.

Experts have expressed doubts that there is a chance it could be even a plankton assemblage as a mass.

This was first noticed by the Chellanam Karshika Tourism Development Society when its president X.J.Kalipparambil shared the image which according to him was approximately around 22 sqkm (8 km in length and 3.5 km in breadth).

Speaking to IANS, former director - research, at the Kerala University of Fisheries and Ocean Studies (KUFOS), K.V.Jayachandran said that he too, read and heard about this phenomenon from the media.

"What it is, can only be proved through proper studies and for those agencies like KUFOS and CUSAT (Cochin University of Science and Technology) can take the lead and am sure they will.

"From what I have read about this, chances are there could be a plankton assemblage as a mass, as, such formations can be captured by satellite imagery. Moreover, I did not find in any of the reports about the presence of soil deposits," said Jayachandran and added that this phenomenon is seen commonly in temple pounds inland localities.

Meanwhile, Vice Chancellor of KUFOS, K. Riji John also pointed out that only through a proper investigation can one find out what the the new structure was.

"To make any sort of comment or opinion on this phenomenon at this stage is too early and it will be too premature. As the first step, we are now going to call a meeting of agencies who work in this area and once we do that, then we will approach the state government to take forward our studies," said John.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Belfast, June 18 : Edwin Poots announced his resignation as leader of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) in Northern Ireland after less than a month in the post amid an internal revolt.

His resignation on Thursday came after a meeting of party officers in Belfast amid the internal revolt over the nomination of Paul Givan as Northern Ireland's First Minister, Xinhua news agency reported.

"I have asked the Party Chairman to commence an electoral process within the Party to allow for a new leader of the Democratic Unionist Party to be elected," Poots said in a statement on Thursday evening.

"The Party has asked me to remain in post until my successor is elected. This has been a difficult period for the Party and the country and I have conveyed to the Chairman my determination to do everything I can to ensure both Unionism and Northern Ireland is able to move forward to a stronger place," he said.

Poots was elected leader of the DUP, a pro-British political party, in May and is reportedly seen by some commentators as more aggressive in his opposition to Northern Ireland's post-Brexit trade barriers.

The latest development came amid a bitter row between the European Union (EU) and the UK over the Northern Ireland Protocol.

It states that food products from Britain to the EU will have to enter through new border control posts at Northern Ireland's ports.

Northern Ireland will continue to apply EU customs rules at its ports, to allow goods to flow into the Republic of Ireland and the rest of the EU.

This is known as the Irish Sea border, a new trade border between Northern Ireland and other parts of the UK, which has angered unionists.
New Delhi, June 18 : Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin on Friday met Congress interim Chief Sonia Gandhi and party leader Rahul Gandhi here for the first time after the Assembly poll results were declared on May 2.

Stalin had met Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday.

The DMK leader along with his wife arrived at the residence of Sonia Gandhi on Friday morning at 10 Janpath.

During the meeting, Rahul Gandhi was also present.

The meeting lasted for over 40 minutes.

Party sources said that the leaders discussed several issues for the development of the state.

After the meeting, Rahul Gandhi took to Twitter and wrote, "Congress President Sonia Gandhi and I had the pleasure of meeting Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin and Durgavathy Stalin earlier today. We will keep working with the DMK to build a strong and prosperous state for the Tamil people." The Congress had contested the Tamil Nadu Assembly polls in alliance with the DMK.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Chicago, June 18 : The Department of Public Health in the US state of Illinois has identified 64 cases of the Covid-19 Delta variant.

The Department said on Thursday that it has so far identified more than 9,400 variant cases in Illinois, of which more than 6,300 are the Alpha strain first found in the UK, followed by the Gamma variant first identified in travellers from Brazil with more than 2,400 cases, Xinhua news agency reported.

Though identified cases of the Delta variant make up the smallest number in Illinois so far, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has estimated that it may account for about 10 per cent of emerging Covid-19 cases in the US.

The CDC has labelled Delta as a "variant of concern".

Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker said at a news conference on Thursday that his main concern regarding the variant is for children younger than 12, for whom a vaccine has yet to be authorised.

"The Delta variant seems to have been most predominant among people who are unvaccinated, and so those kids are who I'm focused on," Pritzker added.

The good news is that the available vaccines are resistant to the Delta variant, the Governor said.

The state of Illinois has so far reported 1,388,586 confirmed coronavirus cases and 25,552 deaths.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)
New Delhi, June 18: Just a day after 28 Chinese military aircraft flew into Taiwan's air defence identification zone (ADIZ), said to be the largest ever incursion into the tiny island nation, China followed it up with a threat to the world at large.

The intrusion over the Taiwanese ADIZ on Tuesday followed a critical communique by the G7 countries on Sunday which criticised China for abuses of Muslim minorities in Xinjiang and termination of human rights in Hong Kong. The G7 statement said: "We will promote our values, including by calling on China to respect human rights and fundamental freedoms".

The G7 nations also called upon China to find a peaceful resolution to the vexed Taiwan issue--while Taiwan sees itself as a sovereign nation, China treats the country as a breakaway province under its One China Policy (OCP).

Speaking with India Narrative, Dr Jagannath Panda, Research Fellow and Coordinator of the East-Asia Centre at the MP-IDSA, New Delhi says: "Occupation of Taiwan is becoming a prestige issue for the Chinese Communist Party. Building pressure on Taiwan and making it realise that its future is with "mainland China" is a deliberate Chinese strategy".

He adds: "Taiwan has been under China's 'gray zone' warfare tactics including frequent aircraft forays, maritime exercises and patrols, cyber-attacks and diplomatic isolation for a long time. The recent Chinese air incursion is a part of that".

Beijing responded angrily to the G7 statement saying that the G7 countries are indulging in "political manipulation". On Tuesday, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian said the G7 was deliberately "interfering in China's internal affairs. China's determination to safeguard national sovereignty, security and development interests is unwavering", he said.

The communist nation followed up the G7 statement with the biggest-ever intimidation of Taiwan. The Taiwan government said that Tuesday's incursion included fighter jets, bombers, anti-submarine and early warning aircraft. Taipei added that this violation of the Taiwanese territory was the largest, surpassing one that happened on April 12 with 25 planes.

According to Taipei, the Chinese mission included 14 J-16, six J-11 fighters, four nuclear capable H-6 bombers as well as anti-submarine, electronic warfare and early warning aircraft.

Panda views this show of strength as a bid by, "Chinese President Xi Jinping to make Beijing's stand steadfastly clear: the unification of Taiwan with mainland China is inevitable, and if situation escalates, the use of force to achieve the same should not be ruled out. Hence, there is now a real concern that China is moving away from merely 'theoretical talk' about enforcing unification with Taiwan to actually contemplating and planning military action".

A Reuters report said the show of strength happened on the same day as the US aircraft carrier Ronald Reagan entered the South China Sea. Experts construe the Chinese flypast as a warning to the US forces in the region.

China's hostile action towards Taiwan did not go unnoticed. Identifying the strong Chinese threat to other nations, Republican politician Nikki Haley said the US must act "strongly" against China. On Wednesday, she said that if Beijing takes control of Taiwan, it would be emboldened to seize other territories.

Haley, a former US ambassador to the UN, said: "And if we don't boycott, if we don't do something to really call them out, mark my words: Taiwan is next. And if they take Taiwan, it's all over, because they will think that gives them free rein to grab any territory, not in the region, but anywhere they want to go".

Defending its action in Taiwan, an article in the State-managed news outlet, Global Times said: "The Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) reportedly dispatched on Tuesday a record-breaking fleet of warplanes to conduct an exercise surrounding the island of Taiwan, with analysts saying on Wednesday that the drill indicated a stronger control over the Taiwan Straits by the PLA, and sent a strong signal to the Taiwan secessionists and their Western supporters following recent provocations, as well as to the activity by a US aircraft carrier near the region." In the last more than one year, almost coinciding with the spread of the Covid-19 virus that originated in China, Beijing has been involved in numerous disputes with its neighbours. It has regularly carried out intimidating flights around Taiwan coupled with statements that it would seize Taiwan by force. Coast to coast, the distance across the Taiwan Strait is approximately 180 km between the two politically-divergent nations.

Among other hostilities that China carried out over the last one year include incursion into northern India in Ladakh, invading the South China Sea with maritime militia and even sending out its navy and air force close to Japanese territory.

(This content is being carried under an arrangement with indianarrative.com) --indianarrative/
Sherni

Cast: Vidya Balan, Sharat Saxena, Vijay Raaz, Mukul Chadda, Brijendra Kala, Neeraj Kabi, Ila Arun

Direction: Amit V. Masurkar

Rating: * * * (three stars)

BY VINAYAK CHAKRAVORTY

"Sherni" tackles several diverse issues. The film is as much about sexism in the 'sarkari' workplace offices as it is about rapid erosion of forest land and the threat to wildlife in the name of development. It is about India's apathetic 'babu' culture as well as the self-seeking rich and mighty who thrive at the expense of nature. There is the political class, forever waiting to turn anything and everything to their advantage. The film allots a fleeting jibe at news television, too, and its incessant fetish for sensationalism.

It is all very well put together with slow-burn impact, as the narrative gradually builds the drama around the story of a tiger hunt. Yet, fascinated as you are watching a world that's constantly fending against peculiar conflicts, Amit V. Masurkar's film and its issues come across as vaguely familiar, and push the story towards a climax that hardly leaves a lasting impact.

"Sherni" lacks the element of surprise that made Masurkar's earlier film "Newton" an outstanding effort.

Although the two films highlight different issues, "Newton" and "Sherni" find a likeness in their heartland India setting as well as the focus on a lackadaisical system that ignores the problems they are meant to address. Masurkar's storytelling idiom is different this time. If "Newton" drove home its message with biting satire, "Sherni" sees the filmmaker stick to straightforward narration.

At the core of the story is Vidya Balan as Vidya Vincent, a well-intentioned forest officer. We see all that goes in the story on through her eyes, which lets us understand the malaise at the grassroots level from the perspective of the protagonist.

Forest officer Vidya hits the ground running, because no sooner has she joined work, a man is reported to be killed by a tiger. More kills follow and the tension in the area escalates. The villagers are upset as they cannot take their cattle out grazing in the forest. The local political bigwig assures them the tiger will be killed, and his rival wastes no time in inciting the locals over political neglect. Vidya gets the help of a professor named Noorani (Vijay Raaz), who is also a DNA expert and is willing pitch in to identify the killer beast. An amateur hunter from an influential royal clan (Sharat Saxena) on the other hand is keen to shoot down the Tiger.

Vidya herself is juggling between tension at work and a long-distance marriage, what with her husband (Mukul Chadda) in Mumbai. Her immediate senior at work (Brijendra Kala) doesn't give a damn about the state of affairs, and a former senior (Neeraj Kabi) she meets in the course of the case would rather be of service to the influential class in the area than look for solutions.

The identity of the killer beast is established as a tigress with two cubs. Vidya and Noorani feel the beast needn't be killed. It could be relocated at the nearby national park. But there are enough people of power with vested interests who would benefit if the tigress died.

Masurkar's treatment of the plot is strikingly authentic. The cinematography (Rakesh Haridas) and dialogues (Yashaswi Mishra and Masurkar) create a milieu that the film, for most parts, seems like it was documenting real-life footage rather than showing a slice of fiction.

"Sherni" is Masurkar's third feature release and incidentally the first one he hasn't written. The script and screenplay by Aastha Tiku, however, bears the stamp of Masurkar's earlier works -- "Sulemani Keeda" and "Newton" - in the way the film never goes over the top even in the most dramatic of scenes.

Vidya Balan spearheads an incredible cast that lives up to its billing. For Vidya, "Sherni" is a among her most effortless portrayals. She gets minimum lines and plays out Vidya Vincent with understated ease. The film is not wholly convincing while imagining Vidya as a woman in a position of power caught in a patriarchal set-up. Her bigger challenge than tracking down the killer tigress is obviously dealing with a system that is reluctant to function or let her function. You get the feeling while watching the film that the problem isn't necessarily related to deepseated patriarchy. A young male protagonists trying to do his job amidst a system that's rotting would face the same woes. If the problem magnifies for Vidya Vincent as a woman, the film somehow doesn't fully succeed in conveying as much.

-- Syndicated from IANS
New Delhi, June 18: Recently, when Zhang Yiming, the co-founder of ByteDance - the parent company of popular internet video brand TikTok announced that he will step down by the end of year, it no longer came as a shock. In fact, it simply sealed the apprehension of many entrepreneurs and the private sector in general, that it had fallen under the red hammer of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

Analysts India Narrative spoke to, said that the serial targeting of the Chinese tycoons could be just the beginning. "There may be many more -- some that will hit headlines and some which may not," one of them said, adding that it is an all-important message from the Chinese government to the country's private businesses that they were being watched.

Zhang of Bytdance attributed his resignation to his personality traits, rather than blaming the authorities. "The truth is, I lack some of the skills that make an ideal manager. I'm more interested in analyzing organizational and market principles, and leveraging these theories to further reduce management work, rather than actually managing people. Similarly, I'm not very social, preferring solitary activities like being online, reading, listening to music and daydreaming about what may be possible," Zhang said in a statement.

A series of resignations of top bosses of Chinese tech companies has taken place since business tycoon and co-founder of Alibaba Group went underground last October. The clamp down on Ma and his companies shocked not just China's private sector but sent jitters the world over. The Chinese government appears to be on a path to stifle the curated private sector it had built.

Also read: Despite 18.3% GDP growth in Q1, China's economy faces strong headwinds "Ma's success story actually was a success story of China and how things in the country were changing from what they were decades ago..This incident however has shaken that ground and is also a sort of warning," the analyst said.

Earlier, Colin Zheng Huang, the founder and former CEO of e-commerce platform Pinduoduo, stepped down to pursue research in food and life sciences.

In December, Wall Street Journal in an article said that Chinese President Xi Jinping, long distrustful of the private sector, is moving assertively to bring it to heel, notwithstanding an exceptionally vibrant role of the private sector in creating the maximum number of jobs.

"The problem with China is somewhat self-created. The private sector has been contributing to the Chinese economy while creating jobs but now it does not know how to handle its own private sector," Subhomoy Bhattacharjee, Senior Adjunct Fellow at RIS (Research and Information System for Developing Countries) told India Narrative.

While clamping down on "free-spirited" private entrepreneurs, the CCP appears to be engaged in its unique hybrid-model of the so-called private enterprise, which, at a strategic level is steered by the Party.

Unsurprisingly, The Wall Street article pointed out that the government has started "installing more Communist Party officials inside private firms, starving some of credit and demanding executives tailor their businesses to achieve state goals.

The Wall Street Journal report: China's Xi Ramps Up Control of Private Sector. 'We Have No Choice but to Follow the Party.' In trying to exercise greater control, the Chinese government has gone into overdrive to marshall and process mountains of data to perfect its surveillance state model.

A Bloomberg report noted that "Xi's administration has tightened control over the hoard of information produced by the nation's tech companies as part of broader efforts to position China as a leader in big data." Not just that, Beijing has been pouring money into data centres and other digital infrastructure to make electronic information a national economic driver and help shore up the Communist Party's legitimacy, it said.

(This content is being carried under an arrangement with indianarrative.com) --indianarrative/
Luca : ; Cast: Jacob Tremblay, Jack Dylan Grazer, Emma Berman, Marco Barricelli, Saverio Raimondo, Maya Rudolph, Jim Gaffigan; Direction: Enrico Casarosa; Rating: * * * (three stars)BY VINAYAK CHAKRAVORTY "Luca" talks of inclusion, and the importance of accepting those that are perceived as different by society. Like all Pixar productions, the film serves its message in a goodlooking package that brims with feel-good verve, and animation that is as striking as you'd expect from the banner. The core adventure aims to regale children, and is served with suitably cute relish. The action is sanitised and the thrills, it is ensured, are never dark.

What "Luca" could have done with is more of the hallmark quirk that usually makes Pixar films irresistible. Apart from a central plot twist pertaining to the film's two lead characters, the film remains predictable as the story unfolds. If you've loved "Coco", "Inside Out" or "Up", you might find that bit sorely lacking in this film.

Enrico Casarosa's film opens somewhere deep within the sea, where Luca (voice of Jacob Tremblay), a young and sprightly sea monster lives with his parents and grandma. Luca is fascinated by what lies above the water surface but his parents have strictly told him not to venture out of the sea, for land is where the evil 'human monsters' live.

Then, one day Luca meets another young sea monster named Alberto ((Jack Dylan Grazer)), who invites him to join him for a trek above. The world outside, Alberto assures, is beautiful, and not at all as bad as Luca's parents have made it to be.

There's a surprise waiting for Luca above. He discovers every time he ventures out of water and the water on him dries off, he -- like Alberto -- turns into a young boy.

The narrative establishes that premises quite crisply and early one, before taking us into the 'Human Town' with Luca and Alberto. Much of their adventure that follows will unfold in the scenic little town on the Italian Riviera.

Casarosa and his screenwriters (Jesse Andrews and Mike Jones) start off with a wonky premise plus the advantage of stunning artwork that serves as backdrop for the animation. They handle the coming-of-age drama fairly well, as the two boys paint the town red with their little escapades.

Amusingly, with smart sales pitch, the writers have managed to blend Vespa branding into the story. The product placement is seamlessly done. The Vespa scooter, just like a bowl of pasta, is something that has come to define average Italian lifestyle. Luca's obsession with the Vespa triggers an important aspect of the story.

"Luca" essentially works as a fun watch that entertains while it runs. There is not much that resonates in your mind once the show is over. The film works for its gorgeous visuals and a voice cast that does a commendable job.
Paris, June 18 : French Prime Minister Jean Castex announced that people across the country can now stop wearing face masks outdoors and the night-time curfew will also be lifted starting from Sunday as the country's Covid-19 indicators continue to drop.

"The health situation in our country is improving faster than we expected," Castex told a press conference after a cabinet meeting.

"We are going to lift the general obligation to wear a mask outdoors." Masks will still be required in busy public spaces where barrier gestures cannot be respected, such as on public transport, in stadiums and other crowded places, Xinhua news agency quoted Castex as saying.

The curfew, in force since October 2020, will end on Sunday, 10 days earlier than previously planned, he added.

However, "if we are to face in the coming weeks an epidemic situation, we will not hesitate to take new measures to act quickly", the Prime Minister said.

France is now "below the threshold of 5,000 (new) cases per day" and "no department reports worrying (epidemic) dynamics", according to Castex.

The number of hospitalised and critically-ill patients, key indicators to evaluate the health system's ability to cope with the health crisis, has been falling for the sixth straight week.

"We are living a happy return to a normal life. We are on the right track. Let's stay mobilised," said Castex.

Calling Covid vaccination "the best bulwark against the epidemic resurgence", he pledged that 40 million people would have received at least one dose and 35 million citizens should have completed their inoculation by the end of August.

Some 30.76 million people, or 58.6 per cent of the adult population, have already received one vaccine dose.

Some 14.75 million people have received two shots, representing 28.1 per cent of the adult population, according to the data from the Health Ministry.

France has so far reported 5,811,456 coronavirus cases and 110,796 deaths.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)
Seoul, June 18 : North Korean leader Kim Jong-un said that the country should be ready for a dialogue, as well as a confrontation with the US, state media reported on Friday.

This is the first time Kim has spoken of the US since President Joe Biden took office in January, the Seoul-based Yonhap news Agency reported.

During a key Workers' Party meeting, Kim "made detailed analysis of the policy tendency of the newly emerged US administration toward our Republic and clarified appropriate strategic and tactical counteraction and the direction of activities to be maintained in the relations with the U.S. in the days ahead", Pyongyang's official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said in a report.

"The General Secretary stressed the need to get prepared for both dialogue and confrontation, especially to get fully prepared for confrontation in order to protect the dignity of our state and its interests for independent development and to reliably guarantee the peaceful environment and the security of our state," it said.

Kim also called for "sharply and promptly reacting to and coping with the fast-changing situation and concentrating efforts on taking stable control of the situation on the Korean peninsula", the KCNA added.

The Biden administration has recently completed its months-long review of its North Korean policy and said it would pursue a "calibrated, practical approach" toward the goal of the complete denuclearization of the Peninsula.

South Korean President Moon Jae-in and Biden met at a bilateral summit last month and agreed to pursue diplomacy to resolve the North's nuclear issue.

Kim's message also comes as the new US special representative for North Korea, Sung Kim, is set to travel to Seoul later this week for trilateral talks with his South Korean and Japanese counterparts, reports Yonhap News Agency.
New Delhi, June 18 : Even as former Congress President Rahul Gandhi has said that he will not celebrate his birthday, the National Students Union of India (NSUI) and the Indian Youth Congress (IYC) has planned to organise free Covid vaccination drive at its office for the people.

NSUI National President Neeraj Kundan told IANS that the organisation is organising a free vaccination drive on the birthday of Rahul Gandhi on June 19.

He said that our leader Rahulji believes that rather than chasing virus we should get vaccinated so that virus cannot chase us.

"Rahul ji has said that vaccination is the best possible way to safeguard people amidst pandemic," Kundan added.

NSUI National secretary Lokesh Chugh said that the vaccination camp at its office will start on Saturday morning.

He said that the NSUI workers will help the people to get them registered at the Cowin site and get them vaccinated free of cost.

Similarly, IYC will be holding vaccination drive across the country for the senior citizens, daily workers and frontline workers who have not been vaccinated.

IYC media incharge, Rahul Rao told IANS, "On the birthday of Rahul Gandhiji we have planned to distribute ration kits, sanitisers, face masks among the people across the country." He said that the IYC will also organise vaccination camp at several places across the country for the senior citizens, daily workers, front line workers.

He further said that if people are not registered on Cowin, the IYC activists will help the people in getting them registered.

The IYC leader further said that it will also provide medicines for the Covid patients across the country.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)
Washington, June 18 : US President Joe Biden and his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, agreed earlier this week that Ankara would play a leading role in securing the Kabul airport, but the two sides remain divided over the issue of S-400 air defence systems, National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said here.

Biden on Monday had his first face-to-face meeting with Erdogan after taking office on the sidelines of the NATO summit, reports Xinhua news agency.

Sullivan told reporters in a briefing on Thursday that the two leaders had a detailed discussion of a potential Turkish mission to protect the airport following the withdrawal of NATO forces from Afghanistan.

"The clear commitment from the leaders was established that Turkey would play a lead role in securing Hamid Karzai International Airport, and we are now working through how to execute against that," he added.

Sullivan said Biden committed to providing the support that Turkey needed to fulfill that task.

The two leaders made no progress on the issue of Turkey's acquisition of Russian S-400 air defence system, Sullivan noted.

"On the S-400, they discussed it. There was not a resolution of the issue," he said.

"There was a commitment to continue the dialogue on the S-400, and the two teams will be following up on that coming out of the meeting." Russia and Turkey finalised the S-400 air defense system deal worth about $2.5 billion dollars in 2017, and the delivery was completed in 2019.

Turkey is the first NATO member to purchase such a system from Russia.

In response, the US suspended Turkey's involvement in the F-35 fighter jet program and imposed a series of sanctions against Ankara.
Kolkata, June 18 : The Calcutta High Court on Friday deferred to June 24 the hearing on the petition filed by West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee challenging BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari's Nandigram win in the 2021 Assembly polls.

The Chief Minister had filed a petition against her one-time aide and now the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Leader of Opposition, Adhikari, in the Calcutta High Court challenging his win in the election from Nandigram and prayed to the court for declaring the election null and void. Banerjee had contested and lost the election from Nandigram against Adhikari.

In her petition, Banerjee alleged that Adhikari has committed corrupt practices as envisaged under Section 123 of the Act, including offences of corrupt practices of bribery, undue influence, spreading enmity, promotion of hatred and enmity amongst the citizens of India, seeking votes on the basis of religion, taking the assistance of the government officials for furtherance of the prospects of the respondent's election and booth capturing.

The plea said that there were several discrepancies and malpractices in the counting process conducted by the Returning Officer on 2 May 2021. Accordingly, Banerjee and her party colleagues had sought a recount of votes. However, such requests were rejected without due cause and the Returning Officer signed the Form 21C, declaring the elections in favour of Adhikari, the petition read.

The petition also said that upon a review of the Form 17C (Account of votes recorded and Result of counting) Banerjee discovered glaring discrepancies and non-compliances in the same.

"The election in Nandigram has been conducted in complete contravention to the constitution and the laws governing elections in India. Suvendu Adhikari has engaged in several corrupt practices that have enhanced his winning chances and materially altered Mamata Banerjee's chance of success in the election. Therefore, there are substantial grounds for declaring the aforesaid election of Nandigram (AC- 2010) null and void in accordance with Section 100 of the Representations of People Act, 1951," the petition said.

The election results for the West Bengal Assembly poll were declared on May 2, more than a month ago. As per the Election Commission, Adhikari, who joined the BJP after quitting the Trinamool, defeated Mamata Banerjee by 1,956 votes. While Adhikari had polled 1,10,764 votes, Banerjee had got 1,08,808 votes. Adhikari's vote percentage stood at 48.49 while that of Banerjee was 47.64.

Justice Kausik Chanda, who was supposed to hear the case on Friday, deferred the case till June 24.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Amaravati, June 18 : Andhra Pradesh government on Friday eased Coronavirus curfew restrictions by another four hours till 6 p.m. from June 21.

"Curfew hours have been relaxed from morning 6 a.m. to evening 6 p.m.," said an official statement on Friday, following a Covid review meeting by Chief Minister Y. S. Jagan Mohan Reddy.

However, all commercial establishments must be closed by 5 p.m. across the state.

"From 6 p.m., curfew will be definitely implemented," said the statement.

Following these changes, the state will witness 12 hours of relaxation and 12 hours of curfew hours.

Meanwhile, the current curfew hours from 6 a.m. to 2 p.m. will continue to hold good in East Godavari district, considering the district consistently logging a higher number of infections.

East Godavari has been reporting nearly 1,000 cases on an average everyday, resulting in the curfew status quo continuing.

East Godavari, Chittoor and West Godavari districts are reporting higher numbers of cases in the southern state.

All government offices have been instructed to follow regular timings, with necessary changes for all employees to attend.

The southern state is recording 6,000 Covid infections on average daily.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)
Chennai, June 18 : Violence continued on Friday in certain areas of rural Tamil Nadu after an ITI student was attacked in Tirunelveli district.

The student, identified as B.Balamukesh, a Scheduled Caste from Marudham Nagam in Tirunelveli district, was attacked on Wednesday night, police said.

The assailants attacked Balamukesh while he was taking a bath in a canal on Wednesday evening. He received injuries and was rushed to Tirunelveli Medical College hospital where he is recuperating.

The Muneerpalam police registered a case against Sankaralingam, Arun Pandian, Arumugam, Vathu Mani, and some other unidentified people under various sections of the IPC and SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.

Giving details of the incident, the police said after the news of the attack on Balamukesh reached his village at Marudham Nagar, a group of youngsters from his village attacked the accused. They ransacked the houses of the accused, destroyed a car, an autorickshaw and a motorbike. They also set on fire two haystacks. More than 10 houses with tile roofing were damaged following stone-pelting.

The attackers also blocked the road passing through Marudham Nagar demanding the arrest of those involved in the attack on Balamukesh. The protesters told the police that the atrocities against the SC/ST people were continuing unabated in the village since 2019 when Rajamani of Marudham Nagar was murdered.

Meanwhile, members from the other caste also blocked the Tirunelveli-Papanasam highway demanding the arrest of those who ransacked their houses, destroyed their vehicles and set fire on the hay sacks.

The police also said that in a related incident the same group, who attacked Balamukesh, entered the Subramaniyapuram Sri Lanka refugee camp and attacked Chinnadurai 55 and Perumal, 65 with sickles and then escaped. Residents of the refugee camp also conducted a roadblock following the attack.

A large police posse led by Inspector General of South Zone, T.S. Anbu is camping in the area to prevent untoward incidents.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Panaji, June 18 : In a stern warning to his political opposition, Chief Minister Pramod Sawant on Friday, urged the Goa Police to crackdown on critics and political opponents who criticise the police department in order to "show them their place".

Sawant also accused his critics of trying to "unnecessarily disturb people" during the pandemic by slamming officials of government departments, especially health and police officials.

"Everyone should be shown their place by the police. I have seen some people from political parties blaming the police... What do they think of themselves? I feel the police need to show them their place," Sawant said at the inauguration of a new police station at Colvale in North Goa.

Sawant also cited a recent instance of a child-kidnapping case -- which was eventually solved within 24 hours -- during which the political opposition had slammed the Home Ministry.

"Shobhit (Saxena) SP (Crime) is expert in that. He knows crimes committed by everyone. They will not allow any more crimes to happen. If these crimes do not stop, then strict action will be taken by my department. I am saying this on purpose on (Goa) Revolution Day. They are habituated to unnecessarily disturbing people, even during the pandemic," the Chief Minister said.

Sawant's warning to his political opposition comes at a time when political parties are preparing for the state assembly polls, which are scheduled to be held in early 2022.

Sawant said that he would not mind if his critics verbally abuse him, saying such criticism is an occupational hazard, but said that unnecessary criticism of government departments tarnished the image of the state.

"You can criticise politicians, I do not worry about it. As a CM, I am used to abuses?AI do not mind. That is their job, our task is to do our job. Do not slander my department. Appreciate the good work done by doctors. Appreciate work by the police department," the Chief Minister said.

"Do not slander my department(s). Appreciate the good work done by doctors. Appreciate work by the police department. Do not slander the name of the state on social media, Twitter. My advise to them is the state belongs to everyone. Politics will be there today and tomorrow. But for sake of politics do not slander the name of the state. Let our image in the country not tarnish," Sawant said.
Gondia : , June 18 (IANS) In a bizarre development, a farmer has been slapped with a penalty of Rs 21,000 for allegedly damaging a stone idol symbolising the village deity at his farm and also threatened with 'social boycott' if he failed to cough out the money, a Gondia police officials said here on Friday.

The incident occurred on June 9 when the peasant, Tikaram P. Pardhi was carrying out the ground levelling work in his farm where the stone idol got accidentally damaged, enraging the Sitepar village of around 2,600 people, said Amgaon Police Inspector Vilas Nale.

"Later, the Sitepar Village Panchayat met, ruled that the incident had hurt their religious sentiments and imposed a fine of Rs 21,000 with a threat of 'social boycott' if Pardhi refused to pay up. Since this is illegal, we have initiated action against the concerned persons there following the victim's complaint," Nale told IANS.

The defiant Pardhi rejected the punishment and countered the diktat by lodging a complaint with Amgaon Police Station on Wednesday (June 16) demanding action against the village elders, including a Police Patil.

The Investigating Officer Balraj Lanjewar said that the villagers believe the stone deity is their 'Kul-Devta' and as per traditions, they kick-off the new annual crop season during monsoon by worshipping the deity which was allegedly damaged by Pardhi in his field.

The village Sarpanch Gopal F. Meshram claimed that the fine amount would be used to repair the stone idol, perform 'puja' and sacrifice to appease the deity, and construct a small temple at the site to prevent any such accidents in future.

Pardhi said in his police complaint that he was not financially well-off and hence could not afford to pay the fine, after which the Panchayat warned him of a 'social boycott'.

Nale revealed that besides the Sarpanch Meshram, eight others, including the village Police Patil, have been booked under sections of Maharashtra Prohibition of People from Social Boycott (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2016 and served them notices.

The accused include: Police Patil Ulhasrao B. Bisen, Tekchand D. Madavi, Rajendra H. Bisen, Pratap L. Bisen, Yogesh H. Bisen, Puran L. Bisen, Yadavrao S. Bisen and Sudhir H. Bisen, and further investigations are underway, Nale added.
Guwahati, June 18 : A Royal Bengal Tiger has died due to "accidental firing" by forest personnel on Friday in the fringe areas of the world famous Kaziranga National Park and Tiger Reserve (KNP & TR) in eastern Assam, officials said.

Director of the KNP & TR, Karmashree P. Sivakumar said that a carcass of the approx 10-year-old male Royal Bengal Tiger was found near Japoripothar, Karuabari area (fringe area KNP & TR) by the forest personnel.

"On enquiry, it is found that the tiger died due to bullet wound suspected to be accidental firing while trying to scare away the tiger from the public area. We are further conducting a detailed inquiry into the incident," Sivakumar told IANS.

"The tiger had killed a buffalo two days back and reappeared on Thursday evening. Forest guards were immediately sent to the area after the local people had informed about the presence of the tiger. On Friday morning, the tiger and the forest guards came very close to each other and the tiger tried to attack them. After finding no other option, the forest guards fired in self-defence," the senior IFS officer said.

Sivakumar said that since the tiger was old, it possibly could not hunt in the forest and strayed out looking for livestock.

This is the third instance in the recent past in which a tiger carcass was recovered from KNP & TR. On June 5, the carcass of a four-year-old male tiger was found at Sidha Kathoni area of the national park.

Forest officials had said that the four-year-old male tiger was killed due to infighting .

Set up in 1908, the KNP & TR, is one of India's seven UNESCO world heritage sites and extends across Assam's Golaghat, Nagaon, Sonitpur, Biswanath and Karbi Anglong districts along the Arunachal Pradesh border.

It is home to more than 2,400 one-horned Indian rhinos, approximately two thirds of the total world population. Besides rhinos, the KNP & TR has 121 tigers, 1,089 elephants and huge numbers of Asiatic buffalo, swamp deer, wild boar, hog deer, porcupine and other endangered animals and snakes.

(Sujit Chakraborty can be contacted at sujit.c@ians.in)
Tokyo, June 18 : Former Japanese Justice Minister Katsuyuki Kawai was sentenced to three years in prison on Friday for buying votes with the intention of securing a seat for his wife in an upper house election in 2019.

The 58-year-old former lawmaker was also fined 1.3 million yen ($11,800) by the Tokyo District Court, Xinhua news agency.

A four-year jail term and 1.5 million yen fine for Kawai breaking the country's election law was being sought by prosecutors.

Kawai handed out a total of about 29 million yen to 100 local politicians and supporters.

In March, Kawai pleaded guilty.

Kawai and his wife Anri, who won the race to become an upper house lawmaker, were indicted in July 2020 on charges of violating the nation's election law by buying votes in the 2019 campaign.

According to the indictment, Kawai, who once served as former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's special adviser for foreign affairs, handed out a total of about 29 million yen to 100 local politicians and supporters in return for their efforts to secure votes for his wife.

Most of the 100 people questioned by prosecutors have admitted to receiving the cash.

The ruling Liberal Democratic Party had injected an unusually large amount of 150 million yen into Kawai's camp during the campaign.

Anri Kawai was sentenced to 16 months in prison, suspended for five years, for conspiring with her husband.
Chennai, June 18 : The Indian Coast Guard is monitoring the 10 kilolitres (KL) oil spill into the sea about 450km southeast of Chennai from a Portuguese flag container ship named MV Devon, said an official.

"The quantity of oil spilled is not large. So, the economical option is to wait and watch. Further the distance is also far off," Coast Guard official told IANS on Friday.

Continuing further the official said, further details will be obtained from the ship once it reaches Haldia in West Bengal.

The official added that MV Devon is expected to reach Haldia on Friday night or on Saturday morning.

The vessel was on passage from Colombo to Haldia in West Bengal, carrying 10,795 tonnes of general cargo in 382 containers, manned by 17 crew of mixed nationality.

The Coast Guard on Thursday said that it had received information from the Maritime Rescue and Coordination Centre (MRCC) in Colombo late on Wednesday about a mid sea oil spill about 450 km southeast of Chennai.

On investigation, it was found that MV Devon had developed an underwater crack on the left side of the fuel tank containing about 120 KL of Very Low Sulphur Fuel Oil (VLSFO).

The crack resulted in spillage of about 10 KL of oil into the sea before preventive action was taken and the remaining oil in the tank was transferred to another tank by the ship's crew.

The coastal security agency said the vesses is stable.
Kabul, June 18 : Fighting between the Afghan National Security and Defence Forces (ANDSF) and the Taliban were reported across 200 areas in 24 hours amid escalating violence in the war-torn country, official data revealed.

The Defence Ministry on Thursday claimed that 148 Taliban fighters were killed in the fighting with Afghan security forces, and more than 160 others were wounded, reports TOLO NEws.

Meanwhile, the Taliban claimed to have killed over 50 security force members and wounded dozens more.

The militant group, which has stepped up activities and captured over a dozen districts since the withdrawal of the US-led forces from Afghanistan on May 1, also claimed that they seized two military bases in Shinkai district, Zabul province, and Bagahwi village of Sar-e-Pul province.

Over the past two months, the government has lost 30 districts to the Taliban, which makes up 8 per cent of the country.

Previously, 210 districts, which makes up 54 per cent of the entire territory in Afghanistan, were under the control of the government, 132 districts are contested and 46 districts were under Taliban control.
Chennai, June 18 : Founder President of the Pattali Makkal Katchi S. Ramadoss on Friday urged the Tamil Nadu government to take stringent action and ban the Chinese apps which are allegedly duping gullible investors of their money.

The PMK leader in a statement issued on Friday said that these Chinese apps were promising high returns within a short span of time for deposits and allegedly cheating the depositors.

He pointed out that it would be difficult to trace the origin of these Chinese apps and recovering money from them would be tough as they don't have any assets. If immediate action is not taken against these apps, people of the state would resort to suicide after being burdened with debts, he added.

He said the state government must launch major awareness programmes among the public against such apps to convince them of the danger of investing money in these apps.

The cyber wing of the Delhi police had arrested 10 people including two chartered accountants for allegedly duping 5 lakh people of crores by using Chinese apps.

The gang had cheated investors by convincing them that the money would be doubled in 24 days. Police said that Apps such as "New Blood", "EZ Plan" and "Sun Factory" get downloaded in India on a large scale. In less than a month and a half, the police cyber wing said that around 50 lakh Indians have downloaded these apps.
New Delhi, June 18 : Congress General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra has spoken to Sachin Pilot, party leader Ajay Maken said this on Friday dispelling rumours that 'no leader was engaging with Pilot'.

Sources have said that party interim President Sonia Gandhi 'is likely to intervene' to resolve the deadlock between the Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot and Pilot.

Ajay Maken Congress General Secretary In-charge of Rajasthan said, "Priyanka Gandhiji and I have spoken to Sachin Pilotji. As he is senior leader of the party and asset, so it's impossible if he seeks appointment he will be denied, K.C. Venugopal has also spoken to him." The MLAs and the Pilot camp in particular have been pressurizing the Congress leadership for cabinet expansion and appointments in board and corporations in Rajasthan. They allege all this is being stalled by the Chief Minister's camp.

Pilot was in Delhi last week and even toured Uttarakhand to meet his supporters where he attacked the BJP.

Maken had said last week, "Vacant positions in the cabinet, boards and commissions would be filled soon and we are in talks with all." He said that all other pending issues will also be taken up.

When asked if senior party leader Sachin Pilot is angry, the former Union Minister said, "I am speaking to Pilotji on a regular basis. If he would have been angry, he would not be speaking to me." Pilot has raked up the issue of non-resolution of commitments made to him.

"It has now been 10 months. I was given to understand that there would be swift action by the committee, but now half of the term is done, and those issues haven't been resolved. It is unfortunate that so many of the party workers who worked and gave their all for getting us the mandate are not being heard," Pilot had said.
New Delhi, June 18 : "What you said may amount to bringing an entire community into disrepute," said a Supreme Court bench on Friday as it stayed criminal proceedings against "Taarak Mehta Ka Ooltah Chashmah" actor Munmun Dutta for allegedly using a casteist slur.

The bench comprising Justices Hemant Gupta and V. Ramasubramanian said: "You say you are a woman but tell us if women have any better rights than men or they also have equal rights?" Senior advocate Puneet Bali, representing Dutta, argued that in the video posted on a social media platform last month, Dutta did not use the word 'Bhangi' intentionally and the word was used in West Bengal to refer to those who took intoxicants.

The bench replied that was not true. "You may not be informed. Everyone knows the meaning. Same word is used in Bangla. She was in Kolkata when she said this," noted the top court.

Bali acknowledged his client made a mistake and deleted her Twitter post within two hours of posting the video.

Bali argued that the top court in several cases clubbed FIRs arising out of the same incident and urged all cases should be shifted to Mumbai.

The top court issued notice to state governments and complainants, after hearing Dutta's counsel that the FIRs lodged in Delhi, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat and Haryana, should be clubbed.

The actor had triggered an outrage with an YouTube video, leading to lodging of FIRs under the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act. Later, Dutta tendered an apology and took down the offensive part of the video. She said she used the word because of language barrier.

Bali contended before the bench that the petitioner was a woman and five FIRs had been lodged against her. However, finally, the top court agreed to examine her plea and stayed the proceedings in the FIRs.

The top court also issued a notice to Dalit rights activist and lawyer who got the first FIR registered against the actor in Haryana's Hisar on May 13. The FIR was filed under the Scheduled Castes and Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act for allegedly humiliating the community.
Quito, June 18 : Ecuadorians will return to offices starting from July 1, after more than a year of working from home due to the Covid-19 pandemic, Labour Minister Patricio Donoso said.

Donoso announced the decision at a joint press conference on Thursday with authorities from the national Emergency Operations Committee (COE), the agency handling the country's response to the health crisis, reports Xinhua news agency.

By June 25, the Labour Ministry has to present the COE with a plan based on recommendations from the two committees' technical teams, said Donoso, adding the public must help to ensure a safe return to offices since the pandemic is not over.

"We cannot be careless or let our guard down. These decisions regarding the return to the office must be combined with the support of citizens to continue taking care of themselves. But, of course, we must reactivate work, (and) reactivate the economy," the Minister added.

All civil servants have been working from home since March 2020, when lockdown measures were adopted to stop the spread of the disease.

Education workers were also working remotely, though some voluntarily returned to the classroom in early June as part of a plan to gradually resume face-to-face classes.

Ecuador has so far registered 442,341 cases of Covid-19 and 15,593 deaths.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)
Tokyo, June 18 : Tokyo authorities may be planning to ease bans on serving alcohol in bars "solitary drinkers" after the state of emergency in the Japanese capital is lifted, a media report said on Friday.

According to the Asahi Shimbun newspaper reported, authorities in the capital are planning to permit the ordering of alcohol between 5 p.m. and 7 p.m. by "solitary drinkers", but the 8 p.m. limit for bars and restaurants to close their doors will remain, reports Xinhua news agency.

The newspaper indicated the "solitary drinkers" will each be allowed to spend 90 minutes at a particular venue serving alcohol between the designated times.

On Thursday, the government approved the lifting of the Covid-19 state of emergency for nine prefectures from June 21.

Tokyo, Osaka, Kyoto, and Hyogo have been under a virus state of emergency since April 25.

The measures, which were originally supposed to be lifted on May 11, have been extended twice and expanded to include Aichi, Fukuoka, Hokkaido, Okayama, Hiroshima and Okinawa prefectures.

The state of emergency is currently set to end for all prefectures except Okinawa on June 20.

Okinawa will remain under the current state of emergency until July 11 due to the recent resurgence.

But rather than lifting all virus measures completely, the government will introduce a quasi-state of emergency until July 11 for Tokyo and eight other prefectures.
Chennai, June 18 : India's second largest car maker Hyundai Motor India Ltd is hoping to notch up good sales volumes in its sport utility vehicle (SUV) segment with the launch of 6/7 seater Alcazar, said a senior official.

Nearly 45 per cent of the company's sales volume is contributed by its SUVs. The SUV sales volume is expected to go up further with the launch of premium SUV 6/7 seater Alcazar, he added.

Last fiscal, the company logged a total sales (domestic and exports) of 575,877 units.

Launching the company's new premium SUV 6/7 seater, Alcazar on Friday, Tarun Garg, Director, Marketing and Sales told reporters that 45 per cent of company's sales is contributed by SUVs (Venue, Creta, Kona and Tucson) and the numbers will go up with Alcazar coming into play.

Presently the company commands 25 per cent market share in the SUV segment.

Garg said with Covid-19 happening people are preferring personal mobility and with vaccination going on, economic growth projected in double digit the prospects are good.

As regards the waiting period, Garg said it may come down as the third shift at the factory near here will start operating from Monday onwards.

The new model has a waiting period of 6-8 weeks.

The Alcazar available in 6/7 seater, petrol/diesel, manual/automatic transmission modes is priced between Rs 16.30 lakh to Rs 19.99 lakh depending on the model.

Garg said the company has followed only three trims for Alcazar and there is no base model and is positioned between Creta and Tucson.

Hyundai Motor has received about 4,000 bookings for Alcazar with all the models getting equal bookings.

According to Garg, Alcazar is developed mainly for the Indian market and may also be exported to some countries.

Queried about the status of mass market electric car project, Garg said it will be launched in three years' time.

-- Syndicated from IANS
New Delhi, June 18 : Kanta Prasad, the owner of 'Baba Ka Dhaba' who found instant fame during the previous Covid wave last year, has been admitted to the Safdarjung Hospital following an alleged suicide bid.

According to the Delhi Police, they received a phone call late Thursday that a man, who allegedly attempted suicide, has been brought to the hospital.

Sources in Safadarjung Hospital told IANS: "He was admitted in the ICU ward on ventilator support. His condition is critical but stable." DCP (South) Atul Thakur confirmed that "the 80-year-old was admitted to Safdarjung Hospital last night. He was brought in an unconscious condition after he consumed alcohol and sleeping pills. Statement of his son has been recorded for the same. Further probe underway." Prasad had shot to limelight after YouTuber Gaurav Wasan had shot the widely shared video of Prasad and his wife on October 7 last year, which showed the couple talking about lack of customers at the eatery in Malviya Nagar.

Following which several people donated money and the couple had put up a bigger unit.

Later things went sour and Prasad had lodged an FIR of cheating against Wasan for allegedly misappropriating money that was raised to help him and his wife.

Just days back, Prasad was again seen on a viral video retracting his allegation against Wasan.

Now according to people in know of things, Prasad had to close the restaurant he opened in December last year after his video went viral and his roadside stall witnessed huge crowd.

He has been back to his old roadside stall as the cost of running the new establishment was around Rs 1 lakh, while his income was only about Rs 30,000.
Gandhinagar, June 18 : Within just three days of coming into effect in Gujarat, the state registered its first case of violation of the 'Gujarat Freedom of Religion (Amendment) Act 2021' in Vadodara on Thursday, officials said on Friday.

The police in Vadodara have arrested a Muslim man for marrying a Hindu woman by introducing himself as Sam Martin - a Christian.

One Samir Abdulbhai Qureshi, 25, residing in Tarsali area of Vadodara, has been arrested following a complaint registered on Thursday. A Hindu woman, 25, filed a complaint against Samir for marrying her under the false pretext of being a Christian.

"The Hindu woman has complained that she was lured into a relationship through Instagram by Samir, who said that he was a Christian, Sam Martin. She has complained that the accused had forced her into physical relationship and had photographed the moments. And he threatened her with making them viral if she did not marry him. They married in 2019," SV Chaudhary, inspector at Vadodara's Gotri police station, told IANS.

"The Gotri police have arrested the person under IPC 376, 377, 504, 506(2) and clause (4) of the Gujarat Freedom of Religion (Amendment) Act 2021," DCP Vadodara, Jayrajsinh Vala told IANS.

The Gujarat Freedom of Religion (Amendment) Act 2021 came into effect from June 15 after the announcement by Chief Minister Vijay Rupani. The new amendment was brought in the state following the footsteps of Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh.

The law had been passed by the Gujarat Assembly on April 1 and had received the Governor's assent almost a month ago.

Under the amended law, forcible conversion by marriage, or by getting a person married, or by aiding a person to get married, an accused shall attract punishment of 3-5 years and a fine of up to Rs 2 lakh. In case, the victim is a woman, minor, SC, or ST, the offender could be punished with a jail term of 4-7 years and a fine of not less than Rs 3 lakh.

Also, if an organization is found to be involved in the said crime, the punishment shall be between 3-10 years. The definition of "allurement" has been expanded to ensure that any person who offers a "better lifestyle, divine blessings or otherwise" can also be considered as allurement. All offences under this bill have been made cognizable and non-bailable.

The aim of the amendment is to curtail the "emerging trend in which women are lured into marriage for the purpose of religious conversion".
Srinagar, June 18 : Waheed Parra, youth president of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) was shifted from Srinagar jail to Kot Bhalwal Ajail in Jammu on Friday.

Parra has been under detention in Srinagar jail for alleged nexus between politicians and terror outfits.

He was detained in November 2020 by NIA in connection with a case involving the dismissed deputy superintendent of police (Dy.SP), Davinder Singh.

NIA alleged that Parra had been in close contact with one of the accused in the case against the dismissed Dy.SP.

He was given bail by the special NIA court on January 10, 2021, but he was immediately detained by the counter intelligence wing of J&K CID under a different charge.

The local CID has approached Google US through the ministry of external affairs to share the details of Parra's two email IDs which he allegedly used to communicate with terrorist groups across the line of control (LoC).

India has, however, not responded to a letter from special UN rapporteur seeking response on Parra's arrest.
New Delhi, June 18 : Lifestyle retailer Fabindia has re-opened doors to 168 stores across India, adhering to safety guidelines, while also offering an option to shop-from-home.

Fabindia has a total of 311 stores across 118 cities in India and 14 international stores. Its product range varies from apparel for men, women, and children to home furnishings, furniture, gifts, jewellery, organic food, and personal care products.

According to the brand, calling on the number 1800-100-1212 enables an alternate shopping experience that allows customers to shop from the comfort of their home. This number connects the customers to a personal shopper who helps them choose items of their choice that are then delivered at the customers' doorstep.

This service allows customers to shop using customized catalogues and look books, browsing collections that span apparel, accessories and home furnishings, while saving an extra trip to the store.

Mentioning the in-store safety precautions, Fabindia says that the garments that have been tried but not purchased are kept aside for 24 hours and then steamed and sanitized before being placed back on shelves and hangers. Trial rooms are constantly disinfected and safety and care instructions have been placed at prominent spots in the stores, it says.

Ajay Kapoor, President -- Retail, Fabindia, said, "In these changing times we at Fabindia are committed to serving our customers better, from being one of the first Indian brands to manufacture masks to changing the way people shop. We are committed to constantly evolving with the times and serving our customers and community." With the launch of these services, Fabindia aims to integrate its online and offline stores.

(IANSlife can be contacted at ianslife@ians.in)
New Delhi, June 18 : Medicover Hospitals has done a study on safety and efficacy of Covid vaccines -- Covaxin and Covishield.

"We have done a detailed review and analysis of the adverse effects and the outcomes of vaccination among the healthcare workers (Medicover staff) and also among the frontline workers including police. Sample size is about 12,000 people," they said.

As the results came in 13% people were infected (out of which 2.63% of people got admitted) after the 1st dosage and 2.83% were infected after the 2nd dosage (out of which 0.4% got admitted).

All the infections are of mild in category and none of them were turned to moderate/severe category.

No deaths were reported and no case is reported with any clotting issues.

"Our motto behind the study is to put a evidence based study in front of the people to avoid the hesitancy towards covid vaccination and also to avoid the confusion regarding the brand of vaccine," Medicover said.

"Healthcare and frontline category of workers are in enormous exposure to the disease, so if we can see this kind of result in them we can excellent results in public and we can definitely break the chain of this pandemic," Medicover said.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)
Mogadishu, June 18 : The Somali National Army (SNA), backed by regional forces, killed 30 al-Shabab militants and injured 24 others in an operation in the country's Middle Shabelle region, an official confirmed on Friday.

SNA spokesman Ali Hashi said the operation was conducted in the Jalable area where the militants were planning attacks against government forces, reports Xinhua news agency.

"The militants attempted to resist the army, but our forces managed to kill 30 of them and injured 24 others," Hashi told SNA radio.

He noted those killed in the operation included Jama Dhere, a senior leader of al-Shabab in the Middle Shabelle region.

The latest operation comes amid sustained efforts by the Somali army against al-Shabab in the southern and central regions where militants still control swathes of rural areas, conducting ambushes and planting landmines.

Meanwhile, Chief of Defense Forces Odowaa Yusuf Rageh confirmed that four government soldiers were injured on Friday morning in a suicide car bomb attack outside a military base in Biyo Adde, also in the Middle Shabelle region.

Odowaa said the suicide bomber, who was in an explosive-laden vehicle, was shot dead before he could reach the army base.

Al-Shabab, which has been fighting to topple the internationally-backed government, claimed responsibility for the latest attack, saying its forces killed 10 soldiers and injured a military commander in the bombing.
New Delhi, June 18 : Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday said the second wave of the pandemic illustrated the kind of challenges that the virus may present to us and the country needs to stay prepared to meet these challenges.

The Prime Minister was speaking at the launch of a 'Customized Crash Course Programme for Covid-19 Frontline Workers' via video conferencing. The training programme will be conducted at 111 centres spread over 26 states.

About one lakh frontline workers will be trained under this initiative. Union Minister of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship Mahendra Nath Pandey, many other Union Ministers, Ministers from the states, experts and other stakeholders were also present on the occasion.

Addressing the event, the Prime Minister said that this launch was an important next step in the fight against coronavirus. He cautioned that the virus is present and the possibility of mutation is also there.

"The second wave of the pandemic illustrated the kind of challenges that the virus may present to us. The country needs to stay prepared to meet the challenges and training more than one lakh frontline warriors is a step in that direction," said the Prime Minister.

He reminded everybody that the pandemic has tested the strength of every country, institution, society, family and person. "At the same time, this alerted us to expand our capabilities as science, government, society, institution or individuals," he said.

He pointed out that India took up this challenge and the status of PPE kits, testing and other medical infrastructure related to Covid care and treatment bears testimony to the efforts.

"Amidst all these efforts, skilled manpower is critical. For this and to support the current force of corona warriors one lakh youth is being trained. This training should be over in two-three months," the Prime Minister said.

He informed that top experts of the country have designed these six courses, launched on Friday, as per the demands of the states and union territories. The training will be imparted to Covid warriors in six customised job roles namely Home Care Support, Basic Care Support, Advanced Care Support, Emergency Care Support, Sample Collection Support, and Medical Equipment Support.

This will include fresh skilling as well as upskilling of those who have some training in this type of work. This campaign will give fresh energy to the health sector frontline force and will also provide job opportunities to the youth.

"Corona period has proved how important the mantra of skill, re-skill and up-skill is. The Skill India Mission was started separately for the first time in the country, a Skill Development Ministry was created and the Prime Minister's Skill Development Centers were opened across the country. Today Skill India Mission is helping millions of this country's youth every year in providing training according to the needs of the day," he said.

The Prime Minister said given the size of our population, it is necessary to keep increasing the number of doctors, nurses and paramedics in the health sector.

"Work has been done with a focused approach over the last 7 years to start new AIIMS, new medical colleges and new nursing colleges," he said.

The Prime Minister lauded the ASHA workers, ANM, Anganwadi and health workers deployed in the dispensaries in the villages.

Modi said many guidelines have been issued related to the campaign which is to start from June 21.

"People below 45 years of age will get the same treatment for vaccination as for people above 45 years of age from June 21st. The Union Government is committed to give free vaccines to every citizen while following corona protocol," he said.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
June 18 : Kangana Ranaut, who felt anxious and agitated over her passport renewal row, today felt a magic around her. Expressing her feelings, the Panga actress shared a post on Koo, which she reposted on her Instagram stories.

Sharing the screenshot of her Koo post, Kangana Ranaut wrote, Everyone falls into the trap of despair, yesterday I had a sinking feeling seemed as if I was stuck at a dead end, felt anxious and agitated but I knew I was wrong and not able to see the magic thats unfolding around me, my pain was real so was the love that was there all along but suddenly seems to have disappeared, this morning in a flash I was dazzled with all that which had left me, TRUST.

Image Source: Instagram/kanganaranaut Kangana Ranaut shared on her Instagram story

Recently, the actress was denied renewal of her passport. The passport authorities stated the reason to be an FIR filed against her by the Mumbai police. Ranauts plea in the Bombay High Court seeking renewal of her passport has been adjourned by the court till June 25.

Earlier on Koo, the actress wrote, Mahavinashkari government has started my indirect harassment again, my request for passport renewal has been rejected because a tapori/roadside romeo called Munnawar Ali filed a sedition case (deshdroh case yes the irony of it is hilarious) on me by the way the case was almost dismissed by the court yet the court rejected my request for passport and the reason given is my request is vague hmmmmmm.

Kangana shared on her Instagram stories another screenshot of her Koo post in which she wrote, Please note, when Aamir Khan offended BJP government by calling India intolerant, no one held back his passport to stop his films or shoots. In no way he was tortured or harassed #JustSaying.

Kangana wanted her passport to be renewed as she has to fly to Hungary for the shoot of her film Dhaakad. Kangana will soon resume shooting for the spy-thriller, directed by Razneesh Ghai. The film also stars Arjun Rampal and Divya Dutta in pivotal roles. The release of her film Thalaivi was postponed due to the second wave of the coronavirus pandemic. The makers of the film are yet to announce the new date of release. Kangana also has Tejas, Manikarnika sequel and the film on Indira Gandhi in her kitty.
Seoul, June 18 : South Korea's science ministry said on Friday it is investigating a potential hack into a state-run nuclear research institute after its internal network was breached last month.

A Ministry of Science and ICT official said the Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute's network was breached multiple times between May 14-31.

The ministry said the institute has since taken security measures, such as halting its virtual private network and blocking the attacker's internet protocol address, reports Yonhap news agency.

Lawmaker Ha Tae-keung of the main opposition People Power Party said in a Facebook post earlier in the day that the institute was the target of a cyberattack on May 14 by a hacker group suspected to be associated with a North Korean intelligence agency.

The science ministry said in a statement that it was currently examining the extent of the hacking incident and the source of the attack.
New Delhi, June 18 : As Indian Medical Association (IMA) members and doctors across India staged a protest over violence against healthcare workers, they got backing from Biju Janata Dal (BJD) Lok Sabha MP Anubhav Mohanty who said that "doctors need our support".

Mohanty said: "Over the past one and a half years, we have gone through unimaginable pain, trauma and suffering brought to us by the coronavirus. And we have seen how the doctors and healthcare workers have put in so much extra efforts to ensure that we are safe and we are treated if we catch the virus, without even caring for their own health and that of their family members." Citing the reports of violence against doctors as depressing, the BJD leader said, "they need our support, they need us in these testing times".

"They are working for us, treating us and the least we should do is to give them enough love, respect, and a sense of comfort when we meet them," Mohanty said.

He urged everyone to respect and love the doctors and healthcare professionals, who are around us taking care of us and our families.

"Small efforts will go a long way in boosting their morale and spreading smiles all over," Mohanty, who is also a famous Odia actor said.

His remarks came as lakhs of doctors of the IMA are observing a nationwide protest urging the government to enhance the security of the healthcare workers in all medical facilities across the country.

The protesting doctors are also demanding that the Central government bring a law to deal with violence against doctors.
Chandigarh, June 18 : The Punjab government will seek a $210 million loan from the World Bank or the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) for the canal-based water supply project for Amritsar and Ludhiana under the Punjab Municipal Service Improvement Project (PMSIP).

The decision to seek such loan was taken on Friday by the state Cabinet at a virtual meeting chaired by Chief Minister Amarinder Singh.

The cabinet authorised the Chief Minister to take any decision to meet the objectives of the project and to ensure successful and timely implementation of various activities proposed by both the lenders.

The proposed project investment is expected to cost around $300 million, of which the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) will finance 70 per cent and the Punjab government 30 per cent.

The cabinet was informed that the present water supply system to the residents of Ludhiana and Amritsar towns is through deep bore tubewells installed at different sites.

However, with the passage of time, the groundwater level is depleting, causing the tubewells to need frequent replacement. Also, the discharge in the tubewells gets reduced, as a result of which residents often complain of getting insufficient water for drinking purpose.

To overcome this problem, it has now been decided to shift to a canal-based water supply in these two towns by seeking a loan.

The work for the water supply for Amritsar town has already been awarded, whereas request for proposal for Ludhiana town is being floated. The implementation period for this project will be three years after award of work.
Chandigarh, June 18 : To tackle the emergent situation of Covid-19 pandemic, the Punjab government on Friday decided to allow specialist doctors of medicine, anaesthesia and TB and chest to continue their services, after their superannuation on completion of 58 years of age till March 31, 2022, on clinical posts.

The move is aimed at ensuring effective management of Covid isolation facilities in the state.

The decision was taken at a cabinet meeting chaired by Chief Minister Amarinder Singh, who said the services of these doctors were required to ensure timely and proper treatment to the patients.

The state government could not afford to take any risk in view of the continuing spread of the pandemic, leading to heavy burden on government hospitals and dispensaries, he added, as the cabinet took note of the fact that the recruitment advertisements had not received encouraging response and it was necessary to take urgent steps to prepare for a possible third wave.

The cabinet also granted post facto approval for extending the services of nine Group-C employees (para-medical staff) who are retiring in June in Government Medical Colleges at Patiala and Amritsar.

To provide nutrition to children in 0-6 years age group, pregnant women and lactating mothers across the state, the Cabinet gave approval to extension of 184 posts, approved under 'Poshan Abhiyaan' (National Nutrition Mission) till June 30.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)
New Delhi/Thiruvananthapuram, June 18 : Former Leader of Opposition in Kerala Assembly, Ramesh Chennithala, who did not get a second term in the post, is likely to be made a party General Secretary.

While Chennithala had majority support of the Congress legislators for a second term, the party high command decided to go in for V.D. Satheesan.

For the past two decades, the state Congress unit has been divided into factions led by Chennithala and former Chief Minister Oommen Chandy. However, following the drubbing in the April 6 Assembly polls where Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan led the Left to an unprecedented second term, the high command decided to step in and not give way to the factions.

First they brought in Satheesan, and last week, sprang yet another surprise, when K. Sudhakaran was made the state party chief.

Following Sudhakaran's appointment, Chennithala was called to come to Delhi by senior party leader Rahul Gandhi. After they met on Friday, Chennithala said that the meeting went off very well.

"I feel a lot relieved and feel very good after the meeting. Even though my first priority is Kerala, I will accept any task that the party gives me," said Chennithala, who is presently only a legislator.

With Assembly elections due in Punjab and Gujarat next year, Chennithala, who was a Lok Sabha member and a member of the Congress Working Committee, seems set to get a new party post as he is fluent in Hindi and has a wide circle of party leaders as good friends.
New Delhi, June 18 : Maximl, a connected worker platform for deskless workers has announced that it won a contract of $1million from Indian Oil Corporation Ltd (IOCL) to digitise the last mile operations for turnaround processes for the next two years across all its nine refineries.

The platform has previously configured the needs of IOCL across two deployments at Panipat and Haldia refineries, leading to an enterprise-wide demand, Maximl said in a statement.

The connected worker platform for turnarounds by Maximl has pioneered digital turnarounds in India and has digitalized over 50 turnarounds in the Indian refining sector.

On the collaboration, Manish Arora, COO, Maximl said: "We, at Maximl, believe in the human-centric view of industry 4.0. In the next few years, the saturating productivity, quality and safety metrics can be pushed significantly by digitalizing the last mile and integrating the on-field workforce with technology." "Turnarounds are very complex and always tends to go over schedule. Our platform has been configured to the needs of IOCL across previous deployments at Panipat and Haldia refineries, where have been able effectively demonstrate the transformation of the turnaround management practices," Arora said.
Chennai, June 18 : Tamil Nadu Minister for Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments (HR&CE), P.K. Sekar Babu has said that the government will allow public worship in temples only after the Covid cases are under control and there are zero deaths in the state owing to the pandemic.

The Minister told reporters at Sri Meenakshi Sundareswar temple, Madurai on Friday that the government is working towards bringing the Covid-19 cases down in the state. He said, "Public worship will be allowed in temples as soon as the Covid-19 cases are under control and the state reports zero deaths due to Covid." Sekar Babu said that the "Kumbabishekham" of the Sree Meenakshi Sundareswar Temple will be performed after the renovation of the Veera Vasantharayar Mandapam which is to be completed in two years. The mandapam was destroyed by fire in 2018.

The minister said that the previous AIADMK government did the renovation work of the Veera Vasantharayar Mandapam at a snail's pace and added, "We will renovate it at the speed of a rabbit".

The HR&CE minister said that the details of the temple jewellery will not be uploaded online as it would be a major safety issue. He said that the department would build strong rooms in all the temples for the safekeeping of jewellery.

Sekar Babu said that the department would take all steps to provide the best treatment to the Sree Meenakshi Sundareswar temple elephant, Parvathy who was suffering from cataract in both eyes. He said that if need be doctors from other states or even abroad may be brought for her treatment.

He added that the government was committed to the welfare of all the 30 temple elephants in the state.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)
Hyderabad, June 18 : Telangana Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao will host lunch for all people in his adopted village in Yadadri Bhuvanagiri district on June 22.

The chief minister on Friday called up the Sarpanch of Vasalamarri village to inform him that he would visit the village.

KCR, as the Chief Minister is popularly known, told Pogula Anjaneyulu that he would host lunch for the entire village.

"I will make all the arrangements for food. You don't have to do anything. I will send a team from Hyderabad," the Chief Minister told the Sarpanch.

KCR enquired about the population of the village. The Sarpanch informed him that there are 2,600 people in the village.

The Chief Minister said food would be arranged for about 3,000 people including all officials and police personnel who will be there during his visit.

KCR also asked the Sarpanch to select a suitable venue for a public meeting to be addressed by him after the lunch. He advised him to arrange rain proof tents in view of the possibility of rain.

Stating that the government wants welfare of every household, the Chief Minister advised him to carry all people with him irrespective of party affiliations and caste.

The Chief Minister also accepted Sarpanch's invitation to visit his house.

It was in November last year that the Chief Minister had decided to adopt the village and promised all support for its development.

The officials have chalked out plans for the development of the village, which is located about 15 km from KCR's farm house at Erravelli in Siddipet district. The Chief Minister is likely to announce various projects for the village's development during his speech at the public meeting.

This was the fourth village adopted by the Chief Minister. He last week announced that he will adopt an entire district to show how rural and urban development can be achieved.
Guwahati, June 18 : The Congress in Assam suffered a blow on Friday as its prominent MLA Rupjyoti Kurmi quit the party and announced to join the ruling BJP coming Monday.

The Congress in turn immediately expelled the four-time MLA from the party for his "anti-party activities".

Criticising the party, Kurmi, a tea community leader, alleged that the Congress has stopped listening to the younger leaders, and envisaged further downfall of the party if Rahul Gandhi continues to call the shots.

"Rahul ji can't bring about change as he is responsible for the downfall of the Congress. The results of the recent state elections are a clear sign that the Congress will keep suffering if it gives importance to Rahul Gandhi. The party will keep losing its relevance," he told the media.

Kurmi said that he has tendered his resignation to both Assam Assembly Speaker Biswajit Daimary and interim Congress President Sonia Gandhi.

The leading tribal leader stepped down days after former Union minister Jitin Prasada, one of the party's prominent faces in Uttar Pradesh, quit the Congress and joined the Bharatiya Janata Party.

After expelling Kurmi from the party, Assam Pradesh Congress Committee President and Rajya Sabha member Ripun Bora termed the development as "unfortunate".

Congress legislative party leader Debabrata Saikia said that Kurmi was a loyal party worker and had some issues regarding certain decisions of the party.

However, it was not correct on Kurmi's part to leave the party in this manner, Saikia added.

Kurmi, 43, is the son of late Congress minister Rupam Kurmi. He has been elected from the Mariani constituency in eastern Assam for four times since 2006.

The Congress, which governed Assam for 15 years (2001 to 2016), failed to win the Assembly polls held in March-April, managing 29 seats, three more than its 2016 tally, when the party had lost Assam to the BJP.

Besides state Congress chief Bora, several Congress leaders lost in the recent elections to the 126-member state Assembly.
New Delhi, June 18 : The Centre on Friday unleashed a barrage of criticism on the Delhi High Court order granting bail to three student-activists accused in a case of "larger conspiracy" related to the February 2020 northeast Delhi riots, which claimed 53 lives and left 700 injured.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, assisted by advocate Rajat Nair, representing the Delhi Police, submitted in the top court that if the finding of the High Court is applied across the country, even a person who had planted a bomb, which ultimately got defused, would escapee the clutches of the law.

He argued that if High Court judgment becomes law, then the persons who had attacked and bombed the Indian Prime Minister, in the past, would not be held as terrorists as they would have also have genuinely believed in their cause and their activity would not be covered by defence of India or an activity carried out during the war. "The interpretation of the Delhi High Court sets a dangerous precedent and ought not to be sustained," said Mehta before a bench of Justices Hemant Gupta and V. Ramasubramanian.

The Delhi Police claimed that the High Court digressed to issues which were not even argued by parties or the lawyers for the activists, and the issue of what constitutes a "terrorist activity" was never argued. "The issue of legislative competence was never argued. Hence, why, how and for what purpose the Delhi High Court ventured into the territory of interpreting as to what constitutes a terrorist activity," Mehta asked.

While granting bail to the activists, the Delhi High Court held that the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act was to be applied to offence limited only to defence of India, as provided in Entry 1 of Union List of the Constitution. Mehta contested this and argued that this finding virtually sets aside the Act, as Delhi High Court could not have gone into Entry 1 of Union List of the Constitution, as it was relatable to military actions during the war.

Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, representing the activists, contended that the top court may issue notice and examine the issue.

After hearing arguments in the matter, the Supreme Court directed that the order of the Delhi High Court may not be relied upon by any court in the country while examining any such issue.

It issued notice on the appeals filed by the Delhi Police challenging the High Court decision to grant bail to three student-activists Natasha Narwal, Devangana Kalita and Asif Iqbal Tanha.

However, it declined to interfere with the release of three accused in the matter.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Mumbai: Depositors and investors gather outside Bhandup Branch of the Punjab & Maharashtra Cooperative (PMC) Bank after the Reserve Bank of India barred the bank from carrying out a majority of its routine business transactions for a six-month period Image Source: IANS News

Mumbai, June 18 : Clearing the decks for the takeover of crisis-ridden Punjab and Maharashtra Cooperative (PMC) Bank by Centrum Financial Services, the Reserve Bank of India has granted its "in principle" approval to it for setting up a small finance bank (SFB).

The "in-principle" approval has been accorded in specific pursuance to Centrum Financial Services Ltd's offer dated February 1, 2021, in response to the Expression of Interest notification dated November 3, 2020, published by the PMC Bank, the RBI said in a statement on Friday.

"The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has today decided to grant 'in-principle' approval to Centrum Financial Services Ltd (the applicant) to set up a small finance bank under general 'Guidelines for on tap Licensing of Small Finance Banks in the Private Sector' dated December 5, 2019," it said.

The central bank will consider granting a licence for commencement of banking business under Section 22 (1) of the Banking Regulation Act, 1949, on being satisfied that the applicant has complied with the requisite conditions laid down by the RBI as part of "in principle" approval.

In March, the RBI had further extended the restrictions on the bank till June 30. The central bank had then said that the process of reconstruction will be commenced as soon as the aforesaid objectives are achieved to the best possible extent.

The PMC Bank had received binding offers from certain investors for its reconstruction, in response to the EOI dated November 3, 2020 floated by the bank.

The RBI and the PMC Bank are presently engaging with prospective investors in order to secure best possible terms for the depositors and other stakeholders while ensuring long term viability of the reconstructed entity, the RBI had said in March, adding that given the financial condition of the PMC Bank, the process is complex and is likely to take some more time.
Bengaluru, June 18 : The Karnataka government has ordered a probe into the telephone tapping allegations levelled by ruling Bharatiya Janata Party MLA Aravind Bellad, said Basavaraj Bommai, Minister for Parliamentary Affairs, Law and Home Affairs, on Friday.

Bellad, a BJP MLA from Hubli-Dharwad West constituency, had claimed on Thursday that his phone was being tapped and he was constantly being followed.

Bellad's allegations had come at a time when Karnataka BJP in-charge, Arun Singh, had visited Bengaluru to hold a series of meetings with party leaders, legislators and ministers since Wednesday evening.

His allegations had provided ammunition to the opposition parties, Congress and Janata Dal (Secular), which wasted no time in demanding a thorough probe into these allegations levelled by a ruling party member.

Bommai told the media that Bellad had written a letter to him and to the Karnataka Director General of Police, Praveen Sood, seeking an investigation into the allegations.

"I have asked Bengaluru Police Commissioner, Kamal Pant, to look into the matter, inquire, get details and book anyone who has done it," said the Minister.

Reacting to Bellad's claims, Kamal Pant told the media that he had received a letter from the government to probe the matter and it will be investigated thoroughly.

On Thursday, Bellad had alleged that someone very influential must be behind such calls, despite his father Chandrakant Bellad being a five-time MLA and he himself being an MLA since 2013.

"We (father and son) have an unblemished record in public life as they were unable to find any fault with us, but want to fix us, the BJP MLA said.
New Delhi, June 18 : Accusing Congress government of profiteering by selling Covid vaccine to private hospitals, Union Minister Hardeep Singh Puri on Friday said that additional 41 oxygen plants for Punjab have been sanctioned under PM-Cares.

He also claimed that Punjab was given more Remdesivir than Assam and Uttar Pradesh by the Union government.

Addressing a press conference at the BJP national headquarters here, Puri pointed out that the Prime Minister has done many things for Punjab in true spirit of cooperative federalism.

"Forty-one oxygen plants have been sanctioned for Punjab under PM-Cares in addition to 13 sanctioned earlier," Puri said.

Reacting to allegations of the opposition ruled state of not getting fair share in centrally procured medicine or vaccine, Puri said: "An analysis of three states of which two having almost similar population shows that Punjab has been allocated more number of Remdesivir per thousand population than Assam and Uttar Pradesh." Puri explained that having a similar population Assam got 323 Remdesivir per thousand population while Punjab received 623 Remdesivir. Uttar Pradesh received 264 Remdesivir injections per thousand population.

He listed a series of works done by the Modi government for Punjab and said, "Prime Minister Narendra Modi personally and his government are doing a lot for all the states including Punjab." On profiteering from vaccine, Puri said, "Punjab government had said that they had procured 4.29 lakh doses of Covishield at Rs 13.25 crore, which on average costs Rs 309 per dose. They had also procured 1,14,190 doses of Covaxin at Rs 4.7 crore, which on average costs Rs 412 per dose. They sold vaccines to private hospitals at a profit of Rs 750 per dose." Puri claimed that there is no consensus among Congress leaders on profiteering by selling vaccines to private hospitals. "Congress leaders are not on the same page. Some of them think profiteering on centrally supplied medicines is legitimate. The Health Minister of Punjab government abstained himself from all responsibility of this scam," Puri said.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Chennai, June 18 : Bharatiya Janata Party state president, L Murugan has said that the DMK government in Tamil Nadu is responsible for the rise in the prices of essential commodities and construction material, especially cement. In a statement issued here on Friday, the BJP leader called upon Chief Minister M.K. Stalin to take immediate steps to curb the rise in the prices of these commodities.

He said, "When people are suffering due to loss of jobs and livelihood, the price rise is a big burden on them. Increase in prices of cooking oil, cooking essentials, vegetables and construction material, especially cement, has turned into a major burden for the people affected by Covid-19." Murugan said, "The DMK government is totally responsible for the rise in prices, within a month of the DMK under Stalin assuming office, the prices of essential commodities have shot up. The prices of construction material, especially cement, have gone up. The price of a bag of cement is now Rs 520, which was Rs 370 before the DMK came to power." The Tamil Nadu BJP won four seats in the recent assembly elections as part of the AIADMK led alliance. The party is now actively involving itself in several public issues with the aim to gain a credible grassroots base in the years to come.
Agartala, June 18 : In collaboration with the Agartala Press Club, the Tripura government has so far administered the first dose of Covid vaccine to around 92 per cent of the journalists in the state, with many of them receving the second shot as well, officials said here on Friday.

The secretary of Agartala Press Club (APC), Pranab Sarkar, said that besides vaccinating the mediapersons, all the print and electronic media houses in Tripura are also being sanitised regularly.

The APC, the apex body of all media organisations in Tripura, in collaboration with the state's health department, has so far organised four vaccination camps, besides holding special camps in all the districts across the state.

Sarkar said that so far, two journalists have succumbed to the deadly disease while 30 journalists have recovered from the virus.

He also said that face masks, sanitisers, PPE kits and gloves have been provided to the journalists across all the eight districts of the state.

One more special Covid vaccination camp would be held at the Agartala Press Club to vaccinate the remaining journalists.

The Tripura chapter of the Indian Medical Association is helping the APC in the inoculation drive.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Mumbai, June 18 : Preity Zinta went down memory lane on Friday to recall shooting for Farhan Akhtar's "Lakshya", co-starring Amitabh Bachchan and Hrithik Roshan, which released 17 years ago on this day. The actress tagged the film as her toughest ever.

Preity posted a snippet of the song "Agar main kahoon" from the film on Instagram. The number features the actress alongside Hrithik.

"Remembering Lakshya today -- My toughest film ever. Filming at 18000+feet in Ladakh was brutal and beautiful at the same time. I'm so proud of this film and everything it stood for," she captioned the image.

Preity added: "It is definitely a love letter to all the army brats out there It's also a reminder to never forget all those sacrifices & the unmatched bravery of our armed forces. Thank you @amitabhbachchan ji @faroutakhtar @hrithikroshan @ritesh_sid@zoieakhtar @reemakagti1@jaduakhtar @shankarehsaanloy & the entire cast n crew for this memorable experience. #17yearsofLakshya #Memories #Jaihind #Ting." "Lakshya", a war drama, tells the coming-of-age story of a young man who finds purpose in life after becoming an army officer. It is a fictional account set against the backdrop of the 1999 Kargil War.
New Delhi, June 18 : The Trained Nurses' Association of India (TNAI) has appealed to the Delhi government to recruit only those people who have completed their nursing training, instead of Class XII pass out, for the specialised jobs, in view of the possible third wave of Covid pandemic.

The association said there are many unemployed nurses in Delhi and therefore it is suggested to give appointment only to the nursing personnel with proper salary and working conditions.

TNAI in a letter to Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Friday has opposed the Delhi government's recently proposed plan to provide training to youth as Community Nursing to strengthen manpower in hospitals in the wake of possible third wave of the pandemic.

"You cannot expect an 18-year-old, just a Class 12 pass out selected on 'first come-first served' basis to perform such skilled tasks as administering medicines, injections, vaccination, sample collection and catheterisation after just two weeks training.

In fact we may play havoc with the people's health if such perfunctory trained persons are asked to do specialised jobs," said TNAI.

The association further said that Delhi-NCR is alone a home to 33 colleges and schools of nursing rating BSc Nursing (600), GNM Nurses (600) and ANM (200) and around 1,500 nurses passing every year.

Recently, passed out students from these nursing institutions are being equipped properly to perform their tasks.

The letter further read, "We kindly request and direct officers to withdraw this proposal immediately. Also we condemn the use of the term 'Nursing' courses which is not approved by the India Nursing Council or the Sate Nursing Council." Earlier, Kejriwal on Wedenesday announced that the Delhi government will provide training to 5,000 youth, who will be working under the direction of doctors and nurses as health assistants in view of a possible third wave of Covid-19. They will be called Community Nursing assistants.

Kejriwal also added that these community nursing assistants will be trained in basic nursing, paramedic, lifesaving, first aid and home care, sample collection, oxygen concentrators and cylinder operations, among other things.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)
New Delhi, June 18 : RattanIndia Enterprises, which recently acquired a stake in homegrown electric two-wheeler manufacturer, Revolt Motors, on Friday said that it had received electrifying response on the reopening of bookings of RV400 electric bike.

The company, RattanIndia-Revolt, had to shut down the bookings of th electric motorcycle in less than two hours of them going live on their website www.revoltmotors.com.

The brand sold Rs 50 crore worth of their flagship model RV400 in Friday's flash sale.

The bike is currently available in six cities including Delhi, Mumbai, Pune, Chennai, Ahmedabad and Hyderabad.

The deliveries of the booked motorcycles will start from September 2021.

In addition to this, seeing the demand for its product in the Indian market, the company will also reopen the bookings of the RV400 soon.

With reduction in the price of electric motorcycle after FAME II incentive revision and the Delhi government incentive on electric vehicles, the bike is currently priced at less than Rs 1 lakh in the national capital.

Revolt motorcycles have been an instant hit with the customers. Revolters across the cities have clocked over 2,00,00,000 kilometres so far. Revolt is also looking to expand the distributor and service network across 35 cities in India.

The RV400 comes with a 3KW (Mid Drive) motor, powered by a 72V, 3.24KWh Lithium-Ion battery that can churn out a top speed of 85km/h. The bike can be operated through the MyRevolt App, which offers connectivity features such as bike locator/Geo fencing, customised sounds that you can change with just a tap on the screen, complete bike diagnostics, battery status, historical data on your rides and KMs done, and also the option of locating the nearest Revolt Switch Station to swap your Revolt's battery at, and be on-the-move in less than 60 seconds.

-- Syndicated from IANS
New Delhi, June 18 : Medicover Hospitals has conducted a study on safety and efficacy of Covid vaccines, Covaxin and Covishield.

"We have done a detailed review and analysis of the adverse effects and the outcomes of vaccination among the healthcare workers (Medicover staff) and also among the frontline workers including police. Sample size is about 12,000 people," they said.

As the results came in 13 per cent people were infected (out of which 2.63 per cent of people got admitted) after the 1st dosage and 2.83 per cent were infected after the 2nd dosage (out of which 0.4 per cent got admitted) All the infections are of mild in category and none of them were turned to moderate/severe category.

No deaths were reported and no case is reported with any clotting issues "Our motto behind the study is to put a evidence based study in front of the people to avoid the hesitancy towards covid vaccination and also to avoid the confusion regarding the brand of vaccine", Sharat Reddy, Executive Director of Clinical Services Medicover hospitals India said.

"Healthcare and frontline category of workers are in enormous exposure to the disease, so if we can see this kind of result in them we can excellent results in public and we can definitely break the chain of this pandemic," Reddy added.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)
New Delhi, June 18: The volatile situation in Myanmar, a pivotal neighbour that shares borders with India, China and South-East Asia is testing New Delhi's capacity to safeguard its short and long-term interests, without falling into the trap of either populism or crass opportunism.

Can India play a constructive role in resolving the acute problems that Myanmar is facing after the February 1 military coup? The elected government led by Aung San Suu Kyi has been ousted. Despite the army's iron fisted rule, the country totters on the brink of civil war. This current situation therefore bears ill of India's core interests.

There is an argument that India should take a clear position, stand with the "democratic forces" and take on the military head-on. In a guest editorial, The Irrawaddy says that this is the right time for India to step in and help solve the Myanmar crisis. The editorial observes: "India's ambiguous stand on the Myanmar coup has left many foreign policy analysts perplexed. Being the world's largest democracy and a neighbour, it should stop procrastinating and initiate some smart diplomatic moves given that the military chief continues to maintain good relations with the government of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi." Highlighting the upward trend in relations between India and the Myanmar Army, called the Tatmadaw in Myanmarese, the article says that India had given a diesel submarine-the first for Myanmar-to the Navy; the Myanmarese forces have been cooperating with India in handing over the North-East rebels and the two forces have been holding military exercises and joint surveillance.

But can India take clear sides, and would that help? Or, instead, is there a creative third way where India neither sacrifices principle nor prudence in dealing with the situation? Some analysts are of the view that it may not be wise for India to go solo in its diplomatic engagement with Myanmar. Bonding with the 10-nation ASEAN and other stakeholders such as Japan and South Korea may be a better option.

"Despite good relations with both sides in Myanmar, India alone may not have that much leverage with its neighbour. Myanmar is a South-East country and its identity lies with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). India can join hands with ASEAN, Japan and South Korea-all of who pull leverage in Myanmar-and persuade the army chief to give and take", Prof. Baladas Ghoshal, former chairman of the Centre for South and Southeast Asian Studies, JNU, and former General Secretary at the Society for Indian Ocean Studies told India Narrative.

The South-East Asia expert says that the Tatmadaw of the Myanmar military will not give up its power without extracting certain advantages. "India and ASEAN will have to meet both parties. A compromise has to be worked out where the army accepts the elections and allows Suu Kyi to rule. The army itself will handle ministries like Defence, Interior and Border Affairs. After their compromise, the two sides will not touch the constitution." Strategically Myanmar occupies a vital position, and also the support of democracies like India, Japan, South Korea, which can help it transform its governance. Also, it has enormous resources and can learn from and replicate the experience of ASEAN nations to become "one of the tigers".

In a candid interview, Myanmar's highly nationalistic army has admitted that it still cannot fully control the country more than three months after the coup. The Irrawaddy reported that Senior General Min Aung Hlaing told the Hong Kong-based Phoenix Television on May 20 that he had not expected such strong and continuous resistance from the pro-democracy group. The general admitted that he had "expected an emotional reaction" but not such a sustained anti-coup campaign.

The question before all the parties is-how to get out of this impasse? ASEAN made an effort to resolve the Myanmar crisis after the world shone an unforgiving spotlight on the grouping. After an initial tepid response to the military coup, ASEAN envoys started talks with General Hlaing-the architect of the coup and have called for the release of political prisoners. However, ASEAN came in for condemnation for speaking only with the military and not the anti-coup National Unity Government (NUG).

"The only way out of the current situation is if India, Japan, South Korea and the ASEAN countries chip in together and persuade Myanmar's warring parties to accept a compromise where both sides show flexibility and the resolution is Myanmar-owned", says Ghoshal. The initiative will also dock well with India's Act East policy, which has a deeper engagement with the ASEAN at its heart.

(This content is being carried under an arrangement with indianarrative.com) --indianarrative/
New Delhi, June 18: Earlier this week, Joe Biden, the President of the United States, met his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin in Geneva - an established icon for staging elite diplomatic encounters. The world waited expectantly, for the outcome of the June 16 meeting.

Keen eyes studied the body language of the two leaders - the firmness of handshake and content of the Joint Statement issued thereafter.

While both sides had played down expectations around this potentially historic summit, especially after bitter feuding between the two countries ranging from geopolitical contests in Ukraine, Syria and elsewhere to accusation by Washington about Russian interference, driven by an army of hackers in the internal affairs of the US, there was, nevertheless, a palpable desire to see forward movement in the bilateral relationship, whose stresses have stalled progress on many international issues.

The Summit did not disappoint. In their individual press conferences after the meetings, both leaders described their interaction as "constructive". Issues ranging from nuclear arms control, strategic stability, climate change, cybersecurity, Syria, Iran, Afghanistan, Ukraine figured in the discussions.

Both appeared satisfied with the opportunity to directly communicate their concerns, positions and redlines. On the many issues of divergence, they agreed to set up mechanisms to understand each other's perspectives. These will show their merit over time.For now, both leaders seemed to leave the venue as victors, a blaring indicator of a good Summit.

The singular formal outcome from the Summit was a short Joint Statement on Strategic Stability. Acknowledging their special responsibility as possessors of the largest nuclear arsenals and the need to address growing risks of nuclear conflict, the Statement announced the establishment of "an integrated bilateral Strategic Stability Dialogue" that would be "deliberate and robust" to "lay the groundwork for future arms control and risk reduction measures".

The Statement recalls their ability to achieve "predictability in the strategic sphere" even in past periods of high tensions. Perhaps, this reminiscence is meant to provide a positive push for difficult negotiations since both sides have fundamental differences over what is threatening strategic stability. But, if the Dialogue can evolve into a regular process where both can raise and redress their concerns, it would be a meaningful step towards risk reduction. It may even yield productive results before New START expires in 2026.

In another bonus for nuclear risk reduction, the Statement reaffirms the principle that a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought. This admittance of the military futility of use of nuclear weapons was first expressed by President Regan and Gorbachev in 1987. It had changed the nuclear dynamics.

Its reaffirmation in contemporary times was considered imperative to reduce the rising salience of nuclear weapons and bring restraint into nuclear modernisation plans caught in an offence-defence spiral.

Possible Spin-offs for India While the Summit was bilateral, its success or failure was expected to reverberate across global issues and regions. For India, the meeting is important for many reasons. Firstly, given the importance of both nations for India's economic growth, military build-up, and political support on international issues, a tension in their relationship complicates things for New Delhi. India's tightrope walking was evident, for instance, in having to defend arms purchases from Russia against American objections, while explaining its participation in the US-led Indo-Pacific and the Quad to Russia. So, an easier relationship between the two would give India a breather of sorts.

Secondly, US-Russian hostility facilitated the development of a close relationship between Russia and China. This caused discomfiture to India given its security concerns with an expansionist and aggressive China. If the Biden administration is able to wean Russia away from China by deepening its latent fears on how Russia could be "squeezed by China" - economically and demographically; and/or by sharpening President Putin's desire to retain his relevance in face of growing Chinese strength, it would be a positive development from India's perspective.

A third benefit is likely from the Strategic Stability Dialogue. High trust deficits between nations holding large arsenals in trigger-ready postures raise risks of misperception and inadvertent escalation. These have been heightened by US nuclear posture review (NPR-2018) advocating use of low-yield weapons for fighting limited nuclear wars, and Russia's strategy of escalate to de-escalate. Acceptance of such strategies encourages nuclear brinkmanship that can cause crisis instability, including when other nuclear dyads mimic similar behaviour. A dialogue on strategic stability would expectedly reduce the casualness towards nuclear use which encourages Pakistan's projection of low nuclear threshold.

Fourthly, disintegration of existing treaties and prolonged lack of engagement amongst major nuclear powers has generated scepticism about utility of arms control. That sentiment would be dispelled with return to engagement. It is also likely that arms control would be expanded in future to include China. This would be beneficial to India given its concerns about China's unchecked nuclear capability expansion and the risk of arms race instability it poses to the region.

After the Summit Will the promise held out by the Summit be realised? Sceptics naturally abound. However, as President Biden opined, "There's a value to being realistic and put on an optimistic front". He took a risk by calling for a meeting with President Putin. But he framed it as a matter of US self-interest since Russia cannot be ignored. He hopes that the engagement would make Russia realise that it was in its self-interest too to favour cooperation over disruption, thus making them both equal stakeholders in betterment of relations.

At his age and stage, President Biden would want to leave a legacy of international peace and security. President Putin too can be expected to seize an opening that can help him arrest an economically ruinous arms build-up in a severely stressed domestic economy. The time may be ripe for the two leaders to steer away from a course of confrontation towards bridging differences. Well-wishers of both, like India, should encourage them along.

(This content is being carried under an arrangement with indianarrative.com) --indianarrative/

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
New Delhi, June 18 : Amid the leadership crisis in the Lok Janshakti Party (LJP), former Janata Dal (United) MP Arun Kumar has written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi saying there is a conspiracy to end the political career of Chirag Paswan, the son of former Union Minister Ram Vilas Paswan.

He also reminded Modi about his treatment by the Janata Dal(United) when he was the Gujarat Chief Minister.

Kumar speaking to IANS, said, "I have written a letter to Prime Minister Modi highlighting that Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar did not allow him to visit Bihar during the 2010 state Assembly elections despite being in alliance with the BJP." After the Bihar Assembly elections, when Modi was expected to attend a programme of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Nitish Kumar once again cancelled the launch programme after sending an invitation to him and made several remarks against the BJP and its leaders, Kumar added.

Arun Kumar, a former Rashtriya Lok Samata Party (RLSP) leader, in his letter to Modi said the LJP under the leadership of Ram Vilas Paswan was the first party to welcome Modi's candidature for the prime minister's post.

He pointed out that it was Chirag's decision to go with the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) during the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. "And he convinced his father, too, for the same," said the former Lok Sabha MP from Jehanabad in Bihar.

Kumar said on the advice of the BJP, the LJP refused to field its candidates in the Lok Sabha as well as Bihar Assembly elections.

"But despite 15 years of Nitish Kumar's tenure as Bihar's Chief Minister the condition has deteriorated. The JD(U) only kept on doing divisive politics and made the state worse than what it was during Lalu Prasad's regime," the former MP said.

He alleged that the JD(U) was behind the coup in the LJP.

Kumar said, "On a number of occasions Chirag Paswan has openly declared that he is a 'Hanuman' for you (Modi). But your silence is not good. The way in which a Dalit youth with clean image and good intentions has come forward in politics it is not good to suppress him. And there is a conspiracy to end the political career of Chirag. And if you remain silent then history will be written mentioning your silence." He will stand with Chirag in these tough times, Kumar added.

Chirag has faced a coup by five Lok Sabha MPs of his party, including his uncle Pashupati Kumar Paras.

The five MPs on Monday removed Chirag as leader of the LJP in the Lok Sabha and on Tuesday removed Chirag as party President during an emergency meeting.

Following the coup, Chirag called a virtual National Executive meeting and sacked the five MPs from the party for anti-party activities.

While addressing a press conference on Wednesday, Chirag declared that the way in which his uncle had been appointed as leader of the party in the Lok Sabha was illegal.
Chandigarh, June 18 : The Punjab government will pay 40 per cent of the Rs 200 crore arrears of private educational institutions, against the post matric scholarship scheme for SC students, for 2017-18 to 2019-20.

This was decided by the state cabinet at a virtual meeting chaired by Chief Minister Amarinder Singh.

The meeting decided that the Chief Minister will take up the issue of the balance 60 per cent pending arrears with the Prime Minister.

The cabinet, while approving the report submitted by the Group of Ministers (GoM), constituted to look into the difficulties faced in the implementation of the Post Matric Scholarship Scheme for Scheduled Castes for the said period, decided that the government will give these arrears to the private institutions in three equal quarterly installments during 2021-22.

The GoM, comprising Finance Minister Manpreet Singh Badal, Social Justice Minister Sadhu Singh Dharamsot, Higher Education Minister Tript Rajinder Singh Bajwa, and Technical Education Minister Charanjit Singh Channi, was constituted on January 14.

The Post Matric Scholarship Scheme to SC students is being implemented through Central assistance but no funds have been released against the demand for the years 2017-18 to 2019-20.

Keeping in view the hardships faced by SC students, the GoM was constituted to examine and resolve this issue to secure the future of SC students.

It had also recommended that private educational institutions would not retain the roll numbers, certificates and degrees of SC students, would make no claims nor approach the court against the Punjab government for claiming pending fees for the session of 2017-18 to 2019-2020.

Further, they will withdraw cases pending in court in this matter, the GoM had suggested.

Further, it has said in its report that if 60 per cent amount is not received from the Centre, then the educational institutions could not claim their fee from the state government.
2BHK houses for poor come up in Hyderabad with lake view Image Source: IANS News

2BHK houses for poor come up in Hyderabad with lake view Image Source: IANS News

2BHK houses for poor come up in Hyderabad with lake view Image Source: IANS News

Hyderabad, June 18 : The Telangana government has built 330 double bedroom houses for poor people near Hussain Sagar lake in Hyderabad, and Urban Development Minister, K.T. Rama Rao will be handing over these houses to the beneficiaries later this month.

Three multi-storey buildings comprising 330 units, overlooking the picturesque lake, have come up in what used to be a slum in Ambedkar Nagar area near the Necklace Road.

KTR, as the minister is popularly known, took to Twitter on Friday to announce that he is proud to be handing over these houses to the beneficiaries. He posted pictures of the buildings overlooking the lake.

"Delighted and proud to be handing over 330 of these lake view 2BHK homes built under Telangana government's Dignity Housing programme thanks to Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao, an area that was a slum, has now been redeveloped and built in the heart of Hyderabad overlooking the famous Hussain Sagar lake," he tweeted.

The Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation has built these houses at a cost of more than Rs 40 crore over 2.5 acre of land.

The supporters of ruling Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) hailed the housing scheme for poor, especially construction of the units near Hussain Sagar.

However, the move has come under criticism from some quarters.

"Be proud of doing illegal things, that's what your party is known for.. constructions at river bodies are supposed to be 50/30 metres away. Next when it rains, go to the same place and express sympathy for people," tweeted Vijay Gopal, an anti-corruption activist.

KTR also posted pictures of 2-BHK houses built in rural areas.

"For those of you who are wondering how the Dignity Housing 2BHK programme is faring in rural Telangana, please see below. The 2BHK houses at Jangampally village of Kamareddy district are a matter of pride not just for Telangana but is setting a benchmark for India," he tweeted.

The minister will be handing over 2BHK houses built at different places in Greater Hyderabad to the beneficiaries on June 26, 28 and July 1 and 4.

He will be handing more than 330 houses built near the Hussain Sagar, 180 houses at GYR Compound, 162 at Potti Sriramulu Nagar and 10 houses at Gollakurmaiah Colony.
Mumbai, June 18 : The Hrithik Roshan-starrer "Lakshya" released 17 years ago on this day, and it was Farhan Akhtar's second film as a director. Akhtar took to social media Friday to cherish memories of the film that had Amitabh Bachchan essaying a pivotal role, and also starred Preity Zinta.

In a note he posted along with a collage of film stills, the actor showed gratitude towards Indian Army for extending support while they filmed in demanding conditions.

"Forever grateful to the Indian army for supporting us and to the incredibly dedicated & tenacious cast & crew who collaborated on this life experience .. I won't call it a film, because it's always been more than that. Lakshya. 17 years," wrote Farhan.

The film is a fictional coming-of-age drama about a young man, played by Hrithik, who fights for the nation during the 1999 Kargil War.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
New Delhi, June 18 : Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan has said that masks are the simplest as well as the most potent and powerful weapon against the coronavirus.

The Minister distributed masks among 'frontline workers' at the Union Health Ministry on Friday.

Vardhan said that although this gesture was symbolic, leading people from various industries, corporate houses and those political leaders holding office, could start a virtuous chain by emulating the exercise, eventually amplifying the 'jan-andolan' to protect everyone from the virus through 'Covid Appropriate Behaviour'.

The aim of the exercise in the Health Ministry is to distribute masks to all employees posted in the Ministry starting with the frontline workers and eventually moving to other staff.

The Health Minister said, "The government worked round-the-clock to stop Covid last year. Under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, we were immensely successful in decreasing the active caseload to a minimum." However, with the arrival of vaccines early this year and things returning back to normal, people gradually became lax in their adherence to the simple code of Covid Appropriate Behaviour.

"While the virus mutated and evolved itself, we let our guard down. All this compounded in the spike in cases snowballing into the second wave." "With many corners of India gradually moving towards unlock from the second wave, we cannot afford the laxity and any further increase in cases again," he added.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Washington , June 18 : Parents and caregivers in the US reported mental health issues more often than others during the Covid pandemic, according to a study by US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

The study showed that about 70 per cent of parents and adult caregivers -- such as those tending to older people, for example -- and about 85 per cent of people who were both, reported adverse mental health symptoms during the pandemic, versus about a third of people who did not hold those responsibilities, the New York Times reported.

The study also found that people who were both parent and caregivers were eight times more likely to have seriously considered suicide than people who held neither role.

"These findings highlight that parents and caregivers, especially those balancing roles both as parents and caregivers, experienced higher levels of adverse mental health symptoms during the Covid-19 pandemic than adults without these responsibilities," the authors were quoted as saying.

"Caregivers who had someone to rely on for support had lower odds of experiencing any adverse mental health symptoms," they added.

The study reinforced the need to destigmatise mental health issues among caregivers and for better support systems, Elizabeth A. Rohan, a health scientist at the CDC, was quoted as saying by the NYT.

Communication is key, she said, and "it doesn't have to be professional help".

"We cannot underestimate the importance of staying connected to one another", which is helpful whether the person is "a trusted friend, a family member or a professional", she added.

The study is based on data from online English-language surveys administered to panels of US residents run by Qualtrics, a company that conducts commercial surveys, for the Covid-19 Outbreak Public Evaluation Initiative, an effort to track American attitudes and behaviours during the pandemic.

The data was gathered from December 6 to 27 last year, and from February 16 to March 8 of this year, and relied on 10,444 respondents, weighted to match US demographic data, 42 per cent of whom identified as parents or adult caregivers.

The surveys included screening items for depression, anxiety, Covid-19 trauma and stress-related disorders, and asked respondents whether they had experienced suicidal thinking in the past month.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)
New Delhi, June 18 : The Supreme Court on Friday declined to pass an order directing medical universities to either cancel or postpone the final year postgraduate exams, as the examinee-doctors have been engaged in Covid-19 duty.

The top court observed that National Medical Council (NMC) has already issued an advisory in April, where it had asked universities to examine Covid situation before announcing dates for final year examination. A bench comprising Justices Indira Banerjee and M.R. Shah said it cannot pass any general order to all the universities to not conduct or postpone the final year exam.

At the beginning of the hearing, the bench clarified that it is not allowing the doctors to be promoted without taking the postgraduate exam.

The bench noted, "We have interfered where it was possible like postponing by one month the INI CET examination conducted by AIIMS, New Delhi." The court declined to entertain arguments advanced by senior advocate Sanjay Hegde, representing 29 doctors, who filed petition seeking direction for NMC to issue directions to all the universities to give reasonable time to students to prepare for the examination.

The bench emphasised that the court interfered when it saw no justification in fixing schedule for the examination without giving appropriate time to students to prepare.

The bench added that it does not know what could be reasonable time to conduct the examination, and what roles do courts have to make a decision on it? "Let the university decide on the basis of the advisory of NMC as per the pandemic situation," the bench said.

Counsel representing NMC submitted that not all doctors were engaged in Covid duty and the council had issued an advisory in April to all the universities after taking into account Covid situation in their respective areas.

Hegde contended since the doctors were engaged in Covid duty, they could not prepare for the examination.

The bench noted that the pandemic situation cannot be the same everywhere in the country and it cannot pass any general order without hearing the universities.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)
New Delhi, June 18 : Amid the crisis in the Lok Janshakti Party (LJP), a five member delegation led by Chirag Paswan, son of party founder and former Union Minister late Ram Vilas Paswan, approached the Election Commission claiming that he was elected as party chief in 2019 for a period of five years.

The Lok Janshakti Party delegation met the Election Commission on Friday.

Speaking to the media after meeting the Election Commission, Chirag said, "A five member delegation met the Commission and kept the matter before it." He said that they apprised the Election Commission that in 2019 he was elected the national president of the LJP and the national executive has passed the resolution for the same.

Chirag said, "I was elected as LJP President for a period of five years and after every five years election for the party chief is held." Before me, the party founder Ram Vilas Paswan was the party President and his tenure was till 2020, but due to his health issues he stepped down from the post as he was also having responsibilities as an Union Minister, he said. "Thus he resigned from the post and the national executive gave me the charge of party chief," Chirag said, adding that he apprised the poll panel about the same.

Chirag said that we have apprised the Commission that 10 people, including five MPs have been suspended from the party.

He said that we also informed the poll panel that these people are trying to claim to be the LJP and are using the symbol of the party. "And as Pashupati Kumar Paras is claiming to be the President of the party, thus it was necessary for us to present out side with the poll panel and apprise them of the entire situation." Chirag said, "We have told the Commission that few people can claim to be the LJP leaders, and as per the Constitution of the party I am the president of the LJP till 2024 and the entire national executive is working with me. And I have requested the Commission if anyone claims that he is the President of the LJP, we should be given a chance to provide evidence." He said that the poll panel has assured him of informing him if someone claims to be from the LJP.

He added that he approached the EC because the Lok Sabha Speaker acted without consulting the party president.

Chirag said that the party will provide all evidence, documents and affidavits to the poll panel whenever required.

Chirag was removed as leader of the LJP in the Lok Sabha on Monday after five put of six MPs, including his uncle Paras, staged a coup against him.

He was also removed as party chief on Tuesday. Following his removal, Chirag called a national executive meet and sacked five MPs from the party for anti-party activities.

While addressing a press conference on Wednesday Chirag asserted that he was ready for a long legal fight as he is a Sher ka bacha (son of a lion). Chirag had also described the selection of Paras as party chief illegal.
United Nations, June 18 : The UN General Assembly on Friday appointed Antonio Guterres, to a second term as the Secretary General to lead the world body through the crisis of the Covid-19 pandemic and the fight against global warming, which he has made his priority.

After being sworn-in to his second term, Guterres said that he would work for a "breakthrough" for a world at "a critical moment in history".

The world is "at the cusp of a new era", he said. "We are truly at a crossroads, with consequential choices before us. Paradigms are shifting. Old orthodoxies are being flipped." The 193-member General Assembly's resolution adopted by acclamation said that in "appreciation for the effective and dedicated service rendered to the United Nations", it approved the Security Council recommendation to give the former Portuguese Prime Minister another five years starting in January as the world's top diplomat.

Security Council President Sven Jurgenson said that Guterres conformed to the highest standards of competence and integrity.

The Assembly's endorsement of the Council's recommendation was only a formality because, in reality, the five permanent members of the Council through their veto powers control the selection and reappointment of the Secretary General.

Guterres ran unopposed because none of the self-nominated candidates was sponsored by a member nation.

India, which is a non-permanent member of the Security Council, supported Guterres's re-election there and in the Assembly.

After a meeting with Guterres last month, India's External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar tweeted that New Delhi "values" his leadership and would back his re-election.

Guterres said on Friday: "We are writing our own history with the choices we make right now." But he warned, "It can go either way: breakdown and perpetual crisis or breakthrough and prospect of a greener, safer and better future for all." However, he said that there were hopeful signs and "we feel a new momentum everywhere for an unequivocal commitment to come together to chart a course towards a better future" because of the pandemic's lessons of "our shared vulnerability, our inter-connectedness and the absolute need for collective action".

The cooperation seen now in the fight against Covid-19 may not have been possible a decade ago, he said.

He said that the world was beset by "geostrategic divides and dysfunctional power relations" that are manifest in "too many asymmetries and paradoxes".

They have to be met head-on and "we also need to be aware of how power plays out in today's world when it comes to the distribution of resources and technology", he said.

The global proliferation of mistrust is another problem that should not be allowed to overwhelm the world, he added.

Guterres displayed masterful diplomacy in navigating a deeply polarised Council without antagonising the permanent members while managing the reflexive opposition of former US President Donald Trump to the UN and China's aggressive diplomacy.

Earlier this month announcing the Council's recommendation for a second term for Guterres, Jurgenson described him as a "bridge-builder".

Seven of Guterres's predecessors were re-elected and only Boutros Boutros Ghali, an Egyptian, was limited to a single term because of Washington's opposition.

During the Covid-19 crisis, Guterres pursued the equitable distribution of vaccines and other resources while fighting disinformation, and set an agenda for post-pandemic rebuilding to put the world back on track in pursuit of the UN's sustainable development goals.

His first term was marked by his passionate advocacy of fighting global warming, which he has called an existential threat to humanity, and a top agenda item.

Guterres, who was a UN High Commissioner for Refugees, was the surprise consensus candidate in 2016 when the bets were on a woman, likely from East Europe, getting the job that had been held only by men and never by a East European.

In his first bid in 2016, he received the essential approval of the Security Council after six straw polls in which he outlasted 12 candidates, seven of them women.

But this time Guterres, who was nominated by Portugal, had no official rivals as the Security Council did not recognise at least seven other self-nominated candidates -- including Arora Akanksha, a Canadian of Indian descent -- because they lacked the backing of any nation.

The requirement for sponsorship by a UN member is not unambiguously stated in the UN Charter or its regulation, but the Council and the Assembly considered it a de facto qualification based on tradtion.

The Assembly resolution appointing Guterres to a second term, said it was "guided by the principles of transparency and inclusivity" as set out in its 2015 resolution that established a modicum of openness to a process that had been shrouded by backroom deals.

The Assembly required the candidates to appear before it to make a pitch for their election.

This time only Guterres came before the Assembly to layout his vision for his second term and the others were excluded because they were not recognised.

Jugenson and General Assembly President Volkan Bozkir have maintained that a nomination by a member state is necessary -- a requirement that would prevent a stampede of self-nominated candidates demanding equal time at the General Assembly with the officially nominated candidates.

Of the self-nominated candidates, only Rosalia Arteaga, a former President of Ecuador, had any shred of credibility and the self-nominations were publicity stunts.

Akanksha, 34, is an employee of the UN Development Programme who made a splashy campaign video pitching her youth and the need for change at a UN weighed down by a sclerotic bureaucracy.

Although she received media coverage, she could not get the support of even her country, Canada, or of India and Saudi Arabia, where she had lived earlier.

(Arul Louis can be reached at arul.l@ians.in and followed @arulouis)

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Shimla, June 18 : A Special Court in Shimla on Friday sentenced Anil Kumar aka Nilu to undergo life imprisonment till the end of his natural life with a fine of Rs 10,000 in connection with the rape and murder of a minor in Kotkhai area of Himachal Pradesh in 2017.

A Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) spokesperson said that the Special Judge (POCSO), sentenced Kumar to undergo life imprisonment till the remainder of his natural life and a fine of Rs 10,000 in the case related to the rape and murder of a minor girl at Kotkhai.

The CBI had registered a case on July 22, 2017 on the orders of the Himachal Pradesh High Court dated July 19, 2017.

The case of rape and murder was earlier registered at Police Station Kotkhai in Shimla district on the allegations of rape and murder of a minor girl in the forest of Halaila.

Six persons were arrested by the local police in the case, he said.

The official said that the case was being monitored by the High Court through the status reports which were placed before it from time to time.

"During investigation, it was found that the victim was raped and murdered by the accused Kumar, a woodcutter by profession," he said.

He said that the case was very challenging and blind, involving public sentiments.

"There was no eyewitness in this case. The scene of crime was in a dense forest with least human encroachment. The accused did not belong to the area of the scene of crime and also frequently changed his location after the said crime. The involvement of the accused in the crime was established through DNA profiling, along with other evidence," the spokesperson said.

He said that after thorough investigation, the CBI filed a chargesheet in the court of Special Judge (POCSO), Shimla against the accused Kumar.

"CBI investigation also revealed that the 6 accused arrested by the state police earlier, were not found involved in the crime," he said.

He pointed out that after considering all the oral, documentary, scientific, medical and circumstantial evidence etc on record, the trial Court found Kumar guilty and convicted him on April 28 this year.

The rape and murder of the minor girl had sparked angry reactions from different sections of the society.
New Delhi, June 18 : The Enforcement Directorate on Friday said that it has frozen investments worth Rs 88 lakh in India of Subrahmanya Srinivas Pinninti from Qatar in connection with a money laundering probe.

The ED, in a statement, said that it issued freeze orders against Pinninti, Head of Buyers Department in Al Meera Consumer Goods Company, Doha, to safeguard proceeds of crime worth Rs 88 lakh.

It said that the freeze order under Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), against Pinninti, froze his investments worth Rs 88 lakh made in India out of the proceeds of crime acquired in Qatar.

It said that the order was passed after the ED carried out searches at his residence in Seethammadhara in Andhra Pradesh's Visakhapatnam, and found that he has acquired three residential plots in his name in Vizinagaram and Visakhapatnam districts of the state.

The current guidance value of the three plots is approximately Rs 43 lakh, it said.

The ED said that searches at Pinninti's premises on June 15 was based on Letter Rogatory (LR) received from the Qatar Embassy of in New Delhi.

It further said that money laundering probe by the financial probe agency revealed that Pinninti had transferred suspected funds from his Doha National Bank account to his Indian bank accounts with Axis Bank and HDFC Bank.

"The money trail revealed that he has invested Rs 45 lakh out of these funds in various mutual funds in the name of his wife and self. And he also acquired a few landed properties," it added.
New Delhi, June 18 : The Supreme Court on Friday agreed to hear the appeals against the Calcutta High Court order denying West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and Law Minister Moloy Ghatak from filing affidavits on their role on the day of arrest of four Trinamool Congreess leaders on May 17 by the CBI in Narada case.

A bench comprising Justices Hemant Gupta and V. Ramasubramanian, in its order, said: "Tushar Mehta, SG has put appearance on behalf of the respondents. Let a copy of these petitions be served upon the office of the Solicitor General. At the joint request of the parties, list the matters on June 22. We hope that the High Court will not take up the matter on June 21 and June 22." The top court asked the High Court to consider the matter after the apex court considers the appeals of the state and Ghatak against the order.

A five-judge bench of the Calcutta High Court on June 9, hearing the CBI's application for transfer of the Narada sting tape case from the special CBI court to the High Court, had said it will consider later the affidavits by Banerjee and Ghatak.

Senior advocate Rakesh Dwivedi, appearing for Ghatak, had said that the minister was attending the cabinet meeting and was not on the court premises at the time of hearing. He emphasised the CBI had addressed the court virtually.

The allegations levelled are that Trinamool leaders played key role in stopping the CBI from performing its legal duty after arresting four party leaders on May 17 in the case.

Solicitor General Mehta had contended before the court that the affidavits cannot be accepted on the ground of delay as they were filed after the completion of his arguments. On June 9, the High Court had decided to consider later the affidavits filed by Banerjee and Ghatak.
Patna, June 18 : Anil Kumar Ram, a Dalit youth of Purnea district who was physically assaulted by BJP MLA Vijay Khemka and his bodyguard, alleged that they are threatening him with dire consequences if he did not withdraw the case.

Ram is currently going from pillar to post in Purnea district with the expectation that legal action would be taken by the police against Khemka and his bodyguard.

"The aides of Khemka threatened me to withdraw the case against him and his bodyguard a week ago. They came on motor bikes wearing helmets and face masks and asked me for the same. They have also offered me Rs 20 lakh to withdraw the case," Ram said while interacting with media personnel in Purnea.

"I just want justice for the humiliation I faced on May 30. I have written a letter to CM Nitish Kumar, DGP SK Singhal, zonal IGP, district SP and district magistrate of Purnea in this matter," Ram said.

As per the FIR on May 30, Ram along with several Dalit families was listening to the "Mann Ki Baat" programme of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the Gulab Bagh locality. BJP MLA Vijay Khemka was also present there.

"After the end of the programme, I pointed out the pathetic situation in Dalit localities of Purnea. They become non-livable during the rainy season when sewage water enters the houses. As he (Khemka) is a public representative, he should address the issues of Dalit localities with proper concrete roads with drainage facility," Ram said.

"Hearing this, Khemka and his bodyguard brutally beat me in full public view. He threatened me with dire consequences for pointing out issues of Dalit Basti," Ram said.

Following the incident, there was a huge uproar among the Dalit community across the state.
Bengaluru, June 18 : Even with a section of the party's disgruntled leaders renewing their attacks, Karnataka Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa said on Friday that there is 'no crisis' in the BJP as such, but for two to three members making frivolous allegations for the last several months.

"Where is the crisis in our party? The same leaders who have been levelling allegations for the last couple of months are still making the noise, and these leaders have not even been able to secure an appointment with Arun Singh, the BJP in-charge for Karnataka," Yediyurappa said.

He reiterated that there is no confusion or crisis in the party, and the entire state unit stands together except for those two to three leaders.

"We, the leaders of the entire state unit, are focusing on development work. Neither me, nor my cabinet colleagues, are disturbed by any of these things. We are all working hard," the Chief Minister said.

In response to a query about BJP MLC A.H. Vishwanath's accusation against his son Vijayendra, Yediyurappa, even before the question was completed, retorted that Vishwanath was making baseless allegations against his son (who is also the party's state unit vice-president).

He added that the party's central leadership has already made it clear that it will initiate action against such elements (like Vishwanth), and the BJP high command will soon decide on the action to be taken.

The Chief Minister claimed that about 60 legislators met the party's national General Secretary Arun Singh on Thursday, but those levelling allegations were not even allowed to meet him.

On June 10, Yediyurappa had openly said that he was ready to resign from the CM's post as and when the party high command wished him to step down, creating a political stir in the state.

Following this, the party's Karnataka in-charge Arun Singh had clarified on June 11 that Yediyurappa would remain at the helm of affairs till the next Assembly polls in the state scheduled in 2023.

Bolstered by this, on June 12, Yediyurappa had asserted that there was no confusion on the issue of leadership and that he will work for the development of the state during the remaining two years of his term.

Singh arrived in Karnataka for a three-day visit on June 16, holding meetings with the party leaders, legislators and ministers, besides attending the state BJP's core committee meeting.
Chandigarh, June 18 : Punjab Police on Friday cracked a multi-crore rupee interstate fake Remdesivir manufacturing racket with the arrest of six people, including the kingpin, who used to black market fake replicas of the life-saving anti-viral drug used to treat critical Covid-19 patients.

Police has also recovered designs and packaging material used for making these vials besides seizing Rs 2 crore cash and four cars from possession of the accused.

Director General of Police Dinkar Gupta said that accused Mohammad Shahwar had taken premises in Maloya village on lease on pretext of stocking medicines 10 months back.

Following the recovery of vials in Bhakra canal last month, the SIT, constituted to investigate the case, traced the marketing address mentioned on the recovered vials to Nautwins Pharmaceuticals in Maloya whose owner was quizzed.

This led the police to unravel the entire conspiracy plot and identify the accused, the DGP added.

Investigations are on to ascertain their area of operations into other states and samples from recovered vials have been sent to Kolkata for forensic examination.

Further, after coming across the name of Shahwar and his aide identified as Shah Nazar, who is the main accused in the supply of these fake injections, Ropar police conducted raids at the main office and house of Shahwar at Kala Amb in Himachal Pradesh to get further leads.

In the meantime Shahwar had managed to abscond and for at least one month, he had traveled to Goa, Bengaluru, Uttar Pradesh, Delhi and various other locations to evade arrest, Gupta said.

The SIT, headed by Superintendent of Police Ankur Gupta, was set up after 3,000 vials, including 621 of Remdesivir and 1,456 of Cefoperazone, and 849 unlabelled, were recovered from the Bhakra Canal in Ropar on May 6.
Gurugram, June 18 : Amid a spike in the number of attacks on doctors in various parts of the country, the Indian Medical Association (IMA) on Friday staged a protest here, demanding implementation of central protection act for the healthcare workers.

Vandana Narula, president of IMA, Gurugram, said : "We demand a zero tolerance on violence against health workers." "Around 1,500 doctors have died during Covid pandemic and it is now time for a central protection act for the health workers so that anyone who attacks a doctor or damages hospital property will be arrested under non bailable charges," she said.

During the protest, doctors from IMA Gurugram wore black masks and created awareness about the situation of doctors in India.

Sarika Verma, secretary of IMA, Gurugram, said: "88 per cent doctors are afraid of violence at their workplace and every death becomes a cause of stress in the hospital.

No one can ensure whether the patient will remain alive or not and it is important to understand that doctors are on a very difficult task. There is no role of a violence in a civilised society." Doctor Karan Juneja said: "We as junior doctors have spent 15 months wearing PPE kits and performed our Covid duty, when patients' kin would not look after them. Nurses, cleaners, technicians, ambulance workers and junior doctors looked after patients till their last breath. Whenever a doctor died, it impacts the mental health of doctors from all over the country.

"Several doctors are hesitant to make their children doctors because of the fear of assault inside hospitals. This violence has gone on too long and has to end now," said a doctor.

IMA members also submitted a memorandum to Prime Minister Narendra Modi through Gurugram's Deputy Commissioner, seeking implementation of central protection act.

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Kolkata, June 18 : In a surprise development, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has written to the Calcutta High Court, urging that her petition challenging the election of BJP's Suvendu Adhikari from Nandigram be re-assigned to a different judge. The petition is presently assigned to Justice Kausik Chanda.

In a letter written on behalf of the Chief Minister by her advocate, and delivered to the Chief Justice of the high court on June 16, Banerjee outlined two reasons for the request.

"My client has filed the election petition challenging the election of Suvendu Adhikari, a member of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The adjudication of the election petition shall also have political ramifications. My client has been made aware that the Hon'ble Justice Kaushik Chanda was an active member of the BJP. Thus, in the event the Hon'ble Judge takes up the election petition, there will be reasonable apprehension in my client's mind of bias on the part of the Hon'ble Judge in favour of the respondent and/or against my client," the letter read.

"In any event, in view of the fact that the respondent in the election petition is a member of the BJP and the Hon'ble Judge was an active member of the BJP, it will lead to a situation and perception whereby the Hon'ble Judge, in adjudicating the matter, may be said to be 'judge in his own cause'. Justice must not only be done; it must also be seen to be done," the letter added.

The letter further said, "Sometime in April 2021, my client had received a letter from the Hon'ble Chief Justice of this Hon'ble court for confirmation of Hon'ble Justice Kausik Chanda as a permanent judge of this court. My client had objected to the confirmation of the judge as a permanent judge of the High Court at Calcutta.

"Further, the Hon'ble Justice Kausik Chanda is yet to be confirmed as a permanent judge of this court. As stated above, my client's views were sought by the Chief Justice on the confirmation of Justice Kausik Chanda as a permanent judge of the High Court at Calcutta. My client had conveyed her objections and reservations to any such confirmation. My client apprehends that the judge is aware of her objections and as such my client reasonably apprehends that there is a likelihood of bias on the part of the Hon'ble judge." "In the aforesaid circumstance, in order to sustain the confidence of the public in the judiciary, the aforesaid election petition ought to be reassigned. Hence, I on behalf of my client, humbly beseech you to forthwith place this letter before the Chief Justice (Acting) for necessary re-assignment of the election petition so as to avoid any prejudice and/or presumption of prejudice against my client," the letter said.

Meanwhile, Trinamool spokesperson Kunal Ghosh suggested that Justice Chanda "may likely have a soft spot for (the BJP) unconsciously" and "perhaps he should leave this case".

Banerjee has filed an election petition against her one-time aide-turned-BJP leader of the opposition, Suvendu Adhikari, in the Calcutta High Court challenging his poll victory from Nandigram, praying to the court to declare the election null and void.

Banerjee had contested and lost the elections from Nandigram against Adhikari. The petition was briefly heard On Friday morning by Justice Chanda before it was adjourned to June 24.
New Delhi June 18 : Union Home Minister Shri Amit Shah on Friday virtually reviewed the various development projects for Jammu and Kashmir with the motto 'Development with Transparency' as enunciated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Shah said that all-round development and welfare of the people of J&P are the top priorities of the Modi government.

The Home Minister appreciated the 90 per cent reach of the Central government's schemes in J&K. Simultaneously, he congratulated J&K Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha and his team for the ongoing Covid vaccination drive in the Union Territory.

At the meeting, Shah directed the concerned officials to ensure that the benefits of the refugee package reach all the refugees from PoJK, West Pakistan and those who had to migrate from Kashmir to Jammu at the earliest.

The Home Minister urged for the completion of many other development schemes, including the Prime Minister's Development Package, and industrial development projects at a fast pace. He also directed the official to start the 3,000 MW Pakal Dul and Keeru hydroelectric projects and fast-tracking other 3,300 MW projects.

For strengthening the Panchayati Raj institutions and the urban local bodies, Shah directed the officials to immediately organise training programmes for the members, and provide equipment and other resources to the concerned people for the smooth functioning of these bodies.

He also directed the panchayat members to visit various parts of the country, so that they can get information about the functioning of the developed panchayats.

The Home Minister stressed on increasing the scope of MGNREGA to provide employment to more and more people. At the same time, he spoke about the use of modern techniques in agriculture to increase the income of the farmers and to set up at least one agro-based industry in each district.

He also said that work should be done to increase the quality and density of apple production in Jammu and Kashmir, so that the apple growers receive maximum price for their crop.

Shah directed the J&K administration to ensure that all farmers are provided the benefits of the schemes being implemented for them, such as the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Yojana and the Kisan Credit Card Yojna, among others.

Lt Governor Manoj Sinha and senior officials of the Central government and the J&K administration attended the meeting.
New Delhi, June 18 : Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Friday apprised Lieutenant Governor Anil Baijal of the administration's action plan to battle the possible third wave of Covid in the national capital.

During a meeting with Baijal, who also chairs the Delhi Disaster Management Authority (DDMA), Kejriwal presented a blueprint of the preparations being made by the Delhi government to tackle the possible third wave.

"A state-level task force, more healthcare staff and a special task force for treatment of children are among the Delhi government's action plan to deal with the third wave," the Chief Minister Office (CMO) said in a statement.

During the meeting, Kejriwal told Baijal if the third wave hits Delhi, then during normal situation about 37,000 coronavirus cases can emerge per day, whereas if the outbreak is very high, then the count might climb to 45,000.

"Delhi government is preparing for the management of beds, among others, keeping in mind the normal and worst-case scenario. If there is a possible third wave of Covid and the situation in the national capital becomes extremely distressing, the government is working continuously on how many oxygen beds and ICU beds will be required during that time," CMO said.

In view of this, the Delhi government has constituted a committee to enhance and strengthen the health infrastructure of the national capital, including a state level expert committee for mitigation and management of the third wave of Covid-19 cases in Delhi.

Besides, a Paediatric task force for management of Covid-19 and treatment of children has also been set up.

As per the data provided by the CMO, Delhi has so far installed 32 PSA oxygen plants with capacity of 29.77 MT and 7 PSA oxygen plants with capacity of 5.7 MT will be installed at the end of June.

Further, Delhi will also install another 15 PSA oxygen plants with capacity of 18.8 MT July 31 and 10 more PSA plants with capacity of 10.42 MT will be added by end of September this year.

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Chennai, June 18 : The Chennai police have constituted a special team to trace former Information Technology Minister M. Manikandan, who has been booked on charges of raping an actress on the pretext of marriage.

Manikandan is absconding ever since the Madras High Court rejected his anticipatory bail plea. Police sources said that the members of the special team have been deployed to Madurai and Ramanathapuram to track Manikandan.

The former IT minister in the AIADMK government was booked two weeks ago by the Women Police Station in Adyar based on a complaint filed by a Malaysia-based actress, who accused Manikandan of continuously exploiting her on the pretext of marriage.

The police booked the ex-minister under various sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) on charges of rape, causing miscarriage, and cheating.

The actress alleged that she had met Manikandan in 2017, and the minister had promised to do business jointly in Malaysia. She further alleged that she was forced to undergo abortion by Manikandan after becoming pregnant with his child.
Lucknow, June 18 : Terming a PIL as more of a 'publicity interest litigation' than a public interest litigation, the Allahabad High Court on Friday dismissed a petition seeking directions to the state authorities to dispose of dead bodies lying on the banks of Ganga in Prayagraj.

A bench comprising Chief Justice Sanjay Yadav and Justice Prakash Padia turned down the argument of the petitioner that it is the responsibility of the state to perform cremation and dispose of the bodies in a dignified manner.

The court also questioned the bona fides of the petitioner and wanted to know if the petitioner had contributed personally to the cause by identifying any of the dead bodies or by giving them a decent funeral.

"What is your personal contribution to the cause you are raising? Tell us if you dug out and cremated bodies," the bench asked.

The court also expressed displeasure over the petitioner for approaching the court under the guise of PIL without having done proper research.

The court dismissed the petition, saying that it is inclined to impose heavy costs on such petitions.

The petition was moved by an advocate named Pranvesh, seeking the court to issue an order or direction in the nature of mandamus directing and commanding the respondents to perform the cremations according to the religious beliefs and dispose of the bodies buried near river Ganga at different ghats in Prayagraj as early as possible.

To the argument of the petitioner that he has "personally visited these places and the situation is very bad", the court said, "You better do some research and withdraw, we are not entertaining such petitions. We are not interested in heavy words and adjectives. There are ground realities you have not examined." In the supplementary affidavit, Pranvesh had brought on record an advisory issued by the National Human Rights Commission directing the state authorities to look into the matter of 'unclaimed dead bodies'.

"We are of the view that the petitioner has not done any research regarding the rites and customs which are there among various communities living near Ganga. We allow him to withdraw and file again with some research work," the court further said.

In its summing remark, the court said that it would not allow such types of petition, merely for the sake of it.
Bengaluru, June 18 : With the southwest monsoon turning vigorous, the weather office on Friday issued a red alert, warning of extremely heavy rainfall in three coastal districts of Karnataka over the next 48 hours.

"Red alert means extremely heavy rainfall to occur in Dakshina Kannada, Udupi and Uttara Kannada districts over the next two days," a Meteorological Department official told IANS here.

An orange alert has been sounded in the districts of Chikkamagalur, Hassan, Kodagu and Shivamogga in the Malnad region where heavy rains are predicted during the weekend.

Moderate to heavy rainfall has been forecast with gusty surface winds in the state's south interior and north interior parts on Saturday and Sunday.

According to the weather bulletin, due to heavy to very heavy rainfall, 21 cm was recorded at Bhagamandala in Kodagu district during the last 24 hours, followed by 18 cm at Kottigehara in Chikkamagaluru district, 15 cm at Agumbe, 13 cm at Thalaguppa in Shivamogga district, and 12 cm in Honnavar and Siddapura in Udupi district.

"Incessant and widespread rains in the coastal, southern and Malnad regions disrupted normal life, as rivers and their tributaries flooded roads and bridges, inundated low-lying areas in villages and uprooted trees and electric poles," said the official.

Fishermen have been advised against venturing into the sea on the next two days due to strong winds up to 50 kmph speed and high waves up to 5 metres from Mangaluru to Karwar.

Meanwhile, Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa directed officials in the rain-hit districts to take preventive measures to protect people from flooding and rain-water entering their houses.

"I will assess the situation and preparations with officials of 20 districts through video-conferencing on Saturday," he said.
Patna, June 18 : Amid the leadership crisis in the Lok Janshakti Party (LJP), the planning of Chirag Paswan, the son of former Union minister and LJP founder late Ram Vilas Paswa, seems to getting leaked frequently these days.

On Friday, a purported audio conversation with between Chirag Paswan and LJP Youth Wing leader Sanjeev Sardar went viral on social media platforms. IANS is, however, not confirming the authenticity of the viral audio clip.

In the alleged audio clip, Chirag Paswan can be heard instructing Sardar to hold a massive protest at the LJP office and at the airport when Pashupati Kumar Paras arrived in Patna on Wednesday. He further asked Sardar to make sure that Paras doesn't enter the party office in Patna.

In reply, Sardar can be heard saying that he would arrange youth from the Dalit hostels in Patna for the protest against Paras' arrival.

Paras arrived here from Delhi on Wednesday to participate in the national executive committee meeting of the party held on Thursday. He was later elected as LJP President with the support of five MPs, including himself and his nephew Prince Raj.

Earlier this week, Chirag Paswan faced a coup by five Lok Sabha MPs of his party, including his uncle Paras and cousin brother Prince Raj.

The five MPs had on Monday removed Chirag Paswan as the leader of LJP in the Lok Sabha, before removing him as the party president during an emergency meeting held on Tuesday.

Following the coup, Chirag called a virtual national executive meeting and sacked the five MPs from the party for 'anti-party' activities.
Dhaka, June 18 : Social networking companies like Facebook and YouTube do not want to help Bangladesh if citizens are engaged in spreading militancy or misinformation, terming those as 'free speech', but comes to the aid in case of serious propaganda against the state or specific people and sometimes regarding terrorism, Mustafa Jabbar, Minister of Telecommunications and Information Technology, said on Friday.

Jabbar said that a draft law has already been prepared as the Digital Security Act is not sufficient to address these issues, saying, "They have all of our information but we cannot take any action against them. A new law of Bangladesh is underway to address the issues with social networking companies." He added that as cybercrime is on the rise, the use of technology needs to be increased in crime detection in every police station across the country.

Jabbar also said that the families need to further emphasise on raising awareness about cybercrime.

In a programme on the tendency of cybercrime in Bangladesh, marking the 6th anniversary of the Cyber Crime Awareness Foundation (CCAF), the minister said that in the name of freedom of speech, social networking companies like Facebook and YouTube do not provide information against 60 per cent of the requests made by the Bangladesh government.

Not even 1 per cent of the parents use the parental control services of the digital devices, he added.

However, the situation has improved after 2018, Jabbar said, adding, "Before 2018, we did not have any communication with the social networking companies and they only addressed about 1 per cent of our complaints. Now, it has increased to 35-40 per cent." The minister further said that the government can now get in touch with the social media companies every week, but still there are many gaps in the communication process which need to be addressed.

Additional Superintendent of Police (Forensic) of the Police Bureau of Investigation (PBI), Mostofa Kamal Rashed, said the government is formulating cyber monitoring cells in every district to ensure cybersecurity.

Highlighting the findings of a research report, Monira Nazmi Jahan, convener of the CCAF Research Cell, said that account hacking is one of the prevailing cybercrimes in the country, with a rate of 28.31 per cent.

Spreading misinformation using social media is in second position with a rate of 16.31 per cent and threatening through online platforms is in third position, she added.
New Delhi, June 19 : Experts at United Nations Office of the Human Rights Commissioner have said in a report that it is concerned that Indias Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021, in their current form, do not conform with international human rights norms.

The observations were made in Mandates of the Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression; the Special Rapporteur on the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and of association and the Special Rapporteur on the right to privacy.

The report is authored by Irene Khan, Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression, Clement Nyaletsossi Voule, Special Rapporteur on the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and of association and Joseph Cannataci, Special Rapporteur on the right to privacy.

"As noted in previous communications sent to your Excellency's Government, we are concerned that these new rules come at a time of a global pandemic and of large-scale farmer protests in the country, where the enjoyment of the freedom of opinion and expression, including the right to receive information, and the right to privacy, is particularly important for the realisation of several other civil, cultural, economic, political and social rights," the report said.

"We would like to recall that restrictions to freedom of expression must never be invoked as a justification for the muzzling of any advocacy of multiparty democracy, democratic tenets and human rights," the report said.

The report said as a global leader in technology innovation, India has the potential to develop a legislation that can place it at the forefront of efforts to protect digital rights. However, the substantially broadened scope of the Rules is likely to do just the opposite.

"We would therefore encourage the Government to take all necessary steps to carry out a detailed review of the Rules and to consult with all relevant stakeholders, including civil society dealing with human rights, freedom of expression, privacy rights and digital rights", the report said.

"We understand the new Rules were issued under the Information Technology Act of 2000 and therefore, were not subject to parliamentary review or opened for consultation with stakeholders. We believe such consultations with relevant stakeholders are essential in order to ensure the final text is compatible with India's international legal obligations, in particular with Articles 17 and 19 of the ICCPR," it added.

This observation along with India's comment will also subsequently be made available in the usual report to be presented to the Human Rights Council, it added.
Chandigarh, June 19 : Describing the death of legendary athlete Milkha Singh with post-Covid complications, Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh said it was the end of an era and India and Punjab "are poorer".

His Haryana counterpart Manohar Lal Khattar said that the country has lost a star.

"Upset and saddened to hear of Milkha Singh Ji's demise. It marks the end of an era and India & Punjab are poorer today. My condolences to the bereaved family & millions of fans. The legend of the Flying Sikh will reverberate for generations to come. Rest in peace Sir!" Amarinder Singh said in a tweet.

"Milkha Singh has left us but he will always inspire every Indian to shine for the country," Khattar added.

Milkha Singh, 91, passed away in a local hospital here at 11.30 p.m. on Friday, said a statement from the Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education & Research (PGIMER), Chandigarh, where he was being treated for Covid-related complications.

Milkha Singh was admitted in the ICU of Covid Hospital of PGIMER on June 3 and was treated for Covid there till June 13 when after putting up a battle with Covid Milkha Singh tested negative.

However, due to post-Covid complications, he was shifted out of Covid Hospital to medical ICU. But despite best of the efforts by the medical team, Milkha Singh could not be retrieved from his critical condition, said Ashok Kumar, official spokesperson for the PGIMER.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)
A Believers Journey: Volume 1: a gripping and potent work that provides insight into the way that every day, each of us who has been chosen to live a life of Christ experiences visions, dreams, and spiritual events led by the Holy Spirit. A Believers Journey: Volume 1 is the creation of published author, Dr. Soretta Patton, an owner and managing broker for a Christian based company.

Author Dr. Soretta Patton writes, It wasnt like I was disobedient or even mischievous in playing outside. I just worried about not being covered by Jesus. Once baptized, I was happy about being safe in God. I couldnt explain why it was such an urgency for my baptism to take place. I recall always being drawn to watch the movie The Kings of Kings on Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays. I never knew why I liked these movies, I just knew that when I watched them, I felt peaceful, and I knew I was being protected from what I did not know. The happiness in my family was devastated at the age of fifteen due to my sister being murdered by her husband. I didnt realize how the impact of her death would affect me.

Published by Christian Faith Publishing, Dr. Soretta Pattons new book dives into the way that Angels protect us and keep us safe even when an event may happen without our knowledge. The book describes how, through the Word of God, we are made whole and how, as believers, we have the power through Jesus Christ.

View a synopsis of A Believers Journey: Volume 1 on YouTube.

Consumers can purchase A Believers Journey: Volume 1 at traditional brick & mortar bookstores, or online at Amazon.com, Apple iTunes store, or Barnes and Noble.

For additional information or inquiries about A Believers Journey: Volume 1, contact the Christian Faith Publishing media department at 866-554-0919.
The Christ Child Is Missing!: an enjoyable Christmas narrative. The Christ Child Is Missing! is the creation of published author, Joann Perry, a retired nurse and devoted family member who is known as Church Grandma to many young souls that attend the local church.

Perry shares, The family is working together to decorate their grandparents house for Christmas. Wreaths are hung, the tree is trimmed, and it is time to set out the nativity set. But waitthe Christ child is missing! Will they find him or find something to take his place? Do they really need to have Jesus to have Christmas?

This story is not only a reminder to keep Christ in Christmas, but reminds us of the importance of keeping Christ with us all year long.

Published by Christian Faith Publishing, Perrys new book is a faith-based testament to the joys of Christmas and the importance of family tradition.

With a fun narrative and enjoyable imagery, Perry welcomes readers to appreciate the true meaning of Christmas.

View a synopsis of The Christ Child Is Missing! on YouTube.

Consumers can purchase The Christ Child Is Missing! at traditional brick & mortar bookstores, or online at Amazon.com, Apple iTunes store, or Barnes and Noble.

For additional information or inquiries about The Christ Child Is Missing!, contact the Christian Faith Publishing media department at 866-554-0919.
recently, the entire industry has been expanding operations, and we're looking forward to scaling while working together with industry leaders

Bitsource (Bitsource Technology USA Inc.), a mining services and hardware company, announced a 1000MW North American expansion. The company currently operates over 1000 megawatts of digital asset mining globally and will expand operations through investing in 1000MW of clean energy mining within the U.S. and Canada by the end of Q2 2022.

The company is currently exploring mining sites and partnerships in multiple U.S. states, focusing on developing renewable energy sources, including solar and hydro-power. According to Bitsource's Business Development Officer for North America, Michael Whitt, "Recently, the entire industry has been expanding operations, and we're looking forward to scaling while working together with industry leaders.

In addition to providing hosting capacity for miners, the company plans to release new information on recent advances in its manufacturing division, focusing on home-based miners for consumer markets.

Organic investments in mining infrastructure will enable the company to extend its global supply chain for mining equipment to the U.S. and Canada. This strategic expansion will grant new partnership opportunities with North American companies seeking to increase mining efficiency.

About Bitsource:

Bitsource Technology USA Inc. is a mining services and hardware company developing mining and digital asset mining equipment. Bitsource operates globally and is incorporated in Delaware.

Bitsource is attending and presenting at the Mining Disrupt Expo and Conference on July 20 - July 21 in Miami, Florida.

If you would like more information about Bitsource or to connect with media inquiries, please visit https://bit-source.net or email connect@bit-source.net.
"...Its through programs and partnerships with organizations such as McClintock Distillery and the Black Is Beautiful initiative that we show our community just that...", says Donte Johnson, the General Manager for the Hotel Revival in Downtown Baltimore

McClintock Distilling will release the second edition of the Black is Beautiful Spirit on June 19th at the distillery and through Black Owned and managed restaurants in Maryland and DC. This spirit is part of the international Black is Beautiful initiative from Weathered Souls Brewery in San Antonio. The spirit was a collaborative effort using the Weathered Souls recipe, brewed by Idiom Brewing and distilled, barrel aged and infused with Dark Chocolate Cacao nibs at McClintock Distilling. One hundred percent of the sales of this product is donated to the Maryland ACLU from McClintock Distilling and partner distributor, Bacchus.

Donte Johnson, the General Manager for the Hotel Revival in Downtown Baltimore is offering the Black Is Beautiful spirit as part of the program at the Topside bar located on the top floor of the Revival Hotel. Donte Johnson said Hotel Revival made a commitment to be a place that is welcoming and accessible to all. Its through programs and partnerships with organizations such as McClintock Distillery and the Black Is Beautiful initiative that we show our community just that. We are honored to serve the Black is Beautiful Spirit and help raise awareness to the injustices that many people of color face daily as well as funds for the Maryland ACLU.

The Black is Beautiful initiative is a collaborative effort amongst the brewing community and its customers, in an attempt to bring awareness to the injustices that many people of color face daily. Their mission is to bridge the gap that's been around for ages and provide a platform to show that the brewing community is an inclusive place for everyone of any color. McClintock Distilling the first distillery to participate over 1,200 participating brewery partners in the Black is Beautiful initiative and one of only 2 distilleries in the country participating.

For more information about the Black is Beautiful Initiative visit the website here: https://blackisbeautiful.beer/

McClintock Distilling, an organic craft distillery located in Frederick, Maryland, offers vodka, gins, and whiskeys. McClintock Distilling strives to maintain a sustainable and locally sourced business with a focus on product quality, environmental impact and community betterment. McClintock Distilling is committed to bringing the McClintock experience to all of our customers through every drop. For more information please visit http://www.mcclintockdistilling.com.


Rimsey has been an incredible asset to the ColinKurtis team, and we are excited to recognize her contributions with this newly created role. As our agency continues to grow, it is crucial that we expand to add roles that support this growth.

ColinKurtis Advertising, a leading food industry agency specializing in strategic branding and communication solutions, recently announced Rimsey Ranken has been promoted to Director of Operational Efficiency. Ranken will establish and execute financial and operational efficiencies to drive agency profitability, pricing consistency, and growth.

Rimsey has been an incredible asset to the ColinKurtis team, and we are excited to recognize her contributions with this newly created role, said Colin Kampmier, President, ColinKurtis Advertising. As our agency continues to grow, it is crucial that we expand to add roles that support this growth. The Director of Operational Efficiency will ensure efficiency in budgeting and manage the work and overall financial performance of our agency and our clients investment. Rimseys previous experience as Director of Project Management for ColinKurtis has shown that she delivers exceptional results, and she exemplifies the characteristics necessary for this critical leadership role. We look forward to seeing what Rimsey will accomplish in her new position!

As the Director of Operational Efficiency, Ranken is responsible for providing long-term operational improvements and efficient business systems for ColinKurtis. She also serves as the point person for agency Human Resource processes and communication and leads hiring, onboarding, and employee-development operations throughout the agency. The position is also responsible for creating benchmarks on pricing and compensation strategies to ensure the agency's financial health.

Rimsey Ranken has been a part of the ColinKurtis project management team since 2015. She has more than 20 years of project management experience, including Project Manager for Sears Holding Corporation. She also held key project management roles at GA Communication Group (formerly Goble & Associates) and Purohit Navigation. Ranken earned a Bachelor of Arts in Speech/Communication from University of Illinois and a Master of Science in Communication at Indiana State University.

For more information on ColinKurtis or to be inspired by some of the agencys work, please visit http://www.colinkurtis.com.

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About ColinKurtis Advertising

ColinKurtis Advertising, a Rockford, Illinois-based company, is a full-service advertising and design firm. The agency strives to provide both business-to-business and business-to-consumer clients with strategic marketing solutions delivered through solid creative direction and concise communication messaging.
I am looking forward to meeting and treating my new patients. I find every aspect of this work incredibly fulfilling, from delivering babies to performing complex surgeries and treating a variety of gynecologic conditions. says Dr. Michelle Picon

The respected medical professionals at Marietta OB-GYN Affiliates, P.A. welcome Michelle Picon, M.D., MPH to the practice. She joins a team of attentive physicians and nurse practitioners that provide a broad range of women's general medical and specialized care in the area of the reproductive system. Dr. Picon attended The University of Miami, Miller School of Medicine and completed her residency at Emory School of Medicine in Atlanta, GA. She values building lasting relationships with patients that allow her to care for them as their needs evolve over the years. Dr. Picon strives to honor diversity, promote health equity and offer research-backed treatment options. As a native speaker, she is also proud to offer all services in Spanish. Her goal is to provide high-quality, educational and individualized care that empowers patients to make the best decisions for their health and well-being.

I am looking forward to meeting and treating my new patients. I find every aspect of this work incredibly fulfilling, from delivering babies to performing complex surgeries and treating a variety of gynecologic conditions, says Dr. Michelle Picon.

About Marietta OB-GYN Affiliates, P.A.:

Marietta OB-GYN Affiliates, P.A. has two office locations in Marietta, Georgia, the Church Street Clinic- 699 Church Street, Suite 220 and the West Cobb Clinic-3475 Dallas Hwy, Building 400, Suite 410. The practice is dedicated to meeting the needs of women in every age range from adolescence through menopause and beyond. The doctors from Marietta OB-GYN Affiliates, P.A. offer the best obstetrical care in Cobb County to patients from Kennesaw and the surrounding areas. Their practice provides pre-pregnancy, prenatal, full pregnancy and postpartum care to support expecting mothers. The physicians are also trained and equipped to manage high-risk pregnancies.

For more information about Marietta OB-GYN Affiliates, P.A. or to schedule an appointment, please visit their website at http://www.mariettaobgyn.com, or call the practice at (770) 422-8505.
Law Office of Blumenthal Nordrehaug Bhowmik De Blouw LLP For more information about the class action lawsuit against Sutter Valley Hospitals, call (800) 568-8020 to speak to an experienced California employment attorney today.

The Sacramento employment law attorneys, at Blumenthal Nordrehaug Bhowmik De Blouw LLP, filed a class action lawsuit against Sutter Valley Hospitals, alleging the company violated the California Labor Code. The lawsuit against Sutter Valley Hospitals, is currently pending in the Sacramento County Superior Court, Case No. 34-2021-00300086. To read a copy of the Complaint, please click here.

According to the lawsuit filed, Sutter Valley Hospitals allegedly (a) failed to pay minimum wages, (b) failed to pay overtime wages, (c) failed to provide legally required meal and rest periods, (d) failed to provide accurate itemized wage statements, and (e) failed to reimburse employees for required expenses, (f) failed to provide wages when due, all in violation of the applicable Labor Code sections listed in Labor Code Sections  201, 202, 203, 226, 226.7, 510, 512, 1194, 1197, 1197.1, 2802, and the applicable Wage Order(s), and thereby gives rise to civil penalties as a result of such alleged conduct.

Additionally, the lawsuit alleges wrongful termination. Defendant allegedly retaliated against Plaintiff after Plaintiff complained to his supervisor(s) of unlawful employment practices, that were allegedly taking place in the workspace. Plaintiff was terminated after this incident, which shows a casual link between the protected activity and Defendant's decision to terminate his employment.

For more information about the class action lawsuit against Sutter Valley Hospitals, call (800) 568-8020 to speak to an experienced California employment attorney today.

Blumenthal Nordrehaug Bhowmik De Blouw LLP is a labor law firm with law offices located in San Diego County, Riverside County, Los Angeles County, Sacramento County, Santa Clara County, Orange County and San Francisco County. The firm has a statewide practice of representing employees on a contingency basis for violations involving unpaid wages, overtime pay, discrimination, harassment, wrongful termination and other types of illegal workplace conduct.

***THIS IS AN ATTORNEY ADVERTISEMENT***
The Press (The Process with Purpose): a profound poetry collection that delves into the changes humans experience in the whole duration of their time on Earth. With the usage of imagery and symbolism, the author seamlessly conveys a powerful message that will motivate the readers to keep striving forward. The Press (The Process with Purpose) is the creation of published author Geleeta Yvette Poe, an establisher of Predestined for Greater Ministries in Saint Louis, Missouri, with thirty years of cleric experience.

Poe shares, ARE YOU READY FOR GODS BEST?

THE PROCESS EVOLVES THROUGH THE PRESS!

The Press (The Process with Purpose) is a narrative using simple imagery to reach absolute truth. While having an elementary undertone, the message conveyed is significant. It begins with an illustration of a grape in a vineyard chosen to take a journey. After surviving many transitions in life, it surmised that it had reached its pinnacle.

At its happiest moment, (the grape) is thrown into the winepress. Without a full understanding of the Keepers plan, it categorizes its treatment as cruel punishment. Upon receiving assurance that the process is not meant to kill, but to build, not to break, but to make, it finally accepts that this process has a purpose!

The process involves pulling, pushing, pruning, plucking, and pressing so we can be Gods masterpiece, bearing much fruit and fulfilling His will!

An excerpt from The Press (The Process with Purpose):

No matter how hard The Press becomes, Im here in the midst.

Applying pressure brings forth what Im after; purposed to get, I insist.

The Press is ordained and charged to squeeze out the real substancethe inner core.

Youre ready nowbefore you werent; to endure such a task; its results I will adore.

The suffering that you will endure may seem impossible to bear.

Dont worry; I am Godthe Holy Father, both just and fair.

Placement here is not cruelty or punishment, and you will not die.

But out of you, I will get the glory; sacrificing the outer shell; more pressure to apply.

This book is a compilation of inspirational pieces inspired through visions, dreams, and worship. While each work has its unique style, shared central themes are interwoven:



Gods Sovereignty: reverence and honor for His supremacyHe is Lord above all!

Gods Salvation: acceptance and gratitude for His saving grace through Jesus Christ.

Gods Support: assurance that the Spirit of the Lord is an ever-present help, enabling us to be more than conquerors in all things.

Published by Christian Faith Publishing, Geleeta Yvette Poes new book is an intellectually invigorating read that will cater to readers who are in pursuit of spiritual growth.

Found within the pages of this well-versed book is the promise of Gods everlasting love for His children, and everything thats been happening in ones life is orchestrated by the Holy Father.

View a synopsis of The Press (The Process with Purpose) on YouTube.

Consumers can purchase The Press (The Process with Purpose) at traditional brick & mortar bookstores, or online at Amazon.com, Apple iTunes store, or Barnes and Noble.

For additional information or inquiries about The Press (The Process with Purpose), contact the Christian Faith Publishing media department at 866-554-0919.
With increased attention on the benefits of cryptocurrency investment, Operation Smile is focused on tapping into this community of forward-thinking investors.

Operation Smile joins the growing list of nonprofit organizations that are now accepting donations through cryptocurrency as interest in this decentralized currency is at an all-time high.

With the ability to accept many types of cryptocurrency, including Bitcoin and Dogecoin, Operation Smile welcomes donors who invest in this digital asset. Donations benefit Operation Smiles mission to increase the accessibility of surgical care in underserved communities around the world so that patients can live lives of improved health and dignity.

We felt that the time was right to provide cryptocurrency investors with the opportunity to extend their generosity to the children and families we serve, said Operation Smile Co-Founder and CEO Bill Magee. The need for cleft surgery and ongoing care in our world is significant, but the compassion of these donors can drive the innovation needed to help local health workers provide world class care to the most marginalized patients.

The value of all cryptocurrencies totaled over $2 trillion in April 2021. With increased attention on the benefits of cryptocurrency investment, Operation Smile is focused on tapping into this community of forward-thinking investors. The organization hopes to reach an audience who believes in redesigning a better system that can ensure more children and families benefit from sustainable health care solutions in their communities around the world.

Donating cryptocurrency is currently classified by the IRS as a non-taxable event, like donating stocks. Donors may offset capital gains taxes on the appreciated value of the cryptocurrency by donating directly to a nonprofit organization.

Operation Smile accepts donations of cryptocurrencies through The Giving Block, which allows nonprofits to directly receive cryptocurrency as tax-deductible contributions. Donations through The Giving Block encourage greater mainstream adoption of cryptocurrency and helps normalize cryptocurrency as an option to give to the greater good. More information on how to donate cryptocurrency to Operation Smile can be found here: https://www.operationsmile.org/donate-cryptocurrency.

About Operation Smile

Operation Smile revolutionized cleft surgery globally in 1982. With nearly four decades of experience as one of the largest surgical volunteer-based nonprofits, Operation Smile staff, its private-public partnerships and thousands of volunteers have improved the health and dignity of patients with cleft conditions, helping them to better breathe, eat, speak and live lives of greater quality and confidence. While one cleft surgery can bring immediate transformation to a childs life in as little as 45 minutes, Operation Smile is committed to providing patients with health that lastsbeing there to offer patients additional surgeries, dentistry, psychological services, speech therapy and other essential cleft treatments. Its training and education programs elevate local surgical standards and entire health systems to aid safe surgery and strengthen a global network to reach more people earlier in their lives. You can learn more about its transformative and healing work by visiting https://www.operationsmile.org/ or by following @operationsmile on social media.

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Greenberg Traurig Presents on Robotics IP Strategies for Success

David J. Dykeman, Roman Fayerberg, and Todd Basile, shareholders at global law firm Greenberg Traurig, LLP, will participate in the Robotics IP Strategies for Success webinar on June 22, at 12:00 p.m. EDT.

The webinar, hosted by the Massachusetts Medical Device Industry Council (MassMEDIC), will cover strategies for building a strong patent portfolio, ways to focus product development through knowledge of the patent landscape, securing ownership in and maintaining control of intellectual property, and intellectual property due diligence. Dykeman will serve as the moderator while Fayerberg and Basile will be panellists alongside Eric Feinstein, CEO, and Dr. Partha Mitra, Ph.D., Founder & Chief Scientific Advisor, both of ClaraPath Inc.

Dykeman, who serves as co-chair of Greenberg Traurigs Life Sciences & Medical Technology Practice and co-managing shareholder of the Boston office, is a registered patent attorney with nearly 25 years of experience in patent and intellectual property law. His practice focuses on securing worldwide intellectual property (IP) protection and related business strategies for high tech clients, with particular experience in life sciences, medical devices, robotics, materials, and information technology. An author of over 50 articles and a speaker at over 45 conferences on intellectual property law, Dykeman is the founding co-chair of the ABAs Medical Devices Committee. He has also been named one of the top 250 Patent and Technology Licensing Practitioners in the world by Intellectual Asset Management (IAM) Magazine, an "IP Star" by Managing IP magazine, a "Life Science Star" by LMG Life Sciences, one of the World's Leading IP Strategists in the IAM 300, and is listed in Chambers.

Basile, a shareholder in the Intellectual Property & Technology Practice in the firms Dallas office, helps technology companies protect and commercialize their innovations across a wide range of industries, including wearable robotics, medical devices, autonomous vehicles, and software. Basile also represents technology investors in mergers and acquisitions (M&A) deals, negotiates IP licenses and technology development agreements, and assists clients in navigating intellectual property disputes.

Fayerberg, a shareholder in the Intellectual Property & Technology Practice in the firms Boston office, is a registered patent attorney with broad experience helping clients to strategically protect and leverage their innovations globally. Fayerberg works with clients to develop and manage worldwide patent portfolios and counsels clients in regard to freedom to operate, patent landscape, and patent infringement and validity matters. He also conducts and defends patent due diligence investigations in connection with venture capital investments, mergers and acquisitions, and licensing opportunities.

About Greenberg Traurigs Life Sciences & Medical Technology Group: Greenberg Traurigs Life Sciences & Medical Technology Group advises clients ranging from start-ups to large multinational public companies to leading research institutions. The groups attorneys work closely with clients, providing innovative legal counsel to help them achieve their objectives  from discovery through commercialization and product marketing.

About Greenberg Traurig, LLP: Greenberg Traurig, LLP (GT) has approximately 2200 attorneys in 40 locations in the United States, Latin America, Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. GT has been recognized for its philanthropic giving, diversity, and innovation, and is consistently among the largest firms in the U.S. on the Law360 400 and among the Top 20 on the Am Law Global 100. The firm is net carbon neutral with respect to its office energy usage and Mansfield Rule 3.0 Certified. Web: http://www.gtlaw.com
...a high rating that combines our happy customers feedback and the expert understanding of the breadth and depth of our platform by TEC analysts

InetSoft is rated as Strong in TECs novel Insight Report on BI & Analytics. TECs unique approach to rating business intelligence vendors combines user ratings and detailed reviews of product features and capabilities.

Senior business software analysts at TEC collected and combined these two data stackssoftware functionalities and software customer experiencewith their years of expertise to arrive at a uniquely holistic and data-driven interpretation of the market. They then produced two complementary outputs, the TEC Insight Report and the TEC Insight Graph. Together, these publications arm decision makers with accurate data and incisive context to better inform their software selection decisions.

The TEC Insight Graph depicts all the major solutions in a software category in relation to each other. They position each solution along two main axesFunctionality and User Experienceand within one of four dynamic states: Reliable, Competitive, Strong, or Dominant. The position of each solution in each state gives an at-a-glance view of the products level of competitiveness along the continuum of software functionality and user experience.

A summary of the report and the TEC Insight Graph are available at no charge at https://www3.technologyevaluation.com/research/tec-insight-reports, and the full report is available for purchase.

To learn more about InetSofts BI and analytics product, please visit https://www.inetsoft.com/products/StyleIntelligence/

The market for business intelligence solutions is cluttered, expresses Mark Flaherty, CMO at InetSoft. We are very pleased to receive such a high rating that combines our happy customers feedback and the expert understanding of the breadth and depth of our platform by TEC analysts.

About InetSoft

Since 1996, InetSoft has been delivering easy, agile, and robust business intelligence software that makes it possible for organizations and solution providers of all sizes to deploy or embed full-featured business intelligence solutions. At the core of the platform is a data mashup and transformation engine that can preclude the need for data warehouse and data preparation expenses. Application highlights include visually-compelling, interactive dashboards, pixel-perfect production reporting, and machine learning functionality accessible to non-data scientists. All of these capabilities combine to allow a maximum degree of self-service that benefits the average business user, the IT administrator, and the developer. InetSoft solutions have been deployed at over 5,000 organizations worldwide, including 25% of Fortune 500 companies, spanning all types of industries.

About Technology Evaluation Centers (TEC)

Technology Evaluation Centers (TEC) is the world's leading advisors of software selection and transformation resources, services, and research materials, helping organizations plan, evaluate, select, and adopt the best enterprise software for their needs. TEC reduces the time, cost, and risk associated with enterprise software selection and adoption with its advanced decision-making process and software selection experts. Over 3.5 million subscribers leverage TEC's extensive research and detailed information on more than 1,000 leading software solutions across all major application areas. TEC is recognized as an industry-leading software selection advisory firm offering resources and services both online and onsite. For more information, visit http://www.technologyevaluation.com.
Swedes and Deeds: The Ups and Downs of Upsala College: a richly historic and detailed account of Upsala College. Swedes and Deeds: The Ups and Downs of Upsala College is the creation of published author Jacob Schaad Jr., now ninety-nine years of age, who has been honored by the New Jersey Press Association for his longevity in journalism, covering eighty-one years. He was widowed a decade ago when his wife, Evelyn, passed away. He now resides with son, Mark, in Middle Township.

Schaad shares, On this particular day, something special struck me in my journey to nostalgia. There had been stories in the newspapers about Upsalas closure, and as quickly as we passed the site of requiem, many happy and sad thoughts about the colorful history of this Swedish Lutheran-related college penetrated my mind until they were interrupted at the parkways next toll. By the time we reached the exit to Kenilworth, the first New Jersey venue for the college and the second overall after a brief period in Brooklyn, New York, I had decided to write a book on the way it was at the college for nearly 102 years when it was started with high hopes by a group of Swedish immigrants, when it advanced to one of the high academic accomplishments in higher education, and when it then dropped from high to low as unexpected circumstances intervened and closed its doors forever.

Published by Christian Faith Publishing, Jacob Schaad Jr.s new book is a historically accurate exploration of Upsala College including stories of former students.

The authors extensive background in journalism is apparent in this meticulous and engaging history of Upsala College. Readers will enjoy the impressive research presented in appreciation of the historic beacon of higher education.

View a synopsis of Swedes and Deeds: The Ups and Downs of Upsala College on YouTube.

Consumers can purchase Swedes and Deeds: The Ups and Downs of Upsala College at traditional brick & mortar bookstores, or online at Amazon.com, Apple iTunes store, or Barnes and Noble.

For additional information or inquiries about Swedes and Deeds: The Ups and Downs of Upsala College, contact the Christian Faith Publishing media department at 866-554-0919.
The JobNimbus Solution Summit 2021 will take place in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico from December 6th to the 9th. Were excited to be hosting JNSS again after a year off due to COVID, and were making it the biggest and best event weve ever held.

JobNimbus has announced the dates and location of the JobNimbus Solutions Summit (JNSS) 2021 to be December 6-9, 2021 in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. The exclusive event will take place at the Hard Rock Hotel Los Cabos and will feature educational sessions to benefit contractors using the software.

Were excited to be hosting JNSS again after a year off due to COVID, and were making it the biggest and best event weve ever held, said Mark Olson, VP of Marketing and Business Development at JobNimbus. My team has been responsible for planning and executing the event and we see it as an opportunity to meet users in a very personal way, which helps us understand them and their businesses so much better. Customers can gain education, give feedback, and learn from each other in a very focused environment, and it can be really influential for the growth of an organization.

JobNimbus first held the summit in 2018 in Austin, TX, followed by Orlando, FL in 2019 before taking a hiatus in 2020 due to the pandemic. The highly anticipated event has become a must for many JobNimbus users to further improve the organization, efficiency, and profitability of their business.

JNSS has also become an opportunity for JobNimbus to show appreciation for customers. We are so grateful for our customers and this gives us the chance to show them, said JobNimbus co-founder and CEO Ben Hodson.

Those attending the event can look forward to:



Keynote speakers that include JobNimbus executives, industry leaders, and business experts

The Jenius Bar, which includes one-on-one sessions with JobNimbus specialists to enhance individual use of the product

Breakout sessions to learn practical business and CRM skills

Customer appreciation events for all attendees

For more information on the summit, including location information and the agenda, visit https://www.jnss2021.com/.

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About JobNimbus:

JobNimbus is a Lehi, Utah-based software company that serves contractors and business owners in the home services construction industry with its project management, CRM platform, and growth services. Since being founded in 2013, JobNimbus has expanded its offerings across 11 home service industries, specializing in roofing, solar install, and exterior renovations. For more information about JobNimbus, visit https://www.jobnimbus.com/.
Executive Alliance, a leader in executive recruiting for more than 25 years, announced today the launch of a re-designed website. The company invested months of human capital and collaboration to reach its goal to create a valuable, user-centric and responsive resource across all platforms and devices.

The new site supplies visitors with rich content and includes professional-caliber videos of each seasoned recruiter discussing their respective areas of specialization. The Welcome video from the companys President, Gary Zelamsky, describes the key differentiators customers receive from working with the firm. The web team focused on making it easier for users to access the available jobs and learn about the firm. The companys blog consists of original content created by the Executive Alliance Thought Leadership Team in partnership with Long Island Business News.

The new website is the first step in a comprehensive marketing plan now underway, said Gary Zelamsky, President of Executive Alliance. For some time, we have wanted to upgrade our digital footprint and the launch of http://www.execsallied.com shows we are on track, added Zelamsky.

Whether you are looking for a job or new, original content on the subjects of hiring or executive level job hunting, you can visit the website to see monthly updates from the Executive Alliance Thought Leadership blog, said Scott Passeser, Sr. Vice President of the company.

The new website is located at http://www.execsallied.com

About Executive Alliance

Executive Alliance is a global executive search firm started in 1997. The company is best known for its dynamic leadership, continuous training, and a staff of recruiters with an average of 22 years of experience. The firm specializes in hiring for Collections, Manufacturing, Engineering, Restoration, Biotechnology, Accounting, Finance, Information Technology, Medical Device and Hospitality. Based in Commack, NY Executive Alliance is one of New York's largest stand-alone staffing firms and has an A+ rating with the BBB.
Car shoppers excited about the upcoming Karma GS-6 can learn all about it on the Prestige Imports website.

A brand-new vehicle from Karma Automotive will be delivered this year  the next step in the evolution of the Karma Revero GT. The new vehicle, dubbed the Karma GS-6, will adopt a similar overall aesthetic to its predecessor while providing an option for shoppers at a more attainable price. It continues the brands tradition of high-performance hybrid vehicles with a truly exotic design, changing up the available features and technologies to expand its availability to even more customers.

Prestige Imports is a dealership in the Miami, Florida, area that provides new and used vehicles from a number of exotic automotive brands, including Karma Automotive. Shoppers in the area that might be interested in the Karma GS-6 when it becomes available can get a head start on learning about the vehicle by heading to the dealerships website at PrestigeImports.com.

The Karma GS-6 will offer drivers an overall range of 360 miles, an MPGe of 70 combined across all driving and a charge time of 34 minutes. These are just a few of the more technical details that a shopper might be interested in before deciding if the vehicle is the right choice for them. Far more details  like specifics about the vehicles whole powertrain, the brands Human Machine Interface technology and more  can be found on the Prestige Imports website.

Prestige Imports is located at 14780 Biscayne Blvd. in North Miami Beach, Florida. Specific questions regarding the Karma GS-6 or any of the other brands and vehicles available at the dealership can be directed to the sales team at 833-290-6287.
President Biden listening to Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, Sr.s appeal for more COVID-19 doses for India We thank President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris for leading the call for more vaccine doses to be sent abroad, said Rev. Jackson.

Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, Sr. is holding a press conference 10 a.m. (PT), 12 noon (CT), Friday, June 18th, at the Hilton Hotel, San Francisco Financial District, 750 Kearney St. San Francisco, to welcome President Bidens efforts to send vaccines overseas and to urge the Biden administration to expedite vaccines to India.

We thank President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris for leading the call for more vaccine doses to be sent abroad, said Rev. Jackson.

Rev. Jackson and Indian leaders including Dr. Vijay G. Prabhakar, Rainbow PUSH Coalition Global Ambassador and chairman of the American Association of Multi Ethnic Physicians, USA, thanked President Biden for pledging to send 2 million doses of vaccines to India of the 6 million he promised to send abroad.

We thanked Rev. Jackson for making a personal appeal on our behalf to President Biden for more vaccines when he was in Tulsa, Oklahoma, said Dr. Prabhakar. We thank Rev. Jackson for appealing to President Biden to remove the Defense Production Act ratings on three U.S. vaccine manufacturers which would ease the supply of raw materials to vaccine manufacturers in India.

Dr. Prabhakar also thanked Rev. Jackson for advocating for vaccine intellectual property waivers.

The call by Rev. Jackson and Indian leaders comes at a time when there have been 1.2 million Indians who have died of the Coronavirus, according to Dr. Bhrhmar Mukherjee, professor of Public Health and Epidemiology at the University of Michigan. That figure is of May 15th. More doses are needed, said Rev. Jackson.

Agreeing, Sathya Padmanabhan, a 16-year-old junior at the Basis Chandler High School in Chandler, Arizona, and the World Federation of Tamil Youths USA Student Wing Secretary also made an appeal for more doses for India. With more than 33,498,468 COVID-19 cases in India, Padmanabhan, who is also founder of BRILLIANAIRE, a non-profit organization, asked Biden to send at least 10 million more doses to India.

Neil Khot, national chair of Indian American Business Coalition, USA, said the U.S. and India have both been tested during this pandemic, and we are heartened to see the U.S. and the diasporas robust response to support India during its dire COVID-19 second wave.

As strong proponents of a close U.S.-India relationship, we are hopeful that the Biden-Harris administration will continue to assist India during its time of need. As Vice President Harris has stated, the diaspora will continue to serve as a bridge between our two countries, said Khot.

M. Rangaswami, founder/chairman of Indiaspora, a non-profit network of global Indian origin leaders and Co founder of. Sand Hill Group, Silicon Valley, thanked Rev. Jackson for his relentless efforts to aid India and for hosting this press conference during his current visit to San Francisco to affirm African American and Asian American/Pacific Islander solidarity.

There is no doubt our diverse communities are stronger when we stand together, said Rangaswami who has helped to raise $6 million for Indias COVID relief through different initiatives including Indiasporas Chalo Give India campaign.

While thanking Biden for promising to send 2 million doses of the vaccine to India, Rangaswami said the situation still remains dire.

He said by sending vaccines through COVAX as well as coming directly to the aid of India by sending vaccine raw materials and advocating for vaccine intellectual property waivers, our world as a whole is a better place. We are all in this together and as long as India is not vaccinated, our work is not done, said Rangaswami.

Dr. Twin Green, Ambassador, Citizens action Alliance For Behavioral Health, USA & CEO, The Link & Option Center, South Holland, Illinois, offered Telepsychiatry services through EnSoftek's DrCloudEHR Whole Person Care solution to rural America and India to combat the challenges of the mental health crisis during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Leveraging digital technology to meet the overburdened mental health providers is the need of the hour, Dr. Green said.

About Rainbow PUSH Coalition

Rainbow PUSH Coalition is a multi-racial, multi-issue, progressive, international organization that was formed in December 1996 by the Reverend Jesse L. Jackson, Sr. through merging of two organizations he founded Operation PUSH People United to Serve Humanity (estab. 1971) and the Rainbow Coalition (estab. 1984). With headquarters in Chicago and offices in Washington, D.C., Atlanta, Detroit, Houston, Los Angeles, New York and Oakland, the organization works to make the American Dream a reality for all citizens while advocating for peace and justice around the world. RPC is dedicated to improving the lives of all people by serving as a voice for the voiceless. Its mission is to protect, defend and gain civil rights by leveling the economic and educational playing fields while promoting peace and justice around the world.
Read My Mind: a candid and eloquent compilation of the authors personal thoughts and problems and how she resolved every stumbling block with the aid of the Holy Word. In this fascinating read, the author bears witness to God being present both in good and bad times. Read My Mind is the creation of published author Supalux Vanda Satornsuntikul, a great woman with a BS degree in Statistic and Computer from Open University in Thailand and a masters in Computer Science in Philadelphia, a competent owner of a massage clinic in Rice, Texas, and a devout Christian for twelve years.

Satornsuntikul shares, This book had been written from journal of everyday life. In every journal, its composed of two parts. The first part is telling about the event and problem that happened in that day and how to solve that problem by using the philosophy of the Bible. The second part is telling the story and the teaching in the Bible that relates directly to the problem. And see the how Bible solve the problem by using the words of GOD.

In every day of these journal, end up with the word-of-wisdom that will help to remember the story and how it relates to the Bible. I do believe that GOD has answer to all problem. And the problem might be easily be solve.

Published by Christian Faith Publishing, Supalux Vanda Satornsuntikuls new book is a highly recommended read for those who are questioning Gods existence.

View a synopsis of Read My Mind on YouTube.

Consumers can purchase Read My Mind at traditional brick & mortar bookstores, or online at Amazon.com, Apple iTunes store, or Barnes and Noble.

For additional information or inquiries about Read My Mind, contact the Christian Faith Publishing media department at 866-554-0919.
The Endometriosis Treatment center of America is pleased to welcome a new team of Physician Assistants that will work directly with patients with a new or established diagnosis of endometriosis.

As the need for surgical interventions, like excision of endometriosis, increases, we needed to expand our team in the offices to manage new and established patients with pelvic pain and endometriosis and maintaining treatment plans developed specifically for these patients. By expanding our team, we will increase our ability and goal of seeing patients within 1-2 days based on their needs and acuity of care, says Dr. Jonathan Zaidan, MD, FACOG, President of The Endometriosis Treatment Center of America.

Lauren Toma, PA, is graduated from Rush University in Chicago, IL. Throughout my time at the Endometriosis Treatment Center of America, I have seen countless patients with pelvic pain who just want to be heard. I strive to treat all my patients like they were my family member and want them to feel taken care of, says Toma.

Kaylee Traver, PA, graduated from Eastern Michigan University. I am passionate about working in Women's Health and helping women feel their best. I truly enjoy being able to help women with Endometriosis achieve a better quality of life. I'm so excited for the opportunity to work with this great group of providers to offer care for this community, says Traver.

Emily Zellmer, PA, graduated from Des Moines University. I want to provide endometriosis patients hope and a life that is not dictated by their disease, giving them more control to live the life they desire, says Zellmer.

For more information or to schedule an appointment, visit http://www.centerofendometriosis.com to utilize live chat and find a location near you. Appointments can also be made at (248) 731-2141.

About Womens Excellence

Womens Excellence is the most comprehensive obstetric and gynecologic office in Michigan. Additionally, they specialize in menopause, weight control, bladder control, endometriosis, robotic surgery, oncology, and midwifery services. Womens Excellence is committed to staying at the forefront of innovation with cutting edge technologies utilizing robotic surgery and minimally invasive surgical options when possible. The knowledgeable, compassionate physicians and healthcare providers of Womens Excellence focus on patient-centered processes to deliver the highest quality of care. They are affiliated with most insurances. They offer seamless medical record access via a state-of-the-art patient portal and use the latest technology for record keeping and sharing, making the patient experience easier and more efficient. Womens Excellence is taking new patients and is conveniently located throughout southeastern Michigan in Birmingham, Clarkston, Lake Orion, Lapeer, Rochester, Royal Oak, and West Bloomfield. Womens Excellence is also a proud partner of Detroits longstanding radio network, WJR 760AM, providing expert womens health news and information. For more information, visit http://www.WomensExcellence.com.
Social Media Day image created by United Methodist Communications. Social media has revolutionized the way we interact with one another, redefining our communication, interaction, and behavior. This is true for the church as well, said Poonam Patodia, Chief Marketing Officer. Social media is more than just being social, it's ministry."

United Methodist Communications will celebrate Social Media Day on Wednesday, June 30, 2021 with free learning opportunities throughout the day, featuring a special live learning session Q&A at 12pm CT  all at Facebook.com/UMCom.

United Methodist Communications (UMCom) seeks to equip churches with tools to effectively minister daily via social media platforms. Some of the ways the agency helps local churches are through providing social graphics, how-to-articles, social media training, grants and marketing assistance.

Additionally, the agency shares the messages and stories of the church and the Gospel through daily postings across multiple platforms, offering articles, inspiration, Bible verses and more. With more than 1.6 million followers, United Methodist Communications social media channels reach and engage nearly 90 million people inside and outside the church, create community and share messages of God's love.

The immense power of social media is undeniable. As of 2021, the number of people using social media is over 3.96 billion worldwide  thats more than 50 percent of the world.

Social media has revolutionized the way we interact with one another, redefining our communication, interaction, and behavior. This is true for the church as well, said Poonam Patodia, Chief Marketing Officer. Social media is more than just being social, it's ministry  and Social Media Day is a good time to celebrate how it can help churches reach out beyond their surrounding communities.

UMCom has created a vast array of training and resources through informational articles, videos, Q&A, podcasts, and more. The following is just a small sampling of whats available:



Live Learning Session: Social Media Day Q&A - Pre-registration is available online with question submissions accepted in advance

Social Media Marketing for the Local Church

Facebook Groups for Churches

Social Media: Your Virtual Front Door

Language Options: Resources in Korean, Spanish, French and Portuguese

Social Graphics: free and shareable images

Social media resources, along with a complete listing of planned activities, are available at http://www.umcom.org/socialmediaday.

United Methodist Communications is using the power of social media to share inspiring content, provide opportunities for dialogue and increase awareness of The United Methodist Church and our beliefsand is resourcing local churches to do the same. To support the work of communication ministry in observance of Social Media Day, please visit resourceUMC.org/GiveUMCom.

About United Methodist Communications

As the communications agency for The United Methodist Church, United Methodist Communications seeks to increase awareness and visibility of the denomination in communities and nations around the globe. United Methodist Communications also offers services, tools, and resources for communications ministry. Discover more about the agency at Resourceumc.org/Communications. Follow us on Facebook and Instagram.

Media Contact:

Aaron Crisler

presscenter@umcom.org
Dedicated to earning and maintaining the industrys leading accreditations, certifications, and education, Venture Construction Group companies were Platinum Sponsors of the Windstorm Insurance (WIND) Conference, held May 24  26 at the Renaissance Orlando at SeaWorld in Orlando, Fla. Venture Construction Group of Florida (VCGFL) was a Platinum, Keynote Speaker and Game Night Sponsor. Venture Construction Group (VCG) was a Platinum and Game Night Sponsor. VCG International (VCGI) was a Platinum, Welcome Reception and Settlement Suite Sponsor. Venture staff and colleagues exhibited and shared best practices, tips and insights on current trends with industry leaders throughout the nation.

Were committed to the development and growth of the industry and were proud to support and participate in these events. Growth and networking are essential to continually provide the best service and advocacy to our clients, said Stephen Shanton, CEO and president of Venture Construction Group of Florida (VCGFL), Venture Construction Group (VCG), VCG International (VCGI).

The annual WIND Symposium provides classes, breakout sessions, CE/CLE credits and networking events. The conference provides professional development and advanced training opportunities to bring together restoration industry professionals.

VCGFL is a leader in commercial construction, restoration, renovations, roofing, storm damage repairs, and 24/7 emergency services throughout Florida, Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands, Bahamas, and the Caribbean. VCG a is a full-service general contractor that provides construction, remodels, renovations, property management services, storm damage repairs, consulting, independent 3rd party property damage assessments, and 24/7 emergency services to residential and commercial property owners. VCGI is a global leader in commercial and industrial construction, restoration, and storm damage repairs, and 24/7 emergency services through the Bahamas and the Caribbean, North America, Australia, Asia, and Africa.

We appreciate the continued support and involvement of Venture Construction Group companies at our annual Windstorm Insurance Conference, said Marty Streeper, executive director, Windstorm Insurance Network.

About Venture Construction Group of Florida

Founded in 1998, Venture Construction Group of Florida (VCGFL) is an award-winning leader in construction, restoration, renovations, roofing, storm damage repairs, and 24/7 emergency services throughout Florida, Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands, Bahamas and the Caribbean. Specializing in residential, industrial and commercial projects, VCGFL assists homeowners, property managers, condominium boards, homeowner associations, association boards, hotels, and business complexes with general contractor services, roofing, specialty construction, historical restoration, water and flood mitigation, and property repairs due to fire, flood, water, wind and hurricanes. With offices in Boca Raton, Ft. Myers, Naples, Panama City Beach, Orlando, Stuart, Tampa, San Juan, and Nassau, VCGFL is committed to operational excellence and exceptional customer service. VCGFL takes care of the details every step of the way including roofing, siding, windows, drywall, flooring, paint, gutters to rebuilding properties after major storm events from hurricanes, tornadoes, and hailstorms. VCGFL has earned leading industry awards including the Gold Coast Builders Association (GCBA) Silver PRISM Award for Safety Team of the Year, GCBA Gold PRISM Award for Craftsmanship- Commercial Exterior, GCBA Silver PRISM Award for Craftsmanship- Commercial Exterior, Owens Corning Pinnacle Award for Safety, Construction Business Owner Award, Roofing Alliance MVP Award, Coatings Pro Contractor Award, Pro Remodeler Forty Under 40 Award, Qualified Remodeler Top 500 Remodelers Award, Qualified Remodeler Master Design Award, Florida Roofing and Sheet Metal Contractors Association S.T.A.R. Spotlight Trophy for the Advancement of Roofing Awards in Sustainability and Community Service. Shanton is a certified member of the WindStorm Insurance Network and is a WIND Certified Umpire, WIND Certified Appraiser, and WIND Certified Fellow. VCGFL carries advanced accreditations and is an exclusive certified National Storm Damage Center Preferred Contractor and Certified Member of the United Association of Storm Restoration Contractors. VCGFL is a proud member of Exterior Insulation and Finish Systems (EIFS) Industry Members Association (EIMA); Florida Roofing and Sheet Metal Contractors Association (FRSA); Gold Coast Builders Association (GCBA); Insurance Appraisal and Umpire Association (IAUA); National Association of Environmentally Responsible Mold Contractors (NAERMC); National Association of Home Builders (NAHB); National Roofing Contractors Association (NRCA); NRCA Qualified Trainer; Property Liability and Resource Bureau (PLRB); Restoration Industry Association (RIA). VCGFL is a registered U.S. Federal Government Contractor and holds leading manufacturer certifications including Owens Corning Platinum Preferred Contractor, Mule-Hide Legacy Contractor, Certified CertainTeed Contractor, and Duro-Last Certified Contractor status. VCGFL credentials have been vetted and screened through independent third-party Global Risk Management Solutions. For more information, call 866-459-8351 or visit us online at http://www.VCGFL.com.

About Venture Construction Group

Founded in 1998, Venture Construction Group (VCG) is a licensed general contractor and an award-winning leader in construction, restoration, renovations, roofing, storm damage repairs, and 24/7 emergency services. VCG services commercial and residential properties throughout the East Coast, Greater Mid-Atlantic Region, Gulf Coast, and Midwest. Operational excellence is our mission in every project we undertake, and we pride ourselves on providing exceptional customer service. Specializing in commercial projects, VCG assists property management companies, condo associations, multi-family structures, hi-rises, retail/business plazas, government facilities, hotels, and resorts with comprehensive general contractor services, restoration, mitigation, specialty construction, historical restoration, remodels, property repairs, and rebuilds due to fire, flood, water, wind, hail, and hurricane damage. VCG has earned prestigious awards including the Construction Business Owner Award, Pro Remodeler Forty Under 40 Award. VCG is committed to operational excellence and exceptional customer service. CEO Stephen Shanton is a proud member of the prestigious Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC). Entrepreneur Magazine hails YEC Consists of Some of the Most Well-Respected Minds in Entrepreneurship. Shanton is a proud member of the WindStorm Insurance Network and is a WIND Certified Umpire, WIND Certified Appraiser, and WIND Certified Fellow. VCG is an exclusive certified National Storm Damage Center Preferred Contractor, Certified Member of the United Association of Storm Restoration Contractors, Certified Member of Exterior Insulation and Finish Systems (EIFS) Industry Members Association (EIMA), Certified Member of National Association of Home Builders (NAHB), Owens Corning Platinum Preferred Contractor, Mule-Hide Legacy Contractor, Certified CertainTeed Contractor, and Duro-Last Certified Contractor. VCG credentials have been vetted and screened through independent third party Global Risk Management Solutions. With offices nationwide and a solid reputation throughout the country, we are able to respond to your needs with quality, ease, and top-notch service. For more information, call 866-459-8348 or visit us online at http://www.VentureConstructionGroup.com.

About VCG International

VCG International (VCGI) is a global leader in commercial and industrial construction, restoration, storm damage repairs, and 24/7 emergency services throughout the Bahamas and the Caribbean, North America, Europe, Australia, Asia, and Africa. With over 30 years of experience and the worlds leading industry accreditations, VCGI leads the way in best practices throughout the globe. Learn more at http://www.VCGInternational.com.

About Windstorm Insurance Network

The Windstorm Insurance Network, Inc. is a non-profit, 501(c)3 organization dedicated to providing education and training, and to promoting a cooperative dialogue among professionals concerned with property and windstorm insurance claims issues. The Windstorm Insurance Network is dedicated to promoting awareness of property and windstorm insurance claims issues through the application of educational initiatives, shared member resources, and technology designed to support and improve the professional delivery of property and windstorm-related insurance claims services. To learn more, visit http://www.WindNetwork.com.

Media Inquiries:

Alexis Bott

Elev8 Consulting Group

Ph: 386-243-5388

Web: http://www.elev8cg.com

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This week, Veronica Roth, Marie Lu, and Alexandra Bracken examine dystopia; Lydia M. Sigwarth revisits the library and librarian that changed her life; and Alexis Nedd and Alanna Bennett talk e-sports.

What Makes You Different, Makes You Dangerous

In commemoration of the 10-year anniversary of the start of the Divergent series (HarperCollins/Tegen), Veronica Roth (r.) spoke with fellow authors Marie Lu (l.) (Skyhunter duology) and Alexandra Bracken (c.) (Lore) during a June 1 Crowdcast conversation titled Revisiting Dystopia, centering the past and present of dystopian YA. Five indie bookstores around the U.S. co-hosted the ticketed event: Blue Willow Bookshop in Houston, The Book Stall in Winnetka, Ill., Main Street Books in St. Louis, Mo., Mysterious Galaxy in San Diego, and R.J. Julia Booksellers in Madison, Conn.

Dear to Me

On June 11, Lydia M. Sigwarth (l.) celebrated the release of Dear Librarian (illus. by Romina Galotta, FSG) at the Carnegie-Stout Public Library in Dubuque, Iowa, the library featured in the picture book, which follows five-year-old Sigwarth, who finds a home in the library when her family experiences being unhoused. Deb Stephenson, the life-changing librarian in the book, joined Sigwarth for the event. Ira Glass and Stephanie Foo of This American Life, the team who first discovered Sigwarths story, provided introductions; the event also included a reading, along with a slideshow of submissions from the Dear Librarian contest.

Let the Games Begin

Hosted by Cafe con Libros in Brooklyn, N.Y., debut YA author Alexis Nedd (r.) (Dont Hate the Player, Bloomsbury), held a virtual launch event on June 14. Screenwriter and culture writer Alanna Bennett was in conversation with Nedd; the duo discussed toxic masculinity in e-sports, creating a team of characters typically excluded from gaming spaces, Nedds adult ADHD diagnosis, its impact on her writing process, and how one of her lead characters shares her ADHD.
With vaccination rates increasing across the country, the industry is showing more signs of opening for business as usual. Among some of the first large in-person publishing events to be held will be the fall regional bookseller association shows. The Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association will be the first to hold a live event when it opens the 2021 PNBA Tradeshow in Portland on October 3. The show will run till October 5 and feature typical in-person author events and education sessions, along with what the association is calling a virtual annex.

The decision was made final after a visit to the hotel show site, the balance of inquiries and endorsements from members and supporters tipping in favor of a show, and an all-day staff retreat to lay out a workable plan, explained Brian Juenemann, executive director of the PNBA. We have to move fast in response to the truncated timeline. Were eight to 10 weeks behind a traditional show planning schedule but embracing the challenge, because, you knowreal live in-person connection!

Mountains and Plains Independent Booksellers Association will be next to have a live show, with its FallCon taking place October 79 in Denver. The organization put out a call for authors earlier this month. The situation in Colorado is making this possible, said Heather Duncan, executive director, of MPIBA. We are basing it on our last show from 2019 and will be as close to a traditional trade show as possible, with an exhibition hall, education, and social and networking events.

FallCon will also feature some virtual elements, such as virtual rep picks and a virtual galley room. Badges to enter the show will be offered for free to members of the American Booksellers Association or any regional bookseller association. We are opening it to all booksellers, and we have already heard that there is a lot of interest from California booksellers in attending, Duncan said. She added that overall interest from potential exhibitors has also been higher than expected, and the event may be bigger than initially thoughtpossibly bigger than previous years. We are preparing for less, but planning for more, she noted.

In addition to FallCon, MPIBA is hosting three different sessions of its Bookseller Summer Camp, July 1315, July 2022, and July 2729. Each session offers virtual sessions with authors, workshops on best practices, and happy hours.

The New England Independent Booksellers Association will host a virtual event September 2123. The most exciting piece of the puzzle this time around is what were planning for the New England Book Awards: an in-person gathering on October 21 in Providencethe NEIBA Masked Ball, said Beth Ineson, NEIBA executive director. So well have a virtual conference, take a months pause, and then get together in person. It will be our first in-person event since January 2020, and we cant wait. Were finalizing the details now, but the plan is to encourage costumes of all kinds. It will be a chance for booksellers to celebrate having navigated through this terrible time, and all of our industry partners who want to make the trip to Providence are welcome to join in the fun.

The Heartland Fall Forum, covering booksellers in the Midwest and presented by the Great Lakes Independent Booksellers Association and Midwest Independent Booksellers Association, will once again be a virtual show, with programming scheduled during August, September, and October, culminating in an awards ceremony in October. Heartlands 2021 events will be scheduled as they are produced, explained GLIBA executive director Larry Law, with the focus on specific events rather than on the usual publisher exhibits. Itll be more event-driven than schedule-driven.

Publishers, in fact, wont even be exhibiting in a virtual exhibit hall as they did at the last Heartland; instead, the focus will be on featured titles. Our plan is to unbox the booth and deliver content to booksellers in a thematic cross-publisher experience, said MIBA executive director Carrie Obry. Our book room will be a vibrant hub for new-title discovery, highlighting a titles regionality, as well as that authors live-event placementif applicableand rep picks pitch.

Reps will record their pitches on video, and these will also be available alongside each title in the Heartland (virtual) book room for instant access. Videos will also be timestamped for specific titles or publishers, allowing viewers to click directly to the content they want to see. This way, booksellers wont have to sit through an hour of presentations that may not be appropriate for their needs, Law said. They can go directly to, say, Candlewicks presentation.

This years New Voices, New Rooms meeting, hosted by the New Atlantic Independent Booksellers Association and the Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance, will be held September 27October 1, and its theme is Opening Doors. Two full days of education will be held starting September 28. The compact education schedule will help bookstore staff attend programming throughout the week without conflicting with interacting with publishers and authors, Linda-Marie Barrett, executive director of SIBA, said.

New this year at New Voices, New Rooms will also be the Vindies! A Celebration of Indie Bookstore Videos, which will have winners in several categories, including best drama and best Covid-related video. Well encourage folks to dress up for the awards ceremony, Barrett said. Another new feature will be interludes videos to be broadcast throughout the conference. These will be brief, focused videos spotlighting the creativity of the book business, such as a video of an illustrator working in their studio, a visit to a library, or a poetry reading.

The first 400 booksellers to register for New Voices, New Rooms get show boxes. Booksellers receive it before the virtual show, and it contains items from publishers and gift vendors that correspond to programming at our virtual show, Barrett said. Last years show box contained tote bags, recipe cards, posters, books, a squeezable stress ghost toy, Mardi Gras beads, our show journal, and more.

The California Independent Booksellers Alliance is planning a hybrid in-person and virtual Fall Discovery Lab. On October 24, Books Inc. in San Francisco will host a live, in-person event for booksellers. Virtual programming is set to run October 2527, with another in-person event set for October 28 at Vromans in Pasadena. The week will end with a virtual town hall for the entire organization on October 29.

Regional Association Fall Trade Show Schedule

California Independent Booksellers Alliance: Fall Discovery Lab; virtual, October 2527; live events, San Francisco, October 24, Pasadena, October 28

Great Lakes Independent Booksellers Association and Midwest Independent Booksellers Association: Heartland Fall Forum; virtual, various dates in August, September, and October

New England Independent Booksellers Association: Fall Conference; virtual, September 2123

New Atlantic Independent Booksellers Association and the Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance: New Voices, New Rooms; virtual, September 27October 1

Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association: PNBA Tradeshow; Portland, October 35

Mountains and Plains Independent Booksellers Association: FallCon; Denver, October 79
Dhonielle Clayton et al. Quill Tree, $19.99 (256p) ISBN 978-0-06-308809-2

Young Black love glows throughout this collaboration by Dhonielle Clayton, Tiffany D. Jackson, Nic Stone, Angie Thomas, Ashley Woodfolk, and Nicola Yoon, which follows six couples through a summer blackout in New York City. In a primary story arc, Tammi Wright is about to start her first day as the summer office assistant at the Apollo Theaters Harlem headquarters when she runs into ex-boyfriend Kareem Murphy, who, due to an admin- istrative error, is there for the same job. Just as they are about to find out who will receive the single opening, a blackout sweeps the city, causing chaos aboveground and under. As the two reluctantly walk together back to Bed-Stuy, where Kareem is set to DJ a party after dark, they navigate their history and their love for each other. Featured between each stage of their journey are connectionssome gentle, some combative, all thrillingthat feature characters falling in or professing their love across the citys landmarks. As each teen makes their way home, this joyful collaboration brings a necessary elation to stories of Black love, queer love, and alternative forms of affection, all of which are all tenderly highlighted in these narratives.
Covid-19, SCOTUS, and the Navy SEALs headline this seasons offerings, along with memoirs from rising politicians, rehashes of Trump administration scandals, takedowns of the gun industry, and portraits of inequality in America.

Top 10

Alpha: Eddie Gallagher and the War for the Soul of the Navy SEALs

David Philipps. Crown, Aug. 24 ($28.99, ISBN 978-0-593-23838-7)

The saga of a Navy SEAL platoon chief who became a right-wing hero after several of his men accused him of war crimes is told in this enthralling, blow-by-blow account, starred by PW.

Believing: Our Thirty-Year Journey to End Gender Violence

Anita Hill. Viking, Sept. 28 ($30, ISBN 978-0-593-29829-9)

Hill explores the causes and effects of gender-based violence and how the fight to end it has progressed in the three decades since she testified against Clarence Thomas.

The Deeper the Roots: A Memoir of Hope and Home

Michael Tubbs. Flatiron/Oprah, Nov. 16 ($27.99, ISBN 978-1-250-17344-7)

Tubbs, who became the first Black mayor of Stockton, Calif., at age 26, reflects on his career and the lessons he learned from his mother, grandmother, and aunt while his father was in prison.

Dirty Work: Essential Jobs and the Hidden Toll of Inequality in America

Eyal Press. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, Aug. 17 ($28, ISBN 978-0-374-14018-2)

Starred by PW, this deeply reported and eloquently argued survey investigates the working conditions of people who perform jobs the rest of society wants to keep hidden from view.

Gunfight: My Battle Against the Industry That Radicalized America

Ryan Busse. PublicAffairs, Oct. 19 ($29, ISBN 978-1-5417-6873-4)

Busse, a former executive at the gun company Kimber, details his reasons for leaving the industry and why it must be reformed in order to bring gun violence to an end.

Home, Land, Security: Deradicalization and the Journey Back from Extremism

Carla Power. One World, Sept. 7 ($28, ISBN 978-0-525-51057-4)

Powerwhose much-praised memoir If the Oceans Were Ink documented the year she spent studying the Quranexamines efforts to rehabilitate ISIS fighters and other extremists.

Invisible Child: Poverty, Survival, and Hope in an American City

Andrea Elliott. Random House, Oct. 5 ($30, ISBN 978-0-8129-8694-5)

Pulitzer-winner Elliott chronicles eight years in the life of a young Brooklyn woman who discovers that escaping poverty might mean leaving her family behind.

The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Age of Fentanyl and Meth

Sam Quinones. Bloomsbury, Oct. 12 ($28, ISBN 978-1-63557-435-7)

Bestseller Quinones follows Dreamland with a look at the next stage of the opioid epidemic and community efforts to repair the damage. 250,000-copy announced first printing.

Lessons from the Edge: A Memoir

Marie Yovanovitch. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Jan. 11 ($30, ISBN 978-0-358-45754-1)

The former ambassador to Ukraine discusses the smear campaign that led to her abrupt dismissal in 2019 and her decision to testify in President Trumps first impeachment trial.

Profit and Punishment: How America Criminalizes the Poor in the Name of Justice

Tony Messenger. St. Martins, Dec. 7 ($28.99, ISBN 978-1-250-27464-9)

Journalist Messenger expands on his Pulitzer-winning series about the practice of forcing poor people charged with misdemeanor crimes to pay unaffordable fines or go to jail.

Politics & Current Events Listings

Abrams

Punishment Without Trial: Why Plea Bargaining Is a Bad Deal by Carissa Byrne Hessick (Oct. 12, $27, ISBN 978-1-4197-5029-8) details how the constitutional right to a jury trial has been undermined by the rise of plea bargaining, and why the current system is unjust.

Algonquin

The Genome Defense: Inside the Epic Legal Battle to Determine Who Owns Your DNA by Jorge L. Contreras (Oct. 26, $27.95, ISBN 978-1-61620-968-1) recounts the fight against a biotech company whose patents on two human genes made it prohibitively expensive to test for hereditary breast cancer. 75,000-copy announced first printing.

Apollo

Some Kids Left Behind: A Survivors Fight for Health Care in the Wake of 9/11 by Lila Nordstrom (Aug. 24, $24.99, ISBN 978-1-948062-62-6) is the story of how toxic debris from the Twin Towers sickened students at a nearby school, and one survivors campaign to win compensation for her classmates.

Basic

The Dying Citizen: How Progressive Elites, Tribalism, and Globalization Are Destroying the Idea of America by Victor Davis Hanson (Oct. 5, $30, ISBN 978-1-5416-4753-4). Conservative commentator Hanson argues that identity politics, rising inequality, and a vast, unelected government bureaucracy have undermined the foundations of American citizenship.

Bold Type

Race Against Time: The Politics of a Darkening America by Keith Boykin (Sept. 14, $28, ISBN 978-1-64503-726-2) revisits recent efforts to address racial inequality to understand where they came up short, and how to move forward in the face of a crisis sparked by demographic change.

Broadleaf

Our Fair Share: How One Small Change Can Create a More Equitable American Economy by Brian C. Johnson (Sept. 28, $28.99, ISBN 978-1-5064-7075-7) outlines the causes of income and wealth inequality in America and how to fix it with a Citizen Dividend.

Counterpoint

The Crime Without a Name: Ethnocide and the Erasure of Culture in America by Barrett Holmes Pitner (Oct. 12, $26, ISBN 978-1-64009-484-0) recovers the term ethnocide, coined in 1944 to describe the systematic destruction of an ethnic groups culture, as a means of understanding the Black experience in America.

Crown

This Is Ear Hustle: Unflinching Stories of Everyday Prison Life by Nigel Poor and Earlonne Woods (Oct. 12, $28, ISBN 978-0-593-23886-8). The creators of the podcast Ear Hustle share stories of incarceration and life after prison.

Custom House

They Called Us Lucky: The Life and Afterlife of the Iraq Wars Hardest Hit Unit by Ruben Gallego and Jim DeFelice (Nov. 9, $29.99, ISBN 978-0-06-304581-1) documents Arizona congressman Gallegos service in the Iraq War, where his Marine company lost more men than any other single unit in the conflict.

Dey Street

Quiet Zone: Unraveling the Mystery of a Town Suspended in Silence by Stephen Kurczy (Aug. 3, $27.99, ISBN 978-0-06-294549-5) depicts life in Green Bank, W.Va., where Wi-Fi and devices with electromagnetic emissions are tightly restricted in order to minimize interference with telescopes at the Green Bank Observatory.

Diversion

The New Border Wars: The Conflicts That Will Define Our Future by Klaus Dodds (Sept. 28, $28.99, ISBN 978-1-63576-907-4) looks at the history of border conflicts in the modern world and how climate change, population growth, and other factors will intensify them in the coming years.

Doubleday

Voices from the Pandemic: Americans Tell Their Stories of Crisis, Courage and Resilience by Eli Saslow (Sept. 28, $27, ISBN 978-0-385-54700-0) collects peoples experiences of the pandemic from across the U.S., including a restaurant owner forced to close his family business and an EMT trying to save lives in New York City.

Duke Univ.

Complaint! by Sara Ahmed (Sept. 24, $29.95 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-4780-1771-4) examines how complaints about sexual harassment, discrimination, and other issues are handled at academic institutions, and what needs to happen in order to make real change possible.

Dutton

Misfire: Inside the Downfall of the NRA by Tim Mak (Nov. 2, $29, ISBN 978-1-5247-4645-2) explains how the gun lobbyist organizations extreme rhetoric in the aftermath of the Sandy Hook massacre led to lawsuits and law enforcement investigations that have severely damaged the group.

Ecco

The State Must Provide: Why Americas Colleges Have Always Been Unequaland How to Set Them Right by Adam Harris (Aug. 10, $27.99, ISBN 978-0-06-297648-2). According to PW, this sharp and vigorous history of racial discrimination in American higher education features vivid portraits of Black pioneers, including George Washington Carver.

Farrar, Straus and Giroux

The Right to Sex: Feminism in the Twenty-First Century by Amia Srinivasan (Sept. 21, $28, ISBN 978-0-374-24852-9) considers sex in the #MeToo era and its connections to gender, class, race, and power.

Wildland: The Making of Americas Fury by Evan Osnos (Sept. 14, $30, ISBN 978-0-374-28667-5). After living in China for a decade, New Yorker writer Osnos visits the U.S. communities he knows best in order to understand the roots of the nations political dysfunctions.

Fsg Originals

The Uninnocent: Notes on Violence and Mercy by Katharine Blake (Nov. 2, $16 trade paper, ISBN 978-0-374-53852-1) narrates the story of the authors reckoning with a horrific crime in her familyher 16-year-old cousins murder of a boy he didnt knowwhen she was a law student.

Ferris and Ferris

The Vote Collectors: The True Story of the Scamsters, Politicians, and Preachers Behind the Nations Greatest Electoral Fraud by Michael Graff and Nick Ochsner (Nov. 16, $28, ISBN 978-1-4696-6556-6) recounts the story behind the absentee ballot scam in Bladen County, N.C., that resulted in the overturning of a 2018 congressional election.

Flatiron/Oprah

The Power of Women: Learning from Resilience to Heal Our World by Denis Mukwege (Nov. 2, $28.99, ISBN 978-1-250-76919-0). Nobel-winner Mukwege interweaves stories of sexual assault survivors he has treated in the Democratic Republic of Congo with a call for reforms to better confront sexual abuse around the world.

Griffin

Carefree Black Girls: A Celebration of Black Women in Popular Culture by Zeba Blay (Oct. 19, $16.99 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-250-23156-7) profiles Black women actors, musicians, and artists who have overcome racism and sexism to influence American culture.

Hachette

The Recruiter: Spying and the Lost Art of American Intelligence by Douglas London (Sept. 28, $30, ISBN 978-0-306-84730-1). A CIA veteran chronicles the three decades he spent targeting and recruiting foreign spies, and describes how U.S. intelligence has declined since 9/11 and the Iraq War.

Harper Wave

Credible: Why We Doubt Accusers and Protect Abusers by Deborah Tuerkheimer (Sept. 28, $27.99, ISBN 978-0-06-300274-6) examines why credible accusations of sexual misconduct are often disbelieved, and what can be done to help protect victims of abuse.

Lawrence Hill

Letters to Martin: Meditations on Democracy in Black America by Randal Maurice Jelks (Nov. 2, $26.99, ISBN 978-1-64160-603-5) reflects on recent political struggles over police brutality, economic inequality, and other issues in a series of letters addressed to Martin Luther King Jr.

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

There Is Nothing for You Here: Finding Opportunity in the 21st Century by Fiona Hill (Oct. 5, $30, ISBN 978-0-358-57431-6) details the former national security advisers journey from Englands coal-mining country to Harvard University, then testifying in President Trumps first impeachment trial.

House of Anansi

China Unbound: A New World Disorder by Joanna Chiu (Oct. 5, $19.99 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-4870-0767-6) surveys the factors contributing to Chinas economic rise and growing influence over world affairs, and its governments use of surveillance technology and crackdowns to maintain control.

Knopf

Honor Bound: An American Story of Dreams and Service by Amy McGrath and Chris Peterson (Aug. 3, $28, ISBN 978-0-525-65910-5). The former Marine combat pilot discusses her military career and her decision to challenge Mitch McConnell for his U.S. Senate seat. 50,000-copy announced first printing.

Squirrel Hill: The Tree of Life Synagogue Shooting and the Soul of a Neighborhood by Mark Oppenheimer (Oct. 5, $28.95, ISBN 978-0-525-65719-4) chronicles how the Pittsburgh neighborhoodone of the oldest Jewish communities in Americais attempting to overcome the 2018 mass shooting at the Tree of Life synagogue.

Metropolitan

Sunbelt Blues: The Failure of American Housing by Andrew Ross (Oct. 12, $27.99, ISBN 978-1-250-80422-8) examines the affordable housing crisis in America through the lens of Osceola County, Fla., near Disney World, where wealthy investors buy foreclosed properties while tourist industry workers are forced to live in rundown motels.

MIT

Digital Suffragists: Women, the Web, and the Future of Democracy by Marie Tessier (Oct. 5, $27.95, ISBN 978-0-262-04601-5). A comment moderator for the New York Times discusses the structural reasons why womens voices are underrepresented in online comment forums, and what can be done to fix the problem.

Morrow

Resistance: How Women Saved Democracy from Donald Trump by Jennifer Rubin (Sept. 21, $27.99, ISBN 978-0-06-298213-1) details the role women voters, activists, and politicians played in ousting Donald Trump from the White House and electing the first female vice president.

New Press

Refugee High: Coming of Age in America by Elly Fishman (Aug. 10, $26.99, ISBN 978-1-62097-508-4). PW says this intimate and moving look at a Chicago high school where nearly half the student body was born in another country is a powerful portrait of resilience in the face of long odds.

Other Press

Beirut 2020: Diary of the Collapse by Charif Majdalani, trans. by Ruth Diver (Aug. 3, $14.99 trade paper,

ISBN 978-1-63542-178-1). Novelist Majdalanis account of the events leading up to the August 2020 explosion at the Port of Beirut is a razor-sharp reckoning with a tragedy decades in the making, according to PW.

Oxford Univ.

The Contagion Next Time by Sandro Galea (Nov. 1, $24.95, ISBN 978-0-19-757642-7) examines how racism, economic inequality, and other social ills made the U.S. vulnerable to Covid-19, and what can be done to prevent the next pandemic.

Pantheon

The Rage of Innocence: How America Criminalizes Black Youth by Kristin Henning (Sept. 28, $30, ISBN 978-1-5247-4890-6) draws on the authors experiences representing juvenile defendants to examine how aggressive policing of Black youth creates trauma, instills resentment of law enforcement, and inhibits adolescent development.

Penguin Press

Survival of the City: Living and Thriving in an Age of Isolation by Edward Glaeser and David Cutler (Sept. 7, $30, ISBN 978-0-593-29768-1) examines how the Covid-19 pandemic and advances in digital technology will affect urban life, and contends that health-care reforms are essential to the future of U.S. cities.

Princeton Univ.

Meir Kahane: The Public Life and Political Thought of an American Jewish Radical by Shaul Magid (Oct. 5, $35, ISBN 978-0-691-17933-9) looks at how militant leftist politics of 1960s America influenced the ultranationalist philosophies of the founder of the Jewish Defense League.

PublicAffairs

Flight 149: A Hostage Crisis, a Secret Special Forces Unit, and the Origins of the Gulf War by Stephen Davis (Sept. 7, $28, ISBN 978-1-5417-0005-5) uncovers the covert British intelligence operation that resulted in an international hostage crisis during Saddam Husseins invasion of Kuwait.

Random House

Justice on the Brink: The Death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the Rise of Amy Coney Barrett, and Twelve Months That Transformed the Supreme Court by Linda Greenhouse (Nov. 9, $28, ISBN 978-0-593-44793-2) documents the Supreme Courts rightward shift and central role in the major controversies of the past year.

Rowman & Littlefield

Thirteen Cracks: Repairing American Democracy After Trump by Allan Lichtman (Nov. 8, $21.95, ISBN 978-1-5381-5651-3) identifies 13 weak points the Trump presidency exposed in American democracy, and suggests ways to strengthen them.

Scribner

The Power of Geography: Ten Maps That Reveal the Future of Our World by Tim Marshall (Nov. 2, $27, ISBN 978-1-9821-7862-8). In the follow-up to Prisoners of Geography, Marshall analyzes maps of Australia, Greece, Turkey, and the Sahel to explain how these and other hot spots will shape world affairs.

Seal

For Brown Girls with Sharp Edges and Tender Hearts: A Love Letter to Women of Color by Prisca Dorcas Mojica Rodriguez (Sept. 7, $28, ISBN 978-1-5416-7487-5). The founder of Latina Rebels offers advice on overcoming the challenges women of color face.

Simon & Schuster

The Big Cheat: How Donald Trump Fleeced America and Enriched Himself and His Family by David Cay Johnston (Oct. 19, $28, ISBN 978-1-9821-7803-1) delves into the former presidents finances, including the $1.7 billion his businesses brought in during his presidency, and the $400 million debt that comes due in 2024.

St. Martins

Aftershocks: Pandemic Politics and the End of the Old International Order by Colin Kahl and Thomas Wright (Aug. 24, $29.99, ISBN 978-1-250-27574-5). Kahl, a national security adviser in the Obama administration, and Wright, a Brookings Institution fellow, analyze the geopolitical fallout from the Covid-19 pandemic.

Univ. of Chicago

A Conspiratorial Life: Robert Welch, the John Birch Society, and the Revolution of American Conservatism by Edward H. Miller (Dec. 6, $30, ISBN 978-0-226-44886-2) reveals the life story of the candy maker who founded the John Birch Society and helped push right-wing conspiracy thinking into the mainstream.

Verso

Everything, All the Time, Everywhere: How We Became Postmodern by Stuart Jeffries (Oct. 26, $29.95, ISBN 978-1-78873-822-4) contends that the rise of postmodernism since the 1970s paved the way for todays political dysfunctions.

Yale Univ.

A World After Liberalism: Philosophers of the Radical Right by Matthew Rose (Aug. 3, $28, ISBN 978-0-300-24311-6) profiles Oswald Spengler, Alain de Benoist, and other philosophers whose critiques of liberalism provided the intellectual framework for the rise of the radical right.

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Liane Hart, CEO and co-founder of Verility LLC, and Jeff Muegge, research manager at Blue River Research Services in Carthage, Indiana, review results from a semen analysis sample on the Fertile-Eyez technology platform before artificial insemination of a sow. Verility, a woman-owned, high-tech startup, is commercializing technology that provides rapid, low-cost and accurate assessment of livestock semen and ovulation samples. (Photo provided by Verility)

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind.  A Purdue University-affiliated, woman-owned startup is working to use mobile artificial intelligence technology to help meet the growing demand for food expected over the next several decades.

Verility LLC develops and markets patented technologies that use proprietary machine learning frameworks for rapid, low-cost and accurate assessment of livestock semen and ovulation samples.

"Fertile-Eyez, our advanced technology platform, offers real-time precision data for animal reproduction. No specialized training is required," said Liane Hart, CEO of Verility and an alumna of Purdue's College of Agriculture. "Improvements in sperm analysis and ovulation detection for animal breeding are two of the most important ways to meet the critical need for more edible protein. Conception rate is highly correlated with producer profitability and food sustainability; we believe Fertile-Eyez will play a key role in the breeding sheds and labs around the world to assist with this effort."

Hart said Fertile-Eyez is a cloud-based mHealth, or mobile health, technology that can provide immediate animal-side testing by rapidly analyzing semen for morphology, motility and concentration along with saliva ferning for ovulation detection.

"It is like having a skilled laboratory technician and a microscope in the palm of your hand," Hart said. "This fertility platform has the potential to change how testing is done in the breeding industry across all of the major livestock species, resulting in increased performance of livestock production facilities and furthering superior genetics."

Hart said Fertile-Eyez has several benefits for end users.

"Not only is it affordable, but it completely removes all subjectivity of analysis since the person reading the sample is completely removed," Hart said. "Because it is a mobile system, it doesn't require someone to send samples to a lab or a different part of the farm for analysis.

"The three major components of semen quality  morphology, motility and concentration  are extremely important in animal breeding and can be often underanalyzed due to labor and time shortages or the ability to have the right machine in the right location at an affordable price. On top of that, estrus detection is a very labor-intensive and time-consuming procedure, resulting in people checking for heat detection only once a day. This results in errors as to when ovulation actually occurs leading to missed cycles and increased labor and animal costs."

The technology was invented at Brigham and Women's Hospital, a nonprofit teaching affiliate of Harvard Medical School. It was originally developed for humans in the lab of Hadi Shafiee, a current co-founding member of Verility, to improve the user experience by allowing sample testing at home versus in-clinic. It was most recently studied for further application in boars for testing semen quality in the lab of Kara Stewart, associate professor of animal sciences at Purdue University. The data proved that the technology was highly correlated with current best practices, and the Verility team is currently working on publishing these results in a credited, peer-reviewed journal.

The Verility team has partnered with other swine experts throughout this development phase: The Maschhoffs, a Top 5 U.S. Pork Powerhouse company; its sister company, Acuity, a pork technology company that delivers competitive genetic resources for unique pork operations; and Summit SmartFarms, a startup that is focused on providing decision-ready information to understand cost of dysfunction in wean-to-finish systems through its SmartMargin app.

Hart has been partnering also with the Purdue Foundry, an entrepreneurship and commercialization hub housed in the Convergence Center for Innovation and Collaboration in Purdue's Discovery Park District, to capture entrepreneurial insights and funding through established venture networks. Verility is currently seeking seed-stage funding for further development phases.

About Verility

Verility LLC is a Central Indiana startup that is focused on disrupting and optimizing breeding and fertility in animal health by leveraging image recognition and proprietary algorithms in the global animal health breeding markets. This new fertility platform is considered a breakthrough product category, creating a much-needed niche, allowing industry players access to mobile product attributes never before seen at such an affordable rate. Verility is located in Maxwell, Indiana. More information about the company is available online.

About Purdue Foundry

The Purdue Foundry is an entrepreneurship and commercialization hub whose professionals help Purdue innovators create and grow startups. The Purdue Foundry is housed in the Convergence Center for Innovation and Collaboration in Discovery Park District, adjacent to the Purdue campus. The Purdue Foundry has been involved with creating more than 300 companies. The Purdue Foundry is part of the Purdue Research Foundation, which received the 2019 Innovation and Economic Prosperity Universities Award for Place from the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities. In 2020, IPWatchdog Institute ranked Purdue third nationally in startup creation. For more information about involvement and investment opportunities in startups based on a Purdue innovation, contact the Purdue Foundry at foundry@prf.org.

About Purdue University

Purdue University is a top public research institution developing practical solutions to today's toughest challenges. Ranked the No. 5 Most Innovative University in the United States by U.S. News & World Report, Purdue delivers world-changing research and out-of-this-world discovery. Committed to hands-on and online, real-world learning, Purdue offers a transformative education to all. Committed to affordability and accessibility, Purdue has frozen tuition and most fees at 2012-13 levels, enabling more students than ever to graduate debt-free. See how Purdue never stops in the persistent pursuit of the next giant leap at purdue.edu.

Contact: Steve Martin, sgmartin@prf.org

Source: Liane Hart, 317-997-265, liane.hart@verilityco.com
(The Center Square) - The Supreme Court ruled unanimously on Thursday that the city of Philadelphia violated the first amendment by refusing to contract with a Catholic foster home because of the group's refusal to certify same-sex couples as foster parents.

The 9-0 decision in Fulton v. City of Philadelphia sided with the group, which says it helps families but does not certify same-sex couples for religious reasons.

The majority opinion by Chief Justice John Roberts asserted that the city of Philadelphia acted unconstitutionally when it severed ties with the Catholic Social Services foster care agency over their religious belief. Roberts wrote that the city had no right to force CSS to accommodate same-sex couples against their religious beliefs.

The refusal of Philadelphia to contract with CSS for the provision of foster care services unless it agrees to certify same-sex couples as foster parents cannot survive strict scrutiny, and violates the First Amendment, said Roberts. In view of our conclusion that the actions of the City violate the Free Exercise Clause.

The majority opinion was joined by Justices Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett. In addition to the majority opinion, three concurring opinions were written.

One of the concurring opinions was written by Justice Samuel Alito and joined by Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch, all of whom did not join the majority opinion. The opinion agreed with the majority ruling but criticized the court for not going far enough in its protection of religious freedom under the first amendment.

The Court has emitted a wisp of a decision that leaves religious liberty in a confused and vulnerable state, said Alito. Those who count on this Court to stand up for the First Amendment have every right to be disappointedas am I.

Alito also stated that the case Employment Division, Department of Human Resources of Oregon v. Smith should be overruled by the court. In Employment Division v. Smith, the court ruled the state may accommodate otherwise illegal acts, in the name of religion, but are not required to do so. Alito contended the case allows a dangerous precedent for the protections of the first amendment and should be overturned.

Smith was wrongly decided. As long as it remains on the books, it threatens a fundamental freedom, said Alito. And while precedent should not lightly be cast aside, the Courts error in Smith should now be corrected.

Nonetheless, the ruling is seen as a clear victory for advocates for religious freedom and the first amendment.

In a statement, Nelson Perez, Archbishop of Philadelphia, celebrated the Supreme Courts ruling, hailing it as an important decision for his church.

Todays decision from our Nations highest court is a profound one that rings loudly in Philadelphia and reverberates throughout the Country, said Perez. The ruling issued today is also a crystal clear affirmation of First Amendment rights for the Archdiocese of Philadelphia and all charitable ministries in the United States who are inspired by their faith to serve the most vulnerable among us.

Alphonso David, President of the Human Rights Campaign, expressed his disappointment with the ruling in a statement.

Though todays decision is not a complete victory, it does not negate the fact that every qualified family is valid and worthychildren deserve a loving, caring, committed home, said David. We celebrate the LGBTQ families who are dedicated to providing homes to the thousands of children in the child welfare system.

The victory for the Catholic Social Services in Philadelphia is seen as an important decision by religious individuals enabling them to continue to practice their faith, a sentiment echoed by Perez.

It is my personal hope that todays decision makes it abundantly clear that religious ministries cannot be forced to abandon their beliefs as the price for ministering to those in need, said Perez. We can all live and work peacefully, side-by-side, to create a better and brighter future for all of our children.
New York City, NY (11385)

Today

Variable clouds with showers and scattered thunderstorms. Cooler. High 77F. Winds SSW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%..

Tonight

Showers and thunderstorms likely. Low 63F. Winds NE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 80%.
Today

Partly cloudy. Slight chance of a rain shower. High near 80F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph.

Tonight

Mostly clear. Slight chance of a shower throughout the evening. Low 58F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph.

Tomorrow

Partly cloudy. Slight chance of a rain shower. High near 80F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph.
Two people were killed and a third was critically injured Thursday morning when their car crashed into a tree on County Welfare Road in Bern Township.
Bern Twp.

Vehicle hits tree; 2 killed

Driver in accident that killed 2 may have been trying to avoid police, authorities say
Education

Flood of funds

Federal COVID relief funds help Pa. schools return to normal

School districts get money to spend, but it's not without challenges
If You Go

The Juneteenth 2021 Reading committee planned a series of activities for Fathers' Day weekend.

June 18 at 6 p.m.: A virtual program will explain why the holiday is celebrated and will include music performances and recognition of local unsung heroes.

June 19 from noon to 6 p.m.: A community family barbecue will be held in the garden of Berks Lodge #47, 237 Walnut St. Picnic dinners will be provided free as long as the food lasts. A drive-thru option will be available due to the coronavirus pandemic. Attendees are encouraged to bring donations of nonperishable food or pet supplies for area food pantries.

June 20 at 10:45 a.m.: Service with Edna Davis Lewis in Gods Worship and Praise Temple of Spirit & Truth Ministries Inc., 459 Schuylkill Ave.

For more information email juneteenththreadingpa@gmail.com or contact Stacey Taylor at 484-769-1020.

To register for the virtual program, visit the Juneteenth 2021 Reading event page on Facebook.
As a candidate, Joe Bidens number one promise was to unite America. Yet in his first months as president, his number one priority has been to divide our country by race and gender at every turn.

There is no clearer example than the Biden administrations new effort aimed at indoctrinating Americas schoolchildren with some of the most toxic and anti-American theories ever conceived. It is vital for Americans to understand what this initiative would do, what drives it and, most importantly, how we can stop it.

For decades, the America-blaming left has been relentlessly pushing a vision of America that casts our history, culture, traditions, and founding documents in the most negative possible light. Yet in recent years, this deeply unnatural effort has progressed from telling children that their history is evil to telling Americans that they are evil.

In classrooms across the nation, students are being subjected to a new curriculum designed to brainwash them with the ridiculous left-wing dogma known as critical race theory. The key fact about this twisted doctrine is that it is completely antithetical to everything that normal Americans of any color would wish to teach their children.

Instead of helping young people discover that America is the greatest, most tolerant, and most generous nation in history, it teaches them that America is systemically evil and that the hearts of our people are full of hatred and malice. Far from advancing the beautiful dream of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. -- that our children should not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character -- the lefts vile new theory preaches that judging people by the color of their skin is actually a good idea.

Teaching even one child these divisive messages would verge on psychological abuse. Indoctrinating generations of children with these extreme ideas is not just immoral -- it is a program for national suicide. Yet that is exactly what the Biden administration endorsed recently in a rule published in the Federal Register aimed at inflicting a critical race theory-inspired curriculum on American schoolchildren.

The rule explicitly cites the New York Times discredited 1619 Project as a motivation. The Times has described the goal of its endeavor as the re-education of the American people, and the project even includes a lesson plan that encourages students to practice erasing parts of the Declaration of Independence. The Biden rule also directly cites a left-wing activist and leading proponent of critical race theory whose textbook states, The only remedy to past discrimination is present discrimination. The only remedy to present discrimination is future discrimination.

This is what the Biden administration wants to teach Americas children.

The Department of Education rule stems from an executive order Biden signed on his first day in office. Bidens order abolished the Presidents Advisory 1776 Commission I created to honor Americas founding principles, and reversed an executive action I took to stop these depraved theories from being imposed upon federal employees in workforce training sessions.

Thankfully, most Americans oppose this insanity. The left has only gotten away with it until this point because not enough parents have been paying attention and speaking up. But that is quickly changing. From Loudoun County, Va., to Cupertino, Calif., parents are beginning to make their voices heard against the left-wing cultural revolution. What they need now is a plan to actually stop it.

Here are the reforms that every concerned parent in America should be demanding.

First, every state legislature should pass a ban on taxpayer dollars going to any school district or workplace that teaches critical race theory, which inherently violates existing anti-discrimination laws. Inspired by my executive order last year, Florida, Texas, North Carolina, Oklahoma and other states have already taken steps to pass such laws. It needs to happen everywhere  and Congress should seek to institute a federal ban through legislation as well.

Second, each state should create its own 1776 Commission to examine the public school curriculum and ensure that students are receiving a patriotic, pro-American education  not being taught that the United States is an evil nation.

Third, parents have a right to know exactly what is being taught to their children. Last year, many parents had the chance to routinely listen in on classes for the first time because of remote learning. As students return to the classroom, states need to pass laws requiring that all lesson plans have to be made available to parents  every handout, article, and reading should be posted on an online portal that allows parents to see what their kids are being taught. Furthermore, in many places, there are rules preventing students from recording what teachers say in class. States and school boards should establish a Right to Record.

Fourth, parents need to organize locally  in every school district in America  to eliminate Action Civics and other versions of the effort to contort traditional civics education into a vehicle for political indoctrination. The lefts new argument is that our divisions stem from a lack of civics education  a problem they intend to fix with lots of new taxpayer money and a redefinition of civics in schools, just as they are trying to redefine the meaning of infrastructure. Right now, Congress is working on a $1 billion bill known as the Civics Secures Democracy Act. No Republican should trust the Biden administration with a billion dollars to spend on such programs. Even worse, the legislation threatens to establish a de facto national curriculum for history and civics, effectively bribing states into adopting the lefts anti-American curriculum. It is Common Core all over again -- but much more extreme. And like Common Core, parents must unite to stop this new federal power grab.

Fifth, any parent who objects to the material being taught to their child in public school should get an automatic voucher, empowering them to pick another school of their choice. The government has no right to brainwash students with controversial ideologies against their parents will.

Sixth, states need to take back control of their schools of education and credentialing bodies to ensure they are not churning out radicalized teachers. To be clear, the overwhelming majority of our nations teachers are some of the most selfless and wonderful people there are  but regrettably, many have graduated from extremely biased education schools and may not even be aware of the degree to which leftist ideology has permeated their curriculum. States should set up alternative credentialing bodies that can certify great teachers who know how to instill a sense of love for America. School districts can then make it a priority to hire teachers with these certifications, especially for English, history, and social studies roles. States could even set up their own versions of Teach for America to get passionate and patriotic young people into the classroom.

Finally, states need to break the tenure monopoly in public K-12 schools. Tenure was originally supposed to protect competent teachers from being subjected to undue political influence; it has turned into a mechanism to protect incompetent teachers who themselves wield undue political influence over our children. Educators who are alienating children from their own country should not be protected with lifelong tenure; they should be liberated to pursue a career as a political activist.

Make no mistake: The motive behind all of this left-wing lunacy is to discredit and eliminate the greatest obstacles to the fundamental transformation of America. To succeed with their extreme agenda, radicals know they must abolish our attachment to the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, and most of all, Americans very identity as a free, proud, and self-governing people. The left knows that if they can dissolve our national memory and identity, they can gain the total political control they crave.

A nation is only as strong as its spirit. For our children, we must act before it is too late.
Speaking to the Munich Security Conference in February, President Joe Biden proclaimed that "America is back." It's a pleasing sentiment, but our allies as well as our adversaries can be forgiven for taking a wait-and-see attitude.

America's approach to the world has gyrated over the past two decades from George W. Bush's assertive interventionism to Barack Obama's lead-from-behind modesty. Donald Trump's "America First" posture was a mixture of obsequiousness toward dictators and truculence toward traditional allies.

Biden attempted to reify the "America is Back" slogan by urging a unified G-7 position toward China. He hoped for a unanimous declaration condemning China's use of forced labor, and while Canada, Britain and France were ready to sign on, others demurred. It seems likely that the Biden administration will continue to press allies on taking a hard line toward Beijing. He has repeatedly emphasized that confronting China is a defining challenge of his presidency. "This is a battle between the utility of democracies in the 21st century and autocracies," he told reporters at his first news conference as president. "We've got to prove democracy works."

America and other free nations have a chance to do something that would earn true admiration and respect from the rest of the world: donate free vaccines. As in trade, development and technology, we would be competing directly with China and Russia. Biden has pledged 500 million doses. It's a start, but we've got to think bigger.

When the United States launched the Marshall Plan in 1948, Europe was still devastated by World War II. America offered generous aid to the whole continent, including the Soviet Union and its satellites (they declined). The Marshall Plan took its place, as Winston Churchill said of the Lend-Lease Act, as the "most unsordid act" in world history.

Less well remembered is George W. Bush's President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief initiative, a program to battle AIDS in Africa, that has saved an estimated 18 million lives. It was the largest effort by any government to fight disease and the largest U.S. government foreign commitment since the Marshall Plan.

There are many goals that are extremely difficult to achieve in foreign policy. It's tough to get Iran to stop funding terrorists. We've tried friendliness (Obama) and harsh sanctions (Trump). Iran remains Iran. North Korea is a disaster. We've tried strategic patience (Obama) and fawning friendliness (Trump). North Korea remains nuclear-armed. It's difficult to try to reform countries in Central America so that their people will not be so desperate as to journey north. It's hard to get nations to agree to joint action on climate change.

But vaccinating the world is something we can do. Is it expensive? Compared with what? The International Monetary Fund estimates that it would cost $50 billion to vaccinate 70% of the world's population over the next 10 months. That amounts to just 0.13% of the combined GDPs of the G-7 nations. In Washington, $50 billion is what you find in the sofa cushions.

China and Russia are both offering vaccines to developing nations. But Russia is demanding quid pro quos. In Bolivia, for example, Russia began talks about rare-earth minerals in return for the Sputnik V vaccine. China donated the Sinovac vaccine to Cambodia and Laos ... in return for backing China's position in the South China Sea.

And here's another potential reason that the U.S. vaccines will be preferred: They work. Though the Russians have claimed a 92% effectiveness rate for their jabs, some have expressed skepticism. A recent Lancet article called the data backing Sputnik into doubt. It seems there's been a lack of transparency in Russia. Who would have thought?

As for the Chinese vaccine, Sinovac, it's efficacy is officially put at 50%, compared with over 90% for Pfizer and Moderna. The newly developed Novavax vaccine just clocked in at 90%, too. Nations such as Bahrain that were early adopters of the Chinese vaccine have backed away as their caseloads have risen.

If the United States had nothing to gain from vaccinating the world except the satisfaction of benevolence, it would be well worth it. But our own self-interest would be served as well. As long as the virus spreads, it has opportunities to mutate. So far, the vaccines have proven effective against the known variants, but that may not last. If a more virulent and/or vaccine-resistant strain gets a foothold anywhere in the world, it will be knocking on our door before long.

A U.S.-led effort by wealthy nations to vaccinate the world would play to our strengths. Thanks in part to our openness to brilliant immigrants such as Kati Kariko, who developed mRNA techniques, our breakthroughs continue to dazzle.

Americans like to help. We may disagree vehemently about whether to withdraw from Afghanistan or rejoin the Paris Agreement, but most Americans will, I hope and expect, feel a sense of pride at leading the world to overcome this deadly plague, and doing so with graciousness and a servant's heart.

Let's do this. Let's be "unsordid" again.

COPYRIGHT 2021 CREATORS.COM
This week, the Senate unanimously passed a bill declaring Juneteenth a national holiday, commemorating June 19, 1865, when a Union general informed the last enslaved people in Texas that, thanks to the 13th Amendment, they were free. This was the denouement of a long process, begun more than four score years before and cruelly delayed for many decades.

There was virtually no articulate opposition to slavery, except among Quakers, in the North American colonies that rebelled against British rule in the 1770s. But there was an obvious tension between slavery and American assertions of individual rights, encapsulated in Thomas Jefferson's phrase "all men are created equal." Revolutionaries were uncomfortably aware of the great English writer and lexicographer Samuel Johnson's remark, "How is it that we hear the loudest yelps for liberty among the drivers of negroes?"

Americans in northern states responded. In 1781 and 1783, Massachusetts trial and appeals courts ruled that slavery violated the commonwealth's 1780 constitution, and later in the decade, New Hampshire courts agreed. These resembled Lord Chief Justice William Mansfield's 1772 decision in Somerset's case that slavery did not exist in England.

In 1780, the Pennsylvania legislature, declaring slavery "disgraceful to any people, and more especially to those who have been contending in the great cause of liberty themselves," passed a law gradually freeing slaves, similar to one passed by the independent republic of Vermont in 1777.

Similar laws, granting freedom to slaves aged 25 born after the law's enactment, were passed in Rhode Island and Connecticut in 1784; in New York at the behest of Gov. John Jay in 1799; and in New Jersey in 1804.

In July 1787, the Continental Congress, meeting in New York even as the Constitutional Convention was meeting in Philadelphia, passed the Northwest Ordinance outlawing slavery in the Northwest Territory -- the future states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin.

The historian Alan Taylor, in his books "American Revolutions" and "American Republics," takes pains to remind readers that emancipation was gradual, motivated "more from a distaste for slavery than from empathy for the enslaved" and sometimes ineffective in practice.

True enough, but as Gordon Wood argued in a mostly favorable review in the Wall Street Journal, this understates "the momentous blow that the American Revolution inflicted on the system of slavery in the New World" and the fact that "the United States became the first nation in the world to begin actively suppressing the despicable international slave trade."

Similarly, legal historian Robert Cottrol concluded in "The Long, Lingering Shadow," his survey of slavery and race in the Americas, that "If the progress of northern abolition was gradual and at times halting, it was nonetheless the first large-scale emancipation in the Western Hemisphere, a testament to the power of the ideals generated by the American Revolution."

It is easy to judge these early antislavery measures as insufficient by 21st-century standards. But they can be defended as the best that practical politicians could do to put the "peculiar institution" on the "path to extinction."

Tragically, the trend did not extend far southward. Virginia in 1782, Delaware in 1787 and Maryland in 1790 passed manumission laws, regularizing granting freedom to slaves, as George Washington did in his will in 1799. By 1860, 92% of Black people in Delaware and 40% in Maryland were free.

But Virginia repealed its manumission law in 1806, and in the 1820s, rejected attempts to abolish slavery. By then, it was breeding slaves for sale in the cotton fields of the Deep South. The invention of the cotton gin had made cotton a hugely lucrative crop, the feedstock for England's enormous textile mills, a central focus of international trade.

But if Virginia and the Deep South became staunch defenders of slavery, the Northwest Territory's ban on slavery made it fertile ground for opposition to the extension and perpetuation of slavery.

Efforts to permit slavery in Ohio were defeated by legislator Ephraim Cutler, whose father played a key role in inserting the ban in the Northwest Ordinance, as David McCullough explains in his latest book, "The Pioneers."

In Illinois, a key role was played by Edward Coles, a young private secretary to President James Madison, who brought his inherited slaves to the prairies, bought them farmland and freed them. As governor of Illinois in the 1820s, Coles defeated the legislature's attempt to legalize slavery, a story told dramatically in Suzanne Cooper Glasco's "Confronting Slavery" and in Kurt Leichtle and Bruce Carveth's "Crusade Against Slavery."

Edward Coles lived to witness the 13th Amendment and the original Juneteenth. This Juneteenth is a good time to remember him and the many others who strived to put American slavery on the path to extinction and, thankfully, finally succeeded.

COPYRIGHT 2021 CREATORS.COM
Kenya Barris discussed his upcoming Netflix animated series We the People and Black-ish ending while appearing on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.

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We the People, which will be released on July Fourth, will cover a range of basic U.S. civics lessons through animated music videos.

Barris executive produces the project with creator Chris Nee and Barack and Michelle Obama. H.E.R., Janelle Monae, Brandi Carlile, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Adam Lambert, Cordae, Bebe Rexha, KYLE, Andra Day and poet Amanda Gorman provide the music.

"I feel like I want the things that I do to be about something. I want people to start a conversation. Even some conversation that is against me, at least it starts a conversation," Barris said about We the People on Thursday.

"I think this conversation is about learning what this country, at its foundation should be be about, and also taking responsibility for what it's not about. And I think that animation is something that lasts the test of time and I'm really happy to be a part of it," he continued.

Barris' Black-ish will be coming to an end with an eighth and final season, ABC announced in May.

"To be a Black show that came on after Modern Family was amazing. It was really important to us to say that we wanted to speak to the world, and talk about our culture. We didn't want to hide it. We wanted it to be a show that was absolutely, positively about a 100% Black family," Barris said.

"You don't get to say goodbye, sometimes you're just canceled. But to be able to walk the show home and give the audience who's supported us this long a proper goodbye means a lot," he continued.
Sutton Stracke says she and Crystal Kung Minkoff are "both sorry" about their feud on Real Housewives of Beverly Hills.

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The 49-year-old television personality discussed her issues with Minkoff during Wednesday's episode of Watch What Happens Live.

Stracke and Minkoff clashed during the cast's trip to Lake Tahoe in the June 9 episode of RHOBH. Minkoff took issue with Stracke entering her room to return her coat while Minkoff was naked.

"I just felt like my boundaries were crossed. I just felt kind of like my space was violated a little bit," Minkoff said.

On WWHL, Stracke said she was not aware that Minkoff was naked.

"I knocked on the door and said, 'Crystal, are you awake?' I could hear her talking and so -- we were all going -- it's a girl's trip, and so we're all going in and out of each other's rooms," Stracke said.

Stracke and Minkoff previously clashed in the May 26 episode after Stracke, who is White, interrupted and interjected as Minkoff, who is Asian, discussed the "painful" effects of racial stereotyping.

Stracke later apologized to Minkoff on Instagram, saying it "was disrespectful to interrupt her and not listen to her express her truth." Minkoff accepted Stracke's apology.

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"Thank you, Sutton. Your apology means a lot to me, and I'm sure it means a lot to many others with similar lived experiences," Minkoff wrote.

On WWHL, Stracke said it "100 percent" meant a lot to her to have Minkoff accept her apology.

"I think we both felt a lot," Stracke said. "Watching the episode, I think ... we're both sorry."

Minkoff is the first Asian American cast member on RHOBH, which is in its 11th season on Bravo. The series co-stars Kyle Richards, Lissa Rinna, Erika Jayne, Dorit Kemsley and Garcelle Beauvais.
By Elizabeth Kwiatkowski, 06/17/2021



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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.

alum Vienna Girardi has revealed she is pregnant three years after suffering a miscarriage with twins.Vienna, who competed on 's fourteenth season and won Jake Pavelka 's final rose, recently took to Instagram to announce she has a bundle of joy on the way, E! News reported "Heaven's [rainbow emoji] and Mommy's [red heart]!" she began her caption on Sunday, June 13. "I can't wait to meet you. I have waited my whole life for you!"Vienna also paid a sweet tribute to the twins she had lost by posting a picture of a newborn's onesie and writing, "Handpicked for Earth by my sisters, Gia and Mia in heaven."Vienna did not share the baby's father, due date or whether she has a son or daughter on the way. It's also unclear how far along into the pregnancy she currently is.However, Vienna gushed about being pregnant at the same time as her best friend, former Miss United States winner Rachael Todd "Getting to experience this with my best friend is the best part," Vienna shared on Instagram Stories, according to E! News.She later thanked her followers for their support, love and prayers and added of her pregnancy, "I have been waiting so long to tell you all about this tiny surprise!"In a separate Instagram Story post, Vienna posted a colorful sign that read, "Rainbow Baby."Vienna announced she had suffered a miscarriage with identical twin girls in August 2017.Vienna was 18 weeks into her pregnancy when her twin girls "went to Heaven on August 5" as a result of twin-to-twin transfusion syndrome.Vienna, 31, shared the news of her devastating loss in an emotional Facebook post on August 13."This is the hardest thing I have ever had to write. On Aug 3rd, I went in for an ultra sound bc the Perinatologist noticed one of my twins had more fluids than the other which was the first sign of TTTS (Twin to Twin Transfusion Syndrome) this is when one twin takes more nutrients than the other," wrote Vienna."They said that it did look like it had improved over the last week though. Unfortunately, that was not the case and that evening my water broke due to the amniotic sacs rupturing. I spent the next 2 days in the hospital trying everything to save them."According to her representative, Richard Harlow, Vienna had celebrated a gender reveal on July 30, 2017, only four days before she was admitted to the hospital on August 3 when her water broke.Vienna continued in her Facebook post at the time: "The doctors had warned me that if I did not go into labor and deliver the babies, I was taking the chance of risking my own life and causing an infection in my uterus but they could not survive at only 18 weeks."She added, "I was rushed into the OR for emergency surgery and was in the ICU for 4 days."Vienna said she was "heartbroken" and apparently had "a long and arduous journey to recovery.""This was the hardest decision I have ever had to make in my life but I knew my little girls were in Heaven already and the pain I feel I would never want any mother to ever feel. RIP My Sweet Angels. Your mommy will never forget you and I loved you both with my entire heart," she concluded.Vienna never publicly announced the identity of the twins' father.Vienna was previously engaged to NASCAR driver Todd Allen, whom she dated for three years prior to his August 2016 marriage proposal.However the pair broke off their engagement and split only a few months later in November, Us Weekly reported at the time."If he's stupid enough to walk away, be smart enough to let him go," Vienna captioned a November Instagram photo of herself out with a girlfriend.Vienna was known as the villain from Jake's : On the Wings of Love because she clashed with most of the women in the house.The couple had called off their engagement in June 2010, just three months after the finale aired on ABC. Their split was very volatile, as both individuals made unflattering accusations and claims about each other in the press.Shortly after her breakup with Jake, Vienna began dating sixth-season ette contestant Kasey Kahl The couple, along with Jake, all appeared on Bachelor Pad's second season together in 2011, which sparked endless drama.Interested in more news? Join our The Bachelor Facebook Group
56, of Traverse City, died, June 25, 2021. He is the son of Elizabeth Yates and brother of Marcia Emery. Scott was preceded in death by his brother, James McCann. Services will be held 11 a.m., Friday, July 2, 2021 at the Greensky Hill Indian Methodist Church, 8484 Greensky Hill, Charlevoix.
FILE - In this April 27, 2021 file photo, an American flag flies over a Ford auto dealership, in Waukee, Iowa. Fords outlook for the second quarter is improving, as the automaker is seeing strong customer reservations for four of its new vehicles. Ford Motor Co. now anticipates, Thursday, June 17, its quarterly adjusted earnings before interest and taxes to top its expectations and be significantly better than the year-ago period.
FILE - In this Jan. 20, 2021, screen grab taken from a Zoom meeting provided by the Grand Traverse County Board of Commissioners, Grand Traverse County Commissioner Ronald Clous holds a rifle at his home during a county commissioner meeting in Michigan. Michigan's attorney general said Friday, June 18 she would not file charges against Clous for the incident which some described as illustrating racial and cultural tensions in the Lake Michigan resort area.
Nolan Harold Kidd, of Crawford, and Savannah Daniel McDonald, of Elberton, were arrested after the FBI received multiple tips that Kidd and McDonald had been inside the Capitol, according to an FBI affidavit.
Various Athens community leaders came together to speak out against the potential demolition of part of the historic West Broad Street School campus.
Greenville, NC (27833)

Today

Thunderstorms likely this morning. Then a chance of scattered thunderstorms this afternoon. Storms may contain strong gusty winds. High 79F. Winds WSW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%..

Tonight

Scattered thunderstorms this evening followed by occasional showers overnight. Low 66F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 60%.
Greenville, NC (27833)

Today

Thunderstorms. Storms may contain strong gusty winds. High 78F. Winds WSW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%..

Tonight

Scattered thunderstorms this evening followed by occasional showers overnight. Low 66F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 60%.
Members of the Brattleboro Fire Department visit the St. Michaels Preschool and Youth Summer Camp during the Community Heroes week on Wednesday, June 30, 2021. The members of the fire department went through fire safety with the children and then showed them the equipment that is stored on
To the editor: I was on the stage in my role as board chair of Bellows Falls Union High School at the time the first of Chris Hodsden's kids g
To the editor: I was assistant editor in the Reformer newsroom when the paper moved to a new building on Black Mountain Road on October 17, 19
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John McClaughry is vice president of the Ethan Allen Institute, a conservative think tank that is a member of the State Policy Network.
Tim Wessel currently serves in his 5th year on the Brattleboro Select Board, after serving as both chair and vice-chair. He writes twice monthly on the convergence of politics and policy in Windham County. The opinions expressed by columnists do not necessarily reflect the views of the Brattleboro Reformer.
Norma Jean Henderson, 90, of Glen Daniel, passed away Wednesday, June 30, 2021. Born January 12, 1931, she was the daughter of the late Fred and Blanche Stover Burleson. In addition to her family, she was preceded in death by a son, Eddie Henderson, and eight siblings Betty Marsh, Ruth Snuff
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP)  Congress and President Joe Biden acted with unusual swiftness this week in approving Juneteenth as a national holiday. That shifted the battle to the states, where the holiday faces a far less enthusiastic response.

Nearly all states recognize Juneteenth in some fashion, at least on paper. But most have been slow to move beyond proclamations issued by governors or resolutions passed by lawmakers. So far, at least nine states have designated it in law as an official paid state holiday  Illinois, Louisiana, Maine, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Texas, Virginia and Washington. All but Texas, where the events of the original Juneteenth took place, acted after the killing of George Floyd last year.

This year alone, legislation to make Juneteenth a paid state holiday died in Florida and South Dakota and stalled in Ohio, all states controlled by Republicans. But even in Maryland, where Democrats control the Legislature, a Juneteenth bill passed one chamber only to die in the other.

The effort recalls the drawn-out battles over recognizing Martin Luther King Jr. Day, the last time the federal government designated a new holiday. That legislation, finally passed in 1983, scheduled the holiday to begin three years later. It set off bitter debates in the states over whether to enact their own holidays.

Only a handful of states headed into Thursday's signing of the federal Juneteenth law with the paid holiday on the books to be celebrated in 2021. The governors of Washington, Illinois, Louisiana and Maine, by contrast, all signed more recent laws that were set to kick in for 2022, when June 19 falls on a Sunday.

Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards closed state offices for a half-day Friday, only a few days after he signed Juneteenth legislation, and Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker was among governors who changed their states' start dates to 2021.

In another twist, many states have laws that automatically recognize all federal holidays  even those not named in state statute.

Such was the case in Ohio, where Republican Gov. Mike DeWine issued a Juneteenth statement late Thursday and closed state offices in the manner of a hastily called school snow day. West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice also declared Juneteenth a state holiday at a last-minute virtual press conference. The governors of Connecticut and Florida issued their Juneteenth proclamations Friday.

Ohio state Sen. Hearcel Craig, a Columbus Democrat who is Black, said codifying Juneteenth in state law remains essential. He is sponsoring a bill that passed the Ohio Senate unanimously last session, but time ran out for consideration in the House. Republicans control both of Ohio's legislative chambers.

Georgia law caps the number of state holidays at 12, meaning Juneteenth could be added only if another holiday were dropped. In other states, including Oregon, whether Juneteenth becomes a paid holiday will depend on union negotiations.

In Mississippi, Democratic state Rep. Bryant Clark has filed bills to make Juneteenth a state holiday for about 15 years. All have stalled.

Clark said Friday that he will keep trying. He noted that Mississippi legislators took four years to create a state holiday honoring King after the federal holiday was established. In 1987, Mississippi legislators revised a holiday named for Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee that had been in place for decades, creating a joint holiday honoring both Lee and King.

Two other Mississippi lawmakers said Friday that they plan to file a bill to eliminate Confederate Memorial Day as a state holiday and replace it with Juneteenth.

Sometimes progress is extremely slow, said Clark, a member of the Legislative Black Caucus. Several communities in Mississippi already hold Juneteenth celebrations. One is the capital city of Jackson, where the population is more than 80% Black.

Minnesota has recognized the third Saturday in June as Juneteenth since 1996, but the statute only obligates the governor to issue a proclamation each year honoring the observance. That's a common situation in the U.S., where the holiday is sometimes called Emancipation Day.

Calls by Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, a Democrat, to make it an official state holiday have failed to gain traction so far in the Legislature, the only one in the nation where Democrats control one chamber and Republicans control the other.

Hawaii had been one of only three states left not to recognize the holiday at all. A bill marking Juneteenth was signed there Wednesday and in a second holdout state, North Dakota, in April. Neither created a paid state holiday, however.

South Dakota still does not officially recognize the holiday, but Gov. Kristi Noem has issued a proclamation celebrating it. The governor does not have the power to make it an official state holiday  that must be done through the Legislature. A bill to recognize it as a working holiday fell a handful of votes short of passing this year.

It was defeated by an unusual coalition of Democrats who felt the day should be recognized as a full-fledged holiday, rather than a working holiday, and conservative lawmakers who opposed recognizing the holiday at all.

Vaney Hariri, a Black business owner who organized a march after Floyds death, said that vote showed the entrenched attitude of many lawmakers who would turn down a day off rather than celebrate your freedom from pain and captivity.

In Tennessee, an attempt to designate Juneteenth as a state holiday stalled last year after some Republican lawmakers raised questions about the $647,000 price tag. Others questioned why it was necessary when the state already recognizes Aug. 8 as Emancipation Day.

Arizona dragged its feet for years on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, until it became the only state that did not have some sort of holiday inspired by the slain civil rights leader.

That long delay cost Arizona a Super Bowl and millions of dollars in tourism revenue from canceled conventions and other events. It also inspired a boycott by singer Stevie Wonder and a protest song by Public Enemy called By the Time I Get to Arizona.

Gov. Bruce Babbitt, a Democrat, issued an executive order in 1986 declaring Martin Luther King Jr. Day a state holiday. Babbitts Republican successor, Evan Mecham, rescinded the order a year later, saying Babbitt exceeded his authority.

Mechams action led to years of divisive political maneuvering, including a ballot measure that ended in defeat for King holiday supporters, before Arizona voters ultimately approved the holiday in 1992.

Warren H. Stewart Sr., pastor of the Institutional Baptist Church in Phoenix, helped lead a grassroots campaign to establish Arizona's King holiday. But he said he did not rejoice when Biden signed the Juneteenth law. He fears it will distract from legislation on vital issues such as voting rights and police reform.

I see it as a distraction," Stewart said, "almost as a handout of some candy, but the meat of justice is still going to be denied.

___

Associated Press writers Stephen Groves in Sioux Falls, South Dakota; Steve Karnowski in Minneapolis; Michael Kunzelman in College Park, Maryland; Emily Wagster Pettus in Jackson, Mississippi; Kimberlee Kruesi in Nashville; and AP statehouse reporters across the U.S. contributed to this report.
LITCHFIELD  Its been nearly two weeks since Matthew Bromley was fatally shot outside a local law firm, and his family says its extremely frustrating that they have received few details about what happened.

State police said Bromley, who had been living in Virginia, was fatally shot in the head June 7 outside the Litchfield law firm, Cramer & Anderson.

The firm said one of its partners, attorney Robert Fisher, was involved in the shooting and has been placed on leave.

Ericka Bromley said many people have reached out, expressing their condolences about her brother, from businesses to organizations, to people at work.

She added its extremely frustrating. It wasnt fair to my brother to have his life taken from him.

State Police Trooper Josue Dorelus, a spokesman for the agency, said they are still looking for witnesses who may have seen two cars traveling erratically or interaction of two vehicles traveling eastbound on Route 202 around the time of the shooting.

Police described the vehicles as a 2002 brown Saab 9-3SE and a 2016 black Audi A5 convertible. Torrington property tax records show Bromley owed taxes on a 2002 Saab 9-3SE in 2017, 2018 and 2019.

Dorelus also confirmed on Thursday that Fisher is not in police custody.

Essentially, youd be violating someones rights by arresting them without probable cause, Dorelus said.Were still trying to determine exactly what transpired prior to the shooting to determine whether or not charges should be filed against attorney Fisher.

Ericka Bromley said shes waiting for the results of her brothers toxicology reports. She said her brother will be cremated in the next week or so.

After the cremation, Erick Bromley said the family will plan a celebration of his life. The burial services are being handled by Hillside Cemetery on Walnut Street in Torrington and Abbey Cremation Service in Rocky Hill.

A candlelight vigil is also being planned by Bromleys niece, Mariah Bromley. Last week, she created a GoFundMe page, which has raised about $2,500.

Ericka Bromley said her brother returned to Connecticut to visit their mother, Ruth Bromley, who is under end-of-life hospice care.

She said her brother was also looking into job opportunities to stay in Connecticut. While in Virginia, he worked for several years for Pinkerton Chevrolet Buick GMC Cadillac in Lynchburg.

Jake Lyon, manager of the parts department at Pinkerton, said Matthew Bromley was employed for several years as a member of the companys collision repair team in the automotive body repair department. Bromley worked there until recently, according to Lyon.

He was a hard worker and was definitely an asset here, Lyon said. We valued him.

Correction: This story has been updated to reflect Mariah Bromley is Matthew Bromleys niece and his mothers name is Ruth Bromley.
POTTSVILLE  Schuylkill County Prison inmates will continue to receive medical care from the same provider, as the commissioners approved on Wednesday a new five-year contract with the company.

The county will pay PrimeCare Medical Inc., Harrisburg, $1,348,016.50 per year under the terms of the new pact, which is retroactive to May 1.

The warden and the prison board are satisfied with their services, County Administrator Gary R. Bender said. The commissioners are members of the board.

Bender praised the company for what he said was its effective response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

We had cases over there, certainly, but they were at a minimum, he said.

Bender also said PrimeCares work was good enough to allow the prison to rework its heating/ventilating/air conditioning system during the pandemic.

Although the contract is for five years, it also contains three mutual one-year extension options.

In another matter, the commissioners approved a resolution to apply for a 2021 emergency solutions grant for $487,211 on behalf of Schuylkill Community Action, Schuylkill Women in Crisis and Servants to All.

Weve been doing that for years and years, Bender said.

He said the money will be used for operations and essential services at all three agencies.

At Servants to All, that also includes counseling for jobs and training, Bender said.

He said that Schuylkill Community Action also uses its share to fund its rapid rehousing program.

But for that money, you would be homeless, Bender said about that program.

Also, the commissioners named John J. Houseknecht, of Saint Clair, Francis A. Spokas, of Tamaqua, and Michael Wozniski, of Pine Grove, to serve on the county Board of Assessment Appeals through Dec. 31. That board hears cases involving taxpayers seeking to have their property assessments, and consequently their real estate tax bills, lowered.

In other business, the commissioners:

 Approved, on behalf of the county Adult Probation and Parole Office, a two-year contract with Lexisnexis Risk Solutions at monthly a fee of $130.

Its almost like a background or credit check, Bender said.

 Approve the resignation of Pastor Mark Brooks from the Mental Health/Developmental Services Advisory Board.

We thank him for his service to the county, commissioners Chairman Barron L. Hetherington said of Brooks.

 Approved the purchase for $1 of an agricultural conservation easement from Glenn R. Hetherington for a 47.58-acre property in Union Township.

 Approved a one-year brokerage service agreement with McGriff Insurance Services Inc. McGriff will receive $26,440 under the agreement, which is retroactive to June 1.

 Approved budget adjustments of $1,000 for the courts, $12,800 for the Drug & Alcohol program, $3,200 for the Election Bureau and $850 for the 911 Center.

We are not increasing overall spending. We are adjusting budgetary authority between line items within each department, Director of Finance Paul E. Buber said.

 Approved the transfer of Antonio Ford, of Minersville, and Angelo Oudinot, of new Ringgold, to full-time correction officer from part-time correction officer. The salary board later approved an hourly salary of $21.7486 for each man.

 Promoted Sarah Newton, of Minersville, to county caseworker 2 from county caseworker 1 at Children & Youth. The salary board later approved an hourly salary of $19.5363 for Newton.
ORWIGSBURG  The Blue Mountain School District held a committee of the whole meeting Thursday in which the board discussed the proposed 2021-22 budget and health and safety plans.

The current 2021-22 budget proposal includes a real estate tax rate of 43.43 mills, an increase from 41.258 mills from the 2020-21 school year. The districts estimated revenue for the 2021-22 school year is $46,134,559, while the estimated expenses are $46,364,481, leaving a deficit of $229,922.

The board will be voting on final adoption of the budget at next Thursdays meeting, but board members asked Business Administrator Michael Sokoloski to prepare two versions of the budget for the board to choose between.

The alternate version would have a tax increase of 3.8%, rather than 5.7%, and take into account estimated savings from students returning from the districts virtual learning academy.

The board also had a discussion about the districts health and safety plan for the upcoming school year.

Frank Musitano, director of pupil services, said to apply for federal ARP-ESSER funding, the district must first submit a health and safety plan to the Department of Education outlining how the district will handle face mask usage, social distancing, cleaning, contract tracing, vaccinations and other related matters.

Superintendent David Helsel, Ed.D., said he recommended submitting a general plan that states the district will follow guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, noting that face mask requirements will be lifted statewide on June 28.

If you got to the state and the Department of Health, theyve already said June 28 is it, Helsel said. I dont see that we need to require face masks for next year, if it were my decision.

The plan is due by July 30. Helsel said if the Department of Education rejects it, the district will have time to adjust and resubmit it.

In actionable business, the board voted to table the authorization of the completion of a traffic impact study for the Blue Mountain Elementary West construction project. The study will cost a minimum of $11,900, plus additional fees. The board voted to wait until next week when those fees are known.

The board also voted to approve the appointment of Andrew F. Diehl as the districts director of technology.
SCHUYLKILL HAVEN  The borough council voted Wednesday to award bids for the lead service line replacement project.

The council awarded the lowest bid of $288,068 to Arthur Aungst Inc. excavation, Pine Grove.

In April, the borough received a $529,645 grant from the Pennsylvania Infrastructure Investment Authority (PennVEST) to pay for the project. This work will replace lead water lines in the borough, reducing exposure to lead in drinking water and decreasing water loss.

Solicitor Mike Semanchick said residents who need to have lines replaced will be officially notified now that the bids have been awarded.

Also at Wednesdays meeting, the council approved invoices for the wastewater treatment plant upgrade in the amounts of $2,340 and $2,790 for mechanical HVAC and $9,855 for electrical.

The resignation of Vince McDonald, former Schuylkill Haven police officer and criminal investigator, was accepted. McDonald will become the new Orwigsburg chief of police.

In new business, Richard Nagle, borough historian, proposed a new historical monument in Schuylkill Haven.

I have been thinking about it for the past few years how there is nothing in town to memorialize John Fincher, who was the first settler in Schuylkill Haven in 1750, Nagle said.

Nagle said he would like to have a monument engraved with a dedication to Fincher put in Bubeck Park, which he plans to pay for. Council members voted to approve the proposal and plans to discuss the location of the monument.

Fincher established his family in 1750 in a log house to the west of The Island Park area. The family was mostly murdered by Indian raiders during the French and Indian War.

In upcoming events, the North Ward Social Club will have a grand opening celebration of a new building at 1 p.m. Saturday.

The councils July 7 meeting will be held in Bubeck Park.
It was 115 degrees in Phoenix on Monday. As residents of Arizona and Nevada braced for record-breaking heat, people in Texas were encouraged on Monday to cut their electricity usage or risk power outages.

In Harrisburg on Monday, though, Senate Republicans resurrected a 2020 fight with Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf and passed a bill requiring him to get legislative approval in order to join the multi-state Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative.

A veto-proof Senate majority passed the bill, which would prevent Wolf from imposing prices on power plant greenhouse gas emissions. It would require legislative approval to join the conservation consortium after public comment and hearings. Wolfs office said he would veto the bill, which must go to the House.

In 2020, Wolf vetoed similar legislation to restrict him from bringing the state into the RGGI, which sets prices on carbon emissions emitted by power plants driven by fossil fuels.

Under his plan, Pennsylvania would join Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island and Vermont in efforts to cut carbon pollution. Power generators would have to take part in auctions to buy carbon allowances, which would raise hundreds of millions in annual revenue for the state. The Wolf administration expects regulatory approval for the plan this year and carbon pricing to start in 2022.

Republicans, who oppose a shift to clean energy in order to protect the states dwindling coal industry and other fossil fuel interests, have resorted to a failed measure to try to halt the transition.

Pennsylvanians who favor energy efficiency and a cleaner and healthier environment should support Wolfs initiative.
A recent Associated Press story regarding unsold Girl Scout Cookies on a national level highlighted the challenges that many Girl Scout councils faced as we emerge from a nationwide pandemic.

This was not the story for Girl Scouts in the Heart of Pennsylvania.

Like many nonprofits and businesses, Girl Scouts in the Heart of Pennsylvania (GSHPA) was not immune to the trials COVID-19 forced upon our organization. But we met those challenges and in many ways exceeded our goals. Our Girl Scouts thought like entrepreneurs. We found creative and innovative ways to reach our membership, our volunteers and to continue to implement our important girl-led programs. Those connections were especially crucial to many girls in our membership during this time of unprecedented isolation.

GSHPA, which represents 30 counties in central and northeastern Pennsylvania, worked hard to seek out that success during this past cookie-selling season, which officially ended in April.

We are proud of our efforts.

In fact, our local inventory controls, unlike the overall theme of the AP story, were actually tighter this year than in years past.

We did have fewer Girl Scouts participating in the program this year, but our program leadership, which collaborated with every department in our organization (as well as neighboring Girl Scout Councils), projected, budgeted and adapted appropriately.

We found new and exciting ways for our Girl Scouts to sell safely both online and in-person, which included holding traditional cookie booths.

Here are some key highlights:

In our Smores Executive Club, which is an exclusive club that spotlights our brightest entrepreneurs who go above and beyond our product program efforts, the number of girls reaching that benchmark in 2019 was 94. In 2021, that number was 138, an increase of 46 percent.

In that same time period, our Girl Scouts increased their average number of cookie packages sold from 178 to 231.

When COVID hit in 2020, Girl Scouts sold about 300,000 packages that year in direct sales. This year, and under most of the same conditions, our planning paid off. Our Girl Scouts sold more than 580,000 packages.

In fact, when our council began our booth sales for 2021, we couldnt meet the initial demand.

Although our booth opportunities were down 50 percent this year (locations where businesses allow us to sell directly) our girls created safe and innovative ways to continue to reach their goals. During the first two weeks of our direct sales in March, we connected with a sister Girl Scout Council to purchase cookies from them so as to meet the demand of our local entrepreneurs, said Jess Delp, GSHPA director of product program and retail.

We are also very proud of the overwhelming success of our 2021 Gift of Caring program. This councilwide service project gives our GSHPA community the chance to donate cookies to military troops overseas and other nonprofit partners.

This year, Operation Gratitude was the recipient of our Gift of Caring initiative, and we easily surpassed our goal of donating 30,000 boxes to troops. Donations were up by 60%. Those donations are a testament to the giving nature of our local Pennsylvania communities.

Its important to note that all proceeds from the Girl Scout Cookie Program remain local and help to fund all of our programs: our camps, outdoor programs, STEAM, leadership training and more.

We know that we will continue to face many challenges as we tackle the rest of 2021 and plan for 2022. But the lessons learned during these past 15 months have certainly shown us that we can adapt and find success in the most trying time period in recent history.

We are grateful to note that we have a strong and resilient GSHPA community to thank for our support as we move forward and we thank the central Pennsylvania community. Your support allowed us to experience the success that we enjoyed.

(Donovan is president and CEO of Girl Scouts in the Heart of Pennsylvania)
Led Zeppelin was a world-renowned English rock band, which was formed in 1968 and now, in a surprising turn of events, a new frog species has been named after the group. Scientists have discovered a new species of frogs in the Andes Mountains and named it after the English band to honour their legacy. The small, coppery-eyed frog is part of the pristimantis genus, which consists of nearly 570 species, many found near the South American mountain range Andes.

Frog species named after Led Zeppelin

According to a report by BBC News, a new species of frogs was found in the Andes last year and it has now been given the name Led Zeppelin, in order to honor the former English rock band. Pristimantis ledzeppelin is a ground-breeding frog found in a part of the Ecuadorean Andes known as the Cordillera del Condor. There are more than 500 known frogs in this genus and Ecuador has the highest number. This particular species was discovered between Ecuador and Peru by two scientists, Carolina Reyes Puig and David Brito-Zapata.

(Image - Carolina Reyes Puig, David Brito-Zapata)

The countrys National Institute of Biodiversity stated that the new frog had been given its name to honor Led Zeppelins extraordinary and influential music. The scientists discovered the amphibian in a cloud forest around 1,700m above sea level with a tree canopy up to 20m high, where many of the trunks were covered in moss and leaf litter covers the ground. Pristimantis ledzeppelin has brown eyes and copper skin. The males are about 24mm long whereas females can reach 36mm.

More about Led Zeppelin

The English band which was formed in 1968 consisted of four band members including vocalist Robert Plant, guitarist Jimmy Page, bassist/keyboardist John Paul Jones, and drummer John Bonham. The rock band made its debut in the year 1969 with the album titled Led Zeppelin, which was a top-ten album in several countries, and featured such tracks as Good Times Bad Times, Dazed and Confused and Communication Breakdown. Led Zeppelin is one of the best-selling music artists of all time and various sources estimate the group's record sales at 200 to 300 million units worldwide.

Image - Led Zeppelin's Official Instagram Account

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New Delhi, Jun 17 (PTI) India on Thursday said its vision for Afghanistan is driven by an approach of pro-development and pro-democracy and that it is for the Afghan people to judge each of their partners on the basis of past actions.

The response by the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) came when asked whether India is concerned over the prospect of Pakistan's greater involvement in Afghanistan, particularly in the backdrop of Turkey seeking assistance from Pakistani agencies to provided security at the Kabul airport.

Turkey has offered to provide security cover at the airport after the withdrawal of the US forces from Afghanistan.

"Our position regarding the Afghan peace process is well known, and I need not repeat it. As regards your specific question, we can only speak for ourselves," Bagchi said.

"India has been pro-development, pro-democracy, pro-human rights and pro-progress. It is for the people of Afghanistan to judge each of their partners on how actions by these partners have affected the Afghan people," he said.

The MEA spokesperson also said that US Special Representative for Afghanistan Reconciliation Zalmay Khalilzad briefed External Affairs Minister (EAM) S Jaishankar brief on the recent developments in Afghanistan at a meeting in Doha on Tuesday.

Jaishankar visited Kuwait and Kenya recently during which he transited through Qatar.

"During these transits, he met his Qatari counterpart as well as senior members of the Qatari leadership. As Qatar is involved in the Afghan peace process, the issue of Afghanistan was also discussed during the external affairs minister's conversations," Bagchi said.

"US Special Representative for Afghanistan Reconciliation Zalmay Khalilzad happened to be in Doha during this period of the EAM's visit and called on the EAM to brief him on the recent developments regarding Afghanistan," he said.

The Taliban and the Afghan government are holding direct talks to end 19 years of war that has killed tens of thousands of people and ravaged various parts of the country.

India has been a major stakeholder in the peace and stability of Afghanistan. It has already invested close to USD three billion in aid and reconstruction activities in the country.

India has been supporting a national peace and reconciliation process which is Afghan-led, Afghan-owned and Afghan-controlled.

In March, Afghan foreign minister Mohammad Haneef Atmar visited India during which Jaishankar conveyed to him India's long-term commitment towards a peaceful, sovereign and stable Afghanistan. PTI MPB ZMN

(Disclaimer: This story is auto-generated from a syndicated feed; only the image & headline may have been reworked by www.republicworld.com)
New Delhi, Jun 17 (PTI) India on Thursday said that Jammu and Kashmir is an integral part of it and no amount of questioning can change the reality, an assertion that came following a letter by the Pakistan foreign minister to two top UN officials alleging a design by New Delhi to change the demographic structure of the region.

Spokesperson in the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) Arindam Bagchi also said that no amount of justification can make cross-border terrorism acceptable.

"The Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir is an integral part of India. No amount of questioning can change the reality. Also cross border terrorism is unacceptable and no amount of justification can make it acceptable," he said at a media briefing.

Bagchi was asked to comment on Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi's latest letter to the president of the United Nations Security Council and the United Nations Secretary-General.

In the letter, Qureshi alleged that India was changing the demographic structure of Kashmir through the issuance of fake domicile certificates and other measures.

He urged the UN Security Council to call upon India to reverse its actions, including those initiated on and after August 5, 2019.

Ties between India and Pakistan nosedived after a terror attack on the Pathankot Air Force base in 2016 by terror groups based in the neighbouring country. Subsequent attacks on an Indian Army camp in Uri further deteriorated the relationship.

Since then, India has not been having bilateral talks with Pakistan, saying talks and terror cannot go hand-in-hand.

The relationship further dipped after India's warplanes pounded a Jaish-e-Mohammed terrorist training camp deep inside Pakistan on February 26, 2019, in response to the Pulwama terror attack in which 40 CRPF jawans were killed.

The relationship hit rock bottom after India announced withdrawing Jammu and Kashmir's special powers and bifurcating the state into two union territories in August 2019.

Since then, Pakistan has been unsuccessfully trying to rally international support against India on the Kashmir issue.

India has been maintaining that the onus is on Pakistan to create an environment free of terror and hostility. PTI MPB ZMN

(Disclaimer: This story is auto-generated from a syndicated feed; only the image & headline may have been reworked by www.republicworld.com)
A Jammu and Kashmir policeman was martyred in a terrorist attack in Srinagar on Thursday. According to reports, the policeman, Javaid Ahmad was shot by the terrorists near his residence in Saidpora. Reports further stated that Ahmad succumbed after being fired upon from a close range. He received several bullet injuries on his neck and head. It is being said that the attack was carried out by The Resistance Front (TRF).

#Terrorists fired upon police personnel namely Javaid Ahmad near his residence at Saidpora #Srinagar. He was shifted to hospital in critical condition where he succumbed to his injuries & attained #martyrdom. Area cordoned off & search is going on. @JmuKmrPolice  Kashmir Zone Police (@KashmirPolice) June 17, 2021

Terror activities within the Kashmir Valley have increased as more police personnel have been attacked in the recent years. In 2018, 56 Jammu and Kashmir personnel were martyred in terrorist attacks like explosions and encounters. While in 2019, 11 police personnel were martyred in the aftermath of terror activities. In 2020, 16 Jammu and Kashmir personnel were martyred while this year terrorists have continued their attack on police personnel. Earlier in February, a terrorist was caught on camera opening fire on a policeman in the heart of Srinagar. A few weeks ago, two police personnel were killed in an encounter in Sopore.

Jammu and Kashmir L-G condemns attack on J&K Policeman

Taking to Twitter, Lieutenant Governor of Jammu and Kashmir Manoj Sinha condemned the attack. Sinha has also assured that the perpetrators of the henious act will be brought to justice very soon. In addition, he also consoled Ahmad's death.
On Friday, June 18, Ravi Shankar Prasad, Union Cabinet Minister for Communications and Information Technology, took to Twitter to congratulate Satya Nadella for his appointment as the new Chairman of Microsoft.

It is a matter for great pride that stalwarts of Indian origin like Satya Nadella, Sundar Pichai, Arvind Krishna and Shantanu Narayen and many others are now heading global tech giants like Microsoft, Alphabet, IBM and Adobe.  Ravi Shankar Prasad (@rsprasad) June 18, 2021

Ravi Shankar Prasad further stated, "It is a matter for great pride that stalwarts of Indian origin like Satya Nadella, Sundar Pichai, Arvind Krishna and Shantanu Narayen and many others are now heading global tech giants like Microsoft, Alphabet, IBM and Adobe".

Wishes pour in from across the country, as every citizen is proud and inspired by Nadella's determination and achievement.

Microsoft names an Indian as its new Chairman

On June 16, Microsoft's Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Satya Nadella was positioned as chairman of the company. The development comes amid reports of a probe getting conducted into Microsoft Chief Gates' involvement with an employee almost 20 years ago after it was told in 2019 that he had tried to start a romantic relationship with the person.

Satya Nadella as the new chairman, in place of John Thompson. Thompson had taken over as chairman from the software giant's co-founder Bill Gates in 2014, will serve as a lead independent director.

Indian-American business executive, Nadella was named as Microsoft CEO, succeeding Steve Ballmer, and had become only the third leader in the companys 39-year history. Nadella, who has served as chief executive since 2014, has helped transform the company into a leader in cloud computing in recent years, resulting in blockbuster earnings and a market cap of close to USD 2 trillion. In addition to these role changes, the board declared a quarterly dividend of USD 0.56 per share. The dividend is payable September 9, 2021, to shareholders of record on August 19, 2021.

Nadella was born in Hyderabad. His mother was a Sanskrit lecturer and his father was an IAS officer. He attended the Hyderabad Public School and pursued Bachelor's in electrical engineering from Manipal Institute of Technology in Karnataka. He then moved to the US to do a Master's in computer science at the University of WisconsinMilwaukee. Hw worked with Sun Microsystems before joining Microsoft in 1992.

(Image credit: AP/PTI)
Uttar Pradesh Additional Director General of Police (ADG) Prashant Kumar on Friday flagged the issue of Rohingya infiltration while stating that it can lead to demographic changes in the country if their infiltration is not stopped. He mentioned that a syndicate facilitated their illegal infiltration and placement in the country.

While speaking with Republic Media Network, he said that there are around 1,800 Rohingyas in the state according to their estimate and the UP Police is running a massive operation to identify and nab them.

Earlier in the day, the Uttar Pradesh ADG addressed a press conference on Friday to inform the arrest of four of the syndicate who were involved in a human trafficking racket and infiltration of Rohingyas. The recent arrests of Rohingyas have taken the toll of total arrests in the state this year to 15.

He also asserted that the Rohingyas in India are involved in anti-national activities, human trafficking and international hawala operation. There are given fake passports and Aadhaar card for their placement in India.

"The four arrested are Hafiz Shafique, Azizur Rahman, Muffizur Rahman, Mohammad Ismail. We have ceased fake documents such as cards of United Nations High Commission for Refugees, mobile phones, Burma ID card, fake Aadhar card, Indian voter cards and birth certificates, Laptop and Pendrive and foreign currency," Prashant Kumar said.

"We were receiving intelligence that some people have formed a syndicate and were facilitating the illegal infiltration of Myanmar Rohingyas to Bangladesh and India. They were also encouraging people living in the Bangladesh refugee camps to cross the border and facilitating their passage to India. These people loot the refugees and make UN refugee cards for them and establish them as Indian citizens illegally with the help of fake documentation," the ADG revealed.

He added further, "These illegal infiltrators are also involved in anti-national activities. The Rohingyas who have been brought to India have also been given important documents such as Passport, Aadhar, etc and they have even conducted international trips with the help of Indian documents."

Hafiz Shafique along with his syndicate facilitated illegal infiltration and placement of Rohingyas in India. Some of his accomplices have also involved in human trafficking. This is the first time a human trafficking incident has come to light and they have even trafficked the women via air to as far as Malasia, Prashant Kumar said.

"This syndicate also had the bandwidth of forging documents such as educational documents, voter id, Aadhar and several other documents to establish the Rohingyas as Indian citizens. These activities can well lead to demographic changes if we don't stop them," the UP ADG said while adding that the Police is also making efforts to find out who all are involved in facilitating the syndicate.
On Thursday, World Health Organisation (WHO) Regional Director Matshidiso Moeti informed that less than 1 per cent of the African population is fully vaccinated against COVID-19 infection amid a third wave of the pandemic in countries.

In fact, as per the official statement, 47 out of 54 countries i.e. 90 per cent are set to miss the September target of vaccinating 10 per cent of their people unless Africa received 225 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine.

Moeti at a press briefing said, "Almost 12 million people are now fully vaccinated but this is still less than 1per cent of Africa's population."

'Africa under full-blown third wave': WHO Regional Chief

According to the WHO regional head, the number of COVID-19 cases has surpassed 5 million in Africa, with the death toll climbing to 136,000 people. The countries in the region have been experiencing a sharp increase in new infections, as much as by over 20 per cent week-on-week in 22 African countries.

Moeti stated, "Africa is in the midst of a full-blown third wave. The sobering trajectory of surging COVID-19 cases should rouse everyone to urgent action. We've seen in India and elsewhere how quickly COVID-19 can rebound and overwhelm health systems."

She explained the reasons behind a slow-paced vaccination drive in the continent were "logistical challenges, gaps in operational funding and vaccine hesitancy".

The WHO African Region stated via Twitter, "Africa accounts for under 1% of the over 2.1 billion COVID-19 doses administered globally. Just 2% of the continents nearly 1.3 billion people have received one dose & only 9.4 million Africans are fully vaccinated."

#Africa accounts for under 1% of the over 2.1 billion #COVID19 doses administered globally. Just 2% of the continents nearly 1.3 billion people have received one dose & only 9.4 million Africans are fully vaccinated. pic.twitter.com/IVtciPftQc  WHO African Region (@WHOAFRO) June 10, 2021

Africa's COVID-19 vaccine rollout picks up

However, United States President Joe Bidens planned announcement that the US would donate half a billion Pfizer vaccines to 92 low and lower-middle-income countries and the African Union is definitely an important step forward. It is important to note that only 23 African countries have used less than half of the doses received.

Doses of the Pfizer vaccine are being used to inoculate people aged 60 and over. About 1.4 million people have received their first dose of the Pfizer vaccine. Reportedly, South Africa is expecting to receive 3.1 million Pfizer doses by the end of June.

As Africa is nearing reaching the 5 million COVID-19 cases, numbers have increased by nearly 20% to over 88 000 in the past week. 72 per cent of all new cases were reported in Egypt, South Africa, Tunisia, Uganda and Zambia and over half were recorded in nine southern African countries.
Chinese vice-minister of State Security, Dong Jingwei, reportedly defected to the US and gave the information about the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which is at the centre of COVID-19 lab leak theory. According to a SpyTalk report, which is a newsletter covering US intelligence, defence and foreign policy, Chinese-language anti-community media and Twitter are abuzz with rumours that Dong fled to the United States via Hong Kong with his daughter, Dong Yang mid-February. The top Chinese official is believed to have given Washington information about the Wuhan Institute of Virology that changed the stance of the Biden administration concerning the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic.

According to reports, Dong is, or was, a longtime official in Chinas Ministry of State Security (MSS) - also known as the Guoanbu. His publicly available background indicates that he was also responsible for the Ministrys counterintelligence efforts in China since being promoted to vice minister in April 2018. Now, if the rumours are true, Dongs defection to the US would be the highest level-defection in the history of the Peoples Republic of China.

Han Lianchao, who is a former Chinese foreign ministry official, who defected after the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre, informed that the issue of Dongs defection was raised by Chinese officials at the Sino-American summit in Alaska. While taking to Twitter, Han cited an unnamed source and alleged that Chinas foreign minister Wang Yi and Communist party foreign affairs boss Yang Jiechi demanded that the Americans return Dong, and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken refused. He said that if the rumour was true, it is really a big bomb.

However, it is imperative to know that several experts have reportedly said that unconfirmed reports of defections surface regularly. Former Pentagon, State Department and CIA expert, Nicholas Eftimiades, called the report exactly what it is, a rumour. Nicholas added that it happens all the time in the information warfare between Beijing and anti-communist overseas Chinese. Mollie Saltskog, a senior intelligence analyst with The Soufan Group, also urged caution and said that unconfirmed reports of defections surface regularly.

COVID-19 origin debate

Meanwhile, Dong was last seen in public in September 2020. Han said that his photos have been also been deleted by the Chinese search engine Baidu. Without naming Dong, the pro-Trump website 'Red State' further reported about a high-level defection from China and said that the Defence Intelligence Agency had received information from him that Bejing is covering up biological warfare research at the Wuhan lab.

There has been mounting controversy over how the virus first emerged in humans - whether through contact with animals at a wet market in Wuhan or leakage from The Wuhan Institute of Virology - as some have suggested. As questions continue to be raised over the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic, the US and Britain have also demanded the WHO to take a deeper look into the possible origins of COVID-19, including a new visit to China where the first human infections were detected. The demand to probe COVID-19 origin intensified after an undisclosed and controversial Wall Street report propelled conspiracies claiming three researchers from China's Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) sought hospital care after they fell sick in November 2019.

(With inputs from ANI)
Around dawn one recent spring day, an inflatable dinghy carrying nearly three dozen people reached the Greek island of Samos from the nearby Turkish coast.

Within 24 hours, refugee rights groups say, the same group was seen drifting in a life raft back to Turkey.

But of the 32 people determined to have initially made it to Samos, only 28 were in the raft the Turkish coast guard reported retrieving at sea.

Four days later, the missing four  a Palestinian woman and her three children  appeared in Samos' main town of Vathy, apparently having eluded Greek authorities. She applied for asylum and last week was informed their application had been accepted.

"I consider that the arrival of this woman, if we're not speaking of a miracle, of a virgin birth, of her falling from the sky, we're speaking of clear proof of a pushback," said Dimitris Choulis, the lawyer who helped 31-year-old Huda Zaga apply for asylum, along with her 12-year-old daughter and sons, aged 11 and 5.

Accusations from human rights groups and migrants that Greece has been carrying out so-called pushbacks  the illegal summary deportation of migrants without allowing them to apply for asylum  are nothing new, on land or at sea. But it is rare for such cases to involve anyone managing to stay behind.

Greece vehemently denies the claims but says it has an obligation to protect its borders, which are also the European Union's external borders. It points to March 2020, when Turkey opened its borders into the EU and actively encouraged migrants to cross into Greece.

Zaga says she arrived on Samos on April 21 in a dinghy crammed with people. After making it to land, the group scrambled up a wooded hill, splitting up to avoid detection by authorities. "We were terrified of being caught and being sent back to Turkey, especially after we crossed into the territorial waters of Greece," Zaga told The Associated Press. Before long, social media posts appeared. A local journalist posted about the migrants' arrival. Other locals said they had seen them,or given them food or water.

But as the day progressed, the story changed. The journalist contacted authorities, and she was told the migrants were not new arrivals but residents of a refugee camp on the outskirts of Vathy on a day trip  a roughly 50-kilometer hike over mountains.

Several residents informed the AP they were told by authorities and others not to speak of what they had seen. They spoke on condition of anonymity, saying they didn't want problems.

The next day, a piece of the dinghy the migrants arrived in still lay on the beach of Marathokampos bay. The rights group Aegean Boat Report, which monitors arrivals on Greek islands, posted photos of the new arrivals. Some showed Zaga and her children with others on a wooded hillside, the Marathokampos coastline in the background.

Asked about the case, Greece's Shipping Ministry, under whose jurisdiction the coast guard falls, said it has no record of an April 21 arrival on Samos. Authorities did not provide any explanation for the appearance of the woman and her children.

Zaga said she was aware of the pushback risk, having experienced it before. She tried to enter Greece three times earlier from the land border but was caught twice inside Turkey and once after entering Greece. This time, she was determined to succeed.

Zaga said she broke away from the others, staying behind with her children, and got in touch with people who had helped arrange her journey to Samos.

She would not provide specifics about how she managed to evade detection, or who helped her contact the lawyer. But on the morning of April 26, she arrived at Choulis' office asking for assistance.

Choulis said he immediately realized they were the people missing from the reported Marathokampos arrival. He informed Greek judicial authorities, police and the coast guard that he was accompanying the family to the refugee camp for registration. As he waited outside during Zaga's registration interview, Choulis said, he was told repeatedly to leave.

"There was a strange climate of suspicion," he said, and an intense fear that Zaga and her children might still be sent back to Turkey. But at this point, representatives of the United Nations refugee agency had been informed and were present.

UNHCR Representative in Greece Mireille Girard said the organization received a telephone message on April 21 about migrants arriving on Samos and sought confirmation from authorities but got no response. A few days later, the agency was informed a family believed to have been with the group had remained on Samos and was applying for asylum. "These elements are concerning. They are indications of a pushback from Samos Island on 21 April and need to be formally investigated by the authorities," Girard said.

In the meantime, Zaga's family has received asylum. She says she fled her home in the Nablus region of the West Bank for several reasons, but mainly to escape an abusive husband who assaulted her eldest son. She hopes to eventually reach Belgium, where her sister lives.

"I want to see my children happy, to see them going to school, eating healthy food, sleeping well and to live normally just like other children. To have safety and security, to have a school and home," she said.

For Choulis, Zaga's successful asylum application underscores the perils of pushbacks, which have at times been allegedly carried out by masked men without visible badges on their uniforms, to hide their identities.

"The fact that her asylum application was accepted shows just how dangerous it is for masked men of the coast guard or the police to judge who has the right to asylum and who doesn't," the lawyer said.

"We cannot leave the fate of something as important as the right to asylum to be determined in the middle of the sea or on the shores."

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Russia, Serbia and Belarus started joint drills labelled Slavic Brotherhood in the Krasnodar region in southern Russia on Wednesday.

Drills started on June 16 and will last until June 18.

Around 1,000 military personel from the three countries took part in the exercises.

"The main objective this year is a coherence not only of units, but the coherence of headquarters," the deputy commander of Russian Airborne Forces Andrey Kholzakov told reporters.

He said the drills would help "our collective forces to be prepared for any test" and reacting to pressure.

Pyotr, a Serbian military member whose last name was not given, said sometimes a translator is needed to understand soldiers from the other nations, but he said

"we understand each other quickly when we carry out these exercises".

This April, a troop build up in Russia's south and southwest near the Ukrainian border raised concerns in Ukraine and the West, which urged Moscow to withdraw its forces.

Russia annexed Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula in 2014 following the ouster of the country's Moscow-friendly president and then threw its weight behind separatist rebels in eastern Ukraine.

More than 14,000 people have been killed in seven years of fighting in eastern Ukraine.

Russia has recalled some troops from its western part after sweeping manoeuvres in April, but Russian Defence Minister Shoigu ordered them to leave their weapons behind for Russia's Zapad (West) 2021 military exercises in September.

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Iranians went to vote on June 18 in the presidential elections in which the hardliner conservative Shia cleric Ebrahim Raisi is viewed as all but certain to coast to victory over his competitors. As per state-linked opinion polling and analysts put protege of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Raisi as the dominant lead in the race to presidency among other candidates that include Abdolnasser Hemmati, Mohsen Rezaei, Amir Hossein Ghazizadeh Hashemi along with Raisi. Even though the former Central Bank Chief Hemmati is running s presidential races moderate candidate but hasnt inspired the same level of support as outgoing President Hassan Rohani.

If elected, Raisi would be the first serving president of the Islamic Republic already sanctioned by the US government even before acquiring the office. The United States sanctioned him reportedly over his involvement in the mass execution of political prisoners in 1988 along with the time he was the head of Irans internationally denounced judiciary that has given go-ahead to the most number of executions in the world. While Iranians tipped in his favour, his victory would imply that hard-liners would be in control of the country.

Polls opened at 7 AM with Khameneis ceremonial vote

Irans presidential elections on Friday came as negotiations in Vienna are underway with the United States to protect Tehrans crippling economy and deal with global powers even as it continues to enrich uranium to the closest point yet to weapons-grade levels. Iran presently shares a tense relationship with both the US and Israel. The polls opened at 7 AM local time for vote and Khamenei cast the ceremonial vote from Tehran where is also called on the public to participate.

Through the participation of the people the country and the Islamic ruling system will win great points in the international arena, but the ones who benefit first are the people themselves, Khamenei said. Go ahead, choose and vote. Meanwhile, Raisi was also quoted as saying, I beg everyone, the lovely youths, and all Iranian men and women speaking any accent or language from any region and with any political views, to go and vote and cast their ballots.

IMAGE: AP
A gunman killed one person Thursday during an attack on the office of a pro-Kurdish party in western Turkey, authorities said..

The Peoples Democratic Party, or HDP, said a gunman entered the building in Izmir province, fired shots and attempted to set the office on fire.

The provincial governors office said one person was killed. The office said a suspect, a former health worker, was detained. HDP confirmed the shooting victim was a party employee.

The HDP, the second-largest opposition party in Turkey's parliament, has faced a widespread government crackdown, with party members being accused of supporting an outlawed Kurdish militant group.

Thousands of pro-Kurdish activists, along with lawmakers and the partys former leaders, have been imprisoned.

The HDP, in a statement, accused the Turkish government and the country's interior minister of targeting the party and provoking such attacks.

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Islamabad, Jun 17 (PTI) Pakistan said on Thursday that a recent legislation passed in the National Assembly to provide the right of appeal to Indian death-row prisoner Kulbhushan Jadhav was aimed at fully implementing the verdict of the International Court of Justice (ICJ).

The Hague-based ICJ ruled in July 2019 that Pakistan must undertake an "effective review and reconsideration" of the conviction and sentence of Jadhav and also to grant consular access to India without further delay.

India on Thursday asked Pakistan to address the "shortcomings" in the bill brought out to facilitate reviewing the case of Jadhav, saying the proposed law does not create a mechanism to reconsider it as mandated by the ICJ.

Spokesperson in the Ministry of External Affairs Arindam Bagchi in New Delhi said the Review and Reconsideration Bill 2020 does not create a mechanism to facilitate effective review and reconsideration of Jadhav's case as mandated by the ICJ judgement.

He added that municipal courts cannot be the arbiter of whether a state has fulfilled its obligations in international law.

Pakistan Foreign Office spokesperson Zahid Hafeez Chaudhry was asked at the weekly media briefing in Islamabad about the bill passed by the National Assembly last week to allow Jadhav to file a review against his sentence.

He said the legislative measures taken by Pakistan are "only aimed at giving full effect to the judgment of the ICJ." "The legislation or its purpose should not be, in any way, misconstrued," Chaudhry said, adding that Pakistan abides by all its international obligations, including the ICJ judgment in Jadhav case.

On Tuesday, the Islamabad High Court adjourned the hearing of the federal government's plea to appoint counsel for Jadhav till October 5 at the request of the Attorney General for Pakistan Khalid Javed Khan, according to Pakistani media reports.

Jadhav, a 50-year-old retired Indian Navy officer, was sentenced to death by a Pakistani military court on charges of espionage and terrorism in April 2017. India approached the ICJ against Pakistan for denial of consular access to Jadhav and challenging the death sentence.

To a question about the Ministry of External Affairs saying that Pakistan was making an attempt to "malign India" on the issue of uranium, Chaudhry claimed that the incident took place in India and was reported by its own media.

He asked India to thoroughly investigate the matter in a "credible and transparent" manner.

About a question regarding reconciliation with India, Chaudhry said Pakistan consistently maintained that it wants peaceful relations with all its neighbours including India but for normalisation of relations with India, resolution of the long standing disputes, particularly the core issue of the Jammu and Kashmir, is critical.

"The onus is on India to create an enabling environment for a meaningful engagement, he said.

India has told Pakistan that it desires normal neighbourly relations with Islamabad in an environment free of terror, hostility and violence.

Chaudhry also said that the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) plenary meeting was scheduled in the last week of June which would review the progress made by Pakistan under the FATF Action Plan and subsequently announce its decision.

"Pakistan has made significant strides during implementation of the Action Plan through concerted national efforts. The tremendous progress made by Pakistan leading toward the conclusion of the Action Plan has been acknowledged by FATF as well as the larger international community, he said.

Chaudhry said that without prejudging the outcome of the upcoming plenary meeting, we would like to reaffirm our commitment to further strengthen our AML/CFT regime to align it with international standards and fulfill our international obligations." PTI SH ZH ZH

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The International Committee of the Red Cross on June 17 said that Afghanistan is at a "crisis point" as COVID-19 cases and deaths are "spiralling out of control". Afghanistan has reported a 2,400 per cent surge in COVID-19 cases in the past month. The hospitals beds are full in many areas across the country, IFRC said in a statement.

Afghanistan reports 2,400 per cent surge in COVID-19 cases

ICRC said that 34 per cent of COVID-19 tests last week came back positive. According to IFRC, the surge in COVID cases in Afghanistan was putting intense strain on a country's economy where people already live in poverty. More than 24 million people are grappling with food shortage following one of the worst drought crisis in decades. Necephor Mghendi, head of Afghanistan Country Delegation for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) said that COVID-19 has given another blow to the country that is already dealing with the threat of violence, displacement, food shortage, and poverty.

"COVID-19 is another cruel blow for millions of Afghans already dealing with the constant threat of violence, displacement, food insecurity and poverty. Were seeing large numbers of people having to make terrible choices between finding a way to feed their families and growing risks of getting sick," Mghendi said in a statement.

The country is also facing vaccine shortage and less than half a per cent of the population has been fully vaccinated. Afghanistans health infrastructure has already been strained due to decades of war and violence. Dr Nilab Mobarez, Acting President of Afghan Red Crescent Society warned that the surge in COVID-19 cases have been adding pressure on the fragile health system of the country.

Afghanistan is at a crisis point in the battle to contain COVID-19 as hospital beds are full to capacity in the capital Kabul and in many areas. This surge is fast spiralling out of control adding huge pressures on our fragile health system and millions of people living in poverty", Dr Nilab Mobarez said in the statement.

IMAGE: AP/ANI
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on June 17 nominated Mahmud Jamal, a member of Ontarios highest court, as the newest justice on the Supreme Court of Canada. Jamals appointment is a historic first for Canadians of colour who have never seen themselves represented on the Supreme Court of Canada. While taking to Twitter, Trudeau noted Jamals exceptional experience and further added that he will be a valuable asset to the countrys highest court.

Trudeau said, I am pleased to announce the nomination of Justice Mahmud Jamal to the Supreme Court of Canada. Respected around the world, Canadas Supreme Court is known for its strength, independence, and judicial excellence. I know that Justice Jamal, with his exceptional legal and academic experience and dedication to serving others, will be a valuable asset to our countrys highest court.

Justice Mahmud Jamal has had a distinguished career, throughout which hes remained dedicated to serving others. Hell be a valuable asset to the Supreme Court - and thats why, today, Im announcing his historic nomination to our countrys highest court. https://t.co/GSoW3zCU3b  Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) June 17, 2021

Jamal has been an Ontario Court of Appeal judge since 2019. He appeared in 35 appeals before the Supreme Court of Canada on civil, constitutional, criminal, and regulatory issues. Jamal has previously even taught at two of Canadas top law school and worked for decades as a litigator.

About Mahmud Jamal

He was born in 1967 into an Indian family in Nairobi and raised in Britain before moving to Canada in 1981. In an essay as part of a questionnaire he filled out for the Supreme Court job, Jamal said that his hybrid religious and cultural upbringing and his experiences in Canada exposed him to some of the challenges and aspirations of immigrants, religious minorities and racialized persons. He said that he was raised at school as a Christian, reciting the Lord's Prayer and absorbing the values of the Church of England, and at home as a Muslim, memorizing Arabic prayers from the Quran and living as part of the Ismaili community.

Jamal went on to say that like many others, he too experienced discrimination as a fact of daily life. He revealed that as a child, he was taunted and harassed because of his name, religion or the colour of his skin. Further, he added that his wife immigrated to Canada from Iran and after marriage, he became a Baha'i, attracted by the faith's message of the spiritual unity of humankind. He added that now he and his wife are raising two children in Torontos multi-ethnic Bahai community.

It is worth mentioning that Jamal must still be vetted by the House of Commons justice committee, but this is a formality. He will be replacing the retiring Rosalie Silberman Abella, the first refugee and first Jewish woman to sit on the court and also the nine-person courts longest-serving justice.

(Image: Twitter)


Zambia's first president Kenneth Kaunda died at the age of 97, the country's president Edgar Lungu announced Thursday evening. Lungu said Zambia will have 21 days of mourning. Kaunda had been admitted to hospital on Monday and officials later said he was being treated for pneumonia.

"KK will be missed by everyone, yes, everyone in this country, friends and foe, people in his party or other parties, we all shall miss him, for he was a shining star," said Enoch Kavinde, an original member of the United National Independence Party (UNIP) and Vice President of Zambia from 2001 to 2003.

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa also paid tribute to Kuanda, saying his passing had "saddened us as South Africans", adding that South Africans would "bow our heads in grief at the passing of a beloved and rightfully revered father of African independence and unity." Kaunda was a leader of the campaign that ended British colonial rule and he became Zambia's first democratically elected president in 1964.

He led the country until 1991 when he was defeated in an election following the introduction of multiparty politics. During his rule, Kaunda made Zambia a center for anti-colonial groups fighting to end white minority rule in southern African countries including Angola, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa and Zimbabwe.

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The United Nations on June 18 reported that despite the coronavirus pandemic, the number of people fleeing war and persecution continued rising last year. According to a fresh report from the UN refugee agency, the global displacement climbed to over 82 million, which is double the figure a decade ago. The agency said that the global displacement figures swelled around three million in 2020 after an already record-breaking year in 2019, leaving a full one per cent of humanity uprooted and displaced.

UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi said, Behind each number is a person forced from their home and a story of displacement, dispossession and suffering. They merit our attention and support  not just with humanitarian aid, but in finding solutions to their plight.

COVID-19 failed to prevent conflict but made it to harder to find refuge.https://t.co/CLLXHD7zDj  UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency (@Refugees) June 18, 2021

The UN report highlighted how drawn-out crises like those in Syria, Afghanistan, Somalia and Yemen were continuing to force people to flee, while eruptions of violence in places like Ethiopia and Mozambique were causing surging displacement. The UN agency found that by the end of 2020, a record 82.4 million people were living as refugees, asylum seekers or in so-called internal displacement within their own countries. The officials said that the numbers were up from some 40 million in 2011.

According to a press release, a full 42 per cent of the worlds displaced are girl and boys under the age of 18. Around 26.4 million people were living as refugees at the end of 2020, including 5.7 million Palestinians. Some 3.9 million Venezuelans were also displaced beyond their borders without being considered refugees, while 4.1 million people were registered worldwide as asylum seekers.

The United Nations informed that last year more than 11 million people were newly displaced, which is slightly more than in 2019, with most in just a handful of conflict-wracked countries and regions. They include Syria, which after more than a decade of war counts 13.5 million people displaced either inside or outside the country - more than half of its population and a sixth of the global displacement total, the report said. It added that more than two-thirds of the world's refugees meanwhile come from just five countries: Syria, Venezuela, Afghanistan, South Sudan and Myanmar.

Further, as per the press note, a number of new crises have also sparked significant displacement. Ethiopia's violence-hit Tigray region saw an exodus into Sudan of over 54,000 people in the final months of 2020 alone. Hundreds of thousands of people also escaped deadly jihadist violence in northern Mozambique, while hundreds of thousands more were freshly displaced in Africa's restive Sahel region.

UN urged global leaders to step up efforts

UNHCR has urged world leaders to step up their efforts to foster peace, stability and cooperation in order to halt and begin reversing nearly a decade-long trend of surging displacement driven by violence and persecution. While citing the report, Grandi said that world leaders must act to reverse the trend of soaring displacement. He added that solutions require global leaders and those with influence to put aside their differences, end an egoistic approach to politics, and instead focus on preventing and solving conflict and ensuring respect for human rights.

Filippo Grandi said, While the 1951 Refugee Convention and the Global Compact on Refugees provide the legal framework and tools to respond to displacement, we need much greater political will to address conflicts and persecution that force people to flee in the first place.

He added, The tragedy of so many children being born into exile should be reason enough to make far greater efforts to prevent and end conflict and violence.

(Image: AP)




The historic railway station in Old Havana is undergoing a complete restoration to give it back its century-old splendor after a year of stalled works due to the pandemic restrictions.

The four-level building made in the style of the Spanish Renaissance lays at the shore of Havana Bay.

Originally constructed in 1912 to substitute the centric location of the army arsenal, it was later declared a national monument in 1983.

But a century later, the structure lost most of its original shine.

The building rehabilitation began in July 2017 with an original budget of 1.2 million dollars, which were soon surpassed by the works needed.

The increase in United States sanctions against Cuba in these four years also affected it.

Providers such as the carpentry suppliers for precious woods that had to be imported to respect the station's originality, refused to complete shipments to the island so as not to suffer the consequences of threats from Washington for working with Cuba.

But for a historical monument with the same status as the city Capitol, erected in front of the house of national hero Jose Martin, works went on.

Adaptations were made to conform to new international safety regulations such as fire escapes, repairs to each of its four floors, renewed roofing and reinforcement of its two towers that were about to collapse due to the effects of time, lack of proper maintenance, constant hurricanes and the looming sea.

Once the building and its three huge platforms are modernized, it will once again provide extra service

Dalia Aguilar, director of investments in the state-owned Western Railway Company, said expenses were not cut down.

Aguilar said the station is not only important as a renewed service, but also to recover the city history and heritage.

Specialists in charge of the construction site, are hopeful the restored station could be reinaugurated in December 2022.

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Operators of an Albany hospital agreed to stop levying hefty fines on nurses recruited from the Philippines and other countries if they left their jobs within three years and to return $90,000 to seven former nurses, New York Attorney General Letitia James announced Thursday.

The legal agreement ends contractual repayment" fees for international nurse recruits at Albany Medical Center, which obligated them to pay up to $20,000 if they resigned or were fired before the end of their three-year employment commitment. Nurses who didn't comply faced the threat of legal action or being reported to immigration authorities, according to court papers.

The attorney general's office argued the contract provision under permanent visa arrangements violated the federal Trafficking Victims Protection Act.

By forcing its employees to choose between paying outrageous sums to leave their jobs, or facing immigration authorities, Albany Med violated their rights as workers and as individuals, James said in a prepared release.

Albany Med Health System disputed the AG's findings. They agreed to remove the provision from employment contracts and to repay the seven nurses solely to avoid litigation costs, according to court papers.

In an emailed statement, Albany Med said they value all their nurses and are proud of our efforts to recruit and support nurses from the Philippines.

We do not agree with the Attorney Generals characterization of the facts in this case, and we do not believe that Albany Med did anything wrong," the statement said, adding that it is not worth our time, effort or expense to fight these politically motivated allegations.

James issued a subpoena in February 2020 after the matter was referred to her office by the New York State Nurses Association, which had sued the hospital the previous year over the provision.

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Washington, Jun 18 (PTI) China is a "pacing challenge" for America, Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin has said, asserting that it is "really important" for the US to focus more on creating opportunities to better partner with its allies and partners in the strategically vital Indo-Pacific region.

Austin told members of the Senate Appropriations Committee during a hearing on 2022 Budget Request for the Defense Department on Thursday that China was his priority focus.

China is, in fact, our pacing challenge and it is my priority focus. You've seen that through quite frankly our actions. My first overseas trip along with Secretary Blinken was over to the Indo-Pacific region, he said.

You saw me stand up a China task force that has helped to focus the efforts of the department on making sure that we are doing the right things to create the capabilities and develop the operational concepts that we need to be successful. You've seen that through quite frankly our actions, he said.

He was responding to questions about the challenges being posed by China to the US national security.

Austin said China taskforce completed its work last week and he issued an internal directive, kicking off wide efforts that will, among other things, help bolster deterrence against Beijing and revitalise network of regional allies and partners and accelerate the development of cutting-edge capabilities and new operational concepts.

My first trip overseas - was out to the region, the Indo-Pacific region where I met with our allies in Japan and South Korea and further traveled to India to meet with our partner there and just as recent as two nights ago, I was in a conference with ASEAN nations and exchanging ideas about how we could better work together, he said.

Austin visited India and met Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the start of his three-day visit to the country in March.

What I've done with the China taskforce is focused our efforts a bit more that in a way will create opportunities for us to better partner with allies and partners in the region, because I think that's really important, he said.

The Chinese military has been flexing its muscles in the strategically vital Indo-Pacific region and is also engaged in hotly contested territorial disputes in both the South China Sea and the East China Sea.

India, the US and several other world powers have been talking about the need to ensure a free, open and thriving Indo-Pacific in the backdrop of China's rising military manoeuvring in the region.

China claims nearly all of the disputed South China Sea, though Taiwan, the Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia and Vietnam all claim parts of it. Beijing has built artificial islands and military installations in the South China Sea.

China and Russia are formidable adversaries and China Mr Secretary has proven to be a true pacing threat. China seeks hegemony militarily, technologically, economically, and geopolitically and is making unprecedented investments to see that to fruition, Senator Richard Shelby said.

Meanwhile, Russia is nearing the end of a massive military modernisation program that saw its defense spending increased 30 per cent in real dollars over the last 10 years, he said, adding that competition with China requires a whole of government investment. PTI LKJ MRJ MRJ

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Citgo Petroleum Corp. of Houston has agreed to pay $19.7 million for environmental damage from a 2006 spill at a Louisiana refinery, the U.S. Department of Justice said Thursday.

The agreement settles both state and federal environmental claims from the 2.2-million-gallon (8.3- million-liter) spill at the Lake Charles refinery's wastewater treatment facility, a news release said.

State and federal trustees will work together on restoration projects using nearly $19.2 million, the statement said. It said the remaining $528,000 will cover remaining costs of the damage assessment.

Oil companies have a responsibility to protect our waters, people, wildlife and diverse habitats from oil spills, and those who violate that duty will be held accountable for the harms they cause, said Jean E. Williams, acting assistant attorney general for the departments Environment and Natural Resources Division.

The payment is in addition to $97 million in earlier penalties and fines, the Justice Department said. It said Citgo has paid an $81 million Clean Water Act penalty, a $13 million criminal fine and $3 million to the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality.

The slop oil and untold millions of gallons of oily wastewater spilled into the Calcasieu River and other waterways from overflowing wastewater tanks during a storm in 2006, the department said.

It polluted about 150 miles (240 kilometers) of shoreline, killed birds and fish, contaminated habitats, closed the ship channel, and disrupted recreational uses of the river and lakes, Thursday's news release said.

U.S. District Judge Richard Haik ruled in the Clean Water Act lawsuit that the accident was caused by Citgo's gross negligence in operating and maintaining the treatment facility.

The proposed consent decree would become final if the court approves it after a 30-day public comment period.

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The authorities want nothing taking to the skies that could affect safety or leak information on or around the big day.

Visitors view drones on display at a technology fair in Beijing in a file photo.

Online sales platform Alibaba has temporarily suspended the sale of drones in China ahead of celebrations for the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP)'s centenary on July 1.

"As a result of regulatory requirements, please cease the sale of any ... drones, including related products like top-mounted displays, image transmission modules, flight control modules and other key parts," the company said in an announcement dated June 17.

The temporary ban took effect on the date of the notice, and will run until July 15, it said.

Documentation containing instructions about the operation of drones and related equipment has also been banned, according to state-sponsored media citing a Beijing municipal government directive.

A website user surnamed Lu said not all online sales platforms appeared to have complied with the ban by afternoon on June 18, however.

"I had a look, and [drones] have so far only been completely removed from [sales platform] JD.com," Lu said. "It seems you can still buy them on other sites."

"The restriction order in is in place until mid-July, so it's probably linked to the CCP centenary," he said.

A search of sales platforms Taobao and Tmall for DJI, a well-known drone manufacturer, yielded no results on Friday.

Some drones remained listed on Taobao, but when an attempt was made to add them to a basket, a message appeared saying sales had been suspended.

On Jingdong, a keyword search for "drones" returned the message "no drone-related products were found."

No-fly orders

Authorities in Beijing, Shenzhen, Shanghai, Jiangsu, Sichuan, and Henan have been issuing "no-fly" orders over their cities since early June.

A Beijing municipal government directive said the order was to "ensure the safety of relevant flight activities during celebrations of the 100th anniversary of the CCP's founding."

Restrictions on drone flights are in place over Dongcheng, Xicheng, Chaoyang, and other districts in the capital.

Restrictions have also been imposed on any activities "affecting flight safety," including helium or hot-air balloons, as well as flights of domesticated doves and pigeons.

Local media reported that a Beijing resident surnamed Li was detained after he flew a drone in defiance of the restrictions.

Burnishing China's image

Chongqing-based dissident Xu Wanping said the CCP is keen to use the centenary to burnish its international image.

The centenary comes amid a growing chorus of international criticism over human rights abuses in Xinjiang, as well as an ongoing crackdown on dissent in Hong Kong in the name of national security.

"Of course [local authorities] are going to be tightening controls of their own accord," Xu told RFA. "Another factor is their need to put on a show for the rest of the world."

"They want to turn their international image around, and they're making sure they have room to do that," he said.

Petitioner Li Ping from the northeastern city of Shenyang said the government's entire focus is on "stability maintenance" ahead of the centenary.

"They have to do this for stability maintenance purposes," Li said. "Because drones are also used for surveillance."

Political commentators have said during previous drone bans during major political meetings that the authorities are concerned about the possibility of terrorist attacks, but also that confidential information could be leaked if ordinary citizens are allowed to fly drones over major events.

Reported by Cheng Yut Yiu for RFA's Mandarin Service. Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.
A Christian aid group says the authorities could be intentionally trying to damage Wang Yi's health.

Early Rain Covenant Church pastor Wang Yi and his wife are shown in an undated photo.

Concerns are growing over the health of the Protestant pastor of the banned Early Rain Covenant Church in the southwestern Chinese province of Sichuan, RFA has learned.

Wang Yi, who founded the church, was detained by police in Sichuan's provincial capital Chengdu on Dec. 14, 2018 on suspicion of "incitement to subvert state power," alongside dozens of church members in a raid that prompted an international outcry.

The Chengdu Intermediate People's Court issued a verdict and sentence after finding him guilty of "incitement to subvert state power" and of "running an illegal business" in a secret trial, jailing him for nine years in December 2019.

Wang's mother and wife were placed under house arrest and prevented from attending his trial, as were dozens of members of the now-shuttered church that he founded.

"It looks as if Pastor Wang Yi is being treated very badly in prison right now," Bob Fu, president and founder of the U.S.-based Christian rights group ChinaAid, told RFA in a recent interview.

"It now appears that the state security police have been lying to Wang Yi's family and the church," he said. "Pastor Wang Yi is being kept in solitary confinement in [Chengdu's] Jintang Prison, with two other prisoners guarding him."

He said the authorities had prevented family members and lawyers from visiting Wang since he was jailed, and now appeared to be withholding medical treatment too, as well as feeding him "moldy rice," Fu said.

"This is clearly because the authorities want his medical deterioration to continue."

Overseas news websites have also reported that medical services in Jintang Prison are limited to those provided by other prisoners, and that the drugs given in inmates are expired pharmaceuticals left over from provincial hospitals.

Fu said the authorities could be intentionally destroying Wang's health, citing the death in prison custody of late Nobel peace laureate Liu Xiaobo in 2017.

Police surround gathering

Meanwhile, police surrounded a gathering of former Early Rain church members in Chengdu last weekend, as they held a memorial service for the father of one member.

Several participants were detained for questioning and released later the same day, a local Protestant church member surnamed Zhou told RFA.

"The family members of a member of the church were having a memorial service," Zhou said. "After Li Yingqiang and some other brothers and sisters arrived at this member's home, the local police officers knocked on the door and forcibly took these people to the police station."

"They were eventually brought back to their homes a few hours later by police from the stations near their homes," he said.

Fellow Protestant Qiu Xuan said the police hadn't produced a warrant or any form of documentation, saying they were allowed to issue summonses at will.

"Another incident also happened that day, when police placed [Early Rain church member] Wu Wuqing under house arrest for two weeks, locking the fire exit and trapping his [family] inside," Qiu said.

Control of religion criticized

Wang Yi's jailing came after he published an essay critical of the governments tight control over religion, and calling on Chinas Christians to resist and peacefully disobey new rules issued by the ruling Chinese Communist Party severely restricting the activities of religious organizations.

Wang, 48, founded the Early Rain Covenant church in 2008 after several years of political activism that saw him named as "one of the most influential public intellectuals" by the Southern Weekend newspaper in 2004.

A graduate of the Sichuan University Law School, Wang went on to teach at Chengdu University. He also founded an online forum to study progress in China towards constitutional government.

The ruling Chinese Communist Party, which embraces atheism, exercises tight controls over any form of religious practice among its citizens.

China is home to an estimated 68 million Protestants, of whom 23 million worship in state-affiliated churches, and some nine million Catholics, 5.7 million of whom are in state-sponsored organizations.

The administration of President Xi Jinping regards Christianity as a dangerous foreign import, with officials warning last year against the "infiltration of Western hostile forces" in the form of religion.

Reported by Qiao Long for RFA's Mandarin Service. Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.
Hongkongers stood in line in the early hours of morning to buy print copies of pro-democracy newspaper the Apple Daily after it was raided by national security police on and several of its top executives arrested under the national security law.



The paper's print run hit a record high as the presses churned out 500,000 copies, after editors vowed to "press on" in spite of the raid and freezing of its assets in the biggest direct attack on Hong Kong's media by the authorities since the 1997 handover to Chinese rule.



As well as coverage of the raid on the paper, the front page also featured a headline which read: "Everyone must stand up," quoting the words of the paper's detained CEO, Cheung Kim-hung.



"We at the Apple Daily will remain faithfully at our posts and keep up the struggle to the bitter end, until the coming of dawn," the paper said in an editorial penned by senior staff.



Thanking readers for their support, it added: "No matter how difficult the path ahead may prove, we will walk it together."



By noon, copies of the paper had sold out at a number of convenience stores and newsstands in the Kowloon Bay and Mong Kok districts of Hong Kong.



Bundled copies of Hong Kong's Apple Daily, which sold briskly a day after the pro-democracy newspaper was raided by national security police and several of its top executives arrested under the national security law, June 18, 2021. Credit: AP Snapping up multiple copies

Some people told RFA they had bought multiple copies in support of the paper.



"I'm really surprised by this," the owner of a pro-protest "yellow" noodle shop, who gave only the nickname Polly, told RFA on . "Hong Kong never used to be like this."



"I think we all need to keep [acts of resistance] going without fear," she said. "If we keep going, we will eventually win through into the light. Go Hongkongers!"



Yau Tsim Mong district councilor Derek Chu said a number of people had also bought hundreds of copies, then handed them to district councilors for distribution. The papers were all gone within half an hour, he said.



Hundreds of police officers raided the headquarters of jailed pro-democracy media mogul Jimmy Lai's Next Digital in Tseung Kwan O at around 7.30 a.m. on , confiscating dozens of computers and arresting CEO Cheung Kim-hung, head of operations Royston Chow, chief editor Ryan Law, associate publisher Chan Pui-man and digital platform director Cheung Chi-wai.



The five were accused of breaking Article 29 of the National Security Law for Hong Kong pertaining to "collusion with a foreign country or with external elements to endanger national security," with the journalistic materials seized as "evidence," according to police.



Cheung and Law were charged on with "conspiracy to collude with foreign powers to endanger national security," and are due to appear in Kowloon Magistrates' Court on .



"This will mark the citys first prosecution of journalists for national security breaches," the paper said in a report on the charges on . "The case is premised on some 30 as-yet unidentified articles published by Apple Daily since 2019."



Seizure of assets

Some of the evidence dates from before the national security law took effect at 11.00 p.m. on , 2020.



At the same time, national security police froze U.S.$2.32 million in assets belonging to the Apple Daily, Apple Daily Printing and the AD Internet Company.



's raid was the second on the paper. The first came a few weeks after the national security law took effect, and resulted in the arrest of the paper's founder Jimmy Lai, 72, on charges of fraud and "collusion with a foreign power," as well as the seizure of his personal assets.



Like many defendants charged under the national security law, Lai was repeatedly denied bail. He is currently serving time in prison for "illegal assembly" over his attendance at peaceful protests.



Chris Yeung, chairman of the Hong Kong Journalists' Association (HKJA), said the raid by around 500 police officers on the Apple Daily was "horrifying."



"When there is no longer any protection for media workers or for journalistic materials, then people will be too afraid to talk to the media, for fear that disclosing certain information could get them into trouble," Yeung said.



"At the very least, they will feel more uneasy about doing so, and more likely to keep quiet," he said.



"The media itself will also be fearful, because they won't be able to protect their sources any more, so the problem of self-censorship will also get worse," Yeung said.



Reported by Gigi Lee, Cheng Yut Yiu, Chan Yun Nam and Lu Xi for RFA's Cantonese and Mandarin Services. Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.
Handout from Indonesia's Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Investments via AFP

Handout from Indonesia's Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Investments via AFP

Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi (third from right) speaks with Luhut Pandjaitan, Indonesia's coordinating minister for maritime affairs and investments, during a meeting in Parapat, Indonesia, Jan. 13, 2021.

Updated at 3:00 p.m. ET on 2021-06-21

Ties are growing between Indonesia and China, as Jakarta balances economic interests with concerns about Beijings expansive territorial claims and alleged human rights abuses, analysts say.

China is not the biggest investor in Indonesia, but its investments in Southeast Asias largest and most populous country have grown consistently, doubling to almost $4.8 billion in 2020 from $2.4 billion in 2017.

Everything seems to come from China nowadays  vaccines, investment  and Mr. Luhut has been at the forefront of this, Indonesian business tycoon Chairul Tanjung quipped to senior minister Luhut Pandjaitan during an online event in February.

Luhut, Indonesias coordinating minister for maritime affairs and investment, and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi have met twice since the start of the year.

Earlier this month, Luhut led an Indonesian delegation for talks with Wang in China, where they signed five agreements on cooperation in the infrastructure, maritime, and investment sectors, details of which were not made public.

In January, Wang visited Luhuts hometown in North Sumatra.

China is funding projects in Indonesia as part of its ambitious One Belt, One Road (OBOR) worldwide infrastructure-building program. These include the $6 billion Jakarta-Bandung high-speed rail project, which is expected to be completed next year.

And this year, Indonesia approved Chinas proposal to conduct a study on the $400 million Lambakan Dam project in East Kalimantan, near the site of the future Indonesian capital in Penajam Paser Utara regency.

Luhut told businessman Chairul at the February event that these Chinese investments have no strings attached.

They are not dictating anything, said Luhut, who is widely regarded as President Joko Jokowi Widodos right-hand man.

Tepid response

But Indonesias enhanced relations with China carry substantial risks, said Aristyo Rizka Darmawan, a lecturer in international law at the University of Indonesia.

For instance, many observers have criticized Indonesia  the largest Muslim country in the world  for its tepid response to the alleged human rights violations in Xinjiang to the minority Uyghur Muslim ethnic group, Aristyo wrote in a recent article on the website of the ISEAS  Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore.

A Chinese Foreign Ministry statement about Luhuts visit in June said that Indonesia adheres to the principle of non-interference in other countries internal affairs and stood ready to help the Indonesian people and the international community have a better understanding of the development and progress of China's Xinjiang.

Western nations and rights groups accuse China of egregious abuses against the Muslim Uyghurs of Xinjiang, which China angrily denies.

Witnesses and experts testified about enforced disappearances, compulsory sterilization and forced contraception, organ harvesting, and torture by Chinese authorities in Xinjiang, at a tribunal in London this month investigating whether Chinas treatment of its ethnic Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslims constitutes genocide.

Indonesias foreign policy can be driven by economic interest and transactional considerations, Aristyo wrote. But Jakarta should mind the gap in its approach to China and also seek to balance its growing relationship with Beijing by pursuing deeper relations with other major powers with interests in the Indo-Pacific.

The limitations of pushing back

Meanwhile, Indonesia and China have had several spats over maritime rights in waters off Indonesias Natuna Islands, located in the southern reaches of the South China Sea.

In January 2020, Jakarta sent warships and fighter jets to the area after scores of Chinese fishing vessels escorted by the China Coast Guard entered Indonesias exclusive economic zone (EEZ).

Chinas incursions near the Natunas were serious in terms of vessel numbers and duration ... one of many to rattle Indonesias security establishment, Natalie Sambhie, executive director of Verve Research, an Australia-based independent think tank, told BenarNews, an RFA-affiliated online news service.

Indonesia has also protested to China over what it called the slave-like treatment of its sailors working on Chinese fishing boats. At least 16 Indonesian sailors working on Chinese boats have died since late 2019, according to officials.

Indonesias stance in the Natuna Sea has been consistent  balancing concerns about sovereignty with the need for investment and COVID-19 relief, Sambhie said.

While these policymakers are well aware of the slow erosion to national confidence and even sovereign rights posed by Chinas incursions, they are also well aware of the present-day limitations of pushing back, she said.

Dewi Fortuna Anwar, a senior researcher on international politics at the Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI), said that the COVID-19 pandemic provided momentum for closer ties between Jakarta and Beijing.

Amid vaccine nationalism in several countries, China has been willing to share their vaccines. This goodwill gesture paved the way for trust, Dewi told BenarNews.

Indonesias stance also strikes an equilibrium between Indonesias interactions with other large powers like the U.S., India and Japan, Sambhie said.

She cited the fact that Indonesia accepted search-and-rescue support from Australia, India, Singapore, and the United States after the KRI Nanggala-402 submarine sank in April, killing all 53 sailors on board.

Jakarta also accepted assistance from China, which sent three ships to support efforts to lift the wreckage of the submarine, albeit unsuccessfully, from waters off Bali a half-mile deep.

It benefits the country

Indonesia is as open to working with anyone as long as it benefits the country, said Rizal Sukma, a former Indonesian ambassador to Britain.

We are working with China in sectors where we think cooperation is essential for our national interests. Indonesia will work with any country when we need to and stand up to anyone whenever we must. That is our principle, Rizal told BenarNews.

If the U.S. is serious about building relationships with ASEAN countries, including Indonesia, naturally we are open to that as well, he said, referring to the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations.

Meanwhile, China is now in a position to invest in many countries, said Yose Rizal Damuri, head of the economics department at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) Indonesia.

Now that China is economically maturing, they can expand by doing what Japan did in the 70s, Yose told BenarNews.

In the last 10 years, they have invested more in natural resources, but now the direction is to build a production bases in countries. If Indonesia can tap this, we will benefit much.

Growing economic relations were not likely to cause Indonesia to become dependent on China, he added.

Our biggest investor is Singapore, and previously it was Japan. Have we become dependent on these two countries? Yose said.

Geopolitics can affect economic ties, but the opposite is unlikely.

Reported by BenarNews, an RFA-affiliated online news service.
ASEAN had lobbied for the removal of a clause calling for an arms embargo on Myanmar that was included in an earlier draft of the UN General Assembly resolution.

Protesters prepare to burn the flag of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) as they take part in a demonstration against the military coup in Yangon, Myanmar, JUne 14, 2021.

Sponsors of a U.N. resolution on Myanmar appear to have weakened language barring international arms sales to the Southeast Asian country, where hundreds have been killed after a military coup, a revised draft uploaded on the General Assemblys website Thursday shows.

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) had lobbied last month for the removal of a clause calling for an arms embargo on Myanmar and that was included in an older draft of the U.N. General Assembly resolution.

A senior diplomatic source who declined to be named confirmed to BenarNews, an RFA-affiliated online news service, that the resolution had been revised, but declined to say what exactly had been changed. The new draft was uploaded to the General Assemblys website on Thursday afternoon.

Yes, it has been revised, the official said, when asked whether changes were made to the resolution.

The new draft resolution does not call for an immediate suspension of sales and transfers of weapons, munitions, and other military equipment to Myanmar, as the older one had done.

Instead it urges U.N. member-states to prevent the flow of arms into Myanmar.

The resolution is set to be heard, and possibly voted on, in the U.N. General Assembly on Friday, according to a calendar of the days schedule on the website of the U.N. body. A vote on an earlier draft was postponed May 18.

On May 27, BenarNews was the first to report that ASEAN had sent a letter to the resolutions sponsors proposing the deletion of the arms embargo paragraph  which was among the reasons for the votes postponement.

The revised clause in the new draft Recalls, in line with the Secretary-Generals call for a global ceasefire as supported by the Security Council in its resolution 2532 (2020) of 1 July 2020, the need to de-escalate violence, and in that regard calls upon all Member States to prevent the flow of arms into Myanmar.

Earlier this week, human rights watchdog Amnesty International said it was imperative for ASEAN to support an arms embargo on Myanmar, where security forces have killed more than 800 people  mostly anti-coup protesters  since the military toppled the elected government on Feb. 1.

ASEAN must support the passing of a U.N. General Assembly resolution calling for a halt of weapons transfers to the Myanmar military, Amnesty International said in a statement Tuesday.

Anything less is an abdication of ASEANs leadership role on the Myanmar crisis, and shows ASEAN is siding with a military that is continuing to kill and imprison unarmed protesters and other civilians.

ASEAN centrality

ASEANs efforts to deal with the political crisis in Myanmar since the Feb. 1 military coup have largely been unsuccessful.

The United States, the G7 group, and the U.N. have all stressed ASEANs crucial role and centrality in dealing with Myanmar.

A senior diplomat from one of the resolutions sponsor-countries told BenarNews last month that ASEAN wanted the draft resolution revised also because the bloc believed it should take the lead in resolving the post-coup crisis in Myanmar.

Accordingly, it appears the new draft has increased the number of references to the blocs importance in the region.

The latest draft has an addition to clause 5  which is to encourage cooperation of a possible ASEAN envoy to Myanmar  a member of the regional bloc  with the Special Envoy of the U.N. Secretary-General.

The revised resolution also adds a call to Myanmar to continue engaging with ASEAN taking into account the important role of the Association in continuing to assist Myanmar in its transition to democracy.

Still, ASEAN has been roundly criticized for its perceived inaction on Myanmar.

While the regional bloc succeeded in hammering out a five-point consensus on Myanmar with the junta chief during a special summit of ASEAN leaders in late April, no action has been take on any of the points almost seven weeks since.

The consensus called for the immediate cessation of violence, which continues. On Wednesday, residents in central Myanmar told Radio Free Asia (RFA), a BenarNews sister entity, that four elderly villagers were killed after the Myanmar military set fire to their village the night before.

The bloc had called for a constructive dialogue among all parties, but no such dialogue has begun.

Among the other points agreed on was the appointment of a special envoy to Myanmar and a visit by an ASEAN delegation to the crisis-ridden country, headed by that envoy.

No envoy has been named so far, amid reports of differences between ASEAN member-states on the issue. Malaysia, Indonesia, and Singapore openly expressed their frustration at a delay in naming an envoy, at a meeting last week in China between foreign minister from the bloc and China.

Notably, no Asian or Southeast Asian country, except for South Korea, is among the 54 sponsors of the U.N. resolution, which was proposed by Liechtenstein.

On the same day at United Nations headquarters in New York, the Security Council is scheduled to hear from one of the two ASEAN officials from Brunei  ASEANs chair this year  who visited Myanmar earlier this month.

Reported by BenarNews, an RFA-affiliated online news service.
"We understand why people hated the military so much and thats why we are joining them," says Capt. Lin Htet Aung.

Capt. Lin Htet Aung left the Myanmar Armys Light Infantry Battalion #528 to join pro-democracy forces resisting the military coup that seized power from the elected government on Feb. 1, citing voting fraud in the November 2020 elections. He told Khin Maung Soe of RFAs Myanmar Service in a telephone interview from an area outside military regime control that about 800 officers and soldiers  roughly five battalions -- have defected since the coup. RFA could not independently verify that number. The following Q&A has been edited for clarity.

RFA: Can you tell us how many members of the Armed Forces have defected to the peoples side?

Lin Htet Aung: There are around 800. That's about the size of five battalions in Myanmars military structure. Some of them were from the army and many are from the Navy, the Air Force, artillery units, the Defense Service factories, etc.

RFA: How do you get these numbers?

Lin Htet Aung: We have contacts with one another and also from other sources.

RFA: What is the security situation of these people?

Lin Htet Aung: Those who have arrived in the liberated areas and territories held by ethnic armed groups have security. For those who have joined ordinary citizens, we are a bit worried for their security. People are trying to give them some protection, though, and some have contacted us for help.

RFA: What about the welfare of these former soldiers?

Lin Htet Aung: Most of them left their units without much money in hand. Those who have arrived in territories held by ethnic groups do not have to worry about food and lodging.

RFA: What about their families left behind?

Lin Htet Aung: Most of them are single. Those with families who arrived in territories held by ethnic groups do not have any problems. But some of them had left their families in their mother units and we are a bit worried for them.

RFA: How many officers have defected from their units?

Lin Htet Aung: There are about 100 among the officers but the majority are from lower ranks.

Capt. Lin Htet Aung in military uniform in an undated photo from an unknown location. Credit: Lin Htet Aung RFA: What are you doing now?

Lin Htet Aung: Most of us have decided to join the armed revolution. Those who do not want to join the armed revolution are seeking ways to help the people in whatever capacity they can.

RFA: There are some people who are suspicious of people like you who have defected. Some people think you could be spies. How do you feel about these doubts and suspicions?

Lin Htet Aung: Yes we have faced such situations. But I believe we will gradually win their trust. We will need time but I hope they will soon realize we genuinely want to oppose military dictatorship.

RFA: Do you think we could say there might be military agents among those who have crossed over?

Lin Htet Aung: Of course it is possible. We cannot trust everyone. We systematically checked everyone who contacted us directly. We have to be very careful because they have very qualified people gathering intelligence. We understand why people hated the military so much and thats why we are joining them. We also hate military dictatorship as much as the people do. Our main objective is to join hands with the people and bring down the military dictatorship.

RFA: Do you face any other difficulties?

Lin Htet Aung: Though we can say we are now in liberated areas we dont actually know what we should be doing or what role we should take. Most of us who defected have pure goodwill in our hearts towards the people.

RFA: Do you think there will be more members of the Armed Forces coming over to the side of the public?

Lin Htet Aung: Changing sides is an important tactic for this revolution. At first, we had hoped about 4,000 of the 400,000-strong military would change sides. But now we are expecting more than 4,000 will come to the aid of the people.

RFA: The present revolution relies a lot on the ethnic armed groups and they have been staging a revolution fighting for their rights for many years. How do you think the two revolutions can be combined?

Lin Htet Aung: We cannot just ask for assistance from them and leave but we will have to help them achieve their goals, too. If we leave them after seeking help from them, then it will be like we are fighting for Burma proper only. If we are to fight for the entire country, we will have to complement each other to achieve better results.

RFA: Do you have any progress in working together with the National Unity Government (NUG)?

Lin Htet Aung: The NUG is working very hard through a lot of difficulties and we have found some cooperation between them and us. We are very encouraged.

Translated by Khin Maung Nyane.
"I do not want (the junta) to push hundreds of thousands of people to their deaths," says physician Zaw Wai Soe, who serves as the parallel National Unity Government's minister of health and education

Dr. Zaw Wai Soe is a physician who serves in Myanmars parallel National Unity Government as minister of health and education, said. He spoke to Aye Aye Mon of RFAs Myanmar Service about the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic and the military juntas pressure on the Civil Disobedience Movement (CDM) and other opponents of the Feb. 1 military takeover. Following is an excerpt from the interview.

RFA: The military has arrested Dr. Htar Htar Lin, chief of the COVID-19 vaccination program on June 10. They said she is not only a hard-core CDM member, but had also held online meetings with you to implement a plan for the NUG. What do you have to say about that?

Zaw Wai Soe: Think of this: Who really is the government and who really are working for the people? Only governments who have the support of the people can win the fight against COVID-19. Our country is one of the few countries to overcome the first wave. I'm really sorry for Dr. Htar Htar Lin. When the second wave came, Aung San Suu Kyi as well as we doctors were telling the people what they should or shouldn't do almost every day. Some doctors hardly sleep at all. Only those governments working for people with love and goodwill can have success. A pandemic cannot be overcome without people's participation. A military dictatorship who doesn't have any love or support from the people cannot fight this kind of pandemic.

RFA: They showed a video file at the last news conference in Naypyidaw in which you were saying that even a small envelope with poisonous stuff in it can kill people. Was that video file real?

Zaw Wai Soe: The video file was real, but doctored. They edited it and showed only what they wanted to show. We don't and will not encourage or do this sort of thing. We cannot accept people dying. We don't want to see people killed. I am a doctor and we feel terribly upset if a patient dies in our hands.

RFA: At the news conference they made very serious accusations against the National League for Democracy. What's your take on that?

Zaw Wai Soe: I am not a politician. I have no color nor party ties with any. I am a doctor who has joined CDM. I just stand for people. I had given treatment in the past to NLD leaders as well as top senior military officers. This 2021 Spring Revolution has nothing to do with political parties. It is meaningless to push ahead like this. I do not want them to push hundreds of thousands of people to their deaths. I want to tell the military from here: Do not do it. It will not be a solution for you or the country.

Translated by Khin Maung Nyane.
Junta says the killings were terrorism, while shadow government says they were acts of war.

Authorities place the body of Soe Soe Lwin into an ambulance after her assassination in Yangon Myanmar, June 8, 2021.

Anti-junta forces in Myanmar have killed at least a dozen army-appointed low-level officials since the Feb. 1 coup  actions the military regime calls terrorism, but which the countrys shadow government says are legitimate acts of war against an illegitimate dicatorship.

The junta has described supporters of ousted State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyis National League for Democracy (NLD) Party, the National Unity Government (NUG) formed by ousted NLD lawmakers, and various regional Peoples Defense Forces (PDF) as extremists responsible for murdering its appointed officials.

At a news conference on June 12, the juntas deputy information minister, Maj. Gen. Zaw Min Tun, said 173 innocent people, including the administrators, had been killed by the NLD and its supporters.

According to statistics kept by the military, 173 people were killed in the period between the coup on Feb. 1 and April 15, and 156 since then. There are no reports from independent organizations regarding either figure.

There are acts of vandalism committed by NLD members and extremists. We have lists of those killed and injured in their destructive activities, said Zaw Min Tun at a press conference.

We will give these lists to the media. A total of 198 schools have been bombed, 50 schools have been set on fire and 173 innocents have been killed, he said, without elaborating.

The attacks should not be classified as acts of terrorism because they were made in in retaliation against the armed coup and the dictatorial regime, NUG Defense Minister Ye Mon told RFA.

Attacking the military council is not terrorism. Its just war. We call it a just war because they have forcefully seized power from the elected peoples government People will decide who the terrorist organization is. History will decide. Ye Mon said, adding that the junta is also guilty of war crimes against Myanmars ethnic minority communities.

RFAs Myanmar Service was able to document a dozen killings of junta-imposed administrators.

The pro-democracy forces first killed 39-year-old Okkar, administrator of Homalin Township in the countrys northwestern Sagaing region on April 15. In May, two village officials and a village administrator the northern state of Kachin were killed.

As those who oppose the junta became more organized, more deaths of low-level officials followed.

Facebook profile photo of Soe Soe Lwin, who was appointed administrator of Kyathit ward in Tamwe township, Yangon by Myanmar's junta before her death on June 8, 2021. Credit: Soe Soe Lwin's Facebook page

In June, Soe Soe Lwin and Hla Oo, two junta officials administering parts of the countrys largest city Yangon were killed.

Soe Soe Lwin was ward administrator of Yangons Tamwe township. She died when a bomb exploded at her apartment building on June 8.

A local resident who declined to be named told RFAs Myanmar Service that Soe Soe Lwin had been targeted for supporting the junta.

During her tenure she had acted as an informer. She was killed as an informer to the military, the resident said.

Pro-democracy forces in June also killed the administrator of Bamar Aye ward in Yangons Dawbon township, as well as administrators in Mandalay, and the Magway, Sagaing and Tanintharyi regions.

Additionally, the family members of junta officials have lost their lives.

Two adult daughters of the administrator of Kyiwa village in the Sagaing regions Debayin township, Hla Sandar, 45, and Than Than Sint, 35, a schoolteacher at Sap Pya Kyin Village Basic Education High School were killed on June 13.

Administrators appointed by the military council are often not accepted by the people. It can be said that they acted against the people, a resident of the village told RFA.

What the administrators said and did could have endangered the safety of the residents. We think its possible that they were killed because of such acts, the resident said.

A statement released by the junta on Monday said the two women were killed by Tin Maung Myo, 30, from the same village, and Soe Zeyar, 25, a primary school teacher at Kyi Ywa Basic Education High School, who was part of the Civil Disobedience Movement (CDM), the nationwide anti-junta movement of white collar professionals refusing to work.

A resident told RFA that the militarys allegations could not be substantiated because there were no eyewitnesses of the killings.

In light of the attacks on government officials, other administrators appointed by the junta have resigned for security situation. Residents say this has caused major inefficiencies in the day-to-day bureaucracy.

More than 50 village administrators in the Sagaing regions Kalemyo township resigned, with only seven administrators remaining at their posts.

One former administrator told RFA that he could not continue because he worried for his family.

We do not want our families to be cut off from the people and I dont want to be caught in between the two sides, the administrator, who requested anonymity for security reasons told RFA.

I had no worries in my area or with any of the villagers under my charge, but there are all kinds of people so I cant say for sure. That is why we have to be careful, the former administrator said.

The former administrator said that community elders were forced to take charge of community affairs in their absence.

Sai Kyi Zin Soe, a human rights researcher, told RFA that tolerance for differences in political opinion in Myanmar have evaporated.

We now see that simple matters that could easily be resolved escalate into violence. The military is always using violence to deal with protesters, and they have launched brutal clearing operations in several areas, he said.

A terrorist organization could be borne out of such bitter violence. If grieving people get their hands on weapons, it would be easy for them to resort to violence, said Sai Kyi Zine Soe.

According to statistics from the Thailand-based Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (AAPP), through Thursday 865 people have been killed by the junta, while 4962 have been arrested

But junta chief Sr. Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, has said in an online interview with China-based Phoenix news agency that only about 300 people had been killed.

I cant say [the situation] is now 100 percent under control. There are still some destructive activities in some areas, he said.

The actual number [of dead] is around 300 There will be some casualties, when necessary, responses are made, he said, while claiming that the 300 deaths were the result of protesters turning to violence.

The continuing violence and bloodshed in Myanmar caused UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet to warn that the country was on the brink a humanitarian emergency.

As I had feared, armed conflict and other violence are intensifying in many parts of Myanmar, including Kayah State, Chin State and Kachin State, with the violence particularly intense in areas with significant ethnic and religious minority groups, Bachelet said.

State security forces have continued to use heavy weaponry, including airstrikes, against armed groups and against civilians and civilian objects, including Christian churches, she said.

She called on the military to cease violence, appealing to their sense of duty to protect civilians, while also telling the several newly formed PDFs to be mindful of civilian safety.

Rather than seeking dialogue, the military is branding its opponents as terrorists and pursuing politically motivated charges against the democratic leadership, Bachelet said.

Reported by RFAs Myanmar Service. Translated by Khin Maung Nyane. Written in English by Eugene Whong.
The move forbids the posting of 'inappropriate' content and encourages account holders to inform on other users.

Vietnams government has introduced a nationwide code of conduct for users of social media, forbidding the posting of inappropriate content and urging account holders to inform on other users deemed to be breaking the rules, state media said this week.

Issued on Thursday by the Ministry of Information and Communications (MIC), the new regulations apply to all social media users in Vietnam: public servants, private individuals and organizations, and service providers.

The new code states it is designed to ensure the right to freedom of individuals, but calls at the same time for users not to post information that violates the law, offends the honor and dignity of other organizations and individuals, [or] affects their legitimate rights and interests.

The regulations language closely mirrors that of Article 331 of Vietnams 2015 Criminal Code, under which democracy advocates and independent journalists have often been jailed for abusing the rights to freedom and democracy to violate the interests of the State, the legitimate rights and interests of organizations and individuals.

International human rights organizations and press freedoms watchdog groups have called for the Articles removal from the criminal code on the grounds that it violates Vietnamese citizens rights to freedom of speech and expression and is used only to punish dissent.

The new code of conduct also calls on public servants encountering conflicting and unlawful information related to their work to report these violations to their governing organization, and on service providers to cooperate with the government to remove unlawful content.

Vietnam today is one of the most repressive environments in the world with regards to freedom of expression online, human rights group Amnesty International said in a November 2020 report, Let Us BreatheCensorship and Criminalization of Online Expression in Vietnam.

While the internet has provided an unprecedented opportunity for the Vietnamese people to express and exchange political opinions, it has also left users at increased risk of harassment, intimidation, physical assault and prosecution by state authorities bent on eliminating dissent, Amnesty said in its report.

Harsh forms of persecution

With Vietnams media all following Communist Party orders, the only sources of independently-reported information are bloggers and independent journalists, who are being subjected to ever-harsher forms of persecution, the press freedoms watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) says in its 2021 Press Freedoms Index.

Measures taken against them now include assaults by plainclothes police, RSF said in its report, which placed Vietnam at 175 out of 180 countries surveyed worldwide, a ranking unchanged from last year.

To justify jailing them, the Party resorts to the criminal codes, especially three articles under which activities aimed at overthrowing the government, anti-state propaganda and abusing the rights to freedom and democracy to threaten the interests of the state are punishable by long prison terms, the rights group said.

In its Freedom in the World 2021 report, Washington D.C.-based Freedom House gave Vietnam an overall score of 19 out of a possible 100, a one-point drop from last years rating. Vietnam scored three out of 40 in political rights, and 16 out of 60 in civil liberties.

Freedom of expression, religious freedom, and civil society activism are tightly restricted [and the] authorities have increasingly cracked down on citizens use of social media and the internet, Freedom House said.

Vietnams already low tolerance of dissent deteriorated sharply last year with a spate of arrests of independent journalists, publishers, and Facebook personalities as authorities continued to stifle critics in the run-up to the ruling Communist Party Congress in January. But arrests continue in 2021.

Reported by RFAs Vietnamese Service. Translated by Anna Vu. Written in English by Richard Finney.
Vietnams Minister of Health Nguyen Thanh Long told state media Thursday that the majority of the one million COVID-19 vaccines donated to the country by Japan this week would be used in the three epicenters of the countrys fourth wave of the deadly virus.

Vietnam has been among the most effective countries in tackling COVID-19, reporting no deaths among its 95 million people through late July 2020a record that was attributed to effective contact tracing, strict quarantines, and early testing.

Since then, four separate waves of the virus swept over the country, leaving a trail of 11,794 confirmed cases and 61 deaths.

Since the beginning of the fourth wave in late April, the northern province of Bac Giang has recorded 5,007 cases, while nearby Bac Ninh province confirmed 1,454, and the southern economic hub Ho Chi Minh City reported 1,197.

The minister said Ho Chi Minh City would get 800,000 doses of the British-Swedish AstraZeneca vaccines donated by Japan, with vaccination starting this week.

Vietnam is the first ASEAN country to receive vaccines donated by Japan and the fifth shipment for Vietnam through the COVAX program and individual country donations. It remains the only country in ASEAN to have not used Chinese vaccines.

China has donated 100 million doses to other countries in the region, Chinas Foreign Minister Wang Yi said on June 8.

Hoang Viet, a lecturer from the Ho Chi Minh City Law University told RFAs Vietnamese Service that although China has announced it would be donating vaccines to many different countries, Vietnam was not among them.

The first possibility is that the relationship between Vietnam and China is no longer as warm as before. The second possibility is that China may require some conditions for receiving donations or purchasing vaccines but Vietnam did not accept them," Hoang said.

He also said that the Vietnamese government may have taken into consideration its peoples objection to the use of Chinese vaccines.

"When the government talked about the possibility of buying Chinese vaccines, many people protested, creating pressure and making the government very cautious," he said.

Carl Thayer a professor at the University of New South Wales told RFA, The Vietnamese government presently is casting a wide net seeking vaccine supplies from a variety of countries.

Among the vaccines in use in Vietnam are Russias Sputnik V and the U.S. Moderna vaccine. Additionally, Vietnam recently gave emergency approval for Pfizer vaccine made in Belgium and Germany.

China does not appear to be on Vietnams list due to anticipated widespread public reaction against Chinese vaccine, Thayer said.

In a related development, Mr. Lam Minh Thanh, chairman of the southern province of Kien Giangs Peoples Committee said that the province planned to ask the central government to provide COVID-19 vaccines to all of 170,000 residents on Phu Quoc island so that the popular tourist destination could welcome visitors again from September or October 2021.

Contact tracing

A police officer in the northern coastal province of Nghe An who works in an ID-issuing office had contact with 6,000 people tested positive for COVID-19 according to a report in Ho Chi Minh Citys Public Security Newspaper.

The officer, called patient BN11634 in the report, worked at the photography and fingerprinting section of the Dien Chau district police. He had been on a busy business and travel schedule before being confirmed positive for COVID-19.

His positive test caused Dien Chau and nearby Vinh city to completely close down Thursday.

A person who had contact with BN11634, a public servant at the Dien Chau Peoples Committee tested positive by mid-day Thursday.

The report said it was not clear if the officer could be prosecuted for spreading the virus or not. A 22-year-old woman was Monday prosecuted on charges of spreading COVID-19.

According to the investigation into the womans case, she met with an infected person but did not reveal this to authorities.

Ms. Nguyen Thi Thu Huong, Head of the Propaganda and Education Department under the Nghe An Provincial Party Committee, denied that patient BN11634 had close contact with over 6,000 people.

Responsible agencies in Dien Chau district have traced/examined the case and confirmed 103 contacts, and 6,000 related people of which many have had close contact with the patient, said Huong.

The Tuoi Tre online newspaper quoted Huong as saying that most of the related people were local residents who had come to the headquarters of Dien Chau Peoples Committee to apply for a new ID.

However, Huong did not specify how those, who had close contact with patient BN11634, should be categorized.

Reported by RFAs Vietnamese Service. Translated by Anna Vu. Written in English by Eugene Whong.
The European Union has reached an agreement on economic sanctions on Belarus, Austrias government and EU diplomats say, in response to the forced landing of a Ryanair flight last month in Minsk and the arrest of an opposition activist who was onboard.



Austrias Foreign Ministry said in a statement on June 18 that the agreement "is sending a clear and targeted signal against the Belarusian regime's unbearable acts of repression," while Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg tweeted that the sanctions were "robust and targeted."



EU foreign ministers meeting in Luxembourg on June 21 will discuss the measure agreed upon by experts tasked with drawing up sanctions designed to hit the regime of longtime authoritarian ruler Alyaksandr Lukashenka "in the wallet," AFP quoted a European diplomat as saying.



If agreed by EU governments at a political level, the sanctions would include a ban on new loans, on EU investors from trading securities or buying short-term bonds, on EU banks from providing investment services, and on EU export credits, according to Reuters.



The news agency said EU experts also agreed on a tighter arms embargo and a ban of exports to Belarus of communications equipment that could be used for spying.



The proposed sanctions also reportedly include a ban on importing potash, a major Belarusian export, as well as restrictions on EU purchases from Belarus of tobacco products, oil, and oil-related products.

The June 18 agreement overcame opposition from Austria to targeting the Belarusian financial sector, amid concerns it could hurt Austrian banks with deep ties to Belarus, diplomats said.

The EU has already responded to the diversion of the Ryanair flight between two EU countries by blocking Belarusian airlines from EU airports and airspace. Europe's aviation regulator has also urged other airlines to avoid Belarusian airspace.



EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell earlier told members of the European Parliament that the bloc would likely adopt economic sanctions on Belarus this month.

On May 23, Belarusian authorities scrambled a military jet to escort the passenger flight over its airspace to land in Minsk in what many countries regard as a "state hijacking." After the plane landed law enforcement immediately arrested opposition blogger Raman Pratasevich and his Russian girlfriend, Sofia Sapega.



Belarus's move came amid a brutal crackdown by Belarusian authorities on demonstrations against the disputed results of a presidential election in August 2020.



Election officials say Lukashenka won a sixth term, but the European Union, the United States, and other countries refuse to recognize the official result and do not consider Lukashenka to be the country's legitimate leader.

With reporting by Reuters
Belarusian Foreign Minister Uladzimer Makey has met with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in Moscow to discuss the status of Russian citizen Sofia Sapega -- the girlfriend of the detained Belarusian opposition activist Raman Pratasevich.

Lavrov told journalists on May 18 that Makey informed him about the legal cases in Belarus against Sapega and another Russian citizen, Yegor Dudnikov.

Dudnikov was arrested in Minsk in May after joining mass protests against Belarus's authoritarian ruler Alyaksandr Lukashenka.

"The Russian Embassy in Minsk keeps this matter under special control," Lavrov said, adding that he hopes the situation with Sapega and Dudnikov "will be solved soon." He did not elaborate.

Belarusian authorities on May 23 pulled Sapega and Pratasevich from a civilian airliner meant to fly from Athens to Vilnius after a Belarusian military plane diverted the flight and forced it to land in Minsk.

The diversion of the Ryanair flight by the Belarusian warplane has been condemned internationally as a state hijacking and has prompted Western sanctions against Belarus.

But a Belarusian court on June 14 rejected Sapega's appeal to be released, ruling that her arrest was legal under Belarusian law.

Sapega's lawyer, Alyaksandr Filanovich, says criminal charges have been filed against her. But he has not elaborated, saying he is under a court order not to release details about the case to the public.

The Vyasna human rights center in Minsk says Belarusian authorities have charged Sapega with organizing and preparing activities that violate civil order, organizing "mass disturbances," and inciting hatred.

In an interview with the Kommersant newspaper in late May, Makey said Lukashenka could decide to pardon Sapega or transfer her to Russia to serve a sentence.

The European Union has responded to the diversion of the Ryanair flight between two EU countries by blocking Belarusian airlines from EU airports and airspace. Europe's aviation regulator also has urged other airlines to avoid Belarusian airspace.

Russia has backed Lukashenka's regime in the case.

Russian President Vladimir Putin met with Lukashenka on May 28 -- pushing for further integration between Moscow and Minsk within a so-called Union State.

The decades-old bilateral agreement envisages a union with closer political, economic, and security ties between Russia and Belarus.

With reporting by TASS and Interfax
Lithuania says migrants have been pouring across the border from Belarus in recent weeks and has accused authoritarian leader Alyaksandr Lukashenka of organizing the influx, asserting that many have been lured from Iraq through a sharp increase in the number of flights from Baghdad to Minsk.



From the Belarusian capital, Vilnius contends, the migrants are moved to the border with Lithuania, where Belarusian border guards turn a blind eye as they cross into the European Union member state.



Vilnius has been one of the loudest critics of Lukashenka and advocates for his opponents since Belarus was thrown into turmoil last August when the 66-year-old strongman claimed a sixth presidential term in an election that many voters believe was rigged in his favor, setting off unprecedented protests.



Lithuania offered refuge to Svyatlana Tsikhanouskaya, who supporters say was the real winner of the vote, and to many others targeted in a violent crackdown. Vilnius has become a center for Belarusians in exile, and the two countries have expelled a number of diplomats as ties have worsened in recent weeks.

With the numbers of migrants stuck on the Lithuanian border rising fast, Vilnius has requested aid from the EU's border guard service, Frontex.



"Lithuanian authorities have requested Frontex support at its external border. The agency is currently working closely with the national authorities to determine the scope of its assistance," the Frontex press office told RFE/RL in e-mailed comments.



Belarus and Lithuania share a nearly 680-kilometer-long frontier that serves as an external border of the EU, less than 40 percent of it monitored by electronic surveillance.



Lithuania is also calling on officials in Iraq and Turkey  also thought by officials to be a starting point of the alleged migrant chain to Belarus -- to more thoroughly check those traveling to Minsk.



"We asked the Iraqi government, the Turkish government to step up control of people departing via airports. We know the specific flights and therefore asked to take measures," Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis told the Baltic News Service (BNS) on June 17.

According to data from the Lithuanian State Border Guard Service, 397 people have been detained after crossing from Belarus this year, according to data cited by BNS. By comparison, 81 people were detained in the whole of 2020, 46 in 2019, and 104 in 2018, BNS said.

"It is obvious that a hybrid war is being waged against Lithuania, and illegal migration flows are one of the means," Interior Minister Agne Bilotaite said on June 7.



Lithuania said Belarusian border guards have been covering the tracks of the migrants, with Bilotaite contending this "shows that officials themselves might be cooperating." She said the Interior Ministry has consulted with Lithuania's armed forces on how to tackle the migration situation.

To deal with the rising numbers, Lithuania has set up a temporary camp at Pabrade, northeast of Vilnius and near the border with Belarus, to shelter and process those arriving, Lithuanian media have reported.



Officials in Belarus, as well as Iraq and Turkey, have not commented publicly on the claims. Lukashenka's administration and the Belarusian Foreign Ministry did not immediately respond to e-mails from RFE/RL seeking comment on June 18.



'Migrants And Drugs'



So far, the rising numbers of migrants arriving in Lithuania does not appear to have led to an uptick in asylum applications, according to the EU's European Asylum Support Office (EASO).



"The latest data on asylum applications (up to 6 June) does not indicate any notable increases in applications in Lithuania. Of course, this does not mean that there have not been increases in arrivals of migrants, but rather that, if this is the case, that they have not applied for international protection up until 6 June. It could also be that the data has changed since 6 June," Anis Cassar, an EASO spokesperson, said in e-mailed comments to RFE/RL.



Lukashenka vowed to unleash "migrants and drugs" amid fresh outrage and demands for more penalties and sanctions after his government forced a Ryanair flight from Athens to Vilnius to divert to Minsk on May 23, citing what is widely believed to have been a bogus bomb threat, and arrested Belarusian blogger and journalist Raman Pratasevich and his girlfriend, Russian citizen Sofia Sapega.

In the wake of the incident, Brussels on June 4 banned Belarusian airlines from flying in EU airspace and using its airports.



Before the ban, Belarusian national carrier Belavia operated flights linking Belarus with some 20 airports in Europe, including Paris and Berlin.



On May 26, Lukashenka defended what many in the West have termed a "state hijacking." In a rambling speech to the rubberstamp parliament and members of his inner circle, Lukashenka said: "We stopped drugs and migrants. Now you will eat them and catch them yourselves."



Baghdad To Minsk



Belarus has never been a major tourist destination, and the current situation there has further harmed its reputation. Since his arrest after the Ryanair incident, Pratasevich, has been paraded on state TV with marks on his face and wrists, delivering what are widely considered to be coerced confessions and words of praise for Lukashenka.



While flights in and out of Minsk International Airport are down, there have been more planes from Baghdad arriving in Minsk in recent weeks.

Travelers from Iraq were reported to be taken to several hotels throughout Minsk on June 16, according to the popular Telegram channel Motolko Pomogi.



That same day, RFE/RL's Belarus Service was on hand as some 100 people deplaned on June 16 following a regularly scheduled Iraqi Airways flight to the Belarusian capital. The travelers, all male, were aided on arrival at a kiosk at the terminal by personnel from two travel agencies, Oscartur and JoodLand.



According to Oscartur's Instagram and Facebook accounts, with about 300 and 3,800 subscribers respectively, the agency organizes tours from Iraq to Belarus.



Most of the 28 posts on the Instagram account come from 2017. Contact information is meager, with only a Russian e-mail address and a Belarusian mobile phone number offered.



RFE/RL's Belarus Service contacted Oscartur by phone for comment and was told "Don't call here again!" in an expletive-ridden response.



Joodland has a bigger social media footprint and offices in Baghdad. It says it organizes tours to a wider array of countries, including Russia.



Economic ties between Iraq and Belarus are not extensive, with bilateral trade so low the numbers are not included in the Belarusian state statistics agency's annual figures.



Iraqi Airways has been flying from Baghdad to Minsk since 2017, according to the state-run news agency Belta, with flights now operating on Mondays and Fridays.



On April 26, Minsk National Airport said that the airline Fly Baghdad would also be serving Minsk, with Boeing 737-800 flights between the two capitals on Mondays and Thursdays.



Fly Baghdad's website indicates that it flies to five freight countries: Turkey, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, and Belarus.

Many of the migrants who have been stopped by Lithuanian border guards claim they have no documents, according to Lithuanian Deputy Interior Minister Arnoldas Abramavicius. "They say they are, mostly, from Iraq," as well as Syria, Iran, and Afghanistan, he told RFE/RL.



"The main route they use is Baghdad to Minsk. A plane ticket only costs $400. Some are also arriving from Istanbul," Abramavicius said. He said Vilnius has sent an official request for assistance and information to the Iraqi Embassy in Warsaw, as Iraq has no diplomatic mission in Lithuania, but had not received a response.



Kremlin Playbook?



Lithuanian authorities say they suspect it is part of a coordinated campaign orchestrated by Lukashenka and modeled on what they assert was a recent Russian strategy.



Lithuanian Defense Minister Arvydas Anusauskas has compared the current situation in his country to 2015-16, when suspicions arose that Russia was directing refugees from Central Asia to Finland and Norway by the so-called "Arctic road."



"Dozens of illegal immigrants are currently pouring into Lithuania from Belarus. They claim they are coming from such counties as Iraq, Iran, Syria. Belarus is using hybrid means to give this asymmetrical response to the European Union sanctions," Anusauskas told a virtual meeting of defense ministers from the Northern Group -- an informal grouping of countries on the Baltic and North seas, on June 9.



"We saw a similar scenario in Finland and Norway in 2015-2016 when Russia attempted to destabilize the EU. Belarus is repeating it. The method and principles are the same," he said.

A day after a June 13 cabinet meeting, Lithuanian Interior Minister Bilotaite said the government had "agreed on joint coordinated action and mutual support, and also the assessment of our institutions' existing capabilities.



"With that in mind, and also planned assistance from international partners, there's no need yet to declare a state of emergency," she said in a comment sent to BNS.



Landsbergis, the foreign minister, said on June 17 that he would seek a meeting with counterparts from Iraq and Turkey later in June, when Italy hosts a ministerial meeting of the Global Coalition to Defeat Islamic State.



Landsbergis said that Lithuania wanted to discuss with Turkey and Iraq the possibility that they could beef up security checks of passengers departing for Belarus and repatriate undocumented migrants who end up in Lithuania.
YALTA, Ukraine -- Floods caused by heavy rains have killed a 26-year-old man in Ukraine's Russian-occupied Crimean Peninsula.



The man died in the city of Yalta after he was taken away by water and mud, Crimea's Moscow-imposed governor, Sergei Aksyonov, said on June 18.



The identity of the man was not disclosed.



The Russia-imposed mayor of Yalta, Yanina Pavlenko, said that eight local residents were injured.

"Rivers overflowed their banks. The city's central part is being flooded," Pavlenko said in a statement. "Residents are being evacuated. Most importantly, the city's central area is fully closed now... There are mudslides in different parts near the city. Work to clean up the roads is under way."



Pavlenko also said the entrance to the city was completely closed because "the uncontrolled amounts of water simply sweep off vehicles and people."



Heavy rains overnight flooded all underground passages in the city, leading municipal authorities to suspend public transportation.



On June 17, the Crimean city of Kerch was also flooded by heavy rains.



Aksyonov introduced a state of emergency across the entire peninsula on June 17 as heavy rains continued.
Former Kyrgyz Deputy Prime Minister Taiyrbek Sarpashev has been arrested as part of an investigation into alleged corruption during the development of the Kumtor gold mine project.

The State Committee for National Security (UKMK) says Sarpashev was detained on June 17 on corruption charges.

The UKMK says Sarpashev is suspected of lobbying in the interests of the Canadian firm Centerra Gold by securing legislation that allowed the company to work at higher elevations of the mountains where the mine is located. Kyrgyz officials say that work resulted in environmental damage on two glaciers.

Other recent arrests in the case by Kyrgyz authorities include former Prime Minister Omurbek Babanov, former presidential staff chief Daniyar Narymbaev, and several former and current parliamentary deputies.

The giant Kumtor gold mine project has been the focus of international attention in recent months as Bishkek has moved to take over temporary control of its operations.

Centerra calls Kyrgyzstan's actions "wrongful and illegal."

On May 16, the Canadian firm said it had "initiated binding arbitration to enforce its rights under long-standing investment agreements with the government."

Centerras claims will be adjudicated at arbitration proceedings in Stockholm that are conducted under the rules of the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL).

President Sadyr Japarov has said it was necessary to take over from Centerra Gold in order to remedy environmental and safety violations.

According to a law approved on May 14, Kyrgyzstan's government can take control for up to three months of any company that operates under a concession agreement in Kyrgyzstan if that firm violates environmental regulations, endangers the local environment or lives of people, or causes other significant damage.

Centerra's Kyrgyz subsidiary, Kumtor Gold Company (KGC), Kyrgyzstan's biggest taxpayer, is the only firm in the country that operates under a concession agreement.

On May 17, the head of a Kyrgyz state investigative commission announced that Centerra Gold's mining concession agreement was being revoked over what he called "corruption" and "violations of safety and environmental regulations."

Centerra's chief executive officer, Scott Perry, says Kyrgyzstan's leadership "has acted with astonishing speed" since the beginning of 2021 "to undermine the basis on which the Kumtor mine has been operated."

He said Kyrgyz officials have "refused to engage with us on any matters it considers to be the subject of dispute."

Centerra also has accused Kyrgyz law enforcement of intimidation -- including police visits to the homes of several senior KGC managers and a May 15 raid of KGC's office in Bishkek.

Canada, Britain, and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) have all criticized Kyrgyzstan's moves against Centerra.

Japarov's sudden rise to power in October 2020 after being freed from jail in the midst of a political crisis was particularly bad news for Centerra.

As an opposition politician during the past decade, Japarov led an unsuccessful bid in parliament and at street demonstrations to nationalize the mine.

He oversaw several chaotic rallies against the company -- including a 2013 rally in which a provincial governor was kidnapped. That incident was the basis of Japarov's 2017 arrest and 11-year prison sentence on hostage-taking charges.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has dismissed speculation that Turkey could build a military base in Azerbaijan as "rumors."

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said during a visit to Baku this week that he hasn't ruled out the possibility Ankara could build a military base in Azerbaijan under an agreement he and President Ilham Aliyev signed on June 15.

The so-called Susa Declaration on Allied Relations between Azerbaijan and Turkey calls for stepped-up cooperation between Ankara and Baku in the military sphere.

Lavrov was questioned by journalists on June 18 about the possibility of a Turkish base in Azerbaijan after he'd met in Moscow with Belarusian Foreign Minister Uladzimer Makey.

Lavrov said the topic had not been discussed, adding "we do not comment on rumors."

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on June 18 that Moscow is closely monitoring developments around a potential Turkish base in Azerbaijan.

Such a move by NATO-member Turkey could require Russia to take steps to ensure its own security and interests.

Peskov said Russia was in close contact with Turkey on stabilizing the situation in the South Caucasus after last fall's six-week war between Azerbaijani and Armenian forces over the breakaway region of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Ankara provided Azerbaijan with both diplomatic and military support during the conflict.

Turkey is now jointly operating a cease-fire monitoring center with Russia under the terms of the Russian-brokered cease-fire agreement that brought an end to the fighting last November.

Nagorno-Karabakh is internationally recognized as part of Azerbaijan. But ethnic Armenians who make up most of the region's population still control part of the territory and reject Baku's rule.

With reporting by Reuters and TASS
The Moscow-based Russian State Humanitarian University (RGGU) seeks to use special software to monitor students' inclination for protest, a group called Roskomsvoboda said on June 17.



According to Roskomsvoboda, its members studied Russia's federal site on state purchases and discovered documents announcing a 12 million ruble ($165,000) tender for software that would allow the university to monitor, compile, and analyze data gathered from students' Internet usage.



According to the document, the monitoring would take place around the clock and alert university officials to any information "of particular interest."



The document said that the software would "analyze in detail material related to education, student life, [and] youth politics posted on Internet websites, social networks, blogs, and forums."



Among other things, the software system is also required to highlight the mention of certain names and groups, activities related to discussions about media reports and social groups, and groups of influence in an effort to analyze tensions among students and their potential for protest.



The goals of the system are described in the documents as "monitoring controlled Internet resources, finding vulnerable parts of controlled Internet resources, preventing leaks of protected data, including service and confidential information, and the creation of reports."
A newly released video shows police breaking into a safe house in Daghestan, southern Russia, and seizing Khalima Taramova. The Chechen woman had fled there with a person said to be her girlfriend after what she described as beatings and threats at home. Taramova's father is a close associate of Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov, who is widely accused of being a violent human rights abuser and is openly hostile to gays and lesbians. Warning: Viewers may find the content of this video disturbing.
When U.S. President Joe Biden invited Vladimir Putin to a summit against the wishes of those who cautioned he would be rewarding Moscow for "malign activities," it seemed to some like a long-shot bet to rein in the Russian leader by giving him the respect Kremlin-watchers say he craves.

After the talks in Geneva, Biden indicated he had no illusions about any breakthrough with Putin, whom the United States has accused with increasing frequency of violating international norms, including sanctioning assassination attempts, cyberattacks on civilian infrastructure, and election interference.



"We'll find out within the next six months to a year whether or not we actually have a strategic dialogue that matters," Biden told reporters following his three-hour meeting with Putin on June 16. "Let's see what happens. As that old expression goes, the proof of the pudding is in the eating."



The leaders of the two largest nuclear powers agreed to set up expert groups on the contentious issues of arms control and cybersecurity and rebuild diplomatic channels, including returning the two ambassadors to their posts and potentially reopening consulates.

Russia has said its ambassador, Anatoly Antonov, who was recalled to Moscow in March as tensions heightened, will resume his duties in Washington next week. U.S. Ambassador John Sullivan, who left Moscow for the United States in April, is expected to return to the Russian capital in the coming weeks.



Ballots And Belarus



Analysts say the United States and Russia could potentially make some progress on a few other issues in the coming months, such as agreeing on humanitarian aid to Syria and conducting a prisoner swap. They see a tough and tortuous road for arms control, a key pillar of Biden's foreign policy goals, due to the complexity of the issue.



However, any improvement in relations from progress on those issues could be swept away by unpredictable developments in Belarus, where the Kremlin backs the crackdown by strongman Alyaksandr Lukashenka, or in Ukraine, where Russia backs separatists who hold parts of two eastern provinces amid a now-simmering war that has killed more than 13,000 people since 2014.

Russian parliamentary elections on September 17-19 are another potential tripwire, analysts warned. The Kremlin has stepped up its campaign of pressure against the opposition since the beginning of the year, jailing its most prominent leader, Aleksei Navalny, and outlawing his anti-corruption organization on what are seen in the West as absurd charges that it promotes extremism.



"The election is a real land mine" for the relationship, said Jonathan Katz, a senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States.



"It will be a test of how the administration is going to address Russia and issues of democracy and human rights because we're likely to see -- as we've already seen -- a great crackdown on Russian opposition political parties and media in the next couple months before this so-called election."

At his post-summit press conference, Biden said he told Putin that "we're going raise our concerns about cases like Aleksey Navalny" and "continue to raise issues of fundamental human rights because that's what we are, that's who we are. "



Putin, at his press conference, claimed without evidence that opposition groups are supported by the United States in an attempt to weaken the country.



'Internal Suppression'



Heather Conley, the director of the Europe, Russia, and Eurasia Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, says the Biden administration faces a challenge in balancing his support of democracy globally with the pursuit of strategic stability as the Kremlin takes a sharp turn away from such principles.



"It is going to be a very interesting dilemma for the administration because the Kremlin has as of last year made a decisive decision about internal suppression. There's no going back. It's only going one way, which is more [repression]," she said.



She says the Obama administration found itself in a similar predicament and sought to "compartmentalize" human rights issues to achieve strategic objectives on issues such as arms control, Iran and Afghanistan -- many of the same issues Biden is trying to resolve today.



Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said Russia expected arms-control talks with the United States that were agreed at a summit in Geneva to start within weeks.



Prospects for swift progress on that issue are few and those talks are likely to be lengthy, as Russia and the United States have yet to decide on which classes of weapons will be controlled by treaties.

Both countries are developing new weapon systems, such as hypersonic missiles, that were not covered under previous treaties, only one of which remains in force -- New START, which covers long-range nuclear weapons and, after Biden and Putin extended it in February, is due to expire in 2026.



"All of these are extremely difficult and thorny [issues] so it does need prioritization and a lot of political will," Conley said. "The biggest thing that's absent is trust, particularly for the U.S. side."



Trust And Self-Interest



Biden seemed to suggest that at his press conference following the summit talks, saying that "this is not about trust, it's about self-interest and verification of self-interest."

The United States withdrew from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty in 2019 after accusing Russia of developing and deploying a missile in violation of the 1987 pact.



As for hacking and cyberattacks, Conley says past U.S. attempts to cooperate with Russia on a cybersecurity framework "have not been successful" in part because the Kremlin denies it engages in any of those activities.



The United States has accused Russian intelligence of hacking into U.S. election infrastructure and, more recently, accused criminal actors based in Russia of a ransomware attack against energy infrastructure. Putin rejected the accusations.



"It is difficult to work on those kinds of issues when one side does not acknowledge that they're involved in that," Conley said. She said a goal of the Geneva meeting was to get Putin to follow international norms and rules such as those for cyberspace by showing him the respect a summit with a U.S. president confers.



"Will Mr. Putin respect those rules? That's the question," she said.

Yuval Weber, a research assistant professor at Texas A&M's Bush School of Government and Public Service in Washington, says Putin needs to tread carefully with the cyberattacks.



He says they get the attention of the United States and Biden but also damage Putin's international reputation and threaten to make Russia a pariah state. "Putin is going to have to find something that will demonstrate that he's sincere about working with the United States," he said.



But if Moscow does begin to ease off on cyberattacks and other methods of harrying the United States, it may want to exact a high price in return, Weber said. One cost it could seek might be an assurance that Ukraine won't be put on track for NATO membership anytime soon.



A day after the summit, Putin's spokesman made clear that NATO membership for Ukraine is one of Russia's "red lines."



First Steps?



One of the first signs of progress from the Geneva talks could come in a July 10 vote at the UN Security Council on humanitarian aid for millions of people in Syria, analysts said.

The United States supports extending the authorization for assistance to be allowed to cross through Bab al-Hawa, the sole border crossing for humanitarian aid from Turkey to northwestern Syria.

Russia, which has given Syrian President Bashar al-Assad crucial support throughout the decade-long war that started with the suppression of protests, has used its veto power in the past to restrict aid.

A prisoner swap is also a real possibility in the coming months, analysts said.

The United States accuses Russia of holding American citizens Paul Whelan and Trevor Reed on trumped-up charges.



Biden raised the men's fate during the summit with Putin, who has not ruled out an exchange for Russians imprisoned in the United States.



"I said the families of the detained Americans came up and we discussed it," "We're going to follow through with that discussion," Biden said at his press conference, without giving details. "I am not going to walk away on that issue."
The Kremlin on June 18 blamed a fresh surge in COVID-19 infections on "overwhelming nihilism" among Russians.

Meanwhile, Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin announced an extension until June 29 of restrictions imposed earlier this week.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Russia's vaccination campaign had clearly not been as effective as desired. He said President Vladimir Putin was closely monitoring the situation.

Sobyanin earlier announced the closure of Moscow's Euro 2020 fan zone and a ban on gatherings of more than 1,000 people.

"I didn't want to do this, but we have to," Sergei Sobyanin wrote on his website. "Starting today, we will limit mass events to a maximum of 1,000 people."

"We are temporarily stopping all mass entertainment events and we'll also have to close dance halls and fan zones," he wrote, referring to the Euro 2020 fan zone outside of the Luzhniki stadium in Moscow.

Peskov told reporters that "overwhelming nihilism, a low vaccination rate, and the deviousness of the infection itself" were the cause of Moscow's record surge in infections.

Peskov was echoing the opinion of Anna Popova, the head of Russia's health watchdog Rospotrebnadzor. On June 17, she also had blamed the spike in daily infections on Russians' disregard for preventative measures.

"[The infection growth] is linked to three reasons that are completely clear," she told Rossiya-1 TV. "The first is total nihilism for the measures that we used to protect ourselves from the coronavirus for a long time."

Sobyanin had said this week that the Russian capital was facing a new, more aggressive and infectious coronavirus variant.

Sobyanin this month ordered mandatory vaccinations for a number of service workers in the city and declared this week a nonworking week. Businesses will return to work on June 21.

On June 17, authorities in three other Russian regions -- the broader Moscow region, the Siberian region of Kemerovo, and the Far East region of Sakhalin -- said they planned to introduce the compulsory coronavirus vaccinations in the service sector, including in retail, education, and health care.

Critics of the requirement say there is no legal basis for companies to pressure staff to get shots in order to meet the decrees and avoid penalties.



Russia was among the first countries in the world to roll out a vaccination campaign, but there is widespread hesitancy to get a shot.

WATCH: Facing A COVID-19 Surge, Moscow Makes Vaccines Mandatory For Some Workers



As of early June, only 12 percent of Russias 146-million population had received at least one dose.



Even in Moscow, only 15 percent of the city's population of 12 million has been vaccinated.



Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin said on June 17 that the situation was "extremely difficult" and the country must step up the vaccination pace."



"Experts speak of the emergence of new strains that not only spread rapidly, but also lead to serious complications," he said.



Authorities say the so-called delta variant that hit India hard and has since spread around the world is behind the rise of cases in Russia.



The delta variant is believed to be faster-spreading than other strains of the virus and there is some evidence to suggest it causes higher hospitalization rates.



Russia has reported almost 5.3 million confirmed virus cases and nearly 128,000 deaths, although real figures are believed to be much higher.

Based on reporting by Reuters, AP, dpa, and Interfax
A rally was held in Kyiv, Ukraine, in memory of Kateryna Handziuk, an anti-corruption activist and public official who died on November 4, 2018, three months after being severely injured in an acid attack. At the June 17 event, participants lit flares and painted the road in front of the Interior Ministry, writing out the names of police officers who, they allege, failed to properly investigate the killing. In the acid attack on July 31, 2018, Handziuk, suffered burns to more than 35 percent of her body, requiring 11 separate surgical operations in an attempt to save her life.
Ukraine has imposed punitive sanctions on Dmytro Firtash, a powerful tycoon indicted by the United States for corruption, as President Volodymyr Zelenskiy widens his crackdown against influential elites ahead of his first official visit to Washington next month.



National Security and Defense Council Secretary Oleksiy Danylov on June 18 announced the sanctions against Firtash, who is currently living in Vienna while fighting extradition to the United States.



In announcing the sanctions, Danylov accused Firtash of selling titanium to Russia's defense industry. Kyiv is engaged in a war against Kremlin-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine that has left more than 13,000 people dead since 2014.

Ukraine's security chief also announced sanctions on businessman Pavel Fuchs over his acquisition of more than a dozen natural-gas fields from a former official tied to the government of former President Viktor Yanukovych, who was ousted in a popular uprising in 2014.



Firtash and Fuchs have been linked to former President Donald Trump's personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, who sought dirt in Ukraine on President Joe Biden's son, Hunter.



Zelenskiy will meet Biden for the first time in Washington in July.



Danylov did not give details about the sanctions, although they historically freeze an individual's assets inside Ukraine, including bank accounts.



Firtash controls key businesses in Ukraine's chemical, titanium, and natural-gas industries. Forbes this year listed him as the country's 25th-wealthiest individual, with a net worth of $420 million.



The United States indicted Firtash, who is believed to have strong ties to the Kremlin, in March 2014, shortly after Russia seized Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula.

U.S. prosecutors accuse the Ukrainian businessmen of paying bribes to officials in India for licenses to mine titanium, which they planned to sell to U.S. aerospace giant Boeing.



Firtash denies the charges and calls them politically motivated. He is currently seeking a new trial after Austria's Supreme Court upheld his extradition in 2019.



Although he has lived in Austria since 2014, Firtash has continued to prosper financially in Ukraine. He is believed to control around 75 percent of the country's gas-supply companies.



Yuriy Vitrenko, the CEO of the state-owned natural gas company Naftogaz, told RFE/RL earlier this month that he suspected Firtash might be shifting his profits from Ukraine's gas industry to affiliated companies in Western Europe through a scheme known as transfer pricing.



He also expressed concern that Firtash was selling gas he bought at below-market prices from Naftogaz to industrial users in violation of an agreement.

'Hold Them To Account'



George Kent, the deputy U.S. assistant secretary of state who oversees Ukraine, called on Kyiv in April to go after Firtash as part of its anti-corruption agenda.



Kent highlighted Firtash's role as an importer in the 1990s and 2000s of gas from Russia, a business that many officials and analysts have said was rife with graft.



"Why is it that it is the U.S. who indicts and goes after corrupt Ukrainians?" Kent said, referring to the U.S. indictment against Firtash.



"It's time for the Ukrainian leadership and the justice system -- rather than not making decisions against corrupt oligarchs -- to use Ukrainian institutions to go after corrupt Ukrainians and hold them to account," he said.



The Biden administration has made Kyiv's progress on reforms, including fighting corruption, a greater priority in the two countries' relationship.

U.S. officials and analysts have expressed concern about a rollback of Ukraine's reform agenda over the past year, including the dismantling of anti-corruption legislation.



Biden stressed the need for Ukraine to push ahead with tough economic and political changes as well as tackle corruption in a phone call with Zelenskiy on June 7. During the call, Biden extended an invitation to the Ukrainian leader to visit the White House this summer.

When asked a day later by Senator Chris Murphy (Democrat-Connecticut) during a Foreign Relations Committee hearing if there were any reforms that the Biden administration wanted to see Ukraine deliver prior to Zelenskiy's White House visit, Secretary of State Antony Blinken cited several, including a desire to see "people engaged in corrupt practices brought to justice."



In an op-ed posted on the website of the Atlantic Council, a Washington-based think tank, Zelenskiy said his administration would be taking steps to rein in the power of tycoons like Firtash who wield great influence on Ukraine from behind the scenes.



Ukrainian and Western experts blame the tycoons for blocking crucial economic and political reforms that could put the country on a path toward greater prosperity and European integration. They have called for them to be investigated by an independent judiciary amid concern Zelenskiy's use of sanctions could become a substitute to proper legal institutions.

Zelenskiy's administration in February placed sanctions on Viktor Medvedchuk, a powerful tycoon and politician close to Russian President Vladimir Putin, for allegedly helping the separatists in eastern Ukraine.
SAMARKAND, Uzbekistan -- Authorities in Uzbekistan's southeastern region of Samarkand say they have detained six alleged members of Hizb ut-Tahrir, an Islamist group banned in 2016 by Uzbekistan's Supreme Court as an extremist organization.



The Interior Affairs Directorate of the Samarkand region says the group was apprehended on June 17 in the district of Urgut.



"Some of the suspects were previously convicted for propagating ideas of terrorist groups," the directorate said.



Hizb ut-Tahrir is a global organization based in London that seeks to unite all Muslim countries into an Islamic caliphate.

The group says its methods for reaching that goal are peaceful.
Given the low expectations for their June 16 summit, U.S. President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin may have headed home from Geneva with the sense of a modest mission accomplished. It was an easier reach for Putin than for Biden, who may face pressure for results in the months ahead.

Here are some of the key developments in Russia over the past week and some of the takeaways going forward.

'Clearly Pleased'

With expectations pared to a minimum, both U.S. President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin can probably say they achieved their goals, modest as they were, at their June 16 summit in Geneva.

Biden and Putin shook hands, exchanged unpleasantries, agreed to have their people get in touch with their other people, and moved on, Sam Greene, director of the Russia Institute at Kings College London, wrote wryly in a newsletter the day after the meeting. "In other words, the summit was a resounding success."

And Olya Oliker, Europe and Central Asia director at the International Crisis Group, tweeted shortly after the summit ended that both came out of this looking good to their core audiences.

Compared to Biden, who faced criticism from some quarters for holding the meeting at all, the bar was arguably much lower for Putin: All he really had to do was get invited and show up.

Putin apparently got what he wanted from this summit, Dmitry Oreshkin, a Russian political analyst who is not aligned with the Kremlin, told Current Time shortly after a solo post-summit press conference in which he said Putin seemed self-assured -- or, as one journalist covering the meeting put it, in which Putinwas clearly pleased by whatever Putin had to say.

WATCH: Putin On Meeting Biden: I Think There Were Glimmers Of Trust

Asked what it was Putin had wanted, Oreshkin replied: Putin wanted a summit.

He wanted to break the blockade of hisperipherality and his toxicity, Oreshkin said, as well as what he described with a Russian word that might be best translated as unhandshakeability -- if such a thing existed in English.

So in the end, all the parsing of the presidential handshake and the short, chaotic portion of the summit that was conducted before cameras was probably superfluous -- for Putin, any handshake at all meant mission accomplished.

For the same reason that summit success was within easy reach for Putin, it seemed like a substantially bigger challenge for Biden.

Aside from maybe a few negligible voices on the margins of discourse in Russia, Putin will face zero criticism or negative political consequences for meeting with Biden.

In fact, Greene calculated that with the exception of a few outliers, U.S.-Russia summits involving Putin have handed him average ratings increases of 1 percent immediately, nearly 2 percent three months later, and nearly 3 percent six months later.

It's The Elections

Thats important to Putin right now: One of his main levers of power, the dominant but unpopular United Russia party, faces a test in elections to the lower house of parliament, the State Duma, that Putin scheduled for September 19, as expected, in a decree issued the day after the meeting with Biden.

And far from applying any pressure on Putin, state-run and Kremlin-friendly private media outlets have, as usual, helped amplify a narrative favorably comparing Putin to Biden -- right down to the color of their neckties.

At least, they were doing so until one day after the summit, when Putin abruptly criticized the fawning chorus for making Biden out to be a doddering fool and said that on the contrary, he is sharp and on the ball.

Putin's praise for Biden sounded like a reward for meeting with him -- and may also have been based on the calculation that it is more impressive to match wits with someone who has them than with someone who does not.

In contrast to Putin, meanwhile, Biden has been taken to task at home by some on both sides of the political divide who contend that Putin should be shunned until he changes his ways, not prodded into doing so. That, they caution, has been tried by several presidents over Putins 21-plus years in power, with little or no result.

Calling for punishment of Putins Russia, they argue that almost any engagement is, on the contrary, an incentive for more misconduct.

At his own solo press conference after the talks, Biden pointedly rejected those arguments, saying the reasons for meeting Putin were "pretty straightforward."

One, there is no substitutefor a face-to-face dialogue between leaders. None, he said. And President Putin and I had a -- share a unique responsibility to manage the relationship between two powerful and proud countries -- a relationship that has to be stable and predictable.

He also hit back against Putins whataboutism, rejecting the Russian presidents effort to equate Americans who stormed the Capitol in Washington, D.C. in a bid to overturn the 2020 presidential election result with Russian protesters seeking basic rights and freedoms as ridiculous.

And he vowed to stand up for the universal rights and fundamental freedoms that all men and women have, in our view, saying thats why were going to raise our concerns about cases like Aleksei Navalny, the imprisoned Kremlin critic who survived a poisoning last year that he blames on Putin.

'A Formidable Task'

Biden also said the United States would respond to cyberattacks and would not tolerate election interference, adding: The bottom line is, I told President Putin that we need to have some basic rules of the road that we can all abide by.

Putin made no commitment to abide by any such rules, and in his own defiant comments rejected all criticism. He can claim that he made no compromises at the summit.

Biden can, too. But he is likely to face more pressure than Putin for progress beyond the modest deliverables that were duly delivered: agreements to bring back the ambassadors who returned to their capitals earlier this year amid rising tension, and for a strategic stability dialogue that would lay the groundwork for future arms control and risk reduction measures" between the nuclear-armed former Cold War foes.

As time passes, Bidens backers and detractors will be watching Russia to see whether Putin changes his conduct -- something the president, in a testy exchange at the close of his press conference in Geneva, suggested was far from guaranteed.

Im not confident hell change his behavior. What will change their behavior is if the rest of the world reacts to them and it diminishes their standing in the world, he said. Im not confident of anything; Im just stating a fact.

Reining in what U.S. officials have called Moscows malign activities is a formidable task, Andrew Weiss, vice president at the Carnegie Institute for International Peace, told The Wall Street Journal.

People in the Biden administration are savvy enough to know thatPutin has no intention of crawling into a box so the U.S. can give its undivided attention to China, he said.

Thomas Graham, a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations who was a top adviser on Russia during the George W. Bush administration, told the newspaper that after the summit "were off to a good start and Putin sees himself as a major player on the world stage."

But how long that lasts is an open question, he said. If he doesnt feel hes getting enough respect hell do something to get our attention again."
EDITOR'S NOTE: This story was originally published on June 7, 2021 by the Ohio History Connection. Richland Source has entered into a collaborative agreement with the Ohio History Connection to share content across our sites.

(This is a special joint piece about the history of Serpent Mound from Ben Barnes, Chief of the Shawnee Tribe and Dr. Brad Lepper, Archaeology Curator at Ohio History Connection.)

In April of this year, former U.S. Senator Rick Santorum told the Young America's Foundation that before Europeans arrived in America there was nothing here.

This astonishing claim echoes the response given by former Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau to First Nations leaders who said that the land belonged to Native people. Trudeau replied, I dont see it written anywhere that the land is yours. Upon hearing this claim, Deborah Sparrow, a member of the Musqueam First Nation in Canada, thought to herself, It is written in the earth. The evidence is everywhere that we have lived in the land. Anywhere that we open the earth, so are unveiled the messages from the past.

Messages from Ohios indigenous past are, indeed, everywhere. In some places, however, they are not veiled by the earth, but are built from it. Serpent Mound, located in Adams County, Ohio, is the most widely recognized effigy mound in the world. There is, however, considerable disagreement over the stories it has to tell.

Archaeologists agree that the ancestors of American Indians built the mound, but disagree about which particular ancestors. We think the available evidence supports a Late Precontact period age of around AD 1100, whereas some other archaeologists think it was built at around 300 BC during the Early Woodland period.

Some think the mound represents a serpent with an egg in its jaws. Others think the so-called egg is the serpents eye or its open mouth.

When viewed in the context of Late Precontact period rock art and American Indian oral traditions, Lepper and several colleagues think the entire earthwork represents an episode from a creation story involving the Great Serpent and First Woman that was told among the Dhegiha Siouan tribes.

This doesnt necessarily mean the ancestors of these groups built the serpent.

The same creation story, or variations on the same theme, originally may have been widely shared among many tribes in eastern North America. The Shawnee, for example, have a tradition of a female creator with many of the characteristics of First Woman; and still have amongst their traditional, religious community a Snake Clan, which speaks powerfully to the importance and durability of the serpent in at least one modern-era Shawnee traditional community.

Serpent Mound may have a cosmic connection like many of the Hopewell earthworks, such as the Octagon Earthworks at Newark.

The head and oval are aligned to the setting sun on the Summer Solstice. Two Late Precontact stone serpent effigies in the valley below the Fort Ancient Earthworks also have alignments to the sun, which supports a Late Precontact age for the sun-aligned Serpent Mound.

Some think the three main curves of the Great Serpents body are aligned to the Summer Solstice sunrise, the Equinoxes, and the Winter Solstice sunrise.

The problem with this idea is that the sight lines are very short, which means there is a lot of wiggle room in the proposed alignment. The extent of this wiggle room is indicated by the fact that other investigators think the same three curves are aligned to some of the key risings of the Moon in its 18.6-year-long cycle.

They cant both be right.

Even though archaeologists disagree about a lot of things regarding the Great Serpent Mound, theres a lot we do agree on.

It wasnt built by ancient astronauts or giants or the Lost Tribes of Israel. It was built by the ancestors of the American Indian tribes with historic ties to the Ohio Valley and its a magnificent example of ancient American Indian monumental art, which has inspired modern artists, such as Ohios Maya Lin, who created a huge serpentine earthwork, which she named Eleven Minute Line.

For the 2021 Summer Solstice (June 20), the Shawnee are returning to their homeland to reconnect with one of the places sacred to their ancestors. And this place is not nothing.

Serpent Mound is a National Historic Landmark. Its also on the United States Department of the Interiors Tentative List of sites to be considered for nomination to the UNESCO World Heritage List.

When you visit Serpent Mound, regardless of when you come or what you might think about when the ancestors of American Indians built it, what the oval earthwork at the head of the mound represents, or whether it was built to align to the setting sun on the Summer Solstice, recognize that American Indians consider it to be a sacred site. We ask you to treat this remarkable place as you would any cathedral, synagogue, or mosque.

If youre interested in learning more about Serpent Mound, you can check out the following links below.

And if youd like to support the ongoing preservation of this American Indian site, visit the website here.

Serpent Mound, site information

Ancient Ohio Trail: Serpent Mound

Serpent Mound, Ohio History Central

Ohio Memory Serpent Mound Collection

The Mississippian Iconography of Serpent Mound
In the fall of 1900, Mansfield had the attention of the entire nation for a brief and somber moment. That was the day the citys favorite son, Senator John Sherman, came home for the last time and was laid to rest with pomp and ceremony.

It is perhaps difficult to imagine today  over 100 years later  just what Senator Sherman meant to Mansfield, but it is significant that so long after his life was over his name is still stamped on this city in maps with parks and streets and institutions.

For nearly 50 years in the 1800s people here and across the nation got used to associating John Sherman with Mansfield in U.S. newspapers and in the Congressional Record. Though he kept a home in Washington D.C., where his life focused, he always considered himself a Mansfield resident. He was proud to claim our city as his hometown to reporters and in the text of his Senatorial speeches.

His home in Mansfield was without question the largest mansion in town, which was an apt symbol to indicate the esteem with which he was regarded here.

It was in Mansfield where Sherman first began his law practice before he ran for Congress. He developed such a keen legal mind that he became one of the most powerful lawmakers in the U.S. Government for recognizing the laws needed to shape society. It is notable that the Sherman Antitrust Act still bears his name, and still 125 years later his name is regularly invoked with that law in courts around the country, on Wall Street, and in Congress.

He was employed on Capitol Hill for nearly 50 years, and it wasnt because nobody of consequence ever ran against him. He lasted because Ohio recognized his value.

He ran for President in four successive national election years, and in at least one of those races he was a very promising contender for the Republican nomination well into the convention balloting.

He was lifted out of the Senate during the Rutherford B. Hayes Administration to serve as Secretary of the Treasury, and again during his last years, during the William McKinley Administration, to be Secretary of State.

It is fair to say that he rose in the nations consciousness steadily and continually from the time of Abraham Lincoln, when he loudly supported Emancipation in the heated debates, until the end of his career, when he put his job on the line in order to oppose the Spanish-American War.

By the turn of the century he was the last man in Congress who had taken part in the great debates that ushered in the Civil War, and his death represented the end of an era.

It is altogether fitting that the nation officially said goodbye to him at the end with the most dignified honors possibles, and meaningful to Mansfield that this rite of national passage took place in the streets and in the hearts of our town.
FREDERICKTOWN  The Ohio Attorney Generals Bureau of Criminal Investigation along with the Knox County Sheriffs Office and Fredericktown Police Department are seeking the publics assistance in identifying a man who pointed a firearm at a peace officer Thursday during a traffic stop near Fredericktown.

On Thursday afternoon, the Fredericktown Police Department conducted a traffic stop on a red Pontiac Grand Am near the intersection of Armentrout Road and Upper Fredericktown-Amity Road.

As the officer approached the vehicle, driver pointed a firearm outside the drivers window at the officer. The officer fired at the driver, who then sped off. The officer pursued the vehicle for a short time but eventually lost the vehicle, which was ultimately found abandoned in Richland County.

The interaction was captured on the officers body-worn camera. Law enforcement officials are releasing the image in hopes of identifying the driver.

Anyone with information about the unidentified individual shown in the BCI public bulletin issued Friday is urged to contact the Knox County Sheriffs Office at 740-397-3333.

The Fredericktown Police Department and Knox County Sheriffs Office requested BCIs help in investigating the officer-involved critical incident. The BCI investigation remains ongoing.

The image is also available on the attorney general's Twitter page.
MANSFIELD -- The two men shot Wednesday evening, including a 20-year-old Columbus man shot by a Mansfield police officer, were both in the hospital Thursday afternoon, according to police Chief Keith Porch.

"The last report I had they were both still alive," Porch said, adding he didn't know the medical condition of either man.

The two men are:

-- Alexander D. Maxwell, 20, of Columbus, who was shot by police, who believe he was a suspect in an earlier shooting.

-- Ryan D. Bond, 22, of Mansfield, who was shot on Johns Avenue at 6:14 p.m.

It would appear both men, initially taken to OhioHealth Mansfield Hospital, have been transferred to medical facilities in other cities.

Christina Thompson, media relations and communications manager for OhioHealth Mansfield Hospital, said Thursday afternoon she had no information about patients with those names.

Porch said officer Jordan Moore, 25, remains on administrative leave, which is department policy after a shooting incident.

The chief said the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation is investigating the officer-involved shooting.

"Once they are done with their investigation, they will take it directly to the (Richland County) prosecutor's office," Porch said, adding it would likely be presented to a grand jury.

The chief said BCI will interview Moore as part of his investigation and that an internal shooting review will also be done before consideration is given to returning the officer to duty.

"I would hate to try to put a date on that," Porch said.

On Thursday evening, Leonard Dillon, president of the Mansfield Chapter of the NAACP, issued a statement to "publicly express concern" over the shooting.

"Moore is the officer who was filmed dragging a teen last summer, resulting in a mere 10-day suspension, much to a lot of the community's dismay," DIllon said.

"While we are also aware that we do not have all the facts of the most recent incident, we would like to formally express that, given the circumstances, we will be keeping a close watch on the development of this case, and the outcomes for Officer Jordan Moore's actions," Dillon said.

Dillon said the NAACP offers its support to the community "to ensure that the incident is resolved in a manner that the community deserves and invite anyone who may have witnessed the incident that occurred on the evening of June 16, 2021, or have other incidents to report involving Officer Jordan, or other officers, to get in touch with us directly at 419-522-9894."

Dillon said complaints involving law enforcement, and all other complaints to the NAACP, may now be filed online, using the following link: NAACP Mansfield Complaint Form, or with this complaint form:

During a Wednesday evening meeting with media, the chief said officers responded to a shooting in the 400 block of Johns Avenue at 6:14 p.m., finding a 22-year-old male victim with multiple gunshot wounds.

Porch said officers investigating the shooting were given a description of a male suspect.

"A short time later, (Moore) observed a subject operating a vehicle matching the description of the suspected shooter," Porch said. "The officer attempted to stop the vehicle in the area of West Third Street and Sycamore Avenue, at which time the vehicle fled from the officer and a pursuit ensued."

The chief said the suspect fled from his vehicle in the 600 block of West Fourth Street, leading to a foot pursuit.

"(Moore) caught up to the suspect and during the ensuing struggle, the suspect pulled a gun, at which time the officer fired his weapon, striking the suspect," the chief said.

Porch said Wednesday evening a gun was recovered at the scene of West Fourth Street shooting.

An eight-minute dashcam video inside Moore's cruiser was released by police on Thursday. The video begins with Moore turning his cruiser to begin following Maxwell's car. The officer activated his siren and attempted to make a car stop.

Maxwell made several turns as Moore remained in pursuit. He stopped and got out of the car in the driveway of a West Fourth Street building and was tackled by the officer in front of the car.

As the altercation moved to stairs to the left, Moore's cruiser rolled forward and stopped against the building and the remainder of the incident took place out of the camera's view.

The siren remains on and it's difficult to hear the entire verbal exchange between Maxwell and Moore.

However, the sounds of the physical struggle can be heard, as well as Moore's apparent usage of a stun and then six total gunshots -- two sets of three with a pause between the two groups.
Rocky Mount, NC (27804)

Today

Thunderstorms likely, especially this morning. Storms may contain strong gusty winds. High 79F. Winds WSW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 80%..

Tonight

Widely scattered showers or a thunderstorm this evening. Then partly cloudy. Low 64F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 40%.
Danvers, MA (01923)

Today

Steady light rain this morning. Showers continuing this afternoon. Cooler. High near 60F. Winds NE at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 60%..

Tonight

Cloudy skies early, then off and on rain showers overnight. Low 58F. Winds NE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 40%.
Danvers, MA (01923)

Today

Rain showers early becoming more intermittent for the afternoon. Cooler. High 61F. Winds NE at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 60%..

Tonight

Cloudy with occasional showers overnight. Low 57F. Winds NE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 40%.
A few days after his aunt died by suicide in 2016, Carlsbad resident Jeff Holland went to her apartment and was stunned to find virtually every visible surface covered with Post-It notes and index cards filled with hand-written notes of inspiration and affirmation.

They were everywhere ... on the walls and mirrors, inside cabinets and in mindfulness workbooks, he said. It occurred to me that she must have been struggling with thoughts of depression and anxiety, and it got me thinking about what we could do for other people who struggle with this.

That was the seed for Coping Cards, a box of of 365 laminated wallet-size cards pre-printed with a mix of motivational statements, affirmations and activities that could be used as part of a patients continuing-care program to combat negative thoughts.

Over the past 18 months, he and his wife Jen Holland, a licensed marriage and family therapist, developed Coping Cards, a product he unveiled last week in a monthling Kickstarter campaign.

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His goal is to raise $15,000 for the first printing of the card sets, which would be sold for $25 at medical offices, in stores and on Amazon.com.

Jeff Hollands Coping Cards pack will have 365 cards divided between affirmations, motivational phrases and activities. (Charlie Neuman / San Diego Union-Tribune)

He timed the announcement for September, which is Suicide Prevention Month, and says the card release is a tribute to his aunts memory.

She was a newly retired teacher who lived alone in Kansas City, Mo., and was just 59 years old when she died. Holland said her death took his family by surprise.

We didnt really see any cues or clues that she was considering anything near this drastic, he said. Everybody in the family was shocked.

Holland, 48, works as the head of North American public relations and events for Mitsubishi Motors USA in Cypress. With his demanding work schedule, it had never occurred to him to create a product and Kickstarter campaign. But he wanted to help people like his late aunt who struggled silently and to save families the grief of finding out too late how much their loved one was suffering.

Its a way to honor her and to create more awareness about suicide. The statistics are staggering, he said. Every time I hear the news about a celebrity taking their life its a reminder to me of what my aunt went through and it makes me want to help.

Each year, nearly 45,000 Americans die by suicide, and for every suicide death there are 25 attempts, according to the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention.

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Suicides have risen by 25 percent since 1999, and the age group with the highest rate of suicide is adults ages 45 to 54, followed by adults 85 and over, the foundation reported.

The use of hand-written or printed coping notes and cards is not new. Its been used successfully around the world, particularly for people with anxiety issues.

Whats new with Hollands Coping Cards is how the card deck is designed and organized and how it aims to counter suicidal thoughts.

The pack  which he hopes to bring to market later this year  will have one card for every day of the year. The cards are divided into three sets: motivational thoughts, affirmations and activities.

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Examples of motivation and affirmation cards include sayings like: Worry will not strip tomorrow of its burdens, it will strip today of its joy and If you want something you dont have you need to change what youre doing. Activity cards include: Relax your face, Go for a drive and Take a 10-minute walk.

The words on the cards and categories were developed by Hollands wife, Jen, and her fellow therapists at a clinic in San Diego. They use tools like these to help their patients deal with the daily responsibilities, pressures and stressors of life.

Self-care is so important yet its often neglected, she said. Coping Cards can be a quick and easy way to spend a few minutes each day focusing on self-care and getting in a positive head space.

Since introducing the Coping Cards campaign, Holland said hes been overwhelmed with positive feedback from his family and friends, as well as therapists who are interested in giving the cards out to clients.

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We know a lot of people who have been touched by this, he said. It makes me so proud that Ive done something like this and can hopefully help even random strangers. Its something people need.

The Kickstarter campaign, which runs through Oct. 6, is about 20 percent funded. To learn more, visit kickstarter.com and search for Coping Cards.

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pam.kragen@sduniontribune.com
A woman once dubbed the Fatal Attraction Killer after killing her ex-boyfriend in Carlsbad more than 31 years ago agreed to forego a parole hearing scheduled Tuesday, according to a prosecutor.

Technically, the next parole hearing for Linda Ricchio wont be set for three years. But as part of her agreement to waive Tuesdays review, Ricchio agreed that she is unsuitable for parole, but she can ask the state parole board to consider setting a hearing sooner than 2022.

Ricchio, now 58, was a San Diego State University student when she shot and killed ex-boyfriend Ron Ruse in front of his apartment in December 1987. The pair had dated for about six years. He was seeing another women when he was gunned down.

After the Carlsbad killing, some called Ricchio the Fatal Attraction Killer, a reference to the 1987 thriller in which a spurned mistress targets her married lover and his family.

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Linda Ricchio (Courtesy California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation)

Deputy District Attorney Tom Manning prosecuted Ricchio about three decades ago. He represented the District Attorneys Office at what turned out to be an abbreviated hearing at California Institution for Women, the Corona prison where Ricchio is housed.

We are adamantly opposed to her release, Manning said after the hearing Tuesday. In our opinion, she still poses an extreme danger to the community.

According to Manning, Ricchios attorney said his client agreed to forego the parole review because she has filed or will file a lawsuit of some sort. Manning did not elaborate, and the Union-Tribune was not immediately able to identify or reach Ricchios attorney.

At trial, according to news reports, Ricchio testified that her plan was to have Ruse witness her suicide, but that he had lunged at her as she raised the gun to shoot herself, and the gun went off.

Ricchio also testified that she did not remember firing four more shots or that Ruse tried to flee, running down the stairs.

Parole commissioners have reviewed Ricchios case a few times before, rejecting her parole bids at least three times, including in 2016.

The following year, in 2017, a panel of commissioners found Ricchio suitable for parole. However, in 2018, then-Gov. Jerry Brown reversed that decision.

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In that written decision, Brown called the killing a brutal crime that was the culmination of a calculated, all-out campaign to ruin Ron Ruses life

After Ms. Ricchio stalked, harassed and threatened Mr. Ruse for months, she moved into the apartment directly next to his, and shot him multiple times in the side and back as he fled for her life, the decision states.

Tuesdays hearing was Ricchios first time back in front of the parole board since Browns decision.

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teri.figueroa@sduniontribune.com

(760) 529-4945

Twitter: @TeriFigueroaUT
Toni Bishop-McWain brings 25 years of experience plus strong ties to the region as Saratoga Hospital's new chief nursing officer.
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In recent years, China's ambitious space program has achieved significant progress. Its next task would be to study asteroids, Jupiter, and Uranus.

When China's Zhurong rover arrived on Mars this week, it became only the third country to successfully soft-land on the Red Planet.

China Wants to Reach Jupiter by 2029

China National Space Administration said China's space exploration goals are picking up steam, with a mission to reach Jupiter, the solar system's most giant planet, in 2029.

The CNSA also stated that the government would explore a comet and collect more moon samples in the coming years and collect samples from Mars and an asteroid.

"In 2029, we will carry out a mission for Jupiter exploration," Xu Hongliang, secretary-general of the space agency, said on Saturday per South China Morning Post.

The Chinese government had confirmed planned exploratory missions, he said, and they were currently completing permission procedures. After considering the needs of developing engineering technology and addressing scientific interests, Xu said China would primarily focus on Mars exploration before 2030.

According to Xu, the next stage on Mars would be to conduct sampling and return missions in 2028.

The agency outlined China's intentions for the next few years as the country tries to catch up to the US in space technology, with Zhu Rong's landing on Mars being a crucial milestone.

ALSO READ: New Age Space Race Happening? Russian Cosmonauts Leaving ISS Could Be the Beginning





China aims to launch two probes to explore the moon's environment further and collect samples during the next five years. Since 2007, the country has launched five lunar missions, with the first soft landing in 2013. Washington Post said the country became the first country to land on the far side of the moon in 2019.

China and Russia agreed to collaborate on constructing and managing an international lunar research station for scientific study, Science Times reported. China's space agency also announced that a road map and guidance for potential global partners interested in planning, design, and operation would be made public soon.

By the end of next year, China intends to have completed constructing a crewed space station. The country will also continue to collaborate with other countries, mentioning space programs with Italy, France, and Brazil as examples.

China's Recent Achievements For Space Race

China performed a soft landing on the Moon (Chang'e 3) as part of its Chang'e lunar exploration program in recent years, National Geographic said. Only the United States and the erstwhile Soviet Union have done it before.

Apart from the United States and the former Soviet Union, China is the only country to return lunar rocks to Earth via Chang'e 5 and the first to land a rover on the moon's far side via Chang'e 4 - a mission it completed in 2019.

The future Chinese space station is another expression of the country's will to explore the cosmos further. The government launched the first core module of the space station into orbit earlier this year after a decade of tests and two prototypes.

However, China was embroiled in controversy over this operation since the core booster stage of the rocket that launched the module was not correctly deorbited.

Many people expressed concerns about China'sChina's ambitious expansion into space, despite uncertainty about where the 18-tonne rocket's debris might fall. Science Times reported that the rocket landed in the Indian Ocean off the coast of the Maldives, with much of it burning up on re-entry.

RELATED ARTICLE: Tiangong Space Station: How Is China Joining Space Race?

Check out more news and information on Space on Science Times.
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With just the shift of her eyes across the screen of a computer, a cerebral palsy patient fills the air with harp music.

A Reuters report describes how 21-year-old Alexandra Kerlidou sits in her wheelchair on a stage in Athens. Here, the disabled student who cannot speak or use her hands is seen playing the "Eyeharp," a gaze-control digital software that enables an individual with a disability to play music, something Kerlidou had never thought possible.

Describing the experience, the 21-year-old said, she felt strange and had never imagined such a thing  the use of speech-generating computer program as she described trying for the first time, the Eyeharp in her home on Lesbos with Zacharias Vamvakousis, the technology's creator.

ALSO READ: 12-Second Tactic: How to Train Your Brain To Be More Positive

Inspiration to Develop 'Eyeharp'

Vamvakousis, a computer scientist and musician, was inspired to develop the program after a musician friend was hurt in a vehicular accident shortly before a concert where they would play together.

In the beginning, the developer said that one of his friends who was playing the Cretan Iyra shared that it was unclear if he would be able to move his arms and hands and play music again. He added it shocked him, and he realized there is a need for such a technology.

This digital eye-tracking technology, commonly used in gaming, medicine, and security, monitors the movement of the eye to perform commands.

Essentially, the interface enables creating arpeggios and controlling their harmony while melodies are played on top of them. To achieve this, the interface comprises two layers which include the melody layer and the step-sequencer layer.

The eye rests on every musical note spaced out on a wheel on the screen, and average can play three to four notes a second. This report also specified, such a program can "play" 25 musical instruments.

A similar CNA Insider report specified, without doing this digitally, Vamvakousis explained, playing music in real-time would never be possible. Eyeharp, he continued, takes away the actual action of strumming a cord.

Discipline and Concentration Needed

The software's developer said that the program needs discipline and concentration, as one needs to keep the eyes from wandering too fast to the next note, although students are thrilled, hearing their efforts.

Most of the children, he continued, initially begin with the drum sound "just to interact with the environment right now."

Vamvakousis has taught the program in special-needs schools in Barcelona, where he studied. With the technology, he added, over 2,000 people have downloaded the program.

Due to the pandemic, he presently teaches online, mostly children who have cerebral palsy, described in Mayo Clinic as a group of disorders affecting muscle tone and movement or posture.

Describing how they felt after seeing the 21-year-old play the harp, Kerlidou's father, Anastasios said, he cried, and the mother cried too after their daughter first played the Eyeharp, described by the Universitat Pompeu Fabra as an open-source that is free for downloading and use.

The student, who wants to work as a computer programmer after she finishes school, likes the piano, not to mention popular Greek songs. She shared she could not imagine her life without music adding; when she is sad or happy, she puts on music.

Related information about EyeHarp is shown on the EyeHarp Project's YouTube video below:

RELATED ARTICLE: Played Back Memories: Researchers Reveal Incredible Powers of Learning Through Modern Imaging Techniques

Check out more news and information on Medicine & Health in Science Times.
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After receiving the go signal for using a used rocket to send the advanced GPA satellite for the US Space Force, SpaceX has successfully launched GPS III SV05 to space on Thursday, June 17, marking its 19th rocket launch this year.

The Space Force Space and Missiles Systems Center retweeted SpaceX's Twitter video of the moment. The deployment of the satellite to space was confirmed over an hour and a half later.

SpaceX Successfully Launched Space Force's Advanced GPS Satellite

The GPS III SV05 of the US Space Force was sent to orbit via SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket blasted off from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station at 12:09 pm EST, according to Space.com.

Nine minutes after the launch, the first stage of the rocket touched down on the deck of the company's drone ship, called "Just Read the Instructions."

Sending the GPS satellite to space is the second launch mission so far for SpaceX this June, after sending the broadband satellite for Sirius XM on June 6.

Fortunately, the weather at the time of the launch was good, so onlookers were treated to a gorgeous view of the Falcon 9 rocket's launch as it climbed to orbit.

The launch also marks the fourth GPS satellite delivery by SpaceX for the US Military, in which three previous GPS missions were also launched on a Falcon 9 rocket. One GPS satellite mission was launched last August 2019 via SpaceX's competitor United Launch Alliance's final flight of the Delta IV Medium rocket.

Youmei Zhou, a SpaceX propulsion engineer, said that GPS helps people navigate through their phones or computer by mapping service or retrieving a location via a pin drop.

According to Spaceflight Now, GPS III SV05 is expected to maneuver into a 12,550-mile-high orbit and join the current constellation of satellites.

ALSO READ: SpaceX Broadcasting Satellite for Sirius XM-8 Radio Launches to Space





Space Force Plans to Launch 10 Upgraded GPS Satellites

As part of the US Military's effort to replace aging members of the current satellite constellation, they are planning to send ten upgraded GPS satellites to orbit. The next GPS satellite mission will also be launched by SpaceX next year.

The next generation Lockheed Martin-built GPS satellites also include novel technology and capabilities that will meet military needs to mitigate threats to GPS infrastructures, Fox Business reported.

Moreover, Lockheed Martin said that the satellites are the most powerful GPS satellites ever built, having three times greater accuracy and eight times increase anti-jam protection.

GPS III satellites are made with a modular design to allow easy installation of new technology and capabilities as technology changes or when there is a new mission.

The upgraded GPS satellites are designed to beam down higher-power signals that are jam-resistant and have additional broadcast frequencies that will make the GPS satellites more compatible with other similar satellites, according to the aerospace defense company.



RELATED ARTICLE: SpaceX Set to Launch National Security Satellites Using Reused Rockets Via Falcon 9



Check out more news and information on SpaceX on Science Times.
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Alert: Vaccine-maker AstraZeneca claims victory in court tussle with EU over slow deliveries
SEATTLE (AP)  A trial over whether the GEO Group must pay minimum wage  instead of $1 a day  to immigration detainees who perform tasks like cooking and cleaning at its for-profit detention center in Washington state has ended with a hung jury.

U.S. District Judge Robert Bryan in Tacoma declared a mistrial Thursday after the nine-person jury indicated they could not reach unanimous agreement following a two-week trial and about two days of deliberation.

Nobody's happy, but nobody lost, Bryan told the attorneys afterward.

Democratic Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson sued the Florida-based GEO Group in 2017, saying the company had unjustly profited by running the Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma  now known as the Northwest ICE Processing Center  on the backs of captive workers.

A separate lawsuit filed on behalf of detainees was also filed that year, seeking back pay. The judge, who rejected several attempts by GEO to dismiss the lawsuits, consolidated the cases for trial, which he conducted via Zoom because of the pandemic.

The judge said he expected that the cases would be set for a new trial.

GEO, a multi-billion-dollar for-profit prison corporation that is publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange, pays workers $1 a day or less to perform essential services necessary to maintain the Northwest ICE Processing Center," Ferguson said in a written statement Thursday. A hung jury allows us to re-try the claim again in front of a new jury.

GEO maintained that the detainees were not employees under the Washington Minimum Wage Act. Even if they were, the company said, it would be unlawfully discriminatory for Washington to require GEO to pay them minimum wage  now $13.69 an hour  when the state doesnt pay minimum wage to inmates who work at its own prisons or other detention facilities.

The jury indicated it could not reach agreement on either question before it: whether the detainees were employed by GEO, and, if they were employed, if the law discriminated against the company.

The definition of employee in Washingtons minimum wage law is broad  it includes anyone who is permitted to work by an employer, without regard to immigration or legal work status. The law says residents of a state, county, or municipal detention facility are not entitled to minimum wage for work they perform.

The detention center didn't fit that exemption because it's a private, for-profit facility, not a state, county or municipal one, attorneys for the state and for the detainees argued. At one point in their deliberations, the jurors sent a question to the judge, asking if municipal meant the same thing as federal. The judge responded that no, municipal referred to a city or town, not the federal government.

The Northwest detention center houses people who are in custody while the federal government seeks to deport them or reviews their immigration status. It can hold up to 1,575 detainees, making it one of the nations largest immigration jails, though as of early this month its population was just 216, largely due to the pandemic.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement requires the company to operate a voluntary work program in part to keep the detainees occupied. It requires them to be paid at least $1 per day for work that includes cleaning bathrooms, showers and industrial kitchens; washing and folding laundry; sweeping and buffing floors; preparing and serving food; and cutting hair.

GEO acknowledged it could pay detainees more if it wanted. In 2018 the company made $18.6 million in profits from the facility; it would have cost $3.4 million to pay the minimum wage to detainees.

Despite the broad definition of employee in the law, the case is complex. GEOs contract with ICE requires it to comply with applicable state and local law  which, the state says, includes the Washington Minimum Wage Act.

But other provisions forbid GEO from hiring anyone who doesnt have legal status in the U.S. The contract spells it out: The detainees are not employees, GEO attorney Joan Mell said. They cant be.

In her closing argument, Mell accused the state and detainee advocates of using the lawsuits to attack the immigration detention system without ever having to go to Congress. GEO has operated the detainee work program for more than a decade, and the state made no effort to get the company to pay the minimum wage until 2017, amid a flurry of lawsuits Ferguson filed against the Trump administration.

Washington appears to be the only state suing a private detention contractor for not paying minimum wage to immigration detainees. But similar lawsuits have been brought on behalf of immigration detainees in other states, including New Mexico, Colorado and California, seeking to force GEO and another major private detention company, CoreCivic, to pay minimum wage to detainees there.

The Colorado and California cases are pending, but a federal judge rejected the lawsuit brought by former detainees of CoreCivics Cibola detention center in New Mexico  a decision upheld by a federal appeals court panel in March.

Persons in custodial detention  such as appellants  are not in an employer-employee relationship but in a detainer-detainee relationship, the panel wrote.

In a separate effort, Washington is trying to close the detention center entirely. This spring Gov. Jay Inslee signed a law that would ban for-profit detention centers in the state. GEO has sued to block it.
NEW RICHMOND, Wis. (AP)  For a few hours last weekend, thousands of Donald Trumps supporters came together in a field under the blazing Wisconsin sun to live in an alternate reality where the former president was still in office  or would soon return.

Clad in red MAGA hats and holding Trump 2021 signs, they cheered in approval as Mike Lindell, the MyPillow creator-turned-conspiracy peddler, introduced our real president. Then Trump appeared via Jumbotron to repeat the lie that has become his central talking point since losing to Joe Biden by more than 7 million votes: The election was rigged.

Lindell later promised the audience that Trump would soon be reinstated into the presidency, a prospect for which there is no legal or constitutional method.

In the nearly five months since Trumps presidency ended, similar scenes have unfolded in hotel ballrooms and other venues across the country. Attorney Lin Wood has told crowds that Trump is still president, while former national security adviser Michael Flynn went even further at a Dallas event by calling for a Myanmar-style military coup in the U.S. At the same conference, former Trump lawyer Sidney Powell suggested Trump could simply be reinstated and a new Inauguration Day set.

Taken together, the gatherings have gelled into a convention circuit of delusion centered on the false premise that the election was stolen. Lindell and others use the events to deepen their bond with legions of followers who eschew the mainstream press and live within a conservative echo chamber of talk radio and social media. In these forums, evidence of fraud is never fact-checked, leaving many followers genuinely convinced that Biden shouldn't be president.

We know that Bidens a fraudulent president, and we want to be part of the movement to get him out, said Donna Plechacek, 61, who traveled from Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin, with her sister for the event. I know that they cheated the election. I have no doubt about that. The proof is there.

State election officials, international observers, Trumps own attorney general and dozens of judges  including many Trump appointed  have found no verifiable evidence of mass election fraud. Indeed, Trumps Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency called the election the most secure in American history and concluded there was no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes, or was in any way compromised.

But Plechacek is not alone. A recent Quinnipiac University poll found that two-thirds of Republicans, 66%, think Bidens victory was not legitimate, while CNN found in April that 70% of Republicans do not think Biden won enough votes to be president. Half, 50%, said there is solid evidence to support that claim.

They are people like Deb Tulenchik and Galen Carlson from Pequot Lakes, Minnesota, who recalled the shock they felt after the election as Trumps early election night lead faded as additional ballots were counted.

Thanks to the countrys polarization, many Trump supporters didnt know anyone who voted for Biden and only saw Trump-Pence signs lining the roadways as they drove around their neighborhoods. Carlson, 61, said he went to bed believing Trump won. He didn't heed warnings that mail-in votes take longer to count, so early returns would likely skew toward Trump, who urged his supporters to vote in person and not by mail.

I was asleep early cause it looked like it was going to be a done deal. And then when we woke up I couldnt believe it, he said.

Disbelief, echoed Tulenchik, 63.

Trump spent months girding himself against possible defeat, insisting he could only lose if there was massive fraud. It's a lie he's sure to repeat as he steps up his public schedule in the coming weeks.

But the narrative was already resonating under the beating sun at the Wisconsin MAGA rally, where attendees came decked out in Trump gear, including plenty of shirts declaring, Trump Won!

While Lindell repeatedly described the event as a free speech festival  paid for by him  it had all the trappings of a Trump rally, including several of his frequent warm-up acts and a large American flag hoisted up by cranes.

It was a carnival atmosphere: a face-painting tent for kids; stands selling corndogs, fresh-cut fries and ice cream; a flyover of old military planes. The 2020 campaign lived on, with vendors selling old campaign merchandise  along with Lindells pillows. One older man with a cane walked around shirtless, wearing a sparkly cowboy hat and Crocs and using a Trump flag as a cape. One young woman carried a helmet with horns  reminiscent of the headgear worn by an Arizona man who calls himself the QAnon Shaman and who took part in the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6.

Indeed, several people said they were at the U.S. Capitol that day, though they were vague on their roles.

While some were Trump rally devotees, traveling the country to see the former president in person, many said they were attending their first political event. Some said they paid little attention to politics until the election, or began to get involved because they opposed pandemic restrictions.

Again and again, attendees insisted Trump won the election. And several said they sincerely believed that he will be reinstated in the coming months  a belief that has been pushed by Lindell and repeated privately by Trump, even though there is no legal framework under which that could be accomplished.

Not all Democrats are evil. They will see the truth. Whether they like it or not, they will see the truth, said Beth Kroeger, 61, who lives in Sussex, Wisconsin, and said she expects Trump back in the Oval Office this time next year, No doubt about it.

Some suggested the military would be involved; others are convinced he remains in control today.

Most assailed the mainstream media and said they instead got their news from people like Lindell and former Trump strategist Steve Bannon, as well as the conservative channel Newsmax, talk radio and social media platforms.

Few have gone to greater lengths than Lindell to convince the American public the election was stolen. By his own account, he has spent millions of dollars staging election-related events, hiring private investigators and creating movies that purport to document the alleged fraud  not to mention the $1.3 billion defamation lawsuit that has been filed against him by Dominion Voting Systems. (He has counter-sued.)

He now claims he has evidence that China and other countries hacked voting machines to switch votes from Trump, a Republican, to Biden, a Democrat, in a cyberattack of historical proportions. But the evidence he cites in his most recent film, which features a blurred-out, anonymous cyber expert, has been repeatedly debunked for not demonstrating what he claims.

Still, attendees repeatedly referenced his videos as clear proof of fraud.

Theres just so much evidence that Mike Lindell has, said Lynda Thibado, 65, who traveled with her husband, Don Briggs, from Menomonie, Wisconsin, by camper and stayed overnight at an adjacent campground.

I mean, such proof positive, Briggs agreed.

The couple said they hoped the election would be overturned, but they were less confident that would happen.

I dont know if they can legally do anything now, said Briggs. Still, he said, I dont think Biden will be the president come 2024, one way or the other.
MINNEAPOLIS (AP)  The Minnesota House launched into a long, contentious debate Thursday that delayed its first floor votes on the big budget bills that lawmakers were unable to pass before time ran out on the year's regular session last month.

The House had four bills teed up for final floor votes. But minority House Republicans were unhappy with being shut out of the closed-door negotiations between House Democrats and Senate Republicans that shaped them. And they showed it by launching a long filibuster that was expected to last into the night. They also filed about 60 amendments in advance.

I think we're going to have a bumpy ride in the Minnesota House, Democratic House Speaker Melissa Hortman, of Brooklyn Park, told WCCO Radio on Thursday morning, before the debate began. The House minority is determined to make things take a little bit longer than they need to, but we'll get it done no matter how long it takes.

An angry House Minority Leader Kurt Daudt, of Crown, blamed Democrats for disregarding GOP concerns while a narrow group of committee chairs worked out the details in private, and he vowed to vet all of the bills thoroughly on the floor.

If you don't think that members of this chamber in this party are willing to stand here and fight for the Minnesotans that you are trying to hurt, you are dead wrong, Daudt said in an opening speech that lasted over an hour. Because the battle that we fight here on this floor today is a worthy one.

The four bills covered the budgets for commerce and energy, agriculture, higher education, and programs funded by the Legacy Amendment, a sales tax increase that voters approved in 2008 to provide extra money for four dedicated funds: clean water, outdoor programs, arts and culture, and parks and trails.

Democratic House Majority Leader Ryan Winkler, of Golden Valley, countered Daudt's assertions, saying the proposals in the bills got a thorough public airing during the regular session.

The bills that we are taking up today represent a bipartisan agreement with your Republican colleagues in the Senate  our Republican colleagues in the Senate. It represents an agreement with the executive branch," Winkler told the chamber. "The only thing standing in the way of this budget getting passed at this point in time is the actions of the minority caucus in the Minnesota House.

Daudt and his fellow Republicans started the day with an hourslong, one-sided fight over the commerce bill as they tried to add a reauthorization of the state's 4-year-old health care reinsurance program. They said it's has been a big success at holding down premiums, and that Minnesota residents face steep increases unless the program is extended. Democrats, who stayed largely silent as GOP lawmakers stretched out the debate, consider it a giveaway to insurance companies.

By contrast, there was little partisan rancor as the Republican-controlled Senate took up its versions of the four bills. Senators laid them on the table with voice votes as a procedural move, just to keep the process going, while they waited for the House to pass them first.

Legislators are under pressure to get the budget bills passed to avert at least a partial government shutdown July 1 when the old budget expires. Hortman, Walz and Republican Senate Majority Leader Paul Gazelka, of East Gull Lake, agreed on broad targets for the $52 billion, two-year budget last month. The special session convened Monday, and negotiators are still filling in details and working through policy disputes.

Hortman told WCCO she wasn't concerned about a shutdown. The speaker said nine of the 14 budget bills were essentially wrapped up. But at least a couple still need intervention by top leaders, she said, including the public safety budget, which Democrats say should include new police accountability measures to build on those passed last summer in the wake of George Floyd's death after a Minneapolis officer knelt on his neck and pinned him to the ground. Senate Republicans have been cool toward adding restrictions on police amid rising crime.
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP)  The Ohio Houses decision to expel former representative Larry Householder was a choice to be respected, Gov. Mike DeWine said Thursday while repeating his belief that Householder should have resigned.

Householder, a Republican like DeWine, was removed from the House Wednesday by a bipartisan vote in the chamber's first expulsion in 150 years. Householder, a former House speaker, is under federal indictment in an alleged bribery scheme.

The GOP-controlled House approved a resolution that stated Householder was not suited for office because of the indictment. The state Constitution allows expulsion for disorderly conduct without defining it.

DeWine said the decision to remove Householder was a matter for a separate branch of government.

I felt that he should have resigned, but this was a decision that was made by the House and we should respect that decision, DeWine said.

House Speaker Bob Cupp, a Lima Republican, set a June 23 deadline for applicants interested in an appointment to Householder's seat. A screening committee will conduct interviews June 24. The seat includes Coschocton, Licking and Perry counties.

Householder reiterated his innocence in a House floor speech before the vote and predicted again he would be acquitted of accusations that he orchestrated a $60 million bribery scheme meant to approve legislation to prop up two nuclear power plants and then kill a ballot issue trying to overturn the law.

Householder and four associates were arrested in July in an investigation connected to the nuclear bailout legislation, House Bill 6, which contained a $1 billion ratepayer-funded rescue that would have added a new fee to every electricity bill in the state and directed over $150 million a year through 2026 to the plants near Cleveland and Toledo.

Householder faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted.

Householder's expulsion came five days after Republican lawmakers voted with majority Democrats in the Oregon House of Representatives on June 11 to expel Republican Rep. Mike Nearman after he let violent, far-right protesters into the state Capitol on Dec. 21. It was the first time the Oregon House expelled a member in its 160-year history.

Two of Householder's codefendants and an involved nonprofit have pleaded guilty in the case. FirstEnergy, the energy company at the heart of the latest scandal, has acknowledged in court filings making the bulk of the payments in the alleged bribery scheme.

The last time the Ohio House expelled a sitting lawmaker was in 1857 when John P. Slough was removed for punching a fellow legislator.

In 2004, Householder left the House the first time due to term limits while he and several top advisers were under federal investigation for alleged money laundering and irregular campaign practices. The government later closed the case without filing charges.

Householder ultimately returned to the chamber and, after a nasty battle, was again elected speaker in 2019.
ROME (AP)  A labor union leader was killed in northern Italy when a truck apparently broke through a picket line outside a supermarket warehouse facility Friday and struck him.

Italian Premier Mario Draghi expressed sorrow for the death of Adil Belakhdim, 37, and said it's necessary that light is immediately shed on what happened.

According to Italian news reports and union officials, about 20 people who work in logistics for the international supermarket chain Lidl were protesting outside the facility when a truck driver trying to leave the facility drove through a line of picketers blocking a gate. An unidentified witness told Italian state TV the vehicle struck Belakhdim and dragged him for several yards.

Italian media said the driver sped away from the scene in the municipality of Biandrate. While initial reports said the driver was stopped by police on a nearby highway, the LaPresse news agency later said that the driver stopped at a tollbooth on the highway and called Carabinieri paramilitary police.

Officers from a Carabinieri station in the nearby city of Novara came for the driver, who was jailed for investigation of alleged vehicular homicide and failing to provide assistance to the union leader, LaPresse said.

The picketers were pushing for better working conditions overall for those in the supermarket logistics sector, which generally includes packing and loading merchandise and food.

Two other protesters were also reported hit by the truck and suffered minor injuries.

LaPresse quoted a union leader, Attilio Fasulo, as calling for an immediate strike in the sector to protest what happened.

Fasulo described both the fatally injured union leader and the truck driver as victims of labor tensions in the logistics sector. He added that union officials for some time have been asking for better working conditions.

Lidl Italia issued a statement expressing condolences to Belakhdim's family. It said the truck involved was from a third-party supplier and not one of Lidl's vehicles.

As for the workers' complaints, Lidl said the company reiterates that it has always been in constant rapport with the main union organizations, aimed at dialogue and reciprocal comparison.
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A 54-year-old Berkeley man was arrested for allegedly assaulting Gov. Gavin Newsom Thursday while the governor was in Oakland to promote Californias reopening.

Serge Emanuel Benoit Chaumette Jr. was booked for assault on a public official and resisting an officer, and was being held at Santa Rita Jail in lieu of $35,000 bail.
San Francisco prosecutors have filed attempted murder charges against the man accused in what police are calling an unprovoked stabbing attack of a 94-year-old woman in Lower Nob Hill, officials said Thursday evening.

Daniel Cauich, 35, was arrested and taken into custody late Wednesday morning, less than two hours after police say he unleashed the random attack on the victim. Police had obtained a photo of Cauich  who was well known to officers following a long history of burglaries  and identified almost immediately.
In an effort to prevent the impending closure of Mills College, the 169-year-old womens school is in talks to affiliate with Northeastern University and open the Oakland campus to male undergraduates.

If an agreement is reached, Mills would become Mills College at Northeastern University, Mills President Elizabeth Hillman wrote Thursday in a letter to the college community. Northeastern is a private research university in Boston.

Though Mills would not be an independent, stand-alone institution, undergraduate and graduate degrees would be offered through the alliance, and Mills would become gender inclusive at the undergraduate level, Hillman wrote. The graduate program has been open to men for years.

Citing financial problems, Mills announced on March 17 that the college would grant its final degrees in 2023 and would stop accepting first-year students after this fall.

Mills, with about 600 undergraduates, has endured years of falling enrollment and declining revenue. The private college has not disclosed details of its finances.

Thursdays announcement led to criticism among some students and alumnae who treasure Mills not only as a womens undergraduate institution, but as the rare private college with more than half of students identifying as people of color and half as LGBTQ.

This is another decision that was made behind closed doors, said Lila Goehring, who just graduated, of the plan to affiliate.The administration continues to use language like collaborative when in fact they have blatantly ignored calls for financial transparency and cries about the importance of Mills as it is.

Goehring said the merger would mean the end of Mills as an independent college centering around women/nonbinary/trans students, people of color and LGBTQ students.

Another recent graduate, SuzyJane Edwards, said, Mills with men on campus is not Mills.

Mills holds a unique place in the Bay Area, one that its supporters say is irreplaceable.

It is believed to be the only single-sex college in the country ever to get its Board of Trustees to reverse a decision to go coed. Students occupied the campus for 13 days in 1990 to win that battle. Now, Mills is one of just 37 womens colleges left in the country.

Lyn Flanigan, a member of the colleges Board of Trustees, said Mills announced the talks with Northeastern now, before the deal is finalized, because word was leaking out.

We wanted to put some kind of information out that was positive, said Flanigan, a 1965 Mills graduate. She called the potential alliance a win-win for both institutions.

COVID Resources Coronavirus Map Tracking COVID-19 cases across the Bay Area and California.

Two groups  the Save Mills College Coalition and UC Mills  planned to hold an emergency town hall about the potential deal on Zoom Thursday evening.

We are calling all alums, students, faculty and staff to join us tonight, the groups said. Bring your voices, your questions, and your strength. Together, well continue the fight for a just future of the Mills College we love.

Kendall Bobo, an entering sophomore who had expected to graduate with the class of 2024, said she has joined with undergraduates who are choosing not to speak about the Mills and Northeastern situation. Asked why, she said, Just waiting to see if it actually works out.

Laura Speelman of Emeryville, a 2005 Mills graduate, was willing to give the affiliation proposal a chance. Ill be super happy if theyre able to remain open, she said. It would be great for the staff, the students and the professors.

Its been a year of surprises for Mills students. Also in March, the college announced that 200 UC Berkeley first-year students, including men, will live and study on campus this fall to raise revenue.

Nanette Asimov and Steve Rubenstein are San Francisco Chronicle staff writers. Email: nasimov@sfchronicle.com, srubenstein@sfchronicle.com Twitter:@NanetteAsimov, @SteveRubeSF
San Francisco classrooms are expected to welcome back all students in the fall, but anger over the closure of district schools during the pandemic has lingered for some families.

The San Francisco Board of Supervisors has designated June 16 as Susan Solomon Day in honor of the outgoing president of the citys teachers union, whos retiring. But the gesture is drawing ire from some parent groups, who say her legacy is nothing to celebrate.

The resolution, which is a largely symbolic gesture, comes after over a year of pandemic-related school closures resulting in learning loss and mental health struggles for many students and families. San Francisco Unified School District and its teachers union, United Educators of San Francisco, agreed to bring a small number of younger and at-risk students back to classrooms in April after months of bitter negotiations and deadlock.

The resolution was passed unanimously last month and returned to the board unsigned by Mayor London Breed.

According to her spokesperson Jeff Cretan, Breed does not sign ceremonial resolutions as a standard practice.

Solomon, a San Francisco native and lifelong educator will be retiring after an unprecedented school year. She began her teaching career with SFUSD in 1999 and became involved in union activism in 2001. She taught kindergarten at John Swett Elementary School before it closed.

I was very surprised and touched by their gesture, Solomon said via email. For someone like me who grew up in San Francisco, the resolution and recognition by the Board of Supervisors is a real honor. In addition, the Boards recognition of the important role that organized labor has in San Francisco is relevant, timely and timeless.

Solomon became president of UESF in 2018, and according to the resolution, her powerful leadership has guided UESF through this pandemic, as she has worked unceasingly to prioritize the health and safety of San Franciscos educators, students, school workers, and families. She said that after she retires, she will really miss the inspiration of the daily engagement with educators, students, families and school communities that my job provides.

Supervisor Dean Preston said he was thrilled to be able to honor Solomon  a longtime resident of his district  upon her retirement through this resolution, calling her one of the most widely respected educators and labor leaders in the city.

Some supervisors, including Hillary Ronen, have been critical of San Franciscos prolonged school closures. Though Ronen disagreed strongly with Solomon, she said that does not erase my deep respect for this human being who has spent not only her entire life, but the life of her whole family, fighting for the people of San Francisco.

I celebrate her. I admire her, she said. Even though I vehemently disagreed with her all year long. That can all exist at the same time.

While the gesture was celebrated by some on social media, others were not as excited. Some parent and activist groups questioned the timing of the resolution, following months of shuttered schools and over a year of distance learning.

Its really a question of who we choose to honor in San Francisco, said Siva Raj. He and his partner Autumn Looijen are currently leading a campaign to recall three school board members and have been strong supporters of returning to in-person instruction. He said that while the union is clearly effective in fighting for teachers, he and Looijen wish someone was fighting as hard for the students.

COVID Resources Coronavirus Map Tracking COVID-19 cases across the Bay Area and California.

This is a lost year for my son, he explained, and its been a lost year for so many kids in this city. The kids who were already disadvantaged are the ones whove fallen furthest behind. So its very surprising to see the city leadership chose to honor someone who was responsible for this loss.

Meredith Dodson, founder of the parent advocacy group Decreasing the Distance, was also surprised when she saw the resolution.

It seems poorly timed at best, she explained. Honoring the woman who basically fought tooth and nail to keep our schools closed, even after we knew the damage being caused to our children, feels wrong at this moment.

In response to the criticisms, Solomon said Parents should be honored each and every day for their heroic work, regardless of who else is being honored, explaining that caring about kids means collectively providing the resources that are needed so that every child has the food, shelter, opportunities, education, health care and love they deserve.

Preston added he thought the events of the last year are no reason to not honor Solomon. Educators in this last year have been really unfairly attacked and criticized, I think this has been an extremely difficult period for them, he said.

Though shes retiring from her role in the union, she said shell still be involved in this city and labor movement she loves, primarily through her work with the San Francisco Labor Council.

Emma Talley is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: emma.talley@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @EmmaT332
After years of bitter feuds over funding and segregation, the Sausalito Marin City School District will merge its controversial charter school with its largely Black traditional public school, in what will be the states first mandated school desegregation effort in 50 years.

The unification plan, which will create a K-8 school across the two campuses this fall, will combine two disparate school communities sharing the same ZIP code, but divided by race, income and Highway 101.

On one side is Sausalito, a 92% white community known for its restaurants, art galleries, houseboats and luxury homes overlooking San Francisco Bay, where the median income is $112,000 and a district charter school serves 346 K-8 students.

On the other is Marin City, where African American shipbuilders settled during World War II, a community thats 60% people of color with a public housing complex and a median income of $45,841, where a traditional public school serves 111 K-8 students.

Following a harsh audit of the district in 2016, the state ordered the district to desegregate in 2019, pointing to discrimination, varying academic outcomes and other problems.

At the time, Black students were suspended 66 days for every day a white student was sent home for misbehavior, the largest disciplinary disparity in the state, officials said.

Test scores also showed wide gaps. At Bayside Martin Luther King Jr. Academy, 21% of students were proficient in math and English, far below the share at Willow Creek Academy, where 65% of students were proficient or above in English and 55% met or exceeded proficiency in math.

Bayside had been neglected for years, with the school board shifting resources and focus to the charter school, the 2016 audit confirmed.

While Willow Creek has been more diverse than Bayside MLK, with 38% white students and 14% Black this past year, the Marin City traditional school was 8% white and nearly 50% Black.

At Bayside MLK, 68% of families are considered low-income, compared with 41% at Willow Creek.

Gabrielle Lurie/The Chronicle

Creating a single school out of two disparate communities felt nearly impossible not long ago, with racism, privilege and anger too embedded in the relationship between the communities.

Despite its reputation as a bastion of liberal politics, Marin is the most segregated county in the Bay Area, with most communities fighting affordable housing or even market-rate apartments. Many cities are 90% white, with pockets of people of color in Novato, San Rafael and Marin City. Racial covenants in decades past prevented African Americans from buying homes in certain cities. The effects linger today.

But with the racial reckoning and push for equity set off by the pandemic and the murder of George Floyd last year, a new urgency took hold, officials said.

The pandemic really doubled down on the why, said Terena Mares, county Office of Education deputy superintendent, who has overseen the troubled district for years. It was a baptism into the real crisis behind the social justice and equity issues that have plagued that district and community.

But the roots of the conflict over desegregation in the district date back decades.

Whats been going on in this community goes back all the way to when they were building boats, said county Superintendent Mary Jane Burke, citing a policy that prevented African Americans from buying homes in Marin County after World War II. Of course people are absolutely bitter about the historical racism that existed.

On paper, the district just north of the Golden Gate Bridge looks flush with money  spending $35,000 for each student at the traditional school in Marin City in recent years, nearly triple what most other districts spend  with funding based on excess property taxes.

While thats about three times what San Francisco Unified spends per pupil, in the tiny Marin County district, with just over 100 students and the standard overhead costs required to run a public school district, it sounds like more than it is.

Willow Creek Academy, which opened in 2001, was eligible for limited funding, spurring fights over the property tax funding, as well as services, staffing and more.

Over the years, Willow Creek pulled students, money and power from Bayside MLK. A school board majority, aligned with the charter, hired a Southern California charter school consultant to be a part-time superintendent making $165,000 a year. He was granted a paid leave when he faced felony conflict-of- interest charges in San Diego. He later pleaded guilty and resigned.

Mares stepped in about that time. Her first impression of the conditions at Bayside MLK, the largely African American school, were devastating.

All the children and adults just felt abandoned, Mares added.

Following the fiscal review in 2016, Burke reported the concerns to the state, leading to an investigation, which found intentional racial and ethnic segregation and discrimination.

In 2019, then Attorney General Xavier Becerra ordered the district to desegregate.

The district had several years to complete the process, but finished the merger in two. The pandemic and racial justice protests resulted in epiphanies about social inequity, creating momentum to move forward, said district Superintendent Itoco Garcia.

We got this unification process done in the middle of a global pandemic and amid social unrest, he said. It was the right thing to do for kids for families, for staff.

COVID Resources Coronavirus Map Tracking COVID-19 cases across the Bay Area and California.

Parent Jahmeer Reynolds, whose son will be in the fourth grade in the fall, moving from the Marin City site to the Sausalito campus, hopes the community can start breaking down barriers and myths, including fears that the Bayside MLK campus was chaotic or unsafe.

His autistic son thrived there, made friends, felt safe, he said.

Were breaking down all of the walls, destroying all of the negative comments and rebuilding with a solid foundation, he said. I just believe were going to come out on the other side stronger.

As of July 1, the former Willow Creek campus will become the districts new K-5 school, while Bayside MLK will enroll middle school students as well as preschoolers.

Willow Creek parent Jennifer Conway, a longtime supporter of creating one district school, said she is super excited about the merger. Her daughter will attend sixth grade at the middle school in the fall.

I just didnt see how two schools and two sets of infrastructure made any sense whatsoever, she said. The division that caused bifurcation of energy and resources was not productive and certainly not helping our kids.

She called the desegregation order the wake-up call that the community needed to get to work and make it happen.

Overall, per student spending will dip to about $27,000 because of the merger, still well above state average.

Kurt Weinsheimer, president of the Willow Creek Board of Directors, said he believes the timing is right to bring the schools together.

A decade ago, he said, you didnt have a lot of trust in public schools, and there was a big sense of separation, between Marin City and Sausalito.

From a parent and family standpoint the idea of unification just makes sense, he said. Kids are already going to school together, and live in different communities that have different backgrounds.

Merging the two schools, however, is only the first step, Mares said. She added that the effects of historic racism still linger and adults need to check their bias.

The really hard work is in front of us, she said.

Jill Tucker and Emma Talley are San Francisco Chronicle staff writers. Email: jtucker@sfchronicle.com, emma.talley@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @jilltucker, @emmat332
It might be the reopening of San Francisco, or it might be the pasta, but the 2-month-old Tailors Son is already a Fillmore Street dining destination. Even on the weekdays, theres a queue at the door when the restaurant opens at 5 p.m., with diners vying for an opportunity to indulge in negronis, fresh pasta and duck liver pate. The servers handsome aprons and the bright and minty fresh interior feel polished and chic, communicating an optimism that in itself feels like a luxury. Yet the food, centered in the homestyle cuisine of northern Italy, is fun and approachable. It all makes you want to be here.

A personal project of Back of the House restaurant group founder Adriano Paganini, the Tailors Son is inspired by his upbringing in northern Italy. Paganini, the eponymous tailors son, grew up in Solbiate Olona, a small village close to the Swiss border where his mother raised him on a diet of simple dishes, like belly-warming and creamy risotto alla Milanese, a centuries-old rice dish colored with precious strands of saffron.

Accordingly, the menu by chefs Freedom Rains (also of A Mano) and Tali Missirlian leans toward the take-it-slow cooking made for the cooler, rainier climate of northern Italy: risottos, braises and handmade fresh pastas.

Scott Strazzante/The Chronicle

The rotolo pasta ($21), a favorite of most of the servers, rolls fresh pasta and a filling of braised rabbit, Fontina cheese and spinach into a spiral shape, which is then sliced into attractive roulades. Finished in an oven, the pastas edges seize up into crisp patches, with caps of caramelized cheese. The shredded rabbit is tender, with the slow braise and rendered fat giving it a subtly gelatinous texture.

Scott Strazzante/The Chronicle

Risotto is a particular focus. When Paganini spoke to The Chronicle about this opening, he lamented the lack of great risotto in San Francisco, despite the glut of Italian restaurants. You need to baby risotto, stir it like youre petting a newborn kitten, and most restaurant kitchens dont have the time nor the staff to do something so delicate. If someone is multitasking too much, you can see it in the way the grains clump together, feel it in the uneven texture. For great risotto, the dish has to be your focus from the get-go, and this is where Tailors Son gets it right.

The risotto alla Milanese ($18) shines  literally. Butter and Parmesan coat each grain of saffron-tinted rice, each one a bona fide happy pill. For $4, you can add bone marrow, in the form of a vertical piece of beef bone filled with squishy, fatty meat butter; for $6, Milanese ossobuco in the form of shredded shank meat. Reducing ossobuco, normally served as an entree in itself at other places, to something you just add onto the risotto tells you exactly what matters most to the restaurant.

Scott Strazzante/The Chronicle

The three-item entree section that follows might come off as second-fiddle, since you might get too overwhelmed by the pasta-laden carbfest to think about anything else. But skipping the polpo ($21), the octopus dish, would be a mistake. A tender braised tentacle is charred on a grill, cooked until the very tip looks like a spent match. Its served atop a pleasant chickpea ragu, and a dollop of olive tapenade gives each bite a bright finish.

Despite the menus comforting fare and nods to parochial village life, the decor is unambiguously cosmopolitan. The space, which formerly housed Elite Cafe, has been decked out in pristine white subway tiles, red marble details and floral wallpapers. The service style is attentive and almost normal-feeling; it seems like the pandemic-era staffing shortages arent a major issue at this restaurant, because I observed plenty of people filling water glasses, running food and chatting with diners about the menu. Orders come out at a brisk pace as well.

Scott Strazzante/The Chronicle

A cocktail menu is home to apertivos, negronis and house concoctions that accompany the food well. I found the Velvet Smoking Jacket ($14) to be the most complementary option for the rich pastas and risottos. Mole bitters, smoked cinnamon and Cynar 70 proof make the bourbon drink astringent, with aromas of bonfire and forest floor. Each sip slices through the bulky flavors of prosciutto and brown butter with ease.

Scott Strazzante/The Chronicle

Though richer dishes are where this restaurant excels, dont ignore the vegetable-heavy starters in your pursuit of comfort. The kitchen takes full advantage of Californias growing seasons. Fritto misto ($12) features a springtime melange of fried asparagus, spring onion bulbs and fennel. Fennel pollen is dusted over the whole dish, lending it a light, floral aroma familiar to anyone whos run their fingers through the wild fennel patches that proliferate all over Northern California.

Food Guide Top 25 Restaurants Where to eat in the Bay Area. Find spots near you, create a dining wishlist, and more.

The snacky burrata crostini ($14), meanwhile, includes diced green tomato pickles with lots of bite to them; its counterpart with duck liver pate gets a slash of huckleberry compote. And the chicory alla Romana ($12), a flavorful take on what Americans know as the Caesar salad, pairs pink-streaked chicory with a creamy soft-boiled egg, sour white anchovy fillets and Parmesan shavings. Itll make you never want to eat a normal Caesar again.

Scott Strazzante/The Chronicle

Heres my advice, if youre ordering for a table of four. Get two vegetable dishes, a crostini (its cut into four pieces), two risotto dishes, a pasta and the octopus. Save room for the pavlova ($10), a meringue dessert adorned with chunks of rhubarb and strawberry rounds; dots of saba, a concentrate of grape must, add depth to the otherwise ethereal dessert.

Tailors Son has a fine balance of nostalgia and on-trend design that makes it a fine place to reminisce  about your last trip to Italy; your first attempt at making risotto; the last time someone who loved you cooked for you. If youve been saving your post-lockdown re-entry into the San Francisco dining scene for someplace special, sentimental and gentle, it would be a great first stop.
In this weekly column, Ill be sharing the best dishes Ive eaten around the San Francisco Bay Area lately. While the list may include Instagram-only deals or seasonal tasting menu items, Ill be sure to include things that you could reasonably get nowish.

This weeks edition includes a fragrant southern Indian dish, a fine dining tostada and the best knafeh Ive had in a long time. Check out my recommendations from last week here.

Chettinad-style chicken at Tilak

At Tilak, a Bernal Heights Indian restaurant, so much on the lengthy, 40-item menu looks appealing; its hard to choose something to order. But something immediately caught my eye: the chicken Chettinad ($14), named after a historical trading hotspot in Tamil Nadu, India. Chettinad cuisine, a centuries-in-the-making meld of Arab, Southeast Asian and other flavors, is a rarity in the Bay Area, with just three or so restaurants here that specialize in it. So I jumped at the chance to try chef-owner Tilak Gurungs take on the cuisine.

The dish is served with a rich, coconut-flavored gravy and layered with toasted spice and aromatic flavors: cardamom, onion, cinnamon and pepper. Red, spiced oil floats to the edges of the curry; whole spices pop in your mouth as you eat. The flavoring is concentrated, but scalpel-sharp application keeps it from tasting muddy or cacophonous. Try it with roti ($2), since you know youll want to sop up the sauce with something.

Tilak. Open for indoor dining, takeout and delivery. 5-10 p.m. Wednesday-Monday. 3501 Mission St., San Francisco. 415-647-4037 or https://tilaksf.com

Nettle tostada at Avery

Soleil Ho / The Chronicle

The nine-course tasting menu ($118) at San Franciscos Avery is one of the hidden gems of the citys dining scene. At this miniscule restaurant on Fillmore Street, chef-owner Rodney Wages and his skeleton crew serve exquisite and imaginative haute cuisine: tortellini as delicate as cats ears; a drink of fermented pineapple with sauerkraut essence; miniature Toaster Strudels with lingonberries.

Wages whole menu is thought-provoking, but the dish I went to bed thinking about was a wild nettle tostada. Fried in a translucent tempura batter, a wild nettle leaf seems preserved in glass. On top are pieces of smoked trout, along with its oceanic roe. Fermented ramps give the two-bite dish a pickle-adjacent punch, and cultured cream moistens the palate.

Avery. Open for indoor dining 5-8 p.m. Thursday-Sunday. 1552 Fillmore St., San Francisco. www.AVERYsf.com

Kanafeh at Manakish Oven and Grill

Food Guide Top 25 Restaurants Where to eat in the Bay Area. Find spots near you, create a dining wishlist, and more.

I dont often just do random restaurant visits, but the promise of zaatar-dusted flatbreads pulled me toward Walnut Creek this week. Opened in late 2019, Manakish Oven and Grill is a Lebanese counter service spot geared toward casual eating, with a menu of manakish, flatbreads, with toppings like tri-tip shawarma, cheese and cauliflower. But its the kanafeh ($7.50) that unexpectedly snagged me.

Sweet and salty cheese is covered with shredded phyllo dough and served with a simple syrup flavored with cardamom. Its baked to order so that the cheese partially melts and the birds nest of dough strands crisp up, the textures coming off like a bowl of cereal, but backwards.

Manakish Oven and Grill. Open for takeout, delivery and indoor and outdoor seating. 10:30 a.m.-8 p.m. Sunday and Monday; 10:30 a.m.-9 p.m. Tuesday-Thursday; 10:30 a.m.-9:45 p.m. Friday and Sautrday. 2905 N. Main St., Walnut Creek. 925-949-8334 or manakishoven.com

Soleil Ho is The San Francisco Chronicles restaurant critic. Email: soleil@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @hooleil
Temperatures soared to above 100 degrees across the Bay Area on Thursday  with Fairfield peaking at 110  as the sweaty and sweltering sought ways to stay cool, plunging into pools and swarming to the coast for a cool breeze.

Triple-digit temperatures scorched the inland East Bay, the North Bay hills and valleys, the South Bay and the Santa Cruz Mountains, stressing not only residents but also the regions energy grid, prompting Gov. Gavin Newsom to declare a state of emergency.

His declaration frees up additional energy capacity and suspends some permitting requirements to help alleviate the heat-induced demands on the states energy grid, a statement read.

Fairfield appeared to be the hottest place in the Bay Area, reaching 110 at Travis Air Force Base, according to the National Weather Service. Concord and Livermore followed with 107 degrees.

Records were broken in San Rafael, which hit 103; Santa Rosa, 104; Kentfield, 103; Redwood City, 102; and Gilroy at 106. Santa Rosa broke a record set for the same day in 1922, when it hit 101.

While Thursday was expected to be the hottest day in the heat wave, temperatures were projected to drop only slightly on Friday, according to the National Weather Service. Temperatures are still likely to be around 100 or higher inland but could be noticeably cooler at the coast.

With the mercury rising, folks on Thursday sought relief in both common and unusual ways.

Chris Fomby, originally from Alabama, employed a Southern strategy in Pleasant Hill, throwing some ice in a plastic bag from the grocery store, crushing it with a soda can and tying it on top of his head, a bit like a shower cap.

Im sweating! he said.

Fomby planned some more traditional  and fashionable  cooling with a stop at a cooling center in Pleasant Hill and a trip to San Francisco for a swim and to get out of the triple-digit weather.

By early afternoon, throngs had escaped the heat by heading to the beach, with crowds at Bay Area favorites like Ocean Beach, Stinson Beach and Pacifica State Beach. Traffic on Highway 1 in San Mateo County and Marin County was moving slowly in the early afternoon as more overheated folks tried to join the oceanfront crowds.

Among the coolest spots in the Bay Area was Baker Beach in San Francisco, where the temperature lingered in the 70s and a sea of blankets, towels and giant umbrellas sprouted up in the bright sunshine just west of the Golden Gate Bridge.

Jason Donato, who fled the South Bay with friends, caught two crabs and planned to cook them for dinner.

Leaving San Jose was a smart thing to do, he said. Things worked out. Except for the crabs.

National Weather Service officials warned beachgoers to beware of the cold water temperatures in the Pacific Ocean that can pull energy from the body and weaken swimmers, as well as rip currents that can pull unsuspecting beachcombers or waders into the ocean.

Meanwhile, residents of inland areas sweated as they tried to escape the heat. In Cloverdale at lunchtime, Rosa Nunez and her son, Elian, stood in line at Picks Drive In for fried chicken sandwiches and root beer floats. It was too hot to cook, she said. The Nunezes moved to Cloverdale five years ago, knowing, Rosa said, that the city had a reputation for routinely logging the highest temperatures in Sonoma County. But they were still unprepared for the unrelenting triple-digit heat.

We moved to the devils mouth, she said.

Briana McCarthy  whose family just moved to Concord from San Francisco  said shes still adjusting to the hot and dry summers, with temperatures hitting the triple digits in the East Bay city Thursday. But she found relief when she brought her 13-month-old daughter to swim lessons at the citys community pool. Shes thankful the pool is open after pandemic closures.

Last summer, as you know, was pretty hot, she said. And fires and pandemic. This summer its nice to have the pool open again and be able to come here and enjoy.

With the high temperatures, electricity usage is expected to climb as well. A flex alert was issued for many parts of California on Thursday to conserve energy from 5 to 10 p.m. Pacific Gas and Electric Co. said an increase in demand for electricity is expected as more people use air conditioners to escape the heat.

Hazy skies and the faint smell of smoke has been reported in the South Bay, weather officials said, but its from wildfires in Arizona, not Northern California. Nevertheless, the weather conditions prompted the Bay Area Air Quality Management District to issue a Spare the Air alert Thursday and Friday. People were urged to limit driving and use of equipment like lawn mowers and leaf blowers, work remotely if possible, and avoid strenuous exercise.

But normalcy will return in a few days. Brayden Murdock, a National Weather Service meteorologist, said next week will bring relief: By Monday, most of the Bay Area should be in the 70s.

San Francisco Chronicle staff writers Vanessa Arredondo, Danielle Echeverria and Steve Rubenstein contributed to this story.

Michael Cabanatuan, Nora Mishanec and Emma Talley are San Francisco Chronicle staff writers. Email: mcabanatuan@sfchronicle.com, nora.mishanec@sfchronicle.com, emma.talley@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @ctuan, @EmmaT332, @NMishanec
Max Whittaker/New York Times

The National Weather Service issued a red flag warning Thursday signaling the arrival of strong, gusting winds and the potential for dry lightning in the eastern Sierra Nevada and portions of northern California on Friday.

The warning covers a broad area east of the Sierra that stretches from Inyo County in California, to Nevada, Utah and western Colorado. In northern California, portions of Modoc, Lassen and Siskiyou counties containing Modoc National Forest are also expected to see worryingly strong winds, meteorologists said.
Back in late 2018, Oakland resident Stephanie Dalton was laid off and collected unemployment for two and a half months until she found a new job.

During that time, Californias Employment Development Department, which administers the benefits, sent her a notice that she had been overpaid by $236. She paid back the money plus a $70 fine and thought no more about it.

Fast-forward to pandemic times. Dalton, 55, was laid off from an executive assistant job in March 2020 and applied for unemployment.

Her small mistake from three years earlier came back to bite her. EDD penalized her by reducing her benefits for many months, a shortfall that totaled more than $14,000 over a year, she said. She burnt through savings, borrowed money, fell behind on her rent and ended up unhoused for six months, during which she lived with friends and stowed away on a docked sailboat.

Its just been crushing, she said. This has devastated my life.

EDDs policy for people who make mistakes on unemployment claims  even minor ones  is to lock them out of future benefits for up to 23 weeks, either starting immediately or the next time they file, as well as having them pay back the overpaid amount plus penalties of up to 30%. That probationary period lasts three years. The benefits halt applies even to people who repaid the money plus a penalty, like Dalton, because the supposition is that they lied to get benefits  unless they file a successful appeal.

Unfortunately, false statement penalties are an issue we saw during the recession that was not fixed before the pandemic began, said Assemblymember Chad Mayes, I-Rancho Mirage (Riverside County). Applying for benefits is a confusing process where one mistake can mean the difference between an economic lifeline or being set financially adrift.

Nina Riggio/The Chronicle

Mayes and Assemblyman David Chiu, D-San Francisco, are sponsoring legislation, AB397, to require EDD to send clearly written, separate notices to people who make mistakes, giving them 30 days to appeal the penalties and explaining what they allegedly did wrong. The bill also would allow claimants to pay back overpayments while explaining that their mistakes were made innocently, so they should not be penalized in the future.

Currently, EDD merely includes a small checkbox on a lengthy form about overpayments that gives 10 days to appeal, does not detail what the infraction was, and does not explain that people who dont appeal will be penalized in the future.

Most people dont understand the consequences if they fail to appeal, said Daniela Urban, executive director of the Center for Workers Rights in Sacramento. They get a notice filled with dense type and say, Whoops, I made a mistake and pay it back, she said. Then, when hit with reduced benefits, they are confused, why did it remain on their account?

Its easy to accidentally make mistakes, she said, because EDDs forms are confusing and its rules are arcane, such as requiring that claimants must report wages in the week when they are earned, not the week when they are paid.

When the pandemic started, thousands of newly jobless workers discovered that they had made past mistakes on the convoluted benefits forms and would have benefits reduced.

EDD created a stopgap fix for them. It let them collect Pandemic Unemployment Insurance, a new program created for self-employed people.

That is what happened to Dalton, but the benefit amount was much less than she would have received with regular unemployment and penalty time was longer than the 23-week caps. She said she called EDD and agents told her that she would be penalized for a full year. When the year was up, she tried contacting EDD to get reinstated on regular, full unemployment but I couldnt get through to save my life, she said.

The false statement problem has been around for years and was on a long list of EDD issues to tackle. During the 2008 recession, thousands of claimants were tripped up by the penalties.

EDD said its policies about mistakes on forms are part of its efforts to stamp out fraud.

Withholding or giving false information to obtain benefits is a serious offense that can result in penalties and criminal prosecution, spokeswoman Loree Levy said in an email.

But Levy said the agency can sometimes assist claimants who made innocent errors.

We do everything we can to work with claimants in situations of false statement penalties and the establishment of an overpayment, while balancing that with our mandated responsibility for fraudulent UI debts recovery, she said. We can determine payment options with the claimant and can waive overpayments in certain circumstances.

The bills backers say it doesnt hamper EDDs ability to combat fraud. It is one of a package of EDD reform measures currently making their way through the legislature. AB397 has passed the Assembly and is currently in the Senate. It does not face any opposition. EDD does not take positions on legislation.

The bill wont help Dalton and others currently in this situation  its goal is to make sure that future claimants dont get caught up by false statement penalties.

After a brutal year of scraping by on her reduced benefits that included six months of homelessness, Dalton found an apartment in downtown Oakland for herself and her two chihuahuas, Mialito and Vanilla.

She started in a part-time contract position as an executive assistant at the San Francisco-Marin Food Bank, and is hoping the agencys budget will allow it to become permanent.

She is rueful about how one small oversight wreaked such havoc with her life.

I want to stop crying and feeling scared at some point, she said. It is very overwhelming. ... I just pray I get hired full-time, so I never have to look back.

Carolyn Said is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: csaid@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @csaid
The states health department on Friday announced a new digital tool for Californians that allows residents who received a COVID-19 vaccination a way to view and save their vaccine record from the states immunization registry systems. Vaccinated workers in California can ditch their masks now that Cal/OSHAs standards board voted to do away with a host of coronavirus restrictions. Given the evident reluctance by many to abandon their masks, despite the states reopening, The Chronicle asked Bay Area health experts what theyre doing about their own face coverings. Plus, hundreds of thousands of Bay Area residents skipped their second coronavirus vaccine shots, and health experts are urging them to get it, especially as evidence mounts that the Pfizer vaccine is less effective against the troubling delta variant.

Resources on COVID-19 and Californias reopening: For detailed maps and new city-by-city Bay Area data, check out The Chronicles Coronavirus Tracker. See a visual guide to what will and wont change here. To get regular updates on our coverage, sign up for our coronavirus newsletter.

Latest updates:

California Department of Public Health and McDonalds partner on vaccines: Starting Monday more than 70 McDonalds restaurants statewide will set up pop-up vaccine clinics for employees and community members. Some sites will be open for a single day while others will have multiple dates. Each vaccine comes with a free menu item. Find clinics here.

U.S. extends travel restrictions at Canada, Mexico borders: U.S. land borders with Mexico and Canada will remain closed to nonessential travel for another month to reduce the spread of COVID-19, the Department of Homeland Security said Sunday. The United States is extending restrictions on non-essential travel at our land and ferry crossings with Canada and Mexico through July 21, while ensuring access for essential trade & travel, the agency tweeted. Last month, the DHS extended the restrictions to June 21. Canada on Friday announced its own extension of the requirements that were set to expire Monday and have been in place since the pandemic began in March 2020, Reuters reported.

Vaccination rates lag for California public safety workers: Despite priority access and array of incentives, vaccination rates for police, fire and corrections agencies across Los Angeles and California have lagged far behind the states average, according to a Los Angeles Times survey of agencies. Experts say public safety workers should be entitled to make independent decisions about their health. But they also say the gap is a matter of public concern because these workers must work in close spaces, such as jails and courthouses, and interact with some of the states most vulnerable residents. As a result, some officials are increasingly considering vaccine mandates for public safety workers.

Arizona sees spike in infections, deaths: Arizona on Saturday reported 641 new COVID-19 cases and 16 additional deaths, the second-highest single day total since June 2, USA Today reported. The spike was relatively small, especially as infections have been on a downward trend in the state. Arizona also lags much of the U.S. in COVID-19 vaccinations, with 49% of adults receiving at least one shot compared to 53% nationally, according to CDC data.

How many people are still wearing masks at Bay Area grocery stores? Under Californias new reopening rules, as of June 15 those fully vaccinated against COVID-19 no longer have to wear masks in most situations. But how is that translating into reality? To get a snapshot of how people in the Bay Area are approaching mask-wearing, we sent reporters and photographers to five grocery stores around the region on Thursday, two days into the reopening. For an hour, the journalists counted customers they deemed to be adults as they exited, tabulating people as masked or unmasked. Reporters then interviewed people about their choices. The consensus: Most people arent ready to move on from masks. Read the full story.

Five reasons you may still want to wear a mask: With California lifting nearly all COVID-19 pandemic restrictions, fully vaccinated people no longer need to wear masks in most public settings  but health experts say there are some good reasons for continuing to do so. Warding off flu, minimizing allergy symptoms and gaining a measure of protection from wildfire smoke are just some reasons to consider not shoving your mask in the back of a drawer. Read the full story.

Delta variant drives surge of cases in Portugal: Authorities in Portugal confirmed Sunday that the new delta coronavirus variant is driving a spike in new cases in the Lisbon region. Portugals National Health Institute said variant, which was first found in India and is highly infectious, has a prevalence of 60% of new cases in the countrys capital, the Associated Press reported. Because of the new spike in infections, authorities last week banned all travel in and out of Lisbon on the weekends, effective Friday. About 2.8 million people live in the metropolitan area.

UCSF expert offers ways the U.S. can help end global pandemic: The World Health Organization estimates that 11 billion doses of vaccine are needed to achieve global herd immunity, yet only 0.4% of the worlds current supplies of vaccines have been administered in low-income countries, according to UCSF infectious disease expert Dr. Monica Gandhi. She offers her opinion on five ways the U.S. can enhance COVID-19 equity globally and help end the pandemic  including donating surplus doses and helping waive patents for vaccines.

Updates from Friday, June 18:

Newsom touts success of Californias vaccination incentive program: Gov. Gavin Newsoms office on Friday said that more than a million California residents have received their first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine since the states health department launched its Vax for the Win incentive program. The governors office said 1,037,462 Californians have received their first shots since the $116.5 million program launched on May 27. It added that less than half of the two million $50 prepaid grocery cards for first-time vaxxers remain available. Turns out, these incentives have worked, Newsom said on Tuesday while hosting the giveaway for the $1.5 million grand prizes.

As face Yankees in front of a full capacity crowd: Yankee Stadium will host a full capacity crowd on Friday for the first time since Oct. 18, 2019, as the New York Yankees play against the Oakland Athletics. Yankee Stadiums official seating capacity is 46,537, according to the teams media guide. Proof of a negative coronavirus test or full COVID-19 vaccination is no longer required in order to attend games at the stadium. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo lifted most pandemic restrictions this week as the state passed the 70% vaccination threshold. Friday also marks Pride Night at the stadium.

SFs Juneteenth/Pride guidance: Have a blast but wear that mask: San Franciscos health department is encouraging people to join celebrations in honor of Juneteenth and Pride, but asks that revelers remain vigilant and proactive by following all public health recommendations aimed to curb the spread of the coronavirus. Have a blast but wear that mask, the agency said in a statement Friday that urges revelers to continue to wear face coverings in several settings, including indoors at public spaces if they are not vaccinated; at any indoor events with more than 5,000 people, unless there is proof that everyone is vaccinated; and when riding public transit like Muni and BART. It adds that, if possible, people should choose outdoor over indoor activities and minimize or avoid unnecessary travel. To avoid disrupting celebratory plans, everyone should still carry a mask to wear as needed or if required, the statement said. Additionally, keep in mind that large crowds increase the risk of transmitting COVID-19, especially for the high-risk and unvaccinated population.

VP Harris: We can do better with vaccine push: Vice President Kamala Harris hit the road Friday in an effort help the Biden administration reach its goal of having 70% of Americans with at least one dose of the coronavirus vaccine by July 4. She met with workers at a pop-up vaccination site in Atlanta before making an appearance at Clark Atlanta University, an historically Black college. Even though we have made a lot of progress, there are still a whole lot of folks out there who are not vaccinated, Harris said at the university. She noted that only 42% of Georgians have received at least one shot. So we know what the numbers tell us. We got to get those numbers up. We can do better, Harris said.

European Union lifts travel restrictions for Americans: The European Union formally recommended on Friday that its 27 member countries lift restrictions on nonessential travel from the United States, which could provide a boon to countries with economies that depend on summer tourism. The recommendation is non-binding, and national governments have the authority to require test results or vaccination records and to set other entry conditions, the Associated Press reported. The United States remains closed to Europeans for nonessential travel as part of a travel ban that was issued by the former administration in March 2020 and extended in January by President Biden.

Biden to commemorate 300 million shots in 150 days: President Biden on Friday will mark the United States administering 300 million shots in 150 days, according to an announcement from the White House. He is expected to speak at 11:15 a.m. Thanks to the presidents whole-of-government vaccination effort, the virus is in retreat, which has brought COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations and deaths down to their lowest levels since the start of the pandemic last year, the statement said. The president will also make clear that there is more work to be done, and highlight the ongoing work by the Biden-Harris administration to achieve equity in our pandemic response.

Californians can now show digital proof of their COVID-19 vaccinations: The states health department on Friday announced a new digital tool for Californians that allows residents who received a COVID-19 vaccination a way to view and save their vaccine record from the states immunization registry systems. While CDPH recommends that vaccinated Californians keep their paper CDC card in a safe and secure place, we recognize that some people might prefer an electronic version, said California State Epidemiologist Dr. Erica Pan. Read the full story here. The tool is available here.

Delta variant now responsible for 99% of infections in the UK: The delta variant of the coronavirus, which was first identified in India, accounts for 99% of new coronavirus cases in the United Kingdom, according to data published Friday by Public Health England. The country registered 33,630 cases new cases of the variant as of Monday and 806 people hospitalized with delta  a significant jump over the 423 hospitalizations reported last week. The World Health Organizations chief scientist said on Friday that the variant, which is 97% more transmissible than the non-variant coronavirus, is spreading rapidly. The delta variant is well on its way to becoming the dominant variant globally because of its significantly increased transmissibility, said Dr. Soumya Swaminathan during a news briefing in Geneva. Dr. Rochelle Walensky, head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director, said Friday she anticipates that the delta will become the dominant variant in the U.S. as well.

Canada extends border closure with US: The Canadian Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness said on Friday that restrictions on non-essential US travel will remain in place until at least July 21. Our number one priority as we fight COVID-19 is keeping Canadians safe, Bill Blair said in a tweet. The two countries mutually agreed to close the border in March 2020  the current order was set to expire on Monday.

CDC relaxes rules on ship travel, for the vaccinated: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention relaxed rules restricting cruise-ship travel, Reuters reported. However, the agency recommended that only full vaccinated people embark on cruise-ship trips: Since the virus spreads more easily between people in close quarters aboard ships, the chance of getting COVID-19 on cruise ships is high. It is especially important that people who are not fully vaccinated... avoid travel on cruise ships, including river cruises, the CDC said.

China nears 1 billion vaccine doses delivered: More than 945 million coronavirus vaccine doses have been delivered in China, The New York Times reported, a mark of a vaccination campaign in full-swing. Chinese officials hope to vaccinate 40% of the countrys 1.4 billion-person population by the end of June.

Vaccinated workers in California can ditch the masks: Workplaces can finally let vaccinated employees do away with masks and many other coronavirus restrictions, after a vote Thursday brought rules for employees in line with the states reopening earlier this week. The standards board for Californias Division of Occupational Safety and Health, or Cal/OSHA, voted 5-1 Thursday to replace stricter rules in effect since November to stop the spread of the virus in work settings. Those rules included masking and physical distancing among other requirements. Gov. Gavin Newsom signed an executive order on Thursday that allows the rules to be implemented immediately. Read more here.

WHO: Delta variant is 97% more transmissible than original virus: A study by the World Health Organization tracking the estimated change in effective reproduction number of SARS-CoV-2 variants has confirmed that delta, the variant first identified in India, is 97% more infectious than non-variants. The study published Thursday used data collected from 64 countries and found that the alpha variant is 29% more transmissible, beta 25%, and gamma up to 38%. Despite differences between countries, our analysis showed a statistically significant increase in the pooled mean effective reproduction number relative to non-VOC/VOI (variants of concern/variants of interest), the researchers said. The study also found that the original virus variant that emerged from Wuhan, China has faded from most countries.
A hacker accessed the computer system of a Bay Area water treatment plant in January and deleted programs the plant used to treat drinking water, a senior intelligence official confirmed Thursday.

NBC News first reported Thursday that the unidentified hacker used a former plant employee's username and password to gain entry to the unidentified Bay Area water treatment facility on Jan. 15.

Michael Sena, executive director of the Northern California Regional Intelligence Center, confirmed NBCs report about the security breach, but declined to say where it occurred or who carried it out.

Sena also declined to say whether the hacker would face criminal prosecution.

The NBC report stated that the hacker tried to poison the Bay Area water supply, an assertion Sena disputed.

No one tried to poison any of our water, he said. That is not accurate

Tampering with the computer programs used to treat drinking water would be unlikely to result in any widespread poisoning, Sena said.

It takes a lot to influence a water supply chain, he said. For a large impact, there has to be a large change in the chemicals in the system. The amount of chemicals it would take to cause harm to people...the numbers are astronomical.

The Jan. 15 hack represented no specific threat to public safety, he added.

News of the breach comes as officials continue to investigate Mays Colonial Pipeline cyber attack, which shuttered gas stations from Texas to New Jersey and raised new concerns about the vulnerability of American infrastructure.

The San Francisco-based Northern California Regional Intelligence Center works with the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI to track suspicious activity, criminal activity and threats to the regions infrastructure.

Nora Mishanec is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: nora.mishanec@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @NMishanec
A gas leak on Clement Street led to evacuations and one injury Thursday afternoon, according to the San Francisco Fire Department.

Around 2:30 p.m., PG&E received reports of a natural gas odor around Clement Street and Fifth Avenue. Crews were immediately dispatched to investigate, a spokeswoman said.

The fire department ordered evacuations of people on the street from Sixth Avenue to Arguello Boulevard. Residents were told to shelter in place and business owners to keep customers inside. Clement Street between Arguello and Seventh as well as Fifth Avenue from Cornwall to Geary were closed.

The fire department said on Twitter that one person has been injured, but will be okay.

PG&E crews are working safely and as quickly as possible to determine the source of the smell, a spokesperson said.

By 6 p.m. crews had located and sealed the leak and were waiting for gas levels to drop before allowing people back in the area. An hour later, people were allowed to enter the area.

Catherine Soto, who lives on Geary Blvd. across the road from the closed-off area, was in the Panhandle when she heard the news about the gas leak. Her first instinct was to hop on the bus to go home, but it was rerouted. The closest she got was two blocks away.

Its frightening, she said.

Mallory Moench is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: mallory.moench@sfchronicle.com Twitter:@mallorymoench
Marie Harrison warned for years that the Hunters Point shipyard where she once worked on San Franciscos southeastern edge was a slow-motion public health disaster.

Parts of the former Navy shipyard were contaminated during the Cold War by fallout from ships brought there after atomic-bomb tests. Its a toxic legacy that left residents like Harrison, the mother of Bayview-Hunters Points environmental justice movement, to wonder if it might be connected to neighbors nosebleeds, breathing problems and tumors.

The Navy and public health officials long denied any links, and Harrisons challenges ended abruptly two years ago, when she died of lung disease. Then, last year, her neighborhood became San Franciscos COVID-19 epicenter.

Today, Harrisons daughter Arieann sees the community at a new crossroads with construction back under way on 12,000 new homes planned for the shipyard and neighboring Candlestick Park. Its dredged up familiar concerns about toxic land, accelerating gentrification and stark health inequities  and in the process, revived Harrisons sense of activism.

There is simultaneously a huge war with the housing and environmental issues, Arieann Harrison said. Theyre colliding.

Late Thursday night, attorneys for the younger Harrison and 9,000 other Bayview-Hunters Point residents who are part of a class-action lawsuit asked a judge to halt construction at the former shipyard, unless multibillion-dollar developer Lennar Corporation and offshoot FivePoint Holdings can prove that theyre controlling the release of toxic materials as required by state law.

Lennar declined to comment on the legal challenge, which a federal judge will consider in a hearing scheduled for July 29. In a statement, a spokesperson for the San Francisco Department of Public Health said the department didnt believe it necessary to halt construction for additional dust monitoring, since all work at the site must already comply with health codes requiring daily dust control and monitoring.

What happens next in the decades-old development battle, which has already spawned a tangled web of lawsuits, could help shape the Bay Areas next chapter. Hunters Point is one of several long-contaminated former military or industrial sites across the region slated for major development amid a housing shortage that has pushed prices to record highs.

From Treasure Island to Vallejos Mare Island to a former chemical and pharmaceutical site in Richmond, developers say the large parcels with long histories of pollution are now some of the Bay Areas biggest, best chances for new construction.

But residents organizing legal challenges in majority non-white, working-class communities like Bayview-Hunters Point argue that promises of new jobs and affordable housing shouldnt overshadow health concerns. Environmentalists add that sea level rise projections make the bayside building boom even riskier.

Its like a broken record around the bay in similar types of communities, said Bradley Angel, executive director of activist group Greenaction for Health and Environmental Justice. Lawsuits are going to be flying, and theres going to be protests. The fight is on.

A history of mistrust

Arieann Harrison works at a social services agency in the flat section of Bayview, across the street from a gourmet sausage-packing plant. While her clients grapple with homelessness and instability, banners outside new condos just over the hill at the old Hunters Point shipyard advertise a balanced lifestyle and luxury retreats.

Home prices have soared in recent decades, to a median $695,000 in Hunters Point and $960,000 in Bayview, according to the National Realtors Association, even after some banks suspended home loans at the shipyard. In 2010, when the housing bust was fueling foreclosures on Black homeowners, the median was $110,000 in Hunters Point and $360,000 in Bayview, according to an analysis by Jackson Fuller Realtors.

Harrison has watched the pressure build for much longer. She was born during the civil rights movement in 1967, just after a white San Francisco police officer shot and killed a Black teenager and sparked an uprising in Bayview-Hunters Point. The shipyard closed in 1974, and the following decades brought unrest over unemployment, displacement, drugs and violence. More recently, Harrison, whos known around town as the resource queen, has struggled to get city backing for a local womens center and endured dire health diagnoses for her uncle, sister, mother and father.

That sense of, like, nobody cares  Ive seen it over and over again, Harrison said. I think whats going on in the community, this warrants international attention.

Residents allege in the new legal filing that they were not given notice about construction restarting, and they worry that dust stirred up by construction could be harmful to nearby schools and homes. As a result, theyre demanding that the developers stop work for four to six months to allow more extensive testing by outside scientists and devise a plan to monitor the work going forward.

The request for an injunction is part of a U.S. District Court case that dates back to 2018, when attorney Charles Bonner first filed suit seeking up to $27 billion in damages, or around $675,000 for each of Bayview-Hunters Points roughly 40,000 residents. Bonner said that settlement negotiations are under way with the developers, though he is also preparing to go to trial if necessary.

Historically, over the last 75 years, this community has been totally trashed and totally ignored, Bonner said. Its time now that that stops.

The Navy and other agencies, meanwhile, have already spent decades and hundreds of millions of dollars trying to remove contamination at the shipyard. In 2004, regulators declared the hilltop portion of the shipyard to be clean, but activists say the more recent discovery of radioactive objects near the site undermines those reports.

The U.S. EPA, the California Department of Toxic Substances Control and the San Francisco Department of Public Health have said the hilltop area is safe for residents. More than 500 homes have already been built, with around 20% reserved for moderate-income buyers as part of a wide-ranging community benefit deal that has divided residents as housing prices rise and good local jobs remain scarce.

Much of the former shipyard remains classified as a federal Superfund site, and it must be tested and cleaned before people can live there. Construction restarted during the pandemic, and FivePoint has said it expects the Navy to transfer other cleaned areas of land to the city for future development between 2023 and 2028.

Lawsuits cloud the path forward. Lennar and FivePoint recently finalized a $6.3 million settlement with early buyers of new homes at the shipyard, who say the cleanup scandal hurt their property values. FivePoint has also sued the Navy for negligent oversight of the cleanup.

Both the developers and local residents are among those suing Navy cleanup contractor Tetra Tech EC. The U.S. Justice Department, in a civil action, alleged that the firm cut corners and falsified radiation tests, and the Navy decided that its data were suspect and areas of the shipyard must be retested. Tetra Tech EC has denied any wrongdoing, though two former supervisors were sentenced in 2018 to eight months in prison for falsifying records.

Youll never know

Long before Keyvn Lutton got sick, she and her artist partner moved to Bayview when they were having a hell of a time finding San Francisco studio space in the mid-1980s. They were the only white residents in a neighborhood of Black homeowners, but she made friends with other activists crusading against the shipyard development  and then watched in horror as many came down with serious illnesses.

Lutton herself underwent several surgeries from 2007 to 2009 to remove brain tumors. In 2013, she was diagnosed with breast cancer. Another blow came when her toy poodle, Penelope, got her own tumor and died.

All the things we were fussing about, it turned out what we were doing was right, Lutton said, though to this day, doctors alternately encourage and dismiss questions about whether it all could have been connected to the shipyard. Its like youll never know, she said.

One persistent doctor is pushing the city and environmental regulators to do more to study and potentially compensate those with health problems. Ahimsa Porter Sumchai, a longtime activist and physician who previously worked with war veterans exposed to Agent Orange and atomic fallout, leads a first-of-its-kind biomonitoring project that has so far tested 55 Bayview-Hunters Point residents and found recurring elevated levels of toxins and carcinogens like cadmium and thallium.

Sumchai said many of her past warnings were dismissed as Chicken Little says the sky is falling dramatics, but she hopes that renewed focus on the links between race, environment and health could push officials to revisit the shipyard. If the health problems turn out to to be widespread, she says shell keep pushing for a health registry like the ones created in post-water-crisis Flint, Mich., and at the World Trade Center.

The pandemic changed things radically, Sumchai said. We have to look at the redevelopment plan, and the reality is that there are some uses at the shipyard that we may have to abandon.

To residents like Harrison who have long questioned the cleanup, the question now is whether enough environmental damage control can be done to resolve health concerns while also creating jobs that many in the community want. It still stings to know that whatever happens, most of the new homes will be far out of reach.

I know there's a way to make the haves and have-nots work together, and its about being fair, Harrison said. This is not fair.

Editors note: This story has been updated since it was first published to clarify the type of legal action taken by the U.S. government against Tetra Tech EC.

Lauren Hepler is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: lauren.hepler@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @LAHepler
Stephen Lam/The Chronicle

The archbishop of San Francisco said Friday that he was grateful after a decision by U.S. Catholic bishops to draft a document expected to rebuke Catholic politicians  including President Biden  who support access to abortion services.

In a brief statement issued after the results of a vote by the bishops was announced, Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone said the bishops had placed their trust in the Holy Spirit to protect the sanctity of Communion. He reminded church members of martyrs who died to protect the most blessed sacrament from profanation.
Monterey County officials ordered evacuations Friday for an area near China Camp Campground in response to a wildfire burning about seven miles west of the Arroyo Seco Campground in the Los Padres National Forest.

The blaze has been dubbed the Willow Fire.
As California defends its 32-year-old ban on the firearms it defines as assault weapons, 22 Republican-led states are urging a federal appeals court to halt enforcement of the ban, saying people will be safer in California and elsewhere if theyre allowed to carry guns that can be fired repeatedly without reloading.

Law-abiding citizens keeping and bearing modern rifles benefit public safety, counter-balance the threat of illegal gun violence, and help make our homes and streets safer, the states, led by Arizona, said in a filing this week in the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco.

The weapons are AR-15-style semiautomatic rifles and pistols with detachable magazines and specific features, such as forward pistol grips. Semiautomatic firearms do not require reloading after each squeeze of the trigger.

Californias 1989 law defines those firearms as assault weapons, but the 22 states said they should be described instead as modern rifles, which are legal in 45 states and owned by millions of Americans.

U.S. District Judge Roger Benitez of San Diego also used the modern rifle terminology in his June 4 ruling declaring the California law unconstitutional as a violation of the right to keep and bear arms for self-defense.

Like the Swiss Army Knife, the popular AR-15 rifle is a perfect combination of home defense weapon and homeland defense equipment, Benitez wrote. He said the guns are rarely used for assaults  murders by knives and physical beatings are far more common  and can be vital in staving off attacks by home invaders.

Those firearms have been used, however, in half of the nations deadliest mass shootings in modern times, including the slayings of 26 children and adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut in 2012. Gov. Gavin Newsom called Benitezs ruling a threat to public safety and the lives of innocent Californians, and the state has asked the appeals court to overturn it.

Benitez put his ruling on hold for 30 days, leaving the 1989 law in effect while the state asks the appeals court for a further stay that would allow continued enforcement during the months-long appeal process. Gun groups that challenged the law have filed arguments against the stay, and the 22 Republican-led states also asked the court to reject it and suspend the California law.

California should not be permitted to invade its own citizens constitutional rights, and this court should not imperil the rights of citizens in this Circuit and other states, the states said. Four of the 22 states  Alaska, Arizona, Idaho and Montana  are in the Ninth Circuit, along with California and four other Western states.

The 22 states did not specify how their residents would be endangered by enforcement of the California law. But Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich issued a statement asserting that our Second Amendment is constantly under attack from out-of-touch Californians and ignorant special interest groups.

California Attorney General Rob Bontas office told the court that every other appeals court that has considered a similar state law has upheld it. If the court allows Benitezs ruling to take effect during the appeals process, the states lawyers said, it will result in an influx of prohibited assault weapons into California, the same thing that happened after another Benitez ruling two years ago.

In the earlier case, Benitez declared unconstitutional a voter-approved ban in California on gun magazines holding more than 10 cartridges. His ruling took effect for six days before Benitez put it on hold, and during that period, Bontas office said, large numbers of gun magazines were brought into the state.

A three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit upheld Benitezs ruling on gun magazines, but the full court has granted a new hearing before an 11-judge panel, leaving the law in effect at least until the ruling. Opponents of that law have also been joined by 22 Republican-led states, virtually the same group as the one challenging the assault weapons ban.

Bob Egelko is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: begelko@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @BobEgelko
Attorney General Rob Bonta is stepping into a court case against a major contractor that screens job applicants for other companies and asks them personal questions  for example, about menstrual periods, venereal disease, mental illness, hair loss, hemorrhoids and constipation, as well as use of tobacco and alcohol.

A federal judge ruled in January that the contractor, U.S. HealthWorks and succeeding companies, could not be sued under civil rights laws because it was only acting as the employers agent. On Thursday, Bonta joined a spurned employment applicant in asking a federal appeals court to hold agents responsible for violating the rights of job-seekers who were compelled to answer their questions.

California law prohibits employers and their agents from making non-job-related, pre-employment medical inquiries of an employee or applicant as to their physical disability, mental disability or medical condition, Bontas office told the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco. He said the state Fair Employment and Housing Act, passed in 1959, explicitly applies to agents that work on behalf of an employer.

The proposed suit is a class action on behalf of more than 500,000 job applicants in California who have been questioned by U.S. HealthWorks since 2014, said Randy Erlewine, a lawyer for the applicant in the case.

Bonta said U.S. HealthWorks was reportedly Californias largest provider of occupational health services. The company, based in Valencia (Los Angeles County), was acquired by Concentra, a Texas-based health care company, in 2018.

The companys lawyer could not be reached for comment.

One issue in the case is how far employers and their agents can go in asking applicants about their lives and physical or medical conditions.

The plaintiff, Kristina Raines, applied in 2018 to Front Porch Communities and Services in Carlsbad (San Diego County) to be a food service aide, a job that involved cleaning the work area, stocking the kitchen and throwing away trash. The company offered her the job but said she first had to pass a medical examination by U.S. HealthWorks.

After seeing the questions, on topics that included menstruation, genital pain, pregnancy, painful or frequent urination, and prescription drugs, Raines refused to take the test, and her job offer was withdrawn. She sued Front Porch Communities, reached a confidential settlement and pursued her case against U.S. HealthWorks as a class action.

In a Jan. 25 ruling, U.S. District Judge Dana Sabraw of San Diego said a contractor like U.S. HealthWorks conducts examinations for thousands of employers and cannot be held responsible for questions that may not be connected to job duties.

Those employers are the entities who best know what the relevant job qualifications are, which qualifications may vary considerably from position to position, Sabraw said. It is the employers responsibility to tailor medical questions to comply with FEHA (the Fair Employment and Housing Act), or to instruct contractors to ask appropriate questions, he said.

In Thursdays court filing, Bonta said the law holds employment contractors to the same standard as the employers that hire them, requiring questions that relate to the job and do not invade the applicants privacy or discriminate based on categories such as race, sex or disability. He said the requirements were particularly significant for the disabled, who are often reluctant to disclose disabilities that will not affect their job performance, and have high rates of unemployment and poverty.

We shouldnt be making it easier to discriminate, but thats exactly what the lower courts ruling threatens to do, Bonta said in a statement. People applying for regular jobs are entitled to basic protections and employment screenings have to be specifically related to the job at hand.

Bob Egelko is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: begelko@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @BobEgelko
POMPANO BEACH, Fla. (AP)  Authorities detained 14 migrants who were traveling in a boat that came ashore hitting a sea wall in South Florida on Thursday.

WPLG-TV reports the migrants were coming from Jamaica and had first traveled to The Bahamas. One of the migrant men told the TV station as he was being handcuffed in Pompano Beach, Florida, that he was fleeing from violence in his country.
Blair Heagerty / SFGate

Nothing screams summer better than a tropical cocktail served at one of San Franciscos most iconic tiki bars. And next month, you can do just that.

On Thursday, the Tonga Room & Hurricane Bar announced via Instagram that it will reopen July 9 for nightly service every Friday and Saturday, in a post reading, "The wait is over. It's time to Tonga again!" Details were slim, but Eater reports that once the restaurant and bar fully open, guests can expect to be seated on a first-come, first-served basis. And yes, the thunderstorms are also coming back.
PHOENIX (AP)  A pair of Republican Arizona lawmakers who objected to a $1.9 billion tax cut in a $12.8 billion GOP budget deal were close Thursday to winning major concessions that would secure their support for the spending plan before the whole deal came to a halt over the tax cut's effects on city revenue.

The changes include smaller tax cuts until actual revenue comes in above projections and a much larger paydown of state debt.

Senate President Karen Fann cautioned Thursday evening that details could change until a deal is sealed.

Actually, nothings been agreed upon because until we get 16 and 31 (votes) everything is fluid, she said.

The changes negotiated by Sen. Paul Boyer and Rep. David Cook would initially limit the tax cuts to $1.3 billion by delaying implementation of the flat 2.5% income tax in the proposal in favor of two slightly higher rates. The deal still shields high-earning Arizonans from the full impact of a new voter-approved surcharge of 3.5% on income above $250,000 for individuals or $500,000 for couples by creating a maximum tax rate of 4.5%, which is the current top tier rate without the surcharge in Proposition 208.

Cities would get a larger share of income tax and protections in case state revenue doesn't meet projections under an early version of the new deal, Boyer said. They would get 18% rather than the current 15% of state income tax collections.

That revenue guarantee, however, was the point of contention that Boyer and Cook both said prevented sealing the deal on Thursday.

Boyer said he thought city revenue streams would be protected if cash flow came in lower than expected by increasing the share beyond 18%. But midday, he said that had changed.

He said he could not support the plan after Senate negotiators moved the goal posts.

Late Thursday, Cook said he thought he had the problem solved, setting up what he called the largest debt payoff in state history times 10.

$1.9 billion in debt reduction, which is going to have a cost savings to taxpayers north of $270 million a year going forward, Cook said.

With a constitutional deadline to enact a spending plan approaching on June 30, House Speaker Rusty Bowers was frustrated with the delay.

He said if a deal isn't cut by Tuesday, he will try to pass a skinny budget that just funds government at current levels to allow time for more talks.

Weve been sitting here all day and twiddling our thumbs, Bowers said. So were going skinny on Tuesday  either put up or shut up.

The initial deal struck between Republican leaders of the House and Senate and GOP Gov. Doug Ducey paid down much less of the approximately $14 billion in state debt and left the city share of income tax unchanged. Cities worried they would be forced to make budget cuts because their revenue relies so much on state-shared income tax.

Cook and Boyer also said that the tax cuts relied on rosy projections that were clouded by massive amounts of federal coronavirus recovery money. They also were concerned that the deal essentially ignored the large load of debt that the state is carrying, much of it accrued since the Great Recession.

Concessions they won delay the 2.5% flat tax and it won't go into effect unless revenue triggers are met. New payouts in the budget deal would erase large amounts of the Department of Public Safety's pension debt and some of the debt in the prison guard pension plan by making a $1 billion payment into those plans. The state would also put aside money to pay off nearly $1 billion in bonds backed by state buildings and lottery revenue.

Both of the debt payoffs free up cash now used to pay higher pension costs and bonding costs. Along with another payoff already in the plan, they will save the state $270 million a year.

The deal excluded Democrats who Gov. Doug Ducey said in recent weeks he was willing to work with to get a budget deal. With just one-vote majorities in the Senate and House, Republicans were unable to pass a budget if any one GOP lawmaker refused to back the deal.

Voters passed Proposition 208 in November to boost education funding, with the new money dedicated to pay more to teachers and support staff, for teacher training and education and for career and technical education. Protecting wealthy Arizonans from the new tax will cost the general fund $827 million in the coming year and $487 million a year going forward; schools will still get the extra money.

The massive tax cut package, which proponents called the largest in state history, would have cut more than 25% of state income tax revenue after being fully phased in over the next two years.

The new proposal envisions two rates, one at 2.55% and another at 2.98% with a phase-down to the original flat 2.5% over several years if revenue holds.

An Associated Press analysis shows the state is on the hook for $6.6 billion in pension debt and $7.6 billion in bonds, lease-purchases and payment deferrals. That includes $930 million owed to schools from a budget gimmick used following the Great Recession that delayed nearly $1 billion in payments.

The initial budget proposal that paid down school debt by just $30 million got a $35 million boost as part of the sweetener revealed earlier this month.
I had come to the California Federation of Women's Clubs Grove in Humboldt Redwoods State Park to find an albino redwood known as the Christmas Tree. But as I checked the online directions for the third time, I was starting to lose hope.

The text was straightforward and the photos made it seem like the bone-white foliage would be easy to spot. But I had twice walked up and down the trail where the albino ostensibly stood and had seen nothing but sky-high redwoods with usual green needles. No one else was around to ask.

I walked the trail one more time, very slowly, studying each tree as I passed it. Not an albino. Not an albino. Not an albino. Just as I was about to give up, my eye caught a flash of white from within a tree directly in front of my face. An albino!

Ashley Harrell

The reason I had such a hard time noticing it was that many of the needles had died and turned brown. The tree was also smaller than I expected, only about 30 feet high. Still, the needles that remained ivory were amazing to behold.

I wondered if all the dead foliage was normal, so I called up albino redwood researcher Tom Stapleton. Hes been studying them for many years, and his answer  along with a lot of other things he had to say about albino redwoods  was pretty mind-blowing.

Stapleton first stumbled on an albino redwood back in 1996 while exploring Jack London State Historic Park, and he had no idea what he was looking at. I thought, this has got to be the most unusual thing I've ever seen, he says. It almost looked fake. The internet was still in its infancy back then, so Stapleton went to a library and checked out a book, The White Redwoods: Ghosts of the Forest, to learn more about the trees. In reading about them, he quickly got hooked.

Stapleton started seeking out albino redwoods throughout Sonoma County, and he soon learned there were a bunch of different kinds. Just to be clear, an albino redwood lacks chlorophyll, the stuff that normally turns plants green. Some are known as basal, meaning they grow from the bottom of other parent redwood trees, which they depend on for photosynthesis. The other kind are referred to as aerial, and they grow as branches of parent redwoods farther up in the tree. Stapleton has documented 561 albino redwoods, and those include chimeras, or trees with some albino foliage and some normal green foliage. The patterns on chimeras can vary, and sometimes, albinos also even come in different colors such as pale green or yellow.

Richard Stenger/HCCVB/Redwoods.info

Whats most interesting to Stapleton, though, is that the majority of the albino redwoods hes discovered are growing in areas where humans have introduced toxic substances via petroleum products, old railroad tracks and septic systems. That's what has really kept me intrigued and why I continue to study them, he says. I want to find the cause.

Stapleton runs experiments with his own albino redwoods that he propagates in Amador County, but he also regularly visits wild albino trees in Humboldt Redwoods State Park, including the one I saw.

Last time he checked, the aerial albinos were all looking pretty good. But during the drought, basal trees like the Christmas Tree are being outcompeted by old growth redwoods for moisture, Stapleton says. Among the seven basal albinos he checked in Humboldt Redwoods State Park, between 50% and 95% of the foliage had died, and they all looked stressed, he says. One tree in particular  the Spirit Tree  was in really bad shape.

Courtesy of Tom Stapleton

The ground around it was bone-dry and it looked like something out of mid-August, Stapleton says. I was really shocked because it was the tail end of May. It's really concerning.

That said, the growth of these special trees is cyclical, according to Stapleton: They can die back one year and flourish the next. And recently, he did find out about one very healthy albino discovered on timberland belonging to Humboldt Redwood Company in Carlotta, just a few ridges over from the park.

Last month, the companys lead botanist met with Stapleton at the tree, which they accessed by traveling several miles on logging roads and bushwhacking through gullies. The tree stood about 11 feet high and 5 feet wide and was a pure white albino.

Courtesy of Tom Stapleton

Despite the ongoing drought of 2021, this mutation appeared healthy compared to others that were inspected several ridges over in Humboldt Redwoods State Park, Stapleton reported on his website dedicated to albinos. Like breadcrumbs in a forest, albino redwoods may be telling us more about human-environment interactions than first understood.

Although Humboldt Redwood Company had marked the parent trees of that albino for harvesting, after meeting with Stapleton there was a change of heart. Because of the rarity and significance of the albino discovery, it was decided  that the parent trees would be marked as no cut, Stapleton wrote.

Ashley Harrell

Its bad form to give out the locations of basal albino redwoods because people like to pick their white needles off and have even killed some trees. But the aerial ones are out of reach, meaning their locations are safe to disclose.

To see an amazing one in the park, head for the Founders' Grove parking lot, walk to the north end and look up, Stapleton advises. Theres an albino up there fanned out like a clamshell, its glistening white foliage bursting from the redwood like some kind of ethereal firework.

Its just beautiful, he says.
Read SFGATE's latest story on the Willow Fire here.

Evacuation information: https://montereyco.maps.arcgis.com

Willow Fire map and updates: https://inciweb.nwcg.gov/incident/7549/

LATEST June 18, 8:50 pm. The Monterey County Sheriff's Office has upgraded the evacuation warning to an order for Zone WF-3a on Friday evening.

Zone WF-3a includes all areas of Arroyo Secco Roadd west of Woodtick Canyon, including Arroyo Seco Campground, Rocky Creek Road, and Camp Cawatre.

See the evacuation map here.

June 18, 4:30 p.m. The Willow Fire grew to approximately 750 acres Friday afternoon, according to the Los Padres National Forest.

The blaze emitted a massive pyrocumulus cloud that rose up to 14,000 feet above ground level, according to the National Weather Service.

"Any time we have a fire, these can develop," said Brooke Bingaman, a meteorologist with the weather service. "I think whats shocking is this is developing very quickly and that plume is going very high and we havent seen that since last year when we had our big lightning outbreak and a lot of fires."

So called "fire clouds" form over forest fires when an intense heating of the air triggers an upward motion, pushing smoke and water vapor to rapidly rise.

"What happens is when any moisture in the air rises, it wants to condense, but it cant condense on nothing, and so the smoke particulates act as something it can condense on," Bingaman explained.

The cloud was visible from the Salinas and Carmel valleys and many posted images in social media. One Twitter user said he spotted the cloud from Capitola near Santa Cruz.

@CarmelValleyGirl

There are 300 firefighters on the ground as well as air tankers and water-dropping helicopters battling the blaze.

Hot and dry weather conditions with temperatures over 100 degrees are creating difficult firefighting conditions. Winds out of the southwest are 5 mph to 10 mph with gusts up to 20 mph.

Find evacuation information here.

Los Padres National Forest

June 18, 1:30 p.m. Monterey County released a map of evacuation orders and warnings for the Willow Fire in Big Sur. Find it here.

June 18, 1 p.m. KSBW-TV broadcast an update on the Willow Fire in Big Sur with a weather forecast. Watch it here.

June 18, noon A wildfire burning in the Los Padres National Forest in Big Sur had grown to 200 acres as of Friday at noon, according to KSBW.

Courtesy PG&E

June 18, 11 a.m. A wildfire burning in California's Big Sur region Friday has triggered evacuations, growing to 180 acres with no containment as of Friday morning.

The Willow Fire sparked on Thursday, June 17, at 8:10 p.m. on Willow Creek in the Ventana Wilderness northwest of the Arroyo Seco Recreation Area close to the Tassajara Zen Center, according to an incident report from the Los Padres National Forest. It is burning north of the Dolan Fire that ravaged 128,050 acres in 2020.

The Montery County Office of Emergency Services issued an evacuation order Friday morning for Tassajara Road from the Tassajara Zen Center to China Camp Campground, in the Los Padres National Forest, including tributary forest routes.

The National Weather Service shared footage on Twitter from a PG&E webcam showing a smoke plume billowing above the mountains near Arroyo Seco Campground in Big Sur.

"Note the rapid expansion of the smoke plume in response to a wind shift that will continue to steer it towards the north thru the rest of today," the weather service said.

Los Padres National Forest

Smoke was visible in the Salinas and Carmel valleys Friday.

The wildfire started amid a sweltering heat wave gripping the West Coast, and temperatures in Big Sur on Thursday rose into the low 90s, which is unusual for the coast. Gradual cooling is expected Friday and through the weekend.

For updates, visit the Big Sur Fire Facebook page and the Montery County Office of Emergency Services Twitter page.

This is a developing story.
Alice Waters gained celebrity fame in the San Francisco Bay Area after opening Chez Panissse restaurant in Berkeley.

Now, she's bringing her farm-to-table California cuisine to the land of A-list stars.

The slow food pioneer is part of a project to open a restaurant in Southern California at the Hammer Museum, an art museum in Westwood Village that's part of the School of the Arts and Architecture at UCLA.

A. Graff

The project is still in the works and the concept remains unnamed and there's no menu as of yet. But the establishment is expected to open this fall in the former space of the restaurant Audrey.

Waters is part of an impressive team collaborating on the endeavor, including former Chez Panisse head chef and New York Times columnist David Tanis and Jesse McBride, a veteran of Chateau Marmont and The Standard hotel. Also involved is Oliver Monday who will serve as forager and farm liaison.

"Waters sees the project as an ongoing experimental endeavora restaurant that is also a teaching kitchen, an artistic expression, and most importantly, a community gathering place," according to a statement from Waters' press office. "The feel of the place will be strikingly different from the France-focused, somewhat more traditional dining experience at Waters beloved Chez Panisse restaurant in Berkeley."

The statement said the restaurant will have "admittedly lofty goals"  aiming to support local artists and craftspeople, inspire the students of UCLA, help to mitigate climate change, promote regenerative organic agriculture, and celebrate the diverse kitchen cultures of Los Angeles.

When Waters opened her renowned Berkeley restaurant Chez Panisse in 1971 after graduating from UC Berkeley, she was among the first chefs to spotlight organic, locally grown ingredients and is recognized for starting a movement in market-fresh cooking.

She opened the upstairs more casual Chez Panisse Cafe in 1980 and Cafe Fanny, named after her daughter, in 1984. Cafe Fanny, which served breakfast and lunch, shuttered in 2012.

A national public policy advocate for school lunch reform, she created the Edible Schoolyard program at Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School in Berkeley.
Editors Note: This story contains references to sexual violence.

Questions about the 1995 murder and sexual assault of Mary Catherine Edwards, a beloved Beaumont teacher and twin sister, had gone unanswered for more than two decades.

Now, thanks to DNA evidence and a genealogy website, an arrest has been made and the details of her demise are coming to light.

It is a sigh of relief to hear they have a suspect, former student LaToyya Twine-Ozane said. She didnt deserve to die.

DNA evidence appears to have tied 61-year-old Clay Foreman, Edwards high school classmate and acquaintance, to the crime scene and led to his arrest Thursday by authorities in Franklin County, Ohio. He is being held on a capital murder charge.

In 1982, Edwards was a bridesmaid at Foremans first wedding, said Jefferson County District Attorney Bob Wortham.

Now, Foreman is awaiting transfer to Beaumont to face a trial for allegedly killing her.

Edwards, 31, was a well-loved teacher who lived alone in a Beaumont townhouse. According to Enterprise archives, she was last seen leaving her classroom around 5 p.m. on Friday, Jan. 13, 1995.

She would normally stay late at school preparing her lesson plan for the following class, Price Elementary Principal Floyd Broussard told The Enterprise at the time.

The next day, Edwards didnt respond to phone calls, and her parents went to check on her at her home on Park Meadow Street. They found her drowned in her bathtub upstairs, police said at the time.

An autopsy revealed that she had her hands bound behind her back in handcuffs and was sexually assaulted before she was killed.

Related: Arrest made in connection with 1995 Beaumont slaying

Neighbors, who were gathered around Edwards townhouse after learning the shocking news of her death, told The Enterprise at the time that they remembered her as a quiet woman who took daily walks with her beagle.

She has a routine that she would follow, neighbor John Stegall said of her morning and afternoon walks.

Police continued to search for leads in the case for years after Edwards death.

In 2006, Beaumont Police Department spokesperson and Officer Carman Apple told The Enterprise that detectives continue to work on cases like Edwards long after they drop from the public eye.

At that time, Beaumont Police Chief Lt. Charles Tyler said police had great evidence in Edwards case and at one time police spent $10,000 for DNA testing at a Maryland lab.

We just havent found the right person, Tyler said. As more and more people are put into the (DNA) database, it gives me hope that we will get more of the offenders.

When Jefferson County District Attorney Bob Wortham took office in 2014, he asked police to renew efforts in the case.

The very first day I was sworn in as district attorney, I called (Beaumont Police Chief James) Singletary and asked him to put some people on the Edwards case because it was such a terrible set of facts, Wortham told The Enterprise. I really wanted to find a way to solve that case.

Other than sharing that developments had been made in the investigation, Beaumont police officials declined to comment.

But court documents released Tuesday and filed to support Foremans arrest revealed investigators path.

In early 2020, according to the documents, police entered the crime scene DNA profile into GEDmatch, a web service and public DNA database. The documents did not say what led police last year to input the information into the service.

But what they found allowed investigators to identify second cousins and other distant family members. Detectives used that information and more than 30 corresponding DNA files to build a family tree and find a connection  on both the maternal and paternal side  to the DNA gathered at the crime scene, the probable cause affidavit stated.

That connection left two possibilities  Foreman and his brother.

Police looked into Foremans brother and found he did not have a criminal record.

Foreman, however, had pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting a fellow Forest Park High School classmate in 1981  a case that officials say bears similarities to Edwards.

In that instance, Foreman happened upon a stranded female and, claiming to be a police officer, offered to take her home, according to the documents. Foreman drove away with the female before tying her up with a belt and sexually assaulting her, the documents said.

There are numerous similarities in the 1981 case and the Edwards murder, the affidavit stated. Foreman claimed to be a police officer in the 1981 case, and in Edwards case the suspect utilized police tools of the trade.

Nearly a year after police began building the family tree, with the help of the FBI Cincinnati Field Office and Reynoldsburg Ohio Police Department, detectives took trash from Foremans residence and sent it to be tested to determine if it would match the material gathered at the crime scene.

These lab results confirmed Foreman is the suspect that entered Edwards residence, bound her hands behind her back, sexually assaulted her and subsequently murdered her, the affidavit stated.

The breakthrough in the case comes after years of dead ends.

According to Enterprise archives, police briefly believed they had a lead in the case in 1996 after two similar murders. The victims, who also were educators, were found bound and killed in bathtubs in Arlington.

But after police visited the area and reviewed evidence, they said the physical evidence in the Arlington cases does not match what Beaumont police have found in investigating Edwards death.

With no suspects and no motive, the Southeast Texas community was shaken to the core by the death.

In the aftermath, counselors from across Beaumont ISD were sent to the school to console students and teachers alike, and officials were pressed for answers.

According to a front page Enterprise story shortly after the death, friends described Edwards, a petite woman who stood less than 5 feet tall, as a little gal with a big heart.

A local pastor told the paper she had been attending a Wednesday night Bible study class and a singles group at First Baptist Church for the last several months of her life.

She was a member of Leadership Beaumont and the Chicken Club.

Edwards was well-liked and well-known in the community along with her twin sister Allison Brocatto, a fellow teacher.

According to an Enterprise profile of the two from 1993, Edwards would tell her students about her twin on the first day of class.

Top hits: Get Beaumont Enterprise stories sent directly to your inbox

I say, If you see another one of me walking around somewhere and she doesnt speak to you, dont get your feelings hurt, she said. Its probably my sister.

Students of the two teachers would still approach them in public.

Edwards told The Enterprise in 1993 that she became accustomed to strange small children running up to her at a shopping mall, throwing their arms around her and giving her a hug. She said she quickly learned to simply hug them back.

Her sister said when Edwards fifth-graders did the same thing to her, and she told them she wasnt their teacher, they would become embarrassed, giggle and hurry away.

Brocatto, who still is a teacher in Southeast Texas, could not be reached for comment.

Former students from across the region, reacting to news of the arrest, looked back on fond memories in the classroom. Joe Bowser remembers enjoying her awesome fifth-grade class.

I loved her class, he said.

A nurse who worked at the school at the time said Edwards would always stop by to say hello.

Twine-Ozane, who had Edwards as a teacher in fifth grade, said she was sweet and loving.

She didnt have children. So, she loved us as her own, Twine-Ozane told The Enterprise. I never heard her raise her voice.

Twine-Ozane was a senior when Edwards was killed.

You reflect on every teacher that made an impact on your life, and she was one of those teachers, she said. In school, I was moved to a separate building in fourth and fifth grade, but I always made it to the main building to get a hug and see her smile.

jorge.ramos@beaumontenterprise.com

twitter.com/byjorgeramos

Isaac.Windes@hearstnp.com

twitter.com/isaacdwindes
TEMPLE, Maine (AP)  Police in Maine are investigating the death of a four-year-old in Maine who they say died of an accidental self-inflicted gunshot wound.

The shooting happened on Thursday in Temple, police said. Police said other family members were in the house at the time of the shooting.
JUNEAU, Alaska (AP)  Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy labeled as defective the state spending package passed by lawmakers this week and said he was prepared to call them into another special session next week if they do not act before the current special session expires Friday.

Dunleavy said notices warning of possible layoffs were sent to state employees, with the new fiscal year two weeks away. He pinpointed as a main concern a failed effective date vote, which he said raises constitutional issues.

The House and Senate this week passed a state spending package, but the House failed to get the two-thirds support for a procedural effective date vote. Attorneys for the Legislature and the state Department of Law have offered differing views on what that could mean.

Megan Wallace, director of Legislative Legal Services, said the spending package includes a section that makes all the provisions retroactive to their intended effective dates.

Because the bill contains a retroactivity provision for all appropriations in the bill, the executive branch may choose to give effect to the retroactivity clause, and allow state government to continue operating before the bill takes effect 90 days later, knowing that the appropriations are retroactive to their intended effective dates, Wallace wrote in a memo to House Speaker Louise Stutes, dated Wednesday.

Wallace, however, noted the Dunleavy administration may choose not to give effect to the retroactivity clause. She also said there may be unintended consequences of a failure to adopt special effective dates that are not immediately foreseeable.

Under the state constitution, laws become effective 90 days after they are enacted, but the Legislature can provide a different effective date with a two-thirds vote in each chamber.

Deputy Attorney General Cori Mills, in a memo to Dunleavys chief of staff dated Thursday, said under a plain application of the constitution, the appropriations set out in the bill are only authorized to be expended when that bill becomes law, which is 90 days after enactment.

Mills wrote that a retroactivity clause has no effect until the bill becomes law.

The retroactivity clause doesn't save this, she told reporters.

Some lawmakers expressed frustration with Dunleavy's stance.

Rep. Zack Fields, an Anchorage Democrat, on social media said Dunleavy could ask minority House Republicans to rescind action on the effective date vote and to vote in favor.

But he has not done that because hes manufacturing a crisis to hold the whole state and economy hostage over the dividend, Fields said.

The annual dividend paid to residents has become a politically charged debate, overshadowing other issues and causing divisions even within caucuses.

Dunleavy, who has spent much of his term under threat of a recall effort, has proposed putting a dividend formula in the state constitution as a way to help resolve the perennial dividend fight.

It was an issue he wanted debated during this special session, but a number of legislators pushed back against the assumptions underlying his proposal. Many lawmakers said they would prefer a more full-fledged debate on the dividend later this year alongside other pieces of a possible fiscal plan.

During Tuesday's budget votes in the House, two of the minority's 18 members voted for the effective date clause, which received 23 votes total but needed 27.

A message seeking comment Thursday was left for House Minority Leader Cathy Tilton through an aide.

Minority House Republicans expressed frustration with the budget, which included strings attached to funding for programs like the dividend. Traditionally dividends have been paid with earnings from the nest-egg permanent fund. But the budget took money from various pots for a dividend this year and tied the dividend's size to a key vote involving a reserve fund that requires three-fourths support in each the House and Senate to access.

The budget called for a roughly $1,100 dividend this year with a successful three-quarter vote and a $525 dividend if the vote failed. Neither the House nor the Senate achieved the three-quarter threshold. But legislative leaders have vowed to continue negotiations on that and ways to address funding for other programs affected by the three-quarter vote failure.

The budget maneuvers irked many legislators, and Tilton has said members of her caucus felt their perspective wasn't being heard.

Corey Allen Young, a Dunleavy spokesperson, did not answer questions on whether Dunleavy would be open to allowing legislators to address the three-quarter vote issues later and if he would be content to get the effective date approved for now.

An effective date of July 1 would repair the constitutional flaw, Young said by email.

Sen. Jesse Kiehl, a Juneau Democrat, called Dunleavy's position on the effective date issue a radical reinterpretation of the law.

Wallace, in her memo, said state attorneys general have opined on several different occasions in several different contexts that funds may be obligated and expended prior to the actual effective date of an appropriation.

House Speaker Louise Stutes, in a statement, called it hard to comprehend the governors decision to ignore more than four decades of legal advice and longstanding precedent. However, in light of the governors interpretation, the House majority stands ready to reaffirm our yes votes in hopes that the minority will join us. We can fix this by tomorrow."

Stutes said lawmakers would continue negotiations in the waning hours of this special session.
NEW YORK (AP)  US Catholic bishops approve drafting of Communion document that could lead to rebuke of President Joe Biden.
PHOENIX (AP)  Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey on Friday signed a bill rushed through in a special legislative session that provides $100 million in funding this year to battle wildfires, react to the damage they cause and to create a new force of more than 700 state inmates to clear brush.

The Republican called the bill he signed at the Capitol an important step in bringing relief to rural communities that have been impacted by a series of wildfires this year.

As many Arizonans know, we are in the midst of another catastrophic wildfire season, Ducey said. "People and pets have been displaced, homes have been burned down, vast swaths of forest and desert have been decimated. Its been horrible.

The $100 million appropriation includes $25 million to pay for 720 state prisoners to clear brush and other flammable material under direction of state forestry officials and some contract clearing operations. Ducey proposed that spending in his January budget plan. The legislation includes money for those crews for the next two years that adds another $70 million in spending.

Theres also $75 million for firefighting efforts to help affected municipalities, people and property owners recover and to prepare for flooding and other fallout from large fires so far this fire season.

The moves come as several large fires are burning across the state, with one near the mining town of Globe already among the top 10 ever seen in the state. As of Friday morning, the blaze in the mountains 90 miles (144 kilometers) southeast of Phoenix has consumed 275 square miles (712 square kilometers) of brush and timber. Several small communities were under evacuation orders and others were under evacuation warnings.

That large fire alone has consumed 52 structures but is more than 70% contained. Other smaller fires are burning as a heat wave that began early this week continues. The temperatures are so high that large aerial tankers cant always fly. Severe drought has also dried up water sources helicopters would normally access to drop on the flames.

House Speaker Rusty Bowers, who lost a home he used as a family retreat in the fire, said he was impressed how rural residents have responded.

"Were grateful for the communities, how they pull together, or they help each other and call each other," Bowers said. It's an example of what rural folks do under pressure.

The bill has had overwhelming bipartisan support in the Legislature, although many Democrats argued that the state needed to take major action to react to climate change that is driving the drought and resulting fires.
CANBERRA, Australia (AP)  A former Australian spy was released from court on Friday with a three-month suspended prison sentence over his attempt to help East Timor prove that Australia spied on the fledgling nation during multibillion-dollar oil and gas negotiations.

The former spy, publicly known as Witness K, and his lawyer, Bernard Collaery, had been charged in 2018 with conspiring to reveal secret information to the East Timorese government.

Former East Timor President and Prime Minister Jose Ramos-Horta is among leaders of the impoverished half-island nation of 1.5 million to urge Australia to drop the persecutions.

K pleaded guilty on Thursday at the beginning of a two-day sentencing hearing in the Australian Capital Territory Magistrates Court. The public and media were excluded when classified evidence was discussed.

Magistrate Glenn Theakston sentenced K to three months in prison fully suspended. K, who was hidden behind black screens in the courtroom throughout the hearing, must also pay a 1,000 Australian dollar ($840) security bond to be of good behavior for 12 months.

K had faced up to two years in prison. The maximum has been increased since his offense to 10 years as Australia tightens controls on secrecy.

The Australian government has refused to comment on allegations that K led an Australian Secret Intelligence Service operation that bugged government offices in the East Timorese capital, Dili, in 2004 during negotiations on the sharing of oil and gas revenue from the seabed that separates the two countries.

The government canceled Ks passport before he was to testify at the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague in 2014 in support of East Timors challenge to the validity of the 2006 treaty.

The East Timorese argued that the treaty was invalid because Australia had failed to negotiate in good faith by engaging in espionage.

There was no evidence heard in open court of a bugging operation, which media had reported was conducted under the guise of a foreign aid program.

But K and Collaery had prepared for the East Timorese government two affidavits that identified K as a former ASIS member and details of ASIS functions.

Theakston noted that the case was unusual because Ks offense was committed in plain sight of Australian authorities.

That suggests to me it was brazen and indifferent or mistaken, Theakston said.

Theakston said it was open to him to find K had made a mistake rather than a deliberate breach based on a perception of justice.

The judge described K as an elderly man more than 70 years old who had had the threat of prison hanging over him for eight years.

The ASIS secrecy rules were strict and absolute for serving and former officers, Theakston said.

Defense lawyer Robert Richter said Mr. K had suffered from not being able to travel overseas with his wife because of the loss of his passport.

Richter blamed Ks post-traumatic stress disorder, clinical depression and anxiety for his offense. He argued for K to escape a conviction being recorded for reasons that will be made clear in closed court.

Collaery has pleaded not guilty and wants to fight the charge in an Australian Capital Territory Supreme Court trial without media or the public being excluded.

Collaery was allowed to sit in the public gallery of K's hearing during the closed and open hearings. Collaery declined to comment on the sentence.

Richter told The Associated Press, I think its a fair outcome.

Prosecutor Richard Maidment declined to comment on the result.

Australia and East Timor agreed on a new maritime border treaty in 2018. A year later, the Australian prime minister arrived in Dili to formalize the agreement and was targeted by street protests demanding charges against K and Collaery be dropped.
MANCHESTER, N.H. (AP)  A judge has reduced bail for a former New Hampshire youth center worker accused of sexually assaulting four teenagers, including one at gunpoint.

Jeffrey Buskey, 54, of Quincy, Massachusetts, was one of a group of former workers at the Youth Development Center in Manchester arrested in April and charged with either sexual assault or being accomplices to abuse between 1994 and 2005. The center, now called the Sununu Youth Services Center, has been the target of a broad criminal investigation since 2019, as well as a lawsuit in which more than 200 men and women allege they were physically or sexually abused as children by 150 staffers from 1963 to 2018.
WASHINGTON (AP)  President Joe Biden took a cautious victory lap Friday in his quest to bring the COVID-19 pandemic under control, announcing that 300 million vaccine shots have been administered in the 150 days since he took office.

Biden credited scientists, companies, the American people and his whole-of-government effort. The president noted that the widespread vaccination campaign had set the stage for most Americans to have a relatively normal summer as businesses reopen and employers hire.

Were heading into a very different summer compared to last year, the president said. A bright summer. Prayerfully, a summer of joy.

But as Biden marks one milestone, he is in danger of failing to meet another: his target to have 70% of American adults at least partially vaccinated by July Fourth, in a little over two weeks.

Overall, about 168 million American adults, or 65.1% of the U.S. population 18 years and older, have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine as of Friday, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The pace of new vaccinations in the U.S. has dropped significantly from a high of nearly 2 million per day about two months ago, jeopardizing Biden's ability to hit the 70% mark.

The White House said its whole-of-government approach to the vaccination effort has put the virus in retreat, which in turn has brought COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations and deaths to their lowest levels in more than a year. But Biden noted in his remarks that some communities in states with lower vaccination rates are seeing cases and hospitalizations increase.

The administration is in the middle of a monthlong blitz to combat vaccine hesitancy and the lack of urgency some people feel to get the shots, particularly in the South and Midwest.

CDC Director Rochelle Walensky said Friday that she expects the delta variant of the coronavirus will become the dominant strain in the U.S. That strain has become dominant in Britain after it was first detected in India.

During an appearance on ABCs Good Morning America, she told Americans who get their shots that youll be protected against this delta variant.

As part of the administration's vaccination push, Vice President Kamala Harris traveled to Atlanta on Friday to tour a pop-up COVID-19 vaccination site at Ebenezer Baptist Church, where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was a pastor until his assassination in 1968. The current senior pastor is U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock.

Harris also spoke at a COVID-19 vaccination mobilization event at Clark Atlanta University, a historically Black school. She told students they have the power to end this pandemic by giving people information about the multitude of resources, such as free car rides and child care, that are available to help them get vaccinated.

In Fulton County, Georgia, where Atlanta is located, 49% of residents have received at least one shot. Statewide, it is 42%, Harris said.

Getting vaccinated is about building the power of community, she said. Getting vaccinated is about building the power of our country.

The Biden administration insists that even if the 70% vaccination goal is unmet, it will have little effect on the overall U.S. recovery, which is already ahead of where Biden said it would be months ago.

Biden wants to celebrate Independence Day as a summer of freedom from the virus.

Earlier this week, the White House announced plans to host first responders, essential workers and service members and their families on the South Lawn for a cookout and to watch the fireworks over the National Mall.

More than 1,000 guests are expected for what will be one of the largest events of Biden's presidency.

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Associated Press writers Josh Boak in Baltimore and Zeke Miller in Washington contributed to this report.
BANGKOK (AP)  At least two explosions on Friday rocked a neighborhood in Myanmars biggest city, killing two people, destroying a military truck and damaging a taxi in what appeared to be a serious escalation of violence between the countrys military rulers and their pro-democracy opponents.

Myanmar media reported that the blasts in Yangons working-class Tarmwe neighborhood were caused by bombs, though there was no official confirmation. The neighborhood has been a stronghold of resistance to the military government that ousted the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in February.

A nonviolent civil disobedience movement arose to challenge military rule, but the juntas attempt to repress it with deadly force fueled rather than quelled resistance, and there is now an incipient nationwide insurrection.

People Media, an online news service, reported that a deputy police chief was killed and four soldiers and two policemen wounded when a bomb was hurled at the military truck. The vehicle had been parked outside an office of the Union Solidarity and Development Party, which served as the main opposition group in Parliament during the previous government of Aung San Suu Kyi.

The USDP was established to serve as a political proxy for the military, with which it is closely identified. Photos posted online showed the truck mostly gutted by a blaze that was put out by fire trucks.

A taxi not far away, near Tarmwe Market, exploded shortly after the truck blast, killing one person and injuring another, People Media said. Photos showed a bloodied body lying behind the vehicle, which had its windows and roof blown out and dented doors.

Security forces have killed hundreds of protesters and bystanders since February. In response, some militant activists began employing violent forms of resistance, even though they are heavily outgunned and outnumbered.

In the past two months there have been almost daily small bombings and arson attacks in major cities, as well as the killings of local administrators and police loyal to the junta. Generally no one has claimed responsibility for these attacks, though they are widely attributed to opponents of military rule.

Online reaction to Fridays explosions, mostly among the juntas opponents, was mixed. Many applauded the actions, but some also wondered if they were staged by the military to discredit the peoples defense forces, organized to repel attacks by the army and police. The government and its opponents each describe the other side as terrorists.
MARYLAND HEIGHTS, Mo. (AP)  The body of a 14-year-old boy has been pulled from Creve Coeur Lake in suburban St. Louis, authorities there said.

A Maryland Heights Fire Protection District search and rescue team found the boys body around 8 p.m. Thursday, about an hour after he went under the water and failed to resurface. Officials said the boy was not wearing a life jacket. Authorities did not immediately release the teens name.
LOS ANGELES (AP)  California residents were asked to voluntarily conserve power again Friday as the heat wave that is baking the U.S. West strained the state's energy grid and raised the possibility of rotating outages.

As temperatures spiked on Thursday, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed an emergency proclamation that suspended certain permitting requirements  allowing power plants to ramp up operations if necessary to meet the demand for electricity. The proclamation cited the extreme heat peril facing the state this week.

The California Independent System Operator, which runs the state's energy grid, issued a Flex Alert for 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. Friday. People were urged to set their thermostats to 78 degrees (25.5 degrees Celsius) or higher and to avoid using washers, dishwashers and other major appliances.

However, the period passed without any outages and the operator thanked residents for their conservation efforts.

During an intense Western heat wave last August, the state had two days of rotating outages that affected more than 200,000 people. They were the first such blackouts since 2001.

Power officials said the electrical grid has had upgrades since then, including transmission improvements and adding four times the amount of power stored in lithium-ion batteries. Boosting the 500 megawatts worth of battery storage currently to 2,000 megawatts by August could be crucial when solar power generation tails off after dark.

In all, about 3,500 megawatts of capacity will be added to the grid  enough to power about 2.6 million homes.

Hot temperatures in the central San Joaquin Valley broke records Friday.

Interior areas of the state broiled. Record-breaking triple-digit highs were reported in the San Joaquin Valley. Hanford in Kings County hit 110 degrees, breaking the previous high for the day set in 1917. Southern California desert communities also broke or tied records. Palm Springs had a high of 119, breaking a record for the day set in 1893.

The temperatures were much cooler in the state's coastal areas.

The heat wave was expected to continue into the weekend, with worst of the torrid conditions affecting California's interior regions.

The heat was blamed on a dome of high pressure that has covered the U.S. West.

The heat wave came amid a drought that has dried up vegetation and increased fire danger. There have been a number of small wildfires around California this week. But the state has avoided the fierce gusts that drove last years devastating blazes.

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This story has been corrected to accurately report the temperature in Palm Springs.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP)  Prosecutors have charged the owner of a gun found in a Topeka home by toddlers, who accidentally shot a 13-year-old girl with it.

Shawnee County District Attorney Mike Kagay filed charges of first-degree murder, aggravated child endangerment and criminal possession of a gun by a felon against 22-year-old Dejuan Thomas Yelverton, the Topeka Capital-Journal reported.
DOVER, Del. (AP)  The Democrat-led state House voted along party lines Thursday to give final approval to a bill raising Delawares minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2025.

Democrats approved the measure after defeating half a dozen Republican amendments, including proposals to allow small businesses and nonprofits to pay 85% of the minimum wage and to require the controller generals office to submit annual reports regarding the fiscal impact of the wage increases on the state budget, and on the broader effects on the state economy.

Democrats also rejected a proposal by one of their own party members, Rep. Sheraea Moore of Middletown, to delay each of the annual wage increases for one year for businesses employing 20 or fewer workers.

The bill now goes to Democratic Gov. John Carney,, who is expected to sign it. The bill was one of the legislative priorities for several left-leaning progressives who were elected last year and were able to get veteran Democrats to sign on to their cause.

In the last 15 years, weve made 15 attempts to raise the minimum wage. Only three of them bore fractional (fruit), said Wilmington Democrat Rep. Gerald Brady, chief House sponsor of the bill.

Republicans, meanwhile, warned that the wage increases could have unintended increases, including small businesses shutting down, people losing jobs, consumers paying higher prices, and some low-wage workers losing more in state assistance for expenses such as rent and child care than they will gain in income.

The dialogue ... has not been about empirical evidence, has not been about statistics, has not been about projections and analysis, said Rep. Bryan Shupe, a Milford Republican, whose amendments to require studies of the fiscal and economic effects of the wage increases were shot down by Democrats.

I really believe that instead of having a discussion on numbers and analysis, this was more of a political agenda, he said. He added that the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office had concluded that a nationwide minimum wage of $15 would result in more people losing their jobs than would be lifted out of poverty. The CBO issue a report earlier this year indicating that moving to a $15 minimum wage by 2025 would lift about 900,000 people out of poverty but would result in 1.4 million fewer jobs.

Delawares current minimum wage is $9.25 per hour. The bill increases the minimum wage by 13.5% to $10.50 effective Jan. 1, followed by similar annual double-digit percentage increases to $11.75 per hour in January 2023, $13.25 per hour in January 2024, and $15 per hour in January 2025.

Legislative analysts estimate that the bill will cost taxpayers an additional $3.7 million in fiscal 2024 for state employee wages, not counting resulting salary and wage compression issues.
OLYMPIA, Wash. (AP)  Deputies this week arrested a 50-year-old Enumclaw man in connection with a 2003 kidnapping and rape cold case in McCleary, Washington.

Paul Bieker was booked into the Grays Harbor County jail on Tuesday, The Olympian reported. Bieker on Wednesday pleaded not guilty to charges of rape, kidnapping, burglary, felony harassment and taking a motor vehicle without permission.

The Sheriffs Office said a 17-year-old girl was kidnapped when she returned to her McCleary home in 2003. The kidnapper bound her, put her into her own vehicle and took her to an undisclosed location where he raped her, according to court documents.

Investigators say she was driven to another location and left her in the vehicle.

DNA evidence was collected but no matches were found in a nationwide criminal database at the time, according to court documents.

A breakthrough in the case emerged in December when the evidence was sent to a lab for genealogy testing, the sheriff's office said in a Facebook post.

The lab results allowed investigators to create a shortlist of people who may be related to the suspect, according to the post. Investigators eventually focused on Bieker, who reportedly lived near the girls home in 2003, per the post.

Law enforcement got a sample of Bieker's DNA from discarded coffee cups June 3, according to the documents. On June 9, the Washington State Patrol Crime Lab compared the new sample with the old and found a match, per the documents.

The sheriffs office also said they are evaluating possible connections to the murder case of 10-year-old Lindsey Baum.

Baum disappeared in June 2009 as she walked home from a friends house. She was not found until 2017 when her remains were uncovered in a remote area of Kittitas County in Eastern Washington.

No arrests have been made in Baums case.
John Minchillo/AP

NEW YORK (AP)  New York City municipal workers are not getting a paid Juneteenth holiday this year, despite a pledge last year from Mayor Bill de Blasio to make it one and as it becomes one for federal workers.

Juneteenth, on June 19th, marks the day in 1865, two months after the end of the Civil War and more than two years after the Emancipation Proclamation, that enslaved Black people in Texas were told by Union soldiers that they had been freed.
DETROIT (AP)  A shooting on Interstate 75 in Detroit killed a 2-year-old boy and left a 9-year-old boy hospitalized in serious condition, police said.

The victims were transported to Childrens Hospital of Michigan in Detroit following the shooting about 9:45 p.m. Thursday, and the younger boy later died, Michigan State Police spokesman 1st Lt. Mike Shaw said.
MADISON, Wis. (AP)  Gov. Tony Evers on Friday vetoed a bill that would have opened the door to more children going to private school using a voucher paid for by taxpayers.

The bill Evers vetoed would have raised the income eligibility for the voucher program to three times the federal poverty level.
Videos released under court order provide a chilling new look at the chaos at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, including body camera footage that shows a man charging at a police officer with a flagpole and tackling him to the ground.

Federal judges ordered the release of the videos after media organizations, including The Associated Press, went to court to request that the Department of Justice provide access. The videos are being presented as evidence in prosecutors cases against three men charged with assaulting police.

The new videos show a Marine Corps veteran and former New York City police officer wielding a flagpole as he attacks police, as well as rioters crushing another officer into a door as he screams in pain. Still another video shows a New Jersey man punching an officer in the head.

The release comes at a time when Republican lawmakers in Washington increasingly try to downplay the siege, portraying the breach of the Capitol as a mostly peaceful protest despite the shocking violence that unfolded.

Supporters of former President Donald Trump fought past police lines to storm the building and interrupt the certification of President Joe Bidens election win over Trump.

The Justice Department has brought hundreds of criminal cases against the rioters. This week, a man linked to the antigovernment Three Percenters extremist movement was indicted on a new charge that he brought a semi-automatic handgun with him to the Capitol.

Body camera video released in the case against former New York City policeman Thomas Webster shows the man holding a flagpole and shouting profanities at officers standing behind a metal barricade. Webster pushes the barricade and swings toward an officer with the flagpole. There's a violent scuffle, the officer manages to take the flagpole away from the man, and Webster appears to tackle the officer to the ground.

Other images in court documents show Webster pinning the officer to the ground and grabbing at his face.

Webster's lawyer wrote in court documents seeking his release from jail while he awaits trial that his client got upset when he saw police using pepper spray on the crowd. The lawyer, James Monroe, wrote that as a former U.S. Marine and a member of law enforcement, defendant's moral instinct was to protect the innocent.

Monroe said the officer provoked Webster by reaching across the barrier and punching him. The lawyer says Webster never actually struck the officer with the flagpole.

Other footage released in the case against Patrick McCaughey III, a Connecticut man charged with assault, show police wearing helmets and face shields gathered in a Capitol doorway as the crowd pushes aggressively forward and shouts at them.

At one point, Daniel Hodges of Washington's Metropolitan Police Department gets pinned against a door and a rioter rips off his mask. The mob shouts heave ho" as it pushes forward. Hodges, whose mouth appears bloody, cries out as he's crushed between a riot shield and the door. McCaughey at one point points to Hodges and says he's hurt," seemingly trying to alert the other officers. Hodges has recovered from his injuries.

An email seeking comment was sent to an attorney for McCaughey.

Democrats used the video of Hodges, which had been previously obtained by some media outlets, in their impeachment case against Trump accusing him of inciting the insurrection. The House impeached him  the second of his presidency  a week after the riot for telling his supporters that morning to fight like hell to overturn his defeat. The Senate acquitted him weeks later.

Footage released in a third case shows a man identified as Scott Fairlamb and others yelling at police as the officers walk through the crowd outside the Capitol. Fairlamb then shoves an officer and punches at his head, hitting his face shield. An email seeking comment was sent to Fairlamb's attorney.

Court documents filed this week also show another man, Guy Reffitt of Texas, has been indicted on new charges that he brought a rifle and handgun to Washington and carried the handgun onto Capitol grounds. He was arrested in January and previously pleaded not guilty to charges including obstruction of an official proceeding.

Reffitt's wife told authorities he's a member of a Three Percenters group, according to court documents. Prosecutors say Reffitt led a group of rioters up the Capitol steps and was stopped only after officers used pepper balls, impact projectiles and pepper spray.

An email seeking comment was sent to Reffitt's attorney on Friday.

More than 480 people are facing federal charges in the riot. Four have pleaded guilty so far, including a member of the Oath Keepers extremist group who has agreed to cooperate with investigators.

A 49-year-old Indiana grandmother is expected next week to become the first Jan. 6 person to be sentenced. Anna Morgan Lloyd is pleading guilty to a misdemeanor charge for entering the Capitol. Prosecutors are asking for a sentence of probation with community service and $500 in restitution.

After the riot, Morgan Lloyd described it on Facebook as the "most exciting day of my life, according to prosecutors. She wrote in a letter to the judge filed in court that she didn't see any violence at the Capitol and was shocked when she returned to her hotel and saw the news coverage.

"At first it didnt dawn on me, but later I realized that if every person like me, who wasnt violent, was removed from that crowd, the ones who were violent may have lost the nerve to do what they did. For that I am sorry and take responsibility," she wrote.

The powerful video footage was made public as Senate Republicans have blocked a bipartisan inquiry into the insurrection and as an increasing number of House Republicans have defended the rioters and played down the violence of the day.

At a House Oversight and Reform hearing Tuesday, several Republicans questioned Democrats efforts to examine the attack and said they should instead be focused on issues like border security or COVID-19 restrictions.

Wisconsin Rep. Glenn Grothman grilled FBI Director Christopher Wray on whether some of those who were arrested for illegally entering the Capitol were in fact innocent. Arizona Rep. Paul Gosar repeated his arguments that a Trump supporter who was shot and killed by police while breaking into the House chamber, Ashli Babbitt, was executed.

At a hearing last month, GOP Rep. Andrew Clyde of Georgia said one video feed of the rioters looked like they were on a normal tourist visit.

Also Tuesday, 21 House Republicans voted against giving congressional medals of honor to Capitol Police and Metropolitan Police to thank them for their service that day. Dozens of those officers suffered injuries, including chemical burns, brain injuries and broken bones as the rioters overran them and broke into the building.

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Associated Press reporter Mary Clare Jalonick contributed to this report from Washington.
BOSTON (AP)  A former Boston police sergeant has pleaded guilty to collecting more than $25,000 in fraudulent overtime pay while working at the department's evidence locker, federal prosecutors said.

Gerard OBrien, 62, of Braintree, pleaded guilty on Thursday to conspiracy to commit theft concerning programs receiving federal funds and embezzlement from an agency receiving federal funds, according to a statement from the U.S. attorney's office in Boston.
COLUMBUS, Ga. (AP)  An Alabama man has been indicted on murder charges in Georgia less than three weeks after Alabama charges in the same killing were abruptly dismissed following a judge ruling DNA evidence was inadmissible.

Local news outlets report a Columbus grand jury indicted Stacey Gray on Wednesday for murder and other charged in Renee Eldridge's July 2015 death. Muscogee County District Attorney Mark Jones said he would seek the death penalty against Gray if convicted.
ATLANTA (AP)  Georgia's secretary of state is making public a list of nearly 102,000 voters who will be removed from the rolls unless they act to preserve their registration.

Republican Brad Raffensperger announced the list Friday, part of an every-other-year bid to remove voters who may have died or moved away. The state has about 7.8 million voters and his office said the removals include about 67,000 voters who submitted a change of address form to the U.S. Postal Service, and about 34,000 voters who had election mail returned.

Voter purges in Georgia became a hot-button issue during the 2018 governors race between Democrat Stacey Abrams and Republican Brian Kemp. Secretary of state before being elected governor, Kemp oversaw aggressive voter purges during his tenure. More than 1.4 million voter registrations were cancelled in Georgia between 2012 and 2018.

In the current purge, election officials said, cancellation notices will be mailed and those who respond within 40 days will have their registration switched back to active. Anyone who is removed could register again.

On a monthly basis, the secretary of state been removing voters who were convicted of felonies or who died.

Raffensperger said more than 18,000 voters were removed last month after Georgia concluded they had died based on information from Georgia's own death registry or from the Electronic Registration Information Center, a partnership among 30 states and the District of Columbia. Officials said they have no record that any of those 18,000-plus cast ballots in the November 2020 general election or the January runoff.

The removals are much smaller than the more than 300,000 voters that Raffensperger sought to remove from Georgia's registration lists in 2019. That year, Fair Fight Action, a voting rights group founded by Abrams, sued to stop a portion of the removals.

During the lawsuit, Raffensperger agreed to keep 22,000 voters on the rolls after finding it was moving too soon to cancel their registrations. A federal judge, though ruled against Fair Fight Action's argument that Georgia should have to keep another 98,000 voters registered.

In 2019, Georgia purged 287,000 voters, while nearly 5,000 either voted or got in touch to keep their registration from being cancelled.

Georgia law says voters should be moved to inactive status if they have no contact with the state for a period of time. The General Assembly voted in 2019 to lengthen the no-contact period to five years. Inactive registrations are later removed if voters miss the next two general elections, giving them a total of nine years.

Only 276 voters will be removed under those use it or lose it provisions this year.

Making sure Georgias voter rolls are up to date is key to ensuring the integrity of our elections, Raffensperger said in a statement Friday. That is why I fought and beat Stacey Abrams in court in 2019 to remove nearly 300,000 obsolete voter files before the November election, and will do so again this year. Bottom line, there is no legitimate reason to keep ineligible voters on the rolls.

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Follow Jeff Amy on Twitter at http://twitter.com/jeffamy.
SAVANNAH, Ga. (AP)  A Georgia state trooper wounded a man who raised a gun at officers after stealing and crashing a police car, authorities said Friday.

Jacob Anthony Palmer, 29, was in stable condition Friday at a Savannah hospital, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation said in a news release. He was charged with assaulting a police officer, theft, felony eluding and other crimes.

The chase happened Thursday after a Chatham County police officer was dispatched to a hotel near Interstate 95 to investigate a suspicious vehicle, authorities said. The officer found Palmer at the scene, police said, at learned that he was wanted on warrants in Virginia.

Palmer drew a gun on the officer and fled in his patrol car, authorities said. Georgia State Patrol troopers chased the police vehicle, which at times crossed into oncoming traffic and hit at least one bystander's vehicle, according to the GBI.

The stolen patrol car crashed and caught fire at a busy intersection about 15 miles (24 kilometers) from where the chase began. The GBI said its preliminary investigation shows Palmer ignored troopers' commands to get out of the car and instead raised a gun, prompting one trooper to shoot him. He was given first aid until paramedics arrived.

No officers were injured.

It was not immediately known if Palmer had an attorney representing him.
GATLINBURG, Tenn. (AP)  A 16-year-old girl was attacked by a bear Friday in Great Smoky Mountains National Park, officials said.

The bear attacked while the girl was sleeping in a hammock at about 12:30 a.m., and National Park Service officials said her family was able to scare the bear away from the area before notifying the park's emergency center, news outlets reported.

The Tennessee National Guard flew the girl to the University of Tennessee Medical Center at about 9 a.m., and she was in stable condition, the agency said in a news release.

A bear that kept trying to come into the campsite was identified by the family as the one responsible for the attack, and rangers shot and killed it, officials said. Forensic testing showed the bear had human blood on it.

The campsite, which is just under 6 miles from the Maddron Bald Trailhead, is closed due to the attack, officials said.

The family's backpacks and food were properly stored, the release said.

Officials encourage hikers to stay in groups of three or more, carry bear spray, comply with backcountry closures, properly store food and remain at a safe viewing distance from bears at all times.
MADISON, Wis. (AP)  Gov. Tony Evers has appointed a commissioner to look into allegations that the Eau Claire County district attorney has behaved inappropriately with employees.

The Eau Claire Leader-Telegram reports Gary King is accused of making inappropriate remarks to female employees. One employee filed a sexual harassment complaint.
ATHENS, Greece (AP)  A Greek helicopter pilot was charged Friday with the murder of his British-Greek wife, whose death he had initially claimed was caused by burglars during a brutal invasion of their home on the outskirts of Athens.

Pilot and flight instructor Babis Anagnostopoulos, 33, was arraigned for the May 11 killing of Caroline Crouch, 20, who died of suffocation.

He was led in handcuffs and a bulletproof vest to an Athens court and is due to return next week to give evidence.

In brief remarks to reporters, his lawyer confirmed that he had confessed to the crime, adding that he had expressed remorse for his actions.

Police investigators said analysis of data from a smartwatch worn by the victim had helped reveal inconsistencies in the pilots account of events.

The pilot had publicly claimed that armed robbers broke into the couples home and tied up and gagged him and his wife in their bedroom as their months-old daughter slept. He had said the men stole cash before escaping.

The account shocked the nation and prompted government officials to announce a 300,000-euro ($365,000) reward for information about the crime.

Their daughter was unharmed, but the family dog was found choked to death on a leash, hanging from a staircase rail, authorities said.

Everything was staged for the crime scene to look like the scene of a robbery, Costas Hassiotis, director of the greater Athens homicide division told reporters, adding that the suspect had tied his own hands and those of his dead wife.

He said the examination of mobile devices, a smartwatch with a heart rate monitor used by Crouch, and cameras, had established a timeline that contradicted with the pilots testimony.

Hassiotis said forensic experts established the time a memory card had been removed from a security camera, adding to the evidence against the pilot.

Anagnostopoulos was detained after authorities summoned him for questioning Thursday while he was attending a memorial service for Crouch on the Aegean Sea island of Alonissos, where she grew up.

He was flown to Athens by helicopter from the nearby island of Skiathos, and interviewed for more than six hours before police announced that he was a suspect.

In a May 16 post on Instagram, Anagnostopoulos uploaded an undated photograph of the couple on a trip to Portugal for a wedding photoshoot, writing: Always together. Farewell, my love.
WINTER HARBOR, Maine (AP)  Interior Secretary Deb Haaland detailed a host of improvements and investments at Maine's only national park during a visit to the state on Friday.

Haaland touted the improvements on a day she toured Acadia National Park, one of the biggest nature tourism drivers in the state. The investments in the park include $7.6 million in Great American Outdoors Act funding to rehabilitate water systems in Acadia's Schoodic District, which she said are beyond their useful lives.

The proposed 2022 federal budget also includes a $1.3 million funding boost for natural resources stewardship and conservation at the park, the interior department said. That would help fund additional staff at the park.

Another piece of the budget proposal would provide $200,000 from the Land and Water Conservation Fund for the park, the department said. That would help acquire land that could be used as a transit hub and parking for access to the Mount Desert Island lighthouse.

Acadia National Park is a huge driver of Maines economy, and we are committed to making much-needed investments to conserve, protect, and support these special places while economically empowering local businesses and communities, Haaland said.

Haaland, who is the first Native American cabinet secretary in U.S. history, also spent part of her two-day trip meeting with tribal leaders from the Wabanaki tribes in Maine. The department said Haaland met with the tribal leaders about protecting their health and natural and cultural resources.

She also met with members of Maine's congressional delegation and Gov. Janet Mills during her visit. The members held a brief public meeting with Haaland at Schoodic Institute in Winter Harbor. Sen. Susan Collins said the Great American Outdoors Act will make a real difference in attacking the backlog in deferred maintenance at our national parks.

Outdoor tourism has become even more important to Maine during the coronavirus pandemic, Mills said.

We value the outdoors here in Maine. It is our biggest asset, in addition to the asset we have in our people, Mills said. We discovered that more cogently in this past year when our state parks were booked up.

The interior department said the National Park Service is also working on improvements for visitors of Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument, which was created in 2016.

The 2022 budget proposal includes $675,000 to expand visitor services and resource management at the northern Maine monument, the department said. A new visitor center is expected to open at the monument this year.

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Whittle reported from Portland, Maine.
HONOLULU (AP)  A Hawaii judge has sentenced a man to 30 years in prison for manslaughter and assault after his speeding pickup truck killed three people waiting to cross a street and injured four others.

Police say Alins Sumang, 29, was drunk and behind the wheel in 2019 when he struck a pedestrian island on Ala Moana Boulevard. Investigators found a half-empty bottle of liquor in his vehicle.
HONOLULU (AP)  Hawaii Gov. David Ige on Thursday appointed state Rep. Lynn DeCoite to fill the Senate seat left vacant by the retirement of former Sen. Kalani English.

DeCoite currently represents Molokai, Lanai and Hana in the state House. In the Senate, she will represent those areas plus upcountry Maui.
HONOLULU (AP)  A Hawaii-based soldier on Thursday pleaded not guilty in military court to first-degree premeditated murder in the January beating and stabbing death of his wife.

Spc. Raul Hernandez Perez also pleaded not guilty to disobeying a noncommissioned officers order that he have no contact with his wife, the Honolulu Star-Advertiser reported.
CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP)  A Harvard health economist has testified that prescription opioids have caused an estimated $3.3 billion in damages in a West Virginia community.

Thomas McGuire, professor of health economics at Harvard Medical School, testified Thursday in a civil trial in which Cabell County and the city of Huntington accuse drug distributors AmerisourceBergen, Cardinal Health Inc. and McKesson Corp. of fueling the opioid epidemic. The companies have maintained that poor communication and pill quotas set by federal agents are to blame for the epidemic, along with a rise in prescriptions written by doctors. The landmark trial is being heard in Charleston.
In impassioned debate Thursday, U.S. Catholic bishops clashed over how to address concerns about Catholic politicians, including President Joe Biden, who continue to receive Communion despite supporting abortion rights.

Some bishops said a strong rebuke of Biden is needed because of his recent actions protecting and expanding abortion access. Others warned that such action would portray the bishops as a partisan force during a time of bitter political divisions across the country.

The issue is by far the most contentious agenda item at the national meeting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, which is being held virtually. It will conclude Friday soon after an announcement of how the bishops cast their secret ballots on the Communion dispute.

If a majority of bishops approve, the USCCBs doctrine committee will draft a statement on the meaning of Communion in the life of the church that would be submitted for a vote at a future meeting, probably an in-person gathering in November. One section of the document is expected to include a specific admonition to Catholic politicians and other public figures who disobey church teaching on abortion and other core doctrinal issues.

Bishop Donald Hying of Madison, Wisconsin, said he speaks with many people who are confused by a Catholic president who advances the most radical pro-abortion agenda in history, and action from the bishops' conference is needed.

Theyre looking for direction, Hying said.

Bishop Robert McElroy of San Diego countered that the USCCB would suffer destructive consequences from a document targeting Catholic politicians.

It would be impossible to prevent the weaponization of the Eucharist, McElroy said. We will invite all of the political animosities that divide our nation into the heart of the Eucharistic sacrament.

Biden, who attends Mass regularly, says he personally opposes abortion but doesn't think he should impose that position on Americans who feel otherwise. He's taken several executive actions during his presidency that were hailed by abortion-rights advocates.

The chairman of the USCCB doctrine committee, Bishop Kevin Rhoades of Fort Wayne-South Bend, Indiana, said no decisions have been made on the final contents of the proposed document. He said bishops who are not on the committee would have chances to offer input, and the final draft would be subject to amendments before it is put up to a vote.

Rhoades also said the document would not mention Biden or other individuals by name, and would offer guidelines rather than imposing a mandatory national policy.

This would leave decisions about Communion for specific churchgoers up to individual bishops and archbishops. Cardinal Wilton Gregory, the archbishop of Washington, has made clear that Biden is welcome to receive Communion at churches in the archdiocese.

Gregory was among the dozens of bishops joining in Thursdays debate, urging colleagues to defeat the measure and allow more time for candid, in-person dialogue before moving ahead.

The choice before us at this moment is either we pursue a path of strengthening unity among ourselves or settle for creating a document that will not bring unity but may very well further damage it, Gregory said.

The chairman of the USCCBs Committee on Pro-Life Activities, Archbishop Joseph Naumann of Kansas City, Kansas, disagreed that the bishops were being too hasty and said Biden had forced their hand.

Its not the bishops who have brought us to this point  it's some of our public officials, he said. This is a Catholic president doing the most aggressive things weve ever seen on life at its most innocent.

San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone, one of the most outspoken advocates of a USCCB rebuke to Biden, said the bishops credibility is already questioned by many Catholics and would erode further if they did not move forward with the document.

The eyes of the whole country are on us right now, he said. If we do not act courageously in presenting this teaching document clearly and convincingly on this core Catholic value, how can we expect to be taken seriously on any other topic?

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Associated Press religion coverage receives support from the Lilly Endowment through The Conversation U.S. The AP is solely responsible for this content.
AP

DAVENPORT, Iowa (AP)  An Iowa man charged in the killing of a 10-year-old girl who was missing for nine months before her remains were found in a pond has pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder and kidnapping.

Henry Dinkins, 48, entered the pleas Wednesday in Scott County District Court. Hes accused of kidnapping Breasia Terrell from a Davenport apartment complex in July, fatally shooting her and hiding her body in rural eastern Iowa. Breasia was the half sister of Dinkins son, and investigators say both children were staying the night with him at the apartment where he was living with a girlfriend.
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP)  Rhode Island lawmakers have proposed a $13.1 billion state budget for the upcoming fiscal year that boosts spending on social services and education.

The House Finance Committee proposal unveiled Thursday night is almost $2 billion bigger than Gov. Daniel McKee's $11.2 billion budget plan, with most of the difference made up of federal pandemic stimulus funds and about $180 million of the increase funded by state general revenue, WPRI-TV reported.

Whenever I can use a federal dollar instead of a state dollar, I want to use a federal dollar, Democratic House Speaker Joe Shekarchi said.

The plan does not increase income taxes on the wealthy or impose a new tax on sugary drinks, while the sales and corporate tax rates will remain the same.

Lawmakers did, however, raise the threshold for a tax on profits made by businesses that received payment protection program loans during the pandemic from $150,000 to $250,000.

The proposal includes budget increases for Rhode Island College and the state Department of Children, Youth and Families.

The budget also addresses the state's housing problem including the creation of a new housing czar who would focus on making housing more accessible.

Without enough affordable housing for workers, companies will not move to the state, Shekarchi said.

The proposal was sent to the full House for a debate and vote next week. Once the budget passes the House it will head to the Senate, before going to the governor's desk for his signature.

The fiscal year begins July 1.
BERLIN (AP)  The leaders of Germany and France called for vigilance Friday to prevent the spread of a coronavirus variant that this week prompted Britain to delay the planned relaxation of pandemic restrictions in England.

Chancellor Angela Merkel said that while Germany has very low numbers of new COVID-19 infections at present, the aggressive delta variant could lead to a rise in new cases.

We cant pretend that corona is over, Merkel told reporters in Berlin.

Even though theres a feeling on such a warm summers evening that its all over, one can see from the example of Lisbon that things can quickly change, she said. Thats why I think its necessary to be careful, so that we have a summer with many freedoms but not yet all freedoms.

Portuguese authorities on Thursday banned travel in or out of the capital region over coming weekends in response to a spike in delta variant cases. Earlier this week, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson pushed back the date for lifting restrictions on social contacts by four weeks as the government reported thousands of newly confirmed cases, mostly with the delta variant.

Asked about travel related to the Euro2020 soccer tournament, Merkel said it was good to see thousands of fans at the recent Germany-France match in Munich again.

But when I see completely full stadiums in other European countries, then Im a bit skeptical whether thats the right answer to the current situation, she said  a reference to Hungary, where authorities have allowed games without limiting spectator numbers.

Merkel spoke ahead of a working dinner with French President Emmanuel Macron, the first time she has hosted a foreign leader in Germany since last year.

Macron said it was important to be vigilant about the new variant and the European Union would discuss at an upcoming summit how to better harmonize travel restrictions during the pandemic  something the bloc has struggled to do more than a year after the start of the outbreak.

EU countries have administered at least one dose of vaccine to roughly half of their populations, while more than a third have received both shots. Britain, which left the bloc last year, has a higher vaccination rate.

Aside from the pandemic, next weeks EU summit will also address foreign policy issues such as the blocs relationships with Russia and Turkey, and the future of its common defense and security policy.

Macron welcomed U.S. President Joe Bidens commitment to NATO.

I think we succeeded in establishing the idea that European defense and EU strategic autonomy is not an alternative to the trans-Atlantic organization, but a solid component of it, Macron said of the recent meetings with Biden at the Group of Seven and NATO.

Merkel concurred. We can all be glad that (Biden) has created a climate of cooperation again, in which everyone of course has their role to play, she said.

But I see an absolute necessity  and this is something I believe the United States expects  that we act coherently, that we say which areas of work we can take on and which contribution we can make.

___

Angela Charlton in Paris contributed to this report.
TAN-TAN, Morocco (AP)  A senior U.S. general warned Friday that the wildfire of terrorism is sweeping across a band of Africa and needs the world's attention. He spoke at the close of large-scale U.S.-led war games with American, African and European troops.

The African Lion war games, which lasted nearly two weeks, stretched across Morocco, a key U.S, ally, with smaller parts held in Tunisia and Senegal. The annual drills were skipped last year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Gen. Stephen J. Townsend, head of the U.S. Africa Command, praised the work accomplished in joint operations, and painted a dark picture of threats besetting parts of Africa.

I am concerned about the security situation across a band of Africa," from the Sahel region in the west to the Horn of Africa, Townsend told reporters. He noted deadly attacks by al-Qaida- and Islamic State-linked jihadis and al-Shabab. All of them are on the march, he said.

African neighbors are helping governments deal with the threat, but, he added, all of that does not seem to be sufficient enough to stop what I call ... (the) wildfire of terrorism thats sweeping that region.

African Lion saw more than 7,000 troops from seven countries and NATO carry out air, land and sea exercises together.

It has helped our interoperability, our joint capabilities, and provided readiness and a good opportunity to build cohesion across the forces, said Maj. Gen. Andrew Rohling, commander of the U.S. Armys Southern European Task Force Africa. He spoke Friday in the desert town of Tan-Tan.

There was a hitch at the start, with Spain withdrawing from the war games citing budgetary reasons. Press reports attributed the move to Spains poor relations with Morocco, a former key partner.

The two countries have been at loggerheads since Spain took in the leader of the Polisario Front independence movement  Moroccos No.1 enemy  for COVID-19 treatment in a Spanish hospital earlier this year. The Polisario is fighting for independence for the Western Sahara, a vast region that Morocco claims as its own.

During the exercise, Morocco held some airborne operations near the Western Sahara and not far from Polisario refugee camps in Tindouf, in neighboring Algeria.

Those activities have been perfectly conducted and agreed upon between the two militaries, Moroccan Brigadier Gen. Mohammed Jamil told The Associated Press.

Townsend, asked whether any action spilled into the disputed Western Sahara, was categoric: I can confirm it did not.

The participating countries in African Lion were the U.S., Morocco, Tunisia, Senegal, Italy, The Netherlands and Britain. Observers also attended from countries including Egypt, Qatar, Niger and Mali.

___

Elaine Ganley in Paris and Krista Larson in Dakar contributed.
BROKEN BOW, Neb. (AP)  A central Nebraska man was convicted Friday of shooting and killing his stepmother last year.

After a four-day trial in Custer County, Trent Esch, 45, of Broken Bow was found guilty of second-degree murder in the death of 62-year-old Crystal Esch, KRVN reported.

She was found shot to death in her home in rural Broken Bow last July. She had taken out a protection order against her stepson for threatening behavior and messages, prosecutors said.

Trent Esch surrendered to police after a standoff at his home in Broken Bow.

He was also convicted of use of a weapon and possession of a firearm by a felon.
LIMINGTON, Maine (AP)  A Maine judge on Friday ordered a mental health evaluation for a man charged in the deaths of two people whose bodies were found by firefighters responding to a fire.

Matthew Cote, 21, of Limington, made his first appearance in York County Superior Court on Friday. He faces two counts of murder stemming from the deaths. The judge identified the victims as Cheryl Cote and Daniel Perkins.
VATHY, Greece (AP)  Around dawn one recent spring day, an inflatable dinghy carrying nearly three dozen people reached the Greek island of Samos from the nearby Turkish coast. Within 24 hours, refugee rights groups say, the same group was seen drifting in a life raft back to Turkey.

But of the 32 people determined to have initially made it to Samos, only 28 were in the raft the Turkish coast guard reported retrieving at sea.

Four days later, the missing four  a Palestinian woman and her three children  appeared in Samos main town of Vathy, apparently having eluded Greek authorities. She applied for asylum and last week was informed their application had been accepted.

I consider that the arrival of this woman, if were not speaking of a miracle, of a virgin birth, of her falling from the sky, were speaking of clear proof of a pushback, said Dimitris Choulis, the lawyer who helped 31-year-old Huda Zaga apply for asylum, along with her 12-year-old daughter and sons, aged 11 and 5.

Accusations from rights groups and migrants that Greece has been carrying out pushbacks  the illegal summary deportation of migrants without allowing them to apply for asylum  are nothing new, on land or at sea. But it is rare for such cases to involve anyone managing to stay behind.

Greece vehemently denies the claims, but says it has an obligation to protect its borders, which are also the European Unions external borders. It points to March 2020, when Turkey opened its borders into the EU and actively encouraged migrants to cross into Greece.

Zaga says she arrived on Samos on April 21 in a dinghy crammed with people. After making landfall, the group scrambled up a wooded hill, splitting up to avoid detection by authorities.

We were terrified of being caught and being sent back to Turkey, especially after we crossed into the territorial waters of Greece, Zaga told The Associated Press.

Before long, social media posts appeared. A local journalist posted about the migrants' arrival. Other residents said they had seen them, or given them food or water.

But as the day progressed, the story changed. The journalist contacted authorities, and posted she was told the migrants were not new arrivals but residents of a refugee camp on the outskirts of Vathy making a day trip  a roughly 50-kilometer ( 31-mile) hike over mountains.

Several residents told the AP they were told by authorities and others not to speak of what they had seen. They spoke on condition of anonymity, saying they didnt want problems.

The next day, a piece of the dinghy the migrants arrived in still lay on the beach of Marathokampos Bay. The rights group Aegean Boat Report, which monitors arrivals on Greek islands, posted photos of the new arrivals. Some showed Zaga and her children with others on a wooded hillside, the Marathokampos coastline in the background.

Asked about the case, Greeces Shipping Ministry, under whose jurisdiction the coast guard falls, said it had no record of an April 21 arrival on Samos. Authorities did not provide any explanation for the appearance of the woman and her children.

Zaga said she was aware of the pushback risk, having experienced it before. She tried to enter Greece three times earlier from the land border but was caught twice inside Turkey and once after entering Greece. This time, she was determined to succeed.

We managed the impossible, to make sure that what happened to them won't happen to us, she said of those returned to Turkey.

Zaga said she broke away from the others, staying behind with her children, and got in touch with people who had helped arrange her journey to Samos. She would not provide specifics about how she managed to evade detection, or who helped her contact the lawyer. But on April 26, she arrived at Choulis office asking for assistance.

Choulis said he immediately realized they were the people missing from the reported Marathokampos landing. He informed Greek judicial authorities, police and the coast guard that he was accompanying the family to the refugee camp for registration.

As he waited outside during Zagas registration interview he was told repeatedly to leave, Choulis said.

There was a strange climate of suspicion, he said, and an intense fear that Zaga and her children might still be sent back to Turkey. But at this point, representatives of the U.N. refugee agency had been informed and were present.

UNHCR Representative in Greece Mireille Girard said the organization received a telephone message on April 21 about migrants arriving on Samos and sought confirmation from authorities, but got no response. A few days later, the agency was informed a family believed to have been with the group had remained on Samos and was applying for asylum.

These elements are concerning. They are indications of a pushback from Samos island on 21 April and need to be formally investigated, Girard said.

In the meantime, Zagas family has received asylum. She says she fled her home in the Nablus region of the West Bank for several reasons, but mainly to escape an abusive husband who assaulted her eldest son. She hopes to eventually reach Belgium, where her sister lives.

I want to see my children happy, to see them going to school, eating healthy food, sleeping well and to live normally just like other children. To have safety and security, to have a school and home, she said.

For Choulis, Zagas successful asylum application underscores the perils of pushbacks, which have, at times, allegedly been carried out by masked men without visible badges on their uniforms, to hide their identities.

The fact that her asylum application was accepted shows just how dangerous it is for masked men of the coast guard or the police to judge who has the right to asylum and who doesnt, the lawyer said.

We cannot leave the fate of something as important as the right to asylum to be determined in the middle of the sea or on the shores.

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Follow all of AP's global migration coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/migration.
WINDOW ROCK, Ariz. (AP)  The Navajo Nation on Thursday reported 12 new COVID-19 cases and one more death.

Tribal health officials said the total number of virus-related deaths on the Navajo Nation now is 1,343 with the total number of reported cases at 30,948 since the pandemic began more than a year ago.
RALEIGH, N.C. (AP)  North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper vetoed gun-rights legislation on Friday that would allow parishioners at more churches to be armed, marking the second year in a row that he's blocked the idea.

The legislation affirms that people going to religious services at a location where private schools or some charter schools also meet can carry handguns in full view or under clothing if they have a concealed weapons permit. There would be other limits.

The Democratic governor said the measure, which cleared the legislature last week, would endanger educators and children. State law otherwise prohibits guns on educational property for nearly everyone.

For the safety of students and teachers, North Carolina should keep guns off school grounds, Cooper wrote in his veto message.

The bill's supporters contend these houses of worship where K-12 schools also are located are at a security disadvantage for their congregants compared to stand-alone churches. There are no such blanket prohibitions in these churches on carrying a pistol, provided the person has a purchase permit or concealed weapons permit.

The bill also contains another provision that allows additional law enforcement employees  such as a civilian front desk worker at a police station  to carry a concealed weapon on the job if the police chief or sheriff allows it and the person has a concealed permit.

Both items were contained in a broader 2020 gun bill that Cooper also vetoed. Like last year, several House and Senate Democrats joined Republicans in initially voting for the measure before the veto. During the GOP attempt to override the 2020 veto, Cooper managed to collect additional House Democratic votes to uphold his veto. He'll have to do the same thing this year to stop the measure.

Ministers of several churches with affiliated schools spoke in committee this year to request the option to be armed in light of high-profile reports of shooters targeting congregations.

Paul Valone with the gun-rights group Grass Roots North Carolina said there is no rational reason for the veto, especially since concealed weapons holders have been able to carry in many churches for 25 years due to state law. He urged lawmakers to override it.

"I didnt think after the violent attacks in churches across the nation that it would be controversial to allow our citizens to protect themselves in church on Sundays, but the governors blind opposition to the Second Amendment seems to outweigh common-sense legislation, said the bill's chief's sponsor, GOP Sen. Danny Britt of Robeson County.

In response to concerns about student safety, the measure contains language stating permit holders can only carry a gun on the church campus outside operating and extracurricular hours at the school. Like standalone places of worship, the churches also could opt out and prohibit weapons by posting a sign.

Democratic opponents of the measure said these churches should hire private security, instead of encouraging shootouts. If the bill became law, people are unlikely to understand the distinction that guns must be left at home when school activities are happening, according to the North Carolinians Against Gun Violence Action Fund.

We thank Gov. Cooper for vetoing this dangerous bill that circumvents state policy outlawing concealed carry of firearms on school grounds and would put school children at more risk of gun violence, Action Fund executive director Becky Ceartas said in a news release.

Cooper's action is just his second veto this year. He vetoed 25 bills during the previous two-year legislative session, none of which were overridden.
MANCHESTER, N.H. (AP)  A ribbon cutting ceremony was held for the unveiling of a new trash can at a New Hampshire elementary school playground Thursday that students reached out to the mayor for after seeing litter there.

When McDonough Elementary School first graders saw litter left on their playground, they wrote a letter to Mayor Joyce Craig to advocate for a trash can to be put on their playground, WMUR reported.
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP)  The debate over whether the public has a right to fish or float streams and other waterways that flow through private property has percolated for decades in many western U.S. states  and it has reaching a boiling point in New Mexico.

The state Game Commission, which oversees New Mexico's wildlife management agency and sets hunting and fishing rules for the state, was scheduled Friday to take up the applications of landowners who want to keep the public from accessing their stretches of streams without permission by certifying the waterways as non-navigable.

Chairwoman Sharon Salazar Hickey started the meeting by saying she planned to defer a vote on the applications after critics raised questions about a potential conflict of interest and suggested that she recuse herself from voting because of her daughter being offered a job at the same law firm representing the landowners.

Salazar Hickey's decision elicited both surprise and frustration from fellow commissioners and people who had traveled to Santa Fe for the public hearing.

While Salazar Hickey was adamant that she and the other commissioners had no conflicts, she said she believed it is important for the attorney general's office to conduct a review before the commission takes up the stream access issue again at an August meeting.

Marco Gonzales, an attorney for the landowners, said he did not know Salazar Hickey's daughter and also did not know she got the job offer at his firm, which is the largest in New Mexico and has attorneys licensed across the Southwest. He labeled Friday's delay of the hearing as a tactic that prejudiced his clients.

Salazar Hickey dismissed that characterization, saying she takes integrity and transparency seriously.

This is the right thing to do, she said during the meeting. We cannot take these issues lightly.

U.S. Sen. Martin Heinrich, D-New Mexico, is among the people who have argued that public access to the waterways should not be limited, regardless of whether streams are classified as non-navigable. Many waterways in New Mexico and elsewhere in the Southwest flow intermittently and depend on snow or storm runoff.

Advocates of private property rights have argued that if access to the waterways is opened up in New Mexico, property values will decline and there would be less interest by private owners to invest in conserving tracts of land along streams. Some fishing outfitters and guides have said their business would be adversely affected.

Public access laws vary widely across the West. In Montana, courts over the years have expanded the publics right to use steams that cross private land.

A legal fight over access by anglers to riverbeds on private property is ongoing in Colorado, while a 2019 ruling by the Utah Supreme Court reinforced legislation that allows people to raft, boat or otherwise float on waterways but prohibits them from walking on the land beneath the water without getting permission from landowners.

The New Mexico Supreme Court has been asked by a coalition of anglers, rafters and conservationists to weigh in on the dispute. Their petition still is pending, and some who addressed the commission on Friday said they hoped the court would settle the matter before the Game Commission takes up the issue again in August.

Hickey also noted that the commission has been waiting for Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, a Democrat, to appoint a seventh commissioner to fill a vacancy on the panel. It was not immediately clear if the governor plans to do that before the August meeting.
Ray Chavez/AP

OAKLAND, Calif. (AP)  A man has been arrested on suspicion of assaulting Gov. Gavin Newsom during his visit to downtown Oakland, authorities said Friday.

Newsom was walking to a barbershop and pizzeria in Old Oakland to promote small businesses on Thursday when he was approached by an aggressive individual, said Fran Clader, director of communications for the California Highway Patrol, which provides security for the governor.
MANAGUA, Nicaragua (AP)  Nicaraguan authorities ordered the capture of a former education minister and a businessman Thursday as the government's crackdown continued to expand beyond leaders of the political opposition.

The Attorney General's Office said in a statement that arrest orders were issued for Humberto Belli, who served in the administration of former President Violeta Chamorro, and Gerardo Baltodano, owner of Cafe Soluble, for not appearing to provide statements as scheduled.

Baltodano is the brother of retired Gen. Alvaro Baltodano, who served in President Daniel Ortega's government as the director for the Free Trade Zone Corporation. Belli is the brother of well-known poet and novelist Gioconda Belli.

Both Belli and Baltodano had served on the board of the nongovernmental Nicaraguan Foundation for Economic and Social Development, or FUNIDES, which is under investigation. The foundation's former executive director Juan Sebastian Chamorro was arrested earlier this month on charges of crimes against the state.

Earlier Thursday, prosecutors announced that a judge had ordered the freezing of the bank accounts of Belli and Baltodano among others tied to the foundation and prohibited them from leaving the country. They are being investigated for alleged financial operations derived from illicit activities.

Gioconda Belli said via Twitter that police had searched her brother's home Thursday.

In recent weeks, the government has arrested 16 people, including 13 leading members of the political opposition, two former employees of the Violeta Chamorro Foundation and Luis Rivas Anduray, president of Production Bank (Banpro).

Among them were four pre-candidates for the presidency. Elections are scheduled for Nov. 7 and Ortega is running for a fourth consecutive term.

The United States government has stepped up sanctions against Ortega's inner circle and on Wednesday the Permanent Council of the Organization of American States approved a resolution condemning the arrests and calling for the prisoners' immediate release.
TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. (AP)  Michigan's attorney general said Friday she would not file charges against a county commissioner who displayed a rifle during a livestreamed meeting, an incident some described as illustrating racial and cultural tensions in the Lake Michigan resort area.

Ronald Clous, vice chairman of the Grand Traverse County Board, showed the weapon on camera Jan. 20 as a citizen on the phone was complaining about a decision to allow two members of the far-right Proud Boys to speak at an earlier meeting.

I find Commissioner Clous' action to be reprehensible and irresponsible, but not illegal, Nessel, a Democrat, said in a statement. While he will not face accountability in a courtroom, Commissioner Clous' constituents have the power to make their opinions clear the next time he's up for re-election.

Phone and email messages seeking comment were left with Clous, a Republican.

The county in Michigan's northwestern Lower Peninsula, about 250 miles (402.34 kilometers) northwest of Detroit, is known for its beaches, trails, orchards, food and arts scene. Its population is well over 90% white. Republicans hold most elective offices in Grand Traverse and neighboring counties.

During the pandemic, the county board met virtually from home and allowed residents to phone in with comments.

The caller during the Jan. 20 meeting urged the chairman to denounce the Proud Boys, some of whom had taken part in the U.S. Capitol riot weeks earlier. The board had welcomed members of the group to a meeting the previous year to urge approval of a resolution designating Grand Traverse County a Second Amendment sanctuary.

As the caller spoke, Clous stepped away from his webcam and returned with a rifle. He held it across his chest for about five seconds, then set it aside.

More than 1,500 people signed a petition demanding Clous' resignation. Some said the incident was threatening to racial minorities and had damaged the community's reputation, while others said it had been blown out of proportion.

In an interview after the meeting with the Traverse City Record-Eagle, Clous said the Proud Boys who had addressed the board were decent guys.

The caller later filed a report with state police. A review by the attorney general's staff found insufficient evidence of malicious intent, Nessel said, noting that Clous hadn't pointed the weapon directly at the camera.

Any time a person feels the law has been violated, the police should be notified and a report should be filed to ensure a proper investigation, Nessel said. I appreciate the community member who came forward to file this report, and I respect the conclusion reached by my office.
CROWN POINT, Ind. (AP)  A northwest Indiana man has been sentenced to two years in prison for the death of a 4-year-old boy he was babysitting who accidentally shot himself with an unsecured handgun.

A Lake County judge sentenced Brett A. Beatty, 32, of Winfield, to five years on Thursday for failing to secure the handgun Eric Cole of Wheatfield found under Beattys bed and used to fatally shoot himself in August 2017.
KINSTON, N.C. (AP)  The pilot of a small plane was killed when their aircraft went down near a drag strip in North Carolina, authorities said.

News outlets reported the Lenoir County Sheriff's Office said the aircraft crashed around 8:30 p.m. Thursday near Kinston Drag Strip, where races were being held. Authorities said there was only one person on the aircraft, but their identity was not release because next of kin had not been notified.
VIENNA, N.Y. (AP)  Hes in for the long haul.

A New York man is charged with stealing a U-Haul van after police say he drove it from Florida, kept it three months past the return date and painted the vehicle to hide its identity.

The van, rented in March and reported stolen when it wasnt returned, turned up this week on a property in Vienna, New York, east of Syracuse.

Police say they found the vehicle during a burglary investigation. The sides were painted with black spray paint to disguise it, but a U-Haul logo could still be seen at the top of the windshield.

The 25-year-old man from Blossvale was charged this week with possession of stolen property, criminal mischief and grand larceny. He was jailed pending arraignment.

Online court records did not list a lawyer who could speak on his behalf.

Police say the spray paint caused nearly $10,000 in damage to the van. They say the man also removed the vehicles catalytic convertor, costing another $1,000.
LISBON, Portugal (AP)  The city council of Lisbon has for years provided foreign embassies with personal information about protesters who organize demonstrations outside their premises, the Portuguese capitals mayor said Friday.

The practice continued even after a new data protection law that took effect in 2018 made it illegal, Mayor Fernando Medina said.

Medina did not specify which embassies were informed, but he gave an example of information provided to the Israeli Embassy in 2011 to show that previous council leaders had followed the same procedure. The information provided at that time named at least one person who took part in the protest against Israeli conduct in Palestinian territories, he said.

The mayor spoke as he published the results of a preliminary internal audit into why the city council shared with Russian officials personal details of at least three Lisbon-based dissidents. The dissidents organized a protest in Lisbon five months ago in support of jailed Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny.

The information-sharing, first reported by Portuguese newspapers Expresso and Observador earlier this month, caused a scandal.

Medina said the audit found that the personal details of protesters had been sent to embassies 52 times since 2018. A broader audit is now looking into pre-2018 cases.

The councils rules on informing embassies about the identity of protesters are unclear despite the data protection law, he said. Council procedures say information should be sent to the proper authorities. For many years, that was understood to mean sending the details to Portuguese police, the government and diplomatic representations targeted by protests.

Recommendations to change the procedures, especially after the 2018 law change, were unheeded, and the councils data protection officer is to be fired, Medina said

In the future, the council will provide information about protest organizers - who must request the council's permission to hold demonstrations - only to the Portuguese police and government, according to Medina.

Police will offer to conduct a security analysis to assess the safety of the individuals whose information was shared with foreign powers, he said.
HONOLULU (AP)  Civil rights activist the Rev. Al Sharpton is condemning the Honolulu Police Department for the fatal shooting of a Black man as various versions of what led to the death continue to emerge.

Lindani Myenis killing is yet another sensational racialization and criminalization of an innocent unarmed black man at the hands of police not following the law and proper police procedures, Sharpton said in a statement Thursday.

Interim Honolulu Police Chief Rade Vanic in response said the police department is committed to public service and that these "are challenging times for police departments everywhere."

Sharpton weighed in on the April 14 shooting of Myeni after lawyers representing his widow in a wrongful death lawsuit made public this week a doorbell video showing the 29-year-old arriving at a house, taking off his shoes and quickly leaving after his presence confused the occupants. Myeni repeatedly apologized to the couple.

Police responding to a 911 call shot him a short time later outside the house.

The lawsuit said he likely mistook the home for a temple next door that's open to the public.

Myeni's presence at the house wasn't as innocuous as lawyers for Myeni's wife portrayed, Scot Brower, an attorney representing the homeowner and the tourists who were staying in the house, said Friday.

Sabine and Dexter Wang, visiting Hawaii from New Jersey for more than a month, were freaked out when a stranger walked into the Honolulu home where they were staying and acted oddly, Brower said.

He didnt get no permission. He didnt get any consent. He went in that house, Brower said.

Myeni told Sabine Wong something like I have I have video on you. You know why Im here, rummaged through the house and said he owned a cat there, Brower said.

He never mentioned the temple or being lost to the couple, Brower said.

Sabine Wang pretended make a phone call saying someone broke into the home, hoping that would be enough to get Myeni to leave, Brower said.

She then called 911 and told an operator about the man and and that he had no weapons in his hands, according to a recording of the call released by police.

In the doorbell video, Myeni is heard in the video outside the home saying repeatedly, Im sorry. He puts his shoes on and leaves, the footage shows.

Police said after the shooting that Lindani Myenis strange behavior frightened the occupants and that he violently attacked responding police officers outside the house, leaving one hospitalized with a concussion.

Police later released short clips of body camera footage, showing him ignoring commands to get on the ground outside the house he entered, a stun gun fired by police either malfunctioning or having no effect on him. The police video showed that an officer fired several gunshots before saying, Police!

The Wangs have provided inconsistent stories about what happened, said Bridget Morgan-Bickerton, an attorney for Myeni's wife, Lindsay Myeni.

Nothing the Wangs have said justifies the way that officer approached Lindani or justifies that they did not announce themselves as police, she said.

Myeni wouldn't have known it was police shining bright lights in his eyes on a dark night, the lawsuit said.

The Wangs, who needed Mandarin interpreters at their depositions in the lawsuit, could have misunderstood what Myeni said during the brief encounter, Morgan-Bickerton said.

He may have made a comment about the cat, she said. But I don't think that should end in death.
SPARTANBURG, S.C. (AP)  Life in prison is the sentence for a South Carolina man convicted of killing his pregnant girlfriend, authorities said.

Tremaine Pierre Johnson, 27, of Spartanburg, was found guilty following a four-day jury trial, said Murray Glenn of the Spartanburg County Solicitors Office, WYFF-TV reported.

Glenn said Johnson shot Brechue Bre Wiles, 23, of Spartanburg, to death on May 9, 2018. The victim was in the early stages of pregnancy when she was killed, Glenn said.

Wiles family reported her missing to the sheriffs office on May 11, 2018. She was last seen leaving her aunts home two days earlier, Glenn said.

Wiles told family she was going to visit Johnson and discuss her pregnancy. Glenn said in her last communication with family, Wiles reported she and Johnson were at a park sitting by water.

Wiles' body was recovered the same day she was reported missing. Two people saw a woman's body in the lake during a morning walk at Duncan Park. An autopsy revealed that Wiles sustained a fatal gunshot wound to her head.

Ricky Tyrell Gentry, 27, of Spartanburg, who faced charges along with Johnson, was convicted of accessory before the fact of a felony and accessory after the fact of a felony. He received a 30-year prison sentence, Glenn said.

Gentry provided Johnson the murder weapon, a .40 caliber handgun, Glenn said.
ISTANBUL (AP)  A Turkish police officer has been sentenced to nearly 17 years in prison for the murder of a teenager who was hit in the head with a tear-gas canister in 2013.

Police officer Fatih Dalgali was on trial for causing the death of Berkin Elvan, a 14-year-old injured in the head by a high-velocity gas canister in Istanbul in 2013 as the Gezi Park anti-government protests were taking place nearby. Dalgali rejects the accusations.
KAMPALA, Uganda (AP)  Uganda is tightening its lockdown measures to try and stem a surge in coronavirus infections in the East African country that is seeing an array of variants.

The measures announced late Friday by President Yoweri Museveni include a ban on private and public transportation within and across districts, including in the capital Kampala. Only vehicles carrying cargo and those transporting the sick or essential workers are permitted to operate on the roads, Museveni said in a televised speech.

The normally crowded shops in downtown Kampala, where thousands of the urban poor operate, have also been ordered shut. An ongoing nighttime curfew will stay in place.

The new measures will last 42 days.

These are urgent and temporary but extraordinary measures which we as a nation must jointly and fully embrace to protect and preserve our lives, our ways of life, Museveni said.

Museveni had avoided imposing a full lockdown in an address on June 6, limiting restrictions to movement between rural and urban areas. He said Friday he is tightening the measures now because Ugandans had not followed his previous guidelines.

Uganda is among some African countries seeing a dramatic rise in the number of infections amid a vaccine shortage. It has confirmed a total of 68,779 infections, including 584 deaths. The actual totals are believed to be much higher. Only a few thousand samples are tested daily.

Matshidiso Moeti, Africa director of the World Health Organization, spoke Thursday of a sobering trajectory of surging cases in Africa that she said should rouse everyone to urgent action.

New cases across the continent rose by nearly 30% in the past week, she said.

Africas 1.3 billion people account for 18% of the worlds population, but the continent has received only 2% of all vaccine doses administered globally. It has recorded more than 5 million confirmed COVID-19 cases, including 136,000 deaths.

Nearly 90% of African countries are set to miss the global target of vaccinating 10% of their people by September, according to the WHO.

One major problem is that COVAX, the U.N.-backed project to supply vaccine to poor corners of the world, is itself facing a serious shortage of vaccine doses.

Amid a global outcry over the gap between the haves and the have-nots, the U.S., Britain and the other Group of Seven wealthy nations agreed last week to share at least 1 billion doses with struggling countries over the next year, with deliveries starting in August.

___

Follow all of APs pandemic coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-pandemic, https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-vaccine and https://apnews.com/UnderstandingtheOutbreak
BOSTON (AP)  A union that represents about 800 Boston city employees who have been working remotely during the pandemic has filed an unfair labor practices claim against acting Mayor Kim Janeys administration for unilaterally ordering them back to the office.

The Service Employees International Union Local 888 filed the complaint with the state on Thursday, the Boston Herald reported.
FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. (AP)  The head of the flagship University of Arkansas campus announced Thursday that he would step down, citing the challenge of leading the school in today's polarized society."

University of Arkansas Chancellor Joe Steinmetz announced his resignation would take effect Friday. His resignation came after the UA Board of Trustees met in executive session but took no action.
BURLINGTON, Vt. (AP)  Officials at Vermonts largest hospital are still trying to determine the full financial impact of the cyberattack last October that knocked out computers affecting three hospitals in Vermont and three in New York.

Scheduling and patient medical records were affected and some cancer patients faced delays in treatment.
PHOENIX (AP)  Extreme temperatures like the ones blistering the American West this week aren't just annoying, they're deadly.

The record-breaking temperatures this week are a weather emergency, scientists and health care experts say, with heat responsible for more deaths in the U.S. than all other natural disasters combined. With more frequent and intense heat waves likely because of climate change and the worst drought in modern history, they say communities must better protect the vulnerable, like homeless people and those who live in ethnically and racially diverse low-income neighborhoods.

This heat has an important effect on people and their health, said Dr. Suganya Karuppana, chief medical director at the Valle del Sol community health clinics in Arizona.

People  along with plants and animals  need cooler temperatures at night to recover from the stress of high heat, scientists and doctors said. But with overnight temperatures in the 90s, thats not happening.

Karuppana noted that many people she sees may have no car and have to take public transportation in the Phoenix heat, walking through neighborhoods with few trees and waiting at bus and light rail stops with no or little shade. Some people live in poorly ventilated mobile homes or without air conditioning. Or they may work outside in the sun as construction workers or landscapers.

Phoenix has been baking in temperatures above 115 degrees (46 Celsius) all week. The high Friday hit a record 117 degrees (47 Celsius) after breaking another Thursday at 118 degrees (48 Celsius). Daily records also were set this week in places across the U.S. West, such as Nevada and California, including 128 degrees (53 Celsius) in Death Valley on Thursday.

Those who are vulnerable to high temperatures include the very young, the very old and people with heart or kidney disease, ailments that disproportionately affect communities of color.

We are activated for Phoenix and monitoring it closely, said Nicolette Louissaint, executive director of the Washington nonprofit Healthcare Ready, which was founded after Hurricane Katrina to help communities deal with natural disasters.

Louissaint said her organization has helped in heat emergencies by funding cooling centers that offer bottled water and shade or arrange transportation for older people without cars who need dialysis or heart checkups.

Extreme heat really exacerbates those kind of serious medical conditions, she said. It's tough on people who don't have a lot of money.

Phoenix and other local governments around the Southwest remind people on social media to drink lots of water, stay out of the sun if possible and take frequent breaks on hot days. They warn people to not leave children or pets in vehicles, and they work with nonprofits like the Salvation Army to open facilities that allow people to cool off.

The rising risks of the heat became painfully clear three years ago when 72-year-old Stephanie Pullman died at her Phoenix-area home after Arizona's largest electric utility turned off her service for failure to pay $51. A coroner listed environmental heat exposure as one of the causes of her 2018 death.

It led to a series of moratoriums on overdue electrical bills in Arizona that continued through the end of last year amid the coronavirus pandemic. The utility, Arizona Public Service, says it has suspended service disconnections and waived late fees through Oct. 15.

The county that includes Phoenix has reported three heat-related deaths as of Saturday, with an additional 20 fatalities being investigated as possibly caused by high temperatures.

Heat-related deaths in Maricopa County have been rising dramatically in recent years, with 323 reported last year, the highest ever recorded. The highest rates were reported among Black people and Native Americans. About 80% of those who died were men.

People living on the street are especially at risk. The Maricopa County medical examiner has said heat was a primary or secondary cause in the death of 146 homeless people last year, when the summer was the hottest ever recorded in Phoenix.

Scientists say the number of heat deaths in the U.S. West and the world over were only expected to rise.

As average temperatures rise worldwide, heat is becoming more extreme, said Gerald Meehl, senior scientist with the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado.

As the average climate warms up from increasing human-produced greenhouse gases, we are seeing more intense, more frequent and longer lasting heat waves," Meehl said.

A study last month estimated the number of heat deaths each year that can be attributed to human-caused global warming. It included about 200 U.S. cities and found more than 1,100 deaths a year from climate change-caused heat, many of them in the East and Midwest, where many people don't have air conditioning or are not acclimated to hot weather.

Joellen Russell, climate science professor at the University of Arizona in Tucson, said the Southwest is an early example of what will hit the rest of the nation later when it comes to the dangers of heat extremes caused by global warming.

I think wed better hurry up, she said. Our kids are counting on us.

___

Associated Press Science Writer Seth Borenstein contributed from Washington. Follow Snow on Twitter at https://twitter.com/asnowreports and Borenstein at https://twitter.com/borenbears.
MADISON, Wis. (AP)  The Associated Press has withdrawn its story about a Wisconsin Supreme Court ruling striking down a state law that allowed for taking blood samples from suspected drunken drivers who are incapacitated because it incorrectly reported that the woman police say was driving in the case had been convicted. She has not yet been tried. AP will publish a corrected version of the story.
MADISON, Wis. (AP)  A unanimous Wisconsin Supreme Court struck down a state law Friday that allowed for taking blood samples from suspected drunken drivers who are incapacitated, ruling that it is unconstitutional.

The court upheld a state appeals court ruling from last year saying that the law violates the Fourth Amendment protecting against unconstitutional search and seizure. The law in question says that incapacitated drivers  those who are unconscious due to drugs or alcohol  are presumed to have agreed to provide blood samples if there is probable cause they were impaired.

Numerous court rulings, both in Wisconsin and across the country, have addressed the issue of taking blood samples from drivers without consent. But until this case the courts had never directly addressed whether the incapacitated driver provision of Wisconsins law violates the Fourth Amendment.

The state Supreme Court, in its ruling written by Justice Ann Walsh Bradley, said the state law is clearly unconstitutional.

Wisconsin Department of Justice spokeswoman Gillian Drummond said the ruling's impact would be limited because police are able to obtain blood draws without consent under the exigent-circumstances doctrine," which the U.S. Supreme Court upheld in a case out of Wisconsin in 2019.

Law enforcement officers in Wisconsin have therefore moved away from relying on the portion of the implied consent statute that has now been declared unconstitutional," Drummond said.

The case involved a 2014 car crash in a suburb of Madison between two vehicles that killed Janet M. Grady, who died at the scene. Fitchburg police took blood samples from a survivor from the other vehicle, Dawn Prado, because the officer believed a warrant was not needed to take the sample.

Prado, who was intubated and unconscious at the hospital, did not respond when an officer asked her for consent to do a blood draw. The officer testified that he did not think he needed a warrant since she was incapacitated and ordered a nurse to draw the blood.

The Dane County circuit court sided with Prado and suppressed the blood draw test result and dismissed the case. A state appeals court said the officer acted in good faith even though taking such samples is unconstitutional, ruled that the blood test results should not have been suppressed but said the state law about incapacitated drivers is unconstitutional.

The appeals court threw out the lower court's ruling dismissing Prado's case.

The state Supreme Court on Friday agreed with that ruling, saying the officer acted in good faith based on an unconstitutional law. Justice Pat Roggensack and Chief Justice Annette Ziegler filed a separate concurring opinion, saying they agreed with the end result of the ruling but not the reasoning.

Anthony Jurek, the attorney representing Prado, said the ruling was a mixed bag since it found the law unconstitutional but allowed the case against Prado to proceed. He called the striking down of the law a big and long overdue win for the people of Wisconsin.

Jurek said he was considering appealing the ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court, but had to discuss that option first with Prado.

A criminal complaint said Prado had a blood alcohol concentration of 0.081%, just over the legal limit in Wisconsin, when a vehicle she was driving crossed the center line on a highway in Fitchburg and struck Grady's car. Prado, 54, was also severely injured and another person was in the vehicle with her at the time of the crash.

Because of three prior drunken driving convictions, Prado was allowed a 0.02% maximum blood alcohol concentration.

Jurek said Prado is contesting the allegation that she was driving the vehicle.

___

This story was first published June 18, 2021. It was updated June 18, 2021, to correct that the woman police say was driving in the case hasnt been convicted. She has not yet been tried.
Scott Bauer/AP

MADISON, Wis. (AP)  Wisconsin got a jump on its Juneteenth celebrations on Friday by raising a commemorative flag over the state Capitol and holding a ceremony organized by Black lawmakers and attended by Gov. Tony Evers and others.

Evers, a Democrat, last year ordered the raising of the Juneteenth flag for the first time in the state's history. Although the holiday marking the end of slavery in the U.S. is technically Saturday, the flag was raised a day early and will fly until Monday, temporarily replacing a rainbow gay pride flag that is up in June. On Thursday, President Joe Biden signed legislation establishing Juneteenth, or June 19, as a federal holiday.
A Colorado woman is suing a Vermont doctor, accusing him of using his own genetic material when he artificially inseminated her in 1978 at what was then the Central Vermont Hospital in Berlin.

In a lawsuit filed June 14 in federal court in Burlington, Shirley Brown, now of Boulder County, Colorado, alleges that Dr. John Coates III had agreed to inseminate her using donated genetic material.

Coates attorney Peter Joslin, of Montpelier, did not immediately return a voice-mail message left at his office Friday or an email from The Associated Press.

A separate lawsuit filed against Coates by a Florida couple in 2018 that makes similar allegations remains pending in federal court in Vermont.

The new lawsuit, which was first reported by the news website VtDigger.org, says Brown didn't learn that Coates, a now retired OB-GYN at what was then the Central Vermont Hospital in Berlin, was the genetic father of her now-adult daughter until last fall when the daughter did genetic testing to learn more about her biological father.

Plaintiff would not have consented to the Procedure had Defendant Dr. Coates informed her that he was choosing to breach the terms of the Representation and instead was choosing to insert his own genetic material into Plaintiff Shirley Brown, to inseminate Plaintiff Shirley Brown with his own genetic material and was choosing to father a child through Plaintiff Shirley Brown, the suit says.

The lawsuit says Brown and her husband, who was incapable of fathering children, met with Coates who agreed to artificially inseminate the woman with genetic material from an unnamed medical student who resembled the husband and had other characteristics that Brown sought.

Brown learned she was pregnant in 1978 and she gave birth to a daughter at the Berlin hospital in February 1979 as a result of what the lawsuit calls Coates fraudulent insemination.

The seven-count lawsuit alleges that Coates' actions constituted medical negligence, he failed to obtain informed consent, he committed fraud and battery, he intentionally inflicted emotional distress and he breached their original contract.

The lawsuit is seeking damages in excess of $75,000.
Jay L. Clendenin/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images

A 54-year-old Berkeley man was arrested Thursday and charged with assault after allegedly throwing a water bottle at California Gov. Gavin Newsom in downtown Oakland.

Newsom was in Oakland with Mayor Libby Schaaf as part of a press tour supporting local small businesses, which included stops at Beastmode Barbershop and Graffiti Pizza.
Simon Fraser University gerontology adjunct professor Sarah Canham is leading a research project examining how to support older people experiencing homelessness in three Canadian cities. The Aging in the Right Place (AIRP) initiative is receiving funding, announced this week, from the National Housing Strategys Collaborative Housing Research Network (CHRN).

The AIRP partnership is a five year, three-city project to evaluate innovative solutions to supporting older people who are experiencing homelessness.

Canham says researchers in Calgary, Montreal and Vancouver are working with housing providers and stakeholders to bring a partnered, community-based approach to measuring what works, why it works, and for whom it works.

The initiative involves identifying best practices for supporting older adults who are experiencing homelessness to age well in community. We need to recognize that where an older person lives impacts their ability to age optimally, and must match their unique lifestyles and vulnerabilities, says Canham.

While Canadas population of older adults who have experienced homelessness is on the rise, theyve been largely invisible in terms of research. Though there are many different programs in place across the country, there is no clear one-size-fits-all solution, she says.

The project aims to build capacity and knowledge to bridge gaps between research and practice, and promote policies that are proven to support aging in the right place for older people.

More than two dozen co-applicants and collaborators, 40 partner organizations, and nine older advisors with lived experience of homelessness, are among participants.

The AIRP initiative is gaining financial support from nearly $14 million in funding from the CHRN allocated to housing research.

The CHRN is an independent, Canada-wide collaboration of academics and community partners that will generate new knowledge to support housing policy decision-making and inform future program development.

Approximately $7.9M of the funds have been committed to the CHRN for its initial five years to undertake research related to seniors homelessness and affordable housing. The funding was announced by Ahmed Hussen, Minister of Families, Children and Social Development and the Minister responsible for Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation.
Sharon, PA (16146)

Today

Thunderstorms likely this morning. Then a chance of scattered thunderstorms this afternoon. High 69F. Winds NNW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 70%..

Tonight

A few clouds. Slight chance of a shower throughout the evening. Low around 55F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph.
NEW CASTLE  After a year-long investigation into drug trafficking, including authorized cell-phone wiretaps, the U.S. Attorneys office in Pittsburgh obtained indictments charging 25 suspects  including 17 from Mercer County and three from Lawrence County multiple law enforcement agencies announced Thursday.

Most of the individuals are in federal custody, while two are still at large and considered fugitives: Forrest Gilmore, 25, of New Castle and Jermall Johnson, 24, of Erie.

We undertook this investigation with the single goal in mind, to improve public safety, said acting U.S. Attorney Stephen R. Kaufman of the Western District of Pennsylvania, during a press conference in Lawrence County that was organized by his agency.

The arrests culminate a year-long investigation into drug trafficking in Mercer and Lawrence counties and other communities, which included extensive use of authorized wiretaps on cell phones of some of the defendants, Kaufman said.

+2 Cooperation between agencies called key After an investigation that resulted in indictments against 25 drug-trafficking suspects, FBI Pittsburgh Special Agent in Charge Mike Nordwall

A multi-agency roundup of the suspects Thursday morning took agents armed with search warrants to residences in New Castle, the Shenango Valley and eastern Ohio, where they seized undisclosed quantities of drugs, guns and cash. Three of the defendants are from Masury, Columbus and Cleveland in Ohio and one is from Brackenridge, Allegheny County.

Two grand jury indictments handed down Wednesday are for trafficking heroin, fentanyl, methamphetamine, cocaine and other substances. The 22 named in the first indictment are charged with conspiracy to distribute and possess with intent to distribute 40 grams or more of fentanyl, 100 grams or more of heroin, 28 grams or more of cocaine base, a quantity of cocaine and a quantity of methamphetamine, between June 2020 and June 2021, according to the U.S. Attorneys office.

Those named in a second indictment Gilmore, Melvin Dorsey-Pace, 28, of New Castle, and Rayjzon Sams, 28, of New Castle and Farrell.

Mercer County residents indicted are: London Pinkins, 26, Nicholas Ostheimer, 23, and Jimmy Gadson, 34, all of Sharon; Harold Hooten, 44, Katlyn McGirr, 29, Joseph Pumphrey, 62 and Jeronte Robinson, 26, all of Hermitage; Torlando Hopson, 32, Kenneth Miller, 59, Eugene Phillips, 29, Quinton Pinkins, 36, Khiry Whiteside 30, and Denzel Williams, 27, all of Farrell; Amanda Karwowski, 29, of Grove City; Michael Love, 43, of Jackson Center; and Courtney Purdy, 30, of Mercer.

Others named in the indictments are Jammar Shelton, 42, of Masury (Brookfield Township); James West, 45, of Brackenridge, Pa.; Jermall Johnson, 24, of Erie; Jackie Bell, 29, of Columbus; Albert Cummings, 41, of Cleveland; and Alphonse Johnson, 39, currently incarcerated.

One count charges Pinkins and Phillips with conspiring to launder drug trafficking proceeds earlier this year between February and June. Other counts charge Williams, Johnson, Kawowski and Pinkins with possession with intent to distribute and/or distribution of 28 grams or more of cocaine base, a quantity of cocaine and/or a quantity of methamphetamine.

Other counts name several defendants with possession with intent to distribute or distribution of fentanyl, heroin, cocaine base and/or cocaine within 1,000 feet of a playground, school or public housing.

Kaufman said all suspects, if convicted, could face at least five to 40 years in prison, and fines of up to $5 million if convicted.

The second indictment charges Gilmore, Dorsey-Pace and Sams with conspiring to distribute 28 grams or more of cocaine between June 2020 and June 2021. They also are charged with possession with intent to distribute cocaine within 1,000 feet of a playground, school or public housing. Gilmore additionally is charged with possession with intent to distribute 28 grams or more of cocaine on Sept. 17, 2020, and Sams is individually charged with possession with intent to distribute cocaine on April 18 this year.

The investigation was led the FBI, the DEA and the Pennsylvania Office of the Attorney Generals Bureau of Narcotics Investigation. Suspects were arrested through a cooperative effort by the state police, the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, Lawrence and Mercer County drug task forces and New Castle, Sharon, Farrell and Hermitage police departments. Farrell police also assisted in the investigation that resulted in the indictments.

An indictment is just an accusation. Suspects are to be considered innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.
Many technological advances in the world have stumped me over the past couple of decades. In each of the next few weeks, I will revisit some of the columns I wrote in the last 22 years where I shared my frustrations and will update you on how my techy skills have improved  or not.
The Spectrum Health Ludington Hospital Foundation recently donated five ultra-low-temperature freezers to District Health Department No. 10, according to a press release from Spectrum Health.

The freezers, which cost $23,250, will store large amounts of COVID-19 vaccine and keep the vaccine viable for a longer period of time. Each freezer is set to -86 degrees Celsius.

Kevin Hughes, health officer at District Health Department No. 10, is thankful for the donation.

We have recently added a mobile van that serves as a vaccine clinic on wheels, Hughes stated in the press release. The new van enables us to go into communities where vaccine availability is a challenge and offer vaccination to those who want it. The freezers we received from the local Spectrum Health Foundation will help us to keep enough vaccine on hand to keep the mobile van stocked as well as our facility in Ludington.

The mobile clinic will not only distribute vaccines, but it will be fully operational for taking care of other health concerns and needs. Hughes noted that the van has already been to several communities, including a Lions Club food truck in Luther, the Mushroom Festival in Mesick and the hazardous waste drop off in White Cloud.

We have made great progress in getting vaccines to people who may not have had the time or ability to receive a dose, Hughes stated in the release. I really want to thank the Spectrum Health Ludington Hospital Foundation board for its generous donation of the ultra-low-temp freezers. Its helping us expand vaccine availability across our service area.

Roseann Sanders, a nurse who retired from District Health Department No. 10 just prior to the pandemic but returned to help in the fight against COVID-19, showed several Ludington Hospital foundation board members one of the freezers and demonstrated the protective equipment needed to handle the frigid vaccine.

Negative 86 degrees is extremely cold! she stated in the release.

Sanders stated she just could not ease into retirement when such a dire health crisis struck.

Kaley Petersen, director of community services and Spectrum Health Ludington Hospital Foundation, is pleased with the partnership.

Improving the health of our community is a mission we share with our area Health Department, she stated in the release. The foundation board was excited to fulfill this need so that more people across West Michigan can receive the COVID-19 vaccine.

Our foundation board remains committed to supporting the evolving healthcare needs as a result of COVID-19 stated Scott Smith, chair of Spectrum Health Ludington Hospital Foundation, in the release. We are excited to support increasing vaccine accessibility.

Jeremy Vronko, chief operating officer at Spectrum Health Ludington Hospital and the person overseeing vaccine distribution, agreed.

We value the partnership we have with District Health Department No. 10 and other community organizations in responding to COVID-19 and other health needs. Working together is important in fulfilling our mission of improving health, inspiring hope and saving lives, Vronko stated in the release.
The Strengthening Social Resilience Program will include institutional and policy reforms to address cross-sector issues of social development in Bangladesh, said the Manila-based lender in a statement received here Friday.

Dhaka, June 19 (IANS) The Asian Development Bank (ADB) on Friday approved a $250 million policy-based loan to the government of Bangladesh to help finance reforms aimed at improving the inclusiveness and responsiveness of the country's social development and resilience program.

"Enhancing social protection support is critical to cushioning the effects of the pandemic," said ADB Senior Social Sector Specialist for South Asia Hiroko Uchimura-Shiroishi.

He said, "ADB supports the government's intention to leverage the Covid-19 pandemic as an opportunity to strengthen its social protection programs as an essential means of building the resilience of the poor and supporting an inclusive recovery."

According to the statement, Bangladesh has made remarkable progress in reducing poverty over the past two decades. The poverty incidence declined from 48.9 per cent in 2000 to 20.5 per cent in 2019, it added.

--IANS

int/rs
Vardhan said that although this gesture was symbolic, leading people from various industries, corporate houses and those political leaders holding office, could start a virtuous chain by emulating the exercise, eventually amplifying the 'jan-andolan' to protect everyone from the virus through 'Covid-appropriate behaviour'.

The minister distributed masks among 'frontline workers' at the Union Health Ministry on Friday.

New Delhi: Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan has said that masks are the simplest as well as the most potent and powerful weapon against the coronavirus.

The aim of the exercise in the Health Ministry is to distribute masks to all employees posted in the ministry starting with the frontline workers and eventually moving to other staff.

The health minister said, "The government worked round the clock to stop Covid last year. Under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, we were immensely successful in decreasing the active caseload to a minimum."

However, with the arrival of vaccines early this year and things returning back to normal, people gradually became lax in their adherence to the simple code of Covid-appropriate behaviour.

"While the virus mutated and evolved itself, we let our guard down. All this compounded in the spike in cases snowballing into the second wave."

"With many corners of India gradually moving towards unlock from the second wave, we cannot afford the laxity and any further increase in cases again," he added.
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By Dr Rais Hussin / Dr Margarita Peredaryenko / Jason Loh / Ameen Kamal



The government recently announced steps towards national recovery, whereby it aims to "exit" the COVID-19 pandemic in four phases.



In addition, EMIR Research believes that the transition into these phases must be accompanied by a comprehensive plan, developed with an understanding of the uniqueness of the crisis and the Malaysian context, with clear targets that can act as indicators of performance and feedback for course corrective measures  all based on science and economic theory.

The famous economic identity, also known as the equation of exchange, that links monetary supply and the real economy, suggests the increase of money supply as a solution to a "normal" financial crisis.

A "normal" financial crisis is always created through an oversupply of money flowing into unproductive sectors of the economy (when the real economy has reached the maximum of its capacity and cannot absorb any additional money), thus causing bubbles and subsequent destruction of money accompanied by the vicious cycle of economic activity contraction (increasing slack capacity and unemployment) and more money destruction.

The increase of money supply and other stimulus is required then to reverse the cycle. Then, money can start again flowing into the real economy, which now has a substantial excess capacity, and the real economic sector will begin growing.

But this is where the current pandemic-induced crisis fundamentally differs. We do have a massive slack of the capacity in the real economy right now due to devastation by COVID-19.

However, the main problem is reopening the economy is coupled with the great amount of uncertainty and hiccups that subsequently rest on our ability to manage the pandemic.

As such, any attempts to stimulate the economy may do very little unless the pandemic uncertainty is taken out of the equation.

Therefore, we suggest the following strategy based on 3+1 main strategic thrusts:

1. Protecting lives and livelihoods

2. Education emergency response

3. National reconciliation

4. National economic recovery plan

The first three strategic thrusts are immediate short-term responses to eliminate the uncertainty associated with the pandemic as fast as possible and minimize the negative impacts on the rakyat.

While the last strategic thrust focuses on what can be done to stimulate economic growth immediately once the pandemic uncertainty is over and the economy can reopen at full or near full capacity on the basis that the first three strategic thrusts are followed through successfully  which could be at the start of 2022.

This strategic thrust is composed mainly of action items that would become fruitful in the mid-term to long-term. However, their implementation must start immediately so that we are ready to stimulate the economy exactly when it is the right timing.

The article herein covers the first strategic thrust, while the subsequent thrusts shall be covered in sequential releases.

First strategic thrust: Protecting lives and livelihoods

The first strategic thrust concerns the immediate and drastic actions needed to protect lives and livelihoods through three goals, namely extension of "full" lockdown, extension of social and business safety nets, and pandemic management strategies.

Protecting lives and livelihoods must be the first and foremost thrust, as it forms the prerequisites prior to the transitioning into subsequent phases of the Movement Control Order (MCO) and the phases towards exiting the pandemic  aligned with the intention of the government.

The three main goals with corresponding objectives are as follows:

Goal 1: Extend a "full" lockdown  Continue with full national lockdown until it is safe to start gradually reopening various areas.

Objective 1: Extend the duration of MCO3.0 at least until July 13 2021SIX (6) weeks in total for Phase 1.

Taking lessons learned from the relationship of lockdowns and downward progression of cases locally and in other countries, the total duration of MCO 3.0 should be at least until July 13, i.e., the total Phase 1 duration is 6 weeks in total.

Objective 2: Ensure MCO3.0 strictness that it is indeed only essential sectors of the economy are allowed to operate.

Definition of essential sectors and specific applications should go through a committee or a task force consisting of MITI, MOH, and MOSTI prior to approval. This is to ensure the list has been vetted by a balanced consideration of lives vs livelihoods.

The following figure summarizes the proposed targets of each respective objectives to track the progress of these proposed objectives.

Goal 2: Extend social and business safety net  Provide a safety net to those at risk due to shutting down economic activities and those facing prolonged unemployment.



Objective 1: Automatic loan moratorium for all micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs), B40 and M40 households while targeted for other individuals for at least three months or 50% loan payment reduction for six months.

Despite the targeted mechanism suggested, an automatic blanket moratorium for all would be preferred due to ease and speed of implementation.

Objective 2: Wage subsidies for three months for the private sector and daily wage earners.

Objective 3: Targeted direct cash transfers for three months to the deserving B40s and low M40s, especially for daily wage earners and gig economy workers.

Objective 4: Renters' protections for at least three months.

EMIR Research has re-iterated the above four objectives numerous times in our earlier publications. These propositions are all grounded in the heart-beat of the rakyat as discovered in the EMIR Research qualitative and quantitative studies in the aftermath of the MCO1.0.

EMIR Research is grateful the government has implemented much of it. However, minor improvements in terms of time-frame and expansion of the deserving categories can be made as underscored above.

In addition to the above four objectives, EMIR Research believes that the other two objectives are essential to make the overall goal of extending safety-net to the rakyat workable.

Objective 5: Lift the debt to GDP ratio ceiling to 65% as a temporary measure until the pandemic is over.

Lifting the limit to 65% of GDP for Malaysia Government Securities (MGS), Malaysian Government Investment Issues (MGIIs) and Malaysia Islamic Treasury Bills (MITB) borrowings as defined and provided for in the Temporary Measures for Government Financing [Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19)] Act 2020 (COVID-19 Act) as approved by the Parliament last year doesn't necessarily mean the government will use up the limit.

However, it'd allow some breathing space so that, if need be, government borrowings can cross the current 60% threshold  to perhaps 62% at most  just to see the rakyat through the impact of the deficit, which is already expected to be higher than 6.1%.

This measure would also reduce excessive politicking around this issue, which is not helpful to the rakyat situation.

Objective 6: Implement tax-cutting measures (on a temporary basis  with some exceptions).

Corporate income tax should be reduced from 24 percent to between 18 percent- 20 percent across the board. The tourism sector should be zero taxed for two years. Interestingly, the G7 countries, worried that countries would seek to reduce corporate tax in view of the ongoing pandemic, have agreed that the minimum level should be set at 15%.

The sales and service tax (SST) threshold for tourism operators should be increased from RM500,000 to RM1.5 million.

Income tax should be reduced by 50 percent across the board  which is out of the progressive schedule of 0 percent to 30 percent  except for those earning RM300,001 and above, for example.

For the purpose of those who do not qualify to pay income tax, the Inland Revenue Board (IRB/LHDN) could, under the broader oversight of the Malaysian Social Protection Council (MySPC, tentatively access the BPN & BPR database prior to the implementation of the single Social Protection Database (PDPS) in the future.

This for the purpose of negative income tax, i.e., payment by the government to the recipient who does not qualify for income tax. Payment would, therefore, come from the existing source of revenue, i.e., tax collection and not from borrowings. Otherwise, every working adult should be encouraged to register and open an income tax account.

The government should consider imposing a (one-off/yearly) windfall tax on the glove and commodities sector (to counterbalance the reduction in corporate tax).

At the same time, the government should consider introducing capital gains tax (CGT)  for dividends amounting to RM1 million and above, for example.

Goal 3: Pandemic managementFocus resources on fast-tracking the National COVID-19 Immunization Program (NIP) and expanding COVID-19 testing.



Objective 1: Ensure a stable and timely supply of the vaccines.

It is noted that the authorities have the least control in this aspect, and the issue could be a "bottleneck" for the NIP.

Nevertheless, efforts include (but not limited to) widening all sources of vaccine procurement, accepting all donations of vaccines approved by the National Pharmaceutical Regulatory Agency (NPRA), participating in international platforms calling for ways to promote equitable access to vaccines, faster Covax delivery fulfillment, and active monitoring and purchase of any surplus from any countries (open up diplomatic channels to support and report to JKJAV).

Malaysia's NPRA should consider expanding the list of conditional emergency approval of vaccines. NPRA's priority and diligence on safety evaluations are well-placed and should not be questioned.

It is also noted that it may not solve the issue in the near term due to overall global production limits.

However, unprecedented times require unprecedented measures, and the authorities should explore any and all options that may increase the chance of faster vaccine delivery.

Objective 2: Increase daily vaccination throughput.

In addition to increasing the number of vaccination centers (PPVs), the government should expedite the decentralization strategies such as the designation of general practitioner (GP) clinics and private hospitals as vaccination centers, rolling out drive-through vaccinations, and the use of Government vehicles to help bring vaccines to the elderlies and people living far away from vaccination centers.

Objective 3: Widen COVID-19 testing in terms of quantitative and qualitative reach.

One of the indicators of sufficient testing is a positive rate below 5 per cent. However, this is still subject to sampling bias. Therefore, in addition to increasing the number of testing, there is a need to widen the sampling quality.

Mapping Malaysia pandemic journey in terms of three dimensions  daily new cases, daily new tests and positivity rate indicates that, currently, Malaysia needs to perform at least 150,000 to 200,000 tests a day.

To ensure that the sample is wide enough to capture asymptomatic individuals and individuals with no obvious exposure, completely random sampling should be applied to the Malaysian population by zip-code areas  red spot zones or otherwise. Under the mass testing program, schools should be used for mass testing of students, followed by randomized testing thereafter upon reopening.

If a lower test positive rate isn't achievable despite a significant increase in testing and broader sampling as mentioned above for a minimum of 14 days, then it would suggest that the spread of infection in the community is already too widespread and would indicate the insufficiency of current measures.

Objective 4: Prioritization of economic sectors in "Phase 4" of the National Immunization Program.

Following the completion of the focus of vulnerable groups in earlier phases of the NIP, vaccination should gradually shift focus to as many economic actors as possible in the following months of June, July, to mid-August, i.e., 1.5 to 2 months focus for economic sectors.

The focus shall be the manufacturing sectors and other essential sectors that are vital economic contributors but an integral part of the historical and potential cluster contributors.

This coincides with the Private Partnership Industrial COVID-19 Immunization Program (PIKAS), which is considered as Phase 4 of the National Immunization Program, whereby Phase 4 should be extended to focus on as many economic sectors and businesses as possible, ensuring mid-tier companies (MTCs) and MSMEs to be prioritized (not just limited to manufacturing sectors).

Other non-essential workforce (to be re-defined as above) of the economy, particularly businesses and organizations that are not profit oriented may be considered for a selective and extended lockdown.

During June, July, and mid-August, non-essential sectors should be considered for continued lockdown until and unless they have been fully vaccinated.

Objective 5: Ensure sufficient manpower through the deployment of existing resources optimally.

For example, existing workforce from RELA, the armed forces, civil defense force and local community associations to be deployed to supplement the healthcare workforce in related efforts such as conducting mass testing programs, assisting at quarantine centers and vaccination campaigns.

The second part will be discussing the strategics thrusts related to education emergency response and national reconciliation.



(Dr Rais Hussin, Dr Margarita Peredaryenko, Jason Loh and Ameen Kamal are part of the research team of EMIR Research, an independent think tank focused on strategic policy recommendations based on rigorous research.)
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Architects David Chancellor and William Rex Patrick of architectural practice Chancellor and Patrick are often compared to the esteemed architect Frank Lloyd Wright.

Their many low-slung houses in areas such as Kew and along Victorias Mornington Peninsula share a strong horizontality and artistry when it comes to materials, often with crafted timber-lined ceilings.

St Pauls was restored and reworked by Law Architects. Credit:Drew Echberg

However, Chancellor and Patrick were also behind some of Melbournes more public buildings, including St Pauls Church at 1201 Riversdale Road, Box Hill.

Those who know of Chancellor and Patricks work will not be surprised that the striking concrete block church bears the firms illustrious signature.
Listed real estate agency and advisory McGrath has struck a deal with Newground Capital Partners, an alternative asset manager with its parent based in Britain.

The alliance will help to boost McGraths projects division and residential business by providing equity to developers that use the business real estate services. Newground was recently acquired by London-listed alternative asset manager Intermediate Capital Group, which manages $74.5 billion in private debt, credit and equity.

McGrath chief executive Eddie Law used his former finance background in structured commercial real estate debt funding and global institutional property asset funding. Before joining McGrath, he was an executive director of Newground Capital Partners.

McGrath Limited CEO Eddie Law. Credit:

The intent is to leverage off our our proven core capabilities of agency project marketing, property management and buyer mortgage provision by acting as a conduit to the delivery of development capital, to assist the developer both acquire and develop the site, he said.
China-based developer Ousia Investments is expecting more than $40 million for a key South Melbourne development site in the Domain precinct, off St Kilda Road.

The 2874 sq m parcel of land at 15-29 and 31-33 Bank Street includes two office buildings and a 380-bay multi-level carpark.

The Bank Street land includes two office buildings and a 380-bay multi-level carpark. Credit:

The site was bought by Ousia City in 2015 for $30 million. It comes with a proposed scheme drawn up by RotheLowman for a mixed-use development with apartments, office and retail. Sources suggest the site could be even bigger with the 480 sq m neighbour at No.35-37 available off-market.

The Chinese developer, backed by a company that sells a raft of chemical-based consumer goods, is developing a 150-room hotel at 50 Batman Street in West Melbourne. Ousia also bought that address in 2015 and scored a deal to put a Courtyard by Marriott hotel on the site.
You dont just suddenly throw up your hands and say there is no way forward. There is always a way forward, he told The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age. Last October, investors filed a class action lawsuit in the United States District Courts New York Southern District against Mesoblast, Itescu and the companys chief financial officer, Josh Munter. Loading They alleged the company had made materially false and/or misleading statements, as well as failed to disclose material adverse facts about the companys business, operations, and prospects, which led to US investors suffering significant losses and damages. The concerns centre on the argument Mesoblast should have been more transparent about the possibility that the US regulator would demand more detail before Ryoncil could be approved.

Lawsuits may emerge in Australia, too: director of corporate litigator Phi Finney McDonald, Tim Finney, said his firm is likely to proceed with a case on behalf of investors to recover losses for what we allege were Mesoblasts aggressive and misleading statements to the market regarding the likelihood that it would be able to commercialise its drug. New York Southern District Court documents show Mesoblasts legal counsel lodged applications on June 14 to defend the company against the US suit, and are expected to apply to dismiss the case. Mesoblast has told investors it will vigorously defend the legal action, with Itescu maintaining that the company has been extremely transparent about the firms interactions with the regulator. This is not a short-term space, he said. Its not a short-term investment for rapid returns. While the delayed drug approval has caused conflict, everyone seems to agree on one thing: Mesoblasts experience with the US regulator last year was indeed highly unusual.

Shock decision After 16 years, more than $800 million in capital raised since 2011 and cumulative losses of $US548 million, Mesoblast was close to US commercialisation. An independent committee that advises the regulator voted 9 to 1 in favour of approving Ryoncil for use in children with acute graft-versus-host disease, an immune response that can occur after bone marrow transplants. The Food and Drug Administration does not have to take expert advice for treatment approvals, but it usually does. Which made it such a surprise when Mesoblasts application was not passed in October and the company was forced to tell investors the regulator had asked for more information before it would give approval for the treatment. The FDA did something that is very unusual, which is go against a panel that recommended approval. That is something that just about never happens, said Max Jacobs, an analyst at US firm Edison Group. No short-term investment for rapid returns: Mesoblast founder and CEO Silviu Itescu. Credit:Josh Robenstone

Investors were floored. On the day the news came out, the stock price plunged more than 35 per cent, which prompted the legal action by shareholders stung by the slump. The FDA had two concerns. It wanted to see another randomised trial where one group got the drug and the other received a placebo or standard care - Mesoblasts phase 3 trial was single-arm only, with all children receiving the drug. The company was asked to conduct at least one additional trial in adults or children. The regulator also wanted more proof that the company could make the product consistently and at scale. In response, Mesoblast scheduled an appeals meeting with the FDA and argued for accelerated approval. When asked why the company didnt set up an additional trial immediately, Itescu said the business had a moral obligation to get the treatment green-lit for seriously ill children for which there were no other options. We have an ethical and moral obligation to bring this product to children, he said. While investors were digesting the regulatory roadblock, Mesoblast revealed a big corporate win.

In November, the firm said it had secured a deal with Swiss pharma giant Novartis, which included $50 million in upfront cash and investment to jointly commercialise the same product Ryoncil is based on to treat COVID-19 patients in severe respiratory distress. Mesoblast said there were potential milestone payments of $US750 million in the long term on offer. But seven months on from the announced coup, which boosted Mesoblasts shares by 30 per cent in the weeks after it was revealed, the agreement has yet to be formalised. Mesoblast had been undertaking a phase 3 study of its COVID treatment, but stopped enrolling patients when it looked like it was going to miss its primary goal. The company has since said it is combing through the data with Novartis as there were signs the product does have an effect on under 65-year-olds on ventilators. Loading Replay Replay video Play video Play video Asked whether Novartis had any scope to alter the terms of the agreement, Itescu vehemently denies it will end up falling through or being altered.

Weve got a contractual arrangement that Novartis had signed, he said. Material uncertainty The delay has put focus once again on Mesoblasts balance sheet, however. The company generates revenue from milestone payments for its research and for licensing of Ryoncil into Japan, where stem cell treatments are more widely used. But its financial results routinely warn investors that the business has been historically unprofitable and needs to keep raising capital to keep going. In February, Mesoblasts half-year reports and accounts spooked some when an auditors note from PwC noted that further cash inflows will be required to meet forecast expenditure and to comply with minimum unrestricted cash balance requirements as required under its loan agreements over the next twelve months and that there was a material uncertainty about the company continuing as a going concern if funds were not raised.

Mesoblast entered a trading halt and a few days later confirmed it had found a surprise new investor, US orthopedic medical centre operator SurgCenter Development, which injected $US110 million into the company. According to Mesoblasts most recent quarterly report, the company now has $US158 million cash on hand and enough money to fund the next 12 months of operations. Itescu insists that the business is in a better cash position than it has been previously  in the same quarter in 2020, for example, it had just $US60 million cash. You dont just suddenly throw up your hands and say there is no way forward. There is always a way forward. Mesoblast CEO Silviu Itescu Even so, the company has net debt of $US56 million, with loan repayments coming due this year. Analysts have forecast it will have to find additional capital if other partnerships or product launches dont come to fruition.

Itescu insists this is not the end of the road, even if products take more than 12 months from here to come to market: I dont see the runway [cash] as being any sort of a short-term issue. True believers Mesoblast has become a cult favourite stock over the decades and punters end up in fiery debates in share forums and social media about the biotechs prospects. It is one of the most shorted stocks on the local bourse, at 6.7 per cent, and the company regularly pops up in the Reddit forums WallStreetBets and ASXBets as investors discuss its underlying fundamentals. They literally have treatments that will save more peoples lives, but nothing is happening with the price. I guess nothing will until the FDA approves something, one investor suggested on Reddit earlier this month.

The company has larger backers in for the long haul, too. Itescus long time friend, billionaire Alex Waislitz, holds a 4.7 per cent stake through his Thorney Investments group, according to Bloomberg data. Loading Waislitz declined to be interviewed for this story, but said he remained supportive of the business. Many analysts are also taking an optimistic view despite the long road of troubles ahead: consensus estimates have both the ASX-listed shares and US authorised depositary interests rated as buys, even though some of these are labelled speculative. Back in March, Edison analyst Max Jacobs predicted the business would have to come up with another $US75 million by 2023 to keep funding its operations. Despite this, he says the data flowing through from other research programs, including a cardiovascular disease treatment, is actually quite good.
John Olsen, Donde Voy? Self-Portraits in Moments of Doubt, 1989 Credit:Private Collection This is a slight exaggeration but looking at that years finalists its an injustice that Olsen didnt win, as Donde voy? is a work of far greater depth and ambition than anything else. Its a stand-out in this survey as well: a late-night horror movie of a painting in which the aged artist, his face hardly more than a skull decorated with a few threads of raw meat, confronts his doppelganger in the dark. The one bright detail is a fried egg that shines like a lightbulb  a reference to Velazquezs famous picture, An old woman cooking eggs, 1618, a demonstration of youthful virtuosity, painted at the age of 18 or 19. Needless to say, in Donde voy? the egg has a very different connotation, serving as a wistful, ironic memento of lost youth. Its a theme that recurs again and again in this show as we find Olsen brooding on his fading powers, coping with bouts of depression or lack of inspiration. He often includes a reference to some great artist or poet, as if to emphasise the universality of such problems. An obvious example is The circus animals desertion, 1994, which takes its cue from WB Yeatss poem that charts long and futile efforts to pin down a theme. In the midst of clutter, both his own and the poets, Olsen paints himself as a red-faced gremlin emerging from a teacup. In these unflattering self-images, we see the other side of Olsens egotism. It might be described as a predilection for melancholy, at worst, feelings of regret and self-loathing. Where this exhibition is truly impressive is the way these dark introspective works gain in force by being set alongside a selection of vibrant, celebratory pictures such as Golden Summer, Clarendon, 1983, Where the bee sucks, there suck I, 1984-86, and  a real coup  an exuberant, two-panel ceiling painting, Le soleil, 1964, deinstalled from a private collection and reinstalled at the NAS Gallery. Olsens Soleil was removed from the ceiling of a private home to be seen in public in Australia for the first time since it was commissioned in 1965. Credit:Private Collection

It required a huge commitment of time and resources to secure works such as Soilel and the five-metre-long, deep blue painting, The bay and tidal pool, 1979, done as a private commission and never previously exhibited. Its this depth of commitment that distinguishes this survey from so many museum shows that tend to cut corners  to the detriment of the subject. Alderton and his team have drawn on numerous private collections, gathering early works and, among other highlights, two fabulous bath paintings. The Bay and Tidal Pool, 1979 by John Olsen. Credit:Courtesy Sophie Olver and Christie Johnston As the title suggests, John Olsen: Goyas Dog explores the artists debt to Spain, and to Spanish artists from Velazquez and Goya to Tapies, Saura and Miro. From his first visit in 1956, Olsen felt a pronounced attraction for Spain, seeing it as the shadowy counterpart to sunny Australia. He has returned repeatedly to Spanish themes throughout his career, from the time of Spanish encounter, 1960, the breakthrough triptych that helped forge his reputation. John Olsen, Spanish Encounter II, 1960 Credit:Private Collection Spanish art and literature are replete with images of absurdity and death, reflecting the countrys long-term poverty, its subjection to the Catholic Church, and authoritarian rule. Its the antithesis of those bucolic pictures of gum trees and sheep pastures that dominated Australian art in the 20th century. Its eons away from the explosive joy in the natural world one finds in Olsens You Beaut Country pictures.

At times Olsen has been completely seduced by the Australian landscape, on other occasions compelled to contemplate the human condition. That second preoccupation has been largely pessimistic, saturated with Spanish references. He has portrayed himself as Don Quixote, the honourable but demented knight who tilted at windmills. He has identified with Goya, who played the courtier at the court of Carlos IV, but devoted much of his private work to scenes of madness, violence and despair. The Bath, 1996 by John Olsen. Credit:Courtesy James and Jacqui Erskine To speak of Goyas dog is to instantly conjure up a painting of a dogs head sticking up from a brown, sloping mass beneath an empty, pale ochre sky. One of the artists black paintings rescued from the wall of his house, the Quinta del Sordo (House of the deaf man), its an image of isolation and helplessness. If the dog is drowning, as is widely believed, there will be no one to come to its rescue. It symbolises the isolation of Goyas deafness and his feelings of helplessness as his life is engulfed by a tidal wave of war and civil unrest. Olsen engages obliquely with this work in three stark, minimal paintings completed this year, Reflections on Goyas dog I, II & III. They feature the artist and a pet dachshund  a breed more comical than noble. Man and beast resemble dirty wisps of smoke against a backdrop of black and brown. The lightbulb that dangles from the ceiling in two of these panels might be taken from Picassos Guernica, or perhaps from one of Philip Gustons studio paintings. If a lightbulb stereotypically signifies an idea, it is but dimly conceived. In this gloomy setting, the dog also suggests the black dog of depression that plagued Dr Johnson and Winston Churchill. Reflections of Goyas Dog II, 2021 by John Olsen. Credit:John Olsen
This is the premise for T.J Newmans first venture into thriller writing and its established fast. Were only on page 11 when the gun appears and Carrie reacts with the characteristic cool that will characterise her conduct, and indeed that of Bill, throughout.

Bill Hoffman, a pilot with Coastal Airways, is a nice man who looks impressive in his uniform. Everyone thinks so, although his wife Carrie is angry with him because he has committed to a weekend flight instead of to their sons Little League season opener. Shes also annoyed because their internet is down. But then the repairman unexpectedly arrives on a Saturday morning just as Bill is leaving for a round trip from Los Angeles via New York and Portland. Carries resigned to the change of plan, until the affable repairman pulls out a gun and she learns that her husband is going to have to choose between crashing his plane into a designated target or blowing up his family.

While things happen quickly, Newman deftly inserts just enough backstory for each of the characters to make us care about their fate. Incrementally we learn more about Bill and Carrie, their marriage and their children, as well as the aircrew on the plane who will have to demonstrate everything they have learned to keep calm in an ongoing emergency. Not forgetting, of course, the terrorists who are also sympathetically humanised.

Central to the action is the redoubtable flight attendant Jo who has been flying with Bill for more than20 years and who I want to be in charge of the cabin in every plane I fly on from now on. Alerted to the drama unfolding in cockpit, Jo texts her nephew Theo, who just happens to be in the FBI, although currently under something of a cloud for a recent misadventure featuring a botched raid on a crack house. As Bill flies inexorably towards the undisclosed target in New York, it is Theo on the ground who is racing to find the kidnapped Carrie and the children.

One of the reasons why Falling is so effective is that T. J. Newman knows a lot about what goes on in planes. According to her bio, for 10 years she was a flight attendant and wrote much of the book on cross-country red-eye flights while the passengers were sleeping.

This is not a book for before bedtime or boarding a plane, but there are many good reasons why you should read it. Falling will keep you awake and totally enthralled; it will confirm in you the belief that not flying anywhere is a good thing in this COVID era; last, but no means least, as we approach the 20th anniversary of 9-11, it will remind you that terrorism is still a real and present danger, and that there are motivations for such extreme acts that we would do well to understand in our current geo-political climate.

And theres something else interesting about Falling, and an inspiration for aspirational writers. Apparently Newman sent 41 submission to agents before her pitch was picked up by legendary agent Shane Salerno, who Newman describes as her Mr Miyagi-like mentor. Through Salerno, Newman was introduced to crime writers Adrian McKinty and Don Winslow, both prose stylists and political commentators of note, who offered her encouragement and direction  and it shows.
Britney Spears says she has no idea whether she will ever perform again.

Spears, who has not performed in public since late 2018 and is under a court-ordered conservatorship, made the statement in a video post on her Instagram page where she answered three questions that she said had been posed by her fans.

Am I ready to take the stage again? Will I ever take the stage again, Spears, 39, said in the video posted on Thursday.

I have no idea. Im having fun right now, Im in a transition in my life and Im enjoying myself. So,  she said.

Her comments follow repeated pleas by fans for reassurance that she is well amid growing conspiracy theories that she is being kept against her will and is sending cryptic messages for help through her prolific Instagram posts.
How does a fun-loving and outspoken teenager from Sydneys western suburbs wind up a so-called ISIS bride in a refugee camp in north-western Syria?

Mariam Daboussy was not particularly religious, according to Good Weekend senior writer Tim Elliott, but rather, something of a wild child. She wanted to go out and party and shop, not really study. Just a normal boisterous teenager, says Elliott. This was until she met Bankstown apprentice electrician Khaled Zahab, when she was 18: Thats how she fell down the rabbit hole.

Daboussy married into a family of Islamic State sympathisers and then  willingly or unwittingly  crossed the border into Syria, where she has remained for the past six years, despite the desperate efforts of her father Kamalle to overcome government inaction and bring her and her three small children home . You couldnt be anything other than moved by this man, says Elliott, speaking in the latest episode of Good Weekend Talks. Its gut wrenching. Its unimaginable.

And yet the claims Mariam makes about what led her into Islamic State require more than a modicum of skepticism, dealing with all manner of grey areas and nuance, which Elliott brings to his investigation for Good Weekend magazines cover story this week: NO WAY OUT: The ISIS bride stuck in Syria since 2015  and the father desperately trying to get her back home.
Jordans new flatmate, Kevin, seemed nice enough  until Kevin mentioned that he and his girlfriend, Rose, were celebrating their first anniversary with a night in a swanky hotel.

Illustration by Jim Pavlidis. Credit:

Do me a favour, mate. Dont mention that to Ingrid, Jordan said, referring to his girlfriend. But Ingrid found out, just as she discovered Kevin regularly bought Rose flowers, made her breakfast in bed and sometimes massaged her feet while they watched TV.

The revelations put Ingrid into a funk and Jordan grew resentful of Kevin. Major changes were needed. Like kicking him out. Anything to make Ingrid feel better.

To read more from Good Weekend magazine, visit our page at The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age and Brisbane Times.
One of the greatest fears of a newspapers court reporter is returning to a case and seeing a barrister for one side or the other brandishing your previous days report, arguing before a judge that an obtuse headline or an errant phrase has somehow derailed the case in a gross miscarriage of justice.

Its happened to most court reporters, with limited success - but its no less gut-wrenching and can unsettle even the most experienced scribes.

Court reporting is about precision and fairness; about reporting facts but also painting a picture with words conveying the important proceedings of a benign courtroom environment to those who cant be there.

For the past two weeks, senior Herald journalists Michaela Whitbourn, Deborah Snow and Harriet Alexander have faced an additional challenge on top of the usual minefields of navigating suppression orders, time constraints and (occasionally) the tedium of complicated legal arguments. They are covering a case in which their own colleagues journalism is on trial.

Its unlikely to have escaped your attention that decorated soldier Ben Roberts-Smith is suing the Herald, The Age, and the Canberra Times over a series of reports in 2018 that he says portray him as a war criminal and accuse him of an act of domestic violence against a woman with whom he was having an affair. Roberts-Smith vigorously denies any wrongdoing; the media outlets are seeking to rely on a defence of truth.
Billionaire property developer Harry Triguboff has suffered a defeat after a planning panel rejected his company Meritons proposal to build 1900 apartments at Little Bay.

The Sydney Eastern City Planning Panel on Friday unanimously decided that a planning proposal from Meriton lacked merit and had unmitigated significant impacts on transport and amenity.

Meritons development proposal for Little Bay has been rejected by a planning panel. Credit:Meriton

The panel led by former Labor minister Carl Scully found the proposals height limits and density were inappropriate and out-of-character for the area.

The height, bulk, distribution of buildings and the intrusion into view corridors to the coast from the surrounding areas would have significant implications for the amenity of the site, its environs and the surrounding area, the panel said.
More than 1000 people are in isolation as health authorities work to contain a highly transmissible COVID-19 variant spreading in Sydneys east while the citys population remains largely unvaccinated.

There was one new case reported in NSW on Friday: a man in his 50s who attended Bondi Junction Myer at the same time as a limousine driver who tested positive to Delta variant earlier this week.

NSW Health on Friday night issued a health alert expanding advice for the shopping centre. Anyone at Westfield Bondi Junction between 11am and 12pm on Saturday, June 12, and 1pm to 2pm and 4pm to 4.30pm on Sunday, June 13, is asked to get a COVID-19 test even if they do not have symptoms. This includes anyone who was in the car park.

People with no symptoms do not need to isolate while waiting for their test result, the department said. Anyone who visited the shopping centre between Friday, June 11 and Friday, June 18 should monitor closely for symptoms and get tested if they become unwell.
Two relatives of Bilal Hamze have been given the same warning about the grave threat to their safety that the slain underworld figure received but dismissed before he was gunned down in the heart of Sydneys CBD late on Thursday night.

The drive-by shooting of Hamze, 34  five minutes walk from Circular Quay and opposite the Australian Stock Exchange  was described by police as a major escalation of gangland tensions and senior officers have warned they are preparing to suppress any violent tit-for-tat reprisals across the city.

Bilal Hamze and a bullet hole near where he was killed. Credit:Janie Barrett/Braden Fastier

Hamze, the cousin of notorious Brothers for Life founder Bassam Hamzy, was shot dead around 10.30pm after leaving upmarket Japanese restaurant Kid Kyoto. According to witnesses and CCTV at the scene, there was an initial burst of gunfire directed at Hamze from a black Audi as he emerged onto Bridge St from the laneway leading to the restaurant, before a second burst at close range.
NSW has recorded one new COVID-19 case, a man in his 50s who attended Myer Bondi Junction at the same time as an aircrew driver who later tested positive.

It comes as masks will be compulsory on Greater Sydney public transport from 4pm on Friday, while eastern suburbs residents are urged to limit their movements amid evidence the virus has spread through fleeting contact.

The man who tested positive in Sydney visited the busy Bondi Junction shopping centre several times while potentially infectious. Credit:Louise Kennerley

It appears from CCTV cameras that it could have been a very fleeting contact between the infectious person and this gentleman, Premier Gladys Berejiklian said of the Myer case, who shopped in the same section of the store as the driver on Saturday and will be included in tomorrows numbers.

NSW Chief Health Officer Kerry Chant asked eastern suburbs residents to be particularly alert given cases emerging in this outbreak were catching the virus in unusual settings.
Water Minister Melinda Paveys office has intervened in a stink over a plan to put an industrial-sized odour control unit in the middle of a much-loved bushwalking track in Sydneys inner suburbs.

Sydney Waters proposal to place the infrastructure at the Two Valley Trail in Wolli Creek has drawn the ire of three local councils and four state Labor MPs, who are urging the authority to move it elsewhere.

Wolli Creek Preservation Society president Gina Svolos wants the proposed odour control unit relocated. Credit:Louie Douvis

The proposed location of the odour control unit also jeopardises long-term plans for the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service to finish the nearby Wolli Creek Regional Park by extending it east to Unwin Street, where the trail begins.

Wolli Creek Preservation Society president Gina Svolos said the sliver of bushland and sandstone rock faces was treasured by the local community and that, as a result of the pandemic, its use had dramatically increased.
Empty immensity. Every part of the Powerhouse project reeks of empty immensity  from Mike Bairds initial thought bubble (I know, lets move it!) to the design brief lite, from the retrospectively recreated 2018 business case summary (there being no actual business case) to the big empty milk crate now set to be built on Parramattas flood-prone riverbank.

This weeks two big pieces of Powerhouse news are no exception. The first is Wednesdays Land and Environment Court decision on Willow Grove , in which Justice Tim Moore (a former Liberal minister) found against a group of Parramatta residents who oppose the governments effective demolition of Willow Grove, a heritage-listed villa, to make way for the new Powerhouse museum. The case hinged on whether the government ever considered keeping the villa.

Willow Grove, built in the 1870s, is set to be demolished and rebuilt elsewhere to make way for the Parramatta Powerhouse. Credit:Janie Barrett

The judge found (a) that although the regulation requires analysis of any feasible alternatives, Infrastructure NSW did not need to do this and (b) that even if I am wrong there was no feasible alternative. Moore adduced as evidence an Infrastructure NSW diagram that more than doubled Willow Groves heritage footprint by including its modern addition, supposedly showing no through-route could be found. Weirdly, for a judicial review, this is a design decision. Its also manifestly not the case that Willow Grove makes any alternative through route impossible. Empty promises, empty arguments, immense expenditure.

The same holds for the half-a-billion-dollar Powerhouse Ultimo dollop, announced on Tuesday by Arts Minister Don Harwin. Some consider it a big community win. Perhaps it is, although a fashion museum in the Powerhouses Wran building was always envisaged. Now, instead of having to flog its workshop building to survive, the museum will be funded. But theres no guarantee to keep the Harwood building in the longer term. Indeed, no information generally. Just a 400-word media puff. Yet another politically-inflated thought bubble, this is less a plan than a press release.
Killer foster father Rick Thorburn mostly likely choked or asphyxiated 12-year-old Tiahleigh Palmer in their Logan home in 2015, a coronial inquest has concluded.

Deputy State Coroner Jane Bentley published her findings on Friday and rejected Mr Thorburns evidence during the two-day hearing last week that he accidentally suffocated his foster daughter.

Tiahleigh Palmers foster father Rick Thorburn pleaded guilty to her murder and was sentenced to life in prison. Credit:Queensland Police Service.

Tiahleigh was last seen alive about 5.45pm on October 29, 2015. That night, she had been at a hip-hop dance class and complained of stomach pains.

Also that evening, Trent Thorburn, Rick Thorburns son, told his mother he was worried he may have impregnated the child.
The Victorian government is set to ask the Commonwealth for more Australian Defence Force members to assist with cleaning up after a deadly storm that lashed eastern parts of the state.

More than 5000 Victorian homes and businesses are still without power more than a week after the storm, which caused major damage and left two people dead.

Acting Premier James Merlino said he would request an additional 120 ADF personnel from the federal government on Friday.

He said the personnel would be involved in road clearing, general clean-up, community assurance and doorknocking.
Parts of the smashed electricity network in the Dandenongs will be rebuilt underground to prevent future outages in natural disasters after recent storms sent trees crashing into poles and wires.

A Grattan Institute energy expert and bushfire mitigation specialist say the government should move to bury power lines underground where possible in the storm and fire-prone area, with thousands of households facing the prospect of weeks without electricity.

Ten years after the Black Saturday bushfires royal commission recommended power lines be placed underground, the state government has preferred a more cost-effective program to safeguard existing overhead wires.

By late Friday, more than 4800 households and businesses were without power and authorities expect about 2000 could remain disconnected until well into next month, after storms and floods battered much of Victoria last week.
There are views that are not socially acceptable. They are not, as the Germans say, salonfahig  meaning, suitable to be aired in the salons, boardroom lunches, writers festivals, or harbourside soirees of fashionable society.

In the time of Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky, people who held such views were labelled freethinkers. They rejected arguments from authority, tradition and religion and insisted on logic and inquiry. Tolstoy praised freethinkers as those who are willing to use their minds without prejudice and without fearing to understand things that clash with their own customs, privileges, or beliefs. But sceptical Dostoyevsky saw also a type of person who wallows in a hotbed of freethinking, depravity, and godlessness.

These days, most fashionable modern salons are stridently godless. If you score an invite and youre lucky, you might even discover one thats still a little depraved, in spite of todays secular moralism. But freethinking they are decidedly not.

Yuin man and Dark Emu author Bruce Pascoe on his property near Mallacoota. Credit:Justin McManus

That is why Bruce Pascoes retelling of Indigenous Australian society, Dark Emu: Aboriginal Australia and the Birth of Agriculture, became instant lore among the fashionable set, when it should have been debated as an argument or theory. And it is why a credible new challenge to Pascoes scholarship is rocking the salonistas who gulped the Dark Emu narrative down whole.
Its very addictive, politics, Hawke was quoted as saying. He also said he was interested in being influential in politics but that didnt necessarily mean being in Parliament: In some ways its more fun on the outside. It gives you more power. These days, in Parliament, he shares a desk with Victorian powerbroker Michael Sukkar, the Assistant Treasurer. In recent months hes become involved in a factional tussle in NSW that is spilling over into several nasty preselection contests, including in the marginal seats of Lindsay and Reid, held by first-term MPs Melissa McIntosh and Fiona Martin. He is Morrisons personal representative on the Liberal Partys NSW executive and has become a divisive figure within the state division because of his tight control of factional numbers. Hawke is also very close personally to Morrison. They are part of a bible study group, along with Stuart Robert, that has met each sitting week since they were elected in 2007. The tight-knit group was integral to corralling support for Morrison when Turnbulls leadership was challenged in 2018.

In his first speech, Hawke told Parliament: I am a big believer in the ideas of grace, forgiveness, redemption and a second chance  Christian values that have seasoned secular culture in a way that makes it more humane and our world more inhabitable. Loading What did he do this week? On Tuesday, Hawke used his ministerial discretion to allow the asylum seekers who have become known as the Biloela family to move to community detention in Perth. Nadesalingam and Priya Murugappan fled Sri Lanka by boat in 2012 and 2013 and met in Australia. The couple and their Australian-born daughters, Kopika, six, and Tharnicaa, four, have been held on Christmas Island since August 2019, after being removed from the Queensland town of Biloela following unsuccessful asylum claims by the parents. Courts and tribunals up to the High Court have repeatedly found Australia does not owe the parents protection.

The family found themselves split up a fortnight ago when Tharnicaa fell ill with pneumonia and a blood infection and she was airlifted to Perth with her mother for medical treatment. Heartbreaking photos of Tharnicaa in tears hugging her sister in a Christmas Island hospital bed before they were separated reignited public pressure for action. Some Coalition MPs who had been lobbying behind the scenes on the familys behalf were prompted to speak publicly. Hawke said he was conscious of the compassionate factors around keeping children in immigration detention for a long time, particularly as legal appeals drag on. The family still has a case before the Administrative Appeals Tribunal and a special application to the High Court in train. Hawke also revealed he is considering two applications to use his ministerial discretion, one for a so-called bar lift that would allow Tharnicaa to apply for a humanitarian or safe haven enterprise visa, and the other under a section of immigration law that allows a minister to grant a visa in the public interest. Why is this important?

For more than a decade the Coalition has decried almost all high-profile acts of compassion towards asylum seekers who arrive by boat, with warnings the merest hint of an exception would give people-smugglers impetus to restart their trade. In 2011, Morrison as opposition immigration spokesman said it wasnt reasonable for taxpayers to pick up the tab for flying relatives to Christmas Island to attend the funerals of asylum seekers who drowned in the dangerous seas around the island. (The next day he said he had erred with the comments.) Loading Even in September 2019, shortly after the Murugappans were removed to Christmas Island, then home affairs minister Peter Dutton described their children as anchor babies  a term used in the United States to accuse would-be immigrants of having children to cement their claims. However while there has been pressure to get the family off Christmas Island once it became clear the protracted legal proceedings would drag on, there is little appetite for a similar push to let them stay in Australia. The governments position remains that anyone who arrived by boat will not be allowed to settle here.
The bill proposes to hand three significant new warrant powers to the AFP and the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission to covertly access computers, devices and online networks, which the agencies say are necessary to identify and disrupt serious crime online, such as child abuse and terrorism. Former spy chief Dennis Richardson, who led ASIO between 1995 and 2006, is among those sceptical of the need for more police disruption powers. His extensive four-volume review of national security legislation in 2019, which predates the Identify and Disrupt bill, concluded the AFPs current disruption powers were sufficient. There is much the AFP can do under its existing powers, with technical assistance and support from Australian Signals Directorate. We are unconvinced that a more specific disruption mandate, or additional powers, are needed, the Richardson report said. Former ASIO boss Dennis Richardson, in his major review of Australias national security laws, concluded there was no need for an expansion of police disruption powers. Credit:Andrew Meares Offensive cyber operations are highly complex and require careful planning. A poorly planned or executed operation could impact negatively on innocent people and, in extreme cases, compromise computers that support the provision of essential services. All agencies, including the AFP, can and do make mistakes and this would be no exception.

The bills three new powers include a data disruption warrant, which will allow police to copy, modify or delete data for the purpose of frustrating the commission of criminal activity. A separate network activity warrant will allow police to access devices for collecting intelligence on suspected online criminal networks. A third warrant power will allow the AFP and ACIC to covertly take over a persons online account - something they can presently only do with consent. The powers build on the Telecommunications and Other Legislation Amendment (Assistance and Access) Act 2018, known as the TOLA laws, which set in place a complex tiered system of laws that give security agencies encryption-busting powers by allowing them to compel communication companies to introduce technical changes to their platforms. Loading Speaking at a PJCIS inquiry into the bill in March, AFP Commissioner Reece Kershaw said disrupting crime was core business for the AFP and existing surveillance powers, including the TOLA laws, were not enough to keep pace with the growing use of the dark web and anonymising technologies by criminals. Weve still got one hand tied behind our back because we cannot identify what their distribution point is and what criminal network they belong to; understand what they are communicating, due to encryption; move things around inside their network  that is, modify data  or take control of their distributors to collect evidence. And, in many cases, we may not even know where the distribution network is, Kershaw told the committee.

But the proposed laws have been met with alarm by legal and digital rights groups. The Identify and Disrupt bill is the latest in a line of troubling laws that expand state surveillance. Even in that context, this bill is particularly shocking because it is so broadly-worded, and lacking in safeguards, that it encompasses any and every Australian, Human Rights Law Centre senior lawyer Kieran Pender says. The Law Council of Australia has argued the proposed laws departed sharply from the traditional focus of investigative powers on the collection of admissible evidence for the prosecution of specific offences. They also have the potential to cause significant loss or damage to large numbers of non-suspects who are lawfully using computer networks or the systems being targeted, Dr Jacoba Brasch, QC, the councils president told the committee in March. Another person urging caution is ex-AFP Commissioner Mick Palmer, now a prominent drug law reform campaigner. Palmer acknowledges the frontier of cybercrime  and the challenge that encrypted communications and the dark web pose to law enforcement  was scarcely an issue when he was federal police chief from 1994 to 2001. But the push to bolster police powers is nothing new, he says.

You really need to be very careful before you extend police powers as attractive as it might sound in the first place, Palmer says. Its important to really think through all the implications. We want to catch the bad guys, but what if we get that wrong? What are some of the implications of mistakes  we need to ensure we achieve a balance in that. What role did Australian laws play in the An0m sting The global legal strategist behind the An0m sting plays down the idea that Australias TOLA laws were the driving motivation behind the FBIs decision to partner with the AFP. There is no single answer to explain why Australia was such a close partner, says Andrew Young, a former US Department of Justice prosecutor.

The An0m sting is almost implausible in its scope and scale. For almost three years, AFP and FBI officers covertly monitored millions of messages exchanged among organised crime figures around the world on the An0m network. Unbeknownst to the criminals, the network had been established by an FBI informant who worked with the AFP to build a master key, or a backdoor, into An0ms encryption system before the devices were circulated to the criminal underworld. An image showing messages on the encrypted An0m app, released by the US Department of Justice. Australia was the testing ground for the operation, with the informant distributing about 50 devices among Australian criminal networks, before it was expanded into other countries reaching a peak of 9000 active users globally. When law enforcement flicked the switch on the sting last week, more than 800 people were arrested across 16 countries. In Australia, more than 250 people have been arrested on 595 charges across Australia, while three tonnes of drugs, 128 weapons and $46 million in cash were allegedly seized. Young is in a better position than most to shed light on the precise nature of Australias role. Not just because of his leading role in the An0m operation from its infancy, but because he bowed out from the investigation in August 2020 to become a partner at a San Diego law firm. But even in the relative freedom of the private sector, Young remains tight-lipped about whether the US looked upon Australia as an ideal legal playground to test drive the An0m platform. A lot of factors went into the decision [to partner with the AFP] but, most importantly, we had developed close relationships with individuals within Australian law enforcement through the Phantom Secure case and there was a lot of trust there.

Loading Phantom Secure was a Candian company that provided encrypted phones to organised crime syndicates until its CEO Vincent Ramos was arrested in 2018. Young, who led the prosecution of Ramos, said this left a void in the market that made the An0m platform so enticing to the underworld. The real difficulty was figuring out how to do [the operation] technologically, legally and logistically all while running a company that otherwise looked legitimate. In the beginning, we realized we needed the technological capability to build the backdoor and an early wiretap to serve as a beta test to prove it would work. The Australians assured us that they could fulfil those needs. And they did, Young says. The miracle of this thing was that it never leaked out. Commissioner Kershaw has stressed the operation was legally executed, with the AFPs involvement facilitated by the TOLA powers.

We provided a technical capability to be able to decrypt those messages, Kershaw said last week. But details beyond that have been scant. This is by design. There are provisions in Commonwealth legislation which prevent the AFP from confirming the details of the legislative provisions relied upon, until these matters are lawfully disclosed in open court, the AFP clarified in a statement last week. Jennifer Lynch, a senior attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a US-based digital rights organisation, says US surveillance laws would have made it extraordinarily difficult for the FBI to carry out the An0m operation without Australias help. We have the Wiretap Act, which governs surveillance of real-time communications, and it really places very strict limits on that surveillance. For example, you have to show that youve tried other means of investigation and those have failed. The orders are very limited in time and scope, and you have to go back to the judge if you want to extend those orders, Lynch says. She said the EFF watched with concern as Australia passed the TOLA laws in 2018, fearing they would allow for the laundering of surveillance of Americans through another legal system.
The nations top statistician is unable to promise there wont be cyber attacks affecting census night on August 10 but said every step had been taken to protect household data from state-based actors and hackers.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics is targeting a 95 per cent completion rate for the 2021 census and predicts a record proportion will answer the census online. The expectation is three-quarters of households will fill out the form on a computer, tablet or smartphone.

ABS chief David Gruen. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

Australian Statistician David Gruen, who is the head of the ABS, said reaching such a high completion rate required timely instructions provided to households and a seamless and trouble-free experience for those who complete the form online.

On census night in 2016 the online form faced several outages following malicious distributed denial of service attacks, known as DDoS attacks, which came from overseas. The ABS took the extraordinary step of shutting down the website to protect the data.
About 1 million more people in their 50s are likely to get immunised against the coronavirus now they can have the Pfizer shot, after AstraZenecas vaccine was on Thursday limited to people older than 60.

Daily vaccination rates are also expected to dip temporarily as clinics across the country cancel AstraZeneca bookings for people aged under 60, after the Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation recommended lifting the age for AstraZeneca due to a slightly increased risk of clotting for people aged 50 to 59.

Health Minister Greg Hunt says more people over the age of 50 will now come forward to be vaccinated. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

Prime Minister Scott Morrison will also convene an emergency national cabinet meeting early next week with state and territory leaders to work through how the change will affect the rest of the rollout.

Health Minister Greg Hunt said one positive from the change in advice was that about half the 2.1 million people aged 50 to 59 who had been hesitant about the AstraZeneca vaccine would now be more willing to come forward for Pfizer.
Nick Whitlam fondly remembers the kitchen of his family home in Sydneys western suburbs, especially the cabinet where his parents, former prime minister Gough Whitlam and his wife Margaret kept their alcohol.

It was filled with slivovitz brought from the local Yugoslav constituents which we would sneak and even though it tasted terrible it was an elixir to an adolescent boy, Mr Whitlam said.

Nick Whitlam the son of former Australian Prime Minister Gough Whitlam inside the kitchen of his family home, with his parents alcohol cabinet to the right. Credit:Kate Geraghty

Now the whole house, most of its wallpaper and even that cabinet from which the grog flowed freely the night his father won the 1972 federal election, will be preserved as a national heritage asset thanks to a grant from the Morrison government.

The Whitlam mid-century Lodge in Waiting will be entrusted to the Whitlam Institute, within Western Sydney University.
Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt faces a community-led attempt to defeat him in his Mornington Peninsula electorate at the next election, using the campaign model that ended the political career of former prime minister Tony Abbott two years ago.

Voices of Mornington Peninsula will launch its push to unseat Mr Hunt on Saturday with an online forum featuring two big political names  former Liberal leader John Hewson and retired independent MP Cathy McGowan.

Ms McGowans defeat of conservative high-flyer Sophie Mirabella in the Victorian seat of Indi in 2013 created the voices model.

Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

She told The Age on Friday that Mr Hunts marginal seat of Flinders could fall to an independent candidate, citing the performance of former Liberal Julia Banks, who ran there in 2019 and snared more than 13 per cent of the vote.
Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt and state government leaders have defended Victorias Chief Health Officer Brett Suttons decision to fly to Canberra for meetings on Wednesday while Victorians remained restricted by a 25-kilometre limit movement limit he imposed.

Opposition MPs accused the state government of running a protection racket for Professor Sutton during a hearing on Friday, which was attended by the Deputy Chief Health Officer in his absence.

Mr Hunt and acting Premier James Merlino both called the criticism of Professor Sutton unfair because he travelled to Canberra to attend a meetings of the National Health and Medical Research Council and the organisations annual dinner.

In the firing line: Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton flew to Canberra for work events. Credit:Simon Schluter

The chief health officer of every state and territory was invited to the nations capital from Wednesday. NSW Chief Health Officer Kerry Chant attended virtually so she could remain in Sydney to deal with a growing outbreak in Sydney. Her Western Australia and Northern Territory counterparts also stayed at home.
The European Union on Friday added the US to a list of countries for which travel restrictions should gradually be lifted. The list applies to all American tourists, vaccinated or not, for nonessential travel.

However the recommendation is not legally binding.

Its up to every country to decide how and when to open the borders, said French Embassy spokesperson Pascal Confavreux. The European Union is the one giving the framework, but the decision comes from the states.

Each of the EUs 27 member states has the power to set its own guidelines and timelines for travellers, including whether or not to require vaccinations or COVID-19 tests for entry.

Several European countries, including Spain and France, have already reopened to vaccinated visitors from the US.
PHILIPSBURG:--- Seventy prison workers from Point Blanche Detention Centre participated in this weeks CARBAVIA 2021  the regions international aviation meet up - to learn etiquette and the art of handling people, in a unique engagement initiative. Their involvement was endorsed by Ms. Ludmila De Weever, St Maartens Minister of Tourism, Economic Affairs, Transportation and Telecommunication, who was pleased to formally open the event this week. And welcome some 60 plus delegates to the Island.

Organizer Cdr Bud Slabbaert and team, responsible for the fifth annual edition of the event, which took place at the Simpson Bay Resort on the Island, despite the challenges of the pandemic, was initially surprised to receive interest in participation. However, he responded positively. We must be the first event organizer ever to adapt our programme for this unusual audience, said Cdr Bud. He resiliently changed the schedule for speaker Leif Ytterstad to accommodate some dedicated training sessions for the group. It turned out to be a great success and we will do it again, said Bud.

Leif is Head Butler and Trainer in the Sky at Fort Lauderdale, FL. DaVinci Training, one of CARIBAVIAs long-term supporters and sponsors. His usual environment is training flight attendants who take care of the safety and well-being of clients who travel on private jets, or who serve in the VIP hospitality industry.

Leif highlighted the need to be kind to people who will be in their establishment and care for some time. He dispensed advice on how to keep day-to-day life simple and sweet - KISS, as he calls it.

Leifs engaging style swiftly brought delegates from the back of the room to the front as he encouraged them to express the issues and feelings they experience on a day-to-day basis. He highlighted the value of leading by example listening to fears and plans for outside life  being a listener and showing compassion. There was laughter and warmth as they listened to the Norwegian-born speaker, who adapted his presentation to reflect and appreciate the often intense and challenging environment these workers encounter in their daily lives.

The prison staff also met with international aviation, travel and tourism delegates at CARIBAVIA who had flown in from all over the USA, various parts of the Caribbean, and internationally from France and the UK.

They look forward to taking on board many of the ideas DaVincis trainer shared with them in a very useful and engaging educational exercise.
Cambridge Broadband Networks Group: \Utilize the growing availability of spectrum via high performance solutions to win the 5G race\

Boston, USA, June 17, 2021 ? If US operators are to reap the rewards of 5G, they must adopt solutions that enable the deployment of networks using under-utilized frequency spectrum bands, Paul Wright, VP of Sales and Customer Operations at Cambridge Broadband Networks Group (CBNG), said today.

Over the next five years, it is expected 5G networks will cover one-third of the world?s population with the 5G Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) market predicted to grow to over $46,366 million globally by 2026. Wright explained that as part of this growth, North America holds several exciting opportunities for operators, representing 51 percent of the overall 5G market.

?The Federal Communications Commission?s (FCC) recent move to open up CBRS, C-Band and 24-27GHz across the US has put more spectrum than ever into the hands of operators, ready for the deployment of next-generation networks. This presents a huge opportunity, which service providers are already looking to take advantage of,? said Wright. ?However, to capitalize on this and meet the ever-increasing demand for fast, high bandwidth connectivity, due to the proliferation of IoT and digital transformation of business, operators must have access to high performance, cost-effective platforms.?

Currently, competition for the provision of urban services is high, with mobile network assets now a popular choice for connecting homes. However, this is causing a real issue with capacity due to a fluctuating mobile base and the challenges of covering fixed connectivity, Wright added. As a result, it has become harder for service providers to achieve a return on investment and recoup the thousands of dollars they have spent on acquiring licenses.

Wright highlighted that there is also a real need to reduce the price of Customer Premises Equipment to below $350 to meet consumer demand. With 80 percent of all mobile traffic generated indoors, it is also important to have a product or service that can provide excellent indoor coverage. Additionally, the spectrum between 24-27 GHz does consist of significant propagation challenges, however there are now new innovations, such as beam steering antennas, which will prove key to unlocking this spectrum.

?With more than 20 years? experience, CBNG has developed its leading range of mmWave VectaStar platforms in response to industry demands. With key strategic relationships with operators and service providers within the US market, CBNG has ensured its solution and software services are field proven to provide a way of deploying networks efficiently with high performance and profit in mind,? concluded Wright. ?By utilizing the services of CBNG, operators can ensure they can take advantage of the new opportunities 5G FWA offers within the US, from 24GHz to 47GHz, with an increased return on investment.?

For more information about Cambridge Broadband Networks Group, please visit www.cbnl.com.
Hannan soil sampling defines copper-silver mineralization over 18 kilometres at Tabalosos east

Posted by Publisher Internet

Hannan Metals Limited (?Hannan? or the ?Company?) (TSXV: HAN) (OTCPK: HANNF  https://www.commodity-tv.com/ondemand/companies/profil/hannan-metals-ltd/) reports on the results from the soil geochemical sampling program from the Tabalosos East prospect within the San Martin JOGMEC JV sediment-hosted copper-silver project in Peru (Figures 1 and 2).

Hannan is rapidly advancing the Tabalosos East target and demonstrating scale and continuity of copper-silver mineralization over 18 kilometres of combined strike, within a 6 kilometre by 2 kilometre area (Figure 2). Three geological teams with more than 10 local assistants and guides are systematically sampling traverses across the densely vegetated jungle. ?The survey is the first systematic attempt to map the continuity of the high-grade mineralized outcrops reported in March 2021.

Highlights:

The soil survey confirms continuity of previously reported high grade copper mineralization at Tabalosos East which included outcrop mineralization of up to 2.0m @ 4.9% copper and 62 g/t silver. The area is covered by dense jungle vegetation and in parts relatively steep topography. It is estimated that <1% of the bedrock outcrops; A total of 1,211 soil samples have been taken with approximately 50% of the survey completed. Sampling will be ongoing for another two months; Results demonstrate continuity of sub-cropping stratabound copper-silver mineralization over 18 kilometres of combined strike, within a 6 kilometre by 2 kilometre area (Figure 2); Permitting to undertake advanced exploration work within Tabalosos East, including diamond drilling, are ongoing with Environmental Impact Statement (Declaracion de Impacto Ambiental, or \DIA\) baseline studies underway.

Michael Hudson, CEO, states, \These results demonstrate the scale of the Company\-\-s multi-kilometre long copper-silver anomalies at the Tabalosos East prospect and coincide with, and expand upon, areas of known mineralization in outcrop. Encouragingly, these data confirm the continuity of mineralization at the same stratigraphic position and outline 18 kilometres of subcropping mineralization at Tabalosos East.? Our sediment-hosted San Martin copper-silver project continues to develop into a major copper-silver system of scale for Peru.?

The soil survey was designed to determine the continuity of copper-silver mineralization under soil cover over larger areas. Hannan has previously reported high grades of copper and silver in outcrop up to 2.0 metres @ 4.9% copper and 62 g/t silver. The 2,500 point soil sampling program was designed to determine the continuity of copper silver mineralization under soil cover over larger areas. The program consists of approximately 35-line kilometers of survey lines covering an area measuring 6 kilometres by 2.6 kilometres.? The main survey lines are spaced at 250-metre centers running east-west, with shorter infill survey lines spaced at 150-metre centers. Soil samples were collected every 20 meters along each of the survey lines. Approximately 1,212 samples to date have been collected and assayed.

Specific areas of interest discovered in the survey to date (Figure 2) include:

Zona Sur: A 1.4 kilometre long anomaly composed of two parallel zones striking E-W. The anomalies show excellent correlation with channel sampled outcrops (reported here and including 0 metres @ 4.9% copper and 62 g/t silver?(partially sampled) and 0.4 metres @ 6.3% copper, 152 g/t silver?(partially sampled), but importantly double the strike length of the outcrop zone.

Zona Oeste: A new blind discovery over three regional lines with over 2.2 kilometres of strike that is open to the N and S. The copper anomalies are situated in the same stratigraphic position in all three lines, close to the mineralized contact seen elsewhere on the project. Additional sampling is needed to determine the continuity of the mineralization.

Zona Norte: To date one sampling line has been completed in the northern area. This line revealed a broadly elevated zone of 800 metres length with three distinct anomalies with soil values >100 ppm copper.

Salt dome targets: The salt dome targets show elevated background values of copper with internal high copper values over five lines with up to 800 metres of strike continuity. Some boulders of gypsum with disseminated chalcopyrite have been observed near the anomalies.?The anomalies show excellent correlation with channel sampled outcrops (reported here and include 0 metre @ 6.3% copper and 101 g/t silver?(partially sampled), 1.8 metres @ 3.7% copper and 42 g/t silver?(partially sampled) and 2.2 metres @ 2.4% copper and 29 g/t silver?(full sample).

Future work during the dry season at Tabalosos East will focus on continued systematic soil sampling, trenching, and sampling of key soil anomalies and detailed geological mapping to aid the interpretation of the soil anomalies.

About the San Martin JOGMEC JV Project (Copper-Silver, Peru, 88 mining concessions for 660 sq km)

On November 30, 2020 Hannan announced that it had signed a binding letter agreement for a significant Option and Joint Venture Agreement (the ?Agreement?) with JOGMEC.? Under the Agreement, JOGMEC has the option to earn up to a 75% beneficial interest in the San Martin Project by spending up to US$35,000,000 to deliver to the joint venture (?JV?) a feasibility study.

The Agreement grants JOGMEC the option to earn an initial 51% ownership interest by funding US$8,000,000 in project expenditures at San Martin over a four-year period, subject to acceleration at JOGMEC?s discretion.

JOGMEC, at its election, can then earn:

an additional 16% interest for a total 67% ownership interest by achieving either a prefeasibility study or funding a further US$12,000,000 in project expenditures in amounts of at least US$1,000,000 per annum (for a US$20,000,000 total expenditure); and,

subject to owning a 67% interest, a further 8% interest for a total 75% ownership?interest by achieving either a feasibility study or funding a further US$15,000,000 in project expenditures in amounts of at least US$1,000,000 per annum (for a US$35,000,000 total expenditure).

Should JOGMEC not proceed to a prefeasibility study or spend US$20,000,000 in total, Hannan shall have the right to purchase from JOGMEC for the sum of US$1, a two percent (2%) Participating Interest, whereby Hannan?s Participating Interest will be increased to fifty-one percent (51%) and JOGMEC?s Participating Interest will be reduced to forty-nine percent (49%).?

At the completion of a feasibility study, JOGMEC has the right to either:

purchase up to an additional ten percent (10%) Participating Interest from Hannan Metals (for a total 85% maximum capped Participating Interest) at fair value as determined in accordance with internationally recognized professional standards by an agreed upon independent third-party valuator; or

receive up to an additional ten percent (10%) Participating Interest from Hannan (for a total 85% maximum capped Participating Interest) in consideration of JOGMEC?s agreement to fund development of the project, by loan carrying Hannan until the San Martin Project generates positive cash flow.

After US$35,000,000 has been spent by JOGMEC and before a feasibility study has been achieved, both parties will fund expenditures pro rata or dilute via a standard industry dilution formula.? If the Participating Interest in the Joint Venture of any party is diluted to less than 5% then that party?s Participating Interest will be automatically converted to a 2.0% net smelter royalty (?NSR?), and the other party may at any time purchase 1.0% of the 2.0% NSR for a cash payment of US$1,000,000. Hannan will manage exploration at least until JOGMEC earns a 51% interest, after which the majority participant interest holder will be entitled to act as the operator of the joint venture.? Initial exploration activities will focus on the collection of the geological, geophysical, and geochemical datasets in the JV project areas.

Sediment-hosted stratiform copper-silver deposits are among the two most important copper sources in the world, the other being copper porphyries.? They are also a major producer of silver.? According to the World Silver Survey 2020 KGHM Polska Miedz?s (?KGHM?) three copper-silver sediment-hosted mines in Poland are the leading silver producer in the world with 40.2Moz produced in 2019.?This is almost twice the production of the second largest producing mine. The Polish mines are also the sixth largest global copper miner and in 2018, KGHM produced 30.3 Mt of ore at a grade of 1.49% copper and 48.6 g/t silver from a mineralized zone that averages 0.4 to 5.5 metres thickness.

Technical Background

All soil samples were collected by Hannan geologists using an in-house protocol for soil sampling in jungle areas. The samples were subsequently analyzed with a portable XRF deploying a protocol developed by Hannan for the San Martin project.? The method is designed to minimize risk of contamination and ground disturbance. In most cases the sample media is the ?B-horizon? of the soil profile. Only 100g of sample material is collected from each site. From the soil sample a pellet is being produced which is dried and analyzed by a portable XRF (pXRF). Certified reference material, blanks and field duplicates are routinely added to monitor the quality of the pXRF data. In addition, 10% of all samples are submitted to ALS in Lima for 4-acid ICP-MS analysis to check the quality of the pXRF data.

Channel samples are considered representative of the in-situ mineralization samples and sample widths quoted approximate the true width of mineralization, while grab samples are selective by nature and are unlikely to represent average grades on the property.

About Hannan Metals Limited (TSXV:HAN) (OTCPK: HANNF)?? ?????? ?

Hannan Metals Limited?is a natural resources and exploration company developing sustainable resources of metal needed to meet the transition to a low carbon economy. Over the last decade, the team behind Hannan has forged a long and successful record of discovering, financing, and advancing mineral projects in Europe and Peru. Hannan is a top ten in-country explorer by area in Peru.

Mr. Michael Hudson FAusIMM, Hannan?s Chairman and CEO, a Qualified Person as defined in National Instrument 43-101, has reviewed and approved the technical disclosure contained in this news release.

Forward Looking Statements

Certain disclosure contained in this news release, including the Company?s expectations regarding the Agreement and the payments and earn-in upon the successful completion of certain milestones, may constitute forward-looking information or forward-looking statements, within the meaning of Canadian securities laws. These statements may relate to this news release and other matters identified in the Company\-\-s public filings. In making the forward-looking statements the Company has applied certain factors and assumptions that are based on the Company\-\-s current beliefs as well as assumptions made by and information currently available to the Company. These statements address future events and conditions and, as such, involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which may cause the actual results, performance or achievements to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by the statements. ?These risks and uncertainties include but are not limited to the potential impact of epidemics, pandemics or other public health crises, including the current coronavirus pandemic known as COVID-19 on the Company?s business.? Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. The Company does not intend, and expressly disclaims any intention or obligation to, update or revise any forward-looking statements whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required by law.?

Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this news
It is with heartfelt sadness that we announce the passing of Walter John Jarusiewicz, Jr. on June 28, 2021. He is survived by his wife of 58 years; Judith Vrablic Jarusiewicz, his four children; Jill, Jody Judy and Walter, III, 9 grandchildren, and 13 great grandchildren. Walter had a great 
ASSA ABLOY Opening Solutions embraces BIM to smooth specification and installation of door security solutions

BIM (building information modeling) provides a process for creating and managing information during the building lifecycle and beyond. BIM is often equated with 3D modeling of construction projects, but the visual component is just part of the value of BIM. Additional data, such as specifications and other documentation, is also part of the process, underlying the visual aspects, helping to drive decision making and providing immediate access to detailed information about all facets of the building process. Incorporating BIM systems For the last six years, ASSA ABLOY Opening Solutions has worked with specification writers and architects in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) to make it easy to incorporate ASSA ABLOY Opening Solutions doors, hardware, and security solutions into BIM systems. Everyone on a project can work together in the interactive and information-rich BIM environment. BIM tools are also used by contractors, distributors, facility owners, and security consultants. BIM software BIM information relating to doors, hardware, and security solutions is available in the cloud BIM information relating to doors, hardware, and security solutions is available in the cloud with the companys Openings Studio BIM software. This improves the process of door scheduling and visualisation and enables customers to focus on the design, installation, and management of openings. If you have up-to-date information inside the BIM model, you can reduce mistakes and misunderstanding in the building industry, says Marc Ameryckx, ASSA ABLOY Opening Solutions BIM Manager for the EMEIA region. It helps to eliminate mistakes before they happen or as early as possible in the building process. The earlier, the less it costs. We provide data as soon as possible in the process. (ASSA ABLOY Opening Solutions also has comparable systems available in other regions of the global company.) Centralised data in BIM 3D model Expanding the data available in BIM provides additional value compared to merely providing BIM objects that can be incorporated into a BIM 3D model. The combination of BIM modeling and the underlying specifications boosts the quality of the project and its key to success, says Marc Ameryckx. Even after the building is complete, the BIM model is still valuable, providing a repository of as-built information that can be used by building managers and security professionals tasked with operating and maintaining the building. For example, if a lock needs to be replaced, retrofitting is simpler because all the information about the lock and existing installation is available in a centralised data file. Revit and ArchiCAD A widely used BIM software is Revit from Autodesk, a program that brings architecture, engineering, and construction disciplines into a unified modeling environment to drive more efficient and cost-effective projects. Another BIM software program is ArchiCAD, developed by the Hungarian company Graphisoft. Openings Studio added a plugin for ArchiCAD this year, in addition to Revit. Tailor-made information security solutions We provide tailor-made information security solutions with various hardware on projects with more doors" We can provide tailor-made information security solutions with various hardware on projects with more doors, adding more flexibility, says Marc Ameryckx. Customers do not need to be the experts on the products because we provide expertise as part of our specifications. For example, how often do building mistakes occur because of a misunderstanding about the electrical needs of a lock and the wrong cabling is installed? The problem is especially expensive if it is discovered only after the walls are complete. Providing complete data about the electrical lock as part of a BIM system avoids the snafu. Another example is the specification of a deadbolt lock on a door that operates with an electric strike. The deadbolt undermines the intended operation of the electric strike and can interfere with escape routes in case of an emergency. The mistake becomes obvious in the BIM environment and can be rectified before consequences impact the real world. Data addition to Opening Suites site ASSA ABLOY Opening Solutions is continuously expanding the data it provides at the Opening Suites site, covering additional functionality and more components including the door, cabling, and electrical connections. Hardware sets are linked to specific doors in the BIM models, including all the details of various components, including article numbers, technical sheets, electrical requirements, all depending on customer expectations. Physical equipment includes QR codes that can be scanned by a smartphone to provide information on the door (A mobile app is in development). More details and more data Experienced BIM consultants work with the Openings Studio software on projects ranging from single doors to large buildings with many doors. Data will be more and more important, and there will be more data inside BIM models Adding more data and detail to the BIM process at the level of each door expands the usefulness of BIM, which has historically been focused on broader issues such as structural work and HVAC. Openings Studio provides all the data to integrate doors and security in the BIM process, says Marc Ameryckx. The higher level of detail may be a new aspect even for customers who already use BIM software. Data will be more and more important, and there will be more data inside BIM models, says Marc Ameryckx. In the future, the use of digital twins could expand the capabilities even further; for example, the software could simulate escape routes in case of fire. More data makes more things possible.
Remark Holdings, Inc., a global technology company with leading artificial intelligence ("AI") solutions and digital media properties announced that its KanKan AI business has installed its Smart Campus system in more than 200 elementary and secondary schools in China.

The system allows for seamless attendance management, epidemic prevention and control, energy management, campus access control, and notification of risky behaviors.

Smart Campus system

During the ongoing battle with COVID-19 and its variants, the Smart Campus system, with its epidemic prevention and control functionality, has been designed to assist school staff by:

Recording body temperature before students enters the campus, thereby allowing staff to begin monitoring health status before students enter classrooms and other buildings.



Controlling access to campus using a pre-generated QR code as well as KanKan's computer vision technology to identify whether persons trying to enter campus are authorized and are healthy.



Reducing manual tasks by automating student attendance management and health screening of students and staff.



Using a mobile app to allow for reservation of and touch-free access into private study rooms, classrooms, laboratories, activity rooms, and other functional areas.



Reducing electricity consumption and greenhouse gas emissions.

Maintenance-oriented monitoring

KanKan AI's Smart Campus system is customisable to meet the needs of each school among other criteria

"In addition to the practicality of the product, KanKan AI's Smart Campus system is customisable to meet the needs of each school regarding the size of the campus, several students, and building and entrance locations, among other criteria," noted Kai-Shing Tao, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Remark Holdings.

"Our product engineers followed up throughout the installation process and the after-sales team trained school staff regarding product use, while our operations team conducted ongoing, maintenance-oriented monitoring to ensure data accuracy and provide customers with an outstanding experience."

Customer-oriented services

The Smart Campus system and its customer-oriented services have quickly taken root in the campus security market. Given the initial success of Smart Campus, KanKan AI will continue its expansion into other provinces.

Official media such as the Zhejiang Daily and Hangzhou Daily strongly affirmed the vital role that KanKan AI's Smart Campus system played in the resumption of primary and secondary schools in Xihu District, Hangzhou City, during the epidemic.

As a successful model for smart campuses, Hangzhou Arts and Science Primary Schools have been publicly praised by the Education Bureau of Xihu District and have become the learning center for school principals from other provinces and cities.

Energy savings

"Our system freed teachers and staff from repetitive tasks and allowed them to focus on what they do best: teaching and caring," noted Mr. Tao.

"I am also pleased that our dedication to ESG efforts has been rewarded. The energy management function of our Smart Campus system has proven efficient at a few schools with which we worked closely. Though the amount of energy savings might seem minor now, we believe that no effort is too small when we talk about saving Earth's resources.

As more schools are seeing both the social and economic benefits of our systems, we believe that our continuous dedication to the environment will translate to long-term results for our partners and shareholder value for our investors."

Reduction in CO2 and SO2 emissions

KanKan calculated the Smart Campus system in a total of 104 classrooms yields a reduction of CO2 & SO2 emissions

According to the United States Environmental Protection Agency ("EPA") calculations, the 4.48 kilowatt-hour of electricity saved per day per classroom by KANKAN AI's Smart Campus System, each kilowatt-hour of electricity saved per day per classroom by the Smart Campus system is equivalent to eight miles driven by an average vehicle, or a savings of 0.357 gallons of gasoline consumed, or other activities in the diagram below.

Utilising data provided by five partnered schools in the city of Hangzhou, KanKan calculated that the application of its Smart Campus system in a total of 104 classrooms yields an annual reduction of 63.9 tons of CO2 (a greenhouse gas) emissions and 1.9 tons of SO2 (a toxic gas) emissions.

At the current rate, 2,556 tons of CO2 emissions and 76 tons of SO2 emissions could be eliminated with KanKan AI's Smart Campus system within partnered schools.
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Dublin (Ireland) 7 June 2021 (SPS) - Irish Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr. Simon Coveney, has reiterated his country's full support for the United Nations Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara (MINURSO), the United Nations-led political process and the efforts of the Secretary-General to reach a final settlement on this issue.



Ireland's head of diplomacy, in a written response to a question before Parliament, stressed that it is an urgent priority for Dublin at the moment to expedite the appointment of a new Personal Envoy for the Secretary-General, which is the focus of current international diplomatic efforts.



The Irish minister's response comes to reinforce the previous position expressed last month, which supported the political settlement process to reach a final solution between the two parties to the conflict in Western Sahara within the framework set by the United Nations, as well as working to promote respect for human rights, accountability and compliance with international law. (SPS)



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Luanda (Angola), June 18, 2021 (SPS) - The ambassador of the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) in Angola, Mr. Hamdi Jalil Meyara, met this Wednesday with Mr. Domingos Custodio Vieira, Minister of International Cooperation and Angolan Communities.

The meeting addressed the bilateral relations between the two countries, as well as the best ways to strengthen it and promote its progress.

During the conversations, Ambassador Hamdi Meyara informed the Angolan official about the latest events related to the Saharawi cause, mainly the deterioration of the human rights situation in the occupied areas and the serious escalation caused by the violation of the Moroccan occupier to the ceasefire, as well as the resumption of the war as a result of the policy of intransigence against international legality practiced by the Kingdom of Morocco. SPS

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Much of Airbnb's success is based on the trust that its users have when renting accommodation. However, the platform is far from foolproof in terms of security . It was recently revealed that the company tried to hide a crime that occurred in one of the properties they offer, which cost it $ 7 million .

The events occurred on New Year's Eve 2015 in an apartment located on the first floor of West 37th Street, in New York . A 29-year-old Australian girl arrived with a group of friends to enjoy the iconic Manhattan-style festivities. As indicated by the landlord, they collected the keys at the counter of a nearby warehouse and settled down.

It may interest you: The Internet attacks Airbnb for high prices and hidden fees: 'These prices are ridiculous'

After ringing in the new year, the young woman left her friends at the bar and returned to the apartment alone, without imagining that someone was waiting inside. The stranger stepped out of the shadows, threatened her with a kitchen knife, pushed her onto the bed and sexually abused her.

Although the streets were full of people, fear paralyzed the girl and she could not scream. In the end, the attacker fled with her phone, but she managed to contact her friends with an iPad and they went to find a police officer.

An hour later, when the agents were in the apartment, the criminal made the mistake of returning and leaning out the door, which allowed him to be caught. In his backpack they found three incriminating items: a knife, an earring from the woman and a set of keys to the property.

Nothing happened here

That morning, the victim received a call from Nick Shapiro, who had been a crisis manager at Airbnb for two weeks. He notified platform officials, including Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky, of the incident.

At the same time, an elite security team from the company relocated the victim to a hotel, took her mother from Australia to New York with everything paid, as well as the expenses back to her hometown, in addition to offering to cover health and counseling costs.

A week later, Airbnb sent a staff member to court to see if the company was mentioned during the legal proceedings, but they did not. Neither did the local media report on the case, which until now has come to light.

According to information revealed by Bloomberg Businessweek , Airbnb paid the woman $ 7 million as compensation . In return, she signed an agreement agreeing not to talk about the payment "or imply liability" to the company or the host. While the deal doesn't prevent you from cooperating with prosecutors, you can't blame or sue the company either.

The woman, who asked not to be identified, declined to comment, as did her lawyer. What is known about the crime is the product of an investigation based on police and judicial records, confidential documents and interviews with people close to the case.

A weekend in a glass house in the middle of the Mayan jungle, doesn't sound bad does it? # AirbnbMexico pic.twitter.com/IlONJBX0QB - Airbnb Mexico (@airbnb_mx)June 9, 2021

Security issues on Airbnb

The set of keys that the criminal had in his hands called into question Airbnb's security policies , since at that time and to date they do not have clear rules regarding the delivery of keys for tenants.

In this case, although it is not known with certainty how the attacker obtained the duplicate, it is speculated that it was as simple as ordering them at the nearby winery posing as a guest.

The Bloomberg Businessweek investigation compiles several recorded incidents in Airbnb accommodations, from theft and vandalism, to physical assault and sexual assault, among others. Much of it has been handled internally through confidential agreements and payments to victims.

The company has a crisis control team made up of about 100 agents distributed in different cities around the world. They are allowed to spend whatever is necessary as long as the victim feels supported: payment for flights, accommodation, food, counseling, health costs, and sexually transmitted disease screenings for rape survivors.

A confidential document seen by the outlet shows that in recent years, Airbnb spent an average of $ 50 million annually on payments to hosts and guests, including legal settlements and damage to homes.

They cannot control incidents, but their response as a company can

Airbnb was founded in 2008 by design students Brian Chesky and Joe Gebbia , along with engineer Nate Blecharczyk . It currently offers nearly 5.6 million accommodations , more than the total number of rooms in the seven major hotel chains combined. Its market value is $ 90 billion, and its share price has doubled since it went public in December 2020.

Their business model is based on the idea that strangers can trust each other. However, they accept that they are not able to guarantee total security for their tenants and hosts.

"You're dealing with real people in real people's homes," says Tara Bunch, Airbnb's director of global operations. "People are naturally unpredictable and, try as we might, occasionally really bad things happen ."

See also: Airbnb is already worth more than 100 billion dollars and surpasses Uber just a few days after being listed on Wall Street

The executive adds that "we know that everything cannot be stopped" , but in the end what is important is the company's response to the unexpected.

"We go the extra mile to ensure that anyone affected on our platform is served," says Bunch. "We don't really care about the branding and image component ."

The alleged rapist of the Australian girl, 24-year-old Junior Lee, was charged with predatory sexual assault, the maximum sentence being life imprisonment. With 40 misdemeanor convictions on his record, Lee has pleaded not guilty and bail was set at $ 250,000.

With information from El Financiero Bloomberg .

Copyright 2021 Entrepreneur.com Inc., All rights reserved
"Lift Every Voice and Sing," written by brothers James Weldon and John Rosamond Johnson, began as a poem in 1900 for schoolchildren. Before long, the song spread across the nation at NAACP events, within Black churches, and in community meetings, gaining prominence each time it was sung. Known as the "Black National Anthem" or the "Negro National Anthem," "Lift Every Voice and Sing" is a triumphant story that chronicles and acknowledges the past while marching forward toward freedom.

Lift Every Voice connects young Black journalists with Black elders in our communities to celebrate and learn from their life experiences - deepening connections with the past to position us all for a better future. Hearst Connecticut Media Group has joined Hearst newspapers, magazines and television stations across the nation to publish dozens of profiles as part of the project.

Dollie McLeans love for the arts started when she was a young girl growing up in New York.

Due to her deep love and appreciation for the city and its resources for the arts, she was hesitant to move to Hartford when her husband, acclaimed jazz musician Jackie McLean, got the opportunity to teach at the University of Hartford. She eventually agreed and was able to bring her appreciation for art to Connecticut through the development of The Artists Collective, also known as The Collective.

Below is a Q&A with McLean that has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Q. In one sentence, how would you describe The Artists Collective?

A. The Artists Collective is to celebrate, teach, help young people understand what their heritage is and to be proud of themselves.

Q. What was the vision for The Artists Collective?

A. My husband wanted an organization that would support young people in North Hartford. As it began coming together, it gave me the ability to coordinate all the pieces that went into it. But it was very difficult in the beginning. Once we began to get support from individuals who understood what we were talking about and the program that we thought we could develop, there was a great deal of support.

Q. How did you and your husband respond to the initial resistance?

A. We had to step past it and ignore it. I was quite blown away with Hartford. In New York, if you go out anywhere, there are thousands of people. You don't see the same people. You also do not get to meet council people or the mayor of New York unless you are involved in politics. In Hartford, I found that I met the mayor and councilmen.

I can recall my husband coming home and saying, you know, there's a young woman in Hartford and her name is Cheryl Smith. She teaches African dance to kids. She never missed a meeting. She was there and always supportive. Cheryl borrowed space to teach dance. She was teaching at the library and any place that she could find space. Ionis Martin, a visual artist, had a group that she had been working with. My husband had jazz musicians. Everybody was teaching out of borrowed spaces. I taught a few classes and had a few rehearsals happening out of Wadsworth Atheneum. We all came together and made plans. There was a lot of effort and a great deal of time that went into starting this. I think timing is of the essence for anything that a person wants to do. I think the time was right here in Hartford.

Shaleah Williams / For Hearst Connecticut Media

Q. How did it feel when you got a building where all of your classes could be held?

A. There was a building on Windsor Street that was owned by two lawyers. The Hartford Jaycees helped us clean up the building and paint it. We had an open house on Jan. 24, 1974. It was a Sunday afternoon and the temperature was about 60 or 65. We had approximately 1,500 people come through. It was a magnificent day.

We stayed there for one year when I received a phone call telling me that the owners wanted to sell the building. After talking with some government officials, we were told there was an old school building on Clark Street. It was a beautiful building, but it was old. We got in there and rolled up our sleeves with any number of helpers. When we started the silkscreening department, we had posters made of Harriet Tubman, Nat Turner, Sojourner Truth, Frederick Douglass, Martin Luther King and Paul Robeson. When doors opened, they would swing with our logo.

[Classes, activities and events continued in the new building with the help of returning and new instructors, including Lee Aca Thompson. Thompson started the Rite of Passage, one of The Collectives most sacred traditions.]

We started the Rite of Passage in 1976. Young people came in and they learned African dance, heritage and culture. The ceremony would close with drumming, dancing and a pledge which was a code of ethics that I developed and the initiates had to say it as they stood up with their parents. If the initiate didnt have a parent, we would find someone from the community to be with them. I also developed Skills for Living under the Rite of Passage. It was really about all of the things we need to know in order to live.

The Clark Street building was wonderful but it was tucked into a neighborhood. There was an open property that I would pass every day on Albany Avenue. I began looking at the possibility of that being our new property. It took 16 years to get, but I just would not give up. The building is beautiful. It became a tribute and a testament to the culture of those people who gave their lives for our community.

Q. You have been recognized by Essence Magazine, former President Bill Clinton and so many others. How does it feel to know that your program has touched people in the Hartford area and beyond?

A. You do what you do because you love it. It's wonderful to get awards, but I never think about that in those terms. They're all outstanding and well appreciated, but from time to time, I don't even think about them. The rewards are watching a little boy that comes in that cant read well and then he stands on the stage and hes magnificent or a little girl learning her right and left. To me, those are the real awards and I know that's what it meant to my husband as well. It's amazing what that does for a young person.

[One of the many recognitions The Collective has received was from Michelle Obama. She invited the Youth Jazz Orchestra to perform in Washington.]



There were 10 organizations that were selected as outstanding in the arts with youth and we were the ones that were invited to perform. They requested the Youth Jazz Orchestra and a dancer. So many wonderful young people came out of YJO so that was an exciting, wonderful time to be invited to Washington by Michelle Obama. My husband selected four major players - a saxophonist and a rhythm section (piano, bass and drums). We also invited a young man who had come to our dance department as a form of exercise for his polio.

Shaleah Williams / For Hearst Connecticut Media

[McLean, now retired, hopes that The Artists Collective continues to touch the lives of students near and far for years to come.]

We only hope that The Collective will be here for another 50 years. That it will be able to grow and change with the times and continue to do what it needs to do. I think what we did in the past and why The Collective was founded is needed even more today. Everything that we did in the 70s is more relevant now.
STAMFORD  Relentless traffic over the past year stripped away the once vibrant Black Lives Matter mural in front of The Ferguson Library. The Black Power fists and bold lettering disappeared day by day.

As part of Stamfords recognition of Juneteenth this year  the 156th anniversary of federal troops announcing the end of slavery in the countrys farthest reaches  the plan was to have artists and volunteers descend on Broad Street to give the mural a new lease on life.

With rain clouds on the horizon, however, organizers made the call to postpone the painting and associated events until June 27.

The repainting of the mural was too integral a part of the planned festivities, they said.

Project curator Valerie Cooper said she wants the group painting effort to be an opportunity for healing from the traumas of the past year. After a jury convicted Derek Chauvin of murder in April and a yearlong pandemic that disproportionately impacted people of color, Stamfordites need something to celebrate, Cooper said

At some point, we have to heal, she said. How do you grieve and then heal and move forward? So this, to me, is a way of moving forward, moving forward in an inclusive, cohesive way.

After watching Black Lives Matter murals crop up in larger cities across the country in 2020, Cooper  who runs a local arts consultancy and worked on diversity issues at Goldman Sachs for 15 years  moved independently to make the exhibition happen in Stamford. Through her money and donations raised on a GoFundMe page, Cooper brought together 16 artists to tackle each letter.

This year, sponsor organizations tagged along for the painting efforts, including the young adult division of the Stamford NAACP and the Stamford High School art department. Both new painters and returning artists from the 2020 team will take on other letters  which passersby can help complete.

Sherron Robinson, a 30-year-old artist from Stamford, will tackle the first A in Black Lives Matter. Last year, he stumbled on the festivities and helped other painters work on their letters. This year, his mini-mural will commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Tulsa Race Massacre, when that Oklahoma citys once-thriving African American business community was decimated after a white mob killed hundreds of Black residents.

In a diverse but still mostly white city, Robinson said he wants his art to help the Stamford community breach uncomfortable topics in public.

The way its presented through art, I feel like it brings home a level of comfort, he said.

From George Floyd to Juneteenth

Without the wave of a national protest movement to ride, Cooper this year wanted to pin the mural celebration on a more joyous occasion, she said.

During the height of racial justice protests after the death of George Floyd in 2020, Black emancipation day  or Juneteenth  gained a more prominent national profile. Juneteenth emerged as a corporate holiday, and the City of Stamford held a ceremony at Mill River Park.

This year, President Joe Biden signed legislation June 17 making it a U.S. federal holiday.

Still, many Americans know few details about the holiday, Cooper said. A new Gallup survey shows that 60 percent of Americans know nothing at all or only a little bit about June 19, despite the increased visibility.

African American customs ... are not well known to mainstream America. People still dont know, Cooper said, adding thats why organizers chose to organize the mural repainting around the holiday. We decided Juneteenth was a great time of year to bond, to learn.

Even though President Abraham Lincoln abolished slavery in the Confederate South in January 1863 and then throughout the country in 1865, the news initially didnt travel. It wasnt until June 19, 1865, that U.S. Army Major Gen. Gordon Granger reached Texas, the last Confederate territory to come under Union control, to announce the wars end. The holidays name is a portmanteau of the day it commemorates.

Popularly, people recognize Juneteenth as the end of slavery, but slavery persisted in states like Delaware and Kentucky until the end of 1865 when Congress passed the 13th Amendment. Even after 1865, slavery was still legal as a criminal punishment, and former slaves became targets for Black Codes  laws that criminalized everything from mischief to insulting gestures to interracial marriage. The codes became prominent in post-war Southern states and upheld slavery for decades.

Past and present

3 1 of 3 Tyler Sizemore / Hearst Connecticut Media Show More Show Less 2 of 3 Tyler Sizemore / Hearst Connecticut Media Show More Show Less 3 of 3





While Juneteenth celebrations in Texas date back to at least 1866, the holiday has a more recent history in Stamford. One of the earliest local celebrations happened in 1997, when city officials like Rep. Annie Summerville, D-6, held a weekend-long celebration with the Rich Forum. Then-Mayor Dannell P. Malloy declared June 19 an official holiday in the city.

I enjoyed it because it was educational, Summerville said of the event, which continued for several years before tapering off. It was more than just talking about civil rights and all that. It was about our beginnings.

Just as the 2020 mural was born out of the George Floyd protest movement, the earlier Juneteenth celebrations followed an 18-months spate of Black church arsons between 1995 and 1996.

In 1997, President Bill Clinton issued a formal apology to the Black men exploited by the Tuskegee Syphilis Study. Just five days before June 19 that year, Clinton also established the One America Initiative, a working group that tried to foster conversations about racial divisions in the U.S. In the wake of sweeping 1996 welfare reforms that researchers said increased deep poverty, scholars dismissed the initiative as political lip service.

Especially because of the library partnership, Cooper said she wants to emphasize the same educational undertones of the citys older celebration. Josephine Fulcher-Anderson of Fergusons Sound End Branch has plans for a family story time to coincide with the artists starting work on the mural. As with the painting, the library story time has been rescheduled to next weekend, as have planned musical performances and speeches from local officials, community members and Stamfords faith leaders.

Though the Ferguson Library and The Cultured Pearl  Black sorority Alpha Kappa Alphas philanthropic arm  are both supporting the festivities financially this year, Cooper is raising money for the remaining costs via GoFundMe. Specifically, she wants to ensure that artists are paid a stipend for their services during the celebration.

First priority is to make sure to take care of the artists because were so appreciative of them and their time, she said, pointing to all the hours last years muralists spent drawing on their hands and knees. Its hard work.

Staff writer Brianna Gurciullo contributed to this report.

veronica.delvalle@hearstmediact.com
DANBURY  One morning earlier this month, Lora Boynton was on her way to work at Danbury animal control when she spotted the body of an opossum lying by the side of Newtown Road.

Instead of passing the animal by, Boynton donned a pair of gloves she keeps in her car and went up to it. When she got closer, I saw her belly moving, she said in a phone interview.

She knew the mother opossum was dead, but her baby offspring were likely still alive inside their mothers pouch.

Though the animals pointy nose and snaking tail can sometimes mean theyre mistaken for rodents, the Virginia opossum or possum is the only marsupial  meaning pouched animal  found in the wild in Connecticut.

Female opossums give birth to tiny young after about 13 days of gestation, according to the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protrection. The animals are born blind and about the size of a navy bean. Once born, the offspring crawl up into an opening in the mothers belly where they attach themselves to a teat and stay latched on for the next 80 days.

So when mother opossums are killed by passing cars, as the one Boynton found was, theres a chance the young might survive, protected inside the mothers pouch.

Thats where rescuers like Boynton come in, who work to save injured opossums, or inspect the pouches of recently deceased animals for surviving young.

Doing so, which is sometimes referred to as pouch picking, has gained more visibility thanks to posts on social media.

While Boynton said she doesnt know of anyone else who checks possum pouches, she said she thinks more and more animal rescuers are becoming aware of the potential to save opossum young, in part due to social media posts.

She insists the animals get a bad rap for their looks, but are actually beneficial to have around.

People just leave them to die because they think theyre ugly, she said, but added that opossums eat thousands of ticks, without carrying tick-borne diseases themselves.

One study published in Nature noted that opossums are poor hosts for the bacterium that causes Lyme disease, will groom and kill off more than 5,000 ticks per hectare of land which might have otherwise gone on to carry the disease to humans.

After she found the mother possum by the roadside that June 4 morning, Boynton said she took the mother and young with her to work where she called Wildlife in Crisis, a rehabilitation center in Weston. A worker there told her she could take the young out of the mothers pouch. Inside the mothers pouch, she found 10 small baby possums, which she pulled out  its like a little suction cup, she said  and wrapped up before taking them to the center.

In an Instagram post, Wildlife in Crisis said its caring for dozens of orphaned opossums. The organization receives hundreds of oppossums each year that are either killed by dogs are struck by cars, the post said.

Boynton said she became aware of the role opossums play years ago, when she lived in California. At the time, she noticed an oppossum in her backyard that would hiss at her when she passed near it. But after she reached out to a local oppossum society, they told her the animal was unlikely to harm her, and was just afraid.

When frightened, opossums bare their 50 sharp teeth and hiss or growl, DEEP notes. However, they would rather avoid confrontation and be left alone.

The animals will sometimes play dead when cornered.

In general, DEEP recommends leaving opposums alone if one is found in a residential yard. The animals dont burrow or threaten pets, but may get into trash if its left out.

Boynton said others who want to check possums for surviving babies should make sure theyre wearing gloves. For those hesitant about handling a dead animal, she recommended calling or bringing the animal to a wildlife rescue center.

If you dont want to touch them, at least call somebody, she said.
A federal bill to extend school lunch benefits to millions of kids being raised by someone other than their parents would help stabilize the uncertainty in their young lives, lawmakers said.

U.S. Rep. Jahana Hayes should know.

Having been raised by my grandmother, I am personally aware that the nuclear family has changed, said Hayes, a second-term Democrat who introduced a bill in the House to help children being raised by grandparents and other guardians to receive the same free school meals as other kids in need.

This is a solution which immediately supports children in these circumstances in need of basic nutrition, Hayes said in a prepared statement. (These kids) need uninterrupted access to school meals programs with automatic eligibility and certification.

The CARE for Kids Act, which has also been introduced in the Senate, is the latest weapon employed in the war on hunger, which Hayes announced earlier this year after being named chairwoman in Februaryof the House Agriculture Subcommittee on Nutrition, Oversight, and Department Operations.

In May, Hayes chaired her first hearing on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, and called on President Joe Biden to commission a White House conference focused on ending hunger throughout the United States by 2030.

Just as Hayes personalized the issue in May by sharing that SNAP helped her growing up in Waterbury public housing  and again at 17 when she dropped out of high school to become a single mom  Hayes used her story this week to humanize the case for more school lunches.

Hayes has been open with Danbury-area voters and in Connecticuts sprawling 5th Congressional District about her mothers substance abuse, sharing in a campaign video that she was raised by my grandmother while my mom struggled with addiction.

Because of the help she received, Hayes went on to raise her children and complete her education, becoming a teacher in her hometown school district, and being named the 2016 National Teacher of the Year.

Today, Hayes says, millions of children growing up in the same situation who are cared for by someone other than their parents, could be ineligible or decertified for free and reduced-price meals at school.

The solution, Hayes says, is to ensure that local education agencies can provide automatic eligibility for children in these living arrangements.

U.S. Sen. Bob Casey, a Pennsylvania Democrat who introduced the companion bill in the Senate, said the opioid epidemic and the COVID-19 crisis have made living situations more unstable for kids.

With so much uncertainty in all other aspects of their lives, these children should not have to worry about when or where they will receive their next meal, Casey said in a prepared statement. The CARE for Kids Act closes a loophole in order to ensure that these children can access nutritious foods through school meal programs. At the same time, it also eases the financial burden for their caregivers, often grandparents or other relatives.

A Republican member on Hayes Nutrition, Oversight, and Department Operations subcommittee agreed.

Not only is a safe, loving home important for children, so is a well-balanced nutritional meal, U.S. Rep. Don Bacon said in a prepared statement. I know that the CARE for Kids Act will ensure these children have access to a healthy lifestyle and their families will receive the support they need.

Among the groups endorsing the legislation is the nonprofit Ending Hunger Connecticut.

We know that ensuring children have access to nutritious food is critical to their long-term success, said Robin Lamott Sparks, the nonprofits, executive director, in a prepared statement. This bill will close a gap in our system and help to feed children who have already faced numerous challenges in their young lives.

rryser@newstimes.com 203-731-3342
STAMFORD  Morgan McDonald has a specific idea of what shed like to do as a career, she just had to go to Bali to discover it.

The soon-to-be Westhill High School graduate took a month-long trip to the Southeast Asian island in 2019 as part of a healthcare initiative through an organization called Global Leadership Adventures.

McDonald, 16 years old at the time, quickly realized the trip she had imagined in her head was not the one playing out before her.

Walking into it, in full honesty, I was not at all prepared, said McDonald, who graduates Friday evening.

She thought she would spend most of her time in a health care clinic working alongside doctors. But that was far from the case, as she and other students on the trip tagged along with Bali medical students going door to door in rural villages.

The task was to provide basic health care to Balinese residents in remote areas of the island where medical facilities were not available, or hard to get to.

Each day, shed spend about four hours with the team walking from house to house. They would knock and ask if the occupants needed any health services.

If so, the medical staff would conduct full body exams, while also assessing the health standard inside the home. McDonald was tasked with checking blood pressure and blood sugar levels of patients. The information would then be put into a database that would go to the government so that medical staff could be sent out to locations where someone was in need of services.

The experience was eye-opening, and exposed McDonald to the inequity in healthcare services, which she described as asymmetrical allocation. She noticed how much easier it was for more affluent members of society to secure and receive medical treatments. And the discrepancy wasnt specific to health care, as she noticed a similar pattern with educational resources.

After returning home, I became passionate about looking into those matters, she said.

As she embarks on a college experience at Princeton University, McDonald hopes to work toward creating impartial distributions for both medical and educational services. Eventually, her hope is to start a nonprofit focused on those areas.

At Westhill, McDonald excelled in her studies, receiving straight As throughout her time there.

Joseph Andrews, a school counselor at Westhill, was effusive in his praise of Andrews, a 2020-2021 National African American Scholar.

Yes, she has perfect grades and a perfect resume, however what you will not find in her resume is her genuine passion for life, he said, in a written message.

Andrews said grades arent the most important thing to McDonald.

Instead, Morgan is genuinely most concerned with positively impacting the lives of those around her, he wrote.

He called her one of hardest working individuals I have ever met.

Morgan stands among those who have demonstrated leadership, citizenship, integrity, and commitment to her school as well as her community, Andrews wrote.

The 17-year-old McDonald said shes always been a passionate person.

I try to give my wholehearted effort, she said. When something fascinates me, I dive right in.

ignacio.laguarda@stamfordadvocate.com
Ladies and gentlemen, start your gummies.

Connecticut has legalized the production, sale and adult use of recreational marijuana, which is a big step because Im pretty sure nobody in marijuana has tried Connecticut before. Wait. I wrote that wrong. Am I high already? Just because the law changed?

This would not have been a good year for legislators to get on their high horse about pot. For one thing, many of them were so drunk, they might have fallen off. But I kid the legislators. True, excessive drinking in the Capitol during sessions of the Connecticut legislature became a national story in 2021 and made it into a Jimmy Kimmel monologue.

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But anyone familiar with the workings of the legislature over the last several decades knows that they were blotto when they passed lotto and they were hammered whenever they retooled the state budget and they were toasted whenever they asked us to part with more of our bread. There were wine nights and beer nights, and often the libations were provided by lobbying firms or regulated industries.

So how do you drink that much and then tell a 21-year-old he has to watch Marie Kondo on Netflix without the aid of marijuana? Im a little sensitive on this subject because I went to college from 1972-76 and did not get high. Marijuana must have been legal at the time because everybody seemed to have it.

But, at the risk of sounding like Bill Clinton, I just hated inhaling smoke, so I was never high. Im one of the few people in the world who listened to Firesign Theater records over and over while not taking drugs, which had the side effect of making me one of the few people who remembers what was on Firesign Theater records.

Allow me to correct a statement two paragraphs up. Marijuana was not legal at the time. It was legal for white people. If marijuana had not existed, the Nixon administration might have invented it. Youve got a lot of enemies and a Southern strategy. Voila. Heres a criminal offense you can enforce selectively.

Now might be a little early to take Northampton off the frequent destinations list on your Waze. Itll take about a year to create a regulatory structure for issuing licenses to produce, sell, package and transport. This will give local companies such as Deep River potato chips time to add staff and increase production capacity. Half of the new licenses are supposed to go to businesses in communities historically most affected by the two-tiered approach to drug law enforcement.

Certain things will change July 1. The charge of possession (for small amounts) will go up in smoke. The new law expunges old criminal records for possession of four ounces or less and eliminates the smell of marijuana fumes as a cause for police search.

I admit to being one of the brake-tappers in the past. It seemed wrong to do it just for the tax revenue. (For what its worth, Massachusetts collected $122 million in the first two years of legal recreational sales. No way well do that well, but there will be significant bucks.)

You do something like this because, on balance, itll make life better in the state, and I think this bill passes that test. It redresses wrongs of the past and makes the present look, on paper, the way it does in the flesh. People will not start using marijuana. Theyre already using marijuana. Well experience the usual state government trade-off. The transactions will become more predictable. The dealers will be more accountable. But youll wait in more lines and maybe pay more.

Ill take it.

Republicans in the legislature opposed the change almost universally. Odd thing: legislators speaking against a marijuana bill often sound high.

State Sen. John Kissel said Connecticut should resist the urge to cave just because neighboring states are legalizing.

Why cant Connecticut be that shining city on the hill, that oasis? Kissel said.

Technically, an oasis is a place where you can get something thats unavailable everywhere else. An oasis is not, A last! A spot with no water! Tether the camels.

Dude, John is totally baked, man. Take his keys.

State Rep. Craig Fishbein said, It appears to me that we fought a Civil War over this. Were saying to the federal government that we dont care you passed a law. Thats a troublesome position to be in. Im so messed up right now. Can anybody else see that rainbow?

OK, he didnt say those last two sentences, but this is not at all like the causes of the American Civil War, man.

Full speed ahead. I look forward to covering the legislature on Pot Night. The speeches will be longer but will pass more quickly.

Colin McEnroes column appears every Sunday, his newsletter comes out every Thursday and you can hear his radio show every weekday on WNPR 90.5. Email him at colin@ctpublic.org. Sign up for his newsletter at http://bit.ly/colinmcenroe.
SEATTLE (AP)  Seattle is extending the citys coronavirus moratorium on evictions through Sept. 30.

Initially established in March 2020, the moratorium is an attempt by the city to stave off evictions of people who lost jobs because of the pandemic and fell behind on their rent payments. The Seattle Times reports the extension announced Friday is the fifth Mayor Jenny Durkan has ordered.

Seattles moratorium applies to residential, nonprofit and small-business tenants, with small businesses defined as those with 50 or fewer employees.

Most evictions are prohibited for those tenants, including evictions for nonpayment of rent, though tenants remain obligated to pay rent and can accumulate debt.

Seattle is requiring landlords to offer payment plans and has banned late charges and interest. Evictions can be sought in dangerous situations.

A similar, statewide eviction moratorium is slated to expire June 30.

Landlords have objected to extensions of eviction bans.

Where is the rental assistance? Literally millions of dollars have been allocated to help cover housing costs and no one is getting a dime yet, the Rental Housing Association of Washington and the Washington Multi-family Housing Association said in a joint statement Friday.
Connecticut families have experienced immense adversity over the last 15 months. Many made great sacrifices to help our communities make it through. Our situation today would be far worse without grit showed by many in big ways and small. Now, the inoculation of most adults against COVID and the overdue removal of many restrictions signify a milestone.

However, Connecticut still faces a variety of immense challenges beyond COVID. From budget crisis to a weak economy to violent crime and beyond, our state will need change for Connecticut families to finally prosper. First, we should objectively assess the job Connecticuts political officials have done until now and where our state stands. Here are five numbers that describe post-pandemic Connecticut:

8.1 percent unemployment  Connecticut has the fifth-highest unemployment rate of any state, a full 2 percent above the national average. Connecticut and other high unemployment states such as Hawaii, California, New York, and New Jersey all shared strict lockdown policies and high taxes that probably bear a lot of responsibility for destroying jobs for low- and middle-income families.

8,247 COVID deaths  Connecticut has the seventh-highest per capita COVID mortality of any state despite its relatively strict lockdown policies throughout the pandemic. The evidence points to the fact that Connecticuts more restrictive policies, like those of New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and others with very high death rates, destroyed many jobs but failed to measurably save lives. And yet, the governor still holds emergency powers over our state, offending civil liberties and the democratic process.

76 percent vaccination  About three-quarters of Connecticuts adults have at least one COVID vaccine dose, giving us the fourth-highest vaccination rate in the United States. It is an enormous credit to the consciousness of the citizens of that they have readily chosen to be inoculated at such a high rate. It is also a credit to the governors administration, which chose a simple and direct policy for distributing vaccines that probably saved lives. While many on the Left were clamoring for the governor to carve out preferences for preferred groups of citizens, Lamont prioritized people by age, because it is such a strong predictor of COVID mortality and simple to measure.

35 percent rise in homicides  In Connecticuts three biggest cities with public data, New Haven, Bridgeport, and Hartford, homicides surged by 35 percent in 2020 and shootings increased 57 percent. Through mid-May of this year, homicides in the only two big cities with weekly data, New Haven and Hartford, increased 75 percent compared with 2020. Our most vulnerable citizens, including a teenager named Makhi Buckly who was fatally shot on Memorial Day in Hartford, are suffering from a historic increase in violence. In that time, Connecticuts leading politicians led prominent protests against policing, after the tragic killing of George Floyd in Minnesota, and even passed a sweeping police reform bill that restricted and imposed new liabilities on our police. It should surprise no one that the result was a surge of lethal violence in a historically safe state.

Fourth-lowest population growth  Connecticut had the fourth-lowest rate of in-migration in the United States in the last year and the fourth-lowest population growth in the last decade. In 2020, 63 percent of Connecticut migration was outbound, according to United Van Lines annual National Migration Study. Our states high rate of outmigration last year was surpassed only by that of New York, New Jersey, and Illinois, high-tax states all. Similarly, the new Census for the decade ending in April 2020 found that Connecticut had the fourth-lowest population growth in the country of just 0.9 percent compared with 7.4 percent for the nation. Similarly, there was a strong relationship between tax burdens and population growth for medium and large states. Lower-tax states welcomed more people. For all the talk by incumbent politicians about Connecticuts economic comeback from COVID and the influx of New Yorkers to parts of Fairfield and Litchfield Counties, families still fled en masse to better-managed states.

These are the hard facts describing the state of affairs in Connecticut. They are incontrovertible, unavoidable, and describe the most important aspects of our peoples lives: Their safety and their livelihoods. For those among us that believe our state can do better, we should ask whether its leaders take responsibility for any of these problems we face  or whether we need new ones to address them.

Ryan Fazio is a member of the Greenwich Representative Town Meeting.
STAMFORD  A 31-year-old city man who was arrested on charges of running a crack cocaine operation out of his West Side apartment threatened to track down and kill officers, according to police.

Officers from the Special Response Team raided Travarius Howards apartment on West Main Street early last Friday after police received a warrant based on a weeks-long investigation, Capt. Richard Conklin said.

During the raid, officers recovered nearly an ounce of crack cocaine, illegally possessed ammunition and $4,596 in cash, according to Conklin.

Howard was charged with possession of narcotics with intent to sell, operating a drug factory, first-degree threatening, possession of marijuana, possession of ammunition by a convicted felon, three counts of risk of injury to minor and interfering with the police, Conklin said.

Howard, who is affiliated with the Bloods gang, became threatening and belligerent during the raid, Conklin said.

He told officers that he was going to track them down and kill them, Conklin said.

Howard also allegedly admitted to officers that he owns multiple weapons, but they were never going to find them, Conklin said.

Police were first alerted to Howards activity after receiving multiple complaints from the surrounding community, he said.

Howard has an extensive criminal record in Connecticut and Florida. In 2018, he was convicted of second-degree burglary and sentenced to six years in prison, suspended after four years.

He has also previously been convicted of resisting police with violence, battery on law enforcement, illegal possession of a firearm, multiple failure to appears, and possession of marijuana in Florida.

On Thursday, Conklin commended the work of Stamfords Narcotics and Organized Crime squad for their proactive work in building the case against Howard.

This was a very serious case that we were getting a lot of community feedback on, so kudos to Narcotics and Organized Crime, who were assisted by the SRT (Special Response Team) and uniform division, he said.

During Fridays raid, officers found three minors in the home from which he was allegedly selling crack, Conklin said. The Department of Children and Families was notified and the children were sent to Howards grandmother, he said.

Howard was held on $500,000 bond and was still in custody. He is next scheduled to appear in court Aug. 2.
Milton, PA (17847)

Today

Mixed clouds and sun with scattered thunderstorms. High 76F. Winds WNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 50%..

Tonight

Scattered thunderstorms this evening followed by occasional showers overnight. Low 57F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%.
Ogden jazz icon Joe McQueen may be gone, but his memory and legacy live on. One physical reminder of his life, McQueen's lifelong home at 3158 Grant Ave., has now become available for sale. The house received extensive remodeling, but as investor Richard Casperson has said, "Joe's energy is 
Since Iran and the U.S. held more talks this week to try to revive their nuclear deal, with some progress reported, I want to share my views on this subject: I supported the original deal negotiated by Barack Obama in 2015. I did not support Donald Trumps tearing it up in 2018, but when he did I hoped that hed leverage the economic pain he inflicted to persuade Iran to improve the deal. Trump failed at that, leaving Iran free to get closer than ever to a bomb. I support Joe Biden trying to revive the deal. And I support Israels covert efforts to sabotage Irans ability to ever build a nuclear weapon  no matter what the deal.

If that sounds contradictory, its because, well, it just sounds that way. There is a unifying thread running through it all: Dealing effectively with Irans Islamic regime  in a way that permanently eliminates its malign behavior  is impossible.

Iran is too big to invade; the regime is too ensconced to be toppled from the outside; its darkest impulses, to dominate its Sunni Arab neighbors and destroy the Jewish state, are too dangerous to ignore; and its people are too talented to be forever denied a nuclear capability.

So, when dealing with Iran, you do what you can, where you can, how you can, but with the understanding that (1) perfect is not on the menu and (2) Irans Islamic regime is not going to change.

Its not misunderstood. After 42 years, some things are clear: Irans ruling clerics cultivate and celebrate conflict with America and Israel as an essential tool for locking themselves in power and for keeping their Revolutionary Guards richly funded and their people under their iron fist, deprived of a real voice in their future or the ability to realize their full potential.

The regime was quite happy to use resources it gained from Americas lifting of sanctions in the 2015 deal not just to build more roads and schools, but also to fund and arm pro-Iranian Arab Shiites so they could dominate Arab Sunnis in Iraq, Lebanon, Syria and Yemen. This ensured that all four remained weak or failed Arab states, unable to threaten Tehran or produce any true multisectarian democracy that would embarrass it.

On Friday Iran will hold a farce of a presidential election, with Iranians free to vote for any of the regimes preapproved candidates. A record low turnout is predicted.

None of this will change as long as these ayatollahs are in power. And, if we are being honest, not only have they been consistent for 42 years, but so, too, have U.S. presidents and Israeli prime ministers. Their strategies can be summed up as this: Always try to get the best deal with Iran that money can buy.

Or, more specifically, always try to get the best deal that lifting or imposing sanctions or covert warfare can buy. But never opt for toppling the regime by force.

Alas, Irans ruling clerics are shrewd survivors. They can guess your might from 100 miles away. And when they concluded that no one would actually dare to try to topple them or destroy their nuclear facilities  no matter how often American or Israeli leaders said that nothing is off the table  these savvy and ruthless clerics found a way to never fully give up their nuclear capacity. The negotiations always came down to the same thing: trying to get the best from Iran that money or covert action could buy.

For all of Trumps tough talk, and even with his assassination of Irans top underground warrior, Qassem Soleimani, Trump had no diplomatic strategy to leverage his maximum pressure campaign into attainable objectives that would improve the Iran nuclear deal or limit Irans regional activities, said Robert Litwak, senior vice president of the Wilson Center and author of Managing Nuclear Risks. He was not ready to use maximum force. So, the Iranians just waited him out.

Im glad for that. I do not support forcing regime change in Tehran from outside. That is a project only the Iranian people have the right and the power to do. Thats why I support all these different ways of getting the best deal money and covert action can buy  but I have no illusions that they will make Iran a good neighbor.

As the saying goes, Problems have solutions, but dilemmas have horns. And managing the struggle with this Iranian regime is to permanently shift back and forth on the horns of a dilemma.

This reality, though, is now causing a quiet but serious rift between the U.S. and Israel. And while the post-Bibi Netanyahu Israeli government will handle it more quietly, it already knows that Joe Biden is a different cat.

Its not only that Biden wont grant Israels new prime minister his every whim the way Trump did Bibi. It is that Biden is tightly focused on securing what he thinks is Americas primary strategic interest in the Middle East  preventing Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon that would force Turkey and all the Arab states to get nukes, thereby blowing up the global nuclear nonproliferation order and making the region a giant threat to global stability.

The Biden team believes that Trumps maximum-pressure campaign did not diminish Irans malign behavior in the region one iota (it will show you the data to prove it). So, Biden wants to at least lock up Irans nuclear program for a while and then try blunting its regional troublemaking in other ways. At the same time, Biden wants to put more focus on nation-building at home and on countering China.

The Israeli retort is that the U.S. will be paying Iran to mothball a nuclear weapon that it is unlikely to ever use or proliferate  while freeing it, and, in effect funding it, to deploy and proliferate the most sophisticated conventional weapons likely to be used: the precision-guided smart rockets Iran is shipping to its Hezbollah proxies in Lebanon and Syria aimed at Israel. Israel is unlikely to tolerate this loaded gun to its head while Irans clerics sit comfortably in Tehran.

In the 2006 war in Lebanon, Hezbollah had to fire some 20 dumb, unguided, surface-to-surface rockets of limited range to damage a single Israeli target. With longer-range GPS-guided missiles provided by Iran, Hezbollah may need to fire only one rocket each at 20 targets in Israel  its nuclear reactor, airport, ports, power plants, high-tech factories and military bases  with a high probability of damaging them all.

The Biden team says it is committed to curbing this threat through talks with Iran  after the nuclear deal is restored. To which the Israelis ask: Thanks, but what leverage will you have once youve lifted so many sanctions?

I have an idea: One way to defuse the tension between the U.S. and Israel would be for Biden to attempt a radical new diplomatic initiative  a leveraged buyout of the Iranian presence in Syria.

Syria today is effectively controlled in different sectors by three non-Arab powers  Russia, Turkey and Iran. Russia is not enamored with having Iranian forces in Syria alongside its own, but it needed them to help crush the democratic and Sunni Islamist enemies of its proxy, Syrian dictator Bashar Assad.

Biden and the gulf Arab states could go to the Russians and Assad with this offer: Kick out the Iranian forces from Syria and we will triple whatever financial aid Iran was giving Syria, and well tacitly agree that Assad (though a war criminal) can stay in power for the near term.

Israels military would back this deal, because breaking the Syrian land bridge that Iran uses to keep Hezbollah supplied with rockets would be a game-changer.

Yes, it would be a cynical deal. To which I say: (1) Its the Middle East, folks. And (2) Problems have solutions, but dilemmas have horns.

THOMAS FRIEDMAN is a columnist for The New York Times.
Ashtabula, OH (44004)

Today

Thunderstorms likely this morning. Then a chance of scattered thunderstorms this afternoon. High 68F. Winds NNW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 70%..

Tonight

Thunderstorms this evening, then skies turning partly cloudy after midnight. Low 61F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 60%.
Published: 18 June 2021

Exports of services falling in the first quarter of 2021

Exports of services fell by 18 per cent in the first quarter of 2021 compared with the corresponding quarter of the previous year. Imports of services also fell by 18 per cent. Exports of services amounted to EUR 5.6 billion and imports to EUR 6.6 billion. As in the previous year, the exports and imports of services declined especially in travel and transport services. These data derive from Statistics Finland's statistics on international trade in goods and services, which are part of balance of payments .

Figure 1. Imports and exports of services quarterly

The combined exports of goods and services in balance of payments terms fell by four per cent and imports fell by six per cent in the first quarter of 2021 compared with the corresponding quarter in the year before. In balance of payments terms, goods exports grew by two per cent and goods imports fell by one per cent.

The levels in customs terms and in balance of payments terms can differ, because goods trade in customs terms includes flows of goods where ownership does not change. In contrast, goods trade in balance of payments terms is based on change of ownership. In addition to the changes made to the customs data, goods trade in balance of payments terms includes sales and purchases from aboard to abroad.

Exports of services fell particularly due to a steep decline in travelling

As one year ago, both travel abroad from Finland and from abroad to Finland went down in the first quarter of 2021 from one year back. Travel to Finland (included as travel exports) declined by 89 per cent (EUR 646 million) in the first quarter of 2021 year-on-year. The value of travel expenditure abroad from Finland, which is included in the statistics as travel imports, fell by 94 per cent (EUR 935 million).

Exceptionally, more travel services were exported than imported. Finland received income from travel services to the value of EUR 83 million in the first quarter of 2021. Expenditure abroad from Finland amounted to EUR 61 million. Travel exports include such as the goods and services consumed by a person having travelled to Finland either for a leisure or business trip for under one year.

Measured in euros, service exports decreased second most due to transport services, which fell by 36 per cent (EUR 314 million) compared to the corresponding quarter last year. Finland received income from transport services to the value of EUR 558 million in the first quarter of 2021. Transport exports include such as income from transport support activities, freight and passenger transport and postal and courier services to Finland. Imports of transport services declined by 17 per cent (EUR 232 million).

Measured in euros, exports of services decreased most due to technical, trade-related and other business services, which went down by 15 per cent (EUR 125 million) from the respective quarter of the year before. Finland received income from these services to the value of EUR 685 million in the first quarter of 2021. Imports of technical, trade-related and other business services also declined by 14 per cent (EUR 191 million).

Other fallen service items were such as research and development services, the exports of which fell by 23 per cent (EUR 59 million). This service item also decreased service imports. Imports of research and development services fell by six per cent (EUR 54 million).

Figure 2. Exports of services by service item

Sweden was Finlands most important country of exports for services

Services were exported most to Sweden in the first quarter of 2021. Swedens share in Finlands service exports was around 15 per cent. Service exports to Sweden fell by two per cent year-on-year, while goods exports grew by seven per cent. Swedens share of goods exports grew by one percentage point and that of service exports increased by two percentage points from twelve months back. The share of the euro area in service exports fell by one percentage point, while its share in goods exports remained unchanged.

Service imports from Sweden decreased by nine per cent in the first quarter of 2021 compared with one year ago, while imports of goods increased by four per cent. Swedens share of goods imports grew by one percentage point from one year ago, as did Sweden's share of service imports. For the euro area, the share of goods imports fell by one percentage point and that of service imports by two percentage points.

International trade in services to the United States in surplus

After Sweden, services were especially exported to the United States, where five per cent fewer services were exported in the first quarter of 2021 than in the first quarter of the previous year. Service imports from the United States decreased by 16 per cent. Service trade to the United States showed a surplus: Services were exported to the United States to the tune of EUR 105 million more than imported from the United States. Goods exports to the United States amounted to EUR 1.2 billion. Goods exports to the United States grew by 2 per cent compared to the quarter of one year ago.

Service exports to Germany went down by 11 per cent, while goods exports went down by two per cent. Germany accounted for nine per cent of Finland's service exports in the first quarter of 2021. This share grew by only one percentage point compared with the previous year. Germanys share of service exports from Finland to Europe was 14 per cent, up by one percentage point. As regards goods exports, Germany accounted for nine per cent of Finlands total exports, similarly as for service exports. The share of goods exports has not changed from one year ago. Germany's share of goods exports from Finland to Europe was 12 per cent, which fell by only one percentage point.

Apart from Germany, service exports declined especially to Great Britain and Russia. Service exports to Great Britain fell by 47 per cent, as did service imports from Great Britain by 17 per cent. Services imported from Great Britain exceeded service exports by EUR 228 million in the first quarter of 2021. Exports of goods from Great Britain went down by 27 per cent and exports of services to Great Britain by two per cent. Service exports to Russia fell by 67 per cent, while the level of service imports decreased by just six per cent from the year before. Twelve per cent more goods were exported to Russia than one year before and imports of goods grew by eight per cent. Four per cent fewer services were exported to China and 12 per cent more were imported than at the beginning of 2020. Goods exports from China grew by 15 per cent and goods imports also increased by 12 per cent.

Figure 3. Exports of goods and services in balance of payments terms by area

Statistics on international trade

The statistics on international trade in goods and services are part of balance of payments . The statistics comprise breakdowns of goods and services on a more detailed level. The guidelines and recommendations of the Balance of Payments Manual (BPM6) applied to balance of payments are consistent with the European System of Accounts (ESA 2010). National Accounts are published on quarterly and annual levels . Finnish Customs publishes data on goods trade across borders. Goods trade published by Finnish Customs is used as source data for the statistics on international trade in goods and services. Removals and additions caused by the definitions described in the quality description are made there to achieve goods trade in balance of payments terms.

Finnish Customs statistical service, tilastot@tulli.fi, +358 29 552 335.

Source: International trade in goods and services 2018, Statistics Finland

Inquiries: Marianna Mukkulainen 029 551 3405, Kasperi Lavikainen 029 551 3674, globalisaatio.tilastot@stat.fi

Head of Department in charge: Katri Kaaja

Publication in pdf-format (273.7 kB)

Updated 18.6.2021

Referencing instructions: Official Statistics of Finland (OSF): International trade in goods and services [e-publication].

ISSN=2343-4244. 1st quarter 2021. Helsinki: Statistics Finland [referred: 2.7.2021].

Access method: http://www.stat.fi/til/tpulk/2021/01/tpulk_2021_01_2021-06-18_tie_001_en.html
Friday, 18 June 2021 17:45:06 (GMT+3) | Istanbul

Vietnam is forecast to import 13 million mt of steel in 2021, down by almost 500,000 mt or 3.55 percent from the volume in 2020, according to the forecast made by Dinh Quoc Thai from the Vietnam Steel Association (VSA) during the SEAISI 50th Anniversary e-Conference & Exhibition.

This reflects the shift of the industry to more local supply which started last year.

Overall apparent steel consumption in the country will increase - by around two percent, the VSA stated. The higher demand will be served by increased local production (HR steel production), which is going to reach 17.4 million mt in 2021, up by six percent from last year.

According to Nghiem Xuan Da, chairman of the SEAISI and of the board of Vietnam Steel Corporation, the Covid-19 pandemic, among all its negative impacts, has driven local steel production and, with the expected continuation of the expansion of infrastructure in the country, this trend is likely to continue.

In 2020, apparent steel consumption in Vietnam lost 3.38 percent, while imports posted a sharp fall of 13.23 percent to 13.48 million mt, year on year. At the same time, HR steel production rose by 7.6 percent year on year to 16.57 million mt.

The strongest production growth was seen in the longs segment last year with an increase by eight percent to above 12 million mt, and in the CRC market, where output added 12 percent to 4.44 million mt, to serve higher HDG production in particular. HR sheets and strip production was 4.45 million mt in 2020, up by eight percent, and it will keep rising at a higher pace this year as Hoa Phat is boosting capacities, the VSA stated.
Police from the western Nadlad Border, Nadlac II and Varsand have spotted 14 foreign citizens from Syria, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq, who were trying to illegally cross the border to Hungary, being hidden in the trunk of a car, and in freight trucks, respectively.

According to a press release sent on Friday by the Border Police, at the Nadlac Border Crossing there was a vehicle which was thoroughly checked, being driven by a young man, 23 years of age, two foreign citizens being found in the trunk of his car.

The persons were picked up and transported to the headquarters of the sector for searches, where upon verification, the border police established that they are citizens from Syria, aged 28 and 34, asylum seekers in Romania.

Furthermore, at the Nadlac II Border Crossing, a Bulgarian citizen presented himself for border search formalities, at the exit point, behing the wheel of a freight vehicle registered in Bulgaria. He was transporting, according to the shipping papers, metallic shapes for cookies, on the Bulgaria-Netherlands route.

Upon a thorough search of the means of transportation, two Iraqi citizens were found, hidden in the cargo hold, aged between 15 and 30.

At the Varsand Border Crossing, the border police noticed a vehicle driven by a Turkish citizen, who was transporting aluminum profiles for a company in Poland, where 8 foreign citizens were hidden inside the cargo hold. Upon preliminary checks, the border police established that they are citizens from Afghanistan and Pakistan, aged between 15 and 37, asylum seekers in Romania.

In all cases, the border police are carrying out searches in order to establish the entire criminal activity, and at the end they will carry out the legal measures that are to be taken.
Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Turkmenistan to Romania Annamammet Annayev proposed to President of the Bucharest Chamber of Commerce and Industry (BCCI) Iuliu Stocklosa, the organization of an event dedicated to the presenting the potential of his country's energy sector and the possibilities of bilateral cooperation in the field, informs CCIB, in a press release.

The visit takes place in the context in which the high diplomat accepted the invitation extended by the President of the Bucharest Chamber to visit the Exhibition "Product Week in North Macedonia" hosted these days by the CCIB Palace.

Iuliu Stocklosa spoke about CCIB's external relations strategy, focused on developing trade and economic cooperation with countries outside the European Union, including those in Central Asia, and pointed out the real possibilities for collaboration between the partners in the two countries. At the same time, the president of the Bucharest Chamber appreciated that there is a need for a better mutual knowledge of the economic potential of Romania and Turkmenistan, the CCIB release shows.

According to the source, the ambassador of Turkmenistan made an extensive presentation of the business environment in his country, pointing out the state support given to entrepreneurs. According to Annamammet Annayev, there are opportunities for bilateral cooperation in the energy field, the petrochemical industry, including the chemical fertilizer industry, the pharmaceutical industry, agriculture and the agri-food industry, but also in construction and the textile industry.

After a "peak" of trade exchanges in 2019, of 163.8 million dollars, of which Romanian imports amounted to 161.7 million dollars, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, in 2020, the value of bilateral trade decreased to only 93.3 million US dollars (-43%), of which exports amounted to 4.9 million US dollars (+ 134%) and imports to 88.3 million dollars (-45.4%). As of March 31, 2021, the total value of Romania's trade with Turkmenistan was worth 38.6 million US dollars, about 8 times the level of the similar period in 2020, of which imports (especially crude oil and nitrogen fertilizers) were 38.56 million US dollars, and only 0.04 million US dollar exports.
The National Union Block (BNS) is requesting the Government to return upon the decision of delaying the growth of children's' allowance, foreseen to take place on July 1, 2021 and to show availability for consulting social partners regarding the identification of a package of measures to combating poverty among children.

"Despite the highly praised economic growth, Romania's children are more and more exposed to the risk of poverty and social exclusion, and this process will be accelerated by the the measures which lack in responsibility and empathy by the current Government. In 2019, the risk of poverty and social exclusion among the under 16 population was of 34.6%, the highest in Europe. 2020 did not only bring a huge risk to the health of the population, but also a risk of poverty among children, this indicator having growing in 2020 to 36.1%. After 4 years, during the period of 2016-2019, a steady rate of poverty reduction among children was realised, in 2020 this trend was again inverted. The poverty and social exclusion rate among children has a close connection with the rate of school drop-out. For this chapter too, Romania is Europe's shame, registering a growth in 2020, as opposed to 2019," the BNS representatives say in a press release sent to AGERPRES on Thursday.

The union organization specifies that through promoted policies at this moment the Government is doing nothing else than "wasting a generation".

"For 2.2 billion RON / year, which is approximately 400 million Euro, less than what the Romanian Government is taking responsibility for through the PNRR (National Recovery and Resilience Plan) for 12 km of subway line for Bucharest and Cluj (the richest, yet with great political importance cities in Romania) and less than what Romania decided to invest through the PNRR in governmental cloud. Digitalization and cloud governing have no sense for a poor, with no education population," the BNS press release mentions.

According to the source, the Ministry of Labor and Social Protection sent on Thursday an emergency ordinance through which it takes responsibility even more than the already announced delay of increasing children's allowance, which was planned to be done on July 1, 2021.

"In fact, the current Government proposes no more, no less, than reducing allowance by 114 RON for children under 2 years of age and those with handicap by 57 RON for children between 2 and 18 years old. It is proposed that the sum for increasing allowance, which was supposed to be granted in July this year, to be granted in January 2022, and the sums for increasing as of January 2022 and July 2022 to never be able to be granted. This proposal is even more toxic because it is issueded in the context in which the Ministry of Labor has already elaborated the National Strategy for Social Inclusion and Combating Poverty," the BNS unionists say.
The central-western city of Cluj-Napoca is in the top of Romania and Europe regarding high concentrations of NO2 (nitrogen dioxide - emissions resulted from auto pollutants) registered in the month of May, according to a ranking made by Airly, the company who monitors air quality.

Also, in the same hierarchy are: western Timisoara (4th place - with an index of Air Quality of 14.84 points), southeastern Ploiesti (7th place, 13.83 index) and Bucharest Municipality (8th place, 13.33 index).

"Given that 62% of world governments do not share data regarding real time air quality, we wanted to take this initiative and show everyone what happens with the air around us. The data is not excellent for some regions in Europe, but we are observing an opportunity of solving this. People need to change their habits, especially regarding their cars' using, and local authorities should begin to monitor these problems, then apply adequate policies to managing them," Wiktor Warchalowski, CEO and co-founder of Airly, says.

According to the specialty analysis published on Friday, in a hierarchy regarding NO2 pollution, the leader of this pollutant type concentration is the city of Cluj-Napoca, with 17.53 points, followed by the British city Newcastle Upon Tyne (with a concentration of 17.05). The podium is closed by Naples (15.88), city, which is first place in the leaderboard regarding high values of PM10, with a score of 23.91.

Along with Phillips, Airly launched the CSR campaign "Romania Breathes", which aims to cover the entire Romanian territory with air quality sensors.
The Constitutional Court of Romania (CCR) will be considering on June 29 a constitutionality objection filed by the opposition Social Democratic Party (PSD) over Decision 36/2021 of the Romanian Parliament for the removal from office of Renate Weber as the ombudswoman, CCR officials said on Friday.

Parliament Decision 36/2021 for the removal from office of Ombudswoman Renate Weber is unconstitutional as it violates the provisions regarding the principle of legality and the five-year office tenure, reads a constitutionality objection filed by the opposition Social Democratic Party (PSD) with the Constitutional Court (CCR).

According to the document, the decision of Parliament would violate the provisions of Article 1(5) regarding the principle of legality and Article 5 (1) in the Constitution regarding the ombudsman's 5-year term of office.

"Contrary to the guarantees of independence for the Ombudsman as underlined by the jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court and provided by European standards, the Romanian Parliament passed a decision to remove the ombudswoman from office in violation of the Constitution, the independence standards in Article 9 (2) of Law 35/1997 on the organisation and operation of the Ombudsman's Office, as explained in the jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court, because removal from office was used as a discretionary, political check mechanism, and not as a legality check on the ombudsman," reads the objection.

The objectors say that they do not question the right of Parliament to assess the activity of the ombudsman, but "the constitutionality of this assessment in the sense that the assessment was not an objective one, did not follow the constitutional and legal framework and was not based on demonstrable cumulative violations of the Constitution or other laws."
The French Ambassador in Bucharest, Laurence Auer, decorated on Friday the Minister of Education Sorin Cimpeanu with the order 'Palmes academiques in the rank of Commander', with the minister stating that he will support the use of French in the institutions EU.

"I will support the use of French in the European institutions. I have already had the chance to be elected by the Secretary General of the OIF [International Organization of the Francophonie], Louise Mushikiwabo, to be part of his team that will represent Central and Eastern Europe to support the use of the French language in the European institutions in preparation for the French presidency in Brussels. I am very proud of that, "the Romanian minister said at the ceremony.

The French ambassador stressed that the medal she offered to Minister Cimpeanu is "probably one of the most beautiful French decorations".

The French diplomat referred to Cimpeanu's role as president of the 2017 Francophone University Agency (AUF).

"You have argued that both the professional training of students and the digitization of educational tools or the social role of universities should be the major objectives of university Francophonie around the world (...) Also under your leadership, the first meetings of scientific Francophonie will take place in Bucharest, in parallel with the General Assembly in September 2021", she said.

At the same time, she mentioned that giving a decoration for an incumbent minister is an exceptional case and called Cimpeanu "a great friend of France".

In his turn, the minister of education spoke about the importance of French culture. "I feel obliged, from this moment on, all the more to support the Franco-Romanian partnership and the universal values of the Francophonie," he said.

Sorin Cimpeanu recalled that he was elected president of the AUF in May 2017, when President Emmanuel Macron began his first term.

He said he was "touched" by the French proposal for a second term as president of the AUF.

"I don't know if I can meet all the requirements, but I have time until September", Sorin Cimpeanu also stated.
The Minister of Interior, Lucian Bode,on Friday stated, in Timisoara, that the Afghan migrant who killed a compatriot in the Timisoara de Nord Train Station, back in April, was caught on Thursday night in an airport in Athens, with procedures unfolding to have him escorted to Romania to be legally held accountable for the deed he committed.

"Following the international police cooperation (...), last night an Afghan citizen, who committed the murder at the Timisoara Nord Train Station, was held into custody in Greece. The procedure has been initiated to bring him back to Romania from Greece. He was caught in an airport in Athens," informed Lucian Bode.

The Minister added that he will request an investigation to see the route where the Afghan migrant left the country and under what conditions he left Romania.

At the end of April, the Timis Court admitted the prosecutor's request to the Timis Prosecutor's Office and ordered a 30-day pre-trial arrest warrant, in absentia, in the name of the Afghan citizen who killed one of his compatriots and stabbed another.

In fact, it was noted that during the afternoon of April 19, the defendant, an Afghan citizen, while traveling with three other Afghan migrants, on a street in Timisoara, allegedly stabbed the victim, also a migrant, in the back, and also injured another migrant, who was taken to hospital.
The Ukrainian authorities must observe the rights of the Romanian historical community to an extent "proportional to the fair treatment" of ethnic minorities living in Romania, Chairman of the Committee on Romanians Everywhere Senator Claudiu Tarziu of the Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR) told an international forum called "Romanian Communities in the Odessa Region: Efficient Ways to Develop Ukrainian-Romanian Relations."

"We do not ask for anything more than what we also offer to the ethnic minorities living on Romanian soil: mother-tongue linguistic, educational and cultural rights - all enshrined in the Constitution. The grievances of our brothers in Southern Basarabia are to preserve and to freely express what has always belonged to them: the Romanian language, the national culture and the educational process, according to criteria that respect their national identity. Nothing more legitimate than that," Tarziu told the forum organised at Izmail, Ukraine, by the Rectorate of State Humanities University and the Consulate General of Romania in Odessa, according to a press statement released by AUR on Friday.

According to Tarziu, "in the absence of an articulated and coherent policy on the part of the ruling parties, the historical community in Ukraine is subject to an intense and aggressive process of forced assimilation by the Ukrainian state."

On a two-day official visit to Ukraine as head of a parliamentary delegation, Tarziu held talks with the faculty of the State Humanities University in Izmail and was welcomed by the mayor of the city, Andrii Abramchenko, as well as by to the Chairman of the Izmail District Administration, Radion Ababaev.
Chairman of the opposition Social Democratic Party (PSD) Marcel Ciolacu declared on Friday in Timisoara that PSD will never support a Liberal minority government and that there would be "no catastrophe" if early elections were organized in Romania after 30 years.

The Social Democrat leader reiterated that PSD is the largest party in Romania which was the winner of the 2020 parliamentary election but despite that was stripped of the right to nominate the Prime Minister.

"Do you see me, or Paul Stanescu, Alfred Simonis, Sorin Grindeanu, ever backing Mrs. Turcan, Mr. Citu to stay on in a minority government? I tell you not. When in normal Romania - as per Mr. Iohannis's promise - but you violate the spirit of the Constitution and strip the election winners of the right to propose the Prime Minister, you must assume the consequences. I don't think it would be a catastrophe if, for the first time in 30 years, Romania held early elections. Bulgaria is holding them too. Anyway, the National Recovery and Resilience Plan needs to be renegotiated, a lot of emergency ordinances must be referred to Parliament for amendment," Marcel Ciolacu told a press conference.

The PSD leader added that his party is not part of the political game that concerns the National Liberal Party.

"We care about the fate of the Romanians. We don't care who will win the PNL leadership, because whoever that will be - either Ludovic Orban or Florin Citu, he will be just as harmful for Romania; they have both proven their administrative capacity, because one of them is the sitting Prime Minister, the other was Prime Minister and you see what happens. (...) We are not hypocrites, we own up to the past, our ability to change the future is important, but we can only do this together with the Romanians," Ciolacu said.
The Recommendation on the Excessive Deficit Procedure in the case of Romania was adopted on Friday at the Meeting of the Economic and Financial Affairs Council (ECOFIN), in Luxembourg, and our country's commitment is to return to a budget deficit up to 3% of GDP by 2024, according to a press release from the Ministry of Finance.

"Minister of Finance Alexandru Nazare participated in the meeting of the Economic and Financial Affairs Council (ECOFIN), held on June 17-18, in Luxembourg. The agenda of the ECOFIN meeting also included items related to the European Semester and the implementation of the Stability and Growth Pact. Increase, in this sense being adopted the Recommendation on the Excessive Deficit Procedure in the case of Romania, which confirms the commitment of our country to return to a budget deficit of maximum 3% of GDP, by 2024", reads the Ministry of Finance's release.

According to the quoted source, in the presentation, the European officials underlined that the excessive deficit procedure was triggered as a result of the expansionary policies and the balance registered in 2019, and the recommendation presents the updated calendar of correction of the excessive budget deficit, also ensuring the necessary fiscal space. supporting investments and achieving economic growth objectives, being in line with the national targets set in the Convergence Program presented by Romania.

In 2021, the Romanian Government has taken the necessary measures to achieve the set targets. Economic growth for 2021 is substantial, and in the medium term it will be supported by the Structural Funds and those in the Recovery and Resilience Facility, the European Commissioner for Economy, Paolo Gentiloni said at the meeting.

In his turn, the Romanian Minister of Finance specified in his intervention that the recommendation formulated by the Commission and adopted on Friday by the Council foresees a calendar of gradual reduction of the budget deficit until 2024, in the conditions where a too fast correction. "For 2021, both the economic growth forecast and the forecast deficit are similar, which indicates the European Commission's confidence in the measures adopted by the Romanian Government," Alexandru Nazare said.

Romania presents to the European Commission half-yearly reports on the effective actions implemented, starting with 2017, when the procedure of significant deviation for our country was initiated.

The significant adjustment of the European Commission's fiscal forecasts for 2021, from 11.3% of GDP (ESA deficit) in the autumn forecast, to 8% of GDP (ESA deficit) in the Recommendation, is mainly due to the measures adopted by the Government in the first months of 2021, in order to reverse the expansionary fiscal policies of 2016-2019.

According to the recommendation adopted by the European Council, Romania should reach a general government deficit target of 8% of GDP in 2021, 6.2% of GDP in 2022, 4.4% of GDP in 2023 and 2.9% of GDP in 2024, which is in line with the objectives of the Romanian government.

The European Council states that it has taken into account the changes in Romania's fiscal situation, the budgetary developments in 2020 and the new budgetary strategy adopted and calls for reforms, including in the management of public finances.

The recommendation adopted on Friday takes into account recent developments and sets a new deadline for correcting Romania's excessive deficit in 2024. Romania is expected to present a report to the European Council by October 15, 2021 on the consolidation strategy for achieving the targets set in recommendation.
British Ambassador Andrew Noble said on Thursday at the Queen's Day reception that approximately one million Romanians have chosen to live in the UK, in the context of Brexit, the vagaries of the weather and culinary differences between the two nations.

In the last two years, the quality and size of the bilateral relationship have increased remarkably. We even discovered that almost a million Romanians chose to live in the United Kingdom, despite Brexit, the weather and the absence of the mici [grilled minced meat rolls] from the English cuisine, the diplomat said.

He recalled that this year marks the 69th anniversary of Queen Elizabeth II's accession to the throne of Great Britain.

The Queen dedicated her life to Great Britain and the Commonwealth, Noble said, recalling that 2021 is a "year of deep sadness for the Queen" following the death of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh. In this context, the ambassador recalled the friendship between Prince Philip and King Mihai.

In his speech, Ambassador Noble recalled the involvement of the British mission in supporting Romanian NGOs "dealing with social challenges such as violence against women or the sexual exploitation of minors."

This year we celebrated the 165th anniversary of the liberation of the Roma people from Romania and the 50th anniversary of the declaration of Roma rights in 1971. We still have a lot to do globally, not only in Romania, to achieve true equality, he added.

At the same time, the British ambassador spoke about the prospects of the present, after the United Kingdom left the EU.

Regardless of personal feelings about Brexit, the current goal is to strengthen the UK's relations globally. The G7 summit demonstrated how global partners can work together to respond to global challenges such as the pandemic, consolidating democracy and freedom of the press, he underscored.
The Martin Luther King Jr. Auditorium of the University of Bucharest Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, freshly refurbished and modernized under a more then $50,000 joint project of the University and the U.S. Embassy, was inaugurated today in the presence of U.S. charge d'affaires in Romania David Muniz.

According to the representatives of the diplomatic mission and of the Bucharest faculty, the grant offered by the Embassy was $42,545 - $29,320 for the latest generation equipment and $13,225 - for new furniture. The University of Bucharest contributed $14,000 to remodeling the electrical circuits, floor restoration and redecorating.

Originally called Mark Twain, the faculty auditorium is now properly equipped for lectures and video conferencing.

It is my understanding that the equipment in this room is of the latest generation, allowing students and teachers to use the best modern technology. What extraordinary times to be a student, with all the world's knowledge at your disposal. I hope this is an inspiration for you, Muniz said.

The diplomat also spoke about the importance of the new name of the amphitheater.

Allow me to confess how excited I and my colleagues are that this hall will be renamed after Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., an unparalleled leader, an American legend whose efforts and legacy encompass all the best in my nation. And as this room pays him tribute, let me remind you of his famous quote - "The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. Intelligence plus character - that is the goal of true education", the diplomat added.

Rector of the University of Bucharest Marian Preda mentioned all that the renovated auditorium is coming with.

These modern facilities are an example of adaptation and a tool for improving teaching, he said, pointing out that the name Martin Luther King Jr. "has been and will continue to be synonymous with democracy, social justice, equity, values that higher education institutions worldwide are invited to adhere to and protect."
Co-chair of USR-PLUS (Save Romania Union - Freedom, Unity, Solidarity Party) Dan Barna on Friday stated, during his visit to the A 3 Ungheni-Targu Mures Motorway, that he doubted PSD leader Marcel Ciolacu would have hopes that any USR-PLUS MP would support the motion of censure announced by the Social Democrats.

"It's a joke. I haven't been contacted and I doubt that Mr. Ciolacu has any real hope that some USR-PLUS MPs would support the joke of a censure motion he announced," said Dan Barna , as a reaction to Marcel Ciolacu's statements regarding the fact that, for the success of the censure motion, there are ongoing negotiations including with several MPs "engaged in the government."

As for the fact that the Social Democrats are ready to take over the government in case of early elections, Dan Barna said that this is the role of PSD "to remain in opposition always prepared, I agree with this line."
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Ask someone at RedKey Realty what its like to work there, and you can expect to hear a string of happy contrasts.

Theyll say its a fiercely collaborative office in an industry that can be cutthroat, an environment thats fun and quirky even as agents conduct serious business, and a place to grow as a person as well as a professional.

And if that sounds too good to be true to you, youre not alone.

I get people that come in and theyre like, Are you guys serious? Nate Johnson, RedKeys director of agent development, said. But I tell them, Yeah, this is real, this is what we do.

Heres the proof: the Frontenac-based firm ranked first among the regions midsize companies in this years Top Workplaces survey.

The company, first established in 2012, didnt get here by accident.

CEO Jill Butler had worked in real estate before founding RedKey, and while shed had success, she wanted the new place to be different.

Some real estate offices will be kind of competitive, like each agent is on their own a little bit, she said in a recent interview. And thats fine, but its not the only way.
Unfortunately, the serially murdered women, all nightclub hostesses, are turning up outside the cafe where Louise works, prayer cards in hand. Can she ingratiate herself with the survivors in time to stop the carnage? Suspending disbelief that this crime-solving scenario would actually happen, Dead Dead Girls still has structural problems that a good editor could have helped with. The story often jumps around without any flow, leaving the reader momentarily lost, only for chapters to end on a had I but known note of foreshadowing.

And overall, the storytelling feels thin. From a novel set in 1926, with the Harlem Renaissance in full swing, I wanted much, much more atmosphere. Afia is good with close-up details at the expense of the bigger picture. And sometimes, her 2021 perspective comes through in too heavy-handed a way.

Dead Dead Girls is billed as the first of a series of Harlem Renaissance mysteries. Afia, who is just 24, is a writer who will be interesting to see grow.

Clare Mackintoshs Hostage is, fittingly, a book to fly through.

Ive enjoyed Mackintoshs earlier books, including 2019s I See You, in which a London woman who thinks she and others are being stalked via newspaper ads tries to stop the chain of carnage.
Boiling over

By 1969, Elliott was working in health services at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville  the first African American in the medical records department. The job gave her the stability she needed to buy her first home for $15,000. Her uncle gave her a loan, and the house at 938 Riley Avenue, the one shed admired since she was 15, became hers. It is just a few blocks from the housing project where she grew up.

Reluctantly, she allowed Linwood to move in. There were some good years, but there were some hard ones too. Especially the late summer evening in 1980 when she was home sick in bed, and their three young children were sleeping. Linwood had left, leaving the front door wide open. Sick, afraid and not quite in her right mind, she decided that was the last time anybody was going to make her feel vulnerable.

She moved to the garage and sat on a wooden church bench for five hours with Linwoods shotgun, waiting for him to return home. When he did, she stood up, raised the gun and warned Linwood that if he came any closer, it might be his last step.

Babe, you dont want to do that, he told her, lets talk as he took one step, then another, getting close enough to grab the barrel and wrest the gun away from her.
Before, it took a few weeks or longer to ramp up like that, Frederick said.

In addition, he said, doctors are seeing more young, healthy adults and pregnant woman in the hospital with COVID.

At the beginning of the pandemic, every person infected with the coronavirus would infect about two people, Finley explained. That number rises to about four with the Alpha variant. With Delta, that estimation can be anywhere from five to eight. That is staggering.

Recent research also shows that the Delta variant is associated with more severe illness.

Since early March, the county health department has sent five positive coronavirus test results a week to the state lab for genomic sequencing to determine if any involved variants, Findley said. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has also conducted surveillance for several months, randomly sequencing cases across the country and sending three to 20 results a week back to Greene County.

The Alpha variant that originated in the U.K. first appeared in Greene County in December, Findley said. It became the dominant variant in the county and the U.S.
For the third time in nine years, the Affordable Care Act has survived a constitutional challenge at the Supreme Court. In a 7-2 decision, the court ruled that the states and individuals who filed the latest challenge lacked standing to sue.

Meanwhile, Democratic lawmakers are looking for ways to expand health benefits as they pull together spending plans on Capitol Hill. And criticism is growing of the Food and Drug Administration, which approved a controversial drug to treat Alzheimers disease over the recommendation of its own expert outside advisers.

This weeks panelists are Julie Rovner of KHN, Joanne Kenen of Politico, Mary Ellen McIntire of CQ Roll Call and Rachel Cohrs of Stat.
Anne Allred is familiar with the Bible passage about God not giving anyone more problems than they can handle.

And in light of the trials recently thrown in Allreds path, the KSDK news anchors reaction should come as no surprise.

Well, God certainly wasnt pulling any punches the last five years, she said.

A few years before COVID-19 shutdowns, Allred endured a difficult pregnancy that caused her daughter to be born three months premature.

Just weeks after that, Allreds kidneys failed and she had to endure seven months of daily dialysis until she underwent a transplant operation.

And now, because transplant patients have to be especially careful about viruses and infectious diseases, her post-coronavirus world has yet to return to anything close to its old normal.

Sometimes, I feel like Im the only person not moving on with life after COVID-19, Allred said in her usual style  to the point, fact-filled and anger-free.

But thats OK, because Im done with the whole woe is me part.

Road to success

Allred is a St. Louis girl to the bone, even though she spent almost 10 years out of town as she worked at several television stations.

Born in Kirkwood, the 39-year-old Allred is the daughter of Allen Allred, a retired lawyer, and Dawn Allred-Kraemer. She has two younger brothers.

Allred went to high school at Villa Duchesne, where she was the editor of the high school newspaper and seemed to be headed toward a career in print reporting.

In fact, she kept that goal her first two years at Ohio State University. But after her sophomore year, she came home for the summer and worked an internship at KSDK. When she returned to college, her focus switched to television news.

Anne Allred Occupation  News anchor, KSDK (Channel 5) Age  39 Family  She and her husband, Drew Lammert, were married in 2014 and have one daughter, Nora, who turned 5 in May. Home  Creve Coeur Causes  March of Dimes, Mid-America Transplant, National Kidney Foundation. Favorite book  The Tender Bar by J.R. Moehringer What you dont know about her  An admitted candy addict, she has never had a single cavity.

After graduating from Ohio State with a journalism degree, she headed off to her first TV job, in North Carolina. Then she returned to Columbus, Ohio, for her second gig.

In 2006, she was hired by WHDH (Channel 7) in Boston, that markets NBC affiliate at the time. She worked there for almost seven years, the last five as co-host of the morning news show.

To say she was held in high regard by her former colleagues would be an understatement.

Less than a year after joining KSDK, Allred returned to Boston in October 2013 to cover the Cardinals in the World Series against the Red Sox.

Her reunion with old work pals broadcasting outside of Fenway Park was a prime example of the irreverent, one-of-the-guys reunions reserved for respected former colleagues, complete with hugs, high-fives and cries of deserter and traitor.

When Allred told the Boston crew that of course, Im rooting for the Cardinals, her former co-host, Byron Barnett, accused Allred of reading that line from a cue card.

Coming back home

After being hired by KSDK and returning home in January 2013, all signs indicated that good things were coming Allreds way.

First assigned as mainly a nightside reporter, Allred anchored only the 5 p.m. weeknight newscasts with Mike Bush.

But within a year, she was added to the 10 p.m. edition and became the main co-anchor, along with Bush.

The pair now anchors the two main newscasts at 6 and 10 p.m., and Allred has picked up several local Emmy Awards along the way.

Even better, the personal side of her life was coming up roses. In 2014, she married Drew Lammert, a lawyer at McCarthy, Leonard and Kaemmerer.

Lammert went to De Smet Jesuit High School and was part of Allreds group of pals from her high school days, a group that has maintained its ties over 20 years.

And the good news just kept breaking. In early 2016, Allred announced she was having a baby.

Turn for the worse

But soon after that, Allreds story took its challenging turn.

The baby, Nora, was due to arrive in late August, but instead made her appearance on May 25, 2016  three months early.

Nora spent the first 96 days of her life in St. Louis Childrens Hospitals neonatal intensive care unit.

I didnt even get to see her the first three days. And when I did, she was in this plastic box, her skin was almost transparent.

I mean, I didnt even get to hold her, Allred said, her voice cracking slightly for the only time during an interview with the Post-Dispatch.

Noras condition slowly but steadily improved, but the same could not be said for Allreds.

In early July, about six weeks after Nora was born, Allreds kidneys failed.

Doctors told her the kidney problems started with preeclampsia during her pregnancy, which then triggered a rare disorder that causes blood clots in major organs.

They were telling me I had clots all over my body, she said. The doctors were freaking out.

Allred underwent surgery and was hospitalized numerous times. She had daily dialysis treatment because her kidneys were operating at about 3% efficiency.

That summer, Id spend nine hours a day on dialysis and then Id go see my daughter in the NICU, Allred said.

That whole summer is still cloudy in my memory, she said, dismissing the old adage about taking things one day at a time. I was taking it one breath at a time.

Another challenge Allred faced during her recovery was internal, a product of her personality.

Drew was a champion, along with my family and friends, Allred said, but then confessed. But for a control freak like me, its really hard to just say you take care of it.

But of all the support Allred received that summer, she made special note of her mother, who often was the person pushing Allreds wheelchair when she couldn't get around on her own.

My mom was my rock, she said. And I realized that anything that hurt her daughter, hurt her too.

Back at work

Allred managed to return to work in October 2016. Even though she was undergoing daily dialysis, she still managed to anchor the 5 p.m. and 10 p.m. newscasts.

But early 2017 brought a shot of the best news. Allred told viewers in January that an old friend called her to say he was a donor match.

At that time, the donor did not want to be identified, but he has since acquiesced.

His name is Mike Zangara, a De Smet guy, one of that old group of friends from high school, Allred said, who then leaned forward to supervise the note-taking.

Thats Mike Zangara, Z-a-n-g-a-r-a.

So by mid-2017, and for the next two-plus years, Allreds life returned to some version of normal  albeit one that included ongoing concerns about Noras health, the need for periodic infusions and the back-of-mind reality that somewhere down the road, Allred likely will need another transplant.

And then came coronavirus.

Going viral

In the early spring of 2020 while the nation wondered how dangerous the virus would prove to be, transplant recipients had no doubts.

Because of her transplant, Allred takes medication to suppress her immune system and therefore was in the highest-risk category.

So early on in the outbreak, Allred sequestered herself at her west St. Louis County home, and a studio was installed for her to handle her anchoring duties.

Allred did not return to the KSDK studios until last month, where she wears a mask whenever possible and tries as best she can to maintain a 6-foot social distance.

Carol Fowler, KSDKs content director, came to the station two years ago, well after Allreds transplant.

So I sort of inherited her, but it didnt take long: I like Anne a lot, Fowler said, then noted Allreds skills.

Shes whip-smart, a good writer and shes always willing to roll up her sleeves and get things done, Fowler said.

Over time, the normally private Allred shared some of her ordeal with Fowler.

And when I started to get a peek behind the curtain, well, Im frankly in awe of what shes accomplished, Fowler said.

As to the continuing coronavirus situation, Allred said: Forget COVID. When youre a transplant patient, a cold is a big thing.

And like many others stuck at home during the shutdowns, Allred engaged in some heavy-duty closet cleaning, which proved to be an emotional experience.

I found all of these things that people sent me during the time with Nora and my transplant, she said.

There were trinkets, prayer cards, medals, handwritten messages, even handmade blankets. And all from people Ive never even met, she said, still sounding surprised several years later by all the goodwill.

When asked what lessons she may have learned over her last five years, Allred did not miss a beat.

You know, Ive thought about that a lot and there is only one thing I know for sure, Allred said.

I know I would do it all over again  all of it  to have that child.

This is part of a monthly series about local TV anchors. Find previous stories here.

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This virus has killed at least 600,000 Americans. I remember early in the pandemic when we first heard estimates that the death toll could get that high. That enormous number seemed ludicrous and horrific at once.

My husband was one of the lucky ones. Despite months on supplemental oxygen, he has largely recovered. I didnt tell him while he was hospitalized that I had also gotten sick from COVID. I didnt tell our children either until he was home from the hospital.

I prayed I wouldnt get as sick as he was.

We were the lucky ones.

When the vaccine became available to health care workers, my husband was among the first in his hospital to get the shot. I received mine shortly after and our kids got theirs as soon as they could, too. After what we had endured, getting the shot felt like a miracle; a life-saving gift from the tireless efforts of scientists around the world.

As of June 13, only 30.7% of city residents had completed the vaccination process. Recent numbers showed 36.9% of people across Missouri are fully vaccinated.
CLAYTON  In response to questions about St. Louis County Executive Sam Pages side job as an anesthesiologist, County Assessor Jake Zimmerman and three former county officials on Thursday told the council ethics committee that they gave up private work for public office under the assumption the charter forbade secondary employment.

The hearing was the latest development in allegations by committee chairman Mark Harder, R-7th District, and member Tim Fitch, R-3rd District, that Page, a Democrat, is violating a charter provision that the county executives entire time shall be devoted to the duties of the office by working weekend and evening shifts at Mercy Hospital and Western Anesthesiology in Creve Coeur.

The charter includes similar provisions for the offices of police chief, prosecuting attorney, counselor and assessor. On Thursday, the four-person ethics committee invited Zimmerman, former county prosecutor Bob McCulloch, former County Executive Gene McNary, and former police superintendent Gil Kleinknecht to weigh in.

They each told the committee  which includes Council Chair Rita Heard Days, D-District 1, and 4th District Democrat Shalonda Webb, who was absent Thursday  that they gave up private-sector careers. And they refused any other paid work while in office, as they assumed was required by the county charter.
Any time there are billions of dollars at stake, its a dangerous game to be playing. Thats exactly whats happening now, Hough said.

Approval of the tax has been in limbo after conservative Republican senators blocked renewal of the tax during the Legislatures regular session, which ended May 14.

Parson has said that without approval of the tax, he will take steps to limit spending on other government programs beginning July 1. The tax, which will expire Sept. 30, is worth an estimated $1.6 billion.

Last week Parson called the issue a huge deal.

It has a dramatic effect on state government, the governor said. Its over a billion-dollar hole in the budget.

Republicans like Sen. Paul Wieland, R-Imperial, want bans on coverage for certain methods of birth control such as the Plan B pill and intrauterine devices, or IUDs, despite concerns that the federal government will reject such a move.

Sen. Bob Onder, R-Lake Saint Louis, wants provisions that limit funding for Planned Parenthood.
Nationwide, increased power demand from air conditioners being turned up high to ward off the heat has stressed electric grids.

Officials in California and Texas this week called for people to reduce energy use to avoid blackouts. But a spokesman for Ameren Missouri assured residents in the St. Louis region they had no need to worry.

We dont anticipate any rolling blackouts, vice president of operations and technology services Kevin Anders said. The grid is built for this.

Still, heat waves can cause isolated infrastructure failures, as equipment is stressed by increased usage and heat. Anders said the company is responding to any outages. Customers can visit www.ameren.com/alerts to sign up for notifications.

Along with the heat, thunderstorms were possible along and north of Interstate 70 overnight Friday. Some storms had the possibility of being severe and the potential to bring damaging winds to northeast Missouri and west-central Illinois, forecasters said.

The chance of thunderstorms will stick around for a few days. High temperatures are forecast to be 97 degrees on Saturday and Sunday, and 86 on Monday.

To check the latest forecast, click here.
Southern Nevada Water Authority General Manager John Entsminger said in a statement that the proposal "helps secure the water resources and facilities that SNWA needs to provide reliable and safe water to our customers for decades to come.

When Cortez Masto's proposal was introduced, there was little mention of how water factors into plans for future growth or if the conservation components of the bill could have any impact.

Roerink said the plan's funding allocations for water infrastructure need to be accompanied by additional serious, realistic modeling" of the Colorado River.

When an entity says, Let's go and build some homes in this region,' theres an implication that waters going to be there in perpetuity," he said.



Associated Press reporter Suman Naishadham in Washington, D.C., contributed to this report. Metz is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.



This story was first published on June 18, 2021. It was updated on June 19, 2021, to correct the title of Marci Henson and the spelling of her first name. She is the Clark County director of Environment and Sustainability, not Air Quality Department director, and her first name is spelled Marci, not Marcie.

Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
COLUMBIA, Mo. (AP)  Missouri is clashing with the U.S. Department of Justice over a new law banning police from enforcing federal gun rules.

In a letter obtained by The Associated Press, Justice Department officials wrote that state lawmakers went too far with the law and noted that federal law trumps state law under the U.S. Constitutions Supremacy Clause.

In response, Gov. Mike Parson and Attorney General Eric Schmitt wrote a defiant letter stating that they still plan to enforce the new law.

Missouris new law would subject law enforcement agencies with officers who knowingly enforce federal gun laws to a fine of about $50,000 per violating officer.

The law also declares that any federal laws, executive orders or other federal regulations to track or take away firearms from law-abiding citizens will be considered void in Missouri.

WHY DID LAWMAKERS PASS THIS BILL?
Soon, another judge in St. Louis County will get to decide whether Baumanns company, Baumann Property Co., has violated the rights of one of those tenants, Regina Wingo. Until Nov. 13, 2019, Wingo and her three children were living in one of Baumanns apartment complexes, Hathaway Village, in Florissant. She fell behind on her rent. There had been some unforeseen medical bills. Wingo had also recently divorced her husband. She has a good job  at the county health department  but she got behind.

Life happened, she tells me.

Baumann began eviction proceedings. Wingo went to court, where an attorney handed her a sheet of paper and told her, she recalls, that if she signed it, she could then work out the back rent with her landlord. She signed. I didnt know what I was signing, Wingo says. She met with the woman who ran the complex and tried to make arrangements to get caught up in back rent. She got a money order for some of the back rent. The apartment manager refused it.

On Nov. 13, Wingo went to work. Her son called her when he got home from school. His key didnt work. The locks had been changed. Wingo got off work early and rushed home. She asked the landlord if she could get inside to gather her belongings. The answer was no.

I was devastated, Wingo remembers.
In an unusually forceful ruling, Judge Lynn Hughes said the plaintiffs had no case. He wrote that the public interest in caring for patients during a pandemic far outweighs protecting the vaccination preferences of the employees, and that the staff were jeopardizing their own health and that of others.

This is not coercion, Hughes wrote. Methodist is trying to do their business of saving lives without giving them the COVID-19 virus. It is a choice made to keep staff, patients, and their families safer.

The employees had argued that the available vaccines are experimental and dangerous  a claim, Hughes noted, for which they provided no evidence. He chided as reprehensible the plaintiffs comparison of the vaccine mandate to forced experimentation by the Nazis against Jewish people during the Holocaust.

Modern-day JonahCommercial lobster fisherman Michael Packard told a story right out of the Bible: He found himself in the belly of a humpback whale.
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.
One aftereffect of the recent brief hostilities between Hamas and Israel was the demonstration of the effectiveness of GPS and INS guidance kits for longer range rockets that Hamas assembled, with the assistance of Iranian advisors, using easily smuggled guidance kits that make these previously unguided rockets accurate to enough to effectively hit long-range targets without having to drench them with prohibitively large numbers of unguided rockets. The Israeli Iron Dome air-defense system can still identify the rockets likely to hit a residential area and intercept. But if too many guided rockets are launched against a distant target, like Tel Aviv or Jerusalem, Iron Dome can be overwhelmed and too many rockets will get through to their target.

Israel also makes a compelling case for maintaining economic sanctions on Iran not just because they have continued with their nuclear weapons program, despite being prohibited by the 2015 treaty that lifted sanctions. The Iranian guided rockets pose a more immediate threat than Iranian nukes. Israel has launched hundreds of airstrikes on Iranian shipments of rockets, ballistic missiles and guidance kits being trucked into Syria for Hezbollah in Lebanon and Iran-backed militias in Syria. If enough of those shipments get through Iran can upgrade hundreds of unguided rockets already in Lebanon and create another stockpile of guided weapons in Syria. The Americans have agreed to share intelligence on Iranian efforts in this area and take joint action. This is also motivated by increasing use of these guided rockets by Iran-backed militias in Iraq against American troops as well as Iraqi security forces. The Iraqi government actively opposes these Iranian efforts in Iraq because it is seen as an Iranian effort to gain control over the Iraqi government. The threat from these guided Iranian rockets is a major reason for Arab nations establishing diplomatic relations with Israel or, in the case of Saudi Arabia, increasing unofficial cooperation.

The impact of the guided rockets in the recent Hamas war would have been greater were it not for Israeli improvements in its communications and intelligence systems that made it possible to quickly pinpoint the locations of underground rocket storage sites, which are often in residential areas. The rockets are brought out of the underground shelters and launched from those same residential areas. Israel was able to locate and destroy, with guided ground penetrating bombs, over a hundred kilometers of those concrete tunnels.

Hamas had diverted most of the concrete and other building materials donated to Gaza after the 2014 war to building these tunnels rather than build new housing for Gaza residents. Those Gaza civilians noted this and now those complaints have to be addressed for any new construction material sent to Gaza. Iran is eager to help finance reconstruction in Gaza and that is another reason why Iranian efforts to get economic sanctions lifted have stalled. Israel did not send ground troops into Gaza in 2021 but have plenty of aerial photos of the recently bombed tunnels and that makes it pretty clear where all the post-2014 reconstruction aid went. Now Hamas is unlikely to get reconstruction materials unless trusted (by the donors) inspectors can account for how all the reconstruction material is used. Hamas opposes this and has a history of intimidating outside inspectors so that ploy is not going to be effective as in the past.

Israel has gotten the Americans to pay more attention to the rocket guidance kits for other reasons, because these guidance kits are also used frequently by Iran-backed Shia rebels in Yemen for attacks on Saudi Arabia, especially military bases and petroleum facilities.

There has been a growing body of hard evidence of these guidance kits. Israel provided a lot of technical help to UN assessment teams that have examined the debris found where these guided rockets were used, especially in Saudi Arabia, and confirm that the guidance kits exist and surviving components can be traced back to Iran.

Iran long maintained that they were not responsible for supplying UAVs, cruise missiles and ballistic missiles to Iran-backed groups in Yemen, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon for attacks on Israel, Yemen, Saudi Arabia and anyone who opposes Iranian aggression. These weapons are built with Iranian components that are deliberately made without any visible evidence that they were manufactured in Iran. A lot of effort is put into this. But Iran sometimes uses the same unmarked components in weapons that are clearly labeled as Iranian.

Despite all those deception efforts, UN and other investigators have been collecting components from debris of Iranian (labeled or unlabeled) UAVs and missiles that functioned properly and exploded as well as some that were captured or crashed near Iranian territory. The UN and Saudi Arabia have put many of these components on public display, and the U.S. has also displayed captured Iranian arms shipments or missile components recovered from weapons that have crashed. One of the common items found in all these cases are unmarked, as in no indication of manufacturer or national origin, gyroscopes. These miniature devices are common in all manner of UAVs and missiles. Gyroscopes of the type Iran is supplying are available on the commercial market but only the model Iran denies producing is showing up in systems used by Islamic terrorists as well as systems that are clearly marked as Iranian. This was the result of Iran trying to save some money by not manufacturing a similar gyroscope clearly marked as Iranian for systems that are officially Iranian. That was a false economy there because dozens of these gyroscopes have been collected from crashed or exploded systems. There is always debris, even when a system explodes and many small components, like these gyroscopes, survive intact. Iran denounces this evidence as an American conspiracy but no one except Iran and their allies are accepting this. A growing number of these Iran-backed groups are recognized by the UN and other organizations as international terrorists.

The gyroscopes have been collected in Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Israel and Afghanistan. One of the earliest examples was found in 2016 when an Iranian UAV crashed in Afghanistan and U.S. forces seized it and photographed/scrutinized the components. In later years the gyroscope kept showing up in other countries. The gyroscope is a unique design not available from any Western, Chinese or Russian manufacturer. It is of no identifiable (by markings) country but all the evidence points to Iran, especially since the mystery gyroscope shows up in UAVs that Iran proudly claims are Iranian made from Iranian components.

Some of these unidentified UAVs and missiles also contain other components that indicate Iranian origin even though the Iranians claim that they were produced locally by Iranian backed groups. That explanation falls apart when you look at pictures of the local product and the Iranian made model it is based on. Differences are often minimal. Some of these UAVs and missiles are built with some local materials like sheet metal but the design is clearly Iranian and key components, like the gyroscopes, are not from any commercial supplier but smuggled in by Iran. The unmarked gyroscopes have one thing in common, they are found in locally built systems of Iran-backed groups.

The most telling evidence comes from Iranian arms shipments captured from the smugglers who are paid to get them into Yemen or Gaza. In addition to Iranian weapons clearly marked as Iranian made, there are often quantities of Iranian components, including the mystery gyroscopes. Iran dismisses all this as an American or Israeli plot to defame Iran. Yet in Iran, the Quds Force, a special section of the Iranian IRGC (Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps) is praised for the extensive support it provides for Iran-backed rebel and terrorist forces throughout the region. It is no secret in Iran that Quds provides technical as well as tactical and organizational help to these groups to carry out attacks using rockets, ballistic missiles and cruise missiles. Israel continues to launchirstrikes against Quds Force operations in Syria, Lebanon, Iraq and Gaza to halt Iranian shipments of these guided weapons or components, from reaching Hezbollah stockpiles of unguided rockets in Lebanon. Iran has developed upgrade kits that make these rockets much more accurate. Those upgrade kit shipments contain more of the mystery gyroscopes.

As more and more evidence of the Iranian guided rocket threat appears, it puts the survival of the 2015 treaty in doubt. The U.S. withdrew from the treaty in 2017 after evidence of Iran continuing to develop nuclear weapons emerged. UN inspectors were turned away from sites identified as involved with nuclear weapons research and a 2018 Israeli intel operation that brought half a ton of Iranian archives on their nuclear weapons program. These were later authenticated by experts from several countries. The foreign experts agreed it was evidence that Iran had not halted its nuclear weapons efforts. This trove of evidence made it easier for the U.S. to revive economic sanctions and harder for Britain, Russia, France, China and Germany, the other signatories of the 2015 treaty to convince the Americans to lift economic sanctions. These sanctions hurt IRGC efforts to expand their operations in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Gaza and Yemen and that has become another factor working against agreement to lift those sanctions.
For over a decade China's leaders have complained about the state of their armed forces. The critics include many irate generals and admirals. Increasingly the complaints are published, so that everyone knows the problem is still seeking solutions. Initially these complaints were confined to private meetings. But so many people attend these meetings that details eventually get out to the general public. Since these leaks do not represent official policy, they do not get repeated in the Chinese media, and foreign media tends to ignore it as well. It's more profitable for the foreign media to portray the Chinese military as scary.

The truth, as Chinese leaders describe it, is more depressing. It's all about corruption among the military leadership and low standards for training and discipline. In short, Chinese military power is more fraud than fact and three decades of trying to change that have not produced as much change as befits the most technology advanced and well-equipped military China has ever produced. Corruption has been reduced, mainly through the use of unannounced audits by anti-corruption organizations that have been kept clean, so far. These audits continue to find a lot of theft and other misbehavior.

Some improvements come from ordering ships to stay at sea for long periods, which is the customary way to develop effective crews. Same with modern aircraft, which are built to be used a lot in peacetime so the pilots can develop flying skills. While the pilots enjoy all that time in the air, the sailors are not happy about spending weeks or months at sea per voyage. The ground forces are the focus of most criticism because commanders can appear capable just by training the troops to look good during basic drills and paying attention to keeping the new equipment clean and presentable.

Government investigators continue to find ground units that report they are well trained to operate all their modern equipment, while the reality is that commanders dont employ realistic training, especially the kind that might injure troops or result in damaged equipment. History shows the more you sweat in peace the less you bleed in war. History also shows that peacetime commanders have to be pushed to practice this because peacetime soldiering has always been more about appearance than wartime reality.

Its not for want of trying to improve. Since the 1990s China has been undergoing a major military buildup and frequent equipment, organizational and training upgrades. There have been several generations of this since the 1960s. All have failed. Why should the current efforts be any different? The earlier efforts failed because of growing corruption and loss of military spirit.

Most people can understand the role of corruption. Military spirit is another matter, but as successful generals and military historians have noted for centuries, the warlike attitudes of an army make more difference than the quality of their weapons. It wasn't always this way. The People's Liberation Army (PLA), as China's armed forces are known, was forced to win or die from the 1920s to 1949, as it fought a civil war with the Nationalists while also resisting a Japanese invasion. The PLA was basically an infantry army which developed innovative tactics and leadership methods that defeated the Western trained Nationalists and fought the American army to a bloody standstill in the 1950-53 Korean War. The original PLA was forged in an atmosphere where failure was not an option. Currently getting rich, or simply looking good to get promoted, is more important than fighting skills because there's no one to fight and much wealth to be had.

After the Korean War the traditional PLA values began fade. The senior members of the PLA had been campaigning for twenty to thirty years and they were tired. China was in ruins, it had to be rebuilt. To make matters worse the communists then spent the next twenty years indulging in disastrous economic and political experiments. In the mid-1970s, the Chinese communists finally got down to business and introduced economic reforms that are still under way. But reforms in the military were not so easily implemented.

Then theres the political angle. The PLA was always seen as the basic enforcer of communist rule in China. The Communist Party wanted one thing above all from the PLA: loyalty. Everything else was secondary. This included military capability and fiscal responsibility. Until the 1990s the government was also broke most of the time. There was not much money for the military. What cash was on hand for defense went into things like nuclear weapons, ballistic missiles, and warplanes. Generals were allowed to fend for themselves. Units had farmland and grew their own food. Other soldiers worked in factories to produce weapons and equipment. This didn't leave much time for training, and a lot of the spare time available went to political indoctrination. Above all, the troops must be kept loyal to the Chinese Communist party. The results of all of this were predictable. For example, when China fought a short war with the combat experienced Vietnamese in 1979, Chinese losses were enormous and the performance of the troops obviously poor. The Chinese soldiers were brave. They rushed forward and died by the thousands. The soldiers were not trained and their leaders knew little of battlefield management. The military still needed reform and going into the 1980s, but did not get it.

China went through an enormous economic boom starting in the 1980s. The communists held on to political power but allowed great economic freedom. It was now OK to get rich and the head of the Communist Party (and thus the country) said so, repeatedly and in public. The military took advantage of this. The military factories that had previously supplied military needs now began producing consumer goods and weapons for a booming export market. It wasn't until the late 1990s that the government forced the military to pay more attention to their primary job. Officers were ordered to get rid of their business interests. There was a lot of grumbling but by and large everyone complied.

More money was allocated to new weapons, including the latest warplanes and missiles from Russia and building new things like aircraft carriers. But this did not mean that the PLA was going to become more effective. There had been several attempts to introduce new weapons and new ideas since the 1970s. All had failed to improve combat abilities because of corruption. Money disappeared and little was spent on actually training the troops to use the new stuff or providing funds to maintain the high-tech stuff.

Going into the 21st century China was still a paper dragon. They have an impressive arsenal of weapons, which are often long on quantity and short on quality. The troops are still spending a lot of time doing non-military tasks. Moreover, the economic boom in China rendered a military career less attractive choice for talented young men.

Despite that, things were changing this time. The lessons of the past finally caught up with the military leadership. The most obvious evidence of this is the change in pilot training. For decades pilots got little air time. This reduced the wear and tear on the aircraft, making it cheaper to maintain a large number of warplanes. What this produced was a large number of ill-trained pilots flying second rate aircraft. Such a force is usually cut to pieces by a better trained foe. That happened time and again to everyone from 1941 on. The Chinese tried the other approach favored by Western air force. The PLA pilots were officially required to fly over a hundred hours per year. There was such enthusiasm for developing competent pilots that most squadrons scrounge up the money to fly their pilots more than the new minimum. Front line units, like those on the Taiwan strait, get even more and some have pilots in the air for over 200 hours a year. This is more than Taiwanese pilots fly and explains why the Taiwanese are so eager to upgrade their air defenses. Yet, at the same time some squadrons do not fly all that much, and the reason is usually that senior officers have stolen the money allocated for all that flight time.

The paper dragon is trying to sharpen its claws, putting on some muscle and learning how to fight. China now has thousands of modern warplanes, a growing fleet of modern warships, and modern equipment for many of its ground troops. But there are still a lot of corrupt or incompetent officers at all levels. It's not just the stealing, it's also the many officers who don't make the extra effort. There's also a lack of recent combat experience, which eliminates the possibility of getting the best officers promoted and worst ones killed off or pushed to the side. While this mess is recognized by the senior political leadership, the public image the state-controlled media puts out there is that the Chinese armed forces are ready for anything and capable of handling any foe. You can get away with that kind of propaganda in peacetime but once these troops go into combat it all falls apart. Keep that in mind the next time China rattles its saber because the Chinese leaders are.
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Army Spc. Raul Hernandez Perez, 25, has been charged under the Uniform Code of Military Justice with murder and failure to follow a lawful order following the January 2021 death of Selena Roth, 25, at Schofield Barracks, Hawaii. (U.S. Army)

HONOLULU (Tribune News Service)  A 23-year-old Schofield Barracks soldier pleaded not guilty this morning in military court to a charge of first-degree premeditated murder in the on-base beating and stabbing death of his wife, Selena Roth, after their one-year wedding anniversary in January.

Spc. Raul Hernandez Perez also pleaded not guilty through his Army-appointed counsel, Capt. Brian Tracy, to the only other charge: disobeying a noncommissioned officers order that he have no contact with his wife.

Col. Mark Bridges, the military judge, set a trial date of Nov. 8. If convicted of the murder charge, Hernandez Perez faces life in prison without the possibility of parole.

The couple was going through a divorce initiated by Hernandez Perez as the soldier rekindled a relationship with a high school sweetheart in Florida, according to an Army prosecutor.

Despite that, on Jan. 9  the day of their anniversary and referred to as Raul Day  the couple spent the day together and went to Pearlridge mall, where they were seen on camera footage holding hands, Army prosecutor Capt. Matthew Bishop said at a May 20 Article 32 hearing similar to a preliminary hearing in civilian court.

Hernandez Perez, a signals intelligence analyst assigned to the 500th Military Intelligence Brigade, obtained a temporary restraining order against Roth, 25, claiming psychological abuse, but Bishop said the soldier, who lived in barracks housing at the time, would go to Roths house on base and have sex with her, leave and call police to say she was violating the restraining order.

On Dec. 15 he made himself the beneficiary of a $100,000 life insurance policy on Roth, the Army said. Early in the morning on Jan. 10, Hernandez Perez Googled in Roths home how many swings it took to kill someone with a bat, and then beat and stabbed Roth to death, Bishop said at the Article 32 hearing.

He wants to make sure she is dead, Bishop said at the time.

The body of the Army veteran, also a one-time signals intelligence analyst and mother of a young daughter, was found on Jan. 13 stuffed in an outdoor trash bin that had been moved just inside the two-story house, Bishop said. Evidence photos show one arm and hand of Roths visible poking up through a towel and sheet rolled up and thrown on top of her.

Hernandez Perez is being held in the brig on Ford Island. He appeared in court today at Wheeler Army Airfield wearing his camouflage uniform.

Bridges, the judge, said the charges were served on the defendant on June 11. Maj. Gen. David Wilson, commander of the 8th Theater Sustainment Command, approved the charges.

Bridges told Hernandez Perez he could be represented by military and civilian counsel. At the time of the Article 32 hearing, mainland attorney Michael Waddington represented Hernandez Perez in addition to Tracy, the Army captain, and Waddington listened in via conference call. However, the soldier said today he would be represented by Tracy alone.

The accused Naples, Fla. man answered, Yes sir and Yes your honor to basic questions from Bridges.

At the Article 32 hearing, Bishop acknowledged that Hernandez Perez and Roth had a very rocky relationship. More importantly, he wanted to be with his high school sweetheart in Fort Myers, Fla., and Selena was in the way of that, Bishop said.

Hernandez Perez and the Florida woman were planning a life together and he had taken engagement steps. He also had checked into flights to South America, Bishop said.

Roth was still in love with Hernandez Perez and she was angry about his relationship with the Florida woman, but he is no longer in love with her, the prosecution said. The discord led to multiple domestic incidents. The defense made no statement, and no witnesses were called.

The night of Jan. 9 the pair returned to Roths house and had sex, and Hernandez Perez was there from just after midnight to about 8 a.m., Jan. 10 with the soldier later denying he was there, and then admitting he was, Bishop said.

Aubrey Rangel, Roths sister, previously said on Facebook that my family and I knew something was wrong because we had not heard from Selena in days, and Rangel called military police to request a wellness check.

What police were greeted by on Jan. 13 was truly horrific, Bishop said.

The master bedroom had blood splattered on all four walls and the ceiling, Bishop said. Blood had heavily stained the spot on the bed mattress where her head would be.

Bishop said Roth was a woodworker. Her garage was strewn with leftover pieces of wood, and Bishop said Hernandez Perez retrieved a several-foot piece of two-by-two to beat her on the back of her head and used a kitchen knife to stab her four times in the back.

Roth was probably lying on the bed early on the morning of Jan. 10, most likely on her stomach, showing there was no threat to the accused, Bishop said. There were no defensive wounds on her hands, he said.

The Honolulu Medical Examiners office found that Roth died as a result of blunt force trauma to her head with stab wounds as a contributor, according to Bishop.

In the backyard, the ground was found freshly dug in roughly a grave shape. Bleach, vinegar, Lysol and paper towels were in the kitchen. On Jan. 11 and 12, Hernandez Perez returned to Roths house and Googled trash pickup days, the prosecution said.

___

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Justice

Kat Bouza
COLUMBIA, S.C. (Tribune News Service)  Change is inevitable.

Even in the U.S. Army.

Fort Jackson acknowledged a moment of significant change on Friday as Brig. Gen. Patrick Michaelis assumed command of the installation. Michaelis takes the helm of the Armys premier training post after a three-year stint in which it was led by Brig. Gen. Milford Beags Beagle.

Beagle, an Enoree native and South Carolina State University alum, is now headed to be the commanding general of the Armys 10th Mountain Division at Fort Drum in New York.

There was a change of command ceremony Friday on sprawling Hilton Field at Fort Jackson, an event that was referred to as an ancient ritual. Michaelis is now the 52nd commanding general of Fort Jackson.

Fort Jackson trains the majority of all soldiers entering the Army, including two-thirds of the enlisted women. It has basic training graduations 46 weeks out of the year, and more than 40,000 people train there annually.

Michaelis brings a decorated military career to Columbia. His most recent assignment was as a deputy commanding general for the Armys Recruiting Command Center. He has served at military installations across the nation and overseas and fought in Afghanistan as part of Operation Enduring Freedom. A graduate of Texas A&M University with a degree in history, Michaelis also got a masters in public administration from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government.

Michaelis was effusive in his praise of Beagle  How do you follow an action figure? he wondered during Fridays ceremony  but noted he will work to put his own stamp on the job as Fort Jacksons commanding general.

What I think I can do is bring a fresh perspective to Fort Jackson, in line with its priorities, that I will stay with, Michaelis told reporters. This is the premier basic training facility in the United States. We want to make sure we focus on the future of the force in leader development. We want to make sure the quality of life for our soldiers, their families and the civilians that work on Fort Jackson every single day is the best it can possibly be.

With Beagles exit, the Columbia installation bids farewell to a commander who has strong Palmetto State roots and who enjoyed an easy relationship with leaders across the capital city. Just last month, Columbia Mayor Steve Benjamin lauded Beagle as an exceptionally effective communicator and someone who is deeply involved in the local community.

During a final address at the change of command ceremony, Beagle noted his connection to South Carolina helped enhance his time as Fort Jacksons top leader.

It is an advantage when you are at home, Beagle said Friday, referencing the numerous hometown friends and family members, including his mother, who were in attendance for the program. I call that home field advantage. You will hear more cheers than you hear boos. Thats the advantage of being at home.

Michaelis arrives at Fort Jackson at an interesting moment. In the last few months, a pair of off-post incidents have grabbed national headlines. In one, a white sergeant was arrested after a heated encounter with a Black resident on the sidewalk of the Summit neighborhood, an incident that was captured on video and went viral. And on May 6, a Fort Jackson trainee was arrested after authorities said he left post with an unloaded rifle and briefly hijacked a bus filled with elementary school kids. No one was physically injured in that incident.

Fort Jacksons new leader said he learned of the incidents in the time leading up to his arrival in Columbia.

Like everybody else, I saw it in the national news, and I saw it in the local news here. So, there was not a sense of anxiety, as he prepared to move to Columbia, Michaelis said. There was a sense that the relationship between Fort Jackson and the local community here is strong enough to weather those instances. I will continue to maintain that relationship to weather through them.

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U.S. service members and their families help one another across a raging river during a flash flood at Ta-Taki Falls, Okinawa, Sept. 13, 2020. (U.S. Marine Corps)

The Marine Corps has honored a dual military couple who helped rescue more than a dozen people stranded when a flash flood struck a riverside hiking trail to a scenic waterfall on Okinawa last year.

Master Gunnery Sgt. Ronald Thomas, 42, and Master Sgt. Sara Thomas, 44, were awarded the Navy and Marine Corps Commendation Medal on Tuesday at Camp Courtney. Both are assigned to the III Marine Expeditionary Force on Okinawa.

The whole mentality for me was never leave anyone behind, Ronald Thomas told Stars and Stripes during a phone interview Friday.

Master Gunnery Sgt. Ronald Thomas and his wife, Master Sgt. Sara Thomas, receive the Navy and Marine Corps Commendation Medal at Camp Courtney, Okinawa, June 15, 2021. The pair was honored for heroic actions during a flash flood last year at Ta-Taki Falls. (Natalie Greenwood/U.S. Marine Corps)

On Sept. 13, 2020, the couple and their son were trekking with friends toward Ta-Taki Falls on a 1 -mile out-and-back trail in Kunigami, according to a Marine Corps statement. The trail runs alongside the Henan River and includes rope climbs and paths that wind in and around the water.

It was raining off and on the previous day, but it was sunny when we initially went out, Thomas said in the interview.

Once they reached the waterfall, he noticed the weather starting to change and suggested they head back.

As we were getting the kids out of the water the rain picked up right away and the waterfall picked up immediately, making it tough for us to advance back, he said.

Minutes later, the fast-rising river along the trail turned muddy and began rushing with a dangerous force, the Marine statement said.

Im about 6-foot-4 and the water was up to my shoulders, Thomas told Stars and Stripes.

The group made a path through the riverbanks steep hillside, according to the Marine statement. After getting to a safe spot, they helped more than a dozen people, including Japanese residents and fellow service members, trapped on the other side by using a rope found on a fence to guide everyone across the rushing water.

We found a small section where the current was still really bad but not impossible, Cpl. Celest Stanwood of the 1st Marine Aircraft Wing, who was among those stranded, said in the statement.

So we crossed with the rope, she said. Once across, other adults staggered themselves around the rope to make it easier for people to cross. We continued this method a few times down the path and picked up people stranded on the river banks as we went.

There was no trail to go down because the current was so quick, Sara Thomas told Stars and Stripes.

Water rages following a flash flood at Ta-Taki Falls, Okinawa, Sept. 13, 2020. (U.S. Marine Corps)

We were making our own path on the side of the mountain, she said. At any moment, any one of us could have fell. It was muddy, the rocks were slippery and the rope was no thicker than a pinky.

The group finally made it to safety after hours of trekking and helping one another through the raging waters, according to the Marine statement.

When faced with this challenge we didnt know the other service members on the hike, but by the end we had a better understanding of each other, Sara Thomas said. The camaraderie of our service played a larger role in our success that day.

snyder.jonathan@stripes.com

Twitter: @Jon_E_Snyder

Jonathan Snyder
Saab, part of the Swedish defense and aerospace firm, will provide the Marines with a next-generation training instrumentation system, which allows commanders to observe and assess the performance of individual Marines, squads and even brigades during live training exercises in the field. (Saab)

SYRACUSE, , N.Y. (Tribune News Service)  East Syracuse-headquartered Saab Inc. has been awarded a Marine Corps contract valued at up to $127.9 million.

Saab, part of the Swedish defense and aerospace firm, will provide the Marines with a next-generation training instrumentation system, which allows commanders to observe and assess the performance of individual Marines, squads and even brigades during live training exercises in the field.

The system includes laser systems attached to weapons and vehicles to instantly determine whether Marines would have hit the targets they were shooting at.

Through this framework agreement with future task orders exercised, Saab will provide a full turnkey live training capability to include equipment deliveries for individual Marine weapons and vehicles, as well as logistics and maintenance support and training exercise support at all major U.S. Marine Corps installations worldwide, the company said Thursday.

The Saab system will replace the Marine Corps current Instrumentation and Tactical Engagement Simulation System equipment.

Erik Smith, president and CEO of Saab in the U.S., said the contract will be run out of the companys Orlando, Florida, office, with support from its headquarters in East Syracuse.

The impact of the contract on jobs at the company has not yet been determined, Smith said. The company has not decided whether the equipment for the system will be manufactured in Sweden, Saabs world headquarters, or in East Syracuse, where all its manufacturing in the U.S. is conducted, he said.

Saab moved its U.S. defense division headquarters to East Syracuse in 2018. The company employs about 700 people in the United States, including about 500 in East Syracuse.

This is really part of the vision, Smith said. Were going to leverage the Syracuse platform and infrastructure to go out and expand our business across the United States.

Under its contract with the Marine Corps, Saab will outfit Marines and their weapons and vehicles with a two-way laser system that instantly determines whether troops aimed correctly during training exercises between friendly and opposing forces in the field.

Jonathan Slater, president and general manager, land systems, for Saab, said the system lends realism to the training and can be deployed wherever Marines are in the world.

We can determine where Marines are, what they aimed at, what the effect of their firing was  was it a hit on a person or was it a miss? he said. Then, all of that comes out for us to do an after-action review and essentially play back in real time what happened so we can determine where training deficiencies are, what went well and what didnt go well.

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U.S. Navy Lt. Kristin Hope signals to launch an F/A-18E Super Hornet from Strike Fighter Squadron (VFA) 195 from the flight deck of the USS Ronald Reagan (CVN 76) during flight operations in the East China Sea, Aug. 22, 2019. (Janweb B. Lagazo/U.S. Navy)

WASHINGTON  Navy officers who focus on the safe operation of surface ships are switching jobs or leaving the military at higher rates than other service officers in similar positions, according to a government watchdog report released Thursday.

The Government Accountability Offices report also found only 12% of female surface warfare officers stay in the job, compared with 39% of male SWOs. Overall, 33% of SWOs remain in the position compared with 45% of officers who are in similar Navy jobs.

Though Naval Surface Forces Command tracks separation rates for surface warfare officers by gender, it hasnt developed a plan to improve retention rates, according to the report titled Navy Readiness: Actions Needed to Evaluate and Improve Surface Warfare Officer Career Path.

The GAO report is part of an ongoing response to two collisions at-sea that killed 17 sailors in 2017. That spring, the guided-missile destroyer USS Fitzgerald collided with a merchant ship off the coast of Japan, resulting in the death of seven U.S. sailors.

Later that year, the guided-missile destroyer USS John S. McCain was struck by a chemical tanker off the coast of Singapore and Malaysia. Ten U.S. sailors died as a result of the crash.

Some changes came after two internal investigations into the root causes of the 2017 collisions found challenges with training, qualifications and assignments as officers progressed throughout their career, according to the GAO report.

The Navy has taken small steps to improve officers career paths, such as extending training and tours of duty to give more time to earn qualifications, but it has not fundamentally changed career paths for more than a century, the GAO said.

Rep. Rob Wittman, R-Va., said Thursday during a House Armed Services Committee subpanel hearing that the lack of leadership among the surface warfare officers continues to haunt him. Thursday was the four-year anniversary of the USS Fitzgerald crash.

A sailor receives his surface warfare officer pin during a ceremony aboard the littoral combat ship USS Freedom on Jan. 15, 2014. (Donnie W. Ryan/U.S. Navy)

During the hearing, Wittman pressed Vice Adm. James Kilby, the Navys deputy chief of naval operations for warfighting requirements and capabilities, on the results of the GAO report and how the Navy is addressing ongoing issues with surface warfare officers.

Specifically, Wittman pointed out a statistic from the report that found by a factor of four to one, surface warfare officers believe specialized career paths would better prepare them for their job than the current generalized career path.

Without periodic evaluations of current approaches, including alternative career paths, and the use of those evaluations, the U.S. Navy may miss an opportunity to develop and retain proficient SWOs, the GAO wrote.

Surface warfare officers are screaming for change, Wittman said during the hearing of the House subcommittee on seapower and projection forces to discuss the Navys budget proposal for fiscal year 2022.

Kilby said he could not speak to the specific data from the study released publicly after the hearing ended.

However, he said: Weve done a lot of work, we feel, to professionalize and increase our mariner skill training. Some of those investments are still underway in Norfolk [Va.] and San Diego and will prove to be sufficient.

Surface warfare officers are trained to serve on all ship departments and all ship types. This training provides a generalist career path spanning across disciplines such as ship-driving, engineering and combat systems. But other Navy officers specialize in specific ship department areas.

According to the commander, Naval Surface Forces, a generalist approach is the best career path for SWOs because commanding officers must know how to drive, fight, and lead on their ship, and SWOs with specialist career paths are less prepared for this responsibility than are SWOs with a generalist career path, according to the GAO report.

However, the GAO found a majority of surface warfare officers want a specialized career path. An estimated 65% of surface warfare officers want a specialized track, compared with 16% who think a generalist model is best.

The GAO recommended the Navy develop a plan to improve retention, including female retention rates, and regularly evaluate its approach to training officers. The evaluation will then serve as a way to improve career options. The Navy concurred with all seven recommendations.

cammarata.sarah@stripes.com

Twitter: @sarahjcamm
Sailors assigned to Embarked Security Intelligence Team 11, deployed with Commander, Task Force 56, and merchant mariners from the Military Sealift Command fleet replenishment oiler USNS Patuxent, approach a boat in distress during rescue operations in the Gulf of Aden, June 16, 2021. (U.S. Navy)

A U.S. Navy oiler this week rescued four Somali men whod been stranded at sea for days off the Horn of Africa after their fishing boat had a mechanical failure.

Sailors of an embarked security intelligence team and merchant mariners of the Military Sealift Commands USNS Patuxent, a Henry J. Kaiser-class underway replenishment oiler, rescued the men in the Gulf of Aden, the Bahrain-based 5th Fleet said in a statement Friday.

The Somalis small fishing vessel was flying the international distress flag after drifting for 12 days and was taking on water, the statement said. The crew had been without food and water for several days, the Navy said in captions on photos published online. They were given food, water and a medical screening once they were aboard the Patuxent.

Its the second time in about a week that the oiler's crew has rescued stranded sailors in the Gulf of Aden. On June 9, the Patuxent steamed at maximum speed to aid the 15-member crew of the Falcon Line, a cargo ship registered in the African nation of Gabon that was taking on water, arriving before it completely sank.

U.S. Coast Guard Cmdr. Benjamin Lehrfeld, right, Task Force 68.6 commander, and members of the Djibouti Coast Guard help four Somali fishermen switch boats, June 17, 2021. The fishermen were stranded at sea after a mechanical failure and were without food or water for several days before they were rescued in the Gulf of Aden, June 16, 2021. (Jacob Sippel/U.S. Navy) One of four Somali fishermen rescued by U.S. sailors in the Gulf of Aden, climbs down a ladder from USNS Patuxent to U.S. Navy Maritime Expeditionary Security Squadron Eleven Patrol Boat 228, based at Camp Lemonnier, Djibouti, June 17, 2021. The fishermen were stranded at sea after a mechanical failure and were without food or water for several days. (Jacob Sippel/U.S. Navy) A U.S. Navy Maritime Expeditionary Security Squadron Eleven patrol boat based at Camp Lemonnier, Djibouti, pulls away from USNS Patuxent, not seen, with four Somali fishermen on board, on June 17, 2021. The fishermen were rescued by U.S. sailors a day earlier after being stranded at sea for 12 days. (Jacob Sippel/U.S. Navy) Petty Officer 1st Class Edgar Ardon, with Maritime Expeditionary Security Squadron Eleven, based at Camp Lemonnier, Djibouti positions his boat closer to USNS Patuxent, June 17, 2021, to pick up four Somali fishermen rescued the previous day from a disabled fishing boat. The fishermen were stranded at sea for 12 days after a mechanical failure. (Jacob Sippel/U.S. Navy)

I am extremely proud of them, Navy Capt. Michael ODriscoll, commander of Task Force 53, said of the oilers crew after the Somali fishermen were rescued Wednesday. I think this perfectly highlights the value of a sustained maritime presence alongside our regional and coalition partners.

The 1974 International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea obligates all mariners to provide assistance to those in distress at sea, 5th Fleet said. While it wasnt immediately clear how many rescues the fleets ships have conducted in recent years, the command reported at least two rescues in 2020 and another two in 2019.

The four Somali fishermen were transferred Thursday from the Patuxent to two boats from the U.S. Navys Camp Lemonnier, Djibouti-based Maritime Expeditionary Security Squadron Eleven, or MSRON-11, and then to the Djibouti coast guard patrol boat Damerjog, which took them back to shore in Djibouti City.

The Damerjog and MSRON-11 also took part in the rescue of the Falcon Line mariners.

garland.chad@stripes.com

Twitter: @chadgarland

Chad Garland Chad is a Marine Corps veteran who covers the U.S. military in the Middle East, Afghanistan and sometimes elsewhere for Stars and Stripes. An Illinois native whos reported for news outlets in Washington, D.C., Arizona, Oregon and California, hes an alumnus of the Defense Language Institute, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Arizona State University.
An airman receives the COVID-19 vaccine at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, Jan. 29, 2021. (Tyler Greenlees/U.S. Air Force)

Medical workers and the young were most hesitant to be vaccinated against the coronavirus during the early stages of the vaccine rollout, primarily over concerns of short- and long-term side effects, a study that surveyed personnel at an Air Force base found.

Researchers analyzed responses from 816 people  uniformed, retirees and civilian contractors  associated with Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio about their likelihood of getting vaccinated, according to the study published June 12 in the journal Military Medicine.

The voluntary survey began in November, a month before the Food and Drug Administration issued its first emergency use authorization for a vaccine. The survey concluded in February.

In a setting where COVID-19 vaccination is not mandatory, we found that the majority of individuals working at a military [base] would accept the COVID-19 vaccination if offered; however, nearly one-quarter of our respondents would not, the study said.

That rate of hesitancy generally matched what other researchers were finding in civilian populations, the study said.

The researchers believe the findings remain relevant even as the vaccination effort is in its seventh month.

Much of the concern was regarding short- and long-term effects of the vaccine, and as more companies produce Covid-19 vaccines, there will be ongoing questions related to the safety of the vaccines, Andrew Berglund, one of the studys nine authors and a critical-care physician at the Wright-Patterson Medical Center, said in an emailed response to a query by Stars and Stripes. Future vaccines designed to prevent Covid-19 or other viruses will likely face similar concerns from the general population in regards to the safety and side effect profile.

Berglund said the research team did not have concrete data to determine how prevalent those early attitudes remain today.

Based on my interactions with patients there is still concern about long term side-effects, but possibly some decreased concern regarding short term side-effects, he said.

As of Wednesday, roughly 84% of sailors, Marines, soldiers and airmen in the U.S. armed forces had been either partially or fully vaccinated, according to Defense Department statistics.

Study participants were asked their age, occupation and whether they would accept a COVID-19 vaccine if offered it. They were then given a list of possible concerns about the new vaccine, including short- and long-term side effects, misinformation on the vaccines, effectiveness, pain associated with its administration, possibility of recipient becoming ill or infected with the coronavirus, and issues involving pregnancy or breastfeeding.

Participants could check as many concerns as they had. Those who were vaccine hesitant showed significantly greater concern about short- and long-term side effects, the vaccines effectiveness and whether the shot would make them feel sick.

The vaccine-hesitant group was younger, with a median age of about 39, as compared to the median age of 46 for the group that did not feel vaccine reluctant.

Looked at another way, 38% of participants ages 30 and younger were vaccine hesitant compared to the 18% expressing hesitancy who were older than 30.

Respondents in the medical field were also far more likely to be hesitant than non-medical participants.

Vaccine hesitancy among medical professionals is alarming, since this group experiences COVID-19 in their work environment and is familiar with the associated morbidity and mortality, the researchers said.

The study had some significant limitations.

The survey took place at a single Air Force base so generalizing the findings to other military bases and services should be done with caution, the study said.

In addition, only about 10% of the bases pool of roughly 8,000 possible respondents took the survey, and those who did were self-selected rather than being chosen randomly by the researchers.

Nevertheless, the researchers concluded that the findings are of particular importance where refusal to vaccinate is likely to impact the ability of active duty military personnel to perform their duties and may negatively impact overall mission readiness.

olson.wyatt@stripes.com

Twitter: @WyattWOlson
Oishiis Omakase Berries cost $50 for a package of eight. (Oishii)

Some months ago, a curious new strawberry began appearing in social media feeds. The berry, which comes in packages of three, six or eight, was a uniform pale red. Each berry in each plastic carton looked almost exactly the same  heart-shaped, symmetrical and indented on the surface where, in a store-bought strawberry, yellow seeds would appear. One more notable thing: They cost between $5 and $6.25 apiece.

The Omakase Berry, a Japanese variety grown by the New Jersey-based company called Oishii, bills itself as an entirely different strawberry experience. The website even offers advice when it comes to eating them: Allow berries to sit at room temperature for 10 to 15 minutes; let the berries' aromatics "fill the room"; inhale the "bouquet"; eat.

Oishii grows its berries indoors vertically, leveraging technology that its co-founder and CEO, Hiroki Koga, 34, explored in Japan. "I got my first start in the vertical farming industry as a consultant in Japan, where it took off before anywhere else in the world," he said. "But the whole industry failed pretty quickly, you know, in the early 2010s in Japan, because it was too expensive to grow leafy greens in a very tech-savvy, costly environment." The technology, he said, was there; someone just needed to find the right way to use it.

The first run of berries (the Omakase cultivar) has been geared toward the luxury market and is available only in the New York City area. But the company is in the process, Koga said, of expanding its market share. Some of the varieties the company is experimenting with can be grown in a much more cost-efficient way, he said, "which means that we should be able to place these into the market at a significantly affordable, reasonable price, compared to what it is today."

Koga came to the United States in 2015, first to California, where, he said, the quality of produce was unexpectedly good, though not as good as in Japan. The strawberries he selected for the company's first vertical farms in New Jersey are known as "short-day cultivars." In Japan, "They're grown during the winter in a greenhouse environment in a little more wet environment," Koga said.

Long-day cultivars  American summer berries  are, he said, "optimized for mass production," at the expense of flavor. Koga says Oishii's low yields are guided by the same principles as fine wine production: An intentionally depleted crop, achieved by such tactics as crop-thinning, forces the plant to push more of its nutrients and flavor into fewer berries, yielding a more concentrated flavor. The growing environment, according to Koga, is also optimized so that berries yield the maximum amount of nutrients and sweetness.

"We constantly were testing and tweaking to find the perfect environment for the unique Omakase berry," Koga said. That meant, he said, finding the optimal temperature and breeze; controlling plant management, water frequency and pruning; and leveraging artificial intelligence to help predict yields.

I wanted to know how the Omakase Berry  billed by Koga as a berry with no American equal  would stand up to other domestic fruit. I arranged my own taste comparison, using three different strawberries: Oishii's Omakase Berry, available only in the New York City area; widely available Driscoll's strawberries, produced by a network of more than 900 independent growers around the world, in such places as North America, Europe, China and Australia; and first-of-the-season strawberries from Balsam Farms, in Amagansett, N.Y., down the road from where I live.

The appearance

Perhaps most striking about the Omakase Berry is its utter uniformity. Each orangy berry  I purchased a package of eight for $50  looks exactly the same. Glance quickly and you might mistake the berries for marzipan candies, their exterior is so flawless.

The Driscoll's berries ($3.99 for the company's standard 16-ounce plastic clamshell) were far deeper in pigment  the company aims for "deep red," said Scott Komar, 58, the company's senior vice president for global research and development  and were larger, overall, than the Omakase, though there was variability in size. They were covered in tiny yellow seeds. In selecting berry plants, Komar said, Driscoll's considers "the color of the strawberry, the shape, the size and the mouth texture."

My local strawberries (a quart for $9) were smaller, deeply pigmented and visually much less consistent. The traditional heart shape that is associated with the fruit became more triangular here on Long Island, where conditions are unpredictable. Balsam Farms, said Ian Calder-Piedmonte, 41, the farm's co-owner, uses a technique called plasticulture. A barrier between plants and the ground is formed using plastic, aiding farmers with weed control, assisting with water management and keeping berries cleaner.

Plasticulture, Calder-Piedmonte said, combined with pruning runners, keeps the plants compact and the berry placement concentrated. Without the plastic, he said, berries can "try to set down roots between rows, and actually will take away from the growth of the mother plants." Still, holding in my hand the tiny first berries of the Long Island season, it was hard not to consider how much work had gone into producing just a pint of fruit.

The aroma

Oishii isn't lying when it says the aroma of its berries will fill the room. When I unearthed my plastic container from its refrigerator pack, I could already smell them. Opening the box, I was assaulted with the most strawberry-smelling fruit I'd ever encountered. Aroma, Koga said, is one of the classic characteristics of the Omakase Berry.

In this category, there was no competition. My Driscoll's berries did not have much of a scent, but aroma may not be at the top of the list in breeding priority. "We conduct quantitative measurements on the sugars, acids and aromatics of our berries," said Komar of Driscoll's berries. "Then that information helps us pick the berry varieties we will commercialize for our brand." Driscoll's places a high premium on flavor and color, and the variety I tried may not have been bred, specifically, for aroma.

My Long Island berries smelled very much like strawberries, although their scent was not nearly as potent as the Omakases. "I think there's probably more variation on local strawberries, as there are with probably everything that's locally produced," Calder-Piedmonte said. Other berries that come from "incredibly controlled" environments "where it's sunny every day" are more likely to be consistent in size, shape, flavor and even aroma. On Long Island, he said, "I think there are a lot more variables."

The taste

Do you prefer a tart berry that's firm to the tooth? Are you enamored by sweetness? What type of berry the average consumer perceives as "best" depends on such personal preference. The Omakase Berry was, without question, the sweetest that I sampled. (However, Driscoll's grows a trademarked, premium fresh berry segment called the Sweetest Batch for strawberries, blueberries, raspberries and blackberries, which Komar said are "unique selections" from the company's breeding program; I did not try these.)

The Driscoll's berries were the firmest of the three, with a consistent mouthfeel and flavor. It seemed to me that the objective in their breeding was a distinct balance between sweet and tart  and that balance certainly came through on each bite. In some ways, the acid, a quality in food and drink that compels you to keep consuming, makes sense: You're unlikely to eat only a single strawberry, but Driscoll's berries come in large, satisfying packages. It's okay to keep eating.

As for my local berries, there was something compelling about the unpredictability. They were not the sweetest berries I'd ever tasted, but they varied between sweet and tart. Pop a strawberry in your mouth and come alive with the surprise of how sweet it is. Get a slightly underripe berry and pucker in delight. That contrast might make you wish that berries at the farm stand were sold by more than just the quart.

And, as Ian Calder-Piedmonte pointed out, the distinct advantage of a local strawberry is that you're eating it the day it's picked. "They really are harvested that day or the day before," he said. Many berries are picked and then held in refrigerators (or refrigerated trucks) for days before they reach the consumer, and flavor can diminish each day. A fresh-picked berry tastes far different from a berry that has been off the plant for a few days or, as happens in some cases, a week.

Then came the Omakase Berry. The berry, Koga said, was "specifically selected out of 250 cultivars that exist in Japan," optimizing for "very strong aroma and high sweetness level." "Because most of the conventional strawberries here in the U.S. have a very high acidity and very low sweetness level, we just wanted to differentiate our product," he added. This berry, with its heightened sweetness, is the type of berry that sits heavy on the tongue. Eat one, consider it, let the sugar coat the palate. That's more than enough. The point isn't to keep eating. The point, in fact, is to stop. So I did.
Col. Robert Born, commander of 1st Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault), briefs Maj. Gen. Brian E. Winski, commanding general of the 101st Airborne Division and Fort Campbell, Ky., about his defensive plan on a map on Sept. 19, 2020, during operations at Joint Readiness Training Center-Fort Polk, La. (Justin Moeller/U.S. Army)

WASHINGTON  The Armys top leaders are working to change training requirements, deployment timelines and training center rotations in an attempt to reduce the stress on soldiers and their families, according to a statement released Tuesday.

The Army invested significant resources and leadership into restoring readiness and modernizing our Army. However, our readiness focus resulted in an unsustainable operational tempo and placed significant demands on units, leaders, and soldiers and families and stress on the force. Therefore, we are prioritizing people as the #1 Army priority, according to the Army statement co-signed by Army Secretary Ryan McCarthy, Army Chief of Staff Gen. James McConville and Sgt. Major of the Army Michael Grinston.

One of the ways that Army leaders are looking to reduce requirements is by implementing the new Regionally Aligned Readiness and Modernization Model, or ReARMM, in a few months. The model will allow the Army to balance its operational needs while providing dedicated periods for mission, training and modernization, according to the statement.

The intent is to give more time back to our sergeants at the lower level, so they have chances to build cohesive teams of highly trained, disciplined and fit soldiers at the squad, platoon, and company level. That is the foundation of our army, its the foundation of everything we do, and we just want to give our junior leaders that opportunity to do that, McConville said Tuesday during a call with reporters.

The Army is also looking at options with the Pentagon and the Joint Staff for reducing continual heel-to-toe deployments of brigade combat teams, which can be up to about 4,000 soldiers, down to task-organized battalion task forces, which could be at most 1,000 soldiers.

What we realized is  that the [operational tempo] is still extremely high, even as the numbers of our forces in combat has come down. So were taking a look at the rotational deployments. Were working with the [combatant command] commanders to see how we can accomplish the mission in innovative ways, McConville said about the new model during the annual Association of the United States Army event.

For units preparing for upcoming deployments, the Army also is reevaluating how much training units need prior to combat training center rotations and how many people in a unit are sent to the centers. The Army has two combat training centers: the National Training Center at Fort Irwin, Calif., and the Joint Readiness Training Center at Fort Polk, La. An entire brigade now would go to one of the training centers prior to their deployment as a final test of the unit after months of training.

The Army is looking at reducing the number of training requirements that a unit needs before going to a training center. They also want to eliminate the brigade and battalion live-fire exercises and field-training exercises requirement prior to a training center rotation. And not every battalion in a brigade combat team will need to go into the box, or designated training areas, while at the centers. Its unclear from the statement whether that means battalions wont go into the box but still go to training centers for other training or remain at their home stations.

A brigade going on a rotational deployment to a noncombat area, such as Atlantic Resolve in Europe, might not be required to go to a training center prior to the deployment if they can do similar training during the rotation, according to the statement.

In addition to the upcoming guidance on training, Tuesdays statement also includes what appears to be a response to a number of recent missing-persons cases at Fort Hood, Texas. Army leaders also announced that guidance will come out in the coming weeks to clarify that if a soldier does not report for duty, we will consider them missing and take immediate action to find them.

When Pvt. Gregory Wedel-Morales went missing from Fort Hood in August 2019, he was considered a deserter. His body later was found in a field in Killeen, Texas, during a search for another missing soldier, Spc. Vanessa Guillen. His death is considered a homicide by the local police and is under investigation.

Following those policy changes, the Army will measure progress, according to the statement.

Divisions and brigades will routinely inspect unit systems that focus on their people including pay, awards, counseling, barracks/quarters, and physical/mental/spiritual health to ensure our focus on caring for our soldiers and families remains constant, the statement reads.

kenney.caitlin@stripes.com Twitter: @caitlinmkenney

Migrated
Lt. Gen. John Kolasheski, V Corps commanding general, speaks at the unit's activation ceremony Oct. 16, 2020, at Fort Knox, Ky. (Facebook/Screenshot)

Lt. Gen. John Kolasheski, V Corps commanding general, speaks at the unit's activation ceremony Oct. 16, 2020, at Fort Knox, Ky. (Facebook/Screenshot) Lt. Gen. John Kolasheski, V Corps commanding general, Command Sgt. Maj. Billy Webb, former V Corps commander retired Lt. Gen. James Terry and retired Command Sgt. Maj. William Johnson, from left, unfurl the V Corps colors at the unit's activation ceremony Oct. 16, 2020, at Fort Knox, Ky. (Facebook/Screenshot) U.S. Army Chief of Staff Gen. James C. McConville and Lt. Gen. John Kolasheski, V Corps commanding general, unfurled the V Corps flag during a ceremony in Krakow, Poland, on Aug. 4, 2020. A portion of V Corps, which was officially reactivated at a ceremony in Fort Knox, Ky., on Oct. 16, 2020, will be based in Poznan, Poland, when it begins a new mission there. (Dani Debehets/U.S. Army) A Bradley Fighting Vehicle is set up in front of the V Corps headquarters at Fort Knox, Ky., Oct. 14, 2020. V Corps officially activated Oct. 16, but it is still not clear when it will send troops to its forward headquarters in Poznan, Poland. (Facebook/V Corps)

STUTTGART, Germany  The Armys storied V Corps officially reactivated Friday during a ceremony at Fort Knox, Ky., and a small portion of the unit is already on the ground in Poland to take up a new mission.

We currently have a handful of V Corps troops stationed in Poland and will continue to build capacity throughout the year, U.S. Army Europe said in a statement.

Full rotations to Poland will begin in the 2022 fiscal year, USAREUR said.

The military announced in February that it was reforming V Corps to bring more command and control support to an expanding Army mission in Europe. In September, the Army selected Poznan, Poland as the site for a command post.

The U.S. and Poland are still working through red tape before fully launching the mission in Poznan, Defense Secretary Mark Esper indicated Thursday. We also plan to rotate forward the lead element of the Armys new V Corps into Poland once the appropriate agreements are finalized, he said during a speech at the annual meeting of the Association of the U.S. Army in Washington.

The reactivation of V Corps will bring the Army much-needed manpower to manage operational planning and mission command, and oversee various rotational forces maneuvering around in Europe. Its main headquarters will remain at Fort Knox under the command of Lt. Gen. John. S. Kolasheski, but 200 out of the units 635 soldiers will be on rotation in Poznan at any given time.

V Corps has a long history in Europe, dating to 1918 when it was activated during World War I. It activated again for World War II and was a fixture in Germany during the Cold War. It also supported the Army during the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan but was deactivated in 2013 as part of the Armys post-Cold War drawdown in Europe.

Its return represents one of several major changes in how the Army is organizing itself in Europe. Earlier this month, it elevated a new consolidated U.S. Army Europe and Africa headquarters into a four-star command, giving the service added clout.

At the same time, however, the Pentagon has announced plans to reduce the number of troops on the Continent in response to a White House directive that called for force levels in Germany to be slashed by 12,000. If those cuts go through, the Army would take the brunt of the reduction with the Vilseck, Germany-based 2nd Cavalry Regiment and its 4,500 soldiers slated to return to the U.S. at some point.

vandiver.john@stripes.com Twitter: @john_vandiver

Migrated
Soldiers with the 25th Infantry Division train for multidomain battlefield conditions at Schofield Barracks, Hawaii, Jan. 19, 2021. (Jessica Scott/U.S. Army)

The U.S. Army will transform over the next 14 years into a multidomain power capable of operating as an inside force within an adversarys defensive zones, according to a strategy paper released Tuesday by the service.

Army Multi-Domain Transformation: Ready to Win in Competition and Conflict outlines in declassified form how and why the service plans to transform into a force able to dominate adversaries in sustained large-scale combat operations by 2035, the Army said in news release.

The United States Army faces an inflection point that requires innovation, creativity, and entrepreneurship in the application of combat power, Gen. James McConville, the Armys chief of staff, wrote in the papers preface.

This bold transformation will provide the Joint Force with the range, speed, and convergence of cutting edge technologies that will be needed to provide future decision dominance and overmatch required to win the next fight.

The transformation affects the Army worldwide, but the paper regards the Indo-Pacific region as the most imminent challenge.

China and Russia continue to challenge the rules-based international order, it said.

Both have become increasingly more assertive in an effort to advance their agendas, aimed at supplanting the U.S. globally. By 2040 China and Russia will have weaponized all instruments of national power to undermine the collective wills of the United States, Allies, and partners, while simultaneously cultivating their own security partnerships.

China and Russia have invested heavily in systems intended to deny U.S. military forces access to contested areas. The transformed Army will provide credible, survivable capabilities that undermine area denial stratagems by China and Russia, the paper said.

Core to the Army transformation is a fundamental change in how pre-conflict theater architecture is established, which enables the Army, Navy, Marine Corps and Air Force to operate as a joint force.

The Army will establish resilient webs of communication, protection, and sustainment through new approaches in posturing units, equipment and personnel to rapidly close with our enemies in the first battle and win from the outset, the paper said.

The Joint Force must move away from synchronizing sustainment using archaic structures that are time and manpower intensive, the paper said. By 2035, sustainment nodes will be survivable and capable of rapidly moving logistics to enable the Joint Force.

The Armys inside land-based force will maneuver rapidly, aggregating and dispersing as required as a low-signature force, the paper said.

Units will have broad fronts and rarely secured flanks as they engage in compartmented battles without the benefit of air and naval superiority, the paper said.

By 2028, the Army intends to have moved soldiers to and among the various theaters to ensure that the right forces are in the right place at the right time to meet the requirements of joint force commanders, the paper said

The details of implementing this new calibrated force posture remain classified, the paper said.

The Army has been developing its multidomain operations concept in recent years, validating it through joint exercises.

Many of these wargames have revealed the utility of inside forces postured before conflict begins, the paper said.

olson.wyatt@stripes.com Twitter: @WyattWOlson

Migrated
Undocumented immigrants walk toward a Customs and Border Patrol station after being apprehended at the U.S. border near Mission, Texas, on Feb. 10, 2021. Various police departments from around the McAllen area assisted in apprehending unauthorized migrants. Nearly 100 migrants were apprehended in a span of about an hour. (Sergio Flores/for The Washington Post)

After four years of beatings, humiliation and sexual abuse, Maria de Jesus mustered the courage to leave the man who would punch her in the face for even changing her clothes to go outside, saying she could only look pretty for him.

Then the death threats began.

You will never, ever be happy, her ex-boyfriend told her on the phone in December. And when I find you, I will disappear you and your entire family.

Maria de Jesus packed her bags and fled Guatemala City with her 11-year-old son on a cold night weeks later. She paid a smuggler and trekked north to the U.S.-Mexico border, where she hoped the Biden administration, promising a more humanitarian approach toward migrants, would welcome a domestic violence survivor like herself into the country.

The only solution was to be far away where I didnt feel scared every day, said Maria de Jesus, 39, who declined to give her last name out of security concerns.

She is among scores of Central American women fleeing brutal violence from boyfriends, spouses and others in one of the worlds most dangerous regions for women who have recently arrived at the southern U.S. border only to find they now encounter an uphill battle to be let in.

Though President Joe Biden quickly signed several executive orders to roll back some of President Donald Trumps most draconian policies  including one that sent asylum seekers back to Mexico to await their court hearings  a number of other restrictive measures and rulings that directly affect domestic violence survivors remain in place.

Biden has ordered a review of the entire asylum system to determine whether authorities provide protection to those fleeing domestic or gang violence in a manner consistent with international standards. Vice President Kamala Harris visited Central America this past week, vowing to commit millions of dollars to address the root causes of migration while also delivering a stern message: Dont come.

You will be turned back, she warned.

Those words still may do little to persuade thousands of women who remain at risk in a region with deeply rooted machismo, entrenched corruption and a weak rule of law. Violence against women has increased in many parts of Latin America during the pandemic, as services such as shelters shut down and women were forced to stay with their aggressors during lockdowns, womens rights groups and international organizations say.

It was a pressure-cooker stress where there was pre-existing violence and then no escape route, said Meghan Lopez, vice president for Latin America at the International Rescue Committee, which works with organizations in the region.

Women such as Maria de Jesus who are already at the border, meanwhile, are in limbo. She is currently living at a migrant shelter in Tijuana, anxiously waiting for her humanitarian parole request to be reviewed.

If they deny it I have nowhere to go and no idea what to do, she said in an interview with The Washington Post.

A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security said in a statement to The Post that they are working to a rebuild a decimated immigration system for one that treats people more humanely and keeps families together.

We are moving swiftly to rebuild, but its going to take time, the spokesperson said.

Central America, the region most of the women seeking asylum in the United States are fleeing, has the highest violent death rates for women in the world, according to data collected by the Small Arms Survey, which tracks violence globally.

According to a 2019 survey by the United Nations Gender Equality Observatory for Latin America and the Caribbean, Honduras and El Salvador, two countries hard hit by back-to-back hurricanes last year, have two of the highest rates of femicides per 100,000 in Latin America.

Data gathered by the IRC show that in the fall of 2020, requests from across the region for womens services and protection information doubled.

Central Americas deep economic contraction, slow recovery from the storms, violence and rumors that the Biden administration would allow new arrivals in all fueled the biggest migrant surge in 20 years.

But in the midst of a heated debate in the U.S. over how to respond to the crisis, the odyssey of women fleeing violence, and domestic abuse in particular, often has been overlooked.

Last month a coalition of immigration advocacy groups, including the Center for Gender and Refugee Studies at the University of California, sent a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland and urged him to restore protections for women and families fleeing persecution and torture.

Karen Musalo, the centers director, said some of these backwards rulings take us back to the Dark Ages in terms of womens rights. She pointed to a 2018 decision by former attorney general Jeff Sessions that established that generally claims pertaining to domestic violence or gang violence perpetrated by non-governmental actors will not qualify for asylum.

The case involved a Salvadoran woman, known as AB, who said she had been sexually, emotionally and physically abused by her husband for years, reversing an appeals court ruling that found her eligible for asylum.

It created an avenue for judges or asylum granters who were already not inclined to granting it, to have the basis to do it and disregard individual circumstances, said Musalo, who was also a defense layer on the AB case.

The case became a symbol of an administration that slammed its doors shut and turned away scores of immigrants that were not only fleeing gang violence, poverty and climate devastation, but in the case of many women, brutal aggression from their partners in countries where domestic abuse is pervasive.

Asylum seekers interviewed by The Post say they sought protection in their own countries and decided to leave as a last resort, disputing criticism that they migrate to the United States solely in search of better economic opportunities.

Such was the case for women such as AB, who asked to be identified only by her initials for fear of reprisal from immigration authorities. She said she endured years of violence and sexual assault from her ex-husband and left El Salvador in 2014 after multiple failed attempts to escape his wrath by moving houses and cities.

I didnt know anything about this country. I just knew it was a faraway place where people feel safe, the 50-year-old Salvadoran said in a recent interview. Staying meant dying.

With her case still pending eight years after she first crossed the border, AB reflected on the grueling process of her quest for protection.

This wait has been so sad and stressful, she said. I have traveled to all the courts, done everything I have been asked to show that I did not come here to steal anyones job or food, that I came here because I was trying to save myself.

Being separated from her three children, whom she left behind after her husband threatened her with a handgun, has been the biggest torment, she said.

If I knew everything that was going to happen, maybe I would have preferred to die, she said in tears.

Prior to the Trump administration and Sessions decision, survivors of domestic violence had a lesser threshold to overcome and their cases often prevailed when they proved that their countries lack the resources or willingness to offer them protection from their abusers, experts say.

Now people are not even afforded that level of process and are just being tossed away, said Margaret Cargioli, an attorney with the Immigrant Defenders Law Center, a social justice law firm in California.

While experts argue the Sessions ruling has created an additional hurdle for domestic violence victims, it did not rule out protection completely, as these cases are decided on a case-by-case basis by immigration court judges.

Court data does not record the grounds for asylum claims, making it difficult to get a quantifiable sense of how these policies have impacted immigration court rulings on domestic violence cases.

Amid the pandemic and the recent surge of migrants at the border, Biden has continued one of the most controversial Trump policies, known as Title 42, which indefinitely closed the border to nonessential travel, citing emergency health concerns due to the pandemic.

While technically migrants at the southern border can still seek protection under U.S. law, the order has translated into approximately 700,000 rapid expulsions  including families and unaccompanied minors  since March of last year, without due process or access to asylum, according to immigration advocacy groups and experts.

Cargioli said the current restrictions are doing more harm than good.

If Title 42 has to do with health safety, how can a system that is purported to save lives, instead put them in peril? she asked. It is illogical.

Only a small number have been allowed into the country for humanitarian reasons that can include health concerns or being at imminent harm or risk of torture, according to immigration advocates.

Sitting in a hotel in San Diego, 19-year-old Rosie from Honduras remembered the many failed attempts to escape her ex-boyfriends house, where he would keep her captive, rape her and forced her to cut any contact with her family or friends, she told The Post in a recent interview.

If she managed to sneak out of the house, he would drag her by her hair through the dirt roads back inside, she said.

The journey to the U.S. was traumatic: Rosie said she was sexually assaulted in Guatemala as she tried to make her way north.

More than two months after being apprehended at the border and deported to Mexico, she was temporarily allowed in on May 10 under a humanitarian parole, said Cargioli, who is representing her case.

Now in the U.S., she said she dreams of becoming a doctor.

I felt I could breathe for a minute, and finally stop feeling scared all the time, she said, sobbing.

She faces a potentially years-long wait for her case to be resolved and could still be denied protection, which keeps her awake at night.

Advocates say the vast majority of domestic violence victims arriving at the border have virtually no chance of gaining protection while restrictions are still in place.

Most end up staying in Mexico in cramped tent cities or shelters, some of them falling prey to organized crime groups or migrant smugglers. Others end up going back to the dangers they are trying to escape.

In Tijuana, Maria de Jesus anxiously waits to find out what will happen with her humanitarian parole request, which would allow to await her asylum process in Indiana, where her sister lives.

She cant fathom going back to Guatemala, still traumatized by the ex-boyfriend who used to create fake Facebook profiles to get information of her whereabouts.

For so long I thought violence was my destiny, she said. I just hope that I am wrong.
Trucks cross the Ambassador Bridge from Detroit into Windsor, Ontario, on May 26, 2021. (Cole Burston/Bloomberg)

Non-essential travel between the U.S. and Canada will be banned for another month despite mounting pressure from businesses to ease COVID-19 travel restrictions.

Justin Trudeaus border chief announced an extension of the current border rules until at least July 21 in a tweet Friday morning. The worlds longest undefended border has been closed to most travel since March 2020, when it was shut in an effort to stop the spread of the coronavirus.

Public Safety Minister Bill Blair also said restrictions on travel to other countries would continue, but added the Canadian government would begin to flesh out planned exemptions for fully vaccinated travelers on Monday.

Fridays announcement comes as airlines, tour operators and other businesses plead with governments on both sides of the border to start reopening, with the vital summer season about to begin.

Its disappointing because it flies in the face of science and is unfair to Canadians who are being denied the ability to travel, and its obviously very damaging to us economically as well, Perrin Beatty, president of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, said in a phone interview. Its another nail in the coffin for the the summer tourism season for Canadians.

The tourism industry has been one of the hardest hit sectors from the pandemic travel restrictions. The Canadian side of Niagara Falls, in Ontario, saw total visitors drop by half last year, and businesses are desperate not to lose another season.

We welcome 14 million visitors a year, and of that 30% come from the U.S. We know with the border closed, that 30% has gone to zero, Janice Thomson, president of Niagara Falls Tourism, said by phone, adding the region saw under 8 million visitors in 2020.

Now that vaccines are being administered widely in both the U.S. and Canada, business groups are asking for a clear plan on how the border will reopen.

Vaccination rates are one of the key benchmarks Trudeaus government is considering before allowing more non-essential travel. About 65% of Canadians have received their first dose, according to data compiled by CTV News, while the Bloomberg Vaccine Tracker shows 53% of U.S. residents have had a single shot.

Canadas decision to prioritize first doses, however, has created a gap on full vaccinations: about 45% of Americans have had two doses, compared to just 16% in Canada.
A bear attacks a Japan Ground Self-Defense Force member outside Camp Okadama, Hokkaido, Friday, June 18, 2021. (Hokkaido Cultural Broadcasting)

TOKYO  A member of the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force was bitten in the chest by a bear on Friday morning as it breached the main gate of Camp Okadama in Hokkaido, a JGSDF spokesman said.

The soldier, who was guarding the gate when the bear approached at about 7:50 a.m., suffered minor injuries to his chest, the spokesman said. Its customary in Japan for some government officials to speak to the media on condition of anonymity.

The bear left the base, which is in the city of Sapporo, at about 8:15 a.m., the spokesman said, adding that the animal did not cause any damage or affect base operations.

A local hunters group shot and killed the bear just after 11 a.m. northeast of Okadama Airport, which is adjacent to Camp Okadama, the spokesman said.

The bear, which was between 5 feet and 6  feet tall, had attacked and injured other people before entering the base, according to the Asahi newspaper.

A bear that bit and injured a Japan Ground Self-Defense Force member is spotted at Camp Okadama, Hokkaido, Friday, June 18, 2021. (Hokkaido Cultural Broadcasting)

Those victims include a 40-year-old man who suffered serious injuries, including a broken chest bone, in an attack in a residential area, the newspaper reported. A woman in her 80s and a man in his 70s received minor injuries.

The bear was first spotted in a residential area at about 3:30 a.m., according to Jiji Press.

It had also entered the grounds of Okadama Airport, including the runway, temporarily shutting down the runway and canceling some flights, according to the Asahi report.

kusumoto.hana@stripes.com

Twitter: @HanaKusumoto
Buy Photo Fire inspector Kaede Miura receives her first dose of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine at Yokosuka Naval Base, Japan, Friday, June 18, 2021. (Akifumi Ishikawa/Stars and Stripes)

YOKOSUKA NAVAL BASE, Japan  The U.S. military in Japan carried on with vaccinating their Japanese workers Friday as infection numbers among American troops continued to decrease there and in South Korea.

Friday was the first day that Japanese employees could be vaccinated at Yokosuka Naval Base, home of the 7th Fleet 40 miles south of Tokyo. By 8 a.m., more than 120 people were lined up at the Hawks Nest Training Center to receive their first shots.

Approximately 800 people had signed up to receive the Moderna vaccine that day, although walk-ins were also expected, said Petty Officer 1st Class Jose Salazar, the emergency operations center manager at Yokosuka.

Hiroko Kazama, an accountant working on the base, said she was excited to get her first shot.

Im tired of this situation, she said of the coronavirus pandemic. I want to be able to go and travel.

Buy Photo Budget analyst Hiroaki Kayama receives the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine at Yokosuka Naval Base, Japan, Friday, June 18,2021. (Akifumi Ishikawa/Stars and Stripes)

However, Kazama said some of her coworkers are hesitant to receive a vaccine administered by the U.S. military because of Japans preventive immunization law. They are worried they might not receive government money provided under the law if they suffer significant medical issues after being inoculated.

Yokosukas commander, Capt. Rich Jarrett, told Stars and Stripes he expects shot clinics for Japanese workers to continue for the next few weeks, and hopes that everyone who opts in will be fully vaccinated by the end of July.

Lt. Cmdr. Daniel Bradshaw, the bases bilateral relations coordinator, said Yokosuka is well prepared for the logistical challenge of vaccinating so many Japanese workers after conducting dozens of shot clinics for U.S. troops and other personnel.

Weve been doing this for quite a while, he said. In a sense, weve been training for this for months, and were ready.

Yokota Air Base in western Tokyo, Naval Air Facility Atsugi in Kanagawa prefecture and Marine Corps Air Station Iwakuni in western Japan also distributed first doses of the Moderna vaccine to Japanese base workers Friday, according to Facebook posts from those installations.

The inoculations were announced late last week in a joint statement by U.S. Forces Japan and the Japanese government. The shots are optional and base workers will not be treated adversely should they choose not to receive a vaccine.

Case numbers decline

The U.S. military in Japan and South Korea had reported three new COVID-19 infections as of 7 p.m. Friday.

The Marine Corps on Okinawa had one person test positive at Camp Hansen, according to a Facebook post by Marine Corps Installations Pacific.

U.S. Forces Korea had one service member test positive on Tuesday and another on Wednesday, the command announced in a statement Thursday evening.

A service member at Camp Humphreys tested positive Tuesday after developing symptoms consistent with COVID-19, the statement said. Another at Camp Casey in Dongducheon tested positive before traveling to the United States. Both patients are currently in isolation at Humphreys.

Japan reported 1,623 new coronavirus infections Friday, 489 fewer than the same day last week, according to public broadcaster NHK and the World Health Organization. There were 48 deaths nationwide.

The government has counted 780,000 COVID-19 cases during the pandemic and more than 14,000 deaths, the WHO said.

Tokyo on Friday reported another 453 coronavirus infections and two deaths, according to NHK, which cited metropolitan government data. Thats 18 more than the same day last week.

Osaka prefecture, the nations second-largest metro area, reported 79 new infections Friday and 17 deaths, NHK said.

Okinawa prefecture, which is home to most U.S. troops in Japan, reported another 86 new infections Friday, 59 fewer than the same day last week, according to NHK.

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Buy Photo Travelers head to departure gates at Denver International Airport in Colorado. Americans will be allowed into Germany for tourism or to visit friends and family starting Sunday, June 20, 2021, the Interior Ministry says. (Karin Zeitvogel/Stars and Stripes)

KAISERSLAUTERN, Germany  Fully vaccinated Americans will be allowed to travel to Germany starting Sunday to visit friends, family and tourist destinations, the German Interior Ministry said Friday.

In view of falling infections in several (non-EU) countries, the federal government will allow entry for all purposes including tourism," the Interior Ministry said on its website.

Travelers from the U.S. or any of the other seven countries, regions and territories allowed into Germany again must have been fully vaccinated against the coronavirus at least 14 days before arrival, Interior Ministry spokeswoman Alina Vick told Stars and Stripes.

The vaccine must be one that has been authorized for use by Germany's medical regulator, the Paul Ehrlich Institute  either the Moderna, Pfizer or AstraZeneca vaccines, all of which require two shots, or the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine.

Germany also considers a person to be fully vaccinated if they have had one dose of the Astrazeneca shot, followed by either the Pfizer or Moderna shot, the Paul Ehrlich Institute says on its website.

Vick said fully vaccinated travelers from the U.S. still have to provide a negative PCR or antigen test and fill in an online registration form, but Americans who entered Germany in recent weeks have said they were only asked for their passport and CDC vaccination certificate.

The new rules take effect at midnight Sunday, Vick said. Travelers from Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau, Albania, Serbia, North Macedonia and Lebanon are also covered by the rule change.

Germany last year closed its borders to all Americans not traveling on official business as coronavirus infections soared in the U.S.

Last week, it dropped the U.S. from a list of countries considered risk areas for the coronavirus, as a mass vaccination campaign that began in January helped drive down the incidence of the virus in the country.

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In an effort to galvanize NASA's return to the moon, former Vice President Mike Pence, in 2019, sought to re-create the 1960s Cold War space race, when the United States beat the Soviet Union to the lunar surface. But this time the role of rival was played by not by the U.S.S.R. but China, which Pence warned was trying "to seize the lunar strategic high ground and become the world's spacefaring nation."

Bill Nelson, President Joe Biden's new NASA administrator, has carried on that hawkish rhetoric, casting China as "a very aggressive competitor" that has big ambitions in space and is challenging America's leadership. "Watch the Chinese," he recently warned.

Nelson's strategy, like the Trump administration's, is to cast China as a competitor racing not only to the moon, but for leadership in space more broadly. It's a scenario that got a boost Thursday when China launched the first group of astronauts to its nascent space station for what is expected to be a three-month stay  the longest duration space mission ever by a Chinese crew.

Some doubt the wisdom of Nelson's approach, however.

"Making the Chinese space station out to be such a serious threat is a mistake as it plays into China's own political goals," said Brian Weeden, the director of program planning at the Secure World Foundation, a think tank whose mission statement calls for the promotion of "ideas and actions to achieve the secure, sustainable, and peaceful uses of space benefiting Earth and all its peoples."

"China is trying to use its space station to show that it, too, is a space power, and these constant allusions to a space race and concerns about the threat posed by their space station are reinforcing that message," Weeden said. Thursday's launch, he said, was "an important achievement, but it does not mean China has equaled, let alone surpassed, the U.S."

Cooperation with China in space is not on the horizon. NASA, which landed men on the moon in 1969 and has had crew living aboard the International Space Station for 20 years, has been barred by law since 2011 from partnering with China  no Chinese astronaut has ever been aboard the International Space Station, which has been host to astronauts from nearly 20 nations. There is no prospect of that changing anytime soon in a Washington where China is seen as a fierce competitor in a wide range of technological endeavors, from quantum computers to the rollout of 5G.

That is especially true for space, since the technologies used in space are also used for national defense, said Scott Kennedy, an analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"These deep concerns about China as a military competitor forestalls cooperation in dual-use technologies, and there are no technologies used in space that aren't dual use," he said. U.S. and China cooperation in space, he said, would require the kind of detente that the U.S. and Soviet Union achieved toward the end of the Cold War. "But we are very far from that."

China's space agency has shown remarkable progress on its path to becoming a preeminent spacefaring power. In 2019, it landed an uncrewed spacecraft on the far side of the moon, a first. Last month, it became only the second country, after the U.S., to land a rover on Mars. Earlier this week, China and Russia announced plans to build an international base on the moon. And then came Thursday's launch.

About six hours after that launch, the astronauts docked with China's Tiangong space station.

In a statement, Nelson congratulated China "on the successful launch of crew to their space station! I look forward to the scientific discoveries to come."

But, like the Trump administration before him, Nelson has sought to leverage China's space ambitions as a way to get Congress to fund NASA's plans to return to the moon, while the space agency works to build an international coalition of its own.

NASA had been planning to fly astronauts to the moon by 2028. But the Trump administration sought to accelerate that, mandating the space agency do it by 2024, a highly aggressive timetable that few thought possible. Under the Biden administration, NASA is currently reviewing the lunar program, dubbed Artemis, but Nelson has embraced it, and its aggressive timeline. And he has spent his first few weeks as NASA administrator picking up where his predecessor, Jim Bridenstine, left off: lobbying Congress for the funds to make it happen.

Nelson's strategy, in part, is to cast China as a competitor.

Speaking before House appropriators last month, Nelson said that China was seeking to land humans on the moon in the 2020s. That, he said, should motivate Congress to give NASA more money for its Artemis program as it seeks to develop a spacecraft, known as the Human Landing System, that would ferry astronauts to the lunar surface. In addition to the Artemis program, Nelson has also called for the life of the International Space Station, which has had humans living on it continuously for more than 20 years, to be extended to 2030.

Last year, Congress appropriated $850 million for the lunar lander, well short of NASA's $3.3 billion request. In its request for funding in this year's budget, NASA has requested $1.2 billion for the lander, but the program is currently tied up in litigation.

Meanwhile, Nelson has said he hopes Congress gives NASA the money it needs to compete. China's lunar ambitions "should tell us something about our need to get off our duff and get on our human landing system program going, vigorously, and NASA can't do it alone," he said during the House hearing.

At another point in the hearing, he held up a photograph for the committee of the Zhurong rover that landed on Mars last month. "I want you to see this photograph," he said, adding that it was a part of China's goal to eclipse the U.S. in space.

The U.S. has had a proliferation of human space successes recently. Over the past year, SpaceX flew three human spaceflight missions for NASA. Boeing also hopes to fly one by the end of this year. And Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic are continuing development of their suborbital space tourism programs.

A key part of NASA's Artemis program is, at the moment, stalled, however.

After NASA awarded SpaceX a $3 billion contract in April to use its Starship spacecraft to fly astronauts to and from the lunar surface, the losing bidders, Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin and Dynetics, a defense contractor, protested the award to the Government Accountability Office. That has forced NASA to put a hold on the contract.

Meantime, Congress has passed a bill that would require NASA to award two lunar lander contracts for future lunar missions. But it's not clear that the $10 billion authorized to fund the contracts will get appropriated by Congress.

A recent bright spot for the program, though, is NASA's much beleaguered Space Launch System rocket, which would send NASA astronauts to the moon. After years of delays, it successfully completed a full-duration engine test. The massive, 212-foot core stage of the rocket was shipped to the Kennedy Space Center, where it has been mated with its side solid rocket boosters. Nelson has repeatedly said it could fly for the first time this year in a trip that would propel the Orion spacecraft, without any astronauts on board, on an autonomous trip around the moon.

NASA is also building an international coalition to support the lunar mission and create norms of behavior in space. Signatories to the so-called Artemis Accords would be able to partner with NASA in its lunar exploration program but would be required to adhere to a set of standards including the public release of scientific data. The program began in 2020 under the trump administration, but has been continued under President Biden. Earlier this week, Nelson welcomed Brazil as the newest signatory.

China, meanwhile, also is seeking international collaboration for the moon. Earlier this week, it announced an International Lunar Research Station, a joint program with Russia. In a statement, the two countries' space agencies said they "jointly invite all interested international partners to cooperate and contribute more for the peaceful exploration and use of [the] moon in the interests of all humankind, adhering to the principle of equality, openness and integrity."
Buy Photo Then-Army Chief of Staff Gen. Mark Milley listens to opening statements during a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on Capitol Hill, April 12, 2018. (Joe Gromelski/Stars and Stripes)

The U.S. militarys top general told senators on Thursday that he was shocked by the number of Pentagon-owned weapons tallied as missing or stolen in a recent news report.

Army Gen. Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said service records submitted to him since The Associated Press published its report on Tuesday appear to contradict the news agencys findings that at least 1,900 military weapons were lost or stolen during the 2010s. But Milley promised transparency to the senators as he further examines the issue.

I've asked each of the services to go back and let's get the numbers, let's get the reports over to [Congress] to make sure that we can level set as to what's correct and incorrect, Milley told the Senate Appropriations Committee during a hearing to consider the Pentagons $715 billion budget proposal for fiscal year 2022. The reports I have from the services, as of this morning, are significantly less numbers than reported in the media.

However, Milley admitted the number of lost or stolen firearms was far from zero, but claimed it was much less than the 1,900 reported and promised Congress a firm answer.

The general was responding to a question from Sen. Diane Feinstein, D-Calif., who expressed concern about the number of military weapons linked to crimes on American streets and questioned the Pentagons transparency on the issue.

She cited, as an example, the discovery of an AK-74 assault rifle  a Russian automatic weapon similar to the more famous AK-47  by law enforcement in Fresno, Calif., during a 2019 domestic assault case. The weapon, which is illegal to possess in the United States, was one of 26 AK-74s stolen from Fort Irwin in southern California in 2011. Another stolen AK-74 was found in the possession of a felon in Fresno by federal agents in 2012, according to the Justice Department.

The stolen AK-74s were just some of the more than 1,900 military weapons that the AP revealed had been lost or stolen between 2010 and 2019, according to its own accounting of those missing weapons via reviews of government records. Some of those weapons were later linked to crimes, including the use of an Army Beretta M9 pistol in a series of 2018 shootings in New York even as service records showed that handgun was safely locked up at Fort Bragg, N.C.

The AP estimated the 1,900 missing firearms from the Army, Navy, Marine Corps and Air Force was likely a low figure after spending a decade investigating the issue. AP reporters were at times provided conflicting information on missing weapons by the Army and defense officials regularly pushed back when asked for data, the news agency reported. The Air Force declined to release any data on the subject, the AP wrote.

Milley told Feinstein that the Pentagon takes weapons security extremely seriously. He promised full investigations via the Armys Criminal Investigation Command, known as CID, and unit commanders, if weapons are found missing.

If anyone is found negligent at all, they are relieved of their command or punished in some other way, Milley said. If there's a criminal involved, for example, you mentioned Fort Irwin  there were people arrested, prosecuted and are currently in jail, as a result of some of those weapons that you were talking about.

Feinstein said she wanted to see the Pentagons numbers on stolen or missing weapons soon.

The general promised to provide greater detail to Congress quickly.

There are weapons that we can't account for, Milley said. But, I can assure you that we take it extraordinarily seriously, and I owe you the exact numbers that we're getting, and I'll get to those very, very quickly.

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After a year of deaths, devastation and dread brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic, many health care workers are cautiously optimistic about the recent decline in cases. (Gaelen Morse, Columbus Dispatch/TNS)

(Tribune News Service)  The first pandemic surge flooded Boston Medical Center with coronavirus patients: 229 at last springs peak, filling nearly two-thirds of its beds.

This week, the COVID-19 count hit zero. There were precisely no patients with the virus in the entire sprawling urban hospital, which had borne a heavy load through the pandemic.

Hurray! said epidemiologist Cassandra Pierre, adding that she was in a relentlessly and uncharacteristically cheerful mood after getting the news Wednesday. At the same time, this is not all joy and roses and releasing balloons. Weve had a rough year, and its going to take some time to recover from that.

COVID-19 counts are hitting the zero mark elsewhere as well. On Tuesday, Californias Marin County announced there were no COVID patients in local hospitals for the first time in over a year. Ditto for the COVID unit at the medical center in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. New Yorks rates have fallen so low that two dozen counties reported zero positive tests in midweek data.

No one in American health care is declaring victory over the virus. But with national vaccination rates passing the 50% mark and zeros proliferating, many are marking a change that grows more dramatic by the day, and is starting to bring cautious downshifting in some COVID health care operations.

This month, Yale-New Haven Hospital closed its last pop-up COVID intensive-care ward, 28 beds on the top floor of the Smilow Cancer Hospital that had held many desperately ill patients. A small, somber ceremony marked its ending.

Were moving on to another chapter, said outgoing medical ICU director Jonathan Siner. The disease is not gone. But the idea that it will overwhelm the hospital, that youll have to take large pieces of the hospital and totally repurpose them, I think that chapter is closed  at least for us and those lucky enough to practice medicine where there is vaccine availability and a high vaccination rate.

This Wednesday, the Cambridge Health Alliance in Massachusetts shut its special coronavirus call center. At peak, its 15 virus-specialist staffers had been handling more than 1,000 calls a day from people with urgent questions about the virus.

With call volume dropping, Weve finally decided to pull the trigger and have those calls go back to our primary-care sites, said outpatient COVID medical director Jessamyn Blau. The virus is going to be with us a long time, and so a broad range of staffers need to be able to handle calls about it.

This is not really an end, she said. Its a transition.

Zeros are fast becoming the norm in many emergency departments around the country, said James Augustine, a spokesperson for the American College of Emergency Physicians.

His colleagues are thrilled they have days with no COVID patients, he said, and to see that patients with other maladies are no longer terrified to come in.

Augustine isnt fazed by the likelihood of a bump in other infectious diseases. When people start getting together again, theyre going to give each other strep and the common cold and lice and scabies, and all the sexually transmitted diseases will increase again, and this is expected, he said.

New York City emergency physician Craig Spencer noted in wonder that during a recent shift, he helped a patient hurt in a motorcycle accident and pulled a large-winged insect out of someones ear  but saw not a single COVID case.

Hes now had several such COVID-free shifts, and says he welcomes the contrast with the cacophony of coughing he described during the spring 2020 surge: We know COVID isnt over, of course. But after the year weve had, it feels really great to have our old job back.

At Boston University, health officials have been running nearly 10,000 coronavirus tests of summer students and staffers per week, and averaging zero positives for the past two weeks. The universitys contact tracers, lacking contacts to trace, have shifted to reviewing the proof of vaccines that students need to return to campus.

Summertime numbers have dropped before, said Judy Platt, BUs director of health services. But I think these zeros do represent something, she said. This feels more lasting. And the vaccination is really the piece behind that.

Vaccination rates vary, and some spots are still seeing a significant rise in cases, including Colorado, where Mesa Countys largest hospital is seeing a spike, and Wyoming, where hospitalizations have been climbing.

They contrast with areas like St. Cloud, Minnesota, where the health department this week reported zero new cases. In the Lansing, Michigan, area, the Ingham County Health Department on Tuesday night tweeted, For the 1st time in a year, ZERO new cases were reported to ICHD today. Yes, this is cause for celebration! But no, we arent done with COVID-19 quite yet.

In Vermont, where 80% of the population has been vaccinated, the seven-day average of deaths is now zero, and of cases is seven.

The first few hospital announcements of hitting zero came last month, including in San Francisco, Alabama and Utah. Now, even some major institutions are getting close: Massachusetts General Hospital is down to six patients with COVID, three in the ICU; the University of California at San Francisco hospital has five, including two children.

With concerns about the more transmissible Delta variant rising, reaching zero is cause for jubilation but not unmitigated relief.

We all know its not over, said Lisa Mashburn, a Cambridge Health Alliance nurse practitioner. Still, she said, when she recently saw that her list of pregnant patients had no coronavirus cases, I definitely teared up, hit by an overwhelmed feeling, knowing that yes, the last year has been tough, but maybe were moving beyond that.

Boston Universitys Platt and her colleagues will be holding their breaths through the first weeks of school this fall, she said. If our cases stay low, and we have beautiful zeros again, we are all going to breathe a sigh of relief.

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Austin Hawk, center, with friends Bryce Armstrong, left, and Brent Grijalva, near Chino, Calif., in 2018. "The bois," as the friends called themselves, dreamed of co-founding a tech company. (Brent Grijalva)

Spc. Austin Hawks family knew he was counting the days until his military contract was up. So when an Army chaplain in a crisp dress uniform arrived at his grandmothers door in Southern California last June, she thought he was bringing some kind of farewell commendation.

The chaplain carried a different message. Hawk, 21, a soldier stationed in Georgia, had been killed, she was told  not in combat or in an accident but stabbed to death in his own barracks room on Fort Stewart.

The alleged assailant, the family would later learn, was a former soldier from Hawks platoon who had walked uncontested through an unmanned installation gate to carry out what prosecutors have said was a conspiracy to silence Hawk for reporting misconduct.

I was devastated, Sandra Hodge, Hawks grandmother, said in an interview. It left a huge, huge hole in our lives. And Ill never get that filled.

That episode, a year ago this week, has heaped confusion on top of the familys grief: How could a soldier who was a witness to alleged crimes be killed on a military base by a man who walked in off the street?

The killing at Fort Stewart prompted a review of base security and the installation of an 8-foot fence and razor wire at the gate that the suspect allegedly entered, the Army said. The review uncovered two other perimeter security concerns that have been addressed, an official said. But the Army has not yet initiated an investigation of command decisions that may have disclosed Hawks role as a witness to drug use in his unit or the security issues at the facility.

I believe the Army is culpable in his murder, said his mother, Julie Hawk.

In a statement, the Army said it relies on numerous measures to protect its sprawling installations, including security personnel, electronic surveillance and natural terrain. Maj. Gen. Antonio Aguto, the commander of the Third Infantry Division, based at Fort Stewart, oversees continuous security evaluations.

At the time the suspect allegedly trespassed onto Fort Stewart, the installation was in compliance with regulations and policies concerning the installations physical security measures, Lt. Col. Lindsey Elder, a division spokeswoman, said in the statement.

Hawk, who grew up in California and Arizona, joined the Army in July 2017, and a welcome change came over him, his family said.

The Army made him a man. It made him more focused, more determined, Julie Hawk said.

Austin Hawk was a model soldier and well-liked in the 92nd Chemical Company, where his unit was trained to handle hazardous-material threats on the battlefield, Army officials have said.

In a Facebook post two days after Hawks death, a soldier who served with him recounted a field exercise punctuated by the early morning news of his own sons birth. Hawk calmed his comrade, carried his heavy rucksack and searched for a way to get him home quickly.

Thats the type of guy Hawk was, the soldier wrote. He would put the needs of others before his own.

Hawk was taking online college courses in his off-duty time and planned to move back to Arizona after his Army contract finished at the end of 2020. He and two friends, who bonded in high school over complicated family issues, planned to finish electrical engineering degrees and dreamed of co-founding a tech company, said Bryce Armstrong, part of the trio they called the bois. He eagerly awaited Hawks arrival out West.

We decided to make our own family, Armstrong said. Three brothers against the world.

The alleged conspiracy to silence Hawk, prosecutors wrote, began after he reported alleged misconduct by two other soldiers in his platoon. Byron Booker, 28, a noncommissioned officer, was accused of unprofessional behavior and mistreating subordinates. Hawk also accused Jordan Brown, a 21-year-old private, of drug use.

Hawk saw things in black and white, said his father, Andrew Hawk. Unfortunately, that is what got him killed.

This description of events leading to Hawks death on June 17, 2020, is drawn from court and autopsy documents; interviews with Hawks friends; and details from two people with knowledge of an April phone call among Army officials, a federal prosecutor and Julie Hawk. Attorneys for Booker and Brown and a federal prosecutor declined to comment, citing ongoing legal proceedings.

Booker was kicked out of the Army weeks before the killing. Brown remained in the Army, and prosecutors allege that he had discussed plans to get a key card to Hawks barracks room.

On the evening before his death, Hawk played the online video game Call of Duty with Brent Grijalva, the third member of the bois, Grijalva said. Nothing was out of the ordinary. They exchanged goodbyes after some digital matches.

A few hours later, around midnight, Booker parked his car on the western edge of Fort Stewart near Gate 7, one of numerous access points at the installation that was unmanned during the night, according to the indictment and Army officials.

The gate, which allows authorized soldiers and civilians to drive onto the base, was designed to restrict the flow of vehicles with a movable barrier that a pedestrian could easily sidestep  a possibility apparently overlooked by those responsible for security at the base but allegedly exploited by Booker.

We did not assess that folks would walk through there, Col. Alric Francis, who previously commanded Hawks brigade, said on the April call. I think if you walk around it, youre in.

Booker continued on for about a mile to the barracks, climbed a stairwell and entered Room 208, according to the indictment.

It is unclear if Hawk answered the door or if his assailant used a key card to enter, according to court records. Hawk was stabbed 40 times, including strikes through his lungs and brain, an autopsy later concluded.

Booker left Fort Stewart on foot, presumably through the same gate, and discarded the clothes he had worn, according to the indictment. He was arrested the next day. Brown, who was kicked out of the Army in October, was arrested after a grand jury indictment in April.

Both men face numerous capital felony charges in federal court, including premeditated murder, murder of a service member and retaliation against a witness, prosecutors said.

The Army has not launched formal investigations to assess whether commanders should be held accountable for Hawks death. Civilian law enforcement officials asked the Army to hold off investigating how Hawks identity as a witness was disclosed until prosecutors get further along in their case, an Army official at Fort Stewart said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing case.

The Army is committed to . . . taking action against what we learn from law enforcement, the official said.

The military may also look at potential command failures that made Gate 7 exploitable, but there were no issues at the gate identified in a 2018 installation vulnerability assessment, according to the official.

Its puzzling they would point to a review done prior to the incident that shows it was fine, said Rachel VanLandingham, president of the National Institute of Military Justice. Obviously, its not fine.

Hawks family has commended the Army for providing assistance through a military liaison and praised some leaders for their outreach. But answers to basic questions have been elusive. As far as information, its been zero, Andrew Hawk said.

Julie Hawk has taken a more critical approach. Her other son requires extensive medical care, and she envisioned Austin helping with family duties when he returned. Now she has turned to online donations to help defray costs.

Her home has been beset by form letters from lawmakers and Army officials describing Hawk as a hero, she said, a word that angers her.

My son wasnt a hero, she said. My son went to bed with every intention of waking up.
The positivity rate for new cases of COVID-19 in Florida seems to be increasing. The state Department of Health reported a new case positivity rate statewide for COVID-19 of 3.8% for the week of June 18-24 compared to 3.3% for June 11-17 and 3.4% the week previous.
Members of the Urban Enterprise Association on Thursday voted to hand out more than $60,000 for exterior improvements happening within its boundaries, including money for a couple who first went before them more than a year ago.

Brett and Lara Dawson first appeared before the board in January of 2020 armed with a handful of quotes for a long list of exterior improvements totaling about $100,000  including new windows, tuck-pointing and some fresh paint  to the former Body Tanning building at 402 N. Seventh St., which now houses Dawsforce Technology, Brett Dawsons own tech company.

At the time, the UEA was low on funds, so the Dawsons were sent away.

In July of that year, the UEA opted to award them $5,000 for some new windows, but they returned in January for a third time asking for more help.

The UEA opted to table their request as, given that so much time had passed, they didnt fully understand the scope of the work, members said.

So the Dawsons came back for a fourth time on Thursday, this time armed with a brand new quote from local contractor Wolfe Construction, one for a similar amount of just over $100,000 for, primarily, masonry and exterior paint.

Previously-secured quotes  including one from Pittman General Contracting in Linton for $85,960, another from Ortega Contracting in Bloomington for $107,000 and a third from local company C&Z Masonry and Construction for an even higher $108,800  are likely now obsolete, Dawson pointed out, due to the ever-rising costs of construction materials.

Many of those bids, too, included new windows, but the Dawsons, in the last year, have decided that work to be cost prohibitive, at least right now.

Part of the reason the couple had been turned away previously was due to a lack of bids from local contractors; the UEA typically requires two, although applicants say that is becoming increasingly difficult to do.

But Dawson pointed out that in 2019, Pittman was hired by the city itself to take on a grant-funded restoration of the Works Progress Administration-Era shelter house at Gregg Park.

It was good enough for the city but not good enough for a private citizen, Dawson told the board.

Dawson also said the new quote from Wolfe for a somewhat scaled-back project is likely the only reliable one, and after a brief discussion, the board voted to award the Dawsons $10,000 but only for tuck-pointing. They placed a stipulation on the money, too  the couple must spend at least $20,000 to be reimbursed the $10,000, a practice not common for the board.

In many other cases, the UEA has awarded half the cost of the proposed project, if funding allows. Other local businesses have, in the past, secured more, including nearly $40,000 given to the owners of Procopios Pizza and Pasta and $60,000  spread over two years  to Old Chicago Pizza and Taproom.

In other business Thursday, the UEA agreed to give Shepard Dunn $1,500  or half of his request  for the restoration of an old ghost sign atop a building he owns at 29 N. First St., one most commonly known as the Dots building.

He recently had the entire building, he said, tuck-pointed, and in the process, crews uncovered an old painted sign for C.B. Donnell Wholesale and Retail, a meat market dating back to 1910, Dunn told the board.

So Im asking for some help in restoring some of Vincennes history, he said.

He sought estimates for all kinds of work, he told the board, including $5,000 to just paint the entire facade, including over the sign remnants as well.

But the owners of Ewing Printing approached him about a product called alumigraphics, which is a kind of adhesive sign.

They can attach it to the building, completely restoring the sign  even distressing it to make it look more authentic  but it wont damage the brick underneath and can be removed later, Dunn said.

A similar technique was used to put a large graphic on Davis Hall, 1200 N. Second St., on the Vincennes University campus.

It will last 7-10 years and wont irritate the original facade at all, he said, adding that it is rolled on similar to a car wrap and that the brick will be visible underneath.

When I saw this product, I was convinced it was what I wanted to do, he told the board. It looks as though its been painted on, but it hasnt.

And that way, Im not messing with the original (sign) or its integrity. And I can always paint it later.

UEA member Aaron Bauer, however, expressed concern with the method, specifically in that it hasnt been used here often  if ever. And he worried about how long it would last, essentially wasting the UEAs money.

Id hate to think that in 2025 this stuff is peeling off, he said.

Instead, Bauer said he would rather give money toward the cost of repainting it.

There is plenty of outline left to do it nicely, he said of the sign.

But Ewing Printing owner Jim Zeigler, who is president of the UEA and abstained from casting a vote in this particular request, said the board had no business telling Dunn what he should be doing with his own building.

Dont get the idea that (the alumigraphics) wont look nice, because it would, Zeigler said. But if you feel that way, just deny giving him any help at all.

We cant tell him what to do with his own building.

In the end, however, Bauer agreed and changed his mind, saying the use of this product could lead to great success and other, more affordable options for those restoring historic buildings.

And in still other business, the board approved a previously-tabled request of $50,000  spread over two years  to Grouseland as it takes on a multi-million dollar restoration there as well as two Upgrade Vincennes applications from Gary Hamilton and his mother Beth Wilson for the repair of porches on their homes at 408 S. Fourth St. and 307 Church St. respectively. The two were awarded a combined $3,300, which should cover the total cost of construction.
EDITORS NOTE: To add your church information, email it to vscnews@suncommercial.com before noon on the prior Thursday.

ASBURY CHAPEL AND BICKNELL UNITED METHODIST CHURCH

Bicknell Asbury Chapel, 11744 E. Ragsdale Road, worship service is at 9 a.m. and Bicknell United Methodist Church, 309 W. Third St., worship service is at 10:30 a.m. Pastor is Greg Waggoner.

BETHANY PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH

Bethany Presbyterian Church, 702 N. Eighth St., will have fellowship from 10-10:30 a.m. and worship at 10:30 a.m. every Sunday. The speaker will be Rusty Thorne.

CENTRAL CHURCH OF CHRIST

Central Church of Christ, 1600 Forbes Road, is holding in-person worship services on Sundays at 10:30 a.m. as well as live on its Facebook page, Central Church of Christ Vincennes. The services are also being broadcast live at 10:30 a.m. on WVJE 98.7 FM.

The sermon titles on Sunday will be a.m. Having Joy in the Faith Philippians 1:19-26; p.m. Growth Through Adversity James 1:2-4 by Ben Wollard

COMMUNITY UNITED METHODIST CHURCH

Community United Methodist Church, 1548 S. Hart Street Road, has service at 9:30 a.m. on Sundays. The service can be viewed live on the church Facebook page, Community United Methodist (Vincennes, Indiana). The services will also be downloaded to our Web site www.cumcvincennes.org for viewing any time. Sunday school for all ages begins at 10:45 a.m. Everyone is welcome.

The sermon title on Sunday is Life in the Spirit by Pastor Darren Williams.

FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH

First Baptist Church, 2625 Wabash Ave., is holding in-person worship services on Sundays at 9 a.m. and 10:30 a.m. while following social distancing guidelines. Services can also be viewed live on our Facebook page, First Baptist Church and also through the Web site at http://fbcvin.com. Sunday small groups and childrens church are available during both services. Youth group will meet on Sunday from 6-8 p.m. View the latest updated information at First Baptist Church Facebook page.

FIRST CHURCH OF GOD

First Church of God, 1408 E. Saint Clair St., offers Sunday morning small groups at 9 a.m., fellowship and coffee at 9:30 a.m. and worship at 10 a.m. with music led by Charlie McCracken, Bryan Quarterman and the Praise Band. Pastor Will Huebner will give the sermon this week.

Church on the Street meets on Wednesdays at 6:30 p.m.

FunDay Nights, for children in pre-k thorugh fifth grades, meets from 5-6 p.m. Sundays. Join us in fun, fellowship, and the love of Christ.

All Church Prayer meeting is from 5-6 p.m. Sunday in the fellowship hall at the church.

View the latest updated information at Vincennes First Church of God Facebook page and group, YouTube (First Church of God Vincennes), or our Web site at letsmakeadifference.net.

FIRST UNITED METHODIST CHURCH

First United Methodist Church, 411 N. Fourth St., offers a simple service at 9 a.m., and a traditional service at 10:30 a.m. each Sunday. Pastor is Matt Swisher. We welcome all children at our worship service. Nursery care is also provided. Call 812-882-0742.

FRANKLIN HEIGHTS CHRISTIAN CHURCH

When you come to Franklin Heights can expect that every Sunday that you will hear a sermon that is straight from Gods word. You can also expect to hear about what Jesus has done for sinners, and how He continues to tirelessly work in the lives of those who He has saved, making them more and more like Him. Sunday service starts at 9:30 a.m. at 1509 Franklin Drive. We would love to see you there!

INDIANA PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH

Indiana Presbyterian Church, 2431 S. Lower Indiana Road, will have in-person worship services at 10:30 a.m. on Sunday.

MONROE CITY CUMBERLAND PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH

Monroe City Cumberland Presbyterian Church, 208 W. Eighth St., will have Sunday worship at 10:30 a.m. with Pastor Dave Parman preaching Gods Word and its relevance for todays world. Come worship Jesus with us! He is worthy of worship.

MORRIS CHAPEL

Morris Chapel Church, 8780 E. Freelandville Road, Oaktown, will have Sunday school at 9:30 a.m. and worship service at 10:30 a.m. Guest speaker will be Keegan Thomas. Special music by Tom Lee. All are welcome to attend.

ST. JAMES EPISCOPAL CHURCH

St. James Episcopal Church, 610 Perry St., holds service every Sunday at 10 a.m. All are welcome.

ST. JOHN LUTHERAN CHURCH

St. John Lutheran Church, 707 N. Eighth St., sermon title for Sunday is Fathers Day Reminder!

ST. JOHNS UNITED CHURCH OF CHRIST

St Johns United Church of Christ, 606 N. Fifth St., is having in-person worship at 10:30 a.m. on Sundays with Sunday school at 9:30 a.m. Social distancing is practiced and masks are required while inside the church building. You will find the link to worship services, normally posted in the afternoon following the service, on the church Web site at myucc.org under the sermons tab. We also invite you to learn more at St. Johns by exploring the church Web site.

ST. PAULS LUTHERAN CHURCH

St. Pauls Lutheran Church, 925 Broadway St., holds Sunday services at 9:30 a.m. St. Pauls is an ELCA congregation. Social distancing in seating, Holy Communion, and sharing of the peace are recommended. Masks are optional but recommended for unvaccinated adults. On this fourth Sunday of Pentecost, Pastor April Dailey will preach from Mark 4:35-41 and Job 38:1-11 on the theme Calming the sea and stirring the waves. In celebration of Fathers Day, men attending the service will receive a small token of appreciation. Join us, all are welcome at St. Pauls.

ST. PETER LUTHERAN CHURCH

St. Peter Lutheran Church, 7000 S. Decker Road, has services at 10 a.m. on Sunday. Bible class and Sunday school are at 9 a.m. For those who cant make it to church, St. Peter sponsors Worship Anew, which is televised at 8 a.m. on Sundays on WTWO, channel 2 in Terre Haute.

The sermon title on Sunday is Jesus Speaks.

For more information call the church office at 812-882-8229.

ST. FRANCIS XAVIER PARISH

Mass Schedules

St. John Church, 803 Main St.

Saturday: 4:30 p.m.

Sunday: 7:30 a.m., 11 a.m.

Monday: 8:10 a.m.

Thursday: 8:10 a.m.

Old Cathedral, 205 Church St.

Sunday: 5:30 p.m.

Monday: 6 p.m.

Wednesday: 6 p.m.

Friday: 8:10 a.m., Noon

Saturday: 7:30 a.m.

St. Philip Neri Church, 605 W, Fourth St., Bicknell

Sunday: 9 a.m.

Tuesday: 6 p.m.

Sacred Heart, 2004 N. Second St.

Sunday: 9:30 a.m.

Wednesday: 8:10 a.m.

Saturday: 5 p.m.

St. Vincent, 1837 S. Hart Street Rd.

Tuesday: 8:10 a.m.

St. Thomas Catholic Church, 6268 S. St. Thomas Road

Thursday: 6 p.m.

THURSDAY CHURCH

Thursday Church, 218 Main St., at has services at 10:45 a.m. on Sunday and 6:45 p.m. on Thursday.

This Sunday will be Fathers Day fun day at Gregg Park from 10:45 a.m.-12:30 p.m. Everyone is invited.

Those uncomfortable with meeting in person can join online at https://live.thursdaychurch.org or on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/thursdaychurchvin/live.

UPPER INDIANA PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH

Upper Indiana Presbyterian Church, 2345 N. Bruceville Road, will hold service at 9 a.m. Sunday with Sunday school to follow. Pastor Pete White will share his message. Everyone is welcome to worship in this casual, country church.

VINCENNES FREE METHODIST CHURCH

Vincennes Free Methodist Church, 1423 N. Fourth St., is offering in-person Sunday School at 9:30 a.m. and Worship Services in the sanctuary at 10:30 a.m. on Sundays. Use the Fourth Street entrance. Live to Please the Lord. We also have worship services posted on our Facebook page-https://www.facebook.com/VincennesFMC.

Spanish worship is offered at 2 p.m. on Sundays. Use the Sycamore Street entrance and go downstairs.

WABASH COMMUNITY CHURCH

Wabash Community Church, 1033 N. 10th St., has returned to in-house worship. Sunday school for adults with Richard Beesley begins at 9:30 a.m. and worship at 10:30 a.m. Everyone is invited to join us where the Gospel is heard in Word and Song.

Fathers Day sermon is titled A Fathers Plea from Book of Luke by Pastor Dale Biehl. Special music by Rebbeca Laskey. Kole Adams will be reading a fathers day poem during the worship hour. Nick Sims will lead our worship accompanied by Darlene Small and Ann Dix.

Everyone is welcome, but for those not able, both our Sunday school and worship is on Facebook and our Web site, www.wabashcommunitychurch.com.

WORD OF LIFE CHURCH

Word of Life Church, 7144 Russell Drive, Bicknell, has Sunday school at 9 a.m., followed by Sunday morning worship celebration at 10 a.m. Childrens church is offered for children ages 4 through fifth grade. L.O.F.T. Youth Ministry meets at 4 p.m. on Sundays and 7 p.m. on Wednesdays. Wednesday evening activities will resume at 7 p.m. on Aug. 11. Like us on Facebook. The worship is broadcast live at 10 a.m. on Sundays on the Word Of Life Church Facebook page. Pastor is John M. Moreland and youth pastor is Emily Moreland.
Vincennes Universitys Board of Trustees on Wednesday approved a tuition increase for students.

In-state tuition will increase $200 for the 2021-22 school year, bringing the total to $6,450. The total cost in 2022-23 will increase again to $6,656.

Even still, university officials say, VU remains the lowest-priced residential college in Indiana.

At the same time, VU has increased scholarship aid to assist more students and has taken several measures to offset the cost of attending VU, according to a press release issued Thursday.

The millions of dollars in enhanced scholarships are important to help us assist those who have been impacted by the pandemic and the challenges they may have faced in their family and financial circumstances, said VU President Dr. Chuck Johnson in the release.

We hope these additional scholarships will encourage more students to take advantage of the great educational experiences that Vincennes University offers at all of our campuses and locations.

As part of that initiative, nearly $500,000 has been allocated to additional scholarships for all university sites and locations across Indiana, online, and at military education locations.

The scholarship application deadline has also been extended to Aug. 15 to allow more students to take advantage of available aid.

Another special scholarship initiative was launched specifically to help students on the

Vincennes campus. Newly-admitted students and eligible returning students can save up to $10,000 on university housing. The Residential Opportunity Scholarship is worth up to $5,000 a year, renewable for two years of study.

VU and the Vincennes University Foundation awarded more than $4.2 million in scholarships for the 2020-21 academic year. On average, students received $3,447 over the academic year.

This years scholarship awards will be even greater. According to Johnson, with the new housing scholarship, the cost of attendance for a student living on the Vincennes campus will be down 28% each of the next two years.

VU, too, has partnered with the Pace Community Action Agency in Vincennes. For VU students who are parents or guardians, the partnership provides free childcare through the Early Head Start and Head Start programs to children ages birth to 5 years.

VU prides itself not on who we exclude, but all we include, Johnson said. The university provides outstanding and life-transforming opportunities for everyone.

We want to make it even more affordable and accessible.

In additional business this week, the board of trustees approved a general operating budget of $85.8 million for the 2021-22 fiscal year and $87.6 million for the 2022-23 fiscal year.

And according to Senior Director of External Relations Sarah Fortune, enrollment for upcoming fall semester looks optimistic as the projected incoming numbers are trending above this same time last year.

She told the board that while two months remain recruiting season, and she is cautiously optimistic.

Fall classes are scheduled to begin on Aug. 16.
More than 29,000 people entered through the gates on the first day of the largest agricultural event in the Southern Hemisphere, an increase of ten percent from day one of Fieldays 2019.

New Zealand National Fieldays Society CEO Peter Nation says yesterday was a great morale booster for the New Zealand primary sector.

You can feel the energy this year. Its an exciting time for New Zealand and for the primary sector and the events industry, and were really looking forward to the next three days.

Our exhibitors have really invested in this years event, the sites this year are spectacular.

In conversations Ive had with exhibitors, theyve said they have had strong sales and foot traffic through their sites and are enjoying having that face-to-face contact again with their customers, so thats excellent news, says Peter.

Visitors are in for a treat this Fieldays.

The KPMG Leaders Breakfast kicked off first thing in the morning, where KPMG launched the annual Agribusiness Agenda, revealing the latest insights into the agribusiness sector.

TVNZs Breakfast show was broadcasted for the second time ever away from TVNZs Auckland studio  the first being at the Americas Cup in March this year.

John Campbell, Indira Stewart, Jenny-May Clarkson, and Matty McLean headed to Mystery Creek and broadcasted live from the Fieldays TV glass studio.

New Zealand television icon, John Campbell says Fieldays is an institution, it is beloved, but its also about commerce.

Matty McLean got a crash course on how to tie a fencing contractors knot, giving a sneak peek of the high-level of skill visitors can expect to see at the Fieldays Fencing Competitions.

John Campbell chatted to the amazing volunteers including Jenni Vernon, a NZNFS board member who cooks for all the Fieldays staff and volunteers, ensuring theyre fueled up to deliver an amazing event.

Jenny-May chatted to Mark Eager, CEO of Mobile Health, who hosts Fieldays Health and Wellbeing Hub, which provides an interactive health and wellness platform that farmers and growers can resonate with.

The team flipped the switch on Fieldays TV, which launched live at 10.30am. Day one of Fieldays TV included Nici Wickes cooking a delicious chicken liver pate on Fieldays Kitchen and the Health and Wellbeing segment included discussions about melanoma and maternity care in rural communities.

Fieldays Future Focus, brought to you by Farmlands, tackled hot rural sector topics such as challenges with food equity and diversifying land use.

The Rt Hon Jacinda Ardern joined Te Radar on the Fieldays couch to talk about all things agriculture.

This could well be the most significant show of its kind globally this year, Jacinda says.

The Fieldays TV interview included topics such as work force issues exacerbated by Covid-19, the Governments work to date in the primary sector, and working with farmers and growers to face climate action.

Commenting on the vital role of the primary sector in the past year, Jacinda says our food producers have played such a critical role for actually helping get New Zealand through.

When the team of 5 million were predominantly staying at home, it was [our food producers] that were still trying to find ways to operate and get their products to market.

We owe them a huge debt of gratitude.

The Rt Hon Jacinda Ardern also attended the Stakeholders Luncheon alongside ministers Hon Stuart Nash, Hon Meka Whaitiri, and Hon Dr Ayesha Verrall.

Yesterday evening, New Zealand National Fieldays Society President, James Allen announced the Fieldays 2021 Site Awards, which are judged on visual display, customer engagement, compliance, and an outstanding feature of their exhibition.

The Commitment to Sustainability Award, presented to Trevelyans Pack and Cool Ltd, was judged on sustainability messaging to the public, waste and energy management during the event, and inclusion of sustainable promotional material at their exhibition.

James says the standards of exhibitor sites at Fieldays are lifting higher each year. The quality of the sites this year is exceptional; exhibitors have really gone the extra mile.

It really highlights how excited exhibitors are to be back on site at Fieldays this year, he says.

Fieldays 2021 Site Award winners

Best Outdoor Site less than 200m: Flexi Tanks NZ Ltd

Best Outdoor Site 200m  400m: Safari Tents NZ Ltd

Best Outdoor Site over 400m: Te Pari Products Ltd

Best Indoor Site: Ministry for Primary Industries, Manatu Ahu Matua (MPI)

Fieldays Supreme Site: Te Pari Products Ltd

Commitment to Sustainability Award: Trevelyans Pack and Cool Ltd

For more information head to www.fieldays.co.nz.
Air New Zealand expects to report a full-year loss of under $450 million.

In an update to the market, the national carrier says it has not drawn down any further on its loan from the government.

It says the recovery in domestic travel and the government's contribution to its cargo business has been a significant factor in mitigating the effects of Covid-19.

In February the company posted a net loss of $72 million for the six months ended December and says it had taken significant steps to cut costs.

In its earnings guidance to the stock market on Friday, the airline says it expected losses before other significant items and taxation will not exceed $450 million for the 2021 financial year.

Domestic capacity was at approximately 90 per cent of pre-Covid levels, while the Tasman market was at 70 per cent pre-pandemic levels following the opening of the travel bubble in April, the company's statement says. Long-haul travel continued to be a lag, with flights less than five per cent of where they were pre-pandemic.

Its cargo business continued to be supported by government subsidies and was expected to contribute between $320m and $340m in revenue.

The government's Maintaining International Air Connectivity scheme provided the airline with the support needed to operate an average of 30 international flights a week until the end of October 2021, it says.

Uncertainty remained despite the domestic market continuing to perform strongly and the fact that bookings on the Tasman and Cook Islands continue to build, it says.

The airline was not expecting any meaningful recovery in long-haul demand in the 2022 financial year "notwithstanding the rollout of global vaccination programmes and the potential for long-haul borders to begin reopening progressively in the second half of the financial year".

It told the NZX underlying operating performance was expected to gradually improve over the coming financial year but international border reopenings, fuel and currency fluctuations, and the recovery of long-haul travel demand remained highly uncertain.

Air New Zealand has benefited from government support and other mechanisms totalling about $300m, which would not continue the same level in the 2022 financial year, it says.

It has not drawn down any further on its $1.5 billion loan facility from the government. The total drawn down remained at $350m, leaving $1.15b available.

The airline was still planning to undertake a capital raise before the end of September, it says.

The airline currently anticipates a loss before other significant items and taxation in the 2022 financial year comparable with that expected for the 2021 financial year.

Salary reductions to end

The company had begun renegotiating the delivery date of the first of eight new Boeing 787 Dreamliners, which were ordered in 2019. The first plane is expected in 2024.

The national carrier also announces that it would end salary reductions from the start of the next financial year.

In recognition of its staff's commitment during the past 12 months, the company would be giving about 8000 staff $1000 worth of shares.

"This is the right thing to do given the mahi and sacrifices Air New Zealanders have made to get the airline through survive and into its revive phase," chief executive Greg Foran says.
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Lawton, OK (73501)

Today

Mostly cloudy early. Isolated thunderstorms may develop this afternoon. High 83F. Winds NNE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 30%..

Tonight

Mostly cloudy skies this evening. A few showers developing late. Low near 70F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 30%.
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Seminole, FL (33772)

Today

Variable clouds with thunderstorms, especially during the afternoon hours. High 84F. Winds WSW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 40%..

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Partial cloudiness early, with scattered showers and thunderstorms overnight. Low 79F. Winds WSW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 50%.
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Bottom line: It's mostly a case of function over form with phones like the new Moto Defy, which also marks Motorola's return to the 'Defy' series after a 9-year hiatus. This mid-ranger is the first addition to Motorola's resurrected series and is built in partnership with Bullitt Group, the firm that makes CAT- and Land Rover-branded rugged phones for outdoorsy folk. The Moto Defy with its IP68 rating, MIL-spec 810H certification and Gorilla Victus display is launching in select European and Latin American markets for 329 / 279 ($387).

Dress the Moto G9 Play in tougher overalls and you get the new Moto Defy, a mid-ranger powered by Snapdragon's 662 SoC with a sizeable 6.5-inch 720p display that's now protected by Gorilla Glass Victus.

The Moto Defy comes with a dual-sealed housing and is IP68 rated for protection against harsh elements like sand, dust, dirt and humidity. Its 3.5mm jack and charging port are also waterproof, while the phone itself can be submerged in up to 1.5m / 5ft of water for 35 minutes.

It will also survive 1.8m / 6ft drops and has a structurally reinforced circuit board to secure it against vibrations and tumbles. While not something as extreme as the Samsung Galaxy S20 TE, the Moto Defy should withstand harsh weather, fumbles and coffee spills of everyday life.

Motorola says that 34 percent of consumers have either broken or damaged their phones in the last three years, making the Moto Defy a worthy proposition. Although it looks tempting with the toughened exterior and a 5,000mAh battery, some will be put off by its size, the last-gen (non-5G) chipset, 4GB/64GB microSD expandable storage and a mediocre camera system.

In terms of software, the Moto Defy ships with Android 10 (upgradeable to Android 11). Motorola also notes Android Enterprise level support, two years of security updates, and a 2-year warranty. The phone will be available in forged green and black colors when it launches in select markets over the coming weeks.
In context: El Salvador's move to have the entire country accept Bitcoin after it became legal currency could face problems following the World Bank's decision not to help with the implementation. The international financial institution cited concerns over the environmental impact of Bitcoin mining and transparency.

Earlier this month, El Salvador became the first country to adopt Bitcoin as legal tender. It sits alongside the US dollar as the Central American country's official currency, with the exchange rate freely established by the market. Additionally, prices for goods can be shown in Bitcoin, tax contributions can be paid with the crypto, and exchanges involving Bitcoin will not be subject to capital gains tax.

El Salvador set a three-month deadline for Bitcoin to be accepted across the nation, but hitting that target may prove difficult after the World Bank said it must do so without the organization's assistance.

"We are committed to helping El Salvador in numerous ways including for currency transparency and regulatory processes," said a World Bank spokesperson in an email to Reuters.

"While the government did approach us for assistance on bitcoin, this is not something the World Bank can support given the environmental and transparency shortcomings."

On Wednesday, El Salvador's Finance Minister Alejandro Zelaya said the country had sought technical assistance from the World Bank as it aimed to implement Bitcoin as an official currency.

Separately, Zelaya said that the International Monetary Fund was "not against" the crypto's implantation and ongoing negations had been successful, though the IMF did say there are "macroeconomic, financial and legal issues" with the process.

Bitcoin has fallen from around $39,000 yesterday to ~$37,600 at the time of writing. We recently heard that the Chinese crackdown on cryptomining and the decreasing value of BTC have seen demand for graphics cards in the Asian nation cool amid declining GPU prices.

Image credit: Useacoin
A hot potato: Scalpers are one of several reasons why the price and availability of graphics cards are comparable to gold right now, but several retailers are introducing measures to try and curb the practice of reselling.

A Micro Center in Dallas made headlines earlier this month after someone captured chaotic scenes of customers rushing to grab restocked Nvidia cards. The incident illustrated the unprecedented demand and desperation for products were experiencing right now, which has resulted in scalpers selling GPUs on eBay for two to four times their MSRP.

Many retailers are attempting to stop resellers by implementing restrictions. Reddit user cubiclewarrior50 (via Kotaku) took a photo of a notice at their local Micro Center showing the graphics card-buying rules.

In order to assure that more customers have the opportunity to purchase video cards, Micro Center is restricting video card sales to 1 per customer every 30 days, the sign reads.

Image credit: cubiclewarrior50

In order to enforce this policy, purchases must be completed using a drivers license or government-issued ID. Several commentators say their local stores have the same or similar rules in place.

There are ways to circumvent such restrictions, of course, including getting friends/family members to buy extra cards for resale, but it does make the whole process of bulk buying and reselling more difficult.

In the UK, members of parliament proposed a bill that would prohibit the automated purchase and resale of games consoles and computer components; and for connected purposes, though it may not lead to any solid action.

There has been some recent good news for gamers looking to upgrade their PCs. ASRock says card prices are falling as a result of Chinas crackdown on cryptomining, which has seen less demand for GPUs in the country. That's encouraging, seeing as 700,000 graphics cards that shipped in Q1 ended up in the hands of miners.

Our monthly look at GPU availability and pricing shows the average eBay selling price of Ampere/RDNA 2 cards fell -8% from May to June, while the Nvidia RTX 2000-series was down -14% during the same period.
Facebook is now allowing satire posts to stay on everyone's News Feed, and would not be immediately subjected as "misinformation," despite its massive change to its Community Guidelines. The company has recently allowed this and is now being adopted by its Oversight Board, giving misleading memes that are satirical by nature, a free pass.

Facebook Allows Satire Posts to Stay

Memes on Facebook lives on, and it would continue to stay on the platform, provided that it is of satirical nature, and not intended to mislead people into believing false knowledge. Facebook has been cracking down on misinformation for quite some time now, and it has evolved its Oversight Board to be a more assertive entity amongst the social media's content moderation efforts.

Facebook has enforced different content moderation tools and policies to help further its fight against misinformation, featuring AIs that can help detect conflicts in comments for moderators and more. The social media company has also aimed to better its platform for children and avoid predatory schemes and harassment online.

Read Also: Facebook to Launch Podcast Tool on June 22

Facebook's Oversight Board to Look Into Wrongful Bans

Despite Facebook's battle against misinformation, it has allowed a more lax approach in handling satirical posts and memes on its platform, by having the Oversight Board review it further for its stay in the News Feed. This was based on a case by a Turkish poster that has talked about the Armenians and its government's genocide, intended to be satirical.

Initially, Facebook's AI has detected it to be a post that violates the Community Guidelines by the social media, and banned the content, taking it off the platform. However, it was contested by the people that have posted it, saying that it was not intended to spread "Hate Speech," or the said violation.

With this, the Oversight Board was brought in, and these are composed of content moderator persons which use the "human side" of Facebook's content moderation aspect. Having them would appeal more to the emotions and intentions of people which have been branded by Facebook's AI as a violation. The board has reinstated the post, seeing as it was satirical.

Facebook's New Content Direction

In recent months, Facebook has been seen to have been reinforcing its measures to fight against fake news and people that go against the Community Guidelines.

This is to help the social media platform be a better place to stay and browse on, despite the many concerns against its operations, directed against its management.

Facebook's new content direction has helped it be a safer place, especially amidst the beginnings of the COVID-19 pandemic and vaccination era, where people have been posting about fake news non-stop.

Related Article: Facebook to Develop a Model to Fight Deepfakes Technology

This article is owned by Tech Times

Written by Isaiah Richard

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Tesla car crashes have been controversial following its self-driving system that many people have criticized. Recently, the auto regulators in the United States said that 30 accidents involving Elon Musk's cars are connected to the advanced driver assistance system.

Since 2016, 10 deaths have been recorded to happen among Tesla car drivers. For this, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) was ordered to launch a special investigation about these events. They also released the latest details that would undergo a review.

Tesla Car Crashes Are Now Under Investigation

The NHTSA, a US federal government agency under the Department of Transportation has been tapped to begin investigating several cases involving Tesla car crashes. Moreover, the organization suspected that the Autopilot System of the electric vehicle is responsible for a series of accidents that previously took place.

However, Tesla CEO Elon Musk said that the Autopilot feature should not be blamed for the fatal crash, BBC previously reported. At that time, the philanthropist stated that the self-driving system was not enabled by the operators. The accident involving the 2019 Tesla Model S claimed the two lives of its passengers on board.

According to NHTSA, Tesla's advanced driver assistance system has been found out to be the cause of the recent deaths in 30 car crashes. Furthermore, the agency has published the reports in two incidents after the verdict.

When asked about the case, Tesla did not comment.

Previously, NHTSA stated that it has unlocked 28 special crash investigations connected to Tesla. 24 cases were left pending. The spreadsheet released by the agency showed data traced back to February 2019. According to the information, there was no indication that Full-Self Driving was used.

The investigators added that the Autopilot was activated in at least three Tesla EV crashes in the US beginning in 2016.

Read Also: Tesla Yoke Steering Wheel To Soon Get 'Progressive Steering' Tech, Says Elon Musk, But Stays Mechanical for Model S For Now

Car Crashes Outside Tesla

In another report published by Reuters on Friday, June 18, the spreadsheet also involved six more car crashes that shared the similar driver assistance feature. This also covered the cases in the Cadillac autos, but no injuries were found among the passengers.

Besides the Cadillac crashes, the four other cases tackled the 2017 Navya Arma and 2021 Lexus Rx45OH. Both of them did not record any injuries, as well.

Meanwhile, there were two fatal car crashes linked to the 2017 Volvo XC90 cars. The Arizona woman succumbed to the accident in 2018.

On Wednesday, June 16, Maria Cantwell, the Senate Commerce Committee chair said that the panel has agreed to impose regulations regarding the self-driving features of the FSD cars.

"It seems like every other week we're hearing about a new vehicle that crashed when it was on Autopilot," Cantwell said.

Related Article: Self-Driving Cars Caused More Speeding and Car Crash Cases, Study Shows

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Written by Joseph Henry

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Snapchat has pulled the plug on its controversial speed filter, the company announced.

The filter, which lets users measure the speed a phone is moving and then share it on the app, has been on Snapchat since 2013.

According to a report by NPR, a Snapchat spokesperson said that the speed filter is "barely used" by the users of the app as the reason the company is removing it altogether.

Snapchat Speed Filter Caused Car Accidents: Critics

Snapchat's speed filter has been one of the many filters on the app that have caused an uproar among users and critics.

In particular, the speed is at the center of numerous safety-related controversies since it was first introduced. Critics have alleged that the filter has caused multiple car accidents that resulted in injuries and even deaths. These include:

2015 - Christal McGee used the app while driving with two co-workers, one of whom was pregnant at that time, and trying to reach the speed of 100 mph on Snapchat. Her car then crashed into an approaching Mitsubishi Outlander at 107 mph. The driver of the Mitsubishi Outlander suffered trauma to his body and brain, while McGee still managed to post a Snapchat of her bloodied self after the accident.

2016 - A post published on Snapchat showed a passenger using the speed app while taking a video of the driver, Pablo Cortes III, as they traversed along E Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard in Florida. Their car then slammed into a minivan, which was carrying a mother and her two children. All passengers of the minivan, Cortes, and his passenger all passed away due to the accident. The speed filter registered 115.6 mph.

2017 - Three teenagers died in a car accident in Wisconsin after their car came off the road, hit a tree, and burst into flames. In a lawsuit, the parents of two of the teenagers alleged that the passengers were using Snapchat's speed filter and that the car was moving at 113 mph at the time of the accident.

Related Article: Snapchat is in Danger of a Lawsuit as Users Accuse Platform of Encouraging Reckless Driving Due to Speed Filter

Lawsuits Filed By Victims Against Snapchat

Some of these accidents have led victims and loved ones of the deceased to file lawsuits against Snapchat over their speed app.

In relation to the 2015 accident involving Christal McGee, the driver of the Mitsubishi Outlander sued both her and Snapchat as a result of the accident. The lawsuit alleged that while McGee was to blame for using the app while driving, she wouldn't even have a reason to be using Snapchat at the time of the accident if the filter did not exist to begin with.

As for the 2017 accident, the parents of two of the teenagers who died filed a lawsuit against Snapchat over their negligent design that allowed the speed filter to be included on the app. In a ruling made early this year by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, it was decided by the court that Snapchat should face the lawsuit, according to Reuters.

Read Also: Lawsuit Filed Against Snapchat Over Inappropriate Content Served To Minors Through Discover

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Written by Isabella James

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
(Photo : Screenshot From PlayStation Official Website)

Walmart PS5 restock is now selling limited digital versions. However, the stock has already gone and gamers are now frustrated as the time given to them was not the time of the launch. Although gamers just had to wait for 10 minutes, some of them didn't know that waiting could increase their chances. Could this be a new anti-bot technique?

Walmart PS5 Restock Online

Gamers were given the announcement that there would be a new Walmart PS5 restock that would only be selling the digital version of the console. Basically, the new Walmart PS5 restock was announced to launch at 3:00PM. While gamers were prepared to go in and buy the PlayStation 5, the add to cart option wasn't available.

Some gamers' instinct was that the stock was sold out which prompted them to leave the site altogether. However, a few gamers decided to wait for 10 minutes until 3:10. By waiting for just 10 minutes, the PS5 online stock magically became available and gamers were able to purchase it online.

PS5 Restock Online VS Scalpers

The PS5 stock online, however, did launch at 3:00PM but was then instantly bought out by scalpers using bots to purchase the console. After the first wave was sold out, the next wave gave a little more success to a few gamers that were able to purchase the console during the second wave!

The conversation and discussion happened on a thread of a PS5 restock tracker on Twitter that gave the news of a new Walmart PS5 restock. The stock, however, was still instantly sold out as more and more gamers have been trying to purchase the console. Online. Although some gamers were successful in purchasing the new PlayStation 5, others striked with no luck once again.

Read Also: Walmart Xbox Series X Restock | New Tip: Expected Stock to Roll Out in Waves

PS5 Restock, Xbox Series X Restock, GPU Restock

Scalpers have been making buying the PlayStation 5, the Xbox Series X, and even some GPUs extremely difficult. Due to them using bots, the scalpers are able to automatically place an order in less than a second which is unfair when compared to regular buyers.

Scalpers, however, are only capable of doing this due to the global chip shortage. Due to the lack of supply of chips, consoles and other electronics are affected as well. The limited supply and the saturated demand has created a market wherein scalpers swoop in, buy the console, then sell them at higher prices.

Sadly, even Sony acknowledges that the PlayStation 5 shortage will last well into next year. It might be some time before gamers actually see the supply of these consoles normalize and buying the new PS5 or Xbox Series X would not be as hard as competing with scalpers online. As of the moment, however, gamers' best hope is to follow restock trackers online and move as fast as possible in order to purchase the consoles from online retailers.

Related Article: NVIDIA Buys DeepMap Autonomous Mapping Company to Improve DRIVE Platform

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Written by Urian B.

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Qualcomm recently announced that your Old Wear OS smartwatches could still adopt the latest Wear OS 3.0 upgrade on different Wear platforms, specifically those under the Wear 3100 and Wear 4100. The chipmaker ensured that the new software would work smoothly beyond its capacity.

OS 3.0 Update to be Included in the Older Wear OS Models

According to XDA Developers, a spokesperson from Qualcomm said that they are now coordinating with Google to contain the new Wear OS 3.0 upgrade to the Snapdragon 4100 and 4100+. This will also include the Snapdragon Wear 3100 which would be housed in the upgrade.

Following another interview, the chip maker's representative added that what they prioritize is the user's experience. At the moment, there's no official confirmation that the upcoming Wear OS smartwatches will arrive on the "unified platform."

Moreover, they also issued some technical requirements for the users to allow the update to operate in the platform so that the optimal user experience would be achieved.

Last month, the Google I/O conference tackled the new brand name for the new version of the Wear OS. Furthermore, the collaboration of Qualcomm would be extended to the South Korean tech giant, Samsung for the development of a high-tech smartwatch in the future.

Some of the improvements that would happen for the merge are the extended battery life and the improved performance of the wearable to name a few. Furthermore, the Google conference also discussed the possible YouTube Music support and a Fitbit integration on the newly-developed system.

Read Also: Google I/O 2021 Summary: What We Got and We Didn't Get This Year

Are there Specifics for the OS Wear 3.0 Updates?

According to Digital Trends, Google has been silent for a while about the expected updates that we could think of. For the part of the traditional Wear OS versions, Fossil said that its wearables won't have support from the new Google Wear. On the other hand, Mobvoi, which introduced TicWatch GTH last April, announced the upgrade has still no definite timeline.

"Mobvoi [is] a close partner of Google and [has] even received investment from them, but there hasn't been any official confirmation on any update timings from Google as of yet, " a Mobvoi spokesperson said via 9to5Google.

It's still puzzling why Fossil would stick to an old version for its smartwatches when it could benefit from the upgrade that it would receive from the new update. For some reason, the company could be thinking if some of its wearables actually need a revamp since its main focus could be on the new ones.

In light of that, Fossil said that the new processors would power its new Wear smartwatches. They are reportedly coming with LTE connectivity, longer battery life, and more optimized battery performance.

The Snapdragon Wear series will be a good addition for the next-gen smartwatches, as companies seek further improvements that would be introduced in their next wearable production.

Related Article: Fossil Wear OS Won't Be Included in Upgrade With Samsung Platform, New Line of Wear OS To Be Released

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Written by Joseph Henry

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Smartphone pickpockets in Brazil are taking their eyes off the actual devices they are stealing. Instead, they are now emptying the bank account apps of their unfortunate victims. The profit from stealing the money of their target is more profitable than selling the used gadget in the black market.

It turns out that criminal minds are also evolving as technology rapidly progresses.

In the old days, pickpockets were interested in taking home the sum of the cost of the stolen devices. Additionally, it was common to see thieves stealing smartphones from people strolling in the streets.

But now, they have found a more advanced way to go beyond their actual earnings. This time around, the profit for each victim differs significantly, depending on how much is inside the bank account.

Smartphone Pickpockets Increased Profits

According to Brazil-based newspaper, Folha de S. Paulo, the unusual kind of theft started to increase at the same time that the pandemic grappled the country.

The problem with theft worsened and extended to scraping off of their savings, even though the citizens are struggling with the ill effects of COVID-19.

The criminal minds specifically opened an iPhone 11 and iPhone XR, just like what occurs in previous pickpocketing operations. However, the culprit successfully accessed their bank accounts as well.

The repeated occurrence of the modus operandi suggested that a specialized gang is behind the organized pickpocketing, 9to5Mac reported.

Read Also: Leica Leitz Phone 1: First Smartphone of the Company, But Looks Like a Sharp Aquos R6-Specs, Release Date, and MORE

iPhone and Bank Account Apps Security

A Brazilian Police Chief, Roberto Monteiro, said that robbers are now exploring the vast information that could be mined by simply getting hands on a person's smartphone.

"Although breaking an iOS system is more difficult, they have also specialized in it," he added.

It has been established that iPhone security is not entirely indestructible. The FBI even devised a method to access it even if it is locked up. So, it is not far-fetched that criminals are doing it as well.

However, the new scheme also exposes the vulnerability of bank apps. In some instances, the victims are left unable to refund the stolen money as banks argue that it was their clients' negligence.

According to Gizmodo, a victim and a Brazilian bank Bradesco are now in a legal battle after the former asserted it was not her fault that hackers infiltrated her bank account.

The Brazilian Federation of Banks even told the local publication that there is no record of a security breach as far as their systems are concerned. It is contrary to what the victims claimed.

As of writing, the smartphone pickpocketing and theft in Brazil has not been eradicated.

Elsewhere, an online banked previously shut down, leaving its clients unable to access their accounts. However, it has been fixed since then.

Related Article: Samsung is Testing 6G Connectivity with Terahertz for Smartphones, Amidst Introduction of 5G in the Market

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Written by Teejay Boris

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
(Photo : Getty Image)

The Chinese Bitcoin miners ousted from China because of the latest crackdown might have found a new home in Miami, Florida. Francis Suarez, the city's mayor, mentioned that he is currently decreasing electricity's cost to attract more crypto miners to the city.

Is Miami the New Home for Crypto Miners?

In an interview with CNBC, Miami Mayor Francis Suarez touched on the city's crypto adoption, specifically Bitcoin. He mentioned that he wants to focus on crypto mining.

Suarez stated that he would like to put the region's cheap nuclear energy into good use and ensure that Miami city could have an opportunity that it can complete.

He added that they are currently talking to many companies, and they want them to stay in Miami. The fact that the city has nuclear power shows that it will be very inexpensive on the companies' end.

However, Suarez admitted that the recent prices are still more expensive than those in China. But the city mayor promises to decrease the power's cost to accommodate the miners' preference of getting to a specific kilowatt per hour.

Indeed, crypto miners who will relocate to Miami could receive better benefits and incentives.

One of the most sought-after incentives is crypto-tailored enterprise zones, which will help miners with their tasks.

These zones operate as areas wherein authorities provide various offers such as tax concessions, scaled-back regulations, and infrastructure incentives. These offers encourage future investments, and provide new jobs for workers.

Read Also: Dogecoin is the 'Bad Boy of Crypto, Victim of Elon Musk's Scheme,' Says Analyst

Nevertheless, the city mayor outlined the complexity of his plans, stating that it is not a project that occurs overnight.

Suarez highlighted his support for the crypto market, and he has been doing so for the past few months. According to Crypto Potato, Miami City Mayor Francis Suarez also purchased Bitcoin and Ethereum shares, and urged Miami to become a crypto hub.

Why Chinese Crypto Miners Need to Relocate

Most of the Bitcoin hash rate has been coming from the world's most populated region for many years. Thanks to its cheap energy, China is a dominant nation within the market, responsible for over 60% of crypto mining.

However, China also has a highly adverse policy against the crypto market industry. In the past few months, the country's strict rules continue to escalate.

Bitcoin and the Entire Crypto Market's Struggle in China

The Bitcoin cryptocurrency has been banned in China for almost ten years, but the government took its rules and regulations implementation one step further in May. Certain areas banned Bitcoin mining, which means that crypto miners are left with no choice but to look for alternative spaces.

Crypto Potato also reported that the U.S. might take a considerable chunk of the pie, with Texas leading the crypto mining race.

Despite Texas' advancement, Miami is still very much pro-Bitcoin and crypto because of its mayor.

Related Article: Tesla's Elon Musk Mocks 'Anonymous' Hacktivist's Threat, Tweeting a Miley Cyrus/Hannah Montana Meme [UPDATE]



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Written by Fran Sanders

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
(Photo : GettlyImages/ Stefano Guidi ) Amazon logo

Juneteenth is the new official holiday in the United States, and massive tech companies are now announcing their plans on how they will observe it.

Tech companies' reactions come after a year of protest as the companies were scrutinized for their recruiting practices and their treatment of Black employees. Some social media companies, like Twitter and Square, started recognizing the holiday in 2020.

Juneteenth National Holiday

Tiffany Bowden, the program manager on Amazon's Global Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion team, said in a blog post that Juneteenth is not just about Black History, but it is also American history and a complex one.

The Amazon blog stated that while rejoicing in progress, they would want people to continue to educate themselves about history in order to help guide the future.

Also Read: Streaming Websites Free Trials: Avail of Monthly or Weekly Freebies from Amazon Prime, HBO Max, Hulu, and MORE

Amazon added that they honor those who fought, endured, and continue to persevere in the fight for equality, and they celebrate with the awareness that advocacy is still needed in the country's pursuit of quality and equity.

To commemorate the holiday, Google has instituted a no meetings day on June 18 and is now encouraging all Googlers to use the day to celebrate, learn, and reflect.

Facebook has stated that its workers can use one of their paid Personal Choice Days if they want to celebrate the holiday, according to CNN.

Employees can also participate in a day of discussions with known activists and public figures, including Tina Knowles-Lawson and Henry Louis Gates, who will share perspectives on the history and significance of Juneteenth.

Meanwhile, Apple said it recognizes the holiday as a company holiday in the United States and gives employees the day off to observe on June 18.

However, Apple Retail and AppleCare will remain open to support the customers. The company stated that the employees could participate in weeklong events that are made to educate, build community, and celebrate.

Storytelling and Education

The tech companies will also give educational material on injustice to employees. Lindsay-Rae McIntyre, Microsoft's chief diversity officer, said that their approach is not to offer a vacation day, according to CNBC.

Instead, the company will use the holiday to create time and space for their employees to understand better the critical topics related to race, ethnicity, and racial injustice.

McIntyre added that recognizing the day with intention allows the public to stay connected to the many unresolved challenges, violence unaddressed, and inequities unchanged for the Black and the African American community worldwide.

Microsoft did not specify what learning programs they will be offering.

Google said that it is going to host a two-hour event spotlighting Black music history and storytelling, including a conversation and performance by Erykah Badu.

As for Amazon, their programming includes educational panels regarding the origins and importance of Juneteenth, remarks from Black history experts, and performance and Q&A with African American New York dance studio the Alvin Alley American Dance Theater.

Facebook stated that it would feature a video by businesswoman Tina Knowles-Lawson, who is Beyonce's mother.

Also, a Lift Black Voices Hub will be released and it will include a mix of educational resources, fundraisers, and content that shows how communities are reimagining Black freedom on Facebook platforms.

Amazon will also sponsor an event called Juneteenth Unityfest. Amazon bookstore will feature a selection of books that show the history of Juneteenth in the section called Celebrate Juneteenth. Meanwhile, Amazon Prime Video has a selection of movies and series to honor Juneteenth.

Related Article: Amazon Prime Day 2021: Dates, Schedules, and Early Deals You Can Buy Now

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Written by Sophie Webster

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
(Photo : GettlyImages/ Theo Wargo) Presidential Alert FCC

FCC has announced that the emergency alerts, the warning notifications that show up on your TV, radio, and smartphone, are getting an update, including a new National Alerts category that the public won't opt-out of.

FCC Emergency Alert Update

The Federal Communications Commission stated that the Emergency Alert System and Wireless Emergency Alerts could be used for everything from forest fire warnings to incoming missile announcements. However, in the past few years, the shortcomings of the system became clear.

In early 2018, a missile attack alert was sent out in Hawaii. The residents were advised to seek immediate shelter from an incoming ballistic warhead, with the promise that the alert was not a drill, according to Slash Gear.

Also Read: Slow Internet? FCC Complaints Now Open for All Internet Connection-Here's How to Report

However, it turns out that while it may not have been a drill, it was not a real emergency. The FCC investigated and found that misunderstandings at the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency or HI-EMA led to the confusing alert. With that, the FCC has stated that they need to improve the systems.

The results will be an update that makes clearer how, why, and when the alerts should be used. It will combine the current Presidential Alerts category that was first tested in 2018 and has no opt-out support on devices that get Wireless Emergency Alerts, with notification from the FEMA Administrators.

The resulting category will now be known as National Alerts and will be non-optional.

In order to avoid any panic like what was caused by the false alarm in Hawaii, the FCC is encouraging all states to form State Emergency Communications Committees.

The states will be responsible for figuring out alert distribution on a state level--meaning, it will review how existing committees may be doing that currently.

New rules about repeating alerts have also been developed, and there is a reporting mechanism for false emergency alerts to the FCC's 24/7 Operations Center.

Jessica Rosenworcel, the acting chairwoman of the FCC, said that this update is considered progress.

However, there is still more to do. With the wildfire season and hurricane season coming up, along with the challenges from the coronavirus pandemic, they will be relying on emergency alert systems more than ever.

The FCC is kicking of a rulemaking to discuss additional ways that they can improve alerting, based on recommendations from FEMA, according to Engadget.

Next month, the FCC is scheduled to hold a nationwide test of the Emergency Alert Systems and Wireless Emergency Alerts to develop further insights about how they can improve these life-saving systems.

One of the considerations of the new policies is to make sure that, while being kept to date on emergencies, people don't also get overwhelmed and end up opting out to too many alerts.

Nationwide Emergency Alert Test

The FCC and the EMA will do a nationwide test of the Emergency Alert Systems or EAS and Wireless Emergency Alerts or WEA that will start at 2:20 p.m. Easter Time on Aug. 11, according to TVTech.

This will be the second nationwide WEA test, but this will be considered as the first national WEA test on a consumer opt-in basis. In the WEA test, the text message will only be sent to smartphone users that have opted-in for text messages.

The test messages will display in either English or in Spanish, depending on the language settings of the wireless handset. The Emergency Alert System portion of the test will be sent to television stations and radio stations.

Related Article: FCC is Collecting Bad Internet Data by Urging People to Use Its Internet Speed Test App

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Written by Sophie Webster

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Samsung looks like it's going to try and expand its business, and they're seeking some very qualified help.

WCCFTech reports about rumors that Samsung might be seeking former engineers from Apple and AMD, with the alleged goal of designing and producing their own CPU in the foreseeable future. Apparently, the company isn't really impressed by the performance of the predominant ARM CPU architecture, which is the one currently used to build modern smartphone chips.

This information comes from a Tweet by a user called @FrontTron, who tweeted with the hashtag #MicrosoftEvent. They revealed that the sub-par performance of the ARM Cortex X series is the main reason that Samsung, along with chipmaker Qualcomm, is looking for custom architecture engineers from Apple and AMD:

[BREAKING] Samsung in contact with former custom architecture engineers from Apple and AMD



Due to lower-than-expectations of ARM's Cortex X series, Samsung and Qualcomm seems to both turning their plans to a custom architecture development.



(1/3)



OP https://t.co/fZbxZ1TDU3  Tron  #MicrosoftEvent (@FrontTron) June 18, 2021

If the rumors are accurate, these engineers were a major player in the design of current-generation Apple chips, as per GSMArena. This could mean that Samsung will have the experience and capability of someone who had major contributions in the design of chips like the A14 Bionic (iPhone 12) and maybe even the upcoming A13 Bionic in the upcoming iPhone 13. Nobody knows who that is, though.

As for the AMD side of the equation, Samsung is actually already working with Team Red. Early this year, they've started work on bringing RDNA2 graphics to the Samsung Exynos mobile chip, according to The Verge. Fans should be excited because RDNA2 means that the next mobile CPU from Samsung might actually feature ray tracing on smartphones.

So far, there's no official word yet from Samsung that either confirms or denies these claims.

Read also: Samsung Galaxy S21 June Update To Fix Camera Lag, Overheating Issue, and More

Samsung, What Are You Guys Up To?

It's not at all surprising that Samsung is looking to design a potential mobile CPU contender with former AMD and Apple engineers. If there is anybody in the industry with employees perfect for the job, it's those two.

AMD, for one, has been steadily climbing up the chipmaking ladder with constant advancements into Intel's industry territory. Granted, they're doing this right now with their Ryzen lineup of chips. But if they're already able to make a serious dent in Team Blue's armor on the desktop side, then it makes sense to assume they can also do it on the mobile side.

Apple, on the other hand, is also no slouch. Their current A14 Bionic chip found in the current-generation iPhone 12 features the smallest manufacturing node in the industry yet at 5nm, as reported by Android Authority. And if there's something you should know about tech, it's that smaller is always better (Moore's Law).

This node ensured that the A14 Bionic can cram more transistors into a smaller package, thereby solidifying its place once again atop the mobile chip performance ladder. In fact, Apple actually targeted laptop-class performance for this specific CPU, which is already amazing on its own.

With some heavyweight assistance on their side, Samsung could potentially be a major chipmaker for the foreseeable future.

Related: Samsung is Testing 6G Connectivity with Terahertz for Smartphones, Amidst Introduction of 5G in the Market

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Written by RJ Pierce

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
A weird malware is currently confusing some security experts and researchers. The reason behind this is that this new computer virus seems to have no interest in hacking your device.

Instead, the new Oddball malware blocks explicitly you from accessing piracy websites. Based on its process, some researchers claimed that this could even be a good malware since it can stop people from downloading or viewing paid content for free.

As of the moment, piracy is still an issue since it can prevent the original creators of new songs, movies, apps, and other things from raising incomes. But, there's a chance that this new malware could somehow help solve this problem.

Specifically, involved security researchers confirmed that the new Oddball computer virus blocks infected computers from visiting these illegal websites. However, they did not confirm if the malware can also prevent clean devices.

Weird Malware Oddball's Details

As of the moment, many hacking groups are developing malware and ransomware that could allow them to breach companies' systems. These include the new ransomware targeting iConstituent, as well as the REvil's malware.

Related Article: BUSTED: Ukraine Ransomware Gang Known for Hacking Universities Arrested

But, the new Oddball is not like these computer viruses. According to Threat Post's latest report, the new malware modifies the HOSTS file on the infected system.

Security experts explained that this method is quite efficient since it can stop the device from access a certain web address, which is the main goal of Oddball.

However, many techie users can easily prevent the malware's effect since it has no persistence mechanism.

"This seems to be a fresh trick on an old attack of compromising people attempting to download pirated software and media," explained Netenrich's Threat Intelligence Advisor John Bambenek.

"In this case though, it seems to be an individual or group trying to protect intellectual property, but make no mistake, this is still clearly criminal behavior," added the security expert.

Should Oddball Scare You?

Security Magazine reported that piracy websites can contain malicious files that can steal your passwords and other sensitive details.

Joseph Carson, chief security scientist, and Advisory CISO at ThycoticCentrify explained that various cybercriminals and other hackers usually create piracy sites. This is also the reason why it is highly suggested to avoid these addresses.

On the other hand, Oddball could be pretty helpful since once it infects your device, you will have a hard time accessing these illegal sites.

For more news updates about Oddball and other strange computer viruses, always keep your tabs open here at TechTimes.

Related Article: Ransomware Attacks Pressure Insurance Companies to Limit Cybercrime Coverage

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Written by: Griffin Davis

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
An electric guitar parade through the streets of New York (above) in honor of the arrival of winter, 2018. Street musicians perform in celebration of the summer solstice Sunday in Ridgway from 5-9 p.m. (Photo courtesy of Make Music Day/Facebook)
ADA [ndash] Jesse G. Denslow, 93, of Ahloso, passed away Saturday, June 26, 2021, in Shawnee. He was born to Leslie Earl Denslow and Poca Vanderpool Denslow in 1927 in Scullin, Oklahoma, "a wide place in the road". He claimed that his secret to long life was that he never drank, never smoked
People line up to get some ice cream during a Juneteenth Commemoration at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette Student Union Courtyard on Thursday, June 17, 2021 in Lafayette, La.. Ice Cream sundaes and other frozen treats were served to all in attendance.
A local attorney sued the Baton Rouge Police Department earlier this week claiming officers used excessive force during a welfare check, which escalated after a profane outburst from the lawyer and ended with him handcuffed to a hospital bed receiving treatment for broken ribs and a punctured lung.

Baton Rouge attorney Jeffry Sanford was booked into jail last August after his release from the hospital. He was later charged with felony resisting a police officer with force or violence.

The criminal case is ongoing.

Sanford filed his lawsuit Wednesday in Baton Rouge federal court, seeking damages from the city. He claims Cpl. Joshua Kirst and Officer Herbert Allen violated his constitutional rights.

A BRPD spokesman said the department conducted an internal investigation soon after the incident and cleared both officers of wrongdoing. Officials declined to comment on specific allegations from Sanford, whose complaint presents his perspective on what happened the night of Aug. 23.

His ex-wife asked police check on their son, who was 12 at the time and staying with his dad, because she was unable to reach them by phone, according to the lawsuit. The officers knocked on the door and told Sanford why they were there.

"Upon hearing that his ex-wife called the police, Mr. Sanford did the sign of the cross," the complaint reads.

He said her concern "was wholly unfounded and without factual basis" and he "became upset that the police, unannounced, had interrupted his evening with a non-criminal matter without either prior notice or a warrant."

So, according to the lawsuit, he "very calmly" gave the officers a message for his ex-wife: "Tell her to suck 10 million d****."

Federal judge voids gun charge, calls bad BRPD bust a 'foul' against justice system Almost a year after the January 2020 traffic stop that landed Clarence Green in jail on a gun possession charge, federal prosecutors in Baton 

Kirst responded by saying he understood the sentiment, according to the complaint. But when the officer tried to keep asking questions, Sanford said, "f*** you" and started to close the door. His profane speech was protected under the First Amendment, his attorneys argue in the complaint.

Kirst then became "visibly angry" and told Sanford not to talk to him like that, the complaint says. The two officers barged into the house "without permission, a warrant, or probable cause of a crime being committed," according to Sanford.

Once inside, a physical confrontation ensued.

The lawsuit accuses Kirst of "violently striking Mr. Sanford" while Allen used a stun gun on him.

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"Ironically, this entire time, both officers completely ignored the cries and screams of the minor child, who from a position crouched on the couch, was witnessing his father being beaten," the lawsuit says.

Sanford was ultimately handcuffed and placed in a police car, where he stayed for about a half hour. Then officers pulled him out and tried to shackle his legs.

"When Sanford widened his stance out of reflex, Kirst rammed the handcuffed Sanford into the ground from behind with his shoulder, using tremendous force, great violence and intent to do great bodily harm," the complaint alleges.

That violent struggle left Sanford with six broken ribs and a punctured lung.

He argues the officers used excessive force and then failed to act with urgency while he "lay on the ground suffering."

Once he arrived at Our Lady of the Lake trauma center, his oxygen level fell to a dangerous low, Sanford said. He stayed there for three days before getting booked into jail.

Two weeks later, after bonding out, Sanford was hospitalized again for more treatment of his collapsed lung, which ultimately required surgery.

His attorneys argue the police violated his constitutional rights during the encounter, focusing on their decision to enter his house without a warrant or other exigent circumstances that would allow such an intrusion.

+2 BRPD narcotics detectives accused of joking about 2013 in-custody 'Flag Street Massacre' death Among many allegations he dropped just before resigning from the Baton Rouge Police Department, Jeremiah Ardoin accused some longtime narcotic

In their probable cause report documenting the arrest, however, the officers described Sanford as "physically abusive." He immediately started using vulgar speech  including calling his ex-wife a b**** and telling police to beat her brains out  and clenched his fists once police made contact, the report states.

He later punched an officer in the face, according to police. Because of his violent attitude and body language, officers believed his son could be in danger, the report says.

But the report skims over the violent struggle that landed Sanford in the hospital, saying only that he "resisted arrest and was eventually subdued after multiple deployments of department issued Tasers."

Sanford, whose lawsuit calls him a Louisiana attorney in good standing, had been jailed before  once in 2015 when a judge held him in contempt after a courtroom outburst. His record also includes at least three other arrests from several years ago. Court records show he pleaded guilty to resisting an officer in 2009 after being charged with domestic abuse battery.
The East Baton Rouge Parish School Board on Thursday narrowly approved Texas-based Great Hearts to start a classically oriented charter school, but rejected two other applicants.

The 5-4 vote for Great Hearts ran contrary to an outside evaluator who urged the board to reject all three applicants.

Great Hearts was supported by New Schools for Baton Rouge, but another charter proposal backed by the prominent nonprofit fell short.

The rejected applicants, Discovery Schools and Pelican Educational Foundation, can appeal Thursday's decision to the state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education, known as BESE. If BESE rules in their favor, they would receive a broader Type 2 charter that would allow them to enroll students from any part of Louisiana.

To get approved, Great Hearts agree to scale down its proposal to opening just one school in southeast Baton Rouge that will eventually have about 1,400 students in grades K-12. It can apply in the future for the two additional schools it had proposed.

The votes come as the parish School Board approved a $489 million budget for the 2021-22 fiscal year that anticipates a big expansion of charter schools already approved in Baton Rouge. The school system would direct about $80.2 million to district-approved, or Type 1, charter schools, up from $57.4 million this year.

In a presentation, Chief of Schools Sharon Williams showed that the school system has already set in motion significant charter growth, even without approving the three latest applicants. She said if all those approved schools grow to their full capacity they will enroll more than 14,000 students, nearly triple the 4,800 students in such schools now.

Board member Mike Gaudet was one of the no votes on Great Hearts. He said he was drawing a line because the board has approved so many charter before and said those past decision will mean painful budget cuts in the future.

"This decision is easy tonight compared to those," Gaudet predicted.

3 new charter schools could serve 7,000+ Baton Rouge kids, but evaluator says they shouldn't open An outside evaluator is urging the rejection of the three latest applicants seeking to open new charter schools in Baton Rouge, including two 

But the prevailing board members were swayed in part by the liberal arts focus and the strong academic track record of Great Hearts schools in Texas and Arizona.

Here's how the final Great Hearts vote went:

For: Board members Mark Bellue, Connie Bernard, Jill Dyason, Evelyn Ware-Jackson and David Tatman.

Against: Board member Dawn Collins, Gaudet, Tramelle Howard and Dadrius Lanus.

The outside evaluator had different concerns with different schools, which combined sought to serve more than 7,000 students. She worried that they won't serve enough low-income students, don't bring anything new to the school system, or don't have a track record of academic success.

In years past, the recommendations of the outside evaluator and schools chief have, with rare exceptions, been the same. But in this case, new Superintendent Sito Narcisse sat silently during Thursdays discussion, by choice not offering no recommendation of his own, and no board member asked him for one.

Discovery runs two schools in Jefferson Parish, Great Hearts has 33 schools in Arizona and Texas, while Pelican has just one school, Kenilworth Science and Technology Charter School in Baton Rouge.

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Pelican was rejected unanimously. Discovery was rejected in an 7-1 vote, with only Dyason voting in favor; Gaudet did not vote.

Discovery and Great Hearts are both backed by New Schools for Baton Rouge. The powerful nonprofit has recruited some of the Capital Citys most prominent charter schools, as well as offering financial support and even helping to build their campuses.

Mary Katie Blunschi, a former school administrator in Baton Rouge, has for the past several years served as the school systems legally required outside evaluator. She and several school system administrators interviewed the three applicants.

Charter schools are public schools run privately via charters, or contracts. Currently there are 29 charter schools operating in the parish, educating more than 11,000 children, or nearly 20% of all of the parish's public schoolchildren. Four more charter schools are set to open this fall.

Daniel Scoggin, president of the Great Hearts Foundation, said that he met with Superintendent Narcisse several months ago and remembers the superintendent asking him, Whats your innovation?

He said the charter schools focus on classical, liberal arts and use of the Socratic inquiry is innovative in Baton Rouge,

There is not an open enrollment, classical liberal arts in this parish, Scoggin said.

Great Hearts, however, is likely to have a low percentage of qualifying low-income students who are likely to attend the three K-12 classical, liberal arts-oriented schools the organization hopes to open in Baton Rouge.

Its application says its target is to have only 40% of their students qualify as economically disadvantaged. Evaluators noted that several Great Heart schools average about 20% on this measure, one with just 8%. By contrast, almost 80% of the students in the East Baton Rouge Parish school system, and about 72% statewide, are considered economically disadvantaged.

State law requires that the demographics of charter schools, with few exceptions, mirror those of their sponsoring school district, coming within at least 15 percentage points.

The applicant does not meet this criterion, Blunschi concluded.

Pelican has applied before unsuccessfully to expand beyond the middle school it has operated since 2009 out of the former Kenilworth Middle School at 7600 Boone Ave. Unlike its past applications, Pelican this time is seeking not a high school but an elementary feeder school with about 330 students, while its middle school would shrink to just 170 students.

Blunschi urged denial of Pelicans request because the groups current school has a D letter grade. District charter policy specifies that groups already operating a charter school in Louisiana need at least a C letter grade to be considered for a new charter in Baton Rouge.

If I were to approve this charter, I think it would make our current charter policy meaningless, said board member Bellue.

Discoverys proposal had a lot of support from business leader, but Blunschi judged it as presenting nothing new and innovative. She noted several current schools are offering a variety of career-oriented programs, as well as Narcisses Pathway to Bright Futures initiative that would expand high school programs in several high-demand career fields. Consequently, the evaluators conclude that the application for Baton Rouge Discovery Academy presents nothing new and innovative.

Caroline Roemer, executive director of the Louisiana Association of Public Charter Schools, said board members erred in not visiting the Kenner campus and seeing it in action.

Im telling you its a phenomenal place  Im telling you youve made a mistake on this one if you pass on it, Roemer said.
The LSU Board of Supervisors narrowly approved a resolution Friday asking the Louisiana Department of Health to add the COVID vaccines to the list of shots required before students can attend public schools, colleges, and universities.

Supervisor Jay Blossman, of Mandeville, said he was uncomfortable with the university sending a message to the state that could lead to making students get vaccinated for COVID.

It gives me heartburn, Blossman said, adding it should be a personal choice. If youre worried about the COVID, get the shot.

The Boards resolution acknowledges the concerns raised by faculty and students, requests the health department to consider adding the COVID vaccines to the required list, and encourages voluntary vaccinations on LSU campuses.

The Boards Academic and Research Committee voted 4-3 to advance the resolution after much, and often, heated discussion. Then at the end of the hearing, the full board summarily approved all other matters advanced by committees during the Boards meeting in Alexandria  except for the resolution. The board discussed the matter further, added language that LSU would also inform students of their legal rights to opt out of any vaccination, then approved the resolution on a 9-2 vote, with several supervisors not voting.

+3 Should LSU mandate the COVID vaccine? Here are the legal issues that complicate it LSU faculty members are pushing to make COVID-19 vaccines mandatory for the campus community ahead of the fall semester.

Usually matters before the 16-member board that sets policies for the LSU colleges and universities are handled with unanimous consent and little conversation. The board, for instance, accepted the contract for incoming LSU president, William F. Tate IV, and outgoing LSU Health Shreveport Chancellor Dr. Ghali E. Ghali in a matter of minutes without much comment.

State law already requires students to have been vaccinated against a lot of maladies such as polio, smallpox and diphtheria, before being allowed to attend. They can opt out for religious and medical reasons.

But the COVID vaccines were only approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration on an emergency basis and cant unilaterally be added to the required list until fully approved, General Counsel Winston DeCuir told the board.

In addition to state law, DeCuir pointed out that House Bill 498, which passed the Legislature and is sitting on the governors desk, prohibits discrimination against those seeking state services based on COVID vaccination status, and House Resolution 20 requires schools to inform parents and students that they can opt out of getting vaccinated for COVID.

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Bills striking at vaccine mandate head to Louisiana governor Republican Louisiana lawmakers have taken aim at the coronavirus vaccine, sending Democratic Gov. John Bel Edwards two bills that would keep s

So right now, the landscape is that there are laws to allow public schools to mandate vaccination but that requires approval by the Louisiana Department of Health, he said.

Attorney General Jeff Landry recently said he would likely sue the Board if the COVID vaccination were made mandatory at LSU.

Faculty and student groups passed resolutions asking LSU leadership to require COVID vaccinations, as have been required as a condition of enrollment at many private schools around the country. Some states have allowed their public universities to require the shots, including Michigan, New Jersey, Massachusetts, California, Rhode Island, and Virginia, but none of the Deep South states have.

LSU President Tom Galligan said 73% of LSUs faculty have been vaccinated and 56% of the staff have. But only 26% of the students have received the shot.

LSU leaders say they can't require students to get COVID vaccine, but strongly encourage it LSU leaders won't require students to get vaccinated against coronavirus ahead of the fall semester  they say the university doesn't have tha

The LSU Board also formally accepted the employment contract of William Tate IV as LSUs new president with applause and little discussion beyond outgoing President Tom Galligan saying, Yay.

Tates five-year contract begins July 6. Hell be paid $725,000 per year base salary, plus receive an annual $35,000 housing allowance, and a $15,000 per year vehicle allowance.

With much less levity, the Board then approved Dr. Ghali E. Ghali stepping down as chancellor of the LSU medical school, returning to the faculty and being paid the remainder of his contract. His contract expires in December.
BATON ROUGE, La.  Gov. John Bel Edwards is shutting down state offices early Friday, giving workers a half-day off in honor of Juneteenth, the day commemorating the end of slavery in the United States.

The Democratic governor recently signed a bill by Rep. Larry Selders, a Baton Rouge Democrat, making Juneteenth a legal state holiday.

"This is an important part of American history, commemorating the day those who had been enslaved in the United States learned of their freedom. There are meaningful lessons for everyone to learn," Edwards said in a statement.

Juneteenth to become 12th federal holiday after Congress approves bill; see next steps WASHINGTON (AP)  The United States will soon have a new federal holiday commemorating the end of slavery in the nation.

The new law designates the third Saturday in June as Juneteenth Day. Starting in 2022, all state offices will be closed the Friday before that Saturday, according to the governor's office.

Juneteenth  which officially falls on June 19  honors the day in 1865 when enslaved Blacks in Texas were freed with the arrival of federal troops. Though slavery was not completely abolished until the 13th Amendment, which came six months later, Juneteenth has come to symbolize the end of slavery.
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I am the author along with fifteen other state representatives of House Bill 498. Guest columnist Jennifer Herricks is misinformed about HB498, now on the governors desk awaiting his signature.

Although I do not have a degree in biology, microbiology, or molecular genetics, I do have a degree in English from LSU. I can read. Obviously, Herricks did not read the bill.

Banning vaccinations was never a part of the text of HB498. I worked with the hospital association in our state to make sure that no licensed health care facility would be restricted from offering the best care possible for their patients.

The COVID-19 shot is currently under Emergency Use Authorization. It has not been approved by the Food and Drug Administration. It is considered an experimental drug and as such cannot be mandated for anyone. Each person must be given this information which is called informed consent and be told that they have the right to refuse any medical treatment offered under current federal (21 U.S.C. 360bbb-3(e)(1)(A)(ii)(III) and state (R.S. 29:764(A)(2)(h) law.

HB498 prohibits discrimination, treating the vaccinated differently than the unvaccinated.

I and many others in the Legislature and the voting public believe that every person should have the freedom to make their own medical choices free from coercion or punitive measures. HB498 only applies this to public authorities, not private businesses. Other states have passed similar legislation.

On the date that the FDA removes COVID-19 vaccines from Emergency Use Authorization and approves the experimental drug, HB498 ceases to become law.

KATHY EDMONSTON

state representative

Gonzales
A court has awarded $82,500 in damages to the owners of a cosmetic surgery clinic, in what is thought to be Australias first judgment involving defamation in an Instagram story.

In the Brisbane District Court, Judge Reid found former Beautyfull Cosmetic Medical Clinic employee Clare Hayes defamed the clinics owners in a story she posted to Instagram.

The case is believed to be the first judgment finding defamation in Australia from an Instagram story.

An Instagram story is a post on the social network which is generally only visible for 24 hours.

A feature of Instagram, and other social media platforms, is that they are often infected by personal grievances aired in an obnoxious manner and are often not a reliable source of information, Judge Reid found.
Scott Morrison thought he had a relatively easy choice to make on climate change at the G7 summit in Cornwall last weekend. In his mind, there was an acceptable position between action and inaction that would assure Australias allies of our good intentions and appease his governments junior Coalition partner, which wants nothing to do with the G7s agenda.

To that end, the Prime Minister used the summit to sign new partnerships on clean energy technology and hydrogen with Japan and Germany, respectively the worlds third and fourth largest economies, while refusing to sign up to the G7s ambitious targets to halve greenhouse emissions by 2030 and achieve net zero emissions by 2050. He also stayed on in London to strike a free trade agreement with Boris Johnson, Britains first such deal since leaving the European Union. In any other age, Morrisons overseas trip would be big news; a sign of Australian relevance on the global stage.

Unfortunately, Joe Biden had no time for the PMs attempt to chart a middle course on climate change and pointedly avoided a one-on-one meeting with Morrison. It was not the greatest snub an Australian leader has faced from a US president on climate change. Barack Obama, who Biden served as vice president, famously embarrassed Tony Abbott when the Liberal prime minister hosted the G20 summit in Brisbane in 2014. Obama used a speech to students at the University of Queensland urging Australia to step up on climate change.

Abbott could console himself that Obamas agenda was being blocked by a Republican-controlled Senate, and that Canada, the country most like ours in terms of its economic dependency on resources, was still a member of the sceptics club at the time. But Morrison does not have that partisan luxury. Unlike Obama, Biden leads a credible, and accelerating, global push for net zero with every rich nation, including Canada, on board.

In Morrisons version of events, it was his idea to arrange a three-way meeting with the US President and British Prime Minister, the host of the G7 summit.
I am not more special than my obligation to do my part for the continued prevention of diseases that have caused enormous suffering and could do it again.

On Thursday Health Minister Greg Hunt announced the government would be taking ATAGIs advice to push the age-range for the use of AstraZeneca to 60-plus in Australia. Credit:AP

Pro-vax all my life, I am a committed believer in doing your bit to ensure herd immunity from preventable disease. You should put your deltoid muscle where your values are and get jabbed for everyones sake .

Troll me if you like, but I was an AstraZeneca hesitater.

Given what we now know, that the federal government accepted on Thursday that the benefit of this vaccine did not outweigh the risk to those under 60 after seven new cases of clotting were confirmed in people under 60 (a woman aged 52 died last week), I reckon those in my demographic are due at least a tiny sorry for having our concerns written off as self-indulgence.

We were reported by several polls to be the most vaccine hesitant Australians, and that hesitation was not grounded in middle-aged superstition. It was based on factual reporting of adverse, if very rare, side effects documented to be happening predominantly in women under 60.

Headlines were unavoidable in March when many European countries pulled the vaccine after the death a 49-year-old woman, a nurse, of clotting in Austria prompted an international examination.

In April, the AstraZeneca-linked death of 48-year-old New South Wales woman Genene Norris, four days after she received her first shot and just hours before the federal government changed guidelines to lift the AstraZeneca age to 50, was poignant and dreadful.

You can be stoic, sanguine, and highly dedicated to being a good enough citizen to take the only jab you are offered, and you can also be someone who reads about Ms Norris death and feels deeply unsettled.
A Moreton Bay man has died after two trains collided near Rockhampton on Friday.

Police said the trains crashed at Westwood, about 30 minutes west of Rockhampton, about 11.40am, killing a 49-year-old Margate man, who died at the scene. Two workers were also injured.

A 43-year-old man suffered a broken leg and was airlifted to Rockhampton Hospital, while a 41-year-old man sustained minor injuries and was taken to the same hospital.

Initial investigations indicate two trains, one empty and the other carrying coal, collided while they were both travelling west.

Queensland Rail chief executive Nick Easy said QR was deeply saddened and distressed by the incident, which occurred about 80 kilometres west of Rockhampton on the Aurizon network.


Save Log in , register or subscribe to save articles for later. Normal text size Larger text size Very large text size The original police investigation into the firebombing of Brisbane nightclub Whiskey Au Go Go has been slammed by multiple witnesses during the first week of the coronial inquest into the 1973 tragedy. A fresh inquiry into the arson attack on the Fortitude Valley venue started this week in Brisbane. The aftermath of the Whiskey Au Go Go firebombing. Credit:Queensland Police Museum Two men were charged with one count of murder over the fire  James Richard Finch, who was deported to the UK and died there this year, and John Andrew Stuart, who died in his cell in 1979. The new inquiry focuses on whether Finch and Stuart were the only ones involved, whether any other key players can be identified, and whether the police investigation was adequate. The inquiry heard evidence this week that the March 8 attack, in which 15 people died, was carried out because the clubs owners had not paid protection money for prostitutes. Various pieces of information also pointed to people involved in the club, including owners Brian and Ken Little, and police officers knowing the attack was coming ahead of time.

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The inquiry also heard police officers visited the home of a witness and said she was mistaken about the number of men who were involved and told her to change her statement. Loading On Friday, Mark Bolton, son of the late Brisbane crime journalist Brian Bolton, said his father gave warnings to various officials that the Whiskey Au Go Go firebombing was going to happen, after being tipped off through his connections to the criminal underworld. Mr Bolton said his father told various detectives and senior police officers, as well as the then-police minister and Commonwealth police. He said a nightclub would be bombed, grenaded or attacked with people in it, and that was the determination, to bomb it with people in it. He didnt say anything to me about calling for armed police. Im not sure if he demanded police turn up, but I think that was an expectation following such information. Retired police officer Hunter Nicol told the inquest earlier this week he stumbled on a police file in the 1990s that said the venue was targeted because the owners had not paid protection money for prostitutes.

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They said the reason for the Whiskey Au Go Go bomb was that people wanted to put prostitutes in the nightclub but the nightclub had to pay protection money, and if they didnt pay the money, they would get firebombed. There had been a few other places that had been firebombed beforehand, but only because the Whiskey Au Go Go firebombing went bad and people got killed, [that] the other place that was lined up was never followed up on. Hunter Nicol, a retired Queensland police officer, outside Brisbane Magistrates Court on Tuesday. Credit:Toby Crockford Kath Potter, a witness who saw the arsonists pull up at the nightclub, said she was in a phone box near the venue when she saw a dark-coloured car arrive. Three men  all wearing black clothing  got out of the car, she said. They took the drum and [white] material to the corner of the building, they were stuffing the white material into the drum. Then they were trying to manipulate it [the drum] up towards the door and they had lit it. They lit it before they started moving it towards the door.

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She said a few days later, two police officers visited her home, where she lived with her parents, wanting to discuss the statement she gave. They said I was lying and I was drunk because there were only two men [involved in the firebombing], Ms Potter said. I said I knew what I saw  and they said: No, you are lying, we want you to rectify this statement. My dad then got angry and threw them out. Whiskey Au Go Go witness Kath Potter in Brisbane on Wednesday. Credit:Toby Crockford Detective Sergeant Virginia Gray, the cold case detective who delved into the firebombing, concluded that other people were involved in, or at least knew of, the attack before it happened. There was clearly a lot of discussion around at a staff level, and even [Detective Basil] Hicks in his conversation with [convicted Whiskey Au Go Go killer John Andrew] Stuart on the seventh [of March 1973] says he heard that something was going to happen on the eighth, Sergeant Gray said.

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The US Consulate in Sydney has written to Chief Health Officer Dr Jeannette Young urging Queensland Health to grant immediate entry to an American citizen so he can see his dying father.

Mark Kilian and wife Anneli Gericke remain in hotel quarantine in Chippendale, NSW, and have been trying to enter Queensland to visit Mr Kilians dying father, Frans, 80, who is suffering from pancreatic cancer.

Trapped in a bureaucratic nightmare, Mark Kilian and Anneli Gericke are desperately hoping to see Marks father before he dies. Credit:Mark Kilian

After his health deteriorated on Tuesday, Frans was rushed to Robina Hospital on the Gold Coast, where he remains and is now unable to walk.

Hes pretty weak ... he just wants to go home, Mr Kilian said. He cant even get up himself now ... the cancer is basically eating him up.
Up one flight of stairs, or one of the oldest operating lifts in Melbourne, Sue Westwoods favourite corner of the Athenaeum Library looks out onto Collins Street from beneath a brass plaque.

Melbourne Athenaeum library and reading room subscription, one guinea per annum, the plate reads.

Sue Westwood, business manager of the Melbourne Athenaeum Library. Credit:Simon Schluter

Members of the library  originally known as the Melbourne Mechanics Institute, the first of its kind in Victoria  for decades paid just a guinea ($2.10) a year to attend classes, lectures and read books, manuals and newspapers from around the world, particularly Britain, in the first years of colonial settlement at Port Phillip.

About 700 library members, who pay closer to $100 nowadays, own the building constructed in 1842 in what Ms Westwood, the Athenaeum business manager, calls a historical anomaly.
A revolt by former Nationals leader Barnaby Joyce and Queensland colleague George Christensen forced the government to scramble for votes to secure a hotly contested law to overhaul the $3.2 trillion superannuation sector.

In a move that signals future threats to the governments agenda, the two Nationals MPs took the super changes to the brink of defeat in the House of Representatives after negotiating with industry fund lobbyists to block the bill.

Nationals MPs George Christensen and Barnaby Joyce wavered in their support for the governments superannuation changes. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

The Nationals are also flexing their political muscle within the Coalition on climate change, with MPs warning against a shift in government policy to embrace a target of net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.

Treasurer Josh Frydenberg is planning to follow the super changes with draft legislation on responsible lending standards, continuous disclosure of company news for investors and tougher rules for litigation funders, setting up tight votes on disputed policies with the potential for government MPs to cross the floor.
The news this week that AstraZenecas COVID-19 vaccine is no longer recommended for those aged between 50 and 60 would have come as a shock to many. After people were encouraged to line up for both doses of the vaccine, they have been told it is now only considered safe to have the second.

Not surprisingly, hundreds have cancelled not only their first dose, but their second, despite the assurances from experts and politicians. After a slow start to the vaccination rollout  which sped up only after the latest outbreak in Melbourne  this change of mind by medical experts was another unwelcome complication.

The AstraZeneca vaccine is now recommended for those aged over 60. Credit:Eddie Jim

While it may be tempting to point the finger at Canberra for this latest setback, a broader view might give some pause for thought.

Only 18 months after the start of the pandemic, and following a swift process of creating, testing, approving, manufacturing and rolling out a vaccine, more than 2.5 billion doses have been given worldwide. That is a scientific achievement with few, if any, parallels in human history. It will save tens, maybe hundreds, of thousands of lives.
Tokyo: A wild bear went on a rampage in the northern Japanese city of Sapporo on Friday morning, storming a Japanese military base, forcing its way into an airport and injuring four people.

Video footage showed the bear galloping across a busy road and pushing its way into a base run by Japans Self-Defence Forces.

The bear was spotted at around 3.30am with additional sightings throughout the morning.

Footage from Japanese network HLK shows the bear scaling a fence at Sapporo Okadama airport, a small airport serving flights around Japans northern island of Hokkaido. Eight flights at the airport were cancelled, according to NHK, while 10 schools were closed in the city.
Juneteenth has finally become a national holiday, so to commemorate it, we've put together a list of shows by Black artists that are currently available for streaming in your own home this weekend. Each of them offers much to contemplate and celebrate as we work together to create a society that is equitable for all.

Marys Seacole

Ismenia Mendes, Lucy Taylor, Marceline Hugot, Quincy Tyler Bernstine, and Karen Kandel in Marys Seacole.

( Julieta Cervantes)

Lincoln Center Theater is presenting a free stream of its 2019 LCT3 production Marys Seacole, written by Jackie Sibblies Drury and directed by Lileana Blain-Cruz. Taking the life of Jamaican-born Mary Seacole as its focus, the drama examines the role of similar Marys throughout history. Our senior critic Zach Stewart called the play "breathtaking to behold," adding: "Mary Seacole may have been an exceptional woman, but Drury makes the case that the Marys who toil among us in 2019 aren't far off... Few of them are likely to end up with statues (as the historical Mary Seacole now has), but they do now have one hell of a play." Marys Seacole will be available via Broadway On Demand though July 4; to register for free tickets, click here.

Pass Over

Namir Smallwood (lying down) and Jon Michael Hill in Antoinette Nwandu's Pass Over, directed by Danya Taymor, at Lincoln Center Theater.

( Jeremy Daniel)

When Antoinette Chinonye Nwandu's Pass Over appeared off-Broadway at Lincoln Center, our critic Pete Hempstead called it "a new masterpiece of modern drama." The play ran before that at Chicago's Steppenwolf, where Spike Lee directed a filmed version. Pass Over tells the story of two young Black men dreaming of escape from a racist world. It's a startling and disturbing riff on Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot. Lee's version streams here on Prime Video, and Nwandu's new version of the play is coming to Broadway in August. It should not be missed. You can purchase tickets here.

Black Light

It's hard to describe Jomama Jones's unforgettable Black Light without using words like "revelatory" and "prophetic." Jomama (the divine alter ego of creator Daniel Alexander Jones) invites us to the Crossroads to contemplate what we must choose at this moment in our own lives, in our civic relationships, in our country, and our world(s). Our critic Hayley Levitt wrote, "For anyone looking for something to match the earnestness of these dark times, Jomama Jones is here to turn your pain into something beautiful." The performance was recorded live at Joe's Pub on March 17, 2018. You can watch the entire show above.

Fires in the Mirror

Anna Deavere Smith

( David Gordon)

Anna Deavere Smith holds a unique spot in American theater for her plays that probe the underlying causes and motivations of social unrest. Her work Fires in the Mirror, which was revived in 2019 at Signature Theater and starred Michael Benjamin Washington, is a documentary play about the three-day 1991 race riot between the Lubavitch Orthodox Jewish and black communities in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. Though Washington's performance is not available online, Deavere Smith's early stunning performance of the work is. For those unfamiliar with her work, this is a fine place to start. The multipart video is available here.

After Midnight

Nova Y. Payton and Christopher Jackson (center) lead the cast of After Midnight, directed by Jared Grimes, for Signature Theatre.

( Christopher Mueller)

After Midnight ran on Broadway 2013-14, and now Washington, D.C.'s Signature Theatre has revived it and made it available for home viewing. Christopher Jackson leads the cast in the production, which takes the form of a variety show at Harlem's Cotton Club. Our critic Zach Stewart says, "This filmed version of After Midnight brings a little bit of nightlife into your living room. It is a particularly exuberant manifestation of the lasting impact Black artists have made on American popular culture, and it couldn't come at a better time." You can watch After Midnight through August 4. To purchase tickets, click here.
I am never quite sure just where the ideas will come to me for our weekly articles, but part of enjoying this process is to see how and where God will provide me with the information that I share with you each week. This week will be in a sense doing a two-part series (first time I have done
Staff Reporter

Nyamekye Daniel has been a journalist for five years. She was the managing editor for the South Florida Media Network and a staff writer for The Miami Times. Daniel's work has also appeared in the Sun-Sentinel, Miami Herald and The New York Times.
Up for debate:

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Check out the latest developments on bills pending before state lawmakers in four key topics.
Regional Editor

Brett Rowland has worked as a reporter in newsrooms in Illinois and Wisconsin. He most recently served as news editor of the Northwest Herald in Crystal Lake, Illinois. He previously held the same position at the Daily Chronicle in DeKalb.
New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu speaks during an interview during the National Governors Association 2019 winter meeting in Washington, Saturday, Feb. 23, 2019.
In this Nov. 19, 2019, photo is the Pennsylvania House of Representatives chamber at the Capitol in Harrisburg, Pa.
The interior of the dome of the Pennsylvania Capitol where the state lawmakers meet is shown in Harrisburg, Pa., in this March 22, 2021, file photo.
A Texas Department of Public Safety officer is seen on a boat while patrolling the U.S.-Mexico border, Tuesday, March 23, 2021, in Mission, Texas. A surge of migrants on the Southwest border has the Biden administration on the defensive.
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Writer Janet Malcolm Photo: George Nikitin/AP/Shutterstock

On Wednesday, prolific nonfiction writer and journalist Janet Malcolm, 86, died of lung cancer, per the New York Times. The long-time contributor to The New Yorker was best known for her sharp criticism and expertly crafted essays, profiles, and books. Her work  including acclaimed essay collections like Forty-One False Starts  is held in high regard by contemporaries and critics alike.

Reading Janet Malcolm is so thrilling because it makes you realize as a nonfiction writer, the skys the limit, New Yorker writer Ariel Levy previously told the Cut. The writing itself on a sentence level is just bananas. Its so smart. Its crackling with intelligence, and also really lyrical and elegant.

Malcolm made her name as a writer and journalist with a unique self-awareness, often criticizing the navel-gazing and sometimes questionable moral efficacy of the field in which she worked. Her famous examination of journalistic ethics The Journalist and the Murderer opens with this remarkable line: Every journalist who is not too stupid or full of himself to notice what is going on knows that what he does is morally indefensible. He is a kind of confidence man, preying on peoples vanity, ignorance, or loneliness, gaining their trust and betraying them without remorse.

Friends and colleagues have expressed their condolences and memories of Malcolm on social media.

RIP Janet Malcolm. A huge influence on many essayists and journalists, thanks to work like The Silent Woman (on Plath), The Journalist and the Murderer and this piece I often teach, Forty-one False Starts. A brilliant mind and stylist - and a big loss. https://t.co/YzKEJS0AEL  Sinead Gleeson (@sineadgleeson) June 17, 2021

Janet Malcolm was a giant of both style and argument. The Journalist and the Murderer is rightly required reading for young writers; In the Freud Archives and The Impossible Profession have been indispensable for me personally. What a legend. pic.twitter.com/5eesvE3dSd  Moira Donegan (@MoiraDonegan) June 17, 2021

RIP to a legend, Janet Malcolm. Her collected @NewYorker work (that has been fully digitized) is here. https://t.co/wHhwTWeT1G  Michael Luo (@michaelluo) June 17, 2021

Janet Malcolm on Eileen Fisher remains an all-time assignment https://t.co/a55aSpW8f8  Sam Schube (@samschube) June 17, 2021

The great New Yorker writer Janet Malcolm has died. She gave us so much. #RIP  Susan Orlean (@susanorlean) June 17, 2021

You can read her full New Yorker archives here.
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A Hong Kong police officer stands outside of the Apple Daily headquarters in Hong Kong on June 17, 2021. (Adrian Yu/The Epoch Times)

2 Apple Daily Directors Charged in Hong Kong Under Beijings National Security Law

Two Apple Daily executives have been charged under Beijings draconian national security law, a day after more than 500 police officers raided the newspapers headquarters and arrested five executives. The Apple Daily is one of Hong Kongs only remaining independent newspapers.

According to a Hong Kong government release published after 3 p.m. local time on Friday, police charged two men, aged 47 and 59, for conspiracy to endanger national security.

The men were charged with colluding with a foreign country or with external elements to endanger national security under Article 29 of Beijings sweeping national security law, which took effect last July. Article 29 of the law bans collusion with a foreign country or with external elements to endanger national security. The collusion charge carries a maximum penalty of life imprisonment.

Apple Daily confirmed that the two men charged this afternoon are CEO Cheung Kim-hung and Chief Editor Ryan Law, citing its own sources. The pair will be brought to West Kowloon Magistrates Courts for mention on Saturday morning, the government statement said.

The papers associate publisher Chan Pui-man, digital director Cheung Chi-wai, and Next Digital chief financial officer Royston Chow Tat-kuen, were also among those arrested, and they remain in custody pending further investigation.

On Thursday, a Hong Kong police official said the collusion charge was in relation to over 30 articles published by the outlet since 2019 that sought to have foreign countries impose sanctions on China or Hong Kong. This marks the first time that authorities have cited media articles as potentially violating the national security law.

Hong Kongs Security Secretary John Lee accused the executives of using journalism as a tool to endanger national security, while cautioning normal journalists to keep their distance from the criminals at the paper.

Yesterdays raid came less than a year after 200 Hong Kong police officers stormed the newsroom in August 2020, a month after the national security law took effect.

Jimmy Lai, Apple Dailys founder, has been in jail since December 2020 after his arrest in August last year. He was charged under the national security law and for his role in pro-democracy, anti-Beijing protests in 2019.

Thursdays arrests were a new low in a bottomless assault on press freedom, Human Rights Watch said, while Amnesty International accused Hong Kong authorities of ramping up their crackdown on press freedom and using the pretext of national security to justify it.

Hong Kongs Foreign Correspondents Club issued a statement saying that it was concerned that this latest action will serve to intimidate independent media in Hong Kong and will cast a chill over the free press, guaranteed under Hong Kongs Basic Law.

Western governments and lawmakers also condemned the raid, saying it showed Beijing was using a draconian national security law to suppress dissent and silence free press in the city.

U.S. Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) in a statement on Twitter urged President Joe Biden and other democracies to condemn this disgusting attack on the free press and hold the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) accountable. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), meanwhile, called for the release of the arrested executives, as well as founder Lai.

Frank Fang and Cathy He contributed to this report.
A Couple Sacrificed Getting a New Kitchen to Rescue Siberian Husky From Chinese Meat Trade

A couple from Scotland sacrificed getting a new kitchen to rescue a Siberian husky from the Chinese meat trade.

Deena, aged 16 months, is now settled into her new home in Crossgate, Fife, after traveling from Beijing to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, then to London, Manchester, Bolton, and finally arriving in Scotland.

The pets new owners, Christine and Steve Arnott, were over the moon when their new pet arrived in Bolton on April 18 after five months of waiting and shelling out around 3,700 pounds (approx. US$ 5,150) on the pooch.

Deena was 3 months old when she was found on the streets of Changchun city, Jilin province, with a broken back legfeared to have been from jumping off a meat truck.

Christine and Steve then found her on an animal welfare charity website called the Great Bulls of China and were struck by Deenas intense facial expression; they knew right then that they wanted to give her a better life with their three Alaskan Malamutes and three German Shepherds.

She was so beautiful and had such an intense expression on her face, yet was unsponsored, Christine, 49, said. We hadnt planned on getting another dog, but we felt like she needed a home when we saw her picture.

Deena in China. (SWNS)

From November 2020, the couple began paying 135 pounds (approx. US$188) a months sponsorship and were finally able to start buying doggie treats, beds, and blankets as the big day neared.

According to health and safety officer Christine, there were five to six attempts made to get Deena onto a plane, but with the pandemic, the cost of flights was astronomical.

During the months that followed, the charity continued to send photos and videos of Deena to the couple as they eagerly waited for her arrival.

Deena in China. (SWNS)

Christine then received a bonus from work that was initially meant to be spent on a new kitchen, but she said this was more important.

Recalling the one weekend the couple thought that Deena had made it onto the flight, but then were told that the canine was refused due to an overloaded plane, Christine said, We were gutted.

However, in April 2021, Deena was finally put on a plane. We were just mind blown when we got told she was on her way, Christine said.

The couple then went all out to buy blankets, treats, and all different brands of food as they were unaware of what Deena would like and couldnt wait to finally hold her.

Christine went down to Bolton to pick up the new arrival. Describing the moment she first saw Deena, Christine said: When the guy opened the back of the pet transfer van in Bolton, its safe to say I was in floods of tears.

It was just amazing to see her and hold her after five months of pictures and videos.

Christine then drove her beloved pet back home and introduced Deena to all the other dogs outside the house one by one.

She was a little bit reserved at first but seemed interested, and very curious, Christine said.

Now that its been a few weeks since Deena has settled into her new home, Christine says that she gets along fabulously with the other dogs, but admits that Deena still doesnt get some things, like realizing her meals are regular.

Sometimes, the couple sit back in amazement and look at her, thinking of the horror that could have happened if she wasnt with them.

To just think of all the thousands of miles she traveled, all the pain she had been in, all the different people that touched her, it breaks my heart, Christine said. If a human had gone through half of what Deenas been through they would need years of therapy.

Epoch Times Staff contributed to this report.

Share your stories with us at emg.inspired@epochtimes.com, and continue to get your daily dose of inspiration by signing up for the Epoch Inspired newsletter at TheEpochTimes.com/newsletter
A Media With No Doubts Charges Cowardice

Commentary

The decline of the Washington Post from its former journalistic eminence might be summed up in one headline that I spotted this week while glancing over its daily Headlines newsletterwhich is usually as much of the paper as I care to see anymore.

This headline was to an opinion piece by one Terrance Weeden and contained the customary thumbnail biography of the author within itself. It read: Im a gay, Christian pediatrician and have no doubt: Jesus would reject anti-trans laws.

Lets just say that the kind of people given to confident pronouncements about what political party Jesus would have favoredpresumably does favorused not to be welcome in the pages of the Washington Postor any other newspaper that cared about being taken seriously.

Of course, such people used to be on the political right. Some, perhaps, still are. But their crass bumptiousness apparently doesnt count against them now that their (and supposedly Jesuss) political views correspond with those of the Post.

What once made them so objectionable, I fancy, is not so much that they presumed to speak for the Only Begotten Son of Almighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace, as that, like Weeden, they had no doubt that the view they took of some currently fashionable political cause exactly corresponded to that of the Ancient of Days.

I cant help thinking of the little rhyme from the World War I era by J.C. Squire:

God heard the embattled nations sing and shout,

Gott strafe [punish] England! and God Save the King!

God this, God that and God the other thing 

Good God, said God, Ive got my work cut out.

The Posts headline is presumably meant to suggest that Weedens being gay, Christian, and a pediatrician all somehow qualify him to have no doubt about the truth of his (and, presumptively, Jesuss) opinions. But my impression is that nowadays its the other way around: its the having no doubt about it which qualifies your opinion to appear in todays Washington Post.

No Doubts

Nobodyat least nobody on the Posts side of our great ideological dividehas any doubts these days. Having no doubt is the first requirement for membership among the putatively good and decent folk of the Left.

You might almost say that the real divergence between the two sides in the culture wars is not over transgenderism or any of the other isms, good and bad, currently in vogue but between the people on either side of the ostensible divide with no doubts and the people for whom, as for me, doubt is not a dirty word.

Needless to say, its the no-doubters who are in charge at The Washington Post, as they are at most other media entities which once dispensed the news but now only offer propagandalargely because it is much easier and more comfortable to have no doubts about propaganda than it is about the news.

A couple of weeks ago in the UK there was a spate of articles by left-wingers with no sense of irony arguing that the culture wars dont actually exist but have been made up by conservatives desperate to distract public attention from their own failures.

The idea is no crazier than most of those promulgated by the revolutionary Left these days, and it may be one that they actually believebecause of this same self-certainty. If they genuinely suppose that no one can disagree with them, its only a short step to thinking that no one does disagree with them. Not really. Such disagreement can only be a pretense. How can anyone disagree with a certainty?

Cowardice

This is also why the Left so often characterizes those who dissent from the media consensus as cowards.

Kevin McCarthy plumbs new depths of political cowardice thundered the Posts editorial board last month when the Republican minority leader in the House of Representatives declined to participate in a Democratic PR exercise disguised as an investigation of the Jan. 6 Capitol riot.

The papers digital opinions editor James Downie echoed his colleagues a couple of weeks later: Senate Republicans know they chose cowardice in killing a Jan. 6 investigation. They just proved it.

Meanwhile, over at The Wall Street Journal, Peggy Noonan was writing that Liz Cheney Confronts a House of Cowardsbecause, as she supposed, House Republicans are about to demonstrate they cant handle the truth about 2020 and Jan. 6.

Such accusations echo the many media citations over the past four years of Republican cowardice as the only conceivable reason why party stalwarts dont, like Liz Cheney, repudiate a President of their own party.

People are, of course, entitled to their opinions, but what entitles them to attribute such poltroonery to those who disagree with them? Only their own self-certainty about the truth as they see it.

Nobody, they believeor at least they pretend to believecould possibly disagree with them in good faith. Therefore, any apparent disagreement must be motivated by fear.

Thus, the Posts columnist Christine Emba recently purported to explain Why conservatives really fear critical race theory.

What they are supposed to be afraid ofespecially given the kudos they would receive from the media for daring to agree with themis never quite made clear.

But the unspoken assumption is always that conservatives must really know the truthabout Donald Trump or Jan. 6 or the pristine 2020 election or critical race theoryas well as they themselves do, since it seems so obvious to them, but are too cowardly to say so.

When put like that, the idea may sound absurd, but its no more absurd than a confident assertion that Jesus is on your side of a political argument that, one suspects, even Omniscience could scarcely have foreseen, back in the days when Jesus walked the earth.

James Bowman is a resident scholar at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. The author of Honor: A History, Bowman is a movie critic for The American Spectator and the media critic for the New Criterion.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
A pro-life campaigner displays a plastic doll representing a 12-week-old fetus as she stands outside the Marie Stopes Clinic in Belfast, Northern Ireland on April 7, 2016. (Charles McQuillan/Getty Images)

Abortion Provider Marie Stopes Closes 4 Regional Australian Clinics

Abortion provider Marie Stopes has announced that it will close four of its regional clinics in Queensland and New South Wales due to financial issues brought on by the CCP virus pandemic.

This comes about a week before Queensland MP George Christensen is due to present his private members bill to Parliament on June 21, which would make it illegal for healthcare workers not to provide life-saving treatment to babies that survive abortions.

It is with great sadness that weve had to take the decision to close our regional clinics in Rockhampton, Townsville, Southport and Newcastle in August, Marie Stopes said in a statement on June 17.

We fought long and hard alongside our passionate and dedicated staff and our supporters to keep these clinics open, but as a result of COVID-19 and the cost of running these clinics in regional areas, we can no longer do it.

The abortion providers financial duress comes despite the Queensland Government providing $413,000 in financial support to assist during the COVID-19 pandemic, which was on top of the $1.65 million it received for Jan. 1, 2020, through to Dec. 21, 2022.

Marie Stopes is an international non-profit abortion, vasectomy, and contraception provider which offers reduced cost and free services on a needs basis to women and men.

The closure of four regional Australian clinics means that people in those areas seeking an abortion will need to travel to metropolitan cities to access legal abortion services.

(L-R) George Christensen with fellow speakers Sen. Amanda Stoker, Queensland state MP Dr Mark Robinson, Martyn Iles of the ACL, Teeshan Johnson of Cherish Life, and Senator Matt Canavan at the March for Life rally in Brisbane, Australia, on May 8, 2021. (Adrian Wedderburn)

Teeshan Johnson from Cherish Life, a Queensland pro-life advocacy organisation, said the closure of the four Marie Stopes clinics was bittersweet because the abortion rate had sharply increased since the Queensland government passed new legislation in 2018.

The Queensland government passed legislation, which came into effect on Dec. 3, 2018, to ensure the termination of pregnancies was treated as a health issue rather than a criminal issue.

In fact, almost 10,000 more babies were killed in the subsequent year, Johnson told The Epoch Times.

Federal figures back up Johnsons claim, revealing that in the year after Queensland changed its laws, the PBS and RPBS recorded 17,087 medical abortions by prescribed drugs were processed. That was 9,641 more than the previous year in 2018.

However, earlier this year, Queensland Health Minister Yvette DAth told the states Parliament that there had been fewer abortions in 2019.

In relation to the statistics about the number of terminations in the public and private sector, I can advise that in 2019 there were 9,496 terminations, DAth said on March 10 (pdf).

She added: This is a lower number, and it has been decreasing since 2013. In 2013, we saw over 12,000 terminations. There were over 11,000 in 2014, 10,800 in 2015, over 10,400 in 2016, and now we see numbers in the 9,000s.

That shows that the passing of this legislation has not led to an increase in the number of terminations, she said.

Whereas figures from the federal government, which Cherish Life published on their site, showed there had in fact been a 58 percent increase in total abortions in 2019, the year after Queensland changed the law.

The figures in the 9,000s related only to surgical abortions but did not include the larger number of medical abortions.

Johnson also noted that the procedure should not be classified as family planning or healthcarearguing that abortion isnt healthcareits killing.

The primary intention of a doctor should never be to kill a human being, she said.

In her view, there are only rare exceptions when abortions are not considered killing, such as when a baby dies during life-saving interventions that are needed to save the mothers life.

An example would be where a pregnant woman is diagnosed with an aggressive cancer of the womb and has to get a hysterectomy to save her own life, and her 19-week-old baby is delivered via C-section during the procedure but dies because it is so young, she said. In this example, its clear the intention was never to kill the baby but to save a life.

However, the Queensland Health Minister has said that women get terminations for a whole lot of complex reasons.

No-one should try to put themselves in the shoes of a woman who has to make that very difficult decision, DAth said. That is a personal decision that that woman has to makesometimes that young girl has to makeand we should respect that right and make sure we continue to provide whatever support we possibly can.

Meanwhile, Children by Choice CEO Daile Kelleher told the ABC that she was concerned the closure of the Marie Stopes clinics would result in people making rushed decisions or finding themselves unable to travel.

It will mean hundreds of kilometres having to travel potentially to Cairns or Brisbane unless there is some sort of public provision through the hospital system within the regions which we know can be sporadic and certainly isnt offered everywhere, she said.

We already know that regional Queenslanders face so many barriers to accessing healthcare.

MP to Present Born Alive Bill to Parliament

On June 21, Liberal MP George Christensen will present his Born Alive private members bill to the federal Parliament, which, if passed, would mandate that life-saving medical care be given to viable babies born alive in an abortion.

Under current state laws in Queensland, Victoria, the ACT, Tasmania, the Northern Territory, and Western Australia, all such babies born alive during abortions are left to die.

MP George Christensen at the Cherish Life 50th anniversary dinner in Brisbane, Australia on Nov. 27, 2020. (Cherish Life)

The additions to the Bill are a new reporting requirement for medical practitioners to report children born alive as a result of abortion within seven days, Christensen said in a press release.

The other change is to underscore the false notion that the Bill would require medical practitioners to provide life-saving treatments to non-viable babies.

It does this by stating that the care or treatment provided would be commensurate to the circumstances and could include palliative care, he said.

The bill also makes it an offence not to provide life-saving treatment with punishment and penalties higher than $400,000 for health practitioners and higher for corporations.

Health practitioners who breach the proposed law may also be deregistered.

Christensen said he was calling on his Parliamentary colleagues to ask themselves the question What happens to a child born alive during a late-term abortion?

The uncomfortable truth is that the child is left to die, he said.
Hong Kong democracy activist Nathan Law stands next to a banner reading "Free Hong Kong. Revolution now" as he attends a demonstration outside the Foreign Office in Berlin, Germany, on Sept. 1, 2020. (Tobias Schwarz/AFP via Getty Images)

Beijing Has Turned Hong Kongs One Country, Two Systems Into One-Party Dictatorship, Expert Warns

News Analysis

On June 12, the two year anniversary of Hong Kongs Anti-Extradition Law Amendment Bill movement, the citys top Beijing official emphasized the governing power of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in Hong Kong.

Analysts say the CCP has completely betrayed its promise to leave Hong Kong unchanged for 50 years, with the CCP turning the one country, two systems agreement into a one-party dictatorship.

The Chinese authorities organized a forum discussing one country, two systems on June 12. Luo Huining, Director of the Liaison Office of the Central Peoples Government in Hong Kong, stressed that in Beijings view, the governance of the CCP is the premise implementation of one country two systems, and anyone who opposes one-party rule is the enemy of Hong Kong who seeks to undermine Hong Kongs stability and prosperity.

Beijing has been eroding Hong Kongs autonomy by introducing a series of new laws, such as the national security laws and the extradition bill, to make it easier to punish dissidents and protesters in Hong Kong.

On Feb. 13, 2019, the Hong Kong government proposed an extradition bill, the Fugitive Offenders and Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters Legislation (Amendment) Bill 2019, which would allow criminal suspects to be extradited to mainland China to face trial.

With the government ignoring many their calls to keep Hong Kong society independent from the regime in Beijing, millions of Hong Kong residents took to the streets on June 12, 2019, to protest the bill. They were met with a police crackdown.

A year later, Beijing imposed its national security law on the city on June 20, 2020. The Hong Kong National Security Law stipulates that anyone who violates this law at any place in the world may be extradited to mainland China when they visit or return to Hong Kong.

U.S.-based China expert Ji Da told The Epoch Times that the CCP officials in Hong Kong chose to mark the two-year anniversary of Hong Kongs anti-extradition movement as a way to imply that the government sees anti-extradition protests is anti-CCP action.

Luo Huinings official title is equivalent to Party boss of Hong Kong. This time, he openly declared that a slogan some Hongkongers have been using, End the One-Party Dictatorship, violates the basic law. That means any anti-CCP action in Hong Kong constitutes a violation of the law, Ji said.

According to the CCPs mouthpiece Xinhua News Agency, the forum was jointly organized by the Hong Kong Central Liaison Office, the Hong Kong National Security Agency, the Office of the Special Commissioner of the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Hong Kong, and the Hong Kong Garrison.

Among those present were Tung Chee-hwa and Liang Zhenying, vice chairmen of the Chinese Peoples Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) National Committee, and Carrie Lam, Chief Executive of Hong Kong.

Ji said the meeting showed that the attendees are actually the CCPs governance team in Hong Kong.

Carrie Lam is basically the Mayor of Hong Kong, and the director of the Liaison Office is Hong Kongs Party Chief. The Hong Kong Garrison is equivalent to the political commissar. The National Security Agency is similar to the CCPs Politics and Law Committee. Together, they made a high-profile appearance at this forum.

It is obvious that the CCP wants to replace the Hong Kong Legislative Council and the Executive Council with this team, Ji added.
Then-Vice President Joe Biden and U.S. Speaker of the House Rep. Nancy Pelosi at the U.S. Capitol in Washington on Jan. 27, 2010. (Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

Biden, Pelosi Could Be Denied Communion After US Catholic Bishops Vote

Catholic bishops based in the United States voted to approve the drafting of a teaching document that may rebuke President Joe Biden, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), and others for their support of abortion.

More than 73 percent of bishopsor 168 to 55 with six abstentionsthis week cast their ballots during a U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) conference to report on the meaning of the Eucharist in the church. The move could potentially set up the denial of communion to Biden, Pelosi, and other elected officials who are Catholic.

Biden, a Catholic who has long been a proponent of abortion, responded to a reporters question on Friday about the bishops vote.

Thats a private matter, and I dont think its going to happen, the president said of potentially being denied communion. He didnt elaborate.

Bishop Donald Hying of Madison, Wisconsin, said on Thursday that many Catholics are confused about a president who attends Mass regularly but supports the most radical pro-abortion agenda in history.

Theyre looking for direction, Hying added.

In 2019, a South Carolina Catholic priest denied Bidendescribed in the media as a regular Catholic Mass attendeecommunion over his stance on abortion. A number of priests and bishops have said in recent months have said that politicians who are pro-abortion shouldnt receive the Eucharist, and critics of Biden have long said that he should attempt to align his politics with his Catholicism.

San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone, who is the archbishop of Pelosi and opposes abortion, argued that eyes of the whole country are on us and if we dont act courageously, clearly and convincingly on this core Catholic value, how can we expect to be taken seriously on another matter, reported the Washington Post.

Previously, Cordileone said Catholic priests should deny communion to elected officials who support abortion.

Opponents of the measure, including San Diego Archbishop Robert McElroy, have said the proposal could turn communion into a partisan thing.

The Eucharist itself will be a tool in vicious partisan turmoil. It will be impossible to prevent its weaponization, even if everyone wants to do so, McElroy said, according to media reports. Once we legitimize public-policy-based exclusion  well invite all political animosity into the heart of the Eucharistic celebration.

Catholics for Choice, a liberal Catholic group, panned Thursdays vote, claiming the bishops chose to be partisan instead of pastoral and wish to foment tension and division.

The Vatican, meanwhile, has attempted to slow the U.S. bishops drafting of the document. Last month, the Vaticans doctrinal office tried to intervene and urged extensive and serene dialogue on the matter.

Ultimately, the document that was voted on this week will require the Vaticans approval, which is known as a recognitio.

The Epoch Times has contacted Pelosis office for comment.
Border Lines (Part 2): How Mexican Cartels Use Immigrants as a Decoy For Transnational Crime

Some say theres a crisis at the southern border of the United States, some say illegal immigration is out of control, and others fear drug or human smuggling. Some say theres no problem at all.

So what is happening at the border? We decided to go there and see it for ourselves.

We went to Hidalgo, Texas, where the U.S. border can be seen, as well as part of the border wall. On this side of the fence, residents come to this location to enjoy the scenery and to appreciate nature.

Why are so many people willing to risk everything to cross the border into the United States? The freedom and safety we have here, which we often take for granted, is one reason. The wish for a higher standard of living is another.

This episode premieres on this page at 12p.m. ET on Saturday, June 19.

Hosted by award-winning documentary filmmaker and author Kay Rubacek, Life & Times travels the nation to bring you the hopeful stories behind the biggest news of today.

In a still image from a video released by NTD, Congressional Candidate Mayra Flores talks to Life & Times about the need of migration reform. (Oliver Trey/NTD)

In a still image from a video released by NTD, illegal immigrants rest after crossing onto the U.S. and await being guided to a processing station in Roma, Texas. (Oliver Trey/NTD)

In a still image from a video released by NTD, Jaeson Jones CEO, Omni Intelligence explains how Mexican cartels Use immigrants as a decoy For transnational crime(Oliver Trey/NTD)

In a still image from a video released by NTD, Illegal immigrates jump off moving vehicle to evade capture from border patrol. (Courtesy Jaeson Jones @Tripwirestriggers)

Jaeson Jones CEO, Omni Intelligence, sits on a rock in Roma, TX opposite from a Mexican border-town (Sunny Yang/NTD)

In a still image from a video released by NTD, Pastor Luis Silva speaks to Life & Times in Roma, Texas. (Oliver Trey/NTD)

Congressional Candidate Monica De La Cruz-Hernandez, sits down to talk with Life and Times (Sunny Yang/NTD)
Picture of a section of the U.S.-Mexico border fence seen from Tijuana, Baja California State, Mexico, on Feb. 5, 2019. (Guillermo Arias/AFP via Getty Images)

Border Officials Have Found More Than 200 Dead Migrants Since October and Rescued Thousands

Border officials recorded over 200 migrant deaths and about 7,000 rescues for migrants who attempted to illegally enter the U.S. since October 2020, a Customs and Border Protection spokesperson told the Daily Caller News Foundation Thursday.

Migrants continue to try and enter the U.S illegally despite high temperatures and other dangers, the Customs and Border Protection (CBP) spokesperson told the DCNF. Border officials rescued at least 60 migrants and a suspected smuggler this week and have discovered over 203 dead migrants since October 2020.

CBPs message for anyone who is thinking of entering the United States illegally along the Southern border is simple: dont do it, a CBP spokesperson told the DCNF. When migrants cross the border illegally, they put their lives in peril. The terrain along the border is extreme, the summer heat is severe, and the miles of desert migrants must hike after crossing the border in many areas are unforgiving.

Although CBP does everything it can to locate and rescue individuals who are lost or distressed, the bottom line is this: there are thousands of square miles of mostly desert wilderness that extend immediately north of the border in our area of responsibility, the spokesperson added. People who made the decision to make the dangerous journey into this territory have died of dehydration, starvation, and heat stroke despite CBPs best efforts to locate them.

Texas border officials recorded the most migrant deaths, including 45 in Del Rio, 37 in the Rio Grande Valley (RGV) and 33 in Laredo since October 2020, a CBP spokesperson told the DCNF.

Border officials airlifted an unresponsive migrant woman suffering from a heat-related injury Wednesday morning to a local hospital for treatment. The woman was traveling with a group of 30 illegal migrants in a remote area near Sierra Blanca, Texas.

If we had not located the injured woman in time, the afternoon heat could have proved fatal for this poor woman, El Paso Air and Marine Operations Director John Stonehouse said in a statement. Human smuggling organizations continue to illegally push these vulnerable migrants across the border in the deserts and mountains of West Texas and New Mexico in 100 degree plus weather placing their lives in danger. They often abandon these people in remote areas without food or water.

Border officials rescued a suspected smuggler who nearly drowned after migrants attempting to illegally enter the U.S. jumped off a raft in an attempt to avoid apprehension in Texas Rio Grande Valley Wednesday, according to CBP. Border Patrol agents saved 17 illegal migrants who were abandoned by smugglers in the Rio Grande Valley Monday, including a teenager who was left alone in a bush for nearly two days and multiple others suffering from extreme dehydration requiring hospitalization.

Officials found 33 illegal migrants were trapped in a locked U-Haul box-truck in a suspected smuggling attempt near Van Horn, Texas, Tuesday, according to CBP. The migrants were close to perishing due to excessive heat and lack of fresh air in temperatures still hovering near 100 degrees and 12 of them were hospitalized while others were treated at the scene.

Eight illegal migrants were rescued after getting lost in the mountains of the Jacumba Wilderness in California Tuesday night, CBP said. Five other illegal migrants were saved from the same region Monday including a woman suffering from a sprained ankle and a man who was left behind and lost in the mountains.

By Kaylee Greenlee

From The Daily Caller News Foundation

Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.
A 'for-rent' sign is posted in front of an apartment building in Los Angeles on Feb. 1, 2017. (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

California Landlords Call for End to Eviction Moratorium

Some California landlords are pleading with state and local governments to end the eviction moratorium on rental properties as planned June 30, rather than extending it.

Dan Faller, founder and chairman of the Apartment Owners Association of California, said some residents have been taking advantage of the moratorium.

Theyre stealing from apartment owners, and its legal, Faller told The Epoch Times.

Faller said he was frustrated with tenants using the moratorium as an excuse to avoid paying rent and save money. He gave an example of a young man who told his landlord he was saving money for a house and wouldnt be paying rent.

Even with knowledge of tenants taking advantage of the moratorium, landlords are unable to evict them, Faller said.

They cant do anything about it, he said. Hell move out when we have the opportunity to evict him.

The big owners have the big buildings; they have enough units that spread it out, and they can stay in business. But its the older couple who owns a duplex or a triplex.  They save their money to buy it, and they were counting on it being their retirement, and now the tenants dont pay.

Gov. Gavin Newsom on May 10 announced a plan to repay property owners 100 percent of rent owed from tenants that qualify for rental assistance due to COVID-19. However, more than a month later, Faller said the money hasnt arrived.

In a letter addressed to Newsom on June 17, the Apartment Owners Association advocated for the rights of landlords, urging the state to move past rent control regulations.

Why are our lifesavings being redistributed to others? Faller said in the letter. We cannot afford to cover another familys living expense. Well eventually lose all of our lifes savings. We have already lost a large amount that we will never recover.

The letter was also sent to 25 mayors of the states largest cities.

While its unclear whether Orange County cities will vote on an emergency eviction moratorium ordinance, the city of Costa Mesa voted to suspend the moratorium in April.

The Costa Mesa City Council voted in favor of revoking the moratorium on April 6, after City Manager Lori Ann Farrell Harrison said shes heard from property owners, business owners, and landlords to end the moratorium.

Harrison said the city was seeing economic improvements at the time, and in removing the moratorium, businesses could receive payments and continue moving forward.

The ordinance was passed and gave tenants a 120-day period to allow them to pay past-due rent.

Californias eviction moratorium for renters is set to expire June 30, but some cities and counties are passing emergency ordinances to extend it.

The San Francisco Board of Supervisors on June 7 extended the city and countys moratorium on evictions until September. Its ordinance seeks to extend renter protection from evictions, non-payment of rent, and late fees.

The San Diego County Board of Supervisors on May 4 voted in favor of rent control regulations and the prohibition of evictions for all rental units beginning June 3 and lasting for 60 days.

Meanwhile, the California Apartment Association (CAA) is leading a grassroots effort to urge lawmakers to reject an eviction moratorium extension.

I beg you to please end this  moratorium this June 30, a housing provider wrote to lawmakers in a statement. I have three separate tenants that are working and obviously not affected by the COVID situation but decided to take advantage and decided not to pay their rents. This has to end.
A police officer keeps watch in Tiananmen Square in Beijing on the 32nd anniversary of the deadly 1989 crackdown on pro-democracy protests, on June 4, 2021. (GREG BAKER/AFP via Getty Images)

China Has Become a Prison: Beijing Beefs up Security Ahead of Centennial Celebration

Chinese authorities are ramping up security measures around the country, especially in the capital city of Beijing, ahead of the Chinese Communist Partys (CCPs) centennial celebration on July 1. One Chinese citizen said China has been turned into a prison.

The 100th anniversary of the founding of the CCP will be a grand occasion and Chinese leader Xi Jinping will deliver a speech, authorities announced on March 23.

Prior to the announcement, the CCP has implemented a series of strict controls in order to maintain social stability, which is the term used by the regime to justify its totalitarian rule in China.

On March 20, 18 departments, including the Ministry of Civil Affairs, the Central Propaganda Department, and the Central Committee of Political and Legal Affairs, jointly launched a three-and-a-half-month special campaign to suppress illegal social organizations. State-run media Xinhua reported that over 500 illegal social organizations were identified and placed under investigation.

On May 24, the Tiananmen District Management Committee announced that from May 25 to July 1, Tiananmen Square and the surrounding areas would be closed for construction for the grand celebration; from June 23 to July 1, Tiananmen Square would be closed.

On May 31, the Beijing Municipal Public Security Bureau announced that the automatic renewal extension of the Beijing Residence Permit and the Beijing Residence Registration Card would be discontinued from June 1.

The security bureau said that residents from other cities must apply for the extension of their residence permit (card). Otherwise, the permit would be suspended if it was overdue for one month and cancelled if it was overdue for six months. This move would make it more difficult for non-permanent Beijing residents to stay and live in the city.

On June 11, the Beijing Municipal Government issued a flying ban from June 13 to July 1. Nine districts, including Dongcheng, Xicheng, Chaoyang, Haidian, Fengtai, Shijingshan, Fangshan, Tongzhou and Daxing, would be designated as restricted flying zones. All flying objects, including doves and drones, are prohibited. In Beijing, doves are usually raised as pets and kept indoors.

Mr. Wang, a Shanghai resident, told The Epoch Times that China is like a prison with total surveillance of the public. I saw several petitioners, and they were stopped before they reached Beijing. Petitioners are citizens who have grievances that they wish to bring up to the central authorities.

He said, Notices have been posted on the internet. Now [the CCP needs to] maintain stability. Dont go to Beijing. Trains, planes, highways, and cell phones are all controlled. Layers of layers of security. Cameras are everywhere. Where can you go? It is useless to go anywhere, they will stop you halfway. Now (in Beijing) even pigeons are banned from flying, all flying objects are banned. It feels like an invisible net is in the air and on land, and nobody can escape.

An anonymous source in China provided a video to The Epoch Times showing six security guards inside a moving bus in Beijing. The guards were wearing red armbands that contained a device, which monitored the movement of every passenger.

Suppressing Dissidents

Prior to the 32nd anniversary of the Tiananmen Square Massacre on June 4, authorities have been arresting dissidents or forcing them to leave the city since the end of May. The 1989 student-led pro-democracy protest movement is a sensitive topic in China and the CCP denies that it violently suppressed the protesters. Unnamed sources within the CCP said that at least 10,000 people were killed that day, according to declassified British cable and declassified U.S. documents.

Pro-democracy activists Zhang Yi, Zhu Tao, and Li Yong in Wuhan city were forced to travel to other places so that they wouldnt be able to organize activities, or post comments on social media to commemorate the victims of the Tiananmen Square Massacre.

Dissidents including Zhang Wuzhou and Wang Aizhong in Guangzhou city, Chen Siming in Hunan Province, and Yang Shaozheng in Guizhou city were arrested around the anniversary of the Tiananmen massacre.

Wang Aizhong was very active on Twitter and often criticized the Chinese authorities. He was arrested on May 28. His wife Wang Henan posted a letter on Chinese social media on May 30, calling for his release.

Zhang Wuzhou was arrested after he put up a banner in public that read, Dont forget June 4.

A screenshot of Zhang Wuzhou from Weiquanwangs (Rights Defense Networks) blog. (Screenshot via The Epoch Times)

Chen Siming was also arrested on June 5 for posting a photo of himself holding up a sign that read, Commemorating the 31st Anniversary of June 4, from last year.

A screenshot of Chen Siming from Weiquanwangs (Rights Defense Networks) blog. (Screenshot via The Epoch Times)

Beijing dissidents, including Cha Jianguo and Hu Jia, were taken out of the city by authorities before June 4.

U.S.-based China affairs commentator Tang Jingyuan told The Epoch Times that the Chinese regime is carrying out a high-profile centennial celebration because the CCP needs to use this opportunity to exaggerate its so-called contributions to China and the world, and to create a softer image for the international community.

Dr. Qin Jin, president of the Australian Democratic China Front, said that the CCP is already on a road that leads to destruction and it has to keep making noise in order to embolden itself.

He told The Epoch Times, Now that the CCPs international environment has worsened, it needs to put on a show in front of the Chinese people to achieve the political effect of deceiving them, even though it is already in dire straits.

It [the CCP] started a pandemic that spread around the world, temporarily alleviating the Trump administrations countermeasures and strikes against it, but leaving the world devastated. Perhaps the world will learn from the pain and hold Beijing accountable. So, the CCP was just drinking poison to quench its thirst, Qin stated.

Despite the regimes efforts, Qin said that the so-called centennial celebration will not be well received by the world because more people are realizing the evil nature of the CCP.

Luo Ya contributed to this article.
Flags of China and the European Union stand at the Chancellery in Berlin, Germany on Jan. 26, 2021. (Sean Gallup/Getty Images)

Chinese Investment in Europe Hits a 10-Year Low While Bilateral Relations Sour: Report

Researchers found that Chinas investment in the 27 EU member states and the United Kingdom tumbled to a decade-low in 2020, and the downward trend could continue this year due to the climbing bilateral defense and souring political relationship.

The key findings were released earlier this week by research provider Rhodium Group and Mercator Center for China Studies (MERICS), a German think tank on China.

A 45 percent decline in completed Chinese foreign direct investment (FDI) occurred in Europe last year, down to $7.7 billion from $13.9 billion in 2019, taking Chinese investment in Europe to a 10-year low, according to the joint report, Chinese FDI in Europe: 2020 Update, concluding that it was partly due to COVID-19 travel restrictions and changed domestic economic circumstances.

However, the pandemic was not the only force at work, said the full report, adding the headwind of capital controls in China, the EU FDI screening, and depreciating public tolerance due to Chinas tit-for-tat sanctions.

In March, the European Union imposed sanctions on four Chinese officials over their alleged roles in the human rights abuses of Uyghur Muslims. Days later, the Chinese regime announced its sanctioning of nine individuals and four entities on the UK side in retaliation.

Rising EU attention over the disputed South China Sea and Taiwan could also exacerbate current political tensions, it said.

Experience has shown that it was the souring of political relations, rather than FDI screening, that triggered drastic falls in Chinese investment into the US.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said on Tuesday that Chinas record on human rights is the main issue that divides it from the European Union, making Beijing a systemic rival for the alliance.

The European Union has also enhanced its investment screening process to tackle national security threats by securing cutting-edge technologies, and to limit the politicization surrounding certain transactions, said the report.

Transactions in sensitive sectors are more likely to be reviewed and potentially blocked.

Notable screened acquisitions in the EU-27 and the UK in 2020 and early 2021. (Courtesy of MERICS)

The research said that infrastructure, ICT, and electronics had attracted over 50 percent of total Chinese investment, taking up the top three sectors.

Chinas global outbound merger and acquisition activity, which has been annually declining since 2016, was found to shrink to a 13-year low in 2020, with completed deals totaling around $40 billiona drop of 45 percent in the past year.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian packs up his notes after speaking at the daily media briefing in Beijing on April 8, 2020. (Greg Baker/AFP via Getty Images)

Chinese Regime Says Wuhan Lab Scientists Should Be Awarded the Nobel Prize

A Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson has claimed that researchers at the Wuhan lab deserve the Nobel Prize just as calls renew for a harder look into whether the virus that causes COVID-19 could have leaked from the facility.

The Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV), hosts Chinas first P4 laboratory, the highest biosafety designation that allows it to handle the worlds most dangerous pathogens. The lab is located just a few miles from a major seafood market in the city that Beijing first identified as the source of the virus.

The possibility of an accidental laboratory leak from the Chinese lab was quickly shut down at the start of the pandemic, but new scrutiny from the White House and prominent scientists, as well as evidence of WIV staff becoming sick before the COVID-19 outbreak, have pushed the debate back to center stage.

Zhao Lijian, of Chinas Ministry of Foreign Affairs, sought to deflect attention on the lab, claiming that the WIV scientists were being faulted because they were the first to identify the COVID-19 genome sequence.

That does not mean Wuhan is the source of the coronavirus, nor can it be inferred that the coronavirus was made by Chinese scientists, he said at a June 18 press briefing.

If those that first publish high-quality viral genomes were to be accused of making the virus, then professor Luc Montagnier, who first discovered Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) would be considered the culprit of AIDS rather than awarded the Nobel Prize, and Mr. Louis Pasteur, who discovered microbes, would be held accountable for the disease-causing bacteria all around the globe.

By the same analogy, according to Zhao, the team in Wuhan should be awarded the Nobel Prize in medicine for their research on COVID-19, instead of being criticized.

Zhaos remarks didnt sit well with China critic Su Tzu-yun, who described the statement as a clumsy attempt to cover up the truth.

Looking at the current evidence, a lab leak seems the most likely source of the virus, Su, who is the director of the Taiwan-based Institute for National Defense and Security Research, told The Epoch Times.

Zhao and other Chinese officials have insisted that the virus came from outside of China, and speculated that the virus may have originated from a U.S. military base and somehow got into Wuhan, or that it was a foreign import that came via frozen food.

While the World Health Organization-led panel declared a lab leak extremely unlikely, a phrase that the regime has since repeatedly cited to direct a virus probe to other countries, experts have questioned how much independence the investigators enjoyed in drawing those conclusions.

More evidence is likely coming out, Su said. If the virus did spread from overseas, it should have broken out on a larger scale there. How come it exploded in Wuhan? This doesnt follow natural logic.

This is not to discriminate anyone who got this diseaseit is unfortunatebut the regimes intentional coverup is the biggest issue.

Inverting Black and White

Chinese citizen Zhang Hai, who blames Wuhan officials delayed pandemic response for his fathers death in Wuhan, said Zhao was inverting black and white.

To the COVID-19 victims in Wuhan, what he said showed an indifference to lives, he told The Epoch Times.

Im very patriotic, but that doesnt mean I cant tell right from wrong. Crimes are crimes. Can you do things at will just because you control the narratives? I definitely wont buy that.

Zhang Hai holds up a photo of his father taken in his youth during an interview in Shenzhen in southern Chinas Guangdong Province on Oct. 16, 2020. (Ng Han Guan/AP Photo)

Given the damage that the pandemic has inflicted on the world, if there is indeed incriminating evidence, those people should be held accountable for war crimes, he said, calling Zhaos demand for a Nobel Prize for the WIV researchers shameless.

While both Zhao and Shi Zhengli, a lead researcher at the WIV, have accused the West of politicizing the virus tracing issue, Zhang said it was a sign of their lack of self-assurance.

A poor lie reveals the truth, he said, using a Chinese idiom. You said you werent to blame, then open up to the world for an honest investigation.

Zhang said the continuing suppression of virus critics, purging the evidence at the Wuhan market, and refusal of an independent probe should arouse suspicions, noting that even today, no actual COVID death numbers in Wuhan have been published.

Chinese people dont have real freedom of speech, but that doesnt mean we are idiots, he said. If a country cant even treat its citizens kindly, it bespeaks what kind of government this is.

Zhang is still pursuing lawsuits against authorities for how they handled the outbreak. He said he has been censored from nearly all Chinese social media platforms for his activism. That wont stop him, he said.

The more they try to suppress me, the more I will speak out, simple as that.

Luo Ya contributed to this report.
Poll workers check in voters at a polling location on election day in Denver, Colo., on Nov. 3, 2020. (Chet Strange/AFP via Getty Images)

Colorado Secretary of State Bans Third Parties From Accessing Voting Systems

The office of Colorados Secretary of State announced on Thursday that it is adopting emergency elections rules to ban third parties from accessing voting equipment in the state.

Effective immediately, the new rules prohibit any third-party individual or vendor from accessing any component of a countys voting equipment in Colorado, according to a news release.

My office just issued rules prohibiting sham election audits in the State of Colorado, Secretary of State Jena Griswold, a Democrat, said on Twitter. We will not risk the states election security nor perpetuate The Big Lie. Sham audits have no place in Colorado.

The Big Lie is a term being used by some establishment media, Democrats in Congress, as well as President Joe Biden, to refer to and refute allegations of potential voter fraud and irregularities in the 2020 presidential election.

Per the rules, a person can only access a countys voting system if they are an employee of the county clerk, an employee of the voting system provider, an employee of the Secretary of States office, or an appointed election judge. They must also have passed a comprehensive criminal background check.

Griswold, whose office is in charge of overseeing elections and was responsible for the 2020 election, said in another statement that her states elections are considered the safest in the nation and that officials must remain steadfast in our dedication to security.

Seven Colorado House Republicans in December 2020 called for a third-party probemeaning not by the Secretary of States Officeinto election software and voting machines in the state to address the allegations of election fraud regarding the November election, reported the Denver Post.

The Centennial states latest emergency election rules will also allow its Secretary of States Office to limit or prohibit the use of, as well as decertify, any voting systems component in the event of a break in its chain-of-custody or other hardware security compromises, such that its security and integrity can no longer be verified, according to the release.

Colorado Gov. Jared Polis has not issued a public statement on the new rules announced by Griswold as of Friday morning. Poliss office did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Epoch Times.

Griswolds office in the release, took aim at the independent election audit currently underway in Arizonas Maricopa County, which is expected to wrap up on June 26.

A third-party vendor with no election experience is currently performing a faulty, unsecure election audit in Arizona and calls for such sham audits have been spreading in other state, the SOS Office asserted. Several Colorado counties have been contacted by third parties offering to conduct audits.

It added, Colorado already administers post-election Risk Limiting Audits after every statewide election, which gives a statistical level of confidence that the outcome of an election is correct.

The audit in Maricopa County was ordered by the Arizona Senate, which previously said that its broad and detailed audit will validate every area of the voting process and includes, but is not limited to, scanning all the ballots, a full hand recount, auditing the voter registration and votes cast, the vote counts, and the electronic voting system. The Arizona Senate has also that its leadership would not be directly involved in the audit process to maintain integrity and transparency.

Griswolds office did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Epoch Times, which sought for clarification as to why it deems the audit in Maricopa County a sham and faulty, unsecure.

Arizona Republican Senate President Karen Fann did not immediately respond to The Epoch Timess request for comment.

Dominion Voting Systems, which says it proudly serves 62 of 64 Colorado counties, issued a statement on June 17 saying that the company, as well as Colorado state and local elections officials, have been unfairly targeted by outlandish, false allegations meant to sow doubt and confusion about the results of the 2020 presidential election.

The Colorado-based company in its statement said that a risk-limiting statewide audit of the 2020 presidential election provided statistical confidence in the results of the election. The scope of the audit was outlined by the SOS Office.

Colorado certified its election on Dec. 8, 2020, giving nine electoral college votes to Joe Biden.
NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian speaks to the media during a press conference in Sydney, Australia, May 6, 2021. (AAP Image/Joel Carrett)

Concerns Grow in NSW Over Delta Variant Outbreak

The issue of mandatory COVID-19 vaccinations for frontline health and allied workers have been thrown in the spotlight by the latest virus outbreak in Sydney.

The cluster of three was sparked on Wednesday night when an unvaccinated limousine driver from Sydneys east and his wife were diagnosed and a woman in her 70s was subsequently infected at a Vaucluse cafe frequented by the couple.

The man from Bondi transports international flight crews and police are investigating if he breached any health orders, which require those working around the hotel quarantine system to be tested for the virus daily and wear personal protective equipment.

NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard said there was an expectation but not an obligation for people working on the COVID-19 frontline to be vaccinated.

There has been a reluctance through the national cabinet to have mandatory testing, he told ABC television on Thursday.

But its certainly something which  were now looking very closely at.

So, Ive asked our lawyers to give us advice on that. And well be making some decisions shortly, he said.

Meanwhile, NSW Health is investigating after a man in his 40s from Sydneys northwest also tested positive for COVID-19.

Its possible the case is a false positive because his test results showed low virus levels, hes not yet linked to any known cases and his three household contacts have all returned negative results.

The man travelled to Canberra on Monday and ACT Health subsequently identified the National Gallery of Australia and a cafe as exposure sites.

The outbreak could mean NSW reintroduces some restrictions ahead of the school holiday period, which begins on June 26.

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern confirmed on Friday that quarantine-free travel will continue with NSW for now.

However, WA and SA have shut the border for those who attended the NSW virus exposure sites.

Victoria also took a similar step, with residents from the City of Sydney, Waverley and Woollahra council areas told to obtain a travel permit, get tested and isolate until they receive a negative result.

Sydneys potential exposure venues include a cinema and shopping centre in Bondi Junction, stores in Castle Hill, cafes in Vaucluse and North Ryde, a car wash in Redfern and stores in Zetland, including at the East Village Shopping Centre.

It also includes the Harris Farm in Leichhardt and Northmead Bowling Club on Sunday afternoon and evening.

People at those venues at that time should get tested, self-isolate and wait for further advice.
Democratic Mayors Call for Tighter Federal Gun Laws Amid Rising Crime

CHICAGOFollowing a weekend of four major shootings in 6 hours covering four cities, over two dozen Democratic mayors turned to the White House for solutions, asking President Joe Biden to push for tighter federal gun laws.

A total of 27 Democratic mayors sent a letter to Biden on Monday advocating for universal background checks, bans on so-called assault weapons and restrictions on gun sales.

They also want Biden to take on more soft power interventions by pouring money into the minority communities that bear the brunt of gun violence.

The weekend shooting spree left seven dead and 32 injured in Chicago, Austin, Cleveland, and Savannah. The shootings took place among outdoor crowds.

So far, 2021 has been more deadly than 2020the pandemic year that saw a record rise of violent crimes nationwide. Across the nation, over 9,000 people died of gun wounds this year (suicides excluded,) according to Gun Violence Archive, a nonprofit which gathers data from nearly 7,500 law enforcement, government, and media sources.

Cleveland Mayor Nan Whaley, who is the president of the U.S. Conference of Mayors and the main organizer behind the mayoral letter, said at the Tuesday press conference, We want to work with President Biden through executive actions to strengthen the tools we already have, and we want him to know that we will stand with him to drive Congress to get off the sidelines and do something.

In April, following a pair of mass shootings, Biden took a series of gun-related executive actions, including new rules on so-called ghost guns. Ghost guns are assembled at home without serial numbers and thus hard to track.

Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot said at the same conference, This isnt about imposing on someones Second Amendment rights. It is about making sure that our children have a real future, that we dont keep hearing from our parents that theyre afraid to let their children out on a warm sunny day.

Kourtney Redmond, president of pro-Second Amendment 761st Gun Club in Chicago, thinks otherwise. Gun restrictions have made it difficult for his law-abiding membersmany of whom are black gun ownersto protect themselves amid the crime wave, he said.

For example, club member Wanda David had to wait eight months for her firearm owners identification card (FOID). David applied for it in August 2020 so she could buy a gun for self-protection amid a rise in carjackings in Chicago. She received the ID in April this year. David told The Epoch Times that she was deprived of her right to bear firearms guaranteed by the Second Amendment during the months of waiting.

According to Illinois law, Illinois residents must have a valid FOID card when they purchase or possess firearms. Illinois is just one of a handful states that have FOID laws, Redmond said. His organization has advocated for years to get rid of the Illinois FOID law.

We have gun controls in Chicago already, we have all these other restrictions in Illinois, and they havent worked. Redmond said.

Chicago has long topped the homicide chart among major U.S. cities. With 310 homicides, 2021 is the deadliest year the city has seen in over a decade. Nine out of 10 deaths are due to gunshots.
Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas holds a press briefing in the Brady Briefing Room of the White House in Washington, D.C., on May 11, 2021. (Nicholas Kamm/AFP via Getty Images)

DHS Chief Defends Harris Not Visiting Border, Calls GOP Question About It Unfair and Disrespectful

Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Chief Alejandro Mayorkas on Thursday pushed back on an inquiry by a Republican congressman about whether Vice President Kamala Harris would visit the southern border, calling the question quite unfair and disrespectful.

Mayorkas made the remarks in June 17 testimony before the House Homeland Security Committee on his agencys fiscal year 2022 budget request, while responding to a series of questions on issues like migration policy and border security operations.

The exchange between Mayorkas and Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.) was prompted by the South Carolina Republicans asking the DHS chief whether he had ever had a medical physical exam. After Mayorkas replied in the affirmative, Norman asked him why, then, would President Joe Biden and Harris not want to go physically look at the border and talk to border patrol agents, given that the in-person approach is one that applies in so many other fields.

Norman also asked whether it was fair of Harris to laugh in response to being asked whether she would visit the border in person, with the lawmaker referring to an incident in March in which the vice president replied to the question by saying, not today, before laughing and adding, But I have before and Im sure I will again.

Mayorkas replied by saying, I consider that question to be quite unfair and disrespectful.

Let me be very clear, the DHS chief added. The President and the Vice President have requested and directed me to visit the border, which I have done on multiple occasions.

Mayorkas later added, I am the secretary of Homeland Security and it is my responsibility to manage the border at the direction of the president and the vice president and I have visited the border on multiple occasions.

The tense exchange came as Harris has faced mounting calls to visit the southern border after Biden tasked her to lead the response to the influx of people seeking to enter the United States, a situation Republicans have called a crisis, but which Mayorkas insisted in his testimony was merely a challenge.

Rep. Andrew Clyde (R-Ga.) asked Mayorkas whether he viewed the situation along the border as a crisis, prefacing his question by referring to a letter-based exchange with DHS officials about expanding detention facilities.

When I asked when did the government identify the need to expand detention capacity, the response was after January 21, the Department of Homeland Security observed an increase in irregular migrant flows to the southwest border,' Clyde said.

The letter goes on to further say, the projected encounters for fiscal year 2021 are expected to be the highest number observed in 20 years, Clyde said, adding, Do we have a crisis at the border, Mr. Secretary?

Mayorkas replied by saying he had previously articulated many, many times that, as has occurred in the past, we have a challenge.

Pressed further on the matter, Mayorkas said, I do not agree with the use of that terminology, adding, we have a strategy, we are executing on our strategy, I have confidence in our strategy.

Throughout Thursdays hearing, Republican committee members repeatedly raised concerns about border security, including frustrations about the pause in border wall funding and the high level of illegal border crossings.

Meanwhile, former President Donald Trump on Tuesday said he would visit the U.S.-Mexico border this month with Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, after both complained about the surge in illegal immigration.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson talks with lecturers and students in the Arts and Design department during a visit to Kirklees College Springfield Sixth Form Centre in Dewsbury, West Yorkshire, England, on June 18, 2021. (Oli Scraff/PA)

England to Expand COVID-19 Vaccination Programmes to Over-18s

Over-18s in England can start booking COVID-19 vaccination appointments from this week, Prime Minister Boris Johnson has announced on Friday.

By now, all adults in England have been invited to take up COVID-19 vaccines in a bid to reduce the transmission of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus and severe illnesses and deaths from COVID-19, the disease caused by the CCP virus.

On Monday, Johnson announced a four-week delay to the highly anticipated removal of all legal restrictions on social distancing, which was originally due on June 21.

The delay was endorsed by Parliament on Wednesday, despite a Tory rebellion of 49 MPs.

Johnson said that the delay was to buy the National Health Service some extra time while the government accelerates the vaccination program to race against the spread of the Delta (Indian) variant of the CCP virus.

He vowed a double jab [for] around two-thirds of the adult population and a first dose for every adult in this country by July 19, the new freedom day.

Johnson said hes confident that July 19 will be the final date, but declined to rule out the possibility of future delay, in case there is some new variant that is far more dangerous, that kills people in a way that we currently cannot foresee or understand.

In a video released on Friday morning asking young people to get vaccinated, Johnson said he was in awe of the utter selflessness that our young people have shown during the pandemic.

Jobs have been lost, education disrupted, plans put on hold, Johnson said, adding that students had to adapt to new ways of learning while missing out on experiences.

Johnson said he doesnt for one moment, underestimate the impact this pandemic has had on the lives of young people, and he thanked them because they chose to do the right thing.

Britain has given a first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine to more than 42 million people, almost 80 percent of adults, while well over half have received both shots.

Health authorities in England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland each run their own vaccination campaigns. Wales and Northern Ireland have already made vaccines available to any adult, while Scotland is offering them to anyone over 30.

Pfizer, AstraZeneca, and Moderna vaccines are being rolled out across the United Kingdom, although officials have said that people under 40 should be offered an alternative to AstraZenecas shot after it was linked to rare blood clots.

Reuters contributed to this report.
Portland Police deploy in Portland, Oregon on Nov. 4, 2020, during a demonstration called by the "Black Lives Matter" movement, a day after the US Presidential Election. (Kathryn Elsesser/AFP via Getty Images)

Entire Portland Police Rapid Response Team Quits After Officers Indictment

The entire Portland Police Bureaus Rapid Response Team (RRT) has left their voluntary positions after an officer was indicted on a protest assault charge.

The team, which is responsible for providing public safety at crowd events when there was a threat of harm to the community, consisted of approximately 50 officers, all of whom resigned on June 16, the bureau announced.

Despite no longer serving as volunteers with RRT, the officers will continue with their regular assignments, the bureau said.

It comes just a day after Multnomah County District Attorney Mike Schmidt announced his team had indicted one member, Officer Corey Budworth, on one count of fourth-degree assault for physically injuring someone during an Aug. 18, 2020, protest.

In this case, we allege that no legal justification existed for Officer Budworths deployment of force, and that the deployment of force was legally excessive under the circumstances, Schmidt said in a statement on Tuesday. My office will continue to do everything we can to ensure justice is done without error or delay and that we make sure our work and practices are rooted in fairness and equity.

Schmidt noted that other use-of-force incidents are still under review and that his office has referred an investigation into Portland Police Det. Erik Kammerers use of force during protests to the Oregon State Department of Justice for review.

The indictment marks the first time a Portland police officer has faced prosecution for striking or firing at someone during a protest, according to The Oregonian.

Budworth was assigned to the Portland Police Bureaus Rapid Response Team at the time of the alleged assault and prosecutors allege he used an excessive and unlawful use of force when he struck activist photographer Teri Jacobs in the head with a baton during a demonstration outside the Multnomah Building.

Multiple videos posted to social media show an officer, identified as Budworth, running after Jacobs and hitting her once in the head from behind, and then hitting her head again after she falls to the ground.

The Portland Police Association claim that Ms. Jacobs fell to the ground and that officer Bedworth had reason to believe she was getting back up to re-engage in her unlawful activities.

Officer Budworth employed one last baton push to try and keep her on the ground, which accidentally struck Ms. Jacobs in the head. The location of Officer Budworths last baton push was accidental, not criminal, they said in a statement on Wednesday.

He faced a violent and chaotic, rapidly evolving situation, and he used the lowest level of baton forcea push; not a strike or a jabto remove Ms. Jacobs from the area.

However, in February, the city agreed to a $50,000 civil settlement for Jacobs in the case.

The Portland Police Bureau placed Budworth on administrative leave Tuesday, officials said.

Unfortunately, this decorated public servant has been caught in the crossfire of agenda-driven city leaders and a politicized criminal justice system, the Portland Police Association said in their statement on Wednesday.

It is also important to know that Officer Corey Budworth is a committed public servant of the highest integrity. He has spent four of his six years as a PPB officer as a highly trained member of PPBs Rapid Response Team (RRT). In his service with RRT and his deployment at hundreds of protests and demonstrations, Officer Budworth has never faced any sustained force complaints, they added.

Portland has dealt with unrestas riots have regularly taken placesince the spring of 2020. Some of the people who have committed crimes are members of the far-left, anarcho-communist Antifa network. Others have identified as Black Lives Matter activists.

Portlanders who spoke to The Epoch Times anonymously said that the violence is becoming worse and is unacceptable, despite being largely underreported by mainstream media.

One 44-year-old man who lives in a Portland suburb said, There are brazen shootings and killings in broad daylight which did not happen before this past year. The violence is no longer limited to nights or certain neighborhoods.

Another 64-year-old woman who works in the information technology field said that companies are also struggling to recruit new employees because Portland is now being perceived as dangerous.

Last week, the Portland Police Association announced it was relocating its headquarters because of repeated attacks by rioters, including members of the far-left network Antifa.

The Epoch Times has reached out to the Portland Police Bureau for comment.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, speaks during a hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington on May 11, 2021. (Jim Lo Scalzo/Pool via AP)

Fauci: Some on February 2020 Call Believed COVID-19 Was Possibly Engineered

Some of the scientists on a recently-revealed February 2020 phone call thought the virus that causes COVID-19 could have been engineered, Dr. Anthony Fauci, who convened the call, said in a new interview.

It was a very productive back-and-forth conversation where some on the call felt it could possibly be an engineered virus, Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told USA Today.

Others on the call believed evidence supported the theory that the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus emerged from nature.

Internal emails obtained by BuzzFeed News (pdf) through a Freedom of Information Act request show Fauci and others hopped on the call to discuss a document about the viruss sequencing.

The main speakers were Kristian Andersen, a professor in Scripps Researchs Department of Immunology and Microbiology, Jeremy Farrar, director of the Wellcome Trust, and Edward Holmes, a virologist at the University of Sydney. The contents of what they discussed were redacted from the email.

I remember it very well, Fauci said. We decided on the call the situation really needed to be looked into carefully.

The call came in early February 2020, after Fauci and others scrambled to respond to a report outlining the possibility that the virus escaped or was released from a top-level laboratory in Wuhan, China, where the first COVID-19 cases were detected in late 2019.

Anderson had told Fauci and Farrar in an email on Jan. 31, 2020, that there were unusual features making up the virus, and that some of the features (potentially) look engineered.

Just a few days later, after the call, Anderson was telling fellow academics in an email that the data conclusively show that the virus was not engineered, according to an internal email (pdf) obtained by a U.S. nonprofit called Right to Know.

Anderson and Peter Daszak, a U.S. researcher whose group EcoHealth Alliance has sent funds to the Wuhan lab, began circulating articles that would be published in February 2020 dismissing the lab leak theory.

Andersen and three other scientists who were on the call later authored an article called the proximal origin of SARS-CoV-2 that claimed the virus is not a laboratory construct or a purposefully manipulated virus.

Two of the people on the call also contributed to a letter published around the same time that alleged ideas about the virus not originating in nature were conspiracy theories.

Fauci publicly wrote off the possibility that the virus escaped from the Wuhan lab.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) speaks at a news conference, as Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) listens, on the Fire Fauci Act on Capitol Hill in Washington on June 15, 2021. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

The mutations that it took to get to the point where it is now is totally consistent with a jump of a species from an animal to a human, he told reporters at the White House in April 2020.

If you look at the evolution of the virus in bats and whats out there now, [the scientific evidence] is very, very strongly leaning toward this could not have been artificially or deliberately manipulated, he added to National Geographic the following month.

A number of members of Congress have called on Fauci to resign after the internal emails were released. They say the emails showed Fauci was giving conflicting messages about key issues, such as masking, and that he lied in some cases.

He owes the American people a lot of answers, but he also owes the world a lot of answers, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) said during a press conference this week while announcing a bill that would bring Faucis salary to zero and require the Senate to confirm someone to replace him.

He has ignored the best advice from scientists in his very own science realm, in favor of fearmongering and theatrics. Egregiously, Fauci even knew that the virus likely originated from a lab in Wuhan, China. Now there are over 2,000 emails proving that Dr. Faucis ego got in the way of the facts over and over again, added Dr. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.).

Fauci has brushed off the criticism and the White House has stood by him.

If you go back then, even though you lean towards feeling this is more likely a natural occurrence, we always felt that you got to keep an open mind all of us, Fauci said on CBS This Morning: this week. We didnt get up and start announcing it, but what we said, Keep an open mind and continue to look. So I think its a bit of a distortion to say that we deliberately suppressed that.

But Richard Ebright, a molecular biologist at Rutgers University, told USA Today that a small group of scientists and some science journalists established and enforced the false narrative that scientific evidence supported natural spillover, and (also) the false narrative that this was the scientific consensus.

The February 1 telecon, appears to have played an importantprobably crucialrole in establishing and enforcing that false narrative, he added.

Andersen said in a now-deleted tweet that we seriously considered the lab leak theory. However, significant new data, extensive analyses, and many discussions led to the conclusions in our paper, he said.

Farrar told The Epoch Times via email that in my view, the most likely scenario is that the virus crossed from animals to humans and then evolved in humans.

The best scientific evidence available to date points to this, he said, adding that we must stay open-minded while efforts continue to gather and share the evidence needed.

Some of the scientists who earlier insisted a lab leak wasnt possible have since dramatically altered their position.

Dr. W. Ian Lipkin, for instance, who was listed as a co-author of Andersons article, told The New York Times in May that the theory must be considered.

Dr. Peter Palese, a microbiologist at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai Hospital, who co-authored the other article, said he now believes a thorough investigation about the origin of the COVID-19 virus is needed.
Work is done on a new border wall being constructed in Jacumba, Calif., on Jan. 22, 2021. (Sandy Huffaker/Getty Images)

Floridas Cavalry Helps Secure the Border: Youve Got a Storm and Were Coming to Help You

At a June 16 press conference, Floridas Ron DeSantis became the first governor to answer the plea for help from fellow Republican governorsDoug Ducey of Arizona and Greg Abbott of Texasby authorizing the deployment of law enforcement resources to help secure the border.

Its undeniable that the border crisis is out of control, Christina Pushaw, press secretary to DeSantis told The Epoch Times. Helping our fellow Americans in their moment of need is always the right thing to do. The governors of other states have sent resources to Florida in the past to help respond to natural disasters. With the federal government unable or unwilling to enforce our laws and secure our border, Florida is ready to step up to the plate and do our part.

Time to Return the Favor

Florida is stepping up to the plate, Brevard County Sheriff Wayne Ivey declared to The Epoch Times, saying, Texas and Arizona, youve got a storm, and were coming to help you.

When the state of Florida has a storm that devastates an area, law enforcement resources from across the country respond and come to our rescue, Ivey explained. The concept of responding to the needs of a state in the aftermath of a storm is no different than responding to the needs of another state in the midst of a border crisis.

Its a sentiment shared by other Florida sheriffs.

When the governor called Wednesday and expressed his concerns about our southern border, I immediately offered whatever resources we could spare for this endeavor, Okaloosa County Sheriff Eric Aden told The Epoch Times. After all, these states have answered the call for us with hurricane relief and other emergencies, so its only fair that we return the effort when they call for help.

Its doing the right thing, Lee County Sheriff Carmine Marceno told The Epoch Times. Inevitably, whenever we have an emergency or a hurricane that comes through here, the governors of Texas and Arizona send us anything that we need.

Bay County Sheriff Tommy Ford told The Epoch Times he also sees the cry for help from the governors of Texas and Arizona to secure the border as an opportunity to repay the debt he owes after hurricane Michael devastated Bay County and many sheriffs from other states came to their aid.

So were going to volunteer to be the first ones there to help, Ford said.

Securing the Border

Securing the border helps Floridians, Pushaw explained. Even though Florida isnt a border state, securing the southern border would help stop the flow of narcotics that end up in our state and ravage our communities. Illegal immigrants have also committed crimes in Florida, which could have been prevented if our immigration laws were enforced.

As Marceno told The Epoch Times, fentanyl cases have gone up 230 percent in Lee County over the past six months and there has been a 3,000 percent increase in the number of sexual predators coming across U.S. borders.

Were not going to allow it, Marceno asserted. Floridas residents are going to be safe and secure.

Its something I think is missed sometimes in the talking points of this issue of a safe and secure border, Ford observed. Its not just the individuals that may be coming across the border but the dangerous products they bring with them.

According to Ford, Bay County has also been flooded with amphetamine, fentanyl, and heroin over the past six months.

While they would typically high five the seizure of a half-pound of meth, Ford said its now not uncommon to intercept five to six pounds, even upward of 10 to 12 pounds. There have also been 150 drug overdoses in Bay County since January, with 15 of them being fatal, all of which he attributes to the fentanyl coming across the border.

Proud of DeSantis

This is exactly what leadership, crisis management, and commitment to law and order looks like Ivey attested. The guys got it going on. Hes not afraid to stand on the ledge and make decisions. He understands, like I do, that the governments one and only responsibility is to protect its citizens, and he has taken an oath to protect his citizens, his cops, and his Constitution.

The governor is the true definition of an amazing leader, Marceno explained, citing the extremely difficult decisions DeSantis made in the midst of the pandemic. That is the reason why 904 people a day move to our state, for law enforcement and safety. He is a phenomenal leader. Hes an amazing man to work with. The communication is constant and I am very proud to say hes our governor in the state of Florida.

I think its very important that we heed those calls because we were in a time of great need two years ago, Ford stated. I just remember that feeling of having the cavalry roll in to assist, not asking any questions like whos going to pay for it but just being available. I know the burden theyre carrying on the border.

The situation at the border is more than a crisis and one that must be dealt with immediately, Aden asserted. Its a matter of national security. But if the federal government cannot or will not gain control, then states like Florida will come to the aid of our fellow states pleading for help.

Critical Democrats

Despite the overwhelming support DeSantis has received from Floridas law enforcement, some Democrats have criticized the move by DeSantis.

Rep. Charlie Crist (D-Fla.), one of two Democrat declared candidates to run for the position of governor in 2022, called the decision to send Florida law enforcement to the border a political stunt. Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried, the second declared Democrat candidate for governor, wrote on Twitter: Floridas current governor just makes controversies up to get on Fox News.

Florida Rep. Anna Eskamani wrote: Another political stunt by @GovRonDeSantisinstead of perpetuating the attacks on immigrants & going after Biden Administration why dont you focus on the people who live in FL!

These are real issues that affect Floridians everyday lives, and its wrong to dismiss the Governors attempt to address these issues as a mere political stunt, Pushaw insisted. Those who criticize Gov. DeSantis decision are the ones engaging in political grandstanding at Floridians expense.

Follow Patricia Tolson on Twitter at @PTolson1
Employees of the Fulton County Board of Registration and Elections process ballots in Atlanta, Ga., on Nov. 4, 2020. (Brandon Bell/Reuters)

Georgia Investigators Notes Detail Massive Issues During 2020 Election

Newly published notes jotted down by an election monitor detail a slew of issues witnessed in Georgias largest county during the 2020 election.

Carter Jones was tapped by Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to observe firsthand the election in Fulton County. His notes detail what he saw from Nov. 2 to Nov. 7, 2020.

Problems started from the time Jones arrived at the English Street warehouse, which holds various election materials, at approximately 9 p.m. after Raffenspergers office received reports throughout the afternoon of materials not being delivered to polling places in a timely manner, or at all.

Just four minutes after arriving, Jones saw an election official working to reset poll pads for a precinct. The precinct only received one bag of pads, despite the system at the warehouse showing both had been checked out.

Jones said many bags of pads and other materials were not packed and paperwork was not matching up. He used the word chaos and said there was much confusion. One county official blamed the secretary of states office, claiming they received a flawed file, but officials with the office responded that the alleged issue was easy to disprove.

Issues continued cropping up on Election Day. At State Farm Arena, Jones said there were too many ballots coming in for secure black ballot boxes, so workers were moving them in rolling bins 2,000 at a time.

This seems like a massive chain of custody problem. It is my understanding that the ballots are supposed to be moved in numbered, sealed boxes to protect them, he said.

Later in the night, the monitor became aware of reports that Fulton County officials said they were stopping counting for the night, prompting observers to leave, only to resume with no one monitoring them.

Jones did not arrive until about an hour after workers resumed counting.

At approximately 12:08 a.m. on Nov. 5, Jones reported that order is starting to break down.

Ralph Jones, a Fulton County election official, newly re-scanned some ballots that had already been processed by Shaye Moss, an election worker, Jones added.

Inspector James Callaway arrives to investigate the accusations that the Fulton staff had told the press to go home and were scanning without observers, he reported shortly afterward.

Staff finally sealed up the ballot bins about 30 minutes later, after leaving them unsealed for an undetermined period of time.

Jones left and went to sleep after swinging back by the warehouse.

Media crews film while election workers process absentee ballots at State Farm Arena in Atlanta, Ga., on Nov. 2, 2020. (Megan Varner/Getty Images)

As workers tried to scan adjudicated ballots in the afternoon of Nov. 5, all five scanners went down and Dominion Voting Systems technology employees began uploading to flash drives. Best practices say not to take down all scanners at once, and a backlog started building, according to the monitors notes.

Fulton County adjudicated some 106,000 ballots. That process applies to ballots that the tabulating machines could not read. People then pore over the paper to see if they can ascertain who the voter wanted to vote for.

At 7:07 p.m., workers started hearing theyd scanned just 10,000 ballots in five hours. People are realizing that there is at least another 8-10 hours of work to finish up so the staff redouble their efforts, Jones said.

A fresh wave of workers arrived about 30 minutes later. Jones heard one worker ask a colleague whether they were ready for a long night. The second replied, yeah, Im ready to [expletive] [expletive] up.

I must keep an eye on these two. Perhaps this was a bad joke, but it was very poorly timed in the presence of a poll watcher, Jones wrote, wondering about the vetting practices of Happy Faces, which hires the temporary workers. He also said that there seemed to be lots of training on the fly happening with the workers who had recently arrived.

As the girlfriend of Elections Director Rick Barron visited with him despite lacking credentials to be in the room, Barron was reading tweets from fans who enjoyed his wearing of a Portland Timbers lanyard, Jones said around 10:30 p.m. Meanwhile, staffers were working hard to speed up their work.

Barron was fired in February but remains at his job.

Pressed for time, workers kept going into the early hours of the next morning. But the slog was wearing them down. Ralph Jones, for instance, was making mistakes.

Staff member tells him that he miscounted the same batch twice. He was off by one both times, the monitor wrote.

Jones, the monitor, later said that Moss found some sloppy final paperwork submitted by one of the workers.

Around 11:30 a.m. on Nov. 6, one worker, described as panicked, told Jones that four boxes or trays of ballots were found at the warehouse. Ralph Jones said the ballots were cured and collected before the polls closed. The worker later agreed, saying the ballots were not found. Jones reminded both of the importance of precise language when the stakes are so high.

The counting finally ended on Nov. 7.

Joness notes were obtained and published (pdf) by Just the News. Raffenspergers office confirmed the authenticity of the notes to The Epoch Times. Fulton County did not respond to requests for comment, nor did Jones.

The county is currently under investigation after legally required ballot transfer forms went missing.

The presence of the monitor was made possible by a consent order approved by the State Election Board, which Raffensperger chairs, in 2020. The order was agreed upon after Fulton County was plagued with problems in prior elections.

The notes and a report that Jones later submitted to the board were not released before now because it just didnt occur to us to post them, a spokesman for Raffensperger told The Epoch Times via email.

A bill that Gov. Brian Kemp recently signed into law opens up the possibility that elections in counties that repeatedly have problems running them be taken over by the state officials. Raffensperger supported that provision, the spokesman said.

In a statement to news outlets after the recent probe was announced, Fulton County Commission Chairman Robb Pitts accused Raffensperger of laying the groundwork for a hostile takeover of Fulton Countys Board of Registrations & Elections.

His comrades in this fight are conspiracy theorists who promote the same Big Lie that he purportedly doesnt believe. The votes have been counted three times, including a hand recount, and President Biden came out ahead every time. Given the results in 2020, I would suggest he focus more on the next election than relitigating this last one, Pittman said.

Jones, the monitor, said in his final report said that what happened between 10:30 p.m. and 11:52 p.m. on Election Night at State Farm Arena continues to be elusive. If poll watchers were being truthful in their recounting of what happened, then there is a serious problem, he wrote.

Raffenspergers chief investigator said in an affidavit in December 2020 that observers and the media were not asked to leave but simply left on their own when a group of workers left. She also said there were no mystery ballots brought out from under hidden tables, as had been alleged by some.

Jones also described persistent chain of custody issues throughout the entire absentee ballot processing system relating to both the 2020 election and the risk-limiting audit that took place.

Jones recommended improved training, stronger processes, and some type of post-action review to identify problems and solutions.

Raffensperger has said the election largely ran smoothly and there has been no indication of enough fraud to swing the election. Democrat Joe Biden beat former President Donald Trump by less than 12,000 votes, according to the certified results. Prior to 2020, no Democrat had won Georgia since 1992.

Jones, who has experience monitoring elections from time with the International Republican Institute, told the State Election Board in February that he observed a lot of sloppy processes, including the kind of fingerprints of what I will call systemic disorganization.

However, at no point in my more than 270 hours around Fulton Countys election processes from October to January did I see any illegality, fraud, or intentional malfeasance, he also said.
A view of the Mekong river bordering Thailand and Laos is seen from the Thai side in Nong Khai, Thailand, on Oct. 29, 2019. (Soe Zeya Tun/Reuters)

Global Community Should Beware of Beijing Weaponizing Water Resources

Commentary

Water is replacing oil as the strategic natural resource of the 21st century. China is fortunate that the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, known as the third pole of the world and also called the Water Tower of Asia, is situated within its borders. However, the Chinese regime has ignored the U.N.s international water laws and has weaponized water resources to gain control and intimidate other countries.

Mekong River

The Mekong River was once one of the richest water resources on Earth. It originates from the Lasagongma Spring, which is a glacial stream in the Tibetan Plateau, and flows through China, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia, Myanmar, and Vietnam, before eventually flowing into the South China Sea. The Upper Mekong Basin is known as the Lancang River in China. Known as the Danube of the East, it has now become a political bargaining chip for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to control Southeast Asia.

The 11 dams built by the Chinese regime in the upper Lancang River basin have severely affected the Mekong River, threatening the livelihood of 70 million people. On Feb. 12, the Mekong River Commission (MRC), made up of four countriesThailand, Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnamissued a statement saying that the fluctuating river flow has fallen to worrying levels and that the dams built by China were part of the reason.

However, on June 8, at the sixth Lancang-Mekong Cooperation (LMC) Foreign Ministers Meeting held in Chongqing, China, five countriesCambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, Vietnamreached a consensus on publishing the Initiative on Deepening Cooperation among Local Governments of Lancang-Mekong Countries with China.

Why are these five countries submissive to the CCP? Because theyve been shortchanged. In 2010, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, and Cambodia spoke out against China over the severe drop in water levels of the Mekong River, believing that Chinese dams on the Lancang River caused the downstream drought. However, the CCP denied the accusation and ignored the drought in the Mekong River basin. Yet, in 2016, Vietnam experienced a severe drought from the reduction of river water volume, leading to some coastal areas experiencing seawater intrusion.

In an unusual move, the CCP reached out to Vietnam and provided them with water from the Jinghong Hydropower Station in Chinas Yunnan Province, through the downstream Mekong River from March 15, 2016, to April 10, 2016. These two incidents indicate that the CCP has controlled the Mekong Rivers faucet.

On April 11, 2020, a research study published by Eyes on Earth Inc., a U.S. research and consulting company specializing in water resources, confirmed the fact.

The company collected satellite data obtained by the Special Sensor Microwave Imager/Sounder (SSMIS) to detect the upstream rainfall and snowmelt of the Mekong River basin in China from 1992 to the end of 2019. The data were then compared with river-level readings by the MRC at Thailands Chiang Saen Hydrological Station, the closest station to China, to create a predictive model of natural levels for the river. The study focused only on waters flowing out of China and didnt look further downstream.

In the early years of the data, the predictive model and the river level measurements matched closely. But starting in 2012, when Chinas upper Mekong hydropower dams began operating, the model and the river level readings started to diverge, coinciding with periods when the Chinese dams reservoirs filled up during rainy seasons and released water during the dry season. The difference was especially pronounced in 2019. Although China dismissed the findings, arguing that Yunnan Province saw a series of droughts in 2019, the satellite data shows otherwise.

A fisherman checks his net along the Mekong River at Sangkhom District, in the northeastern Thai province of Nong Khai, on Oct. 31, 2019. (Lillian Suwanrumpha/AFP via Getty Images)

Yarlung Zangbo River

The Yarlung Zangbo River originates from the Chemayungdung Glacier at the northern foot of the Himalayas. The mainstream is more than 1,300 miles long, of which the river in Tibet is more than 1,270 miles long. It flows from Tibet into India, where it becomes the Brahmaputra, the second largest river in India by discharge, before flowing into Bangladesh as the Jamuna. The Jamuna joins with the Ganga in Bangladesh and flows out into the Bay of Bengal, forming the largest river delta in the world.

As the highest major river on Earth, running at an average elevation of more than 13,000 feet, the Yarlung Zangbo River forms a more than 6,560-foot drop within a straight line distance of 31 miles in the lower reaches of the Great Bend area. This brings nearly 70 million kilowatts of potential hydroelectricity, an energy scale three times greater than that of the Three Gorges Dam, which has the capacity of hundreds of thousands to 1 million kilowatts.

Due to the abundant water resources of the Yarlung Zangbo River, there have been voices within the CCP calling for the construction of dams to draw the river into the Yellow River basin. It would serve as an important part of the South-to-North Water Diversion Project to alleviate the water shortage in Chinas northwest region. On May 25, 2009, under international pressure, then-Water Minister Wang Shucheng expressed that Beijing had no plans to divert the Yarlung Zangbo River to the Yellow River.

The CCP has long wanted to develop hydroelectricity in the lower reaches of the Yarlung Zangbo River, where construction is already underway on its middle reaches. In the Gacha Canyon section alone, five dams will be built on the more than 23-mile river. Among them, the Zangmu Hydropower Station began operation in 2014. The highest roller-compacted concrete gravity dam in the world, the Dagu Hydropower Station, was said to be producing power on May 24. However, this mammoth dam has caused grave concern for years over the geological volatility of the area, fragile ecosystems, incalculable consequences of the project, and Indias control of the southern Tibet region intertwining with Sino-India territorial disputes.

CCPs Fallacies for Avoiding Solutions to Water Disputes

The aforementioned two examples show that the CCP is playing politics and weaponizing water. A few years ago, professor Brahma Chellaney, from Strategic Studies at the New Delhi-based Centre for Policy Research in India, pointed out in his book Water: Asias New Battleground that the CCP has become more and more accustomed to taking unilateral actions in terms of water-resource utilization and dam construction. Beijing deliberately avoids any legally binding commitments on water resources and refuses to resolve neighboring countries concerns.

People from Kachin State take part in a protest against the Irrawaddy Myitsone dam project in Waimaw, near the Kachin State capital, Myitkyina, on April 22, 2019. (Zau Ring Hpra/AFP via Getty Images)

The CCP has its fallacy in this regard, asserting that China has a legitimate right to develop hydroelectricity in Chinese territory and ignores the laws that resolve conflicts. It has reservations to arbitration clauses and judicial settlements in most international treaties that have been signed, ratified, or joined.

This is embodied in the CCPs refusal to join the Convention on the Law of Non-Navigational Uses of International Watercourses. The convention was drafted by the International Law Commission and passed by the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA or GA) on May 21, 1997. Its currently the most influential convention on the use and protection of international watercourses. The CCP has been using absurd excuses to sidestep it.

The CCP hasnt signed or joined existing multilateral treaties with other countries, nor has it established or joined the corresponding multilateral river basin management institutions or the integration of the whole river basin development treaties, plans, and institutions. This fully demonstrates that the CCP hasnt adopted cooperative or legal means on international water resources issues, but has avoided making any substantive commitments.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo attends a meeting with Foreign Ministers of the Lower Mekong countries, Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, and Vietnam during the ASEAN Foreign Ministers Meeting in Bangkok, Thailand, on Aug. 1, 2019. (Jonathan Ernst/AP)

Countering CCPs Water Weaponization Is Urgent

The form of weaponizing water resources includes not only hydropower development and volume control, but also transnational water pollution prevention, biodiversity protection, emergency response, and maintenance of the river basins ecological safety. In particular, the consequences may be devastating if the CCP weaponizes water from a political or even military perspective.

Therefore, countering the CCPs water weaponization has become a priority. On Sept. 11, 2020, the United States launched the Mekong-U.S. Partnership with Myanmar, Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, and Vietnam. Then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo called the partnership an integral part of our Indo-Pacific vision and our strategic partnership with ASEAN.

To support this partnership program, the United States decided to invest more than $150 million to countries in the Mekong River basin in recovering losses from the COVID-19 pandemic, combating transnational crimes, and developing energy and power markets. This support was built on the basis of the $3.5 billion financial aid through the Lower Mekong Initiative and other projects that the United States has provided to the region since 2009.

On Jan. 12, the United States and Vietnam co-hosted the first Friends of the Mekong Policy Dialogue under the new MekongU.S. Partnership. Participating countries and institutions, including Australia, the European Union, Japan, South Korea, New Zealand, the Asian Development Bank, the World Bank, Brunei, ASEAN Secretariat, and the Mekong River Commission, were in support of a secure, prosperous, and open Mekong region. In addition, India, Japan, Australia, and other countries have also increased their investment in the Mekong region to counter the CCPs water weaponization.

The CCP more or less condemns most of the countries that share water resources with China. Countering the CCP is a critical challenge for every nation and the international community.

Wang He has masters degrees in law and history and has studied the international communist movement. He was a university lecturer and an executive of a large private firm in China. Wang now lives in North America and has published commentaries on Chinas current affairs and politics since 2017.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
GOP Senators Launch Bill to Bar Chinese Military Scientists from Entering US

Seven Republican senators have reintroduced legislation aiming to bar Chinese military scientists from entering or remaining in the United States.

The bill (pdf), called the Peoples Liberation Army Visa Security Act, intends to prohibit the issuance of U.S. student or research visas to individuals employed or sponsored by the Peoples Liberation Army (PLA), the armed wing of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

We must ensure that individuals linked to the CCPs Peoples Liberation Army are not able to obtain research and student visas, which enable the theft of American technology, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) one of the bills co-sponsors, said in a June 17 statement. It is in our national security interest to ensure the CCP isnt taking advantage of our open system to steal American intellectual property.

Besides seeking to impose a ban on new visas for individuals tied to the Chinese military, the legislation also calls on the Secretary of State to revoke any existing student or research visas of any people employed, funded, or otherwise sponsored by the PLA.

Allowing members of the Peoples Liberation Army unfettered access to research visas is an open invitation to steal American research, ingenuity, and intellectual property, said Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), in a statement. The United States shouldnt be arming our greatest adversary.

The other co-sponsors of the bill are Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.), Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), and Mike Braun (R-Ind.).

The move comes amid a flurry of legislative activity that seeks to prevent individuals with links to the CCP from exploiting vulnerabilities to the detriment of U.S. national security and interests.

This week, Rep. Mark Green (R-Tenn.) introduced legislation that would block foreign adversaries from buying land near U.S. military bases. Called the Military Perimeter Transparency Act (pdf), the bill would direct the secretary of defense to produce regular reports on land purchases or occupancy around U.S. military facilities by foreign adversaries.

Greens bill offers a definition of foreign adversaries pursuant to the Secure and Trusted Communications Networks Act (pdf).

The term foreign adversary means any foreign government or foreign nongovernment person engaged in a long-term pattern or serious instances of conduct significantly adverse to the national security of the United States or security and safety of United States persons, states the act, which was passed in February 2020 to safeguard U.S. communications systems from threats posed by foreign suppliers, such as Huawei and ZTE.

Earlier, in April, a group of senators reintroduced a bipartisan bill that would impose harsh penalties on companies and individuals found guilty of stealing U.S. intellectual property, with the lawmakers singling out China for its routine theft of U.S. trade secrets.

Under the Trump administration, the State Department revised its policy to reduce the maximum permitted duration of stay in the United States for CCP members and their immediate families, with an official saying at the time that the measures aim was to protect our nation from the CCPs malign influence.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott shows off a gun rights bill he signed, as (L) Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, (R) Speaker Dade Phelan, members of state legislature, and representatives of the National Rifle Association look on during a press conference in San Antonio, Texas, on June 17, 2021. (Marina Fatina/NTD)

Gov. Abbott Signs Into Law 7 Bills Enforcing Second Amendment in Texas, Including Constitutional Carry

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott on June 17 signed into law seven pieces of gun-rights related legislation aimed at enforcing the protection of Second Amendment Rights in Texas.

The governor appeared at Alamo Plaza in San Antonio for the bill signing ceremony and was joined by Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, House Speaker Dade Phelan, and several other Republican lawmakers who authored and passed the legislation. Representatives of the National Rifle Association were also in attendance.

Abbott thanked the GOP lawmakers, noting that they had built a complete barrier of gun rights in Texas for law-abiding citizens.

The governor first signed House Bill 1927, otherwise known as the constitutional carry legislation, which he had officially signed into law the day prior.

From Sept. 1, law-abiding Texans aged 21 and over wont have to obtain a state-issued license for carrying a handgun in publiceither concealed or openlyso long they are not excluded from possessing a firearm by another federal or state law.

Abbott referred to the new law as the biggest and best of them all.

Previously, Texans who wanted to carry a pistol needed a state-issued license and were required to undergo training, a proficiency exam, and a background check, although background checks through the National Instant Criminal Background Check System will still be required when purchasing firearms in the state.

While supporters of the bill argue that it would restore Second Amendment rights by removing unconstitutional government barriers to carrying a handgun in many public places, critics assert that it could lead to an increase in gun accidents and violence.

Other bills that Abbott signed into law on Thursday, which also go into effect on Sept. 1, include House Bill 2622, also known as the Sanctuary State Act.

The bill prohibits state officials from enforcing certain federal regulations on firearms, firearm accessories, or ammunition that are not in line with state law. House Bill 1500 also classifies firearm and ammunition businesses as essential, meaning that government entities are prohibited from banning their sale or transport during emergencies and disasters, such as the COVID-19 pandemic.

Abbott also signed Senate Bill 19, which prohibits the state from contracting with any companies that discriminate against a firearm entity or firearm trade association, and Senate Bill 20 allows law-abiding Texans to store their guns and ammunition inside their hotel rooms when traveling, and carry a gun or ammunition directly from their vehicle to their room.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott shows off a gun rights bill he signed, as (L) Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, (R) Speaker Dade Phelan, members of state legislature, and representatives of the National Rifle Association look on during a press conference in San Antonio, Texas, on June 17, 2021. (Marina Fatina/NTD)

Meanwhile, House Bill 957 repeals the criminal offense of possessing, manufacturing, transporting, or repairing a firearm silencer. Gun rights groups have said that while people may associate silencers with the violence seen in Hollywood movies, they are actually used by gun owners to make shooting safer by reducing noise, recoil, and muzzle blast. The bill also ensures that any firearm suppressor manufactured in Texas, and that remains in Texas, will not be subject to federal law or federal regulation.

Finally, Senate Bill 550 removes the shoulder or belt holster requirements, allowing Texans to carry firearms in whatever kind of holster they choose.

Texans are still forbidden from carrying guns in schools, hospitals, amusement parks, and some other public places. Private businesses can still prohibit customers from carrying guns inside.

Politicians from the federal level to the local level have threatened to take guns from law-abiding citizensbut we will not let that happen in Texas, Abbott said on Thursday. Texas will always be the leader in defending the Second Amendment, which is why we built a barrier around gun rights this session.

These seven laws will protect the rights of law-abiding citizens and ensure that Texas remains a bastion of freedom. Thank you to the Texas Legislature for getting these bills to my desk.

The new legislation comes just days after two groups of underage teens killed one person and injured 13 others in a mass shooting in Austin.

The victim, whom police identified as Douglas John Kantor, 25, succumbed to his injuries at a hospital and was pronounced dead shortly after noon on Sunday, police said.

Abbott said he had visited Kantors family to express his condolences for their loss. They told him that that the incident was not a reason to eliminate Second Amendment rights in the United States.

The family members are heartbroken about what happened. But the family members were adamant about two things: one, do not let this crime committed by teenagers be a reason to eliminate gun rights in the United States of America, Abbott said.

Second thing they told me is they were adamant also that they were against policies that defund police and our cities, like what happened in Austin, Texas.
People walk past signage for Australian universities in Melbourne's central business district on June 10, 2020, (William West/AFP via Getty Images)

Over 4,000 University Agreements up for Review Under Australian Foreign Interference Laws

Australias leading research-intensive universities have submitted over 4,000 international arrangements for review as part of the governments Foreign Relations Scheme (FRS).

Under the scheme, the federal government is able to cancel international agreements that are deemed detrimental to Australias foreign policy and national interest.

The Group of Eight (Go8) universities said their submission of thousands of international arrangements for government review demonstrated their commitment to supporting the foreign policy.

The Go8, which represents Australias leading research-intensive universities and undertakes almost 70 percent of Australian university research activity, takes the integrity of these arrangements extremely seriously.

Go8 universities rigorously review arrangements with a focus on defence sensitivity issues, compliance with sanctions regimes, foreign influence and in the context of Australias foreign policy, Go8 CEO Vicki Thomson said.

Thomson said the impact of the legislation could already be felt in universities, as potential international partners have indicated their refusal to renew contracts due to the uncertainty that the scheme creates.

It will be critical to the future of Australias globally competitive tertiary education sector that our international partners can have confidence in their arrangements with us, she said.

On the grounds of national interest, Foreign Minister Marise Payne has already axed Victorias Belt and Road deals with the Chinese Communist Party using the newly granted powers.

Senator Marise Payne during the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Legislation Committee at Parliament House on March 24, 2021, in Canberra, Australia. (Sam Mooy/Getty Images)

Now, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) will scrutinise thousands of arrangements that Australian universities have made with international bodies.

Thomson noted that the process had been a huge logistical and administrative challenge to put forward thousands of relevant arrangements.

There is however more to be done as some universities were required to review in detail as many as 75 agreements for every one agreement lodged with the FRS, she said.

The University of Queensland told The Epoch Times that they notified the government of 587 existing agreements and 71 prospective arrangements and said they would consider any advice received. The University of Melbourne said they had notified the government of several hundred arrangements for review.

A University of Sydney spokesman said they had notified DFAT according to the requirements of the scheme and would wait for the department to complete its processes before making any further comment.

As this is an ongoing obligation, well of course also continually update our notifications as we enter into new arrangements, the spokesman told The Epoch Times.

The Epoch Times also reached out to the University of Western Australia for comment but the university did not respond in time for publication.

All four Go8 universities, who also have Confucius Institutes, did not comment on their view on the possibility of retaining the arrangements with their Institutes.

Australia has Confucius Institutes at 13 universities and at least one will close by the end of this year due to financial issues.

Former Hong Kong Lawmaker Ted Hui previous told The Epoch Times that the universities should close the institutes because their nature is political, not academic.
Hong Kong Police Raid Apple Daily, Arrest Executives

Hong Kong police raid pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily headquarters. Five top executives were seized under the citys national security law. It marks the second raid in less than a year.

The law has also seeped into the citys movie sector. NTD interviewed a long-time Hollywood producer to get his take.

The United States seeks to ease tensions with Russia. This comes as President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin met face-to-face on Wednesday. But China doesnt seem pleased about the talks.

A young man in Beijing attempted to report a YouTuber for supporting Taiwan independence. But his visit to the police didnt go exactly as planned.

Subscribe to our YouTube channel for more first-hand news from China.

For more news and videos, please visit our website and Twitter.
Migrants disembark the ship 'Geo Barents' run by Doctors Without Borders (MSF), which was given permission to dock at the Sicilian port of Augusta after a week of waiting at sea, to board the quarantine ship 'Aurelia', in Augusta, Italy, on June 18, 2021. (Antonio Parrinello/Reuters)

Hundreds of Migrants Rescued by MSF Charity Land in Sicily

AUGUSTA, ItalyAround 400 migrants disembarked on Friday from the ship Geo Barents at the Italian port of Augusta, in Sicily, more than a week after the first rescue operation was carried out in the Mediterranean Sea.

Of the people on board, mainly from Africa, some 100 were minors, the MSF charity operating the boat said. Around 40 migrants were affected by fuel burns, dehydration, hypothermia, and infected scabies.

The Geo Barents took the first migrants on board on June 10 off the Libyan coast. Most of them will now face 14 days of coronavirus quarantine on another boat.

For years, Italy was the primary route into Europe for hundreds of thousands of asylum seekers and other irregular migrants, but the numbers making the perilous journey across the Mediterranean have fallen in recent years.

Migrants look on as they wait to disembark the ship Geo Barents run by Doctors Without Borders (MSF), which was given permission to dock at the Sicilian port of Augusta after a week of waiting at sea, in Augusta, Italy, on June 18, 2021. (Antonio Parrinello/Reuters)

Prime Minister Mario Draghis unity government has pursued similar restrictive migration policies to the previous administration, impounding several charity rescue boats and supporting Libyan efforts to stop illegal migrant departures.

However, there has been a pick-up in arrivals in 2021, with 18,170 people reaching Italy so far against 5,696 in the same period last year, interior ministry data show.

More than 1,000 landings in the last few days have overwhelmed the reception centre on the southern Italian island of Lampedusa, one of the main landing points for people trying to get into Europe.

Authorities are now moving migrants away from the island to ease pressure on the centre.

By Antonio Parrinello and Angelo Amante
Illinois Governor Signs Law Making Election Day a Holiday, Expanding Voting by Mail

The governor of Illinois this week signed legislation that lets voters apply to permanently case ballots via mail and makes Election Day a state holiday.

Gov. J.B. Pritzker, a Democrat, said the bill articulates the rights of Illinois citizens to vote by mail, allows those awaiting trial to cast their ballots, and makes a state holiday of Election Day 2022.

With attacks on voting rights on the rise in states across the nation, Illinois is proud to stand up for a strong, secure, and accessible democracy, he said in a statement.

The Democrat-controlled legislature previously passed the legislation, which also pushes the primaries next year from March 15 to June 28.

Other provisions include letting sheriffs establish polling locations at local county jails, which has already been a practice in Cook County, entrenching curbside voting in state law, extending hours at permanent polling places, and placing voters whose application for permanent vote-by-mail status is accepted to remain on a permanent absentee ballot list until the voter requests to be removed or state election officials find that the voter has registered to vote in another county.

All qualified voters will be notified of the opportunity to get on the list.

State Rep. Maurice West, a Democrat who sponsored the bill, said last month after its House passage that it makes it easier for people to permanently receive a mail-in ballot, make curbside voting permanent, and set up voting centers on Election Day where anyone within the elections jurisdiction could vote, regardless of the precinct of their residence.

Voter empowerment is what we do in Illinois! he added.

The Illinois Republican Party and the Illinois Senate Republicans did not respond to requests for comment on the legislation, which takes effect immediately.

Rep. Robin Kelly (D-Ill.), chairwoman of the Democratic party of Illinois, recently described Senate Bill 825 as a comprehensive election bill that makes voting a priority by making it more accessible.

This keeps in place a number of voter conveniences that have proven popular, said Illinois Senate President Don Harmon, a Democrat, after Pritzker signed the law. Its a great example of lawmakers listening to the diverse voices of voters and taking steps to maintain and encourage voter participation.
The U.S. Capitol is seen with law enforcement officers outside in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 6, 2021. (Samuel Corum/Getty Images)

In First, US Hits Jan. 6 Defendant With Little-Used Firearms Charge

Federal prosecutors have applied a little-used law against a man accused of obstructing the congressional proceedings on Jan. 6, asserting he transported a gun and used it in furtherance of a civil disorder.

In a superseding indictment (pdf) against Guy Reffitt released this week, the Texas man was charged with two violations of federal civil disorder law for actions allegedly taken in Washington on Jan. 6.

Authorities said Reffitt violated the law against transporting any firearm, or explosive or incendiary device, knowing or having reason to know or intending that the same will be used unlawfully in furtherance of a civil disorder.

He is also accused of violating the portion of the law that fines or imprisons anyone who commits or attempts to commit an act to interfere with a law enforcement officer during a civil disorder to charges.

Both counts carry prison sentences of up to five years.

The counts were added on top of three previous charges: obstruction of an official proceeding, entering and remaining in a restricted building or grounds, and obstruction of justice. He already faced 51 years in jail. One of the three charges, though, was elevated because Reffitt is believed to have had a gun with him when he allegedly committed the crimes outside the U.S. Capitol.

In total, Reffitt now faces 70 years in prison.

The defendants lawyer did not respond to a request for comment.

According to the Department of Justice website listing those charged in the Capitol breach, no other person has been hit with the firearms charge. However, over 100 others have been charged with civil disorder.

Reffitt was arrested on Jan. 18 and pleaded not guilty two months later. He remains in jail. A motion hearing in his case is scheduled for July 14.

Reffitt told FBI agents that he did not enter the Capitol, according to court documents. He also said that he took a Smith & Wesson pistol with him but disassembled it to comply with Washington law.

However, according to his son, Reffitt went to the U.S. Capitol and took his gun with him. The son told agents that, according to his dad, we stormed the Capitol.

Reffitt allegedly threatened his son and daughter, warning them not to talk to the authorities, before his arrest.

Reffitt was identified as commenting on the website for Texas Freedom Force, a militia, and linked to the 3-percenters, a loose collection of groups that are generally anti-government, according to his spouse.

Only one gunshot was fired at the Capitol on Jan. 6, by a law enforcement officer who fatally shot Ashli Babbitt, an unarmed woman who was attempting to climb into a hallway adjacent to the House chamber. Few people are believed to have carried guns inside the building. But authorities have slowly pressed firearms charges against some of those allegedly participating in the tumult.

Lonnie Coffman, an Alabama man, was charged with unlawful possession of several guns and eleven Molotov cocktails after authorities found the items in a vehicle he owned near the National Republican Club and the Democratic National Committee headquarters.

Christopher Alberts of Maryland was accused of carrying a semi-automatic handgun when he was encountered outside the Capitol by a member of the U.S. Capitol Polices Civil Disturbance Unit. The member wrote in a court document that after detaining Alberts, a black semi-automatic handgun was found, in addition to a spare magazine and a bulletproof vest.

And Cleveland Meredith Jr., a Georgia resident, allegedly had two guns with him when he was arrested at a Holiday Inn on C Street on Jan. 7. Authorities said that Meredith had talked in text messages about killing House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).
An Irvine, Calif., family said their cat, Sam, died in transit during a flight from Los Angeles International Airport and Jordan. (Taya Salman)

Irvine Family Blames Airline for Cats Death During International Flight

IRVINE, Calif.An Irvine familys flight to Jordan ended in despair after their cat died due to extreme heat while in the cargo storage of a plane.

Sam the cat began his June 8 travels with owner Haba Mahmoud, who was departing from Los Angeles International Airport with her two daughters, Taya and Maya Salman.

The family was flying to Doha, where they planned to catch a connecting flight to Jordan.

It was Tayas last summer prior to attending college, and she wanted to spend time with her cat, Sam, in Jordan prior to leaving.

The family said they flew with Qatar Airways, but following the 16-hour flight from Los Angeles to Doha, Qatar Airways refused to allow the family to check on Sam. The temperature in the city was about 104 degrees F, and the connecting flight was delayed, the family said.

He was in danger during our entire connecting flight period, and we were not aware of where he was, Taya told The Epoch Times, saying they had a hunch Sam was stuck in the cargo area with other luggage without air conditioning on the extremely hot day.

Qatar failed in numerous ways, because they did not keep us updated. If they were having delays, they should have let us know and stepped in and said, Hey, can you take care of your pet until we can figure this out? or Hey, were taking care of the pet, but they didnt at all.

The situation worsened when the family boarded its connecting, Jordan-bound flight.

I was the second person to enter the flight, and when I stepped inside, I felt a big wave of heat hit my body, Mahmoud said, and after asking the flight attendant if it would be like this the whole time, they assured her the air conditioning would be on soon.

Sam the cat died while traveling from Los Angeles to Jordan with owner Haba Mahmoud and her two daughters, Taya and Maya Salman. (Courtesy of Taya Salman)

After takeoff, she said the air conditioning was not activated, and passengers became upset due to the heat, with some resorting to yelling for ice to cool down.

Mahmoud said she went to the bathroom to wash her hands, and the water was so hot she couldnt use it. She then went to talk to a flight attendant about her large concern with Sam in the cargo below and they assured her that he would be fine.

It was horrid, we were having to take off clothes because we were sweating like crazy, Taya said. I was worried about my moms health, she is a cancer patient, and with the medication she takes, its important that her body stays within a certain temperature, and she cant tolerate heat, which put her life in danger as well.

The 2 1/2-hour flight didnt have air conditioning until the last 20 minutes, the family said.

After arriving at their destination, the family received Sam back from Qatar Airways, and he wasnt moving.

I touched the cage, and it was really hot, Mahmoud said. And once when I touched the cats body, it was boiling.

The family also said they know Sam died on the second flight because the cats cage had a label showing he had been screened in-between flights, meaning he was alive at that point.

This is the problem with Qatar Airways, they will treat your animals as though they are luggage or an article of clothing, Taya said. They will not take care of your pets. They will put them in with your luggage, and for all you know, they could be sitting down there suffocating.

In addition, the family said the crate Sam was in had no Live Animal tag from the airline, which was also concerning, because the crate could have easily been placed with other luggage all around it, with no room for the cat to breathe.

In the days since, the family said Qatar Airways has started an investigation to find out what happened, though theyve only been called once about the incident, to tell them the investigation was still open.

Sam was 17 years of being my best friend, and he was our baby, Taya said, adding that his recent health tests showed he was in great health. He was so playful and kind, and he was there for my mom during all her [cancer] treatment.

Sam had also done the international trip more than 10 times before without any issue.

To date, the family says all theyve heard from Qatar Airways since the incident is, Were really sorry, but nothing else. While nothing can bring Sam back, they want Qatar to reevaluate pet safety protocol on their airplanes to ensure this doesnt ever happen to another pet, as well as improve communication with passengers who are traveling with animals.

When contacted for comment on the matter, Qatar Airways told The Epoch Times, Qatar Airways apologizes wholeheartedly for the tragic loss of our passengers pet cat, which is being fully investigated.

Qatar Airways transports tens of thousands of animals each year without any issue and we are deeply concerned by this tragic loss. The airline has stringent procedures in place for the carriage of live animals and maintains a state of the art facility in Doha for their transportation, in accordance with all regulatory and legal requirements.
A field on fire is seen after Palestinians in Gaza sent incendiary balloons over the border between Gaza and Israel, Near Nir Am, on June 15, 2021. (Amir Cohen/Reuters)

Israel-Palestine Hostilities a Failure of Biden Admin: Experts

Experts in Australia and the United States have argued that the resumption of hostilities between Israel and Palestine this week is the result of a failure of the Biden administration pursuing a failed Obama-era policies.

Arthur Tane, the executive director of the Canberra-based Council on Middle East Relations, told The Epoch Times that the latest outbreak of violence between Israel and Palestine has come after a period of peace and stability in the Middle East brought on by the Abraham Accords.

He called out the Biden administration for not doing enough to build on those accords, which were set up by the previous U.S. administration.

The Middle East was enjoying one of its rare moments of peace and optimism, mostly due to the successful approach by his (Bidens) predecessor, President Donald J. Trump, Tane said.

The Trump administration achieved a good number of undisputed policy successes in this region, which included persuading several Arab and Muslim countriesthe United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan, Kosovo and Moroccoto sign the Abraham Accords with Israel, thus bringing to an end several decades of hostility.

Rather than building on this promising legacy gifted to him from his predecessor, Biden has instead sought to return to the failed Middle East policies of the Obama Administration, he said.

Tane noted that this has regrettably meant that the Abraham Accords were being strained as media reporting throughout the Middle East reverted to a more traditional Arab-Israeli perspective where armed aggression is considered the first option rather than dialogue.

Nevertheless, if this Hamas induced violence ends soon, these significant Accords aimed at unifying the Middle East behind a common goal of peace may yet be put back into place, Tane said.

Tane said that if Australia, or like-minded governments, and human rights groups, really want to focus on avoiding suffering in Palestine then they needed to work towards removing Hamas.

Once that can be achieved, a degree of normality should slowly return, he said.

But that may be difficult as Hamas is currently the ruling political party in Gaza and in large chunks of the Palestinian territories.

These comments come after a ceasefire, which began in May after 11 days of conflict, was broken this week when Israel and Palestine again exchanged fire after Palestinian militants sent incendiary balloons into Israelstarting at least 20 fires.

Israel responded by bombing armed compounds belonging to Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Hamas noted that no one was injured in the attack.

The Biden administrations response to hostilities between Israel and Palestine caused a split in the Democrats, with some unhappy with the U.S. presidents support for Israel.

Shibley Telhami, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institute, also criticised the Biden administration for not calling out Israel for its actions in the recent aggression.

Telhami said the Biden administration lost credibility when it failed to condemn Israel for the bombings of Palestinian territories.

To put this in perspective, George W. Bush, who was considered a strong pro-Israel president, condemned Israel for heavy-handed action in 2002, when it launched a Gaza strike that targeted a Hamas leader, but also killed 14 others, including children, Telhami said.

This came at a time when Hamas was carrying out horrific suicide bombings that killed many more Israelis than the rockets fired on Israel in the past week, he said.

The Biden administration in a statement on May 20 said that the United States fully supported Israels right to defend itself against indiscriminate rocket attacks from Hamas and other Gaza-based terrorist groups that have taken the lives of innocent civilians in Israel.

Biden also noted that he believed that Palestinians and Israelis equally deserve to live safely and securely and to enjoy equal measures of freedom, prosperity, and democracy and that his administration would continue its quiet and relentless diplomacy toward that goal.
The statue of Sir John A Macdonald is about to be removed by workers in Kingston, Ontario, Canada, on June 18, 2021. (The Canadian Press/Lars Hagberg)

John A. Macdonald Statue Removed From Ontarios Kingston City Park

A statue of Canadas first prime minister, Sir John A. Macdonald, was removed from a public park in his home town of Kingston City, Ontario, the latest city to take down monuments of Canadas founders.

The Kingston City Council voted on Thursday night in favour of relocating the statue from the city park to the Cataraqui Cemetery, a national historic site where Macdonald is buried.

This was a difficult decision, and the outcome will not appease everyone. However, the hope is that with this compromise we signal to the community, one with very divergent views on this matter, that were committed to continued dialogue about the legacy of Sir John A. Macdonald in Kingston, Kingston Mayor Bryan Paterson said in a statement on Thursday.

On June 1, the city council of Charlottetown, in the Canadian province of Prince Edward Island, voted to remove a Macdonnld statue from the citys downtown area. And in April, the Regina City Council voted to remove a statue of Macdonald from the citys Victoria Park in Saskatchewan.

Calls for Macdonalds removal gained momentum after members of the Tkemlups te Secwepemc First Nation community last month announced the discovery (pdf) of the remains of 215 indigenous children at the location of a former residential school in Kamloops, British Columbia.

The Macdonald government introduced the residential school system in 1883, which allegedly led to the deaths of roughly 3,200 indigenous children.

Apart from Macdonald, statues of Egerton Ryerson, a prominent educator and a key architect of the residential school system, have been targeted for vandalism.

On June 6, a statue of Ryerson on the campus of the Ryerson University in Toronto was pulled down, following a massive rally that day at the Ontario legislature in honour of the victims of residential schools system. The university president Mohamed Lachemi said Ryersons statue will not be replaced or restored. Lachemi had set up a task force in fall 2020 for considering a change of the universitys namesake.
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General. Mark Milley participates in a news briefing at the Pentagon in Arlington, Va., on May 6, 2021. (Alex Wong/Getty Images)

Low Probability of China Trying to Seize Taiwan in Near Term: Top US General

WASHINGTONThe top U.S. general said on Thursday there was a low probability that the Chinese regime would try to take over Taiwan militarily in the near-term as Beijing has some way to go to develop the capabilities needed.

While there has been increasing concern in Taiwan and among some U.S. lawmakers about Chinese military activity near the island, like flying jets in Taiwans air defense identification zone (ADIZ), U.S. military officials have told Reuters that such moves are not overly concerning.

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley told lawmakers that while Taiwan was still a core national interest of China, Theres little intent right now, or motivation, to do it militarily.

Theres no reason to do it militarily, and they know that. So, I think the probability is probably low, in the immediate, near-term future, Milley said during a Congressional hearing.

My assessment in terms of capability, I think China has a ways to go to develop the actual, no-kidding capability to conduct military operations to seize through military means the entire island of Taiwan, if they wanted to do that, he added.

The United States is Taiwans strongest international backer and main source of arms, which angers the Chinese regime.

Beijing says the democratically ruled island is part of one China and routinely denounces foreign involvement as an interference in its internal affairs.

Democratic and Republican members of the U.S. House of Representatives will introduce legislation this week seeking to boost U.S. support for Taiwan, part of an effort in Congress to take a hard line in dealings with China.

NATO leaders, encouraged by U.S. President Joe Biden, warned at a summit on Monday that China presents systemic challenges, taking a more forceful stance towards Beijing.

Earlier this week, twenty-eight Chinese air force aircraft, including fighters and nuclear-capable bombers, entered Taiwans ADIZ, the largest reported incursion to date.

Like most countries, the United States has no formal diplomatic ties with Taiwan.

By Idrees Ali and Phil Stewart
Undated family handout photo of (left to right top row) Dinh Dinh Binh, Nguyen Minh Quang, Nguyen Huy Phong, Le Van Ha, Nguyen Van Hiep, Bui Phan Thang, Nguyen Van Hung, Nguyen Huy Hung, Nguyen Tien Dung, Pham Thi Tra My, (left to right second row) Tran Khanh Tho, Nguyen Van Nhan, Vo Ngoc Nam, Vo Van Linh, Nguyen Ba Vu Hung, Vo Nhan Du, Tran Hai Loc, Tran Manh Hung, Nguyen Thi Van, Bui Thi Nhung, (third row left to right) Hoang Van Tiep, Tran Thi Ngoc, Phan Thi Thanh,Tran Thi Tho, Duong Minh Tuan, Pham Thi Ngoc Oanh, Tran Thi Mai Nhung, Le Trong Thanh, Nguyen Ngoc Ha, Hoang Van Hoi, (bottom row left to right) Tran Ngoc Hieu, Cao Tien Dung, Dinh Dinh Thai Quyen, Dang Huu Tuyen, Nguyen Dinh Luong , Cao Huy Thanh, Nguyen Trong Thai, Nguyen Tho Tuan, and Nguyen Dinh Tu, are the 39 Vietnamese migrants, aged between 15 and 44, that were found dead in the back of a trailer in Essex on Oct. 23, 2019. (Essex Police via PA)

Man Arrested in Connection With UK Vietnamese Lorry Deaths

UK police arrested a Vietnamese national on Thursday in connection with the deaths of 39 Vietnamese migrants in 2019.

The 39 migrants, aged between 15 and 44, suffocated to death in the back of a refrigerated lorry as they tried to make their way to the UK on Oct. 23, 2019.

The unnamed male arrested on Thursday is allegedly a part of a human trafficking network that moves migrants into the UK through Belgium and France in the back of lorries, according to the National Crime Agency (NCA).

Miles Bonfield, NCAs head of organised immigration crime operations, said that the individual detained is suspected by the Belgian authorities of having played a key role in placing at least ten migrants inside that lorry.

The man is suspected of running safe houses in Brussels where the migrants stayed and organising onward taxis to a collection point near Bierne, France, where the migrants were loaded into the refrigerated lorry.

The lorry was then driven from the coastal town near the Belgium/France border to Zeebrugge, Belgium, and put onto a ferry to England.

The NCA said a Belgian investigating magistrate issued an arrest warrant last December for the man, whom it suspects was in the UK and had had links to the Birmingham area.

The man was tracked down and arrested at a supermarket petrol station just off the A66 in Middlesbrough, a town in North Yorkshire, England, on Thursday afternoon.

He is due to appear before Westminster Magistrates where extradition proceedings will begin.

Another Vietnamese man known as Ngo Sy Taialso wanted by the Belgian authorities for his role in smuggling the victimswas arrested by the NCA in December 2020 and is waiting to be extradited.

Bonfield said officers at the NCA are determined to do all they can  to get justice for the families of those who died, and disrupt and dismantle the cruel organised criminal networks involved in people smuggling.

On Jan. 22, seven men convicted over the deaths of the 39 migrants were sentenced to a total of 93 years and eight months in prison.

Eamonn Harrison, who loaded the migrants into the lorry in Bierne and drove them to Zeebrugge, was sentenced to 18 years in prison.

Maurice Robinson, the lorry driver who found the bodies in Essex, England, was sentenced to 13 years and four months in prison after pleading guilty to 39 counts of manslaughter, conspiracy to assist unlawful immigration, and acquiring criminal property.

Robinsons boss Ronan Hughes and his co-conspirator Gheorghe Nica were sentenced to 20 years and 27 years in prison, respectively.
Former Arizona Secretary of State Ken Bennett (second from left) moves ballots during an election audit at Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Phoenix, Ariz., on May 1, 2021. (Courtney Pedroza/Getty Images)

Maricopa County Audit Report Expected in August

The final report for the 2020 election audit taking place in Arizonas largest county is not expected to be out until August, an official involved with the work says.

Led by Cyber Ninjas, which was hired by the Arizona Senate, auditors are working on evaluating ballots after finishing their ballot recount, save less than 100 braille ballots.

The ballot evaluation is supposed to wrap up by the end of Junethe Senate is slated to vacate the Veterans Memorial Coliseum, where the audit is taking place, by July 1but there will be a few weeks worth of additional work after that, Ken Bennett, a former Arizona Republican secretary of state, told The Epoch Times.

Weve got the remainder of June to do what were doing here at the coliseum. Then theres a few weeks probably of work on checking the envelope signatures, and looking at voter registration anomalies, and this work that we want to do on the retabulation, so maybe that takes up some or most of July, and then the auditors are going to need a few to several weeks to put the report together, said Bennett, the Arizona Senates liaison for the audit.

Cyber Ninjas, which has not returned requests for comment, said in documents sent to the Senate that it estimated the audit would take approximately 35 days, followed by a five-day period to produce the final report.

Auditors were set to start their 34th day of work on Friday. The audit started on April 23 but the teams had to leave the coliseum for approximately 9 days in May as high school graduations took place. Auditors resumed work on May 24.

No details about the final report are included in the documents from Cyber Ninjas. Bennett said the report would be massive.

Its going to very in-depth, he added.

Maricopa County ballots cast in the 2020 general election are examined and recounted by contractors working for Florida-based company, Cyber Ninjas, at Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Phoenix, Ariz., on May 6, 2021. (Matt York/AP Photo/Pool)

Its not clear how much extra funding will be needed due to the audit running over the original projected period of time. Private money is helping fund the audit.

Arizona lawmakers are waiting for the results of the audit to inform future election-related bills.

Itll be our duty to act in whatever way is appropriate, state Sen. Wendy Rogers, a Republican, told The Epoch Times this week.

People involved in the audit are not sure yet where the work in July will take place, according to Bennett. A large building like the coliseum is not needed for the type of work being planned.

Randy Pullen, a former Arizona Republican Party chairman who is acting as a spokesman for the audit, told reporters at the coliseum that data from the election machines will be analyzed in Washington at the offices of CyFIR, a subcontractor working on the audit. Some data will be reviewed at the Cyber Ninjas offices in Florida.

One potential expansion of the audit is still being considered.

The Arizona Senate is still mulling whether to hire a California nonprofit called Citizens Oversight to run a computer retabulation of ballot images. That count would then be compared with the numbers the audit teams come up with and the original tabulation.
Mark and Patricia McCloskey stand in front of their house holding firearms as activists walk through the gated neighborhood in the Central West End of St. Louis, Mo., on June 28, 2020. (Laurie Skrivan/St. Louis Post-Dispatch via AP)

Mark McCloskey Explains Guilty Plea: By God, I Did It. Thats What the Guns Were For

Mark and Patricia McCloskey explained why they pleaded guilty to the charges stemming from a viral incident last summer where the couple was seen holding firearms amid Black Lives Matter (BLM) demonstrations in front of their St. Louis home.

The prosecutor, Mark said, dropped all the felony charges, all the gun charges, and charged me with a crime that said I purposely placed other people in apprehension of imminent fear of physical injury.

And, by God, I did it, McCloskey told Newsmax on Thursday. Thats what the Second Amendment was there for  and I couldnt say no to that one, he added.

Mark McCloskey, a lawyer, pleaded guilty to a Class C misdemeanor of fourth-degree assault, while his wife, Patricia McCloskey, pleaded guilty to a Class A misdemeanor of second-degree harassment. They will pay the maximum fines of $2,000 and $750, and they wont serve any jail time.

The two will be forced to forfeit the weapons they were holding when they confronted BLM protesters who were marching near their home last summer.

According to McCloskey in the Newsmax interview, he and his wife were able to avoid more serious charges that would have landed them in prison for years.

And regarding the now-viral incident, As I said on the courthouse steps, if thats a crime in Missouri, I did it, and Ill do it again, McCloskey said, noting that he will pay what he described as a parking ticket, a $750 fine, and thats it.

Republican celebrity Mark McCloskey visits a GOP headquarters in Scranton, Pa., on Sept. 30, 2020. (Angela Weiss/AFP via Getty Images)

God came knocking on our door disguised as an angry mob, and it transformed us, McCloskey added in the Thursday interview. Patty and I decided to just put the rest of our lives on hold and do what we can to save this great nation.

He continued: Our liberties are being stripped from us so quickly, and the country is deteriorating so fast, we just said, We dont care what it takes, were going to put everything else on hold, and do what we can to restore the America that we knew when we were kids.'

In previous interviews, the couple said that BLM protesters threatened them with bodily harm.

They were going to come in there. They were going to burn down the house, Patricia McCloskey said, recalling what the demonstrators had allegedly told them. They were going to be living in our house after I was dead, and they were pointing to different rooms and said, Thats going to be my bedroom, and thats going to be the living room, and Im going to be taking a shower in that room.

Prosecutors in their case disputed some of their claims, including that a BLM protester was armed.

Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner, who had charged both of them, was later removed from a role in their case after a judge in late 2020 ruled that she appeared to have started prosecution against the two for political purposes.

The Epoch Times has contacted the McCloskeys for comment.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) speaks about his opposition to S. 1, the "For The People Act" in Washington on June 17, 2021. (Joshua Roberts/Getty Images)

McConnell: Manchins Election Reform Proposal Still Rotten To The Core

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on Thursday said he believes all Republicans will oppose Sen. Joe Manchins (D-W.Va.) compromise on the Democratic partys election-related bill that has been dubbed by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and other top Democrats as the For the People Act.

McConnell in a statement pushed back against Manchins slimmed-down elections compromise, saying that it still retains the partisan bills rotten core.

The West Virginia senators version of S.1, the For The People Act, is still an assault on the fundamental idea that states, not the federal government, should decide how to run their own elections, McConnell said.

Manchin put forward his own version of the bill after initially saying that he wouldnt support the Democrat-backed proposal, which was passed by the House along party lines in March.

Republicans and conservative organizations such as the Heritage Foundation oppose the bill, which allows for public subsidies to grassroots campaign, small-dollar donations. Democrats, meanwhile, say the bill will limit gerrymandering, change campaign finance rules, and create new ethics rules for some federal officials.

McConnell described the measure as a one-sided power grab by Democrats now that theyre in government when it was first introduced in 2019.

Manchin said the bill as it was introduced was too broad and had no change of receiving bipartisan support.

On Wednesday, he released a list of the voting reforms he does support, including a nationwide voter ID law, and allowing states in participate in maintenance of voter rolls, which would allow a purging of names from a states registered voters list using state and federal documents.

His pitch would also mandate at least 15 days of early voting for federal elections and ban partisan gerrymandering. Manchin included some proposals from the original bill, such as tighter ethics and campaign rules largely rejected by Republican lawmakers.

Congressional action on federal voting rights legislation must be the result of both Democrats and Republicans coming together to find a pathway forward, or we risk further dividing and destroying the Republic we swore to protect and defend as elected officials, Manchin wrote in a memo detailing the provisions.

Senate Democrats seem to have reached a so-called compromise election takeover among themselves, McConnell said in his statement, responding to Manchins version. In reality, the plan endorsed by Stacey Abrams is no compromise.

It still subverts the First Amendment to supercharge cancel culture and the lefts name-and-shame campaign model, he added. It takes redistricting away from state legislatures and hands it over to computers.

Manchin said in a statement to reporters: McConnell has the right to do whatever he thinks he can do. I would hope theres enough good Republicans that understand the bedrock of our society is having accessible, open, fair and secure elections.

Ive been working across the aisle with all the Republicans trying to get people to understand that thats the bedrock of our democracy, and accessible, fair and basically secured voting, Manchin said.

Meanwhile, Manchin has vowed to oppose legislation that would abolish the filibuster, which allows the minority party in the Senate to block legislation. To overcome any GOP filibuster, Democrats need to get 60 votes.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), however, has said that he is still pushing to bring the bill to the Senate floor at the end of the month, despite poor chances of the legislation passing.
Missouri Officials Vow to Fight Tooth and Nail to Protect 2nd Amendment Rights and Fight Federal Overreach

Missouri Gov. Mike Parson and Attorney General Eric Schmitt have sent a letter to the Department of Justice (DOJ) defending their states recent gun rights legislation while denouncing what the pair called potential federal overreach and encroachment on Missourians Second Amendment rights.

Parson signed a bill into law last week that declares some federal gun control laws invalid, while prohibiting state and local cooperation with enforcement of regulations that infringe on the peoples right to keep and bear arms as guaranteed by the Second Amendment.

The Republican governor said in a press release that the legislation draws a line in the sand and demonstrates our commitment to reject any attempt by the federal government to circumvent the fundamental right Missourians have to keep and bear arms to protect themselves and their property.

But the move prompted a response from the Biden administration, with the DOJ writing in a June 16 letter obtained by The Associated Press that the U.S. Constitutions Supremacy Clause outweighs the bill Parson signed into law, known as HB 85 or the Second Amendment Preservation Act.

The Supremacy Clause establishes that the Constitution, federal laws made pursuant to it, and treaties made under its authority constitutes the supreme Law of the Land, and thus takes priority over any conflicting state laws. Federal statutes and treaties, however, are only supreme if they do not contravene the Constitution.

Acting Assistant Attorney General Brian Boynton said in the letter that Missouris new law threatens to disrupt the working relationship between federal and local authorities, arguing that it conflicts with federal firearms laws and regulation.

Boynton called on Parson and Schmitt to clarify the law and how it would work, requesting a response by Friday.

In their June 17 response to Boynton (pdf), Parson and Schmitt wrote, Your letter purporting to ask for clarification of this important legislation, which was purposefully leaked to the news media, is riddled with a misunderstanding of the law and falsehoods.

We will not stand by while the federal government tries to tell Missourians how to live our lives. Missouri is not attempting to nullify federal law, they wrote. Instead, Missouri is defending its people from federal government overreach by prohibiting state and local law enforcement agencies from being used by the federal government to infringe Missourians right to keep and bear arms.

Parson and Schmitt argued in their letter that, under the Second and Tenth Amendments, the right to bear arms is inalienable and, according to a joint statement issued by the two officials, Missouri has the right to refuse to enforce unconstitutional infringements by the federal government.

We will fight tooth and nail to defend the right to keep and bear arms  and we will not tolerate any attempt by the federal government to deprive Missourians of this critical civil right, Parson and Schmitt wrote.
Vials of the CoronaVac vaccine, developed by China's Sinovac Biotech, are displayed in Bangkok, Thailand on Feb. 24, 2021. (Lillian Suwanrumpha/AFP via Getty Images)

More Than Half of the 10 Worst-Hit Countries by CCP Virus Use China-Made Vaccines

Evidence shows more than half of the 10 most severely affected countries by the CCP virus in the world have used Chinese vaccines.

Our World in Data, an online database created by the UKs Oxford University, provides data on the number of infections per day per 1 million people.

As of June 16, the top 10 hard-hit countries and their relevant figures were: Seychelles (1,690), Uruguay (827), Mongolia (729), Colombia (551), Maldives (508), Bahrain (506), Argentina (506), Suriname (437), Kuwait (365), and Chile (342).

In Seychelles, 57 percent of its vaccines are from Chinas Sinopharm for the 18 to 60 age group, the other 43 percent administered to those over 60 using AstraZeneca vaccines, according to the New York Times.

In South Americas Uruguay, citizens had received about 2.74 million doses as of May 29. Among them, 80 percent of the shots were Sinovac products, China News Service reported.

In Bahrain, an island nation of the Middle East, nearly 1 million have received their first shots, accounting for 56.3 percent of the countrys total population, while 47 percent have completed two doses. Among them, the coverage of Sinopharm vaccines exceeded 60 percent of the total in the locality, according to BackChina.com.

Also in South America, Argentina received 4 million doses of Sinopharm vaccines, according to a Tencent report. Additionally, 76.6 percent of Colombias vaccines came from Chinas Sinovac, NetEase reported. In Chile, as of May 16, the total number of the countrys shots was 16.57 million, of which more than 80 percent were Sinovac products, according to Xinhua News Agency.

Mongolia, Chinas northern neighbor, received 4.3 million doses of Sinopharm vaccines, reported The New York Times.

Efficacy of Chinese-Made Vaccines Questioned

The efficacy of vaccine protection in mainland China has also been questioned.

Since Chinas homegrown vaccines were approved on Dec. 30, 2020, their efficacy has long been questioned partly due to the opaque development process. Worse yet, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) authorities have been reluctant to publish reports of adverse reactions to them.

Tao Lina, a Shanghai-based vaccine specialist, commented on 73 possible side effects of Sinopharm vaccines on Weibo, a Twitter-like platform: [This] vaccine has successfully become the least safe in the world.

This post has since been deleted by censors.

Though the CCP regime has not published any reports of deaths after taking the domestic vaccines, Hong Kong announced 14 death cases, aged 55 to 80, after receiving the vaccination, which occurred within one month since Feb. 28.

Dr. Li Longteng, the dean of the General Hospital of Taipei Renji Hospital, told The Epoch Times in an interview that importing China-made vaccines to Taiwan is essentially a fake issue because both Sinopharm and Sinovac vaccines are inactivated ones.

Their security is really not so good. Nor is their efficacy, he added.

He noted that even North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has banned the use of Chinese drugs, including China-made vaccines against COVID-19, in the main hospitals in its capital, Pyongyang, after a senior regime official died in May after taking a medicine produced in China.

Wu Minzhou contributed to this report.
A barber shaves former French Economy Minister and founder of the political movement "En Marche" (On the Move), now president of France, Emmanuel Macron during a visit to the International Hairdressing Show (Salon International de la Coiffure) in Paris on Sept. 12, 2016. (Eric Feferberg/AFP via Getty Images)

On Taxi Cab Drivers, Barbers, and Learning the Truth

Commentary

It was often said that a journalist writing about a foreign country ought to stay either three days or three years: the former for strength of impression, or that latter for depth of knowledge.

I was a three-day man in that period of my life when newspapers would occasionally ask me to report on some revolution, civil war, social upheaval or other unusual event (I once went on a daytrip to India from Europe).

Given the circumstances, I gathered much of my information from the taxi-driver from the airport to the hotel where all the other journalists were staying. They did likewise, and in many an article, even in serious publications, a journalist has acted as a mere amanuensis for a taxi-driver.

I am far from decrying this genre of journalism: in my experience, taxi-drivers are exceptionally sensible and level-headed men, intelligent and well-informed but not educated, or rather not indoctrinated into believing the most obvious nonsense by having attended western-type establishments of supposedly higher learning.

Knowing that a journalist is a bird of passage, they did not fear, even in dictatorships, to speak the truth as they saw it: and generally they had seen a lot. With the advent of the mobile phone that hears everything and erases nothing, they may since have become more cautious. I dont know: no one sends me anywhere these days.

Barbers are another invaluable source of information and opinion, though seldom acknowledged. My barber in Paris recently summed up the situation in France better than a hundred editorialists, and with a real flair for compression.

France, he said, is like a man who complains of toothache for twenty-five years but has never found time to go to the dentist. And he added, Since I arrived in this country twenty-five years ago, I have heard the same debates on the same subjects, and nothing has changed, with the exception of the vulgarity of the presidents. Needless to say, this was growing, unlike the economy.

My barber comes from Morocco and I admire him greatly, though of course I have never told him so. One of the subjects of the eternal debates in France is about immigration, especially from North Africa.

The two poles of the debate are always the same: either it is something to be welcomed, the only problem with it arising from the racism and prejudice of the French, or it is a curse that is destroying the country as termites destroy a wooden-framed building.

Thus, the debates ascribed my barber to one of two possible roles: that of victim of an unjust society that must be changed down to the very thoughts that its citizens not only entertain but are capable of entertaining, or as the bearer of a cultural infection worse than any plague.

Neither of these roles is very attractive and, as far as I can tell from his demeanour and our intermittent conversations, he refuses to play either, not wanting to be either a victim or a plague-bearer, though his refusal is by means of his conduct rather than by obvious protest.

By his manner of speaking and talking, I should guess that he was educated beyond the level necessary to be a barber. Basic and secondary education in non-western countries is often, or was often, far superior to that found in the more advanced world, at least for that part of the population that was educated at all.

For example, my late mother-in-laws Haitian care-assistant knew far more French literature and history than most young French people today, and not merely because she had a personal taste for study and knowledge, but because she had been taught them at school in Haiti.

In other circumstances, my barber might have pursued a more elevated career than running a one-man barbers shop. (I am aware of how snobbish the idea of a more elevated career might sound. If hair must be cut, there must be barbers, and their work is both useful and perfectly respectable. But I cannot entirely rid myself of my own prejudices and preconceptions as far as the hierarchy of careers is concerned. I certainly mean no insult to barbers or to people employed at a similar levelor even much below it.)

A man of high intelligence, my barber was clearly also of somewhat retiring disposition, not the type to push himself forward and withstand the reverses that the ambitious must accept. A small, one-man business was enough for him, that would provide him with a living and a base from which to launch his children on their social ascent.

I find this heroic, albeit in a quiet and unsung way. I have known many immigrant parents who have sacrificed their own lives, working hard for decades, not necessarily at the level of which they are capable, so that their children may do better and take advantage of opportunities that an open society offers.

Unfortunately, the same spirit is not universal, to say the least, in the lower reaches of our societies. A kind of exacerbated individualism prevents it. If I am the equal of everyone, then my interests, desires and enjoyments are as important as those of anyone else, including those of my own children. Why, then, should I sacrifice anything, let alone years of my life, for them?

Time out of number, I encountered people who had put their own desires of the moment before the long-term interests of their children, which they hardly considered at all. And in a celebrity culture in which fame and wealth seem to be awarded like a winning lottery ticket, the more solid and realistic means of ascent seem in any case unbearably slow and tedious.

I wish I could do more for my barber than merely patronize his shop from time to time, but I do not think he would want me to. He has the dignity of independence and would not thank me for any condescending generosity. I wish my hair, already quite scanty, would grow faster than it does, but try as I might, it will not obey me.

Part of my reason for wishing to go more often to his shop is purely selfish, however: to learn more of the true condition of France.

Theodore Dalrymple is a retired doctor. He is contributing editor of the City Journal of New York and the author of 30 books, including Life at the Bottom. His latest book is Embargo and Other Stories.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
Pennsylvania Election Audit a Very Real Possibility: Top Senate Republican

A Pennsylvania Senate Republican suggested that an election audit in the commonwealth is a very real possibility after meeting with a group of audit activists at the Capitol.

There are a lot of things under consideration right now, and I told them to check back in a week or two and we hope to have some more detail, said Senate State Government Committee Chairman Dave Argall, a Republican, according to a recent interview he gave with a local news outlet.

Argall told the Capitol-Star on Thursday that he was considering subpoenas for ballot details, although its unclear what jurisdictions would receive them. His comments came after a few dozen audit supporters gathered at the Pennsylvania state Capitol calling for the legislature to review the 2020 election.

Several Pennsylvania GOP lawmakers recently visited the audit efforts in Maricopa County, Arizona, last week, with several saying that one is needed in the Keystone State as well. Republican lawmakers from Michigan, Wisconsin, Utah, and other states also visited Maricopa County in recent days before making similar proclamations.

Former President Donald Trump, in a series of statements released by his office, placed pressure on Republicans in Pennsylvania and mentioned Argall by name as well as Republican Senate President Pro Tempore Jake Corman.

Corman is fighting as though he were a Radical Left Democrat, saying that a Forensic Audit of Pennsylvania not take place, Trump said on Monday. Why is Senator David Argall playing the same game? Are they stupid, corrupt, or naive? What is going on?

The former commander-in-chief, meanwhile, suggested that Corman and other Republicans who oppose the measure could be primaried during the next election. Since leaving office in January, Trump has often made announcements where hes thrown his support behind certain candidates while criticizing others, namely House representatives and senators who supported the second impeachment effort against him.

In a statement to The Epoch Times via his office, Argall disputed Trumps comment that he doesnt support an audit.

For the last two weeks, I have said this many times: I support a forensic audit of PAs November 2020 elections. We are now investigating the details of how to do that, Argall said on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, State Rep. Seth Grove, a Republican who chairs the House State Government Committee rejected the idea that an audit of his state is needed. In Pennsylvania, the Senate can vote to authorize an audit without support from the House.

Grove also proposed legislation that allows for more stringent voter identification requirements and mail-ballot signature verification. The bill, among other measures, would eliminate the states permanent mail-in voting list, establish a new Bureau of Election Audit agency, and allow early in-person voting starting in 2025.

The PA House of Representatives will not be authorizing any further audits on any previous election, Grove wrote in a tweet on June 3. We are focused on fixing our broken election law to make it easier to vote and harder to cheat.
Photos Show Whale Watchers Failing to See Huge Whale Pop Up Right Beside Their Boat in Baja

Whale watchers off the coast of Baja California Sur, Mexico, nearly missed the moment of a lifetime when a sneaky whale popped up right beside their boatas they looked the wrong way.

Photos taken from another boat caught the embarrassing episode on camera.

The group were pictured waiting patiently with their cameras poised, and very nearly missed the spectacular sight because they were all facing the wrong way, while the whale had surfaced less than a foot from their boat.

Whale watchers look in the wrong direction as a whale surfaces less than a foot from their boat. (Caters News)

Luckily, the sightseers turned around just in time to spot the colossal marine mammal before she disappeared back into the ocean.

The funny scene was captured by photographer Eric J. Smith during a trip to San Ignacio Lagoon.

The whale was photographed at San Ignacio Lagoon in Baja California Sur, Mexico. (Caters News)

The whale watchers had a close encounter after realizing the whale was right beside their boat. (Caters News)

The whale was photographed breaching during the encounter. (Caters News)

She slowly and silently stuck her head high above the water to look around, the 49-year-old from Los Angeles said.

I was in another panga a few dozen feet away and caught the moment right before everyone realized she was so close.

When everyone turned around, she quickly sank below the surface.

A closeup shot of the whale eyeing the camera underwater. (Caters News)

Upon spotting the whale, cheering and hysterical laughter ensued.

Whale photography involves a lot of luck, but the key is to always be on alert and ready, Smith said.

On a whale watching voyage, it is easy to get complacent because there is a lot of waiting.

It seems like the moment you let your guard down a spectacular breach occurs.

The tail end of a whale breaching. (Caters News)

Epoch Times staff contributed to this report.

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Probe Into Fulton County Absentee Ballot Forms Started Before Public Announcement: Official

The investigation into missing ballot drop box forms in Fulton County was launched before a public announcement this week, according to Georgia authorities.

What prompted the announcement of the investigation was the latest story, but I think investigation was underway even before that point, because we could tell that it was just not up to standards, an official with Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffenspergers office told The Epoch Times.

Mariska Bodison, with the countys Board of Registration and Elections, told Georgia Star News this week that the chain of custody forms for approximately 19,000 absentee ballots placed in drop boxes were missing.

Afterwards, Raffensperger, a Republican, announced that the new revelations  will be investigated thoroughly, as we have with other counties that failed to follow Georgia rules and regulations regarding drop boxes.

But the official with his office said the probe was already underway for some time before the announcement.

We received lots of documents. What we found out after we had a chance to dig into them is that on some of them, the paperwork wasnt complete, the official said. Thats why we launched a formal investigation to get to the bottom of that.

The offices chief investigator, Frances Watson, conveyed that the county has had similar problems at least as far back as 2012.

She said we havent had any reason to suspect, though, that theres anything fishy with the ballots themselves, its just the poll workers didnt follow through on their end of tying up the loose ends on the paperwork, the official said.

Raffensperger earlier this year said three counties failed to complete the absentee ballot forms that are required by Georgia law, but Fulton was not one of them.

Raffensperger said his office had confirmed that the other counties in the state, including Fulton, filled out and retained ballot transfer forms in accordance with Georgia rules.

The overwhelming majority of counties did what they were supposed to, he said at the time.

The official in the secretarys office suggested that because the office received so many documents, it took a while to sift through all of them and discover that Fulton Countys contained problems. Its not clear why Raffensperger went public before the sifting was over.

Vernon Jones, a Georgia gubernatorial candidate, told a press conference Thursday that Raffensperger knew all along about this information, and he has just now announced  that hes going to investigate it.

Based on this new evidence we know the Secretary of State Raffensperger knew about these egregious irregularities, but still maintained our election was secure because he still choose [sic] to argue against the need for a forensic audit, he said. Why did Raffensperger not release this information to the public?

Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger holds a press conference on the status of ballot counting in Atlanta, Ga., on Nov. 6, 2020. (Jessica McGowan/Getty Images)

Jones backs the group of voters who received low-resolution ballot images from Fulton County and are pushing to obtain higher-resolution photographs. A hearing in that case is scheduled for Monday.

A State Election Board rule promulgated last year directed transfer forms be filled out by the two-person teams who collect ballots from drop boxes. The same rule enabled the use of drop boxes amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

Fulton County had 38 drop boxes in place for the 2020 election. Under the recently passed election reform bill, it will have eight in future elections.

Jessica Corbitt-Dominguez, a Fulton County spokesman, told The Epoch Times in an email this week that the county followed procedures for the collection of absentee ballots from Fulton County drop boxes.

We maintain a large quantity of documents and researching our files from last year to produce the ballot transfer forms. We have been in communication with the Secretary of States office to update them of our progress on this matter, she added.

During a Fulton County Board of Registration & Elections meeting on Thursday, Nadine Williams, the countys elections preparation manager, told board members that the two-person teams were seen on cameras installed at the dropboxes picking up the ballots, counting them, and placing them in a sealed bag.

There were about four teams that went out daily, including weekends, to gather ballots, which they would deliver to the countys Registration Office. The teams would deliver forms regarding the ballot count to the office with the ballots, and staff at the office would double check the numbers before filing the forms away.

Williams said the Georgia Star News article contained some contradictions but indicated county workers have still been unable to find some of the forms.

Theres eight entries on the spreadsheet that were researching, she said.

A county spokeswoman did not respond to a request for clarification on what she meant.

State officials have said before that Fulton County cut corners and was sloppy while running the election, but that no proof of fraud has emerged.

Also during the hearing, officials said they expect that the Fulton County Sheriffs Department is close to finishing its investigation into a break-in at the ballot storage warehouse that took place earlier this month.
Rewind, Review, and Re-Rate: Paths of Glory: Young Director Stanley Kubricks Scathing Indictment of War

Not Rated| 1h 28min | Drama, War | 1957

Full Metal Jacket (1987) is a modern-day war classic by all accounts. It covers the Vietnam War: Everything from the stressful weeks that men spent in boot camp, all the way to the brutal carnage during the soldiers climactic street and jungle battles. But it wasnt director Stanley Kubricks only war-movie masterpiece. There is also one of his earliest works, 1957s Paths of Glory.

The film is set in 1916, right in the middle of the World War I (19141918). Germany has attacked France, and after grueling trench warfare on the Western Front, the two world powers have settled into an uneasy stalemate where successes are measured in hundreds of yards.

This stalemate doesnt sit well with the French armys general staff. They want to break through the impasse, impose their will upon the Germans, and kick them out of their country.

With this in mind, French Army Gen. Broulard (Adolphe Menjou) pays a visit to his old friend, Gen. Mireau (George Macready), who resides in an opulent French chateau. Broulard informs Mireau that headquarters is gearing up for a big offensive to break through the German lines. But Mireau tells Broulard that his men are war-weary and in need some good old rest and relaxation.

Gen. Mireau (George Macready, L) and Gen. Broulard (Adolphe Menjou), in Paths of Glory. (United Artists)

When Broulard dangles a promotion in front of Mireaualready preapproved by headquartershe accepts the arduous mission. So hungry is Mireau to add another star to his uniform that he doesnt waste any time and tells Broulard that his entire division, the 702nd, will be moving out in a mere couple of days.

The only problem is that the 702nd has dug in right in front of a nigh-impregnable German fortress on a hill dubbed the Ant Hill.

Mireau travels to the front lines to the 702nds field commander, Col. Dax (Kirk Douglas), who was one of the most revered attorneys in all of France before joining the military. The two men clearly care little for one another, as evidenced by verbal barbs they fling back and forth.

When Dax informs Mireau that his men are already stretched to the limit of their endurance, Mireau chastises him and challenges his bravery. Dax reluctantly acquiesces but knows that Mireaus orders to storm the Ant Hill will result in severe casualties for his unit; its a suicide mission.

Col. Dax (Kirk Douglas, L) and Gen. Mireau (George Macready) dont see eye to eye, in Paths of Glory. (United Artists)

In a beautifully heroic scene, Dax walks through the trenches to boost his mens morale as artillery barrages explode all around them, coating everything in swathes of dirt. His men thus steeled, he courageously climbs out of the trenches and leads his men through no mans land, the wide patch of land between the French and German trench lines.

Ironically, quite a number of men already occupy the placeits just that theyre all dead.

When the first wave of the attack is obliterated by the Germans, Mireau orders the second wave, B Company, to move in. However, B Company men are hunkered down in the trenches behind French front lines and refuse to budge, citing the obviousthat theyll end up getting smashed to pieces as well.

Mireau ruthlessly orders the battery commander to fire on B Company as a way of both punishing them and spurring them into action. But the battery commander rightly regards Mireaus order as illegal and wont comply unless he sees it in written form.

When Dax, who barely survived the first wave, runs back to rally B Company, a French soldiers corpse flies out of no mans land and collides with himsymbolically drawing the failed assault on Ant Hill to a close.

Mireau is furious with the 702nds failure and accuses them of the ultimate military sin: cowardice. At first, Mireau wants 100 men from the unit court martialed for defying his orders. However, the more sensible Gen. Broulard steers Mireau away from his impulsively commanded punishment and gets that severe number reduced to just threeone soldier from each of the divisions three companies: Cpl. Philippe Paris (Ralph Meeker), Pvt. Pierre Arnaud (Joe Turkel), and Pvt. Maurice Ferol (Timothy Carey).

Ralph Meeker (L) and Emile Meyer in Paths of Glory. (United Artists)

Dax steps in to defend the three men, knowing that if convicted, theyll be brought before a firing squad. But as the trial begins, he begins to sense that its not quite legitimatemore of a farce than anything.

Douglas is fascinating as a man who sticks to his convictions, despite the great risks to his career. Meeker, Turkel, and Carey are poignant in their depictions of doomed men awaiting trial. But George Macready as the monstrous, power-hungry Gen. Mireau is so convincing that he generally steals every scene hes in, barring, of course, those with Kirk Douglas.

Paths of Glory is an excellent war drama with gorgeous sets and outstanding acting. And as an extra treat, it gives us a look at Kubricks burgeoning directorial talent.

Paths of Glory

Director: Stanley Kubrick

Starring: Kirk Douglas, Ralph Meeker, Adolphe Menjou, George Macready

Not Rated

Running Time: 1 hour, 28 minutes

Release Date: 1957

Rated: 4.5 stars out of 5



Ian Kane is a filmmaker and author based out of Los Angeles. To learn more, visit DreamFlightEnt.com or contact him at Twitter.com/ImIanKane.
Roger Garside: A Coming Coup Will End Chinas Communist Dictatorship

The Chinese regime is outwardly strong, but inwardly weak, says China expert Roger Garside, and its plagued by a brewing financial crisis, a moral vacuum in society, and the malaise of rampant corruption.

Garside predicts a coming coup will ultimately end Chinas communist dictatorship. In this episode, we sit down with Garside to discuss how he came to his conclusions, detailed in his new book, China Coup: The Great Leap to Freedom.

Garside is a former British diplomat who served twice in the British Embassy in Beijing and witnessed the hysteria of Chinas Cultural Revolution firsthand.

Jan Jekielek: Roger Garside, its such a pleasure to have you on American Thought Leaders.

Roger Garside: Great, pleasure to be here.

Mr. Jekielek: Roger, you have written an incredibly, incredibly fascinating book. Youre suggesting a hypothetical situation that I think is not the norm among China watchers and China experts. Yet, you seem to make a pretty compelling case.

One of the really interesting things that you mention in here is that these potential coup plotters, these are not people that are coming from outside of the system, these are very much people who would be from the highest ranks of the Communist Party.

And they would be doing this very much in their own self interest, so to speak. Again, contrary to a lot of common thinking today. Tell me a little bit about what is it that is in the self interest of these high level officials to see systemic political change in China?

Mr. Garside: Well, I think its in their self interest, but I think theyre not only motivated by self interest. As I read them, these real life charactersand as I portray them in that quarter of my book which is given over to the semi-fictional coup detathave a concern for their country. They see their own personal self interests and those of the country joined going forward together.

They can see the problems, the deep-seated, long-standing problems in China, caused by the system of totalitarian dictatorship, which they have. They understand those problems better than the people in the outside world do.

They can see better than most people can see, that this regime is outwardly strong, but inwardly weak. And that its in a state of political decay. And that their best hope for preserving their own wealth and power, as well as the best hope for China, is to lead a coup detat to remove Xi Jinping and to launch China into a democratic transition.

Mr. Jekielek: You talk about, and this is actually the title of one of the chapters in the book, how the regime is outwardly strong, but inwardly weak. What is the greatest illustration in your mind of this? Because again, this isnt necessarily the conventional wisdom for everyone.

Mr. Garside: All right. Well, this is a totalitarian regime, not an authoritarian regime; its a totalitarian regime. Like all totalitarian regimes, it depends not on trust, but on control. And the communist regime in China is extremely sophisticated, extremely adept at control.

But within that system, there is an absence of true self-confidence. They are fearful. They fear the truth. They fear democracy. They fear the truth so much that they have for 70 years wiped out, covered up, huge areas of their own history of rule.

They fear democracy so they have to smash the freedom of 7.5 million Hongkongers, only 7.5 million Hongkongers, who are attached to freedom and rule of law. Why? Because theyre afraid that the 7.5 million will infect the 1.4 billion whom they hold in political slavery in the rest of China.

They are weak inwardly, because there is a moral crisis in China. There is a system of corruption, the system is corrupt, from top to bottom, from left the right. And I could go on, but the single greatest area of weakness is, curiously enough, the economy.

Because since 2008, they have relied upon pumping billions of credit into the system in order to maintain an artificially high growth rate. And this flood of money has led to a great deal of distortion, false economic activity, un-economic activity, and fragility within the financial system.

Mr. Jekielek: You mentioned the economy, the realities of the Chinese economy are probably the single biggest issue. But before you mentioned corruption as well. And I thought you made a really interesting observation about the corruption.

I think you said, Corruption in China is not the unfortunate byproduct of rapid economic growth, but the result of strategic choices by the Chinese Communist Party. So now thats very interesting, because again, thats another potentially countervailing to conventional thought idea here.

Mr. Garside: To explain what I mean by that, we have to go back to the Tiananmen massacre of 1989, which destroyed the moral authority of the Communist Party of China. And in order to rebuild loyalty to the party, on the part of officials who were going to rule in its name, what could they use to rebuild these peoples loyalty to the top leadership? They couldnt use ideology, nobody believed anymore in MarxismLeninism.

What they could use, though, was material incentive. So they embarked upon the biggest privatization campaign the world has ever seen. But they did it in such a way that the power holders at every level could get together with their friends in business and gain control of the assets, the peoples assets, which were being privatized, without declaring their ownership.

There was an absence of legal clarity in terms of ownership. And that allowed power holders at every level to become rich and powerful.

Mr. Jekielek: So youre saying the corruption is almost by design integral to the system.

Mr. Garside: Yes. I mean, this was the biggest opportunity for corruption and kleptocracy that the world has ever seen. These assets had been owned by the state, they were therefore owned by the state on behalf of the people. And they simply transferred the ownership, effective control of these assets, whether they were banks or mines or companies, to their own officials.

And thats the way its remained, and there is an absence of clarity of ownership in China today on the huge state owned companies: who controls them, who really owns them, even the private ones, who really owns and controls them. This is all very opaque, and where there is opacity in economic and financial affairs, then youll get corruption.

Mr. Jekielek: Its very interesting because what precipitates this contingency plan of the coup-plotters in your hypothetical scenario is the U.S. actually taking China to task and demanding that they open their books, basically be subject to the normal regulatory controls that companies operating in America are required to do. Thats very interesting in this context.

Mr. Garside: In America and in every other well-functioning capital market. When the great awakening from complacency happened in America a few years ago, leaders of Congress, Marco Rubio and other people, introduced a bill. Trump signed it off, I think on the 18th of December 2020.

It requires that companies from whichever country in the worldbut it was certainly designed to be focused on China in this case to be usable, usable against the 172 Chinese companies who are traded and listed on American securities marketsthey would be required within three years to give U.S. financial regulators full access to their accounts.

None of them gave it. Now, theyre forbidden by Chinese law to do so. The law also stipulates that if the companies failed to give that access, then the stock exchanges will be obliged by law to delist those companies. This is a confrontation, which can and will happen. This is not fiction. This is the law of the United States, and it will happen. I say in my first chapter that when this happens, this creates a financial crisis in China.

Mr. Jekielek: And, of course, that makes make some sense. Weve had multiple examples of suddenly realizing the realities of these Chinese companies dont reflect what the prospectus in the Western market says, with the information thats been presented to Western investors.

Another thing I thought was an interesting observation. Over the last many decades, the U.S. has been extremely active in investing in China, right? Both the government and of course the private sector, in an accelerating way until fairly recently. Now, you make this observation in here: No people on earth are less forgiving than the Americans when they believe their trust and friendship have been betrayed.

I think in the last, lets say, four or five years, weve seen kind of an increasing awareness of this. More and more Americans and of course others also are feeling betrayed. The whole coronavirus reality and how the Chinese Communist Party responded to that was a major step.

And now as we speakand this part isnt in your book, because perhaps its just so freshwere beginning to realize that the Wuhan lab leak theory is indeed something that is plausible.

Of course, at The Epoch Times, we knew about this a year ago, weve made a whole documentary on the topic of the possible origins, but for much of the world, people assumed it was some sort of conspiracy theory. Its another potential nail into this whole kind of question of trust. What do you think?

Mr. Garside: Hugely important. I think this is an epoch-changing issue. I mean, already, public opinion in all free societies can see that the totalitarian regime in China covered up the origins of COVID-19 and continues to refuse to allow an international investigation into the origins. It is vitally important, if we are to prevent further outbreaks from other viruses in the future, that we understand how this one came into being.

So there has been an extraordinary breach of trust and extraordinary denial of the truth. This has taught a new generation of people what totalitarian government looks like and how it actsnot only people abroad, but people within China.

There was a moment in February 2020, when there was a tsunami of outrage and grief when people learn through social media that a doctor in Wuhan, who had tried to warn the nation and the world of the virus, was silenced.

Mr. Jekielek: China is portrayed as a rapidly rising economic power. Right? And theres definitely some truth to that. However youre basically saying that theres a kind of rot inside the system and theres more facade than integrity to the financial system. How does this compare to the U.S. and the more normal capital markets that we see?

Mr. Garside: There has been great economic growth; there is dynamism in the Chinese economy. Its in the private sector. But in 2008, the Communist Party concluded, had come to the conclusion, that if it continued the transition from the command economy to the market economywhich had brought great liberation of enterprise and energy in the Chinese people and great prosperityif they continue that transition to the private market economy, that would undermine their political monopoly.

So they stopped it. And thats when they had to start pumping in the credit, and when you got a whole lot of opacity in the financial systems increasing. You do not have a full market economy in China.

Contrast to the U.S. or the UK, where the commanding heights of the economy are open to the private sector, under regulation by the government. We have an open, transparent system, which doesnt protect us from great fraud and corruption from time to time, but at least it is a self-regulating system.

We have, as a result of that, the strongest, deepest capital markets in the world. We have the deepest pool, biggest pool of free capital, which is mobile and can move around the world. We have the biggest banks, and we have control over the international banking system. And we have between us, the worlds major reserve currencies.

These things are great assets in the struggle for power with the Communist Party of China. This gives U.S. great economic superiority, we have got to use it with greater activism, with greater ambition, and with greater imagination.

We have made a beginning, particularly the U.S. has made a beginning, with the law about capital markets, the holding foreign companies to account law passed under the Trump administration. That made a beginning with the controls on export of technology for military purposes, possible military purposes, dual-use technologies to China.

The controls on investment to stop the communist regime from buying up our most advanced and sensitive technologies. That is a lead, which Europe has and the Japan have got to now follow. And we are beginning to do so.

Mr. Jekielek: A number of China observers, China experts that I know, have expressed deep concern about the strong lobby within America to support the Chinese, effectively the Chinese Communist Party, economically, which is Wall Street. The people have argued that Wall Street is the number one champion of basically pushing this capital into China.

Mr. Garside: Yes, I agree. And I see an alarming parallel with what happened under the Clinton administration. You may remember the Clinton administration came to power determined to use the most favored nation trading relationships annual renewal to demand improvement in human rights in China.

But corporate America was so keen to get into the Chinese market and to start investing in the Chinese labor force. They overwhelmed the Clinton administration on that. Yes, it is now a great challenge for the Biden administration to deal with Wall Streets ambitions in China, which the Chinese Communist Party has been extremely adept at fostering.

They are machiavellian, realpolitik players par excellence, and so they have taken big steps to open up opportunities in China to our financial institutions and to attract more and more fund managers monies, to put money into China. And I dont pretend that its going to be easy to deal with this.

But the reality is, the medium term reality is that, if we sell our freedom and our values in exchange for investment opportunities and trading opportunities, we will lose the system which has made Wall Street great and made the City of London great. We will lose that freedom; we will lose our rule of law.

And it wont take very long, these things can be abolished with breathtaking speed. I think perhaps the biggest political challenge that our leaders face is dealing with our financial service industry.

Mr. Jekielek: Roger, I really appreciated in the book, how you make this interesting hypothetical scenario about how coup in China might come about. But you actually dedicate the bulk of the book to the realities in China that you feel contribute to such a scenario. And in fact your endnotes are a huge part of the book. You have a lot of references, which frankly I really appreciated looking up.

Mr. Garside: Well, its true. I devote three-quarters of the book to nonfictional analysis of what the real state of China is, and why I believe that the totalitarian regime is doomed, provided we work with those who want change in China. And one-quarter of it to how we might bring that about.

The three quarters is nonfiction; one quarter is semi-fiction: real people with real names, real histories in a real world context, but a storyline that is a marriage of imagination and prediction.

I developed that device because I thought it would be a challenge to peoples intellect and awaken their imagination in a way that conventional China-watching books dont. Take the reader inside the minds of communist leaders, which is not been done by anybody else. But also ask the big what if America and its allies were going to do this, and the Chinese were going to respond in a certain way.

Mr. Jekielek: Youre not advocating for any country to be advocating top-down regime change or something like this. Youre basically encouraging the West to create a scenario where that change can happen internally in China.

Mr. Garside: Precisely, precisely. We cannot dictate how China is governed. What we can do is to help those Chinese who want to achieve democracy to achieve it.

Mr. Jekielek: In your mind, what are the key best things that can be done? You mentioned, of course, some of these laws that have been passed recently, and successful implementation of these. But what else do you have in mind?

Mr. Garside: Something else which is enormously important is to find ways to break down and break through the Great Firewall of China. In China today, we have a brainwashed population, we have millions of people whove never been taught the truth, denied the truth about our own country and about the world.

We have to find a way of breaking through the extremely efficient system of censorship. Because I believe that when the Chinese people know the truth, they will be outraged to learn the lies they have been fed, generation after generation and the tragedies which have been covered up generation after generation.

Mr. Jekielek: Youve actually been a China watcher, I think you said, since 1958. Can you give me like a brief sketch of how? Youve been a diplomat in China as well and in many other capacities. Tell me a little bit about your history, so our viewers can understand where youre coming from.

Mr. Garside: Yes, youre quite right. I first watched China in 1958, through a pair of army binoculars, when I spent 10 days in an observation post up on the Hong Kong-China border overlooking a peaceful valley, through which the border fence, the wire fence ran.

And on the hills across the valley, no doubt there were soldiers of the PLA watching us. That valley was peaceful by day. But by night, men and women from Mainland China were crawling through and under the wire to escape from the starvation, disease, and deaths that had been visited upon China by Maos Great Leap Forward.

That fascinated me, awakened the fascination with that huge, closed country that lay in front of me, which has stayed with me for the subsequent 63 years.

When I finished army, I went to university, and then I joined the Foreign Service. I volunteered to study Mandarin Chinese, I did that for two years. I was sent to Beijing during the Cultural Revolution. So I saw firsthand anarchy and violence. I resigned from the diplomatic service after that posting, because I was frustrated. I couldnt see what use I could put my knowledge to in China. It was just stuck. And I went off to join the World Bank. That was a great learning experience.

But then I rejoined the diplomatic service, came back to China for a second tour of duty there. Id moved from a country in total anarchy, violence, and anarchy of cultural revolution. I had moved through the United States, time of the Pentagon Papers, etc, a country which was ruled by law. So that was a great political education for me.

Then back to China in 1976. I was there for the death of Zhou Enlai, death of Mao Zedong, and the struggle for succession, won by Deng Xiaoping. Then I took two years of unpaid leave, went off to California, and wrote a book about how Deng Xiaoping had won that struggle for the succession and what he was going to do with his power.

I didnt go back to China after that diplomatic event, after that. I did other things in my life. The last 10 years of my economically gainful life were not as a diplomat, but running a small but very international advisory company, advising countries that were making a transition from the command economy to the market economy on how to create capital markets.

I started that up as the Berlin Wall fell. Months after the Berlin Wall fell, I had my company up and running and we were working in Hungary and Russia and the Czech Republic or wherever. I saw social, political, economic change on the frontline in these countries which were undergoing the great transition.

So when in my retirement I decided to write about China again, I brought with me a baggage of knowledge and experience, which is unique amongst people who write books about China, actually. And I guess it gave me a kind of confidence in judging and making up my mind about the realities in China and enabled me to look a bit behind that facade that we talked about earlier.

Mr. Jekielek: We talked a little bit earlier about this pervasive lack of trust under the Chinese Communist Party and how its systemic and to some extent, unavoidable in the way the system works right now.

One of the things that you really tackle in the book is this moral dimension. Because this trust is connected with this idea that the party is supposed to become the decider around morality and so forth. But you also mentioned that there isnt this belief in Marxism anymore, leaving a moral vacuum, which I guess the Communist Party had no hope of filling.

Mr. Garside: There certainly is moral decay and a moral vacuum: no trust, no truth. People have spent 70 years under a regime which lies to them, day in and day out. Theres a saying on the internet in China: if theyve [the CCP has] denied something, that probably means its true.

A lot of people in China, millions, tens of millions, hundreds of millions of people, have found that the prosperity which has come is not enough to make sense of life, to give meaning to life. And they have looked to religion for that. All five major religions, as they are classified by the Communist Party, which exist in China have enjoyed explosive growth in the era since 1979.

Christianity is particularly noteworthy in this, because it has attracted many of the brightest, best-educated, socially and economically successful people in  China.

So, alongside this loss of public ethics, you see a private search for meaning and for morality. China, before communism was a land which for much of its history was ruled by ethics, not law, rule by ethics. So it feels, the people of China instinctively feel the loss of public ethics. Very deep.

Mr. Jekielek: Just the other day, I had breakfast with Johnnie Moore, who was one of the USCIRF (U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom) commissioners. Recently the State Department sanctioned one of the leaders of the 610 Office, which was the organization that was createdactually on the day were recording this interview, June 10, 1999to basically destroy the Falun Gong spiritual movement. The day that this sanction was put out, Johnnie Moore was sanctioned by the Chinese Communist Party in retaliation.

Of course, hes an evangelical pastor and fairly prominent figure in those circles. I asked him, Why do you think that they sanctioned you after this specifically? And he said, I think they fear Falun Gong practitioners and evangelicals working together.

And this makes me think ofand you talk about this in your bookthe biggest enemy of the Chinese Communist Party, at least if you look at the spending they do on security, is actually inside China. They fear the Chinese people, a lot more than they fear any external enemy.

Mr. Garside: This is true. Since 2011, the budget for internal security has been greater than the budget for the military. One can only conclude that they are more afraid of internal dissent than they are their foreign enemies.

Religion and spiritual practices such as Falun Gong strike at the heart of communist self-faith. Because they say there is no higher authority than the Communist Party. And yet, every religion says, Yes, there is. There is God who is the supreme authority. So I have a chapter: Who rules: God or the Party?

Theres a political dimension to it, of course, which is tremendously important. That is a totalitarian regime cannot tolerate autonomous civil organizations, non-governmental organizations. They allow them in name to exist in China, but they have to be controlled. But its true in religion. In a sense, Falun Gong is a non-governmental organization, which spread like wildfire.

And it was a terrifying experience for the leaders of the Communist Party. Something beyond their understanding, something beyond their control, something which strikes at the heart of their materialist philosophy, to the extent that they believe in any philosophy.

Mr. Jekielek: Id like you to clarify this very specifically. I dont think its generally understood that China under the Chinese Communist Party is in fact totalitarian, versus authoritarian. What is that distinction?

Mr. Garside: As defined by the great historian of the Soviet Union, Robert Conquest, and other American historians, a totalitarian state is one which extends its authority and control into every sphere where that is feasible. And if you look at the Constitution of the Peoples Republic of China, it is spelt out that the highest authority is the Communist Party of China in every sphere.

Now, as a practical matter, Deng Xiaoping, when he came to power, in 78 or 79, recognized that the Communist Party had been unable to eliminate religion in China, and that it would be wise to tolerate it under control. And for decades, until Xi Jinping, there was a kind of modus vivendi negotiated at a local level, under which there was a considerable measure of political toleration.

But Xi Jinping coming to power put a stop to that. Because Xi Jinping is, I think, a convinced totalitarian, and he wants to put the Partys authority into every sphere of life. So, not only religion has been persecuted, but private sector companies now are obliged to have Party cells, which can pull the shots on anything, any decision in that company, in its governance.

An authoritarian governmentsuch as we see successful ones in places like Singaporekeep themselves out of, do not dictate to, religions for instance, as a sphere. But under Xi Jinping, every sphere has to be under the control of the Party. And he is enforcing that to the extent that he can or that they can under his leadership.

Mr. Jekielek: Basically you lay out in your book how that sort of a structure ultimately is doomed to fail.

Mr. Garside: I believe so. But this is a matter of my faith in human nature. Though its not only a matter of faith, its a matter of pragmatic judgment too. Because as I spell out in the book, the totalitarian regime in China has created deep seated problems.

From 2008 onwards, it couldnt continue the transition to the market economy. It had to start pumping credit into the economy to keep the level of employment up, to prevent mass unemployment, to prevent many corporate defaults.

So weve got artificial activity going on, a problem which would not have existed if they had been prepared to enter into political competition with other parties, submit themselves to the judgment of the people as to whether they should be reelected.

No, they are totalitarians; they are going to hold on to power. The same totalitarian system with political imperatives of corruption. Rebuilding a party, through greed and corruption, to make it pay to be an official of the Communist Party.

In the environment, we talked earlier about totalitarian regimes prohibiting any autonomous non-governmental organization from becoming vigorous and growing freely. If you want to control pollution in a country, it is essential to have non-governmental organizations which will monitor the real situation on the ground, monitor the implementation of pollution control laws, expose those businessmen or politicians, their cronies in cahoots with each other, overriding the law to control pollution.

But in China, the totalitarian regime will not permit an environmental movement. And so, in area after area of cultural life, they dare not allow freedom of expression. In area after area of life, you see problems being created which cannot be changed without a change of system.

If youre Li Keqiang, premier of China, you know that, you grew up in this system. And you know the problems better than Roger Garside sitting in South London. The question is, will they do anything about it? And I believe they will, for reasons we discussed earlier.

Totalitarianism is a system which allows people a bit of freedom here, there, there, where it sees it as useful. But it never gives an absolute right to any freedom. There is no absolute human right to anything in China. Everything depends upon a party, which gives and can take back.

Authoritarian regimes do allow a measure of the rule of law. In Singapore, you had the rule of law inherited, if I may say so, from the British, ditto, Hong Kong.

Mr. Jekielek: Since you published the book, weve had these updates, for example this broader realization that coronavirus may have originated from the Wuhan lab. How do you see your prediction in light of developments since you published?

Mr. Garside: Well, I am reinforced in my belief that a crisis is coming in China. The communist regime is vulnerable. But I do not believe that the totalitarian regime will be destroyed solely by dynamics within China. I think its absolutely essential that the U.S. and its allies go on to the offensive.

Im not a warmonger; I dont believe in military control, invading across the strait of Taiwan or something. No, but we are engaged in a war for freedom. The Chinese Communist Partynot China, not the Chinese people, lets be quite clear about the distinctionthe Chinese Communist Party launched this war, and it is in Xi Jinpings own words, aiming at global domination.

Its no secret, he put it in his speeches. And they are spending vast amounts of money to influence our societies in many, many subtle ways that we hardly even recognize at the moment.

We have to do far more to expose what theyve already done and are doing in our societies: cyber threat, industrial espionage, the subversion of Chinese language newspapers. I mean, they have taken control of virtually every Chinese language newspaper outside of China except The Epoch Times. Am I right?

Mr. Jekielek: Virtually, yeah.

Mr. Garside: Virtually, virtually, right. It is very frightening. We face a prospect of a China which, despite its economic problems growing, has set itself the goal of making major leaps forward in advanced technologies of control.

If we do not counterattack against this ambitious and dangerous regime, we are going to lose our freedom. We cannot just sit back and say, we have right on our side, we will make a better job of running our own countries. Yes, weve got to do that. But weve also got to find the vulnerabilities. Weve got to educate our people of the peril which faces us.

Our leaders face the biggest challenge, a more sophisticated, more complex challenge than they ever faced with the Soviet Union. Because, our economies and societies are so deeply interwoven. We have so many vested interests now invested in China and trade with China.

But I believe that democracies have a strength of creativity, which surpasses that of totalitarian regimes. And I believe that in the next 5, 10 years, we can develop the strategy we need to win this war for freedom.

Mr. Jekielek: Well, Roger Garside, its such a pleasure to have you on.

Mr. Garside: Its been a great pleasure to be asked such interesting and challenging questions. Thank you Jan.

This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.

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Sean Davis: Big Tech Companies Are Outsourcing Censorship Through Dishonest Fact Check Firms

Big Tech companies are outsourcing censorship through dishonest fact check firms, according to co-founder of the Federalist, Sean Davis.

In an interview with EpochTVs Crossroads program, Davis said Big Tech is using an Orwellian system when it comes to censorship and often turn to third-party fact-checkers who appear to have materialized from thin air.

Davis noted that many of the so-called third-party fact-checkers are based overseas and are run by college kids who have the power to shut down information under the pretense of trying to stop the spread of false information.

As a consequence, the so-called fact-checking campaigns and censoring serve as nothing more than an attempt to suppress narratives that are inconvenient to Big Tech.

So its actually a really kind of an Orwellian system and its based on the conceit that these big tech social media publishers are not publishers, because under the law, they have to pretend to be neutral third-party platforms, the way the courts have interpreted it, that gives them all kinds of get out of jail free cards, Davis said.

And so what they do is, instead of censoring on their own, and taking it upon themselves, theyll hire outside third-party fact-checkers, and theyll say: hey, youre independent. And were just going to have you fact-check these articles that are going viral.

And if you decide that theyre false, under the terms and guidelines we give you, then what were going to do is were going make sure people dont see those articles anymore. So its a way of outsourcing censorship, and pretending that Big Tech is not doing the censorship themselves, when functionally, theyre the ones running the entire censorship campaign.

Davis also said there are a number of news organizations that do fact-checking, which can have disastrous effects by allowing them to effectively de-platform and censor their competitors.

So you can have a news organization that doesnt like one of its competitors can go and write a fact check claiming its competitors articles are false, even if theyre not. And the result will be that that competitors articles are either removed from the site not allowed to be posted, or when people post them they dont actually show up in news feeds.

Another type of organization that they use are these companies with no vintage whatsoever. They seem to have materialized from thin air. They dont have any journalists there or any real reporters. In some instances we found they are based overseas, they have college kids running them.

And youre putting in these peoples hands the power to shut down dissent, to shut down information, all under the guise of trying to stop disinformation.

Davis pointed to the Hunter Biden laptop scandal in the lead up to the 2020 election, in which explosive messages and emails were discovered on the computer regarding his various business dealings that have taken place in countries such as Ukraine and China.

A cybersecurity expert authenticated one email that indicated Vadym Pozharskyi, a top executive from the Ukrainian gas firm Burisma, met with Joe Biden while in Washington in 2015. Joe Biden was vice president at the time and Hunter Biden served on the board of Burisma.

Davis said, And so this person who owns the shop had this laptop for who knows how long and had the receipt which had Hunter Bidens signature saying, these are all the terms that I agree to, and the media ended up getting a hold of that, specifically the New York Post, and what did Big Tech do?

They came in at the urging of a lot of left-wing politicians and said: No, thats disinformation, were not gonna let you post that. So you had legitimate journalism, where you could see all of the receipts, it was clear the exact chain of custody for this information, you had that being shut down about the presidents son and about his ties to foreign governments in the middle of an election.

Davis added that the situation is really scary and that we are seeing the government outsourcing its censorship, which he called an abridgement of free speech to these big monopolistic tech oligarchs.

Its a really, really scary time because when you see the melding of government and corporate power used to shut down citizens, nothing good happens once that once you get started down that road, Davis said.

The former economic policy adviser to Gov. Rick Perry added that Section 230 protections that shield internet platforms from liability serve as a get out of jail free card for big tech companies and work in contradiction to the First Amendment allowing for freedom of speech and freedom of press.

David continued, And thats the whole point of this totalitarian agenda is you want to eliminate anything, reality or not, that is an obstacle to you getting complete control over people, and thats whats happening with Big Tech and their censorship. The way they control search results, the way they fact check deep platform people, theyre trying to make it impossible to support or say anything thats contrary to whatever the ruling classes particular agenda and narrative is at that time.
Voters wait in line to cast their ballots on the final day of early voting for the 2020 presidential election in a file photo. (Mario Tama/Getty Images)

Senate Democrats Introduce Bill to Eliminate Voting Lines Longer Than 30 Minutes

Two Senate Democrats introduced a measure that would seek to ensure that voters dont have to wait more than 30 minutes at polling locations.

The proposed People Over Long Lines Act, or POLL, introduced by Sens. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), would mandate the Election Assistance Commission to conduct audits to see how long voters have to wait in line to cast their ballot. Some $500 million would be included to help states deal with long lines, according to the senators.

No one should be shut out of the democratic process just because they cant spend hours waiting in lines to cast a ballot, Wyden said in a statement on Thursday. Making voting accessible and convenient shouldnt be a partisan issue. I have never heard Oregonians, Democrats or Republicans, tell me they long for the days where voting took longer. Its time to pass the POLL Act and put an end to unreasonable lines in every state.

The two Democrats noted that there were reports of hours-long lines in Mississippi, Georgia, and several other states during the 2020 election. They also pointed to studies that revealed about 3 million voters waited more than 30 minutes before voting during the 2018 midterm elections.

And citing another study, the two said that more than 500,000 Americans couldnt vote because of the long wait times.

Merkley, in a news release, went a step further and alleged that lines are a long-standing tool used to prevent citizens from voting in a bid to manipulate elections.

Like nearly every voter suppression strategy in American history, he added, its directed six times as often at people of color.

Merkley did not provide specific evidence for those claims, and The Epoch Times has reached out to the senators office for comment.

Nobody should have to spend hours out in the weather, when they might need to get to work or pick up their kids, to exercise their constitutional rights, he said. If we believe in the freedom to vote and democracy, lets make sure staffing and equipment are distributed equitably so nobody has to wait more than 30 minutes to vote.

The bill would also create the ability for voters to claim $50 if they wait for longer than 30 minutes. An additional $50 will be provided for the voter for every hour they have to wait after that, according to the text of the bill.

It comes as Democrats and Republicans in the Senate grapple over the sweeping Democrat-backed For the People Act, which was passed in the House in March along mostly partisan lines. Senate Republicans and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) have opposed the bill, which is all but unlikely to pass barring the elimination of the filibuster.
Sen. Marsha Blackburn (L) (R-Tenn.) speaks before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, on Oct. 13, 2020. (Samuel Corum/POOL/AFP via Getty Images); Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) speaks to members of the media at Hart Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill in Washington on June 23, 2020. (Alex Wong/Getty Images)

Senators Introduce Bill To Protect US Colleges From CCP Influence

A group of Republican senators on Thursday introduced new legislation that would require U.S. colleges to disclose their financial ties with the Chinese regime, and counter the Chinese Communist Partys (CCP) economic influence in higher education.

The Foreign Funding Accountability Act (pdf) was introduced by Sens. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), Bill Hagerty (R-Tenn.), Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), and Tim Scott (R-S.C.), to combat malign foreign influence in American colleges and universities, by amending disclosure requirements of foreign gifts and contracts under the 1965 Higher Education Act.

The Chinese Communist Party has made consistent attempts to infiltrate American colleges and universities, Cotton said in a statement, unveiling the measure. Our bill will close donation loopholes, barring the CCP and other foreign agents from donating millions, or even billions, to levy influence and steal American intellectual property.

Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) speaks during a hearing to examine United States Special Operations Command and United States Cyber Command in review of the Defense Authorization Request for fiscal year 2022 and the Future Years Defense Program, on Capitol Hill in Washington on March 25, 2021. (Andrew Harnik-Pool/Getty Images)

Starting in 2019, the Education Department under then-Secretary Betsy DeVos heightened scrutiny on the enforcement of Section 117 of the Higher Education Act, which requires colleges to report all gifts and contracts involving foreign sources valued at $250,000 or more. Those efforts led to an October 2020 reporting of approximately $6.5 billion in previously undisclosed foreign money, including from China and Russia, as well as compliance investigations into 19 of the nations top universities.

Specifically, the legislation would require American universities and colleges to disclose the full names of foreign donating entities, and to state the reason why foreign gift transactions were made.

It would also close the loopholes that allow gifting by registered foreign agents and exempt in-kind gifts from counting toward the disclosure minimum. If signed into law, the minimum reporting threshold for disclosure in terms would be lowered from $250,000 to $25,000.

Institutions that violate the bill requirements would have a graduated civil penalty structure levied against them. A first violation could see the institution pay up to $250,000, and if it commits a second violation, a civil penalty of $750,000 may be imposed. Three or more violations could result in the violator being fined up to $1,000,000, the legislation states.

As a strategic adversary seeking to overtake the United States, the Chinese Communist Party is going to extraordinary lengths to exert malign influence over Americas free and open society, including our higher education system, said Hagerty of the bill.

Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-Tenn.) speaks to NTDs Cindy Drukier at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Orland, Fla., on Feb. 27, 2021. (Screenshot/NTD)

Hagerty said that by increasing transparency, closing loopholes, and imposing new civil penalties in U.S. law, the bill would prevent the CCP and its intermediaries from hiding in the shadows to buy control and influence within our higher education, to manipulate what American students are taught about China, and to steal intellectual property from our nations researchers.

Attempts by the Chinese Communist Party and other bad actors to infiltrate the American education system is a blatant example of foreign competitors trying to maintain and expand their global power to our detriment, added Scott. By holding institutions of higher education accountable for foreign donations we are taking necessary steps to promote transparency, protect our intellectual property, and ensure our countrys future leaders get a quality education.

It comes as Congress considers the CONFUCIUS Act, which aims to reduce the influence Beijing could have on American college campuses that host CCP-sponsored Confucius Institutes (CI). The bill passed the Senate earlier this month with unanimous approval.

Billed as language and culture centers, Beijing-funded CIs have drawn intense scrutiny over their role in spreading Chinese propaganda and stifling academic expression across college campuses around the world. Theyre funded and largely staffed by Hanban, a nonprofit that claims to be non-governmental but is directly controlled by the CCP, according to a report by the Senate Homeland Security committees investigations subcommittee (pdf).

Once over 100 at its peak, the number of CIs in the United States has fallen to just about 50 as of May 2021, largely due to pressure from the Trump administration in the past two years.

Communist China has infiltrated American colleges and universities, Blackburn said in a statement. It is imperative we cut off Beijings access to funnel money in exchange for influence in higher education. Our childrens education should not be available for purchase by the CCP.

GQ Pan contributed to this report.
Sidney Powell speaking during a press conference at the Republican National Committee headquarters in Washington on Nov. 19, 2020. (Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images)

Sidney Powell Summoned to Michigan Court for Sanctions Hearing: Judge

Attorney Sidney Powell and other lawyers who filed lawsuits to support former President Donald Trumps claims about the 2020 election were summoned by a judge to a sanctions hearing in Michigan.

U.S. District Judge Linda Parker ordered Powellwho filed a series of third-party lawsuits in Michigan and other statesand the other lawyers to appear at a July 6 hearing, according to court documents (pdf) filed on Thursday.

Each attorney whose name appears on any of Plaintiffs pleadings or briefs shall be present at the motion hearing set for July 6, 2021 at 2 p.m. ET in Detroit, the single-line order from Parker read. It concerned a lawsuit, King v. Whitmer, which was filed last year and alleged President Joe Bidens victory was the result of fraud and asked electors in Michigan to discard the certification of the states results.

The Epoch Times has contacted Powell for comment. She hasnt made any comments about the development on her Telegram page.

Last year, Parker sided with Michigan state officials and wrote an opinion that the relief being sought in King v. Whitmer, referring to Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, would disenfranchise the votes of the more than 5.5 million Michigan citizens.

The other lawyers who were summoned to appear in court are Greg Rohl, Scott Hagerstrom, and Stefanie Junttila, as reported by the Detroit Free Press.

Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel, a Democrat, asked the court in January to sanction Powell and alleged she, Rohl, Hagerstrom, and Junttila pursued a frivolous lawsuit in violation of their oaths as attorneys. The City of Detroit in December 2020 also had asked the court (pdf) to sanction Powell.

In response to a separate defamation lawsuit, lawyers for Powella former federal prosecutor who successfully defended retired Lt. Gen Michael Flynnargued (pdf) that her remarks about the Nov. 3 election are protected under the Constitution. Powells comments to media outlets about the election were of public concern and are, therefore, not defamatory, her lawyers said.

There can be no doubt that the statements at issue here relate to matters of public concern, Powells lawyers said.

The comments, the lawyers added, involve the 2020 presidential election and specifically address the reliability of the voting machines and processes used to determine the results of that election, according to the documents. The complaint itself contains scores of references to tweets from President Donald Trump, statements by public officials, the content of related litigation, and national press coverage of the issues.
Smith and Wesson handguns are displayed during the NRA Annual Meeting & Exhibits at the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center in Dallas, Texas, on May 5, 2018. (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

Smith & Wesson CEO Says Ammo Shortage Wont End Soon: Still a Lot of Interest

The CEO of one of the largest U.S. gun manufacturers, Smith & Wesson, said that the current ammunition shortage is showing no signs of improving amid reports of Americans continuing to purchase record amounts of firearms.

Over the past year or so, according to FBI data, gun sales in the United States have skyrocketed amid uncertainty surrounding COVID-19, Black Lives Matter demonstrations and violence, and Democrat officials proposals for more state and federal gun-control measures.

Its widely known the ammunition shortages continue, said Smith & Wesson CEO Mark Smith in a Fox Business interview on Thursday. There is still a lot of interest in firearms.

He noted that Smith & Wesson shipped nearly 2.5 million units last year, up 70 percent from the previous year.

A firearms market research firm, in a report released late last month, found that about 80 percent of American customers said they experienced issues trying to find ammunition in 2020.

Southwick Associates said it surveyed more than 1,800 ammunition consumers as part of its quarterly HunterSurvey/ShooterSurvey tracking study, according to a news release dated May 26. In 2020, four out of five consumers encountered out-of-stock issues while trying to purchase ammunition, while three-quarters encountered out-of-stock situations so far in 2021.

It noted, Of these respondents, 79 percent reported either fully or partially reducing their target shooting and hunting outings as a result of depleted ammunition shelves.

Rob Southwick, the president of the industry group, predicted that at some point, the demand for ammunition will decrease.

However, frenzied purchasing and empty shelves often fuels further increases in demand, he added. We do not see demand softening in the near future.

In early May, meanwhile, FBI background check data revealed that the number of firearms purchased in April 2020 surpassed any previous April on record. More than 3.5 million background checks were done during the month, the data showed.

President Joe Bidens administration has placed emphasis on new gun-control measures, coming in the wake of several high-profile mass shootings. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) earlier this month proposed new rules that would deem illegal most firearms that have a stabilizing pistol brace, a move that pro-Second Amendment groups have called unconstitutional and cumbersome.

Democrats in Congress are keen to take action, too. Two bills proposing enhanced background checks passed the Democrat-controlled House several months ago, although those bills are sure to stall in the 50-50 Senate barring the elimination of the 60-vote filibuster.

Senate Democrats this year introduced a ban on more than 200 assault weapons as well as banning magazines that hold more than 10 rounds.
A group of illegal aliens walk up the road after crossing the Rio Grande from Mexico. Further up the road, they will board a bus bound for the Border Patrol processing facility in McAllen, Texas, on April 18, 2019. (Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times)

Tennessee Child Services Investigating Report of Abuse at DHS Facility Housing Unaccompanied Minors

Federal and Tennessee authorities are investigating a report of child abuse at a facility in Chattanooga used to house unaccompanied minors who were picked up by Border Patrol agents along the U.S.-Mexico border, according to the head of the states Department of Childrens Services (DCS).

While providing scant details, Jennifer Nichols, the head of the agency, told Tennessee lawmakers during a hearing on Wednesday that a teenage boy at the facility told the Department of Childrens Services about the alleged abuse. The teen boy, who wasnt identified, said he wasnt the victim but had witnessed abuse, Nichols said during a hearing with the Government Operations Joint Subcommittee on Education, Health, and General Welfare.

Now, the FBI, Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and state officials are investigating the matter, she added. Nichols didnt disclose the nature of the allegations made by the teen.

Six children being housed in the facility, she said, were selected at random during a surprise inspection during the week of May 31. And one of these children disclosed that he had witnessed an act that in our policy would substantiate and require an investigation into that act take place, the commissioner said.

Local law enforcement was notified and referrals were made to a DCS hotline following the incident, she said.

Since the day after that unannounced site visit, Nichols told the lawmakers, theres been an ongoing investigation involving local law enforcement, FBI was notified, the Office of Inspector General for ORRthey call that the Office of Refugee Resettlementand the federal Homeland Security have all been notified and are working in collaboration with local law enforcement and our department to investigate what this youth disclosed.

As of Tuesday, 41 unaccompanied minors are being housed inside the Chattanooga facility, she said. Its being operated by the nonprofit Baptiste Group, which was licensed by DCS to help provide a temporary shelter for the children and has to contract with the federal Office of Refugee Resettlement, which is overseen by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).

Republican lawmakers in Tennessee have voiced criticism over why such a facility is being operated in Chattanooga, located thousands of miles away from the U.S.-Mexico border. Sens. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) and Bill Hagerty (R-Tenn.) in late May sent a letter to DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas and HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra about an alleged lack of transparency about the conditions of the HHS-operated facilities for unaccompanied minors in their state.

Both senators have used the border crisis to skewer President Joe Biden after he issued dozens of orders rescinding ones handed down by former President Donald Trump. Biden, Mayorkas, and Becerra have defended the administrations immigration policies, terming Trumps orders as inhumane and ineffective.

During the Tennessee House hearing on Wednesday, one state representative openly questioned whether there were more cases of abuse at the Chattanooga facility.

Based on everything you said, this facility did not report this abuse until it was disclosed to you  it never happened until you took the time to sit down with this individual and ask them questions that was disclosed to you, Rep. John Ragan, a Republican, asked Nichols. How do we know that there are not 40 to 50 kids over there who have abused? he asked.

Were not talking about refugees who are coming from war-torn Somalia or North Africa where people are being persecuted for just being [of] a certain religion, he added. These are people coming across the border, illegally, into our country that are being deemed refugeeswhich is not even close to being who they arebeing sent to our communities here in Chattanooga, which is two and a half hours down the road to being dropped off to other places of Tennessee where we dont know where theyre going.

The Epoch Times has contacted DHS and Tennessees DCS for comment.
Texas Prison Forced to Empty Ahead of Surge of Illegal Immigrant Arrests

Texas officials will start transferring inmates from a South Texas prison to make room for illegal immigrants who were arrested by state law enforcement officials amid efforts from Gov. Greg Abbott to curb the surge of individuals crossing the U.S.-Mexico border illegally.

A spokesperson for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) confirmed the decision on Thursday, saying officials will move inmates from the Dolph Briscoe Unit prison in Dilley, which is located in South Texas, to other prisons starting June 16.

The state of Texas continues to deal with a record-high influx of individuals illegally crossing the border, spokesman Jeremy Desel said in a statement to The Epoch Times. To address the ongoing crisis, Governor Abbott is directing state resources to arrest and confine those individuals crossing the border unlawfully and who have committed a state or federal crime.

Desel added that top Texas officials assured the Department of Criminal Justice that Dolph Briscoe Unit prison would only hold the arrested illegals on a temporary basis and that the money will be reappropriated without a negative impact on TDCJ.

The Dolph Briscoe Unit will be transformed to serve as a central holding facility for detainees who have been arrested and charged for state offenses, Desel added. While in the custody of TDCJ, the agency, in conjunction with the Windham School District and the University of Texas Medical Branch, will provide appropriate services to the population, the spokesman said.

The move comes after more than 180,000 illegal immigrants attempted to cross the border in May alonethe highest number reported in decadesaccording to data provided by Customs and Border Protection. Republicans, including Abbott, have raised alarm over the immigration surge, pointing to the Biden administration as the cause, in particular its reversal of key Trump-era border policies.

Earlier this week, Abbott announced his administration would attempt to construct a state- and private donor-funded border wall along Texass border with Mexico. Along with Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey, Abbott also called on other states to send extra law enforcement officials to help a struggling Border Patrol arrest illegal immigrants who cross into the United States. Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is the first to have sent state law enforcement to the border.

Construction of the border wall was a signature campaign promise of President Donald Trump during his 2016 presidential bid, but President Joe Biden issued dozens of executive orders to rescind Trumps immigration orders, including the border wall construction. Biden has said that the wall is wasteful spending and directed some of the funds to be returned to the Department of Defense for other projects.

Bidens policies have spurred hundreds of thousands of peoplemostly from Central America and Mexicoto rush to the southern border, drawing criticism even from Democrats who represent areas along the border.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, responding to GOP-led criticism of his handling of the border, told a House panel on June 17 that we have a strategy, we execute our strategy  I have confidence in our strategy.
An apartment complex in downtown Los Angeles at Eighth street and Grand avenue in Los Angeles, Calif., on Aug. 6, 2020. (Kent Nishimura/Los Angeles Times/TNS)

The Falling Rents of COVID Times Are Behind Us. Expect Prices to Rise

By Andrew Khouri

From Los Angeles Times

The era of pandemic rent declines appears to be over.

After falling through much of the COVID-19 crisis as people relocated to suburbs or moved in with relatives, rents in big cities including Los Angeles, San Francisco and New York are now on the rise. And experts say that prices are likely to keep swinging upward.

Landlords are really eager to charge more rather than charge less, said Rob Warnock, research associate with rental website Apartment List, whose data show the median rent in Los Angeles is up 3.6 percent from the bottom. He said he expects the rise to continue, taking until the end of summer for prices in the city to hit February 2020or pre-pandemiclevels.

In Los Angeles, the median rent for a vacant apartment hit a low of $1,717 in January and has risen ever since, according to data from Apartment List. Other data sources also show a steady increase since the beginning of the year, which analysts attributed to job growth and returning demand for city life as the pandemic ebbs and the economy reopens.

Rents fell last year as people moved out of apartments in big cities, because they wanted more space and bought a house or because they lost their jobs and decided to move in with family. At the same time, the typical inflow of people coming for new jobs and college fell. Landlords said they were forced to cut rents to fill an increasing number of vacant apartments.

In Los Angeles County, rents fell most on the high end of the market but declined somewhat on the lower end, in typically older, more run-down buildings, according to several data sources.

How Much and How Fast?

As of Monday, the apartment vacancy rate in Los Angeles County had declined to 5.8 percent after hitting a high of 6.2 percent in November, according to real estate data provider CoStar.

Chuck Eberly, who manages roughly 3,000 apartments in the L.A. area, sees the fresh demand firsthand. He said that vacancies are dropping throughout Eberly Co.s portfolio and that rents are up 5 percent to 10 percent from the pandemic bottom.

We are getting a lot of lookers at our properties, he said. I think a lot of it is more security as to where they think the economy is going and where they think the pandemic is going.

Rising rents, however, dont mean the market has returned to its uber-competitive days before 2020.

Warnock said rents are rising faster than normal at the moment, but part of the increase probably is due to typical seasonal upswings during the spring and summer.

Eberly said the rents on the companys properties are still about 15 percent to 20 percent lower than before the pandemic, and prospective tenants are negotiating by pointing to competitors with cheaper listings.

Overall, vacancies in Los Angeles County are still up nearly a full percentage point from early March 2020. The median L.A. County rent was $1,776 a month in May, 2.7 percent below the February 2020 level, according to Apartment List.

The median in the city of L.A. was $1,779 in May, 5 percent below the February 2020 rate.

A rebounding economy probably will continue to drive those increases, analysts said, as California marks what officials have described as a full reopening Tuesday, with most pandemic business restrictions coming to an end.

Greg Willett, chief economist at real estate firm RealPage, said theres broad agreement that rents will rise going forward, but theres a debate over how quickly.

There are some folks who think that happens pretty much overnight as everyone is vaccinated and in theory starts to go back into the office, he said. We are more of a slow grind outlook.

For Now, Where Are Rents Getting Pricier?

There are differences depending on where you look, and on the type of home.

Ryan Patap, director of market analytics at CoStar, said rent growth has been stronger in suburban places such as the Antelope Valley, because people during the pandemic increasingly sought out more space at an affordable price.

He said he expects such migration patterns to continue for at least the near termone reason hes not predicting massive rent increases in more urban areas of L.A. County.

At the same time, rents in many lower-quality apartments appear to be higher than pre-pandemic levels, while prices remain lower in some of the areas luxury buildings.

According to CoStar, the average rent per square foot for the fanciest buildings in L.A. County is 1.2 percent below what it was at the start of March 2020, while it is 1.1 percent higher in the lowest-quality apartments.

Its not true across the board. In some L.A. neighborhoods, the average rent for the oldest, most run-down buildings is below what it was on March 1, 2020. In Koreatown its down 0.7 percent, and in Hollywood its down 1.3 percent from that date.

The various apartment data cover the estimate for vacant apartments and are not an estimate for increases that existing tenants pay.

What About COVID-19 Tenant Protections?

In the city of Los Angeles, pandemic-era rules still bar landlords from raising rents on current tenants if those tenants live in buildings covered by the citys rent stabilization ordinancegenerally properties built on or before Oct. 1, 1978.

Statewide, tenants also have protections from eviction if they cant pay rent because of a pandemic-related hardship.

In L.A., tenants have those protections until the city lifts its state of emergency. But the statewide protections are set to expire July 1, leading to concerns that there could be mass evictions and rising homelessness if they arent extended.

Many landlords say that if protections expire, they will work with their tenants on repayment plans rather than immediately start an expensive eviction that would create a vacancy.

Larry Gross, executive director of the tenant rights group Coalition for Economic Survival, said rising rents may mean property owners will be less likely to work with tenants to avoid evictions, particularly those living in rent-controlled units paying way below market rates.

2021 Los Angeles Times. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
You can serve this cookie like a cake, sliced into wedges. (Elle Simone)

This Homemade Fathers Day Gift Is Delightfully Delicious

Generations of kids and grown-ups have baked and eaten chocolate chip cookies.

We have just one person to thank for the chocolate chip cookies we know and love: Ruth Wakefield. In the 1930s, Ruth and her husband ran a restaurant in Whitman, Massachusetts, called the Toll House. Ruth invented a recipe for Toll House Chocolate Crunch Cookies to serve with ice cream for dessert at the restaurant. Her original recipe contained both nuts and chocolate chips.

In 1939, Ruth gave the Nestle company the right to use her cookie recipe and the Toll House restaurants nameand an American legend was born. If youve ever seen a package of Nestle Toll House chocolate chips, youll find Ruths now-famous recipe on the back.

Even today, her cookies are a perfect pairing for a scoop of ice cream!

Giant Chocolate Chip Cookie

Serves 12

Vegetable oil spray

1 cup (5 ounces) all-purpose flour

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

8 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted

1/2 cup packed (3 1/2 ounces) dark brown sugar

1/4 cup (1 3/4 ounces) sugar

1 large egg

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/2 cup (3 ounces) chocolate chips

Adjust the oven rack to the upper-middle position and heat the oven to 375 degrees F. Spray the inside bottom and sides of a 9-inch springform pan with vegetable oil spray.

In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, and salt. In a large bowl, whisk melted butter, brown sugar, and sugar until well combined. Add egg and vanilla and whisk until smooth.

Add flour mixture to butter mixture and use a rubber spatula to stir until just combined and no dry flour is visible, about 1 minute. Add chocolate chips and stir until evenly distributed.

Use a rubber spatula to scrape cookie dough into a greased springform pan and spread the dough into an even layer covering bottom of pan. Bake until the cookie is golden brown, and the edges are set, 18 to 22 minutes.

Transfer the springform pan to a cooling rack and let the cookie cool in the pan for 30 minutes. Run a butter knife around the inside edge of the springform pan to loosen the edges of the cookie from the pan. Unlock and remove the side of the pan. Use an icing spatula or a wide metal spatula to loosen the bottom of the cookie from the pan and transfer the cookie to a cutting board. Cut the cookie into wedges and serve warm.

Recipe Notes

If you dont have a springform pan, you can use a 9-inch round cake pan instead, but youll have to flip the cookie out of the pan just like you would a cake.

You can serve this cookie like a cake: slice it into wedges and top with whipped cream or ice cream.

For 25 years, confident cooks in the know have relied on Americas Test Kitchen for rigorously tested recipes developed by professional test cooks and vetted by 60,000 at-home recipe testers. See more online at AmericasTestKitchen.com/TCA. Copyright 2021 Americas Test Kitchen. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
Through the Silence: The Special Eye of a Photographer Without Hearing

IRVINE, Calif.Walking through the empty COVID-19 vaccination site at the Orange County Great Park, freelance photojournalist John Uy stopped and adjusted the lens on his DSLR camera.

Looking around, most people would see a lifeless parking lot dotted with orange cones and tables. But the 28-year-old American-Filipino, who is deaf, focused only on the opportunity to tell a storyone picture at a time.

Uy has turned his lack of hearing into an advantage by focusing on capturing moments in time.

The moment you click the photo, there is no way to dial the time back, Uy told The Epoch Times. That nanosecond ago as you are reading now is already the past. We are all constantly slipping into the blur of the present and the future.

Uys journey led him to the United States from the Philippinesand to the top of his fieldthrough perseverance and determination. Rather than allow it to hold him back, Uy made his condition part of his strength.

By overcoming the odds, and with the encouragement of his instructors, Uy has risen to the top of the photojournalism field.

The Device That Changed His Life

Uy was born without the ability to hear.

My mom found out a few months after I was born, when she noticed I wasnt responding to her callexcept when she was in my view, he said.

As a youth, he shuttled back and forth between the Philippines and the United States, but neither the cultural divide nor his deafness hindered him from making new friends and experiencing different customs.

Uy learned to multitaskadjusting to hearing aids, reading lips, and focusing on facial movements. Those skills allowed him to become a keen observer of the people around him, a core ingredient to good photography.

At the age of 13, Uy received a cochlear implant. The device provides him with a modified sense of hearing.

Uy noted that when he first received the device in 2006, it changed his lifeand his work. He said that the device allowed him to hear certain sounds for the first time. Previously, he couldnt differentiate some sounds with hearing aids alone, such as s and sh.

Its hard to describe the sound I am hearing, because I never experienced what real sound is supposed to be like. It is like asking the blind to describe the color they never saw, he said.

He compared the change to immediately upgrading from standard definition to high definition.

Photographer John Uy walks through a parking lot at the COVID vaccination site in Irvine, Calif., on May 7, 2021. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

Photographer John Uy angles for the best shot in Irvine, Calif., on May 7, 2021. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

The Importance of Education

Uy said an American education provided him with an opportunity to be inspired by other deaf individuals who have made significant impacts in modern historyincluding Mrs. Leingang, his fifth-grade teacher and first deaf instructor.

[She] taught us the history of famous deaf people, he said. After that, I went out for a recess period, where it then struck methe meaning of the word deaf, as in the person who cannot hear. I laughed at myself upon that realization, because for the whole time, I never saw the difference between my deaf and hearing friends.

Uy discovered a passion for the arts in the early 2000s. He said his interest in photography and video production grew slowly, and he slowly transitioned from drawing to documenting memories after receiving cameras from his parents to capture his travels.

His first memorable photo came about accidentally, he said.

My papa gave me an Olympus camera in Hong Kong, where I took my first shot of young strangers in love under the streetlamp at night, Uy recalled.

They were across from a McDonalds where I was sitting. It was unintentional on my part, as I was testing the camera. As I deleted it, I was charmed by how raw and humanizing it looked.

At the time, photography remained a hobby and he didnt pursue it professionally, Uy said. But then, when he was a sophomore in high school, an art teacher, Mr. Boyd, approached him in front of the school building while he was waiting for his parents to pick him up.

I was fidgeting with my camera just to pass the time. He approached me to remark that I was always seen photographing some activities and events in school, Uy said. He asked if I would be interested in joining his journalism yearbook class.

Instructors throughout his life would continue to push him in that direction.

While completing his studies at Biola University in La Mirada, he said the professors from the schools Visual Media program were a big part of the reason that he decided to use cameras to document life. He mentioned one particular foundation of journalism class taught by Michael Longinow.

I remember in one of his lectures, he mentioned how it is important for journalists to be the voice for the voiceless  bringing out the light in the darkness and exposing the truth within, he said. Somehow, that statement stirred within me, and solidified my passion for photojournalism.

The university would continue to guide him toward a professional career in photojournalism. He credits two other professors, Tamara Welter and Mike Kitata, with helping cement his passion to seek the truth in his future work and share stories with his cameras.

Overcoming Stigmas

Upon graduation, Uy encountered the challenges of finding steady photojournalism work, just as newsrooms across the world were transforming into smaller teams.

Being a deaf photographer exacerbated the challenging search for work in both the United States and the Philippines, he said.

Getting a job as a deaf photojournalist is difficult, especially in the U.S. I was turned away at every interview after learning that I was deaf, Uy said.

Most answers I heard were, Im sorry, we cant accommodate you, as we dont have the facility for that, or I dont think youll fit in our workplace, but I hope youll find someone who can take you.

He hoped potential employers would look beyond his disability and see what he could do as a photojournalistbut Uy noticed that his subjects reacted differently once they discovered his hearing challenges.

Uy learned to read lips at an early age and is a keen observerskills he uses to overcome any barriers in his work. He values making people feel as comfortable as possible, engaging in conversations while pursuing facts.

I tend to work with other writers who can ask questions while I do my photos or videos at the same time. [But] I keep the conversation flowing and make the subjects feel comfortable because of my hearing difficulty, he said. I dont feel stiff. I just converse normally, as you would do with a friend.

Our Same Humanity

Stereotypes of the deaf community abound in the mass media, Uy acknowledged. One of his goals is to use photography to document the deaf community with the correct perspective.

Deaf communities have their own culture and language that is very different from the hearing community, he said.

In line with my belief in God, photography will help show that beyond our differences, we share our same humanity. We celebrate and we grieve. We dream and we fight. We breathe and we move. We are deaf to their sound as much as they are deaf to our silence.

Photography reveals all the rawness and true self of our souls. Deaf, blind, mute, autism, and all other forms of disability are in the same body of humanity with the abled.

Uys constant travels back and forth to Asia have given him the opportunity to experience major contrasts in cultures and gain international work experience.

In 2016, he put his videography skills to work as an intern cameraman for CNN Philippines, as part of the award-winning Profiles team. Since then, he has contributed his unique vision to publications in both the United States and the Philippines.

His experience provides him a unique view of the world.

I tend to shoot in different perspectives, like from a low angle to overhead. I also generally take candid photos more than posed shots, he said.

Between 2018 and 2020, Uy worked for the European Chamber of CommerceSouthern Mindanao Business Council. Covering the groups meetings and gathering on-the-ground photo content for their documentation led him to the opportunity to work as a photographer for the Filipino government.

He turned it down.

Though grateful for the offer, Uys determination to remain nonpartisan in his journalism led him to ultimately decline the position. He wanted to concentrate on people instead.

I want to capture the raw soul of their humanity as it is: every tear of their joy and sadness, every embrace of love and grief, every form of celebration and rage. Thats what makes them truly human in the eyes of man and God, he said.

Theres no surefire path to becoming a photojournalist, Uy said, especially without an alert sense of hearing. He prefers to define his own journey with an old Filipino saying, Bahala na.

Its a Filipino saying which is the equivalent of Whatever will be, will be, he said.

Whatever truth I may find in the darkest corner of our society, I pray it may inspire people to come out and make meaningful change for the good of their community.

Thats why I love taking pictures and being the witness in this present moment of history. And to be the voice for the voiceless, as well as capturing the untold extraordinary stories of ordinary people.

Follow Uy on his photojournalism journey on Instagram at @johnuyphotography.
US Condemns Hong Kong Government for Politically Motivated Arrests of Apple Daily Executives

The U.S. State Department on Thursday strongly condemned the pro-Beijing Hong Kong government for using the draconian national security law as a political tool to target pro-democracy tabloid Apple Daily.

On June 17, some 500 Hong Kong police officers raided Apple Dailys headquarters and arrested five directors of the newspaper including its editor-in-chief. The police accused them of collusion with a foreign country or with external elements to endanger national security because the paper had published more than 30 articles since 2019 calling for foreign countries to impose sanctions on China and Hong Kong. The paper is one of the only remaining outlets still publishing voices critical of Beijing and the ruling Chinese Communist Party and views supportive of Hong Kong protesters.

State Department spokesperson Ned Price in a telephone briefing on Thursday said the collusion charges appear to be entirely politically motivated. He added that the five directors should be immediate release.

We are deeply concerned by Hong Kong authorities selective use of the national security law to arbitrarily target independent media organizations, Price said.

He said the State Department found it deplorable that Hong Kong police would cite those articles as evidence, since exchanging views with foreigners in journalism should never be a crime.

We call on authorities to stop targeting the independent and free media. Efforts to stifle media freedom and to restrict the free flow of information not only undermine Hong Kongs democratic institutions but they also hurt Hong Kongs credibility and viability as an international hub, Price said.

At around 3:30 p.m. local time on Friday, the Hong Kong government announced that the citys national security department has officially charged two of the five directors for collusion offenses. They will be brought to a local court in the morning on June 19. The remaining three continue to be held for further investigation.

Hong Kongs press freedom has plummeted in recent years, in particular after the national security law went into effect in July 2020. According to the press freedom index compiled by the Hong Kong Journalists Association (HKJA), the index for journalists hit a record low of 32.1 last yeardown from 40.9 in 2018.

The reason for the decline was that journalists are more cautious than ever when they criticize the HKSAR Government and the Central Government [Chinese regime], and managements have put more pressure on them.

The Thursday raid was the second police raid at the papers headquarters after July 2020. A month later, 200 Hong Kong police officers stormed the newsroom. The papers founder, Jimmy Lai, is currently in prison for his role in pro-democracy, anti-Beijing protests in 2019. Lai also awaits trial in a separate national security trial.

A man buys multiple copies of the latest Apple Daily newspaper in Hong Kong on June 18, 2021. (Anthony Kwan/Getty Images)

On Friday, many Hongkongers rushed to local newsstands to buy a copy of the paper to show their support for the journalists, with some buying multiple copies. According to Apple Daily, an unnamed local bought 300 copies of the Friday paper at a newsstand in the district of Mong Kok and elsewhere so that he could distribute them at his restaurant.

A woman surnamed Lau told Apple Daily that said she would continue buying the paper even if it only printed the words Apple Daily while the rest was blank. Another woman surnamed Chow criticized local police, saying that she felt the police could do whatever they wanted.

Chow added that there was nothing she could do except to spend HK$10 ($1.29) to buy a copy of the newspaper.

Apple Daily increased its press run on Friday to 500,000 copies, an increase from the 80,000 printed on Thursday.

The United States is not the only country to voice its criticism against the raid and arrests. Australia, Canada, the European Union, the United Kingdom, and Taiwan have all spoken about their concerns.

Australia is concerned at the arrest of journalists from Apple Daily, and the impact this will have on freedom of expression in Hong Kong, as provided in the Basic Law underpinned by the Sino-British Joint Declaration, stated Australias Department of Foreign Affairs on Twitter.

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the United Kingdom signed the Sino-British Joint Declaration in 1984, which paved the way for Hong Kongs handover back to China in 1997. Under the treaty, the Basic Law was drafted, which was meant to guarantee Hongkongers basic freedoms that are not granted to mainland Chinese under the regimes rule for at least 50 years under the one country, two systems model.

Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-N.Y.), chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, urged Hong Kong authorities to release the executives and to stop prosecuting journalists for doing their jobs.

The continued assault on press freedoms in Hong Kong is unacceptable and inconsistent with the rights and freedoms guaranteed under law to the people of Hong Kong, Meeks said in a statement.

Office of the Commissioner at the CCPs Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Hong Kong, in a statement issued on June 17, slammed western politicians and foreign media for commenting on the raid and the arrest of five Apple Daily directors, accusing them of interfering in Hong Kongs affairs and Chinas internal affairs.

Many rights groups around the world have also publicly expressed their concern, including the Foreign Correspondents Club in Hong Kong, Reporters Without Borders, Hong Kong Watch, Freedom House, the World Association of News Publishers, the World Editors Forum, the International Press Institute, Amnesty International, and the International Federation of Journalists.

The newsroom raid and arrest of Apple Daily staff reflect an acceleration of Hong Kong authorities systematic efforts to transform the territorys institutions into authoritarian extensions of the Chinese Communist Party, stated Michael J. Abramowitz, president of Freedom House.

He added: Treating independent, fact-based journalism as a threat to national security is an unacceptable attack on press freedom and comes amid a wider crackdown on freedom of expression and freedom of assembly in Hong Kong.
Logo of Huawei is seen in front of the local offices of Huawei in Warsaw, Poland on January 11, 2019. (Kacper Pempel/Reuters File Photo)

FCC Votes to Advance Proposed Ban on Huawei, ZTE Gear

WASHINGTONThe U.S. Federal Communications Commission voted unanimously on Thursday to advance a plan to ban approvals for equipment in U.S. telecommunications networks from Chinese companies deemed national security threats like Huawei and ZTE.

Under proposed rules that won initial approval, the FCC could also revoke prior equipment authorizations issued to Chinese companies.

A Huawei spokesperson, in an email, called the FCC revision misguided and unnecessarily punitive.

Acting FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel said the new measures would exclude untrustworthy equipment from our communications networks We have left open opportunities for (Huawei and other Chinese equipment) use in the United States through our equipment authorization process. So here we propose to close that door.

FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr said the FCC has approved more than 3,000 applications from Huawei since 2018.

The FCC action would prohibit all future authorizations for communications equipment deemed to pose an unacceptable risk to national security.

In March, the FCC designated five Chinese companies as posing a threat to national security under a 2019 law aimed at protecting U.S. communications networks.

A group of U.S. lawmakers including Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) praised the FCC action, saying it mirrors the goals of bipartisan legislation. They said the FCC voted to put national security first by keeping compromised Chinese equipment out of U.S. telecommunications networks.

ZTE musician robots play the piano at the Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona on February 25, 2019. (Lluis Gene/AFP via Getty Images)

The affected companies included the previously designated Huawei and ZTE, as well as Hytera Communications Corp, Hangzhou Hikvision Digital Technology Co., and Zhejiang Dahua Technology Co.

Huawei said blocking the purchase of equipment, based on a predictive judgment, related to country of origin or brand is without merit, discriminatory and will do nothing to protect the integrity of U.S. communications networks or supply chains.

In August 2020, the U.S. government barred federal agencies from buying goods or services from any of the five Chinese companies.

In 2019, the United States placed Huawei, Hikvision, and other firms on its economic blacklist.

Last year, the FCC designated Huawei and ZTE as national security threats to communications networksa declaration that barred U.S. firms from tapping an $8.3 billion government fund to purchase equipment from the companies.

The FCC in December finalized rules requiring carriers with ZTE or Huawei equipment to rip and replace that equipment. It proposed a reimbursement program for that effort, and U.S. lawmakers in December approved $1.9 billion to fund it.

Rosenworcel said the FCC will vote in July to finalize the rules overseeing the reimbursement fund.

By David Shepardson
WA Polices Access to COVID Tracing Data Put Under Lock and Key

The Western Australia (WA) government has worked quickly to shackle police after it was unveiled that the department had legally gained access to user location data through the states COVID-19 tracing app, Safeway.

New legislation was introduced on June 15 to ban WA police from accessing SafeWA data after it had used personal information for two separate murder investigationsdespite promises the app would only be used for contact tracing purposes.

Compulsory contact tracing was mandated following the launch of the Safeway app in November 2020 and has since garnered around 250 million total scans and close to 2 million total user registrantsequivalent to three-quarters of WAs population.

WA Premier Mark McGowan said his requests for police to halt operations were ignored after he was initially made aware of the apps unintended use earlier in the year.

I became aware in April this year that police had used the app on two occasions in criminal investigations, McGowan told Parliament (pdf).

West Australian Premier Mark McGowan addresses the media at the COVID-19 Vaccination Clinic at Claremont Showgrounds in Perth, Australia, on May 3, 2021. (Paul Kane/Getty Images)

I requested that the police no longer do that, but the Police Commissioner advised me that his officers are exercising their rights under the law and are just doing their job, he said. I accept that.

Following the launch of the app last year, McGowan said in a media release that records would only be used for the purpose of COVID-19 contact tracing, and, in a Facebook post the following day, McGowan said that data would only be accessible by authorised Department of Health contact tracing personnel.

However, SafeWAs privacy policy states that the data stored on Amazon servers could be disclosed if requested by law.

Amazon is subject to both Australian and overseas laws that may require the disclosure of your information (in limited circumstances) to government authorities here and overseas, the policy states.

WA Police Commissioner Chris Dawson defended his departments use of the data, saying that its legal usage was justified when it came to convicting perpetrators of the murder.

West Australian Police Commissioner Chris Dawson speaks to the media during a press conference in Perth, Australia, on Apr. 26, 2021. (AAP Image/Richard Wainwright)

The police have only got information twice out of 240 million transactions, and they are exceptional circumstances, and it is lawful, Dawson told 6PR.

If any person is murdered, the police have a duty to collect the best possible evidence and put that before the court, he said. I expect my officers to do everything possible to bring a murderer to justice and to bring a person who stabs another to justice.

The legal and unintended usage of the app has drawn heavy criticism including from the Digital Rights Watch who said the actions had undermined trust between the public and the police.

The public were explicitly told that contact tracing check-in data would not be used for anything other than public health contact tracing purposes, a Digital Rights Watch spokesperson told The Epoch Times.

Police access to the WA COVID-19 check in-app data is a betrayal of this public trust, the spokesperson said.

While we are glad to see moves to change the law in WA as a result, its disappointing that it took an abuse of trust and inappropriate access to peoples personal information to prompt lawmakers to consider this possibility.
A Wall St. sign at the New York Stock Exchange in New York, on March 23. (Angela Weiss/AFP via Getty Images)

Wall Streets Cozy China Connections

Commentary

If theres one area of bipartisan agreement, its that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) presents a grave threat to the free world and our way of life. So why is Wall Street still financing Beijings authoritarian ambitionswith investor money from Main Street America?

Greed.

For decades, Beijing has used Wall Streets insatiable appetite for profit to infiltrate our capital markets and fund the build-up of its economic and military power. In exchange, Wall Street receives huge fees and access to the Chinese market. This coercive quid pro quo threatens our economic and national security and harms Americas working families, savers, and retirees.

The scale of this cozy relationshipand how it was builtis staggering. CCP-controlled Chinese companies have accessed billions of U.S. investor dollars under false pretenses for years. Between 2009 and 2012, for instance, numerous Chinese companies executed reverse mergers into dormant companies listed on U.S. exchanges, and almost all of them were frauds that left American investors with heavy losses.

Then in 2013, the CCP persuaded high-level American officials to give Chinese companies a free pass from Sarbanes-Oxley rules enacted after the Enron and WorldCom frauds (pdf). More recently, the CCP pressured Wall Street to include Chinese companies in international and emerging market index funds, which allows them to completely avoid our company-specific disclosure and reporting obligations.

This special treatment creates real risks for investors. Last year, Luckin Coffeethe so-called Starbucks of Chinasaw its stock drop over 80 percent as investors learned of fabricated sales and shoddy accounting. Two years ago, Kangmei Pharmaceutical, a Chinese company included in multiple index funds, perpetrated a premeditated and malicious cheating of investors when over $4.4 billion in cash suddenly went missing. These are a few examples of the purposeful and deliberate fraud the CCP has perpetrated on the American investing public with Wall Streets help.

And if the risk of fraud werent bad enough, a number of CCP-controlled companies listed on American exchanges and included in index funds are also on the U.S. government Entity List and OFAC Sanctions List. To get on these lists, a company must be acting contrary to the national security or foreign policy interests of the United States or a threat to the national security, foreign policy, or economy of the U.S.

Despite all of that, Wall Street remains undeterred.

Since modern-day China operates as a Party-State, funds that flow to Chinese industry cant be separated from those supporting the CCP. In other words, theres no way to distinguish the funds raised in U.S. capital markets from those used by the CCP to underwrite gross human rights abuses and other activities that shock the conscience.

Wall Street cant say whether the funds it directs to the CCP are used for forced labor, the ongoing internment of Uyghurs in concentration camps, the emission of more greenhouse gases than all developed countries combined, the buildup of the Peoples Liberation Army, or the support of a cyber-army that relentlessly attacks the United States and other nations of the free world.

Yet, despite it being so outspoken on environmental and social issues here, Wall Streets virtue-signaling seems to end at the waters edge. It hasnt stopped doing business with or divested its portfolios of any security subject to communist Chinas repressive regime. So it appears that no matter what the moral cost, Wall Street will work with the CCP.

Until this changes, the CCP will persist in dumping its companies into our markets with Wall Streets help. This means the CCP will continue to use our money to fund unspeakable atrocities, the destruction of the environment, an increasingly belligerent military, and a disinformation campaign that undermines American values.

While the free flow of capital shouldnt be impeded, communist Chinas threat to humanity, the environment, investors, and our national security trump this maxim.

The Biden administration recognizes this, recently warning (pdf) that Chinas leaders seek unfair advantages, behave aggressively and coercively, and undermine the rules and values at the heart of an open and stable international system.

To counter the CCP threat, we need a whole-of-government approach that prioritizes the interests of the United States. It starts with a Buy America policy that steers American dollars away from communist China and toward American companies, so jobs can be created here.

This also means that to protect Americas mom-and-pop investors, the integrity of our markets, and every American, the CCPs access to the U.S. capital markets must end.

Earlier this month, President Joe Biden signed an executive order to start that process. The order bans 59 CCP-controlled companies from our markets, and it warns Wall Street and the CCP that any conspiracy formed to violate any prohibition in the order is prohibited.

Only a bipartisan Washington can force Wall Street to stop funding the Chinese Communist Party.

Christopher A. Iacovella is the CEO of the American Securities Association.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
Welcome to Wokespeak: Its Logic-Defying Rhetoric Is Making Heads Spin

In the midst of the nations racial upheaval last year, media outlets including the Associated Press, the New York Times and the Washington Post rushed to start capitalizing the word Black in reference to African Americans, some announcing the move as a long-overdue gesture of respect. While RealClear has not changed its style, the change elsewhere prompted newsroom soul-searching on whether to write white or White in reference to people of European descent.

Capitalizing the term made sense as a simple matter of consistency. But the argument for lower-casing white staked its own moral claims. One was that capitalizing it would legitimize white supremacy. Another was that white in lower case is an apolitical description of a skin color; it doesnt merit capitalization because whites dont represent a shared culture.

News organizations adopted inconsistent policies on the question  the AP, Times and others voted for w; the Washington Post and National Association of Black Journalists chose W. But the notion that there is no white culture drew jeers of derision from some quarters. It was virtually impossible to pretend not to see that white culture is routinely cited to refer to white supremacy and white privilege as a shorthand for the cultural biases, prejudices and values that prop up systemic racism.

Both ideasthat white culture is omnipresent and nonexistentcant be true. Or can they?

The white culture conundrum is one of many such paradoxes in todays topsy-turvy woke culture, where colorblindness once represented the ideal of being unprejudiced, but now marks the epitome of racism.

These apparent contradictions can cause confusion, frustration and moral whiplash in a swiftly changing society where many people fear that one wayward move can result in a public flogging or a pink slip. Yet as the public seeks guidance, the fractured market of ideas seems unable to provide clarity on which rules apply in which situation.

These contradictions and conundrums have hit like an avalanche, said Jason Hill, a native of Jamaica and author of the 2018 book, We Have Overcome: An Immigrants Letter to the American People.

Everyone needs to be aware because at some point they are going to be caught in these conceptual snares, said Hill, a philosophy professor at DePaul University. Most people are caught off-guard and cede their position. If you try to argue your way out, theyll ensnare you in more traps.

The paradoxes come in a variety of iterations, from moral imperatives to abstract propositions. In Ibram X. Kendis best-selling book, How to Be an Antiracist, the celebrity professor writes that cultural relativism is the essence of cultural antiracism. To be antiracist is to see all cultures in all their differences as on the same level, as equals.

Taken literally, Kendis dictum would mean that the antiracist culture he envisions is no better than the racist culture he blames for racial disparities in health, wealth, education and other measures. Yet its impossible to read Kendis work as anything but a critique of racist culture, and by extension, gun culture, rape culture and consumer culture.

This paradoxical pairing of a radical cultural critique with a radical cultural relativism is hardly unique to Kendi, but one of a growing number of widely circulating self-cancelling propositions.

Take gentrification, often invoked as an example of systemic racism because it can lead to the displacement of generations of black residents by incoming affluent whites. The famed antiracist writer Ta-Nehisi Coates has described gentrification as a crime, and others have denounced whites moving into black neighborhoods as ethnic cleansing, colonization and genocide.

Yet the reverse of gentrificationwhite flight from increasingly black neighborhoodsis also deemed a racist reflex by some, Coates among them, because it abandons once thriving schools and communities to neglect and disrepair. Hence the paradox: Condemning gentrification and white flight seems to leave no room for movement in any direction, inducing a moral paralysis.

If both advocating for integrating city neighborhoods and advocating for retreat to safer suburban neighborhoods can be painted as racistand there are many examples equivalent to this onealmost anyone could be canceled at any time, said Wilfred Reilly, author of the 2019 book Hate Crime Hoax: How the Left is Selling a Fake Race War.

It makes almost every conversation not among close friends into a booby-trapped environment, said Reilly, a political science professor at Kentucky State University, a historically black college.

Some critics of progressive politics describe these paradoxes as the inevitable consequence of sloppy, illogical thinking based on emotional arguments and political expediencies. The inconsistencies can also result from the social justice movements strategy of problematizinga philosophical posture that deconstructs and delegitimizes existing values and institutions as systems of oppression when seen through the lens of race, gender and power. Indeed, the term woke refers to being hyper-aware of the constant microaggressions and oppressions that become evident everywhere once one gets into the mindset of problematizing, or turning everything into a problem.

Others see the self-cancelling propositions in more sinister terms: as moral double-binds and Orwellian doublespeak deliberately designed to deceive, entrap and neutralize political opponents.

Theyre not bugs, theyre features, said Greg Lukianoff, president of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, which defends free speech and other individual rights of students and faculty at colleges and universities.

It gives you infinite power over your opponent if you can literally have your argument any which way that works to your advantage, said Lukianoff, co-author of the 2018 book The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure.

To be sure, any large movement will have discordant voices and divergent opinions, and a certain amount of viewpoint diversity is inevitable. In all human affairs, from politics to religion, there seems to be no shortage of hypocrisy. Fabio Rojas, a sociology professor at Indiana University, said the visibility of paradoxes in the realm of social justice is a testament to the movements ascendance in Western societies.

Social justice is the theory of the moment. Its all that were doing, said Rojas, author of the 2007 book From Black Power to Black Studies: How a Radical Social Movement Became an Academic Discipline. Right now the social justice world is gigantic, very popular.

Still, many antiracist advocates dont see these conundrums as contradictory, but as being situationally true in specific contexts, and also dependent on other nuances, such as whether a word like culture is being used literally or metaphorically.

Ron Scapp, an academic specialist in ethnic studies, is among those who acknowledge the contradictions and paradoxes as real, not imaginary; but Scapp says they are not the result of muddled thinking or an underhanded attempt at emotional blackmail. They simply reflect the ubiquity of systemic racism that permeates so much of American society, which means that we encounter racism wherever we turn, and all our options are morally fraught.

This sensation of feeling trapped is what is often meant by the idea that facing ones white complicity in structures of oppression will necessarily cause white people to experience discomfort and even distress, because they have no place to hide in the society they have created, said Scapp, a professor of humanities and teacher education at the College of Mount Saint Vincent, in New York, and past president of the National Association for Ethnic Studies.

The options arent painlessthis comes with a price, Scapp said. And doing good doesnt mean that you get to feel free from any pain or inconvenience that history has set us up for. Theres some white people who want a quick and easy out, to buy their way out of that history.

Several critical race theorists told RealClearInvestigations that another factor might be at play in the calling out of contradictions: a whiff of white privilege in demanding perfect logical consistency without bothering to attend to context or to the literal and rhetorical uses of language.

There might be some element of that [white privilege] involved in demanding logical consistency where its so easily shown that there is none, said Robert Westley, a Tulane University law professor who specializes in critical race theory and reparations. If we suspend the rhetoricity of language and just approach it in a logical way, then you could generate these kinds of contradictions all day long.

In many intellectual traditions, logical consistency is not considered to be the loftiest human intellectual attainment, and rationalism lacks the prestige of paradoxes, enigmas, koans and riddles. In the Anglophone world, contradictions have been celebrated as transcendent by the playwright Oscar Wilde, poet Walt Whitman and essayist Ralph Waldo Emerson, who declared that a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds. Political theorist Saul Alinsky, the author of the 1971 community organizing guide Rules for Radicals: A Pragmatic Primer for Realistic Radicals, gamely advised: In the politics of human life, consistency is not a virtue.

Paradoxes arent the sole domain of the activist, but also are a tendency of progressive scholarship. For example, we are told that women are equal to men in all areas of competency, but studies show that women are more effective in 84% of leadership skills and in 13 of 19 areas of leadership effectiveness, according to research reported in Harvard Business Review.

It is accepted as a self-evident truth that slavery and segregation enriched white America at the expense of African Americans. But research also shows the opposite: that racism acts as a drag on the whole economyretarding investment, growth, purchasing power, consumer spending and depressing other metricswhich economically harms white people, too, according to a report in The New York Times.

The most fertile ground for contradictions might well be the diversity and equity industry, which seems to have outpaced the pulpit in its zeal for issuing moral precepts.

A recurring theme in the social justice movement is the plea for an honest conversation about race, where all perspectives are respected. But the public is also getting the inverse message: that it is imperative for whites to remain silent to make room for marginalized voices and to stop centering their privileged experiences.

In the antiracist consulting world, it is a truth universally acknowledged that organizations should hire people of color to promote diverse viewpoints and insights from those employees.

But according to materials from The Walt Disney Co., recently leaked to City Journal, there is a limit on exploiting black wisdom. Do not rely on your Black colleagues to educate you. This is emotionally taxing; Do not call on your Black colleagues to represent the voice of their community; and Be aware of tokenism, when Black professionals are expected to be representative for their entire race.

A screen shows the logo and a ticker symbol for The Walt Disney Company at the New York Stock Exchange on Dec. 14, 2017. (Brendan McDermid/Reuters)

Critical race theorist andre douglas pond cummings (who writes his name in lowercase letters), said this is actually sound advice for an organization that has hired one or two token black employees. The problem of tokenization disappears when organizations have true diversity with many black colleagues representing multiple black perspectives, said cummings, a business law professor at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock who has taught courses on corporate justice and Hip-Hop & the American Constitution.

He said many of the paradoxes will become moot in a socially just society.

Maybe some of these seeming incoherences or inconsistencies just need time to come to a place of coherence, cummings said.

Appeasing moral scolds can present a special challenge for homebuyers who want to be on the right side of history and increasingly see their words and actions as moral statements. The real estate dilemma of gentrification versus white flight is particularly acute for someone who might opt for a hybrid automobile over a gas-guzzling SUV and insists on shopping at businesses that support Black Lives Matter. A home purchase, the most expensive personal investment most people will make, becomes imbued with the greatest moral significance of all.

Rachel Garshick Kleit, a professor of city and regional planning at The Ohio State University, has taught classes on and written about teaching The Socially Just City. She said her students have been torn between the two impossible options when they think about home ownership as a personal moral decision. They were in moral conflict over it in a class discussion, Kleit said. They were trying to figure out what their personal responsibility was.

Gentrification is deeply personal for all involved. In a 2019 New York Times article about gentrification in Raleigh, N.C.headlined The Neighborhoods Black. The New Home Buyers? White.a community organizer vented her frustration: Our black bodies literally have less economic value than the body of a white person. As soon as the white body moves into the same space that I occupied, all of a sudden this place is more valuable.

Some critical race theorists are willing to grant moral absolution on this point. The moral predicament of home ownership arises out of the default cultures fixation with individualism, said Westley, the reparations specialist at Tulane. The critique of gentrification and white flight is not so much a moral litmus test for individual white homebuyers, according to Westley and Kleit, but a critique of the government policies that shape real estate markets in ways that are harmful to people of color.

I think you have to get out of this individualist paradigm where its all about me and what I do, as opposed to its about what we do as a society and a community, Westley said.

Endless Contradictions, Fabrications and Fantasies

The topic of woke paradoxes has received scant attention, but it hasnt escaped notice altogether.

Conservative British author Douglas Murray grappled with the issue in his 2019 book, The Madness of Crowds: Gender, Race and Identity. He traced the cause of the linguistic convolutions to the social justice movements emphasis on identity politics and its jettisoning of traditional liberal principles such as colorblindness. This manner of thinking distorts the benefits of liberalism (that is, civil rights gains for minority groups) into a type of idolatry, elevating identity politics as an end unto itself. This confusion leads to endless contradictions, fabrications and fantasies, Murray wrote.

As a paradox-spotter, Murray has few peers. Murray depicts social justice activism as an incarnation of the Orwellian principle that revolutions start out professing that all people are equal but then slip into the self-serving belief that some people are more equal than others. Though Murray doesnt mention the U.S. Declaration of Independenceall men are created equalslavery and discrimination might well be one of the most egregious examples of this unfortunate tendency.

Murray does cite other examples. One is a 2014 study by Australian researchers that found that children of same-sex couples are healthier and happier than children brought up by straight couples. In another study, UCLA researchers found that gay couples are more likely to stay together than straight couples (and, surprisingly, lesbian couples).

Murray also noted the perplexing declamations that women are more capable than men. This incongruity gained currency after the Great Recession of 2008, which was allegedly caused by too many men in positions of power in the finance and banking industry. Christine Lagarde, former head of the International Monetary Fund (now president of the European Central Bank), blamed the financial meltdown on the underrepresentation of women on the boards of banks and in regulatory agencies. If it had been Lehman Sisters rather than Lehman Brothers, she was quoted as saying, repeating a favorite mantra, the world might well look a lot different today.

IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde speaks at the 13th Annual Capital Markets Summit at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in Washington on April 2, 2019. (Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times)

According to Murray, who is gay, one of the central conundrums of our time is expressed by people with marginalized identities: You must understand me. You will never understand me.

Murray dubbed these moral strictures as paradoxical, impossible demands.

The inherent willingness to rush towards contradiction is not enough to stop this new religion of social justice, Murray wrote. One reason why contradiction is not enough is because nothing about the intersectional, social justice movement suggests that it is really interested in solving any of the problems that it claims to be interested in.

That left Murray with only one possible conclusion: Their desire is not to heal but to divide, not to placate but to inflame, not to dampen but to burn.

This article was written by John Murawski for RealClearInvestigations
Chinese leader Xi Jinping attends the opening ceremony of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on March 4, 2021. (Leo Ramirez/AFP via Getty Images)

What a Chinese Scholars View Tells Us About Beijings Internal Propaganda

Commentary

On May 31, the 25-member Politburo, comprised of the highest-ranking Chinese Communist Party (CCP) officials, held a study session summoned by Chinese leader Xi Jinping. The main topic was about strengthening Chinas international propaganda and renowned scholar Zhang Weiwei was invited to give a speech.

Xi emphasized the importance of telling the China story well and building a more lovable image. So why is Zhang useful in this regard? Zhang is the director of the China Institute of Fudan University and a leading political scholar on promoting the Chinese regimes model of development, its ideology, and narratives, according to the China Institute website. Zhang is popular in Chinahe has been invited as a keynote speaker at high-level government meetings on various occasions, owns his own video channels, and has published several books. Zhangs recent appearance at the Politburo meeting could also indicate that the CCP seeks to strengthen its internal propaganda campaign.

So what does the Chinese regime tells its own people about the CCP and the West? The following narratives were concocted by Zhang.

Zhang: Chinese People Should Be More Confident

Since 2014, Zhang has been giving speeches and publishing books urging the Chinese people to be more confidentmeaning confidence in the CCPs rule. Zhang claims to have visited over 100 countries, and from what he has seen, the CCPs China is on the rise and the West is on the decline. Therefore, he asks Chinese people to have confidence in the CCPs governing model.

Zhang believes the COVID-19 pandemic is a test for political systems and governing models around the world. He compared the number of deaths from the CCP virus in the United States and in China. By Nov. 28, [2020], the number of deaths in the United States was 56 times the number of deaths in China; Chinas population is 4.2 times the U.S. population. Thus the Chinese people should feel 235 times safer than Americans, Zhang said in a speech in December last year. He concluded that the CCPs governing model is far superior.

Zhang is the author of a series of books praising the CCPs political system, which brought about the rise of China. He argues that Chinas rise is challenging many Western assumptions about the virtues of liberal democracy. Xi had even recommended Zhangs book to Robert Zoellick, the president of the World Bank, when he visited China in 2011.

Zhang: The West Should Learn the China Model

Xi has been talking about telling the China story well since early 2013. In the Politburo study session, he re-emphasized the importance of making the world understand the CCPs superiority.

Immediately after lecturing the Politburo, Zhang was interviewed by state-run media Peoples Daily. In the video, he urged the West to have the courage to learn the China model.

A farmer ties a bunch of firewood as her son watches outside their home in Hutou village on Pingtan island, China, in this undated photo. (Goh Chai Hin/AFP/Getty Images)

Zhang blamed the West for not understanding the CCP. The China story has not been told very well, especially in a way that foreigners can understand. Yet I think its mainly a problem on the part of the West because the rise of China is so unexpected. They could not believe in a so-called communist country, a socialist country, so they have a lot of ideological and cultural obstacles to get over in order to grasp the real meaning and essence of the rise of China.

The video of Zhang speaking in English was posted online with Chinese subtitles. The format by itself creates an illusion for the people inside China that Zhang is credible.

Zhang: Internet Firewall Is Governing Wisdom

If there was no internet firewall in China, Zhang said in a forum hosted by the media company Wenhui Bao in 2019, Western entities with stronger soft power such as BBC, CNN, and Google could be inside China steering the public opinion of 1.4 billion Chinese; businesses like Tencent, Baidu, Alibaba, WeChat would not have existed; Amazon and Facebook alike would dominate; American financial companies would have access to our sensitive financial information.

Shooting over the Great Firewall of China, which refers to Chinas censorship apparatus. (Screenshot via blog.xuite.net)

In my view, the internet firewall is a type of governing wisdom, Zhang stated, because less than 5 percent of the population in China is interested in politics and the firewall helps keep it that way. The firewall has prevented the Western hostile forces from politicizing everything, just like how they did it in Hong Kong.  The firewall can prevent people from becoming political.

Zhang believes that Chinese people are better off being preoccupied with non-political posts from their own circle of friends.

With regards to the one person per vote election system, Zhang believes that social media poses challenges. On open social media platforms, with the help of big data and artificial intelligence, it is very easy to identify a users political view. Consequently, it is possible to sway their political views, and manipulating the votes of the general public is entirely possible.

Through Zhangs views, the West should not be surprised by the kind of narratives that are promoted inside China by the CCP.

Yi Song has been a China scholar since 2010. Having lived many years in both the United States and China, she writes about the connections between the two countries.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
Nurse practitioner Nicole Warner prepares doses of COVID-19 vaccines during the Joints4Jabs COVID-19 vaccination clinic at the Uncle Ikes White Center cannabis shop in Seattle, Wash., on June 16, 2021. (David Ryder/Getty Images)

White House Officials Brush Off Questions on Whether US Will Meet Bidens Vaccine Goal

White House officials on Thursday brushed off questions about President Joe Bidens July 4 vaccine goal, which appears to be in jeopardy due to the current vaccination rate.

Asked about the goal during a virtual briefing on Thursday, White House coronavirus coordinator Jeff Zients did not say whether the goal could still be met.

Weve made tremendous progress. Today, more than 175 million Americans have gotten at least one shot: as I said, 87 percent of seniors, 74 percent of people over the age of 40. And were now nearly 2 in 3 adult Americans, hundreds of thousands of people are continuing to get their first shot each day, he said.

And we are going to get to 70 percent. And were going to continue across the summer months to push beyond 70 percent, he added.

Biden earlier this year said he wanted 7 out of 10 adults to get at least one COVID-19 jab by Independence Day.

But the rate of vaccination has fallen sharply, dropping from over 4 million to around 1 million on an average day. Only 184,847 shots were administered on Memorial Day, and several other recent days have seen a figure well under 1 million.

Biden also wanted 160 million Americans to be fully vaccinated by July 4. Fully vaccinated refers to a person getting both doses of the Pfizer or Moderna shots or the single-shot Johnson & Johnson, and then two weeks elapsing. Just 147.7 million people have been fully vaccinated as of June 17.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters on Sunday, after being asked whether she was concerned the goals wouldnt be reached, that while the government can provide incentives to get a vaccine, it is ultimately up to individuals to do that.

What youve seen is that a number of states have met and surpassed that goal, right? Many have not yet. But weve startedkicked off this one-month campaign to do everything we can to reach it. And well see where we get. Weve got some time, she said.

Over a dozen states have vaccinated at least 70 percent of adults but in others, under 50 percent have received a shot.

The Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine is seen at the OSU Wexner Medical Center in Columbus, Ohio, on March 2, 2021. (Gaelen Morse/Reuters)

Federal officials have continued pushing virtually everyone who can to get a vaccine despite a growing body of research indicating that natural immunity is conferred from recovery from COVID-19, the disease caused by the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus.

Dr. Rochelle Walensky, the head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told reporters on Thursday that getting vaccinated is our way out of this pandemic.

Opening up is not synonymous with stopping the push to vaccinate people. So, I think people should not misinterpret that because a city or a state is opening up, that theyre done. No, theyre not, added Dr. Anthony Fauci, the longtime director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

Were going to continue to push vaccination beyond the Fourth of July, into the summer, so to get as many people vaccinated as we possibly can, whether youre open as a state or a city, or not. Thats the goal.
Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer speaks during a mobilization event at Belle Isle Casino in Detroit, Michigan, with former US President Barack Obama and Democratic Presidential candidate and former US Vice President Joe Biden on Oct. 31, 2020. (Jim Watson/AFP via Getty Images)

Whitmer Announces Full Michigan Reopening Ahead of Schedule

Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer on Thursday announced that all statewide restrictions put in place to curb the transmission of COVID-19 would come to an end on June 22more than a week ahead of schedule.

Pointing to an accelerated vaccination rate in the state and falling reported cases of COVID-19, the disease caused by the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, the Democratic governor said that its time to put this pandemic behind us.

Effective Tuesday, both indoor and outdoor settings will increase to 100 percent capacity, and individuals will no longer be required to wear masks in the state, although individual businesses may still impose their own mandates, she said in a news release.

The state was originally supposed to fully reopen on July 1.

Today is a day that we have all been looking forward to, as we can safely get back to normal day-to-day activities and put this pandemic behind us, Whitmer said in a statement. We owe a tremendous debt of gratitude to the medical experts and health professionals who stood on the front lines to keep us all safe. And we are incredibly thankful to all of the essential workers who kept our state moving.

Thanks to the millions of Michiganders who rolled up their sleeves to get the safe, effective COVID-19 vaccine, we have been able to make these changes ahead of schedule, she continued.

According to the states COVID-19 Vaccine Dashboard, more than 4.9 million Michigan residents aged 16 and above have received at least one shot of a COVID-19 vaccine, accounting for roughly 60 percent of the population in that age group. The state has a goal of vaccinating 70 percent of Michiganders 16 years and older.

The states COVID-19 case rates have also fallen in recent weeks, currently standing at 24.3 cases per million, Click On Detroit reported.

Whitmer said that the states priority is now to reopen the economy.

Our top priority going forward is utilizing the federal relief funding in a smart, sustainable way as we put Michigan back to work and jumpstart our economy, she said. We have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to ensure that Michigans families, small businesses, and communities emerge from this pandemic stronger than ever before.

Prior to her announcement, in April, a petition in the state that sought to repeal a law that underpinned many of Whitmers COVID-19 executive orders collected sufficient valid signatures to proceed up the chain that leads to the state Legislature.

Michigan Republicans have argued that Whitmers lockdowns damaged the economy and the livelihood of residents.

Since the onset of the pandemic last year, Whitmer signed nearly 130 executive orders, imposing a bevy of restrictions that critics described as both onerous and arbitrary. The governor initially relied on a 1976 emergency powers law and later pivoted to an archaic 1945 Emergency Powers of Governor Act to undergird her actions. Whitmer repeatedly insisted that the measures were necessary to protect Michiganders from the COVID-19 outbreak.

Tom Ozimek contributed to this report.
WASHINGTON (AP)  President Joe Biden is facing a formidable to-do list now that hes back from his summit-filled trip to Europe, with pressing legislative challenges, foreign policy follow-up and a need to steer the countrys reopening as the coronavirus threat recedes.

His overseas tour was meant to showcase the U.S. return to global leadership  a central pledge of Bidens 2020 campaign for the White House  but he now faces a critical juncture for securing other planks of his agenda. From voting rights and immigration to his massive legislation on jobs and infrastructure, Biden is trying to get as much done as possible in Congress before the start of its August recess.

I think we  the country, has put a different face on where weve been and where were going," Biden told reporters on the tarmac in Geneva late Wednesday as he headed back to Washington. "And I feel good about it.

It has been a start-and-stop process on many of Bidens priorities on Capitol Hill, where Democrats hold the majority but only by the narrowest margins. He is reaching for bipartisan deals with Republicans while also moving along with his own party's go-it-alone strategy, a two-pronged approach that is particularly coming into focus on his big infrastructure investment plan.

Other legislation, on voting rights, policing reforms and immigration, will need support from Republicans in the Senate, and talks are teetering on those and other issues as bipartisan groups of lawmakers strain to find agreements while the days tick off on the legislative calendar.

Talks over immigration have all but come to a standstill, and Democrats are now eying putting some immigration law changes into the infrastructure overhaul, relying on budget rules that would allow majority passage without the need for Republican votes. Talks on policing reform are still going, but even House Speaker Nancy Pelosi noted Thursday, Its challenging.

Still, Biden enters the legislative struggle from a position of strength. A new poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, conducted while he was abroad, found 55% of Americans approve of his handling of his job as president.

The White House believes that Bidens proposals are broadly popular in the country, if not on Capitol Hill, and is wagering that lawmakers can be brought along with a combination of cajoling and the presidential bully pulpit.

Biden is expected to resume regular domestic travel to promote the infrastructure legislation, and continue his behind-the-scenes engagement with lawmakers on other issues where his public involvement might not be as productive.

The AP-NORC poll, conducted prior to Bidens summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin, found about half approving of his handling of foreign policy as well as his handling of the U.S. relationship with Russia. Sixty-eight percent approve of his handling of the COVID-19 pandemic  his strongest issue throughout his presidency so far.

While Biden was away, a new round of bipartisan infrastructure talks intensified as a growing group of 21 senators fine-tuned their $1 trillion plan to meet the long-overlooked national priority. At the same time, Senate Democrats under Budget Committee Chairman Bernie Sanders plotted a $6 trillion go-it-alone approach.

Biden, who was loosely following the back-and-forth while abroad, was briefed on the measures Thursday at the White House, according to an administration official who said the president planned to assess the likelihood of a bipartisan deal next week.

The White House sought to keep up momentum for the presidents legislative agenda while he was away  particularly the infrastructure bill  by deploying Cabinet secretaries across the country and to meetings on Capitol Hill.

Biden aides also held more than 130 calls or meetings with lawmakers and staff about the infrastructure proposal and a dozen staff briefings for aides in both parties.

Meanwhile, senior Biden aides have been keeping in constant communication both with Democrats and Republicans working on the bipartisan deal as well as the progressive lawmakers working on the partys plan B.

At the same time, Biden returned to the U.S. with a pile of new initiatives from his talks with allies and adversaries.

He must fulfill his commitment to sharing 80 million COVID-19 vaccine doses with the world by the end of this month, while devising plans to meet his pledge to share a further 500 million over the next year. White House COVID coordinator Jeff Zients said Thursday that the administration would be unveiling the recipients of those 80 million doses in the coming days, as the U.S. works through the diplomatic and logistical hurdles to ship vaccines abroad as quickly as possible.

Having secured an agreement with the European Union to end a 16-year dispute over commercial airliners, Biden said he is now looking to bring about a de-escalation in a host of other trade tensions with the bloc as he tries to develop a more united front to counter Chinas trade practices. Hes tasked U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai to step up negotiations.

And after sitting down with Putin, Biden said the next six months would determine whether a constructive partnership could be formed in areas of mutual interest, from nuclear arms control and safeguarding critical infrastructure from cyberattacks to a potential exchange of imprisoned citizens. Progress on any of those fronts would be ironed out in the months ahead, Biden added.

The president was very clear yesterday that the proof of the pudding is in the eating, national security adviser Jake Sullivan said Thursday. It is the start of the story, and how the story ends will unfold here over the course, as he said, of the next six months to a year.
NORWALK  Following two mayoral elections, Norwalk resident Lisa Brinton is running for a Common Council at-large seat, with plans to form a new political party in the city as well.

Brinton formally announced her candidacy, political action committee and subsequent plans for a new political party at a campaign event at BJ Ryans BanC House on River Street Monday night. The event was attended by about 60 people, she said.

An unaffiliated voter, Brinton said she is looking to create change at a lower level. The Common Council is currently comprised of 14 Democrats and one Republican.

Erik Trautmann / Hearst Connecticut Media

Im dropping down a level and trying to remind the council why you ran for office, Brinton said. We have to go through the process of petitioning. We go to the state and petition to the Independent Party to be able to run on that line.

Brinton previously ran for mayor in 2019 and 2017, losing to Mayor Harry Rilling both times. In 2019 Brinton was endorsed by local state Reps. Gail Laviele, R-Wilton, and Terrie Wood, R-Darien.

Brinton recently filed paperwork to run for the council seat but has yet to formally file paperwork establishing her political action committee she named Independents for Norwalk, Town Clerk Richard McQuaid said.

As of Thursday, no PAC called Independents for Norwalk was registered in the state, according to the State Elections Enforcement Commission database.

Because (Brinton) had not really filed any papers yet that Ive seen from the state, I dont know what direction shes going in, McQuaid said. Where people are getting confused is that shes running independently of the Republican and Democratic parties. Her party, the PAC she put together, was called Independents for Norwalk.

However, the committee is not affiliated with the Independent Party of Norwalk, which is a recognized federal political party, McQuaid said.

In Norwalk, about 1,065 people are registered as Independents, and at least 23,000 are unaffiliated, McQuaid said.

Brinton has filed candidate registration paperwork out of the town clerks office for the at-large council seat but would need to petition and receive a specific number of votes to have her name on the ballot, McQuaid said. The number of signatures needed is determined by state agencies.

As of Thursday, the only other candidate that confirmed their run alongside Brinton is former Board of Education member Erik Anderson, who filed paperwork to run as the citys constable.

Constables most often work with attorneys, transporting documents, McQuaid said. Anderson previously served one term as a BOE member and was critiqued for his poor meeting attendance.

Rilling, who is running for a fifth term this November, said public engagement is a sign of a healthy democracy.

Every two years, I ask the voters of Norwalk to support me and our diverse slate of democratic candidates, Rilling said. I love Norwalk and I love serving Norwalk residents. I remain focused on growing jobs and our tax base, improving our schools and keeping our community safe. I look forward to continuing to engage residents of each and every neighborhood in Norwalk regardless of what party they may belong to.

abigail.brone@hearstmediact.com
BATON ROUGE, La. (AP)  Louisiana will offer residents who have gotten vaccinated against COVID-19 a chance to win a share of $2.3 million in cash prizes and college scholarships, joining the ranks of states hoping financial incentives will persuade those reluctant to get the shots to change their minds.

The top winner could take home $1 million, under the lottery plans announced Thursday by Gov. John Bel Edwards with much fanfare, including a giant fake check and Louisiana-themed music from a New Orleans brass band. Drawings for the 14 winners of cash prizes will take place over five weeks, starting July 14.

The state will give away nine $100,000 scholarships to winners ages 12 to 17 who can prove they've received at least one coronavirus vaccine shot. Four $100,000 cash prizes and one $1 million award will be handed out to winners age 18 and older.

We need more people to go sleeves up before we can truly end the pandemic," Edwards said. Shot At A Million is a reward for those who've already gotten vaccinated and a fun nudge for others to get the vaccine sooner rather than later.

Registration for the federally financed drawings begins Monday at noon and is restricted to Louisiana residents. People can sign up through the state's shotatamillion.com website or by calling 1-877-356-1511 once registration begins.

The Democratic governor hopes cash incentives  such as those offered in California, Colorado, Kentucky, Massachusetts and Ohio  will boost interest in the shots, since the public safety and health protection arguments have failed to sway significant numbers of Louisiana residents.

Louisiana lags nearly every other state in vaccine distribution, despite a widespread grassroots outreach effort that works to bring the shots directly to neighborhoods, churches and homes.

More than 1.7 million people, 37% of Louisiana's total population, have received at least one dose of the vaccine, according to state health department data. More than 1.5 million people have been fully immunized, about 33% of the population.

Only Mississippi and Alabama have lower vaccination rates per capita among states, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Every day makes a difference. There are people who are getting sick, going to the hospital and dying because they waited about being vaccinated, Edwards said.

The governor is particularly hoping to drum up interest among younger people ahead of the fall start of the school year, since Louisiana has seen limited embrace of the vaccines from college-aged students and teenagers.

For Louisiana's new cash incentive program, anyone who has been immunized since the coronavirus vaccines became available is eligible to register for the weekly drawings. For those newly getting immunized, they have to show proof of one shot of a vaccine that can require two doses.

A person only needs to sign up once to be entered into all five weeks of drawings, which will be handled by the Louisiana Lottery Corporation and paid with federal coronavirus relief aid.

Each of the first four weeks will see two drawings: one for a $100,000 college scholarship and one for a $100,000 cash prize. The fifth week will see drawings for the $1 million grand prize and for five $100,000 scholarships. The scholarships will be deposited into a college savings account administered by the Louisiana Office of Student Financial Assistance.

While the first drawing will be held July 14, the winner won't be announced until two days later  after vaccine status and residency are confirmed, according to the governor's office. The same schedule will be followed each week after that.

___

Follow APs coverage of the pandemic at https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-pandemic and https://apnews.com/UnderstandingtheOutbreak. Follow Melinda Deslatte on Twitter at http://twitter.com/melindadeslatte.
NORWALK  Nearly 400 students celebrated their high school graduation Thursday evening at Norwalk High School.

The Norwalk High graduating class was 280 students while the P-TECH class was 95, Norwalk Public Schools spokesperson Rachael Chappa said.

Alexandra Koletsos was the distinguished speaker for the Norwalk High School graduating class and Katelyn Negron spoke for the P-TECH graduates. A distinguished speaker is chosen in lieu of the traditional valedictorian and salutatorian, according to Norwalk High School Assistant Principal Dan Sullivan.

Koletsos will attend Columbia University in New York City studying computer science, she said.

I looked into Columbias program and liked how it was primarily a liberal arts education but had an amazing STEM program, Koletsos said. That is my niche. I really liked the school their values as institution.

Tom McCarthy, the recipient of the NCC Presidential Award for Academic Excellence, also spoke. This award was given to four NCC college graduates who have earned a 4.0 every semester. Tom was the only early college graduate awarded, Chappa said.

abigail.brone@hearstmediact.com
Fathers Day is this coming Sunday. As a dad, I can tell you that it should be celebrated with unreserved abandon, eclipsed only by Mothers Day, New Years Day, all the other federal holidays  and, oh yes, birthdays.

Still, pops should have his day. This year the hoopla should be even greater, since June 20 is also the first day of summer, a pretty big occasion in my book.

Food and drink are the traditional ways to honor dad, usually a gathering around a table laden with favorites that ends with a popular dessert. A special menu-appropriate wine is always a good idea.

This year, with the coincidence of the two occasions, Ive been thinking about summer wines.

There is, of course, rose. It seemed to come out of nowhere a few years back to dominate summer imbibing. I remember when you couldnt give the stuff away. Nonetheless, I will concede that it is a delightful summer quaff.

This year, Id like to nominate Beaujolais as a candidate for the top summer wine. Made in Burgundy from the Gamay grape, the wine is fruit driven, crisp, and refreshing at its most basic and can rival the complexity and nuance of the sought-after red Burgundy at its peak. Insiders consider it to be one of the best values in red wine.

Frank Whitman / For Hearst Connecticut Media

Beaujolais regions are carefully described and mapped out, as all French wines are. When the label says Beaujolais, the everyday wine comes from the large area in the south of the region. Beaujolais Villages, the next step up in quality, is smaller and further north.

Next up, approaching the town of Macon, are the 10 villages (called Crus) that make the finest wines: Saint-Amour, Julienas, Chenas, Moulin a Vent, Fleurie, Chiroubles, Morgon, Regnie, Cotes de Brouilly, and Brouilly. Each town, with its distinctive terroir, is named on the label without the Beaujolais designation (youre just supposed to know). Fleurie and Morgon are the largest Cru villages. Although these wines are widely available, knowing the producers is important.

But why is Beaujolais a summer wine? After all, its red.

The fruit-driven, slightly tart wine can be (and should be) served slightly chilled. Some time in front of the A/C vent or perhaps 20 minutes in the fridge will bring it just below room temperature.

In the trade, summery words are used to describe the aromas and flavors: Wild strawberries, cherries, flowers, aromatics, red fruits. When you get to the more serious Cru wines, the words broaden out to include terms that you might associate with other wine regions: Plums, smoked meats, tannins, elegance, long-finish, and even suave.

This was all driven home to me at a recent tasting of a dozen Beaujolais across the spectrum of designation, style, and price. DB Fine Wines in New Canaan regularly hosts in-depth tastings. A dozen or so customers gather to sample the wines as they are presented by wine industry veteran Jim Winston.

Frank Whitman / For Hearst Connecticut Media

Winston knows his stuff. He is able to bring the behind-the-scenes story of grape, place, and wine to life, while narrating vivid, clear, and enticing descriptions of the wines.

Last week 10 of us gathered to taste through four Beaulolais and Villages wines along with eight from the Cru regions. Prices ranged from $16 to $45 with seven of the group under $25. I cant begin to list and describe each one, but you can see the full list on the DB Fine wines facebook page.

As is his habit, Winston selects three wines at the end of the evening for win, place and show  personal decisions based on his lifetime of tasting. He admitted that this group was particularly strong and revised his picks a few times before committing to the final standings.

Win: An exceptional and rare wine from the small Cru of Regnie made by Charly Thevenet ($36). Place: Domaine de Fa, Fleurie ($24) a rich, slightly tannic age-able wine. Show: Domaine des Marrans, Morgon ($24) with a wild strawberry nose and fresh fruit flavors (Ill confess I ordered a few of this one).

So for dad, I suggest a relaxing day of favorite activities, a good meal, and a bottle of Beaujolais. For the gift that keeps on giving, consider getting some extra bottles and making it your summer wine.

Frank Whitman can be reached at NotBreadAloneFW@gmail.com.
RICHMOND, Va. (AP)  Virginia's road to legalizing simple possession of marijuana has had some twists and turns, so it's not surprising that advocacy groups have been flooded with calls from people trying to understand exactly what will be allowed under state law as of July 1.

Legislators initially voted in February to legalize possession of up to an ounce of marijuana for adult recreational use, but not until 2024, when retail sales would begin. An outcry ensued over the three-year wait before ending pot possession penalties, so in April they voted to move up legalization to this July 1.

Adding to the confusion: lawmakers included a reenactment clause," which means the General Assembly will have to vote again next year on major portions of the law, mainly to establish a regulatory framework for the legal marijuana marketplace.

The process has resulted in some contradictions that may not get resolved until years after legalization begins.

Sen. Adam Ebbin, one of the lead sponsors, said people need to understand the law's limits for now. Possession of up to one ounce (28.3 grams) with no intent to distribute will become legal for adults, 21 and older. Adults will also be allowed to grow up to four marijuana plants per household. But not much else will change.

People still need to be careful  this is not an official open marijuana market, Ebbin said.

Virginia is joining 17 other states with laws allowing adults to possess and consume marijuana. In each one, laws have legalized simple possession before establishing a legal marketplace for buying and selling marijuana, said Jenn Michelle Pedini, the development director for the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws.

Under Virginia's law, buying and selling marijuana will remain illegal until Jan. 1, 2024, when retail sales are expected to begin. Smoking marijuana in public also remains against the law.

Pedini, who is also the executive director of Virginia NORML, said the organization fields questions every day from people who are surprised to learn that selling pot won't be allowed for another three years.

The only legal sale of cannabis in Virginia is through the medical (marijuana) program," Pedini said.

Virginia NORML has a page on its website to answer frequently asked questions and clear up confusion. The state also launched a website to answer questions about the new law.

Although people can legally cultivate marijuana plants beginning July 1, it will still be illegal for anyone to buy cannabis seeds or cuttings needed to grow those plants. That's one of the contradictions bothering Republican Sen. Ryan McDougle, who voted against the legislation.

The biggest inconsistency is you cannot legally buy marijuana for recreational use in the commonwealth of Virginia," McDougle said.

"Under federal rules you can't transport it (into Virginia), but if you have it, you can possess up to one ounce of it in Virginia. How you get that is the inconsistency. You can't legally get it, but you can possess it, he said.

In the original bill, both possession and sales of marijuana would have been legalized in 2024. But many social justice advocates pushed to immediately end the disparate treatment of people of color under existing marijuana laws.

The General Assemblys research and watchdog agency found that from 2010-2019, Black Virginians were 3.5 times more likely than white Virginians to be arrested for marijuana possession, and 3.9 times more likely to be convicted, even though both populations used marijuana at similar rates.

We want to do this the right way, and what that means is ending the disparate enforcement, which is going to make a huge change in the lives of thousands of Virginians," said Alena Yarmosky, Gov. Ralph Northam's spokeswoman. She said the administration also recognizes the reality that people have marijuana now, even though it is illegal in Virginia.

According to New Frontier Datas U.S. Cannabis Report, Virginia had the fourth-largest illicit market last year, encompassing about $1.8 billion, or 3%, of an estimated $60 billion in total illicit sales nationwide.

Because marijuana remains illegal at the federal level and because Virginia needs time to stand-up the regulatory structure for safe sales, it will not be legal to sell seeds or other marijuana until 2024, Yarmosky said.

People will be allowed to share small amounts of seeds with one another, but they can't sell them.

The primary objective of legalization is to reduce criminalization and then to regulate safe legal access, so we're checking one box, but we're not checking the other this year, Pedini said.

Pedini said may states have expedited adult access to marijuana through their medical marijuana dispensaries, something advocates hope Virginia lawmakers will vote to do in 2022. Most people arent going to grow cannabis, but most people who will want to participate in the adult use market will prefer to do so through a legal avenue, Pedini said.
NORWALK - Nearly 400 students celebrated their high school graduation Thursday evening at Norwalk High School.

The Norwalk High graduating class was 280 students while the P-TECH class was 95, Norwalk Public Schools spokesperson Rachael Chappa said.

Alexandra Koletsos was the distinguished speaker for the Norwalk High School graduating class and Katelyn Negron spoke for the P-TECH graduates. A distinguished speaker is chosen in lieu of the traditional valedictorian and salutatorian, according to Norwalk High School Assistant Principal Dan Sullivan.

Koletsos will attend Columbia University in New York City studying computer science, she said.

"I looked into Columbia's program and liked how it was primarily a liberal arts education but had an amazing STEM program," Koletsos said. "That is my niche. I really liked the school their values as institution."

Tom McCarthy, the recipient of the NCC Presidential Award for Academic Excellence, also spoke. This award was given to four NCC college graduates who have earned a 4.0 every semester. Tom was the only early college graduate awarded, Chappa said.

abigail.brone@hearstmediact.com
With the original tax deadline having already passed, Get My Payment IL Coalition is reaching out to Illinoisans to let them know they may have money waiting to be collected.

Our impression is the people in Illinois with the very lowest incomes, or even no earned income, those are some of the folks that very well may be eligible for some or all of these credits, but may not realize it, Christine Cheng, consultant with Get My Payment IL Coalition, said.

Even after the deadline, people have the right to collect their money from the IRS dating back to 2018, Cheng said. Oftentimes people who dont earn enough money and dont file taxes will be eligible to receive some sort of money back from the government, she continued.

If somebody is in that position, there is no penalty for filing a tax return after the tax deadline. You can actually file three years back, and so in this case  you can go back two years which would be 2018-2019 to file, Cheng said.

During the past year, the U.S. government has dispersed three waves of stimulus checks, two in 2020 and one in 2021. Some of the eligible people never received their payments as a result of mailing issues or not being aware they had one.

Meegan Dugan Bassett, fellow and director of New America Chicago, said the coalition, which began in April 2020, started as a result of nonprofits in Illinois seeing the immediate need to help those people of low income or people on benefits programs who werent aware they qualified for the stimulus checks.

We felt like the people in Illinois were hurting the most and needed the checks the most, it would probably be the hardest for them to get their stimulus checks, Bassett said. Our coalition really quickly stood up a website and we have been providing information to the public about how to access their stimulus checks, who is eligible.

As the stimulus checks rolled out, one of the issues Cheng said arose was independent people who were being considered dependent based on their previous tax filings not receiving their checks. She said in order to receive those benefits, people need to file their 2020 taxes to be recognized as independents.

People with children under age 17 may be able to receive their child tax credit in 2020, instead of 2021, and as much as $300 per child. Bassett said people with children who normally dont file their taxes because of low income should act immediately to receive some benefits early.

The federal government has increased who is eligible for the tax credit and the amount for this tax year, Bassett said. Normally people would be getting that money next year when they file taxes, but because of the pandemic they are willing to pay some of those halves of the amount in advance.

To file for the child tax credit and claim potential missing stimulus checks, Bassett said the IRS opened a new nonfiler tool on Monday, which can be accessed on their website at irs.gov/credits-deductions/child-tax-credit-non-filer-sign-up-tool. She said if you have already filed your 2020 taxes you cannot file again.

Visit getmypaymentil.org or call their hotline 888-553-9777 for more information.

Reach Kristina Johnson at 618-406-8369 or Kristina.Johnson@hearst.com
I saw In the Heights at the new NCG Cinema-Alton. With all the buzz about the new Lin-Manuel Miranda movie, I thought that the theater would be packed, but I was the only one there, until four teenagers came in. They only stayed for 15 minutes and I was all alone again.

The new theater has wonderful lounge chairs, which make the experience so much better. Its like watching from a comfy chair at home.

In the Heights was a successful Broadway musical before it came to the big screen, and that is the only way to see this extravaganza. No matter how big your television is, In the Heights is better with surround sound and a giant screen.

In the Heights begins as Usnavi (Anthony Ramos) tells four children on a beach in the Caribbean the story of people living in Washington Heights, an uppermost part of the borough of Manhattan, during the 1970s, in the days leading up to a blackout in New York City.

Washington Heights is primarily a Latinx community. Usnavi is at the center of the movie, a bodega owner who looks after the aging Cuban lady next door, Abuela Claudia (Olga Merediz), and pines for Vanessa (Melissa Barrera) the gorgeous girl working in the neighboring beauty salon. Usnavi dreams of winning the lottery and escaping to the shores of his fathers native Dominican Republic. Meanwhile, Nina Rosario (Leslie Grace), a childhood friend of Usnavis, has returned to the neighborhood from her first year at college at Stanford with surprising news for her father, Kevin (Jimmy Smits), who has spent his life savings on building a better life for their daughter. Ultimately, Usnavi and the residents of the close-knit neighborhood get a dose of what it means to be home.

The music by Academy Award nominee Lin-Manuel Miranda is fabulous as are all the singing voices of the cast. But, I was bowled over by the dancing. Christopher Scott choreographed the dance numbers. Scott borrowed one scene from the Busby Berkeley movies of the 1930s. Scott devised an elaborate musical production number at a swimming pool that involved complex geometric patterns using a large number of performers in a kaleidoscopic on-screen performance. He also borrowed a dance sequence from an old Fred Astaire movie where a couple are dancing on the side of a tall building.

Jon Chu of Crazy Rich Asians fame directed. Quira Alegria Hudes wrote the screenplay based on his musical play. The score was by Lin-Manuel Miranda.

There is almost no dialog in the film. You must pay attention to the words of the songs to understand the story. Each character tells an important aspect of the story. Listen carefully.

I enjoyed the PG-13 film showing in Alton and Edwardsville and think it is a must see for all lovers of musicals.

I give In the Heights five out of five stars.

Movie critic Mary Cox lives in Wood River and studied film at the University of California, Los Angeles. She has worked in L.A. with various directors and industry professionals. Contact Mary at mary.cox@edwpub.net.
BOZEMAN, Mont. (AP)  Wildlife officials in Montana are seeking feedback on a proposal to expand fishing restrictions to protect declining brown trout populations.

Biologists with Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks and the U.S. Geological Survey have tracked declining numbers of juvenile brown trout in southwest Montana rivers, including the Big Hole, Ruby, Boulder, Beaverhead, upper Yellowstone and upper Stillwater rivers, the Bozeman Daily Chronicle reported Wednesday.

Eric Roberts, fish management bureau chief with Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks, said it is concerning because low numbers of younger fish indicate that older fish are not being replaced.

Biologists are now gathering public comments on the proposed changes, which include seasonal fishing closures from September to May, catch and release requirements and evening fishing restrictions from 2 p.m. to midnight daily. The changes could also apply to the rivers' tributaries.

Residents can submit comment online, by mail or by attending public meetings June 22 and June 23. Department officials will then develop proposals to be considered in August.

Roberts attributed the trout population decline, in part, because of changing water temperatures and habitat alterations. He said there are long-term plans in place to address stream flows and enhance habitat; however, angling restrictions are short-term ways to address the declining population.
This coming weekend, local organizations are inviting Lower East Side residents to a section of Pier 42, just north of Montgomery Street, for a community day. As you may have heard, the Parks Department is moving ahead with plans to turn the old pier into a green space, an extension of East River Park. This summer there will be a series of art, educational and design installations at the pier, beginning with the event on Saturday.

Visitors will be able to build model depicting their visions for the space, meet the artists who will be involved in the installations, learn about river ecology and tour the pier. The community day is hosted by the LES waterfront Alliance, including CAAAV: Organizing Asian Communities, Good Old Lower East Side, Hester Street Collaborative, Lower East Side Ecology Center, 267/275 Cherry Street Tenants Association, Two Bridges Neighborhood Council and the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council and State Sen. Daniel Squadron.

The event takes place from noon-4 p.m. Click on the Paths to Pier 42 web site for more information.

On Thursday, May 9, Community Board 3s Waterfront subcommittee will meet to have a first look at preliminary master plan schemes from Mathews Nielsen, the architectural firm hired by the city for the planning phase of the project. The firm has been conducting visioning sessions with community groups in recent months. The city has around $13 million to get started on the park, perhaps one-fourth of what will eventually be required to finish the job.
In the very near future, another affordable housing lottery will open for Essex Crossing. The city and Delancey Street Associates, which is developing the Lower East Side mega-project, are poised to open applications for 92 senior apartments at 140 Essex St. But even before the lottery goes live, the developers are spreading the word for a public information session to explain the application process.

The meeting has been scheduled for Wednesday, June 26 in the Grand Street Settlement Community Room, 175 Delancey St., 6:30-8 p.m. There will be an overview of the online housing portal run by the NYC Department of Housing Preservation & Development, a review of eligibility requirements and an opportunity to answer questions. This is not a workshop to actually complete applications  its informational only. No applications will be distributed at the event. Translation will be provided in Chinese and Spanish.

The apartments at 140 Essex St. will be all studios, available to seniors 62+ at 30%, 50% and 60% of Area Median Income (AMI). Eligible applicants must have annual household incomes ranging from about $22,000-$45,000. The eight-story building, located on a site that once housed part of the Essex Street Market, is expected to be completed by the end of this year.

Essex Crossing includes more than 1,000 apartments, half of them designated as below-market rate by the city. 140 Essex St. is one of two senior buildings in the project.
Its grand opening weekend for the Market Line at Essex Crossing. Following a VIP preview last night, the subterranean shopping complex makes a long-awaited public debut this morning.

You can enter the Market Line using a sweeping staircase in the Essex Street Market. If you want to access the space from the street, theres an entrance at 115 Delancey St. (the southwest corner of Norfolk and Delancey streets). The market will be open from 7 a.m. until 1 a.m. daily. And for opening weekend, there will be live music, DJs, a photo booth and tarot card readers.

The Market Line is the centerpiece of the Essex Crossing mega-project. Taken together with the separate, city-managed Essex Street Market, the two facilities will eventually span 150,000 square feet under three buildings (only the first third of the Market Line is opening today).

Delancey Street Associates, the development consortium, recruited a number of well-known Lower East Side/Chinatown businesses to open stalls in the new facility. They include: Doughnut Plant, Nom Wah, Pho Grand, Pickle Guys and Veselka. Another familiar local business, Aqua Best seafood market, has opened an expansive restaurant and seafood counter. Essex Pearl is larger than most operators in the Market Line. It is a full-service restaurant with 48 seats and a raw bar. Fabian von Hauske Valtierra and Jeremiah Stone, owners of the critically acclaimed Contra and Wildair restaurants on Orchard Street, are opening Peoples, a combo wine shop and wine bar. And the team behind Davelle, the Japanese cafe on Suffolk Street, will be opening a sake bar and Izakaya in the Market Line (it wont be part of the opening day lineup).

What else can you expect? Theres the Grand Delancey, a 200-seat beer hall from a big restaurant group based in Washington, D.C. Not all of the vendors are peddling prepared foods and drinks. Theres Ends Meat, a whole animal butcher based in Industry City; Schaller & Weber, an outpost from the highly regarded Upper East Side German grocery; Tortilleria Nixtamal, a Queens-based vendor making fresh tortillas on-site; Que Chevere, a new business featuring home-style Puerto Rican food; Kuro Obi, a ramen shop with ties to the Ippudo chain; and Slice Joint, a spot from a former chef at Robertas. Rounding out the opening day lineup: Ample Hills Ice Cream, Cafe Grumpy, Four Sigmatic, Moon Man, Rebeccas Cake Pops, Southeast Asian Food Group and Substance Vitality Bar.
Cast and crew of The Complete Works of William Shakespeare play around with props prior to a rehearsal in Riverside Park. From left are Wyatt Velharticky, Stella Veasey, Hannah Frost with dummy Ophelia, Hunter Redmon and Michael Ricci. Shakespeare in the Park happens at 6 p.m. June 26 and 27 at the Salida Rotary Amphitheater in Riverside Park.
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New Phuket Provincial Hall touted to open in Sept

PHUKET: Phuket officials expect the years-in-coming new Phuket Provincial Hall under construction on the south side of Phuket Town to finally be finished and open for services on Sept 1.

construction

By The Phuket News

Friday 18 June 2021, 12:03PM

The news came from Phuket Vice Governor Vikrom Jakthee at the century-old current Phuket Provincial Hall on Narisorn Rd, in the old government quarter on the north side of town, yesterday (June 17).

Vice Governor Vikrom said that the September opening followed talks with the contractor  named only as the Wall and Tesco joint venture (literal translation from the Thai    )  to finish the works left incomplete by the previous contractor Chun Eaw Co Ltd.

The main building, called Phase 1, that will house government offices is not finished yet, but the meeting hall at the compound is already completed and has already served as a Field Hospital during the initial COVID outbreak last year, V/G Vikrom explained.

The Wall and Tesco joint venture was hired by government contract signed on Dec 14 last year.

The contract explained that the budget is B196 million, and the duration of work is 555 days, from Dec 15 to June 22, 2022, he said, repeating his update from February.

However, the government has expedited the contractor to finish the work within July or August, the new Provincial Hall will be open on Sept 1, V/Gov Vikrom said.

A total of 18 government offices will move into the new building, as well as Krung Thai Bank and Thailand Post. From checking in April, 384 officers in total will move and provide services at the [new] building, he added.

Left unsaid yesterday was that V/Gov Vikrom pointed out in February that the Wall and Tesco joint venture contract of B196mn was reduced from B198mn as reported by Phakaphong Tavipatana, Phuket Governor at the time, on Sept 6, 2019.

At that time, with Governor Phakaphong in Sept 2019 requesting an extra B38mn to complete works unfinished by the initial contractor Chun Eaw Co Ltd, the total cost of the project had blown out to B647mn.

The original contract for building the new Provincial Hall, signed on Sept 9, 2014, stood at B450mn.
Outrage over blacktip reef sharks sold at Phuket fish market

PHUKET: The Phuket Fisheries Chief has confirmed that blacktip reef sharks are not protected species following outrage online sparked from photos of a haul of dead sharks in baskets at Koh Siray, in Rassada, today (June 18).

militaryanimalsenvironment

By Chutharat Plerin

Friday 18 June 2021, 06:42PM

The haul of blacktip reef sharks at the fresh fish market on Koh Siray, east of Phuket Town, this morning (June 18). Photo: Supplied

The haul of blacktip reef sharks at the fresh fish market on Koh Siray, east of Phuket Town, this morning (June 18). Photo: Supplied

The haul of blacktip reef sharks at the fresh fish market on Koh Siray, east of Phuket Town, this morning (June 18). Photo: Supplied

At this stage, the blacktip reef shark has not been classified as a protected animal, Watcharin Rattanachoo, Chief of the Phuket Provincial Fisheries Office, told The Phuket News today

I understand the photos may hurt people who love animals, but the fishing and selling of these sharks is not illegal in Thailand, Mr Watcharin said.

Marine life expert Dr Thon Thamrongnawasawat has campaigned for years for greater protection of blacktip reef sharks after a haul of the fish were found on sale at a fish market on Koh Lanta.

Blacktip reef sharks and many other sharks are not protected animals [in Thailand. Ive tried to push for this many times. I hope we can progress, especially for hammerhead sharks and leopard sharks, whose numbers are rapidly falling, Dr Thon said in a Facebook post in 2019.

We must push for the protection of sharks, especially these two species [hammerhead and leopard sharks], Dr Thon said.

We need to learn more so that we know how many sharks are needed to preserve a amrine ecosystem, Dr Thon noted.

Sharks are important to the ecosystem and the food chain. Sharks are also important for tourism, Dr Thon wrote.

The Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment is planning to list blacktip reef sharks as a protected marine species, after a TikTok clip of five men using a firearm to kill the sharks in Krabi came to light on Monday (June 14), reports the Bangkok Post.

The incident took place outside of the protected environmental zone, about 96 kilometres from Hat Noppharat Thara  Mu Koh Phi Phi National Park. The video clip showed a group of five men shooting at three blacktip reef sharks and two trevallies, before hauling them aboard a speedboat, named Ding Lor Zing.

Even though the sharks were not yet listed as a protected species, Natural Resources and Environment Minister Varawut Silpa-archa slammed the groups behaviour, calling it an act of gratuitous violence.

Ive already instructed Jatuporn Burutphat, permanent secretary for environment, to work with all relevant agencies to review our policies to better protect our marine resources. Agencies in the areas have also been instructed to beef up surveillance and better educate local residents, Mr Varawut said.

Sopon Thongdee, Director-General of the Department of Marine and Coastal Resources, said the department will be reviewing its list of protected animals and will register blacktip reef sharks as protected marine species.

These sharks pose no threat to humans, he said.

He has instructed Marine and Coastal Resources Office 10 to file a complaint with Muang Krabi Police against the men featured in the video for using a boat without permission, which is punishable by a B10,000 fine.
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Rachel Ravina is a journalist covering news and lifestyle features in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania. She grew up in Blue Bell and graduated from Penn State. She's also a news enthusiast who is passionate about covering topics people want to read.
NEW DELHI (AP)  Starting Monday, every adult in India will be eligible for a free vaccine paid for by the federal government.

The new policy, announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi last week, ends a complex system introduced just last month of buying and distributing vaccines that overburdened states and led to inequities in how the shots were handed out.

India is a key supplier of vaccines around the world, and its missteps at home have led it to stop exports of shots, leaving millions of people around the world waiting unprotected. Only about 3.5% of Indians are fully vaccinated and while supporters hope the policy change will make vaccine distribution more equitable, poor planning means shortages will continue.

Here's a look at the changes to India's vaccine policy and what they mean.

THE EARLIER POLICY

India has vast experience in running large immunization programs, and each year it distributes 300 million shots to infants and mothers for free. For these programs, the federal government is in charge of buying the vaccines and then works with the states to figure out how best to distribute them.

But the scale of the COVID-19 vaccination campaign is unprecedented. And a massive surge in March pushed India's health system to the breaking point. As hundreds of thousands of people became infected each day and hospitals overflowed with patients gasping for air, the states complained they werent getting enough shots from the federal government and clamored for more control over how the vaccines were distributed.

So, starting in May, the federal government agreed to buy just half of all vaccines produced for use in India and continued to give them out for free to health care and frontline workers and those over 45. The other half became available for states and private hospitals to buy directly. These vaccines were destined for people between 18 and 45; they were free if obtained from the states, but cost money if obtained privately.

___

WHY IT DIDN'T WORK

The states had never bought vaccines before and a limited supply meant they were competing with one another as well as with private hospitals. They were forced to pay higher prices than the federal government could have negotiated, said Dr. Chandrakant Lahariya, a health policy expert.

That essentially makes it inefficient, he said.

Private hospitals passed that cost on to people, and amid shortages at government centers, people had to either pay for a vaccine, or not get a shot.

The change in policy also expanded eligibility to all adults. Expanding the criteria despite shortages meant shots weren't always going to the groups the federal government initially said it would prioritize: those with essential jobs and the elderly. Since May, more people younger than 45 have received their first shot than those older than 60. More than 74 million people over 60 remain unvaccinated.

Modi said these decisions were taken to satisfy the states' demands, but the fractured response may have cost lives, said Dr. Vineeta Bal, who studies immune systems at the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research in Pune city.

___

WHAT HAS CHANGED NOW?

The federal government has now decided to buy a larger portion of vaccines  but it's still not returning fully to its original policy. It will buy 75% of all vaccines made for use in India and likely renegotiate prices. These shots will be given to states and will continue to be distributed for free. Private hospitals can buy the remaining 25% at prices that have been capped and can charge for them.

States will receive vaccines based on their populations, disease burdens and how many people have been vaccinated. They will be penalized for wasting doses.

But supply remains a challenge. Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said: Where will the vaccines come from is a big question.

India has placed orders for vaccines still in development, but for the moment it will continue to rely on existing, overstretched suppliers like the Serum Institute of India.

___

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.
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EDWARDSVILLE  A Cottage Hills man identified as homeless was charged Wednesday with failure to register as a sex offender.

William S. Keene, 41, listed as homeless out of Cottage Hills, was charged June 16 with unlawful failure to register as a sex offender, a Class 3 felony.

The case was presented by the Madison County Sheriffs Department.

According to court documents, on June 15, Keene failed to report a change of address within three days, as required by law.

According to state records, Keene has a conviction for predatory criminal sexual assault out of Macoupin County, and is considered non-compliant and is listed as a sexual predator.

Bail was set at $20,000.

Other felony charges filed June 16 by the Madison County States Attorneys Office include:

 Timothy R. Baggett, 33, of the 900 block of Southard, South Roxana, was charged with offenses relating to motor vehicles, a Class 2 felony. The case was presented by the Bethalto Police Department. According to court documents, on June 16 Baggett was found to be in possession of a stolen 1997 GMC truck. Bail was set at $50,000.

 Willie B. White, 45, of St. Louis, was charged with unlawful possession of a stolen license plate, a Class 2 felony. The case was presented by the Troy Police Department. According to court documents, on June 13 White was found to be in possession of a stolen Missouri license plate. Bail was set at $40,000.

 Sammie L. Washington, 62, of Berkeley, Missouri, was charged with forgery, a Class 3 felony. The case was presented by the Edwardsville Police Department. According to court documents, on June 15 Washington tried to pass a bad check. Bail was set at $15,000.

 Brent W. Richmond, 44, of the 1800 block of Bremen Avenue, Granite City, was charged with theft over $500, a Class 3 felony. The case was presented by the Madison Police Department. According to court documents, on June 11 Richmond took a 30-foot trailer and tool box valued in excess of $500 from United Ironworkers. Bail was set at $50,000.

 Aaron T. Perry, 34, of the 500 block of Ridge Street, Alton, was charged with theft over $500, a Class 3 felony. The case was presented by the Alton Police Department. According to court documents, on May 6 Perry took paint and paint supplies valued at $3,338.36 from The Landings at Belle Meadows. Bail was set at $15,000.

 Kris A. Tinnon, 53, of the 2100 block of Country Club, Alton, was charged with retail theft over $300, a Class 3 felony. The case was presented by the Alton Police Department. According to court documents, on May 18 Tinnon took an electric generator from Tractor Supply Co., 3001 Homer Adams Parkway. Bail was set at $15,000.

 Zachary S. Montague, 27, of the 2700 block of North Street, Alton, was charged with aggravated fleeing or attempting to elude a peace officer, a Class 4 felony. The case was presented by the Bethalto Police Department. According to court documents, on June 11 Montague attempted to flee from a Bethalto police officer, causing more than $3,000 in damage to personal property. Bail was set at $25,000.
LaTida Smith announced her resignation as president and CEO of Moses Taylor Foundation after six years.

Smith will leave in August to take a new position as president of The Winston-Salem Foundation in North Carolina.

The foundation's board of directors will launch a search for its next president and CEO this summer. Updates will be shared on its website.

Moses Taylor Foundation is a catalyst in continuing the philanthropic legacy of Moses Taylor by providing opportunities for people in Northeast Pennsylvania, especially the most vulnerable, to lead healthy lives.
A 74-year-old Clarks Summit man pleaded guilty to unsworn falsification to authorities in connection with used-car dealerships in Wyoming and Lackawanna counties, as well as five separate counts of disciplinary action.

Neil Christopher Neary, 74, of Clarks Summit, appeared last week with his attorney, Timothy Michaels, in a virtual court hearing before Wyoming County President Judge Russell Shurtleff.

For the single charge of unsworn falsification to authorities on Nov. 30, 2018, Neary could face up to two years in prison and a fine of $5,000, Shurtleff said.

District Attorney Jeff Mitchell said Neary made false statements to a state trooper after he failed to produce business records when requested by other agencies.

The case came to light when a woman purchased a car in 2018, at Complete Body Repair & Sales, just west of Factoryville, and was denied a loan. She went to recover her vehicle used as a trade-in, and was told she couldnt have it back as it had already been sold.

She traced the vehicle to Prestige Motors in South Abington Twp., where she asked a salesperson about taking it for a ride. Then she drove it straight to the township police to report a theft.

Eventually the state trooper put together a web of suspicious activity which, in the original complaint, listed 119 summary charges against Neary, including license suspension, engaging in unprofessional conduct, failing to produce business records and assigning blank certificates.

In a plea arrangement, Neary accepted responsibility only for the lone misdemeanor charge as well as five counts of disciplinary proceedings that carry a mandatory penalty of $1,000 each. He will be sentenced at a later date.

Other guilty pleas entered last week in Tunkhannock:

Jameek N. Bartley Jr., 23, of Hempstead, N.Y., pleaded guilty to DUI on July 31, 2020.

Mark Phillp Bennett Jr., 35, of Point Pleasant, W.Va., pleaded guilty to DUI on March 24.

Alan Edwin Blaisure, 29, of Carbondale, pleaded guilty to defiant trespass on Jan. 28, 2020.

Jeremy William Campbell, 35, of Scranton, pleaded guilty to possession of drug paraphernalia on Aug. 30, 2020. He was immediately sentenced to a $500 fine and four to 12 months in state prison, concurrent to a current Lackawanna County sentence.

Thomas Joseph Gayton, 62, of Wyoming, pleaded guilty to obstructing administration of law on Sept. 14, 2019.

Kurt James Goerlitz, 60, of Scranton, pleaded guilty to DUI on April 9.

Tommy Lee Jackson, 53, of Tunkhannock, pleaded guilty to harassment on June 14, 2020.

Brooke True Maloney, 25, of Dalton, pleaded guilty to disorderly conduct on March 19.

Jonathan Davis Miller, 38, of Lake Winola, pleaded guilty to simple assault on April 17, 2019; and to possession of drug paraphernalia on Sept. 4, 2020.

Nathan Todd Nystrand, 27, of Mehoopany, pleaded guilty to DUI on Jan. 15.

Thomas E. Radwanski, 46, of Tunkhannock, pleaded guilty to DUI on Nov. 27, 2020.

Joseph Hunter Schatzel, 29, of Dallas, pleaded guilty to indecent assault on June 26, 2020.

Elizabeth Barbara-Rose Smith, 24, of Scranton, pleaded guilty to possession of drug paraphernalia on Aug. 20, 2020.

Kelly Carroll Strohl, 28, of Tunkhannock, pleaded guilty to theft by unlawful taking on Jan. 11, 2019.

Jeffrey Paul Walkowiak, 44, of Plains Twp., pleaded guilty to harassment and disorderly conduct on March 8.

Bradley David Warner Sr., 38, of Kingsley, pleaded guilty to possession of drug paraphernalia on Nov. 12, 2020.

Jason David Westbrook, 39, of Montrose, pleaded guilty to DUI, second offense, on Jan. 24, 2020.
A city man stabbed another man in the chest with a steak knife Tuesday night, police said.

Police responded to 300 Meadow Ave. at 9:54 p.m. Tuesday for a reported stabbing, where they found David Irving with a single stab wound to his chest, according to a criminal complaint. At the hospital, Irving told police he had been playing videogames when his brother's friend, Elijah Wade, 18, 615 Back St., punched him. He punched Wade back, and Wade grabbed a steak knife and stabbed him in the chest, according to the complaint.

Wade also confessed to stabbing Irving, police said.

Wade is charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, simple assault and recklessly endangering another person.

Wade remains in Lackawanna County Prison in lieu of $50,000 bail with a preliminary hearing 11 a.m. Wednesday.
Mayor Paige Gebhardt Cognetti blasted the Scranton Single Tax Office in a May letter to the state auditor general to gain advantage in union contract negotiations, Scranton Tax Collector Bill Fox alleged in his own letter to the states top financial watchdog.

Fox, who oversees the single tax office, also alleged in an interview Cognettis criticisms were meant to hurt his chances of filling the unexpired state House term of now-state Sen. Marty Flynn. Local Republicans and Democrats will choose nominees for Flynns seat to compete in a special election Nov. 2; Fox will seek the Democratic nomination.

Cognetti, who worked briefly as a special assistant to former Auditor General Eugene DePasquale before running for mayor, rejects both charges.

Citing a lack of accountability and transparency at the single tax office, Cognetti sent a letter to state Auditor General Timothy DeFoor late last month outlining numerous concerns and requesting a performance audit of the office that collects city, Scranton School District and Lackawanna County property taxes and other levies. The school district supports Cognettis request, board President Katie Gilmartin wrote in her own letter to DeFoor dated June 4. Both the city and school district provide funding for the single tax office.

Among other issues, Cognetti wrote the office provides no routine reporting on collections activity by account/property and claimed constituent calls have raised questions about whether payments are being applied correctly to taxpayers accounts.

In a response to the mayor June 9, DeFoor noted his department lacks authority to conduct the performance audit.

Fox, in the last year of his second and final term as tax collector, contends the mayors critical audit request letter was meant to influence negotiations for a new contract covering about 16 single tax office employees represented by the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers Local 2462. The current contract was to expire at the end of 2020 but was automatically renewed for one year.

Negotiations for a new contract are ongoing among the city, the school district, the union and Fox, who, according to attorney John Appleton, has the right as tax collector to manage all operations of the single tax office under Article 24 of the current contract. Appleton, who is representing Fox in the negotiations, said theyve been somewhat contentious.

While not performance audits, the single tax office is audited by independent CPA firms paid by both the city and school district. Foxs June 10 letter to the auditor general states that at no time during his time in office did any auditor find any adverse issue with the operation of the STO, nor were recommendations regarding operation proffered.

He accused the city and school district of attempting to influence the negotiations later in the letter, which was sent before face-to-face negotiations with a mediator began this week.

One would be naive to not recognize that the mayor has turned to a recent employer to cast aspersions on the STO in order to gain negotiating advantage in the forthcoming negotiations for a new CBA (collective bargaining agreement) with the union, Fox wrote. This is borne out by the city ignoring past recent audit findings and attempting to incorporate your office nefariously, in an endeavor to pressure the union in the bargaining for a new agreement.

Both Cognetti and Gilmartin said their respective letters to DeFoor were unrelated to the ongoing negotiations.

As was made clear in my letter to the Auditor Generals office, my request for a performance audit was made necessary by the lack of communication and responsiveness from the Single Tax Office, despite numerous attempts from the city to request accountings and information for over the past year, Cognetti said in a statement.

Gilmartin said trying to understand the workings of the single tax office has been an ongoing issue.

I would think strengthening the systems and processes in the single tax office would only be a benefit to the employees, Gilmartin said.

Fox and Appleton accused Cognetti of attempting to damage Foxs chances of attaining Flynns now-vacant former state House seat in a Thursday interview. They said the mayor didnt forward Fox a copy of the audit request letter when she sent it last month, and that he first learned of it through The Times-Tribune. Because Cognetti worked for the former auditor general, they argue she should have known DeFoor lacked authority to perform the audit she requested.

They also accused the mayor of maligning Fox to bolster city Human Resources Director Amber Violas chances of attaining Flynns former seat.

The newspaper reported in May that Viola, a Scranton resident and Navy veteran, was considering whether to seek the Democratic nomination. Efforts to reach Viola were unsuccessful Thursday.

She (Cognetti) wanted to undermine him (Fox) as far as her candidate is concerned, Appleton said, arguing later the mayor started the election cycle for Marty Flynns seat with that letter.

Cognettis statement rejected that accusation.

The citys letter clearly documents our motivation for requesting outside review, the statement reads. Our concerns are serious and our approach to understanding the processes and governance of the Single Tax Office is as serious. The tax collectors baseless allegations around labor negotiations and politics appear to be an attempt to deflect from the issues we have raised.

The city hopes to reach an agreement reasonable for both sides as labor negotiations continue, Cognetti said in the statement, noting negotiations must be conducted in the chambers of good faith and privacy, away from political issues and influences.

Cognetti has asked that city council and the school district discuss with her administration the idea of soliciting a request for qualifications for an independent performance audit of the single tax office.

Before learning the auditor general lacked authority to audit his office, Fox wrote to DeFoor that hes always been a person who respects transparency in elected offices and pledged his full cooperation.
Scholarships awarded

West Scranton High School 2021 graduates Celeste Juarez and Brennan Burnside received the fifth annual Captain James R. Minicozzi Memorial Scholarships.

Celeste will attend Penn State Scranton and major in business and economics. Brennan will attend Marywood University and major in early childhood and elementary education.

Proceeds for the scholarships, awarded at Minicozzis alma mater, are raised from the Capt. James R. Minicozzi Memorial Race through the Scranton UNICO Chapter during La Festa Italiana over Labor Day weekend.

To register for this years 5K run or 1 mile fun walk on Sept. 4 at 10 a.m. during this years La Festa Italiana in downtown Scranton or to make a donation, visit runsignup.com/Minicozzi.

High notes

Patrick Williams was named Post Chaplain of the Year by the Department of Pennsylvania, Veterans of Foreign Wars. Williams, chaplain of Abington Memorial, VFW Post 7069, Clarks Summit, was selected for the honor from over 400 VFW post chaplains throughout the state.

Williams served three years in the United States Army and gained his VFW eligibility while serving in Germany during the Cold War. He worked at County of Lackawanna Transportation System as a transportation manager and formerly served as a member of Clarks Summit Borough Council for 18 years.

A life member of the VFW, Williams has served as Post 7069 chaplain for 10 years. He and his wife, Carol, are the parents of four children and have eight grandchildren.

Marywood team wins

Marywood University School of Architecture students won first place in the Attached Housing Division of the 2021 United States Department of Energy Solar Decathlon Design Challenge.

The students design is the Electric Jane, an affordable, net-zero energy prototype for Habitat for Humanity.

The decathlon is an international collegiate competition that challenges student teams to design and build highly efficient and innovative buildings that are powered by renewable energy.

Marywood University faculty members including Jodi La Coe, Ph.D., assistant professor of architecture; and Elizabeth Andrzejewski, instructor of architecture at Marywood University, served as the team leaders, and were supported by Maria MacDonald, professor of practice of interior architecture and executive director of the Center for the Living City; Russell Roberts, lecturer in the School of Architecture; and Bill Conlogue, Ph.D., professor in the English program at Marywood University; as well as other faculty who offered their expertise to the students.

The team was also supported by industry partners, including Richard Pedranti Architect, Greenman-Pedersen Inc., Build SMART and Habitat for Humanity.
A man told police he shot and killed his neighbor's dog on Thursday afternoon in West Scranton when it attacked his German shepherd.

Kyle Farro, 32, 133 S. Grant Ave., told officers he was in his backyard with his German shepherd when a mastiff belonging to his neighbor, Neil Ivanoff, 62, 125 S. Grant Ave., broke out of its fenced-in backyard and began chasing them, Lt. Phil Condron said. Police responded to the shooting at 1:34 p.m.

Farro and his dog tried to run into their home, but the mastiff caught his dog by the throat and pinned it to the ground, Condron said. In response, Farro told police he ran inside, got his legally owned firearm and shot the dog once to stop the attack, Condron said. When the dog did not stop, he shot again, killing it, the lieutenant said.

The German shepherd's condition was unavailable Thursday night.

When asked if any charges could be filed, Condron said police are waiting on a follow-up from the animal control officer.

The investigation is ongoing, he said.
After a pause last year because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Noxen will once again be swimming in snakes this weekend.

Noxen Volunteer Fire Company Chief Lew Hackling is excited about the schedule of events for this years Rattlesnake Roundup, including the main attraction: the rattlers themselves. Canceling the festival last year, which educates the public about the slithering creatures while raising money for the fire company, definitely hurt.

This year all we have to worry about is the weather, said Hackling. We were fortunate to get some COVID relief money ... but for a year and a half we were shut down completely.

The actual rounding up part of the Roundup will be for snakes that are not endangered or a candidate for the endangered species list. All hunters must be licensed by the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission and bring their own equipment. Also, female snakes may not be captured.

We have come a long way in identifying the snakes, so we can tell which are the males and females. We dont want to capture females because the rattlesnake population is in danger, said Hackling.

The registered snake hunters this year have increased slightly from the 2019 festival, which Hackling attributed to people recovering from cabin fever.

According to the Fish and Boat Commission, the timber rattlesnake is listed on Pennsylvanias Wildlife Action Plan as a species of immediate concern. It is one of seven reptiles in this highest-priority tier and protected under specific regulations by the commission.

Across both days of 2019s hunt, 68 registered hunters brought in 39 timber rattlesnakes, seven copperheads and 25 nonvenomous snakes. Awards are given to hunters in a variety of categories, including the most species.

The snakes are on display from 1 to 8 p.m. Saturday and 1 to 5 p.m. Sunday. In addition to the main attraction, the festival will feature music, food, rides, a beer tent, vendors and a Firemans Bazaar. The Firemens Parade will begin at 6 p.m. Saturday, and the festival will end with a fireworks display Sunday around 9:30 p.m.

Grounds open at 6 tonight and 1 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday.
Wreaths Across America  a nationwide nonprofit organization that recognizes veterans  is bringing its Mobile Education Exhibit to the Wyoming Valley as part of its Pennsylvania tour.

The exhibit on wheels provides interactive opportunities, short films and other group activities to educate attendees.

The first stop is 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday in the Plymouth City Hall parking lot and is hosted by the Plymouth American Legion. Festivities begin at 8 a.m., with a police escort for veterans. Brunch is offered from 8 a.m. to noon, which is $9 for adults and $4.50 for children. Bernie Dorshefski is the location coordinator.

On Sunday, the Wyoming Valley Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution will host the exhibit from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. in the Lowes parking area in Wilkes-Barre Twp.
Editor: Some people say America is protectionist (Protectionisms record of failure, June 8).

Really, are people that ignorant?

I worked for a company that was bought by a German company. They have bought two more companies since. I am drinking a Budweiser beer, which is owned by a company in Belgium. I am smoking a cigarette from Commonwealth Brands, a British discount cigarette manufacturer.

I bought my cigarettes and beer at a convenience store owned by natives of India who didnt pay the taxes American owners would have paid. Many American car manufacturers have major production plants in Mexico. Meanwhile, theres a shortage of cars.

Do people consider these elements of protectionism? We are selling America to foreigners at a blinding pace and the profits from almost everything we buy goes into overseas banks. Everyone worries about tariffs and global warming, but even my cats food is made by a Swiss company.

Its a little too late to talk of protectionism, isnt it. There is almost nothing left in America to protect.

CHRIS CARPENTER

DICKSON CITY

Editor: Monday was Flag Day.

We live in the United States of America and the U.S. flag is the red, white and blue, the Stars and Stripes. If you wish to honor a flag in this country, this is the flag that you should fly.

We are a country of immigrants. My family came from England and landed in Malden, Massachusetts, in 1649. It is correct and proper that we should be proud of our national ancestry and heritage. But when you fly a flag in this country, it should be the American flag. Remember that you, or members of your family or ancestors of yours, left another country for whatever reason in order to come to this country. America has many faults but it has more freedoms than any other country in our world.

I am a proud veteran of the U.S. Army. I came home from my service with all of my body parts intact. Many did not, but we have these freedoms because brave men and women have fought, and some even made the ultimate sacrifice, to preserve these freedoms under the U.S. flag.

One of our freedoms is the freedom to go to another country and live under their flag if we desire. The door is wide open, but while you wish to stay in this country, the American flag is your national flag.

JOE SKINNER

CLARKS SUMMIT
Brenda Darlene (Burnett, Witt, Bollmer) Curtin, 52, of Cincinnati, Ohio passed away June 21, 2021. She was born November 13, 1968, in Cincinnati, Ohio to the late Gladys (Jones) Napier and the late Wilburn Burnett. Brenda was preceded in death by a daughter, Jennifer Witt and sisters Alta Ru
Westerly, RI (02891)

Today

Cloudy with occasional rain showers. Cooler. High 69F. Winds ENE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 60%..

Tonight

Considerable cloudiness with occasional rain showers. Low 58F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 60%.
Westerly, RI (02891)

Today

Considerable cloudiness. Occasional rain showers this afternoon. High near 70F. Winds ENE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%..

Tonight

Showers this evening becoming a steady light rain overnight. Low 58F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 60%.
There is no end in sight for surging fuel prices, with the AA saying rises at the pump will only strengthen the argument for switching to an electric vehicle.

The last month has recorded another 2p-a-litre rise in the average petrol price, pushing unleaded to a high not seen for almost three years, according to the latest fuel report from the motoring organisation.

Between mid-May and mid-June, petrol has jumped from 128.43p to 130.69p-a-litre. Drivers last encountered prices at this level in late October 2018, the AA's Fuel Price Report reveals.

And with oil prices reportedly on the verge of soaring in value, experts from the motoring organisation say it makes for a compelling reason to buy an EV now, rather than waiting for the ban on new petrol and diesel cars in in 2030.

Another hike at the pumps pushes petrol over 1.30-a-litre: The AA says another 2p has been added to the cost of a litre of unleaded and diesel in the last month. Should you start thinking about owning an electric car?

A review of prices up and down the country has found a huge disparity in the cost of unleaded.

One retailer in Lancaster is selling petrol for 121.9p-a-litre, while a Gulf filling station in central London is charging an eye-watering 163.5p per litre of unleaded.

That's a difference of 41.6p per litre, which works out at a huge 22.88 difference when filling a 55-litre fuel tank of an average-size family hatchback.

Diesel has also increased on average by 2p-a-lite in the last month, now charged at 133.08p per litre compared to 130.81p in the middle of May, says the AA.

The last time the 'workhorse' fuel was that expensive was back in June 2019, historical data shows.

Between mid-May and mid-June, petrol has jumped from 128.43p to 130.69p-a-litre. Drivers last encountered prices at this level in late October 2018, the AA's Fuel Price Report says

A scan of average pump prices by major retailer brand now shows bigger gaps between the Big Four supermarkets

A review of prices up and down the country has found a huge disparity in the cost of unleaded. A Sainsbury's retailer in Lancaster (left) is selling petrol for 121.9p-a-litre, while a Gulf filling station in central London (right) is charging an eye-watering 163.5p per litre of unleaded.

A scan of average pump prices by major retailer brand now shows bigger gaps between the Big Four supermarkets.

This is being flagged by drivers as the easing of lockdown allows them to start travelling around the country and they discover supermarket fuel often 4p-a-litre - the equivalent of 2-a-tank - cheaper than in their home town.

The AA says the most recent 2p hike and the speculator-driven surge in oil prices - now higher than pre-pandemic - is making one of the best cases for the switch to electric cars, leading to the eventual demise of the road fossil fuel trade.

Petrol prices have been rising since November, with demand for fuel increasing as Covid-19 global lockdowns begin to lift

For drivers who were already contemplating a post-covid car change, the argument for switching to electric has 'become very much stronger' on the back of hiked fuel costs, AA says

'Now that many are travelling on staycations, road trips or out and about for work, drivers are beginning to rumble that lockdown was not only a matter of being restricted to their local area but also being locked into higher pump prices,' says Luke Bosdet, the AA's fuel price spokesman.

These are the average fuel prices by region across the UK

'Holidaymakers heading to big towns in more rural parts of the country are often discovering pump prices that are 4p-a-litre or 2-a-tank cheaper than where they came from, even at the supermarkets.

'This has turned the current pump price shock into even more of a nasty surprise.

'For those contemplating a post-covid car change, the argument for switching to electric has become very much stronger.'

Zap-Map, the website that plots every public charger in the country and provides information on battery electric car running costs, estimates a nearly 7p-a-mile saving for a small electric car (paying 16.5p per kWh) commuting 20 miles a day compared to the petrol version (paying 1.30 a litre)  a daily saving of nearly 1.40.

Respectively, the cost per mile is 4.6p versus 11.5p.

With off-peak home charging costs as low as 4.5p to 5p per kWh, the EV cost of that journey can fall to 1.2p a mile or 25p for the whole commute.
There is much to like about the upcoming float of Wise. By choosing London for its listing it reinforces the UK's reputation as a good place to launch fintech enterprises.

Fintech has become a lynchpin of the City's global ambitions five years after the Brexit referendum.

Wise is choosing to use the London Stock Exchange's direct listing process to set the price rather than allow investment banks to dictate terms. The latter approach backfired at Deliveroo and Made.

Wise decision: Fintech has become a lynchpin of the City's global ambitions five years after the Brexit referendum

Founder chief executive Kristo Kaarmann wants to deepen the relationship with both consumers and business customers by encouraging them to buy shares, and is offering a bonus share for every 20 bought.

The founders are not shrinking violets. Kaarmann describes the behaviour of banks, which dominate money transfers, as scandalous.

Customers may think the cost of a bank transfer at 5 to 10 is reasonable. The reality is banks make big, undisclosed profits on the exchange rate spreads.

Wise has a modest fee, makes nothing on the spread and deploys faster, less clunky tech. It reckons it is eight times cheaper than the big banks and has a competitive infrastructure in the UK through 85 institutions, allowing processing in 88 countries.

Payments innovators such as Wise are tolerated by the banks, which are so dominant. Businesses, a key target for Wise, tend to prefer one-stop shopping for banking services and Wise has no loan facilities.

It operates deposit and debit operations but doesn't want to get involved in the regulatory hassle of offering credit.

The founders don't much like talking about the eventual valuation, although 9billion is discussed. If that is the case then it will be a big morsel for a take-out.

Among the cornerstone investors Edinburgh-based Baillie Gifford is comfortable that the dual class share structure will enable Wise to concentrate on customers. That should serve as a warning to marauders: steer clear.

Purple haze

Prospects for Premier Inn owner Whitbread are brighter since hospitality picked up after the May 21 easing of lockdown.

There is a tendency to think of Premier Inn as a destination for travelling business people but the confusion over holiday flights ought to be good for summer bookings.

The difficulty is that discussion about restored health of the underlying enterprise, under chief executive Alison Brittain, has been swamped by division among investment advisory groups over bonuses.

The 35 per cent dissident vote against the decision to carry over a cancelled bonus payment for 2020 until the current year is an own goal for the pay committee.

It is unusual to have the august legions of the Investment Association dissing bonus arrangements when radicals at Pirc have not objected.

After decades of controversy over executive rewards, dating back to the row over Cedric Brown's pay at British Gas in 1995, the system remains flawed. Remuneration reports are long and complex and are stuffed with obfuscation.

Doubtless the Danish chairman of Whitbread's pay committee, Frank Fiskers, is a fine fellow with great experience of European hotels.

But it doesn't require genius to recognise that committing to a future bonus in a pandemic for a firm which has made necessary redundancies and benefited from Government support schemes is naive.

Chairman Adam Crozier, at the core of many pay rows of his own, should have recognised this.

One explanation for Brittain's carried-over award is that she lacks a long-term bonus plan. But whose fault is that?

The fundamental problem is the cosy relationship between pay committees and remuneration consultants, most of which are offshoots of the Big Four accounting firms.

Potential conflicts of interest are manifold and the ability of some bosses to game the system and wreak unnecessary havoc among investors is only too easy.

Chasing assets

Another reminder of how UK fintech is lighting up the City. JP Morgan Chase is to snaffle up the digital fund manager Nutmeg, with its 140,000 customers and 3.5billion of assets, for a figure not far short of 1billion.

Nutmeg will be an adjunct to new UK digital bank Chase. The deal is both a compliment to UK ingenuity and a disappointment, as it ends up in overseas hands.

It makes chairman Jamie Dimon's warnings of decline for the City look rusty.
To fly over London in an AW149 military helicopter on a clear summers morning is to experience a magnificent vision of the capital in its glory.

On a thrilling trip from Londons heliport in Battersea, we zip by Hampton Court and Buckingham Palace, and enjoy a birds-eye view of The Shards gleaming pinnacle.

In the seat next to me is Nick Whitney, Leonardo Helicopters managing director. Far below is the Olympic stadium, where the Queen and James Bond were airlifted into the 2012 opening ceremony in one of his choppers.

Ready for takeoff: A Leonardo AW149 helicopter leaves Battersea Heliport. The AW149 is Leonardos contender for the Ministry of Defences plan to buy a new medium helicopter

Normally, the AW149 would be stashed with machine guns and rocket launchers, but they wont let us fly along the Thames with military weaponry, Whitney says, looking mildly regretful.

It would also be equipped with a highly sophisticated defensive system to protect the troops on board from being blown to smithereens by anti-aircraft missiles.

Fortunately, thats not necessary on our jaunt.

After following the snaking route of the river, we head out into the countryside where the pilots demonstrate how manoeuvrable it is, which is vital in a war zone.

The AW149 is Leonardos contender for the Ministry of Defences (MoD) recently announced plan to buy a new medium helicopter.

Maximum speed is 193 miles an hour and it can carry up to 16 fully equipped personnel.

Considering all that, it is relatively quiet and smooth.

We dont want troops staggering off the helicopter because they have had such a noisy, bumpy ride. Theyve got to be ready for combat, says Whitney.

If chosen, the AW149 would replace the Puma and three aircraft, understood to be the Bell 412, the Bell 212 and the Dauphin N3.

The price is confidential and would depend on exactly how it is kitted out. To give some idea, according to aviation sources, the AW189 civilian version costs around 18million to 20million.

At the moment, the AW149 is made in Italy, but if Leonardo wins the contract from the MoD, the helicopters will be manufactured in Yeovil in Somerset, where the company employs around 3,100 people.

Its activities in the area support a total of more than 12,000 UK jobs.

Leonardo owns several former big names in aviation including Marconi Instruments in Luton and Ferranti in Edinburgh, as well as the former Westland helicopters in Yeovil.

Westlands history dates back to the First World War, when the first aircraft built there in 1916, a torpedo-carrying Short 184 seaplane made of wood, wire and fabric, was towed off the site by horse and cart.

In the Second World War, more than 2,000 Spitfires and Seafires were produced.

The Westland name more recently became synonymous with a huge political row in the mid-1980s when Michael Heseltine, then defence secretary, fell out with Margaret Thatcher.

She wanted the then-struggling company to merge with Sikorsky of the US, while Hezza favoured a European solution.

The Iron Lady prevailed, and subsequently the business passed through the hands of a number of owners including GKN and Finmeccanica of Italy, which changed its name to Leonardo in 2016.

High flyers: The Mails Ruth Sunderland with Leonardos Nick Whitney. The company is the second largest supplier of defence equipment to the MoD after BAE Systems

Today, Leonardo makes Merlins and Wildcats and is the second largest supplier of defence equipment to the MoD after BAE Systems.

Over the past year, its Merlin and Wildcat helicopters have been helping to fight Covid-19, by transporting key personnel and acting as air ambulances.

The competition is likely to include Sikorskys Black Hawk, though industry expert Howard Wheeldon suggests the Airbus H175 and H225M Caracal are the main contenders to compete with AW149.

Leonardos chances of winning the contract are good, if the Government has taken on board the message about maintaining sovereign capability.

It is theirs to lose, Wheeldon says. He adds that the AW149 would make an excellent choice.

Leonardo claims to be the only company that will produce the helicopters in the UK from start to finish.

That is important, because if they are made abroad, it could entail losing vital skills and intellectual property. In turn, that would risk weakening our military capability and our ability to defend the realm.

The helicopter sector in the UK is at a crossroads. Currently, we have the capability to do everything here. If we get this order it will sustain that, says Whitney.

We need to build and maintain capability in the UK, we cant just buy it in.

We are the only company that can make helicopters in the UK all the way from start to finish, from design to delivery.

Initially they would come out of Italy because we have a production line working there. But they could be finished in Yeovil, and then later aircraft could be built completely in Yeovil.

We can raise the UK content of the helicopter to 65 per cent. But that is not the end of the story.

If you operate an aircraft for, say, 25 years, then there is a lot of income from servicing  around 75 per cent of the money you spend will be on support.

Whitney also argues a contract win for Leonardo will help the economic recovery and the Governments levelling up agenda.

The aerospace industry has been hit hard in the pandemic as commercial flights have been grounded, and desperately needs to bounce back.

Every 1 spent on a Leonardo helicopter product in the UK leads to 2.40 flowing back in the economy, through our employees, through the supply base we activate, he says.

Levelling up is not just about the North, it is places like Yeovil too. We are the pre-eminent employer here and if you take us out of the equation the average salary would fall quite far.

The South West has been badly affected by the pandemic because it is dependent on tourism.

We recruit 160 apprentices and graduates every year. This year, 53 per cent of applicants were female, which is fantastic for getting more women into engineering.

I started out as an apprentice myself. I desperately want to make sure we have capacity to bring more youngsters in.

Post-Brexit, he believes that the defence sector has the potential to become stronger.

One of the things the UK has going for it is that we are right at the front of this industry.

We need the skills and engineers in the UK, and Brexit has heightened awareness of that.

Ten years ago engineering was not seen as a career to encourage your children to go into. I find that really shocking.

But the Government has finally woken up to the fact that we need to build and manufacture to grow our way back to prosperity, and engineering is the basis of that.

The MoD may sign up for between 30 and 40 helicopters. The hope is that will be a catalyst for export orders.

Many overseas customers look to the MoD, says Whitney. We conservatively estimate there would then be 500-550 aircraft that could then be sold over a ten-year period.

Boris Johnson said: Build back better. I say: Build helicopters and build them in the UK.
Financial technology star Wise has confirmed plans to float, in what is expected to be London's biggest stock market debut of the year.

The global payments company is plotting the Square Mile's first direct listing, meaning it will not seek to raise cash and will simply float its existing shares.

These will be valued by an auction before general trading opens up.

London listing: Wise co-founders Kristo Kaarmann (pictured) and Taavet Hinrikus, as well as investors such as Richard Branson, are set to make huge windfalls when the company floats

The firm could be worth up to 9billion. Listing directly has not been used in London before.

HOW THIS IS MONEY CAN HELP How to choose the best (and cheapest) DIY investing platform and stocks and shares Isa

The float is expected to net Estonian co-founders Kristo Kaarmann and Taavet Hinrikus, as well as investors such as Richard Branson, hundreds of millions of pounds.

Kaarmann owns a 19.8 per cent stake, documents revealed yesterday, while Hinrikus owns 11.5 per cent.

The pair could be in line for as much as 1.8billion and 1billion respectively if Wise meets expectations.

Valar, the investment vehicle of Paypal billionaire Peter Thiel, owns 10.8 per cent and US venture capital fund Andreessen Horowitz owns 9.8 per cent.

Former Trainline chief executive Claire Gilmartin will also add to her personal fortune, and will sit on the board.

Wise could attract controversy with a dual-class share structure that gives Kaarmann, Hinrikus and existing shareholders outsized voting powers compared with newcomers.

Kaarmann said: 'A direct listing allows us a cheaper and more transparent way to broaden Wise's ownership, aligned with our mission.'
The boss of Premier Inn hotels Alison Brittain was dealt a blow by shareholders after being awarded a bonus despite the company posting a 1billion loss.

Investors in parent company Whitbread cast 35.8 per cent of votes against the companys pay report, handing chief executive Brittain and the board a bloody nose over its decision to dish out 1.5million of performance payouts.

This was despite the company receiving more than 250million of taxpayer support, making 1,500 staff redundant and cutting the dividend to zero.

Investors in Premier Inn's parent company Whitbread cast 35.8 per cent of votes against the companys pay report which hands chief exec Alison Brittain (pictured) a 729,000 bonus

It also came after the company posted a 1billion loss in the year to the end of March, compared with a 280millio profit the year before.

Despite this, Brittain could get an 729,000 annual bonus, while finance chief Nicholas Cadbury is in line for 492,000.

The vote is embarrassing, especially as it comes less than two years after the substantial 30.2 per cent revolt against the companys move to institute a less arduous restricted share scheme for executives.

Yesterdays vote earned the firm a red top warning from the Investment Association (IA), which looks after 8.5trillion for investors, and is one of Britains most powerful voices on executive pay. ISS, another group which advises shareholders, also said the significant awards are not considered appropriate when staff, taxpayers and investors have suffered.

More than a third of shareholders, voting at the companys virtual annual general meeting yesterday, agreed.

Any vote over 20 per cent is considered a revolt, and will be enough to earn Whitbread a place on the IAs list of shame.

They threw out the companys attempt to dampen opposition by delaying the awards until 2022, when they will be subject to another round of targets. The company said this meant no bonus payments were actually made this year.

Whitbread said it had noted the response and would continue to have constructive discussions with shareholders, adding: We will report on any actions resulting from those discussions in due course.

Yesterday, the company reported very strong bookings throughout the summer from tourists planning to travel to hotels in UK coastal and rural locations.

It has now opened 98 per cent of its hotels, but warned the recovery of its pubs were dependent on lockdown restrictions being lifted on July 19.

In the three months to May 30, takings in its Premier Inns were at 39.1 per cent of 2019 levels, while revenues in its pubs, which include the Beefeater and Brewers Fayre brands, were at 14 per cent of 2019 levels.

Taken together, the groups revenue was just under 30 per cent of 2019 levels over the three-month period.
Online wealth adviser Nutmeg has been snapped up by JP Morgan as the Wall Street titan wades into the UK savings market.

JP Morgan declined to reveal how much it had spent on the nine-year-old firm, but it is understood the deal values Nutmeg at around 700million.

Founders Nick Hungerford, a former stockbroker, and tech entrepreneur William Todd will rake in several million pounds through the deal.

UK foothold: Wall Street titan JP Morgan declined to reveal how much it had spent on Nutmeg, but it is understood the deal values the online wealth advisor at around 700m

Sir Victor Blank, the former chairman of Lloyds Bank during the financial crisis, was an early backer and is likely to make a generous return.

So will more than 2,000 individual investors who ploughed almost 4million into Nutmeg through online platform Crowdcube in 2019.

Crowdcubes chief executive Darren Westlake said the sale had made a very healthy return for those investors, and the deal looked set to be the largest amount returned after a raise on the platform.

Venture capital firms including Balderton Capital and Pentech Ventures, asset manager Schroders, Taiwanese bank Taipei Fubon, the investment arm of Goldman Sachs, and Hong Kongs Convoy will also cash in.

Nutmeg, known as a robo-adviser, asks savers a set of questions through its website or mobile phone app to judge their risk appetite.

It then automatically invests their money into funds which track stock market indices like the FTSE 100. Because it relies on technology, and ploughs savers money into tracker funds, its fees are much lower than those charged by traditional wealth managers.

Nutmeg looks after more than 3.5billion of savers money, and has more than 140,000 customers. But it has never made a profit  in 2019, the last year for which it filed accounts, it was 21million in the red.

Even so, JP Morgan is hoping Nutmeg will give it a strong foothold in the UK as it looks to expand its consumer banking brand  Chase.

Robo-advisers have typically had to burn through money to attract customers, and now JP Morgan will acquire all of that work by snapping up Nutmeg.

The US bank plans to launch a range of products in Britain, starting with a new take on current accounts, which is in its testing phase.

Sanoke Viswanathan, chief executive of the international consumer bank at JP Morgan, said: We are building Chase in the UK from scratch using the very latest technology and putting the customers experience at the heart of our offering, principles that Nutmeg shares with us.

We look forward to positioning their award-winning products alongside our own, and continuing to support their innovative work.

JP Morgan said Nutmeg customers would be unaffected by the deal, but that it would be deciding whether to rebrand the robo-adviser under the JP Morgan or Chase brands.
More food and drink was sold to countries outside the European Union than within the bloc at the start of 2021 - though exports to the EU nearly halved, new data has shown.

The Food and Drink Federation (FDF) also said total food and drink exports to non-EU countries only rose by 0.3 per cent in the first three months of the year, even as it made up 55 per cent of all the sector's exports against 40 per cent last year.

EU nations bought 3.7billion in British food and drink compared to 5.1billion the year earlier and 2billion less than in 2019 before the UK had left the EU.

Sales drop: Food exports to the EU fell by 1.4billion in the first three months of the year

Of the 20 top export markets in the economic bloc, all except Lithuania bought less food and drink from the UK. For example, exports to the Republic of Ireland - the industry's second-largest EU market - plummeted by 680million to 281million.

Meanwhile, sales to Italy, Spain, and Germany, all of them top ten EU markets, more than halved, while the sale of breakfast cereals, savoury snacks and fish to the EU27 nations fell by 37.4 per cent, 40.2 per cent, and 47.1 per cent, respectively.

Decline: All bar one of the top 20 food and drink export markets in the EU, bought less food and drink from the UK in the first quarter

Dairy product exporters were the worst affected sector though, according to the FDF. Milk and cream exports plunged by over 90 per cent, with cheese exports declining by around two-thirds.

The FDF has additionally attributed the drop in part to new trade barriers thrown up following the UK's departure, such as sanitary checks and customs delays, but also to the Covid-19 pandemic impacting demand.

Dominic Goudie, the head of International Trade at the FDF, said: 'The loss of 2billion of exports to the EU is a disaster for our industry, and is a very clear indication of the scale of losses that UK manufacturers face in the longer-term due to new trade barriers with the EU.'

He called on the Government to 'stop prevaricating' and back its plan to help exporters who 'have been shut out of trading with the EU.'

Some of the drop will also be due to EU importers having stockpiled goods from the UK ahead of Brexit, remarked John Whitehead, the director of the Food and Drink Exporters Association.

Yet, he said, 'significant business has been lost as a direct result of the additional bureaucracy, customs delays and costs of trading with the EU.'

Deal done: Australian PM Scott Morrison (left) and British PM Boris Johnson (right) announcing the UK-Australia trade deal this week. The agreement has left many British farmers nervous that cheaper farming produce from Down Under will put them out of business

The pandemic has further hurt the level of goods coming from the EU, which declined by 10 per cent, as well as stockpiling in late 2020, recruitment problems in the hospitality industry and lower demand for specific ingredients.

Meanwhile, outside the EU, exports to numerous Asian states are getting larger, with overseas sales to Hong Kong and Japan rising modestly and by 18.5 per cent to South Korea, where British alcoholic drinks are becoming more popular.

China still remains the largest export market in Asia by far though. Total exports to the Middle Kingdom rose 28.2 per cent as Chinese consumers doubled their purchases of UK whisky, spirits and crustaceans. Vegetable oil exports also soared from 500,000 to 20.8million.

British whisky makers are optimistic that the Australian deal, alongside the UK and US's announcement this week to suspend tariffs on Scotch malts, will lead to a boost in sales

However, sales to the UK food and drink sector's biggest global export market, the United States, fell 18.2 per cent as tariffs on Scotch whisky and other foodstuffs like Stilton cheese continued to bite.

Sales to Australia increased 6.2 per cent, on the other hand. Yet, the free trade deal agreed between the UK and Australia this week has made many British farmers feeling nervous that cheaper food from Down Under will put them out of business.

British whisky makers are optimistic, though that the Australian deal, alongside the UK and US's announcement this week to suspend tariffs on Scotch malts, will boost purchases.
Midatech Pharma delighted investors after releasing what it called 'breakthrough' data relating to its Q-Sphera technology.

The biotech company, which uses 3D printing to put drugs into injectable microspheres, said the data demonstrated its potential and can open significant opportunities for the technology.

'A significant number of latest generation medicines are protein based and reformulation as long-acting injectables could provide significant benefits to patients, physicians and payors,' it said.

Midatech Pharma, which uses 3D printing to put drugs into injectable microspheres, delighted investors after releasing what it called 'breakthrough' data relating to its Q-Sphera technology

A strategic review has seen it shift from focusing on just one potential product to expanding its pipeline, which now has nine earlier stage programmes.

It was not all good news. Secura Bio, the owner of patents previously licensed to the company, is claiming breach of the terms even though the licence has now been terminated.

Midatech says the claims and demands are without any merit and investors seemed to agree, sending its shares up 37 per cent to 37p during the week.

Conversely, Best of the Best, which runs online competitions to win cars and other luxury prizes, tumbled 27 per cent to 1,995p as the easing of restrictions hit trading.

The company is online-only, which means that it's now struggling to keep customers glued to the screen amid the reopening of hospitality and non-essential retail.

Looking at the wider market, the AIM All-Share Index was down 0.6 per cent to 1,241, underperforming the FTSE 100 which was flat at 7,137.

Next week, AIM sees three new arrivals all due to start trading on Monday.

Predictive analytics group Spectral MD Holdings develops AI algorithms to help clinicians make more accurate and faster decisions in the wound care sector; Thor Explorations, already listed in Canada, is a gold exploration and development company focused in West Africa and despite the vintage sounding name, Victorian Plumbing is an online-only retailer of bathroom products and accessories.

Other risers over the past five days included Tavistock Investments, which soared 61 per cent to 4p after entering a ten-year strategic partnership with Titan Wealth, which will acquire Tavistock's asset management segment for 40million. Tavistock will act as Titan's retail distribution partner.

Westminster Group shot up 37 per cent to 5p after securing two separate long-term contracts to provide port screening services in West Africa and to provide security services to five airports in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The group also raised 2.5million through an oversubscribed placing at a small premium.

Zephyr Energy leapt 34 per cent to 5p after receiving two monthly revenue payments for oil wells it acquired in March. They are located in North Dakota and set soon to go into production.

Best of the Best, which runs online competitions to win cars and other luxury prizes, tumbled 27 per cent to 1,995p as the easing of restrictions hit trading

CML Microsystems jumped 17 per cent to 430p after reporting strong results in what it says was a 'transformational' year. The semiconductors maker also recommended a final special dividend of 50p a share.

On the downside, Pelatro reversed 23 per cent to 40p after placing shares at 40p a pop, representing a 24 per cent discount to the previous closing price. The software developer will use proceeds of 2million to invest in mobile advertising opportunity and repay debt.

Aviation services group Esken slipped 18 per cent to 25p after Stobart Air went into liquidation as plans to sell the airline fell through. Potential buyer Ettyl was unable to raise the finance and Esken said it was not prepared to provide any more financial support.

Meanwhile, payment solutions provider Eckoh shed 9 per cent to 67p after posting lower full-year results due to the Covid-19 pandemic, while UK lockdowns caused a fall in recurring revenue to 71 per cent from 75 per cent.
Tifton, GA (31794)

Today

Mostly cloudy early followed by heavy thunderstorms this afternoon. High near 85F. Winds WSW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 90%. 1 to 2 inches of rain expected. Locally heavy rainfall possible..

Tonight

Thunderstorms likely this evening. Then a chance of scattered thunderstorms overnight. Low 72F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 80%.
Tifton, GA (31794)

Today

Mostly cloudy early followed by heavy thunderstorms this afternoon. High 84F. Winds WSW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 90%. 2 to 3 inches of rain expected. Locally heavy rainfall possible..

Tonight

Thunderstorms likely this evening. Then a chance of scattered thunderstorms overnight. Low 72F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 80%.
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Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Mark Milley testifies before a Senate Appropriations Committee hearing to examine proposed budget estimates and justification for fiscal year 2022 for the Department of Defense in Washington on Thursday, June 17, 2021.
A Clayton CrossMod home with porch and garage is an innovative example of today's manufactured housing.
LONDON (AP)  Scotch single malt whisky makers breathed a sigh of relief Thursday after the United States agreed to suspend tariffs on one of Scotland's main exports in the wake of the resolution of a long-standing transatlantic trade row over subsidies to aircraft companies Boeing and Airbus.

President Donald Trump imposed the 25% tariffs on select products of the European Union, including Scotch single malt whiskies, in October 2019 as part of the trade dispute. While the U.K. is no longer an EU member, it belonged to the bloc when the tariffs were introduced.

Earlier this week, the U.S. and the EU reached an agreement to end the aerospace dispute, paving the way for a 5-year suspension of tariffs. Parallel talks were held between the U.S. and the U.K. over the tariffs.

The tariffs on Scotch single malts were the most high-profile to affect Britain. The Scotch Whisky Association estimated that they contributed to a 30% fall in total whisky exports to the U.S., equivalent to around 600 million pounds ($850 million) in the 18 months to March 2021.

This deal removes the threat of tariffs being re-imposed on Scotch whisky next month and enables distillers to focus on recovering exports to our largest and most valuable export market," Karen Betts, the associations chief executive, said.

A thaw in U.S.-EU relations had been widely expected following the election of President Joe Biden. Tariffs linked to the Airbus-Boeing dispute were temporarily halted in a bid to negotiate a solution.

Following the U.S.-EU aerospace agreement, British International Trade Secretary Liz Truss and the U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai agreed to halt retaliatory tariffs for five years.

Todays deal draws a line under an incredibly damaging issue and means we can focus on taking our trading relationship with the U.S. to the next level, including working more closely to challenge unfair practices by nations like China and using the power of free trade to build back better from the pandemic," Truss said.

Tai said the agreement, in which both sides also agreed to form a working group on the civil aviation industry, can be built upon to "ensure fair competition and address common challenges from China and other non-market economies.

Following the U.K.'s departure from the EU's economic orbit at the start of this year, it is free to negotiate trade deals independently. Earlier this week, the British government negotiated the broad outlines of a trade deal with Australia that will see tariffs on a range of goods eliminated over coming years.

Ivan Menezes, the chief executive of drinks giant Diageo, said the elimination of tariffs on Scotch whisky and other recent developments illustrate the benefits that can accrue from Brexit.

With the end of this dispute, a new free trade agreement with Australia that removes remaining tariffs on U.K. spirits and the opening of trade talks with India, the largest whisky market in the world, the U.K.s newly independent trade policy is now bringing major benefits for Scotch and Scotland, said Menezes, whose company's stable of single malt whiskies includes Talisker and Lagavulin.

The Scottish National Party, which runs the devolved administration in Scotland, urged more support from the British government to help businesses that suffered.

Whilst this announcement is very welcome after months of cross-party campaigning, the losses to Scotch whisky exports have been eye-watering, and it will take time for the industry to get back on its feet," lawmaker David Linden said.

Under Thursday's agreement, the U.K. will suspend for five years the 25% tariffs on U.S. rum, brandy and vodka. American whiskeys though will continue to face a 25% tariff in the U.K. that were imposed in connection with a separate steel and aluminum dispute between the EU and the U.S.

The Distilled Spirits Council of the United States welcomed Thursday's deal and hoped that a resolution can soon be found to lift the tariffs on American whiskeys, which it said have contributed to a 53% decline in exports to the U.K.

We hope this positive momentum will also lead to the prompt and permanent removal of the EU and UKs tariffs on American Whiskeys, the group's CEO Chris Swonger said.

___

Follow all AP stories about Brexit and British politics at https://apnews.com/Brexit
Last year, former President Donald Trump signed a $2.3 trillion COVID-19 relief bill that required the Pentagon to investigate unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP) and release its findings to the public by the end of June. Members of the U.S. House Intelligence Committee received a classified briefing from the Navy and FBI on the matter on Wednesday.

The New York Times revealed some early takeaways from governmental officials who were briefed on the findings of the UFO report: while there is no hard evidence that flying objects reported by Navy pilots were of extraterrestrial origin, they cant explain what the mysterious phenomena were, only that they were not American military craft.

Basically, it appears that UAP are still unidentified. And local UFO enthusiasts dont have high expectations that the full report, which will be released to Congress on June 25, will be any less ambiguous.

I have little hope that they will be disclosing anything new, said Linda Zimmermann, a Hudson Valley expert on paranormal activity and phenomena, who doubts the government would admit to concealing information in the past. I dont think this will bring any great revelations.

She said she believes that anything of any real importance will be classified and will never see the light of day.

What we know so far is that the observed phenomena are difficult to explain, including their acceleration and ability to change direction. The report examined more 120 incidents, many of which were reported by Navy personnel.

One possibility for the mysterious flying objects is that it is China or Russia experimenting with hypersonic technology. Christopher Deperno, assistant director of the New York Mutual UFO Network, which studies reported UFO sightings, told the Times Union: Hudson Valley he doesn't share that belief.

It would be a logical thing for the government to claim this as a national security threat and ask for more money for satellite defense or whatever, said Deperno. But there is weakness with them saying this could be China or Russia. Anyone who has looked at this knows things were flying around before the Chinese even had planes. They had nothing like this in technology then.

An increase in UFO sightings has been reported nationally and here in the Hudson Valley, which has always been a hotspot for UFO sightings, especially in the area of Pine Bush in Orange County, where the new Pine Bush UFO & Paranormal Museum opened this month. According to the National UFO Reporting Center, there were 258 reports of unidentified aerial phenomena in May, including one in Warwick on May 18 at around 4 a.m.

Regardless of what exactly the Pentagon report s says, its headway enough that the government and major news outlets are taking UFO sightings seriously, said both Zimmerman and Deperno.

Its been a great validation, said Zimmermann. The fact were even able to talk about this in public venues is a huge change, and a positive one.

Indeed, though the increase in UFO sightings has been attributed to more people having the time to study the skies while sitting at home during the COVID-19 pandemic, Zimmerman suggests that more reporting of UAP might be happening because the stigma is fading that UFOs arent real.

People reluctant to speak out because of the ridicule factor in the past now feel emboldened because there is less of a stigma on the subject, she said.
RANDOLPH, Mass. (AP)  Russian President Vladimir Putin took a little of piece of Massachusetts with him after his meeting with President Joe Biden this week.

The U.S. president gave his Russian counterpart a pair of custom aviator sunglasses manufactured by Randolph Engineering, based in Randolph just south of Boston, according to the White House.
ALBANY  Current restrictions banning non-essential travel across the northern border will be extended again until July 21, Canadian officials announced Friday, quelling U.S. hopes for a new agreement before the summer tourism peak.

The announcement comes days after a meeting between President Joe Biden and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau failed to make progress towards bilateral revisions.

The border with Canada has been closed to U.S. leisure travelers since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Canadian tourists are already permitted to cross into the U.S. by air, though land border crossings have remained limited to essential transit. Visitors to the U.S. from Canada are required to quarantine for two weeks upon their return.

In coordination with the U.S., we are extending restrictions on non-essential international travel and with the United States until July 21, 2021, said Canadian Public Safety Minister Bill Blair on Twitter Friday morning, noting that the governments top priority is keeping Canadians safe.

These border restrictions were first imposed in March 2020, and have been prolonged on a monthly basis ever since.

U.S. Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer, who had expressed hope of some progress towards partial reopening of the border during a visit to Troy earlier this month, said Friday that he wont rest until the northern border is safely and effectively opened for vaccinated New Yorkers.

Instead of endless delays and confusion, we need a concrete plan, based on science and facts, to reopen the border for vaccinated individuals, Schumer said.

Both U.S. and Canadian tourism industry leaders have been pushing the urgency of a quicker reopening strategy for the recovery of their industries.

Each month that travel from Canada remains at a standstill, the U.S. economy loses $1.5 billion in potential travel exports, which is enough to support more than 10,000 American jobs, said Tori Barnes, the U.S. Travel Associations Executive Vice President for Public Affairs and Policy, speaking at a panel for the Tourism Industry Association of Canada.

Canada will also take a hit from the sustained closure. Government data shows that in 2018, U.S. residents spent $10.6 billion while traveling in Canada. The United States is also Canadas largest trading partner.

Some members of Canadas ruling Liberal party have begun speaking out against the sustained closure, including member of parliament Nathaniel Erskine-Smith. Officials are expected to follow public health recommendations when introducing restrictions, he said, and we also ought to have an expectation that they follow the science in lifting those restrictions.

Erskine-Smith joined his Canadian parliamentary colleague Wayne Easter and U.S. Rep. Brian Higgins of Western New York to issue a joint statement calling for the border to reopen for individuals with proof of immunity.

But in a press conference Friday, Prime Minister Trudeau doubled down on the decision to maintain a mostly closed border.

Were not out of this pandemic yet, Trudeau said, noting that there are different perspectives from different experts but reiterating the vaccine thresholds he introduced earlier this spring.

We have to hit our targets of 75 percent vaccinated with a first dose, at least 20 percent vaccinated with a second dose before we can start loosening things up. Because even a fully vaccinated individual can pass on COVID-19 to someone who is not.

While 45.02 percent of Americans are fully vaccinated according to data compiled by the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center, only 15.98 percent of Canadians have reached this same milestone.

Canadas early vaccine rollout focused on ensuring partial protection for as many people as possible, resulting in slower access to second doses of two-shot vaccines for most Canadians  including those from Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna and AstraZeneca-Oxford. A federal dashboard shows 64.23 percent of Canadians have received at least one dose of an approved COVID-19 vaccine.

While one-shot Johnson & Johnson vaccines are also recognized in Canada, they are not currently being offered in the country.

Canadian public opinion still largely backs continued border closure. According to an opinion poll released last month by the Angus Reid Institute, only one in five Canadian respondents said the border should open on June 21. Most preferred that the federal government wait to open the border either in September, or at the end of the year.

Both Trudeau and Blair, his public safety minister, confirmed that the Canadian government is still on track to provide further details on June 21 about a plan to revise the entry process and two-week quarantine requirement for those fully vaccinated individuals who are, under the current rules, already allowed to cross the border into Canada.

Permitted travelers include Canadians and permanent residents of the country, among other exceptions.
ALBANY  A controversial directive issued by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomos administration did cause COVID-19 deaths in nursing homes, although the directives issuance was understandable given the states difficult circumstances, a newly issued report concluded.

The analysis, released this week by the Long-Term Care Task Force of the New York State Bar Association, counters some of the findings of a July 2020 report issued by the state Department of Health.

In its report, DOH absolved itself of responsibility for nursing home deaths, blaming the spread instead on the unwitting infection of asymptomatic nursing home staff members, who then transmitted the disease to vulnerable elderly residents.

But the Bar Association report states the directive remained in effect weeks longer than necessary, and that the Cuomo administration did not provide adequate aid to nursing homes during the early part of the pandemic.

The nuanced Bar Association analysis, running 242 pages, both casts blame on the Cuomo administration and counters some criticism, citing numerous other factors to explain more than 13,600 reported deaths in New York nursing homes during the pandemic.

The New York Post, which first reported the findings of the Bar Association's 16-member task force, also reported that last Saturday, the report was adopted by 93 percent the NYSBAs House of Delegates in a vote consisting of about 200 members.

The Department of Health directive, issued March 25, 2020, stated that nursing homes, as long as they could properly care for a person, could not deny re-admission or admission solely on the basis of a confirmed or suspected diagnosis of COVID-19.

Many nursing homes took the directive to mean that they were required to accept COVID-positive patients coming from a strained hospital system. And critics would soon contend the policy led to rampant infection within highly vulnerable populations.

The directive also barred nursing homes from requiring a previously hospitalized person who was determined to be medically stable from being tested prior to admission.

The Bar Association report found that although a determination of the number of additional nursing home deaths is beyond the capacity of the Task Force, there are credible reviews that suggest that the directive, for the approximately six weeks that it was in effect, did lead to some number of additional deaths.

Specifically, the Bar Association pointed to the February findings of the Empire Center for Public Policy, a fiscally conservative Albany think tank, that found that COVID-positive admissions were responsible for nursing home deaths, ranging from several hundred" to "possibly more than 1,000.

The Department of Health issued a report in 2020 in which it argued unconvincingly that the admission of 6,326 COVID-positive residents during the period the Health directive was in effect had no impact, wrote the Bar Association task force. That cannot be the case, and has now been shown not to be the case.

But the Bar Association added that the directive was not necessarily issued in error: In March 2020, the state believed that it was in need of thousands of additional hospital beds, with intensive care units filling up, as the virus hit New York first and hardest in the United States. The hospital system appeared overwhelmed and in danger of collapse, so difficult decisions were being made.

There were other factors cited in the report for nursing home deaths: an insufficient federal response to the pandemic, including its failure to marshal enough personal protective equipment, to gain information from China about the virus, or to make testing available.

At the time, seeing nursing home beds as a hospital extender when hospital beds were not expected to be available was not an unreasonable decision, the report found.

Yet what was unreasonable, the report found, was the Cuomo administrations failure to recognize that nursing homes needed just as much help as general hospitals. Nursing homes were given little assistance securing personal protective equipment, and the report noted that during an April 2020 press conference, Cuomo roundly criticized suggestions that nursing homes should have been aided further.

The Bar Association also found the absoluteness of the directive unreasonable, noting that the language disallowing the denial of medically stable patients. The directive was commonly read by nursing homes to mean they had to accept COVID-positive patients, regardless of another regulation stating homes should only accept patients they could properly care for.

The directive came at a time when regulations were routinely being overridden, the report noted.

The report stated that it was unreasonable for the Cuomo administration to leave the directive in place for weeks after it was necessary. Emergency hospital beds set up at the Javits Center in New York City were barely used, the report noted, and the USNS Comfort, which was to be used for similar purposes, set sail away from New York on April 23, 2020. (It had arrived in New York City on March 30). The Navy hospital ship's beds also sat empty, the report noted.

Yet the Cuomo administration directive, meant to alleviate stained hospital capacity, remained in effect until May 10, 2020.

The March 25th directive could have been rescinded on or about the date the Comfort set sail, if not sooner, the report noted.

A Department of Health spokeswoman, Abigail Barker, said the Bar Association report like others before it, supports what weve said all along, that New York was blindsided and got hit the hardest, that when COVID got into communities it quickly and quietly spread from asymptomatic staff into nursing homes, and that New Yorks nursing home experience was not unlike that of other states.

The report goes on to say New Yorks proportion of nursing home deaths to total deaths varied little from the rest of the nation and that New Yorks nursing homes are no better and no worse than the nation at large,'" Barker said.

She noted passages in the report stating that nursing homes were unprepared for the pandemic, and not well-suited to manage an airborne, highly infectious disease.

Amidst harsh criticism of the DOH directive, the Cuomo administration for months suppressed data revealing the full scope of deaths in nursing homes.

A February report issued by state Attorney General Letitia James office, however, would find that the Cuomo administration had significantly undercounted the deaths by not including those who were infected in homes, but died in hospitals. Only then did the Department of Health release full figures.

The suppression of that data from state lawmakers and the federal government is now the subject of a U.S. Department of Justice investigation, as well as the Assembly Judiciary Committee impeachment probe.
The Eagle: A Times Union Podcast is available on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify and other popular podcast apps.

As the country prepared this month to celebrate Juneteenth National Independence Day, three trailblazing Black elders in the Capital Region shared their stories with visual storyteller Jamel Mosely. His filmed interviews with Alice Green, Barbara Smith and Earl Thorpe are part of Lift Every Voice, a collection of multimedia stories about the experience of being Black in America. In all, more than 70 people across the U.S. were profiled across Hearst's newspaper, magazine and television divisions.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP)  Iran's tattered nuclear deal with world powers hangs in the balance as the country prepares to vote on Friday for a new president and diplomats press on with efforts to get both the U.S. and Tehran to reenter the accord.

The deal represents the signature accomplishment of the relatively moderate President Hassan Rouhani's eight years in office: suspending crushing sanctions in exchange for the strict monitoring and limiting of Iran's uranium stockpile.

The deal's collapse with President Donald Trump's decision to unilaterally withdraw America from the agreement in 2018 spiraled into a series of attacks and confrontations across the wider Middle East. It also prompted Tehran to enrich uranium to highest purity levels so far, just shy of weapons-grade levels.

With analysts and polling suggesting that a hard-line candidate already targeted by U.S. sanctions will win Friday's vote, a return to the deal may be possible but it likely won't lead to a further detente between Iran and the West.

"Its certainly not as complex as drafting a deal from scratch, which is what the sides did that resulted in the 2015 deal," said Henry Rome, a senior analyst focusing on Iran at the Eurasia Group. But theres still a lot of details that need to be worked out.

He added: I think theres a lot of domestic politics that go into this and an interest from hard-liners, including the supreme leader, to ensure that their favored candidate wins without any significant disruptions to that process.

The 2015 deal, which saw Iranians flood into the streets in celebration, marked a major turn after years of tensions between Iran and the West over Iran's nuclear program. Tehran has long insisted that its program is for peaceful purposes. However, U.S. intelligence agencies and International Atomic Energy Agency say Iran pursued an organized nuclear weapons program up until 2003.

In order to ease the threat seen by the West, Iran agreed under the deal to limit its enrichment of uranium gas to just 3.67% purity, which can be used in nuclear power plants but is far below weapons-grade levels of 90%. It also put a hard cap on Iran's uranium stockpile to just 300 kilograms (661 pounds). Tehran also committed to using only 5,060 of its first-generation centrifuges, the devices that spin the uranium gas to enrich it.

Before the deal, Iran had been enriching up to 20% and had a stockpile of some 10,000 kilograms (22,046 pounds). That amount at that enrichment level narrowed Iran's so-called breakout time  how long it would take for Tehran to be able to produce enough weapons-grade uranium for one atomic bomb.

Prior to the deal, experts estimated Iran needed two to three months to reach that point. Under the deal, officials put that period at around a year. The deal also subjected Iran to some of the most-stringent monitoring ever by the IAEA to monitor its program and ensure its compliance.

What the deal didn't do, however, was involve Iran's ballistic missile program or Tehran's support of militant groups around the region  such as the Lebanese Hezbollah or the Palestinian Hamas  that the West and its allies have designated terrorist organizations. At the time, the Obama administration suggested further negotiations could spring from the deal. However, Trump entered the White House on a promise to tear up the accord in part over that, which he ultimately did in 2018.

In the time since, Iran has broken all the limits it agreed to under the deal. It now enriches small amounts of uranium up to 63% purity. It spins far-more advanced centrifuges. The IAEA hasn't been able to access its surveillance cameras at Iranian nuclear sites since late February, nor data from its online enrichment monitors and electronic seals  hobbling the U.N. nuclear watchdog's monitoring abilities. Iran also restarted enrichment at a hardened underground facility and is building more centrifuge halls underground, after two attacks suspected to have been carried out by Israel.

If Iran's nuclear program remains unchecked, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has warned it could shrink Tehran's breakout time down to a matter of weeks. That has worried nonproliferation experts.

I think for the international community  and specifically for the United States  putting the nuclear program back into a box is critical," said Sanam Vakil, the deputy head of Chatham Houses Middle East and North Africa program who studies Iran. "Its important because beyond the nuclear agreement, the negotiators are ultimately hoping to lengthen and strengthen the deal. And so you cant even get there until the current deal is stabilized.

Since President Joe Biden took office, his diplomats have been working with other world powers to come up with a way to return both the U.S. and Iran to the deal in negotiations in Vienna. There have been no direct U.S.-Iran in those negotiations, though separate talks have been underway involving a possible prisoner swap.

In Friday's presidential election in Iran, hard-line judiciary chief Ebrahim Raisi appears to be the front-runner. He's already said he wants to return Iran to the nuclear deal to take advantage of its economic benefits. But given his previous belligerent statements toward the U.S., further cooperation with the West at the moment appears unlikely.

Meanwhile, it remains unclear when a deal will be reached in Vienna. And while Iran has broken through all the accord's limits, there's still more it could do to increase pressure on the West. Those steps could include using more centrifuges, further increasing enrichment, restarting a facility that makes plutonium as a byproduct or abandoning a nuclear nonproliferation treaty.

Its a very fine tool, Rome said. "The Iranian political leadership can decide quite specifically what type of signal it wants to send, whether thats the type of machines it uses, the speed of the production, the quantity of the production in order to send a message to the West about the degree of pressure it wants to put on.

___

Follow Jon Gambrell on Twitter at www.twitter.com/jongambrellAP.
ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP)  Staunch conservatives and advocates of legal marijuana have formed an unlikely alliance in Minnesota to pressure the Legislature to allow medical cannabis patients to own guns.

The more than 35,000 patients in Minnesota's program can't own guns as the law now stands because the federal government classifies marijuana as an illicit drug, on par with heroin, and prohibits anyone who uses an unlawful substance from purchasing a firearm.

So some gun-rights supporters and pro-legalization groups and legislators are lobbying during the special session to allow the Minnesota Department of Health to petition the federal government for an exemption. The change is being debated as part of the states public safety and health and human services budget bills.

If their effort is successful, the Star Tribune of Minneapolis reported this week, Minnesota would be the first of 36 states that allow medical marijuana in some form to appeal directly to the federal government on behalf of its enrollees. The ranks of the state's medical marijuana patients are expected to triple or quadruple over the next few years under a new law that liberalizes the state's restrictive program to allow smokable marijuana instead of more expensive pills or liquid extracts.

The registry is going to grow a lot, said Rep. Jeremy Munson, a Republican from Lake Crystal, who has been advocating for the change. All of those people will be denied the right to get a shotgun in the fall to go hunting.

Republican Rep. Rod Hamilton, of Mountain Lake, was prescribed medical cannabis to treat the symptoms of his multiple sclerosis. After he enrolled, he was told he couldnt renew his gun permit because it was barred by the federal government.

In the eyes of the federal government, were all felons, and its just tragic, Hamilton said.

Its been nearly two years since he signed up for the program but Hamilton has never filled his prescription for cannabis. When his enrollment lapses in August, he doesnt plan to renew it. But he will renew his gun permit. He said he thinks many other passionate gun owners will make the same choice.

Do I feel like Ive missed out? Absolutely I do. My doctors think this would provide me some relief, Hamilton said. I am prioritizing, right, wrong or otherwise, my Second Amendment rights over using, in the eyes of Minnesota, a lawful medical product.

The Democratic-controlled Minnesota House passed a bill to legalize recreational marijuana last month in the regular session, but the proposal went nowhere in the GOP-controlled Senate.
ALBANY  The state Republican Party plans to informally vote for a "presumptive nominee" to run for governor under the party's ticket, which could help avoid a costly primary race.

But a primary remains possible if a candidate can collect enough signatures to get on the ballot, which at least one candidate has already pledged to do.

The New York GOP may put its support behind U.S. Rep. Lee Zeldin, the Long Island Republican who is often closely associated with former President Donald Trump. Zeldin of Suffolk County has already received verbal commitments from many GOP county chairs.

The vote on June 28 in Albany is more of what Chair Nick Langworthy is calling a strawpoll, and not the official party convention nomination.

"Lee Zeldin has established himself as a front runner pretty clearly because he has amassed a lot of support and has raised a lot of funds, but we'll see where that takes us," Langworthy said Thursday outside of the Capitol.

Langworthy hopes the party can "hopefully coalesce around a single candidate," but he calls the nomination process far from over.

The Republican nominating convention is likely to be in February or early March, he said. Until then, the handful of candidates in the race continue to look to distinguish themselves from Zeldin and pick up steam this summer.

The process to get behind a candidate, albeit informally, is "too early," Westchester Republican Rob Astorino told the Times Union.

"It would've been better for all of the candidates to go around the state this summer and into the fall and see all of the county committees and campaign," Astorino, a 2014 candidate for governor, said. "I think that's what most candidates expected would happen, but so for me it's really not going to change anything."

Astorino plans to collect the 15,000 needed signatures to get onto the party ticket ballot and force the primary. State law requires at least 100 signatures from each of at least half of the congressional districts in New York. He said he has a statewide campaign that can reach many corners of the state's 27 congressional districts. Zeldin did not return a request for comment.

Andrew Giuliani, the son of former New York City and Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani, is also running for governor. He filed to run one month ago, May 12, according to campaign filings.

Lewis County Sheriff Michael P. Carpinelli announced his candidacy in August.

Langworthy's comments on the GOP nomination process came behind a podium that read, "Impeach Cuomo." His remarks focused on the Democratic-led Legislature to come back to Albany, recovene session and move forward on impeachment proceedings.

While GOP candidates go around this summer, growing their support on policies like tough on crime, Langworthy said they are also "talking with the press with why Andrew Cuomo must be replaced."

The GOP is focusing its remarks on Cuomo, and in particular the nursing home scandal, while unsure whether the governor will seek a fourth term, or survive a primary challenge. Cuomo had $16.8 million in his warchest, as of March 18, according to campaign filings.

In describing reasons why the state should move to impeach Cuomo, Langworthy listed off the party's disdain with Democratic leadership  like the tax rate, crime and corruption  providing reasons why he believes New York should elect its first Republican governor since George Pataki ousted Mario Cuomo in 1994.

In 2002, when Pataki won his last election, Democrats held a 2.1 million enrollment advantage over Republicans. Today, as of February, Democrats hold a 3.8 million advantage, according to the New York Board of Elections.
MOSCOW (AP)  Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday praised the outcome of his summit with U.S. President Joe Biden and called him an astute and shrewd negotiator.

The two leaders concluded three hours of talks Wednesday at an opulent villa facing Lake Geneva by exchanging expressions of mutual respect but firmly restating their starkly different views on cyberattacks, the conflict in Ukraine, political dissent and other issues. At the same time, they announced an agreement to return each other's ambassadors and mapped more talks on arms control and cybersecurity.

Putin, who hailed Biden as a highly experienced and constructive interlocutor at a news conference in Geneva, offered more praise of the U.S. leader on Thursday in a video call with graduates of a government management school.

Biden kept him on his guard with his savvy negotiating skills, Putin said.

He perfectly knows the matter," Putin said. "He is fully concentrated and knows what he wants to achieve. And he does it very shrewdly.

He dismissed what he described as media attempts to cast Biden as physically frail, noting that the 78-year-old U.S. president was in great shape even though the meeting wrapped up a European tour for him that included the G-7 and NATO summits.

He was on a long trip, he flew in from across the ocean, involving jetlag, the 68-year-old Putin said, adding that he knows how tiring travel can be.

The atmosphere was quite friendly, he added. I think we managed to understand each other, we managed to understand each others positions on key issue, they differ on many things and we noted the differences. At the same time, we established areas and points where we can possibly bring our positions closer in the future.

Putin particularly emphasized the importance of an agreement to conduct dialogue on cybersecurity between experts, saying it would help reduce tensions.

Biden said he and Putin agreed to have their experts work out an understanding about what types of critical infrastructure would be off-limits to cyberattacks. The agreement follows a flood of ransomware attacks against U.S. businesses and government agencies that U.S. officials said originated from Russia.

Putin, who has strongly denied any Russian state role in the cyberattacks, argued Thursday that instead of finger-pointing and bickering, we should better combine efforts to fight cybercrime.

Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov described the summit as positive and productive, saying it allowed the leaders "to directly put forward their positions and try to understand where interaction is possible and where there can be no interaction due to categorical disagreements.

Peskov particularly noted the joint statement from the presidents that said the two countries will conduct a dialogue on strategic stability issues and reaffirmed that a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought  a principle declared by U.S. President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev at their Geneva summit in 1985.

Restating the principle was a significant achievement amid current tensions between Moscow and Washington, said Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, who attended the talks.

The strategic stability dialogue would cover a wide range of issues related to nuclear and other weapons and is key to reducing the risk of conflict between the two superpowers.

The talks follow a decision this year to extend the New START, the last remaining U.S.-Russian arms control pact and would be aimed at working out a follow-up agreement after it expires in 2026.

The negotiations will be complex and strenuous. The U.S. is worried about new destabilizing weapons developed by Russia, such as the atomic-powered, nuclear-armed Poseidon underwater drone, while Russia wants to include U.S. missile defense and potential space-based weapons in an agreement.

It's a difficult task to conjugate the approaches and formulas, Ryabkov said. But we are ready to try to solve it.

Konstantin Kosachev, a deputy speaker of Russia's upper house of parliament, hoped that talks between experts would help reduce the bad blood.

The more often experts will meet, the less room the politicians will have for speculation and manipulation, he told The Associated Press.

The decision to return the ambassadors, who left their posts amid the tensions, was also widely billed by Russian officials and experts as an important move to stabilize ties.

Russia recalled its ambassador, Anatoly Antonov, for consultations in March after Biden described Putin as a killer in an interview. John Sullivan, the U.S. ambassador to Moscow, flew home in April after public suggestions from Russian officials that he should leave to mirror Antonovs departure.

U.S.-Russian ties have plummeted to all-time lows after Moscow's 2014 annexation of Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula, accusations of Russian interference in elections and cyberattacks, and Western criticism of the Kremlin's crackdown on the opposition.

Biden criticized the imprisonment of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny and other moves by the Kremlin to stifle dissent and independent media. Putin shot back, keeping to his practice of never mentioning his chief political foe by name, saying Navalny knew he was breaking the law and was duly punished. He added that government critics designated as foreign agents were pursuing malign Western interests.

In comments posted to his Instagram account, Navalny denounced Putins comments as lies.

He just doesnt say a word of truth, Navalny said. Clearly, he just physically cant stop lying.

Navalny was arrested in January upon returning from Germany, where he spent five months recovering from a nerve agent poisoning that he blames on the Kremlin  an accusation that Russian officials reject. In February, Navalny was given a 2 1/2-year prison term for violating the terms of a suspended sentence from a 2014 embezzlement conviction that he dismissed as politically motivated.

Navalnys supporters held a protest in Geneva ahead of Putins visit and dotted the city with billboards blasting the Kremlin for refusing to investigate his poisoning.

On Ukraine, Russia reaffirmed its view that the country's bid for NATO membership represents a red line, while the U.S. has restated that the alliance's doors remain open for its membership.

Some in Ukraine voiced hope the summit could help ease tensions that spiked this year when Russia bolstered its forces near Ukraine.

Reducing the conflict potential in U.S.-Russian relations could help lower tensions on our border with Russia, said Volodymyr Fesenko, head of the Penta Center think tank.

But independent Kyiv-based political expert Vadim Karasev warned of a danger that the lack of resolution of the conflict with Russia-backed separatists in Ukraines eastern industrial heartland known as the Donbas would make it frozen, and the country would steadily drift to the fringes of international politics.

The results of the Putin-Biden meeting will cool Kyivs aspirations, Karasev said. Ukraine wont be able to quickly join NATO, and the conflict in Donbas will become a chronic one. The Ukrainian issue will lose its acuteness, leaving Kyiv on the periphery of the global agenda.

Experts say that sharp differences rule out any quick progress on the divisive issues.

Confrontation will continue, but there is a hope now that instead of being uncontrollable it could become more orderly, said Valery Garbuzov, the head of the U.S. and Canada Institute, the government-funded think-tank.

-

Associated Press journalist Kostya Manenkov in Moscow and Yuras Karmanau in Kyiv, Ukraine, contributed.
SARATOGA SPRINGS  In an effort to run more efficient budget votes and board elections, the Saratoga Springs City School district is considering reducing its polling locations from six to two, moving the annual vote from its elementary schools to the middle and high schools.

But the discussion, which will eventually be determined by the Board of Education, has angered members of Saratoga Parents for Safer Schools who say that fewer polling places will disenfranchise voters.

David Buchyn, spokesperson for the Wilton-based group that supports politically conservative board candidates, said the potential change will discourage minorities, the disabled, people without reliable transportation and people of lesser means living in more conservative-leaning neighborhoods and towns such as Geyser Crest, Greenfield, Wilton and around Saratoga Lake.

How will it be good for democracy to make residents drive 20 minutes to vote at the middle or high school?, Buchyn asked. Or 15 minutes from the lake or Geyser Crest or parts of Wilton. And while the district leadership is attempting to rationalize the need for the change, we must wonder why now?

Superintendent Michael Patton said its simple  efficiency. Getting a vote count from six locations is time-consuming and confusing. Furthermore, he said, he has heard from parents who dont like the waves of voters streaming into their childrens elementary schools each year on the third Tuesday in May.

There are community concerns over the safety of conducting school budget votes in elementary schools, Patton said. I hear it every year. We do limit interactions with students and entrances used. The doors are supervised. I reassure people we are doing everything we can to keep student and staff safe so everyone can participate in the vote.

Buchyn said his group, which was founded to advocate for armed security in schools, agrees that safety is imperative. He said his organization would be happy to work with the school in addressing any potential safety issues" to preserve the six sites because the middle and high schools are too far and too difficult for some voters to get to.



It is inexplicable and disheartening to see the Saratoga Springs school district trying to make voting more difficult when everywhere else we see attempts to increase voter participation through means such as early voting, increased voting hours, more polling places and mail in balloting, Buchyn said in an email to the Times Union. This ill-advised proposal is in opposition to every attempt to increase voter participation.

Maple Avenue Middle School is situated in Greenfield, near the Wilton town line. The high school is on the west side of Saratoga Springs.

A check of Mapquest.com found that Greenfield Town Hall is a half a mile from the Greenfield Elementary School, 5.6 miles from the high school and 6.5 miles from the middle school.

Wilton Town Hall is 5 miles from the Dorothy Nolan Elementary School and 5.6 miles from the middle school. The high school is 9 miles away.

Geyser Crests more populated neighborhoods near Hathorn Boulevard are 2.4 miles from the high school and 5.2 miles from the middle school and 0.7 miles from the Geyser Road Elementary School.

Residents along Saratoga Lake have 4.3 miles to go to the Caroline Street Elementary School, 6.7 to the middle school and 4.1 miles to the high school, making the high school its closest locale.

Of the other two elementary schools, Division Street is closest to the high school at 1 mile away, while Lake Avenue Elementary School is 1.8 miles away from the middle school.

Assistant Superintendent Tim Hilker said at the June 10 board meeting that the consolidation of polling sites will end a logistical nightmare. Right now, he said, voters are often confused as to where they go to cast their ballot, requiring the district to field calls all day. The consolidated system with a digital sign-in would allow voters to go to either the middle or high school. He also said it would save the district about $5,000 each year.



Patton also said the consolidation would align Saratoga Springs with other large school districts in the region: Queensbury and Shenendehowa all have one polling location and Ballston Spa and South Glens Falls has two, he said.



Buchyn said that Saratoga Springs has more engaged community than those districts and, therefore, all of the sites are needed. Voter turnout in 2021 bears that out. Shenendehowa had nearly 2,800 voters; Ballston Spa, about 1,300; and Queensbury, about 1,100. South Glens Falls reported 2,662 voters. Saratoga Springs saw more than 4,400 voters this year.



We suggest that if these other school districts value diversity, inclusion, and equity, both Shenendehowa and Ballston Spa should increase their number of polling places, Buchyn wrote in an email. These school districts should strive for higher voter turnout.

At the meeting, board members expressed concerned for those who walk to their polling place. Still, most appeared open to the idea. Board member Dean Kolligan who lives in Wilton and was backed by Saratoga Parents for Safer Schools said the plan is long overdue and makes sense, but hes is also concerned about voter turnout.

But Hilker said he doesnt think any voters will be disenfranchised. He said communicating to voters will be key, especially in the first year.

People will adapt and know where they need to go, Hilker said.

Patton said the change can only be implemented at the board's reorganizational meeting in July. It is unclear if the board will vote on it next month.

This is not the first time this Saratoga Parents for Safer Schools has complained that the district was disenfranchising voters. Last year, the group blasted the district, saying it was suppressing the vote by only providing one drop box for mail-in ballots. It was located at the district office in Saratoga Springs.

At the time, Patton said the district decided to have one central dropoff location to make it easier for voters to know where to go.
Despite the loss of more than 600,000 lives in the United States, public health and government officials have had to find creative ways to curb vaccine hesitancy and convince Americans to inoculate against coronavirus.

But in 1954, it was a different story.

Thousands of parents in Saratoga and Schenectady counties freely gave permission for their children to take part in Americas largest experimental vaccine trial. Nearly 6,000 children from the two counties rolled up their sleeves to test a shot that promised to vanquish polio, which in the early 1950s was crippling tens of thousands of Americans every year. Public health officials called it the most feared disease in the U.S."

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Every mother was scared, said Dr. James Strosberg, a retired Niskayuna physician who with his brother, Martin, wrote the newly released Schenectadys Battle Against Contagious Disease: From Smallpox to COVID-19. No one wanted their child to end up in an iron lung. There werent anti-vaxxers  People were so damn afraid of polio.

They were wise to be scared. Bonny Kehm, a nursing program administrator at Excelsior College in Albany, recalls the story of her aunt Lillian Weiser. In 1953, 10-year-old Lillian came home from her Kansas school feeling feverish and achy. Within hours, she was completely paralyzed and unable to breathe  another victim of polio.

Lillian was forced to live her remaining days trapped in an iron lung - a casket-looking metal machine that breathed for her. Prone and encased in its metal with just her head revealed, she lived another two years, dying just as the first polio vaccine was to be widely distributed.

My Aunt Lily was paralyzed from the neck down, Kehm said. "She could literally not feel or breath on her own. They tried a couple of times to get her out to see if she could breathe on her own, but her lungs, like any muscle paralyzed, couldn't do it. It was heartbreaking."

Kehm's grandfather used to go to the hospital after work and sleep on the floor next to her.

"It took a toll on him, watching his child rot away," she said. "And certainly, there was fear, fear that another child would get it. There was fear throughout the community with people thinking 'that could be my kid.'"

But fear of disease is no longer the only one thing that will prompt people to be vaccinated. With distrust of science rampant, health officials in 2021 have turned to giveaways to incentivize people to take the COVID-19 jab. New York offers college tuition; Ohio, $1 million lotteries, and Washington, marijuana. That was not the case in 1954.

The fear of polio was as great - if not greater - than it is for COVID-19 because children were affected, said Martin Strosberg, a public health professor at Union College who co-authored the book published by Schenectady Historical Society. I remember getting vaccinated in school in Troy. Everyone lined up to get their shot in elementary school. It was fairly well accepted.

The CDC reports that after the vaccine was widely distributed, polio infected less than 100 people in the 1960s and less than 10 in the 1970s. Polio is now considered eliminated in the U.S.

And Dr. Jonas Salks revolutionary vaccine could not have worked without the help of those thousands of parents and children in Saratoga and Schenectady counties who were willing to take the unproven shot in the big, double-blind experiment.

The initial test of Salk's new vaccine began in 180 counties across the nation. Saratoga County historian Lauren Roberts said the two Capital Region counties were selected because they had populations of more than 50,000, a high incidence of polio for the last five or six years, a high rate for a specific age group and adequate health and school facilities.

But just a month before the trial was to begin, it was nearly thwarted when then-popular radio broadcaster Walter Winchell declared the vaccine to be a killer after live, virulent virus was detected in some lots  paralyzing some children in Salk's early private trials.

Fears about vaccine safety led to 150,000 children dropping out of the massive nationwide trial.

Still, more than a million children stayed, ready to get their first dose at their school on May 6, 1954.

The night before, James Strosberg said, doses were flown into the Albany airport from Lilly Pharmaceutical Company in Indianapolis by Colonial Airlines. They were then taken to General Electric where they were stored in the refrigerators at the cafeteria until what became known as VV-Day or vaccine validity day.

That big day in Saratoga County, as described then by the Saratogian newspaper, involved 19 doctors and more than 250 volunteer nurses and nurses aides assisted by school personnel, mothers and other helpers standing at the ready at nearly every school in the county.

The children were divided into two groups - those who received the experimental vaccine, and those who received a placebo. All earned a lollipop.

"The sentiment back then was for everyone to do their part," Martin Strosberg, who lives in Niskayuna, said. "Public health was very involved, local doctors were involved. There was a campaign to get the word out that the vaccine is safe and effective."

Also contributing, said Roberts, was the image of an iron lung that was prevalent in the media.

It was seared into the minds of children and parents of young children, Roberts said.

And a year later, on April 12, 1955, the results of the trial were in. Polio infections dropped by 80 percent. Unfortunately, at the same time, as noted in a Times Union look back at published stories from 1955, a Cutter Laboratories-produced vaccine lot was not inactivated properly - which eventually gave polio to an estimated 40,000 children, with 10 of them dying.

The Cutter Laboratory scandal led to Salk's vaccine falling out of favor. But the Albert Sabin oral dose brought to market in the early 1960s essentially eradicated the disease in the U.S.

Kehm hopes COVID-19 will go the way of polio and that health care workers and the public will learn from history. Thus far in New York, half of the total population has completed the coronavirus vaccine doses, and infection has plummeted to a seven-day average of 0.4 percent.

We have evidence, we have information, we have smart people," Kehm said. "We can put a man on the moon, we can figure out how to cure disease. ... If you had a choice to not be a victim, wouldn't you chose a vaccine? If my family had a choice, they wouldn't have hesitated ... Like anything else important, we need to address vaccine hesitancy."
ALBANY  St. Peters Health Partners said Friday it has increased the minimum wage for its employees to $15 an hour.

The change affects positions throughout the health care network based in Albany. The current federal minimum hourly wage is $7.25 while the state requires employers in the Capital Region to pay at least $12.50 an hour.

"We want to show our commitment to all levels of talent in our system," said James Reed, president and CEO of St. Peter's Health Partners. "This decision to increase our minimum wage is aligned with our mission, which reminds us of our moral obligation to care for one another."

St. Peters Health Partners is a member of Trinity Health, one of the nations largest Catholic health systems, and employs roughly 12,000 people at more than 170 locations in the Capital Region. The previous minimum wage St. Peter's was $12.50 an hour, and the hospital said pay increases will also affect employees who were not making the minimum.

With the move, the health care network joins a tide of employers nationally who have been raising pay to attract workers as the COVID-19 pandemic wanes in much of the country. McDonald's and Chipotle are some of the latest companies to follow Amazon, Walmart and Costco in boosting wages, in some cases to $15 an hour or higher, according to The Associated Press.

In May, McDonald's said it will raise pay for workers in its 650 company-owned stores to an average of $15 an hour by 2024. Entry-level employees will make $11 an hour. The company is urging its 14,000 franchised restaurants to make the same changes.

Also last month, Amazon said it will pay new hires $17 an hour, as it seeks to add 75,000 new workers. Bank of America, meanwhile, plans to set the minimum wage for all positions at the company to $25 an hour by 2025.

Labor activists pushing for higher minimum wages have often set $15 an hour as the standard. And the so-called "Fight for 15" movement appears to be making headway.

In Delaware, for example, the Democrat-led state House voted Thursday to give final approval to a bill raising the states minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2025. The bill now goes to Democratic Gov. John Carney, who is expected to sign it.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
LUSAKA, Zambia (AP)  Kenneth Kaunda, Zambias founding president and a champion of African nationalism who spearheaded the fights to end white minority rule across southern Africa, has died at the age of 97.

Kaundas death was announced Thursday evening by Zambian President Edgar Lungu on his Facebook page. Zambia will hold 21 days of national mourning, Lungu said.

On behalf of the entire nation and on my own behalf, I pray that the entire Kaunda family is comforted as we mourn our first president and true African icon, wrote Lungu.

Kaundas son, Kamarange, also gave the news of the statesmans death on Facebook.

I am sad to inform we have lost Mzee, Kaundas son wrote, using a Swahili term of respect for an elder. Lets pray for him.

Kaunda had been admitted to the hospital on Monday and officials later said he was being treated for pneumonia.

The southern African country is currently battling a surge in COVID-19 cases and Kaunda was admitted to Maina Soko Medical Center, a military hospital which is a center for treating the disease in the capital, Lusaka.

Kaunda came to prominence as a leader of the campaign to end colonial rule of his country, then known as Northern Rhodesia, and was elected the first president of Zambia in 1964.

During his 27-year rule, he gave critical support to armed African nationalist groups that won independence for neighboring countries including Angola, Mozambique, Namibia and Zimbabwe.

Kaunda also allowed the African National Congress, outlawed in South Africa, to base its headquarters in Lusaka while the organization waged an often violent struggle within South Africa against apartheid.

Outgoing and ebullient, Kaunda lobbied with Western leaders to support majority rule in southern Africa. Famously, he danced with then British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher at a Commonwealth summit in Zambia in 1979. Although he implored her to impose sanctions on apartheid South Africa, Thatcher remained a steadfast opponent of those restrictions.

Kaunda was a schoolteacher who became a fiery African nationalist. Although he eventually ruled over a one-party state and became authoritarian, Kaunda agreed to return Zambia to multi-party politics and peacefully stepped down from power when he lost elections in 1991.

In Zambia's heady first years of independence, Kaunda rapidly expanded the countrys education system, establishing primary schools in urban and rural areas and providing all students with books and meals. His government established a university and medical school. Kaunda also expanded Zambias health system to serve the Black majority.

Genial and persuasive, Kaunda gained respect as a negotiator pressing the case for African nationalism with Western leaders.

Kaunda ultimately conducted negotiations with the South African government, despite domestic opposition, that is credited with helping to bring the apartheid regime to release Nelson Mandela and to allow the ANC to operate legally.

He remained lifelong friends with Mandela after the anti-apartheid leaders release from prison, quipping that they shared the same bond of 27 years  him as Zambia's president and Mandela as a prisoner.

Even though Zambia was not spared occasionally violent political strife, Kaunda managed to foster peaceful coexistence between its 73 ethnic groups.

Kaunda was born in April 1924, the youngest of eight children to a Church of Scotland missionary and teacher. He followed his fathers footsteps into teaching and cut his political teeth in the early 1950s with the Northern Rhodesian African National Congress.

He was imprisoned briefly in 1955 and again in 1959, and upon his release became president of the newly formed United National Independence Party. When Northern Rhodesia became independent from Britain, Kaunda won the first general election in 1964 and became the first president of renamed Zambia.

Kaunda imposed a one-party state in 1973, gradually developed a personality cult and clamped down on opposition. He said the one-party state was the only option for Zambia as it faced attacks and subterfuge from white-led South Africa and Rhodesia.

Ruling at the height of the Cold War, Kaunda was a leading member of the Non-Aligned Movement.

Kaundas popularity waned as the once thriving Zambian economy collapsed when the price of copper, its main export, plummeted in the 1970s. Corruption, mismanagement and the nationalization of foreign-owned companies and mines also contributed to the economic decline. Unemployment soared and the standard of living sank during the 1980s, making Zambia one of the worlds poorest countries.

The imposition of austerity measures proposed by the International Monetary Fund and Western creditors, with whom Kaunda had a prickly relationship, led to riots over price hikes and shortages in basic commodities such as maize meal.

Kaunda eventually gave way to domestic protests and international pressure in 1990 and agreed to multiparty elections. He lost the 1991 poll to Frederick Chiluba, and the two men became bitter rivals, with Kaunda dismissing Chiluba and his allies as little men with little brains.

Chiluba sought to ban Kaunda, whose parents had been born in neighboring Malawi, from running again in 1996 by a constitutional amendment barring first-generation Zambians from running for president. He also used a 1997 failed coup attempt to place Kaunda under house arrest, despite the latters protestations of innocence. Kaunda said he comforted himself while in confinement through music and poetry, and thoughts of the late Princess of Wales, who was killed in a car crash in 1997.

Despite his anti-colonialist struggles, Kaunda was a self-confessed admirer of Queen Elizabeth II and the British royal family. He was also an avid ballroom dancer and loved to play the guitar.

Kaunda was shot and wounded by government forces during a demonstration in 1997 and in 1999 escaped an assassination attempt. He blamed Chilubas allies for the November 1999 killing of his son and heir-apparent, Wezi. He lost another son, Masyzyo, to AIDS in 1986.

After his retirement from politics, Kaunda campaigned against AIDS, becoming one of the few African leaders to speak up on a continent where it is often taboo. He set up the Kenneth Kaunda Children of Africa Foundation in 2000 and became actively involved in AIDS charity work. He took an AIDS test at the age of 78 in a bid to persuade others to do likewise in a country ravaged by the virus.

___

Meldrum contributed from Johannesburg. Former AP Johannesburg Bureau Chief Christopher Torchia contributed.

___

This story was corrected to show that Zambia's president is Edgar Lungu, not Edward.
Willa L. Drake Radford of Felton, DE, died Wednesday, June 23, 2021 in Bayhealth Hospital, Kent Campus, Dover, DE. She was 89. She was born in Kingmont, WV, on January 17, 1932, a daughter of the late William Douglas and Rosa Mae Gower Drake. She was preceded in death by her loving husband, 
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If you have any questions or need further assistance, please call our customer service team at 570-724-2287 or email dtaylor@tiogapublishing.com.
Nevada is distributing $5 million in cash prizes to residents who have been vaccinated as part of an effort to encourage more people to get shots
June 16, 2021





The COVID-19 pandemic last year transformed almost every aspect of buying and selling. Since customers were unable to go to brick-and-mortar stores, they switched to online shopping. More than 40% of adults in the United States have significantly increased their online shopping since the beginning of 2020.







With the sudden increase in online shopping, companies also had to digitize their customer care to adapt quickly. Since consumers could not speak to customer care executives in person, businesses had to ensure that buyers received the same level of service. Most of these transformations were already underway, but the pandemic forced them to accelerate these plans by almost a decade.

Adapting to the current digital scenario for most companies consisted of digitization and digitalization. Most people think that both these terms can be used interchangeably.

However, there is a distinctive difference between the two. Digitization refers to the transformation of analog systems or processes into digital methods. On the other hand, digitalization of digital transformation is the process of adopting digital tools and technology for business purposes.

Both digitization and digitalization have impacted consumer experience in several ways. In this post, we will talk about how digitization has optimized customer experience in 2021.

Impacts of Digitization on Customer Experience

In the post-pandemic, consumers are looking for an ongoing relationship with the brand instead of isolated transactions. However, that has also raised customer expectations as digitization has improved capabilities for businesses. A brand needs to provide faster and better service than before to thrive in the present competitive environment.

These are some of the most salient impacts of digitization on customer experience since last year.

Instant Access to Information

Most businesses have started storing the information on the cloud instead of physical storage. That makes it easy for customers to look for and find the information they need without speaking to customer care. They can also access several details related to online shopping, such as:

Previous purchase details

Current purchase tracking

Canceling or returning orders

Reordering

Automated Process

Modern consumers love automated processes. A survey conducted by Accenture (News - Alert) revealed that more than 84% of the respondents prefer interacting with automated apps and systems. Most of the respondents also felt that automated customer care processes communicated faster and more politely. That is why automation in customer service has also become a part of consumer satisfaction strategies.

Personalized Experience

Businesses can use the digitization of customer service processes to make the consumers feel special. They can use customer segmentation and map the user metrics using controlled APIs to provide personalized experiences. Digitization allows companies to tailor their content and product suggestions according to individual customers needs. These factors also make the consumers feel valued.

Transparent Data

Digitization allows businesses to automate the collection of user data. The data provides new insights into consumer purchase preferences and patterns. Thus, companies can come up with more effective digital marketing campaigns.

However, digitization also allows users to know the kind of personal data being collected as well as how it is being utilized. According to a survey published by the World Economic Forum, 87% of Internet users feel that they should be allowed to review and control the collection/use of their personal data.

Digitization also enables businesses to assure the customers that their personal data is not being shared with third parties. These factors can contribute to building brand loyalty and forge long-term consumer relationships.

Ways to Improve Customer Experience Through Digitization

Businesses often find it difficult to understand where to start with digitization and technological innovations focused on customer service. They need to establish a foundation based on their investment budget and expectations. These are some ways that can help them focus on digitization solutions for their business needs.

Establish an Organized Database on the Cloud

Storing all the relevant customer information on the cloud may sound simple, but it can elevate the customer experience to a whole new level. It can also lower operational costs for the company. Apart from the online shopping features that we discussed before, businesses can also offer FAQ sections to answer consumer questions faster.

Implement Automation for Customer Communication

Automation of customer service faced a few hiccups initially. But now the technology uses intelligent AI-based chatbots that can replicate human interactions. They can also offer live chat support as most customers prefer chatting over calling or emailing in the post-pandemic era.

Centralize Omnichannel Interactions (News - Alert)

Businesses may find it difficult to keep up with so many different channels and devices used by consumers to communicate with a brand. Customer service digitization will enable organizations to create a centralized system that saves all the data related to consumer interactions through various channels and devices.

Offering omni channel communication for customer service also enables them to cover more market segments while standardizing satisfaction.

Digitization and digitalization are rapidly changing the customer service landscape in the post-pandemic world. Businesses still have to rely on consumer opinions to optimize their products and services.

However, digitalization has helped companies cope with the increase in the volume of customer communications while maintaining satisfaction. We believe that these current trends of consumer service digitalization are just glimpses of the future of the customer service industry.
June 18, 2021

As we now are hopefully turning the corner on the worst of the pandemic, its back to the office and back to normal for those in the workforce...or is it?

Thinking about employees and the workplace in the framework of customer experience will be essential in keeping workers engaged and happy to prevent a phenomenon known as the great resignation. Another phrase thats making headlines lately is sheltering in job - according to a LinkedIn study, 74% of employees seem to be just biding their time, waiting for a better opportunity to open up for them on the horizon.







Turnover is rampant  and for good reason. Many workers have had a taste of working from home and arent willing to give that up. Others have moved to greener pastures (literally), away from expensive cities and costly commutes (in terms of time, money, and mental anguish) in favor of the promise of a better life. Still others get counted out as hiring managers often exhibit unconscious bias in hiring, which leaves out a lot of people of color. Using AI for hiring is a way forward.

So, what will it take to keep the workplace of the future engaged and happy? Lets explore a few potential applications of customer experience in the workplace.

A Positive Company Culture is Key

Company culture is much more than a few cheap perks such as coffee and casual Fridays. If you think company culture is just a luxury, consider this: In 2020, 85% of employees were not engaged, an equivalent of a $7 trillion loss in productivity. Many workers, especially Millennials and Gen Z, want to attach a higher level of meaning to their work and not just a paycheck. Getting everyone aligned on changing company culture for the better is key. Employees need to know that it is a safe space to do so and not in fear of job loss or gaps in education.

Technology to Support a Distributed Workforce

Its hard enough to keep everyone safe and secure when they are all working in one place, but what can IT professionals do when it comes to a variety of unsecure work from home environments? Theyll need to be cognizant of building secure networks and making it easier to login for a better customer experience.

Time to Start Your Own Gig?

It might be just the time to start your own business, after all. Of course, proceed with caution as you dont want to kill your dream before its ready by leaving your day job. Still, using the power of storytelling, you can impact so many people. If youre building a new website, youll be sure to want to build plenty of links to it as well.

Bringing it All Together

Whether youre working from home or a hybrid mix of a safe return to the office and remote work, the pandemic has made us more thoughtful about how we show up to work and how we should celebrate and support each other through anxiety-ridden times. Lets continue to bring positive values to the workplace that we can be proud of at the end of the day.

Edited by Erik Linask
June 18, 2021





Probably, you saw that most blog posts have links inside them. Backlinking is a vital element of a successful SEO strategy. Links could show to search engines that a site is recognizable, reliable, and, thus, deserves the highest place on the search engine results pages (SERPs). However, a huge number of incorporated links is not enough as their types also matter. Different links have unique purposes and differentiate the levels of impact on search engine rankings and the outcomes you can see from developing them.







However, two types matter the most. Well get to them after a short background piece for beginners out there.

Link and Backlink 101

In simple words, a link is a connection between two websites. The easiest way of putting it is everything that guides you to some page after you click on it is called a link. And you can create a reference from everything like an image, piece of text, or even video clip. A backlink is a mention of your website by another one (with a link, obviously).

But before using or requesting one, you should know what types there are, and what links really matter for the engines and your campaign. Out of the many kinds, not all can help you to improve your rankings.

What Adds Value to a Backlink?

Backlinks are not all created equal, so it is important to realize what makes a link valuable. Some factors make links more beneficial than others and some of them could make a mention very useless or even harmful for SEO.

There are three main factors that could add value to each reference:

1. The quality of the linking website

You need to be sure of the reliability of the backlinks that you incorporate in your post or ask another source to publish. The most qualified links come from valuable websites. The most trustworthy resources will send positive indications to search engines, and this will work well for your own platform.

2. Do follow and no follow statuses

With these options links publishers could also add or remove some value from the link. By HTML code you can set the link as either do follow or no follow.

The link with the first status will send a signal to search engines that will recognize and give SEO importance to the links. No follow rank says to search engines to pass over the links and give them less value. Obviously, do follow links are more helpful as they send a positive message to search engines.

3. On-site link location

The place for your links is an important factor that you should take into account if you want to create high-quality backlinks. The most powerful links are usually placed in the main body content of the website. If you publish them in the header or sidebar, they could not receive the necessary attention from search engines.

Now you need to go deeper. Review all link types and decide what will definitely work for you. You will find many useful lists and many classifications here and at sites like reviewsxp.com. However, only two backlink kinds really matter for optimization and could be useful in any case.

What are these two SEO links?

Guest Blogging Backlinks

There are different ways for building backlinks and guest posting is one of them. You can also purchase quality backlinks from blogs by cooperating with professional services that have connections with credible donors. Usually, if you submit a guest post on some platform, they let you incorporate an editorial mention within your content.

Links in guest posts are a reliable way to build backlinks, trust, and authority through other influential publications. You just need a strong list of valuable guest blogging sites and master outreach writing skills.

Editorial Backlinks

Editorial mentions are probably the best types of free website backlinks. An editorial mention is when another brand or service owner refers to your website and recommends you as a provider of quality content, products, or services. An editorial backlink example is when someone refers to your brand or article as a source of information or an interview with someone associated with your website.

Of course, to get editorial links, you need to have high-quality content and strong marketing strategies. And it is important to generate shareable content that other sites will want to talk about. If you are an experienced brand owner and your platform has already good SEO rankings, editorial backlinks will help you to take a step forward.

Getting Backlinks Naturally or Buying Them?

A balance of both.

In general, you can have natural and manually obtained links. Where exactly depends on the quality of your content, its niche, and many other factors. If you get links from other websites, it tells search engines that your website is relevant and of good quality.

A normal and natural link is that you get from other platform owners without you requesting it. It shows that your platform has good content and other authors recommend it. They redirect their audience to your site because your page contains the information they think is worth sharing.

To create backlinks, you need to invest effort, time, and energy. At times, also money. You should communicate with other website owners and bloggers to link and feature your page or collaborate with link-building agencies. For example, you can purchase quality backlinks from blogs as they are already important for Google (News - Alert) .

Any good SEO strategy is impossible without high-quality links. And their quantity isnt what matters. Only their quality and reliability are vital. There are different types of backlinks that come with varying levels of value and importance. Create your link-building plans around acquiring top-tier links that will be the most beneficial to your SEO.
[June 18, 2021] Alaska Power & Telephone Initiates Marine Route Survey for SEALink Submarine Cable Project

AP&T Wireless (APTW), a subsidiary of Alaska Power & Telephone, has initiated a marine route survey for the SEALink submarine fiber optic cable project. TerraSond - an Alaska-based company with an Alaskan crew - will be using a 105' vessel outfitted with advanced geophysical and hydrographic survey equipment to study the seafloor in advance of developing a final submarine cable route and design. The vessel, named the Qualifier 105, will spend approximately 20 days surveying seafloor areas between Coffman Cove and south Mitkoff Island, and Petersburg and Juneau. APTW will use data resulting from the survey, expected in August 2021, to select a submarine cable route that minimizes impacts and conflicts, and avoids features that could pose future risks to the cable. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210618005547/en/ SEALink Submarine Fiber Optic Map The SEALink project will create a 214-mile submarine fiber optic cable from Prince of Wales Island to Juneau, with an overland crossing on Mitkof Island through the community of Petersburg. The project also involves terrestrial network build-outs in the communities of Coffman Cove and Kasaan, which currently lack broadband service. To minimize project impacts, APTW is constructing terrestrial features on existing utility poles and within existing ROW wherever feasible. "In a remote state like Alaska, the need for broadband is far reaching. It is critical to connect communities, supporting telemedicine and tele-education, and so much more," said Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski. "The SEALink project is an exciting venture that will bring a much needed boost to communities in Southeast Alaska. I'm happy to see the broad support for this project-made possible through public and private partnerships-and look forward to following its progress to ultimate completion." The SEALink project will help fortify long-term economic and community stability on Prince of Wales Island, where legacy industries such as timber and mining have been in decline. "aining access to high-speed internet connectivity can be life-changing, especially for residents in rural Alaska where communication resources and infrastructure are most scarce," said Alaska Senator Dan Sullivan. "The initiation of this marine route survey is welcome news and a great step forward to this critical project, which will result in installing fiber-optic cable, connecting Southeast communities, and meeting the urgent need for accessible high-speed internet throughout the region."



Richard Petersen, President of the Central Council Tlingit Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska, stated: "Tlingit & Haida is excited to support the SEALink fiber project as it will work to close the digital divide that so many rural Alaskans are far too familiar with. For tribes, high speed connectivity for our citizens is truly the latest way to express our sovereignty and move us to the forefront of the digital age." Ronald Leighton, President of the Organized Village of Kasaan tribal council, remarked: "For the Organized Village of Kasaan, access to broadband connectivity is a step toward equity in our rural community." Additional supporters include the city governments of Coffman Cove and Kasaan, and other organizations such as the Sustainable Southeast Partnership.

The SEALink project is funded through a combination of private investment supplied by AP&T Wireless and USDA Rural Utility Service ReConnect grant funds. APTW is on track to construct new terrestrial networks in Coffman Cove and Kasaan in 2022, after which time improved service will begin to become available. Installation of the submarine cable is scheduled to occur in 2023, and will enable significantly higher broadband speeds in communities across Prince of Wales Island. To help keep to this timeline and make broadband available as soon as possible, APTW has proactively placed orders for long lead-time materials, and is developing documents and specifications required for the submarine cable supply/install procurement processes. However, the schedule will ultimately depend upon the timing of permitting processes, and environmental approval processes managed by USDA. Congressman Don Young remarked: "Alaska's vast size and unique geography can present many challenges for broadband deployment in our state. The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the importance of reliable broadband access, particularly for young people who spent a good deal of time learning remotely. Now more than ever, we must work to solve connectivity challenges that have become all too common in remote areas of our state. I am very pleased that Alaska Power & Telephone will be using funds made available through USDA's ReConnect Grant Program to study the seafloor ahead of designing and deploying cables between Prince of Wales Island and Juneau. This is a crucially important task, and I am grateful to Alaska Power & Telephone's efforts on behalf of Alaskans. It is my great hope that all of our rural communities in Southeast will soon have reliable broadband access for education, telehealth, remote employment, and other critical necessities of daily life." Alaska Power & Telephone President and CEO Mike Garrett remarked "the marine route survey is a significant milestone for the SEALink project. We are honored to be in a position to apply USDA funds for the benefit of rural southeast Alaska, and thankful for all of the tribal and community support for this project. Rural broadband access creates tremendous stakeholder value - opportunity that helps all businesses and families succeed in reaching their goals, together." As TerraSond mobilizes to southeast Alaska, the Qualifier 105 will make a slight detour to support the Fallen American Veterans Foundation (FAVF) by searching for a US Air Force charter flight which disappeared in 1951 while en route to the Korean War theater. FAVF hopes location of the aircraft can bring closure to family members of the 38 US air force, UN, and Canadian crew members who were lost. Combining this mobilization with AP&T's schedule will help save significantly on costs and make the search possible. Alaska Power & Telephone Company (OTC: APTL) is an investor-owned utility providing diverse utility services in over 40 communities in rural Alaska. Additional information on AP&T can be found at: www.aptalaska.com View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210618005547/en/

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[June 18, 2021] ALYI EV Pilot In Africa Benefits From IQST And UN Initiatives; Revolt Token Program Update Preview

Dallas, Texas, June 18, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Alternet Systems, Inc. (OTC Pink: ALYI) today released a management update after conducting a scheduled review of its electric motorcycle development program last week with the dedicated design team from MODUS Applied Innovations . The review and corresponding update include details on iQSTELs (OTCQB: IQST) contributions to ALYIs electric motorcycle development program and EV Rideshare and Self-Drive Rental pilot program in Africa. The review and corresponding update also include details on a parallel electric motorcycle pilot recently initiated in Kenya by the United Nations . In summary, ALYI management is confident, after completing the review, that ALYI remains on track with its EV Rideshare and Self-Drive Rental pilot program in Africa. ALYI EV Rideshare and Self-Drive Rental Pilot Program Management Update MODUS is working with iQSTEL on connected, state of the art, electric vehicle technology in support of ALYIs overall electric vehicle program objectives. MODUS is specifically developing a retro electric motorcycle based on the styling of the BMW R71 WWII era motorcycle produced initially for military use. But what MODUS is doing overall has a much more comprehensive set of objectives and far-reaching impact. MODUS and ALYI are nearing finalization of the production ready design of the retro Revolt Electric Motorcycle that will be produced and sold in the United States. ALYI already has hundreds of reservations to purchase the retro Revolt Electric Motorcycle. The wider set of objectives in the MODUS electric motorcycle design initiative was to build an ALYI proprietary electric vehicle technology intellectual property (IP) body of knowledge. The body of knowledge includes inventorying all available off-the-shelf EV technology that would enable the efficient construction of an optimal and affordable electric motorcycle from commercially available components. Hand-in-hand with this inventory of commercially available EV technology, is the identification of solution gaps from the market of commercially available components that can contribute to an optimal and affordable electric motorcycle. There are a good number of gaps, and in turn, little to no electric motorcycles on the market today that can be categorized as optimal and affordable. The general state of the electric motorcycle market today is either an electric motorcycle that costs as much as a luxury combustion engine car, or an electric motorcycle that has limited range and passenger capacity. ALYI is confident in the progress being made by MODUS to close the various EV technology GAPs. The resulting ALYI EV IP Portfolio will set ALYI apart from other EV competitors, particularly EV competitors in the motorcycle sector of the overall EV market. IQST is playing an instrumental role in the MODUS electric motorcycle design initiative for ALYI. IQST brings experience and their proprietary Internet of Things (IoT) technology to the ALYI design team. IQST is concentrating on a custom EV Battery solution for ALYI. The ALYI EV Battery solution is more than a battery with a longer range or faster charging capacity. IQSTs EV Batery design efforts include forward thinking battery management solutions that draw on IQSTs IoT experience and proprietary technology to connect the bike outside the frame to external resources that can contribute to battery management and differentiate ALYIs solution from competitors.



In addition to the IQST contributions, the UN has initiated its own electric motorcycle pilot within the boda boda (motorcycle taxi) market in Kenya. ALYI anticipates the UNs pilot to contribute valuable insight regarding electric motorcycle rideshare enterprise limitations and constraints that will need to be addressed to facilitate the expansion of an effective electric motorcycle deployment. The electric motorcycle rideshare and self-drive rental pilot is on track and anticipated to begin next month. The pilot is moving forward with known solution gaps that we are already working to close. We anticipate the pilot to identify additional gaps in addition to giving us the opportunity to test solutions to close the gaps we have already identified. We expect the pilot to grow our proprietary EV technology intellectual property body of knowledge and accelerate our ultimate commercial deployment of electric motorcycles in Africa.

ALYI has an order to deliver 2000 electric motorcycles in Kenya to be deployed into the motorcycle taxi (boda) market. The first delivery schedule for July is intended to support a first phase, pilot rollout of the rideshare service. The motorcycle ride hail market in Africa is estimated at $4 billion . ALYI's Electric Motorcycle Program is only a small part of the company's comprehensive strategy to build a far-reaching electric vehicle ecosystem. The success of any electric vehicle will depend on the simultaneous availability of an entire network of solutions necessary to support the electric vehicle. For example, the electric vehicle support network ranges from the availability of power, to charging stations where power can be accessed, to long-range batteries to make electric vehicles efficient modes of transportation, to connectivity so software updates for motor synchronization and battery optimization applications can be continuously updated along with other electric vehicle user support applications. ALYI's primary business focus is on its overall electric vehicle ecosystem strategy out of which electric vehicles will be just one component. ALYI is building its electric vehicle ecosystem in a region with one of the lowest per capita transportation ratios in the world, Sub Saharan Africa. To both attract industry leading talent to collaborate in ALYI's electric vehicle ecosystem, and to provide an opportunity to prove innovations coming out of the electric vehicle ecosystem, ALYI is launching an annual electric vehicle race in partnership with a brand name racing organization. The annual race event will be hosted simultaneously with an electric mobility symposium and expo. ALYI is setting itself apart from the rest of the electric vehicle industry not only through its electric vehicle ecosystem strategy, but also through its commitment to democratize the electric vehicle ecosystem. ALYI's financing partner and electric vehicle ecosystem collaborator, RevoltTOKEN, has already provided key funding to advance ALYI's business plan to its current stage. ALYIs funding partner, RevoltTOKEN has opened the sale of Revolt Tokens to contribute to financing ALYIs overall electric vehicle ecosystem strategy. In the course of the initial Revolt Token sales, ALYIs funding partner, RevoltTOKEN has learned from the initial process and is making updates to the Revolt Token program it expects to roll out soon. Look for more news next week coming from RevoltTOKEN. To learn more about RevoltTOKEN and how to participate in ALYIs electric vehicle ecosystem through the purchase of Revolt Tokens, visit www.revolttoken.com . For more information and to stay up to date on ALYI's overall latest developments, please visit www.alternetsystemsinc.com .



Disclaimer/Safe Harbor: This news release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Securities Litigation Reform Act. The statements reflect the Company's current views with respect to future events that involve risks and uncertainties. Among others, these risks include the expectation that any of the companies mentioned herein will achieve significant sales, the failure to meet schedule or performance requirements of the companies' contracts, the companies' liquidity position, the companies' ability to obtain new contracts, the emergence of competitors with greater financial resources and the impact of competitive pricing. In the light of these uncertainties, the forward-looking events referred to in this release might not occur.



For more information, please visit: http://www.alternetsystemsinc.com

Alternet Systems, Inc. Contact:

Randell Torno

info@lithiumip.com

+1-800-713-0297



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[June 18, 2021] CardsPal launches Cardculator - Recommending best cashback cards at popular merchants

CardsPal continues to support local businesses by boosting their digital presence and customer reach, at no cost since launch

More than 2.1k merchants powering over 6.1k deals on the platform SINGAPORE, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Singapore-based fintech app CardsPal launches the Cardculator feature to help its users select their best cashback cards to save more at their preferred popular merchants, including those in the app's big-ticket deals category for bigger savings. This represents a step closer towards CardsPal's mission of helping users to save, through discovering the right deal, using the right payment card, at the right place and right time. The company celebrated its first-year anniversary since its official app launch with over 175,000 app users. 1-for-1 deals, $11-off deals, and 11%-off deals were launched, with the giveaway of whole cakes, and $2,500 worth of shopping mall e-vouchers. The app was ranked the #1 lifestyle app in the Singapore App Store and Play Store in November 2020. CardsPal started as an intrapreneur idea within a bank, which later evolved into a business venture. The payment card advisor app came into being when Saim Yeong Harng and his team envisioned an app to empower users to save, starting with getting the most from their credit cards effortlessly. "CardsPal harnesses powerful data to maximise each user's savings and optimise their spending. The app recommends cards with the most cashback and rewards for each user's spend, based on the cards they own, and can automatically compute the estimated cashback amount ad reflect it in-app seamlessly," said co-founder and Chief Product Officer, Richard Lu.



"The app also offers a wide selection of deals ranging from 1-for-1, dining, leisure and shopping, that can be filtered based on the users' cards collection or the businesses in their immediate vicinity. This fosters a hyperlocal card and cashback experience, maximising savings while enabling users to enjoy relevant deals wherever they go," said Saim Yeong Harng, co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of CardsPal. He added, "This feature not only applies to credit cards but also to debit and membership cards, advising users on the right card for their spend without the hassle of memorising card benefits. More importantly, innovative features such as the Cardculator will be continuously enhanced to improve great user experience and usability of the app, with the purpose of helping users save effortlessly."

Exciting plans in the making CardsPal has launched a big-ticket deals category, and will next launch an air miles and points calculator to further optimise benefits for users, and maximise their savings. It also looks to expand regionally as its next strategic growth plan. To view CardsPal's photographs and videos, please visit their media assets page. About CardsPal

CardsPal is a mobile app that empowers users to optimise their spending and maximise their savings by being the all-in-one platform for credit card comparison and deals. As a card payment advisor, CardsPal recommends users on the most suitable card for their spend, bringing them more cashback and rewards. Moreover, CardsPal aggregates all credit card deals for credit cards issued in Singapore, that can be filtered according to cards owned by users. It automatically calculates cashback with the Cashback Calculator and Cardculator, creating a personalised deal hunting and saving experience. CardsPal is a portfolio company of SC Ventures, an innovative arm of the Standard Chartered Bank. Check out their app in the app store. Learn more about CardsPal by visiting their website and following them on their social media platforms: CardsPal's Instagram Page

CardsPal's Facebook Page

CardsPal's Linkedin Page

CardsPal's Telegram Channel SOURCE CardsPal

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[June 18, 2021] Evergreen Therapeutics, Inc. Announces Agreement with ICON plc to Conduct Phase II Clinical Trial for COVID-19 Drug Candidate

Bethesda, Maryland , June 18, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Evergreen Therapeutics, Inc. (Evergreen, or the Company), a fast-growing clinical stage company focused on the development of new drugs for unmet medical needs, today announced a clinical service agreement with ICON plc (ICON) to conduct a global, multi-center Phase II clinical trial for Evergreens COVID-19 drug therapy candidate EG-009A. ICON plc has been hired as Evergreens Clinical Research Organization (CRO), to take the lead role in managing the company's Phase II clinical trial and overseeing the studys medical testing responsibilities. The first patients with COVID-19 are expected to be enrolled in early August 2021, and the Phase II clinical trial is expected to be completed by the middle of 2022. This clinical trial will be conducted in the United States, Brazil, and Argentina, and will be a randomized, double-blinded, and controlled study. The purpose of the study is to evaluate the efficacy of Evergreens EG-009A drug candidate for the treatment of moderate to severe COVID-19 cases. According to the requirements and recommendations of the FDA, the phase II clinical trial should be designed to show evidence of clinical significance in reducing pulmonary failure and improving the survival rate of hospitalized COVID-19 patients. Dr. David Du, CEO of Evergreen Therapeutics, commented, Evergreen Therapeutics is pleased to partner with ICON plc, the worlds second largest clinical trial service organization, to serve as our CRO and arrange the Companys Phase II clinical study for our COVID-19 injection drug candidate EG-009A. ICON was the clear partner of choice for Evergreen, given their extensive experience in the research and development of new drugs for the prevention and treatment of COVID-19. Dr. Du further commented, We are excited that our pipeline EG-009A has achieved a clinical breakthrough while the COVID-19 pandemic is raging around the world. EG-009A is an innovative drug candidate to treat moderate to severe coronavirus caused pneumonia, and to inhibit the cytokine release syndrome (CRS). CRS is a critical and primary cause of death in a variety of viral infectious diseases, such as Ebola, SARS, viral influenza and other conditions. Since the beginning of 2020, we have conducted significant fundamental research ad secured patent protection for the clinical development of EG-009A, and we are now entering the clinical stage for this drug candidate. We are very grateful for the guidance of the FDA, the partnership with ICON, and the strong support of investors. In March of 2021, we completed a $15 million USD equivalent Series A financing with several institutional investors. The proceeds from this offering will allow Evergreen to fund this Phase II clinical study.



About Evergreen Therapeutics, Inc. Evergreen Therapeutics, Inc. is a bio-tech pharmaceutical company founded by highly experienced pharmaceutical executives including 5 former FDA senior reviewers. The Company is committed to the development and commercial operation of clinical stage drug therapies. Evergreen is committed to the clinical research, development, and commercialization of innovative drugs that have urgent and unmet clinical needs. Evergreen is developing more than 10 drug candidates and possesses a world class management team with top research & development capabilities.

For more information on Evergreen Therapeutics, Inc., please visit the Companys website at http://www.egpharm.com/ . About ICON plc ICON plc is a global provider of outsourced drug and device development and commercialization services to pharmaceutical, biotechnology, medical device and government and public health organizations. The company specializes in the strategic development, management and analysis of programs that support clinical development - from compound selection to Phase I-IV clinical studies. With headquarters in Dublin, Ireland, ICON employed approximately 16,070 employees in 89 locations in 43 countries as at March 31, 2021. For further information about ICON, visit: www.iconplc.com and www.iconplc.com/pra . Forward-Looking Statements This press release contains statements, which may constitute "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the Securities Act of 1933 and the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended by the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Those statements include statements regarding the intent, belief or current expectations of Evergreen Therapeutics, Inc., and members of its management as well as the assumptions on which such statements are based. When the Company uses words such as "may," "will," "intend," "should," "believe," "expect," "anticipate," "project," "estimate" or similar expressions that do not relate solely to historical matters, it is making forward-looking statements. Prospective investors are cautioned that any such forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance and involve risks and uncertainties, and that actual results may differ materially from those contemplated by such forward-looking statements. For these reasons, among others, investors are cautioned not to place undue reliance upon any forward-looking statements in this press release. The Company undertakes no obligation to update or revise forward-looking statements to reflect changed assumptions, the occurrence of unanticipated events or changes to future operating results.

For more information, please contact: Company: Evergreen Therapeutics, Inc. China: 33A, Media Finance Center Shenzhen, Guangdong Province, PRC +86 18688785126 USA: 10411 Motor City Dr., Suite 500 Bethesda MD 20817 +1 301-637-6781 Investor Relations Agency Contact: William Tu / Scott Powell Skyline Corporate Communications Group, LLC One Rockefeller Plaza, 11th Floor New York, NY 10020 Office: (646) 893-5835 Email: wtu@skylineccg.com Email: info@skylineccg.com

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[June 18, 2021] Fastmarkets successfully completes IOSCO assurance review for its NBSK CIF China price

LONDON, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Fastmarkets, the industry-leading cross-commodity price reporting agency (PRA), is delighted to announce the successful completion of an external assurance review of its NBSK CIF China assessment. This milestone confirms its alignment to the standards defined by the International Organization of Securities Commission (IOSCO) within the Principles for Oil Price Reporting Agencies. Professional services firm BDO carried out the independent assurance review. The firm found that, as of May 31, 2021, Fastmarkets' responses were in line with the IOSCO principles for PRAs. The review process is comprehensive, examining all relevant documentation and processes to ensure their quality, integrity and adherence to stated methodology. "Fastmarkets is delighted to add the NBSK CIF China assessment to the list of our prices that have successfully completed an assurance review," said Fastmarkets CEO Raju Daswani. "We remain committed to growing our list of audited prices and providing our users the highest possible level of confidence in the reliability of our benchmarks." As per guidance from the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA), this assurance review by an independent external auditor is sufficient to demonstrate compliance with the requirements of the Benchmarks Regulation (BMR) for commodity benchmarks (paragraph 18 of Annex II). Reviews must take place at least annually. "Providing our customers with dependable prices backed by reliable methodologies is at the heart of what we do," said Fastmarkets senior vice president Matt Graves. "With this new audit, I'm happy to confirm thatall of Fastmarkets Forest Products' exchange-traded prices have now successfully undergone IOSCO assurance audits, including the two new China pulp contracts for hardwood and softwood pulp futures launched earlier this month by NOREXECO."



To obtain a copy of the independent assurance report, please click here. Fastmarkets has invested significantly in resources and technology to ensure its price-assessment process aligns with IOSCO principles. View details here.

To view Fastmarkets Forest Products price methodology/specifications, please click here. For further inquiries, please contact Katharine Kellar at?katharine.kellar@fastmarkets.com. ABOUT FASTMARKETS

Fastmarkets is the industry-leading Price Reporting Agency (PRA) for global commodities, providing price data, news, analytics, and events for the metals and mining, forest products, and agriculture markets. Fastmarkets' data is critical for customers seeking to understand and predict dynamic, sometimes opaque markets, enabling trading and risk management. Fastmarkets is a global business with a history exceeding 130 years built on trust and deep market knowledge. Its team of more than 430 people are located in global offices including London, Helsinki, Boston, New York, Shanghai, Beijing, Singapore, Brussels and Sao Paulo. Fastmarkets is part of Euromoney Institutional Investor PLC (LSE: ERM), a listed company on the London Stock Exchange. Euromoney is a leading international business-to-business information group focused primarily on the global commodities, banking and asset management markets. View original content to download multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/fastmarkets-successfully-completes-iosco-assurance-review-for-its-nbsk-cif-china-price-301315299.html SOURCE Fastmarkets

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[June 18, 2021] Government of Canada invests over $1.6 million to bring high-speed Internet to more than 684 more homes in Northern Ontario

Ontarians in rural communities to benefit from increased connectivity OTTAWA, ON, June 18, 2021 /CNW/ - The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted how much we rely on our connections. Now more than ever, Canadians across the country need access to reliable high-speed Internet as many of us are working, learning, and staying in touch with friends and family from home. Right now, too many Canadians living in rural and remote communities lack access to high-speed Internet. Through the Universal Broadband Fund's (UBF) Rapid Response Stream, the Government of Canada is taking immediate action to get Canadians connected to the high-speed Internet they need. Today, Paul Lefebvre, Member of Parliament for Sudbury, on behalf of the Honourable Maryam Monsef, Minister for Women and Gender Equality and Rural Economic Development, announced over $1.6 million in federal funding for Bell. These investments will bring high-speed Internet to rural residents of Powassan and Hornell Heights. These projects will connect more than 684 underserved households to high-speed Internet. The Honourable Anthony Rota, Member of Parliament for NipissingTimiskaming, was also in attendance. The $2.75-billion UBF was launched on November 9, 2020. Projects funded under the UBF, as well as through other public and private investments, will help connect 98% of Canadians to high-speed Internet by 2026 and achieve the national target of 100% connectivity by 2030. Today's announcement builds on the progress the Government of Canada has already made to improve critical infrastructure in Ontario. Since 2015, the federal government has invested more than $2.85 billion in over 4,060 infrastructure projects in Ontario communities with a population of fewer than 100,000 people. These investments mean 452 km of new or upgraded roads that are making our communities safer; more than 938 projects to provide residents with cleaner, more sustainable sources of drinking water; and more than 5,427 additional housing units built in rural communities, helping ensure all Ontarians have a safe place to call home. Quotes

"High-speed Internet is esential for Northern Ontario. It connects us to work, school and each other. This project is part of our commitment to connect 98% of households to reliable broadband services by 2026 and 100% of Canadians by 2030. We will not stop this important work until everyone has access to the high-speed Internet they need."





Paul Lefebvre , Member of Parliament for Sudbury "Connecting people in Nipissing-Timiskaming continues to be a high priority. Residents of Powassan and Hornell Heights will soon have access to reliable, high-speed Internet so that they can work, learn and keep in touch with their loved ones from home. Access to high-speed Internet is critical for economic development and for our region's overall recovery from the pandemic. Broadband Internet has been an essential tool for years and now, more than ever, the COVID-19 pandemic has shown how much everyone needs reliable access to high-speed Internet."

 The Honourable Anthony Rota, Member of Parliament for NipissingTimiskaming

"Bell has committed to making historic investments in Canada's high-speed broadband networksinvestments that connect even more rural communities and that reflect confidence in the country's recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic. As part of that commitment, we're proud to invest $564,478 and to partner with the Government of Canada in providing residents of Powassan and Hornell Heights with access to the fastest next-generation connections they need to thrive in a digital economy."

 Bruce Furlong, Senior Vice-President of Access Engineering and Deployment at Bell

Quick facts Canada's Connectivity Strategy aims to provide all Canadians with access to Internet speeds of at least 50 megabits per second (Mbps) download / 10 Mbps upload.

Connectivity Strategy aims to provide all Canadians with access to Internet speeds of at least 50 megabits per second (Mbps) download / 10 Mbps upload. The Universal Broadband Fund (UBF) is a $2.75-billion investment designed to help connect all Canadians to high-speed Internet. Applications to the UBF were accepted until March 15, 2021, and are now being evaluated.

investment designed to help connect all Canadians to high-speed Internet. Applications to the UBF were accepted until March 15, 2021, and are now being evaluated. The UBF is part of a suite of federal investments to improve high-speed Internet. The suite includes the Connect to Innovate program, which is expected to connect nearly 400,000 households by 2023, and the recently announced $2-billion broadband initiative from the Canada Infrastructure Bank. Associated links Backgrounder: Universal Broadband Fund and Telesat low Earth orbit satellite capacity agreement

Universal Broadband Fund

Connect to Innovate Program  Project status updates

Canada Infrastructure Bank announcement

High-Speed Access for All: Canada's Connectivity Strategy Stay connected Follow Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada on Twitter: @ISED_CA SOURCE Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada

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[June 18, 2021] How Will Blockchain Affect The Future of Education and Learning? Tim Miller, CEO Certif-ID Shares His Views

- Madhuri Dubey, Founder - National Skills Network, recently conducted an online interview with Tim Miller, Co-Founder & CEO - Certif-ID, to talk about how blockchain technology can better facilitate digital transactions. BANGALORE, India, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Tim Miller is an enthusiastic, driven thinker with a global perspective and is involved in the strategic development of future-ready learning, training and consultancy solutions. With diversified international work experience covering digitalisation of learning solutions, management system certification, product certification and training - across 25 countries, Tim has his finger to the pulse of the technologies and trends that fuel the market. Recently, Madhuri Dubey, the Founder of National Skills Network, sat down with Tim to discuss how breaking down fundamental constraints by applying technology in innovative ways has led him to create a blockchain-powered platform. Read their conversation below. Why did you turn to blockchain technology for Certif-ID? The vision of Certif-ID is to bridge the gap between 'New Economy' skills and employment prospects. To bring trust and transparency to digital transactions. Through Certif-ID, one of our goals is to harmonize educational standards and bring equal opportunity to technical professionals around the world. In line with this, we have focused on building a community of professionals in developing markets, helping them to showcase their skills and find employment in developed markets. We therefore needed a technology that would help us build a system to support the coexistence of traditional services and new services. And blockchain technology combined with data analytics and automation was our ideal choice. Its decentralised ledger system offers us the much-needed transparency and traceability. What is the foundation of the Certif-ID platform? Our primary mission is to harmonize educational standards and bring equal opportunity to technical professionals around the world. For this, we needed a process which would align with existing training providers to explore current levels of training and expected competency outcomes. To achieve this, Certif-ID uses European Skills, Competences, Qualifications and Occupations (ESCO) framework and Artificial Intelligence (AI). The ESCO framework provides an excellent guide and can support the process of skill and competency mapping to job roles and occupations. It identifies the key indicators and the core skills, which are required to meet industry specific needs, while also describing the steps required to achieve global standards. Additionally, we addressed the lack of transparency in the certification process by digitising and powering it with blockchain technology. This ensures that the digital certificates issued through Certif-ID are verifiable instantly and immutable. AI on our platform furthers our mission in various ways, whether it is our smart search feature or providing course and job recommendation based on members' skills. On the whole, Certi-ID is designed for individuals who want to learn new skills, providing easy access to credible courses and institutes for enrollment. After completing a course, learners can earn digital certificates via the Certif-ID platform. We are facilitating a continuous upskilling, in turn, improving a learners chance of landing a job and achieving professional equality.



How has Certif-ID grown since its inception in 2019? We had a great experience working on Certif-ID. It has certainly been challenging considering the current times, but we have been welcomed by people in the industry, communities and beyond.

Certif-ID is unquestionably solving current challenges, from making it a possibility for institutions to issue contactless digital certificates which can be verified instantly to providing a secure space for technical professionals to build a profile and gain visibility. We began our journey focused on helping Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) institutions in their certification and accreditation processes. Today, we have multiple offerings for institutions such as data analytics to gain insights and business value. Technical professionals or members on Certif-ID can build their SkillPass. It is an online profile that one can use to showcase their skills and experience. SkillPass offers a range of features including, a self-assessment to gauge one's job-readiness, CV generator to create different CVs to suit the job role one is applying for, Video CV to show off their personality and much more. SkillPass is beneficial because it allows members to store, access and share their credentials securely at any time from anywhere. Again, recruiters on the platform can list jobs, screen candidates based on their skills, access and verify their digital certificates and make an informed decision on shortlisting the candidate for an interview. What are some of the big events in the life of Certif-ID? Every small step we take toward bettering our platform and services, has been a big event for us and I would like to thank an extremely dedicated team behind the scenes for this. We are extremely proud of our partnership with leading institutions of the likes of, TUV Rheinland Academy, Automotive Skills Development Council (ASDC), ASTS Global Education India Pvt. Ltd., ICICI Foundation, and UNNATI Skill Center, publishing over 50,341 blockchain-powered digital certificates. In 2020, we were able to run a large-scale event, titled 'Next Step Seafarers', focused on getting seafarers in the Philippines back to work, as a response to the impact of COVID. This event was a big success, with the support of UNESCO, multiple industry players, including Q2 Hr Solutions, TESDA (Technical Education and Skill Development Authority) and importantly an endorsement from the Vice President of the Philippines, Ms. Leni Robredo. Recently, we have entered a new market of upholding environmental sustainability. We have partnered with Woodify, a startup focused on planting new, climate-resistant mixed forests across Germany. They are set to issue carbon credits digital certificates per year via Certif-ID to ensure that the issued carbon credits are encrypted, secure and instantly verifiable. How do you foresee Certif-ID shaping the future of businesses? Most companies we converse with are faced with the similar challenges of not being able to track or monitor digital transactions. Using blockchain technology to secure transactions, making it possible to track assets from production to delivery or use by end users, will solve this issue. This need for visibility will only increase for business across all sectors, from supply chain to healthcare. Blockchain technology will continue to play a critical role in reducing fraud, losses from counterfeit and gray market trading, as well as increase confidence in end users. Additionally, as blockchain provides all parties access to the same information, it will reduce communication or data transfer errors. Businesses will gain more control over outsourced materials and will spend less time on validating data; ultimately improving quality, reducing cost, or both. For those who haven't started adopting blockchain my message would be, to embrace this change; decentralized, identity and credentialing solutions are taking very big steps with some of the world's biggest and most trend setting companies. It will undoubtedly play a massive role in your business' success. About NSN National Skills Network (NSN) is a digital platform dedicated to creating awareness about skill-based education and training by sharing the positive impact. NSN has helped many organizations in bringing visibility to their initiatives, networking and promoting their vision for skilling Indian youth and making them employable. Website: https://www.nationalskillsnetwork.in/ About Certif-ID Certif-ID is a dedicated skills community. It is a global networking platform built on blockchain technology, connecting technical training institutions, industry professionals and recruiters. On the platform, technical training institutes can issue digital certificates placed on blockchain, optimising their certification and placement processes. Technical professionals can build their SkillPass to showcase their skills, record online interviews, plan their learning journeys, store all relevant information in a digital portfolio and share their credentials with potential recruiters. Recruiters can screen and source candidates based on competency, verify their digital records and reduce recruitment efforts. Connecting key stakeholders in the technical sector, Certif-ID focuses on streamlining the sourcing process, bridging the skills gap between education and employment while establishing trust and transparency. Website: https://certif-id.com/ Logo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1535599/NSN_Logo.jpg

Photo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1535600/Certif_ID_Tim_Miller.jpg

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[June 18, 2021] Inamori Foundation Announces 2021 Kyoto Prize Laureates

The Inamori Foundation today announced the 2021 recipients of its Kyoto Prize, Japan's highest private award for global achievement, in the categories of Advanced Technology, Basic Sciences, and Arts and Philosophy. See complete details at: https://www.kyotoprize.org/en Each laureate will receive a diploma, a 20-karat gold medal, and a monetary award of 100 million yen (about US$907,000) this autumn. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2021 laureates will not convene in person for traditional Kyoto Prize ceremonies in Japan, but will give commemorative lectures online. They are expected to convene in March 2022 for the 21st annual Kyoto Prize Symposium in San Diego, Calif., and in May 2022 for the Kyoto Prize at Oxford events in Oxford, UK. The 2021 Kyoto Prize Laureates In Advanced Technology, the 2021 Kyoto Prize laureate is Computer Scientist Andrew Chi-Chih Yao, Ph.D., Dean of the Institute for Interdisciplinary Information Sciences at Tsinghua University. Dr. Yao created new trends in computer science and made a great contribution to cutting-edge research in diverse areas, including security, secure computing, and quantum computation, by establishing innovative fundamental theories for computation and communication. His achievements continue to influence current real-world challenges in such areas as security, secure computing, and big data processing. In Basic Sciences, the 2021 Kyoto Prize laureate is Biochemist and Molecular Biologist Robert G. Roeder, Ph.D., Arnold and Mabel Beckman Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at The Rockefeller University. Dr. Roeder has revealed the principle of the regulatory mechanism of gene transcription in eukaryotes through more than 50 years of research, by identifying the functions of a series of factors - including three distinct RNA polymerases, basic transcription factors, one of the first gene-specific factors, and regulators in transcription from chromatin. Through his achievements, he has made significant contributions to the development of the life sciences.



In Arts and Philosophy, the 2021 Kyoto Prize laureate is Philosopher Bruno Latour, Ph.D., Professor Emeritus at the Paris Institute of Political Studies. Dr. Latour has revolutionized the conventional view of science by treating nature, humans, laboratory equipment, and other entities as equal actors, and describing technoscience as the hybrid network of these actors. In re-examining "modernity" based on the dualism of nature and society, Dr. Latour's philosophy has become influential across disciplines, involving multifaceted activities including proposals relating to global environmental issues. About the Inamori Foundation and the Kyoto Prize

The Kyoto Prize is an international award bestowed by the non-profit Inamori Foundation to honor those who have contributed significantly to the scientific, cultural, and spiritual betterment of humankind. The Foundation was established in 1984 by Dr. Kazuo Inamori, founder and chairman emeritus of Kyocera (News - Alert) Corporation; founder and honorary adviser to KDDI Corporation; and chairman emeritus and honorary adviser to Japan Airlines. Inamori created the Kyoto Prize in line with his belief that human beings have no higher calling than to strive for the greater good of society, and that the future of humanity can be assured only when there is a balance between our scientific progress and our spiritual depth. Counting the 2021 recipients, the prize has honored 115 laureates worldwide - 114 individuals and one group (the Nobel (News - Alert) Foundation). Individual laureates range from scientists, engineers and researchers to philosophers, painters, architects, sculptors, musicians and film directors. More information can be found at https://www.kyotoprize.org/en. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210618005529/en/

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[June 18, 2021] Local Bounti, Disruptive AgTech Company Redefining the Future of Farming, to Go Public in $1.1B SPAC Deal via Leo Holdings III Corp.

Breakthrough U.S. indoor agriculture company Local Bounti Corporation (Local Bounti) has agreed to go public through a merger with Leo Holdings III Corp. (Leo or Leo Holdings) (NYSE: LIII), a publicly-traded special purpose acquisition company, pursuant to a definitive business combination agreement. The transaction values the combined company at an equity value of $1.1 billion (assuming no redemptions) and upon closing of the transaction, the combined company is expected to remain listed on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol "LOCL". Strategic partners include food and agriculture industry giant Cargill and Sarath Ratanavadi, CEO of Gulf Energy Development Public Company Limited - Thailand's largest private energy and infrastructure company and one of the world's leaders in sustainable energy - which are investing in the combined company through a private investment in public equity (PIPE) arrangement. Cargill is also expected to provide $200 million in debt financing to accelerate Local Bounti's expansion plans. Local Bounti plans to use the capital to build local strategically-located indoor farming facilities across the Western U.S. to provide fresh, superior-tasting, long-lasting and sustainably-grown produce with minimal carbon footprint. Local Bounti Investment Highlights Superior unit economics, with high yield and low-cost operations, enabled by unique hybrid facility configuration that addresses the challenges of conventional greenhouse and vertical farming

Producing leafy greens today at initial facility with pipeline to grow to eight facilities and the company expects to have over 30 SKUs by the end of 2025, which extends Local Bounti's penetration, beginning in the largely untapped Western U.S. market

Superior brand and product that is local and sustainable across a growing number of SKUs, currently in more than 400 retail stores, including Associated Food Stores and URM served retail banners such as Rosauers, Super 1 Foods and Yoke's

Strong commitment to Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) practices and standards, including an executive team member who is Global Reporting Initiative (GRI)-certified to ensure aggressively transparent reporting per GRI and Sustainability Accounting Standards Board

Best-in-class, established management team of seasoned veterans at scaling early-stage companies, with Fortune 500 and public company experience "Today's announcement takes Local Bounti to the next level in enabling local, sustainable production and delivery of fresh, delicious and nutritious produce, including in regions that traditionally don't have access to local supply, starting in the Western U.S. and expanding globally," said Local Bounti Co-Founder and Co-CEO Craig Hurlbert. Based on publicly available market research on CEA, Local Bounti believes the current Western U.S. market opportunity is approximately $10.6 billion, and estimates that the total U.S. market for vegetables and herbs will reach up to $30 billion by 2025. "We look forward to leveraging our proven business model as we accelerate the building of cutting-edge local production facilities that feature our proprietary IP, referred to as Stack & Flow Technology, and transforming conventional agriculture practices for the benefit of all our customers, no matter where in the world they're located," he said, adding that the company's growth plans include adding seven new facilities and local leadership in different geographic regions, as well as global expansion of its proprietary technology. An industry disruptor changing the way food is grown and re-imagining the Farm of the Future, Local Bounti is a premier controlled environment agriculture (CEA) company redefining ESG standards for indoor agriculture. The company's unique business model is based on building local facilities, operated by local teams, to deliver the freshest and highest quality produce to local communities while maintaining a limited carbon footprint. Using proprietary technology to grow leafy greens and herbs in a smart, indoor controlled environment - and with a cultivation process that uses 90 percent less water and land than conventional agriculture, free from herbicides or pesticides - Local Bounti delivers high-quality produce that not only has a longer shelf life, but is also superior in taste. "Local Bounti is set to be a transformational force in the AgTech industry with its demonstrated concept and model in food production and distribution," said Lyndon Lea, President and CEO of Leo. "Combining Local Bounti's emphasis on innovation, entrepreneurial spirit, and technology-driven approach with the institutional knowledge of the Leo Holdings team, we are confident in the company's ability to expand in both reach and consumer offerings." Leveraging its innovative proprietary modular and scalable building system, which is designed to easily and efficiently replicate the company's sustainable indoor farm model, Local Bounti is more than doubling the size of its flagship facility in Hamilton, Montana, and plans to break ground on additional facilities in the Western U.S. before the end of this year. To learn more about Local Bounti's unique growing process, diversified product offerings and experienced leadership team, please visit localbounti.com. Transaction Overview As a result of the transaction with Leo, Local Bounti will receive up to $400 million in gross proceeds (assuming no redemptions), including $125 million from a fully committed PIPE anchored by existing investors and new investors, including Fidelity Management & Research Company LLC, BNP Paribas Asset Management Ecosystem Restoration Fund and Cargill. The Boards of Directors of Local Bounti and Leo unanimously approved the transaction, and the transaction will require the approval of the stockholders of both Local Bounti and Leo and is subject to other customary closing conditions. The transaction is expected to close in the second half of 2021. Additional information about the proposed transaction, including a copy of the merger agreement and investor presentation, will be provided in a Current Report on Form 8-K to be filed by Leo Holdings III with the Securities and Exchange Commission ( SEC (News - Alert) ) and will be available at www.sec.gov. For materials and information, visit the investor section of www.leoholdings.com for Leo, which can be found HERE.



Advisors Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC, Deutsche Bank Securities Inc. and Nomura Securities International, Inc. served as placement agents on the PIPE and Debevoise & Plimpton LLP served as legal advisor to the placement agents. Kirkland & Ellis LLP served as legal advisor to Leo. Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC and Nomura Greentech served as financial advisors to Local Bounti and Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP served as legal advisor to Local Bounti.

About Local Bounti Local Bounti is a premier controlled environment agriculture (CEA) company redefining conversion efficiency and environmental, social and governance (ESG) standards for indoor agriculture. The company operates an advanced indoor growing facility in Hamilton, Montana, within a few hours' drive of its retail and food service partners. Reaching retail shelves in record time post-harvest, Local Bounti produce is superior in taste and quality compared to traditional field-grown greens. The company's USDA Harmonized Good Agricultural Practices (GAP Plus+) and non-genetically modified organisms (GMO) produce is sustainably grown using proprietary technology 365 days a year, free of pesticides and herbicides, and using 90 percent less land and water than conventional outdoor farming methods. With a mission to 'bring our farm to your kitchen in the fewest food miles possible,' Local Bounti is disrupting the cultivation and delivery of produce. The company is also committed to making meaningful connections and giving back to each of the communities it serves. To find out more, visit localbounti.com or follow the company on LinkedIn for the latest news and developments. About Leo Holdings III Corp and Leo Holdings Leo Holdings III Corp is a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) that seeks to invest in entrepreneurially driven growth companies that seek to disrupt existing industries or business models. The management team has extensive experience owning and operating businesses on a global scale through its private equity vehicle, Lion Capital. Leo Holdings' management team has collaboratively worked together for over 20 years. Leo Holdings III Corp is part of a special purpose acquisition company initiative, Leo Holdings, which is focused on investing in disruptive, innovative business models. The initiative seeks businesses positioned to thrive in the evolving digital information age where changing consumer behavior creates the opportunity for outsized returns. In 2020, Leo Holdings Corp entered into a business combination with DMS, a disruptive performance marketing business which delivers high-intent customers while de-risking client advertising spend. Leo Holdings Corp II (LHC) and Leo Holdings III Corp (LIII) are currently listed on the NYSE. Leo Holdings was formed by the principals of Lion Capital, which is led by Founder and Managing Partner, Lyndon Lea. For more information, visit https://leoholdings.com/. Cautionary Statement Regarding Forward-Looking Statements Certain statements included in this Press Release that are not historical facts are forward-looking statements for purposes of the safe harbor provisions under the United States Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements generally are accompanied by words such as "believe," "may," "will," "estimate," "continue," "anticipate," "intend," "expect," "should," "would," "plan," "predict," "potential," "seem," "seek," "future," "outlook," and similar expressions that predict or indicate future events or trends or that are not statements of historical matters. These forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to, statements regarding estimates and forecasts of other financial and performance metrics and projections of market opportunity. These statements are based on various assumptions, whether or not identified in this Press Release, and on the current expectations of Local Bounti's and Leo's management and are not predictions of actual performance. These forward-looking statements are provided for illustrative purposes only and are not intended to serve as, and must not be relied on by any investor as, a guarantee, an assurance, a prediction or a definitive statement of fact or probability. Actual events and circumstances are difficult or impossible to predict and will differ from assumptions. Many actual events and circumstances are beyond the control of Local Bounti and Leo. These forward-looking statements are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties, including changes in domestic and foreign business, market, financial, political and legal conditions; the inability of the parties to successfully or timely consummate the proposed transaction, including the risk that any required regulatory approvals are not obtained, are delayed or are subject to unanticipated conditions that could adversely affect the combined company or the expected benefits of the proposed transaction or that the approval of the stockholders of Leo or Local Bounti is not obtained; failure to realize the anticipated benefits of the proposed transaction; risks relating to the uncertainty of the projected financial information with respect to Local Bounti; the effects of competition on Local Bounti's future business; the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on Local Bounti's business; the ability of Leo or the combined company to issue equity or equity-linked securities or obtain debt financing in connection with the proposed transaction or in the future, and those factors discussed in Leo's final prospectus dated February 25, 2021 under the heading "Risk Factors," and other documents of Leo filed, or to be filed, with the SEC. If any of these risks materialize or our assumptions prove incorrect, actual results could differ materially from the results implied by these forward-looking statements. There may be additional risks that none of Leo or Local Bounti presently know or that Leo or Local Bounti currently believe are immaterial that could also cause actual results to differ from those contained in the forward-looking statements. In addition, forward-looking statements reflect Leo's and Local Bounti's expectations, plans or forecasts of future events and views as of the date of this Press Release. Leo and Local Bounti anticipate that subsequent events and developments will cause Leo's and Local Bounti's assessments to change. However, while Leo and Local Bounti may elect to update these forward-looking statements at some point in the future, Leo and Local Bounti specifically disclaim any obligation to do so. These forward-looking statements should not be relied upon as representing Leo's and Local Bounti's assessments as of any date subsequent to the date of this Press Release. Accordingly, undue reliance should not be placed upon the forward-looking statements. Certain market data information in this Press Release is based on the estimates of Local Bounti and Leo management. Local Bounti and Leo obtained the industry, market and competitive position data used throughout this Press Release from internal estimates and research as well as from industry publications and research, surveys and studies conducted by third parties. Local Bounti and Leo believe their estimates to be accurate as of the date of this Press Release. However, this information may prove to be inaccurate because of the method by which Local Bounti or Leo obtained some of the data for its estimates or because this information cannot always be verified due to the limits on the availability and reliability of raw data, the voluntary nature of the data gathering process. Important Information In connection with the proposed transaction, Leo intends to file a registration statement on Form S-4, including a proxy statement/prospectus (the "Registration Statement"), with the SEC, which will include a preliminary proxy statement to be distributed to holders of Leo's ordinary shares in connection with Leo's solicitation of proxies for the vote by Leo's shareholders with respect to the proposed transaction and other matters as will be described in the Registration Statement, and a prospectus relating to, among other things, the offer of the securities to be issued to Local Bounti's stockholders in connection with the proposed transaction. After the Registration Statement has been declared effective, Leo will mail a definitive proxy statement/prospectus, when available, to its shareholders. Investors and security holders and other interested parties are urged to read the proxy statement/prospectus, and any amendments thereto and any other documents filed with the SEC when they become available, carefully and in their entirety because they contain important information about Leo, Local Bounti and the proposed transaction. Investors and security holders may obtain free copies of the preliminary proxy statement/prospectus and definitive proxy statement/prospectus (when available) and other documents filed with the SEC by Leo through the website maintained by the SEC at http://www.sec.gov. These documents (when they are available) can also be obtained free of charge from Leo upon written request to Leo by emailing brown@leo.holdings or by directing a request to Leo's secretary at c/o Leo Holdings III Corp, 21 Grosvenor Pl, London SW1X 7HF, United Kingdom. Participants in the Solicitation Leo and Local Bounti and their respective directors and certain of their respective executive officers and other members of management and employees may be considered participants in the solicitation of proxies with respect to the proposed transaction. Information about the directors and executive officers of Leo in its final prospectus dated February 25, 2021. Additional information regarding the participants in the proxy solicitation and a description of their direct interests, by security holdings or otherwise, will be set forth in the Registration Statement and other relevant materials to be filed with the SEC regarding the proposed transaction. Stockholders, potential investors and other interested persons should read the Registration Statement carefully before making any voting or investment decisions. These documents, when available, can be obtained free of charge from the sources indicated above. No Offer or Solicitation This communication is for informational purposes only and is not intended to and shall not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy or subscribe for any securities or a solicitation of any vote of approval, nor shall there be any sale, issuance or transfer of securities in any jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful prior to registration or qualification under the securities laws of any such jurisdiction. No offer of securities shall be made except by means of a prospectus meeting the requirements of Section 10 of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and otherwise in accordance with applicable law. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210618005074/en/

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[June 18, 2021] Millennials Continue to Fuel the Explosion of the Smart Home in Southeast Asia

HANGZHOU, China, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Leaders from across the Southeast Asia region gathered together to participate in Tuya Smart's Global IoT Press Meeting series on Friday. They discussed current trends, industry challenges, and how the industry will create opportunities for growth in the future. Southeast Asia remains one of the fastest-growing regions in terms of technology adoption, with the smart home providing a huge opportunity. Key players attending the meeting included representatives from top brands and associations such as Ace Hardware Indonesia, Cherry Mobile, Schneider Electric, SCT, and the Singapore Manufacturing Federation. Representatives from Tuya included Ross Luo, the General Manager of Asia Pacific Region and Charles Zhao, the BD Director of Southeast Asia APAC. They discussed the power of the Tuya IoT Cloud Platform and how it has helped to accelerate the industry. Furthermore, as tech-savvy millennials progress in their careers, begin to purchase homes, and start their families, their appetite for innovative smart home products is insatiable. How can brands meet theirdemands to keep their families safe? How can brands continue to delight them with voice-controlled, predictive environments powered by connected lighting, HVAC systems, and appliances? And most importantly, how can brands answer this call in a timely fashionfaster than their competitors?



"The Southeast Asia region has tremendous opportunity for growth in the smart home market. Tuya Smart is a leader driving innovation in IoT space, giving it a major role in helping brands bring the technology to the masses. With our motto 'IoT Made Easy', we believe in helping brands accelerate their go-to-market strategies, reduce costs, and provide opportunities for category expansion and monetization," said Ross Luo, General Manager of Asia Pacific Region from Tuya Smart. Adding to that Charles Zhao, BD Director of Southeast Asia at Tuya Smart said, "With the growth of young consumers and increased spending power, the Southeast Asian e-commerce industry is expected to continue to enjoy dividends fueled by this demographic trend. There are lot of key projects in the pipeline for the region and we are proud to partner with various brands and associations within the region so as to help them get ahead of the curve."

During the event, the SMF will sign a Memorandums of Understanding (MOU) with Tuya Smart to further strengthen their cooperation in smart business. "With this MOU, SMF member- companies and Singapore manufacturing community will be able to leverage on Tuya Smart's solutions to assist them in adopting technological solutions that can enable enterprises to grow their businesses," said Douglas Foo, President of SMF. Echoes with the theme, ACE company is also aiming to serve the customers with their Smart Klic brand, building the road map from bulb, to air purifier, IR remote, now to robotic vacuum cleaner and more options ahead to connect every person and every thing. This year brings together the global IoT industry during the ongoing pandemic and supporting various partners across markets remains a major focus for Tuya, so as to establish the fact that IoT as a technology is beneficial for mass consumers and many industry verticals. With tailor-made solutions for each region, Tuya aims to dig deep into the insights and learnings in many regions and continue to develop the industry in partnership with associations and brands. At the end of the day, these leaders agreed that the IoT is much more than just connecting devices to the internet. It's truly about connecting every person with everything to enhance humans' everyday experiences on Earth. SOURCE Tuya Smart

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[June 18, 2021] Next-generation insurance company Hellas Direct raises EUR 32m round and welcomes investment by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development

ATHENS, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Hellas Direct, an innovative, technology-driven insurance company operating in Greece and Cyprus, announced that it has raised a further EUR 32m in funding in its latest financing round, bringing the total raised to date to EUR 56m. The company also welcomed on board a leading investor, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD). The EBRD is providing a mandatory convertible debt facility of EUR 10m to Hellas Direct, to support its growth and provide the company with solvency capital. The EBRD is added to an all-star roster of investors backing Hellas Direct, including Portag3, the IFC (member of the World Bank Group), Endeavor Catalyst and well-known family offices including those of Jon Moulton and Lord O'Neill. Hellas Direct is a digital-first, full-stack insurance company, empowered by cutting-edge technology and the use of advanced analytics. With its investors' support, it aims to accelerate its hih organic growth in a post-Covid world, across multiple products and distribution channels. Empowered by the latest round of funding and using technology as a competitive edge, the company plans to expand into five blindspot European markets - which similarly to Greece and Cyprus tend to be overlooked by the global powerhouses - starting with Romania, in order to replicate the multi-product, multi-channel approach it has successfully deployed in Greece. The Group also plans to start offering its own credit product, as part of its strategy to dominate the mobility ecosystem in the broader region.



The EBRD is a multilateral bank that promotes the development of the private sector and entrepreneurial initiative in 38 economies across three continents. The Bank is owned by 69 countries as well as the EU and the EIB. EBRD investments are aimed at making the economies in its regions competitive, inclusive, well-governed, green, resilient and integrated. To date, the Bank has invested more than EUR 4.6b in over 75 projects in the corporate, financial, energy and infrastructure sectors of the Greek economy. "We are proud to welcome the EBRD into our group of investors at Hellas Direct. Our investors' support will enable us to accelerate some of our longer-term strategic goals and to pursue a more aggressive acquisition strategy in the region," said Alexis Pantazis, Executive Director of Hellas Direct.

"We are excited to be teaming up with one of the world's leading investors. This is a great opportunity for us to further optimize the service we offer to the consumer, by expanding our activity to multiple sectors. Our aspiration is to make Hellas Direct the dominant player in the wider region's mobility ecosystem," added Emilios Markou, Executive Director of Hellas Direct. "We are delighted to support Hellas Direct, a technology-driven insurance company offering innovative products and digitalising the insurance value chain in Greece. Accelerating digital transition, unleashing the power of technology to bring changes for the better, is among the top priorities for the EBRD. We are very proud to support the growth of an insurance market player with a unique, digital business model well-positioned in the post-Covid-19 world in scaling up its operations. We are confident that EBRD funding, know-how and strong presence on the Greek market will help Hellas Direct to continue improving its cutting edge service offerings and increase its market share," said Andreea Moraru, EBRD Head of Greece and Cyprus. Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1536531/Hellas_Direct_European_Bank.jpg

Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1536532/Hellas_Direct_Logo.jpg

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[June 18, 2021] WeChat Helps Digitise Australian and Kiwi Businesses with Mini Programs and Green Ocean Plan

SYDNEY, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- With merchants seeking new online revenue in the wake of Coronavirus, China's WeChat Pay is witnessing a significant uplift in the Oceania market and is committing more resources to support the digital transformation of local businesses. In an online conference with Australian and New Zealand business partners this week, WeChat Pay disclosed that the volume of transactions on WeChat Mini Programs in the region during Covid-hit 2020 increased by 480%, while the number of active Mini Programs grew by 180%. A "WeChat Pay Green Ocean Plan 2021" was also announced, where WeChat Pay pledges to offer enhanced marketing support and subsidies for local partners. "The uptake in transactions in the Oceania market over the past year proves that the WeChat ecosystem not only brings huge traffic but is effective in helping merchants attract repeated purchases from customers, reduce costs and improve operational efficiency in the time of Coronavirus. In 2021, we are committed to creating even more value for our partners with the Green Ocean Plan," said Monica Zheng, WeChat Pay's regional managing director. Faced with a sharp drop in tourists, a steep decline in offline income and surging costs, cross-border eCommerce brnds and local businesses alike are actively seeking new ways to reach new customers and increase revenue. The charm of WeChat lies not only in its strong ecosystem traffic with 1.2 billion users, but also the powerful social marketing tools it offers merchants.



WeChat Mini Programs, which give users instant access to enterprise services without having to download separate apps, were pioneered by WeChat in 2017 and today boasts over 400 million daily active users. WeChat's built-in payment service WeChat Pay offers users a seamless online-to-offline and offline-to-online shopping experience within the app and handles over 1 billion daily transactions. It continues to grow its international reach with the growth of Chinese outbound tourism, study and work, offering fast and secure cross-border payment services for Chinese tourists, students and resident Chinese with attractive exchange rates in more than 64 markets and 25 currencies. Lagardere, an established travel retail specialist serving over 25 million customers, accelerated digital transformation after COVID-19 with its deep integration into the WeChat ecosystem. Chris Laverty, Lagardere Pacific's Chief Merchandise Officer & Chief Digital Officer, said, "WeChat has always been an important tool for us, however over the last year we have had to look at new ways to reach customers who are no longer travelling."

"By working with the team at WeChat we have been able to find new ways to enhance cross border e-commerce, using tools such as their unique CRM platform and Mini Programs, and by livestreaming to a wider audience. We have been able to keep in touch with our current customers, but also find a whole new market to speak to," said Laverty. With the newly launched Green Ocean Plan 2021, the opportunities in Oceania are only set to grow. WeChat Pay said it will offer more marketing and onboarding support for local merchants, financial institutions and service vendors, including enhanced rights and interests' packages. Service vendors could earn generous technical service subsidies. More product features, saleable categories, and traffic exposure will be offered to merchants of various sectors in Oceania. Interested parties may reach out to their relevant WeChat Pay business development representatives or email wechatpayglobal@tencent.com for more information. SOURCE WeChat

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[June 17, 2021] Intelligent Office Introduces New Fully Renovated Tysons Corner Business Center

TYSONS CORNER, Va., June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Intelligent Office, the leader in business services, providing members dedicated offices, conference room rentals, virtual address, phone reception and customer service, and a number of other virtual services, is unveiling a new 20,000 square foot space during its grand re-opening week starting June 21st. Guests are invited for a week-long celebration after months of significant updates and renovations. The week-long celebration will include VIP events each day, starting with the Vienna Business Association & Reception on June 21st. The following days will consist of: Loudon Chamber on June 22nd, Tower Club & Team Network/Reception on June 23rd, Tysons Corner Chamber/ Private Reception on June 24th, and finally, the Dulles Regional Chamber on June 25th. Tysons Corner is located on the third floor of the Bank of America building with easy access to the 495, 267 and 66 highways. Intelligent Office has taken a bold step in expanding this office suite footprint from 8,000 square feet to a 20,000 square foot state of the art business center. Strategically located within walking distance from the Tysons Metro, mall shopping and a variety of gourmet restaurants, its location is desirable for the on-the-go business professional. "The renovated facilities were designed with the mindset of servicing small, medium and large companies from a variety of business industries," said franchisee owner, Hari Ramamurthy. "We are also catering to a wide-range of industries from tartups to well established local companies."



The newly renovated Tysons Corner business center includes: 55 dedicated offices with brand new furniture

Adjustable lift desks

Guest chairs

New carpet

Multiple conference rooms ranging in size

Virtual offices

Business lounge

A cafe kitchen and large co-working space

Two copy/print stations that service all clients The new Tysons Corner location also features high end state of the art video conferencing rooms, Bluetooth access controls that can be accessed via your smart phone, free covered parking, and high-end wireless projectors with drop down large screens. In addition, the new Pike and Gallows Business Center can seat up to 70 people. The Pike and Gallows reception support area provides: double warming ovens, bread warmer, commercial ice maker, dishwasher, sink, serving counter and coffee station, making it ready to service a diverse range of meeting requirements.

"I am incredibly passionate about the Intelligent Office concept and am excited to reopen and continue helping small businesses throughout the community grow," said franchisee partner, Praveen Bagalkotkar. "As businesses continue to implement work from home policies and downsize, we are prepared to provide entrepreneurs spaces to rent that are private and clean. We are also prepared to help companies that are looking to cut down on costs, like expensive leases, as our virtual services can support them effectively," said Chief Revenue Officer, Brandon Barr. Intelligent Office's goal is to provide the virtual assistants, rentable office space, phone answering services, and virtual mailboxes to small business owners and entrepreneurs so they can spend less money on fixed costs like leases, administrative, and IT related support staff. With a wide range of virtual services that includes appointment scheduling services and CRM database management, Intelligent Office strives to help solopreneurs, micro-enterprises and SMEs exceed their goals. About Intelligent Office

Founded in 1995 and franchising since 1999, Intelligent Office provides private and productive offices and meeting space along with customized virtual administrative and phone answering services so small business owners and entrepreneurs can spend less on fixed costs like leases, administrative and IT related support staff. With 56 locations open, Intelligent Office offers a variety of virtual services including phone answering services, appointment scheduling services, and a virtual address. Intelligent Office has 7 locations throughout the DC Metro area including Alexandria, Fairfax, Arlington, Reston, Tysons Corner, Washington, D.C., and Rockville. Intelligent Office also operates in British Columbia, Alberta and Ontario as well as 20 US states, Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, Idaho, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio and Pennsylvania. For more information, please visit: https://www.intelligentoffice.com. View original content to download multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/intelligent-office-introduces-new-fully-renovated-tysons-corner-business-center-301315179.html SOURCE Intelligent Office

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[June 17, 2021] Family of Former Camas Paper Mill Worker Receives Record $16.67 Million Verdict in Mesothelioma Case Against Scapa Waycross, According to Schroeter Goldmark & Bender

A King County Superior Court jury recently returned a record-setting $16.67 million verdict in favor of the family of Kevan Holdsworth, who in 2019 died of mesothelioma caused in part by exposure to asbestos from products sold by Scapa Waycross Inc. The verdict against Scapa, rendered on Tuesday, June 15, 2021, is the largest verdict in an asbestos case tried in King County and the second largest in the state. Mr. Holdsworth's widow, Sherrie Holdsworth, brought the case against defendant Scapa, which sold asbestos-containing "dryer felts" used in the papermaking industry until the late 1970s. Scapa sold its products to the paper mill in Camas, Washington, where Mr. Holdsworth worked from 1964 to 2001. According to court documents, despite ample notice of the hazards of asbestos, Scapa never tested its products for asbestos release, never investigated potential asbestos hazards associated with its products, never issued any asbestos-related warning, and never labeled its products as containing asbestos - all of which contributed to Mr. Holdsworth's death at the age of 73. "Kevan Holdsworth's life was unnecessarily cut short by a terribly cruel disease caused by Scapa's failure to protect the hardworking individuals who, year after year, came in close contact with its hazardous products," said attorney for the Holdsworth family, Tom Breen of Schroeter Goldmark & Bender. "Kevan was a kind, humble and sweet man. He left us far too soon. We are so pleased to have been able to pursue this case on his behalf." Mr. Holdsworth grew up in Washougal, a suburb of Vancouver, Washingon, and began working at the paper mill in Camas shortly after his high school graduation in 1964. From 1970 to 1976, Mr. Holdsworth worked on the mill's paper machine clean-up crew, which required him to clean the paper machines, including Scapa's asbestos-containing dryer felts, with compressed air.



"Scapa manufactured and sold dangerous asbestos-containing products for many years, and it has now adopted a 'no settlement' litigation strategy, meaning costly litigation is the only way to get accountability. If Scapa had exerted the same sort of effort to investigate the dangers of its products that it now spends fighting lawsuits, Kevan Holdsworth might still be alive. We're grateful the Holdsworths insisted on seeing this case through, and we think the verdict constitutes a clear statement that they were wronged," said Schroeter Goldmark & Bender attorney Luke Garrett. After a four-week trial, held virtually via Zoom, the jury in the Holdsworth case returned its verdict in less than a day, finding Scapa negligent and Scapa's products not reasonably safe as designed and not reasonably safe for lack of warnings, according to court filings.

"Kevan was an incredible man who spent his life putting others before himself. Those who knew him knew his generosity and sense of humor and deep love for the Seahawks - and countless other things that I miss every single day," said Sherrie Holdsworth. "I'm grateful for SGB's work to ensure Kevan's legacy continues, and to hold companies accountable for their negligence in preventing this horrible illness." The Holdsworths met in 7th grade and dated in high school, but it wasn't until the two reconnected in their 30s that they were married. After Mr. Holdsworth's retirement in 2001, the two moved to Surprise, Ariz., where they continued cheering for the Seahawks until his death in 2019. About Schroeter Goldmark & Bender:

Founded in 1969, Schroeter Goldmark & Bender (SGB) is a nationally recognized law firm based in Seattle that holds the most powerful companies, government agencies, and people accountable for their wrongdoing. SGB specializes in representing injured persons in asbestos and mesothelioma, catastrophic injury, brain/spinal cord injury, medical malpractice, unsafe products, wrongful death, and sexual assault and harassment cases. The firm believes the law is a force of good and is committed to achieving justice for people who have been harmed. Find more at www.sgb-law.com. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210617005913/en/

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[June 17, 2021] Osome Raises a $16M Series A to Expand its AI-based Accounting Platform to Global Markets

SINGAPORE, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Osome , a super-app that digitizes accounting and compliance services for SMEs, has raised $16M in a Series A funding from a group of investors including Target Global, AltaIR Capital, Phystech Ventures, S16VC, and Peng T. Ong, an angel investor. The capital enables Osome to expand its footprint internationally, as well as to fuel product integrations. "Back-office operations are annoying, tedious yet mission critical for businesses, especially for SMEs. Remarkably, an average entrepreneur spends 68% of their time to deal with routine tasks vs 32% to strategize and deliver on their long term goals. Osome combines artificial intelligence software with operational excellence to automate administrative, accounting, payroll and tax-related work and help entrepreneurs focus on what they can do the best - growing their business", Victor Lysenko, co-founder and CEO of Osome, says. "We strive to build a future where small business owners can ully rely on the technology in their administrative routine".



The demand for Osome services has accelerated with COVID-19 as clients recognized the importance of automation. This has led to more than 100% YoY revenue growth and $9.5M ARR with over 6,000 happy customers in Singapore, Hong Kong, and the UK. Additionally, the company has identified a product / market fit in the fast-growing e-commerce segment and will double down on it in the next 18 months. Osome's core offering is online accounting services for SMEs, especially those involved in e-commerce -- ?ccountants take over the documents and convert them into actionable numbers, tax filings and reports, making accounting and bookkeeping service for online sellers as simple as ever.

The company also helps with business set up and provides corporate secretary services -- Osome checks compliance, tracks deadlines, files documents, and answers questions in a chat at any time of the day or week. The platform categorises and stores any documents users send, so nothing is lost, and then creates and files reports on time. "We have supported Osome since the early days and are excited to continue our partnership in the latest round. We are especially happy about the strong growth Osome has shown in the expanding e-commerce segment. Online Sellers require unique tools and custom approaches to be serviced effectively and Osome's mix of technology and human expertise is the perfect solution", says Mike Lobanov, GP & COO of Target Global. Media Contact: Osome

Safiah Alias

safiah@osome.com

+65-6589-8807 SOURCE Osome

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[June 17, 2021] Iran Election Boycott Threat As Economic Conditions Worsen NewsBlaze Story

FOLSOM, Calif., June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The Iranian regime has been controlling and suppressing its population since 1979. As with all bad regimes, they will eventually fall, as long as other countries do not come riding to rescue the regime. In 2009, the ordinary people desperately tried to get the mullah's boots of their neck, but were crushed. In "Protests Grow in Iran as Working Conditions Worsen," Iranian writer, Hamid Enayat tells the latest story of the Iranian people's struggle for normalcy. "In Iran, the people are being deprived economically by the policies of the regime and its Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corp (IRGC). Repressive tactics are employed to keep the Iranian people in line and punish those who dare to participate in protests and uprisings," Enayat writes. See the latest story: https://newsblaze.com/world/iran/iran-working-conditions-worsen_180514/



"NewsBlaze has been telling the story of the Iranian people's struggle against the mullahs since 2006. We published stories of 3,000 Iranian dissidents in Camp Ashraf, documenting harsh living conditions, killings, betrayals by the US, the UN, and Iraq. We reported when Albania gave them a home. We followed the 2009 green revolution but it failed. We continue to tell their stories," said Alan Gray, NewsBlaze CEO. About Hamid Enayat

Hamid Enayat is a human rights activist and an expert on Iran based in Paris. He writes about Iranian and regional issues. Contact Hamid Enayat through NewsBlaze. About NewsBlaze Pty. Ltd. NewsBlaze was founded in 2004 as an independent online newspaper and information portal, forming relationships with other publishers and wire services. NewsBlaze covers broad topics of interest to readers worldwide, which has helped build a loyal, global following of readers, especially in Australia, North America and Europe. NewsBlaze promotes its brand through exclusive stories that interest readers from around the world. In addition, as the lead Syndicate Partner of the World City Press Network, NewsBlaze provides news, editing and content services for the publishers that make up the World City Press Network. Visit NewsBlaze.com to learn more. Media contact: Alan Gray, media@newsblaze.com, +61 8 8531 0254 View original content to download multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/iran-election-boycott-threat-as-economic-conditions-worsen-newsblaze-story-301315196.html SOURCE NewsBlaze

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[June 17, 2021] DEADLINE ALERT: Bragar Eagel & Squire, P.C. Reminds Investors That a Class Action Lawsuit Has Been Filed Against Churchill Capital Corp. IV and Encourages Investors to Contact the Firm

Bragar Eagel & Squire, P.C., a nationally recognized shareholder rights law firm, reminds investors that a class action lawsuit has been filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Alabama on behalf of investors that purchased Churchill Capital Corporation IV (NYSE: CCIV) securities between January 11, 2021 and February 22, 2021, inclusive (the "Class Period"). Investors have until June 18, 2021 to apply to the Court to be appointed as lead plaintiff in the lawsuit. Click here to participate in the action. On January 11, 2021, Bloomberg (News - Alert) News reported that Lucid Motors Inc. ("Lucid"), an American automotive company specializing in electric cars, is in talks to go public via merger with one of Michael Klein's special purpose acquisition companies, including Churchill. Over the next several weeks, Lucid's Chief Executive Officer Peter Rawlinson made media appearances during which he stated that Lucid was aiming for a spring delivery for its first vehicles. On February 22, 2021, the merger between Churchill and Lucid was announced with transaction equity value estimated at $11.75 billion. Churchill's share price closed at $57.37. The same day, after the market closed, Bloomberg News reported that production of Lucid's debut car would be delyed until at least the second half of 2021 with no definite date for the actual delivery of vehicles. Details of the merger also disclosed that Lucid was projecting the production of only 557 vehicles in 2021, instead of the 6,000 it had been touting in the run-up to the merger announcement.



On February 23, 2021, Churchill's stock fell $22.16, or 38%, to close at $35.21 per share on February 23, 2021. The complaint filed in this class action alleges that throughout the Class Period, Defendants made materially false and/or misleading statements, as well as failed to disclose material adverse facts about the Company's business, operations, and prospects. Specifically, Defendants failed to disclose to investors: (1) Lucid was not prepared to deliver vehicles by spring of 2021; (2) Lucid was projecting a production of 557 vehicles in 2021 instead of the 6,000 vehicles touted in the run-up to the merger with Churchill; and (3) as a result of the foregoing, Defendants' positive statements about the Company's business, operations, and prospects were materially misleading and/or lacked a reasonable basis.

If you purchased Churchill securities during the Class Period and suffered a loss, are a long-term stockholder, have information, would like to learn more about these claims, or have any questions concerning this announcement or your rights or interests with respect to these matters, please contact Brandon Walker, Melissa Fortunato, or Marion Passmore by email at investigations@bespc.com, telephone at (212) 355-4648, or by filling out this contact form. There is no cost or obligation to you. About Bragar Eagel & Squire, P.C.: Bragar Eagel & Squire, P.C. is a nationally recognized law firm with offices in New York, California, and South Carolina. The firm represents individual and institutional investors in commercial, securities, derivative, and other complex litigation in state and federal courts across the country. For more information about the firm, please visit www.bespc.com. Attorney advertising. Prior results do not guarantee similar outcomes. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210617005058/en/

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[June 17, 2021] Solis Inverter Powers Sinopec's First BIPV Carbon-Neutral Gas Station

NINGBO, China, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Global Energy Major Sinopec's first BIPV (building integrated photovoltaic) carbon-neutral gas station commenced operations at Liuhua gas station, Baise, Guangxi, China. Solis had carried out an in-depth survey with Sinopec in July 2020 to transform the high power 255kW inverter into an integral part of the project. The project is seen as a breakthrough for Sinopec in the application of distributed solar power generation and also the first carbon-neutral gas station built and run by Sinopec in Guangxi. Offered by LONGi, a BIPV solution is an integral part of plans before construction commences. Offering advantages such as integrated design/construction, light structural weight, and reduced use of materials, the solution also extends the service life of the gas station canopy from 5-10 years to 25 years, equal to the service life of the solar power generation module. The annualpower generation of this project is expected to reach 91,000 kilowatt hours. More than 10,000 kilowatt hours of surplus power will be supplied to the grid, enough to meet the annual power demands of 12.5 households.



The project will reduce 81.5 tons of carbon emissions per year, enough to offset about 76 tons of carbon emissions from the gas station per year, making the gas station itself carbon neutral. For Solis, the 110V inverter, as the flagship 380V low voltage (Adapting to China's power grid) product for C&I, will support "green buildings" everywhere.

Besides the maximum efficiency of up to 98.7%, the inverter has 100MPPT/MW grade high power tracking density. Revenues from power generation per MW are about 3.5% higher. The DC side configuration supports up to 150% over sizing and the economical and flexible system design explain the inverter's popularity with customers. Functions such as AC lightning protection Type I (optional) and AFCI (optional) also reduce fire hazards on the DC side. The overvoltage load reduction and the leakage current suppression technology reduce issues of disconnection under overvoltage conditions and trip under leakage conditions enhancing safety. Sinopec is building 160 photovoltaic power stations across China and plans to build 7000 distributed solar power stations as part of their "Five-year Plan". By developing distinctive modes of carbon neutralization such as carbon-neutral forests and gas stations, Solis will support Sinopec in the mission to make 'green and clean 'gas stations. Click here for more information.

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[June 17, 2021] Over 50 World-Class Innovators Announced for Knowledge of Design Week (KODW) 2021

FREE registration now open Leaders from AliPayHK, Animoca Brands, Azerai Resorts, Google, Goxip, Huawei, Joyce Wang Studio, K11, Klook, Microsoft, Royal College of Art, Philips, scenarioDNA, Siemens, Tencent, The Gettys Group, ViuTV, among others Free access to live forum, plus on-demand viewing for two weeks, with Simultaneous Interpretation in three languages and simulcasts to target a global audience HONG KONG, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Knowledge of Design Week (KODW), a Hong Kong Design Centre's annual thematic event with Create Hong Kong (CreateHK) of the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR Government) as the lead sponsor, providing a unique cross-disciplinary learning and exchange platform for innovation trends and game-changing solutions to address the most pressing problems of our times, will bring together over 50 entrepreneurs, field experts, and leading creatives across the sectors of hospitality, healthcare, e-commerce, and digital solutions to explore the post-pandemic future of the service economy with a global audience from 21 to 25 June (all livestream forum sessions will take place on 23 and 24 June). Imperative to a successful shift to the world's next normal, human-centric Service Design is crucial for cities and businesses to succeed in this year and beyond. Under the theme 'Reimagining Service Economy', a roster of highly sought-after global leaders and experts will deliver a multi-industry programme of 10 forum sessions and eight interactive workshops. KODW's hybrid live panel sessions will air simultaneously on ViuTV Channel 96 for the first time, as well as on online and social media to reach viewers across the world. The simulcast will feature simultaneous interpretation in English, Cantonese, and Putonghua. KODW is organised by Hong Kong Design Centre (HKDC), co-organised by Hong Kong Design Institute (HKDI) and The Hong Kong Polytechnic University School of Design (PolyU Design), together with CreateHK as the Lead Sponsor. Mounting a unique cross-disciplinary learning platform Held across two days on 23 and 24 June, KODW 2021's live panel discussions cover forward-thinking topics across industries  healthcare, smart living, ageing well, and hospitality. The key panel sessions that will be broadcast live on ViuTV Channel 96 are: Innovation for Future Service (23 June, 8:15pm8:55pm)  The desire for human touch and meaningful interaction has never been greater, which is what business leaders must adapt in 2021 and in the coming years. Experts Tim Stock (Co-founder and Managing Partner of scenarioDNA, US), Emma Chiu (Global Director of Wunderman Thompson Intelligence, UK), and Clive Grinyer (Head of Service Design of Royal College of Art, UK) will share inspiring success stories of introducing human-centred design that ride on digital trends like AI, digital ownership and automation, as Guy Parsonage (Partner of PwC Experience Centre, HK) moderates the live discussion.

 The desire for human touch and meaningful interaction has never been greater, which is what business leaders must adapt in 2021 and in the coming years. Experts (Co-founder and Managing Partner of scenarioDNA, US), (Global Director of Wunderman Thompson Intelligence, UK), and (Head of Service Design of of Art, UK) will share inspiring success stories of introducing human-centred design that ride on digital trends like AI, digital ownership and automation, as (Partner of PwC Experience Centre, HK) moderates the live discussion. Global Conversation on Hospitality (23 June, 8:55pm10:00pm)  It takes vision and innovation to lead the hospitality business out of an economic crisis. Discover how Adrian Zecha (Hotelier of Azerai Resorts, Singapore ), Keith Yates (Partnership Chair of Yates and Partners, Thailand ), Joyce Wang (Principal of Joyce Wang Studio, HK), and Ron Swidler (Chief Innovation Officer of The Gettys Group Companies, US) will envision hospitality in this post-pandemic world. Charmaine Chan (Design Editor of South China Morning Post, HK) and Guy Parsonage to co-host.

 It takes vision and innovation to lead the hospitality business out of an economic crisis. Discover how (Hotelier of Azerai Resorts, ), (Partnership Chair of Yates and Partners, ), (Principal of Joyce Wang Studio, HK), and (Chief Innovation Officer of The Gettys Group Companies, US) will envision hospitality in this post-pandemic world. (Design Editor of South China Morning Post, HK) and co-host. Creative Entrepreneurs & Industry Disruptors (24 June, 8:00pm8:50pm)  Local disruptors will come together in this panel that explores how creative mindsets can overcome unforeseen challenges and lead to success, no matter the field. In discussion will be Eric Gnock Fah (Co-founder and COO of Klook, HK), Juliette Gimenez (Co-founder and CEO of Goxip, HK), Lofai Lo (Director and General Manager of ViuTV, HK), and Yat Siu (Co-founder and Chairman of Animoca Brands, HK), with moderator Darren Chuckry (Chair HK of Marketing Society and Managing Partner of HK Initiative, HK).

 Local disruptors will come together in this panel that explores how creative mindsets can overcome unforeseen challenges and lead to success, no matter the field. In discussion will be (Co-founder and COO of Klook, HK), (Co-founder and CEO of Goxip, HK), (Director and General Manager of ViuTV, HK), and (Co-founder and Chairman of Animoca Brands, HK), with moderator (Chair HK of Marketing Society and Managing Partner of HK Initiative, HK). Innovating Future Health & Care (24 June, 8:50pm10:00pm)  Specialists in design and architecture will converge and provide insights on shaping the future of better healthcare and implementing empathy in practice. Dr Edmund Lee (Executive Director of HKDC, HK) and Dr Gina Jiang (Managing Director of Hong Kong Institute of Biotechnology, HK) will moderate the discussion with panellists Cheaw Hwei Low (Head of Design of Philips ASEAN Pacific and Design Consulting, Asia , Singapore ) and Reinier de Graaf (Partner of OMA, The Netherlands ), Prof. Jeremy Myerson (Helen Hamlyn Chair of Design of The Helen Hamlyn Centre for Design, Royal College of Art, UK), Rama Gheerawo (Director of The Helen Hamlyn Centre for Design, Royal College of Art, UK), and Dr Ching-choi Lam, SBS, JP (Chairman of Elderly Commission, HKSAR Government, HK). In addition, six other panel sessions providing free livestreaming will touch on topics related to smart living, inclusivity, and healthcare. These sessions are: Inclusive Future (24 June, 10:00am11:00am)  Gaelle Loiseau (CEO of Shared Value Initiative Hong Kong, HK) will moderate a panel on inclusive design that has the power to embrace the diversified needs of different stakeholders, featuring Christopher Patnoe (Head of Accessibility and Disability Inclusion of Google, US), Christina Yung (Head of Community, Diversity & Financial Vulnerability, ASP, HSBC, HK), Noriko Deno (Community Designer of studio-L, Japan ), and Kevin Siu (Co-founder and Director of AaaM Architects, HK).

(CEO of Shared Value Initiative Hong Kong, HK) will moderate a panel on inclusive design that has the power to embrace the diversified needs of different stakeholders, featuring (Head of Accessibility and Disability Inclusion of Google, US), (Head of Community, Diversity & Financial Vulnerability, ASP, HSBC, HK), (Community Designer of studio-L, ), and (Co-founder and Director of AaaM Architects, HK). Winning in Hyper-efficient Commerce (24 June, 11:15am12:00nn)  Dr Toa Charm (Chairman of OpenCertHub, HK) will moderate a panel on designing efficient, pleasurable e-journeys for best customer experiences featuring Ken Lo (Head of eCommerce, Hong Kong & Macau of SF Supply Chain, HK), Yvonne Leung (Chief Marketing Officer of Alipay Payment Services (HK) Limited, HK), and Michael Ng (Head of Digital Product of WeLab Bank, HK).

(Chairman of OpenCertHub, HK) will moderate a panel on designing efficient, pleasurable e-journeys for best customer experiences featuring (Head of eCommerce, & of SF Supply Chain, HK), (Chief Marketing Officer of Alipay Payment Services (HK) Limited, HK), and (Head of Digital Product of WeLab Bank, HK). The Rise of New Retail in China (24 June, 12:15pm12:45pm)  Conducted in Putonghua, this session to be moderated by Prof. Viveca Chan (Chairman & CEO of WE Marketing Group, HK) will explore digital transformation and online-to-offline-to-online (O2O2O) interactive customer journey with James Yang (General Manager, Digital Marketing of K11 Concepts Limited, Mainland China).

Conducted in Putonghua, this session to be moderated by (Chairman & CEO of WE Marketing Group, HK) will explore digital transformation and online-to-offline-to-online (O2O2O) interactive customer journey with (General Manager, Digital Marketing of K11 Concepts Limited, Mainland China). Futuring UX with AI and Data-driven Design (24 June, 2:00pm2:45pm)  Also conducted in Putonghua, this session will be moderated by Prof. Stephen Jia Wang (Full Professor in UX Design & Design Intelligence of School of Design, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, HK) to explore how machine learning and AIoTs can be used to improve our health and well-being, together with Prof. Ying-Qing Xu (Professor of Academy of Arts & Design and Director of The Future Lab of Tsinghua University, Mainland China), Yangwu Cai (UX Project Leader of Huawei, Mainland China), and Sonya Sun (Head of Design Team of Tencent , Mainland China).

Also conducted in Putonghua, this session will be moderated by (Full Professor in UX Design & Design Intelligence of School of Design, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, HK) to explore how machine learning and AIoTs can be used to improve our health and well-being, together with (Professor of Academy of Arts & Design and Director of The Future Lab of Tsinghua University, Mainland China), (UX Project Leader of Huawei, Mainland China), and (Head of Design Team of , Mainland China). A New Hospital in Four Months: A Design Journey Meeting Service Challenges (24 June, 3:00pm3:35pm)  Moderator Patrick Bruce (Founding Director of The Oval Partnership Limited, HK) will discuss modular integrated construction for medical facilities with Dr Lily Chiu (Operations Director of China State Construction Int'l Medical Industry Development Co. Ltd., HK) and Allen Kin -tak Leung (Project Director of Architectural Services Department, HKSAR Government, HK).

Moderator (Founding Director of The Oval Partnership Limited, HK) will discuss modular integrated construction for medical facilities with (Operations Director of China State Construction Int'l Medical Industry Development Co. Ltd., HK) and (Project Director of Architectural Services Department, HKSAR Government, HK). Smart Living, Smart Working (24 June, 4:00pm4:45pm)  Moderator Dr Charleston Sin (Executive Director of MIT HK Innovation Node, HK) will explore upcoming trends for smart living and new modes of working with Jens-Peter Brauner (CEO of Siemens Mobility Limited, HK), Cally Chan (General Manager of Microsoft Hong Kong Limited, HK), and Ren Yee (Director of Design/Strategies of UNSense and Head of Innovation Strategy and Forecasting of UNStudio, The Netherlands ). KODW will also mount eight workshops (six virtual and two physical workshops) that tackle topics of the future of Service Design, Design Thinking, and Creative Leadership. Taking place from 17 to 25 June, these workshops will be conducted in small group size to ensure optimal interaction between participants and workshop leaders: Exploring Future Services with LEGO SERIOUS PLAY method (17 June, 3:00pm 5:30pm; 20 June, 3:00pm 5:30pm and 25 June, 12:00nn2:30pm)  Led by Per Kristiansen (Partner at Trivium, Denmark ) this workshop will introduce this unique problem-solving technique by LEGO and how it can be used in service innovation.

 Led by (Partner at Trivium, ) this workshop will introduce this unique problem-solving technique by LEGO and how it can be used in service innovation. Thriving in Maturity: Designing for Tomorrow's YOLDs** (21 June, 9:30am1:00pm)  This workshop led by Dwayne Serjeant (Design Director at EY wavespace, HK), Thierry Halbroth (Associate Partner at EY wavespace, HK) and Sunhera Cariappa (Design Strategist at EY wavespace, HK) will examine the differences between young people and seniors and how these two mindsets can interact to change global views.

 This workshop led by (Design Director at EY wavespace, HK), (Associate Partner at EY wavespace, HK) and (Design Strategist at EY wavespace, HK) will examine the differences between young people and seniors and how these two mindsets can interact to change global views. Smart Services for New Customers (21 June, 4:00pm6:00pm)  Clive Grinyer (Head of Service Design of Royal College of Art, UK) will discuss in this two-hour masterclass how decisions on the design method and future technology may cater to changing consumers.

(Head of Service Design of of Art, UK) will discuss in this two-hour masterclass how decisions on the design method and future technology may cater to changing consumers. Transforming Brand in a World Transformed** (22 June, 10:00am12:30pm)  Join Jonathan Cummings (President, APAC, at Landor& Fitch, HK), in this workshop that will explore how brands are changing the world and vice versa.

 Join (President, APAC, at Landor& Fitch, HK), in this workshop that will explore how brands are changing the world and vice versa. X Thinking: The Transformation of Value  From Products to Services to eXperiences (25 June, 10:00am12:00nn) Dr Michael T Lai (Dean of X Thinking Institute, Mainland China) will focus on how the method can help brands upgrade and gain a competitive advantage.

(Dean of X Thinking Institute, Mainland China) will focus on how the method can help brands upgrade and gain a competitive advantage. Creative Leadership: Three Values to Transform Your Practice (25 June, 3:00pm6:00pm) - The final workshop of the programme will introduce Creative Leadership with the guidance of Rama Gheerawo (Director of The Helen Hamlyn Centre for Design, Royal College of Art, UK), and how one can grow individual creativity.

**Workshops to be held physically Join KODW 2021 and discover how a new approach to Service Design will shape the future of retail, hospitality, smart living, ageing well, and health & wellbeing. Register for FREE access to the live forum sessions as well as on-demand viewing for two weeks, and sign up for the hybrid workshops at www.kodw.bodw.com. Early bird discount at 40% off and 50% discount for BODW 2020 full pass and premium pass holders are offered until 11 June 2021 for workshop registration. Press Materials Images including KODW 2021 event photos and innovators' portraits are available at https://finnpartners.box.com/s/nagtswhh2mh0dyz8e2229uqctc7j5c11 About Hong Kong Design Centre and Institute of Design Knowledge Hong Kong Design Centre (HKDC) is a non-governmental organisation founded in 2001 as a strategic partner of the HKSAR Government in establishing Hong Kong as an international centre of design excellence in Asia. Our public mission is to promote wider and strategic use of design and design thinking to create business value and improve societal well-being. Learn more about us at www.hkdesigncentre.org The Institute of Design Knowledge (IDK) is an initiative of HKDC to advance creative thinking across different sectors via the provision of professional training and resources. It serves as a learning platform, offering specialised courses on topics such as innovation, design management and creative leadership to prompt executives and business leaders to explore, develop and sustain innovative approaches in the workplace. Learn more at www.idk-hkdc.org About Knowledge of Design Week Knowledge of Design Week is an annual flagship event organised by Hong Kong Design Centre (HKDC) and Institute of Design Knowledge (IDK), co-organised by Hong Kong Design Institute (HKDI) and The Hong Kong Polytechnic University School of Design (PolyU Design), together with Create Hong Kong (CreateHK) of the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region as the Lead Sponsor. It is a week-long event that comprises a series of workshops, forums, and a high-level networking event. Launched in 2006, Knowledge of Design Week (KODW) offers an exciting and premier global knowledge platform for local and international designers, brand strategists, business leaders, entrepreneurs, technologists, educators and visionaries to share industry insights, trend analysis, creative solutions and game-changing innovation to transform individuals, businesses and the society. Learn more at www.kodw.bodw.com Please follow us at

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kodwhkdc

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kodw_hkdc/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/KODW_HKDC

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/knowledge-of-design-week/about/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCB9QTGZRIJyjEwIrBh09uZw About Create Hong Kong Create Hong Kong (CreateHK) is a dedicated agency set up by the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region in June 2009. It is under the Communications and Creative Industries Branch of the Commerce and Economic Development Bureau and dedicated to spearheading the development of creative industries in Hong Kong. Its strategic foci are nurturing talent and facilitating start-ups, exploring markets, and promoting Hong Kong as Asia's creative capital and fostering a creative atmosphere in the community. CreateHK sponsors Hong Kong Design Centre to organise Knowledge of Design Week and other flagship events to promote Hong Kong design. CreateHK's website: www.createhk.gov.hk .







Disclaimer: The Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region provides funding support to the project only, and does not otherwise take part in the project. Any opinions, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed in these materials/events (or by members of the project team) are those of the project organisers only and do not reflect the views of the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, the Communications and Creative Industries Branch of the Commerce and Economic Development Bureau, CreateHong Kong, the CreateSmartInitiative Secretariat or the CreateSmartInitiative Vetting Committee.

SOURCE Hong Kong Design Centre

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[June 17, 2021] Navigate Your Business through the Pandemic Storm & Achieve Profitability - CS Web Solutions

MISSISSAUGA, ON, June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Covid-19 has not only brought upon us a global health emergency, but it has made a monumental impact on the world economy. Businesses are fighting for their survival across the globe. United States of America : 34% of America's small businesses are still shut because of the COVID-19 pandemic according to a report by Reuters. Canada : The Canadian Federation of Independent Business (CFIB) reported that businesses have collectively taken a whopping $135 billion debt in an attempt to overcome the debacles of the pandemic. Australia : 8% of the businesses in Australia reported that the pandemic has affected their business by 'a great deal'. United Kingdom : 80% of the SMEs have reported that their revenues are declining. These are numbers. Hardcore numbers which reflect the devastation caused by the pandemic in the business world. Ask your friends & acquaintances, take a walk down your usual street, read newspapers and you'll get to know first-hand accounts of how businesses have borne the pandemic's brunt."Small-business owners trying to weather the COVID-19 pandemic will face a financial blow that's likely to be worse than what they experienced during the Great Recession more than a decade ago," says Karen G. Mills, a senior fellow at Harvard Business School. Go Digital or Go Dark

McKinsey & Company indicate that businesses have totally surprised themselves at the pace at which they have adopted digital transformation in response to the pandemic, extended lockdowns, and official health protocols. In a matter of few months, the pandemic has ushered in years of change and digital adoption in the way businesses operate across the World. In a world of social distancing, the majority of interactions with customers are happening virtually. With some exceptions, digital operations and platforms are keeping the businesses alive. The mantra has been simple  "Go digital, or Go dark." Areas of Escalated Digital Adoption: Cloud Computing

Digital Assets

E-commerce

Mobile Apps

Business Softwares

Digital Marketing

Remote Working / Collaboration

Online Transactions

Online Learning How CS Web Solutions is Helping Companies Navigate through this Storm?

CS Web Solutions has been n the driver's seat ever since the pandemic struck. We are helping companies in North Marica to steer through the rough roads with our tech-powered fuel and creative navigation skills. We have a versatile tech team and dynamic personnel at the top level who understand the intricacies of the business needs, market demands, and customer psychographics.



Our Key Domain Areas: Website Design & Development

Application Development

Digital Marketing

Branding & Design

Comprehensive IT Services

Startup Packages

Dedicated IT Resources All these areas have become an absolute necessity for businesses to survive in this pandemic, and that's where we excel. We have assisted businesses in the adoption of digital technologies, digital platforms, digital presence, and digital marketing to maneuver their way to profitability in the New Normal.

We have an enviable track record built over the years and unparalleled credibility to deliver optimized business solutions. Our portfolio speaks volumes about our capabilities and the diverse set of business sectors that we have worked in. Here are a couple of recent case studies showcasing our credentials. Case 1: Verifications Canada VerificationsCanada is one of the leading verifications and background check specialists based in Canada. We helped Verifications Canada turn their business model 180-degree and adopt a complete online channel to render their services. Customers can log in to their websites and avail quick and reliable background checks in a matter of few clicks. Case 2: Tenderly Tenderly got a major overhaul and how they operate with the help of CS Web Solutions. We designed and developed a user-friendly digital tender platform that is 100% compliant with options for digital paperless submissions and 247 bidding. The online platform is completely safe. The processing time has been cut down by a whopping 40%, making Tenderly one of the most preferred e-tendering platforms. Elaborating on the changing dynamics of how businesses operate, Vin Sonpal, Business Head  CSWebSolutions.ca  Canada, says, "In every crisis, lies the seed of opportunity. Digital transformation was on the horizon and inevitable, but the pandemic has really catalyzed its adoption by nearly 7-10 years." Businesses need to be agile and adaptive in keeping technology at the heart of every process. Those businesses who ride high on the wave of digital will survive and see the sunshine. Vin Sonpal has more than 15 years of experience in the IT sector and has served the Canadian market for over 10 years. He leads the charge of CS Web Solution's North American division and boasts expertise in how web platforms can be designed to meet custom business needs. He loves exploring newer technologies and how they can be integrated to optimize business processes. Sonpal has completed his MSC.IT from Liverpool University, UK. If your business has been on the edge since the onset of the pandemic, we recommend you get in touch with Vin Sonpal by sending an email at (vin@cswebsolutions.ca) or calling up at our phone (phone number). We're sure your one email or a phone call will not help your business survive but also thrive in these difficult times. About CS Web Solutions

CS Web Solutions is among the top web design and development companies in Canada that have been in business for more than 10 years. We Offer customized iPhone / Android App Developments, Responsive Website Design, Social Media & Digital Marketing Services for your business growth. While developing a website for our esteem client, we build it in a way that is search engine friendly and also takes care of our clients long-term goals. Get in touch with us for your next project. We would like to hear from you. Call 647-979-9324 for a quote. Contact: Vin Sonpal

647-979-9324

https://www.cswebsolutions.ca View original content to download multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/navigate-your-business-through-the-pandemic-storm--achieve-profitability--cs-web-solutions-301315236.html SOURCE CS Web Solutions

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[June 17, 2021] Growatt consolidates market-leading position as global top 10 brand

SHENZHEN, China, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Global PV inverter shipments increased by more than 35% in 2020 despite the pandemic according to IHS Markit's latest PV Inverter Market Tracker, with Growatt consolidating its market-leading position as one of the world's top 10 brands. In 2020, Growatt continued to be the top Chinese supplier of residential inverters, ranking third globally. "For distributed solar energy, especially residential, Growatt has very strong competitive advantages over other brands. Our products and solutions are highly trusted and are extremely popular in mature solar markets ike Europe and Australia as well as emerging markets like Brazil," commented Lisa Zhang, Marketing Director at Growatt.



The company also ranked among the world's top 5 suppliers of three-phase string inverters for commercial and industrial solar PV projects. Zhang attributed these achievements to the company's continuous product innovations and localization strategy adopted since its establishment. "We have established an extensive service network with 20 offices and warehouses worldwide, enabling our team to deliver efficient technical support and service to our customers. With such dedicated local teams, we have been able to weather the impact of COVID-19 and continue to expand our business globally," Zhang continued. By the end of 2020, Growatt had shipped over 2.6 million inverters to more than 100 countries. The company has also developed the new X inverter series that feature sleek and compact design as well as safer and smarter functionalities. "We're very glad to see the growing popularity of our new generation of products across global solar markets. It's great recognition of our dedication to product innovation for our customers," said Zhang.

To meet surging demand, the company has built a new factory in Huizhou, China to boost production capacity. The new facility, covering an area of 200,000 square meters, features advanced production lines, a stringent quality control system, automated transfer and storage systems. "With 20GW annual output, we are now able to meet the growing global demand for our products and make sure customers can have clear access to clean and smart energy," Zhang concluded. Contact: Whiskey Lu, whiskey.lu@growatt.com SOURCE Growatt

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[June 18, 2021] CYPHER LEARNING Raises $40 Million Growth Equity Round from Invictus Growth Partners to Accelerate Innovation in the Global Business and K-20 Education Market

CYPHER LEARNING, a leading provider of learning management systems ("LMS") for enterprises and educational institutions, announced today that it has raised a $40 million growth equity round from Invictus Growth Partners ("Invictus"), marking its first outside financing. The investment will be used to accelerate the sales, marketing, and development of its cutting-edge learning platform, and build on its profitability. Invictus Co-founder and Managing Partner, John DeLoche, will be joining CYPHER LEARNING's Board of Directors. Graham Glass, CEO and founder of CYPHER LEARNING, said: "Our mission is to innovate in education and have a major impact on the way people teach and learn. We bootstrapped the business to profitability so had a high bar in terms of bringing on an equity partner that would bring more than just capital. Invictus is the perfect partner for us, bringing deep operating expertise, a broad network, and unique data science resources that will enhance our platform and help us scale faster. We are excited to have Invictus as a partner as we continue to accelerate our vision of providing enterprises and educational institutions worldwide with the best online teaching and learning experience." CYPHER LEARNING is the only company that provides an LMS for all major e-learning sectors. The company has three award winning products: MATRIX LMS for Businesses, NEO LMS for Schools and Universities, and INDIE LMS for Entrepreneurs. The products are used by more than 20,000 organizations globally and are available in more than 40 languages. The global LMS market is estimated at more than $21 billion, yet it is still very fragmented and populated with outdated, subscale companies that have not kept up with the current needs of enterprises and educational institutions. This large market has created significant growth opportunities for CYPHER LEARNING as its leading-edge learning platform continues to gain traction due to its intuitive user-experience, powerful functionality, and innovative approach to teaching and learning.



"CYPHER LEARNING's unique positioning in the industry and the vast addressable market in both the business and K-2O sectors has led to tremendous growth that we expect will rapidly increase over the next several years," continued Graham Glass, CEO and Founder of CYPHER LEARNING. John DeLoche, Co-Founder and Managing Partner at Invictus Growth Partners, said:

"CYPHER LEARNING's platform brings many benefits to enterprises and educational institutions, including ease of use, consistency of learning, innovative tracking and reporting, increased engagement, and better learning results. Graham and his leadership team have created a world class learning platform with innovative automation, mobile, social, and gamification features that is built to scale and lead the space across all sectors. We are honored to partner with CYPHER LEARNING and look forward to working with them to achieve their mission." For more details about CYPHER LEARNING and its products, please visit cypherlearning.com. About CYPHER LEARNING CYPHER LEARNING is a company based in San Francisco that specializes in providing learning platforms to organizations worldwide. CYPHER LEARNING has three products: MATRIX LMS for Businesses, NEO LMS for Schools and Universities, and INDIE LMS for Entrepreneurs. The products are used by over 20,000 organizations, support 40+ languages, and have won several awards. CYPHER LEARNING is currently the only company that offers platforms in all major e-learning sectors: academic, corporate, and entrepreneurship. About Invictus Growth Partners Invictus Growth Partners is a growth equity and buyout firm which invests in bootstrapped and capital efficient, automation-enabled cloud software, cybersecurity and fintech companies which seek capital and strategic resources to accelerate their growth. The firm and all their professionals are based in San Francisco, CA (News - Alert) . View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210618005298/en/

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[June 18, 2021] Unified Women's Healthcare and CCRM Fertility Establish Strategic Partnership

Unified Women's Healthcare ("Unified"), a leading practice management platform in women's healthcare backed by Altas Partners ("Altas"), funds managed by the Private Equity Group of Ares Management Corporation ("Ares") and Oak HC/FT, today announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement to partner with CCRM Fertility ("CCRM"), a global pioneer in fertility treatment, research and science. As part of the transaction, CCRM founder Dr. William Schoolcraft will remain Medical Director and Jon Pardew will remain president and CEO. In addition, TA Associates, which has been a strategic investor in CCRM since 2015, will exit its stake in the company. Financial terms were not disclosed. CCRM has established a network of leading fertility clinics that offer patients high-quality care and access to award-winning physicians, a full suite of services, innovative technology and cutting-edge labs. Founded in 1987 by Dr. Schoolcraft, CCRM leverages proprietary data and a dedicated team of in-house reproductive endocrinologists, embryologists and geneticists to deliver industry-leading outcomes. CCRM has 11 in vitro fertilization (IVF) labs and 26 locations in North America supported by more than 40 physicians, 22 PhDs and 560 employees. The CCRM network offers exceptional convenience through a wide variety of treatments from basic infertility care to advanced IVF. "The addition of CCRM's clinically integrated fertility services platform marks the beginning of an exciting new chapter for Unified," said Bob LaGalia, president and CEO of Unified. "CCRM has become the gold standard in fertility care and treatment through its collaboration with expert physicians and investment in research and development. Since its inception, CCRM has pioneered significant research breakthroughs in IVF and driven industry-leading success rates, helping meet the growing need for fertility services. We look forward to collaborating with CCRM to serve even more physicians and patients across the spectrum of women's healthcare." "We're thrilled to join forces with Unified, a company that has fundamentally transformed women's healthcare and shares our deep commitment to helping physicians deliver best-in-class patient care," said Dr. William Schoolcraft, founder and medical director of CCRM. "As part of Unified's diversified healthcare platform, we'll advance our mission to provide innovative solutions and treatments that help build families. We look forward to working alongside the exceptional team at Unified as we continue to deliver the highest level of patient care." The partnership, which is expected to close in July, is subject to regulatory approvals and other customary closing conditions. About Unified Women's Healthcare Founded in 2009, Unified Women's Healthcare is the largest Ob-Gyn physician practice management company supporting more than 1,900 providrs across 13 states and the District of Columbia. Unified remains an indispensable source of business knowledge, innovation, and support to empower physicians to make the greatest impact on transforming women's healthcare for their patients. For more information, visit www.unifiedwomenshealthcare.com.



About CCRM Fertility Founded by Dr. William Schoolcraft in 1987, CCRM (Colorado Center for Reproductive Medicine) Fertility is the nation's leading network in fertility care and research. CCRM Fertility's network of expert physicians in coordination with its embryologists and geneticists coordinate to deliver in the most advanced fertility treatments, with deep expertise in in vitro fertilization (IVF), fertility assessment, fertility preservation, genetic testing, third party reproduction and egg donation. Unlike many other fertility labs that outsource their specialists and testing needs, CCRM Fertility leverages its own data, as well as a dedicated team of in-house reproductive endocrinologists, embryologists and geneticists in order to deliver industry-leading outcomes. CCRM Fertility has established a network of 11 fertility centers, including 26 offices throughout North America, serving prospective parents in major metropolitan areas, including Atlanta, Boston, Dallas, Denver, Houston, New York, Northern Virginia, Minneapolis, Orange (News - Alert) County, San Francisco Bay Area and Toronto. For more information, visit www.ccrmivf.com.

About Altas Partners Altas Partners is an investment firm with a long-term orientation focused on acquiring significant interests in high-quality, market-leading businesses in partnership with outstanding management teams. Key elements of our approach include responsible capital structures, active ownership through strategic and operational support and an emphasis on sustainable value creation. We strive to deliver outstanding investment returns for our investing partners. Altas invests on behalf of endowments, foundations, public pension funds and other institutional investors. For more information, please visit www.altas.com. About Ares Management Corporation Ares Management Corporation (NYSE: ARES) is a leading global alternative investment manager offering clients complementary primary and secondary investment solutions across the credit, private equity, real estate and infrastructure asset classes. We seek to provide flexible capital to support businesses and create value for our stakeholders and within our communities. By collaborating across our investment groups, we aim to generate consistent and attractive investment returns throughout market cycles. As of March 31, 2021, including the acquisition of Landmark Partners, which closed June 2, 2021, Ares Management's global platform had approximately $227 billion of assets under management with more than 1,600 employees operating across North America, Europe, Asia Pacific and the Middle East. For more information, please visit www.aresmgmt.com. Follow Ares on Twitter (News - Alert) @Ares_Management. About TA Associates TA is a leading global growth private equity firm. Focused on targeted sectors within five industries - technology, healthcare, financial services, consumer and business services - the firm invests in profitable, growing companies with opportunities for sustained growth, and has invested in more than 535 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 $47.5 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 can be found at www.ta.com. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210618005302/en/

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[June 18, 2021] Banty CEO Scott Wilson Provides Tips on Proper Video Call Body Language

TORONTO, June 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- When participating in a virtual meeting, one has to always be cognizant of their body language and what it is conveying. Not being mindful of something this critical can give those you video chat with a very incorrect impression of you. Professor Albert Mehrabian's famous 7-38-55 rule stipulates that 7% of meaning is communicated through spoken word, 38% through tone of voice, and 55% through body language. With that in mind, you need to always be aware of what your body is saying, even when you are silent. Scott Wilson, Co-Founder and CEO of virtual meeting platform Banty.com , believes in this theory. Subsequently, he has offered the following tips on proper video call body language: Sit up straight: When you sit up straight, you are showing everyone on the call that you are focused, interested, and respectful. What's more, this position implies confidence and strength, two traits in business that are always important to showcase to both co-workers and clients

When you sit up straight, you are showing everyone on the call that you are focused, interested, and respectful. What's more, this position implies confidence and strength, two traits in business that are always important to showcase to both co-workers and clients Make clear eye contact: Providing amazing eye contact during a virtual meeting can be challenging. Some people want to look straight at the screen when speaking, while others try to concentrate on the tiny webcam lens. Zone in on the latter, as you will always appear more attentive if you look into the camera instead of at the screen

Providing amazing eye contact during a virtual meeting can be challenging. Some people want to look straight at the screen when speaking, while others try to concentrate on the tiny webcam lens. Zone in on the latter, as you will always appear more attentive if you look into the camera instead of at the screen Be aware of facial expressions: Even though you can see yourself on a video call, it's not easy to always be aware of what your facial expressions are doing. While some resting faces look mean-spirited, they are not always intended to put forth that vibe. However, eye-rolling, and disapproving smirks cannot be easily explained away. Try your best to maintain a neutral expression until a reaction becomes necessary

Even though you can see yourself on a video call, it's not easy to always be aware of what your facial expressions are doing. While some resting faces look mean-spirited, they are not always intended to put forth that vibe. However, eye-rolling, and disapproving smirks cannot be easily explained away. Try your best to maintain a neutral expression until a reaction becomes necessary Keep fidgeting to a minimum: Whether you are presenting, or listening to others speak, avoid fidgeting constantly with your clothing, items on the desk, or the device being used for your video call. Frequent fidgeting will not just distract everyone in the room, but could even shift your focus away from the objectives at-hand. Keep your head still and centered on the screen

Whether you are presenting, or listening to others speak, avoid fidgeting constantly with your clothing, items on the desk, or the device being used for your video call. Frequent fidgeting will not just distract everyone in the room, but could even shift your focus away from the objectives at-hand. Keep your head still and centered on the screen Exude enthusiasm: If you are excited or encouraged by a topic in the meeting, do not be afraid to get slightly animated and speak with your hands. Those in the room will certainly appreciate the spirit. That said, do not get too carried away and flail your arms uncontrollably. Such actions can grow old rather quickly "A lot of us don't normally think about how big of a role our body language plays in terms of communicating with other people," offers Scott. "On video calls in particular, it must be remembered that not everyone knows what you are like in an in-person environment. A a result, you should always concentrate on putting forth the most positive, professional demeanor you can in a virtual meeting . Exuding such traits will go a long way toward building a productive and respectful rapport with others in your industry."



Banty.com's video call service offers all subscribers a custom, permanent URL (i.e., Banty.com/MyMeeting ); a secure, end-to-end encrypted meeting space; excellent video quality; unlimited meetings each month; and straightforward scheduling tools. Banty has a number of solutions that are meant to make it easy to meet with those who matter most to you. (Watch the 'Banty Is Easy' video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nhmVdwrR_w8&t=10s )

Today, everyone has a mobile number and an email address. In the near future, everyone will have a Banty video chat address: Banty.com/YourName About Banty Banty offers exceptional video conferencing solutions for Businesses , Enterprise , Medical Practices , Virtual Events , and Personal use. Banty meeting rooms are accessible via any desktop browser, or through our iOS and Android mobile apps. Banty video conferencing is easy to use and ultra-secure. In order to receive government approval to become a verified medical platform, Banty was upgraded to meet new cyber security standards, making it one of the most secure platforms available. Each day, we go above and beyond to ensure Banty remains one of the most secure and innovative virtual meeting platforms in the world. For more information, please visit Banty.org/solutions , or follow Banty on social media to learn more about the latest platform innovations: LinkedIn , Twitter , Facebook , YouTube , Instagram . Media Contact

Scott Wilson

289-259-8059

312485@email4pr.com View original content to download multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/banty-ceo-scott-wilson-provides-tips-on-proper-video-call-body-language-301315335.html SOURCE Banty Inc.

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[June 18, 2021] Brady Corporation Acquires Code Corp.

Brady Corporation (NYSE: BRC) ("Brady") today completed the acquisition of The Code Corporation ("Code" or the "Company") for approximately $173 million. Brady will fund the transaction with cash on hand and borrowings on its existing revolving line of credit. Code has forecasted sales of nearly $50 million for Brady's first full fiscal year of ownership, which ends July 31, 2022. Brady anticipates EBITDA from Code of approximately $10 million for the first full fiscal year ending July 31, 2022, inclusive of integration-related costs. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210618005087/en/ Code specializes in high-performance barcode readers and scanning software that provides data capture and powers track-and-trace applications. Founded more than 20 years ago, the bulk of Salt Lake City-based Code's sales are in U.S. healthcare. The Company is expanding its barcode reader portfolio with devices for industrial track-and-trace applications. Brady is a leader in high-performance niche application industrial printers and materials; acquiring Code will optimally position Brady as a full-service provider of industrial track-and-trace applications. "Code is a highly regarded brand for its offering of durable, high-performance barcode scanners," said Brady's Presient and Chief Executive Officer, J. Michael Nauman. "The addition of Code's high-quality complementary product offering to Brady's already existing leadership position in niche application industrial printers and materials will accelerate Brady's expansion in the industrial track-and-trace market. Once integrated, our complete service offering in these faster-growing end markets should accelerate Brady's overall growth profile. We also intend to increase investments in research and development and increase Code's addressable market through Brady's global footprint throughout Europe, Asia and the Americas."



Kent Hansen, Code CEO, stated, "Over the last several years, we've expanded our product offering, developed strong software solutions, expanded our patent portfolio, and have secured a strong position in the healthcare industry. We are proud of what we've accomplished at Code. The sale of Code to Brady, a market leader in printing and materials, is a very exciting next chapter for The Code Corporation. Brady's strong presence in both healthcare and industrial settings will most certainly open up many more opportunities than those that would have been available to us as an independent company. We believe that the sale to Brady provides an unparalleled opportunity for future growth, access to new markets and access to new customer sets." About Code Corporation

For more than 20 years, Code Corporation has been an industry pioneer, leader, and champion for data capture innovation and has garnered more than 100 patents. By crafting and continuing to perfect its unique decoding algorithms, Code and its line of image-based scanning and decoding technology consistently deliver unparalleled performance that companies around the world depend on every day. Code designs and manufactures a complete line of market-leading hardware and software data capture solutions. Code products are not only valued for providing a consistent level of workflow efficiency year after year, but also for their ergonomic design, durability, ease of customization, and seamless integration. Code is headquartered in Salt Lake City, Utah with offices in Boston and Amsterdam. For more, please visit www.codecorp.com.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210618005087/en/

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[June 18, 2021] Deadline Reminder: Law Offices of Howard G. Smith Reminds Investors of Looming Deadline in the Class Action Lawsuit Against RLX Technology Inc. (RLX)

Law Offices of Howard G. Smith reminds investors of the upcoming August 9, 2021 deadline to file a lead plaintiff motion in the case filed on behalf of investors who purchased RLX Technology Inc. ("RLX" or the "Company") (NYSE: RLX) American Depositary Shares ("ADSs" or "shares") pursuant or traceable to the Registration Statement and Prospectus issued in connection with RLX's January 2021 initial public offering ("IPO"). Investors suffering losses on their RLX investments are encouraged to contact the Law Offices of Howard G. Smith to discuss their legal rights in this class action at 888-638-4847 or by email to howardsmith@howardsmithlaw.com. RLX purports to be the "No. 1 branded e-vapor company in China," which the Company claims is its "largest potential market." In January 2021, RLX conducted its IPO, selling approximately 116.5 million ADSs) at $12 per ADS, raising approximately $1.4 billion in gross proceeds. On March 22, 2021, China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology posted draft regulations confirming tha e-cigarettes and new tobacco products would be regulated similar to traditional tobacco offerings.



On this news, RLX's share price fell $9.31, or 48%, to close at $10.15 per share on March 22, 2021, thereby injuring investors. Then, on June 2, 2021, the Company announced its first quarter 2021 financial results, reporting only a 48% increase in net revenues quarter over quarter, and second quarter guidance suggesting that its gross margin would "remain steady."

On this news, RLX's share price fell $0.97, or nearly 9%, to close at $9.90 per share on June 4, 2021, thereby damaging investors further. The Company's shares have traded as low as $7.89 per ADS, or 32% below the IPO price. The complaint alleges that Defendants overstated certain financial metrics and failed to disclose that these metrics were not indicative of future financial performance since regulators in China were already working on a national standard for e-cigarettes that would regulate them either under the same rules or in the same manner as ordinary cigarettes. If you purchased or otherwise acquired RLX ADSs pursuant or traceable to the IPO, you may move the Court no later than August 9, 2021 to ask the Court to appoint you as lead plaintiff if you meet certain legal requirements. To be a member of the class action you need not take any action at this time; you may retain counsel of your choice or take no action and remain an absent member of the class action. If you wish to learn more about this class action, or if you have any questions concerning this announcement or your rights or interests with respect to these matters, please contact Howard G. Smith, Esquire, of Law Offices of Howard G. Smith, 3070 Bristol Pike, Suite 112, Bensalem, Pennsylvania 19020, by telephone at (215) 638-4847, toll-free at (888) 638-4847, or by email to howardsmith@howardsmithlaw.com, or visit our website at www.howardsmithlaw.com. This press release may be considered Attorney Advertising in some jurisdictions under the applicable law and ethical rules. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210618005053/en/

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[June 18, 2021] SmartMetric Reveals That 60% of Existing Credit Card Holders are Willing to Pay Sixty Nine ($69) Dollars for a Biometric Protected Credit Card

SmartMetric, Inc. (OTCQB: SMME): The estimated size of the market for biometric credit and debit cards is significant. While SmartMetric is not making any projections on the actual size of the market, a number of industry figures point to the outsized market size and potential. According to EMVCo, who is a credit card standards body responsible for the licensing and rules governing EMV chips used on today's credit and debit cards, more than 10 billion 1 EMV chip cards have been issued by banks globally. SmartMetric contracted an independent consumer market research company to ascertain the potential consumer demand for a credit card with incorporated fingerprint biometrics. The survey was conducted in the USA of credit card users. The questions and results of the consumer research survey are as follows: 1: Are you concerned about credit card or identity fraud? Answered Yes: 80.1% 2: Would you pay for a safer biometric secured credit card that has a built-in fingerprint reader for your protection? Answered Yes: 65.5% 3: What would you prefer to pay for a biometric fingerprint secured safer credit card? Answer 1: $69.95 onetime charge for the life of the card (3 years) 60.2% Answer 2: $8.95 per month (includes identity theft insurance) 39.7% Given these research results and given the number of credit cards issued by banks around the world, it is a massively large potential market that SmartMetric has developed its product for. The more than 10 billion chip-based credit and debit cards issued throughout the world have been issued by banks in order to provide increased card security. By now adding fingerprint biometric sensing technology used to activate the cards contact and contactless chip, it takes security for credit cards to the next level. Interesting for SmartMetric and card issuing banks is that the consumer research is showing that bank customers are willing to pay for biometric credit card. This is based on the consumer's desire to have a safer technology that aids in protecting against card fraud. For banks card customers, the concern of card fraud goes well beyond the financial loss they may or may not experience. Card customers find the whole experience of having their financial safety violated unpleasant. It is a logical as well as an emotional reaction by consumers. The sense of violation along with the general concern for their financial safety is the main driving force as to why the research is showing so many existing card customers are willing to pay for a biometric card. For card issuing banks, they also are advantaged by the increased security offered by biometric credit and debit cards, while at the same time being able to turn their cards into a revenue generating new source of income, making the credit card a new consumer device in its own right. SmartMetri is the inventor and manufacturer of electronics that fit inside credit and debit cards.



The SmartMetric fingerprint scanning technology inside the card allows the user to secure their credit card using their own fingerprint. It also allows payments networks to be confident that the person making the transaction is indeed the person to whom the card has been issued. Fingerprint biometric secured credit and debit cards by SmartMetric have been designed around the chip that has now become the standard on newly issued cards within the credit and debit card industry. Touching a small sensor on the cards surface causes a fingerprint scan that reads and matches the card users' fingerprint in less than a second. Following a fingerprint match, the card's surface chip is then activated allowing the card to work in a card reader at a point-of-sale terminal or ATM.

Touch and store read once technology, developed by SmartMetric for its biometric card, allows mass card issuing financial institutions to issue their cards direct to consumers without the need for consumers to come into a bank branch. This is an important feature of the SmartMetric biometric card, since most new card issuance particularly in the USA is done via the mail. SmartMetric is a USA based company with sales and marketing partnerships in Latin America, Europe and United States. Engineering of the biometric card electronics is done in-house and is the owned intellectual property of the company. SmartMetric has issued patents and patents pending surrounding its biometric card technology. To view the SmartMetric Biometric Card please follow this link - Video of the SmartMetric Biometric Card. To view the company website: www.smartmetric.com 1 Data Source (News - Alert) : 10 Billion and Counting: What the Latest EMV<sup></sup> Chip Data Means for Global Payments - EMVCo EMV is a registered trademark of EMVCo Safe Harbor Statement: Forward-Looking Statements in this press release, which are not historical facts, are forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Also such forward-looking statements are within the meaning of that term in Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. Our actual results, performance or achievements may differ materially from those expressed or implied by these forward-looking statements. In some cases, you can identify forward-looking statements by the use of words such as "may," "could," "expect," "intend," "plan," "seek," "anticipate," "believe," "estimate," "predict," "potential," "continue," "likely," "will," "would" and variations of these terms and similar expressions, or the negative of these terms or similar expressions. Such forward-looking statements are necessarily based upon estimates and assumptions that, while considered reasonable by us and our management, are inherently uncertain. Factors that may cause actual results to differ materially from current expectations include, among others, if we are unable to access the capital necessary to fund current operations or implement our plans for growth; changes in the competitive environment in our industry and the markets where we operate; our ability to access the capital markets; and other risks discussed in the Company's filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, including our Annual Report on Form 10-K, which filings are available from the SEC (News - Alert) . We caution you not to place undue reliance on any forward-looking statements, which are made as of the date of this press release. We undertake no obligation to update publicly any of these forward-looking statements to reflect actual results, new information or future events, changes in assumptions or changes in other factors affecting forward-looking statements, except to the extent required by applicable laws. If we update one or more forward-looking statements, no inference should be drawn that we will make additional updates with respect to those or other forward-looking statements. Investors and security holders are urged to carefully review and consider each of SmartMetric Inc. public filings with the SEC, including but not limited to, if applicable, Annual Reports on Form 10-K, proxy statements, Current Reports on Form 8-K and Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210618005502/en/

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[June 18, 2021] Alzheimer Society expresses disgust, deep concern at callous attitudes displayed in online videos

The Alzheimer Society of Ontario reaffirms its belief in and steadfast support of frontline health care workers, including PSWs, the overwhelming majority of whom are selfless, compassionate individuals. TORONTO, June 18, 2021 /CNW/ - The Alzheimer Society of Ontarioour staff, Board members, volunteers, and clientsis unified in our shock and disappointment at dehumanising videos being circulated by a small number of Personal Support Workers (PSWs) on social media platforms, including TikTok. The videos exhibit the worst attitudes people living with dementia confront on a daily basis, and for these attitudes to come from someone in a position of care and power is deeply concerning to all long-term care residents, care partners, and families affected by dementia. A diagnosis of dementia is not the end of a person's independence and individuality. Like all of us, people living with dementia need and thrive on social contact and human connectionboth of which have been in short supply over the past year. For anyone, especially a care provider, to belittle and mock that need for connection is hurtful and contributes to the stigmatisation of dementia. We understand that it was PSWs themselves who identified and called out this hurtful content. This reinforces our belief that PSWswho have been working in stressful, traumatic conditions since well before the pandemicare true health care heroes. We hope any care provider who may have seen his content, and shared or agreed with it, uses this as an opportunity to confront their beliefs about dementia, and commits to seeing beyond the disease to form meaningful connections with the person.



In response to numerous messages from concerned staff, care partners, and people living with dementia, Cathy Barrick, CEO of the Alzheimer Society of Ontario, has released the following statement: I am saddened to learn of these disparaging videos from a handful of PSWs circulating online about people living with dementia. The Alzheimer Society of Ontario has an established partnership with the Ontario Personal Support Worker Association (OPSWA) to provide dementia-specific training to their members. I, as the Chief Executive Officer of the Alzheimer Society of Ontario, reached out to OPSWA to understand the full nature of their involvement and to impress upon them my reaction to these discriminatory and disgusting videos about people living with dementia. I appreciate that OPSWA recognised the profoundly unacceptable nature of these videos and terminated their relationship with the third party responsible immediately.

While this behaviour from a small number of PSWs is alarming, it certainly underscores the critical importance of education for PSWs on dementia and how to provide dignified and client-centred care. Dementia is a life altering and fatal disease that affects more than half a million Canadians. The importance of having a system in place that can provide dementia-specific and client-centred care is crucial. Everyone knows someone with dementia and, like the Alzheimer Society, everyone should be offended by the videos posted by this account. It should be noted that these videos demonstrate the worst side of the profession, however there are thousands of PSWs who are the backbone of long-term care and community homecare who are outstanding, professional, and compassionate in their care of people living with dementia. It was PSWs themselves who first brought these videos to light, and every PSW I know shares my disgust at this content. About the Alzheimer Society The Alzheimer Society is a Federation of 29 community support providers, operating in every corner of Ontario. We supported over 100,000 clients last year, including both care partners and people living with dementia. We provide education and training to physicians and other healthcare professionals, as well as the general public. With hundreds of staff and thousands of volunteers, we seek to alleviate the personal and social consequences of Alzheimer's disease and other dementias, and promote research into a cure and disease-altering treatment. SOURCE Alzheimer Society of Ontario

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[June 18, 2021] BC School Support Workers Welcome Education Recovery Plan

British Columbia school support workers are welcoming the $43.6 million in funding announced yesterday to support the safe reopening of BC schools for the 2021/2022 school year. CUPE's K-12 Presidents Council, representing over 30,000 support workers in B.C.'s education system, says the announcement by Minister of Education Jennifer Whiteside represents a big step forward in ensuring a healthy and safe school environment for students and staff. "We are extremely proud of the work our members have done throughout the pandemic to limit the spread of COVID-19 in our schools, to protect students, fellow staff and our communities," says Paul Simpson, president of the K-12 Presidents Council. "It is gratifying to see the efforts of school support workers recognized as an essential part of our province's recovery from COVID-19. Of the $43.6 million announced, $14.4 million in one-time pandemic funding will be made available to school districts to support the necessary cleaning and disinfecting performed by custodians and caretakers, hand hygiene, improved ventilationand restocking supplies of personal protection equipment (PPE).



"CUPE locals have been doing a lot of work in their communities and schools systems advocating for these health and safety measures. We are pushing for the necessary funding for school districts to continue enhanced cleaning measures that proved so successful during the pandemic," says Simpson. "We are looking forward to working with school districts so that they can fully utilize this directed funding, along with their other resources, to effectively and efficiently keep schools clean and safe." CUPE K-12 locals are prioritizing the continuance of daytime custodial services in all schools across the province and says this new funding would be well used to continue this vital health and safety measure.

"Unfortunately, past BC governments almost eliminated daytime custodial services in schools. So, when the pandemic hit, we had to scramble. Thankfully, our efforts to re-establish daytime custodial services contributed greatly to cleaner and safer environments for students, staff, and helped slow the spread of COVID-19," says Simpson. "I'm optimistic we have all learned this lesson from the pandemic and we can work to continue daytime custodial services permanently to keep protecting our communities from COVID-19 and a host of other illnesses." The K-12 Presidents Council represents 57 CUPE locals in school districts across British Columbia. CUPE represents more than 30,000 education workers including: education assistants, school secretaries, custodians/caretakers, Indigenous support workers, IT workers, Strong Start facilitators, trades and maintenance workers, and bus drivers. cope491 View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210618005510/en/

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[June 18, 2021] AHF Files Federal Antitrust Lawsuit Against the PBM Prime Therapeutics

Today, AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF), the leading provider of health care to people living with HIV/AIDS around the world, filed a lawsuit in federal court in Los Angeles to stop Prime Therapeutics LLC from fixing prices of reimbursements to AHF pharmacies, along with all other independent pharmacies doing business with Prime, for providing prescription drugs to patients in need. The action was filed in U.S. District Court, Central District of California (Case No. 2:21-cv-04979). Prime is a pharmacy benefit manager (PBM), a "middle-man" in the distribution system for prescription drugs in the United States. In its capacity as a PBM, Prime acts as a gatekeeper between pharmacies and health insurers.1 The PBM boasts of administering the pharmacy-benefits components of health-insurance plans for about 33 million people in the United States. Some of those people are patients of AHF pharmacies, and, in 2020, Prime processed almost 100,000 drug prescriptions for AHF patients. In late 2019, Prime announced "a new three-year collaboration" with another PBM, Express Scripts, Inc. The word "collaboration" suggests something complicated. In fact, it appears Prime is simply aligning its reimbursement rates with those of the other PBM, and doing so on an ongoing basis. AHF's pleading asserts that Prime is thereby violating the most settled pinciple of antitrust law, the prohibition against fixing prices with a direct competitor.



Almost immediately after the "collaboration" went into effect in the spring of 2020, AHF noticed that it was being reimbursed less than before for providing the same pharmacy services to patients whose PBM is Prime. Indeed, those reimbursement rates now line up exactly with those of the other competitor PBM. "The reimbursement money Prime has been unlawfully taking from AHF is money that can no longer fund the specialized care and lifesaving services that AIDS Healthcare Foundation offers to people living with HIV/AIDS -- regardless of a patient's ability to pay," said Jonathan M. Eisenberg, Deputy General Counsel for AHF. "There is thus a real human cost here."

With its lawsuit, AIDS Healthcare Foundation is now standing up to Prime, a powerful PBM that essentially controls access to many insured patients that use AHF pharmacies and healthcare centers, as well as on behalf of other independent pharmacies. "AIDS Healthcare Foundation has real reason to fear that we may face retaliation from Prime for exposing it as a price-fixer," added Eisenberg. "However, we take that risk on behalf of the patients and clients we serve and many other independent pharmacies to try to stop Prime's flagrantly unlawful scheme." About the lawsuit, AIDS Healthcare Foundation President Michael Weinstein added, "PBMs are very powerful, and they always are tempted to squeeze pharmacies financially. Somehow Prime found out that it was giving larger reimbursements to pharmacies than another PBM. Apparently, Prime just could not leave a single dime on the table and resorted to fixing prices. AIDS Healthcare Foundation and its patients - and other independent pharmacies and their patients - are literally paying the price for that crime. But we are fighting back, and we are going to win." Here again is a link to a copy of the complaint: [Case No. 2:21-cv-04979]. AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF), the largest global AIDS organization, currently provides medical care and/or services to over 1.5 million clients in 45 countries worldwide in the US, Africa, Latin America/Caribbean, the Asia/Pacific Region and Europe. To learn more about AHF, please visit our website: www.aidshealth.org, find us on Facebook (News - Alert) : www.facebook.com/aidshealth and follow us on Twitter (News - Alert) : @aidshealthcare and Instagram: @aidshealthcare 1 Note: Prime is, in fact, owned by a group of Blue Cross and/or Blue Shield health insurers. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210618005552/en/

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By: Comm. Penny Schwinn

Since we know parents are our students first teachers, we knew it would be essential for Reading 360 to engage parents as partners in the effort to get all children reading by third grade. Our investment in Tennessees teachers through the Early Reading Training will ensure excellent reading instruction in every classroom. However, educators are not the only partners in literacy. We know we need to equip families to be partners in creating strong learning experiences for our kids.



This summer, five community organizations will host literacy nights for families, to bring families to the important conversation about how children learn to read. Theyll offer a chance for families to learn what strong, structured reading instruction looks like, directly from Tennessee teachers.

Families will also learn how they can create reading experiences at home and take advantage of the new, free resources available from the Tennessee Department of Education through Reading 360: free decodable books for early readers, Ready4K informational texts, and educational summer programming on local PBS stations. Families can learn more about these opportunities below.

Learn more about Reading 360.

As a parent, I have found knowing the fundamentals of how kids learn to read to be empowering, and I want all parents to have this key information.

Join a Family Literacy Night:

These events are open to all Tennessee families:

Let's Talk Literacy -- An Event for Parents Hosted by The Metro Nashville Schools Of Innovation Thursday, June 17 @ 6:00 PM CT | REGISTER HERE

Arm Yourself with Reading Knowledge Hosted by The Memphis Lift Thursday, June 24 @ 6:00 PM CT | REGISTER HERE

How Are Our Schools Advancing Childrens Literacy? Hosted by United WE READ, an initiative of the United Way of Greater Kingsport Tuesday, June 29 @ 6:30 PM ET | REGISTER HERE

Focus on the Future: Supporting Your Childs Reading Success Hosted by The Salvation Army Thursday, July 15 @ 6:00 PM CT | REGISTER HERE

The Keys to Research-Aligned Reading Instruction Hosted by the Tennessee Branch of the International Dyslexia Association Thursday, July 29 @ 7:00 PM CT | REGISTER HERE



A special thank you to these community leaders for hosting family literacy nights. Im inspired to see the collective, statewide passion for supporting childrens literacy and empowering families.

Spread the Word: Free Decodables for Families

Parents of K2 students, dont forget to order your free, decodable books! As youll learn in the family literacy nights, these books are designed to help children sound out words and build their reading skills.

To date, more than 45,000 Tennessee families have ordered these free decodables, and we want them to reach all families!

Tune Into Teaching Tennessee

This summer, PBS stations across Tennessee are airing professionally developed content for children based on our materials, to support summer learning.

There has never been a more important time to support Tennessee families, and Im grateful to each of these organizations for partnering in the effort to get all kids reading!
NASHVILLE  A Fentress County man is charged with TennCare fraud involving the alleged resale of prescription drugs obtained using TennCare healthcare insurance benefits.

The Office of Inspector General (OIG) today announced the arrest of Kenny Evans of Pall Mall, Tennessee, in a joint effort with the Fentress County Sheriffs Department. Evans is charged with one count of knowingly selling drugs he obtained through TennCare benefits and TennCare fraud. Investigators say Evans used TennCare to obtain Oxycodone tablets, then sold a portion to an undercover informant.

One of the Office of Inspector Generals missions is to prevent people from using their TennCare benefits to sell drugs on the streets of our Tennessee communities, Inspector Kim Harmon said. We strive to ensure that our taxpayers money is being used properly and that people such as Mr. Evans are held accountable for their actions.

The case is being prosecuted by District Attorney General Jared R. Effler.

The OIG, which is separate from TennCare, began full operation in February of 2005, and has investigated more than 5,760 criminal cases leading to more than $10.8 million being repaid to TennCare, with a total estimated cost avoidance of more than $163.6 million for TennCare, according to latest figures. TennCares budget is comprised of both federal and state dollars: 65% and 35% respectfully. To date, 3,123 people have been charged with TennCare fraud.

The OIGs most wanted for TennCare fraud are posted online at https://www.tn.gov/finance/fa-oig/fa-oig-most-wanted.html. Anyone with information about their whereabouts is urged to use the contact information on the page.

Through the OIG Cash for Tips program, established by the legislature, Tennesseans can get cash rewards for TennCare fraud tips that lead to convictions. Anyone can report suspected TennCare fraud by calling 1-800-433-3982, toll-free, or by logging on to www.tn.gov/oig/ and following the prompts that read Report TennCare fraud.
DATE OF NOTICE: June 16, 2021

EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE PUBLIC MEETING

The Tennessee Human Rights Commission announces that it will hold a THRC Executive Committee Meeting on Friday, June 30, 2021 at 1:00 p.m. CST and 2:00 p.m. EST.

This meeting is open to the public and due to COVID19 will be held via Web Ex. To observe the meeting, see the information below.

Please contact Lynn Cothren before the meeting if you:

 would like an invitation to participate via Web Ex.

 require an accommodation for a disability, or

 need assistance due to limited English proficiency.

Contact Information:

Lynn Cothren

312 Rosa L Parks Avenue

Nashville, TN 37243

615.741.5825

ASK.THRC@tn.gov
KNOXVILLE, Tenn.  A Tennessee Army National Guard medical flight crew responded to an emergency air evacuation mission after a camper was attacked and injured by a bear while sleeping in the Great Smoky Mountain National Park area, June 18.

Shortly before 7 a.m., the Tennessee Military Department and Tennessee Emergency Management Agency were notified of a camper in distress at a backcountry campsite 5.7 miles from the Maddron Bald Trailhead. Requiring immediate medical care, the Tennessee National Guard was alerted for a helicopter rescue.

A UH-60 Blackhawk helicopter from Detachment 1, Company C, 1-171st Aviation Regiment based in Knoxville assembled in under an hour and launched to the incident site, arriving at the campsite at approximately 8:45 a.m.

The flight crew consisted of Chief Warrant Officer 3 Andrew Redley, Pilot in Command, Capt. Philip Webster, Pilot, Sgt. Tim Allen, Crew Chief, and Sgt. 1st Class Tracy Banta, Critical Care Flight Paramedic.

Once the rescue aircraft arrived on scene, the flight crew began hoist operations. With the aircraft unable to land due to terrain, Allen lowered Banta to the patient via rescue hoist where he performed a medical assessment with the park rangers who were providing initial medical care, and ensured that the patient was stable enough for hoisting. Once complete, Banta and the patient were lifted safely into the helicopter, which departed for the University of Tennessee Medical Center in Knoxville. The entire hoisting operation took 14 minutes to complete.

While onboard, the aircrew continued medical aid to the patient during the 20-minute flight to the hospital.

This is the third search and rescue mission by the Tennessee National Guard this year.
ANDERSON COUNTY, SR 61 Bridge over Norfolk Southern Railway and Market Street in Clinton: SR 61 East is reduced to one lane through this bridge repair project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, changing conditions, lane shifts, and use extreme caution through this area.

ANDERSON COUNTY, US 25/SR 9 Bridge over Clinch River between SR 61 and Carden Farm Drive: SR 9 northbound is reduced to one lane approaching the bridge as crews continue work in this area. Motorists should be alert for workers present, changing conditions, lane shifts, and use extreme caution through this bridge construction project.

BLOUNT COUNTY, US 129 North and South between SR 35 Hall Road and Tyson Boulevard: Motorists should be alert for workers present, possible lane closures and brief stoppages of traffic through this roadway construction project. For project information, go to https://www.tn.gov/tdot/projects/projects-region-1/sr-115-alcoa-highway-hall-road-to-tyson-blvd.html

BLOUNT COUNTY, SR 335 Hunt Road between Ambrose Street and Ramsay Street: Motorists should be alert for possible lane closures at various times as crews install utilities through this construction project. Motorists should be alert for workers present directing traffic and use extreme caution through this area.

BLOUNT COUNTY, SR 33 between Foothills Mall Drive and Henry Street: Motorists should be alert for possible nightly lane closures between the hours of 7 p.m. and 6 a.m. the following morning through this intersection improvement construction project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, changed conditions, and use extreme caution through this area.

CAMPBELL COUNTY, I-75 North near Mile Marker 131.7: On Monday, June 21, 2021, motorists should be alert for possible temporary lane closures between the hours of 8 p.m. and 6 a.m. the following morning as crews perform guardrail repairs. Motorists should be alert for workers present, slowed traffic, and use extreme caution through this area.

CAMPBELL COUNTY, I-75 North and South between Mile Markers 135 and 142: Motorists should be alert for possible temporary lane closures between the hours of 7 p.m. and 6 a.m. the following morning through this project. Motorists should be alert for slowed or stopped traffic, expect potential delays, and use extreme caution through this area.

CAMPBELL COUNTY, SR 63 between Myers Lane and Frontier Road/Woodson Lane: Motorists should be alert for possible temporary lane closures between the hours of 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. and/or 7 p.m. and 6 a.m. the following morning through this construction project. Motorists should be alert for slowed or stopped traffic, expect potential delays and use extreme caution through this area.

CARTER COUNTY, US 19E/SR 37 Bridge over the Doe River and Riverview Road: Motorists should be alert for possible lane closures through this bridge repair project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, slowed traffic, and use extreme caution in this area.

CLAIBORNE COUNTY, SR 33 between Irish Cemetery Road and Hardin Street: Motorists should be alert for possible lane closures through this area between the hours of 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. as crews install traffic signal detection loops in the roadway. Motorists should be alert for workers present and use extreme caution through this area.

CLAIBORNE COUNTY, SR 63 between Old Town Creek and US 25E/SR 32: Motorists should be alert for possible lane closures through this construction project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, expect delays and use extreme caution through this area.

GRAINGER COUNTY, US 11W/SR 1 between Promiseland Road and Circle Loop: Motorists should be alert for possible daily lane closures between the hours of 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. through this resurfacing project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, reduced speeds, expect possible delays, and use caution through this area.

GRAINGER COUNTY, SR 375 between Helton Road and US 25/SR 32: Motorists should be alert for possible daily lane closures between the hours of 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. through this resurfacing project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, reduced speeds, expect possible delays, and use caution through this area.

GREENE COUNTY, US 11E/SR 34 both directions between Blue Springs Parkway and Forest Road in Mosheim: Motorists should be alert for lane closures and lane shifts through this area for bridge repair operations. These lane closures will remain in place 24/7 until repairs are complete. Motorists should be alert for workers present, changing conditions, and use extreme caution in this area. This bridge repair project is estimated to be complete on or before October 31, 2021.

HAMBLEN COUNTY, SR 34 near Commerce Blvd.: Motorists should be alert for possible lane closures between the hours of 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. through this construction project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, slowed traffic, and use extreme caution in this area.

HAMBLEN COUNTY, SR 160 near Commerce Blvd.: Motorists should be alert for possible lane closures between the hours of 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. through this construction project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, slowed traffic, and use extreme caution in this area.

HAMBLEN COUNTY, SR 343 between US 11E and East Main Street: Motorists should be alert for possible temporary road closures with detours between the hours of 7 p.m. and 5 a.m. the following morning as utility crews perform work in this area. Motorists should be alert for workers present, follow signed detours, and use extreme caution in this area.

JEFFERSON COUNTY, I-40 West near Mile Marker 425.5: On Friday, June 18, 2021, motorists should be alert for possible temporary lane closures between the hours of 8 p.m. and 6 a.m. the following morning as crews perform guardrail repairs. Motorists should be alert for workers present, slowed traffic, and use extreme caution through this area.

JEFFERSON COUNTY, I-81 North near Mile Marker 1.8: On Friday, June 18, 2021, motorists should be alert for possible temporary lane closures between the hours of 8 p.m. and 6 a.m. the following morning as crews perform guardrail repairs. Motorists should be alert for workers present, slowed traffic, and use extreme caution through this area.

JOHNSON COUNTY, SR 167 at Log Mile 7.5: Motorists should be alert for intermittent roadway work through this slide repair project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, slowed traffic, and use extreme caution in this area.

KNOX COUNTY, I-40 East near Mile Marker 383: On Thursday, June 17, 2021, motorists should be alert for possible temporary lane closures between the hours of 8 p.m. and 6 a.m. the following morning as crews perform guardrail repairs. Motorists should be alert for workers present, slowed traffic, and use extreme caution through this area.

KNOX COUNTY, I-640 East and West between Mile Markers 0 and 3.6: Motorists should be alert for possible temporary lane closures nightly between the hours of 7 p.m. and 6 a.m. the following morning through this milling and resurfacing project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, slowed traffic, expect potential delays, and use extreme caution through this area.

KNOX COUNTY, I-640 Ramps at Exit 8: Motorists should be alert for possible temporary lane closures nightly between the hours of 7 p.m. and 6 a.m. the following morning through this construction project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, slowed traffic, expect potential delays, and use extreme caution through this area.

KNOX COUNTY, Various Interstates through Knoxville: On Thursday, June 17, 2021, motorists should be alert for possible mobile lane closures between the hours of 8 p.m. and 6 a.m. the following morning as crews perform roadway maintenance activities. Motorists should be alert for workers present, slow or stopped traffic, and use extreme caution in this area.

KNOX COUNTY, US 129/SR 115 Alcoa Highway between Topside Road and Maloney Road: Motorists should be alert for possible temporary lane closures and lane shifts as crews perform work through this project. Motorists should be alert for new traffic patterns. Motorists should be alert for workers present, reduce speed and use extreme caution through this area. For project information, go to https://www.tn.gov/tdot/projects/projects-region-1/sr-115-alcoa-highway-little-river-to-maloney.html

KNOX COUNTY, US 129/SR 115 Alcoa Highway between Maloney Road and Woodson Drive: Motorists should be alert for possible temporary lane closures and lane shifts as crews perform work through this project. Motorists should be alert for new traffic patterns. Motorists should be alert for workers present, reduce speed and use extreme caution through this area. For project information, go to https://www.tn.gov/tdot/projects/projects-region-1/sr-115-alcoa-highway-maloney-to-woodson.html

KNOX COUNTY, US 441 Broadway Viaduct between Jackson Avenue and Fifth Avenue: US 441 Broadway Viaduct over Norfolk Southern Railroad in downtown Knoxville is closed for bridge replacement. The Broadway Viaduct will be closed to all traffic for the duration of the project. During the closure, Broadway will be closed from the intersection of Oak Avenue, Worlds Fair Park, and Jackson Avenue to just north of the Depot Avenue intersection. Depot Avenue will also be closed. These closures will ensure the safety of workers and motorists as crews demolish the old bridge and reconstruct the new bridge. Primary and Local Detour Routes around the bridge closure will be in place. For detour routes and project information, go to https://www.tn.gov/tdot/projects/projects-region-1/broadway-viaduct.html

KNOX COUNTY, US 441/SR 33 Henley Street between W. Hill Avenue and W. Main Avenue: Motorists should be alert for possible nightly lane closures between the hours of 7 p.m. and 6 a.m. the following morning through this resurfacing project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, reduced speeds, expect possible delays, and use caution through this area.

KNOX COUNTY, US 441/SR 71 Chapman Highway between Nixon Road and Martin Mill Pike: Motorists should be alert for possible nightly lane closures between the hours of 7 p.m. and 6 a.m. the following morning through this resurfacing project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, reduced speeds, expect possible delays, and use caution through this area.

KNOX COUNTY, US 441/SR 71 Chapman Highway between Highland View Drive and Burnett Lane: Motorists should be alert for possible lane closures daily between the hours of 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. through this construction project. Motorists should be alert for workers and equipment present, expect potential delays, and use extreme caution through this area. For project information, go to https://www.tn.gov/tdot/projects/projects-region-1/chapman-highway-evans-to-burnett.html

KNOX COUNTY, SR 62 Western Avenue between Copper Kettle and Texas Avenue: Motorists should be alert for possible nightly lane closures between the hours of 7 p.m. and 6 a.m. the following morning through this resurfacing project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, reduced speeds, expect possible delays, and use caution through this area.

KNOX COUNTY, SR 162 Pellissippi Parkway West at Hardin Valley Road: Motorists should be alert for possible temporary lane closures through this construction project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, reduced speeds, expect possible delays, and use caution through this area.

KNOX COUNTY, SR 332 Concord Road between Turkey Creek Road and Northshore: Motorists should be alert for possible lane closures daily between the hours of 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. and new traffic patterns through this construction project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, expect potential delays, and use extreme caution through this area. For project information, go to https://www.tn.gov/tdot/projects/projects-region-1/sr-332-proposed-widening.html

LOUDON COUNTY, I-40 West near Mile Marker 363: On Tuesday, June 22, 2021, motorists should be alert for possible temporary lane closures between the hours of 8:30 a.m. and 3:30 p.m. as crews perform bridge maintenance repairs. Motorists should be alert for workers present, slowed or stopped traffic, expect potential delays, and use extreme caution through this area.

LOUDON COUNTY, I-75 North and South between Mile Markers 79 and 84: Motorists should be alert for possible temporary lane closures between the hours of 7 p.m. and 6 a.m. the following morning through this resurfacing project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, slow traffic, expect delays, and use extreme caution through this area.

LOUDON COUNTY, SR 2 between Loudon Middle School and Carter Street: Motorists should be alert for possible temporary lane closures daily between the hours of 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. through this construction project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, reduced speeds, expect possible delays, and use caution through this area.

LOUDON COUNTY, US 321/SR 73 between I-40 and Simpson Road: Motorists should be alert for possible nightly lane closures between the hours of 7 p.m. and 6 a.m. the following morning through this resurfacing project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, slow or stopped traffic, and use extreme caution in this area.

LOUDON COUNTY, US 411/SR 33 between Blount County Line and Monroe County Line: Motorists should be alert for possible lane closures daily between the hours of 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. through this resurfacing project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, slow or stopped traffic, and use extreme caution in this area.

ROANE COUNTY, I-40 West between Mile Markers 340 and 344: Motorists should be alert for possible lane closures at various times through this slope stabilization project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, reduced speeds, lane shifts, and use extreme caution through this area.

ROANE COUNTY, I-40 East near Mile Marker 353: Motorists should be alert for possible lane closures between the hours of 7 p.m. and 6 a.m. the following morning as crews perform work through this slope stabilization project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, slow traffic, and use extreme caution through this area.

SCOTT COUNTY, US 27/SR 29 between Industrial Lane and Second Avenue: Motorists should be alert for possible temporary lane closures through this construction project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, expect possible delays, and use caution through this area.

SEVIER COUNTY, SR 71 between US 411 and Macon Lane: Motorists should be alert for possible lane closures daily between the hours of 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. through this construction project. Motorists should be alert for workers and equipment present, expect potential delays, and use extreme caution through this area.

SULLIVAN COUNTY, I-26 East and West between Mile Markers 5.3 and 9.9: Motorists should be alert for possible temporary lane closures through this resurfacing project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, slow or stopped traffic, expect potential delays, and use extreme caution in this area.

SULLIVAN COUNTY, West State Street (US 11W/SR 1) near Island Road, N.E. in Bristol: Motorists should be alert for possible and closures between the hours of 7 a.m. and 5 p.m. as crews construct a median crossover and turn lanes in this area. Motorists should be alert for workers and equipment present, expect potential delays, and use extreme caution through this area.

SULLIVAN COUNTY, SR 36 at SR 126: Motorists should be alert for possible nightly lane closures between the hours of 7 p.m. and 6 a.m. the following morning through this intersection improvement project. Motorists should be alert for workers and equipment present, expect potential delays, and use extreme caution through this area.

SULLIVAN COUNTY, SR 93 from near I-26 (Log Mile 6.2) to near US 11W/ SR 1 (Log Mile 11.3) : Motorists should be alert for possible lane closures through this resurfacing and bridge repair project. Motorists should be alert for workers and equipment present, expect potential delays, and use extreme caution through this area.

SULLIVAN COUNTY, SR 126 Memorial Boulevard at SR 36: Motorists should be alert for lane reductions through this intersection improvement project. Motorists should be alert for workers and equipment present, changed traffic patterns, expect potential delays, and use extreme caution through this area.

SULLIVAN COUNTY, SR 355 between Log Miles 1 and 3: Motorists should be alert for possible lane closures daily between the hours of 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. through this construction project. Motorists should be alert for workers and equipment present, expect potential delays, and use extreme caution through this area.

UNICOI COUNTY, I-26 East and West near Mile Marker 33: Motorists should be alert for lane closures as I-26 will be reduced to one lane in each direction around the clock through this bridge repair project. Wide loads should follow signed detour routes. Motorists should be alert for workers present, slow traffic, and use extreme caution through this area. This project is estimated to be complete on or before August 31, 2021.

UNICOI COUNTY, SR 81 between Log Miles 0 and 1.8: Motorists should be alert for possible lane closures daily between the hours of 9 a.m. and 8 p.m. through this resurfacing and safety project. Motorists should be alert for workers and equipment present, expect potential delays, and use extreme caution through this area.

UNICOI COUNTY, SR 107 between 6th Street and SR 173: Motorists should be alert for possible lane closures daily between the hours of 9 a.m. and 8 p.m. through this resurfacing and safety project. Motorists should be alert for workers and equipment present, expect potential delays, and use reme caution through this area.

WASHINGTON COUNTY, SR 93 between Davis Road and Fire Hall Road: Motorists should be alert for possible temporary lane closures through this construction project. Motorists should be alert for workers present, reduced speeds, and use caution through this area.

For information on statewide interstate construction motorists can access the Tennessee Department of Transportation SmartWay website at https://smartway.tn.gov/traffic

TDOT is now on Twitter. For up to the minute traffic information in Knoxville and the Tri-Cities follow us on Twitter at www.twitter.com/knoxville511. For statewide travel information follow www.twitter.com/TN511
The meeting will be held by Webex.

The Investment Committee of the Tennessee Consolidated Retirement System (TCRS) Board of Trustees will meet at 1:00 p.m. CST Thursday, June 24, 2021, via Microsoft Teams meeting.

Join the meeting
The Mayor's EXPENSIVE homeless agenda was put on hold this week in a surprising move by a council player along with resounding opposition throughout Kansas City neighborhoods.

To wit . . .

FRIDAY FACE-OFF: COUNCIL LADY SHIELDS SHUTS DOWN MAYOR Q OVER TINY HOMELESS VILLAGE!!!

This debate at 12th & Oak is important for two reasons . . .

- Widespread outcry against the zoning switcheroo revealed that neighborhoods are not on board with haphazard zoning rules . . . Even in the name of social justice.

- The council lady flex on Mayor Q offers proves that her connections to local biz are far more "influential" than so much activist chatter and outcry.

Moreover . . .

J.E. Dunn pushing back behind the scenes didn't help the mayor's cause and created an unwinnable situation.

We expect continued debate but this PUBLIC SMACK DOWN is yet another sign that the activist agenda and recent victories at 12th & Oak confronts a reality check now that the pandemic has seemingly, hopefully concluded.

Check the links . . .

Kansas City Council delays decision on new homeless village ordinance, funding KANSAS CITY, Mo. - Kansas City's plan to set up a homeless village is running into more problems. On Thursday, the council decided to hold off an ordinance that would help find a location for the tiny homes and postponed the vote for two weeks.

Kansas City's plans for homeless campus blocked for now The plan to set up a city-authorized homeless camp or campus is being blocked for now. Part of the problem is no one wants it near their neighborhood.The "not-in-my-backyard" argument is one of the main sticking points. But there are others. It would have to be near a utility connection and probably close to bus stops.

Developing . . .
A Kansas City architectural flop is on the way thanks to a dearth of leadership and overall disdain for area drivers.

Here's a preview amid the last days of the internal combustion engine . . . Read more:
The United States now has two separate but equally meaningful holidays celebrating liberation.



Sure, there's political disputes which confront festivities on both sides of the aisle . . . But generally, we're in favor of people taking off work as much as possible.



And so we ask our blog community to contemplate this question for the overnight/early morning . . .

HOW WILL YOU CELEBRATE JUNETEENTH?!?! DON'T BE A JERK, SHARE SOME THOUGHTFUL ANSWERS!!!



To help spark insight we share this collection of news items on the topic from BOTH sides of the equation . . .

Juneteenth becomes federal holiday celebrating end of slavery in US The US will officially recognize Juneteenth, which commemorates the end of slavery in America, as a federal holiday after Joe Biden signed a bill into law on Thursday. At a jubilant White House ceremony, the president emphasized the need for the US to reckon with its history, even when that history is shameful.

New national holiday sets off scramble to shut down governments nationwide Friday States across the country are scrambling to close their government offices Friday after President Joe Biden signed legislation establishing Juneteenth as a US federal holiday.

Missouri to close state offices in observance of Juneteenth, new federal holiday JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. - Missouri state offices will be closed Friday as the state recognizes the new Juneteenth federal holiday. The bill to make Juneteenth, or June 19, a federal holiday swiftly passed through the Senate and House this week, and President Joe Biden signed it into law on Thursday.

Tucker Carlson Is SO MAD That Juneteenth Will Be A National Holiday If Tucker Carlson had his druthers, America wouldn't bother to acknowledge that slavery was once a big thing in America and just move on. How else could one explain his fury that legislation to make Juneteenth a federal holiday has been so widely embraced by Democrats and Republicans alike in both the Senate (which unanimously voted to pass the bill) and the House (where only 14 people, all Republicans, voted against it)?

Here are the 14 House Republicans who voted against a bill making Juneteenth a federal holiday The House overwhelmingly passed a bill on Wednesday that would establish June 19 as Juneteenth National Independence Day, a US federal holiday commemorating the end of slavery in the United States.

Biden got down on one knee to welcome the 94-year-old 'grandmother' of Juneteenth to the White House President Joe Biden delivered a special greeting on Thursday to Opal Lee, a 94-year-old Texas activist. In 2016, Lee marched 1,400 miles from Fort Worth, Texas, to DC to advocate for making Juneteenth a federal holiday. Biden officially made Juneteenth a national holiday, signing the bill into law with Lee by his side.

As Juneteenth becomes a federal holiday, the US needs a culture of reparations Like most policy agendas, reparations won't come from Washington, D.C. It will go to the nation's capital, as the local initiatives described above demonstrate. These initiatives signal a change in culture, and encourage a shift.

Here's what's happening for Juneteenth 2021 in Kansas City The annual Juneteenth parade held June 12 by JuneteenthKC/Courtesy photoIf you missed the annual JuneteenthKC parade through 18th Street last Saturday, don't fret. There are still plenty of upcoming ways to celebrate Juneteenth, a holiday that commemorates the end of slavery in the United States.

Developing . . .
As violence steadily increases across Kansas City and community support for his agenda starts to noticeably fade, Mayor Q delves into a constitutional theory promoted by the newspaper in order to salvage an ordinance mired in litigation.



The editorial premise as newsies play lawyer for their last remaining subscribers . . .



Kansas City cant be required to spend more than 20% of its general revenue fund on police, (Gwen Grant's) motion argued, because that would violate Missouris Hancock Amendment, the sprawling 1980 initiative that remains the gold standard for anti-tax, anti-government conservatives everywhere.

The Hancock Amendment also includes a little-noticed clause forbidding the state from imposing additional spending on cities and counties. The prohibition against these unfunded mandates prevents the legislature from loading expensive state programs on the backs of city councils, county legislatures and their taxpayers. In 1980, as is the case today, Missouri law required Kansas City to pay just 20% of its general revenue fund to the police board. The Hancock Amendment explicitly bars the state legislature, or any state agency, from requiring anything more than that, forever.

That's a very clever argument that won't improve overwhelming public sentient against Kansas City's sketchy defund ordinance.

Btw . . .

HAVE ANY OF YOU D-BAGS SEEN THE BUDGET FOR THE 'COMMUNITY SERVICES & PREVENTION' $42 MILLION POLICE DEFUND?!?! TKC ASKED LAST MONTH AND STILL NO ANSWER!!!



But I digress . . .

This post was actually inspired by the Mayor's latest demand directed at the Kansas City Police Board that was, in turn, inspired by dead-tree media legal theory . . .



Again, this comment is revealing for reasons that have nothing to do with mind-numbing legal theory based on political chatter.



Mayor Q is now fighting alongside activist Gwen Grant and The Kansas City Star for a defund ordinance that has earned overwhelming local and nationwide rebuke. In fact, the "defund the police" movement has been disavowed by Democratic Party leadership.

The reality is that without revealing the budget for his ordinance, Mayor Q is merely asking for a blank check in service of yet another 12th & Oak slush fund; making an utterly hypocritical and highly questionable argument predicated on transparency and accountability but offering none in return.



You decide . . .


The only part of this presser that's really important is that the Democratic Party majority in congress and the senate realize that they hold only a slim majority and now confront a HUUUUUGE RED WAVE of conservative backlash.

Read more . . .



From Politico and a move that might not exactly represent progress . . .



The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee announced a slate of nearly two dozen members who will join its leadership ranks as it looks to preserve a narrow House majority after redistricting.



The expanded roster is a part of DCCC Chair Sean Patrick Maloneys pledge to ensuring diversity is reflected in the upper echelons of the committee, something lawmakers complained that his predecessor failed to achieve in the early days of the past cycle.

The local mention toward the end of this presser . . .



Reps. Sharice Davids of Kansas, Dan Kildee of Michigan, Gwen Moore of Wisconsin and Raul Ruiz of California will spearhead the committees work with Native American tribes and Indian Country.

Developing . . .
Bunk Tribe Holidays Pvt. Ltd organized the group tour to Arunachal Pradesh for senior citizens. So join the 11 days 10 nights tour package for senior citizens and experience the never forget pleasure.



(TRAVPR.COM) INDIA - June 17th, 2021 - The COVID-19 pandemic hampered travel for much of 2020 but now vaccines are distributed and more countries reopen their borders to tourists. Still, Safety will be the top priority and while conditions can change in a hurry in the time of COVID-19, there are a handful of potential destinations that stands out when it comes to offering travelers both protection and peace o mind, and Arunachal Pradesh is one of them. After shutting down for a long duration, the state is now gradually reopening for travelers.

So Bunk Tribe Holidays Pvt Ltd has launched The Arunachal Pradesh Tour Package for Senior Citizens.

Shying away in the Northeastern corner of India, Arunachal Pradesh though maybe an introvert when it comes to tourism, is a land of abundant travel opportunities. Adorned with an unspoiled landscape, this Northeast state of India is a place that every nature lover and explorer should visit. A treasure trove of culture, natures beauty, rich history, and warm people, Arunachal is truly a land that can not afford to miss.

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@IsaacAvilucea on Twitter

Isaac Avilucea is The Trentonians main municipal scribe. A two-time prior restraint winner and testicular cancer survivor, he relishes his reputation as the "Mean Girls" reporter that followed his 18-day stay at the now-defunct North Adams Transcript.
Johnstown, PA (15901)

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Terre Haute, IN (47803)

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Seen here in 2015, former U.S. ambassador Cynthia Shepard Perry looks over a mural featuring the faces of local black history at Terre Haute North on Friday as North art teacher Edward Holloman describes how he painted the mural during Perry's visit.
KAMPALA, Uganda (AP)  Ethiopians will vote Monday in a landmark election overshadowed by reports of famine in the countrys war-hit Tigray region and beset by logistical problems that mean some people wont be able to vote until September.

The election is the centerpiece of a reform drive by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, whose rise to power in 2018 seemed to signal a break with decades of authoritarian rule and led to his Nobel Peace Prize the following year. He has described the poll as the nations first attempt at free and fair elections.

Abiys ruling Prosperity Party, formed in 2019 by merging groups who made up the previous ruling coalition, is widely expected to cement its hold on power. The party that wins a majority of seats in the House of Peoples Representatives will form the next government.

We will secure Ethiopias unity, Abiy said ahead of his final campaign rally on Wednesday, repeating his vow of a free and fair election after past votes were marred by allegations of fraud.

But opposition groups have accused Ethiopias ruling party of harassment, manipulation and threats of violence that echo abuses of the past.

And Abiy is facing growing international criticism over the war in Ethiopias northern Tigray region. Thousands of civilians have been killed and more than 2 million people have been displaced since fighting broke out in November between Ethiopian forces, backed by ones from neighboring Eritrea, and those supporting the now-fugitive Tigray leaders.

Last week, humanitarian agencies warned that 350,000 people in Tigray are on the brink of famine, a crisis that several diplomats have described as manmade amid allegations of forced starvation. Ethiopias government has rejected the figure and says food aid has reached 5.2 million in the region of 6 million.

No date has been set for voting in Tigrays 38 constituencies, where military personnel who usually play a key role in transporting election materials across Africas second-most populous country are busy with the conflict.

Meanwhile, voting has been postponed until September in 64 out of 547 constituencies throughout Ethiopia because of insecurity, defective ballot papers and opposition allegations of irregularities. Outbreaks of ethnic violence have also killed hundreds of people in the Amhara, Oromia and Benishangul-Gumuz regions in recent months.

Some prominent opposition parties are boycotting the election. Others say they have been prevented from campaigning in several parts of the country.

There have been gross violations, Yusef Ibrahim, vice president of the National Movement of Amhara, said earlier this month. He said his party had been effectively banned from campaigning in several regions, with some party members arrested and banners destroyed.

Neither officials with the Prosperity Party nor Abiys office responded to requests for comment on such allegations.

Ethiopia last year postponed the election, citing the COVID-19 pandemic, adding to the tensions with Tigrays former leaders. Recently the vote was delayed again by several weeks amid technical problems involving ballot papers and a lack of polling station officials.

Abiys Prosperity Party has registered 2,432 candidates in the election, which will see Ethiopians voting for both national and regional representatives. The next largest party, Ethiopian Citizens for Social Justice, is fielding 1,385 candidates. A total of 47 parties are contesting the election.

But on Sunday, five opposition parties released a joint statement saying that campaigning outside the capital, Addis Ababa, has been marred by serious problems, including killings, attempted killings and beatings of candidates.

Two prominent opposition parties, the Oromo Liberation Front and the Oromo Federalist Congress, are boycotting the vote. Its going to be a sham election, OFC chairman Merera Gudina said earlier this month.

That means the Prosperity Party will face little competition in Oromia, Ethiopias most populous state.

Several prominent OFC members remain behind bars after a wave of unrest last year sparked by the killing of a popular Oromo musician, and the OLFs leader is under house arrest. The leader of the Balderas Party for True Democracy, Eskinder Nega, was also detained and is contesting the election from prison.

Getnet Worku, secretary general of the newly established ENAT party, said earlier this month it is not standing candidates in several constituencies because the threat of violence is too high, asserting that armed militias organized by local officials frequently broke up rallies.

There are growing international concerns over whether the elections will be fair. The European Union has said it will not observe the vote after its requests to import communications equipment were denied.

In response, Ethiopia said external observers are neither essential nor necessary to certify the credibility of an election, although it has since welcomed observers deployed by the African Union.

Last week the U.S. State Department said it is gravely concerned about the environment under which these upcoming elections are to be held, citing detention of opposition politicians, harassment of independent media, partisan activities by local and regional governments, and the many interethnic and inter-communal conflicts across Ethiopia.

Abiys appointment as prime minister in 2018 was initially greeted by an outburst of optimism both at home and abroad. Shortly after taking office, he freed tens of thousands of political prisoners, allowed the return of exiled opposition groups and rolled back punitive laws that targeted civil society.

In 2019 he won the Nobel Peace Prize in part for those reforms and for making peace with Eritrea by ending a long-running border standoff.

But critics say Ethiopias political space has started to shrink again. The government denies the accusation.

Several prominent opposition figures accused of inciting unrest are behind bars. While opening a sugar factory earlier this month, Abiy accused traitors and outsiders of working to undermine Ethiopia.

This week his spokeswoman, Billene Seyoum, described the election as a chance for citizens to exercise their democratic rights and accused international media of mounting a character assassination of the prime minister.
A roundup of some of the most popular but completely untrue stories and visuals of the week. None of these are legit, even though they were shared widely on social media. The Associated Press checked them out. Here are the facts:

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Brain waves not a factor in naming COVID-19 variants

CLAIM: The new COVID-19 variants were named after brain wave frequencies.

THE FACTS: Both virus variants and brain wave frequencies are named using letters from the Greek alphabet. But the names have no connection. As news about the delta COVID-19 variant made headlines, posts online began falsely claiming that the new variants were being named after brain waves or frequencies. Some posts falsely claimed this connection had to do with a secret conspiracy to control humans through technology. For example, posts suggested that one COVID-19 variant was named delta because it largely impacts children, and they claimed that delta is a brain wave specific to children. But delta waves are actually more closely associated with deep sleep. Sleep is critical for development so in a contorted way you could say kids have more delta waves, said David McCormick, professor of biology and director of the Institute of Neuroscience at the University of Oregon. The brain has billions of neurons that are all oscillating or generating brief signals, which are also known as brain waves. The first brain wave that was discovered was the alpha rhythm, which is the rhythm prominent in the visual cortex when you close your eyes, McCormick said. The delta COVID-19 variant was first discovered in India and is known for being more transmissible than other variants. But the variant did not get its name as part of a plot to control brains. The delta variant was named after the World Health Organization announced in May it would change its system for labeling COVID-19 variants. The Greek alphabet is often used for naming purposes in math and science, not just for brain waves. Before the change, COVID-19 variants were referred to by the location where they were found along with complex alphanumeric identifiers that have to do with how a given variant has descended from those that came before. For example, a variant found in South Africa was known as the South Africa variant, or B.1.351. In order to get away from naming variants after their locations, which WHO said was stigmatizing and discriminatory, the system was changed, and the Greek alphabet was selected as the source for labeling. The variants would now be publicly known as alpha (B.1.7), beta (B.1.351), gamma (P.1) and delta (B.1.617.2).

- Associated Press writer Beatrice Dupuy in New York contributed this report.

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Study touting hydroxychloroquine flawed, experts say

CLAIM: The malaria drug hydroxychloroquine, when used with the antibiotic azithromycin, can improve survival by nearly 200% when given to COVID-19 patients on ventilators.

THE FACTS: Experts say the small study that this claim is based on proves nothing, and that enough evidence now exists from well-run studies to indicate that hydroxychloroquine is not effective for treating COVID-19. The study in question is being misrepresented online to falsely suggest that top health officials were wrong when they found that hydroxychloroquine, a drug used to treat malaria, had no benefit as a COVID-19 treatment. The observational study, which has not been vetted by independent scientists, gained attention on social media after it was posted on May 31 to Medrxiv, a website that displays medical papers that have not been published. Posts online, many from supporters of former President Donald Trump, claimed the study shows that health officials and media were wrong to discount the benefits of hydroxychloroquine against COVID-19, which Trump had championed. Several health professionals told The Associated Press that using the new study to tout the benefits of hydroxychloroquine is misleading. This is a very small study from a single hospital that was observational only, said Dr. Jaimie Meyer, infectious disease physician at Yale School of Medicine. The answer to COVID is vaccination, not hydroxychloroquine. Randomized double-blind studies are the gold standard in medical research. In such studies, patients are not told whether they are receiving the drug being tested or a placebo. They allow for even distribution across groups and take into account potential differences among subjects that researchers may not have anticipated. In an observational study, like the one being touted in the false posts, researchers simply observe patients without randomizing who gets what treatment. These studies are susceptible to bias and cannot prove cause and effect, Meyer said. The study cited in the false posts examined 255 COVID-19 patients on ventilators starting on May 1, 2020. It was conducted by the Smith Center for Infectious Diseases & Urban Health in East Orange, New Jersey, which is run by Dr. Stephen M. Smith, an early proponent of hydroxychloroquine to treat COVID-19. The study offers no information on how it was funded and the center did not respond to an AP request for comment. The study itself notes that it should not be used to guide clinical practice. Hydroxychloroquine has since been tested on thousands of COVID-19 patients. Data from randomized studies has shown the drug is not effective for treating the disease  alone or with other drugs like azithromycin. These included major studies published in The New England Journal of Medicine and The Journal of the American Medical Association.

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Boy in courtroom images was charged with manslaughter, not hacking bank

CLAIM: Photos show a boy who, at 11 years old, hacked the computer system of a Swiss bank and transferred $75 billion to his fathers account.

THE FACTS: The caption on the photos is incorrect. An AP photo dated May 20, 2009, matches one of the images in the post. Its caption explained the handcuffed suspect, who was 14 at the time, was appearing in court in Caldwell, Idaho, on a charge of first degree murder for killing his father. He was charged as an adult. Photos shared more than a thousand times on Facebook on Tuesday showed the boy in a courtroom in a yellow jumpsuit and handcuffs. At 11, he hacked the computer system of a Swiss bank and transferred $ 75 billion to his fathers account, said a caption with the post. Commenters on the post reacted to the false claim, calling him a genius who should be recruited by NASA. However, a reverse-image search reveals the boy was in court for allegedly killing his father, not stealing from a bank. According to the AP and the Idaho Press-Tribune, the boy pleaded guilty in 2010 to a reduced charge of voluntary manslaughter after testifying that his father had sexually abused him. Five years into a seven-year sentence, a judge determined him fit to be released to probation, allowing him back into society in August 2014.

 Associated Press writer Ali Swenson in Semora, North Carolina, contributed this report.

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FBI headquarters in Washington is open as usual

CLAIM: The FBI headquarters building in Washington is completely closed, empty and walled off.

THE FACTS: A video spreading the false claim shows the back of the building rather than the main entrance, which was open and fully operational this week, according to a statement from the FBI. The 30-second video, posted Monday on the encrypted messaging app Telegram, shows a view of the FBI headquarters, also known as the J. Edgar Hoover Building, from E Street NW in Washington. A narrator identifies the date as June 14, then claims the building is completely closed. No ones in there, the narrator says. In fact, its even walled off. You cant even get inside. The bogus claim spread to Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Reddit and other platforms, with users speculating that the federal government is shutting down buildings in preparation for some kind of large-scale event or attack. Theres no evidence this is the case. The FBI Headquarters building at 935 Pennsylvania Avenue NW is open and fully operational, as are all of our field offices, the FBI said in an emailed statement. An AP reporter who works near the building confirmed that people have been entering and leaving the building all week, including on Monday, when the video was filmed. The main entrance to the building is located along Pennsylvania Avenue, not E Street NW, where the video was filmed.

 Ali Swenson

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Interview with boy who claims he shot burglar is satire

CLAIM: Video shows a television interview with Lucas Armitage, an 8-year-old boy who used his dads gun to shoot a burglar several times and then laughed so loudly it woke his dad.

THE FACTS: A video purporting to show a daytime talk show interview with a child who laughed after shooting a burglar to death was being shared as real on social media on Monday, despite the fact that it originated as satire. The video, produced by The Onion, a satirical website, appeared to show two eager television hosts interviewing an 8-year-old boy and his father, with a logo reading Today Now in the corner. Text on the screen read, MORNING INSPIRATION: Hero Eight-Year-Old Uses Dads Gun to Stop Burglar. The two hosts and the boys father egged him on as he described using his fathers gun to shoot a burglar several times, including shooting off each one of his fingers until he stopped screaming. The hosts asked the father if the burglars screaming woke him. Actually, it was Lucas laughing that woke me up, the father said. The Onion created the video for its parody morning news show called Today Now.

 Ali Swenson

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Find AP Fact Checks here: https://apnews.com/APFactCheck

___

Follow @APFactCheck on Twitter: https://twitter.com/APFactCheck
Tucson, AZ (85741)

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Russia has withdrawn only 12,000 troops out of more than 100,000 deployed near the border with Ukraine and in the territory of the temporarily occupied Crimea.

Maintaining close attention of the international community to the situation along the Ukrainian-Russian state border is critical to prevent Russia from further escalation. Despite previous announcements by Russian officials, only a small part of Russian troops was withdrawn, no more than 12 thousand out of more than one hundred thousand deployed, Ambassador Yevhenii Tsymbaliuk, Permanent Representative of Ukraine to the International Organizations in Vienna, said at the OSCE Permanent Council meeting on 17 June.

He noted that the threat had been underlined by G7 leaders in their Summit Communique of 13 June, in which they called on Russia to alleviate tensions, act in accordance with its international obligations, and to withdraw its military troops and materiel at the eastern border of Ukraine and on the Crimean peninsula.

We reiterate our call to the Russian side to recognize its role as a party to the Russian-Ukrainian conflict and start meaningful negotiations on peace, Tsymbaluk stressed.

As reported, in late March-early April, Russia amassed more than 100,000 troops near the border with Ukraine and in the occupied Crimea.

Later, Russia announced the withdrawal of troops under the pretext of "successful completion of the exercises." However, it maintains a significant military presence near the border and in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine.

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The Ministry for Foreign Affairs will help Ukrainian businesses enter alternative markets if Belarus takes unjustified restrictive measures.

Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs (CDTO) Dmytro Senik said this at a meeting of the Export and Investment Support Committee of the Kyiv Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Ukrinform reports with reference to the ministrys press service.

During the discussion, Senik reminded that Minister for Foreign Affairs Dmytro Kuleba had earlier advised Ukrainian companies to contact the Ministry if they suffer from Belarusian sanctions.

"Together with the Economy Ministry of Ukraine, we are already taking efforts to find alternative markets for our companies to sell their goods," Senik said.

The diplomat assured entrepreneurs of full support from the Ministry for Foreign Affairs and called on business representatives to contact the Ministrys Council of Exporters and Investors to support the entry of domestic goods and services into foreign markets, attract investment to Ukraine and develop inbound tourism.

As reported, on May 26, Belarus approved a resolution introducing an individual licensing regime for the import of certain Ukrainian goods: confectionery, chocolate, juice, beer, chipboard and fiberboard, wallpaper, toilet paper and packaging, bricks, ceramic tiles, glass ampoules, agricultural machinery for sowing, washing machines and furniture.

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Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Dmytro Kuleba and U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland discussed in a phone conversation preparations for President Zelensky's visit to the United States.

"Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Dmytro Kuleba had a telephone conversation with U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland who informed him in detail about the content and results of the U.S.Russia talks in Geneva on June 16," the press service of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine informed.

As noted, Nuland said that U.S. President Joe Biden had stated clearly and firmly during the talks with the President of Russia that the United States strongly supported Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity which would continue to remain intact.

"Victoria Nuland underscored the unwavering commitment of the United States to the principle of 'no agreement on Ukraine without Ukraine' in negotiations with Russia and any other country," reads the statement.

The parties also discussed preparations for the visit of President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky to the United States of America and reaffirmed the mutual commitment to make it as meaningful and effective as possible.

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Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Dmytro Kuleba believes that Ukraine had every reason to be invited to the NATO summit, which took place in Brussels on June 14.

"Ukraine should have been invited to this summit. It had every reason for this," Kuleba said on the air of 1+1 TV channel.

The minister has repeatedly stressed Ukraine's Euro-Atlantic prospects.

We understand that we will go through this path, and Ukraine will be a member of the North Atlantic Alliance, Kuleba stressed.

Regarding Moscow's influence on this process, he pointed out that the Russian Federation is "a certain reality that must be reckoned with, but it does not and will not have the right to veto Ukraine's accession to NATO."

Kuleba also called Putin's statements about Ukraine's NATO membership as a "red line" for Russia a deceit, since Estonia is a member of the Alliance and "located not far from St. Petersburg."

As Ukrinform reported, on June 14, the NATO summit was held in Brussels to consider ways to strengthen the transatlantic partnership and develop the Alliance by 2030.

NATO Heads of State and Government reaffirmed their support for the territorial integrity of Ukraine, Georgia, and the Republic of Moldova, and called on Russia to withdraw its troops from the occupied territories.

Meanwhile, the Kremlin said that Ukrainian membership of NATO would be a "red line" for Moscow and that it was worried by talk that Kyiv may one day be granted a Membership Action Plan.

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U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman and German State Secretary Miguel Berger have reaffirmed their support for Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity in the face of Russian aggression.

They said this during a meeting in Washington, D.C., on June 17, according to a press release posted on the website of the U.S. Department of State.

The parties emphasized the importance of transatlantic and U.S.-German relationship.

During the meeting, they discussed the importance of cooperating on a joint approach to the Peoples Republic of China (PRC) and Russia, as well as maintaining their diplomatic presence during an orderly military withdrawal from Afghanistan.

The deputy secretary and the state secretary also reaffirmed their support for Ukraines sovereignty and territorial integrity in the face of Russian aggression, while underscoring the need for Ukraine to make continued progress on reforms.

The deputy secretary stressed the importance of European energy security, reiterating the United States opposition to the Nord Stream 2 pipeline.

ish
Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Dmytro Kuleba has stated that now it's time to make Russia pull back from Ukraine.

"This summit demonstrated that America is back, and now it's time to make Russia pull back from Ukraine," Kuleba said in an interview with Reuters, commenting on BidenPutin meeting.

He assured that the talks between the two leaders did not cause concern in Ukraine.

"President Putin saw... no invitation to bargain from the United States on the Ukrainian matter. And this is a matter of principle because we agreed with the United States that no deals on Ukraine will be made without Ukraine, and America kept its promise," Kuleba stressed.

The minister said Ukraine was stepping up its verbal pressure on NATO because it remains "in a security vacuum" even as it battles the Russian-backed separatists in its east.

"We are not members of any security alliance... So yes, we are a nation desperately seeking security. And this prompts us to be active, to be pushy, if I may," Kuleba added.

The Ukrainian minister also noted that Moscow had no power of veto over Ukraine's accession to NATO.

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Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Dmytro Kuleba says many traditionally powerful allies of the United States still do not have as many contacts with U.S. President Joe Biden's administration as Ukraine does.

Kuleba said this during the Pravo na Vladu (Right to Power) talk show on the 1+1 TV channel, an Ukrinform correspondent reports.

During this short period of time, President Biden had two conversations with President Zelensky, and the President of Ukraine was invited to pay a visit to Washington. The U.S. Secretary of State made a visit to Ukraine. There are many countries that are traditionally considered powerful allies and friends of the United States, with which there have been no such contacts so far, and there is a very long queue, the minister said.

He added that the United States is Ukraine's main ally and partner in security and defense matters. "We always have something to talk about The American side really wants to see not a ceremonial visit, but a visit that will bring concrete results. This fully coincides with our vision and we are already working on its preparation," the minister said, commenting on the discussion of the upcoming meeting between Zelensky and Biden with U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland.

Kuleba also expects that Zelensky's forthcoming visit to the United States "could change a lot in terms of our security relationship."

As Ukrinform reported, on Thursday, June 17, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Dmytro Kuleba and U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland discussed in a phone conversation preparations for President Zelensky's visit to the United States. Kuleba also said that U.S. involvement in a peaceful settlement in eastern Ukraine would be a key topic of Zelensky's meeting with Biden, which was agreed upon by the two presidents during a phone talk on June 7. According to Kuleba, the meeting will take place in late July.

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The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic has allocated funds for the purchase of personal protective equipment and other necessary equipment for hospitals in Donetsk and Luhansk regions.

This was reported by the Embassy of the Czech Republic in Ukraine on Facebook.

The Czech Foreign Ministry has allocated new funds for humanitarian aid in Ukraine! Today, Ambassador Radek Matula signed an agreement with the NGO Initiative E+ on the implementation of the project "Challenge 2021: Donbas recovery"," the statement reads.

The organization will help hospitals in Donetsk and Luhansk regions to combat the COVID-19 epidemic through the purchase of PPE and other necessary equipment.

At the same time, another part of the funds will be spent for the organization of summer camps for children affected by the war.

"Last year, due to the pandemic, it was impossible to organize the camps, and we sincerely hope that this year the camps will take place and the children will be able to get the long-awaited rest and rehabilitation," the embassy noted.

As Ukrinform reported, in May the Czech Republic provided Ukraine with humanitarian aid consisting of face masks and COVID-19 test kits.

ish
Shaker Ali sits in front of what used to be a marketplace in Aden, Yemen.  UNHCR/Saleh Bahulais

GENEVA  The number of people forcibly displaced by conflict, violence, persecution and human rights abuses rose for the ninth year in a row in 2020 to reach 82.4 million, despite COVID-19 making it harder for those fleeing to seek safety abroad, according to the latest Global Trends report released today by UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency.

The total is equivalent to 1 in every 95 people, and represents a four per cent increase over the previous year. While the worlds refugee population continued to grow, most of the total increase was due to a larger number of internally displaced people (IDPs) fleeing within the borders of their own countries.

Behind each number is a person forced from their home and a story of displacement, dispossession and suffering, said UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi. They merit our attention and support  not just with humanitarian aid, but in finding solutions to their plight.

The COVID-19 pandemic, which has claimed more than 3.8 million lives and continues to rage in many parts of the world, proved especially devastating to people living in marginalized communities, including refugees, IDPs and stateless people, who have no national identity.

The pandemic wiped out jobs and savings, caused widespread hunger and forced many refugee children to leave school  perhaps permanently. Many families reported sending their children to work rather than school to make ends meet. Some refugee girls faced forced early marriage and a greater risk of sexual and gender-based violence.

Behind each number is a person forced from their home. (Melik Benkritly, editor / Linda Muriuki, Producer )

The pandemic and related lockdowns proved particularly disruptive to those refugees trying to maintain their mental health and rebuild social and support networks far from home.

Venezuelan psychologist Loredana Hernadez Giraud, who lives in Lima, Peru, volunteers with a helpline run by Union Venezolana. The NGO helps Venezuelan refugees and migrants.

Many people have lost their jobs and are constantly worrying about being evicted  or running out of food, and what to do with their kids being all cooped up, she told UNHCR last year.

We see all sorts of cases, but a very common one is panic attacks because of the confinement.

Pandemic restrictions, combined with growing xenophobia, left many forcibly displaced people with limited options.

Many countries, such as Uganda, used improved medical screening, temporary quarantines, remote interviewing and other measures to protect public health while continuing to offer refuge. However, at the peak of the pandemic last year, more than 160 countries had closed their borders, with 99 making no exceptions for people seeking international protection.

Countries also slashed the number of spaces for resettlement last year. In the early part of the pandemic, UNHCR and the International Organization for Migration put their resettlement departures on hold due to border restrictions. But after they resumed, only 34,400 refugees were resettled, the lowest number in two decades.

Although many refugees long to go home, resettlement offers a lifeline to those who cannot.

Former refugee Abdallah Al-Obaidi was just six years old when a bomb exploded at his school in Iraq. He and his family fled to Jordan, where they lived for eight years without citizenship. In 2013, they resettled in the United States. Abdallah learned English by studying the dictionary, became president of his high school class and then attended Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia. He will soon attend Tufts University School of Medicine in Boston. He said finding a mentor enabled him to make it so far in an education system that can be challenging for newcomers.

I was lucky. I found someone who mentored me and took me under his wing and introduced me to a programme called YPI, Young Physicians Initiative. It advocates for the diversity and education in medicine specifically in underserved communities, Abdallah said during a panel discussion this week in advance of World Refugee Day with High Commissioner Grandi and US Permanent Representative to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield. Ill be the first in my family to go to medical school. Im a first-generation American.

World Refugee Day, held each year on 20 June, honours the courage and contributions of refugees around the world as well as those who have welcomed the forcibly displaced into their countries and communities.

Despite the many challenges, forcibly displaced and stateless people around the world continued to contribute to their communities. Many worked as doctors and nurses to fight the spread of COVID-19. Somali refugee business people in South Africa banded together to distribute food and supplies to people hurt financially by the lockdowns. In Kenya, a Ugandan refugee took her yoga classes online for refugees and aid workers.

Last year, people displaced within their own country accounted for more than half of the number of forcibly displaced, or 48 million. That number is the highest on record and up 2.3 million compared with the year before. Crises in Ethiopia, Sudan, Mozambique, Yemen, Afghanistan and Colombia accounted for the large numbers of IDPs, as did escalating violence in the countries of Africas Sahel region, including Niger, Burkina Faso and Mali.

"Behind each number is a person."

In Yemen, more families were driven from their homes last year bringing the total number of IDPs to 4 million, as continued fighting contributed to what the UN has called the worlds worst humanitarian crisis. Roughly 233,000 people have died since the conflict began six years ago due to the violence or related causes such as hunger and lack of health services.

Many IDPs remain in dire circumstances.

We had a good life but we did not feel safe. We fled the conflict. Now we feel safe, but we struggle to survive, Samirah, a mother of four young children who escaped fighting in Yemens Al Hudaydah governorate last year, told a UNHCR partner.

More than two thirds of all refugees and Venezuelans displaced abroad came from just five countries: Syria (6.7 million), Venezuela (4.0 million), Afghanistan (2.6 million), South Sudan (2.2 million) and Myanmar (1.1 million). Most sought refuge in neighbouring countries, which meant that low- and middle-income nations continued to host the largest number of refugees.

For the seventh consecutive year, Turkey hosted the highest number of refugees (3.7 million), followed by Colombia, (1.7 million including Venezuelans displaced abroad), Pakistan (1.4 million), Uganda (1.4 million) and Germany (1.2 million).

Written by Sarah Schafer.
UNHCR holds its World Refugee Day commemoration, together with government representatives, high-level supporters as well as refugees.  UNHCR/A. Shahzad

Number of people fleeing wars and violence rose to 82.4 million; forced displacement hits record high; one per cent of humanity is displaced.

Press release

ISLAMABAD, 18 June 2021: UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency revealed on Friday that almost 1 million children were born as refugees between 2018 and 2020, and called for greater efforts to prevent and end conflicts. Failing to do so will result in children continuing to live as refugees for years to come.

According to a newly released Global Trends report by UNHCR, it is estimated that the number of people fleeing wars, violence, persecution and human rights violations in 2020 rose to nearly 82.4 million people  a 4 per cent increase on top of the already record-high 79.5 million at the end of 2019. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Mr. Filippo Grandi, called for greater political will to address conflicts and persecution that force people to flee.

Turkey hosts the largest refugee population worldwide with 3.7 million refugees, followed by Colombia with 1.7 million, and Pakistan with 1.4 million Afghan refugees.

According to the statistics, 1 per cent of humanity is displaced, and there are twice as many forcibly displaced people than in 2011, when the total was just under 40 million.

The 2021 World Refugee Day theme is: Together we heal, learn and shine. In Islamabad, UNHCR, together with the Government of Pakistan, organized a virtual event to express solidarity with refugees and the communities that generously hosted them.

The online event was attended by the UNHCR Representative in Pakistan, Ms. Noriko Yoshida, the Commissioner for Afghan Refugees (Islamabad Headquarters), Mr. Farid Ullah Jan, other government officials, representatives from diplomatic missions, UN agencies, partners, civil society and refugees.

Speaking on the occasion, Ms. Yoshida said that the continuous rise in forced displacement worldwide is alarming. The most worrying fact is that 42 per cent of all displaced people are children below the age of 18, she said, adding that hundreds of thousands of children continue to be born as refugees, and that efforts should be made to prevent displacement across the globe.

Despite its own challenges, Pakistans commitment to Afghan refugees has never diminished; it deserves special recognition, Ms. Yoshida said. She appreciated the Government of Pakistan for its policies that include refugees, such as its national COVID-19 vaccination programme, and for the access to educational opportunities and health care that the country provides.

Referring to the Support Platform for Afghan Refugee Solutions created in 2019, she appreciated and welcomed the renewed interest shown by the international community in sharing the responsibility and burden with Pakistan in hosting Afghan refugees.

In 2021, we mark World Refugee Day amid a continuing pandemic, and the pandemic has taught us that we are stronger when we stand together, she added. Despite the challenges they face every day, she said that refugees have stepped up, working as doctors and nurses, and keeping their communities functioning. She said that given the chance, refugees will continue to contribute to a stronger, safer and more vibrant world.

Mr. Jan from the Commissionerate for Afghan Refugees, the government body responsible for managing Afghan refugee affairs in Pakistan, welcomed further international support for Pakistans efforts.

The people of Pakistan opened their hearts to refugees and welcomed them when they fled conflict. For over forty years, we left no stone unturned in our support to refugees, he said.

Afghan refugees who participated the virtual event also shared their thoughts, needs and dreams with the audience.

ENDS

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Special Assistant to Prime Minister on Poverty Alleviation and Social Protection Dr. Sania Nishtar on Friday said the government has allocated Rs 260 billion for 'Ehsaas Program' in Budget 2021-22 for poverty alleviation and provide relief to the low income people in the society

ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 18th Jun, 2021 ) :Special Assistant to Prime Minister on Poverty Alleviation and Social Protection Dr. Sania Nishtar on Friday said the government has allocated Rs 260 billion for 'Ehsaas Program' in Budget 2021-22 for poverty alleviation and provide relief to the low income people in the society.

Major focus of the government is to execute the "Ehasaas Program' with its true spirit for 14 different categories for low income people, including widows, orphans, poors, unemployed, needy students and special citizens in society, Dr Sania Nishtar said this while addressing the Senate Session in Parliament House.

SAPM on Poverty Alleviation said that "We have evolved the dynamic digital social protection ecosystem for the future to ensure transparency and accountability in our program.

She said a comprehensive survey was completed through big data analytics by tracking real-time information about the evolution of the beneficiary status, to make social protection adaptive.

Dr Sania Nishtar said after evolving the modern digital data system, around 800,000 beneficiaries of "Ehsaas Program' registered in the previous government were disqualified from the program.

She said that "We have introduced digitalization and Information Technology (IT) reforms in our system for enhancing the efficiency of the system.

She said that through ' 'Ehsaas Kafalat Program' "We are providing this financial facility in 124 districts to the low income people in different regions of the country.

The SAPM said that the 'Ehsaas under Graduate 'programme also approved to provide thousands of Ehsaas undergraduate scholarships for students from different regions of the country in the upcoming Budget 2021-22.

She said that during COVID -19 the government has provided relief of Rs 179 billions to 15 million people from different regions of the country.

Dr Sania Nishtar said that women empowerment is top priority for the government in the coming Budget 2021-22 and allocated 50 percent total resources for women to provide them health and education facilities.

He announced that in January 2022 in the coming Budget, the government has decided to increase the stipend for 'Ehsaas Program' from Rs 12000 to 13000.

While briefed to the forum, she also hailed the tax relief provided by the government in the coming budget and said the government has waved off the tax on industrial raw material to minimize the cost of doing business in the country.

The government has also decided to introduce tax reforms and automation in the Federal board of Revenue (FBR) for enhancing the efficiency in the tax system and expanding the tax net in the country.

He said revenue generation is important for financial inclusion to support the low income people in the society.
Vienna, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 18th Jun, 2021 ) :Austria will donate one million doses of Covid-19 vaccines to western Balkan countries, Chancellor Sebastian Kurz said Friday.

In April, Austria and Slovenia promised thousands of coronavirus vaccine doses to the Czech Republic after coming under fire from Brussels for refusing to help EU partners in greater need of jabs.

"We will deliver one million doses of vaccines from Austria to the western Balkans from August until the end of the year," Kurz told reporters after meeting representatives from Albania, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, Republic of North Macedonia and Serbia.

A spokesman told AFP that the donations would be mostly AstraZeneca and that further details -- including who gets how many -- would still need to be decided.

"We will only be able to overcome this pandemic once all countries in Europe and beyond have overcome it," Kurz said.

Almost half of Austria's almost nine million people have already received at least one shot, while a quarter is fully vaccinated.
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Apia, Samoa, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 18th Jun, 2021 ) :Samoa's incumbent prime minister suffered a setback in his bid to retain power Friday when a court disqualified one of his party's candidates over bribery, further boosting his rival's majority.

The Pacific nation's caretaker leader Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi has refused to leave office despite narrowly losing an April 9 general election and suffering numerous court defeats in his bid to challenge the outcome.

The latest came on Friday when the Supreme Court overturned the election of Seiuli Ueligitone Seiuli, who had won a seat for Malielegaoi's Human Rights Protection Party (HRPP).

The court found Seiuli was guilty of bribery after presenting cash to a village meeting last year and ordered a by-election for his seat on a date yet to be determined.

The decision leaves HRPP with 24 seats, while Malielegaoi political foe Fiame Naomi Mata'afa's FAST Party has 26.

Mata'afa argues she is prime minister-elect and Malielegaoi should stand aside after his 22-year rule, and allow her to become the nation's first female prime minister.

Mata'afa was sworn in last month in a tent on the lawn of parliament after loyalists to the previous government locked the doors of the building in a bid to stop her from assuming power.

A legal challenge to the swearing in is expected to be heard next week.
Niamey, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 18th Jun, 2021 ) :The West African state of Niger said it had reopened land borders that had been closed since March 2020 to help prevent the spread of coronavirus.

Road crossings on the the landlocked state's borders were reopened on Thursday after Covid trends showed "the situation is still under control," the government said.

Niger, one of the world's poorest countries, took drastic measures to stop the spread of coronavirus after the first cases emerged in March 2020.

The authorities ordered border closures, a state of emergency with a curfew, the closure of places of worship and schools, and the isolation of the capital Niamey from the rest of the country.

Most of these measures were eased over time, the chief exception being the closure of land borders.

Travellers arriving in Niger must present a negative test result for coronavirus or face being send back, a health ministry official told AFP.

People leaving the country will also have to present a negative test no more than five days old, he said.

The cost of the test is 5,000 CFA francs ($9 / 7.6 Euros) for people crossing by road, and 25,000 francs for air travellers, a rate set by all members of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS).

Niger has been relatively unaffected by the epidemic, reporting 5,457 cases including 193 deaths, according to official figures.

The health ministry on Tuesday launched a "mass vaccination campaign" against Covid-19, seeking to reach as many people as possible among those still reluctant to be vaccinated.
ISTANBUL, 18 June (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 18th Jun, 2021 ) : Turkey's state-run aviation company, Turkish Aerospace (TAI), is building Europe's second-largest subsonic wind tunnel for testing the country's fighter jets.

"The wind tunnel is intended to be used in the development of indigenous, rotary-wing and fixed-wing aircraft, especially the Turkish Fighter," a press release read on Friday.

The tunnel, including three different sections -- large, small and open --, will be equipped with state-of-the-art technology measurement and sensing devices for advanced testing.

"With the integrated moving ground belt system, landing and take-off tests for aircraft will be carried out only in this tunnel in Turkey," it noted.

Temel Kotil, the company's CEO, said: "Our facility will be the only facility in Turkey in this field with the capability to allow aeroacoustic testing."
European Union (EU) on Friday welcomed the progress made by Pakistan in the implementation of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) and it's commitment to continue the engagement with the FATF to address all of the remaining issues.

ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 18th Jun, 2021 ) :European Union (EU) on Friday welcomed the progress made by Pakistan in the implementation of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) and it's commitment to continue the engagement with the FATF to address all of the remaining issues.

EU also appreciated Pakistan's efforts towards full implementation of the 27 international conventions stipulated under the EU's unilateral trade preferences scheme, the Generalised Scheme of Preferences Plus (GSP+).

The EU and Pakistan agreed to enhance bilateral trade, investment for improving the business climate.

A meeting of Pakistan-European Union Joint Commission was held here at EU Commission Office.

A meeting of Pak-EU Joint Commission was co-chaired by Gunnar Wiegand, Managing Director for Asia and the Pacific in the European External Action Service, and Noor Ahmed, Secretary of Economic Affairs Division, however, representatives of relevant ministries of the government of Pakistan, the European Ambassador to Pakistan, Pakistan's Ambassador to the EU and observers from EU Member States were also participated in the meeting.

The Joint Commission aimed to provide an opportunity to deliberate and exchange views on all existing areas of cooperation between the EU and Pakistan.

During the meeting, they have discussed the long-term socio-economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and ongoing vaccination cooperation between EU and Pakistan for wiping out the pandemic, besides appreciating Pakistan's efforts for sustainable economic recovery after pandemic.

They have also exchanged views on climate change, where the EU informed Pakistan about the European Green Deal, connectivity and digitalisation.

From Pakistan's side, the delegation briefed about various ongoing climate projects, including eco-system restoration, green stimulus and national electric vehicle policy. They also discussed cooperation in the fields of education, culture, science and technology.

While recalling the joint declaration on Afghanistan during the 5th session of the Pakistan-EU Strategic Dialogue, the EU and Pakistan reaffirmed their strong support for an Afghan-led and Afghan-owned peace process and encouraged the stakeholders to resume negotiations in earnest to achieve lasting peace and stability in Afghanistan.

The EU has also appreciated Pakistan's hosting of millions of Afghan refugees for past two decades and assured Pakistan of its cooperation and ongoing work towards a durable solution, including through assisting and promoting the safe and dignified return of Afghan refugees to their homeland.

Pakistan briefed the EU on the recent developments in the region and reiterated its concerns regarding the human rights and humanitarian situation in Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK).
Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi on Friday expressed Pakistan's unwavering support for the Palestinian cause and underscored the importance of a two-state solution based on pre-1967 borders under the relevant UNSC resolutions for sustainable peace in the region

ANTALYA (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 18th Jun, 2021 ) Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi on Friday expressed Pakistan's unwavering support for the Palestinian cause and underscored the importance of a two-state solution based on pre-1967 borders under the relevant UNSC resolutions for sustainable peace in the region.

In a meeting with Palestinian Foreign Minister Dr. Riyad Al Maliki on the sidelines of Antalya Diplomacy in Turkey, Qureshi strongly condemned the latest Israeli strikes against Gaza after the recent ceasefire.

Foreign Minister Maliki briefed Foreign Minister Qureshi on the latest situation in Palestinian Occupied Territories.

He also conveyed deep appreciation on behalf of the Palestinian President and people of Palestine to the Foreign Minister for proactively taking up the case of Palestine at the UN General Assembly during the recent Israeli aggression against Gaza.

Both foreign ministers exchanged views on rising Islamophobia and agreed on the need for evolving a joint strategy to counter discrimination against all religious faiths, particularly against Muslims.

Foreign Minister Qureshi also extended an invitation to Foreign Minister Maliki to visit Pakistan, which he accepted.
WASHINGTON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 18th June, 2021) US State Secretary Antony Blinken will start a European tour to visit Germany, France, Italy and Vatican next week, State Department spokesperson Ned price said in a statement on Friday.

"Blinken will travel to Berlin, Paris, Rome, the Vatican, Bari, and Matera, June 22-29," Price said.

In all capitals, Blinken will meet local top officials to discuss bilateral and international issues.

"In Berlin, the Secretary will attend the Second Berlin Conference on Libya to support national elections in December and the withdrawal of foreign forces," the statement read, adding that he will have separate discussions with Libyan and other foreign officials on the margins of the forum.

Blinken also will be meeting with Chancellor Angela Merkel and Foreign Minister Heiko Maas to highlight the importance of bilateral relations, as well as combating anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial.

In Paris on June 25, Blinken will meet with President Emmanuel Macron and Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian, as well as Mathias Cormann, the Secretary General of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.

In Rome, Blinken will co-chair a meeting of the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS with Italian Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio. He also plans to participate in a Syria Ministerial to discuss the crisis in in the country.

The US Secretary of State also will meet with senior Holy See officials in Vatican to discuss freedom of religion or belief and tackling the climate crisis, the statement said.

He will end his tour in the Italian cities of Bari and Matera at a G20 Foreign Ministers' Meeting in preparation for the G20 summit that will take place in the Rome in October.
The World Health Organization voiced alarm Friday at surging Covid-19 cases across Africa, with the spread of new more contagious variants even as vaccination rates remain dangerously low

Geneva, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 18th Jun, 2021 ) :The World Health Organization voiced alarm Friday at surging Covid-19 cases across Africa, with the spread of new more contagious variants even as vaccination rates remain dangerously low.

"It's a trajectory that is very, very concerning," WHO's emergencies chief Michael Ryan told reporters from the organisation's headquarters in Geneva.

According to WHO data, the number of new Covid-19 cases in Africa rose to over 116,500 in the week ending June 13, up from nearly 91,000 the previous week.

Ryan stressed that in terms of absolute numbers, the region did not necessarily look like it was in bad shape, accounting for just over five percent of new global cases and 2.2 percent of global deaths last week.

However, he warned, across the continent, the trajectory was pointing straight up, with over 100-percent increases in a range of countries, and over 50 percent in others.

"This is a phenomenon occurring across the continent," he said.

Africa has been hit less hard by the pandemic than most other regions, recording over 136.000 deaths from some 5.1 million cases so far.

WHO's regional director for Africa Matshidiso Moeti warned earlier this week that the continent was "in the midst of a full-blown third wave." The WHO said "a lack of adherence to transmission prevention measures has fuelled the new surge that coincides with colder seasonal weather in southern Africa and as more contagious variants spread.

" - 'Storm' potential - Ryan stressed though that regardless what was causing the rising case numbers, the continent had been left far more vulnerable than it needed to be due to inequitable access to vaccines.

"The brutal reality is that in an era of multiple variants with increased transmissibility and potentially increased impact, we have left vast swathes of the population and the vulnerable population in Africa unprotected by vaccines, in the context where health systems are already weak," he said.

"That's the reality. And this is the consequence of the current unfair distribution of vaccines," he said, warning that "the population that needs to be protected is not." While people in many wealthy nations are enjoying a return to a sense of normalcy thanks to high vaccination rates, the shots remain scarce in less well-off parts of the world.

That is particularly true in Africa, where only about one percent of the population is fully vaccinated, according to the WHO.

While Africa so far as found itself less hard-hit by the pandemic than many other parts of the world, Ryan warned that the third wave there could prove more severe.

"To assume that the next wave in Africa is just going to be a small passing shower, and will not be a storm, I think is very, very premature," he said.

"I think we have to really take what's happening on the African continent, very, very seriously."
NATO member Lithuania said Friday it would grant asylum to a dozen Afghans who worked as translators and interpreters for international armed forces and now fear Taliban reprisals once foreign troops leave Afghanistan

Vilnius, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 18th Jun, 2021 ) :NATO member Lithuania said Friday it would grant asylum to a dozen Afghans who worked as translators and interpreters for international armed forces and now fear Taliban reprisals once foreign troops leave Afghanistan.

"These are people who helped our forces. This is a matter of honour for our country to help them in return," Prime Minister Ingrida Simonyte told AFP.

Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis called it "the right and responsible decision", telling local media: "We will provide asylum to these people." Authorities in the Baltic EU member received a letter this week from 12 Afghan translators and interpreters who said they worked with its troops in Afghanistan until 2013, when Lithuania was leading a reconstruction team in Ghor province.

The Afghans said their request for asylum was "a matter of life and death" in the letter seen by AFP.

Defence Minister Arvydas Anusauskas said checks were underway to confirm that the people who sent the letter had truly worked with troops in Afghanistan.

The Afghans said that while working for foreign forces they had gathered information from locals and governmental authorities, attended intelligence meetings, assisted with training exercises and even participated in military operations against the Taliban.

They warned that as the Taliban takes control the people who worked with international forces "are the first target for them".

Last week the Taliban said that Afghans who worked with foreign forces in the past have nothing to fear once international troops leave, as long as they "show remorse."
MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 18th June, 2021) North Korean Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un has outlined Pyongyang's approach toward the United States under the administration of President Joe Biden, stressing the need for both dialogue and confrontation, the state-run Korean Central News Agency reported.

During the third-day sitting of the 3rd Plenary Meeting of the 8th Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea (WPK) on Thursday, Kim provided a detailed analysis of the news US administration's policy toward North Korea, while also outlining Pyongyang's strategic and tactical countermeasures.

On May 21, Biden and South Korean President Moon Jae-in held a summit in Washington, where they discussed the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula and coordination on the issue of North Korea. Biden said he would be willing to hold a meeting with the North Korean leader if Pyongyang commits itself to denuclearization.
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DOHA (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 10th June, 2021) The Qatari special envoy on counterterrorism and conflict resolution, Mutlaq bin Majed Al Qahtani on Wednesday met with US Special Representative for Afghanistan Zalmay Khalilzad, as well as the head of the Taliban delegation at the inter-Afghan negotiations in Doha, Abdul Hakim Sheikh, Qatar's foreign ministry said.

Earlier in the day, Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen announced that the movement's negotiating teams and the Afghan government had met on Tuesday to discuss accelerating the negotiations.

"HE Special Envoy of the Minister of Foreign Affairs for Counterterrorism and Mediation in Conflict Resolution Dr. Mutlaq bin Majed Al Qahtani met Wednesday with the US Special Representative for Afghanistan Zalmay Khalilzad and his accompanying delegation, during his current visit to the country," the ministry said in a statement, adding that the sides discussed the ongoing peace process and the Doha talks.

Qahtani also reviewed the state of the Afghan peace process during his meeting with the Taliban official.

"HE Special Envoy of the Foreign Minister of the State of Qatar for Counterterrorism and Mediation of Conflict Resolution Dr. Mutlaq bin Majed Al Qahtani met today with chief of Taliban's negotiation team Sheikh Abdul Hakim Sheikh, and members of the negotiation team," the ministry stated.

The peace negotiations between Kabul and the Taliban began in the Qatari capital back in September. In early December, Kabul and the Taliban announced that they had agreed on the framework of the talks, allowing for discussions to now be held on substantive issues. Little progress, however, has been made since then.
Russia's parliamentary elections in September will be held over three days to limit the spread of coronavirus, the head of the poll body said Friday, as new cases hit a record in Moscow

Moscow, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 18th Jun, 2021 ) :Russia's parliamentary elections in September will be held over three days to limit the spread of coronavirus, the head of the poll body said Friday, as new cases hit a record in Moscow.

Voting will be staggered from September 17 to September 19, Ella Pamfilova told a commission meeting.

"Three days will guarantee sanitary and epidemiological safety for the health of our citizens," Pamfilova was cited by Russian news agencies as saying.

Moscow on Friday reported a pandemic daily high for new infections at just over 9,000, with the city's mayor blaming the surge on the highly infectious Delta variant first identified in India.

Russia is one of the countries hardest hit by Covid-19 with the sixth-highest number of infections worldwide, according to an AFP tally.

Local and regional elections in September last year were held over three days, while several months earlier a week-long constitutional referendum paved the way for President Vladimir Putin to remain in power until 2036.

Golos, an independent election monitor, said it received hundreds of complaints of violations during the referendum, including multiple voting and intimidation.

The opposition claimed that voting over several days gives election officials greater opportunities to fix elections.

The lead up to September's parliamentary elections has seen the authorities pile pressure on the opposition, declaring the organisations of jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny extremist and barring his allies from legislative polls.

Critics point to sagging ratings for Putin's United Russia party, which is becoming increasingly unpopular amid economic stagnation.

A survey published by the state-run pollster VTsIOM on Friday showed that 30 percent of voters support United Russia compared with an approval rating of 61.5 percent for Putin himself.

Despite the clampdown on the opposition, Navalny's allies are promoting his Smart Voting strategy that backs candidates best placed to defeat Kremlin-linked politicians.

The tactic has seen United Russia lose a number of seats in recent local elections.
MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 18th June, 2021) Russia will officially withdraw from the Open Skies Treaty on December 18 of this year, the Foreign Ministry said on Friday, adding that Moscow has notified the depositories of the agreement about its withdrawal.

"Russia has notified all participating states of its decision to withdraw from the Open Skies Treaty six months after the notification was sent. Thus, this will happen on December 18," the ministry said in a statement.

Russia also requested the state parties of the treaty to convene a conference as soon as possible to consider the consequences of its withdrawal from the agreement.

In addition, Moscow said that the US is responsible for the collapse of the Open Skies Treaty.

"The expectation that the 'technical superiority of the West will make it possible to bypass Russia and leave it on the sidelines is also not justified. This was the case with the transition to digital technologies in the implementation of the Open Skies Treaty - it was actively promoted by the Americans, and as a result, our country was ahead of its Western partners by 8-9 years. We are sure that it will be the same now, when the United States is destroying the treaty, relying on national technical means of control," the ministry said.
The United States congratulated Antonio Guterres with his appointment as UN Secretary-General for a second term, US Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield said in a statement on Friday

UNITED NATIONS (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 18th June, 2021) The United States congratulated Antonio Guterres with his appointment as UN Secretary-General for a second term, US Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield said in a statement on Friday.

Earlier on Friday, the UN General Assembly swore Guterres in office for the second term which is set to span from January 2022 to December 2026.

"On behalf of the United States, I am pleased to congratulate Antonio Guterres on his reappointment as UN Secretary-General," Thomas-Greenfield said.

The US diplomat said Guterres' appointment is a testament to his leadership in tackling the current challenges.

"The United States recognizes the many challenges the Secretary-General will face in the coming years, and we hope that... the next five years will see more peace, more security, and more prosperity than the last," she said.

Thomas-Greenfield also stated in order to achieve these goals, UN member states will be required to demonstrate their commitment and respect for human rights.
Mississippi INBRE Research Efforts Aided by Technology Upgrade

Fri, 06/18/2021 - 16:14pm | By: David Tisdale

An enhancement of the cutting edge technology employed by the Mississippi INBREs (IDeA Network of Biomedical Research Excellence) Imaging Facility, headquartered at The University of Southern Mississippi (USM), will keep its affiliate faculty and student researchers at the forefront in STEM (Science, Technology Engineering and Mathematics) research.

The Mississippi INBRE Imaging Core has upgraded its existing Leica SP8 confocal microscope to the STELLARIS STED super resolution platform, one of the most complete imaging systems in the region. The instrument was acquired through funding from the NIH-supported Mississippi INBRE Imaging Core Facility, as well as an NSF Major Research Instrumentation Program grant whose Principal Investigator (PI) is Dr. Alex Flynt, an associate professor in USMs Center for Molecular and Cellular Biosciences.

The Mississippi INBRE Imaging Facility, directed by Dr. Jonathan Lindner, provides imaging and microscopy expertise to researchers throughout the state, offering access to and training on biomedical research equipment at no cost to users. The facility houses several types of microscopes, as well as a variety of large-scale instruments. The imaging facility also offers computational services and expertise to Mississippi researchers.

The addition of the STELLARIS STED super resolution microscope will enhance the quality and scope of biomedical research in the state of Mississippi, accommodating the varied needs of the INBRE Imaging Core user base. This cutting-edge technology is now accessible to faculty and students at USM and across the state who otherwise would not have access to super-resolution confocal microscopy.

According to Dr. Flynt, while light-based microscopes are indispensable to the advancement of many scientific fields. Unfortunately, he says, there is a lower limit to the size of objects that can be observed due to the physics of light itself, a barrier that impedes investigation of minuscule objects. Fortunately, recent advances have vaulted over this hurdle, yielding super-resolution microscopes such as the STELLARIS STED.

This specific super-resolution technology is well-suited for imaging dynamic objects like those in cells, as well as nanoparticles created in the laboratory, Dr. Flynt said. Areas of research that will be investigated with this microscope include material scientists studying assembly of plastic-like materials, cell biologists, and biochemists investigating cell components important in Alzheimers and genetic tools, and microbiologists who examine bacterial community structures involved in infection and plant-soil interactions.

Dr. Lindner concurs, noting also that researchers from a broad base of biological, chemical, and material science fields, including cellular and developmental biology, virology, biochemistry, high performance materials, and nanoparticle development, can greatly benefit from the instruments unique and powerful capabilities.

Microscopes are essential tools for the investigation of biological and molecular systems, Dr. Lindner said. Access to cutting-edge instruments is vital for cell biology, embryology, biochemistry, and imaging advanced materials.

Further, the addition of the advanced microscope will provide important training opportunities for students, also enhancing Mississippi STEM education.

The Leica STELLARIS STED Super-Resolution Confocal Microscope upgrades the previous confocal microscope to a fully automated platform with a 3D STimulated Emission Depletion (STED) super resolution module. The STED technology enables fluorescence microscopy approaches for visualizing objects smaller than the diffraction limit of light, increasing resolution up to 10 times more than traditional microscopes. For reference, the diameter of a nucleus of an average human cell is approximately 10 micrometers. STED super-resolution imaging is capable of resolution below 50 nanometers, over 200 times smaller than a nucleus. This enables the real-time study of sub-cellular molecular interactions and mechanisms on the nanoscale.

The system is capable of both conventional confocal scanning and resonant scanning for rapid low-light illumination imaging, which is ideal for live specimens. It is equipped with an automated motorized stage with upgraded software for expanded view image stitching options, 3D modeling, FRAP, and co-localization. Additionally, the instrument is outfitted with an Okolab CO 2 chamber for long term mammalian tissue culture imaging, and a Hamamatsu Flash camera for ultrafast acquisition.

Mississippi INBRE, directed by USM Professor Dr. Mohamed Elasri, is a statewide program supported by an award from the National Institutes of General Medical Sciences. Its mission is to enhance the biomedical foundation in Mississippi and engage talented researchers and students in biomedical research projects that will increase the state's research competitiveness, as well as positively impact the health of the states citizens.

For more information about Mississippi INBRE, visit msinbre.org.
Valdosta, GA (31601)

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Zambias founding President, Kenneth Kaunda, has died, aged 97.

Paul Samasumo - Vatican City.

The death of Zambias founding president was confirmed by the countrys Secretary to the Cabinet of Zambia, Dr Simon Miti, in the Zambian capital of Lusaka.

Dr Kaunda died Thursday. There was speculation that he may have died of Covid-19 given a third wave now devastating Zambia. However, the government said Kaunda tested negative of Covid-19 and that he died of pneumonia.

Several heads of state and government in Africa have paid tribute to Dr Kaunda, described by many as a charismatic leader and statesmen. Zambian President, Edgar Lungu, declared 21 days of national mourning while neighbouring Botswana declared 7 days.

Last surviving OAU founder, statesman and liberator

Dr Kaunda ruled Zambia from 1964 to 1991 when he conceded defeat to the Movement for Multiparty Democracy. By conceding and accepting defeat at the polls, Kaundas action distinguished him from other African leaders. He set a precedent that many African leaders are still struggling to emulate. The continent is replete with contested presidential elections.

Kaunda was the last surviving founder of the Organisation of African Union OAU (OAU), now known as the African Union (AU). He was a dedicated pan Africanist committed to ending colonial rule in Africa. He played a crucial role in the liberation of southern African countries.

As chairman of a group of six African frontline heads of states, Dr Kaunda galvanised these countries to oppose the Ian Smith regime in Rhodesia (Zimbabwe), apartheid in South Africa and several other southern African countries still under colonial rule.

Dr Kaundas commitment to the liberation struggle especially in sothern Africa came at a great economic cost to Zambia. Nevertheless, it was a sacrifice that Kaunda said time and again was worth making because Zambia could not be free until all of southern Africa was liberated. South Africas liberation movement and others were beneficiaries of Kaundas benevolence. The African National Congress of South Africa, for example, had its headquarters in Lusaka, Zambia.

Early years

Dr Kaunda led the struggle for liberation until Northern Rhodesia attained political independence from the British government on 24 October 1964, and the country was renamed Zambia. Affectionately known throughout his life as KK, Kaunda served as President of Zambia for 27 years before being defeated in an election held in October 1991 following the reintroduction to multiparty politics.

Born Kenneth David Buchizya Kaunda on 28 April 1924, in the north of Zambia at Lubwa Mission near Chinsali, Kaundas father, David Julizya Kaunda, was an ordained Church of Scotland missionary and a teacher. In fact, both Kaundas father and mother were teachers. Kaundas father settled in Zambia in 1904 from then Nyasaland (now Malawi).

Struggle for Zambias independence

Kaunda was a teacher who decided to join politics in the early 1950s as a member of the Northern Rhodesia African National Congress. Later he broke away to form in October 1958 the Zambia African National Congress (ZANC). Because of its vibrancy, ZANC was banned in March 1959 by the British colonial government. However, in a coalition with its rival, Kaundas new party, the United National Independence Party (UNIP) and the African National Congress party (ANC) of Harry Mwaanga Nkumbula, together campaigned and agitated to finally attain independence from the British government in October 1964.

Kaunda in post-independent Zambia

As President of a new Zambia, Kaunda sought to unite Zambia under the One Zambia One Nation motto and through appointments to national positions in what came to be known as tribal balancing. Zambia has 73 ethnic tribes, most of which are Bantu-speaking.

Shortly after October 1964, Dr Kaundas government embarked on ambitious national development projects to construct schools, hospitals and roads. These projects were disrupted by the rise in oil prices, the slump in copper prices on the international market, and Zambia's rising international debt. Copper was for many decades the major foreign exchange earner for Zambia. Kaundas government nationalised the mining industry, and the economy was highly centralised, which resulted in the increased cost of living. And when one-party states were common in Africa at the time, Zambia also followed suit until public outcry and protests led to the reintroduction of multiparty politics, in 1991.

Kaunda: The Church and Humanism

As a son of a reverend, Kaunda was always a religious person and maintained good relations with the Church. He encouraged the freedom of worship, and under his rule, churches thrived. In part, this was because Churches were, in fact, assisting the governments development agenda of providing education and health care delivery to citizens.

Kaunda generally enjoyed harmonious relations with various denominations in the country. His government introduced the philosophy of Humanism which promoted the centrality of the human person in all activities. Kaundas philosophy of Humanism for Zambia, tinged with socialism, was initially well received by the citizens, but as the countrys economy nosedived, Humanism was abandoned when Kaunda lost power in 1991.

Father of the nation

After leaving office, Kaunda became an anti-AIDS activist through his Kenneth Kaunda Foundation Children for Africa. He lost one of his sons to AIDS. In the twilight of his life, Dr Kaunda was actively sought after for speaking engagements, advice, and inspiration by various civic and non-governmental organisations in Zambia, Africa and beyond. In his death, Kaunda will forever be fondly remembered and referred to as the Father of the Nation.

(paul.samasumo@spc.va)
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The UN has called Burkina Faso's 1.2 million internally displaced people the world's fastest growing humanitarian crisis but the government refuses to recognize thousands of IDPs, who get no support.
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Uganda, Africa's largest refugee host, is locking-down movement after another spike in COVID-19 cases, an economic struggle for the urban vulnerable. One refugee from the Democratic Republic of Congo started a youth-led initiative to help her fellow refugees get needed healthcare products.
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In northern Cameroons refugee camps, fighting over natural resources between host communities and mostly Nigerian refugees has caused tensions and environmental damage. Local groups, with the support of the UNs refugee agency, are working to reduce conflict and improve the ecology.
A survey by Afrobarometer indicates that Zimbabweans would vote for Zanu PF if elections are held now in the country.

In its latest research, according to Afrobarometer, if presidential elections were held tomorrow, one-third (33%) of respondents say they would vote for the ZANU-PF candidate, compared to one-fourth (26%) who say they would vote for the MDC-Chamisa candidate. About four in 10 refused to answer, say they would not vote, or say they dont know.

More than half (54%) of Zimbabweans say they feel close to a political party. About a quarter (27%) of citizens say they feel close to ZANU-PF, while a fifth (20%) say they feel close to MDC-Chamisa.

The survey also reveals that Zimbabweans broadly commend the government for its response to the COVID-19 pandemic - 81% say it managed the response fairly well or very well, and 84% say it kept the public informed.

Four out of five respondents (81%) endorse lockdowns and school closures to curb the spread of COVID-19, although most say lockdowns were difficult to comply with and schools should have reopened much sooner. Almost half (47%) of Zimbabweans say they lost a job, business, or primary source of income due to COVID-19.

Half (51%) of citizens say it is justified for the government to temporarily limit democratic freedoms by postponing elections or limiting political campaigning during a health emergency.

Large majorities say the government is performing badly on creating jobs (91%), keeping prices stable (78%), improving living standards of the poor (75%), and other issues.  On a positive note, 57% of Zimbabweans commend government efforts to prevent or resolve violent conflict.

According to Afrobarometer, considerably more Zimbabweans trust NGOs (79%) and religious leaders (78%) than trust the president (48%), members of Parliament (44%), or the police (38%).
MINNEAPOLIS (AP)  Newly filed court documents detail gun evidence recovered from the scene of a fatal shooting of a driver during an arrest attempt by members of a federal task force in Minneapolis.

The Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension has said evidence indicates Winston Boogie Smith Jr., who was Black, fired his gun before he was killed June 3 in a parking ramp in the city's Uptown neighborhood by members of a U.S. Marshals Service fugitive task force. Authorities have said Smith was wanted on a warrant for being a felon in possession of a gun.

Search warrant affidavits filed this week in Hennepin County District Court show that 15 cartridge casings from police firearms were found outside of the SUV in which Smith was sitting and six cartridge casings from another gun were found inside.

According to one affidavit, a Smith and Wesson M&P 380 pistol was also recovered from the drivers side of the SUV and the six casings found inside matched the pistol. Following the shooting, the BCA said a handgun and spent cartridge cases were found inside the drivers area.

Attorneys for an unidentified woman who was in the SUV with Smith said last week that she never saw him with a weapon.

A loaded magazine was also found in a duffel bag in the SUV, according to an affidavit. Authorities also said they found cash, tablets in prescription bottles, as well as baggies and plastic containers that contained what was described as plant material.

Smith's death happened in a city that has been on edge since the death of George Floyd just over a year ago and the fatal shooting of Daunte Wright by an officer in nearby Brooklyn Center in April.

Smiths shooting sparked days of protests in the neighborhood as his family members and community members have demanded transparency. Authorities have said there is no body camera or police vehicle camera footage of the shooting.



This story has been corrected to note that 15 cartridge casings were found outside Smiths vehicle, not 14, according to the search warrant affidavits.
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Papaikou / Moderate shaking (MMI V) / single lateral shake / 2-5 s : Felt stronger than any in recent past. I thought it was a 6. Really short but strong. Surprised at 4.3 | 9 users found this interesting.

Kailua-Kona / Light shaking (MMI IV) / single lateral shake / 2-5 s : A large rumble feeling and a loud boom, almost like a dump truck. We are visiting so this was quite a surprise! | 6 users found this interesting.

Royal Hawaiian Estates R (31.7 km NE of epicenter) [ Map ] / Light shaking (MMI IV) / 2-5 s You could hear it coming from Kilauea. It was like a jolt or like a bolt of energy passed underneath our home. It seemed like it was heading towards Fern Forest. | 7 users found this interesting. (reported through (reported through our app / Light shaking (MMI IV) / 2-5 s

Kealakekua Bay (60.2 km WNW of epicenter) [ Map ] / Light shaking (MMI IV) / single vertical bump / very short : Felt like something hit the south side of the house. Like a boom! Definitely lurched. Maybe just a second or so duration. I went outside to see if something had happened to the side of the house. Nope. Then I googled and found this site and the time it happened is right. | 6 users found this interesting.

Hilo Hawaii, Paipai Street (62.6 km NE of epicenter) [ Map ] / Moderate shaking (MMI V) / single lateral shake / very short : One strong jolt | 3 users found this interesting.

Home - Kona / Weak shaking (MMI III) / rattling, vibrating / 2-5 s : Good little shaker - scared me | 3 users found this interesting.

Pepeekeo (74.8 km NNE of epicenter) [ Map ] / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / rattling, vibrating / 2-5 s : The Hale wen bump lidat and den went make lideese !! | 3 users found this interesting.

Kailua Kona, hawaii (70.7 km WNW of epicenter) [ Map ] / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / single lateral shake / 5-10 s : Movement side to side - weakish | 2 users found this interesting.

milolii, HI (52.4 km W of epicenter) [ Map ] / Weak shaking (MMI III) / rattling, vibrating / very short : sitting in bed and bed shook a little | 2 users found this interesting.

Hilo Hawaii / Light shaking (MMI IV) / 1-2 s : A few shakes one and them another one a few minutes apart | 2 users found this interesting.

Kamuela / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / rattling, vibrating / 1-2 s : There was a slight tremor followed by the stronger 1-2 second shaking | 2 users found this interesting.

Kamuela, Hawaii (104.2 km NNW of epicenter) [ Map ] / Light shaking (MMI IV) / rattling, vibrating / 1-2 s : rumble shake vibration | 2 users found this interesting.

Kailua Kona Hawaii (73 km NW of epicenter) [ Map ] / Very weak shaking (MMI II) : House made a creaking noise, table swayed, wind chimes fluttered. | One user found this interesting.

41.4 km WSW of epicenter [ Map ] / Light shaking (MMI IV) / rattling, vibrating / 5-10 s T | One user found this interesting. (reported through (reported through our app / Light shaking (MMI IV) / rattling, vibrating / 5-10 s

Kailua / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / both vertical and horizontal swinging / 2-5 s : A couple seconds of intense movement- initially thought it was garage door opening as I live above garage until I realized it was a different beast. | One user found this interesting.

Tiki gardens / Light shaking (MMI IV) / single lateral shake / very short : One jolt, house and car car cover shook. | One user found this interesting.

Mountain View, HI 96771 / Light shaking (MMI IV) / rattling, vibrating / 5-10 s : First it was light vibrations then much more vigorous shaking & rattling. Then a pause, then another firm quick shake. | One user found this interesting.

Captain cook / Moderate shaking (MMI V) / complex motion difficult to describe / 1-2 s : Very strong quake! | One user found this interesting.

88.4 km NNW of epicenter [ Map ] / Light shaking (MMI IV) / vibration and rolling / very short : It felt like a shake and moving back and four | One user found this interesting.

Ocean View Hawaii / Moderate shaking (MMI V) / vibration and rolling / 10-15 s : A bang at first followed by shaking that rapidly increased in strength for approximately 5-10 seconds then followed by a subtle rolling sensation maybe lasting 3-5 seconds. Ripple effect? | One user found this interesting.

Hilo / Moderate shaking (MMI V) / rattling, vibrating / very short : Short, sharp jolts; cracking of house joints | One user found this interesting.

Nanawale estates (60.7 km ENE of epicenter) [ Map ] / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / rattling, vibrating / 2-5 s : Very mild | One user found this interesting.

Hilo / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / single lateral shake / 1-2 s : One moderate jolt. | One user found this interesting.

Ocean View Hawaii (45.8 km WSW of epicenter) [ Map ] / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / single vertical bump / very short : standing in front of my desktop computer. Screen was slightly moving | One user found this interesting.

57.5 km NE of epicenter [ Map ] / Light shaking (MMI IV) / 1-2 s : Ground & house movement sitting in chair on deck | One user found this interesting.

195.8 km NW of epicenter [ Map ] / Weak shaking (MMI III) / rattling, vibrating / 2-5 s : I was laying on my bed and it was like a jiggling for a few seconds | One user found this interesting.

Kona, HI / Weak shaking (MMI III) / single vertical bump / very short : Felt a quick movement and windows popped. | One user found this interesting.

96738 (85.7 km NNW of epicenter) [ Map ] / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / rattling, vibrating / 1-2 s : Could hear windows rattling | One user found this interesting.

Kailua-Kona (74.6 km NW of epicenter) [ Map ] / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / rattling, vibrating / 1-2 s : More like an audible rumble | One user found this interesting.

Deb, Hawaiian Beaches (61.3 km NE of epicenter) [ Map ] / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / single vertical bump / 1-2 s Outdoors on lanai | One user found this interesting. (reported through (reported through our app / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / single vertical bump / 1-2 s

Keaau, Hawaii / Light shaking (MMI IV) / single lateral shake / 1-2 s : It was abrupt but significant. | One user found this interesting.

Hawi / Weak shaking (MMI III)

Hawi / Weak shaking (MMI III)

Home - Kona / Weak shaking (MMI III) / rattling, vibrating / 2-5 s : Good little shaker - scared me

Home - Kona / Weak shaking (MMI III) / rattling, vibrating / 2-5 s : Good little shaker - scared me

Hilo / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / very short : Couch I was sitting on shook as if someone bumped into it.

95.8 km NNW of epicenter [ Map ] / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / rattling, vibrating / 5-10 s

Wailuku, Maui / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / rattling, vibrating / 2-5 s

Kahuluu-Keauhou, HI / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / rattling, vibrating / 10-15 s

Waikoloa / Light shaking (MMI IV) / rattling, vibrating / 5-10 s

45.1 km NE of epicenter [ Map ] / Moderate shaking (MMI V) / 10-15 s : It definitely wasnt weak! Lol

PAPAIKOU / Light shaking (MMI IV) / rattling, vibrating / 2-5 s

Mountain View / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / rattling, vibrating / 1-2 s : Light shaking of the ground beneath me while sitting outside

Kahuluu-Keauhou, HI / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / rattling, vibrating / 10-15 s

Kailua-Kona (71.2 km NW of epicenter) [ Map ] / Weak shaking (MMI III) / 1-2 s

Captain cook / Light shaking (MMI IV) / rattling, vibrating / 1-2 s

Waikoloa / Light shaking (MMI IV) / rattling, vibrating / 5-10 s

KAILUA KONA / Weak shaking (MMI III) / rattling, vibrating / 2-5 s

59-727 Kaala Road, Kamuela, HI 96743 / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / rattling, vibrating / 2-5 s

Hilo, HI / Weak shaking (MMI III)

Puumoi road Papaikou / Light shaking (MMI IV)

Kealakekua / Weak shaking (MMI III) / simple rolling (tilting sideways along one direction) / 2-5 s

Kamuela / Weak shaking (MMI III) / 10-15 s

64.3 km NNE of epicenter [ Map ] / Light shaking (MMI IV) / horizontal (sideways) swinging / 5-10 s (reported through our app / Light shaking (MMI IV) / horizontal (sideways) swinging / 5-10 s

16-1381 Pohaku Circle / Weak shaking (MMI III) / 1-2 s

Kurtistown / Light shaking (MMI IV) / vibration and rolling

Kailua Kona / Light shaking (MMI IV) / simple rolling (tilting sideways along one direction) / 2-5 s

Kailua Kona / Light shaking (MMI IV) / single vertical bump / very short

Kakaako, Oahu / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / horizontal (sideways) swinging / 2-5 s

Naalehu / Light shaking (MMI IV) / rattling, vibrating / 10-15 s

Kailua Kona / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / single vertical bump / 2-5 s

Holualoa (71.2 km NW of epicenter) [ Map ] / Light shaking (MMI IV)

51.4 km W of epicenter [ Map ] / Light shaking (MMI IV) / 2-5 s

Ocean View Hawaii (42.2 km WSW of epicenter) [ Map ] / Light shaking (MMI IV) / rattling, vibrating / 10-15 s (reported through our app / Light shaking (MMI IV) / rattling, vibrating / 10-15 s

Keauhou (72.7 km NW of epicenter) [ Map ] / Weak shaking (MMI III) / 1-2 s

Kealakekua (63.3 km WNW of epicenter) [ Map ] / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / single lateral shake / 1-2 s (reported through our app / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / single lateral shake / 1-2 s

Holualoa HI (258.6 km SSW of epicenter) [ Map ] / Moderate shaking (MMI V)

Keauhou (69.3 km WNW of epicenter) [ Map ] / Light shaking (MMI IV) / rattling, vibrating / 2-5 s

Mt. View (47.7 km NE of epicenter) [ Map ] / Light shaking (MMI IV) / rattling, vibrating / 2-5 s (reported through our app / Light shaking (MMI IV) / rattling, vibrating / 2-5 s

Kailua kona / Light shaking (MMI IV) / rattling, vibrating / 5-10 s

Mountain view Hawaii (49.7 km NE of epicenter) [ Map ] / Light shaking (MMI IV) / horizontal (sideways) swinging / 2-5 s (reported through our app / Light shaking (MMI IV) / horizontal (sideways) swinging / 2-5 s

Honolulu / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / rattling, vibrating / 2-5 s

Kailua Kona (73.4 km NW of epicenter) [ Map ] / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / 2-5 s

Kailua-Kona / Light shaking (MMI IV) / horizontal (sideways) swinging / 2-5 s

Holualoa (66 km WNW of epicenter) [ Map ] / Weak shaking (MMI III) / complex motion difficult to describe / 20-30 s

96780 (83.8 km NNE of epicenter) [ Map ] / Weak shaking (MMI III) / horizontal (sideways) swinging / 5-10 s (reported through our app / Weak shaking (MMI III) / horizontal (sideways) swinging / 5-10 s

62.9 km WNW of epicenter [ Map ] / Very weak shaking (MMI II) / rattling, vibrating / 2-5 s

Captain Cook (50.1 km W of epicenter) [ Map ] / Light shaking (MMI IV) / horizontal (sideways) swinging / 2-5 s (reported through our app / Light shaking (MMI IV) / horizontal (sideways) swinging / 2-5 s

Hilo (65.9 km NNE of epicenter) [ Map ] / Light shaking (MMI IV) / vibration and rolling / 5-10 s (reported through our app / Light shaking (MMI IV) / vibration and rolling / 5-10 s

Palisades area / Weak shaking (MMI III) / rattling, vibrating / 2-5 s

Keaau (59 km NE of epicenter) [ Map ] / Weak shaking (MMI III) / single vertical bump / 2-5 s (reported through our app / Weak shaking (MMI III) / single vertical bump / 2-5 s

Kona / Weak shaking (MMI III) / rattling, vibrating / 2-5 s

Ocean View (41.1 km WSW of epicenter) [ Map ] / Weak shaking (MMI III) / horizontal (sideways) swinging / 10-15 s (reported through our app / Weak shaking (MMI III) / horizontal (sideways) swinging / 10-15 s

56.1 km ENE of epicenter [ Map ] / Weak shaking (MMI III) (reported through our app / Weak shaking (MMI III)
Morristown, VT (05661)

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Showers early, then cloudy overnight. Low 53F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 40%.
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Photo: Nathan Klima/The Boston Globe via Getty Images

The judge presiding over a sexual assault lawsuit against Kevin Spacey officially dismissed one accusers legal claims against the actor on Thursday, after the accuser refused to openly use his name in court proceedings. The accuser, identified in court papers as C.D., had previously spoken to Vulture about his allegations.

The Manhattan Federal Court lawsuit against Spacey was filed in September 2020 by C.D. and Anthony Rapp; both alleged that Spacey had sexually assaulted them on separate occasions when they were 14 years old. Although a judge dismissed C.D.s claims against Spacey, Rapps legal claims are ongoing.

Spaceys lawyers did learn C.D.s identity, but they had argued that he shouldnt be allowed to proceed with his case anonymouslyand specifically cited his conversation with Vulture during a February 2 proceeding.

C.D. has chosen to come forward, and hes chosen to come forward to make his allegations public, one of Spaceys lawyers argued during that telephone conference. He shouldnt be permitted to proceed anonymously.

Spaceys lawyers were referring specifically to the November 2017 article, which came out shortly after Rapp came forward with allegations against Spacey in a BuzzFeed News interview. In this interview, the man claimed that at the age of 14, he and Spacey began a sexual relationship which culminated in an attempted rape. I have worked really hard to have a nice life and feel safe, and Im not giving that up for him, the man remarked in remaining anonymous for the article. I dont want them to be able to find their way back to me.

During the early February proceeding, Spaceys attorneys discussed the reporting process in arguing that C.D. shouldnt be permitted to proceed with initials. He disclosed his name, obviously, to the magazine, they remarked during the February proceeding. He also allowed the magazine to use his name to speak with people close to him.

They maintained that C.D. used the media to advance his case strategically and that there was no compelling reason to let him proceed anonymously.

C.D.s lawyers responded that Kevin Spacey attempted to rape a 14-year-old boy, and thats what this case is aboutThe plaintif C.D. never disclosed his name to the general public.

They claimed that since this article came out, C.D.s name was nowhere on the internet associated with Kevin Spacey and has been kept in confidence.

Judge Lewis Kaplan decided on May 3 that the threat of significant media attentionhowever exacerbated by the modern eraalone does not entitle a plaintiff to the exceptional remedy of anonymity

Accordingly, C.D.s privacy interestdespite the publicity this case may generatedoes not outweigh the prejudice to Spacey and the presumption of open judicial proceedings.

In Kaplans decision, he said that C.D. had 10 days to file an amended complaintwith his name. In a May 13 letter, C.D.s lawyers told Kaplan that he wouldnt file new paperwork with his name, and understood that it might result in the cases dismissal. C.D., they said, believes he is unable to withstand the scrutiny and intrusion into his life if his identity is revealed in this matterthe sudden unwanted attention that revelation of his identity will cause is simply too much for him to bear.

Lawyers for both sides said no comment when asked about the development.

According to C.D.s now-dismissed legal claims, he was about 12 years old in 1981, the year he claimed to have met Spacey. Spacey was teaching an acting course in Westchester County; C.D. was an acting student in the class,the suit stated.

Approximately two years later, C.D. happened to meet the actor in New York City, the lawsuit claimed, and Spacey then invited him to his apartment. Spacey engaged in sexual acts with the plaintiff, C.D., while the plaintiff was 14 years old, including, but not limited to, the infant plaintiff performing anal intercourse on defendant Spacey and oral sex.

The actor continued to engage in sexual acts on different occasions with the plaintiff, who was around 14-years-old at the time. During the final sexual encounter, the defendant, Kevin Spacey, for the first time, attempted to anally sodomize the plaintiff, C.D., who was then a minor, the suit claimed. The plaintiff, C.D., resisted and said No multiple times, but the defendant, Kevin Spacey, continued to attempt to anally sodomize the infant plaintiff despite the plaintiffs verbal and physical resistance.
Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey announced late Thursday that state offices will be closed Friday in recognition of the new federal holiday for Juneteenth.

It's celebrated on June 19 to mark the day in 1865 when African-American slaves in Galveston, Texas, were among the last to be told they had been freed -- two-and-a-half years after the Emancipation Proclamation outlawed slavery in the Confederacy and two months after the Civil War officially ended, according to ABC News.

President Joe Biden signed the bill making Juneteenth a federal holiday earlier Thursday.

Since June 19 is a Saturday, Ivey made Friday the observed day of the holiday.
Mail will be delivered on Friday and Saturday even though federal and state offices are closed Friday for the new Juneteenth holiday signed into law on Thursday.

Here's the official announcement from the United States Postal Service:

The Postal Service will continue regular operations June 18-19.

President Joe Biden signed legislation on June 17 that makes June 19  also known as Juneteenth  a federal holiday commemorating the end of slavery in the United States.

In a June 17 memo to USPS executives, Deputy Postmaster General and Chief Human Resources Officer Douglas Tulino wrote that while the organization is fully supportive of annually observing and setting aside a day to recognize this historic event, it is not possible to cease operations to accommodate an observance within 24-48 hours.

We are part of the nations critical infrastructure and our customers are relying on us to deliver our essential services. Closing down our operations without providing appropriate time would lead to operational disruptions and be a disservice to our customers and those who rely upon us. For that reason, the Postal Service will be operating on June 18 and 19, 2021, on a normal schedule, serving our customers to the best of our ability.

The Postal Service will discuss future recognition of the new holiday with its unions, management associations and other stakeholders, consistent with its collective bargaining and consultative obligations. Once those discussions take place, we will update you on appropriate developments, but we reiterate that we are fully supportive of this important national holiday, Tulino wrote.
North Alabama wraps up a rare dry workweek in mid June Friday. We'll see some cloud build-ups in the afternoon heat today but mostly sunny skies with highs in the low-to-mid-90s. There will also be just enough added humidity today for heat index values approaching the upper-90s this afternoon.

Of course all eyes are on the Gulf of Mexico with the potential genesis of Tropical Storm Claudette Friday. Development only has until midnight tonight before moving over land into Louisiana early Saturday morning.

Local weekend rain chances will be determined by this tropical system. Per the 7AM Friday update from the National Hurricane Center, Potential Tropical Cyclone 3 is still just a tropical disturbance and not yet a tropical depression. However, this system is expected to strengthen to a tropical storm (named storm: Claudette) by landfall. Once this system becomes more organized, model guidance will have a much better handle on a forecast for this weekend.

At this point, the remnants of this system look to track VERY near North Alabama. This means that a deviation of just a few dozen miles to the north or south will have a pretty big impact on our rainfall totals and/or threat for rotating storms. Parts of North Alabama, especially our southeastern counties, are looking at picking up an inch to an inch and a half with spots closer to northwest Alabama getting less than half an inch of rain. Wind will be picking up too, but gusts shouldn't exceed 25 MPH.

As the tropical remnants shift eastward, scattered showers and storms are still expected Monday due to an approaching cold front. Expect widespread activity from Monday into Tuesday with the passage of the front and an additional inch or so of rain with locally higher amounts possible. Cooler temperatures return Wednesday as we'll be running about 10 degrees below average.
Tonight, we'll dip into the mid 60s and with a shifting wind, Friday will not only be hotter, but it will also be slightly more humid. Regardless, our forecast remains free of rain chances until the weekend.

Of course, the weekend rain chances will be determined by the tropical system currently in the Gulf of Mexico. Per the last update from the National Hurricane Center, Potential Tropical Cyclone 3 is still just a tropical disturbance and not yet a tropical depression. However, this system is expected to strengthen to a tropical storm (named storm: Claudette) by landfall. Once this system becomes more organized, model guidance will have a much better handle on a forecast for this weekend.

At this point, the remnants of this system look to track VERY near North Alabama. This means that a deviation of just a few dozen miles to the north or south will have a pretty big impact on our rainfall totals and/or threat for rotating storms. Parts of North Alabama, especially our southeastern counties, are looking at picking up an inch to an inch and a half with spots closer to northwest Alabama getting less than half an inch of rain. Wind will be picking up too, but gusts shouldn't exceed 25 MPH.

As the tropical remnants shift eastward, scattered showers and storms are still expected Monday due to an approaching cold front. Expect widespread activity from Monday into Tuesday with the passage of the front and an additional inch or so of rain with locally higher amounts possible. Cooler temperatures return Wednesday as we'll be running about 10 degrees below average.
Calhoun Community College in Decatur is hosting its 15th SWeETy Camp for girls.

During the three-day camp, high school girls get hands-on experience learning electrical and welding skills.

Jessa Usery said it's a job most men do, and the camp has shown her she can do it all too.

"It's showing us that we can get out, we can do it just as well as men can," said Usery. "That's a lot of what our speakers talk to us about, us going into a more male dominant industry and trying to get into maintenance."

Usery said in a short amount of time, she's learned a lot about electrical work.

"I didnt know a lot about that before coming in," said Usery. "I know how to wire a socked, stuff along those lines."

Sierra Frazier said on the last day of camp, they were using a bicycle chain and welding it into a lamp.

The first day of camp was focused on electrical work and learning how to wire sockets and light switches.

"The next day we went in and learned some basic welding just to get us used to it, and thats what weve been doing today as well," said Usery.

Not only is the welding camp a hands-on experience, but the girls also get to hear from successful females in the industry.

Amber Fortenberry, with the Decatur-Morgan County Chamber, said they've had speakers from Mazda Toyota Manufacturing, Nucor and ULA.

"All-female speakers that do these professions and they can relate to the girls and show them they can do it as well," said Fortenberry.

The camp is also an introduction to college majors in the technology field.

Calhoun Community College offers a dual enrollment program, where students can get high school and college credits.

"We had a student who did the summer camp, SWeETy camp with us, she then took high school dual enrollment welding classes and then got a job offer as soon as she graduated high school to start working with Mazda Toyota," said Heath Daws, the Dual Enrollment Advisor at the school.

Last year the camp was canceled due to the pandemic. In previous years, there have been 25 girls involved. This year, there are 10 participants.
Decatur, IL (62521)

Today

Sun and clouds mixed. High 79F. Winds NNE at 10 to 15 mph..

Tonight

Mostly clear. Low around 55F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph.
Decatur, IL (62521)

Today

Sun and clouds mixed. High 78F. Winds NNE at 10 to 15 mph..

Tonight

Mainly clear skies. Low around 55F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph.
How Italy's covid-19 'Green Pass' works and how to obtain it.

Italy's premier Mario Draghi has signed a new decree launching the national digital green certificate website for people who have been vaccinated, tested negative or recovered from covid-19.

The 'Green Pass' certificate is designed to facilitate travel, allow people to participate in large events and provide visiting access to nursing homes.

The Certificazione Verde website lets people in Italy request the Green Pass which in addition to Italian is available in English, French and German.

The form, which comes in digital or paper versions, is completely free and contains a scannable QR code.

In order to claim the Green Pass it is necessary to provide at least one of the following: vaccination certification, details showing that you have recovered from covid-19, or a recent test with negative results.

Green Pass certificates relating to vaccinations carried out to date will be made available by 28 June, with those vaccinated being notified by email or text message with a code giving access to download the form onto a PC, tablet or smartphone.

The digital cert can be obtained from the website as well as via the online health system of your region (Fascicolo Sanitario Elettronico); SPID, the digital identity system with access to public administration services; or via the Immuni contact-tracing app.

It will be also possible to obtain a paper copy of the certificate by requesting it from your doctor, paeditrician or pharmacy, using your tessera sanitaria health card.

Italy's Green Pass comes ahead of the EU Digital COVID Certificate (EUDCC) which will allow free travel across the European Union from 1 July.

The Green Pass website warns however that the "certificate is not a travel document," with people advised to check the travel requirements of the country they wish to go by consulting the Viaggiare Sicuri website.

The Certificazione Verde website contains extensive information about how to obtain the Green Pass and how it works but for those who still need assistance, there is a call centre, tel. 800 91 24 91 (open daily 08.00-20.00) and an email address cittadini@dgc.gov.it.

For official information relating to the covid-19 situation in Italy - in English - see the health ministry website.
After huge success in Italy, could the Rome band be on the brink of global fame?

Italian rockers Maneskin are the subject of a praise-laden article in The New York Times which suggests the Rome band - fresh from Eurovision triumph - could be on the cusp of achieving global stardom.

Under the title They Won Eurovision. Can They Conquer The World?, the article mentions celebrity record executive Simon Cowell of X-Factor fame as a possible successor to long-time manager Marta Dona with whom the band parted ways abruptly last month.

Maneskin has had a phenomenally successful 2021 so far, winning Italy's national music festival Sanremo in March, then claiming victory at Eurovision in May with the winning song Zitti e Buoni.

The catchy track (whose title is translated as 'Shut Up and Behave' by the NYT) recently landed in the Top 10 on Spotify's global chart  a first for an Italian act  racking up over 100 million plays on the audio streaming platform.

As for the winning Eurovision song, the article states: "It celebrates individuality and marching to the beat of ones drum, or guitar riff. The refrain repeats: Were out of our minds, but were different from them.'

The article, written by Elisabetta Povoledo, notes that although Eurovision fame tends to be short-lived, Maneskin could be destined to become a "rare long-term Eurovision success story."

Maneskin celebrating Eurovision success

The band, comprising Damiano David, Victoria De Angelis, Thomas Raggi and Ethan Torchio, has enjoyed a meteoric rise to the top of the Italian music industry since forming in Rome in 2015.

Known for a unique sound fusing punk-funk and glam rock, the group has come a long way after several years honing its act by entering battle-of-the-bands competitions and busking on the streets of the Italian capital.

In 2017 Maneskin finished second in Italy's talent show X Factor, an experience which proved to be a springboard for greater things to come.

The NYT also article refers to the "postcurtain controversy" when rumours spread that Damiano David was sniffing cocaine, on live television, on the night of the Eurovision win.

Photos and footage of the alleged incident went viral but David denied any wrongdoing and took a drug test to prove it.

After the result came back negative, the European Broadcasting Union competition organisers issued a statement saying that no drug use took place and that it "considered the matter closed."

The article makes reference to the band's distinctive image too: "With its carefully curated, stylish androgynous nonchalance  accessorised with high heels, black nail polish and smoky eyes  Maneskin break down gender barriers and champion self-expression."

Quoting bassist De Angelis: For us, music is passion, fun, something that lets us blow off steam, the article says: "this is no surprise to anyone who has seen Maneskin perform live," describing the band as a "high-octane powerhouse of onstage charisma and youthful energy."
I kind of brainstormed. I looked to see what space I have available, said Jackson, 35, who has worked at the firm for 13 years. Because its just me  its not like I have a wife or girlfriend or children  and I have a big closet and big living room space, I was able to look at how to navigate it. I sketched it out on paper and said, this will work.
People relax at a beach in Frances Calanques National Park. (Sandra Mehl for The Post)

Some tourist destinations are eager to welcome back visitors. Other used the pandemic as a chance to pivot to more sustainable practices. One French national park launched a a de-marketing campaign aimed at reducing the number of visitors it attracts.
Rise Again: Tulsa and the Red Summer (National Geographic at 9) Dawn Porters documentary follows Washington Post reporter DeNeen L. Brown as she investigates the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre. Pictured above: Brown and author Marc Carlson look through archives at the McFarlin Library at the University of Tulsa.
Better yet, Id suggest that you eat a filling dinner and not eat or drink anything before bedtime. There is an ongoing debate about eating before bedtime, with one side arguing that your metabolism slows down at night and eating at that time causes weight gain. The other side argues that some people lose weight, because they dont eat enough during the day and become hungriest later at night. Please check with your doctor to see what he or she suggests and why you cant sleep without eating before you go to bed.
I had planned a rim hike at Capulin Volcano National Monument for the second day of my trip but woke to a grim forecast  37 degrees and cloudy. I feared the clouds would obstruct the views of the crater. I rushed to the top and was greeted by an unusual sight for May  ice on the pinyon pine and juniper trees that lined the rim, the result of a cold front combined with the 8,182-foot elevation. The ice on the trees was peculiar  it was only on the northern side of the branches and resembled miniature patches of toothpick-size icicles. Despite the overcast skies, the view was unobstructed, and the ice only made my hike more magical; I stopped every 10 feet to photograph another ice formation. Three hours later, as I hiked the trails at the base of the extinct cinder cone volcano, the skies cleared and the temperature increased 20 degrees. So, I drove to the top again to take photos with the blue-sky background  and realized that I preferred the icy magic of the morning.
Critics say the statute dates to 1968 when southern Senators pressed Congress to pass the Civil Obedience Act as an amendment to the Civil Rights Act, to protect the public from irresponsible rabble rousers in the civil rights movement. Its most frequently invoked provision makes it a crime among other things to interfere with police or firefighters doing their official duties during a civil disorder, punishable by up to five years in prison.
His more than 40 years of teaching Dante gave him many insights into the poem which he incorporates into the commentary, Christopher Kleinhenz, a professor emeritus of Italian at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, said in an interview. He has made Dante accessible, Kleinhenz continued, so that we as contemporary readers can appreciate and can see how Dante was important in the Middle Ages and how he continues to be important today.
Disability Rights DC reported its concerns to the D.C. Department of Health and the D.C. Department of Behavioral Health, according to the report, but it took nearly eight months for D.C. Health to present advocates with its findings. The agency failed to adequately address the neglect allegations on the day of [the patients] death and incorrectly analyzed videotape footage of the incident, the report said.
Eleven years ago, according to Pennsylvania court records and media accounts, Stone and at least two other men forced their way into a home outside Philadelphia, hoping to seize $150,000 from an apparent drug dealer. Instead, they ran up against an occupant armed with a 9mm Glock handgun  leading to a gun battle in which at least 22 shots were fired and one of the intruders was killed, according the Philadelphia Inquirer.
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It was especially meaningful, she added, to think of the Africans who arrived on this spot in 1619 without knowing what lay ahead. We are so fortunate to be able to have this holiday acknowledged and be right here where we are. Its powerful, she said. We are the dreams of our ancestors, and to be able to come here today and at this location is a powerful point.
The killing at Fort Stewart prompted a review of base security and the installation of an eight-foot fence and razor wire at the gate that the suspect allegedly entered, the Army said. The review uncovered two other perimeter security concerns that have been addressed, an official said. But the Army has not yet initiated an investigation of command decisions that may have disclosed Hawks role as a witness to drug use in his unit or the security issues at the facility.
There ought to be some checks and balances and at least reasonable suspicion before they do to another Chinese professor what they did to Anming Hu, said Philip Lomonaco, Hus attorney. He said the FBI investigated Hu for a year and nine months, with agents following him to work and the grocery store, staking out his house and even monitoring his son, a college freshman.
The situation at the U.S. compound grows more severe after several embassies in Kabul, including the American one, stopped consular services over the past few days, citing the coronavirus outbreak. The decision could stymie the issuance of visas to thousands of Afghan interpreters and other people who have worked for the U.S. government, despite threats by the Taliban.
Mona Lisa copy sells for $3.4 million at Paris auction: A European collector has bought a 17th-century copy of Leonardo da Vinci's "Mona Lisa" painting for $3.4 million, a record for a Mona Lisa reproduction, in an auction at Christie's in Paris on Friday. Known as the "Hekking Mona Lisa," after its owner, who unsuccessfully argued that a copy he had bought in the 1950s was the real thing, it is one of many reproductions of the original, which hangs in the Louvre museum in Paris. "This is madness. This is an absolute record for a Mona Lisa reproduction," a Christie's spokeswoman said. The Louvre's original is not for sale. But in 2017, Christie's New York sold Leonardo's "Salvator Mundi" for $450 million to an unidentified telephone bidder, making it the most expensive piece of art ever sold at auction.
These threats continue long after the height of the 2020 vote dispute: In May, Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs tweeted, Earlier today a man called my office saying I deserve to die and wanting to know what she is wearing so shell be easy to get. It was one of at least three such threats today. Then a man who Ive never seen before chased me and my staffer outside of our office. It is only a matter of time before election officials end up hurt  or worse. Even if the point is merely to intimidate, it is toxic for democracy if voting administrators have to fear what one side may do to them if it loses.
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For Biden, family has been central to his decades-long political ascent. His sister, Valerie Biden Owens, has been perhaps his most influential aide, helming his campaigns for local, state and national office over the years. The tragic deaths of his wife and infant daughter in a 1972 car crash, and his son Beau, who succumbed to brain cancer in 2015, have become core parts of his political identity through stories he tells about overcoming grief. His fondness for his grandchildren is on frequent public display and he spends many weekends as president at home with family in Wilmington, Del.
Johnson, one of the most politically vulnerable Senate Republicans up for reelection next year, said he heard plenty from constituents in Wisconsin about the significance of the Juneteenth holiday. He said he realized the point he was trying to make  that it was too costly to give federal workers another day off, when so many in the private sector do not  was likely to get lost if his blockade continued.
Garcia said working for de Blasio was a lesson in how not to manage a city. He would often show up for meetings hours late, she said, derailing entire swaths of the government for a day as they waited on him. I wouldnt be hours late, she said. She added that she would also not be as reactionary as de Blasio. Wed wake up and whatever was on the front page, thats what we were going to do that day, she said.
The ACA is still in place. So I think what weve got to do now is think about what we can do in terms of reforms . . . that will protect people with preexisting conditions, but then also create new choices and options, said Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.). Hopefully this will be a spur for some new ideas and new proposals, because pretty much all thats been on ice since Ive been here, because everybody said, Well, lets see what happens with the court decision. 
When a proposal to draft a document on the Eucharist was put on the agenda for the USCCBs June meeting, Cardinal Luis Ladaria, the prefect for the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, sent a letter to USCCB President Jose Gomez, the Archbishop of Los Angeles, urging the conference to tap the brakes on the Eucharist discussion. The head of the Vaticans doctrinal watchdog argued the effort could suggest abortion and euthanasia are the only grave matters of Catholic moral and social teaching that demand the fullest level of accountability on the part of Catholics  a notion he called misleading.
Stetzer wasnt wrong, but it is not only Black pastors who care about racial justice and diversity, which has become one of the biggest issues facing the Southern Baptist Convention. The denomination, founded on support for slavery and which opposed the civil rights movement, is still 85% white, but many young leaders desperately want to see the group diversify, and Mohler is on no ones shortlist for an NAACP Image Award.
They also advocate for a pathway to citizenship for immigrants who are already in the U.S., adding that many families in their parishes have lived in the U.S. for a generation without legal status, and ask for support as Catholic groups work to ensure U.S. aid money makes it to the communities that need it the most.
The ruling said that AstraZeneca had not lived up to commitments to use its best reasonable efforts to fulfill its contract to the E.U. The company had used its production site in Oxford, England, for doses only for Britain, which is no longer in the E.U. The vaccine was developed along with the University of Oxford.
Among the sweeping reforms, as the report put it: The government said victims would no longer be subjected to a digital strip search that required them to hand over their phones to investigators who would then download all communications  whether pertinent to the rape allegations or not. The report recommended returning phones after 24 hours and directed investigators to download only data relevant to the case. Victims should also receive better support during investigations and be more informed about their rights, the report said.
Polls in the days leading up to the voting predicted historically low turnout amid soaring voter apathy and calls to boycott the election, further threatening the legitimacy of the contest. The election was also held amid a struggle to tame the coronavirus pandemic in Iran, which has suffered one of the deadliest outbreaks in the world.
The arrangement to cooperatively manage their vaccine stocks would have allowed the Palestinian Ministry of Health to accelerate its vaccine campaign while keeping unneeded doses in Israel from going to waste. Israel  which has already vaccinated a significant majority of its residents  will get its vaccine stocks replenished in time for booster shots later in the year, experts said.
Charles L. Riney, 86, of Washington, went home to be with our Lord and Savior on Sunday, June 27, 2021, at 7:25 a.m. He was born in Washington on Nov. 3, 1934, to Thomas and Ann Marie (Smith) Riney. He loved gardening and spending time with his beloved dog. He is survived by one sister, Paul
Marisa Mecke is a Report For America corps member for Mountain Times Publications. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.
Trusted local news has never been more important, but providing the information you need, information that can change sometimes minute-by-minute, requires a partnership with you, our readers. Please consider making a contribution today to support this vital resource that you and countless others depend on.
Barely a week goes by without another sign cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin are catching on more widely. Perhaps youve got a friend whos invested in cryptos, maybe youve noticed the ads urging us to buy bitcoin at bus shelters, or you saw this weeks survey from Vanguard that found one in five Millennials owned cryptocurrencies.

For all the hype  and risk  surrounding these new assets, there is also clearly demand for them. Youth-focused fintech Zip Co sees the potential opportunity and has said it could offer crypto trading at some point, and theres been speculation Afterpay could do something similar.

Bitcoin gets huge amounts of attention, but dont expect the major Australian banks to get involved soon. Credit:AP

So if crypto assets really are moving towards becoming more mainstream, how long will the banks be able to resist dabbling in this potentially lucrative market?

Short answer: I wouldnt hold my breath for a major Australian bank to facilitate trading in bitcoin anytime soon, or take other risks in this area with the banks balance sheet.
Detectives will now explore a number of inquiries, including ongoing conflict between rival families and organised crime networks. Police had warned Hamze his life was at risk and offered him advice in order to protect himself. A police source said the 34-year-old  viewed as a long-time mover and shaker in the underworld  had been contacted by officers and warned about the threat. He was urged to keep an eye out and call the police if he had any concerns but effectively responded: I wont call you. That advice was not received in the sense it was given, Detective Superintendent Robert Critchlow, commander of the gangs squad, said on Friday.

He sought to live his life the way he wanted to and made some choices. A police source said members of the notorious Hamzy family were upset following the shooting and officers were speaking to them on Friday, including those in prison. There is a substantial risk of reprisals, Detective Superintendent Critchlow said. We will be opening doors, kicking down doors, tipping people over. We will talk to them, we will harass them within the bounds of the law to make sure that they know that we are there. Detective Superintendent Robert Critchlow He warned against any revenge attacks and said the cycle of violence is damaging everybody in this town and this state.

Several arrests would flow from the murder, police said, adding that it was possible the violence was linked to Operation Ironside  a global law enforcement sting that tricked organised crime figures into using the app An0m, promoted as a secure encrypted platform but actually operated in secret by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation and monitored by the Australian Federal Police. Detective Superintendent Critchlow said Hamze was shot on the street and his associates were being spoken to. We believe he left an establishment nearby and as he walked onto Bridge Street he was shot down in a hail of bullets, he said. We will be opening doors, kicking down doors, tipping people over. We will talk to them, we will harass them within the bounds of the law to make sure that they know that we are there.

One witness, Sayad Hussein, said he saw two men in the getaway vehicle after Hamze was shot. He was screaming on the floor, he said. Everyone was trying to help him. Mr Hussein, who was sitting in his car across the road, said there was an initial burst of shots in the laneway leading to Kid Kyoto and then further shots on Bridge Street. A crime scene was established at the intersection of Bridge and Pitt streets, which has been forensically examined. The footpath on Bridge Street where Bilal Hamze was shot is hosed down. Credit:Janie Barrett

On Friday morning, Bridge and Grosvenor streets were closed between Pitt and York streets while police remained on the scene. A nearby resident said she heard gunshots from her apartment followed by silence. A burnt-out Audi was found on a street in Norwood. Credit:Nine Last night I was at home and I was in bed reading and all of the sudden several shots go off  three, four or five  and I was like that cant be a gun, she told reporters on Friday morning. I didnt hear any cars or anything for at least another minute or two.

A burnt-out car was found on Fleming Street in the lower north shore suburb of Northwood, where police have established another crime scene. Loading Replay Replay video Play video Play video Hamzes mother, Maha, was in 2013 the victim of a shooting, receiving eight bullet wounds to her legs when 21 shots were fired into her Auburn home. A man, who cannot be named, was in 2014 found guilty of shooting with intent to murder her. Prosecutors alleged that attack stemmed from a debt collection dispute between the man and Bilal Hamze. The court heard that Bilal Hamze and his cousin Bassam Hamzy were involved in collecting $20,000 for the man but trouble broke out after Hamze demanded a $5000 recovery fee from the mans mother. The townhouse was shot at again in October 2020 and February this year, incidents that were linked by police to gang conflict. A stray bullet penetrated a window in the adjacent Auburn Hospital in the February incident.

Hamze relatives and associates were seen gathering at the Auburn home on Friday morning and multiple vehicles had been parked in the driveway, blocking access to the townhouse complex. Bassam Hamzy is one of the countrys most notorious criminals, jailed in 2002 for a shooting murder at a Sydney nightclub in 1998 and also convicted for conspiring to murder a witness due to give evidence against him. He is also facing current charges for alleged drug supply offences and perverting the course of justice. Mejid Hamzy was in October last year shot dead at the door of his Condell Park home, in Sydneys south-west. Police earlier this year established a new anti-gangs squad in response to the escalating conflict between members of the Hamzy and Alameddine families.
Department of Health secretary Professor Brendan Murphy strongly encouraged everyone to get their second dose. You need the two doses of your vaccines to be protected, he said. What is the clotting side effect? Thrombosis with thrombocytopenia syndrome (TTS) is a blood clotting disorder accompanied by low blood platelet counts that can occur in rare cases after an AstraZeneca vaccine. There have been 60 confirmed or probable cases of the syndrome detected in Australia so far. Of those, 22 patients remain in hospital, including four in intensive care, and 36 patients have been discharged from hospital. Two deaths have been linked to the syndrome. Symptoms of TTS generally occur between four and 30 days after vaccination and include a severe or persistent headache or blurry vision, shortness of breath, chest pain, leg swelling, persistent abdominal pain, unusual bruising and small round spots that develop beyond the site of vaccination. Anyone who develops those symptoms should seek immediate medical attention. But doctors in NSW and Victoria say theyve had a rush of cancellations as people in their 50s decide not to get their second doses due to the changing advice. In Sydneys east, about 20 per cent of the Bondi Junction respiratory clinics AstraZeneca appointments were cancelled on Thursday despite the new locally acquired cases of COVID found in the area.

Loading The clinics business manager Vladimir Stamenkovic said he expected first dose cancellations in those aged 50 to 59 due to the changes, but surprisingly among those scrapping their appointments were people due for their second dose. In Melbourne, doctors say patients are calling in droves to cancel their AstraZeneca appointments. General practitioner Todd Cameron, who runs several medical practices in Melbourne said hundreds of cancellations led him to cancel two vaccine clinics due to administer 500 AstraZeneca doses to patients this weekend. This will hold up the vaccine rollout massively, Dr Cameron said. Public confidence in the vaccine has yet again been completely shot.

Nathan Pinskier, who runs multiple GP practices across Melbourne, said doctors were bracing for pushback from people over the age of 60, who may no longer want the AstraZeneca vaccine. He feared doctors would be left with an oversupply of AstraZeneca and not enough Pfizer. Rodney Shave says he will not be going back for a second dose of AstraZeneca. Credit:Simon Schluter We are going to have more and more people asking for Pfizer and less and less wanting AstraZeneca, he said. Rodney Shave, 53, sought out the first dose of AstraZeneca over worries that he might be more vulnerable to coronavirus if he caught it due to a health condition.

The Melbourne man said he wont be going back for the second dose, and is now weighing whether he can, or should, try to get the Pfizer vaccine as his second dose instead. I feel cheated that its coming out that its really only suitable for people over 60 because people are getting blood clots and things like that, he said. Im very apprehensive about getting the second one. Professor Kelly said at this stage there was limited data on the efficacy of mixing vaccines. There are some trials looking at a mix and match approach, and some countries have gone down that path, but there is very little evidence that it is either effective or safe, he said. Victorian health authorities have offered to replace the AstraZeneca vaccine with Pfizer if 50-59-year-olds are currently booked in to receive it.

A statement released by health authorities said that anyone aged between 50 and 59 who were booked for a first dose of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine between Thursday, June 17 and Sunday June 20 would be offered the Pfizer vaccine. It went on to say that those booked for a first dose of AstraZeneca from Monday, June 21 might be contacted by the Victorian Coronavirus Hotline or their health service to offer them a booking for Pfizer. Small change to clotting risk part and parcel of pandemic Public health experts say the change was a good move. Professor Julie Leask, a vaccination expert at the University of Sydney said there was only a small shift in the risk for people aged 50 to 59.

Loading Replay Replay video Play video Play video Right now the fact is the risk of COVID is exceedingly low, and the risk from the vaccine for over 50s is ever so slightly higher, she said. UNSW infectious disease social scientist Associate Professor Holly Seale said it showed the government was being transparent and fluid enough to accommodate change when necessary. This is part and parcel of this pandemic. And until we shake off this pandemic, we have to be somewhat flexible, she said. So far about 600,000 of the roughly 2.1 million people aged 50 to 59 have had at least one dose of the vaccine, while 205,000 people under the age of 50 have opted to get the AstraZeneca.

Loading More than 6 million doses of both the AstraZeneca and the Pfizer vaccines have been administered across the country. About 3.8 million of those doses were AstraZeneca. To date, 64 per cent of people aged over 70 have been vaccinated, and 46 per cent of those over the age of 50 have had at least one dose. Health Minister Greg Hunt said he remains confident all Australians who want a vaccine will be able to get one before the end of the year despite the change in advice. Were adapting immediately and were able to do that, he said.

Professor Mary-Louise McLaws, who is supportive of the update to advice, said it just wont be possible to vaccinate everybody in that time. It will have an impact on the speed, and my calculations of how many injections we need per day will not be met, because of the delay of getting Pfizer, she said. But thats okay, as long as authorities delay opening up the border. Opposition health spokesman Mark Butler said the new advice would cause yet another delay to the rollout because the federal government did not have enough variety in its vaccine portfolio. Our quarrel is not with the health advice provided by ATAGI, he said. Our quarrel is with the governments refusal to take out enough insurance against this very sort of thing happening.
Chinas President Xi Jinping asked Australians whether they were prepared to stand up for their sovereignty if he applied some economic pain. We now know their answer.

Yes.

While China is applying punitive trade bans to over $20 billion worth of Australian exports, holding two Australian writers in prison on political charges, and refusing any high-level contact, Australian public sentiment is firm.

The Resolve Political Monitor showed Australians were in no mood to negotiate over Beijings demands. Credit:AP

Sixty-two per cent of respondents to todays Resolve Political Monitor, conducted for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age by Resolve Strategic, say Australia should be guided by the principle of sticking to our values and speaking up in its confrontation with Xis China.
Dr Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and a key backer of the program, said he looked forward to a time when COVID-19 patients could pick up antiviral pills from a pharmacy as soon as they tested positive for the coronavirus or develop COVID-19 symptoms. I wake up in the morning, I dont feel very well, my sense of smell and taste go away, I get a sore throat, Fauci said in an interview. I call up my doctor, and I say, I have COVID, and I need a prescription. Loading Faucis support for research on antiviral pills stems from his own experience fighting AIDS three decades ago. In the 1990s, his institute conducted research that led to some of the first antiviral pills for HIV, protease inhibitors that block an essential virus protein and can keep the virus at bay for a lifetime. In the early 2000s, researchers found that an antiviral called sofosbuvir could cure hepatitis C close to 100 per cent of the time. Tamiflu, an over-the-counter pill for influenza, can cut the time it takes to recover from an infection and reduce the chances that a bout of the flu will land someone in the hospital.

At the start of the pandemic, researchers began testing existing antivirals in people hospitalised with severe COVID-19. But many of those trials failed to show any benefit from the antivirals. In hindsight, the choice to work in hospitals was a mistake. Scientists now know that the best time to try to block the coronavirus is in the first few days of the disease, when the virus is replicating rapidly and the immune system has not yet mounted a defence. Loading Many people crush their infection and recuperate, but in others, the immune system misfires and starts damaging tissues instead of viruses. It is this self-inflicted damage that sends many people with COVID-19 to the hospital as the coronavirus replication is tapering off. So a drug that blocks replication early in an infection might very well fail in a trial on patients who have progressed to later stages of the disease.

So far, only one antiviral has demonstrated a clear benefit to people in hospitals: remdesivir. Originally investigated as a potential cure for Ebola, the drug seems to shorten the course of COVID-19 when given intravenously to patients. In October, it became the first  and so far, the only  antiviral drug to gain full FDA approval to treat the disease. Yet remdesivirs performance has left many researchers underwhelmed. In November, the World Health Organisation recommended against using the drug. Remdesivir might work more effectively if people could take it earlier in the course of COVID-19 as a pill. But in its approved formulation, the compound does not work orally. It cannot survive the passage from the mouth to the stomach to the circulatory system. Researchers from around the world are also testing other antivirals already known to work in pill form.

One such compound, called molnupiravir, was developed in 2019 by researchers at Emory University and has been tested against viruses including influenza and Venezuelan equine encephalitis virus. In partnership with Ridgeback Biotherapeutics of Miami, the Emory team carried out experiments in mice that were so impressive that Merck approached them to bring the drug into human clinical trials for COVID-19. We thought this molecule was really amazing, said Daria Hazuda, vice president of infectious disease and vaccine research at Merck. The companies began a second study last northern autumn, this time testing the drug on people recently diagnosed with COVID-19. That trial is continuing, and Merck is recruiting volunteers with a higher risk of infection, such as older people with obesity and diabetes. Hazuda said the trial should deliver clear results by October. Last year, the US governments funding of COVID-19 treatments focused on a handful of candidates, such as monoclonal antibodies and remdesivir. Many other studies on antivirals were small and underfunded. In January, the incoming Biden administration began designing a new program dedicated to antiviral pills.
"It all just makes a difference in the wellbeing of people, and that changes who they are and what they can be for you," said Sarah Titus, co-owner of Wilmington's The Comic Book Shop. "I don't know. People are worth it."

Slated to appear before the state House Thursday, June 17, 2021, is Senate Bill 15, and act to gradually increase Delaware's minimum wage to $15 by 2025. It is the last stop in the General Assembly before it would head to the governor's desk to be signed into law.

The bill has had it's detractors along the way, especially from industries that would be particularly impacted by the move, like the service industry. In April, Carrie Leishman of the Delaware Restaurant Association said during public comment as the bill moved through the Senate that what the bill sought to do created untenable stress on restaurants.

"The state really is looking to increase this minimum wage," she said at the time. "It's simply too much, too fast, and too steep. The restaurant industry cannot absorb the increases."

But a small business owner like Titus, who already pays her employees above minimum wage, said owners fearful of the move aren't looking at the greater picture. Not only is it attainable, she said, but the results create a more lucrative environment for everyone.

"Sometimes business is counterintuitive, and you're processed and geared to keep lean and mean, and always cut your payroll, and be minimal, and don't don't spend too much money in places where you don't need it," Titus said. "But that results in a lot of short-sighted thinking, where you're saving money now, but not seeing how that impacts you in the grander scale."

Delaware House releases $15 minimum wage bill from committee A $15 hourly minimum wage is one step closer to heading to Governor John Carney's desk after

Particularly, Titus said, creating an environment in which employees desire to be results in a better environment in which more customers tend to linger.

"They need to be appreciated. It's just about making people feel valued," Titus said. "Then they know that they can give more of themselves to the business as well. Because if they're good and they feel like they are really being appreciated, they're going to want to give a little bit more effort into helping customers, and keeping things clean, and being reliable. So it all just, it makes sense in a longer term."

Lawmakers have their own concerns. In March, Senator Gerald Hocker disagreed with trying to increase the minimum wage. He said doing so now would be a "job killer."

"This is just a job killer, not a job helper, and you're hurting the ones that you think you're trying to help because their buying power is gonna be less on your low income," he said. "I can guarantee you there's no body on that bill as co sponsors that have ever signed their front of upon paycheck, and I've always just endorsed the fact, it makes a huge difference."

But Titus does sign the front of paychecks, as does Courtney Sunborn, owner of Ecolistic Cleaning in Lewes. Even among small businesses, Titus acknowledged selling comics is a "unique" model, with a very niche appeal for a loyal fanbase. She called The Comic Book Shop a "really tiny micro business," and acknowledged only having one full-time payrolled employee.

With 26 employees in Delaware and Maryland, the Ecolistic Cleaning is more established and less niche, but all 26 of owner Courtney Sunborn's workers are already making above minimum wage.

"I started as my first employee, so I realized first-hand what hard work and how physically intensive cleaning is, and I knew I deserved a fair wage," Sunborn said. "At the time, I was a single mother of three children, and I needed to make enough to provide for my family. So when I hired my first employee, I wanted to pay them as fairly as I wanted to be paid, and knew that minimum wage doesn't allow for single mothers with three children to survive."

Keeping with the theme of happy workers, Sunborn said her turnover rate was "extremely low," and their good performance translates into savings. Not only do she spend less time training new hires, but their work is so good, word-of-mouth advertising is as effective for Sunborn as any other method.

"My company has grown every year that we've been in business, excluding one--which was COVID's year," she said. "So it's actually a virtuous cycle; paying your employees more is better for business, I have found. So maybe there's skepticism or just fear to make the shift, but to me, it works. And I'm an example of it working."

As the bill heads before the House, it's had nine amendments placed on the bill since the 10th of June. Eight of them come from Republican representatives Lyndon Yearick, Michael Ramone, Michael Smith, Ruth Briggs King, and Bryan Shupe, the latter of whom has four on his own.

They seek to do everything from push the effective dates of each step in the bill back by a year, to capping the increase at $13.25, exempting small business and non-profits from needing to pay more than 85% of minimum wage. Shupe's additions all seek to create a Controller General who would monitor the fiscal impacts of the legislation and have the findings reported back to the General Assembly.

Democratic Senator Jack Walsh did not take kindly to the last minute additions, issuing a statement Wednesday evening.

Bill to end youth, training sub-minimum wage pay clears Delaware Senate A bill removing a provision allowing businesses to pay below minimum wage to trainees and th
After passing in the state House Thursday evening, a bill gradually increasing Delaware's minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2025 will head to Governor John Carney's desk to be signed into law.

The bill passed with a vote of 26 to 15, while every amendment attached in a last-minute flurry over roughly the last week failed. All votes occurred almost exclusively along party lines, with Democrats voting in favor of the increase, while dismissing Republican attempts to delay the increase for a period, or adjust increases pertaining to businesses of a particular size or non-profits.

Republican Representatives Mike Smith and Ruth Briggs King, and Democratic Representative Sherae'a Moore all introduced amendments which would dial back the need for certain small businesses of certain sizes, or non-profits, from having to match the minimum wage. Briggs King noted the challenges particularly for not-for-profits, which could not simply raise prices on services provided to match market rates

"There are other economic factors that have greatly impacted them in addition to COVID," she said. "Many small businesses will struggle with the proposed increase...[which] will greatly exceed the 3-to-4% annual increase. This increase will cripple many agencies."

Representative Bryan Shupe sought to add specifics on how the Controller General could study the impacts of the minimum wage increase on the state's economic landscape and report the findings back to the General Assembly. Even these suggested provisions were shot down.

"I hope that, moving forward, regardless of how this bill goes today...we can start to get back to a point where we start looking at and speaking to each other about statistics, about analysis, about actual numbers and not political agendas," he said.

When his amendments failed, Smith expressed dissatisfaction with the outcome.

"You brought up why you're passionate about it, and I commend you about that. But you just shot down all the amendments that help us get to the practical, so that we know how to absorb it, for the state to have answers and make it better for all of Delawareans," Smith said. "That was political, that was not a policy."

Statistics don't matter as much as the obvious need for Delaware's lowest earners to have not just a better minimum wage, but a living wage, Brady said.

"I approached this entire process from a very simple standpoint: the minimum wage in the state of Delaware needs to increase," Brady said. "We have, in the last 15 years, we've made 15 attempts to raise the minimum wage. Only three of them bore fractional fruit...I'd love to hear continued discussions about percentages, and numerals, and figures, but we see it in human kind."

Senate Bill 15 received an ovation upon passage, and now awaits the governor's signature.
Wilmington, DE (19810)

Today

Partly cloudy with isolated thunderstorms possible. High 79F. Winds W at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%..

Tonight

Partly cloudy skies. Slight chance of a shower throughout the evening. Low 61F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph.
Reporter

I cover a range of stories for WDRB, but really enjoy tracking what's going on at our State Capitol. I grew up on military bases all over the world, but am a Kentuckian at heart. I'm an EKU alum, and have lived in Louisville for 30 years.
Indiana State Police to take over investigation into vandalism outside southern Indiana home
Thomas Smith was arrested in Bowling Green, Kentucky, in connection with a fatal shooting in Clarksville, Indiana, on Wednesday, June 9, 2021. (Warren County Regional Jail)
Weatherford, TX (76086)

Today

Variable clouds with thunderstorms, especially during the afternoon hours. High 89F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 50%..

Tonight

Variable clouds with showers at times, and perhaps a rumble or two of thunder, especially this evening. Low 72F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 50%.
At stop lights or freeway on and off ramps, youve probably seen people holding signs and asking for money. It can be tempting to hand over your spare change, but next time you may want to think twice.
White County Sheriff's Department continues to investigate a shooting that took place earlier this week.

According to deputies, a shooting took place on Monday, June 14 along 2400 North at 1987 North, just south of Grayville, Illinois.

Dispatch recieved a call of a man shot and yelling for help. The caller picked up the victim in their car and took him to another car, that headed for Rt. 1 South.

White County Sheriff's Department and White County Ambulance caught up to the vehicle. He would not provide information to deputies who had shot him.

Illinois State Police joined with deputies in the investigation. Investigators continue to search for a suspect, but said there remains no threat to the public.
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BRIDGEPORT, CT (WFSB) - An officer-involved shooting that happened in Bridgeport remains under investigation.

The shooting happened at Main and Catherine streets just before 10:15 p.m. on Tuesday.

The states Division of Criminal Justice released surveillance footage on Friday that captured the shooting on camera.

A preliminary report about the incident said FBI agents and Bridgeport officers were attempting a motor vehicle stop on Tuesday night at the intersection of Main and Catherine streets.

The stop was a result of a tip stating the occupants inside a vehicle in that area were in possession of an illegal handgun that they planned to use.

The car was stopped at a traffic signal when officers in five separate unmarked vehicles surrounded it and tried to conduct the traffic stop. The report said four of the five vehicles had lights and sirens activated.

The car in question reversed, backing into a civilian vehicle and the door of an unmarked cruise, causing a Bridgeport officer to be partially wedged between the inside driver's door and frame, the report said.

The suspects car then drove toward officers.

Thats when a Bridgeport officer fired a single round at the car. The bullet entered the drivers door and struck the driver in the upper leg.

The car then crashed into a light pole.

The driver, identified as Dennis Waiters, of Stamford, was taken to Bridgeport Hospital for treatment of non-life threatening injuries.

The front passenger, identified as Lamaine Heard of Bridgeport, ran from police but was found a short distance from the scene.

Officers found a loaded semi-automatic handgun on the floor of the front passenger compartment.

The Bridgeport State's Attorney's Office is determining whether criminal charges will be lodged against Waiters and Herd, the report said.

None of the officers involved were wearing body cameras due to them being undercover. The FBI does not require its agents to wear body cameras.

The shooting remains under investigation by the Stamford/Norwalk State's Attorney's Office and the Connecticut State Police.
EAST HARTFORD, CT (WFSB)  With less than 48 hours to go until the Summer Solstice, many state and local swimming areas are already opening despite a nationwide lifeguard shortage.

That includes pools in East Hartford, which beat the odds.

All 55 of its lifeguard positions were filled, so it will be fully staffed this summer. The timing is perfect because all five town pools, including Terry Pool, open at 1 p.m. on Friday.

Not all places were as lucky.

Many reported fewer lifeguards because much of the nation, including Connecticut, is dealing with a serious lifeguard shortage.

At the state level, the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection's lifeguard staffing is only at 63-percent. As a result, DEEP lifeguards will only be positioned at six locations per day instead of the typical eight locations.

However, none of the 22 state swimming areas will close. DEEP just advises parents to keep close eyes on their young swimmers.

The shortage is impacting many cities and towns as well.

For example, Hartford said its lifeguard workforce shrunk by about two-thirds when comparing this season to pre-pandemic summers.

Families could check online to see when a lifeguard would be on duty.

Otherwise, non-residents are welcome at the pools in East Hartford; however, they must pay $5 per day.

Locals get to enjoy the pools for free.
Composer and venue owner Andrew Lloyd Webber has issued a statement as he prepares to present new musical Cinderella in the West End.

Lloyd Webber has confirmed he will present the piece with socially distanced audiences in line with current government guidance, rather than attempt to break the law with staging shows at a higher capacity.

At the start of the week, the Prime Minister suggested he'd been in talks with Lloyd Webber to let Cinderella open with higher capacities.

You can read the statement in full below:

After a long week of Government delay and confusion, I confirm that I cannot and will not take part in yet another pilot scheme around the reopening of theatres, as suggested by the Prime Minister on Monday. I have made it crystal clear that I would only be able to participate if others were involved and the rest of the industry - theatre and music - were treated equally. This has not been confirmed to me.

It has become clear that, while sporting events like Wimbledon had obviously been working with the Government for some time on this pilot, and were even able to start selling tickets yesterday, the theatre industry and its audiences is, once again, an afterthought and undervalued.

Cinderella will perform its first preview next Friday 25 June. Like theatres and venues across the country, this will sadly be at the Government's arbitrary 50 per cent capacity, not the 100 per cent we so passionately wanted.

Having taken legal opinion from senior counsel, if we had gone ahead at 100% it would be very likely that every member of my cast, crew and orchestra, the front and backstage staff, plus our loyal audience members, could be individually fined hundreds of pounds, which I couldn't possibly risk. If it were just me, I would happily risk arrest and fines to make a stand and lead the live music and theatre industry back to the full capacities we so desperately need.

I could not look my young cast and crew in the eyes to tell them we were delaying or closing down. So, I have made the decision to personally bear the losses until we fully open on - or hopefully before - 19 July.

For our audience who have booked tickets to our show, I can only apologise. We will be in touch as soon as we can to explain what this might mean for you. I appreciate all of your ongoing patience and understanding. Rest assured, come hell or high water, we will get you to the ball.

For now, Cinderella is the first world premiere of a new musical in this country since the pandemic. It is the product of hundreds of people's tireless effort for years. Win, lose or draw, we have to continue.

Finally, can I thank the thousands of people who have contacted me with messages of support, including those who wanted to come and bring me cake in jail.





Having checked our notes, Lloyd Webber's claim about Cinderella being the "first world premiere of a new musical in this country since the pandemic" may not be accurate  the world premiere of new musical Lady Chatterley's Lover will open at the Shaftesbury Theatre tonight. A variety of new musicals have been staged across the UK during the pandemic.
John Newport of Paynesville to be sentenced in the death of his daughter
The monthly meeting of the Connecticut, (CT,) Poetry Society Workshop - Online Zoom Meeting is tomorrow, Friday, June 18, from 10:30 a.m. to noon. The group meets every month to encourage each others love for writing poetry. Participants must be willing to share their original poetry aloud to the group. Copies of the poetry should be emailed in advance to Ray Rauth at rayrauth@optonline.net. Rauth will distribute the poems to the group shortly before the session. Space is strictly limited to just 15 attendees to promote discussion among all the participants. There is no charge; online registration is required. The Zoom invitation link will be emailed to registrants shortly before the event. To register, visit www.wiltonlibrary.org.

Crafty kids, happy dads

Children in pre-K, and up are invited to join the fun in Fathers Day Crafts on Friday, June 18, from 4 to 5 p.m. In the Zoom session, children will make ties, and cards for their special dads. Kits for the crafts are available either at the librarys drive-thru window, or at the librarys Childrens Library service desk. Registration is required for the children in order for there to be enough kits for all participants of the program. The Zoom session link for the program will be emailed the morning of the program to those children who have registered for the program. Email Lesley Keogh at lkeogh@wiltonlibrary.org with any questions. Visit www.wiltonlibrary.org to register.

Childrens book chat

Children entering the fifth grade through the seventh grade can enjoy reading new books, and talking them up in the Silver Club Virtual Book Club on Saturdays through July 10, from 3 to 4 p.m. The club is run by four girl scouts who are earning their Silver Award. The girls scouts are: Kendra W, Sydney F, Lena O, and Grace H. New books will be chosen by a vote amongst the group every two weeks. Members will be added to a Google Classroom where information, extra activities, and more will be available. Registration is required. Zoom links are emailed shortly before the start of each program. To register, visit www.wiltonlibrary.org.

More crafty things

Mondays are crafty afternoons with Virtual Crafternoon, on Monday, June 21, through Monday, August 9, from 4 to 4:45 p.m. Children ages four-years-old, and up, can join the weekly crafting session. Each week, the children will make a new craft based on the librarys Summer Reading Program Theme, Tails and Tales. Craft kits will be available to registrants at the librarys drive-thru window/circulation desk. Zoom links will be emailed the day of the program. Registration for each child is required. Email aszabo@wiltonlibrary.org with any questions. The library will be closed on Monday, July 5, for the nationally observed Independence Day, July 4, Fourth of July holiday. To register, visit www.wiltonlibrary.org. Participants must be registered separately for each weekly session.

Fun pizza creations

Children have an opportunity to enjoy a summers worth of Wonderful Wednesdays beginning with Animal Face Pizza with Food Explorers, on Wednesday, June 23, from 3 to 4 p.m. In just one hour, children who are entering kindergarten, and up will make their own pizza dough, and use toppings to design animal faces. Ingredients are listed on the registration link on the librarys website. Registration is required. The event is a Zoom event. The link will be sent the morning of the program. Questions may be emailed to Lesley Keogh at lkeogh@wiltonlibrary.org, or call 203-762-6336. To register, visit www.wiltonlibrary.org. See the Childrens Events area on the librarys website for all the Wonderful Wednesday programs, and all the events this summer, 2021.

Special story time

Children ages two-years-old, and up with caregivers are invited to join Courtyard Police Officer Story Time, on Thursday, June 24, from 10 to 10:30 a.m. Wilton Police Officers will hold an interactive story time in the librarys reference courtyard. Masks must be worn at all times for protection amid the pandemic from the coronavirus. Registration is required. Any questions may be emailed to aszabo@wiltonlibrary.org. Visit www.wiltonlibrary.org to register.

Teen summer reading

Its time for teens to enter into the act for summer reading in the program, Tails and Tales - 2021 Teen and Tween Summer Reading, that begins Monday, June 28, and goes through Saturday, August 14. Children entering the sixth grade through the 12th grade in the fall of 2021 can join in the fun, and the prizes. All that is needed is a good book, and a clock, watch or phone to help track the amount of time spent reading this summer, 2021. Children will then update their Wandoo profile with the book's title, and minutes they read. Every time 180 minutes of reading, which amounts to three hours time, is completed, one ticket will be applied to that week's drawing. The lucky weekly winner will receive a $10 Wilton Chamber of Commerce gift certificate. The more children read, the better their chances of winning. At the end of the summer of 2021, all of the tickets will go back into the pot, and one person will walk away with a $100 Wilton Chamber of Commerce gift certificate. The program is supported by the John and Patricia Curran Teen Fund. To register, visit www.wiltonlibrary.org. The librarys Childrens Summer Reading program is also now underway. Registration is on the librarys website.

Visit www.wiltonlibrary.org for information, and to register for any of the librarys virtual programming, for information about the librarys Digital Library, or any of the librarys databases. For those Wilton residents needing a library card to access the Digital Library, call 203-762-6334. If anyone has questions about accessing or using the Digital Library, email reference@wiltonlibrary.org.


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The federal government says it wants to ban most flavoured vaping products in a bid to reduce their appeal to youth.

Various vaping nicotine e-liquids or "juice" are shown in a lab at Portland State University in in Portland, Ore., Tuesday, April 16, 2019. The federal government says it wants to ban most flavoured vaping products in a bid to reduce their appeal to youth. THE CANADIAN PRESS/AP-Craig Mitchelldyer

The federal government says it wants to ban most flavoured vaping products in a bid to reduce their appeal to youth.

Health Canada put forward draft regulations Friday that would restrict all e-cigarette flavours except tobacco, mint and menthol.

The department said in a news release that the proposed changes would make vaping less enticing to youth, while still providing options for smokers looking to switch to an alternative source of nicotine.

"Vaping is putting a new generation of Canadians at risk of nicotine addiction," Health Minister Patty Hadju said in a statement. "These new measures build on our efforts to stop young Canadians from vaping."

The proposed rules would also limit promotion to products with tobacco, mint or menthol flavours.

This would build on existing regulations that prohibit the promotion of dessert, cannabis, confectionery, energy drink and soft drink flavours.

But according to regulators, other youth-friendly flavours have been identified on the Canadian market, including branding related to fruit, spices, nuts, alcoholic beverages and otherwise suggestive names such as "honeymoon" or "brain freeze."

The federal proposal would also curtail the use of most flavouring ingredients, including all sugars and sweeteners, in vaping products.

It would also set standards that would limit the tastes and smells that vaping manufacturers can evoke.

Research suggests that sweet-flavoured vaping products are more appealing to young people and perceived to be less harmful than tobacco-related flavours, Health Canada said.

Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island are among the jurisdictions that have banned vaping flavours other than tobacco, while Ontario and British Columbia have limited the sale of flavoured e-cigarettes to age-restricted specialty stores.

The Canadian Cancer Society welcomed Ottawa's proposed flavour restrictions as a step in the right direction. But the group called for the draft regulations to be amended during the 75-day consultation period, which launched Friday, to add mint and menthol to the list of banned flavours, citing their appeal to youth.

Meanwhile, the Vaping Industry Trade Association railed against the proposal, arguing that flavour restrictions will prevent smokers from making the transition to e-cigarettes while doing little to curb youth vaping.

Also on Friday, the federal government finalized regulations that lower the maximum nicotine concentration for vaping products sold in Canada to 20 mg/ml from 66 mg/ml.

The nicotine cap will take effect for e-cigarette manufacturers on July 8, and retailers will have to pull products that exceed the limit after July 23.

A Statistics Canada report released in March suggests that about one in seven young Canadians reported vaping in the previous month in 2019.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 18, 2021.
WASHINGTON (AP)  The Supreme Court, though increasingly conservative in makeup, rejected the latest major Republican-led effort to kill the national health care law known as Obamacare on Thursday, preserving insurance coverage for millions of Americans.

In this June 8, 2021 photo, the Supreme Court is seen in Washington. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

WASHINGTON (AP)  The Supreme Court, though increasingly conservative in makeup, rejected the latest major Republican-led effort to kill the national health care law known as Obamacare on Thursday, preserving insurance coverage for millions of Americans.

The justices, by a 7-2 vote, left the entire Affordable Care Act intact in ruling that Texas, other GOP-led states and two individuals had no right to bring their lawsuit in federal court. The Biden administration says 31 million people have health insurance because of the law, which also survived two earlier challenges in the Supreme Court.

The laws major provisions include protections for people with existing health conditions, a range of no-cost preventive services, expansion of the Medicaid program that insures lower-income people and access to health insurance markets offering subsidized plans.

The Affordable Care Act remains the law of the land, President Joe Biden, said, celebrating the ruling. He called for building further on the law that was enacted in 2010 when he was vice president.

Also left in place is the laws now-toothless requirement that people have health insurance or pay a penalty. Congress rendered that provision irrelevant in 2017 when it reduced the penalty to zero.

The elimination of the penalty had become the hook that Texas and other GOP-led states, as well as the Trump administration, used to attack the entire law. They argued that without the mandate, a pillar of the law when it was passed, the rest of the law should fall, too.

And with a Supreme Court that includes three appointees of former President Donald Trump, opponents of Obamacare hoped a majority of the justices would finally kill the law they have been fighting for more than a decade.

But the third major attack on the law at the Supreme Court ended the way the first two did, with a majority of the court rebuffing efforts to gut the law or get rid of it altogether.

FILE - In this Jan. 6, 2021, file photo, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton speaks in Washington, at a rally in support of President Donald Trump. The Supreme Court, though increasingly conservative in makeup, rejected the latest major Republican-led effort to kill the national health care law known as "Obamacare" on Thursday, preserving insurance coverage for millions of Americans. Paxton pledged to continue the fight against "Obamacare," which he called a "massive government takeover of health care." (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, File)

Trumps appointees  Justices Amy Coney Barrett, Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh  split their votes. Kavanaugh and Barrett joined the majority. Gorsuch was in dissent, signing on to an opinion from Justice Samuel Alito.

Justice Stephen Breyer wrote for the court that the states and people who filed a federal lawsuit have failed to show that they have standing to attack as unconstitutional the Acts minimum essential coverage provision.

In dissent, Alito wrote, Todays decision is the third installment in our epic Affordable Care Act trilogy, and it follows the same pattern as installments one and two. In all three episodes, with the Affordable Care Act facing a serious threat, the Court has pulled off an improbable rescue. Alito was a dissenter in the two earlier cases in 2012 and 2015, as well.

Like Alito, Justice Clarence Thomas was in dissent in the two earlier cases, but he joined Thursday's majority, writing, Although this Court has erred twice before in cases involving the Affordable Care Act, it does not err today."

Because it dismissed the case for the plaintiff's lack of legal standing  the ability to sue  the court didn't actually rule on whether the individual mandate is unconstitutional now that there is no penalty for forgoing insurance. Lower courts had struck down the mandate, in rulings that were wiped away by the Supreme Court decision.

With the latest ruling, the Supreme Court reaffirmed that the Affordable Care Act is here to stay, former President Barack Obama said, adding his support to Biden's call to expand the law.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton pledged to continue the fight against Obamacare, which he called a massive government takeover of health care.

But it's not clear what Republicans can do, said Larry Levitt, an executive vice president for the nonprofit Kaiser Family Foundation, which studies health care.

Democrats are in charge and they have made reinvigorating and building on the ACA a key priority, Levitt said. Republicans dont seem to have much enthusiasm for continuing to try to overturn the law.

Republicans have pressed their argument to invalidate the whole law even though congressional efforts to rip out the entire law root and branch, in Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnells words, have failed. The closest they came was in July 2017 when Arizona Sen. John McCain, who died the following year, delivered a dramatic thumbs-down vote to a repeal effort by fellow Republicans.

Chief Justice John Roberts said during arguments in November that it seemed the laws foes were asking the court to do work best left to the political branches of government.

The courts decision preserves benefits that have become part of the fabric of the nations health care system.

Polls show that the law has grown in popularity as it has endured the heaviest assault. In December 2016, just before Obama left office and Trump swept in calling the ACA a disaster, 46% of Americans had an unfavorable view of the law, while 43% approved, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation tracking poll. Those ratings flipped, and by February of this year 54% had a favorable view, while disapproval had fallen to 39% in the same ongoing poll.

The health law is now undergoing an expansion under Biden, who sees it as the foundation for moving the U.S. to coverage for all. His giant COVID-19 relief bill significantly increased subsidies for private health plans offered through the ACAs insurance markets, while also dangling higher federal payments before the dozen states that have declined the laws Medicaid expansion. About 1.2 million people have signed up with HealthCare.gov since Biden reopened enrollment amid high levels of COVID cases earlier this year.

Most of the people with insurance because of the law have it through Medicaid expansion or the health insurance markets that offer subsidized private plans. But its most popular benefit is protection for people with preexisting medical conditions. They cannot be turned down for coverage on account of health problems, or charged a higher premium. While those covered under employer plans already had such protections, Obamacare guaranteed them for people buying individual policies.

Another hugely popular benefit allows young adults to remain on their parents health insurance until they turn 26. Before the law, going without medical coverage was akin to a rite of passage for people in their 20s getting a start in the world.

Because of the ACA, most privately insured women receive birth control free of charge. Its considered a preventive benefit covered at no additional cost to the patient. So are routine screenings for cancer and other conditions.

For Medicare recipients, Obamacare also improved preventive care, and more importantly, closed a prescription drug coverage gap of several thousand dollars that was known as the doughnut hole.

Associated Press writer Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar contributed to this report.
UNITED NATIONS (AP)  The outgoing U.N. humanitarian chief warned that the explosion in needs for humanitarian assistance in recent years will keep getting worse until major powers tackle the root causes of hunger and desperation -- conflicts, extremism, climate change, poor governance, corruption and violence, to name a few.

FILE - In this Oct. 23, 2017, file photo, Mark Lowcock, U.N. Emergency Relief Coordinator, addresses his statement, during the Pledging Conference for the Rohingya Refugee Crisis, at the European headquarters of the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland. Lowcock, who steps down Friday, June 18, 2021 after four years, said in an interview with The Associated Press that unfortunately the world has been dealing with symptoms, including people displaced by fighting and natural disasters or at risk of famine, which is now stalking Ethiopias embattled Tigray region and Yemen. (Salvatore Di Nolfi/Keystone via AP, File)

UNITED NATIONS (AP)  The outgoing U.N. humanitarian chief warned that the explosion in needs for humanitarian assistance in recent years will keep getting worse until major powers tackle the root causes of hunger and desperation -- conflicts, extremism, climate change, poor governance, corruption and violence, to name a few.

Mark Lowcock, who steps down Friday after four years, said in an interview with The Associated Press that unfortunately the world has been dealing with symptoms, including people displaced by fighting and natural disasters or at risk of famine, which is now stalking Ethiopias embattled Tigray region and Yemen.

In a very divided world, where the geopolitical system has failed to manage conflicts very well, he said, there has been a failure of the leading powers" to tackle the causes.

If the world wants to see less humanitarian suffering, you have to deal with the causes of that suffering, Lowcock said. If you tackle the causes, you can make progress, you can improve peoples lives.

During his lifetime, the 58-year-old British economist said the world moved from having more than half the global population living in the most extreme poverty to less than 10% in that dire situation before the COVID-19 pandemic in early 2020.

The people and countries left out of that economic progress are the ones enmeshed in humanitarian suffering, he said.

Lowcock was highly critical of the worlds rich countries, and especially the Group of Seven leading industrialized nations, for not acting much more aggressively and generously and protecting the poorest countries coming out of the pandemic, not only with vaccines but supporting their economies, which have taken the biggest hit in relative terms and are under huge strain.

Rich countries pumped trillions of dollars into their economies to protect their citizens and their nations, and thats the right thing to do, he said.

But it would also have been a smart thing as well as a kind and generous thing to have spent a little bit of that money protecting the very poorest countries, Lowcock said in the virtual interview on Wednesday.

It is also in the self-interest of wealthier nations, he said, because the problems that can brew in fragile countries  becoming havens for terrorism, places where climate change is hardest to tackle, sites where new diseases emerge and old diseases like Ebola reemerge  come back to bite you if you dont invest enough to contain the problems.

Lowcock called for a much bigger effort to help poorer countries out of the pandemic.

Rather than just announcing it was donating vaccines, he said, the G-7 should have made clear that what they were doing was a small down payment, and that they would work with the larger Group of 20 major economies to do a lot more.

The G-7 leaders promised 1 billion doses for vaccine-hungry countries, far short of the 11 billion doses the World Health Organization said is needed to inoculate at least 70% of the worlds population and truly end the pandemic.

Lowcock said the G-7 announcement -- including 500 million doses from the United States and 100 million each from Britain and Canada -- is basically enough vaccine to reach about 10% of the people who need it in low- and middle-income countries.

He said the G-7 didnt announce money to get the vaccine from the manufacturer into the syringes of health workers who can immunize people, stressing that there are huge costs in the delivery system. Some of the very poorest countries that got a little bit of vaccine but had no delivery systems gave some back, he said.

The G-7 should have made a much more rounded, longer term commitment to finance vaccine requirements, he said, and it should be challenging the G-20 to step up and meet part of the share of the costs as well.

By comparison, he recalled that in the much smaller financial crisis of 2007-2008, the leading countries in the G-20 instructed the international financial institutions to provide a lot of assistance to the most vulnerable countries, and they bankrolled that.

For the last 15 months, Lowcock said, he has been pressing the G-7 and the G-20 to provide a lot more economic help to the poorest countries.

That has not happened through this crisis, he said. If more resources dont come, then the pandemic is going to last a lot longer than it would otherwise do, and that will ultimately harm the rich countries as well as adding to the misery and suffering of the poorer countries.

Lowcock called his last four years as the U.N.'s undersecretary-general for humanitarian affairs challenging, especially because the causes of humanitarian suffering have been growing.

He said the U.N. and the broader humanitarian community, whose true grit he has come to admire, have been able to stave off the worst outcomes in these big disasters, essentially because we have raised quite a lot of money.

In his first year, the U.N. raised $14 billion for its global humanitarian appeals, Lowcock said, and four years later we raised $20 billion, so roughly a 40% increase over the period.

But he said he worries that funding for humanitarian aid is voluntary, and theres far too much reliance on a small number of countries. As a prime example, he said, 70% of the $20 billion raised last year came from the U.S., Germany, the European Union and the United Kingdom.

Historically, the system for humanitarian relief has been far too reactive, Lowcock said. Its waited for the problem to get almost overwhelming before doing something about it, and weve tried to act much earlier when we knew a problem was coming, and much faster.

He said an earlier and faster response to a humanitarian crisis is cheaper, and its also more humane.

We reach 100 million people a year, Lowcock said. We certainly saved millions of lives.
JUNEAU, Alaska (AP)  A split federal appeals court panel has sent back for further legal review a 2019 decision by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to withdraw proposed restrictions on large-scale mining in Alaska's Bristol Bay region.

JUNEAU, Alaska (AP)  A split federal appeals court panel has sent back for further legal review a 2019 decision by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to withdraw proposed restrictions on large-scale mining in Alaska's Bristol Bay region.

A panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals sent the matter back to a lower court to determine whether the agency's action was arbitrary, capricious, an abuse of discretion or contrary to law. The appeals court panel expresses no view on that question," the decision dated Thursday stated.

The EPA during the Obama administration proposed but never finalized restrictions on large-scale mining in response to the Pebble Mine project.

In 2019, during the Trump administration, the agency withdrew the proposed restrictions, removing what it called an outdated, preemptive proposed veto of the Pebble Mine and allowing the project to be vetted through the permitting process.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers last fall rejected a key permit for the proposed copper and gold mine. Pebble's developer, the Pebble Limited Partnership, is appealing that decision.

Trout Unlimited and other groups sued over the EPA's 2019 decision. U.S. District Court Judge Sharon Gleason last year dismissed the case and determined the agency's action was not reviewable. That ruling led to the appeal.

Nelli Williams, Alaska director for Trout Unlimited, in a statement called the ruling an important step toward providing immediate Clean Water Act safeguards for Bristol Bay.

Mike Heatwole, a Pebble partnership spokesperson, said the ruling means the case will be subject to further review by the district court.
WASHINGTON (AP)  President Joe Biden took a cautious victory lap Friday in his quest to bring the COVID-19 pandemic under control, announcing that 300 million vaccine shots have been administered in the 150 days since he took office.

Vice President Kamala Harris speaks at a COVID-19 vaccine pop-up center at Ebenezer Baptist Church, Friday, June 18, 2021, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

WASHINGTON (AP)  President Joe Biden took a cautious victory lap Friday in his quest to bring the COVID-19 pandemic under control, announcing that 300 million vaccine shots have been administered in the 150 days since he took office.

Biden credited scientists, companies, the American people and his whole-of-government effort. The president noted that the widespread vaccination campaign had set the stage for most Americans to have a relatively normal summer as businesses reopen and employers hire.

Were heading into a very different summer compared to last year, the president said. A bright summer. Prayerfully, a summer of joy.

But as Biden marks one milestone, he is in danger of failing to meet another: his target to have 70% of American adults at least partially vaccinated by July Fourth, in a little over two weeks.

Overall, about 168 million American adults, or 65.1% of the U.S. population 18 years and older, have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine as of Friday, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

President Joe Biden speaks about reaching 300 million COVID-19 vaccination shots, in the State Dining Room of the White House, Friday, June 18, 2021, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

The pace of new vaccinations in the U.S. has dropped significantly from a high of nearly 2 million per day about two months ago, jeopardizing Biden's ability to hit the 70% mark.

The White House said its whole-of-government approach to the vaccination effort has put the virus in retreat, which in turn has brought COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations and deaths to their lowest levels in more than a year. But Biden noted in his remarks that some communities in states with lower vaccination rates are seeing cases and hospitalizations increase.

The administration is in the middle of a monthlong blitz to combat vaccine hesitancy and the lack of urgency some people feel to get the shots, particularly in the South and Midwest.

Vice President Kamala Harris speaks at Clark Atlanta University, Friday, June 18, 2021, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

CDC Director Rochelle Walensky said Friday that she expects the delta variant of the coronavirus will become the dominant strain in the U.S. That strain has become dominant in Britain after it was first detected in India.

During an appearance on ABCs Good Morning America, she told Americans who get their shots that youll be protected against this delta variant.

As part of the administration's vaccination push, Vice President Kamala Harris traveled to Atlanta on Friday to tour a pop-up COVID-19 vaccination site at Ebenezer Baptist Church, where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was a pastor until his assassination in 1968. The current senior pastor is U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock.

Vice President Kamala Harris speaks at Clark Atlanta University, Friday, June 18, 2021, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

Harris also spoke at a COVID-19 vaccination mobilization event at Clark Atlanta University, a historically Black school. She told students they have the power to end this pandemic by giving people information about the multitude of resources, such as free car rides and child care, that are available to help them get vaccinated.

In Fulton County, Georgia, where Atlanta is located, 49% of residents have received at least one shot. Statewide, it is 42%, Harris said.

Getting vaccinated is about building the power of community, she said. Getting vaccinated is about building the power of our country.

The Biden administration insists that even if the 70% vaccination goal is unmet, it will have little effect on the overall U.S. recovery, which is already ahead of where Biden said it would be months ago.

Biden wants to celebrate Independence Day as a summer of freedom from the virus.

Earlier this week, the White House announced plans to host first responders, essential workers and service members and their families on the South Lawn for a cookout and to watch the fireworks over the National Mall.

More than 1,000 guests are expected for what will be one of the largest events of Biden's presidency.

Associated Press writers Josh Boak in Baltimore and Zeke Miller in Washington contributed to this report.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP)  With tourists flocking to distilleries, concerns about a pandemic hangover for Kentuckys world-famous bourbon industry are quickly evaporating.

This photo provided by Heaven Hill Distillery on Friday, June 18, 2021 shows the Heaven Hill Distillery opened a $19 million tourist center this week In Bardstown, Ky. The new center, called the Heaven Hill Bourbon Experience, is the latest investment by a Kentucky bourbon producer to promote the states tourism tourism.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP)  With tourists flocking to distilleries, concerns about a pandemic hangover for Kentuckys world-famous bourbon industry are quickly evaporating.

A $19 million tourist center that Heaven Hill Distillery opened just days ago in the heart of the states bourbon country is already overflowing  with reservations filling up quickly to learn about whiskey-making and sample its spirits, including its flagship Evan Williams whiskey.

Its a similar story for the numerous other distilleries in the region that last spring were temporarily closed to visitors due to the COVID-19 pandemic. More than a year later, the businesses are facing such overwhelming demand for tours that one industry official has started encouraging people to call ahead or check tour availability online before pulling off the highway.

Starting last summer, some distilleries began allowing limited numbers of visitors in accordance with virus restrictions. With capacity limits now lifted, the attractions are gearing up for a full resurgence of guests, many from outside Kentucky.

We saw it coming, but I dont think we saw it coming this quick, said Kentucky Distillers Association President Eric Gregory.

We were a hot destination before COVID cooled us off considerably," he added. "But now were getting back to the point where people want to get out, they want to have fun."

Gregory predicted that bourbon tourism will quickly rebound to pre-pandemic levels.

Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, left, joins Heaven Hill Brands President Max L. Shapira on Monday, June 14, 2021, to toast the new Heaven Hill Bourbon Experience in Bardstown, Ky. Heaven Hill Distillery recently opened the $19 million tourist center in Kentucky bourbon country. (Heaven Hill Distillery via AP)

I think next year will be more of a normal year and if this trend continues, I think it will be another record-setting year, he said.

Bourbon is an $8.6 billion industry in Kentucky, where 95% of the worlds supply is crafted, according to the association. About 9.3 million barrels of bourbon were aging in the state last year, or more than two barrels for every person living in Kentucky. And bourbon tourism has become a big business, driven in part by a surge in enthusiasm overseas.

Spirits companies invested huge sums into new or expanded visitors' centers to play up the industry's heritage and allow guests to soak in the sights and smells of bourbon making. Kentucky Bourbon Trail visitors spend, on average, between $400 to $1,200 per trip, Gregory said. More than 70% of visitors come from outside Kentucky.

To help visitors plan trips, the organization is promoting a new Bourbon Trail Passport and Field Guide, a 150-page guide to participating distilleries, with cocktail recipes and suggested itineraries.

In Bardstown, where Heaven Hill opened its tourist center, the return of travelers will spin off considerably more spending at restaurants, stores and motels, said Dixie Hibbs, a former mayor.

The picturesque town, about 40 miles (64 kilometers) southeast of Louisville, is so entwined with the industry that the smell of locally crafted bourbon wafts into downtown.

Most people will tell you thats the smell of money, Hibbs said.

After years of constant growth, bourbon tourism plunged during the pandemic. Visitors took about 587,000 tours last year at distilleries on the Kentucky Bourbon Trail and the Kentucky Bourbon Trail Craft Tour, down 66% from 2019 when stops topped 1.7 million, according to KDA. The craft tour features smaller distilleries springing up across the Bluegrass state, while the Kentucky Bourbon Trail showcases the sector's biggest producers.

While most distilleries have reopened for tours, some still aren't allowing visitors into front line" areas where bourbon is produced, Gregory said. For guests allowed into production areas, chances are they'll be asked to wear a mask for that phase of the tour, he said.

Some distilleries remain closed to tours. That includes industry giant Jim Beam, which is overhauling its visitor experience with plans to reopen in the fall at its flagship distilling operation in Clermont, said company spokesperson Emily Bryson York.

At Maker's Mark, both tour sizes and the number of tours will increase starting in mid-July at its distillery in Loretto, said Rob Samuels, the brand's managing director.

For visitors unable to join a tour, Maker's Mark and other distilleries offer tastings of their products. They can order cocktails or perhaps a meal if the distillery has a restaurant. And they can walk the distillery grounds and shop at the gift shop.

If a larger distillery is booked, visitors often can check out a smaller distillery nearby, Gregory said. Kentucky now boasts distilleries in 32 of its 120 counties, with more than a dozen others recently announced or under construction, he said.

Like his predecessors, Gov. Andy Beshear has become a fixture at events toasting the bourbon industry's growth. At Monday's opening of the Heaven Hill Bourbon Experience, Beshear said the visitor center gives people one more great reason to visit Kentucky and experience the Kentucky Bourbon Trail.

The new tourist center is three times larger than Heaven Hill's previous Bardstown visitors' center and is part of a $125 million investment by Heaven Hill that includes new barrel warehousing, bottling line and equipment upgrades.

Heaven Hill Brands President Max L. Shapira summed up the industry's relief in seeing tourists return.

We are extremely pleased to be welcoming fans and visitors back to bourbon country to see, taste and learn about Americas Native Spirit in a new way, he said.
A quarrel between Canada's largest furniture manufacturers and the council representing a majority of the country's retailers continues to intensify, with the ultimate decision in the hands of a federal tribunal.

A quarrel between Canada's largest furniture manufacturers and the council representing a majority of the country's retailers continues to intensify, with the ultimate decision in the hands of a federal tribunal.

Winnipeg-based producer Palliser Furniture, along with five other producers, initiated an investigation by the Canada Border Services Agency earlier this year into "dumping" practices by China and Vietnam. The group claimed those countries were exporting goods, such as upholstered sofas and recliners, to Canada at cheaper prices than in their home markets.

The probe swiftly led to a preliminary determination, whereby products from China are now subject to provisional duties as high as 296 per cent and items from Vietnam as high as 101 per cent.

Palliser Furniture Ltd CEO Peter Teilman. (Supplied)

These are tariffs the Retail Council of Canada is strongly fighting against, even opening up avenues for anonymous contributions from the general public to do so, before the foreign taxes are finalized by Ottawa-based Canadian International Trade Tribunal in August.

In exclusive interviews with the Free Press, executives from Palliser and the Retail Council did not mince words  pointing fingers at each other and quipping about where their loyalties lie.

"Our main goal here is to make sure there's an even playing field that benefits Canadian producers and manufacturers, because we want people to have Canadian jobs and Canadian opportunities, and not these egregious, artificially-run practices," said Peter Tielmann, president and chief executive officer of Palliser.

"Our main goal here is to make sure there's an even playing field that benefits Canadian producers and manufacturers, because we want people to have Canadian jobs and Canadian opportunities."  Peter Tielmann, president and chief executive officer of Palliser

"Personally, I don't have any clue about why the Retail Council is taking this kind of negative stance against that. Shouldn't they be on the side of Canadian business?"

Tielmann accused the Retail Council of "inaccurately" and "inappropriately" putting up smaller furniture shops  such as Love Dodd in Victoria  at the forefront of the fight.

"They're making it seem like those mom-and-pop places are the ones that are losing out on this situation. All the while, they're using big-shot lawyers and taking cues from places like Leons and the Brick," he said.

Diane Brisebois is the President and CEO of Retail Council of Canada. (Supplied)

"And what other small furniture shops, apart from Love Dodd, have they asked the media to interview? I haven't seen anyone else."

Diane Brisebois, president and CEO of the Retail Council, said she couldn't disagree more vehemently.

"It's outrageous to me that Palliser even dare insinuate something like this," she said Thursday, defending the organization that represents more than 45,000 retail establishments, accounting for more than 70 per cent of all sector sales in Canada.

"The reality is, simply the number of phone calls and letters we've gotten from family-run and independent retailers shows otherwise: these tariffs are not what retailers want and it's also not something consumers will want either."

".. The timing couldn't be worse. We're smack dab in the middle of the pandemic, and this is what these manufacturers want to be doing to struggling retailers? Haven't they suffered enough?"  Diane Brisebois, president and CEO of the Retail Council

Manufacturers such as Palliser "have not been innovating enough or offering enough variety," Brisebois said, adding that's why some shops have been "forced" to turn to foreign outlets.

There have also been many delays in getting products delivered on time from Canadian producers, she added.

"More than that though, the timing couldn't be worse. We're smack dab in the middle of the pandemic, and this is what these manufacturers want to be doing to struggling retailers? Haven't they suffered enough?"

Tielmann admitted "the timing isn't great, but it's the right thing to do." In 2003, his company operated five furniture factories in Canada; today, it only has a single plant located in Winnipeg.

In 2003, Palliser operated five furniture factories in Canada; today, it only has a single plant located in Winnipeg, says president and CEO Peter Tielmann. (Jody Moroz / Winnipeg Free Press files)

"Here's the thing: the U.S. and other jurisdictions already have tariffs like this in place. And so the real issue is, if this doesn't go ahead, I'm afraid we won't be the only Canadian manufacturers that will be forced to leave this country because it's just not viable to be here for our business," he said.

Second Palliser plant planned Negotiations are underway for Palliser Furniture to open a second Canadian plant, potentially next to its only current facility in the country, located in Winnipeg. It's a process that will need to be approved by the Manitoba government. Should things go ahead, it will add up to 400 new jobs and increase output capacity by 50 per cent, the company says. click to read more Negotiations are underway for Palliser Furniture to open a second Canadian plant, potentially next to its only current facility in the country, located in Winnipeg. It's a process that will need to be approved by the Manitoba government. Should things go ahead, it will add up to 400 new jobs and increase output capacity by 50 per cent, the company says. In a recent interview with the Free Press, president and chief executive officer Peter Tielmann hinted at details about the new facility. While he couldn't comment precisely, given pending government approvals, he said Palliser might also be looking at Alberta as a potential candidate for its second plant. Tielmann added "everything to do with the facility" also is "directly related to the tariffs" on exports from China and Vietnam for furniture. "Of course, if the tariffs are finalized in August, then we'll very aggressively expand to meet the demand in Canada," he said. "And yes, that might also mean more than just the second facility  it could mean a lot more." Should Palliser expand in this fashion, furniture industry sources say other manufacturers  especially those with Canadian headquarters  will also likely start to increase their presence in the country.  Temur Durrani Close

Dumping is also "just completely unsustainable," Tielmann added, "because in the long run, once China and Vietnam have exhausted their artificial prices, they'll revert back to higher costs. And by then, there won't be any Canadian manufacturers left to turn to."

It is a stance Brisebois "takes offence" to.

"We'll have to wait and see what the final decision is. And yes, duties are there to be paid for a reason," she said. "I just don't think it's accurate to assume that a product is being 'dumped' because it's cheaper and so then, should have higher duties.

"Maybe Palliser and others should look to see why their product isn't at a better price point. Right now, I don't think there's much of a quid pro quo going on, and so even if these tariffs go ahead, I'd like to see how savvy manufacturers are willing to become."

The Canadian International Trade Tribunal said it will not comment on the situation while the process for a final decision is ongoing.

temur.durrani@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @temurdur
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP)  As both summer and the scheduling of a recall election date loom, Gov. Gavin Newsom wants to make sure Californians know about the cash payments and prize money he is doling out.

FILE - In this June 15, 2021 file photo California Governor Gavin Newsom, center, celebrates with other guests after the Vax for the Win lottery contest during a news conference at Universal Studios in Universal City, Calif. The vaccine prizes are among a slew of cash payments Newsom's introduced as summer, and the recall campaign against him, approach. (AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu, File)

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP)  As both summer and the scheduling of a recall election date loom, Gov. Gavin Newsom wants to make sure Californians know about the cash payments and prize money he is doling out.

Newsom is delivering money to your pocket," a narrator says over a video of a smiling family gathered on a couch in a campaign ad Newsom released Thursday, his first of the recall. It references $1,100 in one-time cash payments he proposed in his state budget.

The spot is one of three now airing statewide on television, though the other two are negative, painting a dark picture of Republicans behind the effort. Their release follows two weeks of Newsom traveling the state as game show host, appearing at theme parks to award millions of dollars in prize money for vaccinations and to celebrate the end of most pandemic-related restrictions.

The celebratory atmosphere mirrors Newsom's growing confidence in his ability to fight off a recall. But some Republicans charge he's wrongly using taxpayer money to buoy his standing and ignoring the state's problems in favor of flashy events.

It certainly looks like over the last couple days that Gov. Newsom has decided to join the recall circus mentality," former San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer, a Republican running in the recall, said in a Twitter video. What this recall is really about is rolling up your sleeves and fixing our great state."

But the events showcased the advantage Newsom has over his rivals in his ability to generate headlines and get free media.

I think it is smart to break out beyond conventional political news," said Rob Stutzman, who served as spokesman for former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who had a taste for headline-grabbing appearances.

It's not going to play well with everyone but, at large, my guess would be this is probably smart of them," he added.

Amateur Republican political organizers launched the recall drive last year, and missteps by Newsom helped it gather enough signatures to make the ballot. It needs final certification before a date can be set, but that could come within weeks, potentially allowing for a September election.

Many of Newsom's allies believe an earlier election is better before a natural disaster strikes or greatly diminished virus cases unexpectedly surge.

The start of television ads by Newsom and some of his Republican competitors signal a new phase into the campaign, which will turn into a sprint once an election date is on the calendar.

Newsom's positive ad focuses on big spending initiatives in his proposed state budget, which he must sign by the end of the month. That includes up to $1,100 in cash payments to low-income and middle-class people, $4 billion in relief for small businesses and free preschool for all children.

His other ads, one in English and one in Spanish, attempt to tie the recall to extremist Republicans by showing images of people storming the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6. The English ad calls the recall an assault on democracy" while the Spanish one references comments by the recall's lead proponent about microchipping immigrants. That organizer, Orrin Heatlie, later said the comment, made on Facebook, was hyperbole and is not something he supports.

Sonja Diaz, founding director of the Latino Policy & Politics Initiative at the University of California, Los Angeles, said Newsom's positive ad presents messaging that will resonate with families and young people who have been hard hit by the pandemic by highlighting the cash payments, help for businesses and an expansion of preschool.

This is something that I think is really targeted to talk to the policy choices that are going to help younger Californians," she said.

Meanwhile, Faulconer dropped his first campaign ad on Monday, also in Spanish. It paints Newsom in a negative light, highlighting the closure of most schools during the pandemic, the state's struggles to contain homelessness, and the expansion of good behavior credits that could lead to earlier release for tens of thousands of people in prison.

As a heatwave hit the state, John Cox, another Republican candidate, said Newsom wasn't focused on the right issues. The state's independent system operator urged conservation on Thursday but said blackouts were unlikely.

While Gavin Newsom visits theme parks and appears on talk shows doling out tax dollars, California faces a looming energy crisis," Cox tweeted.

To be sure, Newsom's week wasn't a typical one for a politician. He drew 10 winners of $1.5 million prizes, danced with cartoon movie characters and hopped on a rollercoaster  with TV cameras rolling.

I think hes having a ball, I think hes a little bit more relaxed about the recall," said Sherry Bebitch Jeffe, a professor of public policy communication at the University of Southern California.

But, she said, the image of governor-as-game-show-host might appear too gimmicky for some people's liking. Still, the majority of people are likely to care more about what his actions mean for them than how he presents them.

It sounded an awful lot like a bribe to me, but I'm not the average voter," she said, referring to Newsom's television ad. She added, When was the last time you saw anybody, particularly anybody who's hurting, turn down free money?"
BERLIN (AP)  Lufthansa's chief executive said Friday that the company aims to pay back billions of euros in aid provided to help the airline through the coronavirus pandemic before Germany's election in late September.

BERLIN (AP)  Lufthansa's chief executive said Friday that the company aims to pay back billions of euros in aid provided to help the airline through the coronavirus pandemic before Germany's election in late September.

Germany's biggest airline, which also owns carriers including Austrian Airlines and Swiss, received a 9 billion-euro ($10.8 billion) government rescue package about a year ago. The German government took a 20% stake in the company.

We were one of the first companies that was rescued by the German government, Lufthansa CEO Carsten Spohr said Friday at an aviation conference just outside Berlin, news agency dpa reported.

We also want to be one of the first companies that pays back the rescue money  hopefully, before the parliamentary election,Spohr added. We are on it.

The German election is scheduled for Sept. 26, and will determine who succeeds Chancellor Angela Merkel.
General Motors is investing more money in electric vehicle and self-driving technology, adding capacity at its car assembly factories and building two new battery plants in an aggressive effort to advance and lead in EV sales.

General Motors is investing more money in electric vehicle and self-driving technology, adding capacity at its car assembly factories and building two new battery plants in an aggressive effort to advance and lead in EV sales.

In a wide-sweeping announcement Wednesday, GM said it will increase its investment in EV and autonomous vehicle technologies to US$35 billion through 2025, a 75 per cent boost from its initial commitment in early 2020.

GM also said it will build two new battery cell manufacturing plants in the United States by mid-decade but declined to disclose the locations. The battery plants will be in an "optimal location to achieve volume," GM CFO Paul Jacobson told the news media Wednesday.

GM is presently building an Ultium Cells LLC battery plant in northeast Ohio near its former Lordstown Assembly plant and one in Tennessee near its Spring Hill Assembly plant, where it will build the Cadillac Lyriq electric SUV.

"We are investing aggressively in a comprehensive and highly-integrated plan to make sure GM leads in all aspects of the transformation to a more sustainable future," said GM CEO Mary Barra in a statement.

Later Wednesday morning, Barra said GM will lead in EVs, taking on Tesla CEO Elon Musks claims to be at the forefront of EV development. In an interview on CNBC, Barra also reiterated GMs intentions to keep its battery production in-house and not spin it off as a separate entity.

Beyond GMs autonomous and electric vehicle spending boost, Jacobson also said GM anticipates reporting bigger profits in the first half than it had previously told Wall Street it would. He cited strong consumer demand for GM vehicles as the reason.

Canada is not being left behind in the push towards electrification. As a result of negotiations with Unifor, the union representing the Detroit Three carmakers in Canada, General Motors is investing C$1 billion to build electric commercial vans in Ingersoll, Ont., Ford is spending C$1.2 billion to build five battery-powered vehicles in Oakville, Ont. starting in 2025 and Stellantis (formerly known as Fiat Chrysler Automobiles) is investing as much as C$1.5 billion to create its own electric vehicle platform in Ontario.

No regrets capital

GMs increase in AV/EV spending comes after Ford said in late May it now expects to spend more than US$30 billion on electrification, including battery development, by 2030, up from its prior target of US$22 billion.

GMs initial commitment to AV/EV technology in March 2020 was US$20 billion through 2025, that included capital, engineering expenses and other development costs. In November last year, GM increased its planned investment over the same period to US$27 billion.

GM will spend US$9 billion to US$10 billion in total capital this year, with the majority of that going to AV/EV development, Jacobson said. The challenges with the semiconductor chip shortage, which has slowed production across the car industry, has not affected GMs planned spending, he said.

The automaker, which announced Tuesday it would make hydrogen fuel cells for the railroad industry, said it plans to launch its third-generation fuel cells that will have greater power density and lower costs by mid-decade. GM makes its fuel cells in Brownstown in a joint venture with Honda.

GM has said its goal is to sell more than one million EVs globally by 2025 and, to do that, Barra said, "We are increasing our investment to scale faster because we see momentum building in the United States for electrification, along with customer demand for our product portfolio."

Jacobson said GM is confident in a future of EVs based on consumer adoption of the only current EV it sells: the Chevrolet Bolt and Bolt EUV.

"What we see is a very strong pipeline of new vehicles with 30 new EVs coming out by 2025. We see some good success with the Bolt and the Bolt EUV beyond the higher-priced entries with the GMC Hummer EV and the Cadillac Lyriq," Jacobson said. "This is no regrets capital. We know well need those battery plants moving forward and we can then flex upward as we need it, so its a good investment."

New products coming

Barra, while on CNBC on Wednesday, said GM intends to lead the EV market, beating other major carmakers and niche manufacturers such as Tesla. When asked who she considered GMs biggest EV competitors, Barra said, "Ive always taken every one of our competitors very seriously. But we are the No. 1 vehicle producer in the U.S. and China."

Barra said GM has many market advantages such as its dealer network, 20 years of developing EVs for commercial vehicles, high customer loyalty and brand recognition, including that of the high-profile Hummer marquee.

"Well take all of that experience... and put all that into our products across the board," Barra said. "I think were exceptionally well-positioned."

Barra also indicated GM will keep its battery division inside the company and not spin it off as a separate entity. Barra said battery production creates value for GM because it can sell the batteries to other companies.

GM first outlined its goal to transition to an all-electric company about four years ago. Early last year, it started retooling its Factory Zero plant, previously called Detroit-Hamtramck Assembly, to build only EVs.

Factory Zero will be complete by this fall and the plant will start making GMs first EV on its Ultium battery platform late this year, the 2022 GMC Hummer EV pickup, which starts at US$79,995. That plant will also build the Hummer SUV, the Cruise Origin self-driving car and the electric Chevrolet Silverado, at a future date.

GM will build its all-electric Cadillac Lyriq SUV at its Spring Hill Assembly plant in Tennessee and its due in showrooms later next year.

GM said with the additional investments announced Wednesday, it will add to its North America plan new "electric commercial trucks and other products." GM will also add additional U.S. assembly capacity for EV SUVs, but any further details will be announced later.

Big first-half results

In early May, GM had told Wall Street it would report adjusted earnings before interest and taxes of US$5.5 billion for the first half.

On Wednesday, GM boosted that guidance to US$8.5 to US$9.5 billion, "due to the strong demand we see and the united efforts across the GM family to make sure were solving problems in the near time," Jacobson told the media. "We were able to pull forward some semiconductors from the Q3 to get vehicles finished to market."

Earlier this month, GM said it would increase vehicle deliveries to car dealers in the U.S. and Canada by rerouting chip parts to its most in-demand products and it will speed up the assembly line at Flint Assembly to build 1,000 more heavy-duty, full-size Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra pickups per month.

Despite all that, Jacobson said GM remains cautious about the full year and, "well have more guidance on the full year on our earnings call on Aug. 4."

 Detroit Free Press, with files from staff
CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP)  West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice is defending his appointment of a Republican Party operative to a public broadcasting oversight board, saying it will bring balance and diversity.

CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP)  West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice is defending his appointment of a Republican Party operative to a public broadcasting oversight board, saying it will bring balance and diversity.

I do believe there ought to be diversity to that board, Justice told the Charleston Gazette-Mail on Thursday when asked about the appointment of GOP operative Greg Thomas to the state Educational Broadcasting Authority, which is the governing body of West Virginia Public Broadcasting.

Changing the board to be more balanced and everything, I dont think the more liberal folks have total ownership of that board. I dont think the more conservative folks should have total ownership of the board in any way. I think it should be balanced, Justice said.

The choice of Thomas prompted concern about his credentials and whether the GOP governor will use his political muscle to fill multiple expired seats.

Members of the state Senate Confirmations Committee received notice last week of the pending appointment.

Senate Minority Leader Stephen Baldwin, a Greenbrier County Democrat, said on Monday that Thomas background doesnt make him a good fit for the authority and the pending appointment stood out like a sore thumb.

Justice has been critical of overall media coverage of his failed attempt this year to lower income taxes and shift the burden to sales taxes.

In 2017, Justices initial budget proposal sought to eliminate state funding for West Virginia Public Broadcasting, which lawmakers eventually fully funded. The GOP-controlled Senate made a failed attempt to eliminate funding for the authority in the 2021-22 state budget during the most recent session.

Baldwin said he is concerned that Justice will use his power to appoint EBA members to accomplish what Senate Republicans couldn't.
HONG KONG (AP)  Hong Kong pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily increased its print run more than fivefold to 500,000 copies as residents lined up Friday to buy the paper in a show of support for beleaguered press freedoms, a day after police arrested five top editors and executives.

A vendor adjusts copies of Apple Daily at a news stand at a downtown street in Hong Kong Friday, June 18, 2021. The pro-democracy paper increased its print run to 500,000 copies on Friday, a day after police arrested five top editors and executives and froze $2.3 million in assets linked to the media company. (AP Photo/Vincent Yu)

HONG KONG (AP)  Hong Kong pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily increased its print run more than fivefold to 500,000 copies as residents lined up Friday to buy the paper in a show of support for beleaguered press freedoms, a day after police arrested five top editors and executives.

The raid on the papers offices by hundreds of police and security agents  along with the freezing of $2.3 million worth of its assets  marked the first time a sweeping national security law has been used against the media. It was the latest sign of a widening crackdown on civil liberties in the semi-autonomous city, which has long cherished freedoms that dont exist elsewhere in China.

Police said the editors were arrested on suspicion of foreign collusion to endanger national security, based on over 30 articles that authorities said had called for international sanctions against China and Hong Kong.

On Friday, the National Security Department charged two men with collusion with a foreign country to endanger national security, according to a government statement. The two will appear in court on Saturday.

It did not name them, but the South China Morning Post newspaper cited an unnamed source saying they are Apply Daily's chief editor Ryan Law and Cheung Kim-hung, the CEO of Apple Daily's publisher Next Digital. The other three were being detained for investigation.

With anti-government protests silenced, most of the city's prominent pro-democracy activists in jail and many others fleeing abroad, people snapped up copies at newsstands and in convenience stores.

There are lots of injustices in Hong Kong already. I think there are a lot of things we cannot do anymore, said resident Lisa Cheung. Buying a copy is all what we can do. When the law cannot protect Hong Kong people anymore, we are only left to do what we can.

The office of Chan Pui-man, deputy editor at the Apple Daily newspaper is seen at Apple Daily headquarters in Hong Kong, Thursday, June 17, 2021. Hong Kong police used a sweeping national security law against a pro-democracy newspaper for the first time Thursday, arresting five editors and executives on charges of collusion with foreign powers. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)

The front page of Friday's edition splashed images of the five editors and executives led away in handcuffs. Police also confiscated 44 hard drives worth of news material. A quote from Cheung, the arrested CEO of Next Digital, said Hang in there, everyone.

Another resident, William Chan, said he bought a copy of the paper as a show of support.

It was such a groundless arrest and suppressed freedom of the press, he said.

The national security law was imposed after massive protests in 2019 challenged Beijing's rule by calling for broader democratic freedoms. It outlaws subversion, secession, terrorism and collusion with foreign countries. The maximum penalty for serious offenders is life imprisonment.

Security Minister John Lee had on Thursday warned other journalists to distance themselves from those under investigation at Apple Daily. He said those arrested had used journalistic work to endanger national security and that anyone who was in cahoots with them would pay a hefty price.

The United States, which has imposed sanctions against Hong Kong and Chinese officials over the crackdown, strongly condemned the arrests and called for the immediate release of the five arrested.

We are deeply concerned by Hong Kong authorities selective use of the national security law to arbitrarily target independent media organizations, State Department spokesman Price said, adding that the suspected foreign collusion charges appear to be politically motivated.

As we all know, exchanging views with foreigners in journalism should never be a crime, he said.

British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said in a tweet that freedom of the press is one of the rights China had promised to protect for 50 years when Britain handed over Hong Kong in 1997.

Todays raids & arrests at Apple Daily in Hong Kong demonstrate Beijing is using the National Security Law to target dissenting voices, not tackle public security, Raab said.

European Union spokesperson Nabila Massrali said that the arrests further demonstrate how the National Security Law is being used to stifle media freedom and freedom of expression in Hong Kong. Media freedom and pluralism are fundamental to Hong Kong's success under the "one country, two systems" framework, she said.

In Beijing, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian rejected the foreign criticism and defended the government's action, repeating China's insistence that the national security targets only a small group of anti-China elements who disrupted Hong Kong and endangered the national security of the country."

No right or freedom, including freedom of the press, can break through the bottom line of national security," Zhao told reporters at a daily briefing.

Hong Kong is Chinas Hong Kong, Hong Kong affairs are purely Chinas internal affairs, and no country, organization or individual has the right to intervene," he said.

Apple Daily has pledged to readers that it will continue its reporting, and on Thursday night invited members of the media to its printing presses to watch its Friday edition roll off the press in a show of commitment.

Its founder Jimmy Lai is currently serving a 20-month prison sentence on charges of playing a part in unauthorized protests in 2019, and faces further charges under the national security law that could potentially put him away for life.

The paper's average daily circulation has been around 86,000 copies.
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP)  A sharply divided Iowa Supreme Court on Friday stopped a lawsuit aimed at reducing the flow of fertilizer and hog farm waste into the state's river and streams, finding that limiting pollution from farms was a political matter and not one for the courts.

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP)  A sharply divided Iowa Supreme Court on Friday stopped a lawsuit aimed at reducing the flow of fertilizer and hog farm waste into the state's river and streams, finding that limiting pollution from farms was a political matter and not one for the courts.

The 4-3 decision handed a significant defeat to environmental groups hoping to get the chance to prove that Iowa should scrap its voluntary farm pollution policy, order new mandatory limits on nitrogen and phosphorous pollution and stop construction of new hog barns.

It is the latest court rejection of an attempt to force the nation's leading corn and pork producing state to clean up farm pollutants from its major rivers that provide drinking water to hundreds of thousands of Iowans.

The lawsuit, which was brought by Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement and Food & Water Watch, contended that unregulated farm pollution is violating the rights of citizens to clean water in the Raccoon River for recreational and drinking water use.

It said a legal concept that precedes Iowa statehood  the public trust doctrine  should apply to this case and require the state to ensure that citizens have a useable Raccoon River untainted by excess pollution caused by farm runoff of fertilizer and animal manure.

A state judge ruled in 2019 that the environmental groups sufficiently demonstrated that they suffered injury because the river's untreated water is too polluted to enjoy recreationally or aesthetically. The state appealed the ruling and asked the court to dismiss the lawsuit.

Four of the court's conservative justices said the environmental groups didn't show that the state's actions had caused a concrete injury the courts could fix. They also said the public trust doctrine historically hasn't been used to solve a problem as complex as the environmental issues raised, and that the issues at the heart of the case were political questions that would fall to the Legislature to settle.

There is not enough here to demonstrate that a favorable outcome in this case is likely to redress the plaintiffs alleged reduced ability to kayak, swim, or enjoy views of the Raccoon River, or would save them money on drinking water. The plaintiffs claims must therefore be dismissed for lack of standing, Justice Edward Mansfield wrote for the majority.

He said the Des Moines Water Works would have better standing to sue, but he pointed out that the utility already did so and lost a 2017 federal court case that was also dismissed.

The utility filed a brief with the state Supreme Court saying it was pursuing the development of alternate sources of water but that its long-range plans involve the implementation of new treatment technologies that would cost customers tens of millions of dollars.

DMWWs decision to invest millions of dollars in treatment infrastructure to contend with nutrient pollution in the Des Moines and Raccoon Rivers should reveal the magnitude of the water quality problem in Iowa," the utility wrote.

The Iowa attorney general's office declined to comment immediately on the ruling.

The plaintiffs said in a statement that they were considering all of their options.

The fight for clean water in Iowa is far from over, they said. Until further action is taken, industrial agricultural runoff will continue to pollute the river unimpeded, and Iowans right to clean water will remain a right without a remedy.

Justices Brent Appel, Christopher McDonald and Dana Oxley would have allowed the environmental groups' case to proceed to trial.

Oxley said the court majority's dismissive characterization of the plaintiffs requested declaratory relief as too general rings hollow. She said if a court struck down the state's current voluntary pollution strategy for farmers, the state could impose mandatory regulations on farmers that would provide relief to the plaintiffs that meets constitutional standards.

The Raccoon River is a 31-mile tributary of the Des Moines River and is a primary source of drinking water for about 500,000 central Iowa customers of the Des Moines Water Works. The utility's nitrate removal system was one of the largest in the world when it was built in 1992.

Iowa is the nations leading pork producer, with about 24 million pigs on farms that discharge billions of gallons of liquid manure into the environment every year. The state also is the nation's leading producer of corn, which requires significant amounts of nitrogen fertilizer to thrive. Iowa also has one of the most elaborate farm field drainage systems, which often dumps excess fertilizer and manure into waterways.
JERUSALEM (AP)  The Palestinian Authority called off an agreement whereby Israel would transfer 1 million doses of coronavirus vaccines to it in exchange for a similar number later this year, hours after the deal was announced on Friday.

A health care worker administers a dose of the Oxford-AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine to a Palestinian man during a vaccination campaign, in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Sunday, June 6, 2021. (AP Photo/Nasser Nasser)

JERUSALEM (AP)  The Palestinian Authority called off an agreement whereby Israel would transfer 1 million doses of coronavirus vaccines to it in exchange for a similar number later this year, hours after the deal was announced on Friday.

The Palestinians said the doses, which Israel began shipping to the occupied West Bank, are too close to expiring and do not meet their standards. In announcing the agreement, Israel had said the vaccines will expire soon without specifying the date.

Palestinian officials had come under heavy criticism on social media after the agreement was announced, with many accusing them of accepting subpar vaccines and suggesting they might not be effective.

There was no immediate comment from Israel, which had largely shut down for the weekly Sabbath.

Israel said Friday it would transfer around 1 million doses of soon-to-expire coronavirus vaccines to the Palestinian Authority in exchange for a similar number of doses the Palestinians expect to receive later this year.

Israel, which has fully reopened after vaccinating some 85% of its adult population, has faced criticism for not sharing its vaccines with the 4.5 million Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and Gaza.

The disparity has played out across the globe as the bulk of vaccines went to wealthy countries. As those countries have made progress containing their own outbreaks, they have recently begun pledging supplies for poorer countries that were left behind for months.

FILE - In this Feb. 23, 2021, file photo, Palestinians take a selfie after receiving the coronavirus vaccine from an Israeli medical team at the Qalandia checkpoint between the West Bank city of Ramallah and Jerusalem. Israel said Friday, June 18, 2021 it will transfer around 1 million doses of soon-to-expire coronavirus vaccines to the Palestinian Authority in exchange for a similar number of doses the Palestinians expect to receive later this year. (AP Photo/Oded Balilty, File)

The new Israeli government, which was sworn in on Sunday, said it would transfer Pfizer vaccines that are close to expiring, and that the Palestinian Authority would reimburse it with a similar number of vaccines when it receives them from the pharmaceutical company in September or October. Up to 1.4 million doses could be exchanged, the Israeli government said in a statement.

We will continue to find effective ways to cooperate for the benefit of people in the region, Foreign Minister Yair Lapid tweeted after the deal was announced.

COGAT, the Israeli military body that coordinates civilian affairs in the occupied territories, said it had coordinated the delivery of the first 100,000 doses to the West Bank on Friday.

The Palestinians portrayed the agreement differently, saying Pfizer had suggested the transfer as a way of speeding up its delivery of 4 million doses that the PA had already paid for in an agreement reached directly with the drug company.

This is not an agreement with Israel, but with the Pfizer company," Palestinian Health Minister Mai Alkaila said earlier Friday, before the deal was called off.

At a press conference Friday evening, she said health officials who inspected the vaccines found they did not meet standards and so we decided to return them.

Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh ordered the cancellation of the agreement and the return of the vaccines to Israel, his spokesman said. Ibrahim Milhim said the Palestinians would not accept about-to-expire vaccines from Israel, citing the official Israeli statement.

Vaccines from Pfizer, authorized in the U.S. in December, typically have a six-month shelf life. It wasnt immediately clear when the 1 million batch that Israel was to give the Palestinians was produced.

An Israeli security official said the batch of vaccines that were transferred on Friday are to expire in two weeks. The official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media, said further shipments were planned in intervals also several weeks ahead of expiration.

Israel has carried out one of the most successful vaccination programs in the world, allowing it to fully reopen businesses and schools. This week, authorities lifted the requirement to wear masks in public, one of the last remaining restrictions.

Rights groups have said that Israel, as an occupying power, is obliged to provide vaccines to the Palestinians. Israel denies having such an obligation, pointing to interim peace agreements reached with the Palestinians in the 1990s.

Those agreements say the PA, which has limited autonomy in parts of the occupied West Bank, is responsible for health care but that the two sides should cooperate to combat pandemics. Israel has offered vaccines to the more than 100,000 Palestinians from the occupied West Bank who work inside Israel, as well as Palestinians in east Jerusalem.

Gaza is ruled by the Islamic militant group Hamas, which is considered a terrorist organization by Israel and Western countries. Israeli officials have suggested linking any supply of vaccines to Gaza to the return of two Israeli captives and the remains of two soldiers held by Hamas.

The PA has said it is acquiring its own supplies through agreements with private companies and a World Health Organization program designed to aid needy countries.

To date, around 380,000 Palestinians in the West Bank and around 50,000 in Gaza have been vaccinated. More than 300,000 infections have been recorded in the two territories, including 3,545 deaths.

Israel captured the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem in the 1967 Mideast war. The Palestinians want a state in all three territories. There have been no substantive peace talks in more than a decade.

Associated Press writers Fares Akram in Cairo, and Isaac Scharf and Areej Hazboun in Jerusalem contributed to this report.
CARSON CITY, Nev. (AP)  Record-breaking heat and historic drought in the U.S. West are doing little to discourage cities from planning to welcome millions of new residents in the decades ahead.

FILE - In this Feb. 9, 2005, file photo, shows the suburbs of Las Vegas from atop the Stratosphere tower looking west down Sahara Ave., towards the Spring Mountains. Despite drought, cities in the U.S. West expect their populations to grow considerably in the coming decades. From Phoenix to Boise, officials are working to ensure they have the resources, infrastructure and housing supply to meet growth projections. In certain parts of the region, their efforts are constrained by the fact that sprawling metro areas are surrounded by land owned by the federal government. U.S. Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto wants to remedy the issue in Las Vegas by strengthening protections for some public lands while approving the sale of others to commercial and residential developers. (AP Photo/Joe Cavaretta, File)

CARSON CITY, Nev. (AP)  Record-breaking heat and historic drought in the U.S. West are doing little to discourage cities from planning to welcome millions of new residents in the decades ahead.

From Phoenix to Boise, officials are preparing for a future both with more people and less water, seeking to balance growth and conservation. Development is constrained by the fact that 46% of the 11-state Western region is federal land, managed by agencies like the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management that are tasked with maintaining it for future generations.

That's led officials in states like Nevada and Utah to lobby the federal government to approve land transfers to allow developers to build homes and businesses on what had been public land. Supporters in the two states have won over environmentalists in the past with provisions that allocate proceeds to conservation projects, preserve other federal lands and prevent road construction, logging or energy exploration.

A small group of opponents is arguing that routinely approving these kinds of swaps to facilitate growth isn't sustainable, particularly in areas that rely on a shrinking water supply.

For the seven states that depend on the Colorado River  Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming  a regional drought is so severe that less water is flowing to Lake Mead and Lake Powell, the two manmade reservoirs where river water is stored.

If the level of Lake Mead keeps dropping through the summer as projected, the federal government will likely issue its first-ever official shortage declaration, which will prompt cuts in the share of water Arizona and Nevada receive.

The predicament is playing out in the Las Vegas area, where environmental groups, local officials and homebuilders united behind a proposal from U.S. Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto that was heard in the Senate this week.

FILE - In this Oct. 11, 2016 photo, a gypsum mine owned by developer Jim Rhodes, who wants to develop housing on the site, is seen in the foreground while the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area is seen in the distance. Despite drought, cities in the U.S. West expect their populations to grow considerably in the coming decades. From Phoenix to Boise, officials are working to ensure they have the resources, infrastructure and housing supply to meet growth projections. In certain parts of the region, their efforts are constrained by the fact that sprawling metro areas are surrounded by land owned by the federal government. U.S. Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto wants to remedy the issue in Las Vegas by strengthening protections for some public lands while approving the sale of others to commercial and residential developers. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Sun via AP, File)

The Nevada Democrat is pushing what she calls the largest conservation bill in state history to designate more than 3,125 square miles (8,094 square kilometers) of land for additional protections  roughly the size of Delaware and Rhode Island combined  and 48 square miles (124 square kilometers) for commercial and residential development, which is about the size of San Francisco.

Some conservationists support the proposal because it would add federal land to the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area for recreation and reclassify some undeveloped parts of Clark County, where Las Vegas is located, and the Desert National Wildlife Refuge as Bureau of Land Management wilderness areas," which carry stronger protections than national parks.

Jocelyn Torres, field director for the Conservation Lands Foundation, said at the Senate hearing Wednesday that the protections would restore lands to more efficiently capture carbon, which would help mitigate rising temperatures.

Our public lands present our best chance to address climate change, our biodiversity crisis and invest in our local communities and economy, she said.

The effort mirrors land management pushes made over the past decade in Washington and Emery counties in Utah to designate wilderness and sell other parcels to developers to meet growth projections. The U.S. Census Bureau reported that St. George, in Washington County, was the nation's fifth-fastest growing metro area last year.

In both regions, affordable housing is among officials' top concerns. Soaring home prices in California have added to a flow of people leaving for nearby states like Nevada, Arizona and Colorado, where open land, lower tax rates and jobs are attracting new residents.

The fast-growing Las Vegas area lacks the housing supply to meet projected population growth. A 2019 University of Nevada, Las Vegas, study that Cortez Masto's legislation references projected the population in Clark County would increase 35%, to 3.1 million residents, by 2060. That spike will be difficult to accommodate without building in existing communities or public lands.

Due to this federal ownership, our options for planning and development are very constrained and require constant coordination with federal agencies, Clark County Director of Environment and Sustainability Marci Henson said.

Growth may stretch an already limited water supply. Water officials support the proposal, which allocates funding to maintaining the channels used to recycle wastewater through Lake Mead. The region has enacted some of the U.S. West's most aggressive conservation measures, including an outright ban on decorative grass in certain places, to prepare for growth.

Last year, water officials projected a worst-case scenario in which consumption patterns and climate change could force them to find other supplies as soon as 2056. Critics say the projections are concerning.

This legislation doesn't have an identified, sustainable supply of water going out 50 years in the future, said Kyle Roerink, executive director of the Nevada-based conservation group Great Basin Water Network. When you couple that with everything that were reading about at Lake Mead and the Colorado River, it's very precarious to be putting forward a bill that invites another 825,000 people to the Mojave Desert.

Southern Nevada Water Authority General Manager John Entsminger said in a statement that the proposal "helps secure the water resources and facilities that SNWA needs to provide reliable and safe water to our customers for decades to come.

When Cortez Masto's proposal was introduced, there was little mention of how water factors into plans for future growth or if the conservation components of the bill could have any impact.

Roerink said the plan's funding allocations for water infrastructure need to be accompanied by additional serious, realistic modeling" of the Colorado River.

When an entity says, Let's go and build some homes in this region,' theres an implication that waters going to be there in perpetuity," he said.

Associated Press reporter Suman Naishadham in Washington, D.C., contributed to this report. Metz is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.

This story was first published on June 18, 2021. It was updated on June 19, 2021, to correct the title of Marci Henson and the spelling of her first name. She is the Clark County director of Environment and Sustainability, not Air Quality Department director, and her first name is spelled Marci, not Marcie.
OTTAWA - Travel restrictions at the Canada-U.S. border will remain in place for at least another month to prevent a fourth wave of COVID-19, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Friday while acknowledging growing frustration with how the issue was being managed.

The border crossing into the United States is seen during the COVID-19 pandemic in Lacolle, Que. on Friday, February 12, 2021. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Paul Chiasson

OTTAWA - Travel restrictions at the Canada-U.S. border will remain in place for at least another month to prevent a fourth wave of COVID-19, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Friday while acknowledging growing frustration with how the issue was being managed.

Measures to limit non-essential international travel have been in place since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020, with the latest extension set to expire Monday.

On Friday morning, the measures got another one-month extension until July 21.

Pressure to relax restrictions is mounting from businesses and politicians on both sides of the border as vaccination rates climb in Canada.

Trudeau said it would take 75 per cent of Canadians getting a first dose and 20 per cent receiving a second before rules can be loosened because a fully vaccinated individual can pass COVID-19 to someone who is not vaccinated.

He said he understood growing impatience from tourism operators and Canadians who want to travel, but the government didn't want to risk another flare-up of COVID-19.

"If we are able to avoid more outbreaks like we've seen in some places across the country, even recently, by delaying a little bit more by keeping people safe  so we're not seeing more people in hospitals, and more people and more families losing loved ones  then that's the right decision," Trudeau said from his Ottawa residence, where he is isolating after a trip to the U.K. to meet with leaders from G7 nations.

The decision garnered immediate criticism from two U.S. congressmen who co-chair the Canada-U.S. Interparliamentary Group.

Western New York Democrat Brian Higgins and Michigan Republican Bill Huizenga decried the lack of transparency around the border talks as a disservice to residents on both sides of the border who want to see loved ones and renew business ties.

"While the arrival of vaccines in record time has been a modern marvel, the inability of the U.S. and Canadian governments to reach an agreement on alleviating border restrictions or aligning additional essential traveller classes is simply unacceptable," the duo said in a statement.

Goldy Hyder, president of the Business Council of Canada, which represents Canada's largest employers, called for a clearly articulated plan to reopen the border safely "so that friends and families can be reunited and businesses can welcome back travellers."

Perrin Beatty, president of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, said the policy should be based on whether a traveller is vaccinated, not on nationality. He noted how France now allows Canadians and Americans to visit, which makes it easier to travel abroad than within this country and to our closest neighbour.

"We are the deer caught in the headlights, unable to move," Beatty said in an interview. "What the government is doing flies in the face of science, of economics and good public policy."

The scenario envisioned, and laid out to premiers during a Thursday night call with Trudeau, would see restrictions gradually eased starting July 21 for fully vaccinated travellers first, said Quebec Premier Francois Legault said.

"Its clear that either you get a double dose of AstraZenca, or double dose of Moderna or Pfizer, or a mix of double doses, (and) you will have access to international flights," Legault said at an event in Laval, Que.

More details on rules for vaccinated Canadians and permanent residents are scheduled to land Monday.

Trudeau said the government plans to have Canadians upload proof of vaccination pictures to the ArriveCan app so border agents can verify someone is fully vaccinated when travelling this summer.

For the fall, Trudeau said federal officials are working with provinces to automatically share vaccination status, which could then be accepted around the world.

He also said the government is working with other countries on ensuring travellers who receive vaccines not approved in arriving countries are still able to safely enter.

"Having to demonstrate that you have been vaccinated has been a standard piece of international travel since international aviation began," said Mike McNaney, president of the National Airlines Council of Canada, in an interview.

"We've been quite supportive of the government coming up with a policy and a mechanism on how it's going to capture that data."

There are yet other issues that need to be addressed, Trudeau said, including what to do about children under 12 for whom vaccines have not been approved. He suggested children could be subject to a repeated testing regime after arrival because having a two-week quarantine away from vaccinated parents may not be possible.

Later Friday, the Federal Court upheld the constitutionality of the federal government's quarantine hotel program, but said the way the measures were imposed on one applicant in the case  who wasn't told where she was going or of her right to a lawyer  violated her charter rights.

The ruling from Chief Justice Paul Crampton said anyone engaging in behaviour that poses a risk to public health cannot expect the law to prevent the state from performing its essential function of protecting citizens.

 With files from Jacob Serebrin and Salmaan Farooqui

This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 18, 2021.
RICHMOND, Va. (AP)  Virginia's road to legalizing simple possession of marijuana has had some twists and turns, so it's not surprising that advocacy groups have been flooded with calls from people trying to understand exactly what will be allowed under state law as of July 1.

A worker holds a cannibis leaf as they trim cannibis plants that are close to harvest in a grow room at the Greenleaf Medical Cannabis facility in Richmond, Va., Thursday, June 17, 2021. The date for legalizing marijuana possession is drawing near in Virginia, and advocacy groups have been flooded with calls from people trying to understand exactly what becomes legal in July. (AP Photo/Steve Helber)

RICHMOND, Va. (AP)  Virginia's road to legalizing simple possession of marijuana has had some twists and turns, so it's not surprising that advocacy groups have been flooded with calls from people trying to understand exactly what will be allowed under state law as of July 1.

Legislators initially voted in February to legalize possession of up to an ounce of marijuana for adult recreational use, but not until 2024, when retail sales would begin. An outcry ensued over the three-year wait before ending pot possession penalties, so in April they voted to move up legalization to this July 1.

Cannabis oil flows into a flask at the Green Leaf Medical Cannabis plant in Richmond, Va., Thursday, June 17, 2021. The date for legalizing marijuana possession is drawing near in Virginia, and advocacy groups have been flooded with calls from people trying to understand exactly what becomes legal in July. (AP Photo/Steve Helber)

Adding to the confusion: lawmakers included a reenactment clause," which means the General Assembly will have to vote again next year on major portions of the law, mainly to establish a regulatory framework for the legal marijuana marketplace.

The process has resulted in some contradictions that may not get resolved until years after legalization begins.

Sen. Adam Ebbin, one of the lead sponsors, said people need to understand the law's limits for now. Possession of up to one ounce (28.3 grams) with no intent to distribute will become legal for adults, 21 and older. Adults will also be allowed to grow up to four marijuana plants per household. But not much else will change.

People still need to be careful  this is not an official open marijuana market, Ebbin said.

Virginia is joining 17 other states with laws allowing adults to possess and consume marijuana. In each one, laws have legalized simple possession before establishing a legal marketplace for buying and selling marijuana, said Jenn Michelle Pedini, the development director for the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws.

Under Virginia's law, buying and selling marijuana will remain illegal until Jan. 1, 2024, when retail sales are expected to begin. Smoking marijuana in public also remains against the law.

Pedini, who is also the executive director of Virginia NORML, said the organization fields questions every day from people who are surprised to learn that selling pot won't be allowed for another three years.

The only legal sale of cannabis in Virginia is through the medical (marijuana) program," Pedini said.

Virginia NORML has a page on its website to answer frequently asked questions and clear up confusion. The state also launched a website to answer questions about the new law.

Although people can legally cultivate marijuana plants beginning July 1, it will still be illegal for anyone to buy cannabis seeds or cuttings needed to grow those plants. That's one of the contradictions bothering Republican Sen. Ryan McDougle, who voted against the legislation.

The biggest inconsistency is you cannot legally buy marijuana for recreational use in the commonwealth of Virginia," McDougle said.

"Under federal rules you can't transport it (into Virginia), but if you have it, you can possess up to one ounce of it in Virginia. How you get that is the inconsistency. You can't legally get it, but you can possess it, he said.

In the original bill, both possession and sales of marijuana would have been legalized in 2024. But many social justice advocates pushed to immediately end the disparate treatment of people of color under existing marijuana laws.

The General Assemblys research and watchdog agency found that from 2010-2019, Black Virginians were 3.5 times more likely than white Virginians to be arrested for marijuana possession, and 3.9 times more likely to be convicted, even though both populations used marijuana at similar rates.

We want to do this the right way, and what that means is ending the disparate enforcement, which is going to make a huge change in the lives of thousands of Virginians," said Alena Yarmosky, Gov. Ralph Northam's spokeswoman. She said the administration also recognizes the reality that people have marijuana now, even though it is illegal in Virginia.

According to New Frontier Datas U.S. Cannabis Report, Virginia had the fourth-largest illicit market last year, encompassing about $1.8 billion, or 3%, of an estimated $60 billion in total illicit sales nationwide.

Because marijuana remains illegal at the federal level and because Virginia needs time to stand-up the regulatory structure for safe sales, it will not be legal to sell seeds or other marijuana until 2024, Yarmosky said.

People will be allowed to share small amounts of seeds with one another, but they can't sell them.

The primary objective of legalization is to reduce criminalization and then to regulate safe legal access, so we're checking one box, but we're not checking the other this year, Pedini said.

Pedini said may states have expedited adult access to marijuana through their medical marijuana dispensaries, something advocates hope Virginia lawmakers will vote to do in 2022. Most people arent going to grow cannabis, but most people who will want to participate in the adult use market will prefer to do so through a legal avenue, Pedini said.
A weeklong search for a Manitoba man suspected in the homicide of his missing neighbour ended Friday with shots fired at police in Ontario during his arrest.

A weeklong search for a Manitoba man suspected in the homicide of his missing neighbour ended Friday with shots fired at police in Ontario during his arrest.

"When we heard that the (Ontario Provincial Police) had this residence surrounded, our entire team was holding their breath," Manitoba RCMP Supt. Michael Koppang said at a news conference.

Eric Paul Wildman is seen in an undated police handout image. Manitoba RCMP say a man wanted for a homicde in has been arrested near Belleville, Ont. THE CANADIAN PRESS/HO-RCMP, Sgt. Paul Manaigre, *MANDATORY CREDIT*

Mounties had been scouring Manitoba for Eric Wildman, 34, for nearly a week. There had been credible sightings of him renting a vehicle at the Winnipeg airport and at city hardware stores.

The search had expanded to the area near the Ontario boundary after a sighting of a suspect vehicle.

Then tips started to come in from east of Toronto more than 2,000 kilometres away.

"It was a heck of a long drive in a fairly short period of time," Koppang said.

A vehicle with a matching description and licence plate was spotted at a residence just outside Belleville, Ont., on Thursday night.

Ontario Provincial Police Sgt. Kerry Schmidt said police surrounded the home.

"Upon entering, they were met with gunfire coming from the residence," Schmidt said in a video posted online.

Schmidt said crisis negotiators were eventually able to get the two men inside to surrender. One of the men arrested was Wildman. RCMP said the other was his "associate."

Mounties said they believe the home was always Wildman's destination.

"We are very grateful there were no injuries in this situation as it could have been a very violent encounter," Schmidt said.

Wildman is a suspect in the homicide of Clifford Joseph, 40, who was his neighbour in rural Manitoba. Joseph has been missing since June 7. He was last seen leaving his home in the Rural Municipality of St. Clements, north of Winnipeg.

RCMP later found his truck abandoned in a rural area. Investigators have said there is evidence he was the victim of a homicide.

Mounties had warned that Wildman was armed and dangerous and could have clothing and gear resembling that used by police. Officers found police tactical equipment, patches and other items resembling officer uniforms when they searched his vehicle on Sunday.

Koppang said Mounties are still searching Wildman's vast rural property.

Fire crews were called to a blaze on the property last month. Fire Chief Mark Sinclair said the fire had taken over the home, a garage, a workshop and more than 40 nearby vehicles.

"The spread was fairly fast due to winds and high temperatures," Sinclair said.

It took four hours to put out and the cause of the blaze remains unknown, he said.

Images supplied by RCMP from their search of the land showed burned-out vehicles and other debris.

Koppang added Friday that despite an extensive investigation, there is no evidence to show that the disappearance of another missing man in the area is linked to this case.

Vernon Karl Otto was reported missing in 2018. His burned-out truck was found, but Otto has not been located.

Both Otto and Joseph had lived in the same house at different times and were Wildman's neighbours.

Wildman was being transported back to Manitoba.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published on June 18, 2021.

Note to readers: This is a corrected story. A previous version said Wildman was missing.
HALIFAX - Responding to complaints from an Indigenous girl and her mother, the Nova Scotia government has scrapped a high school correspondence course that asked students to list the advantages of the residential school system.

The Kamloops Residential School is photographed using a drone in Kamloops, B.C., Monday, June, 14, 2021. Responding to complaints from an Indigenous girl and her mother, the Nova Scotia government has deleted a section from a high school correspondence course that asks students to list the positive attributes of the residential school system. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jonathan Hayward

HALIFAX - Responding to complaints from an Indigenous girl and her mother, the Nova Scotia government has scrapped a high school correspondence course that asked students to list the advantages of the residential school system.

Malaika Joudry-Martel and her mother shalan joudry  a Mi'kmaq poet who writes her name with lowercase letters  were reviewing the chapter on First Nations on Wednesday when the 15-year-old warned her mother that some of the content in the English course was racist.

One assignment asked students to list in chart form the benefits and disadvantages of being placed in a residential school.

"I just froze," joudry said in an interview Friday from her home on the Bear River First Nation.

"I thought, no, we removed this years ago from the Canadian curriculum .... That activity makes it seem as though there could be a balance, that there are advantages to that legacy."

The 170-page course offered other "passively racist" content, she said, including questions asking why poverty, alcoholism and unemployment are common among First Nations populations.

Given the recent reports from Kamloops, B.C., where Tk'emlups te Secwepemc First Nation discovered what are believed to be the remains of 215 children at the former residential school there, it's impossible to associate anything good with that system, joudry said.

"What is surprising is that in 2021, course material approved by the minister of education and sent to my daughter  a Mi'kmaq student  was encouraging her to talk about the advantages of these schools," she said.

"When I read those questions, it does not look like they are asking the students to be critical thinkers. What this is doing is reinforcing negative stereotypes."

On Wednesday, she posted excerpts from the course on her Facebook page. Education Minister Derek Mombourquette confirmed Friday that he called the family Thursday to apologize for the hurtful content, and he committed to reviewing all correspondence courses to ensure no similar material exists.

"I will apologize to the Mi'kmaq community and the larger Indigenous community across Canada," the minister said in an interview from Cape Breton, where his electoral district includes the Membertou First Nation.

"I have reached out to a number of Mi'kmaq leaders since this took place .... As minister of education, I'm reaffirming my commitment to ensure ... that our education system is truly reflective of our history and the culture of the Mi'kmaq in Nova Scotia."

There were 74 other students in the course, which has been offered with the existing content since 2003, the minister said.

Mombourquette said he was devastated when he saw joudry's Facebook post.

"I really want to thank them for coming forward with this," he said. "It does not reflect what our curriculum is in Nova Scotia. We take the recommendations of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission very seriously."

The commission's final report in 2015 documented the cruel history and legacy of the schools, concluding they were devoted to "cultural genocide." As well, the commission compiled a list of 4,100 students who died of disease or accident while attending one of the church-run, government-sponsored schools, which operated for 120 years.

In all, about 150,000 First Nations, Inuit and Metis children attended the schools. For those Indigenous families who resisted the system, children were forcibly taken by the RCMP. The 130 schools became infamous as places where many students suffered emotional, physical and sexual abuse.

They were also known for overcrowding, poor sanitation, unhealthy food and menial labour. Harsh punishment was meted out for those who spoke their native language or took part in traditional rituals.

"There's still work to do to educate the educators," joudry said. "What's disturbing to my 15-year-old daughter is that there are other students who now have this misinformation running around in their minds in 2020, 2019 and so on."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 18, 2021.
OTTAWA - Canada's attempt to narrow the list of First Nations children who can access services under Jordan's Principle is linked to the country's long-standing "racist and colonial" policies toward Indigenous Peoples, lawyers argued in Federal Court Thursday.

Two hundred and fifteen lights are placed on the lawn outside the Residential School in Kamloops, B.C., on June, 13, 2021. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jonathan Hayward

OTTAWA - Canada's attempt to narrow the list of First Nations children who can access services under Jordan's Principle is linked to the country's long-standing "racist and colonial" policies toward Indigenous Peoples, lawyers argued in Federal Court Thursday.

Questions about who is considered a First Nations child, and whether this should include children living off-reserve, those who are not registered under the Indian Act and those with just one Indigenous parent, are at the heart of the arguments being debated over the final two days of a week of related legal proceedings.

The answers will be key to future interpretations of Jordan's Principle, a rule stating that when governments disagree about who is responsible for providing services to First Nations kids, they must help the child first and argue over bills later.

Assembly of First Nations lawyer Stuart Wuttke told the court Ottawa's attempts to overturn a decision by the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal that expanded eligibility for Jordan's Principle ignores that Canada cannot unilaterally define Indigenous identity.

He argues Canada is trying to limit the number of children who can access medical and child-welfare services under Jordan's Principle for monetary reasons, and is using the "racist" Indian Act and its "colonialist" custodianship of Indian status to try to achieve this.

"This judicial review is another blatant attempt to avoid the provisions of medical and social services to First Nations children  through a narrow application of Jordan's Principle," Wuttke said.

"In a twist of irony, Canada takes exception to the fact the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal would not endorse or sanction Canada's attempt to limit the effect of Jordan's Principle  to the detriment of First Nations children  through the application of racist law, namely, the Indian Act."

The Indian Act gives the federal government authority to issue "Indian status" to Indigenous people that meet certain criteria. Those who qualify can access a number of federal programs and services, including child-welfare and medical care.

The arguments stem from a CHRT ruling delivered last year that spelled out what groups of children are eligible to receive services through Jordans Principle. It came after a number of disputes over how to define First Nations identity for the purposes of Jordan's Principle. It ultimately expanded previous eligibility to include children living off-reserve, even without Indian Act status, who are recognized as citizens by their nation. Children with just one parent with Indian status were also deemed eligible.

But Ottawa's lawyer, Robert Frater, argues the tribunal applied too broad a definition of who is a First Nations child.

He told Federal Court Justice Paul Favel Canada had already taken a "liberal" view when it came to which groups of First Nations children could be eligible for Jordan's Principle. For example, it did not demand that children be on-reserve at all times  for example students studying off-reserve  and included children who did not live on reserve but faced the same barriers to obtaining services because of their Indian Act status.

"The impact is each of these children, and their parents, will be able to claim the statutory maximum compensation, including the maximum amount on the basis that Canada was wilful and reckless," Frater argued, referencing a separate compensation decision by the tribunal.

That ruling, which Ottawa is also appealing, ordered the government to pay $40,000 each to First Nations children, as well as to each of their parents or grandparents for "wilfully and recklessly" discriminating against children living on reserves by not properly funding child and family services.

Frater argues the tribunal overstepped its authority in widening eligibility for Jordan's Principle in an attempt to right the wrongs of the Indian Act.

He noted the complaint brought to the tribunal was about whether Canada was discriminating against children living on reserve, and argues the tribunal only had jurisdiction to assess discrimination against that group of people.

"The complaint, respectfully, does not give the tribunal a roving commission to right all wrongs," Frater told the court.

"This is a definitional issue in this hearing. It's not to determine whether there is discrimination generally against any child in Canada  We simply ask you, as a reviewing judge, to say, 'You went a step too far here, tribunal.'"

Lawyers will wrap up their arguments in the case on Friday.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 17, 2021.
THE timing of the provinces rushed request to nursing colleges to submit proposals on increasing their respective admissions as fast as possible has sparked widespread speculation.

THE timing of the provinces rushed request to nursing colleges to submit proposals on increasing their respective admissions as fast as possible has sparked widespread speculation.

"The nursing shortage is nothing new," said Lynda Balneaves, an associate professor of nursing at the University of Manitoba, adding it applies to both practising professionals and nurse educators. "In fact, even four or five years ago, the alarm bells were being rung."

Last month, the provincial government put out a request to the schools to create draft plans on increasing enrolment of future nurses. It was made clear the province wants an additional 200 seats in Manitoba, and funding will be provided to support scale-ups.

Schools were then given four days to turn over blueprints.

The call came 14 months into the COVID-19 pandemic, during a third wave that has stretched a health-care system to its limits, and amid contentious bargaining talks. The Manitoba Nurses Union membership has since voted overwhelmingly in favour of taking strike action.

Advanced Education Minister Wayne Ewasko was not made available for an interview on the subject Thursday.

In a lengthy statement, Ewasko said the province called for proposals on expanding nursing programs  and did not mandate expansion  because nurses are in high demand now more than ever, both locally and worldwide.

"The province will often reach out to our post-secondary institutions to work on addressing a labour market need," Ewasko said. "It is our belief that the increase of nursing training seats in our post-secondary education system will increase the supply of Manitoba nurses."

The plan "feels more like a mirage," said MNU president Darlene Jackson.

"If the government actually wants to make a difference in our future, they need to deal with the issues on the table that would make Manitoba a desirable place to practise nursing," Jackson said in a statement Thursday.

During a U of M senate meeting, school president Michael Benarroch spoke Wednesday about the proposal scenario being "atypical" and addressed the fact some staff were "very nervous" because of the quick turnaround required.

Faculty in the nursing college have expressed frustration they were not consulted on the draft put forward, which includes major scheduling changes they say could affect educational quality and research time, among other things.

Benarroch said internal processes will be followed before anything is approved.

"They have told us that they want to make resources available and that they want to be targeted to a specific area, which is nursing. Thats something I think were going to see a lot more (of)," he told the senate.

The Manitoba Organization of Faculty Associations put out a news release Thursday condemning the provinces request as an ironic "back-of-the-napkin plan," drawn up after years of post-secondary budget cuts and political interference in school autonomy.

"Weve been in a crisis position for a long time and just trying to dump on 200 new nursing students, its really not getting at the root of the problem," said Orvie Dingwall, vice-president of the organization and a health sciences librarian at U of M.

Complex issues, ranging from nurses working without a contract to work/life balance concerns, are impacting retention, said Balneaves, who has heard firsthand about the front-line stresses her students have faced during the COVID-19 pandemic.

In her view, widespread collaboration between health-care stakeholders, nursing educators included, is required to discuss how to expand seats while ensuring quality education. She suggested one option is developing an intensive second-degree nursing program at the U of M.

maggie.macintosh@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @macintoshmaggie
Greg Ftoma locked his doors and took the key out of the console of his truck Wednesday night for the first time, and for good reason.

Greg Ftoma locked his doors and took the key out of the console of his truck Wednesday night for the first time, and for good reason.

Ftoma owns Brereton Lake Resort, 40 kilometres east of Whitemouth, where a suspected killer, deemed armed and dangerous, was spotted Wednesday driving eastbound on Highway 44 in a grey Chevy Equinox he had rented at the airport on June 11.

Eric Paul Wildman in an undated police handout image. THE CANADIAN PRESS/HO-RCMP, Sgt. Paul Manaigre

Mounties descended in droves on the rural area that includes the popular Whiteshell Provincial Park  normally quiet cottage country.

"Until they catch him, Ill keep my doors locked," Ftoma said of alleged killer Eric Paul Wildman.

Wednesday night, Ftoma's daughter saw 10 or 12 RCMP vehicles between the resort and the nearby town of Elma, some positioned at road intersections.

Officers from across southern Manitoba and special units including major crimes investigators, emergency response tactical officers and senior critical incident commanders are on the scene, RCMP said. The force's air services, which includes planes and helicopters, are part of the manhunt, as are police dogs. The Ontario Provincial Police are working closely with RCMP  Whitemouth, where Wildman was last seen, is about 75 kilometres northwest of the provincial border.

Wildman, 34, is wanted in the disappearance of Clifford Joseph, 40, who rented a property next to Wildmans in the RM of St. Clements near Stead, about 70 kilometres northeast of Winnipeg. Officers recovered guns, ammunition, police tactical equipment, clothing patches and other items resembling police clothing while executing a search warrant of the vehicle last Sunday. They said he may have more police equipment.

Wildman, described as 6-2, 170 pounds with blue eyes, is suspected of killing Joseph, who was last seen on Road 44 East in the RM of St. Clements early June 7. His body has yet to be found and no motive for the crime has been released.

An old friend who grew up with Joseph on Lake Winnipeg described him as a kind, family man.

SUPPLIED Clifford Joseph, 40, was a working-class commercial fisherman according to friends.

"I want Cliff to be remembered as a person who mattered. As a father," the friend said. She asked that her name not be used because the suspect remained at large.

Joseph worked for much of his life as a commercial fisherman, having learned the trade from his father, and he raised his daughter on his own. He smoked goldeye and had a good sense of humour.

"He was a good-hearted Metis man who learned the traditional ways of fishing and being on the land," the friend said. "He had a good heart, he was very caring and very giving."

While Joseph's alleged killer is still at large, RCMP have been fairly tight-lipped about their investigation.

Royal Military College professor Christian Leuprecht shed light on police tactics in the search for an armed and dangerous suspect, in an interview with the Free Press Thursday.

"Youre going to go to his bank and get production orders on his credit card, on his bank card. Hes going to get a wiretap warrant on his phone. Youre probably also going to apprise areas where he might be sighted, especially gas stations and the like," said Leuprecht, a policing and security expert who has long studied the RCMP.

"Eventually, people leave an electronic footprint somewhere. That tends to tip off authorities."

Leuprecht said if it's suspected Wildman has ditched the vehicle and is travelling on foot, RCMP would likely conduct infrared searches over the area by plane.

The expert added RCMP are at an advantage as a national police force, with strict training standards, including on the use of long guns, and significant resources. However, a search for an armed and dangerous suspect has inherent risks.

"Whenever youre chasing someone who is a murder suspect, it becomes a problem in the sense that  if hes killed once, theres a risk hell kill again," Leuprecht said.

"It becomes a different type of search in that sense. Any time that person is sighted somewhere, let alone is sighted by a Mountie or another police officer, theres a risk that if they engage, that person might kill again. It means that the search has to take extra precautions. That means the proper body armour, C7 rifles."

RCMP/HANDOUT Police-related items seized from Eric Wildman's vehicle.

The prairie director of the National Police Federation, which represents RCMP officers, said the force's cops are particularly fit for rural and remote searches based on their training and experience.

But, director Bobby Baker, a nearly 25-year RCMP veteran with experience in front-line policing and major crimes investigations, said there are concerns over officer safety in serious armed events.

"Ensuring that they have other officers nearby with backup at hand. That they would have the equipment available, that they have leadership for decision making," he said, adding investigations like the search for Wildman are staffed and resourced differently than day-to-day operations.

 with files from Malak Abas

erik.pindera@freepress.mb.ca
Summer day camps for kids will be permitted and school-age children will be able to return to child care as of July 1, Families Minister Rochelle Squires announced on Friday as the province reported four deaths and 189 new COVID-19 infections.

Summer day camps for kids will be permitted and school-age children will be able to return to child care as of July 1, Families Minister Rochelle Squires announced on Friday as the province reported four deaths and 189 new COVID-19 infections.

"We know that a parents ability to work may be dependent on the availability of child care," Squires said.

"I would like to acknowledge Manitobas early learning and child-care sector, and all Manitobans, for their flexibility to adapt to the advice from our public health officials as we continue to navigate this pandemic."

Summer day camps will open with cohort sizes of 20 children, Squires said. At this time, there are no changes to the sizes for licensed child care facilities (30 children).

Deputy chief provincial public health officer Dr. Jazz Atwal said day camp programs will only be an option for families with children 11 and under who do not attend licensed child-care facilities.

"Were providing this information today to allow sites and parents to begin planning," Atwal said. "More details will follow next week as new public health orders are finalized.

"This will help alleviate some of the pressure on licensed child-care facilities."

On Friday, Manitoba reported the deaths of four more people.

The province said a Winnipeg woman in her 30s infected and with an unspecified variant of concern, a Winnipeg woman in her 60s and a Winnipeg woman in her 80s infected with the Alpha (B.1.1.7) variant of concern and a woman in 60s from the Prairie Mountain Health infected with the Alpha variant, have died.

On Friday, new infections were reported in all health regions, including 87 in Winnipeg, 38 in the North, 23 in Southern Health, and 19 in both Interlake-Eastern and Prairie Mountain Health.

RUTH BONNEVILLE / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS FILES Summer day camps will open with cohort sizes of 20 children. There are no changes to the sizes for licensed child care facilities (30 children).

On Thursday, 2,122 COVID-19 tests were processed by laboratories.

The five-day test positivity rate in both Winnipeg and provincewide was 8.3 per cent.

To date, 130 Delta (B.1.617.2) variant cases have been reported by the province.

"The (Delta) variant, in particular, has a potential to be more transmissible and have more severe impacts on individuals," Atwal said, adding that work is underway to incorporate the mutated virus into pandemic projections.

Atwal said due to data transmission errors, previously identified cases of the Delta variant were not reported on the provinces dashboard.

Those cases were manually entered on Thursday, Atwal said.

"This has not affected how public health has monitored or managed each one of these cases and work is now underway to address the technical issue," Atwal said.

A total of 258 Manitobans were hospitalized with COVID-19 as of Friday, including 80 people in intensive care. Twenty of those patients were being treated out of province (19 in Ontario and one in Alberta).

The province said 1,115 Manitobans have died of COVID-19. One death was removed from the count due to a data correction, the province said.

The death was a woman in her 80s from Winnipeg health region and linked to the alpha variant of concern and the outbreak at Seven Oaks General Hospital (3U4-7). The death was reported June 16.

"Despite the declining case numbers over the past week, we expect hospitalization and ICU numbers to remain high," Atwal said.

fpcity@freepress.mb.ca
A number of large forest fires have blazed across Manitoba so far this year.

A number of large forest fires have blazed across Manitoba so far this year.

Since March 22, 103 fires have broken out in the province  77 of which were human-caused, 21 were due to natural occurrences, and five are still under investigation. Manitoba logged 149 fires in 2020.

Firefighting crews have been rushed in from British Columbia, Ontario and Quebec to assist local forces in their efforts. As of Friday afternoon, the infernos had scorched some 712,000 acres of land  just over half the area of Prince Edward Island.

An abnormally dry spring created dangerous conditions for wildfires in the province. Southern regions were "severely dry to extremely dry" in March, April and May, according to the Manitoba Drought Monitor.

There is some good news, said Rob Paolo, a retired Environment Canada meteorologist and volunteer climate observer.

"Southern Manitoba has received some good precipitation in June," he said. "Last week, we received quite a substantial amount."

It should help dampen fire conditions in the south, but the Interlake region remains parched.

"Since April 1, theyve only had 50 to 80 millimetres of precipitation, which is about 50 per cent of normal," said Paolo.

Combined with sustained dryness leading up to spring, that puts the region in a drought of a severity seen just once every 10 to 20 years, he said.

To quench the area and quell wildfires, Paolo suspects 100-150 mm of rain would need to fall. Thats not impossible, but the trend doesnt look good, he said.

By far the provinces largest fire this year continues to burn in the Interlake near Gypsumville, 36 days after it first sparked. It currently covers almost 510,000 acres.

It provides a startling reminder how quickly a wildfire can spread given the right conditions. While on most days, growth was minimal, the fire expanded some 445,000 acres in three days (May 17-19).

On May 19, more than 750 people from five Manitoba First Nations communities  Lake St. Martin, Little Saskatchewan, Pinaymootang, Skownan, and Dauphin River  evacuated the area due to smoke. Canadian Red Cross spokesman Jason Small said the relief organization supported the evacuation, but the communities carried out the operations themselves and residents had returned by May 23.

In connection with the Gypsumville blaze, conservation officers charged a landowner with failure to take precautions to keep a fire under control under the Wildfire Act, after a debris fire restarted, according to a news release from the province last week.

The provinces wildfire program has a budget of $49 million, but actual costs vary based on the severity of the fire season, said a spokesman from the Manitoba Wildfire Service.

 with files from Kevin Rollason

cody.sellar@freepress.mb.ca
While on probation for sexually assaulting a young girl, Patrick Sinclair lured another dozen teen girls online, pushing them to pose nude for him and perform sex acts.

While on probation for sexually assaulting a young girl, Patrick Sinclair lured another dozen teen girls online, pushing them to pose nude for him and perform sex acts.

This week, a judge sentenced the 27-year-old Manitoba man to five years in prison.

Sinclair pleaded guilty last year to internet luring, extortion, and making and distributing child pornography  a five-year long stream of crimes provincial court Judge Alain Huberdeau described as "shocking and chilling."

Huberdeau rejected an eight-year sentence recommended by the Crown as too high, saying evidence Sinclair lived with intellectual disabilities and "deficits," as well as his Indigenous background, "tempered" his moral culpability.

"I also find his (culpability) remains at a level which requires that a meaningful period of custody be imposed," he said.

Huberdeau also cited the current pandemic as a factor in rejecting the higher sentence.

"Given that Manitoba appears to be the epicentre of the third wave of the pandemic, I also find it important to consider the effect of COVID-19 on Mr. Sinclairs sentence," Huberdeau said.

"There have been and continue to be documented outbreaks in the prison population," resulting in the suspension of prison visits, access to counselling and programming and other services, he said. "The impacts of COVID have made prison life much more difficult for inmates."

Sinclair was sentenced in October 2015 to two years supervised probation in connection to his molestation of a preteen girl. By that time, he had been luring children online for nearly 3 1/2 years, behaviour that would continue until his arrest in October 2017.

Sinclair contacted the victims, all but one of whom lived in the United States, through online chat groups before moving to Skype, where he secretly recorded them as they gave in to his sexual demands.

According to an agreed statement of facts provided to court, Sinclair threatened to post nude pictures of one victim online if she did not submit to his demand for more pictures, sending her a picture he had secretly taken of her, including all her social media contact information, to bolster his threat.

Sinclair made a similar threat to another victim, who contacted police in the U.S. The girl provided police with Sinclairs first name and said he was from Winnipeg. Investigators ultimately traced his IP address to his rural Manitoba home.

Police seized Sinclairs electronic devices, which were found to contain 80 pornographic images of the victims and 37 videos. Police were ultimately able to identify only four of the 12 girls, the youngest of whom was 13.

Court heard Sinclair has never held a job, and has lived a "reclusive" life in his foster parents rural Manitoba home.

"Hes never been incarcerated before and his disorders may make him more vulnerable to exploitation, while also presenting barriers to treatment while in custody," Huberdeau said.

dean.pritchard@freepress.mb.ca
OTTAWA  The Trudeau government has unveiled $2.6 million for groups that help Manitobans addicted to meth.

OTTAWA  The Trudeau government has unveiled $2.6 million for groups that help Manitobans addicted to meth.

"I will always say it takes too long for money to get into the community when these issues present themselves," said Michael Payne, head of the Nine Circles Community Health Centre.

Parliamentary hearings into the meth crisis in Winnipeg and other cities wrapped up two years ago. In June 2019, a committee of MPs called for better psychiatric care and programs to provide uncontaminated meth to drug users and help them gradually wean off the drug.

Since then, the Liberals have offered funding for programming targeted at people addicted to opioids, with some grants that can be used to tackle the meth crisis.

"Obviously, COVID has intervened. We have done our best to address that crisis, but also attending to the meth crisis and the opioid crisis," said Winnipeg Liberal MP Terry Duguid.

On Thursday, he announced $6.7 million for 13 projects across Canada dealing specifically with meth.

That includes five projects in Manitoba, including one to provide clean meth pipes in Pine Falls and Selkirk. Other projects involve analyzing provincial health data and expanding Klinics mobile one-month detox program.

Early in the pandemic, city police said opioids took over from meth as the drug of choice.

Violent attacks against hospital staff became less common, after border restrictions raised the cost of meth components to beyond the price of opioid combinations, such as purple heroin.

Experts say treating meth and opioid usage requires different supports, as opioids are generally more deadly but there are fewer drugs to wean people off a meth addiction.

Payne said the federal funding is flexible enough to get at the issues that drive drug usage.

"Drug-use patterns change all the time," said Payne, whose centre on Broadway serves people downtown and in Point Douglas.

"All services need to be able to respond to a range of drug uses, and need to be able to pivot and move."

The Pallister government is reluctant to fund harm-reduction projects, leaving Ottawa less focused on recovery programs.

Payne said hes waiting to hear from the city on how services such as libraries and heating centres can accommodate drug users.

"Were hopeful that that may bridge the gap in some of the federal and provincial perspectives on harm-reduction," he said.

dylan.robertson@freepress.mb.ca
OTTAWA  Canadas top judge says a committee advising the government on how an independent panel should review possible wrongful convictions could broaden its work, to help courts prevent injustices in the first place.

OTTAWA  Canadas top judge says a committee advising the government on how an independent panel should review possible wrongful convictions could broaden its work, to help courts prevent injustices in the first place.

"If the committee and the elected officials can provide measures that would avoid in the future, as much as possible, wrongful convictions, I would support that," Chief Justice Richard Wagner said Thursday, in response to questions from the Free Press.

"Of course, (with) wrongful convictions, one is too many."

The Trudeau government has pledged to establish an independent panel to rectify wrongful convictions, similar to ones that exist in Britain and New Zealand.

That promise came after decades of advocacy by David Milgaard, the Winnipeg man who served 23 years in prison for a 1969 murder in Saskatoon that he didnt commit.

Earlier this month, two former judges appointed by Justice Minister David Lametti launched consultations on how such a panel should work. That includes its mandate, which might go beyond solely hearing cases from prisoners who feel theyve been wrongly sentenced.

Milgaard said hed be open to the panel having such a role.

"The present process that is being used in Canada is failing everybody so miserably," he said in a Thursday interview.

"Its not producing justice, its keeping people held in prison that dont belong there."

Milgaard suggested botched convictions might be avoided with tighter standards around eyewitness identification and confessions. He argues sting operations produce dubious evidence, and could be effectively banned.

He said once Canadians are convicted, its hard to get their case reviewed.

Under the current process, Justice Department officials, whose colleagues are often involved in the original prosecutions, are involved. Prisoners are often denied parole until they admit guilt, while police tend to investigate alleged police wrongdoing.

"Those rules are there to basically keep (convicted) people from going into a solution, until the system itself has a way to circle the wagons and defend itself, so (officials) are not held responsible," Milgaard said.

"Theyre holding people hostage in situations when they have evidence that shows they should be released immediately and exonerated."

Meanwhile, Wagner said courts should keep some of the virtual adaptations they were forced to implement for the COVID-19 pandemic, but not all of them.

"Canada cannot have a completely virtual justice system. Poverty is a real issue in Canada, so is the absence of reliable internet."

Wagner added criminal and family trials are particularly sensitive, and some provincial courts have reported people undermining decorum by appearing virtually while doing errands.

"Unacceptable delays pre-existed this pandemic. So we cannot blame the pandemic for everything," he said.

dylan.robertson@freepress.mb.ca
A man who was out on bail after being arrested in a drug raid last month has become the city's 16th homicide victim of the year.

A man who was out on bail after being arrested in a drug raid last month has become the city's 16th homicide victim of the year.

Adam Albert Laforrest, 33, of Winnipeg, died in hospital after being assaulted at Main Street and Dufferin Avenue Wednesday afternoon.

Adam Albert Laforrest, 33, died after being assaulted at Main Street and Dufferin Avenue on Wednesday.

A woman on social media expressed sorrow about Laforrest's death.

"Nooo pls Adam Laforrest why did u have to leave?" said Melaine Duke, a mother of four children.

"I love you so much. You were my one and only love. Im so sorry. Why did you have to leave me and the kids. What am I gonna do without you?"

Laforrest was arrested for firearm and drug offences on May 2 as part of a sweep of several locations by the guns and gangs unit and tactical support team.

Two of the locations were at an Exchange District hotel, another was at a residence in the Norberry neighbourhood, while a fourth was a storage locker in Inkster Industrial Park.

The raids found more than 668 grams of methamphetamine, about nine grams of cocaine, a loaded 12-gauge shotgun, and more than $8,000 in cash.

Laforrest was charged with several offences, including possession of a prohibited device or ammunition, possession of a firearm knowing its possession was unauthorized, and tampering with the serial number of a firearm.

Another man was also charged and two women face charges in connection with the raid.

Laforrest received a 60-day sentence after being convicted for committing an indecent act in a public place in 2017.

Carla Bridgette Duck, 38, of Winnipeg, has been charged with manslaughter in connection to Laforrest's death. She has been detained in custody, according to police.

Duck has a previous record, with her most recent conviction in 2013 for a minor assault and breaches of court orders which landed her a sentence of one year of supervised probation.

Police are asking anyone with information about the homicide to call investigators at 204-986-6508 or Crime Stoppers at 204-786-TIPS (8477).

fpcity@freepress.mb.ca
Premier Brian Pallister's government would be facing a "catastrophic" reckoning at the ballot box if an election was held tomorrow.

Premier Brian Pallister's government would be facing a "catastrophic" reckoning at the ballot box if an election was held tomorrow.

A new Free Press / Probe Research poll indicates support for the province's governing party is plummeting, as the Tories now trail the NDP by nearly 20 percentage points.

The parties have been on opposite trajectories during the last two years; when the PCs won a second majority government in September 2019, they were at 47 per cent support and the New Democrats were at 31 per cent. Today, the NDP has a commanding lead at 47 per cent of decided voters; the PCs are at 29 per cent.

The gap is even wider in voter-rich Winnipeg, where leader Wab Kinew's NDP has 55 per cent support, compared to the Tories' 22 per cent.

"To see, provincewide, the NDP at 47 per cent and PCs at 29 per cent, these could be considered catastrophic numbers for a governing party," said Christopher Adams, adjunct professor of political studies at the University of Manitoba.

With the city and surrounding area home to the majority of the population  and 32 of the legislature's 57 seats  the NDP would have a majority if an election were held now.

Pallister's PCs have dropped from 32 per cent support in Winnipeg in September, to 30 per cent in December, to 27 per cent in March to 22 per cent in June.

While the Tories have enjoyed pockets of support in some well-to-do areas such as Tuxedo, they're in trouble across most of the city.

"The PCs would be shut out in Winnipeg," said Adams.

The next provincial election has to occur by Oct. 3, 2023.

The notion that support for the government will soar once the pandemic lifts and the economy recovers is looking less likely, said Probe Research president Scott MacKay.

"We've got a long time before the next election, so this isn't yet over, but the more I start seeing these kind of numbers, the more I wonder how much of a comeback would you really need to get out of this mess?" he said Thursday.

"It's really looking bad."

The government's director of media relations and issues management declined to comment on the survey results.

"Our governments present focus is on Manitobas pandemic response and recovery," Blake Robert wrote in an email.

Kinew said the only poll that matters is election day, but offered a theory for the survey results putting his party ahead by a wide margin.

"I think it reflects how Manitobans are frustrated with the pandemic, but then there are other issues, too, like the nurses' strike and Bill 64 (the Education Modernization Act) and hydro rates going up," he said Thursday.

"There's been so many areas where the government under the PCs has lost touch with what the average person out there is thinking and what they want."

The Tories aren't offering what most women in Manitoba want, the survey shows.

Just 21 per cent of women provincewide  and only 13 per cent in Winnipeg  would vote PC right now. The New Democrats have the support of 55 per cent of women provincewide and 64 per cent in Winnipeg.

Health care is a major concern with women, who are watching as Premier Brian Pallister's austerity measures result in intensive-care patient transfers to other provinces and overwhelmed nurses voting to strike, says Probe Research president Scott MacKay. (Mike Deal / Winnipeg Free Press files)

"You're not going to win an election unless you get a strong proportion of women in the electorate supporting you," said Adams, pointing to past results here and in Saskatchewan.

"When the NDP loses the support of women, they don't win. We're seeing the opposite  not only are the NDP gaining back ground, they're overwhelmingly winning ground from women voters."

Health care is a major concern with women, who are watching as government austerity measures result in intensive-care patient transfers to other provinces and overwhelmed nurses voting to strike, MacKay said.

"They might have believed in the early days  when there was no pandemic  that these changes might be worth it and there may be some fat in the system," he said. "But I think now no one's really believing this."

Click to Expand The methodology The Probe Research Inc. survey of a random and representative sampling of 1,000 adults in Manitoba was conducted from June 2 to 11. The survey results are plus or minus 3.1 percentage points of what they would've been if the entire adult population had been surveyed with 95 per cent certainty. Poll question: If a provincial election were held tomorrow, which party's candidate would you most likely support? Even though you have not decided whom you would vote for, is there nonetheless a provincial party's candidate that you think you might want to support or are currently leaning toward? Source: Probe Research Inc.

Even in the Tories' traditional rural stronghold, their support is slipping. Just 40 per cent of voters said they'd likely vote PC, down from 50 per cent in March. In June, 35 per cent of rural voters expressed support for the NDP, up from 32 per cent in March.

MacKay said he wonders why there's been silence from the PC caucus about their sinking numbers.

"Often when a party is under this much pressure, there's something that happens inside the party, and there's some kind of revolt as there was with (former NDP premier Greg) Selinger," he said. "Somebody comes onto the scene and starts to sort of make noise or the caucus starts to make noise, and we haven't really seen this yet."

MacKay suggested the quiet could hurt some MLAs' chances re-election, including some who suddenly find themselves vulnerable in city ridings.

"There will be guilt by association," he said.

"I just wonder how long you can hold on for, with this kind of thing, before somebody has to step up and say, 'You know, the emperor has no clothes. We have to move on.'"

carol.sanders@freepress.mb.ca
Iranians are voting for a new president . Judiciary chief Ebrahim Raisi, a hard-line protege of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei who is under U.S. sanctions, is the front-runner to replace Hassan Rouhani.

A bear attacked four people, barged onto a military camp and disrupted flights at an airport in Sapporo, Japan. It was later shot and killed.

The Progressive Conservatives are facing catastrophic numbers for a governing party," a poll by Probe Research for the Free Press shows.
WHEN the province announced that $100 million was earmarked to accelerate school construction, we noted a lack of discussion regarding sustainability requirements for these new schools. Sustainable Building Manitoba is concerned that this is a missed opportunity to build long-term resilience into our schools and move forward on Manitobas Green Plan.

Opinion

WHEN the province announced that $100 million was earmarked to accelerate school construction, we noted a lack of discussion regarding sustainability requirements for these new schools. Sustainable Building Manitoba is concerned that this is a missed opportunity to build long-term resilience into our schools and move forward on Manitobas Green Plan.

It appears that these new schools will have minimal obligations to meet any significant level of energy efficiency or support the provinces greenhouse-gas reduction targets. As a result, they are out of step with the provinces own Climate and Green Plan. This runs contrary to the mandate letter from the premier to the responsible minister, Reg Helwer, minister of central services, that states:

"We will complete the construction of 20 new schools to provide better environments for our children to learn. We will deliver our Made in Manitoba Climate and Green Plan to achieve our vision of the cleanest, greenest and most climate resilient province."

We are concerned that these many millions of dollars will not be used with the best interests of Manitobas students, the environment, or taxpayers in mind.

A well-built school will still be in operation 100 years from now. Climate science tells us we must stop using fossil fuels in 20-30 years. If our infrastructure today is not built to the highest sustainability standards, we will have to spend vast sums to retrofit these new schools in the near future to adapt to the requirements of the future. We will effectively be building these schools twice.

This is sad, because we know how to build sustainable schools in Manitoba. Less than a decade ago, Manitoba designed some of the most energy-efficient schools on the continent and we were viewed as leaders. Indeed, in 2017 a Manitoba school was given the Greenest School in Canada Award. Under the Green Building Policy enacted by the province in 2007, 11 high performance sustainable schools were constructed in Manitoba. These schools use an average of 50-70 per cent less energy per year compared to conventional designs. A preliminary report suggests that just four of these new-generation green schools save 484 tonnes of carbon per year.

The primary objective of any school is to provide an environment that optimizes learning outcomes for our kids and a healthy workplace for staff. Green schools significantly improve the four elements for increased student performance in classrooms: better temperatures, lighting, acoustics and ventilation. With increased natural light, better air quality and superior temperature control, green schools deliver results. In a number of studies, green schools improve student health, which results in less absenteeism due to a reduction in asthma, colds and flu. This means childrens grades improve because they are more awake throughout the day due to year-round fresh air. Today, in light of COVID-19 and our new understanding of airborne pathogen transmission, we recognize the importance for all new schools to have exemplary fresh-air systems.

Yes, a green school will cost up to five per cent more to construct, but they are designed to be durable and last 100 years. Over their lifetime, they are estimated to save 30-40 per cent on operating and maintenance costs. Construction costs typically represent only 10 per cent of the total life-cycle costs of a building. This means that the $100 million in construction costs used to build low-quality schools will actually cost $1 billion over the life of the building. If we invest $5 million more up front for smart, green design, we can save at least $300 million over the functional life of a school. This is a sound investment for Manitoba taxpayers.

Why would we not take advantage of this tested green school technology? It cant be about saving taxpayers money. It is not due to a lack of technical skill or experience. It is not because we dont understand the importance of fresh air for health and learning.

It can only be short-term thinking and a lack of concern for the future.

It shows a lack of concern for students, teachers, and taxpayers. It even disregards the provinces own climate promises. While the federal government announces a further reduction in carbon emissions to 40-45 per cent, Manitoba is poised to build more inefficient schools heated by natural gas, which will continue to add more carbon to the atmosphere and cost taxpayers hundreds of millions more than necessary.

We implore this government to seize this opportunity and build high-performance, net-zero, all-electric green schools. This approach ensures more cost-effective schools for taxpayers and healthy learning environments for our children and grandchildren.

Dudley Thompson is chair of the advocacy committee of Sustainable Building Manitoba, a cross-sector building industry-based organization with a commitment to working with government and business to achieve the vision of a "Sustainable built environment in Manitoba."
OTTAWA - The National Advisory Committee on Immunization said Thursday people who got the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine as their first dose should get Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna for their second shot.

Workers unload a shipment of the Moderna COVID19 vaccine at the FedEx hub at Pearson International Airport in Toronto on Thursday, May 20, 2021. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Cole Burston

OTTAWA - The National Advisory Committee on Immunization said Thursday people who got the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine as their first dose should get Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna for their second shot.

On June 1, NACI had said AstraZeneca recipients "could" get Pfizer or Moderna for their second shot if they wanted, but Thursday went further to say an mRNA vaccine was the "preferred" choice.

"Since NACI first looked at mixed vaccine schedules, new evidence is starting to emerge suggesting immune responses are better when a first dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine is followed by an mRNA vaccine as a second dose," said NACI vice-chair Dr. Shelley Deeks, in the new guidance documents.

NACI also updated its previous recommendation that people at high risk of exposure to, or serious illness from, COVID-19, could opt to get AstraZeneca rather than waiting for Pfizer or Moderna. Now NACI says everyone should always get the mRNA vaccines first, unless they are allergic to them.

Deeks said the advice is based on the growing supply of Pfizer and Moderna, and the risk of vaccine-induced blood clots associated with AstraZeneca. But she is still trying to reassure people who got one or two doses of AstraZeneca's vaccine that they are nevertheless well protected.

"Anyone who has already received two doses of AstraZeneca/Covishield can rest assured that they are protected, particularly against severe illness," she said. "There is no need for a third dose at this time."

Dr. Theresa Tam, the chief public health officer of Canada, said the new evidence in favour of mixing different types of vaccines included four studies in Germany.

"It's really the immunogenicity, that immune response, after that mixed-dose schedule that's resulted in NACI updating this recommendation, because all the accumulated studies essentially suggest that immune response is a better response," said Tam at a news conference in Ottawa.

One of those studies from Germany's Saarland University, published early data Wednesday saying giving Pfizer as the second dose after AstraZeneca, or two doses of Pfizer only, generated far more antibodies and T cells as two doses of AstraZeneca.

The mixed-dose schedule was slightly better than two doses of Pfizer at producing the neutralizing antibodies and killer T cells that are critical to preventing infection or serious illness.

Quebec was not moving to follow NACI's advice. Health Minister Christian Dube, who got two doses of AstraZeneca himself, said Quebec is still saying people can opt for a mixed schedule or two doses of AstraZeneca, depending on their personal choice.

Almost 25 million Canadians have now received at least one dose of vaccine, and almost six million are now fully vaccinated.

As of June 5, 2.1 million people had received one dose of AstraZeneca, and 15,186 had received two doses.

Canada has received 56 reports of blood clots following an AstraZeneca vaccination, and 38 are now confirmed as vaccine-induced thrombotic thrombocytopenia, or VITT.

There are no further shipments of AstraZeneca currently scheduled, but there are about 600,000 doses still left from previous deliveries.

There are 14 million doses of Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna being delivered this week and next, including a donation of one million doses of Moderna's COVID-19 vaccine from the United States that was to arrive in Canada Thursday night.

The donation won't cost Canada anything, and will be on top of the 44 million doses Canada has purchased directly from Moderna.

It comes less than a week after Canada promised to donate 13 million doses to the COVAX vaccine-sharing alliance, which will entirely come from the remaining share of doses Canada had purchased from COVAX itself.

Canada has been heavily criticized for buying three times as many doses of COVID-19 vaccine than it needs and not sharing any doses from its own direct purchase agreements with vaccine makers. The World Health Organization has made repeated pleas for wealthier countries to share more doses with developing countries, some of whom have vaccinated very few people at all.

Canada expects to have fully vaccinated 75 per cent of all eligible Canadians  everyone over the age of 12  by the end of July, and has administered 78 doses for every 100 Canadians. Across Africa, nations have given out three doses for every 100 people.

"Taking vaccines at a time when we are nearing complete vaccination when many developing countries are so far behind makes Canada a vaccine hoarder and leaves Canadians vulnerable to dangerous variants," said NDP health critic Don Davies.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 17, 2021.
One day last week, somewhere in what must be a daily crush of meetings and reading and work to lead Manitobas mass vaccination efforts, Dr. Joss Reimer found some time to speak directly to a handful of church congregations in southern Manitoba.

One day last week, somewhere in what must be a daily crush of meetings and reading and work to lead Manitobas mass vaccination efforts, Dr. Joss Reimer found some time to speak directly to a handful of church congregations in southern Manitoba.

In the session, held over the video-conferencing app Zoom and inspired by meetings between church leaders and the provinces vaccine task force last month, pastors from Steinbach and Morden asked Reimer questions on behalf of their flocks. For nearly 40 minutes, Reimer answered with the same clear-spoken calm shes known for in news conferences.

She explained how the vaccine came to be developed and approved so quickly, but still with the same strong safety guardrails in place. She explained how we know the vaccines are safe for pregnant women, how the vaccines dont use any cells from aborted fetuses, and why its important to get vaccinated even if youve had COVID-19.

"I think its a wonderful way for communities to support each other," said Reimer, who grew up in Winkler. She later added a gentle, personal appeal: "I really want us to all do this together."

This discussion is one of many Reimer has held with groups across Manitoba, and people are listening. Pastors shared the video of this session with their congregations; by Thursday, the video had over 3,500 views, a robust figure for such a demographically targeted discussion about vaccines and public health.

RUTH BONNEVILLE / FREE PRESS FILES Last month, pastors from Steinbach and Morden asked Dr. Joss Reimer questions on behalf of their flocks.

There is, clearly, interest in what Reimer has to say, especially when space is created for her to speak the most directly to a community, to close the distance between those at the top of the provinces vaccine machinery and those who are trying to sift through a torrent of debate and opinion, trying to sort it all out.

So I thought of that video again on Wednesday, when Reimer turned this focus to a different community. Early in that days vaccine news conference, Reimer spoke about how the province is working to support vaccination for temporary foreign workers, many of them labourers from Latin American countries.

"We have heard that some employers are not supportive of their workers getting vaccinated," she said. "So I want this to be very clear: that you do not need the permission or the support of your boss to get the vaccine."

Then, speaking in deft Spanish, she spoke directly to those workers, repeating the same information. It was a remarkable moment, a living example not only of the value of linguistic diversity in the provinces top leadership, but also of the power and potential of reaching directly across barriers.

What that moment, and the outreach Reimer and others have done in southern Manitoba, should remind us is this: to get out of the pandemic, to get to a point where we can relax more restrictions, rebuild social and community life and protect the health system, we need to get the vast majority of Manitobans vaccinated.

"We have heard that some employers are not supportive of their workers getting vaccinated. So I want this to be very clear: that you do not need the permission or the support of your boss to get the vaccine."  Dr. Joss Reimer

And to get the vast majority of Manitobans vaccinated, we ought to remember how this mess started.

Its strange to remember now the way we went into the pandemic, the way each day of March 2020 churned with a mix of confusion and apprehension and the sense that the rug of everything familiar had just been yanked out from under us. But I do remember the little stories of hands reaching out to lift others up.

We told some of those stories in this paper. Many more happened out of the spotlight. There were the folks who checked in with isolating neighbours. The people who delivered groceries to seniors or even total strangers. The Facebook groups that sprang up to connect people with helpers, under the motto "were in this together."

Over time, the urgency of that community networking fell away. Manitobas first wave was, in comparison to other jursidictions, little more than a trickle. After that we learned to live with the pandemic, as chief public health officer Dr. Brent Roussin often says, and when cases surged there was often more frustration than communal spirit.

In the midst of that tension, it was easy for loud voices to draw a great deal of attention. There were rallies against restrictions, and self-styled experts vociferously posting vaccine misinformation on social media, though it remains unclear whether the noise they generate is proportionate to their actual influence.

MIKAELA MACKENZIE / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS FILES The vaccination and observation space at a pop-up community vaccine clinic.

Surely, those who sow misinformation can do a great deal of damage. And there are communities, both geographic and demographic, in which vaccine uptake is lagging. But as Manitoba looks to beat back COVID-19 one shot at a time, it may very well prove that the barriers to uptake were not so very high, or so difficult to overcome.

You can see those barriers being chipped away now, all around the province.

They were being chipped away one morning this week at the Oak Tables community outreach hub in Osborne Village, where a vaccine clinic put shots in the arms of some of Winnipegs most vulnerable people. They were being chipped away with every information session, and every new way and place to get a vaccine.

In January, when a vocal group of mask opponents held a small rally in Steinbach, that city was briefly held up as ground zero of Manitobas fight against COVID-19 misinformation, but ever since a vaccination supersite opened there in mid-May, appointments have been booked solid, and the regions vaccination rate is steadily climbing.

Or, consider the instructive example set this week, when the province opened a pilot walk-in clinic at its Leila Avenue supersite. On the second day of the walk-in, it had given out all 1,761 earmarked doses in just two hours; the next day, more than 100 people were already waiting in line by 7:30 a.m., 90 minutes before it even opened.

Getting Manitobans vaccinated, it turns out, may simply come down to those points of connection that helped get us through the pandemics beginning.

The province acknowledged the "overwhelming response" to the walk-in, which was open for both first and second doses. On Thursday, it said more of them will be coming.

Getting Manitobans vaccinated, it turns out, may simply come down to those points of connection that helped get us through the pandemics beginning. Talking to friends, family and neighbours. Reaching across linguistic and cultural barriers. Making the vaccine widely available and convenient to get at all times and in all areas.

It doesnt actually matter why people get vaccinated. It doesnt matter what road they took to arrive at that decision, or what concerns they had before they did. It only matters that, in the end, as many of us as possible choose to roll up our sleeves, and join in the steady march of getting our province to herd immunity.

Were getting closer, fast. To go all the way, maybe we, like Reimer, just have to meet people where theyre at.

melissa.martin@freepress.mb.ca
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP)  Ethiopias leaders in closed-door talks with a European Union special envoy earlier this year said they are going to wipe out the Tigrayans for 100 years, the envoy said this week, warning that such an aim looks for us like ethnic cleansing.

FILE - In this Thursday, May 27, 2021 file photo, Finland's Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto speaks with the media in Lisbon. A European Union envoy says Ethiopias leaders told him in closed-door talks earlier this year that they are going to wipe out the Tigrayans for 100 years. The envoy, Pekka Haavisto, Finland's foreign minister, says such an aim looks for us like ethnic cleansing. Haavisto spoke in a question-and-answer session Tuesday, June 15 with a European Parliament committee. (AP Photo/Armando Franca, file)

NAIROBI, Kenya (AP)  Ethiopias leaders in closed-door talks with a European Union special envoy earlier this year said "they are going to wipe out the Tigrayans for 100 years," the envoy said this week, warning that such an aim "looks for us like ethnic cleansing."

The remarks by Pekka Haavisto, Finland's foreign minister, describing his talks with Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and other ministers in February are some of the most critical yet of the Ethiopian government's conduct of the conflict in Ethiopias northern Tigray region. They came in a question-and-answer session Tuesday with a European Parliament committee.

Ethiopias foreign ministry dismissed Haavistos comments as "ludicrous" and a "hallucination of sorts or a lapse in memory of some kind."

Haavistos special adviser, Otto Turtonen, told The Associated Press that the envoy "has no further comment on this matter."

For months, Haavisto has served as the EU's special envoy on Ethiopia. In February he said he had "two intensive days in substantive meetings" with Abiy  the Nobel Peace Prize winner in 2019  and other "key ministers" about the growing humanitarian crisis in Tigray, where thousands of civilians have been killed and famine has begun in a region of some 6 million people. Ethiopian and allied forces from neighboring Eritrea have been accused of atrocities while pursuing fighters supporting Tigray's former leaders.

It is not clear from Haavistos remarks this week which Ethiopian officials made the comments about wiping out ethnic Tigrayans.

"When I met the Ethiopian leadership in February they really used this kind of language, that they are going to destroy the Tigrayans, they are going to wipe out the Tigrayans for 100 years and so forth," the envoy said.

"If you wipe out your national minority, well, what is it?" Haavisto added. "You cannot destroy all the people, you cannot destroy all the population in Tigray. And I think thats very obvious, that we have to react, because it looks for us like ethnic cleansing. It is a very, very serious act if this is true."

In comments shortly after those February meetings, Haavisto had warned that the crisis in Tigray appeared to be spiraling out of control.

The United Nations human rights office has said all sides in the conflict have been accused of abuses, but witnesses have largely blamed Ethiopian and Eritrean forces for forced starvation, mass expulsions, gang rapes and more.

Haavisto's remarks emerged as Ethiopia prepares to vote in a national election on Monday, the first major test at the polls for Abiy as he seeks to centralize power under his Prosperity Party.

Abiy was awarded the Nobel a year after he took office and introduced dramatic political reforms while sidelining Tigray leaders who had dominated Ethiopias government for years in a coalition with other ethnic-based parties. Months of growing tensions between Abiys government and Tigrays ruling party followed, and the prime minister in November accused Tigray forces of attacking a military base.

The EU and the United States have been outspoken about Tigray, with the U.S. last month announcing it has started restricting visas for government and military officials of Ethiopia and Eritrea who are seen as undermining efforts to resolve the fighting.

The U.S. earlier this year asserted that ethnic cleansing is occurring in western Tigray. The term refers to forcing a population from a region through expulsions and other violence, often including killings and rapes.

"It is critical that leaders within the EU are raising the alarm bell," Human Rights Watch researcher Laetitia Bader told the AP. "There is now ample evidence of widespread atrocities having been committed against civilians in Tigray. ... But so far the international response is nowhere near matching the magnitude of the crisis."

She called on the EU to take "further concrete steps, bilaterally and in international fora, to prevent further atrocities and human suffering."
Eric's sister, who was 8 years old when he died, witnessed the shooting and its aftermath.

She must now relive the trauma each time someone asks if she has siblings, which is followed by questions about what happened to Eric, Kandice Cole said.

Ron Cole said it wasn't worth it to try to explain the pain of losing a child.

"This sentence is not going to be enough, in my opinion," he said.

Beatty apologized to the family and said he prayed they would forgive him.

"I wish I could change this for you, turn back time or have never bought the gun in the first place," he said. "I still feel the same sorrow in my heart that I did on Aug. 5."

Eric Walker, Beatty's manager at McDonald's and personal friend, said Beatty is a man of "noble character" who is always willing to help others.

He recalled an instance when Beatty volunteer to bring jumper cables to a new employee who was having car trouble one cold day.

"I would plead for leniency," Walker said. "The community has lost a bright light. We will never know how bright that light could have shined. But I don't believe it serves society to dim another light."
Wampanoag, a chick that hatched May 12 at Crane City, added to that number. Whooping crane pair Sunflower and Alec laid two eggs this year at Zoo New Englands Stone Zoo in Massachusetts, which contacted Boardman, the species survival plan coordinator for whooping cranes. The zoo is one of the programs exhibit locations but doesnt hatch or raise the birds, Boardman said, so ICF identified alternative homes for them.

Theres a lot of logistical details that have to get worked out in placing eggs, and we actually have a weekly call  and sometimes more than that  across all the breeding centers just to update everybody on whos laying what eggs and whos where, so that we can identify these homes for birds, she said.

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One went to Baraboo, the other to Virginia, she said.

While egg transfers are common for ICF, this was Stone Zoos first successful one, though Sunflower and Alec have laid fertile eggs in the past, according to Kim Allen, a lead zookeeper there. In a statement to the News Republic, she said she flew to Wisconsin with the egg in a portable, temperature-controlled incubator which she monitored throughout the flight.
There doesnt seem to be an end to right-wing crackpots spewing wild conspiracy theories and misinformation to anyone who will listen. Rational thinking tells me most Republicans grit their teeth and roll their eyes when yet another of their party reveals their stupidity.

The most recent example is Rep. Louie Gohmert, (R-Tex.) who, during a June 8, National Resources Committee hearing, seriously asked Jennifer Eberlien, an associate deputy chief at the U.S. Forest Service, a question that has to be heard to believed. Its available on video at several websites, including nbcnews.com.

The topic was climate change, and Gohmert asked, And we know theres been significant solar flare activity. And so, is there anything that the National Forest Service or BLM [The Bureau of Land Management] can do to change the course of the moons orbit or the Earths orbit around the sun? Obviously, that would have profound effects on our climate.

To Eberliens credit, she didnt choke or laugh out loud. She did smile, though, and replied, I would have to follow up with you on that one, Mr. Gohmert.
Disorderly conduct  At 5:49 p.m. June 5, a caller reported a man behind a business in the 300 block of South Spring Street who was shutting off the gas. The man was taken to jail for disorderly conduct and bail jumping.

Disorderly conduct  At 1:55 a.m. June 6, a caller reported two men were arguing at a bar in the 200 block of Front Street. They were having a verbal argument and nothing physical occurred. They were separated.

Intoxicated driver  At 5:16 p.m. June 6, a caller reported an intoxicated woman at a gas pump in the 1300 block of North Spring Street. She was arrested.

Disorderly conduct  At 10:26 p.m. June 6, a caller reported a man and woman were in an argument in the 500 block of Madison Street and that the man punched the woman. The woman denied being hit. The man attempted to run and broke fence boards in the area. The man was released to a responsible party.

Unwanted person  At 1:28 a.m. June 7, a caller reported a man was intoxicated and refusing to leave a bar in the 500 block of Madison Street. The man was taken to jail.
Mark asked Somers if he noticed any differences in Lori after a car crash she was in, and he said no. The topic of Loris drinking came up during the conversation. Somers said he did not know he was being recorded.

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Somers testified that he and Lori had met four times in person. He said Lori did not exhibit depression immediately before she died and indicated she was ready to leave Mark at a moments notice

He said he did not attend Loris funeral and has not visited her grave. He does not have the letters she sent him.

Sabrina Groom and Gerald Halverson, who were married in the 1980s, previously lived in an apartment in the Bringe household after Groom was hired for a housekeeper and nanny position. Groom said when she first got the job, Mark and Lori were happy and smiling. Mark was polite and generous, she said. Then, over time, Lori became more quiet and distant, and Mark became less sociable as well.

Groom eventually left the job after Mark was frustrated about her job performance. She said the home environment got weirder and weirder by the day. She said she did not know a conversation she had with Mark about her job performance was being recorded.
When many kids were running around playing tag or video games, Chanda Prescod-Weinstein was thinking about particle physics.

After her mother took her to see "A Brief History of Time," Errol Morris' 1991 documentary about theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking, she fell in love with the discipline. She was just 10 years old.

Nearly 30 years later, she is the first Black woman to hold a tenure-track faculty position in theoretical cosmology as an assistant professor at the University of New Hampshire. Prescod-Weinstein is one of the country's few core faculty members of both physics and women's and gender studies departments at a higher institution.

In her new book, "The Disordered Cosmos: A Journey into Dark Matter, Spacetime, and Dreams Deferred," Prescod-Weinstein invites readers into the universe as she sees it -- and as a self-described queer agender Black woman, she sees it differently than many people.

Her book chapters -- including "The Physics of Melanin," "Black People Are Luminous Matter" and "The Anti-Patriarchy Agender" -- show her focus "at the intersection of astrophysics and particle physics" and at the intersection of physics and Black feminist thought and anti-colonial theory.

Her book is a tour of particles like quarks and leptons, as well as the axions that Prescod-Weinstein specializes in, but it also explores the various structural oppressions that affect who gets to study and discover them -- and even who gets to name those discoveries.

She points to terms like WIMP -- weakly interacting massive particles -- and its relative MACHO, or massive astrophysical compact halo objects, as examples. "You can tell that physicists love an acronym," she wrote, "and that the physicists who came up with WIMP and MACHO were almost certainly men."

Women and people of color, she notes, are routinely left out of histories of science, despite their important role in the progress that White men are credited with making. Prescod-Weinstein asks us to consider how science would be different if scientists were from more diverse backgrounds, and if it incorporated Indigenous scientific knowledge and voices.

We spoke to Prescod-Weinstein about her ideas and her hopes for future scientists.

This conversation has been lightly edited for clarity.

CNN: The subtitle of your book combines dark matter, space-time and dreams deferred. How do those three things intersect for you?

Chanda Prescod-Weinstein: I'm a dark matter expert, and so of course, the dark matter -- an invisible form of matter that we believe comprises 80% of the universe -- is going to figure into it in some big way. And dark matter exists in this larger context of space-time, which is how Einstein's theory of relativity requires us to think of space and time, as existing in relationship with each other.

I also wanted to be honest that this was going to be part of the larger social context and not just the larger physical context. That larger social context is dreams deferred. That is both a comment on the social issues that I raise in the book, but also a comment on having to raise the social issues.

CNN: How so?

Prescod-Weinstein: "Dreams deferred" refers to a suite of poems by Langston Hughes, about the Black experience under White supremacy in America and in all of its facets, and that there are still limits on how we live. One of the things that attracted me to particle physics and particle physics as a career path when I was 10 years old was that it seemed so far away from the problems that my parents were confronting.

When I was a young person dreaming of particles, it was never my dream to write a book about popular science that also problematizes how science happens. And yet here I am doing this work.

CNN: Tell us more about your parents and how their work influenced you.

Prescod-Weinstein: I had a political vocabulary that was maybe a little bit unusual for a kid who was interested in physics. My parents were both political organizers. I was raised by a Black feminist thinker who was also doing Black feminist organizing. She was spending a lot of time dealing with the problem of the way poverty is criminalized in the United States. I was also at points going to picket lines with my father, who was a union organizer and, at one point, a union officer. I was seeing a lot of bad things, and I was hearing a lot of bad stories.

Particle physics just made it seem like there is a universe out there, and life isn't just about what's messed up on our little planet. And that was really exciting -- that maybe there was a way to get away from the bad stuff.

But it turned out that it wasn't just my job to do the things in physics that excite me, but to think about what I was doing in a larger social context and the impact of my work on the larger community.

The question that I'm interested in, ultimately, is how can we be in good relations with each other and what is the role that scientists play in what kinds of relationships we have with each other? But also: What is the role that particle physics and cosmology can play in promoting good relations?

CNN: You note that White people sometimes find the term "dark matter" scary and foreboding, and that for terms like that and others, "a Black feminist physicist working in the 1960s would never have used this language." How would such terms be different if scientists had been and were now a more diverse group?

Prescod-Weinstein: My biggest pet peeve around the phrase "dark matter" is that it's not a good name for it, because it misrepresents the properties of the thing. It's not dark; it's actually invisible.

The thing about a question like yours is that it's speculative fiction. At the time that dark matter got its name, there were almost no Black men and literally zero Black women with a doctorate in physics. So, we have no idea. It would be another 40 years between when dark matter got its name around 1933, and when Willie Hobbs Moore got her doctorate in physics in 1972 at the University of Michigan; she was the first African American woman to earn a doctorate in physics.

But it's an interesting question to ask, and I think it's one that we have to ask, knowing that there never actually will be a clear, definitive answer. And at the same time, we have to grapple with these alternative futures that were foreclosed because of White supremacy, because of patriarchy.

CNN: Can you give an example of someone whose future in physics was curtailed because of White supremacy?

Prescod-Weinstein: Elmer Imes was the second African American to earn a doctorate in physics, which he did at the University of Michigan in 1918. His work as an experimentalist actually played a really important role in providing evidence for quantum mechanics. When you're situating the history of how quantum mechanics came to be accepted as a correct model for physical reality, Elmer Imes should be part of that story.

The way that students of physics typically learn the history of the field is through anecdotes that their professors told them during class and through anecdotes that are littered throughout their textbooks. But Black people have our own community historians, like Dr. Jami Valentine Miller, the first African American woman to earn a doctorate in physics from Johns Hopkins University. She runs African American Women in Physics and has been keeping track of Black women who have a doctorate in physics and related areas. A lot of these stories get transferred through oral communication, even if no one has been given the opportunity to write it up for a publication.

I think publishers have a really big role to play here when writing their quantum mechanics textbooks. I think that we are long overdue for a history of Black people in American physics.

CNN: Would having more physicists who look similar to you have made a difference in your path?

Prescod-Weinstein: I talk in the book about meeting Nadya Mason, an incredibly accomplished condensed matter experimentalist at University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, who is also a Black woman. She shares my heritage: one Black, non-Jewish parent and one White Jewish parent. Meeting Nadya was incredibly important for me, but we were both the kinds of students who got into Harvard. This kind of representation is particularly helpful for the chosen few. But if you have a situation where you're living in a bubble of a chosen few, effectively the power relations are unchanged. Yes, it is important to see examples. But if those examples are exceptions, then you have a problem.

I don't want to undercut the significance of my accomplishments, because I know that I have worked hard and that I have overcome barriers. I also know that as a light-skinned woman who has a Harvard degree, I experienced less racism because of my appearance.

I don't think that representation or diversity and inclusion necessarily bring us to material change that actually changes those power relations. What we need are a different set of power relations.

CNN: You talk about making the "night sky accessible" to all children. What does that mean to you?

Prescod-Weinstein: It starts with a very simple question: How do we create the conditions so that every child has access to a dark night sky and the opportunity to sit and wonder underneath it? It has very deep implications, because that requires thinking about public transportation and how people get access to dark night skies. It requires thinking about pollution and whether dark night skies continue to be possible. And it has to do with thinking about patriarchy: making it safe to be out under a darkening sky.

It has to do with making sure that parents aren't working 80-hour weeks because their jobs don't pay a living wage. It's about making sure that everyone has access to good health care, to clean water, to food, because it is hard to just enjoy and wonder when you are either being poisoned or when you are hungry.

At the end of the day, even though I have pretty extensive critiques of the scientific community, at heart I'm still a scientist who is really passionate and excited about the fact that we can use math to describe the universe. It's such an incredible thing that it starts with learning to count when you're a toddler and ends with being able to describe to my students how gold is made in stellar explosions.

Each generation is tasked with doing the work of trying to push the boundaries further into freedom. I find myself hoping that someone from the next generation will actually get to live my dream, which is enjoying learning about the universe and telling its stories, without being distracted by racism, transphobia and other forms of oppression.

Correction: An earlier version of this story incorrectly referred to Willie Hobbs Moore's accomplishment. She was the first African American woman to earn a doctorate in physics.
The planet is trapping roughly double the amount of heat in the atmosphere than it did nearly 15 years ago, according to new analysis from NASA and NOAA.

Here's what you need to know to Get Up to Speed and On with Your Day.(You can also get "5 Things You Need to Know Today" delivered to your inbox daily. Sign up here.)

1. Affordable Care Act

The Supreme Court has dismissed a challenge to the Affordable Care Act brought on by Republican-led states. The justices decided that the opponents in this case, who urged justices to dismiss the entire 2010 law, weren't actually harmed by ACA provisions because Congress has reduced the penalty for failing to buy health insurance to zero. This was the third major challenge to the landmark healthcare reform law, and while the decision has preserved the ACA for now, there will undoubtedly be more Republican challenges. One such lawsuit is currently brewing in Texas, in which a group of individuals and businesses are arguing that an ACA provision requiring insurers to offer certain free preventative services is unlawful. About 31 million Americans have health coverage through the Affordable Care Act.

2. Juneteenth

Juneteenth is now officially a federal holiday. President Joe Biden signed a bill into law yesterday commemorating June 19, 1865, the day slaves in Texas were told of their emancipation. Juneteenth is the first holiday to be approved since Martin Luther King Jr. Day, which was established in 1983. Since Juneteenth falls on a weekend this year, some state government offices may be closed today in observance. Juneteenth gained wider recognition following the wave of racial justice activism last summer. While many have welcomed the new holiday, other nationwide issues related to race and equality are still being met with division. Congress is all but stalled on police reform legislation, debates are roiling about teaching critical race theory in schools, and several states have passed or are trying to pass laws threatening the voting rights of underserved communities.

3. Coronavirus

The Biden administration has announced it will invest more than $3 billion for the discovery, development and manufacturing of Covid-19 antiviral medicines, like a pill someone could easily take at home early in an illness. Meanwhile, the US is still trying to reach a goal, set by President Biden, of at least partially vaccinating 70% of the adult population by July 4. Experts continue to sound the warning of possibly dangerous consequences if the US doesn't meet such thresholds. In Indonesia, hundreds of health workers have been sickened with Covid-19 even though they received the Sinovac vaccine, raising even more questions about the efficacy of some vaccines against more infectious variants.

4. Iran

Voters are heading to the polls today in Iran for a controversial election that is all but guaranteed to deliver a hardline president after all the other serious contenders were barred from the race. The practically uncontested frontrunner is Ebrahim Raisi, a close associate of Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Raisi lost a 2017 election and has headed the country's judiciary for the last two years. He emerged as the likely victor after an election supervisory body barred his main rivals from the race in a widely criticized move. If he wins, Raisi and his government will have to confront an economic crisis exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic, calls for constitutional reform and growing questions around the succession plans for Khamenei, 81, who is the final arbiter of all Iranian affairs.

5. China

A coronavirus outbreak in a powerful shipping region in China could end up snarling holiday shopping, even though the holidays are half a year away. Last month, authorities in the southern Chinese province of Guangdong -- home to some of the world's busiest container ports -- canceled flights, locked down communities and suspended trade along its coastline to bring a rapid spike in Covid-19 cases under control. Things have improved, but the shipping damage is already done. The shutdown created a huge backlog of shipping containers and vessels waiting to dock. This congestion has led major shipping companies to warn clients of delays, changes to vessel routes and destinations and spikes in fees. The whole situation could take months to clear.

BREAKFAST BROWSE

Vacation home sales spiked during the pandemic

Some people bought houseplants. Other people just bought ... more houses.

New England Aquarium honors woman's 38-year-old ticket

It's never too late to see the fish!

A mannequin is going to the moon, and you can help NASA name it

It's currently being called a "moonikin" and frankly, that's going to be hard to top.

This disgusting 'house from hell' is listed for $600,000 ... and getting multiple all-cash offers

The real estate agent said "you can feel the smell." Looking at the pictures, she's definitely right.

Murder hornet' found near Seattle is the first US sighting in 2021

No! No more scary bugs! Go back to 2020 where you belong!

TODAY'S NUMBER

26%

That's how much of the American TV viewer's diet is spent on streaming services like Netflix and Hulu. That's still less than cable, which accounts for about 39% of all TV consumption, according to Nielsen.

TODAY'S QUOTE

"It's never an easy decision to take but after listening to my body and discuss it with my team I understand that it is the right decision."

Rafael Nadal, who has announced he is pulling out of Wimbledon and the Tokyo Olympics. Fellow champ Naomi Osaka has also pulled out of Wimbledon, but still plans to compete at Tokyo.

TODAY'S WEATHER

Check your local forecast here>>>

AND FINALLY

And who are YOU?

In honor of Father's Day this weekend, an all-time dad video, in which a baby meets her father's twin brother and gets INCREDIBLY confused.

(Click here to view)
SYRACUSE, N.Y.  Billy Fuccillo, who had a huge personality that captured the attention of New Yorkers for years through his commercials, has died. He was 65.

The Syracuse Auto Dealers Association sent an email to its members Friday, saying "It is with great sadness that we advise you of the passing of former member and friend, Billy Fuccillo."

Photo courtesy of BillyFuccilloBlog Photo courtesy of BillyFuccilloBlog

He and his son, Billy Fuccillo Jr., owned several car dealerships across upstate New York and Florida, which he promoted with his trademark slogan Its gonna be Huuuuuuge. The two had recently sold five of their dealerships in Syracuse and Rochester, and the locations in Florida.

Fuccillo was a graduate of Syracuse University.

He passed away at his home in Florida after months of declining health, according to SADA.

His funeral will be held on Friday, June 25, at Our Lady of Pompei/St. Peter Church, 301 Ash St., Syracuse. Calling hours will be held from 3 - 7 p.m. on Thursday, June 24, at Thomas J. Pirro Jr. Funeral Home, 3401 Vickery Road, North Syracuse.
NEW HARTFORD, N.Y.  NBT Bank is out more than $10,000 after a fraudulent check scheme was discovered over the past month.

According to New Hartford police, 36-year-old Justin J. Vanderhoof allegedly deposited several bad checks into an NBT account at the Seneca Turnpike location starting in May. After each deposit, police say the money would be withdrawn in different ways shortly after.

When NBT Bank realized there were no funds in the account the checks came from, they contacted police to report the theft.

Following an investigation, Vanderhoof was arrested on June 17 and charged with third-degree grand larceny, a D felony.

He was held at the Oneida County jail after his arraignment.
TIPPECANOE COUNTY, Ind. (WLFI) - On June 17, President Biden signed Juneteenth into being a federal holiday. This comes just two days before celebrations begin in Greater Lafayette.

For Associate Professor of History at Purdue University Cornelius Bynum, it helps Americans to remember what shouldn't be forgotten.

"And so Juneteenth is a really important symbol for recognizing the profound shortcomings of the nation when it comes to living it's core principles," Bynum said.

Juneteenth celebrates the news of emancipation arriving to Galveston Texas, two years after the emancipation proclamation of 1863. While enslaved African Americans had been freed under the law, post-reconstruction and Jim Crow laws have limited their freedoms. Bynum says with the federal recognition of Juneteenth, the country is making an important first step to recognizing it's shortcomings.

"And first steps should be followed by other steps and so long as that's the process, then I think it should be acknowledged and celebrated as an achievement moving forward, but it can't be the only thing the federal government does," Bynum said.

Of course, Juneteenth has been celebrated by friends and families for years, including here in Greater Lafayette. Deanna McMillan is the director for advancement for the Baptist Student Foundation at Purdue.

"We were ahead of the curve, and that just goes to show... I'm from New York City, big city, but you know I have never been to a Juneteenth celebration in New York City. We had this planned before it was a national holiday," McMillan said.

She echoes Bynum's belief that today is a day the country moves forward.

"So I think this is another step in that direction where we can say it out loud that there was an injustice done, and we can move on and not dwell in that," McMillan said.

The Baptist Student Foundation is holding a Juneteenth celebration Saturday at Tapawingo Park in West Lafayette from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m.
WABASH TOWNSHP, Ind. (WLFI)  State Sen. Ron Alting (R-District 22) is hosting a special meeting Monday at the Indiana Statehouse to discuss Wabash Township Trustee Jennifer Teising.

Elected officials, attorneys and other legal experts will attend the meeting.

As News 18 previously reported, a grand jury indicted Teising in May on 20 counts of felony theft over accusations she didn't live in the township for several months beginning last year. She's also facing criticism for her plans to shrink the township fire department.

Teising will lay off the township's three paid firefighters at the end of the month. As News 18 previously reported, she faced public outrage for that plan during a Tuesday township board meeting and has ignored calls to resign.

State officials are coming together to see what can be done to save the fire department.

The special meeting at the statehouse begins at 2 p.m. Monday.

Township board members and other elected officials in Tippecanoe County will be there, as well as representatives from the Indiana Legislative Services Agency, the Indiana Township Association, the Association of Indiana Counties and the Attorney General's Office.

Township board members say their power stops at approving the township budget.

Alting says he doesn't want to leave any stones unturned when it comes to legal options to reinstate the firefighters' jobs.

But he stopped short of calling on Teising to resign.

"I think that's a decision the people should make and that's something that she's gotta make, but I think she needs to look in the mirror and ask herself, 'Am I really being a good public servant?'" Alting said.

Alting added he would resign if he was in Teising's position.

"I don't throw darts at people but I think the writing's on the wall ... when you're a public servant, you serve the people and what's in the best interest of the people?" he said. "It's certainly not continuing to go down the road that that township has been going down."

As News 18 previously reported, township board approved a last-minute money transfer they say could keep the firefighters employed through 2023. But emails from Teising suggest she's moving forward with the layoffs and disagrees with the legality of the transfer.

Alting also wants to explore future legislation that could limit trustee powers.

As News 18 previously reported, he presented an amendment to a bill this year that would add trustees to a list of elected officials that can be removed from office through votes by commissioners and county council members. The amendment didn't pass.

Teising did not return a message seeking comment.
Show Low, AZ (85901)

Today

Partly cloudy early followed by scattered thunderstorms this afternoon. High 81F. Winds SSW at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 40%..

Tonight

Cloudy skies early, then partly cloudy after midnight. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 62F. Winds S at 10 to 15 mph.
For centuries, the boundary between the Alaskan Panhandle and Canada was often ignored partly because it was a rugged wilderness. However, the view changed in the late 19th century following the gold discovery in Klondike, with the panhandle offering access to the goldfields. The gold rush in Yukon increased the regions population, creating the increasing importance of fixing a defined boundary between Alaska and Canada. The British (representing Canada) and Americans failed to agree in 1898. The disputed area, known as Alaska Panhandle, is a complex area comprising channel islands and large fjords. However, the territorial dispute, which dates back to 1821, was finally resolved in 1903.

Early History

Varying claims in Southeast Alaska before arbitration in 1903. Image credit: CaptionWilliam R. Shepherd via Wikimedia Commons.

The Alaskan Panhandles eastern boundary remained unclear throughout the Russian colonization period (the 1780s to 1867). The Russian traders and explorers, who traveled east settled around coastal Alaska, claimed the entire area, including the panhandle, which was an attractive region because of its abundant sea otters and fish. Throughout this period, Americans and the British also developed interests in the area and increasingly encroached on it.

In 1825, the British and Russian governments signed the Treaty of Saint Petersburg, defining their respective colonial borders. The treaty also set the panhandles southern coastal border near Prince Rupert, British Columbia. However, the treaty did not clearly define the eastern border because the region was rugged with mountains and the negotiators did not see it as a priority.

On March 30, 1867, the US purchased the entire Alaskan region from Russia. The Alaska Purchase took place at the time when the Russians feared the British would capture Alaska in future wars, while the US was rapidly expanding its influence on the Pacific coast. At the time of the purchase, Canadian colonies were also negotiating for Confederacy, a process that was completed in July 1867. British Columbia chose to join Canada in July 1871, ending the US aspiration for complete control of the northern pacific coast.

Klondike Gold Rush

Map of routes to Klondike (red spot). Image credit: National Park Service, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

The Klondike Gold Rush in Yukon began in late 1897, with hundreds of people finding their way to the area. About 100,000 gold prospectors passed through Alaska to the gold rush region, with the areas population reaching about 30,000. Canada needed a direct route from the Pacific fjord to the goldfield. However, the US wanted to maintain control of the region. But, Canada claimed its territory extended past the panhandle to the pacific coast, a claim the US strongly rejected.

Arbitration

A joint commission comprising the British (representing Canada) and American arbitrators attempted to resolve the territorial disputes in 1898 but failed. The dispute proceeded to the international tribunal, with Henry Cabot Lodge, Elihu Root, and George Turner representing the US, Sir Louis-Amable Jette and Sir Allen Bristol Aylesworth for Canada, and Lord Alverstone for England. The American and Canadian representatives held on to their claims.

According to the 1825 treaty, the borderline should have been 54 kilometers east of the coast. However, the definition of the ocean coast was unclear. The Americans insisted the coast began where the mainland touched the ocean waters, while the Canadians argued the coast was on the Channel Islands western boundary. To the surprise of the Canadians, Lord Alverstone, the Chief Justice of England, supported the Americans. In protest, the Canadians refused to sign the final verdict. However, the resolution was signed and issued on October 20, 1903.

Aftermath

The Canadians rejected and protested the resolution and considered it as a betrayal by the British. Anti-British campaigns erupted throughout Canada, with the country beginning to distinguish its national interest from both the Americans and the British. For instance, Canadians rejected free trade with the Americans in 1911.
TotalEnergies to expand public charging network for electric vehicles in the municipality of Amsterdam.

AMSTERDAM / PARIS, FRANCE: The municipality of Amsterdam has awarded the concession for the expansion of its public charging network for electric vehicles (EV) to TotalEnergies. As part of this new concession, TotalEnergies will expand Amsterdam's current network with 2,200 new EV charging points, to be installed by fall 2022.

The installation of 1,100 chargers, each equipped with two charging points, will give a boost to the Clean Air Action Plan of the Municipality of Amsterdam, which aims to realize completely emission-free transport by 2030. One of the main challenges of this ambition is to facilitate enough charging points to support the strong growth of electric vehicles.

Amsterdam has selected TotalEnergies, through its subsidiary TotalEnergies Marketing Nederland, as a key partner to realize this increase in scale. TotalEnergies focuses on a hassle-free and transparent customer experience for the e-driver, while guaranteeing both the availability and the quality of the charging service.

For the first time in Amsterdam, Total Energies will make large-scale use of clustering of chargers and the expansion of the charging network will be partly based on requests from e-drivers. In addition, a data-driven approach will be used, in which the load on the current charging network is monitored to determine optimal locations. When charging demand on the current charging network will become high, chargers will be proactively added. In this way TotalEnergies ensures that there will always be enough charging points to meet the demand. To further shape the required scaling-up and the growing demand for charging, as many clusters of chargers as necessary will also be installed in Amsterdam.

This policy of the municipality of Amsterdam, supported by TotalEnergies, is a striking example of joint efforts towards more sustainable and emission-free mobility, delivering affordable energy that is increasingly reliable and accessible to as many people as possible.

"With the installation of 2,200 new charging points in the city, we are taking the next important step towards cleaner air for all Amsterdam residents. Together with TotalEnergies, we will continue to work on the roll-out of a reliable charging network, which is essential for the transition to electric transport. I look forward to a great collaboration, said deputy mayor (Alderman) Egbert de Vries (Traffic, Transport, Water and Air Quality) of the municipality of Amsterdam.

This partnership with the City of Amsterdam will support TotalEnergies ambition to further accelerate its transformation into a broad energy company. Our promises are to deliver 100 percent renewable electric charging services and user experience, aligned with their expectations, said Alexis Vovk, president, marketing & services at TotalEnergies.

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Smoke and flames are seen after an Israeli air strike in the northern Gaza Strip on June 17.
Further hospitality support on way as First Minister reiterates minimise travel in and out of Chester and Cheshire West advice

Advice earlier this week to minimise travel in and out of Enhanced Response Areas in England has been reiterated today by the First Minister.

Near neighbours Chester and Cheshire West is one of six new areas that UK Government have assigned additional support to help deal with a rise in Covid-19 cases.

Today saw Public Health Wales report +14 cases for Wrexham in the daily dashboard update, with our seven day rolling benchmark figure now 36 per 100k up to the 13th of June  with 97% of new cases in North Wales now the delta variant.

Over the border Cheshire West and Chester has seen their rate hit 110 per 100k, and The Countess of Chester hospital has seen 4 admissions in the seven days up to the 13th.

Locally we have been told that some hospitality venues have seen bookings in Wrexham drop by a third over the last week compared to the previous week, with suppliers also reporting similar drop in trade.

A few miles north in Chester a range of hospitality businesses have closed their doors over the last week as staff members test positive for coronavirus and isolation processes begin, with local licensees pointing to those issues starting to affect customer confidence in Wrexham.

We asked the First Minister how keenly are issues on border areas being observed, and if there would be any new direct revenue support to hospitality to reflect the new circumstances in what was already a tough trading position.

The First Minister replied, I think weve said over a number of weeks that when you have clusters of a new variant, very close to a very porous border, then the chances of just turning it back at the border are pretty slender. Im not surprised at all to hear that people become more cautious as they see numbers going up.

We will work with the sector, my colleague Economy Minister Vaughan Gething announced 2.5 million pounds extra on Monday of this week to help those businesses affected by the delay that weve had to introduce in the reopening of some indoor hospitality, and we are working on a further package. We discussed the package yesterday at the Social Partnership Council.

The details are still being worked through with the different sectors , so there will be more help for businesses here in Wales who find themselves in this situation.

With cases rising across the border the First Minister was asked again about people being urged not to travel to help stop transmission.

The First Minister said, I do reinforce the advice that has already been given to those populations by the government in England. That advice is if youre living in an English hotspot, the advice for some weeks now has been to minimise travel, not to travel in or out of those areas.

I think that is good advice that has been given to those populations and Im very happy to reinforce it and repeated from a Welsh perspective.

You can view the full briefing on the below video link:
North Wales project teaching people how to respond to a cardiac arrest hailed a success

A life-saving project to provide access to hundreds of defibrillators across North Wales and teach people how to respond to a cardiac arrest has been hailed a success.

In the last three years more than 500 new community public access defibrillators (CPAD) have been made available, while 315 more have been reinstated  including one in every secondary school in the Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board area.

Starting cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and using a defibrillator before the arrival of an ambulance increases the chance of survival from a cardiac arrest significantly.

The project is a partnership between the Health Board, the Welsh Ambulance Services NHS Trust and the cardiac charity SADS UK.

Julie Starling, Advanced Arrhythmia Clinical Nurse Specialist and Project Manager, said: This weekend we had a stark reminder about the importance of understanding how to respond to a cardiac arrest and having access to the right equipment to do it.

Christian Eriksens collapse highlighted that anyone of any age, even children, can suffer a sudden cardiac arrest.

Christian Eriksens life was saved by CPR and the use of a defibrillator, the most powerful combination to save a life in this situation. This has been one of the main focuses of the North Wales project, which has offered life-saving CPR training and education on the use of the defibrillator to our communities.

More defibrillators have been placed in our communities to ensure they are widely available to help save lives, which is especially important in more rural parts of North Wales, as the sooner CPR starts and a defibrillator is used the more chance a person has of surviving.

SADS UK fully funded the first two years of the project, which included bringing in a Community Public Access Defibrillator Officer to ensure all existing equipment in the region was tested and ready to use.

Anne Jolly MBE, the founder of SADS UK said: Although there is very little needed to upkeep the defibrillator it is essential that pads and batteries are replaced at intervals.

The CPAD Support Officer has been key in ensuring this is done and defibrillators are always ready to use, with the help of the community. The charity is delighted to be supporting this important project, teaching lifesaving skills and providing information and assistance to help schools put a defibrillator on site.

Greg Lloyd, Head of Clinical Operations at the Welsh Ambulance Services NHS Trust, said: Early administration of CPR and defibrillation is the most powerful combination in saving a life and the CPAD Support Officers role has been pivotal in making this happen by ensuring all community defibrillators remain rescue ready, as well as attending cardiac arrests while on duty in a first responder capacity.

This project has been a huge success and is evidence of what collaborative working can achieved. The Welsh Ambulance Service is pleased to have been a part of this important project and is very pleased to hear that the project is looking to be extended throughout Wales. The partnership would like to wish Christian Eriksen a speedy recovery.

The project is also being supported by funds raised through Cadwch Curiadau Keep the Beats which is part of the Health Boards charity Awyr Las. Keep the Beats has so far managed to raise more than 20,000 and invested in new equipment, training videos and lifesaving defibrillators.

Any school or community group that would like further information can contact SADS at info@sadsuk.org or Awyr Las at BCU.AwyrLas@wales.nhs.uk
Rule changes on hold for four weeks as delta spreads  second doses to be sped up

First Minister Mark Drakeford will announce a four-week pause to the coronavirus rules aimed at helping boost protection against the new delta variant.

Welsh Government have said Wales world-leading vaccine programme will speed up second doses over the next four weeks with a planned deployment of more than half a million doses to help prevent a fresh wave of serious illness as cases of coronavirus begin to rise.

The latest figures show there are almost 490 cases of the delta variant in Wales. More than four out five new Covid cases in Wales are the delta variant and two-thirds of these are not linked to travel or contact with another case  suggesting community spread.

Wales coronavirus case rate has risen steadily since the end of May and the positivity rate has more than doubled  but it remains the lowest in the UK.

First Minister Mark Drakeford said: In the space of just a few short weeks, the delta variant has entered Wales and quickly spread throughout the country. There is sustained and accelerating transmission, not just in North and South East Wales but in all parts of Wales.

It is now the most dominant variant in new cases in Wales. We are once again facing a serious public health situation.

We have the lowest coronavirus rates in the UK and the highest vaccination rates for first doses. A four-week delay in relaxing restrictions could help to reduce the peak number of daily hospital admissions by up to half, at a time when the NHS is very busy supporting all our healthcare needs  not just treating coronavirus.

The Welsh Government reviewed the public health situation this week, mid-way through the current three-week regulations cycle, after announcing a phased move into alert level one. The rules around larger outdoor activities and events were relaxed on June 7.

Although there will be no substantive changes to the rules for a four-week period  the regulations will be reviewed again on 15 July  some small technical amendments are being made to the coronavirus regulations explained as making them easier to understand and easier to apply for businesses.

These include:

The number of people who can attend a wedding or civil partnership reception or wake, organised by a business in an indoors regulated premise, such as a hotel, will be determined by the size of the venue and a risk assessment.

Clarifying small grassroots music and comedy venues will be able to operate on the same basis as hospitality venues, like pubs and cafes.

Primary school children in the same school contact group or bubble will be able to stay overnight in a residential outdoor education centre.

Pilot events in theatre, sport and other sectors will also continue throughout June and July.

The First Minister added: This week, we reached the target of offering all eligible adults their first dose vaccine six weeks ahead of schedule.

But those offers wont help protect people, unless everyone turns up for their first and second dose appointments.

I would urge everyone to take up their invitation for a vaccine and to complete the full two-dose course. Its the best way we can protect ourselves against this virus.

Top pic: As usual, the empty podium where the First Minister will make his address at 12:15PM.
Summer of Fun to support children and young people in Wales recover from the pandemic

A Summer of Fun to support children and young people take part in a range of sporting, cultural and play based activities has been announced.

Launching the 5m Summer of Fun project at Romilly Park in the Vale of Glamorgan, Deputy Minister for Social Services Julie Morgan said it was important to look at the full range of our children and young peoples needs and embed social and emotional wellbeing in the pandemic recovery.

Summer of Fun will be run by local authorities from 1st July until 30th September and will provide a range of free leisure, recreational, sporting and cultural activities for children and young people aged 0-25 to help support their social, emotional, physical and mental wellbeing.

Activities provided through the Summer of Fun will be free, in both English and Welsh and in addition to any regulated childcare provision. The Childrens Commissioner for Wales has launched an information hub to advertise the free activities available as part of the Summer of Fun.

The three main objectives of the Summer of Fun are:

supporting fun and the opportunity for children and young people to express themselves through play;

community based interactive, creative and play-based initiatives for all ages and;

provide opportunities to play with friends and peers.

As part of the investment, 450,000 will be shared between Sport Wales and the Arts Council for Wales to deliver a pilot scheme that will enhance the school day by opening up school facilities for community use, to create a new wellbeing offer for children and young people. The pilot scheme will complement the Summer of Fun programme.

The Deputy Minister for Social Services, Julie Morgan said: The impacts of the last year have been felt by all of us, and particularly so by our children and young people who have missed many opportunities to socialise, to be active and to play.

That is why, as part of our Renew and Reform plan for learning, I am announcing funding to support our children and young people to take part in a range of free social and wellbeing activities.

Activities funded through the Summer of Fun will provide opportunities to support the social, emotional and physical health and wellbeing of our young people.

Supporting these needs can also help them build confidence, reengage with learning and education, and strive to reach their full potential. I look forward to seeing the wide range of activities taking place this summer.

Sally Holland, the Childrens Commissioner said: Children and young people have missed out on so many opportunities to play and socialise during the pandemic.

Im so pleased that the Government has responded so positively to the calls I made with the Urdd and Sport Wales for a Summer of Fun. The funding announced today takes into account the issues raised during a large round-table event we hosted on the subject earlier this year, including the need for more support for transport costs, Welsh medium provision and targeted approach to disabled children , those on low income and children from Black, Asian and ethnic minority communities. Lets ensure every child and young person in Wales now has a summer of fun after such a rollercoaster year.

Cllr Kathryn McCaffer, Vale of Glamorgan Council Cabinet Member for Leisure, Arts and Culture, said: Covid-19 restrictions have had a profound effect on all of us, with children among those most severely affected. They have been unable to attend school for long periods, which can have a significant impact on social development and activity levels as well as learning.

Loneliness and social isolation have been real problems over the last 15 months and the Summer of Fun scheme has been launched in an effort to address this.

It will allow children to reconnect with each other and the outside world through a range of exciting activities. Using funding provided by Welsh Government, we are looking to provide a variety of opportunities across the Vale of Glamorgan utilising a wide range of resources and organisations. We are really looking forward to seeing children and young people enjoying themselves again.

The Summer of Fun is one element of the Welsh Governments commitment to supporting children and young people to recover from the pandemic. With activities running as part of the 150 million Renew and Reform plan, announced by Education Minister Jeremy Miles earlier this week, to support learners, teachers and staff.
KNOXVILLE, TN (WSMV) - The Tennessee Army National Guard announced that a medical flight crew performed an air evacuation after a camper was attacked and injured by a bear while sleeping in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park on Friday.

The Tennessee National Guard said that shortly before 7 a.m., they were notified of a camper in distress at a backcountry campsite almost six miles away from the Maddron Bald Trailhead.

The man required immediate medical care, and the Tennessee National Guard sent a helicopter rescue to the man's location.

The helicopter crew arrived at the campsite around 8:4 a.m. where the crew performed hoist operations since the terrain was too difficult for a landing.

Gators and cougars and bears, oh my! NASHVILLE, TN (WSMV) - If you've been worried by recent rumors of cougars and alligators invading Tennessee, fear not!

They said a medical assessment was performed with Park Rangers who performed initial medical care.

Once lifted into the helicopter, they departed for the University of Tennessee Medical Center in Knoxville. Hoisting and rescue were completed in 14 minutes.

This is the third search and rescue mission the Tennessee National Guard has performed so far this year.
While refusing to mobilise workers or even its own members in support of 80 striking General Mills staff, the United Workers Union (UWU) has brought a conga line of Labor Party politicians and senior union bureaucrats to the western Sydney factory.

Since the strike began two weeks ago, the UWU has held a series of community protests, family days and other solidarity events. None of them have been attended by more than a few dozen people.

McManus speaking at the UWU meeting (Screenshot, UWU Facebook page)

Far from strengthening the strikers, the deliberate aim of such events is to sow demoralisation and to maintain the stranglehold of a union officialdom that has no intention of broadening the stoppage.

Production continues unabated inside the factory, which is being staffed by casual workers. In a godsend to management, the UWU has repeatedly denounced the casuals, ensuring that they do not join the stoppage and that there is no major disruption to company operations. Meanwhile, strikers are hung-out to dry on a permanent community protest outside the factory gates, without full strike pay from the UWU.

Labor and union officials are brought to the protest, and the strikers are told that they are important leaders who represent thousands of workers. The bureaucrats dust off a few old slogans, solidarity forever, union power and workers united will never be defeated before departing, while the strikers are left at the end of an isolated cul-de-sac in a dispute that most workers dont even know about.

One of the challenges the UWU has faced is that the Labor and union leaders it has promoted are all right-wing hacks. Anyone familiar with their record knows they have never led a genuine struggle of workers but have only imposed sell-outs and defeats. The UWUs solution to this problem has been to ensure that as little as possible is said at the events, and that socialists, workers and anyone else who might raise awkward questions are excluded.

Both methods were on display in a meeting at the community protest on Wednesday.

Socialist Equality Party members were once again blocked from speaking to workers by UWU officials, as they have been repeatedly over the past fortnight.

And the meeting itself, billed as a Wage Crisis Forum, was organised to ensure no free discussion took place. It was a forum in which the speakers did not deliver opening remarks, there was no participation from workers and questions from the online audience were ignored or deleted. A handpicked delegate was permitted to speak for fewer than two minutes, and the only questions posed to the speakers were from senior UWU officials.

Sally McManus, the featured speaker, is secretary of the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU), the national union umbrella organisation. In that position, she nominally represents the 1.5 million members claimed by unions across the country. But Wednesdays meeting demonstrated that McManus is not even able to speak directly to an audience of workers that numbered fewer than 40, with around 50 people watching live on a Facebook livestream.

McManus participated remotely via Zoom. The UWU officials and the one delegate who spoke were sequestered in a small tent, while a couple of dozen workers watched on a screen outside it, ensuring a buffer between them and the ACTU leader. The other speakers were UWU president Jo Schofield, John Falzon, a former charity CEO and senior fellow at Per Capita, and David Richardson of the Australia Institute. Both Per Capita and the Australia Institute are think tanks with close ties to Labor and the unions.

In response to questions from UWU officials, McManus and the other speakers pointed to the deepening social crisis confronting the working class. Wage growth, having stagnated for years, was at record lows. Casual and precarious employment accounted for a greater percentage of the workforce than ever before. Housing prices and living expenses had skyrocketed, while the major companies were seeking to further slash workers pay and conditions.

All true. But what was to account for this state of affairs? Richardson at one point referred to the neo-liberal policies of successive governments going back decades. McManus, a senior member of the Labor Party, which led many of those successive governments, looked nervous. Richardson, however, did not elaborate.

The problem, the speakers insisted, were greedy companies and the current federal Liberal-National government. On the latter issue, none of them addressed the point Richardson had hinted at, namely that the current government is only continuing the pro-business policies of its predecessors, including Labor administrations.

The unions are once again seeking to channel workers anger behind the election of a Labor government, even as its main pitch is that it would serve the interests of big business and successful people in society better than the Liberal-Nationals.

Completely absent from the discussion was any reference to the record of the unions themselves.

All the social ills that the speakers pointed to are a direct product of the collaboration of the unions with governments and the corporations.

McManus is very familiar with this history. Her lifelong career as a union bureaucrat began as a protege of Bill Kelty, with McManus taking part in a 1994 ACTU Organising Works program he led.

Kelty, who was ACTU president from 1983 to 2000, played a central role in imposing the Price and Incomes Accords. Devised by the Hawke Labor government in the 1980s, these were pacts with big business and the unions, which provided for the deregulation of the economy, the destruction of hundreds of thousands of jobs and the closure of entire industries. The ACTU responded to widespread opposition to this assault by breaking up shop stewards and workplace committees.

In the 1990s, when McManus entered the bureaucracy, the unions were supporting the Keating Labor governments introduction of enterprise bargaining. This divides employees up, workplace by workplace, and has been used by the unions and business to impose one regressive enterprise agreement after another. Enterprise bargaining has been one of the central mechanisms for repressing wages.

Over the past year, McManus and the ACTU have written a new page in this rotten record. Together with all their affiliates, they ensured that 2020 was the year with the fewest strikes in Australian history, going back to when records began in 1919. The unions forced workers to stay on the job, even when they were threatened with COVID-19 infection.

While she may denounce the Liberal-National government now, McManus was on the best of terms with it not so long ago. When the pandemic struck, she helped the government devise JobKeeper, a wage subsidy program that amounted to a massive handout to the largest corporations. At the same time, she agreed to suspend various industrial awards, forcing millions to work longer hours and stripping them of overtime payments and other rights.

In April 2020, McManus publicly declared that employers could get everything you want by working with the unions. She collaborated on what was described as an almost daily basis with then Industrial Relations Minister Christian Porter, who said the ACTU leader was his new bff (best friends forever). No wonder McManus and the UWU were so anxious to prevent workers from raising any questions.

UWU officials ended the meeting as soon as it hit the half-hour mark. None of them, including McManus, had said anything concrete about expanding the strike, mobilising support or providing the workers with strike pay. Instead, McManus repeated the slogan one day longer, one day stronger, as though the continuation of the isolated strike, with production proceeding unabated at the facility, would resolve everything. This is simply a means of wearing down the workers, to the point that they are forced to accept a sell-out.

The meeting demonstrated that the UWUs repeated attacks on Socialist Equality Party (SEP) campaigners are part of a broader attempt to intimidate workers and suppress opposition from them.

Beneath the livestream of the meeting on the UWU Facebook page, one worker posted a critical comment. In response to the UWUs request for donations, he asked Where is the fighting fund? of the union.

The worker recalled his own experience, noting that when jobs cuts were announced at a Woolworths warehouse in Minchinbury, the union disappeared. The union allowed jobs that people held to be destroyed and replaced by managers. During the sackings, not one person from the union came on site to oversee the issues and speak with workers.

The worker surmised that this was because unions had become a big business. Labor and its corporate mates had left workers to defend themselves. When it comes to a strike the union distances itself because of mates in big corporations.

Within a minute or two, the comment had been deleted from the UWU Facebook page. It provided a far more accurate description of this corporatised, anti-working-class organisation, than any of the lies from McManus and her fellow speakers.
The following is an edited version of a report presented to a meeting of the Cross-Canada Educators Rank-and-File Safety Committee held last weekend. To learn more about the CERSC and get involved, email: cersc.csppb@gmail.com.

* * *

Across Canada, provincial governments of all political stripes are aggressively implementing reopening plans, rapidly removing all remaining COVID-19 pandemic restrictions. In this, they have the full support of the Justin Trudeau-led Liberal government and the corporatist trade unions.

A nurse holds a phone while a patient affected with COVID-19 speaks with his family from the intensive care unit. (Image Credit: AP/Daniel Cole)

The restrictions that the provincial governments grudgingly put in place at the peak of the third wave in April were minimal from the start. Yet even these are now being repealed, in favour of extracting every last dollar that might be made over the summer season.

This is being done even though only a small fraction of the population has been fully vaccinated, and health experts are warning of a fourth wave fueled by the Delta variant, first identified in India. Just five percent of all Canadians are fully vaccinated, and little more than 50 percent of the population have received one dose. Canadas chief public health officer, Dr. Theresa Tam, still maintains her recommendation that only once 75 percent of all people over the age of 12 have had one vaccine-shot and 20 percent are fully inoculated should provinces and territories begin to lift the most restrictive public health measures, such as stay-at-home orders.

However, provincial governments, with Ottawas complicity, are ensuring that this recommendationone which is inadequate to begin with, considering what is now unfolding in several countries that had higher vaccination rates prior to easing restrictionsis a dead letter.

The ruling elites back-to-work/back-to-school drivethat is, its prioritization of corporate profit over working peoples health and liveshas already resulted in devastating second and third waves that are responsible for the vast majority of Canadas more than 1.375 million COVID-19 infections and 25,750 deaths.

The dangers of the current reckless reopening drive have already been amply demonstrated in jurisdictions with far higher vaccination rates.

In the United Kingdom, the Boris Johnson-led Tory government promised the population that June would see a grand return to normal life. Yet with 70 percent of adults having received one vaccine dose and 45 percent of the adult population fully inoculated, figures that far surpass those of any Canadian province, the UK is now dealing with the biggest increase in cases it has seen since March.

This is overwhelmingly due to the spreading of new variants. On June 6 5,683 cases were recorded in the UK, the fifth day in a row with more than 5,000 cases. A total of 35,796 cases were recorded from June 1 to June 8, 52.9 percent more than in the previous week. Hundreds of coronavirus outbreaks have occurred in schools. Teachers and other workers in Canada should take this as an indication of what is to come if reopenings go ahead in this country in a similar fashion.

Another example of tragedy in the wake of premature reopening is the current situation in the small East African country of Seychelles. By early May, Seychelles held the title of the most vaccinated nation on Earth, as more than 60 percent of its adult population were fully inoculated against COVID-19. The island nation relies heavily on income from its tourist industry. After the country lifted restrictions and reopened its borders to travellers, a variant-fuelled outbreak developed. For its population of less than 100,000, the outbreak was worse in per capita terms than that currently raging in India.

In Canada, there has been a steady decline in cases since the third waves peak in mid-April. In the last week of May, 3,400 new infections were reported daily, down from a rate of nearly 9,000 new infections recorded every day only six weeks earlier. The ruling class is exploiting case numbers trending in the right direction for its own aims, however, twinning it with the populations pandemic fatigue and understandable desire to get back to normal.

Epidemiologists are sounding the alarm that vaccinations are not a bulletproof vest and that abandoning restrictions now could spark a fourth wave. Governments at all points on the official pro-capitalist political spectrum, from John Horgans New Democratic Party (NDP) government in British Columbia to Jason Kenneys far-right UCP regime in Alberta, are striving to do away with public health measures that are needed now more than ever to prevent a fourth wave and protect the Canadian populations lives and livelihoods.

Ontario

In Ontario, the hard-right Ford government accelerated implementation of its reopening plan early this week, allowing outdoor dining and larger private gatherings. The case count continues to fall. Yet the COVID case data has led epidemiologists to suggest that this may be because the Delta, or B.1.617 variant, is muscling its way in and replacing the currently circulating strains of the virus.

Public Health Ontario data from recent weeks shows that the percentage of cases testing positive on the provincial variant-screening tests has dropped from 95 percent in early May to 85 percent. While this initially seems like a positive development, the variant screening tests do not check for the gene specific to B.1.617, which is thought to be up to 50 percent more transmissible than the B.1.1.7 variant that launched the provinces third wave.

My belief is that B.1.617 is going to be the story for the fall. And the question is, where are we with vaccinations? Because a fourth wave, if we have one, will be B.1.617 among people not yet vaccinated, Colin Furness, an infection control epidemiologist at the University of Toronto, recently told the Toronto Star. Furness said that he is particularly concerned about a return to in-person learning in September if children are not yet vaccinated, a virtual certainty given inadequate supply levels.

Dr. David Fisman, an epidemiologist at the University of Torontos Dalla Lana School of Public Health, said that B.1.617 is growing about 20 to 40 percent faster than B.1.1.7. And, he noted, thats with schools closed.

Quebec

On June 8, Quebec reported that eight additional people had succumbed to the virus in the province, bringing the provinces COVID-19 death toll to 11,164. The province had 2,400 active cases, with 263 people hospitalized due to the virus and 60 of those patients in ICUs.

The reopening plan for Quebec was announced by Premier Francois Legault of the Coalition Avenir Quebec (CAQ) government on May 18. Simon Bacon, a professor of behavioural medicine at Concordia University, summarized the agenda of every province across Canada in his critique of the reopening plan. He noted that Quebecs government has been very hell-bent on defining the reopening process based on dates rather than the actual situation with the pandemic.

Quebec has imposed some of the strictest pandemic measures in Canada, including a months-long, now withdrawn, province-wide evening curfew. However, the CAQ government has simultaneously risked the lives of its residents. It has kept virtually all nonessential industry, including manufacturing, mining, forestry and construction, open since April 2020; and it insisted that the provinces schools provide only in-class instruction, except for a short period in January, throughout the pandemics devastating second and third waves. Quebec is the province with the highest per capita death toll.

On June 2, Education Minister Jean-Francois Roberge announced that students returning to school in September will not have to wear masks or be restricted by classroom bubbles and that special pandemic class-size caps are being abolished.

British Columbia

British Columbia announced its four-step reopening plan on May 25 and immediately moved to Step 1. Stable case counts and hospitalizations due to COVID-19 were used to justify the rolling back of the minimal restrictions the province implemented at the end of March, reinstating indoor dining and low-intensity indoor fitness, among other relaxations.

The plan will have already proceeded to Step 3 by July 1, less than a month from now. The only restrictions that will remain at that stage are limits on the number of spectators that can watch indoor sporting events and on the capacities of bingo halls, nightclubs and casinos. On September 7, Step 4 of the plan will be reached, at which point the resumption of normal social contact and behaviour will be allowed, and masks will be a personal choice.

Significantly, schools are not included among the categories in the plan. This is due to the fact that, as the third wave proved, neither the provincial government nor the British Columbia Teachers Federation (BCTF) will even consider closing schools to protect educators, staff or students in the face of record-breaking infection numbers.

The unveiling of BCs plan was accompanied by many disclaimers by public health officials that its success and implementation is contingent upon low case numbers, declining hospitalizations and 70 percent of the provincial population having received one dose of a vaccine. The reality is that the NDP government has no intention of following these inadequate pledges. Early on in the pandemic, the Horgan government presented benchmarks to determine when stricter controls should be imposed in schools, including outright closures. However, even as infections skyrocketed, the government relied on misleading and distorted infection data to justify systematically ignoring these requirements.

Alberta

Stage 1 of Albertas recently released Open for Summer plan went into effect on June 1 and has evidently been formulated to work backwards from the Calgary Stampede. The reopening plan moves to Stage 3 in late June or early July, meaning that virtually all public health restrictions will be lifted at that point. The Calgary Stampede, which had a 2019 attendance of 1.27 million visitors, is set to take place this year from July 9 to 18.

As of June 8, only 13 percent of Albertas population over the age of 12 had been fully immunized. An influx of visitors from across the country flooding into the province in five weeks time will put the lives and health of a significant chunk of the population at risk.

Its time to open up Alberta. Im confident Albertans will clear these last hurdles and push towards a wide-open summer, Premier Jason Kenney brazenly declared. Kenney, it need be recalled, like Trump and Brazils far-right President Jair Bolsonaro, first dismissed COVID-19 as akin to the flu, and till only a few weeks ago was encouraging his fellow UCP legislators to denounce social-distancing measures in the name of personal freedom.

Presently, there are 4,431 active cases of the virus in the province, and more than 417 schools have recorded outbreaks or exposures. Since January 11, there have been over 870 officially acknowledged occurrences of in-school transmission in Alberta.

Manitoba

In Manitoba, more than 12,000 people contracted the virus in the month of May alone, an astonishing development that saw it overtake Alberta as having the highest per-capita infection rate in Canada.

On June 1, another grim provincial record was broken, as 109 Manitoban patients were being treated in intensive care for the virus. Thirty-seven of these patients had to be transferred out of the province because hospitals had surpassed surge capacity, and there was no room to treat them anywhere in Winnipeg or Brandon. It may be several weeks yet before hospitals will be able to stop transferring critically ill patients to Ontario hospitals by air.

Manitoba hit the peak of its horrific third wave on May 22 and has since seen new infections decline. However, the population is still grappling with the worst current COVID-19 outbreak in any province or state in Canada or the United States.

On June 1, Brian Pallister, the provinces Progressive Conservative premier, callously played down the severity of the ongoing crisis, remarking that during the pandemic Manitoba had been the peak and valley. While the province did see relatively low case numbers in the first five months of the pandemic, it has since recorded the second highest pandemic death rate in Canada, with 77 deaths per 100,000 residents, second only to Quebecs 103 per 100,000.

Despite the ongoing devastation, Pallister has unveiled a reopening plan for Manitoba no less aggressive than those being implemented elsewhere in Canada.

Build rank-and-file safety committees to combat the pandemic and save lives

The reopening plans that the provinces are implementing, indeed in many cases accelerating, are defended and endorsed by the Trudeau Liberal federal government. In last Septembers throne speech, which only passed thanks to the support extended to it by the New Democrats, the Liberals stated that all future measures to fight COVID-19 must be short-term and implemented at the local level, i.e., totally ineffectual. The top priority for the Liberals, like the ruling elite as a whole, is to have big business resume full-scale operations and profit generation across the board, no matter the human cost.

Educators, school staff, students and their families should be deeply concerned about the premature easing of any and all public health measures based on profit considerations and business schedulesnot vaccination rates, scientific data surrounding the spread of variants or the capabilities of the countrys provincially administered health care systems.

As protests, strikes and other expressions of working-class opposition continue to grow internationally, it becomes ever clearer that the fight for a rational, science-based plan to suppress the virus, based on putting human lives before capitalist profit, can only be waged by teachers and other workers independent of, and in opposition to, the corporatist trade unions.

The education unions are complicit in the endangering of workers lives by allowing schools to be open with totally inadequate protections. Teachers unions in Alberta, British Columbia, Ontario and Quebec helped design reopening plans whose principal aim was to avoid school closures at almost any cost. Even though contract struggles have been waged by teachers in Ontario and Quebec since the pandemic began, the education unions in both provinces refused to raise any COVID-19-related demands with the respective provincial governments, and instead endeavoured to sell out the teachers struggles on the terms demanded by the hard-right Conservative and CAQ governments.

When a Quebec educator sought to use a union local meeting on the teachers contract struggle to demand an emergency meeting of his union to discuss taking action against the life-threatening situation in schools, he was ruled out of order by union officials and told that he would have to wait two months to raise his concerns at a future meeting.

Asked last fall what his union intended to do about the life-threatening conditions in schools, Ontario Secondary School Teachers Federation (OSSTF) President Harvey Bischof said, If the question is whether we are planning some illegal job action, the answer is a flat out no.

The unions have followed this maxim to the letter ever since. When teachers or education staff have walked off the job at individual schools because of COVID outbreaks, the unions have quickly intervened to shut the protests down. Where school closures have taken place, like currently in Ontario, they were imposed by local health officers, i.e., government officials, not the unions. This makes clear that even if infections rise sharply in September as part of a deadly fourth wave, teachers in Ontario and elsewhere will have to fight not only the capitalist governments overseeing a homicidal profits before lives strategy but also the teacher unions.

Rank-and-file committees must be formed in educational institutions, as in every workplace, to fight for a scientifically guided approach to bringing the pandemic to an end. Until the virus is suppressed through mass inoculation, nonessential businesses must be closed and in-person schooling suspended. Moreover, the state must provide full income support for all affected workers and massively improve public health care and online learning, by reappropriating the hundreds of billions in pandemic bailout funds Ottawa funneled to big business and the financial oligarchy.
The following letter was sent on June 13 from David North, chairperson of the WSWS International Editorial Board, to the editors of the Chronicle of Higher Education and Jack Stripling, a leading writer for the Chronicle and author of the June 11 article, What the Hell Happened? Inside the Nikole Hannah-Jones tenure case.

The article by Stripling references Walter E. Hussman Jr., an Arkansas newspaper publisher and donor to the Hussman School of Journalism, who opposed the granting of a tenured position to Nikole Hannah-Jones at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill.



Neither the Chronicle of Higher Education nor Stripling has acknowledged receipt of the letter or given any indication that the Chronicle intends to publish it. The WSWS is therefore publishing it here.

June 13, 2021

To the editors:

Re: What the Hell Happened?

I am writing in my capacity as the editorial board chairperson of the World Socialist Web Site (wsws.org) and editor and co-author of The New York Times 1619 Project and the Racialist Falsification of History.

In Jack Striplings account of the rejection of tenure to Nikole Hannah-Jones, there is the following passage:

I read the stuff on the World Socialist Web Site, [Walther E.] Hussman told The Chronicle, sounding a bit aghast at how far he had descended down the rabbit hole, and they were criticizing. I mean, I tried to read everything.

The Oxford Dictionary defines rabbit hole as a bizarre, confusing, or nonsensical situation or environment, typically one from which it is difficult to extricate oneself.

The clear implication of this passage is that the World Socialist Web Site is a disreputable source, one that should not be cited and has no place in a review of Hannah-Jones credentials. Therefore, Hussmans reading of its critique of the 1619 Project, according to Stripling, discredits his opposition to Hannah-Jones appointment.

In fact, the World Socialist Web Sites critique of the 1619 Project included extensive interviews with several of the most celebrated scholars of the history of the American Revolution and Civil War, including Pulitzer Prize winners Gordon Wood and James McPherson, Lincoln Prize winners James Oakes and Richard Carwardine, and other respected historians such as Victoria Bynum (author of The Free State of Jones), Adolph Reed Jr. and Clayborne Carson. These scholars were interviewed by the WSWS not because of their private political views but on account of their outstanding scholarly work.

The interviews and the contributions of other writers, including that of co-editor Thomas Mackaman and my own, comprehensively exposed the falsification of history in the 1619 Projects lead essay written by Hannah-Jonesmost notably the claims that the American Revolution was fought to maintain slavery and that the African American struggle for civil rights was waged largely alone.

The work of the World Socialist Web Site attracted widespread attention not only because of the detailed, authoritative and comprehensive character of its critique. It also came as a surprise to many that this refutation of the 1619 Project came from an avowedly left-wing and socialist source. This challenged the commonly accepted narrative that opposition to the 1619 Project came exclusively from the political right. Moreover, many of the essays in The New York Times 1619 Project and the Racialist Falsification of History documented the historically reactionary provenance of the 1619 Projects efforts to make race and anti-black racism the driving force of American history. The World Socialist Web Site was particularly critical of the New York Times elimination of the class struggle from its historical narrative.

For the record, The New York Times 1619 Project and the Racialist Falsification of History includes a chapter that demolishes the Trumpian effort to counter the 1619 Project with its own brand of xenophobic myth-making.

In light of the serious contribution that the World Socialist Web Site made to the analysis of the 1619 Project, Jack Striplings derogatory reference is highly inappropriate.

First, Striplings essay implicitly and uncritically endorses the narrative that there are simply no intellectually respectable grounds that could justify the rejection of tenure to Hannah-Jones; and that it was necessary for Hussman to descend far down into a disreputable socialist rabbit hole to come up with reasons to oppose her appointment.

Second, it does not seem to have occurred to Stripling that he should have examined the essays and interviews in the WSWS that apparently influenced Mr. Hussman. The impact of the WSWS on the controversy surrounding the 1619 Project has been prominently noted by such well-known establishment publications as The Atlantic and the Wall Street Journal.

Journalistic objectivity should have led Stripling to examine whether the WSWSs interviews and essays provided a legitimate basis for Hussmans opposition to Hannah-Jones appointment. Instead, Stripling goes so far as to portray Hussman as sounding aghast that he had descended to the depths of the rabbit hole of the World Socialist Web Site.

Striplings crude reference to the World Socialist Web Site is a telling example of the enduring presence of the anti-red hatreds of the McCarthyite era on journalism and intellectual life in the United States. His unspoken assumption is that the arguments of Marxists and socialists are illegitimate and should not be part of the public discourse. Stripling is, apparently, unaware that this outlook was challenged by students and faculty at the University of North Carolina during the historically significant protests against the Act to Regulate Visiting Speakers, passed by the state legislature in June 1963 to bar academics and speakers deemed sympathetic to the Communist Party and other left-wing organizations from addressing students on campus. The law was overturned in 1968.

A review of the fight against the Act to Regulate Visiting Speakers would have provided a broader context to the current claims that the denial of tenure to Hannah-Jones is a serious attack on academic freedom. The UNC faculty and students of the 1960s waged an important struggle against the suppression of free speech on campus. Their protests raised democratic issues of a fundamental character, rooted in the US Constitution, that are hardly present in the arguments being made on behalf of Hannah-Jones claim to a tenured post at UNC.

Striplings attitude to the World Socialist Web Site exemplifies the basic problem that underlies the defense of the 1619 Project and the work of Hannah-Jones. It is based not on an objective study of historical facts but on an ideologically driven racial narrative.

Thus, Jack Stripling frames his story as one of a Black woman named Nikole Hannah-Jones, who is waiting for the mostly white trustees of one of the nations oldest public universities to grant her an honor that her new colleagues say she more than deserves.

But that is the very question that a conscientious journalist should have carefully explored. Does Hannah-Jones, on objective grounds, deserve the appointment? Does her work as a journalist withstand serious scrutiny? Is it correct to assume that Hussmans opposition to her appointment lacks all intellectual legitimacy and is based, notwithstanding his denials, on racial prejudice? Why has Hannah-Jones work been sharply criticized by highly respected historians whose commitment to civil rights and racial equality is unquestioned?

Had Mr. Stripling taken the time to review the critique of the World Socialist Web Site, rather than dismissing it in such a contemptuous manner, he might have discovered information that seriously challenges the racial narrative advanced by Hannah-Jones and her legion of advocates.

Yours sincerely,

David North

Chairperson

World Socialist Web Site International Editorial Board
The COVID-19 pandemic has killed more than 600,000 people in the United States, according to the semi-official tabulation by Johns Hopkins University. But while more people have been killed in the US by coronavirus than in any other country, American state governments are moving pell mell to drop all public health protection against the deadly virus, while the Biden administration points to a July 4 reopening of the entire country.

Medical staff wearing protective equipment attend to patients affected by the COVID-19, at the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) of the Machakos County Level-5 hospital in Machakos, Kenya, Thursday June 17, 2021. Africa, whose 1.3 billion people account for 18% of the global population, has received only 2% of all vaccine doses administered globally. (AP Photo/Brian Inganga).

Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer announced Thursday that all the states restrictions on social distancing, indoor gatherings and mask-wearing will be lifted next Tuesday, ending 15 months of state-mandated public health requirements.

All capacity limits will be removed for bars, restaurants, arenas, churches and other indoor venues, and the states mask mandate will end 10 days earlier than the previous goal of July 1. Limits on entry into most health care and juvenile facilities will end, remaining only for visits to prison inmates and individuals living in long-term care facilities.

Whitmer crassly acknowledged that her administration was now focused on boosting corporate and business profits, declaring, Our top priority going forward is utilizing the federal relief funding in a smart, sustainable way as we put Michigan back to work and jump-start our economy.

State health officials justified the lifting of restrictions based on the level of vaccination and the return of warmer weather as summer approaches. About 50 percent of the adult population of the state is fully vaccinated, while 61 percent has received at least one shot.

Whitmer had said in April that she would lift restrictions only when 70 percent of the population had received at least one shot. That promise has been unceremoniously discarded in a capitulation to right-wing opposition, which reached the point that ultra-right gunmen linked to the Republican Party were arrested last year in the midst of a plot to kidnap and murder the Democratic governor for her actions in enforcing a limited lockdown.

The figures on vaccination mask significant regional disparities. Better-off suburban areas are more vaccinated than impoverished cities like Detroit and Flint and far more heavily vaccinated than the predominately rural northern half of the state, where economic dislocation and the domination of fundamentalist religion and the Republican Party play a pernicious role.

The same disparities exist on a national scale. The vaccination rate in the Northeast and West Coast states is over 70 percent, while in many of the poorer states of the South and Mountain West the vaccination rate is as low as 35 percent. Midwest industrialized states like Michigan fall somewhere in between.

Some inner-city areas in the Northeast have low adult vaccination rates: only 38 percent of adults in the Bronx and 41 percent in Brooklyn, two of the boroughs that comprise New York City, have been fully vaccinated.

From May to June, the vaccination rate has slowed sharply in the United States, down at least two-thirds from the April peak, according to a survey by the Washington Post. In 12 states, mainly in the South and Mountain West, daily vaccination rates have fallen below 15 shots per 10,000 residents. In Alabama last week, it was only four per 10,000.

The Post study found that until about 10 days ago, the rate of vaccination was not highly correlated with the rate of new infections, but this has begun to change. Counties with low vaccination rates (fewer than 20 percent vaccinated) have seen rising rates of infection. Counties with higher vaccination rates (at least 40 percent) have seen rates of infection declining.

Under these conditions, with as many as 100 million US adults not vaccinated, as well as nearly all children, there is a vast pool of vulnerable people unprotected from the new variants of coronavirus now spreading rapidly throughout the world.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) declared this week that the Delta variant, first observed in India, is now a variant of concern, making it a serious threat to those who are not vaccinated. The CDC estimated that the Delta variant accounts for as many as 10 percent of all new COVID-19 infections in the US, up from 2.7 percent two weeks ago, and as many as 20 percent in the Western states.

The Delta variant is far more infectious than the Alpha or UK variant, which became dominant worldwide during the winter and was in turn far more infectious than the original, or wild, form of coronavirus that emerged in China in December 2019.

In an interview with National Public Radio Thursday, Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said, If you are not vaccinated, you are at risk of getting infected with the virus that now spreads more rapidly and gives more serious disease.

Fauci pointed to the mounting crisis in Britain, even though a higher proportion of the population is vaccinated than in the US, because the Delta variant has swept rapidly through the large remainder of the population that is still unvaccinated. He warned that US states with a much lower vaccination rate than Britains could be in great danger.

Similarly, Surgeon General Vivek Murthy told CNN, Im worried about those who are unvaccinated, because the Delta variant is rapidly increasing here in the United States.

Epidemiologists not constrained by working for the Biden administration have been sharper in their warnings against complacency. Dr. Michael Osterholm, director of the University of Minnesotas Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy, pointed to the danger of regional variations in the US.

The variants continue to spin out of infections around the world and have gotten more complicated and more dangerous, he said. We have a mistaken belief [the pandemic] is over here, but there are over 100 counties where less than 20 percent of the people have one dose of vaccine, Osterholm continued. He added, The challenge is what is the next variant going to look like.

Dr. Peter Hotez, co-director of the Center for Vaccine Development at Texas Childrens Hospital, expressed concern about the impact of the Delta variant in his region of the country. Im really holding my breath about the South and what happens over the summer, Hotez warned in an interview with CNBC. Here in the South, particularly in Louisiana, Mississippi, were seeing really low vaccination rates. And less than 10 percent of adolescents are vaccinated in many of these southern states, so we have a real vulnerability here.

Eric Feigl-Ding, an epidemiologist and senior fellow at the Federation of American Scientists, also warned that states with low vaccination rates could be at risk given the rapid spread of the variant. If the UK is where we should draw our lessons, I think the US is in for a surge in the lower vaccinated states.
As many as 18 people have died from a June 7 fire at an SVS Aqua Technologies chemical plant located in the Pirangut industrial zone, some 40 kilometres from Pune, the second largest city in the western Indian state of Maharashtra. The plant produces chlorine dioxide for water purification.

The fire broke out during plastic packing, said Devendra Potphode, the chief fire officer for the Pune Metropolitan Region Development Authority Fire Services. Smoke was so much that female workers could not find an escape. We have recovered 17 bodies15 women and 2 men. The fire was punctuated by two powerful explosions. It took several hours for the bodies of the victims, all charred beyond recognition, to be located and sent to Sassoon General Hospital for identification and post-mortems.

The fire at a factory at Ghotawade Phata in Pune on June 7, 2021. (Photo: NDTV)

Under conditions of mounting anger among the plants workers and the families of the dead, the local police filed a FIR (First Investigation Report) against the CEO of the company on June 7 and arrested its owner Nikunj Shah the following day on charges of culpable homicide. Preliminary investigations have pointed to criminal negligence on the part of management, with flammable materials stored without following prescribed safety norms.

The Maharashtra state governmentwhich is a three-party coalition led by the fascistic Shiv Sena and that includes the Congress Party and a regional off-shoot from it, the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP)has announced an ex gratia payment of 500,000 rupees ($US 6,828) to the families of each of the deceased. In announcing the payment, the states Deputy Chief Minister, Ajit Pawar of the NCP, said an expert committee has been designated to ascertain the cause of the fire and assign any responsibility for it.

Indias far-right Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led central government has announced 200,000 rupees compensation for the kin of each of the deceased and 50,000 rupees for the injured. Pained by the loss of lives due to a fire at a factory in Pune, Maharashtra. Condolences to the bereaved families, tweeted Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

These are crocodile tears. The tragic loss of life and terrible injuries among the SVS Aqua Technologies workers are a direct result of the callous indifference of company management and both state and central governments to worker safety.

Modis government, in which the Shiv Sena served as a junior partner until November 2019, has relentlessly attacked workers rights, including by further weakening Indias notoriously lax environmental and occupational health and safety laws.

The loss of life from the Pune factory fire comes on top of the deaths of thousands on a daily basis due to the COVID-19 pandemic, which, fueled by the highly contagious and more lethal Delta variant, continues to rage across India.

Although the authorities are now reporting less than 100,000 new infections per day, India is still recording nearly 4,000 deaths daily, even according to the official figures, which are almost universally acknowledged to be a vast undercount. Maharashtra reported a seven-day average of over 11,000 new COVID-19 cases per day last week with a 1.7 percent case fatality rate.

Modis real concern is that the factory fire disaster will undermine his governments demand that workers return to their jobs amid a still raging pandemic, risking their lives and those of their loved ones.

Even when India was averaging more than 400,000 new cases daily in the second week of May, the Hindu supremacist BJP government was adamant that it would fulfill Modis April 20 vow to save India from lockdown, not the pandemic. Citing the recent fall in cases, Modi, for several weeks now, has been urging those state governments that did enact partial lockdown measures, while leaving most industrial production to continue operating at full tilt, to quickly remove them.

The Pune factory explosion and fire is just one of many thousands of examples of major capitalist corporations sacrificing workers lives and forcing them to use hazardous materials and dilapidated machinery with little to no safety equipment or training, so as to maintain production and maximize profits.

Last year, as India reopened from the Modi governments ruinous, ill-prepared COVID-19 lockdown, there was a series of major industrial accidents, due to companies failure to carry out proper inspection and maintenance before resuming or accelerating the pace of their operations. These include: a toxic gas leak at an LG Polymers plant in Andhra Pradesh on May 7, 2020, which killed 11 and made more than 1000 sick; a June 3 boiler explosion at Yashashvi Raasayan Private Limiteds Dahej, Gujarat facility that killed at least eight people and injured some 40; and boiler explosions at Neyveli Lignite Corporations thermal power plant in Tamil Nadu on May 7, and again on July 1, that killed at least 20 workers.

According to Labour and Employment Ministry data, 3,562 workers died in factory accidents in India between 2014 and 2016, and more than 51,000 were injured during the same periodan average of three deaths and 47 injuries every single day. A 2017 study by the British Safety Council painted a far bleaker picture, reporting that 48,000 workers die of occupational accidents in India every year.

Successive Indian governments have worked to transform the country into a cheap labor haven for giant multinational corporations and international investors, who have systematically neglected workers health and safety while reaping billions in profits.

Although central and state government authorities have worked with employers to cover up the number of COVID-19 workplace infections and deaths during Indias devastating second wave of the pandemic, reports suggest that the deaths number in the thousands, if not tens of thousands.

Late last month, major automakers in the southern state of Tamil Nadu, including Ford India, Hyundai, and Renault-Nissan, were forced to idle their operations in the face of protests and strikes by workers outraged over the lack of protection from COVID-19.
Governments around the world are using the far from complete vaccination programmes as justification for letting coronavirus rip through their populations.

As well as putting at risk the huge numbers of people still unvaccinated, and those for whom the vaccine has not produced a robust response, this policy is submitting millions of children to a programme of unmitigated herd immunity.

Alex Dickerson the reception class teacher, left leads the class at the Holy Family Catholic Primary School in Greenwich, London, Monday, May 24, 2021. (AP Photo/Alastair Grant)

COVID-19 infection can have serious consequences for young people. It has resulted in thousands of childrens deaths in countries like Brazil. Just yesterday in India, three children had eyes removed after developing the Black Fungus infection having fallen ill with coronavirus. Around 8 percent of children infected in the UK go on to develop long-COVID symptoms. Much remains unknown about the longer-term consequences of COVID-19 in childrena small number of studies have drawn a link between the virus and the development of diabetic conditions.

Moreover, allowing the virus to circulate in any significant section of the population gives it an opportunity to develop new variants which threaten the whole vaccination programme.

The speed with which coronavirus spreads through the young population when public health restrictions are withdrawn is being demonstrated in the UK. COVID-19 infections, driven by the more transmissible and deadly Delta variant, are rising exponentially in Britain, with over 11,000 cases reported on Thursday.

Ten days ago, Health Secretary Matt Hancock admitted that a huge proportion of the latest cases are in children. Infections in schools have risen even more since. The latest Office for National Statistics data show the highest infection rates are in secondary schools. Pupils in years 7 to 11 had the highest rate of any age group, with one case in every 210 on June 2.

Thursdays REACT-1 study from Imperial College London indicated that the prevalence of COVID-19 is highest among those aged five to 12, as well as younger adults aged 18 to 24.

How dangerous the new variant may prove to be for children is clear in the number of hospitalisations. Ten childrenfrom babies up to age ninewere admitted to hospital in Scotland during the last week of May alone.

Instead of closing schools immediately and returning to remote learning until the virus is suppressed, the Department for Education (DfE) emailed school leaders to encourage staff, and students to continue to test twice weekly, stating that student bubbles should stay in place.

On May 27, the DfE reported 4,000 COVID-19 cases in children. The estimated absence rate in Englands state schools was 1.8 per centthe highest since summer term began. The number of children self-isolating surged from 60,000 to 90,000 in a week. This week, Public Health England data (PHE) confirmed 149 school outbreaks have been linked to the Delta variant since April 26with 136 of them coming in the four weeks up to 6 June.

Up to the start of half-term, the proportion of pupils in England absent from school because of COVID-19 nearly doubled from 1 to 1.8 percent. According to official data, this amounted to more than 140,000 pupils.

A June 11 article by five experts in the BMJ, (formerly, British Medical Journal) condemned the government for leaving children, staff, and communities exposed to the rapid spread of a new and more transmissible variant, and at risk of long covid. Absent in schools were basic mitigations of face coverings, space, and fresh air.

Such is the spread since the government almost fully reopened the economy on May 17 that, as the school summer term resumed, many schools reintroduced mask-wearing. This was against government advice, which insisted any mask-wearing could be relaxed in schools and other education settings.

Speaking to Sky News on June 7, Sir David King, chair of Independent SAGE (Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies), and former chief government scientific adviser said mandatory face coverings in schools should be enforced. King questioned whether the government actually believed in herd immunity amongst school children? Is that why they are saying take masks off, so that the disease spreads rapidly and that they all become immune by having had the disease?

The government decided to lift mask-wearing despite knowing the Delta variant was spreading in schools. Advocacy group The Citizens and data rights firm AWO have sent a pre-action legal letter to PHE accusing the government body of withholding vital data regarding outbreaks of the variant in schools. A report was due to be published last month.

The fact that COVID-19 is spreading like wildfire through schools is nonetheless impossible to hide.

Last week, 15 schools across all 10 areas of Greater Manchester confirmed cases of the Delta variant. Almost one in three children were absent in Bolton schools in the last week of May due to the variant.

In nearby Liverpool, the Bluecoat school sent 180 pupils home after positive cases were confirmed.

Downend School had to resume remote learning in Gloucestershire after 31 cases were confirmed.

In the London borough of Bromley, health chiefs wrote to parents in Ealing, Hillingdon, Brent, Harrow, and Hounslow advising mask-wearing continue until further notice. With 58 confirmed cases, Bromley is the eighth-worst affected borough in London with the new strain.

Bristol, which reported 25 schools with outbreaks of the variant, has also reintroduced face coverings.

In Yorkshire, Sandal Castle Primary School in Wakefield and Outwood Academy Hemsworth reported Delta cases as term began. Tadcaster Grammar school reverted to remote learning after positive cases were identified.

Haslingden High School, in Rossendale, Lancashire had no cases in the run-up to half term. As school resumed on Monday, two students tested positive, by Friday there were 35 and by the weekend, 70.

Students at Wilmington Grammar Schools for Girls and Boys, Kent are being tested after outbreaks at the University of Kent and Kings School, Canterbury.

Hertfordshire County Council issued a Covid warning in the Three Rivers districtwith a population of 93,323as a cluster of coronavirus cases was found May 27-29 in children aged 10 to 14. Children aged five to nine tested positive.

In Watford, Cherry Tree Primary closed before half-term after cases were confirmed.

In Wales, children at Goitre Primary School in Merthyr Tydfil went home for a week after a school visitor tested positive. An outbreak of the Delta variant involving schools was reported in Denbighshire. Basseleg school in Newport sent 300 children home after 100 tested positive.

In Scotland, 316 children in Perth and Kinross self-isolated after pupils tested positive in five schools. St Johns RC Academy reported nine cases between May 26 and June 1. Positive tests were identified in students at Balhousie Primary School, Inch View Primary School, Kinross High School and Perth Grammar School.

Relying on scientifically discredited lateral flow testing in schools to control the spread has utterly failed. The UKs Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) is expected not to recommend vaccinating almost all under-18s.

The response from the education trade unions to this unfolding disaster is only to call on the government to reintroduce mandatory mask-wearing. Joint NEU general secretary Mary Bousted said lamely, We advised the government it was premature to be taking the masks away.

The NEU has consistently refused to mobilise its membership of 450,000 to keep schools closed during the pandemic. Along with the other education unions, it suppressed opposition by parents and teachers, who wanted face-to-face learning replaced with remote teaching until it was safe to return to the classroom. So opposed is the NEU to closing school sites that the unions joint leader, Kevin Courtney, tweeted last week that Outdoor lessons should be encouraged wherever possible.

General Secretary of school leaders union NAHT Paul Whiteman said complacently, the number of children not attending school due to Covid is low overall while noting a distinct rise in some areas.

The virus was able to spread and mutate because the Labour Party and unions agreed schools and the economy must reopen. Labour Mayor of Greater Manchester Andy Burnham backed the governments roadmap to reopening the economy. Before Mondays announcement of a four-week delay in ending all restrictions on social distancing (originally scheduled for June 21), he said, I want to try and stick to the 21st June  but it's got to be done safely.

Without the introduction of the most stringent public health measures, until the whole population is vaccinated, more cases and deaths will follow.

The Socialist Equality Party calls on educators and parents to join the Educators Rank-and-File Safety Committee to take forward the fight for a rational response to the pandemic based on science, including the closure of all educational settings and non-essential workplaces until the virus is properly suppressedwith tens of billions of pounds given over to resourcing remote learning. Such a struggle can be successful only if waged independently of the unions, as part of a united struggle for socialism with workers in all sectors against capitalisms subordination of lives to profit.
Myanmars ousted leader Aung San Suu Kyi was placed on trial behind closed doors this week, on the first of a series of bogus charges evidently designed by the military junta to shore up its power and claim international legitimacy for its dictatorship.

The militarys February 1 coup prevented elected legislators from Suu Kyis National League for Democracy (NLD) from taking office, following what was officially confirmed as a landslide election victory last year.

Myanmars leader Aung San Suu Kyi addresses judges of the International Court of Justice for the second day of three days of hearings in The Hague, Netherlands, Wednesday, Dec. 11, 2019. (AP Photo/Peter Dejong)

The army justified its coup by alleging that Suu Kyis government failed to properly investigate accusations of voting irregularities. Since then it has claimed to have found evidence of fraud, but that assertion has been rejected so far by various international agencies.

The trial is being conducted amid ongoing repression, against widespread popular opposition. United Nations deputy spokesman Farhan Haq this week said a UN team on the ground estimated that at least 861 women, children and men had been killed since February 1, with thousands more injured. About 4,800 people are in detention, including politicians, teachers, health care workers, civil servants, journalists and ordinary citizens.

Suu Kyis lawyers said she had been charged with illegally importing walkie-talkies for her bodyguards use, unlicensed use of the radios, and spreading information that could cause public alarm or unrest. There were also two counts of violating the Natural Disaster Management Law for allegedly breaking pandemic restrictions during the 2020 election campaign.

Two more serious charges against Suu Kyi are being handled separately. One is for breaching the British colonial-era Official Secrets Act, which carries a maximum 14-year prison term, and another for bribery, which has a potential penalty of 15 years imprisonment and a fine.

The proceedings are an obvious travesty. Although Suu Kyi faced her first charge just days after the coup, she was not allowed her first face-to-face meeting with her lawyers until May 24, when she made her initial appearance in court for a pre-trial hearing. She had only another brief meeting with them before the trial started on Monday.

Representatives of the ousted government, which was a partnership between the NLD and the military, are agitating for intervention by the imperialist powers. Myanmars ambassador to the UN, who has continued to be recognised by that body, despite being fired after the coup, has called for effective collective measures against the junta, ahead of expected UN Security Council talks on the crisis.

These appeals underscore the fact that the orientation of the NLD and its alternative national unity government in exile, is not to the youth and workers, who have conducted widespread strikes against the junta, but to the same world powers that backed the previous power-sharing arrangement between the NLD and the generals.

To overthrow the junta requires the mobilisation of the millions of workers, as well as the rural masses, to fight, not just for essential democratic rights, but for improved social conditions, which were under assault by the NLD-military regime.

As happened internationally, the COVID-19 pandemic intensified the attacks of government and big business on workers jobs and conditions. Suu Kyis government provided virtually no cash support to those hardest hit.

According to one survey conducted last October, the proportion of the population living in poverty (making less than $US1.90 a day) had risen from 16 percent to 63 percent over the previous eight months.

With the military takeover, the UN Development Program now expects half of Myanmars population of 55 million to fall into poverty over the coming six months, and the World Food Program worries that 3.5 million more people will face hunger.

Essential medicines and treatments are reported to be in extremely short supply, and during 2021, 950,000 infants will not receive the vaccines they need for diseases such as tuberculosis and polio.

Since the pandemic erupted, industries on which working-class households rely, such as tourism, have collapsed, as have remittances by migrant workers overseas, which totalled about $2.4 billion in 2019. The garment industry, which employed over a million people, many of them young women, has been devastated as orders from Europe have dried up.

Within days of the coup, hundreds of thousands of people poured onto the streets, demanding an end to military rule. A civil disobedience movement emerged, with medics leaving government hospitals, and quickly spread across the public sector. On February 22, a general strike shut down businesses, including banks.

The army cracked down ruthlessly. During the last week of February, elite infantry divisions, including units responsible for the ethnic cleansing of the Rohingya ethnic minority, began moving into cities, firing on people in residential neighborhoods, breaking down doors and hauling people away

Nevertheless, protests persisted. Young men and women erected makeshift barricades and wielded shields to defend themselves. On March 14 alone, dozens were killed in Yangons industrial suburb of Hlaingthaya. On March 27, over 100 died as the army opened fire on crowds across Myanmar.

Amid the resistance, some protesters raised signs calling for R2P, referring to responsibility to protect. This is a doctrine developed to justify imperialist intervention, supposedly to defend people from crimes against humanity. Hopes of such action have since faded.

Some youth have since joined armed separatist groups, based on ethnic minorities in border areas, but these are outgunned by the military. Numbering perhaps 75,000 fighters in total, they face a military with over 300,000 personnel, equipped combat aircraft, drones and rocket artillery.

The fight for democratic rights, moreover, is bound up with far broader political issues, including overturning the divisive nation-state framework imposed over the region by British colonialism and maintained by the local ruling classes, which are utterly subservient to the global capitalist powers.

In 1937, ten years before Pakistan was split from India along religious lines, the British partitioned Burma from India on the basis of perceived racial differences. After being granted formal independence in 1948, the Burmese elite retained a communalist policy, denying basic rights to those designated as aliens, such as the near million Rohingya, driven into neighbouring Bangladesh.

Mired in this Burmese Buddhist nationalism, Suu Kyi and the NLD defended the militarys atrocities committed against the Muslim Rohingya.

The military had freed Suu Kyi in 2010, after 15 previous years of detention, and staged elections under a constitution that ensured its continued grip on the key levers of power. The Obama administration and its allies oversaw this anti-democratic arrangement, seeking to coax the generals away from links to Beijing, as part of US imperialisms offensive against China.

As this history demonstrates, the working class can place no faith in Suu Kyi to defend democratic rights. No less than the generals, the NLD leaders fear a working-class uprising that could threaten capitalist rule. They represent sections of the capitalist class in Myanmar, whose profit-making interests have been flattened by the military, which controls substantial sections of the economy, including mining operations.

Myanmar is the worlds third-largest source of strategic mined rare earths. This not only provides the regime with revenue but heightens Myanmars strategic value for the US and its allies in their conflict with China, which borders Myanmar to the north and east. Any imperialist intervention will seek to pursue that confrontation, not defend the masses of Myanmar.

That is why, rather than looking to the NLDs national unity government or pleading for Washingtons help, Myanmar workers need to appeal to the international working class for support, and turn to the International Committee of the Fourth International for assistance to build the revolutionary socialist party.
Defying overwhelming hostility among university staff and students to an unprecedented assault on jobs and conditions, University of Newcastle (UoN) management, in the industrial city north of Sydney, is proceeding with a sweeping restructure.

The cuts at UoN are an acute expression of the drive by the ruling class, exploiting the COVID-19 pandemic, to restructure operations and working conditions in order to maximise profits, at the expense of workers and students.

A joint management and University of Newcastle Student Association meeting in May (WSWS media)

Across the universitys three collegesEngineering, Science and Environment; Health, Medicine and Wellbeing; and Human and Social Futuresmanagement aims to eliminate 164 Full-Time Equivalent (FTE) jobs among academic staff and another 61.4 FTE jobs among professional staff. Of these positions, nearly half are already vacant or will become so by the end of the year, through an early retirement scheme or the ending of fixed-term contracts.

A spill and fill process, like that imposed at Macquarie University, the University of Queensland and the University of Sydney over the past year, will force academics and staff to compete for new positions, supposedly amounting to 100 FTE academic staff jobs and 50.3 FTE professional staff jobs.

UoN managements change proposal states that it will achieve financial sustainability by primarily tilting the staffing profile towards junior positions. In other words, by hiring/rehiring staff on lower wages.

Staff members who do not accept the new roles, or cannot be trained for redeployment, will be forced into redundancy. Dozens or even hundreds of employees face being thrown onto the scrapheap, while students will end up with lower quality courses, larger class sizes and fewer opportunities for research and collaboration with academics.

To add insult to injury, management has pledged to offer a miserly $500 in financial advice and assistance, through a licensed Financial Planner for those being laid-off.

The cuts are a continuation of the restructure that began last year, which has already seen the consolidation of five faculties into three colleges, cutting or amalgamating approximately 530 of the universitys 2,200 courses.

In the College of Human and Social Futures, the proposal is to consolidate five schools into four, with the merger of the schools of Humanities and Social Science and Creative Industries, and the loss of 46.7 FTE positions.

Another 74.8 FTE positions are set to be axed in the College of Health, Medicine and Wellbeing, with the School of Health Science already reeling from the removal or amalgamation of 32 courses last year, and the scrapping of the disciplines of Family Studies and the Master of Workplace Health and Safety.

The College of Engineering, Science and Environment stands to lose more than 20 FTE positions, with the Earth Science discipline having already gone through major restructuring last year.

As at the 39 other public universities across Australia, it is unclear from these figures how many casual and fixed-term workers are being laid-off. According to Universities Australia, approximately 17,300 FTE jobs were lost in 2020, but the National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) last year admitted that the real figure was closer to 90,000.

University management insists that the cuts are necessary to reduce costs by about $20 million annually, because of the introduction of caps on government funding for domestic students in December 2017 and the impact of COVID-19 on international student revenue and reduced income from student accommodation.

Employers and governments are seizing on the coronavirus pandemic to accelerate a decades-long pro-business offensive, against university workers and students, since the last Labor governments pro-market education revolution. The changes are part of the current Liberal-National Coalition governments demand that universities produce job-ready graduates, while they receive about 10 percent less funding.

None of this could happen without the complicity of the NTEU and other trade unions, which have kept university staff split into individual workplaces and straitjacketed them within the enterprising bargaining system that has facilitated years of cuts and casualisation.

UoN management says its organisational change process is being carried out in accordance with the NTEUs 2018 enterprise bargaining agreement, which typically only requires consultation with the union and staff members, before the cuts are imposed.

The NTEU has effectively pressured staff members into taking voluntary redundancy packages, through the early retirement scheme, under the guise of exercising a choice to quit their jobs.

More than 4,500 staff and students have signed a petition circulated by the NTEU Newcastle branch, which was submitted last week. While the petition has been promoted as opposing the restructure, it is effectively an appeal to the vice chancellor for greater consultation with the union on ways to achieve managements requirements without provoking a revolt.

The petition pleads for a pause on the restructure, to give greater consideration to managing the financial situation through gradual staffing changes through natural attrition (retirements) and strategic recruitment. That is, the NTEU accepts the entire framework of intensifying cuts to government funding, and wants to help management destroy existing jobs and replace staff with lower-paid employees.

Likewise, the University of Newcastle Students Association (UNSA) is essentially acting as a public relations agency for management. It has held a series of five joint meetings with senior management executives to sell the cuts to students.

UNSA vice president of welfare and wellbeing, Jess Philbrook, told a May 26 meeting, that we [UNSA] are not here to endorse or support, we are here to create a forum for students to have their voices heard.

In plain English, UNSA does not oppose the cuts, but is collaborating with the university to divert growing student opposition into supposed discussion sessions with university executives.

Management is also stepping up its subordination of research to the demands of the corporate elite and the government, including for a military buildup. The change proposal declares that the restructures reflect a greater focus on impactful research and enhancing engagement with industry partners.

In 2018, the university signed an Altitude Accord with Lockheed Martin, one of the worlds biggest weapons manufacturers. According to a Defence Connect report in late 2020, the program includes a virtual lecture series presented by Lockheed Martin engineers, working on projects like the Future Submarine Program and a simulated training system for air force pilots.

Vice-Chancellor Alex Zelinsky, who was installed in November 2018, was Australias Chief Defence Scientist from 2012 to 2018. He is deepening the integration of the university sector into the arms industry and the US-led war preparations being directed against China and Russia.

The International Youth and Students for Social Equality (IYSSE) club is the only political organisation on campus opposing the restructure and fighting to mobilise students and staff against it. To get involved with this campaign, please contact us.
Eight candidates for the Democratic Party nomination for New York City mayor held their final debate on June 16, six days before the primary election for the nomination to succeed Bill de Blasio as mayor of the largest city in the US. With the Republican contest in the June 22 primaries involving two backers of ex-President Donald Trump, widely hated in the city, the Democratic nominee is virtually certain to win the mayoral election that is still almost five months away.

The two-hour debate featured presumed front-runner Eric Adams, current Brooklyn Borough president, and his three main challengers: Maya Wiley, the former counsel to de Blasio as mayor, who has been anointed the progressive candidate in the race; Kathryn Garcia, the former sanitation commissioner, who has been endorsed by both the New York Times and the Daily News; and Andrew Yang, the businessman and former candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination.

Democratic mayoral candidates at their final debate on Wednesday, June 16 in Manhattan. (Photo: WNBC-TV and NYC Campaign Finance Board)

For all the noisy exchanges between these and the remaining four candidates, the debate only illustrated more than ever the role of the Democrats in disenfranchising the working class and sidelining all opposition to Wall Street and big business.

To the extent the contenders spoke of problems such as homelessness, these were posed without even hinting at the responsibility of the financial aristocracy for the misery of millions of workers. All of the candidates, from the most moderate to the most left, said nothing about challenging the stranglehold of the ruling elite on social and economic life. In the city of Wall Street, they all evaded the question of who should pay for the crisis of the profit system.

Remarkably, the election campaign has unfolded with virtually no discussion of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has so far claimed the lives of more than 33,000 New York City residents.

The Democratic Party and the bourgeois media have used the primary campaign to shift the axis of city politics sharply to the right. De Blasio won his first election in 2013 campaigning against the tale of two cities, one rich and one poor. But the current campaign has dropped any reference to social inequality, which grew steadily during de Blasios eight years in office, accelerating enormously in the course of the past 15 months.

Instead, the Democrats and the media have made public safety the watchword, with the candidates grilled on how they will deal with the uptick of shootings and violent crime in the course of the pandemic. This has inevitably strengthened Adams, an ex-cop who has postured both as an advocate of law and order and an opponent of police misconduct (despite the obvious incompatibility of those positions), and who has been endorsed by the Murdoch-owned, pro-Trump New York Post.

Adams is currently leading in some pre-election polling, but the large number of candidates, the expected low voter turnout and the introduction of a ranked-choice voting system for the first time all mean that the polls are even less predictive than usual.

Yang, who originally presented himself as the optimistic candidate and led in some polls based mostly on name recognition from his presidential campaign, has now staked out a position as the most right-wing of the four main candidates, boasting of his endorsement from the Captains Endowment Association within the New York Police Department, and inveighing against the homeless and their alleged threat to the quality of life.

The other major issue in the phony electoral jousting between the candidates has been the advocacy of identity politics: the claim that capitalist society can be made more tolerable to the masses by putting black or female politicians in charge.

Four of the eight candidates participating in the final debate are black: Adams and Wiley, as well as ex-banker Raymond McGuire and former nonprofit executive Dianne Morales, two of the four presumed also-rans.

A main feature of the campaign has thus been breathless media speculation as to whether the outcome will lead to the citys second black mayor (Adams or McGuire, following David Dinkins), its first female mayor (Garcia, who is Hispanic only by marriage), or its first mayor who is both black and a woman (Wiley or Morales). Yang, of course, would be the first Asian mayor.

Only two of the candidates, Scott Stringer and Shaun Donovan, are white males, and they are expected to disappear early in the ranked-choice voting, which eliminates candidates starting from the lowest vote-getter, redistributing their votes to the voters next selection on the multi-choice ballot until one candidate accumulates a majority.

The emphasis on race is all the more reactionary when one considers the history of the last 50 years, with African American and women mayors in virtually every major city presiding over a social counterrevolution which has condemned millions to mass incarceration, poverty and the threat of homelessness. These bitter experiences have demonstrated that the fundamental issue is that of class, not race, and the need for a socialist program that targets the source of the attacks on the working class.

In this respect, the role of Maya Wiley is particularly significant. She has attracted attention after her endorsement about two weeks ago by Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the leading progressive in Congress. While the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) announced several months ago that it would not be endorsing a mayoral candidate this year, DSA member Ocasio-Cortez has anointed Maya Wiley as the choice of the left.

Wiley has also won the backing of Elizabeth Warren, newly-elected progressive Congressman Jamaal Bowman and New York City Public Advocate Jumaane Williams.

While Wiley has emphasized such issues as affordable housing and child care and called for the defunding of the police by transferring $1 billion from the NYPD budget to social spending, there is no reason to believe that her demagogic promises are any more meaningful than those made by Bill de Blasio, in whose administration she served.

Wiley has highlighted her gender and race as though they were actual credentials for office. In an interview with Essence magazine, she said that being a Black woman also makes for a better mayor. Black women get stuff done because they know how to walk in the shoes of others and bring empathy, courage and clarity to their work. My lived experiences give me great insight into the varied challenges all Black and brown New Yorkers are facing.

For the two decades before de Blasio was elected, New York City was governed by Republican mayors Rudy Giuliani and Michael Bloomberg (although Bloomberg eventually changed his party registration over the course of his terms in office). De Blasio, however, ran as a self-proclaimed progressive, declaring he would slash homelessness and pour money into the schools and colleges. At the end of his eight years in office, homelessness has never been higher, while inequality and everything associated with it has reached new heights.

None of the 2021 Democrats bother to explain this contradiction, nor does the media bother to ask. For all de Blasios posturing during his election campaign, when he entered City Hall he quickly demonstrated that he was the servant of Wall Street. Whoever wins the primary vote on June 22 will likely run City Hall next year, and will govern in the interests of the super-rich. But the next mayor will also be forced to confront an eruption of the class struggle, as workers respond to growing attacks on their living standards and democratic rights.
The World Socialist Web Site calls on Volvo workers and all autoworkers to come to the support of the nearly 3,000 striking Volvo Trucks workers at the New River Valley (NRV) plant in Dublin, Virginia.

Volvo Truck workers last month [Source: UAW 2069]

The Volvo workers have been on strike now for more than 10 days, following their overwhelming rejection, by 90 percent, of a second tentative agreement brought back by the United Auto Workers (UAW) union. The workers are demanding a significant increase in wages to make up for previous concessions, a cost-of-living escalator clause to meet the soaring cost of consumer goods, an end to the multitier wage and benefit system, the preservation of the eight-hour day, and full health care for current workers and retirees.

The Volvo workers at NRV face a war on two fronts. First, they are waging a battle against a multinational corporation with more than $50 billion in annual revenue and more than $4 billion in annual profits. Volvo management, with the support of the entire capitalist state, is determined to intensify the exploitation of workers to pay for the billions of dollars it is handing out to its major shareholders.

Volvo NRV General Manager Franky Marchand released a statement Thursday declaring that the company will not return to the bargaining table until the process for the new round of negotiations is clear to allthat is, until it can receive assurances from the UAW that a new agreement will be ratified without failure.

Marchand added that what he found most troubling is the stress the process is putting between all of us, which is uncharacteristic of our community. What is really troubling Volvo is the fact that it is being forced to take the will of the workers into account. When the second contract was voted down earlier this month, Marchand released a statement saying that it is difficult to understand this action, because the agreement had been endorsed by the UAW International, Regional and Local leadership.

What Marchand finds difficult to understand is that the traditional process of contract ratificationwhereby the company tells the UAW what it wants, and the UAW forces it through with lies and threatshas broken down, due to the interference of the workers themselves.

Late Thursday afternoon, Volvo announced that it had agreed with the UAW to resume negotiations on June 23, that is, not for another week. This makes clear that management is determined to crush the strike while workers are strung out on the picket lines. The company has already canceled health care for the striking workers and is utilizing state police deployed by the Virginias Democratic governor to bring in scab labor to continue operations.

The second front of the war is against the UAW itself, which is doing everything it can to isolate Volvo workers. It does not have a strategy for victory but a strategy for defeat.

Responding to Marchand, UAW Local 2069 President Matt Blondino released a statement with vague promises that the UAW was working hard to address the shortcomings from previous tentative agreements that membership rightfully so wants the company to address. With cap in hand, Blondino begs the company to resume negotiations while complaining that they want to test our mettle on the strike line.

Blondino, however, said nothing about what the UAW is actually proposing that is different from the shortcomings of two contracts that were overwhelmingly rejected by Volvo workers. Nor did he care to explain why the UAW and Blondino personally campaigned so aggressively for them if workers rightfully thought they did not meet their needs. Most significantly, Blondino did not suggest that the UAW would do anything to win the strike. Instead, the UAW is doing everything to undermine the mettle of workers by starving them on the picket lines and leaving them isolated.

In an effort to organize opposition and break free from the UAW-imposed isolation of their struggle, workers at NRV have formed the Volvo Workers Rank-and-File Committee (VWRFC).

On Monday, the VWRFC issued a powerful open letter to UAW International President Rory Gamble, UAW Secretary-Treasurer Ray Curry and Blondino. The letter demands that the UAW explain what it is proposing to the company that is different from what it proposed in the two agreements that were overwhelmingly rejected. It also demands that the UAW explain why workers are only being paid a poverty-level $275 a week in strike pay, despite the massive resources possessed by the UAW.

The letter emphasizes the UAWs isolation of the strike. It notes that the UAW International Facebook page has not posted a single notice about the strike, and that workers at other plants, including autoworkers, have said that they do not even know about it. You claim to be our representatives, the open letter states, yet we see that on every front your actions are undermining our strike.

In its effort to isolate the strike, Volvo and the UAW have the critical assistance of the media and the entire political establishment, from the right to the pseudo-left. The New York Times, the main mouthpiece of the Democratic Party, has not published a single article on the resumption of the strike this month. Nor has the Washington Post, which includes Virginia as part of its local coverage. Neither have the network and cable news television programs reported on the strike. Jacobin magazine, affiliated with a faction of the Democratic Socialists of America, has not written on it, and the DSA itself has issued no statement.

It is the working class that must organize support for the Volvo NRV workers. This begins with the Volvo and Volvo-Mack workers in Maryland, Pennsylvania and Virginia. The UAW is keeping 3,500 workers on the line at Volvo-Mack plants, even as the company is beginning to implement layoffs due to a shortage of supplies caused by the NRV strike.

Volvo is an international company, with operations in Europe, Asia, Latin America, the Middle East and Africa. It is necessary to bring to the attention of Volvo workers in every country the struggle of their brothers and sisters in Dublin, Virginia.

Support must be extended to all autoworkers, who face the same conditions. When informed about the strike at Volvo, autoworkers at the Big Three plants and the parts plants express full support and a desire for a joint struggle. News of the stand taken at NRV must be spread far and wide, breaking the blackout imposed by the UAW and the media.

The strike at Volvo, moreover, is part of a series of struggles throughout the United States that reflect a growing mood of anger and rebellion, including the strike of Warrior Met coal miners in Alabama; nurses in Worcester, Massachusetts; and ATI steelworkers in Pennsylvania and other states. In Beaumont, Texas, oil workers at ExxonMobil have been locked out in their fight to preserve jobs and defend safety conditions.

In every case, the unionsthe United Mine Workers of America, Massachusetts Nurses Association and the United Steelworkersare employing the same methods as the UAW. They are isolating the struggles, while telling workers nothing about the strike that has erupted at Volvo. This must be ended.

The ruling class response to the pandemic, the massive growth of social inequality, and the soaring cost of basic goods are fueling a growth of the class struggle throughout the world. Miners in Canada are currently on strike against Vale Inco after rejecting a contract brought back by the United Steelworkers. In India, autoworkers have engaged in strike action in an effort to stop production amidst the expanding coronavirus pandemic. Miners throughout Latin America have launched strike action against unsafe conditions.

In organizing an independent rank-and-file committee, workers at Volvo have created a new power at NRVthe workers themselves. This initiative must be extended throughout Volvo, the auto industry and beyond, in the United States and internationally, to develop in the working class a united counteroffensive against capitalist exploitation and inequality.

The isolation of the Volvo strike must be broken!

The World Socialist Web Site calls on all workers to distribute the Volvo Workers Rank-and-File Committees open letter as widely as possible. Send it to your co-workers, friends and family members and post it on social media. Send your messages of support to volvowrfc@gmail.com. Contact the WSWS for assistance in forming a rank-and-file committee at your workplace.
Peru is gripped by sharp political tensions, as the country is set to complete a second week since the June 6 presidential election without a winner being officially declared.

With 100 percent of the ballots counted, Pedro Castillo, the former teachers strike leader and candidate of the Peru Libre party, leads the right-wing Fuerza Popular candidate Keiko Fujimori, the daughter of former dictator Alberto Fujimori, who is imprisoned for 25 years for crimes against humanity, by a margin of 50.12 percent to 49.87. Just 43,000 votes out of the more than seventeen and a half million cast separate the two candidates, but it is clear that Castillo has won.

Supporters of Fujimori (left) and Castillo (right) demonstrating in Lima (Credit: Andina)

A declaration that Castillo has won, however, has been blocked by the Fujimori camp, which has mounted a legal offensive based on spurious claims of election fraud, seeking to overturn the results from hundreds of polling stations in the Andean highlands and Amazonian regions where Castillo won by overwhelming margins.

As of Wednesday, the National Election Board (JNE) announced that of the 942 challenges brought by the Fujimori camp, 792 have been resolved, without one of them establishing electoral fraud of any kind. Most of the claims had been brought after a June 9 cutoff for making such challenges.

While the challenges have no basis in either fact or law, they have been brought by an army of high-powered lawyers drawn from Limas top law firm, with the aim of delaying confirmation of the election results as long as possible. The Fujimori camp is playing for time, with the intention that its challenges and ceaseless claims of fraud will create the conditions for overturning the election by extra-constitutional means, up to and including a military coup.

This conspiracy enjoys the support of the corporate media, the bulk of the countrys financial oligarchy and sections of the military.

The similarities between the tactics pursued by Fujimori and those employed by Trump in the 2020 US presidential election do not stop at the use of fabricated charges of electoral fraud to overturn the election or, at the very least, delegitimize the incoming government. Like Trump, Fujimori, along with other members of her family and top aides, face the prospect of criminal conviction and imprisonment if they fail to seize the presidency.

The Anti-Corruption Prosecutors Office has asked that Keiko Fujimori be returned to pre-trial detention on charges of money laundering connected to political bribes, including from the Brazilian construction giant Odebrecht. She is also charged with heading a criminal organization, i.e., her own party, Fuerza Popular.

The threat of political violence or even a military coup is real. Fujimoris followers have staged fascistic demonstrations, replete with torches and the singing of the national anthem while giving the Nazi salute.

Castillos supporters, including many who have come to Lima from the interior, have also demonstrated in the capital demanding that their candidate be officially declared the winner.

Meanwhile, 63 retired generals and other high-ranking officers issued a communique demanding the resignation of the head of the election board, warning of the danger of a Castillo victory and calling for the strengthening of confidence in the armed forces and the police. The Defense Ministry felt compelled to issue a statement in response deploring the use of official military symbols in the communique.

Ever since Castillo emerged with the highest number of votes in the first round, and Fujimori with the second highesteach of them with less than 20 percentthe Peruvian right and the media have conducted a rabid campaign branding Castillo a communist and a terrorist, charging that he would turn Peru into another Venezuela.

Since winning the second round, Castillo and his backers have sought to disassociate themselves from radical policies, including the nationalization of mining industries called for in Peru Libres platform, while drawing in a group of moderate advisers. The most prominent among them is Pedro Francke, a Catholic University economist and former official at the World Bank and Perus central bank. Francke had served as a chief adviser to Veronika Mendoza, the candidate of the pseudo-left Juntos por el Peru party, who placed a distant sixth in the first round of the presidential elections.

The increasing role of Mendozas advisers is politically significant. In the 2016 presidential election, Mendoza threw her support to the ex-Wall Street financier Pedro Pablo Kuczynski as the lesser evil in his successful second round run-off with Keiko Fujimori, making clear Mendozas responsible approach to the interests of Peruvian and international capital.

At a press conference in Lima Tuesday, Francke reassured the Peruvian and international bourgeoisie: There will not be expropriations, there will not be nationalizations. Nor confiscations, nor anything. It is widely expected that Francke will be tapped as Castillos economy minister.

Earlier in the week, Scotiabank Peru, the countrys third-largest financial institution, issued a statement declaring its approval of Franckes role and of a document issued in Castillos name suggesting a softer, more pro-market (or at least, less radical) stance on issues such as property rights, respect for economic institutions, the relationship with private business, price controls and other concerns. It concluded that rather than being a radical leftist, Castillos chief economic adviser is a Keynesian.

Both Castillo and Francke have carried out a whirlwind of meetings with big business figures. As a result of these meetings, Roque Benavides, head of the Buenaventura mining company, which for decades has extracted billions of dollars worth of minerals at the cost of the destruction of Perus rivers and valleys, and also president of the main business organization, Confiep, declared that he would accept proposals for tax increases, but he would not tolerate nationalizations.

Castillos program has been whittled down to tax reform, renegotiation of royalties from the transnational mining corporations and an agrarian reform that forswears any expropriation of redistribution of land.

The corporate media and the Peruvian political establishment have demanded that Castillo prove his reliability by breaking with the founder of Peru Libre, Vladimir Cerron, the ex-governor of the central department of Junin. Combining pseudo-Marxist rhetoric, populist demagoguery and extreme right-wing social policiesembraced by Castilloon issues such as abortion and gender politics, Cerron was criminally convicted on corruption charges.

The official declaration of Castillos victory will hardly resolve Perus deep-going political, social and economic crisis. The country is among the hardest hit by the COVID-19 pandemic, registering the highest per capita death toll in the world. The effects on the economic conditions of the working class and oppressed masses have been catastrophic, with an estimated nine million jobs wiped out, poverty increasing by 10 percent and soaring prices of basic commodities.

The real fear of the Peruvian bourgeoisie is not of Castillo, who is already making clear that he is someone with whom they can do business, but of an eruption of class struggle driven by declining living standards and a dramatic increase in social inequality as those at the top have enriched themselves, while working people have faced death, disease, unemployment and impoverishment.
On Wednesday, a parcel delivery union called off a week-long strike in South Korea while it continues negotiations with the companies involved in the dispute and the government. Workers struck on June 9 citing exhausting 12 to 14 hour workdays, much of it unpaid. They previously walked-off the job in January over the conditions.

The Parcel Delivery Workers Solidarity Union (PDWSU) claimed to have reached a tentative agreement with logistics companies including Hanjin Transportation, Lotte Global Logistics and CJ Logistics. It has said the deal means workers will no longer be forced to sort packages beginning on January 1 next year and weekly hours will be limited to 60. Additional details have not been made public.

A South Korean delivery driver (Credit: Reddit post, u/babylemurman)

This agreement will do next to nothing to address the strikers demands. Workers have complained that package sorting takes up a great deal of time while they are not being paid for the additional labor. Instead, they are paid per package delivered. They have also accused Korea Post, the countrys national postal service, which employs the majority of the strikers, of shifting the blame for accidents onto workers, imposing excessive delivery quotas, and violating the Labor Standards Act.

In addition, at least sixteen workers throughout the industry died last year as a result of overwork as people have increasingly used delivery services during the COVID-19 pandemic. A worker from Coupang took his own life in March, leaving a note that said, Im too tired. The rise in online shopping has produced a surge in profits for the companies. Food delivery alone has increased 79 percent, generating $US15.6 billion.

As a result of these conditions, the strike had overwhelming support from the workers. Some 4,910 union members out of a total of 5,310 voted to strike. This represents about ten percent of all delivery workers nationwide.

At the beginning of the strike, a union official told a rally of workers: Logistics companies and the postal service have gained enormous benefits for decades by forcing delivery workers to sort parcels. By asking to delay the implementation of the overwork prevention measures by one year, they are saying they will continue to subject workers to long work hours and the risk of death from overwork.

This did not stop the PDWSU from ending the strike in order to meet the demands of big business. The union only called the stoppage after weeks of negotiations yielded no results it could force on its membership. The union wanted to allow workers to let off steam before sending them back to work. On Tuesday evening, the union staged an overnight protest in Yeouido, Seoul to bolster its image with workers before shutting the strike down the next day.

Demonstrating the governments hostility to the striking workers, police attempted to disperse the rally, citing the COVID-19 pandemic. Some clashes between cops and the striking workers took place. As thousands of people have assembled in Yeouido, concerns have grown that the efforts by the people and the government to stop the spread of the virus could go to waste, the Seoul Metropolitan Police stated.

Ultimately, the tentative deal amounts to an attempt by the union to force through a sellout, as it tries to prevent an explosion of anger from this section of highly exploited laborers. More than anything, the unions, acting as an industrial police force for big business, fear that a protracted strike could become the focal point for a broader movement of the working class, directed not only against the delivery companies, but the corporate elite as a whole and the government.

Workers are now being forced back to the same jobs they walked out on with no changes except a tentative promise that companies will alleviate their workloads next year. At the same time, the workers will still be expected to put in twenty hours of overtime a week, assuming management does not simply ignore the agreement as they did earlier in the year.

Following a strike in January, logistics firms agreed to hire more workers to sort packages and put an end to overwork while paying employees who do the sorting. This did not happen. On June 13, the PDWSU reported on its Facebook page that another worker had suffered a cerebral hemorrhage, likely caused by working an average of 93 hours a week.

Furthermore, Korea Post has to this point refused to sign on to the latest deal with private delivery companies.

From the start, the PDWSU isolated workers even within the same union. Kowtowing to the demands of the government and big business, the union kept workers on the job in order to minimize the impact of the walk-out on the companies. No appeal was made to the 45,000 other delivery workers in the country, let alone other sections of the working class, such as the crane operators in the Korean Construction Workers Union (KCWU) who had struck at the same time over deadly conditions.

Both the PDWSU and the KCWU are affiliated with the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU). The KCTU postures as a militant, and at times even anti-capitalist, organization, but in reality, has a long history of betraying workers struggles. The union backed President Moon Jae-in, whose government now oversees the brutal conditions at Korea Post, in the 2017 presidential election.

The PDWSU is now working to prevent another strike from taking place. The union leadership is using cheap stunts to give the impression that it is carrying on the fight. The bureaucrats claim they will begin a hunger strike if the tentative deal is not concluded within a week. Jin Gyeong-ho, the head of the union, said on Thursday, We make it clear that the union can never sign a deal if the issue with the postal service is not resolved. Workers must ask themselves: if this is the case, why are they back on the job?

Delivery workers and those in other industries throughout the country must take their struggles out of the hands of these corporatised organizations. Workers should form rank-and-file committees completely independent of the unions in order to carry forward their struggles for safe conditions, decent wages and workplace rights.
TERRE HAUTE, Ind. (WTHI) - The Indiana State University Board of Trustees met on Friday to discuss potential increases to tuition costs.

ISU's fees for in-state students will increase by $66 per semester starting in 2021. The cost will increase again in 2022 by $67 per semester.

Other Wabash Valley schools

Vincennes University also announced a tuition increase earlier this week. The Board of Trustees at VU approved the $200 hike this coming year, with another increase of $206 the following year.

Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology will not increase the cost of tuition for next year.

The Board of Trustees made that decision back in March. The president of the college says they are working to find ways to reduce costs further.

A new tuition model for Ivy Tech Community College will freeze tuition for the next two years.

The new structure includes the cost of textbooks as a regularly assessed fee. Full-time students will be charged the same tuition rate.

Ivy Tech will cover the cost of textbooks for students for the 21-22 school year.
TERRE HAUTE, Ind. (WTHI) - A local business is doing its part to remember the late Vigo County Councilman Don Morris.

The Dawgleg Bar and Grill at Idle Creek is hosting a memorial night for Morris.

The bar says he played there almost every third Friday for the last 20 years.

Morris would have been scheduled to play on Friday night. Instead, they will play his music and look back at his life.

Morris and his wife, Cheryl Hart, were killed last month when a car hit them in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.
LAWRENCEVILLE, Ind (WTHI) - An Indiana State Police trooper and an Indiana Gaming Commission agent are both facing charges after an off-duty incident.

It happened Saturday, June 12, at a home in Lawrence County, Indiana.

According to Indiana State Police, Sgt. Russell Garrison, a 23-year state police veteran, and Tiffany Corbin, a 15-year gaming commission veteran, were involved in a domestic incident.

Details surrounding the incident remain limited, but the alleged battery was between the pair, according to state police.

Garrison is assigned to the state police post in Bloomington.

Both Garrison and Corbin are each facing a charge of domestic battery.

Garrison was placed on administrative leave pending the results of the criminal proceedings.
SULLIVAN COUNTY, Ind. (WTHI) - One of the two men charged with the death of a 15-year-old girl made his first court appearance on Friday morning.

A Sullivan County judge set a trial date of September 28 for Matthew Todd Earle.

LINK | Court docs: 20 total shots fired between two suspects in Carlisle shooting that killed teen

He's charged with criminal recklessness and obstruction of justice.

Indiana State Police arrested Earle and Kyle Johnson.

That's after the shooting death of 15-year-old Mezmeriah Wilson. State police say the investigation is ongoing and more charges could be filed.

Johnson will be in court next Friday.

Both are still in the Sullivan County Jail on a $15,000 bond.
COLUMBUS, Miss. (WTVA) - Columbus city leaders voted to sell a vacant lot downtown to a private developer.

For years, the Gilmer Inn operated on the property before it was torn down, and local officials hope the location will soon be a popular spot in town again.

Columbus City Hall, Photo Date: June 9, 2021. Columbus City Hall, Photo Date: June 9, 2021.

The city council approved the sale of the property for $270,000 to private developer Financial Concepts at Tuesday's meeting.

David Armstrong is the city's chief operations officer.

He believes the council's decision to sell will help Columbus grow.

Its a very desirable area and we knew that from the start," he explained. "Were trying to redevelop that whole area and thats going to fit right into it.

The CEO of Financial Concepts, Scott Ferguson, told WTVA that his plan for the land is to build two separate buildings.

One building will house the company's new office space. The other will hold a retail store.

Also, both buildings will have two apartments above the business units.

Current Columbus Mayor Robert Smith said although he is leaving office soon, he sees this sale as a step in building Columbus.

I hope that this will be just a starting point as far as businesses located uptown and also in the other areas across the city of Columbus," said Smith.

Ferguson said he plans to break ground on the buildings in late summer or early fall depending on paperwork.

He hopes to be finished and moved into the new location by the end of 2022.
JACKSON, Miss. (WTVA) - First Lady Jill Biden is scheduled to travel to Mississippi on Tuesday, June 22.

Shell travel to Jackson and later Nashville, Tennessee, where she will visit vaccine sites and encourage those communities to get vaccinated for COVID-19.

In Jackson, she will be joined by U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-MS, and Mayor Chokwe Antar Lumumba.

In Nashville, country singer Brad Paisley will join Biden.

As of Monday, June 22, the Mississippi State Department of Health has administered 1,981,761 total doses of the vaccine.

Exactly 1,076,034 people have received at least one dose and 958,576 people are fully vaccinated.
JACKSON, Miss. (WTVA) - Mississippi is scheduled to lift its COVID-19 State of Emergency on Aug. 15.

It officially takes effect that night at 11:59.

"I want to thank all Mississippians for their sacrifices over the past 15 months," Gov. Tate Reeves said. "Your actions resulted in a significant decline of COVID-19 cases and allowed our state to effectively manage the impacts of the virus. Im also extremely proud of the way our Mississippi National Guard, MS Department of Health, MEMA, and other state agencies have capably handled this pandemic. With their help, weve administered nearly 2 million COVID-19 vaccinations. While a State of Emergency should no longer be necessary after August 15, all Mississippians should remain vigilant, get vaccinated, and follow public health guidance."

The Mississippi National Guard will stop its COVID-19 operations on July 15.

Mississippi is winning the battle against COVID-19! Mississippi National Guard Soldiers and Airmen have served with honor and dedication supporting the Governors COVID-19 Task Force since March 2020, Adjutant General of the Mississippi National Guard, Maj. Gen. Janson D. Boyles said. "The Governors timeline to lift Mississippis State of Emergency declaration on August 15, 2021, ensures our over 1,500 service members complete all necessary out-processing requirements and receive the benefits and entitlements they have earned during their dedicated service to our state.
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Morgantown, WV (26505)

Today

Considerable clouds this morning. Some decrease in clouds later in the day. Slight chance of a rain shower. High 71F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph..

Tonight

Partly cloudy. Slight chance of a shower throughout the evening. Low 57F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph.
Primary care physician outreach program at West Virginia University designated as one of only eight 'ECHO Superhubs' in the nation
Clarksburg, WV (26301)

Today

Partly cloudy. Slight chance of a rain shower. High 73F. Winds NW at 10 to 15 mph..

Tonight

Partly cloudy. Slight chance of a shower throughout the evening. Low near 55F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph.
At a glance

Laramie County District Attorney Leigh Anne Manlove responded Thursday to a call by the Wyoming State Bar for a disciplinary hearing, which would address what special bar counsel called her "incompetence and lack of professionalism."

"This process will unfold as it must, according to the Rules of Disciplinary Procedure, and I am confident I will be exonerated," Manlove said in a news release.
Researchers sequenced coronavirus samples at the microbiology laboratory of the University Hospital of Badajoz in Spain on April 15. Javier Pulpo/Europa Press/Getty Images

The Delta variant appears to be more transmissible than any other coronavirus strain.

Some experts worry the variant could result in more breakthrough cases in vaccinated people, especially those who have had only one dose of vaccine.

Right now, the Delta variant does not seriously threaten anyone who has had two vaccine doses.

See more stories on Insider's business page.

Scientists have long worried about a coronavirus variant that's more dangerous than the original virus in three key ways: It would be more transmissible, result in more serious illness, and evade protection from existing vaccines.

"The nightmare here is a variant that checks off all three boxes," said Bob Wachter, the chair of the Department of Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco.

No prior variant, he said, has checked more than one or two. But the Delta variant, first identified in India in February, has come closest to checking all three.

Right now, two doses of vaccine are at least greater than 88% effective at preventing serious cases of COVID-19, of the type that might put you in hospital, even from the Delta variant. However, a single shot is only about 33% effective in protecting patients from that level of harm, according to studies of Delta variant.

"The data today says that this variant gets a full checked box for more infectious, probably gets a checked box for more serious, and at least gets a partial checked box for immune evasion. And that's scary," Wachter said.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention labeled Delta a "variant of concern" on Tuesday.

"Delta is a superspreader variant, the worst version of the virus we've seen," Eric Topol, the director of the Scripps Research Translational Institute, tweeted on Tuesday.

For the most part, however, Delta hasn't drastically challenged vaccines. Public Health England analyses have found that two doses of Pfizer's vaccine are still 96% effective at preventing hospitalizations - and 88% effective at preventing symptomatic COVID-19 - from Delta cases. Two doses of AstraZeneca's vaccine, meanwhile, are around 92% effective at preventing hospitalizations and 60% effective at preventing symptomatic COVID-19 from Delta.

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But that efficacy does not come after just one dose: A single shot of either Pfizer's or AstraZeneca's vaccines were just 33% effective at preventing symptomatic COVID-19 from Delta.

"The fact that three weeks after your first dose you're only 30% protected - versus, in the original, you were 80% - says that this thing has figured out how to at least partly evade the immune system," Wachter said.

It's also possible, he added, that vaccine protection could "wear off more quickly."

Delta is the most transmissible strain yet

People wait to receive COVID-19 vaccines at HB Kanwatia Hospital in Jaipur, Rajasthan, India, on April 11, 2021. Vishal Bhatnagar/NurPhoto/Getty Images

While Delta undoubtedly poses the biggest threat to unvaccinated people, some experts worry that it may result in more breakthrough infections - cases of COVID-19 diagnosed at least two weeks after someone is fully vaccinated.

"That's the concern - that you're more likely to get COVID from the same exposure than you would have been before," Wachter said. "And you're more likely, if you have COVID, to have a more serious case."

Other experts are also afraid the strain may further evolve into something more dangerous, since Delta's high transmissibility enables it to spread easily among unvaccinated people, and therefore to keep replicating and mutating.

"The worst-case scenario is if Delta mutates into something completely different, a completely different animal, and then our current vaccines are even less effective or ineffective," said Vivek Cherian, an internal-medicine physician in Baltimore.

Research from Public Health England suggests that the Delta variant is associated with a 60% increased risk of household transmission compared to Alpha - the variant discovered in the UK. Alpha is already around 50% more transmissible than the original strain, the CDC said.

In other words, "Alpha is to the original as Delta is to Alpha," Wachter said.

Researchers in Scotland, meanwhile, found that getting infected with Delta doubles the risk of hospital admission relative to Alpha.

Does Delta make breakthrough infections more likely?

Maryland National Guard Specialist James Truong administered a Moderna vaccine in Wheaton, Maryland, on May 21. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

Although variants are responsible for the majority of breakthrough infections, it's very rare to get COVID-19 after being fully vaccinated: A May CDC report found that just 0.01% of vaccinated Americans got sick.

Even when it comes to Delta, Cherian said, "my guess is you don't really have to worry about breakthrough infections."

But Wachter worries that Delta could turn a mild breakthrough case into a more serious one.

"It increases the risk that we're going to see more breakthrough infections and maybe more serious breakthrough infections than I would have worried about a few weeks ago," he said.

The biggest risk may be for elderly or immunocompromised people, he added.

"The 80-year-old who's been fully vaccinated - their level of immunity is not the same as a 30-year-old," Wachter said.

Delta could threaten our return to normal life

People dined while wearing masks in San Francisco on April 3. Yalonda M. James/The San Francisco Chronicle/Getty Images

At the moment, Delta accounts for 10% of US coronavirus infections, but scientists expect it to become the dominant strain within weeks. Wachter said he would "start acting much more carefully" if Delta came to represent one out of every three or five COVID-19 cases in a given region.

"If I had gotten comfortable with being inside without a mask in a place where I wasn't sure that everybody's vaccinated, I would now be uncomfortable," he added.

Cherian, on the other hand, doesn't think Delta warrants that level of caution yet - though most experts still worry that a more concerning variant could arise out of the fast-mutating strain.

"It is a perfectly human instinct to feel now we have weathered this terrible 18 months, and now we are out of it and over it," Wachter said. "I hope that's true, and it may turn out to be true. But the chances of that not being true, and that we're going to have more in our future to deal with, have gone up considerably in the last few weeks because of Delta."

Read the original article on Business Insider
Reuters

Both chambers of Nigeria's parliament have passed a bill that overhauls nearly every aspect of the country's oil and gas production, putting a project that has been in the works for two decades one step closer to presidential sign-off. Legislators have been hashing out details of the bill since President Muhammadu Buhari presented an initial version in September last year, but an overhaul has been in the works for some 20 years. Earlier in the day, senators entered a closed-door session with the petroleum minister and the head of state oil company NNPC for a briefing on the technical terms and details.
Firing squad Hulton Archive/Getty Images

South Carolina, like many U.S. states, has been unable to obtain lethal injection drugs, so in May lawmakers passed and Gov. Henry McMaster (R) signed a law giving death row inmates a choice: the electric chair or a firing squad. Brad Keith Sigmon, scheduled to be executed on Friday, chose the firing squad, but because South Carolina doesn't yet have a firing squad set up, the state Supreme Court on Wednesday halted all executions until South Carolina can give prisoners the bleak choice it promised them, CNN reports.

The South Carolina Department of Corrections said a "firing squad is currently unavailable" because it has "yet to complete its development and implementation of necessary protocols and policies." The state Supreme Court responded by vacating the execution orders for Sigmon and Freddie Owen, scheduled to be put to death on June 25, until "the Department of Corrections, in addition to maintaining the availability of electrocution, has developed and implemented appropriate protocols and policies to carry out executions by firing squad." South Carolina hasn't executed an inmate since 2011.

Meanwhile, Arizona has secretly refurbished its gas chamber, even though it has lethal injection drugs. Arizona prison officials bought materials in December to make hydrogen cyanide gas, the same gas the Nazis used to murder 865,000 Jews in the Auschwitz concentration camp alone. "Whether or not one supports the death penalty as a general matter, there is general agreement in American society that a gas devised as a pesticide, and used to eliminate Jews, has no place in the administration of criminal justice," the American Jewish Committee said last week.

The U.S. lethally gassed 594 prisoners between 1924, when the world's first gas chamber was used in Nevada, and 1999, when Arizona executed Walter LaGrand, who gasped and writhed for 18 minutes, says Scott Christianson, author of a book on "the Rise and Fall of the American Gas Chamber." Arizona halted executions in 2014 after Joseph Wood took two gasping hours and 15 doses of a two-drug lethal injection cocktail to die. Arizona has scheduled two executions for August and September. It's not clear if the gas chamber could be used.

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"You have to wonder what they were thinking to seriously believe that executing a prisoner with cyanide gas is morally acceptable in 2021," the Death Penalty Information Center's Robert Dunham told The Associated Press. Arizona officials say they're following the state constitution.

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Amid the wave of discussions about racial injustice that began to gain momentum last summer, companies such as Allstate, Google and Nike have announced over the past year that they will recognize Juneteenth as a paid holiday for their employees.

After passing both the House on Wednesday, the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act was signed into law Thursday by President Joe Biden, making it the 11th federal holiday established by law, along with Christmas, Thanksgiving and Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

The day celebrates the delayed news that President Abraham Lincoln had signed the Emancipation Proclamation on Jan. 1, 1863, freeing all persons held as slaves in the United States. However, it wasnt until June 19, 1865  referred to more informally as Juneteenth  that enslaved people in Galveston, Texas, learned of their freedom when Union soldiers arrived.

Employees say their companies aren't sticking to the promises they made on racial justice

Opinion: Juneteenth, symbolic end of America's original sin of slavery, complements Independence Day

Juneteenth has been celebrated by African Americans for generations since that day. But it wasn't until after the murder of George Floyd in 2020 that companies began making a significant change to celebrate the holiday amongst their employees.

More than 460 companies are observing Juneteenth at this point, with many offering a paid day off or holiday pay, according to HellaCreative, an initiative launched by Black creatives in San Francisco to make Juneteenth an official holiday.

Among them is Gannett, the parent company of USA TODAY and the USA TODAY Network.

Here are some other companies that are continuing PTO (paid time off) this year and some who have newly started:

T-Mobile

The mobile communications company made Juneteenth a paid company holiday for the first time this year.

It is the result of the great feedback from our employees about what T-Mobile can do to effect positive change inside and outside our walls, Mike Sievert, CEO, told USA TODAY.

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Yelp

This is the first year the review app has made Juneteenth a paid holiday. The company said it would observe the holiday on Friday, June 18.

Myself and other Yelp executives conducted a series of listening sessions to hear from our Black employees and discovered the areas where we can and must do better. Stemming from those conversations, we realized the importance of giving our employees the space to observe Juneteenth as a global paid holiday, Miriam Warren, Yelps chief diversity officer, said in a statement.

The company has planned internal events for its employees to attend to celebrate and recognize the significance of Juneteenth.

Home Depot

The company has planned a series of events and celebrations for its associates and will host a virtual event for all associates to come together and talk openly, a spokesperson told USA TODAY.

Starbucks

The world's most popular coffee chain made Juneteenth a holiday in 2020 and pays hourly employees time-and-a-half. Salaried partners who are required to work will receive a holiday as compensation, and support partners will get the day off with regular pay, the company said in an email.

This was one of the many actions weve taken to promote an environment where our partners see and feel real progress, Dennis Brockman, global chief inclusion and diversity officer at Starbucks, said in a statement.

Lyft

The rideshare company will give employees the day off for the second year in a row.

We encourage team members to use this day to reflect, participate in civic engagement, or leverage anti-discrimination resources to deepen understanding of the work still needed to support the Black community. the company said in an email.

Executives at Lyft will also take part in roundtable discussions about Juneteenth, voting, rights, allyship and more throughout the week. NAACP President and CEO Derrick Johnson and National Coalition on Black Civic Participation President and CEO Melanie Campbell will be in attendance.

Zillow

Zillow expanded its holiday calendar in 2020 when it added Juneteenth as a paid holiday for all of its employees.

As part of our ongoing commitment to racial equality, Zillow observes Juneteenth as a paid holiday, and encourages employees to take the day for reflection, volunteerism, education, and activism to commemorate the end of slavery in the U.S., Kristina Adamski, vice president at Zillow, said in a statement.

Altria

Tobacco company Altria announced in 2020 that it would celebrate Juneteenth as a Day of Healing, to further support its Black employees.

We made Juneteenth a company-paid day off last year and will do so again this year, Steven Callahan, managing director of communications at Altria, told USA Today.

The company will recognize it on Friday, June 18.

Nike

The "Swoosh" logo is seen on a Nike factory store

Nike made Juneteenth a paid annual holiday for its employees in both the U.S. and Puerto Rico last year.

Across our Nike, Converse, and Jordan family, we will close our corporate, retail, manufacturing and distribution operations in observance of Juneteenth to provide educational opportunities that honor Black history and culture, a Nike spokeswoman told USA TODAY.

The companys corporate offices and distribution centers will be closed on Friday, June 18, while Nike and Converse retail stores will be closed on Saturday, June 19.

Mastercard

The financial services company made Juneteenth a Mastercard Day of Solidarity for its employees last year. The same will happen in 2021.

We continue to offer employees globally the day for service, learning or reflection, Will OConnor, senior vice president of communications at Mastercard, told USA TODAY.

Juneteenth will be observed on Friday, June 18, and Thursday, June 17, for countries that do not work on Fridays.

Best Buy

Juneteenth is an official company holiday at Best Buy, which it announced last year. Corporate offices will be closed on June 18, and corporate employees will get a paid day off. Hourly workers who work full or part-time will receive time-and-a-half.

Its really important for us to recognize its significance with our employees and offer them an opportunity to celebrate, reflect or give back, Mark Irvin, chief inclusion, diversity and talent officer at BestBuy, said in an email.

The company is also providing resources and information on local community-led celebrations, educational resources about Juneteenth and volunteer opportunities.

Target

Outside of a Target store.

The global retail giant made Juneteenth an official annual company holiday in 2020.

In 2021, Target is doing the same by providing team members with the opportunity to observe the day however they prefer, through education, service or celebration, the company said in a statement.

Employees working hourly will get paid time-and-a-half.

Allstate

The insurance company followed suit by making Juneteenth an annual, paid company holiday in 2020. Itll give employees the opportunity to reflect, learn and engage in their communities, Allstate spokesperson Mallory Vasquez said in an email.

The company will observe the holiday on Friday, June 18.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: These companies are giving Juneteenth off for their employees
Gary Miller/Getty Beto O'Rourke

Beto O'Rourke is getting ready for yet another long drive across Texas as part of his push to increase voter turnout in upcoming elections when he makes a quick declaration: "One way or the other, I'm in for the distance for Texas."

"That might be as a candidate," O'Rourke tells PEOPLE, referencing next year's Texas gubernatorial race and the state Democratic Party's self-described anxiousness over whether he'll be on the ballot.

"But it might also be as a volunteer," he adds, shushing down speculation and putting "full focus" back on his recent work to promote voter awareness and speak out against what he calls Republican "voter suppression laws."

Whether O'Rourke, an El Paso native and Texas' former 16th district representative, will run against Republican Gov. Greg Abbott in 2022 - in what's expected to be a critical Democratic heave to push the state a little more blue - has been a burning question in Texas politics as of late. But for now, it's not one they'll get an answer to.

Chip Somodevilla/Getty Beto O'Rourke

LM Otero/AP/Shutterstock Beto O'Rourke

The hustle rings just as it did when he was in college, touring the country in a punk band. It still shapes a chunk of his identity like it did when he ran, unsuccessfully, for both the U.S. Senate in 2018 and the presidency in 2020. And it energizes O'Rourke with a youthfulness that makes state Democratic Party leaders believe he's their guy.

"If anybody could beat Abbott, he could beat him," chairman Gilberto Hinojosa told the Associated Press last month.

Right now, that "anybody" is dizzying himself trying to drive up the number of people at the polls.

"We've been... I don't know... in 16 or 17 different cities over the last 13 days?" O'Rourke tells PEOPLE, after pausing to ask for music recommendations ahead of the drive to his next rally. "As dire as the situation is, it's been really encouraging how many people are coming out, and getting engaged, and then committing to taking action."

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"I'm in the middle of all that right now," he adds.

RELATED: Texas Democratic Party Would 'Welcome' Matthew McConaughey to Run for Governor, Leader Says

Taking the lead from the likes of Stacey Abrams and Michelle Obama in recent years, O'Rourke has spent "the better part of the last two years" rallying up volunteers to help register others to vote.

In 2020, he says his Powered by People organization registered 196,000 Texans to vote - just shy of the roughly 215,000 he lost to Sen. Ted Cruz in 2018.

Since his short-lived White House bid, O'Rourke has taught courses at the University of Texas - on, "of course," voting rights - and a general politics course at Texas State University.

RELATED: Beto O'Rourke Won't Count Himself Out of 2022 Texas Governor's Race

Like most Americans over the past year, O'Rourke says he's also been "trying to make the most" of his time at home with wife Amy, 39, and their three kids - Ulysses, 14, Molly, 12, and Henry, 10, who all recently "had their last day of school."

The bassist-turned-politican has marveled at watching his youngest take up music on his own, recording songs in the family basement on the computer.

"We've got a drum kit in the basement, and amps, and a little PA system," the proud father says. "Sometimes we'll all play together."

Although O'Rourke has "really been busy" ramping up his voting advocacy efforts, he says the extra moments at home last year were also welcomed. "We are grateful to be doing this work and grateful for the good luck that we've had with our family," he says. "Nothing's more important."

Justin Sullivan/Getty Beto O'Rourke and his three children

O'Rourke's recent voter rallies have been leading up to a climactic event this weekend on the steps of the state Capitol building in Austin, where O'Rourke plans "to command the attention of the country" and underscore Texas as "ground zero" for the U.S. Congressional national fight to pass the For the People Act in Congress.

He says the federal law would help "roll back" controversial voting laws in several Republican-led states in the country, which the GOP claims are about election security and Democrats have called restrictive.

O'Rourke expects about 20,000 people to join him Sunday afternoon around 5:30 local time, when he plans to point a finger at Texas Republicans' own divisive new voting bill.

President Joe Biden described the legislation last month as "an assault on democracy."

RELATED: Joe Biden Signs Bill Officially Making Juneteenth a Federal Holiday: 'an Important Day'

The Texas GOP party has described the proposed bill as a set of "integrity" propositions to stop voter fraud, echoing former President Donald Trump's baseless gripes about his election loss.

However, The Houston Chronicle reported that state government data shows only 43 cases of fraud out of 11 million votes in the 2020 election, which sparked debates over voting laws in Texas, Georgia, Florida and Iowa in recent months.

State Democrats have described the bill's components just as O'Rourke has: "laws that would make it harder" to vote.

RELATED: Revealing Memories of George H. W. Bush - Including How Secret Service Carried Him to Say Goodbye to Barbara

O'Rourke may very well be the state Democratic Party's preferred face of its 2022 efforts to oust Abbott, over potential competitors like fellow 2020 candidate Julian Castro and actor Matthew McConaughey.

But right now, O'Rourke's attention is firmly planted on making Texas "a truly competitive state" by encouraging more people to vote and urging currently elected officials to pass laws making it easier for them to do so.

"That's why we are fighting so hard," O'Rourke says, counting the 2,500 miles he's put on his truck in the last two weeks. "It's why I'm literally, along with so many others, going the distance by driving the entire state of Texas."
Yet again, the magicians curtain is pulled back, and the little people get to see inside the circus of horrors that is still running the country (Getty)

A shock result in the Chesham and Amersham by-election is enough to draw the dreaded Islington Threadmonster back to his keyboard.

A number of political journalists had had the temerity to predict that, what with the Tories having won the seat 18 months ago by 16,000 votes, the same result was likely this time. One had said he would even eat his hat if the Tories did not win. A hat has now been eaten.

Stop reading these pundit babblers, reads tweet one on the latest thread from north London-based former macro and now micro blogger Dominic Cummings. They dont understand political communication.

Not that long ago, Dominic Cummings used to reserve most of his loathing for what he described as Oxbridge egomaniacs with humanities degrees, which I have, on occasion, been known to point out is precisely what Mr Cummings is.

I cant and therefore wont pretend to know very much about the psychological trait known as projection, so all I can do is point out that Cummingss new number one hatred, of political pundits, appears to have occurred at the exact same period in his life at which he sits about at home doing tweets about politics and is also setting up his own political newsletter via Substack.

Dont forget, at this point, that Dominic Cummings is not a mere pundit. He is a (self-taught) scientist. This is demonstrated in his next point, which is about how in 2019, all the drone-pundits got it wrong by saying what a mistake it was for Boris Johnson not to do that interview with Andrew Neil.

He proves how wrong they all are, by sifting through the truly comprehensive range of opinion that can still be found online about all that, from the time, and then cuts and pastes together the ones that support his argument  as all good scientists do, and no crap pundit setting up his own Substack would ever dare attempt.

But were not done there. Next, Cummings delivers what he must imagine to have been his coup de grace. Yet again, the magicians curtain is pulled back, and the little people get to see inside the circus of horrors that is still running the country.

Story continues

Back in 2019, we now learn, Boris Johnsons most senior adviser, Dominic Cummings, was advising the prime minister not to do that interview with Andrew Neil. Which he then didnt do. Mr Cummings sums up his advice at the time thus: why the fu*k wd we put a gaffe machine clueless about policy & government up to be grilled for ages, upside=0 for what?

If you happen to be related to one of the 130,000 or so people whove died of Covid-19 in the last year, you might want to have looked away by now. Because this really is Boris Johnsons most senior adviser, breezily admitting that, back in 2019, he was mainly strategising how to go about making sure a clueless gaffe machine could win a general election and be returned to 10 Downing Street.

We all know what happened, and the next major plot point in the story involves Cummings himself explaining to a select committee that, at the hands of his very own clueless gaffe machine, tens of thousands of people died needlessly.

As a mere pundit myself, a drone babbler, it is naturally impossible to supplant myself into the mind of a power so superior. What can possibly be gained by my even posing the question: If Id admitted tens of thousands of people had died needlessly on my watch, would I have the temerity to be sitting around on social media slagging people off for their bad tweets?

Versions of this question were, as it happens, put to Mr Cummings, who explained that really hed had no choice but to get Boris Johnson elected. The alternative was prime minister Corbyn and a second referendum in which he feared people would be killed. Hes probably right.

Maybe people would have been killed. It was a febrile time, the system still very much choking with all the poison that had been poured into it  by Dominic Cummings.

Thing is, there was this pundit around back then, making all these wild predictions on social media, about how Turkey was going to join the EU, and how thered be 350m a week for the NHS, and a lot of people got very angry about them.

One forgets his name, but as a result, Dominic Cummings had precious little choice but do what he did. Otherwise, you know, people might have been killed. Tens of thousands of them, we must assume, entirely needlessly.

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Watch live as Joe Biden signs Juneteenth National Independence Day Act

So Matt Hancock is useless? Glad the PM so clearly cares about dealing with Covid-19

Boris Johnson is putting politics ahead of the country when it comes to Matt Hancock
Comedy Central

Unlike Jimmy Kimmel, The Daily Shows Jordan Klepper couldnt get the MyPillow guy to come to him. So he did what he does best and went to the MyPillow guy.

In his latest field piece from MAGA world, the long-serving correspondent traveled to Mike Lindells free speech Woodstock in Wisconsin with the hope of interviewing some of the election truthers who are still holding out hope that Donald Trump will return to the White House this summer. He likely never could have imagined that he would end up spending several minutes confronting Lindell himself before he took the stage to spread his 2020 lies.

Asked by Klepper if he still believes Trump will be reinstated as president in August, Lindell said, Absolutely.

This is the crime of the century youre describing and they came to the MyPillow guy, Klepper said, expressing skepticism that Lindell actually obtained evidence that could overturn the election. Is this helping, Mike? he asked. Ginning all this up?

Do you know what this is doing? Lindell replied.

Its perpetuating anger, fear and attacking our democracy, Klepper shot back without missing a beat.

As Lindell ranted about machines, vaccines, the border and Jesus, Klepper brought the conversation back to the very real death threats against election officials that his continued campaign has inspired.

How Daily Show Contributor Jordan Klepper Became the King of Humiliating Trump Fans

If August doesnt happen, what do you say to these people? Klepper asked in the end. He was met with more nonsense about ongoing audits in the statesincluding, apparently, the states Trump wonand more empty promises about Trumps triumphant return.

So theres a plan, Klepper said. Its like watching that Bigfoot show. They dont find Bigfoot at the end, but if you tune in next week, maybe its going to happen.

Lindell had no response to that besides saying, You guys are horrible as he stormed off.

For more, listen to The Daily Shows Jordan Klepper on The Last Laugh podcast.

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Pfizer has recently announced that the company has named Ramcess Jean-Louis, Esq. as Global Chief Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) Officer.

Jean-Louis, who is originally from Brooklyn, New York, is the holder of a Juris Doctor degree from New York Citys Columbia University School of Law and a Bachelor of Science degree in Industrial and Labor Relations from Cornell University.

Jean-Louis was recently employed at Verizon Media where he served as Global Chief Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Officer. He goes to the pharmaceutical company with more than 20 years of experience as a change agent who had delivered human capital solutions and also had a passion for helping all employees reach their full potential and fostering a culture of continual learning and inclusion where he worked.

In this new position at Pfizer, he will be solely responsible for developing and leading the execution of the companys global, enterprise-wide strategies to transform its Diversity, Equity & Inclusion agenda while creating strategies, infrastructure, and programs to make sure that Pfizer continues to enhance the type of culture where every person is seen, heard and cared for.

Before he joined Verizon Media, he had the position of Director of Workforce Diversity and Inclusion at Comcast. In that role, Jean-Louis was responsible for developing and executing strategies that made Comcast more reflective of the communities in which the company served and drove diversity across all levels of the organization. He was tasked with having responsibility for the Employee Resource Groups, the live national Employee Enrichment Series broadcast, national partnerships, outreach programs, military hiring, and diversity councils and champions.
Pablo Sarabia has urged Spain to make life uncomfortable for Robert Lewandowski as they attempt to get their Euro 2020 campaign up and running against Poland.

Luis Enriques side could only manage a 0-0 Group E draw with Sweden in their opening fixture despite dominating, and will seek to edge themselves towards the last 16 when they meet the Poles in Seville on Saturday evening.

However if they are to do so, they will need to to find a way to stop Bayern Munich frontman Lewandowski, who plundered a Bundesliga record 41 goals last season.

Spain midfielder Sarabia told www.uefa.com: Of course, Lewandowski is the principal threat in attack. Hes had one heck of a season  but he often does.

Our idea is that we make him as uncomfortable as possible and move him into areas of pitch where he doesnt want to be.

Limiting Lewandowski, who scored six goals  including a hat-trick against Latvia  in qualification will not be Spains only challenge after a frustrating encounter with the Swedes, who defended for dear life at La Cartuja on Monday evening.

Paris St Germains Sarabia, who came on as a 66th-minute replacement for striker Alvaro Morata in that game, said: Its very difficult to play against that style  10 men plus the goalie all in their own half.

After two years at PSG, Im used to it. And now thats happening to Spain because of how we play.

But thats where quality comes in, when you try to wear them down. What you want is to create space and that will begin to come in games if we stick to our style.

If Spain, who have skipper Sergio Busquets back in the fold following his Covid-19 enforced exile, have work to do, so to do Paulo Sousas Poland after they surprisingly lost 2-1 to Slovakia in St Petersburg in their first game.

The Poles, who were beaten only once in qualification  2-0 in Slovenia  will be without influential midfielder Grzegorz Krychowiak through suspension following his dismissal for two bookable offences against the Slovaks.

Speaking from his sides base in Sopot, defender Jan Bednarek said: We know how to play, what to do in order to win. If any player does not, better he stays in base camp in Sopot.

There is big will to show not everything is lost. I do believe it will be a breakthrough moment for us.
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The University of Nebraska  like other colleges and universities across the country  isn't emerging from its COVID year unscathed.

Increased expenses to deliver education amid a global pandemic and a loss of revenue streams created a $43 million budget shortfall NU is working to close within three years.

Meanwhile, the university system launched programs expanding student access and affordability, invested in faculty and staff salary and benefits, and made plans to address aging infrastructure across its campuses.

The steps taken have positioned NU for what comes after COVID, said President Ted Carter, who will send a $1 billion operating budget to the Board of Regents for consideration next week.

Regents are scheduled to meet at 9 a.m. June 25 in the Varner Hall Boardroom.

"We held firm on all the things we said we're going to do," said Carter, who is about a year and a half into his tenure leading NU. "Ultimately, we're coming out of this in a position of strength with a lot of optimism for the fall."

Included in the 2021-22 operating budget are a two-year tuition freeze for students who attend NU campuses in Lincoln, Omaha, Kearney, as well as the Nebraska College of Technical Agriculture in Curtis.
Q: We want the community center to be fixed and its such a shame there are so many extra serious problems that have now been found. My question is how will the extra cost for the extra work be paid for? Is there money somewhere to access to pay for that work, which obviously has to be done in order to complete the ongoing project and save the facility.

A: York Mayor Barry Redfern said, From the beginning the intention has been to pay for the improvements at the auditorium and the community center by the city taking out a bond and making the payments over time from LB357 funds which is the extra  percent sales tax we collect that can be used for infrastructure or recreation projects. The additional structural things that have to be fixed at the community center will mean that we will have a larger payment than first projected and that we will likely need to stretch the payments out over 15 years. The cash flow is available in the LB357 Fund to make this payment but it does limit the money we will have to do other projects until the bond is paid off.
MOVIE: Sherni

DIRECTOR: Amit Masurkar

RATINGS: 3.5/5 stars

OTT PLATFORM: Amazon Prime Video

What a roar! After a really long wait, a film which actually keeps you at the edge of your seats is here - SHERNI. Well, quite literally, the title comfortably is synonymous with lead actress Vidya Balan leading the pack. Director Amit Masurkar of Newton once again proved his finesse and understanding of the script.

WHY SHERNI IS WORTH A WATCH

Right from a tight screenplay by Aastha Tiku to thundering performances by supporting actors - Sherni is a towering example of how to present a multi-layered story in this Amazon Original. It strongly shows how the existence of red-tapism, intertwined at workplaces with casual sexist comments flying here and there - amid a dark exploration of wild spaces.

Vidya Balan plays Vidya Vincent - a Divisional Forest Officer (DFO) has a major task to tame and capture the T12 tigress, who has claimed several lives and is on a prowl. The plot moves smoothly showing how Vidya finds herself trapped in a man's world with many pressure-building tactics trying to hold her back.

Never does the lead actress lose her composure, Vidya Balan has done full justice to her part and once again proved why she remains the best choice for character roles.

DIRECTION, CAMERA WORK AND DIALOGUES:

Newton director Amit Masurkar must be lauded for his vision and highlighting a major issue of man vs wild which remained untouched in cinema before Sherni howled.

Rakesh Haridas behind the camera takes us into the deep forests through his lens and we are swayed into the wilderness, unchained.

There are a few dialogues that ring a bell, forcing viewers to ponder how nature has been exploited by us and what if the wild animals switch on their bestial mode back at humans."Sher hain to jungle hai, jungle hain to baarish hain, baarish hain to paani hain aur paani hai toh hum hain," by Hassan Noorani, played by Vijay Raaz leaves an impact.

Mukul Chadda plays Vidya's husband Pawan Shrivastava in the movie while other supporting actors such as Brijendra Kala, Neeraj Kabi, Sampa Mandal, Sharat Saxena fit the bill.

OUR VERDICT:

This Sherni will keep you hooked, booked and cooked for most parts. Watch the thrilling jungle safari riding high on emotions as Vidya Balan anchors you through the wilderness with courage and brilliance.

'Man is a social animal, trapped in human body', if this doesn't wake you, then nothing will!
Shares of companies controlled by billionaire Gautam Adani recorded their biggest weekly losses ever. The six stocks cumulatively lost 1.91 trillion Indian rupees ($25.83 billion) of value over five days through Friday.

THE FUNDS

Indian newspaper Economic Times reported on Monday the accounts of three Mauritius-based funds, which are among the top foreign investors in Adani group companies, had been frozen by the National Securities Depository Ltd (NSDL).

The NSDL website showed accounts held by the three funds frozen as of May 31, among thousands of others, without citing a reason, according to a review by Reuters. The exact date of the freeze is unknown and the accounts remained frozen on Friday, according to the website.

DENIALS, CONTRADICTIONS

The Adani Group firms, in identical statements issued to stock exchanges, rejected media reports, including in the Economic Times, as "blatantly erroneous."

The companies, which are in the businesses of operating airports and ports, power generation and transmission, coal and gas trading, said the accounts in which the funds hold Adani shares were not frozen.

NSDL and India`s securities regulator SEBI did not respond to requests for comment from Reuters.

But a senior NSDL official, who declined to be identified, told Reuters on Monday the funds have multiple accounts and that the Adani shares were held in other accounts that were not frozen, adding that freeze was "not new".

The shares of the Adani companies however have continued to fall.

THE FUNDS

The three foreign funds - Albula Investment Fund, Cresta Fund and APMS Investment Fund - are all registered at the same address, according to the Mauritius financial regulator.

The funds cumulatively control 2.7% of all shares in the Adani Group companies as on June 11, calculations based on an e-mail sent by Adani executive to NSDL and reviewed by Reuters showed.

Two other Mauritius-based funds that are also investors in Adani companies - LTS Investment Fund and Asia Investment Corp - are also registered at the same address.

Reuters was unable to find a website for all five funds, and calls to the phone numbers provided to Mauritius regulators went unanswered.

The five funds deployed 94.4%-97.9% of their total capital in Adani companies` shares, data by Indian stocks analysis firm Trendlyne showed.

Reuters could not independently verify Trendlyne data.

Four of the six Adani stocks have a public shareholding of about 25% - the minimum level mandated by regulators for companies listed on Indian exchanges.

Indian stock exchange data shows most shares of Adani Group companies are held by trusts controlled by Adani. Foreign portfolio investors are the next largest shareholders, while retail and domestic investors typically control about 5%.

THE IMPACT

After falling 0.4-8.5% on Monday, the day of the Economic Times report, Adani group stocks fell between 7.1%-22.6% over the week compared with last Friday`s close, wiping out nearly 22% of the gains in the year preceding this week.

The decline saw the firms` cumulative market capitalisation decline by over a sixth.

Flagship Adani Enterprises rose 8.76% and Adani Ports rose 7.33% on Friday, but the four other Adani stocks each closed 5% lower.

Jimeet Modi, founder of Mumbai-based Samco Securities, said the jump in the two stocks was due to some investors buying the shares after the steep fall in prices this week, but added that the stocks were "still in a bear market".

"I don`t think the market is convinced with the quality of the clarification from the Adani group," Modi told Reuters.

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NEW DELHI: After spending nearly a year in jail, Pinjra Tod activists Natasha Narwal, Devangana Kalita and Jamia student Asif Iqbal Tanha were released on bail from the high-security Tihar Jail late on Thursday.

They were released after getting bail in the northeast Delhi riots conspiracy case. Soon after walking out of the jail, they vowed to continue their struggle. The release of the trio, who were arrested in May last year under the stringent Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA), came after a lower court order.

Their friends and family members had gathered outside the jail before their release. JNU students Narwal and Kalita thanked their friends and well-wishers, many of whom gathered outside the jail, for supporting them during their year-long stay behind bars.

DEVANGANA AND NATASHA WALK FREE! Devangana Kalita and Natasha Narwal have finally been released from Tihar Central Jail today evening after Delhi High Court granted Devangana, Natasha and Asif bail in FIR 59/2020 which charged them with UAPA. pic.twitter.com/zdezevjjNR  Pinjra Tod (@PinjraTod) June 17, 2021

Hugs, cheers, sloganeering outside Tihar Jail

As soon as the Pinjra Tod activist-duo walked out of Tihar Jail, they were greeted with slogans of 'Lal Salaam', 'Natasha Zindabad', 'Devangana Zindabad'. Slogans were also raised in memory of Natasha's father, Mahavir Narwal, who succumbed to the coronavirus last month.

Tanha walked out of a separate jail gate. The Jamia Millia Islamia student was wearing a mask, which read 'No CAA, No NRC, No NPR'. Walking out of Tihar Jail, Tanha said he had kept hope that he would be released one day and asserted that the fight against the CAA, NRC and the NPR would continue.

Students were carrying banners demanding the release of other political prisons, including former JNU student leader Umar Khalid, and the scrapping of the UAPA, under which the trio was arrested. "We have received tremendous support inside the jail and we will continue our struggle," Narwal told reporters.

Activists welcome court verdict

Welcoming the Delhi High Court order granting them bail, Narwal, an activist of women collective Pinjra Tod, said that when they were arrested, it took them many months to believe that they were in jail under such stringent charges.

While stating that the matter is still sub-judice, Kalita said, "... We would like to thank the Delhi High Court for upholding what we believe in. Any such protest that we have done is not terrorism. It was a democratic protest, led by women."

Hitting out at the government, Kalita said people are in jail for raising their voices. "It shows the desperation of the government... We are women who are not scared of them. They are trying to suppress the voice of people and dissent. We got a lot of support from people which helped us survive inside (jail)," she told reporters.

Fight against CAA, NRC, NPR to continue

In a statement, Tanha said, "I want to reiterate that our fight is against the discriminatory CAA (Citizenship Amendment Act) and not against people of any faith. I am glad that the honourable court has asserted that our peaceful and democratic protests had nothing to do with the riots. I hope that this judgement will serve as an important precedent. We have full faith in the fairness of the judiciary. I hope that the trial takes place in a speedy manner and we all are acquitted soon."

Tanha is a member of the Students' Islamic Organisation of India. While demanding the release of other prisoners, he also appealed to the government to address the Covid conditions in prison.

According to a senior jail official, Kalita and Narwal were released around 7 in the evening, and Tanha was let out half an hour later. Director General (Delhi Prisons) Sandeep Goel said their release got pushed by two days over delays in verifying their addresses and sureties.

In its order for the immediate release of the trio, the Delhi court said the delay in the verification process by the police could not be a plausible reason for the accused to be kept imprisoned. After securing bail from the high court, the activists had moved to the trial court, seeking immediate release from prison.

When the trial court deferred the order on their plea for Thursday, they moved the Delhi High Court, which ordered the lower court to proceed with the issue with "promptitude and expedition".

Arrest in northeast Delhi riots case

The three student activists were arrested in May 2020 and are accused of being the "masterminds" of the February 2020 violence, which left 53 people dead and more than 200 injured. The high court, while granting them bail on June 15, had observed that "in an anxiety to suppress dissent, the state has blurred the line between right to protest and terrorist activity" and if such a mindset gains traction, it would be a "sad day for democracy".

The Delhi Police has, however, have moved the Supreme Court, challenging the high court judgement granting them bail in the case.

(With Agency inputs)

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New Delhi: Model-actress Urvashi Rautela has always managed to hog the limelight with either her fashion sense or incredible social media postings. The actress recently uploaded a video on hers on Instagram flaunting her jewellery.

Urvashi Rautela is known to own some of the most expensive outfits and jewellery. She flaunted her new collection set of rings, bracelets, and watches with freshly manicured golden nails on her Instagram with a bling filter, she captioned the video excitedly as "Fresh Set @bulgari @louisvuitton @versace @vancleefarpels".

Urvashi can be seen wearing an expensive Bvlgari Serpenti Tubogas watch which costs around Rs 9 lakh, 8 rings from Louis Vuitton costing around Rs 4 lakh and the three bracelets with a head of a panther on both ends come from the top most luxury brand 'Cartier' from their collection PANTHERE DE CARTIER, it's price goes up to Rs 20,00,000 and the last addition to her collection is a Versace bracelet priced almost Rs 3 lakh.

The total fresh set of collection costs around Rs 35 lakh. The glam diva will always be spotted wearing bling which makes her stand out from others. Urvashi Rautela is currently going through intensive training for her upcoming action film where she has decided to do her stunts on her own.

On the work front, Urvashi Rautela will be making her Tamil debut with a big-budget sci-fi film in which she will be playing the role of a microbiologist and an IITian, and later she is going to appear in a bilingual thriller Black Rose along with the Hindi remake of Thirutu Payale 2.

The actress recently got a blockbuster response for her song "Doob Gaye" opposite Guru Randhawa. Urvashi is starring in a lead role in Jio studio's web series Inspector Avinash opposite Randeep Hooda, which is a biopic based on the true story of super cop Avinash Mishra and Poonam Mishra.
Kolkata: Former TMC minister Santiram Mahato on Friday (June 18) moved Calcutta High Court challenging the poll result of Balarampur constituency in Purulia where he lost to BJPs Baneswar Mahato by less than 500 votes.

Mahato through his petition has appealed for recounting of votes cast in the constituency in the recently concluded assembly elections.

The high court observed that the documents related to counting and nomination of the Balarampur seat should not be tampered with in any way. The matter was then fixed for the next hearing on July 15.

This comes a day after Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee challenged the polling process in the Nandigram assembly constituency, where she lost to BJPs Suvendu Adhikari by a narrow margin.

In Banerjees case, a single-judge bench of Justice Kaushik Chanda asked her lawyer to serve copies of the election petition to the opposite parties. Further, he adjourned the hearing to June 24.

In her petition, Banerjee has accused her protege-turned-rival and Suvendu Adhikari of committing corrupt practices as envisaged under Section 123 of the Representation of the People Act, 1951.

She has also alleged that discrepancies were committed in the counting process during the Nandigram seat results.

Meanwhile, BJP took potshots at Banerjee over the move. Amit Malviya, BJP IT cell chief took to social media, and said, How do you lose an election twice? First, at the hustings and then, like a sore loser, challenging peoples verdict in the court.

"It would be fascinating to see Mamata Banerjee suffer the humiliation of Nandigram defeat twice over," he tweeted.

Live TV
New Delhi: The 80-year-old owner of the famous Baba ka Dhaba, Kanta Prasad attempted suicide on Thursday night (June 17, 2021) and has been admitted to the Safdarjung hospital.

Kanta Prasad shot to fame last year after a YouTuber Gaurav Wasan made a video of his humble eatery, in Malviya Nagar, highlighting the miseries of the couple during COVID-induced lockdown.

Delhi | Kanta Prasad, 80 y/o owner of 'Baba Ka Dhaba' was admitted to Safdarjung Hospital last night. He had brought in an unconscious condition after he consumed alcohol & sleeping pills. Statement of his son has been recorded for the same. Probe on: DCP South Atul Thakur  ANI (@ANI) June 18, 2021

According to the reports, Kanta Prasad was rushed to the hospital on Thursday night after he took an overdose of sleeping pills along with alcohol. The reports quote his wife revealing that the couple is in huge debt right now, as the rent of the restaurant they opened in New Delhi last year is Rs 1 lakh and they were only able to make Rs 30,000 per month.

According to Delhi Police, around 11:15 PM on Thursday night, they received information from Safdarjung Hospital that Kanta Prasad, age 81 years, was admitted to the hospital. The Delhi Police have launched a further probe in the case.
Srinagar: The Kashmir valley saw a bumper cherry crop produce this season and the harvesting has started. In a bid to support the farmers, the government has arranged to airlift the produce to different parts of the country.

The government recently signed an MoU with GoAir to transport the produce from the valley to various parts of the country.

The move is aimed at benefitting the farmers monetarily and ensuring that the fruits are not damaged waiting for the buyers.

''About cherry, this year our government has earmarked a separate budget for cherry transportation, and we have signed an MoU with GoAir recently. We have taken up with the government to provide subsidies also. Normally our production is 14 thousand metric tonnes or more but we are expecting a higher yield this year. Production is more and diseases among the fruit trees are less, said Aijaz Ahmad, Director of Horticulture Department.

Kashmiri cherries are famous all over the world and there is a high demand for them. The farmers said they will benefit if the government helps them to sell the produce or market it. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, they had to incur huge losses last year, they said.

The produce is good and the market is good too. Our whole produce was wasted last year but this year its been good, traffic is moving. If the government takes our produce, it will benefit farmers a lot, said Gulzar Ahmad, a farmer.

The produce this year is good but the market should retain. If we are able to send it across, we will be benefitted. The government is saying we will take the produce at less cost and sell it. We are getting good rates, said Mohd Ayub, another farmer.

The farmers are now expecting that the government will provide them similar support with other crops as well. Apple, almond and walnut growers are hoping that the government will come up with some scheme for them too.

Also Read: Bumper strawberry produce in Kashmir, but market closure leads to huge losses

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Chennai: According to Genome sequencing results of the lions which tested COVID-19 positive at the Chennai Zoo, four samples have been identified as Delta variants of the virus. As per the World Health Organization(WHO), this variant showed higher transmissibility and reduced neutralization(by antibodies). This variant is first said to have been detected in India in late 2020. Variants of the SARS-CoV-2(infection) have been emerging and circulating around the world throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.

In two batches, 11 samples from the Chennai zoo lions were sent for testing. The ICAR-National Institute of High-Security Animal Diseases (NIHSAD), Bhopal was sent four samples on 24th May and seven samples on 29th May. Of the total 11 samples, nine tested positive and it was reported on June 3rd and the lions have been under treatment since then.

Genome sequencing of 4 of the samples was done at NIHSAD, Bhopal. Analysis of the sequences shows that all the 4 sequences belong to Pangolin lineage B.1.617.2 and are Delta variants as per WHO nomenclature said the Director ICAR-NIHSAD. It was added that on 11th May 2021, the WHO classified B.1.617.2 lineage as a variant of concern (VOC).

The Arignar Anna Zoological Park, which is locally known as Vandalur Zoo housed 15 lions, of which two(lion and lioness) passed away due to Covid-19. According to the Deputy Director of the Zoo, eight out of the thirteen lions are Covid-19 positive at present. While four of them are said to be completely safe, two are asymptomatic, and two are showing occasional lack of appetite owing to age.

Temperature checks, eating patterns and food data of 53 different animals are being monitored on a regular basis. Tigers did show appetite issues, but they were fine after we replaced beef with chicken. But even these tigers results returned negative. Rest all animals are okay Naga Sathish Gidijala, IFS, Deputy Director, AAZP told Zee media.

While the mystery over how the captive big cats got infected with the deadly virus remains unsolved, experts and vets advising the Zoo suspect human-animal(man to the single lion) transmission followed by animal-animal(lion to multiple lions) transmission. Based on a discussion between experts, the transmission from man-animal seems to have happened, despite animal keepers and feeders having worn PPE suits and followed precautions.

On the possibility of animal-human transmission, they felt that it could not be ruled out. Citing existing information, they said that only know cases of animal-man transmission are said to be from bats. Even in the case of pet dogs getting infected, the team feels that dogs got infected from humans and not vice versa. They feel that lion-lion transmission is likely, whereas there are no known cases of dog-dog transmission.

AAZP authorities have been providing treatment to the animals and following protocols in consultation with experts from Tamil Nadu Veterinary and Animal Sciences University(TANUVAS), Veterinarians of Hyderabad Zoo and Bronx Zoo.

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New Delhi: The suspicion that the third wave of the COVID-19 pandemic will affect children severely may not be true after all. The Centre on Friday (June 18) said that the children may not be disproportionately affected by the third wave.

Addressing a routine COVID press conference, Luv Aggarwal, Joint Secretary at Health Ministry, said that the result of the serosurvey shows that the spread of infection was almost equal in all age groups.

It may not be true that children will be disproportionately affected in the third wave as the serosurvey shows seropositivity was almost equal in all age groups, Aggarwal said.

But the government is not leaving any stone unturned in terms of preparations, he added.

The governments statement comes a day after a WHO-AIIMS survey showed that the sero-positivity rate of SARS-CoV-2 among children is high and comparable to the adult population which means the coronavirus is unlikely to affect children more than the adult population in any future wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.

AIIMS chief Director Randeep Guleria and Professors from the Department of Centre for Community Medicine Puneet Misra, Shashi Kant and Sanjay K Rai were a part of the study.

Citing the survey, Dr VK Paul, Member-Health, Niti Aayog, said that the seropositivity in persons below and above 18 years of age is almost equal. In persons above 18, the seropositivity rate is 67 per cent and 59 per cent in persons below 18.

In urban areas, it is 78 per cent in persons below 18 and 79 per cent in above 18. In rural areas, the seropositivity rate is 56 per cent in persons below 18 years of age and 63 per cent in persons above 18, he added.

The information show that the children were infected but it was very mild. Only isolated cases of infection may occur in children (during 3rd wave of COVID), Dr Paul said.

Aggarwal, however, mentioned that there is a need to be cautious while activities are resumed across the country.

Over 5000 children affected in Meghalaya

Meanwhile, Meghalaya Health Minister A L Hek on Friday said that over 5000 children in the age group of 0-14 have tested positive for COVID-19 in the state since last year. He informed that 17 of them succumbed to the disease.

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New Delhi: Even in times as distressing as this when the entire world is struggling due to the COVID-19 pandemic, there are people who are running dangerous rackets at the cost of the lives of the people. In a disturbing development, several housing societies in Mumbai were targeted by individuals running fake COVID vaccine camps.

Zee News Editor-in-Chief Sudhir Chaudhary on Friday (June 18) cautioned people about the fake vaccination camps running at various places and discussed key points one must know to be safe from such frauds.

On May 30, a vaccination was organized in a housing society in Mumbai and the first dose of Covishield vaccine was administered to 390 people living in the society. The team that organized this vaccination told that they came from a big hospital in Mumbai and charged Rs 1260 each person for a dose of the vaccine. That is, 390 people gave about Rs 4.91 lakh to this team to get the vaccine.

But the relief did not last long. The 390 people who got the vaccine did not feel any side effects or changes in their bodies after getting the vaccine.

According to the medical journal The Lancet, one out of every four people who get Covishield vaccine shows minor side effects. The Union Health Ministry has also said that after getting the vaccine, in some cases, patients may experience mild fever, headache, fatigue and abdominal pain.

But nothing of this sort happened in this case. That is when these people got suspicious about the vaccination camp.

This suspicion increased when these people did not get the vaccination certificate for a week after getting the vaccine. And even when they got it, the certificates had different dates and names of the vaccination centres.

Just like the vaccination camp, the certificates were also fake. After this, when people reached the hospitals from where this team claimed to have come, it was found that the hospital had not organized any such vaccination camp. It became clear that the people were cheated.

When the matter went to the police, it was revealed that there was not just one such fake vaccination camp in Mumbai, but nine such camps had been set up by the same team who were duping people and earning lakhs of rupees.

Consequently, Mumbai Police registered a case of adulterated vaccine and arrested four people in connection with the racket.

The issue of fake vaccines is not just limited to India.

The WHO in a report said it has received information of fake vaccines being recovered from the health ministries of many countries. In this report, the WHO said that people making fake vaccines collect empty vials of the original vaccine to carry out this work.

Currently, coronavirus vaccines of Pfizer, Moderna, Sputnik-V, Covishield and Johnson & Johnson are being sold on the dark web and up to Rs 60,000 is being charged for a dose of a vaccine.

Presently in big Indian cities like Delhi, Noida, Gurugram, Chandigarh, Hyderabad, Bangalore, Mumbai, Pune, Chennai and Kolkata, many teams are organizing vaccination camps in the offices of housing societies and private companies. There are reports of complaints from people regarding vaccination and certificate in these cities too.

On May 29, the central government issued an order stating that vaccination programs can be run in housing societies, government offices, offices of private companies, offices of RWAs and old age homes. For this housing societies and private companies can contact private hospitals. However, the government has advised keeping some things in mind in this process.

First, housing societies can sign an MoU with private hospitals for vaccination. This will ensure that the vaccination camp is going to be set up by the same hospital.

Second, before vaccination, it must be ensured that the district health department is informed so that the department can check the whole process and register that housing society as a private vaccination centre.

Third, if someone claims that you can get vaccinated without registering on the CoWIN app, then that person is lying to you.

Fourth, if you are getting the vaccine in your society or it is being done by the office, then you can get the vaccination certificate immediately. If someone tells you that you will get the vaccination certificate after two to three days, then it is likely to be a lie.

By keeping these things in mind, one can avoid such frauds.

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New Delhi: The Indian Medical Association (IMA) held a nationwide protest on Friday (June 18, 2021) demanding a central law dealing with violence against medicos in which over 350,000 doctors are going to participate.

IMA national president Dr. J A Jayalal said besides IMA members, a number of organisations such as the Association of Physicians of India, the Association of Surgeons of India, the Medical Students Network, Junior Doctor Network are also participating in the nation-wide protest.

Delhi: Indian Medical Association (IMA) is conducting a nationwide protest today, demanding a central law to protect doctors against violence. Visuals from AIIMS. pic.twitter.com/Kgr8GB4LRO  ANI (@ANI) June 18, 2021

In parts of Bihar and Kerala, doctors are closing their clinics in the morning to press for the demand of a central law against violence against doctors. In the evening, public interaction has been arranged to form a coordination team in each branch of IMA to stop such violence from taking place.

We are deeply hurt to see increasing physical violence on doctors and healthcare professionals. Its occurring day in and day out. The IMA is pressing for a central act against the violence," the IMA said in a statement earlier on Thursday. The Health Services Personnel and Clinical Establishment (Prohibition of Violence and Damage to Property) Bill, 2019, which sought to impose a jail term up to 10 years for assaulting on-duty doctors and other healthcare professionals was dismissed by the Home Ministry saying the special law was not feasible as health is a state subject, it said.

There are many central health laws such as the PCPNDT Act and the Clinical Establishment Act. Currently, 21 states have local laws, but what we need is a strong central law to protect doctors from violence," the doctors body said.

IMA is going to submit memorandums to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, senior ministers including home minister Amit Shah. All branches of IMA would submit memoranda to local authorities. All the 1,700 branches are organizing events to mark the protest. Students wings are very active on the event as they are the ones most concerned about how the issue is tackled and addressed," the IMA statement said.

We demand that the government enhances security features in every hospital and declare hospitals as protected zones," the statement said. On the issue of Yoga guru Ramdevs recent controversial comments, the IMA said a number of police complaints have been filed across the country for his malafide statements, which, in our opinion, is against the interest of the citizens of the country".

Accordingly, we have urged the prime minister to take appropriate action against him. We respect Ayurveda as part of our culture and ancient science and we never go out and criticize it Our job is to ensure that they (patients) get treated in the best way possible. We are not interested in controversies," it said.

(With PTI inputs)

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New Delhi: As West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee approached Calcutta High Court challenging the Nandigram election result, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) took potshots at the TMC supremo.

Amit Malviya, BJP IT cell chief took to social media, and said, How do you lose an election twice? First, at the hustings and then, like a sore loser, challenging peoples verdict in the court.

"It would be fascinating to see Mamata Banerjee suffer the humiliation of Nandigram defeat twice over," he Tweeted.

How do you lose an election twice? First, at the hustings and then, like a sore loser, challenging peoples verdict in the court. It would be fascinating to see Mamata Banerjee suffer the humiliation of Nandigram defeat twice over.  Amit Malviya (@amitmalviya) June 17, 2021

On Thursday, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee moved the Calcutta High Court challenging the polling process in the Nandigram assembly seat. The matter is listed before a single-judge bench for hearing on Friday at 11 am.

Mamata Banerjee lost to BJP's Suvendu Adhikari from the Nandigram seat in the recently-concluded West Bengal Assembly elections. The TMC chief had vacated her Bhabanipore seat to contest from Nandigram in a bid to challenge her former confidante Suvendu Adhikari.

BJPs Suvendu Adhikari had won the Nandigram seat by 1956 votes after recount, according to the Election Commission of India (ECI). TMC, however, swept the election by winning 213 out of the total 294 seats, while BJP managed to increase its overall tally from 3 to 77 in the West Bengal Assembly.
New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Friday (June 18) set aside the order of Punjab and Haryana High Court dismissing the plea filed by slain gangster Jaipal Singh Bhullar's father seeking directions to Punjab government to conduct a second autopsy of his son's body. The apex court also directed the Punjab and Haryana High Court to consider the plea again on June 21.

A vacation bench of Justices Indira Banerjee and M R Shah also directed the Punjab government to make appropriate arrangement to preserve the body, which has been taken to Firozpur in Punjab from Kolkata.

The Punjab and Haryana High Court had earlier declined the plea of Bhullar's father for conducting an autopsy of the body either at PGIMER or AIIMS, New Delhi, or some independent medical institute to ascertain the nature of injuries. The court said that the matter is not under its jurisdiction as the encounter took place in Kolkata.

Jaipal Bhullar and another gangster Jaspreet Singh, involved in killing two policemen recently in Ludhiana, were gunned down by a Kolkata police team in a shootout in the city on June 9 after receiving 'pin-pointed' information from their Punjab counterparts.

During the hearing in the apex court, advocate Ishma Randhawa, appearing for Bhullar's father Bhupinder Singh alleged that it is a fake encounter and the deceased was killed by custodial torture. She contended that Singh has seen the body of Bhullar which has gone blue and bones were broken.

Randhawa said that his father had gone to Kolkata on his own and brought back the body to Firozpur in Punjab.

"I am not seeking a CBI probe into the encounter but all I want is second autopsy to ascertain the fact whether he was killed in custodial torture or not. I have the right to know under Article 21 of the constitution to know how my son was killed," she said. Bhupinder Singh, a retired Punjab police inspector, has alleged that his son was tortured before being gunned down. Earlier on Monday, the Ferozepur deputy commissioner had rejected the request of Bhullar's family for a second post-mortem.

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New Delhi: The Indian government said that Jammu and Kashmir is an integral part of it and no amount of questioning can change the reality, an assertion that came following a letter by the Pakistan foreign minister to two top UN officials over alleging a design by New Delhi to change the demographic composition of the region.

Spokesperson in the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) Arindam Bagchi, in an address on Thursday (June 17), also said that cross-border terrorism is "unacceptable".

"The Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir is an integral part of India. No amount of questioning can change the reality. Also cross border terrorism is unacceptable and no amount of justification can make it acceptable," he said at a media briefing.

Bagchi was asked to comment on Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi's latest letter to the president of the United Nations Security Council and the United Nations Secretary-General.

In the letter, Qureshi alleged that India was changing the demographic structure of Kashmir through the issuance of fake domicile certificates and other measures.

He urged the UN Security Council to call upon India to reverse its actions, including those initiated on and after August 5, 2019.

Pakistan has been making concerted efforts to internationalise the Kashmir issue. The neighbouring country stepped up an anti-India campaign after New Delhi announced in August 2019 its decision to withdraw special powers of Jammu and Kashmir and bifurcate the state into two union territories.

India has told Pakistan that it desires normal neighbourly relations with Islamabad in an environment free of terror, hostility and violence.

India has been maintaining that the onus is on Pakistan to create an environment free of terror and hostility.

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New Delhi: The Jawaharlal Nehru University administration has reportedly issued at least four show-cause notices to its student union president Aishe Ghosh in a week.

The latest notice was issued by the proctor's office in relation to an on-campus demonstration Ghosh was a part of on December 5 last year in support of the farmers agitation.

She has been accused of violating COVID-19 rules implemented by the university and the Government of India".

Ghosh has been asked to submit her response by June 24.

Sharing the notice on Twitter, she wrote, Let this be said loud and clear, for any injustice happening around us, in this society, we will keep speaking against the oppressor. We will keep speaking for the oppressed. In solidarity with our farmers.

Last week, Ghosh was issued a show-cause notice for a protest in 2018, calling it an act of "indiscipline and misconduct".

The JNUSU president said she was issued another notice for an act of "effigy burning" of the ABVP and a fourth for holding a protest earlier this year demanding that the library be reopened after the pandemic-induced closure.

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New Delhi: After concerns of Delta plus variant stoking the third COVID-19 wave in Maharashtra came to the fore, a state department official said that reintroducing lockdowns in a graded manner might be a possibility.

Aseem Gupta, principal secretary, state relief and rehabilitation department told The Times of India, if the COVID-19 caseload rises during the third wave, the possibility of reintroducing lockdown cannot be denied.

It must be realised that these levels are not cast in stone- if the government feels that the cases are rising in an alarming manner, it will react immediately and impose stricter measures, Gupta was quoted as saying by TOI.

Meanwhile, the government has decided to stick with its five-level unlock plan rolled out earlier. State public health minister Rajesh Tope confined that the unlock process will continue in the state, the leading daily reported.

Earlier, during a meeting attended by Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray on June 16, the state health department discussing the possible third wave said, The number of active patients could reach up to eight lakh, while 10 per cent out of them could be children.

The Delta plus variant could stoke a third wave in Maharashtra. It could spread at double the rate," an official said.

The meeting was organized to take stock of preparations to tackle a possible third wave of COVID-19 in the state.

"If we do not follow COVID-19-appropriate behaviour, we would be hit by the third wave before we can fully recover from the second one," Thackeray was quoted as saying.

(With inputs from agency)

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Kolkata: West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjees advocate representing her at the Calcutta HC writes to the secretary, Chief Justice, Calcutta High Court.

Mamata Banerjee's lawyer has said that sometime in April 2021, Chief Minister received a letter from the Calcutta High Court Chief Justice regarding the confirmation of Judge Kaushik Chanda as the permanent judge.

The Chief Minister had objected to this being appointed as the permanent judge of the Calcutta High Court. Also, the Justice was an active member of the BJP, hence he would be biased. Lastly, the lawyer has urged to re-assign another bench to hear the election petition o avoid prejudice.

The Calcutta High Court on Friday (June 18) adjourned hearing to June 24 in Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's petition challenging the election of Leader Of Opposition Suvendu Adhikari from Nandigram.

The matter was mentioned by Banerjee's lawyer before the court of Justice Kaushik Chanda as per the list for hearing. Justice Chanda said Banerjee is required to be present on the first day of the hearing as it was an election petition.

The lawyer for Banerjee said that she will act in accordance with the law. Justice Chanda then fixed the matter for hearing on Thursday.

In her election petition, the Trinamool Congress chief accused BJP MLA Adhikari of committing corrupt practises as envisaged under Section 123 of the Representation of the People Act, 1951. Banerjee also claimed in the petition that discrepancies were committed in the counting process.

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Shillong: The water level in the flooded 152-metre-deep coal pit in Meghalaya's East Jaintia Hills district, where five people have been trapped since May 30, receded by 22 feet on Friday, an official said.

Rescuers have pumped out 2.88 lakh litres of water from the main shaft and 8.10 lakh litres from the second shaft, he said.

"Navy divers could not dive during the day due to repairs and replacement of parts of the crane. As soon as the crane is ready, the divers will resume the operation," the official said.

The dewatering process is continuing, he said.

The Navy and NDRF (National Disaster Response Force) divers had on Wednesday retrieved a body which has not been claimed by anyone so far, he said.

The Navy divers had on Thursday failed to retrieve an object suspected to be the body of another miner as it was trapped under the debris inside the main shaft.

Five migrant workers from Assam and Tripura have been feared trapped in the coal mine after a dynamite blast led to its flooding.

Hazardous rat-hole coal mining is not permitted in Meghalaya after the National Green Tribunal (NGT) banned it in 2014.

In rat-hole mining, a deep vertical shaft is dug till coal seams are found, after which the mineral is taken out through small holes along a horizontal line of coal seams.

The coal mine owner has been arrested but the 'sordar' (mine manager) is still at large.
Bengaluru: Karnataka Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa on Friday ruled out any political crisis in the state, even as the rumblings within the ruling BJP have come out in the open during the visit of its national General Secretary in-charge of the State Arun Singh, amid speculations in some quarters about his replacement.

The Chief Minister said that the BJP high command will decide on action against party MLC A H Vishwanath for his recent "open statements," as he rubbished as "baseless" his allegations against his younger son and party vice-president B Y Vijayendra of interference in administration and "kickbacks" in an irrigation project.

"There is no political crisis at all...What is happening is just because one or two people (legislators) are saying something in the media, it is creating misunderstanding...These one or two people speaking against me is not new, they have been doing it since the beginning and it is getting highlighted," Yediyurappa said.

There is no political confusion, one or two people spoke something to the media that is being highlighted. They're doing it from the beginning. Incharge Arun Singh hasn't even met them, there is no confusion. No cabinet member is worried: Karnataka CM BS Yediyurappa pic.twitter.com/HQzRHfA7VG  ANI (@ANI) June 18, 2021

Speaking to reporters, BS Yediyurappa said, about 60 legislators have met national General Secretary Arun Singh on Thursday, but these one or two people who are making statements were not even allowed to meet him.

"There is no confusion or crisis, we are all together and united, and are focusing on the development work. None of my cabinet colleagues are disturbed by any of these things... we will try and talk to one or two people who are involved in such activities, and try to resolve things," he added.

Speculations have been rife for some time now that a section of the ruling BJP is trying to push for unseating Yediyurappa, despite Singh ruling out replacing the Chief Minister and asserting that the 78-year old Lingayat strong man will continue in the top post.

MLA from Hubli-Dharwad West Arvind Bellad and Vijayapura MLA Basanagouda Patil Yatnal who are said to be from the faction seeking Yediyurappa's replacement did not meet Singh on Thursday.

However, Tourism Minister C P Yogeshwar, who is also reportedly disgruntled, held discussions with him. Not willing to comment on Vishwanath's statements, Yediyurappa said, the high command will decide on what action should be taken against him.

Regarding his allegation against his son and kickbacks in an irrigation project, the CM said, "these are all baseless allegations and the Irrigation Department Secretary will clarify everything...Unnecessarily such allegations are being made, there is no basis for it. It is being done for political reasons."

Vishwanath has openly demanded Yediyurappa's ouster, and levelled allegations of corruption and interference in the administration against Vijayendra. This has resulted in a slugfest, as it elicited sharp reactions from the faction supporting the CM, especially his political secretaries M P Renukacharya and S R Vishwanath.

To add to this, allegations of phone-tapping and conspiracy to fix him by Bellad, had caused further embarrassment to the party and the government. Amid speculations about replacing him, Yediyurappa had earlier said that he will continue in the top post as long as the BJP high command has confidence in him.

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Chennai: A 10 kiloliter mid-sea oil spill was reported from a Portuguese flagged container ship MV Devon, 450 km off Chennai coast. It occurred while the vessel was transiting the region, during its voyage from Colombo, Sri Lanka to Haldia, West Bengal.

The vessel is stable and is continuing its voyage and is expected to reach its destination by the late hours of Friday (June 18).

The Indian Coast Guard said it received the information on the oil spill from Maritime Rescue and Coordination Center (MRCC) Colombo in the late hours of Wednesday. It said that the MV Devon vessel developed an underwater crack in the left side fuel tank containing about 120 KL of Very Low Sulphur Fuel Oil (VLSFO).

As a result of this crack 10 KL of oil spilled into the sea, but the crew had taken preventive action by transferring the remaining oil into another tank, ICG said.

ICG said it is in continuous contact with MV Devon and its pollution response team at Chennai has been alerted and kept on standby. In addition, ICG ships and aircraft deployed at sea are also put on alert in pollution response configuration.

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Patna: Newly-elected Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) national president Pashupati Kumar Paras on Friday (June 18), stated that his election to the top post was completely valid under the party`s constitution, refuting nephew Chirag Paswan`s claim to the contrary.

"According to party`s constitution, Chirag Paswan is neither LJP`s national president nor the Leader of the parliamentary party now. Yesterday`s election was completely valid under the party`s constitution, of which he is not aware," Paras told ANI.

On Thursday, after the rebel faction of the LJP elected unopposed Paras as the new party president, Chirag Paswan had said that the election was illegal as it was conducted by members of the LJP who were suspended from the party."LJP`s national president is elected by the party`s national executive which has around 75 members. Only 9 members were present at the national executive meeting.

Suspended members have elected my uncle as the president, which is illegal," Paswan had said. He had further said that he believes LS Speaker Om Birla Ji not aware of their party`s constitution and that`s why he declared him as the Leader of the parliamentary party.

On Thursday, LJP party MP Chandan Singh said that Chirag Paswan was replaced as the LJP national president by MP Pashupati Kumar Paras.

On Sunday, Paras, the younger brother of LJP founder Ram Vilas Paswan along with five other MPs met Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla and handed over a letter to him seeking removal of Chirag Paswan as party chief and as the Lok Sabha Parliamentary party leader. Om Birla accepted Paras as the floor leader of the LJP in the lower house. In a revised list of floor leaders of parties on Monday Paras was listed as the Lok Sabha LJP leader.

LJP was formed by former Union Minister Ram Vilas Paswan in 2000. Paswan, a heavyweight leader in Bihar politics, passed away in October 2020.

(Inputs from agency)

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New Delhi: Reading down of anti-terror law is an important issue and may have pan-India ramifications, the Supreme Court observed on Friday as it sought responses from three student activists granted bail by the Delhi High Court in the northeast Delhi riots conspiracy case.

The top court, however, upheld the Delhi High Court verdict granting bail to them and said that it will not be treated as a precedent and not relied upon by the parties before any court.

A vacation bench of Justices Hemant Gupta and V Ramasubramanian made it clear that the bails granted to these student activists - Natasha Narwal, Devangana Kalita and Jamia student Asif Iqbal Tanha - will not be affected for the time being.

SC refused to stay the Delhi High Court judgment. SC said that the judgment of the Delhi High Court will not be treated as a precedent & not relied upon by the parties before any Court.  ANI (@ANI) June 18, 2021

The bench also took note of Solicitor General Tushar Mehta's submission that the entire anti-terror law, UAPA, has been turned upside down by the Delhi High Court while granting bail to these activists. The bench said what is troubling was that 100 pages of the verdict have been rendered while granting bail and the judgement discussed the entire law.

The Supreme Court made these observations while hearing the special leave petitions filed by the Delhi Police against the bail granted by the Delhi High Court to the Pinjra Tod activists and students Devangana Kalita, Natasha Narwal, and Asif Iqbal Tanha.

Student-activists Natasha Narwal, Devangana Kalita and Asif Iqbal Tanha will stay out of jail, the Supreme Court said as it upheld Tuesday's Delhi High Court order granting them bail.

The Supreme Court also agreed to examine the legal aspects of the Delhi High Court verdict and said the case would be taken up next month.

All three - arrested in May last year over alleged links to riots that erupted in northeast Delhi in February last year amid tension over protests against the citizenship law - were given bail Tuesday on personal bonds of Rs 50,000 each and two sureties of a similar amount.

On Wednesday Delhi Police had moved the Supreme Court arguing that the bail order should be stayed. The police had said that the High Court's findings are "perverse and contrary to record" and appeared to be based "more on the social media narrative.

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New Delhi: In a boost for Indias COVID-19 vaccination drive, the Serum Institute of India (SII) is likely to roll out Covavax, US firm Novavax`s Indian version, by September this year and begin trials on children from July, ANI reported.

As per the news agency, Novavax`s vaccine showed a 90.4 per cent overall efficacy in Phase-3 clinical trials. It also said that the Pune-based vaccine manufacturer hopes to introduce Covavax in India by September.

"Serum Institute plans to start clinical trials of the Novavax shot for children in July, ANI quoted a source as saying.

On Tuesday, the Centre had asserted that the declared Novavax COVID-19 vaccine efficacy data in a large trial was promising, adding that the clinical trials being conducted in India are at an advanced stage of completion.

"What we`re learning from data available in the public domain that" said Dr VK Paul, Member-Health, Niti Aayog during a routine briefing on COVID-19 situation in the country.

Meanwhile, the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in Delhi started the screening of children belonging to 6 to 12 years age group for the clinical trials of Covaxin. AIIMS Delhi has already completed the clinical trial for a single dose of Covaxin for children aged 12-18 age group.

In a respite for all, a new study conducted by WHO and AIIMS has revealed that as seropositivity rate of SARS-CoV-2 among children is high as compared to adults it means the coronavirus is unlikely to affect children more than the adult population. Hence, the third wave may not affect children more.

(With agency input)

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New Delhi: What began as a hobby has now become a thriving business for Pawadeep Singh, 29, a resident of Jaithuwal village, near Amritsar. The young apiarist has over 220 beehives but not a single inch of land, and yet he is a motivational force for many to adopt apiculture as a source of living.

Pawandeep Singh moves from one state to another to find a suitable place in the vicinity of fields where he sets up the beehive boxes to produce honey with peculiar aroma flavours and tastes.

He begins his journey in January from Rewari in Haryana due to mustard seasons and then he is back to Amritsar while the eucalyptus flowers are blossoming. In March, he takes his beehive boxes to Pathankot near the litchi orchards and then he enters the neighboring Jammu and Kashmir Union Territory for multi flower nectar including apple, etc.

In June, he is back to Haryana to set up beehive boxes near the cotton fields. Then there is time to move to Rajasthan where Beri flowers are in full bloom at Nohar Bahadra village. In October, he moves to Gwalior in Madhya Pradesh for caraway flower honey. And this is how he harvests honey and money around the year.

The honey from mustard flowers would have a different taste and quality as it freezes quickly in winters. Similarly, he said the honey from litchi flowers would have a litchi flavor while the honey from caraway flowers would have a peculiar caraway aroma. The taste, color, and texture of honey vary from flower sources.

Pawandeep, a postgraduate, didnt get any job so he thought of trying beekeeping but soon he adopted it as a full-fledged profession.

When I didnt get a job after post-graduation, I made my mind to go abroad but then again there were certain issues due to which I couldnt go so I thought to help my father in his beekeeping business which is now my full-time profession, said Pawandeep Singh.

He said his father was in Madhya Pradesh where he fell ill due to Dengue and he had to go there to take care of him. Initially I didnt like beekeeping but now I think there is no other profession like this one, he said.

He said the beauty of apiculture was that one didnt require big fields to harvest honey, the beehive boxes could be placed on roadsides, in the vicinity of fields, banks of rivers, on hills and so on.

I dont have any land but I put up my beehives in the vicinity of fields, maybe on roadsides, riverbanks, hills and the fields in whose vicinity I put my beehives boxes gives 30 to 35 percent more yield due to pollination by the bees, he said.

He said there were various government schemes which the beekeepers could avail for taking various benefits and growing their business. Giving example, he said the National Horticulture Mission gives 40 to 50 percent subsidy on beekeeping and even Prime Minister Narendra Modi had earmarked Rs 500 crore for the promotion of apiculture.

However, the young honey producer suggests that the farmers shouldnt depend on any middlemen for marketing and instead they should be doing direct marketing. I have no middlemen, from farm to customers end I do everything by myself, besides I have given a brand name to my honey, he stated.

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New Delhi: Top commanders of the Army on Thursday carried out a comprehensive review of India's overall security challenges including in eastern Ladakh as well as other sensitive areas along the Line of Actual Control with China on the first day of a two-day conference, people familiar with the development said.

The commanders also deliberated on the ongoing ceasefire between Indian and Pakistani troops along the Line of Control (LoC) in Jammu and Kashmir besides reviewing the security scenario in the union territories, they said.

They said Chief of Army Staff Gen MM Naravane and top commanders of the nearly 1.3 million-strong force were briefed India's combat readiness in eastern Ladakh where Indian and Chinese troops have been locked in a bitter standoff for over one year.

India and China were locked in a military standoff at multiple friction points in eastern Ladakh since early May last year. However, the two sides completed the withdrawal of troops and weapons from the North and South banks of Pangong lake in February following a series of military and diplomatic talks.

The two sides are now engaged in talks to extend the disengagement process to the remaining friction points.

"All operational matters relating to India's security preparedness were discussed at the conference," said one of the sources about the deliberations at the conference being held in Delhi.

The sources said the deliberations on ways to further enhance India's combat prowess will figure in Friday's deliberations.

The conference took place two days after the first anniversary of the deadly clashes in Galwan valley in which 20 Indian soldiers laid down their lives while defending the country's territorial integrity in the face of unprecedented Chinese aggression.

In February, China officially acknowledged that five Chinese military officers and soldiers were killed in the clashes with the Indian Army though it is widely believed that the death toll was higher.

The conference is being attended by all Army Commanders, Principal Staff Officers (PSOs) of the Army headquarters and other senior officers.

"The Commanders are carrying out a comprehensive review of the security challenges facing the nation," said another person.

Last month, Army Chief Gen Naravane had said that there can be no de-escalation without complete disengagement at all friction points in eastern Ladakh and that the Indian Army is prepared for all contingencies in the region.

Gen Naravane also said that India is dealing with China in a "firm" and "non-escalatory" manner to ensure the sanctity of its claims in eastern Ladakh, and that it was even open to initiating confidence-building measures.

The people familiar with the development said the commanders also deliberated on matters relating to human resource management and promotions in the Army.

The Army commanders are also expected to deliberate on various reform measures recommended by separate internal committees, they said.
Across the country, central and state boards have decided to cancel Class 12 board exams keeping the students safety' in mind amid the pandemic. Yesterday, the Supreme Court approved the marking scheme of CBSE and CISCE. While this has definitely brought students some clarity, doubts and questions remain as to what the next step should be - how to go about the college admissions.

Here are some of the country's top universities and what we know about their admission process so far:

Delhi University

DU is likely to start the registration process for admissions by July 15, according to media reports. On CBSE and CISCE's marking scheme, Rajeev Gupta, dean of admissions at Delhi University, told the Times of India, The assessment policy will not affect our admissions because it seems that the Class XII results will be determined in percentage and we use percentages for deciding the admission cutoffs.

However it's not clear yet if the Central Universities Common Entrance Test (CUET) will be held this year. The university had earlier proposed 50% weightage to CUCET and 50% to Class 12 marks. But in the current scenario, it seems that the university might just go for merit-based admission.

Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU)

Students getting admitted to JNU for undergraduate and postgraduate courses have to appear for the JNU Entrance Exam (JNUEE). NU VC Mamidala Jagadesh Kumar had earlier told ANI, "We will conduct the JNU entrance examination whenever it is safe for students to write. If entrance is delayed due to COVID and if admission happens at a later date, we'll surely adjust our academic calendar to take care of lost time without compromising academic rigor."

Going by media reports, the National Testing Agency (NTA) is expected to begin the registration process for JNUEE 2021 sometime in June. Candidates appearing for the entrance examination will have to fill the application form before the last date of submission.

Anna University

The Anna University admissions to all the programmes usually begin in August every year. Either entrance exams or merit-based markings are considered for admission to different programmes. For BE/BTech courses, students have to appear for the Tamil Nadu Engineering Admissions (TNEA) conducted by the Directorate of Technical Education, Tamil Nadu. The registration process and exam dates for TNEA 2021 are yet to be announced. For MBA, MArch, MPlan and MCA, candidates have to appear for TANCET 2021. The exam was conducted in March 2021 before the COVID-19 second wave. But the counselling process for TANCET 2021 is yet to begin.

Mumbai University

Maharashtra University is yet to share how it will enroll students. The Maharashtra education department on June 3 announced its decision to scrap the Class 12 state board or Higher Secondary Certificate (HSC) exams for the 2020-21 academic year. The colleges affiliated to the university are still planning the course of action.

IP University

Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University has released the application form for admission to the 2021-22 academic session. To register online, students can visit ipu.admissions.nic.in and ipu.ac.in. The last date of registration is July 15. Apart from undergraduate courses, admissions are open for PhD, MPhil courses for both Indian and international students.

Jadavpur University

Jadavpur University offers several undergraduate programmes in the field of engineering, pharmacy, architecture, science, arts, commerce, among various others. Apart from BE and BTech, it also offers BPEd, BArch, B.Lib.I.Sc, BSc, BA and BPharma at UG level. Students have to clear WBJEE to pursue BTech and BE courses while entrance exams are held for BA courses. But amid the pandemic, merit-based admission is likely. A decision on WBJEE 2021 is still awaited.

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Noida: The police in Ghaziabad lodged an FIR against social media giant Twitter, some journalists and opposition politicians over them sharing a video clip -- about an attack on an elderly Muslim man by some young men and claimed to be their intentional attempt at disrupting peace.

366 FIRs have been lodged in a year over allegations of disruption to communal harmony through posts and comments on various social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter, the state police said.

Ghaziabad Police sent legal notice to Managing Director of Twitter India over viral video of an elderly man in Loni being assaulted with the intent of "provoking communal unrest" The MD has been asked to come to the Police Station Loni Border & record the statement within 7 days pic.twitter.com/u5Ct8Omq6l  ANI UP (@ANINewsUP) June 18, 2021

UP Police's Additional Director General (Law and Order) Prashant Kumar said police in districts across the state regularly monitor online activities through their social media cell and ensure action over objectionable content.

According to Ghaziabad (Rural) Superintendent of Police (SP) Iraj Raja, no communal angle was found in the incident in Loni where a man was thrashed and his beard was chopped off.

"A total of five accused have been arrested in the case. We will take strong action against them. The complainant had initially told us he had no prior contact with the accused, but their call records show us otherwise. We will also take action (against the complainant) for providing some wrong facts," he said.

Ghaziabad Police filed FIR against nine entities, including Twitter India in connection with the Loni incident.

In the FIR, the Police had said, "There is no communal angle to the incident in Loni where a man was thrashed and his beard was chopped off. The following entities -- The Wire, Rana Ayyub, Mohammad Zubair, Dr Shama Mohammed, Saba Naqvi, Maskoor Usmani, Salman Nizami -- without checking the fact, started giving communal colour to the incident on Twitter and suddenly they started spreading messages to disrupt the peace and bring differences between the religious communities."

"Another 366 cases were lodged during the same period over social media posts and comments that disrupted communal harmony in the state," the officer stated in a statement.

Besides these, 623 cases were lodged over social media users misusing the platform for any other reason by their posts or comments, he added.

He said social media content is reviewed every day at the UP Police headquarters in Lucknow and necessary guidelines and instructions are issued to police at district level.

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NEW DELHI: After spending nearly a year in jail, Pinjra Tod activists Natasha Narwal, Devangana Kalita and Jamia student Asif Iqbal Tanha were released on bail from the high-security Tihar Jail late on Thursday.

They were released after getting bail in the northeast Delhi riots conspiracy case. Soon after walking out of the jail, they vowed to continue their struggle. The release of the trio, who were arrested in May last year under the stringent Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA), came after a lower court order.

Natasha Narwal

Natasha Narwal is a student and a women human rights activist. She is also one of the founding members of the Pinjra Tod, a grouping of women students and university alumni from across Delhi, who seek to fight against oppressive forces, restrictions imposed on female students and a plethora of other social issues.

Narwal is closely associated with Pinjda Tod, since it was founded in 2015 to protest against the hostel restrictions for women in Delhi colleges. She is a student of Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU). Natasha Narwals father, Mahavir, a retired senior scientist from the Haryana Agricultural University, was a senior member of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPI-M).

In 2020, Narwal was arrested on May 24 for allegedly engaging in premeditated conspiracy in the northeast Delhi riots of February 2020. She was booked under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.

She was protesting against the controversial Citizenship Amendment Act proposed by the central government.

Devangana Kalita

Devangana Kalita is an MPhil student from Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) in Delhi. Devangana grabbed eyeballs in 2020 after she took part in various anti-CAA & NRC protests in Delhi and NCR following which she was arrested in May 2020 and charged under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA).

Devangana had been very inclined towards student politics during her days at Miranda House, University of Delhi. She had contested the student council elections as an independent candidate and got elected as the student council vice president of the university. She regularly took part in various protests related to safety and social issues both inside and outside the university campus.

After her graduation from Miranda House, the University of Delhi in 2010, Devangana interned at the Seva Mandir, an NGO based in Udaipur. Thereafter, she moved to the UK to pursue a masters course in Gender and Development from the University of Sussex. In 2015, she enrolled at JNU to pursue a second masters degree in History. In JNU, she started taking part in various events and indulged in a campaign in Delhis Jamia Millia Islamia (JMI) University to create awareness about menstrual hygiene.

Like Natasha Narwal, Devangana had also been vocal in her criticism of hostel curfew hours since her days at Miranda House womans college. In August 2015, she, along with her friends, started a Facebook page Pinjra Tod: Break the Hostel Locks. This was a protest against the Jamia Milia Islamia Administrations new rule that changed the return time to the hostel for girls from 10 pm to 8 pm.

Later, Pinjra Tod movement, which initially began to protest against the curfew hours, went on to expand its fight in support of gender equality and against a plethora of other social issues.

Asif Iqbal Tanha

Iqbal Tanha is a 25-year-old student pursuing his final year of the BA (Hons) Persian programme at the Jamia Milia Islamia University. Along with Natasha Narwal and Devangana Kalita, he was also arrested by the Delhi Police in connection with the northeast Delhi riots case and was charged under UAPA.

Tanha is a member of the Students' Islamic Organisation of India. While demanding the release of other prisoners, he also appealed to the government to address the COVID conditions in prison. Tanha also asserted that the fight against the CAA, NRC and the NPR would continue.

All three were given a warm welcome outside the Tihar Jail. Their friends and family members had gathered outside the jail before their release. Pinjra Tod activists Narwal, Kalita and Tanha thanked their friends and well-wishers, many of whom gathered outside the jail, for supporting them during their year-long stay behind bars.

As soon as they walked out of Tihar, they were greeted with slogans of 'Lal Salaam', 'Natasha Zindabad', 'Devangana Zindabad'. Slogans were also raised in memory of Natasha's father, Mahavir Narwal, who succumbed to the coronavirus last month.

Tanha walked out of a separate jail gate. The Jamia Millia Islamia student was wearing a mask, which read 'No CAA, No NRC, No NPR'.

Why were they arrested?

The three student activists were arrested in May 2020 and are accused of being the "masterminds" of the February 2020 violence in North Delhi, which left 53 people dead and more than 200 injured.

The high court, while granting them bail on June 15, had observed that "in an anxiety to suppress dissent, the state has blurred the line between right to protest and terrorist activity" and if such a mindset gains traction, it would be a "sad day for democracy".

The Delhi Police has, however, have moved the Supreme Court, challenging the high court judgement granting them bail in the case.

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Srinagar: Terrorists shot at and injured a man in the Anantnag district of Jammu and Kashmir on Friday (June 18), police said. The incident took place in Hasanpora Arwani area of Bijbehara in the south Kashmir district, a police official told PTI. The injured has been shifted to a hospital, the official added.

He said that further details are awaited.

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New Delhi: The Indian Army has invited applications for recruitment to the posts of officers under the NCC Special Entry Scheme (Indian Army Recruitment 2021). Interested and eligible male and female candidates, who want to apply for these posts, can complete the registration online by visiting the official website of the Indian Army, joinindianarmy.nic.in.

The registration process for these posts started on June 16 and will conclude on July 15, 2021. Under this recruitment process, a total of 55 posts will be filled.

Candidates can also directly apply for these posts (Indian Army Recruitment 2021) by clicking on the link, joinindianarmy.nic.in/index.htm. One can check the official notification by visiting, joinindianarmy.nic.in/writereaddata.

Important dates for Indian Army Recruitment 2021:

Starting date to apply: June 16

Last date to apply online: July 21

Vacancy details for Indian Army Recruitment 2021:

NCC Male: 50 Posts

NCC Female: 5 Posts

Eligibility criteria for Indian Army Recruitment 2021:

Candidates should have a graduate degree or equivalent from a recognized university with a minimum of 50 per cent marks. They should also have working experience of at least 2-3, as applicable in the Senior Division/Wing of NCC.



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There is a good opportunity for the youth who are dreaming of becoming an officer in the State Bank of India (SBI).

For the SBI Recruitment 2021, the State Bank of India has sought applications for recruitment for the posts of Fire Engineer under Special Cadre Officer (SCO).

Interested and eligible candidates who want to apply for these posts they can apply online by visiting the official website of SBI, sbi.co.in.

The last date to apply for these posts is 28 June 2021.

Apart from this, candidates can also directly apply for these posts by clicking on this link https://recruitment.bank.sbi/crpd-sco-fire-2020-21-32/apply.

Also, you can also see the official notification through this link here.

A total of 16 posts will be filled under this recruitment process.

Important Dates for SBI Recruitment 2021:

Start date to apply online: 15th June 2021

Last date to apply online: 28th June 2021

Vacancy Details for SBI Recruitment 2021

Fire Engineer  16 Posts

Eligibility Criteria for SBI Recruitment 2021:

Candidates should possess BE (Fire) or B.Tech/ B.E. from National Fire Service College (NFSC) or B.Tech/B.E. (Fire Technology and Safety Engineering) or B.Sc (Fire) or equivalent four-year degree in Fire Safety from a UGC recognized University / AICTE approved Institute for UGC recognized University / AICTE recognized Institute or Institute of Graduation from Fire Engineers (India/UK) or Divisional Officer course from National Fire Service College (NFSC), Nagpur.

Application fee for SBI Recruitment 2021: 750/- as application fee for the candidates will have to pay.

Salary for SBI Recruitment 2021: Candidates will be given 23700  980/7  30560  1145/2  32850  1310/7  42020 as salary.

Selection Criteria for SBI Recruitment 2021: The selection of the candidates will be based on shortlisting and interview.

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New Delhi: The Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) has released the timetable for the preliminary phase of the Engineering Services Exam (ESE) 2021. UPSC ESE Prelims 2021 will be conducted on July 18, 2021.

Candidates who are going to sit for the examination need to note that the timetable for the same is available on the official website of the commission- upsc.gov.in.

As per the notification, the Stage I examination will take place in two shifts. The first shift will start from 10 am to 12 noon, followed by the second shift from 2 pm to 5 pm.

The first paper duration will be for 2 hours and will comprise of 200 marks and the second paper duration will be for 3 hours and will comprise of 300 marks.

As per the timetable, General Studies And Engineering Aptitude Paper will be conducted in the first shift and Civil, Mechanical, Electrical, Electronics & Telecom. Engg. (Discipline- Specific Paper) in the second shift.

The candidates who will qualify for the UPSC ESE 2021 prelims will be eligible to appear for the main examination followed by an interview.

A total of 215 vacancies will be filled through the ESE 2021 in Survey of India Group 'A' Service, Indian Defence Service of Engineers, Indian Naval Armament Service, Indian Skill Development Service, Central Engineering Service (Roads), Central Power Engineering Service, Indian Radio Regulatory Service and other services.

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New Delhi: Actress Munmun Dutta, popularly known for playing the role of Babita Iyer in the sitcom Taarak Mehta Ka Ooltah Chashmah, recently treated her Instagram followers with a stunning throwback picture in which she had her long locks.

On Thursday (June 17), Dutta posted a picture in which she was seen donning a blue striped shirt-dress and golden heels. The actress was leaning against a table and posing for the camera, flaunting her long legs.

Check out her latest post:

On May 10, Twitter users had burst into outrage over the actress's YouTube video in which she had used a 'casteist slur'. An FIR under the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act was filed against the actor.

Later, Munmun took to social media to issue an apology and claimed that she didn't know the offensive meaning of the word. She blamed 'language barrier' as the cause

Recently, the actress was reprimanded by a Supreme Court bench for using a 'casteist slur' in one of her YouTube videos.

"What you said may amount to bringing an entire community into disrepute," said a Supreme Court bench on Friday (June 18) as per an IANS report.

The top court has agreed to stay the proceedings in the FIRs filed by Dalit rights activist and lawyer in Haryana's Hisar on May 13. The FIR was filed under the Scheduled Castes and Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act for allegedly humiliating the community.

(With IANS inputs)
New Delhi: Actress Disha Patani has a way to impress her fans, each time she drops a bomb of a photo. She took to her Instagram account and shared a picture of her posing in a leopard-print two-piece oozing oomph at the picturesque beach.

Disha Patani's timeline is already full of comments from industry friends, fans and followers. Take a look:

On the personal front, although rumour mills are rife that Disha and actor Tiger Shroff are dating, the two always remain tight-lipped about their relationship status. The fitness enthusiasts have featured in 'Baaghi 2' together and fans would surely want to see them again on the big screens.

Recently, Tiger Shroff took to social media to wish his rumoured ladylove Disha Patani on her 29th birthday and shared a video where the two of them are dancing together.

On the work front, Disha Patani was last seen in Salman Khan starrer 'Radhe: Your Most Wanted Bhai'. The film is helmed by Prabhu Deva.

Disha has a solid 44.4 million follower base on Instagram alone and that explains her popularity on social media.
Mumbai: A special NDPS court here on Thursday granted interim bail to Siddharth Pithani, a former roommate of late actor Sushant Singh Rajput and an accused in a drug case, for his wedding scheduled on June 26.

Siddharth Pithani, currently in judicial custody, was arrested by the NCB from Hyderabad on May 28 in the drug case linked to Rajput's death last year.

Last week, among other grounds for seeking bail, the accused had told the court that he is getting married on June 26. However, Pithani later withdrew his bail application and pleaded for an interim bail for his wedding. Special judge V V Vidwans granted him an interim plea till July 2. Pithani was arrested on charges of procuring and helping Rajput get narcotics substances under section 27-A of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act which deals with financing illicit traffic and harbouring offenders, NCB had said.

Sushant Singh Rajput was found dead in his home in suburban Bandra on June 14 last year.

Following the actor's death, the NCB began a probe into alleged drug use in the film industry based on some WhatsApp chats. Several people were arrested by the NCB under the NDPS Act in the case and most of them are out on bail currently.
New Delhi: Nikki Tamboli of Bigg Boss 14 fame recently opened up on how she coped with shooting for Khatron Ke Khiladi 11 days after her brother's demise in an interview with a leading daily.

Nikki revealed that it's been incredibly tough for her to leave her parents behind after such a devastating tragedy. She feels that she has become 'weak' and isn't the same headstrong girl she was in Bigg Boss 14.

She told ETimes, "I came to Cape Town leaving my emotional parents behind after my brothers death and it has been the biggest challenge for me. To be honest, I respect the show a lot but because whatever I went through recently I feel main bahut weak pad rahi hoon... people have seen in Bigg Boss and they know I am very headstrong but in this show I have had many weak moments because of the family issues."

"While I was doing Bigg Boss, everything was fine with my family so I was very focused on the show, but this time things have been very difficult. My brother passed away on May 4th and on May 6th, I came to Cape Town. Obviously it was not possible for me to be all happy and fine within two days and be strong at the same time. It is not easy for me to get over the pain, the loss, so easily. People are motivating and encouraging me to get back to normal but it will take time for me to overcome this loss. I know a lot of people have many expectations from me but lets see what happens in the show," she added.

Former Bigg Boss 14 contestant Nikki Tamboli lost her elder brother Jatin Tamboli, 29, to COVID-19 on May 4. The actress soon after left for Cape Town, South Africa to participate in the Rohit Shetty hosted, adventure reality show - Khatron Ke Khiladi 11.

Nikki had earlier shared a long note about how she constantly misses her brother. The actress also shut down the trolls for questioning her decision to participate in Khatron ke Khiladi. The actress revealed that her brother was excited about her participating in the show and her family too would want her to go after her dreams.

She however said that her family will always be her priority.
New Delhi: The Indian government had rolled out the PM Kisan Samman Nidhi scheme to provide financial aid to millions of poor and marginalised farmers across the country. Under the scheme, farmers receive annually Rs 6,000 in three different instalments.

So far, the government has provided Rs 16,000 in eight instalments to individual farmers who have been receiving the benefits since the start of the PM Kisan Samman Nidhi scheme.

The eighth instalment under the scheme was recently disbursed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi directly in the bank accounts of farmers. So far, the Centre has released over Rs 20k crore directly in the bank accounts of farmers under the scheme. Also Read: PM Kisan Yojana: Beneficiaries could land in jail if theyre found doing THIS

How to get double benefits under PM Kisan Samman Nidhi scheme?

Farmers who arent registered under the PM Kisan Samman Nidhi yet can receive two instalments worth Rs 2000 each (Rs 4000 total) in one go. farmers will have to register under the scheme before June 30 to receive two instalments that will be directly transferred to their account.

These newly registered farmers will receive Rs 4,000 in July, as part of the eighth and ninth instalment under the PM Kisan Samman Nidhi scheme. Also Read: PM Kisan Yojana: Farmers can receive Rs 36,000 annually, heres how

How to register for PM Kisan Samman Nidhi scheme?

1. To register yourself under the PM Kisan Samman Nidhi scheme, you need to visit the official website: https://pmkisan.gov.in/

2. In the former's corner, select the New Registration option.

3. Fill in your Aadhar number details.

4. Enter other details such as your state.

5. Submit the details along with the captcha code.

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#mute
New Delhi: State Bank of India (SBI) is extremely active on social media. The public sector lender also issues several alerts related to consumer convenience and safety from time to time.

In its latest tweet, SBI has alerted the banks users to be very careful with the links that come on their email.

Are you receiving these links in your inbox? Steer Clear! Clicking on these phishing links could lead to loss of your personal and confidential information. Stay alert. Think before you click!, SBI has tweeted.

Are you receiving these links in your inbox? Steer Clear! Clicking on these phishing links could lead to loss of your personal and confidential information. Stay alert. Think before you click!#ThinkBeforeYouClick #StayAlert #StaySafe #CyberSafety pic.twitter.com/URZcURvECl  State Bank of India (@TheOfficialSBI) June 17, 2021

The tweet asks bank's customers to stay away from 'Free gift' promises.

Free gift from the national bank of India? Don't take the bait and beware of phishing links offering freebies.
New Delhi: Facebook is all set to cash in on its TikTok clone, Instagram Reels, the social media giant announced on Thursday (June 18). Facebook said that ads on Instagram Reels will appear between individual Reels.

These ads can be as long as up to 30 seconds, which means that our experience on Instagram Reels wont be the same. Facebook hasnt revealed the frequency of the ads yet. However, it is likely that the number of ads that youll be seeing on the platform will increase in the future.

Facebook had started testing ads on Instagrams short-form video feature in India, Brazil, Germany and Australia in April 2021. BMW, Louis Vuitton, Netflix and Uber participated in the pilot of ads on Instagram Reels.

Instagram`s Chief Operating Officer Justin Osofsky said, We see Reels as a great way for people to discover new content on Instagram, and so ads are a natural fit."

Osofsky added that brands of all sizes can take advantage of this new creative format in an environment where people are already being entertained. Also Read: Truecaller rolls out group voice calling, smart SMS and inbox cleaner for Android

Instagram Reels was soon launched in India after the Indian government banned TikTok. Cashing in on the popularity of the Chinese short video sharing app, Instagram Reels popularity grew in a snap.

In the absence of TikTok in India, many other companies had launched their short video sharing apps, including MX Players Taka Tak, Sharechats Moj, DailyHunts Josh. However, Instagram Reels appear to be taking a lead, thanks to the popularity of the app among affluent users. Also Read: Gautam Adani no longer Asias 2nd richest person, loses $9 billion in 3 days
Lucknow: Though the assembly election 2022 in Uttar Pradesh is still a few months away, major political parties have started exploring all the options for a possible pre-poll alliance and initiated discussions over who could be their top choice for the chief minister's post.

As far as the ruling BJP is concerned, it has categorically ruled out replacing incumbent Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and has thrown its full weight behind him. This implies that the monk-politician will possibly be the main face of the saffron partys 2022 election campaign.

Yogi Adityanath (BJP)

Despite recent rumblings within the party and in view of the oppositions blazing attack over the state governments handling of the COVID-19, the BJP top brass has given the Yogi government a clean chit and lauded its work in the past 4 years. However, it still remains concerned about how to handle the rising public anger against the government over its mishandling of the devastating second wave of COVID-19.

Another factor that the BJP top brass has been deliberating upon is that its 'Hindutva' card has been losing its sheen in state politics. What further proves this is the fact that several BJP-supported candidates had to face humiliation in traditional BJP strongholds like Gorakhpur, Ayodhya, Varanasi and Mathura in the recently concluded panchayat polls.

This implies that Ram temple or 'Hindutva' alone can not fetch votes for the saffron party in the coming polls, which is crucial for the BJP and PM Narendra Modi for seizing power in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. Though the outcome of the 2022 polls cannot be predicted on the basis of the results of the local panchayat polls, it still reflects which way the wind is blowing. On the other hand, Akhilesh Yadavs Samajwadi Party made considerable gains despite not showing great enthusiasm during the local panchayat elections.

There is no denying the fact that BJP has the strongest vote bank in Uttar Pradesh, but what worries the party is the rising anti-incumbency factor against the government due to high unemployment, declining law and order situation, people's frustration and anger due to a large number of COVID deaths, poor management of the pandemic, etc that can dent its poll prospects in UP this time.

Despite its strong positioning among the forward castes, the Jat and the Vaishya community members are quite disenchanted with the saffron party, mainly due to the Narendra Modi govt's cold response to the farmers agitating against the three farm laws and huge losses to the small traders due to demonetisation and the Goods and Services Tax (GST).

The party is not hopeful of a good voter turnout in its favour in the western UP where the RLD led by late former Union Minister Ajit Singh wields considerable clout among the farmers. This time, RLD is likely to go with Akhilesh Yadav's party, which will hurt the chances of BJP getting good numbers in the region.

The BJP, according to sources, may also follow its Assam model of not projecting a chief ministerial candidate before elections in an attempt to beat any anti-incumbency in other poll-bound states - a strategy party might discuss in the run-up to the assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh. Besides Uttar Pradesh, the strategy is likely to benefit the party in other states like - Uttarakhand, Goa, Himachal Pradesh, and Gujarat.

Priyanka Gandhi (Congress)

While Congress is trying hard to revive itself in the state, it is still in search of a credible face in UP. Jitin Prasadas exit will further make a dent in its upper caste vote bank. The main opposition party may further lose its Brahmin vote bank. The Congress partys poll prospects will clearly depend on Priyanka Gandhis charismatic appeal and her connection with the voters of UP. However, this too has been tested in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls and the last assembly elections in which BJP came out as a clear winner.

With Rahul Gandhi not very keen on taking the party's reins again and organisational elections due to take place in some time, it would be interesting to see if Congress projects Priyanka Gandhi as its CM face in UP. The UP in-charge of the Congress party has been very vocal about the Narendra Modi and the Yogi Adityanath government both at the Centre and state respectively and has emerged as a formidable challenger to the Chief Minister. She also enjoys a good equation with both the old and young guards in the party and has a massive youth appeal too.

Sanjay Singh (AAP)

Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwals Aam Aadmi Party - another player in UP politics - has also made its presence felt by winning a significant number of seats in UPs panchayat polls. Though talks of a rapprochement with poet-politician Kumar Vishwas is too far-fetched at the moment, the AAP leadership may try to project its Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh as its CM candidate.

Sanjay Singhs UP background may help AAP to woo upper caste voters in UP, thus dividing the BJPs vote bank. He is the national spokesperson of the Aam Aadmi Party and the state-in-charge for Uttar Pradesh, Orissa and Rajasthan. Sanjay Singh was born in Sultanpur District, Uttar Pradesh.

AAP has already made it clear that Sanjay Singh will be the face of the post of Chief Minister in UP. The party leaders have claimed that if AAP wins, the Delhi development model will be implemented in Uttar Pradesh too.

Mayawati and Om Prakash Rajbhar

In all probability, Dalit icon and states former Chief Minister Mayawati will be the chief ministerial candidate of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP). Mayawati had sometimes back announced that her party would go alone in the Uttar Pradesh assembly election next year. However, the party would not hesitate to join hands with Om Prakash Rajbhar, who has ruled out any alliance with the BJP for 2022 polls.

Ending all speculations, Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party (SBSP) leader Om Prakash Rajbhar has said that there will be no alliance with the BJP again. The SBSP leader also claimed that the BJP passed over backward leaders and even deputy chief minister Keshav Prasad Maurya was "ignored" in the Yogi Adityanath government.

Accusing the BJP of deceiving the backward section, Rajbhar claimed that his party played a major role in BJP winning close to 100 seats in UP in the last assembly polls. The SBSP had contested the 2017 UP Assembly elections in alliance with the BJP, but later parted ways. In the 2017 Assembly elections, the SBSP contested eight seats and won four. Rajbhar was made a Cabinet minister but he resigned later due to differences with Yogi Adityanath's leadership.

There is also a possibility of BSP and All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) coming together in Uttar Pradesh. If this happens, the alliance will cause a major dent in SPs Muslim and backward votes.

Akhilesh Yadav (SP)

On the other hand, Samajwadi Party chief and former chief minister Akhilesh Yadav has said that his party will not form an alliance with the Congress or Mayawatis Bahujan Samaj Party. Yadav said that SP will not tie up with any major political parties but would instead go with smaller regional parties.

The party will tie up with smaller parties in UP, look to forge alliances with Jayant Chaudharys Rashtriya Lok Dal, Sanjay Chauhans Janwadi Party and Keshav Dev Mauryas Mahan Dal, the SP chief has said. The Samajwadi Party president also hinted at forming an alliance with his uncle Shivpal Yadav, who is also trying hard to stay relevant in the state politics after facing humiliation in the last assembly and Lok Sabha polls.

The SP chief has also said that his party will not field its candidate on the latters seat in Jaswantnagar. The Samajwadi Party has had bitter experiences in the previous assembly elections and the 2019 general elections, in which it contested in alliance with Congress and BSP respectively. Consequently, the party is now looking to go without them. Moreover, SP had a decent showing in the recently concluded panchayat elections in which it emerged at the top, leaving behind the ruling BJP.

Hence, Akhilesh Yadav will certainly be the biggest bet of the Samajwadi Party in the upcoming UP assembly elections. Also, with the ''Bua-Bhaija'' (Mayawati-Akhilesh) relationship souring at the moment, there is no possibility of the two parties coming together to oust the ''Modi-Shah powered'' BJP in UP.

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Kolkata: Suvendu Adhikari, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader and the Leader of Opposition in the West Bengal Assembly, has filed a petition to West Bengal Legislative Assembly Speaker demanding disqualification of MLA Mukul Roy who recently switched sides and re-joined TMC from BJP.

BJP leader and Leader of Opposition in West Bengal Legislative Assembly, Suvendu Adhikari has given a petition to the Assembly Speaker for disqualification of TMC leader Mukul Roy, MLA from 83-Krishnanagar Uttar Assembly constituency (file pics) pic.twitter.com/lRhWwZwgDh  ANI (@ANI) June 18, 2021

Adhikari had earlier said that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will take the legal route if former party MLA Mukul Roy did not resign from his post by June 15. The BJP leader had on Thursday said the party has completed the paperwork to back its demand for the disqualification of Mukul Roy, who recently switched over from the saffron party to the TMC, from the West Bengal assembly.

However, Adhikari said he couldn't submit the documents to the assembly secretariat during the day as the receive section was shut.

"We have readied all the documents to back our demand for the disqualification of Mukul Roy from the assembly, who had won on the BJP's lotus symbol. "The receive section of the House was closed today. If we find it shut again tomorrow, we will mail the documents and our letter seeking Roy's disqualification. We will do whatever is required to realise our demand," Adhikari told reporters.

The TMC, however, hit back and questioned whether Suvendu Adhikari has asked his father Sisir Adhikari, also a turncoat, to resign as the MP of the Kanthi Lok Sabha seat after joining the BJP.

Roy and his son Subhranshu had returned to the ruling Trinamool Congress in the presence of party supremo and Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on June 11. He had joined the saffron party after quitting Mamata Banerjee's party in 2017.

Mukul Roy had won the recently held Assembly election as a BJP candidate from Krishnanagar Uttar constituency by defeating his closest rival, actor Koushani Mukherjee, fielded by the ruling camp.

Responding to the demand, TMC state unit general secretary Kunal Ghosh said that law will take its own course but Suvendu Adhikari has no right to speak on the issue.

"Suvendu must look at the mirror before raising such demands. Has he ever asked his father Sisir Adhikari to quit as the MP of Kanthi, which he had won on a TMC ticket?" he said.

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New Delhi: Antonio Guterres was re-elected as the United Nations Secretary General for a second five-year term on Friday (June 18). The term will begin on January 1, 2022.

He was appointed as the UN chief by the 193-member United Nations General Assembly. The 15-member Security Council earlier this month recommended the General Assembly re-appoint Guterres.

"I will give it my all to ensure the blossoming of trust between and among nations large and small, to build bridges, and to engage relentlessly in confidence building," Guterres told the General Assembly after taking the oath of office.

Guterres has been serving as the Secretary General since 2017. He was the ninth person to assume the position.

He also served as the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees from 2005 to 2015.

Prior to that, Guterres was the prime minister of Portugal from 1995 to 2002. He was voted as the best prime minister of the previous 30 years by the Portuguese public in two separate polls conducted in 2012 and 2014.

During the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, appealed for global solidarity to overcome the crisis.

On Friday, he called for debt relief extension for middle-income countries in the wake of the global COVID-19 crisis.

He said that middle-income countries should have their debts suspended into 2022 to cope with the social and economic impact of the ongoing pandemic.

Following the deadly conflict between Israel and Palestine, Guterres called for full respect of the ceasefire.

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New Delhi: The Delta variant of COVID-19, first identified in India, is becoming the globally dominant variant of the disease, the World Health Organization`s chief scientist said on Friday.

Soumya Swaminathan also voiced disappointment in the failure of CureVac`s vaccine candidate in a trial to meet the WHO`s efficacy standard, in particular as highly transmissible variants boost the need for new, effective shots.

Britain has reported a steep rise in infections with the Delta variant, while Germany's top public health official predicted it would rapidly become the dominant variant there despite rising vaccination rates.

The Kremlin blamed a surge in COVID-19 cases on reluctance to have vaccinations and "nihilism" after record new infections in Moscow, mostly with the new Delta variant, fanned fears of a third wave.

"The Delta variant is well on its way to becoming the dominant variant globally because of its increased transmissibility," Swaminathan told a news conference.

Coronavirus variants were cited by CureVac when the German company this week reported its vaccine proved only 47% effective at preventing disease, shy of the WHO`s 50% benchmark.

The company said it documented at least 13 variants circulating within its study population.

Given that similar mRNA vaccines from Pfizer and BioNTech and Moderna posted efficacy rates topping 90%, Swaminathan said the world had been expecting more from CureVac`s candidate.

"Just because it`s another mRNA vaccine, we cannot presume all mRNA vaccines are the same, because each one has a slightly different technology," Swaminathan said, adding the surprise failure underscored the value of robust clinical trials to test new products.

WHO officials said Africa remains an area of concern, even though it accounts for only around 5% of new global infections and 2% of deaths.

New cases in Namibia, Sierra Leone, Liberia and Rwanda have doubled in the last week, WHO emergencies programme head Mike Ryan said, while vaccine access remains miniscule.

"It's a trajectory that is very, very concerning," Ryan said. "The brutal reality is that in an era of multiple variants, with increased transmissibility, we have left vast swathes of the population, the vulnerable population of Africa, unprotected by vaccines."

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Washington: Canada`s National Advisory Committee on Immunizations (NACI) is recommending those who received the Oxford-AstraZeneca coronavirus shot as the first dose in their vaccination schedule to get vaccinated with a messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccine for their second dose.

"An mRNA vaccine should now be offered as the second dose for individuals who received a first dose of AstraZeneca or [its Indian analogue] COVISHIELD vaccine," Canada`s Chief Public Health Officer Dr. Theresa Tam said during a press briefing on Thursday.

There are two mRNA vaccines currently approved for use in Canada produced by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna.

NACI said the mixed-dose schedule provides better protection against the disease and reduces the risk of developing Vaccine-Induced Immune Thrombotic Thrombocytopenia.

Canadian public health officials have received 56 reports of blood clotting events following vaccination with AstraZeneca, with 38 of the cases being confirmed, and all were related to the first dose.

Canada`s "vaccine tzar" Krista Brodie said there are 600,000 AstraZeneca vaccine doses in circulation in the country and their future will now be determined by the provinces.

Canada`s vaccination regime has faced repeated setbacks, with the country experiencing a shortage of doses, while NACI has been criticized for inconsistent messaging and Canadian health officials` decision to delay the time between vaccinations for up to four months based solely on acquisition schedules.

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